by KS Villoso
“You keep saying if. It worries me,” Camden said.
She smiled. “It suits your face to be worried. May you always be blessed. Now I must go. Be careful, please.”
They settled against the walls once she left. Kefier dozed lightly, his eyes flickering open once in a while. It seemed hours before he heard footsteps flood the room. He saw the guard enter, to check up on them. At this instant he lunged at Camden, roaring.
Camden swung out at him in panic. The guard jumped towards them, waving a heavy stick. “Stop it! You two!” He grabbed the bars with both hands, rattling them. At that instant Kefier ducked Camden’s next blow and grabbed the guard’s arm. The man gasped. In the moonlight, the sword’s blade glinted against his throat.
“The keys!” Kefier hissed. “The keys or your neck right here, right now!”
The guard started to shake. Kefier pressed the sword tight against him. “The keys, damn you!”
“Hold on. Be gentle, please,” the man stammered. He inserted a key through the bars, dropping it inside the cell. Kefier jerked his head back at Camden, who picked it up. He reached through the bars and unlocked the door from the other side.
The cell door swung open, and Camden walked out. He looked back at Kefier, his face white. Kefier ignored him. He wrapped his other arm around the man’s throat, removing the sword, and pulled back. A few moments later, the man began to kick before crumpling to the ground.
“Mother of mine! Why did you kill him?” Camden cried, shielding his face with one hand.
“We don’t know he’s dead. We have to go.”
“We have to help him!”
“We don’t have time for that, Camden.”
Camden clenched his fists. He looked as if he would strike Kefier for an instant, then his eyes fell on the sword and he whirled around, unable to look at the room any longer.
They walked into the empty streets in silence, and headed north, as Lillah instructed. Before dawn they reached the farm. A horse and a cart stood by the road. The man loading the cart with fruit looked up and regarded their appearance with detachment. “So you come at last?” he said, wiping a hand across his forehead. He pointed to the back of the cart. “I’ve been waiting all evening. Get inside.”
They settled underneath the heavy canvas that covered the cart. Camden still looked shocked, as if he was playing the night’s events over in his mind. Kefier closed his eyes and tried hard not to think about the kind of man the Boarshind had taught him to be.
Chapter Five
They had been on the road for a few hours, exhausted from the jolting and hungry from lack of provisions. The farmer had told them that Lillah had paid enough for their travel, and nothing more. Kefier expressed his feelings about this by hacking away at a watermelon the size of the farmer's head. Pieces of green watermelon skin flew around them. He managed to hew out a sizeable chunk and offered it to Camden.
Camden stared at him, unmoving. The blanket was covering their laps—it was the only contact they had since they started, and he had accepted it only because of the cold. He didn't take the food, though. Kefier sighed. He didn't really feel the need to justify what he'd done back at the prison. Sometimes compassion meant death. Each man's path was his own, untouched by his fellows, even his god.
So Oji, why did you save me? You had nothing to gain. He shifted in his seat. Now you're dead and I'm here.
The cart pulled to a stop. Camden started to jump off, but Kefier pushed him back, lifting one hand. “Don’t move,” he mouthed. There were voices outside. Kefier recognized the farmer’s. There was an angry note to it. His hand strayed to the sword.
“Some watermelons, onions, to sell at the market,” the farmer was saying. “Nothing else.”
“Are you sure? I really don't like lies.”
“Sir, I can't possibly be…”
Kefier thought he heard what sounded like sword crushing moist watermelon flesh. He closed his eyes. There was another creak, more steel being drawn, more flesh being hacked. The horse’s scream pierced the sky. Camden looked at him in alarm, his whole body rigid. Kefier looked back, afraid he would bolt at the last moment. He would never be able to outrun them.
“Vegetables, eh?” a man was saying outside the cart.
“Fruit, I think,” another added.
“We’ll see about that.”
Kefier heard, saw, the canvas rip from above, and thought he felt the blade sliding into his own flesh. He turned to his right, a second later, sweat streaming across his face in rivulets, and saw, instead, the blade buried deep within a watermelon.
