The Isle of Ilkchild (The King of Three Bloods Book 4)
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Russ L. Howard Library for House of Howard Publishing
The King of Three Bloods:
Book One: The Sire Sheaf
Book Two: The Frightful Dance
Book Three: Witan Jewell
Book Four: The Isle of Ilkchild
Book Five: The Bok of Syr Folk
Book Six: The King-Queen
Book Seven: The Scynscatha
Book Eight: Brekka
Book Nine: El Yid
Book Ten: The Evil Ennead
Book Eleven: Rebirth of the Elven-Gods
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Copyright © 2018 by Russ L. Howard
Cover Art: Deranged Doctor Design
Formatting: Deranged Doctor Design
Publishing: House of Howard Publishing
ISBN: 978-1-945130-18-2
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to locales, events, business establishments, or actual persons—living or dead—is entirely coincidental.
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Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1 : Renegades
Chapter 2 : Off on the Whale Road
Chapter 3 : The Black Wose and the Green Knight
Chapter 4 : The Lilly and the Wose
Chapter 5 : Into the Den of the Cat Queen
Chapter 6 : Ilker’s Tale and the Queen’s Festive Board
Chapter 7 : The Monsters of the Deep
Chapter 8 : The Cat Queen, the Wyrm, and the W-OS-E
Chapter 9 : The Sisterhood
Chapter 10 : The Mysterious Island
Chapter 11 : The Grass Beast
Chapter 12 : The Wyrm Kats
Chapter 13 : Ilker’s Journey Home
Chapter 14 : Herman and the Troll
Chapter 15 : Reporting to the High Lord Sur Spear
Chapter 16 : The Settlers Arrive on the Isle
Chapter 17 : The Great Lights of Herewardom
Chapter 18 : Muryh’s Statues, Fromer’s Indignation, and Dummy
Chapter 19 : Secret Combinations
Chapter 20 : The Wives of Sur Sceaf
Chapter 21 : Home at Last, Thank the Gods Home at Last
Chapter 22 : The Origin of the Herewardi
Chapter 23 : The Council of Gods
Chapter 24 : Copperopolis
Chapter 25 : Hartmut at Sea
Chapter 26 : Mendaho’s Struggle
Author Biography
Acknowledgments
I extend my gratitude to Paula Riggs whose tireless editing spanned seven years, much of which required her to endure my corny jokes, and to her husband Carl who had to endure the many blood drenched battle scenes in the book. Much appreciated help came from Jeff Day in preserving my sanity through dealing with my hated computer and for computer and technical assistance above and beyond waking hours. Particular thanks to Susie Stokes for her exquisite artistic talents and formatting despite her own busy schedule, and she, too, gave endless hours of technical direction. I give praise to my beloved wife whose constant feed-back and aide has always inspired me, and to my son, Adam, who performed the final edits, formatting, and publishing of this book. He gave continuous encouragement and deeply thought out opinions when asked. I thank my many children and my devoted friends who repeatedly asked, “Is it done yet?” Unto them I say, “Here it is.”
Chapter 1 : Renegades
Stink Water was a vast marshland that offered the easiest passage through the high desert. It was the cross roads from north to south and from east to west. It was in the domain of the Ochoco and White Knives tribes. Although it was smelly and difficult to traverse, it was the only easily accessible watering hole between Fort Rock and Hunta, a now abandoned Herewardi Settlement.
A group of young Sharaka braves approached on their colorful ponies. Dressed in loin clothes and leather vests, with battle axes and bows, they waded out on their ponies into the water hole, dropped the heads of their ponies and let them drink.
They dismounted into the knee high brackish water, while the horses drank, all the while swatting at all the marsh flies. There were fourteen braves in all, led by Hotuekhaashtait the Standing Bull. The party was too big for an affective hunting party but too small for a strong raiding party.
The brawny leader and his pock-faced friend separated from the group to speak privately.
“I see no tracks of Pays-No-Attention, Standing Bull.” Pock Face glanced in all four directions. “What if they’ve killed him?”
“If he’s dead, we’ll send someone else. This is too important to our plans to let anything get in the way.”
“But—”
“There’s the dust cloud,” called one of the braves. “Someone’s coming!” The dust cloud arose out of the distant dry hills to the east.
Standing Bull shouted, “That has to be Pays-No-Attention.”
A rider on a painted horse—which meant it was likely a Sharaka horseman—rode out ahead of a large band of Pitters. The braves were tense and anxious, but they did not flee. Instead, they gathered into a tense clump near the banks of the marsh.
Standing Bull walked over to his horse and withdrew a red signal flag from his saddlebag. Attaching it to his lance, he hoisted it aloft and waved it back and forth. As though expecting the signal, the Pitters signaled back with their khaki green flag, signifying they were coming to set terms of trade and to parley. This was a pre-arranged meeting.
The traitors waded to shore.
Good for nothing Billy Weasel drank from a skin flask while swatting at the flies. Lone Dog hacked at willow branches with his knife, while shooting anxious glances at the approaching Pitters. He looked as if he would break and run into the willows at any moment, but he showed none of the usual signs of fear. Something else was compelling him to flee.
