Ben
Ben was running.
The battle lay beyond his sight; all he could see were feet racing toward their fate.
That was the first thing—the thing he would remember later, when he wrote it down, when he shaped it into something cleaner than it had been. He could not see the battle. He could see boots. Hundreds of them. Thousands. Leather and iron and mud, and the mud was not mud anymore, it was something else, something that sucked at his own small feet with every stride, and he had to lift his knees higher than a man would, higher than a man could, just to keep moving.
His shield was above his head. It was too large for him. It had been made for a man, and Ben was not a man, not in the way these soldiers meant the word, and so the shield bobbed and swayed with each stride like a banner that had forgotten what it was for. The strap cut into his shoulder. He could feel the leather biting into the place where his neck met his collarbone, and he knew that by the end of the day there would be a bruise there, a dark ring, a mark. He thought about that bruise. He thought about it because it was small and specific and it was something he could hold onto while everything else was enormous and loud and trying to kill him.
"Stay close!" he shouted. His voice cracked. It always cracked when he was afraid. "Not too close. The boy is mad. Mad men swing wide. And remember what you are. You are not here for honor. Or glory. You are here for me."
The men around him advanced slowly. Their boots sank into the mud beside him, and the mud made a sound—a wet, sucking sound—and Ben hated that sound. He hated it more than the screaming, which he could not yet see the source of. The screaming came from somewhere ahead, somewhere above, and it was directionless, and that was worse than if he could see it.
He darted between them. Left, right, left. He was small enough to move between their legs, and he did it without thinking, the way a rat moves between the legs of horses. The comparison occurred to him. He did not like it. He filed it away anyway. It would go in the story.
One of the knights said, "He is getting away."
"Then follow him," Ben said. "Or must I do everything myself?"
Ben tried to see through the legs. Through the forest of boots and greaves and the hanging cloth of cloaks that dragged in the mud. Robert's army was advancing quickly, sweeping past Ben and his men, and the speed of it was frightening. They moved like water moves. They moved like something that had been waiting to move for a long time. Ben could barely see Sam. And what he saw most—what filled his vision and his fear—was the hill. The hill, and the thousands of Meriel's men pouring down it, on horseback.
He had never seen horses move like that. He had seen horses before, of course—he had seen them in stables, in streets, in parades. But he had never seen them fall. He had never seen them come down a hill with men on their backs and men on the ground below them, and the sound of it was not a sound he had known to expect. It was not thunder. It was not drums. It was the sound of the earth being struck, again and again, by something that did not care what it struck.
The hair on his arms stood up. His skin prickled, all over, as if he had walked into a cold room. His breath came short. He could feel his heart in his throat, in his temples, in his fingertips, everywhere it should not have been.
"Go!" he screamed. "Advance! I cannot see him!"
One of the knights said, "You are the one slowing us down, dwarf. Shall I carry you, or will you run like a man?"
Ben stopped.
He looked down at his feet. His small feet. His short legs. The body that had never been built for war, that had never been built for anything except sitting in a chair and writing down what other men did. He looked at the mud swallowing his boots. He looked at the blood on the mud—someone else's blood, he did not know whose—and he thought, for a moment, about how easy it would be to turn around. To walk back. To find a tent, a horse, a road, a place where none of this was happening.
Then he looked back at the reason he had joined this battle. He looked at what he had come for.
He raised both hands—a small gesture, almost comical. His fingers were trembling. He hoped no one noticed.
"Up."
"What?"
"Lift me," Ben said. "Two of you. Each takes an arm. Use your other hand to make a shield over me. Protect me while you run."
Two of the knights exchanged glances. Their faces twisted with disgust—the disgust of warriors reduced to carrying a dwarf. Ben saw it. He saw it and he filed it away, because he had seen that look before, on other faces, in other places, and he had learned that the look did not matter. What mattered was whether they obeyed.
They obeyed.
Each grabbed one of his arms. Their swords went into their scabbards—a small sound, a click, and Ben noted it, because a man with a sword is one thing and a man without a sword is another, and he needed to know which kind of man was holding him.
Their shields rose above Ben's head, forming a roof of iron.
Ben dangled between them, his short legs kicking uselessly. The ground was far below him. The ground was close below him. He could not decide which. He could smell them—the two men carrying him, the sweat on their necks, the leather of their armor, the faint sourness of breath that had been held too long.
"Faster," he said. "And lower the shields. I cannot see anything."
The knights' faces were grim. But they ran.
