The False Martyr

by H. Nathan Wilcox

  Teth screamed. The arrow left her bow, flew exactly where she had aimed it, sent the young man with the pendant falling from the wagon, clutching at the shaft that had connected the pendant directly to his heart. His fellow met the same fate before he had another bolt in his crossbow. He fell to the opposite side, hit a soldier hiding behind his wagon as he went, driving the man into his own sword.

  Teth screamed again and locked on the next wagon, the next set of crossbows. They were not even loaded. The soldiers that held them were not even trying. They stared at her in shock. They were worthless, could not give her what she wanted. Arrows flew from her bow so fast as to almost fly in parallel to end their worthless futility.

  Somehow, she was walking forward, was almost to the first wagon, voice a banshee, rising again and again to the heavens in a shriek. She cast her bow aside, pulled the knife from her belt, and yelled at the first soldier she saw, “Kill me! Do it! Do it or I’ll end you!”

  The man barely tried. Shaking as if facing a demon rather than a girl, he lunged with his spear and missed her completely. She caught the shaft as it went by and pulled its owner to her, slashing his throat as he fell past. Blood sprayed over her, covering her hand, draining onto her legs, splattering across her face. She cast the man aside and held her arms out for the next. He would have to do it now, was too close to miss, was motivated by fear and revenge. Not even the Weaver could stop him.

  A pole blade cut into his side, threw him into a wagon, and took him to the ground before he could thrust his spear forward. Teth screamed at the big dockworker who was nearly touching her, looked at the pole blade in his hand and drove her knife into his chest. Again and again she hit him, screaming the entire time, until he fell backward from the road, gasping and writhing, chest a stain of red.

  More men came at her then, but she had lost herself completely. She had become exactly what the Weaver had made her to be, and she fulfilled that calling with a brutality that would have sickened Hilaal himself. Men came at her with spears and swords and hooks, allies and enemies, from in front and behind and the sides. Every one of them was bigger than her, stronger, older. And none of it mattered. They fell as fast as her knife could move. They tripped on rocks, ran into their fellows, were blinded by the sun, hit by errant arrows, nudged by frightened horses, but more than anything their hearts were pierced, their throats were slashed, their organs were spilled by a girl who moved like a force unto herself, a girl that they could not touch, who showed no mercy, who was created by the Order over generations then positioned perfectly to ensure that not a one of them survived.

  And as she killed, she screamed. Guttural screeches rose from the very core of her being until she had no more voice to give them life and they became silent howls, the rage of a ghost seeking its revenge on the living.

  Chapter 70

  The 56th Day of Summer

  The crowd was even bigger today. Dasen was not sure how that was possible. There were men and women, young and old, wealthy and workers. They had formed just as they had two days prior, arriving just as he emerged from the inn, led by their champions, drawn to their saint. The Tappers had made it known that Lady Esther planned to take food and water to the camp, so they brought wagons of both with them. They marched with Dasen at their lead, singing another hymn, packing the streets and trailing for blocks.

  The last remnants of the army had arrived that night and gone at first light, but supplies were still moving, men were still gathering, and the governor had declared another curfew – the last, he promised. That promise was not enough for Lady Esther. The people of the camp had not had food or clean water in days. The sickness was likely spreading, people were starving and dying. Another day would be that many more bodies piled into wagons, that many more children without parents, that many more parents crying over children. Dasen could almost convince himself that it was a cause worth marching for, one worth dying for.

  “Halt,” Governor Colmar called as they turned onto the wide road that would lead eventually to the camp. “Return to your homes. No one is allowed on the streets without specific permission from me or Field Marshal Landon.” He looked at the line of soldiers to either side of him. There were perhaps fifty of them. They had formed a makeshift barricade across the street with carts and barrels not more than twenty paces in front of Dasen. Governor Colmar, in his full armor, was the only man among them on a horse, but at least twenty held heavy crossbows aimed at the crowd.

  Dasen searched for Kian among those men. He had promised that he would be there, that he would be the one taking the shot, but what if he had been redeployed? What if he hadn’t received a bow? What if one of the other men got nervous and fired first? He felt his breath catch and his knees grow weak. He tried to keep himself steady.

