“Of course, of course. Mia!” A young woman emerged from the sodden mass, weary and bolstered at the same time. “Would you take them to the town hall? There should be some room.”
“Not enough, Father. We’ll be lucky if half of these people will fit.” She sighed at the hopelessness of the situation. “Come with me.”
Sylver and Oliver were led along a side path that kept them behind the houses and clear from the mob already clogging the main streets. Sylver heard them though, the frightened tales of rape and pillage, the fear and the hatred, the innocence snatched from them by monsters that shared their skin and nothing more. She shivered with guilt, and shivered again at the fanatical light in Oliver’s eyes.
“Do you know if any of your family survived?”
“Samuel was my only child. He’d just come back from a hunt. He thinks...he thought he was a great hunter. Wouldn’t shut up about it. I’ll be greater than this legendary hunter, he kept saying.” She paused, withdrew herself to combat a great tremor through her body. “The last thing I said to my son is that he was worthless.”
The town hall was not a town hall, Mia was saying. It was an inn at first, hundreds of years ago, when the Amden kings of old announced an expansive colonization. Only the plague had swept the lands, and the money meant to furnish the king’s grip on his kingdom went to leeches and humors in a desperate attempt to ward the Black Death. Something of the wealth must have found its way here, for a great portion of the inn was pure marble, etched with gold leaves. The rest of the building was oak and pine and hickory. I’ve seen worse.
It was also buzzing with activity. The whole town was up in arms, giving out bowls of soup, a used blanket, or simply a willing ear. It’s working. Before tonight, the people of Naven thought the war was simply a peddler’s tale to these people on the countryside. Now the war had a face. Now the war had a voice. It was all frighteningly real because it was now on their doorstep. The people were galvanized to fight over a town that didn’t exist. Yes, it was working. It was working very, very well.
Yet appearances had to be kept, and so she let Oliver guide her to a table at the heart of the room. Involuntarily she scanned the chamber, noting every detail before reminding herself she was not a soldier tonight. Still, it was a monumental effort to feign a smile.
“Everything’s working perfectly,” Oliver whispered. “Just like the Tactician said.”
Just like that the mental alarms shrilled louder than ever. “My dear, can you speak of these plans? We have won, after all.”
“I’m afraid not, dearest. The plans are still in motion.”
“Plans?” A grimace touched her words despite herself. “What plans?”
“It is not of your concern. You must trust me that I know best.”
It was best that the fool left the table to acquire drinks; Sylver was nearly ready to smash that insipid look off his face. He knows best? He knew nothing, best or otherwise. Sylver skimmed through every memory she had of the ruthless Tactician and growled inwardly when she realized she was chasing whispers.
“Sylver.”
Involuntarily she looked up. A willowy flower of a girl slid into the seat opposite to her, face calm and eyes sparkling. Looking on her face drudged some degree of familiarity, but Sylver couldn’t exactly place it.
Then her words penetrated. She knows my name. Impossible, of course. Great pains had gone into the fabrication of a new persona. Sometimes at night there were moments that her true identity eluded her. But those doubts had never had been given form, much less a whisper. “Who are you?”
“A friend.” But the glance that preceded was a twisted knot of emotion. Her eyes...so familiar. “It is time for you to go.”
“I can’t go until Mint falls.”
But the girl shook her-honey-blonde hair. The way it brushed her shoulders from side to side...who was this girl? “The Tactician’s plan calls for the mobilization of all true believers to lay siege to an ancient fort called the Hawk’s Wing, leaving a skeletal crew to defend the town.”
“But you think that makes a difference.”
“Half a league to the northeast is a legion of Solvicar. They know of the Tactician’s over-extension. Once the Coicro men had cordoned themselves off, the Vicars plan to ambush the town. It will be in their hands within the day.”
‘How do you know this?” The girl...so familiar. But from where?
“I’m not allowed to answer those questions, Sylver.” Somehow her tiny hand clasped Sylver’s. “Your task is done. Mint will fall.” She began to pull away, but Sylver stopped her with a simple squeeze.
“I know you from somewhere.”
The girl’s face melted into a gratifying smile. “I’ve always wondered about you. Father told me all the stories, shown me pictures. But to meet you face-to-face, it’s more amazing than I ever thought.” Now she pulled away, and there were tears in her eyes. Her head craned back and she said, “I’m ready now.”
Who are you talking to? But Sylver couldn’t find her voice. She could only see the feathers of glowing gold swirl around the girl’s body. “I wish we had more time,” came the girl’s voice, light and incandescence. “Go to Irismil.” There was a string of words, but the golden energy swirled up to block the sound.
Then she was gone.
For an eternity Sylver just sat there, frozen in disbelief. Those words...they had been soft, but not enough for the ranger’s trained ear. Goodbye, Mother.
Sylver brushed fresh tears from her eyes. Travelling with a Weirwynd lover meant truths of the strangest origins. But this isn’t one of those times. It’s impossible. Yet the thoughts rang false. Unbidden the ranger’s hands went to the swell of her belly. Goodbye, Mother. Goodbye. Sylver didn’t know what to believe.