And Ben, dangling, swaying, his arms aching in their grip, looked out from under the shields and saw the world in a way he had never seen it before. He saw it from above the crowd but below the tops of the helmets. He saw the backs of men's necks. He saw the way the rain had darkened their hair. He saw a man in the middle distance stumble, and he saw the man behind him not stop, He saw the man's boot come down on the fallen man's hand, and he heard the sound—He heard it, a small wet crack—and he knew that he would write that down. He did not know why. He only knew that he would.
Ahead, Robert's army joined flank to flank with Sam's men. The armies merged, then collided with Meriel's forces. The sound was like a wave breaking against a cliff. Ben had heard that sound before—he had stood on a shore once, as a boy, and watched the sea throw itself at a rock—but he had not understood, then, that the sea was not trying to break the rock. The sea was simply doing what it did. The rock was simply in the way.
The same was happening here. The men were not trying to kill each other. They were simply moving, and the moving was the killing.
Ben's eyes swept toward Meriel's army descending the hill.
"Slow down," he said. "We pull back. Or their horses will ride us into the mud."
One of the knights said, "We are not here to hide."
Ben's head snapped toward him.
"You are here because I wanted it. You will hide because I want that too. That was the agreement. If you do not like it, you may explain your objections to the king. I am sure he will be fascinated."
The army was closing. Ben's men slowed their pace. They were being overtaken—Robert's soldiers pushing past them, Meriel's horses thundering closer. The ground itself seemed to be shaking. Ben could feel it through the knights' arms, through their grip on him, a tremor that came up through their bodies and into his.
One of the knights said, "We will lose the The mad boy."
Ben said, "No. We will win our lives. We can find him later. He is not a boy who is difficult to spot. Don't you hear laughter? That's him."
He meant it. Sam was not difficult to spot. Sam was the kind of man who could not help being seen. It was, Ben thought, the only truly reliable thing about him.
"Lift me onto your shoulders," Ben said.
"What?"
"Onto your shoulders. I need to see."
The knights—faces dark with anger, jaws tight—lifted Ben onto their shoulders. He stood there, his small frame swaying above them, looking over the front ranks. His hands gripped their helmets. His legs were trembling. He could feel the tremor in his thighs, and he hoped they could not feel it, and he knew they could.
He looked out.
And he saw the collision.
It was not like anything he had seen before. It was not like anything he had imagined. He had imagined battles—he had written battles, he had put words on paper, he had made them sound grand. But what he saw now was not grand. It was horses leaping over entire ranks of men. It was bones breaking—he heard the bones breaking, a sound like dry wood snapping, a sound that went on and on. It was skulls cracking. It was horses falling—the horses fell too, and when they fell they did not get up, and the men beneath them did not get up either, and after a while you could not tell which was which.
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He heard screams. Screams of terror, screams of pain—screams that were not words, that had never been words, that were the sound a body makes when it has been pushed past what a body can bear. And beneath all of it, cutting through it, there was a sound he knew.
Sam's laughter.
Ben stood there, stunned, swaying on the knights' shoulders. His mouth was open. He could feel the wind on his teeth. He could feel the blood drain from his face. He could feel, in his stomach, a cold, dropping sensation, as if he were falling and had not yet hit the ground.
In the moment of collision, no one was fighting. Men were being crushed like rats. But with louder screams. He thought that. He thought it clearly, in the middle of everything. Like rats, but louder. And then he thought—that will go in the story too.
Meriel's army drove deep into Robert's ranks. The lines broke, reformed, broke again. And there—in the middle of the soldiers—Ben saw Meriel. On his horse. His sword was light in his hand—not his hammer, but a sword—and he cut through the heads of Thornholl's knights without giving them a chance. Meriel was surrounded by Thornholl's soldiers, but he was in control. He did not even need to dismount.
Heads flew around Meriel with each stroke of his sword, and with every strike, the siege on Meriel widened, but Meriel kept coming closer and striking, closer and striking.
Ben laughed. A light, nervous laugh. The laugh came out of him without warning, and it surprised him, and he did not know what it meant.
"Retreat," he said. "Retreat!"
He looked at Meriel again. It seemed his horse had been stabbed. It fell beneath him—a slow fall, a heavy fall, the fall of something that had been standing a moment before and was now on the ground, and the men around it moved away as if the falling horse were a hole opening in the earth.
But Meriel did not fall. Or he fell and rose—Ben could not tell, the crowd closed over him—but the sword kept moving. Heads kept flying. The sword knew nothing but cutting. As the screaming rose and heads continued to fall, the sword kept cutting.
Ben patted the head of the knight beneath him. His hand was shaking. The knight's helmet was cold under his palm.
