We were trapped.
They knew we would come.
I judged the distance between us. It was too far for them to block our reserves, and too far for us to block theirs. None of us moved. I shifted my weight in anticipation of what might come next. We were surrounded. We were outnumbered. And I cursed myself for being unprepared.
A dark surge bubbled up inside me. I struggled to keep it down – but I could not. It began with a hiccup; innocuous at first, just a little thing. Avaxenon looked over to me briefly, keeping his attention on either exit.
“Not here, Bram! Not now!” he pleaded under his breath.
A quick bark of laughter escaped my lips. I clapped my hands to my mouth and screwed my eyes shut and tried to keep quiet.
The Black Laughter rose up like a shiver inside me, through my stomach, through my chest, into my throat. My hands shook, my shoulders quaked with effort.
Why here? Why now?
I heard footsteps through the pounding in my head and I opened my eyes. Both pairs of costumed assailants were taking a few cautious steps forward. Avaxenon raised his hands in warning.
“Not a step closer, you brigands!” He cried aloud with the booming voice of a practiced orator. “One more step and someone will die!”
The assailants stopped.
Slowly, with all the strength I could muster, I fought back the Black Laughter. I managed to stand back upright and lower my hands from my face.
“Go back the way you came,” warned Avaxenon. “Leave us in peace!”
They were still about fifteen strides away. In a few more they would be in range to block our reserves. Whatever spells we cast would have to happen before they came any closer.
“Can’t do that, y’know,” said one of the ur-men, putting a hand to his belt. “A job is a job.”
“What job?” I managed to ask. “Who sent you?”
The other ur-man laughed at my question.
“Doesn’t matter, Magus. Our orders are simple – keep you two quiet,” said the hobgoblin from down the hall.
The four assailants drew thin daggers from their belts, all in unison. Avaxenon tensed up next to me and I giggled involuntarily.
I kept my eyes shifting right to left, trying to keep sight of every menace. My hands were low, ready to cast. I knew I could make it out of here fine – but Avaxenon? We were just seers, not battle-mages, not shamans. We were all but defenseless and all I could do was escape at best.
“Bram,” Avaxenon whispered. “You need to go.”
I knew exactly what he meant. He wanted me to disappear – to disappear into the aether, my sole means of escape, and to reappear somewhere else far away. And he knew I only had enough power for a one-elf trip.
“I’m not leaving you behind,” I said back. “We still need to convince the council!”
Avaxenon relaxed his stance and looked to me. I looked back at him. His face was calm and he had a small, sad smile.
“Bram. Majira needs you. I can handle myself,” he said.
Was he mad? Did he not care that they kill him?
I grit my teeth. And I started to laugh.
And the laugh was not my own, and it was not from joy. It was bitter and black and unbidden. And this time I didn’t try to stop it. I let it peal out long and loud and as I did tears rolled down my face and I almost doubled over.
I didn’t want Avaxenon to die. Not for me.
As my laughter echoed down the long, dim corridor, the assailants struck. Simultaneously they leapt to close the gap between us, thin blades held low, spell-hands up.
“Go!” cried Avaxenon. “Go now!”
The assailants dashed forward and they were practically upon us. It all happened in the blink of an eye, their daggers flashing and their faces grim and my laughter pealing through the hall and despite myself I grabbed Avaxenon in both arms -
and we disappeared.
* * *
For an aeon there was nothing – and yet there was light.
Matter without substance swirled in eddies and coursed in torrents of colour around us.
But there was no us – there was no me, there was no him. There was no existence and yet there we were – shattered but unbroken, part of a limitless, incomplete whole.
A land of impossible angles and unbending curves surrounded – it was here, then gone. Here forever, gone before it began.
Darkness and light, darkness and light, every minute detail distinct while bleeding together in a horrifyingly beautiful mass of all that ever was and is and could be -
Darkness before it was separate from light, night before it was apart from day, the land before the sea, and then all after – all after, split apart, then all converging again, over and over as a flower blossoms and dies, blossoms and dies, blossoms and dies
not flowers, but suns -
impossible!
a darkness so complete it erases even memories of light -
a light so complete there could never again be darkness -
nothing at every edge, something at every nothing
darkness and light, darkness and light
colours I could not comprehend, colours my mind could not consume
but I was not there – could not be there
there was no me, no him, no today or yesterday or tomorrow
swirling in eddies and torrents of colour, untouched, passing through, submersed
darkness and light, darkness and light -
then nothing.
* * *
I gasped.
The sun was in my eyes.
Was it a sun? Or a flower?
I sat up. I was lying in the dirt. Sand poured off of me, off of my rough-spun cloak. I wiped my face.
I surveyed my surroundings, still seated on the ground.
There was nothing out here. Just rocks – orange rock. Sand. Pillars of orange rock. Hillocks of sand. A desert?
Then I noticed something, a sound - I was laughing. And I couldn’t stop.
I clapped my hands to my mouth, but still the giggles came. They seeped through my fingers. Out the laughter crawled, the Black Laughter, like rats exiting a flooded burrow, the burrow was my mouth, and out they swarmed.
