Several figures in a confused cluster moved across my field of vision, blurred twins twisting and struggling in the centre of a blurred group of men who dragged someone who kicked and screamed and begged. I tracked their movements without interest as my head turned to the right, then lost awareness of them as I began to turn it slowly the other way. The slow shaking of my head merged with the shrieking hysteria of the voice that danced around the stone square, accompanied by weeping and wailing and gasps that susurrated through me like a blustery wind in a forest. The pale undersides of green leaves danced before my eyes and waves crashed on a rocky beach somewhere far away.
Someone was kneeling in front of me, knees planted either side of one of my long legs. I looked at how they stretched out in front of me. Bare toes of the one foot I could see twitching far away.
“I don't blame you,” the figure was saying. “Anything would have been better than this. Death would have been better. We were betrayed. It wasn't your fault. We fought but they were amongst us, inside the compound.” He was crying. I watched the tears track down his face, like drops of condensation. He must be cold then, I thought. The cold pulls water out of the air. How did I know that? I reached out unsteadily and dragged a finger over his face. Not what I'd intended. It didn't matter. “Patron? Can you hear me?”
A face loomed in my vision, filling the world, making me grunt in fright.
“Can you help us? You have magic, patron.” The voice hissed like the wind in the leaves and a hand spun crazily past the face, touching my forehead. “Is there anything you can do? They are going to turn us all into zombies,” the voice broke. “Do you understand?”
“What happened?”
I heard a sob. I wondered if it was me. No one answered. The hand went away. My head wobbled. My neck felt too weak and thin to take the weight of my head. I slowly turned it to the left and then slowly back to the right. There were people. Lots of people moving. The light was bright. It hurt my eyes, Maybe I should close them. No, I thought, no, no.
#
I wanted to move.
Something was stabbing into my head and making it hurt. I was cold. Sitting in a puddle. I wondered if I was all right. Maybe I needed help. If I moved, maybe I could find someone to help me. Meran was always there to help me get back home.
My hands were in my lap. My legs stretched out in front of me. My feet were bare. I watched my toes twitching. The light was too bright. I'd have to move to get away from the light. My hands were in my lap. Id have to move them. Slowly I dragged one heavy arm away from my body and set it on the ground by my side. There was something tight against my side, holding me up. It was a barrel. I wouldn't be able to go that way. I'd moved the wrong arm. I moved it back. My arm would be more comfortable in my lap. It seemed to take a long time.
I watched the movement around me, there were people. Lots of people. Most were still. Those close by. There were many others. Some of them were shiny. Armor, I thought The shiny ones were wearing armor. I wished they would take it off; it was too bright in the sunlight. The sun was overhead and it beat down on my skull rhythmically, hurting, making me feel sick. I tried to think of a reason to move and couldn't think of a one. Where would I go? Why would I go there? Maybe I could get out of the light. I tried to move but my arms were weak and it seemed entirely too much effort. Something solid supported my back and pressed gently against my arm. I'd have to give up that support if I moved.
A shiny group of men stepped out of the crowd that stood all around, seemingly very far away. I could tell they were upset. It was the wild cries, the sobbing, the stifled screams. Those closer to me were moving but not going anywhere. I wondered why they didn't just go if they wanted to go. The shiny figures closed in and dragged one man away. They dragged him as he twisted to break free. For a while they stopped and beat him. Then they dragged him away. I wondered why he didn't just walk.
I closed my eyes slowly. It was hard. My throat was dry. I wanted something to drink. The thought of beer made my belly lurch and I gagged, once, a painful choking cough that brought nothing into my mouth.
The light faded abruptly and I opened my eyes. A black robed figure stood there, looking down on me and a voice rang though my head. “Your woman is asking after you,” the voice said. “I said I would see and tell her of your condition. It isn't good, cityman. I will tell her. If she cooperates then maybe I will have someone do something to help you live. But no, no of course I will not. I will say that but I will lie to her. She is just one of the sheep, after all. We have great deal of experience with reluctant sheep, cityman; they bleat and mill and scheme and plot and plan and it is all the mindless bleating of sheep in the end; among them we have sheepdogs who watch and listen and herd them as needed and one way or another they are used to further our ends.”
I looked at him. Wondering who he was and trying to make sense of what he was saying. I could hear a babe crying, its primitive distress uncomforted.
“She may want to see you, I suppose. She is a stubborn one. Arrogant as all of you are. But she is mine now. Ishal Laharek will be upset. He will have to bargain with me.”
The babe was crying and crying and wouldn't be comforted. The dark figure before me sighed and turned to look over his shoulder at two figures hazy behind him. “Kill that noise.” He turned back as one of them moved purposefully away from us. “Don't fret. Not you. I hear you are useless but I have decided to let death decide your fate. If you live to see the dawn we will take you with us. If not, I will call you back and let the barbarian Dannat have you, as Ishal promised him.”
The babe went suddenly silent.
We looked at each other for a while. I couldn't decide why I was looking at him; didn't know why he was looking at me. After a moment he nodded. “Yes, I think I can describe you to her well enough to suit my purpose. Blood matted hair down to your eyes, sitting in your own filth like the animal you are. Doubtless she would be impressed if she saw you herself. Maybe I will treat her.”