  Valati Lareno was there to support him. “Say something,” he whispered.

  “We will go to our brothers and sisters at the camp,” Dasen managed. He tried to yell, but his voice was strangled by fear. This was it. It had all come to his. Deena Esther was going to die. He almost felt like it was a part of himself that would take the arrow. “We bring the Order’s mercy. It will not allow us to be deterred. We will see that Its work is done.”

  He heard the thwack of the string on wood. He turned toward the source but never saw the arrow that hit him.

  When he woke, he was on the ground. He looked up at a hundred bleary eyes blocking every bit of the sky above. The eyes were popped. Jaws hung. Faces were frozen. Dasen brought up his hands. They were covered in red. His chest hurt like his heart had been pierced. His head rang. Kian hadn’t been kidding about that hurting. He stared for a while at his hands believing for some time that the blood was his own, believing that the bolt standing in his chest had actually made it through the leather.

  “My lady,” Garth bellowed, his mighty voice rising to the heavens. “What have they . . . ?”

  “She’s shot,” Valati Lareno screamed. “The Order have mercy, they shot her.”

  Dasen’s thoughts were moving slowly, but he recognized his cue. He spasmed, raising his chest to the sky then shook slightly, trying to give a show without overdoing it. “Aghh,” he moaned. “Aghh.”

  Valati Lareno reached a hand to his face ostensibly to brush away a strand of hair, but it ended with him smearing blood down the side of his cheek. “Be still, my lady,” he said. “Be still. We will get you to safety.” He lowered his head to Dasen’s lips. “What is that, my lady? Please, save your energy.”

  Dasen had wondered what he would chose as Lady Esther’s final words, but it seemed that, even in that, Valati Lareno would pick. “You’re dead,” he whispered. Dasen did his part. He shuddered slightly then lie as still as possible, eyes open, mouth slack, barely breathing

  “Yes, my dear, sweet lady. Yes,” Valati Lareno declared. He pulled a square of black lace from his sleeve and laid it across Dasen’s face. “She’s dead!”

  The crowd gasped, a murmur spread and grew to a roar. “Her final words.” He waited for the mob to grow silent. “Her final words were, ‘The Order’s will must be done. We must cast out the chaos that holds us so that the Order may reign again!” Dasen wondered how he had managed to say all that with a final gasping breath, but the crowd seemed not to care. They thundered.

  Garth was lifting him then. His strong arms sliding under his back and legs. Dasen allowed himself to lie limp in the big man’s arms despite how the vest shifted to pinch his neck and arms.

  “The governor’s done this,” someone in the crowd yelled. Dasen recognized it as Jaren playing his part. The crowd roared again. “He has killed the Order’s chosen for his Exile masters. He must face the Order’s judgement.”

  Dasen was moving back through the crowd now, Garth carrying him slowly so that as many people as possible could see his body before it disappeared. Through the gaps in the lace, he watched their faces go from shock, to sorrow, to fury as he passed. Their voices went from murmurs, to silence, to screams. Then they were flowing aro
und him, charging toward the barricade, taking back their city all in the name of a false martyr, a saint that had never existed.

  #

  Garth carried Dasen through the doors of the River Maiden and into the common room. Pig blood ran down his arm in a long line to his middle finger where it dripped slowly to the floor. The rest of it had pooled around his stomach were it bowed in Garth’s arms and soaked into the dress to transform the silk from yellow to orange-brown. For Dasen, the world was still spinning. His chest ached so that even the small, slow breaths he allowed himself were painful. He was growing faint for having his head dangling upside-down in Garth’s arms, and everything was bouncing.

  The few people who remained in the common room gasped when they saw the bloody corpse in the Morg’s great arms. Dasen could not see from his angle, but Garth must have put on a show of his own because the people universally blanched and stumbled away as if the body in his arms was an example of what happened to those who crossed his path.

