Fortnightly Writing Competition - Cloak and dagger

[Blondbraid]

Ok, I really hope the theme that I've picked isn't too narrow and specific, but I chose a subject which deeply intrigued me;
The Gerum Cloak

It is a cloak found in a peat bog, preserved from the iron age from around 360-100 BC which I once saw in a museum, and I've remembered it ever since.

The reason this cloak caught my interest is that it contains several holes after knife-stabs in it and traces of blood in it, meaning that a man was likely murdered while wearing it.
The cloak was then neatly folded together around a few small stones to weigh it down, and hidden in a bog, where it was left for more than 2000 years.

Who was murdered, and why was their cloak, and only their cloak, folded and buried in a bog?
We may never know what truly happened, but this Fortnightly Writing Competition will be about writing a story on what could have happened that led to the cloak getting stab marks and ending up in a bog.

Since it's a writing contest and not a history contest, it's ok to speculate and make your own interpretation.
I hope you find this theme interesting and inspiring, and if not, please let me know.

Deadline is April 15th.

[CaptainD]

Fascinating theme Blondbraid!  I might just enter if I manage to get inspired...

[Mandle]

Wow! This reminds me of a text book we had in Social Studies called "Legal Eagle Cases" or something like that.

It had historical murder mysteries like The Princes In The Tower, and we had to play as detectives to figure out the most probable killer, and then as lawyers to prosecute that person in a simulated court of law, with the teacher playing the part of judge.

Probably the most interesting thing for me in my whole high-school experience.

So, yeah, great theme even if just for bringing back those memories.

I might have the seed of a story idea. Will have to see if it grows into something worth writing.

[Baron]

It was the wicker dragon druid butler what done it!   

[Mandle]

THE HAZE OF TIME

I stabbed him over and over, his blood spraying onto my hands and my arms.

The thick hide of "The Gerum Cloak" from Museum Exhibit #1040 offered him a tad more protection than I had desired when we persuaded him to put it on and parade around in front of us, but the Aztec sacrificial dagger from Museum Exhibit #7638 was sharp enough to slice through it.

He had broken and stained a few of the holo-reader panels on certain exhibits when he fell, and the cloak's pristine condition had been ruined by my knife-work.
   
After looking at each other in shock for a moment, we engaged the mental links that deployed the nano-cleaners to deal with the mess, and the nano-coms to speak with each other:

My mind was flooded with the shocked responses from my frat brothers:

"You weren't supposed to KILL him!"

"What are you, some kind of psycho?!"

"I think I'm going to be si..."

I replied to all channels:

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!"

All channels fell silent...

I broadcasted: "Take the body to Museum Exhibit #2240!"

My frat brothers did as I ordered. After stripping it, we loaded the body into the outdated temporal disturbance device that was exhibit #2240 and sent it off to the year 7085.

My nano-channels buzzed to life:

"But what do we do with the cloak?"

"What about the cloak...it's ruined..."

"The cloak has holes and blood..."

I broadcasted back: "Grab those stones from Museum Exhibits #834 and #7234... Okay, put them on top of the cloak... There's an old peat bog in 246 B.C. I almost fell in once in history class. The cops will never think to look there..."

It took some broadcasting over the next few weeks, but I managed to convince my frat brothers that sometimes hazings can just go wrong... 

[kconan]

“Sir, the blacksmith revealed that our quarry is nearby and is still in possession of the cloak.”  Centurion Romulus stared at his officer and responded, “Our charge was to scout and incite dissent in Gaul, not march around in circles way out here with these red-bearded shipbuilders.  This impudent slave has cost us dearly in terms of time and favor with our commander.  Capture him…Alive if possible.”  The officer nodded, and returned to his command as Romulus watched with fists clenched.  Romulus rubbed a large forearm scar earned from a recent campaign while allowing himself a small grin amidst his rage, the former gladiator turned slave that started this adventure had done something unheard of:  He stole a Roman Senator's official toga along with some food and most importantly, a prized cloak.


