Chapter 12: Part One - Chapter Twelve - Steading

Steading

2nd Day of Harvest

757 Karloman’s Peace

‘Alright, take them in!’ Aldedramnus bellowed from atop his horse.

His voice carried down the grassy hill, echoing across the grazing fields. A few hundred metres away, Audomar directed a team of mounted farmhands, steering two hundred head of cattle from one pasture to the next. With harvest dawning, the entire estate was focused on ensuring their herds were well-fed.

Harvest was not the cattle farmer’s season. As crop prices plummeted, people turned away from meat products, opting for the cheaper alternative.

For the cattle farmer, however, this was a time of fattening.

When winter arrived and crops became scarce, the demand for meat and animal fats would skyrocket, allowing the Reubkes to rake in profits. Thus, their family’s prosperity was dependent on how well the farm was managed during harvest, and the Reubke family laboured under the direction of the newly returned Audomar.

From atop the hill, Ekkehard waited alongside his brothers, Evroul and Aldedramnus.

Aldedramnus, the most experienced farmer among the three, guided the workers below, keeping a watchful eye for straying cattle. Meanwhile, Evroul assisted and learned from Aldedramnus.

Ekkehard, however, was little more than a shadow, a silent spectator on the hill.

Ekkehard had never had much taste nor talent for the rearing of animals. Despite having grown up on the farm, it had not been part of his education. That was Audomar’s domain. As the firstborn, and with the war over, the farm estate was now his, as it was always meant to be, and he had returned to his calling.

Ekkehard, on the other hand, was raised in robes, intended for the priesthood. That future was no longer tenable, and he found himself lingering without purpose in a place that was never meant to be his home for this long. To make matters worse, his family had little sympathy for his unwelcome decision to break his oath to faith and doctrine and for two seasons, Ekkehard had struggled to find his place, and sometimes he wondered if he should leave the estate and search for a new beginning elsewhere.

‘Argh, see that!’ Aldedramnus exclaimed, leaning over and giving Evroul a slap on the arm. His brother’s exclamation broke Ekkehard’s reverie, and he turned his attention back to the events below. After all, he was supposed to be learning about farm life, just like young Evroul.

Aldedramnus pointed to a side of the herd where a group of cattle was starting to veer off. ‘They need to keep their spacing tighter, they're leaving too much room for a break off.’

‘It’s okay,’ Evroul said, pointing to the head of the herd, ‘Audomar’s already on it.’

Although the words were lost in the wind, Audomar’s authoritative bark carried up the hillside. The eldest Reubke commanded the farmhands and his siblings to redirect the dividing herd back into a single unit. Ekkehard watched as two riders spurred their horses to get ahead of the wandering stem and guide it back into the main body of the cattle.

‘That’s better,’ Aldedramnus exhaled with relief. ‘Once they get them in the pen, we will be done for the morning. But you see, you two, that’s why a spotter is important. From up here, we can see what the herd is up to sooner than if we were down there.’

Evroul nodded eagerly in agreement with his brother.

‘I understand the benefit of a vantage point, Aldedramnus,’ Ekkehard muttered in a snide tone. Ekkehard’s younger brothers regularly spoke to him as if they knew better than he, and it was becoming increasingly difficult for him to bite his tongue when they did. After all, he was their elder, the best educated of them all and a veteran. He wasn’t some clueless peasant that needed to be taught basic agriculture.

The exasperated look on Aldedramnus’ face sent a shot of guilt down Ekkehard’s spine, and as usual, he regrated his words and tone. Ekkehard was making a habit of regretful barbs at his family, and he ought to do something about it. He locked eyes with Aldedramnus and thought of apologising; however, he didn’t, fearing that anything he said would seem insincere.

‘Well,’ Aldedramnus continued after a few awkward moments, ‘anyway, you might as well head on back,’ he said to Evroul, ‘go and help mother prepare for our guest. Me and Ekkehard can handle it from here.’

Evroul’s gratitude was palpable. He was somewhat socially awkward at the best of times, and Ekkehard’s brooding did nothing to make his brother more comfortable. Without hesitation, Evroul pulled the reins and trotted down the hill toward the Reubke family manor.

Ekkehard chewed on the inside of his cheek as he and Aldedramnus waited for their younger brother to be out of earshot. Ekkehard knew the only reason Aldedramnus had sent Evroul away, was so he could attempt another heart-to-heart talk.

This had become a habit of Aldedramnus, who, for some reason Ekkehard didn’t understand, seemed to think it was his role to mend Ekkehard’s tortured spirits. That annoyed Ekkehard. After all, he had spent his life studying holy scripture and philosophy, while Aldedramnus had spent his with cows. What sage wisdom did Aldedramnus think he had that Ekkehard wouldn’t already know?

