A Poisoned Land (Book 1: Faith, Lies and Blue Eyes)

by Craig P Roberts

  The inked boy began to stretch. With his legs apart, he bent forward, placing his face onto his left shin, then did the same on the other side. He crouched from side to side then did the splits. Docháran sprung up to his feet, unleashing a flurry of practice kicks, high and low, spinning and jumping. His fists were flying. Then he came to a dead stop and walked to the center of the ring.

  Only hands that hit you, hurt. Baskie wasn’t impressed with the bravado.

  Mior, meanwhile, stood with his arms out to his side, his palms and face pointing at the sky, mumbling some shit Baskie couldn’t make out.

  Is he crying or something? Baskie wondered.

  A few tears ran down Mior’s face and dripped into the sand. He clenched his fists and walked to the center of the circle, taking up a high guard position with a narrow stance, in front of Docháran, who stood like a strange insect, ready to pounce. His hands were locked forward, looking like pincers. Baskie recognized this style: it was a form sometimes practised by those that follow the way of Lixus. The Blind-Seer, Kiko, followed this way of life. It was first developed by ancient Lixian tribes that dwelled in the land that is now the Peak Kingdom, before the Great Poison. The Peak Kingdom still taught its ways, long after the Lixians were forced south into the marshes. This form mimicked the movements of the red lantar insect.

  “Let the Mother’s strength flow in both of you,” the Mister shouted with his arms outstretched, much like Mior had just done. “Ready… Engage,” he sang, sharply dropping his arms to the side. And a silence fell around the ring as the two opponents waited, swaying slightly in their very different stances.

  Mior was the first to move, throwing a quick jab at Docháran’s face. The crouching insect-boy hooked and deflected the blow with a pincer-like hand, spun and kicked Mior’s jaw, knocking him to the ground. The bent-nosed boy sprang to his feet and walked away from his opponent with his arms outstretched again. He walked near to where Baskie stood. Now his mutterings were clear: “Oh Mother, fill my fists with strength. Mother who watches from above, give me strength.”

  Docháran, on the other hand, was silent, breathing, swaying low in his insect-like stance again. His sharp blue eyes were locked on his opponent’s every move, waiting calmly.

  Mior turned and ran towards his opponent, throwing another jab, which was parried, a cross, which was blocked and then a hook, which the inked boy ducked and then unleashed a combination of fast kicks. The crowd grew louder. Mior backed off, avoiding and blocking the flying feet, until they became too fast for his hands. His face was back in the sand again. Clapping enveloped the ring.

  As the fight continued, Baskie heard the boys behind him talking. “Docháran’s going to fuck him over. I bet you Mior shit himself when he saw him step forward.” A group laughed behind him. “You ever been punched by him?” another asked. “In the stomach! I couldn’t breathe for about an hour!” Another piped up, “The Mister says that the ten marks were given to him by the Mother to mark him as a warrior.”

  Well you’re a fuckwit, Baskie thought at the last comment. The Mister could say anything and the boys here would believe it. They are all so desperate to tug themselves off in that vision room or get inside a woman on that hidden island, that they would believe the Mister if he told them the sky was pink and he could fart fire.

  Mior managed to land a solid punch to Docháran’s face. The bent-nosed boy leapt onto his inked opponent, knocking him to the ground, and started pounding his fists into his face. The watching boys gasped with every blow that landed. Docháran calmly, with insect-sharp precision, hooked around Mior’s wrist and twisted. Mior screamed, cursed and rolled onto his side. Docháran knelt next to him and raised his fist for a finishing blow. Mior submitted by tapping his chest. His opponent sprang up, releasing the lock, bowed and walked away. The crowd cheered all around the ring. Mior struggled to his feet, brushing off the sand clinging to his back, chest and arms.

  Two raised arms from the Mister brought silence to the world. “A wonderful variety of styles. The Mother is proud of both of you. Let Her love enter your bodies and souls. Congratulations, Docháran!”

