Fractured Dreams

by Greg Alldredge

  She held back, letting the man in front take the lead. He pulled the thick needle from its hiding place, and he now held it like a dagger. She never thought about weapons, but that was when she decided that anything could be weaponized, the more harmless looking it might be, the better. Why advertise your ability to kill someone when it would be much more effective to find the danger from others?

  The man advanced on the body and reached out to check for life. When his fingertips touched the young man’s neck, he woke and let out the most horrid scream Della ever heard.

  “No!” the boy screamed.

  If people didn’t know we were here, they do now, Della thought.

  The Black Knight did his best to silence the boy, but it did little good. He clapped his hand over the young man’s mouth. Della imagined how his body had been torn by multiple weapons, and the ravenous harpies had eaten part of his ragged face.

  “What happened here?” the knight hissed through clenched teeth.

  The young man tried to speak, but his mouth remained covered. The knight removed his palm long enough to let the words out. “The house of cooper is no more.”

  Della couldn’t help but take a quick intake of breath. Her eyes darted from side to side, anticipating an assault at any moment.

  “Who attacked you?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. I slept. They breached the gates before the alarm even sounded. We never stood a chance. I woke here…” Tears streamed from the boy’s eyes. The cause was immaterial: the pain of loss or the physical pain Della knew he must suffer.

  The coopers had been one of her family’s strongest supporters. Out of the city, their guild hold gave a secure location for private meetings of the rulers her mother trusted the most. If the coopers had fallen… her family must truly be dead. Lightheaded at the thought, she leaned against a nearby pillar of raw stone. The world as she knew it must be gone.

  Her man continued to question the young man that still hung from the gate.

  “Can’t you take him down?” It was Della’s voice that asked. She recognized her tone, but she didn’t remember saying the words.

  Her man glanced over his shoulder and locked eyes with hers then slightly shook his head. Before she could question his meaning, his hand moved within the beat of an eyelid. His needle flicked under the man’s arm and pierced his side, deep into his chest. Della was certain the knight struck the poor boy’s heart. Life left his body before she gasped a protest.

  “He was dead, his body just didn’t know it. I did him a favor.” The man didn’t bother to look at her, he merely peeked inside the gate.

  “I… I know. Deep down, I know, it still hurt to watch.” She couldn’t take her eyes off the lifeless body. “We don’t need to travel to Zar now. None of my family can be there if the coopers have fallen.” Della spoke as if in a dream. Her voice sounded alien to her. Her body moved to stand behind her knight out of reflex.

  “Right now, we need to see if there are any clothes for us and maybe some food. Weapons would be nice as well, but it will take the gods smiling on us… I doubt the attackers left much behind. We will continue on our journey.”

  “I don’t know how much more of this I can take.”

  The man stopped his inspection through the gate. When he turned, the needle disappeared from his hand. “Life will always take things away from you. It is the way it works. When it knocks you down and kicks the shit out of you, the key is to always get back up. As long as you get up, you don’t lose.”

  “When do you get to rest and remain down?” Della asked before she collapsed into his arms.

  With practiced ease, he hefted the young woman into his arms. He strolled into the walled compound. Della felt her head loll side to side. “When you’re dead, you can stay down. Keep getting up until then.”

  Della nodded with half-closed eyes. “I’m not dead yet.”

  Chapter 7, Zorra Villa:

  With a reluctant step, Zorra made her way across the field of bodies. The light in the sky struck her as bizarre. Odd shadows cast over the dead from the bonfire glowing ahead.

  With each breath, she forced herself to choke back the vomit. The stench of rotting flesh assaulted her. She was ready to run at a moment’s notice, and the hair stood on the back of her neck as she approached the grisly sight.

  Backlit from the flames stood the unmistakable sight of a head impaled on a pole. She was terrified to look, but her legs kept moving her closer.

  One step at a time, until the severed head with curly dark hair and vacant eyes stared down at her. It was her husband’s, ripped like a savage from his body and, she was certain, placed as a warning for others.

