In Pain and Blood

by Aldrea Alien

  “That man!” Tracker yelled as he took out another of the Talfaltaners in his path. He pointed his sword in the direction of the deserter. “I want him alive!”

  Dylan turned his focus to a narrow pulse. The air rippled, tearing across the space and smacking into the Talfaltaner. The man flipped, hit the ground and was still. Hopefully, through being unconscious and not dead.

  The remainder were far easier to pick off after that. Most of them heeded the man’s words and tried to flee, the act leaving them open to Marin’s arrows and the hound’s knives.

  Katarina appeared from the farmhouse after the last of them had fallen. She took in the pile of bodies, her lips pursed. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many Talfaltaners this far inland before.”

  “It is certainly unusual,” Tracker agreed. He wiped his sword on the shirt of a fallen man and sheathed it. Even in this simple act, he seemed to be favouring his arm. And, if Dylan wasn’t merely seeing things, the man’s sleeve was wet where the sword had struck.

  Dylan quietly retrieved his pack from inside the farmhouse and rifled through its contents for a length of cloth. Found, he marched over to the hound and went to bind the strip around the idiot’s arm.

  Tracker flinched as Dylan grabbed the man’s elbow. The hound frowned at him, then the bandage. “What are you doing?”

  “You’re bleeding.” Dylan nodded to the injured arm. He could rationalise that the elf might not have felt the cut, but surely it had begun to hurt by now.

  “Is that all?” Tracker gaze dropped. He parted the tear in his sleeve to examine the wound and shrugged. “It is not the worse I have had.”

  Having had a decent look at some of the scars marking the man’s skin, Dylan didn’t doubt it. Undeterred, he resumed his task of bandaging the wound as best as he could. He’d see to it properly once they’d set up camp. “You should be more careful,” he grumbled under his breath. “I can’t heal you like the others.”

  The thin press of Tracker’s lips lifted at one corner. “I promise, this scratch will not hinder us.”

  It’s not us I’m worried about. That blow was meant for him. He should’ve been the one to take it. His shield had been strong enough to absorb the hit, but even if it had failed… Well, the blow would’ve hurt at first, but his magic would also have taken care of the injury by now. Whatever had made the man do something so foolish?

  The hound’s lips curved into what Dylan supposed the man believed was a reassuring smile. “I will be fine, truly. What of you, though?” Those long fingers grasped Dylan as if he wasn’t capable of standing on his own. He was twisted this way and that, the hound examining him like he was a clumsy child. “You are unharmed, yes?”

  He nodded. The elf was bleeding from a cut Dylan wasn’t too sure didn’t also have poison in it and he couldn’t use his magic to heal. Tracker had to know that, yet he was concerned for Dylan? “I was shielded the whole time.”

  “Good.” Tracker absently pulled Dylan closer and patted his shoulder. “Good.” He sighed and gave Dylan one last pat before turning to the pile of bodies littering the farmyard. “I have not fought that many people at once in a while.”

  “I guess it would be prudent to ensure they stay down,” Marin said. She clutched her bow as if the mere suggestion would have the bodies rising up to attack again. A few of them still moaned or gave the occasional twitch, but they did seem incapable of causing any harm.

  “It would indeed,” Tracker replied, he gaze lifting from the corpses to the unconscious man lying apart from the others. “Then we shall see what our dear friend has to say.”

  Not wanting to watch the grisly task of Tracker picking through the Talfaltaners to ensure all bar one were completely dead, Dylan turned his attention to checking over the others. Authril’s armour and shield had gained a few dents, but she was uninjured. Likely thanks to being behind the deadly whirlwind of Tracker’s assault.

  Marin had sustained only a few splinters from evading the archer’s initial attack. She waved him away—insisting that such injuries weren’t worth bothering about—in favour of gathering her arrows and picking through the fallen archers for more to add to her quiver. She would pause every so often to also pick other things from pockets and packs.

