A Warrior's Burden: Book One of Saga of the Known Lands

by Jacob Peppers

  And how many promises, how many such vows would he break now, should he take it in his hands once more? Would he, as if by some magic—for it was a blade forged by the Fey and the Fey were known for their magic more than anything else—become the man he had once been? The man who had thirsted for blood above all else, who’d had such a thirst that it might never be sated? But then, he thought of the Doppel at the stream, the one he had killed so brutally, and he wondered if maybe he always had been that man, that the change he thought had occurred in him had been no more than a fantasy, a dream which must be abandoned upon waking.

  Shadelaresh had laughed when he had called himself the boy’s protector, and he had been right to. His were not hands meant to hold, to protect, but to destroy. Perhaps the gods had fashioned him thus; perhaps he had fashioned himself. In the end, it made little difference. It only mattered that he was what he was, an edge as sharp now as he had been fifteen years ago, a weapon that, like the Breaker of Pacts, would never lose its keenness. Still, he did not want to take the weapon, and he looked at it lying there like some great serpent, one which meant to swallow him whole.

  If he left it, he could go on pretending that he was that man no longer, at least for a time, could continue dreaming. Perhaps, if he were lucky, the dream would last until his death. But if he did that, if he refused, the boy would suffer, would die for it.

  He took the axe. It felt right in his hands, natural, as if some missing part of him had been restored. And that felt very wrong.

  Ah, there, Destroyer, Shadelaresh said. Now, you are complete once more. The serpent has his fangs returned to him. Go, then, and know that the Boon promised you by our king has been fulfilled. Should you set foot in the Black Wood again, your death, like your life, will be a thing of nightmare. Do you understand?

  “I understand,” he grated, his eyes still on the axe blade, on the blackness of it that seemed to shift and roil like shadows. He took a slow, deep breath, then turned to Matt. “Come, boy. It’s time to go.”

  He started away, the boy slowly following, casting his gaze between Cutter and Shadelaresh as if there were a thousand questions he might ask, but ones that he could not seem to put into words.

  Tell me, Destroyer, the creature said from behind him, now the serpent has its fangs returned, who, do you think, will feel their bite first? Not the serpent itself, no—I can hear your thoughts, but that will not happen. You cannot just as the serpent cannot. But someone will feel the bite, for the serpent must bite, Kingslayer. It is all it knows how to do. Will it be one of those men who hunts you even now, who trespasses into our wood, so great their need to see you dead? Or…will it be the boy?

  Cutter ignored him, walking on, his shoulders hunched, feeling as if he carried some great weight. But that weight was not the axe. Now, as ever, the weapon felt as light as a feather in his hands, and he felt the weight of it no more than a man might feel the weight of a part of himself. No, it was not the axe. And yet…it was.

  He didn’t think it was evil. That would have been ridiculous. A weapon could no more be evil than a horseshoe or a hammer could. But then horseshoes had not tasted the blood the axe had, and hammers were used to create while the axe was made to destroy. And destroy it had. Did its edge remember the taste of the blood it had spilled, Fey and mortal alike? Had it enjoyed it, that taste? Cutter knew it was ridiculous and yet he thought that maybe it had, thought, also, that it wanted to taste more.

  “What did he mean?”

  Cutter grunted in surprise, for he had been so distracted by his own thoughts that he had nearly forgotten the boy was there. “What?”

  “The…the demon thing, back there. He called you Kingslayer and Destroyer…he said that your people called you a hero. What did he mean?”

  Cutter met the youth’s eyes, saw the question in them, the desperate, hungry need to know. But he shook his head. He had never been much of a liar, preferred to cut to the truth as quickly as he could. Some truths, though, did not need to be spoken of, for speaking of them would do nothing to change them, only force him to relive them and that he was not ready to do. He shook his head. “It was just talk, lad. That’s all. The Fey are very strange creatures, and often their meanings are impossible to decipher.”

  The boy frowned at him. “His meaning seemed clear enough. He didn’t like you, not one bit. He said you betrayed them.”

  “Yes.”

  “But you’re not going to tell me, are you? What he meant?”

