Coldmarch

by Daniel A. Cohen

  We’d discussed a few different names – testing out alternatives, like Sun-Demons and Sun-Worshippers – but Dunes liked this one best, claiming he could make it sound the most authentic. From his perfect delivery, I was almost ready to believe that such a fearful group had been terrorizing the city as of late.

  ‘The who?’ the Nobleman asked, taking one step back, his voice discernibly meeker than before. ‘Wuzzat?’

  ‘The unworthy scum who’ve been hiding in the Eastern Dunes and stealing your Noblewomen for the past week!’ Dunes shouted, spit flying from his lips. He ripped open his shirt and revealed all the scars. ‘I’ve seen more than most, but this is the worst enemy to face the Khatdom in a century!’

  One of the Noblemen near the front turned to another and gave an obvious sort of nod, as if this was common knowledge. I nearly broke character and smirked, but instead I let out something between a whimper and a squeak.

  ‘I haven’t heard of dem …’ the hairy Noble said, giving a haughty sniff. ‘Are you sure—’

  CRASH.

  The blade reverberated for a few moments this time. Dunes huffed and broadened like the front wall of a sandstorm, and the fire in his eyes negated all the Bellows in the place. He was the single scariest thing I’d ever laid eyes on in my life, making the Vicaress seem like a sweet lady who only carried around a knife to cut up figs.

  ‘It may be your Noblewoman who is stolen next!’ Dunes seethed, smashing the flat of the blade against his Closed Eye brand and then pointing it at the small man, who let out a similar squeaky noise to mine. ‘They stalk the unbelievers first!’

  The Nobleman swallowed hard, the lump stopping halfway down his throat. ‘Not muh sweet Bethildah.’

  ‘IF YOU DON’T GIVE ME CROSSBOWS THEN BETHILDAH IS AS GOOD AS GONE!’ Dunes pressed the hook to my neck. He was so deft with the blade that he was able to believably dig into my flesh without drawing any real blood. ‘I caught this Jadan beetle spying and tortured it all out of him. He broke so easily it was pitiful.’

  ‘Pitiful!’ one of the Nobles near the back added with a smile. ‘The weakest of the weak, their kind is!’

  Dunes nodded, and then snarled. ‘I learned it all. Turns out there’s a hundred Jadan escapees from the Glasslands all festering together in the Eastern Dunes, making a base in Hillel’s Crag. They stole a whole caravan cart of Cold, and have been gnawing on the bones of your sweet Noblewomen for food. That’s how they’ve been hiding out there so long. I know it all now, and I sent the signal, and my Hookman brothers are on their way. I need five crossbows so we can take the demons out. We need to be able to fire arrows into all those dark places where the Jadan scum are hiding and stealing your Bethildahs.’

  ‘Not muh Bethildah,’ the Nobleman gulped. ‘You can get them? You can kill dem slave bastards?’

  ‘With crossbows!’ Dunes shouted, tossing a golden token at the man’s feet with the Khat’s seal on it. I assumed it was a Hookman thing. ‘The Khat will reward you handsomely for them! But the New Jadan Brotherhood of Menace and Terror has a secret way into the city and has spies on the walls and I believe they watched me capture this Coldleech. I need to get to Hillel’s Crag now! No time to waste, my masters!’ – SLAM – ‘No time to waste, or the Jadan enemy shall feast like the Khats of old on the chosen flesh of all those—’

  The lead Nobleman held up a hand with a grimace, smacking his lips distastefully. ‘Okay. No moah, puhlese.’ He ripped off his gloves and snapped his fingers. ‘Get dem crossbows for the Hookman. Derriss. Moussa. At the quick, yah lazy scum.’

  I nearly spasmed out of Dunes’s grip at the name, but I looked up and saw that it was a different Moussa he was referring to, this Jadan much lighter-skinned and with shorter hair. Still, I had to work to compose myself, having almost fainted from dread.

  ‘Wass wrong with him?’ the Nobleman asked, gesturing at me and giving another sniff. ‘Pissin on mah—’

  ‘I cut out all his teeth and slit open his stomach and then sewed them inside his body!’ Dunes roared. SLAM. CRASH. ‘And I promised the little stain worse if he makes another sound!’

