The True Bastards

by Jonathan French

  The centaur wasn’t interested in Fetch’s assessment. He had shouldered the pole and now dipped his chin at the hog, saying something before pointing away from the grove.

  “Seems our welcome is at an end,” Fetch told Womb.

  He was still mystified by the truffle—though it was long gone—and gave an ungrateful grunt in reply. Taking advantage of his distraction, Fetch stowed what she’d saved of the centaur provisions in the hog’s saddlebag. There was nothing else to take. The pyre had been reduced to ash.

  Fetch swung up into the saddle and urged Womb Broom to carry them away from the watchful centaur, the trees, and the canyon of inexplicable charity. She rode for the only place that might help her now, the last place she wished to go.

  South and west.

  FOURTEEN

  IT WAS OFTEN SAID there were no gods in Ul-wundulas. Often said, and far from true.

  The frails worshiped their gaggle of drunken, lustful immortals and imperious virgins, so it was a rare settler who didn’t bring some small icon down from Hispartha, lighting candles at night while whispering pleas for protection. Fetch did not hold with any of that nonsense, few half-orcs did. No one was ever spared from an orc’s scimitar by praying to a statue.

  But there was one god dwelling in Ul-wundulas whose power she found difficult to deny, for she had witnessed it with her own eyes. One god that had been here since before Hispartha abandoned the land to irreverent mongrels.

  Belico, the Master Slave.

  Two days after departing the centaur canyon, Fetch crossed into his lands.

  Belief in the ancient human warlord who won divinity was central to halfling life, as well as the lives of the Unyars, a tribe of frails descended from Belico’s soldiers and pledged to protect his temple at Strava. Consisting of an ancient tower perched atop a hideous man-made hill, Strava’s true sanctuary lay beneath the earth. Once, in bed, Jackal had tried to describe the maze of low tunnels that connected the subterranean tombs of Belico and his host, but the thought had clearly disturbed him. He and Fetching had decided they would rather fuck again than discuss the place further.

  Fetch had not returned here since she, Oats, Jackal, and Crafty came with a Tine girl rescued from the Sludge Man. Jackal had suffered a grievous injury fighting the bog trotter and sought help from Belico’s high priest. None of them had known it at the time, but that visit changed everything. Jackal was healed, but Zirko made him swear vows that would prove to be unbreakable. The ritual had also left Jackal with a vitality that could only be described as unnatural. Without those strange gifts, he might never have been able to save the Bastards from Crafty and the Claymaster. Without those gifts he would not now be away from the Lots, hunting a wizard until yanked back by puppet strings held firmly by a god and his stunted earthly servant.

  Unyar horsemen met Fetch even before the hill and tower came into view. She was accustomed to the tribe’s stalwart vigilance, but something was different. The slanted eyes of the Unyar riders were suspicious as well as watchful, the powerful recurve bows in their hands already fitted with arrows. Even the motions of their hardy and spirited steeds seemed more fractious.

  “I am Fetching, chief of the True Bastards,” she told them. “I need to speak with the Hero Father.”

  One Unyar gave the barest hint of a nod, but said nothing.

  With a surrounding escort, she was brought to Strava and its supplicant village. The Unyars were industrious as ever. The ride through their huts was a spectacle of herding, fletching, weaving, and cooking. The tribesmen guided their mounts with confidence through the confusing sprawl, at last reining up before a hut identical to hundreds already passed. An ancient Unyar couple stood waiting outside the door, small and wrinkled as old fruit. It was clear Fetch was to dismount, so she slid from the saddle. The troop turned their mounts as soon as her boots touched the ground.

  “I must speak with Zirko!” Fetch called after them. Clods of dirt kicked up by the retreating hooves were her only answer.

  “You’ll have to wait like the rest of us, woman.”

  The deep voice rolled out of the hut across the way. A big half-orc ducked through the hide flaps covering the entrance. His size and lack of hair or beard were the obvious traits of a thrice-blood, though he carried a layer of well-fed flesh over his muscles. The pair of mongrels who followed him into the sun were also thrices. Their hoof tattoos marked them all as sworn to the Orc Stains. The speaker looked her up and down with a sneer before sauntering off in the opposite direction of the Unyar riders, his brothers in tow.

