All is Fair in Love and War

Chapter 11

Seline hugged the stout little bay mare around the neck. Will came and gave Seline a hug from behind. He held her for a long time. Finally Will released his grip "It's time for you head home. Let them know about Heinz and where his body is. They will send some men to fetch him so he can be burried." Will brushed her hair back from her face and kissed her forehead as they embraced one more time. Will backed away and turned to go. Seline looked at him from behind as he walked off toward town. She could not let him go without telling him. "Will wait!" Will stopped mid stride. Seline ran up to him mare in tow and wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him. She tried to put every bit of emotion behind that kiss. Will's surprise turned to welcome and then delight. He embraced her back and picked her up off her feet. As he set her down and looked into her face with a smile that melted her heart, she knew that he had to come back to her. He had to come back and he had to be hers. She opened her mouth to tell Will this when from behind Will came, "Well now boy, this is not where you should be, and I will thank you to keep your hands off my betrothed." Seline jumped as she peaked around the side of Will. It was the widower. He was coming back from town. Will turned slowly and saw the man walking towards him. "She is not your betrothed yet. No announcement has been made by her father. I expect that will have to wait now until the war is over." Will said moving between Seline and the widower.

"Actually boy it won't wait. I'm heading over there now to have her father make the announcement. We will be wed in 1 week. No sense in waiting when there is no one around." Will was astonished. "How can that be. You have to report to fight like the rest of us. We are all going off to war. You will not even be here tomorrow. The war will not be over by next week." Will looked at the man critically. Seline had not even gotten a word in edgewise. A week! I am to be married in a week! How can that be?

"Boy, when you have been around a while you will understand that with the right leverage you can get, or get out of, anything you want. I am not going to war, you are. Further more I will wager you won't be coming back. Either way, I will be here and Seline will be my wife. She will be obedient and she will bare me sons." The widower had walked up to the pair by this time. "Seline, I will let you say your one last farewell. After you are my wife, even if he comes back you will never be able to see him again." The widower looked from one to the other. "I will see you at your home in a few hours." With that he walked off laughing to himself.

Will looked after him with a look of hatred. "How did he get out of it? He is not going to war with the rest of the men?" Seline still stood there stuned. She watched him go with a growing sense of dread. She had heard that he was old and grumpy, she had even felt bad for him because his wife and child died. Now she was not so sure that she felt bad for him. She certainly did not want to marry him.

Will walked closer to her. He looked her in the eye, and bent down to kiss her. This time it was on the cheek. He looked miserable. Seline reached up to put her arms around him to comfort him, but he grabbed her hands and shook his head. "He is right. I am going off to war and may not come back. He is staying and you are to be his betrothed and his wife. I have no right to you." Will placed his hand on his heart. "I will carry you with me in here. I will always love you no matter what. Be happy. That is all I ask." He reached out and touched the sides of her face with his hands then bent her head down and kissed the top of her head.

Seline could not say a word. Her throat had become tight and nothing would come out. She watched, frozen, as Will walked away from her, maybe for the last time. As he mounted his horse and rode away, she stood there crying in the road until Will was out of sight. Tears were dripping down her face, and she felt totally defeated. The sun was going down when she finally realized that she had been standing there in the road all by herself for a long time. She wiped her tears and pulled herself together. Finally she mounted Heinz's little mare and rode home. While she turned away from Will and the one man that she wanted to be with and who truely loved her, she knew that she would need to do something. Her life with the widower would be misery. The betrothal was not yet. There was still time to do something. She had thought that the widower was too old to be conscripted, and it turned out that she was right. He would not have to goto war. This left him available to marry any unmarried woman that was not yet betrothed. Seline was trying to think of any other eligible maids that he might want to marry instead of her. She could not think of any other girls other than her sisters. She would not pawn off her responsibility on one of them. Seline knew that she could not lay it on any other girl in the area either. She needed to convince her father, but where to start? She would have to tell her father everything.