Expiring Covenant (Black Lake Book 1)

Chapter 29
Bick

~

I climbed stiffly out of the wagon, head hung. The cold penetrated my bones. The ache made me feel much older than my six decades, plus an odd year, or three, as I often joke. The dark wrapped around me like a shroud.

I looked across the point. The troll, my companion the last four weeks, faded into the background of snow, and disappeared into the woods as I watched. Sar had been eager to get his news to his people, so left my company as we approached the valley. I figgered the troll would be very happy to be around his own kind. The feelin’s mutual.

Across the broad, open field below, the back door of the Inn flew open, and a form dashed into the night.

The elf’s ears never rest.

I smiled for a fraction of a moment. It faded too quickly in my exhaustion. Any emotion took more energy out of me than I had to spare. But knowin’ my wife of six weeks ran to greet me offered a smidgen of relief.

I struggled to take a deep breath to calm my nerves, but the cold hurt my lungs, and I coughed. If I didn’t die from the consumption, it’d be a miracle.

“Bick! Bick!” Gladys called.

I walked toward her. The horses complained about not bein’ tended to first. Their heads were down, and guilt at the strain I put them through the last few weeks wracked at my conscience. But the woman runnin’ toward me came first.

My mind oddly focused on the crackle of my boots on the frozen grass, as though that might manage to block out the pain in my knees, neck, hands, and hips. I tried to stand tall, paste a smile on my face, but it was too dauntin’ a task. I could feel myself failin’ miserably.

Her arms wrapped around me. I grabbed her hungrily.

“My God. Ya feel like an icicle.”

“In this heat?” The words were right, but they didn’t help form the smile I struggled to create.

Others converged on us. Hands pounded my shoulders and back. Friendly voices welcomed me home, but my eyes were closed, the side of my face pressed against Gladys’. I breathed in her scent.

“Take him inside,” Yoso told Gladys. “We’ll see to the animals and the wagon.”

“I’ll run and add wood to yar fires,” Eina said, and dashed away.

It became quiet and I finally opened my eyes. As expected, everyone stared toward the wagon. It took a moment for Gladys to notice. She stepped around me and her hand went to her mouth. There were a couple of sobs. Not sure from whom.

“What took the old goat?” Coedwig grunted.

I studied the dwarf’s face for a moment, surprised he was even here. Isn’t that sociable to begin with. Would have expected him to be at his loft, my former loft, before I married Gladys. I turned to what everyone else looked at, the tarp-rolled body of Jear, the ancient, curmudgeon, checker-cheatin’, foul-mouthed, odorous troll.

“When he climbed into his fur three nights ago, he told me he thought his time was used up. He said he’d insulted enough people, erred enough times, seen about everythin’ any one troll deserves to see.”

Gladys turned around and threaded her arms around me again, pulled me close.

“He’d been coughin’ somethin’ awful for three days before that, but wouldn’t let us stay in one place to let him rest. ‘We’ve ’bout finished our work,’ he said. ‘Push on. I’ve ’bout had it, lookin’ at all yar ugly human faces. I want to get home to my own kind,’ he said.”

We all stood quietly for a few moments, until Yoso placed his enormous hand on my shoulder. Nudged me. “Go. Nothin’ to be done tonight. We’ll see to him tomorrow.”

To Rueti and Tueti’s displeasure, the orc, Janding, crawled into the wagon to gather up the reins, and encouraged them toward the barn. Where were the gnomes? Always show up durin’ key events about the Hamlet. Yoso hurried forward, to open the broad doors of the barn. I turned with Gladys and walked toward our home while the rest of the assembled community filtered back to the Inn. I pulled Gladys tightly against me.

We’ll have to get reacquainted.

“Ya were gone a long time,” Gladys murmured into my shoulder, obviously thinkin’ much the same thoughts. “I missed ya.”

“I’m sorry, runnin’ off so abruptly, for so long, right after exchangin’ vows with ya.”

She gripped my arm and we wobbled awkwardly together up the stairs to the porch. “I know ya wouldn’t have done it if it wasn’t important.”

“It meant a lot to Jear,” I said, lookin’ straight ahead.

Gladys looked up into my face in the gloom.

