Don't Feed the Trolls

by Jacob Peppers

  The hill came down on the other side until eventually leveling off to a large, flat field through which the road cut. At least, they had once been fields. Now, though, the grass and ground as far as Dannen could see had been churned up by untold footsteps leaving the earth muddy. But what caught his eye the most was not the ruined fields but the bodies that lay scattered about them like broken dolls. Hundreds, thousands of broken, bloody dolls.

  “Shit,” Fedder said beside him, and Dannen nodded silently, not completely trusting himself to speak as he stared at the carnage. He had seen dead bodies before, of course, had seen the aftermaths of and taken part in far more battles than any living man ought to be able to claim, but there were some things that a person just didn’t get used to.

  Angry, fitful clouds of flies buzzed and swarmed around the corpses, and so, too, did vultures, picking and scavenging, fighting over their grisly prizes. It was clear that King Ufrith had made his stand here, and Dannen could not blame him. It was good, open ground, ground where his archers would have clear shots and nothing to block the flight of their arrows, ground where his cavalry could have room to maneuver. In the end, though, it had availed him nothing.

  Dannen saw skeletons, far too decomposed as to have been among those slaughtered mortals, most headless—one of the few ways possible to kill that which was already dead—but not many. Nowhere near enough.

  “How many dead, do you think?” Fedder asked.

  Dannen shook his head slowly. “Too many.” He found himself despairing as he stared at that great swath of devastation, at the thousands of corpses littering the fields beyond the hill. Perandius had told him of what he faced, and he’d gotten some inkling of it in the mountains when they’d been attacked, more when he’d learned that King Ufrith had been forced to flee with the remnants of his army back to his capital. He had known that it would have been a grim undertaking with devastating casualties to have forced the northern king into retreat. But knowing a thing and knowing it, seeing it with your own eyes, was very different.

  “Oh, gods, be good.”

  He turned at the sound of the voice and saw that Arabelle had walked up, and he had been too distracted even to hear her approach. The bandit leader nearly always seemed to have a smile on her face—one that, without fail, was directed at Tesler—but she was not smiling now. She stared at the devastation as if she could not believe what she was seeing, blinking as if by doing so she might banish the vision from her sight. Dannen could have told her it would do no good, that the vision would remain with her long after they had left the fields behind, would creep upon her, likely even years later, in her dreams, revisiting her. Pleasure, he’d found, was all too brief in life but pain…pain lingered.

  “Is it…” The woman paused, licking her lips, not a flirtatious gesture now, but a nervous one, “Ufrith’s army?”

  “Not all of it,” Dannen said, hoping he was right. For all he knew, Ufrith had never even made it to his capital. Perhaps he and the others had been doomed to fail in their rescue attempt from the start. Perhaps they had failed already, and even if they had not, what chance did they have? What good could they possibly do against such a force, one that had so convincingly bested the greatest warriors the king of the north could muster?

  The woman let out a whimper and turned away and that, too, Dannen could have told her was pointless. Some things, once seen, could not be unseen, no matter how much one might wish it. Still, he understood. He turned to regard her and saw that Tesler had also walked up and was staring silently at the carnage, unblinking, as if unable to look away.

  A moment later, the woman ran to him, burying her face in his chest and Tesler wrapped his hands around her, the motion wooden as if he were a puppet as he continued to stare at the bodies. Dannen frowned, watching the bandit leader, wondering if it was an act of artifice, one meant to garner the young man’s affections, or if it was genuine. He had his answer a moment later when she burst into tears. If the tears and the sobbing were fake then the woman had missed her calling and should have been a famous actress in some traveling troupe instead of a bandit.

  Tesler awkwardly patted her on the back, looking at Dannen as if for help, but Dannen had no help to give. Mariana arrived a moment later, her presence announced by a gasp of shock as she, too, took in the remains of what had obviously been a slaughter. She reached for Tesler, as if to seek comfort in his embrace as the woman had, only to realize that Arabella had beat her to it.

