One corner of his mouth twitched upward. “I had help.” He moved into the clearing and busied himself, examining the trail of footsteps before she could ask anything else.
They followed the trees as far as he could see before disappearing beyond the curve of the forest.
He stepped back and looked up. The winter sunlight was diffused by grey and white clouds making the whole sky just bright enough to blind. He shaded his eyes as he searched.
He saw a thin trail of grey smoke that wound upward until it disappeared completely in the like colored sky.
Whoever the mystery person was, they were headed in the direction of the smoke.
He turned to Eskeilay, “I don’t know why you are here, but I would suggest it’s best to not get in my way. I’ve had a long week and my patience is long gone.”
“Your patience isn’t the only thing that’s gone, Mal’Ak.” Eskeilay scratched her nose and began a slow wide circle around them.
Eli pivoted with her. His sword slid smoothly from the scabbard. Its point followed her. “Maybe you should come and find out.”
Her laugh rushed over him and ate at his desire to fight.
He growled and closed his soul to her touch as best he could. He hoped that portion of his power was left to him.
“I don’t wish to fight, Great One. Only help.” She shimmered between woman and beast, morphing without thought of what she should be. “You will need me before this is done.”
Eli felt Keezie push her back against his. “Don’t trust her,” she whispered.
“Ya think?” he snapped and immediately regretted it. “Sorry,” he whispered.
Eskeilay was almost done with one complete revolution when she stopped and cocked her head. Her body flickered as she transformed. It made Eli feel as if claws scraped the inside of his skull. She sat on jet black haunches and cleaned her front paws.
She looked at them from cat eyes, her voice at odds with her appearance. “I’ll be there in your time of need, Mal’Ak.” There was a blur as she hurtled into the forest.
Keezie’s voice barely reached his ears it was so soft. “I do not like her.” Usok’s growl echoed her proclamation. Her body moved away from him, leaving a void of warmth that he very much wished would return.
“We should make sure she’s gone,” he cautioned.
She walked around to face him, her cheeks red from the cold and danger. “Oh, she’s gone. I can tell.” He must have looked confused, so she added, “I’ve met her before.”
That didn’t exactly help, but he put it aside for the moment.
He pointed at the smoke. “That is probably a settlement or village. We should head that way and see where we are.”
Usok brushed against him. He scratched behind the great hound’s ears and grinned as the dog’s tongue lolled out of his mouth in pleasure. “I’m glad to see you, too.” He was.
Eli kept his hand on Usok’s head as they followed the footprints.
Keezie touched his shoulder. Her lips were pursed when he turned. “What happened to you?”
He sighed, “I guess it’s as good a time as any.” He hated explaining things.
They spent the next hour walking and talking. Eli recounted his experience in Kwanokasha up to his arrival at Mammoth Springs. He left out a few details, ones he thought didn’t need to be spoken. She didn’t need to know just how helpless and weak he was.
When he was done he asked her to tell him what happened after Grand Isle.
He worked to keep the worry from his face. It was, in order of magnitude, beyond frightening, and it felt like misdirection.
It was frustrating to know your enemy knew you better than you knew them, and that they had the benefit of thousands of years to plan the perfect crime.
A crime you were supposed to stop without even knowing the end goal or reason.
He knew it wouldn’t do her any good to know he was terrified. He didn’t think it did him any good either, but there was nothing he could do about it.
The guilt of two hundred years ate at him, but somehow keeping secrets from Keezie felt the worst.
Eli touched her hand. “Let me get my bearings,” he said. He needed some space from the looming trees to see if they were still headed toward the smoke. He didn’t wait to see her nod before he stepped away from the frozen footsteps they followed.
He shaded his eyes and peered into the sky. “Not good,” he announced.
“What is it?” Keezie couldn’t keep the panic from her voice. Her feet crunched in the snow as she ran to his side.
Eli pointed to the smoky column. Its oily black coils twisted through the sky.
Keezie’s frowned as she tried to decipher the meaning. “And?”
He motioned toward the trees, “Go.” The giant hound took off. Clouds of snow bloomed behind him until he disappeared into the shadows.
“It was grey before.” His eyes locked onto hers. “The smoke,” he clarified. “That’s normal.” He looked back up at the sky. “That is not normal. That,” he jabbed his finger at the dark trail, “is people burning.”
It took a moment for his words to penetrate. “Oh.” She shuddered.
“Can you run?” He asked.
He was at a full sprint by the time she finished her nod.
“Wait!” she called.
“Follow me!” He yelled back to her.
His best guess was they still had a mile or so to reach the source of the smoke. He would need some speed if he was going to make it there with any hope of helping. If it wasn’t already too late. He hesitated just a moment then retrieved the canteen of Black Drink. He gulped the remainder of the bitter draught.
He shivered like a boy getting his first taste of whiskey. He gagged a little, but kept his pace, and prayed drinking that much of the potion in such a short period of time wouldn’t stop his heart.
Then again, if it did, it would solve all his current problems. He hoped.
