There was something desperate, pleading in his voice, and it moved a rare iota of pity inside of me. This poor boy was a month’s travel from home, further than he had ever been from the only place he had ever felt safe. Wherever the Lady Aelia’s domain lay, it was painfully obvious he had never so much as touched a riot, uprising, or battle. It must be a very boring place for a castle guard. Lucky boy.
I felt an echo from inside when I gazed at the terror evident in his eyes. It took a full minute to yank the axe from the wall, but only a second to turn the bent, nicked head to a more deadly purpose. The axe came to a halt midway through the beast’s skull, but it was enough for it to die. The rest of its last scream came out between dead lips like a bladder being squeezed. After two more strikes I was confident enough to yank the Angel from its torso and sit back down. I sat there breathing for what seemed like a long time, just letting the rush of the Beast go, burying the relish with which I had done my business.
Like a wounded animal, Theo crept forward toward the gray lump that used to be his enemy. He touched it, twice, and each time yanked back his hand as if burned. “What… What is it?”
“A faerie. A redcap. Battlefield scavenger.” I said, levering myself to my feet and heading for the corpse of the beheaded old woman. I tore off part of her dress and used it to clean the ichor from the Angel and my hands before realizing I was covered in the stuff and it had the consistency of snot. I was going to need another bath, “The barbarians raided this village, killed some people, took some supplies and moved on. The redcaps smelled the carnage and showed up later, looking for food and clothing.”
“Food and clothing, they aren’t wearing…”
“Theo, don’t!” But, of course I wasn’t quite fast enough.
He had gotten a good look at the crude white leather garments. He could see the raw, pink edges, the splotchy patches of blue, and the unmistakable hints of stitched shut eyes, noses, and mouths. He spent several seconds vomiting, and then several minutes heaving. I grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and dragged him back into the center of the square where the air was marginally clearer. He regained control of his stomach and I sent him back down the road to the carriage, carrying a message urging the Lady to make her way here with all haste.
An hour later the whole group arrived. I already and had a pyre started.
The boys again showed their skill as porters, piling the villagers in a large stack spread with kindling while I hung the dead bodies of the fairies over the wall. I hoped the smell of their own dead would ward off any other fell scavengers. To be sure, as the night went on and they seemed to dissolve into bundles of sticks and piles of white curds, no fly, bird, or furred creature took even remote interest in consuming any part of them.
In any case, we could go no further today, and I was eager to have the protection of the palisade. Aelia flat refused to sleep in any of the houses and instead had the boys pitch her tent. Her cat had no such trouble, and wandered into one and came out with a fat mouse. If danger showed up in the night I would have rather had her inside of wooden walls than behind pegged curtains of silk, and I would have argued that point if I thought there was some use.
Worse, the boys had the enraging habit of unpacking the oak and iron treasure chest from the top of the carriage and setting it down in an out of the way spot at the edge of camp. Surely it would take four burly men to make off with it, but I assumed all of the funds for Aelia’s mission were inside and if we lost that, we lost everything. Unfortunately, nobody was asking me what I wanted right now. Instead I made sure the watches were set for the night, and that the pig Theo had shot was well cooked and portioned out. Shame to waste fresh meat, after all.
Theo did not eat with us, but instead kept himself away from me for several hours, only joining the campfire after I had eaten and moved on. At least he gave a full report to her Ladyship, and allowed me to get on with more important things, like sneaking into a home to procure a tub so I could wash. And wash my clothing. And my hair. I don’t remember hair being able to hold so much blood, but there you go. In fact anything I could find to keep away from her, and the feelings she brought up inside me-
The Dark Thing inside flung handfuls of broken glass into my mind’s eye, and the sounds of screaming inside my skull drove all the softer thoughts away. Long after dark had vanquished any trace of the sun I took a seat on the apex of the bridge, watching the whole of the village from this one central location. I just stared into the night, drawing cold curtains inside myself.
