A klaus encounter, p.19
A Klaus Encounter, page 19
part #5 of Horned Holidays Series
Because she loved them. Both of them. More than she’d thought possible.
And in three days, that love might not be enough to save them.
CHAPTER 23
The Longest Night festival had drawn the entire population of the village. Every villager who could walk had made their way to the central gathering point where bonfires blazed against the encroaching darkness. Every villager except Talia and Theo. She’d wanted to come in order to defend herself, to defend him, but in the end she’d agreed to remain home while he reconnoitered.
Klaus crouched in the trees, in the usual place from which he observed the activities in the market. The snow beneath him had been compressed to silence, his breath controlled to eliminate visible condensation. They were standard reconnaissance protocols, except this wasn’t a mission. This was survival. His survival. Talia’s. Theo’s.
The thought of them back at the homestead, waiting nervously for his report, made something uncomfortable twist in his chest.
“Brothers and sisters!” Jorund’s voice carried across the square, amplified by the acoustics of surrounding buildings. “We gather on this sacred night to renew our bonds. To reaffirm what we hold precious. To protect our community from forces that would corrupt and destroy.”
His jaw tightened. Jorund was invoking an external threat and positioning himself as a protector, as one of them. It was a classic approach to manipulating a population. Unfortunately, it was also an effective one.
The crowd murmured agreement. He counted faces, cataloging who stood closest to Jorund, who hung back, who looked uncomfortable but didn’t leave. Martha stood near the edge, arms crossed, face set in disapproval. Albert beside her, equally grim. Three others he recognized as frequent recipients of Talia’s generosity. Only five obvious allies in the crowd? Unacceptable.
“You’ve all seen the changes,” Jorund continued, pacing before the fire like a performer. The flames cast his shadow long and distorted against the snow. “How the outsider woman suddenly thrives where honest folk struggle. How her contraptions move with unnatural precision. How her… companion… demonstrates capabilities no mortal man should possess.”
Companion. The euphemism made his claws flex involuntarily.
“Martha says it’s just city learning,” someone called out. “Technical knowledge.”
“Is it?” Jorund reached into his coat and pulled out something. A mechanical bird. The one Talia had made for Anna’s daughter. Smaller and more delicate than anything else she’d made, with wings that gave the illusion of flight and a head that tilted curiously to one side.
He’d helped calibrate the gears. He’d watched Talia’s face glow with creative satisfaction and felt something warm and illogical when she’d kissed him in celebration.
Now Jorund held it up like the evidence of wrongdoing, deliberately manipulating the gears to make its movements appear jerky and wrong.
“Look at this abomination!” He manipulated the winding key with deliberate exaggeration, making the bird’s movements seem jerky and wrong instead of graceful. “Wings that move without muscle. Eyes that seem to see. Technology, they call it. But our grandparents had a different word.” He paused for effect. “Witchcraft.”
The word fell like a stone into still water. Ripples of reaction spread through the crowd—gasps, muttered prayers, unconscious steps backward from the mechanical bird as if it might contaminate them.
“Now, now,” Martha’s voice cut through the murmurs. “That’s a child’s toy, Jorund. Nothing more sinister than clever gearwork.”
“Clever gearwork created by an outsider who harbors a demon.” Jorund’s eyes gleamed in the firelight. “Ask yourselves—how did a city woman with no homesteading experience suddenly master skills that take lifetimes to learn? How does she create mechanisms beyond any local craftsman’s capability? What price did she pay for such knowledge?”
Rage, cold and precise, cut through his careful analysis. This was a targeted attack on the female he loved, the child he’d sworn to protect. The primitive instincts that his people had worked so hard to suppress demanded that he eliminate their enemy. But he’d already suggested preemptive action against Jorund, and Talia had objected.
“Violence won’t solve this, Klaus. It’ll prove his point. We have to show them we’re not dangerous.”
“I am dangerous,” he said coldly.
