Broken Birthday Early Version

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Written for " Magic Words Contest " 
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Bronze medallion winner
Approximately 4350 words

J'mie opened his eyes but instantly slammed them shut. The stab of light in his skull and the blood on his chest were too much to bear. He lay gasping until the pain receded to a tolerable level and he could try again. He was slumped against a wall of his bedroom, with the winter sun shining through the cracks of a shuttered window. A foot-long slash across his left breast, though not deep, had bled freely and was still oozing. A tender lump on the back of his head suggested that he had bashed his skull against the wall. Bloody and unconscious, he had evidently passed for dead.

Standing made his head explode and tore at his chest. He waited a few minutes, gathering strength. The house was cold and quiet: the Breakers had gone. He hoped. He folded his shirt over the cut and pressed his withered left arm against it. Nothing to be done about the pain in his head, or the fear and shame in his heart. With some difficulty because of his hurts, he crawled down the ladder from the loft.

The house was a mess: furniture smashed, crockery broken. He found his father's body in a corner, his own sword driven through his back, slumped atop a dead Breaker as though victor in a wrestling match. J'mie's breath caught in sadness and horror, but a knot of anger formed in his core.

At the kitchen end of the house, food and broken dishes lay scattered about. What hadn't been stolen was fouled with urine and feces and blood. His nose wrinkled at the stench. His feet crunched on eggshells and shards of earthenware as he crept to the front door.

His mother lay outside on the frozen ground, her skirt up, her legs splayed, her throat slashed. He averted his gaze and found two Breakers by the door. Where their eyes had been, there were only scorched holes. His mother's staff lay beside them, its shaft bloody and its orb dark. For all her counsel of peace and harming none, she had in the end spent her power to take down at least two of her attackers. Well done, Mam. Keeping his gaze away from both her nakedness and her gaping wound, he used his strong right arm to pull down her skirt and cross her arms on her chest. Her body was still warm.

Shame flushed through him that he had obeyed his father's command and fled to hide in his room. I should have stayed, I should have fought, I should have died with them. Fueled by shame, the knot of anger in his heart began to smoulder.

Dazed, lost, grieving, he wandered into the farmyard. The stillness struck him--no clucking chickens, no cackling geese, no quacking ducks, no grunting pigs, no lowing cow. He found the cow slaughtered and steaming in the barn, the pigs dead in their sty. Poultry gone, presumably into Breaker bellies or tied by the neck to Breaker belts. Three horses were stabled in the barn, evidently from the dead in the house, and left to be picked up later. They must have left only minutes before I woke up.

It had been his job to feed the livestock, not a chore but a joy with the birds flocking around his feet for scattered grain, the pigs rushing to see him with the evening's slops, the eager nudging of the cow for her hay. Somehow the death of the animals triggered his tears, and he threw himself to the ground and sobbed for what was lost.

Cold soon gnawed his muscles into shivering awareness. He was face down in the frost, with the wind dusting snow over him like a thin blanket. When he forced himself up, his bloody shirt stuck to the ground and ripped his wound afresh. Shuddering, teeth chattering, he stumbled past the snow-drifted body of his mother and into the house.

He gathered chunks of firewood that had been scattered when the wood box was smashed, and added them to the banked embers in the hearth. Why didn't the Breakers burn the place down?

As he huddled close to the growing flames, memories of the morning overwhelmed him.

"Happy birthday, J'mie. " His mam smiled and ruffled his hair before he could duck away.

"Aye, lad!" added his pap. "Fifteen years you are, now! You stand taller than me, and still have height and strength to come."

"A nice thought, thank you, Pap." And kind of you not to mention the shriveled arm that gets me called 'half-man'. "Though I'll never be as strong as you."

"Be that as it may, I'll never be as fast as you. You won every race at the last festival, even against the men. Made me proud, it did!"

J'mie swelled a bit at that. He'd won prizes for handcrafts, too. His arm might be weak, but his hands worked just fine, so knot-work and carving and mending harness and the like came easily to him.

"They call me 'outlander', though, Pap."

"Well, aye, you are a bit more like your Mam, slender and dark, not stocky and tow-haired like me and folks here-about. She had a hard time being accepted herself, after I won her heart and hauled her home from my travels. Not sure it's a good idea for her to be teaching you outlander magic, though. Makes folks suspicious."