“He was quite the troll patriot,” I said.

Eina met us inside the door with a lantern in her hand, and pushed me toward the main hearth where a new fire grew. The troll hen’s hand pulled not-too-gently at my overcoat, and I shimmied out of it. Gladys pulled me out of my jacket. I sat on the chair Eina pulled near the hearth before she disappeared. Gladys drew up a footstool and helped me off with my boots.

“Oh, my,” she said, rubbin’ a cold foot. “Ya need a hot tub.”

“The fire feels wonderful,” I said. Wouldn’t have energy to climb into a tub for a month.

We sat quietly for a while, listenin’ to the crackle from the hearth. I closed my eyes and held my hands out to capture all the heat I could. The growin’ warmth oddly seemed to make me shiver harder.

“Ya poor thin’,” Gladys murmured.

“I wish Jear lived long enough to report to his council the results of his efforts,” I said.

“Good news?” she asked.

“Some. Better than I expected. Not as good as many will want.”

“Will they be welcomed north?” Gladys asked.

“Many mines were taken over by the locals,” I answered. “Others weren’t. But many livin’ near those weren’t interested to see their one-time enemies return.”

“Change isn’t accepted overnight,” Gladys said. “Braes told me Yoso and Birs were neighbors the better part of a year, and hardly got past the wave-from-a-distance stage.”

“True,” I said. “It takes more than abuttin’ property to even bring humans together, much less ogres and trolls.”

Eina emerged from the kitchen carryin’ a bowl. “Soup isn’t too hot yet, but warm is better than nothin’ right now. I have cider heatin’ in a sauce pan, if ya’ll check it in a moment, Gladys. I’ll take off and let ya two be alone.”

She was gone after settin’ blankets across both of our shoulders and closin’ the flue damper a bit. The front door closed with a vigorous clomp, as though firmly assurin’ us we had our privacy. I spooned down the soup greedily. When I finished, Gladys took the bowl away and returned with a steamin’ mug, the promised cider.

I wrapped both hands around the hot ceramic and took a tentative sip, and shivered hard again. I found tears streakin’ Gladys’ cheeks. I expect she thought how the cold took her last husband. She and Wilbur had over four decades together, a lifetime.

I’ve been gone a long time. Must seem like a stranger to her all over again.

My slight-built wife of six weeks pulled the footstool closer and leaned over, restin’ her head on my knee, wrappin’ my legs up with an embrace. I wanted to tell her it was goin’ to take more than a little cold to take me away from her, but the words didn’t fully form, and I pressed my lips closed.

Not the words I should be mutterin’.

I drew my hand over her loose hair, pulled it away from the side of her face, caressin’ her cheek.

~

I woke the next mornin’, early light streamin’ through a crease in the drapes. The fire in the hearth had been stoked maybe a half-hour earlier, since the logs on the andirons were fully ablaze. The bed next to me, empty. I snuggled under the quilts for another minute, considerin’ how lovely it would be to roll over and go back to sleep. But the eagerness to renew the gettin’-to-know my wife made me throw the covers back.

Downstairs, the tub had been moved into the center of the kitchen, and six buckets of water lined the back of the two cast-iron stoves. Steam wafted from them. I smiled, thinkin’ how gamy I must smell.

I poured myself a cup of hot coffee and sipped at it as I looked out the window, toward the barn, where Gladys was no doubt, seein’ to chores. The thought of her havin’ to go about with Jear’s body lyin’ there in the wagon made me scrunch up the side of his face.

I ladled hot water into my shavin’ bowl and swished up a lather to work at my whiskers. I was slickin’ away the last vestige of the past week as Gladys came in with a bucket of fresh milk and a basket of eggs. Her smile made me fall in love all over again. My gut tingled. Her hair remained unusually loose, and the gray-streaks flowed over her shoulders and down the middle of her back.

A new shiver took me, but it wasn’t the cold. I quickly wiped away the last of the soap on my face as she set down her burdens. I rushed to her and pulled her close.

She screeched and giggled, threw her arms around my neck.

A lifetime to find this woman.

I pulled myself away from her faster than I would have preferred, but thought about the purpose of the heavy tub sittin’ a few feet away.

