A Quantum Mythology

by Gavin G. Smith

  ‘What are you frightened of?’ Britha asked. Ysgawyn just glared at her.

  ‘Andraste’s children,’ one of the other warriors said.

  ‘Is that why your numbers are so few?’

  ‘They are too numerous,’ the young warrior continued, ‘and even with weapons washed in the blood of heroes they are very difficult to kill.’

  ‘Not like running down unarmed landsmen and -women as they flee, then?’ Britha enquired.

  ‘Kill me, sacrifice me to your northern gods, just get on with it,’ Ysgawyn said, his voice so tired that Britha suspected he’d welcome death. She wasn’t feeling particularly merciful, however.

  Britha ran the sword down her palm. The five men watched her nervously as a red line of blood appeared. Ysgawyn’s horse reared away from her. She wasn’t sure how she knew to do this, but she smeared the blood on the horse’s neck and then darted out of the way before it could bite her. The blood disappeared as if it had been sucked through the animal’s skin. In her mind she saw the horse calming, accepting her, and she thought of herself riding the horse. Finally she turned to Ysgawyn.

  ‘Take your armour off,’ she told him. She didn’t want his armour so much as the clothes underneath. ‘Do you have anything to eat?’

  Britha gorged herself on what little food the five Corpse People riders carried with them but she still felt hungry. They watched her miserably. She was considering what they had told her. She had a mind to kill their horses, hamstring the warriors and then wait for their returned-to-life ancestors to find them. She found herself curious as to what would happen. These were the thoughts of a dryw, she decided. To seek knowledge, and power, and the Corpse People had put themselves well beyond any decent consideration with their own behaviour.

  ‘So what will you do now?’ Britha asked instead. Ysgawyn shrugged and looked to the south-west. He had been doing this since they found her. Britha followed his gaze. The sun was setting, just a faint glow on the horizon now. Britha squinted. She wasn’t sure, but she thought there might be movement to the south-west.

  ‘We’re going to find Bress,’ Ysgawyn said softly.

  His name was like a dagger. She was overcome with absurd guilt as she thought back to lying with Fachtna. She pushed the feeling down. It was ridiculous. She owed Bress nothing but death. She wished she had taken Fachtna’s sword with her. Unless more had survived than she had seen, it looked as though Bress was responsible for all but wiping out her people.

  ‘Did any survive the wicker man?’ she asked quietly.

  ‘Horse, armour, sword, spear and brand,’ said Ysgawyn. ‘Our enemies fell before us like wheat to a sickle. We weren’t terrified victims kept in our own filth. If this is what has become of us, what chance did the people in the wicker man have? They are either dead or afflicted with the sickness Andraste spreads. To think otherwise is to lie to yourself.’

  Britha took this in. She became aware she was touching her stomach. Thinking of her child, one moment part of her, the next gone, but she had felt it nonetheless. She moved her hand away. Ysgawyn was watching her carefully. It was becoming clear to her that he had been made the rhi of his tribe as a result of his mind and probably his tongue, but not as a result of his sword arm.

  ‘Very well,’ Britha said quietly.

  ‘Very well what?’ Ysgawyn demanded, but tiredly.

  ‘I will come with you.’ If Fachtna had lacked the magics to take her back then perhaps it was a secret she could steal from Bress’s corpse. One thing she had decided: she was sick of the Otherworld’s presence in these lands.

  ‘I had thought you finished with me,’ Bress said.

  ‘I had, but I want to know what came through,’ Crom whispered in his ear like a lover. He was standing behind, always just out of sight, little more than a presence.

  ‘Why should I serve you again?’ Bress almost flinched as he felt a hand brush against him.

  ‘What do you want?’ The whisper sounded sweet, or it would have if Bress hadn’t known of the corruption it promised.

  ‘You know what I want.’

  ‘You could do that yourself.’

  ‘There would always be echoes.’

  ‘Do you want to go home? I will murder a sun for you. Lay it out on an altar and sacrifice it for your return.’