  Tesler noticed and took a step as if to pull away from the bandit’s embrace and offer what comfort he could to Mariana, but Arabella only held on tighter, seemingly unaware, in her grief, of the woman at all. Mariana stared for a moment, her eyes casting around desperately, her panicked gaze traveling over Fedder and Dannen.

  “It’s okay, lass—” Dannen began, but before he’d finished, Mariana turned and fled, not toward the field of the dead but instead to the east, away from the road and in the direction of a small stream.

  “I need to go to her,” Tesler said, pulling away from Arabelle’s embrace now.

  “No, please,” the woman said, “don’t leave me.”

  “I have to,” Tesler pressed, looking out after Mariana.

  “She’s an assassin,” the woman snapped, angry in her fear. “She’s used to death.”

  Tesler spun on her so abruptly that for a moment, Dannen was certain the man would strike her. In the end, though, he did not, only stared at her with undisguised disgust before starting away. Dannen grabbed his arm as the man started past, shaking his head. “No, lad. Everyone deals with such things in their own ways, and she will not want to see you, not now.”

  “Are…are you sure?” Tesler asked. “I have to…I mean, she…”

  “I’ll see to her,” Dannen said. “You stay here. Alright?”

  “I…alright,” Tesler said, a dazed expression on his face. “If…if you think it’s best.”

  “I do,” Dannen said. He looked past the man at Fedder, a question in his gaze, and the mage gave him a single nod.

  “I’ll keep an eye on them, Butcher,” he said, his voice the grimmest Dannen had ever heard it.

  Dannen nodded then turned and started in the direction Mariana had gone. He found her sitting by the stream, her face buried in her hands.

  “Mariana?”

  She looked up at him, and it was not just grief that he saw on her features—it was anger. She said nothing, only looked away a moment later, burying her face in her hands again, and he walked to her and sat on the bank beside her.

  For a time, they just set there in silence, for Dannen knew that sometimes, words were not enough. Sometimes, words failed.

  Eventually, after several minutes, she got the worst of her sobbing under control and looked at him. “I don’t remember the last time I cried,” she said, “except...” She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. When I was training in the guild, they used to say I had ice in my veins. They took me in at a young age, you see, and no matter how brutal the training or the trainer—and believe me when I tell you many of those were very brutal—I never cried.” She gave a humorless half-laugh, half-sob. “I wonder what they would think of me now. Likely they’d be ashamed.”

  Dannen sighed. “There’s nothing to be ashamed of, lass. Life hurts sometimes. Most times, really. But the pain, it’s what makes us human.”

  She stared at him for several seconds then, as if trying to decide whether or not he was mocking her. In the end, she gave a single nod. “Maybe you’re right. Still.” She gave another sobbing laugh. “I hope it doesn’t become a habit.”

  “There are worse things.”

  She nodded again, and, once more, they lapsed into silence for a time. “I don’t trust her,” she said eventually.

  “Arabelle?”

  “Yes.”

  “Gods, I’d hope not—I’d think less of you if you did.”

  She looked surprised by that, her eyes widening. “But…if you don’t trust her either then why�
��”

  “Why did I agree to have her as our guide?”

  The woman nodded, and Dannen shrugged, thinking it over. “My wife, Val, before she passed, used to say that there’s nothing to fear from snakes, just so long as you never forget that they are snakes and that if, given the chance, they’ll bite.”

  Mariana frowned, as if considering arguing, but in the end she only nodded once more. “Anyway,” Dannen said, sighing, “the fact that she’s a bandit leader…that’s not the only problem you have with her, is it?”

  She opened her mouth, shut it, then opened it again, hesitating. Finally, she spoke in a voice barely loud enough for him to hear. “No.”

  Dannen nodded. “Have you told him?”

  She recoiled at that as if she meant to leap to her feet and flee. “Tell him? Gods, no. I couldn’t…that is…I wouldn’t know what to say.”

