Sister of the Dead

by J. C.

  Pain smothered awareness until it, too, numbed in a growing chill that filled Welstiel's body more quickly than darkness filled his sight.

  When his eyes opened again, he was lying on the floor of his room in his own feces and urine, stinking like an unwashed peasant after his dying body released its waste. It took moments for him to realize he no longer breathed, and panic made him suck in a mouthful of air.

  Breath brought no calm—or any effect at all. His body felt cold and distant as the stone walls of his room.

  Heightened anxiety widened his senses. He heard the thrum of a spider as it worked its web in the ceiling corner. He sat up, clothing sticking to him with filth, and he saw his father and Ubad by the door, watching him. At their feet was a grimy peasant girl, bound and gagged, eyes wild with fear. How long had he lain in this room?

  Welstiel felt the girl's body heat.

  The sight of her... the scent of her warmed flesh made him feel... starved.

  "Come, my son, " Bryen said. "Instinct will guide you. Put aside thought of last night. There will be time enough for that. Now, you must feed. "

  Welstiel could not remember his father ever speaking to him with this mild taint of compassion. The night before, he would have given much for a kind word. Now he did not care for anything...

  ... only the warm flesh beneath the girl's jaw where it flexed with the soft rhythm of her pulse.

  He crawled at first, forgetting the stench of his own flesh, and then scrambled like an animal on all fours, rushing across the room. The girl squirmed in her bonds. She tried to scream through the gag as he fell on her, sinking his teeth into her throat until blood flowed into his clumsy mouth.

  Strength and comfort filled him, and then a peace that was wholly unsettling. He stopped gulping and slowly swallowed the pleasure on his tongue.

  When Welstiel could take in no more, he raised his head to look down at the body clenched in his arms.

  The girl's eyes were open. Her jaw slacked around the gag. Her throat was a torn and mangled mess, and blood had run across her face and soaked into her loose dress. Her heart beat twice and stopped.

  Welstiel looked down at himself. His shirt was soaked with blood. His heightened sense of smell took in its coppery scent amid the stench of his own wastes. He dropped the corpse and rolled away to huddle on the floor by the bed.

  "What have you done to me?" he cried.

  But Welstiel knew the answer. There would be no return to light and life. Nothing in his arcane arts could ever rectify this.

  "How could you?" he whispered.

  Ubad glided to Welstiel's desk and poured fresh water into a basin. He picked up clean towels and came to Welstiel.

  "Remove those clothes and clean yourself. Your father needs you. "

  "Get away from me. Both of you. "

  "Do as he says, " Bryen ordered. "Your bride is waiting. "

  Chapter 14

  Winter was not far off, and dense muck upon the roads made the journey to Apudalsat longer than expected. Or so it seemed.

  The first time Wynn insisted upon taking her turn at the reins, Leesil was surprised, and Magiere was openly concerned. Did they think her so helpless that she couldn't drive a team of gentle, well-trained horses?

  "I'm not so sure—, " Leesil started.

  "I have spent more time with horses than you have. " Wynn cut him off. "And with far less complaint about them. "

  Leesil scowled at her and crawled into the wagon's back to give her room to come forward. Wynn climbed onto the wagon's bench,, taking the reins Magiere held out. When Magiere stayed upon the seat beside her, Wynn shot her a glare..

  "I will be fine, " she said in an overly polite tone. "You should take some rest, as well. "

  "I'm not tired, " Magiere answered, eyes ahead on the road.

  She had barely spoken those words when Wynn jumped as Leesil wrapped his arms around Magiere's waist.

  "Hey!" Magiere snapped, but it was too late.

  Leesil heaved, and Wynn ducked aside as Magiere tumbled backward into the wagon's bed.

  "Leesil, dammit!" Magiere snarled. "What do you think—?"

  That was all she said, and Wynn did not look back to see how Leesil had silenced her. Leesil's mood, if not Magiere's, had oddly improved since the morning they left Keonsk.

  Chap scrambled up on the bench beside Wynn and settled there with a low grumble.

