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Description
--45--

In the mill camp Torvald was god, and in his own, private way, he knew that the supply was coming long before anyone arrived. He stopped all work in time for the men to put their tools away and straighten up as though it was nightfall and not noon, then marched them single file along the road that ran in front of the cabins, where he made them kneel in the mud, workers on display.

Nathaniel wondered at this show of power, unusual even for Torvald, who never let anything interrupt work, but he understood as soon as he saw Torvald's two favored men leading several strangers and a wagon with the livery and light armor of the King's own guards from a trailess stretch of the Forest several hours later. Delivery meant reporting to the King as well, and the Reporter had been among the chief guards who had accompanied the royal court on its last visit to the inn. Nathaniel's heart began to race. Discovery would mean a quick death, likely on Torvald's terms. He hung his arms at his sides and stared at the ground instead of just bowing his head as Torvald required. All the woodsmen had filthy, greasy hair closer to black than brown, and none had a spare scrap of weight on their bones. As long as Nathaniel avoided attention and eye contact, his unusual features could pass unnoticed.

"Lord Torvald," called the Reporter. From the way he approached Torvald without bowing (there was no clatter of buckles and weapons), Nathaniel guessed that Torvald was one of the least of the Lords--the upper-level guard considered him an equal.

Strangely, or so Nathaniel thought, Torvald accepted and returned the informality. "Brought me something good this time?"

"The King likes your work," the Reporter said, open and honest as an old friend. "He's sent along some wine from 'long the Road. Some of the best in Tollan, they say."

"Excellent!" Torvald rubbed his hands together in greedy delight. "And the usuals?"

"Of course."

Nathaniel heard his voice dip with displeasure before Torvald roared with laughter, just as he had the night Nathaniel arrived, and clapped the guard on the back. "Oh, don't be so sour."

"It's an awful waste," was the terse reply.

"Ah." Torvald was not bothered. "I'd sell 'em extras if I could, but John can only carry so much to market." Torvald's annoyance that John--Nathaniel knew he meant Jean--could not carry quite as much as a man was evident, and that annoyance turned toward the Reporter. "King don't know the first thing 'bout convicts," he grumbled. "Give 'em a bit and they'll take more. So you can go tell him to stop sending the unnecessaries."

It was a bold statement, one that should have earned at least a reprimand, but the guards let it pass without comment. Nathaniel balled his fists in anger, remembering that they had not been so kind to him.

"Sell 'em yourself, if you want," Torvald said, "but do it on your own time."

He stepped around the Reporter to look over the supply wagon, then turned to the line of men, kicking up dirt in front of four, including Nathaniel. "Unload," he grunted, waiting for them to scramble to their feet and get to work before returning to his conversation.

The barrels, sacks, and boxes were all heavy, and between the concentration required not to drop anything and his trips indoors, Nathaniel missed most of what was said. He cursed in his mind the silent woodsmen who would take what they heard to the grave before they filled him in. The not hearing--the not knowing--made him nervous, even afraid, more than he had been in a long time. And then, just when he began to think the Faeries or luck or whatever might favor him...

"Got forty-three still. Lost one few months ago, but we got a new one just after. Walked right in and asked--"

Nathaniel ducked inside, carried the box in his arms to the farthest corner of the store room before he set it down, and then stood, not moving, barely breathing, waiting for Torvald's inevitable call. He would want to show off the fool who had asked for work, would perhaps call him Gnat in front of the Reporter, and it would be over.

The other woodsmen shuffled around in the dim light, setting down boxes and sacks before shuffling back out. He knew he did not have long before someone--Torvald or a guard--noticed his absence, and having his name called would draw him to attention at once. He was spared the agony of a decision.

"Outta the way, ya stinkin' woodworms, let us through." Torvald almost had to double over to squeeze in through the cabin door, and the guard forgot the height of his helmet and hit his head on the lintel with a curse of surprise. Torvald laughed, clapped him on the back again, and led him to the inventory table to sit down. Nathaniel recognized the chance and ducked behind the next supply pile, then the next one, and made his way along the wall towards the door, knowing they would ignore him as long as he looked like he was doing his assigned job.

