Chapter 1367: A bloody penny(6)

Unlike the rapt silence that had greeted Vilon’s tale, the tavern went right on with its own noisy business as the drunkard spoke. The locals had likely heard the man’s ramble a hundred times over, but for Vilon, it was a first.

And this time, it was the knight’s turn to find himself utterly speechless.

Vilon had always supposed a story like that was simply one of many. He had never given the matter deep thought; in his mind, it was merely a man’s duty to serve his lord, whether through the sweat of his brow or the shedding of his blood in war. He had never truly possessed a home to lose, but even so, he could sympathize with the hollow, terrifying void of discovering that everything you loved had been reduced to cinders.

He had felt a shadow of that same agony when he had briefly considered leaving Owen behind with his family. That had been harrowing, realizing you had finally found someone to care for and that would care for you, only to remember that the world was inherently cruel, and that expecting anything different was nothing short of your own damn fault.

In the end, all Vilon could manage from the ache in his chest was a few quiet words of comfort.

"I am sorry for what happened to you," Vilon said softly, understanding now the bitter roots of the man’s appetite for wine. Who was he to judge?

The man’s bloodshot, yellowed eyes slowly rose to meet the knight’s.

"It was a bloody, senseless war," Vilon continued, his voice low. "Driven by the vanity of high lords who could have brought us peace far sooner had they not been blinded by their own pride. What was done to you, and to so many others, was a grave injustice. You have my sympathy."

They were light, feeble words, far too frail to carry the weight of such ruin. Vilon had not expected them to mend anything, but he certainly hadn’t anticipated the wild, wet splutter of laughter that erupted from the drunkard’s throat.

"Befell me?" the man cackled, clutching his belly as if Vilon had delivered the grandest joke of the evening. "Befell me?!"

Vilon frowned, wondering if the creature before him was truly mad. "Aye. What befell you."

"When in the five hells did I ever say that story was about me?"

The tavern seemed to tilt slightly on its axis.

"...What?" Vilon blinked.

"All those things... the boy? The march? The mule?" Vilon pressed, his mind racing. He glanced around the taproom, but the farmhands were merely drinking their ale and ignoring them both. Was this some elaborate, cruel local prank?

"At the end of the story, the stupid boy proved himself even dumber than I thought and hanged himself from a low oak branch," the drunkard said, winking maliciously. "What a complete fool. He lost his appetite to learn, forgetting that every single day a man draws breath is a new lesson."

Vilon felt himself reduced to a broken parrot. "What?"

"Oh aye, he strung himself up from a tree!" the man chirped, waving his greasy cup in the air. He made a dangling gesture with his tongue out. "So along I came, scooped up his fine wool coat, took his boots, claimed his mule for my own, and set myself to work, learning from his mistakes, you might say! Found ample, profitable work right here in the ashes of Oizen." He took a long, merry swig of his wine, his crooked yellow teeth gleaming. "I am the only man in this entire village with a working mule, so I’m the only one who gets paid to haul goods to the surrounding towns! And then all the silver I make, I bring right back here to drink with this fine, noble company!"

He raised his cup in a grand toast to the room, but not a single patron acknowledged the gesture.

"I always love telling that story," the man grinned, leaning closer, "for in a way, it is mine! There is always gold trailing behind broken people, ser, whether they broke others or broke themselves! Bah!"

A wave of sudden, violent disgust washed over Vilon. He wanted out of this tavern, out of this village, and far away from this wretched creature. He made a sharp motion for Owen to rise, but as the knight pushed back from the bench, the drunkard scrambled up with surprising speed, throwing his filthy, gaunt-framed body directly between Vilon and his squire.

"Hey, hey! Hold your horses, ser!" the man urged, planting a hand flat against the center of Vilon’s armored chest. "I still have a secret to tell you. I swear on the gods it’s worth your while!"

Vilon’s hand rose, deeply misliking the touch of those greasy fingers on his iron plate. "You can keep your secret to yourself," the knight growled, almost wondering if he should hit him. "I don’t want to hear another word out of your mouth."

He had been made a fool of.

"You fool! Have you learned absolutely nothing from my story?" The man’s grin vanished instantly, replaced by a dark, intense sternness. "How is your own tale ever going to prosper if you insist on remaining stupid?"

Vilon’s jaw tightened. His father had called him stupid nearly every day of his youth. He misliked the word even more than he misliked the man standing before him.

"I have already told my story," Vilon said coldly.

"No," the drunkard said, his voice dropping into a hard, razor-sharp register that belied his slurred speech. "Neither your story nor the lad’s is over. I dare say they haven’t even bloody begun!"

"What could a creature like you possibly know about my life?"

"A great deal of things!" the man barked, exasperated, as if answering a question he had been forced to address a hundred times before. "And I know enough to admit there are still a thousand things I do not know! I am stupid, perhaps the stupidest, most ignorant bastard walking this dirt since it formed , but I am still infinitely wiser than the arrogant fools who do not grasp their own ignorance, for they will never learn a damn thing! And I know, with absolute certainty, that the greatest Chapters of your lives are still waiting ahead of you!’’

There was something in the madman’s piercing gaze, a strange, magnetic conviction, that compelled Vilon to stay his hand. He took a slow breath.

"And what, pray tell, is this great secret of yours?"

