Rivers Run Red (The Morhudrim Cycle Book 1)
Page 47
Renco clenched his fists.
“But you’re a boy still. Tell me boy where is your master?”
Renco shrugged. He didn’t know.
Holt stepped in and kicked Mao, the force spinning the old man off the ground and onto his back. He landed heavily crying out in pain, hands clutching his gut and sides. He groaned in agony, the sound pitiful as he tried to suck air in. Holt knelt grabbing a fistful of Mao’s tunic lifting him easily. Then looking at Zoller waited.
“Sometimes all it takes is the right incentive. If you can talk now is the time.” Zoller stared at Renco’s clenched fists then pointedly back at Mao. “He looks old and frail. He needs your help boy. Will you help him?”
There was the sound of hooves on the road. Renco, turning saw Luke Goodwill canter to a stop just outside the Red Cloaks' cordon. It suddenly made sense then. The bard had betrayed them to the Red Priest, but why? He recalled Lett’s whisper in his ear the day before. “Don’t worry. I’ll look out for you Renco. My Da is very canny.”
The bard must have known master wasn’t a mage, he was shrewd. Saw his master for what he was and had used it. I wonder how much they paid him, he thought bitterly. He took several deep breaths, a mix of fear and anger percolating in his veins.
“Your oath,” Mao croaked from the ground. There was a sickening smack as Holt punched him. Blood exploded as his nose crunched and his head snapped back.
“What are you doing? He’s an old man. You’ll kill him,” Luke cried. He went to step in, but the small guard held his hand out.
“Another step and I’ll gut you where you stand,” Tuko said his voice a mix of menace and calm.
Luke stood there uncertainly. “Where’s my daughter?” He turned, pleading to Lord Menzies. “My Lord they have my daughter, Letizia.”
Before anyone could answer a cry came from the carriage and Renco saw Lett’s face appear at the window.
“Da, I’m here.” She’d been crying, her face blotchy and red. She opened the carriage door but a hand clamped down firmly on her shoulder stopping her from leaving.
Renco tensed taking a step towards the carriage, if they hurt her…. Zoller moved back sensing the barely contained violence in the young man.
“Lett,” Luke cried out. “Why have you got her? Let her go. I’m a bard. We are sacrosanct. Lord Menzies I beseech you.” He was talking to anyone and everyone, fear and desperation in his voice.
“Father Zoller, let the girl go. Stop this, whatever it is, and let us leave. We do not have the time,” Menzies insisted.
Zoller held his hands out. “The girl came to us remember. Fortunately she is not a bard, not sacrosanct, so that leaves just you, Goodwill isn’t it?”
“Let her go. She is nothing to do with whatever the hells this is,” Luke shouted.
“She has everything to do with it,” Zoller barked. “She’s here for the boy, to save him and I promised her I would. But you Goodwill, you’re a liar and a traitor. Your beautiful daughter did her duty. Told me all about Hiro, an old adversary of mine and Knight of the Order no less. An outlawed Order banished from the Rivers. The question is why didn’t you come to us?” Zoller turned to Menzies. “But you’re right. We don’t have the time.”
Tuko drew a knife and stepping past the bard ran its blade across his throat, ear to ear. Blood gushed in a fountain.
Luke’s hands clasped uselessly trying to stem the blood pulsing from his neck. He stood a moment, eyes disbelieving before they glazed over. Then, strength leaving his body sank to his knees and folded up onto the wet grass. He jerked a few times then lay still.
Lett started screaming.
Her cries tore at Renco even whilst he tried to make sense of it all. Lett had gone to Zoller? The hand on her shoulder dragged Lett back into the depths of the carriage her cries muffled but no less heart rending.
“By the gods man are you mad? You can’t go round killing bards. The Black Crow will hang you for this, priest or no.”
“He colluded with a known felon wanted for murder and blasphemy. Besides, the Black Crow is dead even if he doesn’t know it yet.” Zoller turned to Holt. “Bind the boy’s hands and bring him.”
“Aye Father,” Holt grunted.
Renco stood transfixed; he was reeling from Lett’s betrayal and her heartbreak and watched in shock as Luke Goodwill bled out. Renco’s body started to shake as energy coursed through it. He looked down at Mao to find his friend staring back through swollen eyes, face covered in blood.
His hands moved and he signed, “Your oath.”
Holt beat Mao again, opening up a savage cut across his right eye brow, splitting the skin like a peach. His head smacked into the ground and Mao lay there wheezing like each breath would be his last, blood sheeting down his face.
Something caught Holt’s attention and he ripped Mao’s tunic neck revealing a thin black necklace. It was threaded through with gold the glint of it drawing Holt’s eye.
