by Hart, Blaine
Chapter 3 Yasmeen de LaCroix
“To hell and beyond!” Anna cried.
“To the gates of Eternity,” the other Anna echoed.
“How about to the tiller,” Kell suggested.
“Absolutely,” they said in harmony.
“I’ll do it.”
“No, I will.”
“No me!”
“Tend to your sails.”
“There’s no wind.”
“So?”
“So!”
“Enough,” Kell cried. “Put your tongues to better use and blow wind to the sails. Longo, come with me.”
I followed my master to the prow. The sea, sky and fog were slate grey and the water was like glass. I watched the gentle ripples roll silently away from the bow. For a long time the only sound was the slow creak of the mast. And then off in the distance we heard someone screaming.
The Annas started to speak but Kell cut them off with a wave of his hand. I heard one of them scurry below, but I was listening more to the ocean. The cries were faint as we drifted, and we strained to find a direction. Sounds can be tricky in the sea fog, but after a time Kell turned his ear, then he pointed and Anna steered.
“The waters are shallow,” she said softly.
“I see,” Kell answered. “And now I see.”
I peered into the mists. Land began to form. Through the shroud of fog I saw low trees, then a short beach. A moment later the ship ground to a halt. The screams were much clearer. We all looked a little to port and Kell nodded. Then there was a long wailing shriek that cut off quick. The silence that followed was chilling.
Quick as quick the Annas leapt off the bow and splashed into the water dragging the mooring line. Kell and I followed, and we soon had the Chaos dragged aground and anchored to a tree.
“You wait here,” Kell said to the twins. “Mind the ship.”
“No,” they said in harmony.
That was when I saw that the two were armed. Anna had a bow and quiver slung on her back while the other Anna wore a belt with no less than six slender throwing daggers. They both held short broad swords.
“Listen,” Kell began.
“No,” Anna said.
“This way,” the other said pointing to the jungle.
And before my master could say a word the two plunged into the undergrowth. Kell just shook his head and we followed. The girls were like vixens in the woods, bobbing and weaving along and under the foliage. A few times I thought I heard them sniffing. They soon struck an ill defined path and urged us on. They disappeared on either side of the trail as my master and I moved low and quiet. Sometimes one of their heads would pop up through the leaves and the other would quickly appear nearby.
As we crept along I started to feel useless. I didn’t know what we were heading into but everyone else was armed while all that I had were my wits and my hands. I looked about for a stout branch to use as a club, but all I saw was rotted wood. I wondered what use I might be in any fight.
Then the brush ahead shook in two straight lines. The Annas were on to something. Kell motioned me to hold still. We crouched and waited. Minutes later the twins appeared.
“Pirates,” Anna whispered.
“Never seen their likes,” the other added.
“Lean like Dorimans.”
“But dark like Shorethorns.”
“Five of ‘em.”
“Armed with strange swords.”
“They have a prisoner.”
“A lady.”
“Bound.”
“And gagged.”
“And they’re tormenting her.”
The other just nodded wide-eyed. Kell raised his hammer and led. The Annas followed in line while I brought up the lonely rear. Then Kell paused and motioned. The Annas fanned out on either side of him and I crept up to my master then went to my hands and knees to peer into the clearing.
It was as the twins had said. A woman hung by her arms. She was fair skinned with gleaming blonde hair, and she was half naked. Parts of her fine garments were strewn about. Her eyes were shut and she wept while five swarthy men jeered. The men were ugly and hairy, and to me they had weasel-like faces. One of them laughed as he held the point of his cutlass to the shard of cloth above the lady’s breast and cut it free, revealing an ample bosom. The woman shrieked.
With a piercing war cry Kell burst forth from the jungle, his hammer swinging. The first pirate froze -- an arrow in his back. As the others turned, one of the men’s skulls exploded under Ashrune with blood and bones spraying the others. Kell then whirled, the blade from the hilt of the hammer slashing another pirate’s chest open from shoulder to belly. He crumbled with an agonized gurgling. Kell recovered and planted himself before the last two, snarling. The pirates turned ghostly pale, then turned tail and ran. A knife caught one in the back as he disappeared into the foliage. Another arrow whizzed through the leaves.
