Evil water rushed down his nose. All he could hear was the pounding of his heart. They struck the muddy bottom, which threw up a cloud that was nearly as blinding as the wizard’s magic.
The snake was wrapped around one arm, his chest, and legs. Muscles tightened, trying to crush the life from him. All Chattarak had to do was outlast him, but the wizard was wounded and impatient. The fangs released from his wrist and bit deep into this shoulder. Ashok grimaced at the twin punctures, and regretted it as precious bubbles escaped from between his teeth.
As they rolled along the bottom being propelled by evil forces toward distant hell, Ashok knew he was running out of air…But if the Heart of the Mountain could beat for a Protector to get them through a crushed throat or punctured lung, then maybe it could stave off drowning for a time as well? Ashok focused on that, and since he didn’t fade into unconsciousness, it must have worked. Only as he used the Heart for that, his body was no longer resilient enough to hold off the crushing pressure of the snake. His ribs creaked and his back popped, but the sacrifice bought him time.
When the snake had removed its fangs from Ashok’s wrist, it meant he was now free to reach one of the knives on his belt. He drew a blade and plunged it through the scales, again and again. This knife was a mere four inches long, just wider than the palm of his hand, but sharp as a razor, and each time he twisted it hard before ripping it free, opening a massive hole in the beast.
He just kept on stabbing, over and over. Chattarak bit him again, but whatever manner of poison was contained in those fangs, the Heart of the Mountain had encountered it before, so it did nothing beyond burn and cause his muscles to cramp. The wizard was weakening and could no longer keep them stuck at the bottom. They floated along, locked in a battle to the death, the surface tantalizingly close.
Chattarak must have been growing desperate, because the death grip loosened. Either he was going to try and swim away, or come at Ashok from a different angle, but it didn’t matter, because the instant Ashok’s hand bumped into a better weapon, he let the little knife float away, and took hold of the katar still embedded through the snake. The river turned red as Ashok began sawing it back and forth through the serpent, splitting scales and the muscles beneath.
Then everything turned magically black.
They broke the surface and Ashok gasped for air. The snake was gone and Chattarak had returned. The wizard had either passed out or was dead, but Ashok still didn’t know how to swim. He immediately turned the Heart back toward granting strength to his limbs, and grabbed onto one of the wizard’s arms before he could be swept away.
The shore was near. They’d traveled surprisingly far on the current, but he could see the casteless’s fires burning nearby. Ashok kicked and wallowed about grotesquely in the evil river, and his head kept plunging back below the surface. He was so tempted to let go of Chattarak, so that he could use both hands to flail, but he would not give the evil water that victory.
“Curse you, river! I am Ashok Vadal and I will not drown in you! Give me this wizard and let me go!”
His boot struck solid ground, just a toe, but it was enough. It took several tries to stand on the slippery rocks, but he slowly made his way ashore. The ground ahead was cold, clinging mud, but it was the most wonderful thing he had ever felt. Crawling, he dragged Chattarak all the way out of the river before flopping down next to him.
Ashok took several deep breaths and tried to compose himself. The cold had pierced him to the core. He couldn’t stop shaking.
Chattarak was still breathing, but was missing an eye, there were a multitude of stab wounds scattered across his body, and the katar wound had gone from a single puncture to opening him from sternum to pelvis. The wizard coughed up river water and blood.
Ashok took hold of his collar and shook him. “Where is Thera?”
The wizard’s teeth were stained with blood as he gasped, “I’m afraid to die.”
“I am not,” Ashok snarled. “Help me find her so I can.”
As it to spite him, Chattarak died anyway.
Ashok roared in anger, drew back his fist, and with a single furious blow shattered half the bones in the wizard’s face. He rolled off the body and lay on his back in the mud beside the dead man.
He tried to control his breathing. Red blood and black venom slowly dribbled from his arm and shoulder. The poison caused a great deal of pain, but was nothing compared to the terrible feeling of not knowing what to do next.
