by A Van Wyck
The woods returned to empty stillness, the few instants of murderous cacophony having made no lasting impression on it.
Curious, she rolled the dead man over. Above the crimson gape of the neck sat a face that could pass for Imperial or Renali either one. Stooping, she pawed through the pockets (professionally empty). Perhaps the saddlebags would be more forthcoming, once she’d found their horse–
She was no longer alone in the clearing.
A moment ago she would have staked her life on the fact that these two had been working alone. Now it seemed she had done exactly that. In the space between one blink and the next she registered the slight figure standing at the edge of the trees, sheathed in dark leathers and masked in the Rasrini style.
Her blow-dart winged away at almost the same instant, speeding toward the newcomer. Who blithely sidestepped and disappeared in a swirl of coal-colored smoke.
Unholy sorcery!
The beak of her pick-blade glinting in one hand, a dagger appearing on close guard in the other, she readied herself for the inevitable attack. Her eyes swept the seabed of needles and ferns for the slightest movement. The stillness of the woods settled like an oppressive weight. Her senses strained to catch a hint of her oppo–
No one looking at her ungainly form ever expected speed from her. In truth, her ridiculously low center of gravity and thick slabs of muscles (easily mistaken for fat) made sudden, violent movement child’s play. And her unconventional choice of weapons extended her limited reach far beyond what a simple dagger might yield. The end result was a funeral procession of dead bodies, expressions of intense surprise frozen on their features.
Like the two in this clearing, soon to be three…
There!
The hook of her pick-blade sheared through insubstantial smoke. Her dagger met an unseen weapon edge-on. She followed up with a vicious swipe that hit nothing, spinning to follow the suggestion of movement.
The sensation of closeness receded. She resumed her defensive crouch amid the storm of settling leaves.
A dozen paces distant her assailant reappeared from thin air, standing straight and empty-handed once more. She awaited the next attack, considering going on the offen–
Wetness ran down the inside of her thigh.
Disbelieving, she checked to see whether she’d pissed herself. Her downward glance revealed the hilts of two daggers sprouting from her chest.
Nin watched as the strange, round little woman with the quick hands took in the blades sunk between her ribs.
Slowly, very slowly, like swans bowing their necks, the woman’s weapons were lowered. Then she keeled over backward with comic abruptness, stumpy legs kicking high. A most fatalistic cabaret.
Bemused, Nin looked around the little clearing, eyes finding two more bodies. She wondered what in perdition she’d just interrupted. She had left the rescued clergyman to the two Heli warriors, having no further interest in their goings-on. She would find them later, to collect her payment.
The business with the creature, Marco, had left her confused and unnerved. She’d been absorbed in her own thoughts as she’d made her way through the woods and down the mountain. She had not expected to meet anyone. Certainly, she hadn’t expected to come under attack.
It had been a very strange day all-round.
With a shake of her head, she resumed her journey.
EPILOGUE
A sun, newly risen. A pastoral scene. A lone figure, ambling in the distance. A perfect picture. But something was missing. Whistling was called for! He tried again. Whistling was what should be happening! He was doing all the right things! Another attempt produced a bar of off-key raspberries.
“Aagh!”
He must be missing something. He worked through his list again.
“Lips! Pouting!” he shouted.
He made sure, prodding at them experimentally with one hand.
“Gah!” he choked, spitting. “Phut! Phew! What is that?”
He held the hand up to his face, inspecting it minutely as he continued on his solitary way.
“What is this?” he vented, outraged. “Look at the state of these nails! All black rimed and chipped! This is a disgrace! Why, just look at this one here. What is that?” He sniffed at the filthy finger experimentally. “It smells like someone wiped their ass with it!” He spun, screaming. “Who’s been wiping their ass on my finger?!” He turned a full circle, glaring impressively at the silent pine trees. With a flash of intuition, he locked eyes with the nearest one. “You there! Trying to hide behind that fern! Yes, you!”
The tree froze.
A more promising approach occurred and he changed tack. “Come now,” he cajoled slyly, “we’re all friends here…”
The tree stared at him, poleaxed.
“You can tell me,” he continued, “it’ll feel good to get it off your cabinet… I mean chair– I mean chest!”
The tree was obviously too petrified to respond.
