Lois sighed as she climbed into her bed that night. It seemed that every muscle in her body ached in some way, straight down into her bones. At first, everything had seemed wrong that day. Lord Luthor's visit. Lucy's accident. Getting stuck, miles from home, with no way to get Lucy back to Lane Manor without causing her excruciating pain and possible permanent damage to her leg. Then, suddenly, everything had changed for the better. That peasant farmer - Clark - had shown up unexpectedly to save the day.
It was funny, in a way. When she'd first met Clark, she'd barely spared more than a passing thought for the attractive, yet low-born, man, thinking the chance encounter had been a one-time thing. But suddenly, there he was, once again finding his way into her life. And this time, though he hadn't actively tried, he'd made a definite impression on her.
As they'd talked, she'd come to know him. In return, she'd allowed him to get to know her as well. He'd been pleasant company and Lois had found that she'd completely forgotten his humble origins. He could have been any one of the numerous lords she'd met over the years. And, if she was being completely honest with herself, he'd actually been much politer and interesting than any lord she'd ever met.
"Doesn't matter," she told herself. "He's a peasant. I'll never see him again. He doesn't even live in our lands."
She wouldn't have minded striking up a real friendship with him. He'd been so nice and normal and down to Earth. It had made him unlike anyone else she'd ever met. She wished he was a lord. Maybe, just maybe, she could have convinced her father to let her marry Clark instead of Lex. At the very least, Clark was her own age, she thought with a smirk.
But destinies couldn't be changed. Clark's was on his farm, just a couple of hours' ride away, but in a completely different world for the circumstances of his birth. And hers was, unfortunately, with Lex Luthor, her future traded away in the hopes of keeping her people safe.
"It must be nice," she mused to herself as she watched the shadows caused by the flames in the hearth dance across the walls, "to be able to choose your own destiny." She sighed. "In a lot of ways, I envy you, Clark," she whispered.
***
The night crawled by, unnoticed by Clark. He mindlessly went through the motions of bringing Merlin into the barn, unhitching the cart, and covering his father's body with one of the blankets. Merlin pranced around nervously at the scent of blood in the air, but Clark was able to calm him. Still, the stallion wasn't his normal self during the night, and Clark couldn't blame him at all. For a large portion of the night, Clark simply sat, his knees bunched up into his chest, his arms wrapped around them, feeling both completely devastated and utterly numb. He didn't even notice when the hellish glow of the house fire burned itself out after running out of fuel.
At some point, he must have fallen asleep. The next thing he knew, the sun was starting to rise. He left his vigil over Jonathan's body and stepped out of the barn. The sky was nearly clear of clouds, and those that were around were gossamer-thin and tinged in baby pinks and blues. It would have been a beautiful day - even the weather was warm for the time of the year - if not for the nightmare of the previous few hours. A thick stench of smoke clung to the area like a death shroud and made everything hazy. For the first time, Clark could really see the extent of the devastation that his home had suffered.
The house was nothing more than an untidy pile of cinders and charred beams of wood. The fields were scorched earth as far as the eye could see. With the exception of Merlin, all of the animals were missing or dead - even the two stray cats that had adopted the family as their own and kept the mice in the barn at bay were laying in pools of their own blood.
He ate some of the previous night's leftovers, silently sending his thanks to Lois, even though he wasn't even tasting the flavors of the food. But some part of him acknowledged that without the leftovers, he would have gone hungry. Not even a sack of apples or handful of carrots remained. The raiders had taken everything. When he was finished, he repacked everything and got to work. With an old, bent shovel, he went out to the spot where he and his father had buried Martha a few years before. Directly next to her grave, he began to dig. It was strenuous work, made all the more difficult by the oppressive grief and loneliness that weighed on his heart. All through the morning and into the afternoon he worked, making the hole deeper and wider to accommodate his father's large frame.