  Aside from this one moment, their passage was peaceful, though the nights grew colder and the roads more troublesome as they reached the marshy region of eastern Droevinka. They pressed on for several days, sometimes starting before dawn and not stopping until well after dusk.

  Like Leesil's, Chap's demeanor had altered. He was not his old self, begging or grouching about meals, but he had become more compliant. No longer growling each time Magiere mentioned their journey's purpose, he remained silent. Wynn was uncertain what disturbed her more, his change of attitude or his constant watchfulness as he gazed all day into the thickening wilderness. She often tried to discern what he watched at any particular moment. She saw little, hearing only croaking frogs, an occasional plop of something surfacing in a pond or marsh, or the far-off screech of a bird. The stench of a bog assaulted her nose now and again.

  Near dusk on the seventh day, Leesil was at the reins when he pointed ahead.

  At first, Wynn could not spot what he wanted them to see. Against the gray-white clouds, the distant skyline was only just visible through trees along the open road stretched out before them. Far ahead was a dark knob like the jut of a barren rock mesa, its top peeking above the trees on a tall hill. Wynn recognized it as the crest of a keep.

  Magiere's eyes followed to where Leesil pointed.

  Sympathy wrestled with wariness in Wynn when she saw Magiere's anxious expression. Each piece of Magiere's past found so far promised the next to be darker still. It was not long before they crossed a stone-and-timber bridge spanning another of the many sluggish streams.

  The water was clogged with dead branches and masses of sprouting reeds, and the road beyond climbed a large rise in the land. Down a short side path to the right were the remnants of an empty village. Thatch or timber roofs were pocked with holes or had collapsed entirely. A small stable at the village's near end had a broken fence. Cottage doors were ajar or missing.

  No one in the wagon said a word as they passed the village of Apudalsat.

  Leesil had earlier said its name meant "water downs village" and the reason was apparent as the main road swerved toward the keep and met with another bridge. This one was a long mound of piled stone and packed earth that spanned a wide pond turned green with floating scum. The village was situated on a rise in the marshland, with filmy water, bogs, and quagmires on all sides of it. Once they crossed over, the road straightened, and the keep loomed before them as they crested its hill. Leesil pulled the horses to a stop, and they all climbed out.

  Wynn grabbed her pack and approached the keep before the others finished gathering what they needed. She had searched a few abandoned buildings and strongholds with Domin Tilswith, but nothing quite like this. The keep near Magiere's village was well mended by comparison.

  Half the wooden gate in the outer stockade had rotted away long ago, and the remaining half was dank with decay.

  The main building's top had crumbled, leaving large moss-covered stones embedded in the courtyard around it.

  Wynn looked back toward the deserted village, but she couldn't see it through the forest. "What happened here?"

  "Civil war, famine, perhaps sickness that swept through long ago, " Leesil said. "Any of these could leave a fief without enough people to carry on work to support it. And it's certainly not a prized piece of land. Who knows what the main livelihood was here. "

  Somehow, Wynn did not believe anything so easily explained had happened here. The silence of this place made the cold of the coming night more acute. Though she could not see the village, the moss-draped trees blocking her view carried
their own telltale signs.

  "Look, " she said, pointing, and Magiere came to join her.

  An ancient spruce close to the outer stockade was tainted with brown. A few limbs had broken away or rotted through, and the stumps showed the same color turned dark with dampness. Other trees were in a similar state, and tumbled stones inside the keep grounds showed patches of lichen that had faded, only to be plastered down to mere stains. Around the keep of Apudalsat, death nibbled at the world, leaving marks too recently familiar for Wynn's comfort.

  Chap came to join her and growled once as he shoved his head under her hand. She stroked him absently, looking about at the creeping blemishes within the forest.

  "We should go inside, " she told Magiere. "Osceline said her master would know when you arrived. There is no one waiting for us, and we will learn nothing further out here. "

  Magiere looked into the forest, hand on sword hilt, and then turned and led the way as Wynn followed. Leesil stepped out ahead of them.

  As with the stockade's gate, the keep's huge wooden door had crumbled to scraps that littered the ground and floor beneath the arched stone entrance. The pieces mulched to smears under Leesil's boots as he stepped close.

