Tag Archives: Middle-Grade

Title: Being Valter

Chapter: A man who needs a heart

Genre: Fantasy, Middle Grade

Rating: G

——-

She was furious but it didn’t stop her from turning and going straight home.  She hadn’t gotten this far on her own without being cautious.  She knew how to act cowed by people, it was better to take a little embarrassment than have everything she’d worked on taken away from her.  It didn’t mean she liked it.  In fact she’d like nothing better than to march up to that mountain of muscle and – and – well, she couldn’t do anything to him.

Fia slumped against the door in her small, cramped apartment and slid the bar over the door.  With a heavy sigh she began pulling off her kitchen clothes and hung them on a peg where they could dry and be washed later.  She washed up in a basin of water she’d brought up last night and changed into a well worn dress; it was frayed on the hem and at the cuffs and the style was old but it fit her better than her maid’s uniform.  Carefully Fia shook out the skirts, a fine covering of magic dust fell away; grimacing, Fia knew she’d need to sweep before she left tomorrow, she couldn’t take any chance of someone finding it in here.

Leaving her room she locked it behind her and went out the back door to the building where she rented her small room.  It was late afternoon and people were bustling this way and that, finishing things before going home to families.  She’d wasted much of her precious time.  Sour, Fia pulled the long wheat colored braid of hair over her shoulder and turned down a foreboding alley.  She was a daily traveler of these dark streets; were she not she might find herself in trouble, but the street toughs let her pass and avoided looking at her.  The closer she got to the shady areas of town the more people stepped out of her way and made a point in not being where she was.

She stopped outside of a set of shallow steps going down to a door below street level.  Several colored lanterns hung around it and paint that had once marked the door brightly was now dull and chipping away.  Fia knocked in a triple rhythm and then slid inside the door, closing it behind her.

Inside the apartment was hazy with burning incense.  There were pillows and rugs spread on the floor and in the middle of the common room on the right was a low, squat table.  To her left was a small kitchen, partitioned off with a half wall.  An old, foreign woman turned and looked at her; she merely grunted and went back to what she was doing.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” Fia murmured and went to stand beside the old woman.

“Cut these.”

Fia did as she was told, slicing vegetables for a stew and combined the ingredients in a pot and put it over a fire in the hearth.  The old woman had moved on to slicing up other things and crushing bits together on a separate stretch of the kitchen.  From this vantage point she could stand in the kitchen and gaze out over the rest of the room, as if it were her kingdom; and for all intents and purposes it could be that these set of rooms were her kingdom.  Mommy Fortuna was a woman who set her own laws and rarely went outside of her domain.  People only came looking for her because they knew of her skills and were willing to do what was necessary.

Most of the time Fortuna supplied healing remedies, foul smelling concoctions that applied to the body and healed quickly.  It was only the wise who realized the reason her potions and salves worked so well was because they were infused with magic; that medium reserved for only those highly educated.

“Why you late?”

“Some strange things happened in the palace today,” Fia leaned her elbows on the counter.  Her feet hurt terribly, but she wanted to watch Fortuna at work.  She learned so little each day it was maddening, but she knew she had to take it slow.  “The Royals are being strange and then they weren’t going to let me out of the palace and then I had to get away from this street tough hanging around the palace.  I didn’t mean to be late, honest.”

Fortuna smiled and held out a piece of something Fia didn’t recognize.  Wary but obedient, she opened her mouth and let the old woman put it in her mouth.

“It good.  Chew!”

It was tasteless at first, but then seemed to melt in her mouth into a sort of mushy, liquid warmth.  “Mmm, what is it?”

“I no have word for it.  It help you open mind though. I need you help me tonight. Man with no heart come in. He need heart.  I need your help.”

Sometimes Fia didn’t understand a single thing Fortuna wanted her to do; tonight looked like it would be one of those nights.

Title: Being Valter

Chapter: Somethings you’re better off not knowing

Genre: Fantasy, Middle Grade

Rating: G

——-

A direct approach would get him nowhere.  Stiig had forsaken the main palace entrances for the servants gateway, but the two guards stationed there had wanted to challenge him.  As wrong as it felt for two foreign men to be standing guard on the palace, they did wear the proper livery and Stiig could not justify knocking their heads together, so he’d retreated to gather his thoughts.  He was at a loss for what to do; he had always heard that palace servants had lose lips and he’d hoped to capitalize on that.  But no one was coming or going from the servants entrance.

