For the first time, she glanced up from the straw, held my eyes. “No. I won’t let it control me. All I ask” — she drew in a deep breath — “all I ask is for your help.”
“I’ll knock a goddamn chalice of wine right out of your hand if I see you holding one.” I winked. “How’s that for help?”
She chuckled. “I think it’ll do. Thank you, Astul.”
“Anything for my commander. Funny how fate has brought us together again, isn’t it?”
“Fate doesn’t exist. You know this. We’re together again because of my own volition and yours. Had I come with you and Lysa, I very well might have perished on the journey.”
I kicked my feet out and allowed the heel of my boots to smack back against the stall, like an energetic child. “Maybe you’re right. But you know I don’t like admitting when I’m wrong.”
Vayle smiled. “It would be unbecoming of you. Hopefully you are not wrong about the need for your reaper friend.”
Hopefully not, I thought. Although I had an inkling that Vayle suspected my desire to prevent Rovid’s demise was not based solely on a need for his assistance. And she’d be right. He’d put his ass on the line for me in Erior, to rescue my Rots. Letting him die and, according to him, endure an eternal torture in Amortis did not seem… well, fair. And life isn’t fair, not in the least bit, but you do what you can to make it fairer.
Silma told us that Gurtle and Hauditch offered us a room in their cottage. So Vayle and I slung our supplies we’d brought from the Hole over our shoulders and introduced ourselves.
Gurtle looked like my grandmother about a minute before she croaked, and Hauditch looked worse. I half-expected to have to shout so they could hear me, but their ears were just fine, and they moved with the flexibility of youth. It was then I remembered bodies here were only vessels. Mere aesthetics. I’d guessed Gurtle and Hauditch hadn’t been lucky enough to snag one of the fresh corpses Rovid, Lysa and I had brought over from the Prim.
As evening approached, the sky split open into a cordial palette of violets and blues. Bloated clouds departed, taking with them the rain. And soon, smoke billowed high above the buildings of Crokdaw Village, and folks paraded along the circular streets.
Fire pits were edged with smooth, colorful stones. Skinned deer were brought out on spits and positioned above the fires. Performers were dressed in brightly colored clothes and drummed on percussions, plucked string instruments and sang songs I did not know. A woman with long, thick hair woven into a tight nest held a pair of animal bones. When she knocked them together, they’d click in musical harmony, and those around her would clap their hands and swing their hips out, as if the music was an enchantment that commanded their souls.
“Astul!” called a hearty voice.
I felt a hand on the back of my shoulder and turned to see Taryl holding a wooden bowl. “Silma said you were here. Good to see you again.” He put the bowl to his lips and tilted his head back, drinking as much of whatever was inside as he could. A green liquid dripped down his chin and into the knotted hairs of his chest. “Ever have kashik before?”
“Can’t say that’s a thing where I come from,” I said.
“It’s to die for!” He winked and gave me a jab of his elbow, like he’d just told a knee-slapper of a joke.
I smiled, but quietly refused his offer.
“No, no,” he said, pushing the bowl into my hands. “You’ve got to try it. It’s a festival tradition. Go on.”
I took the bowl uneasily in my hands. The liquid was a thin soup of what looked like juiced cucumber, or maybe ground parsley mixed with broth. The hell if I knew. But it didn’t look appetizing in the slightest.
“What’s in it?” I asked.
“Just drink!”
A blur of fingers flashed in front of my face, and the bowl was snatched from my grasp. My eyes caught up to the thief just in time to see Vayle throwing back the bowlful of kashik. She wiped her lips, slammed the empty bowl back into the hands of Taryl and let out a satisfying sigh.
“That’s a merrymaker!” Taryl shouted, bent over and howling. “What’s your name?”
“Vayle,” she said. “Queen of rubies.”
“A queen?”
She leaned in and added, “In my own mind.”
Taryl slapped his thigh in amusement. “You’ve got a good one there, Astul. Funny as they make ’em!” He motioned over a ways. “Come on over and sit with us, the boys’ll love you two.”
