"Don't go," Mikhail reached towards her. "Please, it is you I need."
Ninsianna pushed him gently back onto the bed.
"Lay still, or you'll re-open your stitches."
"How long have I been unconscious?"
"Three days," she said. "You're still running a fever, though you seem a little better than you did last night."
"Lay down with me?" he pleaded. "Please? I miss you so badly it hurts."
"Mama is more familiar with these kinds of fevers." She pulled her red cape tighter around herself, as if she was cold. How long had she sat there, refusing to leave his side? He realized he was acting selfishly.
"Go, mo ghrá," he murmured. "Go get some rest."
She kissed his chest, right next to the poultice which stank of bitumen-tar and myrrh sap, and then hurried out of the room. He lay his head back against the pillow in defeat and shut his eyes. Time drifted, and then his mother-in-law bustled in with Siamek in tow, carrying a large woven basket full of healing supplies.
"Mama," he gave his mother-in-law a weak grin.
Needa's expression was grim. She pulled up the little three-legged stool which usually occupied the kitchen and sat down next to him, her hands still glistening with water. A strange thought crossed his mind. Why wasn't Ninsianna tending to him?
Because she's exhausted, that's why, he chided himself. Stop behaving like such an infant and pleading with your wife to hold your hand.
"How are you feeling?" Needa asked.
"Like goat dung," Mikhail replied.
"You scared us the other night." Needa said. Her infamous scolding gaze, the one that made you wish she would take out a switch and beat you with it, was conspicuously absent. In a way, her evasiveness was far more frightening than if she'd just come out and said, 'Mikhail, you're in terrible shape.'
The other night. The other night. What had happened the other night? The only thing he could remember was a need to find Ninsianna.
"I'm sorry," Mikhail said after he drew a blank. "Did I spike a fever?"
"You don't remember?" Needa raised a shapely eyebrow that was nothing like her daughter's.
"Should I?" Mikhail asked.
"No," Needa said. "You just … you tried to get out of bed."
Really? Then how come he couldn’t even roll over right now or get his wing out of the weird position it'd crimped into as he slept? He must have been all kinds of delirious if he'd dragged his sorry tailfeathers up off of the sleeping pallet. It occurred to him, as he made eye contact with her, how very frightened Needa looked. What was she not telling him?
"I'm sorry I frightened you, Mama."
Even he, clueless as he was, was astute enough to pick up on her sorrow. She reached up and yanked the covering off the window, allowing the late afternoon sunlight to filter in. Mikhail threw his arm over his eyes to shield them from the light which made his head pound.
"Here," Needa reached for the bandages which bound his chest. "Let me check your stitches."
"How many?" He vaguely recalled her telling him yesterday, or was that the day before, but now he couldn't remember.
"Only twelve," Needa said. “You were very lucky. You have so much scar tissue that your heart wasn't quite where it was supposed to be.”
He tried to prop himself up on his elbows so Needa could unwrap the bandages from around his torso. Siamek moved forward to lift him, soggy and weak like a newborn infant. Why, of all people, did he have to appear weak before him, Jamin's former second-in-command?
Siamek's touch was firm, but respectful. Mikhail made eye contact, willing his eyes that did not want to obey to see, to look the man over who had once been a secondary nemesis. He saw no adversary now. All he saw was a concerned man who wanted to help him. With a sigh, Mikhail lay back, grateful Siamek had the acuity to recognize he'd been trying to get his wing unpinned and adjusted it for him.
The scent of death wafted up to his nostrils as Needa removed the last remaining bandage. Mikhail stared at the horrific boil which bulged out of the knife-wound, filled with green pus and black streaks stretching into the scarlet flesh around it. With each heartbeat the boil trembled as if it was alive, a horrific, monstrous child, waiting to burst forth from the place it had embedded itself inside his chest.
Needa gestured at Siamek and barked. "Go get my husband."
Siamek's brown eyes met Mikhail's. It was the look one man gave to another when they knew the odds of winning a battle were not good. He hurried out of the room, leaving his spear leaning against the wall.
