"´Idhra´ chapter 2" by J. lawrence

Chapter II

“But why?” Idhra asked. “He was here! In this city.”

“The least likely place for him to look then, don’t you think?” Her father answered.

Sara clung to her mother’s hand, pressing her cheek against Aunt Cathrin’s waist.

It was a sound theory, Idhra thought, but a scary one. They had followed the main road into Valdarr, a bigger place than Idhra had ever seen. She’d been to a small town to the north of their home, but only to help sell her father’s goods. That town, as well as the one Idhra lived in were farm communities: unplanned, discordant groups of farms in the middle of a grassy wilderness.

Here in Valdarr, though, the inner city was planned and orderly. It made Idhra uneasy, the way each house was the same distance from the next, and there was so little space between them. The entire city looked like a big square, which was very unsettling. And the fortress of Valdarr loomed ominously in the middle.

“Valdarr,” murmured Uncle Mats. “Powerful warrior, it means.” He looked into his daughter’s eyes. “Though this city is small, it is very old. Its name comes from the language of the old times.”

This city didn’t seem small at all to Idhra, and she shivered as they walked through its streets, wondering how its inhabitants could be comfortable inside it, bustling around like the people of any town might.

“Excuse me, sir,” said Idhra’s father. “Where might we find a suitable Inn?”

“Ah, to the Mær Inn, you might like to go,” the mann answered in a raspy voice. He smiled, revealing many missing teeth. “Tis old as the city ‘erself!”

Uncle Mats nodded. The man pointed down a street to their left as the Valdarr Fortress gates erupted with dozens of horses, all speeding different directions. A man on a white horse out came after, in tight black trousers and a red, blue and gold shirt. He wore a broadsword at his side, which swung in its sheath as he rode slowly toward a platform near the gate. Everyone stopped to watch.

“Citizens!” he bellowed. “As Lord of this fortress, I commandeth you: go into thine homes, and do not emerge until the time our King sees fit. He shall ride through the city this night, searching house by house for Christianne Pierre Pont, lost daughter of Christophe, the Tyske crown contender and friend of thy great King Kamin!”

Cheers erupted through the streets, and Uncle mats and Kjersten also raised their arms in shouts.

“Mamma!” Idhra said. “What are you doing?”

“What everyone else is doing,” said her father, “and it is a good thing. There are soldiers stationed in the fortress that are looking for disloyal subjects like ourselves.”

“Go, now, good people of Valdarr, and hope to hear good news in the morn!”

The crowd thinned as people rushed to their homes, and Uncle Mats frowned. “I’ve never liked him,” he said. “Extravagant with his clothes and words. Commandeth? Ha!”

“What are we going to do?” Aunt Cathrin interrupted. “There are guards at every exit.” The men on horses that had come out of the gates before the Lord of Valdarr were encircling the city.

“We die,” said Kjersten simply. There was silence.

“But they won’t!” Aunt Cathrin suddenly said, jerking Sara away from Mats. Dark was falling, and stars were coming out. The air was getting cooler, and Idhra shivered as her father shoved her behind a statue of one of the gods that was carved into the wall of Valdarr fortress.

Sara was behind the god to Idhra’s left, and whimpering. Idhra saw her parents and Sara’s disappear down a narrow alley.

They stayed there through the night. It became steadily cooler, steadily darker, steadily more frightening. Idhra shivered whenever a group of soldiers rode by, whenever the wind blew. Her feet started hurting and became numb, but she couldn’t quite sit in the cramped space behind the statue of her god.

Then, as dawn started creeping into the sky, red tendrils of light sneaking through the darkness, the soldiers retreated in one horrifying mass: just the way they had come out, they went back in the gates, the Lord of Valdarr following slowly.

When they’d been gone for some time, Sara jumped down to the street, Idhra following suit. She looked around and stretched, still scared and cold. The god Idhra’d been behind was Odin, the most powerful of the gods, and her father’s namesake. He stood regally with only one eye, and surveyed the city before him. Idhra bowed slowly, and turned to Sara.

“What should we do now?”

“Find an orphanage,” Sara said. Her voice was high and thin, her eyes were red and her hands and knees were shaking. They were the only two people on the streets. The gates to the fortress started to open once more, and the slow-riding Lord of the Fortress began his descent into the city.

“Get back behind your statue, Sara!” Idhra said, alarmed. Her stomach tightened as the Lord rode right in front of them to get to his podium. A small, dark-skinned boy ran behind him with a horn, and blew it when his master dismounted his horse.

“My people! You may return to your daily tasks. But the news I bring is not joyous, as we all had hoped. The lady Christianne was indeed in this fair city, but her body was found dead on the outskirts mere minutes ago.

“This is doubtless the work of our fiendish rebels, the Nýarr as they call themselves: new warriors. They have killed a friend of the King, and must be punished!”

It was a strange sight, the Lord on his podium with no crowd surrounding him. It looked as if he was speaking to no one, but then people started to emerge from their homes and shout approval.

“And let us hope that we may find and slay as many of the Kings traitors here as the number that reside here, so that there may be only loyal subjects in our midst!”

Killed by the rebels? No! Idhra knew the King had killed her parents. The knowledge that her parents were dead aroused strong emotions: tears meandered down her cheeks and dropped off her chin like a waterfall. But the lie made it worse.

The cousins slipped from their hiding places and into the crowd, trying to wipe their tears, but without success.

“Lastly!” yelled the Lord, scaring Idhra, who’d been sure he was done. “If any strange children are seen roaming these streets, please inform me at once. Good day to all!”

Sara’s eyes widened, making them look like big, shiny, wet balls of white and blue glass. They couldn’t stay in the city, and upon seeing the guards near every entrance, Idhra knew they couldn’t leave either. Trapped.

