The Cyber Chronicles Book II: Death Zone

by T C Southwell

  Sabre leant against a tree and rested for a while, trying to gather what little strength he had left. The cyber's host status light flashed, which indicated that he had recovered somewhat. His liver had released its store of blood to replace some of that which he had lost. His condition was still serious, but no longer critical. A raging thirst burnt his throat, and he climbed to his feet, clinging to a sapling as waves of dizziness washed over him. When his heart had speeded up to compensate for his low blood pressure, he hobbled through the forest until he encountered a trail.

  The Andaron girls, being skilled in forest lore, should not have left one, so he hoped it was Tassin's, and followed it. The forest passed in a blur, and he concentrated on what was in front of him, avoided trees and used saplings and vines for support. Tassin's trail of scuffed moss and overturned leaves was easy to follow, and he limped faster when his stiff muscles loosened. He slaked his thirst in a stream, hoping Tassin was well on her way to the village by now, and would return with help.

  A few minutes later, the scanners detected a stationary human on the track ahead, and Sabre approached quietly. A muddy form huddled next to a tree, her legs drawn up and her arms wrapped around them, her face buried in her knees. He stepped on a twig, and Tassin's head snapped up, her eyes wide.

  "Sabre!"

  Leaping up, she hobbled to him and flung her arms around his neck, making him stagger and grab a sapling. Trust Tassin to put her foot in something, he thought.

  "I thought you would be killed!" she said, her eyes glimmering with tears.

  "I'm hard to kill, remember?" His legs folded, and he sank to his knees, then back onto his haunches. Tassin crouched beside him, her horrified eyes flitting over his scabbed wounds.

  "You're hurt!"

  Sabre chuckled, blood loss and his sense of the ridiculous making him euphoric. Did she really think he could beat thirty-two sword-wielding warriors without injury? She had thought he would be killed, but not hurt, apparently.

  "I'm a bit battered, but I was a slightly outnumbered."

  "I would have gone for help, but I twisted my ankle."

  He sighed as dark abyss yawned his mind. "You would."

  Tassin gave a shocked cry when Sabre keeled over backwards, senseless. His ashen face and clammy skin alarmed her, and her eyes flinched from the terrible gashes on his belly and chest. She straightened his legs and scraped some leaves into a cushion for his head, then crouched beside him, wishing she knew more about medicine. At least the wounds were no longer bleeding, and what he seemed to need most was rest. She lay down beside him, and the forest's soothing sounds lulled her into an exhausted sleep.

  Tassin woke with a start, opening her eyes to find several tall blonde women standing around her, their spear butts resting on the leaves. Pale morning light filtered through the leaves in golden shafts, gilding the Andorans' bright hair.

  "Shizana!" Tassin scrambled to her feet, grimacing as her ankle protested. The warrior woman stepped forward to help her.

  "I'm glad we found you, Queen Tassin."

  "So am I."

  Mishra moved closer, eyeing Sabre. "What happened?"

  Tassin smoothed her muddy hair. "Sabre followed us to the Orokans' city and freed us. We spent two days in the swamp, then the Oroka caught up with us. The girls ran away, and Sabre stopped the Oroka from following them."

  Shizana nodded. "We found them while we were hunting, so we came to look for you. You're fortunate indeed that Mishra wanted to hunt on this side of the forest." She cast a meaningful look at the princess.

  Tassin pulled a face. "I stepped in a hole and twisted my ankle, then Sabre found me."

  Mishra peered at him. "Is he dead?"

  "No, he's just hurt."

  "Where are the Oroka?"

  Tassin shook her head. "They were fighting Sabre, then he told me to run, and I left. I haven't seen any since."

  Mishra scowled. "He couldn't have beaten them. He must have run away also."

  "I don't know, but he's been in a terrible fight." Tassin turned to Shizana. "We need help to get back to the village."

  Mishra asked, "You expect us to carry him?"

  "Why not? The least he deserves is a bit of help!"

  "We will not touch him!"

