The Humbled (The Lost Words: Volume 4)

by Igor Ljubuncic

  “I am saving my strength for when it matters. When the White Witch finally moves against us, I will tamper with the weather to foil his troops’ movement. I will use fog and rain to cause confusion and slow their progress. And I will shield the rest of you from Calemore’s own magic.”

  Somehow, Ewan did not believe him. He did not doubt the god would use his powers to weaken the enemy, but he did not really believe Tanid would risk his own life too much. He would hurl his pilgrims forth, and he would cower behind Ludevit and Pasha—and Ewan. His own sacrifice would be the very last.

  Ewan understood the importance of leaders. Generals ordered men to their deaths and held back, watching the toll rise from a safe distance. That was how it worked, and it should not be any different for gods leading their own armies, he figured. Still, there was something about Tanid that rang beyond pure selfishness and calculated cowardice. It was a skewed sense of personal worth that clashed with all that was human.

  The two Sirtai also seemed quite eager to stake their claim in the war. They did not relish fighting, but Ewan could see the subtle, egomaniacal desire to be the ones who defeated the son of a god, a legendary relic from an ancient time. He could not guess the reasons, but the need for glory was there. The bloodstaff did not just leech blood from its victims. It leeched humanity, too.

  And he was still lonely. The massive human company around him did not lessen his feeling of being all alone. He longed for friendship and intimacy, but no one in the camp had enough to share. Everyone was preoccupied with their thoughts of war and personal loss.

  Amalia was the only one to pay him any special heed, but her attention was quite the opposite. She haunted him.

  She was obsessed with the weapon, he knew. She burned to touch it, to hold it, and he knew he must not surrender it to anyone. The bloodstaff was his, and he alone would use it when needed, at the expense of his own guilt.

  Tanid was standing a short distance away from him, in front of a fresh ditch, staring north. His two odd henchmen were lurking nearby; Ludevit looked focused, Pasha bored and timid, like he always was. Those two must be Special Children. There was no other reason why the god would keep them around otherwise.

  Their presence made him feel that much less of a monster, but it was a tiny spark against the overwhelming void of his loneliness.

  “What?” Ludevit barked suddenly, startling him. Then, Ewan heard a sound, like a giant rock shattering. Then, another. Another. A quick cascade of them, getting closer. It was—

  Pain.

  Sharp, blinding, beautiful pain.

  After so long, physical pain, white-hot, searing.

  He saw the earth in front of the axman explode, large wet chunks of upturned earth and old tree roots flying in all directions. Then, Ludevit exploded. Unceremoniously, he burst open into a pale red flower.

  Ewan stood, paralyzed by the treacly agony of burning pain in his left arm, staring stupidly. He had not even blinked. Pasha looked sideways, and then his left arm detached, ripped off like a bit of cloth from an old doll. More earth ruptured.

  Ewan realized what was happening.

  Someone was firing bloodstaff pellets at them.

  Silent, deathly destruction, like the one he had rained on the enemy just weeks back.

  Still standing like an idiot, he glanced at his left hand and saw a couple of his fingers missing. The small one and the one next to it were gone, sliced off. Blood dripped onto the ground below. More wet earth showered him.

  He jumped into the ditch behind him. Wet, muddy rain sprayed on his shoulders and hair. The pain was debilitating. It pulsed through his body, almost blinding him with its intensity, but he had to focus. He had to fight back.

  “Gavril!” he shouted.

  “Save me,” Tanid whimpered, huddling in the trench not far away. Lumps of meat covered the back of his tunic, but he did not seem to notice.

  Ewan realized he was still clutching the bloodstaff in his right hand. He lumbered up, shaking, and looked up over the mound. People were running everywhere, ordinary soldiers trying to figure out what was happening. But they milled mindlessly, unaware of the threat that had just shredded several of their comrades.

  One of the wagons had been punched through. A Red Caps soldier was lying against one of its shattered wheels, eyes wide open in shock. Ewan saw that both her legs were missing. Another body lay in the wet grass not far away, the signs of its mutilation hidden.

  Pain. He cherished its return. But the sensation threatened to choke his mind.

  “Mom…Mom…” someone moaned.

