Rune mage

Chapter 47: Forgotten

We were not actually forgotten.

A week after we expected our men to return, a single cart was spotted struggling to get through the snow. I watched as three familiar figures worked to help the heavily haired ox and the over packed wagon through the deep snow.

I pushed heat into the stones at the base of the fort, hoping it would at least help. What I wanted though was for the path, lined with stones and covered in runes, to welcome my men back.

They could have abandoned us. Could have sent someone with supplies and gone on with their lives. My heart, so shrouded in darkness, lifted and my magic responded. It unfurled, past the dampening rune and through the fort to welcome my men. The snow began to melt on the path. And unbidden my men began to sing a song of welcome. Their voices filling the walls with such a sound I wished I could capture it.

So I did. I pulled out a pre marked stone and placed it on the wall and let my power flow as my men lifted their voices and welcomed their brothers home.

By the time their cart and oxen arrived, it felt like a festival.

We gathered and helped unload the wagon.

The oxen was content to eat hay, something we had had little use for until now.

They brought another cat, a pitch black male happy to chase after the matriarch of the fort.

They brought grain and flour and dried meats, beans and even a small keg of ale. They had for us blankets and hats. And even some seeds that were labeled prickly berry bush.

There was a mountain of supplies that left me flabbergasted.

"You came back?" I managed to ask Longslim.

He shrugged even as he smiled. "Thing of it is sir, no one in that village died this year from fighting. They said that usually at least a small party of the enemy slip past and they are the first village on the road. When we told them all that had happened, they had already started to collect items from everyone, so that no one have more than they could spare."

"But then they asked about the runes on our faces," Carver stepped in and added. "And we showed them the mage torch, and offered wellness runes to their old and frail. That's how we ended up with an oxen to pull the wagon. We are invited back when supplies run low."

"And," whistler said softly, "if ever there is another babe. That story... they were tight lipped about that but I'm pretty sure they have seen that tactic before with their own being taken."

I took a deep breath in. "Well done. Well done."

And then I walked away, mind already on trade opportunities the village might appreciate.

"Do you want us to save you some ale?" Longslim dared ask.

"Please," I said.

"Commander, sir," Carver said.

I stopped and turned.

"They had no specific news, but everything they have heard, the war moved further south after they tried our pass and failed with the major assault. The war continues."

I had of course suspected as much. The war always continued. We had been generations at war.

With the battlefield focused further south, it was likely we had been forgotten. Still, I had sent messages now, through the village. Someone would read them and remember us.

I hoped.

In the mean time perhaps we could work with that tiny village. I was already planning trades.

"Sir," Carver stepped to my side and gave me a small object.

Then he walked away.

A small carving was wrapped in parchment. I took it to my study and sat it on the desk. Carefully I unraveled the figure.

The parchment was the old kind, thick and clearly made by pressing pulp through cloth and drying it flat. No magic made this page.

I read the careful script.

"We loved him as our son. You loved him as a brother. His name was Ryan Olsao Smithson. Will you write his name upon his stone, so that when we can one day safely do so, we may say our proper farewells?"

The figure was not wood as I had first thought. It was made of metal and so intricate I could see his features.

My first emotion was anger. How dare they remind me! How dare they give me his likeness and force me to feel that pain again!

But then their words captured my angered gaze and I saw. They were new to the grief. They were his parents and they had just learned their child would never grow to adulthood. They would never see him home again. He sat under dirt and rock a short ride from home but would never return.

I wanted to rage at them.

I wanted to.

But I didn't. Because they had earned their grief more than I had. They had held him as a babe and rocked him and sang to him. They had hopes for him for more years than I had.

So I gently set the figure aside. Maybe I could rune it so that it held that feeling of steadfastness that he had had for me. I wasn't sure how I could do that, yet.

I tucked away the paper with his name. Then pulled it out and put it under the figure so I wouldn't lose it.

The sound of cheer from my men brought me passing joy. I stood and walked to stand in my doorway, listening to them.

I reached out to the stone and pulsed power through it. "Remember," I said. "This brotherhood, this welcome. Remember it."

I wasn't sure if I was praying that I would remember or hoping or begging. I wasn't sure why I engaged my power. I just wanted to remember their joy.

Then I went about making plans for trade items.

If the kingdom forgot about us, perhaps we could help ourselves.

And it was this thought that led me to spending my winter nights creating stockpiles of stones and mage torches, charms and refuse squares.

The kingdom may have forgotten us, but we would not go quietly into oblivion.