Bloody and wrecked as he was Mao raised his hand and Holt slapped it away contemptuously before pulling violently on the necklace. Mao’s head flew up, it wouldn’t give. Drawing a vicious serrated knife from his belt Holt sawed at the necklace.
Renco heard a pop and hiss as the black necklace parted, saw a faint dark mist cloud the air for an instant before the breeze and rain tore it away.
Holt held his thin black trophy up triumphantly before looking around suspiciously and slipping it into a pocket in his coat.
“Enough Holt, bind the boy.” Zoller snapped. Walking over he looked down at Mao’s battered face. It was a mess.
“Can you hear me old man? Tell Hiro we have his boy. If he wants him I’ll be at Rivercross waiting. Tell him Father Zoller sends his regards.”
Oath or no, Renco wasn’t sure he could stand it. He tensed ready to explode into action when Zoller's eyes switched to him.
“Behave yourself, I would hate for the girl to suffer for your actions. You understand me boy?”
He remembered Mao’s words from earlier. Sometimes the best thing is to do nothing and doing nothing can sometimes be the hardest thing. The moment passed. Holt stepped behind him and rough hands yanked his arms back. Holt bound and knotted a chord of leather about his wrists. “You want him in the carriage Father?”
“No I do not,” Zoller retorted. “Stick him on the bard’s horse. It’s already saddled and he won’t be needing it anymore.”
With a shove Renco stumbled towards Luke’s horse. A cackle rose up behind them and they turned as one to look.
Mao had rolled on to his side. He was spitting blood and laughing, his crooked teeth red.
“Mao tell him,” he laughed hysterically, bloody face swollen so bad Renco couldn’t see his eyes. Mao’s laughter turned into a cough as he choked vomiting blood.
“Mao tell him,” he sighed, laying his head back against the wet grass. He took great wheezing gasps of air, lungs rattling with every breath.
“If you’ve killed him prematurely Holt I will be most upset with you,” Zoller berated the giant.
Turning away he smiled. “Come Lord Menzies let us depart whilst we are able.”
Chapter 66
: Slaughter House
The old man wheezed and groaned, the only overt sign he was alive. His body lay like a sack of bones on the ground. Nihm and Morten had returned as the Red Cloaks prepared to leave and stood watching quietly from the roadside, two amongst the gathered crowd of on lookers.
Nihm saw a brute of a Red Cloak bind the hands and arms of the young man from the camp before unceremoniously hefting him up on to a horse and lashing him to the saddle. The horse was the same that had cantered past not ten minutes gone forcing them from the road.
Nihm put her head down letting her hood hide her face as the Red Cloaks left, avoiding eye contact with the small assassin escorting the priest Zoller back to his carriage. Instead she let her eyes wander to the crumpled body lying on the ground, blood soaking the grass where he lay. It was the rider on the r
oad. Her eyes roved back to the old man.
Then he was gone. The Red Cloaks rode off pulling him after, his horse tied to the saddle horn of a big black destrier, the giant Red Cloak on its back. They didn’t turn back to Fallston but headed east along the Reach towards Longstretch, Lord Menzies and his men close behind.
The small gathering of onlookers started dispersing, many trudging east down the road following the Red Cloaks. A few glanced at the two bodies lying on the ground, one dead and one dying, but none moved to help.
Nihm hobbled over to the old man, Morten at her side. Ash bounded ahead and sniffed at him where he lay.
“Hope Ash don’t mistake him for breakfast,” Morten quipped.
Leaning on her staff Nihm slowly knelt and pushed Ash away. The old man’s face was swollen and lumpy, his eyes just slits. He was covered in blood, diluted by the constant drizzle but as fast as it washed away more gushed from his nose and brow. She touched fingers to his wrist as Marron had taught her. His pulse was faint but steady.
“Bring the wagon,” she told Morten, each word slow and distinct as she sounded them out. Morten didn’t argue but turned sprinting towards their camp.
Nihm rose slowly. Looking about she gathered what she might need from their camp. The old man’s body shivered almost imperceptibly and Nihm laid his cloak over him not sure if he was cold or in shock. She felt his wrist again.
Nihm removed her cloak, folded and tucked it behind his head. She tore a shirt into strips and bound his head with them and stoppering his nose. Marron’s lessons played in her mind as if she was there but she had no time for self-reflection or remorse, the old man’s life hung in the balance.
She sensed Mercy approaching with Stama and turned as they arrived. Mercy quickly knelt and examined him, doing much the same as Nihm. Inspecting his dressings she grunted.
“You’ve done well, but he’s very weak. We’ll get him to a physiker before we leave.”
“No,” Nihm said.
“What do you mean no?” Mercy asked.
“He comes with us.” Nihm sounded slightly drunk as she slurred her words, rushing them together.