It was pulled out. “That smells good. Get us one.”
A pair of hands slid under the canvas. Kefier felt blinded as the light streamed against his face and he gripped the sword tightly, his skin growing hot. But he didn't move for some reason, though every muscle in his body was urging him to fight. Looking at Camden, bigger and stronger than he was, unarmed and shaking, he felt exhausted. He didn't want to fight anymore.
The flap of canvas was left back in place and he felt the darkness on his skin.
“Ugly watermelon.”
“They’ll all taste the same.”
“They’re all watermelons there? No humans?”
“Of course they’re all watermelons there. What do you think I am, blind?”
“Hmmm.” There was a second’s pause, and then another blade slid into the canvas and buried itself neatly into a watermelon right on Kefier’s lap.
“Stop that. I swear, I think if Old Man Winter doesn't care, Algat shouldn't care. I'm sick of this whole affair. Bad enough they did what they did to Rok and the others. Isn't Kefier that dark little fellow? The Dageian?”
“He's from Gorent, I think,” the other man replied.
“Huh. I could've sworn—the accent—”
“Well, they speak Dageian up there, I think. We should go. We're wasting our time here. You didn't have to kill that guy. He probably had a family.”
“He had that look, the kind that reports to Caelian guards.” A pause. “You know what they think of us up here.”
The voices dispersed, and in a few seconds were gone, leaving Kefier and Camden in total silence. They waited until the dark turned to grey through the holes in the canvas. And then Kefier crawled out of the cart, where the first thing he saw was the farmer, still on the driver’s seat, holding the reins in his hands. His head was gone. It had rolled off onto the dusty road, a few meters away from them, blood-marked, eyes gazing blankly.
Behind him, he heard Camden gasp, and vomit.
They had also killed the horse. It was lying where moments ago it had stood in harness, the great neck pierced. Kefier rubbed the cold head with his hands. “Were they from Vildar?” Camden asked. The first words he had spoken in hours.
Kefier shook his head. “Those weren't guards.” He glanced at the road. “We have to go. We can't wait here.”
“Go? Where?” Camden’s voice broke. “You’re wanting to go in there?” He pointed to the wood.
Kefier did not want to nod, but he did. He trudged forward, expecting Camden to stay behind. He didn't. He followed him into that certain death, or so the folk tales of the Kag would have them believe.
Of course, for the hours they walked through the dark, the only real certainty lay in the silence around them. Several times Camden tried to drown it with a whistle, a tune to drive the seeming blankness away, but he gave up after a while. Even the birds were quiet. It all sounded like the night after somebody's funeral and Kefier wasn't so sure if it had been the wisest idea after all.
They stopped underneath a tree with huge, looming branches. Camden slumped against a thick root jutting out of the ground, his round face red with exertion. Kefier settled on the dirt nearby.
“We'll make it to Cael City,” Kefier said, thinking Camden needed the reassurance. “But then I don’t know what to do from there.” He ran his hands through his hair. “I don’t know who’s chasing us or why.”
“I’m thinking the man you killed…” Camden started, but he stopped himself and turned away.
“We don’t know that he’s dead.” Kefier paused. “I think we’re safe here. We should be safe here.” The forest did seem less menacing than where he had come through, going to Vildar. “Are you hungry?”
Camden grunted.
“Wait here. I’ll find us something.”
He found the tracks a little off to the right of their camp, and then the deer not long after. It was old and lame. He gutted and skinned the meat where he stood, removing the guts and burying them, and then he returned to camp. Camden had already started a fire. Kefier appreciated the forethought as he dropped the carcass by his feet. “Here you are, mother bear,” he said.
Camden stared at him. “That's—”
“Extraordinarily good luck. After all the sacrifices I've made to my god I'm sure he doesn't mind pulling his hand out once in a while.” He began to cut the meat into strips to lay out in front of the fire to cook. “Help yourself,” he added, noticing Camden's stare.
Camden hesitated. “You have an extra knife somewhere, maybe?”
