"You are weak," the priestess announced.
The claws sank deeper into his flesh.
"Your spirit is not the spirit of a survivor or a warrior. If you were one of us, we would have staked you in the woods to feed the animals."
The crowd roared with approval.
"Instead, you screamed and shrieked and begged. You whimpered and moaned, as not even our tiniest babe would whimper." The witch's teeth flashed in a grin. The firelight gleamed off her long canines.
Jendara shrank against the post holding her up. There was something hideous about that sick smile. Her stomach twisted.
"You have revealed your only power to be the strength of your tongue. And I will use that." The woman raised her voice so the crowd could hear her better. "The creature whose pelt we transform tonight is a creature whose cry stills the blood of its prey, and this prisoner's tongue will help strengthen the war cry of the warrior I choose to bear this pelt." She dropped the prisoner's face, her claws leaving bloody trails on his jaw. "Bring the cauldron!"
Two men rushed forward, the first of the barbarians Jendara had seen without pelts. But their bared skin was not pale. The lumpy purple scars of old burns stood out across their shoulders; the tattooed outlines of wolves and bears ran down their arms. As they dropped the heavy iron cauldron at the witch's feet, Jendara saw the faces they raised in adoration. Geometric patterns and paw prints covered their cheeks, and black ink outlined eyes covered over in a milky-white film.
The Crow Witch twisted her fingers in the prisoner's hair and drew back his head. His larynx bobbed in the taut arc of his exposed throat.
The witch raised the wicked blade.
He didn't even have time to gasp.
Blood sprayed from his slit throat, his racing heartbeat pumping the stuff into the air. The crowd shrieked delightedly. The drums picked up speed and Jendara felt her own heartbeat quicken in response. The dying man's body must have responded the same way. The bloody fountain pulsed faster.
The witch clapped her hands. More tattooed assistants hurried to help bleed the victim, their own knives flashing as they carved off pieces of the dying man. If he'd had a voice, he would have screamed.
Jendara's head spun. The heat of the bonfire, the sickening roil of her own damaged skull, the sight of lumps of fatty meat tossed from hand to hand in the dancing firelight: it was abominable. Was this how it had been at Alstone Quarry?
Was this how it had been in her own village?
With a wrench, Jendara realized the witch had turned toward her. The madness of the scene had distracted her. She had wasted precious moments she could have used to free herself.
The crow headdress leaned closer. Jendara could hear the rustling movement of the bird trapped inside and smell the rancid flesh of the untreated wings mounted on the eerie thing. Up close, its many layers of bone and feather showed, the fresh wings and crow heads covering old ones that had rotted down to nubs. Jendara swallowed hard.
She pressed her feet against the wooden post and tried to shift her weight slowly, imperceptibly upward. If her timing was right, she could use her fall to crush the witch and even take her knife. She didn't trust her chances with the larger men.
"You look like a strong woman," the Crow Witch said. "You've shown fewer weakness than any of these soft islanders. I would see your face cleaned before I add your blood to my cauldron."
She snapped her fingers, and one of the tattooed men hurried forward with a cup of water. With a quick slice of his knife, he removed the filthy handkerchief she'd tied on a lifetime ago, back on the boat with Hazan, then scrubbed the crusting vomit from her face and neck.
He ran his hairy forearm across her face to dry it, then gave a curt nod. He stepped aside.
The Crow Witch took his spot.
"Let me look at you, woman." Her clawed hand reached for Jendara's chin, tipping it up to better look into her face.
The witch leaned in closer, struggling to see in the low light and the shadow cast by the black headdress. The odor of rotting flesh made it hard to breathe.
Jendara tensed her leg muscles, ready to leap.
The woman stumbled backward, the knife falling from her hand. Her mouth opened and closed, but for a moment, no sound came out.
Then, finally:
"Jendara?"
paizo.com #3236236, Corry Douglas
Chapter Twelve
Signs and Stories
Jendara trembled. The woman's blue eyes bored into hers. They looked horribly, horribly familiar.
"Jendara?" she repeated.
Jendara turned her face away. Inside her chest, her heart shattered.
