by J. D. Lakey
Cheobawn shied away from his mind, profoundly perplexed. How could a handful of pretty stones be worth a life in the world down below the cliffs? The shoulder of Old Father came between her and Sam, forcing her at last to look away, her questions unanswered.
Those questions died in her mind as a nightmare covered in gore crawled out of the belly of Old Father Bhotta. The monster pulled a sodden cloth sack with him. Garro. He looked up to find her watching him. It made her sad when he hugged the heavy sack protectively against his chest, a snarl on his lips.
“I have found them, witch, I have found them all,” he crowed defiantly, his pleasure bright on the ambient.
“Have you? There are twenty-three spinal sacs.” It was a cruel thing to say, she realized, after the words left her mouth.
Garro stared at her suspiciously for moment. His chin began to tremble. A sound somewhere between a growl and a sob burst from between his lips as he dropped to his knees in the offal soaked sand. Upending his bag, he frantically counted his slime covered bloodstones. He cursed and counted them again. He stopped and looked up at her.
Cheobawn recoiled. A hatred of such intensity it bordered on madness boiled behind those eyes.
“Witch!” he spat at her. “You’re lying! There are only twenty.”
His lips were so blue it looked like he had stained them with berry juice. She wondered that he was still on his feet.
“Twenty is good enough, Garro. Come away,” she begged, trying not to cry. She did not know how much more of this she could bear. Garro snarled at her as he gathered up his stones.
He had the last one in hand when a seizure shook him. It was small and quick, a preamble to what was to come. His arms jerked and his back stiffened. The stone in his hand flew into the air to landed near her feet. She retrieved it and carried it back to him, squatting down, meaning to add it to his bag for him. Garro stared up the sky, blind to everything but the storms blasting through his brain. She waited and watched as his muscles relaxed and his eyes refocused. He blinked at her, momentarily confused, his face gone soft. In that brief instant she caught a glimpse of what he must have been like as a boy, before the world had destroyed his belief and Eater of Worlds had consumed his soul.
It was gone in the next moment. He snarled at her, his fury returning in full force. One of his hands shot out to grab her hand, crushing it around the stone in her palm. His other fist caught the front of her tunic, jerking her off her feet, slamming her against his hard body.
“They are mine!” Garro screamed, bits of spittle hitting her face. Even as sick as he was, he was still strong. She could feel the bones in her hand grinding against each other. She dared not cry out, dared not flinch. Bohea was roaring something but she had no room in her mind to hear it.
“I do not want them, Garro,” she said reasonably. “They are yours. I told you how to find them, remember?” But he was not listening. Instead he stared at a spot at the base of her neck.
“What is that?” he asked hoarsely, his eyes gone wide. She did not have to look down to know he had found her omeh.
“It is mine. It is nothing.”
Sam was adding his voice to the cacophony in the air around them. She could feel the boy’s feet pounding into the gravel as he raced across the sand bar towards her. Nothing could save her. She saw the certainty of her own death, there, in the insanity behind Garro’s eyes.
“Holding out on us, were you? Letting us dig in the guts of this gods-cursed beast, all the while you carry a king’s ransom around your neck?” Garro seethed, an odd glitter in his eyes.
“Stop this, Garro. Listen to what you are saying. It is the poison in your body talking. You have enough. You don’t need this one.”
Garro shook her so violently her teeth knocked together.
“Shut up!” he screamed. “It is you. You are the poison in my mind, witch.” He let go of her fingers, a blessed relief, only to bring his hand crashing across her face. Her vision exploded into chaos.
When she could see again she found Sam standing over them. How had that happened? She was losing track of things. Sam had an arm wrapped around Garro’s neck, choking him while his other hand pried at Garro’s fist where it was locked around the black bead in her omeh. She tasted blood in her mouth.
Garro was twisting the omeh, trying to break the threads but the plasteel was meant to outlast the wearer. He would have to take off her head to get it. Omehs were woven in place without a clasp for a reason.
Cheobawn could not breath around all the knuckles pressed into her throat. She tried to claw at anything that seemed vulnerable but her right hand was blocked by Sam’s and her left hand did not seem to be working properly.