His vision narrowed as the capillaries in his eyes contracted, followed by an odd hollow sensation in his sinuses, but the traces of exhaustion vanished. An unnatural energy blossomed in its place. It tingled his nerves like a sudden bolt of electricity.
The trees thinned at a tedious pace, until a creek blocked their crossing.
On the far side of the gurgling water, mud, snow, and blood mixed into sticky slurry.
What remained of huts and homes smoldered and sizzled. Bodies lay twisted and empty, mashed into place by hooves and feet and weight. A few smoldering corpses sent the black oily smoke into the air.
He was too late. Again.
He rubbed at his eyes, angered at the well of tears that sprung from them, and walked the ruin of the village.
He touched each body he encountered, thanking each spirit, each vessel of flesh, for its life.
He moved in a circle around the outer edge, and worked his way in.
Everything was destroyed. Every man, woman, child, horse, and dog had been brutally and ruthlessly murdered.
In his search he found only one still alive. A child who died with her hand in his. He wept.
There was only one body left when Keezie ran from the woods.
He heard her gasp. He turned to acknowledge her before he pulled his feet from the mud and made his way to the lone body in the center of the village.
It was a woman. She lay on her back, her buckskins kicked up around her thighs. She was covered with the foul slurry of death. A long wound traveled from her sternum to her pelvis.
He knelt beside her and touched her handsome face.
He started when her eyes fluttered open. “Shhh,” he whispered. “Be still.”
She struggled to open her mouth and raised her hand.
Eli caught her work hardened fingers in his own and held them.
“Donehegowa,” her voice cracked, but the word caught his heartbeat in his throat. He thought he must have been mistaken. She licked her muddy lips and spoke again. “Donehegowa, you’ve grown.” She reached for
his face, “So handsome. So strong.” He caught her arm as it fell and clasped her hand again in his own.
He struggled to respond, but the sound of his true name paralyzed him.
The woman coughed again. Blood and spittle bubbled from her mouth.
Eli shook when her hand tightened around his. “He took you,” she continued. “He’ll keep you safe.”
His mind reeled. What was she saying? He pushed his voice from his mouth, “Who? Who took me?”
She faded. He could see the light of life as it leaked from her.
She jerked and took a deep ragged breath. She looked at him with sad and loving eyes. “Cleve,” she whispered, “your father.” His face buzzed with stunned realization. This was his mother. His mother.
He cried like a child. His tears fell on her cheeks as she died. Her hand fell slack, and he held it a moment before he laid it over her chest.
All the pain and sadness of his long life poured out of him. All the longing and wishes to know this woman.
His reward was to watch her die. He hated his life with more passion than he could express. He had no escape or release, so he shook and sobbed in the cold mud. He didn’t even care that Keezie saw the tears and snot run down his face.
She rested her hand on his shoulder. It was warm, but cold comfort against his loss.
When Ammonih awoke, he was alone at the fountainhead. There was a scorched spot of earth with a pool of melted silver in the center where Marks and Keezie had been.
His body hurt and his ears rang. When the storm exploded, the concussion had been severe. Severe enough to knock him out.
Lingering dreams of the pale girls flickered in and out of focus in his mind. He tried to clear away the webs they cast over his thoughts, and hoped they were only phantoms of his unsettled mind.
He felt a little guilty for ignoring them, but things had moved so quickly from that point it was like being swept away in a flood.
I’ll find you, he promised them through the ether, and hoped it would suffice for now.
He closed his eyes and followed the lines of power that ran from the spring. Looking, searching, for signs of whatever malignant force had been unleashed on the world.
It was there all right, along with something else almost familiar. It took a moment, but then it clicked. Joseph. Not normal Joseph, but monster sized Joseph.
Ammonih sprang to his feet and ran with all his might. He could feel the two forces battering one another with their wild raw power.
It was terrifying. He wasn’t scared for his friend, but for everything surrounding the two. There was going to be destruction. Wholesale destruction.
Within a mile he could hear the concussions of their collisions, and with each step the calamitous noise grew until he was within sight.
Joseph's broad back blocked his view for a moment. The giant staggered back, threw his boulder arms in the air and roared his defiance. When the golem swung again, it cleared Ammonih’s line of sight.
What he saw stopped him cold. It was, literally, a monster straight from his childhood nightmares.
His older brother terrified him with stories of a demon so powerful, even the Nvnehi couldn’t kill it.
That demon was here in front of him, mouth frothing and wings flapping.
The Piasa screamed. Its deadly wail popped his eardrums, and his own scream disappeared in the maelstrom of noise created by the monsters.
He knew he would have real nightmares after this.
If he lived through the day.
Foul smoke rose from the pyre of bodies they built. It had taken quite the effort to start the fire.
He grimaced at the reminder of his separation from Asahel.
Eli reached for Keezie’s hand as he stood, praying she wasn’t aware he needed her as an anchor to keep himself upright. His tears left muddy tracks down his cheeks and chin, but he refused to wipe them from his face and eyes. Let them be a reminder of this day. This thing that’s been done.
He turned to face her. He dipped his chin in acknowledgement of the sorrow in her eyes.
