Martin Hengst - The Last Swordmage

Winter had come to the Frozen Frontier and with it, hunger and desperation. The autumn harvest had been meager, marred by drought and constant incursions by rival clans.

Salt was the primary ingredient in any meal of late, Tiadaria thought bitterly. Salted beef and salted fish had become all too common. At least the salt made it harder to taste the less than palatable side dishes that accompanied the main meal. Her stomach rumbled in protest, loudly reminding her that portion sizes had suffered as much as quality had. The men and boys ate first. Whatever was left was split among the women and girls. This was the way of the clan.

She shifted the yoke across her shoulders, careful not to splash any water out of the buckets that hung on each end of the curved pole. She glanced up and down the field. There was no one else about. The men had gone hunting and the majority of the women and children were gathered together in the long house, weaving rushes into mats. The rough mats were uncomfortable, but at least it was better than sleeping on the frigid ground. Tiadaria sighed and with a last survey of the area, tugged the rope loop from the gate and slipped inside, closing it behind her.

Her father had scolded her time and again for cutting through the paddock instead of going around. It spooked the animals and made them harder to feed and milk, he said. The aurochs never seemed to mind her presence, lowing to her in their mournful voice whether she passed through the paddock or not.

Still, he was the Folkledre of her clan and she suspected that his loud, often public berating of her shortcomings served to reinforce his claim of impartiality when it came to clan business. Tiadaria received no preferential treatment. Regardless of being the Folkledre’s daughter, she was still a girl, and therefore less important than even the babes who had been blessed with the good fortune to be born male.

Approaching the far end of the paddock, Tiadaria saw that she had picked the worst possible day to defy her father. He stood at the gate, his expression black. Another man stood beside the Folkledre. He was only about as tall as Tiadaria, but he was wrapped in so many sleek furs that he looked more like a miniature bear than a man.

A wagon was parked not too far off, with a long string of pack animals spread out behind it. They pulled at their tethers, obviously unhappy to be stuck in a place with nothing to graze on but ice and snow. The horses that drew the wagon were the finest beasts that Tia had ever seen. Their manes were long and silky, their coats lustrous under the winter sun. They were absolutely beautiful, not the scrawny, threadbare beasts that the clan had traded for.

When she reached the gate, her father swung it open. She passed through without a word. She was familiar with the expression he wore and had often born the bruises that had resulted from it. Silence was the better option. Tiadaria would speak when spoken to, and only when spoken to. Then, maybe, she would be able to spare herself the full fire of his wrath.

“Put those down, girl,” the smaller man said. His voice put Tia in mind of a squealing piglet, high pitched, nasal and grating. “Let me get a look at you.”

She looked to the Folkledre, not as the head of her clan, but as her father, seeking some comfort or reassurance there and finding none. He nodded curtly and motioned for her to deposit the yoke and its burden beside the paddock fence. As she bent to relieve herself of the load, she felt the little man’s hand on her rump. Tia jerked upright, stepping away from his grasping hand even as she spun on her heel, her arm outstretched.

The Folkledre caught her wrist in a grip as cold and tight as a vice. Tia’s stomach turned over. The sudden assault from two different fronts was making her ill. Her father had never been warm to her, true, but she had always attributed that to his station and responsibilities. She was a mere girl, but was it really possible that she meant nothing at all to him?

“She has spirit,” the little man laughed. “What about my other terms?”

“She is clean and pure,” the Folkledre replied, speaking for the first time. His voice was cold and harsh, like the wind that blew along the paddock fence. “You have my word, Cerrin.”

“Surely you don’t expect me to take you at your word?” The little man’s eyes widened, feigning surprise. “Would you take me at mine?”

The clansman didn’t reply. His hand still around Tia’s wrist, he pulled her to stand in front of the swarthy little man. The Folkledre pulled her arm up behind her back, his other hand grasping her shoulder firmly.

Between the pain and the betrayal, Tiadaria panicked. She tried to strike out at her father with her free hand, and finding no way in which she could reach him, batted ineffectually at the man standing before her. Cerrin laughed and slapped her hand away. The grip on her shoulder intensified and the arm her father held behind her back was wrenched up so forcefully that she thought it would break.

“Stand still,” the Folkledre snarled in her ear. “You dishonor the clan with your foolishness.”

Stepping forward, Cerrin kicked her legs apart and grabbed the front of her breeches with one hand. Tia tried to scream, but all that came out was a hoarse croak. It dishonored the clan to try to fight for her own honor? Tears of anger, fear, and shame spilled from the corners of her eyes.

The slaver’s free hand slid down her belly like a cold snake, his thick fingers probing at the crease between her legs. She closed her eyes, begging to all the Gods she knew to either let her die, or wake her up from this horrific nightmare she had stumbled into. Please, she pleaded silently, please just let this be over. Her sobbing had become uncontrollable, a ragged gasping that made her tremble from head to foot. Cerrin’s finger pressed deeper inside her, stopping as it met the resistance of her maidenhead.

Cerrin nodded, a broad smile spreading across his feral face. Her father released his grip on her, casting her unceremoniously aside. Tiadaria collapsed to the frozen ground, unable to stand, unable to do anything but cry and shake like the last autumnal leaf on a storm-ravaged tree.

“Your offer is acceptable, Folkledre.” Cerrin said, taking a small wooden chest from the back of the wagon. He produced a thin metal band, a circlet the color of storm clouds with a thin wedge cut out of it. With the band in one hand, and an ominous looking black tool in the other, he knelt beside Tiadaria.

The fight had gone out of her. The violation had left her cold. Colder than the chill of winter in her barren, frost covered homeland. She felt as if she was observing herself from high above; a snow hawk on the wing looking down on her torment. Tia saw him fit the metal band around her neck and place the ends into the tool he carried. As he squeezed the device, a searing pain shot into the back of her neck and spread down her spine, branching out until it felt as if she had been plunged into the red hot fury of a forge’s fire.

Tiadaria screamed, a raw, primal sound that tore at her throat and added to the agony coursing through her body. Just as she thought she wouldn’t be able to endure any more, the pain was suddenly gone. Her entire body tingled, a lingering after effect of the systemic shock. She lay there, whimpering, on the ground, her fingers twitching spasmodically. When Cerrin slipped a pair of steel shackles around her wrists and locked them tight she offered no resistance or even any indication that she was aware of his actions.

Later, Tiadaria would remember the minutest details. The clink of the coins landing in her father’s palm; the words they exchanged as her father selected the two finest aurochs Cerrin had in his train; the wave of dread and despair that made the gorge rise in the back of her throat and the sudden, unavoidable knowledge that she had been sold into slavery by her own father. At the moment, however, she could only feel the tracks of her tears freezing in the bitterly cold winter morning.