Something just wasn’t right.  Why hadn’t the prince come to greet them?  Who were these strange men in their country’s colors standing guard at the palace?  Mid-thought, he heard a grunting and a few leaves fell from the tree in front of him.  And then legs appeared!

Things were only getting stranger.

A young woman slithered out of the tree and landed on the empty avenue with a heavy thud.  Duty bound to protect his country from any perceived threat, here was one he could investigate.  Before she could run away, he put a hand on her shoulder, holding her in place.

“Where are you coming from?”

Her whole body jerked, and then slowly she turned around.  She looked at him like something might look at a manack before it snapped up its dinner.  Her eyes took up nearly half her face and she smelled strongly of soap.

She clasped her hands in front of her breast and looked up at him pleadingly.  “They wouldn’t let me leave, and I have to get home,” she squeaked out.

He had thought she was only a girl, but she was just a very small woman.  Stiig was useless at determining women’s ages so she could be five years younger than him or ten older and he wouldn’t know the difference.  “Why not?”

She shuddered again in his grasp, as if his voice were the trigger to her spasms.  “I don’t know sir.  Things are strange.”

“Strange?”  He bent down and put his face on level with hers.  “How so?”

She licked her lips and shifted her weight.  “Well, sir, these strange, foreign fancy men come to see the Royals.  The army men came back and the prince didn’t go out to see them.  And then there are strange men posted at the gates and no one knows who they are.  No one is saying anything, I’m only a scullery maid, I don’t know anything.”

For a scullery maid she spoke well, as if someone had taken the time and effort to educate her.  Stiig looked her over; she was wearing sturdy clothes, splattered with food and wet in places.  She seemed to be telling the truth and anyways, she wasn’t going to be involved with this.  She was just a scullery maid.  Stiig needed to find a magician; someone who would have the power to know what was going on.

“Who were the men who came this morning?”

She shook her head, the scarf wrapped around her hair moving with the motion.  A strand of wheat colored hair slipped out to caress her cheek.  “I don’t know, sir.  I’m only a scullery maid.”

“Right,” he let her go and stood up.  By all accounts he was being paranoid; these men could be envoys, diplomat types who would see to government matters he wouldn’t understand.  But Stiig couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong.  “Go home,” he waved her off, transferring his attention to the wall and thus his second problem.  Getting to the bottom of this.

Paranoid he might be, but usually for the right reasons.  He’d survived long years fighting barbarians.  He’d kept himself and others alive by listening to his hunches and right now they were screaming that something was very, very wrong.  He’d decided without realizing it that he was getting into the palace.  There were bound to be guards inside who knew what was going on and would tell him; if he could just find the right people he could calm his nerves or raise the troops.

“You’re not going to – do anything, are you?”

He’d dismissed her already in his mind and was surprised that she hadn’t left.  She stood stock still, gazing up at him, her eyes unreadable and – the fear gone.

“You’d be better off not knowing.”

Her face grew tight and she looked at him with a modicum of authority that surprised Stiig.  “Who are you?”  She put her right hand out, spreading the fingers as if to receive something from him.

He looked down at her hand, which she snatched back, her cheeks flushing.  She was educated, but she was also a scullery maid.  “You’d be better off not knowing,” he repeated with more authority.

“I’m in service to the Royals.  I have a right to know and if you’re threatening them it’s my duty to stop you.”

Stiig grunted; the fearful little mouse had grown teeth, inflated on its good luck so far.  “Look, scullery maid, you said so yourself that things aren’t right.  Then why wasn’t it your law abiding citizen’s duty to look into it?”

Her cheeks turned a remarkable shade of red and her eyes snapped down to the ground.

