Fate of the Fallen

by Kel Kade

  Half the spinning world turned pink, and Aaslo blinked. He paused to lean on the closest building and wiped sweat from his eyes. His hand came away crimson. Just then, a horrifying shriek broke through the hum in his ears. Without thought, Aaslo ran toward the sound of an angry horse and found the ugly beast blocking the escape of two men in an alley. It took him a moment to figure out that it was his angry horse, and one of the two men was the fugitive who had stolen his bag—the bag that now lay empty in the mud.

  Aaslo took a tentative step forward, his right leg dragging along the ground. He looked down and shook it, but it didn’t seem to respond the way it should have. He wondered if he had torn something important and hoped it was a temporary sprain. Looking back at the perpetrators, who were cowering against a wall, he wiped blood from his eye. Then he reached over to Dolt’s saddle and drew the axe that had been strapped to its side. Aaslo stomped his right foot on the ground a few times and only felt a tinge of pain. He looked up and pointed the axe at the two men. The one on the left was young, only a boy. The boy sank to the ground, covering his head with his arms as he cried. Focusing on the one on the right—the one who had stolen Mathias—he said, “Where is it?”

  The wide-eyed young man held up filthy hands wrapped in rags. “Look, man, I don’t have it. I mean, that’s messed up. Who carries around a head?”

  Knowing he looked a terror at that moment—disheveled, dirty, and covered in blood—Aaslo allowed anger to fill his voice. “Where is it?”

  “I—I threw it in the river.”

  “What river?” Aaslo snapped. He didn’t recall passing a river; but, at that moment, most of the events leading up to his standing in that alley were a blur.

  The thief tipped his chin. “Over there—on the other side of the building. I threw it from the roof.”

  Aaslo pulled his arm back, then thrust the axe through the air. It tumbled end over end. With a thunk, it sank deeply into the wall beside the young man’s head. Aaslo followed in its wake, shoved the thief against the wall, and grabbed the man’s throat. “You’re going to find that head. If you run, I’ll follow you until the end of your days, and it won’t be just me. You have no idea how many enemies you’ve made, and I am the least of them. If you help me find the head, I’ll let you live. Others will not be so accommodating.”

  It was a lie. Aaslo had never lied so much in his life as he had since leaving the forest. He knew no one would go after the thief, at least not directly; but if he didn’t get the head back, he wouldn’t have proof for the king. If the king didn’t find a new hero, then this thief—and all the other thieves, and everyone else in the world—was doomed.

  The thief tried to shake his head but settled for a pained wheeze of compliance. Upon release, he doubled over gasping, then looked up at Aaslo.

  “The river’s slow this time of year. Not much rain. It shouldn’t have gone far.”

  “You’d best hope no one finds it before we do,” said Aaslo.

  The man nodded and coughed, then grabbed the boy by the back of his shirt. “Stand up, Mory. We gotta find the head.”

  Aaslo looked down at the patched burlap sack. Since it hadn’t rained recently, he didn’t want to think about what had created the mud caking it. His first thought was to find a new sack. Then he grabbed the one in the mud with a hard shake to remove the muck.

  The thief grimaced. “Look, man, I’ll find you a new one, okay?”

  Aaslo held it to the man’s face and said, “Does this look like something you’d steal?”

  Covering his nose and turning away, the thief said, “It certainly doesn’t smell like it.”

  “Precisely,” said Aaslo. “Remember what I said about running.”

  “All right, as if I wasn’t already convinced by your insane horse. How’d you train him to do that?”

  As if unable to accept the praise, Dolt chose that moment to release his bladder, showering the alley—and their legs—with his pungent spray.

  “Unbelievable,” said Aaslo as he took up the reins and started down the side street toward the river.

  The eldest thief caught up to him as the younger straggled behind, keeping his distance from Dolt. The thief said, “Hey, man, what’s your name?”

  “What does it matter?”

  “Well, since we’ll be working together, I’ll need to know what to call you. I’m Peckett, but everyone just calls me Peck.” As Peck spoke, he pulled the ragged wraps from his hands and shoved them into his pockets. Then he took off his raggedy jacket and turned it inside out before replacing it.