“Get out of the way, boy,” roared Bohea. Sam heard nothing over his own curses and Garro’s howl of frustrated rage. She could feel Eater of Worlds at her back, its jaws wide, its breath hot on her neck.
Bear had been waiting for this moment. She did not see it happen but somehow Garro managed to break Sam’s hold. Sam reared back but not in time. Garro’s elbow slammed into Sam’s face, sending him flying. Then Garro pulled his knife from his belt sheath.
Well, this is ever so much better, she thought at Bear. Bear’s delight was unbounded, her sarcasm lost on him.
The air split apart, a fist of sound hammering into her mind. Time did strange things, flowing thick and slow like cold tree sap on a winter morning. Impressions flashed by, caught up in the flow, jumbled and in no particular order. The knife, suspended in the air above her neck, weightless for one brief moment before dropping of its own accord, guided only by gravity. Garro’s fingers gone lifeless, the empty hand open to the sky in a supplicant’s prayer. The cloud of red mist, hanging over Garro’s shoulders where his head should have been. Falling backwards, falling forever, Garro’s dead fingers locked in her omeh, her weight toppling his lifeless body on top of her. The blood. So much blood, more than her fingers could stop. Sam, his face a gory mask, his nose oddly flattened against his face, trying to drag Garro off her. Bohea, his face grim, prying at Garro’s dead fingers. The sound and feel of a dead man’s finger bones snapping against the skin of her throat. Tam.
Tam. How did Tam get inside her nightmare? Yet here he was, standing over her, his stick a blur, his face terrible in its rage. Poor Sam. Tam’s stick caught him under the chin, snapping his head back, sending him flying again. Tam was not done. He pivoted, his bladed stick spinning, reversing. She watched him step deep into the next blow, putting all the force he could muster behind the swing, knowing there was no way to stop it. The blade sang as it sliced through the air, passing through Bohea’s neck as if it were not there.
She was tired of blood. She closed her eyes.
Chapter Twenty Three
“I would be careful with that, boy. It is not a toy,” Bohea drawled.
Cheobawn’s eyes snapped opened. Bohea stood over her, his arms held wide, his hands above his head. Tam had the hollow weapon in one fist, his stick in the other, the blade resting in the hollow of Bohea’s throat.
Cheobawn stared at Bohea, her mind turned to water. Was any of this real? Perhaps they had gone flying, after all. Perhaps she lay broken at the bottom of the scree below North Trail, having fallen from the sky. Perhaps this was just a fevered nightmare of her dying brain. That made more sense than this.
“Be quiet,” Tam shouted at the envoy, tossing the hollow weapon to Alain. Bohea flinched as his eyes followed the weapon’s flight but said nothing more. Looking down, he met her eyes.
“I am sorry, Lady. I did not intend to harm you,” Bohea said softly, a sad look on his face.
“Shut up!” Tam screamed. “Don’t you dare … Don’t you dare talk to her!”
His stick spun again, slamming into Bohea’s chest. It snapped in two, the blade spinning away to lodge in one of the downed trees. Bohea barely even blinked. It was as if he were made of stone. Tam cursed in frustration as he tossed the remnants of his weapon aside. “Alain. Tie their hands.”
Bohea dropped to his knees and obligingly put his hands behind his back.
“In front. We need to ride,” Tam snarled. Connor pulled a cord from a pocket and tied Bohea’s wrists. Bohea submitted to this, his face an emotionless mask.
Star Woman and Bear Under the Mountain pushed at her. She was not done. She had things to do.
One thing at a time, she thought in tired resignation. Herd Mother’s presence in the ambient was loudest. The bennelk were upset about something. She could hear them, feel the pounding of their feet in the sand under her back. They were circling the edge of the clearing, a restless wall of tusks and spurs that never presented a vulnerable flank for more than a moment, their constant motion meant to confuse predatorial minds.
Keep the small things back until we are away, Mother, Cheobawn thought at her.
Stomp and kick, Herd Mother said. Hurry, hurry.
She agreed with Herd Mother’s assessment. They had very little time. Cheobawn tried to move but realized Garro still lay across her legs.
Megan knelt down beside her. She was crying. Megan, her Megan. It was cruel that she had to be here, to see this. She tried to tell her friend she was sorry but no sound came out of her mouth.
