“And we spare it, anyway. You have never understood, have you, Qurrah? Do you think us weak sacrificing meager provisions to a man in need? You know this not to be true.”
“Why do you mock me?” the half-orc asked.
“I do what I do for the sake of my village. Now go.”
He purposely put his crooked back to the necromancer and returned to his town. Qurrah clutched the supplies in his arms, feeling his anger boil. He was being played the fool, he just didn’t know how, or why. And not just that. He was being treated the inferior. He could strike the man dead with a thought, but here he was, made to seem the beggar and the fool.
“What is the name of your village?” he asked, using magic to heighten his voice to a shout, for his throat was too frail to do so on its own. The priest turned and cupped his hands to his mouth.
“I think it best you not know.”
That was the last he saw him. Qurrah swore to return. Once he had the spellbook of Darakken, once his promises were fulfilled, he would burn the entire village to the ground.
“Qurrah?”
Tessanna had ventured from the forest, her naked body a startling oddity among the dying grass and cold air. The half-orc handed her the clothes, which she held out to look at.
“Fairly simple,” she said. “And the skirt is far too long.”
“I’m sure you’ll make it fit,” the half-orc said.
Tessanna slid the dress on. It was rough and prickly, but it was still something. She took her dagger out from Qurrah’s robe and used it to cut a thin strip from the bottom. She then tied it as a sash and tucked the dagger within. This done, she looked at Qurrah and giggled.
“You just can’t stand kindness for kindness’s sake, can you?” she asked.
Qurrah’s glare was answer enough.
T he food, dried and salted venison, did well to sate their hunger. Tessanna ate little for she wore a simple wooden ring that allowed her to survive on a single meal every ten days. While in the forest, they had lived on deer and squirrel, but there was little to hunt on the grassy hills and plains they now crossed. Some days they walked, but other days…
“Should we ride?” Tessanna asked the next morning, blankets wrapped about her body. “The ground is getting colder.”
Qurrah sighed. While Badback had given them clothes, he had forgotten shoes for Tessanna to wear. The travel was wearing on her feet, and some nights she would rest by the fire with blood soaking them from toe to heel. She never complained, and by morning the blood was gone and the cuts nothing but scars. The ground had steadily grown rockier and their travel slower.
“Yes,” he said. “I guess we can this day.”
Tessanna smiled. She let the blankets drop. The cold air bit her skin, but she held in any shivers. With her hands above her head, she started swiveling her hips in a small circle, weaving to some unheard music. She placed one foot in the ashes of the previous night’s fire. The ash sprang to life, burning although it had no fuel. Tessanna twirled, her other foot stepped in the fire, and then it roared high above her knees. It did not burn her.
Qurrah watched, mesmerized as he always was by the summoning. Her movements grew slower and slower, every twirl of her hips and gyration of her back intensely erotic. The first time she had ever shown him, she had been naked. He had immediately made love to her afterward.
“Seletha,” she whispered into the morning air. The fire sprang like a river into the grass before her, pooling and growing. Her spell lashed it together, lifting the fire higher into the shape of a large horse. She slowly drifted her hands downward, magic flaring across her palms. The fiery form solidified, growing muscle and bone. When her hands reached her sides, the creature was whole and the summoning complete.
The horse lowered her head and raised one bent leg, her way of bowing. She snorted, plumes of black smoke blowing from her nostrils. Qurrah pulled his robes tighter about him, fighting against the fear that always filled his gut at the sight. It wasn’t the supernatural aspect of the creature that bothered him. Before their first ride, he had admitted to Tessanna his fear of horses. It took all his willpower to sit atop the magical being without panicking.
“The Gods’ Bridges are close, Seletha,” the girl said, gently patting the horse’s head. “Think you can get us there by nightfall?”
She clomped a hoof and nodded.
“Good. Let’s go, Qurrah.”
