The Spine of the World

by Philip Athans

  “It’s not so bad,” Meralda replied, adding, “being a peasant, I mean.” Liam laughed heartily. “Gets you out of the castle at night.”

  “And gets you back in, whenever you’re wanting,” Liam replied. “Steward Temigast says I’m at your disposal, Miss Meralda. I’m to take you and your family, if you so please, wherever you’re wanting to go.”

  Meralda smiled widely and nodded her thanks. She noticed then that her grim-faced father had opened the door and was standing just within the house.

  “Da!” Meralda called. “Might you help my friend …” The woman paused and looked to the driver. “Why, I’m not even knowing your proper name,” she remarked.

  “Most noble ladies don’t take the time to ask,” he replied, and both he and Meralda laughed again. “Besides, we all look alike to you big folks.” He winked mischievously, then bowed low. “Liam Woodgate, at your service.”

  Dohni Ganderlay walked over. “A short stay at the castle this night,” he remarked suspiciously.

  “Lord Feringal got busy with a merchant,” Meralda replied. “I’m to return on the morrow. Liam here’s having a bit of trouble with a horseshoe. Might you help him?”

  Dohni looked past the driver to the team and nodded. “’Course,” he answered. “Get yourself inside, girl,” he instructed Meralda. “Your ma’s taken ill again.”

  Meralda bolted for the house. She found her mother in bed, hot with fever again, her eyes sunken deep into her face. Tori was kneeling beside the bed, a mug of water in one hand, a wet towel in the other.

  “She got the weeps soon after you left,” Tori explained, a nasty affliction that had been plaguing Biaste off and on for several months.

  Looking at her mother, Meralda wanted to fall down and cry. How frail the woman appeared, how unpredictable her health. It was as if Biaste Ganderlay had been walking a fine line on the edge of her own grave day after day. Good spirits alone had sustained the woman these last days, since Lord Feringal had come calling, Meralda knew. Desperately, the young woman grasped at the only medication she had available.

  “Oh, Ma,” she said, feigning exasperation. “Aren’t you picking a fine time to fall ill again?”

  “Meralda,” Biaste Ganderlay breathed, and even that seemed a labor to her.

  “We’ll just have to get you better and be quick about it,” Meralda said sternly.

  “Meralda!” Tori complained.

  “I told you about Lady Priscilla’s garden,” Meralda went on, ignoring her sister’s protest. “Get better, and be quick, because tomorrow you’re to join me at the castle. We’ll walk the garden together.”

  “And me?” Tori pleaded. Meralda turned to regard her and noticed that she had another audience member. Dohni Ganderlay stood at the door, leaning on the jamb, a surprised expression on his strong but weary face.

  “Yeah, Tori, you can join us,” Meralda said, trying hard to ignore her father, “but you must promise that you’ll behave.”

  “Oh, Ma, please get better quickly!” Tori implored Biaste, clutching the woman’s hand firmly. It did seem as if the sickly woman showed a little bit more life at that moment.

  “Go, Tori,” Meralda instructed. “Run to the coach driver—Liam’s his name—and tell him that we three’ll be needing a ride to the castle at midday tomorrow. We can’t have Ma walking all the way.”

  Tori ran off as instructed, and Meralda bent low over her mother. “Get well,” she whispered, kissing the woman on the forehead. Biaste smiled and nodded her intent to try.

  Meralda walked out of the room under the scrutinizing gaze of Dohni Ganderlay. She heard the man pull the curtain closed to her parents’ room, then follow her to the middle of the common room.

  “Will he let you bring them both?” Dohni asked, softly so that Biaste would not hear.

  She shrugged. “I’m to be his wife, and that’s his idea. He’d be a fool to not grant me this one favor.”

  Dohni Ganderlay’s face melted into a grateful smile as he fell into his daughter, hugging her closely. Though she couldn’t see his face, Meralda knew that he was crying.

  She returned that hug tenfold, burying her face in her father’s strong shoulder, a not so subtle reminder to her that, though she was being the brave soldier for the good of her family, she was still, in many ways, a scared little girl.

  How warm it felt to her, a reassurance that she was doing the right thing, when her father kissed her on top of her head.

