by Craig Zerf
Lonny moved stealthily through the shadows. Behind him, Donny carried the dripping sack. The two of them crouched down behind a wagon and contemplated their next move. The well was in the center of an open area that was brightly lit with torches. On the periphery of the clearing stood an Orc guard.
‘What now?’ Whispered Donny.
But before Lonny could answer there was the chilling sound of steel been drawn from leather. A silken sound that both boys knew was the precursor to a violent death.
‘Turn around slowly, boys,’ sighed a voice behind them. The words spoken so softly as to be almost a zephyr of wind, or the faint susurration of an insect’s wings.
Both heads swiveled slowly to look.
In the shadows, only barely visible, was the faded outline of a male human being. His face was covered in dark mud and he wore clothes that were tied with length of sacking in which he had pushed leafy twigs and clumps of grass. The broken outline and natural coloring made him close to invisible in the darkness. Even the blade of the vicious knife that he had drawn had been blackened with soot, preventing any inadvertent reflection of light that may give away his position.
‘What are you doing here?’ The man whispered.
Donny held up the stinking sack in reply.
‘We could ask the same of you, sir,’ answered Lonny in a shaking voice.
‘You could,’ agreed the man. ‘Now answer me. And be quick before I gets irritable and decide to slit your throats.’
‘We came to poison the well, sir,’ continued Lonny. ‘The sack is full of rotten rats.’
The man nodded slightly. ‘Not bad. But you’ll never get to the well without raising the alarm. Tell you what, boys. Set the sack down and follow me.’
The twins looked at each other and, with an unspoken agreement, concurred that they actually had little to no choice in the matter. The man slid into the darkness and the twins followed.
He led them to a building that was situated behind the main barracks. Two Orc guards stood outside the front entrance and a row of flickering torches lit the open area in front of the building. The man motioned the boys to get down and both of them prostrated themselves, still keeping to the shadows. Then the man opened the rucksack that he was carrying and started to clip together a small, two shot, crossbow. It was an ingenious affair. The butt constructed of laminated wood and the two sets of arms in stainless steel that looked as if they may have originally come from the leaf suspension of a car or truck.
Once the weapon was assembled he slotted two short steel bolts into the twin slots and, without warning, lined the bow up and pulled the triggers.
Both bolts slammed home with uncanny accuracy and both Orcs dropped noiselessly to the ground, a feathered steel bolt sticking from both of their right eye sockets.
The man sprang to his feet and ran across the open ground to the door of the building.
He looked back at the boys who were both riveted to the floor in shock.
‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Help me.’
The twins sprang to their feet and followed him.
He eased the bolt open to the front door and slipped inside, closing the door as soon as the twins were in. Then he struck a flint and lit a small torch.
It was immediately apparent that they were in the main armory. Hundreds of long bows lined the walls and, at the far end, countless thousands of goose-fletched cloth-yard arrows lay staked in oilcloth wrapped bundles. Along the center of the warehouse, leaning together for support were pikes and broadswords and wooden steel-rimmed shields.
The man pulled three flasks from his rucksack and handed one to each of the twins, pulling the stoppers out as he did so. The pungent smell of fish oil filled the air.
‘Come on then,’ he said to the twins. ‘Splash this over everything. Particularly the arrows and the bows. They’ll burn the best.’
The boys scurried around the warehouse, liberally dousing the weapons with the stinking oil. The man finished his flask and pulled another one from his rucksack. He poured the contents all over the wooden shields in the middle of the room then he headed to the door.
‘Let’s go, boys,’ he said. ‘Unless you’re big on self immolation.’
The twins rushed after him and followed him through the opened door. With a last look over his shoulder the man chucked the flaming torch into the oil soaked armory. There was a pause and then a low booming whoosh of conflagration as the oil took the flame.
The man grinned, his teeth shockingly white against his mud-smeared features.
‘Now what?’ Asked Lonny.
‘Now,’ said the man. ‘We run like hell. Follow me.’
And he set off like a long dog after a rabbit.
Chapter 4
The massive gates slid to a close. They ran on railway tracks and old locomotive wheels, powered by a series of pulleys and gears that Roo, the resident genius, had designed and constructed. Normally gates were considered to be a weak point in a defensive wall, however, these gates were so massive and so thick that they were easily as strong as, if not more so, than the stone wall itself.
The wagon train rolled onwards as they followed Tad and Nathaniel into the heart of the main wall fort. The entrance to the Scottish Free State.
Nathaniel steered his horse to the stables, leaving Tad to take care of the new refugees as he looked forward to a bath and a hot meal. He hoped that he would have a little alone time before he was inundated with requests for his attention. He had managed to build a substantial buffer between himself and the day to day running of the kingdom, but it still seemed that every minor decision needed his attention. Everything from new tax levels, to grain quotas, to educational needs for children, landed up on his desk.
He longed for the times when he was still but a Marine Master Sergeant. High enough in the military structure to be above the pile of crap that officers sent running down hill but low enough to avoid any really serious decisions apart from the day to day combat ones.
