Tales of the Far Wanderers

by David Welch

  Also by David Welch:

  Chaos Quarter

  Chaos Quarter: Imperial Ambitions

  Chaos Quarter: Horde

  The Gods’ Day To Die

  The Fallen Angel Hunters

  Tales of the

  Far Wanderers

  David Welch

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the express written consent of the author.

  Copyright © 2018 by David Welch

  All rights reserved.

  eBook Cover Design by www.ebooklaunch.com

  Table of Contents

  Places and Names, for the 21st-Century Reader

  The Face of the Mountain Gods

  Masks in the Tall Grass

  The Burning Vale

  Harlonth

  Wolves of the White Wood

  Siege on the Mother River

  The Carpenter God

  The Sword of Mercy

  The Palace of the Red Prince

  The Lands Between the Waters

  Tales of a Northern Shore

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Places and Names, for the 21st-Century Reader

  Arranged by tale:

  The Face of the Mountain Gods - The Black Hills of South Dakota

  Masks in the Tall Grass - Vicinity of Bear Butte, near Sturgis, South Dakota

  The Burning Vale - Vicinity of the northern section of Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota

  Harlonth - Vicinity of Minot, North Dakota

  Wolves of the White Wood - The forests of north-central Minnesota

  Siege on the Mother River - Vicinity of Hastings, Minnesota

  The Carpenter God - Vicinity of Great Bluffs, Minnesota

  The Sword of Mercy - Vicinity of the confluence of the Mississippi and Wisconsin Rivers, Wisconsin

  The Palace of the Red Prince - Vicinity of Blue Mounds State Park, Wisconsin

  The Lands Between the Waters - Vicinity of North Chicago, Illinois and the eastern Upper Peninsula of Michigan

  Tales of a Northern Shore - Eastern Upper Peninsula, Vicinity of Brimley, Michigan

  Others -

  The Great Grass/The Great Grasslands - The Great Plains

  The Spine of the World - The Rockies

  The Mountains of (Eternal) Ice - Vicinity of Glacier National Park

  The Sea of Winds - Lake Superior

  The Sea of Kings - Lake Michigan

  The Sea of Travels - Lake Huron

  The Mother River - Mississippi River

  The Sandwater River - Wisconsin River

  North America, 20,000 years from now.

  The Face of the Mountain Gods

  Gunnar crouched behind the tree, the pine’s bark pressed against his face. He glanced around the side of the trunk, his mind not quite able to grasp what he beheld. A mountain rose before him, a grey bulk of hard rock. Rings of boulders formed talus slopes around it. He had seen mountains before – far larger ones, in fact; his distant home was full of them – but none had been carved.

  The mountain bore the look of a man astride a horse, his long, stone arm pointing off into the distance. The face of the great carving was worn, the features hard to see after long years of rain and wind. The horse too had a battered look, a chunk of its mane missing. Cracks riddled the massive form, larger than a man yet so small against the looming shapes. The magi of his homeland, babbling on about ancients who walked like gods, filled his thoughts.

  A scream broke his wonderment. His gaze shifted, focusing on a small group of people not two hundred feet away. Below him, at the base of the talus slope, a woman dropped heavily to the brown, late-summer grass. Blood pumped from a slash across her neck, pooling around her as tortured gurgles leapt from her ruined throat. They dwindled to nothing, the woman’s form lying still. Leering over her stood a copper-skinned man in a feather-covered robe. White dots of paint marked his face; he was clearly some kind of priest or shaman. Two other men stood armed with axes. They wore the thick leather of warriors and watched the sacrifice attentively. Gunnar cursed himself silently for not detecting them earlier.

  The feathered priest grasped the rope binding the dead woman’s wrists. It led back to the wrists of a second woman who, like her fallen companion, had skin the color of dark sap. Unlike the first woman, she was startlingly beautiful, with high cheekbones, gentle lips, and wide, doe eyes. She wore a sleeveless dress of tattered buckskin that ran to her knees, slit high on the sides for mobility, and long, wavy hair ran over her shoulders. She had the lanky, muscular limbs of somebody used to long hours on the move. She glared at the priest, disgust twisting her graceful features into a cruel mask. He jerked her forward, next to the body of her slain companion, and then cut the rope.

  Gunnar wasn’t sure what compelled him to run straight for them, but he found himself doing so. He unslung his shield from his shoulder with practiced ease, sliding his left arm through the grips. His right hand pulled his sword from its baldric. A thirty-four-inch fullered blade with a cruciform hilt and wire-wrapped grip, it was a beautiful weapon made far from the wilds of this place. He held it out at his side as he ran, ready to chop upwards at his foe. He didn’t scream as he charged; he just ran.

  The priest slit the dark-skinned woman’s dress from the neckline to her waist, exposing her breasts. He covered his hands in the blood of the slain woman, turned back to his next victim, and traced a line of blood down her sternum. Beginning to chant, he traced concentric circles on her breasts.

