On the Banks of the River of Heaven

by Richard Parks

  “Twice in one day, Hiroi. That’s something of a record for you.”

  “Twice I . . . ? Twice what?”

  “Twice you were right. You are right about why you burn. And yes, I admit it—I am real, at least in part. Though it wasn’t your cleverness that found me out. You already knew and had known for some time; you just weren’t ready to admit it, as with Michiko. Still . . . all things in their time.”

  Hiroi closed his eyes. “What is my punishment to be now? Have you thought of something better?”

  “Much,” the demon said cheerfully. “I’m throwing you out of Hell.”

  Hiroi sat up. For a moment he felt a shot of pain as he braced himself with his broken wrist, but in a moment the pain was gone as his wrist healed itself. “What are you talking about? That’s beyond your power!”

  “You want to stay? Perhaps tend your garden?”

  Hiroi looked at the garden. Try as he might, he could no longer see the garden. It was just rocks on sand, and nothing more. “No,” he said. “I’m done with the garden.”

  “Then Hell is done with you. Come with me.”

  The demon held out its hand. Hiroi hesitated.

  “Michiko. Did . . . did she ever find what she needed?”

  “The answer is ‘no.’ She’s still trapped, still searching from rebirth to rebirth, over and over.”

  “Then how can I leave Hell? My failure remains, and no ‘Goddess of Mercy’ has come to fetch me.”

  “You can’t leave Hell. Hell has left you.”

  Hiroi looked around. The black sand was gone. The fire was gone. Hiroi stood with the demon on a vast expanse of nothing. “Whatever Enlightenment is, I’m sure it’s not this,” he said.

  “Certainly not,” the demon said. “You’re just ready for the next turn of the wheel, your next chance to put things right. Give Hell credit that it did that much for you and trust the rest to patience, Hiroi. Even a great fire cannot burn a forest all at once.”

  “When I return to the living world can . . . can I help Michiko?”

  “Perhaps. If you can find her. Perhaps she will find you, when the time is right. Perhaps she already has, many times before.”

  “What if I fail again?”

  The demon smiled. “Then Hell is waiting,” it said. “Whenever you need it.”

  Hiroi took far more comfort in that fact than he thought perhaps he should. Yet before he forgot almost everything and his slate was wiped clean, Hiroi wished, for a moment, he had thought to ask the demon’s name. It was a failure of courtesy, since the demon was real, after all. It must have had a name . . .

  Just for an instant and, perhaps, for the first time in his life or death, Hiroi managed to see through the illusion, and what he saw was that the demon was not an “it.”

  It was a “she.”

  Oh, of course. How stupid of—

  Hiroi forgot everything, save what really mattered.

  The TWA Corbies, Revisited

  “In behint yon auld fail dyke, I wot there lies a new-slain knight; And naekens that he lies there, But his hawk, his hound, and lady fair.”

  —Traditional Ballad

  Prince Malthan considered the tableau before him with more than professional interest. The knight’s name was—that is to say it had been—Sir Gillan. He died bravely, which was no less than you’d expect for a knight errant bent on doing brave and dangerous deeds. Now his lay in the grass by an ancient oak. His opponent, likewise departed, had left his own mortal coil some distance away. Dogs had been at it, possibly because his foe’s armor was much more damaged than Sir Gillan’s and therefore his easier to reach. Sir Gillan hadn’t been touched. Yet.

  “I wager it was a lucky blow,” Malthan said.

  Malthan’s friend Gurgash peered out from his side of the oak. Like Malthan, his eyes were large and dark, his teeth long and sharp. Like Malthan, he was a young ghoul. Handsome, as their kind went. And, also like Malthan, the sun hurt his eyes. No matter, it had been a slow week for death and the two were hungry. Hunger overruled the sun.

  The two corbies who had arrived some time later croaked a protest from the branches of the oak above. Gurgash spared them one sour glance. “Oh, get off. Times are hard,” he said, in the common language that even corbies understood. The two corbies did understand but merely glared back, not approaching but not leaving either. There was always the chance of leavings and corbies knew even more than ghouls about patience.