  “What are you doing?” said Aaslo.

  Peck brushed his hands down the soft black velvet and slipped two gold buttons through their loops. He ran his fingers through his dark hair and tied it back into a queue. “If I’m gonna be walking about the city in broad daylight, I gotta look respectable, you know? The city guard, the shopkeepers—they’ll watch you like a hawk if you look like—well, you.”

  Aaslo reached up and wiped drying blood from his face, then looked down at his shoddy clothes. The thief had a point. He still had to retrieve the head from the river, though, so he’d worry about his appearance afterward.

  “Don’t listen to him,” said Mory, his voice cracking with youth. “He just wants to look good for her.”

  Peck grinned and said, “I won’t deny it.” He waggled his eyebrows and said, “Lena works by the river. She sells seeds and herbs at an apothecary stall, and she smells as sweet as she looks.”

  Aaslo felt a stab in his gut as his thoughts turned to Reyla. She liked to make lotions and perfumes from the herbs and cuttings he had brought to her, so she had always smelled fresh like the forest.

  “So, what’s your name?” said Peck.

  “Aaslo.”

  Peck glanced around, then leaned in and whispered, “What’s the deal with the head, anyway? Are you a bounty hunter? It’s proof of your kill, right?” Peck grinned and waved at a few people he seemed to know when they reached the river. Then he said, “So, um, what does something like that cost? I’ve got a few I wouldn’t mind putting on your list.”

  Ignoring the questions, Aaslo said, “Where did you throw it?”

  Peck looked up at the tops of the buildings and pointed to a two-story structure with a flat roof. “I threw it from up there. I was in a hurry, so I didn’t throw it too far. The river’s slower on this side.” He pointed to a place a few hundred yards down the riverbank and said, “It probably hasn’t made it to the fishing docks yet. It might’ve washed up on the shore.”

  Aaslo surveyed the bank beyond the paved street. Cobbles and boulders dotted the landward side of the long point bar. Scraggly bushes and grass had grown among them, and the mud nearest the river was thick with dark silt and clay covered in brush. Aaslo was relieved. There was a chance the head had gotten hung up on the plants, which might also prevent anyone from finding it. The river wasn’t wide, though, and he worried that the head might have gotten swept into the faster current. Something about the river wasn’t making sense, though.

  “Where does the river come from?” he said.

  “You’re not from around here, eh? It comes from the east.”

  “We’re on top of a hill. It slopes downhill to the east.”

  “So?”

  “So, water flows downhill.”

  “Ah, you’re not thinking big enough. There’s mountains to the east. The water goes fast down the mountains, so it swoops up the hill,” said Peck with a sweep of his hand.

  “The mountains are hundreds of miles away. The river wouldn’t come up the hill. It would go around.”

  Peck scratched at his temple, looked up at the sky, and then shrugged. “I guess it’s the wizards, then.”

  “The wizards?”

  The thief nodded. “Wizards, sorcerers, witches, whatever—they’re always making weird things happen. A lot of stuff doesn’t make sense around Tyellí. Try not to think about it too hard. It’ll give you a headache.”

  “Do
you know any magi?” asked Aaslo.

  “Magi?”

  “Magus, magi—they’re the general terms for people with magic, in case you don’t know which to call them.”

  “Huh, I didn’t know that. We wouldn’t know those types. We don’t exactly run in the same circles, them being nobles and rich folk, and us being”—he tugged at his lapels and winked—“entrepreneurs.”

  “We met a wizard once,” said Mory. “Remember, Peck? He was in the city square. He made that man’s purse disappear and come back filled with flowers.”

  “He wasn’t a wizard, Mory. He was an illusionist. They use sleight of hand to make you think they’re using magic. They’re one step up from a pickpocket.”

  “But you said he was a wizard,” said a crestfallen Mory.

  “You were eight. I didn’t want to ruin the excitement for you.”

  Aaslo shook his head, then secured the axe to his saddle before withdrawing a smaller hatchet. He pointed downstream. “The river always runs in that direction?”

  Peck grinned and said, “Of course. Water runs downhill, doesn’t it?”