Lugus knew the blacksmith would talk - either freely or under duress - and so he retreated to the cover of the town's crevices and shadows.  The man had done quality work, sharpening his small gladius and hammering out the odd dents in his buckler, and so the visit to his forge was worth the risk.  The smith offered up a battle axe for twenty bronze pieces, but Lugus declined since he'd only had minimal training on axe fighting and the extra weight would hinder him while on the run.  The ex-slave felt the heft of the gladius on his hip, and watched from the cover of a large bush as the villagers made their way to home to their small hovels.  Lugus chuckled thinking about his crime, and wondered if a Roman legion would have been sent after him if he had only made off with the Senator's toga and lunch, and had left behind the large brown cloak which turned out to be a family heirloom.  It was the most infamous theft to happen in Roman territory; the only other notable heist was of a set of governor's seals which were all eventually returned (the culprits lost their hands).  The former gladiator's stunt was hailed as a prank meant to poke fun at the gluttonous Senator and his luxurious bathhouse, though Lugus's original intent was to make a statement:  There are poor people in and around the ever expanding Roman Empire that can't feed or clothe themselves.


Romulus strode through the town as his men searched the hovels and questioned those who resided within.  He adjusted his ornate signet ring, and barked, “Help us and be rewarded, hinder us at your peril!”  One Roman soldier locked eyes with a large bearded villager giving him dirty looks, and began hitting the local with his scutum shield.  Romulus ordered his man to stand down, and watched as the giant bearded man stood right back up with a scowl on his face as blood poured from his forehead onto a fiery red beard.  The bleeding man's children glared at Romulus with pure hatred in their eyes.  In that moment the old centurion came to the conclusion that Rome would do well not to underestimate the local population to the Northeast of Gaul.


The Roman legion was fanning out to the outskirts of town when Lugus took a prisoner.  The young soldier was showing a drawing of a brown cloak to an old woman, and to her credit she didn't register the surprise when Lugus snuck up behind her inquisitor.  She cackled and walked away as Lugus knocked the man out with his buckler, and dragged his victim off for questioning.  The soldier revealed that his legion was redirected from Gaul to find Lugus, capture him, and retrieve the cloak.  He also mentioned that morale was low amongst all of the legionnaires, as they considered tracking down a slave to be a lowly errand and some of the men were suffering physically as they hadn't been outfitted for such cold weather.  Lugus left the soldier hogtied amongst a small copse of trees; the young man was cooperative and killing him could embolden his pursuers resolve.  The former slave was tiring of the chase, and longed to return home.


Romulus surveyed the remains of a bloodbath.  In the main area of town, or more precisely where most of the hovels were located, torn bodies littered the large dirt path.  Among the carnage was a woman with a plumbata dart buried in her face, a Roman soldier with a battle axe lodged in his forehead, and a local man with several crude daggers sticking out of his chest.  Romulus approached his top officer, Marcus, for the full report.  Marcus pointed to an old wooden longboat explained, “Our crossbowman and archers were using that old longboat as target practice since it is landlocked and appeared to be decommissioned…We found out later that it is some kind of shrine.  We lost one legionnaire, and twenty locals are dead including the village elder.”  Romulus stared intensely at Marcus who sighed, and admitted, “We started it sir.  The villagers tried to stop the target practice, and our men…well, they only know violence.  I'm told Antonus killed the first one,” and he pointed to a headless woman's corpse riddled with crossbolts.  Romulus said, “My orders were clear:  Only people with ties to the slave are to be harmed.  Killing unarmed locals openly like this only fuels resistance; which means they could side with the fugitive.”  Romulus added, “Assemble the villagers and bring me Antonus.”


The tree offered a good view of the surrounding area, which consisted of grasslands dotted by a handful of large trees and a huge bog.  Lugus watched five of his pursuers begin to break camp, and then…the limb he was perched on snapped.  He turned what could have been a nasty fall to the ground into a graceful roll, right into the small encampment.  Lugus grinned at his startled pursuers and proclaimed, “Well, honorable legionnaires, here I am!”  Two soldiers were half into their armor, another was bent over a recently doused campfire, and yet another was fumbling with an oil lamp and a large crossbow.  The remaining soldier, who was unarmored and loaded down with satchels, was sitting on a stump and appeared amused by Lugus's entrance.  All of them froze as Lugus said, “I've tired of this grand adventure, and I'd bet an emperor's ransom you men have as well.  There is an easy way to share in the glory of being the heroes who killed the most notorious ex-slave in recent history.”  Lugus produced the sought after garment, bloodied his small gladius using a leg wound that had reopened from the tree fall, and proceeded to stab holes in the cloak.  While keeping his eyes trained on the soldiers, he then neatly folded up the cloak and set it at the edge of the peat bog.  The largest soldier, clad only in leg armor, picked up a spear and stalked towards Lugus.  Lugus offered, “I'll caution you now legionnaire.  You train as part of a whole, and in conventional military formations.  I was born of the arena, and trained for slaughter.”  The soldier advanced on Lugus and threatened, “Centurion Romulus will need a body to go with that cloak.”  A plumbata dart hit Lugus in the shoulder, though his leather armor partially absorbed the blow…and the former gladiator sprang into action.


