The Wanderer's Tale

by David Bilsborough

  The Ogre howled in surprise as its nose crunched beneath the force of the well-aimed blow; not for nothing did the mercenary wear hob-nailed boots. But this only fired its wrath further, and the struggling Paulus was held up, dangling, ready to be thrown down into the gully.

  Suddenly the Ogre’s leg buckled, as Bolldhe’s broadaxe sheared through the tendons of its calf. Hamstrung, the hill-giant crumpled heavily to the ground, with Paulus trapped beneath it.

  Again Bolldhe brought down his weapon, and this time the stricken Ogre caught the axe head in its outstretched hand as it tried to defend itself. Maimed from the wounds dealt by its three attackers, the howling Ogre struggled uselessly as Bolldhe’s axe hacked mercilessly into its mangled flesh; up, down, up, down, up, down. Its roars rose to a high-pitched shrieking, then died into a gurgle and finally stopped.

  Sickened by his first sight of bloody battle, Gapp sank to his knees and wept convulsively. This was not the adventure, glory or even courage he had imagined; it was nothing more than simple butchery. Retching in horror, the tortured boy finally threw up into the gorge.

  His deerskin tunic splashed with hot blood, and the gleam of berserk madness now fading from his eyes, Bolldhe stepped away from the bridge. He glared defiantly at the Peladane, as if daring him to utter one word of reprimand for Bolldhe’s initial hesitation.

  But Nibulus merely sat astride his horse, his face still red with fury and frustration. How he yearned to howl at Bolldhe angrily, but he could hardly do so when the man had saved the life of the Nahovian, and possibly Methuselech too.

  Instead, he handed the unused lance back to Finwald and silently dismounted. He walked briskly up to his esquire and kicked the crouching youth hard in the ribs. Sprawling across the path, Gapp squealed in pain and stared up with frightened eyes at the metal-clad warrior standing over him.

  ‘You EVER do anything like that again,’ the Peladane spat, ‘I’ll stick your head on a spike. Next time I order you to do something, you do it bloody sharpish! Xilva here could’ve died because of you!’

  Suddenly a voice cut in harshly: ‘Don’t take it out on him, Peladane, just because your own sport was thwarted!’

  They all turned to see Wodeman glaring at Nibulus angrily. Gapp stared in surprise at this unexpected support. ‘Blame your lanky mercenary, instead,’ he went on. ‘Ogres never attack against the odds.’ He pointed an accusing finger at their leader. ‘Just remember that,’ he said.

  Then before Nibulus could answer, he turned to Gapp. ‘Come on, Greyboots,’ he said in a gentler tone. ‘Get up off the ground.’

  Gapp still eyed Bolldhe with disgust. To witness that obscene screaming and hacking was like a waking nightmare, and he was still trembling with revulsion over it. But worse by far was that look in Bolldhe’s eyes as he had set about his prey. Gapp could understand that fear might have motivated such a frenzied attack, but what made him shudder was seeing the mad glint of satisfaction still in the man’s eyes.

  And he isn’t even a warrior!

  Gapp turned to stare at the mangled corpse of the Ogre, steam rising in wreaths from the gaping wounds in its flesh. Paulus, still dazed, was pulled out from beneath its weight, then several of them heaved the bloody carcass through the newly made breach in the rampart. The Ogre’s remains slithered off the little bridge and disappeared into the foggy oblivion below, swallowed up by the night that had finally descended in full.

  That night none of them managed to get much sleep. After crossing the bridge they had found a suitable cave, but the events of the evening had cast a cloud of gloom over their heads. The travellers were still too fired up with adrenalin to relax, and although none of them was seriously injured, the effort of battle had taken its toll.

  Cautiously approaching the cave, they could see a fire burning within. Its warm glow drew them towards it as though they were under a glamer, and when they entered they found Wodeman waiting for them. No one had even noticed him go on up ahead.

  Gapp could get no sleep at all. He lay awake all night, going over in his head every detail of the shocking conflict, reliving each gory moment until he felt he would go mad. These waking nightmares haunted him through the hours of miserable darkness, cheating him of the sleep that both his body and mind desperately needed. By the time dawn broke over a colourless, craggy landscape, he felt more drained than he had felt before settling down for the night.