She faded into the night like she had been trained to do. No one saw her leave, no one even remembered her. About half an hour later a mass of torches descended upon the village, touching it ever so briefly and then followed to Mint, leaving a charnel house in its wake. Sylver felt no pity for those misled rebels. They would have met misfortune regardless of her presence. Only the words were slightly hollower than she’d liked. Snarling at herself, Sylver kicked her new horse towards the horizon and never looked back.
LXVIII
“Where are they?”
Orson had come across this land in his exile, a long time ago. The Whitecrest Hills, they called it, for the fringes of clouds hanging just shy of the horizon. The Rhine River wound a dazzling steam in and out of the hills like a serpent of diamonds. The water there was always fresh, said the local legends, and they were right too. The river was the finest and freshest water he’d ever tasted. As twilight began to fall Orson remembered a time, long, long ago, when he watched the sun set. That was the first dreamless night since he fled the only home he’d ever known.
All it was gone now. The once green hills were torn away by man and flame to form the trenches made so famous in the Greeniron Conflict. They didn’t even bother to call it a war. The Pinecones of Amden, frustrated with repeated japes when out of earshot, or the plays and songs the noble-folk thought the family too stupid to realize the parody. Anger clouded their judgment. The Hills were to be theirs, they said. One of them said that the hills looked like pair after pair of green tits. Now men would vent upon how the breasts of Whitecrest were ripped away to make for the vein-like garrisons housing all those fools desperate for land and wealth.
And now, caught in Orson’s vice-like grip, was the man responsible for it all.
“You will pay for this!” Orson tightened his hold just to see the man’s eyes bulge from the sockets. “You don’t want to fuck with me! My family will hunt yours down! They will grind their bones and piss on their
wounds!”
Orson threw the nobleborn fool to a ground now more red than green. He scrambled back as far as the manacles would allow. They were a lucky find, them and the chains and most especially the hammers. They were too heavy for a single man, but the hate in Orson’s veins gave him strength and more.
“Damn you! Don’t you know who I am?”
No, but I don’t have to. A million times, he saw men like him. A million times a million. The father cracking a whip across the shoulders of his children. The con artist gulling old women of their silver. The sultry charmer, hiding behind a mask of smiles to better fuck daughters into marriage. The kind of man who tortured small animals for a taste of power, and the kind of man who tortured people just to revel in their cries. Oh yes, Orson knew this man. He knew this man very, very well.
“Talk. And I might let you live.”
There were no words to be said. One moment the man looked ready to give up his own mother, the next there was a black blur and an entire quarter of his head wasn’t there anymore. In a moment that stretched forever Orson saw the glimmering of light shining upon the blood sluicing from the brain, that rich ripe gray shower of brain bits. Cerberus was at the center of it all, devouring the meat as if starved for centuries.
“What the hell were you thinking?”
HE WAS A COICRO. WE KILL COICRO.
“He was a physician, you idiots! Just a cog in their machine! He knew where other laboratories were! We could have saved dozens from his confessions!”
HE WAS A COICRO. WE KILL COICRO.
Somewhere inside Orson felt something break. Staring into the three heads of his great big hound gave him pause. He realized he was looking at a dark mirror. They stared at Orson oddly when he cradled the poor fool against his chest. He felt the needles of their glares prick into his back like a pincushion. Orson kept walking until a serviceable town came into view and a priest to call for the last rites. Still the triplets did not understand, and Orson was in no mood to explain.
The priest held a prayer amidst a garden of weeds. The congregation was pitifully small, even for a flyspeck village like this one. Mothers clutched their children to ward them from the cold. Orson grimaced. Their clothes were so ratty and torn that their embrace was little protection for themselves, much less their children. Half of them looked one foot in the grave, and the other half would be in the ground by night’s end.
“What are they doing?” It was Apple that spoke, the red-blue elemental. Orson ground his teeth. Apparently, the spells that fused themselves together left them witless of any life they had before.
“Having a funeral.” Orson tried not to look directly at the elemental, at the crimson and azure thrashing out like living anger. That was another oddity. They had walked straight through towns just like this one with nary a second glance to be cast. Part of their eldritch arsenal, it seemed, was to cast spells that kept mortal folk from recognizing them. Or something like that. Stromgald’s the Weirwynd, not me.
“Funeral.” That was Orange, rolling the word in his mouth, chewing on it as eyes glazed in a futile search for memory. He was gold and green, looking nothing more than a walking, talking piece of snot. “What’s a funeral?”
“A funeral is when the living pays their last respects to the dead, and to return them to the earth’s embrace before ascending to Heaven.”
“Embrace?” Banana. Sky-blue and steel. Out of the three, Banana was the one asking the most questions. Maybe he was just stupid. “Why bury the dead if the goal is to ascend into Heaven?”
“It’s complicated.” But their minds were already latched on to a new display: the sound of sobbing mingled with the hardy grunts of fucking. “Why do they hump with two legs?” The dog in them. First it was a laugh. Now it had grown obsessively old. “We like to take them from behind.”
