by Andy Remic
“Yeah, you back-stabbing cunt,” snapped Narnok. “We fucking fought for you, we saved the wall at Desekra against the mud-orcs, against that bitch-queen Orlana; we offer up our lives on a plate and you fucking try and hang us! Some king you turned out to be.”
“It was… necessary,” said Yoon, stiffly. “I had greater plans with Orlana, and you got in the way. The point is, my friendly little Narnok One-Eye and his band of incredibly stupid mercenary cunts, the point is that the elf rat over there who you have so happily rescued from my secret prison, is helping to plan an invasion of Vagandrak; I was in discussions with Orlana. She did not want to conquer Vagandrak. She simply wanted passage to the Plague Lands and our little fortress stood in the way. I was in negotiations to open the gates and provide passage, and you came stumbling along and ruined everything! Now, you have committed the most vile treason and, get this Iron fucking Wolves, put the country in far more peril than it was already.”
“That is so much horse shit,” said Kiki, finally. “Orlana’s mud-orcs were slaughtering our people. Your men. Your soldiers. There were no talks to begin with. No groups of politicians sat around in war council trying to prevent war. Orlana the Horse Lady came and attacked the fortress. It was that simple. Now you’re trying to twist it because some other game was being played.”
Yoon looked sly for just a moment. It was a glint in his dark eyes that hinted at, despite his veritable insanity, a cunning that ran deeper than any twisted politician.
“The elf rats plan to attack,” he said, gently. He pointed at Sameska, who looked suddenly vulnerable and terribly, terribly frightened. “That bastard is an elf rat spy for Daranganoth, the Elf Rat Ring. This will be the war, Iron Wolves. This will be the battle to end all battles. They will pour like a plague from their lands in the far northeast, Zalazar, beyond the White Lion Mountains. And when they come, it will be a flood. When they come, none shall stand in their path.”
“And you know this?” said Kiki.
“Tortured it out of that little quivering bastard,” said Yoon, gesturing to Sameska.
Suddenly the elf rat, snarling and spitting, scrambled across the logs and leapt at Yoon, claws raking for the King’s eyes. Narnok interposed himself, serious and big and holding his double-headed axe like he meant business. Dek and Kiki grabbed at Sameska, then swayed back as blackthorn claws like razors slashed towards their throats.
“You liar!” snarled Sameska, filled with a fury so huge he was shaking like an earthquake. “LIAR! You people, you humans, you drove our race from Vagandrak thousands of years ago, and then deleted us from your history books, erased us, so it appeared we had not even existed! Your ancestors hunted us, killed us, hundreds of thousands of elves were slaughtered and the poor remains driven into the White Lion Mountains to die in the ice and snow. But we found our way through treacherous passes, many thousands more dying of cold or tumbling down into the bottomless valleys filled with ice and blood.” Now, Sameska backed away from Yoon and Narnok. Kiki had her sword out, Dek his hands splayed wide as if trying to pacify a hot-headed fist fight. Sameska looked around, and no longer was he a weak and tortured individual; now, suddenly, in the blink of an eye, he appeared incredibly powerful, containing the strength of root and heartwood, sap flowing through his twisted veins. Sameska may have been tortured by Yoon, but he had not been broken. Not by a very long bow-shot.
“Kill it,” croaked Yoon, suddenly full of panic. “You must kill it!” he screeched.
“You forced us into the place of poison, away from our Heart Trees, away from the Motherwood.” Sameska was hissing and spitting. “In Zalazar the land is poisoned beyond repair. It is a terrible, haunted, evil place.” And Kiki realised the elf rat was addressing her, large yellow eyes almost pleading. “We were forced to join with the twisted, blackened, poisoned and poisonous trees just to survive; an elf is connected to the earth by more than blood and bone. You should know this, Shamathe…”
Kiki gasped.
And then Sameska turned and with incredible agility, incredible strength, bounded across the camp. Trista and Zastarte had weapons drawn, formed a wall, but in a blur Sameska was beyond them, both Iron Wolves knocked back, whirling around, Zastarte gasping, sword cutting out at something that was no longer there.
Silence fell like ash. The fire crackled. A log shifted, making a banging sound.
