Enter the Lamb's Head (The Adventures of Ranthos Book 1)

by Jasper B. Hammer

  Nosgrim crossed his arms, and Ranthos mumbled under his breath. They both smelled angry.

  “And apologize to each other,”

  “No!” they both shouted. They met eyes and looked away quickly in a huff.

  Alrys groaned, “Why did I have to be left here with you two?”

  Ranthos scowled as Nosgrim walked ahead of him, not keeping pace with him any longer. Now that they weren’t allowed to speak anymore, Ranthos fell behind the group a considerable amount. Ranthos would have been afraid that he would get ambushed, but just didn’t care much at this point. He missed Bell, and he worried every second that she was in danger. She had hardly been outside before, and now she was thrust into the bloody world of the ‘White Cult,’ as Alrys called it. Though Ranthos saw little white in their works—it was mostly red.

  Ranthos didn’t know how to process his anxiety; he had found purpose in protecting Bell for so long; he didn’t know what to do when he couldn’t do that anymore. He felt like a waste of a person. Not only were his wounds the cause of this trouble, but he was powerless to help fix it. He was hurting and was too embarrassed to say so.

  So he took it out on Nosgrim, like he used to. And Nosgrim returned in kind. He smelled anxious and fearful too, when they weren’t talking to each other. He assumed Nosgrim felt something similar.

  The angry arguments were good enough distractions from their fears.

  Ranthos’ nose prickled with a wretched, decaying scent—it smelled like the Sortie-on-the-Hill gates. He called out, “Alrys—”

  “I smell it too, cub,” said Alrys.

  “What is it?” Nosgrim asked Alrys, not Ranthos.

  “Rot,” said Alrys, “You’ll smell it soon.” He looked in its direction, directly ahead, and marched faster. There was a standing stone perched atop a hill near the source.

  Had the barruses been killed? The rot smelled heavy, like a massive creature had died, or a hundred smaller creatures, like at the Labyrinth.

  Nosgrim kept pace with Alrys, but Ranthos fell behind, unable to keep up on his three legs.

  Eventually, Nosgrim caught a whiff of the smell, and almost gagged. Ranthos did the same as it got stronger. What if Bell was among the dead?

  Don’t think like that.

  He couldn’t purge the image of Bell’s lifeless corpse from his mind.

  Ranthos smelled the barrus musk stronger too as they neared the rot.

  Alrys crested the hill and covered his nose, but stopped dead in his tracks when he saw what lay there. Nosgrim did the same. They smelled disgusted, which was in truth a disgusting scent, like sulfur.

  There was a low rumble, and a deep growl, and a snort. There were massive creatures up ahead—barruses, it must have been. They’d caught up to them.

  Ranthos met them at the spot, and beheld a terrible sight—a dead, rotting, rent barrus bull. His four tusks were pounded into his head, and all around him were the motionless bodies of what could have been fifty sheep. Ranthos spied a number of flockers too, lifeless on the ground. But more shocking than all of this were the massive, living barruses circling the bull’s corpse. There could have been a dozen cows, and Ranthos spied three calves.

  They stood round the broken corpse of the bull, stroking his hide with their trunks. The oldest calf had collapsed beside the bull’s trunk and rubbed her face against his slowly. They moaned and rumbled mournfully, and none louder than the largest of their herd, who bore many scars. The scent of hopeless despair filled them as well. Ranthos had smelled animals feel a few limited emotions; Remy was happy to be pet and such, but never had he sensed the depth of soul that these beasts felt. It was indistinguishable from a mourning human.

  Ranthos had only ever seen a single bull before. The cows never passed through the Tatzelwood, and the bulls only rarely did. Ranthos had been sitting atop Chickenrock as a cub and spotted him stomping through the trees half a mile away.

  A few of the barruses turned to face Ranthos, Nosgrim, Alrys, and Sarky. Alrys struggled to kneel with Sarky on his back, but did so promptly, telling the boys, “Kneel. Don’t anger them.”

  Nosgrim knelt and then noticed Ranthos trying to lower himself to his wounded legs. A kind scent came over him, and he helped Ranthos off his crutch and kneel.

