“That sword is too heavy for you.” The man said with a laugh as Goldie unbalanced and nearly toppled over. Farirkar walked to a nearby pile of weapons and drew out a single-handed mace and a small shield that buckled to the arm. “Try this. I think it’ll suit you”
Goldie buckled the light shield to his arm and held the mace. It felt good in his hand.
“Now why are we doing this again?” asked Farirkar as he swung his huge axe down at Goldie, forcing him to jump and roll smoothly across the hard packed sand. He rolled to his feet and spinning faster, this time, shoved the man hard with his shield in the side. Farirkar grinned as he was pushed slightly by it.
“Cause I’m fucking angry and this is better than drinking,” Goldie said.
He dropped the mace, one mention of drink and he was thirsty now. He’d been beaten by the tireless mercenary for more than an hour since they had made camp. The sun had fallen and the cold of night was starting to creep in. He’d felt it now he’d stopped panting and the sweat that made his shirt cling to him started to cool.
“Why so angry?” Farirkar asked, tossing Goldie a skin that held some red wine.
“You know why, this king, he’s got us on killers duties, you think Quest and his men will come along quietly as we kill twenty of his people, you think our northern lads will like the fact were killing wise women and the third one, he thinks I don’t know what that is but I do. I bloody know and I won’t do it,” he said, taking a big drink of the warm wine and wincing.
“What’s there? Some gambling den, my boys told me. Dogs, pit fights, card games, hey that does sound like you!” He said.
“It’s more than that; it’s the temple of the lucky lady. That’s how they show her love,” Goldie said.
“By cheating each other at cards, drinking, and fighting?” Farirkar laughed.
“Yes, doesn’t it sound perfect?” Goldie said back” We have to get out of this contract, the king has men following us and he’s going to see pretty quickly we're not doing the job,” he said.
“We will if your friends are warning them all. I’d say your right, but we’re not really in a position to take on the king,” Farirkar said.
“How many mercenary armies are there from here? Cravosi? The north, the desert, how many in total? Enough to fight back right?” Goldie said.
“Oh fuck, no, don’t even think it.” Farirkar raised his axe again. “Come on, you’re still clearly angry”
He was angry. His whole life he’d walked the line of the criminal, he never viewed himself as a bad person. Not truly evil just one to press the limit of the laws and what was acceptable, he was a charming rogue like the stolen books he’d read as a runaway to teach himself the art. Still at every turn, there were people trying to get him to do their dirty work. It was always the same. The nobles used other poor people against themselves, they never got their hands dirty themselves but they sure would happily pay for it, if it kept their own soft hands clean.
He’d never been one for gods and worship. His mother was an extremely superstitious Northern slave who was frankly lacking in the brains that the gods gave an ox. She was a slightly more attractive female version of Flint and Stone. His father was a crooked tradesman whose only gods were drinking and trying to get a few gold coins out of any situation. When he’d run from them he’d ended up at the lucky ladies temple.
His first job, actually getting paid to do something was to help keep a small wine stall that sat resting against its outside wall. He was big for a youngster and his gift of counting coins was a blessing for the owner who allowed his patrons to buy in the coins of their homelands. His whole life luck was always with him, every time something went wrong he knew it would work out not quite as bad as it possibly could. Sure he might get beaten but not to death when that drunk had stabbed him, the blade had missed anything vital. If he tripped over in the street it was likely over something of value and women had always liked him a lot more than his looks should have allowed, that was the lucky lady, shining out from their eyes He liked thinking he had someone in the whole world who actually gave a shit about him. She was the only one who ever had and he’d not raise a blade against her now, not for any amount of gold coins and empty promises of a noble.
***
Grimm had ridden through the night. The moon cast a bright light across the landscape and it was easy to guide his horse around the occasional rock or uneven piece of ground. The steed had proven itself and kept up a solid canter for the last few hours, now it was beginning to slow and falter, he could feel his own legs were wet and cold with the sweat coming from the animal. He slowed down to a trot and cast his eyes around him, there were more shapes now, more rocks and small trees. Grimm stopped his horse and slowly dismounted. He could feel the presence of life around him but knew they would give him time to prepare, they would test him and his knowledge.
Grimm let his horse wander away from him into the night, taking only his sword and axe from its side. With the tip of his sword blade, he drew a large circle in the dirt with him in the middle. He hoped as Minsetta had said only northern weapons could pass. As he drew the circle, he thought of home. The trees and snow, the strength needed to live in that place and the beauty of its austerity. He sang songs in his mind of home. When it was done he looked off into the darkness, there was certainly someone there, but all he could see was sand and stones.
“I’m ready,” he said in the desert tongue loudly.
Within a heartbeat, a hand cut arrow painted bright red came flying from the darkness. He flinched back by instinct as it hit the air in front of him and glanced off as if it hit a well-held shield. He laughed to himself, thank fuck he thought. Three more arrows came from the dark and all bounced off the solid air. He heard gruff laughter from the darkness and then he saw them. They appeared from the darkness, the sand and the very stones. He saw some were dressed in clothes painted like the land and were crouching in the dark. Some hid in the shallow sands and others had small branches and twigs across their bodies, there was, at least, twenty, so the whole tribe.
