by J. Thorn
Gaston smiled as Morlan stepped away from the altar and walked slowly back toward Genris.
“Yes, my lord, I do believe I know exactly who can help guide the people spiritually.”
“Good. I had hoped you would.” The man looked down at the still-breathing form of Genris. The injured witch doctor slowly opened his eyes and looked up, realizing what was to come just before the blade slid home. His eyes went wide, and he coughed again, and then he fell silent and still. Morlan placed one heavy boot on Genris’ chest and pulled the sword free.
“I will leave it to you, then, Gaston.”
Chapter 58
“Wait for me, boy. You and I, we’re gonna do like lovers do.”
Declan reached for the knife sticking through his leg, and that was when the first wave hit him. He leaned back, his calf on fire and the world swirling overhead. Warm blood oozed from the wound, and no matter how little he moved, more flowed.
The Cygoa warrior strutted through the forest, stepping over fallen trees and pushing branches away from his face. The other four had stayed back about a hundred yards, picking through Jac’s clothing in the hopes of finding something valuable.
“I don’t know anything. I’m a kid. The chief sent me to scout Rocky Mount. That’s it.”
“Oh, we’re past the point of negotiating, my new friend. That option disappeared about four hours ago, when you started running. You, and your fucking buddy there, wasted our time chasing you when we should be halfway to Wytheville by now. And what you did to my three friends? Well, that’s something that can’t be forgiven. You owe us for that.”
The warrior had a battle axe on his hip but he had left his shield against the tree where they killed Jac. Declan used his left leg to push his body back and away from the warrior, but that only exacerbated the pain in his right leg. He reached down to grab the knife, and the warrior chuckled.
“Go on. Yank that fucker out. If you can do it without passing out, you can keep it.”
Declan curled his fingers around the hilt and even the slight pressure on the knife sent a shock of pain up his leg. The cool air made the wound itch, and yet the slightest touch made him want to vomit.
“I can get it for ya.”
The Cygoa warrior squatted and smiled at Declan before yanking the knife from his leg. Declan screamed and darkness closed in from the edges of his vision. The warrior’s voice wavered, as if he spoke from beneath the surface of a lake.
“Okay.” The word was all Declan could muster, his body trying to shut down and protect him from the pain. “What now?”
The warrior leaned in, and even through all the pain, Declan could smell the odor of his unwashed body and the man’s foul breath.
“First. You become my bitch.”
The man grabbed him by the neck, the grip so tight that Declan couldn’t breathe. But in the next moment, a whirring sound cut the air and the Cygoa warrior released him. Declan fell back, his head bouncing off the ground. The Cygoa moaned and he stood up, an arrow lodged in his left shoulder beneath the collarbone. Another whir and yet another. Declan pulled himself up and looked over his shoulder, but he saw nothing.
The other Cygoa warriors scattered, leaving Jac’s corpse sitting beneath the tree where Declan had been hiding. Footsteps and shouts came from everywhere, and the world started to shift to the right and turn fuzzy. Declan grabbed his injured leg and the shock jarred his senses. He came back to the present, the unbearable pain snapping him into the moment.
The Cygoa warrior turned and ran, the arrow bouncing in the air as he did so. He grabbed his shield and followed the others into the woods, back east toward Rocky Mount. The shouts subsided and Declan could feel the presence of several men standing behind him. He waited, deciding not to try turning around to see who it was.
“Go back. Do not go any further west. Tell your chief not to come west. There is nothing but death out here.”
He couldn’t see them. Not a single man. They had stayed behind him, even when firing arrows at the Cygoa warriors. Declan winced as the pain grew. The sharp, violent jolts continued and now the rest of his leg began to thrum with an ache that intensified with each passing moment.
“We will bandage your leg. Stop the bleeding. We’ll leave you with a hunk of dried venison. And then you will go back east and take your clans with you.”
Declan felt a hand on his head and another waved beneath his nose. He smelled sweet basil and jasmine and his eyelids became heavy. The pain and trauma of the previous night faded as Declan passed out.
Chapter 59
Donast slammed the head of his axe into the nearest tree and bellowed. The warriors around him took several steps back. There was already blood on the axe and more on the club that he had abandoned in the dirt fifty feet away, it’s shaft cracked beyond repair.
The Nikkt leader slumped forward, leaning heavily against the tree, his chest heaving with exertion as he reached up for the axe.
“Ten lost,” he said. “Ten. Ten more.” Then he sighed, pulled the axe from the tree, and began to pace back and forward across the clearing.
A short distance away, in the next clearing, his men were already picking over the bodies, taking whatever equipment they could carry, and not just those of his own dead fighters. Across the large clearing were the remains of at least thirty Valk warriors.
Donast turned from his pacing and stalked across the clearing, heading in the direction of his dead enemies. He walked past the scavenging crew and stood looking down upon the remains of the Valk warband. This wasn’t the battle.
