The Knight Who No Longer Wished To Be A Knight

The knight who no longer wished to be a knight sat by his smoldering campfire as a tendril of smoke curled up into the starlit sky. The scents of death– autumnal rot and metallic blood– hung in the air. His armor, which he struggled to remove by himself, lingered nearby reflecting the firelight like the carapace of a dead beetle. River had been acting as his squire over the last few months and he’d forgotten how difficult it was to doff a full set of plate mail without her assistance. The knight’s body ached all over, beyond his chronically painful knee. The final battle had been tough, as expected. But like every fight he’d been in before, he was victorious. It was the greatest victory he’d ever attained– they’d ever attained. It was River’s victory too.

But I was not there to celebrate with him.

Avrely, who no longer wished to be called Sir Avrely, nibbled on the remains of the rations he had packed three days prior. A pitiful victory feast. Crusty brown bread on the verge of molding, a wedge of hard cheese, and some mealy, shriveled apples. Not a drop of wine in sight. The corrupt and evil gods were gone and Solsgard was safe again. He was a hero. King Harald and Queen Natalia would honor him as soon as he made it out of this gods forsaken forest and back to civilization. Then he’d have a real hero’s feast. But for now, the night after saving the kingdom, he was alone, camping in the chilly wilderness, and strongly considering throwing his greatsword into the creek.

The food filled his belly but a hunger lingered within him that no meal could sate. An ache that could not be soothed. The slow unwinding of the residual time stored within his body. It was the gods’ parting gift– a curse.

A flash of something like moonlight caught his eye through the trees. There was no sound, no snapping of branches or rustling of leaves. It was a shimmer of silvery white, a wisp of silky vapor. Perhaps it was good the greatsword was still leaning against a nearby log and not covered in muddy sediment. The magic of Solsgard was concentrated in the Forest of the Gods. But now that the gods were dead, or as close to dead as gods can be, what remained in these dark trees? Something. That was for sure.

It was me. Difficult as it was to manifest some kind of physical form, I had to reach him.

Avrely wrapped his scratchy woolen cloak around himself a little tighter, shivering in his linen shirt against the night air. He stared into the abyss beyond the campsite, pleading with whatever it was to leave him alone so that he wouldn’t have to leave the fireside. Not another battle. He was done. The autumn rain had made everything in the forest damp and the ground was glazed and slick with fallen leaves. Stumbling over moss covered rocks and clusters of mushrooms in the darkness while fighting some kind of spirit was the last thing he needed.

He was so bone-deep exhausted that if a malevolent ghost did approach him, perhaps he’d just surrender. Let it devour his soul, or whatever it was going to do, and then let his body decompose with the rest of autumn’s rot. Being folded into this place– the place where the gods lived, ruled, and were ultimately defeated– wouldn’t be the worst fate.

Poor Avrely, my sweet knight.

The wisp of moonlight vanished and seemed uninterested in bothering the knight who no longer wished to be a knight. The silver plate mail remained heaped next to the fire. The greatsword, still crusted with my blood, remained leaned against a log. Avrely curled up into a little ball on the hard ground and fell asleep.

***

When Avrely awoke the next morning a dusting of frost made the forest glitter in the weak light of dawn. Even after the fire had gone out, and without River beside him, the cloak kept him warm. He sleepily shook tiny ice crystals from his long, dark hair and scrubbed a hand over his pale face. How was he still here?

He stirred the campfire from dormancy and broke his fast with more stale bread and nearly-frozen cheese. The forlorn apples were gone. The ache of his curse became insistent and he ignored it. A problem for later. He donned his armor once more, perhaps for the last time. Maybe it too would end up at the bottom of a creek. Or thrown down a ravine. Or, more kindly, given to someone in need.

Avrely had a gentle heart and sweet nature. At the next town, surely a pauldron would find its way onto someone’s doorstep, a bracer tucked into a stranger’s rucksack, the chestplate quietly leaned against a stable wall. The knight who no longer wished to be a knight would distribute his armor to those who could use it or sell it with no desire to be recognized for his charitable gifts. A single piece of his plate mail could fetch enough coin to feed a starving family for an entire year. His greatsword however…

Avrely retrieved this last, only when he was finally ready to depart. The dried blood looked like rust on the blade. An ugly, guilty stain. For someone who did not know how meticulously Avrely maintained his weapon, they might think he was a careless knight who misused his equipment. Hardly the case. He gingerly sheathed the sword in its scabbard, taking great care to not disturb the remnants of a life force drained from a heart that no longer beat.

