Blue Words

by M. C. Edwards

  “Shut up!” the stranger yelled. “I read on Facebook not to believe a word you say. So don’t bother saying anything.”

  “Fuck I hate Facebook,” mumbled Malaki.

  By that time, Kahn’s whistle had drawn Neasa and Teefa from the house. They slipped around the side and through the bushes lining the driveway. The girls took the assailant from behind with little effort and disarmed him. Neasa unloaded his gun while Teefa bound his hands and sat him against the drunken shed.

  “What’s this nonsense about our blood?” Kahn demanded of the man, as he haunched to his knees. The stranger looked past Kahn’s tolerant expression to the tiny, seething brunette behind. The red brute, stood at his shoulder.

  “Don’t kill me,” he begged. “I wouldn’t have really hurt you, I just wanted the reward.”

  “Reward for what?” asked Kahn.

  “Your blood,” he sighed, throwing his bound hands up. Frustration laced his voice as much as fear, as though it was something he shouldn’t have to explain. The Inscribed passed glances about.

  “Why would they want our blood?” asked Neasa. Her question was actually directed at Kahn, but the stranger took it for his.

  “It heals.” The looks did another round.

  “My blood heals no better than your shit boy,” replied Malaki pacing back and forth like a hunting wolf.

  “How many people have heard this? How many people have you told about us?”

  “Uhh, everybody knows about the reward,” he jittered. “Heaps of people are hunting. The Warlock mainly, but one of you or a vial of blue blood could still set a man and his family up for life.” The Inscribed glared at him, none of the expressions were tolerant any more. “B-but I didn’t tell anyone I recognised your face, I swear. I wanted the reward for myself.”

  “Recognised it from where?” probed Kahn.

  “The news, the net, the papers. Everywhere! But I swear I only wanted the reward for my family.”

  The fear in his eyes told Kahn he spoke the truth. Judging from the weapon, he didn’t expect so many people to be there. “Do we kill him?” asked Brood. The man shivered and fidgeted at the suggestion. Kahn drew his knife. The stranger fidgeted more, harder and tears began to pool in his eyes.

  “No, but if he ever returns we will,” answered Kahn, cutting his rope, “Go!” The man ran frantically off into the scrub. Neasa threw the gun to Kahn.

  “This will be a problem. We should have killed him,” Dorian grumbled angrily.

  “What and be exactly what they portray us to be? We are not monsters, we only kill for the cause,” he replied, heading back to his garden.

  “We may not be monsters, but they can be. You remember Salem right?” added Ami. Neasa’s face washed with sadness at the mention. Dorian however seemed to surge in confidence with Ami’s support.

  “This is a mistake!” he barked at his retreating father. Kahn’s face hardened.

  “I am in charge Dorian and I am sick of you questioning my every decision. If you can’t accept that, then go!” he yelled, returning to his vegetables. Dorian swept his fringe aside and stormed off to the beach, seething with rage, Ami at his heels. Neasa went to Kahn to see if he wanted to talk. Kahn said nothing more on the matter, only slipped her a look which firmly said, “Not now.”

  The day of celebration continued, despite the interruption. The boar was eventually staked and it began to cook. The fish, crabs and crayfish were wrapped in banana leaves and put into the coals; damper and vegetables were wrapped in aluminium foil and buried alongside them. By afternoon mouthwatering smells filled the air and a festive mood grew. The boar crackled and hissed as the meat roasted, grease and juice oozed from it. Mouths began watering. Knives frequently sliced small samples from it, just to see how it was progressing. As the sun began to turn toward the sunset the mead started to flow and the party was truly under way. Crave and Brood at first, but quickly the others joined as well. The warring parties took up residence on opposite sides of the shed, Dorian and Ami to the south, Malaki and Kahn to the north. All was peaceful upon first glance, but a misting tension hung in the air. All was not forgiven.