“Of course,” the half-orc said. He had ridden Seletha twenty times since fleeing the confrontation with his brother. He had hoped to get over his fear. But of course he hadn’t, and Tessanna struggled to hold in her laughter as he placed a hesitant hand atop Seletha’s back.
“You’ve always been so good at mounting me, silly,” Tessanna said. “Surely you can mount a horse without too much difficulty.”
The half-orc rolled his eyes and then climbed atop the giant beast. The two rode atop Seletha bareback, one of the other reasons Qurrah tried to ride as sparingly as possible. By nightfall, his legs and back would ache and he’d swear any hope of producing children was lost to him.
Tessanna arced back her head and levitated herself onto Seletha’s back, both legs bent and tucked on the right side.
“I hate this damn thing,” Qurrah said.
“Shush and enjoy the ride,” she replied.
The girl whispered to the horse and then they were off. So great was Seletha’s weight that deep hoof prints marked their passing across the earth, the centers of each one lined with a tiny flare of dying flame.
2
Qurrah hunkered beside the fire, a deep scowl covering his face. He pulled his hood low over his head and muttered about the pain in his lower back. Tessanna cuddled beside him, quietly singing. Each note was slow and soft, her voice as cold as ice atop a river.
“We were made for joy, we were made for suffering. We feel love, and we hate who we love, and this is not real until we cry…”
Love swirled within his chest, and in such a manner, he touched her face as she sang. But she was the girl of apathy, and her face was stone against his touch.
“I will not cry ‘til I die, and I will die when you come for me. Come for me. Make me real.”
She ended her song, her eyes staring up at the sky.
For the longest time she remained silent. Qurrah brushed her face again, not hurt by the lack of emotion she showed to him. Ever since Aullienna’s death, her love for him had come and gone, much like her personalities. He knew, given time, she would return his affection. If she didn’t, he’d take her and give her no choice but to love him. Sometimes he wondered if that was what she preferred the most.
“The stars are beautiful,” Tessanna said. Qurrah did not respond so she continued. “I used to wish upon them when I was a little girl. I’d wish for a bear to come and eat my father and then a great black hawk to come and let me ride on its back. Do you know what I wish for now, Qurrah?”
The half-orc shook his head. She stared at him, wanting to see his reaction.
“I wish for a way to replace what was lost. The girl you killed.”
“You desire a child?” he asked, fighting anger at the guilt she cast his way. “One of your own womb?”
“I do,” she said. Her voice was perfectly calm, yet a tear ran down the side of her face. “But I know I can’t have one. No life sparkles inside me. So what am I to do, Qurrah? What am I to do?”
Qurrah kissed her lips and then used his thumb to wipe the tear away.
“Even if it takes all my life, I will repay you for my mistake. For my brother’s pride. Perhaps, in time, I may give you a child.”
Tessanna finally smiled.
“You just want me more often.”
He laughed.
“Any more than we already do, I may injure myself.”
She laughed, the apathy within her melting away. Underneath the ice, a smoldering fire flared. “How about tonight,” she asked. “Always worth a try, isn’t it?”
He kissed her again as h
e removed her dress. In the light of the campfire, her body was perfect. He could not see her scars or the bones of her ribs. Her slender hands removed his sash and parted his robe. She crawled atop him, her lips and tongue flitting across his neck.
Qurrah moaned and arced his back, and as he did, he saw the men watching them.
“Tessanna,” he said, his entire body suddenly tensing.
“I’m sorry,” the girl said. “I should have sensed them sooner.”
And then they were atop them, pulling Tessanna off. A boot pressed hard against Qurrah’s neck. Another crushed his right hand. Two men each held Tessanna by an arm. They all wore brown coats and grey trousers.
“Hold them steady,” one man said to the others. “Seems they’re both all riled up and ready to go.” The man, the leader of the bunch by the way he yelled at the others, knelt next to Qurrah and spat. The half-orc swore death as the saliva covered his eyes.
“Looks like you won’t get to have too much fun, but your girl there…”
“A toll!” one man shouted, and his cry was quickly repeated by the others.