When she had found the crow pendant, she had hoped to track down her sister's killers. The day she'd found her father's ruined body but not her sister's, she had been certain of the worst. If the kind of monster who would maim and kill and eat human flesh had carried Kalira away, then there was no way she could have survived the kinds of horrors they would have inflicted upon her on their own ground.
But she couldn't deny the truth of her own eyes. "Kalira?"
"Jenny!" Kalira threw her arms around Jendara, pressing her cheek against her sister's. The headdress smelled worse up close. Maggots wriggled in its depths.
The captive crow made a questioning sound. Kalira laughed. "Quentzal! Oh, Quentzal! At last, my sister, my Jendara!"
Behind her, the crowd had fallen silent, waiting for their leader to explain herself. Kalira pressed her hand to her lips, overcome. Her fingers were long and slim, just like Jendara's mother's had been.
Kalira raised her arms and spun to face her followers. "My people!" she called. "We have been given a blessing beyond my greatest expectations! My sister, lost all these years, has been found!"
The crowd cheered. The drummers, reassured by this announcement, returned to their beating. Kalira gave instructions to the men around her, sending the blood-filled cauldron into the night. They cut Jendara's bindings and lifted her down from the post.
Kalira clapped her hands. "Bring food and wine to my tent. I will need Brynorm and fresh bandages, as well. Come."
They carried Jendara as if she were a baby. She wanted to walk, but the burning and heaviness in her feet warned against the idea. She must have been bound quite a while before she regained consciousness; it might take some time for proper blood flow to return to her limbs. As they moved away from the beach, the cannibals' rude shelters appeared, lean-tos of hides and branches with the occasional small tent. The tents grew more frequent the farther they went from the bonfire. They passed the burnt framework of a house—Jendara could still smell the char. These people hadn't been on this island long.
Kalira stood outlined against the entryway of a well-made hide tent, braziers lighting the inside to daytime brightness. She held back the tent flap and waved Jendara's porter in. "Lay her on the bed."
He put her on a pile of furs. The inside of the tent smelled musty and faintly herbal, with none of the stink permeating the rest of the camp. Jendara sagged with relief. Perhaps her sister wasn't so far gone as she seemed.
Kalira dropped to her knees beside the bed. "Jendara," she breathed. She traced Jendara's cheek with her unclawed hand. "After you left us, I would sit on the beach and hold my crow necklace, waiting for you to come back. I was so lonely. And now we're finally together again!" A beatific smile lit up her face. It softened the thin, sharp planes of her face, and for a moment she looked once again like the sweet teenage girl Jendara remembered.
Jendara's heart sank. She'd never imagined that Kalira had felt abandoned when she left home. She'd never even thought about it. She blinked back sudden tears.
Kalira lifted off the headdress and set it aside. The crow hopped down to her shoulder. It cocked an eye toward Jendara.
Kalira rolled her head a little, stretching her neck. "The Black Crown is heavy," she admitted. "There's a great deal of wire in it, since I keep adding on to it." She ran her fingers through her wild wh
ite hair, massaging her scalp.
Someone scratched at the tent flap.
"Come," Kalira commanded.
A man entered. He stood head and shoulders above the other men Jendara had seen, and wore a bear skin swept over his shoulder like a cloak. He wore only leather trousers, but his torso was so heavily tattooed and scarred that it might as well have been clad.
His nostrils flared as he trained his whited-out eyes on Jendara. "This one has been a great deal of trouble."
Kalira laughed. "Of course, Brynorm. She's my sister."
She waved the man to the pile of furs. "Her shoulders have dislocated. Set them."
The man scowled and crossed the tent. He squatted, studying Jendara's shoulders. After a moment, he slipped off his sandals, stepped onto the furs, and stooped to grab Jendara's arm at the elbow. He jammed his foot down on her ribcage and twisted her arm.
It was worse than the moment they'd hung her on the post. She growled at the pain, then gasped at the sudden feeling of freedom within the joint. It was fixed.
He repeated the process on the other side and sat down on the floor. "What are you going to do with her?"
Jendara couldn't even raise her head. Exhaustion had dumped itself over her. Her shoulders felt vaguely puffy and her head pounded. She could feel prickles of sweat itching in her armpits. It was very hot in Kalira's tent.