“Then show them you choose not to be. Show them you’re a person, not a threat.”
From a logical standpoint, the fact that he was capable of causing harm would remain, regardless of whether or not he took action, but she had been adamant, and he’d found himself agreeing because her approval mattered to him. It still mattered to him—which was why he was monitoring a village gathering instead of simply eliminating the danger.
“There is no demon,” Martha insisted, stepping forward. “There’s a man helping a woman and her orphaned nephew. A man who has done nothing but good since he arrived.”
“Has he not?” Jorund wheeled on her, pointing a dramatic finger. “Who carries impossible strength? Who displays knowledge no human should possess?”
“You’ve seen him working with Albert,” Martha shot back. “That’s knowledge, not evil.”
Albert moved to stand beside her, frowning at Jorund from under bushy brows. “That’s right. He understands wood and grain and construction principles better than anyone I’ve ever met, but it’s education, not magic.”
Jorund laughed, a harsh, unpleasant sound. “Educated where? In what school does one learn these tricks? In what land do men grow horns like creatures of nightmare?”
Another manipulation, using physical differences to create division.
“The creature in her cellar claims to be Tandroki,” Jorund said, pronouncing the word with exaggerated foreignness. “From some distant land none of us have heard of. Convenient, isn’t it? Unprovable. Unverifiable. But I’ve read the old texts. I know what demons do.”
“Oh, for—” Albert’s voice. “You’ve read sensationalist pamphlets, Jorund. Not some ancient wisdom.”
“I’ve read enough to recognize danger.” Jorund turned to face the crowd fully. “Demons offer help before they take your souls. They integrate themselves into communities, make themselves indispensable, all while corrupting from within. And we—” He gestured broadly. “—we’ve welcomed this corruption with open arms because the outsider woman makes pretty toys for our children.”
The mechanical bird continued its jerky movements in his grip. Jorund was damaging the mechanism to make it look unnatural.
“My daughter loves that bird,” Anna said, but her voice held uncertainty now because of the doubt that Jorund had so skillfully planted.
“Does she? Or is she enchanted by it?” Jorund’s voice dropped to something almost sympathetic. “How many of your children have become fixated on these toys? How many ask for them constantly, cry when separated from them? Is that normal childhood play, or something more sinister?”
“This is ridiculous,” Martha insisted. “I’ve known Talia for months now. She’s a good woman doing her best in difficult circumstances.”
“Is she a woman?” Jorund’s smile was terrible. “Or something wearing a woman’s skin? How do we know the creature didn’t replace the real Talia? How do we know—”
“Because I know her!” Martha’s voice cracked like a whip. “I saw Talia’s grief over her sister. I was there while she mourned. She’s as human as any of us, and twice as kind.”
“Kindness can be feigned. Especially by those who serve darker powers.” Jorund’s eyes swept the crowd. “I’m not asking you to act on faith. I’m asking you to observe. To remember. To recognize the pattern.”
He began ticking off points on his fingers. “The outsider arrives and then, just as winter comes, a demon appears from nowhere. She suddenly demonstrates skills she didn’t have before. Unusual prosperity follows. And now—” He held up the mechanical bird again. “—she creates objects that move as if alive.”
Jorund was deliberately confusing correlation with causality. It was a logical flaw, but the crowd wasn’t thinking analytically. They were feeling instead, feeling fear and uncertainty, and the primitive need to identify and eliminate threats before winter killed them all.
“What do you propose?” someone asked. An old man with a weathered face and eyes that had seen too many hard seasons.
“I propose we enact the old law. The one our grandparents used to protect this community when danger threatened.” Jorund sounded solemn now, righteous. “I propose we go to the outsider’s homestead. We demand the demon show itself fully, demonstrate what it truly is. And if it proves dangerous—if it shows unnatural capabilities that confirm its demonic nature—we cast it out. Banish it beyond our borders, where it cannot corrupt or harm.”