Roo wanted permission to strike a new range of coins, arguing that the simple copper, silver and gold range did not allow for enough diversity. Tad argued that they had more important things to concentrate on, like land rights for new refugees and start up capital for all that arrived in the Free State. Gogo was insistent that the teaching of Magik control to gifted children should be the Free State’s main priority and that they should be spending more time seeking out any and all gifted children to enroll in a college of magiks.
The newly appointed General, mister Ronald Carson, ex pre-pulse British army general and professional soldier, whom Nathaniel had recently promoted to head of the Free State army, was insistent that all available time and effort should be spent on preparing for an inevitable war against the massed forces of the Fair-Folk.
And the most exhausting thing about the whole melting pot of ideas was…they were all correct. Every point seemed to be just as important as the next. It gave The Forever Man a headache just thinking about it. Therefore he tried, whenever possible, to escape to the field to simplify his life back to the days when decisions were based on the principles of combat and tactics as opposed to games of thrones and the painful politics of a burgeoning nation.
He dismounted and handed the reins of his horse to a stable boy. Then he made his way back to his residence.
Although Nathaniel was king of the Free State, his living quarters were very simple. A low sprawling affair that was half stone and mortar and half canvas and wood. If he needed another room for meetings or administration staff he simply asked Roo to tack another one on, and so the royal “palace” was more tent city than regal building. And that was how Nathaniel preferred it to be. For, although he was king, in the deep recesses of his mind, he would never be more than a marine master sergeant. And proud of it.
The marine pushed open the unlocked front door to his residence and the smell of fresh baked cherry pie immediately assailed his nostrils and started his mouth watering. But at the same time his heart dropp
ed.
There was only one person that he knew that baked cherry pie and that was Milly.
Nathaniel had first met her as a young girl, saving her from a group of thugs after her family had been beaten to death in front of her. She was seven years old and he had taken care of her until she was nine. Then he had left her in the care of Gramma Higgins and her two grown daughters. He had left her so that he could continue with his quest. The geas that had been imposed on him, compelling him to continue north at all costs.
But then the marine had been magically taken to the time of the Picts and when he had returned, over twenty years had passed. During this time Milly had been kidnapped and brutally gang raped. She had grown up hating Nathaniel and blaming him for the hardships and cruelties that had befallen her after he had left.
He later met up with her when she had become a Worthy Human, a reward class of human bestowed on people who were fanatically loyal to the Fair-Folk and their minions. She had professed both her hatred and her undying love for the marine. Seeing him as her only real savior and protector. But Nathaniel could not get over their age gap. To him she was still a nine or ten year old girl. Only two years had passed since he had last seen her and he could not rationalize the little girl he knew with the grown, sexually active woman that she now was. He did truly love her and his guilt at having left her was immense but he could think of her only as a child. A daughter. Never a lover.
So, once again, he had left her and, in revenge, Milly had convinced the Fair-Folk leadership to attack the Free State in order to kill Nathaniel. But, on realizing what she had done, she had ridden to warn him and, since the Free State’s victory over the Fair-Folk attack, she had stayed with the Free State and had spent all the time that she could trying to convince Nathaniel that she was now a fully grown woman capable of receiving proper adult love from him.
Nathaniel had done his best to explain and to kindly rebuff her advances but it had proved difficult, as she was highly stung and her life was governed almost entirely by her feelings of lost love and rejection.
She came running down the corridor towards him, her dark hair pulled back into a ponytail, dressed in a short, clinging green cotton dress, her feet bare and her long, strong limbs exposed. A small streal of white flour on her face. Domesticated war paint.
‘The watch told me that you were near,’ she said. ‘So I put the cherry pie in the oven so that it would be ready when you got here.’
She threw her arms around the marine and tried to kiss him on the lips. But Nathaniel turned his head slightly to direct the kiss onto his cheek. Milly said nothing but her eyes narrowed at her obvious displeasure.
She took his hand and led him to the kitchen.
‘Come,’ she said. ‘I have ale and roast venison with potato. Eat and then I shall run a bath for you and scrub your back.’
Nathaniel laughed awkwardly. ‘No need for that, Milly,’ he said. ‘I’ve been washing myself for over thirty years, I’m sure that I can continue doing so for the foreseeable future.’
Milly raised an eyebrow. ‘We’ll see,’ she said.
Nathaniel ignored her and sat down to eat. No sooner had he taken his first mouthful when there was a knock on the door.
‘Could you see who that is?’ He asked Milly.
She shook her head. ‘Ignore them. This is our time. That’s the problem with us, don’t you see?’ She continued. ‘We never get any time alone. How can a relationship ever work if we’re never alone?’
‘Milly,’ replied Nathaniel. ‘That’s not the sort of relationship that we have. And you know that. I love you, my girl. Just not like that.’
The knocking persisted. This time it was a little more forceful.
Nathaniel stood up to answer it.
Milly threw her arms around him. ‘No,’ she commanded. ‘This is our time.’ She nuzzled her head into Nathaniel’s neck, kissing and biting softly at him.
The marine pushed her gently away. ‘Milly. Stop it. Please.’
