Lulita was deeply moved, as well as confused and angry at bumping into Balthazar once again.
“My darling,” Karolina was sobbing. “By the Gods, we’ve fought for our lives. We nearly lost our boys, Gáramond and Rufus as well. If it hadn’t been for that man,” she said, pointing at Balthazar, “we’d have died. He arrived just in time when they attacked the carriage. He doesn’t talk much, but he’s a first-class hunter, a magnificent healer, and an experienced guide. He told us he’d take us to Kathanas, that he was going there himself. Oh, my love, how I’ve missed you! We thought you were dead, that you hadn’t survived the battle in the village.”
Lulita went over to Balthazar warily, while Luchy and Tomasa stood a little distance away. They found it difficult to believe it was him, the one who had managed a shop in the central market, the one who had worked at the now-ruined estate, who had trained Manchego to be a farmer. Luchy found him changed. Little remained of the man she had met together with Manchego that day at the central market. Then, he had looked like an old man without hope, defeated; now, his blue eyes suggested a celestial depth, and his way of moving had taken on a new force. He still had that thick cloak he had worn over his head and which hid him almost completely except his chest, which was strong and outlined with well-toned muscles. His hair was a thick mane of gray. The Wild Man had always worn his hair long and untied.
“Balthazar,” was all Lulita could say when she was only a few inches away from him.
Balthazar tensed. “Lulita…”
“Where have you been all this time? We needed you. The village suffered so much, and you… disappeared. How could you abandon us at the worst possible moment?”
Balthazar did not reply.
A figure appeared, climbing the rocks. It was Mowriz. Balthazar looked at him with interest. “It’s incredible that this boy’s still alive.”
Lulita turned to look at the boy, then once again at Balthazar. She was sure the Wild Man was keeping something from her.
“I’ve been with Mother, Lulita. She’s forgiven me, and now, I’m Her vassal. I’ve come back because the Empire is about to enter a dark time. For four centuries, hate has been fermenting. They’ve gotten themselves ready. They’ve engendered several Grim Shepherds for Némaldon’s most sinister operations. If you think a sáffurtan can cause harm, wait until you see what a Grim Shepherd can do. It was one of them who was behind the disaster in the village. It was the mayor, Feliel Demanur. He was a Grim Shepherd who infiltrated the politics of the Mandrake Empire. And I fear he’s not the only villain from Némaldon who’s infiltrated the government. I’d wager there are more in Háztatlon.”
The Wild Man attracted everybody’s attention. Karolina and Gáramond were astonished; it was the first time they had ever heard him say more than two or three words, this strange man who had introduced himself as Innominatus.
“All this business about the Grim Shepherd is what Lulita told us,” Gáramond said. “To think that there might be something like that in Háztatlon makes my hair stand on end. On the other hand, it would explain a lot.” The philosopher was half-spent. His old age and unhealthy lifestyle had left him weak and, at times, nearly dead.
“It makes sense that there should be more infiltrators, particularly in the capital,” said Strangelus, eyeing Balthazar. The Wild Man was very interesting indeed. He seemed to be a sorcerer of sorts. Perhaps a shaman?
“What’s your name?” Leandro asked. He was nervous in the presence of a Wild Man who appeared to be much more than a simple Devnóngaron hunter.
“There was a time when my name was Tzargorg. Then I was Innominatus, the one with no name. Then I was named Balthazar. My name doesn’t matter anymore. With no true destiny, all destinies are mine. With no true path, all paths are mine. Walking, I shall discover my new name; for the moment, I am Innominatus.”
“You’re in good hands,” Lulita said. “He’s a first-class hunter and healer.”
“What?” Karolina asked in amazement. “You know him?”
“It’s a long story,” the grandmother replied. “We don’t have time, but yes, we do know each other and we’ve known each other for many years. He worked at our estate, The Holy Comment Ranch. He was my husband’s right hand, and then later he helped my beloved grandson. Luchy and Tomasa know him too. We called him Balthazar.”
There was a heavy silence, during which the travelers tried to take in this information.