“And if it refuses to show itself?” Another voice.
“Then we know it’s hiding something. And we act accordingly.”
The euphemism was clear—“act accordingly” meant kill. I could end this, he thought. Make it clear that threatening Talia and Theo would result in an immediate lethal response.
It would be effective, but it would also prove every fear Jorund had cultivated. It would transform him from an uncertain threat to a confirmed monster and eliminate any possibility of peaceful integration.
“This is madness,” Albert said. “You’re talking about attacking a woman and child based on superstition and fear.”
“I’m talking about protecting our community from proven danger.” Jorund’s voice hardened. “The creature has demonstrated unnatural strength and uses tools beyond our understanding. Those aren’t superstitions. They’re observed facts.”
“Facts that could be explained by advanced technology—”
“Or by demonic power. Which is more likely—that a random traveler possesses knowledge so superior to our best minds, or that something unnatural has infiltrated our village?” Jorund turned to the crowd. “Use your common sense. Use the wisdom your grandparents passed down. When something seems too good to be true, it usually is.”
The murmurs were changing—fear was crystallizing into consensus, doubt was hardening into conviction.
They’re going to act.
He needed to return to the homestead and warn Talia. He should establish a defensive position and ready his weapons… But if he used them, it would destroy everything she had tried to achieve.
“I won’t be part of this,” Martha said firmly. “Talia’s done nothing wrong.”
“Then stay here. But don’t interfere with those who understand what’s at stake.” Jorund gave her an icy smile. “We are not barbarians. We’ll give them chance to speak, to explain. But if explanation proves insufficient—if the creature demonstrates danger as I expect—then we do what we must.”
“How convenient that your standards for ‘sufficient explanation’ are impossible to meet,” Albert said. “You’ve already decided their guilt.”
“I’ve decided to protect my community. If that makes me guilty of caution, so be it.” Jorund raised his voice, addressing the crowd. “Who stands with me? Who’s willing to ensure our children’s safety, even if it means confronting uncomfortable truths?”
Klaus counted the raised hands, his heart sinking. More than half the adult population.
Not everyone looked comfortable with the decision—some hands rose hesitantly, fearfully—but they rose nonetheless, because social pressure and fear of the unknown outweighed individual doubt. Fear was a race’s most effective weapon against itself, and Jorund wielded it like a master.
“Then we go. Now. Before the night grows darker and courage fails.” Jorund tossed the mechanical bird into the fire.
Rage filled him again as he watched the delicate craftsmanship destroyed by flame. The bird that had made a child smile. The bird Talia had spent three nights perfecting because she wanted it to bring joy. Burning because of hatred and ignorance.
The crowd began to move, striding towards the track that led towards Talia’s homestead. Towards his family. Jorund led the way, his serious expression not quite hiding the triumph in his eyes.
Klaus tracked their progression, already calculating intercept trajectories and elimination sequences. But he’d spent two months watching Talia choose kindness over efficiency and witnessed her build community through generosity rather than dominance. How could he destroy that?
The crowd reached the path to the homestead. Torch light bobbed in the darkness like predator eyes. He counted their weapons—farming tools mostly, a few hunting implements, nothing technologically sophisticated. Against his training and capabilities, they might as well be unarmed.
But they weren’t just targets. They were Talia’s neighbors. People she wanted to be part of her community.
But they were also people who were currently marching to her home with torches and weapons, prepared to cast her out or worse. And he was running out of alternatives that didn’t end in bloodshed.
CHAPTER 24
The mechanical clock on the mantle was ticking towards midnight when Talia heard the first voices. Not Klaus returning from reconnaissance. Not the wind rattling the shutters. But human voices, multiple and loud, carrying across the snow with the distorted acoustics of anger and fear.
Her stomach dropped.
Theo looked up from the wooden puzzle Klaus had made him, his small face going pale in the lamplight. “Aunt Talia?”