The moment he stepped out into the light, the clearing beneath the tree burst into chaos. A dropped box with no lid spilled its contents--poorly stitched sacks of rough flour--and the sound combined with the cloud that erupted from the wreckage startled the horse. Agitated, it kicked the cart and dragged it forward, pulling it into a more comfortable position. With the protective straps and coverings removed for unloading, both actions sent goods tumbling from the cart into the mud.

It all happened in a few seconds, though Nathaniel saw it so vividly that it felt like minutes. In a rare break of uniformity, the kneeling woodsmen looked up, eyes widened, some of the men close to the horse even muttered and leaned back as the horse tugged itself in their direction. Then someone a few inches shorter than him shoved Nathaniel back to his senses.

"Don't just stand there, get up! And you three-" Jean flung her arm in the general direction of the line of men "-get up and get it before it soaks in or you'll be eating mud for four months!"

Nathaniel knew better than to express his surprise that Jean could be so authoritative, and instead hurried forward into the white cloud to help the five men who Jean may or may not have selected start shoveling heaps of flour back into sacks by hand. No questions, only orders and actions. That was, after all, how everything was done at the mill.

--46--

Unable to blame the incident on a single person, Torvald led all nine flour-coated men around the back of the supply cabin, where he lined them against the wall, instructed them to strip off their shirts, and hand over their belts for individual beatings from the guards. Once the guards had gone, Torvald repeated his instructions and took his own belt to the line of bent backs. After thrashing them all in whatever order he pleased and as hard as he wanted for as long as he wished, he shrugged off the accident by saying that their clumsiness had lost them their own food.

Nathaniel was sure he would send them all back to work once the supplies were taken care of, but to his surprise and relief, Torvald pointed them in the direction of the bunkhouse and watched them go to make sure they remained quiet and in line the whole way. It was dark and dull inside, but lying on his stomach with his back torn into stinging, burning stripes, Nathaniel could have cared less.

--47--

His eyes flew open hours later to something tapping on his temple. He swatted it away only to feel a human hand. Ignoring the pain on his back, he jerked his head around and found Jean's face inches from his own.

"Come help with dinner," she whispered, then slid down the ladder and strode out the door before he could reply.

The pain had dulled to soreness, but it still made getting down the ladder difficult, and he could not help but relish taking the stairs at his own pace. A quick glance around the common room told him that Jean had taken care of everything on her own. The wooden trenchers, spoons, and knives were stacked at the heads of the tables with mugs lined up behind, the wooden serving dish that looked so much like a handled version of the inn's horse trough was full and steaming, and there stood Jean before the dying fire with her arms crossed and a serving spoon in one hand. Her pockmarked face made it difficult to read her expression, but Nathaniel guessed it was something between worry and disappointment.

"What's wrong?" he asked, though he thought he knew.

"You showed up here five days after an eighteen-year-old innkeeper's son with noble features tried to force himself upon the Princess and killed a royal guard."

Nathaniel swallowed, his mind racing as he wondered whether she would turn him in despite their slight friendship.

"I'd kind of like to know what's true and what's not."

Relief...relief so strong that it dragged him down until he sat on the steps. He could tell her everything now...he could and he would. Nathaniel took a deep breath, ready to explain at last, to finally admit how much the Princess's trickery and--even worse--his crime had been eating away at him inside... How his anxiety and fatigue were dissolving the few words that he might have said aloud until he sometimes felt as defeated and hopeless as the other woodsmen... How he had begun to realize that the work and the routine were finally toying with his mind.

"Don't tell me," Jean said fiercely when he opened his mouth. "I may want to know, but I know better than to get involved by now."

"What?" Nathaniel gasped, confused at the conversation's sudden change in direction.

"I'd rather keep you in my head the way you are. As far as I know, you're the only one who's never done anything to deserve to be here."

He swallowed hard. If the mill was full of convicts, as the Reporter had said, than he seemed to have done the King a favor by delivering himself into Torvald's hands.