Theo came to me carrying a bundle. He stopped just out of sword’s reach, face pale and eyes wandering. I squelched all thought toward words and just let him sit, second upon second of sand weighing down his mind until he was ready to speak. He was normally a friendly boy with such an easy laugh, and even the horrors of the day had not erased that from him. It was still there, buried under the shock of River’s Bend, but not gone. I found myself respecting him for that, and not a little jealous. I would be a liar if I said that the hollow shell that represented him inside of my mind was not being filled with more vibrant colors. He was becoming a person to me. Not a friend, not yet, but now much more than a simple, expendable thing. Something within me rejoiced, and something inside growled in anger. No, it was fear.
The least I can be is honest to myself, whoever I am.
“How did… I mean, why did you fight them?” The boy chewed on some bile and silently called himself a host of horrible names, “No. I mean: I was sure we were going to die. No! I mean…” Theo squared his shoulders, “You took on four of those things. How did you do it? I saw part of it, but I still can’t tell you how you killed them. How do you know how to move, how to dodge? How do you fight like that?”
Ah. “Theodemar. I can tell you this: If they bleed, if they die, then they can be killed and everything else is a matter of speed, will, and timing.”
Theo stared at me, trying to decide if what I had just said was very profound, or a cartload of crap. He shook out the bundle in his arms, revealing a beautiful, heavy traveling cloak. “The cleric says there is a frost coming tonight, so I spoke to the men. This belonged to the Captain, and we know he would have wanted you to have it.”
The chestnut fabric was hardy to the touch, and the copper colored fox fur lining promised to fend off even the worst winter winds. I could not stop smiling as I put it on, the rugged iron broaches fixing it perfectly in place. I walked back down to the fire with Theo, thanked the guards there, and waved to the one on duty at the gate.
The spotty kid, Jonathan? Came back to the fire and raised his ration of wine toward me in salute, “We all thought after the day you had, you deserved some kind of reward.”
The entire group chuckled, but not as loudly as I, “Really? Yesterday seemed to me to be far worse.”
They looked amongst themselves for a moment, nonplussed, “What happened yesterday?”
“I woke up with a fractured skull and a damn black bird on my chest waiting for me to die!”
They sat in stunned silence for a few uncomfortable seconds until the weight of the idea hit them. Then as one they roared with laughter and slapped their thighs. Theo reached out and plucked at the lining of my new cloak, “Surely, my friend you are as much a fox as he who wore that trimming before you! Even Death can’t land his crows on you for long!”
Another boy, Miller? waved his eating knife in the air, at me, “Fox! You are a magician with a blade. Where did you study?”
I shrugged, “I don’t know.”
A boy with a face of angry red acne spit tidbits of pork into the fire, “Don’t call him that, he’s much more crow!”
“But you must know something! How long have you been at it, then?” A gawky lad with a prominent throat bulge on a near nonexistent neck swallowed hard as he repeated, “I mean, how long? Don’t you remember?”
I shook my head, tagging him as the slow one of the group, “I don’t know.”
Theo leaned forward, betraying his de
sire far too clearly, “But could you teach it?”
I looked at all the eager faces, sensing the serious question buried in the mirth. I took a deep breath and fought against every instinct in my body, “That depends. Who else feels like getting up early tomorrow?”
The boys cheered, and chanted “Fox! Crow! Fox! Crow! Fox! Crow!” until Gelia came out of the pavilion to express her mistress’s displeasure at such revelry in this mournful place. She scolded us thoroughly, and retired. But she was too late.
I had earned my name, bestowed by the boys with whom I would face death; Fox Crow.
6
Withershins
In a perfect world, the rest of our trip would have been swift and neat, I would have made love to the lady and scampered on my way with my memory fully restored and a hat full of gold. Of course, if you remember, life is neither perfect-nor even fair. That’s probably why we were standing in the center of the road, screaming at one another. Well, to be fair, one does not scream at a noble lady. That is why when history books look back on this moment, I am sure it will say that I was screaming irrationally in a calm, collected tone, while she was making salient points at the top of her lungs.
“You can’t have understood: We are catching up to them. If we continue going forward, eventually we are going to run into the back end of the barbarian raiders. Then this trip of yours will be well and truly over.”
