131 Days [Book 1]

by Keith C. Blackmore

  “You look like shite,” someone said.

  Halm opened his eyes to see the shady figure of Goll supported by a pair of crutches. He raised a hand to shield his eyes, peering at the Kree with his mouth half-open in an ugly grimace.

  “Good thing you’re you; I might’ve said something,” Halm croaked.

  “Like what?”

  “Dunno. Something. What do you want?”

  Goll smiled and stood with the crutches jammed into his armpits. He squinted at the sun. “You. Actually.”

  Halm studied the man. He wore a short skirt that stopped mid-thigh, befitting the style of the season. A white tunic, loose, covered his body, but bandages were visible along the shoulder where the cloth stopped.

  “Where’re the others?” Halm asked.

  “Who? Pig Knot?”

  “Aye.”

  “He fought earlier this day. Won his match in perhaps the worst way possible.”

  “He got cut up?”

  Goll paused and thought about it. “I don’t think so.”

  “Then any win is a good one.”

  Standing there, balanced on his crutches, Goll seemed to think even more. Halm found that refreshing.

  “How well do you know that man? Is he a friend?” the Kree finally asked.

  Halm considered it. Pig Knot a friend? “Well, yes. He is. Sort of. He… he’s pretty much the only one who’s been around as long as I have in these games, although I have a couple of years on him.”

  “I see.” Goll threw his head back and inhaled sharply through his nose. “You didn’t accompany him to his fight this morning.”

  “Pig Knot needs no nursemaid. And I was still unconscious. I don’t even know where Muluk is off to.”

  Someone jostled Goll from behind, and he had to stamp his left foot into the ground to stop himself falling over. The offender disappeared into the crowd, but Halm saw how Goll’s arms had been cut up and bandaged by the Butcher of Balgotha. He remembered the Kree saying that his right shoulder might have been broken as well, so just using the crutches would probably be an agonizing challenge. The old champion had danced a jig on his flesh before Goll had killed him.

  “You want something to drink?” Halm asked him.

  “Me? Now?” Goll frowned and shook his head. “Too much drinking going on around here. No, thank you.”

  More for me then, Halm thought.

  “You and I have to talk.” Goll stared straight into his eyes. “We have some work before us. Or at least I have work to do. You have a decision to make.”

  Halm squinted in the sun’s glare. “Sounds serious.”

  “I’m going to meet with the Gladiatorial Chamber this day. I’m going there now, in fact.”

  “What? Why?”

  “To see what must be done to set up my own house.”

  Halm felt his mouth go dry, and he wasn’t sure if it was from the drinking the night before or something else. He kept his eyes on the man before him as he lifted his nearby pitcher and took a drink from it. When the water was gone, Halm got to his feet, his great belly quivering, and tucked the pitcher under one arm. He didn’t bother to brush the dust from his black breeches or bandages.

  “You really want to do this?” he asked.

  “I do.”

  Halm shrugged. “Let’s go then. At the very least, I’ll be interested to see where it all leads. Which way? It’s next to the Pit, isn’t it?”

  “It is. Part of the Pit, really. This way, but walk slowly. I can barely stay on these things”—he indicated the crutches—“as it is with my arms and shoulder. The healer said I only need to keep off my toes for a few weeks. And I don’t think my shoulder’s broken like before. I can still move it.”

  “Hard to take a piss?” Halm joked gruffly.

  Goll regarded him with a mildly distasteful look.

  “Only asking,” the Zhiberian muttered. The Kree wasn’t Pig Knot; that was for certain. He placed a hand to his own covered wounds, the bandages stained with dust and dirt. “You think the Chamber will see us?”

  “They will.”

  Halm looked at his companion and saw the determination on his battered face.

  “They must,” the Kree said simply.

