by RJ Baker
“Master, there is something else …”
An odd expression crossed her face, one so strange it stopped my words dead. Her brow furrowed and she glanced down at the hand on my knee.
It shook.
Around the bloody bandage on her arm was a thin line of black flesh which extended as I watched it, as though drawn on her arm by an invisible scribe.
“Girton, I …” She froze. From the black line around her bandage more thin lines were drawn out, and these hairs of black flowed along the veins of her arms, tracing out delicate antlers on her skin. Her expression became slack, then tightened and locked into an agonised grimace. She made a sound, like none I had ever heard before – part grunt, part scream. Her eyes opened so wide I thought they would start from her head, her whole body bowed, shaking the bed and rattling the bottles on the trunk to the floor. She collapsed into my arms.
“Mastal! Mastal!” I screamed, and the healer came running, scooping my master out of my arms and placing her on the bed. He stared at the black lines and I backed away, dread mounting.
“No,” he said: upset, puzzled, angry. “This cannot be happening. The dose was right; the poison was beaten. We beat it!”
“What is happening to her, Mastal?”
“Hold her hand, Girton,” he said. “Let her know you are here. It may be some comfort at the end.” He made no move for his medicines and his words were without hope – final.
“End? No! You cannot simply give up without a fight! Help her.”
“I cannot.” And my knife was at his throat. “Help her,” I said.
“I cannot. This should not be happening. The power of the leaf is broken and the poison floods back in.”
“Do you need more yandil?” I dropped the knife and ran to the back of the tent, scrabbling at the floor like a hunted animal desperately burrowing for safety. “I have more yandil, lots more of it.” Understanding slowly grew on his bearded face.
“Why didn’t you tell me you had that?”
“I was going to.” Panic filled me, burning and fizzing through my body, and I gave no thought to my words. “I was going to give it to her when you had gone.”
“Gone?” He looked puzzled. And then he didn’t. “You changed the dose? That is what you have done? That is why you had me make that promise to leave? You changed the dose?”
I did not reply but he didn’t need me to – he knew.
“Give her more,” I said, pulling the package from the hole in the ground and returning to my master. I lifted her limp hand and spoke in a voice low and full of threat while dark lines swirled over her flesh. “Give her more, Mastal.”
“You stupid boy,” he hissed. “There is no going back once it has failed. It is useless now. By being too cowardly and suspicious to trust others you have killed her.” He raised his hand, bringing it down towards my face in an open-palmed slap. I dropped the yandil and grabbed his hand, tightening my grip on it and squeezing his fingers in a way I knew must cause him pain, but there was only anger on his face. “You have killed her, Girton,” he said, and there was the sparkle of tears in his eyes. “Why would you do this? Why would destroy what you love most?”
I stared into his eyes and that voice, that cold, black voice, wormed its way into my mind. I can give you what you want.
One hand on him and one hand on her, I felt the difference in them.
Felt her.
Felt him.
Felt the shadow as the poison eclipsed my master’s life.
I can give you what you want.
She is fragile, thin as a lizard’s wing bone, her spirit barely existing. She is on the edge of mortality. The poison is a ravening dog running through her – breeding, multiplying. Big dogs beget small dogs beget smaller dogs, and they grow and breed and bark and screech until soon she will be gone, devoured by the poison, taken from me by an agonising death. Somewhere on the edges of my consciousness a dark figure, somewhat sad, somewhat terrifying: Xus the god of death. Here to take his due.
I can give you what you want.
Mastal is strong. Burning with life and anger. All he is becomes open to me and I can peel his mind away, see his life moment by moment, but I do not. There is a split second without end – it gives me as long as I need. Shows me what I want and how to do it. A decision is made, a sad, scared, lonely, grieving boy hears the voice of a thing that wants to be used.
I can give you what you want.
And says yes.
All that was Mastal – his life, his hopes his fears, his loves and lusts – it is extinguished. It is instant and it is eternal. I felt the moment he realised what was happening. His question, how? Not why. I felt him accept what was happening. I understood the man in a way I had never let myself before and I knew how utterly I had wronged him. He had only ever had one desire, and that was to heal. And so he did. In death he was as true to his calling as he had been in life. I sucked the strength from him in a rushing wave, a riptide of life barrelling up a river. It flowed from him, through me and into my master, drowning the poison dogs in a foam of hot, powerful life. The transfer seemed to go on for ever but cannot have taken more than moments, and when it was finished my master breathed easily, and Mastal, or what had been him, lay on the floor, a husk of flesh, dried out and curled up as if he had spent a year in a blood gibbet.
“No,” I said. What had I done? I said it again, “no,” as if denial could somehow alter this terrible thing. This hadn’t been meant to happen. I had only meant him to go away. Seconds after the act all that was left was regret, regret and fear. How would I hide Mastal’s corpse? How would I explain this to my master? Would she ever understand?
We can make her understand.
An image of a terrified mount bending to my will.
“No!” The world was wavering, the air around me moving as if made up of strangely coloured weeds, my movements languid, like I danced a sleeper in a story. The scent of spices and honey filled the air.
“Girton?”
The word.
The world.