"Put me down. I cannot see anything from here."
Ben climbed down from the knights' shoulders. He stood on the ground, his small feet sinking into the mud. The mud was warm now. He did not want to think about why the mud was warm. He pulled his foot up and the mud made a sound as it released him, and he did not want to think about that sound either.
"We advance," he said. "Let's go after the young king Sam and find him. I don't think King Meriel will fall, that man was made for battles."
The knight said, "Where is this Sam? We are in the middle of a war, hiding behind men who are fighting. Will we just keep watching Won't we fight?"
Ben's head turned. His eyes were sharp. The fear was still in him—it was always in him—but the fear had been pushed to a place where it could be used.
"No. You will have your chance. But only in defense of me. Anything else will be considered betrayal of the king—and his precious writer." He pointed at himself. "That me. Now I say—forward. Follow the sound of the strange laughter. That is him."
The knights advanced quickly. Ben gripped the cloth of one of their cloaks and looked behind him.
As the knights advanced, one of them turned and looked at Ben. "Hide well, writer. We are approaching trouble."
Ben raised his shield, hiding between them, making sure to hold the cloth of the lead knight.
"Do you see him? Do you see him?"
"I can only hear him," the knight said.
The knights began engaging the enemy, fighting while hiding the little man with their feet.
Ben moved between them—terrified, wondering what was happening. He could not see. He could only hear. Only the sound of swords. Only the sound of death.
The ground was slick. He slipped and caught himself on a knight's leg. The knight did not stop. Ben held on. He could feel the knight's calf through the leather, hard as wood, and he could feel the way the muscle moved under the skin, and he thought—this is what a man is. This is what a man is made of. It was not a helpful thought. He had it anyway.
Then—one of Meriel's soldiers fell between the knights. In front of Ben. He came down on his back, and his eyes were open, and his mouth was open, and blood poured from his mouth—not a trickle, but a pour, a steady pour, as if something inside him had opened and would not close.
He looked at Ben. "Help me."
Ben was terrified. He tried to move away. His feet did not work. He pushed back, and the mud held him, and he tried again, and the soldier's hand came up and grabbed his foot.
The hand was warm. The hand was warm, and Ben felt the warmth through the leather of his boot, and he wanted to scream, and he did not scream. He pulled. The soldier held on. Ben pulled again, and the hand let go, and Ben fell to the ground.
He was on his back. He was on the ground with the dead and the dying, and the mud was cold under him, and the sky above him was black, and for a moment—just a moment—he could not remember how to stand.
He rose quickly, his heart pounding in his throat. His hand found a knight's arm. He pulled himself up. He did not look down. He did not want to see the face of the man who had grabbed him. He knew that if he saw the face, he would remember it, and he did not want to remember it.
Then he heard the knight ahead of him say, "Your man is in front of us. Shall we get closer?"
"No," Ben said. "Just—give me some space. I need to see between your feet."
He crouched. He put his face near the mud, near the boots, near the place where the world was small and simple and he could see what he needed to see. He looked through the gap between two knights' legs.
Ben saw men screaming while swinging their swords. He saw swords piercing their bodies. He saw mens’ feet trembling and their asses shaking. He saw men begging for mercy—and he saw mercy piercing their necks. And as his eyes moved To see more, he saw at last what he wanted to see.
He saw Sam.
Fighting without a shield. His face is covered in blood. But it is not his own. And in his left hand—he is mad. He is holding one of their arms. He is using it as a sword.
Ben said In a frightened voice, "Yes. That is him."
wounded In the shoulder. And in the side. But he is still standing.
Ben said, "I've found him, I'll go after him."
The knight said, "Are you sure?"
Ben said, "Just stay close. I will crawl between the bodies."
The knight said, "We will be near you. Do not panic."
Ben said, "Go. Make way."
Ben drew his dagger. It was a small thing, and he knew it was a small thing, and he knew that the men around him carried swords as long as his leg. But it was his. It had been his for years. He had used it to cut bread and to pry open letters and to scrape mud off his boots. Now he held it the way he had seen soldiers hold their swords—low, ready, close to the body—and he knew he looked ridiculous, and he did not care.
He moved through the feet of his knights. Then he walked between the corpses.
He ran. No one paid him any attention. Most were already fighting their own battles. The ground was soft and uneven, and he had to look at every step, and looking at every step meant looking at what he was stepping over.
Hands. He saw hands. He saw a hand with a ring on it, and he saw a hand with a thumb bent the wrong way, and he saw a hand that was not attached to anything, and he did not stop, and he did not think, he just kept moving.
