Of all his chores, Linduin Kayle disliked chopping firewood the least.

It wasn't just the mindlessness of it, although that definitely helped. And, unlike many of his daily tasks, it didn't seem pointless -- firewood was a thing one needed year-round, after all, even if it was just for cooking. But the thing that really set it apart from all of his other dutiful labors was the fact that he could imagine each log to be an enemy -- an oafish bandit, say, or a snarling dragon -- and bring his axe down upon it with the might of justice. In those fleeting moments of imaginary triumph, he could forget that he was a slave.

He would never say such a thing aloud, of course. He had once mumbled it in his father's hearing, and received a lightning-fast slap that had sent him spinning; slender and bespectacled though he was, his father had the strength and quickness of a lion. He had then proceeded to make Linduin sleep outside, without blankets, and given him no food for three days, "to show you what real slaves experience". In his own mind, Galar Kayle had taught his son an important lesson about appreciating the fortunate hand life had dealt him; in reality, he had taught his son not to get caught, which is a far more common lesson for children to take to heart.

In truth, Linduin was merely a servant, albeit an unpaid one. He joined his father every day at the burgon's compound, to perform such menial tasks as needed doing while his father handled the tax sums and other such matters of importance. It might have interested him to know that he was, in fact, being compensated for his labors, at least in a nominal sense -- the burgon's pay to his father was increased by a certain miniscule amount each month in recompense for his work, which his father dutifully set aside to keep in trust. Had he been aware of this and inclined to spend it, Linduin likely would have invested every coin on books; however, Galar Kayle knew nothing of his son's interest in scholarly pursuits and misinterpreted his frustrations with menial labor as laziness. Linduin's mother, on the other hand, would have been quick to notice the truth if she were still alive, but that had not been the case for nearly ten years. Galar Kayle had never remarried, and never would. If asked, he would have said something about it being better to have the memory of love than a pale replacement; the truth, an altogether uglier beast, was that he had had enough of one wife's criticisms and had no desire to acquire those of any additional wives.

At sixteen, Linduin was finally beginning to grow into his gangling frame. His daily labors, which he despised and scorned at every opportunity, had given him just enough musculature for him to feel inadequate about, and his face had begun to sprout the beginnings of a patchy and embarrassing beard which he shaved off with great loathing each morning. His education, without doubt the finest of any youth in his village, had primarily taught him about the degree of his own ignorance and cultural destitution to an exacting standard. In short, he was a fairly average young man of his age -- sullen, sensitive, and possessed of both great potential and an equally great facility for squandering it.

As he raised his axe above the last log, imagining it to be a cackling witch, his labors were interrupted by an irritated sound from behind him. Twitching guiltily, he half-turned, causing his axe to glance the side of the log and send it hurtling off into the brush. He groaned, turning to discover that the earth had apparently disgorged a toad-faced emissary and a dirt-spattered carriage while his back had been turned.

"I certainly hope you greet guests better than you chop firewood, boy," sniffed the stranger, who wore a multicolored surcoat and an expression of exquisite disdain. "I've been traveling for nearly two hours, and this is the welcome I receive?"

"I'm sorry, sir." Linduin had had a great deal of practice at sounding contrite, at least. "How may I serve you? The burgon did say something about expecting company, but..." he trailed off, realizing that it had probably been an instruction which he had misinterpreted as idle conversation. This day was not going well. "If you'd care to follow me, I can take you to a place where you may take your ease."

The emissary nodded sourly. "I suppose that would at least be better than being abandoned to my own devices in the courtyard. Lead on, then."

In a larger fief, the burgon's estate would have had at least one or two of the prettier class of servant girl, ready to soothe the ruffled spirits of such a visitor. Unfortunately, Haelid was the runt of its province, and its tax revenues were strained enough as it was. The closest thing the burgon could have had to a servant girl would be if he put Linduin in a dress.

In the sitting room, tea was produced, denounced, and then consumed with ill grace. Linduin alerted his father, who presumably would alert the burgon, and then fled for the safety of the kitchen. He managed to cut himself twice while slicing the cheeses, and created a truly spectacular mess when he filled a mug from the wine keg before discovering it had a hole in the bottom. By the time the burgon arrived to greet his guest, both Linduin and his father were in a mood so foul that it was in danger of qualifying as a political movement.

