The Brand of the Warlock

by Robert Kroese

  The man glared at me.

  “I ask because now that you’ve lost your captive, that rapier is the most valuable thing in your possession. I assume that your comrades are all enterprising young men, and no doubt it has occurred to at least one of them to make the best of this disastrous operation by appropriating the rapier for himself and selling it for a profit. Perhaps that is your own motivation for keeping the weapon, although undoubtedly you will claim that you intended to split the proceeds with your fellows. The profit on such a rapier is a paltry sum to be divided twelve ways, though, and you will have to travel together at least as far as Nagyvaros to sell it without raising suspicion. At some point, you will have to sleep, and I suspect that when you wake, you will find yourself relieved of the rapier. A clever man might give the rapier to a man he deems trustworthy and get some rest while waiting for the others to grow tired. Then, when you are rested and the holder of the rapier falls asleep, you can take it from him.”

  I frowned, affecting consternation. “It occurs to me, though, that the man you deem trustworthy may not be so naïve as to fall for this ploy. In fact, I may have inadvertently sabotaged your plan by speaking so candidly. Now the man you select to hold the rapier will feel himself singled out as a rube, and likely will abscond with the weapon rather than be taken advantage of.”

  “We will cast lots to determine who holds the rapier,” offered another of the men. The leader pursed his lips but did not reply.

  “An excellent idea,” I said, “although it entails the possibility that the most devious among you ends up in possession of the rapier. Lots, as you know, are one of the chief ways in which the gods apply their will in the matters of men, and the gods are notorious for rewarding the worst among a band of evildoers as a way of punishing the rest. You could, of course, nominate a second man to watch the first, although this would in all likelihood result in identifying the two least trustworthy members of your group. Such men would likely conspire to slip away with the sword, reasoning that a two-way split would be an agreeable outcome. In the end, though, I think you will find that whatever system you devise will yield to the brute fact of power. That is, the ownership of the rapier will, tautologically, be determined by the holder of the rapier. Even now, watch how your leader, hearing talk of casting lots, moves to decide the matter.”

  This had the desired effect: the leader, who had been watching for an opportunity to seize the rapier, leaned back on his log and held up his hands in a feeble attempt to appear disinterested. This gave me the chance to bend down and pick up the rapier before any of them knew what was happening. I drew it from its scabbard and pointed it at the leader’s chin. “Consider this a lesson in leadership,” I said. “Never let the enemy determine the rules of engagement.” Still holding the rapier, I backed away from the camp. When I was cloaked in the darkness of the trees, I slid the rapier back into its scabbard, strapped it to my belt, spun around and ran toward the creek.

  Chapter Eleven

  As I neared the creek, I stopped to listen and soon heard movement a hundred yards or so to my right. Pyotr, the fool, had fled northward along the creek in an attempt to evade me. I went after him, finding him a few minutes later, tangled in a bramble. While I tried to pull his cloak free from the thorns, he struck at my face clumsily with his fist. I’d been expecting this, but couldn’t easily get out of the way of the blow, so I turned my head aside so that his fist struck my skull just above the ear rather than my nose, as he’d intended. I heard something crack, and it wasn’t my skull. Pyotr cried out in pain.

  “Shut up!” I snapped, cuffing him across the cheek. “If those bandits show up while you’re still tangled in this bush, I’m leaving you here.”

  “You mean there really are bandits? I thought you were making that up to scare us.”

  “No, that part was true.” I’d gotten him free. “Go. South, this time, unless you’d prefer to take your chances with the bandits.”

  He complied, and we crept along the creek for some time in silence. Occasionally I stopped and glanced behind us to make sure we weren’t being followed.

  “What is your name?” he asked after we’d covered nearly half the distance back to the bridge.

  “You won’t be needing my name.”

  “Are you a sorcerer?”

  “No.”

  “Why do you have those marks on your face?”

  “I cut myself shaving. Turn left. Climb up that hillock.”