  Dannen shrugged. “My experience, lass, the truth usually works best.”

  “The truth,” she said in a tone of voice as if he had just suggested she find the nearest cliff and leap off it, see if she could fly.

  He laughed. “Well. It’s worth a shot, anyhow. Besides, any fool with eyes can see that the lad fancies you.”

  “But…why?” she asked.

  “Sorry?”

  “Why does he fancy me? I don’t like Arabelle, but even I have to admit that she’s right. I’m an assassin, and he…well, he…”

  “Talks to animals and hangs out with a squirrel god,” Dannen said, shrugging. “Seems to me that bar is set pretty low.”

  She gave a laugh at that, which was a good thing. It wasn’t perfect medicine, maybe, but sometimes it was the best on offer. “Maybe…maybe you’re right,” she said. “Maybe I will. Tell him how I feel, I mean. I’ll…I’ll think on it.”

  He nodded. “Just don’t think too long, lass. There’s little enough good in this world that a person better snatch it up fast when he sees it.”

  She sighed. “What are we going to do?”

  “About the undead?”

  “Yes.”

  “If you’ll listen to one more piece of advice from a fat old man, lass, it’s this: there are always a thousand battles to worry about. The best thing anybody can do is to fight the one in front of them.”

  “And what’s the battle in front of them?”

  “Right now?” he said, offering her a smile. “Gettin’ you on your feet.”

  ***

  Tesler paced back and forth on the hilltop, worried for Mariana, wondering if he should go to her. He felt guilty, not just for snapping at her a few days ago but for not being there when she needed him. The expression that had been on her face rose in his mind over and over again as he paced—an expression of betrayal.

  Mortals are very strange creatures.

  Tesler glanced at his shoulder where Maela, the squirrel goddess, perched. “Have you seen your teeth?” he muttered.

  Yes.

  Tesler sighed, running a hand over his face. “What I mean is, we are all strange creatures.”

  Perhaps. Still, this woman, this Mariana. You are attracted to her.

  Tesler felt his face flushing. “Well…yes.”

  Good. Then you should mate with her.

  He made a strangled sound in his throat. “I’m sorry…what?”

  The squirrel lifted its shoulders in what might have been a shrug. It is how it is done. She is in heat, and the two of you will mate. And then you will leave. It is the way.

  He winced. “Not the mortal way.”

  Isn’t it?

  He frowned at that. “Well. Sometimes. Anyway, that isn’t the point. She doesn’t…that is, I don’t think she would be interested.”

  I see. It is too bad you don’t have a tail. A big, fluffy one to impress her with.

  “Yeah…” he said slowly. “Maybe.”

  She lapsed into silence after that, which was just as well as Tesler had a lot on his mind and didn’t really have the energy to explain mortal courtship to a squirrel goddess. Particularly when he didn’t understand it himself. He was so distracted by his thoughts, his concerns, that he forgot all about the dead lying in the field below, did not even notice the smell, just as he did not notice the bandit leader studying him from a few feet away, a thoughtful expression on her face.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The trip down the hillside was not a pleasant one. No one spoke, each of them plagued by their own dark thoughts, struggling to keep themselves and their mounts—which shifted and reared from time to time as if they might bolt—under control.

  Dannen understood the urge, for he wanted to turn and run as well. The problem, of course, was that there was nowhere to run to. After all, if the undead army—and the two brothers who led it—were as dangerous as Perandius claimed, then fleeing would only be delaying the inevitable. Sooner or later, if left to their own devices, the brothers would conquer the north, and somehow Dannen doubted that two such men who were willing to raise the dead to do their bidding would be satisfied with that conquest.

  So, left with no other option, he led the others into the carnage.