  The Zhiberian grunted and idly adjusted the sword at his waist. They walked through the crowds, keeping to one side and away from most of the traffic in the middle. The smell of the city could always be improved upon as every so often even Halm wrinkled up his nose at an old man who smelled as if he hadn’t washed in months. Also, the merchants were guiding strings of horses, goats, or cows, not in the least concerned with the heaps of dung—collectively and colloquially known as cow kisses—their animals left behind. The Zhiberian had no trouble passing through the mob. Big and ugly as he knew himself to be, all he had to do was keep a hard face about him, and the masses parted like wheat. It was even easier this day than most since he looked as though he’d been in a fight. Goll fell in step behind him, moving along as best as he could on his crutches. Bare clotheslines spanned the main street, but down the smaller alleyways, more lines hung and drooped with washed clothes, some colourful, some grey in the shade.

  As they walked, Halm noticed a leather worker and stopped in his tracks.

  “What is it?” Goll asked from behind.

  “I need a new scabbard,” Halm told him. “Wait here, would you?”

  “Don’t be too long.”

  Halm didn’t respond to that, letting his silence do the talking. He would take as long as he needed to get what he wanted done. The leather maker, a middle-aged man with a chin full of rusty stubble, sat in the middle of a wooden stall that ran far back and ended in a wall of curtains. On tables, fine leather scabbards for all manner of blades were on display, and the merchant paused for a moment, looking up from his stitching as Halm closed with one table.

  “Ho, leather worker.” Halm’s voice carried over the bustle of the people. “Can you make me a sheath for this?”

  With that, he removed the scabbard from his waist and handed it over.

  The merchant took it from him and turned it about, extracting the sword and nodding favourably. “Mademian. Very nice. I can put something together, but it will cost you. Too bad I can’t adjust one of the scabbards already made.”

  “When can you have it done?”

  “Come back tomorrow. I’m not that busy. What’s your name?”

  “Halm of Zhiberia. And best be careful with that piece. It has… memories attached to it.”

  “Sentimental, are you?” The man smirked.

  Halm scowled. “What did you call me?”

  The leather maker cleared his throat. “Nothing. Have no worries. It’ll be here when you come back tomorrow. You can pay me then.”

  Mulling over whether or not he’d just been insulted and whether he should slap the punce in front of him, Halm eventually turned and left. He rejoined a waiting Goll.

  “Buying a scabbard?” Goll asked him.

  “I am. When one has coin, it’s best to spend it.”

  Goll didn’t say anything to that, and Halm wondered if he had misjudged the man somehow. The Kree was becoming increasingly more serious as the day went on. Halm really didn’t know anything about him other than he was from Kree and he had killed Baylus, who had spared Goll in their fight only to lose his life to him.

  “Let’s be off then.” Goll swung away on his crutches, pushing back into the crowds and leaving Halm to catch up. The Zhiberian soon stepped around the Kree and resumed his place as a divider of people.

  “You’re a serious one, aren’t you?” Halm asked, splitting his attention between the masses and Goll.

  “What?”

  “I said, ‘You’re a serious one, aren’t you?’”

  “You’re not?”

  “Seddon, no.” Halm chuckled. “Not since birth. Too much going on around me to be that way. I try to just live and make my way through it all.”

  “I see,” Goll said pointedly. “And how has that w
orked out for you?”

  “Not bad thus far.”

  “This is not bad?”

  “Er… yes.” But Halm wasn’t so sure anymore.

  “When I look at you, do you know what I see?”

  Halm wasn’t certain he wanted to hear this. It sounded far too serious, and him still partially hung over. It was a wonder his headache was gone, but his innards still ached.

  “What?” he finally asked, deciding it would be good for a chuckle.

  “I see a man with little push and motivation but fat with potential. A man with little, if that, to his name, who deals in life or death games for the amusement of the people, while there is a war on, and ignoring the gathering dangers beyond Sunja’s walls. Living in ignorance as you are, I see you dead perhaps by year’s end. If not sooner.”

  Halm slowed in his tracks at the mention of Sunja’s walls and turned around to appraise the man as he prattled on.