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The burgon, an old hand at both supercilious visitors and inadequate facilities, wasted no time in disabusing his guest of the notion that he cared one-nineteenth of a shit about his comfort. The emissary, unexpectedly chastised, discharged his message and business with remarkable alacrity thereafter, and was gone by the time Linduin returned with a sad attempt at a dessert pastry. Linduin scowled, simultaneously hating that his work had gone to waste and hating that he had worked so hard for so poor a result.

"The border villages are coming up short again," the burgon confided in Galar, stuffing a garlic sausage into his mouth and chewing noisily. Squat, fat, and bald, the burgon liked to give the impression that he was stupid and boorish, which had resulted in many of his political opponents underestimating him and shortly thereafter being fed to large droves of pigs in the dead of night. "The principiate, may the gods put a fat boil upon his arshole, has decided that we are to remedy the shortfall."

"How?" asked Linduin's father, squinting in puzzlement. "All the troops are deployed at the garrison. And our finances are stretched thin enough as it is."

The burgon scowled, his brows knitting together. "They don't care how we do it, Galar. They asked us for the money, and they expect us to pay it, out of our own pockets if need be. Coming up with the coin in the first place is our problem." He gulped down a dram of wine, belched, and then rubbed his massive belly. "I've seen your figure-books. I doubt we could make up the shortfall out of our reserve funds, either."

Galar nodded. "It woudn't be a wise course of action anyhow, lord. If the border villages learn they can short us once, they'll do it again next year, and our reserves will continue to shrink. Someone will have to intervene." He picked at a piece of cheese as though distressed, though Linduin knew his father secretly reveled in intellectual quandaries. "I suppose we'll have to make our own attempts at collections, but... Tebes won't be enough by himself. They'll mob him if he doesn't bring backup."

"So send the boy." Linduin, who had been daydreaming of driving his wood-cutting axe through the head of the recently-departed emissary, came awake with a jolt. "He's big enough now." The burgon eyed Linduin sourly, as though deciding whether to broil or roast him for dinner.

Linduin's father frowned. "My son is a serving-boy. He can read and do sums, but those are the extent of his special skills. He's not going to be much use knocking the heads of peasants together and hoping that coins fall out."

The burgon shrugged. "He's all we've got. I can't spare you. Losing Tebes for a few weeks will be bad enough, and I'll need you to keep the peasants here in line." Unspoken was the shared understanding that the burgon would not be sullying his own grease-covered hands. "He takes his little wood-chopping axe, he keeps his mouth shut, and he gets the job done. He brings back the money, he gets a bonus. He brings back enough money, and maybe we can hire a proper serving girl and kick him up the road to the prova. Stick him in a school for a few years and see if they can beat the failure out of him."

Linduin and his father eyed each other warily. The burgon's logic, as always, was both sound and sweetened with just enough bait to tempt. After a moment, Galar sighed. "As you say, lord. Linduin, return home and begin your preparations. I'll be along to instruct you shortly."

The remainder of the evening passed in a blur. To Linduin, it seemed that scarcely had he lain down to sleep before the sun was sauntering menacingly over the eastern horizon. The day did not improve from there.

***

Tebes of Reth was a sullen, brooding sort of man who looked a bit like a twisted old ash tree, with short black hair well on its way to graying. He was lanky rather than muscular, laconic rather than boastful, and generally somewhat sour in disposition. He was also brutally violent to an astonishing degree, which was his primary qualifying job skill in his capacity as the reeve of the burgon's estate. His reaction to being saddled with Linduin was a grunt of disappointment and a gimlet stare lasting exactly five seconds, which Linduin correctly interpreted as "screw up and I will personally gut you and piss into your steaming wound as you die shrieking". Tebes was good at communication.

While this was not Linduin's first foray outside the estate, his previous endeavors had mostly been field trips with his father to learn about some geographical or botanical area of study. During an earlier period of Linduin's youth, the burgon had taken him hunting, a disastrous adventure which had taught the both of them to loathe each other's company and given Linduin a lingering anxiety about both archery and boars. He did not anticipate that this adventure would turn out any better.

Had either of them possessed a slightly different set of skills and characteristics, their journey might have ended very differently. But Tebes of Reth was a through-and-through bastard who excelled at hurting people for specific and well-defined purposes, and Linduin Kayle was an awkward teen-aged boy with more education than was good for him and an upbringing equal parts sheltered and neglected. The outcome was, when you think about it, inevitable.