  Ranthos protested, “No you don’t have to—”

  “It’s fine,” said Nosgrim.

  Ranthos settled into a painful kneeling position, and Nosgrim helped support his weight, holding Ranthos’ arm over his shoulder. “Thank you, Nosgrim. I’ve been a real scut—”

  “I’ve been a scut,” said Nosgrim at the same time.

  “Me too,” they both said, smiling faintly to each other. Ranthos felt a swell in his chest as they seemingly mended something broken.

  Alrys shushed them angrily.

  The barruses seemed appeased by their show of respect, turning back to their fallen friend to mourn. Alrys stood, but kept his eyes low, and turned around and walked down the hill out of sight. Nosgrim lifted Ranthos back to his crutch, and they followed.

  Alrys led them in a wide arc around the barruses and toward the standing stone.

  “Alrys,” asked Ranthos, “Why did we have to kneel?”

  “The barruses rule these lands, not us folk. Sortie-on-the-Hill lives in peace with them, so long as they respect their sovereignty.”

  “Do they understand what it means to kneel?” asked Nosgrim.

  “They seemed to,” said Ranthos.

  “I wasn’t asking you,” snipped Nosgrim.

  “Here we go again,” groaned Alrys.

  They both heard him and squinted angrily. Nosgrim poked Ranthos’ cut temple, and Ranthos elbowed his meaty side. They considered the situation resolved.

  As they neared the standing stone, Ranthos smelled Bell. His eyes lit up, and he could hardly speak, his voice catching in his throat. “Al-lresysBellelisscent!”

  Alrys smelled it too, and rushed to the base of the stone, sniffing it and inspecting the ground. Ranthos didn’t see anything where he was looking, but trusted Alrys as a tracker. Ranthos could smell the faint echo of Bell’s scent—and now Vhurgus’ too. They’d spent a lot of time here, but left eventually.

  “What is it?” asked noseless Nossy.

  “Bell!” shouted Ranthos, trying to smell which direction they went. It was tough, it had been a long time, and the scent of decay and the barrus musk mixed with the scents and made it difficult to differentiate.

  Alrys followed some trail that Ranthos could not see, and eventually smelled confident, “They went this way. They were here only a few hours ago.”

  “Was the healer with them?” said Nosgrim loudly, prompting an ear-splitting trumpet from a barrus in the herd. Nosgrim yelped and almost fell flat on his face.

  Ranthos too, except that he lost balance and actually fell flat on his face. Alrys knelt respectfully. So did Nosgrim. They assumed that Ranthos’ prostrate position would suffice and left him there.

  They all slowly got to their feet and followed the trail away from the barruses.

  A calf trotted up the hill and stood by the stone as the four of them reached the peak of the last one. Only Ranthos saw him.

  The calf shook his head wildly, flopping his little trunk and huge ears around his face. Ranthos waved his hand at him as Nosgrim and Alrys walked back down the hill again.

  The calf raised his trunk into the air, and stood up on his wobbly hind legs for a moment, mimicking Ranthos’ posture, and trumpeted a squeaky “Toot toot.”

  Ranthos smiled, and the wind carried the calf’s happy scent to him before a larger trunk rose from behind the hill, snatched the calf’s tail, and dragged him away.

  26

  Her Brother and Her Butcher

  Bell could run. She could jump. She could swing Grimtusk—

  She lost grip of Grimstusk and flung it into the dark grass beside her.

  Vhurgus and Blossom laughed at her, walking along the road behind her. Bell put her hands on her hips and
scowled at them, before marching to her axe with her chin in the air and swiping it up.

  All her limbs were perfectly functional, she felt like she was a brand new person, like she was dipped in a pool of honey and came out a radiant warrior princess.

  Blossom’s magical moss was just marvelous.

  “Blossom!” called Bell as she walked back to her, Grimtusk over her shoulder.

  “Yes, Bellelar?”

  “Where did you get that moss?”

  “From—”

  Bell heard something.

  She suddenly spun around, shushed Blossom, and looked out into the distance, lit only by the moon. She saw three figures step out from behind a hill. Bell’s heart accelerated to absurd speeds. She waved her arms over her head, and shouted, “Over here!”

