Hans

A Trials of Light and Darkness Story

Author's Note:

Welcome to the newest addition to the TLD saga! If you're a newcomer to the series, know that while Hans can certainly stand alone as a distinct story, there are certainly threads from Trials of Light and Darkness, as well as Words of the Protector, that are being picked up in this story, as well as some mild spoilers for the main cycle. If you like what you read here, I suggest trying out my flagship fanfiction, Trials of Light and Darkness.

Also, astute followers may recognize what seems to be a character inconsistency in Hans in this chapter - in TLD1 he says something about 'never having taken another life.' Don't worry, the continuity will remain whole in the end. ;)

I hope you all enjoy!

xxx

Chapter One

Perhaps if his term of service called him into combat, sire, your son's aggressive impulses would be put to good use.

Edmund Adorno, advisor to King Westergaard

Lujenne River Bank,

Northern France

July 15th, 1835

Hans leapt into the brine, surprisingly frigid water rushing up to meet him. He plunged into the deep, hair and jacket momentarily billowing about him before his feet touched the riverbed and he started to move. Behind him came a series of heavy splashes as the rest of the squad joined the rush. Hans's head broke the surface and his torso followed suit, and then he was running, raising his knees high with each step and streaming water.

The young prince reached to his chest and undid the strap holding his broadsword in place, bringing the scabbard to bear in front and loosening the blade in preparation for battle. He did not hear the pounding rush from behind. He did not care if he was followed into the fight. He was going to take many lives today.

Hans reached the river bank and exploded onto the shore, starting into a sprint and ripping his sword from the sheath. His destination was a little camp on the skyline, trailing smoke into the sky and abuzz with the movement of terrified people, unready for the coming onslaught. They were deserters, men who had abandoned the army of the Southern Isles and fled the country rather than risk death in battle.

Well, now death would find them after all.

Truth be told, Hans didn't care to punish the deserters in particular. They were cowards, but who was he to bring judgment to them? It was now just over two months since Hans's eldest brother Maxwell had taken the life of Mallory James, Hans's love, in a bout of hedonism. During that time, Hans had been the worst coward of all.

That horrible day refused to leave him. Every time he shut his eyes, every time he felt a moment's happiness, every time sleep evaded him at night, she was there. Lying beaten on a bed in a little shack down by the water, covered with blood. Maxwell's horrible smile when he'd told Hans that he'd raped her. Hans had hurt him. Hans had hurt Maxwell and his friends. He'd made them bleed. But he hadn't killed Maxwell. He hadn't been able to.

He'd failed Mallory. He'd failed to avenge her wasted death on his brother, failed even to give him more than a scar. Hans had taken the self-imposed exile that his father had recommended, if only because he couldn't stand to look his family in the eyes anymore. Not after they stood by Maxwell.

For six weeks now, Hans had fought along the outlands in Northern France, earning an embellished reputation for viciousness as he attempted to make others feel the same pain that he did. Two months ago, Hans had spared Maxwell's life because he couldn't bring himself to kill a person. It was a particularly cruel twist of fate that now it was all he wanted to do.

A disorganized, ragged group of men gathered around the nearest of the tents and leveled a set of burnished rifles at the advancing force. Hans's stride didn't even falter when they fired. A sharp crack sounded and a gout of smoke shrouded the tent, but few of the irregulars fell. The deserters were scared, and ill-trained. They weren't trying to kill their attackers, they were trying to make time for others to get away.

Hans leapt over a small crest in the earth and dug his left hand into the ground, throwing the grit into the crowd at eye level just as the other irregulars caught up with him. The crown soldiers of the Southern Isles got to work, falling upon the deserters with almost sadistic glee. One of the deserters dropped his rifle halfway through reloading and started to flee, screaming hysterically.

Hans sprinted after him, chasing him past rows of tents and the campfire. It didn't take long to outpace the man, who seemed weak and malnourished. Hans caught up and slapped him across the back with the flat of his blade and the fellow tumbled to the ground, rolling over and covering his face with his arms.

