by David Welch
“I’ve seen so many claims of God,” Gunnar said. “From many peoples.”
“And you wonder why mine is any different?” Tark concluded. “I don’t blame you. I could talk for weeks, and you still wouldn’t be convinced. But that is okay. The Carpenter will reveal to us when it is the right time to spread our teachings to those who will listen. For now, we are only to watch and remember.”
“Why are you so interested in our stories?” Kamith asked. “With all the travelers I saw today in the courtyard, you must have thousands of tales.”
“Tens of thousands. We’ve dug chambers into the bluff and walled them off with stone, all so we can store the tales. But each tale has something a little different from the last. Even if most of what you say has already been said, there will be some bit of information, some perspective that has not been seen before. Be it king or slave, something new is always said. Such is the wonder of the souls He gave us!”
Gunnar felt himself smiling at the man’s enthusiasm. He understood Kamith’s question, but he feared it didn’t apply to him. Even excluding the adventures he’d had at her side, he still had seven years of battle and three years of wandering under his belt. He had plenty of things to tell, and he felt oddly comfortable about telling them to this man.
“Who should I start with?” Tark asked. “I can write very fast. It won’t take nearly as long as you think!”
Gunnar smiled at his woman, saying, “Go ahead, love. I’ll watch the kid.”
Kamith punched his arm playfully.
“Don’t call her that,” she said. “She’s a woman.”
“Okay,” Gunnar said with a roll of his eyes. “Have fun.”
“Don’t worry, I won’t spare him the juicy details,” Kamith said with a sly smile.
Gunnar fought the urge to groan.
“Trust me, I’ve heard far juicer than you two could ever imagine. Have to lock up some of the scrolls to keep the teenage acolytes from stealing them and running off into the bushes,” Tark laughed.
Gunnar said nothing, just paced away. Tark’s voice boomed behind him as he went.
“A little reserved, but that’s okay in a man! Now, tell me, my dear, by what name may I call you?”
***
“It’s beautiful! Is it gold?” Turee asked, turning the heavy ring over in her hands.
“Yes,” replied Vadid. “A gift to our humble home from the king of Jarte.”
“King Eothai?” she asked, looking at the likeness carved into the top of the rings. It did bear a striking resemblance to the Jartian king. She’d only seen Eothai V once, at the ceremony when her father had married her mother and made her Queen of Starth. He’d been a handsome man in his mid-thirties, proud and broad of shoulder.
Vadid took the ring back and returned it to a large chest. Turee had run into the prelate while wandering around the grounds, and he’d asked if she wanted to see Sanctuary’s ‘gifts’. They’d entered a solidly built cabin filled with chests, all of which were secured with heavy iron locks; locks to which Vadid had the key.
She gazed into the chest at the various riches inside. Most of it was coin, glittering gold and silver. Jewels the size of cherries were mixed amongst them, some smaller gems mounted into rings, necklaces, and other royal accessories left to Sanctuary.
“But why do they give you all this?” she asked.
“Information,” Vadid replied. “Knowledge and guidance. Tark and his scribes have compiled information on the ancients, and on peoples in all directions. Kings and lords come from far and wide to listen and take our council. Jarte, Skar’gat, Lavnas, Mancera… even Starth. All the tribes to the west of us, even out onto the Great Grasslands. They all come, and while we welcome all, many feel compelled to leave behind gifts. The king of Jarte has even lent us a dozen horsemen to keep the place secure.”
“You said Starth?” Turee asked.
“Yes,” Eothai said. “Cahdar came here several times. I’m glad I’ve had the chance to meet his daughter.”
Turee jumped back, eyes wide with surprise.
“How did you know?” she asked.
“It’s alright” Vadid said, raising his hands in supplication. “I can see it in your face, is all. There was a rumor you’d escaped your brother; I am glad to see it’s true. Ythell is a cruel man, King or not.”
“Yes,” Turee agreed quietly.