The villagers watched as Romulus personally disarmed a confused Antonus, and threw him in their direction.  Romulus glanced at Marcus and said, “Have someone translate that we are giving him to the villagers,” and the centurion commander walked away just as Antonus dashed towards a nearby treeline, though his escape was short-lived as he was cut off by several big locals who began pummeling him.  Marcus watched the men tear into the trigger happy crossbowman, and he turned to his officers and advised, “Our task is very specific.  We are here strictly for the slave and his cloak, and NOT to subvert or invade.  Tell your men to redouble their efforts…The sooner we find that damned slave, the sooner we can leave this cold, wretched place.”


Lugus parried a polearm thrust with his buckler, and in a lighting quick move grabbed the spear and pulled the soldier toward him.  The gladius punched through his attacker's throat, and the soldier fell to the ground writhing.  A crossbolt caromed off his buckler, as Lugus stalked towards the two men who were now cautiously advancing towards him.  The former slave was careful to position himself so that his melee attackers were between him and the crossbowmen.  Lugus offered, “Just take the cloak, your commanders will think I've been stabbed to death.”  The attackers lunged in a coordinated strike, and Lugus blocked one with his buckler and the other with his gladius.  He frantically looked around for the crossbow attacker while backing away, and noticed the crossbowman was slumped over.  The man from the stump was now hovering over the body, and removing his burdensome satchels.  Lugus shield-blocked an incoming sword strike, and with a risky lunge slashed the attacker's ankle.  The hobbled attacker stumbled backwards, while the other raised his shield and went in for the attack swinging his large gladius.  Lugus dodged a shield bash, and blocked the sword charge with ease.  The attacker had his sword hand lopped off for his trouble.  The man screamed until he was silenced by a crossbolt through the back of his head.  Lugus noticed the man, who had returned to the tree stump, lower his crossbow and nod.  The soldier with a slashed ankle was kneeling and had reared back with a throwing dagger, when he felt the gladius enter his midsection.  Lugus recalled that it had been a long time since he threw a sword, as he retrieved it from the twitching body.  He wiped off and sheathed the gladius, and tossed his battle worn buckler on the ground as the weary former slave made his way over to the large tree stump to greet his newfound ally.

The man rose from the stump, and exchanged a forearm grip handshake with Lugus.  As he carefully removed the plumbata dart from Lugus's shoulder, the man explained, “My name is Crixus.  They call me their equipment squire, but I'm really a barbarian slave.  Romulus and his men want this quest to finally come to an end, though I personally don't mind since I despise both them and Rome.”  The man paused and went on, “You know that damn cloak is probably a war trophy from one of Rome's conquests, perhaps originally claimed by that fat Senator's grandfather.”  Lugus gazed out into the misty bog and asked, “So what now?”  Crixus finished dressing Lugus's wound and advised, “Go north Lugus and take to the seas, the Romans will lose your trail…And stop dragging around that bulky and easily identifiable cloak.”  The Roman army equipment squire strolled over to the bog's edge, exchanged glances and a smile with Lugus, and then nudged the cloak into the murky peat bog.

[kconan]

  History is your bag Baron, so I assume you have something in the works.

[Sinitrena]

Hallgard the Husbandless Wife

The rain was pattering down on her head and she moved again. It had been weeks and the roof was wet, leaky and moldy by now. It leaked in more and more places every day, water dripping down into the single room of her hut. It was the same for everyone in their village and probably the next village over too. There was so much rain, they couldn't patch all the roofs fast enough, even though it seemed they did nothing else â€" except for other bare necessities, of course â€" but work on the roofs during the day and sleep as much as possible with rain and wet straw falling down on them.

