by A J Dalton
‘I know, I know! I’ll make it up to you later,’ he promised.
His chest, torso and legs had been tied into place with secure knots and interwoven lengths of rope. Aching all over as he was, with one arm that had gone to sleep and numb fingers, he wondered if he’d ever be able to free himself.
‘I can see myself dying here and riding the world as a sightless corpse. That would amuse Lacrimos, always assuming He has a sense of humour. It wouldn’t be a lively sense of humour of course, but he might have a morbid one of sorts. That’s not blasphemy, is it? Nostracles would know. Is he around here, boy? Nostraaacleees! Scouuurge!’
The skittish colt danced in circles at his shouting.
‘Okay, okay, that’s enough of the three-sixty. And if the Scourge were here, he’d be telling me off for alerting any potential enemies in the area. Whoa, boy! Right, there’s nothing else for it. I’m going to have to try and get loose on my own.’
He wrestled and wriggled on the circling horse until he was hot, frustrated and dizzy. Added to that, pins and needles had started up in his dead arm and were causing him not inconsiderable pain.
‘Pain’s good! It let’s you know you’re alive,’ Young Strap wheezed.
He finally won free and clambered down from the saddle. His legs almost buckled under him, so he had to hold on hard to the stirrup. He went to his knees with a pained expulsion of breath and scooped wet snow into his parched mouth.
‘Want some? It’s very good. Don’t say much, do you?’
The colt harrumphed, rumbled a concessionary neigh and went back to his shoots.
‘I’d ask you where we were, but there doesn’t seem much point. What d’you reckon? Dur Memnos or Accritania? I reckon the latter cos I don’t recognise this view of the mountains. Which way to go, though?’
Should he follow the tracks in the snow back towards the mountains, to find out what had happened to the others, or should he carry on down the slope, across the clean snow and head in the direction he thought Accros to be?
What would the Scourge do in this situation? Help his comrades or put his mission and duty to the King first? Toss a coin? No, that was too much like divination or superstition, which was too much like faith, so the Scourge wouldn’t do that. He’d sit down and try and reason things out, that’s what he’d do. Young Strap sat down, and then decided the Scourge would be sensible enough to sit down somewhere dry.
Wiping his trousers off, he moved to a nearby, exposed tree root that was free of snow and ice. He made himself comfortable and pondered the unremarkable and monochrome sky. At least there were no ill omens and harbingers of doom in immediate evidence. The Scourge and Nostracles might still be in trouble and waiting for his help, though, if the gods simply did not consider a couple of mortals being in trouble to be of sufficient significance to mess up the weather just to warn another mortal.
The Scourge certainly wouldn’t expect anything of the gods, beings he seemed to view as a bunch of ambivalent loafers at best. At worst, he saw each one of them as a malicious and personal enemy. Surely that didn’t include Shakri though, did it? The Scourge had promised the high priest in Corinus that he would allow Nostracles to accompany them. And Nostracles had said something in Holter’s Cross about the Scourge somehow helping Shakri end the war. One did not make promises and offer help to an enemy. Was there some sort of relationship between the divinity and the Scourge, then, even if it was facilitated by Nostracles? And if there was, did it mean Shakri could help the Scourge and Nostracles in return? The power Nostracles had been gifted through the jade amulet when they faced the demon Phyrax had certainly been impressive.
If Shakri was helping them, then there wasn’t much Young Strap could contribute that the goddess of all creation could not. But it was all about that if. So much hung on such a small a word. Perhaps, like the other gods, Shakri wasn’t inclined to intervene directly in mortal affairs. Gods seemed to prefer to work in “mysterious ways”. Maintaining that air of mystery helped maintain their appearance of divinity, after all. That was how the Scourge would see it.
The Scourge wouldn’t rely on any of the gods for help, that was for sure. He’d follow the hoof prints in the snow and try to resolve things himself. Decided, Young Strap returned to the colt and remounted him. They followed the prints back up the slope to the top of the local rise.