  The Nobleman almost fell backwards with a gag. The two Jadans sprang into action and grabbed some of the crossbows from the walls, rushing them over to Dunes and kneeling next to the puddle at his feet, presenting the weapons with shaking hands.

  The man who’d called my people pitifully weak raised a flabby fist, nearly jumping into the air. ‘Huzzah! Kill them all, Hookman!’

  ‘I am not a Hookman!’ Dunes shouted, waving his blade, his teeth wild and bared. I noticed even his gums had rows of scars.

  The whole room went silent, Noble heads cocked and confused. There were a few murmurs as the fires sizzled in their kilns, waiting for clarification.

  Dunes paused, his hands stiffening on my shirt. I could feel him turning from side to side, trying to figure out what to say next. I held my breath.

  ‘No! Not a Hookman!’ Dunes said with confidence, drawing his tongue across the blade, licking up a long line of the red. ‘For them, I am Death itself!’

  More rounds of ‘huzzah’ filled the air as the two Jadans stumbled away. One of them eyed the piss, and we both knew he was destined to do some putrid scrubbing in the very near future. His nose was wide and his brow prominent, and I remembered the face, promising myself I’d bring him an Abb for his troubles when all this was over.

  Dunes sheathed his blade in his belt and grabbed all the crossbows at once with a meaty hand. I took a moment to look them over and I noticed the bolting mechanism looked shoddy and crooked. It took everything in me not to shake my head at the smiths’ lack of skill.

  ‘The Khat will reward you all for your valour and craftsmanship, fine Noblemen!’ Dunes bowed, drawing one finger down his cheek. ‘You are all heroes to the city and to the Crier above— shall I one day feel his mercy.’

  ‘Bring back their skulls!’ one of the Nobles shouted. ‘We’ll solder them together and turn them into something. Maybe a tub for the Jadan slaves to shit in!’

  ‘Or we’ll use them for target practice,’ another one of them said, gesturing to the remaining few crossbows on the wall.

  ‘I will bring you fine masters a trophy, but I cannot delay!’ Dunes shook with power, flexing for the whole room to admire. ‘For I shall bring the end to the Jadan tyranny and bring stability back to the City of David’s Fall.’

  ‘You talk a little fancy for skin that colour, Hookie,’ another Noble said, this one still holding one of the smouldering pieces of iron. ‘What’s that about!’

  SLAM.

  ‘I am the Khat’s blade in the darkness!’ Dunes shouted, pounding a fist against his chest. ‘I am the Crier’s wrath!’

  It didn’t really answer the question, but it sounded fierce, and the guy backed away with a shrug.

  Dunes bowed low and then turned, heading for the door. I grabbed the handle for him, since his hands were both occupied when—’

  ‘Wait a damn minute naw!’ the lead Nobleman shouted.

  The Jadans began backing away into their corners, positioned in their slave stance.

  ‘There’s no time to delay!’ Dunes said, his back still to the room.

  ‘Yuh turn around this instant, slave!’

  Dunes swung around. I was still dangling from his hand, so I careered along with him. The Coldmaker bag carried on and slammed painfully into my knee, but I still didn’t regret having the machine with me.

  The Nobleman’s face was creased and sneering. He scratched at the puffy facial hair on both sides, an odd look coming to his face, as if he were having second thoughts.

  ‘Aint gunna skewer those Sun-cooked bastards without arruhs,’ the Nobleman said finally. Snapping his fingers, he beckoned again to the two Jadan boys, who moved so quickly I thought they might have been anticipating the command.

  I could feel Dunes’s relief at my back.

  Dunes bowed. ‘You prove why my kind is here to serve. Yes, arrows. Most grateful.’ />
  Derriss and the other Moussa grabbed a few quills of ammunition and came our way. I did a little quick-fingered manoeuvre into the Coldmaker bag while they scurried. When the Jadans were close enough, I reached out and really played up my pain, grabbing this new Moussa by the shirt.

  ‘Plsss!’ I screamed, making my voice indiscernible, wrapping my lips around my teeth, trying to make it sound like Dunes had actually ripped out my teeth. ‘Hllpme. Hlleppmee!’

  Moussa pawed helplessly at my hand. ‘I— I—’

  I grabbed him closer. ‘Hllppmmeee!’

