The previously shocked Richard prayed. “Ancestors bless this man’s life. Bless this man’s friends for being in the right place to bring him peace and calm. In oblivion may he escape the torture of the state of undeath, and may the living remember him for who he was, and not for what evil made of him.”
“Well said apostle,” Private Stone said as he pulled the flaming arrow out of Dunwood’s chest, followed by his own arrow. It had survived the shot and would be used again.
“Thank you and well done,” Richard said as he stepped back from the corpse.
“He’s not contagious,” Hester said as he too dropped to a knee beside Dunwood’s body. He examined it for other wounds.
“I—I know. It’s just... I’ve never faced the undead before. It’s unsettling. I apologize.”
“Don’t apologize,” Marcus said as he used a rag pulled from the back of his belt to clean the gore from his blade and shield. “Learn from this moment. Before long we’ll be swimming in the Empire’s undead. Be ready for that. Attend to the boy. He might still survive.” He tucked the rag away.
“Yes my lord,” Richard said as he walked under the porch roof of the nearby business, dragging the young man who had been choked by the dead soldier they’d just put to rest. He kneeled at the man’s side with his hands on the reddened and raw throat that threatened to kill him, and closed his eyes. He started to pray silently for the spirits to heal the teenager.
“Don’t call me that. I Lord over no one. I lead. Knight Major or Sir will suffice. Hester, what killed Dunwood?” Marcus asked as he sheathed his blade.
“Sir you never answered my question,” Hester asked as he looked at Dunwood’s body.
“Which question was that?” Marcus replied.
“How you keep track of all of our names.”
Marcus laughed—a strange, forced sound in the presence of his friend’s dead body. “It’s a curse. I remember every man that serves with me. You see it as something remarkable. I see it as a string of faces that haunt me when I try to sleep at night. Now what killed my friend?”
Hester was speechless for a moment, but he gathered his wits and gave his leader an answer. “Other than what we just did to him to put him down sir, all I can see is a small bit of blood near his belt,” Hester rolled him over almost onto his chest and pulled the gap of armor and clothing at his waist open, revealing a small dark mark on the skin. With his fingers he moved the flesh, and the mark revealed itself to be a small stab wound, no wider than a finger.
“That’s not a lethal wound,” Marcus said. “Not quickly lethal, at least. Poison. Or The Way again. Damn Fitch and his bullshit.” Marcus kicked a flat stone with his armored boot hard. It knocked against the rough stone foundation of the tannery they stood beside. “And that awful smell. Piss and rot. I don’t understand leatherworkers.” Marcus looked at the simply illustrated sign hanging above the porch. It had a crude painting of a stooped over old man hammering silver rivets into a leather bodice. To his rear was a small boy that bore a strong resemblance to the one they’d just rescued from Dunwood. The boy stirred a large vat of boiling animal hides. Tanneries were known for their stench. The hides were cured in the most awful of substances in the hot tubs. Suddenly Marcus’ brain assembled the puzzle. He looked to Richard, who had just finished his prayer over the boy, who now breathed hard, but breathed. “You said a place that smelled?”
Richard nodded as he helped the boy sit up against the porch rail. “I did. The spirit mentioned something of a stench.” Marcus made a motion as if he was sniffing the awful smell in the air, and pointed at the sign with an armor clad finger. Richard’s mind caught up. He stood and removed his back from the door of the leatherworker’s shop, stepping away from the entrance as if evil looked to him from just the other side of the shut wooden door and its single pane of narrow glass. “Oh!”
Stone nocked another arrow as he and Hester moved to their leader’s side. “Richard, if you would say a prayer for us, I would be grateful,” Marcus asked
The priest reached deep, and said moving words before they opened the door, and went inside.
Peiron Fitch heard the door above bust inward off of its hinges and clatter to the floor. He couldn’t isolate exactly how many sets of boots he heard crossing the door jamb above, but he knew it was more than enough to do him in. He prayed in his own manner, for his own salvation, as the boots moved closer to the stairs that led to his hiding place beneath the animal skins.