  The light outside was fading, and Wynn unpacked the lamps, placing the crystals in the holders and settling their glass covers in place. Handing one to Magiere, she followed Leesil through the short entryway, and they found themselves in a center hall.

  The interior was less decayed but not by much. It was an old-style keep, with a huge fire pit in the center instead of a hearth to one side. The walls held archways and doors that likely led to side rooms and antechambers. Those same walls reached up to the remnants of an upper floor. The hall's center was open all the way to the keep's top, where an iron grate would have let the fire pit's smoke escape. Now all Wynn saw was the dark sky above where the roof should have been and crumbled stone littering the fire pit and floor. There was no sign of the fallen roof grate.

  Enormous tapestries hung on the walls, their images faded and streaked with grime and mold. Sections had decayed through, and some hung in folds by their tattered threads. One portrayed a battle between forces Wynn did not recognize. She stepped up to another, raising her lamp to illuminate the image of men in long cream robes and head wraps riding thin-legged, fierce horses.

  "I think this is Suman, " she said. "There are dunes in the distance behind the riders. It would cost a great amount to bring it all the way here. Why would a Droevinkan lord want such a thing?"

  Magiere paced around the fire pit. "The place feels familiar, but I know I've never been here. I've never been this far east. "

  Wynn joined her. "You are certain?"

  "Yes, I'm sure. "

  Leesil stopped examining the tapestries and circled the room to peer through archways and test old doors. Wynn was about to begin herself, hoping they might still find records or other information in this place. She spotted the first dead rat and stepped back.

  "Leesil!"

  "What?" He hurried over. "What is it?"

  Rats did not frighten Wynn, and she had certainly seen dead ones before.

  Instead of being bloated or rotten, the carcass was shriveled. The skin had shrunk around its rib cage and limbs, as if it had starved to death. In a place like this, where the forest grew wild and thick, that seemed impossible.

  Chap sniffed it and growled.

  "Another one, " Magiere said from a few steps away.

  They scanned the floor, kicking aside debris and checking the shadowed comers. There were at least a dozen tiny corpses about the hall, all in the same condition.

  "All right, " Leesil whispered. "Do I need to say how much I don't like this?"

  Chap whirled about, and his growl rose to a snarl. He cut loose an angry wail.

  The sound resonated from the stone walls, and Wynn tried to cover her ears. This was Chap's hunting wail.

  Magiere set down her lamp beside Wynn and pulled her falchion. Chap circled them, doubling back now and again as he looked toward the archways and doors all around.

  "Leesil, blades!" Magiere shouted, but Wynn barely heard her above Chap's noise.

  Leesil's cloak was already dropped to the floor. He wore his studded hauberk and slipped the holding straps on his thigh sheaths to draw both winged blades.

  "Chap, quiet!" he shouted, and the dog's voice dropped back to a growl. "Where is it?"

  The dog bolted toward a small archway at the back of the round hall. Magiere and Leesil rushed after him.

  Wynn carried both cold lamps. She ran behind her companions down a narrow passage, more frightened of being left alone than of what they might be hunting. She had seen Chane throw Vordana's brass urn into the smithy's coals, seen it melt, and watched as the sorcerer dissipated into smoke. But the dying trees and shriveled rodents fostered doubt in her mind.

  She could not see much with the others ahead of her. Chap's growl abruptly shifted to a snarl, and Leesil pulled up short. Wynn caught sight of Magiere in the jostling lamplight as she turned left. Leesil followed, and Wynn hurried to catch up.

  As they passed a side opening in a widening of the passage, Chap swerved and leaped through the doorway. Magiere and Leesil turned, as well. As Wynn stepped in behind them, she glimpsed a blur, little more than a moving shadow, racing away.

  She faltered as fright took a sharp hold on her.

  A creature like Vordana would never flee. He would not need to.

  Someone screamed out, "No, no! Please no. "

  Leesil and Magiere were in front her, weapons out but poised where they stood. The broken shelves and scattered pots and implements on the floor told Wynn they were in some type of kitchen. Vordana, or any undead, would not plead in fear. She pushed past her companions with a shout.

  "No, Chap! Stop it!"