  And Goll did. “I see a man who would jump at the chance to better himself if the opportunity arises, for he’s smart enough to know this life will be the death of him, but by Seddon above, he has no idea of how to better his lot. So he placates himself by getting drunk when he has the coin. Comforts himself with hired wenches if need be. Tells himself life isn’t something to be taken seriously while searching for that very thing that will save him—though he doesn’t know what it is. And who jokes about his life as if it’s no more than cow kisses dotting the road.”

  Goll stopped then, locking eyes with the bigger Zhiberian and not backing down in the least.

  “That’s what I see.”

  Halm stared into the depths of the Kree’s brown eyes and saw, even felt, a man who would start swinging the very crutches he walked with if Halm took a swing at him. And he believed that Goll expected him to swing at him. He had the sense to see that, but why would the Kree say such a thing to him?

  “Why are you saying this to me?” Halm finally asked without a shred of humour in his voice. “I’ve done nothing to you.”

  “Sometimes, the hardest hits come with words,” Goll said, barely heard over the din of the crowds milling around them, “and they also do the most good.”

  With that, Goll moved back a step and went around Halm, leaving him to stare after the smaller man. He thought for a moment, weighing the Kree’s stinging words. Not too many men had the balls to say such a thing to his face, and in the middle of the street, no less, before simply walking away.

  “Saucy bastard,” Halm said. He hurried to catch up.

  To the north of Sunja’s Pit, placed seamlessly up against the wall of the arena, stood the building that housed the Gladiatorial Chamber. Like the arena, it was built of brick, stone, and heavy timbers, but it rose far above the highest seats and the walls of the Pit, and it was rumoured that the members of the Chamber could actually see the matches from the highest points. Grey and white rock composed the outer shell of the five-story building. A row of six white marble columns, their bases too wide to embrace, rose up from street level to an overhang, offering protection from harsh summer rains if needed. Near the bottom, their surfaces were chiselled into scenes depicting small battling figures and ferocious animals. A pair of great oak doors fashioned to fit an archway lay just beyond the marble giants. Six Skarrs stood on either side of the entryway, their backs against a wall cut with a scattering of windows fixed with closed wooden shutters. Each warrior carried sword, shield, and spear. Their visors remained fixed ahead, watching the pair of battered men as they drew closer and entered the shadow of the Gladiatorial Chamber.

  6

  Goll hobbled straight for the main doors, and Halm expected the Skarrs to bar the Kree’s way at any moment. Where it went from there, Halm only hoped they would be able to walk away. The city guard remained motionless even as Goll stopped and jerked his head towards the doors, indicating that Halm open it. The Zhiberian did so, pushing them inwards and holding them open until Goll hopped past on his crutches.

  Even as Halm followed his companion inside the building, he expected someone to shout orders to throw them out.

  On the walls inside, intricate scratchings of arena battles adorned gleaming sheets of copper. The pictures faded into the height of the ceiling. Despite the shutters being closed, some of the higher windows allowed thin shafts of light to spear down and mark the walls at steep angles. Torches burned from wall sconces, and a black iron brazier dominated the middle of the foyer, burning some exotic incense that Halm didn’t expect at all. It felt out of place. The area seemed more like a temple of sorts. Benches made from heavy wood with cracked surfaces spotted the floor in places while six doors, some opened and some closed, ringed the walls at even intervals.

  A group of four men, two of whom sat on the benches, turned and eyed the newcomers. The two standing men, who faced Halm and Goll as they entered, watched them with expressions of disdain. They were well built and casually dressed in light clothing, but there was no mistaking the ominous strength in their limbs. One of the sitting men, an older one, regarded them over his shoulder and then turned and took a closer look before smiling smugly and showing his back once more. He spoke something to his companions, which caused the two standing to break into leers.

  Halm didn’t like them from the start.

  Goll drew up on his crutches and studied the six doors. Officials moved past the open ones like pictures leaving their frames, carrying scrolls in and out of view or undertaking some unknown organizational tasks.

  Goll started for the nearest one, his crutches echoing in the vast foyer. Halm followed him.

  “Where one goes, the other follows.”

