The Path of Ashes [Omnibus Edition]

by Parker, Brian

  *****

  Something hard poked Freya in the ribs and her eyes jerked open. Where am I? she wondered momentarily before realizing that she’d fallen asleep in the carriage. How long have I been out? Is it time?

  Varan was supposed to nudge her when he decided that they’d traveled a sufficient distance from the stadium and all of the guards there. As they’d hoped, there were only the two men across from them and the driver above, who would be of little help to the occupants unless he stopped the carriage.

  Freya hoped that she could be as violent as she needed to be. All she had was the element of surprise and a hint of desperation. This might be my only shot to escape captivity. She clutched at that idea and used it to fuel her anger. Why was she a slave while other women walked around freely without worry? What had she done to deserve being taken away from her family? Nothing.

  She peered through the tangle of her hair. Mark sat directly across from her. He stared out the window, obviously bored with the assignment of transporting the two luckiest slaves in the House of Miller. Varan and Freya were allowed the most freedoms of any of the slaves. He probably thought that they wouldn’t do anything to ruin their good fortune.

  Cooper sat across from Varan. His bare knife rested on his leg, the tip pointing toward the outside of the carriage. He was not bored with his task. He stared intently at the Primus, waiting for him to make a move. Varan had predicted this as well. He knew that if Cooper was present, their chances of surprise lessened considerably.

  This is it. This is the moment. Tentatively, she extended her index finger and pushed lightly into Varan’s ribs. It was a quick, furtive movement, meant to pass on the information that she was ready without being seen.

  “Hey, Coop,” Varan said, startling her. “How long have we been together?”

  “Hmm? I don’t know, Primus. I was only a guard when Lucas bought you, so it’s been a long time.”

  Varan nodded his head. “Yeah, that’s what I remember. I was just a boy when I came to the House of Miller.”

  “And now look at you. You’re the most powerful slave in California,” Cooper mocked. “You even get your own woman.”

  The Primus shrugged, intending to look like he was careful not to wake her. “She’s alright. Remember the lessons that you taught me about a slave’s place in this world?”

  “Remember those, do you? They served you well, you’ve been a model slave for Lucas. Don’t cause much trouble, not like some of the others.”

  Varan shifted slightly beside her. “It would be hard to forget an adult entering your cell in the middle of the night. Being too weak to do anything about it. Begging for the pain to stop.”

  Cooper chuckled nervously and glanced at Mark. “Well, you know. The past is the past, right, Primus?”

  Freya felt the muscles in Varan’s legs tense and then he was gone. She sprung forward, hitting Mark across the bridge of his nose with her elbow and then used her other hand to claw roughly across his face. He screamed and lashed out with a foot, catching her in the shin. Her leg flew backward and she fell into him.

  She didn’t know where she landed, but she bit down hard onto whatever part of Mark was in front of her. He shrieked again and she was thrown into the side of the carriage by the struggle of the two men beside them.

  Mark brought his elbow down heavily into her back and her eyes watered in pain, but she refused to unclench her teeth from his flesh. He hit her again and she almost blacked out from the agony of his desperate blows. She steeled herself; she’d been beaten by men before, although never this severely. Her entire life depended on staying awake.

  Freya knew that if she allowed him to get a swing at her head, she was finished. She pushed forward, ramming the top of her head into his gut, the flap of skin from his leg tore loose in her mouth. She bit down in a new location and held on as the carriage bounced down the road, their struggle unheeded by the driver.

  Her hand climbed along Mark’s thigh and she found the intersection of his legs. She grabbed his testicles and squeezed with every ounce of strength she could muster. The pounding on her back became frantic and she pulled him toward her as she squeezed. Then she swung her other fist in an awkward punch, lashing out blindly above her head.

  She rained punches into Mark’s upper body and face. Over and over, she punched and he was forced to throw up his hands to protect himself. Finally, she opened her mouth to release his leg and wrapped the hand she’d been punching him with around the fist that grasped the guard’s testicles. Then she fell backward, using her bodyweight to add to the fight.

  Mark tried to scramble backward, his feet sliding along the floor, trying to gain a foothold. First one, and then the second testicle ruptured inside the soft skin she held in her hands. For a moment, she was suspended in the air and then she fell hard to the bottom of the carriage as the shriveled flesh passed through her grasp.

  Freya didn’t let her advantage slip. She jumped back on top of Mark and punched rapidly into the protrusion on his throat, collapsing his windpipe.

  Beside her, Varan and Cooper continued to struggle. The older man had the advantage of fighting from his back, where Varan struggled against gravity to hold the knife away from him and punch with his opposite hand.

  Freya didn’t think; she just reacted. Her fingers, hooked like claws, dug into Cooper’s eye socket and came away with a soft, gelatinous mass. She yanked hard, severing the connective tissue and flung the eyeball away.

  It was all the help that Varan needed. He took the knife from Cooper and plunged it into the man’s gut. Then again. “We were just boys, you sick fuck,” Varan sobbed as he stabbed the blade into the cell keeper repeatedly.