Kalira leaned over to smile down at Jendara. "It hurts, doesn't it? Don't worry, I have just the thing."
She disappeared from Jendara's field of vision, and Jendara stirred up the energy to turn her head. Kalira propped a drinking horn next to a small chest and took something gray out of a satchel sitting beside Brynorm. She crumbled it into the cup.
"Don't worry," she said, sweeping back to sit beside Jendara and hold the horn to Jendara's lips. "It's just a mushroom. It's very good for pain."
Jendara smelled wine and the darker funk of dried mushroom. She tried to recollect what kind of mushroom might be used as a painkiller and drew a blank. But the liquid pressed against her lips and she let herself sip. Kalira, no matter how changed, wouldn't kill her.
"What are you going to do with her?" Brynorm repeated.
Kalira fixed him a stern look. "She is my sister. She will join our tribe and help me lead our people to greatness."
The woman stood and began to pace. "Yes, Jendara will be the perfect person to oversee the sacking of Halgrim. She has our father's training, and his fierce disposition. She will have the islanders begging for our leadership."
"Sacking...Halgrim?" Jendara's lips felt twice their size, her tongue floppy. She blinked and watched reality ripple. Her head no longer hurt and her shoulders felt lovely, but she had the vague suspicion her mind had been lifted free of her body and its messages barely reached her limbs. She struggled to raise her hand and watched the thing flop back on the bed. "People on these islands won't let you just walk in and take over."
"Oh, but they will. You should have seen what it was like, down at that ridiculous quarry. Just the sight of my warriors filled those people with despair. No, when I get done with these islands, everyone will be happy I've come to lead them." Kalira laughed. Jendara had forgotten the silvery tinkling of her sister's merriment. "Dear Jenny, you must be so confused. Let me explain."
Someone scratched outside, and Brynorm opened the tent flap. A woman, clad in strips of fur, scuttled inside. She nearly tripped over a pile of dirty gear beside the wooden chest. Booty from captured prisoners, the functioning part of Jendara's mind realized. She squinted at it. Maybe her own sword belt was somewhere in there.
Jendara blinked as the pile shimmered, turned blue, then went normal again. She rubbed her eyes, hard. That mushroom was powerful.
The serving woman placed a tray and a small pitcher on the chest where Kalira had mixed the mushroom drink. For a moment the woman became two identical dirty figures, then shimmered and twisted back into a single nervous servant. Jendara squeezed her eyes shut for a second, then reopened them. The woman adjusted the bowls and plates on the tray and gave Kalira a deep bow before turning to exit. The black outline of a paw had been printed on her shoulder, the edges purple, ropy scar tissue.
"Brynorm, get the brands," Kalira murmured. The man arose and hurried away.
Jendara's stomach plummeted. "Brands?"
"There are few metalworkers on Kalva," Kalira began. She crossed to the tray the woman had left and examined the offerings a moment. "I'm lucky that Brynorm is a fine smith."
Jendara licked her lips, trying to force them into normal function. "How did you meet Brynorm?"
Kalira beamed. "He adopted me. He taught me to live like a Kalvaman." She waved a hand, indicating the tent and its contents. "I owe all of this to him."
She brought the tray to the bed. Jendara stared up at her, trying to read her expression.
"They've brought cod roe," Kalira said. "It's good food for a sick person." She scooped some onto her fingers and offered it to Jendara. The orange roe glistened in the light.
"I'm not hungry."
Kalira's eyes flashed. "It is our way to share food when we exchange stories," she said. "You must learn our ways now, Jenny."
Jendara opened her mouth wide. The eggs felt cool and damp on her tongue, pleasantly salty. But the heavy scent of rotting flesh clung to Kalira's hair and hands, and Jendara nearly gagged.
Kalira pressed the horn cup to Jendara's mouth and held it there a long time, her eyes growing distant. Wine covered Jendara's mouth, crawled up her lip, went up her nose. She wrenched her chin away, spluttering for air.
Wine ran out of the cup, soaking Jendara's shirt and the furs, but Kalira didn't notice.
