by Ian Dyer
‘What else did he say?’
‘Nothing much but I will tell ya, you can be sure of that. Just sit down and relax a whiles whilst I make us a brew. Coffee?’
‘Aye. Black and sour, please.’
Albert shuffled over to the one burner stove and fiddled with it until the flames licked at the dented pan. He grabbed two mugs from a pile of books, blew in them and then cleaned them out with the bottom part of his coat. Martin regretted his decision but he was thirsty. He would ask for water but seeing the state of the place he knew that boiled water was the way forward. Martin slumped in one of the old wooden chairs and breathed out letting his body calm and muscles rest.
The coffee took but a few minutes and Martin didn’t wait for it to cool before drinking it. It was sour, too sour, but he didn’t care. The hut was run down, barely standing, and it stunk, a mirror image of the man that had helped him, but he didn’t care. He asked for another mug, drank that just as quick and gave his thanks.
As he stretched out his legs and untied his boots he looked at the floor and wandered where the hell he was going to rest for the night. He was about to ask when Albert, busying himself by the stove said, ‘You can have the bunk behind me, Marksman. I sleep in with old Fanny. Nights get cold and I aint as pert as I used to be. Need the warmth of that old cunny I do!’ he cackled and it made Martin squirm. He didn’t want to think about it but was grateful for the bed.
‘Coffee, a soft bed and company. Seems like I haven’t had those things for a long, long time.’
Albert wiped his hands on the front of his coat and placed a frying pan on the one ring. ‘Not much company for me, either, except old Fanny and she aint much of a conversationalist. Mostly I stumble about the wares I have collected. I might pop into town to get some bits but I don’t talk to anyone except the butcher. My travelling days are long since gone.’
The meat in the pan started to sizzle and released its aroma. Martins gut rumbled and he began to salivate. He had been eating on his travels but jerky and stone bread weren’t exactly the best travel companions.
‘Smells good.’
‘Always does. But don’t ask what it is. Only know that it smells good and doesn’t taste like fried arsehole.’
8
The two men ate in silence, something both had become used to. Martin considered his future – he had been on the run, fleeing from a murder he had thought was righteous but turned into something darker. But now, with the knowledge that the man – or whatever Samson is now – is still alive his self-absorbed mission isn’t over. Martin would have to carry on, hunting down the Sorcerer – he was too dangerous to be left alive especially if the Wretch King was reborn. Fleeing Martin had believed that in time he would find peace, solace and a place to end his days, but now the hunt continues and he can think of nothing else.
Once finished Albert took the two plates and threw them into the bucket which stood for the sink. He didn’t wash them and Martin guessed that they would never be washed, only reused time and time again until that cancerous cough got the better of him and he hacked up his last breath.
Albert grabbed a bottle that was hidden behind an odd looking metallic machine and two dull glasses that were close by. ‘Saving this bottle for a special occasion. Fancy a swig or four?’
‘Sounds good to me.’ Martin couldn’t remember the last time liquor had passed his lips. Months? Who knew?
‘Grab those old cushions, Martin, we shall drink this like the old desert folk do; under the stars getting pissed as they twinkle at us.’
Martin gathered together some wood and kindling using the light of the moon to guide him. Occasionally he would pick up what he thought were twigs but turned out to be sharp copper wires – some protruding from heavy metal, others twisted around like mad spiders fighting. When he had enough for a good sized fire he knelt next to Albert and began to build.
He built the kindling up like a chimney until it was two hands high. Martin then gathered some razor grass, taking care not to cut himself, and shoved it into the centre of the construct. Fiddling in his pockets he removed some matches and went to light. Albert grabbed his arm and leant in, his free hand holding an odd pencil shaped object.
‘Allow me, Martin.’ Albert flicked a small button on the pencil thing and a small flame instantly sparked from the metallic tip. There was no flint, no sour smell nor did the flame burn a pale orange. It was truly a marvel. Albert smiled, his crooked teeth glinting in the glow of the flame. He touched the flame to the razor grass and the dry weed smoked for a while and then with a familiar popping sound it took to the flame. Within a minute the small chimney construct was aflame and both Martin and Albert added to it.
