Leopold was only ten when he was taken hostage. It happened on a gloomy autumn day when the wind reeked with blood and ash. The village just outside the castle walls projected a large orange blaze towards the blackened sky as countless soldiers scaled the walls of the keep Leopold was sheltering in. To Leopold they looked like ants: small, black, swarming. Leopold liked watching ants on his frequent trips to the woods with his nan, when he eagerly picked berries, stuffing them by the fistful into his mouth, sweet red juice dripping down his chin. Now a different kind of juice dripped down the keep’s walls: it was red but hardly sweet, smelling of sweat, iron, and madness. The walls of the keep were weeping with blood as many who scaled them were hacked at through the arrowslits, their ladders pushed away and crashing to the ground with a dull thud.
Still, there were too many of them, and it was only a matter of time before they overwhelmed the keep. Leo watched the slaughter on the battlements, enthralled, as scores of knights in bright red armor mauled the last remaining defenders of the castle walls. The scene reminded Leo of the fire ant colony reaving a hill of the common wood ants. Perched on a large rotting tree stump nearby, Leo observed for hours how big red soldier with massive jaws bit the heads of the feeble wood ant workers before they breached the inner passages of the formicary, emerging moments later with an endless stream of small black wood ants following the red soldiers obediently.
Now Leo looked at the same scene playing out at the base of the keep within the walls of the castle he lived in. He saw a big and fierce-looking knight in a glistening bronze-colored silk cloak riding in through the smashed gate, hacking at the few remaining defenders with his longsword. On foot and dressed in all black the few reeling survivors reminded Leo of the wood ants whose hill he watched being ransacked by the fire ants, except that to Leo the rampaging bronze knight looked more like a giant tree beetle rather than a fire ant. Leo noticed how the beetle dismounted, his bronze cloak stretching out behind him like elytra. With the sword in his hand, the giant strode towards a thin line of the remaining defenders, no doubt bearing ill intentions for them. Whichever few were still standing hastily threw their weapons on the ground as he approached, some even dropped on their knees so there would be no mistaking them for the unyielding. The bronze beetle approached the first kneeling man and raised his sword. Ravens! Leo thought he had called them ravens as the first kneeling man lost his head. Then another. The third one was trying to say something and lifted his gloved hands to his face, but he lost them too along with his helmed head.
The bronze savage was about to move to the next person and give him a trim as well when another knight rode through the gate. Mounted on a white Friesian he wore a red cloak, his armor gleaming scarlet in the setting sun. The Sol seemed to have grown weary of the carnage and spilled its last oily rays on the survivors, claiming them for prisoners.
The red knight dismounted, approaching the bronze beetle just in time to catch his arm with which he was preparing to shorten a large pot-bellied black man a height of his head.
“Enough, Gregor, there is no honor in killing prisoners,” Leo heard him say, as he was pulling the bronze beetle away from the remaining survivors, what few were still standing, most already on their knees, covered in mud, sweat, and blood.
“There is even less honor in letting them live!” spat Gregor, “You and your honor, Cecil! One day it will do you in, my lord, mark my words!” The bronze beetle sheathed his sword angrily, glaring.
“Where is the duke?” The red knight spoke to the bronze beetle again. “Bring me the duke and his son.”
The bronze beetle looked up and made a broad gesture towards the keep, glancing exactly at the window where Leo stood. Leo felt cold sweat trickling down his spine. “Still in the keep, m’lord,” said the bronze knight shifting his mass from one leg onto the other restlessly, “Still workin’ on routing those cravens out of the keep, but the damn sackers keep falling off their bloody ladders! Must I do everything myself?” He ran off to join a small group of siege soldiers swaying a battering ram at the keep’s massive studded oak door.
The red knight nodded approvingly and too marched to join the battering crew, yet there was no place for him at the ram, so he watched how the brown ants led by the assiduous bronze beetle hammered at the door. Soon the iron bars bracing the beams together bent inwards, the bolts split and the entire door slab fell inward catching a few black ants under its solid mass. Lead by the bronze beetle, the brown ants poured in, followed by the red knight who strode almost leisurely, the longsword in hand, stepping around the dead and the dying, fending off an occasional feeble attempt at an assault.
