Harvest 3, 855
Buu held his breath as the soldiers crept past him. Quiet and professional, they moved towards Red Birch Village with cool purpose, eyes hard and jaws set. Buu watched their burgundy uniforms disappear between the tree trunks before allowing himself to breathe.
He didn’t hide, exactly — just sitting down beside the closest tree when he heard footsteps approaching. He’d expected his uncle to appear with a scolding at the ready. Resigning himself to hear it, he made himself comfortable. He needed a rest anyway.
Before he could call to his uncle, imperial soldiers appeared with something more than a scolding in their sheaths . Knowing his legs would not carry him far or fast, Buu just sat there, very still, resisting the urge to pull his green cloak closer around himself in case the movement caught the soldier’s eyes. But their gazes never stopped on Buu, another spot of green, black, and brown against the forest, as they passed him by.
Red Birch village technically fell within what the Thaven Empire would call ‘rebel territory,’ but they had never had the time for rebellion. Whether they paid taxes to the empire, Yanakavi and its university, or their native Zadyatan and its ‘rebels,’ the taxes still needed paying. From the look on their faces, Buu didn’t think the soldiers would accept apathy as allegiance .
Buu pictured himself leaping into action, charging heroically from the Aching Wood to warn his neighbours. Helping the sick and wounded, he would lead the evacuation, keeping the villagers from the clutches of military might. He barked out a laugh , hysteria fringing its edges, clamping a hand over his mouth to stop the sound.
Glancing about for listeners, Buu pulled his feet under him one at a time, levering himself to stand, weighed down by every ounce of the fatigue he’d carried with him since birth. He wouldn’t be anyone’s hero any time soon. With nowhere else to go, Buu began the short walk back to his village. His stomach turned as images of what he would find ran through his head. Flinching at every rustle and movement, he strained his ears and heard strange sounds on the breeze.
The regular slapping of the lumbermill’s waterwheel, the heartbeat of the village, continued, but beyond that, screams pierced the morning peace. Buu expected to hear the clash of steel on steel, a staple in any of old lady Fira’s stories of invasions, but only panicked voices reached him.
He offered a quick prayer to Anaya when he saw the smoke rising above the rooftops. The billowing pillars of black meant a death sentence in these woods if not controlled. But then, who’s worried about a death sentence like that when there are soldiers on your doorstep?
Once again, Buu turned away from the heroic images dancing in his head, a nearby axe winking at him from where it leaned beside a yawning, empty doorway. He passed it by, already feeling weakness in his arms without the extra burden, the folly of his early morning tree climbing attempts doubly obvious now.
Skirting the village, Buu found his way to the lumbermill. Buu panted with the effort of clambering up the stairs, hauling in ragged breaths as he watched every shadow for movement. The song of the paddle wheel never stopped, accompanied in the daytime by the whir and whine of the giant head saw, or the smaller resaw. Today though, the wheel sung alone, its steady solo eerie in the daylight .
Buu wandered the mill like a ghost, drifting between the still machines and half-loaded timber. His heart stuck in his throat when he saw the first body. Three of them lay scattered around the mill’s main floor, axes in hand or nearby, blood pooling around their unarmoured bodies. Buu breathed a sigh of relief when he couldn’t see his uncle with the dead. He sucked the breath back in apologetically as he looked again at the bodies of men he’d known his whole life. His mouth went dry, and he bit his lip, guilt welling up and breaking on the shores of a surprising acceptance.
He had heard stories about shock. Loggers half-crushed by trees, laughing and joking, still believing they would be okay. Inattentive sawmen, watching their own blood gush with an awful fascination. He didn’t feel shocked though, just calm. Like the men had gone for a stroll and would be back any minute.
Buu paused at the top of the basement stairs, catching his breath as he weighed the limited options before him. Cowardly survival, or useless bravery. Rolling what tension he could from his shoulders, he descended into the basement. He would be in the way if he went to the fighting. Inconveniencing the soldiers, rather than his own people, would be the best he could hope for .
His eyelids drooped as he settled behind the hanging tools and stacked crates in the mill’s basement. Adrenaline screamed at him — Soldiers! Uncle Kavir in trouble! Fire in the village! — but exhaustion overcame his body before the thoughts could evoke any kind of real panic. He had spent his measly supply of energy on a walk and some sad attempts at tree climbing. As he escaped into the darkness of sleep, he saw the faces of the three dead men upstairs, waiting to poke fun at him for his weaknesses — just as they always had and never would again .
