Good morning, good afternoon or whatever time you will read this.
My native language is not English, so please excuse my poor grammar or use of words.

Pairing: Scotland x France

Rating: M

Genre: Fantasy

Disclaimer: France and Scotland belong to Europe, Francis Bonnefoy belongs to Himaruya and Alasdair Iain Kirkland (Scotland) belongs to a user in pixiv. I'll name him this way in this story… Everyone gives him another name.. *le shrug*

_

So they crossed the mountain with a reasonable motive. When they reached the peak they had a fantastic view for miles and miles. It wasn't even cold though there was of course snow.
"I can see the city!", Francis chirped, adjusting his weight on his horse. Alasdair had put him there after Francis had insisted on shovelling and clearing the way for hours now.
"Pure?", Alasdair laughed. He found Francis so cute. It had taken him some time to get the blonde to know and work with him. Both had grown fond of each other in the short time they had been together now. At least it felt like a short time. In reality already half a year had passed.
Francis loved it to be with these mercenaries. The only thing he regretted was that he hadn't met them earlier.

It seemed that the mountain range the mercenaries were standing on had been keeping off the bad weather from one side. One side was all white already, destroyed by a hurricane and humiliated by snow. The other side they were facing was but green and sunny.
"It feels good to get out of the snow. Let's hurry."

The march down the mountain was rather difficult with the horses and with the snow. Often it was too slippery to ride and many of the men had to take their horses by the bridle.
It was already deep night when they reached the foot of the mountain. They couldn't see the city they had seen from the top of the mountain. There was at least one forest in between they were facing now.
"We should have made a map, right?", Francis looked lust less at the forest. He hated camping by now when it meant sleeping on a hard ground, even though he often slept halfway on Alasdair. Sometime in the night he would slip off and sleep on the hard ground, it was inevitable.
"Och nae, we'll be braw.", Alasdair said, offering Francis help to get on his horse. Not that Francis needed that but the plan now was that they'd proceed through the forest for a bit and then take a rest.

The horses and the people needed rest. And also their provisions soon were empty. When they wouldn't reach a town or something, they were sentenced to dig out edible roots from the hard frozen ground or hunt the bit of prey that was still not in the seasonal slumber. They were on the edge of winter after all. It was just a matter of time when the first snow in the lower lands cloaked the ground and gloved the trees in white.
This night, everyone cuddled close together.

More days passed as they fought their way through the forest. Suddenly, the trees gave way for a larger clearing. The clearing was featured with some evenly shaped stones. On second view they could be recognised as gravestones, making it a graveyard. On some were even candles and flowers that were able to blossom during winter.
"It's already so late…Alas, can't we just proceed? This graveyard is the best evidence for civilisation nearby.", Francis looked over to his husband sitting on his horse.
"Hum…Aye, afore… some o' us stairt tae sloch thair horses.", he made a grimace.

Matthias, the Dane found footprints in the snow. The rest of the group followed him. It was a slight surprise that the quite loud man was good at finding such slow 'messages' that said where the person that had lastly been here had gone.
The path led to a large wall. The brick stone wall even had some sharp looking items on its top. Then there was a rusty but solid main gate.
"Okay…?"
Behind the gate were several houses, also made from bricks, some were painted with some nasty orange colour. It really didn't look welcoming. Then the sound of dogs barking came closer.
Francis tensed a little and looked at Alasdair.
"Ah wonder wha owns sic a steid …"

The dogs appeared on the gate, tried to force their heads through the metal bars and barked violently at the visitors.
If the gate had not been there, Francis possibly would have somewhere trying to climb Alasdair's tall figure. He noticed that he hated dogs… or maybe just being barked at like so. He suddenly felt even colder than this and the insides of his hands got wet.

Then the voice of a man called the dogs back. They barked a bit more but then they ran towards the man who had called them. It was a rather fine one; a man who looked like he was very strict and disciplined with his blond hair slicked back and piercing clear blue eyes.
"What do you want from me?", the man said in a dark voice.
"Fae ye? nothing… weel, whit's this steid?"
"You are not from here?"
"Na. We ur travelling mercenaries. It's getting mirk 'n' we saw this hoose, sae we thought …"
"This is not a hotel. If you want a place to sleep during night…", the man was interrupted by another person coming towards the gate. A rather slim man with mean eyes and surprisingly white hair. He spoke a different language, but the blond man seemed to understand him.

After talking a fair while, the white haired man left with the dogs on a leash and the blond man opened the gate.
"I am afraid I cannot offer you a lot but a stay for the night? How many are you?"
"152…"
"That should work."
"Who… howfur shall we ca' ye?"
"Beilschmidt…Ludwig. You saw the man with the white hair. That was my brother. Gilbert."
Ludwig led the quite large group of mercenaries to a large barn. Of course not all fitted into there, but at least almost half of them. The other half was led to two smaller barns.

Francis made a bed for Alasdair and himself in the not-so-soft hay. It was basically just hay with his cape. He tugged around there until he was satisfied with the result.
"This is also something nice… sleeping in the middle of cow shit."
"Ach, I'm sorry ah cannae gie ye an eiderdown ilka nicht. Mibbie someday bit nae yit.", Alasdair was tired and curled up beside his lover. It was rather cold and their blankets and capes hardly held back any warmth. It would take a while. "Mibbie we shuid buy some better armour soon. We shuid see a nobleman wha is in contact wi' th' king."
"Oui, do we have any money at all?"
"It's juist enough fur sloch bit we … th' king owes us. 'n' he kens that. Did ye ken that we hae at least yin body fae th' king among oor fowk? he is tae document whit we dae."
"Oh… that's… isn't that a bit like a sword hanging over your head?"
"It's, bit amurnay feart. Ah hae hee haw tae scouk."

