by Bruce Blake
High overhead, two dark shapes circled. The smell of blood had already attracted carrion feeders, and the birds would eventually attract attention from the fortress.
“Let’s go before they swoop down and take our eyes by mistake.”
Ghaul climbed down into the ditch first, moving with the athleticism of a practiced soldier. Khirro slid down the side painfully, skidding against the dirt side and coming to a jarring stop at the bottom. He gritted his teeth, determined not to cry out.
The trench’s earthy odor reminded Khirro of home where the aroma of turned dirt was a constant in his life. His family would be readying for the summer harvest, storing some away and taking the rest to market to trade for meats and staples they’d need for winter. The thought made his heart ache. Emeline would be with her parents doing the same. He longed to be there, to tend to her while her belly swelled. At least she’d be safe.
I hope.
Khirro breathed in the normally comforting smell but it offered no solace this time. He swayed on his injured leg, grappling for balance, then started after Ghaul.
Don’t dwell on the past, it holds only sadness now.
Easy to think, difficult to do.
He didn’t want to think of his future, either, for the complete unknown of it held only dread. As the fortress wall receded behind, his boots splashed in a trickle of water snaking down the middle of the trench. He tottered along the bottom of the ditch trying to calm his spinning head and a sound came to his ears, a rumble as if distant thunder spoke to him. He glanced up at the cloudless sky, confused for a moment before he identified the sound as hooves beating dry ground.
“They’re coming,” Ghaul said.
Chapter Eight
The sounds were small and far away. Khirro stopped to listen while his companion continued along the dusty path, pace unchanged. Sunlight streamed over the edge of the ditch though they walked in shadow. Early evening. They had a head start on their pursuers.
King’s soldiers or Kanosee?
The death birds might have drawn their attention, but more likely one of the regular patrols discovered the battleground. Or maybe the Kanosee come through the drainage system again without the Shaman’s magic to hold them back.
No, too much noise to be the enemy.
Khirro scrambled up the side of the ditch, careful of his aching leg, and hoisted himself above the edge. He heard shouts and the sound of horses, but the tall grass blocked his view. He pushed himself up farther, straining to see. Another inch higher and his eyes would be clear of the grass.
A hand gripped his belt, yanked him back and brought him tumbling from his perch. His back slammed against the ground, leaving him gazing again at the clear blue sky. He wished he could float away into it, leave behind the pain in his leg, the fear of the curse, flee from the vial at his breast and the pool of water collecting at his shoulder. Then Ghaul’s silhouette blocked his freedom.
“Are you trying to get us killed? We’ll be easy enough to track in this dirt. Would you make their task easier by signaling them?”
Khirro shook his head as the water soaking his breeches and the fresh pain in his tail bone erased thoughts of a better place. This was the only place for him, the only place he could be. And Ghaul was right—had Khirro seen them, then they might have seen him, too.
Why can’t I think more like a soldier? More like Ghaul.
“I wanted to see who it is.”
“King’s soldiers. They’ll be on our trail soon. We mustn’t waste our lead.”
Ghaul offered his hand and Khirro took it. The warrior hoisted him to his feet, spun on his heel and continued without waiting.
“How much farther before the ditch ends?” Khirro brushed dirt from his breeches, grimacing at the pain in his rump and his leg as he hurried to catch up.
“Not far. The sides are not so steep anymore.”
The yellow grass-trimmed edge—well above their heads when they entered the ditch—had dipped to Ghaul’s height. Khirro shook his head, frustrated he hadn’t noticed the change. He’d been trained as a soldier of the king, endured the same hardships as other recruits, even as Ghaul had at some point, yet still couldn’t make his head work in the manner of a soldier. How far apart to plant corn or when to harvest crops he knew without putting thought to it, but observing his surroundings or remembering not to reveal his location were things yet beyond him. He hoped time would improve his skills, but there wasn’t time for practice, not when everything was life or death. If a crop languished in the ground too long, there would be other crops and other years, other farmers from whom to purchase food. The same couldn’t be said of a soldier. One mistake could end everything.