"Please don't kill me!" He screamed, voice truly pathetic as he begged for his life. "Please, I'll re-enlist, if that's what you want!"

Hans knocked the man's arms away from his face with the flat of his blade and laughed heartlessly. "That's not what I want. You can't give me what I want."

Hans rammed his sword into the man's head, killing him messily. He heard high-pitched screaming, and looked up to see, with some surprise, that a small, ragged band of women and children were attempting to flee the camp. A little girl with an ashen face struggled against her mother's arms as she grasped the air towards the corpse Hans had just created. He drew a blade coated with blood and viscera from the man's head and stopped, shock freezing him still.

The mother turned and continued running, her daughter continuing to cry. Hans whipped around and watched the battle continue to rage before him with a sudden revulsion. A man, on his knees, begged for his life. He still wore a threadbare army uniform, and he looked like he hadn't had a decent meal in months. One of the irregulars shoved him to the ground and ran a sword through his chest. The deserter's body flopped like a ragdoll.

All around him, the carnage continued as the deserters were slaughtered. Hans suddenly couldn't take it.

"Stop it! STOP!" He roared, casting his sword aside into the ground and raising his voice over the din. His hands were shaking. Suddenly, the little flecks of blood on them made his skin burn. Though he was not the commander among these men, all stayed their hands and turned to gaze towards him.

"This isn't right," he said, voice harsh and strained.

Captain Drexler stepped away from a group of irregulars and approached Hans, placing a hand on his shoulder and speaking in an undertone.

"Hans. What's going on?" Drexler looked up from under his brow into Hans's downcast gaze, searching for something there that would explain the outburst. "You know that we're just following orders."

"So take them prisoner," Hans said loudly, refusing to keep his voice low enough that it wouldn't carry. "They deserve a trial."

Drexler glanced around the battlefield. Six or seven of the crown's irregulars had encircled the fleeing women and children. Only five of the deserters remained alive, and they knelt in a circle in the center of the camp, their hands raised and clasped behind their heads. The captain turned back towards Hans.

"What is this about?" He said in a whisper. "You know we can't do that. We barely have the rations to get ourselves back to the Southern Isles. We can't take on five more. And what would we do with the families? Most of those women –" he gestured, "- are French. We don't have any right to extradite them."

Hans took a few unsteady breaths. Drexler was right. Hans knew that he was right. These men were sentenced to death because death was the only honor left for them. He'd personally done the sentencing to some. But… this wasn't about justice. Not for Hans. He was here for vengeance, and he would never have his vengeance from these deserters.

"No," he said slowly. "No, I can't do this. I can't do it."

The burning sensation crawling across his skin deepened. Hans was on fire. Horrible, painful images came roaring back into his mind. A bearded old veteran, beheaded by Hans's blade. A wooden barracks, filled with men, ignited by Hans's torch. The screaming cloyed at the edge of his ears, and Hans's hands buckled, his fingers curling inwards into pained claws. He stumbled away from Drexler, and in his mind's eye he saw a young boy, no older than fifteen, wearing a uniform that was far too large. He'd been crying.

He'd screamed for his mother.

Hans had slaughtered him like a pig.

"NO!" He screamed, trying to force the images from his mind. They were not Maxwell. None of them were. They did not deserve his wrath. None of them.

Hans whirled about and looked around, wildly. He needed to get out of here. He needed to run, right now. He started to move erratically.

"Stand DOWN, soldier!" Drexler bellowed, starting to walk towards Hans. "Listen, son, I don't know what's gotten into you, but we can't –"

Hans turned and slammed into the captain, shoving the man back. Drexler stumbled and fell into the muck, where he swore. Hans hadn't meant to hit him. His mind felt jumpy, and strange. He took a step backwards, realizing that several of the irregulars had rushed to Drexler's aid. They shot worried looks at Hans. He'd been the most eager among them to fulfill their mission, and now he seemed completely unhinged. Well, he didn't know what had happened any more than them.

