Bachiyr Omnibus

by David McAfee

Another tremor shook the earth as she stared at his lifeless body. This one was stronger than the one before, but in her distracted state she barely noticed it. All her attention was focused on the body in front of her. Her former friend and one-time lover, now dead. Another avenue in her search closed.

  Who would she ask about Filo now?

  She looked up, wondering where the tall Roman had gone. Maybe if she could find him, she could ask what he meant. She thought back, trying to remember what he’d said. Something about hiding in a cave, but the only caves nearby were in…

  Caelina turned her gaze toward Vesuvius. Could someone be living in one of the caves there? It seemed unlikely. Who would live in such an isolated and dangerous place? But then again, given the things she’d seen tonight, she supposed anything was possible. The more she thought about it, the more she realized that living in a cave on an active volcano made a weird kind of sense, at least for a person deranged enough to hunt and kill children. After all, what better place to take your victims and finish them off than a place no one in their right mind would dare to go? A place where no one would hear them scream…

  She rose to her feet again and started walking, making sure to grab her sword. As she passed Jarek’s prone body, she spat on it, mentally berating herself for the moment of weakness that had led her to his bed. At the time, she had been searching desperately for Filo and her husband didn’t seem to care. Jarek had also lost his wife, and so the two had comforted each other and it had simply gone too far.

  Or so she thought. Her memory of that night was a bit hazy. All she could remember clearly was Jarek plying her with wine. Had the wine tasted odd? She’d been too far enmeshed in her own depression to notice…or care. But the more she thought about it, the more his actions that night seemed more like those of a predator than a grieving husband. Not that it mattered for the end result was the same.

  In any case the city, and the world, was most likely better off without him.

  She walked away, never looking back, as she headed for the gate out of the city.

  Chapter Nine

  TARAS watched, dazed and helpless, as the boots approached, preparing himself for the end. He hoped it would be quick, but knew better. Ramah was not known for mercy. The only thing he had going for him was the fact that dawn was only about an hour away, so Ramah could not afford to linger. Still, he had no doubt the elder Bachiyr could make an hour seem like a very long time.

  “Hello, Roman. It has been a long time.”

  That was not Ramah’s voice.

  Taras looked up and was surprised to see Theron standing over him.

  “Not long enough,” Taras replied, echoing his reply to Ramah. He willed his claws to grow and tried to rise, but an unseen force kept him pinned to the street. It was as though a great weight were attached to each of his four limbs. Try as he might, he could not lift them more than an inch or two off the ground. He struggled for several minutes, pulling and straining with every ounce of his strength, be it was no use.

  “What have you done to me?” Taras demanded.

  “Do you like it?” Theron asked, smiling. “It’s something I’ve been working on. The trick is to fool your blood into thinking it is heavier than it actually is. It’s quite effective at immobilizing Bachiyr and humans alike. I haven’t thought of a name for it yet, but I’m sure I’ll think of something.”

  Taras growled. He’d come all the way from Hispania to destroy Theron, and now the opposite would happen. He wondered where Baella had gone, and decided it didn’t matter. He’d been a fool to run blindly to Pompeii on her word alone. For all he knew, she may have planned this. In fact, the more he thought about it, the more likely it seemed. Theron, Taras, and Ramah, all in one city—it had to be her doing. Only Baella would stand to benefit from such a situation, though that realization was tempered somewhat by the fact that Taras could not think of how the situation would prove profitable to her.

  Not that it would matter to him, since he was, after all, about to die.

  “Just kill me and get it over with,” Taras said.

  “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Theron asked, kneeling on the cobbles to bring his face closer to Taras’s. The older vampire smelled of blood and smoke. “You’d like for this to be over and done, and for me to send you to the abyss and end your pain. Pathetic. Pathetic and predictable. You are so weak, Roman. You always have been.”

  “Let me up and I will show you how weak I am.”

  Theron chuckled and shook his head. “No, I don’t think I will.” He rose to his feet, his eyes gleaming with an amused inner light. “Killing you would bring me a great deal of pleasure, true, but it would also be a waste of a valuable opportunity. I have a use for you. Or rather, someone else has a use for you.”

  “Who would that be?” Taras asked, although he had a pretty good idea he knew the answer already.

  “Why, Baella, of course,” Theron replied. “Who else?”

  I knew it! Taras thought. “I should have known better than to trust that witch.”

  “Indeed,” Theron replied. “You would think you would have learned that lesson already.”

  “Yet I see you are working with her, as well.”

  “True,” Theron replied. “But I know better than to trust her. Besides, I have a use for her, too. When she is finished with you, that is.”

  “What does she want with me?”

  Theron chuckled. “You’ll find out soon enough, I suppose.”

  With that, Theron pulled a knife and a small vial from a pocket in his trousers and knelt in the street next to Taras. Taras fought like mad to escape the force that kept him pinned to the earth, but his struggles did nothing to alleviate the weight in his limbs. Helpless, he watched as Theron brought the knife to bear. He thought the older Bachiyr would stab him in the throat, or perhaps the chest, but Theron placed the knife on the skin of Taras’s forearm, instead.

