Witchbreaker (Dragon Apocalypse)

by James Maxey

  “Those are the lies the church tells,” said Sorrow. “You can’t believe everything the victors of war say about their enemy.”

  Mama Knuckle lowered her head, looking weary. “When you came to me, girl, I knew I had to train you. I could see in your eyes that nothing would stop you from finding the answers you sought. I taught you many things, but you never learned mercy. You never learned love.”

  “I show mercy constantly,” Sorrow said, thinking of how she’d spared Eddy, the river pygmy who’d betrayed her, from suffering a moment more than necessary. “As for love, I don’t know that you can teach something that may not even exist.”

  “Oh, child,” Mama sighed.

  “Love is just a mumbo jumbo word used to hide our animal natures,” said Sorrow. “Between men and women, it sanitizes lust. Between a mother and child, it’s a pretty word for an instinct that, as you say, even wild animals possess. Between a child and her parent, it’s simple dependency that forms the bond. We romanticize these feelings, blend them together, and label them love. We attempt to make something noble out of mere biology.”

  Mama Knuckle rose and hobbled back to her stove. She lifted the lid and a cloud of steam rolled out. The fat from the marrow of the monkey bones had turned the broth a dull yellow. Mama Knuckle pulled down a bundle of dried chilies that hung near the stove and tossed them into the pot without bothering to chop them. After stirring the concoction in silence for a few moments, she said, “I took you into my home, girl, when you were nothing but a hungry little runaway with a scalp full of oozing wounds. I nursed you to health and taught you my secrets. I cared for you even though the guardian spirits told me to kill you. They said you were sharp with anger, the way a porcupine is prickly with quills. Touch that girl, they told me, and you’ll bleed.”

  “I don’t deny I’m angry. What I’ve never understood is why everyone else isn’t. Why is the world so blind?”

  Mama Knuckle fixed her unseeing gaze on Sorrow’s face. “If the rest of the world can’t see the things you see, do you think they maybe don’t exist?”

  “Don’t be absurd. The cruelty, the injustice, the hatred... they’re the facts of the world, even if no one else has the courage to see it.”

  “But because you’re blind to love, you think it doesn’t exist.”

  Sorrow grimaced. “Fine. I’m honest enough to admit I may have a few blind spots. What does it matter?”

  “It matters because the world is in balance, Sorrow. You see only the bad things. I remember how you would walk through the cotton fields and come home to tell me how you saw workers sagging under the weight of their burdens. You’d tell me how hungry the children looked. You never told me about walking through the village in the evening and seeing the men and women dancing. You never talked about the children running around like wild things in the alleys, laughing with their friends. There’s good in this world. Ordinary people can bear their heartaches because they’re lifted by their joys.”

  “You think I can’t feel joy?” Sorrow asked.

  “Can you?”

  Could she? She’d felt excitement, obviously, like the anticipation she’d experienced finding the Witches’ Graveyard. She could feel satisfaction, like the sense of accomplishment she felt when she constructed a particularly useful golem. And she could certainly feel amusement. She’d been able to laugh when Slate had been confused about Bigsby’s gender. Weren’t these things joy?

  Thinking about Slate, she said, “We’ve talked about me long enough. I’ve questions of a more practical nature.”

  “Yes?”

  “I’ve met... a man. Who has no aura.”

  “Is he lethargic? Sad? Sometimes the soul perishes before the body.”

  “He’s anything but lethargic. While he’s a bit moody, he certainly smiles more often than I do.”

  “Perhaps some magic masks his soul?”

  “Maybe,” said Sorrow. “Do you know how to create such a mask? Would you know how to remove it?”

  “I’ve not had much reason to mask souls,” said Mama Knuckle. “But I know it can be done.”

  “So do I,” said Sorrow. “Apparently, there was an animating spirit locked into the woodwork of the Freewind. I spent weeks on the ship and never suspected. I was told the soul had been masked to hide it from Rott. That ship was destroyed, but the soul lingers on inside the figurehead. The family is wanting me to help move the spirit into a new ship. I’ve no clue how to do this.”

