The Wanderers

by Paula Brandon

  “Spare me the beating and the head in the bucket,” Jianna suggested, “and I can offer valuable, useful knowledge.”

  “Heh.” Odilline grunted. “That’s a new one. What kind of ‘valuable, useful knowledge’? Like where a treasure’s buried, say?”

  “Well, I was thinking, maybe I could teach you how to read and write. Probably you’ve never had the chance to learn. I could teach you the letters, how to put them together, how to set down your own name on paper—”

  “Now, what would I be wanting with such trash? I’ve done well enough without. And when I want to make my mark, I can do it with an X on paper, or with a bruise on other folks’ skin.”

  “Numbers, then. You could learn to count, and do sums. This is something that often comes in handy, particularly when you need to keep track of—”

  “Numbers. Pah, what a sorry sack of cinders. You’re boring me.”

  The creature wanted diversion. Jianna’s mind raced.

  “Entertainment?” she essayed.

  “Getting better. You know how to juggle?”

  “No.”

  “Eat fire? Tumble and fly? Leaps, backflips, splits, rolls, and bouncies?”

  “No, but—”

  “Prance and cavort? Or maybe make funny mouths? No? What about jigs and high-stepping?”

  “Yes.” Jianna spied a glimmer of hope. “I know how to dance, I’m quite good at it. I can show you the classical three-pace, the Valorous March, the glide, the double-spin, the graduated dip, all the basic steps.”

  “Never heard of ’em. Can you do Stomp-the-Snake? Or the Greasy Grind?”

  “No, but—”

  “Stow it, you can’t dance. Anything else? Jokes? Comic songs? Impersonations? Can you do Drunken Governor Gorza? No? What can you do, then?”

  A scene from the recent past flashed across Jianna’s mind. Another cell in this same building. A leather-bound volume, the rise and fall of voices reading aloud. “I can recite,” she offered. “Poems or stories.”

  “Fairy tales, you mean?”

  “Not exactly, although there are marvelous creatures and fantastic happenings. There’s one—it’s very long, it would take days to get through it—about a handsome, brave young prince, whose hotheaded father wrongly banishes him. He ventures forth into the world, acquires a group of eccentric but loyal companions, one of them a great arcanist, and embarks upon a magical quest filled with all manner of adventure. He has to prove his courage by beating an entire army of a foreign king’s terrible Iron Men. Then he’s almost done in by a beautiful, wicked forest sprite living in a tree house made of human bones. And there’s lots more.”

  “Sounds like a great heap of rat shit,” Fraxi opined.

  Verth spat expressively.

  “Poor stuff, most like, but better than nothing, in a hole like this,” Odilline decreed. “I’ll hear the tale. Start talking, Burlap.”

  “Let me up.”

  Odilline nodded, and they released her. Jianna sat up, brushing away straw and insects. The three female bullies were regarding her expectantly. She took a moment to order her thoughts, and commenced.

  I sing of ages past, of ancient days,

  of valor, and of legendary deeds.

  I sing the golden years that offered men

  the hope of winning honor with their swords,

  and wresting glory from the grip of Death.

  She had hardly believed that the opening lines of the Journey of the Zoviriae would not be known to all, but the faces of Odilline and her henchwomen remained blank; so blank, in fact, that she questioned their comprehension. More to the point, she questioned her own knowledge of the poem. Long ago she had memorized long stretches of verse, suitable to postprandial recital, and she remembered them still. But she had never learned the entire gigantic text. No matter. She knew the story, the characters, and incidents. She could fill in the gaps with prose, and improvise where necessary.

  I sing of deeds whose luster never fades,

  And deeds of darkness deeper than the pit

  Wherein the souls of evildoers bide

  In everlasting grief and endless woe—

  “Sounds like this place,” Odilline interjected.

  I sing of perils met and overcome,

  Of suffering and great adversity,

  Of tyranny opposed and overthrown,

  Of Justice brought again unto a land

  Long crushed, long broken, long deprived of hope.