  Docháran looked as if he was ignoring the Mister’s words. He bent down to pick up his robe and cloaked himself, then rejoined the crowd. Mior, on the other hand, knelt before the Mister, looking as if he was having some kind of fit. His sweating body and flustered face rocked backwards and forwards. He spoke in a tongue Baskie had never heard before.

  “Be calm, Brother Mior. The Mother has not deserted you. She just chose to give strength to Docháran. You will stand to fight for Her again.” The Mister spoke kindly, and then leaned forward to whisper in the kneeling boy’s ear.

  Whatever he said, that fuckwit just ate it up, Baskie thought as Mior came out of his trance and strode surprisingly steadily back to his robe that was lying somewhere around the outside of the ring.

  “Now, Brother Baskie.” The Mister’s booming voice hit his ears. “Do you still wish to fight?”

  “Yes, Mister!” He stepped into the ring and removed his robe again. He pulled off the blue trousers too, as he preferred to move in just shorts. They were the traditional red of his home kingdom and the Mister didn’t look too pleased at the sight of them. His old eyes stared at the long strips of red material that Baskie wrapped around his feet and up his lower legs to support his ankles.

  The Mister’s eyes narrowed. “Do you feel the Mother’s strength flow through you, Brother Baskie?”

  He hesitated. Use your words to block, as if they were arms blocking punches. “I feel a strength flow through me, yes.”

  Through a coy smile, the old man uttered, “That is not what I asked.”

  “I wish to feel the strength you speak of.” Can we just get on with the fight? I’m not going to say what you want me to say just so you can put on a show for these mindless fuckwits.

  “You have a clever way with words, Brother Baskie.” The Mister raised his arms and prayed, declaring, “Mother above, give Brother Baskie the strength to answer my words truthfully.”

  For the tenth fucking time, I’m not a brother, so stop this fucking ridiculous show! “No, I don’t feel the Mother’s strength but I have my own strength and I know I can take anybody you pair me with.”

  The Blind-Seer had been brutal when she trained him and she had made him strong in the process. He hoped his cocky words wouldn’t come back and bite him on the arse as he pictured the Mister sending in somebody like Saul, who fought like a crazed thug. Or bringing out Docháran again and he’d get twenty kicks to the face before he could blink.

  “Corus,” the Mister sang out.

  Corus?! Corus is practically a girl! This will be a piece of piss, Baskie thought as he saw the boy walk out from the crowd, a quarter of the way around the ring from where he stood. As Corus took off his robe, his body trembled. He wore shorts and had only a sparse covering of thin hairs on his legs, being a boy of around thirteen years. Corus was the youngest on the island and easily the most timid. Their trainings were full of moments of him crying when he twisted his ankle or feigning retching when he got tired. Is the Mister hoping I’ll feel sorry for him and let him win, so he can claim it was the Mother’s strength that brought victory to the little creature?

  The Mister walked over and put a hand on the bare shoulder of the skinny but well-trained boy. “Brother Corus, you are the youngest here and you feel the strength of the Mother, do you not?”

  “Yes, Mister,” Corus blurted nervously in his surprisingly deep voice.

  “Then let us show the Mother your strength close up. We will fight outside the House of the Mother.” The Mister leaned forward and whispered in Corus’s ear. The boy nodded then locked blue eyes with Baskie. His stare looked like one of guilt, as if he had just taken a shit in Baskie’s bed.

  Why the House of the Mother? All fights take place here! Baskie had traveled and seen enough places and met enough people to suspect something was wrong—but he didn’t know what. Do not just se
e with your eyes, feel everything, hear everything, smell everything, taste everything. And something most definitely tasted off and smelled like shit.

  The crowd walked towards the big gray house. They stopped on the freshly cut grass just inside the wide circle of towering standing stones that encompassed the House of the Mother. The boys formed a ring, much like a green version of the sand one they had just come from. At least Corus will have a soft landing, Baskie thought, as he felt an itch in his nose. Corus knelt and put his hands on the ground. Mumblings and the usual recognizable words could be heard: Mother and strength and other bullshit. His opponent stood with balled, shaking fists.

  The Mister signaled the fight to begin and the crowd fell silent.