  It was pure chance that Malthan and Gurgash had stumbled onto the feast; wars had been unusually scarce of late. The knights were all scattered around the land, searching for cups and whatnot. Human deaths had thus been reduced to isolated affairs, mostly old age and disease.

  Lean times for the Kingdom of the Ghouls.

  The noise of the duel had drawn the two ghouls just in time to witness the end. Malthan knew the knight’s name solely from the way his Lady had wailed that name over his prostrate form until her servants had forcibly packed her away, claimed the two combatant’s horses, and rode off. The ghouls had waited for a long time after to make sure they would not soon return; humans weren’t supposed to know about them.

  Gurgash glanced at Sir Gillan’s body. “I wonder why they left the armor? I gather humans rather value it.”

  Looking at Sir Gillan’s silvered plate edged in gold, Malthan rather valued it himself. “I suppose they were in a hurry. Something about reaching some castle before nightfall. Doubtless they’ll return for it in the morning, or send someone.”

  “Another reason to get down to business,” Gurgash said. “I do wish they had taken the time to remove it. It’s rather in the way.”

  “Here, let me . . . ”

  Gurgash stared at his friend as the young ghoul set to work on the straps and fastenings. Malthan had the armor neatly stripped and set aside in just a few minutes. The hose and padded gambeson took even less time. Gurgash frowned. “How did you know how to do that?”

  Malthan looked almost embarrassed. “Haven’t you seen a tomb effigy before? They’re pretty much accurate as to the specifics of armor.”

  Gurgash nodded. “And if I’d seen one a thousand times I wouldn’t know how all the buckles and straps worked. You’ve been paying attention to the things, haven’t you?”

  Malthan just shrugged, and looked away. “What if I have?”

  Gurgash shook his head. “I have known you all my life, Malthan, but I do not understand you. What is this interest in humans? Other than as meat for our bellies, I mean.”

  Malthan looked down at Sir Gillan’s corpse. “I don’t know. It just seems a shame, really.”

  In truth the blond, ringleted Sir Gillan could have posed for a statue even in his current state. His opponent’s dying blow that slew the knight may indeed have been sheer luck—bad, for Sir Gillan—it had barely pierced the mail at his neck but pierce it had, and too close to an artery. Sir Gillan’s padded gambeson was soaked with blood, although the armor itself was almost spotless.

  “I know,” Gurgash said. “By rights this meat should age properly for a week or so, but if we carry it back to the necropolis we won’t get any at all.”

  “That’s not what I meant,” Malthan said.

  Gurgash looked up from Sir Gillan’s arm, which he had just begun to gnaw. “I know. I was being polite and not mentioning that. I was hoping you’d do the same. Are you going to eat or not?”

  Malthan sighed, then reluctantly reached out for the gobbet Gurgash offered. He was awfully hungry.

  Later, when Gurgash was sleeping off his meal peacefully in the shelter of a nearby cave, Malthan slipped back out into the welcoming darkness and made his way back to the oak. Some nocturnal creatures with bright red eyes had found the remnants of the corpse and were busy scavenging what meat Malthan and Gurgash had left. Malthan paid them no heed. He very carefully gathered up the pieces of Sir Gillan’s armor and crept away. It was only near morning when he rejoined his friend, still fast asleep, in the cave.

 
For several moments, Gurgash just stared. “What, by all the Cold Stones of Caldun, are you doing?!”

  Malthan, for a moment, could only look as guilty as he felt for several long moments, then thought of something. “Reconnoitering.”

  Malthan lay under the bushes on a high hill, overlooking the drilling fields of a local guard tower. Two men-at-arms took turns swinging blunted swords at each other; further away a score of archers practiced on a straw opponent.

  Gurgash crouched beside his friend. “Malthan, when did you develop the delusion that you’re talking to a fool?”

  Malthan sighed. “All right, I was spying on the humans. So?”

  Gurgash shrugged. “It rather depends on why you were spying on them. A sensible ghoul might be looking for signs of impending conflict. We compete with the vultures and corbies more effectively if we find a battlefield first.”