"Jean...please..." He had to speak. To have a chance to confess dangled before him only to have it snatched away was cruelty, almost more than he could bear. "Just let me--"

"No." She shook her head. "I can't know. Knowing too much just brings trouble."

Nathaniel felt as though his heart had turned to lead behind his ribs, joining forces with all the things outside to bring him down. "My father said that about thinking. But it's not true," he said, his voice low as he tried to keep it steady. "It's not." The words came from somewhere deep inside of him, some desperate place clinging to his old life, to his old ways of questioning the world and thinking, trying to find answers on his own. "Please Jean... I have to talk. I need to talk." The pity that flashed across her face encouraged him to keep trying. "Jean?"

She stood there, just as she had stood when Nathaniel first came down, her eyes unreadable as she looked him over. Slowly her expression began to harden, and when she spoke, Nathaniel knew it it was finished.

"You're stronger than most of the men here. You've lasted this long, at least. But you've got to remember that Torvald and I have been here the longest, and Earth only knows how much strength that takes, especially from someone like me. Everyone here is carrying a past heavier than most people's, and even if they can't handle it and keep their selves intact, I know you can. No one needs any more trouble in their minds, and it's not because we--" She stopped and corrected herself. "It's not because I don't care, it's just because I'm trying to get by as it is."

By the time she finished, Nathaniel had his face buried in his hands on his knees, and was shivering with...with what? Fear? Disappointment? Loneliness? As he sat there drawn in on himself as though to present a smaller target to the world, he realized how pointless it was. He was sitting there, doing nothing, killing himself inside with his own thoughts--trying to ignore what he had done and lost until it overwhelmed him, when no one even cared. No one knew that he had killed a man, so no one cared. Without his home or his work he was nothing he had been before, nothing that had defined who he was beyond his own body. All of it was gone, and all that remained was...

"Nathaniel?"

He had not expected to feel her hand on his shoulder, but it did not make him start...because she was touching all that was left of him: one body and one mind containing thoughts and memories that he carried with him, where no one else could ever see. The good and the bad were inside...he could choose what he showed the world.

"Are you all right?"

He was still shaking, but it no longer felt like a lack of control...it felt like shaking off his dependence on others to decide who he was, and then from the shock at how alone it made him feel. "I-'m-- I'm fine." He raised his head at last, running his hands over his face one more time, removing the worst of his immediate fear of discovery as he did so. "I really am fine." He smiled, a weak effort after his internal struggle, but enough to satisfy Jean. She gave his shoulder a rub and a pat. "Good. Now help me get the men to dinner."

--48--
Nat and Jean took her time rousing everyone, and Jean woke the most exhausted individuals herself. They made their way downstairs whenever they felt ready, though there still was an order in the way they lined up to go down the steps.

"Sit where you like, gents," Jean called. "Torvald's night off."

The woodsmen smiled at this--something Nathaniel had never seen any of them do before--and some sighed heavily as they sat in a different place than usual, enjoying the small sound as much as the change.

Jean had only asked Nathaniel to help wake the men, but he liked the feeling that he knew what to do and was good at it, and needed no excuse or explanation as to why, so he kept working after the men had filed downstairs and taken their seats. Together he and Jean carried the serving dish of stew to the square table between the four rows, Jean produced another ladle from somewhere, and the two of them loaded and delivered the trenchers to every man instead of making them pass the food along to the end.

"Oh for goodness' sake!" Jean cried when she saw that the men were waiting to begin at the same time, as usual. "Just go ahead and eat!"

"Thank you," Behn whispered as he took up his spoon, and from then on the basic words of mealtime manners hissed like water on a hot pan whether they were necessary or not.

Jean and Nathaniel put off their own meals for a while to keep the woodsmen's mugs full of ale. Although the tiny noise increase made him feel more satisfied than he had been in a long time, Nathaniel knew that something was still missing.

"So," he said, and half the woodsmen looked up from their food when he spoke. "What's Torvald up to that we can do all this?"