His mam laughed. "That it does, D'ter. Dreamers, we outlanders are, wizards and poets and singers, not plodding oxen to work ourselves to death on a farm. But farmers we must be. If you want roast chicken for dinner, J'mie, you'd best go out and butcher one."

Heaving a sigh, he threw his cloak on. Killing hens, butchering pigs, hunting deer--all necessary but distasteful chores that left him frustrated with farm life, but unsure of just what he wanted. He grabbed his cut-saw and left the room.

Before the door closed behind him, he heard Pap say, "Maelina, you coddle the boy. Time he grew up and left his mam's apron strings."

Shame sent him slinking to the chicken coop.


Once he had stopped shivering, he struggled to the loft, where he tore a sheet into strips to bind his chest. His left arm was weaker than usual, no doubt from the pain. Ah, well, his right arm was still strong from years of one-armed farm work.

He found his cloak slashed and pinned to the wall with his own cut-saw. He donned the cloak, grateful to find it warm despite its rips. He slid the blade into the sheath he still wore and returned to the hearth.

###

The fire had burned low and J'mie reluctantly left its warmth, but the knot of anger glowed brighter. He would travel to the Davoish's, the neighboring farm, for food, and rest, and sympathy. He had to tell them what had happened, had to warn them of Breakers on the attack. Then, with their help, perhaps he could do something about the Breakers. I will kill them all, or join my family in the try.

He went to his father's body and wrenched the sword free. He was forced to put his foot on his father's back, and the sucking noise as the blade came out made him dizzy and ill. He cleaned the blade on the shirt of the dead Breaker. After some search, he located the scabbard in the wreckage and slung the sword on his back.

Next, he went to the barn to retrieve the slasher--a long blade atop a pole, more farm implement than weapon, but he felt it would be useful. He fashioned a sling for it from a length of rope and slipped it on his back beside the sword. The extra rope he wound around his waist. Always a use for a piece of rope. He considered the Breaker horses, but the thought of sitting in the saddle of a killer made him queasy. Taking pity on them, he removed their tack, smoothed salve on their saddle sores, and fed them the hay that would have gone to the cow.

With the ground frozen hard, he had no thought of burying his parents. He climbed up to the sleeping loft and threw down two blankets to cover their bodies. He spread one over his pap, and spat at the dead Breaker. When he picked up his mother's staff to lay it beside her body, to his surprise the orb flickered. It would recharge from his life energy, though he feared he could not command its power as had his mam. He set the staff by the doorway and returned to his purpose. He had to weight his mother's blanket with firewood against the surging wind.

By the time he had retrieved the staff and fought his way a hundred paces into the wind, the blanket was covered with snow.

###

The Davoish holding was in the valley, normally an easy downhill trip. Today the wind drove into him as though to force him back. Cold stabbed through his leather pants and torn cloak. Snow flensed his bare skin and froze to his eyelashes, nearly blinding him. With his torn cloak clutched to his torn chest with his weak left arm, and his mother's staff frozen to his stiff right hand, he was so helpless that he couldn't even wipe his eyes.

His stomach growled and churned, reminding him that he had found nothing edible at home. He licked ice off his lips to ease his thirst. Every step sent a pulse of agony through his chest wound, and his head throbbed. His heart burned with loss, and he ached with desire to lie down in the snow and join his mam and pap. But in his heart also burned the glow of anger and hate. And something new--an echo of Pap's words. Was I coddled? Too much tied to Mam's apron strings? Is that who I am, the half-man that they call me, to curl up and die rather than fight back? Around the burn of hate grew a layer of determination and purpose. Head bent to the wind, heart bent to new emotions, he struggled on.

A screech roused him from his torments. He was crossing the graveyard, wending past markers with an X to block the dead from wandering the world. Perched on a rock in front of him was a black-tailed hawk. He had been about to step around it.

Man! The word rasped in his mind. Take care. I suffer enough without your clumsy feet.

"You talk! I have never known a hawk to speak."

The surprise is mutual. I have never known a man to hear.

"I'm sorry, I meant you no harm."

My thanks. But heedless harm is still harm.

One of the bird's wings drooped. "Are you hurt?"

The men who came before threw a rock. I sprained a wing dodging it. I will be fine with rest, but I will freeze long before I can fly.