“The Empire is about to suffer the grimmest period of its history,” said Balthazar. “If you think its origin was dark, wait and see what is coming. The Master of Némaldon, Legionaer, has been resurrected.”
A chill ran through the air. “That much we’ve learned from Lulita,” said the general.
“How come you know so much about our history and our future?” Strangelus said. He sounded skeptical and distrustful.
“Mother told me. Mother is everything. Mother rules everything. She, too, will suffer Némaldon’s assault. You must know that Némaldon will not rest content with conquering these lands. They will invade and lay siege to every corner of the Empire. They are already close to Kathanas, but now the army has divided into two and the left arm is on its way to Háztatlon.”
“You and your Mother know nothing,” the philosopher replied in his usual tone of voice, mocking, rough, and hostile.
In the space of a sigh, Innominatus wielded the ax at a blinding speed and shaved off the tips of the philosopher’s beard. The philosopher gasped. He gripped his neck as if he had been cut.
“Nobody insults Mother without paying a price.” Then the Wild Man turned to Deathslayer. “Things are as they are. You’re the one they call General Deathslayer. A young general who has advanced in rank quickly due to his prowess in battle.”
Leandro turned pale. “How do you know I’m the general?”
“I know many things, Leandro Deathslayer. I also know that the mage is Strangelus Üdessa and that this one here is your philosopher, Gáramond Sophis. I am one of Mother’s vassals, and I carry out my missions. As her faithful servant, I am also her defender, and I am ready to confront any threat that falls upon my land.” He looked at Lulita and Luchy. “I understand that Manchego has returned and that he has visited you and given you a message of vital importance.”
Lulita shivered. “Yes, Manchego is alive and has told us the same as you, Balthazar—I mean, Innominatus.”
“Call me what you like, Lulita. That’s nothing but a triviality, considering the danger prowling around us. The best we can do is to go on our way to Kathanas. From here to the Path of the Fallen is a day’s journey. We will reach the rock towers in a couple of days.”
Amid strangeness and many still-unsolved mysteries, the group began the ascent of the Irontangle Mountains at a very slow pace, guided by the Wild Man who seemed to know the area like the back of his hand. Nobody dared dispute his leadership.
Part II – Total Reform
Chapter XV – Ehréledán
After months in the most absolute loneliness, he had become fond of the rats that lived with him in the dungeon. He wished he was one of those vermin, able to feed on almost anything and also to be able to feel at home in that miserable state.
He had been put in the deepest cell, the most wretched of all the palace rooms. It was in such a terrible state that nobody could have imagined that the splendid Imperial Palace could have contained underground spaces like it. He was also kept isolated.
It was not often that a guard came down the stairs, and the voices of other prisoners reached him like a very distant echo, almost inaudible. Once every two days, he was served an inadequate meal: rice water or (with luck) seafood broth on the point of going off. Several times, he would have sworn there was urine in those concoctions, and he imagined his great enemy Cantus de Aligar or Loredo Melda pissing in his bowl before it was brought down to him. Then he would remember Aligar’s treachery, and that Melda had taken his post in the Council of Kings, his estate, his wife, and his daughter.
; “Misbegotten swine…”
After the beating which followed his meeting with Aheron III, his body and mind had been subjected to torture that lasted for weeks. He was sure he was going to die there. Although the guards normally left him in utter darkness, the last time they had forgotten to take the torch with them when they left, and now the cell was illuminated. He gazed at the walls of his coffin, a cell of moldy stone that was so small that he could not stretch and always had to stay bent double. He could only think of inevitable death; Mérdmerén knew he was giving way to terror.
Often, he thought about Ságamas and Hexilda, his traveling companions. The witch had died at the hands of sáffurtans. Of Ságamas, he knew nothing. Was he still alive? Had he reached Merromer and got his ship back?
Once—impossible to know whether it was day or night—he was awakened by footsteps.
The light of a torch was approaching his cell. He rubbed his eyes and noticed how bony his hands were. He felt his body and realized he had grown dramatically thinner. In the dim light, he also noticed that his skin was dry from malnutrition. Death was coming closer by the moment.