Chuckling again, Stiig put his hands on his hips and looked down his nose at her.  “Thought so.  Run on home, girl.”  He watched her walk stiffly away, just to make sure she really was leaving and not going back to tell the guards.  Once he was safely alone, Stiig hauled himself up into the tree; the branches groaned and creaked under his weight but held.  He had to force his way through the branches where he girl had been small enough to wiggle through without leaving much of a trace; anyone with eyes would be able to tell someone had come this way.  He didn’t like doing it, but once he was safely sitting on the wall Stiig used his feet and kicked the lowest hanging branch until it splintered and fell to the ground; now his trail looked like a falling branch.

Getting down was easier than getting up, so he was able to lower down onto the springy grass without much trouble.  The only issue was that he had no idea where he was on the palace grounds.

Title: Being Valter

Chapter: Attempted escape

Genre: Fantasy, Middle Grade

Rating: G

——-

Fia kept her head down and hands in the pots.  It was well after lunch and yet no one knew anything.  People came and took food away.  They brought plates back.  Yet no one said a word.  Usually the kitchen was full of laughter and noise; Fia liked it because she could be quiet and no one would notice her, but she heard everything.  Today the silence was painful.

As the girls left, leaving just Cook and Fia at last before the evening staff took over, Fia was startled by Cook suddenly walking over, turning a bucket on it’s end and sitting down with a heavy sigh.

“What’s wrong, Cook?”  Fia finally got out.

“I don’t like this, girl, I don’t like this one bit.”

“What don’t you like?”  Fia ducked her head and heaved one of the largest pots onto the counter space she’d cleared off for it to dry.

“Whatever is afoot.  There is something nasty going on.”

“But we haven’t seen anything.  Maybe the men who came today were just some fancy men, come to talk to His Highness.”  Fia’s hands worked of their own mind, washing the remaining pile of dishes by muscle memory.

“But High Highness never left the palace today!”

“But there are days when he doesn’t leave at all.

Cook looked Fia in the eyes.  “Soldiers returned today.”

Fia gasped, a cast iron pot lid splashing into the soapy water.  “Soldiers returned?”  Her eyes grew large as eggs.  “And the prince – “

“The prince never left the palace.”

Fia felt cold all over.  It was tradition, dating back to Valter himself.  Only under near death circumstances had the sitting monarch not gone to pay the military its thanks.

“Maybe something’s wrong.”  Fia ducked her head and fished the lid back out of the water and finished cleaning it.  “Maybe he’s sick?”

“Then why no magicians?  Why no soups?”  Cook shook her head, “No, if it were that we would have known.  Doctors would have brought us recipes and oversaw the cooking themselves.”

As much as Fia didn’t want to admit it, Cook sounded right.  “I – I’d better hurry up then.”

“Mark my words, Fia, something ain’t right.”

——

Fia tugged the shawl she’d wrapped around her head, making it just a bit more snug and hunched her shoulders.  There was something not quite – right – about the guards posted at the servant’s gate.  Fia didn’t speak to them, but she knew all of their faces and if hard pressed she could probably remember their names as well.  These she did not recognize.  Their uniforms were also brand new, but they were far too old to be new recruits.

The only thing Fia wanted was to remain unnoticed.  That was how she survived; she drew as little attention to herself as possible and got along fine.  It was when people noticed you that you had problems.  There weren’t any others on their way out or in of the palace; just Fia.  The guards watched her approach; no, they waited for her.  When she would have walked past, one stepped in front of her.

“Here, you, girl,” he looped a thumb in his belt and glared down at her.  “Where are you off to at a time like this?”

“H-home, sir.”

“It’s such an odd hour,” his companion leaning up against the yawning gateway remarked.

“I scrub pots, sirs.  I leave when the pots are ready for dinner, and not before.”  Her voice was quiet, hesitant even, but it didn’t fail her.

“Really?”  The first said, his chin jutting out.  “I think you’re skimping your duties, you are!  You’re off to meet some no good boy instead of fluffing pillows like you’re supposed to!”

Fia’s jaw dropped a little and she looked up into the man’s face.  His features, so dark and lined and brown, were foreign to her.  Whoever he was, he was not from the parts near the city.  Glancing at the other guard, Fia had the quickly swelling paniced feeling the hunting birds sometimes seemed to catch.  If she had wings, she would be beating the air with them, her feathers fluffed out.

“Look at her!  You caught her in a lie,” the second laughed and took a bite out of an apple.

