Crack'd Pot Trail

by Steven Erikson

  What a tirade of cynicism! I am not like this at all, I do assure you. I have this lockbox hidden inside me, you see ... do come find it, will you?

  It is a sage truth that there can never be too many disappointed wives.

  Her lips found mine. Have I missed something? I have not. Quick as a cat upon a mouse, a cock upon a snail, a crow upon a sliver of dead meat. And her tongue went looking for the treasure chest. She didn’t believe me, recall? They never do.

  In my weakness, which I call upon in times of need, I could not resist.

  Was she the most beautiful woman I ever knowingly shared fluids with? She was indeed. Shall I recount the details? I shall not. In protection of her sweet modesty, of that luscious night my lips shall remain forever sealed.

  Oh, forget that. I cupped her full breasts, which is what men do for some unknown reason, except perhaps that it has something to do with the way we gauge value, upon scales as it were, replete with aesthetic appreciation, engineering terminology and so on. With a dancer’s grace (and muscle) she drew one meaty thigh up along my left hip, grinding her mound against my crotch with an undulating, circular gyration that snapped the buttons of my collar and burst seams everywhere. With nefarious insistence, that leg somehow wrapped itself to rest athwart my buttocks (buttocks, what a maddeningly absurd word), her taut calf appearing upon my right, curling round (was this even possible?) to hook over my hip. If this was not outrageous enough, the very foot at the end of that selfsame leg suddenly plunged beneath my breeches to snare the rearing tubeworm of my weakness, between big toe and the rest.

  At this point, she’d already closed one hand about the bag and was rolling the marbles to and fro, whilst her other hand was driving a finger against previously unexplored areas of sexual sensitivity in that dubious crack people of all genders cannot help but possess.

  And my thoughts at this stage in the proceedings? Picture, if you will, a newborn’s expression of interminable stunned witless stupidity, wide as a bright smile following wind, eyes spread to the wonder of it all when every bit of that ‘all’ is entirely beyond comprehension. If you have reared children or suffered the fate of caring for someone else’s, then you know well the look I faint describe herein. This was the state of my organ of thought. Immune to all intrusion as my clothing miraculously melted away and she mounted herself smooth as perfumed silk, only to suddenly pull free, unwind herself with serpent grace, and step back.

  “You get the rest when I am redeemed.”

  Women.

  I am at a loss for words. Even all these decades later. At a loss. Forgive.

  For all our conceits we are, in the end, helpless creatures. We grasp all that is within reach, and then yearn for all beyond that reach. In said state, how can we hope for redemption? Staggering off to my bedroll, I slept fitfully that night, and was started awake just before dawn when Steck Marynd returned on his weary horse, the trundled form of Nifty Gum straddling the beast’s rump.

  Mild and fleeting my curiosity at the absence of the Entourage, until exhaustion plucked me free of the miserable world one last time before the sun rose to announce the twenty-fifth day upon Cracked Pot Trail.

  A Recounting of the Twenty-Fifth Day

  His face bleak, Steck Marynd crouched before the ash heaped hearth, and told his tale whilst we gnawed on what was left of Calap Roud. Bludgeoning the heat with the sun barely squatting on the eastern hills. Turgid the dusted air through which crazed insects flitted. Squalid and pinched these faces on pilgrimage to expressions of ecstatic release. Unmindful the implacable mules and unhampered the innocent horses.

  The host sat in fret. Tiny, Midge and Flea crouched and picked like rock-apes over the last of the unspoiled meat. Relish braided blades of grass, making small nooses. Mister Must puttered about the carriage, pausing to scratch his backside every now and then, before adding more leaves to the pot of tea, stirring and whatnot. Apto Canavalian huddled beneath his threadbare blanket, as if withering beneath the murderous glares of Brash Phluster. Purse Snippet sipped at her steaming cup and a hand and a foot was visible from the ditch where Sellup was lying.

  Tulgord Vise paced, fondling his pommel as knights will do.

  Arpo Relent, alas, had not moved a single twitch from his facedown deliberations, and this was ominous indeed.