The main floor of the shop spilled over with dark shadows and the smell of terrible rot. The tanner had made signs that hung from the walls of his establishment that held decorative pieces of various kinds of leather and animal skins. You could reach out and touch what you wanted to purchase, and tell the shopkeeper exactly what you wanted. One sign in the far back of the shop near the stairs they needed to descend displayed the thick, plated hide of a Plainswalker.
Marcus thought of Umaryn, and his resolve quaked. He missed her, but felt glad she wasn’t here at his side. She had to be safer wherever she tread.
He put the half-pleasant thoughts of his occasional lover to the side and moved past the tables and racks of armor and clothing, towards the pitch black doorway that descended into the basement he knew Peiron hid in. As he took the first step downward, he reminded himself that he was surrounded by friends, skilled soldiers, and faith in the spirits that surely watched what they already knew would come.
Peiron heard the feet clonking across the floor with firm but cautious steps. It helped him identify that there were no less than three people searching the building. Their slow movement told him they expected danger, and that meant his two gifts to the people of Ockham had done damage. Despite his fear for the doom the men above represented, he smiled. When the first boot hit the first creaking wooden step, his smile slipped away, and he dropped into near silent prayer. He began to cast a spell.
The Way would be Peiron’s only ally if they found him.
Precious little light crept into the basement, and Marcus paused to allow his eyes time to adjust to the threatening, rancid-smelling blackness. It wouldn’t do for him to make a misstep here and now.
“Allow me,” Richard said from several steps above and behind the knight. Marcus halted and watched as the brave apostle picked up an oil lantern from a wall hook.
He opened the rear-facing tin door of the lantern to expose the wick. Richard held the lantern close to his face and whispered to an anonymous spirit, “Share with me your fire.” A beat of the heart later Marcus saw a flash of yellow light inside the lantern, and the wick ignited, giving off a warm glow. He smiled proudly at the knight, and held the lantern high; casting the fresh light into the depths the stairs fell off into. He shut the door to protect the wick from the moving air and nodded at the rest of his company.
Marcus continued his perilous descent.
The basement had uneven walls made of stones ripped from the earth at the time it was dug. They were held together in the rough square of the building by mortar that surely came from the mines of the far off Protectorate. Another small sign of the glue that held Elmoryn together that the rails were. The stones themselves were dark, much darker than the storm-cloud gray that the mortar was, and the effect on the eye with the lantern light made the basement look like a massive bee hive. Marcus’ skin shuddered under his well used armor at the thought of so many stinging insects. The acrid stench of death, bodily fluids, and old fires didn’t do any favors for the knight either. It felt like crawling into a shit-filled, insect infested sewer, even though it wasn’t.
Three vats, each big enough to boil three people at a time, were arranged along the far back wall below two flattened, thin windows. Above the glass slits letting in the trickle of useless moonlight were hammered tin hoods that led to pipes that escaped out of the basement through holes in the mortar. Ventilation as best as could be done on a rural budget. The fires below the cauldrons were no more than the faintest of embers thankfully, and that meant the
basement air was at least breathable. How bad could it get during peak business hours? Marcus shuddered again.
Between the base of the stairs that Marcus now stood at and the tubs of curing chemicals stood chest high piles of hides. Too numerous to count, and made of too many different animals to identify, the piles of hides were haphazardly laid. They looked more like miniature multi-colored mountains than the product of a master craftsman. Peiron Fitch had his choice of hiding places everywhere the eye could see in the dank hole under the shop.
Marcus halted his advance into the mysterious and threatening cellar once the other three men reached the hard packed dirt floor. Sword drawn, shield at the ready, he announced his intentions. “Anyone in this basement should announce their presence peacefully and be seen this instant. Any hesitation to do so I will interpret as hostile intent.”
One of the vats bubbled in the back of the room.