  Dylan looked around as the others picked through the mass. Weapons littered the ground at his feet. He scooped up one of the swords, testing its weight. It seemed lighter than either Tracker’s scimitar or the warrior’s blade. Shorter, too, and thinner. Perhaps if he could find a sheath to fit it, then Tracker could teach him more swordsmanship.

  “For the sake of my heart,” Tracker said. “Put that knitting needle down.”

  A flush of guilt heated his face. He spun, instinctively tucking the sword behind him as he turned.

  The hound squatted not far from where he stood, one brow raised. The purple alchemist’s dagger dangled between his fingers, the blade wet with use. Ever since Dylan told the man of its ability, Tracker rarely unsheathed the weapon. It seemed he was prepared to take no chances in ensuring the death of these men.

  Dylan slowly withdrew the sword. “I just thought that maybe—”

  “I know what you are thinking, my dear spellster, but look around.” Tracker stood, swinging his arms wide to indicate the mass of corpses surrounding them. “That sword did not exactly aid its previous owner in staying either mine or our dear warrior’s blade. It is a fine weapon, do not mistake me there. If you are fighting aboard a ship. But on land? Against heavily armed foes?” The hound shook his head.

  Dylan nudged one of the shields. That probably explained why they were such small things, about as big around as a man’s head. The front side bore the black and white symbol of a sun rising over the sea. They aren’t even hiding where they came from.

  Did the Talfaltaners want a war with Demarn? Or were they striking at what the Udynea Empire would deem as an asset before the empire could claim it? He supposed that was a question for the unconscious man to answer.

  Dylan turned his gaze on the lone Talfaltaner. If the man could.

  “Well then,” Tracker said, brushing his hands clean. “Shall we see to our dear friend and give him the news? I am certain he will be quite broken up over it.”

  Dylan halted next to the fallen man as the others gathered around. The Talfaltaner had landed face-down in the mud. He still breathed, albeit shallowly.

  “Did you hear what he said?” Marin asked them.

  “The dead would have heard him, my dear hunter.” Tracker knelt next to the unconscious man. “But how do you know of me, hmm?” He grasped the mop of dark hair and lifted the man’s head. Grunting, the hound let the man flop back to the ground. “I saw some rope in the barn. We should tie him up before he wakes. I think what he has to say will be most interesting.”

  Dylan trailed behind the others as, between the four of them, they carried the man into the barn. The structure didn’t look quite as hastily abandoned as the farmhouse. There was indeed a few scraps of rope lying about, enough to bind the man’s limbs. “How will we know?” he asked. Tracker might have spewed what sounded like obscenities to the men earlier, but that didn’t mean the hound knew enough to converse civilly with their captive.

  Tracker glanced up from securing the rope around the man’s legs. “My dear spellster,” he chuckled. “You seem to have forgotten I grew up in Wintervale. Talfaltaners often docked there. It does not take much for a small boy to learn their language.” The hound stretched up the man’s body to pat his cheek. Gently at first, then harder.

  Dylan wet his lips, fidgeting as each pat was met with no response. Perhaps he’d been a little exuberant in stopping the man from fleeing.

  The lack of response didn’t seem to deter Tracker. He lifted one of the man’s eyelids before pressing an ear to the man’s chest. Sighing, the hound leant back. “Dear man, would you be so good as to heal him?”

  He frowned at Tracker before turning to glare at the unconscious man. “Really?” The word fel
l flat from his lips. What made this bastard worthy of his magic? There was no reason not to just leave him to die here.

  “I cannot speak to him if he will not wake.”

  Dylan chewed on the inside of his lip, trying to see any flaws in that logic. The man could tell them where the rest of the company was, its size, how they managed to win against a tower of spellsters when thirty or so of them couldn’t take out one. All the information they needed to aid them when the time came to avenge the tower and her slain inhabitants.

  “I need to know what really happened in the tower, Dylan,” Tracker persisted. “We both do.”

  “But can we be entirely certain that the Talfaltaners orchestrated the attack?” Authril asked. “Seems a bit farfetched if you ask me.”

  “Then it is fortunate no one did, dear woman,” the hound snapped back. “They were there. The crest on their shields does not belong to anyone within Demarn and their armour is all wrong.”