Drexler accepted a hand and started to pull himself to his feet, wiping his bleeding mouth with his other hand. He spat onto the ground, then turned to look back at Hans. He saw the fear in the young prince's eyes.

"Follow me," he said softly, walking forwards and taking Hans's shoulder. "Walk with me for a minute." And he started to lead, towards a nearby hill. He nodded over his shoulder to another of the men.

Hans felt a horrible, strange lightness. It was an out-of-body experience as he and the captain crested the hill and then came to a halt in the shallow behind it. They were by the river again, another of its wends, this one rushing far faster and more powerfully; rapids would be nearby somewhere downriver, beyond sight. Drexler knelt and cupped some water, little breakers over the rocks misting at his jacket. He swished it about in his mouth for a moment, and then spat into the grass. Hans blinked at the red.

Drexler did this a few more times, until the spit came out mostly clear. Then he turned towards Hans. In the distance, there was a crack of gunfire, followed by the plaintive wailing of women who had just lost their lovers, children who had just lost their father. Hans realized that he'd begun to cry.

"What's going on, son?"

"I'd never killed someone," He said softly. Not before this assignment. I wouldn't even have been able to fathom doing something so ugly, so wrong.

"What?" Drexler narrowed his eyes.

"I'd never killed someone before," Hans repeated. "I was mad. I was so mad at my brother. I wanted to hurt him. I did hurt him. I wanted to kill him. But I couldn't make myself do it."

Drexler's forehead was creased with concern. The man's thick moustache was tinged with blood now. "This was the first time? This mission?"

Hans slowly nodded. "Somehow, it didn't catch up with me until now. I… I can't do this."

Drexler rubbed at his jaw. "Christ's sake, son, I never could've guessed. Normally, greens are afraid of battle. You… you looked like you wanted to die, the way you fought."

"I do," Hans whispered.

For almost a full minute, the only sound was the gurgling of the stream, and the cries of loss over the hill.

"It's hard," Drexler said. "For a long time, it's hard. It's the sort of thing that you carry around with you forever."

Hans looked towards the horizon. His eyes stung. He wiped at them, but it didn't help much. His hands still burned, and he was careful not to get the blood of a dead man in his eyes. He turned back to the captain.

"I was insubordinate."

"Yes, you were, soldier."

He nodded. "What happens now?"

"You're not on good terms with your father, are you?"

Drexler knew Hans's true identity, but the rest of the irregulars knew him as Hans Siguror, the name he'd chosen to use with another infantry captain some years ago. Hans had gotten attached to the sort of person he liked to think that Kess had made him into.

"No." Hans replied.

"Then you don't want a court martial. Not that you'd want one anyway, but your father could get you out of trouble if he really wanted to."

"No, I don't, sir."

"Well," Drexler said, "I can't do nothing. Your fellow men saw one of their peers disobey a direct order and then hit their commanding officer."

"Yes, sir," Hans said.

"You don't think you can do this sort of work anymore."

"No, sir," Hans said.

"Well, then it seems obvious to me what happened. We raided a camp of deserters, only to find it far larger than we'd anticipated. We were outnumbered ten to one. We made a valiant stand before a tactical retreat, but you were among our losses. They killed some, took some captive because they expect to be able to ransom them for asylum. Little do they know, they managed to capture a particularly valuable bargaining chip with this little maneuver.

"Make your way back to the Southern Isles within a few months, and you can return as a hero with a grand tale about how he managed to escape deserter captivity and make his way home."

Drexler met Hans's eye even as he drew a small pouch from his belt and handed it to Hans. The former prince felt it clink, and realized it was a small amount of money. He felt a surge of gratitude. Not for the first time, he wondered what he would do without men who stood far taller than him to set an example.

"What will you tell the men?" Hans said, aware that they would need a different ruse.

