Wing shut his eyes hoping to exclude the thoughts or, at least, conjure new ones, when a large heavy-bodied spider crept up. It tickled Wing’s hand and he looked down. The thick black and golden hairs on the spider’s legs glistened as it crawled into the pale slice of moonlight shining upon the cavern floor.
“There you are,” Wing said.
The body of the spider would have filled the palm of Wing’s hand and had proven itself, so far, to be surprisingly sedate. Its size made it feel more like a pet than creepy arachnid and Wing and the tunnel-dweller had managed to share the root cavern amicably since Wing’s coming.
“I’d head into your hole,” Wing advised. “I’m no good company tonight and it’s only going to get colder.”
But the spider remained in the bit of pale moonlight, its body hovering just above the ground, the joints of its thick, fuzzy legs jutting up like tiny mountain peaks, its small black claws vanishing into the shadowed valley of its belly.
Irritably, Wing asked, “What?”
The spider remained, still.
“We’ll have a problem if you’re here after I fall asleep and I get bitten over some sleep-related accident.”
The spider scratched the top of its abdomen with a back leg, replaced its foot, and settled in again.
“By all means,” Wing said with resignation, “make yourself comfortable.”
Glancing around the root cavern, Wing’s gaze returned to the spider. There was really nothing else to look at.
After a time, Wing acquiesced to the spider’s company.
“E’te,” he said to it, “here’s the plan. As soon as I can, I’m getting on to Legran — deliver Lant’s plans to Master Monteray. After that I’ll come back, and if you’re still around...” Wing’s throat closed and the end of his thought passed between him and his spidery companion in silence: Then at least someone will know where I was, what happened in the end.
Wing cleared his throat, the spider blurred as tears brimmed his eyes. “I have a task for you while I’m gone. I’m going to sing a song. You can hold it for me, and just in case I don’t make it back, it’s important that you remember it because you’ll be the last one in this world to hear it.”
Wing’s once smooth voice sounded impossibly forlorn and small within the knotted amphitheater of the root cavern as he began to sing:
“I Mesko
A freasente yullalpa
Ma ta ma ta no’va-hm
I fa tendehre a medthre vencentt
Ma ta ma ta no’va-hm
Seeg’ente tepedthre veelan
A leetal’s en corashee-on
Ma ta ma ta no’va-hm in”
Wing let the words fade into the thick root and dirt of the Mesko chamber.
The spider had crept away into the dark.
Curling into a ball, his head in the fold of an arm, Wing closed his eyes and somewhere in that supernatural space between waking and dream the fervid beating of the spider’s tiny heart was like the softly falling footprints of Fey’s running feet, the swelling and shrinking of the tree’s great roots was like the sound of Nien’s breath as he slept, and the pulse in the earth’s deep crust was like his father’s voice calling to him from across the fields.
And beyond the heavy cloud cover Wing imagined the stars shining upon a dark log home and a stretch of fields that reached to the edge of a mountain and a single great Mesko tree where he lay in one hole and a spider in another, and from that hallowed cavern his dreams carried over into the land of the dead and for a small moment that which seemed so far away and impossible to grasp was quite real, so heartbreakingly close, in fact, that nothing had happened — he was not alone in an unfathomable reach of mountains, he was not alone in the world nor the last of his race, he had a mother and a father, he had a little brother and a baby sister, he had a home and a warm bed and a brother of iridescent skin colour who was more a part of him than the swell of blood in his own veins, and in the morning he would go to the fields where the snows of Ime had begun to melt and the dark soil beckoned, offering its rich black soul to the seeds in his hands.
In the morning, everything would be as it once was.
In the morning, he would go home.
Chapter 48
Broken Man
K ate took up the large jug from beside the sink and headed out the back door to the river. A wide path had been cut in the snow by their traveling back and forth for water. The early evening was uncommonly warm and she smiled a little, glancing up at the mountainous horizon and the lowering sun. She’d almost made it to the river’s edge when a dark shadow against the white of snow caught her eye.
Pausing, she squinted, wondering if what she’d seen had been nothing more than the play of cloud in the slant of evening light.
But her visual search brought no clarity, so, unsatisfied, she set the jug down and moved toward the abstraction. As she drew near, the shadow began to solidify, taking on form. Kate stopped. Lying prone in the snow not far from the bank of the river was a man. A Preak man. Moving closer, she saw that his face was bruised and partially swollen, his clothing torn and near frozen solid, stiff and unyielding at the seams, softened a little across his back where the sun shone with some significance. Insanely, he must have swum the river. What looked like frozen blood matted his clothing all the way down his left side.
Kate felt a constriction in her chest and she made a sweeping search across the fields toward town. They were empty.
Kneeling at the man’s side, she touched his face. It was warm. Placing her cheek next to his lips, she felt a thin brush of air.
Getting to her feet, she ran back to the house. “Tei! Tei!”
Tei came down the stairs into the dining area. “What? I was in the middle of something.”
“Come with me,” Kate said as she grabbed up rags and blankets.
“What’s going on?”
“Just come with me.” And Kate was running back out the door.