Young Strap stopped in consternation. The prints had disappeared! He realised that he must have just come up a lee slope that had protected the few prints he’d followed from a recent snowfall. He scanned the terrain ahead for other lee slopes that might have preserved signs of his passage, but there didn’t seem to be anything sheltered enough.
The Needle Mountains ahead watched him silently, refusing to tell him anything. He had no idea where to start and knew he could end up wandering lost for days. He turned the colt round again.
‘Accros it is, boy. Let’s just hope they’re okay and that we meet up somewhere along the way, eh? And that Shakri’s watching over them, whether the Scourge likes it or not.’
***
He’d been praying his entire life, or that’s how it felt sometimes. Of course, he’d prayed for different things at different stages of his life. When he was very young, he’d understood that praying might give you a chance of getting the things you needed and that gods were people with more things than they needed. So he’d prayed to the indwellers, in their holy city, for food.
Like many of the children born amongst the outdwellers, he’d been born with twisted and deformed limbs, but he’d been one of the lucky ones because he’d been able to bend his arms and legs. He could slither over the rocks faster than most of the other children and get to the scraps and bones left by the outdweller grown ups once those grown ups had finished fighting over the daily body dump organised by the Wardens of the gods. Just as the sun was setting at the end of each day, the Wardens would open the Gate of Lacrimos and throw out the dead bodies of those too poor or criminal to deserve a proper burial in the catacombs. As soon as the sun was set, the outdwellers would scramble hungrily out of their burrows and descend upon the flesh gifted to them by the gods.
Of course, the strong amongst the outdwellers lived in actual houses along the roads up to Corinus, and they would invariably get to the flesh first, taking the best bits for themselves, but they always left enough for the burrow people. He’d crept up to those houses a few times, even while the yellow fireball was still in the sky. It had hurt his eyes, but it made everything bright and pretty. It was like having a secret look at heaven, except the holy city was supposed to be even more fabulous than this. They said you could have as much food as you wanted all the time and that there was something called a palace, where the King of heaven lived. The King was so kind and generous that he had a moat of blood around his palace, from which the people could drink as much as they liked without having to fight for it because there was so much. And they said the King used his own blood to keep the moat filled every day, and that was why he looked so pale… except he didn’t know anyone who’d ever seen the King.
It was when he was looking at the houses one day that he was finally caught out. He’d crept closer than usual because he’d smelt the most delicious thing ever, though he didn’t know what it was. He’d heard the grown ups talking about wanting something called cooked food, though, but not having enough wood for a fire. They said it was the bestest thing you could ever eat, and what he’d caught a scent of that day had smelt like it would taste divine. Enough drool had certainly run from his mouth to tell him it would be good.
Suddenly, there was someone on the road not more than a few metres from him. He wore long cloth and rode a horse-creature. It was a god, it was a god, the first one he’d seen! He was scared because he knew he wasn’t supposed to be near the houses. He crouched between two boulders and kept stiller than a grey rock mouse. But the god seemed to know he was there, and stopped and turned his head. Then the god did something funny with his mouth, so that it looked
upside down.
‘Hello, child! There’s no need to be frightened.’
But he was frightened. He came out and lay on his back as a sign of submission, hoping that he wouldn’t be mauled by the god’s horse-creature.
‘I p-pray to you!’ he said loudly. ‘I pray for food and that you will not hurt me.’
The god’s mouth went back to normal. ‘You don’t need to pray to me, child.’
‘You are a god! You have food. I pray for food.’
‘I am no god. Stand child and tell me your name.’
He knew this might be a trick or a test, just as a stronger creature plays with a weaker creature before devouring it. He did not move. ‘I do not have a name. I pray to you for a name if it tastes good.’
‘I will give you food and a name if you stand.’
He didn’t know this trick or test. He wasn’t sure what to do, so stood up because he’d already tried laying down and the god didn’t like that. The god tossed something yellow at him and he snatched it out of the air. Then he sniffed it and nibbled at it cautiously, watching the horse-creature warily all the time in case he had to fight for it. It tasted good, like old, wet bones.