  Ewan saw it was the boy Pasha. He was lying on his back, weeping. “Don’t move.” Oh, he was getting nauseated from the throbbing sizzle in his left arm.

  “Forget him! Fight back!” Tanid rasped. “Fire that thing! Destroy Calemore!”

  “Use your magic,” Ewan snapped. “Heal my hand!” He showed the ruined fist to the god.

  Tanid stared at the bleeding limb with a dazed look, then shook his head. “No, no. It is no good.”

  Ewan sagged against the trench wall. He was dizzy. He had to take care of his wound. Those sounds again, rocks shattering.

  He cowered inside the ditch, hoping the pile of dugout earth was thick enough to stop the pellets. A flurry of screams rippled through the camp above. Several soldiers jumped into the trench by his side, looking terrified. Some were bleeding from small scratches caused by flying splinters and shards of stone, but they looked immensely relieved to lurk there.

  “Use the bloodstaff!” Gavril foamed.

  A nearby hit blasted a massive chunk of land away. For a moment, Ewan was blinded by the debris. Behind him, soldiers wailed, trying to wipe their eyes. Another blast, and Pasha’s body slid down the mound and into the narrow furrow. The boy was still alive.

  “Mom…” he wept.

  Ewan lowered the bloodstaff by his feet. He tore a strip from his shirt and gingerly pressed the cloth to his left hand. He gasped breathlessly, almost fainting. The surprise was just as sharp as the real physical sensation. He had thought himself invincible, immune to damage.

  Apparently not.

  His whole body shaking, he wrapped the cloth round the wound. But it was so hard doing it with one hand. “You,” he called to the nearby soldier. “Bind my hand. Now. And you, take a look at this boy. See if you can stop his bleeding.”

  Glad to be given commands, the Athesians moved quickly. The second one slid past Ewan, his thigh accidentally rubbing against his fist. Tarry blackness stabbed at Ewan’s eyes, and he bit off a curse and tasted blood in his mouth.

  “Fight him!” Tanid was shrieking.

  “He’s dead, sir,” the soldier mumbled. “The boy’s gone.”

  “My hand,” Ewan whimpered.

  Tanid was crawling on all fours, pushing past Ewan and his shivering medic. He laid his divine hands on the bloodstaff. With a last drop of consciousness, Ewan noticed and pushed his foot hard against the crystal rod, burying it in the wet ground. He would not let the god use the rod.

  He almost fainted again as the soldier tied a clumsy knot against his palm. It was a ridiculous tourniquet, but it would have to do. The cloth was turning red quickly. The pain was like a hot furnace, but Ewan was almost getting used to it. Swallowing back vomit, he shoved his right shoulder against the trench and slid up again.

  Calemore was still firing the weapon against the camp. But it was not an incessant torrent of pellets, more of a calculated destruction, probably aimed at crippling Tanid’s most valuable assets. Pasha. Ludevit. Himself. Special Children.

  A cart burst, slivers flying with an ululating, whirring noise. Pieces of wood landed all around Ewan. Soldiers of the realm were running away now, leaving the injured and dead behind. They still did not understand what was happening, but they knew they had to get away as quickly as they could.

  I am vulnerable to this thing, like anyone else, Ewan thought, feeling human again. It was such a strange, perverse elation. He tried to see a pattern
in the mayhem, to try to figure out where the witch might be firing from. But it was so hard to tell. Those pellets could be coming from a mile away.

  A hundred paces all around him, there was not a single thing left intact. Calemore had destroyed everything. If not for the safety of the trench, they would all have been dead. And that was still a viable option, it seemed.

  More pellets, and they slammed into the ground to their left, leaving deep gouges, showering huge chunks of debris into the ditch, choking it closed. Another salvo, and the trench was blocked on the right side, too. The White Witch had cleared the killing zone of any obstacles and hideouts that Ewan and the rest could use. If they wanted to escape, they had to dash across a naked clearing.

  He knows we are here. He is waiting for us.

  Ewan aimed in the general direction of the highest knoll to the north of his position and fired. A soundless torrent of rubies sped away. He was not really sure if his aim was good, but it did not matter really.