Why did the Shaman think I could do this?
As Gendred said: a dirt farmer would do nothing but get in the way. If he could release himself from this curse, pass it on to someone else, he’d do so without second thought. A real warrior like Ghaul would be better suited.
Khirro reached beneath his jerkin and brought the vial from its hiding place, held it up toward the sky. The sun shone through it, turning it into a glowing liquid ruby.
The king’s blood. The fate of a kingdom in a small glass vial.
“Ghaul?” His companion responded with a grunt but neither stopped nor turned toward him. “How long have you been a soldier?”
“I am the son of a soldier’s son. Ten summers had tanned my skin when I joined the town garrison.”
“I’m not a soldier. My place is digging in the earth, providing for my family, selling my crops at market.” He rolled the vial in his fingers watching the blood ebb and flow.
“A noble profession when there’s no war.” With Ghaul’s back to him, Khirro couldn’t gauge the sincerity of his words. “But these are dark times, the darkest you or I have seen. I was barely out of swaddling clothes when Braymon took the crown.”
“Have you fought before?”
“Your archer friend is not the first blood my sword has tasted.”
“When war comes, they make a farmer become a soldier,” Khirro said curling his fingers about the vial. The feel of it gave him comfort. “But when war is ended, no one asks the warrior to become a farmer.”
“Better for both of us.” Ghaul chuckled. “The kingdom will always need protecting, as its people will always need feeding. Neither is more important than the other, each of us is a small part of the greater whole.”
Khirro considered his words. Perhaps he did mean what he said.
“Do you know how far apart to plant corn? When to harvest potatoes?”
This time Ghaul stopped. Khirro hid the vial behind his injured thigh without knowing why. Something in him made him want to protect it—all the time, at any cost.
“They grow in the ground and they’re ready when they sit upon my plate, that’s all I know. Do you know how many ways you can kill a man with your bare hands? I’m no better with a plow than you are with a spear, but if I needed to know, I’d learn. It’s our lot to do what’s asked of us.”
Khirro couldn’t dispute Ghaul’s words. It seemed his companion may be more than the average soldier—not just a killing machine bred to serve. Perhaps, with Ghaul’s help, he would reach the Necromancer, and perhaps the kingdom could be saved. A warm feeling spread through Khirro, calming him, but he quickly realized it wasn’t emotion or certainty, duty or loyalty. The feeling didn’t emanate from his heart or his head or his gut. Instead, the feeling flowed from his leg.
No, not from my leg—into my leg. The vial.
Ghaul started moving again, talking to Khirro over his shoulder.
“We approach the end, then there’s some distance to the forest. We have to move swiftly.”
Khirro nodded but didn’t immediately follow. The mute heat flowed into the muscle of his thigh, flooding his leg with warmth like the Shaman’s poultice had imparted upon his wounds, though this time it ran deeper, warmer. He didn’t want to move in case it ended the sensation.
“Khirro?”<
br />
He shook his head, refocusing on the man in front of him. “What?”
“We’ll have to run. Can you do that?”
Nodding, Khirro said he could.
The ditch shallowed. The shadows that dogged them through their flight gave way to sun. Grass spilled down the sides, reaching for the rill of waste water struggling its way to freedom. Then the ditch ended abruptly, the water disappearing in a patch of muddy ground. A sweeping hill of grass fell away, ending in tangled brambles held in check by forest beyond.
“Elevation will hide us a short while,” Ghaul said as he surveyed their path. “But we must make the forest before they reach this spot.”
“Two men can move faster than many.”
“Even when one has an arrow hole in his leg?”
“It feels alright.”
“They’ll be on horse. If they’ve found our tracks in the ditch, it won’t be difficult for them to follow.”
Frowning, Khirro watched Ghaul bound down the hill, then turned his attention to the vial.
Why did I take it out?