  I sing of brotherhood—

  “Why do you keep saying that you’re singing?” Odilline demanded. “I haven’t heard the snippet of a tune yet.”

  “It’s a poetic convention. Minstrels and bards used to sing these things.”

  “Minstrels and who?”

  “Bards. Poets. People who carried these old tales far and wide. Now, I’m just getting into the story. Wouldn’t you like to hear?” Without awaiting reply, Jianna resumed. Judging her audience’s attention span short, she skipped the remaining introductory verses and hastened on into the plot.

  King Brovius sat in his lofty hall,

  A goodly space, with posts of carven wood,

  Agleam with gold and brightly colored gems.

  The walls were hung with shields, spears, swords, and pikes,

  The trophies of five hundred victories—

  “Never mind about the hall, we don’t care,” Odilline interrupted. “What’s the king look like?”

  “Snow-white hair, worn long. High, frowning brow—”

  “Old codger, eh?” Odilline lost interest.

  “Don’t forget, he has a son, beautiful as a young stag, with golden hair that snares the sunlight slanting down through the trees of the forest.”

  “That’s more like it. Let’s hear about the son.”

  “Very well.” Suppressing a sigh, Jianna skipped some half hour’s worth of descriptive material, and proceeded directly to King Brovius’s anger with his blameless son Vazian. She knew this particular section of the Zoviriae quite well, and recited smoothly, rarely at a loss for a line or word. Keenly aware of the need to keep her audience entertained, she threw all the dramatic expression she possessed into her voice, face, and gestures. And her listeners were caught; she could see it in their stillness, parted lips, and rapt expressions. Several roommates in the immediate vicinity had abandoned all pretense of slumber and lay listening, their eyes wide open.

  Jianna came to the end of a canto, and halted at a point of high suspense in the story.

  “That’s all for tonight,” she announced. “Time to sleep.”

  “More,” Odilline commanded.

  “Tomorrow night. Remember, we’ll be out sifting at dawn.”

  “I suppose. Tomorrow night, we start earlier.” Odilline scowled. “I’ll swear that King Brovius is a thick-skulled old fart. He don’t know his backside from a barrel.”

  “I’d like to thump ’im,” Verth declared.

  “And I’d like Vazian to thump me.” Fraxi grinned lasciviously.

  “Vazian wouldn’t look twice at you, gutter rat,” Odilline returned. “He’s got better taste than that. Come on, girls. That’s it for tonight.”

  The three of them retreated, leaving Jianna free to return to her interrupted slumbers. She drifted off to sleep very quickly, secure in the knowledge that she would not be attacked or troubled again for the rest of the night.

  Dawn came too soon. A guard was there, yelling them all awake, and then there was the distribution of inadequate breakfast, and then the queue formation for the march to the sifting yard.

  Jianna went through it all almost mechanically. Her body waited in line. Her mind ranged the corridors of the Witch, quickly finding its way to 16 East Gallery. She knew the route to that cell, she knew its appearance and contents, but she did not know what its tenant was doing now. Had some guard come to wake Falaste and send him off to an allotment of labor similar to her own? Possible, but unlikely. There had been too many signs of favor and privilege present in h
is cage. Somehow she could not believe that Falaste Rione spent his days sifting, or digging, or boiling linen clean. They valued him too highly for that.

  Out of the dormitory and along the corridor the prisoners marched in double file, monitored by their guard. Jianna was scarcely conscious of her surroundings. Her intellect was off in 16 East Gallery, meticulously reconstructing every detail of her last meeting with Falaste; every word that had passed between them, every inflection of his voice, every fleeting expression upon his face. From this, it was natural to proceed to the details of the failed escape attempt, and there her mind churned miserably, recalling the disaster, and wondering whether some different decision or action somewhere along the way might not have changed the outcome. If only she had been more vigilant in the forecourt—if only she had noticed Onartino’s presence—they might have made a run for it, they might have made it through the gate … She could drive herself mad with such thoughts.