  With a few steins under their belts, Malaki and Brood began to sing, old songs learnt in ancient taverns, songs of battle, songs of heroes, songs of sadness and songs of love, stomping and clapping in rhythm. Crave’s armour glowed blue as he bent the light to sculpt ghostly images of exotic dancing girls on the tables. Unlike most abilities held by the Inscribed, Crave had trained his body to hold his light sculptures for extended perods of time without any significant harm, as long as they were not too complex and the intended angles of vision were not too many. It was something no other Inscribed had masterd. Many reasons had been suggested over time, but the cause of Crave’s privilege had never been understood. Crave didn’t even understand it himself. “I came off a month long opium bender and I could just do it,” he would say when put to the question.

  The girls soon decided that they could out-dance Crave’s creations and leapt through them onto the table. Teefa and Neasa danced and sang together while Ami lured George up. For the first time since she last saw Tabitha, George enjoyed herself and briefly forgot her grief. Crave picked up his illusions, trying to out-do the flesh women. Teefa winked at Neasa and drew her close, grinding against her sensually. Brood slapped Crave, excitedly pointing. Once she had his eye, Neasa leant in, kissing Teefa slowly, deeply and passionately. Crave’s concentration was instantly shattered. Brood’s eyes nearly burst from his skull. The ghostly dancers flashed and flittered away to nothing. The girls cheered and raised their arms in victory, laughter erupted. Brood and Crave glanced at each other briefly and raised their steins, claiming it a victory of their own.

  Dorian sauntered up and lifted Ami from the table; she brushed the hair from his face and kissed his lips as he brought her gently to the ground. Kahn discreetly stood up and walked away towards the house. Most thought nothing of it, in fact no one else noticed, but the sight of his father leaving seemed to reignite Dorian’s embering rage.

  “You need to get used to this dad!” he yelled after his father. The laughter and song fell silent. “For seventy years we have tip toed around you and grit our teeth, even followed orders which were given for no reason other than to force us apart.” His eyes burned as he spoke. “It needs to end today. Give your blessing.” Kahn stopped. For a moment he did nothing, but eventually he turned to grimly face the ultimatum.

  “You are my son and I love you, but you are drunk. Talk no more of this.”

  “No! Give your blessing.”

  Kahn sighed deeply, “My blessing is something you will never receive.”

  The other Inscribed shot awkward looks at each other. All wanted to end the conflict, but none wanted to interfere in family matters. Malaki grit his teeth and scowled at the ground.

  “Why do you have to be so stubborn about this?” asked Dorian. Kahn hesitated, frozen.

  “What, other than the fact you are fucking his ex lover,” interrupted Malaki, finally boiling over.

  Dorian glared at him, then back at his father. Malaki continued, “He doesn’t trust her anymore than I do. Why don’t you ask your precious Ami how your mother died.”

  “Shut up Malaki,” Ami snapped. He ignored her.

  “On the day of the Betrayal.”

  “SHUT UP!”

  “We approached in pairs, from all directions,” he continued under scorching glares. “She was paired with your mother, but I saw Sakura die and she died alone.” He pointed accusingly at Ami. She was trying to storm away, drawing Dorian by his hand. He stood strong but, still listening as Malaki spoke. “Your father likes to believe the best in people, but I tend to see them for what they are. She was in his service when first we met, she was in his service when she abandoned your mother to die and she was in his service when she betrayed our location and cost the girl.”

  “Fuck you Malaki!” she raged storming towards him. Malaki rose to his feet, sliding his chai
r back into the wall. She pointed a finger into his chest. “You have been on my back since day one and I have put up with it. No more! Either you move past this shit like Kahn did or I’m gone.”

  “Kahn never moved passed it!” he roared, inches from her face. “You simply twisted the guilt he had and manipulated him.”

  “God Kahn, do something,” thought George, “They’ll kill each other.” But the leader’s lips stayed silent. A braver man in battle you would never find, but in emotional matters Kahn had all the spine of a jellyfish. It tore at his insides to see anyone close to him heartbroken or upset, especially at him. It was situations like this he retreated from.

  “Say something dad,” challenged Dorian. Kahn just stood downcast, searching for the right words. His family was falling apart before his eyes, and he had not the vocabulary or the courage to stop it.