  “I’m not saying they didn’t attack the place, just… What if they were merely hired? By the Udyneans, even?” She indicated the unconscious man. “He might know nothing beyond where his people were meant to march, maybe even less. What then?”

  Tracker remained silent, although his face grew cold. He glared at Authril, his eyes eerily flat.

  “Then we do the only thing we can,” Marin said, nudging the warrior aside until she stood in Tracker’s line of sight instead. “We find out where his superiors are. They would have to know more, right?”

  The hound nodded. He turned his head, peering at Dylan over his shoulder. “My dear spellster, if you please?”

  Dylan laid a hand on the Talfaltaner’s shin and drew on his ability. Simple injuries whispered for his magic—a scrape on his shoulder from where he’d landed, a few crushed vertebrae in the lower neck, a broken nose… the list seemed endless. He gently aided their mending whilst searching out the cause for the man’s unconsciousness. Nothing seemed serious enough to—

  Oh. As the smaller injuries faded under his skill, Dylan found the root of their problem. There was too much fluid surrounding the man’s brain.

  He shifted his grip, clasping the man’s head, and focused on the area beneath his palms. Slowly, the swelling that kept the fluid there went down, returning everything to normal.

  “Is he salvageable?” Tracker asked once Dylan stepped back.

  Dylan stepped back, rubbing at his forehead. Healing the man on top of the fighting pinched his brain. “He’ll wake,” he replied. “Although, I’m not sure how much he’ll remember. The blast hit him harder than I meant to.” He’d not been so sloppy since his first year in combat training. Perhaps Tracker would be agreeable to a little sparring session against his magic. It certainly wouldn’t hurt to hone his skill.

  “It would seem that someone is unaware of his own strength,” the hound murmured as he once more bent over the man to gently slap his cheeks. “Come now, wake up.”

  The man’s eyes fluttered open. He struggled against his bonds until he seemed to realise their presence. That dark gaze silently swept over them, before settling on Tracker.

  “I still don’t think he actually knows anything,” Authril said, crossing her arms. “Soldiers usually aren’t told shit except what direction to march.”

  “In the army perhaps, dear woman, but things work a little differently aboard a ship. He will know enough.” Tracker nudged the man with his boot, earning him a faint sneer. “Is that not right, my friend?”

  The man said nothing. He stared straight ahead, his face carefully blank.

  “Oh, there is no need to be so coy.” Tracker knelt before their prisoner. “I know you can understand me. So, tell me what it is you know about the tower.”

  The Talfaltaner continued his silence. He gaze flicked to Dylan and his lip quivered in a sneer.

  In one swift move, the purple dagger was in Tracker’s hand, the flat of the blade lying against the man’s cheek. “Do not look at him. It is I you must be more worried about. Where did you see hounds to identify me so readily?”

  The man’s jaw squared. The glare he shot the hound suggested it was just as well that he was bound. He growled something and spat in the elf’s face.

  Tracker’s arm came up far faster than Dylan expected it to. The back of his hand connected with the man, sending the Talfaltaner flat onto the ground. “So, it is going to be that way, yes?” The hound sighed as he stood. “The rest of you carry on to Whitemeadow. I will catch up once our dear friend decides he would prefer to talk.”

  A sick, sinking feeling took Dylan’s gut as the others gathered up their packs and started to leave. “Track…” At times, it was all too easy to forget the man was trained to hunt and kill spellsters. He probably knew plenty of painful ways to extract information. “Are you going to torture him?”

  The man’s eyes bulged at the word. “Wait,” he croaked. “I can tell you everything.” His accent wasn’t as grating as that of the other Talfaltaners, almost a heavier, faster version of the coastal Demarn inflection Tracker’s voice carried. If the hound hadn’t been here to compare against, Dylan could’ve seen himself thinking this man was a Demarner. “Give me your question again, I will answer it.”

  “Yes, you will,” Tracker replied, bending over the man. “Just as soon as we are alone.”