  Malthan turned his attention back to the practice, particularly the shield-work of the smaller man. He’s quite good. “Yes,” was all he said.

  “But it’s not why you’re watching them, is it?”

  Malthan thought about it. “I don’t know,” he said.

  Gurgash nodded. “That’s truth, if I’ve ever heard such. You’re frightening me, My Prince.”

  Malthan groaned. ‘My Prince’ could only mean one thing. “Father wants me, doesn’t he?”

  “Yes. As the only son of the King of the Ghouls, you have duties.”

  “Meaning that carrion has been found and he wants me to help back up his claim to First Portion. That’s what being ‘King of the Ghouls’ really means: the most vicious and brutal of the lot!”

  Gurgash sighed. “I wager it means something similar among the humans. Shall we go?”

  Malthan hesitated. “You’re not going to tell him where you found me, are you?”

  Gurgash shuddered. “Certainly not.”

  Malthan followed Gurgash away from the hilltop, but his thoughts were elsewhere. There would probably be a fight coming back at the Necropolis. Shield technique wouldn’t be much use to him there, but some of the footwork looked interesting; he’d have to try it.

  Malthan blinked, realizing they were passing under the oak where Sir Gillan had died. The two corbies glared down at them from the limbs as if they had never left, though Malthan doubted there was so much as a scrap of Sir Gillan left now; even the bones were gone. Malthan wondered if the knight’s lady had come to claim them; more likely wild animals and dogs had carried them away. Still, one could dream.

  Malthan stood at the entrance to his father’s tomb, watching the sunrise. The bones of the original owners lay quietly in their stone coffins, or arrayed tastefully in their niches on each wall; there hadn’t been anything left of them to concern a hungry ghoul in some time. At the far side of the mausoleum Malthan could see the patch of blackness that served as a doorway for the tomb’s current owners. Across the hilly necropolis rose other tombs and barrows apparently left just as they were when the village in the valley below had been abandoned years before.

  Below the surface, of course, things were very different. Others of his kind lay claim to the ground below, sleeping snuggled into the buried vaults and tombs, making their way like moles through the earth. Malthan should have been asleep, too. Foraging had improved slightly due to a nearby border dispute; now there was nothing to concern a proper ghoul during daylight hours but rest and dreams of charnel houses yet untapped.

  Malthan wasn’t the least bit sleepy.

  The underground ways were narrow and, at the moment, hard to pass without disturbing the sleepers. Malthan looked carefully about and then slipped out into the morning sun. He carried his offering in a small cloth bag.

  He ran upright and not bent close to the earth in the shambling gait common among the ghouls. It wasn’t such an unusual thing, he told himself once more. There was nothing shameful in walking and running upright when he had a mind to; any ghoul could. Yet with so much time spent underground it wasn’t a skill many of his kind practiced often. Malthan had, as well as other skills even less appreciated among ghoul kind.

  Malthan was outside the Necropolis proper now, standing at the gaping hole that had once been the doorway to the village church. Looters had smashed it in years ago, once fear of the plague had subsided somewhat. Inside the church it was dark and quiet, even after sunrise. A prime location, forbidden even to the King of the Ghouls. But then, kings among the ghouls were a late addition. The Ancient had been around much, much longer.

  “Honored one, I must speak with you.”

  “Honor among the ghouls? What a notion.”

  What had at first appeared to be a greasy bundle of rags near the vestry stirred, and a pair of yellowed eyes opened in the gloom. The Ancient wasn’t asleep, any more than Malthan was. He didn’t sleep at all, if the stories were true. Malthan doubted that; surely the Ancient slept but not, it was clear, very much. His face was ugly even by ghoul standards, scarred and wrinkled. Most of his nose was gone but he still had all of his teeth.

  Malthan held out his bundle. “I’ve brought a gift.”

  “Food? Yes, of course. What else has value?”

  “Your wisdom, Ancient,” Malthan said, and the withered ghoul laughed at him.

  “Your manners are terrible. That is to say, they are excellent. Which in a ghoul is terrible. You are confused, young one.”

  “I know.” Malthan tossed the bag at the Ancient’s head.