  “How did he know where we were?” he finally asked, directing his question at Ami. It was a whisper at first, but he found his voice by the end. “We have been so careful with the location of this place. There were no search parties, no flyovers, just a direct tactical strike. Someone gave him this location.” He wiped sweat from his brow. “I have thought on it long and hard, it’s the only explanation.”

  “What are you saying? Just come out with it,” said Dorian defensively.

  Kahn’s focus stayed with Ami. “You were in his organisation. I trusted you, but you could have given him the time, location and even provided the distraction.”

  “You ordered her undercover to separate us!” Dorian growled becoming more enraged at being ignored. Ami’s eyes now dropped to her feet.

  “Is that what you told him?” Kahn asked Ami. He turned to his son, “She begged and begged me to let her go undercover. It was against my better judgment, but I relented.”

  “Bullshit!” spat the son. Dorian looked into the eyes of his lover. To his shock, they confirmed his father’s story.

  “Things were getting so serious between us. I got claustrophobic.” She reached out to grab his hands. “We were always together; I thought I could do some good for the group and for us by having some space.”

  “I was there Kahn,” said Malaki, re-entering the argument, “Kyran said straight out that he had a familiar in his pocket.” He glared at Ami.

  “Um, sorry I missed it, I was unconscious and dying,” replied Ami sarcastically.

  “Exactly! He could have finished you at any second, but he didn’t. Why would that be?” Glares ricocheted about the shed.

  “Baiser tout! Let’s just chill the hell out!” yelled Brood, suddenly leaping to his feet and standing on the raised stone rim of the fire pit with his arms outstretched. The group was silenced, but the matter was far from dead. Dorian grabbed Ami’s arm and turned to storm towards his car. Brood’s eyes widened, looking past the group. They spun to see a pack of six armed men emerge from the darkness. Instantly another five stepped out of the black behind the fire, surrounding the Inscribed.

  At the front of the first pack stood the young stranger from the morning. “Thought with all of you here I could afford to split the money,” he said. He was much more cocky than he had been that morning.

  “Look, like we told you this morning there is no difference between our blood and yours. There is no magic here,” said Kahn, holding his hands up in surrender.

  “Lies!” said one of the other men behind him.

  “Whether it works or not, the reward still stands,” grinned the stranger.

  “Well,” pondered Crave who still sat in his chair, “If everything you heard is true what makes you think that those peashooters you are holding will do anything at all to us?” The men flicked their eyes from side to side at each other.

  “A mob of geniuses,” mumbled George.

  She was well plied with liquor by that stage, and not for the first time. In the days following the loss she had found herself wondering what was left for her and had quickly sunk into the bottle. She stomped toward the larger half of the group, snatching a serrated knife from the table as she passed. George ran the blade down her palm and thrust the bloody hand into the startled man’s face. “Does that look blue to you?” she screamed.

  “It’s a Warlock trick!” barked one of the others.

  “Do as you must,” said Kahn, his patience well and truly spent. “But we will not come willingly and I guarantee you will never take us alive.” Gun shots rang across the water.

  I am Gudrik

  For days I flew through the dry heart of the southern land. Its arid centre brought me a level of solace, a solitude embraced with silence. My grief was crushing, yet it was but a shade of what George must have felt. Kahn believed that accepting George’s hatred and blame without protest had been a noble, selfless act on my part. An act solely intended to soften her fall, but in all honesty it was nothing of the sort. In truth it was almost the complete opposite, purely for me. A selfish act so that I could convince myself that I had given her something other than pain, torment and broken promises in our short life together.

  I have no plan for what I will do from here. For so long all I have thought about was revenge. I feared that it would feel hollow; I was warned it would be empty, but that’s not true at all. It felt good, liberating. I simply hope to find somewhere remote to live out eternity alone. Solitude….that is the life of a Varth-lokkr. It was the life I was born for and despite everything I have been through I must never forget that. If there is one thing this new land is abundant with, it is remoteness.

  Wise Man

  “Older is not always wiser.”