“The future of my father’s territory rides on this trade deal.” Tears welled up in her eyes and part of me instinctively rejected them as a negotiating ploy, beneath her. As she spoke, however, I became less sure, “I have no intention of going home and telling him I turned back when I was almost there. It is this discussion that is over, Crow.”
And that is that. I nodded, bowed, collected my gear, and then lied like a bastard, “Theo, stay and get the boys to break camp. I’m going to scout ahead.”
The boy-guards were moving a little stiffly, and their faces were pictures of misery. That was to be expected. They wanted to learn how to fight, and that always starts with exercises. The one who talks with his mouth full (Miller, my hindbrain whispered) was still massaging his wrists and waddling on burning thighs. I chuckled as I hitched up my pack and shook my head. The kid was an eager student, no doubt about it.
Then I realized that I would never see them again. There was an echoing, hungry hole, too high in my chest to be my stomach. A claw swept out of the Fog in my skull and murdered the mournful feeling. Aelia’s life wasn’t worth the pouch of silver she had given me, and mine was worth more than a mountain of it. If she chose to march her serfs into a trap, so be it. I was not going to follow along to my death like an obedient beagle. I took to the road.
Every few minutes, I attempted to lengthen my stride. I pulled my new cloak tighter against the chill that had settled in overnight. The day was clear, and it seemed that every sound would carry for miles. Even the soft chink, chink, chink of coins in my pouch echoed back from everywhere. At that moment it crystallized that I had left the carriage party behind and I had no intention of ever going back.
After a few miles the road began to shoot out more spurs. They were not large or well traveled, leading doubtlessly to lone farmsteads, charcoal burners, or grazing lands, but it was still further evidence of civilization. The wind brought a burning, greasy smell to my nostrils, and the Beast took hold of me so seamlessly I did not even notice. I found a path heading upward and raced along it, hoping to get to a hillock so I could see any trace of another blasted settlement.
I did even better than I could have hoped, because I found a cliff face. Not completely sheer but dramatically steep all the same, with trees cleared by a helpful storm years previously, the exposed brink was like a massive panorama painted in a king’s palace. Green had exploded into autumn colors that were rich and vibrant in coming death. The sky was wind-tossed and splashed carelessly with cotton combed into horse-tails. Still, what demanded the focus of my eyes was the exposed field of harvested corn where two armies clashed.
Down there around six hundred men desperately struggled for the right to draw in air. The Kingsmen army, resplendent in reds and yellows, struggling against a barbarian horde, in furs and raw wool. Only the shadowy echoes of sounds reached me here, the clang of sword on armor, the cry of a life stolen, the screams of fallen horses.
Suddenly, the battle was on all sides, with the screeches of steel and strained creaking of leather. The brown ground was being churned into a bloody froth, looking to the sky as a red sea slowly clotting into black clay. I blinked as my eyes stung viciously, pressure building behind my eyes as carrion birds swarmed like flies. Armor shrieked as it peeled away from ruined flesh. The smell of bowels thrown into sunlight mingled with freshly spilled blood. The distinctive grinding, tearing sounds of sharpened steel slicing through flesh shot through me as I collapsed.
The world was in color, bolder and richer than I had ever seen. Even the honest, hand worked wood and peeling paint of River’s Bend held a poignant, simple beauty uncomplicated by shadows or judgments. All around the inhabitants of this village went about their business on either side of the river. I was standing on the apex of the bridge, but I could still hear the winter rye rustling, whispering secrets to me beyond the wall. I turned…
Wings cast outward like gates, an angelic priest barred my path, shining blue heart bleeding light.
I had always known he was there.
My stomach flipped inside my belly as the figure raised his arms. Two hands, carved of aged alabaster, emerged from within the robe woven of webs and night. He held a regal raven in his right hand, carved of ebon wood so pitted and worm-eaten it seemed to wither and crumble in his grasp. His left held the finest sculpture I had ever beheld. Easily ransomed for a king’s crown, the gold and ruby blazed in the shape of a lidless eye. Sparkling facets caught fire in the too bright sun, lighting an unending fury within it. He seemed to be offering the statuettes to me, waiting with the patience of one who has no life left to trickle through the hourglass. Power. Knowledge. Wealth. I reached for the eye.
