by Sam Taw
“He is your son and heir to a great city. Would you see him succumb to the green rot of the flesh, to writhe in agony as the bad humours send him mad with fever?” I saw a flicker of pain cross his face for a moment, before he recovered his composure. For a man so intent on regaining his title and position, he seemed to think little of the generation who would follow him.
Maleek stepped closer to me, covering the slash on his wrists with his free hand. His knife dripped from within the case strapped to his waist. He said nothing, but stared at his father with a poisonous glare.
“Surely you can break the rules in order to save your kin? He is your flesh and blood. Melkarth would not punish you for a little healing ointment and a few stitches.” I held my gaze for longer than it was comfortable. Maleek alternated his stare between his father, me and Tallack.
Suliaman’s eye’s twitched again, showing how far the curse had spread through his bodily control. He tried to curl his lip in disgust, but it manifested as a strange grimace instead. “Do what you will, but when the Gods strike you down, don’t be surprised.”
It was neither permission nor censure. At first, I was unsure whether to proceed or whether the Prince would have me killed for touching Maleek’s arm. Holding my hand aloft to stop Tallack from walking towards his lover, I stepped between them and led Maleek over to my medicine kit. Jago flitted about, fetching clean water, and handing me prepared muscle fibres, my bone needle, plantain paste and fresh leaves to cover the wound site.
When I was finished, Maleek tried to give me a golden fibula in payment. Expressing my thanks, I politely rejected his offer. I do not want to be beholden to him or his father any more than we already were. Maleek was greatly surprised at my refusal to take his gold. Material possessions are obviously very important in his city. They afford those who hold great wealth the power to choose who lives and who dies. In the Dumnoni lands, trust and honour are valued above all else and he and his father had failed to prove either.
Our supper was a far cry from luxury. Cold ale and a few strips of dried meat to lessen the hunger pangs. The Prince ate nothing, favouring more resin water instead. I was starting to see the benefits of having him dosed up on the stuff in preference to his wakeful savagery. Maleek disappeared into the mists to check on his warriors at the guarded perimeter. I supposed this to be either side of the cool river and beyond the confines of the wooded vale.
Tallack, Cade, Renowden, Idina and I stayed close to the cart, wishing that we could light a big fire to ward off the damp. The mist stuck to our clothes and our faces and soaked us all through.
“We should keep our own watches through the night, Cade. I have a bad feeling about this place.” I said to the son of the Cantii.
“And miss out on the chance to get some rest. You heard Maleek. He’s got all his foreign warriors surrounding us. We are safer in the centre here than out on the track.” Cade unrolled his bedding and took a prime spot beneath the cart for himself and Idina. She stayed close to me. Idina had barely uttered a word since the discovery of the severed heads.
Tallack shrugged and packed away our dried rations. I watched him take an age to move each item and fold a waxen cloth about the meat. It was only when I spotted his smile as Maleek appeared from between the trees through the fog, that I realised he was dawdling on purpose. He intended to hide with his lover away from camp.
Maleek looked stern and drawn. I doubted that it was from blood loss, as I was quick to bind his wound. It seemed to me that his frown was a result of an internal struggle of some sort. Tallack watched him approach, beaming with promise of delightful times ahead, but Maleek strode right past him without uttering a word. New wrinkles and deep-set shadows mired his youthful complexion.
Tallack jumped to his feet and ran after him, catching him by the shoulder and spinning him about.
“Don’t touch me, infidel!” Maleek bellowed.
Tallack staggered backwards, reeling from the rebuff. “What’s got into you?”
“Don’t you understand? I belong to Melkarth now. Other than healers like your aunt, No one can touch me ever again.” Maleek panted, his shoulders heaving in rhythmic waves with his despair.
“But that’s ridiculous.” Tallack sneered reaching out for Maleek’s arm. “You know that don’t you? You can’t go the rest of your life untouched, it’s just not feasible.”
The Prince’s son snatched his limb away, turning from his lover with a pinched frown and tears pooling in his eyes.
