The day of the harvest festival arrived in the blink of an eye. Before I knew it, my family and I were locking our house as well as the barn to go towards the central plaza, a quaint and simple clearing in the junction between all other farms. There, tables were already prepared as well as the different stations where people worked over their produce, preparing their ingredients for the cooking.

Animals were stationed on a make-up corral, most of them pigs and goats. On another table there were boiled eggs but not a single chicken in sight. Of course there wouldn’t be. Chickens are for eggs, not eating. If we eat them where would we get our eggs from?

I kinda missed eating fried chicken though.

When we arrived all the other adults greeted my parents. My mother went over to the cooking station with the other women, holding two baskets in each of her arms: one basket full of different vegetables and fruits from our farm and the other with bread. Meanwhile, my father took the two pigs we brought along to the corral where most of the men were. You know. Meat. Men. They were our biggest ones as well, and the ones that would be more difficult to keep feeding during winter.

That left me, Lucas and Thomas alone, though soon Thomas ran over to some of the other kids his age. It was understandable. After all, not every day he could play with them.

I took Lucas by the hand and guided him to the group of girls my age that were doing some crowns and bracelets out of dried leaves and fresh flowers. My mom asked me to help her with the cooking, but it seemed it still wasn’t time for it, so I wanted to catch up with some of the girls. The boys were running around causing trouble a little away.

“Are you up to sitting with us, girls, or do you want to play with the other boys?” I asked Lucas, suddenly thinking maybe he wouldn’t like making handmade accessories and so. Lucas gave a short glance to the group of boys on the other side, before shaking his head and coming with me.

It was understandable for him not to want to separate from me. Though all the kids already knew Lucas, there wasn’t enough time for him to make a solid friendship with any of them. As for the reason we gave for his sudden arrival at our farm… my parents simply said I found him in some dark alley and he followed me home, and since then he’d been adopted.

Of course, there were many skeptical ones, who knew of my family’s situation for the last year and of the compensation given to us by our new lord. The change in liege did not go unnoticed, and so, some were speculating Lucas had something to do with the viscount and his evil deeds and now he had to hide. Some even thought he could be the viscount’s illegitimate son, a theory validated by Lucas’ similarity to him.

But, well, Tosca was the farthest region from Cela, where the viscount used to live. No one has really seen his face. Maybe in passing if they ever went over to Cela, but no more than that. It helped the viscount always sent envoys to control this part of his territory rather than coming himself. So, in that way, I thought Lucas was safe.

For now.

Anyway, they could speculate all they wanted. Even if the rumor of Lucas being the illegitimate child of the viscount was true, I knew the community was more interested in gossiping, not in verifying whether what they were saying was true or not.

It’s not like they had a way to confirm their theory, now, with the viscount dead. And it was going to pass sooner or later, until a new rumor started circulating and everyone forgot they ever talked about Lucas.

In the meantime, we could still enjoy the little moments life gave us.

“What do you think, Elaine?” Lucas asked once he was done with his flower crown. I took my eyes from my own work and looked at his, narrowing my eyes upon seeing a perfect creation of white, yellow and pink flowers. I turned back to my own crooked crown, before throwing it to the ground. “I take it is good then” he concluded with a smile.

“Oh, look at that!” one of the other girls approached, fascinated by Lucas’ crown. “It’s so pretty!”

“How did you make it like that? I’ve been trying since an hour ago!”

“Ah, I think this is the first time I ever met you. You’re Elaine’s new brother, right?”

“You’re cute! Hey, wanna hang out with us?”

“Ehm…” Lucas’ eyes were big and scared. It was most likely the first time in his life he interacted with girls his age other than me, so I could understand why he looked like a deer on headlights.

He turned to look at me as if asking for help, but I simply smiled and encouraged him to talk to the other girls. It was not the response he wanted, but it was too late when the girls grabbed him by the arms and took him to their own circle, fawning over him and saying things that made him all red.

I should probably be angry they took Lucas away and left me alone but… the fangirl in me was happy other people could appreciate him and convert. I spent the rest of the time until my mother called me to help with the cooking watching as Lucas tried, and failed, to let the girls down gently.