He took another short break once the grave was dug, laying on his back on the dying grass. The warm late fall sunshine caressed his body, but did nothing to warm the cold deadness he felt in his soul. He wanted nothing more than to find those responsible and make them pay somehow. Finally, he pushed himself up off the ground and went into the barn. Reverently, he picked up his father's stiff body and carried it to its final resting place. With all the care in the world, he lowered the body into the grave. Then he pulled himself back out of the hole and used the shovel to fill in the grave with the pile of dirt he'd made earlier.
Satisfied with his work, he lashed two large pieces of wood together in the shape of a cross and planted it in the ground at the head of the grave. He stepped back and looked at the place where his parents now resided. To the left was his mother, her grave covered in a carpet of green and a sense of peaceful repose. To the right was his father, the rich black soil overturned and looking like an ugly, fresh scar.
"Well, Mom," Clark said after a while. It had always made him feel a little better to speak aloud to her, as if she could still hear him and answer him somehow. "Dad's with you now. I know you two have been missing each other, ever since you had to leave us. Look after him for me, okay? I did the best I could, but it wasn't enough. Nothing I ever do is enough. I couldn't save you and I couldn't save him."
He sighed noisily. "I should never have left you here alone, Dad. I'm sorry. I thought I was doing the right thing, by sparing you a long trip. I should never have accepted the invitation to stay for dinner. If I'd only gotten home sooner, maybe I could have stopped all of this from happening."
He would have told you that if you'd been here, they would have killed you too, his mind told him.
It was true. Jonathan had said as much the night before, when Clark had first found him bleeding out in the barn. But it didn't make it any easier to bear the knowledge that he hadn't been there when his father had needed him the most.
"Lois was wonderful though," he admitted after a moment of self-loathing. He almost smiled. "You'd like her, Dad. You too, Mom. She's beautiful inside and out. I'd give anything to be worthy of asking her hand in marriage. But now, more than ever, I can't. I've nothing to offer her. It's not fair."
Nothing about life is fair, son, his mind told him in Jonathan's voice. All we can do is make the best with what we have and strive to better ourselves as much as possible.
Clark remembered when his father had first told him that. He'd been no more than five and had wanted a stuffed horse doll that he'd seen in the market. The farm hadn't been doing well that year, and money had been excruciatingly tight. He'd whined about how unfair it was. He hadn't understood that his parents weren't being mean by not purchasing the toy. They hadn't been able to buy it. He'd refused to eat dinner that night and had gone to bed hungry, angry, and sad. Jonathan had come in and sat with him, gently explaining things to him. And Martha - talented woman that she'd been - had eventually saved up enough scraps of material to sew him his own horse doll. Clark had loved it dearly and still had the toy. Or rather, he'd had the toy until his home had been burned to the ground.
"I know, Dad," Clark continued. "You always said that nothing about life is fair and that it was up to us to change our fortunes to the best of our ability. But...I'm at a loss here. The farm is gone. The animals have been either killed, gone missing, or been stolen. Our store of food...nothing is left. Once the food Lois sent home with me is gone, I don't know what I'm going to do. I'll freeze to death this winter if I try to live in the barn, and I'll never get a house built before the first snows." He sighed. "I wish you were here. I could really use your guidance. Both of you," he amended, looking at the cross that marked his mother's grave.
He took a long, deep breath, trying to exhale some of the panic that was building up in his heart. He had to take things one at a time. He would try to make a list of priorities that night, and do whatever he could to make sure that he survived. He only wished he knew how he was going to do that.
***
The next few days crawled by. Clark ate as little as he could - just enough to be able to function. He hunted as much as possible, taking down any game he could find - birds, rabbits, squirrels, fish, even a scrawny deer. He collected broken pieces of tree branches as well, to use for the fires that kept the nights tolerable, if not comfortable. His nights were filled with butchering the meat, drying it in strips, and scraping the hides clean, before passing out from exhaustion. He began to tack the skins up to the walls, trying to insulate the barn, now that it bore holes and broken wood in places - scars that reminded him constantly of Tempos' raiders. In the spring, he would do what he could to sell the skins discreetly, and use the money to buy what he needed to rebuild his home, seeds to reestablish his crops, and food to eat in the meantime.