That was why Hallgard sat in the dark, feeling the cloth she was weaving in her cold hands, instead of seeing it, all the while hoping that it would be done in time.

It was early in the morning. She had worked late into the night and fallen asleep with the half-finished cloak in her hand. When water dripped down on her nose some time later, as it so often did these days, and woke her up, she just sighed and moved to start working again.

Soon, the other people would get up as well, the village would awake from a mostly restless slumber and they would begin their endless circle anew.

But today was different. Today, Björn, their priest would read the will of the gods in the entrails of a fish and tell them what they had done wrong and how to appease the gods.

She already knew. She knew what she had done wrong, what Björn had done wrong. Even though they hadn't talked about it, they knew.

*

Hallgard sat on a stone in front of her family's hut, mending a fishnet and watching the people of her village. She wasn't the only one. It was the first warm day of the year. The snow had melted, the sun peaked out behind some last dark clouds and the returning birds were singing their songs of spring. Hallgard smiled, humming along with them.

Volkward smiled as well. He had removed his shirt and thrown it over a stump, while his ax moved up and down in a steady rhythm, cutting wood billet after wood billet in two. Hallgard couldn't help  but watch his muscles.

On the other side of the village square, Björn also sat in front of his hut. In his hands he held a bronze tablet of some kind. She had often seen it and often asked what it was. But Björn never gave her an answer. She only knew that he got it out of the temple just twice a year, studying it intensely and then putting it back where it belonged.

All in all, life was good, perfect even. When the fishnet was done, Hallgard would finish working on the new cloak for Björn so that he would look good for her wedding. It was a good day. It would be a good year with an early spring. It seemed the gods promised them a good harvest even now.

Björn noticed her watching him and he probably also noticed that she was distracted, tired from the fresh air of the spring and the smell of blooming flowers as she so often got. She moved her legs, crossing them under her, then stretched her arms and cracked her fingers. It felt good. Spring always felt like waking from a long dream, like seeing the world for the first time like it really was.

She hadn't seen Volkward finishing chopping wood and leaving or Björn walking up to her and squatting down next to her, too occupied with her own idle thoughts.

“Tired?” She had yawned.

“Slightly.”

“Maybe I could wake you up...”

“Oh, can you, now? And what did you have in mind?”

Obviously, he had nothing specific in mind, because he kept quiet for an uncharacteristically long time while a teasing smile danced on her lips.

“I..., I...,” he stammered. More and more often he seemed to lose his words around her, like he did when they were still young children, and his freckled face got a nice red touch to it.

Hallgard laughed. “You could show me this tablet of yours,” she suggested, nodding at the bronze plate he still held in his hand.

“I..., I really can't. You know... I...”

“Oh, please, Björn. What is so bad when I know about this? It's just bronze and copper.”

“It's of the gods, given to us by them that we may know when the time of sowing is and when the time of harvest. I'm not allowed to tell you more.”

Hallgard played with her long red locks coyly. “Come, now, Björn. You sound like the days when you speak to the gods in the grove. It is made by men, for men.”

“You're not even supposed to know what I sound like in the grove!”

“Björn, everyone knows that. Everyone has watched you at least once there. Please.”

“Hall...”

“Please, I won't tell anyone. I just want to know. How does it work? Why isn't it enough to look at the sun and the clouds to know the end of winter? It's spring. Why haven't we started the sowing yet? Does this tablet tell you? What does it tell you? Björn, please.”

“You're really not supposed to know.”

“Please?”

One last look in Hallgard's smiling face and her bright eyes and his resolution was gone. “Not here. Come to my hut this night and I'll tell you.”

*

The cock crowed and woke the last people of their little village. Volkward stretched his long legs and got up as soon as he heard the sound. He didn't have much time. He needed to ready his small boat and row out onto the sea. Björn needed fresh fish for a ritual they all dreaded.

Not only keeping their roofs tight had become difficult in the last few weeks. Their food was running out too. Corn got moldy, the fish seemed to disappear in the sea. And most of the time, the rain, storm and lightning was so bad that they couldn't risk going out. When Björn's ritual didn't change that soon, they would all be lost.

The old, threadbare cloak around his shoulders hardly helped against the rain. The fishnets hardly withstood the yanking of the sea. But if he had to risk his life to catch a single fish, so be it.