  Leesil grabbed her from behind. Both blades were in one hand as he wrapped his other arm around her waist. He lifted her out of the way as if she were a small cat. Wynn struggled to see what they had cornered. The cold lamps jangling in her grip made light waver across the walls, and she could not make out anything beyond Chap but the arch of the cooking hearth.

  Leesil dropped Wynn to her feet and grabbed Chap by the scruff of his neck. "Enough, get back. "

  Chap snarled but obeyed, and Wynn steadied one lamp, holding it up so that its light spilled out beyond the dog.

  Cowering inside the barren hearth's hollow was a boy dressed in tatters turned dark by dirt and grime. Gaunt, with filthy brown-black hair to his shoulders, he squirmed to the hearth's far side and pressed one shoulder tightly into the comer. He covered his face as he looked out in horror, only one eye peeking between stick-thin fingers. There were fresh slashes down his arm from Chap's claws.

  "Chap, what have you done?" Wynn cried.

  Magiere crept forward in a crouch, ready to lunge at the boy, and her voice sounded forced and slurred. "Leesil, let Chap go!"

  Wynn turned to Leesil, about to argue, but Leesil stood wary and tense with his gaze locked upon the cowering little figure. Wynn's own anger faded.

  The topaz amulet Magiere had given Leesil hung in plain view, and it glowed brightly.

  "It is only a boy, " she whispered, looking back to the hearth in disbelief.

  The boy shuddered continuously as he tried to force himself deeper into the hearth's corner.

  Magiere glared back at Wynn. "I don't care what it was. "

  Her irises were completely black, her words barely clear, as if her mouth wouldn't form them correctly. Wynn wasn't certain, but Magiere's teeth appeared longer between her moving lips.

  "Think, " Wynn insisted. "No one lives here. The village and keep were deserted long ago. Do you not find it strange that he is here alone?"

  "Wynn, don't you do this again, " Leesil warned.

  "No!" she shouted back, and jerked out of his reach.

  Chap tried to snap his jaws closed on her short robe's hem, but Wynn backed away to the wall by the hearth. She cr
ouched down along the wall, set her lamps upon the floor, and peered around the hearth's edge. Languages came easily to her, and she had picked up enough Droevinkan now to converse in simple phrases.

  "If you... attack, " she said quietly, "They... take your head. Understand? Be still and we... not hurt you. "

  "Speak for yourself, " Magiere hissed.

  "Magiere, not now. " Wynn kept her gaze upon the boy. "What is your name?"

  He studied her and finally pulled his hands from his face, glancing now and then at the others. "Tomas, " he whispered, as if it were some secret he shared with her.

  "Did you eat... the rats?"

  The boy shrank back, eyes on Magiere. Wynn did not turn her attention away to see what had made him cower again. He shook his head.

  "No. My food all dead now. Can't find any but dead ones. " His voice cracked. "I starve now. "

  Pity washed through Wynn.

  "No toads, no rats, no snakes, and birds all gone, " Tomas whispered, and his eyes half closed in exhaustion. "I sleep. I starve. I sleep more. "

  His face was so coated with filth, it was dun colored instead of the pale shade Wynn remembered of Chane and the undead of Bela. His gaunt body would not stop quivering.

  Wynn dug blindly in her pack, watching Tomas cautiously. She felt the slick skin of an apple, and then another. When she had found three, she pulled them out.

  "We have nothing for you, " she said, holding out the fruit.

  "These come from... living tree. Fresh. Perhaps some life in them. "

  Tomas lunged at her.

  "Wynn, get back!" Leesil snapped.

  She felt his grip close on the shoulder of her short robe as Chap rushed forward with snapping teeth. Before Leesil could jerk her away, Tomas's narrow fingers seized the apples. One crashed in his grip as he quickly retreated into the hearth. Wynn thrust out her arm in Chap's way, and the dog halted.

  Tomas shrank into his corner. Sharp teeth and fangs sank through an apple's skin. His gaze fixed on Chap as he sucked, hunger overriding fear.

  "Wynn, what are you doing?" Magiere demanded, stepping forward.

  This time it was Leesil who held a hand out to stop her.