Shattered Shields

by Jennifer Brozek

  He was a house in boots. Guys like him usually end up being called Tiny or Little Whoever, and are dim, but this walking building was supernaturally quick, monster strong, and twice as smart as the creep who employed him.

  He was Buzzard Neck because his neck was long and crooked and included an Adam’s apple like an Adam’s melon. The name quickly shrank to Buzz.

  He never said much. He was as well-liked as Two Dead was well-loathed. He claimed to have survived some of the shit the Company had, including the Battle at Charm.

  Two Dead headed out. We followed, me hoping I would not have to hold it long.

  Technically, we could have told Two Dead to go pound sand. He was not in our chain of command. But he was tight with Whisper, and Whisper was hungry for excuses to pound the Company. Also, he might be a cat underfoot for a long time. Not to mention, I was really curious about what could give the spider wizard the jimjams.

  * * *

  Aloe sprawls without being big, though it is the grandest metropolis for a hundred miles. Two Dead led us a third of a mile, to the lee of a redbrick box on whitewashed limestone foundations.

  “There.” He indicated a mound of brown fur in a dried-out flower patch. Wind stirred the fur and dead leaves.

  I opined, “It don’t look healthy.”

  Silent said nothing. Buzz clutched his gut.

  I asked, “What is it?” Not a badger. It was too big and the color was wrong. Not a bear. It was too small.

  “I don’t know,” Two Dead said. “It smells of sorcery.”

  Silent nodded. Buzz looked desperate to take a squat.

  I stepped left, relieved myself at last. Steam rose to meet randomly falling snowflakes. Fat flakes. It must be getting warmer.

  I eased closer. The beast was curled up like a pill bug.

  Two Dead said, “There were two others. They scooted when they saw us.”

  Buzz said, “I didn’t see them.”

  Two Dead said, “They ran a few steps and just faded out.” He was nervous all over again. How come?

  I asked, “What did they look like?”

  “Giant beavers or woodchucks? They were gone too quick to tell.”

  Well. Beavers and groundhogs are somewhat less fierce than bears.

  This one was not the right shade for a woodchuck. I didn’t know about giant beavers, though.

  I noted a stir not caused by the wind.

  Silent offered a sorcery alert.

  Two Dead said, “Something magical is about to happen.” He did not mean magical in a wondrous surprise for the kids kind of way.

  The moment disappointed. It expired without calamity.

  I took a knee, faked veterinary skills.

  The animal breathed slow and shallow and had a faint heartbeat. Hibernating? Some bears just drop in place when the sleepy season comes.

  It didn’t waken and shred me. Two Dead took that as license to revert to his old obnoxious self.

  * * *

  Silent and I hauled the beast on Buzz’s shield. Buzz was too damned big to help. The downhill end had to carry most of the weight. Plus, he was having trouble keeping his trousers clean.

  * * *

  The beast sprawled on a table in my clinic. Two Dead perched like a spider on a stool close by, manfully keeping his yap shut. The captain and Otto were present as well. Like Two Dead, they kept quiet while the professional me worked. Buzz was off haunting a latrine.

  “This is one ugly gob of snot,” the professional said. Stretched out it looked more like a baboon than a beaver. Its face was a fright mask of scarlet skin. It had teeth fit for a crocodile. Its eyes were snakelike. Each foot included semi-retractable claws and a stubby but opposable thumb.

  “It’s starting to smell like a vulture’s breath,” Otto observed.

  Its heart rate was rising, too. “The cold must have laid it down.” Our vile weather might not be all bad.

  The captain jiggered the flue on my heating stove.

  “Then these things shouldn’t be dangerous till the weather changes.” It would, local boy Corey had promised. We would see one more spring-like week before winter came to stay.

  Otto prodded, “Croaker?” There was work to do. Critical work. The Old Man was here his own self.

  Did they know something? Two Dead certainly wondered.

  The Old Man was all fired-up curious. “It’s supernatural, right? What kind? Where from? Was it summoned? Is it invasive? Somebody talk to me.” He was sure that Two Dead was to blame.

  Two Dead shook his head. “I promise, it’s new to me.”

  “Where are Goblin and One-Eye? Anybody know?”