It was all he had left of me.

He set out walking due east, toward the royal city of Fellskol. The armor was loud and unwieldy traipsing through the forest. He was eager to lose the weight of it. The burden he carried on his tired bones and his identity as a knight. But he couldn’t set it down yet. The gods surely left foul spirits and spiteful creatures behind in their sacred wood. Avrely would be grateful for the heavy silver shell when something evil came to rip his guts from his belly.

The walk out of the Forest of the Gods gave the knight who no longer wished to be a knight plenty of time to ruminate on his final battle, the one in which he became Solsgard’s greatest hero. Surely everyone in the kingdom felt the moment the gods were defeated. The hold the deities had on the common folk was unquestionable. When River trapped and subdued the gods, and Avrely used his sword to seal their demise, the spell was broken. Avrely felt it in his chest. The gods wielded fear as a weapon. And without their presence, there was finally peace.

Wherever he went for the rest of his life, no matter who he encountered, no matter what he did, he would be honored as Solsgard’s savior. Everyone would know his name. There would be songs written about his triumph. He could sit at the right hand of the king if he so chose. Lead the King’s Guard if he was not through with being a knight.

Then there was the matter of his newly acquired curse. Avrely needed to figure out how he was to survive it. But an even bigger issue was the notable absence of River, the true victor in this battle. It might have been his weapon that made the killing blow, but it was her magic, her weaving of the threads of fate, that brought doom upon the gods. And she was, after all, the one that everyone in Solsgard knew. She had been famous before this final battle. She was an even greater legend than Avrely. She’d squired for him, despite her immense power and magical abilities. It was silly and selfless for someone like her to help him don and doff his armor and yet she insisted upon it.

A true leader is first and foremost a servant to those depending on them.

The knight who no longer wished to be a knight never got to tell her that he loved her. He didn’t love her in the way the people of Solsgard loved her as a folk hero and champion. But in a way that made his curse a barbaric torture. The god that had cursed him, Myra, knew exactly what she was doing. She knew exactly how to pierce his heart and keep that barb lodged in his flesh, deep and painful, for the remainder of Avrely’s days. Of which there would be many.

***

As dusk approached on the first day of Avrely’s victory journey home, he saw the flash of moonlight again through the trees. He stopped walking, dropped his rucksack, and unsheathed his sword. Did the spirit know what the subdued hiss of steel drawn from a scabbard meant? Unlike the night before, Avrely was ready and willing to fight the ghost that haunted him. Already wearing his armor made it easier to engage in a fresh battle.

The wisp of light lingered much longer this time and he was able to get a good look at it. The silkiness of its shape reminded him of River’s long hair. When he first met her it was raven black, but by the time they reached their final battle, it had morphed through every shade of silver before turning white as winter snow. She was not any older than him, still shy of her thirtieth name day. It was not age that blanched her locks. It was the magic she’d acquired. She was as close to a god as any mortal could get. Only someone like her could have defeated them.

Avrely paused as he watched the spirit drift through the dark trees. Did it even know he was there? Perhaps he ought to sheathe his sword and ignore it. The village he hoped to reach by nightfall couldn’t be that far away. But just as he was about to retrieve his rucksack off the forest floor, the wisp began to move closer to him. He ground his feet into the slippery leaves, trying to find stable footing. He caught a whiff of woodsmoke in the air. If there was to be another battle, at least a warm hearth would follow soon after.

As it approached, the ghost made a strange sound. It was like a cry, but no louder than a whisper. There was no aggression or malice– only sadness. Avrely gripped his sword tighter. Could a steel blade even harm such a spirit? The apparition got terribly close and Avrely realized that it didn’t matter. He dropped the greatsword with an unceremonious thud onto the damp soil. The spirit had River’s hair because it was River.

But you already knew that.