  As for Nifty Gum, why, from what could be seen in that bunch and fold of cloak, that haystack of once glistening gold hair now as disheveled as a hairball spat up by a dragon, he was at the very edge of gibbering unreason, as might afflict a famous person no-one wanted to know anymore. Buffeted by our disregard, he sat like an overgrown milestone, head lowered, hands hidden, his boots splashed with dark stains and churning with flies.

  Steck Marynd prefaced his recount with a shudder and hands up at his face, as if in horror of memories resurrected. Then he lowered those weathered hands, revealing a visage of guttered faith, and began.

  I am a man of doubts, though with eyes set upon me none would say such a thing. Is this not fair? Stalwart and firm, is Steck Marynd. Slayer of demons, hunter of necromancers, the very spine of the Nehemothanai—you will be silent, Mortal Sword, for even you must accept that this is a bloodied trail I have followed far longer than you. I am the cutter excising the cancer of evil, the surgeon setting blade to the tumour of cold malice. Such is the course of my life. I have chosen it and do not begrudge this nest of scars.

  Yet, there are doubts within me, the begat of the very life I have chosen for myself. I tell you all this: when one looks into the eye of evil, one’s very soul is shaken, and trembles but one tug from uprooted and forever lost. The ground becomes uncertain underfoot. Balance tilts awry. To then strike it down, to destroy it utterly, is an act of self-preservation. In defense of one’s own soul. It is like that. Each and every time. But there are moments when it is not enough, not nearly enough.

  Are we the children of gods? If so, then what god would so countenance such ignoble spawn? Why is the proper and good path so narrow, so disused, while the cruel and wanton ones proliferate in endless swarm? Why is the choice of integrity the thinnest branch within reach? While the dark wild tree is a mad web across half the sky?

  Oh, yes, I know. You poets will sing to me of value gauged in the strain of the challenge, as if sheer difficulty is the meaning of worth. If righteousness was easy, you say, it would not shine like gold. And do not beggars dream of gold, just as the fallen dream of salvation, and the coward dreams of courage? But you do not understand anything. Do the gods exult in the temptations they fling before us? Why? Are they insane? Are they, in fact, eager to see us fall? Give us the clear and true path, and in the act of seeing the darkness falls away, the lures vanish, the way home beckons us all.

  If you would awaken our souls, dear gods, be so good as to then sweep the shadows from the road ahead.

  No, the gods have all the moral rectitude of children. They created nothing and are no different from us, knuckled to the world.

  Listen! I have no faith in any of you. And naught in me either. Do none of you see how this pilgrimage has already failed? Oh, easy enough for the poets to comprehend that hoary truth— seeking fame we step into their path and cut them down, and then gnaw on their bones. And what of you, Sardic Thew? And you, Lady Snippet? And the Dantoc and her footman? You have eaten of the flesh and it was the easiest road of all, wasn’t it? And who stood tallest with armoured excuses? Why, none other than Tulgord Vise, Champion of Purity, and indeed the Well Knight Arpo Relent, paladin of virtue.

  One day I shall stand before the Nehemoth, before Bauchelain and Korbal Broach. I shall look upon true evil. And they will see in my eyes all the evil that I have done, and they will smile and call me friend. Companion. Cohort in the League of Venality. Could I deny them?

  Faith? Look upon Nifty Gum, this broken thing here. An artist beloved, so beloved his retinue of worshippers would bare fangs against the envy of the gods themselves.

  I found their trail, even as the shadows of dusk clos
ed in. A rampant, rabid thing, skittering this way and that, a small herd led by a blind bull. Rocks overturned, plants torn loose—yes, they hungered. They thirsted. And suffered. Two women, the man they honoured with their loyalty.

  In darkness I came upon their first camp, and from the scuffs and signs I was able to reconstruct the dreadful events with nary a test to my woodsmanship. See me claw my face yet again? The youngest was set upon, the other two in cahoots, a pact forged in a demon’s hole, that one. The innocent child, strangled, all the soft parts of her sweet form torn away by savage teeth. Teeth. Ah, Midge, do I see you pause in your breaking fast? Well you should. You see, when those eager mouths drank and fed, poor Oggle Gush was not yet dead.