The man smiled, puffing out his chest with the insufferable pride of a street preacher who had finally cornered a willing ear. "Down the road, a few leagues back, there was once a prosperous village. Like so many others during the war, it was reduced to black ash." He cast his eyes down in a brief, mock-mournful pause before snapping his fingers and brightening up again. "But it is being rebuilt! Food is being hauled in, the fields are being plowed, and the soil is coming back to life!"

"I see..." Vilon murmured. He did not see the point at all.

"And near that village, there is a winding creek," the drunk continued, leaning in until his breath reeked of sour wine. "Very similar to the one running through our own hamlet, feeding into a small river. The local women , or at least those that will have home there, go down there every evening to wash the road dust from their skirts."

"And...?"

"...And sometimes," the man whispered, winking slyly, "they strip off those skirts and take a bath."

"That is quite enough," the knight growled, stepping forward and shoving the man back an arm’s length.Fault himself for having stopped to listne more. "I have had a bellyful of you and your twisted games. You can keep your room. I wouldn’t sleep in your bed if you paid me in gold."

"But that is where your story needs to go, ser!" the drunk shouted, unbothered by the shove.

"Peeping at washing-women in a creek?!" Vilon spat, his face darkening with anger. "That is where my story needs to go?"

"Yes!"

"Then that is a tale not worth living, let alone telling."

"All stories are worth telling, and all stories are worth making!"

"Then go make a proper one of your own," Vilon snapped, reaching down to grab Owen by the shoulder, "and try finding one that doesn’t start with robbing a fresh corpse!"

"I can’t," the man said softly, his voice suddenly drained of all its theatrical bombast. "My story is already over. All I can do now is sit in the dark and listen to others’."

"I thought you said every living day was a lesson?" Vilon countered, lingering at the threshold of the booth. "Surely some of those lessons make for a decent story."

"Not for me. Not anymore."

The man crept half a step closer, his trembling, dirty hand reaching out to grab the thick wool edge of his own brown cloak. Vilon raised an arm, ready to knock the drunkard into the wall if he tried to touch him again, but the man didn’t get closer as if he already knew what the knight was intending.

Instead, with a single, sweeping motion, he pulled the heavy fabric aside, throwing back his cloak to expose what lay beneath.

Vilon froze, his breath catching in his throat. Beside him, Owen let out a confused grunt, he could not see behind him. Nor did Vilon allow him.

How in the name of the five gods could this be?

"Who are you?" Vilon breathed, his voice barely a rasp.He took a step back.

"That is not important," the man said, his voice dropping into a cadence that was unnervingly steady for a drunk. "What is important is for you to follow your path. The right one. To that creek. Recall my words, ser. Learn from them. Yours will be a hard, bloody road, but that is what was written for you, and that is what is expected.And above all it is what you will do! "

He let out a long, hollow sigh, whispering in a tone so low Vilon could scarcely catch it over the crackle of the hearth. "I hope I shall learn from you, as well."

The man snapped his cloak shut, burying himself back beneath the ragged cloth. He turned his head toward the counter, and only then did Vilon notice that the entire tavern had gone dead silent again, every eye glued to them.

"Old bitch!" the man bellowed, his theatrical swagger returning in a heartbeat. "Give my room to Ser Vilon and his squire! I shall be taking to my own road tonight!"

"Do whatever the fuck you want," the mistress of the tavern barked back, slamming a wooden plate onto the shelf. "Hopefully some bandits will catch you out in the ditch and rid me of your sour mug for good."

"Well then! Perhaps I’ll learn something new from them!" He turned to face the entire room, spreading his broad, filthy hands wide. "And if I do, I’ll be sure to come back and share it with every last one of you! It is a wondrous, glorious thing to always know a bit more than you did yesterday!"

"And why the fuck should any of us care about that?!" a voice shouted from the back.

The man turned toward the heckler, a broad, pale-yellow grin stretching across his face. "Knowledge is its own reward, I fear."

he sniffed and said this time in a smaller voice ’’Though it is not a gift of many. And it is getting of fewer’’

And with that, he swung his heavy cloak back over his shoulder, and hopped-shuffled toward the threshold with swift speed. He was shouldering his way through the heavy oak door when Vilon finally snapped out of his trance and called out.

There were a thousand burning questions roaring in the knight’s chestl,about the war, about the hag in the woods who he now thought the man had something to do. But in his shock, the words that left his throat were the most foolish of all.

"Who are you?!"

The man did not reply. He didn’t even bother to turn his head. He simply pushed through into the cool evening air.

Vilon bolted after him, his iron boots thundering against the floorboards as he burst out into the dirt lane.

"Who are you?!" Vilon demanded again, his voice echoing along the quiet timber houses of the hamlet.

"Nobody," the man called back, continuing his rhythmic, lurching stride down the road without stopping. The last dying rays of the sunset stretched his long, warped shadow across the mud like a giant’s. "I am who I have always been, ser, a nobody who knows nothing. And yet, for that very reason, I know a bit of everything, and I search for the rest. Always remember, Vilon: knowledge is its own reward.Be one of the few!"

The knight stood frozen in the middle of the road, watching the solitary figure hobble into the bruised crimson twilight. For a beat, every instinct in his body screamed at him to give chase, to grab the bastard by his cloak and demand real answers.

But his boots remained glued to the dirt. Deep down, in the quiet dark of his soul, he knew that following the shadow was not what he was meant to do.

Then what in the five hells am I supposed to do? the knight asked himself.

He stared down the empty highway, the man’s final, absurd words ringing over and over in his mind like a striking bell.

A creek.

And beside them roared other words.

Go forth and be a good knight.