The Godless Lands

Crows burst from the forest in a storm of wings and screeching cries. It was nothing unusual. Every few weeks, another band of warriors marched into the wildlands, seeking to quell the chaos and the Godless men who roamed beyond the kingdom’s edge.

Peter followed the crows with his eyes as they circled a small section of the forest before descending again. He turned back to his work, striking the hard earth several times with his hoe until the tool snapped with a sickening crunch. The soil had grown less fertile with each passing year. In just fourteen years of life, Peter had watched the earth wither. The crop yields shrank with every harvest, and famine no longer loomed—it felt inevitable.

“Put down the farming tool, boy,” called Lan Godfric as the gnarled old warrior approached.

The man Peter considered old was, in truth, no older than forty. His hair had greyed at the temples, and a streak of silver ran through his beard. He wore his usual blue tabard emblazoned with the white fox of Tillia, the God of Justice, over a chainmail shirt and a white tunic beneath. The left sleeve was rolled and pinned below the bicep for his missing arm. A sturdy sword hung at his waist on the left, a dagger on the right.

“Is it time for my lesson already?” Peter asked, brightening.

Godfric merely gestured with his right arm toward a small patch of unfarmable land where they trained. Peter noticed the frown on the old man’s face.

“The crows flying from the forest is perfectly normal,” Peter said, waving a hand dismissively as he walked over.

Godfric grunted. “One day, it won’t be,” he replied tersely.

Peter struggled to read the man. Godfric had arrived two summers ago with another man—though that one had died shortly after from his wounds. He spoke little of what lay beyond the God lands, but everyone knew the truth: Lan Godfric was the only man to ever return from the Godless lands alive. After weeks of recovery, he had immediately sought out every young man in the village, eventually settling on Peter to be his ‘squire,’ of sorts.

Godfric’s training was hellish. For the first six months, Peter endured brutal weight and endurance drills before he was even allowed to touch a sword. When sword training began, Godfric tested him weekly, holding nothing back and leaving him black and blue. Peter’s mother had swiftly put an end to that practice, and Godfric learned restraint—quickly.

“Is this truly necessary?” she’d asked one evening over dinner.

“If you knew what lay in wait beyond these lands...” he began, then trailed off, either unwilling or unable to elaborate. But the haunted look in his eyes was enough to silence her questions forever.

In the second year of Godfric’s arrival, Peter’s father fell ill with the blight—a sickness that blackened the skin and turned it into a pus-riddled mess. His mother had wept; the disease had claimed everyone it touched. His father died after a short, horrific decline, and they solemnly burned his body in an unfarmable portion of the fields. The land within three meters of the pyre remained sick and dead ever since.

Peter’s childhood friend, Marian, had consoled him, though Peter shed no tears—his father now rested with Arthius, the Shepherd of the Dead. Marian was a pretty girl, a year younger than him; she was demure and cheerful, though Peter feared the coming scarcity would soon steal her joy. It was almost written in the stars that the two of them would marry when they came of age. But whenever their affection threatened to grow into more than innocent kisses, Godfric was always there to intervene, a disapproving scowl carved across his face. It annoyed Peter greatly—especially since many of his friends had already come of age.

“I care not about your friends,” Godfric had scoffed. “A man should always remain one of virtue. Doubly so for a woman.”

Several months passed after that nearly forgettable day in the field—until a sudden commotion erupted outside.

Godfric kicked open Peter’s front door, his single arm grabbing the boy by the shoulder.

“Crows have risen from the forest,” he barked, tossing Peter a sheathed sword before dragging his mother away with him.

No warriors had marched into the wildlands since that day.

But something—or someone—was coming back.