They fanned out with crunching footsteps that would wake the dead, and surrounded the first several homes. Titon had predicted they would have been detected already. That they had not been made his nerves build to the point of trembling. The sound of a door being smashed released his tension, replaced by anger at his men for defying orders.
He had expected to hear the sound of husky war cries associated with battle, but what he heard was far different. His own men had remained silent, and the air was filled with the horrific shrieks of those they attacked. The men, women, and children all sounded equally hysterical as they screamed, not for help or to alert their fellow villagers, but with no justification other than to grate their attackers with such caustic noise that they might end their lives sooner. And indeed it seemed to be working.
One by one the shrieks heard from those in the nearer homes were silenced. Decker burst through the door of the home he and Titon were upon, finding within it a man, a woman, and a crone, all standing and in their undergarments with hands extended in front of them as if to fend off blows. The woman wasted no time taking to shrieking, and the man fell backward onto the bed they shared, cowering. Decker was upon them. He threw a small axe, which smashed the man in the head with the blunt end, and followed up with his large axe to cleave the Dogman near in half. Decker then went for the woman, who was about as attractive as her husband was brave, and took off her head. The older woman had managed to arm herself with a knife and, to her credit, moved toward Decker as if to stab him. Titon flung his axe. It embedded itself in the side of her head, killing her instantly.
Titon stared at the picture of gore before them. The younger woman’s corpse spurted blood from the neck as it had fallen backwards against the wall. The man who had been sliced from the left of his neck to his right hip had organs, blood, and feces spilling out onto his bed. The old woman he himself had killed was crumpled on the floor, his axe still in her skull.
“Get your axe. We move,” said Decker.
Titon complied. As he pulled his axe from the feeble old woman, the only of the three to effect any form of offense, he wondered if indeed his father had spoke truly about these people. It was hard for Titon to imagine even his comatose mother putting up less of a fight than did the man of this home.
After stepping outside the safety of the wooden walls, Titon felt the twinges one had when fearful that at any moment a projectile may come and strike him. These Dogmen, now undoubtedly alerted to their presence, would have bows, though Titon had yet to see sign of any such threat. A well-placed arrow could spell the end for even a beast such as Decker. Titon’s men ignored his rule of only breaking into homes with partners, as the bloodthirsty among them who had missed out on the first homes were eager to ensure they got their kills. It would be embarrassing for any of them to have to admit they had not managed to help in the battle, and Galatai did not lie about their headcounts. Members of their party darted off alone after the few men and women who chose to flee on foot rather than barricade themselves inside. Others chopped through doors that had been locked and fortified, sending splinters flying with blows from their axes.
Titon spotted a broad-shouldered Dogman who seemed to be putting up a fight. The man had a knife in one hand and a pitchfork in the other, and had already dodged or deflected a few poorly-thrown axes. The Dogman flung his knife, barely missing his attacker, a boy Titon recognized from the back as Arron. Titon lobbed an axe at the man from thirty paces away, hoping that he would not move much during the time it would take to arrive. The man moved left, then right again, and Titon’s axe sliced into his shoulder causing him to drop his pitchfork and grasp at his wound. Arron was on the man at once with his heavy axe, a weapon that had proven surprisingly ineffective versus the length of the pitchfork, and finished him off with a blow that split his skull. Arron gave Titon a thankful nod.
The rest of the battle proceeded with little difference. The most difficult part was catching those villagers who fled their homes, but so few chose to do so that it was possible they may have managed to kill every inhabitant. Any that had escaped their grasp would likely die of exposure.
“The first of many victories, brother,” Decker said with conquest. Through the battle Decker had never left his side—a thing Titon found surprising. He’d expected Decker would want to brag of having killed as many men as possible.
Titon cleared his throat to ensure his words would not come out squeaky. “Are there any wounded?”
There came no replies.
“Are there any still hungry?” shouted Decker. The cries of affirmation that returned his question were overwhelming.
As he surveyed the men, Titon was surprised to find that none had wounds worse than small cuts or deep bites probably suffered upon engaging in carnal combat with the Dogmen women.
Never before having seen a person killed by a thrown axe, Titon had often wondered how destructive such an attack was. Now that he had his answer, his mind was not at ease. The sound of his axe cracking into the brittle skull of the old woman remained in his ears, and he was unable to replace it with thoughts of the throw that may have saved Arron from injury.
“Titon, over here,” yelled Decker with elation in his voice.
It was what they had come for. They’d broken into what must have been a very rich man’s cellar. There was more food than Titon could recall ever having seen stored in a single location. This slaughter had not been without purpose. The survival of his people through the coming winter was now ensured.
“Four days of raiding and you have not yet taken a woman,” said Decker.
Both Titon and his brother had blood spattered upon their clothes and carried bags full of meats, cheeses, and vegetables. Their side entrance into the canyon landed them into the richest Dogmen farms imaginable—rich in provisions, at least. Titon had still not found any of the jewelry or gems he sought that would allow him to keep his promise to Red. There were not even many of the demon-dogs their parents had told them stories of, and the ones that they had come across did not seem to Titon much like demons. It was mainly goats and pigs, farms and farmers, and none particularly good at defending what they had. Only one of their crew had been slain so far, and that was due to infighting over a wheel of cheese.