  A quick thump rocked the back of my head, again believable, but not enough to actually hurt me. Dunes was proving to be quite an asset. I went limp, but not before dropping one of the Abbs in this Moussa’s pocket.

  Dunes stormed out carrying everything, myself and the Coldmaker included, and shot right into the shadows of the alleyway.

  ‘Brilliant work, and quick thinking,’ I said as he put me down, looking around to make sure we weren’t followed. ‘And damn, you were scary.’

  All the angry creases in Dunes’s face came to a rest. ‘Not me. Hamman. But he’s gone again.’

  I examined one of the crossbows, looking down the barrel. The rivets were about the right size. With a few minor adjustments they were going to be perfect. ‘Think you could be that scary for me? If I need you to.’

  ‘For you, Meshua,’ Dunes said, knuckles squeezing around the handles of his hooked blade. ‘No.’

  ‘I—’

  He pounded a fist against his chest again, his face darkening with rage. ‘For you I could be worse.’

  Chapter Nineteen

  Cam thrust a floppy straw hat on top of the Khatmelon and then stepped back with a flourish. The plump fruit had been speared over the tip of the thinnest rock Pyramid in the cave, which looked a little like a slouching body. The juices from the fleshy melon had streaked the stone, imitating long trails of wet blood, making my heart beat a little faster. I never thought I had the lust for battle inside me, but I kept telling myself that, for now, it was a necessary compulsion. The guards at the Sanctuary were surely going to try to kill us at every corner, and the force I wanted to embody couldn’t sit around and hope things passively worked in my favour. For the good of the Crier, Coldmaker, and for Shilah, I had to put aside compassion and become deadly.

  I looked at my boilweed-wrapped fingers, understanding now that the painful blackness creeping along my skin was not a plague as I’d previously thought.

  It was a sign.

  All along I’d been underestimating the Coldmaker. It was as if I’d been focused only on the illuminated side of a parchment, too afraid to turn it over and look under the shadow. The machine really was a miracle. I’d been viewing the whole thing as a grouping of materials that together made something astounding; but in doing so I was discounting one of its biggest virtues. In making Cold, the machine was more than just a sum of its parts; it was in direct opposition to the Sun. It represented something much greater than the single Abbs formed at its mouth. The machine embodied the fighting spirit of the Crier. It was the piece of the divine that clung to life, regardless of the pain grinding everything towards oblivion.

  The Coldmaker was a weapon.

  And I was going to learn how to use it.

  Cam and Split weren’t able to get their hands on any proper armour to hang on the stone, but the texture of the rock would work just fine, as it was hard and unyielding. I needed to know how the Abbs would react to different surfaces in order to plan accordingly for our ambush. It was all the preparation I was allowing, however, because I had no idea what sort of horrors were happening to Shilah in that Sanctuary. I wasn’t going to leave her there any longer than I had to.

  ‘What do you think?’ Cam asked with a smirk, flicking the brim of the floppy hat further down over the melon. ‘Accurate enough?’

  ‘Wrap the face of the melon in boilweed, so it’s a little spongier,’ I said, continuing to scrape the blade into the groove of the last crossbow, widening it so the Abbs could roll evenly. I was doing my best with only one good hand. ‘And I think it needs to be more evil. Can you make it more evil?’

  ‘I could name it “Dad”,’ Cam said.

  I shook my head. ‘That only works for you.’

  Cam shrugged. ‘That’s true. You lucky bastard, Spout. You got a good father and you get to be Meshua. Not a bad haul. All I got was insanely good looks and a brain like a … no, that’s not right.’

  ‘Like a what?’ I asked. I didn’t shut down at the thought of my father like I had before. Instead I listened intently to the babble of the sacred pool at my back, hoping to catch some secret whispers. The cave was still as dark as night, but Split had lit all the candles he could, revealing contours we hadn’t seen before, deeper ripples in the stone. We’d set up targets all around the cave: wood and glass and clothing from the shrines; but I considered the stone with the melon face to be the most important.

  I wanted to see what my new discovery might do to a guard.

  Cam bit his bottom lip. ‘I wanted to say like a library, but all the libraries I know are full of lies and deceit. So it would be a very opposite comparison.’

  ‘How about a brain like the horizon itself,’ Split said wistfully, scratching at Picka’s chin.