On the side of justice there was an answer to every question, even if it was a simple because the Law requires it. There was power in certainty. If the solution wasn’t obvious, every man had a place, so there had always been a superior to tell him what to do. Now he had many followers, but had never been more alone. The not knowing was one of the harshest parts of his sentence.
The Law would give him no direction beyond obedience to his final orders. But how could he serve a prophet he couldn’t find? He had followed the most tenuous of leads across the eastern third of Lok, pursued like criminal scum every step, only to kill the one man who knew the path.
Frustrated, wounded, damp, freezing, and lying in the mud, Ashok had nowhere else to turn. The wizard had said Sikasso was not a patient man. Thera’s time was running out.
No one else would help him find Thera, so he might as well try the gods who’d supposedly chosen her.
“Heed me, Forgotten. I have made an oath I cannot break. If you are real and you want Thera found, I demand you show me the way…Also, your people keep flocking to me. If you give a damn about the fools who believe in you, then help me to not spend their lives uselessly. You are supposedly gods, so act like it.” He waited a moment. Their silence just made him angrier. “If you do not, to the oceans with you, and I will do it myself!”
Satisfied that ought to do it, Ashok got to his feet. The coils of the snake had wrenched his knee, and he couldn’t put his full weight on it. He pulled the katar from Chattarak’s body so he would at least have a decent weapon, then started back toward the docks to see if Gutch was still alive.
He paused when he realized that he was being watched by two of the non-people. They’d come over from their fire to see what the commotion was about, and were just standing there, wide-eyed and silent. They were both male, and appeared stronger than most untouchables. If they thought he was just some foolish whole man who’d washed up on their shore, easy to be robbed, he held up the bloody katar to show them he was not in the mood. “What do you want?”
“All along the river, our people have been whispering about a hero,” said one. “Could it be?”
“Are you Fall?” asked the other, hesitant.
It was pointless to deny his identity. Ashok lowered the katar. “That was my casteless name. How did you know?”
“You killed the barge master! Who else could do such a thing?” They were awestruck. Thankfully they didn’t start bowing, because he couldn’t stomach that right now. “The barge master was a monster. A terrible, terrible devil.”
“He took our women whenever he wanted, even drowned some of us for sport. But when we heard about Fall, who fights for the casteless, we prayed for the gods to send you to save us from him. And they did! They really answered our prayers!”
Ashok just shook his head. It seemed the gods were rather fickle about whose prayers they answered. Perhaps the casteless asked nicely? What foolishness. “At least someone is having a successful night.” He muttered as he started limping away.
“Thank you, Fall! We’ll tell the others about you. We’ll sing songs about you! Tonight we celebrate for now we are safe. The whole men will give us a new barge master to pole for, but hopefully that one won’t be so evil.”
“Wait…” Ashok stopped. He thought back to his own time on the Martaban River with Keta and Thera, and how their barge had been driven by…casteless. “You rode on Chattarak’s barge? Did you go with him downriver?”
The two exchanged a confused glance. “Of course. Whole men
are too lazy to pole. He sat in the shade and drank wine while we worked.”
It couldn’t be. “There is a secret castle in the wilderness to the east, somewhere by the sea. Did he ever take you there?”
“Sure. The river don’t go all the way to his golden house. There’s more tributaries than I’ve got fingers and toes, but I know which he used to get close.”
Ashok began to laugh. Sometimes it was too easy to forget about the casteless.
Chapter 27
Ashok sat alone by the river, sharpening his new sword. It was a Vadal blade, similar—not in power, but in style—to mighty Angruvadal. They had found it in Chattarak’s warehouse along with several other fine weapons and pieces of armor from various houses, probably trophies taken off those he had defeated. This sword would replace the simple one Ashok had dropped in the river, but nothing would ever replace his ancestor blade.
From the hesitant footsteps upon the dock, Ashok could tell that it was Keta who approached. “You should not try and sneak up on a man like me in the dark, Keeper. It never ends well.”