Then something caught my eye.
A dark shape in the sand. Dark and long and very familiar. It was lying right next to me.
It was Avaxenon.
His face was pale.
There was a sudden sinking feeling in my stomach. I reached out with a shaking hand and touched his cheek. It was cold.
“Avaxenon?” I said aloud between choking fits.
But he did not stir. Neither did his chest rise with breath. I grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him toward me, and he was limp, heavy.
“Avaxenon, please, no…”
His eyes were glassy. I reached around and hugged him close and as I did I felt something wet upon my hand, wet upon his back – and I pulled away.
I held my wetted hand up to the light. It shone ruby red. It was blood.
I looked back down to Avaxenon’s half-shut eyes.
My friend was dead.
I hadn’t been quick enough.
I used every scrap of energy, every ounce of my power and then some – I felt the awful tearing in my soul as I cast our beings through the very space of creation to escape – and yet I had been too slow. They had already stabbed him through the back, through the heart.
Avaxenon was dead.
I hugged his lifeless body and tears streamed down my face and I wept bitterly.
And all the while there was laughter.
20
The Slave
I scrounged through a heap of rubbish. Flies and hornets rose up, buzzing evilly in the hot air, then landed back down. One fly landed on my face. I did not swat it away.
Three days passed since I last ate. Now the mere thought of the thin gruel from the slave galley made my stomach grumble, my mouth
water. Three days ago I managed to steal a half-loaf of bread from the market – a feat as dangerous as hunting wild game back home. Everywhere there were guards. Everywhere. Even the merchants were armed.
My fingers found something in the stinking rubbish; something hard, leathery. I pulled it out. It was nothing of worth. I threw the tattered non-thing back into the filthy heap. The flies buzzed. I rocked back on my haunches.
There was no food to be found anywhere in this wretched city. Only in the market, bustling with folk and bristling with guards. Like an animal I was forced to slink through twisting alleyways, rummage through fetid refuse – or else be caught, returned to slavery.
With a length of tattered cloth I wrapped my head so as to cover my torn ear; for a torn ear was a sure sign of an escaped slave.
Flies crawled over me. I paid them no heed.
I stood up. The whip-slashes on my back and shoulders were scabbed over. From a low-hanging line of clothes I had stolen a loose-fitting shirt which I now wore. It was good because it did not rub against my closing wounds. Now I just needed shoes. And some money to pass the toll gates. And food.
My stomach growled again.
I stood up and wandered to the next trash pile. I repeated the process I now knew so well – kick the edges to scare the rats, then dig in.
As I reached into the rubbish something caught my eye. Out from an adjoining alley came two motley beggars. Both were hunched forward, walking sticks bearing their weight. Just meager urchins. I ignored them.
Slowly they approached me. One of them spoke, but in a tongue I could not comprehend. I did not look up.
But they did not leave. They kept trying to speak to me. I kept ignoring them. With any sense they would leave me be. Perhaps they would think I was mute.
I felt a sharp thwack against my elbow – one of the urchins hit me with his walking stick.
I stood up from the trash heap and faced them. They backed off.
Standing to my full height I towered over them. Like cockroaches they scurried away, disappearing back down the alley. I loathed such creatures; I loathed myself for being lowered to their level. We were all mangy urchins, but I was no beggar. Once I had a pair of shoes and some money in my pocket, I would leave this accursed town and never look back.
My stomach rumbled once again. And some food. First, always first, I needed food.
I went back to rummaging through the garbage.
My hands came to a burlap sac – I withdrew it from the surrounding garbage. I looked inside. There were some softening potatoes. I pulled some out, sorted through and threw away the most mouldered ones. With the small, curved knife I had taken from the slaver’s corpse I carved away the mushy rot.
A sense of grim satisfaction came over me as I used that knife. After weeks of torment at the slaver’s hand, it had been immensely pleasing to strangle the life from him.
Soon I had a pile of potatoes. I put them into a rough sack I had found outside of a grist mill and continued on. I intended to cook them somehow; I knew that eating too many raw would make me ill. Despite myself, I pulled one out and bit into it. It was chalky on my tongue, gritty on my teeth, but it filled my stomach just enough.
I rounded a corner and stopped.
Before me were the two beggars, walking sticks in hand. With them were three more beggars. They barred my path.
At first I was confused; rarely would beggars travel in groups so large. But then, looking at the way they stood, walking sticks held in both hands, I realized they intended to fight.
I almost laughed. They looked pathetic; sickly, greasy creatures, almost half my height and certainly less than half my width. They were a collection of hobgoblin and hill uyrguk.
I unslung the sack of potatoes from my back. The beggars snarled at me. I was beginning to hate the swarthy hill uyrguks – they were so very different from my tribe. Smaller, servile.
One of the beggars said something to me in a strange tongue. He shook his walking stick at me. I did not move.
The alley was narrow, the buildings high. Not even a window peered down from above. Cautiously, two of the beggars crept forward, walking sticks held out like spears.