  Otto said, “They ain’t been seen for days.”

  I reminded, “The colonel says there were more of these things. Better find the others while it’s cold.”

  Otto mused, “Warfare by elliptical means?”

  “When is the battlefield not a battlefield?”

  We had crushed the Rebel in the region, a success that troubled some “friends.” Vast incompetence and corruption had been turned up, which the guilty resented. Whisper’s own discomfort was why we had Two Dead as a guest.

  I had hoped the Rebel survivors would slink away to recruit, to train, to collect weapons and supplies, and to wait for us to be transferred. Informants said that quiet season would never come. Senior Rebels wanted Aloe back. The Port of Shadows might be hidden here.

  Aloens did not understand that echo out of deep time. Rebel insiders did. The honest ones got so scared they sometimes came over to us.

  * * *

  I read a lot. I root around in folklore, legend, and local history. Port of Shadows references a plot to resurrect the Dominator, lord of the old Domination. He is still a demigod to some. The Port of Shadows is a gateway he can use to escape his tomb.

  Some Rebel chieftains are closet Resurrectionists. The Lady has been plagued by them since she escaped her own grave, leaving him behind.

  The Old Man and his cronies are worried, but they do not confide in the Annalist. The Annalist writes things down.

  Might this monster be a Resurrectionist tool? Our enemies had not yet gone supernaturally asymmetric. Sneaking lethal paranormal uglies into an enemy camp was more like something we would do.

  The captain leaned in, tempting the beast. He asked Silent, “Have Croaker cut it up to look at its insides? Or cage it and wait?”

  Silent shrugged. He was out of his element.

  The captain asked Two Dead, “Suggestions, Colonel?” while looking for some subtle tell.

  The beast had been the sorcerer’s discovery.

  Two Dead remained unperturbed. He had come to us suspect. That would never change. “Let it live, but keep it cold. Find the others. Examine a healthy one.” He eyed Silent.

  Silent shrugged again, stubbornly frugal with his opinions.

  * * *

  I bent close, combed fur, hunting vermin. Fleas, ticks, lice, all tell tales. “This thing is getting warmer . . .” I reeled back, shoved by Silent. He pointed. Flakes of obsidian ash had puffed out of a nostril. “Hand me a sample bottle.” Then, “Make that a bunch.”

  A black beetle stomped into the light, as shiny as the flakes. It glared around, measuring the world for conquest.

  The Old Man asked, “That some kind of scarab?”

  A second bug marched out, bumped into the first. Number one was in a bad mood. Bam! No threat display. No ritual dance. The bugs started trying to murder one another with ridiculous bear-trap jaws.

  I whined, “Anybody got any idea what the hell?”

  Nope. Two Dead, though, did snag my biggest glass jar, which he shoved over the beast’s head. He packed the gaps with handy rags.

  Otto took off in a big hurry, leaving the door halfway open. Snow blew in before Silent shut it.

  Black flakes presaged the emergence of more beetles. These were not immediate bugacidal maniacs. They just wanted to leave. The jar frustrated their ambitions.

  Then they went be
rserk. “What a racket.” The captain was rattled, something you seldom saw.

  The host animal began to deflate. Two Dead stuffed more bandages. A few beetles, struck brilliant, snipped cloth chunks with those nasty jaws.

  “We need a container big enough for the whole thing,” Two Dead said. “Maybe a pickle barrel.”

  Bam! Otto came back lugging a big tin box with a latch-down top that hailed from the commissary, where it kept grain and flour free of vermin.

  “Perfect,” Two Dead declared, nonplussed. This was too-quick thinking by people he wanted to be too dull to notice him nudging them onto a hangman’s trap.

  Otto said, “Push it in, glass and all.” He positioned the tin so Two Dead could shove the beast in.

  Two Dead held his paws up like a dog begging. He should soil his delicate fingers?

  “Really?” the Old Man barked. “Push the damned thing!”

  A particularly formidable beetle chose that moment to make his getaway via the beast’s nether orifice. A Two Dead finger was nearby. It took a bite. Two Dead howled, “Oh, shit! Gods damn, that hurts!”