Rough hands pulled Buu to his feet before he fully awoke. For a moment, dreams mixed with reality, and he mistook the man before him to be one of the millmen, shouting in his face about sleeping too close to the mill’s deadly moving parts. The soldier shook him hard again, dislodging the dregs of his dream and yelling louder.
“I said, what do you think you’re doing down here, boy?” Sweat glistened across his face under speckles of brown mud. “Everyone is meant to be in the chapel. Get moving.”
The soldier steered Buu towards the stairs, keeping one hand firmly clamped on his shoulder, preventing the escape a healthy boy could have made.
Buu didn’t need the hand; he plodded forward with all the resistance of old lady Fira’s favourite goat. He panted as he reached the top of the stairs, his lungs protesting as if he had taken the steps three at a time. As they stepped into the cool afternoon, Buu breathed a sigh of relief. Red Birch Village remained mostly as he remembered it — streets clear of bodies, buildings sagging but steady. A far cry from the burned-out shells and decimation he had feared.
More soldiers waited outside in easy conversation .
“Who’d you find?” a tall, slender woman asked as she spotted them.
“Some kid sleeping in the basement,” Buu’s escort answered, shaking Buu a little and adding, “what’s your name, kid?”
Buu mumbled, “Buu Yati ,” pretending to himself that speaking unclearly counted as rebellion.
“Buu, is it?” his escort looked Buu up and down, brows rising, slightly cocked as he took in Buu’s pale cheeks, gaunt frame, and shortness of breath. “What’s the matter with you?”
The soldier asked the enormous question with innocent curiosity, but it almost buckled Buu. What was wrong with him? A kid that couldn’t climb trees, or run, or swim, or do anything a kid should do . A kid who, despite his uncle’s best efforts, couldn’t make letters stay still on a page, like they seemed to for the handful of literate people in Red Birch. He spent more time in bed than he did out of it, exhausted, picking up any sickness that came to the village first, and holding onto it longest. What was wrong with him?
Buu shrugged, mumbling into his chest, “Dunno” and moving dirt around with his toe to avoid looking at anyone. He tried not to cry and cursed himself for conjuring tears for his own shame, but not for the fallen men he’d known forever.
“Whatever, just put him with the others. General Ido wanted to see them all.” The tall woman jerked one thumb over her shoulder, a bored look creeping over her features.
Buu’s escort nodded, taking Buu’s arm more gently this time and marching down the village’s central dirt road. Before they made it ten steps, an authoritative, stone-hard voice stopped them.
“Wait, lieutenant.”
The escort spun around, dragging Buu with him by the arm and whipping off a smart salute. The other soldiers now stood at attention, eyes set to the middle distance, faces carefully neutral. The man who had barked the order strode out from the alley beside the sawmill.
Buu saw all the things the general meant for him to see — his glossy, steel-grey hair pulled into intricate braids, no strand out of place. Ranks of medals, carefully polished and displayed, flashing bronze and silver against his pressed burgundy uniform. But even through all the pomp and polish, the dark circles and too-bright eyes stood out to Buu first — well-hidden exhaustion, all too familiar to him .
The general waved his soldiers back into their easy stances, tired eyes locked on Buu. Buu had felt relatively calm until that moment — the knowledge that he couldn’t run or fight leaving him resolved to go wherever the soldiers meant to take him. He doubted that they would hurt him if he didn’t resist. No one ever killed children in the stories Fira told.
But the look in the general’s eyes stoked fluttering panic in Buu’s stomach. His chest tightened as he recognized the sad, practical resignation. The same look that Yuravi got every farrowing season when he had to choose which piglets needed to have their throats cut. The look of someone making a sacrifice.
“Put him back in the basement and keep him there,” the general ordered Buu’s handler, keeping his gaze on Buu. “And keep this to yourselves.” The last he directed at the other soldiers , his tone leaving no room for disobedience.
Buu quivered as the lieutenant on his arm nodded with hesitation, uttering a gentle ‘Yes, sir,’ before leading Buu back into the mill. He moved slowly , letting Buu go at his own pace, supporting him, rather than leading him. The escort’s face creased in worried lines.
“What’s going to happen to me?” Buu whispered as he led the way down the basement steps. He didn’t quite manage to keep the catch from his voice.
The escort shook his head, his face a little green and a note of frustration clear in his voice as he said, “You’ve been separated from the herd, kid. You’re the cost of victory against the rebels.”
———
*Yuravi’s sow always birthed a few piglets too sick or too deformed to waste food on. Zadyatan had only begun importing the huge, delicious animals in recent years, however, so finding a replacement was no small feat.
Prefer to listen along? No problem, I read each chapter aloud on my Youtube channel: