by M. A. Ray
Krakus didn’t care what Droshky thought of it. Every time he flipped open a book, the pages inside accused him, the cold anatomical drawings representing all the people he could have saved, had he only looked. He hadn’t seen it any more than he’d seen his toes. Now his breastbone cracked and split, and his rib cage yawned wide, exposing his buried, beating heart to the scalpel’s slice like so many of the people whose insides the doctor had drawn. However long they’d lasted afterward, they had been living when Droshky had carved from their flesh the things that made them different. When he saw his distorted reflection in a bone saw that shone with loving maintenance, he packed it in its case, snapped the lid shut, and put it aside for burning.
It took all day. Once they’d finished with the books, he and Fillip moved on to the jars that filled tables and shelves. As quickly as they could, they transferred the jars to a wheelbarrow and out to the broadest clear space in Section Two, a small green where sometimes the doctors and nurses took the air. The job required several trips. Krakus felt like weeping, and Fillip swiped at his eyes, when they dropped off the first load: clawed hands and strange eyes, bleached pieces of people suspended in straw-tinted liquid, their souls forever trapped in the abomination of body parts that hadn’t gone up in the smoke of a pyre. The drizzle dampened Krakus’s hair, Fillip’s blacks, and stuck in beads to the glass, blurring the jars’ contents to formless, whitish blobs.
By the time they’d dropped off the third load, Krakus had a buzzing, smeared sensation in his chest. He dragged the rusting pig-iron weight of his heart back and forth until nothing remained in the shed but tables, the terrible chair, and Droshky himself.
In a dull voice, Krakus said, “Brother Fillip, fetch me a couple of soldiers.”
“Yes, Father,” Fillip said, hardly above a whisper, and ran from the shed.
While he was gone, the whole endless time, Krakus and Droshky didn’t unlock stares for a moment. A hundred questions, a thousand imprecations, seethed in the doctor’s expression, but Krakus didn’t say a word. You’re not owed, he thought. You’re not owed a chance to talk. You’re not owed an explanation. Again and again he thought it; he was convinced, if only by himself, that he did right, and that he would do right this evening, and as much after as he could.
At last, Brother Fillip returned with two of the soldiers who inhabited the Fort: a corporal so fresh he still had spots and a private who looked to Krakus as though he should have been on leading-strings. They came waiting for orders, and Krakus said, “Bear witness.” He didn’t look away from Droshky, but took a deep breath and lifted his hand in a holy gesture—he’d never done this.
“By the power granted me by Naheel Queen of Heaven, and the wisdom my Brothers trust me to possess, I hereby condemn Tadeusz Droshky to death by the sword this night after the Office of Vespers, for crimes against those I hold under my protection. I myself condemn him. My own hand will strike him down. And if I err in judgment, may the Queen have mercy on my soul.”
Droshky blanched at the beginning of the Ordinance of Summary Justice. By the end he shook, green in the face.
“Take him to the stockade,” Krakus ordered quietly. The young soldiers lunged to obey, and marched Droshky out with his legs wobbling, rubbery under the strain. After they’d gone, Krakus stood with Fillip, gazing sightlessly, but all too aware of the Brother’s gaze on him. The drizzle hissed on outside the open door. Water dripped from the eaves; gray, filtered light and the damp scent of rain filled the shed. “Well,” he said. “Well. Let’s go and burn it all.”
They smashed the jars into the pile so it’d burn in spite of the wet, and wound up bent over an arrow trying to light a pitchy rag in the rain. Fillip, the better shot, loosed the arrow into the bottom of the pile, and it went up in a spectacular fireball that toasted Krakus’s face even from a distance. When the flame died down, it all smoldered, charred specimens, sooty broken glass.
“You can go,” he told Fillip.
“I’ll stay, if that’s all right, Father.”
Krakus put his hand on Fillip’s shoulder. The young man felt chilled through his damp habit, but he didn’t shiver. They stood for some time, watching the pile collapse slowly in on itself.
“He’s evil,” Fillip said suddenly. “I, all the others, we think he killed a Brother once. Boleslav always teased him. And when Boleslav got hurt and went under his care…”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Fillip looked at him; he felt the eyes and looked over, too. “I didn’t think you’d care.”
“You were probably right,” Krakus said, bowing his head under the shame of it.
“Thanks and praise to the Queen of Heaven, from Whom all goodness shines, and Who makes us holier than yesterday,” Fillip recited. He turned from under Krakus’s hand and headed for the gate to Section Three: Commissars. “I think it’s almost time for Vespers.”
Krakus put his all into the service that evening. Things were going to get better here. He’d fight for that, and he swore it to Her over and over in his heart. When Lech pronounced the benediction, he went straight to the stockade in Section Four. The square stone building hulked in the darkness, and mist swirled around the single torch that burned to show its position, collecting on Krakus’s white armor and in his hair.
His sabatons clacked on the boardwalk leading up to the front door. When he opened it, the light in the anteroom hit him in the face. “I’m here for Droshky,” he said, when the soldier manning the desk had finished saluting.
“Droshky?” The soldier’s broad face scrunched in confusion. “Father, why would Doctor Droshky be here?”
“Are you serious?” he blurted.
“I’m sorry, Father. He wasn’t here when we did shift change at sundown. I didn’t know he was meant to be here.”
Krakus rubbed at his tonsure with a gauntleted hand. “Let me onto the block.”
“Yes, Father Krakus, right away.” The soldier rose, pulling a jingling mass of keys on a chain out from his belt, and came around the desk. Krakus followed him to the plain door that led to the block of four cells, and stepped inside ahead of him.
The place was swallowed in night, until the soldier followed him in with a candle. The flame danced over three empty cells, over the form of another soldier with a torn uniform and dark blood on his stubbly face, curled in the straw. Krakus approached the barred door.
“That’s Nosek. He was drunk,” the soldier said helpfully.
And Krakus had thought “seeing red” was just an expression. He shut his eyes, vibrating inside his prison of enameled steel.
“Father Krakus?”
He whirled and stalked out of the block, on, down the wooden walkway into the dark. When he reached his apartments, he doffed his armor and hung it up with shaking hands. He could hardly see anything at all now, let alone red. He sank to his knees and laid his forehead against the door of the wardrobe, pleading wordlessly for grace. His knees protested when he rose again, and he tottered to the office, gaining flexibility and strength as he went, until he strode in straight and tall.
Lech didn’t even look up from his end of the desk. Krakus grabbed the back of his hard wooden armchair and jerked it around to the side. Lech’s quill scudded down his parchment, leaving a long, black slash at the end of whatever he’d been writing.
“What can I do for you, Krakus?” he said, seemingly even, though his face looked sour. Always looked sour.
Krakus bent, hands on the arms of the chair, leaning into Lech’s space so far that the back of his head struck wood, so far that he had to tilt his head up to hold the stare. “It’s not enough that I’ve forsworn my vows a thousand times over?” Krakus asked, in a flinty voice, nose to nose. “Now you have to make me forswear again?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” But Lech’s larynx bobbed.
“Don’t bullshit me, Lech. And don’t dare to stand between me and my duty again. Are we clear?”
“I don’t—”
Lech curled his lip.
Without thinking, Krakus slapped him hard across the face. He stepped back to suck air through his teeth, hands in fists. Control, he thought. Control yourself. “Don’t do it again,” he said, in the most reasonable tone he could muster. Before Lech could respond, he left. His urge was to run out of the building and turn the world upside down to shake Droshky out of his hole, but his reason told him the doctor was long gone. He went to his bedroom to think.
Dad
Seal Rock to Windish
Dingus enjoyed Seal Rock. It was a feast for the eyes after the long, unbroken expanse of scrubby plain. The last few days of the journey from Knightsvalley had been filled with increasingly stony ground and difficult passage, until on a cloudy afternoon they reached a place that looked like a massive finger had reached into the world and scooped some of it out, and the water had rushed in. A fjord, Vandis had called it, or an inlet, and the water was Hadrok’s Sea. Dingus had never seen anything like it. Wealaia was landlocked, but from studying maps he knew he’d actually grown up closer to the Shining Sea than to this great, gray, wild reach of water. Off to the east, along the land, was Dreamport, and slightly west of that—between here and there, across the sea—was Rodansk, which Vandis said a guy could see on a very clear day.
A small town snuggled into the fjord, on the landward end where the grade wasn’t so steep, and three ships lay inside the walls at anchor with sails furled, swaying gently in the tiny waves that made it through. A wide ramp angled down to the town. Out closer to the sea, the walls sloped upward, until around the mouth they dropped sheer. Dingus smelled brine and fresh fish on the chilly wind that whipped from the north. Green clumps of plant life clung to the walls, especially at the mouth, and near the surface of the water, what looked to be sandy clusters of rocks.
The caravan eased down the ramp. Dingus helped some, but had to admit he was distracted; everything he saw, heard, and smelled was completely different from anything he’d ever experienced. In the background, the constant wash, wash, wash of waves called, “Dingus, Dingus, Dingus…” He wanted to go climb down at the mouth and see what the plants were, what the sandy rocks were, what the ocean tasted like, since already salt touched his tongue. “It’s cold,” Kessa complained, but the wind made his blood sing, and he kept gazing around at the fjord even while they walked through the town, so the thatched buildings and dirt streets completely passed him by.
“Dingus,” Vandis said. Since the Hayedi had gone down to the docks to sell off their cargo, he was calling Dingus by his right name again.
He stopped. He realized he’d walked right past Vandis and Kessa, who’d stopped outside one of the bigger buildings. It was an inn with a strange sign, sort of a cross between a fish and a dog. His heart sank at the thought of going inside when he hadn’t even gotten half a look around.
Vandis looked at Dingus’s face and laughed. “Go.”
“You guys aren’t coming?”
“I’m exhausted,” he said, “and Kessa’s teeth are chattering.”
Dingus sagged. “All right. Let’s go in.”
“We talked about this, remember? Get out of my face a little while.”
“But—”
“Dingus. The only thing that’s going to happen to me is a nap. I don’t want you hovering. Go. Just be back at sundown for supper.”
“Are you sure?”
Vandis raised his eyebrows, mouth pulled down, and Dingus backed off quick.
“Okay, thanks, bye!” He dashed away and spent the afternoon crawling all over the fjord, feasting his senses, testing his body, like he’d wanted to anyway. It was the best thing since the Moot. He picked out a spot on top of the rocks to come watch from later, climbed down and saw that instead of being rocks, the sandy patches were made of some kind of alive things that opened and closed slowly with the waves shattering against the dark cliffs. He tasted the ocean: dirt and salt, insanely salty. He stroked bare fingers over the shells of those little alive things, over slimy plants. He saw, far out to sea, a huge black-and-white fish gone small with distance as it leapt high into the air like a fish in a pond and came down with a terrific splash he could hear. And that wind! Cold and damp, it lifted his hair even where it was soaked from the spray he’d collected down by the water, and he felt sure this was the Lady’s country. When the sky began to darken he made his way back down to the inn, wet, exploding with questions, and passionately in love.
“Have a good time?” Vandis asked when he came through the small, smoky taproom and took a seat on the bench next to the fire. Water steamed off his clothes, and all he could do was grin until his face hurt. Kessa snickered, but Vandis didn’t; he grinned right back and said, “Well, let’s hear your questions.”
Dingus spilled them, starting with, “Will you come out with me tomorrow? Please?” He couldn’t think of anything better than this place with Vandis nearby.
“Yes,” Vandis said, and Dingus felt his chest glow. “I’d be glad to make some time for you. Our ship doesn’t leave for a fortnight.”
“Hey-la-hey!” Dingus said, just that.
“I wish I’d been able to book passage a little sooner, but I can see it makes you happy.”
“I’m not ready to leave yet, that’s for sure. I saw this fish, a huge one, all black with big white spots, and it jumped—” He paused to nod at the barmaid laying plates and mugs on the bench next to each of them. “—it jumped right out of the water and splashed back down again. It had a real stubby nose, and a wide tail, and a fin on its back almost like a knife.”