"Have you ever seen anything like this?" Needa's voice warbled.
"No," Mikhail said. "Wait a minute, maybe? I…"
He stared at the hideous boil, but with his pre-Assurian memories little more than a framework like a cobweb, he couldn't for the life of him remember what would cause such symptoms. The boil shuddered with each breath as though it had taken on a horrible, demonic life of its own.
"Do you know how to treat such an infection?" Mikhail asked, his voice sounding small and frightened even to his own ears.
"I lanced it last night," Needa said. "And packed it with bandages soaked with myrrh-sap, but it didn’t look anything like this at the time. This is much more than an infection. This is black magic."
Mikhail had the wherewithal to not remind her there was no such thing as black magic. What they called evil spirits he called bacteria or viruses. Did it really matter what they called it, so long as they all understood the evil spirits could be chased away by cleanliness and antibiotics?
Antibiotics. Yes…
No. He had given his medical supplies to Needa when she'd adopted him into her household as her son. They'd long since been depleted curing illnesses in the village. There were no antibiotics left, not even in the wreckage of his ship, and he had no idea how to manufacture them or he would have already taught her how.
"Do what you have to do," he gave his mother-in-law a grim look.
Needa nodded. She pulled out the tiny scissors he had given her as a bride-price and a small knife that was little more than a paring knife. She plunged the blade into a bucket of steaming hot water.
"Where's Ninsianna?" Mikhail asked.
Needa gave him a trapped, panicked look, blended with a hefty dose of sorrow.
"I sent her to wash fresh bandages down by the river," Needa said. She held out her hand as he started to protest. "And I sent Tirdard and Firouz to guard her while she washed."
"That's where her cape was stolen from."
"Enough, man!" Needa snapped. Her entire body shuddered, as though she kept too much emotion inside that threatened to erupt like a volcano. She dabbed at her eyes with her sleeves. When she spoke again, her voice was calm. "Ninsianna has always been fastidious in her grooming. Would you want to put her own health at risk due to lack of cleanliness?"
Bathe. Ninsianna had gone down to the river to take a bath and no doubt not said anything because she knew he’d be jealous at the thought of two warriors ogling her soft curves, enhanced by the luscious ripeness of her advancing pregnancy.
Mikhail closed his eyes and held that thought in his mind as Needa stood over his heart with the knife, ready to cut it open and lance the wound she had only hours before closed. One part of him wanted to beg her to call Ninsianna back into the room, to hold his hand and help him bear this experience he knew would be unpleasant, but the bigger part of him wanted to spare her the emotional distress of watching him suffer. He was a grown man. He'd take his pain like a big boy.
"I am sorry," Needa whispered.
He tried to remain silent, remain still and not writhe, but the pain as the knife touched his engorged skin was too much to bear.
Mikhail whimpered.
The room spun.
The overwhelming stench of something evil filled the room, causing bile to rise in his throat as his stomach tried to hurl up nothing but stomach acid. Oh, gods. What in Hades was that stench? It reminded him of the scent of an entire battlefield filled wit
h rotted and unburied bodies!
"I am sorry, son," Needa's voice was anguished. "I have no choice but squeeze the puss out."
It felt as though his chest exploded as Needa put her hands on either side of the stitches she had just reopened and squeezed.
Mikhail arched his back and screamed.
His entire body shuddered like a prey animal which had just been disemboweled and was in its death throes while a larger predator ate it alive. His last thought as merciful unconsciousness took him was just how grateful he was that Ninsianna was not here to see him weakened.
~ * ~ * ~
Chapter 24
November: 3,390 BC
Earth: Village of Assur
Pareesa
Pareesa swore her arms were about to fall off!
"Are you sure about this?" Siamek asked her.
"Um … I think so?" Pareesa said. She swung the sword using an awkward overhand motion. The sword moved towards him, but there was nothing smooth about the way she swung up at the man who towered over her. She stopped just short of his neck.
"You were supposed to block that."
"You didn't say anything about blocking," Siamek said.
