Once upon a Spring morn ou-2

by Dennis L McKiernan

  Tears ran down Borel’s face, and nearby his Wolves whined in uncertainty; they cast about, seeking the cause of the woe besetting their master but finding none.

  “Friends, family, loved ones,” began Borel, “even though she was the youngest of us, my sister Celeste was the most headstrong. Always did she seek a challenge, and for that we loved her. Perhaps it was to show us that she could hold her own against Alain and Liaze and me, and hold her own she did, yet I think it was in her nature to-” A distant horn cry interrupted Borel’s words.

  He frowned and looked toward the far woods.

  Again sounded the horn, and bursting out from among the trees came a rider, a remount in tow. Across the sward galloped the stranger, and he wore the tabard of a king, but just which king it was-

  “ ’Tis Avelar’s man,” said Valeray.

  Once more sounded the horn, and up galloped the youth. He leapt from his steed and called, “A message from Vicomte Chevell.”

  The lad strode forward, and his gaze swept over the gathering, for all their faces were turned toward him.

  He then saw Giselle, her own face puffed and her eyes and nose red with weeping, and the youth frowned in puzzlement.

  Now he saw Steward Vidal, as well as Armsmaster Anton, yet in spite of his instructions, he gave over the message to Prince Borel, whom he also recognized.

  “We’re having a memorial here, son,” said Vidal quietly.

  “Oh, my, I did not mean to interrupt,” replied Quint.

  Just then there came a whoop from Borel. “She’s alive!” he cried, holding the letter aloft. “She and Roel did not drown after all, but landed on a ship instead!” What? cried some. Alive? cried others, but most shouted in glee.

  “I’m going to wring her neck,” muttered Liaze, embracing Luc, tears of relief and joy running down her face.

  22

  Captive

  Of a sudden the rope went slack, as if it had been snapped in two. Roel scrambled to his feet and drew in the line, only to find a frayed end. With his heart hammering in dread for Celeste, he disentangled himself and unsheathed Coeur d’Acier, and drawing the rope behind in case of need, he stepped through the ebon wall, wanting to run in haste, wanting to yell out her name, but moving carefully and silently instead.

  Lighter grew the twilight, and then he was free of the bound. At his feet lay Celeste’s bow as well as a scatter of arrows.

  And in the distance he saw. .

  . . he saw. .

  . . the back of a retreating, fur-draped Ogre, a being fully twenty-five or thirty feet tall and bearing Celeste over one shoulder.

  “Celeste!” cried Roel, but she did not respond, and at the sound of the shout the Ogre sped up, now loping toward stony crags beyond.

  “Celeste!” Roel cried again, but the princess lay limp, as if unconscious.

  Knowing afoot he would never catch the Ogre, Roel slammed his sword into its scabbard and snatched up the bow and arrows and turned and sped back through the twilight. Quickly he ran to the horses and slipped the bow into Celeste’s saddle scabbard and the arrows into the saddle quiver, and using the retrieved line, he tethered her mount to his own pack animal. Then he leapt astride his horse and spurred forward, drawing the other steeds behind, and into the twilight he rode.

  Darker it got and he passed through ebon, and then lighter it became, and he emerged from the twilight and into day. Ahead he looked, and left, and right, but the fur-clad Ogre and his prize had vanished.

  Roel cantered forward, now scanning the ground for tracks, and he rode in a line toward where last he saw the monstrous being. Almost immediately he came upon great swaths of flattened grasses some eight or ten feet apart, there where the Ogre had stepped.

  Following these dents, Roel spurred to a gallop, and soon the impressions came some fifteen or twenty feet apart, for Roel now rode along the track where the Ogre had been loping.

  As he came in among the crags, Roel cocked and loaded his crossbow, and on into the rock-laden land fared the knight. Yet the ground was stony, and he had to slow to a walk, for he would not have any of the horses lamed.

  And the easy tracks vanished, and now Roel had to follow traces where the Ogre’s feet had turned up rocks, leaving fresh hollows behind, or the dark of stones where they had long lain with one side unseen by the sun but now were flipped over and exposed.

  In places he had to dismount and cast about for spoor. He found an impression here, and an overturned slab there, and a slip of sand yet faintly trickling down.