Solid again, hard and unyielding. The stink of death filling my nostrils, and now everything was worse. Now there was a witness who could not be allowed to live.
I spun, scooping my knife from the floor and only just managing to stop before I opened the throat of Areth.
“Are you going to kill me –” she showed no fear “– or do you want help hiding the body?”
“What?” I stumbled over the words, confused beyond all bearing. How could she be so calm? Why was she here?
“I felt what you did from the other side of the camp,” she said, “but it took me half an hour to get out of the council meeting I was in.”
“Half an hour?” I had only been here minutes, I was sure.
“Yes,” she said and, very gently, took the knife from my hand and laid it down. “I suspected you were one of us from the start but could not be entirely sure.”
“One of you?”
“One of Neander’s children.”
And suddenly it was explained. The feelings I had for Areth were not real; it was the same force that had first drawn me to Drusl – a shared magic. It was not love even if it could become it. It felt like drowning, being overwhelmed by something so vast that to fight it is to only to waste what precious moments of life were left.
“Control yourself, Girton, or we’re both dead.”
I could barely speak.
“You know magic?”
“How else would I be here, or know about yandil?”
“But how?”
“I told you. I was one of Neander’s girls, like your Drusl.” And my knife was in my hand and at her throat again.
“You are the spy!”
She laughed and pushed the knife away as if I were no threat at all. “The only thing I owe Neander is a blade in his black heart. He sent me here as a spy, and Rufra knows that –” she lowered her voice “– but he does not know about the magic. He would not countenance that, not even in me.
”
“How do you explain your scars to him?”
“I have no scars. I was not beaten. Neander did not treat us all so physically, Girton. Some of us he found other ways to hurt.” She put her hands on her hips. “Now, do you wish to interrogate me or to save yourself from a blood gibbet?” She pushed me aside and stared at Mastal’s body.
For a moment I thought she would vomit. His corpse looked like he had been burned alive, his body shrivelled and bent into a foetal position, but instead of being charred and black it was desiccated and yellow. The same dry, dead yellow as the sourlands.
“I have never seen anything like this; what awoke within me is for healing.”
“But you did not try and save my master,” I said.
“And I could not save my son either.” The words came quickly, angrily, and I felt only two fingers tall. “Besides, you had Mastal, he seemed to know what he was doing.” She pulled up a corner of the carpet. “Are you going to stand there like a lost child or help?” I helped her pull up the carpet and roll it around Mastal’s corpse. “Magic was how I knew my child was poisoned,” she said, her voice quiet, “but, of course, I cannot tell Rufra that. But I can tell you.”
“You do not think Karrick was the spy, or the killer?”
“No,” she replied. We finished wrapping the corpse and she searched Mastal’s packs for string. “I am thankful you stopped him interrogating the old woman. She would have told all eventually – they always do – and that would have been bad for me and you, but Karrick would never murder, he was too obsessed with rules.”
I thought about what she had left unsaid: that Karrick may not stoop to murder but I would.
“What do we do with Mastal’s body?” I asked.
“It is dark,” she said, “and there is a copse not far away.” She pointed through the back of the tent. “You can bury him. I’ll make sure the way is clear. We need to do this now.”
“Why are you helping me? All I do is kill people who do not deserve it.”
“I did not say Karrick did not deserve death, Girton – he was a Landsman after all – but I help you because they’re wrong about us, about what we do.” As she spoke I stared at the carpet which contained the husk of Mastal. “That was not your fault.” She touched my arm, and her touch was a fire running through me. For a second our eyes met and I saw clothes falling, felt warm skin and heard quick breaths in the dark heat under the eaves of a castle. Areth stepped back, her chest rising and falling, a flush across her neck and face. “They make us hide, and this –” she motioned at the body, avoiding my eyes “– is the end result. It is meant to heal, Girton, that is what the magic is for, and if we bury it, hide it, then it lashes out. Even what you did here, really, was to heal.”
I nodded even though I knew she was wrong; nothing about the power inside me had anything to do with healing. What I had done may have healed my master, but I had needed a death to do it.
“Being here puts you in danger, Areth.”
She put the finger that had brushed my arm against her lips, as if to taste it, then, realising what she was doing, clasped her hands behind her back.
“You stood up for me,” she said. “You fought Karrick to protect me, and I owe you thanks for that no matter what trouble it causes Rufra.”
“Trouble?”
“Karrick was a calming hand on the Landsmen. He did not agree with Rufra about many things but he was no Fureth. That man is a fanatic.”
“You mean I killed the wrong Landsman?”
“In a way, but through Irille and her yandil leaf he would have discovered us eventually, Girton. He was a methodical man. So no, you did not kill the wrong Landsman, and maybe events turned out for the best. Let us just say your timing was off and it is unfortunate it could not have been handled another way.”
“How?”
“An accident would have been better.” She smiled and I wanted to cut my hand in annoyance. What a fool I was, so cocksure and angry that I challenged a highly trained warrior when that was not my way. My way was the quiet way, the poison, the blade in the back or the tumble down a stair. “Now come,” said Areth, and pushed past me out of the tent.
