“Like a hem chawing Forester, you know,” the big man guffawed. “Keep your eyes open. You going in or what?” He looked into the pantry and gestured. “I’ve got food to cook.”
Derk nodded and walked past the potatoes, beans and barley, stepping down the ladder into the lower room. The room was packed, barrels and ropes keeping the audience back from the fighting ring, a circle drawn on the floor in white powder. It was hot and it smelled like sweat and alcohol, a hint of blood tinging the stuffy air. The sound of every smack and punch and grunt was followed by the shouted commentary of the audience, pushing and jostling to get a better look. Derk tied his belt tighter and waved to the man behind the table.
“Lurk, I put a bet this morning on Sunny’s boy, one lunar.” The man looked over a ledger, a small knife used as a pointer.
“Just in time,” the old man said. “This fight’s almost over if you can’t tell.” A shout rang up, louder than before and Derk wondered how no one upstairs heard them, even with the band playing. Derk nodded and looked over the crowd, trying to figure out the best way to get to the front. In one corner of the room he could see Sunny’s boy, hair cut close to the scalp and skin shining with oil. Sunny stood to the side, towheaded and melancholy.
Derk pushed through the crowd, wondering where Jezlen was, if he was still around. At the same time he scanned the crowd for the other fighter and a good spot to watch the fight. A chorus of screams, curses and laughs went up as one of the fighters stumbled and fell.. Hands flew into the air and a man pushed into the middle to see if the man could keep going. People stomped the floor so loud Derk thought it’d make the ceiling fall in. In another corner he saw the boy kicked out of the military academy. His hair was a bit too long for a fight but his nose looked like it had been broken a few times. He looked angry. Very angry.
Across the ring Derk saw the dark face of Jezlen. They saw each other at the same time, the Forester’s eyes growing wide and his face dropping as their eyes met. Derk waved. He expected Jezlen to make a face and wave him over but to his surprise his friend just ducked his head and started pushing through the crowd. Derk started to make his way in his direction, finally walking around the push of people, waving as he saw the elf pop out of the crowd.
A shout dampened the words Jezlen called and Derk walked up to him, patting his own belt to make sure his belongings were all still there. If he hadn’t been so intent on finding Jezlen, a few more items might have made their way into his possession. But the look on Jezlen’s face drew Derk close “What’s going on? Everything alright?”
“Sindra-” Jezlen started but a scream from the crowd said the fight was over, the clang of a bell and a shout announcing the winner. Derk didn’t care. Jezlen put his arm on Derk’s back, turning them both away from the crowd.
“What about her?” Derk said.
“I went by her temple on my way up from the South,” Jezlen shouted. “To see her. She is dead.”
Derk pulled away from Jezlen. What? He felt as if all the air had been sucked out of the room along with the sound. “What?” he said, too quietly. “What?” Maybe he had misheard. The room was noisy. People were starting to push past him, bumping him. “Jez-”
“She is dead,” Jezlen said putting his mouth close to Derk’s ear. “I had to tell you.”
“What? HOW?” Derk grabbed Jezlen by the collar of his shirt. He felt like he had been punched in the stomach but he was still standing somehow. He needed to know. “HOW?”
“Let go of me!” Jezlen shouted, putting his hands on his chest. Someone saw the two of them and shouted in approval, a crowd starting to form around them. “Stop, people are staring!”
“If this is a joke-” Derk started.
“Why would I joke about this?!” Jezlen screamed.
“Punch him in the face!” someone suggested, drawing laughs and more shouts from the crowd. It knocked Derk out of his stupor and he let go of Jezlen, drawing boos and jeers from the crowd. He loosened his grip on his friend and Jezlen dropped his hands from him.
“Just a misunderstanding!” Derk said, draping an arm around Jezlen’s shoulders. “Just a matter of money!” he said, laughing it off. He could feel Jezlen tighten under his hold, the Forester not a fan of being touched. To appease the crowd and anger Jezlen more he reached over and ruffled his hair, waving till the crowd turned their attention back to the ring, leaving the pair of men to themselves.
“I am going to send you to the tits of your Goddess if you do not stop touching me right now,” Jezlen hissed in his ear. Derk might have found this funny under other circumstances. But he needed answers.