“Thera is the one who is good at sneaking. I wasn’t sneaking. I was merely trying to be polite and not interrupt. May I join you?”
“Very well.” Ashok went back to polishing the blade. There were a few spots of rust on it. Chattarak had never bothered to clean his trophies or store them properly, and that disgusted the ever meticulous Ashok. Since they had found a way to proceed without the wizard’s help, it made Ashok glad that he’d killed him. Improper equipment maintenance was an indication of poor character.
“Why are you sitting by the water? You’re constantly going on about how evil it is.”
“Evil is what I deserve.” Mostly Ashok had picked this spot because it was quiet. Back in the camp the new recruits kept trying to talk to him. He didn’t like the way they looked at him with adoration, or spoke to him about their hopes.
“You are rather morose.” Keta approached, carrying a clay jug and two cups.
“What do you have there, Keeper?”
“I don’t know, but these eastern folk love to get drunk from it. Since we are going our separate ways in the morning, I thought we could have a drink together.” Keta sat next to him. From the smell, the Keeper had already been doing quite a bit of drinking on his own. Ashok placed the sword on a cloth, and took the offered cup. “That’s what men do, isn’t it?”
“Legally speaking, neither of us is a whole man.”
“Fine. Then that’s what friends do.”
Ashok began to respond, but then realized he didn’t really know what to say. Oddly enough, Keta’s words were probably true enough. So he just held out the cup so Keta could pour.
“How goes the preparations, Keeper?”
“Well, tomorrow the local casteless will ferry the women, children, and infirm across the river, and I will guide them to our refuge in the south.” Keta proceeded to fill his own cup. “Jagdish is looting supplies from Chattarak’s warehouse to outfit the Sons who are traveling east with you, while Gutch took the wizard’s valuables into Haradas to sell at deep discounts to merchants who will ask few questions, so that you may have funds…I figure he’ll bring you some, tell you that’s all of it, while most of the notes end up in that greedy worker’s pocket.”
“How is his head?”
“Sore, but workers have exceedingly thick skulls.” Keta lifted his cup. “May you find glory, kill many vile wizards, and bring our prophet back safe and sound.”
Ashok downed the cup. It burned worse than the snake venom. Keta drank too. His face turned red and he began to cough violently. “That isn’t drink. That is liquid cruelty!” After composing himself, Keta asked, “Another?”
“No thank you. I think I would be better off using the rest of it to remove the rust from this sword.”
“Probably wise. The casteless I got it from warned me that this stuff can make you go blind.” The two of them watched the flowing river in silence for a time. Keta poured himself another cup anyway. “I wish I was going with you, Ashok. Thera is my prophet. My responsibility.”
“You feel guilty.”
“Of course I do! But I can’t neglect my people any longer. Thera and I left because the Forgotten wanted us to find you. I had to talk her into it. I had to pay her a lot in fact.”
“I still do not understand having to pay your prophet for her services as a mercenary criminal to serve the rebellion she commands.”
“Eh, it’s complicated. There’s the Voice and then there’s Thera, and I’ve learned they’re two very different things. I don’t know why the gods chose her. The Forgotten tells us things through her, which she then ignores and does what she wants anyway. Thera doesn’t care about the Law anymore, but she’s made up her own code to replace it. I can’t for the life of me figure it out. She’ll come around eventually. If she’s still alive that is…Not that you care. Sometimes I think you’d prefer she were dead, so that you’d be free of your obligation.”
“At times,” Ashok said truthfully. But at the same time, rebel or not, oddly enough he was fond of the stubborn woman. She had saved him from a river. It was only right to save her from wizards. “As you said, it is complicated.”
“I worry constantly. What if Thera was tortured into giving up the rebellion’s location and they told the Inquisition?”
“If everyone is dead when you reach your hideout, then you will know that answer.”
Keta gave a long sigh. “You are a most melancholy drinking partner. Or what if in our absence, deprived of the Forgotten’s guidance, my people have turned to wickedness?”
