“Aye, they are in desperate need of swords. I’ve been telling my father the same for months, but he’ll only send them debtors and prisoners.”
Ogdon looked again to the sigil on the stranger’s cloak. “Your father?” he asked.
“Lord Gregander Blackheart… the second,” the stranger added with a smile. “That makes me Gregander the Third, heir of Duskhall; and I suppose that makes you a lucky one. That wasn’t very smart, lad, you telling me who you are. That bounty is backed by real gold. I’ve seen it myself, and so have the trolls roaming the roads and the woods and the ferries on the south bank. If it weren’t me who found you, you’d be tied in knots and tossed in with the brackdragons.” He paused and looked over the lake, then toward the moon, a faint gray gloom in a starless sky. “I’m still curious as to what you’re doing out here all by yourself. But the night’s dying, and I’ve yet to catch myself a new pair of boots. Tell me, lad, have you ever been out on the bog before?”
Sylvertre shook his head, glancing toward the knoll where his companions slept. “I should get back to the others. If the captain were to discover I’m gone—”
“Bah, that’s some shit.” Gregander chuckled. “It’ll be another few hours before the ass crack of dawn, and I’d rather have company if I’m not like to catch anything.”
“How can I trust you won’t turn me in?” It was the last of Ogdon’s inhibitions. He would have accepted any response, yet what he received was more than he expected.
Blackheart gazed at the knoll and told him, “Because if I were wanting to do that, I’d just gig you instead and tell my old man about your friends on the hill. Now, are you coming?”
Sylvertre nodded, blushing at the blunders he’d made, at the ones he was likely making now as they climbed together into the broad, flat boat. Gregander hooked his lantern to the bow, and with the squire in toe, shoved off his vessel with a huge, spruce pole. They were on the water a few minutes or so before the first word was spoken. They were an eerie few minutes. Every direction Ogdon looked was yellow-tinged mist reflecting the light of their candle lantern. Nothing else seemed to exist except them and the boat and the cold, black, bitter water. An owl shrieked from the darkness beyond the fog, then Blackheart spoke, his breath joining the bog-mist.
“So, what were you planning on doing with that sword all on your own? I don’t imagine I found you on the bank by chance.”
The squire blushed again. “I thought you were a bounty hunter. I thought that if there was just one that I could handle it on my own. The others look down on me because I’m a lord’s son—they’re all kin to lowly knights or disfranchised nobles. I wanted to prove to them wrong, that their opinion of me is just jealousy. I wanted—” Sylvertre stopped and considered if he might be saying too much. He didn’t know this man sitting across from him, bearing the symbol of a treasonous house, but somehow he trusted him. He’d not told Ogdon to shut up or that he was an idiot. He seemed truly to be listening. “I wanted Jael to respect me, for her to look at me the way she looks at the captain. If you’d been a mercenary instead and I’d beaten you myself, she’d have no choice but to be impressed.”
Gregander sat arms crossed and shaking his head. “I should have known a lass was involved. What else makes a man do something so foolish? Well let me tell you, lad, you had the right idea. Only, killing a man is messy business. Just look at your poor Captain Gildmane. He lops off one reprobate head and half of the west is out to hang him.”
“Aren’t you angry about that too?” the squire blurted, regarding for the first time the familial connection. “Wasn’t Harold your brother?”
“Aye,” Blackheart spat into the impenetrable waters, “he was my brother, and more so than I, he was my father’s son—Pa’s favorite, I mean—both him and Byron. The day they left for your damned capital, I prayed neither would ever come home again. Now my brother’s back and with a fire in his eyes, ambitious. But that’s another tale for another time. I want to hear more about this girl.”
“Well,” answered Ogdon, unsure how to approach the question. He’d never truly thought it through before. Now that he tried, he found himself less and less certain of his own emotions so that his feelings fumbled out of his mouth. “She’s… unique. Like a daylily: sensitive and delicate yet tough as any of our squires, and better with a sword too. I only wish I was half so skilled. She learned it from her father, and he was a knight of the Temple Guard. Paladin Gardner said she moves just like him.”