“And now that I’ve met you, I can sincerely say you do not deserve the horrors he no doubt had awaiting you. You are a sweet young woman, Turee, and do not deserve to be caught up in the misery of royalty and its squabbles.”
She blushed, unable to hide her smile, not wanting to.
“But I have kept you long enough,” he said. “Your ‘protector’ might get upset.”
“I am not his to control,” Turee replied emphatically.
“Yes, I can see that. But this is a place of peace, and I fear his anger could disturb that,” Vadid said.
He nodded respectfully, took her hand, and led her from the cabin. They split, the man slowly walking towards a nearby cabin. Turee watched, seeing him look back time and time again, confidently gazing at her. She watched him until he entered, taking note of the building.
“There you are,” a voice said from her side.
She turned to see Kamith. She wasn’t upset, not like Gunnar would’ve been.
“Vadid was showing me Sanctuary,” she said. “You know kings and lords come here for advice?”
“Do they?” Kamith asked.
“Yes, he showed me the gifts they leave behind,” Turee explained as they walked back toward the courtyard.
“Makes sense,” Kamith figured. “What with that Tark fellow writing down the stories of everybody who comes through here.”
“I can’t wait to tell him mine,” Turee said. “I want everybody to know what Ythell is and what he wanted to do to me! I swear, if Vadid would let me, I’d stay here until Ythell comes for council, then I’d leap out and bash his skull in!”
Kamith frowned, saying, “Turee, I don’t want to sound too cold, but that part of your life is over. From what Gunnar told me of kings and the children they have…”
“I know, I’m just a bastard,” Turee grumbled. “Even if my father eventually did marry my mother.”
“Would the Starth ever accept you as their princess?” Kamith asked.
“No…” she said. “Unless you and Gunnar led an army and killed Ythell! I could be his claim to the throne, and we could be his queens!”
Kamith sighed and shook her head.
“You know that’s never going to happen,” she said. “Even if Gunnar wanted to be a king, your people would never follow some foreign barbarian.”
“Yes, but I can dream,” Turee replied.
“We can all dream,” Kamith said. “I dreamed I could have children, that I was wife of the chief of my people! Or I used to; now, I dream Gunnar rides in and takes over, and I’m by his side.”
“I’m sorry, Kamith,” Turee said. “I don’t know much about the Red Horse, but—”
“It’s alright,” Kamith said with a wave. “Talking to Tark just stirred up old memories.”
“If the two of you want children…” Turee said.
They entered the courtyard and headed for their corner.
“I cannot carry,” Kamith informed her.
“I could carry for you,” the young woman said.
Kamith shook her head, a wistful look on her face.
“You’re too young to be talking about babies,” she said.
“I am not! My mother had me at my age! I am sixteen winters; I am not a girl!”
They ducked under the roof, slipping past the pillars and into the cool shadows of the arcade.
“No, you’re not,” Kamith affirmed. “But Gunnar doesn’t see you in that way.”
“I know,” Turee agreed. “But he could at least show some attention to me. I wouldn’t have to go find some man every time we stop!”
“If you get preg
nant—”
“That is not a problem!” she declared, digging into her pack. She pulled out a small leather bag the size of her fist. Opening it, she revealed a dark-green powder to Kamith.
“See this? It keeps a man’s seed from taking root,” she whispered. “My mother taught me how to make it a year ago!”
Kamith looked on, stunned. She’d never heard of anything like that.
“How does it work?” she asked curiously.
“I mix it with my morning tea,” she explained simply. “So I can have a man whenever I need one.”
Defiance flashed across her face. Kamith didn’t have to think back long to remember that age. It seemed like another life, now; so much so that she couldn’t really recognize the person she’d been. It had only been four winters ago, just before the truth of her barrenness had hit home.
“It is more than just that,” Kamith said. “Many peoples we may encounter won’t think highly of a woman who, um, well—”
“Bah! What do I care about their opinions? I have my own life to live,” Turee declared triumphantly.
“Easy to say when you’re a king’s daughter,” Kamith remarked.