Only you never fucked a woman before. The thought recalled the trysts with the hound master’s kennel a few weeks back. Orson was no stranger to the dominatrix’s lust, but even he winced when he saw the triplets were fucking the dogs in mortal form. Running from an angry mob was not a treasured memory.
“I don’t understand why we’re here.” Banana whined. Why did they have to inherit the most annoying of children’s traits? “We should be killing more Coicro.”
Orson sighed. “We’ve been doing that for a week. I’m tired. I need a break.”
“We don’t need breaks,” Orange declared. “We never get tired.”
Yes. I am aware. They certainly proved that with the ceaseless howling at the moon. The damn thing wasn’t even full yet. It took hours to convince the three that yes, they could tear anyone they wanted into tiny pieces, but the mindless slaying would bring them unwanted attention. “The Coicro will be harder to kill if they know we’re coming.”
The triplets were unconvinced. “It’s more fun that way.”
Orson sighed. A giant three-headed dog capable of astounding destruction, and there were no consequences whatsoever. Brilliant, jackass. Just fucking brilliant.
The rest of the town was far less hospitable. Orson caught only glimpses and flashes of faces through rotten windows, and those who paused glared at them with slitted eyes. An able-bodied man with swords was next to useless in winter. Swords couldn’t keep the crops from withering, or make chopped wood less brittle. All a sword could do was slice pinecones from struggling branches. If things continued as they were, then the village folk would eat the things by the bushel. Even if the pine’s needles would shred tongue and throat, they’d eat and ask for seconds.
The town well inched into their view. Once it had been a mighty thing of stone. Time and the elements had eaten it alive; scouring the well so bad only flecks of gray remained to tell passerby it had once been stone. Hushed giggles rose from the well, undeniable proof that children squatted in the dark. Orson had to bodily tear the triplets away from the well.
“Why do they sit in the well?”
Orson sighed. “In the summer children would hide in the well for some shade.”
Orange shook his head. “But it’s not summer. It’s winter. They’ll freeze to death down there.”
Freezing to death was a better alternative than watching parents change from guardians to vultures, or to lose hands a finger at a time to the merciless cold. Orson knew the answer wouldn’t satisfy them, so he said nothing and continued down the rough path twisting through the snow. Orson took one last look at the small village. It was small even from the fences. The winter will kill them. It’ll reach up and swallow them whole. And that inevitably happened there would a score of villages ready to take its’ place. It was the way of things when the king’s eye was blind to the fringes of his kingdom.
The winter slackened somewhat. The wind whistled through the clothing to sear the skin before whistling out. Orson didn’t mind. Searing was better than feeling nothing at all. A glance at the triplets saw them shivering, but they kept their peace. Most of the time.
“Why are we walking?” Banana whined.
“Because everyone knows what we look like.”
“You should have let us kill everyone,” Apple ground his teeth. “Then we wouldn’t be here.”
Kill everyone. The thought was tempting, but no. Not after what they did. They looked like little boys, talked like little boys, but they were anything but. No child could rip into the enemy with such obvious glee. Everyone with so much as a speck of silver was harried down and killed. Orson felt the same fear as before. I thought I could control them. They know nothing else. Firmly the Northborn ranger set the idea aside. Don’t be making excuses for them. They lie at the heart of this.
The countryside was crisp and white and glaring, heavy with the silence of the dirge. What were at first glance
irregular mounds of snow eventually became ratty old farmhouses, abandoned by the families and raped by the elements. Orson took special care of where he walked after the first one. It was entirely possible that the families lay beneath his boots, entombed by ice forevermore. The prospect did not stir Orson in the slightest, but he feared the triplets’ reaction. With their impatience, the dead might bolster them to even greater bloodlust, and in-fighting when there was no battle to be had.
“I want to run.” Orange complained.
“No.” Orson knew what that meant. They wanted to merge into Cerberus and streak down the road like black lightning, obstacles be damned.
“Why not?”
“Because I said so.”
“You’re not our father.” Banana sneered. Already in his eyes Orson saw the first crackles of their transformation. Orson forced himself into the best imitation of his own father. Eyes slitted and glaring, a frown so hard it nearly cracked the chin, and arms as large and foreboding as a pair of tree trunks, folded across the chest. It worked to mollify the triplets, but they saw the fractures of their relations and knew the bluff would eventually fade. When that happens...Orson shoved the thought aside and kept walking.
The hours passed remade the path into hell. Towers of bulbous black smoke oozed upward like a blot on the sky. Sometimes there were voices, women’s voices, crying out for mercy when outlaws robbed and raped them. Sometimes the ravens beat them to it, plucking and stabbing their organs of choice. There was one particularly large black cloud on the third day of travel. The triplets watched raptly, fascinated and repulsed at one of the same time. When Orson finally cast a bone and the cloud exploded into a thousand crying ravens, they pouted and glared at the man that stole their entertainment.
Far too often they found themselves on the remains of a battle. Entire fields of snow were red with blood. Severed heads and limbs were everywhere. It was sheer chance that they found a body that was whole and not yet claimed by scavengers. This one, like so many others, was nude. Someone had stripped them clean.
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