A brave with coon tails on his belt teased Lone Dog. “If you’re not happy here you can go home to Mama, Lil Pup.”
Just as Lone Dog turned with his knife in hand, ready to fight, his attention was redirected toward the approaching horses. A brave bent low on his paint was riding hard toward the renegades. It was the young brave, Pays-No-Attention, the little thief. Reaching the edge of the marshes, he dismounted before the horse halted, and shouted, “Standing Bull, I gave the commissar your message, and he has agreed to parley.”
Standing Bull squeezed his fist tight and turned to the others to crow. “Very soon, as I promised you, my brothers, we shall be lords of the desert. Yeow!”
“Tell this suckling child, Lone Dog that I am to be your second in command.” Pock Face whined.
“You lie,” Lone Dog cried as he shoved Pock Face. “I am the second in command.”
“Enough!” Standing Bull roared. “I’ll make my decision based on how well you two handle events of this next week.”
“But I...” Pock Face was interrupted by a murder of crows which rose up filling the sky, signaling the arrival of the Pitters.
There were four times the number of Pitters that is common for a robber band. This was not a dispersal band sent out to terrorize a community before legions passed through, as was their prac
tice, but a group of elite fighters led by a commander of significant rapport. Four outriders with large black flags adorned with red crosses in each quarter and an upside down Elwas in the center led the Pitters in. This was the commissar, the Cha’Kal, the infamous and freaky offspring of the traitor Yggep and the Skull Worm, given life under unusual circumstances through the dark magic of the witch lands. His real name was Scynscatha.
After the flag bearers, a dark-skinned white man rode up on a pale, ugly, ill-favored, snorting horse which halted directly in front of Standing Bull. He was followed by well-trained legionnaires, who removed their turbans, revealing shaven heads covered in tattoos portraying the battles they had fought. They quickly fanned out, surrounding Standing Bull’s men. A chuck wagon and twenty, bedraggled involuntary camp whores followed at a distance, two to a horse.
Among the whores was a large blond man, dressed in Hickoryan green, with hair and beard that looked like too many campfires had exploded in them. Most likely, he was their Hickoryan cook, probably a broken captive, if not a goblin-robbed mind bent to the commissar’s will.
Without dismounting, the dark-skinned white man shouted, “I am Commander Scynscatha!” He looked haughty with his nose in the air and his mouth cocked as if to spit at any moment. He did not possess the usual yellow protruding teeth of the Pitters, but otherwise closely resembled them. Between his dark angry brows was a tattoo of the sahle. Around his bull neck he wore a coyote-toothed amulet signifying the he was indeed the Cha’Kal.
“Who is the one called Standing Bull?” He demanded in a haughty voice.
“That would be me,” bellowed the arrogant voice of Standing Bull, who spread his legs and held his lance with Vardropi scalps hanging from it. Behind him his men gathered in tightly.
“I have heard your messenger, and am prepared to offer you the terms of our bartering,” the Cha’Kal paused, “the terms of us leaving you unmolested and sovereign.”
His Pitter soldiers sat on their mounts ready to take up arms if commanded. They were dressed in mud green clothing. Virtually all bare skin on them was heavily tattooed, as was their custom. Their yellow incisors were clearly discernible under their upper lips. Because of their shaven heads, they wore swaddling turbans wrapped around their heads for protection against the sun.
“Then sit with us and bargain,” Pock Face offered.
The veins in Standing Bull’s head bulged and his face turned dark red. As fast as a rattler’s strike he turned on Pock Face in a furious tone and declared, “I did not give this sorry excuse for a brave permission to speak for me. The heat of the day has fried his brains.”
Paying no attention to Standing Bull, Scynscatha declared, “Permit me to introduce my negotiator.” He pointed to a small shaven-headed man in a black cowl. “This is Dirnetier and he speaks for me.”
Dirnetier looked down at Pock Face from his sallow horse. “Be it known, the Pitters do not bargain with inferiors, we give terms and you accept or reject. It’s that simple.”
“We will give our horses rest here.” Scynscatha rubbed sweat off his forehead with a handkerchief and swatted at the biting midges. “You must find us a place out of this cesspit. Some place higher and cooler,” he fondled the coyote tooth amulet on his chest. “Then as soon as our horses are refreshed, we must be off from this foul place.”
Standing Bull pointed to a rocky outcropping about a mile ahead. “There’s a good place to camp at the crest of those rock outcroppings. It will get us above the mosquitoes and flies, but is close enough to still get water.”
“It better be amenable to my liking, I’m weary of this endless desert. If this is your idea of a good place to meet, I’m not in the least impressed.”
They rode off with Standing Bull in the lead. Scynscatha along with the legionnaires followed. At a slight distance the chuck wagon and the poor bedraggled women trailed.
* * *
At the Pitter campsite, the first tent to be erected was a black tent situated in a stand of cooling junipers which would house the Commissar Scynscatha.