He didn't want to do it. He didn't want to help Björn, but there was not really a choice. Björn was their only hope, after all. He was the one the gods talked to, he was the one who could find out what they did wrong.

If only he didn't hate him so much...

*

Volkward was waiting for Björn behind his house in the morning, idly playing with his knife. There must be a reason, he told himself, there must be an explanation. But even if there was one, did he want to hear it?

When Björn opened the door, he found a knife at his throat.

“What were you doing with Hallgard?”

“Volkward?”

“She's my wife! How dare you?”

“Not yet.” It was the wrong thing to say, of course. Volkward's fist struck the side of his head and he stumbled to the ground. Without warning, a kick to his rips followed, before Björn rolled through the grass and out of reach of his opponent.

“What are you doing?” he asked, coming back to his feet.

“All night! She was with you all night!”

“So what? It's her choice, isn't it?”

“She's promised to me!”

Volkward still held his knife in one hand. He struck again against Björn's face. A quick move with his shoulder and the weapon only struck the air. Björn turned back, ramming his shoulder in Volkward's side. The larger man landed on his back and Björn added a kick of his own. Then he put his foot on Volkward's throat.

“She might be promised to you,” he jeered, “but I guess she prefers spending time with me!”

Volkward grabbed the priest's leg and toggled him over. Both lying on the ground, the larger Volkward had the upper hand. He knelt on Björn's breast, hitting him again and again.

“Stop it! Stop it, what are you doing?!” Hallgard shrieked, running up to the fighting brothers.

She grabbed Volkward's strong arm and the next thing she knew, she lay on her back as well, the just finished cloak of the priest in the dirt beside her. Volkward turned to her, ready to struck her too, but when he saw the look on her face and the blood on his hands, he stopped. Slowly, he got up from the ground and with a last, seething look at Björn, he walked away.

*

It was strange seeing all these people on the clearing in the grove. Usually, he was alone at this one large tree in the middle of it, just he and the gods. When other people were involved, the ceremony didn't happen here, but in the village or at the beach, but the grove was not for everyone.

They were waiting, waiting for the gods' sign, waiting for the priest to tell them the verdict.

He couldn't do it. He looked into the entrails of the freshly caught fish over and over again. When he suggested the ritual, he had feared not to see an answer, that he would disappoint everyone and that all hope was lost. But now, now he saw the answer clearer than he ever imagined. The only problem was that he really, truly did not want to see it, did not want to say it out loud.

It was obvious in the structure of the bones, in the colors of the organs, in the look of the dead eyes. The scales told him and the teeth. The skull agreed, so did the tail. There was no doubt.

“A sacrifice,” he whispered, his voice too weak to carry to the anxiously waiting people. He cleared his throat, then repeated, louder but still far too weak, “A sacrifice.” He had to clear his throat again, to turn around and face his people to make his voice carry to all of them. “A sacrifice, the gods demand a sacrifice.”

The words did not have the expected reaction. As a matter of fact, the villagers all kept quiet, probably waiting for an explanation why he was so pale, why the words didn't want to leave his lips.

Why weren't they shocked, why didn't they protest and scream? Were they really that afraid, that exhausted that they didn't care? They didn't care that the gods demanded a life?

And then he realized it, then he understood that the words didn't have the meaning he thought they had, that only he saw what the gods really demanded. After all, what was unusual about a sacrifice? What was strange about another dead animal?

“A sacrifice,” he said again, quiet, and then louder, crying it out for all of them to hear: “A human sacrifice!”

*

Hallgard dipped the cloth in the full basin of cold water again and dabbed the blood from his forehead. The new cloak lay next to his bed and she knelt on the ground. Björn's eye had started to swell, the nose seemed slightly askew and a nasty gash graced his brow.

“He didn't mean it. He's just jealous,” Hallgard said, not exactly looking Björn in the eyes.

“He's a brute.”

“And your brother.”

“And my brother. And your future husband. You're sure you want me to marry you?” There was hope in his voice.

She tried to ignore it. “I'm sure.” She hesitated a moment, then she grabbed the discarded cloak from the ground. “I made a new cloak for you. As payment.”

“As payment, of course.” Björn turned to the side. Now he was the one avoiding her eyes.

*

The looks came slowly, but they came. The steps where even slower, but they happened as well. They turned to her, but in truth they turned away. They created distance, in their looks, their words, their gestures.