  He was nigh in tears, and he cursed at the slowness of his progress, and his heart hammered in dread for his beloved, for the tales told that Ogres were man-eaters.

  With his mind racing ’round all of the terrible things that might be visited upon her, Roel walked forward, his crossbow in hand, the horses plodding after.

  And then he lost the track altogether.

  Celeste came groggily awake as the Ogre reached into a stony crevice and pushed a great boulder in and aside to expose a cavern beyond. As she began regaining her full senses, she tried to get up from the ground and flee, but the moment she lurched to her feet, the monstrous being took her up, and on one hand and his knees, he crawled into a vast chamber beyond. He set her down and rolled the huge stone back into place.

  Light leaked in ’round the edges of the boulder, but Celeste saw that the crevices were too small for her to squeeze through. The cavern itself was lit with a reddish glimmer from embers somewhere within. In the dull scarlet gloom, Celeste heard a striker scrape, and then the glow from a large lantern filled the place. A huge chair and table loomed up in the shadows nigh the center of the lit chamber. Against one stone wall stood an enormous bed, and thereon a monstrous straw mattress and a jumble of blankets lay awry. A massive chest rested at the foot of the bed. Some thirty or so feet out from the opposite wall of the cavern sat an open-pit fireplace, ruddy embers within, and in the stone ceiling high above a jagged crevice acted as a smoke hole. Nearby lay shattered tree limbs and broken logs of oak, birch, maple, cherry, walnut, and the like with which to feed the fire. Beyond lay a clutter of splintered bones from meals long past. Great copper pots and pans sat on an immense sideboard, along with huge utensils-knives, spoons, cleavers, and such. In midchamber a stone ring marked a wide well; a large bucket and a long rope testified to water below.

  Celeste shook her head to dispel the dregs of her muzziness. The last thing she remembered was being snatched up by the heels just as she emerged from the twilight boundary, and there was a painful lump on the back of her skull, where it had hit the ground. She was sore ’round her waist, and there the rope was yet cinched. She discovered the line had been broken off short, with no more than ten feet remaining. The Ogre must have snapped the rope in two when he found I was tied to someone or something. Ah, when I was grabbed, Roel was yet- Roel! Is he-? Did the Ogre-?

  The Ogre hung the lantern on a wall hook and then turned and leered down at her and rumbled, “Give up all hope, for your companion will not find you here.” My companion. That must mean Roel is yet safe.

  Quickly, Celeste took stock. No bow, empty quiver, but wait, I yet have my long-knife; even so, what can such a small pick do against this monstrous foe. .?

  She looked up at the huge creature. He was hairy and unkempt, and he had a beard that reached down to his belt. Some of his teeth were missing, and those that were left were stained a scummy green. His breath smelled rancid, and it was clear he hadn’t had a bath in months, if ever. “Why have you taken me hostage?” demanded Celeste.

  “Hostage?” he boomed. “Ha! I want no hostage.”

  “Has a witch anything to do with this?”

  “Witch?” The Ogre’s eyes widened, and Celeste thought she caught a glimpse of fear within. “What have you to do with a witch?”

  Celeste frowned. If he is a friend of Hradian, or Nefasi, then he might turn me over to one of them. But if he is a foe, then he might aid me. On the other hand, he might slay me outri
ght just for knowing their names.

  Mayhap I should remain silent as to the acolyte sisters.

  “I wondered if you were the thrall of a witch,” said Celeste.

  “Thrall? Me?” sneered the Ogre. “I, Lokar, am no one’s thrall.”

  “Then why have you taken me prisoner?” Celeste demanded. “If it is for ransom, then-” The Ogre roared in laughter. “Ransom? Pah! I want no ransom.”

  “Then why?”

  “To be my servant, my slave.” But then Lokar’s eyes filled with puzzlement. “Wait. Your voice is high-pitched.” He leaned down for a clearer look. “Ah, in spite of your clothes, you are no man, but a woman instead.” Again he roared in laughter and said, “You will be my wife!”

  “Your wife?”

  The Ogre nodded. “To cook and sew and keep the cavern clean, and to sing to me. . and pleasure me in other ways as well.”