On the fifth day since Jonathan had died, Clark was about to head out into the woods to hunt again when two of Lord Luthor's tax collectors appeared. He was lucky that he saw them coming before it was too late. He popped back inside the barn and hide the makeshift spear he'd fashioned under a pile of straw. Then he strode back out into the cool morning sunlight to meet the tax collectors.
Every bone in his body told him to flee. He knew he couldn't pay. He had nothing at all. Not a single coin to offer up as a promise to pay what he owed in the future. But he knew that if he fled, they would pursue him. And even though Merlin was a swift, strong horse, Clark knew that, eventually, they would catch him. Things would go even worse for him if he ran.
"Are you the property owner?" one of the men asked, dismounting from his horse. It was obvious that he was the one in charge.
"I am," Clark said with a nod, swallowing around the hurt that statement caused. His father was supposed to be the property owner.
"You know why we are here," the burly man said.
"I do," Clark replied with another nod.
"Then let's get this over with."
"I...I can't," Clark stuttered, forcing the words out. "I don't have the money."
"Why do you mean, you don't have the money?" the tax collector demanded.
"Look around!" Clark said, gesturing broadly. "Not five days ago my farm was raided by Lord Tempos' men. I have nothing! I'm living in a barn!"
"I fail to see how that's our problem," the man shot back. "Pay up, or pay the consequences."
"I would pay if I could," Clark replied.
"Jeremiah? Take him," the man ordered.
"With pleasure," the second man, Jeremiah, said, a cruel smile unfurling over his lips.
Jeremiah bound Clark's hands and feet with a length of sturdy, thick rope. Just enough slack existed between his ankles to allow him to shuffle along behind the man's horse. He could not move his hands at all.
"Take the horse too, Maxwell," Jeremiah prompted, after Merlin's whinny from the barn alerted them to his presence. "We should be able to get something for the beast."
Maxwell marched into the barn with a stiff nod. Clark heard Merlin protesting, followed by muffled cursing as the man tried to get a handle on him. Clark closed his eyes as he came to a heartbreaking decision. He gave a sharp whistle. In a moment, Merlin came trotting out and to his side.
"Hey, boy," Clark told the horse. "It's okay. We'll go quietly. I'm sorry, my friend. But I'd rather see you with a new master than starving to death this winter. Be good for these people, okay?"
"Hey, Jeremiah! You need to see this!" Maxwell called from inside the barn. He came out holding a stack of furs in one hand and a skinned rabbit in the other. "Someone's been stealing from Lord Luthor."
"How do you know I didn't buy them?" Clark challenged, trying anything that might work, knowing the penalty would be steeper if poaching was added to his inability to pay his taxes.
"Right. Poor little farm rat can't afford his taxes but can afford all the meat in that barn? After he claims that raiders took everything?" Jeremiah spat his contempt. "And I have a pet unicorn waiting for me back home." He finished tying Merlin to a long lead that he then attached to the pommel of Maxwell's saddle. "Let's move."
Maxwell loaded the furs into his saddle bags swiftly. Then he mounted up and gave his horse a nudge in the ribs. Clark was towed along behind Jeremiah, with shame, loathing, and sadness dueling within his heart. In the end, hopelessness won out and he merely bowed his head, trying to think his way out of the situation. He didn't make eye contact with anyone they came across on his walk of shame throughout the countryside.
It was a long way to Luthor's manor. Clark was aching and exhausted by the time they entered into the main courtyard. The taxmen stopped there, handing the horses over to a young groom. It was the only respite Clark got before he was marched around to the garden in the back of the manor. Lord Luthor was there, sitting beneath a canopy, a glass of dark red wine in his hand. He was giving orders to a couple of servants when Clark was brought before him.
"What is it?" Luthor asked before either of the taxmen could speak.
"We have a 'failure to pay' and a poacher to boot," Maxwell explained, shoving Clark a step forward. "To your knees, farm rat."