Hallgard stood alone. She had never felt so alone before. It at taken them all a while, but soon enough it dawned on all of them: There were rules for who was eligible as a sacrifice â€" an adult but not yet married. Their village was small and only three people met the criteria: Björn, Volkward and her.

But Volkward was young and strong, a fisherman as well as a fighter, and Björn, he was their priest, there was no way they would even consider him as a sacrifice. And that left only her. A could chill ran over her back and arms, the blood seeped from her already pale face. She didn't want to die.

And at the same time, she knew that it was right. The gods demanded it and she, Hallgard, had broken the law, had flirted with Björn and teased him until he showed her their most precious belonging.

“You asshole!” The shout was sudden and loud, piercing through the wall of bodies that seemed to have formed around her â€" not threateningly, but definitely there.

Volkward ran forward, pressing through the mass of people to the front where Björn stood with a bowed had and a crooked nose.

“You asshole!” he repeated, “What do you think you're doing? She doesn't want you and now you're going to kill her! Is this revenge? Vengeance? You ungrateful bastard! She gives you a new cloak, she spends the night with you, and you still can't have her! And now you're killing her. Murderer!”

All the color that had drained from her face returned tenfold. “Stop!” she shriek but it was already too late. Volkward's fist connected a second time with Björn's nose in just a few weeks.

“Don't, Volkward, don't.” Hallgard tried to get through to the two brothers but the people watching her and watching them stood too close.

Luckily, other villagers pulled them apart.

“I am sorry, I am so sorry,” Björn whispered with a voice that sounded why more nasally then she had ever heard him before. “Hallgard, I am so sorry. I don't want this, I really don't. I... I don't know what to do, didn't know. I... How... What was I supposed to do?” The last question was directed at Volkward, who still fought against the other people, trying to get back at the priest.

“There is no other way,” Hallgard, her head bowed deeply with tears in her eyes, said with a quiet voice that nevertheless cut through the ruckus of voices and nervous excitement. “There is no other way. And,” now looking up directly into the eyes of Björn, “it is the right thing to do. We both know this. We know.”

Björn hung his head, blood dripping to the ground, the forehead pale and the cheeks burning with shameful fire. “Tomorrow,” he whispered, “tomorrow.”

*

She sneaked into his hut as she had so often done in the last year. He sat on his bed, not able to sleep, not even able to look at her when she entered. According to tradition, she was already dead. You do not talk to dead people, you do not look at them. But the truth was, that he couldn't keep quiet, that he couldn't spent their last night together with her as strangers.

Volkward raised his head. She just stood there and said nothing. In her shaking hand she held a newly woven cloak with the most beautiful pattern he had ever seen, the riches colors and finest embroidery. Deep down in his heart, he also saw it as the everyday cloak it really was, but sometimes you just don't want to see the truth.

“You're not going to die,” he simply stated, grabbing her wrists and dragging her down to him. She didn't struggle, but she didn't make a move to fall gracefully. She just stumbled into his lap and buried her face in his shoulder.

“You're not going to die,” he said again, stroking her red locks.

“Don't,” she said, “don't say anything. Just hold me. Hold me until I fall asleep.”

Volkward nodded into her hair, not saying anything more.

*

When she woke, she was alone. The cloak, made for a husband, not a widower, was gone. Rain still pattered down on all the huts, still fell through leaks and onto her head. It was dark outside. It was dark in the house. Darkness filled her heart and mind.

Not really knowing or caring where she was going, Hallgard left the house. Her naked feet sank into the muddy earth in front of the hut. On her way across the square to Björn's home, the rain stopped. She didn't see him at first, but Björn stood in the dark, looking towards the forest and the clearing that would soon be her fate.

“Hallgard?” Björn said when he noticed her, “I thought it was you.”

“What was me?”

“I... I thought I saw someone going to the grove. I thought it was you.”

“No, I...” Hallgard hesitated. “Volkward is gone.”

They looked at each other, confused first, then afraid. As if an unspoken agreement existed between them, they ran into the forest.

*

Again and again the knife was thrust into his chest and no matter how fast she ran, she knew that she was too late. She couldn't believe that he was still standing, still fighting against the pain, still keeping upright, still ramming it into his body. Even as the first drop of blood had appeared, hardly visible in the dark, it was already too late. She counted the thrusts, even though she didn't want to, while she ran, ran and ran, a distance that seemed to get larger, not smaller. Björn was by her side, though she had forgotten him.