“Is that the only thing you could think to say right now?” Derk asked. He wanted to slap Jezlen across the face. He could feel his hand twitch, wanting to hit him. But he didn’t. His breath came quickly as he waited to think of what to ask, letting his hand slide off the Forester. “What are you talking about?” The referee was announcing the other two fighters, the crowd commencing with their ruckus, but still Derk kept his eyes on Jezlen. He found himself leaning against one of the walls. “Jezlen?”
“We should leave,” Jezlen said, loudly, so Derk would hear him. “It is too loud here.”
“I…I have to stay. I have to collect Hock’s bet. He made a bet. On Sunny’s boy.” Derk pointed at the crowd.
“The boy is going to lose,” Jezlen said. “I hope Hock gave you the money to pay.”
“I’ve two extra lunars. But…” Derk didn’t care how Jezlen knew. He pushed himself off the wall and nodded toward the exit, Jezlen falling in behind him. He waved two fingers at the old man at the betting table before he climbed up the ladder into the dark pantry. When Jezlen had climbed up Derk knocked on the door, waiting for the cook to let them out. The bald cook looked them over and grinned.
“Ah, see you found each other,” he laughed.
“Yes,” Jezlen said. The annoyance in his voice was obvious to Derk. The cook just continued to smile
“Is there reentry?” Derk asked, walking toward the door. It was cooler in the kitchen than downstairs and a cool breeze still managed to make its way through the half-door.
“If the fight is still going, yeah, but if it’s over you can settle with Ferix. Open all night if you get hungry.”
“Right,” Derk said, wanting to leave already. He pushed the bottom door open and walked out into the late spring evening.
Sindra. Dead. “How could this be?” Derk asked. “Jezlen, tell me?”
“I went by her temple on my way up from the south,” Jezlen began. He didn’t look at Derk but across the alley as if he was ashamed to tell him, avoiding his eyes. “When I went and asked for her, the priestess looked concerned and asked if I was related to her. I told her I was her..her nephew.” All these years and Jezlen still had trouble with certain words. “She took me aside and told me Sindra was dead.”
“But how?” Derk asked. Jezlen’s lack of telling was starting to make him anxious and he wanted to shake him but he stopped himself. “An accident?”
“It looks like…someone killed her?” Jezlen said it like a question, as if he himself didn’t believe it. “Or as if she killed herself.”
“She wouldn’t kill herself,” Derk insisted. “She had no reason to. Sindra was never in despair.”
“They found her in her tent. Her knife was in her hand. Her throat.” Jezlen didn’t bother to say anything else. His hands were shaking. Derk leaned up against the building, his head swimming with Jezlen’s words.
“It had to have been someone else,” Derk said. “Someone. Who? Who could have done this? Who? She never…she never mentioned anyone to me besides the priestesses, never said she was in trouble. She would have told me, right?” His last few words were muffled by the lump forming in his throat. “Who could it have been?”
“It…Derk, no matter who it was…she is still dead.” The Forester’s words were quiet but clear. Derk was grateful for the sadness in Jezlen’s words. He dropped his head to his chest and
now the tears fell, burning his eyes and making his face feel tight. Sindra…gone. Pulled from life, from his life. He balled his hands into fist and set them on his legs, not caring Jezlen could see him cry. He loved her. He still did. His heart ached for her, ached for her in a different way now. Knowing the hole would never be filled. He would never hold her hand, kiss her cheek, lay beside her. He would never hear her say she loved him. He would never hear her refusal. Smell the sweet scent of her neck or hair, taste the salt of her skin, feel the press of her lips.
Derk slumped to the ground, sobbing. He cried for the loss of the woman he loved, for the future they wouldn’t have. His plans for the both of them, destroyed. Her own plans, the history she wanted to write, the ways she wanted to help the Church and the Valley. They had been robbed. He had felt alone before hitting the Red Rabbit but he felt even more alone now. Though he wasn’t. Derk wiped his nose with the back of his hand, pressing his palms into his eyes. He still had the Cup. And Gam. And Jezlen. He turned his reddened eyes to the Forester, not surprised to have Jezlen’s metal flask offered to him. The lid was already undone. Derk brought it to his mouth and sipped from it while Jezlen pulled out his pipe. Derk didn’t say anything when Jezlen went to the kitchen door for a light. He just waited for Jezlen to hand him the pipe.