Men who came before? Foreboding tickled his mind--he might be following the Breakers. But they were on horseback and he had seen no sign of their trail.

"May I carry you?" He opened his cloak in offer.

You may, and thank you. J-mie tucked the large bird under his cloak as best he could with his withered arm. It was like embracing a frozen rock. The coolness felt good against his wound.

"The men who came before and hurt you? They were probably Breakers."

Why do you call them that?

"That is who they are. Wild rogues, cast-offs from over the mountains who live only to raid and destroy. They rape and kill and plunder for sport. They would rather break than build and so took that for their name. Parents tell their children to be good or the Breakers will get them." He snorted in disgust. "They are not tales to frighten children. They killed my parents and destroyed our home. They are foul beasts. I wish I could kill them all."

The antidote to wickedness is not revenge but righteousness.

"But if you are slain in your righteousness,"--he thought of his parents--"then evil wins."

Being righteous does not mean being stupid or helpless. Righteousness includes having sharp wits and sharp talons and knowing how to use them both.

J'mie was silent. His parents had been neither stupid nor helpless.

You are armed - you have many weapons. Are they decoration, or do you know their use?

"My father's sword and slasher, for all the good they did him in the end. My mother's staff, exhausted in her need. My own cut-saw, good for pruning trees and butchering pigs. I can wield them one-handed and badly. I am J'mie one-arm, J'mie half-man. I am no warrior."

Even a hawk with one set of talons can kill a mouse.

J'mie considered that at length. Breakers were not mice. But still....

The wind and snow lessened as they pressed on, and soon stopped.

###

Smoke tainted the sky ahead. Pausing on a hilltop, he and the hawk studied the farmhold. The Davoish barn was aglow with sullen flames, half-extinguished by the snow. Nothing stirred. Smoke drifted from the farmhouse chimney. Two bodies lay before the house on a blanket of red, like broken dolls cast aside by a careless child.

I see nothing of danger.

Trusting the raptor's sharp eyes, J'mie gulped down his fear and crept forward, using the leafless brush for cover as best he could, until he reached the house and ducked under a window.

A peek through the crack between the shutters showed no violent, senseless damage as at his own farm. A fire still crackled in the hearth. He slunk around to the front. The crumpled dolls were Mam and Pap Devoish, the red blanket a pool of blood from violent wounds.

I am warm now. Leave me. I will keep watch.

After setting the hawk on the ground, J'mie opened the door and scanned the empty room. He wiped his feet with care on the rag mat so as to not leave wet footprints, and entered the house. What if they had left one behind to stand guard?

Five small casks of apple brandy, unbroached, had been stacked in one corner. Amazing that they didn't stay to drink themselves stupid. But the Tarnao farm is only two miles off. Perhaps the brandy is for a celebration. Ah, and that must be why they didn't fire our farm--it would have warned the Devoishes. By the time the Tarnaos noticed the smoke from here, the Breakers would be on them.

In the loft, he found the bodies of the three Davoish girls, too small to rape but not too young to kill. The manner of their death sickened him, but he swallowed his anguish and allowed it to feed the growing knot of anger, hate, and determination.

The larder had not been fouled. He helped himself to some bread, a slice of cold beef, and a piece of cheese and hoped their absence would not be noticed. He stuffed the food into his pockets, retrieved his staff, and surveyed the room from the doorway. He had left no sign of his presence.

While he had been inside, the snow had resumed. Thick, fluffy flakes hid the world and began to cover the horror of the Devoish's bodies.

You have food?

"I have food. But first we must have shelter. Perhaps the barn. I must take off my cloak. Can you ride my shoulder for a while?"

I could. But my talons are sharp and would cut you. Perhaps I can fly. The bird flapped awkwardly half-way to the barn.

"Good enough. Wait there. I will come for you,".

Dragging the cloak to brush out his footprints, he went to where he had stood at the window and then moved on to the hawk. The snow in the yard was churned from hooves and boots, with tracks showing where the Breakers had ridden in and out. There were other prints from the house to the barn, from either the Devoish family or the Breakers. He shook snow out of his cloak and put it on, then picked up the hawk and followed the tracks to the barn. The fresh snow would soon cover his passage. By the time he reached the barn, he was wet and shaking with chill.