  Taken off guard by the appearance of the mongrels, Fetch had said nothing, but after a moment she followed, leading Womb Broom and ignoring the incomprehensible words of the elderly Unyars still standing in welcome. She meant to catch up to the three Stains and demand what that big fuck meant, but she caught sight of other mongrels along the way, slowing her steps. They were milling outside huts, some drinking from clay jars. Others she saw tending hogs in rope paddocks set back from the dwellings. There were brethren from the Shards, the Cauldron Brotherhood, and the Sons of Perdition. Fetch’s hands went to her hair.

  The centaurs had been summoning it.

  The Betrayer Moon.

  “Fetch?”

  The voice was familiar, strained with shock. And relief.

  She spun and pulled Mead’s rush to reach her into an embrace. They stepped back, still clutching each other.

  Mead’s eyes were agog as he took in her bedraggled appearance. “Where…? Chief, we thought—”

  “I know. Listen, Mead, I must talk to Zirko. Before the ’taurs come. It can’t wait.”

  Mead’s brow creased. “It’s not the Betrayer.”

  “What? Why the fuck are all these mongrels here, then?”

  “The Noumenia Gorperetos.”

  It was Fetch’s turn to be confused.

  “Zirko’s summons,” Mead said. “He asked all the chiefs to come.”

  “Shit.” Fetch sagged. She hadn’t remembered. Hells, she hadn’t cared a shit. “What’s the reason?”

  “We don’t know. The Tide, the Skull Sowers, and the Fangs haven’t arrived yet. They’re late. It’s already a day past the Noumenia, so whatever Zirko wants, it was never about the day. I figure he just wanted to give us all time to arrive and tried to make it happen at the same time. No one has been allowed to see him, though we’ve all asked, some louder than others.”

  Fetch shot a look down the track between the huts where the thrice-bloods had been swallowed by the teeming life of the village.

  “Reckon I just saw the Orc Stains chief.”

  Mead nodded. “Knob.”

  “Wager that lumbering cock’s been grousing.”

  “He and Pulp Ear, mostly. Though Notch is starting to get restless too.”

  “Notch. That’s the Shards’ hoofmaster?”

  “Right. And Pulp Ear leads the Cauldron Brotherhood.”

  Fetch knew some of the chiefs by name or reputation, yet none by sight. Communication between the hoofs was limited. Hells, the Claymaster never met with all his fellow leaders at any time in Fetch’s memory.

  She smirked at Mead. “And what’s the chief of the Bastards feeling?”

  “Figured someone had to come,” he said, mortified. “But there’s been no vote.”

  Fetch patted his cheek with rough affection. “You did right. Which of the brothers did you bring?”

  “None. Just Sluggard and Marrow.” Mead held up his stump. “That way if whatever Zirko wanted had a chance of getting us killed, the hoof would only lose a one-handed rider and a couple of nomads. Plus, after this we planned to ride to the castile. Look for you.”

  Fetch wanted to tell him how invaluable he was to the hoof, that the Bastards would likely crumble without him, but the words seemed feeble. So she smiled, tousled his Tine plume, and called h
im a fool-ass instead.

  He suffered the playful indignity with a smile, but when she was done, his face fell.

  “Chief. What happened to you?”

  Fetch took a breath. “They got you bunked with the nomads?”

  “Yes.”

  “This way, then. I think I got my own hut with two Unyars that look like walnuts.”

  Sitting upon the floor with the fire pit between them, they spoke. The ancient husband and wife fussed over them, pressed them with tea and bowls of curdled cheese while Fetch told Mead what had transpired since her departure from Winsome. About Bermudo and the guns, the destruction of Rhecia’s and the execution of all her folk, about the attempt to take Fetch to Hispartha, the murder of Cissy. She told him about the centaurs, but it was the giant orc that truly puzzled him.

  Mead rubbed at the back of his head. “Saved you from cavaleros and left you alive? Not like any thick I’ve ever heard of, to say nothing of the hyenas.”