Only the fallen on the ground tried to grab him. They reached up from the mud—reached up like the dead in old stories, like the hands in the stories he had written, and he had always thought those stories were exaggerated, and now he knew they were not. He avoided them. He stepped over them. He did not look at their faces. He only looked at their hands.
Ben kept going until he reached Sam's side. Behind his leg. Sam turned and saw him.
He said nothing. He just kept fighting.
Ben tried to hide behind him. Sam fought brilliantly—like someone born on a battlefield, not in a stable. His shield was gone. His helmet gone. His body was covered in wounds. But he fought.
Ben touched Sam's leg with a trembling hand.
"Whose arm are you carrying?"
Sam He looked at the arm, then threw it into the mud, "I told you not to obstruct me, dwarf. Move, Or die."
Ben stepped back slightly and said loudly, "Watch behind you!"
Sam turned and struck the enemy in the neck with his sword, the enemy who was trying to stab Sam in the back.
Ben said, "See, I am on your side."
Sam turned. He smiled. The smile was not a warm smile. It was the smile of a man who had found something amusing in a place where nothing was amusing.
"Is that supposed to comfort me? You cannot even fight."
Ben said, "I fight my way."
Sam said, "So do I, Go..."
And as he looked at Ben and swung his sword—a voice came from behind. Accompanied by many stabs in the back.
The voice was warm.
Ben retreated. He did not decide to retreat. His body decided for him. His legs moved before his mind had understood what was happening. He stumbled back and fell against a corpse, and the corpse was still warm, and Ben did not move away from it, because moving away meant moving forward, and forward was where the stabbing had happened.
And the one who had stabbed Sam from behind said in his ear: "You forgot to take your medicine."
Sam tried to grab the one who stabbed him. He caught him. His hand closed on the man's arm. But he did not attack. He did not ask why. He just held on. Sam, as he fell, looked at his face and said: "You are a man of ours. You're not supposed to be here."
The killer pushed Sam's hand away and disappeared into the crowd.
Sam fell on his back, next to Ben's feet.
Ben looked down at him. He could see the wound in Sam's back—the wound, and the others, the many others, the ones Sam had taken in the front, and the one he had taken from behind. He could see the blood spreading out from under Sam's body, dark and slow, the way blood spreads when it has nowhere to go. He could smell it—the iron, the copper, the warmth.
Sam was breathing with difficulty. And the smile was still on his face.
Ben approached. His voice was quiet, his face carrying shock.
"Who was that? Why did he stab you? What did he whisper?"
Sam said, "My back hurts."
Ben said, "Tell me who that was."
Sam looked at Ben. He grabbed his foot. His grip was not strong. It was not the grip of a man who could hold on to anything for very long.
"Help me."
Ben removed Sam's hand. He did it gently. He did not know why he did it gently, but he did. He placed the hand on the ground beside Sam's body.
"Sorry," he said. "Your death will add much to my book, don't you think...The death of a foolish king isn't something that happens every day? But don't worry, I will write of some honor and courage in your death."
He paused.
"I didn't put myself through the trouble and risk of catching up with you. To help you? No. I was simply waiting for your fall. All thanks to whoever that was."
Sam, breathing his last breaths, said, "You...fucking dwarf, your turn is coming soon. I will find you in another life. I will show you pain."
Ben said, "I believe only in this life."
He said it quietly. He did not say it cruelly. He said it the way a man says something he has believed for a long time—something that has cost him, something he has paid for, something he will not give up.
Ben—while the knights beside him fought—one of them said, "Move away from him. They outnumber us."
Ben said, "I think we have reached the end."
He looked at Sam. Sam's eyes were open. They were looking past Ben, at the sky, at the place where the eyes of the gods would have been if the eyes of the gods could be seen from here.
He said, "Take this with you, boy. When you reach your next life—live it wisely. Or you will fall again."
Ben and the knights were retreating. Sam was looking at the eyes of the gods. He was smiling. He said some random words—words Ben did not catch, words he would wonder about later, words he would try to reconstruct and fail. Then his eyes closed.
And a body fell upon him—and he was buried in the war he had not been invited to in the first place.
Ben did not stop to watch. He was already moving, already between the boots, already looking for the next safe place. But as he moved, he thought about the body that had fallen on Sam. He thought about how Sam had come to this battle uninvited—no, not uninvited. Sam had come because he wanted to. Sam had come because he could not stay away.
Ben thought: that is what a king means.
He thought it in Sam's voice. He did not know why.
Then he stopped thinking, because a hand was reaching for his ankle, and he had to move, and moving was all there was.