  Not good at all. Calemore responded with his own deluge. Ewan flattened himself at the bottom of the ditch. Pellets hammered into the ground all around him, almost burying him alive in dirt. The other soldiers were doing the same thing, trying to keep low and still, even as death flailed maybe two feet above their prostrate bodies.

  I have just given away our position, Ewan figured.

  “You must stop him!” Tanid shrieked.

  He wants you, Ewan knew. It was all about this god right here. The pain had become a dull ache up his entire left arm. He could not move the healthy remaining fingers. He could not flex his wrist or bend his elbow. That whole thing was a dead, hot weight.

  The silent thunderstorm ceased suddenly.

  “Ewan! Ewan!” someone was shouting. “Ewan!” Jarman.

  “We are here,” he hissed. His mouth tasted like clay and blood.

  Just behind the god, the Sirtai hopped into the trench. He was filthy and sweaty. “Are you hurt?”

  Ewan flopped onto his back so he could breathe more easily. He let go of the bloodstaff once more and gingerly lifted his left hand by the shred of a sleeve. “Lost my fingers. Ludevit and Pasha are dead.”

  Jarman nodded gravely. “Lucas has raised a defensive shield around us. We will be safe for now.”

  Soon, dozens of soldiers were there, trying to get the survivors out of the trench. Ewan tried to stand, but he sagged, and they lifted him on a stretcher, the bloodstaff pressed close to his body. Apart from some mud on his clothes, Tanid was unhurt, and he stepped out on his own.

  “Let me take a look,” Jarman spoke, coming closer. “Lower him.”

  Ewan winced as the Sirtai wizard probed his hand. He was growing weaker by the moment. The feeling of vulnerability was strangely uplifting. Human again, he thought. At least some parts of me.

  “I can stop the bleeding and seal the wounds, but your fingers are lost forever,” Jarman said.

  Ewan nodded dumbly.

  “Do you know the exact details of what happened?”

  Ewan inhaled deeply through his nostrils, trying to stave off bile at the back of his throat. “Calemore attacked us all of a sudden. Without warning. Killed Ludevit right away. Got Pasha, and the lad bled to death. Got me.” Blackness clouded his vision, and he blinked. “I got up to see what was happening, must have shown my face to the witch. He cut us off, started blasting the ground.”

  “Brace yourself,” Jarman warned.

  It was too much. A white rod of anguish stabbed him through the shoulder, up his neck, and under his jaw. He could not find any breath to gasp, so he just moaned mutely into a chasm of black despair that gripped his face. But then, the agony eased.

  “You still need urgent medical attention,” the Sirtai confessed. The stretcher jostled, and Ewan was in the air, feeling light and disembodied. “What? Speak up.”

  Ewan realized the words he was telling had only happened inside his head. He was confessing about his supernatural strength, his immunity to fire and cold and sword blows, and how it had all changed just moments ago. He wanted to share his revelation with the wizard. He would certainly know more. The young man hailed from the same land as that famous investigator that had taken him to the Broken Isles. The Sirtai were wise people…

  “Ewan, try to stay awake,” Jarman urged.

  “If you hadn’t showed up,” Ewan mumbled. From the corner of his teary eye, and through the silver woolly mist descending on the world, he could see the remnants of the ditch now, far more shallow than it had been earlier that morning, all that mound chewed up, earth blown apart by the magical pellets. With a little more time, Calemore would have cratered out enough land to hit the men hiding at the bottom. And I have helped him pinpoint the digging. Fool.

  The sky opened up. It began to rain. Ewan was glad for each drop on his seething skin. Today, he had tasted his own death. After so long, he was so much more human than he had been in a long time. Maybe coming here was the answer to his legacy.

  He passed out.

  CHAPTER 34

  The situation in Ecol was grim.

  Ever since Calemore’s attack against Gavril and Ewan, there was a deep sense of helplessness among the soldiers and citizens alike. The common troops realized they could die any moment, anywhere, without prior warning. They could be going back to their barracks and suddenly find themselves missing an arm or a leg, or maybe dead in a red, hot puddle. That was no dignified way for men and women of the sword to die.

  For Amalia, the personal hurt was even greater. Every night, she dreamed of Calemore coming to her, taking the bloodstaff away, ruining Athesia. She sometimes saw Adelbert watching her pee, smirking. She would wake up covered in sweat, stiff and tired, choking on despair.