They hid in an unburnt part of the barn; though the smell of smoke was sharp and pervasive, they were out of the wind and relatively warm. The hawk tore at the beef, and J'mie ate part of the bread and cheese. The heavy snow hissed on the dying embers. After their sparse meal, the hawk perched on a beam and fluffed up its feathers. J'mie rolled in his cloak. Almost retching at the stink of wet burnt wood, blood, and dung, he huddled for warmth behind the still steaming corpse of a cow.

He was almost asleep when the evening was filled with hoofbeats, shouts, curses, and harsh laughter. The Breakers had returned. J'mie froze in terror when they clattered into the barn to tie their horses. The harsh, guttural Breaker speech was barely comprehensible, and what he heard, he wished he hadn't.

"That was good sport! That black-haired bitch drained me right dry!"

"Gorfagharn, you'd drain your loins into a half-cooked beefsteak."

"Well, yah, if it wasn't too hot. But that little girl, now...."

J'mie gritted his teeth, plugged his ears, and nursed his knot of anger, grateful that none of them spared a glance for a dead cow.

###

Against all odds--the chill, the stench, the pain in his chest, the ache in his heart--sleep slithered into his mind and whispered promises: with two strong arms, he swung his father's sword, and Breakers' heads rolled and Breakers' blood flowed; with energy and will, he commanded his mother's staff, and Breakers' eyes burst and Breakers' brains boiled; with cut-saw and slasher, he whirled and struck, and Breakers' throats gaped and Breakers' bellies spewed purple guts.

The dream changed. The sword hung in the hand of his withered arm and he lacked the strength to even lift it. The staff was just a stick, its orb dark and powerless. He reached for his cut-saw but it was not in the sheath. A group of Breakers, ugly bearded men in rough and soiled clothing, taunted him. "One arm! Half man! Outlander weakling!" The one called Gorfagharn raped a little black-haired girl while the others cheered him on. They turned towards him, all menace and evil grins, waving clubs and knives and swords. He fled, running like the wind, but the group was always on his heels.

He awoke gasping for breath, as though he really had been running. From the house came raucous laughter, drunken shouts, and the sound of something being smashed. The Breakers were enjoying the applejack, he guessed, and would soon drink themselves into stupor.

He slept again, and in his dream a hawk flew overhead and cried, "Remember! Even a one-legged hawk can kill a mouse!"

He woke again at dawn, still chilled and hardly rested, but with a head full of half-remembered dreams and plans. He creaked to his feet and went to slap his arms around himself to bring some warmth, but stopped at the pain in his chest. Better to stride about.

The horses stirred at his movement but settled quickly. He expected that they were cold and hungry too, but he could do nothing for them. The poor beasts had not even been unsaddled.

The hawk stretched its wings and arched its neck. Another morning. We still live.

"Yes, if barely."

He offered to share his meager breakfast with the hawk, but it declined.

I will hunt this morning. A hot mouse or vole will go well. The hawk stretched its wings.

"Wait a bit. When you fly off, would you be so kind as to scout the area to the east?" He explained what he wanted.

I can hunt east as well as west. I will look.

On the hawk's return, J'mie was pleased with its report. After the hawk had rested, the two set off into the rising sun. He had considered driving off the horses, but decided it would be better if the Breakers rode. They would no doubt sleep until noon, and awake hung-over. He would have plenty of time to set things up. Perhaps a one-legged hawk could indeed kill a mouse.

###

Feeling oddly light and vulnerable without the sword and slasher and staff, J'mie crept to the window and looked in. As best he could tell through the shutters, three men sprawled asleep in the room; there were probably a few more in the loft. He had counted seven horses in the barn.

Now, how to stir the hornet's nest without getting stung? The hawk chuckled at the prospect.

"We smoke them out, of course."

The hawk flew up to the roof. J'mie boldly entered the house and raked embers from the hearth onto the wood floor, then added the dried sticks he had brought in. Once the fire was burning well, he added dried dung he had carried from the barn. When smoke began to fill the room, he seized a fry pan from the rack and and a wooden spoon from the table, then stood in the open doorway while he banged the two in a staccato racket. When the hung-over Breakers stumbled to a confused and coughing wakefulness, he threw the fry pan and spoon at them and walked out.

J'mie stopped at the edge of the forest, and the hawk joined him on a nearby branch. Together, they watched the house.