Pain was edged into Volkward's face, but only when the ceremonial knife hit him for the fourteenth time did he sink to the ground, the blood mixing with mud and rain on the ground.

She reached him when his eyes flickered with the last moments of life.

“I promised,” he said, “I promised.”

His cloak, his new cloak had holes in it. His beautiful new cloak. So beautiful, made for him, with her hands, her shaking hands. All other thoughts had left her.

“It... it was a sacrifice,” Björn said beside her, “the purest sacrifice, given of his own free will.”

“Leave me the cloak,” she said, “leave me the cloak.” She said it over and over again, without looking up, without even realizing why she was saying it.

“We have to burn the body,” Björn said gently, understanding her better than she did herself. It was necessary. You did not bury a sacrifice. The body and everything he had on him had to be burned so that the ashes would reach the gods.

“Leave me the cloak. Leave it to me. Leave me the cloak.”

In the end, Björn agreed. Slowly, carefully, he opened the fibula at Volkward's neck, then he turned the body of his brother around and removed the cloak. He folded it and pressed it into her arms. She didn't even take it. It fell to the ground and Björn brought it along for her.

*

The rain had stopped the night before. Even before Volkward had given his life instead of her, the rain had stopped. If the gods anticipated the sacrifice or if they were just cruel, Hallgard couldn't tell. She didn't care. A new, a different kind of water soaked the mud at her feet.

She held the cloak tight in her arms and watched the large fire on which the body of her husband burned â€" for he was her husband in all but name. Volkward's fibula was pinned to the cloth as was the needle she had used to make it. She stroked it gently like a small child but other than that she didn't move all day.

Volkward's name would be spoken often in the village from no on, but the people would not remember the person, they wouldn't remember a fighter and jealous lover, they would remember a sacrifice, a dead man who walked among them. They would forget that he was human, forget his flaws, forget that he was just a man, a man Hallgard loved. There would be no grave and no barrow, nothing to show that he was ever anything but an ideal.

But Hallgard wanted to remember a man. The man who preferred his own death to hers.

When Björn told her that they had to get rid of the cloak, lest someone saw it and understood that it had to be burned, she agreed. Together they weighted it down with stones, together they sank it in the bog where the ground was wettest and softest.

And it is said, that this part of the bog never dries, that the tears of Hallgard the husbandless wife still moisten it to this day.

[Ponch]

Sadly, I wasn't able to get my story together in time. It was a comic tale of a prehistoric Swedish caveman and his attempt to build the first Ikea with stone age tools that tragically went awry and ended badly for everyone. But I just wasn't able to pull it all together in time. Nice entries from other people though. I look forward to voting on them.

[Blondbraid]

Sadly, I wasn't able to get my story together in time. It was a comic tale of a prehistoric Swedish caveman and his attempt to build the first Ikea with stone age tools that tragically went awry and ended badly for everyone. But I just wasn't able to pull it all together in time. Nice entries from other people though. I look forward to voting on them.

Sounds like a fun story, shame you couldn't finish it.
I could extend the deadline a few days longer if anyone is interested.

[Baron]

Dang it!  I've been away for Easter.  I can pull something together in a day or two if you are extending the deadline for Ponch.  I look forward to reading about how his caveman assembled his Smeärbarf out of mammoth tusks and a stone allen key.

 

[SilverSpook]

In creative limbo between Neofeud and the next project, so I think I'll play your game this round.

Nevermind, don't wait for me, looks like I won't have much time after all do to RL!  Good luck to all entrants, though!

[Baron]

Dark Age Doings

   Hraþaz Soft-Axe lolled lazily in the willow coracle as it floated amid the long grasses, a fishing line tied to his remaining big toe and a flask of mead in his two-finger hand.  He absently swatted at a fly with his eponymous axe, renting another great tear in the flesh of his scalp, causing him to wince momentarily before settling back to the important business of lazing the day away.