A thin shaking arm reached for Leo, pulling him back from the window. A terrified woman crouched next to him, her face next to his. She was speaking to him in an uneven trembling voice, all the time shaking him. Leo was calm and did not quite understand the words her colorless lips were spouting. The next moment Leo heard a dull thud on the other side of the door to the chamber he and his mother were sheltering in. Another dull thud was followed by a groan and the sound of clanking armor falling down the steps. Leo thought he recognized the voice. It belonged to Sir Eddington, one of the guards by his door, yet the familiar voice sounded strange to him now, it was hoarse and wheezing. Another groan, another thud, another cacophony of clanking metal obeying gravity on the way down the curving stairs, then silence. The silence seemed deafening and prickled ears. For a while there was nothing and Leo thought that they were gone, until a hurried sound of a key opening the lock returned the boy to reality, startling him. His mother was still holding him by the arm, dagger in hand, when the door swung open and a huge body of the bronze beetle filled the room. With him, the bronze monster brought in a gust of fresh cold air, and a sharp smell of blood, mud, horse shit, and urine. The smell almost made Leo vomit, but he managed to stay still. His mother rushed towards the intruder, her dagger raised, yet his sword caught her in the chest before she could approach. She dropped the dagger and slowly slid down to the floor without making a sound. Red rose bloomed on her back through her icy-white gown, its iron stem gleaming wetly.
Soon she was on the floor, her eyes still open when the bronze monster stepped over her body and grabbed Leo by the arm, jerking him violently towards himself and then towards the door. It was painful. Leo’s feet stepped into something sticky and wet, it was his mother’s blood he tracked on his way out of the room as the bronze giant dragged him down the narrow winding stairs. They passed Sir Eddington, his helm slid awkwardly to a side of his face, his skull cracked open, brains spilled. Then they passed Sir Robert, the other guard. Leo recognized him by his family’s sigil on his breastplate as his head was nowhere to be found.
When they reached the hall, Gregor thrust the boy forward, and Leo tumbled to the floor. When he lifted his eyes, he recognized the red knight seated on a tall chair by the hearth. Somehow his glistening red armor was free of dirt and blood, as if the bronze beetle had claimed those spoils chiefly to himself. Looking up, Leo recognized his father, Duke Ashwood standing next to the red knight, his hands shackled behind his back.
“Sit, my lord,” the red knight gallantly offered a smaller chair to the duke.
The bronze beetle spat, “This scum is not worth your courtesy. Cecil, my lord, let me cut his head and put an end to this mummery!” He demanded stepping forward towards the duke and unsheathing his sword.
“There will be no more head-cutting today,” The red knight replied calmly. He removed his helm revealing a fountain of matted blond hair. Turning to the Duke, the red knight announced, “You are defeated, Lord Ashwood, your keep is sacked, we hold you prisoner and we also have your son,” he gestured towards Leo, still crouched on the floor, “But fear not. No harm will come to either of you, I stake my honor on that.” The red knight stood up and walked toward the Duke; the man was too proud and refused the chair offered to him shaking defiantly.
“I spit on you and your honor, Lord Cecil!” The duke growled seething with resentment, “You harm my boy and I will feed your entrails to my curs,” he attempted to launch at Cecil, yet Gregor punched him in the gut, laughing.
“That do you will! Brawling now, are you, dawg?” Gregor raised his fist again, but Cecil stopped him.
“No harm will come to your boy as long as you and your knights remain in their seats from now on. No more reaving and raiding, you hear me, Lord Ashwood?” he pulled up the duke’s head to look him in the eyes. The duke breathed heavily, the air knocked out of him by Sir Gregor’s powerful blow, “Your son will be safe, I stake my honor on that. From now on your son Leo shall be a ward of mine… and hostage.” he let go of the duke’s head and paced towards Leo. With a gentle yet strong pull the red knight lifted Leo to his feet, “I promise you that no harm will come to Leo as long as you abide.” he turned back to the duke, “Pledge your allegiance now Lord Ashwood. Pledge it on your honor!”
“And on the life of your son and heir!” added the bronze beetle, smiling crookedly, revealing missing teeth.
Blood was dripping from the duke’s open mouth as he spoke, “I… I pledge my allegiance to Lord Cecil, the Castellan of the Shivering Rock…” he had to squeeze words out of his lungs like drops of blood from a puncture wound.