Kell cut the lady’s bonds with the blade of his hammer and caught her in his arms. He yanked away the gag. I rushed forward, grabbing up a fallen cutlass. But even as I did I heard an unearthly cackle.
“Stupid fool,” the woman laughed.
And in that moment many things happened.
The woman’s eyes glowed. Threads of eerie green light flew from her to Kell’s face. My master wailed in agony, his body twitching and thrashing. An arrow flew from the foliage straight at the woman, but she snatched it from the air without ever moving her gaze from Kell. The man who had fallen by Anna’s arrow was encased in a sickly light, and before my eyes he transformed into a rat with the likeness of a small man. He snarled, got up on his hind legs, grabbed his fallen cutlass, and then dashed into the woods. I heard the Annas scream. Not a moment later another rat-man burst from the jungle and I was on my back. His forepaws were as big as my hands and he pinned me to the ground. It was strong as a man. Its ugly face within inches of my own, the beady yellow eyes glaring. I cried out and thrashed -- and then my head exploded and I knew nothing.
I woke to a cry of agony that went quickly silent.
My head hung low. I strained to look up. I tried to focus. It was twilight and the night was closing in. A roaring fire lit the clearing. The first thing I saw was my master. He was naked and bound. His wrists were tied with crude hemp across his belly. A thick rough branch had been threaded between his bent elbows and his back, and he was suspended by that stick. His ankles were lashed and pulled up tight, bound to the ends of the pole. His sweat soaked body gleamed in the orange light and his face was wracked in pain. In the middle of the bonfire Ashrune lay, its leather handle smoldering.
I fared no better. My hand and feet were bound cruelly and I too hung suspended so that my spine was arched backwards. The ropes were so tight I could feel my wrists bleeding, and the pain in my back was growing as I looked to my captors.
There before the fire I saw no beautiful lady, only an old ugly hag, dressed in a fine gown. The woman looked to be over a hundred. Her face was drawn with wrinkles that made sinister shadows. Her hollow eyes were sunken beneath sickly red folds that oozed pink mucus. She had neither pupil nor color, just milky dark orbs with the deathly stare of a shark. The tawny skin on her face was stretched so that the bones of her skull shown through, while her crows feet looked like a mask of deep spider webs. Her teeth were the color of rotten logs and her cracked lips were grey. Over the crown of her head her silver hair was sparse, but from the sides it fell about her shoulders thin and scraggly.
She stood holding a long stick in the fire. The three rat-men were hunched over their fallen comrade, gnawing on the raw flesh of the carcasses. One of them sniffed and then looked to me. Its hideous muzzle seemed to smile and my heart froze.
“The other’s awake Yasmeen,” she said in a high, whiny voice.
“I’ll deal with the pup in good time,” the hag said in a voice that was like dry leather being torn. “As soon as you idiots catch me the bowman.”
“There’s two out there,” one said.
“Three,�
�� another said. “And one’s a warrior elf, and no mistake.”
“I don’t care if it’s a troop of warrior-elves,” the hag said, kicking hot embers at them. “You just better find them if you value your skins.”
“Our cousins are sniffing them out,” the one said. “The island is small and flat. They have nowhere to hide. It will be dark soon. We’ll find them.”
Their words stirred some small hope in my heart. The Annas had escaped. But whether the frightened girls had taken to their boat or not I could not know. I clung to the thought that they may be lurking, waiting for the chance to send an arrow or a knife into the hag’s neck.
“And what about that?” the rat-man said nodding toward my master.
“That,” the old hag chuckled. “That is my salvation.”
She then rammed the fiery red point of a hot stick into Kell’s thigh. My master grit his teeth and clenched his eyes. His whole body tensed and he let loose a low, agonized wail. If there could have been any vestige of delight in the old hag, I saw it on her face then and there. The rat-men whooped and stomped their feet in joy.