  Through an extraordinary amount of wriggling, the Talfaltaner managed to make his way across the barn floor to Dylan’s feet. “You are just going to leave me here with him?”

  Dylan took a step back, then hesitated. The others had already gone. If he left, he wouldn’t hear what the man had to say, but if he stayed…

  Tracker whirled on the man. Grasping the man’s shirt, he hauled the Talfaltaner back to the post. “Move again and I will saw your legs off.” He turned to pin Dylan with those honey-coloured eyes. They’d grown hard, like chips of flint. “Go.” The word came on a whisper, yet carried all the force of a war hammer. “Please.”

  Dylan found his feet obeying well before he’d thought to move. Soon, he was running after the women.

  Screams of agony followed in his wake, chasing him as they made their way down the path leading to the road. The sound chilled his blood and concocted a dozen nasty scenes in his mind. Did the hound cut him? Was he breaking the man’s bones? Burning him?

  He glanced over his shoulder to find the barn door closed. The faint crack of light leaked under the door. He kept looking back until the barn was out of sight, vaguely hoping he would find Tracker right behind him and that this was just another nightmare. Maybe the hound would do the merciful thing and just kill the man.

  The man’s a murderer. He had to remember that. The Talfaltaner wouldn’t have shown mercy to the spellsters he cut down. Not to the children he slaughtered or the people whose only crime was living in the tower. They would’ve begged for their lives and gained nothing but a swift death.

  Rather than pressing onwards to the city, they entered the forest blanketing the roadside opposite. A little poking through the undergrowth had them eventually coming across a clearing big enough to set up camp. Night wouldn’t come for a little while, but they set about their routine anyway.

  Dylan piled branches for a fire as the others pitched the tents. No one made a move to stop him. They were well out of sight of the road. Even with the firelight, if anyone came upon them, it would be deliberate. And he needed to feel warm again. Although he couldn’t hear them, the screams still echoed in his mind.

  A quick fireball was enough to ignite the wood. He settled next to the blaze, his hands outstretched. Slowly, the warmth reached his extremities and burrowed into his core. How long would it take for the hound to get what he was after? Would he be able to look at Tracker the same way knowing what the elf had done?

  One by one the women joined him at the fireside. Authril carefully removed her armour, fussing over the dents and blood splattered across the surface. Blood stained the leather where the metal joined.

  Dylan followed the warrior
’s movements as she rubbed a cloth over the tarnished spots on her breastplate.

  “I’ll go wait for Track out by the road,” Marin said.

  Dylan leapt to his feet. “Are you sure that’s wise? What if there are more?”

  Smiling, the hunter patted his arm. “Don’t worry. You’re in good hands with those two.”

  He remained by the fire, speaking only to procure the hedgewitch’s little case of sewing supplies to go with the bottle of whisky he’d lifted from Marin’s pack whilst she worked on the tents. The other two ate and, eventually, left for their respective beds as the sky grew dark. His ears strained to pick up anything beyond the forest’s natural sounds.

  Surely, the hound was done with the man. Or had Tracker learnt something that changed the hound’s priorities? What could be more important to a hound than escorting a spellster?

  Dylan couldn’t enter the capital without a hound at his side. He clutched the small pouch hanging from the outside of his pack. The two fused pieces of the collar felt no different to any other lump of metal. Who else would believe he survived its destruction?

  Trying to shake the thought free, Dylan busied himself with sterilising a needle for when the pair returned. Despite Tracker’s insistence, the cut he gained when he foolishly dove between Dylan and that Talfaltaner would need stitches.

  Night had well and truly claimed the sky by the time the pair arrived at their camp. Marin vanished into the tent she shared with the hedgewitch, whilst Tracker settled before the fire, munching on what looked to be a pasty. Dylan couldn’t recall their group still being in possession of such food, which meant the elf had procured it from the very men they’d slain.

  He eyed the hound. Odd how there didn’t seem to be anything different about the man. It was still just him.

  Tracker cleared his throat, causing Dylan to jump, and stood. “Well, I guess I should get some rest and leave you to your watch. Unless you would care to tell me the reason you stare so intently?”