  “Blood, child. Spirits flow with blood.”

  “I know this. But there’s no body, only wood.”

  Mama nodded. “Then someone from the family would have to supply the blood.”

  “I’m sure there would be volunteers,” said Sorrow. “How much blood would we need?”

  “Enough to soak each board of the new ship.”

  “That would take gallons! No one has that much blood.”

  “The blood could be diluted in wine. Still, to remain potent spread across an entire ship, you would probably need all the blood from an adult.”

  “I doubt that’s going to happen. I imagine any of the Romers would be happy to bleed a little for the cause, but it makes no sense for one of them to sacrifice their life to free one ghost.”

  “Without understanding love, it’s impossible for you to judge these things,” said Mama Knuckle.

  Sorrow stretched her arms out to the side and yawned. “You’ve given me a lot to think about. Maybe some of it will make sense to me in the morning.”

  “Will you stay the night here?”

  “We both know I won’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because if you don’t want me going to see Avaris, you have a hundred different tricks to stop me. You once showed me the recipe for that paste you put on sleeping men’s tongues to destroy their will and render them obedient. Going to sleep in your presence wouldn’t be very smart.”

  “Sorrow! You trust me so little? I would never harm you. Though you’ll never understand it, I love you, girl.”

  “Even though I scare you? Even though you think I’m corrupted by ambition?”

  “Everything in balance, child. You may be blind to the good in life, but I see the good in you. The ghosts tell me you helped save the sun. The world would be a cold, dark place without you.”

  “I played some small part in ensuring that we’d still have daylight, yes. I can’t pretend that was a particularly difficult moral choice.”

  “If not for your ambition, you would never have had the power to do this important thing. If not for the coldness in your heart, you wouldn’t be able to stay clear-headed and focused in the face of danger. You’re as close to fearless as anyone I’ve ever met.”

  “Not so fearless. If you offered me a cup of tea, I wouldn’t have the courage to bring it to my lips.”

  Mama Knuckle laughed. “That’s wisdom, not fear.”

  “I’ve seen what you’ve put in your teapots,” Sorrow said, also laughing.

  SORROW SPENT THE remainder of the night and much of the morning sleeping in an old barn on the edge of Two Mile Ditch. Perhaps it came from seeing Mama Knuckle, but she felt a wave of nostalgia sweep across her as she curled up in the loft, away from prying eyes. In recent years, she’d had the money needed to live in relative ease. She lived as a vagabond, but a comfortable one, able to afford the best rooms in the best inns, or her choice of cabins aboard ships. But for most of the first few years following running away from home, she’d slept any place that kept rain off her head—under bridges, hiding in cellars, haunting old houses half-way fallen down. She’d fed herself by stealing from gardens and, when hungry enough, from the scrap heaps of taverns. A wriggling rat had been a horrifying meal, but it wasn’t at the top of the list of the worst things she’d put in her mouth.

  She rolled her eyes, thinking of those starvation meals, amazed at the things one could feel sentimental about.

  She spent most of the day watching the main road through a gap in the boa
rds. At last, she saw Brand, Slate, and Bigsby approaching town in an ox-wagon. Most surprising of all, Jetsam was with them, sitting next to Brand on the bench.

  Sorrow slithered out of the barn. Though it was getting late in the day, the light was still strong enough that there were men working the fields. They fled as she undulated toward the road, most heading in the direction of Mama Knuckle’s hut. Hopefully the necromancer would calm them down.

  As she reached the road, Brand called out, “Sorry we’re a little late. Arranging to have the Circus restocked took longer than I planned.”

  “What are you doing here, Jetsam?” Sorrow asked. “Wanderers can’t come onto land!”

  “Technically, I’m not on land. I’m on a wagon. Abyss doesn’t seem to have a problem with us walking around on boats or docks. A wagon is kind of a land-boat.”

  “What if someone knocks you off?”