Hefting the carpet over my shoulder, I followed her. It weighed surprisingly little. Areth walked ahead but the camp was quiet. When she vanished into the dark I waited between two tents, listening to the hissing of the night lizards. Then she reappeared and we made our way to the small wood.
“Girton, I must leave you here. If I return to Rufra covered in dirt and twigs questions will be asked.” I felt a brief touch on my arm, and white shock through my body. “Bury him well, Girton, or the black birds of Xus will give us away.”
“What will I tell my master?” My words were barely louder than the wind brushing through the trees.
“Tell her he left – that he could not stomach his failure.”
“She will know I am lying, she always knows when I am lying.”
“Then send her to me, Girton, and I will tell her it is true,” said Areth, and it felt like all the pain in the world was in her voice. “I can lie. I have become very good at it.”
Then she was gone, and there was only the sound of her swiftly retreating footsteps. When they had faded I wondered how I had come to find myself in this place, alone with the corpse of a good man at my feet.
It would not be the last one of course.
I would always walk with death.
Chapter 25
I did not sleep that night. I spent the dark hours lying next to my master, willing her to wake up but at the same time frightened that she would. I could not look at her face as I stripped the wound on her arm. The deep gouge was still raw and frightening to look at. I had seen deep cuts before on the bodies I left behind but it was rare I saw the weave of another’s life while they still lived. In the flickering candlelight I searched for signs of the black lines that had risen to overtake her flesh but found nothing, only layers of white bone, creamy fat and red muscle. There was something about her now that I could not place – she felt different, the way the Tired Lands felt washed clean after the Birthstorm has come and gone. I was sure that she would wake even if I did not know when, and I was sure she would have questions even if I did not know how to answer them. As the subtle light of dawn slipped under the edges of our tent I laid her wounded arm gently down on the covers and slipped out.
I walked aimlessly until my feet were picked up by a breeze made thick and tempting by the smell of fresh bread. I followed it to one of Rufra’s bakers who was giving away the king’s bread. The queue parted to let me through, though I wished it hadn’t. I was uncomfortable being known and unhappy with the idea people expected something of me. I took my bread and wandered away through the camp keeping my head down. As I approached the Landsmen’s compound I slowed, not wanting to be recognised, and veered away. The wide paths leading from the compound had been churned into thick mud, as if by the feet of many mounts. I noticed the usual noises of a busy camp were missing.
Curious, I headed back to find the Landsmen’s gates stood open, the compound empty. Tents, mounts, men, all were gone; all that was left was rubbish blowing about in the breeze. The Landsmen had left only one object for us, a bonemount in the centre of what had been their camp. It had been raised by smashing a spear through the skull and a hand axe had been buried in the top of it. One of the antlers had been broken off halfway down so it looked like the skull Rufra used. There could be no misunderstanding the message; the Landsmen had declared themselves against Rufra.
“Happy now, Girton?” I turned. Nywulf stood behind me with five troopers. “Take that down,” he said to them, pointing at the bonemount.
“I did not want this,” I said.
“Well it is what you got us.” He was angry, his thick body tight with it. “We beat five hundred Nonmen and many died doing it, but you have cleverly managed to send Tomas a few hundred mounted and trained Riders to make up his numbers.”
“The Landsmen
would never have fought for Rufra anyway,” I said. Nywulf stepped in close. “No, but if Karrick lived they would never have fought at all,” he hissed, “and you ruined that for the life of one old woman.”
“And to remove a spy,” I said, but I could not put the confidence into my voice that I’d had before. Nywulf did not reply, only pushed past me and went to help his troops take the bonemount down.
“Nywulf,” I called. He turned. “Have you ever heard the name Forven Aguirri?”
“Aguirri?” he said and his brow furrowed. “No. Now leave, Girton. I am too angry to look at you and I have real work to do.”
I walked away from the empty Landsmen camp to find a quiet place where I could think. At one point I saw Ossowin, the headman of Gwyre, who glared at me, his eyes full of hate, and then gave a curious smile before turning away. I considered following him, to apologise for his village and his wife and his daughter, but for what? He would not accept it. I had got everything wrong: Gwyre, the Landsmen, Mastal, even my feelings for Areth. Only when I finally stopped and sat down did I realise that my aimless walk had taken me back to the small wood in which I had buried Mastal. When I tried to eat my bread it tasted like dust.
Why had Karrick given me that name? Was it simply to curse me with indecision? Maybe he had been angry that he had been caught out as a spy and angry I had beaten him with a blade, and this was his revenge – this lingering, ghostlike doubt.
That was it. I had not been wrong. He was a killer and the spy.
I tried to make myself believe it but could not.
One of Xus’s birds landed on the ground between two trees and I threw it some bread. It screamed a harsh bark of thanks at me and was joined by more of its kind, so I threw more bread. Maybe I should ask Danfoth the Meredari about the name. He had been closest to Arnst. I ripped up the rest of the loaf and threw it to Xus’s birds, then headed back into the camp.
Around Arnst’s tent flocked a different kind of black bird – the followers of Arnst. They sat together quietly, causing no trouble, only wanting to be where their master had been. In front of them stood Danfoth, reading from a scroll. As I approached he stopped speaking and rolled up the scroll.