Abruptly he was gone.
I closed my eyes against the light and tried to remember what sounds I should use to ask for something to quench my thirst. It raged. “Water,” I remembered, but then couldn't think what I wanted it for.
#
Someone was squatting in front of me. He held my jaw in one gloved hand, steadying my head so that I was forced to see him.
“It's me, Sumto. Tahal Samant.”
I blinked. It hurt. He'd said that before. It still didn't make any sense.
“Well, it all seems to be over for you. I would help if I could... well, perhaps I would. You have been no friend to me, trying to spoil plans well laid and set. Still, we adapted, we knew you would come after us. We knew some force would come with you. We knew in your arrogance it would be a small force. We knew where we were going and so where you would follow. As it turned out your force followed along behind you, but that changed nothing. When we met the Alendi we forced them to change their plans, to gather up their forces and head for Darklake where it was always planned that Orlek and Duprane would meet your men and the Alendi would aid in their slaughter.”
Tahal, I thought. “What?”
“What? What slaughter? You really learned nothing from the battle of Undralt, did you? With no effort to prepare yourself, you stumble blindly into the sea and wonder why you are suddenly out of your depth and drowning.” He leaned forward and hissed into my face. “What are my real plans, Sumto? What are my real motives? Why am I here? Why are you here? What do you think? Do you think?”
He leaned back and slapped my face. I whimpered and raised a hand in a feeble attempt to fend off another blow.
“Really, Sumto, you are all that rumour had you be. A drunken, immature fool. You assume too much. But assumptions are useful. I had it that I was under the sway of the last king's amulet and no one questioned it, any more than you would have had the occasion arisen.”
“Just die,” I said, my voice breaking.
He smiled. “Wh
at? Me or you? I know which I would bet on. I'm going to leave you here and I'm confident all will be well with me, sot. Just as I am confident that all will not be well with you.” He sighed. “You would be well served to have spent more time studying strategy. No sense having a sound grasp of tactics if you have no strategy to define what you intend to achieve. I know what I intend to achieve; do you?”
I didn't answer. I couldn't. I had none.
“Time to go. I just wanted to say goodbye, Sumto. So, goodbye.” He raised hand, holding a large bright stone. “Now forget,” he said, “Just in case you survive, you will be as clueless as ever.”
My vision swam and the world spun. Dizzy, I set both hands to the ground to support myself. Swallowed a desire to vomit, knowing how much it would hurt.
When I managed to look up, someone was walking away from me; I had no idea who.
#
Something cool touched my lips and I opened my eyes. The sensation of cool moisture was a delight and I pried my gummy mouth open to take the cloth between my lips and suck the moisture out of it as I studied the shadowy figures that trembled in my vision; dark on dark, they were, but the whites of their eyes were bright.
I swallowed, let the cloth fall from my mouth and asked them what had happened.
They said something and a black woman appeared, seeming far away even though she must be right there in front of me. She looked at me, looked into my eyes and judged me as she moved closer and closer until she touched me and faded into me; I could feel her skin, cool and gentle as it washed through me and I gasped and wept as the coolness swept through my blood and washed the pain away. She leaned my head back against the wood behind me and I rested it there, looking up at the stars as their fuzziness resolved itself into clean, crisp points of light that didn't hurt at all. Her words whispered gently though my mind and cleared it. I breathed and felt the clean air in my mouth and lungs. Smelled the ill scents of sick and blood and piss and shit around me. The cold air resolved itself against my skin and I knew it for what it was. The wood against my back and shoulder was painful. I must have been leaning there for hours. It was night and I was Sumto Cerulean and I sat in a pool of my own filth. I hurt everywhere. I moved my head forward with care and focused on the man in front of me. His name was Dubaku.
“She's gone,” I said.
“Hush,” he said. “Speak as though you are ashamed of your words or they will hear us.”
I nodded. Regretted it. Better if I kept still, I decided. I could feel the blood encrusted on my face. Feel the stiffness of my tunic that was doubtless dried blood and filth. A shudder rippled through my body as I became aware of how cold I was, how hurt I had been.
“What happened?”
“We were betrayed. I did what I could. It wasn't enough. Of the people who looked to you, many are dead. Not all. Not yet.”
I moved gently, easing myself away from the filth I was sitting in, testing my strength. I didn't have any. “Damn, I'm a mess.”
“You're lucky to be alive. There was nothing I dared do until the dark came. I feared you would die before I could help you. I didn't dare risk exposure. Held in my mind are the names of many spirits and I could not risk putting them in the hands of such evil mastery. They would not serve willingly. They would be... harmed.”
I thought to nod but decided against it.
I remembered... I remembered a spirit that was called by someone, some time ago. I couldn't remember his name though and my head started pounding warningly as I tried. I stopped trying, leaned my head back against the wall behind me, closing my eyes. “Thirsty.”
“I have water. Move slowly. Even in the shadows movement attracts the eye.”