“Aunt Mel, tell him that he is over-reacting.” Tallack spun about to seek my help. What could I do? It was their faith, their beliefs, not ours. No one could gain say hundreds of cycles of worship and rituals. I looked to the ground and said nothing.
They spoke in hushed growls, Maleek laying out his bedding while Tallack crouched at his side trying to reason with him. Suliaman sat in a dazed stupor having drunk the poppy water mixed by his generous healer.
Jago and I moved further away, acutely aware of our intrusion into their private discussion. Cade and Renowden both snapped their heads back towards the trees, startled by the same sound. The noise of dry sticks snapping underfoot. Renowden scanned everyone in camp. It looked to me that he was counting us, figuring out who from our party was missing. There were none absent, we were all accounted for.
“Pssst!” Renowden signalled to Tallack. A few hand gestures later and he, Cade, and Tallack made ready their weapons.
Maleek caught up with events. He jumped to his feet and ordered the two remaining warriors to investigate the source of the noise. The burly men ran off in the direction of Tallack’s outstretched arm. We all waited, fretting and poised. They did not return.
Renowden looked to Tallack for his Chieftain’s orders. My nephew nodded. With spears, swords, daggers and axes, they formed a line next to Maleek and marched into the dense fog between oak and ash.
Just Jago, the healer and us women were left in camp to protect the Prince. I stood one side of the tall chair, Jago the other. Both of us held blades from my healing kit, and shook from fear. Idina slipped past me and ushered her handmaidens under the cart, before retrieving a longbow and quiver from her belongings. The Prince took a few deep inhalations, clearing his mind of resin fog. He was alert enough to understand that we were under attack.
He signalled to the healer with a jittery hand, and barked an order to him. The healer bowed, scurried over to the cart, fetched a long bronze sword with a golden hilt and stood behind the tall chair.
“In front of me you coward!” The Prince bellowed, but the healer looked to have pissed himself.
A blurred host of wild men came into view through the swirling mists, screaming, yelling and hurling axes and spears.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
They came at us from all angles, their faces daubed in woad, chalk grease and the blood of their enemies. We were outnumbered and surrounded. The river lay at our backs hindering any possible escape. The mist concealed the scope of our opponents. We had no idea of the fate of our warriors or whether they were fighting at the boundaries of the wood. Jago trembled at my side. Idina shushed the terrified handmaidens. My stomach erupted into my mouth, but I swallowed the fear down. I’d had a good life. If this was to be my end, let it be, but I would go down fighting. I am Dumnonii after all.
The healer took one look at the marauders, dropped Suliaman’s sword to the ground and fled. He threw himself into the frigid waters of the river and tried to wade through the strong current. His robes grew heavy, sucking up the moisture and slowing him down. He was less than a third of the way across when the first arrow hit him in the back. The second and third caught him in the ribs and neck, sending him tumbling face down into the stream.
The attackers were upon us. Arrows flew, hitting the Prince in the shoulder and sticking into the wood of his chair, pinning him down. I held up the material of my tunic and cloak, readying myself for the onslaught with the biggest knife I had left after Brea’s theft. There was no time for nervous prattle or de
liberations. We had to act, and fast.
Jago slipped behind the chair and picked up the sword. Grasping the hilt in both hands, he marched in front of the Prince and stood firm as the Cornovii raged towards us. I’m not so stupid as to think that I could over power them, but I am not a bad aim at close range. Ducking from the spears and arrows, I managed to dodge the worst of their weapons until I could see the anger in their faces. Drawing my arm back, I took aim and let my blade loose. My first throw found a home between the eyes of a massive warrior. He skidded to the ground at my feet as another jabbed a spear past me and towards Jago.
With surprisingly fleet footwork, Jago sidestepped the spear and thrust the blade home through the man’s belly, ripping a gash wide enough for his guts to spill out at the feet of the Prince. A shorter clansman lunged next, slamming his dagger down onto Suliaman’s wrist and grabbing at the metals strung about his neck. Jago spun around with a slicing swipe, nicking the stout man’s throat with the tip. Blood gushed over the Prince, soaking all his fine robes and drenching his face in red humours.