‘So,’ Aldedramnus began, ‘what is bothering you today, brother?’

Aldedramnus’ dismissive tone irked Ekkehard, and he clenched his jaw to bite back the spite he might otherwise have released. ‘You know very well what is bothering me,’ Ekkehard said after a moment's pause.

Aldedramnus did know, of course. Their whole family knew that Ekkehard would be irritable today, as he had been many times since his return from the war. What angered Ekkehard, however, was that his family always seemed surprised that he was annoyed on days like this, like they hadn’t played a hand in it at all.

‘Yes, I do,’ Aldedramnus replied. ‘Mother has invited Abbot Ren to join us for supper again,’ he continued with a shrug. ‘What of it? It is not the first time the Teacher has graced us with his presence.’

‘It seems the Teacher graces our dinner table more than his own temples these days,’ Ekkehard grunted.

‘And what if he does?’

Ekkehard bristled at that question.

‘Is it really that terrible for our family to receive so much spiritual guidance?’ Aldedramnus continued. ‘Can you really blame our widowed mother for seeking solace in the scripts?’

‘She isn’t seeking solace in anything!’ Ekkehard snapped. ‘She’s just trying to push me into taking vows.’

‘Can you blame her, though?’ Aldedramnus asked, unfazed by Ekkehard’s harsh tone. ‘Breaking oaths isn’t something people do often Ekkehard, and it has caused our mother no end of grief in a time when she could do with less of it.’

Ekkehard grunted. There was no point in arguing this with Aldedramnus. He wouldn’t understand.

Only Audomar really understood why Ekkehard had forsaken his oaths to the Faith, as he alone had witnessed what Ekkehard had experienced. Yet, Audomar seemed more focused on pretending the war had been a grand adventure of tall tales, rather than acknowledging the ordeal it had really been. Ekkehard couldn’t understand how Audomar could do that, and it pained him to admit it, but Ekkehard feared he was simply weaker than his elder.

Aldedramnus, on the other hand, had been too young when the war began and had been protected from it, just like the rest of Ekkehard’s siblings. There was no one on the estate with whom Ekkehard could speak honestly.

When Ekkehard didn’t respond, Aldedramnus shook his head.

‘Brother,’ Aldedramnus began in a tone that Ekkehard expected his sibling mistakenly thought was sympathetic rather than patronising. ‘You have to try and see it from mother’s point of view. Before the war, you loved scripture, you loved the gods. You and father would stay up into the early hours having moral debates and competitions in theological analysis. You loved nothing more than discussing those dusty pages until everyone, but father, had left the room.

‘You were a young boy, wide-eyed and full of wonder and excitement. A boy who cared for others and spoke passionately of his future in service to doctrine. One who bravely went along at his father’s side when the war began, so that you could better learn how to tend to the souls of man. A caring lad with a broad smile and an open heart. That is who our mother said goodbye to all those years ago.

‘Yet, she has welcomed back into her home someone entirely different. A grim young man with no passions or joy. She worries that the war took more than just our father from her; she worries it has killed your soul too.’

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Aldedramnus turned and fixed is gaze on Ekkehard, as if to emphasise his final words.

‘She merely hopes that the Abbot will remind you of the boy you used to be,’ he continued, ‘and in those memories, she hopes you will find the son she has lost.’

Ekkehard tutted with derision at his brother’s melodramatic hypothesis. He considered the naivety of Aldedramnus’ argument for a second and thought that it might have even been enjoyable to burst his brother’s bubble. Yet, things were difficult enough as it was, and he needed no further bad blood with his family.

‘I still love the gods,’ Ekkehard said to his younger brother, ‘I just doubt they love me anymore.’

Before his brother could respond, Ekkehard urged his horse forward and began the slow journey down the hillside. ‘Come,’ he called to his younger brother as he descended, ‘looks like Audomar and the others are finished for the day.’

As afternoon turned to evening, the entire Reubke family, except for Ekkehard, hosted Abbot Ren for supper in one of the estate’s grander receiving rooms. All the Reubke family except for Ekkehard, that is.

Ekkehard chose to spend the evening upstairs in his room, figuring it best to spare his family from another awkwardly silent meal. He remained upstairs until late, waiting for the sky to darken before venturing down to the kitchens to scavenge for leftovers.

As Ekkehard made his way down the stairway, one of the side doors of the blue and white-walled vestibule opened. His mother was showing the Abbot to his room. Ekkehard’s heart seized, and he quickly attempted to turn back up the stairs; however, he was already halfway down and it was too late to escape the encounter that would surely follow.

‘Young master Ekkehard,’ he heard Abbot Ren address him as he tried to escape. ‘I’m glad to see you’re feeling better.’

Ekkehard sighed and turned to look down the stairs at his mother and the Abbot. The trio were caught in an awkward standoff.