I did as he asked. Taking a flask and sipping at its cool, clean contents gratefully.
“Jocasta?!” How could I only have thought of her now?
“Hush. She is safe enough for now. Alive.” He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder and I looked to see a large building with an ornate frontage above steps that lead to a pillared portico. Here we were in moonshadow but the building was lit up by moonlight and torches; figures stood in the pools of light that the burning brands shed. Even from here I could tell that most were dead men standing, but two that stood at the entrance were living men, spearmen of a type that I recognized.
“You have seen her?”
“I have seen her. She is not harmed in body. She is distraught but holding in her terror and fear bravely.”
“You spoke to her?”
“No. I could not. A glimpse only, through an open door.”
My gaze fixed on the doorway across the square, it suddenly blurred and came clear again. “We have to get her out of there.”
He nodded but didn't say anything.
We were silent for a time. I remembered the water and drank. I was thirstier than I had ever been in my life, still I was wise enough to take only small swallows. I kept my eyes moving, assessing everything I saw.
We were in a fenced enclosure of heavy posts and rails such as farmers keep livestock in. Doubtless cobbles had been raised and the posts driven into the earth below. Inside the pen the cobbles were now covered in a layer mud and filth. The whole area reeked of piss and shit and fear. In each corner bales of hay had been strewn about to make bedding and a few shadowed figures rested there, a dozen or more to a corner. The message was clear. You are livestock waiting for the slaughter.
“Is this all that is left?”
“All of those that were deemed loyal to you. Most are women and children. A few of the men remain. It takes time, the capture of the departing spirit, the raising of a corpse, linking it to whatever power animates the corpse, the binding of the spirit into it. It all takes time. Some remain.”
A kaleidoscope of images from the long day of horror scudded like storm-driven clouds through my mind and my blood ran cold. The screams. The terror. Knowing their fate. Fighting it. Walking back as obedient corpses through the crowds, showing those still living what their fate would be and displaying to the crowds why it was wise of them to obey their new masters. I suppressed a laugh, shocked at myself and horrified that any part of me could find anything to laugh at in this. “I'm going to kill them all,” I said cheerfully. “You know that, don't you?”
“We will destroy them utterly, Sumto. The two of us.”
I bit my lip, chest heaving with suppressed laughter. What the hell was wrong with me? Madness; was I going mad? I calmed as suddenly as a small fire doused with water. “I think I'm losing my mind.”
He nodded. “The blow to the head.”
I reached up a hand to my blood stiffened hair in surprise. “I was hit on the head?”
He nodded. “I can just make out your eyes. One pupil is bigger than the other. Your brain is hurt.”
“Oh,” I said. Concussion. I should have worn a helm. A helm might have saved me and saved many of my people. “What happened?”
He sighed. “Sumto, you have been asking that question all day. It is almost the only thing you have said. I watched you crawl from one end of this pound to another. Then all the way around, taking hours. Then here. Please, tell me you remember what we have been saying.”
I nodded. “We were betrayed. By who? How?”
“He told you. I was close by, listening... you don't remember?”
I shook my head. I didn't remember. “Just tell me.”
“Dannat. He had betrayed you already in his heart, though I think he wavered for a time. His father is made undead, and these lands are promised him. They have not only his sisters but also his wife and children. He is an angry young man, Sumto. Trapped. With no good choices.”
“He made his choice. What happened?”
“He told some of the men, those who came with the magistrate, that there was no hope of victory, that your maniple was lost, destroyed at Darklake with the aid of Duprane and an army of Alendi. He turned them and they betrayed their fellows.”
I blinked. Trying to absorb the information. Could i
t be true that my maniple was lost? Of course it could be true, but what were the odds? What kind of numbers were we talking about? Who was Duprane? What kind of power did Duprane have? Could she defeat a city battle mage? I tried to imagine the battle that might have happened. My attention wandered, my gaze drifting from one cluster of sleeping forms to another. Sheep. Sheep in a pen awaiting slaughter. “Did they fight?”
Dubaku followed my gaze then nodded. “It was hopeless. The reserve unit that would have been controlled by you and the magistrate hit them from behind as the attackers came from the fore. They were slaughtered, but they fought.”
“Where is Jocasta? No, you said.” I looked at the building over his shoulder. I guessed it to be the hall of magistrates, where they would have met and where the day-to-day business of administering the town took place. “We have to get her out of there.”
“There are guards at each entrance to this square, both alive and dead. There are guards on the doors, as you see. There are guards inside. The dead are not a threat for now; they obey only Hathen Elt and they do not make decisions for themselves. Their will, their desire to act, these things have gone from them. But the living guards are enough. You are in no condition to walk, let alone fight. I am an old man with a few tricks. The town is subdued; many are dead and the rest live in fear. There are no allies here, Sumto, and many enemies. The one who hides me can only shield me from view, not any other. Not you.”
The situation was hopeless. He couldn't help me. I couldn't even get myself out of here. I closed my eyes. I was exhausted. I wanted to sleep, to give up and let the darkness take me.
The Key To The Grave (#2 The Price Of Freedom) Page 23