Turee darkened and put away the bag of powder.
“Just don’t try to seduce any of the men here,” Kamith warned. “We’ll be gone soon, and we don’t need trouble.”
“Gunnar says that every time we stop,” Turee retorted.
Kamith sighed and motioned for her to sit.
“Fine, let’s just drop it. Come on, I want to teach you some more words in Langal,” she said.
Turee settled down across from her but rolled her eyes incredulously.
“Why do I have to learn a language nobody this side of the Great Grass speaks?” she whined.
“Because he and I speak it, and you’ll always be wondering if we’re talking about you until you learn it,” Kamith replied coolly. “It’s not that hard.”
“It sounds like a wolf choking on a rabbit!” she declared.
“It does not. Now, come on. If you want to say ‘fire’, you say ‘githhr’.”
***
“My name is ‘Gunnar’. I’ve been known as ‘Gunnar of the Tarn’ and ‘Gunnar of the Langal’. Also, ‘Gunnar the Half-breed’ and ‘Gunnar the Wanderer’.”
Tark’s quill pen scratched across a tall piece of parchment. He wrote in a script Gunnar had never seen, but his hand flew with impossible speed. A pair of scribes sat at desks behind him, copying every word spoken.
“I was born in the village of Cordat in the valleys of the Tarn, beneath the Mountains of Eternal Ice. My mother was Sigurna, daughter of Lorvakn, chief of Cordat. My father was Haemon, a Langal refugee originally from the Kingdom of Harmon. When he was young, he fled into the mountains. My grandfather’s people found him and brought him into the town, because he knew how to work metal. He lived as a blacksmith and married my mother. She was a widow with a young daughter, my older sister Aeisra. Together, they had me and two other children who did not reach their third winters.
“When I was fourteen, soldiers from Harmon raided the valley and burned the village, killing the men and any women who resisted. My sister had just moved to her new husband’s village, but my mother and father were killed. I was the only half-grown male to survive, and only because my father’s people saw his look in my face. They saw that I was half-Langal, so they brought me back and dumped me on Lord Tylor of Eslor. He was brother to King Conn III. For three years, I was a servant, but then he noticed me fighting with his sons. They were trying to have their way with a servant girl, and I intervened. Instead of punishing me, he had me trained as a soldier. I was seventeen.”
He paused, taking a drink of water from a wooden cup they had provided. Tark dipped his quill and wrote on, his iron-trap memory recalling every word spoken. Gunnar continued, explaining the campaigns and battles and wars in as much detail as he could. Tark occasionally asked questions about the various peoples, and Gunnar provided whatever knowledge he could on the Langal kingdoms and the plains and foothills beneath the ice-bound peaks. He told of the vicious Kingdom of Harmon, small and trapped in valleys between the great Spine of the World and smaller mountain ranges to its west and south, facing its fellow Langal nations and the raids of vengeful Tarn. He spoke of Rulk, to the north, a mix of rolling plains and forested peaks. He told of Wildar to the east, a vast stretch of plain whose territory stretched east from the great peaks for five days’ ride, encompassing grass, low hills, and sudden rising buttes. He spoke what he knew of Chaem to the far north, large and reclusive and connected to the other Langal states only by a common tongue and origin. He spoke of the Tarnish tribes, and of Quinia peoples who lived just north of the peaks of ice. He told of the people who lived deeper in the rocky peaks that made up the Spine of the World, of the raids and squabbles his people had fought with them during his childhood. He told all, and the pages piled up.
“May the Carpenter praise you,” Tark said at a stopping point. “Your memory is magnificent!”
“Remembering things helps to keep me alive,” Gunnar replied simply.
The old wordkeeper flexed his hand and took up the pen again. Gunnar kept going.
“When I was twenty-four, I grew tired of the ceaseless war. I faced a life of constant fighting, with no chance at achieving nobility due to being ‘polluted’ with Tarnish blood. I had no chance of returning to my mother’s people. Tylor’s estate and castle lay on the eastern borders of Harmon. I was sent there purposely, so I could not escape back into the mountains. Besides, I had nothing to go back to. But I did have things that needed to be done, before I left.”