  Cooper stopped struggling against Varan and he handed her the knife. Freya used it to slash Mark’s throat. The man writhed weakly against her weight, but couldn’t take in any air. The damaged tissue across his neck was surprisingly easy to cut and blood bubbled out, covering her hand in the warm fluid.

  “What do we do?” she asked.

  “Take their clothes, money, weapons—whatever they have on them. Then we jump.”

  They stripped the bodies quickly as blood and the rising odor of severed intestines made Freya gag. She knew that they’d be thankful for the clothing once they were exposed to the cold night once again. She gathered everything in her arms and looked to her lover.

  “Ready?” Varan asked, unlatching the carriage door.

  She nodded, shuffling over to him. They were on a dark, tree-lined road in the middle of nowhere. The ground sped past them as the driver continued on, unaware of the violent deaths that his companions had suffered in the carriage below. Weeds and the detritus of a lost society choked the open area between the road and the trees. If she aimed for the larger bushes, Freya thought she might have a chance of not breaking her neck.

  It’s now or never. Either we jump and run for our lives or we’ll be caught with the dead guards when the carriage pulls up to the Guild minister’s house.

  Freya wrapped her arms in Mark’s bloody clothing and jumped into the wind.

  SEVEN

  The air fogged with Darci’s breath. Winter isn’t ready to release its hold just yet. She scanned the valley from her perch beside the chimney, thankful for the warmth radiating off the stone. In the way that chilly mornings seemed to do, it was exceptionally quiet across the Seer’s valley.

  Along the ridge, nothing moved. No animals slunk from tree to tree or boldly tempted fate by exposing themselves. She wondered for a moment if an invading army surrounded the valley, scaring away the wildlife—or was it simply a cold morning when the previous week had been warm and everything was curled up in its den?

  Since she’d been working for the Seers, the valley had come under frequent attack, often by three or four man teams who’d heard of their “wealth,” but the women always seemed to know about it and gave plenty of warning to the security forces. Each attack was a bloodbath, but they’d lost many of the old explosives and didn
’t have a way to replace them. Darci wondered if they could make explosives or build traps around the valley. I’ll have to look into that. Maybe I’ll send Garth to Creede and dig around the old library.

  She watched the valley intently for several more minutes before deciding that it was nothing. Her back was nice and warm from leaning against the chimney, but her front was freezing so she stood and turned around. She opened her long coat, exposing the thick clothing underneath, and pressed herself snugly against the rock. Warmth flooded through her and she smiled. It was a beautiful morning; the only thing that would make it better would be—

  “Darci,” a male voice called from below. “I’ve got some coffee for you.”

  “Thank you, Ryan. I was just thinking about getting coffee.”

  The chief of security for the Valley Lodge scanned the perimeter rapidly once again and then climbed down the metal rungs that the builders had skillfully hidden among the chimney stone. Darci accepted the steaming mug with a nod of thanks and continued to stare out at the snow.

  “It’s quiet this morning,” she stated.

  “Probably the cold, ma’am,” Ryan replied. “I know if you gave me the morning off, I’d be curled up, back in bed.”

  She smirked. “Well, you’re not getting the day off. The weather seems to have taken a turn for the worse, but that doesn’t mean we should let our guard down.” She thought about everything that she’d seen in these mountains, the deviousness of people who were too lazy to work for their own food and wanted to take from the Seers. “Ryan, tell the men to get ready for a perimeter walk. I want to ensure that everything is as it seems.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Darci didn’t turn to watch the guard go. All of her men were good soldiers and followed orders well. Besides, the crunching of his boots across the snow, hardened by the cold, told her that he did as directed.

  She raised the mug to her lips and paused as she saw a thick bubble of blood come up in the center of her coffee. It spread across the surface, then the half-full cup began to fill with the blood until her mug overflowed. The dark, steaming fluid cascaded over her fist and down her arm. It fell in a constant stream to the ground, splattering against the white snow, staining it a deep crimson.

  There is to be another war.

  The thoughts came unbidden as she watched the blood flowing from her coffee mug. She’d had visions of death her entire life; she was used to this. It would pass soon and she’d finish her coffee. Darci knew that she had a touch of the Gift, but not enough to be a Seer. Trying to understand her visions was one of the reasons that she’d accepted the offer to become the chief of security.

  Crch. Crch. Crch. Boots crunched in the snow behind her.

  In front of her, the snow melted rapidly where the blood fell and thick, green-leafed bushes sprang up. Movement across the valley made her look away from the bushes. Giant trees, taller than any she’d seen before, filled the space where she knew there was none. Mist swirled between their trunks, spreading over more of the same type of bushes that had sprung up at her feet.

  “Darci, the Mistress wants to see you.”

  She didn’t take her eyes off the forest before her. “I’ll be right in.”

  As the guard retreated, the landscape continued to take shape in her vision. The trees were some type of pine tree, or maybe cedar, similar to those that grew in the mountain valleys surrounding the lodge. In the mist, men moved silently, their movements quieted by the long, pointed pine needles covering the forest floor.