When I stood up Lucas extended a hand to me. “Wait! Elaine! I’m coming with you!”

“Don’t worry. I can help mom on my own.”

“But-!”

“You heard Elaine. Now, stay with us Lucas!”

“Can you help me with my bracelet? Yours is so cute!”

“Hey, hey, how old are you? What type of girls do you like?”

“He’s getting red again! So cute!”

Oh yes, watching Lucas confused and not knowing what to do was the best. Keep at it girls, we need to convert more people!

Though the betrayed look he sent me just as I was leaving was meant to make me feel bad, it actually furthered the notion in my heart. Cuteness is justice.

The food was done quickly. We prepared a heavy stew full of vegetables and sheep meat for the lunch. There was also bread and eggs as well as ale for the adults and juice for the children. When the people were called over for the food, Lucas had a sullen expression and refused to speak with me, actually making me kind of sad, but I easily gained his favor again when I ceded my portion of meat to him.

Once the food was over the tables were moved away, and a few people that could play instruments started playing a merry tune for the people to dance. I never realized how badly they played until after I recovered the memories from my previous life though. Old man Jean was playing the fiddle, and I found myself enraptured by the instrument despite his out of tune melody.

It wasn’t until mid-afternoon, after much dancing and singing was done, when some of the men went over to the corral. That could only mean one thing. It was time for the carnage.

The music stopped while the people reunited in front of the corral to watch. There were some others who stayed behind to clear the tables for the production of the sausages and to process the meat, my mom included, but most of us went over for one of the most important parts of the day.

Honestly, even though I liked harvest I never really liked watching the carnage, not even before recovering my memories. The animals, especially the pigs, made so much noise it was annoying and quite disturbing. However, it was Lucas’ first time participating, so I had to be there.

“I don’t know if I can do it” Lucas said, his face pale as he watched how the men hanged the pigs upside down from their rear hoofs, all the while squealing and screaming.

I made a face at the noise, but ignored it to pass Lucas the knife. “Yes, you can. You spent your whole life eating these poor animals without knowing the process of how they arrived at your table, so today you’re going to compensate for a life of ignorance. Besides” I added, puffing my chest and taking Lucas’ hand to forcefully place the knife in it, “those who don’t have the balls to kill don’t deserve to eat.”

“That… doesn’t make any sense…” Lucas complained but took the knife anyway. He walked over to my dad, who guided him to the corral and his respective pig.

There were big buckets under each pig with which to collect the blood for the sausages, but if experience taught me anything, most of it would go to waste. There were plenty of young men who were participating for the first time, and those were usually too scared or too clumsy to aim correctly.

I stood almost at the rear of the crowd, close enough to watch Lucas but far enough blood wouldn’t splatter on me in case of incompetence. Someone gave the signal everyone was ready, and only then it started.

The older men killed the pigs with ease and expertise, aiming correctly for the veins and arteries and ending the animals’ lives quickly, but, just as I predicted, plenty of the young ones couldn’t aim right, their hands trembling, and the other adults had to go over to their rescue.

Luckily, Lucas was not one of them. He managed to cut the veins in his first try, much to his surprise, and I could see from where I was standing how my dad congratulated him.

“Ah, he did it” someone said from behind me. I immediately froze, unprepared for the familiar voice that caressed my ears. “It’s me, Elaine. Please don’t make a sound and just follow me.”

Slowly, I turned around, my eyes finding a person cloaked completely in black. There was a hood over his head, but since I was much shorter, I could see his face.

Mathias.

“You… you…”

He raised an eyebrow, cocking his head to the side. “So, coming or not?”

It was a simple question, but his tone of voice brought forward all the bad memories I had of him ever since the first moment I saw him. Clenching my fists, I quickly looked around, making sure nobody was watching. To my surprise, people acted as if there wasn’t a conspicuous figure clad in black standing right in front of me. Shaking my head, I took his hand and guided him to the fringe of forest off to the side, all the time keeping my guard up.

Once safely hidden, kneeling behind some bushes, he pulled down his cloak. “What the hell are you doing here?!” I yelled at him, taking advantage of the cacophony just a few meters from us. “If my parents see you…! No! If my mother sees you, she will kill you! Don’t you see what they’re doing to the pigs?! You will have the same fate!”