The heir of Duskhall mussed his thick black hair. “God save you southerners. Why you would want a woman who moves like a man is beyond me, lad, but if the sword hasn’t turned her into half a lad herself, I think I can help you out. You see, we in the west haven’t lost our common sense. For instance, this lassie you’re fawning for. Every man north of the Serpent’s Tail could tell you that daughters with strong fathers want strong men. It’s just a common fact. So, I know you’re wondering, ‘how do you show a lass how tough you are?’ It’s like I said, you’re in the right boat with your heroic notions, but I say you need a better pole to push with.” Gregander held out his bifurcated spear. “Tell me, lad, have you ever done a gig?”
And from that second onward, for hours drifting atop the algae-green lake, Ogdon listened to his host recount half a dozen exploits of what he dubbed, “maidenhead hunting.” With zealous jubilation, he described every element: whether it was predawn or dead of night, the stars and the season and the shape of the moon, what kind of gig he used and what kind of girl he was after, and the stories he told to get her heart rapping hard in her chest and breathless at the size of the brackdragon when finally they found it.
Then Gregander delved into the details of his western tradition. In this, he became increasingly enthused, raving happily on the proper way to thrust, where to aim, what to do when the brackdragon dives or rolls or tries to bite back. By then, Sylvertre was lost in his imagination. Already was he contriving his night with Jael. He had the perfect tales in mind—one to get her on the water, the other once they found themselves adrift in the mist under a pale, gray moon. His night of head hunting couldn’t come soon enough.
A warmthless, white sun had long topped the trees to the east of camp by the time Ogdon found the bank again. He’d passed it several times during the final hours of night with only a dying lantern to guide him—one of three parting gifts: a gig, a boat, and an old candle lantern bestowed by the heir of Duskhall with wishes of good fortune as they separated on the southwestern bank. They’d provided no such luck thus far, thought Ogdon after scouring the southern and eastern shores for his companions. He hoped that meant the gifts had saved their luck for when he’d need it more.
Now, in the gray of day, the muddy bank looked naught but mundane. Gone were the ghasts and the chattering demons. Only the fog and the high hill remained, and even they seemed smaller, shabbier, barren. The tents were gone—the horses, gone—nothing left of the fire pit save for a pile of ash salts. And all around were hoofprints, deep cleaves and clods from iron shod destriers, scattered leads in every direction. They’d left him.
“They left without me,” Ogdon reflected aloud the sudden grip of despair over his thoughts, Or do they think I left them? “God,” he said, like the prayer of a dead man being led to his crucifixion. He looked around again at where the horses hooves had torn into the ground. If he could just track them down, catch up and explain, maybe he could save himself. But the prints they left were purpose made to lead astray pursuers, a precaution they’d be taking for the rest of their days in the western lands. There was no way he could find them, no way to catch up, no bargain to be struck with God or fate. The weight became too much. Ogdon collapsed to his knees on the rocky soil, felt his fear become anger and his anger a flash of hatred as he flung his sword and lantern and heard the glass shatter on a stone. The squire cringed at that, already the passion dissolving, then he crawled after his discarded weapon, abashed of his tantrum. He went immediately to wiping what dirt tha
t he could. But as the mud came off onto his sleeve and he saw the scratches and rolled edges on his steel, tears peeled from his eyes. He was a fool, a milksop, and this was the proof—that they would up and leave him to the wolves and the wilderness in the middle of winter in a forsaken land. It made him shiver, knowing now he was truly alone, feeling the numb going from his toes and fingers—replaced by the bitter cold.
A rolling thunder pounded in the distance, the familiar sound of galloping hooves. Ogdon didn’t look. He didn’t believe he would survive if it turned out not to be his companions, and it likely wasn’t. Perhaps Blackheart had betrayed him, or maybe they were pagan horses with naked riders who would catch and flay him and stew his bones. Sylvertre was considering which he would prefer when Jael called out to him, riding hard and leading his horse. His eyes filled with tears again, and he muddied his face trying to wipe them away on his sleeve.
“Thank God,” she started, dismounting with an expression which Ogdon had never thought he’d see. It was something between remorse and joy; and when she spoke, it was with a genuine smile on her lips as she helped him struggle to his feet. “Thank God you’re alive. Are you wounded anywhere? We followed your tracks to where a boat had shored and thought that maybe you’d been captured. What happened to you? Where have you been?”