“We have to find my father,” he said. An idea formed in his mind, a certainty that pieced together the myriad parts of this puzzle. He knew what Kish was after.
He pulled the scavenged fur coat tight around himself, hoping his feet and hands would be okay in the blood and mud-soaked boots and mittens he’d chosen to wear.
It wasn’t what they wanted, but neither had been willing to brave the cold without the furs. He turned and pulled at her belt to make sure it was cinched well around her. He wanted to keep the furs closed, and the freezing mud off her skin.
He attempted a smile. “Let’s go.”
She nodded, then followed him to the far edge of the village.
He found two sets of tracks leaving the village. Both were horses under load, both with indistinct edges indicative of someone traveling at high speed.
The tracks started within feet of one another but crisscrossed as far as he could see.
Once again, Eli and Keezie were at a disadvantage, having no means of transport, save their own feet.
He shook his head in frustration. It wouldn’t do to pine and wish; he could only work with what he had.
Eli turned to look, once more, at the village and his mother.
He was positive he knew who was responsible for the massacre. He’d seen Kish’s handiwork firsthand. The little weasel needed to pay for this, and all the other destruction he’d engineered.
Their walk became a slow jog. It was hard to keep a steady pace in the snow, the flat surface of white created the false sense that the ground beneath was level, and they found themselves stumbling in unseen troughs and holes. Twice, they were forced to stop to nurse slightly twisted ankles.
The cold deepened as the afternoon wore on, but Eli kept their pace as regular as possible to avoid overheating their bodies. Sweat was deadly.
He lost himself in the monotonous pace, rousing his faculties occasionally to check on Keezie, and to make certain he hadn’t missed anything important in the tracks.
It was straightforward. Cleve was running, and Kish was in pursuit.
“What are we going to do tonight?” Keezie’s voice shattered the silence.
“What?” he mumbled confused.
“Tonight? When it’s dark?” her voice was venomous. “We can’t keep going without light, and we don’t have any kind of shelter.”
It was clear she thought he was an idiot for not considering any of this. She was right. He felt his face heat, and scalding words simmer in the space between his mind and tongue.
His mouth twisted with the struggle to keep the words contained. He watched his breath curl in great white billows in front of him. “The safest thing to do is walk. Slow as we have to go.” He half turned in her direction. “We need the body heat we create when we walk. If we stop, it stops. If it stops, we die.” It would be bad enough anyway. His furs were soaked through in places and he could feel the chill of frostbite creeping into his toes. “Are you warm?” he asked.
She hesitated as if gauging his sincerity before she nodded.
“Dry?”
She nodded again.
“Are you lying?” She shook her head.
He dipped his chin in affirmation, and turned his attention back to the treacherous snow-covered ground.
Night fell in tandem with fatigue and covered the world in a blue black that tested their eyesight and their footing in equal measure. They had to constantly pick themselves up from the snow.
Eli wished they had horses but didn’t dare voice the thought aloud. That, or any other thought. He didn’t dare waste what little energy they had on argument, which is the only communication they seemed capable of having.
Just before dawn, the tracks expanded and swirled into a patch of hard packed snow. It was painted with a dark spatter of blood.
It took Eli an hour in the dark to find the continuance of the trail, and by midmorning they’d passed two more a
reas like the first.
If he was guessing, he would say the horses were tiring. That would explain the increased frequency of the encounters, but there was something that bothered him about the trail; something he couldn’t quite define. As if the areas of fighting covered too much space.
There was more blood, but not enough to assume anyone was dying.
The temperature dropped steadily as the day wore on. The edges of the tracks were rounded and frozen, which made it harder to determine if they were gaining ground or not, but most importantly; there was no sign of habitation. That meant they would most likely have to spend another night in the cold.
He stole a glance at Keezie and flexed his freezing toes. She was a trooper, he’d give her that, but the light in her eyes was beginning to fade. They needed to get out of the cold and wind. Soon.
The pair trudged onward, the crunch of snow the only sound they shared.
Sometime in the afternoon Usok’s giant paw prints joined the horses’ tracks, and then veered off again to disappear in the flat white snow. He guessed it was the hound’s way of telling him he was close. Eli wondered if, in his stupor, he had missed the dog’s tracks before now.
The sun was low on the horizon when he noticed the trail was looser, less frozen, the edges crisper but unstable. It was full dark when he heard a faint noise that could be angry men. It carried across the plain on a wind that sprung up when the sun disappeared.
He guessed they were close enough to see. Had there been any light.
“You hear?” He grunted.
“Barely,” she answered. Her stomach growled. “Sorry.”
Eli laughed. “We’re freezing to death, and you’re sorry your stomach growled.”
She grinned.
“You are something else, Keezie Stockman.”
“Hey Eli.” The sweetness in her voice made him shiver.
“Yeah?”
“Shut up.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
They spent the rest of the night listening to the sounds of violence grow louder and closer.
Just before dawn Eli suggested they stop and rest. He pulled a small bag from his belt and offered it to Keezie.
She took it hesitantly and peered inside. “What is it?”
Shackles of Light (The Mal'Ak Cycle Book 2) Page 17