  Fetch allowed her silence to voice her agreement. But the fingers on Mead’s hand were tapping his thumb in sequence, forefinger to small and back again. He only did that when his mind had come to grips with an idea and was wrestling it into submission.

  “What?” she asked.

  “The night we saw the dogs. They killed Slivers. But not…” Mead grew hesitant. Fetch leaned in, insisting he continue. “Not the women. Slivers was protecting them, but that pack was big enough to split. Why leave them alone? Why leave you alive?”

  You taste weak. “You’re saying this fucker doesn’t think women are worth killing?”

  Mead shook his head. “I don’t know. Might be your worth is…what you can provide alive.”

  Fetch saw the fear he had to master to put that forward. “He didn’t rape me, Mead.”

  His relief was quickly chased away by a further perplexing thought. “Sounding less and less like an orc.”

  He hadn’t meant it to be funny, but Fetch had to laugh. “Speaking of women. How are our three new slopheads?”

  “Incus and Dacia are shaping up fast. Ahlamra…?” Mead’s mouth wrinkled.

  Fetch raised her eyebrows in agreement. “Figured that.”

  Mead did not allow the following silence to linger long. “So what are we doing, chief? About all this?”

  “I have to talk to Zirko. He’s the only one who might know anything about this fucking thick. I just don’t want to start a war with Strava to get it done, but they’re not giving me much choice. You speak Unyar?”

  “Not enough. Marrow seems to have a grasp, though.”

  “Get him.”

  Mead jumped up from the floor and left the hut.

  The Unyar man placed a bowl of dumplings in Fetch’s lap. She was on her second portion when Mead returned without Marrow and looking troubled.

  “Problem?” Fetch sucked another dumpling down.

  “He’s leaving.”

  “The fuck he is!”

  Fetch followed Mead out and into the lane. Hurrying through the crowd he led her to one of the hog paddocks. Marrow was within, making last adjustments to his tack. He glanced over his saddle as Fetch approached, but did not pause.

  “Sorry, chief,” he said, tying a bag down. “Glad to see you breathing, but I can’t stay.”

  “Need to hear a reason.”

  “Just heard the Sowers arrived.”

  “You don’t care to see your former brothers,” Fetch realized.

  Marrow grunted in affirmation. He kept glancing toward the entrance of the paddock as if he expected his old hoof to come charging in at any moment. “There’s bad blood ’twixt me and Tomb. Bad blood.”

  “Strava is neutral ground,” Fetch told him. “He can’t do anything to you here.”

  Marrow’s flaxen whiskers bowed outward as he gave a grim chuckle. “You don’t know Tomb. A colder mongrel was never born.” He shot a glare at Mead. “Had I known there was going to be a meet like this, I sure as shit would not have come. I’ve tarried long as I dare.”

  “You don’t strike me as a coward, Marrow.”

  He bristled. “It’s never been said in my hearing.”

  “Good. Because I need you here. You speak the Unyar tongue?”

  “How do you think I got warning about who was coming? Had every slant-eye in here on the lookout.”

  Marrow’s gaze shifted, arms tensing to climb into the saddle, as a trio of mongrels rode into the paddock. Seeing they weren’t Skull Sowers, he relaxed. A little.

  “I need to get in front of Zirko,” Fetch pressed. “The Unyars think I’m here at his bidding and just squawking like all these other impatient mongrels, but I’ve come on another matter. Zirko will want to hear me. Marrow, I’ve got to have someone that can speak to them, make them understand. You wanted a chance to be with the Bastards, and far as I can see you’re a worthy rider. But if you ride off now to flee your old hoof you’re fleeing all chances of the new one too. The places a nomad can go are vanishing. You need a home and the Bastards need good mongrels. Fuck Tomb! Fuck the Sowers. Show them, show me, you’re a True Bastard.”

  Marrow set his whiskered jaw. He thought a moment and met her eyes. “Very well. I will try to get you an audience with the waddler priest.” He pointed at Mead. “You’re untacking Dead Bride.”

  “And Marrow,” Fetch said when he came around the hog. “Go faster.”

  With a laugh, the nomad departed.

  Mead set to unsaddling Dead Bride.