  Disgust filled Celeste’s face. “Pleasure you in other ways?”

  Lokar reached under his hides and grabbed at his crotch and joggled his hand. “Here.” Celeste turned away in revulsion. But then her eyes widened in horror. Mithras! His manhood will split me in twain. I’ve got to find a way to escape.

  “Cook for me while I rest,” Lokar harshly commanded. “After I eat, you can then pleasure me.” I must find a way out. And to do that I need to delay.

  — Wait! The fire. Smoke. Perhaps Roel will see. Then she looked at the wood and despaired. Oh, no. Hardwoods.

  Clean-burning hardwoods.

  In spite of her desolation, “I will need pots and pans and the makings for whatever you wish to eat,” said Celeste, bidding for time.

  “Bah, there is already stew in the cauldron. All you need to do is stir it.”

  “Then set it on the fire and give me the ladle,” said Celeste.

  Among the crags Roel wound in an ever-widening spiral, or as close to a spiral as he could manage, for ridges and bluffs barred the way. ’Twas midafternoon and still he had found no sign of tracks, but for those he and his horses made. Roel looked up and about. The Ogre could have stepped straight over some of these ridges and gone another way. Think, Roel, think! Which way would he have gone? Which way? — Wait! Go back to the last known trace of him and cross over yourself.

  Roel returned to a place where a slope of sand had been disturbed, the trickle of its slide now long spent.

  He looked up at the ridges on each side of the rocky slot and decided that one of them was low enough for the monstrous being to step across. Leaving the horses, Roel climbed up the fold and down the other side.

  Sweeping back and forth across the stony floor beyond, at last he came to a recently overturned rock.

  Quickly he climbed back over the slope and down, and he took his mount by the reins, and he led the animals back to a low dip in the fold.

  “The last wife I had knew how to give me joy. She would cover herself and my stiff pole with oil, and she would embrace it and. .”

  Celeste tried to shut out Lokar’s voice as he sickeningly regaled her with how she was to “pleasure” him.

  Her thoughts were desperate: I’ve got to find a way to escape. But how? Oh, Roel, where are you?

  She dragged two logs from the pile and cast them on the coals. As the fire blazed up she took the ladle in hand and began stirring the stew within the cauldron.

  Lokar watched for a moment and then moved to the table and sat idling with dark tiles of some sort, and he continued to tell her just what she was to do: “And then you can use your tongue and. .”

  Celeste refused to listen, and even as she stirred, the ladle struck something hard, and then it surfaced.

  What’s this? A row of teeth glinted in the lantern light, and then rolled in the stew, and bone was revealed. Is that someone’s jaw? Oh, Mithras, it is! It is a jaw! Celeste cast a glance at the litter of splintered bones beyond the woodpile. Human! They are all human bones. Or if not human, then humanlike.

  “. . but in my pleasure I made the mistake of grabbing her, and. .” Celeste looked at the Ogre and gritted her teeth. I’ve got to find a way to stop this monster.

  As Lokar continued to idle with the tiles, he went on talking of being pleasured.

  “Are those pips?” asked Celeste.

  Lokar looked up from the tiles. “Do you know the game?”

  “My brothers and I play at times.”

  “As I eat,” said Lokar, “you will be my opponent and learn that I am a master at pips. Then afterward you will delight me.”

  As Celeste stirred the cauldron, using the ladle much the same as if she were plying an oar, her mind raced: Mithras, but how will I avoid “pleasuring” him?

  Then she remembered an ancient fable, and she struck on a plan. “Have you any wine?” she asked in all innocence. “I would flavor the stew.” Once again Roel climbed a ridge, up the near side and down the far. And in the stony vale beyond he moved along the slot, first one way and then the other, and he swept back and forth; this time he found nought.

  He crossed back over the ridge and climbed the fold opposite. And there an impression of a gigantic toe in a low swale pointed the way. He followed as soon as he had retrieved the horses, for he and Celeste might have to flee upon the mounts, once he had rescued her. . or so was his intention.

  “Aha!” roared Lokar. “Again I win.”

  “You are a master indeed,” said Celeste, “but I think I will win the next one.”

