The Jarl's Son, Chapter 5-1
Accounts of the Accused, Part 1
“You want me to give you what?”
Jarl Ostock’s confusion was evident in both his tone and his expression. With furrowed brow and narrowed eyes, he looked at Gaiur as one might a raving simpleton.
“A gem from your treasures, the clearest you have,” she repeated, pausing to draw a circle in the middle of her left palm with her right index finger. “It needs to be at least this size.”
The Jarl’s frown deepened. The fire that burned in the center of his large home’s main hall illuminated them both in bright orange light, yet the dance of those flames also deepened the creases of age in his face. Truthfully, Jarl Ostock wasn’t very old at all. Gaiur guessed him to be somewhere around forty five years, give or take one or two, yet the deep shadows that fire set into his face almost made him appear an elder. How much of this, she wondered, was the result of worry for his youngest son? How much was for Marten and the burdens he carried? Life in Stenise was hard on everyone, and the signs of age tended to come to its people quicker than most, but most didn’t find their children threatened by creatures of shadow.
“Do you have one?” she pressed.
The Jarl shook his head, though not as an expression of denial. “I may be able to find such a stone, but for what purpose? Is this your way of demanding payment from me?”
“No,” Gaiur said flatly. She had little need for gems in her nomadic life. Valuable though they were, purchasing supplies with them was a far trickier prospect than the use of simple coin or hacksilver.
She started to explain the situation to the Jarl, beginning with her confirmation about the source of Erik’s illness. “It’s as I feared,” she said. “Erik’s been bitten by a shadow adder, but for reasons I don’t yet know, the snake’s venom didn’t act as it normally would.”
Then she told him what Renald told her, how instead of attacking Erik’s spirit directly, the snake’s venom wreathed itself around his soul like some sort of shadowy miasma. The gem, alongside the fresh cut branch of a birch sapling and the clump of troll’s hair moss she still needed to collect, was necessary in drawing that accursed substance from his body. Of course, she was careful to avoid any direct mention of Renald in this explanation. The last thing she needed was to further spook the Jarl by openly introducing the presence of another otherworldly animal into this mix. It wouldn’t stop the Jarl from asking about him, but she hoped that his concern for Erik’s wellbeing would be strong enough to let her get away with vagaries.
Jarl Ostock scratched pensively at his gray mottled red-blonde beard. “This is what the friend you spoke to had to say?”
Just as expected. Gaiur nodded quietly, and after a long pause she said, “He believes there’s something else at work here than a mere chance attack by the adder, and I agree with him. I’d like to stay, to see if I can find out what it is, but that can wait. Right now we have a chance, a real chance, to save your son.”
The Jarl’s lips pressed into a thin line. He tried to hide it, but Gaiur could see tears begin to well in his eyes. This must’ve been the first time in the last season that he’d felt a sense of hope for seeing his child well again. A moment later, he looked her in the eye and nodded.
“Very well. If I can find such a gem, then you’ll have it. I’d gladly part with all the treasures of this house, nay, this city, to save my son,” he said.
Gaiur smiled, an unusual thing for one normally so reserved and dour as she, but she couldn’t help herself. She admired the Jarl’s resolve. It was more than what she had when she’d lost her own family all those years back, but then, the Jarl hadn’t yet lost his son. Perhaps his stalwart nature would buckle under such a strain? Bah, what a sour line of thinking. This was a hopeful moment, not a time for the intrusiveness of darksome thoughts. Gaiur banished them from her mind, turning her focus to the task which lay ahead as the Jarl addressed her once more.
“Is there anything else you require of us, Wolfmother?” he asked. “You have but to say the word, and if it’s within my ability, I’ll use all the power of my authority to see that it’s done.”
Gaiur briefly pondered on that. “There is something else,” she said. “Do you have a læknir in your city?”
“Ah, Hlín. She tends a plot along the northern palisade,” he said.
“I need to speak with her tonight,” Gaiur insisted.
“She may be reluctant to meet with an outsider after dark,” the Jarl muttered, “but if I send you with a mark of my station, she’ll be more willing.”
Jarl Ostock started to take off one of the wristlets he was wearing, a band of polished hardwood set with a scrimshaw showing the pike’s head pierced by a bone hook that was the symbol of the jarldom. Gaiur waved it off. She had a different idea in mind.
“Send Marten with me instead,” she suggested. “I’d like to speak with him more on what happened the day Erik was bitten.”
The Jarl’s expression darkened slightly, but he agreed. As he bound the leather wristlet back into place, he called Marten into the main hall and explained the situation. Marten eagerly agreed to go with her, swiftly infected by the sliver of optimism that came with the first real chance to reverse Erik’s condition he’d seen. They left shortly after, exiting the warmth of the Jarl’s home for the cool of a moonlit late summer night.
“It’ll take a little while to walk all the way to Hlín’s plot,” Marten said as they stepped outside.
“That’s fine. I just need to see to Varro before we leave,” she said. However, Varro was no longer laying out by the front entrance. Both he and her cloak were gone.
“Ah, I’d forgotten to tell you. Father wished your wolf to be moved away from the entrance to his home. He didn’t want the people to be further frightened,” Marten said.