A woman walked in front of him and regarded him, her bow dropped to her side, held in her hand. She was younger than him but, at least, thirty name days. Tall for a woman, dark skin, and dark hair. She wore a leather patch across her eye which had a white circle painted on it. Her clothes matched. Tight leather pants and a sleeveless top that showed her dark arms and firm stomach, it was dark crisscross of symbols in dark scars. She pulled the eye patch aside and looked at him with strong dark eyes, then she smiled, it lit up her face with perfect white teeth and humor.
“Well-crafted word fortress,” she said, or something like that, her tongue was a bit off from what he knew, but then again they’d been here a long time along and probably spoke their own dialect now. How did he know things like this, he thought.
“Thank you,” he said with a little bow, she was clearly the leader. “I’m Grimm and I’ve come to warn you of a great threat,” he said.
“You mean your friend who leads 600 of so red-faced killers to our home with pouches fat with the king’s gold,” she said back.
He was crestfallen. What had he expected though? These were the people that taught the Gatherers their tricks.
“That’s the one,” he said.
She laughed, seeing the look of disappointment on his face.
“Never fear, hero. They serve their purpose in bringing you to us, now we can speak properly,” she stood forward and with her two hands made a fast clawing motion through the air that was his circle. The power tore like paper and with a loud sound, like the wind ripping a canvas sail. She reached into the circle, took his hand and led him out.
“Don’t be afraid, Grimm. You’re one of us, we know it,” she said.
He walked with her dark hand in his across the sand. His boot sinking into it, her gliding on top on soft furred sandals. The others of her tribe leading the way, giving them privacy. In the distance, he could see firelight and the faint outlines of
a few small huts and skinny animals tied up to rough wooden railings.
“Are you white eyes’ child, is that why you have the eye patch,” he asked.
“I think you’ll know the answer if you simply search for it within yourself, many before you came to us, the Gatherers, curious children asking all the questions you would,” she said.
Grimm cast his mind back as they walked. He’d not delved too deep into the memories he held. There were too many, hundreds and hundreds of voices it was like trying to pick a whisper from a screaming crowd. He knew a face, Elizebetha’s father, he’d seen a portrait of him in the Keep. Kindly and soft but deep grey eyes that looked like a brewing storm. He focused on the man and saw him sitting in the sand, an old man by his side. He had two eyes that were white and blind, he spoke to the man, a different white eyes.
“You’re not his child but you hold the most power in the clan,” they were a clan, not a tribe. In years past they would bandage a child’s eyes and turn them white and blind but now they just where the patch instead. Why?” he asked.
“Being blinded was supposed to give more power, a greater connection with the unseen or some bullshit, but I’m not sure it ever did, besides it’s awful and pointless. I like being able to see, besides our gods have lessened in their demands of us as ours have of them,” she said.
Grimm had no idea what that meant, there was still so much he didn’t know.
They had reached the small camp. The other members of the clan put down spears, bows, and their long hooked swords and welcomed him by the fire. As they sat he saw people coming from the tents, children, women and all the men too old to fight, there was ,at least, a hundred of them. The small children ran around him like a flock of small birds, they reached out and touched his white skin and ran off laughing as he spoke to them in his version of their tongue.
She laughed at him and shooed them away. Gripping his wrist like a fellow warrior she shook. “I’m Seek,” she held out her hands. “And these are the people your friend is coming to kill.”
“He doesn’t want to clearly, that’s why he sent me,” Grimm said back, taking the offered seat and drink of warmish milk. It was laced with something that tasted like grain alcohol.
“He doesn’t, but his new master does. What do you know of the king and his legion of eagles?” she said.
“Not a lot, they call themselves the Order of the Learned. They hate the gods it seems, they hate powers and rituals, they like rules and order, they are bald as cocks as we’d say back home,” he said.
She laughed. “They are very dangerous, the face you see of them is just the new face, they have been around for hundreds and hundreds of years,” she said.
“Doing what,” He asked.
“Doing what their god tells them to, spreading fear in his name. We have seen his work in this world and the other and your friend the one called. Seth.” She actually laughed. “He has upset his plans so very badly.”
Grimm laughed at himself, it would be like Seth to ruin the plans of a god without knowing it. “In what way?” Grimm asked.
“This is a war Grimm, we left our own lands hundreds of years ago because the worship of the sun was outlawed, our people are all but converted to the Pellosi ways now. We call the sun the many faced bringer, he is the sun and the rain, the flame and the water but as we were weakened so was he. Our legends say he fought a great monster and was in prison, but the Druheim set him free.”
“But the sun was only gone in the land of the dead, not here?” Grimm asked.
“True, the many faced bringer was too strong here in this place, but weak in the land of the moon children, they made him weak and trapped him”
“Why?” Grimm said knowing well the answer.