All around, I heard the shuffling feet of the villagers as they came close. I turned and saw those coming up behind me still bore the horrible wounds inflicted by the barbarian raiders. Close, too close, was the decapitated old woman from the bean pile. She reached for me, bloody neck hole whistling with a mouthless scream-
I woke up face down in the dirt, choking myself. I heaved myself onto my back and panted at the clear, blue sky. Uncounted minutes slipped by as I lay there, a confused jumble of thoughts invading the space between my eyes and the miserly Fog. There were impressions of people I know I should remember, and bloody corpses I knew I had some connection to. I shook my head and for once tried to shove it all back into oblivion, but I might as well have been bailing out a boat with a bread knife.
My stomach convulsed, streams of half digested food splashing against dead leaves and steaming even before it finished moving. To my skin the winter frost turned hot, sweltering, and sweat began to pour down my back and face. The crackling, empty melon sound of a skull collapsing drowned out my coughing inside my own mind. I vomited again, and rolled away from the fresh puddle and concentrated on breathing.
In a flash, the Thing in the back of my head made up of Claws and Night swooped forward and gathered up all the smells, sensations, and sounds, shoving it back into the Fog with ruthless efficiency. Again, a voice that was not mine echoed inside of my head, Are you going to get up, or am I going to kill you here?
The agony across my back once again dried like sweat, leaving discomfort but no real damage. I gingerly rubbed against a tree, but I couldn’t detect anything but skin back there, and thankfully I did not set off another attack. Nonplussed, I sat against the tree to consider my options, of which there were none.
Ahead there were two armies. If the barbarians won there would be no safe passage whatsoever. If the Kingsmen prevailed, then I would be a nameless vagabond with a very expensive and confis
catable sword in the vicinity of a major battle. It would be hard to guess a time measurement short enough for them to finger me as a spy and hang me.
In the middle of the empty forest, under the cover of the dying and damned, I screamed at the sky, cursing all the Gods, devils, angels, demons, and pretty much everyone alive in alphabetical order. Behind me was a stubborn noble, ahead was a barbarian horde. I needed the princess to survive on one hand, and I could always ditch them again on the other. I dreaded going back to being under that woman’s thumb, and at the same time wanted to slice out the part of me that rejoiced at the same thought.
I turned over every possibility in the back of my head, sifting through plans and discarding the dross. I had to make up time. I had to find the carriage party. It was what would happen next that I didn’t know. There are times in life where suspense is preferable to the alternative.
I sprang unsteadily to my feet as if I had been branded. Unsure hands grasped clumsily at a tree trunk for support. A clear, long note echoed across the treetops. My eyes snapped open and focused on the battlefield below. The Kingsmen troops were rallying, and giving chase. I blew out the acidic dregs of puke that had packed into my nose and then spit viciously. Somewhere nearby a small forest animal blinked and I was gone. Soon my breath came in harder and harder, but still my feet flew like the spirit of retribution. A stitch collected on my side, and I cursed every spare waterweight of gear on my back, but my boots still slapped the hard dirt.
I heard them long before I saw them. I skidded around a corner and there they were down the road. Everything looked normal, with one carriage, two horses, and five boys. Still I ran to within a few paces before slowing to a jog, then a walk. The carriage rattled to a halt and the curtain moved angrily aside. Aelia fixed me with a dire gaze as I moved toward the cabin. “What now? Why have we stopped?”
“Kingsmen… and westerners… ahead.” As I gasped I motioned to the stinky boy (Wesker… no, Ryan… Daniel? my mind searched uselessly), handed him my pack, and motioned for him to stow it with the rest of the baggage, “Kingsmen… won… remnants of… barbarians… retreating… this way… we have to…”
I Know Not: The Legacy of Fox Crow Page 7