Yoon gave a low, deep laugh. “You’ve done it now. You’re like a group of lively village idiots, re-enacting a tragedy in the village square for your supper and a hard bed and even harder fuck with the local syphilitic whore. But the only tragedy is your lack of understanding of the real fucking world. The only tragedy, my hopeless friends, is that you’re allowed to continue. Thankfully, when Captain Dokta sorts his shit out and arrives, we can offer you thanks on behalf of the slaughtered people of Vagandrak.”
“Big words for a little man, tied up,” said Narnok, moving close.
Yoon tried to back away, seeing murderous intent in Narnok’s single iron eye, but the tree was in the way. Kiki appeared at the axeman’s side and gave the monarch a bleak smile.
“When Dokta arrives, we’ll be waiting for him. No matter how many men he brings. My guess is he’ll travel light and fast in the hope of catching up, intercepting us. It will be a pleasure, King Yoon, I assure you. But for now, I really do suggest you keep your flapping, pessimistic mouth shut. Or maybe next time, I won’t intervene when Narnok here wants to smash out all your fucking teeth in an attempt to silence you.”
Everybody slept. Kiki lay awake, staring up at the pines high above and the occasional flake of snow that penetrated their dense canopy. Dek and Narnok followed Sameska’s trail into the woods, but soon lost the wood elf; the wood elf rat. As Dek so eloquently put it, “He’s a fucking elf. Bonded to the trees and the heartwood. How will we find him in here?” Kiki felt reasonably safe. She had a funny feeling Sameska contained an incredible power, possibly similar to the Shamathe power she herself carried, which… could be unleashed… when a need for massive destruction was at hand.
Kiki shivered, but not through the cold.
The elf rats plan to attack... This will be the war, Iron Wolves. This will be the battle to end all battles. They will pour like a plague from their lands in the far northeast, Zalazar, beyond the White Lion Mountains. And when they come, it will be a flood. When they come, none shall stand in their path.
She rolled from beneath the thin blanket and, grabbing a makeshift poker, a wood with a pointed, blackened end, she stoked the embers of the fire and tossed on another couple of logs. Soon, heat was blossoming from the burning wood. It crackled softly, glowed like an old friend in an alcoholic embrace. Kiki warmed herself for a while, but the chill in her soul was nothing that an external heat source could ever cure. She glanced over at Yoon, and spat into the fire. The bastard was still keeping facts to himself. Still playing his xazenga cards close to his chest in the hope of cleaning up across the whole game board. Well. Kiki didn’t care for his fucking politics. She didn’t care for his kingship. And maybe, just maybe, for the first time in Vagandrak history, it was time to put his wife – the queen – on the fucking throne.
Kiki stood and stretched, a long, feline movement, then moved away from the campfire. Away from the flames, it was suddenly, deeply cold and she gave a shiver from the core of her body. And then he was there, wrapping a blanket around her. She said nothing, and as he placed the blanket around her shoulders he stayed there for a few moments, holding it in place, sharing his body heat.
Kiki walked a few more steps out into the dark, and the snow cool of the forest. Long shadows danced. The blacks were blacker than ink. The scent of pine was strong, mesmerising. Like a drug.
“How do you feel?”
She turned, and stared up into Dek’s face. To some, she knew, he was nothing more than a brutal thug. After the Iron Wolves had folded, after the glory and the honour and the prizes, Dek had bounced from meaningless dockland job to meaningless warehouse jo
b. Finally, an argument led to a fight outside a tavern, the Fighting Cocks, and after a short brutal bout where Dek demolished the resident bare-knuckle champion, the landlord of the Fighting Cocks had come up with a proposition. Now, a renowned pit fighter – huge, heavily muscled, with small dark eyes and a head that constantly lost a fight with a razor – Dek was scarred and badly tattooed in places, with some of his tattoos received after drunken sessions, and some even only half-finished. His carcass was not one that inspired instant respect; well, not as much as his scarred knuckles and the natural broad shoulders, narrow hips and easy gait of the born fighter. But to Kiki, to Kiki, he was so much more. So much deeper than a fucked-up pit fighter with no family, a history of betrayal and nowhere to go. And, worst (or best) of all, she knew he loved her. Through and through. Right down to the core. He loved her like no other human being on this miserable fucking planet had ever loved her before.