The Abbot wore his formal harvest robes, a tightly cut ensemble of amber with apricot embroidery bound by a luxurious saffron sash. The back depicted naked women frolicking in a wood, enjoying a bountiful banquet of wines and fruits. Standing at the bottom of the stairs he looked up at Ekkehard with his usual condescendingly blank expression.

Ekkehard’s mother, on the other hand, wore a fine yellow dress robe with a white trim and cuffs. The luxury of her dress contrasted the expression of pleading plastered on her face.

‘Your mother was just telling me,’ the haughty-sounding priest began, ‘of your struggles finding a place here on the farm.’

The Abbot had barely spoken two sentences before prying into Ekkehard’s private affairs. The man had no tact or subtlety, and Ekkehard despised him for it. Priests were meant to approach their flock with comfort and empathy, helping them open up without feeling pressured. They were not meant to clumsily push their charges further away. Ekkehard thought Ren an embarrassment to the Faith and a poor student of the Doctrine.

Ekkehard gritted his teeth and clenched his jaw. He raised his chin and looked down at the priest as the old fool continued to speak.

‘I remember you enjoyed your apprenticeship at the temples in your youth,’ the priest continued. ‘We had discussed whether you would find it beneficial to winter in the city and work again in the scriptorium. You could help make fresh copies of the holy words and perhaps find comfort in their lessons. What do you say to that?’

Ekkehard looked from the priest to his mother, who gazed back with desperate eyes. She must think that pathetic expression was enough to guilt Ekkehard into following a path that was no longer suited to him.

He felt bile build in his throat as he struggled to contain his anger. After a deep inhale of breath, however, he composed himself and began to descend the stairs, keeping his back straight, his chest broad, and his fists clenched by his sides.

As he went, Ekkehard replied to the priest. ‘As I have told you before, “Teacher,” I have no intention of joining you at the temple. Not this winter, not next, nor any other that comes after. I would, however, be most grateful if you would endeavour to remember that fact, should you come to drink us out of house and home again.’

Ekkehard smirked as he savoured the look of offence on their faces. Ekkehard’s mother quickly turned and tried to apologise for his conduct, but the priest silenced her with a raised hand.

‘Young man,’ Ren responded, ‘I know the war was difficult for you, as it was for many others. It is no excuse, however, for the dereliction of duty and disregard of oaths sworn. Your absence from the House of Karloman will be noted.’ Ren pouted his lips and nodded as if he had made some impenetrable intellectual point.

‘Funny,’ Ekkehard replied, ‘the only noteworthy absence I recall is yours on the front lines for the last decade.’

‘Boy!’ the Abbot bellowed, ‘I am Abbot of the Faith, a Teacher for the Saved, a Student of the House of Karloman. I am a man of peace, and you know that full well. I will not have you call me a coward.’

‘Our Lady Summer,’ Ekkehard began, quoting the scripts which he knew and understood far better than the Abbot did, ‘grants us men the power for immeasurable violence, so that we may learn how not to be.’

Ekkehard let the holy words hang in the air before stepping closer and squaring up to the priest. Ekkehard’s broad frame dwarfed the smaller, frailer man.

‘Karloman’s own words,’ Ekkehard continued. ‘When his descendants called, I took up the sword. When the war was done, I put it away. You, however, feared the sword. I am a peaceful man; you are just a harmless one.’

Abbot Ren’s eyes dropped, and his timid nature finally rose to the surface as he shrank away from Ekkehard.

‘Ekkehard!’ his mother shouted, stepping between her son and the priest as she pushed him back. ‘How dare you speak to a guest in such a manner under my roof.’ She slapped Ekkehard, and all of the bluster and bravado fled from him.

His cheek stung as if struck by a barbed bludgeon, and his mouth hung agape.

Suddenly, he was a little boy again, and his mother was angry at him.

Tears threatened to spill from his eyes and Ekkehard quickly darted towards the vestibule’s side door and headed for the kitchen. As he left, he heard his mother profusely apologising to the Abbot.

Ekkehard rushed through the rooms and hallways of the estate until he pushed through the door of the kitchen. He went immediately to the back corner of the room where shelves of raw foodstuffs, such as fruits, vegetables, and bread, were stored. He did not take any, however, and instead griped the countertop beneath it digging his fingertips into the wood. He took deep breaths and tried to calm his racing heart, the sting of his mother’s hand still burning hot against his cheek.

Just as he managed to stem the welling tears and compose himself, he heard the door open and close behind him.

‘Do you feel clever?’ his mother asked him.

Ekkehard didn’t turn to face her but closed his eyes and braced himself for what was to come.

‘I bet you do,’ she continued, ‘because you are, you know. You have always been clever. Your father saw it from when you were just a boy. That’s why he picked you for this life. He knew it would be good for you, to put that mind to use helping others understand this world.