Avrely fell to his knees next to his discarded weapon and pulled off his helmet. He tried to say something, but the words lodged in his throat. He choked out a sob, tears spilling from his eyes. He’d done as she’d asked of him. In their final battle, he obeyed her orders as he promised he would. River had ensnared the evil gods, tangled them up in the threads of fate that she had learned to weave with her magic. All threads must be anchored somewhere. A tapestry cannot be created without a loom. And River’s loom, the branches in which she spun her webs, were no other than her mortal ribs. And to kill the insects trapped within her grasp, the loom and all its threads had to be destroyed.

“River!” Avrely managed to say at last. Her wispy form flickered like a candle next to an open window. “River, please!” Was he begging her to stay? To return to life? To be merciful? It was her death all over again.

When she died, Avrely had held her body as she bled out in the hidden forest meadow where they defeated the evil gods. He was forever a dutiful knight that faithfully obeyed his orders. The orders that saved all of Solsgard, but forced him to be the harbinger of his one true love’s demise. As she died, he begged her to stay with him, to somehow transcend death. He buried her there, thinking that it was the end.

The knight who no longer wished to be a knight reached out a gauntleted hand towards River’s ghost and tried to touch her. But his fingers slid through her misty form. She gave him a look– one he’d seen before. It said, you will find a way.

Then she vanished.

Where in the nine hells did she go? In a panic, Avrely scanned the forest, his eyes manically dashing from root to tree limb, trying to find her again. He’d lost her once. There was some part of her that lingered on this material plane. He would not lose her again. He grabbed his sword and rucksack and began to run through the trees. River’s spirit couldn’t have gone far. He would find a way to bring her back.

Sweating and sore, desperate and panting, Avrely searched until darkness took hold of the land. The lights of the nearby village twinkled in the distance. He was nearly done with his long, lone walk of victory from the Forest of the Gods. But the ghost that contained some still-living part of River was nowhere to be found. Avrely slumped down against a tree and dripped the last dregs of his waterskin onto his parched tongue. His stomach growled. The deeper ache of his curse intensified. Soon he would need to feed on more than just food.

“Come back, River,” he cried. But she was gone.

Avrely had all but forsaken his vows as a sworn knight of Solsgard in his intent to abandon his armor and greatsword. But the honor that lingered with him would not be so readily discharged. He decided to make a final vow, a different sort of promise.

He stabbed the tip of his sword into the moist, dark earth. He kneeled before it, placing one hand on its pommel and one hand on his heart.

“I vow to you, River,” he said. “I will find you.”

***

What Avrely didn’t know was that I was not dead, just stuck. Trapped in my own catastrophically magnificent web. Tangled up with the corrupt gods. Banished to the same place I had intended to imprison them. They were still alive and so was I.

Over the time he and I had spent plotting to overthrow the gods, I often asked myself, what makes a god? What gives them their power?

It was the belief of the people around them. Avrely believed in me like a parishioner believes in a deity. And I suppose, in some way, that dispelled my mortality.

I couldn’t linger in that ghostly form for very long, not whilst keeping the other gods contained. But it was enough to send Avrely a message. To tell him that I was still alive somewhere and that he would have to free me.

How he would find me and free me was another problem altogether. I imagined that after the knight who no longer wanted to be a knight was freed of that duty, he might venture to a place he’d always wanted to go– the Scholar’s Hall at Havenspire, to learn what he could about the gods and where we might be trapped. He deserved the softness of scholarly work. His curse, unbeknownst to him, would provide him an unusually long life. Assuming he could feed the hunger, that is.

***

After making his vow, Avrely pulled his sword from the soil. He glanced at the blood still marring the blade and winced. Yanking some damp, stringy moss from a nearby tree branch, he cleaned his faithful weapon. There was no need to cling to River’s remains when the hope that she might still be alive filled his heart. He straightened up, sheathed his sword, and set out towards the warm lights of Greenbriar Village for a hot meal and a soft bed.

Avrely would always be a knight, no matter what he did with his armor and greatsword. He was bound by honor, always and forevermore. He served no king nor kingdom. But a woman he loved. In life and in death.

I knew he’d find me again, even if it took four hundred years. He had all the time in the world. It wasn’t like I was going anywhere.

When he glanced up into the night sky one last time, the stars glittered like a thousand blinking, hopeful eyes. He smiled back at them, at me.

You will find a way.