"I just swung a sword at your neck and you didn't do anything but swat at it," Pareesa said.
Siamek gave her a patronizing grin. "That's because you're a pest."
"Hey!" Pareesa said. She mock-jabbed at him. This time, he had the wherewithal to move out of her way. "That's better."
"Says the little çok puan ile mızrak," Siamek teased her with the nickname Mikhail had given her, spear with many points.
Pareesa swung at the tall, swarthy-complexioned warrior even harder, an awkward, overhanded motion more reminiscent of an old woman threshing grain than the Cherubim-possessed heroine who had thrown herself into battle to save her mentor. They’d come out here before dawn, away from the village to avoid the gawkers who might gossip that Pareesa couldn't really wield the sword she'd used to save Mikhail.
"You sure you know how to handle this thing?" Siamek asked.
Much to her frustration, Siamek seemed to handle the blade better than she did. Her face flushed with anger. Why? Why did she have so much trouble mastering the weapon?
"No!" Pareesa glared at him. "I don't. Like I told you before, it wasn't me who saved him!"
Siamek lowered the sword.
"It had to have been you." Siamek's brown eyes were sympathetic. "You’ve seen how hard Mikhail trains. He said the gift isn't goddess-given, but hard won through practice."
Pareesa jabbed at him again. This time, Siamek blocked her and swung upwards, his movements as coarse and clunky as hers. The sound of steel hitting steel rung through the air. The swordplay itself might not be goddess-given, but that peculiar precognitive ‘echo,’ the ability to see the shadow-thought which preceded an enemy’s actual physical movement, was a divinely inspired enhancement she was certain. As was the ability to dampen her own fear and focus. All abilities which were frustratingly absent now.
Siamek’s sword came perilously close to her neck even though he wasn't aiming to hurt her. Mental note. Getting your head chopped off during sword practice would leave you just as dead as getting decapitated during a battle.
"Maybe you should ask your friend?" Siamek said.
"My ... friend?"
"Yeah, you know..." Siamek pointed up towards the sky.
It took a moment for his meaning to register. "I don't think Mikhail would approve of us using the Cherubim god so disrespectfully."
She didn’t add that for the past several days she had prayed for the Cherubim god to grant her knowledge of how to use the sword, repeatedly, and all she got was a sense of divine bemusement.
“Like Mikhail said,” Pareesa feigned nonchalance. “There are no shortcuts to becoming proficient as a warrior. We have to learn the old-fashioned way.”
Siamek shrugged, and then thwacked at her with a particularly awkward-looking move that made him look like an old man beating a dog.
"Okay," she relented. "Maybe we should ask a little prayer for guidance? Together? So we don’t undo everything Mikhail worked for when we go to Qishtea and tell him we have no idea how to do the thing."
She stared upwards at the sun, imagining she sassed the old God of War to get his attention the way she often did her mother.
“So are you going to help us out here, or what?” Pareesa jabbed her finger at the sun. “Because if you aren’t, you can just … just …”
Siamek raised one eyebrow.
Pareesa focused, not the prayer she'd invoked to beg him for intervention, but the first prayer Mikhail had taught her, the one which encouraged her to clear her mind. It wasn't communication in the way it had been when she'd been desperate to save Mikhail, but she could sense the old god still hung around, no doubt watching to make sure she didn't abuse the knowledge she'd gained while he'd been in possession of her body.
‘Please…’ she added silently. ‘You’re making me look bad.’
Did old gods laugh? Because she could swear from the tickle of energy which caressed her crown that the old god found her amusing. Pareesa’s shoulders sagged in defeat.
"Maybe we should cut some practice swords," Pareesa suggested.
"Out of what?" Siamek asked.
"Wood," Pareesa said. "So we can practice decapitating one another without actually doing it."
"Qishtea will expect you to train him using a real sword," Siamek warned. “Not a wooden one.”
"How do you know?" Pareesa asked.
"He and Jamin were … I don't know if you would call it friendly. Friendly enemies? There was always an intense competition between the two."