  “No. Now, come. We need to travel as much distance as we can today. We have to get out of the forest soon and my broth—that is, those men will be searching for us. If we don’t make it far enough, they’ll find us, and I promise you, boy, you do not want that.” None of us do. It wasn’t because he was afraid, at least not of dying. All men died, sooner or later. He had seen enough death—caused enough of it to know that it was a journey no man could avoid no matter how much training or luck he had. No, what he was afraid of, more than anything, was seeing his brother again. Fifteen years it had been, and yet it felt as if it had been no time at all.

  For Shadelaresh had been right about another thing too—he was a traitor. Yet for all its ability to see to the heart of things, to know the truths men left unspoken, Cutter doubted even the Fey knew just how right he had been.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  They were an odd bunch, the Crimson Prince’s inner circle.

  Odd but powerful, some of the most dangerous people I have ever met, save only the prince himself.

  But their talents at their own respective crafts were not what amazed me about them.

  Instead, it was their loyalty to him, a loyalty that survived test after test.

  I do not know where that loyalty came from.

  In truth, I doubt they knew themselves.

  —Exiled Historian to the Crown Petran Quinn

  “Ah, there it is,” Chall said, smiling from where he lay as the woman above him went about her trade with an energy that could only be described as…energetic. Well, he wasn’t the poet of their team, he’d known that then and he knew it now. Their team. He didn’t know where that thought had come from, but he wished it would pack its shit and go back there, wherever there was.

  Their team.

  What a thing to think about, and now of all times. They had never been a team, not really. Any fool with eyes to see would have known that much. What they had been were fools, puppies following after a master that was destined to turn around and kick them sooner or later. Only, the master hadn’t been satisfied to just kick them, had he? No, instead he’d decided to go sticking his wick where it most certainly did not belong and getting a price on their heads high enough to give some mountains self-confidence issues.

  Chall gave his head a shake, trying to focus on the woman above him, to let himself forget, for a time, about the dream he’d had, about the two men and the field and their dooms come upon them. It didn’t work, of course, it never did. What it did do, however, was snap him out of the first pleasant dream he’d had in some time, and he opened his eyes to discover that the form on top of him—the one which had so pleasantly been rocking back and forth moments ago—was not a beautiful prostitute with a perfect body and the face of an angel. Instead, it was a pig, a very big, very fat pig with a very big, very fat body and with the face of…well, a pig. And the pleasant, wet, tingling sensation Chall felt on his cheek turned out not to be from the woman’s fervent kisses. Instead, it was from the pig, its rough tongue wet and slimy along his face.

  Abruptly, Chall’s moans of contentment suddenly changed to sputters of disgust as he struggled out from beneath the hulking beast, desperately pawing at his tongue—the pig hadn’t been the only one doing the licking—and kicking his way backward until he fetched up against something hard. That something, as it turned out, was the side of a wagon bed and, just like that—as if by magic, a particularly assholey, bitchy kind of magic—he remembered where he was and how he’d come to be there.

&nb
sp; As for the where, he was in a wagon currently traveling toward the village of Celdar and as for the how, well, that had been a rather unpleasant night spent fleeing half-naked down the street from guards, a few minutes spent stealing a pair of trousers which were, unfortunately purple and were also, at it happened, far too tight for him, then a morning sneaking his way out of the city. He had seen city guardsmen ignore some terrible atrocities in his time—robbery, certainly, muggings absolutely, even a few kidnappings. But apparently, they drew the line at a trouserless fat man running down the street as if such a man would possibly have wound up there on purpose.

  “Ah, you’re awake.”

  “Unfortunately,” Chall muttered, turning to look at the man riding in the front of the wagon, the skin of his face so tanned and leathery that it looked like some animal’s hide—though not a damned pig, that much was sure.

  The man frowned, adjusting the piece of grass in his mouth. “What’s that s’pose to mean?”

  “Nothing,” Chall said. “Never mind. Anyway, are we there yet?”