  His body was lost, probably thrown into the heap and set aflame with the humanity he worked so hard to save. Whoever did this was heartless. Zorra was certain the camp held few weapons and only a limited number of guards to keep the peace.

  These people were like lambs waiting to be slaughtered. The people that took advantage of them… were worse than monsters. They needed to be put down like any sane person would do to a rabid animal.

  She reached her face with the backs of both her hands and wiped the tears from her cheeks. Barely a woman, a newlywed, and now a widow, she wasn’t sure how she could go on. “Oh, Ollie, how did it come to this?”

  She wanted to breakdown and cry, let her body fall to the ground and curl into a ball. She could hug her legs and bawl until she joined her husband in death, but something wouldn’t let her. Her body was no longer under her control. She looked over her hands, and they shook with tremors of fear. Her breath fogged before her, the temperature dropped that low, despite the raging fire only a few paces away.

  “You need to head west, find the desert.” Ollie’s voice spoke to her.

  The shock of the sound made her shift her gaze back to the lifeless head on the pole.

  “Did you hear me? There is a ship ahead… m’lady.”

  Ollie’s mouth stood open in death, but no movement came when he spoke. The voice shifted to her new bodyguard, Joti. “Ma’am, we need to keep heading west, but there is a ship ahead… Do you hear me? What should I do?”

  Like the shifting sands, the dark sky faded away and turned to gray overcast skies. The mound of burning flesh turned into the outstretched sail of a small open craft. The most painful and lasting image to dissolve: her late husband’s face.

  The severed head turned into Joti, who stood in front of her, his nose nearly touching hers. The smell of death had been replaced with the saltwater smell of the cracks. The scent of the open water brought her back. Their little craft made good time riding the wind.

  “I’m all right… just lost in thought,” she lied. Joti didn’t need to know about her daydream, nightmare, or perhaps… a vision… Joti didn’t need to know. “You said a ship?”

  “Yes, ma’am, I can see the sails.” His voice remained calm, but his shifting gaze betrayed his anxiety.

  Joti proved to be no sailor. He had trained for combat to defend his charge to the death if necessary… on dry land. On the water, he floundered like a fish left ashore on a hot day.

  “Do you think they saw us?”

  “It is hard to say. They have not moved since I spotted the sail.” Despite the overcast misting skies, he shaded his eyes for a clearer look.

  Zorra doubted it would do little good. She followed his gaze and quickly spotted the craft. Larger than their small boat, with three masts. There was no way they could outrun it if they gave chase. It was of Zar design, and in Zar waters, but that meant little. Zorra was no sailor, but she knew ships and sailing well enough to keep them alive on the open water of the cracks. That ship ahead dropped all but one sail and now sat dead in the water, with a slack sail, bow facing the wind.

  “Do we have food or water?” Zorra asked.

  “You know we don’t.”

  “Then we have little choice. That ship is adrift, maybe we can find something there. If not, we will eventually risk going ashore. I d
on’t think we can do that just yet.”

  His eyebrows knitted together, creating wrinkles on his forehead his young face shouldn’t have.

  Zorra smiled. She thought of him as young, but he was at least several years her senior. She was a young bride, asked to do her duty to end the killing of an unneeded war, only to lose her new husband to another one. Such a bitter irony.

  Right now, she knew he was contemplating the risks of boarding what might be a ghost ship versus landing and searching out supplies. His preference didn’t matter, she remained in charge, and she knew Joti knew it.

  Zorra ran her fingers through her copper-colored hair. She understood too well it marked her as a Villa, the mayor of Zar’s daughter, and a target for anyone wishing that city to fall. She needed to run far away.

  “We will try the ship, but you must stay aboard. If it is a trap…”

  “We will be caught. If it is a trap, do not fight. We cannot win this battle. We will find another way.”

  “Then why risk it, if I might ask?”