  The next day passed by uneasily, a black cloud of tension hanging over the company throughout, silencing every attempt at conversation. There was a bad feeling amongst them. Nibulus rode alone at the head of the line, silent, sullen, his face set grimly against the wind that constantly buffeted them from the North. His esquire kept his distance, and even Nibulus’s friends were reluctant to approach him.

  He sighed inwardly, his face feeling uncomfortable with the frown it had worn since the battle on the bridge, for his was the sort of face upon which frowning sits ill.

  Well, that was a lousy start, he reflected bitterly. I only manage to get seven men to command, and I can’t control even them!

  It had never been like this on his father’s campaigns. He was a Thegne, and as such had the command of an entire Manass-Uilloch, a company of two-and-a-half thousand soldiers. Two thousand five hundred well-trained Peladanes, brave and strong, every fifty – or Oloch – under the command of a sergeant . . .

  This lot were more like a gaggle of fishwives, and even the two mercenaries had managed to piss him off. It was definitely high time to sort out who was in control here, and to get his head around exactly how one goes about commanding civilians.

  He could learn maybe from Schwei Dautchang, the seventeenth sultan of Qaladmir, who had listened to even the lowliest of men, asked their opinions, made out he was interested in them and their lives, and thus gained the love and devotion of a whole nation.

  Or he could be like Stag-Headed Ichtatlus, the legendary Dragoon-Lord of Rhelma–Find, who had ruled by barbarous cruelty and slaughter inconceivable; his methods appealed to the pack mentality in humans, in other words if you can raise the level of your clan’s strength and cruelty above that of your rivals, your men see themselves as the elite and will follow your orders fanatically, even knowing how wrong it is, taking pleasure in its sheer extremeness . . .

  Wondering which style of leadership he should aim for, he again sighed, for Nibulus Wintus really did not possess the disposition for either.

  Bolldhe rode at the rear, staring up at the lammergeyers that soared overhead, their huge wings filtering air with a sound like tearing silk. He remained as taciturn and unapproachable as ever. And as weary. So very weary. Far more than any of the others. They had been travelling for just over two weeks now, whereas he had been on the road for eighteen years. Eighteen long years of pointless travelling, wandering aimlessly from one place to another, without ultimately any real reason for doing so. Maybe there had been cause to travel years ago, when he had first set off, but not now. Now he only journeyed because there did not seem to be any good reason to stop.

  Seven days after the fight with the hill-giant, whilst riding along at possibly the highest point of the track so far, the party happened upon another cave. It was only late afternoon, but the horses were exhausted from this most arduous day’s travel, so it was decided to make camp early. Their path, after all, was little likely to improve for some time yet.

  All that day, and for three days before, they had stumbled along at a snail’s pace. Steep rises, broken bridges, stretches of track that had fallen away down the mountainside decades or even centuries ago, boulders and scree fall in their way, everything possible seemed to have conspired to hinder their route. The ancient and little-used path was deteriorating with every mile and, to make matters worse, it was still climbing.

  That afternoon, whilst negotiating the fifth cliff-side stretch that day, it had been so narrow and slippery that Finwald had nearly lost his horse. It took four of them – Nibulus, Methuselech, Wodeman and himself – to hau
l the terrified Quintessa back onto the ledge. Contemplating this incident and others, their worsening and unavoidable situation was becoming a considerable strain.

  On exploring the cave they discovered that it was not so small as at first sight. Several recesses lined the main cavern, one of which turned out to be a narrow crack leading to a larger space than the outer cave itself. The dirt floor was strewn with dried grass and a gnawed bone or two, and was rank with the musk of some wild creature.

  But for the present at least it was uninhabited. Bolldhe, being well used to spending nights in animals’ lairs, recommended that they line the cave mouth with dry firewood and keep a torch burning at all times to ignite if necessary. This suggestion was gladly (and hurriedly) taken up.

  After such an arduous day’s travel, no one might have felt bothered to prepare a meal. But they were all famished and cold, and soon their efforts had produced a good-sized fire and plenty of warm food. Though bland and uninteresting, their rations did manage to coax some spirit into the weary travellers, and it was not long before some of them were even in the mood for conversation.

