Chapter 2

 

        Luitold Knoll was leaving the confines of Holzstadt for the first time in his life, only not in the way he ever dreamed. Luitold, an orphan and a serf, had grown to know little of life beyond digging and starving in the two years since his mother disappeared. Freedom from this life was an aspiration that seemed further and further away as the months passed, yet somehow, the day he left Holzstadt was already upon him.

Calling this leave a demonstration of freedom would certainly be a stretch, though. The way his life didn’t matter in the brimstone mines was the same way his life wouldn’t matter in the battlefield. With so many years of suffering under his belt, however, Luitold found little reason to care how exactly he would be punished. After all, it was a sort of constant in his life.

Other serfs marching alongside him did seem a little more distraught with their new job. They had more to lose than he did. They had families, friends, a sense of belonging. Luitold simply understood his role in the world. For as long as he lived, he would be used, and that was certain.

Luitold stared wide eyed toward the dirt beneath his feet as he marched on, ahead of much of his fellow levymen. The only people ahead of him were Lord Rudolf and his knights, including two sent to him by Count Dietrich to lead the way. The path they travelled on cut through a dense forest as they headed west to the border of Rheinmark, a place which Luitold found difficult to picture in its ravaged state. All he had been told is that it sat beside the Rhine River, which held Alemannia on its other side. 

Luitold didn’t know much of war, only that it was far more common before he was born. In all of his fourteen years of living, a war with a sovereign kingdom had never occurred in Avaria, though news sometimes travelled with merchants from the east, reporting on feuds between barons in far-off counties. 

His lack of battle knowledge didn’t make him a stranger to death, though. Among the baronies of Isenburg, Holzstadt had garnered a reputation as the accursed one. When the King brought fantasy to reality, myths both light and dark had come to life, only the dark seemed to be centralized in Holzstadt. Frequently, beings such as werewolves and trolls were either seen or mentioned second-hand, and many people would disappear into the forests to never be seen again. Most deadly were the regional creatures known as bleichtouvels, pale human-like beings that crawled through the woods in packs, screeching when they found their prey.

The deaths that Luitold had seen were acts of nature. Even in his background he had yet to see the cruelty of man in battle. As much as he had been hardened, it would be a lie to say he didn’t at least slightly fear what he was getting into. In his monotonous walk along the path, Luitold thought deeply about his own mortality, questioning how deadly this war would come to be.

His thoughts were interrupted, however, when the voice of another levyman emerged from behind him.

“Look above, it’s snow!” the man said, pointing everyone’s attention to the sky. Just after he spoke, Luitold noticed snowflakes landing on his clothes. This was a normal occurrence in Avaria. During all times of the year, the more rural areas of the kingdom could expect brief moments of snowfall every so often. This snow was different from the typical winter snow, however. There was nothing cold about it in the slightest, and upon closer inspection, the snowflakes wouldn’t really look like snowflakes at all, instead taking the shape of something more similar to a salt crystal. Either way, these flurries were always a delight to see whenever they appeared.

“Don’t be distracted!” a brutish knight ordered as some of the younger boys started stopping in their tracks, “You can look at the snow without losing your pace.”

Some folks associated these strange snowfalls with the King’s magic. After all, it seemed like this was a phenomenon exclusive to Avaria, and oftentimes magical occurrences would come just after the snow fell. This was part of the reason people found the snow so exciting. Luitold, on the other hand, was a bit of a downer in this regard, as he was with many things. It would take a lot more than falling crystals to bring back the glimmer in his eyes. Just this once, though, while there was nothing else to occupy him but the road ahead, he enjoyed having a bit of excitement in this dull moment.

Luitold, still marching along, briefly looked over his shoulder to see the joyous faces of his fellow men. Or at least, that’s what he imagined he would see.

Following behind the levymen were five pack horses, each carrying large bags of brimstone from Holzstadt’s mines. The horses and their handlers were intended to switch paths to Isenburg Castle about halfway through the journey. However, it didn’t seem like they would be making it much further.

Just as Luitold looked back, a horse cried out in pain as it fell to the ground, though it was hard to tell what exactly had happened to it with all of the other levyman obstructing the view. As the other men averted their attention to the back, another horse fell alongside its handler. A scream of terror echoed through the air, as well as a bizarre screech, almost akin to the call of an eagle.

Panic rang out among the levyman as they scattered around the area. As they spread out, Luitold finally got a glance at what happened in the back. Three pack horses laid on the ground with bloody gashes on their sides and underbellies, with handlers in similar condition by their sides. The two remaining pairs of horse and handler were able to flee into the crowd away from the attacker. At the lead of the group, Rudolf and his knights halted their horses to address the situation.

“What the hell is going on?” the baron asked in a mix of anger and concern.

A young boy came running from the back, hurrying behind the knights for protection.

“Bleichtouvels!” he cried, pointing to the heart of the chaos, “They’re attacking!” 

Luitold, amidst the commotion, found that he had lost his position in the front of the pack. As he turned his attention to the knights and then back to the scene, he was met with a terrifying sight. Only a few yards in front of him was a sole bleichtouvel, with no other person between them. The pale boney creature was poised, seemingly ready to lurch onto him at any moment.