  “The Order save us, what’s happened?” Mr. Tappers screamed from the end of the bar. “Is that Lady Esther? Oh, the Order take us, no! Please, oh please, no!” He ran around the bar, waving his hands, voice rising like a girl who had seen a rat.

  “She’s dead,” Garth rumbled, voice broken by grief. “The governor’s men killed her. Her followers are seeking justice. The city is chaos.”

  “The Order be merciful, it can’t be. That idiot. How could he?” Mr. Tappers moaned. “Please take her to the side room and lie her down. Let her rest now that the Order has called her back.”

  Garth dropped his head, great beard falling across Dasen’s chest so that its tip was stained with the blood pooled at his middle. He walked to the private room.

  At the same time, the few residents remaining in the inn began clamoring. “The city in chaos?” “A mob?” “Riots?” “What do we do?” They crowded around Mr. Tappers seeking reassurance.

  They received none. “You heard the Morg,” Mr. Tappers proclaimed. “I cannot guarantee your safety here. We are too close to the mobs. You must seek refuge elsewhere. Please, you must protect yourselves and your families. Run to the docks. The army is still there. Tell them what has happened and beg for their protection.”

  Men yelled. Women screamed. Children cried. Families formed into single units. And they ran. Some men dashed back to their rooms for purses or prized possessions, but most of them just ran. And the innkeeper herded them out the door.

  Garth crashed into the private dining room, slammed the door behind him, and set Dasen in a chair. The blood that had been pooling on his stomach flowed down all at once, staining the front of his dress and splattering to the floor. Dasen retched as its smell rose, sharp, metallic, and rotten. He had barely noticed it before, but now, as it started to dry, he felt it pulling at his skin, sticking to his clothes, and clinging to his face.

  “You alright?” Garth asked.

  Dasen looked to the door, made sure it was secure. Shouts, clamor, and commotion pounded its surface as the inn’s residents sought their escape. No one would be able to hear what he said over that. “My whole chest aches so I can hardly breathe, and my head is spinning, but I’ll survive.” He tried to stand, became lightheaded, and had to catch himself on the table. Garth held his arm to keep him from falling. “Help me get out of this dress,” he said when he had recovered enough to stand.

  “Humph,” Garth said and stepped back to the door. Dasen looked at him then tried to work the buttons on his own. They were small, tight, and ran up the back of the dress. His fingers were slick and sticky at the same time from the blood that covered them, and the vest restricted him so that he could barely reach his back. He would never be able to unfasten the buttons, but he couldn’t stand to wear the blood-soaked, stinking, choking dress for another moment.

  “Give me your knife,” he said to Garth. The big man’s eyes went wide. “So I can cut off this dress.”

  Garth snorted and handing him a long, thick knife. Dasen inserted the blade at the neck of the dress, and pulled it down, using the vest to protect his body from the blade. In a moment, the dress was falling away. Climbing from it, he kicked the remnants into the corner. He added the dripping bag and the leather vest a moment later, gasping with each movement for the pain in his chest. Finally, he began pulling out the pins that secured the great wig to his head. Mrs. Tappers had outdone herself that morning so that the wig would not come off in all the excitement, and it took him what seemed like hours to find and remove the last of the pins. When it was out, he cast the cursed thing into the opposite corner, wishing it were a fire.

  That left him in an undershirt that was surprisingly only bloody at its bottom and a, now rather ridiculous, set of pantaloons that billowed around his legs. The top of these was soaked red with streaks running in streams all the way to the polished slippers on his feet. The sticky blood still covered his middle, ran down his legs, and stained his hands. It pulled at his skin as it dried and smelled like death. Even worse than the cosmetics, it was everything he could do to not claw at his face and hands. Desperate for a reprieve, he looked for something to wash it away, but the room was empty, containing not even a pitcher of water. “Can someone get me a damp cloth and some clothes?” he finally asked.

  Garth snorted, but more humor entered the sound this time. “My knife,” he said, holding his hand out.

  Dasen looked down at the knife still in his hand. It was broad and as long as his forearm with a blade on each side. It was a killing knife. He shuddered and handed it to the Morg, who, thankfully, returned it to its sheath.