  Bress could turn around, he supposed. He knew, even in this darkness, that he would be able to make out Crom Dhubh’s form, little more than a crooked shadow, a dark ghost so malformed it would hurt to look at him.

  ‘It’s not my home, I … we … changed it.’

  The laughter was low and sickly. Bress knew that Crom Dhubh was weak now. What had happened inside the Muileartach had lessened him.

  ‘The Muileartach sleeps again. Her energy is spent. It will be years before she wakes again, millennia, but during that time, the sickness that infuses the human mind will leak into her, poisoning her, driving her mad.’

  ‘Why don’t you tell the others? Whisper it to their poisoned minds?’

  ‘They are too far beyond madness to hear me.’

  ‘And I find myself asking again – what do you want from me?’

  ‘What do I want? I am a servant, just like you—’

  ‘Of an idiot god stinging itself—’

  ‘Rail against it all you want, but we serve the same master. You were born for this.’

  ‘I don’t think I was born—’

  ‘If it’s someone from the Ubh Blaosc, if we can get to them before they are destroyed—’

  ‘We can find out where the Ubh Blaosc is. Why?’

  ‘Because they oppose us.’

  ‘For the Naga?’ Bress asked, spat and then wondered if he had spent too long in this land.

  ‘They are tools, nothing more. This wouldn’t have mattered if we had succeeded.’

  ‘Nothing would have mattered. I have a condition.’

  ‘The bargain is an illusion.’

  ‘Leave the woman be.’

  ‘Do you think she’s alive?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said simply. She had struck him as someone who wouldn’t stop fighting.

  ‘But she wants—’

  ‘I said, leave her be.’

  ‘You are a fool, but I agree.’

  He felt the task he had been charged with settle into him like a weight. Initially it did not seem as bad as his previous task, but if he succeeded he could be responsible for so many more deaths. He wasn’t necessarily opposed to that. He just couldn’t see the point.

  ‘I tire of slavery,’ Bress said quietly.

  ‘That is a pretence, a lie we all tell ourselves. If we didn’t like it we would do something about it.’

  Bress awoke in his cot. He sat up and saw his moulded ‘leather’ armour hanging from the framework of the skin tent. He pushed the fur blanket aside and stood. He had to find one or two people in this whole, empty land. He would have to ride to the stones and try tracking them from there. That said, if they had access to the stones, there was a good chance that whoever they were would be coming for him. The age of gods was over, and there weren’t many with the blood of ‘heroes’ in this part of the world.

  Still, he thought, at least he had something for his army of blood slaves to do. Though first he’d have to find some horses.

  She made Ysgawyn ride behind Gwynn, the youngest of the Corpse People, and she took his horse after mastering it with her blood magic. They found a well-trodden road, one that looked like it had been used much for trade, judging by the grooves wagon tracks had dug in the hard-packed dirt. There was nobody on the road today. The road climbed up onto a ridge line looking down on woodland, farmland and patches of swampy lowland.

  Behind them was the plain. Britha could just about make out the large circle of stones. She assumed it was where she had appeared. Beyond that the land looked wrong, dead, stunted, t
wisted and strange. She could see shapes moving across the plain. They looked larger than anything not living in the sea had any right to be, and their movement was all wrong.

  The land before the creatures appeared to be normal but behind them was sourland. They were changing it, turning it from good, rich earth that could be sown and harvested by people into material for some other purpose. She saw smaller shapes as well, scattered over the plain, but always heading inexorably north.

  The road on the ridge was taking them east. The beleaguered Corpse People did not know where Bress and the Lochlannach had gone, but they had last been seen sailing east away from the Isle of Madness. Ysgawyn’s plan was to head north and east, try to distance themselves from the Muileartach’s spawn. Where Bress went there would be stories for them to follow.

  They travelled for weeks, finding only abandoned settlements and villages. Britha shamefully joined with the Corpse People in scavenging for supplies.