Luitold fumbled for his weapon, a makeshift spear composed of a farm hoe with its head detached and reattached vertically with rope. He stared into its dark wolf-like eyes, waiting for it to make a move as his body trembled. Finally, it brought its chest low to the ground and let out a gargling cry, then leaped forward with its talons open wide. Luitold thrust his spear forward, piercing the creature’s stomach before it hit the ground. The bleichtouvel squirmed in pain, its arms and legs dangling as it hung from the spear. With his assailant taken care of, Luitold darted his eyes left and right, checking for other threats. Just as he feared, another one of the pale creatures was approaching him from the right. As it jumped toward him, Luitold swung his spear against it, with the first bleichtouvel still hanging from its point. The impact broke the spear in half, leaving Luitold with a splintered wooden stick about two and a half feet long and two monsters ready to feast on his body in a moment’s notice. The first of the bleichtouvels ripped the spearpoint out of its abdomen, leaving a gushing trail of blood flowing from the wound. Despite this, it continued inching forward, seemingly unfazed. Luitold held his broken weapon in front of him with his arm fully extended, trying to maintain as much distance between himself and the creatures as possible. 

As the bleeding bleichtouvel began to wind back for its next pounce, a knight on horseback swooped in from the side of the path and slashed through the monster’s body with the effortless swing of a halberd. From beneath his iron helmet was a stern, emotionless voice.

“Hold still,” the knight said, keeping his eyes on the enemy. Luitold held his ground, assuming the knight was talking to him. 

The knight subtly shifted his weight atop his saddle, guiding the horse to quickly make a few steps forward. From there, the knight made another swing of his halberd, swiftly killing the second bleichtouvel. He then slid the large weapon into a set of leather loops on the side of the horse and adjusted his posture to a comfortable upright position.

“Is there any left?” he called out to his fellow knights, raising the visor of his helmet to help project his voice.

“It seems to be all clear,” another one replied.

Luitold looked up in awe at the knight, though part of his speechlessness was also from narrowly avoiding his death a moment prior. The knight looked down at him, observing the broken spear in his hand.

“Good job, kid,” he said.

With that, he again lowered his visor and led his horse back to the front of the pack by Rudolf. The path was laid with bloody corpses of both human and beast, which the horses had little concern stepping over. Rudolf and the knights, after a small quiet exchange, quickly returned to formation as if nothing had happened at all and began their trot forward once again. However, the levymen didn’t follow. They remained in place, some kneeling at the sides of their fallen brothers, some staring down at the mass of bodies from above, and others simply curling into fetal positions on the ground.

A knight from ahead turned around to affirm that the levymen were following, only to be met with this disappointing image. He stopped his horse and faced the splintered crowd.

“Men!” he barked, “It is your duty to move! To remain and lay here is treason against your king!”

Some of the levymen rose from their mourning, though the younger boys hesitated, looking up at the knight as they bit down on their quivering lips and stifled their tears. Now the other horsemen had stopped, too, Rudolf among them. The baron, seeing the unwillingness in his men, came to the side of the knight and placed his hand on his shoulder, signalling him to stand back.

“My children and my brethren,” he said calmly, his eyes solemn and his expression grim, “I understand you have little reason to fight in this war.”

As Rudolf spoke, a change was felt in the atmosphere. Luitold saw more boys rise from their crouched positions, their faces relaxing from their fear. For some of them, this was their first time hearing from Rudolf. While only some of Holzstadt’s people had spoken with him, his high regard was held among everyone. It was commonly known that he was a good and caring lord to his people. Luitold recalled specifically the friendship Rudolf had held with his mother, as she often worked the grounds of his castle’s flower garden. She had said to Luitold how her and the baron would talk and share their love of flowers with each other whenever he passed by.

“As your lord, I have seen the horrors you face in our home. The tragedies that befall your families and your friends every week. I know it may be improper to say, but I understand why you call our Holzstadt a cursed land. As people of this barony, we are strangely removed from the glory of Avaria, caught in its shadow where we only see the dark side of its magic. In my lordship, I must be honest and say to you that I feel nothing but guilt. Guilt in my inability to protect you from these horrors. I raise you in this hellscape and then instead of fixing it I have no choice but to send you off to another, one perhaps even more bloody.”

Luitold, though appreciative of the baron’s honesty, felt no more inspired to continue on than he did before, and he struggled to see how his fellow men could possibly feel any different, which, judging from their faces, they likely didn’t. It seemed Rudolf possibly caught on to this, as after a brief pause, his expression changed to a more inspired and confident one.

“However, there is more than just obligation that we are fighting for in this war,” he said, “When we rise from the other side of this battle, Isenburg will know our worth. I will speak with the Count and find a home beyond the walls of Holzstadt. One in which we can thrive and feel the warmth of the sun, our King Willem. We will bask in the glory of magic, no longer trapped in shadow. This, my brothers, is what we fight for. Do you hear me?”

Now, everyone was back on their feet. The men cheered and came together, spreading an intoxicating determination that even Luitold couldn’t resist. Perhaps there was a future outside of this barony, one beyond the brimstone mines, beyond the grip of the forest’s monsters.

But would it still be a future spent alone?