“Why don’t you be a good little girl and go back to where you’re supposed to be.”

A little part of Fia rose up inside of her.  She didn’t know who these men were, or why they were here, but they had no right to talk to her like this!  She was Fia, she had Talent, she had hard bought education, and she would – continue to bow her head and get by being looked over.

“Yes sir,” she curtsied, “my mistake.  Please forgive me.”  She turned and scuttled away as quickly as was dignified.  She couldn’t run, because they would remember a girl who ran, but walk away and she became yet one of the many trying to skirt duties.  There were other ways out of the palace walls, if you were but crafty enough to find out.

Out of sight, Fia skirted some green houses until she could walk freely, hidden by hedges and orderly planted things.  Working at the palace was not exactly prudent for one like her, but it was the last place one might suspect her to be, so in her mind it made perfect sense for her to be there.  She had made conditions.  She had to have multiple ways out of the palace; she was just going to exploit one now.

Standing under the inviting boughs of a tree, Fia looked around to see if anyone was watching.  She even stretched and smelt some of the fragrant blossoms growing on the vines that clung to the stone wall.  Satisfied she was alone and unobserved, Fia hiked her skirts up and hoisted herself up and onto a low hanging branch.  Her arms shook with the effort; hauling pots and pans all day left her arms like rubber.  Grunting, she pulled herself up and sat huffing and puffing, her legs dangling.

The wall wasn’t too tall, and this tree provided an excellent way over and down, thanks to its drooping branches.  The only bad thing was that the leaves grew so thick and numerous this time of year that she couldn’t see anything of the street below her.  Fia had to inch herself along the branch until she was at the spot that curved towards the ground, as if the tree were trying to touch its own toes.

Fia worked her legs through the branches and let herself drop.  Her feet slapped the ground harder than she would have liked, and she grunted heavily – but she was out.  Wiping sweat from her brow, Fia picked a twig from her hair and lifted her foot to take a step; she had lessons to get to after all.

“Where are you coming from?”  A voice boomed behind her, deep and rough like scrubbing stones.

Wincing, she turned around to gaze at a young man, near her own age, whose size dwarfed that of the wall and all that around them.  He had the sort of face that could only be crafted; the fine, strong lines of cheek and jaw, his jutting brow and – well – the rest of him.  He was a statue come to life.  And he had his hand clamped tightly on Fia’s shoulder.

Title: Being Valter

Chapter: To know.

Genre: Fantasy, Middle Grade

Rating: G

——-

Stiig shifted his weight; the manack under him shook with a rumble but shifted its weight easily and turned up the column of foot soldiers.  After a winter spent chasing barbarians through the mountains, the spires and domes on the horizon were a welcome sight.

“Stiig!”  His commanding officer hailed him, arm in the air, his own tawny golden manack flicked its tail and eyed Stiigs mount.

The two manacks sidled up to each other, their feline bodies so graceful and powerful.  Stiig reached forward and patted the hard, protective plates on his mounts head.  “Sir?”

“It’s been a long time since we last saw home, huh?”

Stiig nodded in response.  When he first joined the army after graduating from the orphanage school, Piotr had demanded the most of him.  Piotr had created him, fostered him, but he was no family.  He was Stiigs commanding officer.  But he was also his friend during more relaxed circumstances.

The manack shifted with liquid grace under Stiig.  “Easy boy.”  He reached up and scratched the beasts shoulders.  It could be easy to think of it as an overgrown house cat, but the manack had evolved, grown into something much larger and deadlier.

“What will you do with what time they give us home, Stiig?”

Stiig looked off into the distance, through the hills towards farm country.  “Nothing.”

“Well I’m going to enjoy myself!”  Piotr gave a hearty laugh and slapped his manack on the shoulders.

Stiig nodded but declined to respond.

They rode next to each other, their manacks, litter mates, striding comfortably shoulder to shoulder.  It took the better part of the day to winde between the hills.  The capitol stood on top of one of the tallest hills the eye could see in a sea of hills.  Once long ago a village sat on that very hill.  There hadn’t been any Royals back then, only villages like island nations all to themselves.  No one was in charge of the land, no one was educated about magic, and everyone did what they wanted to do.  For a few years there was a shortage of food.  Talent was easy to come by, but the knowledge to use that talent for magic was less common.