  Cam beamed. ‘Beautiful and endless.’

  ‘No,’ Split said with a wicked smile. ‘Because there’s usually not much there.’

  Picka brayed happily, showing her blackened gums.

  ‘Atta girl,’ Split said, scratching deeply. His tone was light and playful, almost healed in a certain respect, and I knew my intuition about having the Pedlar be in charge of making more Abbs had been correct. It was easy work, and didn’t require more than a switch of the lever, but I figured it might make him feel more attached to all of this. As coarse as his disposition had been throughout the Coldmarch, it had changed once he’d become an active participant in the making of Cold. Now he watched that machine like he would watch a new lover getting undressed for the first time.

  ‘Maybe that’s true about the horizon for now,’ I said, widening the groove down the crossbow. ‘But it won’t be for long. Soon, Langria is going to be over every horizon.’

  Split went quiet, whatever words were at his lips dissipating quickly.

  Cam steepled his hands and held them against his chest. ‘Look at that, Split. The saviour of the world, and he still stands up for his friends.’

  ‘Not a saviour yet,’ I said, keeping my face even. ‘But I will save Shilah. Even if the machine and I have to burn every last guard in the Sanctuary.’

  ‘Damn,’ Cam said, folding his arms across his chest.

  ‘What?’ I asked, stopping and flexing my tired fingers.

  Cam swallowed hard, his face flushed with something like longing. ‘I’m just so proud. You’re a very different Spout from the one I found on that street corner.’

  I gave a single nod. ‘Just wait till I get more Frosts, so I can tinker more Coldmakers.’

  ‘I will get them for you!’ Dunes called from the back of the cave. ‘Anything you want, Meshua. I will storm the Pyramid and slit the throats of anyone in my way.’

  I smirked. ‘Thanks, Dunes, but I’m sure there will be plenty of Frosts in Langria. Right now, I just want you to practise shooting these crossbows with me.’

  ‘By your command,’ Dunes said, wandering out of the shadows, silhouetted by the candles and grass. He was standing taller than he had previously.

  I nodded to one of the crossbows on the floor. ‘You take that one on the left, Dunes. It’s the best as far as sturdiness goes, and I believe that you’re going to be excellent at this.’

  Dunes bowed, looking to Cam. ‘You are right about his kindness, Camlish. It will one day echo as legendary as his deeds.’

  I rolled my eyes. ‘I’m right here. Anyway, forget about my deeds and let’s focus on getting Shilah back. That’s all that matters for now.’

 
Cam smirked, tying off the piece of boilweed around the melon’s face. ‘Getting Shilah back will definitely count as one of your deeds. And what we’re about to attempt will certainly be worthy of a legend or two. The big man’s point sticks.’

  I sighed, gritting my teeth. Cam wasn’t taking this as seriously as he should.

  ‘What?’ Cam asked.

  ‘Nothing,’ I said.

  ‘Does this have something to do with all that unsettled tension between you two?’ Cam asked.

  ‘No,’ I said, too quickly.

  Cam smirked. ‘What’d you do anyway, to cause this rift? Invent a miracle with some other girl?’

  ‘Split,’ I said, looking away. ‘How about making some more Abbs? We’re going to need as many as we can get.’

  ‘Has the Coldmaker had enough rest?’ Split asked eagerly, eyes aglow.

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘We’re working hard. I know she can keep up.’

  ‘She, huh?’ Cam asked, pretending to dance with the stone dummy, gently caressing the side of the straw hat.

  I shrugged, hating myself for letting a smile slip onto my lips. ‘Great Gale. Mama Jana. Shilah. I’ve known some brave women in my day, and in that way the machine feels like a she. And, Cam?’

  ‘Hmm?’ he asked, pretending to lead the stone in a twirl.

  ‘Do me a favour, and take this seriously.’

  Cam’s smile faltered as he nodded and stepped back. Once the expression faltered I could see the intense pain he’d been covering up.

  Split nudged Picka’s head off his lap, and jumped to his feet, the camel grumbling with dismay. I’d never seen the Pedlar move so fast as he went over to the Coldmaker. He flipped the lever and spurred more gold. The air inside the cave always shifted as the Abbs were being created, as if the wind was rushing towards the machine to get a better look.