Three days, he thought, staring at the nearest Valk corpse. This one had been speared through the throat, and the broken shaft of a spear still protruded from the wound. Three days since we left, and I have lost half of my warriors. Donast shook his head. How many attacks was that now? A dozen? No, maybe not that many. Ten at least, and every time they came with just as many warriors, sometimes more. Where were they coming from? How did the Valk have so many warriors? How could such large numbers remain hidden in the tunnels and lost places under the ruins for so long?
He studied the armor they wore. It was rough, crude, but it was made to fit them, not just thrown together. This was a force that had been building up over a long period of time. And they were well trained.
Where did they get so many weapons and so much armor? he wondered.
The city of Eliz was long stripped of the carcasses of old vehicles and road signs, but somehow the Valk seemed to have gathered hoards of the stuff, and they had shaped it into quite an arsenal. He looked around at his own men, many of whom now wore the armor of those they had slain. His own warriors were beginning to look like Valk, and even their complexion paled, but from lack of sleep and from battle-weariness. So many conflicts in such a short time. This is not the way battles went. If two clans faced off against each other, it was done in one conflict, one battle. The result was one winner and one loser. This constant barrage of warbands, one after the other, evening, night and sometimes when the sun was at its highest…it was too much.
Donast turned back and stared into the woods, his eyes glazing over as he spotted the distant dark line of the breach. It crossed the land like a deep scar. They were nearly there, finally; half a day’s walk that Donast would insist they made before nightfall. But at what cost? Now his clan was lesser by more than fifty warriors, maybe even seventy. He had not had time to count the survivors.
Fortunately, there had been no loss of the young ones and the women, or even the old. They had managed to keep those safely ahead of them as they fought a running battle each day to keep the Valk from the clan.
The bridge, he thought, his eyes focused on the wooden structure. We take it and then destroy it. It’s the only way. Once my people are across we must burn it down.
Then we keep going west until the land runs out.
He turned to look for his lieutenant, Strom, but the man was not there. He had fallen the day before, and Donast had yet to declare a new
right hand. There didn’t seem time to even think of such things. He paced back across the clearing, leaving the sprawl of bodies behind.
“Be swift,” he barked at those still scavenging among the dead. “We leave now and reach the bridge today.”
Chapter 60
A wolf had been clawing at Declan’s face, tearing flesh away in long, bloody strips. He tried to run but the wolf’s paws held him down, the beast’s power overwhelming.
He rolled over. The late-afternoon sunlight cut through the trees and illuminated floating dust like glittering starlight. He put his hands to his face and rubbed his cheek.
He couldn’t remember how long he had slept or how he ended up on a makeshift bed of leaves atop soft pine needles. His head had been propped up and a lean-to had been built on the east-facing side. He moved his leg and the pain made him gasp for air. His left hand had been bandaged and a flowery blossom of dark amber stained the gray cloth.
The hunters? They warned me, he thought. And then treated my wound. Kept me alive.
He looked around and saw a satchel resting against the trunk of the tree. The cinch had been pulled tight but Declan fumbled with the strings and yanked open the top to see a flask of water, a hunk of meat and the knife that had been lodged in his leg.
“Nice.”
His stomach growled. He grabbed the meat with one hand and sniffed it.
Venison.
Declan tore into the salty, dry deer meat and then reached for the flask. The cool water hit his lips and he gulped, spilling some down the front of his shirt. He set the meat aside, shoved the water flask into a pocket and grabbed the knife. The blade had been cleaned, and as he ran his finger gently along the edge, Declan realized it had been sharpened as well.
He grabbed a branch and used his upper body strength to rise, putting most of his weight on his uninjured leg. Declan slowly shifted his weight to the injured leg. He felt a tightness and knew someone had stitched his wound shut. Although a faint ache radiated throughout his leg, he could stand—even take a few short, measured steps. Maybe a doctor in their clan had treated the wound or maybe they used an herbal pain deadener. Or maybe both. It didn’t matter. They had helped him, and set him up to survive, and when Declan thought back to the murky moments before he passed out, he remembered why.
“Go back. Do not go any further west. Tell your chief not to come west. There is nothing but death out here.”
There must be a reason. The hunters who saved him from the Cygoa could have tracked any of the scouts back to Jonah and the Elk. They had strong bows and medical knowledge. They didn’t need a messenger, and yet, they saved him. They wanted him to report back to Jonah.
“There is always more to the hunter clan than the hunt.”
Declan smiled and glanced to the west, where the sun had now faded. It would be dark within the hour and so Declan decided to stay at the temporary camp built for him by the mysterious hunter clan. He would sleep the night, let the skin beneath his stitches begin to heal, and fill his belly with venison. Tomorrow, he would head east and back toward Rocky Mount, to Jonah and the Elk. Or would he? A momentary doubt crept in, a nagging suspicion that the hunters knew more than he did and saw beyond the immediate scope of Rocky Mount and the Cygoa. They had been insistent that Declan return with the message. That he would not scout further west.
“But that is not their call, is it? I promised Jonah to scout, and that is what I will do.”
Declan felt his face flush with the confusing rush of contradictions that his teenage mind could not resolve. He had already disobeyed Jonah. Twice. Declan had willingly engaged Cygoa, and they had been every bit as dangerous as Jonah had claimed they would be. And he had gone days west, knowing he was miles beyond where Jonah had given him license to explore.