   The hours dripped by like blood from a non-lethal wound.  The late September sun bathed the land in the deep vivid colours that heralded a harsher season on the way, but Hraþaz was not known for his forward thinking.  Long forgotten were the trials of winters-past, of surviving on tree bark and squirrel droppings.  It was just possible that àâ,¬bjorn Greed-Drool would need a human pin-cushion of his calibre to front his winter reindeer raids, but even this happy scenario eluded Hraþaz's simplistic mind.  He lived wholly in the now, leaving the heavy mind work to the likes of Bjarnvarðr Bore-Words or Fastaðr Split-Face.  If a problem couldn't be solved with a crushing blow of his axe, it was too difficult by half for him to grapple with.

   Which is how, in the dancing shadows of the later afternoon, that Hraþaz came to face his ultimate opponent.  Perhaps if he'd been more awake, or more sober, he might have realized the futility of the fight.  Perhaps if he'd more than one eye he would have gained more perspective on the situation.  Perhaps.  But perhaps it was inevitable that a man of Hraþaz's violent ignorance would one day pick a fight that even his brute grit could not overcome. 

   It began with Hraþaz's coracle running aground, a fell shadow falling over him and a cool breeze gusting up.  Hraþaz sat up, blinking in a confused and somewhat murderous state, finding a wooden man dancing in a brown cloak above him.  The man was hard to make out, as the sun was now low and behind him, but the knobbly angle of his branchy head seemed to imply some sort of joke at Hraþaz's expense.  At any rate, the gaiety of his dance and the otherworldliness of his body meant only one thing to to HraÃ,þaz: he must be smote!

   And so Hraþaz balanced himself with both feet on either side of his coracle and swung his blunt axe in a mighty arc towards the offending stranger.  But through some jape of the light the wooden man eluded the blow, dancing merrily on as Hraþaz's axe smashed the water in frustration.  Twice more Hraþaz swung to smite, and twice more his axe feasted on nought but air and water.  Now quite unbalanced (for he was missing even the inner components of his left ear), Hraþaz fell forward to grapple with the wooden man by hand.  It was a fearsome spectacle, the veteran warrior screaming and flailing, the wooden man dancing wildly over the surface of the water.  Hraþaz managed to get in a few good blows, but the stranger stabbed him viciously with the sharpened points of some unseen armour beneath his garb.  Blood and sap flowed gloriously in a battle worthy of the heroes of the great sagas.

   Then at last Hraþaz was spent, impaled one too many times upon the sharp points of the broken undergrowth.  He fell back into his coracle, floating off into the sunset gateway to the halls of Valhalla.  There was a brief peace as the wooden man saluted his worthy opponent. 

   And then Bjarnvarðr Bore-Words returned from his cranberry gathering to gather his cloak from the tree.  Finding the garment now pierced and blooded, he looked about pensively and scratched his great grey beard.  Shrugging meekly at the unknowable mysteries of life, he carefully folded the cloak around a few small stones and sank it in the bog as an offering to the norns that weave the twisted fate of all men.

[Sinitrena]

I really don't want to nag - though I guess I am  - but the official deadline was over a week ago and the last new entry nearly a week ago. Shouldn't we start the voting soon?

[Blondbraid]

I really don't want to nag - though I guess I am  - but the official deadline was over a week ago and the last new entry nearly a week ago. Shouldn't we start the voting soon?

You are right, I wasn't sure if Ponch was going to add an entry or not, but I guess it's long overdue. Sorry to have kept you all waiting!

Entries:
The haze of time by Mandle
A story with no title by Kconan
Hallgard the Husbandless Wife by Sinitrena
Dark age doings by Baron

You will vote on these categories:
Best writing
Best character
Best story

[Sinitrena]

Best Writing: kconan
Best Character: kconan for Lugus.
Best Story: Mandle, for the very unusual interpretation of the theme.

[Baron]

Best Writing: kconan for well-penned fight scenes.
Best Character: Mandle for a thoroughly despicable main character.
Best Story: Sinitrena, for the twist at the end.  I mean, I know the title implied that Hallgard's husband wouldn't make it, but right up till the end I was pretty sure it was Bjorn who was going to man-up and take the hit for the team.

[Ponch]

Fine entries all around, but my votes must go to...

Best writing Kconan
Best character Mandle
Best story Mandle

Nice work, everyone.

[Mandle]

I'm planning to read all and vote tomorrow before leaving for a trip home to Australia...

[kconan]

Best Writing: Baron
Best Character: Mandle
Best Story: Sinitrena

Fun round with a unique theme, writing a backstory for something that exists in the real world.