"To the men, I took you aside to try and talk some sense into, but it turns out that you'd gone entirely mad. They already feared you were, so they'll believe it. Our conversation turned into a struggle, so it was unfortunate but necessary that I defend myself in the only way that I can. Your body, unfortunately, was lost to the river, but seeing as you weren't getting a soldier's burial anyway with that sort of conduct, it doesn't matter much."

Even as he spoke, Drexler unholstered the pistol at his belt and pointed it into the air. He fired, and earsplitting crack that would take away Hans's ability to hear through his left ear for more than a day. Already, a commotion had kicked up from the irregulars, who were sure to rush to the aid of their commanding officer. Hans felt his heart jump.

"Go," Drexler said, shoving Hans into motion. "GO!"

Hans turned and ran like the wind.

xxx

Two days later, Hans awoke with a painful start. He was in a sweat, nightmares having come for him again. Screaming and unwelcome thoughts. As he fought away the panic that still gripped at his chest, he looked around and took stock of his surroundings.

He lay with his back against the trunk of a tree at the edge of a copse fed by the Lujenne. He'd walked five leagues upstream now, and he had yet to find any sort of settlement. He was starting to fear that he'd slipped into some sort of hellish dimension where he was the only human left in the world. It certainly felt like a long ways to go along a river with no sign of other human life.

He had plenty of water, at least, and the near-idyllic French countryside, with its mild summer weather, was conducive to his survival. He could keep going for quite some time, provided that he eventually found something to eat. Even now, he wasn't particularly hungry, yet. He couldn't imagine himself eating with the horrors that stalked his mind.

Hans slowly stood up and walked towards the river. He stepped out of the trees and into the moonlight, where he stood and stared at the glimmering water dance for some time. Eventually, movement behind him made him turn, but the disturbance was just an owl, settling down in one of the trees. It let out a lonely hoot.

Hans closed his eyes and breathed. Center your soul, Kess's grizzled old voice seemed to whisper to him. Hans found himself smiling. He assumed the first stance of Olympian swordform, a martial tradition that had been passed from mentor to servant since the days of knights and castles. Tradition held that it had first been taught by an swordmaster from the Orient, traveled thousands of miles to share his art with the West. The Sato-sama, the ritual was called, was more about discipline than functionality. The graceful, sweeping movements served the body and the mind, and were said to bring them closer together.

The Sato-sama was also said to bring tranquility, and if here was one thing Hans needed right now, it was precisely that. So he swept his right foot, toe pointed outwards, around the earth before him until it pointed to his side, and he brought his hands together clasped before himself, as if in prayer. Then he adjusted his stance, pointing out with the palm of his left hand and arcing the right behind his head, cupping palm down.

From here his movements became more swift, though they were always mediated with a practiced grace as he flowed through the stances that the Sato-sama taught. He extended his arms to the sides and drew one knee to his chest, turning in a wide sweep and nearly bringing one hand to brush the ground as he performed a wide, flourishing kick with the other.

Only ten minutes into the ritual did Hans let loose the scabbard from his back and raise his blade, still sheathed, to enter into the dance. A warrior's blade, the teachings went, cuts sharpest when it does not cut at all. Let strength of character and discipline be your finest weapons, and let the sword be your final resort.

When you draw your blade, be ready to take a life. Understand the gravity that such a decision entails.

Hans tried not to let his form waver as he considered the weight of failure that rested upon his shoulders. He had failed Mallory. He had failed Kess, and the teachings that had made him whole again. Most of all, he had failed himself. He'd been a coward and a fool, and his actions had cost him the weight of a pained conscience. Never before had he realized what a heavy toll that could be to bear.

Some time passed, he and his blade as one, moving through the forms. At the end of the Sato-sama, thirty minutes had passed and Hans knew what he must do.

He would find a way to atone for his misdeeds. He would do good to outweigh the evil. He would walk the path of redemption, wherever the road may lead.