“Scream paladin,” the witch taunted as she ground the stick. “Fill your heart with pain and fear. It will make things all the more delectable when the time comes.” She cackled evilly.
She then yanked the point out and Kell’s flesh smoked. The stench of his burn made me want to vomit when it reached my nostrils.
“Paladin,” she said, holding a freshly lit smoking ember under his nose. “You are a prize beyond my dreams. It would be a great thing for me to stand before the great Visalth holding the head of the fool who would seek to slay the mighty one. But it will be an even greater triumph for me to stand once again in the full glory of my youth and beauty.”
She grinned as she jammed the end of the stick up the paladins left nostril. Kell didn’t scream this time, but his eyes did start to go wild as the witch then took the sharp stick and moved it near his eyes menacingly. She then put the stick back into the fire.
“I know that you won’t speak,” she said. “You know that if you speak then you admit my claim over you, and once that happens, whatever pathetic power you have will vanish and then even your soul will be at my mercy. Truth be told, paladin, I’m counting on that.”
She cackled as she played with the stick in the embers, burning off the blood and flesh on the stick and getting it to glow brightly once again. I saw my master’s wracked form tremble, but his face was stern and set. I thought I saw his tense lips just slightly moving.
“Oh I know,” the hag went on. “I know that you are strong. I could hold you over the fire and watch your manhood shrivel to cinders and still you would not speak. And I might just do that. Just for fun. But that will come later.”
“You see, I understand your sort. You have empathy. You care. And while you care little for your own flesh, you are overwhelmed with concern for others; so concerned that you would risk your quest to save all of your people in the hopes of saving one poor damsel in distress from torment. Stupid fool.”
She turned to him. Her eyes sparkled green, and for a moment I saw the visage of the lady who we had tried to rescue. She batted her eyes innocently, then she turned and the ugliness crept back over her like a swift plague. She stared into the fire and the crackling light reflected in her murky black eyes. Her face seemed to glow with restrained glee.
“Rest assured, you will speak to me. In fact you will beg. You will beg for your companions as I slowly skin them alive before your eyes. My rats will gorge on their guts as they writhe and wail and your heart will burst with compassion, and when your soul is filled with evil thoughts and hate then . . .”
Then she plunged the fiery point into his chest.
“Then I will use the blade from your own hammer to rip out your heart and I will devour it as the last strains of life seep from you. And as I eat your heart I will be restored! Yasmeen de LaCroix will be young again! I will have the power of a holy paladin and my Dark Lord will see my beauty and power and I will take my place among the elite faithful as my master lays waste to all who would stand in our way.”
Kell wailed through clenched teeth. He writhed under the burning torment and the hag laughed as she twisted the stick cruelly. The rat-men howled with glee and my heart froze.
“Yasmeen the Beautiful!” a rat-man cried.
“Yasmeen the Terrible,” another echoed.
“Yasmeen the Asshole,” came a cry from the woods.
A dozen spears rained from above. They sank in the sand and each had a rat impaled. Then arrows flew. The rat-men clutched their throats. Yasmeen was stuck twice but the bolts didn’t stop her. She shrieked in rage and stomped her foot. The fire flared and engulfed the clearing in blue and white. The trees caught fire with her cry of fury.
Kell arched his back and thrust his arms. The branch binding him cracked, the fibers of the wood tearing into his flesh. He grabbed a broken shard of wood with his bound hands and charged at the hag with a furious bellow. He caught her square in the chest with the sharpened wood and she fell back with a guttural grunt. Looking around, the rat-men looked like pin-cushions as the woods around us burned.
The Anna’s leapt into our midst. In a moment one had Kell’s hands and legs freed of the ropes while the other sliced me free with her dagger. Meanwhile the witch Yasmeen had found her feet while Kell grabbed his Warhammer Ashrune from the fire, and I heard his flesh sizzle.
“Kill me then,” Yasmeen said crossing her arms before her. “Kill me and put me out of my misery!”