“Don’t feel like talking, eh?” he said, hefting the woodsman’s axe he’d found abandoned, stuck upright and forgotten in a chopping block. Next to a farmhouse with smoke pouring from the chimney. With the bright steel cradled to his chest, he tiptoed nearer the tree. “I have something here that will loosen your trunk… I mean table– I mean tongue!” he purred. “In fact,” he crowed, “loosen any limb – haha! – you care to name!” He crept closer.
“Heeeeeee!”
The sound was womanly indignity made manifest. He fumbled the axe in fright, looking for the author of the piping scream.
“What do you think you are doing?” he found himself being berated, the timbre and tone transporting him effortlessly to a time of pre-pubescent guilt.
“Nothing!” he yelped automatically, stepping quickly to hide the axe behind his back. “Nothing at all! I… er… was just… um… and the… ah…” he cast a guilty look at the tree, “I wasn’t going to…” he tried disarmingly, with a nonchalant shrug, “I was just… um… well, you know how it is… haha! When you… er…”
He gave up and made a run for it, pelting off down the narrow track between the thick boles. The relieved tree was left in the company of no one at all. Though he did turn back briefly – once he’d reached a safe distance – to shake a fist and vent before continuing his headlong flight.
“It’s my hand, you hear me!” he yelled over his shoulder. “Mine!”
He tripped, his foot snagging on a root. It wasn’t your average, Whoops, I seem to have fallen. It was a proper, full-fledged face plant. It started with the impromptu swan dive and ended with the masterfully executed full-body plough. He carved a furrow through the blanket of pine needles. His legs even made a halfhearted attempt at an end-over-end tumble. But finding the momentum insufficient, they merely hung abashedly above his head for a moment before snapping back to earth. So flattened, he turned his head, spitting black dirt.
The axe, having made a keener effort and having achieved greater height, came down a moment later. The shiny blade chopped into the loam a hand’s breadth from his face and stuck there. His eyes shot wide at its sudden appearance and he remained absolutely motionless for a long moment, staring fixedly at the bright steel.
“Nose hairs!” he screamed, curling up into a ball and pressing his face closer to the mirroring metal. He lay on the ground, one hand maligning his nose this way and that, plucking offending follicles with the other.
That kept him busy for some time.
Eventually, he got up and dusted himself off, one nostril significantly less hairy than the other. And – would you look at that! – someone had left an axe out! He scooped it up. After a moment’s confusion and a smart crack to the head he managed to balance it on one shoulder. He set out.
A wooded scene. Light playing through the branches. A solitary figure. But the tableau needed something. Whistling was for the birds. So he decided he would skip merrily along. He’d never skipped before. Could not, in fact, remember ever having seen anyone skipping. But
it couldn’t be that difficult if children did it, could it? He experimented with some different steps, trying to get it right… then left… then right again. He oscillated uselessly between wading like a heron and tiptoeing like a centipede. Finally he settled on using both legs at once. Rabbits were merry creatures, after all!
He hopped along until he collapsed, sweating and panting and hovering on the cusp of unconsciousness. Curse all rabbits, children, centipedes and herons – in that order! Rabbits were profoundly evil creatures, he was beginning to find. Perhaps even more evil than children.
With a titanic effort of will, he picked himself up and continued on his way. There was an axe following him, he noted, its silvery wedge leaving a snail’s trail in their wake. He would have to be mindful not to feed it or show it any kindness, otherwise he might never be rid of it.
Finally he came to the river. It was foaming at the mouth and so he kept a wary distance. He might approach later, if he were feeling brave, to let it smell his hand and perhaps to pet it. The axe thought the icy waters looked choppy. Two large stones poked their heads above the water. He hid out of sight in a hollow until they lost interest.
Seized by a sudden spur to action, he topped his trench to brave the soft sand of the bank, ducking and dodging imagined arrows as he ran. With significant flair, he stabbed the butt of the axe into the ground, planting if firmly. He struck a regal pose, one foot up on a nearby stone.
“I claim this land,” he declaimed, looking around imperiously, “in the name of evil rabbits, woodpeck-peckers and spotted mushrooms!” His voice became shrill as he added, “But not poached eggs!”
With that, he began singing a nonsense song, marching up and down the bank, waving to imagined crowds and stopping only to kiss the odd baby. It was before his speech and during a spectacularly impressive salute that his gaze was drawn up, following the curve or the river around the bend. Up, up into the mountains.