More smiles, some lopsided from lack of use, and even a few tiny chuckles.

"Man drinks more than I did," said a man across the table. Jean smiled in praise and gratitude to hear him speak, and although her disfigured face would have disgusted anyone in the outside world, he turned a little pink before he ducked his head back toward his trencher. It was enough to set the room free.

"Drinks like a fish," another man agreed.
"Knocks off two days after supply," one offered.
"All the time."

Their voices were still far lower than normal, and none would speak more than a few words, but more and more took the thrilling risk to hear themselves speak again. Jean glowed and Nathaniel smiled in her direction, even if the feeling did not reach all the way to his conflicted heart.

"Gets ale for us," said a man about Torvald.
"And waters it down."
"Drinks good with them guards."
"Gets wine for his work."
"Good wine."
"King sends it."
"King likes him."
"Likes Torvald," someone clarified.
"He makes money off us."
"Money instead of blood."
"We're too bad to hang."
"Or something like that."

"And too..." The speaker could not think of the word, so others offered some up.

"Dangerous."
"Hungry."
"Useless."
"Unwanted."
"...to keep around."
"Out there, at least."
"Right, we're safe in here."
"He thinks."

Fewer, darker chuckles this time. Nathaniel frowned to see Jean so pleased with the grim conversation as he reached over to pour a little more straight ale into Behn's mug.

"Safe in Torvald's hands," Behn said bitterly as he raised his mug to his mouth. Nathaniel noticed, not for the first time, the dozens of different scars on Behn's knuckles and arms, and he wondered what crimes the man had committed to earn a sentence at the mill.

"His hands kill more than mine," one daring man muttered.
"And hurt more, too," one of his roommates said, earning a glare.

"We die without John," said the man Nathaniel recognized as the one who had tried to steal the ham.

"Some have."
"From talking too much."

Silence crushed the lightened mood. The men sat still for a long while before they took up their spoons and knives again to pick at the stew in their trenchers instead of shoveling it down as they did every day.

Nathaniel was not about to let them stop talking. "What about those two other men?"

"Ven and Karn."
"Torvald's sons."

Nathaniel jerked his head toward Jean, eyes wide with amazement, but she avoided his gaze.

"Go to the fort."
"With the guards."
"Time off for them."

"Well then," Nathaniel said, trying to contain his frustration. "Is there anyone here, other than Jean and Torvald, to keep us in place?"

They stopped moving, to a man, to a finger, the ones across the table staring at him while the others on the near side stared at their food as always.

"Guards."

"Torvald's got birds he can send to the Fortress if there's an emergency," Jean explained.

"So why don't you get rid of them? What's keeping us here?" he asked, almost at his normal voice level, which sounded like shouting. "There's forty-three of us, why don't we pick up and leave?"

Jean answered for the silent room. "Torvald would follow."
"All of us?" Nathaniel snapped.
"He'll catch you," someone muttered.
"Catch you and kill you."
"But if it was us," Nathaniel protested. "If we all ran together--"
"Nowhere to go."
"Local guards know us."
"No house would take us."
"Smell and filth."
"They'd bring us back."
"They'd know it was you."
"Only if someone told him," Nathaniel pointed out.
Almost all the men stared at him.
"He'd know," Behn said in a tone that few would dare question.
"He'd kill you slowly."
"Make you suffer first."
"Real bad."
"In front of us."
"As an example."

Nathaniel swallowed, trying to get rid of the lump in his throat along with his poisonous mixture of disappointment, anger, and pity. They were against him, all of them, but not because it was a bad idea or a crazy idea. They were all too scared, somehow, these men who were once thieves, murderers, rebels, and who knew what else, to use their numbers to their advantage, so afraid that they would not even run. Their fear kept them rooted and grew around them in vines that ensnared him as well.

"I'm gon' to eat," he muttered to Jean as he turned away from the men. He kept the pitcher in his hand. It was almost empty any way, and it had been a long time since he had tasted straight ale. With all the heaviness and pain he had felt in that one day, he felt he deserved a treat.

