by B. H. Young
"Lord Willem, how does the day find you?" Maven remained standing, running her fingers along the tabletop.
"Trying my lady, very trying."
"Yes, your Geryn told me you had a meeting with Lady Jillian Cyndil earlier." Her face cringed with a slim of seduction. "She is such a dish, her ignorant innocence, oh the things I would do to her. Ravaging!" her voice lowered and her lips parted under peeling eyes.
He knew Maven liked to keep company with women, preferably against their will, but hoped she would spare him the details of her twisted desires. The stories of the things she has done would make any strumpet cry and murderous bandit cower. She was a sick sorceress of perversions, but a councilmember, much to his detest.
"I'm sure," Willem said and sighed.
"On to pressing matters then shall we," she said and took a seat at the other end of the table.
"And they must be pressing to bring you this far."
"Yes, well, I would like you to explain to me why you tried to keep Jonhekah's death silent to me? Did you really think you could keep such a thing from me, that only you have greatly informed spymaster's in your service?"
"The importance of the task at hand outweighs the things in life we should give great care to. I only intended to keep it silent until this is all over."
"The decisions of a Harbinger," she said. "I'm more troubled by the fact you had his body disposed of rather than attaining it to allow me to give proper burial in time."
"My lady, unfortunately, sensitive times call for hard decisions." He pulled a chalice from the center tray and filled it with wine. He was certain there was not enough wine here to numb him though. "Ceremony can still be given if you so wish to do so."
Maven placed her hand under her chin. "Without a body, no I'm afraid your send off has guaranteed his soul to wander the Shadowlands aimless and without peace." She made sure her words flowed with venom. "My dear late sister loved that boy. Did you know that it was I who raised him from the age of twelve?"
Willem did know but he also knew had she not thrown her sister to the skinvers she would not have had to raise the rat. "Then maybe you should have raised him with better sense than to try and extort hired men of such an important task," he said. Maven would not intimidate him as she did other councilmember's of the Eldafienden.
She let out a shrewd laugh. "And you my dear Willem are the authority on raising children properly. Tell me how is your lovely Lucinda these days. I heard one of your bannerkyn grabbed her ass under drunken mind and she repaid him in kind by stabbing him in the throat... thirty-seven times I'm told."
"I did not come all this way to bicker with you on such matters." He slapped his hand on the table. "I kept his death from you because I do not need a blood honor mucking things up. You can protest to Overlord Withlem if you so wish but I assure you he, as well as the others, stands with me. What we are trying to achieve is of far more greater importance than the greedy life of an imbecile taken!"
"Dear Willem, you think me so petty? I would not dare jeopardize our task." She smirked. "However with Jonhekah not leading the inquiry, the Irons appointed to investigate are out of our reach and are already endangering it," she said.
"The Irons are not privy to what is transpiring and are simply chasing ghost. It is wise to let them continue doing so to not arouse further suspicion. Besides, there are plans in place to deal with the Iron High Guard in the coming days," he said.
"Not privy you say, chasing ghost? A brothel owner in Vette has made them aware to our involvement. If this filth put a bug in their ear... who's to say he won't fill many ears."
"Then I shall deal with it," Willem said.
"See to it that you do, I wouldn't want the Overlords to catch wind of this." Maven stood and brushed her hands along her hips. "I'll be staying at my mountain top hold on the border for the time being."
"Why?" Willem asked as he picked at the rim of his chalice.
"So as to not, as you say, arouse any suspicion. It wouldn't look right for me to remain in Vinreer Keep and go unscathed as Province Stewards are being killed. And this way I will be closer to keep an eye on things, so if any more deviations should arise be sure and let me know Lord Willem," she said and left the room under his burning eyes.
"I despise that woman beyond measure. She thinks power afforded to her because of Overlord Withlem's fondness of her and her rhetoric," Willem said as Geryn walked over and stood by the table.
"What she says about the brothel owner is true my lord. His name is Gayleon Enner," Geryn said.