  A sudden tumult, a swirl of sound and motion pulled her back to the present. Along the corridor came a group of six men, one of them undead.

  Jianna’s breath caught. There could be no doubt. The milky upturned eyes, the greenish grey cast of complexion, and patch of mold branding one cheek all marked the individual at the forefront as a Wanderer. Here. Inside the prison. The plague had worked its way into the close confines of the Witch, and the implications were appalling.

  Behind the Wanderer lagged three reluctant wretches, their ankles loosely fettered. The prisoners bore long wooden poles, with which they strove to direct the movement of the undead. They were prodding, pushing, and rapping at the lifeless limbs, but without enthusiasm, and to little effect. Clearly they dreaded the Wanderer, and sought by every means to avoid contact. This aim was thwarted by a couple of guards, who stood behind the prisoners, plying whips.

  The Wanderer lurched straight on toward the double column of women, who screamed and scattered at his approach. For some moments, the corridor was wild with shrieks and desperately random movement. The three unwilling shepherds took the opportunity to drop their poles and retreat;

  nor could the most vigorous action of the lash hold them in place.

  On came the Wanderer, now so close that Jianna could see the odd crystalline deposits rimming the dead eyes, the purple-black hue edging the long fingernails. Terrified of contagion, she backed away, but there was nowhere to go. She was hemmed in on all sides, and the ghastly thing was coming straight toward her.

  Her heel hit something, and she looked down to discover one of the discarded poles lying at her feet. She stooped, grabbed, straightened, applied the end of the pole to the Wanderer’s midsection, and thrust with all her strength. He staggered back a few paces, tottered, hesitated, and resumed his interrupted advance. Again, she rammed the wood into his belly and shoved hard. He fell back a step, paused as if in surprise, then seized the end of the pole, wrested it from her grasp, and exerted sudden force of his own, driving her backward.

  Her spine struck the wall. The pressure of the pole in undead hands pinned her there like an insect in a collector’s box. In vain she fought and fluttered. Crushed between wood and stone, her viscera would surely rupture, if they had not done so already. Her eyes squeezed shut in agony, and red glare flashed behind the lids.

  The pressure vanished abruptly as the Wanderer let fall the weapon, freeing her. She dropped to her knees, mouth wide open and gulping air, arms wrapped around her mistreated middle. Her eyes opened again in time to witness a second staff ramming the Wanderer’s chest. The staff was wielded by a tall, gaunt figure crowned with an orange sunburst.

  For a few seconds the Wanderer gave way before Odilline’s onslaught, retreating several paces. Then, repeating the tactics that had bested Jianna, he seized the staff and thrust. Like Jianna, Odilline was driven backward and pinned against the wall.

  Forgetting her aches, Jianna grabbed the pole that lay on the floor beside her, rose to her feet, and charged, wooden weapon couched like a lance. The blunt end took the Wanderer in the side, and he staggered. Instantly Odilline reclaimed her staff and smashed it into the undead’s throat, sending him lurching several steps back along the hallway. Halting, he stood as if bemused, weight shifting restlessly from one leg to the other.

  “Get away from here!” Jianna plied her pole fiercely, and the undead retreated a little.

  “You heard ’er, Maggotface!” Odilline’s staff plunged, and the Wanderer reversed course, plodding back the way he had come. “And don’t come back again!”

  “Here, you two, don’t just stand there,” one of the guards directed. Encountering incomprehension, he elaborated, “Keep it up, move him right along! Pole ’im, pole ’im! To it, girls!” A snap of his whip underscored the command.

  Jianna and Odilline traded startled glances.

  “If you please, sir, move him where?” Odilline inquired respectfully, her eyes fastened on the whip.

  “That way, that way! There’s a niche waiting!”

  A niche? No time for questions. And certainly no time to complain that it ought to be strong male prisoners, rather than a pair of women, assigned to herd the errant Wanderer. The guards appeared willing to abandon gender bias, as expedient.

