Chapter 2: 02 : Winter Tax

Will gasped awake, drenched in sweat.

His chest heaved. His fingers clawed at loose hay as the dream faded from his vision, replaced by the cracked beams of the barn roof above him. The warmth of the day had not yet broken. Only early light teased the edges of the slats. He sat up slowly, breath shallow. It wasn’t the first time he’d had that dream.

But this time, it felt like more than a dream.

The rooster had hardly managed its second cry when Garret Docket clanged the barn doors open and filled the dawn with his voice.

“Up, boy.”

Will was half-sitting on a bale of straw, nursing the ache the dream had left in his chest. The ghost of those crystal antlers still glimmered somewhere behind his eyes, but the barn’s cold bit deeper than any memory. He rose without a word, boots muffled by straw, shoulders squared. Anything slower invited a backhand.

Outside, mist rolled low across the pasture, catching threads of sunrise like torn silk. Garret’s stride carved a wake through it—broad shoulders, sword belt slung even for a trip no farther than the pig pens. A soldier’s habit that never left him.

Will followed.

----------------------------------------

The Docket farm ran wide along the flats north of Calrune’s fertile ribbon. Wheat in the east fields, a scattering of hog pens to the south, and the vineyard—Garret’s pride—running along the gentle hill behind the house. From a distance the place looked prosperous. Up close the paint peeled, hinges rusted, and the silence around the main house felt like a door half-closed on grief.

Miriam’s absence sat in every room. Two years gone and the windows still carried her curtains, faded roses fluttering against cracked panes. Will had tried, once, to tuck them away so Garret wouldn’t have to look at them. Garret had set him straight with a single hard stare.

Now the curtains rotted where they hung, and Miriam’s ghost watched the mornings alone.

----------------------------------------

“Bram!” Garret’s voice carried toward the front porch. “Rise and dress. The god-rotted sun’s already higher than you.”

Bram answered with a grunt from inside. He would be down eventually—clean tunic, boots polished, hair combed into the same slick wave Garret wore in his younger days. For now, Garret turned his attention to the pens.

“Slop these hogs, Will. Check the troughs. Afterward the vineyard rows need walking—rats or rot, call it out.” He paused, thumb stroking the hilt of his short sword as though it might purr. “And remember the collector comes five nights hence. Everything shows well. Understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“No mumbling.”

“Yes, sir.”

Satisfied, Garret headed for the house, leaving the smell of stale ale and damp leather in his wake.

Will set to work.

----------------------------------------

Every farmer in Calrune feared the coin wagon—two horse teams, iron chest bolted to the bed, Osric’s blue-and-black standard fluttering above like a sneer. But fear did strange things to men: some hid grain, some begged saints, some sharpened pitchforks in dark barns. Garret Docket cooked.

If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

Osric fancied himself a connoisseur. He claimed a soldier’s palate: plain cuts, done right. Miriam had once served him a simple pork shoulder glazed with apple vinegar, and the man had eaten until the buttons strained his vest. From that day Garret paid less in coin than his neighbors.

Will remembered—he had been ten, elbows barely clearing the table edge, watching Miriam smile politely while Osric smacked his lips. Garret joked that a good roast was worth ten silver. Miriam’s smile had faltered then, but Garret hadn’t seen.

Miriam was gone; the ritual remained.

----------------------------------------

Will hauled slop buckets, scattering pigs that squealed round his feet. Dirt swallowed his boots to the ankle, cold sucking at his toes. He worked by habit—bucket, trough, kick the greedy snout aside—while his mind wandered to the meadow, to the elder deer’s mournful eye, to the sudden fall that never quite ended.

Fight.

The word echoed in his skull, softer than a whisper now but still there. Why that word? Why always that word?

“Move, mutt.”

Bram’s voice snapped him back. The older boy strode between pens, lace-up shirt crisp, carrying a bow far finer than Will’s chipped ashwood. A polished yew curve with silver inlay—Garret’s Feast Day gift last spring. Bram swung it easy, like he’d earned it.

“You staring at dung for pleasure or just slow?” Bram nudged Will with the bowtip—more a prod than a strike, but enough to sting pride. “Father wants you in the vineyard. My bowstring needs re-waxing.”

Will clenched his jaw, stepped aside. Bram sauntered on, whistling.

----------------------------------------

Rows of dormant vines etched black lines across brown earth. Last week frost had kissed the outer shoots—Will clipped those away first, fingers moving with a practiced economy Miriam once praised. He tried not to remember her voice; it weakened him.

Between stalks he counted: five nights until Osric’s arrival. The tax always landed at winter’s throat, when barns were lean and days brief. This year, rumors said, the lord of Drenmarch demanded new levies for some far-from-home skirmish. Osric would be eager to please.

Garret’s larder looked respectable enough, but Will had balanced the sums. Even with reduced toll, they would scrape the cask for coin, and Bram’s appetite for tavern dice had grown costly.

Garret didn’t see. Or he refused to.

Will clipped, pruned, bound the canes. His shoulder muscles burned in the cold. When he finished the eastern row, he heard hoofbeats on the lane—too early for traders, too casual for highwaymen. He rose onto a rail, peering over the hedgerow.

Polock wagons rattled by, loaded with sacks of barley and two trussed geese. Ricket Polock bounced on the driver’s board, waving wildly when he spotted Will. The boy’s grin was lopsided, eyes bright with a simplicity that felt almost holy. Will lifted a hand in return.

Behind Ricket sat his elder brother Efram, jaw tight, gaze fixed forward. Beside him, their sister Brinna whispered something that drew a laugh. Neither spared Will a glance.

The wagons creaked out of sight.

----------------------------------------

That night the farmhouse echoed with spoons and tension. Garret at the head, Bram right of him, Will silent at the far corner. A single candle burned low, throwing long shadows across Garret’s lined face.

“The Polock geese looked meaty,” Garret said between bites of turnip stew. “Efram bragged they’ll fetch double at market.” He sipped watered ale, eyes narrowing. “Maybe I should raise geese instead of you two.”

Bram chuckled, nudged Will’s shin under the table. “Birds are smarter,” he muttered.

Will kept chewing.

Garret wiped his mouth. “We leave before dawn tomorrow. Three days out. Game’s thick near Orlin Creek—boars fat from acorn fall. Bram, keep the farm,” he added, forestalling the protest already forming on his son’s face. “Show me you’re worth half the feed you swallow.”

Bram’s jaw worked, but obedience won. He jabbed a finger at Will. “Don’t let him touch my bow. He’ll snap it.”

Garret looked to Will then—no, looked through him. “You’ll carry the yew. Your stick wouldn’t down a crow in its current condition. Bring meat home or beg Osric for mercy. Understood?”

Will’s pulse quickened. Bram’s bow was perfectly tuned to Bram’s stronger draw; he had never loosed an arrow from it. The slightest scuff would bring fury. Garret didn’t care.

“Yes, sir.”

“Speak up, damn you.”

“Yes, sir.”

The candle guttered.

----------------------------------------

After supper Will gathered travel gear in the barn while Bram lounged in the upper loft, tossing pebbles at the barn rafters. Garret’s snoring leaked through a cracked shutter—already deep in ale-soaked dreams.

Will wrapped dried venison, flint, whetstone, and bandages in oilskin. He reached for the Bram’s yew bow where it hung on a peg.

A boot heel crunched straw behind him. Bram dropped from the ladder, face flushed.

“What did I say?” His voice slithered with drink—he must have raided Garret’s cask. “Touch it again, bastard, and I’ll break your fingers.”