I had all my blades lined up at my feet, stooping low and aiming high for their eyes. By my third knife, I’d taken down two more, before I realised that I was out of daggers. Jago stood in front of the Prince, his stance wide, his determination visible from his gritted teeth.
More Cornovii dashed from the trees into our small clearing. There were more than I could count at a glance. Outnumbered with only one sword in defence, I thought that we had reached the end of our quest. Idina let her arrows fly, taking out four more before they got within spitting distance of us. She threw her expensive dagger, hilt first across the ground to my feet, allowing me to dispatch another marauder.
Muttering a prayer to Cernonnus in the Summerlands, I asked for his assistance. It was as if he was watching over me, since Tallack and Renowden ran out of the trees from each side to help even up the numbers. Cade and Maleek came shortly after, wrestling, chopping, spearing and killing anything in their paths.
I used their presence to gather up my knives from the dead, allowing me to pick off a few more attackers from the side-lines. Even amid the fury and terror, I could see that Maleek was suffering from his wounds. The self-inflicted offering to his god had left him vulnerable. From that weakened stance, he had suffered new wounds from the Cornovii.
Tallack limped badly from a wound to his thigh, but still managed to out manoeuvre two Cornovi warriors. He dropped to his knees as each of them swung their axes. With their weapons tangled above his head, he grabbed a couple of daggers and stabbed both men in their crotches at the same time. I could tell from the amount of blood that his larger blood vessels were not ruptured. He would survive the scrape.
I was out of blades to throw. Shimmying on my knees, I ducked under the cart alongside Idina and her maidens. She had just three arrows left in her quiver. Mindful of her limited resources, she took her time to aim at those warriors who were inflicting the most damage. Every single one of her shots hit their precise target. She was a formidable woman.
Renowden bellowed over to Tallack and pointed at the cart. While we were defending our lives from the front, more warriors had pillaged the Prince’s wealth from the rear. I turned about beneath the wagon to see them yanking the trunks of metals and jewels up the bank on the opposite side of the river. As a final act of defiance, one of the Cornovii kicked out at the healer’s body, propelling it into the fastest part of the current to bloody the waters downstream. The few remaining stragglers retreated, leaving our party injured and without metal to aid our journey.
Idina and I dragged ourselves from beneath the cart and walked over to the carnage surrounding Suliaman. Jago still brandished the sword, swishing it about the air and twitching with edgy fury.
“You can put that down now, boy. They’re all gone.” I tapped his shoulder and had to jump out of his way as he swiped the blade in my direction. He was so revved up by the experience.
Tallack chuckled, leaning in to disarm my slave. “We should give you a new name. Jago the Underestimated… how about Jago the Giant, you know, cause you’re so little?”
“He already has a name.” I said, annoyed with my nephew for his ungallant behaviour. “He is the Chosen One.”R I shot Tallack such a glare as to silence him on the matter. To Jago, I whispered, “Why would you risk your life for the Prince like that?” How had this slave boy overcome all his fears to brandish a sword so effectively?
Jago stammered. “He… he… All rulers are powerful priests, Fur Benyn. His dark magic could still reach me even after death. No one from my homeland would act differently.”
I had no answer to that. Was this how the noblemen of Phoenician cities kept their people in line, by making them believe they wield the power of gods?
All around us were spilled guts, chopped flesh and leaking corpses. Heading towards the Prince’s tall chair, I kicked a body over onto his back to remove one of my knives from his face. There was a severed hand next to the corpse, complete with jewelled rings and pale sores. Glancing up to the Prince, his fine robes ended with a bloody stump. His life force was trickling down the side of his chair, and yet no one noticed, not even the Prince.
For longer than I care to admit, I stood and pondered what might happen if I let him bleed out. If the Prince were to die, it would be from the attack. Tallack and I could not be held responsible. Would Maleek keep the old man’s word over the trade agreements and payment if Suliaman perished? Would their homeland be better off in Maleek’s hands rather than his changeable father? This was a man who valued wealth and power more than his own kin. I must have ruminated for too long, as Tallack saw Jago staring at the hand and raised the alarm.