The first one lunged. I batted his stick away and stepped back. He lunged again; I grabbed the stick and pushed back with all my weight, sending him stumbling backward.
As I did the other swept at me, cracking his walking stick against my right arm. I swung out with the sack of potatoes, narrowly missing his head.
I did not want to damage the potatoes. After my swing missed, I placed the bag on the ground.
The five beggars recoiled a few steps, but they did not retreat. I bent over to pick up the sack, keeping my eyes on them all the while. Potatoes in hand, I backed away slowly – and they followed.
My frustration was beginning to mount. Hunger gnawed at my belly. I finally had food, and now I could not even eat it. These damned beggars would hound me forever.
I put the sack back down. The beggars stopped. From my belt I drew the small, curved knife. The beggars recoiled, and one of them snickered.
One of them jabbed at me again with his walking stick. This time I snatched it in the air and wrenched it, pulling him forward. With my other hand I slashed at his throat with the small knife, raking the tip across his neck. He shrieked and fell back, letting go of the stick and clutching at the gushing wound. Blood poured through his closed fingers.
The other beggars cried out in shock. They babbled at me in their strange tongue. Immediately, two more rushed at me to get around. They were trying to encircle me. I charged the one on my right, catching his head with my shoulder and knocking him down. The other struck me across the back with his stick. With a closed fist I swung back at him, but caught only air.
I turned on him. He tried to fend me off with his stave; I pushed it aside and, with an open hand, shoved his head against the stone wall. I felt his nose squash against my palm and he screamed.
I looked around. The other two beggars were gone. They were running down the alley to get away.
But I would not let them.
Snatching up my potato sack I sprinted after them. I was upon them before they knew it.
With arms outstretched I leapt, catching them both around the shoulders. The three of us plunged to the dusty earth. They cried out as they hit the ground. I stood up and stomped on one of their heads. He went silent.
The other tried to scramble to his feet. I snatched his cloak and pulled him toward me. I caught him up in both arms and, with a sharp hug, squeezed until I heard bones crack. He screamed. Then I let him go. He slumped to the ground and lay still.
My chest heaved with exertion. I surveyed the alleyway. Five beggars, dead or dying or badly injured, all sprawled out in the dust. Sweat made the dust stick to my skin. I spat.
Then I picked up my potato sack and walked away. I ignored the moans.
But I stopped; the beggars may have things to take. They may have shoes, or better, coins.
I stooped over and searched the nearest two. Neither had shoes; just foot wrappings. There were a few small coins in little cloth purses tied around their necks. I took both.
At the other end of the alley two of the beggars still stirred. Their movements were groggy, their moans senseless. One was leaned up against the wall; his nose was flattened to his face and blood streamed onto his chest. He was wearing worn-out leather sandals. With both hands I yanked them off, pulling his languishing form away from the wall. He yelped but did not resist. I tucked the sandals under my arm and searched the other two, snapping the coin purses from off their necks. I had to be quick. I did not want to be discovered.
Satisfied that I had taken all I needed, I rounded a corner and headed to the market’s edge.
Through the labyrinth I walked until I came to a wide alley that emptied onto a street. There were many urchins there, leaning against the cool stone walls or holding out clay bowls, hoping for charity
. I sat down and pulled on the sandals. They were a bit small, but they fit well enough. Furtively I dumped all the coins into one pouch and hung that one around my neck, tucking it into my loose shirt. Then I sat there a while, watching the folks go by. I chewed on a potato.
I did not like this city. I did not like the smell; I did not like the folk. I hated this Empire of Un and all its soldiers, all its priests. I longed for home but it was so far away and I was not even sure where.
How long had I rowed? I flexed my left hand, felt the muscles ripple in my shoulder and back, studied the hardened callouses. Weeks, at least. Weeks below decks on some stinking, wormy galley. For weeks I was a slave – perhaps months.
Now for days I was a beggar. I did not want it to turn to weeks. I would not suffer being a beggar for months.
I touched the heavy coin pouch at my chest. Certainly this was enough to pass through the toll gate. So long as I kept my torn ear covered, I could get by. Then I would be out of this strange city and… then what? I did not know where I was. I did not know to how distant a land I had been carried. I had scarcely heard a familiar tongue since I leapt from the galley decks.
I looked down at my feet. They were darkened with dust. Could I really walk all the way home?
I pulled another raw potato from my sack and bit down. I knew it would make me sick but I did not care.
There must be another way home…
There was another way. By sea.
I stood up, potato still in hand. I needed to find the docks.
I made my way through the market, feeling safe with the cloth wrapped around my head, covering my ear.
If I found a ship heading east I could get home. Now that I had money I could pay – yet I doubted the few measly coins I had accrued would buy me passage. Perhaps I could find work aboard a ship instead.
The market was packed with folk. It was midday and very busy, very loud. Everywhere there were voices, there was food, and exotic animals and queer clothing. I passed by a square where slaves were being sold, their half-naked bodies roped together like cattle. The heads of the menfolk were shaved and shining.
Day of the Hunt (The Faun Quartet Book 2) Page 17