‘Good!’ he pronounced. ‘Food.’
‘Yes, it’s called food. Now, I shall call you Nostracles.’
‘Yes, but first give me a name. I am still hungry. You said you would give me a name.’
The god looked a little angry at that. ‘I have just told you your name is Nostracles. That is your name.’
‘Yes, but give it to me so that I can take it back to my burrow. I will eat it.’
‘No, a name is not food. It is a word.’
Nostracles stared at the god. ‘Can I eat a word?’
The god sighed. ‘No! Oh dear, this isn’t going very well.’
‘Then what good is a word?’
‘Never mind! Follow me and I will give you more food. I will show you a god and you can pray to her.’
So he’d followed the god who was not a god into the holy city. He’d never been more excited and frightened in his life. His heart ran and skittered like a hunted rock mouse. But he’d got to the temple of Shakri and started praying to a new god for new things.
The kind temple-master had healed Nostracles’s deformities and explained that the god Shakri gave it as a gift so he should pray to her. And Nostracles was given food every day. Although it was not given in the limitless amounts spoken of by the outdwellers, it was still more than he’d ever had before.
He’d quickly decided he wanted to spend the rest of his life praying to Shakri and had been accepted as a novice by the genuinely delighted temple-master. The day the Scourge had come to the temple of Shakri in Corinus, and the master had decided Nostracles was ready to go out into the world, had been the worst in Nostracles’s life. But that was what the temple-master and Shakri had wanted. And they’d given him so much. And asked so little in return.
Now, he lay on the ground praying that the cold inside him wasn’t the feeling and touch of death. He prayed that he wasn’t trapped in a corpse that he had no control over. He prayed that the darkness around him wasn’t the void. He prayed to Shakri with all his being that She would open his eyes on Her creation once more. And the goddess answered him as She had always done in the past.
***
The Scourge spasmed like one of the dead being reanimated. Drawing breath was difficult and painful, as if his body had forgotten how. He looked up at a grey-white sky and realised he’d fallen asleep here amongst the blood, mud, snow and the dead. Stupid, stupid! He was lucky he hadn’t died of exposure. Looking at the blue ends of his fingers, he knew there was still a chance he might.
Maybe he shouldn’t be so hard on himself. He’d fought himself to an exhausted standstill against the animees, and then there’d been the shock of that gruesome giant coming out of nowhere. What had it called itself? Brax, one of the King’s Wardens. The Scourge wasn’t surprised he’d lapsed into a deep stupor. And wasn’t Brax the name Trajan had mentioned when talking about the Chief Warden back in Corinus?
Brax had told the Scourge to go back to Voltar and tell him the Wardens would bring back Mordius and Balthagar. And the Scourge had half a mind to do just that, thinking he was getting too old for all this running around and battling the undead. The rest of him, the half that was less forgiving, reminded him that the King had given him specific instructions and it was his duty to follow them. On top of that, Young Strap was in his professional care and still had to be found. More persuasive than that, though, was the fact that the King would probably execute him if he returned empty handed with only a few half-excuses.
Of more immediate concern was finding the energy to sit up. His stiff muscles and aching bones protested, but they gave sufficiently so he could raise himself and look around. The light had a strange quality up here in the mountains. Everything had a stark, vivid quality, only heightened by the contrast provided by the clean snow. He could pick out details on even the bodies scattered furthest away.
When the female necromancer had been destroyed, all the animees had pretty much dropped where they were, mid-stride or mid-leap. Many lay with limbs stuck in the air like toppled statues. One had actually contrived to remain standing, and stood with fresh snow piled on its head and shoulders. A few had large chunks bitten out of them, but in the main the giants had spurned the old, desiccated flesh in favour of the fresh meat provided by the persons of the Accritanian soldiers.