  Vhurgus reached over and slapped her leg, “Stop that, we don’t know—”

  Bell took off running at them. One figure waved back.

  Vhurgus muttered something to Blossom. She giggled in response.

  Bell rushed down the hill, her bare feet scraping through the tough grass. She had forgotten her axe behind her completely—if she was wrong, and these were flockers, she would be dead in seconds, but if she was right, then she could see her family again.

  She wanted nothing more than to be beside them, laughing and arguing. They were so rude, and obnoxious, and such a problem for everyone else. They were everything.

  Her Ranthos, who, only months ago, called a goose ‘some damn huge duck,’ because he didn’t know what it was.

  Her Nosgrim, who was insistent that he knew more about magic than she did, and, Good Heavens, he would be so angry to learn that Bell was now a tried-and-true alchemist.

  Every inch of her body longed to see those stupid boys again. Bell reached the bottom of the hill, and one of the three figures waved back at her. It called out in Ranthos’ familiar voice, “Bell!”

  Bell cried out his name back to him—or tried. She wasn’t sure if she said anything—she was so excited. Everything was an unintelligible blur until she crashed into a thin, bony body, and felt Ranthos’ arms wrap around her. He almost fell down without his crutch, and Bell had to support his weight. She could feel his bandages all over his torso, and could feel him groan as she wrapped her arms around them.

  She didn’t care at all. He was about to get healed, he could endure a little pain. Bell needed a hug right now. Ranthos said something to her, but she couldn’t hear him past her sobbing. She had done it. Bell had saved him. She wanted to tell him everything that had happened, but at the same time, had no idea how she could. It was all so horrifying.

  She didn’t know what lay ahead of them, and she feared everything that lay behind them.

  Bell would cry, but after all her misadventures, she couldn’t see how there could be any more tears left in her.

  Nevermind.

  Ranthos pulled away from her and smiled down with his stupid, crooked smile. She hadn’t seen him since the ambush, when he was just a helpless speck behind her, watching her leave. His eyes were almost as red as hers, and he said something again, but Bell was not listening.

  Alrys passed them, smelling happy. He carried Sarky over his shoulders, who smelled like she was barely alive.

  Vhurgus and Blossom rushed to him. Vhurgus took her off his shoulders, allowing Alrys to rest, and Vhurgus lay Sarky down gently so that Blossom could cover her face with moss.

  Nosgrim approached behind Ranthos and picked up his crutch for him. He was walking perfectly fine. That ‘wounded leg’ turned out to be little more than theatrics. But she was thrilled to see him, and she extended a hand to him to invite him into their embrace.

  He reluctantly joined. Both he and Ranthos were slightly uncomfortable hugging each other, but Bell, again, didn’t care. This wasn’t about them.

  Bell loved her brother and her butcher; they protected her and provided for her; they saved her from Tatzelton. She had finally saved them. They beckoned her out the door, and she stepped out to find her place.

  And there she stood, where she belonged, under the open sky facing the horizon.

  27

  A Fungal Mummy

  “Listen well, you ingrates!” Ranthos shouted as Bell and Nosgrim dragged him forward, each holding one of his arms over their shoulders while he hopped along on his one unbroken leg.

  Nosgrim synchronized a blabbing hand to Ranthos next words.

  “I want to be abundantly clear,” he said, raising his eyebrows angrily, trying to struggle against their grip. “That I don’t believe a single word of this nonsense.”

  Bell’s mouth gaped, “Ranthos!” She poked a bandage on his side.

  He wailed.

  “After killing that buck thing—”

  “You can just say buck,” said Nosgrim. “And don’t poke his wounds, Bell.”

  “After killing that buck thing,” she did not relent, “You more than anyone oughta believe in magic.”

  “Is that so?!” he fumed, “Well I don’t!”

  “One Almighty,” groaned Nosgrim, “You’re insufferable.”

  “If anything,” Ranthos spat, “I proved that the buck thing was not magical.”