  The man studied him for another few seconds with narrowed eyes, then hocked and spat, somehow managing to keep the green stem of grass in his mouth as he did. “Nearly. Celdar’s right over that hill, yonder,” he said, cocking a thumb ahead of them to indicate an incline in the road ahead. “With the gods’ graces, we ought to be there in half an hour.”

  “You ask me, the gods stopped handing out grace a long time ago,” Chall said, working his tongue around on his teeth to try to get the last remnants of pig hair off. “Who knows, maybe they ran out. Or took a holiday.”

  The farmer frowned again. “Don’t much care for that kind of talk, mister. You aim to blaspheme, you can do it on someone else’s wagon, understand? Or finish the trip with a walk, if you’ve a mind. Though”—he paused, flashing a look of disgust at the purple trousers Chall wore—“who’s to say whether or not you’d be able to walk in those things.”

  It was Chall’s turn to frown. Sure, maybe the trousers weren’t exactly the best fit—fact was, he would have laid even odds that he would have burst out of them by now—but they were certainly better than him walking around with his fruits dangling for everybody to see. “I can walk just fine, thank you. And—” He cut off, slapping at a pig’s snout as the thing sniffed at him. “Get off me, you damned beast.”

  “Alright,” the man said, “that’s it.” He clucked at the donkey, giving a tug on the reins, and the beast came to a stop, casting a look over its shoulder as if to see what all the fuss was about. “Go on then,” the man said. “Off with you.”

  “Fine,” Chall snapped, doing his best to maintain his dignity and—more importantly—avoid several fresh piles of pig leavings as he climbed out of the back of the wagon. “Tell your wife I said hi—or nevermind.” He cast a look at the half a dozen pigs milling about the wagon. “Just tell me which one she is—I’ll say it myself.”

  The next thing he knew, he was sitting on his ass in the road, the purple trousers riding up into some unwanted places so aggressively Chall had a thought to call the guard. Not that there was likely to be any guard in a shitty little town like Celdar. There was the farmer, though, the man standing over him even now, his fisted hands on his hips as he stared down at Chall. “Don’t much appreciate folks talkin’ about my wife. Now, you best learn you some manners, fella, before somebody learns ‘em to you.”

  “What does that even—you know what?” Chall sighed. “Never mind. I’m sorry, alright? About the thing I said about your wife. That wasn’t kind.” And then, because fools will be fools and he’d never claimed any different, he turned back to the pigs. “Sorry, ma’am.”

  It took him a bit longer to lever himself to a sitting position the second time. The farmer was still there, watching him. He didn’t look angry, as he had before. Or, at least, not only that. He was staring at Chall in a manner usually reserved for insane people. Which, considering that Chall had not ignored the dream but had chosen instead to go find Maeve, probably was just about what he deserved. “What’s your deal, fella? You got a death wish?”

  Chall considered the dream he’d had, considered, too, the time he’d spent with his team, Maeve and all the rest, and he started laughing. The man hadn’t meant it as a joke, of course, but in his experience, the best jokes were the ones men didn’t mean to tell. He laughed loudly, falling back onto the dirt road and letting the tears of mirth stream down his face. It wasn’t that funny of a joke, maybe, but then the jokes the world told to a man were often not funny unless, that was, the man had a particularly dark—and suicidal—sense of humor.

  The farmer shook his head, frowning. “Well. I ain’t got time to be sittin’ around here watchin’ you lose your mind. There’s things need doin’. Now, I’ll take my payment now.” He held out a hand and Chall slowly sobered, blinking at it.

  “Payment?”

  “That’s right, like we agreed. Three sovereigns for the trip.”

  Chall grunted. “And how much for the punches? Or are those extra?”

  The farmer raised an eyebrow. “Oh, they’re extra. Matter of fact, I got another one lyin’ around here somewhere, if you want it. And you keep flappin’ your gums like you are, I’m gonna assume you want it.”

  “No, no,” Chall said, holding up his hands and deciding that he really needed to work on his interpersonal relationships, read a book on it, maybe. “That won’t be necessary.”

  The farmer snorted, satisfied. “Didn’t figure it would be. Now. My coin?”