  “That ship is facing the wind. It sits dead in the water. It is covered in harpies. I doubt there is a person on deck. This is a horrid place for an ambush. I think something bad happened onboard.”

  Joti looked from Zorra and scanned the horizon once more. Zorra did the same but spotted no more ships waiting to spring a trap. It looked as safe as it could be. She heard death from lack of fresh water was a miserable way to die, not that she thought of a particularly pleasant way to the end. Better to go out quick on the tip of a spear than withering away from thirst.

  She waited and thought while Joti brought their small boat closer. She had witnessed so much death. Poison, blade, arrow, sickness, and the mass carnage caused by a type of magic never seen before. The blast in the market still repulsed her. Zorra didn’t hold out much hope for her life to be a long one. She spotted the bright yellow flag fluttering on the main mast. The ship carried a sickness and marked itself for others to keep away. Zorra knew it still might be a trap.

  Absentmindedly, her right hand rested on her belly. She only hoped she could live long enough. So many of her family and citizens died a violent death. She hoped her end was… gentle.

  Her vision of Ollie left her with many unanswered questions. The scene was similar to reality, but him instructing her to journey to the desert was… new. If he meant the Great Beach, why would the dead ask her to travel to her own demise?

  Everything she knew about the wasteland was bad. However, she had to admit everything she knew was little. No one really knew about the Great Beach. Few explorers visited the area, and fewer returned to talk about the experience. As far as Zorra knew, only death waited for her on the Great Beach.

  The escape from Zar was fresh on her mind, the city’s streets littered with the dead. The flames that engulfed the city lit up the overcast sky. The rain that fell was never enough to put out the fires. Her city burned. She assumed her brother Jo, the mayor, died in the house above the fighting. The leaders of the coup did a masterful job of decapitating the leadership of the city.

  That first night, Joti piloted the small boat to where he left the larger ship that carried him to Zar. His curses left little in doubt, the ship had deserted him to his fate.

  Even now, safe from Zar, the clouds overhead danced, and the rain never fully stopped. Zorra had never seen the rain last so long. Perhaps the gods cried for the dead and dying, but she doubted it.

  The sound of a dog barking carried over the water. It was a strange thing to hear so far from land.

  They approached the ship, and Zorra spotted the small puppy chasing the harpies from the deck, never fast enough to catch one of the birds. They would scatter from the dog, only to land on a different part of the ship. She had seen these types of mutts before. They wandered the city streets looking for food. Mutts that held no lineage like the animals that guarded the pinnacle. The mayor never would have allowed a pet in the house. Only working animals were allowed near the family.

  Zorra was correct. The ship proved dead in the water, and to the best of her knowledge, only one thing attracted harpies in such large quantity: carrion. The ship’s deck must be littered with the dead. The dog worked hard to protect his territory but failed.

  Joti was wise enough to keep his distance from the craft, lowering the sail several boat lengths away. Zorra knew they sat well within crossbow range. If the crew wanted them dead and were still alive, they would have died long ago.

  “Hello to the ship,” Zorra shouted from the bow. She steadied herself with the bowline. Now dead in the water, the little boat bobbed in the swells.

  “Shush… They will hear you.”

  Zorra wasn’t sure what difference it made now. They were too close to run. She shot him a glare that silenced his complaints.

  The only answer came from the pointed ears of the dog as it jumped over the gunnel to see, finally leaping onto some object to provide an unhindered view of the two. The dog’s barks became almost instant. Zorra felt it waited for them to save it.

  “Might as well bring us alongside. I don’t think anyone is home to complain.” Zorra never looked back when she spoke the order. She decided Joti didn’t need to see the uncertainty on her face. Better to leave the impression she knew what she was doing. Why ruin her image of being in charge by telling him she was a frightened little girl alone in a world where it seemed everyone wanted her and her family dead?

  Joti didn’t argue or even voice a concern. He brought the sail to half-mast, catching just enough wind to provide the craft steerageway.