  On his left was a bloody pile of corpses where half a dozen soldiers had apparently stood back to back. Stood and been hacked to pieces until they could stand no longer. On his right, he passed another dead man—at least, he thought it was a man. The blood—and the fact that the body was missing a head—made it difficult to know for sure. The vultures picking at the bodies seemed to mark their progress with their black eyes, the closest making rasping, hissing noises, flapping their wings to warn off Dannen and the others from their meal.

  The stench was nearly unbearable, the sight little better, and he glanced back at the others to see Tesler, the man’s face nearly as white as parchment, his jaw clenched, moving forward with his eyes set in a determined line ahead of him. The woman, Arabelle, was much the same, her usual mocking smile nowhere in evidence. Mariana’s eyes roamed over the sky mostly, which was just as well as the last thing Dannen wanted was for her to see the blood and have one of her vomiting episodes.

  Even Fedder was obviously affected by the terrible slaughter, his mouth set into a grim line, his eyes hard and cold. And in all their faces, Dannen could see his own feelings reflected. There was despair, yes, despair and a sort of disbelief that the world could ever be so cruel as this. Mostly, though, what he saw in their gazes was anger, an anger he himself shared and one which grew as he was forced to guide his horse between the corpses.

  The two brothers Perandius had told him of had a lot to answer for, and he promised himself that he would make them, if he could. The trip through the fields took only a couple of hours, but it felt as if they spent an eternity among the dead and by the time they reached the other side he felt exhausted, wrung out, as if the energy, the life had been sapped from him.

  A quick glance at the others showed that they, too, looked exhausted, shuffling forward almost like the undead themselves, vacant, dazed looks in their eyes. They paused on the other side of the field, turning back.

  “It seems…wrong,” Tesler offered, speaking the first words that had been uttered in the last several hours. “To leave them.”

  “Yes,” Dannen agreed.

  “But…we can’t help them…can we?”

  He shook his head sadly. “No, lad. The dead are beyond all help, and even if we could do something, we haven’t the time, not if want to reach Ufrith in time.” In time to die along with him.

  And so, with nothing else to do, they continued in silence, leaving the fields and the dead behind them, corpses that would add to the many other dead Dannen had left behind him over the years.

  They rode their horses at a walk and as they did, they passed the ruins of homes and farmhouses, which, judging by their smoldering ruins, had only recently been put to flame. Dannen knew that they needed to stop soon, that they all needed rest, but he also knew that none of them would likely get any decent rest among the shattered, smoking wreckage of what had been someone�
��s home only a week, possibly days before.

  So they walked on, and eventually in the distance, he noted that the great expanses of fields through which they’d traveled gave way to a forest. “The Great Wood,” Arabelle said.

  Fedder grunted. “I’ve seen better.”

  The woman gave him a sidelong glance. “It’s the name.”

  “Right. I knew that.”

  She studied the mage for a second, an expression on her face which said she clearly didn’t believe him, then she shrugged. “Anyway, we’re close now. Travel through the wood should take no more than a day, two on the outside. When we leave it, we will be within sight of the capital’s walls.”

  “And then the real fun starts,” Fedder said, and a quick glance at the man showed that, judging by his wide anticipatory grin, he meant it. The crazy bastard.

  Dannen had participated in plenty of battles during his time, and he didn’t remember any of them ever being fun.

  The others were nodding though, not looking frightened—as, by all rights, they should have—so much as determined. Dannen sighed, glancing over at Arabelle. “Well. Lead the way.”

  It took them no more than an hour to reach the forest, but by the time they did each step was a struggle for Dannen. It wasn’t just that he was exhausted, which he was; it was also that some part of him, the part that wasn’t a complete fool—admittedly a small part—knew that what they were doing was no less than walking to their deaths.

  Still, he told himself that he had risked his life for far less, and that if—when—he died, at least he would die attempting something that actually mattered. He doubted that fact would slow the worms in their feasting, doubted if it would mean anything to the vultures before they started their meal. Still, he found that it meant something to him. Maybe his thoughts on it would change when the dying started, but right now, he felt good, better than he had in a long time.