“Dek,” she said.
“Let me just hold you a while.”
“That’s… good. Yeah.”
They stayed like that, his arms around her from behind, his chin nuzzled into her neck. She sensed him inhaling her musk. The scent of her hair. She grinned. Now that’s not been washed in a long time. Still probably had mud-orc blood and brains lodged in the matted strands from Desekra’s walls before…
before.
She blinked, and it was gone. The Shamathe. The powers of the Equiem. Dark magick. Old magick.
He reached up, took hold of her shoulders with surprising tenderness for one so brutal. He turned her around to face him, and she was looking down.
“Kiki.”
“Yes, Dek?”
“I have something to say.”
“Will I like it?”
“Probably not… I love you.”
Kiki paused, and his hand came up, finger pressing against her lips. “I know I’ve told you that before. And I know I was a bad man. I know I did terrible things. Not just killing your friend that time, although I was drunk and she fucking deserved it, the carping fish bitch; but… the other things. The women. The woman. Narnok’s wife. I know I had you. I know you were mine, body and soul. I know I was sucked into a web of deceit and lies and violence; set up like a piece of cheese in the centre of a steel-fanged rat trap. I took the bait, like the weak fuck I am. And I suffered the consequences. We all did.”
“Dek…”
“No. Wait. Let me speak. I fucked up. I was more stupid than the village idiot after ten pints of Old Bowel Rot. And I suffered. You suffered. We all suffered. But I’m a different man now, and I’m a different man living a different life. We live in dangerous, violent times, in a time of change, of upheaval, of battle, and of war. Back there in the Prison Box, when we faced down those white-skinned bastards… well. I was proud to have you by my side. But I was ashamed. Ashamed you didn’t know the deep roots of my love for you. I can live with dying, Kiki. But I can’t live with dying until you know how I feel.”
She lifted her head and stared into his dark eyes. “I know,” she said, gently.
“I betrayed you. But I am not that person any longer. I am yours, body and soul, forever, until we die, until we are condemned to the Chaos Halls and tortured for eternity. But I am yours.” He took her hand and kissed her skin. “Yours, Kiki. Until the stars die.”
Kiki leaned up, and kissed him on the cheek.
“That’s a nice fuck-off.” He grinned.
“Not at all.”
“Then what is it?”
“You could have just asked me for sex. It’s… been a long time.”
“This isn’t about sex,” he said.
“I know,” she said, and punched him playfully on the arm.
Dek stared into her eyes. “What are you saying, Kiki?”
“I’m saying I love you, Dek. I always have. I always will. I can still hate you for betraying me. I can hate you for betraying Narnok. I can hate you for fucking his wife, for sticking your tongue into her cunt and her groaning her way to orgasm… but hate only gets you so far. And you know what, mate? Love gets you further.”
Dek leaned down, and touched his lips to Kiki’s. She responded, and they stood in the cold, snow-bound forest, enjoying the gentility of a kiss that should have belonged on the lips of lovers two decades younger. Then Kiki took Dek’s hand, and led him out into the forest, and under random beams of moonlight, removed her clothing to stand naked before him.
Dek groaned, a low animal sound, and he stepped forward, but her hand pressed against his chest.
“I’ve shown you mine. Now it’s your turn.”
Dek undressed in a frenzy and, naked, his cock huge and eager, stepped in towards her. He licked lips dry with nerves and gave a little laugh.
“What is it?” she said, moving in close, hands touching his skin, head dipping, teeth biting him just a little.
“I can face down the biggest fucking mud-orc in the world, and not feel as much fear as this. This, now.”
Kiki lifted her head, features softened by strands of moonlight. “There’s nothing to be afraid of here,” she said, and guided him towards the soft, cool, welcoming forest carpet.
ZANNE
They travelled north. The snow had stopped. A biting wind filled with ice needles drove into them, making each man and woman lower their heads, wishing for hats and gloves as they pushed onwards towards the nearest city on Dek’s battered, tattered map: Zanne.
“I fucking hate Zanne,” mumbled Narnok.