Albert sat back a bit and grabbed his tobacco pouch from his pocket. ‘Ya smoke, Martin?’
‘Nah, didn’t take to it. Though at times I do regret it.’
Albert hacked and laughed spitting some vile phlegm into the fire. It hissed with anger. He placed the tobacco back into his pocket and produced instead a freshly rolled cigarette which he didn’t light it but placed it into his mouth – this would be the way in which Martin would always remember him. ‘Been doing it since I turned the man’s age. Back then though the weed was different.’
Martin had heard the term “man’s age” before and knew it to be from day’s long, long past. It wasn’t a term used anymore and represented the dark days; when the earth was becoming new again. It was rude, but Martin had to ask, ‘How old are you, Albert?’
The old loon opened the bottle, the cap resisting for a while until finally giving up with a satisfying crunch and poured some of the reddish brown liquid into the two glasses. It smelt sweet, hot and old.
‘How old!’ Albert croaked, ‘Fuck the days, I have no idea.’ He scratched his ancient chin and downed the drink in one, his mouth narrowing and his nostrils flaring. As he swallowed he cracked his teeth together and sucked in some air, he then gestured to the Marksman to follow suit and Martin did as he was told. The drink was as it had smelt but by far more intense. As he composed himself, letting the heat from the drink lessen in his gut Albert continued.
‘It doesn’t rain out here much. Something stops the clouds as soon as they reach the forest over yonder. But there is a pattern ya see, not many people see it, or know about it, but I know.’ Albert’s eyes were wide with psychotic delight and the fire danced in them, ‘In that forest there is a great bird, black as night with a beak as blue as the ocean – I know, I have seen it – and this bird is a sleeper. It sleeps for three years until its hungry and when it wakes it takes flight and heads east out toward the unknown lands. Two days later, black clouds, black as the bird itself loom from the east and whatever stops the normal clouds from leaving the forest has no control over these black carpets of death. On the third day it rains and rains and rains; turning the desert a lush green. Aye tis a sight to behold ya figure.’
‘Sounds it.’ Martin said pouring the two men another shot each. The both downed it simultaneously and it tasted better.
‘Aye, so the rains come every three years and when they do I mark the occasion on the side of my hut with a single mark.’ Albert pointed over to his hut and to the opposite wall where “Rag and Bone Man” was written. ‘I shall leave it as a surprise, Martin. Something to look forward to in the morning.’ The old loon hacked and laughed; the cigarette hanging on one lip as if its life depended on it.
The desert went quite except for the crackle of the wood. The sky was clear tonight, the stars bright and Xerxes Flame shone from east to west filling the sky with a cloudy orange and blue beauty. The night was getting late and Martin could feel the weariness begin to take him.
‘What else did the Sorcerer say, Albert?’
Albert placed the lid back onto the bottle and heaved a sigh. ‘You remind me of him, Marksman. It’s the eyes. You have the same gaze, a killers gaze me old pa would have said. But I can tell you already know that so to end yer torment and to get ya off to bed I shall tell ya.�
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‘He didn’t talk much. It was odd, it was like he was here, but not here. Like he had other things going on and was watching them as he talked to me. Occasionally he would say something that I didn’t understand and had nothing to do with what we were talking about, but I didn’t make much of it. He had something too, Martin, something hidden beneath his cloak. He didn’t show me it but I could feel her.’
‘We spent the night like this, under the stars palavering about this and that. About my life, about his life and about you. He talked about you and when he did his eyes were fierce, boy oh boy he has some business with you Martin. Anyways, he put his hand to my chest, he pressed hard and told me of the cancer that grows there. He showed me, Martin, images flashed in my head of how I would cough myself to death. And it would be a hard long drawn out way to go. One I don’t want. He could see I didn’t want this so he asked for a coin and a favour.’
‘Sounds too good to be true.’