‘Please,’ she said back to him. Her voice high and loud. ‘Please. Please. Please,’ she taunted.
‘Milly, calm down. I’m going to see who is at the door. Settle. There is no need to make a scene. You’re just going to upset yourself.’
‘Sure,’ retorted Milly. ‘Why don’t you go and see who’s at the door? Why don’t you just go? Go again like always.’ She burst into tears.
The knocking on the door continued and someone shouted ‘Hey, Nathaniel. It’s me. Are you in?’
‘Listen, Milly,’ said Nathaniel. ‘It’s Roo. I’ll just have a quick chat with him and then we can get back to dinner. We can talk. It’ll be nice.’
‘I don’t want to talk anymore,’ said Milly. ‘Get out. Get out and never talk to me again!’ She shouted.
Nathaniel threw up his hands in exasperation as he left the room. He went to the front door, opened it and stepped outside to greet his friend.
Milly ran to the table and swept the food off it with her forearm, knocking it to the floor. Then she picked up the cherry pie and threw it against the wall.
Finally she sat down, her breath coming in huge gasps, tears streaming down her face. She picked up the carving knife that was still on the table. Then she pulled up the hem of her dress to expose her thighs. The top of her legs were covered in a welter of thick purple scars. Thirty or forty of them.
She sucked in another deep breath and then, with dreadful concentration, she drew the blade across the top of her inner thigh, cutting deeply into her flesh. She gritted her teeth against the pain and forced herself to continue the cut. It was necessary. It had to be done. She was a bad girl and needed to be punished. Perhaps, if she punished herself enough then Nathaniel would forgive her. Perhaps…even love her.
She set the blade against her skin and prepared to cut again.
Chapter 5
The twins both gathered firewood as the man set up a bivouac. It was proving difficult, as everything was wet.
Two days had passed since that mad escape from the burning of the Orc armory. They had traveled the whole of the first night and most of the next day before resting up. This morning they had set off again, but the man had called an early stop as the weather had turned. Heavy rain turning to sleet as the sun started to go down.
The man’s name was Jack. Jack Olsen. He was in his mid forties and, before the pulse, he had been a member of the British SBS or Special Boat Service, the Royal Marine version of the respected Special Air Service. During the initial stages of the Fair-Folk leadership, Jack’s brother, a farmer in Devon, had been hung for dissent. He had refused to trade with the Fair-Folk, insisting that his crops would go to humans first.
From that day on, Jack had carried out a one-man program of resistance. He burned down buildings, poisoned wells, set traps for Orc patrols and driven off their cattle and burned their crops. Sometimes he would strike two or three times in a row and then, sometimes he would simply lie low for weeks, even months at a time. After talking to him for a while, the twins came to realize that the ex-special forces man seemed less driven by revenge than the fact that he simply did not know what else to do with his life. The sabotage and retribution was no longer a means to an end, it had become the end in itself. A reason to wake up every day. To eat. To sleep. To stay alive.
Jack was no longer fighting a war. He was no longer even seeking revenge. He was simply continuing to do the only thing that he knew how to do. But, despite all of that, he did it very well.
The boys carried their collection of firewood back to the camp and piled it in front of Jack. The ex-soldier had pulled two young trees down and lashed them to a stake in the ground, creating a rain resistant area under them. It wasn’t waterproof but it did keep the bulk of the rain out. He had also strung up a tarpaulin against a large rock and that area was waterproof, as well as being protected from the wind.
He started a small fire under the tree shelter and, within a short time, had the damp wood burning merrily, albeit smokily.
The twins sat close to the flames for warmth as Jack spitted three rabbits over the fire.
‘So, boys,’ said Jack as he turned the rabbits. ‘Have you ever heard of the Scottish Free State?’
Donny chuckled. ‘Yeah. Also Eldorado and Atlantis.’
‘No,’ said Jack. ‘I’m serious. It’s real. It’s the other side of Hadrian’s Wall. No Orcs or goblins or Fair-Folk. No bleeding Worthy Humans either.’
‘Come on, Jack,’ argued Donny. ‘It’s a fairytale. A myth. There’s no Free State. The Fair-Folk wouldn’t let it exist.’
‘It does exist,’ insisted Jack. ‘I met a guy who knew someone who had been there. Apparently a king rules it and everyone gets land and a house with running water and meat and bread and clothes. It’s true.’
‘Well,’ said Lonny. ‘I heard that it’s run by an immortal demi-god who can do magic and he carries a huge war axe and controls thunder and lightning and he traveled through time to save the human race.’
‘Actually,’ said Jack. ‘I must admit, I heard that as well.’
Donny sighed. ‘Would be nice if it was true,’ he said.
Both Jack and Lonny laughed. ‘Yep,’ they agreed. ‘That would be nice.’
‘I’ll tell you something that is true,’ continued Jack. ‘And this I know because I’ve actually been there. About ten years ago, but still. It’s a place called the Abbey. A sort of farming collective run by an ex –soldier. A guy called Axel. He doesn’t allow Worthy Humans in the collective and he makes all Orcs and goblins and Fair-Folk stay outside the farm limits.’