Patience is a virtue.

She refilled my cup and I stood close to a stove tellin’ her about the journey, while she mixed up a batch of biscuits, fried a huge chunk of bacon, and scrambled a dozen of the fresh eggs. We sat at the tiny table across from the stoves and I stuffed myself as we competed to share the minutia of the past weeks.

“Ya never seemed to be the jokester,” I said.

“No, really,” Gladys said, face showin’ a tad of frustration she couldn’t convince me. “Janding really has made friends with one of Mo’sale’s young bulls, and flies about on his shoulders.”

“Sure, and a swarm of goblins have built their own inn on the far side of the point, next door to Kelhin and Kincere.”

“No sign of goblins yet, that I’ve heard,” she said. “Don’t believe me if ya choose.”

“I won’t.” I grinned. “Just because I’ve been gone the first part of the winter doesn’t mean I’ve lost my faculties.”

“Of course not,” she said. “What was I thinkin’?”

~

Mid-day, a young troll pounded on the front door. The lad’s Standish wasn’t great, but I’m pretty sure he asked, for the troll council, if Jear could be buried in the East Cove in the human fashion. I stared blankly at the trollin’ for a moment. I never considered the other races might have different rituals for the dead.

Never have come across a troll cemetery before, though.

“Of course,” I finally heard myself answer.

“My people, preparin’ for the celebration. We be back next mornin’.”

The troll gave me of a bow, turned, walked off the veranda without another word, pullin’ his hat down low over his brow to block as much sun from his eyes as he could. I walked out into the freezin’ air and watched the lad lumberin’ across the snow, headed back for the mines.

Celebration?

I stepped inside and grabbed my jacket and yelled, “Gladys, I’m goin’ down to talk to Yoso.”

Her acknowledgment echoed through the granite walls of the house before I closed the door behind me.

~

“That’s a shame,” Yoso said, when I repeated what the trollin’ had said. He shook his head a moment later. “I figger the buryin’ is a tribute to ya, but I’ll bet we’ll get the benefit of a fine send off nonetheless.”

I pressed, but Yoso only smiled. “It won’t be a dour affair like when we set Wilbur to rest.”

~

The next mornin’ passed without any visitors showin’ up from the mines, but Yoso made the rounds and told everyone not to dress in flimsy, somber attire. “Yar heavy winter thin’s, for the cold,” he warned. “But spiff up, color-wise, as well as ya can.”

Spiff up?

The song rang over the Lake’s ice before the trolls appeared at the edge of the woods later that afternoon, hundreds maybe thousands of trolls. I didn’t have a clue so many souls lived nearby in the mines. They wore bright-colored clothes, with orange, red and yellow scarves. Many wore outlandish pants, similar to what I’d seen clowns wear in festivals up North.

The trolls made their way first to the small clearin’ above the East Cove, overlookin’ the Lake, where Wilbur is buried. Every troll carried a provision or dragged firewood behind them. At the edge of the clearin’ they piled the wood high for a bonfire, as a few set to diggin’ a grave. Blankets, foodstuff and urns were set out.

After all was complete in the clearin’, the trolls formed a long line that made its way down the hill, the singin’ never interrupted. I walked with them to the barn to collect Jear’s body as the others from the Hamlet gathered. I smiled when I saw Yoso and Eina. They sported the bright orange and red clothes they wore at Wilbur’s funeral.

The couple’s choice of clothes made a lot more sense now.

The volume of the song rose as the giants carried the frozen body of the ancient troll without ceremony toward his final restin’ place. Jear was shifted from the arms of one pair of troll bulls to another as they marched and sang, the deep, guttural Trollish boomin’ across the icy air.

At the clearin’, they lay the body solemnly in the grave that had been dug in the frozen ground minutes earlier, and the trolls spread into a circle around it, thirty, forty deep.

Yoso leaned toward me and said, “Ya’ll be expected to speak yar last words to him when the council is done. Don’t be surprised if much of what’s said sounds a little disrespectful. It isn’t meant that way. They’ll be speakin’ to him as though he were alive and lookin’ them in the eye. It’d be impolite if overly kind words were shared this day. The celebration requires honesty.”