“The sun brings hope, it brings light and happiness. They want to create darkness and fear, where there is no light there is no hope.”
Chapter Nineteen.
Seth walked from the now deserted decks of The Opulent. The huge ship was resting against a small pier clearly not built for such a massive vessel. He knew it well and had spent much time here as a boy, it was near his hometown of Bloodcrest. Checking his weapons one more time, Seth took a deep breath in of the familiar cold air of home and walked down the wooden plank to the dock.
It was a typical northern day like he’d not seen in such a very long time. His voyage from here to the land of the dead had only been something like a year but he was not the same simple boy who had left. He’d been filled with so many simple dreams and hopes to do his Volk proud and show the northern skill in the city guard, now look at him. He had no idea if they would be proud of him or throw rotten food like he was a criminal in the stocks. Still this was clearly not his home, it looked and smelled the same but again it seemed false, like painted props and stagecraft.
As Seth walked up the small pier he saw two men appear from the fog. They were dressed in the house colors of Bloodcrest and carried typical broadswords across their backs. They were massive weapons, useless for fighting in a group, best for the lone fighter against many. Very typically northern.
One of the men stepped forward. Seth recognized his face, as one of the hundreds of men he’d trained with during his two years at Bloodcrest.
“The duke would see you boy, you’re not meant to be here,” the man said simply.
He stood behind Seth and shoved him roughly in the back, the other drew his blade and they pointed Seth towards the Keep. He could fight them but what was the point, they were already dead, but he wasn’t.
Seth walked through the township and was shocked by how small it all was. Bloodcrest, once the big city in his mind now just a tiny collection of muddy streets and ill made trading stalls off rotting and unpainted wood. The whole town would fit inside the Pellota spice district. As Seth walked he looked to the side. Some stalls were filled with people and others empty. One was a weapons trader Seth remembered buying his first sword from. A very dented and nicked thing over a hundred years old if it was a day and not in a good way. It had cost him all his father had given him. He couldn’t come before the duke with the carved wooden thing he’d practiced with.
Seth stepped forward the trader and the man smiled at him shaking his hand, he was a flat faced man, fat and jovial, born to be a trader.
“Well met young Seth, how’s your father,” he said.
“Not here I hope,” Seth said back, feeling the cold of the man’s hand, he had a large stab wound in his chest. His shirt was ripped showing the gaping and bloodless wound.
The man looked down at it. “I know, fucking thieves, well anyway I’ve got something for you.”
The man walked from the counter and opening a long chest pulled out a long heavy broadsword placed on the counter before him. It was a fine weapon, sharp and well made, with the Bloodcrest symbol etched in the hilt.
“I’ll trade you for your Pellosi toothpicks, you will be laughed at if you carry those noble weapons around here,” he said.
Seth looked at the sword and could tell it was worth a lot more than his current ones. They could be noble’s weapons but this had the look of a king’s sword, the man also spoke truly. Seth pulled free his rapier and dagger and gave them to the man. He undid his belt and passed him the hilts as well. Seth strapped the large blade across his back and the once familiar weight of one felt good.
The trader smiled. “A good price?” he asked.
“A little too good for me I feel,” he said back.
“Well I have some shit to make up for it seems, now off you go, don’t keep the duke waiting.”
Seth was shoved again by the guards and kept moving. Soon they were at the large wooden gates of the Keep. There was only a handful of guards and the people in the town were even fewer. Seth had no idea how this worked, did people come here once they died just to keep living out their same old boring lives in death? It seemed fairly bleak.
He was shoved once again inside the Keep. Seth walked towards where he knew the duke would be. The main
room held a huge fireplace and table. Many men would sit around it. Thains and Carls of the duke. To have a seat at that table was a thing of pride. Once again the room seemed small. He saw the duke as he approached. The man still looked fearsome. He was Northern through and through. Furs against the cold, strong bear arms and a simple metal circlet on his head. The man smiled as Seth entered.
Seth walked calmly in front of him and bowed, this was the man who had trained him and given him a purpose.
“Well met, my lord, good to see you, in a way,” Seth said.
“True enough boy, surely good to see a friendly face and less good to know I’m dead, but I died well, fighting which is good for a duke, quite hard to achieve these days,” he said with a laugh.
“I’ve only been gone a year,” Seth said.
“A lot happens in a year as you well know,” he said, then shaking his head, he stepped down and took Seth’s shoulder.
“You have fucked everything up boy, one you’re alive and here which is wrong, second you have broken many of our codes and then exceeded some others beyond belief. There are things interested in you that have no right speaking on such matters as Northern deaths. I’m here to prepare you. If you’re are truly the Druheim then all is forgiven, a soldier of fate has no choice in the path he’s guide to, however if you’re just a misguided idiot we’ve got a problem.”
Seth was filled with fear but pushed it down, he had no idea what he was but he would face this the same way he’d faced everything else, by running headlong into it and hope for the best.
Take My Heart...: Dark Ages - Fantasy (Dark Gods & Tainted Souls Book 3) Page 8