Description
--45--

In the mill camp Torvald was god, and in his own, private way, he knew that the supply was coming long before anyone arrived. He stopped all work in time for the men to put their tools away and straighten up as though it was nightfall and not noon, then marched them single file along the road that ran in front of the cabins, where he made them kneel in the mud, workers on display.

Nathaniel wondered at this show of power, unusual even for Torvald, who never let anything interrupt work, but he understood as soon as he saw Torvald's two favored men leading several strangers and a wagon with the livery and light armor of the King's own guards from a trailess stretch of the Forest several hours later. Delivery meant reporting to the King as well, and the Reporter had been among the chief guards who had accompanied the royal court on its last visit to the inn. Nathaniel's heart began to race. Discovery would mean a quick death, likely on Torvald's terms. He hung his arms at his sides and stared at the ground instead of just bowing his head as Torvald required. All the woodsmen had filthy, greasy hair closer to black than brown, and none had a spare scrap of weight on their bones. As long as Nathaniel avoided attention and eye contact, his unusual features could pass unnoticed.

"Lord Torvald," called the Reporter. From the way he approached Torvald without bowing (there was no clatter of buckles and weapons), Nathaniel guessed that Torvald was one of the least of the Lords--the upper-level guard considered him an equal.

Strangely, or so Nathaniel thought, Torvald accepted and returned the informality. "Brought me something good this time?"

"The King likes your work," the Reporter said, open and honest as an old friend. "He's sent along some wine from 'long the Road. Some of the best in Tollan, they say."

"Excellent!" Torvald rubbed his hands together in greedy delight. "And the usuals?"

"Of course."

Nathaniel heard his voice dip with displeasure before Torvald roared with laughter, just as he had the night Nathaniel arrived, and clapped the guard on the back. "Oh, don't be so sour."

"It's an awful waste," was the terse reply.

"Ah." Torvald was not bothered. "I'd sell 'em extras if I could, but John can only carry so much to market." Torvald's annoyance that John--Nathaniel knew he meant Jean--could not carry quite as much as a man was evident, and that annoyance turned toward the Reporter. "King don't know the first thing 'bout convicts," he grumbled. "Give 'em a bit and they'll take more. So you can go tell him to stop sending the unnecessaries."

It was a bold statement, one that should have earned at least a reprimand, but the guards let it pass without comment. Nathaniel balled his fists in anger, remembering that they had not been so kind to him.

"Sell 'em yourself, if you want," Torvald said, "but do it on your own time."

He stepped around the Reporter to look over the supply wagon, then turned to the line of men, kicking up dirt in front of four, including Nathaniel. "Unload," he grunted, waiting for them to scramble to their feet and get to work before returning to his conversation.

The barrels, sacks, and boxes were all heavy, and between the concentration required not to drop anything and his trips indoors, Nathaniel missed most of what was said. He cursed in his mind the silent woodsmen who would take what they heard to the grave before they filled him in. The not hearing--the not knowing--made him nervous, even afraid, more than he had been in a long time. And then, just when he began to think the Faeries or luck or whatever might favor him...

"Got forty-three still. Lost one few months ago, but we got a new one just after. Walked right in and asked--"

Nathaniel ducked inside, carried the box in his arms to the farthest corner of the store room before he set it down, and then stood, not moving, barely breathing, waiting for Torvald's inevitable call. He would want to show off the fool who had asked for work, would perhaps call him Gnat in front of the Reporter, and it would be over.

The other woodsmen shuffled around in the dim light, setting down boxes and sacks before shuffling back out. He knew he did not have long before someone--Torvald or a guard--noticed his absence, and having his name called would draw him to attention at once. He was spared the agony of a decision.

"Outta the way, ya stinkin' woodworms, let us through." Torvald almost had to double over to squeeze in through the cabin door, and the guard forgot the height of his helmet and hit his head on the lintel with a curse of surprise. Torvald laughed, clapped him on the back again, and led him to the inventory table to sit down. Nathaniel recognized the chance and ducked behind the next supply pile, then the next one, and made his way along the wall towards the door, knowing they would ignore him as long as he looked like he was doing his assigned job.

