March till Death (Hellsong Book 3)

by Shaun O. McCoy

  The fight of the lovers ended with the girl leaving. Martin saw her run across the village, dodging between hovels. She made it to the chamber’s exit and ran out into the wilds.

  “Sarah!” the boy shouted after her.

  Martin watched him run by those same hovels.

  “Shit man, I know what that guy feels like,” Martin told Benson. “But I need to talk to you. I need to talk to you bad. I’ve been through some serious shit. I know you’ve heard about the Kyle-thing. I’m scared, Bense. I’m real scared. And the worst part is, you know, that I can’t tell nobody about it. I have to be all strong and shit now. I can’t tell nobody but you.”

  Benson’s still, lifeless eyes stared out across the village.

  “Oh, you’re worried about the couple?” Martin asked. “Don’t worry, they’ll be fine. Katie and I are like that, too. Sometimes. But we manage, you know. We manage. Look, I’ve got to tell you what I’ve been thinking. That Kyle-thing, it got in my head. It’s fucked me up, deep down. I think the whole battle did, really. I was scared, Bense. I was scared like a leader can’t let themselves be, you know. But Chelsea, she brought me out of it. She brought me . . .”

  Martin stopped mid sentence and stared at Benson more closely. “She brought me . . .” He wanted to say more but he couldn’t. Benson’s eyes were the same as ever, just as shrunken. Just as lifeless. His cheeks were just as hollow. He was a man with the stilling, after all.

  No. Please not this.

  The staring eyes were dry. The man’s emaciated chest was still.

  “Bense?”

  Martin leaned forward, putting a hand in front of the still man’s mouth. He felt nothing. He pushed a little on Benson’s chest. No response.

  Martin felt as if he’d had the wind knocked out of him. He let his head fall back against the stone wall of the Fore.

  Ole Bense had died.

  Molly found Cris more intimidating, more intriguing, than any man she’d ever met. It had been easy, as they crept through the Carrion, for her to avoid speaking to him. Now, however, while they sat and waited for the coming of their contact—supposedly safe in this stone room—she was drawn to him. She wasn’t looking at him, but she could feel where he was.

  I should talk to him.

  The idea scared her in a way that crawling through the Carrion did not.

  What would I say?

  She had every right to talk to him of course. He wouldn’t think less of her. Hell, he owed her at least that much for crossing half of Hell to deliver his message. Even more so because now she was going to become an infidel herself. He should at least be okay with talking to her, even if he didn’t want to sleep with her.

  But there was danger, too. He and El Cid had something. An understanding, perhaps; a past, definitely—and maybe something more. Realistically, Molly wasn’t sure how anyone, let alone herself, was going to be able to compete with a force like El Cid. The girl moved mountains. She fought bare handed against harpies and won. The infidels, even Cris, leapt to do her bidding. And she had that human shadow, that blond haired six-foot-plus Adonis of death they called Aiden, following at her heel.

  Aiden is Cris’ son, but is El Cid his mother?

  Molly stood up, ducking her head to avoid hitting the low ceiling, and walked down the narrow chamber, passing the infidels. She sat down next to Cris.

  Cris glanced up at her from the M-16 he was cleaning before looking over towards where Aiden stood watch at the room’s exit.

  Molly realized her hands were shaking, so she put them behind her in the small of her back and let her weight push them into the stone. “How long do we wait?”

  Cris shrugged and then went back to his work. He was brushing out the trigger mechanism. “Malkravyan will be along. There was probably trouble, if he’s this late, but I would trust him to come out on top of it.”

  “That Minotaur we saw? The one with one horn?”

  Cris shrugged again. “Could be.”

  “Aiden seems very close to El Cid.”

  Cris held the trigger mechanism up, though there was very little light, and examined it. “She helped raise him,” He held the trigger closer to his eyes and peered at it. “since he was a young man.”

  “She’s not his mother?”