“I hope they won’t be embarrassed when a girl drinks them under the table,” Vayle said.
“Oooh, they’ll take you up on that bet.”
She smiled. “We’ll be right over.”
Taryl flipped the bowl into the air, caught it and spun around, walking away unsteadily.
Vayle had a conceited look on her face. I crossed my arms and waited.
“What?” she said. “You’ve lost your knack for bashes. I had to step in. It’s not like a drink of kashik will kill me.”
“You said—”
“Forget what I said. Different time, different day.”
“It was eight hours ago at best.”
“That man, Taryl,” she said, “he’s our in. Keep him happy, keep him drinking at all costs, and we’ll get information out of him.”
I couldn’t much argue with that, even if I felt like I was letting my commander down. She’d regret this tomorrow, but we weren’t carrying any skins of wine in our supplies, so she’d be dry again for a good while.
“That kashik stuff,” I said as we walked toward Taryl and friends, “how was it?”
“Delicious.”
“Truly?”
“No. It was awful.”
It was awful. Taryl and his pals forced a bowlful on me soon as we sat down. I figured it’d be like taking a swim in a winter lake: less painful if you take it all in at once.
I was wrong. Terribly, gut-wrenchingly wrong. I suppressed all instincts to gag and expel the foul shit through my mouth, even with the knowledge that my body would in fact expel it via other routes later that night.
“Don’t like ginger?” Taryl asked, apparently seeing my face squirm. “Lots of ginger in it.”
Ginger. Yeah, sure. I didn’t taste a lick of ginger. The texture was reminiscent of thin, curdled milk that’d gone bad two weeks prior, and the taste… gods, the taste. Sour, smacking of overripe grapes that even bats would turn up their noses at, and those fuckers love fruit.
Vayle drank her bowl without complaint. Apparently she’d swallowed her taste buds.
After dancing around a fire — dancing sober is entirely not fun, by the way — participating in catch-the-eye (a Crokdaw tradition wherein the lucky winner who catches an eyeball plucked from a skinned deer receives good luck for the next year), and playing spectator to running of the coals, the festival had wound down. Only Taryl remained from his group of friends. Just like Vayle and I had wanted.
I pretended to sip a bowl of kashik so as to not seem suspicious. “So where you keeping the freak?” I asked.
“You mean the reaper?” Taryl said. His eyes were droopy slits. I had to get information out of him quickly. “They got ’im locked away. He won’t escape, don’t you worry — hey!” The woman with the nest of hair walked past. “Beeeeee-autiful song, er, melody… there that you played with those, um… bonesh.”
She laughed. “Thank you, Taryl — again. You told me earlier.”
Taryl let out a drunken chuckle, then conked his forehead off the table. “I’m tired.”
“You said he won’t escape,” Vayle said. “I guess he’s guarded well, then?”
“Mm,” Taryl murmured, face still plastered onto the table. “Got four guardin’ him at all times, plus a hound. Not taking… yeah.”
“Not taking what?”
“Huh? Oh. Chances. Not taking those, yeah.”
Vayle and I traded glances. “Good,” I said. “Wouldn’t want him running around again.”
“Unless the rope breaks,”
Taryl said, “you don’t have… we — we!” He picked his head up. “We won’t have anything to worry about. Goodnight.”
“Why would that be a worry?” Vayle asked. “Can’t you just string him up again?”
“Sign that the Three don’t want him dead,” Taryl said. “Can’t go against the Three.”
“They better take the rope inside tonight,” I said. “Looks like stormy weather. Makes for frayed rope.”
“Blagh. Silma keeps it safe. Going to sleep now. Goodnight.”
With that information in hand, Vayle and I got up from the table and let the sleepy drunk be. We took refuge in the stables, away from the few who were still mingling about the fires.
“Do you know the Three?” Vayle asked.
I shrugged. “Probably some sort of gods or spirits. I bet you the rope’s inside that building.” I stared at the triangular structure Silma had been going in and out of all day. “A small cut will ensure it snaps tomorrow.”
“We’ll have to wait until everyone goes to sleep,” Vayle said. “We’ll stick out like sore thumbs trying to get in there now.”