  Gudrik sat on the edge of a gently flowing water course. Its fine trickle of crystal, clear nectar had patiently etched the rich, red stone over what must have been thousands of years, sculpting the rock to its will. The bubble of moving water echoed up through its deep crevasses, its walls flowing with sediments of ages passed glowing shades of red, orange and brown in the sun. He flicked his toes in the cool stream, washing away the fine dust which attached itself to every surface. His skin had become much darker during his time in the desert, the harsh outback sun quickly tanning his previously pale back and chest to an earthy brown tone.

  He had grown fond of this new place. It had forced him to crawl back to his roots, his nomadic days before the change, before The Twelve. His gift….or curse had already caused too much pain to too many people. He crafted weapons from the land and hunted the strange creatures and huge lizards which were abundant in the area, but there was no denying that he had lost his knack. The change had made him lazy and he endured many hungry days as his hunting skills were slowly remembered. At times, Gudrik actually felt like the beasts were gathering around to openly mock his efforts. The dark was cold when the hot desert days faded into night, the season was changing. Once again he went without warmth for many nights as it was sometime before he could start a fire the way which had been second nature in his youth.

  Again Gudrik managed to eke out an existence, wandering and hunting under the sun’s light before setting up camp undermoon. He saw no one. It was as if Gudrik was the sole survivor of some secret apocalypse. Isolation was his goal and isolation he had found, but in an unexpected turn, he still yearned for human contact.

  In his Varth-lokkr life he had always had his father. As a Warlock he had always had people around him in towns. As he travelled commoners would join him for protection. Then there had been Elya. Gudrik soon came to realise that not until his capture had he ever truly felt the cold torture of pure solitude. For a thousand years he spoke with no one, joked, laughed and quarrelled with no one. It was worse than the endless hunger or the burning thirst. Having no news of events, no comprehension of time, that was a torture of its own, and that was how he had begun to feel now. Put simply, he was lonely, until late one night, fate once again came searching for him.

  As the sounds of day faded into the speckled silence of night, his ears picked up a distant sound, the faint whisper of rhythmic thumping drifting on the wind. It w
as a very distinct beat, music. Gudrik removed the larger chunks of wood from his fire and smothered the flames with red sand, reducing it to embers. He wandered after the whispering sound. As he climbed over a small bank of red dirt the volume grew and the melody became audible. Lights also appeared, flickering through the line of bare desert trees ahead. He soon realised that the tune was coming from a roadside tavern.

  His wisdom warned him to turn from this place, his loneliness begged him to explore further. Standing on the edge of that road he twitched in one direction, then the other. A battle raged within him, a battle in which his loneliness soon found an ally. Gudrik had developed a weakness for the drink. There had always been as much as he desired at the beach house, something he dearly missed. He was certain in this remote area no one would know him anyway; there was nothing for miles in any direction. The tavern would most likely be empty, or as good as. “After everything I have been through, I deserve a drink.” He drew his wand and produced a handful of pea sized gold pieces which he slipped into the pocket of his dusty jeans.

  The bare wooden floor creaked as Gudrik entered the building. Tall circular tables scattered the floor space, all surrounded by a mismatched clutter of equally tall stools. There was a dartboard precariously hung on the eastern wall and a small collection of gaming machines to the west. The bar ran north to south facing the door. Its top was made from a single mammoth slab of timber which must have been the remnants of an ancient forest giant. The varnish drew the natural grain of the timber out and caused it to glisten in the lights, proudly touting its age like medals of service. Below the wooden bar was a skirting of corrugated iron, most likely left over after building the roof. The walls around the bar were cluttered with an endless montage of odds and ends left by travellers.

  Gudrik was taken aback by the number of patrons present. Sure he had walked past a few vehicles as he entered, but not enough to expect the congregation which greeted his arrival. The bar was lined with silent drinkers all minding their own dismay, while small groups of men and women chortled, bragged and swore at various volumes about the room. In fact all but a few of the tables were occupied. Even the one dangerously perched under the dartboard had a small group of patrons merrily drinking away at it.