Byrthiri

I remember the when the first of the invaders reached Haugra. The stream of travelers had gotten steadier than we’d seen yet—every couple hours someone would come by pleading for a snack. Some of the people in our own village began to pack their things in case of an invasion. Some actually left, fearful of the stories they had heard from strangers from the north. Many who left simply tagged along with strangers who had come to their door.

On one morning in particular, a week before the invasion reached our village—though I couldn’t have known that yet—several of our neighbors left at once. I asked my father where everyone had gone so suddenly.

“The Dragon-Folk are south of Hailkalle now,” he told me. “Much of Haugra believes they will be here in a couple weeks’ time. There is another wave of raiders at the north of Byrthiri as well.”

I went outside and took a brief walk around the village. Although about two thirds of the inhabitants of Haugra remained for the time being, an eerie silence had settled over the town. In homes that normally had children playing outside at all times, their property appeared empty; the doors were closed and locked and there were curtains drawn over all of the windows. Where one would normally see men practicing their trade at the side of their homes, instead there would be stillness, and a watchful woman peering out the windows at intervals.

It was as though the spirit of the town itself had fled. I spent an hour wandering to every corner of the village, looking for signs of life, but it seemed as though no one even dared to venture across the threshold of their own home.

When I returned home, my father had left. It was some three hours before he came home; by then my mother and sister had risen, and my mother—acting far more coldly than she had even since the first messengers of the invasion—had served a slightly burnt breakfast for my sister and me, cooked with less attention than would otherwise have been the case. I had a suspicion that my mother’s irritation was linked to my father’s absence, which was confirmed when I asked where he was and whether we should wait to serve breakfast until he returned.

“Your father is attending to business,” she told me sharply. “He can eat while he’s out, or he can wait until the next meal. There’s no reason his children should have to pay for his decisions with starvation.”

Soon enough I understood. When my father returned, he was accompanied by one of the other men in the village, who was helping him carry a large chest into the house. As soon as he walked in, my mother picked up Alani and carried her to her room. I took a cautious step back while my father, with the help of the other villager, carried the chest to the far back corner of the room, then thanked the other man and bid him farewell.

I hesitated to speak, but my curiosity outweighed my anxiety. “What have you brought home, father?” I asked cautiously.

My father looked at me for a moment, seeming to hesitate as to whether or not he should answer me. Then he let out a heavy sigh and opened the chest.

Inside was an assortment of things I never thought my father would have need for: Chain mail armor, a sword, a shield, and other pieces of armor and weaponry I couldn’t name.

“I’ve been bartering with the other villagers,” my father explained. “Many of them are preparing to fight, and I’ve been asking for anything they can spare. One of the villagers who is planning to flee tomorrow had a collection of things that had been his father’s, and he gave them to me, as well as this trunk, and he let me use his cart and helped me carry all of the things I had gathered.”

My father looked in that moment more like the old stranger that had come to our home all those weeks ago than like himself.

“Is this why mother is upset?” I asked.

My father looked at me for a long time without answering, and I wasn’t willing to push him for a response. I was about to turn away and pretend I hadn’t said anything when he answered.

“Your mother is upset because I’m staying behind.”

So that was it—staying behind, he had said, meaning that the rest of us were not.

“Your mother has made plans to leave with some of the other villagers, two days from now. She doesn’t want you or Alani at risk. Yes, you are to go with her,” he said, reading the disappointment and frustration in my face. “You are not yet prepared to fight. You are not yet a man. And if you were, even then I would not risk your life.”

“But we are to risk yours?” I said, suddenly angry. I could feel my body shaking. I wanted to scream. I wanted to take every piece of armor and weaponry and destroy it somehow.

“You are to do as you have been told!” My father’s voice boomed suddenly. Though I was nearly as tall as he was, he stepped forward and seemed to tower over me. “You are still a child, and you will not question me!”

I fell silent, and my father took my silence for resignation. But that evening I still could not shake off the indignation and rage I felt at being expected to comply with complacency while my father’s life was at risk.

That night I could not sleep. I lay watching the moon make its great arc through the sky, and when I knew dawn was coming, I rose before my family, took the money I knew my father had meant to save for the coming wool trade—noting that it was already substantially lighter than it should have been, due to my father’s bartering for weaponry and armor—and went out barter for my own defenses. If my village was to fall under attack and my father was to risk his life protecting it, then I was determined to do the same.