Before Clark could react, Maxwell kicked his knees out from under him, sending him crashing to the marble paving stones beneath his feet.
"We found these skins hoarded in his barn," Maxwell continued, nodding to where Jeremiah stood, holding the damning evidence of Clark's hunting.
"I see," Luthor said with a neutral expression. He turned his cold eyes to Clark. "What have you to say for yourself?"
"Milord, my farm was raided and destroyed by Lord Tempos' men. Everything I had - every cent to my name - was stolen. My father was killed. Without the meat, I would starve. And I would pay my taxes, if it was at all possible. Time is all I need, milord. I'm sure that I could find a way to earn the money I owe, if only you'll grant me the chance."
"You peasants," Luthor said with disdain. He sighed. "I've set up banks and money lenders for exactly these kinds of reasons."
"With all due respect, milord, my family never truly had enough money to use the banks. And I could never afford the interest the money lenders would charge."
"That is not my problem," Luthor said icily.
Clark bowed his head, biting his tongue to keep from saying anything he might regret.
"What do you want us to do with him?" Maxwell asked. "The debtors' prison is full. Shall we arrange for a public execution?"
Luthor paused for a moment, thinking. After a moment he shook his head slightly.
"No. We just hung three poachers last week. His death wouldn't mean a thing right now as an example. Sell him on the slave market. At least I can recoup my losses that way."
"As you wish, my lord," Maxwell said, putting a hand to his breast and bowing slightly. "He did have a horse when we found him. It's a fine stallion, I have to admit. Would you like him to be kept?"
Luthor wrinkled his nose in disgust, as though Maxwell had offered him curdled milk.
"What for? Surely my horses are superior to anything this little slave could have once owned. Besides, I have no use for another horse. Sell the beast to the highest bidder."
"It will be done, my lord."
"You heard Lord Luthor. Move it, slave," Jeremiah commanded, a wicked gleam in his eyes.
He grabbed a fistful of Clark's hair and hauled him to his feet. He gave Clark a violent shove forward to get him to start walking. It was as though Luthor's proclamation that Clark should become a slave had caused a complete personality shift in the man, and not for the better. By the time Clark was herded into a large, barred wagon packed with other men and women headed off to the slave market, he was bruised and bloody.
For the next two days, Clark and the others were carted around to several villages. The women all sold first, all to lecherous old men. It left a bad taste in his mouth and weighed on his mind. What kind of rich parasite was going to purchase him? And for what reason? A couple of the biggest, burliest men sold as well. Clark had gathered that one of them had been a blacksmith. By some miracle, Merlin hadn't been sold yet either. It eased Clark's loneliness to know at least that part of his life hadn't been ripped away just yet.
On the third day, the wagon was brought a long way before it finally stopped. Clark wondered where he was, but he'd long since let his tongue go mute. He said nothing to neither his fellow prisoners nor his captors - he'd learned the hard way on the first day that conversation of any type was unwanted. With a heavy heart, he waited his turn as the wagon was emptied. He silently hopped off the wagon and stood between two muscular men - a former butcher on his right and a miller on his left. He didn't listen as his captors called out in booming voices to grab the attention of passersby. He kept his eyes downcast, not caring about who might be sizing him up and considering buying him.
"Clark?"
Clark's head snapped up, his eyes wide. He'd know that voice anywhere.
Lois!
It was Lois, pushing through the small throng of people who gathered to gawk at the slaves being sold. She finally made her way to the front of the crowd, her father hard on her heels.
"What has this man done?" she demanded of the man who was running things. Clark had overheard him being called Oliver. "That one there, in the middle." She pointed.
"Refusal to pay his taxes and illegal poaching of animals," Oliver sneered, glancing at Clark.
Lois searched Clark's face. "Is it true?"
Clark took a deep, shame-filled breath and hung his head. "It's true, milady, but I had no choice."
"How much for him?" Lois asked Oliver.
"Fifty gold pieces."
"Done," Lois said with finality, not waiting for her father to respond. She scanned the area quickly. "And his horse. The roan stallion."