“The smoke you gave me last time wasn’t good. It gave me strange dreams.” Derk thought about the dream he had and how Sindra had been in it. “I…Sindra was in the dream.” Derk took a pull off the pipe. His lungs burned along with his eyes. Something about it made him feel more calm.
“Oh?” Jezlen said. He took the pipe from Derk. Derk nodded, taking another sip from the flask. It was strong, whatever it was, but Jezlen’s stuff always was.
“Yeah.” Derk looked over at Jezlen, trying to keep too much hope from his voice. “You don’t think…maybe. Maybe it was Sindra?”
Jezlen exhaled a chestful of smoke, staring off in the distance for so long, Derk thought perhaps he hadn’t heard him. Derk was about to ask him again when Jezlen shook his head, turning to give him the pipe again. “No, I do not think it was.”
“Oh.” Derk frowned. He held the pipe in his hand, looking at it and the flask. He wondered what Sindra would say if she saw him. “Out of curiosity, how d’you figure?”
He saw Jezlen stiffen slightly, crossing his arms over his chest. “Because,” came Jezlen’s reply. “The people from the Forest of Clouds do not dream.” Dark eyebrows on his face raised at Derk, annoyance in his voice. Derk knew he hadn’t wanted to give up the piece of information but he had given it to him. It surprised Derk. But it answered his question.
“What happens to Foresters?” Derk asked, knowing what he was about to ask was strange. “When they die?” The contents of the flask were starting to make him woozy, his stomach growing warm.
“They rot. Like Valleymen.” Jezlen’s eyes smiled but he managed to keep his face calm, one of his more annoying traits. Derk managed to laugh, shaking his head.
“No, to their souls,” he said. “What happens?” Again, Jezlen didn’t answer. This time he stared at the ground, his lips a thin line on his dark face.
“To tell the truth, I think Sindra will go to be with your Goddess. Her body was made in the Forest but her soul was made here, I think. Why else would she have come here?” Jezlen took the flask from Derk and held it for a breath before he took a large swig from it. Derk thought he looked like he needed it.
“And what about you?” Derk asked. He stood up slowly, his back sliding against the rough wall of the bar. “What’ll happen when you die?”
“Hopefully I will just be dead,” Jezlen said. This time Jezlen did smile, one of the rare times he did. It was such a terrible reason to smile but it made Derk laugh. They both laughed for a while, the dark mood lifting slightly. Derk handed the pipe back to Jezlen and started to walk down the street.
“I could steal a horse today but getting out of the gate would be the issue. Unless we left and hit one of the farms outside the wall but there’s no guarantee any of the horses will be good for riding, and not in the dark. Plus, the noise.” Derk looked up at the sky. “When is New Moon?”
“Two evenings from now.”
“I’ll never get to Southpoint by then.”
“For what?” Jezlen asked, sounding genuinely confused.
“The Goddess comes on the New Moon to collect the souls of the living. I thought-” Derk put his hands on the back of his neck, realizing what he was going to say. “I could say goodbye. Talk to her one more time.” Doctrine said the souls remained in the bodies until the Goddess came to collect them. People kept vigil over the dead to keep them company, singing songs or speaking so the souls wouldn’t grow lonely or crazed while still trapped in their bodies.
Jezlen handed him the flask once more, his face stripped of the mirth which had just been there. “Derk. She is dead. There is nothing left to say. She knew you loved her.”
Derk let Jezlen’s words wrap around his heart once more, remembering the last time he had kissed her. Before he escaped out her window. “And a good amount of help that afforded me.” He brought the flask to his lips and drained it, feeling the hot liquid snake down his throat, burning away his pity and regret for now. Sindra. “Come on. I have to pay Hock’s stupid bet. We can go from there to Bluemist. Give him his money. Then.…” The thought of being inducted into the Cup floated through his brain. For some reason he wasn’t as excited for it anymore. He needed it, now more than ever. Now Sindra was gone. He remembered Drink’s words, about more people together making a bigger mark. He wouldn’t do anything with Sindra. This was his chance. The fact this was the way he would leave his big mark, this way alone, filled him with something. It wasn’t hope. It was something else, something darker and more desperate. Derk didn’t like the feeling.
