The Children of Stron – part 109

Table of Contents – (spoilers)

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Father Morrenthall, Peep, and Choke rode down from the fort together with Lieutenant Cooper and his ten men. Cooper and his chosen sergeant were mounted, with the other soldiers marching two by two behind.

“Now, Lieutenant Cooper,” Father Morrenthall said as they rode, “when we reach town, we shall seek out Lieutenant Hamon and his men. I shall give him the news of his order to return to the fort, to save whatever acrimony between you that I can.”

“Thank you, Father,” Lieutenant Cooper said.

“Not at all, Lieutenant. Following that, I shall leave you to assign your men to their posts and duties as you see fit. I expect all of you to attend tomorrow morning’s event at the tower to help with crowd control. Any questions?”

“No, Father.”

“Good. Lieutenant Bartholomew and Miss Otilla: I would like you to stay in the jail tower tonight. Guard the prisoners and let no one in but the Baron himself. If Lieutenant Cooper or his men bring you any more prisoners, accept them, of course, and get them situated as you see fit. Your horses should be stabled at the tower. If you need anything from the church, I suggest getting it before going to the tower. Any questions?”

“No, Father. I think we’ll come to the church to get our bedrolls, is all,” Choke said.

“That’s fine. When I have finished giving Lieutenant Hamon his orders, I shall be returning to the church. That shall continue to be my base of operations. Lieutenant Cooper, once you have your men situated, if you have anything to discuss concerning the matters I spoke of with you and Captain Edison, I suggest seeking me out at the church this evening. Of course, I am more than willing to hear your formal confession, if you would like to unburden yourself of anything. Whatever your sins might be. Yes?”

“Yes, Father. Thank you. I will come and speak with you this evening, then,” said Lieutenant Cooper.

“Excellent. Well then, why don’t I have Mrs Dunn cook dinner for the two of us? I can hear what you have to say, and then we can break bread together.”

“That would be marvelous, Father. Thank you,” Lieutenant Cooper said.

By this time, they had ridden down the fort’s hill and were heading through the town proper. There were more people in the street than usual, most of them also heading the way of the jail tower. The townsfolk had an excited and expectant air about them as they hurried to get out of Father Morrenthall and his procession’s way. The folk tugged their forelocks low as the Knight of the Holy Sword passed, and then hurried to follow him and his men to the tower.

At the crossroads by the tower was the reason for the townspeople’s excitement. Father Morrenthall’s man, Srecko, who was now officially Spitzer’s new jailer, torturer, and executioner, had set up the burning Wheel near the hanging gibbet. The wrought-iron wagon wheel was big enough for a man to be laid across. It was suspended by an iron hook from a three-meter iron tripod, so that it rested stably across two of the tripod’s legs. The bases of the tripod’s legs had been secured to the ground with large iron pins driven into the ground by a maul. The whole rig was very stable.

Srecko was now stacking dried lumber underneath the tripod in what would fuel a large bonfire. Almost a hundred people had gathered in and around the crossroads to watch him work, and were chatting and chattering happily as they speculated who it was to be burned.

Amongst the excited villagers was another group. The twenty, or so, devotees of Otilla of the Holy Fire who had been staying at the church were kneeling in the dirt near the burning Wheel praying, singing, swaying back and forth, and otherwise making a spectacle of their superior faith.

Ignoring the scene at the crossroads, Father Morrenthall rode into the tower’s yard between the stables and kennel. He reined up and turned to Choke.

“Lieutenant Bartholomew, I shall leave you here. Take command of the jail. I shall return here early tomorrow morning to prepare the prisoner for his repentance. That shall take place mid-morning, I expect. Any questions?”

“No, Father. Although, I suppose I should tell you, Father, that my name is now Bartholomew Pekot. So, I suppose we should start using the surname?” Choke said, feeling oddly embarrassed as Peep did a double take to start smirking at him.

Father Morrenthall frowned in confusion at Choke for just a second before he connected the dots:

“Ah. The Captain and his ledgers. Of course. Very good, Lieutenant Pekot. A fine choice for a surname. Carry on then,” Father Morrenthall saluted Choke before turning to Lieutenant Cooper:

“Now, let us find Lieutenant Hamon, so that you can get on with your duties.”

“Actually, Father, there he is now,” Lieutenant Cooper said, pointing over to an open lot to the north of the crossroads, just by the Spitz River. There was a small squad of soldiers there, keeping an eye on the growing crowd.

“Excellent!” Father Morrenthall spurred his horse that way, leaving Lieutenant Cooper and his men on foot to follow in their time.

Lieutenant Cooper nodded to Choke and Peep. “Lieutenant Pekot. Miss Otilla. Good day to you both.”

“Thank you Lieutenant Cooper. To you, too,” Choke said.

Peep just gave Cooper a cheeky thumbs up.