  Jetsam shrugged. “Hopefully I’ll have time to get airborne and make it to water. Besides, if I lost the protection against drowning offered by Abyss, I know it would break Ma’s heart, but I really don’t think I’d be worried. I can walk on water. I’m more likely to break my neck tripping over a wave than I am to drown.”

  “But why risk coming here at all?”

  “Ma has a letter she wants me to give Avaris.”

  “I could deliver the letter.”

  “Ma says she can only trust a family member.”

  Sorrow frowned. She didn’t like that Gale was doing things involving magic without consulting with her.

  Slate stood up in the back of the wagon. He was dressed in the form-fitting, black glass scale-armor Sorrow had crafted for him, though he wasn’t wearing his helmet. “Have you found Avaris yet?”

  Sorrow shook her head.

  “Any sign of Walker?” Brand asked.

  “No.”

  “Perhaps we should have asked him to explain his plan in more detail,” said Brand.

  “What’s the point?” said Bigsby, clanking as he stood. “The more he talks, the more confused I get.” He was once again dressed in the chain mail he’d worn when he’d thought he was a princess, only without his breast plate. It also looked as if he had lined his eyes with black make-up. At least he wasn’t wearing his wig.

  “We’re still a few miles from where the road ends in the swamp,” Sorrow said. “My understanding is we’d find him there.”

  “Lead on,” said Brand.

  Sorrow led them to the ferry. The riverman fled as she approached, but he left his pole behind. Jetsam flitted ahead to grab it. Shortly after the wagon was secured, he had the ferry free from its moorings and pushed off from shore.

  “I’m a little surprised to see you geared up for battle,” Sorrow said as she glanced at Bigsby.

  The dwarf looked at his mace as if he was also surprised to find it in his hands. “I’ve been thinking a lot about what Equity said. About having the courage to be who you want to be, no matter what the world thinks. There was something deep inside me that wanted to be a warrior. I mean, I had my armor made up long before I went crazy. The legend of the missing Princess Brightmoon has been going around for a while, and it was fun to daydream crazy scenarios where I might be her.”

  “I can assure you that you’re not,” said Sorrow. “Infidel was the true Princess Brightmoon.” As soon as she said it, she wondered if that was the sort of thing she was supposed to keep secret.

  “Hah!” Jetsam said.

  “You don’t believe me?” asked Sorrow.

  “Of course I believe you!” Jetsam laughed. “It makes perfect sense.”

  Sorrow couldn’t tell if she was being mocked.

  Bigsby said, “I was used to being bullied in Commonground. For release, late a night, when I was alone in my shop, I used to dress up in armor and my wig and beat the living snot out of straw men with my mace. But the odd thing is, when I went crazy and got into some real fights, I did okay. Maybe I’m more of a natural fighter than I thought. Maybe Equity was right. All I’ve been lacking is courage.”

  “I think Equity was talking about the courage to wear whatever clothes you wanted,” said Sorrow.

  “I’ll start with testing myself in combat. That seems much less daunting than going out in public wearing my wig.”

  “I notice you didn’t throw that mop overboard like I suggested,” said Brand.

  “It’s an expensive wig,” said Bigsby.

  They continued to follow the road on the other side of the creek. They soon left behind cultivated fields, and before long the road was flanked on both sides by marshes. Twisted trees rose from the water here and there. Blueherons perched in their branches: huge, ungainly birds that turned into graceful ballerinas once they took flight. Trunks fallen into the river were thick with black turtles, still catching the last rays of the vanishing sun.

  As the light disappeared, so did the road. It came to an end with a row of pilings stretching off into black water, looking like the foundation of a bridge or a dock that had never been finished. Across the water, there was a thick forest of tangled trees. The air was cacophonous with frogs.

  “I’m guessing this is where Walker will meet us,” said Sorrow.

  Jetsam jumped from the wagon and swam into the air. “What do we need him for? From what I know, Avaris lives in a walking castle taller than these trees. It seems like she should be easy enough to spot. At least, if the light was better.”

  “If her castle only walked this world, that would be true.” They all turned toward the voice and found Walker sitting on the bench where Jetsam had just been.