“Sounds like an orca.”
“Is that what it’s called?”
“Yeah. It’s not quite a fish, though; it doesn’t have gills. It has lungs like ours, and when it jumps out of the water, it breathes. It’s a kind of whale.”
Dingus reached down and picked up his supper. It was some kind of thing on bread, and he paid a lot more attention to what Vandis was saying about whales with teeth and whales without than he paid to what went into his mouth. He started to chew, and gagged. He’d never once met a food he didn’t like, but this—this was the absolute worst thing ever to pass his lips. It was a fishy, salty, caraway-seed nightmare, and as quick as he’d taken a bite, he spat it out again. “What the fuck is this?” he blurted, interrupting Vandis.
“Pickled herring,” Vandis said.
“Don’t you like it?” Kessa asked, eating her own with every appearance of relish.
“Ugh.” Dingus picked up his tankard and drained the dark beer in one long draught. “That’s not food. That’s a curse on mankind.” Watching both of the others eat it was almost as bad as eating it himself. He tried to pick it off, but it was in little pieces, and even when he was sure none of it remained with the bread and chopped egg, he could taste it. He set the bread down, nauseated and hungry at the same time. “Can I get something else, Vandis? Please?”
“If they’ve got something else, you’re welcome to order it,” Vandis said.
“I’ll eat yours,” Kessa said eagerly, and took the pickled herring plate away from him. Dingus wound up with dark bread, onions, and cold boiled eggs. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t the kind of supper he’d hoped for, either. Afterward, they all went upstairs to the room Vandis had taken. Kessa enthused over the real beds the whole way.
It wasn’t a big room, but there were two double beds inside, made up with bright felt blankets. One looked slept-in. On the east side there was a little fireplace with a friendly blaze, and a table with a bowl and pitcher for washing. There were three plain chairs around the table; Dingus suspected that was at Vandis’s request.
“Since we’ll be here a while, I thought we might as well be comfortable. You can share with me, Dingus.”
Kessa sighed happily and fell back onto the neater bed, the one closer to the fire. “It’s so cozy,” she said, wriggling with joy.
Dingus found the bed too soft. He felt as if he were sinking throug
h the ropes that held up the straw tick. Vandis snored in a familiar way, rocklike except when he rolled over and flung out a hand. It landed, hard, right over Dingus’s heart. Vandis kind of smiled, and he let out a long breath and settled again. Dingus lay still, thinking it’d be pretty stupid to wake Vandis because of it. Besides, his Master hadn’t touched him once since the Moot. It wasn’t Vandis’s way, wasn’t Dingus’s either, but every so often it would’ve been nice to get hugged, especially when he knew Vandis would be leaving pretty much as soon as they got to Windish, leaving for a place where Dingus couldn’t see him, couldn’t be around him, couldn’t watch his back.
He knew Vandis cared a whole lot about him, but sometimes he thought maybe Vandis didn’t know how much he loved him, or didn’t think about it. Dingus didn’t even need a thumb to count the people who made him feel like he really mattered: Grandpa, Grandma, Kessa—but she had her own growing up to do, and the four years between them yawned wide as a gully—and Vandis. Cranky, crotchety, solid Vandis, who, even when he was pissed off, shielded Dingus like a fortress. Now he was going away, and he’d take everything certain with him. He was going to Dreamport alone because he wanted them to be safe, he’d explained all that, but he didn’t understand that when he was gone, there wouldn’t be anything safe in the whole world. He didn’t understand how damn scared Dingus was over the idea of something happening to him.
He shuddered at the thought and Vandis muttered in his sleep. His fingers flexed over Dingus’s sternum. He sat up, letting Vandis’s hand fall to the mattress, and swung his legs over the side of the bed, propping his forearms on his thighs.
Vandis groaned, blinking owlishly in the sullen light cast by the fire as it burned low. “S’matter, you dreaming?”
“No.”
“Then—” he began, sounding cranky as ever, but he let his thick body fall back and scrubbed at his face. “Talk.”