  Cris shook his head and started to reassemble his weapon. “No. Aiden’s mother fucked him up. Nearly turned him into a wight. You have no idea how hard I had to fight to save him. El Cid made that possible.”

  “Your son is very beautiful,” she said, and then immediately regretted it.

  He shrugged for a third time. “I breed well.”

  She laughed softly. “Do you think if we had a child, he would look as good?”

  Cris grinned slyly. “A gentle touch, you show, when you like a guy.”

  Her heart froze in her chest.

  He’s an infidel. They speak openly and honestly about things that we would only hint at. I said nothing out of line, and nor did he.

  “You and El Cid, do you love each other?”

  “Off and on,” he answered.

  “Is there room, in your heart, for another?”

  Cris folded up the cloth kit which held the tools he’d used to clean his rifle. He tucked it into his pack.

  He did not, however, answer.

  “I crossed Hell for you,” she said. “I went and found an Infidel Friend, just like you asked. I brought them back while you healed. I abandoned everyone I knew for you. My entire village, my best friend. I need to know if it was a good choice.”

  She looked intently at Cris, but it was Aiden’s whisper which came to her ears.

  “He’s coming.”

  Now? He had to come now?

  “They would be,” Cris said.

  Molly wasn’t sure what he was talking about. “What?”

  “Our hypothetical child, I think they’d be as beautiful.”

  Julian’s soul was like the pick, and Selena, she was like the rock. She thought she was hard, she thought her faith was strong, she thought that she was in control—but that was just because she’d never met true faith. True faith was like steel.

  He thought of this as he slammed his pick against the stone. In the beginning, his hands had formed blisters. Those blisters had bled, making the handle hard to grip. The pain had driven him mad. But now his hands were as rough as cured dyitzu skin.

  In the beginning, he had hit the rock as hard as he could with every blow. It had taken so much out of him. He didn’t understand how the others could work for so long, but now he knew the secret. Now he knew that he didn’t have to swing hard, just fast, and that the weight of the pick would do all the work—and just like his faith would make mincemeat of Selena’s belief in Ahuramazda, so too did the rock crumble into rubble beneath his rapid blows.

  Brother Jeremy was coming. He was the only Christian that Julian knew of on this detail, though he thought there might have been others. There was an empty wicker basket in his hand. He stumbled and fell. Nearby, one of Selena’s darkly dressed soldiers stood watch. Julian hurried to Jeremy and helped him to his feet.

  He must be near exhaustion.

  “Are you okay, brother?” Julian asked him.

  But when he saw Jeremy’s face he knew the man was not tired at all.

  Jeremy gripped Julian’s wrist so hard it hurt. “George has been taken to a Little Lady,” he whispered. “They suspect him of fostering a rebellion.”

  Julian felt cold. A shiver ran along his body from his feet to his shoulders. He wanted to ask Jeremy more, but that soldier was looking right at them. Julian watched his fellow Christian walk away. Jeremy was still feigning tiredness, but when he glanced back, Julian saw only worry in the man’s eyes.

  Julian did his best to return to his work as if nothing was wrong, but his pick seemed heavier, slower. His heart was a stone in his chest, refusing to beat hard or fast enough. His fingers were tingling and his arms felt weak.

  Jeremy had been terrified, but he hadn’t looked ho
peless. That was because he didn’t know about George. Jeremy thought George was a man of faith, but Julian knew he was a pretender. No matter how strong George’s convictions, they would be nothing compared to the torture of a Little Lady. Julian had been through that horror himself. No, George only thought he was strong, but he had no spirit. No real strength. The body was weak. Even to Julian, who had given himself over completely to the Lord, the calling of home and honey had nearly caused him to give up on his friends and flee. Without that armor of Faith, George would crumble. He would give them all up.

  Poor George. I wish you had listened. I wish you had found God.

  Julian felt the steel of his soul inside him. He felt the invincibility it offered.

  Come what may, I am yours, Lord. Let them do their worst. I am dedicated to you. My soul is in your keeping. They can destroy my body, but my heart will be yours, forever and ever, amen.