The last vestiges of the orange sky wavered and faded into deep purple hues. The first stars appeared in the east, silver sparkles against a black velvet sky.
A single howl pierced the silent forest.
Declan sat down, his back to the trunk. He clenched his teeth and scanned the trees. Shadows moved, and he could hear the slightest ruffling of leaves on the forest floor. He saw a set of eyes set against the darkness, floating through the air as if belonging to the ageless spirits. But Declan knew the threat was not supernatural.
Wolves.
He grabbed the venison and tossed it as far as he could, hoping the scent would attract the pack and buy him some time. Next, he reached down and gripped the knife. He took a step and fell forward, the pain in his leg screaming through the blanket of pain-killing herbs the hunters had given him. He reached for a long branch and snapped off the end so he could use it as a cane.
The growling came from all directions as the pack surrounded him, much like the Cygoa had. Declan hobbled forward, dragging his injured leg along and ignoring the new burn forming around the wound. If he had popped the stitches, he could bleed to death in this forest. But if he stayed, the wolves would tear out his throat.
He counted five but heard many more. The alpha male snarled and strutted not more than fifteen feet away. The wolf sniffed at the air, and its eyes never left Declan’s.
Declan saw a tree nearby. The massive trunk had split about five feet off the ground, forming a tight V. He hobbled faster now, the tree about twenty feet away. When he turned around, Declan saw the alpha male leading the pack. They sniffed his lean-to, and one of them had found the venison and tore at it before the others realized what it had found.
He ran as fast as he could for the tree with the split trunk.
Ten feet away.
Five feet away.
The pain in his lower leg had spread to his thigh and his lower back. Declan fought back tears as he leapt up from his good leg and grabbed the left V of the trunk, his arms wrapping around the bough while his legs dangled.
Another howl came and he looked over his shoulder to see the alpha male leading the pack, closing in on him.
Declan swung his good leg up but his boot bounced off the branch. He swung it again, this time hooking his foot over the top. He used his lean, powerful upper-body muscles to pull himself upright on the top of the branch, his legs swinging below, but now ten feet in the air.
“Fuck you. Fuck you all.”
The alpha male growled and the pack circled the tree. Declan soon lost his defiance as he realized just how many wolves there were down there. Thirty? Maybe forty of them. He couldn’t count exact numbers because they circled the tree, weaving in and out of each other. But it was a pack the size of which he had never seen before.
The lead wolf then sat down on its haunches and stared up at Declan.
Chapter 61
Declan shuddered, jolting himself from dozing off to sleep for the tenth or twentieth time. How long had he been up there? Minutes? Hours?
He couldn’t be certain. Declan’s hands ached and the harsh bark of the tree caused blisters where the backs of his legs met the trunk. His ran his tongue over dry, cracked lips and that sparked a giggle, blossoming into a laugh that threatened to eject him from his perch. He couldn’t remember the last time he ate and his water was nearly gone.
“Fuck!”
The trees did not answer. He scanned the ground around the tree and turned his gaze outward, in concentric circles, as far as he could see. The alpha male had gone and taken his pack with him. Declan didn’t think the wolves were intelligent enough to bait him. If he couldn’t hear them or see them, he had to assume they had tired of waiting for him to fall from the tree and went to hunt slower, more accessible prey, and they had done so while he was passed out, sleeping precariously in the tree, likely to fall at any moment.
He turned his body and the pain in his leg roared back to life. If he kept it still, he could feel pressure and his heartbeat in the wound. But as soon as he moved, it felt as though the blade had ripped through his skin yet again. Based purely on his ravenous hunger, Declan estimated that it had been three days since the hunters had bandaged his wound a
nd left him with enough food and water to get him back to Rocky Mount; at least that had been the plan before the wolves had arrived. Three days without changing the bandage or cleaning the wound. In fact, Declan had not even looked at what the hunters had done. He assumed they stitched his leg closed, but he didn’t know for sure. Now, a sickly-sweet smell wafted up from the bandage and it seemed as though the burning intensified, as if someone had slipped hot coals beneath his skin.
Declan slid his good leg over the branch and used both hands to hold onto it while his legs swung freely. He would drop about five feet to the ground and need to use his good leg to cushion the fall, turning into it and rolling through the leaves. Declan hadn’t spotted any sharp rocks or branches below.
One. Two. Three.
He experienced a momentary sensation of weightlessness before his good leg hit the ground. Declan spun and came down on his hip, smacking the ground with more force than he had anticipated. His wound screamed, even though he had done his best to keep the bad leg from hitting anything during the fall.
Declan blinked tears away. He leaned back against the tree and closed his eyes, breathing heavily. He opened his eyes and looked at the bandage.
His fingers trembled as they slid beneath the cloth, releasing an odor that reminded him of greened meat and maggots. Declan peeled the bandage back, and it with it came dried blood and pus. The cold air provided a momentary sense of relief until an overwhelming compulsion to gouge the stitches rose up. He wanted to dig his fingers into the wound and scratch until the itch went away or he passed out.