“Why did he not fetch me, then?” she barked, her anger spiking. If Varro had hurt someone, there was a good chance the Jarl would’ve had him killed for it.
“We didn’t want to interrupt your work,” Marten said. “It’s fine, he’s in the training yard around the back. I moved him myself a few hours ago.”
What happened next, neither of them expected. With her fist balled up tight, Gaiur threw a swift punch square at Marten’s gut! Had he lacked practice the sudden hit might’ve caught him fully by surprise, but he was fast enough to step back and swat her blow aside.
“Damn fool!” she spat. “Varro’s the size of a bull elk! What if he’d been frightened and bitten you?”
“Calm down, woman! You can see he did nothing of the sort!”
Gaiur swung for him again, but this time Marten caught her by the wrist. He tried to pull her in and restrain her, but she wrenched herself free of his grip with a strength that surprised him. He stumbled forward a step, then regained his balance.
She was still incensed by their decision, the Jarl for not asking her to move her companion himself, and Marten for being stupid enough to do it on his own. She huffed out a heavy breath, though it sounded more like a growl than a huff. “Next time, you ask me before touching him,” she snarled.
Exasperated, Marten threw out his arms. “Gods be, Gaiur, nothing happened! He and I are both fine!” he said.
“That doesn’t make it alright!” She thrust a finger in his face. “You’re still here after those accusations were made. Does that make those acceptable now?”
Marten sneered at her. “How dare… That isn’t the same and you know it!” he hissed through clenched teeth.
“If your accusers were believed, you’d be dead, just as Varro would be if he’d been scared enough to lash back,” Gaiur countered. “I see no worthy difference there.”
Leather creaked as Marten closed his gloved fingers into a tight fist. He looked like he wanted to hit her. Frankly, part of her wanted him to. It would excuse her hitting him right back. Fortunately for the both of them, cooler heads did prevail. Marten turned his back on her and roughly beckoned her to follow.
“Come on,” he said. “We’re wasting time with this. You want to see your wolf, he’s back here.”
He led her around the back of the house to the training yard. Varro was laying under the awning, half leaned against a rack of painted round shields. They bore the grass green backing and pale yellow stripe of the Ostock Jarldom, as well as its pike’s head and bone hook sigil. As Gaiur approached the greatwolf, his ears perked up and he lifted his head. Once he saw her, he rose to his feet and padded over, immediately attempting to lick her face.
“Alright, that’s enough,” she said between gentle chuckles. Scratching at his ears and his scruff, she managed to get him to sit down. “I’m sorry I made you wait so long. Did they feed you?”
He whined in response, recognizing one of the words that meant food. “I guess not,” she murmured. She glanced over her shoulder at Marten. “Is there anything you can fetch him quickly? A fish or a joint of mutton, maybe?”
“I’ll fetch him something from the larder,” Marten said. A minute later, he returned with a freshly butchered duck that hadn’t been cleaned of its feathers yet. “Will this do?”
Gaiur nodded and tossed the fowl to Varro. The greatwolf snatched it by one of the legs, which he then tore off by placing his paw on the body and pulling the entire leg out of its joint. Smiling fondly at him, Gaiur ruffled the fur behind his ears once again and gave his flank a solid pat.
“That animal means a great deal to you,” Marten commented after they’d left the yard. “I always thought the Wolfmother name was some frightful title to scare bandits off, but seeing how you are with him, it fits well.”
“I never chose that name for myself,” Gaiur said. “It was put upon me, like most things in my life.”
Marten looked back up at the Jarl’s large home. They’d already started on the road back to the market plaza he led her through earlier in the day. “Was he one of those things?” he asked.
Gaiur kept silent for a moment, unsure how to answer at first. Varro’s companionship wasn’t something she sought out. Their meeting had been a chance thing from years past, back when she still called the isolated arctic village Valdun her home. Like herself, Varro had been another victim of cruel circumstance, a greatwolf pup whose mother was killed by a wretched demon which fell from the night sky. When she found him, he was weakly defending his mother’s frozen corpse from a murder of crows.
For a long time, she wasn’t sure why she chose to feed him. After all, it was one of Varro’s own kind that killed her own family. That left her full of fear and animosity toward all greatwolves for many years, and yet she still felt some sort of strange sympathy for him regardless. Later, she’d realize why. They were kindred, different species who endured the same loss. With that realization came an understanding, and an answer.
“No,” she told Marten. “Varro was my choice, and I was his.”
“How did you find him?” he asked.
She smirked, and half a chuckle escaped her. “That’s a long and grim story,” she said.
“Ah, I see,” Marten replied before quickly moving to a new topic. Gaiur was thankful that for as bullheaded as he sometimes seemed to be, he also seemed to pick up on her hints quite easily. “Father said you wished to speak with me more about what happened when Erik was bitten?”
Gaiur nodded. “I did say that, yes,” she said, conspicuously letting her words trail off.
Now it was Marten who chuckled. “So what, then? An excuse to get me off on my own?”
Gaiur scoffed. “Voice of Luthmor,” she groaned. “You dream wildly, don’t you?”