  Up on the hill a short distance away, Jaka Sculi watched Dohni Ganderlay help the coachman fix the horseshoe, the two of them talking and chuckling as if they were old friends. Considering the treatment Dohni Ganderlay had given him the previous night, the sight nearly leveled poor, jealous Jaka. Didn’t Dohni understand that Lord Feringal wanted the same things for which Dohni had chastised him? Couldn’t the man see that Jaka’s intentions were better than Lord Feringal’s, that he was more akin to Meralda’s class and background and would therefore be a better choice for her?

  Dohni went back into the house then, and Meralda’s sister soon emerged, jumping for joy as she rushed over to speak with the coachman.

  “Have I no allies?” Jaka asked quietly, chewing on his bottom lip petulantly. “Are they all against me, blinded by the unearned wealth and prestige of Feringal Auck? Damn you, Meralda! How could you betray me so?” he cried, heedless if his wail carried down to Tori and the driver.

  He couldn’t look at them anymore. Jaka clenched his fists and smacked them hard against his eyes, falling on his back to the hard ground. “What justice is this life?” he cried. “O fie, to have been born a pauper, I, when the mantle of a king would better suit! What justice allows that fool Feringal to claim the prize? What universal order so decrees that the purse is stronger than the loins? O fie this life! And damn Meralda!”

  Long after Liam Woodgate had repaired the shoe, shared a drink with Dohni Ganderlay, and departed; long after Meralda’s mother had fallen into a comfortable sleep at last; long after Meralda had confided to Tori all that had happened with Jaka, Feringal, Priscilla and Temigast; and long after the storm Temigast had predicted arrived with all its fury, pelting the prone Jaka with drenching rain and buffeting him with cold ocean winds; he lay there, muttering curses and mewling like a trapped cat.

  He still lay upon the hill when the clouds were swept away, making room for a brilliant sunrise, when the workers made their way to the fields. One worker, the only dwarf among the group, moved over to the young man and nudged him with the toe of one boot.

  “You dead or dead drunk?” the gnarly creature asked.

  Jaka rolled away from him, stifling the groan that came from the stiffness in his every muscle and joint. Too wounded in pride to respond, too angry to face anyone, the young man scrambled up to his feet and ran off.

  “Strange bird, that one,” the dwarf remarked, and those around him nodded.

  Much later that morning, when his clothes had dried and with the chill of the night’s wind and rain still deep under his skin, Jaka returned to the fields for his workday, suffering the berating of the field boss and the teasing of the other workers. He fought hard to tend to his work properly but it was a struggle, for his thoughts remained jumbled, his spirit sagged, and his skin felt clammy under the relentless sun.

  It only got worse for him when he saw Lord Feringal’s coach roll by on the road below, first heading toward Meralda’s house, then back again, loaded with more than one passenger.

  They were all against him.

  Meralda enjoyed that day at Castle Auck more than any of her previous visits, though Lord Feringal did little to hide his disappointment that he would not have Meralda to himself. Priscilla boiled at the thought of three peasants in her wondrous garden.

  Still, Feringal got over it soon enough, and Priscilla, with some coughing reminders from Steward Temigast, remained outwardly polite. All that mattered to Meralda was to see her mother smiling and holding her frail face up to the sunlight, basking in the
warmth and the sweet scents. The scene only strengthened Meralda’s resolve and gave her hope for the future.

  They didn’t remain at the castle for long, just an hour in the garden, a light lunch, then another short stroll around the flowers. At Meralda’s bidding, an apology of sorts to Lord Feringal for the unexpected additions, the young lord rode in the coach back to the Ganderlay house, leaving a sour Priscilla and Temigast at the castle door.

  “Peasants,” Priscilla muttered. “I should batter that brother of mine about the head for bringing such folk to Castle Auck.”

  Temigast chuckled at the woman’s predictability. “They are uncultured, indeed,” the steward admitted. “Not unpleasant, though.”

  “Mud-eaters,” said Priscilla.

  “Perhaps you view this situation from an errant perspective,” Temigast said, turning a wry smile on the woman.

  “There is but one way to view peasants,” Priscilla retorted. “One must look down upon them.”

