by Paul Yoder
Nomad hesitated for a moment longer, starting to ease up on Reza’s arm, looking off to the side in contemplation, fully ignoring the shouting group of guards that continued to approach.
“In the name of the king, I order you to turn around, or we will attack,” the lead guard shouted, stepping within striking distance from Nomad, brandishing his iron capped staff.
“Last warning!” the guard growled, lining up a shot with his weapon.
Arie and Reza pulled on Nomad frantically to move out of the way of the incoming assault, knowing that once a blow was struck, their night would become unconditionally worse.
Nomad stood still like a monument of stone.
The iron cap smacked solidly into the back of Nomad’s head with enough force to crack a skull, a sickening impact jolting his head forward for a moment.
Nomad’s red eyes went wide, his gaze snapping to the assaulter behind him, glaring at the man with bloody intent.
Nomad ripped away from Arie and Reza and snatched the guard by the neck, easily lifting him in the air, pausing a moment before throwing him to the ground in a heap, the snap of a bone splitting the otherwise quiet night.
The three other guards did not wait to jump in as more guards began to rush to the scene from the castle gate, the night shift apparently being informed of the unusual scuffle happening along Main Street.
Nomad was about to pounce on the fallen guard when a mace slammed into the side of his head, delivering another, what should have been, fatal blow, the ball of iron nudging Nomad a step to the left before he switched targets, now aware of the other three guards coming at him with maces swinging.
He sidestepped the second guard’s attack just in time, having to readjust his movement a moment later to attempt to get out of the way of the third attacker’s mace, which did land on Nomad’s shoulder, but not solidly enough to matter to the red-eyed horror.
Curling his fists, Nomad sprung back in at the three guards, snapping his fist into the side of the first guard’s helmet, knocking him off into the gutter. Without a pause, Nomad threw an uppercut at the second guard, hitting him beneath the chin strap, blowing him off his feet for a moment before landing unconscious on the ground.
The third guard swung again, attempting to land another hit on Nomad before his focus turned to him. Nomad rolled with the hit again though, and the solid ball of iron only glanced ribs as Nomad brought a leg up to kick the last guard back, stumbling around as he backpedaled, trying desperately to keep his footing as reinforcements began to show up.
His eyes grew more wild, more crimson, visibly enough to halt the approaching castle guards in their tracks a good ten feet away from the menacing stranger.
The twang of a crossbow sounded just before a bolt whizzed in, thudding into Nomad’s upper chest, sinking half the shaft through just above the man’s lungs.
Worried murmurs began to sound through the ranks as Nomad took a step forward, not fazed by the bolt stuck in his body in the least.
Two more crossbows were raised, trained on Nomad, ready to shoot, but the guards never got their second shot.
A warm hand pressed softly on Nomad’s marble-like skin as Reza, drawing energies from deep within, began to unleash her inherited power of healing, blacking her out almost instantly after a wild scream of pain, falling back into Arie’s arms.
Nomad stumbled forward, grunting as he tried to shrug off the searing touch of his former comrade. What was once a touch of divine healing now crippled him, locking up the muscles in his racked back, contracting until the pain forced him to scream out like a wild, tortured beast, loud enough for all of Sephentho to hear.
His screams were cut short as a dozen iron clubs came in on his unprotected body, beating the consciousness from him.
“Seize ‘em! Seize all of ‘em!” The captain shouted, rushing in with the rest of the guard.
7
A Grim Sentence
Slitting an eye open, Reza peeked out at her unfamiliar surroundings, her battered brain attempting to catch up with where she was and how she got there.
It was dark, to the point where the only thing she could make out was a torch on the wall through the bars. Reaching down, she felt a cold shackle bound around her ankle, and with the constant drip of condensation coming down from the ceiling and the far distant wind echoing through corridor after corridor, she was beginning to piece together where she might be.
Placing a hand on her head caused her to recoil momentarily before lightly inspecting once more. A large contusion just above her brow, and the pounding headache that began intensifying, brought to mind the events that likely landed her here in jail.
Nomad had gone on a rampage, and after he had fallen, mostly due to her healing touch, she had been knocked cold by one of the guards.
From her side came a low voice, “I’m surprised you’re up so soon. After all that alcohol, excitement, and punishment, I was figuring you’d be out the rest of the night.”
Reza turned her squinty gaze to Arie who was a cell over from her, also shackled and shivering slightly.
“Arie, what’s happened?” Reza hoarsely mumbled out while rubbing her noggin.
“The guards locked us up in here a few hours ago. They were pretty gentle with me considering what they did to you and Nomad,” Arie said, wincing at the knot just above Reza’s brow.
Reza looked around the jail once more, trying to get a clearer sense of her surroundings. There was no one else, aside from Arie, in their wing of the jail that she could see.
Turning back to Arie, Reza asked, “Nomad—what did they do with him?”
“I don’t know,” Arie replied in a sharp tone, pausing a second before continuing, “Once they clubbed him unconscious, they dragged him off first. My guess is they’re still dealing with him or they’d probably already have questioned us by now.”
Reza sat back against the cold, damp stone wall, trying to push past her headache to consider her options with the current situation. With nothing immediately clear coming to her, she gave up, closed her eyes, and tried to rest.