Tei caught up to her and, even running, still managed to complain until Kate stopped once more at the long dark shadow near the riverbank.
“A Preak,” Tei said, startled. “Mother, who is he?”
“I don’t know,” Kate replied, breathing heavily and scanning the river and the fields leading into town once more.
Tei had begun to scan the white stretch of fields toward town as well as she asked, “What are you doing?”
“Help me.” Kate cast her eyes up to their home in the distance, then at the nearby cabin. “Let’s move him into the cabin, it’s closer.”
“How?”
“Well, if we cannot lift him, we’ll have to drag him.”
Attempting twice to lift him, they gave up the effort.
“We’ll have to pull him over,” Kate said.
“He’s freezing, and…” Tei’s nose inched up. “Is that blood?” Reaching down, she went to take hold of the man’s right arm.
“No, don’t,” Kate quickly said. “Can’t you see the shoulder?”
“Well, of course. What’s wrong?”
Kate shook her head with irritation. “Sometimes you’re not much help.”
“Why are you doing this anyway?” Tei snapped. “Look at him. Clearly he was involved in something bad.”
Kate cast her daughter a quick look. “We don’t know what happened. It could have been a wild animal.”
Tei looked back at her dubiously. Her daughter might be short on compassion but she wasn’t naïve. Kate didn’t want to show it, but she knew better as well. The last thing Legran needed was a new confrontation between one of them and someone from the Valley of Preak. Kate glanced to her left, across the long stretch toward the business and trading center of Legran in the unseeable distance. She shook her head, telling herself, No. If the man had been in a fight with someone in town he would have swam to the other side of the river.
Glancing back at her daughter, she said, “Just help.”
After some struggle, the two managed to get the man into th
e cabin and onto the bed inside.
“Get a fire going in here,” Kate said.
Tei glanced around. “There’s no wood.”
“Well then you’ll have to go up to the house for it,” Kate said. “But first, help me here — ”
Kate was struggling with a rough, frozen, leather shoulder mantle.
Tei stepped up beside her and they managed to get it unlatched and off over his head.
Kate set to removing the leather jerkin and woven shirt that lay beneath it. Both were stiff, also frozen; they were also torn extensively in large, sweeping cuts.
Pulling them free of the man’s body, Kate and Tei gasped simultaneously.
“My gods,” Tei said. “What happened to him?”
Kate felt her heart go very still and very cold.
Ignoring Tei, she set about getting the man’s trousers off.
“Get his boots off,” Kate said.
Tei pulled at the man’s boots, as Kate tried to work the pants down off his hips. Part leather, part heavy fabric, the simple task was proving almost impossible. Considering cutting them off, she tugged a few more times and finally managed to get them off.
Tei’s eyes were traveling over the man’s body as he lay now, all but naked upon the bed.
“Why, he’s quite handsome,” she said, eyes widening.
“You can tell?” Kate said, trying to dissuade her easily aroused daughter.
“Well, I bet he was,” she replied.
“If you can, keep your mind on the business at hand.”
But Tei was fixed upon the man, tracing the lines of his body as if he were the first one she’d ever seen.
Kate shook her head. “Never mind that. We have to get a fire going and I need some water from the river. Also, when you’re up at the house, get more blankets, rags, a cup and a bowl, soap, the good whiskey, and some of your father’s clothes.”
Tei slapped the second of the man’s boots down onto the floor. “Fine. I’ll just drag the whole house out here by myself.”
As Tei huffed out the door, Kate returned to the terrible task at hand. Most of the man’s visible wounds had begun to scab over, but the scabs were rough, in most places still raw, filled with hard, dried blood that had not been loosened by the freezing but short swim across the river.
A few moments later, Tei returned with a bucket of water.
“How many trips am I going to have to make?” she asked, setting the heavy bucket down beside Kate.
“As many as it takes,” Kate replied, pulling a blanket across the naked man’s genitals. Tei sighed.
“I’ll go get the stuff from the house, then.”
As the door closed again behind Tei, Kate muttered, “That child.”
With Tei gone, Kate began a closer examination of the man. Her life with Monteray had taught her a great deal about the nature of fighting, it had also taught her how to care for the wounds it inflicted. Apart from at least one punch to the face, the rest of his injuries were indicative of those caused by sword combat, the largest of which cut along his left side where it appeared a sword had slid off his ribs. The tattered remnants of a thin strip of cloth had fallen away from this wound as she’d removed his shirt. A jagged section of his scalp was covered in scabs. His left arm below the elbow was a dark purple swell, causing his skin in that area to appear even more iridescent than normal. Kate palpated the area gently, but it was too swollen to tell how badly it might be broken. Amidst the smells of blood and sweat, Kate caught the brief scent of herb. Carefully rolling one of his shoulders she looked at his back. The river had washed away most of it, but there remained in a large wound through the thick muscle beside his scapula bits of poultice that had dried in with the blood. Apparently, he had applied it himself since it was hit and miss. Though the colour and scent was dry and tainted with blood seepage, Kate recognized the combination of plants used to create the poultice. It was incredible that anyone in his condition could have prepared it.