I imagined my expression must have been—a description didn’t come to mind, but Yoso gave me a smile, and clomped me on the back, hard, the stinkin’ troll, before movin’ on to visit the others of the Hamlet, presumably sharin’ the same warnin’.

A few moments later an ancient troll with solid-white hair, leanin’ over a staff, barked in Trollish for several moments, before switchin’ to Standish. “Yar a smelly old grump with the personality of the fertilizer spread on the mushrooms,” he shouted, what sounded very angrily, to me. “If ya had lied a time or two in yar life ya would have led the clan, but ya were stubborner than one of the mules the humans till their land with. It’ll be a pleasure not to have to put up with yar complaints and arguments any longer in council. Ya contentious fart. Rot quickly, ya old goat. Return to the gods.”

A round of troll, guttural laughter echoed through the clearin’.

Gladys tensed against me and I held her tighter as the next troll stepped up to speak. The bull struggled to remain in Standish, but got help from a friend from time-to-time. He spoke of the antics and follies Jear is known for, as the crowd roared in their deep-chested laughs.

“Ya were blessed with two mates ya had to place on the pyres,” another said, as the trolls growled. “They were both good hens who cared for ya, why I’ll never know. Ya should have selected another mate a long time ago. A young one to keep up with ya. Yar two look down angry at ya, I’m sure, for not takin’ on a new partner. All of us who had to put up with ya wish ya had, too. Ya put us through hell for yar solitude.”

Growls echoed.

Speaker after speaker rose and made derogatory remarks about the soul we were sayin’ our goodbyes to. Most every unpleasant adjective in Standish was used, and I assumed most of the Trollish expressions, which were not translated for us, were even less complimentary.

Yoso spoke mid-way through. He used soft words that got glares from the other trolls, but the residents of the Hamlet surely better appreciated them. He concluded, “Ya had the patience of a field mouse and showed the intelligence of a shovel of ore too often in yar life, but ya accepted yar errors straight enough.

“Though ya had to be watched every moment at the checker board, I’ll remember best yar roar when ya got spanked soundly by the orc, he with five kings remainin’ in the battle.”

Every troll erupted in angry-soundin’ shouts, that would have had me shiverin’ in fear any other day, that slowly fell into gravelly laughs. The elders pounded the ground with their staffs and howled at the dark-gray sky. I couldn’t begin to guess why the last remark so moved the crowd of trolls. I’d have to ask Yoso later.

Sweat broke out and ran down my sides when Yoso looked over and nodded that it was my turn. I stepped forward, takin’ in the glares of the deep-set eyes of the trolls around me.

“Before six weeks ago I only knew Jear, uh, ya, as the crankiest checker player in the world.”

I paused until the growls settled.

“Since, I’ve learned of the fire that lived in yar heart for yar people. I’m certain yar clan came first in every thought, every moment of the day. I learned how fierce that heart was. It’s what ya used to speak for yar clan the last weeks, with love, devotion, pride, and honor.

“The smart thin’ for ya would have been to stay home bundled up against the encroachin’ autumn, but ya knew humans had to look into experienced, knowledgeable eyes. Ya gave yar life for yar clan. Ya will always have my respect—even though I had to watch yar hand on the checker board.”

The trolls erupted again in their gravelly chants. Yoso pounded me on the back.

~

The celebration, eatin’, drinkin’, singin’, dancin’, and tale-tellin’, lasted long into the night, until the last of the wood burned out, and the freezin’ air sent us for our homes and the mines. What would a troll springtime funeral be like? Probably last for days. I decided their kind celebrated the end of life as they did all thin’s, with vigor, a candid eye, and an open heart.

Every human child should attend a trollish funeral before they developed any prejudices.

Under the clouds hidin’ the full moon, I watched Birs’ family walkin’ home in front of me and Gladys. The two middlin’ sons spent more time pushin’ and tryin’ to trip each other. The youngest, the terror the entire evenin’, with hands clamped on everythin’ that came nearby, draped over his father’s shoulder, finally asleep. The daughter walked hand-in-hand with her mother.

My heart welled.

Who would have guessed a funeral could be so—invigoratin’.

I pulled Gladys tighter against me, and blinked against a wash of tears.

~