“Louder, dawg!” the bronze beetle commanded. Had it not been for Cecil’s watchful eye he would have kicked the half-crouching man with his heavy iron-clad boot, shattering his ribs for good measure.
“I pledge my allegiance to Lord Cecil, the Castellan of the Shivering Rock”, Lord Ashwood repeated louder, the spittle of blood froth revealing a queer smile. The duke looked at his son, “Remember what I taught you, Leo”.
Leo did not hear the rest as he was yanked sharply by a hand as one of the other knights dragged him away from the hall.
Ten Years Later
Armed with a short spear, Leopold, a slender youth of twenty, was standing on the wall flanked by his brother Robert. Robert was not his real brother in truth, for Leopold was a ward to Robert’s father Lord Cecil, and not his true son. Yet they were as close as any two brothers could be, even if they were siblings not by blood but only by upbringing. Robert was wearing the gleaming red armor of his house with a matching red cape, a tall helm with a red plume, and a longsword in his hand. Leopold wore a white tunic underneath his sun-polished plain steel armor and a plain white cape. It felt inappropriate for him to wear his house’s colors for it was his father’s banners he saw beneath the castle’s walls today. His real father’s banners. Wind blew through Leopold’s thick hair bringing the smells of spring, wet fields, blooming fruit trees… and war. Leo saw towering smoke pillars at a distance. Those were the villages of the Shivering Meadows, burning. Farther away he saw a dull orange glare, which might have looked like a sunset, except that the sun was up and the glare was in the north. It was the Rockport Harbor, its ships and storehouses ablaze with hungry flame, some twenty leagues north of the Shivering Rock castle. A ten-year peace had abruptly come to an end when Duke Ashwood rose up unexpectedly, gathering a huge host of his vassals and hired swords to reave and pillage once again the very lands that he had counted for his. Some wounds never heal and some possessions are never truly given up on, thought Leopold.
Leo’s contemplation was interrupted by the sound of heavy steps. It was Sir Gregor, the bronze beetle, climbing up the steep stairs onto the battlement. Leo never liked the man and could not quit thinking of him as the bronze beetle that he was, all but a horn on his head. Sir Gregor has gotten heavier over the years, his breastplate wider than before, and his jet-black hair had a snowy whisp to it now, yet his eyes and beard were as fierce and menacing as ever. Following him closely behind was another man in red armor and red cape, the man Leopold called now father, and had been calling him that for the past ten years much to the disgust and dismay of the bronze beetle, who scoffed every time he heard Leo calling Lord Cecil father and spat. However, Sir Gregor was clever to do so quietly, out of sight of his liege lord.
Leo was short and small for his age, his breastplate was narrow; he was nearly a full head shorter than his brother Robert, who looked even taller with his red plume. Leopold’s helm was plain, even if shiny, with no ornament. To placate the ever-restless bronze beetle Leo decided that it would be best to turn down the offer to wear his captor’s colors on his armor, and it was only wise not to wear the colors of his own house Ashwood, lest he might find Sir Gregor’s dagger in his throat.
“Let me help you, father”, Leo rushed towards the steps past the beetle and offered his hand to Lord Cecil. Lord’s hair was all white now, with hardly a trace of dark blond it once had been, a neatly trimmed mustache and a short beard graced his solemn chiseled face. The beetle quietly spat, eyeing the host beneath the castle’s walls wearily.
“He got a good ten thousand on us,” he pointed out peering off the walls, “We can’t fight them off, not like this, not now, but we can hold the castle, my lord, this I am sure of. We can hold fast here until Lord Greenwood joins us, I’ve sent the riders for him, my lord.”
Lord Cecil accompanied by Leo approached the parapet and gazed at the massing riders and foot soldiers down below. Black ants were busy readying a battering ram. His gaze swept the field and stopped at the orange glow in the distance. “The port…”, his mouth uttered near silently.
“The damn dawgs got the port, my lord”, the beetle spat again, all the time giving Leo an evil look from the corner of his eye, “You should have killed the boy, Cecil. You should have killed him when the old fool struck the port. He is your hostage! You should have killed the boy and sent the dawg his head for a concession”, the beetle was glaring at Leo as if ready to launch at him at any moment to fulfill his wish.