  Baskie didn’t take up any kind of fighting stance. Fighting is life, stand like you’re living. He just watched the younger boy’s back and clenched fists. From behind, the boy’s shoulders shook and shuddered. Walking forward cautiously, Baskie felt another tickle in his nose and his eyes dripped like they frequently did. He was close enough now to see the neatly trimmed, short, dark-brown hair on Corus’s head and the slightly longer hairs on the top blowing in the wind. Only fuckwits make the first move.

  Baskie waited.

  The boy turned. Baskie’s face was hit with a mound of grass that filled his nose and blinded his vision. Each breath was like sucking through a thin tube. Another handful of the grass trimmings came flying at his face, then a punch, albeit a weak one, hit his stomach. He couldn’t breathe. There was a second punch, then a kick to his shin. All the time, his eyes streamed and his nose failed him. Baskie collapsed to the ground, face first. The throbbing in his nose and eyes overwhelmed him. He felt a foot on his back and heard the roaring crowd.

  Through clouded, tear-filled eyes, an old hand with a white sleeve appeared, offering help. Baskie didn’t take the Mister’s hand. Instead he sneezed and punched his own nose over and over. He lay on the ground, refusing to move through embarrassment, frustration and the overwhelming need to stay still to make sure he didn’t interrupt a much-needed sneeze.

  “Brothers, it is true that Corus is the youngest out of all of you. Brother Baskie may have traveled far but he does not feel the Mother’s strength. Our young Corus is not known for his fighting prowess, but look. He is triumphant!” The Mister pointed to the cheating shit. “He was the first to be born on the Hidden Womb, he feels the Mother’s strength and it has indeed, made him strong.” The Mister’s voice boomed through an endless cloud of grass, tears and snot. “Let us pray to the Mother and thank Her for Her strength and ask that one day you will all lie with the goddesses.”

  The ring of boys dropped to their knees along with the Mister, who knelt in front of the cheating little cunt, Corus, with their heads resting together. They all murmured the same words as if in one low droning voice.

  Baskie could hear his friend and teacher, Kiko, the Blind-Seer in his head, only a fuckwit thinks there are rules to fighting. Fighting is life, and life has no rules.

  The Guard Who Watched

  This was the third time today he had snuck them into his tent. The boy king and King Stewart’s slut were paying him well and it was a pleasant show to behold, but Grey’Gon knew this was dangerous business.

  The temptress’s small tits were what he liked to focus on the most. He imagined what they must feel like in the boy king’s hands as he squeezed them and licked the nipples. Three days ago, when this arrangement first came about, he felt awkward watching the pair, but now after many meetings it felt normal.

  Greytis was King Romarus’s chief personal guard and was in his eleventh year of service to Last Kingdom. He grew up on the sandy market streets of Loren Tan. As soon as he came of age, he left for Tromon Tal to train in the noble service of the Ten Kingdom guards. After years of training, he swore his oath to First Kingdom and was given his guard’s name of Grey’Gon. After gaining their title, guards are assigned to various kingdoms. Grey’Gon remembered the reluctance of those not assigned to the three more powerful kingdoms. However, he welcomed his posting to his former homeland of Last Kingdom. His brown eyes meant women rarely desired him and because of his line of work as the king’s protection, it was unlikely that he would ever lie with a woman.

  As the boy king continued to fuck the piece of tail from the Wetlands, not one footfall away from where he sat, he remembered the time King Romarus tried to explain what it felt like to be inside a woman, just days before they left on this journey. His mind drifted back.

  “It just feels right,” King Romarus told him one night when it was just the two of them left in the throne room after a day of court.

  “That doesn’t really help me picture it.” Grey’Gon laughed as he sat on the top step of the dais leading to the throne, on which King Romarus sprawled, casually. They had just opened another bottle of red wine, traded from the Land of the Old Ways. It was from the northern province: Arland. They produced the sweetest of all wines and it was getting him and the king pissed as two fish that just had their heads bashed against a rock.

  “Well, when I first went with Bostonia, last quarter-moon-turn, I hadn’t been in a woman before.” The boy king waved his hand around, his voice echoing off the mud walls of the empty throne room.