When the soldiers had all gone, Peep grinned wide at Choke.

“Well… la-dee-da! Aren’t we getting important now, with two names and everything! Two names and a rank, no less! Yar gonna need to start fucking so’s ye can spread that fancy name around!”

“Yes, thank you, Peep. I had no choice. The Captain demanded that I choose a name for his ledgers.”

“And ye chose Pekot? What, was Horsefucker already taken?” Peep laughed.

Choke stared at Peep hard for a long moment before finally saying, “fuck you, Peep.”

“Don’t ye start with that, Mr Fancy Man. I aint looking to be Mrs Pekot. Ha!”

Choke sat in his saddle and stared silently at Peep as she had a good laugh. When she had composed herself somewhat, he said:

“If you are just about done, Peep, can we go the church to get our bedrolls? I’m exhausted, and tomorrow’s going to be another shitkicker of a day.”

“Ohhhh… shit,” Peep said as she wiped a tear from her eye. “Yeah, ye must be tired if yar trotting out yar potty mouth like that. Yeah, let’s head to the church.”

The two rode through the crossroads and saluted Father Morrenthall and the soldiers still in their conference. Peep’s worshipers finally noticed Peep and kicked up an animated ruckus towards her: bobbing up and down while wailing praise and prayer. Peep scowled at them and drew up her wolfhead cloak. The worshipers continued their racket as Peep and Choke rode on down Main Street towards the church, but did not follow.

On Main Street, Sheriff Waters was standing out in the street in front of his office with both his deputies.

“Good afternoon, Sheriff,” Choke said tipping his helmet brim towards him.

“Okay, ye know what? Fuck you, ye horsefucking jink! How’s about that for a good afternoon, ye orphanage cocksucker?” Sheriff Waters snapped before spitting right at Nike’s feet.

Choke and Peep reined up. Peep already had her shortbow cradled in her lap, so she drew an arrow and notched it.

Choke laughed down at the Sheriff as he shifted his seat to excite Nike into a bit of an aggressive prance with some hoof lashing of the air between them.

The Sheriff and his two deputies backed away from the warhorse.

“Yeah, real tough guy, huh?” the Sheriff spat again as he reached the boardwalk. “Ye wouldn’t be shit if ye didn’t have this burning wheeled cunt with ye! Ye know that, right? Ye think the father would give ye shit if it weren’t for her? The Baron wouldn’t even know who ye are! Ye’d a been strung up in the bush by the Chisel a week after ye first got here!”

“But he does have me with him, Sheriff,” Peep said. With her hood drawn up, only her smirk was visible under the black wolf head. “And yar just a pathetic little pervert that can’t do shit except cuss us out like the limp-dicked, drunken loser that ye are. And the Chisel? Yar gonna bring up that useless piece of shit like he’s anything to us? We killed him, we two. Him and his whole fucking crew, straight up. Him, Tully, and Tully’s boys. We killed them all. And the fuckin Chisel was the biggest bitch of the bunch. He didn’t even put up a fight. So what are ye gonna do about that, Sheriff? Ye gonna make a move? Or just talk some more shit that ye can’t back up.”

Sheriff Waters turned on his heel and went into his office, slamming the door behind him to abandon his two deputies on the boardwalk.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought!” Peep shouted. Then she smirked at the two deputies: “Yar working for a bitch, ye know that, right? He aint nothing but a waterboy for whoever flashes him some coin. Ye two need to go and talk to Father Morrenthall to unburden yarselves of yar sins. Because he aint fuckin around now. Be smart. Get ahead of what’s coming around the bend at ye, and the Father might have a use for ye in his new order of things around here. Maybe they’ll even make one of ye the new sheriff!”

With this Peep and Choke wheeled their horses and rode on to the church.

“We should probably avoid coming by the Sheriff’s office on the way back,” Peep said. “Waters might be hot enough to take a shot at us with a crossbow.”

“Yes, that seems prudent,” Choke answered.

At the church, Peep and Choke had only meant to gather up the squad’s bedrolls to return to the jail tower immediately, but Mrs Dunn had other notions. She pulled Choke into the kitchen so that she could check the size of the epaulets she had modified for him. They were fairly simple, with a minimum of gold braid in the pattern signifying a Lieutenant. Of course, they were designed to be laced overtop of a tabard, but Mrs Dunn had Choke covered there as well. She had two tabards for him, both in the Baron Hart’s black and green. One was of simple hemp and very lightly dyed. This meant it was perfect for working rough in the bush, where it would almost work as camouflage. The other tabard was of a tight-woven wool and well-dyed with bright forest green and deep black.

Choke was tall in the saddle and rather short otherwise, having his race’s barrel trunk and stumpy legs. This meant that both tabards would have to be resized. Mrs Dunn set about doing this immediately.