  Gunnar’s footfall broke his ritual. The priest turned and saw a charging warrior. Just shy of six feet tall, Gunnar was a compact man with a medium frame, hair the color of rust, and eyes so brown they looked black. The priest panicked at the sight, calling out in fear. His guards turned, raising their weapons in readiness, and Gunnar’s mind ran through all the reasons this was a mistake. He didn’t know this woman. He didn’t know these people or how far their power extended. He didn’t know if he was calling the wrath of this giant mountain god down upon him. And, most importantly, his chain-mail was sitting in a pack on his horse, a hundred yards away.

  He struck anyway, targeting the warrior on his right. The warrior swung his axe towards the shield but hit nothing. Gunnar slid to the man’s right, planted his right foot, and leapt forward in a burst. Shield and sword struck the warrior, his blade penetrating between the man’s ribs. The round, steel boss of his shield crashed into the warrior’s side, thrusting him backwards, off the sword. The warrior tripped and fell, roaring in agony.

  The second warrior was on him in a heartbeat. Two hard axe blows fell on his shield, the metal cutting though the rawhide exterior and into the oak beneath. It bit into the wood, but it didn’t break through.

  Gunnar leapt forward again, extending his shield arm above his head to intercept a wild, overhand swing. He brought his sword arm up sharply as he did, slicing into the man’s stomach. His blade cleaved deep, tearing into the man’s insides.

  The warrior staggered back, dropping his axe. He fell to the ground, his life flowing from the wound. Gunnar stepped forwards, looking into the brown eyes of the dying man. They pleaded for mercy. Gunnar nodded his assent and quickly thrust the tip of his blade through the man’s neck. The eyes went dull, staring off aimlessly as death came.

  Gunnar turned back to the priest, expecting him to have a knife at the woman’s throat. Instead, the woman had the knife in her bound hands and was stabbing r
epeatedly into the feathered chest of the holy man. The man was long dead, but she didn’t seem to care. Again and again, the knife came down, cracking bone. Blood spattered the woman’s face. Gunnar cleared his throat.

  She spun like a surprised animal, her cold, green eyes blazing into him. He motioned to the priest, and she looked down, noticing for the first time that her tormentor was dead.

  “I think you killed him,” said Gunnar.

  The woman kept a firm grip on the knife as she got to her feet. For a moment, she just stared at Gunnar, then, with the speed that comes only of awkwardness, she clutched together the split sides of her dress.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  The woman walked over to her dead compatriot and knelt next to her. She whispered something, a prayer of some sort, then rose again.

  “Friend of yours?” Gunnar asked.

  “No. I did not know her before yesterday. She was one of my people, though. She deserves something.”

  Gunnar nodded solemnly.

  “Do you have a name?” he asked.

  “‘Kamith’,” she replied. “You?”

  “‘Gunnar’,” he replied.

  “Langal?” she asked, cocking her head at his accent.

  “Sort of, but not really,” he replied.

  He turned and started walking for his horse. Kamith moved to catch up, holding her dress closed with one hand, clutching the sacrificial knife in the other.

  “So, not anymore?” she asked.

  “Not for some time,” he replied. “You have anywhere to call home? I could bring you —”

  “No,” she said quickly. “No. As far as I know, she and I were the last of my people.”

  Curiosity welled up in him, but Gunnar didn’t push her. Instead, they walked, entering the forest. The sparse, ancient pines formed a savannah in the rocky soil, making for easy passage up the slope of a small ridge. At the top, Dash waited, his reins tied to the branch of a scraggly spruce. Gunnar rummaged through a saddlebag, removing three metal pins. He handed them to Kamith, who thanked him and bound up her torn dress.

  “Can you get me away from here?” she asked, once finished.

  He looked to his horse, already heavily laden with his gear and various trade-goods. He doubted Dash would be able to carry both of them and the gear, and if somebody came along and noticed the priest lying dead, they might start looking around. If those pursuers had horses, and he was walking alongside Dash, it wouldn’t be much of a contest.

  He stared at the woman for a long moment, knowing in his heart that there really wasn’t a decision. He couldn’t save a person then just leave them, regardless of the risk. Gunnar grumbled to himself and nodded his assent.

  “You have somewhere to go?” he asked.

  “No,” she said, a sadness crossing her face. “But I can’t stay here. These people… you saw what they do to us.”

  “‘These people’? Who exactly are ‘these people’?” he asked.

  “Tabori,” she replied. “They worship the Stone Gods, with blood.”

  “Your people’s blood?” Gunnar asked.

  “Any people’s blood,” she said. “They believe that with enough blood, their gods can arise from the mountains and live again.”

  “Sounds pleasant,” he said with a sarcastic smirk.

  They began walking northeastwards, down the ridge, away from the ancient stone man and his horse.

  “Well, before finding your party, I hadn’t seen anybody in these peaks. Those bastards were the first,” Gunnar remarked.

  “They live to the south, at the base of the peaks, where the Great Grasslands meet the hills. They say these mountains are the homes of their Stone Gods, and they only enter to hunt and bring offerings,” she explained.

  “You know a lot about them?”

  “They’ve been hunting my people since the time of my birth,” she said. “Village by village, band by band.”

  A tear streaked from her eye.