“Shh, don’t talk, Ch’che. I am here,” Megan said, the tears coursing down her cheeks as she ran her fingers over Cheobawn’s face and body, looking for wounds while brushing at the clinging bits of skull and brain. The older girl tried pushing Garro’s body from where it lay on Cheobawn’s legs but his limp weight stymied her.
Challenge calls echoed around the rim of the small valley. The larger carrion eaters were massing there. The sun had given them courage and the smell of charred meat that hung heavy in the still air must surely be driving them to the edge of madness.
Tam came to her finally, his strong hands pulling her out from under Garro. He was nearly weeping in rage as his fingers probed her swollen lips and the growing bruise on the side of her face. His fingers dipped lower, touching the skin of her neck, and came away crimson. Garro must have sawed through the skin with the threads of her omeh. The sight of her own blood was a remote thing, as was the pain. She had gone numb inside and out. It was a very curious feeling.
Alain and Connor shoved Sam down beside Bohea as Tam helped her to her feet. They had not been careful with Sam. On top of the ruin of his face, he was now bleeding from a half dozen superficial cuts on his arms and belly. He looked dazed, his eyes not quite focusing.
We need to move away from the blood smell, daughter, Herd mother said firmly. Stomping and biting will not keep them all out.
“We must mount and ride. Now,” Cheobawn repeated, her voice hoarse and strange in her ear.
“Bring everything. Leave nothing,” Tam snapped out his order. “Two minutes.”
Alain, Connor, and Megan leapt into motion, gathering everything they could find, shoving it into the backpacks and satchels that lay scattered around the fire pit. Cheobawn did not think they had two minutes to spare but she did not argue with Tam because the order seemed right for some reason.
She bent over to spit the blood out of her mouth and then paused, not sure if it was all her own. Megan whimpered, appalled at what flashed across the ambient. Cheobawn felt instantly contrite but could not stop her anguish from hemorrhaging into the air around her. Tam held her, his hands around her waist to steady her as she bent double, trying not to vomit, trying to breathe, trying to think.
When she thought she could stand, she raised her head to glare at Bohea. “Only a few hours in your company and look what I have become. No fit company for anyone.”
“Considering the circumstances, I think you could be forgiven, Lady,” Bohea said softy.
“Call her Little Mother or call her nothing at all. I will not have you insulting her,” Alain seethed, poking Bohea in the side with the tip of his blade. The envoy did not flinch but that did not surprise her anymore.
Bohea met Alain’s glare, a thoughtful look on his face. The look he turned her way was knowing and pointed. She ignored him. She could feel his mind. It wanted to twist everything it saw into something sinister. He had said it already. He thought her some sort of queen and her Pack was her army. She had no cure for his lack of innocence. Bohea was free to misinterpret anything he wanted, now. She was done explaining herself. Cheobawn sent a thought towards Herd Mother to call in the bennelk.
Mounting the bennelk proved to be something of a logistical nightmare. The animals refused to come near the body of Old Father nor were they willing to let down their guard for fear of something launching itself at them out of the thick brush. The Pack was forced to drag Sam and Bohea across the sand bar as the bennelk contracted the length and breadth of their dance into smaller and smaller circles, with the children at the center.
Connor had to hit Sam to keep him moving. Cheobawn flinched as if the stick had found her own flesh.
“Don’t. Don’t do that,” she said, her voice shaking. “He is mine, to kill or keep as I see fit.” She caught Tam giving her a strange look but she chose to ignore this as well.
Herd Mother pushed her nose into Cheobawn’s back. Cheobawn managed to stay on her feet.
I smell blood, she said, licking Cheobawn with her enormous tongue in a futile attempt to clean her off.
“I will wash later. We need distance between the living and the dead,” she said, pushing Mother’s head aside. “Let me up.”
Herd Mother danced nervously but finally dropped to her knees. Tam locked his hands together and tossed Cheobawn up onto Herd Mother’s broad back. The bennelk scrambled to her feet again, thrusting her horns high, lest any predator mistake her for one of the wounded. One by one, a bennelk peeled off the edge of the moving circle and knelt down in the center, allowing themselves to be mounted. Tam tossed Sam up first.