She didn’t get shuteye for long however, the urgent footfall of someone in armor marching towards her cell roused her from her half sleep.
“Who the hell are you two and what are you doing in the company of that demon?” the captain from earlier in the night that had been present at Nomad’s rampage said in a cutting tone.
Reza rubbed her face, trying to wake up again while Arie remained silent, waiting for Reza to give the answers the man was there for.
“Multiple witnesses say you had been seen with him earlier. He’s calming down now but he had my men hard-pressed most of the night just to keep him restrained in his cell. We had to triple up on the shackles he’s so damn strong. So, I ask you again, who are you people, and what is your business in Sephentho?”
Reza dropped her hands to her lap, and though the man did not know her, Arie did, and she could tell how absolutely exhausted the girl was. Rarely did she not have a drive to what she did, but there, in that jail cell, she seemed as though, perhaps since the first time she had known her, she had given up on something.
“Yes, he was our companion. He was a good man, once…” Reza whispered out, looking down to the floor, remaining silent once more.
Arie, though she didn’t care to be the one to answer the questions, saw that she would have to speak for them or risk having the captain prosecute them for withholding information.
“His name is Nomad. He was cursed a few moons ago and we’ve been traveling to priests since then to try and have his curse removed. He hasn’t harmed anyone up till this point, though I understand he seems dangerous.”
“Seems dangerous? I’ve got two of my guards in the infirmary from that scuffle in the streets, one’s in a real bad way, too. Not sure if he’s going to pull through. Look into that man’s eyes and tell me he’s not a demon.”
Reza did not move, a true picture of pity, wh
ile Arie broke eye contact with the captain, wanting to argue Nomad’s case but knowing the captain had the truth of it. Nomad had indeed fallen a great ways since their time at the monastery.
Seeing the worn and beaten women silent in their cells softened the captain’s features momentarily, taking in a deep breath, attempting to relieve some of the pent-up stress that had built up from the night’s events.
“Look, neither of you gave us trouble last night. In fact, it seemed as though you were trying to calm that beast-of-a-man you were traveling with at your own peril. I have no further reason to hold you here, so I’ll have a guard gather your belongings and see you out. If…,” the captain hesitated for a moment before awkwardly continuing, “what you say is true about that demon being a former friend of yours, I’m sorry for your loss. He cannot be permitted to roam neither our streets, nor the countryside. He’s unhinged. I’m sorry.”
Arie could tell, in terms of military men, the captain seemed a genuine fellow, and though she appreciated his kindness, she knew he was more likely to sentence Nomad to execution than dungeon time.
“What will you do with him? Nomad isn’t our former companion, he’s our companion still,” Arie pressed, more than a little desperation in her voice at the thought of what might befall Nomad in the coming hours.
“Death would be too kind for servants of the devil…whatever devil it is he serves. Our priests will find that out tonight. Tomorrow at trial, I suspect the judges will call for his execution,” the captain said before walking off, leaving Reza and Arie to reflect in quiet a moment before a guard arrived with a few of their personal items and unlocked their cells, leading them out to the streets before setting them free.
Arie looked around, seeing a few townsfolk gawk at them briefly before moving on with their routines. Looking to Reza, who was still sulking and exhausted, she grabbed the saren’s hand and toted her back to their inn, making their way through the streets in silence.
Walking past the two low-hanging trees on either side of the front door to the inn, Arie led Reza into the front room of the establishment. Fishing out the keys to their room, Arie sighed, “Alright, let’s get you in bed, you look like hell,” as they started back to the hallway that led to their rooms.
“One does not simply tell Reza Malay to do anything,” a familiar voice warned from the bench by the window of the sitting area.
Both Arie and Reza looked over to see their former traveling companions, Finian and Cavok, in dust-covered trailcoats, sharing a pipe between the two.
Reza barely glanced Fin and Cavok’s way before snatching her room’s key from Arie and headed off down the hall, leaving Arie to deal with a confused Fin, as Cavok took another long toke of the cheap ragweed he had been tending to.
“What was that all about? I know she’s not big on hellos, but gods, I at least expected some manner of recognition.
“Fin,” Arie started, considering how much to tell him and how to deal with Reza’s current state, “Nomad is to be tried and most likely executed tomorrow. You’re not going to get a nice hello from Reza right now. Give her some space.”
“Executed?” Fin’s eyes widened. “Well that’s a harsh sentence, how’d he get himself into that situation? What happened with you three?”
Arie looked around the sitting room briefly. The innkeeper wasn’t there currently, but just to be safe from prying ears, she grabbed Fin’s arm and led him down the hallway to her room, Cavok slowly getting up to follow behind them. Fin waved Cavok to hurry up so they could close the door to the hallway.
Once the three of them were in the room, Arie began to answer Fin’s question in a hushed tone, ragweed smoke already filling the small bedroom, Cavok kicking back in the corner chair as Fin and Arie had a seat on her bed.