He’d considered giving it to the warrior, reasoning it would be safer in the hands of a man able to defend it, but found the thought of parting with it unbearable. He slipped the vial back into its hiding place, its gentle warmth pulsing briefly before disappearing to become just a piece of glass pressed against his chest. Khirro started down the hill, the pain in his leg fading to a tolerable ache.
When he reached the edge of the snarled brambles, Khirro looked back over his shoulder. No soldiers stood at the top, but they weren’t far behind. Even now, he felt the dull thump of hooves in the earth beneath his feet. High overhead, death birds circled and swooped, dots against the cerulean sky, upset at having their dinner of fresh man flesh interrupted. The soldiers would take the bodies of Rudric, Gendred and the Shaman and bury them in the barrows at the foot of the fortress wall, but the enemy would be left to rot. The buzzards would yet eat. Khirro thought of the undead creatures with their rotted flesh and shriveled fingers and grinned.
They won’t make much of a meal.
The neighing of a warhorse interrupted his thoughts. Khirro turned and rushed into the brambles, heedless of the thorns grasping for his flesh.
Chapter Nine
“Did they see us?”
As dusk deepened to night, they glimpsed their pursuers at the crest of the hill. Khirro didn’t doubt they were soldiers of the king.
“I don’t think so. The brambles will slow them. They’ll likely stop for the night and pick up our trail in the morning.”
Branches whipped off Ghaul as he broke the trail, thorny twigs slapping against Khirro’s arms and chest. A barb raked his face drawing warm blood to run down his cheek.
“Can’t we stop? They were Erechanian. We needn’t fear them.”
“And how would you explain the vial you carry? Or the trail of dead behind us? They’ll want someone to blame, Khirro. The king is dead.”
The thicket thinned to a rocky swath before the trees began. Khirro wiped blood from his cheek and trotted to catch up to his companion.
“I’ll explain what happened.”
“Why should they believe you? You could be a Kanosee soldier dressed in Erechanian mail. You slew the Shaman, stole the king’s blood for you own purpose. You have the Shaman’s sword in case there’s any doubt.”
Khirro grasped the scabbard at his belt, a fresh wave of guilt torturing him.
“But I didn’t.”
“Then maybe they’ll kill you for a spy, or think you killed the king yourself. Do you know the penalty for regicide? You’d pray for them to kill you quickly.”
Khirro ground his teeth. There has to be a way.
“They’d have to believe both of us. Why would we lie?”
“For your life. Maybe they’ll deduce you followed the Shaman and his friends, ambushed them with the other Kanosee, and killed them all yourself.”
“All I’d have to do is show them how I wield a sword to convince them otherwise. I’d have been no match for either Rudric or Gendred on their own, never mind both.”
“They won’t ask for a demonstration. You’d be dead before your steel cleared the scabbard. As soon as we fled, we became guilty of anything they want to accuse us.” Ghaul stepped over a moss covered log. “It won’t be a stretch for them to add the deaths of Braymon and the Shaman together to come up with a likely reason for you to have done it.”
“Rudric and Gendred disposed of the king’s body. They will only have found his armor.” Maybe he’s right.
“Worse. The king’s missing and you carry a vial of his blood. How’s that look for treason?”
Khirro fell quiet as they picked their way beneath enormous hemlock and fir trees and through the shrubs crowding the forest floor: salal and ivy, skunk cabbage and salmon berry bushes. Somewhere above the branches would be a half-moon, Khirro knew, and stars arranged in constellations his father taught him before he lost his arm and stopped speaking to his eldest son. The outdoors normally calmed his soul, but not on this night, not with his countrymen coming to lynch him.
How could this have happened?
“Why would a Kanosee spy want a vial of the king’s blood?” Khirro moved through the underbrush, careful not to trip on roots and runners that grasped for his foot like human fingers.
“What good is it to you?”
“The Necromancer. The Shaman said he could bring the king back.”
“Right. Did you see the undead fighting beside the Kanosee? Imagine if Braymon was one of them and led the Kanosee forces against his own subjects. The war would end.”