There was a common man, a farmer most likely who just had a knack for persuading people and had a bit of talent himself.  Hungry people will do many things for food.  The man’s name was Qvan.  No one named their child Qvan anymore.  Qvan gathered as many with magical talent as he could find and taught them a handful of spells, tricks and the like to intimidate people.  They went to the neighboring village and bullied the people into giving them their food.  When that ran out, they went to another village and then another.  People who had talent joined him because Qvan gave them food.

It was so long ago that no one remembered how long Qvan and his army of poor, magic wielding farmers terrorized defenseless villages.  The towns had only the most basic defenses.  They didn’t even have leaders.

The only place of any formable kind of defenses was the town of Lians.  They even had a leader, a man named Valter who was reputed to be the most powerful Kendte; he used magic like most artists used paint.  The people who had no food, who had been terrorized by Qvan went to Kendte Valter and begged him to do something.  An organized, educated man he gathered all of the displaced people, fed them from his stores and picked the most sturdy to join his own men and went out to fight against Qvan.

It may or may not be true, but it was a long standing tradition that the two forces met on this very hill.  Qvan and his rag tag band of tricksters were no match for Kendte Valter, who subdue them and accepted their surrender on the top of the tallest hill as far as the eye could see.  The villagers were so thankful and afraid it might happen again that they asked Kendte Valter to become their King; and so they had their first Royal and the Kingdom of Valter became reality.

The stories flooded into Stiigs mind as the city came closer and then welcomed them with open arms.  Above them girls leaned out of windows and threw scarves with their House emblem stitched onto it; their invitation to an expensive dinner.  Stiig tossed the scarf that fell across his manack’s neck to a nearby foot soldier and glared at the paving stones.  He didn’t like the attention.  He liked doing his job.  The jaunt through the city felt like it took forever.  The barracks were a sight for sore eyes!  The grounds were thick with the press of bodies unloading and jostling loved ones.

Stiig twisted around in his saddle, brows deeply furrowed.  “Where are the Royals?”  He asked Piotr.

His commander swung his head towards him and shrugged.  “No idea.”  Piotr’s head snapped around as two junior solders clung to their manacks who were hissing at each other.

“But they’re supposed to be here when we return,” Stiig muttered to himself, eyes dark as he gazed up at the platform where the Royals had always stood to greet them.

Stiig urged his manack towards the den where they were kept and only released his mount to a more senior handler.  Manack could be docile or savage; Stiig preferred his mount to be spirited.  He gave the animal a scratch on the jaws and removed his packs before escaping through the back of the den, past the piles of toothy kittens that would grow into their claws some day and the hustle and bustle of the handlers.

Everything would be clogged with people for the next two days, but at least the back of the den let out onto a lesser congested avenue.  His own room was a short hike away, but even that was short in comparison to the journey they’d just finished.

“Hey Stiig.”

He turned around and gave a rough nod to the young man that fell in line next to him.

“Stiig, you headed back to your room?  Going to go out tonight with us?”

Stiig shook his head, “Just to my room.”

“You’re no fun,” the young man grinned and hefted his pack higher on his back.

“Any idea why the Royals weren’t out here?”  It was gnawing on him.  They had always been there for every return of the soldiers.

“Oh I heard that they all took off this morning to the lakefront house.  Think they’re going to crown the prince this year?”

“He’s still just a kid.”

“He’s as old as us.”

“It’s not the same.”  Stiig looked away from the young man and grimaced.  How could he explain that a life spent in the palace, even educated, was different than spending years in the army, fighting with a manack against barbarians.

“Well, we’re going out soon, so if you change your mind you know where to find me.”

Stiig nodded and turned into his own building.  He didn’t stay long, even after being gone for almost two years.  He dropped his packs and locked the door behind him to retrace his steps back outside.  He wanted to know what the Royals were up to.  It was obsessive, probably pointless, but Stiig was restless.  It was in his nature to know.

Title: Being Valter

Chapter: Everyone needs to eat.