At least I’ll die soon, he thought, almost hopefully. I should’ve stayed in Nabas, at the Field Villas Hotel. There, he would have spent his last days in the relative quiet of resignation, though he knew that he would never have been happy that way, with his enemies free and enjoying the life that had been his. If only they’d left me Stern’s dagger, I could take my life, he thought with regret. I can’t go on any longer.
They had brought him a bowl of seafood broth. He took a sip and noticed the spittle. He wondered what other bodily fluids had gone into the dish and lost what little appetite he had. But he went on eating; maybe with luck, it had poison in it which would kill him once and for all.
His consciousness came and went. Sometimes, he recalled the audience with the king. He had found him old, gaunt, and desperate. He had been concerned with the news from the South, that evil was advancing relentlessly. He remembered that the king had already known about it all! But he could do nothing. That damned Cantus de Aligar had him completely powerless. He wondered why the traitor had not executed him in the main square in front of all the curious citizens who wanted to watch. Instead, he imprisoned him to torture him to inflict the greatest possible punishment on him: darkness, frustration, and loneliness.
“Ehréledán—” Another stab of pain came over him, for all those who had died for his sake. Hexilda had given him a talisman to protect him against the Brotherhood of the Crows. And all for what? To be beaten and tortured by the forces of the Imperial Palace?
He had fulfilled his obligation to give the message to the king, but he had failed to get the sovereign to act on that information. And he had given himself up to the enemy. What can that bastard be getting up to? He felt his blood boil.
A guard came down to his cell. He was bald, with one eye shut by a thick scar. His torso was naked, exposing his hairy paunch. Instead of clothes, he wore strips of leather. A hump curved his great height.
“You have a visitor, you vermin,” he spat out.
“Wh—who?” he muttered, after so long without uttering a single word.
“Don Cantus de Aligar, Don Loredo Melda, and a very pretty girl who makes me want to—” The approaching footsteps silenced the brute’s blasphemy. He swept away the rats’ feces with his feet.
Mérdmerén tensed. He was being buffeted by emotions that were like daggers tearing at his soul, and the fires of revenge were boiling. He rubbed his eyes and blinked. Fine leather boots appeared at the bottom of the stairs. Three individuals, dressed in the utmost elegance: leather pants, silk shirts, and thick black cloaks. The visitors had covered their noses and mouths with white handkerchiefs.
“Leave us,” one of the men ordered.
The guard did as he was told. As he went up, he passed very close to the girl and leered at her.
“Mérdmerén,” said one.
The prisoner could not see his face, but by his voice, which was wild and almost hissing, he knew it was Loredo Melda. If there had been more light, he would have noticed his shiny black hair, perfectly combed back, his treacherous dark eyes, and his crow’s beak of a nose.
“The king’s messenger occupying the most disgraceful dungeon in the Imperial Palace,” another man said ironically. Mérdmerén immediately identified him as Cantus de Aligar.
Mérdmerén was shaking with fury. He did not understand why these two had come or why this girl was with them.
“You’re a son of a bitch, Cantus. You’re a real misbegotten son of a bitch, born between the legs of the most misbegotten bastard whore in the whole universe. You’re a disgrace, a piece of scum, the shame of the Empire.”
Aligar waited patiently, as in the face of a child’s tantrum. Mérdmerén felt humiliated; his wrath did not matter; his fate was to die in prison, buried beneath his filth. If the peephole had been bigger, he would gladly have thrown a sample of his feces at them.
“After so many years, only you would think of going back to the place you were thrown out of,” Melda said.
Aligar took a torch from the wall and brought it up close to the cell. The light went through the bars and stung the prisoner’s eyes like needles.
“Evil advances from the South even as we speak. I came to warn the king.”
“Nonsense,” Cantus said disdainfully. “The only thing that’s advancing is scum like you, you worthless Deserter. I’ll bet you came to murder the king. You’re nothing but a viper that wasn’t decapitated in time.”
“I’ve seen it with my own eyes! I saw the dead walking!” Mérdmerén cried.