  "You would just leave him here to die?” Tassin demanded. “After all he's done for you?"

  "He's a man!"

  "And a human being!"

  "He can manage on his own."

  Tassin opened her mouth to give Mishra a tongue lashing, but Shizana placed her arm around the princess' shoulders.

  "We'll aid him, Queen Tassin, never fear. As you say, after all he's done for us, he has earned our help."

  Tassin closed her mouth with a snap, glaring at Mishra. Sabre opened his eyes, then closed them again with a grimace and groaned, "Oh, no."

  Tassin turned to him. "Are you okay?"

  "I've been better."

  She smiled. "You've looked better too."

  Sabre glanced down at himself. Those parts of him that were not crusted with dried gore were smeared with a mixture of blood and mud. "They fought dirty."

  "The Andorans will help us back to the village."

  He swept the band of stony-faced women with sceptical eyes, which came to rest on Mishra, who glowered at him.

  "Where are the Oroka?" she demanded.

  "Mostly dead, I'm afraid."

  She thumped her spear butt on the ground. "That's impossible! The girls said there were over thirty of them!"

  He nodded and winced. "Thirty-two, actually. Some were just unconscious when I left, and two ran away."

  "We lost fourteen warrior women to kill eight of them, and you say you killed thirty, alone?"

  "Like I said, some of them were just unconscious."

  The Andoran princess looked incensed. "You lie! That's not possible! You ran away, and lost them in the forest."

  Tassin rounded on the princess. "Sabre doesn't lie! If he says he killed them, then he did."

  Mishra subsided under Tassin's wrathful glare, shooting a scathing glance at Sabre, who lowered his eyes and fingered the crusted scabs on his stomach.

  "I didn't kill all of them," he muttered again.

  Shizana gestured to two women, who approached him with obvious reluctance, handing their spears to others. They gripped his arms and helped him to his feet, supporting him as he hobbled after Tassin and Shizana. Plainly they considered him so loathsome that they would only touch him under duress, but Sabre seemed glad of their support.

  The journey back to the Andoran village took two days at Sabre's slow pace, and sapped the last of his strength. The women provided fresh meat each night and blankets to sleep on, looking shocked when Tassin curled up beside Sabre. He was not all that keen on the idea himself, but did not have the energy to argue with her about it. He cited his wounds as a reason to keep her from cuddling up to him, which was not altogether unfounded.

  When they shuffled into the village under the curious stares of the women who came out to watch the procession trudge in, Sabre could barely put one foot in front of the other.

  A furore erupted when Shizana refused to allow Sabre into Tassin's new hut. He sat on the ground with his head in his hands while Tassin argued that he needed rest, a soft bed, good food and medical attention. Shizana would not be moved, but when she could take no more of Tassin's barrage, she sent a warrior for the Andoran Queen. Molla arrived with her bevy of advisors, looking annoyed at being roused from her comfortable chair. Tassin turned to vent her wrath on the Queen, but Molla held up an imperious hand.

  "There's no need to lecture me, Tassin. I'm glad you have returned safely." She looked down at Sabre, eyeing the blood that seeped from his thigh wound. "He's fulfilled his promise to my daughter, and now he's freed our young girls who were captured by the Oroka and avenged our warriors who were slain." Molla glanced at Mishra, who stood grim-faced beside her. "Therefore, he'll be allowed to stay with you, and the midwife will attend him. When h
e's recovered, he'll be banished once more."

  Tassin nodded. "Fair enough."

  Molla slipped an arm around Mishra's slender waist. "We're grateful, Tassin, even my daughter, though she does not show it, is thankful. It would be truly churlish of us to deny him aid now, after all he's done." She shot a hard glance at Shizana. "We may hate men, for reasons of our own, and shun their company, but we'll help those who help us."

  Shizana bowed and strode away.

  Molla gazed after her. "She is proud. As chief of the warriors, she must be. I think it shames her that a man succeeded where she failed."

  "But it was Shizana who helped him in the forest when Mishra would not."

