Free The Tessellation Saga. Book Two. 'The One' by D. J. Ridgway Page A

ain’t ‘ere,’ he pleaded
as his face crumpled with pain and sorrow. ‘Fergive me boy,’ he
whispered as a look of triumph lit up Toby’s face, ‘fergive me…’ he
whispered again as the old woman was thrown sobbing onto her
husband where he lay on the cold hard ground.
    ‘One of yer tie
‘em up an’ leave ‘em ‘ere,’ ordered Toby impatiently, as he strode
off toward the wood. ‘Come on, hurry,’ he added as his men ran to
catch him up.
     
***
     
    In the barn,
Jayson unbridled the horses found them clean stalls and rubbed them
down, he busied himself in caring for the animals not noticing his
surroundings or the other horses already stabled. Hearing a woman’s
scream he started, his soft hands becoming rigid and still, the
animals feeling his agitation became fidgety and cross.
    ‘Hush, be
still,’ he whispered to the disturbed animals forcing himself to
calm down and as he did, they copied. He hated this part of his job
and hated himself for being a coward. How many times have I
stood back and done nothing? He asked himself, I didn’t join
for this, his thoughts continued. His stomach knotted in anger
as the woman screamed again, he knew he could do nothing to help
the poor folk who lived here anymore than he had been able to help
his own family, feeling a coward and a failure he stood back,
unknowingly leaning against a beautifully carved stall. His eyes
closed and he tried to ignore the pain in the sound but it seemed
to go on forever, mingling with the screams from his memories.
Suddenly he could see his family once more, his father lying dead
on the ground, his mother held fast in the arms of a bandit and
struggling in vain to get away. He saw his sister lying on the
ground and screaming as another bandit tore at her clothes. He
could see the knife at her throat where the blade was beginning to
bite at her pale skin and unsure whom to help first, he ran toward
his mother who was closest.
    ‘Drop the knife
boy,’ the bandit holding his mother had ordered.
    ‘Drop the knife
or they both die...’ Jayson, wild with fury ignored the command as
he continued to rush forward holding his knife point first,
intending to kill the men who had destroyed his family. As he
neared the bandit holding his mother, she suddenly flew toward him,
Jayson could still see the look of shock and surprise on her face
as his knife pierced her soft belly. He held her tightly as the
momentum of the push forced the knife through her.
    ‘NO..., ‘no,’
he shouted, as his mother lay dying in his arms with her lifeblood
pouring from the wound he had inflicted. In his grief, he did not
see the second man approach from behind and hit him over the head.
Later he awoke in a pool of congealing blood still holding his
mother’s body and as he looked around, he wondered why the bandits
had left him alive. His family lay around him, his sister ravished
with her throat slashed; his father’s body where he had fallen
trying to protect them all and his mother, his mother run through
by his own hand. Behind him, the family home lay in a smoking ruin
and his few possessions were gone, along with what had once been a
happy life. Alone and left alive to bury his dead, knowing he had
been unable to prevent his father’s death , he believed himself the
cause of his mother and sister’s demise, he hated himself and
joined the army to die rather than accept the king’s bounty.
    For a moment,
Jayson just stared the images of his dead family swirling through
his mind just as they always did at times like this. Why am I
still alive? The question again whirled around his head as he
placed his hands behind him and leaned further into the stalls
supports, his head back and his eyes squeezed tightly shut, his
fingers clutched hard at the wood forcing his tears to stay away,
forcing the merging screams from his mind. As his fingers squeezed
tighter, he felt an anomaly in the normally smooth wood, a tiny
knot beneath his fingers and a strange