  Then, she would go out, to try to shake out the phantoms of gloom, and she would see that scrawny lad Ewan gripping the bloodstaff. And her hopes would return, focused down to a glowing obsession. She would stare at the glass rod until her eyes watered.

  If she got hold of that weapon, she could defeat the northern army.

  If she had the bloodstaff, she could destroy Princess Sasha and King Sergei and restore pride to her realm.

  If she could somehow get her hands on the beautiful artifact of magic, she would be unstoppable.

  Alas, even with his left hand maimed and wrapped in a mushroom of linen, the boy would not let go off the staff. He would cradle it, never relaxing his grip.

  Amalia knew she had to be close to him, without raising too much suspicion. But her duties kept her away. She was too important, too precious to send on scouting missions, too valuable to squander on simple tasks. Jarman, Lucas, and Sasha would just not let her get close enough to the bloodstaff.

  Ewan might die one day, just like he almost had nine days earlier. What then? Who would take the weapon then? Who would be its new owner?

  Her thoughts drifted to her half brother and his Caytorean friend Rob, who had also perished in a haze of blood and muscle, like so many soldiers last week. She hoped Jarman’s magical shield still protected her against Calemore, and that he had enough strength to defend her both against the White Witch and human threats. Now, it seemed, he would have to extend his protection to Ewan and maybe Gavril, and she did not feel confident about it at all. After all, Calemore had almost killed James and her that snowy day. He might try again, and he would not miss this time. If only she could hold the Bloodstaff…

  My name is Calemore. I’m also known as the White Witch of Naum.

  She was deeply suspicious of Gavril. There was something wrong about him. Then, where had Ewan found the bloodstaff? A second example no less. What did that mean? Maybe that the same Lord Erik who had given the weapon and the book to her father had also known Ewan? But how could that be? Ewan was just a boy.

  She felt confused, worried.

  For the thousandth time, she wished she had read The Book of Lost Words.

  The one weak, jaundiced light of happiness was the birth of Agatha’s son. Her maid was still recovering f
rom the ordeal. She had a fever, but Jarman promised she would be all right soon. Amalia had begged the wizard to use his magic to stave off any infection, and the Sirtai had grudgingly agreed. Oblivious to the hazards of childbirth, Pete was strutting through the camp, chin raised, a silly grin on his lips. The man had changed completely, from a barely restrained brute to a responsible husband. Amalia was truly happy for Agatha. At least one of them had managed to get her life sorted out.

  Pete’s joy also helped others cope. Captain Speinbate had given the young father a small present, a fertility idol of some sort, shaped like a tiny man with a gigantic phallus. Amalia guessed it was yet another crass Borei joke. Then, the goldtoothed mercenary had also begged Pete not to name his child in the first year, because it was bad luck.

  Amalia had secured a small satchel of silver for her maid. She did not know when her funds would run out, and she wanted to make sure that Agatha was well-off, at least. The future flow of Caytorean money was uncertain now that Parus had taken over Athesia, and Amalia was not sure if Princess Sasha would be forthcoming with any help, at least not until the war ended and Amalia took her place in Roalas as her vassal.

  If they won the war, that was.

  With the bloodstaff, she could solve so many problems all at once. But it was no longer hers.

  Amalia wondered how much she really knew about the history of the realms. She wondered how much her father had known and tried to tell her. All his teachings, all his warnings, they must have steered her toward this, only she had been too proud, too stupid to heed his advice. Now she had to fight on her own, unaware of so many crucial details and developments. What was Calemore really trying to achieve? What did Jarman know? Who was this Ewan? Or Gavril? Then she remembered Adelbert lurking in her chamber, and a shiver ran up her spine. She was just a silly girl who had once thought she could rein in the world to her liking.

  She stared at Ewan.

  The boy carried with a fresh dose of vulnerability she had not seen before. His calm, almost-timeless composure had cracked, and he no longer bore with that sad, frightening look of apathy on his young face. If anything, he seemed invigorated by losing two fingers. But maybe it was just shock. Or the effect of magic the bloodstaff had on its surviving victims. No one could really know how the weapon affected people.