  “Why?”

  “The posse is coming.”

  “Then you were telling the truth about that as well?”

  “More or less. Don’t cry out or I’ll gut you. Climb.”

  Pyotr did as instructed. Together we hunched down behind a shrub at the top of the hillock as the posse slowly approached and then passed beneath us. I held my knife to Pyotr’s back. I was right about the posse: they carried torches and were making almost as much noise as Pyotr’s supposed kidnapers. I counted only eleven of them, which meant they’d probably left horses near the bridge.

  When they’d passed, I prodded Pyotr back down the hillock.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “To your father.”

  “What will you tell him?”

  “The truth.”

  “You think he will reward you for rescuing me if he knows I concocted the scheme myself?”

  I hesitated. The lad made a good point. “I suppose we shall have to agree to leave out your involvement.”

  “Ah, then you’ll be a co-conspirator!” Pyotr cried.

  “What is it to you?” I asked, irritated. “I have need of money, and no qualms about taking it from a man such as your father.”

  “It’s only that I imagined you to be of purer motive.”

  “My face should have told you different.”

  “I assumed it was part of your camouflage, making yourself appear more fearsome than you are. But I’m afraid it’s no good. He will never believe one man could face down a whole gang of bandits.”

  “He will believe it.”

  “No, he is a skeptical and miserly man. He’ll suspect you of being in league with the bandits, and I shall be forced to testify against you lest suspicion fall on me as well.”

  “I appreciate the warning of your inevitable betrayal.”

  “I warn you so that we can reason together and avoid the eventuality. Look, I’ve got eighteen ermes in my boot. Between that and the rapier, you’ve made a fair profit for a night’s work.”

  We had emerged from the woods, and in the distance I saw Ember’s mane shimmering in the moonlight. I breathed a sigh of relief; the posse either hadn’t seen her or had left her unmolested. There were no other horses around; the posse must have left theirs on the other side of the bridge.

  “Why are you suddenly so afraid to see your plan through?” I asked, as we moved across the open ground toward Ember.

  “To be honest,” Pyotr said, “it was not entirely my plan.”

  “What? You’re going to claim someone else put you up to it?” We had reached Ember, and I went to untie her.

  Pyotr shook his head. “What happened was this: yesterday, two friends and I went to explore the ruins of the temple called Romok, which are in the Maganyos Valley, on the southern outskirts of my father’s land. Several sheep have gone missing lately, and the shepherds, who owe tribute to my father, have protested that evil things are coming out of the ruins and making off with their sheep. It’s nonsense, of course; just a way for lazy and superstitious men to excuse a lack of vigilance. I decided to camp at the ruins for a night to demonstrate the innocuousness of the site.”

  “And being a coward, you took two friends along.”

  “It’s hardly cowardice to travel with company, as you well know, and what transpired next proved the wisdom of that decision.”

  I waved my hand impatiently. “Proceed.”

  “We—my two friends and I—spent the afternoon exploring the ruins and carousing. At one point, Abel found
an old bleached skull half-buried in the dirt, and we had great fun carrying it around and moving its jaw while imitating some of our more loathsome acquaintances. At last we grew bored of this game and, leaving the skull more-or-less where we found it, went to where we had set up camp and bedded down for the night. I awoke sometime in the middle of the night and found myself unable to get back to sleep. Annoyed by the snoring of my comrades and thinking to amuse myself, I stuffed my bedroll full of grass so that it appeared I was still sleeping and then retrieved the skull and placed it where my head would have been. I crept behind one of the old fallen stones and made the ghastliest noises I could muster, until at last Abel awoke. Terrified, he shook Liam, and the two of them cowered there for some time while I continued to groan and wail like a man possessed. At last one of them tried to wake me, and I watched as the skull rolled off my pillow and came to a halt a few inches from the fire, the shadows flickering across its countenance seeming to bring it back to life. My two friends got up and ran back toward my father’s manor, some two miles away. I tried to bid them to come back, but I was laughing too hard to speak. By the time I’d recovered, they were too far away to hear me.