‘What do you think he would say if he saw you using that intellect to belittle a guest in his home? Hmm?’ His mother let the question hang for a moment, as if she actually expected him to answer. ‘I’ll tell you what I think he’d say,’ she continued when she saw no answer was coming, ‘he’d say you were the coward, not the Abbot. He’d think you a little boy playing at being a man. Letting down his family and making his mother, who broke her back raising him, a pariah among her peers.’

Could she not let this go, Ekkehard thought to himself, and he clenched his fists and pressed his knuckles into the wooden surface of the countertop. Could she not see what he had become? He was a killer, a soldier who had slaughtered so many, and she still imagined him a gentle boy, fit to care for the troubles of others. Did she not understand what he was?

‘That is what we have become,’ his mother continued relentlessly in her barrage. ‘Pariahs. People look at us and they know that our family’s oath is broken. That you have turned your back on the Faith and Doctrine. They think us godless. In the city, old friends avoid me in the street and whisper behind my back. Well, I have had enough of it and it’s time you took some responsibility.’

‘I have taken my share of responsibility, mother!’ Ekkehard shouted as he spun to face her. The offended him too much to let it lie. ‘I was responsible for more than any man ever should be. There is blood on my hands mother.’

‘You think that makes you big, do you?’ his mother spat back without hesitation.

Her misunderstanding of his words angered him further. How dare she think he was boasting.

‘It doesn’t,’ she continued, ‘just because you killed people doesn’t mean you can do whatever you want now. It isn’t impressive, and it isn’t something to be proud of.’

‘I am not proud of it, mother!’ he bellowed, his voice filling the room and shaking his mother's resolve for a moment. She stepped back, if only an inch, before squaring her shoulders.

‘I killed people,’ Ekkehard began, his eyes darting away from his mother’s and coming to rest upon the floor. ‘Not just soldiers, but…’ Ekkehard lost his voice, unable to speak the shame that plagued him out loud.

His mother, at last, seemed to recognise the hardship Ekkehard was going through, and stayed quiet, letting him speak.

‘I went through all of that,’ Ekkehard continued in a croaked voice, ‘and more. The only thing that kept me going was dreams of home. Of coming home and forgetting what we had done. And what happened the day I returned Mother? You had Ren waiting in the kitchen, ready to take me away. When I had finally escaped, finally reach the place I felt safe, you were ready to cart me off without a moment’s hesitation.’

His tears flowed freely now.

‘I,’ his mother began, although her voice hesitated, and she struggled for a moment to find the words to say. ‘I didn’t realise how that may have seemed, Ekkehard,’ she said, ‘I thought you’d be excited, that, that is what you would have wanted. The war delayed your induction. I thought you’d be happy that you didn’t need to wait any longer. If you needed time…’

‘It isn’t time I need, mother,’ Ekkehard said, cutting her off. ‘I just can’t do that. I can’t be that man anymore. Not after what I have done.’

There was silence between them for a time.

‘Ekkehard,’ his mother spoke softly now, ‘we are required, as all families are, and your father, as head of this house, promised you…’

‘But he is not head of this house any longer,’ a new, steely voice interjected.

Both Ekkehard and his mother were startled and turned to look at the kitchen door. There, wearing an expression equal parts dour and warm, was Audomar.

‘I am sorry, mother,’ he said, raising a hand to silence her before she could speak, ‘but that is the truth. Father is dead, and headship of this family falls to me.’

Ekkehard wiped the wetness from his eyes and looked at his older brother. Audomar nodded at him in response.

‘That might be true,’ their mother argued, ‘but that doesn’t change the fact that Ekkehard has vows to uphold on behalf of this family.’

‘I am sorry, mother,’ Audomar replied, shaking his head, ‘but I understand what Ekkehard is trying to tell you. You were not there. I was. I know why my he cannot do what you ask. I have struggled with it just as much as he has. I try to hide it, but my wife fears to share a bed with me in case I hurt her in my sleep again. What we went through changed everything.’

New tears welled in the corner of Ekkehard’s eye as the tension in his shoulders loosened and relief washed over him. Up until now, Ekkehard had thought he was alone on the estate in his difficulties. His brother had acted as if the war was some children’s adventure story to regale their younger siblings with. At last, he saw that he was not alone in suffering.

Ekkehard gasped for air, breathing as if for the first time in years.

‘Another will have to do,’ Audomar explained to their mother, ‘perhaps Florentin should be educated in the scripts. He is clever, after all, and a suitable candidate. He will safeguard our family’s honour.’

‘But Florentin is still so young,’ their mother tried to argue, but Audomar would have none of it.

‘The Abbot will have to be patient then,’ he decreed, ‘but I have decided. Ekkehard will remain on the estate, and that is final.’