His mismatched nostrils quivered.
“Blood in the water,” he mused. “Yes, oh yes, hairy hairy blood!” He came to himself as if waking from a dream. “Oh, well. Best get on with it.” He moved off toward the tree line, performing strange motions, bending his knees and swinging his arms in tandem with every other step.
“Limbering up! Very important! Don’t want to pull something do we?” He hesitated, uncertainty crawling across his face. “Or do we? Do we want to pull something? Are we pulling something? Did we come here to pull something? I could have sworn we came to build… Why doesn’t anyone ever tell me these things?” He seemed on the verge of tears. “I don’t wanna play anymore!” He stamped his foot in tantrum.
Which was when he saw, among the crowd of trees, one in particular that stood out as familiar.
It had followed him!
“You!?!” He accused.
The tree feigned innocence but he was not fooled. It was, quite obviously, at the center of a plot. But now that he’d rooted it out, he would bring it down. He, Phelamy Mop, hero of ages! And there! Standing in a spear of sunlight, the instrument of his vengeance, bestowed by the heavens themselves: an axe!
He scampered over but stopped just shy of it.
Hang on. Why would the heavens-themselves leave a perfectly good axe lying around? The suspicion surfaced that this might be some sort of trap. Since they were in the woods, a bear trap would be expected. But bears didn’t use axes. Woodsmen did, though. And woodsmen set traps for bears, didn’t they? This looked like a woodsman’s axe. So perhaps it was not a bear trap but a woodsman trap. Woodsmen who carried axes set traps for bears. So it would make sense that woods who didn’t like axes set traps for woodsmen. This might be just another pitfall in the deadly tree plot.
Experimentally, he hopped closer and hurriedly back out of reach again. Closer and away again. Nothing happened. Licking his lips, he extended one hand slowly, touching a finger to the axe blade before jerking away and skipping back two steps. But the axe remained motionless. Satisfied, he snatched it up. Holding it high above his head and laughing maniacally, he capered back towards the offensive tree, dancing a little jig. Reaching it, he halted, axe held behind his back.
“Well hello there! Remember me? We spoke earlier.”
He brought one hand from behind his back and spat into his palm. Repeating the gesture with the other he rubbed the two together, giggling in anticipation. With neither hand holding the axe, it fell, clattering hollowly. He whirled to grab at the handle. Glancing at the tree, he directed his eyes past it, widening them hugely. He pointed, yelling, “What is that!?” in an astonished voice and hefted the axe.
Oldest trick in the book.
He swung mightily, striking the hard bark. The axe rebounded and went spinning, taking him with it.
“Ouch!”
He picked himself back up, glaring at the tree.
“A most stunning defense, sir,” he complimented. And then, in a darker tone, “You almost had me fooled, you know. Despite your wooden performance. But the time has come for you to take a bough.”
He squared up to his opponent in knightly fashion, save that it was not even midday yet. With short-lived ceremony, he wet a finger to gauge the wind’s direction. This was followed by a bout of violent spitting.
Gah! Phut! What is that!?!
He hefted the axe.
“Best two out of tree,” he growled and charged again. Chips of wood flew in all directions as he made a mess of the bark.
Perhaps I’ll build a canoe, he thought. Or a rocking chair. Or a pair of shoes. Or a whistle! I’ve always wanted a whistle! Grimy sweat dripped from him.
No, he knew what he’d build... A dam! Like a beaver! Much better than evil rabbits.
“Blood in the water,” he sang his nonsense song. “Chop, chop, chop! Damn blood in the water! Chop, chop, chop! Bloody dam in the river! Chop, chop, chop!”
He kept chopping happily.
At some point, he began to whistle.
– END OF BOOK 1 –
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
André van Wyck is a South African-born writer and law school graduate. Although the necessary evils of a day job and the inconsiderate programming of AMC keep him fairly busy, he finds time to do the occasional spot of writing.
“Just to fill in the lulls while I’m waiting for my own favorite authors to publish their new works.”
His debut novel, A Clatter of Chains, published on Amazon in February of 2016.
He lives in Luxembourg with his wife and imaginary pet rock.
visit:
---www.andrevanwyck.com---
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