"It's a wonder any secrets are able to stay hidden. Have Lestat and Lucinda go there and see to it this Gayleon remains silent."
"At once my lord."
"How was your trip to Northanos?" Willem asked.
"Pleasant my lord, I find the air up there agrees with me better."
"The Overlords thought it wise to outsource the job rather than handling it with our own." Willem agreed with it, but the assassin had shown too quick to kill. Maven was right as much as he did not want to believe it. "This slayer, Sylo, you assured me he was capable of the task. Do you still believe this?"
"Yes my lord, he and his men were responsible for that incident in Glassvale. I do not find it surprising that he killed Jonhekah for simply inconveniencing him. Men like him are... peculiar in such manners."
"How so?"
"Capable in his craft," Geryn stared entranced for a moment, "though I'm not sure what frightens me more about him? That he is crazy or that he seems to be completely aware that he is crazy. I can't say that I have ever met someone so... so void, and cold." Geryn scratched at his brow and stepped closer to the table. "He was not easy to track down even for my sources, seems even in the underworld most steer far away from any involvement with him. But I assure you, my lord, he will finish the task."
"Is he knowledgeable to what our end is?" Willem said.
"No, he did not seem to care about the details, only asked for the names of those we wished to be removed. And that it is the Eldafienden who have procured his services, nothing beyond that. He does not even know my name, never asked, simply refers to me as spymaster, which is just as well. We are simply shadows who are lining his pockets."
"Good." Willem glared at the door still stewing about his meeting with Lady Maven. "That vile woman should kiss the Gods asses the Overlords value her so, otherwise I'd have her stripped, let the filth of the lot have their way with her and then burn her alive like the witch she thinks she is!"
Chapter 15.
The gypsy could not take them as far as Lothel, but she got them to the split path of Revin Forest past the mountain range out of Vette. Riding with pirates was bad enough but at least, they did not talk as much as gypsies. Revin Forest sat smudged in moss by a chaotic brush clenched in the hand of time. The road grew narrow the further in they went. Nothing was out here past the Bogendurd Range but the faint pulse of nature and the things that called it home. A different kind of animal watches these roads, Ginrell had said and Godzton knew it to be true. The stretch of woodland was dwellings for criminals who could no longer exist in the common world, even among their own. The unlawful were bad enough, but then what does it say about the ones even they despise.
In the thick of the woods, Godzton stood before the decrepit stead barrack that sat crowded in shrub. His eyes had caught it from the road, sitting nestled deeper into the wall of russet bark. They had trekked so long his feet had gone numb and he could feel the deadness starting to spread. The sky hung cloaked in navy fading into grayness on the horizon and boomed a forewarning of a heavy storm impending with the failing sun. They would not make it out of Revin Forest by nightfall and a downpour would surely misdirect them if they so tried. The door of the stead barrack looked rotted but secure, and the stone well off to the side spewed vegetation from its mouth in an effort to regurgitate the squalor of its depths. The roof still showed sturdy, solid, and would keep them dry. As long as the walls were standing and the ceiling guar
ding, it would do just fine.
"We'll hold here for the night," Godzton said and pulled his swords, "should be safe enough."
Laythan stepped up beside him with his blade in hand and said, "Every time you say that about one of these old hovels, you pull swords. Doesn't make me think you mean it much."
"Not far from the road, could serve some bandits well," Ginrell said.
"It could." Godzton walked up to the door and opened it slow. Entering these old buildings only to find danger was all too common, so the tips of his swords led the way.
A long table of timber graced the center of the room with split-wooded benches at its side. Metal tankards and plates sat anchored to the tabletop under webbing. A large hearth, tall as a man, with a rack mount held an iron cooking caldron surrounded by shelving. In the far corner, a burlap sheet laid over a clustering of barrels and crates. Godzton swept his eyes over the room and slid the tip of his blade along the sheet of dust on the table. The place had not seen any inhabitants for quite some time he gauged. Outside thunder snapped, rattling the walls and shaking the flooring. The stead barrack was dark and musty and presented mood for the rumbling sky. The storm was soon to set in and Gods know with a roar like that it was to be a bad one.