  “You seem to know a thing or two about walking between worlds,” said Sorrow. “When I saw you on the Isle of Fire, I thought you were a ghost. Now you look solid enough. Are you a spirit, or a living man?”

  Walker grinned. “Aren’t we all ghosts?”

  “I’m reasonably sure I’m not,” said Jetsam, hovering above.

  “Living men are merely bewildered ghosts, oblivious to their true nature,” Walker said. “Were you not dead before you were born?”

  Bigsby smiled. “I like having him around. It means I’m no longer the craziest person here.”

  Sorrow studied Walker. “I don’t think you’re crazy. I’ve been to the Sea of Wine and the Great Sea Above. I know that our reality is like the heart of an onion, surrounded by other layers. How is it that you move between them so easily?”

  Walker’s face suddenly turned serious. “I’ve paid a great price. Nothing of my existence is easy.”

  “What price?” asked Sorrow. “Who exactly are you? Why are you helping us? For that matter, the first thing you said to me was that you’d come from hell where you’d been chatting with demons. Why should we trust you at all?”

  Walker shook his head. “I speak to demons for the same reason I speak to men. Infinity is a lonesome burden. Conversation offers a moment of relief. As for who I am, I was once called—” He suddenly let out a string of whistles that sounded like a bird call. “I was the shaman of the Spike Bark tribe. I was taught by my father to grind roots into a paste that I rubbed in my eyes. This allowed me to see the true nature of the world. For a long time, I served my tribe, helping guide the spirits of my dead brethren to the Realm of Roots.”

  “That’s another afterlife?” asked Sorrow.

  “I would not use the word ‘after,’” said Walker. “Though even I made the mistake in assuming there was a distinction between the material world and the spirit world. I did not learn the truth until my wife died. In my grief, I tried to follow her spirit. But she was already tangled in the roots, being sucked back into what I thought of as the living realms. When I tried to follow her back, to discover how she would be reborn, I found myself... elsewhere.”

  “Elsewhere?”

  Walker looked wistful. “It looked the same, my village in the trees, my children, my brothers, my sisters. But all was changed. I saw the truth for the first time. What I thought of as the ‘real’ world was only a waking dream, ne
ither more nor less substantial than the Realm of Roots. The treasure I thought of as life was only a facet of the larger jewel of death. I was certain that I misunderstood what I saw, so I left my village to seek the wisdom of others. Eventually, as I was led through more and more abstract realms by my guides, all barriers between the worlds became visible to me. They’re thin as tissue, and easily torn.”

  Sorrow had more questions, but Brand interrupted. “I’m sure that this would be a fascinating conversation under other circumstances, but I’m having a little trouble focusing while I’m being devoured by mosquitoes. Why don’t we set up camp and get a fire going?”

  “You didn’t come here to camp,” said Walker. “You came seeking Avaris.”

  “Any chance we’ll find her while I still have some blood left?” Brand asked, slapping a bug that had alighted on the side of his neck.

  “Her castle is near,” said Walker. “I came here last night and sang for it. It enjoys music. It will return to listen once more for my serenade.”

  “Start singing. That sounds a hell of a lot easier than human sacrifice. I’m not sure why you thought that required a lot of boldness, however.”

  “Sacrifice will be required. The castle will listen to my song, but it will not leave the Black Bog unless it can feed.”

  “The Black Bog is the swamp?” asked Jetsam.

  “The Black Bog is another realm of the dead,” said Sorrow. “It’s part of the local mythology.”

  “What kind of sacrifice?” Brand asked Walker.

  “You must die, of course,” the pygmy said. “But not for long. I’ll guide your spirit back into your body once the castle crosses into this world to feed.”

  “So... what? I just slit my wrists and trust you to handle the rest?”

  “The castle dislikes the taste of suicide,” said Walker. “It prefers the flavor of murder.”

  “If we kill Brand, what guarantee do we have that the castle will notice?” asked Sorrow.

  “It’s here right now, watching us.”

  Everyone craned their necks toward the forest, searching the shadowy treetops.