  “But the Ganderlays are to be peasants no more,” Temigast couldn’t resist reminding her.

  Priscilla scoffed doubtfully.

  “Perhaps you should view this as a challenge,” suggested Temigast. He paused until Priscilla turned a curious eye upon him. “Like coaxing a delicate flower from a bulb.”

  “Ganderlays? Delicate?” Priscilla remarked incredulously.

  “Perhaps they could be with the help of Lady Priscilla Auck,” said Temigast. “What a grand accomplishment it would be for Priscilla to enlighten them so, a feat that would make her brother brag to every merchant who passed through, an amazing accomplishment that would no doubt reach the ears of Luskan society. A plume in Priscilla’s bonnet.”

  Priscilla snorted again, her expression unconvinced, but she said no more, not even her usual muttered insults. As she walked away, her expression changed to one of thoughtful curiosity, in the midst of some planning, perhaps.

  Temigast recognized that she had taken his bait, or nibbled it, at least. The old steward shook his head. It never ceased to amaze him how most nobles considered themselves so much better than the people they ruled, even though that rule was always no more than an accident of birth.

  t was an hour of beatings and taunting, of eager peasants throwing rotten food and spitting in their faces.

  It was an hour that Wulfgar didn’t even register. The man was so far removed from the spectacle of Prisoner’s Carnival, so well hidden within a private emotional place, a place created through the mental discipline that had allowed him to survive the torments of Errtu, that he didn’t even see the twisted, perverted faces of the peasants or hear the magistrate’s assistant stirring up the mob for the real show when Jharkheld joined them on the huge stage. The barbarian was bound, as were the other three, with his hands behind his back and secured to a strong wooden post. Weights were chained around his ankles and another one around his neck, heavy enough to bow the head of powerful Wulfgar.

  He had recognized the crowd with crystalline clarity. The drooling peasants, screaming for blood and torture, the excited, almost elated, ogre guards working the crowd, and the unfortunate prisoners. He’d seen them for what they were, and his mind had transformed them into something else, something demonic, the twisted, leering faces of Errtu’s minions, slobbering over him with their acidic drool, nipping at him with their sharpened fangs and horrid breath. He smelled the fog of Errtu’s home again, the sulfuric Abyss burning his nostrils and his throat, adding an extra sting to all of his many, many wounds. He felt the itching of the centipedes and spiders crawling over and inside his skin. Always on the edge of death. Always wishing for it.

  As those torments had continued, day after tenday after month, Wulfgar had found his escape in a tiny corner of his consciousness. Locked inside, he was oblivious to his surroundings. Here at the carnival he went to that place.

  One by one the prisoners were taken from the posts and paraded around, sometimes close enough to be abused by the peasants, other times led to instruments of torture. Those included cross ties for whipping; a block and tackle designed to hoist victims into the air by a pole lashed under their arms locked behind their back; and ankle stocks to hang prisoners upside down in buckets of filthy water, or, in the case of unfortunate Creeps Sharky, a bucket of urine. Creeps cried through most of it, while Tee-a-nicknick and Wulfgar stoically accepted whatever punishment the magistrate’s assistant could dish out without a sound other than the occasional, unavoidable gasp of air being blasted from their lungs. Morik took it all in stride, protesting his innocence and throwing witty comments around, which only got him beaten all the worse.

  Magistrate Jharkheld appeared, entering to howls and cheers, wearing a thick black robe and cap, and carrying a silver scroll tube. He moved to the center of the stage, standing between the prisoners to eye them deliberately one by one.

  Jharkheld stepped out front. With a dramatic flourish he presented the scroll tube, the damning documents, bringing eager shouts and cheers. Each movement distinct, with an appropriate response mounting to a crescendo, Jharkheld popped the cap from the tube’s end and removed the documents. Unrolling them, the magistrate showed the documents to the crowd one at a time, reading each prisoner’s name.

  The magistrate surely seemed akin to Errtu, the carnival barker, ordering the torments. Even his voice sounded to the barbarian like that of the balor: grating, guttural, inhuman.

