A/N: This is beginning of a story I started last fall. I have maybe 3 or 4 chapters written. Unsure if I am going to continue but I would like to share what has been written so far. Hopefully its enjoyable enough to read and during the editing process I hope to wake my muse and become inspired to finish the story. Let me know what you think! :)
Believe
Chapter 1
The sky was cloudless; black velvet sprinkled with diamonds and a full silver moon. There was no breeze in the woods, the air hung still and heavy. The cold bit at her fingers and nose but she ignored the unpleasantness. She had to focus. A brightly moonlit, silent night was not their friend.
She watched the men and women around her prepare. Some sharpened knives and daggers. Some were checking that their pockets and bags were secure. Most kept glancing up at the moon and shaking their heads in disappointment. She shared their sentiment.
They weren't a people meant for a life of crime. Their first instinct, as a collective, was to ask for help, cooperate with others to achieve goals. This war had forced their hands. Good people were now thieves and cutpurses, all in the name of survival. Did the high lords even know what war did to their common people and lesser nobles?
Yet here she was, homeless, parentless; a girl born to privilege now left to live a life of quiet raids with her baseborn villagers, stealing what they needed in order to survive. War was unfair, even to the noble.
"Ready milady?" George, the captain of her family's guard in days past, was the only man left from the castle that used to be her home. "We need to move now, while they sleep deep."
Eleanor nodded. She stood, sweeping her gaze across the group of twenty or so villagers that were going to go with her and George. Most were not meant for fighting. Eleanor herself was raised to be a lady. At seventeen, she had been weeks away from being married off when her future husband was called away to fight for the Lannisters, after the Starks had declared war. He was killed in the first battle he had fought in. She had never met the man but still she mourned, as a good lady should, for the man who was to be her husband.
Before her own home was attacked she had never picked up any sort of weapon. Her brother had tried multiple times to get her to duel him, a way to entertain himself on long, hot afternoons when most people just wanted to lie in bed and not move. Eleanor always refused him. Ladies did not wield weapons, for play or otherwise. Now even he was gone to war, protecting the Riverlands, and she was here, in this forest, wishing she had let him teach her.
Currently, she and the surviving villagers were trained and practiced, compliments of George. They were by no means a force to be reckoned with. Head on, any number of soldiers would be able to take them out easily. That was why they needed stealth and precision. They invaded camps at night, stole only what they needed, and disappeared as quickly as humanly possible. They avoided fighting at all costs. So far they had been very good or very lucky; no one had been caught.
George was issuing soft orders to the men and women who were to go out this evening. It was a large camp they had found, easily one of the lord's armies that was fighting for the crown. Typically she and the villagers came across smaller parties; groups of knights and lordlings that were out on their own for one reason or another. Some ended up being messenger parties, others had been raiding parties. Sometimes they were deserters. It didn't matter; the villagers took what they needed and were long gone before the parties discovered they'd been robbed.
She was not convinced that raiding this large of a camp was the wisest course of action, however. George had talked to her for hours about how this one raid could last them for weeks which would mean less risk for their people in the coming month. Brella was about to have her baby and a few of the children were sick. They needed enough provisions to hunker down in one spot for while until everyone was well enough to move on. This raid could help them to that end.
George, with his gruff voice, gray beard, and pleading eyes, had finally convinced her to concede, with reluctance. They were both the leaders of this patchwork group of people but she relied on him for strategy and battle counsel. If he thought it was necessary and she was hard pressed to deny him beyond her gut feeling, she had to trust him.
She still felt that ember of uneasiness burning in her stomach now as she watched him finish preparations. Lifting her chin up she swallowed the disquiet and tried to look confident. She was one of the villagers' leaders after all; she couldn't look shaken before they even began.
Bo was a thirteen year old boy who was tall for his age and not quite used to how long his arms and legs had gotten over the past six months. He was gangly and prone to tripping or stumbling. He didn't usually go on raids with them as he was still very much a boy. Yet he wanted desperately to prove he was a man so he always volunteered to accompany them. His job usually ended up as guard to the women and children back at the camp, the ones who were unable to help with the raid. This night, however, it was all hands on deck; they needed every body that could reasonably help.
He was standing by a stump, his knees visibly shaking as he watched men and women disperse among the trees after getting their assignments from George. Eleanor took a deep breath and walked over to him. He jumped when she set a hand on his shoulder but managed a jittery smile when he met her eyes. "Milady." He gave a half curtsey, half bow at seeing her.
"Bo. Don't be nervous. It will be just like we practiced." She tried to assure him. She hoped she was more convincing than she felt.
He looked straight at her; they were the same height now even though he was years younger. "Thank you, Lady Eleanor. I am not scared though." He tried to look brave though his gray eyes betrayed him.
She needed him calmer, steadier. One clumsy moment from this boy could ruin it all. George had confidence in him; she less so. Still, they needed the extra set of hands. Bo was bound and determined to prove what an asset he could be beyond camp guard. George had agreed that he was ready to prove himself a man. Eleanor was trusting in George's judgment, yet again.
She took both Bo's shoulders in her hands and faced him to her. "It's ok to be scared. It will make you more alert. Just watch where your feet go and you'll be fine. Remember, George and I believe in you." She hoped they were reassuring words that bolstered his confidence.
Bo nodded. "I know, milady. I will do you proud." He was trying to look confident for her. It was the best she could hope for.
"You know your job. Go do it." She let go of him and gestured toward the wood, toward the awaiting camp. He nodded and took off into the woods. To her astonishment and pleasure he did not trip once. She watched until he disappeared into the black forest. Maybe she had been wrong to doubt him.
"You're turn." George stood next to her. They were the last two in the clearing.
"I would like to say one last time that I think this is a bad idea." She pressed her lips together to keep from saying more.
"Your protest has been noted, milady. But you did agree to this, in the end." George reminded her.
Eleanor remembered the argument well. The lord's camp was too big, too well guarded; there were too many chances to be caught. George, her strategist, her counsel, countered that this one big raid would make it so they would not have to steal again for many weeks. The men and women were trained well and with such a large number going in the whole entire incursion would last less than twenty minutes. In and out, then safe for weeks. George insisted it was an opportunity not to be missed. Eleanor had to take his word for it; he was the one who had seen and been in battles before. Maybe her misgivings were just the fear of what she didn't know. His argument and expertise, in the end, swayed her decision.
She inhaled deeply, the scent of pine and smoke from the distant fires calming her, helping her to focus. She knelt down to rub her fingers in the dirt. Smearing the mud across her already grimy face she stood, checked her dagger at her hip then brushed her hands off on her tunic. "I did." She agreed finally before setting off into the unfortunately silent, bright woods.