Albert smiled and his face looked younger and a lifetime of worries seemed to evaporate. ‘It does doesn’t it? But I accepted anyway. He promised that if I help you he will take my cancer away and I shall live out the rest of my days here and my passing will be in my sleep. When you have lived as long as I, Martin, it’s time to call it quits and take an opportunity when it shows itself. Trust me, Marksman, when Old Man Time takes a grip of ya, he sucks ya dry and as my old pa used to say – when you get old and wrinkly never ever, whatever you do, never trust a fart.’ With that the old loon hacked and laughed and hacked and laughed and disappeared behind the hut to sleep with old Fanny.
Above him Old Mother and her Nine Daughters sparkled and Martin watched them until he too stood, stretched and had himself a good night’s sleep on a creaky old bed in a stinking old hut in the middle of butt fuck nowhere.
For the first time in ages Martins sleep was dreamless and when he awoke he instantly regretted sleeping so deeply.
Stood over him, with a wicked glint in his eye was a man he knew from Ritash. In his hand he held an ancient gun and that gun was pointed right between his eyes.
The Book of Stephen - Just Follow Orders
1
The hunting party had left Ritash numbering ten – many more than usual – in search of the traitor Martin Doyle. Their hunt had taken them from the lush green forests of home to the harsh nothing of the Wastelands. The men had walked for hundreds of miles, their horses long since carrion for the desert.
Sat around a poorly made campfire situated on a small plateau of land jutting from the Wastelands like a giant molehill, Stephen, Watchman for the Eleventh King scanned the faces of the five other remaining Watchmen. All he could see was fear and exhaustion. The reason for their fear was twofold; the game they were playing wasn’t as straight forward as they had originally thought and the Black Sorcerer was alive.
The game.
It had no name and because of their stupidity and disbelief, four Watchmen; Drake, Lombard, Hughes and Davies had all died. They had forgotten…no misunderstood, the rules and now their bodies graced the hot dead earth of the Wastelands.
Stephen couldn’t remember how long it had been since the Sorcerer had visited them, days and weeks seemed to blend together like milk poured into a steaming mug of coffee. He could remember what the Sorcerer had said as his body curled and licked like the flames of the campfire that were engulfing him.
Let us play a game, Watchmen. The game has no name and only one rule. The aim of the game is for no more than five of you to reach the Marksman, because five is the key. This means that five of you must find another path to walk along. The rule of the game is simple: play or die. So it’s each man for himself.’
Stephens’s mind’s eye flicked back to that night and saw the black garbed man standing in the campfire, his image swaying and contorting and his words spiralling through the air. At first the Watchmen thought it a dream, a vision caused by the Wastelands fury but as the days went on and their number decreased it became all the more apparent that what they had seen in the fire was as real as their own names and the threat the game posed could not be ignored. The Black Sorcerer was alive and for some reason; tormenting their small group. Cursing the hunt of the traitor. The mere thought of the Black Sorcerer and what he brought with him should be enough to scare the toughest of men but for Stephen the thought of the power and the sheer strength of the Sorcerer and the Wretch King, for whom he does his bidding, it brought total fascination.
The silence of the group was pleasing to Stephen. Being a Watchman meant leading a very singular life with rules and regulations to follow and only one other person’s welfare to take care of, the King. You awoke alone, dressed alone and went about your business alone. You have no friends, no lovers only whores. If you work with another Watchman then the task beset you will be tough and usually requiring travel to far off lands. If like this mission you were required to work in a group numbering ten then you could guarantee whomever or whatever you were hunting required much bloodshed. Usually a far lesser number would return. With four Watchmen already dead and the Marksman almost within trapping distance, Palaluka was certainly being kept busy.