“I guess…” he responded, but by his nonchalant tone, I could see he was not taking my warnings seriously. That angered me. He hasn’t changed at all! “You don’t need to worry. My cloak has a special type of illusion magic that makes me inconspicuous to other people unless I will them to notice me. They’d see me, but won’t pay attention to me or find anything out of place with my presence” when he finished with his explanation, I sighed in relief. I nodded, showing I understood. Once that was done he spoke again. “I need to talk to you… and I thought harvest would be as good a time as any to do it, since it will be difficult getting you alone otherwise…”

“How did you even know today was the harvest festival?  Every year the date changes! And besides, what happened to you? Why didn’t you contact us at all these past three months?” I asked, taking in his appearance for the first time.

Under the dark cloak, the clothes he was wearing looked expensive. He was dressed completely in black, and everything from his greatcoat to his riding boots seemed both brand new and luxurious. In the left pocket of his coat, I saw a coat of arms with the image of a roaring panther. I couldn’t help but raise my eyebrows.

“It’s the coat of arms of the Sellan family… look, I truly didn’t know today was harvest. I mean, I knew harvest fell sometime around this time, so I was hopeful I could find you here. I was just making my way from Pramak to the duchy and since Tosca was directly in the way…”

“Wait a moment” I raised a hand, blinking and looking at him, astounded. “You mean Pramak, the prison for nobles?”

“Yeah, well… I was there for a time… but that’s not the point!” he quickly changed the subject, ignoring my confusion. So he actually went to prison? Was that the reason he didn’t contact us all this time? My mind could barely believe it. He went to prison. For only three months and a noble’s prison to boot, but a prison nonetheless. “I need to talk to you about something important, and it will take time, so I can’t do it here. I’m staying at the only inn in the nearby town. Do you think you can sneak out and go see me there tonight?”

“Sneak out and…” I repeated, dumbfounded. It has been a long time since I last saw Mathias, so I didn’t really know how to feel, but now it turns out he wanted to talk to me about something… more likely in the room he was renting for the night. I frowned. “Why can’t you come to my house? We can talk in the barn or something.”

“I’m not allowed to go out anywhere after seven…”

“You have a curfew?” alright, this was really strange. What was this? Did his uncle think Mathias was going to escape before he could reach the duchy?

“I don’t know either. I just know the guards taking me to the duchy don’t allow me to go out of my room after seven. They control all my movements.”

“Then how did you come here now? And why did you come in the first place? Couldn’t you have sent one of the guards to deliver the message?” I asked, truly confused. Mathias shook his head.

“I don’t trust any of my uncle’s men. And how I managed to come here… I snuck out.”

“…”

“They are less strict during the day. They tend to fool around most of the time, so it’s easy to leave their sight for a short period of time. It’s night when they keep an eye on me the most.”

“…” what a thing to be expected from the great men of the Duke of Sellan. Didn’t surprise me at all. “And how am I going to enter your room if they watch over you so much?”

“Show them this” then he reached for my hand and placed a small button on it. The button had the coat of arms of the Sellan family engraved in it with quite an amount of detail. “Just say you come with a message from the duke… there are a few children your age working for him as messengers who come and go everywhere alone, I’m sure they won’t find it strange.”

“…”

Had it all planned out, this little fella.

“I’ve been here for too long. I need to get going” he said, standing up while covering his head with his cloak. When he did, I remembered something suddenly.

“Wait!” he stopped his movements, looking at me questioningly. “What about Lucas? Can he come too? It’s been a long time since the last time you saw each other and…”

And Lucas will be happy to see his older brother again. To know he was fine. I was sure he also wanted to make up with Mathias, or, at the very least, clear the air between them.

Mathias remained pensive, his eyes turning to glance at the patch of grass next to me. Whatever he said, I already decided to tell Lucas and take him with me, but, it would be better if Mathias also wanted to see his brother.

Finally, he nodded, much to my relief. “Just make sure to… cover your faces. Especially Lucas’” he warned, before giving me a nod of farewell and leaving.