“Well, there’s a lot to the story, but suffice it to say, Reza’s people weren’t able to help. In fact, it almost came to blows at one point. They were convinced Nomad is a lost cause. While I don’t think that’s true, he—” Arie paused, trying to pick her words carefully to not overly concern Fin, “he has been losing himself to this wound with each passing night. It’s not looking good at this point.”
“Even the sarens can’t heal him?” Fin whispered, his gaze drifting off to the window, watching the tree leaves shimmer in the morning breeze.
Not having anything reassuring to say about that, she continued, “We arrived here two nights ago. Sometimes we can’t get through to him. His eyes go black. He mumbles in his foreign tongue and neither Reza nor I know what he says most of the time. Last night his eyes were red, somehow they were lit! Almost as if on fire, like a dark ember. He made his way into the streets and we met him there, and he…well he attacked us along with anyone else that moved to confront him. The city guard did not take the situation lightly. They jailed Reza and I and just let us out this morning, but the captain said that they plan to bring him to trial and most likely will execute Nomad within a day.”
“Tried here in Sephentho? That’s not good. Their judges are known to be brutal. This is not a place you want to get tried,” Fin said, looking back to Arie.
Arie got up and snatched a wine bottle from the nightstand, uncorking it before adding, “Reza has not been taking all this too well. She may be close to giving up on this whole thing. I don’t know her well enough to say, and maybe it was just a really rough night, but she’s starting to shut everything out,” she said, taking a swig of wine, giving Fin and Cavok time to think the situation over.
After a while, Cavok knocked his pipe against the table, fingering the remaining ash on the floor, breaking the silence with his deep voice. “Let’s jail break ‘em.”
Fin gave Cavok a sideways glance, mulling over a reply to his comrade’s suggestion. “I don’t enjoy skulking around castles. Cities are one thing, lots of places to hide and get lost in, but castles are made to keep things in or out. A jailbreak would be far from easy, even for you and I.”
“You getting old, Fin? You’ve been in and out of jail since I’ve known you so many times that I’ve lost count. C’mon, it’s Nomad. It might not be simple, but we can handle it,” Cavok said, stretching out in the chair.
“You two okay with being felons, huh?” Arie pointedly asked, looking both men over, Cavok answering for the both of them.
“It’s never ideal to burn bridges like this in regions, but if it means bailing a friend out of trouble, you do what needs to be done.”
Arie locked eyes with Cavok, thinking on what Cavok was proposing they do and asked after a moment, “What if Nomad’s too far gone into the dark? What if he’s not worth the risk at this point? If we get caught trying to bust him out, we’re all headed for the chopping block.”
Cavok licked the smoke from his gums and responded without blinking, “We owe that man our lives.”
The two stared hard at each other for a few tense seconds before Fin let out a long sigh.
“Alright Cavok, you bloody hero. I’ll get to devising a plan. Alls I can say is that Nomad better be happy to see us.”
8
The Red
“He’s calmed down from the night before or I wouldn’t allow this visit; but, if he is tried and sentenced for execution tomorrow, then it is custom here that we allow farewells by loved ones,” the guard said, casually leading Arie and Reza along the golden-lit corridors of the ground-level cell.
Reza, still in a state of despair, didn’t respond or even seem like she was paying attention, but Arie was doing her part to play along, asking as many questions as she could to find out more about where they were keeping him.
“Thank you, he was a good friend of ours until that curse was placed upon him. He’s not been himself lately. I hope this visit helps us get some sort of resolution in this unfortunate circumstance,” Arie said, with as much concern in her voice as she could stand to invest. She knew they needed the sympathies of the guards if she wanted to get good information out of them.
“So,
I hear he was giving the guards a hard time last night?” she tentatively probed, seeing how talkative the guard was willing to be with her.
“Yeah. Oh yeah,” the man chuckled. “Took a crew of five of us just to strap him in a few pairs of irons when we first got him in a cell. Even with three sets of manacles, we’ve got two guards on watch at all times since he’s straining the anchors when he really gets into a fit. He so far hasn’t responded to any questioning.”
“I see,” Arie said, mulling over the information the guard had divulged. Fin and Cavok could use that when planning their jailbreak, and though asking the captain to have one last visit to see their ill-touched companion had mostly been a smokescreen to obtain location and information of where they had Nomad held, she genuinely did want to visit with Nomad to try and assess where he was in dealing with the corruption that had hijacked his body and mind.
As they rounded a corner, she noticed the guard glancing sideways at her and Reza, sizing them up almost with a predatory look in his demeanor. She knew her and Reza were attractive specimens when it came to men in the region, and though Reza never thought to use that fact to her advantage, Arie thought it senseless not to. She doubted this guard, or the captain, would have treated them as respectfully as they had if they were ugly, or dressed in peasant’s garb. Wealth, power, and beauty were inescapable high-value tokens in the game of life. Tokens that could be cast aside; or, used when the stakes were right.
“Here we are,” the guard said as Arie and Reza clung to the cell’s iron bars, looking at their visibly exhausted companion.
Nomad seemed a different man from the night before. He lay on his back amidst a sea of iron links, three chains per limb binding him loosely down. He rested uneasily currently, twitching in his slumber, eyes closed, but squinting from time to time. He was paler than they remembered, most of his color gone from his darker, foreign complexion.