"The Kalvamen came just before lunch," she murmured. "No one saw them coming. Our people fought well, but we weren't prepared for the fury of the Kalvamen. They laughed when we struck them. They cheered when their warriors died. And they swarmed over us, fighting as no islander has ever fought."
Her eyes focused on Jendara's face for a second. "Have you ever watched a woman scream as her lips are being chewed off? The sound..." She paused and took a deep drink of the wine. Jendara wondered if she dared speak, but Kalira continued.
"After they had eaten their fill, including Father's liver, spleen, and male member—I won't tell you the things they did to him, while he was still alive—they took the youngest of us and put us in their ships. We were both larder and playthings for the Kalvamen, and the three days and nights we rowed to their island were filled with screams." She touched her collarbone thoughtfully. "I prayed to the spirits that I would die. I prayed you would appear with your ship and save me. I prayed to every god and every ancestor every single second of that voyage, even as blood leaked from my ears and my nose and between my legs. I prayed and prayed."
Metal clattered behind Kalira. Jendara had not seen Brynorm return, but now she turned her head to watch him. He shifted his grip on a number of implements, including another brazier, which he put down to light. He propped a metal brand up on the wooden chest so that its insignia lay in the growing flames.
"What happened?" Jendara whispered. She didn't want to know. She didn't want to hear any more of the terrible things her sister had seen and felt and lived through. Hell couldn't have been any worse. But she had to know.
"Something answered." Kalira stroked the crow on her shoulder. "Quorna, Quentzal's grandmother. I don't know where she came from, but she flew down out of the sky and landed on my shoulder and gripped it hard." She tugged at the neckline of her dress so it revealed her collarbone. Three silver scars showed. They must have been large wounds on a young girl.
"Maybe our clan ancestors sent her, or maybe my heart felt the weight of the crow-shaped pendant you gave me. I'll never know. But what I do know is that Quorna wouldn't let anyone touch me. The Kalvamen left me alone after that."
Jendara glanced at the brazier and the brand. Its metal was still mercifully dark. But Brynorm had not been sitting still while Kalira told her story. After
removing a metal bowl from the chest, he opened the satchel where Kalira had found the mushroom. Jendara bit her lip as he searched in the bag. She doubted anything that came out of there could be good.
She wriggled her toes and looked back at Kalira. "I'm glad you found a protector."
"I would have died without Quorna," Kalira agreed. "When she died, I saved her bones to make the black crown. It was a way to keep her spirit close to mine." She reached for the tray and lifted a long sliver of meat, dripping with some kind of sauce. With a wet rude noise, she slurped off the sauce.
Jendara recognized the knobbed shape of a man's forefinger and swallowed her gorge. She rolled her feet at the ankles, hoping no one noticed. She had to get out of here somehow.
Kalira wiped her mouth on her arm and put down her revolting meal. "Anyway, the Kalvamen dumped me in their slave hut. I was the only one left from Crow's Nest, but there were other prisoners in the hut, both from the islands and from other tribes on Kalva. Brynorm was one of them. He watched me with Quorna and knew there was something special about me."
The man grunted and turned the brand so it would heat evenly. Jendara struggled to make out just what design had been worked in the metal. She closed her eyes. The tale Kalira was spinning sickened her. She wished it would end, but she feared what might happen afterward.
"He came for me in the night. Together, we killed our guards and set out across the island. We found a place for ourselves among a clan on the other side of the island. For many, many winters, they had been the weakest of all the Kalvamen. There were almost no women or children left, because they had been stolen away."
Jendara flexed her feet. Her legs had feeling again. Her head had stopped pounding and the effects of the mushroom were easing. If she got the chance, she could probably run. She'd jump to her feet right now if she could, but her need to know held her as tightly as the thick shroud lines held the Milady's mast in place.
"With the help of Quorna and other birds I befriended, our new clan regained its strength. I meditated on what I learned from the creatures I met, and the powers inside me grew." Kalira's eyes gleamed as she spoke, fervor building in her voice. "I learned to speak and move like animals do. Eventually, I could take on their shapes. With my powers and Brynorm's strength, we wiped out his former clan, absorbing their women and children. The flesh of their men made our hearts hard as shields. We took their strength and turned it upon our neighbors."
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