Steel Sirens

by Maxx Whittaker

  He spits the dry, gold grass like a harpoon and jumps to his feet. He’s huge. Nearly as tall as me and built like a man who fights an anvil all day, not a boy whose voice still breaks.

  “That what you got from Bri’s hide-lashing?”

  “Part of it,” I admit.

  Kel stalks inside, head shaking. “Bollocks, Ew. She’ll have murdered us both before you get your head straight about her meaning.”

  “Do you want to go hunting?” I call after him.

  He shuts the back door. And slides home the bolt.

  Something is wrong, more wrong than I imagined. If I were around more... If I could admit that Briet is on to something, that I take more than solace in the wood, things would unquestionably be more right.

  But I can’t and they aren’t.

  So back into the wood I go.

  2

  Sunlight shifts from shadowless high point to make a forest floor of distinctly east-leaning tally marks.

  I’ve followed a boar path of destruction for longer than I should along the last low foothills east of Braemar. When was the last time I went so long without hearing a grunt or a rustle of undergrowth? No beasts, just signs.

  Oak trees bare of any leaves cling to a torn hillside, leaned at a precarious angle. Saplings jut up from continually tilled soil like skeletal fingers to snare and trip, some ugly and tenacious variety of tree able to withstand the beast’s abuse. Once, the miller’s dog got caught up in these holes and overgrowth while chasing the wild pigs. They turned on the dog, stomping and butting him to death. He’d been chasing them from the remains of several winter gardens reduced to mud pits filled with onion tops and chard scraps.

  If I were a proper game warden with hounds and spears, we’d have fuller smokehouses and a lot less boar, that’s for damn sure.

  I still, close my eyes, and stretch my awareness through the wood. Its sounds, scents, and something else, intangible, that I’ve never been able to name.

  The stench is all around, urine and feral musk, but the odor is no different than the trees, a part of the forest. This isn’t a new or immediate smell; like my bear this morning. The pigs have moved elsewhere.

  Tracks veer from the pig run where a new path has been torn through the undergrowth.

  The river. Dammit. My plan had been to shoot from the treetops. Hye’s outwash is a narrow ribbon of river cut by sandbars and banded by wide stretches of bleached-bone gravel and silt. No trees and no shelter for taking a boar.

  This doesn’t discourage me; I didn’t become village ranger by accident.

  I crouch and pick my way down a low berm, the last green bit of the Hye’s floodplain.

  A steady breeze comes off the Hye, cold and sharp year-round, the breath of glaciers somewhere high above the upper swell. For the first time, I catch a pungent manure-musk of wild game.

  My thought about the bear wasn’t far off. Nearly all the boar of the eastern track are crowded onto sandbars between the Hye’s pewter swells. Some struggle to swim to the farther eastern shore. Roan bristles jut from their necks and backs in defense.

  They feel what I’ve felt all day, that something is wrong, but unlike the pigs, I ignore my gut. Thom wants meat, he’s expecting a good spread, and I’ve a handful of hours to make good on my task.

  And my luck isn’t all gone; two thick-haunched males pace the waterline a few yards away, standing guard. I’m downstream from them; if I herd the pair just right, I can use crags and trees along the Upper Swell to my advantage.

  I roll my ankles, shoulders, hold a long breath to stretch my lungs. A first tremble of anticipation must pass before I nock an arrow.

  The pair strut away. They turn around each other, bumping and stumbling, letting out angry screee noises and jabbing each other with armored snouts. I guess there’s a comfort in knowing boar are jackasses to each other and not just everyone else.

  Air fills my chest. I hold it there and draw my arrow. Air seeps into my limbs and steadies them. A creak of yew and string measures inches and replaces my heartbeat.

  A hip, a flank; I let fly.

  My arm and eye communicate with instinct. No reason to wait; I already know my shot will land true.

  I jump from the berm and run.

  The second beast spins and squeals, tearing off into the water. My prey is silent save for a slavering huff as it cants, kicking up gravel. He runs north along the outwash just like I’d hoped.

  I dodge nests of driftwood gathered by the wind and measure the crimson line painted atop river rocks. My arrow juts from the boar’s flank, but he’s hardly bleeding; this won’t be fast or easy.

