Timmy’s instructions had not been particularly detailed. Henry had gone looking for the bandit camp early in the morning, and yet by noon he was hopelessly lost, Pebbles’ hooves clomping precariously through the deep wood. It was full of ruined cabins, leftover pieces of people’s lives - something horrible had happened here, and it had happened some time ago. No one had bothered to come pick up the pieces.

(Henry warded himself off from any comparisons to himself, thank you. Sir Radzig had given him a task, and while he hardly felt up to it, he would do his best.)

In the end, finding the camp was pure dumb luck. Pebbles had gotten herself stuck in a stream, and Henry had slid off of her to try and figure out how to get her out again. There were two more half-ruined cabins at the edge of the river, and he’d climbed up– only to see a Cuman clomping by in full armor just a few steps away.

( In which there are bandits, battle, trauma, and Henry gets friendzoned in the worst way. )

[[ nfb, nfi, and taken from Kingdom Come: Deliverance (2018) and I can't believe I got through the battle at Pribyslavitz in just three hours of playtime this time. also last of the catchup posts for now, thank god. ]]

The last few days in Ledetchko had been eventful, to say the least. The ride there had been both shorter and longer than Henry remembered; there was something about the familiar curve of grassy hills, the small paths without concrete or stone, the quiet among the trees– he’d rarely paid this much attention to it before.

But with so much time spent among the strange, man-made places of Fandom and its future, it was a welcome sight. A way to set his mind back to rights. He could now say he enjoyed the adventure of it all, but Rattay and its nearby villages was home, a soothing balm to his soul.

That feeling had stuck with him all the way to Ledetchko, and then it had fled him the second he saw smoke pouring upwards from behind the hill. Not a fire, no, just chimneys. But he had a job to do. He wasn’t just here to admire the scenery.

( It was a good thing he had his journal on him... )

[[ taken from Kingdom Come Deliverance (2018). CW for discussion of animal death. nfb, nfi! ]]

Last night, Henry had dragged Hans to the preserve on the pretext of hunting-- not that they'd gotten far with it, but still. It had kept Hans away from anywhere he could do further damage, and put him at ease besides; for all his airs, Capon really did seem most settled in the woods, far from the rest of the world.

But as Jane had said, come midnight, he'd vanished. Just like that. Left Henry there, staring at the fire they'd made, once again lost in a world he didn't understand, all by himself.

He hadn't slept well upon return to his room. There were the usual nightmares, of course, but also a worse restlessness that kept crawling into his legs and moving them about. By first light, he'd sat back up - as quietly as he could - and grabbed his journal out from under the bed. He flipped past several pages of scratch (paused, briefly, over Pious, Timmy, Reeky) and pressed flowers to an empty one, and set his pen to the top.

Sir Hans appeared as if out of nowhere this week's end, and returned just as quickly. I was able to share some of my pri predit troubles with him and he esr spoke of his worry I would not make it back--

He was getting handier with the writing the longer he kept this journal, but he'd still be quite a while that morning, just filling the page as he tried to pull all the ends of the past few days from memory.

After a few hours, he got up to open the door and let some fresh air in, but he remained pensive.

[[ open ]]

Henry woke up with the worst bloody headache and not the faintest idea where he was. Memories from last night only filtered through in uneven bursts.

There had been the talk with Father Godwin at the tavern, of course. He remembered that much--

( Cut for excessive Catholicism. )

[[ taken from Kingdom Come Deliverance (2018), following yesterday's post. ]]

Henry was starting to acclimate, a tad. He thought. Yes, it was likely that what he was acclimating to was-- Hell? Heaven?

Crimbo? Like that priest had talked about that one time.

But still. He finally could make it through a day without spending half of it staring at the walls, though Skalitz still burned behind his eyes at times. He could even leave the castle, as he was doing now, heading back out into the park with his notebook to see how all the flowers and things were doing.

Perhaps, he mused, as he stepped between some shrubs, he should take some home and see what happened if he a--

So lost in his thoughts Henry was that he completely missed the root sticking out of the ground. The fall felt as if he was moving slowly and quickly both at once, and his eyes widened before his face landed straight in the mud...

He sunk into it, helplessly. How was there so much of it? It hadn't rained much or anything...

"Henry!" called a familiar voice. And then followed a familiar burst of laughter. "What are you doing in the mud, you bloody oaf of a peasant? Was it calling to you?"

Henry frowned, pushing himself up. He squinted, eyes adjusting to the light. He caught blond hair, slightly off teeth, an obnoxious grin-- "Just lookin' for turnips as a peasant does, Lord Capon," he managed, finding his wit somewhere amidst all of the madness. "Sorry your Lordship had to see all that."

And before he knew it, he was being hoisted up onto his feet by a firm grip, to a standing-steady beneath the bridge to Pirkstein Castle in the heart of Rattay.

Had it all been a dream?

[[ commence the week of canon catchup! that henry tripped and fell and disappeared is FB, the rest is not. ]]

It was a beautifully sunny day out here, so near to Sasau River. Henry doubted he would have been able to enjoy it one way or another, but the prospect of going hunting with Sir Hans Capon didn't improve it any.

Still, he knew better than to ignore Sir Hanush's orders. There was little else he could do but trek his way up to the upper castle in the morning, his head heavy with an actual night's sleep and already-dawning irritation.

He found Sir Hans leaning against the tall cobbled walls, his arms crossed over his blindingly-yellow pourpoint. Right. Might as well get this over with.

"Here I am," Henry announced.

"I'm overjoyed," Sir Hans said, with a roll of his eyes and a wave of his hand. "Have you got a horse?"

A horse? Henry barely had twelve groschen on him. "No, sir," he said, blinking. "Where would someone like me get a horse?"

"... Good point," Sir Hans allowed. "Unless it was a cart horse, I suppose." He eyed Henry speculatively. Was he going to offer-- "Well, you'll just have to trot along behind me like a good dog."

( Henry really should have tried harder to land a few more punches last night. )

[[ adapted from Kingdom Come: Deliverance (2018), nfb and nfi due to distance. ]]

Sleeplessness was a curse and a blessing. It bled into every waking second, turning the world sluggish, like mud pulling on his legs. It was fine. It blunted the edges of the pain the nightmares kept dragging up to the light: the mud and the blood, the calculating eyes set in a bald man’s face, the light receding from Ma and Pa as they fell. Over and over again, whenever Henry closed his eyes.

The burning husk of Silver Skalitz.

So it was better, Henry reflected, that he were not to close them. That helped him haul himself through his first guard shift: the time spent taking care of minor disputes, patrolling pointlessly across the cobbled streets, trying not to be bothered by the sight of his fellow Skalitzmen and women begging on the street, watching them be judged and shoved around. Rattay was so much bigger than Skalitz had ever been, with its large houses and well-dressed burghers, and yet: there was nothing in him that could muster the wonder he would have once felt.

Then his guide - Nightingale, the guardsman was called, that was it, it was so hard to hold on to anything - called it good for the day.

They played dice. How many groschen he’d won or lost? Hard to say. Perhaps it didn't matter.

( Just one more thing and we're done for the day... )

[[ nfb/nfi/ooc-ok/and so on. adapted from the game Kingdom Come: Deliverance (2018) by Warhorse Studios. ]]