“He was my hostage, Gregor. That is, he was my hostage when we took him from Lord Ashwood”, Lord Cecil replied calmly, “He is my son now, he has been my ward for ten years, Gregor. He is my son now as good as Robert,” Cecil stepped closer and placed his gloved palm on Gregor’s shoulder, “Please try to remember that. There is no honor in killing your own, even if they are not by your blood…”
“You and your damn honor, Cecil!” Gregor looked like he was crying. Leo knew that Gregor could not weep; it was his old age showing now through his graying hair, bulging gut, and even fewer teeth than before. Yet sir Gregor’s eyes were wet as if from smoke, “Your honor might bring about your undoing, my lord”, he said, turning away.
“My honor hasn’t killed me yet, nor it ever will, Gregor”, Lord Cecil looked at Leo, “People like Lord Ashwood have none of it, and look at them!” He gestured at the host making camp in the fields around the castle, “Pillagers! Rapers! Raiders and Murderers!”
Gregor spat from the wall; it was a long way down. They were safe here, and Lord Greenwood will be on his way soon.
“Shall we give them a battle by the gate?” young Robert spoke up, eager to prove himself to his lord father, “Let me lead the sortie, my lord!”
“You will have your battle yet,” Lord Cecil replied, turning to his son, “But not today. Lord Greenwood will be here soon; we will join him in raiding the duke’s host then. Any word from Lord Greenwood?” he asked, turning to one of his squires.
“No word from Greenwood Keep yet, my lord”, was the reply.
Cecil sighed, when he looked back at the field, he noted a procession approaching the gate. They waved a white parley banner, the duke himself riding in front with the two bannermen at his sides. Cecil frowned.
“Looks like the old dawg wants to talk!” the bronze beetle exclaimed excitedly, “Do send me down there, Cecil, I will bring you his head so you can have his tongue closer to your ears!” He reached for his sword, unsheathing it. “What do you want dawg?” the bronze beetle climbed the parapet, waiving his huge longsword, “Did you come here to offer your head? Come closer, we’ll take that offering off you.” Then turning to Cecil, “Let me go down there to collect it for you, my lord!”
“Calm down, Gregor!” Cecil interrupted him, worried, an uneasy look in his eyes. He stepped closer, “What do you want Lord Ashwood? I do not suppose you rode all the way here to wish me well?”
“You suppose right, my Lord, wish you well I do not!” the duke roared back, his destrier wheeling in a circle, “I see you got my son there with you. Hello Leopold!”
Leo was startled and took a step back from the parapet instinctively as if he was caught spying on something that he should not have seen. The beetle who was off the parapet now prodded him briskly to the crenel. “C’mon pup, show your face to your dawg father!” The beetle jerked him forward rather violently. Stumbling, Leo approached the parapet.
“Good day Lord Ashwood,” Leo uttered reluctantly.
“Lord Ashwood, is it what I am to you now, boy?” Duke shouted back, his lips cracked and bleeding from the cold, as his horse kept wheeling about.
“Lord Cecil is my father now, my lord”, Leo replied, stubborn, chewing his lip nervously.
“Is he now? We’ll see about that”, Duke sprung his horse and rode away.
“You should have killed the pup!” Gregor insisted, reaching for his dagger, yet his hand failed to find it. Leo was standing behind Lord Cecil when he heard a muted gasp, watching Cecil slide slowly to the ground in front of him. Leo deftly put his hands under Lord Cecil’s armpits, carefully lowering him to the stone floor of the parapet. Sir Gregor’s dagger was wedged deep in Lord Cecil’s back between the armored plates.
The last thing that Lord Cecil saw was Sir Gregor holding onto a spear protruding from his throat. The spear pinned the beetle to the wall, preventing him from falling, his empty gaze was dull now, deprived of its former fierceness. Young Robert was nowhere to be seen, except for those beneath the castle’s wall, for that is where he could be found now, splattered across the jagged rocks, his arms and legs twisted grotesquely.
Leo was standing on the parapet wall alone now, the squires and servants that came with Lord Cecil huddled back to the stairs, running for their lives, frightened witless. Leo looked over the parapet and saw his lord father circling in front of the gates of the castle, his cape fluttering in the air wildly. Lord Ashwood pulled the reigns and looked up at Leo; the pink froth at his mouth receded revealing a queer smile.