Sylvertre grabbed onto her sleeves as if they were the inviting hands of an angel. “Come with me,” he said, pulling himself up. “There’s still time. I’ll show you.”
Leonhardt pulled away from him, her face twisted with bewilderment. “No, we need to wait here. The others are out scouting the lake looking for you. They should be back soon. You should rest, maybe change into your gambeson. You’re covered in mud; this wind will give you a chill.”
“But there’s no time!” Ogdon raved, “If we don’t go now, it’ll be too late.” He began down the knoll, moving quickly and against Jael’s protests, yet she followed after him as he hoped she would, and before long they were together on the shore. The broad, square boat was there as well, wedged in the mud not an inch from where he left it. He gestured for her to climb inside. “Come on, we have to go out on the lake. I can’t wait to show you.”
Leonhardt stopped short. “Ogdon, are you alright? Why don’t you just say what it is you want to show me? You can tell me at camp, but we need to get back. I never tied up the horses. And the captain might return any second.”
“Exactly!” Sylvertre snapped. He could feel the blood pooling in his face, the hate seething in his heart. He tried his best not to direct it at Jael. “What I mean is that the captain won’t allow me to show you. That’s why we have to go now, before he gets back.” He turned to face her, his thighs pressed against the side of his boat, his breath quickening in pace with his nerves. And the morning mist was thick. His vision to blurred.
“Ogdon!”
He heard her shouts and the sounds of boots sloshing and thumping as she climbed in after him. She was asking him something, picking him up off the floor of the boat, but he couldn’t understand or get his tongue to work. But he could feel in one hand the tremendous spruce pole and was coherent enough to tell which way the ground was. That proved enough, for the moment Jael managed to prop him into a seated position, he sunk the boat pole as far as it would go into the water and shoved off with all his might.
His cognition returned. They were adrift, slowly yet surely, Leonhardt standing above him, fretting back and forth between him and the shore. Then her focus turned to the pole—too late. Sylvertre was watching her, so when she lunged, he was one step ahead and flung the pole into the water. They watched it disappear into the morning fog before Jael tore into him.
“What in Hell is wrong with you? Did the Devil get to your head? How are we supposed to get back? Why would you—” Her throat suddenly swelled in a fit of coughing. It lasted nearly a minute, and half again as long till finally she uttered the word, “Mist.” She coughed again. “It’s this mist! Have you been breathing this all night?”
Ogdon shook his head. “No, no, it’s not that. I truly wanted to show you where I was, what I was doing.” He picked up the gig he’d left in the boat and leaned it against his shoulder, posing almost the way Gregander held himself: broad, spacious, imposing. “I met the heir to Duskhall last night, out here on the water. He taught me about hunting the brackdragons. They say they’re big enough to swallow a man whole. I wanted to show you one before we left. I thought we could hunt one together.”
Jael slumped despondent in the broad, flat boat—placed her face into her hands, began rubbing her temples. “Please, stop this. You’re exhausted. You’re not in your right mind. You don’t know what you’re saying.”
“No, truly! I mean it! You’ll see. If it isn’t brackdragons, perhaps it’ll be bounty hunters or maybe renegade Watchers or pagans or even witches. You can hear them at night, cackling and howling. Maybe you know the stories too. How they lure maids and girls and skin them for their youth.”
“Those are just milk-tales, Ogdon. I swear, the swamp has made you mad. How are we ever going to get back? And what if we drift too far south? Duskhall sits on the lake’s edge.” She gazed up into the steel gray sky.
Sylvertre’s demeanor fell suddenly dark. “Why do you want to go back to him so badly?” His thoughts were of Jael and Trey alone in their tent, of what might have happened between them. “Is he so much better? Or is it that you just hate me? Why? What have I done to deserve being spit on? Haven’t I stood up for you? What has he done aside from throw you to the wolves?” His voice carried over open water, flat, echoless.
For a long time after, there was silence. Then finally she said, staring into the muck and the bubbles, and the algae, “You’re right. You have been kind to me, during the Struggle and with Paladin Corvin. I should have appreciated that more. I shouldn’t have said those things to you on the road. It wasn’t your fault, you didn’t know about the plan.” She paused, looked up and locked eyes with him. “Thank you, Ogdon. If we had more time, I’d gladly go hunting with you, but we need to get back. You need to rest and to clear your head, and I’m certain the others are worried sick. Do you know which way is the shore?”