  Aaslo growled, “Come on. We’re going into the water to search the bank from the river.”

  Mory practically shouted, “But I can’t swim.”

  “Can’t swim?” said Aaslo in disbelief. “You have a river in your city, and you can’t swim? How old are you—twelve?”

  Mory lifted his chin. “I’m fourteen.”

  “Hmm, you’re small for your age.” He glanced at Peck, then added, “No doubt from lack of proper food.” He tossed the reins to Mory, who caught them on impulse and then held them at arm’s length. Aaslo said, “You watch Dolt. If you try to take any of my things, he’ll eat you.”

  Mory shook his head vigorously up and down, then seemed to think better of it and shook it side to side.

  Peck removed his coat with a sigh and handed it to Mory. “Don’t let anything happen to this or I’ll eat you.” Mory grinned, and Peck tousled the boy’s shaggy brown hair before following Aaslo into the water.

  Several moments passed in silence, and Aaslo’s thoughts rolled freely through his mind. Finally, he returned to something that had caught his attention earlier. He looked over at Peck, who was within arm’s reach. “Entrepreneurs, huh?”

  Peck pushed a branch to one side as he inspected the bank and said, “Yeah, there’s this other country where the people with the most money get the power. It doesn’t matter how you grew up or who your parents were. They call it capitalism, and people who start their own businesses are called entrepreneurs.”

  “I know what an entrepreneur is,” Aaslo muttered. “I’m just surprised you do.”

  “I heard it from a traveling merchant in a tavern. Truth be told, it sounded like a faerie tale, but I like it.”

  “Maybe not as great as it seems,” said Aaslo. “Everyone doesn’t come into this world on an even scale. People born to money usually end up with the money.”

  “Yeah,” said Peck, “but it doesn’t have to be that way. They might lose their money. More important is people like me and Mory—we’d not be limited. There’d be nothing stopping us, you know. It might be hard, it might take a long time, but it could happen. If we kept trying, eventually we’d find a way. Not like here. No matter how hard we try, we’ll never be more than we are. It’s the law.”

  “You’ll always be commoners, but you don’t have to be thieves.”

  “What else are we gonna be? We raise ourselves. We’ve never been trained to be anything else. No one’s gonna pay for an apprenticeship. If we don’t steal, we don’t eat. Plus, there’s dues to pay, you know. Being a thief ain’t free.”

  “You’ll pay with your life when you get caught. I doubt there are too many old thieves in Tyellí.”

  “That’s true enough, but I don’t intend to go hungry in the time I got. Besides, Mory’s gotta eat, too, and I’m pretty good at what I do.”

  “Not so good you don’t get caught,” Aaslo said with a pointed stare.

  “Ah, well, no hard feelings, right? I mean, it was too easy. A lonely bag just dangling there, no one paying it any attention. It was too good to pass up, and I’ll probably be regretting it for the rest of my short life.”

  “You speak freely for a criminal.”

  “Don’t see as I have much to lose. I figure I’ll be lucky if you don’t kill me when we find the head, and I know you’ll kill me if we don’t. How was I supposed to know you were a bloody blade for hire on a demon horse?”

  Aaslo wanted to correct the man. He was a forester—an emissary of life, growth, and tranquility. He ultimately decided it was better for the thief to continue believing his own tale for the time being. Instead, he said, “Is Mory your brother?”

  Peck reached into the water, pulled out a boot, and then tossed it aside. “Nah, I sort of found him. I guess you could say his mom gave him to me.” At Aaslo’s questioning glance, he continued. “When I was ten, I was nearly caught stealing a pan of muffins from the bakery. The pan was still hot. It burned my hands, and I dropped it. I ran for a while with the city guard on my tail, then ducked into a basement boiler room. It wasn’t long before I realized I wasn’t alone. A woman was there. She was pregnant, and she wasn’t doing so well. She was trying to be quiet, so I knew she wasn’t supposed to be there. There was a little boy with her. She told me his name was Mory, and he was four years old. She asked me to take care of him. Then she started screaming, and a whole lot of blood came pouring out of her. I grabbed Mory and got out before the city guard got there. I went back later and asked around, but everyone who knew anything said she had died. Turns out they didn’t even try to get the baby out of her. They said it was better the baby die with her than end up as another street rat.