A hand slipped around her mouth, and pulled her backwards. She hit a man’s chest and was dragged down a narrow street. The man was strong; her struggles couldn’t release her. She tried to yell for help, but his hand was clamping her jaw tight, and she became more scared then, than she’d been all night long.

The man brought her to a dark room, lit meagerly with a single white candle. He dropped her in the glow of the candle, and left to hold the door open for another man, who brought Sara in the room.

She was shivering and pale. Her eyes were still wide and she was still crying. Her entire face was wet, and there were splotches on her clothes. The man that was dragging her was saying something: “We won’t hurt you. Calm down. Sërá, please stop!”

Sërá ? “Mister Macauley?!” Idhra yelled, and he jumped in shock.

“Yes, it’s me,” he said worriedly. “Please tell her to calm down!”

“What are you doing?” Idhra demanded.

“Getting you out of here!” Mister Macauley half-shouted, with a slightly hysterical edge to his voice. “She needs to calm down! She’s in shock, I believe. And has a fever…”

“Let’s go, Macauley,” said the man that had grabbed Idhra. “Worrying won’t help a thing.” He grabbed something from a corner, and it clanked as he dropped it over Idhra’s head. She panicked for a moment. It didn’t seem like they should need chain mail to escape the city!

She was pushed back onto the street; the light was instantly blinding. And before anyone could see them, dirty, scared, and armoured, Mister Macauley pushed the two girls into the bottom of a straw-filled wagon.

“Find the trap door,” said Mister Macauley, “and get inside.”

The trap door led to a small compartment below the rest of the wagon. It was small, but big enough that both girls could fit inside, though Idhra had to drag her delirious cousin. It creaked and drooped under the weight, but held, and soon, the wagon started to move.

Idhra could see through the wooden planks to the dirt road below, and once they passed over a stray chicken. The exit to the main road was near, and Idhra’s stomach clenched. They slowed to a stop before a line of guards, and Idhra felt the wagon shudder as Mister Macauley and his friend got off.

“Now why would you be taking goods out of the city, mister?” came a voice. “You’re going toward the farms, you know. This is where you’re supposed to sell your crops.”

“Well,” Mister Macauley said slowly, bringing out his befriland accent more than ever. Idhra frowned. It wasn’t right that the guards thought all farmers were stupid. They were just like Ylva: always teasing and showing off. But if pretending to be stupid could get them out of the city…

“Nobody here needs straw, so I was just bringing it back home. But I though maybe since I need to sell it, I might go to¾”

“That’s enough,” the guard cut in. “I don’t care where you’re selling your straw. We just need to make sure there’s nothing in it.”

Idhra tensed. If they looked through the straw, they’d see the trap door. There was a thud to her left. A spear poked through the bottom of the wagon. It was wrenched out and thrust in a different spot. She started breathing hard. It might come through the wood above her.

It did. Right over Sara’s neck. Idhra gasped. Then it came down hard right on her hip. She bit her tongue so as not to cry out in pain. But the spear hadn’t pierced her flesh, and now Idhra understood the reason for the chain mail. Still, there would be a large bruise where the spear had hit.

The guards must’ve been satisfied, for the wagon lurched, and they were off toward home. Relief flooded Idhra for a moment, before she started to wonder why Mister Macauley’d been in Valdarr, why he wanted to help her, and who his companion was.

The wagon stopped after about twenty minutes of slow riding, letting wheat stalks push through the wooden planks and brush Idhra’s nose and face. The door above her creaked open, and straw fell over her, but the sky was a welcome sight after watching the ground for so long.

“Out you go, now,” Mister Macauley’s friend growled. They were in the middle of a field, with the butcher’s shop to the near nor-east. Idhra looked at the man again: he was Þórr, the butcher. And Ylva’s father.

Ylva came skipping out the back door of the house, with her mother close behind. They waved and shouted to him, and he smiled, but raised his arm for silence.

“Someone could’ve heard us,” he said when they were all in the house.

Ylva obviously hadn’t known Idhra was there, too, because now she was pouting in a wooden chair, twirling one of her white-blonde braids around a pointer finger.

Sara was lying on the couch; her fever had risen, and Ylva’s mother was mopping her brow with a wet cloth. Sara turned over, groaned and shivered in her fevered sleep, and Idhra looked away, not wanting more to worry about. Then Mister Macauley turned towards her.

“We’re part of the Nýarr,” he said.

“Oh, not really,” Þórr argued. Mister Macauley shrugged.

“We are supporters of the Nýarr, though they won’t fully accept us in their ranks.”

“Why not?” Idhra asked.

“They’re not very trusting,” Mister Macauley explained. “We know their purpose for existing, and that is good enough, for me at least, to want to help them.

“They can’t just accept anyone that comes to them, because the number of traitors and spies would be horrendous. But if someone wants to help with their cause, they may.

“All one has to do, is find a member. And that alone can be hard enough to dissuade someone that’s not truly committed. That member speaks to others, and they find you tasks: usually ongoing ones, like to listen or watch out for certain things. And by not letting you into the entire organization, only the life of the one member is put at risk, so the entire group cannot be exterminated with one person.

“Only thoroughly trusted men are let to meet more than a handful of the Nýarr, and only once they’ve done something that clearly and completely betrays the King, may they be truly admitted into the organization. All the ranks and levels of it are unclear to me. That’s the basic idea.”

“Then there aren’t a lot of people in it,” Idhra said thoughtfully, “just a lot of informants.”

“Oh, no,” said Þórr. “He exaggerates a bit. There are thousands in the ranks. We belong to the thousands of disloyal subjects not among them.”

“Go sleep, dear,” Ylva’s mother mother cut in. “You must be tired. All this about the Nýarr is too much for today.”