“But neither have I. I believe only the most desperate among us have. These Dogmen bitches are far uglier than I could have imagined!” Decker barked with laughter to drive home his point.
Even Titon had to chuckle at the observation, though he did not believe it to be true—at least not the part about Decker having taken no women as of yet. Unlovely though they may have been, Titon had seen Decker exiting a home with the need to retie his trousers, something rarely required after standard combat.
“Do you enjoy this, brother? The killing?” Titon asked.
“Eh. It is little more than slaughtering livestock,” said Decker with a shrug. “The only difference is we eat their supplies and not their flesh.”
Titon had found killing Dogmen to be crude and unsavory work, but nonetheless, it was empowering knowing how easy it was to take from these men all they had. The harsh training their father had put Decker and him through seemed to have more purpose now that he saw the results of those who went without such preparation.
“That does not mean I would not enjoy killing, should I find a man worthy of my axe,” added Decker.
With these words still echoing, the brothers crested a hill, and saw in the distance a solitary woman standing outside a small home. As a hawk can see a mouse from beyond a mile, so can a man see a woman who is of proper form and proportion. All of the men stopped and took notice that the figure in the distance did not share the same hunched back, oversized hips, or any other of the traits that seemed to plague the women in this region. From the corner of his eye, Titon could see Decker give him a nod, the meaning of which was clear. Titon did not expect himself to have been so quick to action, but he found he was sprinting toward the woman, hoping her face was as comely as h
er silhouette. Toward his rear he could hear his brother yelling, “To the victor, the spoils!” along with the hoots of the other men.
As he closed upon her, she did not flee. Her mind appeared to be trapped elsewhere, and she did not even seem to notice him nor look in his direction.
Perhaps she is simple. Not that it mattered. He would have his way with her just the same and think of Red all the while. It was the compromise he’d come up with to maintain an ideal of faith to her while still doing what was expected of him as a leader of men.
He was quite relieved to see she was indeed beautiful. She was perhaps of a mother’s age but certainly had a maiden’s figure. Her long brown hair was cared for every bit as well as Red’s, and her face had the glow of youth. Her eyes, however, carried in them an incredible depth of sadness. Somehow he knew that look, and it turned his stomach.
He grabbed her by the hair and dragged her inside. Titon then went from room to room in search of some sign of wealth. A woman as fair as this was sure to have some jewelry.
The home had a strong fire burning in the large stone hearth but reeked of demon-dogs. This was a home of those who slept with their foul creatures beside them, but the animals were nowhere to be seen. The mantles and shelves were cluttered with knickknacks, mostly ordinary stones that gave Titon a sinking feeling. These Dogmen were a strange people to put the prettiest among them in a tiny home adorned with worthless rocks, but he put the thought aside and bore down on the task at hand.
The woman struggled now, but slowly and weakly as a person might do while dreaming. He put her face closer to his so he could look upon her and stir himself to action, but the utter despondency he saw in her eyes again sickened him in spite of her lovely features. In a rage he threw her, face down, upon a small table in what looked to be the home’s kitchen. He could feel her firm form trapped beneath him, and he became more than ready for what must be done. He readjusted his grip on her hair, exposing her neck and ears, and yanked her head back with violence.
An image appeared in Titon’s mind, one most unsettling given the circumstances: his mother’s face, young and smiling. With outstretched arms she bade her new toddler approach her. Decker crawled to their mother through the lush grass of summer where he paused, lifted a knee, and stood. With bumbling steps, and undaunted by their father’s roar of laughter, Decker slogged his way toward their mother, the breeze pulling at her hair. Titon flinched as if caught in mischief when his mother’s eyes then darted toward him accusingly. And there her gaze lingered, captivated by some unknown force, unwilling or unable to glance at Decker as he finally reached her.
An overwhelming feeling of abhorrence flooded Titon as he returned to the present, his focus again on the woman he had pinned to the table.
Her ears, those small, slightly-pointed ears, the look of dejection in her eyes, the near-catatonic state, they were all so familiar because they were identical to the features of his own mother. They did not share the same face, nor color of hair, but the similarities they bore were unmistakable. Without thinking, Titon removed his knife and opened her neck with a single slice. Like you should have done years ago, Father.
Blood fountained out her wounded throat and upon the wooden floor. The house seemed to be growing smaller, trapping Titon inside. Scant relief came moments later when he saw that she had succumbed, but Titon still felt just as eager to be gone from this home.
He ransacked the few rooms of the house, hoping to find a hidden compartment or lockbox, but the most valuable item in the entire structure seemed to be a near worthless flint. Forced to check the woman’s body as a last resort, he found only an ill-fitting ring of crude metal on her finger. Perhaps Red will be touched by the sentiment, he thought. A ring of metal was after all a difficult thing to make and was only given by a man to a woman if he intended to bed no others. Crude that it may have been, it was obvious someone had spent many hours toiling to shape its pattern. It was better, he supposed, than coming back empty-handed.