  “Wait…You have a horde of women. How the fuck—” He paused. “Forgive my language, Your Grace.”

  “Fucking forget the fuck about it. I don’t give a fuck how you speak. You’re a fucking friend…Go. Continue.” The intoxicated words rolled out of the boy king’s mouth.

  “Okay, so how the fuck had you not been inside a woman when you have a horde of them to fuck whenever you want?”

  King Romarus let out another laugh. “They do other things to me.” The boy king sat up, trying to look official. “And some of my horde have brown eyes or we don’t know how pure their blood is. Some have blue-sight but you don’t know where they’ve come from. So Londenia wants to make sure the first one I put my seed into properly has briny, shight blue eyes…I mean, shiny brrrrright,” he corrected, as two poorly aimed fingers moved perilously close to the king’s eyeballs, “and know that their father and mother were blue-sight and theirs before them and theirs before them and theirs before them and theirs before them…right back to the gods, like my bloodline.”

  The Ten Kingdoms had strict rules that Grey’Gon never fully understood regarding who could fuck whom and who must not attempt to shoot their seed and who’s allowed to shit in what room. The whole thing must seem ridiculous to anybody not of the Ten Kingdoms. In fact, the rules seemed ridiculous from anybody’s standpoint, unless of course, you were lucky enough to be a blue-sighted king!

  “So you never went inside them?” asked Grey’Gon.

  “I go inside them all the time now that Bostonia has taken my seed—but fuck knows if she is actually properly with child yet. But no! Never went inside them before that.” A drunken arm swung around close to Grey’Gon’s face. “They let me do it in their mouths…and they did so many things with their hands.” He waved his hands to Grey’Gon, likely in an attempt to make sure he knew what hands were. “And there are other places you can put your cock.” Everything seemed hilarious to the boy king that night.

  Grey’Gon laughed along but was more interested in the dirty details. “So, tell me about the first time with Bostonia…If it pleases you, of course.” The wine was making him forget his place, and he had a desperate desire to find out what Bostonia’s cunt was like.

  “Well if you promise not to tell another soul…” The king sat up, swaying slightly.

  “I swear, Your Grace. It is my duty to protect you but also to hold my silence on any matters relating to the King of—”

  “—Okay shhhh.” The boy king interrupted and raised a finger to his drunken lips. “Fine…shhhhh. I believe you. The first time we fucked was in front of all of the people at our joining ceremony in the sand…that sand gets fucking everywhere by the way. Everywhere! But, at first I nearly put it in the wrong hole.” He
laughed.

  Grey’Gon feigned laughter but was more excited to hear the rest of what happened. “What did Bostonia say?”

  “She just smiled and guided it to the right place. Nobody saw. I pushed in and it just felt right. It was wet and warm and tight and you could tell she liked it too.”

  Stories from that night warmed Grey’Gon’s evenings in his lonely tent many times—sometimes more than once in a night. The thought of Bostonia was a treat. Her sister, Queen Londenia, was also arousing but now this live performance (although it was not Bostonia or the queen) was even more captivating.

  The two were naked, lit by the warm candlelight. It was dark outside and the camp was silent. King Romarus was on top. Sweat dripped off his body as he worked the girl from the Wetlands, hard. The king’s smaller body meant Grey’Gon saw more of those wonderful tits and smooth skin. The two made no sound but he could see from their faces they were desperate to moan and scream. The cheater held the boy king’s face on either side, looking deep into his eyes. The two pressed their lips together. King Romarus was on both knees over her, leaning forward so his lips could reach. His thrusting stopped so she took over, lifting her hips up and down underneath him. This excited Grey’Gon—seeing the curve in her lower back leading to her peachy arse, which jiggled ever so slightly.

  King Romarus whispered through gritted teeth, “Don’t stop.” Over and over the boy king whispered it between pressing his lips to hers. He took over the thrusting again. His jaw was tight. He looked down and gasped as his hips slowed.

  The dirty girl dug her nails into the boy king’s thighs and her mouth hung open.