  “It rotted trees with its antlers,” said Nosgrim with a shrug, “Seems magical to me.”

  “Well, it died, didn’t it?!”

  “Here we are!” beamed Bell, “Ranthos! Meet Blossom.”

  Blossom, a small woman with a nice dress and a mysterious mask, waved her hand nervously to him. She smelled happy, relieved, but also a bit shy.

  Ranthos waved back.

  Bell and Nosgrim laid Ranthos down on his back underneath a tree atop a hill.

  Ranthos was anxious to say the least. Though he would maintain to the death that he didn’t believe in magic, on the inside he was terrified of what this masked witch would do to him with her powers.

  Blossom hardly said a word to anyone after healing Sarky, who rested her weary head against Alrys’ shoulder down the hill. Nosgrim and Bell stood expectantly over Ranthos, waiting for Blossom to do her work.

  Blossom poured out of a small bag the remainder of her healing moss. It was a deep green with long sprouting bulbs that glowed a warm light in the darkness when she pressed them into Ranthos’ wounds. It was painful until the pain was overtaken with a soothing numbness.

  Soon, Ranthos was almost covered in the moss. She planted it in his largest wounds, and the moss quickly soaked up his blood and mended his wounds with sharp tendrils, stitching through his numb skin. The moss followed his blood and grew over nearby cuts. Blossom even dripped a trail of blood down Ranthos’ side so that the moss could follow it to his next wound. He felt puffy, and looked down at his body, slowly being covered in a blanket of moss, glowing with twinkling yellow lights, like little eyes that scoured him for more hurts. The moss was tight against his skin and made the cool of the night almost disappear with its warmth.

  Blossom used up the final bit of moss that she had on Ranthos’ back, where the buck’s antlers and hooves tore through him, and still had a ways to go. Ranthos furrowed his brow worriedly.

  Vhurgus retrieved a large sack from Alrys and rushed it back up to Blossom. Ranthos could smell that it was full of beardmoss from the Tatzelwood. It was nice to smell a scent of home.

  Blossom nodded her head in thanks, her wooden mask not betraying the slightest hint of emotion. She had red hair like himself, Bell, and Alrys. Was she a hodge too? Was red hair a common trait with his kind?

  “Blossom?" he asked, hoping that he didn’t misremember her name.

  “Yes?” she said in a quiet, sweet voice. She didn’t speak loudly at all. A human certainly wouldn’t have been able to hear her.

  “Thank you,” he said, unsure of what else he could say.

  Blossom nodded her head, set the sack of beardmoss on the ground, and kneeled before it. She pulled up her skirts over her knees to reveal her intricate atvyyrk, and Ranthos watched in amazement as the inked lines began to shimmer with a
flowing light that scintillated from green to pink to yellow. The trees and flowers that adorned her knees began to move and sway as if a breeze had touched them. The wind even blew in the same direction as the tattoos moved. Ranthos saw the same effect happening to the branches of the tree above him.

  Then, emerging from the dark spots on her skin were bright dots of light, like fireflies. Once enough had surfaced, Blossom brushed them into her hand and sprinkled them into the sack of beardmoss. Ranthos could see the glow of her magical moss illuminate the bag from within, as the mundane moss from the Tatzelwood was transformed into a similar creature as those that covered his wounds. Blossom then began scooping out the beardmoss and treating him elsewhere. The moss eventually grew to cover his eyes as she healed the cut on this temple and jaw, and cover his mouth as she healed the one that ran over his lips to his chin.

  He was a little afraid, but took heart again when he heard Bell and Nosgrim laughing softly above him.

  “Let the moss heal you,” whispered Blossom, “By morning you will be yourself again.”

  Ranthos mumbled a thank you through his stitched, numb lips. Blossom touched his hand and squeezed it in her own. It was more affectionate that any stranger had treated him before. It made his heart beat very fast, and he hardly knew how to react—even while mummified.

  After a few moments, Blossom released him and walked away to check on Sarky’s moss. Vhurgus followed her down the hill. Ranthos heard Bell and Nosgrim sit at either side of him under the tree. Remy, finally free from his cage, curled up on Ranthos’ belly.