Genre: Fantasy, Middle Grade

Rating: G

——-

Fia knelt quickly, the bundle of clothes tucked against her gut as she washed the last traces of magic dust off of her hands.  A scullery maid had no business with magic dust on her.  Hastily she dried her hands on her rumpled skirts and darted through the herb garden and into the palace kitchens.  It was early still, but in the kitchens the work started early and didn’t end until even later.

“Fia, I need those pots clean so I can make the porridge!”

“Yes Cook!”  Fia dumped her bundle on the floor and picked around until she found the hem of her Maid’s uniform and pulled it over her head.  She hadn’t even bothered taking the apron off separately so they both went on over her head.  With a twitch of her skirts the clothes settled on her comfortably enough for her to begin.

“You’re such a dear, coming in early.”  The Cook continued to chatter away at Fia while she scrubbed.

Her head bowed, Fia only knew the other cooks and helpers arrived because of the sound of shuffling feat and the growing heat as more pots and kettles and dishes were added to the stove.  The mornings passed in enough regularity that Fia didn’t even have to think about what she did.  She took a pot from the pile that grew on her right and scraped out spare bits of food into a refuse bin and then she scrubbed it until it was clean and added it to the stack on her left that would disappear with astonishing speed.  It left her mind free to think about other things.  Like her nightly lessons.

She was making progress, but at the expense of her sleep.  She had been so tired last night that she had fallen asleep still wearing her under dress and magic dust all over her.  If her neighbor wasn’t so loud when he got up for his shift with the morning watch she very well might still be sleeping.

Fia glanced up at the slit of a window high above her head.  There were two moments in her work day that she waited for.  One was now, just after the royals had eaten breakfast.

“Cook, I’m taking the slop out.”  She didn’t bother drying her hands.  The slop bucket was mostly full and she waddled to keep it from sloshing out and on her dress.

It was her favorite moment of the morning.  She lollygagged a bit in the herb garden.  If she was going to see him, if he was going to the kennels, he’d do it now.  Some mornings the prince didn’t go to the kennels after breakfast, but not knowing made it more exciting.  It was almost eerily quiet, with no one around, but still Fia waited.  She liked to imagine that the prince wanted some time alone, a little peace and quiet that he spent with his dogs.  She dreamed that the prince felt that the only ones who understood him were his faithful hounds.

It was silly, her day dreaming, but Fia couldn’t help it.  She’d always thought the prince was the most handsome and tragic figure she’d ever seen.  He was the only child of the dead king; his uncle ruled as regent in his place and the prince could do nothing without a host of servants shadowing him.  Fia knew she would never speak to him.  She was nothing to him.  But she still had those moments in the garden when he walked past.  She still had her dreams.

Back in the kitchen Fia rolled up her sleeves and tucked into washing the breakfast dishes.  The fine plates she handled with care, handing off to another to dry and put away.  As the breakfast preparation gave way to clean up, some of the cooks and helpers retreated to the garden to shell and slice.  Fia would finish as the cooking started again, giving her some time off her feet to eat.  She tucked herself between an awkward alcove of stone in the garden, her food balanced on her knees and examined her rough, wrinkled hands.  Being a scullery maid wasn’t ideal but it paid well and she had all evening free to spend studying.

Fia was so tired she leaned her head back against the cool stone and closed her eyes.

“Fia! Wake up!”

Her eyes fluttered open and she yelped.  “Cook! I’m so sorry.”  Wedged in as she was she couldn’t get up without pushing Cook, so she stayed where she was.  “What’s wrong, Cook?”  The woman’s face was red and splotchy, her eyes wide like a scared animals.

“Get inside deary, come on.”  Cook hustled Fia inside and shut the door.

“I’m sorry Cook – “

“Hush now.”  Cook put a firm hand on Fia’s arm and a finger to her own lips.

From the corner of her eye Fia could see the rest of the kitchen staff huddled over near the root cellar and a few clustering around one of the large tables used for cutting.  They all had worried expressions on their faces.

“What happened?”  Fia whispered.

“We don’t know.  A paige came running in and said some armored men came into the palace this morning and there was fighting.”

“The royals?”  Fia gasped, her mind flying to her troubled prince.

“We don’t know anything.”  Cook shook her head and hefted a basket of greens onto the tale, “But people need feeding so lets get to it.”