I squinted, trying to get a clear view at the edge of the forest. I knew what lay waiting in those trees, but I could not see them. “We’ve got a bigger problem. Red Eye. The guy who greeted us with bows and arrows. He might sleep at night, but he’ll undoubtedly have men patrolling.”
“A ruse, then.”
“A ruse,” I agreed. “It’s gotta be a good one. Big enough a distraction to alert all the archers.”
Vayle chewed on her cheek. “A bear?”
“What?”
“I could go into the woods. Scream that a bear is attacking.”
I tossed the idea back and forth in my head. Suddenly, it clicked. “A reaper. Fuck the bear. Scream for help because a reaper is attacking you. That’ll get everyone worked up more than a bear.”
“I like it,” Vayle said. “But I need a reason for going into the forest alone at night.”
“Say you were taking a shit. Didn’t want to bother the lovely Gurtle and Hauditch for their chamber pots.”
“Most embarrassment I have suffered has come while drunk. This will be new.”
“You drank five bowls of kashik. You’re not even a little knackered?”
She looked down at her shirt. “I spilled most of it. Purposefully.”
I shook my head, laughing. “In that case, I’m dunking you in the nearest river, because you’ll stink worse than cow shit once the air cleans the smoke off your clothes. All right, we wait until everyone goes to sleep. You venture into the forest and holler for help. I’ll find a way inside the building. Distract them for as long as you can.”
Once the festival officially ended with the fires put out and everyone off to bed, Vayle draped her hand around my shoulder. “See you on the other side, Astul.”
I waited in an empty tie stall till I heard the shriek. Then I poked my head out, watching archers swarm in from the blackness of night, all convening on the sound. They vanished within the forest, and I stepped out.
The vagueness of muddled voices burbled in my ears. But as I scuttled across the mud roads, I heard only the whoosh of my breath rising and falling. It’s a sublime sensation, skulking about in the dead of night. Your mind enhances every sense. Suddenly, you hear things that during the day would slip by as trivial and unimportant — the wood of a building croaking as a wind leans on its supports. You see things your eyes would typically ignore — lifelike shadows wrought from a deceiving moon casting the perfect angle of milky light against a door. Makes your chest collapse against your heart. Seizes your legs. For a moment, you wonder if you’ve been caught.
Then you press on. And I did. I pressed on. I moved. Every exhale was a scream I was certain the world would hear. The quiet jousting of ebon and leather a cry for attention. But I was alone in Crokdaw Village. All alone as I jumped the steps to the triangular building at the center of town.
I tried the handle. It opened. Of course it did. The honor code at work. Too bad these people did not realize I am not an honorable man.
I closed the door behind me. It smelled heavily of sandalwood in here. For a moment, fear paralyzed me… was Silma waiting in this building? Was she here?
Fragmented moonlight through the windows shaved away the darkness, revealing an emptiness I gladly welcomed. A single cedar table stretched from one wall to the other, its chairs pushed neatly in. At the front stood a podium and hallway that led to another part of the building. I went there after initially finding nothing of interest.
A door barred my entry. And this one was locked. Locks are only as good as a thief is bad, or in this case, an assassin. Few had ever stood between me and whatever lay on the other side.
This one was no different. A pick inserted at the top, pinpoint of a tension wrench at the bottom, a few turns, some wiggling and… pop went the lock. It always pays to have lock-picking tools in your pocket. Any worthwhile assassin wouldn’t be caught dead without them.
The room inside was darker than the rest of the building. A lack of windows hindered my progress, as my eyes had to adjust. But adjust they did, and I went to scouring the desk and all of its drawers. I closed the final drawer, bent backwards to crack my back and there I saw it. Hanging on a hook in the wall.
A coiled rope, braided as thick as my wrist. The noose had already been tied. Had it been used before? Probably not. Better chance of snapping.
I slid my pant leg up and unsheathed my ebon dagger. Now, I’d never sabotaged a hanging, but I had a theory on how to do so successfully. The trick, I hypothesized, was in the braids. If you fit the edge of your dagger perfectly between two braids, the wound will remain concealed.