His voice grew cold and dark, hiding unfathomable depths of horror.
“Tylor of Eslor was a monster. He killed for pleasure, shrieking for joy in battle. He killed a few men in the practice ring and even one poor soul at a tournament. His lust for blood was matched only by his lust. He had three wives, the maximum allowed by Harmon law, all of whom had borne him a dozen children. He had mistresses who always seemed to be pregnant and catamites who would have been, nature allowing. He was not particular about whether a man or woman received him, and nor did he let things like age get in his way. After raiding a town or capturing a village, he would select the most beautiful women and girls and have his way with them before tossing them to his men. Several times, after battles, he raped surviving enemy soldiers. In front of the beaten enemy, he’d take their commanders, bellowing his dominance over all. It was so awful, I found myself sympathizing with enemies that, minutes before, I’d been killing. I hated that man… but the king loved him.
“King Conn of Harmon had little care for morals or decency. He lived for power and wanted to expand his kingdom, to rule over all of the Langal, and his brother Tylor brought him victories, so he ignored his sadistic cravings. But I could not. So, one day, I used my status as a soldier to get into his house, and I stole every piece of gold I could get my hands on. Then, I cleaved the bastard’s skull with an axe and killed two of his sons when they tried to stop me. I stole Dash, Tylor’s best horse, and I rode east.”
The words hung in the air. One of the scribes had stopped writing and stared in horror at Gunnar. A look of disgust crossed Tark’s face, but he kept writing.
After pausing to compose his thoughts, Gunnar went on. He talked about his adventures in the three years before meeting Kamith. He spoke of wandering to the red-rock canyons and dry deserts of the far south, then back north through the plains, following great herds of bison until he reached the Mountains of the Stone Gods. He told of the people he’d met, remembering names where he could, and whatever he recalled of their cultures and customs. He spoke of women who’d spent fleeting nights with him, and friendships forged in hours or days. He described the lands as best he could, forcing Tark to pause and call in another scribe, an illustrator. He sketched out the images, getting rough outlines of the land down on scratchy parchment.
Finally, Gunnar spoke of recent months. He told of re
scuing Kamith from sacrifice, then of her nearly being forced into a warrior’s harem as part of a fertility ritual, when they’d visited with the Open Sky People. He described the rugged valley of the Vale People, and how they stampeded bison with fire. He told of the Vale People’s desperate fight to recover women who had been stolen in the night by savage raiders. He spoke of the trade town of Harlonth; of how the last man of the Red Horse People had died beneath his sword when he tried to take both his money and his woman. He told of the winter he spent with the Duahr, regaling them with descriptions of the greatbows that could shoot an arrow through any known type of armor, describing how he’d trained spearmen to hold the line. He recounted, blow for blow, the crushing victory the Duahr had won against the Kingdom of Bailor in early spring. Tark had heard word of this and shook his head in amazement. Gunnar finished by recounting their latest mess, when he’d found himself trapped within a fortress on the west bank of the Mother River, the last refuge of the dying king of Starth. He relived the short siege in his words, sparing nothing. Tark learned of King Ythell’s twisted lust for his half-sister and what he’d threatened to do should he ever catch her.
“You’ll keep that last part secret, right?” Gunnar asked.
“All is confidential,” said Tark. “We speak in generalities when we advise and council. All folk around these parts know this. Nobody would come to us if they thought we were blabbing everybody’s secrets.”
And then, abruptly, they were done. He had nothing left to say. The light of dawn shined through the stained glass. He’d been talking for the whole of the night.
Tark got to his feet slowly, stretching his old body as he rose. Looking down at the six-inch-thick pile of parchment on his desk made him shake his head and whistle his amazement.
“It has been many years since somebody spoke this much,” he said.
“It is all true,” Gunnar insisted. “To the best of my memory.”