  “I shall tell to you a tale,” Jharkheld began, “of treachery and deceit, of friendship abused and murder attempted for profit. That man!” he said powerfully, pointing to Creeps Sharky, “that man told it to me in full, and the sheer horror of it has stolen my sleep every night since.” The magistrate went on to detail the crime as Sharky had presented it. All of it had been Morik’s idea, according to the wretch. Morik and Wulfgar had lured Deudermont into the open so that Tee-a-nicknick could sting him with a poisoned dart. Morik was supposed to sting the honorable captain, too, using a different variety of poison to ensure that the priests could not save the man, but the city guard had arrived too quickly for that second assault. Throughout the planning, Creeps Sharky had tried to talk them out of it, but he’d said nothing to anyone else out of fear of Wulfgar. The big man had threatened to tear his head from his shoulders and kick it down every street in Luskan.

  Enough of those gathered in the crowd had fallen victim to Wulfgar’s enforcer tactics at the Cutlass to find that last part credible.

  “You four are charged with conspiracy and intent to heinously murder goodman Captain Deudermont, a visitor in excellent standing to our fair city,” Jharkheld said when he completed the story and let the howls and jeers from the crowd die away. “You four are charged with the infliction of serious harm to the same. In the interest of justice and fairness, we will hear your answers to these charges.”

  He walked over to Creeps Sharky. “Did I relate the tale as you told it to me?” he asked.

  “You did sir, you did,” Creeps Sharky eagerly replied. “They done it, all of it!”

  Many in the crowd yelled out their doubts about that, while others merely laughed at the man, so pitiful did he sound.

  “Mister Sharky,” Jharkheld went on, “do you admit your guilt to the first charge?”

  “Innocent!” Sharky protested, sounding confident that his cooperation had allowed him to escape the worst of the carnival, but the jeers of the crowd all but drowned out his voice.

  “Do you admit your guilt to the second charge against you?”

  “Innocent!” the man said defiantly, and he gave a gap-toothed smile to the magistrate.

  “Guilty!” cried an old woman. “Guilty he is, and deserving to die horrible for trying to blame the others!”

  A hundred cries arose agreeing with the woman, but Creeps Sharky held fast his smile and apparent confidence. Jharkheld walked out to the front of the platform and patted his hands in the air, trying to calm the crowd. When at last they quieted he said, “The tale of Creeps Sharky has allowed us to convict the
others. Thus, we have promised leniency to the man for his cooperation.” That brought a rumble of boos and derisive whistles. “For his honesty and for the fact that he, by his own words—undisputed by the others—was not directly involved.”

  “I’ll dispute it!” Morik cried, and the crowd howled. Jharkheld merely motioned to one of the guards, and Morik got the butt of a club slammed into his belly.

  More boos erupted throughout the crowd, but Jharkheld denied the calls and a smile widened on the face of clever Creeps Sharky.

  “We promised him leniency,” Jharkheld said, throwing up his hands as if there was nothing he could do about it. “Thus, we shall kill him quickly.”

  That stole the smile from the face of Creeps Sharky and turned the chorus of boos into roars of agreement.

  Sputtering protests, his legs failing him, Creeps Sharky was dragged to a block and forced to kneel before it.

  “Innocent I am!” he cried, but his protest ended abruptly as one of the guards forced him over the block, slamming his face against the wood. A huge executioner holding a monstrous axe stepped up to the block.

  “The blow won’t fall clean if you struggle,” a guard advised him.

  Creeps Sharky lifted his head. “But ye promised me !”

  The guards slammed him back down on the block. “Quit yer wiggling!” one of them ordered. The terrified Creeps jerked free and fell to the platform, rolling desperately. There was pandemonium as the guards grabbed at him. He kicked wildly, the crowd howled and laughed, and cries of “Hang him!” “Keel haul!” and other horrible suggestions for execution echoed from every corner of the square.

  “Lovely gathering,” Captain Deudermont said sarcastically to Robillard. They stood with several other members of Sea Sprite among the leaping and shouting folk.

  “Justice,” the wizard stated firmly.

  “I wonder,” the captain said pensively. “Is it justice, or entertainment? There is a fine line, my friend, and considering this almost daily spectacle, it’s one I believe the authorities in Luskan long ago crossed.”