Ashok snorted.
“Don’t you laugh at me, Ashok Vadal! Surely by now you know there’s some truth to all this gods business!”
“I intended no offense.” He thought about keeping it to himself, but what was the use? “I did not tell you before, Keeper, but after I killed Chattarak, I knew not where to go, so I demanded that your gods show me the way. Which is when these casteless approached, willing to help.”
Keta got really excited. “You asked and the gods sent them to you? It’s a miracle!”
“It is something.” Ashok looked at the jug, thought to hell with it, and poured himself another cup of the disgusting drink. It reminded him of the stuff that some Protector acolytes would secretly make during training, fermenting odd vegetables in glass jars hidden behind the practice field. There had been no specific rule against acolytes making their own alcohol, but Ashok had been so devoted to following the spirit of the rules that he had not drunk any, until Devedas had ordered him to maintain unit cohesion. When Ratul had found out they’d all received a severe beating. Good times.
“I do not know what it is, Keeper. But it is…something.”
“The gods smile upon you, Ashok. You are our new Ramrowan. That’s why I know that I can take these people south. It is the gods’ will that I make this rebellion succeed, just as it is their will that you protect Thera. Once we’re reunited we will build our great army, and together, bring freedom to Lok.”
Ashok said nothing, but if that was the case, perhaps failure was for the best? Maybe that was the lesson Omand had been trying to teach. Without Thera’s gift, Keta’s rebellion would fold. All who believed in their foolish dreams would be executed. Maybe their dismal failure would be so epic that it would long serve as an example to anyone else who thought about crossing the Law, and Ashok’s participation would only add to their infamy.
“You seem so certain, Keta.”
“I am. I know we are accomplishing great things.”
“I was certain of things once.” Ashok drank more of the poisonous swill. “I miss it.”
“You were magically indoctrinated to be a perfect tool of tyranny, untroubled by fear or remorse. Of course you were certain, because they’d left you no capacity for doubt! Now that you’ve seen the truth, their construction crumbles!” Keta pounded down yet another cup of the vile drink. This time the coughing fit was rather short, a
nd he quickly poured another. Most of it missed and splashed onto the docks.
“It is not so pleasant when your very mind is the crumbling construction in question.”
“You feel doubt? Good! That means you’re human after all! I’m glad you’re questioning your conditioning.”
Ashok had spent his life defending the Law, and when some of the highest representatives of the Law had put him on this path, he had immediately complied. He was still following those orders. Yet Sikasso had claimed to be working for the Grand Inquisitor too. Chattarak had not answered his question, but who else was in any position to promise his sword to criminals? Ancestor blades were sacred, not trinkets to be bargained with. The very thought of Omand being so selfish filled Ashok with an anger that only a bearer could comprehend.
No one was above the Law, but the Grand Inquisitor was a vital champion of it, and Ashok’s final orders had been signed by some of the highest-status judges in the Capitol. Those people created the Law. Why would they damage the very thing they were sworn to protect?
Maybe it was the strong drink making him think this way, but if their paths ever crossed again, Ashok would ask Omand why he had given out a punishment that required loyal servants like Ishaan Harban to sacrifice their lives. For the Grand Inquisitor’s sake, it had better be a damned good answer.
Keta had finished yet another cup of the potent substance, and he wasn’t a very large man to begin with. His eyes had gone watery and he was swaying a bit. “You’re quiet. What are you brooding about now?”
“I do not…brood.”
“Ha! That’s all you do. Brood and kill people! You, my friend, need a hobby.”
“Your drunkenness has made you more annoying than usual. Besides, I already have a hobby.”
“What?”
“Sword practice.”
The Keeper of Names began to laugh so hard he threatened to topple off the dock. In his inebriated state, he’d probably drown immediately. Now that would be an ignominious end to a rebellion. Ashok stood, retrieved his new sword, and then helped Keta up. “Come on. You need to sleep. We both have long journeys ahead of us tomorrow.”
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