  As he worked on through the rest of the day, he felt a deep sorrow in his heart—not for himself, but for George. It seemed terrible that the man could have been so close to true happiness, and yet eschew it. If he had just opened his heart’s eyes, not his mind’s, he would be invincible. George was a good man, he truly was. He wanted what was right for people—but he was only a man. Human beings couldn’t face things like that. They didn’t have the will.

  The flesh is weak.

  Now they would all pay for George’s lack of faith.

  And then the shift was over. The soldiers came, as they did every day, and took them away. By this point George would have broken. At any moment, Selena’s men would come for him.

  The flesh is weak.

  He had been assigned to one of the lower rooms. These were the darkest and usually where the Kruks preferred to hunt. Julian didn’t have the energy to resist when one of the cruelest Kruks, Edmond, and his gang came to him. Julian let them strip him bare and turn him over. There were only three of them, so he knew it wouldn’t take too long.

  They pushed him into a corner and bent him over at the waist. He let them pound him rhythmically into the wall, but he made no sound.

  The flesh is weak, but I am the pick, and you, Selena, are the rock.

  Kelly had waited for Aaron and Arturus to finish bathing before she came to the river. She wanted privacy.

  Only Avery hadn’t washed so far, but it hadn’t looked like he was going to wake up any time soon.

  Her robe was so threadbare she figured it would be see-through in bright light. Her clothes beneath the robe were in tatters. She doubted that she would even bother to put them back on after she took them off. Her shoes had worn so thin in the soles that she could feel the texture of the rock through them, and at one point, under the ball of her left foot, she could feel the cool stone of the floor directly.

  She shrugged off her robe and what was left of her shirt fell in tatters to the ground with it. Her pants were a few strips of rotten cloth attached to her waistband. With a negligent gesture, she tore them off, feeling then the cold air of the Carrion on her skin. Goosebumps rose on the parts of her flesh which were alive.

  The rush of the water was calming.

  For a moment she closed her eyes.

  I’m ready. I can do this. I just have to be strong.

  Even so, she hesitated. She opened her eyes and stared up at the ceiling.

  Just be strong.

  She looked down at her rotten body.

  Flakes of skin were peeling off her arms. Dark splotches of necrotic tissue covered her over, looking worse than any rash she’d ever seen. Blackened pus was leaking out of her body in places. Around those dead patches, the skin was wrinkled—not like she’d spent too much time in the water—but as if she had the skin of a woman succumbing to old age. She could not even make out her belly button through the decayed mess of her abdomen. There was an open pocket there, an abscess maybe an inch deep, where her body had rotted out completely.

  I can’t let Turi see me like this.

  The water was swift enough to distort her reflection, a fact for which she was grateful. She tried dipping her toe into the water, but she couldn’t feel it at all, so she lowered her leg deeper.

  Suddenly she could feel the cold water on her naked nerves, and the agony knocked the wind out of her. She yanked her foot out, collapsing to the ground and fighting to hold in a scream.

  So much pain.

  She closed her eyes again.

  Be strong.

  She tried a second time, this time letting her body descend slowly into the water. For all she could tell, she was descending into a pool of fire. Tears ran freely down her cheeks as the pain covered her over. She let her head descend beneath the surface, and for a moment, she was alone with her agony. There was nothing else in Hell but herself and the wretched, insidious and all consuming sting of the cold water on her half dead flesh.

  This is what it is to be alive.

  She felt the sludge that was the mix of human and corpse blood thin in her body from the sudden power of her beating heart.

  This is my fire. When the fire is done burning, only I will remain.

  She felt the dead skin washing away from her limbs. She stayed beneath the water until the pain had dulled. Then she surfaced. With her back still to the bank, she pulled herself out of the water. Parts of her skin looked restored, and she could see places on her arm where her typical ivory coloring had returned. In other places, however, the dead flesh had become swollen, bloating like a dead body might. She saw, as she inspected her arm, a single dark hair. It made her think of Turi.