“A toll! A toll!”
They jostled the naked girl this way and that, her slender frame lacking any strength to resist. Yet despite their cries and their looks, she did not appear afraid. Instead, she let out a tiny moan as she moved her hips back and forth.
Qurrah forced himself to open his eyes. He needed to know how many had attacked them. He counted only four, two holding Tessanna, another restraining him, and then the leader. Daggers were attached to their belts, but so far they remained undrawn.
“For what should we pay a toll?” Qurrah asked. His free hand crawled across the ground and tightened about the handle of his whip, which lay atop the fabric of his cloak, nearly invisible in the darkness.
“To cross the Gods’ Bridges, of course,” said the leader. “Tory’s boys own it now, own the whole bloody Delta. If you want to cross, you pay a toll.”
“We have no coin,” he said, glancing at Tessanna. He wondered if he should act or wait for her. The ruffians had no clue what they held in their arms. No clue at all.
“Well ain’t that a shame,” said the leader, standing up and walking to Tessanna. He cupped her face in his hand, turning her chin this way and that. “But I’d say this pretty girl does have something of value. Doesn’t she boys?”
All four cheered and whistled.
“Touch her and die,” Qurrah said.
“Shut up,” said the man towering above Qurrah, pressing harder against his neck with his foot. “Close your eyes and keep them shut. We gonna take our toll.”
The leader grabbed Tessanna’s hair and pulled her head back. She moaned, louder. A smile creased her face.
“You like that?” he asked her. “You want a real man, don’t you, not some bony little orc runt.”
“You couldn’t handle me,” she said. “You’d only end up hurt.”
He laughed. The others only smirked and chuckled. They knew what was coming. Tessanna wasn’t the only woman to sass off when they took their toll.
“Oh, is that so?” he asked before backhanding her across the face. As she spat blood onto one of her captors, he drew his dagger and held it to her neck.
“You keep that pretty mouth of yours shut,” he whispered. “I’ve humped corpses before, you little whore, and we’d all have hours of fun with yours before you turned cold.”
Qurrah watched his lover smile even as blood ran down her lips. He tightened his grip on the whip’s handle, knowing the one who held him was far too interested in Tessanna’s body to pay him any attention. The girl was playing games with them, with all of them.
“It’d be more than hours,” Tessanna said, licking the blood with her tongue. “I’m fire, you naughty little boy, pure fire. I’d burn you the second you put that little weed you call a prick inside me.”
Sparks of flame burst within her eyes. The leader glanced around, for the first time realizing he was not dealing with normal travelers. Qurrah saw this and chuckled. About damn time.
“What the abyss,” the leader said, pressing harder against her skin with his knife. Her hair caught flame, then her shoulders, her chest and her neck. The fire hid her nakedness. The men who held her screamed, the flesh of their hands seared black. The leader thrust his dagger only to have the cheap metal shatter. Fire leapt across the broken blade, burning a thin line up his arm. He tried to run but Tessanna was not done. She whispered a few words of magic, paralyzing him where he stood.
The man holding Qurrah fled. Qurrah whirled immediately, fire consuming his whip. He wrapped it about the fleeing man’s legs, tumbling him to the ground. The man screamed as the fire burned his ankles to the bone.
“Shut up,” Qurrah said. The necromancer hooked his fingers in bizarre directions and let his dark power flow. The bones in the man’s ankles snapped. The broken pieces tore out the black mess of flesh, animated with dark power. With a thought, he ended the man’s screams, shredding his throat with his own bones.
Qurrah picked up his robe and put it back on. He tied the sash while he watched Tessanna have her fun. The two men that had held her had long fled into the night. Only the leader remained, held sway by the beautiful sorceress. She ran a hand down his face, smiling as one of his eyeballs popped.
“Do you still want to bed me?” she asked. Tears ran from his good eye, and he tried to speak but all that came out was a pathetic whimper. “Good. You interrupted my fun, so I’ll have to have fun with you.” She pressed her body against his. Her arms wrapped about his body and pulled him closer. She ground her crotch against his leg. She slipped a finger inside his mouth. His clothes burned away, as did his flesh. Still she caressed him. Still she held him against her.