  He veers off into the trees and toward the cliffs and I eat my words. This is exactly what I’d hoped.

  Sweat beads my hair. On the second slope, my legs start to burn. I can hear the pig but he’s just out of sight. He crashes up a scrubby cliff face and into a narrow slash eroded into the hill.

  The high-sided trench cuts a zigzag into the land. It’s longer than I expected; the river bend doesn’t seem so deep from shore. Wet chunks of shale skitter down the walls, carried on a trickle from an underground spring. I smell the boar over a mossy mineral odor but can’t hear him. I pause at each leg of the cut and look and listen in the shadow.

  That is, until I reach the crag’s end, a pinched space that stretches ten or fifteen feet up toward white afternoon light.

  “Where in the hell…” Overhead, all around; I peer for a cave or alcove.

  Screeee!

  The boar screams down into the ravine. Its sound carries on a small avalanche of rocks. I make the mistake of thinking the pig has fallen, is wounded. My bow isn’t ready.

  He charges from shadows back toward the ravine’s mouth. Shame at not being vigilant mingles with a suspicion this wild pig tricked me into becoming prey.

  Nock, draw. Thunk.

  My arrow imbeds in the folds above his chest.

  And another.

  He shrieks and doesn’t slow down. There’s no time for another shot.

  I throw my bow aside, crouch and brace against the chipped wall.

  His head slashes, tusks eager to cut. My hunting blade is useless.

  Lunging in, I grab both arrows and shove. My shoulders burn, elbows flexed all wrong.

  The boar’s hooves spray wet grit into the air, showering us both. He squeals and thrashes.

  My hands start to slide on the arrow shaft, and I grunt out a curse, muscles straining. It’s so gods-damned strong.

  It takes a cold second to realize I still feel fletching against my palm. My hands aren’t sliding, the pig is impaling himself to reach and gore me.

  A tusk buries in the leathers at my gut. I grab it, hold fast while he snaps at my wrists. It takes three good kicks to drive my arrows home. I lose my grip on the second one; only a well-timed jump saves my arse.

  The pig falls, slavering and shuddering before one porcine eye lolls skyward.

  Winded, I slide to the ground on shaking legs. Not the worst close-call I’ve ever had, but close enough.

  I lie back, heaving huge breaths as I rest a moment. A smell of wood smoke trails into the ravine. It’s late in the day but they can’t wait for me? Ungrateful lot.

  I struggle up, grinning, and grab the boar’s legs. Wait till they see what I’ve caught. Teach them to have some patience next time.

  On the upper slope, I stop to catch my breath. The air is thick with seasoned wood smoke and something else. Something acrid.

  “How many damned trees did Thom put on...that…”

  My words fade in time with my turning west toward Braemar.

  Gray and black columns erupt above the trees like the souls of my village escaping. They clutch in long fingers across an afternoon sun.

  “Bloody Thom and his paying court!” So worried about impressing the godsdamn governor.

  But, no. This is something else.

  The same thing that’s chased away the game.

  Briet, Keldan.

&
nbsp; Mother and Father.

  I leave the boar and run.

  ***

  No sentries stand atop our walls when I clear the tree line. That’s not strange, with the walls nearly obscured in a roiling dark fog. But no church bell clangs a warning of danger or calls men to a bucket line. I must have missed it, too busy with the boar.

  The customs’ house rail stands raised above the high road, and Braemar’s gates stand wide. Alroy the toll-taker is nowhere to be seen. His stool lies in the middle of the road, and his flask a little way beyond, like amputated parts.

  Wide gates. Missing men. Silence that nests a pop and hiss, the death moan of a living place…

  My arms are leaden, paralyzed. A buzz forms in my temples and there’s so much of fear of what I’ll see that my vision fades.

  Briet, Keldan.

  Run to them.

  I can’t. So long as I stand right here, choking on a cloud of ruin, they’re neither alive nor dead. This isn’t a new feeling. I knew it clutching a sobbing Briet and Keldan, staring at the flames of our house and willing our parents to appear.

  Silence crowds in, fills my ears like cotton wool. Pressure in my head pushes me forward.

  The wassail bonfire is gone. Not burned, but dismantled. Barrel-sized log butts rest against foundations and jut from under fallen walls, smoking. Kindling.