“Thank you, Mrs Dunn. I appreciate this very much. But you needn’t rush yourself so. I can get these from you tomorrow, or even the day after. That would be fine,” Choke said.

“What? I’ll not have you leaving here without the proper trappings of your position and rank! Are you mad, boy? You are an officer of the Royal Bitina Army! You must look the part! Particularly since there is an important public event tomorrow morning! Yes? Now you sit here and wait for me to finish. It won’t be but an hour.”

With no choice but to comply with Mrs Dunn’s command, Peep and Choke stayed at the church. Choke took the opportunity to kneel before the altar in prayer. Peep hung out with Mrs Dunn and watched her work. It took just twenty minutes to hem the finer of the two tabards, which she declared would be the one Choke would be wearing to the event the next morning. With that finished, she took it and the epaulets into the church to get Choke into them. She was just lacing up his epaulets on his shoulders when Father Morrenthall entered from the kitchen side of the church’s transverse.

“Ah, there you all are. Very good, Mrs Dunn! Lieutenant Pekot, you look excellent.”

“Thank you, Father.”

“Now, if it’s not too much trouble, Mrs Dunn, I have invited Lieutenant Cooper to dine with me tonight. I understand I have left you scant time to prepare for that, so I do apologize. Whatever you can throw together shall be fine, I am sure,” Father Morrenthall said.

“It’s not a problem, Father. I’ll manage,” Mrs Dunn said.

“Thank you, Mrs Dunn. I shall be in my office. Please let me know when Lieutenant Cooper arrives. Lieutenant Pekot, Miss Otilla, I shall come to the tower tomorrow morning after breakfast. We shall execute Billy then. Any questions?”

“No, Father,” both Peep and Choke said.

“Good. Until tomorrow, then,” Father Morrenthall said before leaving out the door to his side of the church transverse.

“Well, I suppose I won’t have time to do that other tabard for you until tonight,” Mrs Dunn said, looking sour about it now that Father Morrenthall had left. “I’ll have it for you tomorrow.”

“Thank you, Mrs Dunn. I appreciate everything you have done for me.”

“You’re welcome, Lieutenant. Off ye go, then.”

In order to avoid going past the Sheriff’s office again, Peep and Choke rode back to the tower by heading through a narrow lane behind the church to go through the red-light district. As they were exiting that to loop around to the jail tower’s crossroads, Peep jerked her thumb the way of a big tavern named the Busted Unicorn. It was the joint where Peep had killed her captor, Orcstabber, on the night the Pekot boys had first come to town.

“Hey, Choke, ye wanna pop in there and grab a drink? Show off that pig tavernkeeper yar new threads? He’ll shit a fuckin brick!” Peep laughed.

“Not today, Peep,” Choke said.

“Aw, yar no fun at all, man!”

At the tower’s stable, Choke had to take a moment to process the crisp salute the corporal in charge gave him when he and Peep dropped off their horses. They took the time to unsaddle Nike and Gorgeous Boy themselves before brushing them down quickly.

When Choke pounded on the jail tower’s door, with Knuckle, Pinch’s, and his own bedrolls thrown over his shoulder, it took Knuckle just a moment to open up the barred peephole.

“Who goes there?” Knuckle demanded.

“It’s us, Knuckle. Open the door,” Choke said.

“Uhhhh… ye got Father Morrenthall out there with ye?” Knuckle asked, stooping down to press his face up to the little window’s iron bars and have a look around outside.

“No. Let us in!” Choke barked.

“Uhhhh… Choke, I mean, Lieutenant, sir, the Father said that we aren’t supposed to open the door for nobody but him and the Baron himself,” Knuckle said, now looking worried.

Choke sighed deeply and dropped all the bedrolls on the ground so that he could rub his temples properly.

“Knuckle. He gave that order to all of us as a unit when we were all in the tower together. Obviously, he meant that you should let us in,” Choke said, trying to keep his voice level. Peep giggling away next to him was not helping in his struggle.

“Well, yeah, Choke. I mean, Lieutenant, sir. But he did tell us specific that we could let Srecko in. Which we did. But, he didn’t say anything about you two.”

“We are all of the same unit, Knucklehead!” Choke shouted, finally losing his temper. “Open this fucking door immediately! Now!”

“Well, fine. Ye don’t have to shout! If Father gets mad about it, I aint gonna be the one—”

“Now, Sergeant!” Choke screamed.

“Fine. Fuck!” Knuckle said as he slammed the peephole’s little door shut and unbarred the main one.

Choke threw Knuckle and Pinch’s bedrolls through the door into the jail before picking his up and following Peep inside. Inside, Choke barred the door and he and Knuckle both stomped around for a little, avoiding looking at each other, while Peep and Pinch shared a chuckle at the situation.

