Surviving the Guilt - Chapter 1 and 2

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Noah’s entry won second place in the International category of our Chronicles of Tyria anniversary contest for 2019. You can find out more about Noah on Twitter: @NoahHaehnel

Noah is also joining the Chronicles of Tyria team as a writer. He is turning his winning entry into a longer form story. Enjoy!

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Chapter 1 - Life at the Frontline

For all of his life, Milton lived in a small house in Nebo Terrace. Only once during his eleven years of living there, did he sleep somewhere that was not his own bed. 

A few years prior, most people were evacuated from Nebo Terrace and brought to Ascalon Settlement. The newly transferred guards of the Seraph came to Nebo Terrace and thought it would be easier to protect everyone behind the sturdy stone walls shielding the city of Ascalon Settlement. But they did not account for the disturbance. Ascalon Settlement did not welcome these people and fell into a panic. Doors were closed, food was hidden, and the Seraph had to defend the citizens of Nebo Terrace against rowdy agitators.

It wasn't just the fault of the people of Ascalon Settlement. Some of “these hungry Nebo Terrace folks” were too proud to accept the help. They undermined the authority of the Seraph and the guards had no other choice but to bring the people of Nebo Terrace home. 

After the short trip to Ascalon Settlement, life went back to normal for Milton. As sad as it may seem for an outsider, Milton didn't realize that life could be simpler somewhere else.

He knew playing outside the gates was a privilege he could only have when a Seraph or other adult had spare time to stand guard. He always played quiet enough to hear the bell that signaled everyone to go inside. Not particularly your own home, simply, inside. 

And he also knew that you don’t ask or remind the survivors about their centaur imprisonment. Oh, and he certainly knew not to use coconuts to make hoof sounds—like that boy Gerwin did last summer. "He almost gave old Johnny a heart attack," his mother said. 

"And we don't even have to talk about nighttime," both his father and mother preached regularly. "At night you can't make out a moa from a centaur, so just stay inside!"

Milton trusted his mother. She had been a soldier before he was born. She was fighting the centaurs and protecting citizens and travelers, until the centaurs took her captive. She never spoke about it. Merle, a woman old enough to be everybody's grandma, told him about it. Apparently, she led the operation that freed his mother and many more that day. 

"This was before the Seraph came and stripped me from my ranks and powers," she said, "From that day on, everything went downhill!"

His mother took good care of him and everybody else in town since her retirement as a soldier. She woke up in the morning helping old Johnny to wash, planting flowers in Merle’s garden, or bringing the hay into Farmer Haywood’s barn before the rain came. She never accepted coins for any of this, she simply felt like she owed it to everybody. 

Milton never knew she still carried a lot of guilt from her time as a soldier. That is why she tried so hard to be a good person. She even stood guard so that Milton could play outside the gates almost every time he asked her.

Gold could fall short from time to time. Not because his father made too little. He simply didn’t come home frequently enough to bring the coins. Of course, nobody would think twice of giving his mother a loan or even bread for free, but she was too proud to ask for anything. 

It's why she serves at Jannick’s Inn for a few coppers a night. Maybe she even likes the attention she gets. Who could blame her with her husband away.

Most fathers at Nebo Terrace were gone. Usually dead. Not Milton’s father. He was just away a lot. He too had been a soldier, but that didn't pay enough and with no other skills or talents, he became a mercenary. His wife felt guilty about leaving the people of Nebo Terrace, but they had decided to table the discussion until they had enough gold to move. 

Most of the time, he was hired by the Consortium to protect goods on their way to the customer. If he could, he chose jobs that were as safe as possible. That left nothing in their area and meant that he was gone for most of the year. It was hard for everyone, but better than having no father at all.

Chapter 2 - Nebo Terrace

It was a sunny day in Nebo Terrace. Milton sat outside and stared up at the walls that surrounded the village. It was a small town, far away from any big city. 

A few weeks before, an asura came with a self-proclaimed solution to the centaur problem. 

Milton had always been interested in everything mechanical and wanted to ask if he could help, or at least silently watch. However, Milton was too afraid to ever talk to her after mistaking her for a dog once. If there was something small in a doorway, it was usually a dog craving attention. He accidentally—and out of habit—screamed, “Bad dog!” as he tripped over her. As much as he practiced in his mind, he knew he would never have the courage to apologize to her.

Even after all this, he still had difficulties describing the asura. There was nothing he could compare them to. They were smaller than most children, had long ears, huge, tar black eyes and a skin color he could only describe as "old grape".

The asura said that she was only waiting for a few more parts to arrive. Then, her Centaur-Discombo-Something would annihilate every centaur and every human stupid enough to fight the beast. 

Milton thought she was just building a fancy trebuchet and those had never helped before.  His discovery dampened his enjoyment to watch, and he got bored. He thought about going outside the walls to play but quickly abandoned that plan, after he saw which Seraph was currently off duty: Always-Annoyed-Seraph-Samson. He never stood guard for the children. But to be honest, Milton wouldn't have trusted him with his life anyway. How could someone be a watchful guard if he was more concentrated on sighing than on doing his job?

Milton decided to go home. The sun was setting, and his mother was probably preparing dinner right now. She always smiled when he offered to help her. 

"Can I help you, Mother?"

“Yes, that would be wonderful, my dear. Come here and stir while I set the table”, she said with the warmest smile. 

Milton would describe the room as noisy. Everything was made out of wood and creaked with the slightest movement. A notable example were the wooden stairs that would wake him up each time his mother came home from the inn. 

