As a mere Mercenary, even a temporary Lieutenant like me I couldn’t just turn up at the Manor House and demand to see my sister. I had sent her a letter a couple of days ago informing her of my expected date of arrival and upon my arrival in the Barony I took rooms at the Inn in the village of Grisby, part of the Manor of Wreake one of the five Lordships that along with the Barons own manor of North Shields make up the Barony of North Shields.
Like most Barons and the higher-ranked nobles, Timothy FitzWilliam spent a portion of each year visiting each of his vassals. In his case, he spent a month at each of them and spent all but one of the remaining months of the year at his own manor, which rather than a manor house actually had a small castle, not that it had seen active use at a fortification in centuries. As for the remaining month well that was spent in Matseka, a nearby city and the principal residence of Duke Allan Stanley, the local bigwig in this part of the kingdom otherwise known as the Dukedom of Lermo.
The kingdom as you know is made up of seven such dukedoms plus the personal territory of the king and the three border marches which are ruled by either some relative of the king, usually one of his sons if they are of age or alternatively someone appointed by him.
Maccleston by the way is located in the Dukedom of Baylem and the mercenary companies based there usually operate within it and the neighbouring Dukedom of Laric.
The Baron, his family, retainers and all his servant my sister included who haven’t gone ahead already to prepare for their arrival will be leaving Wreake in three days to spend the Winter and fall at North Shields. If all goes to plan I will follow them there and spend what time I can with my sister when she isn’t busy working that is before starting my return journey seven days from today.
I also hope to do some business with the Baron, I have some things I think he might be interested in acquiring. Whether or not he keeps them for himself, gifts to others or even sells them on I do not know or care for that matter. If he doesn’t bite I shall have to find another buyer for them which might take some time or I suppose I could try and find an auction house or somewhere else willing to take them on consignment?
Not knowing when she would arrive or what condition she would be in when she did so I decided not to have my dinner until about half an hour before the kitchen closes for the night. That way if she arrives before that time and hasn’t eaten herself she can then join me.
In the end, I didn’t have to wait all that long as she arrived well before darkness fell. Being as practical as ever she was wearing the most appropriate of winter wear with plenty of insulation from the cold which was becoming more and more prevalent these days. It had snowed for a short while earlier in the day and while not very deep it had settled on the ground this time. She didn’t seem to be a stranger to this establishment and thus spotted me straight away and before I could head over to meet her she was well on her way to meet me in the middle.
“Niel, you're in time for once, I feared the weather might have delayed you”
“It would have taken much more than this piddling case of bad weather to have delayed the likes of me, don’t you know.”
“I suppose compared to what we would be experiencing if we were still at home even the worst winter hereabouts isn’t anything to worry about.”
“So how are you sis, been getting into any trouble at all.”
“Not one iota, those days are long gone, now I’m the one who has to go around cleaning up other people's messes. Pardon my language but my charge can be a bit of a shit at times. She’s ten times worse than I was at her age, I kid you not and on top of that she's such a Klutz. She’s always dropping things or running into them.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
And of course, if anything happens to her even the slightest of things her mother blames it all on me and then Anna starts crying and it takes forever to calm her down. Both me and her mother despair of what the future might have in store for her. Hopefully, she’ll grow out of it but if she doesn’t well I’ll not be expecting a glowing reference, that’s for sure.
But enough about me, how are you, I got your last letter a month or so ago. So how was father's grave, I haven’t been there myself since his funeral and I don’t suppose I ever will.”
“I’m fine, the grave was fine and it’s not your fault, I’m sure if you could, you’d visit it every day.”
“Every other day anyway bro, you haven’t been all that lucky with the contracts you’ve been on recently, have you, hopefully, the next campaign season will prove less challenging.”
“Well it can’t get any worse can it?”
“Why did you have to go and say that Niel, now Telondia is sure to curse you with more bad luck and who knows if you’ll survive it this time.”
“Don’t worry kiddo, he doesn’t work that way, he isn’t one for handing you more than you can manage and if worst comes to worse he always leaves you with a way out.”
“Yes but that doesn’t mean you’ll be able to find it in time and I can’t stand to lose another family member
“It’s the job I signed on for and I’m up for the challenge, you can be sure of that, now have you had any dinner.”
“No I decided not to wait around for it and come visit you as soon as I could, I’ll be busy for the next few days after all and I won’t get all that many chances to see you, not until it’s near time for you to be on your way again.”
“In that case will you join me for it?”
“Well, I must warn you, for the most part, the food in this place isn’t all that good though they do an exceedingly good apple tart.”
“In that case, I’ll be sure to leave some room for it.”
We soon settled down in the dining area of the inn and ordered our meal. I had a nice enough fish pie with all the trimmings while Holly had a steak cooked medium rare, just the way she liked it. And that apple tart managed to live up to the hype and then some. While eating our meal we spent a lot of the time catching up with each other.
“So when will I get to meet this young man of yours, he is still in the picture is he not”
“Yes he is still after me but he went with the advanced party so you’ll have to wait for a few days before I can introduce him to you.”
“Mores the pity, so has he asked for your hand yet?”
“I’m not sure we’re quite at that stage of our relationship yet”, she said blushing, “But he seemed really interested in meeting you so who knows. Now what about yourself, is there anyone in your life?”
“No, I don’t think the life of a mercenary is conducive to marriage at least at the tail end of things and anyways I’ve yet to meet anyone I’ve taken a fancy to.”
“As if you are ever likely to be in a position to meet any members of the opposite sex.”
“That’s not strictly speaking true, I meet plenty of women, sure maybe not the sort I might consider marriage material but life is littered with surprises so who knows what the future might have in store for me.”
“Alright have it your way, congratulations on your temporary promotion how likely is it that you’ll be able to keep it?”
“Hard to say to tell you the truth, it could go either way but I remain hopeful.”
“And if it doesn’t, what will you do then?”
“Well in that case I have two options, remain with the company as a sergeant or find an opening as a lieutenant elsewhere but the latter one is likely to prove challenging. I wasn’t a temporary lieutenant for all that long and then only a day of that was all that significant. If it comes to it I of course will try my best but whether that will prove good enough is debatable. That’s enough lollygagging now what happens when your charge gets married, will you have to find another position?”
“To tell you the truth that all depends on who she ends up marrying and I don’t just mean whether they have a place for me in their new household but also if I feel like moving to wherever she ends up. For instance, I don’t plan to move much further West than the capital or to any of the border marches for that matter. You may have chosen the life of a mercenary but I don’t want anything to do with any kind of conflict, not if I can help it anyway.”
“Well, you’ve likely got a year or more before you even begin to have to come to a decision.”