He waved nonchalantly. “It's okay. I kind of like doing this.”
This took the whole night. Camden finished eating and became bored. He reached for Oji's sword, plunged unceremoniously in the soil. Kefier had no sentimental attachments to the weapon and allowed him to do what he would. Camden started tinkering with something around the handle.
“Where did you find this?” he asked. Kefier looked up to see Camden holding up a green stone pendant. He had not noticed it on the sword before. Back when he took it from Oji’s body, it had no such ornaments. Gaven had taken the sword from him when he was captured and that was the last he’d seen of it until the day he woke up in the cart.
“I don’t know,” he said.
Camden held it in his hands, against the fire. “It was my boy’s.” His face twitched. “I gave it to him on his name day.”
“Don’t they make those by the cartload?”
Camden turned to him. “I made it myself. So I know. I know—” He covered it in his palm. “You’re sure you don’t know anything at all? If he’s alive or if he’s gone.” Kefier didn’t reply immediately and Camden, disgusted, walked away. The crickets started their silky chirping, but Kefier was silent for the night, staring as the fire crackled and spat, thinking of a thousand things that had nothing to do with death or despair or loss.
Camden didn’t return, and the next day, even after the morning mist had receded there was still no sign of him. Kefier folded the blanket, gathered the dry pieces of meat, and scattered the leftovers where other animals could partake of his blessing. He covered the fire pit with dirt and then went off to follow Camden's trail.
The broken foliage went around in large circles—Camden was not gifted with a sense of direction. By noon, Kefier had all but given up on finding him. He had climbed a tree to rest, hoping he was high enough to see movement from afar. He had started to doze off when he heard voices.
“Look, we've been through this already. You were with him, weren’t you? Speak properly!”
Something incomprehensible followed. The man swore. “We're not exactly giving you a choice. We heard in Vildar he escaped with you. Where’s Kefier?”
The mention of his name, and the sound of the voice, chilled his heart. The man was also from Singular Seven, part of the group who frequented the Chiming Princess instead of Blue-dog's Tavern. They once talked about dogs. A good four-hour conversation a lifetime ago.
“I’m not knowing, yeah?” Camden sounded weary. “We were together, but he left me on the road. He’s probably gone now. Does this have anything to do with those dead children?”
“By the rocks of Apulkar, what children? Did Kefier’s madness infect you too?”
“Can’t help but wonder.” This was someone else, someone Kefier didn't know. “First that Oji dies and then that officer, Gaven, starts acting strangely. Goes off for a year, brings Kefier in, and then lets him go free. Just like that. Now we’re here chasing him under Algat’s explicit orders, completely contrary to another officer’s actions.”
“Don’t tell me you think those rumours are true?”
“What, that Old Man Winter's off his rocker? I don't know about that, but what else in hells' teeth is a man supposed to believe? They don't tell us anything till the job's right there and by the time we're paid—if we’re paid—we're just sitting wondering why in Agartes' name we don't just move to a place where a man can find a decent job without having his balls on the chopping block every damn day.”
“Talk some more like that and I'll report you myself. You know what Algat thinks about that kind of nonsense. Now, pig, will you tell us where Kefier is or not?”
There was a long pause, and then Camden’s voice came, steady and resolute. “I’m thinking you’re getting nothing from me.” A different tone than last night's. Kefier shifted, having heard all he wanted to hear. He should have known to be more careful. Baeddan’s men were sent everywhere, wherever there was money to be made. Even the lords in Hafod hired them. And Vildar? Vildar, at the edge of the wood in Cael, a road away from Cairntown? Oji would've laughed and called him a half-wit. He knelt by the bushes and waited until nightfall.
The fire had dwindled to glowing embers. A single guard lay by a tree some distance away, clearly the night watch, but too exhausted to pay any attention to the job. Kefier stepped towards Camden and shook him by the shoulder. Camden’s eyes snapped open. What word he meant to utter next was stifled by Kefier’s hand against his mouth.
Kefier lifted a finger to his lips.