  With a quick flick of his wrist, Theron cut him. Taras winced, but the pain was nothing more than an annoyance. What game was Theron playing here?

  Theron took the vial and used it to scoop up a small amount of Taras’s blood, which oozed sluggishly from the cut. After it was nearly half full, he smiled and put the stopper in place. Then he rose to his feet and took a step back. He passed his fingers over the top of the vial and whispered a word that Taras did not recognize.

  Taras had no idea what Theron was about to do with his blood, but he was certain he would not enjoy finding out.

  “Now I will show you something else I have been working on,” Theron said. “But first, I can’t have you alerting anyone to our location.”

  The world went deathly quiet. Taras knew what that meant. He turned to watch Theron, wondering what the Psalm of Silence was for.

  Then Taras’s body caught fire.

  At least, that’s what it felt like. The weight that had pinned him to the street vanished, leaving him free to move, but all he could do was flail and roll around on the cobbled street as his limbs and chest began to burn from the inside out. He squirmed, writhing in pain, barely conscious of the strange steam that poured from several open wounds. What in the name of the gods was Theron doing to him? Taras screamed, but no sound came from his throat. His mouth tasted like blood. His eyes clenched shut, blocking out the sight of a grinning Theron standing over him. The world was silence, darkness, and white hot pain.

  Then there was nothing at all.

  ***

  Baella had sat for half an hour, listening to Galle recount as much as she could remember of Theron’s experiments, which turned out to be very little.

  “So,” she said, “he takes you into the chamber and draws symbols on your flesh. He uses blood to draw them?”

  “Yes,” Galle replied.

  “Your blood?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then he burns you?”

  Galle nodded.

  “With fire or with magma?” According to Galle, Theron’s chamber had both.

 
“Sometimes one, sometimes the other,” Galle said. “Other times he uses a bit of both.”

  “And do you know what the ritual is supposed to do?”

  “He has never told me,” Galle replied. “Only that it will help him defeat the Council of Thirteen, somehow.”

  “Come now,” Baella said. “You don’t strike me as particularly dull or stupid. You can do better than that.”

  Galle stared at her, but nodded. “I suspect he is trying to find a way to build up an immunity to fire.”

  “Or the sun?”

  Galle nodded again.

  “Well,” Baella said. She had suspected as much. “That would certainly help him defeat the Council.” Too bad it would never work. Galle’s torment had been in vain, every second of it.

  “He hates them,” Galle said. “Especially the one called Ramah.”

  Baella knew better. On the surface, Theron hated the Council and their ways. But when it came down to bare truth, what Theron hated most about the Council of Thirteen was that he was not part of it.

  “Envy,” Baella said quietly. “Such a destructive emotion.”

  “What?” Galle asked.

  “Nothing. Just thinking out loud.”

  “Does what I told you help?”

  “It does,” Baella replied. “And it doesn’t.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You don’t need to.” Baella rose to her feet.

  “Are we leaving now?” Galle got to her feet.

  “One of us is,” Baella replied. She shook her head as the expression on Galle’s face shifted from eagerness to confusion. “I’m sorry for the deception, but Theron is more important to me than you are, and I need him to trust me for just a little longer.”

  “You tricked me!” Galle’s eyes blazed, and she took a step forward.

  “I wouldn’t do that,” Baella said. She pointed a finger at Galle and spoke a word. Galle’s eyes widened to the size of dates as her body lifted from the ground. Baella moved her arm in a wide arc, and Galle flew through the air of the chamber and slammed into the stone wall. She crumpled to the floor in a heap, her bluster broken, along with several bones.

  Galle raised her head, groaning in pain. Then she looked around the chamber, her eyes settling on Baella. “You are as bad as he is,” she whimpered weakly.

  “If it’s any consolation,” Baella stated as she turned her back on Galle and headed for the door, “you gave me nothing of value. Nothing I hadn’t already suspected, at any rate.”

  “Good!” Galle spat. “I hope he throws you into the fire next.”

  Baella stopped on her way to the door. “Oh, yes,” she said. “I knew I was forgetting something.”

  Galle’s eyes narrowed.

  “You should reconsider feeding on the child,” Baella said.

  “No.”

  “She will feel nothing.”

  “No,” Galle said again. “I will not.”

  “I can’t very well have Theron learn I healed you, can I? Feed on the girl and I will not have to hurt you, Galle.”

  “I would rather die,” Galle said.

  Baella sighed. She had feared as much. “Then you leave me no choice.”

  “Do your worst.”

  Baella swept her hands across the room, and the flames from the lone torch grew into a giant, fiery ball. She turned to Galle and winked. Then she dropped the ball of fire right on top of the poor Bachiyr woman’s head.

  In the tiny chamber, Galle’s screams were quite loud.

  ***

  Caelina left the city and began the long walk north toward Vesuvius. Soon enough, she left the cultivated lands behind and entered the thick woods that stretched from Pompeii to the base of the volcano. The forest around her echoed with the sounds of early rising animals. Squirrels chattered at her from above, while here and there a songbird greeted a sun she could not yet see. Once or twice, the lonely call of an owl floated through the lightening gloom. They would be retiring for the day soon enough, she knew. For though she could not see the sunrise through the thick trees, she noted the lightening of the sky and was thus not surprised when pale shafts of sunlight began to filter down through the leafy canopy, illuminating her way with a green-tinted light.

