They had orders not to touch the other prisoners and thought their god had blessed them with a fair woman. Blonde hair apparently wasn’t something they were accustomed to.
A Malduk took Damaris roughly by the arm and led her to camp.
They want to present her to their commander first. Likely give him the first go. Your part of the plan is working so far Damaris.
Let’s hope we don’t screw things up.
Ava gave the signal and the group slowly advanced.
Farther up, the Malduks called out, telling others of their prize. Several around the fire whooped in delight, one grabbing his crotch in anticipation. All the noise made Ava’s job of concealing movement much easier.
Everyone in their group fanned out into position and waited as Damaris entered camp and stood near the center fire. A large Malduk with gray at his temples came up and appraised her. Ava pegged him as the commander.
He circled Damaris, studying her. She spoke something to him as well as the others, but Ava couldn’t make it out. The Malduks ignored her whether because of a lack of understanding or because they didn’t care. The commander cupped Damaris’s backside, causing her to jump. A grin crawled across his face. He nodded in approval at the four who brought her to camp.
He took Damaris by the arm and pulled her out into the dark shadows on the opposite side of camp. As he did, those that remained behind slapped each other jokingly. They immediately began drawing lots, their gestures indicating the winner would have the next turn with their prize. All the while, the two dark-skinned prisoners looked with dread to where Damaris had disappeared.
Ava gritted her teeth. This was the part of the plan she had argued against. Damaris had hidden a blade under her dress, strapped against the back of her left thigh. Though Damaris had recently proven that she was not afraid to get her hands dirty, Ava thought it far too risky for them to rely on her to sound an alarm.
Killing a man with a spear is much different than doing so up close with a blade. And trying to kill a trained warrior in close quarters is just plain foolish.
The more she thought about the situation, the more Ava hated it. She began working sorcery, something different than what she had used before. She had to check on Damaris before something went wrong.
The Malduks continued to laugh around the fire.
Ava reached out, searching for Damaris and the Malduk leader. She found Damaris quickly due to familiarity. The other figure next to Damaris by default had to be the Malduk leader.
Ava honed in on him, getting a sense of his body’s rhythm so that she could attack and disrupt his breathing if needed. She was ready to begin squeezing his lungs when the figure jolted upright. Tensing, he screamed loudly in the night. Damaris shrilled in anger and the figure screamed again.
Ava lost her connection with both figures then as madness erupted, their group responding to Damaris’s scream, the signal.
A half dozen crossbow bolts flew through the night into the center of the Malduk mass. All found marks, killing or wounding their targets. Figures flashed through the woods a heartbeat later with weapons raised. They descended on the confused Malduks in a fury.
The Malduks tried to defend themselves. The first few failed miserably as weapons descended, cutting deep or smashing hard into them. Crunching bones, muffled grunts, and confused curses mixed with their cries.
After the initial shock, a couple of Malduks managed to recover and stand in a defensive position. However, by that point, they had attackers all around them and after a quick strike or two fell under the press of the group.
Gods, it worked!
Ava ran into camp. “Damaris!”
Those who had volunteered for the mission stood around the bloody carnage, heaving mighty breaths. The coppery smell of freshly spilled blood mingled sickeningly with the wood smoke from the fire. It reminded her of a freshly killed deer ready to be placed on a spit.
Eder was the first to retch as the reality of the situation caught up with him. Two more followed. Blood had spattered several people. Everyone involved looked at their gore-covered weapons, then at the carnage wreaked by them.
Eder retched again. The smell of vomit was a poor addition to the pungent odors already present.
Ava took that in while moving toward Damaris’s last known location.
“Damaris!”
Heads turned quickly and there was a rise of panic in Ava’s throat as sorcery flowed through her to aid her search. She only needed a couple of steps.
“I’m here,” Damaris said, emerging through the forest gloom.
Her appearance mirrored that to how she looked after killing the scout. Blood covered her hands and forearms, more adorned the front of her dress. Ava noted the dress had been ripped worse than before, split entirely up one side, exposing her hip.
Too much risk. Ao’s teats, we lucked out.
A spray of blood also splashed across Damaris’s neck.
Ava met her eyes. They blinked rapidly. Not blank, but distant, as they had been after killing the scout.
“Are you all right?”
Damaris nodded, silent.
“Are you sure?”
She nodded again.
Ava fidgeted. “Rest a moment then.” She started giving orders to others. “Get cleaned up as best as you can. Then start grabbing all the supplies and weapons you can carry. We’ll sort out what we can use when we get back to camp. We don’t want to be here much longer in case they were waiting on others to meet up with them.”
That announcement got people moving. No one wanted to be ambushed themselves.
Eder moved over to the two prisoners who surprisingly had remained perfectly quiet and still during the ordeal as if wondering how the newcomers would compare to the Malduks.
Ava wanted to go over to them and start asking questions, but decided it would be better to do so later. Besides, Eder was already cutting their bonds and explaining who everyone was. It appeared they knew the Turine language.