It was never a pleasant when weariness and time would push them to reside in such abodes with haunted minds. Fear was the first emotion Irons learned to silence, but it never truly stays quiet. The best one could hope to do was ignore it, but it was always there creeping its fingers at the edge of the door and pulling back just a little to remind its presence was still here.
Ginrell ruffled through the shelves, picking up items and setting them down before moving to the next. The old man looked as if he hoped to find something of worth in the cupboards. Old eyes did not see the place was dank with nothing of value hiding in it. Laythan pulled off his coat, threw it over the bench, and sat down. He propped one leg over the other and rolled his ankle while massaging it through his boot.
"I'll see if I can get us a fire going," Godzton said. "Laythan, think you could muster us up some food before the storm hits?"
"Might be slim pickings round here, but I'll see what I can do."
"No wood around here lad, going have to chop some," Ginrell said.
"The barrels and crates will do," Godzton said.
Dust kicked up as he walked over to the clustering and threw back the cover from the top of the debris. A hollow feeling dropped quickly in his chest and fear gripped him from the dark nook, by the throat. The marbled face with eyes of fog, a snarl of blades, and head of tangled hair stared him back, curled in the niche. It's wet tongue clanked a sharp warning as its dried face twisted in anger.
Godzton knew what gazed back at him from the darkness. "Witch," Godzton yelled. She sprang from the hiding spot to his hollering, striking him and sending him falling back to the wall.
In a leap, she cleared to the other side of the room shrieking twisted cries as she did. She chugged a large pot from the shelf, hitting Ginrell and knocking him from his feet. Laythan advanced but his head collided with another flung pot, spinning him onto the table.
Godzton gripped his two swords and rushed her. Her bladed mouth sung in horror. A sphere of red mist formed in her dried palm, swirling like a storm, and the witch grinned and then threw it at him. Godzton shouldered into it taking the brunt of the hard magic. Its force sent him to bended knee. The mist spread over him embracing him like a sheet trying to take hold. The pressure pushed in from all sides and he curled up. With vigorous hands, the mist felt its way around for a breach, coiling like a snake, but could find none. It dissipated into the air with failed attempt and Godzton pushed from the floor, lunging at the witch, and dodging the debris she flung in a panic of failed magic. He drove one sword through her chest pinning her to the cabinet. The witch frantically swiped away at him with scraggly-clawed fingers howling in agony. Without hesitation, he gripped his other sword with both hands, stepped back, and delivered a side slash, decapitating her.
Black blood streaked erratic fingers along the wall waking the dust from its slumber. The look of her gnarled face was frozen and silent, almost as if at peace now. Her head tilted and then tumbled off smacking the floor splattering more blood. The headless body buckled as Godzton pulled his blade from her chest. He stood with padded breath, shaking with adrenaline as his heart pumped to break free of its ribbed prison.
He glanced back to Ginrell and Laythan, pushing themselves from defeat with groans. "You two alright?" he asked.
"Aye." Ginrell smacked his hand against his head and spat a wad of blood to the floor.
"Fine," Laythan slurred staggering to his feet.
Godzton watched the veined face of the woman revert to a gaze of calmness. The skin began smoothing out and regaining its color as blackness flowed from her wound. Witches can blend in with ease and only show their true face when riled. It had been awhile since last he had to deal one. She was young, he thought, maybe sixteen at most but deadly nonetheless. He could not help but feel a bit of sympathy for the girl, pondering why one so young would allow a coven to infect her. Could they have offered her a better life than she had?