“I say again to you, Peiron Fitch, no more hiding. We know you are here. Make yourself seen peacefully and answer the questions we have for you or suffer the consequences,” Marcus’ voice had a new edge to it. One of frustration.
“Marcus?” a muffled voice called out from under one of the piles of hides.
The Knight Major knew exactly who the speaker was. “Stand and be seen apostle. You have much to answer for.” Private Stone slid out to the side and readied his bow as Richard took two steps up the stairs in retreat. His new elevation helped the lantern illuminate the darkness, casting long, bloated shadows out from the heaps of skins.
One of the giant stacks of animal hides shifted, and a moment later Peiron’s shaved head appeared behind it. Sweat ran down from his brow in dirty streams. He had a look of relief on his face. “I’m so glad it was you who found me. I’ve been attacked by the undead.”
“Is that so?” Marcus said, his feelings and purpose unshaken by Fitch’s words. “Care to give your version of the events that led to you hiding under a pile of animal hides instead of seeking out the protection of my soldiers?”
Fitch made a face that spoke of relief but Marcus didn’t buy it. The knight held his shield firm and noted the apostle made no attempt to move closer. “I checked in with some of the soldiers on the fire teams and went for a walk around to check on the other groups, when I was attacked by your second in command. What is his name? Dunwood right? He attacked me, and I fled in here and hid. Simple really.”
Marcus considered the statement, and found it unbelievable. “Richard?”
The young apostle startled at the sound of his name. “Yes Knight Major?”
“Are you able to ask the spirits if Peiron speaks the truth to me?” Marcus’ question hung in the air like a guillotine blade atop the executioner’s platform. Fitch’s head hung below it over a basket.
“I am sir. Though they may not know the truth of it. I would need only a minute to get an answer either way.”
“Your minute starts now. Fitch, if you so much as—“
Peiron’s hands came up in a reassuring, calming way. Marcus flinched, thinking it was an attack. “There’s no need to bother the spirits. I tell you the truth. Simply allow me to—“
“Shut. Your fucking mouth,” Marcus said in a grim tone that allowed for no further argument or speech. “I’ll cut your tongue out to keep you quiet while my apostle does what I bid him to. I’ll have silence on your part. I just killed my friend because I loved him. Imagine what I’ll do to someone I hate.” As if to put a period on the sentence Private Hester swung his sword in an arc, flashing the lantern light about the room like ripples in disturbed water.
Peiron’s eyes flared in amazement at how he’d been addressed. Surely the ranking apostle hadn’t ever been spoken to with such brazen disregard for decorum. But he held his tongue. Marcus had threatened to cut it out after all.
Richard licked his lips and after building a moment of courage he closed his eyes against the dim room and the angry men inside it. The world went gray again as he funneled the energy of the dead into The Way. A ghostly overlay inside his closed eyes appeared. Each mound of dead animal appeared as it was in the physical world, and behind that the giant pots where the skins were soaked and prepared for their final form. Milling about angrily in the room, wherever space could be found to stand, were a hundred spirits or more. Each stood straight, tense, and faced the spot on the floor where Peiron was. With a trembling heart Richard asked the spirits in the gray what he had to.
I need an answer to a question and quick, if any of you can humor me. A life rides on your assistance.
In a low-toned angry unison that vibrated his chest and shook the dust from the rafters they responded, Ask it.
Did Peiron kill two men tonight? Corporal Beckett? Or Sergeant Dunwood if you know of them by name?
The spirits spoke no intelligible words, but the rage that exploded outward from the gathering of the deceased and their screams said everything that decipherable words might’ve. A ring of visible and audible power thrust outward from the center of the ghostly basement and Richard was tossed back into the stairs from the force of their outburst, falling and hitting the small of his back on a hard wooden plank and nearly dropping the oil filled lantern onto his lap. Richard’s eyes opened, and once again he returned to the real. Hester and Stone both turned to look at the disheveled and disturbed apostle. Marcus had his narrowed eyes fixed hard on Fitch.