  ‘Well!’ Methuselech began, ‘I don’t know about you lot, but I feel much better for that!’

  No response.

  ‘What with good, warm food in me, and all,’ he continued, trying hard to sustain the levity in his voice.

  Someone muttered something sarcastic about the weather being good for the time of year, but apart from this, nobody bothered to join in.

  Methuselech persevered: ‘I feel almost fit enough to take on whatever revenge Skaane may inflict on us now for killing his pet . . . mmm.’

  His voice trailed away as a ruby-tailed wasp buzzed in through the cave mouth, snooped around half-heartedly, then wandered off. The travellers watched its every movement in silence.

  Then a small voice piped up from the back of the cave: ‘Who’s Skaane?’ Gapp, in spite of himself, was still awake enough to be inquisitive.

  ‘Skaane?’ The desert mercenary brightened up again. ‘You’ve never heard of the Great Ogre himself?’

  Gapp inquired fearfully, ‘He doesn’t live around here, does he?’

  ‘No, no, no!’ Methuselech laughed. ‘You’ve no need to worry on that score, young Radnar. No, Skaane doesn’t live anywhere. He never has. He’s just a story: Skaane the Great Hill Giant, fiercest of all mountain spirits – the Ogre-God himself. They worship him, in their strange way, offering sacrifices and suchlike. Keeps them happy, I suppose. Like all pagan religions, just a bit of harmless fun.’

  Crouching on the floor at the cavemouth, Wodeman laughed hoarsely. ‘You’ve changed your tune. “Harmless fun!” According to what a little bird told me, you were wetting yourself at the Grey Dog during the winnowing.’

  ‘Only because of those bloody hedgehogs.’ Methuselech smiled. ‘Tell me, do you believe in Skaane? If you do, how come you’re sitting so close to the mouth of the cave? Aren’t you worried he might suddenly appear and grab you?’

  The sorcerer chuckled strangely. ‘I don’t believe any giant Ogre-God would want to harm me. And even if I did, I doubt this cave would be much protection against it. No, I question Skaane’s existence, but that is still no reason to mock. Hill giants may have a barbarous reputation, but they are all, like us, children of Erce.’

  ‘You have to understand that Erce exists in countless forms,’ Finwald joined in, enthusiastic all of a sudden, ‘depending on how the primitives interpret it. For some tribes it is a bison, a wolf, a tree, or even the sun. It all hinges on the environment or needs of the tribe concerned. For your people, Methuselech, Erce is Uassise, Bringer of Gardens, and Shirraq, the Great Sand Elemental, who leads the traveller—’

  ‘Ordure.’

  ‘Ordure notwithstanding,’ Finwald insisted, ‘I have read much on the subject.’

  ‘And you believe in it?’

  ‘Of course not; it is a load of ordure. Cuna is the only way.’

  A snort from the cave mouth drew their attention. Wodeman glared towards them, looking Finwald straight in the eye.

  ‘You put too much faith in your bits of paper, priest. Whatever Erce is, he certainly cannot be imprisoned by leather-bound parchment. Erce can only be perceived by those close to him, those who live in him, those whose senses have not become fogged by ritual incense and darkness. You and your brethren are so inward-looking you have even less perception of the real world than a bunch of Aescal farmers.’

  ‘That was a bit cheap, wasn’t it?’ Nibulus put in, unexpectedly.

  Surprisingly, Wodeman backed down a little. Aescal farmers were, indeed, a little fogged, but it could be due to all the gin they drank. Because Nordwas was a divided community, this had bred disillusionment and malaise in its citizens. Some followed the way of the Peladane, others inclined towards Cuna, but there was more than a hint of the old ways in many of the population still. Hence their age-old veneration of a kind of hefty Venus figure: a lumpen female deity of bygone days, whose living embodiment could still be seen in just about every wide-buttocked fifteen-year-old farmer’s daughter in Wyda-Aescaland.

  As the sorcerer squatted upon his haunches on the floor of a stony cave high up in these lonely mountains, Gapp saw how his eyes glimmered like blood in the flickering firelight.

  ‘You know what we call those fine horses of yours, Peladane?’ he suddenly asked.