  “Once you’re done there, can you see to Womb Broom?” Fetch asked. “He got feathered and I don’t want it to fester.”

  “Sure, chief.” After a moment, Mead’s look brightened. He tried to hide it, but she saw.

  “What?”

  “Polecat owes me a month’s wine ration.” Mead let the smile loose. “I bet him you knew what we were calling that hog.”

  “Funny fucks, every last thumb-cocked one of you,” Fetch said. “I’m going back to my hut to be fed to death.”

  The trio of riders were seeing to their barbarians. As Fetch drew near, she recognized one as Red Nail, the older mongrel who’d helped Jackal during the Claymaster’s betrayal and escorted the Winsome folk to the Wallow.

  A cold stone dropped into Fetch’s gut.

  That meant these riders were from the Tusked Tide.

  Red Nail saw her coming and said something to a mongrel even more grizzled than himself.

  “Fetching,” the Tide’s master said, stepping around his barbarian. “We meet at last. I am Boar Lip.”

  It was simple to see where the name came from. His lower fangs protruded greatly before sweeping back toward his nose. Most half-breeds developed such teeth, but none Fetch had ever seen boasted a pair that immense.

  Fetching clasped the offered arm. “I’m sorry for the riders you lost trying to aid us.”

  He took that with the hardened resolve of an experienced chief. “They were good brothers. I only wish you could have brought back their remains, so they could be mourned at the Wallow.”

  Fetch gave a regretful nod. “I am sorry. I also want to thank you for all you’ve done for the True Bastards.”

  “Not much need for that,” Boar Lip told her. “You’ve paid enough shine for it.”

  “You took our people in when the Kiln fell with no promise of coin, and kept them safe while we recovered. The Bastards owe the Tide. And we will make good.”

  “You can make good by telling me why that god’s-cock-sucking waddler made us all ride out here.” Fetch opened her mouth to answer and then realized Boar Lip was only grousing. He took a deep breath. “You should hear it from me. I regret having to withdraw our help. But the Tide is down to seventeen sworn brothers. I could not afford to lose any more to the troubles of another hoof.”

  He didn’t want to lose any more to a lost cause is
what he meant. To the hoof that had a leader go mad and bring about the fall of their stronghold. To the hoof that was beset by sorcery, starvation, whose numbers had fallen to the point that they could hardly patrol their own lot. Boar Lip did not want to lose any more men to the hoof whose beggar chief stood before him without thrum or brigand.

  Yet the decision still set her brain afire. She wanted to scream, proclaim that he and the rest of his hoof were cunts and cowards, that with seventeen riders they should be afraid of nothing. With seventeen riders, the Bastards could take the world! That same fire raged with flames of another sort, the sort that pushed her to beg forgiveness of the Tide for getting their boys killed, for needing their help at all. Boar Lip’s own barely concealed pity only helped fuel both blazes.

  It was hogshit that they would blame her. But they did, should. She was chief. It was deeper hogshit that she blamed herself, but she did. The deepest was that she blamed Jackal. She often wondered what he would do in her position. Not as a means of inspiration, but a genuine question, edged with spite. What would you do, pretty Jackal? You wanted this so badly. Only you didn’t, you wouldn’t, not this. Building walls, training slops, feeding frails, begging from other hoofs. This wasn’t what you wanted. It’s what you handed off!

  Fetch gave Boar Lip the only reply she could.

  “I understand.”

  * * *

  —

  FETCH GOT DRUNK.

  She hadn’t meant for it to happen, but the kinnabar infusion was still in her saddlebags and she’d taken her first dose in days, once Marrow came back after nightfall shaking his head. The Unyars wouldn’t budge. Zirko would not meet with any mongrel chief until all had arrived. Forced to languish, hating the delay, she made sure Mead was keeping a tight rein on the nomad lest he run afoul of the Skull Sowers while she holed up in her hut, eating all offered by the old couple. If she were to be stuck here, she would use the time to get stronger. After the stew of mutton, the bread, there came the fermented mare’s milk. Fetch almost gagged on the first sip, but the sour drink took the edge off the Bone Smiler’s medicine. By the second saucer, the stuff was going down easy enough.