My master needed no other encouragement. He swung the hot hammer with furious blow, fueled by his hatred and pain – and his hammer struck sand. The force of his swing sent him tumbling.
“Missed me,” she taunted.
We all looked. The hag stood in the middle of the burning trees. Anna’s arrow flew but burned to ashes before it touched her. Kell cried out and ran towards the witch. He swung his hammer but she vaporized and he struck nothing but a burning bush.
“Missed me,” the hag sang in a taunting childish voice.
My master roared in rage. He hacked at the blaze until he had opened up a way into the woods. I heard the hag mocking him from beyond. He plunged through. In his rage my master ran heedless. The Annas didn’t hesitate. We grabbed my master’s armor and what weapons we could and raced after him.
But the island was enchanted against us all. My master seemed always within sight and within reach, but even as we called and struggled forward, he and the teasing old crone would flee from our sight. And all the while the fire raged.
Over time the flames forced us to the beach. The smoke enshrouded us thicker than the fog, and the glow behind us lit the sky with a weird light. We called and called but my master didn’t or wouldn’t answer. The three of us stayed together, running along the shoreline and ever calling for Kell. We found him standing by the Chaos. In the eerie light he looked as one insane, but when he spoke his words were calm.
“Longo.”
“Yes master?”
“Be my witness.”
“Master?”
“Hear me and remember. I am going to kill Yasmeen. I am going to wrap my hands around her scrawny ugly throat and I am going to throttle the life out of that bitch.”
“Yes master.” I said, a bit worried that his torments had rendered him insane.
Chapter 4 Of Demons and Angels
It took almost a full day for the Chaos to get clear of the hag’s enchanted waters. Anna was hard pressed to rediscover our course, and it took another day for us to reach clear blue water and fresh winds. My wrists and ankles had been cut nearly to the bone by the hemp ropes and so while Kell sang chants of healing, the other Anna tenderly bandaged me. Kell’s own injuries were cruel, and the burn on his hand was ghastly. He worked his healing on himself also, and it wasn’t long before all of us where totally healed... all the physical damage at least.
During the rest of the boat trip a strange thing happened; K
ell began to open up. He had the Annas tell their tale, and we were both so amused with their antics and ways that we urged them to tell it again. Kell was particularly tickled with the way they had trapped the spy-rats and so he called them the Cunning Annas. The girls beamed.
Then, sensing Kell’s mood, we urged him to tell tales of his own warrior youth, and to my delight he did. I learned a thing or two. I also learned that when my master promised a story, an incredible tale was always told.
But Kell was also aware of my feelings of uselessness. So he cleansed and blessed the rat-men’s scimitars, and when he felt sure that all evil had been purged from them, he presented them to me and the Annas. He also gave two long and very sharp daggers.
“These aren’t trophies,” he said. “These are well crafted weapons from Allieala, a strong, proud land in the southern sea. You must learn to wield them well. En Garde!”
The next few days on the lonely sea where littered the clang and clatter of steel as I was taught how to wield them properly. The Annas joined our lessons and no longer was I bored. We made a rotation where two of us would be tutored by Kell while the other saw to the wheel. And so it was that in those days on the Western Ocean I learned how to use swords, daggers, and how to operate a ship.
My master was tireless in his teaching, and when we would stop to eat he would regale us with yet more tales of the war against the Doriman. At night we would sing songs and tell lies. The Annas had some leather workings in their stores, and so the other Anna began to make simple scabbards for our new swords. Kell nodded and directed their fashioning and urged me to learn. Under the girl’s guidance I discovered the basics of yet another skill. She was a patient teacher and smiled often at my crude beginnings. The days on that vast expanse of sea were happy, except when I would fall asleep and the nightmares of our encounters with the witch would haunt me.
Then one day things changed.
Anna and I were engaged in battle. My goal was to plant the broad of my blade behind her left knee. She did not know that, nor did I know her aim. She parried and thrust like a rabid weasel. Her sword-work was bold and sure while mine was swift and light.