Tei returned with the port and soap, new rags and water.
Kate looked at her. “Wood?”
As the door shut unnecessarily hard behind Tei, Kate turned back to the man, surprised he had not come conscious with all of the activity. Placing heavy towels beneath him, Kate grimaced as she poured a brief shot of alcohol over the wounds in his back and side.
He did not rouse.
Laying loose, clean cloths over the wounds, Kate waited; she needed to warm the water before using it to cleanse the wounds.
In a way, Tei had been right, the side of his face that was not swollen had very handsome features, but there was something more than that, Kate thought, there was a genteelness about them. Strange that a face, even in unconsciousness, could exude a sense of…
Kindness, Kate thought, surprised that was the word that came to mind.
Dipping a corner of one of the clean rags in the cold water, she let it sit a moment, allowing it to warm to her hand before smoothing it gently beneath his swollen eye.
A kick on the door to swing it open brought Kate to her feet, and she hurried to help Tei with her armful of wood.
Kneeling by the cabin’s fireplace, Kate arranged a few pieces of the wood. Pulling some frayed threads from one of the rags from the house, she wadded them and placed the small balls beneath the wood. On top of the fireplace lay the flint and steel. With long practice, Kate soon had a fire blazing. Hanging the bucket of ice-cold river water on the long metal bar over the fire, she returned to the man.
“Yech,” Tei said. “I can’t believe he’s still alive.”
Looking over the man’s torn breast, swollen face, and misshapen shoulder, Kate couldn’t disagree.
“I can’t believe he didn’t freeze to death — swimming a river in this early in the season…” Kate shook her head.
As if in answer to her incredulity, the man shivered violently. Though the mystery of his presence concerned her, what managed to worry Kate even more was that with all the talking, jostling, and investigating of the wounds he had not awoken.
“Check on the water, will you?”
“Getting there,” Tei called back to her, pulling her finger out of the bucket.
“Ladle out some and we’ll get started; let the rest continue to warm.”
Tei did so, returning to Kate’s side.
“We need to get this blood cleaned off and wrap the wounds — as best we can.”
Kate knew this would be the one task she wouldn’t have to fight with her daughter over.
Tei nodded, eyes bright.
Kate took a short breath for patience. It was the first time Tei had seen the violence that could be inflicted by fist and sword. It was also the closest Tei had ever been to anyone from the valley of Preak. Kate knew her daughter’s mind worked in different ways than her own, so she hunted for a way to try and help Tei understand. “He’s someone, Tei,” she said admonishingly. “No doubt his inner landscape is as rich as yours or mine.”
Tei looked back at her.
Usually, Kate found it nearly impossible to get through to her daughter; this time, however, it seemed her words had some small effect.
“All right, amma,” Tei said.
Relieved, Kate instructed Tei to clean his face — gently — while she started further down.
Four times Tei had to empty the bowl of blood and refill it with the water warming over the fire.
The man continued to tremble, but his shivering was less with the warm water and the rising temperature in the cabin. Unconsciousness, however, lay deep upon him and Kate hoped the time he’d lain, half frozen, by the river would not visit him with something worse than the wounds he already carried. His legs were notched here and there, as with the tip of a sword.
As she worked, Kate thought to take pains to keep the man’s privates covered. To her surprise, however, Tei was tending to his face with considerable care, her curiosity for once extending to something other than the longing for sex or romance.
Kate felt a brief warmi
ng in her chest; such a thing would be good for Tei — maybe for all of them. Tei had always held a particular fascination for the people of Preak. Perhaps it was that inherent part of her that loved to needle others, loved to love that which others thought she should not. But there were times Kate could see a greater purpose behind Tei’s attraction, her fascination: a healing. For far too long relations between the Legranders and the Preak had been strained.
“Help me support him while I secure this around his chest,” Kate said, standing and unfolding a long thin strip of cloth.
The clean cut lancing across the man’s side stood livid and ghastly, fresh blood oozing from it as they’d cleaned out the old, dried blood.
Maneuvering his heavy, inert body was something of a task, even with two of them. Managing to get the cloth underneath him, Kate secured it over the only small section of his body that was not covered in wounds or bruises.
“I’ll hold him up, you slip the shirt behind his back.”
Kate strained to hold the man, his head lolling to her shoulder like a child’s, his breath rattling deep in his chest.
Laying him back, Kate dressed his left arm, leaving the dislocated arm free. The pants were only slightly easier to get onto him. At last he lay free of frozen clothes and blood, the most gruesome of the wounds covered; it helped him look better — more human, less creature. She was pleased with what they’d accomplished, still, the great bruising across half of his face would not let her heart ease. Casting aside her worries for the moment, Kate completed their administrations by covering the man with a few heavy blankets.
“That’s good,” she said.
“He looks a lot better,” Tei said, echoing Kate’s own thoughts. “You did a good job.”
Kate felt touched by her daughter’s genuineness — it happened so seldom with her.
“Well, let’s get dinner ready. Your father will be home anytime.”
“You might want to keep it,” Kate said.
Monteray stopped shrugging out of his long coat and pulled it back on.
Wing & Nien Page 39