  Chall grunted, licking his lips. He wanted to tell the man he was an idiot. After all, what fool, if he had money, would pay for the privilege of riding in the back of a pig—and pig-shit—infested wagon? But since his nose already felt a bit loose, and he still hadn’t recovered from the candle-stick beating he’d taken at the hands of the ugly innkeeper, he decided to let it go.

  Instead, he reached into his pocket, fingering the small pebbles there, pebbles he generally always kept in his pockets—at least those times in which he had pockets—for situations just like this. He closed his eyes for a moment, concentrating, calling on the magic.

  “Well?” the farmer demanded. “Now, look here, if you lied and you ain’t got no money, you’ll get a ride from me alright, right to the constable in Celdar, see what he has to say about folks as don’t pay their debts.”

  “No…lie,” Chall said, focusing then, a moment later, producing several pebbles from his pocket. Pebbles which, just then, looked like coins. Except for the flaw, of course. He stared at them, looking for it, not seeing it but knowing it was there, then decided to let it go. Not perfect, certainly, but close enough for the farmer to believe that he was holding several coins. The magic would dissipate in time—half a day, no more than that—but until then, the farmer would think he’d gotten a steal. “Here,” Chall said sweetly, “take an extra. For your trouble.”

  “Kind of you,” the man said, snatching the coins away so quickly that a person might have been forgiven for thinking he was a magician in his own right. He looked at them then paused, frowning. “What are you playing at?”

  “Hmm?” Chall said, just now picking himself to his feet. “What do you mean?”

  “You tryin’ to cheat me with fake coin, that it?”

  Chall held a hand to his chest. “You can’t be serious. Me? I’m as honest as they come. Now, what would even make you say such a thing?”

  “This,” the farmer said, turning the coin to face him, and Chall did his best to hide his surprise. “Now, I ain’t gonna claim to be the richest bastard in the world, but I’ve seen a few sovereigns in my time. You tell me—this look anythin’ like old King Reinhart to you?”

  The nose. It was always the damned nose. The man was right, though. The nose on the king’s golden face looked like a huge, bulbous mass, as if he had some terrible infection. “That’s strange…” Chall said, doing his best to hide his nervousness. “Can I see the coin?”

  The man frowned deeper t
hen handed it back. Chall took it, staring at the face, focusing on it, then closed his eyes. When he opened them again, the nose was as it should be, a large, prominent nose that was common among the aristocracy. “There you are,” he said, offering the farmer his best smile as he handed the coin back. “Must have been a smudge of dirt.”

  The man frowned. “A smudge.”

  “That’s right,” Chall agreed, glancing at the pigs. “One can’t imagine where it might have come from.” The man scowled, but he took the coin, snatching it away.

  “Well. I guess that’s alright then.” And with that, the pig farmer swung himself back into the front of the wagon and Chall was left staring after him, waving a hand in front of his face in an effort to bat away the dust the wheels kicked up behind the wagon.

  “Bastard,” he said at normal volume when he’d judged the wagon was far enough away that the man had no way of hearing him. Then, he glanced down the road, in the direction the wagon was traveling, and asked himself, once again, what he was doing here. And once again, himself had no answer—at least none that didn’t involve him being a complete fool.

  He could have just turned around then, probably should have. He could have gone back to the city, found a good tavern and a good ale or, failing that, any tavern where he didn’t have an extended line of credit already—surely there had to be one out there, it was a big city after all—and if good ale wasn’t on offer, he’d be satisfied with any with alcohol in it. Why should he let a little thing like a vision of impending doom falling on an old comrade—if anyone could be said to be comrades with such a man—make him uproot his life, such as it was, and travel to see a woman who had always hated him anyway? He shouldn’t, that’s what, just as he shouldn’t allow a little thing like being banned from said city keep him from relaxing and having a nice pint. Or two.

  The problem, though, was that the city was over two days’ travel behind him now. A long way to go just to have the guards throw you into irons as soon as they saw you. A long way to go even if there was a warm bed and a cold ale waiting on you, and unless dungeons had changed considerably in the last month or so since he’d last visited one, neither would be on offer.