The men made noise outside now, and they would surely wish to go through the belongings themselves to see if Titon had left anything of value. Titon tore the woman’s skirts to give the appearance of what had been expected. Then he put on his best fake grin of accomplishment and walked out of the home to be greeted by the half-taunting, half-cheering men to whom he felt no kinship. If this is all the glory of victory, he thought, I should surely hope to never taste defeat.
TALLOS
Tallos knew little of his father’s faith to which he had tried to be true, only what his mother had told him. He knew that one should not piss in a river, one should not sleep through the rising of the Dawnstar, and one must bury the bodies of the dead so they can return to the Mountain. He had obeyed all these laws of the three gods of his father. In return, they had taken from him everything.
Seemingly without effort, Tallos had also abided by all the tenets of the Faith, the religion of his fellow villagers: one should be kind and giving to one’s fellow man, one should be clean of mind and body, one should maintain monogamy and faithfulness to one’s spouse, and one must never eat nor burn the flesh of man. There were others, but these were the core beliefs shared by all villagers…and often abided the least by those who proclaimed themselves to be most pious.
And so he watched as the home he built with his wife and shared with his faithful companion began to burn. Great clouds of black smoke billowed as the tar packed between the logs caught fire, filling the sky with the taint of his hatred while he remembered what he had found within.
Why she was still inside when he had returned, he did not know. The door in the kitchen, the one that led to a narrow vine-covered pathway, able to be barred from the outside, remained unbroken. The front door had also not been broken or dislodged in any way. You let them inside? Tallos thought, unable to understand. What were you thinking?
His despair had turned to rage as he’d sat with her on the blood-covered floor, squeezing her cold body in his arms. He would never forgive himself for having left her, but he wondered if he could forgive her for not having done what together they had so carefully planned. He sought more reasons to justify his anger towards her, or at least to explain what to him made no sense. The house was in disarray, but the table he found her on still had objects upon it. Did you not even fight your attackers? Did you enjoy it, you whore?
He rid himself of his spiteful thoughts and shamed himself for even having had them. The men who attacked their village were savages; they could have killed her before raping her. He desperately hoped that was the case. And was he not truly the one who should be blamed? She had all but begged him not to leave, and he’d answered her pleas with frustration and anger. He thought of how fine she had looked the day he left. It seemed her aura of youth had never diminished over their many years together, and now it had been debased and snuffed out in the cruelest way imaginable. He thought of when he had tricked her into baring her breast during a dip in the brook, the many times they so happily tried to make a child, and the work and pride they’d shared upon completing their home. He thought also of when he brought her to meet Lia at the muddy riverbank. The memories tore at him.
Flames leapt to the roof where they danced defiantly, consuming in an instant the thatching that Leona had woven so perfectly as to always keep them dry, even during the worst of storms. The roof collapsed, sending an explosion of embers into the air that drifted with demonic grace. They would be burning now, Leona and Lia. It hurt him to know, but he embraced the pain. He needed their memory erased for his sanity. He needed to burn it out of the world and out of himself, but it would not yet let him be.
As he had sat on the kitchen floor with Leona, he’d heard a faint cry, and, for a moment, he had let himself believe it could be his wife. Putting her at arm’s length, searching for some sign of hope, all he saw was the same lifeless corpse with the smiling wound on its neck. It was no longer the wife he had loved. It was a laughing husk, a horrible reminder of what he’d had and what
he’d thrown away, but he was as gentle with her body as if she were merely unconscious as he laid her down, not wanting to leave her. Hearing the cry again, he sunk yet deeper.
He found Lia lying in front of the hearth as he had left her. She was saturated in blood, some dry and some still sticky wet. The bandage he had made for her was not adequate to staunch the flow, and that the trickle had all but ceased was only due to her having so little left to lose. Without the strength left to lift her head, her eyes begged him to fix her. Clinging to life, she looked confused as to why he had waited so long to pull the thorn from her paw, to give her relief. There was nothing he could do to save her, however. She was far worse than he had expected. Even with a flint and quick fire his efforts likely would have resulted only in lengthening her torment. He had only to end her suffering or watch her slowly die, and having had made a promise to himself to never again avoid the path of action, he removed the knife from his belt. But as he saw the dull luster of his small blade, he could not help but imagine it to be little different than the one used to kill Leona. He could not cut Lia’s throat. Loss of blood did not kill as quickly as one might think. It would simply cause her more pain.
“I am sorry, girl,” he’d sobbed with tears in his eyes. He stroked her head where she had no wounds, trying to comfort her as he put his head beside hers. But she had lacked the strength to lick his face. “I’m going to help you.”
Lia’s breaths came rapid and labored as she foolishly fought to stay alive so that he could save her. Unable to bear allowing her to hurt any longer, he hoisted the iron kettle from the hearth above his head and looked into her sad, confused eyes a final time. Images of her as a pup dirtying Leona’s dress on their first meeting barraged him. The horrific injustice too much to bear, he’d screamed out with rage and fury when the deed was done, hoping it would stir the very gods that had forsaken him.
The Axe and the Throne (Bounds of Redemption Book 1) Page 19