  She heard the scrape of a boot behind her.

  I’m not alone.

  She turned around.

  There were three men there, dressed all in grey.

  Calimay’s serfs.

  They looked hungry. They began to disrobe.

  Kelly stood to face them. “Try it,” she said, her voice wavering a little. “I’ll break you.”

  She wasn’t sure if she could in her current condition—and if they were to do this thing, they would probably have to kill her anyway. Nothing said that the murder had to come after the rape.

  “Oh, no,” said one of the slaves, “we weren’t going to use flesh.”

  He held up his pick.

  I should have expected this. Calimay’s rape culture is as strong as Maab’s, only here I have no authority.

  Wounded and weaponless, a priestess without protection, she was the perfect outlet for these serfs’ frustrations.

  Avery limped into the room. “Well I’ll be.” He crossed his arms and regarded her.

  The men turned in alarm, but Avery only had eyes for Kelly.

  “Miss, I’ll be honest with you,” his lips curled into a sneer, “I’ve been in Hell a long time. In that time I’ve seen a lot of corpses. A lot of ‘em. But I ain’t never seen one I wanted to fuck before.” He turned to the slave which had threatened her. “Give me that pick.”

  The slave held it closer to his chest.

  Avery limped up to him. “Look at me, sonny. You see the shit I’ve been through? Look at my cock, you Calimay-whipped son of a bitch. You see those stitches? You see them? You know who did that to me?” Avery pointed at Kelly. “Now maybe you fuckers are used to having your pecker ripped up by little girls, but where I come from, that shit just don’t happen.” He looked back to Kelly for a second. “And it’s time for her to pay the piper. Now give me the God damned pick.”

  The slave held it out. Avery took it from the slave only a moment before burying the sharp end into the slave’s head.

  “Run!” he shouted to Kelly.

  Kelly dove into the back of one of the slaves, knocking him over, sending his pick clattering across the stones. She grabbed it and bludgeoned the fallen slave as she moved to stand next to Avery.

  She couldn’t imagine how horrible they must look, standing there, her naked and Avery mostly so, each a little more than half dead.

  Kelly recognized the last of them. She had sat near him, once, while
they had feasted on the dyitzu Galen had brought back to Calimay’s complex.

  How quick we go from civilized to barbaric.

  She and Avery advanced towards the man, each coming at him from a different angle. He tried to flee, heading for the water, but Kelly threw herself at his feet. He toppled over her. Then Avery was there, pick held high. He swung the flat end of the pick into the base of the man’s neck. Then he repeated the strike, but with the sharp end.

  Kelly looked at the three bodies. For a moment, she was worried that she might have shed enough corpsedust to make them rise—particularly the one she had tripped—but their bodies lay still.

  I just bathed, and Avery didn’t touch them.

  She looked up to Avery. “Why? Why save me?”

  His pick fell to the stones at his feet. He crossed his arms. “Frankly, you fucking whore-bitch, I would have enjoyed watching them ram those picks up your dead cunt. But Turi’s fond of you. I wouldn’t want him to be broken up about it.”

  She shook her head and stepped closer to him. “You’re lying to me.”

  “I hate you. I have no reason to lie to you.”

  “I don’t believe you,” she said.

  “Another step forward, whore. We’ll find out.”

  She sneered. “You have to keep on lying, because if you admit for one moment that I’m a human being, then you have to admit that you’re a rapist.”

  Avery’s arms uncrossed. “I’d never rape a real woman.”

  Kelly swallowed. She grabbed the pick and offered it to him. “I need to tell you something. You just showed me mercy. You had me dead to rights, and you showed me mercy. You had power over me, but I can’t say what I need to say unless you still have that.”

  Avery took the offered pick and held it over his head. He was as angry as Kelly remembered seeing any man.

  “I know you don’t hate me.” Kelly said. “I know you’re more angry at yourself, and that you’re hiding it,” she started.