  They ate themselves sick, did Pampera and Nifty. And they left the body in their wake, spoiled, rotting. I see your shock, Brash Phluster, and I do mock it. If you had but one adoring fan in your wake, and starvation loomed, you would not hesitate—deny it not! See Nifty Gum, huddled there. No hesitation stuttered his hands.

  When I renewed my tracking, I admit my thoughts were black as a pauper’s pit. Now, I did hunt. I believed I could forge this distinction, you see, between what they had done to that child, and all that we have done on this here trail. Is not the soul a thing of sweet conceit?

  So now, consider this. He had but one worshipper left, and she was close in that she shared his crime, a murderess, a belly-bloated beauty he could touch with familiarity so absolute no mortal could step between them. You might think. And you might fold tight your arms and whisper easing words to yourself. She but followed his lead—what else could she do, after all?

  Was it guilt, then, that launched her upon his back? That sank teeth into his shoulder, striving towards his throat? The mouth-fuls of spurting flesh she gobbled down, even as he shrieked and thrashed? And what of Nifty Gum? That he should twist round and bite her in turn, fatally as it transpired, snipping through her jugular, whereupon he bathed and did drink deep. Even as she died, she gnawed upon his right calf, and so was left in a pose of blessed defiance.

  I caught him twenty paces down from this final atrocity, limping and streaming crimson. Oh yes, all of you set eyes upon him now. This poet of appetites. Study him in your arrayed expressions of horror and disgust. Hypocrites one and all. You. Me. The wretched gods, too. Aye, I should have killed him then and there. A quarrel through the back of his head. I should have. But no. Why should the blood stain my hands alone? I give him to you, pilgrims. He is the end of this path, the one we have all chosen. I give him to you all. My gift.

  As his last words drifted and sank into earth and flesh, Brash Phluster licked his lips and said, “But, where is she? Can’t we still—”

  “No,” growled Mister Must, in a tone that stirred awake his soldier days, “we cannot, Phluster.”

  “But I don’t want to die!”

  And at that, Steck Marynd did weep.

  For myself, I admit to a certain satisfaction. Oh, don’t look at me like that! Given the chance, what artist wouldn’t eat his fans? Think of the satisfaction! Far preferable than the opposite, I fervently assert. But let us skip and dance from such admissions, lest they unveil things even more unsightly.

  Sellup crawled from the ditch, her split lips stretched back in a ghastly smile, her eyes fixing upon Nifty Gum. “All for me!” she cackled, dragging herself closer. “I won’t eat you, darling! I’m not even hungry!”

  The wretched poet, thrice named Artist of the Century, lifted his bedraggled head. The modest balance of his features was gone, each detail inexpertly reassembled into a pastiche of Gumdom. Old blood stained his chin, flaked the edges of his tunneled mouth. Flanking the ill-ruddered nose, each eye struggled with the other, fighting over proper alignment, which neither could quite manage. And if a lockbox waited behind those orbs, it was kicked over, contents strewn in tangled heaps. From the weep of his crusted nostrils to the coagulated clumps in his stringy hair, he was indeed a man bereft of his Entourage, barring one dead hag avowing undying servitude.

  “It was the eggs,” he whispered.

  At this even Sellup paused.

  “I was so hungry. All I could think of was ... was eggs! Sunny side up, scrambled, poached.” Trembling fingertips touched his mouth and he flinched, as if those fingers did not belong to him at all. “Those tales. A dragon spawn trapped in a giant egg— that’s just stupid. I—I don’t even like meat! Not real meat. But eggs, that’s different. Like an idea not yet born, I could eat those.

  I so want to! It was the maiden he stole. The Egg Demon, I mean. Stole—stole away in the night! I tried to warn them, you see, I really did. But they wouldn’t listen!” He stabbed a finger at Sellup. “You! You wouldn’t listen! I’m out of ideas, don’t you see that!? Why do you think I plundered every fairy tale I could find? It’s— it’s—all gone!”

  “I’ll be your egg, sweetie!” She picked up a rock and rapped it against the side of her head, eliciting a strange muted thump. “Crack me open, darling! See? It’s easy!”