They rummaged through the bushes for thick, straight branches, something in short supply in this land of scant rainfall. The real swords made quick work of hacking off suitable sticks. Within moments they circled one another, fake swords raised above their heads.
Pareesa struck at him. Siamek defended in an upswing which looked vaguely familiar.
"Do that again," Pareesa said.
"What?"
"That upswing movement."
Siamek complied. Pareesa blocked it easily and swung the same move back at him. She felt a sense of inner peace, as though this path was the one to get the best results.
"That will work," Pareesa said. "That move feels familiar to me."
"How can you not remember?" Siamek said.
Pareesa went to bite his head off and bit her tongue when she saw his expression was serious. Yes. How could she have forgotten everything the god of war had taught her?
The god of war, thankfully, chose at that moment not to mock her.
"Because I didn't really know those moves in the first place," Pareesa said. "He had me do, I don't know, training katas? The ones we do with the long staff. He counted them out for me, but there were so many of them I can’t remember all the movements."
"So let's master just one," Siamek said, "and then adjust it from there?"
Siamek replicated the move and Pareesa performed the block which felt familiar to her. Yes. That routine she remembered. It was not that different from the staff-weapon kata Mikhail had taught them. They worked the bugs out of it to adapt it for the swords. Swing for the neck on one side, swing to the neck from the other. Underhand up, underhand up, stab. Clonk the enemy over the head. Finish him off. It was not the smooth, efficient movement the Cherubim god had used, but she remembered using it during the battle. It had stuck out at the time because it had felt familiar to her.
They switched back to using the real swords and hit at each other until the mid-morning sun chased away the morning chill. Sweat stung her eyes and began to seep into her clothing.
"Enough!" Pareesa bent over, holding her side as she panted to get her breath. "That should be enough to teach the men something useful today.”
“We’ll meet like this every morning,” Siamek said. “The same way Mikhail used to meet with me whenever he was debugging a stra
tegy and he wasn’t sure how much he remembered.” His eyes turned serious. “If something gets messed up, I’ll take the blame. You’re the one they look to carry the mantle of leadership if Mikhail doesn’t make it. Not me.”
"Me?"
That same sense of fear she’d felt when she’d seen how very badly Mikhail was wounded gripped her in the gut. Mikhail? Not make it? The thought was too horrific to even contemplate. No… The old God of War hung around for a reason, and it wasn’t to play nursemaid for her.
“Mikhail will be fine,” Pareesa gathered up the swords. “Why else would the God of War intervene?”
Siamek tussled her hair as though she was still a little girl.
“We’ll practice every morning before the lesson, Little Fairy, so they don’t figure out that neither one of us has a clue?"
Pareesa swatted at his hand.
Siamek gave her a noogie.
Pareesa kicked him.
Siamek laughed at her, but it was a good laugh. The laugh of friends. She wished Mikhail hadn’t had such a rough start with Siamek because, truth be told, until Jamin had gone and stirred up trouble, Pareesa had always looked up to the man and nursed a little bit of a crush on him.
She skipped happily behind him, swords clanking as they moved over to the flat, dry plain where the visiting warriors had set up their encampment. Most of her men were here, but the visiting warriors still hadn’t stumbled out of their tents, a casualty of the drinking which had gone on until the wee hours of the morning. Pareesa made small talk with her B-team while they waited.
"How's Mikhail?" Ipquidad asked, the gentle giant who had carried him up the stairs.
Pareesa and Siamek exchanged a gaze. The Chief had impressed upon them the need to keep Mikhail's dire prognosis a secret, especially since it was him Qishtea expected to teach his men how to use a sword, not her, a thirteen summer girl. She had no problem lying to Qishtea, but she hated deceiving her own men. She trusted her B-team implicitly. They had all forged bonds of trust in battle.
"He's still in and out," Pareesa spoke low, "but please don't let that get around. As far as the Chief is concerned, Mikhail should be strong enough to oversee the training within a few weeks."
Sword of the Gods: Agents of Ki (Sword of the Gods Saga) Page 26