  "Ah, yes." Molla nodded. "Shizana is fair, and doesn't hate men the way Mishra does. She was willing to aid the man, but not so far as to break the rules. That's why she's a good warrior. She was helping as much as she could, you understand?"

  "Without breaking the rules."

  "Exactly. I'll have the midwife come to you, but you had best get him onto the bed before he passes out. Few will be willing to carry him." Molla dismissed the crowd with a regal wave and led Mishra away.

  Tassin helped Sabre into the hut, where he sat on the bed with a sigh. She removed the muddy harness and heated water, using it to wash off the worst of the dried blood. Her stomach knotted at the sight of the wounds she found under the crusts, amazed that he had survived, never mind walked away. Sabre sat with his eyes closed, and only an occasional twitch betrayed the pain she inflicted, although she tried to be gentle. As she was throwing out the dirty water, the midwife and her two apprentices arrived.

  The large, motherly woman shook her head while she inspected Sabre's injuries. She ordered him to remove his boots and trousers and sit on the floor. The Queen slumped on the bed while the midwife took charge, sending her apprentices for more water, which she used to slough the dirt from his wounds.

  By the time she was satisfied that they were clean, water ran out of the door. Sabre sat on the bed while she stitched the wounds on his back, then he was allowed to lie down. He closed his eyes and seemed to drift into an exhausted doze in spite of the pain. Tassin watched him with deep concern, noting that there were an abnormal number of flashing red lights on his brow band. When she finished her needlework, the midwife smeared the wounds with a strong-smelling green paste, leaving some for Tassin to apply later. She bound the Queen's ankle with a strip of cloth and ordered her to rest it, then gathered up her bag of medicine and left.

  An older woman brought a pot of broth at dusk, and Tassin shook Sabre awake. His eyes kept closing unless she continued to shake him, and it took a great deal of prodding and persistence to feed him a bowl of broth. She settled down on the extra straw mattress Shizana had brought, satisfied that she had done all she could for him. In spite of this, images of him beaten and bleeding to death invaded her dreams, making her toss and turn.

  Gearn glared at Murdor, who leant on his broom, scratching his armpit. After the brawl in the square, they had languished in the Orokan dungeons for two days before being brought before the judges. When two warriors returned from the party sent to track down the girls and informed the judges that the man with lights on his head had freed them, Gearn and Murdor were acquitted of the charge. Blood had been spilt in the brawl, however, even though no one had been killed. Murdor was blamed for it, with Gearn as his accomplice.

  The sentence had been four days of service, which involved sweeping streets and hauling garbage. Their first job had been to scrub the blood from the square's stones. Murdor did little, leaving Gearn to do the bulk of the work. Gearn had never done so much hard labour, and his healing spells gave him little relief from his aching back. He now hated this city's cleanliness, convinced that he was the only person keeping it that way.

  Without his bag of potions and magical items, he could not cast a spell powerful enough to free them. Nor could he conjure his bag without the potion he used for that. Even if he could, the only spell that would ensure a clean getaway was the translocation spell, which had proven fickle when he had used it to circumnavigate the Death Zone. He could cast a confusion on the guards to facilitate their escape, but Murdor would still have to fight his way out of the city, and Gearn doubted that even the giant would be able to do that.

  According to the rumours that circulated amongst the soldiers in hushed tones, the warrior mage had defeated thirty men and slain seventeen of them, which made Gearn wonder afresh if Murdor would be able to vanquish him. Sighing, he pushed the broom again as the guard scowled at him. Just a few more days, and they would be free.

  Sabre spent most of the next week asleep, rousing only to eat and drink before dozing off again. Five days after the fight, Tassin, who sat vigil at his bedside, noticed the brow band's flickering pattern change. Two new red lights flashed, and her concern grew when his skin became flushed and sweat poured off him. He groaned and muttered in a strange language that she assumed was his own tongue. She laid a hand on his brow, and snatched it back in shock when she found his skin burning hot. When the midwife arrived, she was convinced he would die, and ordered buckets of water to be poured over him in an effort to cool him.

