Page 74

“You must have been so happy.”

“I was, indeed. Having Theo, Magnus, and Edwin as friends made all the troubles of the military well worth it. And even now, I am certain if I had known as a young boy that I would meet my lifelong friends in the military, I would have been happy to go.

“However, I did not know, and when the new recruits and I were packed into the ship, I was terrified out of my mind. I had never been with so many boys my age, after all. And my father would often threaten me with talk of how the other boys would beat me up until I became a man.”

“I am so sorry. I hope you were never beaten?” Eveline asked.

“Indeed, none of the other boys ever bullied me like my father had threatened,” William said. “If he had known how much I would grow to enjoy the military because of my friends, I am certain he would not have paid to have me sent away.”

“Your father was simply your biggest bully.”

“I suppose you can say that. Being around other boys my age made me realize that what I had experienced was, in fact, not special. A lot of the other boys also had rather violent fathers. In fact, Edwin was a year younger than me when he was sent away by his father.”

“How could men who are unbearably cruel to their children possibly call themselves fathers?” Eveline scoffed.

William shrugged. “Some years after, Magnus received a message from home. His father had died, and he had to go back home to handle his father’s estate and take care of his little sister.”

“He must have been relieved.”

“Indeed, he was, and we were happy for him. Still, we could not help the jealousy we felt, and in some ways, I wished that I had such luck too. I feel ashamed to admit that I wished that upon my own father.”

“Oh, William,” Eveline soothed. “You have nothing to be ashamed of. Absolutely nothing. You suffered unimaginable horrors at the hands of your own father. Of course, you are justified to wish he was no more.”

“It does not matter anyway. My prayers were never answered. Year after year, we got more scars from the battlefield. We acquired fatal injuries, and we still lived. It was only by a miracle that we survived such battles. It was shortly after Magnus left. The Army had received information that the enemy would be invading a little town. Unbeknownst to us, it was only a trap and the enemies had planted the information.”

Eveline clapped a hand over her mouth as she imagined how terrifying it must have been.

“We were ambushed, and they opened fire on us mercilessly. I can still feel it now, the rapid sound of gunfire and how it went on and on and on. Men fell all around me. It was only becauseof my friends that I made it. There was especially a scrawny, wee boy who had only just been recruited. He begged the captain to let him join us. He was one of the first to-to be hi?—”

For the first time since William began to speak, he seemed to choke on his words.

Eveline patted his back, afraid to look into his eyes and see him in tears. She was not certain he would find it dignified to be seen in such a state.

“We can call it a night now,” she suggested. “This is all too much for one person to bear. And it must take such incredible strength for you to recount it.”

“No, it is important that I continue,” William insisted.

Eveline’s heart went out to him. To have experienced such a rough life and still be able to talk about it…

“Soon after that battle, Edwin left. He must have been sad about leaving us, but I know he must have been even more relieved that he was finally escaping. It was me and Theodore for a long time. You might see Theodore as a jester now, but back then, he had slipped into such depth of sadness that all lights had gone out of his eyes. It was a welcome relief when he finally received a letter from home. I was happy for him when he left.”

There was pain in his voice when he made that last statement.

“But Theo leaving meant you were all alone again, did it not?” Eveline whispered. “That must have been damning.”

“Indeed, it was. It was lonelier than when I had endured my father’s torture.”

“How could that possibly be?”

“When I was a little boy and my father had done all he could to torture me, I never imagined that I could be free from him. However, after I found my friends in the Army, I finally experienced a life I never thought was possible.”

“And with them leaving, you lost it yet again—the friendship and brotherhood you found in your friends,” Eveline concluded.

“They wrote letters, of course,” William continued. “But it was not enough.”

“No letter could replace their presence.”

“I was plunged into loneliness again, and for many years to come, I was all alone. I could not even bring myself to make new friends, as I could not help but compare them to Theo, Magnus, and Edwin. I prayed every night for my father to die so I could finally return home, but it never happened for many years. Instead, I nearly lost my life in a dangerous faceoff.”