  ‘Loef,’ Nibulus replied without hesitation. ‘It means “Faithful”.’ This much of Torca at least he did know, and he sat back, rather proud of himself.

  ‘It means “congregation”,’ Wodeman corrected him, ‘or, to put it another way, “faithful idiots”. We use the same word to describe their owners, too, and also the Lightbearers; you’re all one and the same to us, herded into your stable-like temples like cattle, faithfully awaiting salvation like idiots . . .’

  He trailed off, knowing by their quiet indignation that he had now gone too far.

  Yet it seemed to Gapp that he did not talk of his religion with the fiery fanaticism of a zealot. Instead his was a quiet, confident faith that needed no ardour; a faith that came to him as naturally as water fed a spring, air stirred a breeze or heat sprang from a flame.

  Appa leaned closer to the fire, staring into the red tongues of flame gradually consuming the crackling wood. He spoke up in a trance-like voice, as if seeing things far away in time and space. Gapp could not be sure whether he was talking to them, to himself, or to some ‘other’.

  ‘Cuna has a purpose for each of us,’ he said, ‘and it is up to the individual to decide which path to follow. Freedom and Law are honoured side by side; without the first, a man has no mind of his own; and without the second, coexistence is impossible. Chance and Fate too must be honoured. So our way is also one of Balance. But the way of Cuna is not the easiest; it may be beset by an unending succession of tests, distractions or terrible hardships, even death. But one cannot follow Cuna only in times of peace, and set him aside when some other code seems preferable. Believe me, the true Lightbearer is the strongest one of all.’

  Even before Wodeman had the chance to sniff in disdain, Nibulus erupted in a snort of contempt: ‘Everything is Wrong unless I do it, you mean.’ Appa growled low, but did not make eye contact.

  Bolldhe meanwhile had cocooned himself in his bedroll against the night, his back to them all. He seemed about as interested in their reflection as a cow would be in the buzzing of a bluebottle.

  Deep within his bedroll, however, he was fully awake and deep in thought. There was truth and fallacy in the dogmas of all three priests here. Finwald was right about Erce; he himself had witnessed so many aspects of the Earth-Spirit, far more than were contained in the pages of the mage-priest’s librams or tomes. But there were so many other religions, too, the countless cults and innumerable ideologies. How could even the wisest man make any sense out of it all?

  Often he had tried to relate his life in some way to these various beliefs, but exactly where did he himself stand in relation to Good
or Evil? Somehow the neutrality of Wodeman’s Erce seemed more likely to him. He had, after all, always considered himself the eternal lone wolf. Was he, then, as Wodeman had hinted, a child of the Earth-Spirit? Looking at the man, he somehow doubted it, but there was something about his words that rang true.

  His gave up thinking about it. He was physically and mentally exhausted, and could no longer think straight. He put it down to travelling so closely with all these religious fanatics, each one of them trying to control his mind. He would have to watch them closely in the days to come.

  But for now he just wanted to sleep . . .

  It was the dead of night, and a blanket of total silence had descended upon the mountains. There was no wind, no rattle of slithering slate fragments, not the remotest cry of beast or bird. The clouds that cloaked the mountain heights had both deadened any sound there might be and obscured the scant light radiating from the stars and crescent moon above.

  Gapp sat alone at the mouth of the cave, staring out into the night in silent contemplation. He had been sitting thus, unmoving and hardly breathing, ever since he had been shaken awake by Paulus, nearly an hour ago, to take over the watch. The silence was so deep he could even hear his own heartbeat, and the darkness so complete he felt as if he might have gone blind. In fact he had been staring into this nothingness for so long now that he was beginning to forget what his companions, and friends back home, looked like, his tired and numbed mind failing to evoke any images of their faces. It was as if he had become all that was left in the universe, everything else having disappeared into the void.

  It was a strange feeling, to be sure, just sitting here all alone, high up in a silent world of mountains in the depths of a timeless night, with mountain spirits crowding the edge of his mind, the beat of his heart counting out the seconds of his life, beat after beat after beat. He could not even see the outline of the cave mouth, the only assurance of facing the right way being the occasional, almost imperceptible stirring of air against his face.