The moment he stepped out into the light, the clearing beneath the tree burst into chaos. A dropped box with no lid spilled its contents--poorly stitched sacks of rough flour--and the sound combined with the cloud that erupted from the wreckage startled the horse. Agitated, it kicked the cart and dragged it forward, pulling it into a more comfortable position. With the protective straps and coverings removed for unloading, both actions sent goods tumbling from the cart into the mud.

It all happened in a few seconds, though Nathaniel saw it so vividly that it felt like minutes. In a rare break of uniformity, the kneeling woodsmen looked up, eyes widened, some of the men close to the horse even muttered and leaned back as the horse tugged itself in their direction. Then someone a few inches shorter than him shoved Nathaniel back to his senses.

"Don't just stand there, get up! And you three-" Jean flung her arm in the general direction of the line of men "-get up and get it before it soaks in or you'll be eating mud for four months!"

Nathaniel knew better than to express his surprise that Jean could be so authoritative, and instead hurried forward into the white cloud to help the five men who Jean may or may not have selected start shoveling heaps of flour back into sacks by hand. No questions, only orders and actions. That was, after all, how everything was done at the mill.

--46--

Unable to blame the incident on a single person, Torvald led all nine flour-coated men around the back of the supply cabin, where he lined them against the wall, instructed them to strip off their shirts, and hand over their belts for individual beatings from the guards. Once the guards had gone, Torvald repeated his instructions and took his own belt to the line of bent backs. After thrashing them all in whatever order he pleased and as hard as he wanted for as long as he wished, he shrugged off the accident by saying that their clumsiness had lost them their own food.

Nathaniel was sure he would send them all back to work once the supplies were taken care of, but to his surprise and relief, Torvald pointed them in the direction of the bunkhouse and watched them go to make sure they remained quiet and in line the whole way. It was dark and dull inside, but lying on his stomach with his back torn into stinging, burning stripes, Nathaniel could have cared less.

--47--

His eyes flew open hours later to something tapping on his temple. He swatted it away only to feel a human hand. Ignoring the pain on his back, he jerked his head around and found Jean's face inches from his own.

"Come help with dinner," she whispered, then slid down the ladder and strode out the door before he could reply.

The pain had dulled to soreness, but it still made getting down the ladder difficult, and he could not help but relish taking the stairs at his own pace. A quick glance around the common room told him that Jean had taken care of everything on her own. The wooden trenchers, spoons, and knives were stacked at the heads of the tables with mugs lined up behind, the wooden serving dish that looked so much like a handled version of the inn's horse trough was full and steaming, and there stood Jean before the dying fire with her arms crossed and a serving spoon in one hand. Her pockmarked face made it difficult to read her expression, but Nathaniel guessed it was something between worry and disappointment.

"What's wrong?" he asked, though he thought he knew.

"You showed up here five days after an eighteen-year-old innkeeper's son with noble features tried to force himself upon the Princess and killed a royal guard."

Nathaniel swallowed, his mind racing as he wondered whether she would turn him in despite their slight friendship.

"I'd kind of like to know what's true and what's not."

Relief...relief so strong that it dragged him down until he sat on the steps. He could tell her everything now...he could and he would. Nathaniel took a deep breath, ready to explain at last, to finally admit how much the Princess's trickery and--even worse--his crime had been eating away at him inside... How his anxiety and fatigue were dissolving the few words that he might have said aloud until he sometimes felt as defeated and hopeless as the other woodsmen... How he had begun to realize that the work and the routine were finally toying with his mind.

"Don't tell me," Jean said fiercely when he opened his mouth. "I may want to know, but I know better than to get involved by now."

"What?" Nathaniel gasped, confused at the conversation's sudden change in direction.

"I'd rather keep you in my head the way you are. As far as I know, you're the only one who's never done anything to deserve to be here."

He swallowed hard. If the mill was full of convicts, as the Reporter had said, than he seemed to have done the King a favor by delivering himself into Torvald's hands.