“Are you okay?” Private Stone asked Richard.
He nodded, shaking. “Yes. Nothing that won’t heal given time.” His ears hurt, and it felt as if his teeth dangled in his gums, threatening to come loose in his mouth.
“What have you learned?” Marcus asked in more of a growl than a voice.
Fitch fidgeted.
“The spirits hate him for what he’s done. They stare at him on the other side. Too many to count. I believe he is a murderer,” Richard said from his seat on the stairs.
Fitch leapt to his own defense, his hands gesticulating like the conductor of an orchestra only he could see and hear. “You can’t possibly listen to such an inexperienced apostle, Marcus. I demand that you remand me into custody until such a time comes that a more senior apostle can judge me of whatever crimes it is you accuse me of.”
Marcus responded without hesitation, but instead with decisive finality. “No. No custody for you. You’ll get a clean death and Richard’s blessing. We’ll put you to the flames and sow your ashes into the fields for the crops. It will be an honorable death. One that I am not sure you deserve.”
Peiron looked to be building an argument to the contrary right up until Marcus said the word flames. The very word made his face wrinkle, and his lip twitch and quiver. “You—“
“Would,” Marcus interrupted. “I would, Fitch. For the safety of my men and the success of this holding action against the Empire. And may the ancestors judge me right in this. Let’s get it done with. Stone, put an arrow into him.”
The archer did as he was ordered, and drew off an arrow, and sent it straight into the upper chest of Peiron Fitch, just below the line of the apostle’s collarbone. The arrow thunked home into the flesh with a wet, piercing sound followed by a release of air from Fitch that started as surprise but turned into a groan of pain. Marcus moved around the stack of hides and readied his blade to kill the apostle. Hester was at his back, ready to help.
Fitch backed up, his eyes wide and his teeth revealed in a mixture of feral rage and pain. With a finger jabbed at Marcus, he spoke words of magic. Words of anger. “Spirits who betray me, serve my words! Smite this man!”
Richard saw what happened next differently than the others did, as one who could reach out and touch the spirits ought to. The others saw a single flash of white-blue light that scalded the eyes. It appeared to be a strike of lightning right in the basement. Richard saw it all slowed in his mind’s eye. The spirits lingering on the other side of death that looked on at Peiron Fitch in anger for his crimes were drained by his will, sucked into his own body like smoke wicked out an open
window. Already insubstantial they disappeared temporarily, consumed into his flesh and soul as he channeled their eternal energy into a spell. A profound spell.
The spirits leapt out of his extended digit like a bolt of pure hatred, a tidal wave of crushing aggression, and it blasted Marcus off his feet and into the pile of hides, nearly bowling Hester over in the act.
The pure energy from the spirits ignored the trappings of armor the warrior wore, burning his skin, muscle and bone below as if his naked body had been buried under a mountain of coal and fire. The bolt struck him so severely his helm flew off, and banged against the stone foundation like a bell struck by a thrown stone. He let slip a scream as his skin and fat sizzled and sloughed off under his armor, leaving nerves, muscles and blood exposed in a torturous moment of pain and agony.
Richard already knew what to do, and as Hester leapt over his falling leader to slash at Fitch, the gathered and brave Richard jumped from his perch on the stairs to within arm’s reach of the Knight Major, words of love and adoration for the dead already on his lips. “Undo this savagery, and let this man find justice for the dead!” Richard said as he caressed the very crown of Marcus’ black hair.
The very same spirits that destroyed Marcus’ body moments before had already coalesced on the other side, and funneled their way through Richard and his body, and then into Marcus, where the devastation they had been forced to wreak on him could be undone.
The soft golden aura of healing magic washed over his shocked form like a comforting summer breeze in the shade over an afternoon sunburn. Eyes could not see beneath his protective steel, but Richard knew the skin reformed, the blood seeped back in, and the pain faded, all in an instant, all because of the love of the dead for the living.
The Echoes of Sin (The Kinless Trilogy Book 3) Page 24