Once Gisilbert started trying to teach the young one his language communication grew easier: the child's halting Prussian seemed to be more an artifact of his lack of interaction with anyone than anything else. He did have trouble with some of the words – he clearly understood them but simply could not wrap his tongue around them.
Well, however many years he had lived, he had the body of a small child, and the limitations that went with that.
The confusion that came when Gisilbert tried to tell the child his name and ask if the young one had a name of his own – Gisilbert suspected he didn't – meant that the child now considered 'Gilbert' to be his name, and only because that was as close as he could get to pronouncing Gisilbert.
The ax-smith lacked the heart to tell the little one of his misunderstanding. There was an innocent sweetness to it, one that warmed the place inside him which had lain empty and cold since his family died.
Leaving the child's shelter was something Gisilbert prayed he would never experience again: the little one had grasped his hand, taken his cart with the other, and twisted reality in a way that forced Gisilbert to close his eyes lest he be driven mad.
He trusted the child to guide him, and clung to that tiny hand as though he would die should his grip fail. And counted steps. Ten steps, and the normal sounds of the forest, normal smells returned.
He risked opening his eyes, and near wept with relief to see trees and not that... other place. After that, reassuring the little one that he'd done nothing wrong took time, but it allowed him to recover from the experience and ready himself for the journey.
Little Gilbert relaxed from his panicked fear that he'd irredeemably ruined things between himself and his quasi-adoptive 'father' as they walked, Gisilbert pushing the cart and the child walking alongside him, sometimes helping to get the wheels over large tree roots or past swampy ground. In truth, Gilbert could have handled the cart alone, but that would not look like a father and his son.
The first village they came to after leaving Prussia – Gisilbert's suspicions that the child was the Prussian Land-Soul grew stronger, for Gilbert paused to take a handful of soil and slip it into a leather pouch, and he knew when they were no longer in Prussian lands – Gisilbert traded some of the pelts they'd taken from the old tomb for proper clothing for the boy, explaining to the villagers that they'd been wandering so long his son had outgrown his old clothing and that they were traveling to the Holy Land to pray that the boy's affliction would be healed.
The explanation sufficed to allow him to trade his skills – and teach Gilbert the smith's art as he did – in the villages they passed, without the child having to hide himself completely. He also taught Gilbert what he remembered of Father Aelfred's teachings, though he was unsure how well the little one understood them. He'd known so little kindness in his life.
For the most part they were alone: a man, a child, and a cart containing their worldly belongings making their way south through Poland, then Hungary. They had been in Hungary some days when they heard the shouts and screams.
Gilbert tensed, and the air around him twisted, then he held a sword longer than he was tall clutched in both hands. Gisilbert did not doubt the child could use the weapon. He took two axes from his cart, said softly, "Shall we investigate?"
The boy nodded. "Is bad," he said as they quickened their pace. "Church-men attacked."
Gisilbert's lips tightened to a thin line. He saw no reason to ask how Gilbert knew this: the little one was more than merely human, and far, far older.
The attackers paid them no heed: they were fully intent on beating the monks they had ambushed. Cumans, all, no doubt raiding for whatever wealth they could find and likely frustrated at the paltry takings from the monks.
Gilbert moved faster than the eye could see, one moment still and tense, all but vibrating in place, the next pulling that outsized sword from a Cuman body. His bird screamed and dived onto a man's head, talons digging into his eyes.
Gisilbert joined the fray, an ax in each hand, chopping with cold, methodical strokes, until no Cuman remained alive.
Gilbert's sword was nowhere to be seen, and he knelt by the most severely injured of the monks, murmuring something Gisilbert could not hear clearly. His hood had fallen back in the fighting, revealing his unnaturally pale hair and skin, and those red, red eyes.
"Need bandages, father," he said.
"I will bring the cart, little one. Will you be well here?"
The child gave a single nod, and resumed whatever magic he was working.
