Chapter Text
Edwin could easily admit that he was not a sight for sore eyes. When he was a child, he was often made fun of for his appearance. He was tall, had short, dirty black hair that stuck up whichever way, a crooked nose, and, in general, looked perpetually filthy all the time. He never understood why it was so odd that he could hardly ever bathe; he never had the time to, and he saw it as a waste of time since he would always just go back to doing farm work. And besides, it wasn’t as if his peers were any cleaner than him. Peasants never had the luxury of frequent cleaning– that’s a thing only nobles do, really.
However, that was not to say that Edwin didn’t at least try to improve his appearance, at least a little. When he had time, he went to the well and brought up some water to clean his face, but this didn’t happen frequently, as he always got dirty right after. He would attempt to make his hair look at least decent, and he would wash his clothes every so often. It still hurt when somebody made a snide remark regarding his appearance. It was not his fault that he was skinny, nor was it his fault that his nose was slightly off. Edwin, naturally, blames those things on Lord Fischer; whether or not they were actually the lord’s fault is uncertain.
Actually, Edwin and many of his neighbours had blamed quite a bit on the lord, though they knew many of those things likely weren’t the man’s fault. However, many things: the dirty well, the lack of wood, and the lack of food were. The mentioned grievances had been brought up many times to the lord and the overseer, but neither did anything. Considering the punishments, people were too scared to fix the wood and food problem themselves. Edwin had once attempted to get some wood himself.
It had almost been winter in Germany, and the town he lived in had a wood shortage. Edwin, being 12 years old and stupid, grabbed his father’s axe and went out. He found a tree with thick branches, pulled a crate to make it easier to cut the branches, and began chopping. He had been proud of himself, then. After all, it was just one tree; Lord Fischer had hundreds, what was one tree? He got through about 8 branches before the overseer caught him. The overseer knocked him off the crate and put him into the pillory until the lord told him what to do.
Edwin waited for hours in the cold for the overseer to get word from the lord. Eventually, the overseer came over with a metal rod and began beating him. Edwin didn’t remember much of it; it was so long ago, and he blacked out from the pain, but what he could remember were the effects of the beating. The pain in his back never went away, and he still flinched when he saw the overseer (though this one was not the one who beat him) with a rod or a stick of any kind, whether it was for beating or not. It had only made Edwin hate Fischer even more. Fischer had allowed that to happen, likely did not care that he did that to a child, and had the overseer dispose of the wood so nobody could use it. He and his family went cold for months, and had to cut off some wood from stables for the small fireplace they had.
God damn that man.