“Let’s just pay the bet,” he said finally, walking ahead and Jezlen falling behind once more. “I’ll decide what to do next after I deal with Hock and the Cup.” Derk pushed open the doors, not surprised to see some of the faces from the fight in the bar now, singing along with the girl on stage. The ex-student from the military academy was sitting at a table, his nose obviously broken again but he was obviously too drunk at the point to care. As for Sunny and his boy, they were nowhere to be seen.
Carefully they wove their way through the crowd, Derk carefully relieving anyone who bumped into them of their purse, passing them back to Jezlen as he made his way to the bar. He pounded his fist onto the bar top, wanting to deal with the bet and leave. The barkeep from earlier came to him, looking dreadfully tired. “Can I help you?” he asked. He look like he was about to fall asleep on his feet.
“I placed a bet,” Derk said, not bothering to keep his voice down. It was so loud no one would have heard, and anyone who would have heard was probably at the fight himself. “Lurk,” he reminded the keep. The keep nodded and ducked into the kitchen. Jezlen squirmed on his seat beside him, obviously uncomfortable with the volume of people.
“Here you go,” the barkeep said, sliding him a piece of bread. Under the bread were three white coins. Derk frowned, tucking them away before the barkeep could take them back, looking around the room. The man beside him looked like someone from the fight so he tapped him.
“Eh, who won the fight?” Derk asked. The man swayed in his seat, drunk as well and seemingly happy to be so.
“Oh, Sunny’s boy!” the man exclaimed. “It was a great fight!” Derk held up his hand and thanked him before the man could get any further and he hopped off the stool and wove his way back through the crowds, the effects of the liquor and the heat pushing toward the cool night air. As soon as they got outdoors, Derk looked to Jezlen.
“I thought you said the other one would win,” he accused.
“I just wanted to get you out of there,” Jezlen admitted with a comical shrug.
Derk snorted. “Ass,” he said. A quick glance around the road and Derk realized they had nowhere to go and they wouldn’t be able
to get out of the town until first watch. He didn’t want to sleep in the Church. Not tonight. Even though he had been awake for only a few hours he felt tired.
“You have any money?” he asked Jezlen. Jezlen raised a brow. “Come on,” Derk insisted. “I know you’ve got a pack stashed somewhere. You don’t just wander the Valley with your knife and you don’t stay in temples.” He put his hands on his waist and waited for Jezlen to answer.
“You just received a good bit of money in that bar,” Jezlen reminded him, raising his brows. Derk hit himself in the head and laughed.
“Right you are!” he said. “Let’s go get a pitcher of beer and a room. Something with a few beds not on the floor. Something…nice.”
“If you crawl into my bed, I will kill you,” Jezlen said.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Derk laughed, walking in the direction of an inn he knew, one which didn’t have a band and a fight on the same night. “I know a place that makes a nice ground apple brandy. I could use…I could use a drink. And a good sleep.” Derk took a deep breath and he and Jezlen walked down the street in silence. Derk couldn’t help but hold the Goddess Bead from his bracelet in his hand, casting a glance at the almost New Moon in the sky. It was too late, he told himself. For some things. Not for all things. If he couldn’t make a future with Sindra, he would find another way. He was already well on his path. The thought of anyone wanting to kill the gentle priestess…the moon looked cold and sharp despite the warm air and Derk shivered. It was a cruel end to a good woman. Derk crossed his arms across his chest, wishing he could hold Sindra one last time.
CHAPTER 20
Personal Business
Derk dipped his spoon in his cup, watching the hot tea dissolve the honey at the bottom. He still smelled the incense from the temple in the chamber, but the High Priestess’ office was scented more like parchments, oil lamps and sunshine on stone, the windows opened wide to the streets outside. Derk rubbed at his chin, scratching his beard with recently cleaned fingernails. The High Priestess was dressed in robes of simple but sharp grey and white. Derk knew her hair was dark and very curly but the woman somehow kept it wrapped in a dark grey shawl. Her stole embroidered with silver thread was the only thing giving away her position within the Church.
The Valley of Ten Crescents Series (Box Set: Books 1-3) Page 41