The covens of today were aberrations of the ones from ancient times, though just as aloof. Witches were the result of one delving too far into the abyss of hard magic to the point it corrupted them beyond return. They suffered an agonizing fate in the sickness of the magic twisting and damning them to a life of chaos under a rabid mind. Unlike magic that required a strong intellect to weave, hard magic was a illness, that even the simplest mind could attain and use, and debatable by many scholars, as if it should even be considered of the Arcane Arts. The Meister's of Spire Hall declared the condition of witches a disease. Necroith they called it, a consequence to embracing the poisonous hands of hard magic for too long. The peculiar thing about Necroith was that it could be spread by the infected, however, only to the willing in the act of intimacy.
"It's safe now," Ginrell said in an obstructed voice. He dug his finger around his mouth then spat more blood and a tooth fragment.
"What the hell was she hiding from?" Laythan asked still rubbing his jaw.
"Ginrell, chop her up and place her in the burlap," Godzton said. "Not going to risk drawing down any more unwelcomed guest not so easily dispatched, she'll be staying inside with us. Burning her now would flood the room with a rank lung bleeding smoke so we'll feed her to the fire in the morn before departing."
Ginrell rolled his grip over his ax handle with a squint of revenge resting on his face. "Aye," he said.
Godzton watched as he hacked the woman into quarter pieces with quick chops of his ax and strained breath. The dead do not rise nor walk nor crawl, but old tales say that only burning a witches remains would guarantee their stay in hell for eternity.
The storm consumed the outside in the black of night as they sat at the table eating their makeshift stew. The large hearth blazed with flame of old wood. Laythan had boiled up some wild potatoes and kerried greens that he managed to find growing outside the stead barrack. It was a peasant's meal for sure, but it kept their stomachs full and their bodies warm and they slurped it up as if it was fit for a king. The musty smell of earth blooming from the kettle helped mask the stench of the dismembered witch tied up in the burlap cover.
Traveling with pirates, gypsies and now spending the night with a chopped up witch in the room, Godzton couldn't help but see the humor in it, even if he only kept it to himself. If the Gods were anything, they were pranksters he thought.
He took glance at the soggy sack in the corner remembering the stories he had read, about powerful witches who could take down twenty men with the flicking of their fingers, when hard magic could rot away the very skin of a person as if it were nothing more than dust. But its power, as the power of all magic, dried from the world a long time ago and the residue left behind was diluted. Once mighty curses flung from erudite hands were reduced to a minor inconvenience now, but painful nonethe
less if not shielded with enchantments. Not like the magic of the ancient world, he had read about. It was in that trance remembrance Godzton was thankful for the Vannik Serum and happily placed that needle at his wrist and his men did so as well.
"Not a bad stew you got here Laythan, could use a dash of pepper and a nice ale," Ginrell said, slurping down one spoonful after the next.
Laythan was too preoccupied with his own bowl to respond. He knew it was good; he was the best field cook he knew. And if not for him they would have starved many times before. It doesn't take much effort, just a good sense and taste of what works well with one another.
"We should be out of the stretch shortly after the sun rises," Godzton said. "We'll pick up some horse when we reach Lothel."
"If those poor bastards are caught out in this mess they may not make it to Lothel," Laythan said in a gurgled voice.
Godzton paid him an absent look with a slow nod. "All the better."
"You think that Elven flesh peddler's information will pan out?" Ginrell asked and rubbed his coat arm across his mouth.
Godzton stirred the spoon in his bowl staring at the slow spinning pool of soup. It was an honest question he would have had no trouble answering with certainty before. "I'm not sure, Gayleon has been very reliable in the past, but I suppose everyone falters at some point."
"You know, there are a lot of things I can believe in this world but the Eldafienden being behind this brazen act is a tough one to swallow." Ginrell looked down at his bowl and cocked his head. "They hide in the shadows, extort commerce, deal in illegal goods," he said and then stood and made his way back over to the pot for second helpings. "The Eldafienden," he said and sniggered.
"What does it even mean?" Laythan asked gazing with lost thoughts.
"It's from a long dead language. It means ancient enemy... I think," Ginrell said and scooped out another bowl of stew from the caldron.
"Ancient enemy?"
"It refers to The March," Godzton said, continuing to turn the spoon in the bowl.