“Why’s that, axeman?” asked Dek, genuinely interested.
“It reminds me of worse days. It reminds me of bad days.”
“Such as?”
“Maybe I don’t want to talk about it.” Narnok threw Dek a scowl.
“Come on, Narnok. We’re old friends. Maybe I’m here to help.”
“What, liked you helped fuck my wife? Like you helped split us up? Liked you helped channel her towards a friendly torturer who removed my eye and fucked up my face? I’ve seen enough of your help to last me a lifetime, Dek. Why don’t you fuck off and grease up your new and yet old pussy. I’m sure she’s enjoying it. Sure sounded like it out in the forest last night.”
Dek’s jaw clamped shut, and he cut sideways, leaving Narnok walking alone and tugging along the uncomplaining figure of King Yoon behind, like a dog on a leash.
“Trouble?” said Kiki, smiling until she received no response.
“Nothing I can’t deal with.”
“Is he moaning about his wife again?”
“Oh yes.”
“He’ll never get over it, Dek. Something you’re going to have to learn to live with. You betrayed him. He hates you for it. Can’t blame the man for that.”
“It wasn’t my fault,” said Dek.
“Have you heard yourself? Did your cock force itself inside her quim? Did she drug you and rape you?”
“No. All right. It was my fault. I was weak.”
“We’re all weak,” said Kiki, remembering the lure of the honey-leaf and the need to slit a person’s throat just to get that bitter sweet drug under her tongue. Nothing mattered anymore. Not people. Not family. Not friends. Although in all honesty, her family were shit and dead. Especially Suza. Especially that bitch. Kiki shuddered. The lure of the honey-leaf was still strong; and yet she had passed away from the physical addiction. General Dalgoran had helped her with that. Helped her overcome that, God bless his suicide-soul. And she realised, now, with a gradual understanding, that the addiction was not in the chemical, not in the drug in her blood. It was in her head. In her mind. And even without the need for chemical stimulant – even without the need to take the shit to feel normal again – it was still there. Gods. The honey-leaf was still there like a long lost bastard brother coming back to regain his shitty undeserved inheritance. Still there. Always would be. Would haunt her until her dying day. Would ensnare her until her dying day; or at least, until the day it forced her to die.
Forever gone. Forever lost. Forever loved.
&
nbsp; Kiki found tears on her cheeks, and she wiped them away, and Dek asked her if she was okay, and she wiped that away as well. Some things you had to suffer on your own. Some things weren’t for fucking sharing.
“Look at that,” said Narnok, and they stopped, snow stuck to their boots, the sun hanging bloated and orange and low in a bleak winter sky streaked with blood.
“What?”
And then they all stared.
It was a copse of trees, presumably oak. But each one was twisted and blackened. As if the whole woodland had been strafed with a series of rapid lightning blasts in some unholy storm from angry and belligerent gods.
“That’s unusual,” said Trista, taking an uncertain step forward. She stopped when Narnok placed his hand on her shoulder.
“Leave it.”
“What’s wrong?”
“They are wrong. Those trees. Look, they’ve not been struck by lightning. Some of the leaves are still green. Some of the ends of branches are still… living. It’s as if they’ve been poisoned and it’s worked its way through them from the inside out.”
Kiki approached, but stopped short. The snow had melted around the base of the trees, and a thick, black tar was seeping up through the soil. It smelled rancid, corrupt, and Kiki backed away. “We need to get away from this place.”
“What caused it?” said Narnok.
“I don’t know. I’ve never seen anything like that in my entire life.”
“It begins,” said Yoon, smiling up from under dark curls.
“What does?” said Kiki, jaw tight, muscles rigid in her cheeks giving her a stern look: the look of the Captain of the Iron Wolves.
“The pollution. I told you. The elf rats are coming. And you just let one of the most important ones escape. What was he? Sorcerer? Acolyte? Spy for the Elf Rat King?” Yoon shook his head. “I had him ready to spill his information. It took a lot of work. A lot of effort with blade and fire. But we’d damn near broken him. You waded in with your misguided sense of justice, of right and wrong. Tell that to the children you find crucified on twisted oaks like those.”