  The separation narrowed before he asked, “Can you take the tiller? I will jump aboard.”

  Zorra worked her way around the sail and mast until she took his place. Her skills at handling the craft were rudimentary at best. Her mother never allowed the girls in the family to travel with the trade ships to learn the way of the cracks. Unlike her brothers who all left on cruises of several weeks at a time to become familiar with that way of life. Trade by the water was too important for the rulers of Zar to ignore.

  Now she needed to bring their boat alongside the stalled ship and not damage either in the process… or crush Joti to death. It wasn’t a perfect pilot job, but it could have been worse. Joti was able to keep from falling over the side when the two hulls smashed together with a thud and a scrape. The bow left a visible gouge in the wood of the ship, but the damage was all superficial.

  In an instant, Joti drew his sword and scrambled over the side. Zorra dropped the sail with all haste and grabbed a line to tie off to, all while waiting for the sounds of battle to erupt on deck. The clash of weapons never came, nor did the sound of the animal attacking Joti. However, it kept up its barking, loud enough to wake the dead under the water.

  Joti’s head popped from behind the gunnel. His face showed little emotion. “It seems clear, but I’m not sure you want to join me. The dead cover the deck.”

  “Can you find food and water alone? What of the dog?” Zorra asked as she moved closer to the hull of the ghost ship, pulling the line that attached them with all her might to keep the boat alongside.

  “I think I can search the ship. The mutt won’t come near me.”

  “Go ahead then.” Zorra hated the idea of leaving an animal to its fate.

  Joti disappeared to search the ship.

  It only took a few seconds of uneasy waiting for Zorra to mutter to herself, “How we treat the weak is a better measure of our worth than how we defeat the strong…” She wasn’t sure where the words came from, but it sounded like something Ollie might say. In reality, she barely knew the young man, but she was certain she would have grown to love him over time.

  Gripping the line, she did her best to scramble over the side of the ship. Joti didn’t lie, the ship was dead. Before she had cleared the rail, she’d counted five dead. Flesh missing from their bodies, nearly picked clean by the harpies. Their clothing was shredded, only a few sidearms remained. She grabbed a lethal looking dagger
from the nearest body. The dead made her skin crawl—better to end their search and leave this place of death.

  The dog still barked.

  Lashed to the mast was a keg. Each step took some small measure of courage from Zorra. She wasn’t ready for the death this ship held.

  At the barrel, she slid back the top and found it half full of stale water. A ladle hung from the side. Needing free hands, the dagger point sank easily into the mast over her head. She dipped the scoop into the water and walked to the barking dog.

  The barking stopped, and the tail wagged. This animal was no threat. It was simply alone and scared, not unlike Zorra and Joti. Working her way to the animal with half steps, she stretched out the water for the animal to drink.

  Her idea worked. The dog’s tongue flicked out and devoured the water. It jumped down from the capstan and licked the water that fell to the deck. Zorra returned to the keg, with the dog on her heels, barking for more. She retrieved three more ladles full before the dog finished filling its belly.

  Zorra looked up, and Joti stood watching the pair, his normally tan face pale from the recent experience. “We should leave now and burn this ship.”

  “What is wrong?” Zorra pulled her dagger from the mast.

  “The flesh has been picked from the bodies, even those in closed rooms were not safe. The sickness from Zar is here and ran its course. Everyone has been eaten by the flesh-eating disease.” Joti held a sack over his shoulder. “Lady, we need to escape this place of death or risk joining them.

  It only took a moment for Zorra to decide. “Take the sack and return to the boat. Did you find water?”

  “There is a keg below, I will get it.”

  “No… you have risked enough. I will retrieve it. Take the dog if it will follow you.”

  “But… what if it is sick?”

  “Then we are already dead. I am not sure the animals are affected by this sickness. They have been eating the flesh, yet they live.”

  Joti looked over the dog.

  With caution, she held the back of her hand out for the dog to sniff. “I am sure he did what he needed to do to survive.”