  “And you think you’re the last?” he asked.

  “I am the last,” she spat. “Our village was the last one left. They came, we fought, they won. There were too many of them.”

  “People could have escaped—”

  “Our warriors had the horses, and they died with spear and bow in hand. The rest of us tried to flee, but we were on foot. If any escaped, I didn’t see them. They ran us down and brought us back to their camps,” she explained.

  “And none of your people remain there? In their villages?” he asked.

  “No. The beasts would come for us, taking a pair at a time. That woman and I were the last two,” she said, another tear tracing its way down her face.

  Gunnar didn’t speak, giving her a long minute to collect herself. They came out of the savannah into a clearing. The carved mountain rose above them again, and Gunnar paused, staring at the talus slope. Here, the Tabori’s grim faith made itself evident. Ruined bodies littered the ground, fought over by coyotes and vultures. The stones nearest the base were stained red with gore. Older bones, long stripped of flesh, were scattered amongst them. Kamith turned away with a sob and Gunnar averted his eyes, striding quickly out of the clearing.

  The savannah arose around them again, growing into a forest as they left the Stone God behind.

  ***

  They made northeast, walking through savannah much of the way. It looked wild and rugged, but Gunnar had seen such landscapes before. Somebody had put the forest to the torch, and the fire had cleansed it of shrubby undergrowth, leaving only the tougher trees capable of withstanding the blaze. Grass had grown in the cleared areas, feeding animals that, in turn, fed people. He had seen elk, bison, and wild horses during the day. They had all purposefully moved away from him, within sight but well beyond bowshot. They were cautious animals; the kind familiar with human hunters.

  Now, he stood atop a rocky peak that was almost a dome. It rose above the surrounding hills and mountains, possibly the tallest around. Around it, illuminated by the setting sun, stretched a landscape foreign to him. Hills covered in pine forest and savannah rolled towards the Great Grasslands that surrounded them on all sides. Random spires and domes of rock pieced the tree cover, capping the peaks with hard summits. The stone was rugged and cleaved in many places, but it lacked the jagged edges of his homeland. It seemed older to him, and defiant, like a man in a losing fight who refuses to stop swinging his fists, raw as they may be.

  He moved from the rock, down into a forested cull between two of the summit ridges. Under a handful of tall pines, a small fire burned, surrounded by rocks Kamith had gathered. She had fashioned a wooden spit over the fire and hung his only iron pot from it. Water boiled slowly within.

  “See anything?” she asked.

  “Just more of the same,” he replied. “Can’t see anybody following us. Doesn’t mean they aren’t.”

  “Well, this is just about ready,” she replied expectantly.

  Gunnar moved to his saddlebags, producing a rabbit he had shot and gutted not an hour before meeting Kamith. Placing it on a large boulder near the fire, he began the skinning process. Kamith mixed pine needles with some herbs from his supply then dropped them into the pot. Minutes later, chunks of rabbit meat followed. Gunnar finished it off by adding a few small potatoes he’d traded for at a farm of the Circle Rock People some days before. They were tiny little things, but would add some taste to their spartan meal.

  They settled down and watched the fire as it boiled their food, stirring it occasionally with a stick. A heavy silence hung on them. Gunnar couldn’t help but steal glances at his new traveling companion, and Kamith couldn’t help but notice. She fought to withhold a grin until she realized that Gunnar no longer hid his gaze. She smiled visibly and shifted a few inches away.

  He sighed and poked the ground with a stick for a few moments.

  “Can you tell me about your people?” he asked.

  She frowned, looking at her feet for a long moment. Gunnar had all but given up on her answeri
ng when she spoke.

  “Red Horse. The People of the Red Horse,” she said. He watched her wipe away a tear, saying nothing. “Three days hard ride, to the south, is a river. It runs east. My people had a dozen villages on that river. The men rode the plains and hunted the bison and elk. We women planted corn and wheat along the riverbanks, where there was enough water for growing things.”

  “And the Tabori?”

  “Before I was born, they left us alone. They fought with the Smoking Grass People to the east, until there were no more Smoking Grass People to feed their gods. Then, they turned on us,” she said, anger palpable in her voice. “They killed my husband.”

  Gunnar perked up. The woman before him could not have seen more than nineteen winters.

  “Your husband?” he asked.

  “Three months ago, when they took our village. We had less than a year together.”

  “I am sorry,” Gunnar replied.

  “Yes, well…” she muttered, clearly looking for something appropriate to say. Her mouth pressed together into a frown as she struggled and came up with nothing. Finally, she fixed him with a stare.

  “What about you? Why are you wandering the wilds, far from the Kingdoms?” she asked.

  Now he frowned, darkening at the last word.

  “My father was Langal, my mother was Tarn,” he said.

  “Tarn?” she asked, no spark of recognition in her eyes.

  “We… they live in the Spine of the World, west of the Great Grass. My father fled to them when he was young, lived there with my mother. One day, my father’s people came to raid, like they’ve been doing for centuries. Burned everything, killed or enslaved everybody. Kept me alive ’cause I was a half-breed.”

  “They took you?” Kamith asked.