Ogdon nodded slowly, unsure if he felt overjoyed or disappointed. He pointed over the stern of the boat. “I think it’s this way. The water might be shallow enough yet that we could push with the gig.” He stuck the hunting spear shaft first into the lake. Pieces of green broke apart on the surface. He hit something soft. It disappeared, and bubbles frothed on the face of the water. Then there was a knock against the bottom of the boat. “Did you feel that?” he asked. She nodded and drew her sword. Another knock. The screech of an owl like a demon in the distance. Bubbles. Silence…
The jaws of Hell burst forth from the water, a sheen black snout replete with bone daggers rendering to splinters the side of their boat. At once, it sunk it into the noxious abyss, and with it went the squires. The cold hit Ogdon like the kiss of death as he plunged beneath the algae. The breath went out of him, as did his memory—everything Blackheart said of killing these brackish demons dissolved in darkness. Into the gray, then into the light. He burst to the surface, blind for the sulfuric burning in his eyes, but he heard Jael scream a warrior’s cry, and he felt teeth sink through leather and wool, deep into his ankle. Down again the devil dragged him—torturous—just enough so that he couldn’t breathe but so that he could feel the air above and his leg below being crushed. In the cold, the pain came slowly, growing like the fire in his lungs desperately consuming what little air was left to them.
Then an angel’s voice boomed, loud as a trumpet blast, smothered under the water, though it was clear to Ogdon that she was calling his name. So he opened his eyes to the caustic bog and saw the steel flash of frost-white lightning—the wrath of God falling upon the demon between sickly-green eyes, slashed and ignorant of mercy. There was a shimmer in the water, a shiver, a shaking of the beast as its jaws released and Sylvertre found himself floating helpless on the surf
ace, his head resting on the bank, Jael standing over him, her body drenched in acid algae, her sword soaked with dragon blood.
Seventeenth Verse
They were a week’s march into the Tsaazaar, two seasons gone since the start of their journey. So much had changed: the golden steppes of Babylon exchanged for ocean and mountain range and now the red death of the heathen wastes. Adam considered himself as well—Ba’al, Magdalynn, and Adnihilo—their hair long, their faces hollow, their bodies work-hardened like the edge of a bronze blade. Eyes forward and toward the east. With blistered feet, they sought the end of the world where they might find the key to unlocking the Bridge of Babylon.
“There’s a city out there, isolated from the Mephistine trade posts. Old Iisah,” Ba’al had explained the day they’d departed Qi Shi Monastery. “They were the one of the Impii tribes before the building of Babylon—before the Bridge. The Scribes’ records in Pareo say they fled across the sea and the desert and settled on the River Vereringeks. So that’s where we’re headed. The priestess there might know what we need.”
To bring down the walls that hold back the promise of revelation. Adam never thought it possible he would live to see the prophesies fulfilled, yet now that the pieces had all fallen into place, nothing else could better explain the suffering he was made to endure. He was sure of it, that the false prophet reigned and that his armies had already begun staining the earth with innocent blood. He thought of Babylon, then of what was next to come—the Anarch Prince, and then the Messiah—in the interim: corruption, war, disaster, and disease. His only uncertainties were how far it had come and what role precisely they were to play—assuming any of them would make it that far.
The Tsaazaar had proved harsher than their preparations. Even in winter, the sun ravaged the landscape, bleeding the very air of moisture and the soil of life. It left their lips stale and arid as the desert dunes and scorched whatever skin showed from under the gray cloaks Brother William had given as parting gifts. They were a boon during the day, and at night, a godsend; for when the white sun plunged and the yellow moon hung high in the firmament, the warmth went with the northern winds, and the yawn of Hell froze over the wasteland. It was a wonder anyone could live in such conditions, enough to make even a pastor’s son skeptical. Their rations—another parting gift—were two days gone, and the days before their exhaustion were nothing but gnawing on hard rice to save what little water was left to their skins. Now that, too, was depleted, so they shambled like skeletons carrying their empty packs, and Adam with Magdalynn withered thin as tumble-grass.
Salt, Sand, and Blood Page 24