Sufferborn

by J C Hartcarver

  “Thanks, darlin’.” Daghahen rose and headed toward the kitchen for a discreet escape through the back alley.

  After he passed the blazing central hearth, a drunk old man rose with his arms outstretched. “Hey, mercyman! How ‘bout a dance? Don’t you good folk answer requests?” He wrapped his meaty arms around Daghahen’s whole frame. A woman with frizzy black hair cackled a stream of laughter at the two.

  “No,” Daghahen hissed. “Stop!” He wiggled until the man’s arms loosened, but the drunk grabbed at him again.

  “Give us a kiss for mercy’s sake.”

  Daghahen ducked and slid to the side. The drunk’s fingers caught his hood and pulled it off his head.

  “It’s an elf!” the black-haired woman yelled.

  It was over. Daghahen dashed for the kitchen. Those two would be on his heels now.

  Bursting through the kitchen, the cook yelled, “Marg! Where you been?”

  Daghahen slipped behind the door before he turned around. From his viewpoint through the hinge gap, he saw the wild-eyed man and his pretty lackey shoot through the door. Daghahen held his breath, standing board-stiff behind the door.

  “Who are you two? Get out, get out!”

  “Didn’t an elf come in here?” a sharp male voice hissed back.

  “I see no elves. Patrons aren’t allowed back here.” Daghahen watched the gap between the door and the frame as two pairs of footsteps pattered closer and passed through.

  “Close the door behind you!”

  The two ruffians were gone, so Daghahen himself slammed the door to satisfy the cook and prevent himself from being discovered. He ducked behind the chopping block and crawled across the floor to the linen closet on the far wall. In the shadows, amongst stacks of fresh table cloths and spare aprons, Daghahen paused to rest his heart. How long could he get away with hiding in here?

  Tap…tap…tap… The sound continued in perfect rhythm. The moon shone through the little window, and when his eyes adjusted, he reached his hands out. One hand grazed along the row of hanging cloaks belonging to the staff until it smeared across a soft, cold face. A woman’s face.

  Daghahen stifled his instinct to blurt out a “sorry.” It wasn’t needed because this woman had been murdered. He gasped instead and lifted his foot from the sticky puddle of blood under his new boots. Outside the window, a roar of voices was coming down the road with a glow of torches bouncing off the whitewashed walls of the buildings. It would be a better idea to slip out the back door before the noise reached the alley.

  Chancing a peek into the kitchen, Daghahen saw that the cook was keeping busy dicing onions and cutting limbs off amorphous, skinned animal bodies. After a while, he checked out the door and shouted for Marg at regular intervals. The readied stew bowls were accumulating, and the barmaid could no longer serve them. Daghahen had to slip out fast before the cook decided to look for Marg in the linen closet where he’d finally find her.

  After a few more minutes, the cook got so angry, he stormed into the dining hall. Daghahen finished his chant for Gariott’s Blend and dashed out the back door.

  “There!” a familiar sharp voice snapped. The man and woman had been waiting for him.

  “I don’t see where,” the woman said, and the man slapped the side of her head.

  “The door opened by itself!”

  Daghahen raced through the alley with the stranger hot on his heels. A small explosion erupted with a flash of light—this man was indeed a sorcerer.

  “See? There he is!”

  “I see him now,” the woman responded.

  Damn! The flashes of light caused glimpses of him to show. Up ahead, the group of shouting people passed the alley; a large crowd surrounded a small group of skin-hooded men, jeering and threatening them. The glow of their torches would cancel Daghahen’s spell; the spell generally worked better in daylight, but the crowd might be hiding place enough.

  He flew into the mass of people, knocking a few men over, and wound around to enter the group of tan-hoods, pulling his own over his brow. These were mercymen—real ones, like the man he had taken his hood from. The mercymen walked with their open hands held high as some form of demonstration. Daghahen mimicked them, watching over his shoulder as the man and woman chasing him emerged from the alley and reeled at the flow of people, their eyes darting to find him. Soon he lost them in the throng of anger and flickering firelight.