2
A harsh nudge on his shoulder brought Stephen out of his dreamless sleep and back into the chilly night air. With a silent gesture the man that had awoken him, Jessie, ushered Stephen to the lookout point situated roughly thirty meters from the camp and to an area that over looked the valley below them. With aching joints and a numbing headache Stephen stood, took hold of an already lit piece of wood and some kindling and slowly walked over to the cold dark rock which doubled as a chair as well as a look out position. Stephen placed the kindling onto the dead earth and then lit it with the piece of flaming wood. Making two trips Stephen constructed himself his own little fire and hearing Jessie slump down in his once recently departed bed he too sat upon the rock like the three others before him and awaited the rising of the sun which signalled the end of his watch.
Stephen was a gifted Watchman. Still young at twenty-four but with a wise head on his shoulders. He could sense many things. See many things that no normal man could see. Stephen was as close to a Marksman than a Watchman could get and it irritated him that his tutor had not allowed him to raise himself to that level. He was an excellent tracker, as deadly with a gun as any Marksman and as ruthless as the most bloodthirsty Watchman. Only out upon the mission and during the hunt could Stephen let his true skills show.
He could smell the sweet aroma of cooking meat. He guessed that Martin waited for them to make their move and by the end of tomorrow either the Marksman would live or he would die. It was in the hands of the Fates and in their hands any outcome was possible. Stephen knew though, that his fate would lead him elsewhere, that he would not see the Marksman, Martin Doyle, ever again.
Stephen scanned the stars as he thought of his own life and the parts of it he had missed out on; a wife, lovers, friends, a true home. Above his resting body the nine daughters flickered wildly; a reminder that all things go on and that nothing is set in stone. He enjoyed his life but always knew that he wanted more. He was in a way lost. Looking for something he didn’t know existed; looking for something he didn’t even know was owed to him. He yearned for a true calling, a higher reason being. Answers to unasked and unknown questions.
A shiver ran down his back as a soft breeze wrapped itself around him. How the wind on the Wastelands was like the breath of the dead scared Stephen. He was not a superstitious man, no Watchman was, but this place always seemed to bring with it death and sorrow. No story of the Wastelands was complete without someone getting lost, getting bitten or slashed or being swallowed up by some ancient demon.
Behind him, somewhere far off, four bodies were rotting because they too had fallen to the desert, all of them sucked down into its hot core and then spat out like seeds from a melon.
Stephen could still see the monster that had taken them; its massive body made up of the hot, harsh sand span wildly like a storm. I
ts head was that of a raging bull and its eyes seemed to be made up from the fires of hell. The Watchman had ran, no guns had been drawn however it engulfed four of them as they deviated from the path, thinking their own way better than that of their betters. They paid for their stupidity with their lives. The demon chewed on the skin and sucked out the souls, blood and bone falling to the hardpan. Then, without care, the demon beast had spat them back out upon the Wastelands and as quickly as it had appeared it disappeared leaving a harsh wind and the foul smell of death upon the air. Never before had Stephen seen a demon and he lay awake for night after night, terrified that the demon would return. His fears were still shared by the remainder of the group for they all knew that sooner rather than later there was going to be another death.
But Stephen was about to find out that just because another Watchman had to find another path that didn’t mean that one of them had to die.
3
The night rolled on; the chill of the evening desert growing. Stephens’s eyes focused on the sun rise two hours away and his mind was far from his station.
‘A Watchman caught off his guard. The King would be most disappointed.’
Stephen stood and turned around. The voice had come from a black garbed figure, lost in the shadows of the rocks and only visible when the light from the flickering fires illuminated him.
As Stephen spoke he lowered his right hand toward the gun at his side. ‘Who dares..?’
The black garbed man waved his left hand to silence Stephen, ‘No need for such words, Stephen, Watchman of the King, we are well met on this chilly night.’
Stephen leaned in closer recognising the voice behind the shadow, ‘you again, Sorcerer. Have you not had your fun?’
A hiss of a chuckle emanated from inside the hood and slowly the Black Sorcerer approached. ‘For the time, Stephen, call me Samson, for that is my name after all.’ With that the Sorcerer lowered his hood and revealed himself. His eyes were wide and white, his skin pale but red in the fire light; his mouth full of sharpened teeth. ‘Now, let us sit by the fire, Stephen, and talk of your future.’
