Sci Fi & Fantasy / Danjen, Rebel-At-Arms. Pt.3

Itia Sergis wept as she sat alone in the threadbare drawing room. It had once been a prosperous family home of which she had ruled like a queen bee. Itia had not come from much and indeed the first time she had met Danjen it had been at sword-point and she had been forced to undress for his pleasure. ‘Woe to the vanquished’ he had said as he took her in the ruins of her childhood. Itia remembered the fierce joy in his eyes at the pain he must have seen in hers. The memory always made her uneasy as it reminded her that even in the best of men there was a demon waiting to be let loose. For reasons unbeknown to her, after killing her father and brother then putting torch to their family farm, he had kept her on as a concubine.

Eventually he had begun to feel more than lust for her. Oddly, she had found that she to had grown to love him. Grown to love and depend on him so much that now he was gone and was likely to never return she was helpless before her pain. It raged inside her head like a wild animal. If it weren’t for her children she thought she would just lie down and let death take her.

From upstairs she heard the sound of her daughter crying out for attention, perhaps the child had sensed her own grief. Pulling herself together she left the room and climbed the creaking stairs. The children’s room was a spacious one, illuminated by the moonlight inside were two beds and one cot, the dressers had been emptied the previous day and packed. Baby Sorer was crying out in the night in distress, as Itia came into view the babe calmed and reached up with small grabbing fingers, wanting to be held. Itia sympathised.

She lifted the babe and held her close and then turned as she heard one of the boys get out from his bed. It was Tonech, her eldest, he reminded her so much of her own dead father it almost hurt to look at him. He would never be a tall man but he had an inner fire in his dark eyes that declared he knew what to do at all times. Before Danjen had left the army Itia had insisted nightly that he make preparations for Tonech to enter the army at officer level, she had known he would make a good one.

“Mother?”

“Sorer was weeping, go back to sleep my child”

“Aye, but why do you weep?” he said, ignoring her command.

“Your father has gone to his fate” she would give this one no illusions.

“And what fate is that?” his eyes glistened at the answer he knew he would receive

“Death and glory as he has always dreamed of” she had not meant for the bitterness to creep into her tone and so qualified it with a sad smile. The boy visibly crumpled as he had his father taken from his life, Itia hoped his grief would not mirror the vastness of her own.

“Where’s Daddy gone?” this from Danton who was still in his bed. The middle child as Danjen had called him, nine years old and already as tall as his thirteen year-old brother, everything about him was from Danjen apart from the naivety of childhood. That could never have come from a man like Danjen, he had had no time for the children when they were not trying to imitate him.

“He‘s gone away Danton dear, he will not be coming back”

“What are we going to do now mother” asked Tonech.

“In a few hours we leave the city and travel to my old family farm, we will take the servants, I have already packed your belongings”

“What about Khas? He is in no fit state to travel” Tonech sounded worried at this. Whilst Danjen’s brother had stayed at their house he had taken a liking to the man, taking him his meals each day.

“Men are coming for him, he will be taken to a safe place to recover from his wounds, now go back to sleep and I shall go and inform him” her tone brooked no argument from the boys. Itia put the now sleeping Sorer back in her cot. As she left the room she closing the heavy door silently.

Across the hall a copy of the door she had just closed stood ajar and some oil lamplight spilled out onto the darkened landing. The ornate grandfather clock in the room chimed three short times to mark the hour as she entered. He was sat up in bed reading and did not look up as she crossed the room to sit in the armchair where Danjen had sat and talked to his brother for hours as Khas was recovering.

“So he‘s gone then” he said without looking up

“You know he has, damn you and your ideas Khas, you have killed him and ruined me”

“If I know that then you must have known that he would never be content with the life you offered him, my brother was never a man to sit around whilst injustice goes on without the recourse of the law”

“You talked him into this” she said with more than a little venom.

“He talked himself into it, my injury brought the ideas he has always viewed from afar close to home. His rash decision was none of my doing, take your grief out on some other invalid. He died doing what he loved, you should take solace from that”

“He‘s not dead yet! You bastard, they should have left you in the rubble”

“I have no doubt that they should have, for then I would not have to live out the rest of my days without my legs. All that is left to me are my wits, do not insult them with your own stupidity. What he does today is what he must do, if I could stand I would be with him. As it is I have to sit here in this damn bed and wait for the news of my brothers death. All I wish is that I could give my life the way he is.”

With that he threw his book to the floor by the bed and looked her in the eyes. Itia saw the old fire, the old anger, but now it was infused with a smouldering hatred for the world around him; she knew now this man was dangerous. So scared was she by her crippled brother-in-law that she flinched as he grabbed hold of the coverlet and threw it back to reveal his twisted and grotesque legs.

“To me all men are already dead, they do what they can with their lives but in the end it is all meaningless. They strive and meander through their tiny existence, not knowing that they are trapped by this empire, guided in what to do with their lives, sometimes forced. What nobler cause can a man’s existence have other than that to challenge the pre-determined order and allow each man his own right to a life, where he is free to do with it as he pleases. Tell me that woman and I will gladly crawl after my noble brother and tell him we were wrong and that his wife is twice the brain we are put together.” He was left without breath and she saw him struggle to refill his lungs. His face had the waxy cast of the invalid but the old strength was there still and she could find no kind words for him.

After a long silence Itia said “I have told the boys you are going to be sent to a safer place to recover, agree with that if they ask you otherwise I will be unable to make Tonech leave you behind, will you do this for me?” pity and desperation filled her as she looked at the man.

“I will, now leave me to my rest woman I have a mind to wait for the bells that will herald the soldiers” She almost thought she could see her own pity mirrored in those dark eyes.

Itia left the room feeling crushed. All seemed ugly, and death seemed to dog her at every turn. All she could hope for was that it would come to her one day. She would give the children an hours or so more of sleep, then they would all leave the city at first light, apart from the bitter man Khas had become.

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