Better to let them catch their bearings. There are other things to consider first.
Ava faced Damaris again. The woman hadn’t moved. “You’re not really all right, are you?”
She frowned. “I’m not hurt if that’s what you mean. I killed him before he . . . you know.”
“Good. But that’s not all I meant. Are you all right up here?” she asked tapping her head.
“I don’t know.” She frowned. “Maybe not. I—I thought I was ready to do this, but maybe I wasn’t. Knowing what I had to do before hand, thinking about it, planning for it, expecting it. It made everything much different. And then the struggle. I was scared. It wasn’t like last time.”
Ava understood completely. “And the next time will be different again. It’s never the same.”
“I-I want to help, but . . .” She looked at her the bloody knife in her hand.
Ava put an arm around her and gave a squeeze. She surprised herself with the move. She had never been one to show affection easily. However, she felt a certain bond with Damaris, especially then as she recalled the first time she had killed someone up close. The circumstances were different, but she was sure they shared similar emotions.
Damaris leaned her head on Ava’s shoulder and sighed.
CHAPTER 25
Everyone hurried back to camp. Those who had remained behind greeted everyone warmly. Other than a twisted knee, everyone returned without physical injury.
Hard to hope for more than that.
People either began cleaning up, eating, or in a couple instances, crawling up next to a loved one and going to sleep.
Eager to forget the fighting. We’ll know about the mental injuries when the nightmares come.
Ava grunted. There’d be no loved one for her to curl up to. Not that she wasn’t used to that. She had told Tyrus that she mostly didn�
�t think about relationships, which was true. But that didn’t mean she didn’t sometimes long for the touch of another. In the army, she’d borrow that feeling from someone.
But who would I sleep with here? Gods, people wouldn’t stop talking about it. The kids don’t need that.
She sighed. Find comfort in sorcery. A girl’s best friend.
“I was coming to check on you, but it seems like you’re doing fine,” said Nason walking up. “Were you just grinning?”
She blinked away her thoughts. “Gods if I know.” She did know. She just didn’t wish to share her thoughts. “I thought you’d be sleeping next to your little ones.”
“Dinah’s keeping an eye on them so I could talk to you. Everything went all right?” He gestured to his right where Myra and Zadok sat with the two people rescued from the Southern Kingdoms.
“It was a success.” Her gaze shifted over to Damaris who sat staring at her bloody hands. “I wouldn’t say everything went all right though.”
“You need to talk?”
She smiled. “No. I’ve seen so much of this, I’m a little numb to it.” She paused. “There is something you can do though.”
“Anything.”
“Switch places with Dinah.”
“All right,” he said hesitantly. “You need her?”
“Sort of. Ask her to go to Damaris. She could use some help right now in getting cleaned up. Maybe someone to talk to as well.” She paused. “I’d do it myself, but I need to take care of a couple of things first.”
Besides, she had already spent much of their time coming back to camp at Damaris’s side, and was at a loss for what else to say or do. Dinah seemed like a woman much more in tune with how to help others anyway. Ava hoped she’d have more success at comforting Damaris.
“Sure, no problem.”
“Thanks.”
He started to turn. “Ava?”
“Yeah?”
“I know you might be used to this sort of violence, but if you do need to talk to someone about it, whether tomorrow, or whenever, well, I’m a good listener.”
He was a good listener and a good friend, but the burdens she carried from the war and the life she lived would be hard to truly share with someone who hadn’t been through it.
How do you explain to someone the smell, the fear, the anxiety of killing someone? How do you explain that you had moved past those emotions and killing a man is sometimes no different than stepping on a bug? How do you say that killing isn’t what scares you about war, its living afterward? Will my next meal be the last? My next breath?
Sure, Ava could try to explain, but words only told part of the story. The rest of it came only through experience that Nason didn’t have.
Still, Ava smiled, genuinely touched by the offer. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
And she would. She just wouldn’t act upon it.
Ava walked over to Myra and Zadok and the two people they had rescued from the Malduks. The husband and wife, as confirmed by Eder, seemed much more relaxed than before.
Not being bound will do that to you, I’m sure.
Chadar, a middle-aged man, sat with his back against a struggling pine tree. He kept his dark hair closely cropped. The gray at his beard stood out even against his dry skin in the flickering light of the nearby campfire. His wife, Galya, a much younger woman also with short hair, sat at his side. Their arms rested intertwined. They were both dressed in simple clothes—brown trousers, black boots, and white shirts long ago stained yellow from sweat and dirt. A deep weariness sat upon their wrinkled faces. But despite their haggard form, there was still something beautiful about their foreign features.
Though they appeared in better spirits since their rescue, neither had moved more than an inch from the other’s side. Chadar’s eyes never stopped as he studied his surroundings.
Their dark skin and southern features reminded Ava very much of Lasha. People from the Southern Kingdoms rarely ventured this far north, and so the only person Ava had ever had strong interactions with from that part of the world was her sister-in-law.