#
It took until near sunset for Gilbert to finish bandaging wounds, for he insisted on washing them first and using a poultice of herbs in the bandages to keep the wounds from becoming infected. It seemed an outlandish thing to Gisilbert, but the child's confidence in his actions was sufficient to convince him: he had nursed Gisilbert to health after wounds that should have killed him.
By then, the least injured monks were awake, watching man and child with wariness. They looked Germanic rather than Hungarian, though why German monks would be here instead of in their place in the Holy Roman Empire was a question to which Gisilbert could find no answer.
Gisilbert bowed to the nearest. "Brother, you are fortunate we happened by in time to aid you and your brothers."
The man's face brightened. "You are of the Germans, then?"
He nodded. "I travel to the Holy Land, to seek guidance for myself and healing for my son."
The monk turned to study the child for a moment. "He is... a strange one, brother."
Gisilbert squatted, wincing as the movement caught at his left leg and hip. "He is, yes. But I love him no less for it, good brother." He sighed, then said, "I am Gisilbert Ax-Smith. My son is Gilbert."
"I am Brother Clovis. My brothers and I go to aid the German hospital in Jerusalem. We were traveling to the monastery south of here to recruit volunteers ere we turned our path to the south." The monk coughed, his face twisting with pain.
"How far is this monastery?" Gisilbert asked. "We will travel with you and protect you."
For a moment it seemed Brother Clovis would object, would claim that a man and a child could not protect half a dozen monks, then his gaze turned to the fallen Cumans and his unvoiced protest died. "It is but a half-day's walk, brother Gisilbert. I thank you for your kindness."
"It is what a Christian man should do," Gisilbert said. "I must deal with those," he indicated the dead. "Rest, brother, and be well."
#
It was not the most pleasant of camps, with blood and worse soaked into the ground, but with the monks not able to walk as yet and twilight fading fast there was little else to be done. Brother Clovis intoned a blessing on the despoiled ground, and Gisilbert tethered the Cuman's horses nearby, so the camp fire would protect them also.
He knew little of the care of horses, and none at all of the care of such war-beasts as these, but they were willing to be led and Clovis said one of the wounded knew how to tend them. The goods in the packs the horses carried would no doubt aid the monks in funding their journey.
Admittedly those goods were blood-geld, but it would be all but impossible to find their rightful owners, if those unfortunates still lived. Best to let the Church sanctify the evil which had brought them to Gisilbert's hands.
Once the monks were settled, Gilbert joined him, sitting by his side and leaning against him.
Gisilbert wrapped an arm around the boy, felt his shivers. "What is it?" He kept his voice low, so the monks were not disturbed.
The little one shuddered. "It happened again." His voice quavered.
"It?" Those damned heathen Prussians had no notion how precious the child they treated so callously was. If Gisilbert was able, he would happily end them all, such was his anger at the way they had left a gentle soul so damaged.
Gilbert took an unsteady breath. "When I angry... big angry... I want kill. Kill all." Another rough breath, then, "I hate it."
Gisilbert had heard of such things. They were most common with the North-men of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, where some of their warriors could induce a battle-trance in which it was said one merely needed to aim them at the enemy. Some German men could do it, those who lived in the northern regions of the Empire, but it was frowned on, for a proper man at arms had discipline. He did not simply throw himself at his enemies and hack until they died or he did.
"Do not hate or fear it, Gilbert," he murmured. "This is something some of the northern peoples do: they call it bear-sark, for the bear skins they wear in place of armor. These are mighty warriors, and fierce, but without control, for the men of the north value such things. In my lands, those with this... trait learn to control it. If they can do so, so can you, yes?"
Even in the dim light he could see the hope in the boy's expression. "Not demon?"
Ah. The poor thing had been called a demon by his own people for so long he feared anything that might mean it was true. "No, you are not a demon, Gilbert. This does not make you one."
Only then did the child relax enough that he could sleep.