  “How are you feeling, my dear?” Mrs. Tappers burst through the door, nearly running into Garth. She held a small bucket in her hand. Steam rose from it, along with the smell of flowers. Bubbles were visible along its top.

  “I’ll live.” Dasen meant it as a joke, but no one laughed. The truth was that he was feeling light-headed and woozy. His head throbbed, and each breath felt like a knife cutting through his ribs.

  “I can tell you’re hurting,” Mrs. Tappers approached and ran her fingers over his head and down across his chest. “I don’t think anything’s broken. Probably just bruises, but I’ll get you something that will ease the pain. In the meantime, I brought you some soapy water and a rag, so you can clean up. I’ll be right back.” She pushed her way back past Garth and disappeared through the door.

  Dasen exchanged glances with Garth before he stripped, but it was clear that the Morg had no intention of leaving, so he stripped down to his final layer and used the soft rag to scrub away as much of the blood and cosmetics as he could. As he scoured, he thought about what would happen next and found anticipation easing his other miseries. Any minute now, Teth is coming through that door. We’ll be away from here. We’ll be together and nothing will stop us.

  The door opened again as he finished with the, now decidedly orange, water and rag. He jumped, thinking his silent wishes had come true, but it was just Mr. Tappers. He held a bundle of clothes in one hand and a steaming mug in the other. “Everyone is gone,” he said. “I’ve checked every room, every nook and corner. I think it’s the first time this place has had this few people in it since the day we opened the door.” Though he tried to maintain his usual chipper demeanor, Dasen could hear the sadness and regret beneath. He took a long breath, looked at Garth with resignation, and handed the clothes to Dasen. The mug went to the table.

  Dasen dressed quickly but relished pulling on the light canvas pants, buttoning the shirt up the front, allowing the neck to hang loose, rolling the sleeves, but most of all, he delighted in looking and feeling like a man. “Ah,” he said as he plopped back down in the chair, legs spread in the least ladylike position he could imagine. “I can’t believe I’ve been wearing all that for four weeks. I tell you, I have no idea how women do it.”

  “It is nothing in comparison to putting up with you men all the time,” Mrs. Tappers answered as she swept into the room. “Drink up your tea now, dear,” s
he ordered. “It will make you feel right as the day you were born.”

  Of course, she was right. Taking a sip, Dasen found it sweet, herbal, and immediately relaxing. “What is this?” He held the cup out, took another sip, and felt his lips begin to tingle.

  “Something from a previous life,” Mrs. Tappers said. “Best thing in the world for a headache. Now, I’m just going to get some things together for your journey. Relax for a few minutes and drink your tea. You should go soon, but we’re safe for now.”

  “Thank you, I can’t say how much it means that you’re helping us. I don’t know what Teth and I would do without you.” Mrs. Tappers waved off his thanks as she strode out of the room, so Dasen caught her husband’s eyes instead. “I really mean it. I . . . I don’t know when or how, but if there is anything we can do to repay you after this, I will do it without hesitation.”

  “That’s very thoughtful of you,” Mr. Tappers waved off the thanks just as his wife had, “but we’ve got everything we need here. Now, drink your tea before its cold.” Dasen took his advice and felt his miseries easing with each sip as if washed from him by the tea.

  “It sounds like everything went as planned?” Mr. Tappers started after a pause, directing his question at Garth and Dasen simultaneously.

  “I guess,” Dasen answered when Garth only grunted. “Deena Esther is dead, I’m still alive, and the very Maelstrom seemed to have broken loose as we were leaving. I suppose time will tell if Kian gets what he’s looking for.” The thought of Kian brought Dasen’s mind lurching back to Teth, and his heart leapt into his throat despite the calming effects of the tea. “Where is Teth?” he started, breath catching with each question so that he could barely get them out as new ones piled up waiting for their release. “When will she get back? Have you heard anything?” Please, hurry, Teth. Please, be careful. Please, come back to me. Please, come through that door smiling. Please, be the girl I knew before everything went wrong.