  “Assuming they would soon realize I’d played a trick on them and return, I waited for nearly an hour by myself as the fire slowly died. I began to think I was perhaps not safe out there on my own, and had just started to follow my friends back when a man stepped out of the darkness. I could see that he had several others with him. It was Elias, the leader of the group you met back there.

  “At first I was relieved, for I knew Elias and his fellows. They are the sons of farmers and laborers who live in the area. Not bad folks, but farming is seasonal work, and idle men of low breeding often congregate together and cause mischief. I suppose it is the less constrained among these sorts who eventually turn into the hardened bandits you speak of, but Elias and his gang rarely get up to more than public drunkenness and violation of the curfew in Kalyiba. It seemed that this night they had had the same idea as my friends and I: they had come to test their bravery against the ghosts said to be haunting that place.

  “Finding no ghosts, but rather only a lone man hoping in vain for the return of his comrades, Elias and his gang made the best of the situation. At first I assumed my elevated social status would protect me—for even the most dissolute hooligan thinks twice before molesting the son of a count—but they preyed upon my vanity, pretending to be very impressed that the owner of the ruins had come to give them a guided tour of the site. I should have told them to be off at once, as they were technically trespassing, but I feared that I would appear foolish if they did not comply. So I told them I would happily tell them what I knew about the history of the ruins if they would then leave me in peace, as I was very tired. I told them what I knew, which was little enough, and bid them be gone. But Elias claimed I was holding out on them, and he began to joke that they would hold me hostage until gave them the full story of the ruins. I don’t know if Elias really believed there was something I wasn’t telling him, or if he were simply toying with me, but I soon realized I had let the game go too far. I drew my rapier, but they only laughed, and I lost my nerve. I pretended I was offering it to them as a ransom, and soon I was offering them my purse as well. I think by that time Elias had begun to sober up and realized he had threatened the son of a count, so he had little choice but to beg my forgiveness or pursue the matter to the end. Thinking he might kill me, I suggested they ransom me to my father for a thousand ermes, which they might split among themselves. I promised to go along with the scheme and not reveal their identities to my father.”

  “Then you really were being ransomed.”

  “In a manner of speaking. But you see, I was only stalling for time. My father will never pay.”

  “Perhaps he will not pay the full ransom, but he will surely give some reward for the return of his son.”

  Pyotr shook his head. “I will tell you this because you have saved my life, and because I don’t think you are the sort of man to tell stories in any case. My father maintains his title at the whim of the Torzseki. They have squeezed him for every erme he has, and in return they allow him the fiction that he rules County Kavics. He could not pay if he wanted to, and I doubt he would pay if he could. I am his eighth child and his fourth son. He does not want for heirs.”

  “But has the man no affection for you?”

  Pyotr seemed truly pained to consider the matter. “I think I would rather die than find out how little,” he said quietly. “I am glad not to have to die at the hands of Elias or that unruly posse, but you strike me as an honorable man despite your claims to the contrary. Look, the sky is lightening in the east. Perhaps you could kill me beside this pleasant creek as the sun rises. Elias’s band took my purse, but you will find, as I mentioned, eighteen ermes in my boot.”

  I was taken aback by the young man’s plea. If he was pretending, he was a far better actor than I would have imagined. “Surely you would not rather die than face your father?”

  “I am not afraid to face him, but I will not be humiliated. If you intend to demand a reward from him, I will claim that you are one of the kidnapers to avoid testing my father’s esteem for me.”

  I sighed. The lad was no doubt a practiced liar, but I didn’t think he had it in him to push the ruse this far. He really was prepared to die rather than face humiliation, and I could hardly blame him. “Take off your clothes,” I said.

  “I would prefer to remain clothed for my execution.”

  “I’m not executing you. If you have more than eighteen ermes on you, though, I’ll take you to your father and we’ll see about that reward.”