This was how most people lived in Nebo Terrace. Anything else than timber that grew in the area was hard to get by. Milton remembered a time when he wasn’t allowed to throw even the tiniest stone and had to gather the rocks he found. The town wall was damaged severely, and centaurs occupied most of the quarries around. Everything new is made solely out of wood now. 

The dinner was delicious tomato soup. Milton almost mustered enough courage to ask his mother why she got sad so often. He heard her crying at night, but she never talked about it. He was sure he could help if she would tell him.

Tonight was one of the nights his mother would go to work at Jannick's Inn. He didn't like her to leave and come back late at night, but he had noticed that she was happier the days after she worked there.

There was still some tomato soup left. Perfect to be eaten the next morning so it could stay on the table until then.

His mother was getting ready while Milton cleaned the dishes. She always looked more beautiful than anybody else who went to the inn. She was the only one who dressed up. Milton knew because most people had to walk by his window to get there. 

“I’ve got something for you, my dear. I didn’t know if the caravan would make it to us this time, so I didn’t tell you before,” she said and put a book on the table. Milton’s eyes grew big. 

She continued speaking with such excitement as if the present was for her, "Come on, Milton, take it... 'Uzolan's At Home Curiosities!' They claim that the toys described in the book can be built with materials found in every house. But if you need anything, tell me." 

She kissed him goodbye and told him to go to bed.

The moon was bright, thankfully. Milton was afraid of the dark even though he never experienced being outside at night. When the sky was not enough to illuminate the room, his mother would place a candle next to his bed or even let him sleep next to her. He knew he was getting too old for that, but what was he supposed to do? Not sleep at all?

He was almost sleeping when he heard dragging footsteps outside of his window. A shadow moved through his room. 

Probably Henson, he thought. That man was drunk every chance he got. His mother always said, "Henson isn't a bad man, he simply doesn't know that drinking beer from Eldvin Monastery won't make the gods make you forget." Milton still tried to keep away from him. Henson usually smelled, and sometimes he began to cry and scream about his son, wife or centaur imprisonment. Milton had never met them.

He heard something grunt and squeal outside. Henson throws up again, he thought. He waited for the familiar cough that followed after. But there was no cough, only the whistling breathing as if there was a sick person outside.

He saw another shadow and was relieved that somebody came to pick Henson up. But then there were more shadows, many shadows that passed through his room. Many, long shadows. Centaurs.

His body refused to move. What should he do? Scream? Run outside to ring the bell? Throw stones against those beasts? All of this was contrary to what he had learned. If you see, hear or sense a centaur, you have to go inside and be quiet. His mother never obeyed these rules, but even she told him. 

So he kept still. 

He heard several loud bangs and kept quiet. 

He felt vibrations of hooves galloping on wood and dirt. He kept quiet. 

He heard the screams of men and women. 

He still—kept—quiet. 

The shadows rushed through his room again. This time not as silent as before. Sounds of metal clashing against each other shrilled outside. Then there was no sound at all, not even from the inn.

Milton was afraid. Should he let the adults handle it? No! Usually, his mother was the one to help first, and she may be hurt. 

He put on his shoes, ran with panic through the dark kitchen, and went outside. He saw scared faces in every window around him.

The door to the inn was open. Warm light shone out. 

He started to slowly move forward. To his right, on the flower pot next to him, there was Henson. It wasn't puke that was dripping out of his mouth. 

Milton started to panic and ran quickly to the bright light from the inn. 

The inn was a mess. Most people were lying unconsciously on the floor. Some seemed to breathe. Blood was soaking into the floorboards. 

Just two weeks ago it seemed like a massive victory when the Seraph took the iron mine back from the centaurs. The room felt empty. The swords that usually graced the walls, gone. The metal jugs for the beer, gone too. 

Milton heard someone struggling to get up behind the counter. It was Jannick who looked at Milton for a second and then just said, "Petra," while pointing to the room behind the bar. He collapsed back onto the floor. 

Petra? Who is Petra, Milton thought. He slowly made his way through the bar, careful not to step on bodies. The wooden boards were soggy, almost spongy, with blood.

Milton wasn’t afraid anymore. Everything seemed so surreal. This was simply too much, way too much for him to comprehend. 

He peeked inside the room that Jannick had pointed to. Someone was lying there.

Outside, some woman started to scream for help. 

Then Milton realized that Petra, the woman in front of him, was his mother. She was lying in her own blood. Her eyes were open, but she wasn’t breathing.

Milton’s legs gave in. He watched his mother, he watched Petra. Tears rolled down his cheeks. 

At this moment, Milton felt more than just sadness. He felt stupid. Stupid for not realizing that Jannick meant his mother.

Not that it would've changed anything.

Throwing rocks could've changed something. Going outside to alert someone, may had changed something. Doing anything could have saved his mother! 

Someone pulled him up by his left arm and hurt him while doing so. It was Elize, the young merchant.

She forced him through the inn, holding his eyes shut with her hand. He stepped onto several bodies. Some screamed of pain, others made no sound at all.

She finally pushed him outside, he almost fell, then she hugged him. They both cried as people were rushing around them, trying to save the few men and women that were still breathing. 

A few hours passed as they sat on the watchtower, waiting for the bodies to be cleared. 

Elize didn't have a house, and nobody else had any capacities left to even think about a half-orphaned boy. How could they? Almost everybody in Nebo Terrace lost somebody that night. 

But Elize couldn’t let him go home alone. So she brought him to her room. At Janick’s Inn. She gave him her bed, while she slept on the floor. 

Milton was supposed to sleep, not only on the night his mother was killed but also in the very same house she died in. Needless to say, he didn’t sleep a minute and silently cried until sunrise.