At last she pulled back and cried out in ecstasy. She released him from his paralysis. His throat and mouth was so charred and burned he could not even scream. Nothing but a blackened mess, he collapsed to the ground, bled, and died. The fire left her body…at least the outward fire. Qurrah wrapped his whip around his arm, amused at how aroused his lover was.
“I told him he couldn’t handle me,” she giggled.
T he next morning, Qurrah was first to awake. His whole body shivered underneath his blankets. He pulled them tighter about himself and attempted to return to sleep but the groaning of his stomach refused to let him rest. He had eaten nothing the previous day. Their provisions were running low, and he meant to stretch them as far as they could go.
“I should have made her teach me that spell,” he muttered, thinking of the banquets his brother’s wife Aurelia had conjured seemingly at will. The spell most likely required some sort of component to cast, but whatever it had been, Qurrah knew it would be easier to carry and obtain than his current stock of food.
Tessanna stirred at his voice.
“Getting hungry again?” she asked, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. He didn’t answer as he opened the dried meat’s brown wrapping. He tore off a chunk and ate, grimacing at how salty it was. He immediately craved water. The girl watched him, absently picking at her lip.
“Do we ride today?” she asked. Qurrah shook his head.
“The Bridges are near. I want us to be prepared in case our welcome is as kind as last night.”
The half-orc took another bite. Couldn’t Aurelia summon water too? He thought he remembered her soaking his brother once or twice in such a way. The elf was a walking supply caravan, he thought. Here he was, able to manipulate shadow, bone, and blood, and he would trade it all for the ability to conjure a tiny bit of water along with a sweetroll or two.
He finished the rest of the meat and then cast the wrapping to the dirt. Tessanna raised an eyebrow.
“Someone’s being a pig. Where will we get more?”
“Those men that attacked us last night must live nearby,” he said. He pooled saliva in his mouth and then spit, imagining it full of salt. “Most likely a village. If we meet them at the Bridges, we’ll find out, and take what we
need.”
“Murder for supplies?” She wrapped the blankets around her so that only her head peeked out. “That’s low even for us, isn’t it?”
Qurrah opened his mouth to speak, then stopped. It was, wasn’t it?
“They attacked us first,” he decided. “If they dare touch us again, well, would you blame me for taking what they will no longer need after I send them to the abyss?”
The girl shrugged. She pulled the blankets above her nose.
“Will they try to hurt me again? I don’t like it when people do that.”
Qurrah offered her his hand, and was not at all surprised that she shrunk back from it. She had slipped into her childlike state. She seemed more like a six-year-old girl than the young woman she really was.
“I’ll protect you, whether you need the protection or not,” he told her. “Now get dressed. Those men likely saw our fire from their post at the eastern bridge, so we cannot be far.”
“Qurrah?”
“Yes, Tessanna?”
She smiled an unseen smile behind the blankets.
“What are the Gods’ Bridges like? I’ve always heard they’re pretty.”
“Come with me,” he told her, once more offering his hand. “And we shall see together.”
He took her hand and pulled her from the blankets. She kissed his cheek before putting on her dress.
“Together,” she said. “I like that.”
When they were ready, Qurrah scattered the last few ashes of their fire and led them west.
The Bridges had been constructed centuries ago by the gods Karak and Ashhur after they had Celestia split the land of Dezrel with the great Rigon River. Just before reaching the ocean, the Rigon River forked in two, creating a large delta. Each god had placed a bridge just south of the fork. Each had hoped this crossing would allow them to claim the fertile delta, and it was their twin claims that led to their war.
Karak had built his bridge across the eastern fork, and it was this bridge that Qurrah and Tessanna first saw.
“Oh, Qurrah,” Tessanna said, smiling. “It is beautiful.”
The Death of Promises h-3 Page 2