"Jean...please..." He had to speak. To have a chance to confess dangled before him only to have it snatched away was cruelty, almost more than he could bear. "Just let me--"

"No." She shook her head. "I can't know. Knowing too much just brings trouble."

Nathaniel felt as though his heart had turned to lead behind his ribs, joining forces with all the things outside to bring him down. "My father said that about thinking. But it's not true," he said, his voice low as he tried to keep it steady. "It's not." The words came from somewhere deep inside of him, some desperate place clinging to his old life, to his old ways of questioning the world and thinking, trying to find answers on his own. "Please Jean... I have to talk. I need to talk." The pity that flashed across her face encouraged him to keep trying. "Jean?"

She stood there, just as she had stood when Nathaniel first came down, her eyes unreadable as she looked him over. Slowly her expression began to harden, and when she spoke, Nathaniel knew it it was finished.

"You're stronger than most of the men here. You've lasted this long, at least. But you've got to remember that Torvald and I have been here the longest, and Earth only knows how much strength that takes, especially from someone like me. Everyone here is carrying a past heavier than most people's, and even if they can't handle it and keep their selves intact, I know you can. No one needs any more trouble in their minds, and it's not because we--" She stopped and corrected herself. "It's not because I don't care, it's just because I'm trying to get by as it is."

By the time she finished, Nathaniel had his face buried in his hands on his knees, and was shivering with...with what? Fear? Disappointment? Loneliness? As he sat there drawn in on himself as though to present a smaller target to the world, he realized how pointless it was. He was sitting there, doing nothing, killing himself inside with his own thoughts--trying to ignore what he had done and lost until it overwhelmed him, when no one even cared. No one knew that he had killed a man, so no one cared. Without his home or his work he was nothing he had been before, nothing that had defined who he was beyond his own body. All of it was gone, and all that remained was...

"Nathaniel?"

He had not expected to feel her hand on his shoulder, but it did not make him start...because she was touching all that was left of him: one body and one mind containing thoughts and memories that he carried with him, where no one else could ever see. The good and the bad were inside...he could choose what he showed the world.

"Are you all right?"

He was still shaking, but it no longer felt like a lack of control...it felt like shaking off his dependence on others to decide who he was, and then from the shock at how alone it made him feel. "I-'m-- I'm fine." He raised his head at last, running his hands over his face one more time, removing the worst of his immediate fear of discovery as he did so. "I really am fine." He smiled, a weak effort after his internal struggle, but enough to satisfy Jean. She gave his shoulder a rub and a pat. "Good. Now help me get the men to dinner."

--48--
Nat and Jean took her time rousing everyone, and Jean woke the most exhausted individuals herself. They made their way downstairs whenever they felt ready, though there still was an order in the way they lined up to go down the steps.

"Sit where you like, gents," Jean called. "Torvald's night off."

The woodsmen smiled at this--something Nathaniel had never seen any of them do before--and some sighed heavily as they sat in a different place than usual, enjoying the small sound as much as the change.

Jean had only asked Nathaniel to help wake the men, but he liked the feeling that he knew what to do and was good at it, and needed no excuse or explanation as to why, so he kept working after the men had filed downstairs and taken their seats. Together he and Jean carried the serving dish of stew to the square table between the four rows, Jean produced another ladle from somewhere, and the two of them loaded and delivered the trenchers to every man instead of making them pass the food along to the end.

"Oh for goodness' sake!" Jean cried when she saw that the men were waiting to begin at the same time, as usual. "Just go ahead and eat!"

"Thank you," Behn whispered as he took up his spoon, and from then on the basic words of mealtime manners hissed like water on a hot pan whether they were necessary or not.

Jean and Nathaniel put off their own meals for a while to keep the woodsmen's mugs full of ale. Although the tiny noise increase made him feel more satisfied than he had been in a long time, Nathaniel knew that something was still missing.

"So," he said, and half the woodsmen looked up from their food when he spoke. "What's Torvald up to that we can do all this?"