  After a long distance, he broke off from the mercymen and slipped into another dark alley. This one opened onto a new avenue with a few other inns. He took the inn at the corner and met the bouncer at the door.

  “Out of here, mercyman! No handouts.”

  “I’m not asking for a—”

  He shot a pointed finger alongside Daghahen’s face. “Go!”

  Five buildings down the street, some men were filing into a house with a red lantern. Daghahen weighed his coin purse and sighed. They would take all of his money. But a team of killers were lurking about looking for him, most likely for the troublesome sword he carried, and the stars glared overhead. He needed to get inside a building.

  As he stepped in line to enter the alluring atmosphere, some of the men turned around and snickered. Daghahen kept his eyes low and his mouth in a frown.

  “Does your kind go to places like this?”

  “Sure,” he said under his breath.

  “I don’t think so, old man. You must be lost.”

  “I’m just here for a room.”

  The door swung open and a brutish man waved an arm. “Come on in, fellas! Lookin’ for a place to bury yer cocks?” The line began to move, and newcomers extended the line behind Daghahen. “I recognize you…Grathe, is it? Hey, Raul, welcome. Take off yer hats and loosen yer coin.”

  When Daghahen approached the threshold, the man pressed his chest with a rough, meaty hand. “Not you, grandpa.”

  “I need a place to shut my eyes.”

  “You wanna sleep? Go to an inn.”

  “Please, I’ve got lots o’ money.”

  “Or maybe you’re looking for a free bounce. You should already know we don’t do free handouts.”

  “No, I have money—truly.” He revealed his coin purse and shook it.

  “Sorry, you didn’t leave fast enough.”

  The man’s hard fist connected with Daghahen’s jaw and knocked him flat to the dusty road. Glittering stars spun in the sky. Force of habit made him shut his eyes, and the stars remained spinning inside his eyelids.

  “This is for annoying me.” The jingling of his money faded into the night air.

  Daghahen pulled himself up and staggered to the nearest shadow, away from the laughing hooligans, trying to remember the words to the spell. In the darkness, he tripped over a heap of rubbish. A broken cart stood against the wall, and he crawled underneath it with barely enough room to fit his tall form. He yanked the hood over his face. Later, he’d try to scrape the paint off with a rock. But for now, the broken cart sheltered him. And so did his new mercy hood.

  Chapter 5

  Her Kindness

  Kalea sprang up at the first ring of Mother Superior’s hand bell—lee-ah-lee-ah-lee-ah. Hospital day! She said her morning prayers, dressed in her blue kirtle with the grey novice tabard, and flew out the big green door belonging to the novice’s dorm. She walked as swiftly as she could get away with, her suede slippers scuffing across the slate floor. She bypassed the laundry room on her way outside, pausing to wave at Joy.

  With her cloak on and hood drawn up against the chill morning air, she walked the long path through the forest toward town. The sun shone through the millions of crisp pine needles in the canopy, dappling light on the path and radiating on her skin, as if promising the return of summer heat.

  Her favorite thing about the convent was its forest location. The tree line hid the hump-backed old house with the steeple and colored windows away as well as the Sisters of Sorrow as if by the Creator’s design. They were all safe inside, though only partially cloist
ered. Established to protect disadvantaged girls in general, it also gave the well-functioning ones the opportunity to do work for the Creator in town, such as teaching the illiterate how to read and write, collecting donations, and helping out at the hospital to which she headed.

  “Good morning, sister,” various townsfolk said as she walked by. She returned the greeting with her best smile. The sun washed over Tintilly more than the forest, warming her under her heavy wool cloak and tabard. The smell of fresh-baked bread greeted her as it always did when she came here on duty, though when she approached the bakery, the bread was all gone. Her stomach ached for a slice after her thin breakfast—thinner than yesterday. Not that she could complain; some people ate less for breakfast every day than she did. Some people ate nothing for breakfast.

  The squat little plastered buildings closed in tighter the farther she went, similar in appearance to the convent. The ancient cathedral had been converted to a hospital after the new one went up. It could easily be found by following the large, pointy bell tower looming over the shorter roofs.