These legionnaires were far more efficient and disciplined than most Pitters. The tents were set up in orderly rows, with the makings of campfires in front of each one. In the center of the camp sat the chuck wagon, where the Hickoryan was helping the captive women to erect their own communal tent. They looked bone weary.
The rocky rise was far cooler than the marsh and the air moved more freely here. The sides of the commisar’s tent were rolled up to allow the air to pass through easily. A short way off, was the Hickoryan fellow dressed in his green attire. He had the muscle armoring of a warrior and moved about like a trained soldier. This was no dirt farmer captured along the way. This was probably one of the champions of the rink or a gladiator from the colleseum. Paradoxically, he seemed to be assigned to menial tasks.
After he had completed erecting the communal tent, he and the women returned to the wagon and began the process of preparing the food.
The commissar entered his tent with Dirnetier following on his heels like a puppy. He stripped out of his black cowl revealing underclothing of white shorts and shirt. Dirnetier, as if anticipating his next move, handed him a full length linen tunic which he quickly donned and laid his coyote tooth outside of. Dirnetier then handed him the badge of office, a necklace fashioned out of human hair of countless hues, with a large silver medallion stamped with the sahle cross in the middle of it.
Scynscatha took up his seat on a fold out canvas chair, as did the negotiator, Dirnetier. Commissars and negotiators were extensively trained to carry out the will and wishes of the Emperor Hryre Seath. Each bore the distinctive mark of the Seath on their foreheads. All four corners of the tent had armed guards stationed to the commissar’s bidding. Dirnetier summoned the guard on the northwest corner. “Festorlock, fetch the savage leaders here.”
The Sharakah renegades arrived just as one of the camp whores, a petite brunette, was bringing food.
As the renegades took their seat on the raw ground before Scynscatha, she carried a plate in each hand, delivering one to Dirnetier and the other to Scynscatha.
Scynscatha took the plate of vittles with one hand, and with the other grabbed the girl by the hair and pulled her face down to his as he spat out, “Bitch, I told you, you always serve me first.” Then he tossed her head like one would throw a sack of potatoes, causing her to fall across Lone Dog’s crossed legs. She tried to regain her balance, assisted by Lone Dog, before walking out of the tent backwards and bowing repeatedly. Not a word spoken.
The Scynscatha shook his head in disgust and glanced at Dirnetier. “Isn’t that the little bitch, the one we took from that farmstead where we killed her horse and dog because she didn’t want to come with us?”
“I believe it was, Commissar.” Dirnetier said. He turned to Standing Bull, as if nothing had happened. “I am curious, Standing Bull, how you knew we would be passing this way, and why you chose this particular spot to parley?”
Standing Bull proudly asserted, “We hear almost everything that happens in the high desert. This is the least likely place for anyone to discover our dark council because we can see anybody from here long before they approach. That’s why I chose it.”
“Well, it will barely do, though you must understand, The Cha’Kal ordinarily would not submit himself to such poor accommodations.”
“The Cha’Kal!” Standing Bull addressed Scynscatha directly, “Is that name why you wear a coyote tooth amulet?”
The commissar forked food into his mouth, speaking as he chewed with mouth wide open. “Why do you ignorant people call a jackal a coyote. Yes, I am called the Cha’Kal because, like the jackal, I am cunning and full of trickery. And this other necklace I wear is made up of the finger nails and hair of my enemies. See to it you don’t find yours affixed to it.” He placed his hand over the medallion of human nails, as if he were somehow drawing strength from the trophy.
Drawn by the cooking odors, crow began arriving in murders, al
ighting in the junipers and the sage. Dirnetier was doing the speaking while the Cha’Kal was wolfing down his food. “What could you possibly have to offer us?” He asked before taking a bite out of a potato.
“We can spy on your enemies for you.” Standing Bull declared. “More than that, we can get into the very presence of Sur Sceaf and all his lackeys.”
The Cha’Kal turned up the corner of his mouth. “Sur Sceaf, the King of Three Tribes?” Then he shot a glance at Dirnetier.
“What makes you think that would be of value to us?” Dirnetier inquired.
Standing Bull’s eyes glittered with anticipation. “We know that the Cha’Kal’s mission is to destroy Sur Sceaf, the same as the Skull Worm’s mission is to destroy Kanarus.”
Cha’Kal and Dirnetier couldn’t quite hide their surprise. “How could you possibly know such information?” The Cha’Kal demanded. “How came you by this information?”
“We have our ways. I told you, we know all that goes on in the desert. We can also obtain any information you will need about Sur Sceaf and his new city-state he’s building on the coasts of the deep. And by the way, Sur Sceaf is the chief of chiefs, not yet a king.”
“So what is it you expect to gain from such an exchange?” Dirnetier demanded with raised eye brows and a half gnawed potato in his hand.
“Here’s what I propose to trade. I spy on Sur Sceaf and find all the chinks in his armor in exchange for your granting me the rule of the high desert. Make me the chief of all tribes from the Columba in the north to the Mountains of the Kalifornias in the south, and grant me sovereignty over the same.”
Standing Bull was ignorant that he was merely another disposable commodity. The Pitters only used fools like this to their end, then tossed them aside.