“I dream wildly? You’re the wild woman looking for excuses to drag me off to be alone with you,” he retorted.
She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “Horny goat,” she quipped, a grin tugging once more at the corners of her lips. Sadly, it was short lived, unable to be maintained in the face of the topic she did wish to broach.
“There is something I wanted to ask you more about,” she said. “Your accusation, or rather, your accuser.”
From the edges of her vision, she saw Marten’s smile fade, too. “Seems the subject of grim stories is on both our minds tonight,” he said.
“I’m sorry,” Gaiur said.
Marten smiled ruefully and gave a dismissive wave of his hand. “Bah, it’s fine. Won’t be a pleasant tale, but I suppose that means we each have one to share now, right?” His rueful smile shifted into a slight smirk.
Dour as that prospect was, Gaiur couldn’t resist the humor she found in it. “Ha! So we share our miseries instead of sharing a bed, then?” she remarked, and her laughter quickly turned to a resigned sigh. “Fine. It’s as good a night as any for wallowing, but you talk first.”
“Very well, then,” Marten agreed. “What do you wish to know?”
Many questions had crossed Gaiur’s mind on the subject of Marten’s accusation, but one stood out among all the others. The what of it bore no asking. Someone had claimed Marten poisoned his younger brother, that much was easy to figure out based on the situation alone. The why of it could be a few things. Marten’s position at the head of Halvfjord’s guard could’ve made him a thorn for one of the Jarl’s advisors, so they wished to see his authority diminished. It also might be that someone wished to sow discord across the Jarl’s house, perhaps a greedy advisor or an enemy from without. Renald had suggested the possibility of the shadow adder acting on someone else’s accord. Could one of the Jarl’s advisors be responsible?
Could Marten be?
She was quick to dismiss the latter idea. If Marten truly were responsible, it stood to reason he wouldn’t be so willing to speak with her on the matter. True, he could be planning to lie to her, but if this were some plan he enacted in hopes of a coup, then why not just let the adder kill Erik and be done with it? There were too many obvious holes for that suspicion to be reasonable, which left only one question worth asking.
Stopping in place, Gaiur took hold of his wrist and quickly took stock of their surroundings. They were just outside the market square, and other than themselves she couldn’t see anyone else nearby. Even so, she didn’t wish to risk speaking about this quite so openly, so she tugged Marten behind one of the lightless homes on their right.
“Who accused you?” she asked in a low tone once they were out of sight.
Gaiur wasn’t looking at Marten when she asked the question, but for just a moment she felt his eyes on her. When she turned to face him he’d already turned away, his gaze downcast, his expression dark. She pressed her lips into a thin line and followed his gaze to where it fell. It was a patch of empty ground, a dark spot among the already dewy grasses who’s droplets reflected the moon’s glow. A patch of inky shadow that drew the eye not to stare at, but pensively stare through.
Her chest ached as that dark dirt patch swallowed her gaze, and her vision blurred as it lost focus. Marten was hurting, and she had a feeling that she understood his particular pain. A sting of betrayal, the crushing weight of abandonment and suspicion. She’d been subjected to that herself back in Valdun when her own people, superstitious as they were, deemed the deaths of her husband and son to be her fault. Cursed, they called her, a harbinger of ill omen. To their minds it wasn’t desperate hunger that drew that greatwolf to her home on that evil dawn. It wasn’t that her home stood at the village’s edge, making it an easier target; or that her beloved Varro had the misfortune of being unlucky enough to step out with their son that morning while the wolf was still hidden behind the trees, opening its opportunity for ambush. No, it was because she’d been cursed, that the gods themselves had turned their backs on her and the foreigner whom she’d chosen to wed.
She might well have died that day herself, given up by her fellow Valdunites as an offering to placate the perceived anger of their gods, had it not been for Esbern’s intervention. Esbern, whom the Valdunites viewed as their hero and champion. Esbern, who’d been a dear friend to her husband. Esbern, who did his best to watch over Gaiur when she fell into her deep depression and sequestered herself in her home, away from the rest of her people. Esbern, whom she nearly died alongside on their journey to seek the star that fell into the expansive Glimmerfrost half a decade prior, adding one more to the tally of close relations whom she’d lost in that isolated arctic village.
Yes, Gaiur understood far better than most what Marten was likely feeling. That’s why she snatched his hand in hers and said in a low tone, “If it’s too painful, you don’t have to share.”
“No,” Marten replied, shaking his head. “I promised I’d speak of it, and so I shall.” Squeezing her hand tightly, he looked up at the moon. His expression had hardened, but she could see the faint glimmer of mistiness in his eyes. Even so, no tear rolled down his cheek, even as he gave his answer.
“The accusation came from my father.”
Thank you for reading.
The Jarl’s Son sees Gaiur the Valdunite return to embark on a new adventure and acts as the follow-up to my dark fantasy mystery tale, In the Giant’s Shadow. The previous story isn’t required reading to understand and enjoy this tale, but doing so will enhance the experience.
As always, you bring great insight into the humanity of people. Great betrayals cause great pain. Sometimes that pain can only be lightly covered, but it's always with you.