The Prince began to panic. Until then, he was too occupied fighting the effects of the resin. His head must have been in a permanent haze. He was so busy watching our movements that he was unaware of his own body. Not only had he lost his hand, but he had not felt it happening. The curse was growing in strength every day.
Maleek dashed to his father’s side. He too had injuries, but none were as urgent as Suliaman’s. “Help him, please.” He cried, falling to his knees at the side of the tall chair. I could hardly let him bleed out with everyone watching.
“Bind it tight. Strap a belt higher up his arm to slow the humours.” I called to Tallack. “Jago, get wood and kindling. I need a fire.”
“But, Aunt…” Tallack began.
I almost laughed. “I think it’s a bit late for stealth, don’t you? They won’t be back this night. They have what they came for, and lost a great many warriors in the process.”
No one disagreed. Renowden walked the perimeter, and came back with a collection of spears and a few arrows from the bodies of Maleek’s men. “If I had to guess, Fur Benyn, I’d say that they were ambushed in the fog. All their metal stripped along with anything of value. I found these alongside the couple of Cornovii who were killed.” The weapons were piled next to the fire. Other than what we carried on ourselves, it was all the wealth we had left between us.
Cade helped to drag the bodies from camp into a pile, while I heated my blade to seal Suliaman’s wrist closed, just as I had done on his feet. He felt nothing. The man was still addled, allowing me to close the wound to his shoulder with ease. Tallack was my next priority. His leggings were slashed open, revealing a tear in his thigh muscle as long as my hand. I gave him a strap to bite down on and did my best to stitch the muscle fibres back together before closing the skin over the top. This patient felt every stitch and every movement. I could tell from his pinched face and sweaty brow, even though the ground around us was frozen hard.
By the time I had moved on to treat Maleek, Tallack was asking for willow bark and ale. Jago supplied both, but it did not ease the pain. By some miracle, neither Cade nor Renowden were injured. Whether they were better warriors, or just luckier in their opponents, I could not say, but both made themselves invaluable in sorting through the dead or dying, and calming the handmaidens of th
eir hysteria.
It was Idina who surprised me the most. We had travelled through these lands at her insistence. I knew that she felt fully to blame for what had happened. She wore a permanent frown over her lovely face, and rushed about camp helping every one of us to the point of exhaustion. She may have suggested the route, but her warnings were clear enough. It was Cade and Tallack who had made the final decision to press on. And in truth, Idina had killed more than her fair share of marauders with her deadly aim. In my opinion, she had more than acquitted herself.
As soon as all the injured were healed, we all stood together next to the cart to make sense of the situation. By Renowden’s reckoning, all but two of Maleek’s warriors had given their lives protecting us. The Cornovii had lost more than a dozen in their raid. There was no time to waste. If the same raiding party returned for their dead, or worse, sought out reinforcements, the rest of us would perish too.
Suliaman and the remaining weapons were bundled onto the cart, along with Maleek. The rest of us mounted our horses and set off along the western trail before daybreak. The going was slow, with the wagon getting bogged down fairly often as the scouts had predicted. Idina took the lead up front, her knowledge of the area and superior eyesight giving us an advantage in the fog. She also refilled her quiver, with enough arrows collected from the dead, and rode with her bow resting on her leg. After all we had been through that night, no one would survive who crossed our path.
I did feel some pity for those poor warriors who were left as carrion for the crows. We dared not tarry to burn or bury the bodies, but I fully expected the Prince to demand an even greater sacrifice in their honour come nightfall. I looked at each of the people in our party. My anguish manifested as roiling bile in my chest. If his own son’s blood was not sufficient to appease their wrathful god, then what would?
After a long morning of riding, Tallack complained that the willow was not sufficient to ease his pain. He rode alongside the cart and stepped onto the moving wagon, hitching his horse to the back. I suspected that he had used it as an excuse to ride with Maleek. He had suffered more devastating wounds in his time, and at a younger age with less fuss.