“Lemme go,” Camden mumbled. “Your hand smells.”
Kefier turned his head to check on the sleeping men before he withdrew his hand, wiping it against his trousers with disgust. He lifted the knife from his belt and began to work at the rope.
“What are you doing here?” Camden whispered.
Kefier stopped and gave Camden a worried look. “So you like it here? Should I leave?”
“Ach! Just keep quiet! Hurry up!”
“I'm trying.” Kefier pointed at the tangled mess the rope had been knotted into while he began to hack at it with the knife in his other hand. “Better stop wriggling.” He drew back for a second to inspect his work and sighed. The rope was thick and the knife was dull after all the meat he had gone through the past night.
“Thanks,” Camden whispered. “I mean, after last night—I was just upset, you ken…”
Kefier shot him an angry look.
“You’re wanting no sentiments, yeah?”
“None right now, thanks,” Kefier growled. He had almost severed through the rope, but the last bit proved to be troublesome. He shifted his weight and took the rope in one hand, lifting it slightly so that he could slide the knife underneath it and cut it from the other end.
The rope fell.
“Oh balls!”
The knife had gone through not just the rope but across the skin of his thumb. He realized his mistake all too quickly. Grasping the bleeding thumb with his other hand, he turned and saw the men stirring from their sleep.
“Somebody’s tryin’ to free…it’s Kefier!” The man stumbled towards them, sword in hand. Sweat dripped down Kefier's face. His head leered. The man’s every step seemed slow and he felt as if he was in a dream, his eyes weighed down by rocks. So he thought it was only his imagination that made the man look to his side in fear, if he hadn’t heard Camden’s scream.
A huge figure emerged from the bushes and crashed into the Singular Seven man. It pulled his head off in one quick motion and waved it at the dying fire, screeching. Then it started to dance around the camp, cracking his skull as if it was nothing more than a piece of fruit and slurping the insides with relish.
Camden had dropped to the ground. Kefier knelt beside him and pulled the blanket over them, hoping it would hide them in the night. He felt nauseous, looking at the remains of the man he
once knew. He remembered he liked greyhounds, suddenly. Something about their grace, their independence. That thing in the middle, prancing apelike around the fire, didn't even register in his mind. It still didn't seem real. It wasn't real. It couldn't be.
That thought didn't stop it from flinging the men left and right. Some, the lucky ones, died at once. Others had to watch their companions ripped from limb to limb. The creature sat in the midst of this bloodbath, laughing, its long hairy arms moving to shove each morsel into its gaping mouth.
Kefier and Camden remained motionless for what seemed like hours. And then, when they thought that it would be over, that the creature would take the last bite and leave, it sat up, and begin to sniff the air, unmindful of the writhing body parts around it. Kefier felt the sweat drip down his jaw. The creature was still hungry. It was still hungry. It had caught their scent. It was looking for them.
The tears began to roll off Camden’s face. His own breath felt laborious, cold. Time stopped.
He forced himself to look back into the clearing. The creature had ventured nearer and sat an arm’s length away from them. He saw its face for the first time. It looked vaguely like a man, though its head was the size of two, with greyish-green skin and eyes, eyes so unlike anything he had ever seen before. But what unsettled him the most was the creature’s smile. It stretched all the way to its ears, nonchalant, happy, still tainted with the blood and bits of flesh from the men it had just killed.
And then the creature scratched its head and moved away, and only then did he realize that it didn't seem to know where they were. He suddenly remembered the incident on the road, when the mercenary had looked down at him and seen nothing but watermelons. He fingered the blanket. It felt like an ordinary wool blanket, but it had to be more than that. He had thought the man who left it was strange—could he have been a mage? He’d heard they could attach power to ordinary things.
But the creature could still smell them. Undaunted, it continued to rummage through the camp. Kefier realized that if they stayed where they were it would stumble on them sooner or later. He made a decision and touched Camden's shoulder, to warn him. Camden gave him a puzzled look. He reached for a stone and threw it across the bushes.