Unless you cut too deeply and saw the fucker in two.
Luckily, I didn’t do that. I sawed until I felt the rope bite back, which meant I was cutting through some deeply woven threads. I turned it around, eyed it from the back to make sure the ebon wasn’t too close to cutting through. And I sawed some more.
Then I admired my handiwork, adjusted the rope on the hook so it appeared untouched, and hurried back outside, because I figured Vayle could only keep Red Eye’s men distracted so long.
Crokdaw Village remained as dead as the night above. I scrambled back to the stables and waited for Vayle to return.
Which took nearly an hour. She gave me an exasperated look.
“They interrogated me until they could conceive no more questions,” she said. “They wanted to know the shape of his nose. His nose!”
“It’s good exercise for your imagination,” I said. “The job is done. Rovid will be a free man tomorrow, unless something goes terribly wrong.”
Vayle sat on a pile of roughage. “Good. Nothing ever goes terribly wrong, so I should assume we will leave this village tomorrow.”
“My, my. My commander’s turned sassy on me.”
“I’m tired. And I’m going to sleep.”
Sleep sounded like a good plan. I laid my head on a pillow of roughage, closed my eyes and tried to ignore the fact that I was sleeping where horses actively shat.
Dreams came, I was sure, but morning came fiercer and more vibrantly. Thanks to a sharp clicking. I instantly recognized the sound as that of the bone instruments the woman had played at the festival.
I sat up, sucked down the fresh scent of barnyard mud and squinted with sleepy eyes at the sky outside.
I jumped up and kicked Vayle gently. “Get up. I think they’re starting.”
“Huh?” she said groggily. “Who?” She blinked, then said, “Oh.”
I dusted straw from my hair and body, because if you can’t be presentable during an execution, then when can you?
Near the forefront of Crokdaw Village stood a red-leafed tree with blossoming orange petals strung along drooping tubular stems. In that tree, figures moved. Three, to be exact. One had a rope around his neck and rope around his hands. He had no shirt, only a loincloth for pants.
It appeared t
he entire population of Crokdaw Village had come out to witness the reaper’s death. Not so much different than the hoopla surrounding executions in many cultures on Mizridahl, except these people had a very personal reason for celebrating death.
“Astul,” Silma said, greeting Vayle and me with a tight smile. She stood with prominence at the helm of the crowd. “You did not sleep in the bed Gurtle and Hauditch offered you?”
“All that kashik made us stupid,” I said. “We passed out in the stables.”
She fingered her hair, readjusting the flower in her braid. It’d come from the tree Rovid was getting to know very personally. “Taryl should have warned you. It’s quite a strong drink. I’m glad you’re here. Justice shall be carried out shortly. Please, take your place among my people.”
The ceremony began with two men in the tree steadying Rovid on a knotted branch.
Silma said some words, concluding her speech with, “It is now our time to reap. May justice be served.”
One of the men in the tree produced a handsaw. He hammered it into the branch supporting Rovid’s weight. And he pushed and he pulled, dragging the serrated teeth deeper and deeper into the bark.
Halfway through, the limb gave. It crackled. Snapped right off.
And Rovid fell.
My hands clenched into fists. Time slowed. Had I cut deep enough into the rope? Had Silma noticed and replaced the rope with another?
Yes and no, in that order. Rovid hung from the tree for the precise amount of time a rock hangs in the air. The force of the drop severed the rope, just above the noose.
Rovid’s legs flailed as he tumbled to the ground with a solid thud. There was a cloud of dust and a few displaced leaves fluttering about. And lots of gasps.
Then silence. No one moved, except the bruised reaper. He grunted, got to his knees. To his feet. And he ran.
“Fuck,” I said to Vayle. And I also ran.
Ran past the crowd of onlookers who had been lambasted into a stupor by unthinkable surprise. As it turns out, the speed of a lifelong assassin surpasses that of a reaper. Particularly a reaper who just fell out of a tree.
The Miscreant (An Assassin's Blade Book 2) Page 26
