Kingdom's Fall

Chapter 9, Part 1

Kara turned in her saddle to look back at the horse and cart. When they carried the princess down the hill, Siv had climbed into the back of the cart with the unconscious girl and sat watching over her, bow in hand. Einar walked along next to the cart-horse, one hand resting lightly on the animal’s halter, and Kara had no doubt that if he wanted to stop the horse dead in its tracks all he had to do was take hold and pull. This left her and Aiden walking, until they had found the horses the priests had used. Kara had been reticent about having to ride, and the brief instruction she received hadn’t been enough to keep her from ending up bruised and sore in places she didn’t know existed. Aiden was quick to spot her discomfort, though, and with nothing to occupy him on the journey, made a patient and attentive tutor. As the cart was restricted to a slow walk, they found themselves riding in a stop-start rhythm as they halted, waiting for the others to catch up. Her horse was a black gelding, with white splashes of colour - boots, Aiden called them - marking the lower part of his front legs. She had never felt any particular inclination towards horses, as very few tended to come into the inn of an evening, but the more time she spent on his back, or leading him along, or even just watching him graze, the fonder she became of him.

Kara looked across at Aiden. He was gazing off into the distance, either lost in thought or thinking nothing at all. To Kara, the silence itched in the air between them, and it rankled her that it didn’t seem to bother him in the slightest.

“What do you think that thing was?” Kara had avoided mentioning the creature they had killed on the hilltop, afraid that Aiden would take offence at being reminded of how he’d reacted, but the question niggled at her. They had left the mess of its corpse soaking into the hillside, the ground underneath it turning black as though rotting, and never looked back.

Aiden’s face twisted for a moment as though tasting something that had spoiled. “I don’t know. Something terrible. Siv and Einar told me they’d been attacked by a creature - something the priests summoned from one of their bottles - but I didn’t think it would be like that.”

“Like something from an old story.”

Aiden blinked in confusion. “A story?”

“My father-” Kara paused, remembering Garven’s face and the look he’d given her as he died. A tremor - guilt and grief combined - bubbled up in her chest and she swallowed hard, pressing it back down. It was easy enough to keep a hold of it in the day. At night, it consumed her. The only sleep she had managed was that of exhaustion. “My father used to tell me a story about a snake that was big enough to go all the way round a hill. It could eat a man whole, he said.”

“Folk tales. He didn’t say where it came from, did he?”

Kara thought for a moment. “No, sorry. I just remember how it grew and grew. It could never stop eating.”

“What happened to it in the end?”

“Everyone was afraid it would eat them, so all the nearby villages kept bringing it food. The more it ate, the bigger it got, so the more food it needed. Eventually they started to run out of food, so they started drawing lots to see who they would have to feed to it.”

“Sounds like a nice village.”

“In the end, they didn’t need to. One of the villagers volunteered, and rode his horse right down its throat. He lit a fire inside it, and cooked the snake from the inside out.” Kara shrugged. “After that, there was plenty of food for everyone.”

Aiden sat quietly for a moment. “How did he get enough wood for the fire?”

“It’s just a story, Aiden.”

“Not anymore it’s not.”      

They lapsed into a silence that stretched out uncomfortably between them. Aiden shifted in his saddle and turned to look at the cart as it dawdled along far behind them, before turning back and looking at Kara’s horse. The animal sensed his attention, and nickered hopefully in anticipation of a treat. There had been carrots in the saddlebags, but most of them were gone after the horses had gone from person to person and discovered that Einar - the biggest and most intimidating - was a pushover. For the moment, the horses would have to do without.