  Two hours later, the fever abated as suddenly as it had developed, leaving him weaker. After that, his wounds healed swiftly, which surprised the midwife, who spent a great deal of time grinding leaves and bark to make the pungent ointment Tassin smeared on the wounds. Tassin spent most of her time with Sabre, leaving only for an occasional walk or to do chores. She would sit beside the fire and watch him sleep, comforted by the sound of his breathing. To her surprise, Mishra often came to stand beside the bed and stare down at him, strange expressions flitting across her face, as if she was trying to come to terms with him.

  Tassin was darning a tear in the tattered pink dress, and Sabre snored softly as usual, when Mishra broke her habitual silence.

  "The day after we returned with you, I took a patrol to the place where he fought."

  Tassin glanced up. "Oh yes?"

  Mishra's expression was a mixture of puzzlement and awe. "We found seventeen bodies."

  The Queen smiled, returning her attention to her sewing. "He did say he didn't kill all of them."

  "Seventeen! We killed eight, at a cost of fourteen warriors, and he killed seventeen on his own!"

  "And he wasn't even trying."

  "What do you mean?" Mishra turned to frown at her.

  "Sabre hates killing people. He would rather just beat them unconscious if he can. Against so many, I suppose he had no choice. It was him or them."

  Mishra eyed the sleeping cyber. "It must be strange to know a man so well."

  Tassin smiled again, her sewing forgotten as she too gazed at Sabre. "I hardly know him at all. He's an enigma to me. I do know that he's gentle and kind, but that's about it."

  "From my experience, that's not normal for a man."

  "It depends on how they're raised. If they're taught to respect women, they don't treat them badly."

  Mishra wandered over to the fire in the corner, where a pot of broth bubbled, and stirred it. "They're not like us. They have no feelings. They enjoy inflicting pain and dominating women."

  Tassin tended to agree, remembering Rai's brutality and Torrian's reputation, but then she thought of Sabre's gentle ways and shook her head. "No, not all of them. There are good men, like Sabre."

  "Certainly if we had men here, the Oroka would not be able to steal our young girls."

  "That's true. Why don't you keep your sons, instead of sending them to the men's village, where they're taught to despise women? Then they return to abuse you as men."

  Mishra shook her head and blew on a spoonful of broth. "We don't trust them. They could rise up and enslave us again."

  "Is that why you became autonomous?"

  Mishra glanced at Sabre as he shifted and sighed, relaxing when he resumed his soft snore. She tasted the broth and stirred it again. "Yes. Many generations ago, we were slaves. We till
ed the fields, hauled the water and wood, bore the children and cared for them. Women were bought as wives or mistresses. Fathers sold their daughters. Men had as many wives as they wished."

  "What did they do?"

  "They hunted, sold the skins the women prepared, the produce they grew, and the daughters they bore."

  "So the more wives a man had, the richer he was?"

  Mishra nodded. "We rebelled. We ran away one night, all of us. They hunted us, and there were some terrible fights. Many women were recaptured, many more were killed. Of the two hundred and eighty-six who ran away, only fifty-two made it here."

  Tassin was stunned. "Were the Oroka your tribe before?"

  "No." Mishra snorted. "They're just savages who discovered that we have no male warriors to defend us. The men who enslaved us, we left very far away."

  Tassin resumed her stitching. "Despite what you went through, male warriors are an advantage. You've seen what Sabre can do, although he's exceptional. If you kept the tribe a matriarchy, and made sure any trouble-makers were cast out, you shouldn't have any problem with your sons."

  "How will we be able to throw them out when they're so much stronger than us?"

  "The good ones will help you, just as Sabre did."

  "It's an interesting notion," Mishra said. "The boys cry when we send them to the men's village, sometimes the mothers cry too. They want to stay with us; it is we who are afraid to let them."

  "If you told them that story, and raised them to respect women, I'm sure they'd be good to you. Boys love their mothers just as girls do. It's only when their fathers teach them that women are worthless that they lose respect for them. With no men to influence them, your boys would grow up to be good."