  They came across a hill fort guarded by spear-carriers. All their warriors had ridden east to fight the army of giant serpents coming from the south. Britha and her companions were refused hospitality because someone from within recognised the Corpse People who had raided the Atrebates for many years. Ysgawyn cursed them, and told them there was no fighting what was coming, and that they were all dead anyway.

  As they followed the road further north and east, they started to see more people using it. Nearly all of them were warriors who had either missed the chance to do battle with the Lochlannach or, shamed by running and hiding, were heading south. The warriors came from disparate tribes and there appeared to be an uneasy truce among them.

  Britha and the others were cursed for cowards when it became apparent they were heading away from the spawn, which resulted in a series of challenges being fought along the road. Ysgawyn made sure they picked their victims very shrewdly, and each new victory meant that the dead warrior’s horse, armour and weapons were forfeit to the Corpse People. They took what they could use and traded the rest.

  Ysgawyn made one miscalculation and another of the Corpse People died. Now only four remained: Brys and Gwynn – both of whom Britha was starting to like despite herself, Ysgawyn and Madawg. Madawg looked too frail to be a warrior, particularly after the ravages of the Corpse People’s flight. He was nearly silent, and his odd, narrow face had a complexion so sallow he looked ill. His dark hair was thin and receding. Despite his appearance, however, he was a cunning, vicious and very fast fighter. He’d won the challenge he fought because the other warrior had woefully underestimated him.

  They turned off the trade route and started travelling north after they met a bard heading south for the mighty battle. He had heard rumours of sightings of the black curraghs on a river further north. The river was said to have a fearsome spirit living in it that made it burst its banks and drown the surrounding land with remarkable frequency. The river was called the Tros Hynt.

  Britha had a spear now and a dagger traded from Ysgawyn after he’d won a challenge. It was the dagger, not the spear, which she took into the woods on the darkest night, when the moon’s light was little more than a sliver in the heavens. It was the dagger that she worked her will and her blood magic on. It was the dagger that she whispered her purpose to. It would be easier to get the dagger closer to Bress.

  He had known of them as soon as the first of his slave army became aware of them. They rode in with the points of their longspears pointed down. He recognised their horses first – Crom Dhubh had transformed them – but it took a moment for him to place the people without their corpse paint. They were members of some ridiculous warrior cult Crom Dhubh had controlled. At Crom’s behest they had hunted down those who still possessed some residual power in their blood and bones, leftover blessings given to their ancestors by the remnants of ancient civilisations. The warrior cult who thought themselves already dead, who consumed their prey to steal their power. They were nothing more than parasites as far as Bress was concerned. They were only still alive because she was with them.

  He wore a simple blaidth and trews. No armour, not even his boots. His sword remained in his hide tent, only a dagger hanging from the belt at his waist. It didn’t matter. They were no threat to him.

  They had come as far west as they could on the Tros Hynt, but beyond this point the river was simply not navigable. The hide-hulled curraghs were much smaller now that the ships did not have to carry so many prisoners. They held themselves steady in the water against the forceful current. He had left the giants submerged further upriver, but he could call them with a thought. His slaves pitched his hide tent on the driest patch of ground they could find in a small clearing close to the riverbank.

  After raiding the surrounding area extensively for good horseflesh which he subsequently transformed with the Red Chalice, he had been ranging out for some time now but found little. He used the Red Chalice to control and interrogate those they did find but learned nothing. Then he drew the metal out of them again – he would create no more slaves. Whoever had arrived was keeping very quiet. He was aware of the mortal warriors heading south to die or be warped by the children of the Muileartach, but he gave them little thought.

  ‘I am Ysgawyn, son of—’

  ‘Be quiet,’ Bress said softly, but his voice carried. They had ridden in through the silent ranks of his Lochlannach. He could smell their fear.

  ‘Careful,’ the one called Ysgawyn hissed, but Bress was only looking at Britha. He could not read her expression, but he could sense the power born of the Ubh Blaosc in her blood. She had changed. This was not her first form. He did not like the pain he felt in his chest at the thought that she was little more than an Ubh Blaosc changeling sent to kill him.