  She cut through various alleys on her way there and ducked under hanging laundry, like when she’d led the elf out of town. She crossed the same little courtyard with the well. Pulling her hood tighter, she cut through the market square. It stood empty because today wasn’t a market day, but she proceeded warily anyway. Father Liam had assured her the Sanctity would protect her under its own jurisdiction, as it had already punished her for the deed. But what did that mean? What if any of the laypeople found out she had banged the farmer in the face with a washing bat and aided an outlaw’s escape? She quickened her pace.

  A stale, balmy air hit her when she walked through the hospital door, as it always did. Only once in a while could she volunteer at the hospital; she missed it in between visits. Huge windows emitted hot light, and a serenade of coughs and the raving voices of the homeless welcomed her.

  A long string of linen-canopied beds stretching down the central aisle housed the sick middle class and wealthy people who could afford them. Otherwise, dozens of people sprawled out on thin beds of straw along each wall, practically shoulder to shoulder. The hospital didn’t have enough straw for everyone. Many of the hospital residents were vagrants staying for a night, elderly people, and a few mentally ill.

  She went straight to the kitchen and swapped her cloak for an apron on the wall.

  “Been a while, Kalea,” the cook said, twisting around as she stirred a huge pot of gruel.

  “Too long, if you ask me. What shall I do first?”

  “I’ve already got Annika sweeping the floor. Why don’t you take some breakfast out to the residents?” She began ladling out small portions into chipped clay bowls.

  Kalea pulled out the large wooden tray from the cupboard and placed it on the table so the cook could load it. About twelve bowls fit on the tray.

  “Are these portions smaller than the last time I volunteered?”

  The cook shrugged and placed two more on the tray. “Donations were light this month, in both dendrea and food.”

  “Oh,” Kalea said. “Why do you think that is?”

  “A famine’s comin’, according to the old folks.”

  “I see.”

  “Well, go on, girl!” Kalea lifted the tray by its handles, now much heavier, and pushed the door open with her hip.

  On the other side of the door, the sultry air made her sweat. She turned to the right and lowered her tray to the people sitting on the floor, some coughing and pale, some elderly, and others scratching scabby boils on their skin.

  “Hey!”

  Kalea turned around. A middle-aged man in one of the beds had called her. “Yes?”

  “Why are you serving them? Annika always serves us first.”

  “Sorry, but you’ll have to wait. There’s plenty to go around. The Creator rewards patience.” What would this man say when he saw today’s portions? Even the poor frowned when they received their bowls.

  Against the wealthy man’s moaning, Kalea moved along the row of poor people, unloading her tray. Along the walk back, an elderly man’s hands shook violently as he struggled to hold the spoon and get any of the gruel into his mouth.

  “Oh, you poor man.” Kalea knelt beside him and wiped his mouth with the corner of her apron before helping him finish the rest of the bowl.

  Finished with sweeping, Annika blew past Kalea and entered the kitchen. She passed her again coming out with the next load of bowls as Kalea went in. The cook had already dished out more gruel for the third round, these more shallow than the first. Taking the new tray, Kalea resumed delivering bowls to the hungry poor folk.

  After that round, she collected the used bowls and took them back to the kitchen, where the cook huffed and sat down to wipe her sweaty hairline. Three bowls waited on the table to be delivered. Kalea put the tray on the table and unloaded the dirty bowls, staring at the three new ones.

  “Do you need help with the next batch?”

  The cook sighed and swept her eyes right to left. “That’s it. There won’t be another batch.”

  “What?”

  “I told you already. We were expecting a load of food from the king yesterday. Didn’t show yet… I should send a letter to the bishop. They might be swayed to sanction some donations for us.”

  “I’ll tell Father Liam. He’ll send a lot of us out to beg.”

  The cook threw her apron over her shoulder. “You won’t get anything out of this town.”

  Kalea moved the three last bowls onto the tray and lugged them out to the main hall without the starch her shoulders used to have.