  That was good. Most of the predators in the area were nocturnal. She should be relatively safe from wild animals for now. Or so she hoped. There were always bears and wild dogs about. They tended to stay close to the city, living off the refuse left by Pompeii’s populace. While they generally stayed clear of humans, they had been known to attack small children or the infirm. Not that she was either of those, but still, it would be best to remain cautious. She patted the sword at her side, taking comfort in its presence. If a bear should happen by, she would be ready.

  And if any two-legged predators happened by, she would be ready for those, too.

  She passed through the thick stands of birch, maple, and oak, along with the occasional wild olive and acacia trees. The smell of green leaves mixed with those of loamy earth, small animals, and far too many flowers to separate any one from another. Caelina loved the smell of the woods. She had often brought Filo here to play and teach him about the various trees and plants that surrounded their home. Her husband had wanted to teach him archery here, but he never got the chance.

  He will! she thought. I will find Filo and bring him home, then he can learn whatever he wants! And I will never again swat him for confusing a maple with a poplar.

  “Oh, Filo,” she sighed. “I will find you, son. I will!”

  She tried to force the memories of their time together from her mind, knowing they would only make the trek through the woods that much more difficult. She needed to be clearheaded and alert in order to face whatever was ahead. She was only partially successful, however. She managed to block out memories of Filo for short stretches, but sooner or later she would see a tree or a plant that took her back to their time together in the woods. Eventually, she gave up trying, knowing that she could no more stop the memories from coming than she could stop her own heart from beating. To her surprise, the walk went much faster afterward.

  Her belly soon reminded her that she had not eaten since the night before, and she began to watch the squirrels wistfully. She found herself wishing she’d thought to bring a bow. While hardly an expert marksman, she would have chanced a shot at a small target like a squirrel if it meant she could have something to eat. Her husband had taught her how to make a snare, but doing so would take time, and there was no guarantee it would catch anything. At least not in time to make any difference. A better option would be to scan the trees for fruits. Perhaps she would find a wild olive or pear tree. The ground around Vesuvius was fertile and supported a great variety of trees and plants. Surely, she could find something edible along the way.

  She had just spotted a wild pear tree when the forest around her went quiet. She froze, held her breath, and listened to the sudden silence, hoping for a snap of a twig or the crackle of fallen leaves to alert her to where the danger might be. She imagined a solitary wolf—a pack of them would already have attacked—or perhaps a hungry bear, watching her through the dense foliage, trying to make up its mind whether she represented food or danger. She tensed, waiting for the attack, but it never came. Instead, the ground began to shake.

  This quake was longer and stronger than the last, and as she stood among the trees, she watched them sway back and forth. A thick limb snapped from a birch a short way ahead, and it crashed to the ground, taking several smaller branches with it. The noise it made on its way down joined with a low rumble that seemed to come from everywhere around her.

  She stood, her feet frozen in place, and waited for the shaking to pass. After perhaps a full minute, it subsided, but not before several more branches broke free and fell to the earth. One large limb crashed to the dirt very near her, missing her by only a few feet. As it was, several branches scratched her face and arms, but none of the scratches were serious.

  After the
last branch hit the ground, there was only an eerie silence, as though a very large predator had just passed by and all the smaller animals remained rooted to their places for feared of giving away their position.

  Slowly, the trees around her filled with sound as the animals returned to normal. Within minutes, the only evidence that anything had been amiss was the scattering of branches and limbs from the trees. She resumed her walk, stepping over one of the smaller branches. She felt a small tug of pity at the bird’s nest underneath. Several light blue eggs lay cracked in the dirt and dried leaves. One of the eggs had broken open completely, revealing an underdeveloped chick that twitched weakly as the albumen that gave it life soaked into the thirsty ground. Just above her, a bird squawked and chirped. To Caelina’s ears, it sounded sad. The mother bird grieving over her lost young.

  Caelina could relate.

  A short while later, she happened upon a fallen pear tree. The crack in the tree’s trunk looked fresh, and she guessed that it had fallen victim to the recent quake. Not that it mattered to her empty stomach how the tree had fallen. Food was food. She grabbed a few large pears and devoured them, barely tasting the tart fruit, then she grabbed three more and started up the path again, chewing as she went.

  Hunger sated for the time being, she found her steps beginning to falter as she slogged forward through the forest. The heat was thick, and the heavy humidity coated her body with sweat. When she began her walk, she hadn’t thought much about the oppressive air in the thick woods where the breeze didn’t reach and the earth’s warmth lay trapped under a hundred feet of still, green leaves. In her mind she saw only her arrival and her triumphant rescue of her lost son. She hadn’t considered the trip itself. She shook her head, mentally chiding herself for not thinking this through well enough. Had she come into the woods on any other day she would have carried plenty of water and food and dressed as lightly as decency permitted. On this day, however, thoughts of finding Filo had filled her mind, and as a result she had gone into the forest without adequate supplies, bringing no food at all and only a single canteen of water along to sustain her in the thick summer heat.