“He’s likely going to die, even with a physiker. We don’t have time to nursemaid a dying man.” Mercy’s eyes softened. “I know you mean well but really it’s not your responsibility. He’d have a better chance in Fallston.”
“He comes with me,” Nihm insisted, enunciating each word.
“Why?” Mercy asked as if she had eavesdropped on Nihm's thoughts.
“Stama and I saw deer this morning. A herd of them not fifty paces from camp,” Nihm stuttered. “I saw Lord Menzies ride away with the Red Cloaks and two supply wagons. Not to Fallston but east.”
Their wagon rumbled across the road and pulled up beside them as they spoke, Morten on the reins and Lucky leading the horses.
“Lord Menzies estates are to the east. What are you trying to say?” Mercy asked calmly.
It didn’t fool Nihm. She could see Mercy’s frustration. She was being indulged; Mercy was not taking her seriously. Nihm shook her head in exasperation.
“Menzies runs from something. The deer run from something. What could both possibly be running from I wonder?” Nihm said.
Mercy’s face changed as Nihm’s words registered and she thought through the implications. “Shit.”
She looked about. There were a lot of people on the fields outside Fallston and many more inside. “Lucky put the old man in the back of the wagon.”
The big man bent lifting the old man easily. Carrying him to the wagon Lucky laid him on Nihm’s pallet. As the old man’s head touched the pillow a long low rumble peeled out, sounding like thunder.
“That ain’t thunder,” Stama said. He looked towards the low hills. The clouds to the north and east were dark and angry. “There’s a storm coming but weren’t no thunder,” he repeated.
“Come, we have to go now!” Mercy yelled.
Another deep rumble rolled out, drums. Cries went up, shouts of panic rising from the many people still in the fields.
“We need to go now. We won’t have horses if we stand around much longer,” Mercy said.
“Nihm, Nihm, what’s wrong with you girl, get on the damn wagon we have to go. Now!” Mercy shouted.
“No, take the horses and go.” Nihm pointed down the road to the east. “Urak a league east maybe more, if you ride hard you might make it. I’m staying with the old man. It’s too late for us,” Nihm slurred sounding like a drunk again.
Another drum beat, this time Nihm could sense it was from the north now that she knew to listen for it.
“The gods damn you. This has been an unholy mess the moment we crossed paths. I’m starting to wish we’d never set foot in the Rivers,” Mercy cried exasperation and anger matching Nihm’s own.
“Then go. Now!” Nihm threw her staff, stuff Morten it was her staff now, into the wagon and climbed up awkwardly beside him. He looked pale and scared; his red hair wet with the rain was plastered to his head. Nihm pushed him. “Mort, go. Leave.”
“I ain’t leaving you Nihm. I go where you go. Get off the reins.” He shoved her hands away as she tried to snatch them. “You are so… so infuriating,” he shouted. “Now where are we going? Town I’m guessing?”
Nihm saw the same stubborn look in his eye Darion got when he’d made his mind up about something. She nodded her head yes and Morten gave the reins a flick. Expertly turning the wagon he headed it towards town.
They fought against a tide of people, many running, terror and fear driving the
m on. Some few made for town but it was largely defenceless with no curtain wall and few guards, most having left with Lord Menzies. To stay was to die.
“You’re going the wrong way. Fallston will just be a slaughter house,” a man cried out.
The drums beat again, a quick staccato beat rumbling through the rain.
Sai offered.
A collective cry rose up, rippling and rising like a wave as more and more people looked in horror to the north.
Turning, Nihm saw that a line of large manlike creatures had stepped out of the undergrowth. Their line stretched away eastward, disappearing into the misty rain. They looked fearsome, the top half of their heads were red as if dipped in blood and the blood left to run down face and chest. They looked primal and savage.
The tide turned, people suddenly rushing back towards Fallston. Nihm watched as Mercy’s horse rode past them, Stama with her. She looked defiant and nodded her head at Nihm as she passed them. There was no sign of Lucky though. Nihm presumed he rode behind but there was too much going on for her to focus on that right now.
Houses sprung up and suddenly they were in the town limits. It was a shadow of itself, the crowds of people mostly gone. Those on the street were from the fields outside of town looking for shelter. Those already in town had either fled or taken refuge wherever they could. Ahead, through the rain Nihm saw a mass of people on the switchback leading to the Uppers.
A sudden guttural roar of noise sounded behind and Nihm looked back. Blessedly she couldn’t see much but what she did sent a ball of fear into the pit of her stomach.
The urak charged, rushing forward on mass. People on the road and in the fields ran in terror, dropping whatever possessions they carried. It didn’t save many of them. Those with young or elderly were the first to fall, the urak breaking over them in a rush of bodies hacking and clubbing them to the ground.