“Hang onto the long hairs and try to stay on. If you fall off, we will leave you to the carrion eaters,” Cheobawn said, looking into his face. His eyes still looked glassy but she saw the man inside struggling to regain control. He nodded grimly and copied her, burying his fingers in the ruff, as his animal began to circle, keeping as close as possible to the inner edge, perhaps sensing the weakness of its rider.
Bohea clambered up onto the next mount. He seemed to be enjoying himself. Cheobawn glared at him. The least he could do was act like a captive for her benefit. Megan mounted after him, her animal moving her away to the outer edge of the circle as she pulled her stick from its sheath on her back. It seemed the bennelk were well trained in combat and did not need to be told how to position an armed rider.
Tam tugged the chin ruff of the only bennelk carrying baggage. Cheobawn stared in wonder. Somehow they had rigged a rudimentary pack saddle out of the odds and ends in the tack boxes back at Meetpoint dome. This pack held all their gear, freeing up hands and bodies for battle. She shook her head in amazement at her Pack’s cleverness.
The pack animal dropped to its knees, the herd shifting to protect it. Alain and Connor moved up with their burdens. The two boys tied down the newly gathered packs as quickly as they could while Tam pulled Cheobawn’s bladed stick out of from under the kite. She very nearly laughed to see that he brought their toy. This was so typically Tam, hanging onto all his equipment, thinking it would be less of a burden to carry the extra weight than having to explain himself to the Fathers who took a dim view of abandoning equipment in the field.
She looked around the empty camp one last time. It was then that she spied Garro’s sack lying not far from his body. She did not blame them for missing it. It looked no different from the offal in which it lay.
“I need that bag,” she said, pointing at it with a bloody finger, “the one near Garro.”
Tam looked up at her.
“What is a garro?” he asked but Cheobawn could not answer, suddenly transfixed by the gore on her hands. It was hard to hear over the roaring in her ears.
“Garro,” Bohea said, “is the name of that man without a head. The bag she is
referring to lies near his feet. It is full of bloodstones.”
Tam paused to glare at Bohea, his loathing apparent before turning to make his way out of the bennelk circle. Slapping shoulders and haunches with the haft of his stick to keep from getting trampled, he danced clear of the great beasts and then paused just outside the restless circle to rake the open space with his eyes. Seeing no apparent threat, he leaped into motion and sprinted towards the body where it lay crumpled amid the ruins of Old Father’s belly. As he drew near Tam launched himself feet first. He slid to a stop against Garro’s torso, already twisting to reached for the bag with his free hand. Something flashed into motion above his head. Tam recoiled, his blade unerring. A carrion lizard tumbled to the sand, head and body rolling in separate directions. Tam did not stay to admire his handiwork. In the next heart beat he had the bag in hand and was racing back towards the circle of bennelk.
A handful of lizards screamed their challenge from the ridge of Old Father Bhotta’s spine, not yet willing to launch their paltry numbers against the bennelk defenses. Their courage would grow as their numbers increased. Three more lizards scrambled up the side of Old Father as Cheobawn watched. She clamped her teeth together and forced the muzziness from her mind. The scavengers had been using Old Father’s body as cover to move in close without her realizing it. The Pack was very nearly out of time.
Everyone but Tam had found their way onto the back of a bennelk by the time he sprinted back into their midst. Tam tossed the bag up to Connor and vaulted onto the back of the nearest animal.
“Fly, Mother!” she shouted.
Herd Mother trumpeted her defiance at the things in the bushes as she gathered herself under Cheobawn and surged towards the mouth of the small valley. Her herd sorted themselves out, forming a wedge of moving muscle that crushed the undergrowth underfoot along with any scavenger that stayed over long or thought to challenge the herd’s might. Something leapt at her and died, squealing out its last breath under Herd Mother’s talons. She glanced over her shoulder in time to see Tam lean down low, his stick twirling, his blade severing the spine of a hunter cat hanging off the foreleg of his mount. Obviously well trained to fight in this way, the bennelk had put the herd members with the armed riders on the edges of the wedge. Blessing Vinara and all her drovers, Cheobawn turned her face into the rush of wind. For the first time since the previous dawn, she started to believe she might survive long enough to face the Coven’s judgment.