Chapter 8

The bullet struck him harshly on the back, breaking his spine. As he fell to the ground, someone stabbed him in the abdomen with the side of a blade, causing his intestines to spill out. He lay there, his eyes still open when I found his body. When I retrieved the bullet that had taken the life of my friend and benefactor, I realized it was the kind of bullet used in a homemade hunting gun. Isn't the answer obvious? He must have discovered your despicable deeds, poaching and logging, and so you murdered him. You had long harbored deep resentment towards my forest ranger, hadn't you?"

"Damn the noble privileges, go to hell!" A curse came from the crowd of peasants, followed by waves of passionate encouragement. Many cheered for Durand, "Go on, Durand, bring your mother over. He won't dare do anything. This wasteland forest is public land; we have the right to enter and cut wood. Go on, Durand, show your courage!"

This emboldened Durand. He rolled up his sleeves, took a few more steps forward, and glared at Coen, occasionally glancing at his mother who was lying on the ground, moaning. Emotions overwhelmed him, and he couldn't utter a word.

"Do you want to take back Durand's mother? Very well." To everyone's surprise, Coen's tone softened. He turned to the dozen or so peasants in front of him, pointed to the priest Estuni and the Felix siblings standing behind the hay cart, and smiled, "Have you seen the young master of the Godan family in town? He is willing to pay me fifty livres to redeem your mother."

At that moment, Aire looked up at her brother with a mix of surprise and admiration.

Felix also felt that the situation was getting out of hand and might turn deadly. He raised his hands and shouted to the crowd, "That's enough, everyone..."

But before he could finish, Estuni saw the fierce "kestrel," the rural noble Coen de Blangy, take advantage of the moment when his back was turned to the peasants and their attention was on Felix. He swiftly untied his cloak!

"No, no, no!" Estuni almost leaped from the hay cart, trying to pull Coen back.

But it was too late. Coen drew a slender flintlock pistol from a shoulder holster under his cloak, turned, and planted one leg slightly forward. The gun barrel pointed straight at the peasant Durand's forehead. The gun was pre-loaded with ammunition, and at such close range, no aiming was needed.

Felix was stunned.

"Bang."

The flintlock ignited the gunpowder, a puff of smoke shot up and split from Coen's hand. Durand's head jerked backward as the round bullet entered his forehead, spinning wildly inside his skull, shattering his skull—Durand swayed, then knelt on the ground and fell at Coen's feet with a thud.

"Mother Mary!" Aire screamed, covering her face in horror.

The peasants were also stunned.

One of them had just raised a crude hunting gun, but a bullet from the woods struck his cheek, the powerful impact knocking him to the ground, blood gushing out.

Felix's legs felt weak. He looked in the direction of the shot and saw a young man with brown skin, bright eyes, and an Indian-style braid, kneeling on one knee, holding a "1333" flintlock rifle, the barrel still smoking. This was the son of the murdered forest ranger, Little Roels.

Little Roels quickly took a carbine from his assistant and fired another shot, bringing down another peasant with a hunting gun. The remaining peasants, in fear, began to crawl and run back to the village along the path they had come.

Coen, like a predatory kestrel, his half-old sky-blue cloak flaring like wings in flight, had somehow discarded his pistol and pulled out a sharp scalping knife from his pocket. He rushed forward and slashed the neck of the peasant who had been shot but was still struggling to sit up. The peasant fell straight down, and Felix saw his bare feet twitching, like a dead frog whose skin had been peeled and touched by an iron hook.

After a while, Coen, with his bloody scalping knife, wiped the blood from his face with his elbow, grabbed the unconscious Durand's mother by the collar, and, along with four Creoles and seven or eight servants (mostly his tenants), armed with rifles and swords, dragged the poor woman away from the bodies of her son and fellow villagers. He walked down the path calmly, like a victorious general.

The bullet that killed the peasant Durand was the same one he had used to kill Roels—Coen had melted it down and recast it. "Blood for blood," Coen had said.

Estuni and Felix approached the three dead peasants, "Truly a revolting act." Estuni made the sign of the cross.

For the scalps of the three victims had been cut away by Coen's scalping knife!

Felix stopped Estuni from pursuing Coen.

He knew that Coen de Blangy had achieved his goal, and it would be unwise and dangerous to tangle with him.

In the circular huts of the village, Coen, holding a bloody scalp in one hand and another flintlock pistol in the other, threw Durand's mother by the fence. He raised his pistol and fired a shot into the air. The peasants trembled and scattered, no one daring to stop him. Soon, Little Roels found the poached roe deer skins, rabbit skins, and bundles of fine wood in Durand's house.

"The stolen goods are here. I have no hope of a fair judgment from the robed and wigged men (referring to judges). Burn down the Durand house," Coen ordered succinctly.

The Durand hut was consumed by flames.

Durand's two sons fled, his wife and young daughter wailed, watching their home burn to the ground.

Durand's mother, severely beaten, was carried to a neighbor's house and died that night.

Not only that, Coen threw the bodies of Durand and the other two peasants in front of the ruins of the house, their blood forming dark pools, soaking into the ground. "This is the fate of poachers," Coen said viciously.