Kate and Nostracles! Had they been consumed in the Wardens’ feeding frenzy? The Scourge quickly looked around. He thought he could see mud-splattered, green leather showing from under the body of a soldier some distance away. Nostracles should be nearby, but there was no obvious sign of him.
He moved from his seated position to his hands and knees and then got unsteady feet under him. Damn! He should have picked up his sword before straightening up. Now he’d have to negotiate getting back down to the ground again. He could leave it behind of course, but that would be like leaving a limb behind. And he should take a weapon in case any of the soldiers still lived.
He had visions of slipping and shattering his leg like an icicle or breaking an arm like a dry twig. He shut them out of his mind and bent creaking knees to lower himself. He slipped but managed to land on his rump.
Pleased with himself, he clambered back up. If life had taught him anything, it was that mighty conquests could be achieved through numerous, small victories and trivial triumphs. Armies could be inspired by the simple acts of an individual, and go on to win against impossible odds. Faiths could be undone by new, whispered ideas. Disdaining empires could be brought down by the gentle breeze of time.
He tottered over to the piece of ground where he thought he’d last seen Nostracles. There he was, all but buried in the snow and mud. No wonder the Scourge hadn’t been able to pick him out before.
Nostracles lay with his eyes open and a beatific smile upon his face. Was he dead?
‘Nostracles, can you hear me?’
The priest turned his head slightly towards the Scourge in response.
‘Why are you just lying there? You must be cold. Your lips are blue. Are you injured?’
‘Ah, the King’s Scourge! Good to see you. Good to be alive, isn’t it? It’s a lovely day. I’m quite comfortable here, just enjoying being alive really.’
‘Er… great!’ the Scourge smiled, wondering if the priest had received a nasty blow to the head.
‘Because I really didn’t think we were going to make it that time, what with the flesh-eating animees, the blood-thirsty soldiers and the head-crunching ogres, or whatever they were. One of the animees took a bite out of my leg, you know? But I managed to heal it. One of the ogres wanted to eat me too, but the big one said to leave me alone because I had the stench of the Guardians on me. Someone must be looking out for us, Scourge. I really think you should show more gratitude to the goddess. It seems to me we need all the friends we can get at the moment.’
/> It had to be shock. ‘Sure, sure,’ he said gently. ‘You just stay where you are and I’ll go see if Kate’s alright.’
‘Kate! Yes, we must help her,’ Nostracles replied and began to squirm his way free.
The mud was reluctant to let him go and slurped and sucked angrily at him. It finally had to concede he was not one of the dead and gave him up. The Scourge put a hand out to steady both himself and Nostracles.
‘Over this way.’
Leaning on each other, they navigated their way around, through and over the mutilated dead, having to look at them more closely than they liked because of the need to place feet carefully.
‘It’s so sad,’ Nostracles mourned. ‘If they hadn’t seen us leave Worm Pass, perhaps none of them would have been killed. If Kate hadn’t mentioned your name…’
‘Stop it!’ the Scourge said sternly. ‘We are alive. If we’d done anything differently, we could have ended up like this lot here. Those Wardens looked to have insatiable appetites. They would have attacked the soldiers whatever happened. You can’t take responsibility for every death you come across. Death is a necessary part of life, priest.’
‘And it’s a lovely day. Their lives had value, Scourge. Their passing should be marked.’
‘Well, you can say a blessing over them if you like, but that’s your lot. Their isn’t any holy water left to make the bodies safe and the ground will be too frozen and rocky to bury them. We don’t have the tools either. And I doubt we’ll get a fire going without any dry wood. Besides all that, I’m hoping there’s still one more of the living for us to attend to. Help me roll this body off her.’
Nostracles blinked slowly, looked down at the ground where the Scourge gestured and nodded like a simpleton. The priest’s behaviour dismayed the Scourge, for it showed all the signs of a deep trauma or serious concussion. He would have to speak to him more gently from now on, but he knew they were in trouble. They needed to find somewhere warm and dry to rest, and soon. And now there was the problem of Kate.