  Pyotr did as instructed. When he was naked and shivering on the bank of the creek, I went through his clothes and found exactly eighteen ermes. Satisfied he was telling the truth, I put them in my purse and then climbed onto Ember.

  “May I get dressed?” he asked.

  “If you like.”

  He began to put on his trousers. “You are not going to demand a reward from my father?”

  “No.”

  “Thank you.”

  I shrugged. “The posse will be back here soon. If you cross the bridge, you should be able to find their horses. Wait for them there. They’ll take you home.”

  “What do I tell them?”

  “Whatever you like.”

  “They’ll demand a reward.”

  “You escaped on your own. A man doesn’t earn a reward for letting you ride his horse.”

  “What if they catch Elias and his gang?”

  “They won’t. They’ll pursue them to the edge of the woods, realize they’ve lost them and come back for their horses. They’ll find you and figure it’s better to get you home than to head out across the plains after the bandits.”

  Pyotr nodded, seeing the sense in this.

  I gave Ember a kick and we started up the embankment toward the road. With a glance back, I saw Pyotr pulling his shirt over his head as the edge of the sun peaked above the horizon.

  I shook my head. Eighteen ermes and a rapier was a far cry from the thousand ermes I was hoping for. Still, the young man was alive, the rapier looked to be a respectable weapon, and eighteen ermes would buy me another week in Nagyvaros to look for Beata. It was the first break I’d had since getting out of Nincs Varaslat.

  Cold and tired but in good spirits, I took the Cotton Road east and then cut overland to avoid the town where I’d seen the posse gathering. Getting back on the road, we traveled until the sun was halfway to its zenith, and then I directed Ember to a field where we lay down and slept until mid-afternoon. I mounted her again and we traveled for another three hours, getting to Nagyvaros just after sundown. When we reached the quarter where the inn was located, I handed Ember off to a liveryman and then went to the inn, where I ate a meal of fish and bread, paid the innkeeper for a private room for a month, and slept until morning.

  Chapter Twelve

  For the next five days, I searched
in vain for clues regarding Beata’s whereabouts. The neighborhood of the inn had changed a great deal since I had first gone there looking for her six years earlier, the city’s less desirable elements having broken out of the ghettos to the south and west and converged on the Hidden Quarter as if by some tacit agreement. Residents with the means to move to more dignified areas of the city did so, taking their wealth and prestige with them. In at least one way this served me: what I paid for a month’s stay at the inn would once have bought me perhaps a week. But the change complicated my search: few of the residents and shopkeepers in the area had been there for more than a few years, and those who had were suspicious and defensive as a rule. In any case, few of them remembered a beautiful girl with honey-blond hair who had once entranced the customers of the Lazy Crow with her songs, and none of these had any clue of her whereabouts. The most I got from anyone were fragments of a story I already knew: Beata had disappeared after some sort of disturbance at the inn.

  I didn’t bother with the bandages during my inquiries. I found that if I approached in daylight, giving a cough or scuffling my feet to announce my arrival, people were generally not overly frightened of my appearance. That isn’t to say that they were warm or friendly, but only that they treated me as they might some other pitiable specimen of humanity, such as a hunchback or paralytic. I avoided smiling or any other overt expression of emotion, as these resulted in contortions of the dark labyrinth that made it appear even more sinister.

  I found too that the brand could be a boon to my efforts as well as a hindrance. It certainly augmented my ability to intimidate, as I’d learned when dealing with Pyotr’s captors, but it also made me memorable. After a few hours of inquiring of shopkeepers, everyone in the neighborhood knew of the strange man with the disfigured face who was asking about a woman who had disappeared six years earlier. After two days, I daresay everyone in the city knew. If anyone in the city knew Beata’s whereabouts, pity or curiosity might prompt them to seek me out. If Beata was still in the city, she might even come to the Hidden Quarter to see this strange man for herself.