  “Pah, woman! Do. . do you. . do you not by now understand I am far and away your s-superior?” Celeste pointed at the great, foot-long tiles and said,

  “We shall see, Lokar. We shall see. Shuffle the tiles while I pour more wine and refresh your bowl.” Lokar had eaten nearly the entire cauldron of stew, including crunching through long bones for the marrow, and through spines for the matter within, and he had drunk almost an entire cowhide full of wine. Groggily, he pushed the facedown tiles around on the table, while Celeste used one of the huge cups rather like a bucket to fill Lokar’s wine goblet to the brim and then hefted more meat-and-bone stew into his great bowl.

  Roel despaired, for the sun had set, and in spite of the light of the nearly full moon and that of the lantern he bore, he could not find the subtle signs of spoor. He sighed and finally made camp at the last trace of track that he had found. He unladed the steeds and curried and watered and fed them and took a meal of his own, though he had no appetite. Even so, he knew he needed to eat, for that was one of the lessons of war: eat when you can, and rest when you can, for you never know when the opportunity will come again.

  Lokar pushed back his chair and wobbled to his bed.

  “Now you will pleasure me,” he slurred as he shed the animal hides clothing him and stood naked and filthy and blearily looked down at Celeste. And then he fell backwards onto the mattress and immediately began to snore, his feet yet on the rough cavern floor.

  Though his manhood hung limp, Celeste gasped at the monstrous thing. Mithras, had he tried to bed me, I would be lying dead.

  She stepped to the woodpile and took up a sturdy billet, and then walked back to the bed and set it down.

  Then back to the fire pit she went, and drew her long knife and shoved the blade into the red coals. Then she dragged one of the empty cauldrons over to the bed and upended it to use as a step to reach the mattress. Next, she upended a cook pot to use as a stool to climb onto the cauldron. With her stair built, she picked up the billet of wood and clambered up onto the cot. Across a blanket crawling with vermin she went, and she laid the wood down near Lokar’s head.

  Back off the mattress she climbed and went to the fire, and there she withdrew her long-knife from the coals, the two-foot-long blade radiant with heat.

  Swiftly she ran across the floor and scrambled up onto the cook pot and then the cauldron and finally the bed; across the blanket she trod, where she took up the wooden billet and moved to stand at Lokar’s cheek.

  The Ogre yet snored.

  Celeste positioned the point o
f the long-knife just in front of his right eye, and angled the blade, and raised the billet. . and hesitated. Of a sudden, the Ogre ceased snoring, and he opened his eyes, and gasped.

  With sharp blow of the wooden billet Celeste drove the red-hot blade through Lokar’s eye and into his brain, the blade sizzling as it was quenched in his head.

  The Ogre cried out and lurched up and fell back, and then his air left him in one long sigh, and he breathed no more. And his bladder and bowels loosed, and liquid and slurry splashed to the floor, and a great stench filled the chamber.

  Gagging in the stink of urine and feces and burning flesh, Celeste reeled hindward, and turned and fled and scrambled down from the bed. Even as her feet touched the floor, she retched again and again. . but no vomit came, only a thin, yellowish bile.

  And she wept, for she had never before slain someone in his sleep or even in near sleep and perhaps would never do so again, no matter how vile.

  Still sobbing, she strode to the great boulder block shy;

  ing the exit. And there she confirmed that she could not squeeze past it to the outside. Nor could she roll it aside.

  Along with his massive corpse, she was trapped in the Ogre’s cave.

  23

  Escape

  Celeste stepped to the woodpile and took up a length of sturdy limb to use as a lever, and she bore it back to the boulder blocking the door. She set one end in between the edge of the massive stone and the cavern wall and pried with all of her might. . to no avail.

  Next she sat with her back to the wall and placed her feet against the limb, and braced as she was, she tried to use her leg strength to roll the boulder. The limb flexed, but the boulder moved not.

  Perhaps if I had a fulcrum. .

  She fetched a thick billet from the woodpile, and as close to the boulder as she could lodge it, she jammed the log upright between limb and wall. She moved to the far end of her improvised lever and pushed with all of her strength, trying to nudge the weight away. .