Smoke poured from the open door, followed by five men coughing and cursing. The smoke died away: they had put out the fire. Two more Breakers emerged.

The hornets are upset indeed.

J'mie yelled to get their attention. "Hey! Baby killers! Rapists! Look over here, you murderers!"

Several started to stumble towards him. "No," bellowed the tall one. Jamie recognized the voice from the night before as Gorfagharn, apparently the leader. "We'll never catch him afoot. To horse!" They straggled towards the barn.

J'mie turned to the hawk. "Fly, my friend, and thanks."

We fly together, my friend, and may your hunt be successful. The hawk took to the air.

When the first mounted Breaker left the barn, J'mie dashed into the woods, forgetting his wound, running as in a village festival race, but this time the prize was his life.

Following the path he had worked out in the light of dawn, J'mie dodged trees and ducked under low branches that would slow the riders, heedless of the snow the trees dumped on him. There was less snow on the ground under the trees, and he needed to leave a plain trail. He had to be fast enough to avoid being caught, but slow enough to encourage the chase. Distant yells and curses and the crash of brush told him he had the right lead.

He looked back to be sure his trail was visible, then sped past the place where the slasher was tied to a bent sapling under the snow. Moments later a yelp and a vicious curse told him the trap had been sprung. He smiled, but realized that he had slowed to listen. The thunder of hooves now seemed to pound on his heels.

He clambered over a fallen log, again careful to leave a clear trail. A horse would jump that log, only to land on the sword buried point up in the snowdrift behind it. The stab of regret he felt at the squeal of a wounded animal failed to slow him.

He hurtled past his mother's staff, its brightly glowing orb concealed by a pile of brush, with barely a glance. The crash of branches, the pounding hooves, and the shaking ground told him the Breakers were almost on him. He might have left his lead too short.

"There he is!" Gorfagharn shouted. "Get him! Kill the little bastard!"

J'mie burst from the woods to find himself at the top of a cliff. Cries of glee and victory came from the Breakers when they saw their quarry trapped and teetering on the edge. Whooping and laughing, they charged.

J'mie seized the rope he had tied to a tree growing at the cliff edge and swung down to the hidden ledge below. To the Breakers, he would have vanished.

Before they could rein up in puzzlement, he reached out with all his will and might. "Now!" he commanded.

The hawk swooped, screeching and flapping at the Breakers. The orb exploded with a sound like thunder and a flash of lightning. The horses bolted in panic. J'mie watched in fascinated horror as men and horses alike rained past his perch. Four...five...six plummeted to their death.

Watch, friend. One comes.

At the hawk's warning, he drew his cut-saw and set his back to the cliff. A leering Gorfagharn slid down the rope, sword in hand, onto the ledge to J'mie's left, his weak side. The Breaker stabbed with the sword. J'mie managed a block with his cut-saw. Gorfagharn dodged to Jamie's left, but found himself out of ledge, so he aimed a backhanded blow with his sword hilt. J'mie ducked and leaned in. With his left arm, the arm too weak to lift a milk pail or haul firewood, J'mie pushed the unbalanced Breaker. Gorfagharn dropped his sword, windmilled his arms in a frantic grab for the rope, and with a last curse and glare, fell backwards over the edge.

The scream of the falling man jarred the silence until it was cut off with a heavy thump. J'mie climbed one-armed up the rope back to the cliff top. The pile of crumpled bodies at the bottom, the carnage of broken bones and writhing flesh, should have filled him with elation. His soul should have soared with joy and satisfaction. There was only sadness for the horses, and peace. He felt the knot in his soul unraveling, the anger and hate dissolving. Yet somehow the determination and purpose remained.

The hawk fluttered down beside him. It cocked its head and studied the pile of destruction at the bottom.

You have killed your mouse. The Breakers are broken. Revenge--is it sweet?

"No, not sweet. Proper. Fair. A wise bird once told me, 'The antidote to wickedness is not revenge but righteousness.' At the time, I misunderstood. Now I know that anger can be righteous. Grief can be righteous. Justice can be righteous."

Then come, let us seek the sky. It is time to soar. It took to the air in rising circles.

He mounted Gorfagharn's horse and went to retrieve his weapons, weighted still with pain and grief, but feeling for the first time no longer half a man.