"Lois..." Lord Lane said in a displeased tone.
Lois whirled on her father. "Have you forgotten what he did for me? For Lucy? We can help him. And I will, one way or another."
Samuel hesitated a moment and nodded. Then he addressed Clark. "You know about horses, correct?"
"Yes, milord," Clark said, not daring to hope that he might get the chance to live at Lane Manor. "I know about horses - breeding, care, just about anything there is to know."
"Good. Our stable master has been thinking of stepping down and retiring. You will be his replacement." He turned to Oliver and tossed him a small bag of coins. "This should be enough."
Oliver deftly caught the bag and hefted in his hand. Satisfied, he nodded and motioned to one of the other men. "Release him."
The man produced a key and unlocked the manacles that bound Clark's wrists and ankles. Clark immediately rubbed at his wrists where the metal had chafed and cut his skin. Dried blood marked the place where the metal had dug in too deeply.
"Get the horse," Oliver commanded the other man.
The man hurried to comply with Oliver's demand. In a moment, he brought the horse over and handed Samuel the reins. Samuel immediately handed them to Clark.
"Can you ride?" he asked Clark.
Clark nodded. "I think so, milord."
"You look weak. Some food and drink first," Samuel declared.
Clark's stomach growled as if in response. He felt himself blush.
"Thank you, milord," he said, slightly embarrassed.
"Right this way," Lois said. "Father and I were just about to get some lunch."
Father and daughter led Clark and his horse through the busy streets to a small tavern run by a smiling, friendly, portly woman and her gangly teenaged son. Lord Lane chose a table in the far corner, where they were unlikely to be bothered. When the tavern owner came to their table, Lord Lane ordered three roasted cornish hens, a loaf of bread, and two mugs of wine, with Clark opting for water instead. He gulped down two mugs before his thirst finally began to abate.
"Thank you, milord. Milady. For rescuing me from those men. I am forever in your debt."
"What happened?" Lois asked. "I know I don't know you well but, well, you don't strike me as the type to dodge taxes and poach game."
Clark shook his head. "I'm not, milady. I swear it." He took a deep breath and slowly let it out, steadying himself. "The night I escorted you home, I returned back to my farm only to find it razed to the ground. Anything worth having - money, food stores, animals - were taken. My fa...my father," he said, choking around his grief. "He died in my arms. Before he passed...he...he told me it was Lord Tempos' men."
"I'm so sorry," Lois said, reaching out and lightly touching his hand. "This is all my fault. If I hadn't insisted that my brother and sister and I take a ride that day..."
"Milady, there was no way you could have known. I'm just glad you were well out of the area, safe at home, when the attack came," Clark said. "Anyway, there was nothing left - just the barn by some miracle. I had no money to pay the tax collectors. And the only reason why I hunted those animals was in an attempt to lay a store of food aside for the winter, and to use the skins to shore up the drafty places so that I wouldn't freeze to death. My plan was to try and rebuild, as best I could, come the spring. Or even start the process during the winter if it proved to be mild enough."
"Father...we should help him. Let him go back home. Help him rebuild his farm."
Clark shook his head. "That is kind, milady. But there is nothing there for me now. I willingly submit myself to you as your slave, no matter what tasks you may demand of me."
"We will never make demands of you," Lord Lane said, his voice a solemn oath. He cracked a small smile. "We will ask. And you are not our slave. You will work for us for a fair wage, housing, and food."
"It would be my honor to serve you," Clark replied, shaking the hand that the other man outstretched toward him.
"Good," Lord Lane said with a smile. "As I said earlier, the stable master is getting older. He's been talking about retiring and enjoying the rest of his days with his grandchildren. If you are half as good with horses as your stallion suggests, we'd be lucky to have you take Frederick's place. Are you up for the task?"
"Horses have always been a passion of mine," Clark replied. "I would love to care for your horses."
"Good. It's settled then. Welcome to the Lane Manor staff."
To Be Continued...