  Working their poles with fervor, Jianna and Odilline drove the Wanderer along the hallway. Such was the industry of the two women that the guards following close behind them withheld the lash. At an intersection of corridors, they were instructed to turn the Wanderer left, and soon they came to a small alcove or niche in the wall, recently equipped with a makeshift gate of wooden slats now standing wide open. A civilian workman or turnkey waited beside the door.

  “Put ’im in, girls!” one of the guards exclaimed, with the enthusiasm of a hunter present at the kill.

  Guided by the jabs and blows of two wooden poles plied with swiftly increasing skill, the Wanderer advanced toward the niche at a good pace. He balked slightly at the entrance, but two neatly synchronized thrusts pushed him through. The workman slammed the gate and shot the bolt.

  “Got ’im! Good job!” The exultation of the guards echoed.

  Immediate danger averted, Jianna now took note of the pile of bricks, bucket of mortar, and trowel set out beside the gate. Taking up the trowel, the workman set about his business of walling up the niche. Behind the locked gate, the Wanderer trudged in slow, aimless little circles.

  “How many have they mewed up like this?” she wondered aloud. “And what happens when they run out of niches?”

  “The likes of us will be digging out new ones with our bare hands,” opined Odilline.

  Jianna turned to encounter an expression of unwonted approval.

  “Not bad, Burlap.” Odilline nodded. “Not half bad.”

  She actually sounded amiable.

  “Here you go.” A guard distributed one square of flatbread apiece to Jianna and Odilline, in the manner of a master rewarding a brace of hardworking sheepdogs. “You’ve earned it. Now out to the yard, and no more chatter. Move it.”

  The guards led them back the way they had come, and together they stepped out into the courtyard, where their fellow inmates already sat sifting. Every eye in the yard fastened on the two of them, but nobody ventured to voice a question; talking was not permitted prior to the break.

  Jianna took up sifter and sack, retired to her place in the corner, and went to work. She dusted no sparklers, committed no infractions, and was approached by nobody.

  Midday arrived, bringing its brief respite from labor. At once Odilline stationed herself beside the well and began to hold forth, while her admirers, subordinates, and victims clustered close to hear her. She described the encounter with the Wanderer at length, presenting herself in the most vivid of terms as the heroine whose courage and quick thinking had saved everyone in sight from infection and swift onset of the plague. According to Odilline, she had seized a pole dropped by one of the quavering male chickenhearts, and with it she had driven the Wanderer into a dead-end passageway, forced him into a
closet, locked him in, then issued instructions to the nearest turnkey to have the closet door bricked up. He had wisely obeyed her. The speaker went so far as to concede that the new girl, Burlap, had tagged along, even made herself useful once or twice, and generally proved herself quite the little scrapper.

  Jianna knew better than to offer any alternative version. Her reward came that evening, following a long recitation of the Zoviriae. She had come to the close of a passage describing Prince Vazian’s historic first encounter with the arcanist Soliastrus, and there paused for breath.

  “More,” Odilline commanded predictably.

  “Not tonight. My throat’s growing sore.”

  “You’ll survive. Keep talking.”

  “If I strain my throat and lose my voice, I might not be able to talk at all for days to come.”

  “A good clout to the pate might take your mind off your gullet.”

  “Perhaps, but it might also drive the words of the poem clean out of my head.”

  “Hmf.” A sardonic grunt escaped Odilline. “Well, we wouldn’t want to have to take a bone-blade to your brain and dig around in search of those words, so I guess we’ll say we’re done for now.”

  Jianna waited, but Odilline did not go away. Evidently her mood was sociable.

  “So then, Burlap—what are you in for? Me, this time, it’s for beating up my landlord. Verth, drunk and disorderly again. Fraxi, hawking fake Troxius medals.” Odilline considered. “With you, I’ll wager it was sticky-fingering.”