It was a little strange to see how much more noticeable the Southern Kingdom features were on her niece and nephew with them sitting so close to Chadar and Galya.
She stopped a couple feet away from the group. Chadar looked up, smiling. The gesture made Myra and Zadok turn her way.
“Hi, Aunt Ava,” said Zadok. “We were just—”
“I need to talk to you in private,” she said to Myra.
Myra frowned. “Can it wait? We were just talking about—”
“No. It can’t.”
Her frown deepened, but she stood and followed Ava over to a secluded edge of camp.
“What is it?”
“I need you to go talk to Damaris.”
Myra looked over Ava’s shoulder. “Dinah is with her now.”
“I know, but I think Damaris could use some more company after tonight.”
“I don’t know what to say. I wasn’t there.”
“Neither was Dinah. That’s not the point though. Making the effort goes a long way. It will show that you care about her, and that her risking her life meant something. Understand?”
She bit her lip. “Can I do it in the morning? I really want to talk to Chadar and Galya.”
“That can wait until morning. At least for you. I need to talk to them to figure out our course for tomorrow. I can’t do that, talk to Damaris, and get some semblance of rest. That’s why I’m coming to you. I need your help.”
“All right. I’ll go.”
“Thank you.”
They parted and Ava returned to their guests. She sat next to Zadok.
“Aunt Ava,” said Zadok, excited. “Chadar and Galya are from this town called Okahao. It’s within a day’s walk of Rundu. Do you know what that means? They might have met Ma when she was a kid and didn’t even know it.”
Galya smiled. “Well, most of our travels outside of Okahao took us in a different direction than Rundu. Still, it is possible our paths crossed.”
Chadar met Ava’s eyes. “Is everything all right with Myra?”
“Fine. She asked me to apologize for her, but she has some more pressing things to take care of right now.” She changed the subject. “So, I hate to be blunt and interrupt your conversation, but it’s late, I’m tired, and I’m sure you are too.”
They nodded.
“Then let’s get down to the heart of things. What are you two doing so far from home? And why were the Malduks keeping you as prisoners?”
Chadar took a deep breath, but then began coughing.
Galya patted his chest. “I can answer her questions.”
He nodded in assent, collecting himself.
“Are you all right?” Ava asked Chadar.
“He will be,” Galya said. “The eruptions made him very ill, and though he’s recovered in most other ways, he still feels a tightening in his chest from time to time.”
“I hope it doesn’t affect his ability to travel. We have a lot of walking ahead of us.”
“He’ll be fine,” she said. “Now, your questions. The first one is very easy to answer. We left the Southern Kingdoms months before all this destruction happened. We were tasked by our government to expand our trade routes. We had already opened up new ways with the Byzans and also parts of southern Turine. However, we knew we’d have a real advantage if we could get new routes established with the Geneshans.”
“You wanted to establish trade with the Molak-be-damned Geneshans?”
“Why not?”
“For one, didn’t they attack you in the early years of their expansion?”
Galya chuckled. “And they were reminded quickly how foolish such a thing was. We beat them quite easily.”
“And they turned their attention to everyone else. Like Turine
. What about all the awful things they’ve done? You had to have heard the stories.”
“Of course we have. And we are not so blind to think that your military didn’t also do things to them as well. It is war after all.”
“They sacrificed children!” she hissed. She was about to go further when she remembered Zadok was next to her. Though he had seen his fair share of atrocities, she didn’t want to add to it by sharing her experiences. “That goes beyond just the evils of war.”
“This is true. It’s why our government wanted to establish Geneshan trade routes. We hoped that our influence might eventually sway them away from such barbaric practices.”
“And what would have happened had they turned on you later?”
“We would have beaten them handily as before, probably worse to make the point again. Just as we would have done if Turine grew arrogant in their victory and thought to look south.”
Ava bristled at the arrogance. Of course, how could she argue? History showed that the Southern Kingdoms hadn’t lost a military engagement in hundreds of years.
You’d think that a nation with such a powerful army would have become the conquerors instead of the Geneshans. Yet, they’re absolutely passive. The sleeping giant.
Ava didn’t like Galya’s response, but she knew it was fruitless to argue when so much else still needed to be said.
“Back to your story, you were going into the Geneshan Empire. . .”
“Yes. We were several weeks into their lands when the first eruption occurred. It made us both very ill. Chadar almost died. We found safety in a small town after the first eruption, then later in an old wolves’ den after the second. We were on our way home when the Malduks captured us.”
“Why?”
“Why did we get caught or why were we taken as prisoners?”
“Both.”
“The first answer is because we are not soldiers. We didn’t see the signs of an ambush. At least that’s what I presume. The second answer we didn’t learn until much later. Apparently, there are a lot of smaller armies moving north made of both Geneshans and Malduks.”
Resurrected Soldiers: The Tyrus Chronicle - Book Three Page 24