  An even studlier bug tromped forth as the beast flopped forward. It had even more ridiculous jaws and a back end like a long, thin funnel. It flew at Two Dead, literally, wing cases flung high, ladybug style. It landed on the back of the sorcerer’s left hand, grabbed hold, took a hearty bite. Then it stood on its nose, curled its tail down, drove its tip into the wound.

  All that took only an eye-blink to happen. Two Dead shrieked again.

  Silent crunched the bug.

  Otto pounded the lid onto the can. The monster left several wriggling grubs on the table. The Old Man chased escaped beetles. Silent and I wrestled Two Dead into a chair. He began to shake. Shock? The bites did not look that bad. Silent hand signed, “It laid eggs.”

  The sealed tin sang like a metal roof in a hailstorm.

  The Old Man killed one last fugitive bug, turned on the grubs. “Otto, take the can to the trash pit. Then get every swinging dick out looking for the other two animals. Hire tracking dogs.” He moved over to watch as I dug almost invisibly tiny cream-color beads out of Two Dead’s hand.

  Otto left with the singing biscuit tin. And busted back in half a minute later. “Look what I found sneaking around with a sack of stolen bread and bacon.” He had our apprentice sorcerer, the Third, by the scruff of the neck.

  The kid was not happy. Truth be, he had had few shots at happiness since he got tangled up with Goblin and One-Eye.

  The Old Man settled into a chair, leaned back, considered the Third. He put on his “I’m eager to hear how you’ll try to bullshit me on this” face.

  Silent passed me a jar of carbolic. I put bug eggs in, then dribbled liquid onto Two Dead’s wounds. He squealed.

  The Third volunteered, “One-Eye sent me to fetch food.”

  Really? That little shit is not big on bacon. On the other hand, the Third would devour it by the hog side.

  I worked on Two Dead. Silent watched grubs in a jar. They behaved no better than adults. The Old Man glared at the Third. The level of noise outside rose. Otto had relayed the captain’s orders.

  Buzz stumbled in looking like death warmed over. His sojourn in the latrine had not helped much.

  The Third said, “I was getting stuff for me. Otto spotted me before I started on One-Eye’s stuff.”

  I observed, “The kid has his priorities straight.”

  Two Dead managed a ghost smile. His shakes continued.

  The Old Man grumped, “Watch the colonel till you’re sure he’ll be all right. We don’t hand Whisper any fresh excuses. You.” He poked the Third. “You’re with me.”

  Buzz wanted to fuss over his boss. Two Dead growled, “You look like a man with the drizzling shits, Tesch. Smell like one, too.” He poked me with his unbitten hand. “I’ll live. Help him.”

  I thought Buzz must have drunk some bad water. He ought to know better. I loaded him with liquids and orders not to stray far from the latrine. He was unhappy about not being able to stick close to Two Dead.

  “Yet here you are alive and recuperating,” I observed after Two Dead suggested that the Company might have rigged all this. “You probably conjured those animals yourself and just accidentally got the bad end.”

  That was plain chin music, ridiculousness in exchange for absurdity, but Two Dead found something curious there. Like was he supposed to get it with the rest of us?

  I was tempted to pin a target on Whisper’s back. The more discord at HQ the less time those people would have to harass us out here.

  I reiterated the common remark: “When is the battlefield not a battlefield?”

  Two Dead eyed me. “An intriguing question, physician. Worth considering here, in these troubled times.” He cocked his head, listened. I caught a vague hint of distant wind chimes. That rattled me. It tied into my recurrent nightmare somehow. “I’m going to lie down and brood on it.” Two Dead indicated a cot.

  * * *

  I was snuggled into a cot and blankets myself. The captain poked me. “What’s wrong with him?” Head jerk toward Two Dead, on his back, on his cot. Drool glistened on his ugly cheek. Snot hung from the nostril on that side. Dead sexy.

  “What time is it?”

  “Nighttime. We got the other beasts. What about Chodroze?”

  “He was his old ugly self when I laid down.” I set my feet on the cold dirt floor, rose with a groan, toddled over. Our chatter had not awakened Two Dead.

  I felt the heat before I touched him.

  The Captain said, “The dogs found them, unconscious from the cold. The men tinned them up and threw them in the fire pit.”

  “We need to pack Two Dead with snow. He’s burning up.”