  As one might imagine, we stared in morbid fascination at this tableau and all its bizarre logic, and I was reminded of that cabal of poets from Aren a few centuries back, the ones who imbibed all manner of hallucinogens in a misplaced search for enlightenment, only to get lost in the private weirdness that is the artist’s mortal brain when it can discern nothing but its own navel (and who needs hallucinogens for that?).

  “Get away from me.”

  “Sweetie!” Thump-thump. “Here take my rock!” Thump! “You can do it too!” Thump! “It’s easy!”

  As it turned out, even Nifty Gum was of no mind to discover what hid inside the skull of one of his fans. Instead, he whispered, “Someone end it. Please. Someone. Plea—”

  I would hazard the notion that this heartfelt utterance referred to a wholly natural desire to see Sellup expunged from his (and everyone else’s) sight, and in that regard Nifty won my sympathies entire. For reasons unknown, however (oh how I lie, don’t I?), Tulgord Vise misinterpreted the Great Artist and in answer he thrust his sword between the poet’s shoulder blades. The point burst from Nifty’s chest in a welter of blood and splintered bone.

  Nifty’s eyes gave up the struggle, and he sagged, leaning heavily on the sword blade before, with a grunt, Tulgord heaved the weapon free. The poet fell back in a puff of dust.

  Sellup moaned. “Thumbsy?”

  Seeing the man’s lips moving, I edged closer—after a wary glance Tulgord’s way, but he was already cleaning his blade in the sand beside the trail—and then I leaned close. “Nifty? It is me, Flicker.”

  Sudden horror lit up Nifty’s eyes. “The eggs,” he breathed. “The eggs!”

  Whereupon, with a strange, blissful smile, he died.

  Is this the fate for all artists who wantonly steal inspiration? Certainly not, and shame on you for even suggesting it.

  Our family was indeed in tatters. But this morning was yet to give up the last of its shocking revelations, for at that moment Well Knight Arpo Relent sat up, blinking the gobs of mucous from his eyes. The crack in his head dripped pink tears, but he seemed unmindful of that.

  “Who dressed me?” he demanded in an odd voice.

  Apto Canavalian lifted his gaze, and a most forlorn and dejected gaze it was. “Your mother?”

  Arpo stood, somewhat unsteadily, and tugged clumsily at the straps of his armour. “I don’t need this.”

  Poor Sellup had resumed her crawling and was now curled up on Nifty’s sundered chest, tentatively licking at the blood. “Look at this,” she muttered, “I have no taste at all.”

  “Well Knight,” said Tulgord Vise, “do you recall what happened to you?”

  At that Apto Canavalian started, and then stared up at the Mortal Sword in horror commingled with blistering hatred.

  “The blood dried up,” Arpo answered. “Miserable shits, after all I did for them. Open the flood gates! Who pissed on that altar? Was that a demon did that? I hate demons. Death to all demons!” He succeed
ed in shucking off his coat of mail and it fell to one side with a golden rustle. “All dogs must hereafter walk backwards. That’s my decree and make of it what you will. Pluck one eye from every cat, bring them in buckets—of course I’m serious! No, not the cats, the eyes. It’s tragic the dogs can’t see where they’re going. So, we take those eyes and we—”

  “Well Knight!”

  Arpo glared at Tulgord Vise. “Who in Farl’s name are you?”

  “Wrong question!” the Mortal Sword snapped. “Who are you?”

  “Well now, what’s this?”

  We all stared at what Relent now gripped in one hand.

  “That’s your penis,” said Apto Canavalian. “And I say that advisedly.”

  Arpo stared down at it. “Kind of explains everything, doesn’t it?”

  Personally, I see no humour in that statement whatsoever. In any case, Arpo Relent (or whoever happened to be inhabiting his body at that time) now focused his entire attention upon his discovery, and moments later made a mess of things. His brows lifted, and then he smiled and started over again. “I could do this all day. In fact, I think I will.”

  With a disgusted grunt Tulgord Vise turned to saddle his horse.

  Sardic Thew clapped his hands. “Well! I think today’s the day!”

  Tiny Chanter belched. “Better not be. Flicker’s got stories to finish and he ain’t getting away with not finishing them.”

  “Dear sir,” said I, “we have the breadth of the sun’s passage, if our host’s assessment is correct and why would we doubt it? Fear not, resolutions abound.”