  Halm heard quite clearly that time and cast a frown in the direction of the foursome. The pair standing continued to eye him like meat gone bad while the older one, wearing a light beard of grey, caught Halm’s eye and winked at him. The Zhiberian frowned once more, no longer liking the feel of the room.

  “You there,” Goll asked of a robed official as he passed from one room to the next, “where might I find the Chamber members? I wish to speak with them.”

  Halm heard the four men chuckle behind him.

  The official, a middle-aged man losing his hair, stopped in his tracks and blinked at Goll. “Are you supposed to be here this day?”

  “No.”

  This brought more chuckling from the men near the brazier. Halm half-turned towards them and eased his hands to his hips in warning.

  “Oh ho, that one seems upset now.” Grey Beard smiled slyly, his eyes cruel. He didn’t look away from the Zhiberian. “Imagine that.”

  “You have to have an appointment to see the Chamber,” the official said dourly, not hearing the men beyond.

  Goll didn’t seem to hear him. “I wish to see them this day, if possible.”

  Another rash of snarky giggles came, with one man even snorting and shaking his head. Halm felt his blood rise, wondering what was so damned funny. Then it struck him like a thrown spear. The four were gladiators, gladiators that belonged to a house or school. They all wore swords, with the exception of Grey Beard. The realization made Halm chew on one corner of his mouth, mulling dark thoughts.

  “That’s impossible,” the official said.

  “Please ask,” Goll kept on.

  “I just said it’s impossible.”

  “I’m asking you to ask.”

  “You cannot simply enter and ask to see the Chamber. There are rules, you know.”

  “Really? And what are those?”

  The official let out an exasperated sigh. “You need to schedule a meeting. I’ve just told you that. The Chamber is very busy during the season.”

  Goll screwed up his face as he took in the almost-empty foyer. “Well, I’m asking for a meeting now.”

  “You can’t have a meeting on the same day.”

  “Why not?”

  The official rolled his eyes. “It isn’t done that way.”

  “Perhaps it should be done that way.”

  More scald
ing snickers came from behind. The evil smile on Grey Beard stretched even farther, and he leaned in the direction of Goll, finding great amusement in the conversation and sadly shaking his head. He nodded to Goll but directed his words to Halm.

  “Your man is persistent; I’ll give him that.”

  Halm wanly smiled back. He was tired of these bastards already. “In your hole, old tit.”

  The startled look on Grey Beard’s once-smug features pleased Halm immensely.

  “Look—” Goll struggled forwards on his crutches, speaking in a low voice. Halm’s attention became wholly centered on Grey Beard and his men.

  “You’ve got a smart mouth, dog.” Grey Beard's unpleasant smile returned. “The last man to speak to me in such a tone disappeared.”

  “Probably went looking for your mother.” Halm bared his own unpleasant smile. “If she shat out a pup like you, best for all concerned to sew the hole shut before anything else dropped out.”

  The men about Grey Beard became visibly tense, but the old one—their leader, Halm assumed—smiled on.

  “At least I know my mother,” Grey Beard came back, leering.

  “You’re a right happy topper, aren’t you?” Halm immediately fired. “Why is that, I wonder? Unfit in the head, are you? Simple-minded?”

  “Simple enough to—”

  “Because,” Halm spoke over Grey Beard, seeing the man’s mouth quivering at the corners. “I pity simple-minded idiots like yourself. Truly. I see you have three punces to walk you around. That’s a good thing. Which one cleans your ass? Hmm? Or do you just leave it in the street when the urge takes you—just like a cow kiss?”

  Grey Beard’s face twisted in on itself. His companions were all ready to pounce now, and for the first time, Halm saw just how large they were, and powerful looking. The brute that had been sitting next to Grey Beard even had an eye-patch draped across his left socket.

  Though he didn’t show it, Halm winced at the fact that he had left his blade with the leather maker.

  “You’ve got a sharp tongue, youngster.” Grey Beard seethed.

  “Not as sharp as yours, I wager, to service the ass cracks of those three around you. You must pull it out once in a while. Why else are they just standing there? Hm? How much do you charge them a go? Or is it free all round?”