  Shadows covered the men’s faces, disguising their features. The closest of them looked up, startling her. The eyes. The man’s eyes were yellow, the color of fresh corn. He grinned at her and the vision ended. The trees disappeared and snow returned to the valley. The vibrant green bushes at her feet vanished and the blood along her arm faded to nothingness.

  She’d had visions of people before, but none of them had ever interacted with her. That man, with those strange eyes, had seen her. He’d acknowledged that she was there; that was odd.

  Darci glanced into her mug, half-expecting to see the remnants of blood along the surface of her coffee. Nothing remained. She took a sip; it was cold. How long have I been like this? she wondered. The frozen stiffness in her legs as she turned to see what the Mistress wanted indicated that she’d been standing there in the snow for a long time. She flung the contents of the cup out into the snow and walked around the building to the front entrance.

  The woman stumped up the steps and across the porch, knocking the snow from her boots as she went. The vision bothered her. What did those men in the forest have to do with the war that she predicted when she saw the blood? She’d have to think about it, but for now, she had to answer the Mistress’ call.

  The inside of the massive hunting lodge hadn’t changed at all since she’d been working there, the furniture likely sitting where it sat when the building was first built. She could almost imagine the place filled with people before the radiation killed so many. Two couches sat opposite each other near the fireplace that warmed her outside; blankets covered their worn, old world fabrics. In the old days, families and friends must have gathered to read stories near the fire. Several sets of armchairs with side tables made little islands of conversation where friends who wanted to chat could still be social, but be by themselves to discuss private matters. The bar would have been full with men and women drinking, attempting to erase the troubles of a long day’s work or looking to find a mate for the evening. It must have been exhilarating to see the place back in the day. Now, the ghosts of the past competed with the terrors of the present.

  The Mistress liked cleanliness, familiarity and routine—all things that contributed to the Valley Lodge remaining unchanged over the years. The young Seer acolytes spent half of their time just cleaning the large building. The remainder of their time, they assisted with preparing the hallucinogens and aromatics for the rituals and attended the full-fledged Seers’ needs. To Darci, it seemed like a dull life for the girls, and that was coming from someone who spent most of her time perched on the roof staring at the ridgelines.

  Diane sat in one of the armchairs by the fire. Arielle and Candace weren’t present. So, this is to be a private conversation then.

  “Good morning, Diane. I hope you slept well,” Darci said in greeting as she walked over to the Mistress.

  “I did, thank you. You and your men keep us safe and allow us to dream peacefully.” The older woman’s deep, abrasive voice, the lifelong gift from her bastard father, echoed across the open common area. She smiled and indicated the seat beside her. “Would you like some coffee?”

  The vision of blood flowing from her cup flashed in her mind. “No, thank you, Mistress.”

  Diane shrugged. “I’ve asked to see you because I want you to begin training your replacement.”

  Darcie blanched. Of all the things that she would have thought the Mistress wanted to talk to her about, it certainly wasn’t the termination of her employment. “I…ah, am I no longer the chief of your security?”

  “No, sorry, that’s not what I meant,” Diane replied quickly. “I’ve had a vision, in my sleep, away from the sanctum—which is rare these days.

  “Before I came here, I used to be terrified of going to sleep because that was when my visions would come to me,” the Mistress continued. “I was exhausted all the time and went through life in a daze, unable to function or do my daily chores. Then, I came here. As you know, we use the Calamus to invoke the visions during a ritual, but one of the side benefits is that it eases the burden on us when we’re trying to go about our daily lives.”

  “I didn’t know that the Sweet Flag helped you outside of the sanctum, Mistress. I will ensure our gatherers bring in much more of it.”

  “That would be appreciated. It’s always in high demand and we have the space to store much more than we already do,” Diane acknowledged.

  “Last night, I dreamt of the future. Humanity will have peace and
families will not have to worry about their children going to war or suffering from radiation sickness… But that is in the future. To get there, we must endure much hardship, sadness and death.” The Mistress paused for a moment before continuing. “Do you remember Garrett Traxx, the king of Homelake?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Good, I wasn’t sure since it’s been a few years since he was here. During his prophecy, we saw that he would have to fight against an enemy that has plagued his family since his great grandfather’s time and he has prepared for this. Somehow, your fate is intertwined with the Traxx, but I don’t know how. I dreamed that they came to us for help and of you fighting alongside them.”

  “Is the lodge in danger?”

  “I did not see that,” Diane stated. “But when the time comes, there will be no hesitation, you must go with them or they will fail.”

  “And the Traxx were fighting against this enemy?” Darci asked.

  “Yes. I still don’t understand how you figure into their war, but without you, the peace of the future will not come to be.”

  The Mistress’ words filled her with an overwhelming sense of responsibility, more than she already had as the chief of the Seers’ security. “So, I’m supposed to wait for them to come here and then go with them? Wouldn’t it be better suited if I went to them now?”

  “The future in our visions is not a perfect picture and can be affected by what we do in the present. The gods allow us to choose our path to reach their destination.” The Mistress paused while Darci thought about her words. “I don’t know when my vision will occur. It could be a week or it could be twenty years. The choice of leaving is up to you, but sometimes being too proactive can have its drawbacks. Did you know that the Traxx family has a history with Seers?”