  The Ancient snatched it out the air, faster than Malthan would have thought possible. “Better. Or at least appropriate.” He sniffed the aroma of decay appreciatively, then ripped the cloth aside to reveal the prize.

  “A whole arm, by the Cold Stones . . . ” The Ancient took an experimental bite and chewed, then closed his eyes in contentment as he swallowed. “Aged to perfection. You must want something very badly.”

  “I want to know what it means to be a ghoul.”

  The Ancient looked up from his meal. “As opposed to what? You are a ghoul. You eat decaying flesh. That is our way, now.”

  “Now? You mean we have not always done so?”

  The Ancient grunted. “Of course not. We used to be human.”

  For several long moments Malthan just stared. “What . . . what did you say?”

  “You’re not deaf, nor am I inclined to waste my breath repeating things I’ve already said. I’ve more respect for my time than that.”

  Malthan shook his head. “Pardon, Ancient. I was just surprised.”

  “A capacity for surprise is a human trait. We still share it, for all that we are not human now.”

  “But what happened?”

  “Time and circumstance. Take for example, this village where we now reside. Suppose not all had died? What would the survivors have eaten, with the food supplies spoiled and everyone too weakened to hunt or forage?”

  “That would have been a great sin in their eyes . . . or so I am given to understand,” Malthan added hastily. “But it would have made them cannibals, not ghouls.”

  “As long as the meat was fresh,” the Ancient conceded. “But does it remain that way? No it does not. Hunger compels, even as the corpse ripens. Now imagine what those who survived were forced to do. Now imagine how their tastes must change to allow that survival. Fewer still by now, I would think. Now they no longer tolerate rotted flesh; they crave it. See the difference?”

  Malthan nodded, reluctantly.

  The Ancient yawned, and continued. “It didn’t happen all at once, but there have been plagues enough over the years. Many years, many centuries. Our kind has been around for a very long time. Never so many of us to outstrip supply, or to be that easy to find. Our rarity has served us well, just as the fecundity of the humans serves them . . . and by extension, us. We kept human speech because it was useful. We kept memory, since experience teaches us what we need to know, just as I teach you. The rest . . . ” The Ancient dismissed it with a wave of his taloned hand.

  “This is why cannibalism is a
sin among the ghouls, as well, isn’t it? One of our few.”

  The Ancient smiled then. “Thus demonstrating the value of memory, even among the ghouls. Yes, to eat another ghoul, even one dead for a week, is a shameful thing. Mostly because we know better than most where such things may lead.”

  “The humans fascinate me, Ancient,” Malthan said. He hurried the words out; it sounded like a confession.

  The Ancient wasn’t impressed. “Not terribly unusual. I went through such a time myself, long ago. It should pass.”

  “But . . . what if I cannot be content as a ghoul?”

  “Then you are going to be very unhappy. You’re a ghoul, young one. Your face marks you. Your strength—remarkable even by our standards, I’m told—marks you. If that weren’t enough, your scent marks you. You can not be human again, if that’s what you’re thinking. Now go away; I hunger and the scent of your gift is making me giddy.”

  Malthan almost smiled at the thought of the Ancient being giddy about anything, but he could not quite bring himself to do it.

  Malthan made his preparations as best he could. He went off into the woods alone; he told no one, not even Gurgash. For five days he bathed in a cold water stream morning and evening and, though the taste and texture disgusted him, ate nothing but apples and berries. He couldn’t keep the fruit down the first few times, but after the second day it got easier. He let nature do its work and by the fifth day he was of the opinion that he didn’t smell too much like carrion, or at least he didn’t smell the same. On the other hand his breath, despite the change of diet, was slower to give up that mark of ghouldom. Malthan started chewing wild mint on the fourth day and, by the fifth, realized it was probably as good as it was going to get.

  Malthan took Sir Gillan’s armor from its hiding place and laid it out on the oiled cloth he’d kept it wrapped in. There was very little rust, he noted with satisfaction, and the straps on the few pieces of plate were still supple. He started with the washed but still blood-stained gambeson and worked his way outward to the mailshirt.