  “It was the most horrible thing I’ve ever seen, and I’ll never forget it. I keep up with my women, you know? At least for a few months, just to be sure. I’ll never be responsible for a woman dying in pain, scared and alone in a basement. As far as I know, I’ve never gotten one pregnant. Well, there was one, but she said the baby wasn’t mine. She married a city clerk’s assistant, and I figure he’s better off with them either way.”

  “The city guards, the officials, they just let the woman and baby die? They didn’t call for a healer?”

  “Why would they? There wasn’t any money in it for them.”

  “How about basic decency—respect for life?”

  “Says the hit man. Come on. Can you say that you’ve worked so hard to help others in need, especially when there wasn’t anything in it for you?”

  Aaslo considered his life before the past few weeks. If someone had asked, anyone besides Mathias, there would have been few, if any, reasons good enough for him to leave the forest. The very nature of his work was in helping people, though. He couldn’t be expected to do everything. He knew he was lying to himself. He didn’t do it for the people. He did it for the forest—for the trees and the wild land that needed to be preserved and protected. That had been his calling. Helping people was someone else’s. Was he no better than the apathetic city guard or the common thief?

  No, Mathias was dead, and he was trudging through a mystical river in Tyellí. He had left the forest and hadn’t returned because the world needed a hero and didn’t yet know it. When fate had called upon him, he had stepped up to the challenge. Mathias’s calling had been to help people, and Aaslo was trying to see that through. He would get the head to the king so that a new champion could be found. Now, he just needed to find the head.

  Aaslo spied a mass of hair floating beneath a briar bush. He used his hatchet to hack away the tangle of limbs and then grabbed the soft mess, plucking it from the water with ease. The putrid stench of decay hit him like a roaring bull, and he dropped the mass.

  “Ugh! What was that?” said Peck.

  Aaslo gagged and tried to expel the vapor from his nose and mouth. “Some kind of algae. I’ve never seen or smelled anything like that.”

  P
eck said, “It smells like death. I think I’m going to be sick.”

  His eyes watering, Aaslo waved Peck downstream away from the algal source. When they passed the thicket, they found Mory standing beside the water with golden locks threaded through his fingers and a perfectly preserved face staring at them.

  “I found it,” said the boy through clenched teeth and a wry smile.

  Aaslo spied Dolt standing placidly beside the road, his supplies still secured to the saddle. Slogging onto the bank, Aaslo pried the head from the boy’s white-knuckled grip and stuffed it into the sodden burlap sack.

  “It’s about time.”

  Aaslo was both relieved and struck with stomach-churning anxiety at hearing his friend’s voice again.

  “What’s wrong with it?” said Mory.

  “What do you mean?”

  Mory scrunched his face. “I’ve seen a head before.”

  Peck snapped, “When did you see a severed head?”

  Mory looked only slightly apologetic, as he couldn’t take his eyes off the burlap sack. “I went to the chopping block. I know I wasn’t supposed to go, but I went anyway. After they cut off the heads, they put them on pikes for everyone to see. It doesn’t take long for them to get pretty horrible. This one looks perfect. It might as well still be attached. I half expected it to start talking to me.”

  “Did it?” Aaslo said, a little too eagerly.

  Mory released a nervous laugh. “What? Talk to me? Of course not. It’s dead, and I’m not crazy.”

  “Is all my stuff still there?” Aaslo asked with a nod toward the horse.

  Mory glanced at Peck. “Yeah, I didn’t touch anything. Your horse is crazy. I tried to make it stop, but it insisted on following you along the river. And, it tried to eat my shoes.”

  “Your shoes?”

  “Yeah, I don’t know much about horses, but I don’t think they usually eat leather.”

  “When did it try to eat your shoes?”

  “Um, well, he suddenly stopped walking and started nipping at my shoes. He chased me around until I took refuge in the rocks. I guess it was a lucky break, because that’s when I found the head.”