“I hadn’t thought of that.”
Khirro’s head swirled. His own countrymen on his trail, the undead soldiers, the Necromancer. The last thought stopped him in his tracks. Ghaul traveled another three steps before he noticed.
“What is it?”
“All are against us.” Khirro swallowed hard, felt the pulse beat at his throat in spite of the feeling that all the blood had drained from his head. He suppressed a tremor in his knees. “Our own people pursue us. The enemy will be after us if they know what we have. And the man we seek has sided with them. Why would he help us?”
“All we can do is follow the Shaman’s wishes and hope for the best. Let’s get on with it before our pursuers hear your whimpering and relieve us of our problems.” Ghaul strode back to Khirro and put his hand on his shoulder. It did nothing to reassure him. “For now, we’re the only ones who know of your burden. Let’s keep it that way.”
Khirro’s stomach churned. At best, he’d be branded a traitor, at worst: a king slayer. And that was if his own people caught them. What if the enemy found them instead? In the space of a few hours, the most dangerous option—going to Lakesh—had become the best one. Khirro expected the fear and dread the name Lakesh provoked, but he felt something else, too. This task meant more than feeding people. No matter what happened, he’d never guide a plow again. His life had been irrevocably changed when the king came to rest on the landing beside him. He was a warrior now, like it or not. The last hope for the realm.
The thought made him want to vomit.
The night passed in silence, disturbed only by rustling brush and the snap of twigs underfoot. Night under the trees wasn’t like night on the farm, the darkness was deeper, claustrophobic. Khirro fumbled for the hilt of the Shaman’s sword when shapes loomed only to find no more threat than an overturned stump or fallen log. Thankfully, the darkness hid his trepidation from Ghaul. After a time, he got used to the screech of the owl and the skittering of tiny feet hiding from it. Something larger followed them for a while, keeping its distance—they both noted it but didn’t speak of it. As night lightened with the dawn, the noise ceased without approaching closer.
When the interwoven branches above their heads parted, Khirro glimpsed the dark sky fading to midnight blue. His favorite time of day. Most mornings, his day would start at this time, full of promise. His brothe
r would still be sleeping, forsaking the farmer’s life, convinced there were better things for him, though he never tried to discover what. Many times Khirro tilled soil or fed animals with teeth clenched in anger at his brother. He felt the same this morning knowing he slept safe at home, but he missed him, too.
“There’s a stream ahead,” Ghaul said, the first words either had spoken in hours. “We’ll rest there, slake our thirst and change your bandage.”
Khirro hadn’t thought about his wound in a long while. The pain and limp he’d carried along the drainage ditch were gone.
Walking must have been good for it.
The stream’s gurgle reached Khirro’s ears as evergreens gave way to smaller deciduous trees. The brush thinned until the forest paused at a glade carpeted with flowers all the way to the water, each species of flora a different shade of gray awaiting the life-giving sun to coax them open and give them color. At the edge of the stream a spotted deer raised its head but bolted into the forest before Ghaul removed the bow from his shoulder.
“Damn. I’d have enjoyed venison for breakfast.”
They hurried across the clearing, knelt at the edge of the stream. Khirro wiped his hands on his breeches as Ghaul leaned forward, immersing his face in the water. Khirro watched him for a moment, then did the same. The first gulp of cold water hurt his head, but his throat was thankful for the wetting. He took a deep draught, drinking until his lungs begged for air. When he’d had enough, Ghaul was already standing.
“Much time has passed since anyone’s been here,” he said surveying their surroundings. “All the better for us.”
Khirro inhaled the stream’s crispness and the perfume of blossoming flowers, then washed his hands in the cold water, splashed some on his face It stung the tender scratch where the thorn had caught him. He touched it lightly and his finger came away with fresh blood.
“Let’s change your dressing.” Ghaul dropped his pack from his back. “It would do the kingdom no good if the only man who could find the Necromancer lost his leg to the blood sickness. Lakesh is a long way to hop.”