“Was the witch you were traveling with the one who thought that up?”
Mérdmerén froze. What did Cantus know about Hexilda? Someone must have informed him, but who? Trágalar Maximus? Ságamas? The murderers of the Brotherhood of the Crows?
“Yes, Mérdmerén. We know you had a witch advising you. Did you want to scatter your spells around here? You should never have come back. You were all right in the poverty of the South, fleeing from the authorities like the Deserter you are. You took the risk, and now you’ve lost everything all over again.”
“So why have you come now?” Mérdmerén countered with venom in his voice. “Stop this crap, Cantus, and don’t play the innocent. Here you all know what’s happening. The king confirmed it to me.”
Loredo could not hide his surprise, while Cantus remained cold.
“After a month’s deliberation,” Loredo continued, “sentence has been passed on you: you’re guilty and condemned to the maximum punishment. You’ll be decapitated in public tomorrow, in the main square.”
“Has it only been a month?” Mérdmerén muttered. “Well, the torture’s going to be over at last. Death will be an improvement on all this shit.”
Loredo Melda smiled maliciously, eager to launch his surprise.
“Let me introduce you to my daughter, Ajedrea of the Recesses. I’ve brought her so that she can see with her own eyes the kind of scum we’re trying to eradicate from the Empire. I want her to learn to stay away from your kind.”
The girl was frightened, her gaze restless.
Mérdmerén’s eyes locked on the girl’s. Dark eyes like black, beautiful pearls. Her skin was white, and her long black hair was as lovely as ever. She had grown into such a lovely woman! His daughter was right there! In front of him! Cursed and blessed be the Gods! But she was looking at him with such disgust. The father within Mérdmerén broke.
“I can’t look at him any longer! Get me out of here, Papa!”
“Come on then, my child. Let’s leave this stinking dungeon. Don Cantus still has things to say to the prisoner. Off we go.” Melda took the girl’s hand and very tenderly led her upstairs.
Cantus was enjoying the moment. Seeing Mérdmerén defeated, the suffering on his face, was the cherry on the cake. The prisoner was shedding dry tears of pain.
“I didn’t want to miss this reunion,�
� the nobleman said, like a child apologizing for his naughtiness. “She’s grown a lot, hasn’t she? She’s no longer the baby you left whimpering in her cradle when you were declared a Deserter; she’s a full-grown young lady, and soon I’m going to ask for her hand. Fucking her will give me great pleasure. I’ll think of you with every thrust. And I’ll educate the son she’ll give me using you as an example, Mérdmerén. An example of what he has to learn to hate. Your grandson will hate you, your daughter will hate you, and I’ll bathe in the waters of that hatred.”
Mérdmerén felt that his heart had burst, that his life was escaping from him in his last sighs. His daughter… His beloved daughter…
“What have you done with my wife?” he asked in a thread of a voice.
“She’s sick. I doubt whether she’ll hold out much longer.”
“There are walking dead, and you know it. Acknowledge it, you vile snake, now that we’re alone. Grant me this last wish now that I’m condemned to die, you son of a bitch!”
“Ah, Mérdmerén,” Cantus replied, unconcerned. “You never cease to impress me. Did you just come back for that? Aren’t you moved by revenge?”
“Revenge doesn’t matter anymore. You and Loredo have ruined my existence. Why?”
Cantus took his time before answering. “Don’t be so self-centered. We never considered you so important that we needed to ruin your life. You were simply a counselor who was in our way. We needed Loredo to be part of the council and, of all of them, you were the easiest to remove.”
“Why? Speak out, man. We’re alone, nobody can accuse you, and I’m going to die tomorrow.”
“For decades, we planned what’s about to happen.”
Mérdmerén clutched the bars.
“We took your place on the Council of Kings to ensure that our position would win. We needed more political weight to veto the king at every moment.”
“Why?”
“To make him powerless, Mérdmerén, so that he wouldn’t be capable of making decisions on his own. So we could send the general and the head mage down south to investigate the anomalies that occurred in that accursed little village and leave the Empire helpless.”
Archangel’s Ascension Page 16