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CHAPTER XVII

"Bless me, Father, for I have sinned," said the lad Enda.

"I know it, my son," I sighed. "Whatever possessed you to do such a thing?"

Enda knelt at my feet in the mud of the steading. His hands were tied behind his back, his face was tracked with tears and grime, and the wet snow fell on us. There are no trees in Jaeder high enough to hang a man on, but someone had fixed a beam to the peak of one of the storehouses, and we spoke in its shadow.

"It was a bonny knife, and the man has many knives. I only thought it would be pleasant to carve something with such a knife, and sell it maybe."

"You knew it was death for a slave to steal," I said.

"Father, don't you see—sometimes a man's got to reach for the thing he wants or he'll go mad. And if he can't—well then why not die and be done? What's the use of living this way?"

"I've pled for you with Lord Erling, but he says there's naught he can do."

"I expected nothing more, once they found the knife in my bed," said Enda. "Please hear my confession, Father."

As he recited his little sins for me the crowd grew impatient and took to murmuring. Lord Erling told them to be quiet and gave us our time. Lemming stood nearby, a coil of rope over one shoulder. Hanging was thrall's work, but Erling had had the kindness to hire the big man rather than force one of Enda's friends to do it. If Lemming felt one way or another about the job, he showed no sign.

I shrove the lad and he said to me, "One last thing I ask, Father."

"Anything."

"Pull out the thong about my neck."

I fumbled at his collar and fished up a small wooden crucifix. It wasn't expert work, but it showed promise (dear God, what a word!). It was also unfinished, Christ's feet melding into the uncarved wood at its base.

" 'Twas the thing I was working on," said Enda. "I know it's incomplete, but I'd take it as a favor if you'd wear it when I'm gone. It would be . . . as if a part of me went on in the world."

Blinking back my tears I said I'd be honored to wear his cross. Then I patted his shoulder and turned away as they strung him up. I pushed through the men and women staring up at the last struggle, and took the path down to Sola Bay. The snow, melting as fast as it hit the ground, soaked through my shoes. Still, I thought, I'm not as cold as Enda. I wanted to cry, or punch somebody. I walked along the sandy shore and watched the gray waves, and let the gray sound of them wash over my soul.

"An unpleasant business," said a voice. I turned to see Lord Erling behind me.

" `An unpleasant business,' " said I. "We'll raise a stone to the lad and carve on it, `An unpleasant business.' "

"I take no pleasure in hanging thralls," said Erling. "There's no glory in it and it's expensive. But the law's the law. For God's sake, if he'd only been patient he could have earned his freedom. Why in the name of all the saints must thralls always act like thralls? If they're my brothers, as you say, then why don't they behave with honor?"

I rounded on him and yelled in his face. "Honor! Honor is something for a man with a home, with family, with friends! You act with honor because you've a place you must go where they'll drink to you if you're brave and shame you if you're a coward. But the thralls—you drag them from their homes and their land, you pen them up with strangers in a place where all despise them, and you expect them to act with honor? Where was Enda's father, where was his uncle, to teach him honor? How can a man have honor without a clan?"

Erling sighed. "I did not make the world. If God makes some men thralls, what can I do, except treat them with the best justice I can?"

"Justice! Would you hang a free man for stealing a knife?"

"I've never heard of a free man stealing anything. I suppose his own family would kill him, out of shame."

"What if it were a woman?" I asked. "Would you hang a thrall woman for stealing too?"

"No. We'd cut an ear off her."

"And if she did it again you'd take the other ear?"

"Of course. The third time we'd take her nose. After that, she can steal as much as she likes."

"Most amusing, your law," I said, and plopped down on a wet rock.

"I'm not making it up. Actually, the law for a foreign-born thrall who steals is flaying alive. I refuse to do that."

"You're too kind."

"Answer me this then, Father. What could I have done other than what I did? Give me your counsel."

"I don't care, my lord. This morning I don't give a herring's nose about your duties, or your honor, or what you can or cannot do. I heard the confession of a lad not yet twenty, and now he's rotting meat. Pardon me for being judgmental."

Erling reached a hand out and jerked me off the stone, pulling my face up close to his. I'd never felt his strength before. My feet dangled in air.

"You are my priest," he whispered, and his face had gone red. "I found you in a slave pen and set you free. I gave you a life and I gave you honor. You've no right to speak to me that way!"

"String me up then!" I screamed back. "You're so high and mighty and righteous, you've no need of a priest anyway!"

Erling tossed me backwards onto the sand, turned and went home. I sat on an icy rock and watched the sea.

And it was thus I caught the fever that kept me in bed until nearly Christmas.

 

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Framed


Title: The Year of the Warrior
Author: Lars Walker
ISBN: 0-671-57861-8
Copyright: © 2000 by Lars Walker
Publisher: Baen Books