  Her heart sank as she surveyed the people who’d already eaten. They could all use more. How could she ever tell the fourth person in line they wouldn’t be fed today? She veered off to the other side of the hall, where no one had seen her yet. In this more open area, huge round columns supported the sky-high ceiling, and scattered people leaned against them as if they were massive trees. The hospital’s priest currently made his rounds with the residents, reminding them to pray for the well-being of the hospital’s donors.

  How could Kalea choose who got the last three bowls? The first answer became obvious when she spotted a small child with tattered clothing and large, dark-ringed eyes.

  “Here you go, little sir,” she said. “May the Creator bless you.”

  She moved on, her eyes roving around the crowd for the next hungriest-looking person. A drowsy old woman got the second bowl before Kalea moved on toward the shadowy gallery at the other end where the sun hadn’t angled yet.

  The dark gallery was quiet, save for a cough here and there, and empty due to the cold absence of sunlight. When Kalea’s sweat made her shiver, she turned to go back into the central aisle and spotted a figure curled in the corner who’d either frozen to death or was too sick to crawl into one of the sunbeams.

  She reached out to touch his shoulder; a light spread of web-like blonde hair lay over it. “Sir?” One of his hands grasped the hood covering his face; his fingernails were a chilly blue. “Are you alive?”

  As soon as her fingers brushed his soft leather mantle with the thin silken strands, he jerked upright, his flashing, pale blue eyes reflecting the soft light even from its odd angle.

  She threw up her hands and shook them. “Sorry!”

  His eyes darted around and returned to her. “It’s all right.” His eyelids drooped again and he rubbed them. “I was restin’ my eyes, but I’ll leave right now.”

  “Well, I should hope so. You have one of those hoods on. Do you mean to take a free breakfast away from someone more unfortunate than you?”

  He waved a hand. “No. I swear, I merely needed a place to rest.”

  “Oh. Sorry about my rudeness. I don’t see a lot of mercymen in here, but I’ve heard about how they extort hard-working innkeepers for free food in exchange for vague promises of ‘mercy.’”

  “Well, I’m not that kind o’ mercyman, lass.”

  “Lass? Wher
e are you from?”

  “Nowhere! I mean, Theddir. I’m from Theddir.”

  “And so something happened that caused you to decide to join the mercymen, and now you’re here, handing out mercy?”

  “I give as much mercy as I can.” The smile spreading across his gaunt, weathered face made Kalea’s heart burn. He lifted his head some more, revealing the black-and-blue bruise around his eye typical of the mercymen. Superstition dictated respect for these zealots, but some could be so brazen as they wandered around demanding free food or a free bed that business people often had outbursts.

  “I’m glad you’re not here to take advantage. It’s good of you to be so modest.”

  He leaned forward. “I’ll get out of your way.”

  She put her hand on his shoulder. “Don’t go. Here. You look hungry.” She handed him the last bowl, and his eyes brightened and locked on hers.

  “Thank you.”

  Kalea smiled. “You’re in the house of the Creator now, and He has more than enough mercy for everyone.”

  “Thank you, lass. I needed that.” He spooned small amounts of gruel into his mouth slowly, as if to make it last longer.

  “You walked all the way from Theddir?”

  He nodded as he swallowed. “Not in a straight line. I’ve been walking around for ages.”

  “As mercymen do, I suppose.” He must’ve walked for years. Theddir was all the way across the continent to the northeast. The bottom hems of his robes and cloak were caked with mud, though it hadn’t rained lately. It hadn’t rained in weeks. It hadn’t snowed either.

  He practically sat on a travel pack wedged behind him. A wrapped, cross-shaped object stuck out of the top and leaned against the wall.

  “Is that a sword?”

  “Yes, but I don’t know how to use it. It belonged to my father originally.”

  “Was he a knight? Or a guard?”

  The mercyman leaned his head against the bricks and stared across the huge room echoing with distant voices and coughing. His smile had long faded. His empty bowl sat on the floor. “I’m looking for my son.”