Francis listened to the cows softly mooing in the barn and smelled the flavour of hay. It wasn't too bad, the barns were in a quite good shape. He wondered who kept them this way. The person must love cows…

Later that night he woke up to some horrid screaming that was audible over the large yard surrounding the building. It certainly sounded like a woman. Or more than just one. Francis tried getting back to sleep but he couldn't, so he just grabbed his sword and left behind the snoring Scotsman.
He knew it had been one of his stupidities, getting out at night on a place where brutal dogs would come around every corner barking and maybe ripping flesh apart that was meant to stay in one piece…
But curiosity had its questions. Questions that left Francis sleepless. He basically followed the voices, which led him inside the larger house. He was surprised to find it unlocked and so easy to enter. But with a large wall and a front gate and watchdogs like that it was possible that everything was open here at any given time. Sure, why not?

The corridors were kind of misleading at some point until Francis found a door he had been missing a few times. Everything in here was dark and he had missed the chance of having brought a torch with him. His senses were very sensitive at the time, trying to hear more things, trying to see more things. He felt his heart racing and beating up to his neck. He was almost afraid that the heartbeat would be audible for ears that should not be hearing it.
Suddenly, the tearing screaming stopped. He heard a woman down in the base talking. Francis couldn't understand it really, it was a different language, not English nor French, yet it seemed similar to English a bit. Some words were familiar.
Then there was the howling of a female voice, possibly the 'victim'.
The Frenchman decided that it was best he'd go back to Alasdair and the others.

He just turned his heel and walked right into Gilbert, the male with the white hair and blood red eyes. Francis froze at the spot, paling.
"Liked what you saw?"
"I…didn't see anything."
Gilbert grinned like a cheshire cat. "Just my advice… I'd rather you go back to bed, 'honey'. And stay there. It would be bad if something happened to you."

Francis didn't ask much more but hurried back to the barn in which Alasdair was awake by now.
"Whaur hae ye bin? ah hae bin worrying."
"J-just took a piss…", he hurriedly said and slipped under the covers.
The redhead frowned and looked at his wife. It was unusual for Francis to use such words. But he didn't ask further. Obviously, he was safe and sound and that was what mattered.

In the next morning, a bell sounded and a group of people dressed in black went out of the gate. On second view, there were only women. There were coffins too… yet the wood of the coffins was fresh. They were simply makeshift crates in the size of a person, lovelessly crafted in a hurry.

"It's time to go, Alasdair… I want to leave this place.", Francis begged upon getting ready for their journey.
"Mmmh…Aye. We need a steid tae bade fur th' winter. Forordinar we bide at hame bit amurnay sure if we kin reach it at this pace. However, ah don't wantae bade 'ere either."
Francis nodded and cracked a smile. "This place has a bad aura. Leaves a bad feeling."

But before they could actually leave, Gilbert showed up with two armed guards…
"You, will you come with us? Just for a short talk.", the albino nodded towards Francis.
Francis had a bad feeling about this and looked at Alasdair who just gave him a quizzical look.
"It won't hurt. Juist gang wi' thaim 'n' you'll be back soon.", Alasdair finally said. Then he stepped closer and convinced Francis that if they were not back within at least an hour, he would look for him and get him out.
This actually made the French feel a lot better and he went with Gilbert.

The albino led him down to the cellar, but further than Francis had been the previous night.
"…I'm sorry I got sneaking in here last night.", Francis began. "…but I heard screaming and I couldn't sleep. …Whatever you were doing, could you not stop that for at least one night? It would have spared me becoming suspicious."
"Shut up! No one can help you when you are nosy like that.", Gilbert hissed and slammed open a door in which were manifold gadgets, instruments and other things which obviously were for torture. But also documents and pictures of the human body. Then again, the tiled room seemed very sterile. Not even the tiniest drop of blood.

"Bruder and I are doctors. And this is a prison. The people here have been sentenced to death by the king. It may seem cruel to you but who are you to think so highly of yourself and so low of this place? These people have lost their right to live and yet fulfil one last service to the state. We find ways to keep the good ones alive. The ones you'd love. Children for example. Imagine a child to die just because you think this place is just full of filth and we are just human scum to have experiments with people that would have died one way or another anyway. Imagine a child molester or a rapist to die just for to save the group he'd count as his victims! You really are not to judge us! Not you!"
The albino looked pretty pissed by now.
"…I didn't .. know that.", Francis softly replied, looking to the ground. He didn't like to be scolded. The words of Gilbert got right to his heart. He just stood there and chewed on his lower lip.
Gilbert tilted his head and found that it had been enough for now. "Fine. I lead you back to your mercenaries now. And don't tell them a word. …Just tell them that I gave you directions on how to get out of here."
"…Mh! That would be indeed helpful. You must know this place, right? We need to get to some city or something to stay there during winter. Do you have a map? We got completely lost after passing the mountains."

Gilbert led the way up to an office.
"You came all the way through the mountains? No wonder, that you… Ah, ja. Here is the map.", he took out a piece of paper and unfolded it. It showed the mountains, the prison, the nearby graveyard and some surrounding places. "You were quite lucky. The prison is surrounded by swamp. Just a bit stray and you'll be sucked into death."
Francis paled again. "…Oh!"
"Ja. …Let me just make a quick copy of this map and you can go with your mercenaries."

Just 5 minutes later, Francis left the main building with the map. He was happy to have been left off the hook so easily. He had almost thought that Gilbert was going to kill him after what had happened the other night.
"Alasdair! I have a map, we can go now!"