More smiles, some lopsided from lack of use, and even a few tiny chuckles.

"Man drinks more than I did," said a man across the table. Jean smiled in praise and gratitude to hear him speak, and although her disfigured face would have disgusted anyone in the outside world, he turned a little pink before he ducked his head back toward his trencher. It was enough to set the room free.

"Drinks like a fish," another man agreed.
"Knocks off two days after supply," one offered.
"All the time."

Their voices were still far lower than normal, and none would speak more than a few words, but more and more took the thrilling risk to hear themselves speak again. Jean glowed and Nathaniel smiled in her direction, even if the feeling did not reach all the way to his conflicted heart.

"Gets ale for us," said a man about Torvald.
"And waters it down."
"Drinks good with them guards."
"Gets wine for his work."
"Good wine."
"King sends it."
"King likes him."
"Likes Torvald," someone clarified.
"He makes money off us."
"Money instead of blood."
"We're too bad to hang."
"Or something like that."

"And too..." The speaker could not think of the word, so others offered some up.

"Dangerous."
"Hungry."
"Useless."
"Unwanted."
"...to keep around."
"Out there, at least."
"Right, we're safe in here."
"He thinks."

Fewer, darker chuckles this time. Nathaniel frowned to see Jean so pleased with the grim conversation as he reached over to pour a little more straight ale into Behn's mug.

"Safe in Torvald's hands," Behn said bitterly as he raised his mug to his mouth. Nathaniel noticed, not for the first time, the dozens of different scars on Behn's knuckles and arms, and he wondered what crimes the man had committed to earn a sentence at the mill.

"His hands kill more than mine," one daring man muttered.
"And hurt more, too," one of his roommates said, earning a glare.

"We die without John," said the man Nathaniel recognized as the one who had tried to steal the ham.

"Some have."
"From talking too much."

Silence crushed the lightened mood. The men sat still for a long while before they took up their spoons and knives again to pick at the stew in their trenchers instead of shoveling it down as they did every day.

Nathaniel was not about to let them stop talking. "What about those two other men?"

"Ven and Karn."
"Torvald's sons."

Nathaniel jerked his head toward Jean, eyes wide with amazement, but she avoided his gaze.

"Go to the fort."
"With the guards."
"Time off for them."

"Well then," Nathaniel said, trying to contain his frustration. "Is there anyone here, other than Jean and Torvald, to keep us in place?"

They stopped moving, to a man, to a finger, the ones across the table staring at him while the others on the near side stared at their food as always.

"Guards."

"Torvald's got birds he can send to the Fortress if there's an emergency," Jean explained.

"So why don't you get rid of them? What's keeping us here?" he asked, almost at his normal voice level, which sounded like shouting. "There's forty-three of us, why don't we pick up and leave?"

Jean answered for the silent room. "Torvald would follow."
"All of us?" Nathaniel snapped.
"He'll catch you," someone muttered.
"Catch you and kill you."
"But if it was us," Nathaniel protested. "If we all ran together--"
"Nowhere to go."
"Local guards know us."
"No house would take us."
"Smell and filth."
"They'd bring us back."
"They'd know it was you."
"Only if someone told him," Nathaniel pointed out.
Almost all the men stared at him.
"He'd know," Behn said in a tone that few would dare question.
"He'd kill you slowly."
"Make you suffer first."
"Real bad."
"In front of us."
"As an example."

Nathaniel swallowed, trying to get rid of the lump in his throat along with his poisonous mixture of disappointment, anger, and pity. They were against him, all of them, but not because it was a bad idea or a crazy idea. They were all too scared, somehow, these men who were once thieves, murderers, rebels, and who knew what else, to use their numbers to their advantage, so afraid that they would not even run. Their fear kept them rooted and grew around them in vines that ensnared him as well.

"I'm gon' to eat," he muttered to Jean as he turned away from the men. He kept the pitcher in his hand. It was almost empty any way, and it had been a long time since he had tasted straight ale. With all the heaviness and pain he had felt in that one day, he felt he deserved a treat.