Choke set his bedroll down on a bench at the big table and glowered at Billy’s cot next to the cookstove.

“You let Srecko in, you said?” Choke asked.

“Yeah,” Pinch said, his tone dark.

Choke looked over at him sharply. He saw that Pinch, as well as the five prisoners in the big cage behind him, all looked rattled. Even more than they had earlier.

“Where is he?” Choke asked, while already knowing the answer.

Pinch pointed at the closed trap door. As though on que, or perhaps because they were now focusing on it, muffled shouts could be heard from the dungeon below.

“Yeah…” Pinch said. “After ye left, Srecko must have gone straight to his cabin, or whatever, and he came back with some crap. He also had a hutch rabbit in a little wicker cage. He took that downstairs. Then he left to go get the Wheel. When he came back again, he went straight back downstairs…” Pinch drifted off.

Choke sighed and nodded. He then moved to the big pot on the cookstove to see what Pinch had managed to cook for dinner.

“And?” Peep asked.

“Rabbits can scream real loud!” Knuckle said. “I’m guessing he took that anus stick of his to it. Ye know, to show Billy all about it. Just like he said he would!”

“Yeah, no doubt. And they’ve been down there together since?” Peep asked.

“Yeah. It’s mostly been quiet,” Knuckle said.

“Ye didn’t go down there to check on it?” Peep asked.

“No! I don’t mind knocking on a motherfucker a bit. But I don’t need to be seeing whatever those two freaks are getting up to down there with fuckin rabbits and squirrels and pinecones and shit. Fuck that!” Knuckle said with a big grin.

“I mean, Father Morrenthall did say Srecko would be fine unsupervised. Do you wanna go down there?” Pinch asked Peep.

“Fuck no. I was just curious if either of ye had. That’s all.”

“We are to sleep here tonight,” Choke said loudly to disrupt the topic of conversation. “I suppose that Srecko is going to take Billy’s cot, and I have no interest in challenging him for it. So, where are we going to sleep?”

“There’s four private cells upstairs on the second floor, but they’re pretty nasty,” Pinch said. “Then on the top floor is a nice room, actually. It’s a cell, but it’s clean and set up nice like a proper bedroom with a desk and some slit windows.”

“Really?” Peep laughed. “What, Sheriff Waters is too good for just a fuck hut in the woods? He set himself up with a whole room for that upstairs?”

“No, that is not what it is,” Choke said. “Although I grant you that seems to be what he was using it for. A room like that is for prisoners or hostages of quality. Nobles are always taking each other hostage for ransom and what have you.”

“Really? Wicked! Shady motherfuckers! No wonder they run everything,” Peep said gleefully. “Let’s check it out!”

“Take a lantern, it’s dark up there,” Pinch said.

Peep and Choke went up to the second floor, where there was a small guardroom accessing four windowless cells. The inner walls of the cells were solid wood, as were the doors, so any prisoners kept in them would be totally isolated from each other. As Pinch had said, the cells were nasty, each with two bare sleeping benches and a toilet bucket. They all stank like a latrine.

On the third floor was a small room with another iron cage built around the door to the noble cell. The cell’s door was iron bound with a peep window and secure bolts. The cage door was unlocked with its key in the lock. The stairs continued on up to the roof, so Peep and Choke went up to check that out.

On the roof, the tower had defensive crenelles and piles of rocks for dropping on attackers. It also had a good view of the town, so Peep and Choke stood up there leaning on the wall enjoying the fresh air as they took in the view. The sun was just beginning to set on what had been another hot, sunny, spring day.

“Man… Well, we fuckin did the shit outta this town today, huh? What a fuckin day,” Peep said.

“Yes. I can barely stand up. I need to eat and go to sleep.”

“Yeah, today musta been a hell of a mindfuck for ye. Wake up a shitty, jink orphan boy from Pekot and wind up Lieutenant Pekot about to help the Father spit roast the fuckin Sheriff. Well, tell ye what, boss, we’re secure as shit in this tower tonight. Why don’t ye sleep right through without taking a watch? We’ve got ye covered.”

Choke opened his mouth to protest this idea, but realized that a long, uninterrupted sleep was something he wanted more than anything in the world just then.

“That would be wonderful. Thank you, Peep,” Choke said, squeezing her shoulder.

“No problem. Just don’t get used to it. Where ye gonna sleep?”

“This whole tower stinks. It doesn’t look like rain. I’m going to sleep up here, I think. How about you?”

“Me? Unless it’s been totally spunked up by Waters, I’m gonna sleep in that nobleman cell. It’s a fuckin princess tower, that!”

“Well, that sounds like a plan. Pinch and Knuckle can stretch out on the benches on the main floor, I suppose. We need someone down there to keep an eye on things.”

“Sounds good, man. Okay, let’s go eat!” Peep said happily.