  “Whatever. Keep him healthy.”

  Two Dead had a weak, fast, irregular pulse and a dangerous fever. “I’ll need help cooling him down.” I started stripping him. That did not waken him. “What did the Third have to say?”

  The Old Man looked like he had bitten into a chunk of alum candy.

  Goblin and One-Eye were up to something. And he might not entirely disapprove.

  Dead fierce, he snagged a bucket and headed outside. The weather had turned enthusiastically blizzardy.

  He returned with a pail of muddy snow.

  I indicated Two Dead’s wounded arm. Scarlet threads ran up it from the uglier wound.

  “Blood poisoning?”

  “Some kind of poisoning. Blood poisoning isn’t usually so aggressive.”

  Skin flexed near Two Dead’s worst wound. I had not gotten every egg.

  “Help me get him on the table. I’ll clear the wound. You pack him with snow. Start with his head and throat. We need to cool his brain.”

  Move made. Snow packed and melting onto the floor to make mud. I dug with a scalpel. The Old Man hauled more snow.

  * * *

  “How about we just dump him in a snowdrift?”

  “I need light to work.” I had excised two thin grubs. They writhed in an alcohol bath. I was after what I hoped was the last.

  “Those bitty things caused the blood poisoning?”

  “Their shit is probably toxic.”

  “Ugly.”

  “Life is.” In some forms, ugly for lots of us.

  I fit puzzle pieces while I worked, hoping I was fooling myself, but afraid I was looking chaos in the crimson, googly eye.

  “How come the tourniquet?”

  “Keeping the poison contained. To avoid amputation if I can.”

  “That wouldn’t be good.”

  No. “I should ask what he wants, worst case, but he won’t wake up.”

  “We need more hands. Maybe Silent can get to him.”

  “I can’t go. Where the hell is Buzz?”

  “Buzz is in his rack, down and out and soaked in shit. He’d be dead if you hadn’t given him that tea. Poor Corey is babysitting. I’ll get another bucket, then head out on a recruiting tour.”

  So. Old Buzz came
down with the drizzling shits right when his principal started dying from an infestation of supernatural parasites. That wanted a closer look. The timeline might tell us when Buzz picked up what was trying to kill him. Also, maybe who was there when it happened.

  I winkled the last worm out. The Old Man brought more snow. I mused, “When is the battlefield not a battlefield?”

  The captain eyed me oddly, shrugged, took off with his trained-bear shuffle.

  The day’s puzzle might have an explanation hidden inside the recurring question. That might put me eyeball to eyeball with a repellant cousin question that could have multiple readings as well. “When is my enemy not an enemy?”

  * * *

  Otto and his pal Hagop turned up. The captain had caught them trying to sneak off to town to help Markeg Zhorab get a little bit richer. They hauled snow.

  We did not see the captain again right away. He went and stole a short nap. When he did turn up he had the Third in tow, all decorated with light shackles. “He’s all we got. Silent is missing now, too.”

  The Third shook his wild shock of curls, lost in the insanities.

  Answers had to wait. Two Dead was not improving. Snow packs were not enough. I told the Third, “I need the colonel awake. We need to talk. Amputation may be his only salvation. I can’t decide that for him.”

  “Why bother? We could get shot of him.”

  “I save whoever I can.” Not that I have not made exceptions. Not that Two Dead was insufficiently despicable to make the “he needs killing” list. “And he’s Whisper’s pet.”

  “Don’t smell like that special a relationship to me.” The Third eyed Two Dead. “It’ll be tough. Feels like Silent put him in a coma for the pain.”

  “You can’t bring him out?”

  “Didn’t say that. Said it’s gonna be tough. Get ready for some serious screaming. His arm is gonna feel like it’s on fire.”

  “Hang on then.” I slathered Two Dead’s forearm with topical painkiller. “All right. Go.”

  * * *

  Two Dead surprised us. He did not let the pain unhinge him. He was creepy normal, disinclined to shed any limbs unnecessarily.

  He was short four already, you asked me.

  “I won’t do it casually,” I promised.

  He was caught in a cleft stick. I had no reason to wish him well, but he did realize that I would not just maim him when death by inattention would be so much easier.