She moved to the window, peered through the gap in the curtains. Torch light flickered between the trees, bobbing and weaving like predator eyes in the darkness. Too many lights. Too many voices.
They’re coming.
The knowledge arrived with terrible clarity, stripping away the fragile hope she’d been clinging to for the past three hours. Klaus had gone to observe the festival, to assess the threat level and determine whether Jorund’s rhetoric would translate into action.
Apparently, it had.
“Go to your room.” Her voice came out steadier than she felt. “Get under the bed. Stay quiet no matter what happens.”
“But—”
“Now, Theo.”
He scrambled up the stairs towards his bedroom, clutching his puzzle piece like a talisman. His door clicked shut just as the voices grew loud enough for her to distinguish words.
“—can’t just let this stand—”
“—unnatural things in her cellar—”
“—our children at risk—”
Her hands trembled as she stepped back from the window. The homestead suddenly felt too small, too exposed. Every repair Klaus had made, every improvement they’d implemented together, now seemed like evidence of guilt rather than simple competence.
Where is he?
He should have returned by now. He should have given her a warning or prepared defensive measures or… something.
Unless something had happened to him. Unless Jorund had somehow captured or injured or—
No. She forced the thought away. He had survived a crash that should have killed him, healed from injuries that would have crippled a human. He was fine. He has to be fine. The alternative was unthinkable.
The torch light grew closer. She counted at least twenty distinct flames, maybe more. Her neighbors. People she’d traded with, helped, tried so desperately to befriend. Coming to her home in the middle of the night with weapons and fire. The betrayal tasted like copper in her mouth.
She’d given Martha herbs for her arthritis and fixed Albert’s broken plow blade using Klaus’s tools. She’d made toys for children whose parents could barely afford food, asking nothing in return because that’s what neighbors did. And now those same neighbors were marching towards her door, convinced she’d brought demonic corruption into their village.
Maybe sheltering Klaus was selfish, a traitorous part of her mind whispered. After all, she knew how dangerous he could be.
But that thought dissolved when she remembered Klaus reading to Theo, his deep voice stumbling over unfamiliar words but persisting because he wanted the boy to smile. Klaus tending to Nimbus’s injuries with the same focused attention he devoted to everything he did. Klaus looking at her like she was the most precious thing in the universe, his icy reserve melting into a warmth that made her heart ache.
Demon, Jorund called him. But demons didn’t stay up all night fixing toys for children. They didn’t learn human bedtime rituals because a grieving boy needed comfort.
The voices were close enough now that she could identify some of the speakers. Jorund’s authoritative voice driving them on. Thomas the blacksmith, usually jovial but now grim with purpose. Old Man Henrik, who she’d helped with his firewood last month.
Anna, whose daughter treasured the mechanical bird Klaus and Talia had made together. Anna, who’d smiled when her child laughed at the bird’s movement, who’d thanked Talia with genuine warmth, now holding a torch and walking towards Talia’s home like she was purging evil. The hurt of it threatened to buckle her knees.
She’d tried so hard to build bridges and demonstrate friendship. And she’d thought she was finally succeeding, finally becoming part of this community her sister had loved.
Sarah would have known what to do. Sarah had always known how to deal with people. But Sarah was dead. And Talia was alone, standing in a house that would never truly be hers, protecting a child who’d lost everything, and waiting for an alien who might have abandoned her to save himself.
No. That last thought was wrong. Klaus wouldn’t abandon them.
She’d seen it in his eyes three nights ago when he’d looked at her and Theo over dinner. The fierce protectiveness that transcended rational calculation. The belonging that had nothing to do with strategy. He’d stay. And if necessary he’d demonstrate exactly the kind of dangerous capability that would prove Jorund right and destroy any hope of a peaceful resolution. Because that’s what happened when you backed a warrior into a corner with the people he loved. And she loved him back, which meant she couldn’t let him throw away his future defending her from fear and superstition.