  ‘We had an alliance,’ Ysgawyn insisted. ‘I demand you honour it!’

  Bress turned reluctantly from Britha to look at the angry man. ‘You demand what?’

  ‘Your aid, access to your magics as per the terms of our alliance sworn in blood—’

  ‘Stop,’ Bress said. Ysgawyn did so. ‘There was no alliance.’

  Bress didn’t look the man in the eye as Ysgawyn replied, ‘We served the same master and he has betrayed us. Where there should be death, there is more life than ever before.’

  ‘Are you a child? You slavishly worshipped my master and he used you for his own ends. Go and ask him for aid and magics. I suspect they will not be forthcoming as you appear to have little to offer in return. I owe you nothing.’ Bress started moving towards Britha and Ysgawyn opened his mouth to protest again. This time Bress merely looked at him and Ysgawyn knew to be quiet. ‘Was this not what you expected? Having made enemies of all others, did you hope for succour from me? Because you have travelled here with her, I will grant you a great boon. If you leave now I will neither kill nor enslave you, but if you say one more word to me …’ Bress let his voice trail off almost sadly. There were tears of frustration and rage on Ysgawyn’s face, but he turned and walked back to his horse. The Lochlannach watched him all the while.

  ‘And what of me?’ Britha asked quietly. Bress moved quickly to her. He lifted his hand to her face, long, powerful fingers almost touching her skin. She did not shrink from him. Her expression was guarded, but he could see water gathering in the corners of her eyes.

  ‘You can stay and do what you want. All I ask is that you don’t leave.’

  She stared at him, saying nothing. The silence was broken by the sound of the remaining Corpse People galloping out of the camp, Ysgawyn hurling insults as he rode away.

  ‘Have you come to kill me?’ he asked, lowering his hand, clenching it into a fist before forcing it back to his side. She nodded, and a tear ran down her cheek.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered. The trees, the clearing, the riverbank were filled with the silent Lochlannach, but they were, to all intents and purposes, alone.

  Her hand moved to the hilt of her dagger. Bress glanc
ed down at it but did not move.

  ‘It’s you, isn’t it?’ he asked quietly. She nodded as more tears ran down her cheek. He looked back into her eyes. ‘What did they do to you?’

  She started to collapse. Bress gathered her into his arms, knowing how much she must hate this weakness. She started to beat him with her fists as she sobbed into his chest. He carried her to the ground with him and held her.

  Fachtna came to. He concentrated, working out exactly how hurt he was. Then he registered the pain from his leg. He opened his eyes and looked down past the sword protruding from his chest. He screamed. Some half-formed thing, a corpse-like mockery of life with beating, pulsing rudimentary organs hanging down from rotted bones was chewing on his leg, harvesting flesh – and presumably the magics contained within – for itself.

  Fachtna kicked out but only succeeded in bucking the creature up and down on his leg. Every movement caused the sword wound to widen, and blood coursed from the gash as pain shot through him. Fachtna brought to mind the calming exercises he’d learned in warrior camp and managed to control himself. He reached for the sword sticking out of him and closed his fingers around its hilt. He wanted to cry out as teeth tore into this flesh. He did cry out as he ripped the sword from his body, and his cries echoed across the plain. He felt darkness closing all around him as he started to drift away. He was bolted back into consciousness as a large chunk of his leg was torn away by the living-corpse-thing’s teeth. This time his scream was joined by his sword’s song. He only just had the presence of mind to use the correct magics to activate it.

  He pushed the sword through the undead thing’s head, being as careful as he could not to cut off his own foot. It did not want to die even after he all but bisected it, and he started grabbing at it and flinging its constituent parts away.

  The wards drawn by the drui on his bones and flesh told him he was being attacked. It was not dissimilar to Naga magics. If anything, this attack was more potent. He recognised this as the magics of the Muileartach.