  Charred roof timbers thrust from the ruins like accusing fingers. Where were you? Why didn’t you come?

  Smoke rises, a black beacon to indifferent gods.

  I run. Stumbling, stamping over heaps of debris, my face and hands nipped by sparks of cinder.

  The west gates are closed and barred, with hardly any damage. Our people didn’t flee that way. There was no sign of escape on the east road, nothing save the stool. Someone must be here. Lots of someone’s.

  “Hello?” My voice falls into the rubble.

  No one calls out. I push further, eyes stung by smoke.

  “Hello! Anyone?” I shout, flail, and suddenly I’m lost. No church spire, no baker’s chimney, no line of slate roofs to mark the high street. Smoke filters the sun and obscures geography. It steals my bearings. I’ve lived here all my life, and now I’m lost inside the skeleton of a foreign place. A first touch of bile stings my throat.

  A small screech thaws my icy fear.

  Talos wings a low circle. He glides away, flaps back, and glides again. Home; he’s showing me the way.

  I shove through the rubble, clumsy and only half-aware of splinters and searing heat.

  I stand frozen at the threshold. It’s not fear this time. I turn a slow circle and search for anything out of place, a purple tree or impossible creature. Any evidence this is a dream or a fever delusion.

  I stretch my memory back ten years and my arms grow heavy and numb again, this time with bandages. But the house and the dooryard, the clumps of smoldering thatch are so identical...is it now, or then?

  They wrapped my parents in tarps. It made me angry when I heard Hul Fletcher whisper this to his wife as I sat, burned and sullen at their table, refusing to eat Sila Fletcher’s porridge. Sheets, at least. They deserved sheets.

  Glancing around, I realize there are no sheets. What will I do for Briet and Keldan?

  Please, Varin and Ora. Hear my prayers.

  I pass over the threshold, fall to my knees and dig. I whisper my prayer.

  Shards of crockery, a charred piece of leather. It’s one of Keldan’s boots. My heart beats into my head. It takes the bright blue scrap from one of Briet’s dresses for me to realize these are things from our attic.

  No bones or charred limbs. No sweet-sick odor of flesh.

  They’re not here. My face rises to a sky gone dark, and I whisper a silent thank you.

  Climbing what’s left of the back wall, I land in our garden. The kitchen is intact, its slat door open just the way I left it hours ago. Inside a kettle sits atop Briet’s cutting table. Peeled potatoes lie beside it. A well bucket waits by the hearth. Keldan’s leather glove is still wrapped around the iron bail.

  I turn back. A glint catches my eye. Briet’s knife rests in shadow behind the open door. It’s left skitters in the dirt floor.

  Kicked, or thrown.

  My mind thaws.

  Briet and Keldan wouldn’t sit in a burning house. Who in Braemar would?

  I retrace my path back to the market square. This time I make myself look. Not panicked searching, but the same eyes I use to spot prey.

  Carts, cloth sacks, iron lamp arms. A scorched wheel of cheese and a smoldering stall collapsed under cabbages and pears. A dead cat. The remains of a sheep, decapitated.

  Everything is here. Everything except people and horses.

  Someone would have stayed to fight the fire or keep watch while Thom sent a constable for help. Even if every soul has gone for shelter in Whidby or Graysmere, Briet and Keldan wouldn’t travel with them. My family would stay close and find me.

  They’re not dead. They’ve been taken.

  Standing alone in the market square, I feel cut out from the world’s cloth. Severed, with no idea how to begin. So alone that a grating sound nearly makes me piss myself.

  It sounds again, louder and longer, but still lost in the debris. I walk one soft step at a time, listening.

  It’s not until I see the arm that I realize it’s not a grating sound. It’s a body so broken it’s trying to scream and can’t.

  I lift the away the remains of the striped marquee.

  An odor of vomit, blood, and shite roils up.

  “Oh gods, Thom…” I crouch, to be closer and because I’m not sure this is Thom. I know it in my gut, but his face...

  “Someone?” Thom’s face is swallowed by purple knots. Despite the smoke, flies crawl in frenzy over his crusted black wounds.

  “It’s me, Thom.”

  “Anyone?” His words are an exhalation.

  Thom’s head lolls.

  I retch. He doesn’t know I’m here because he can’t see me. His eyes are gone.

  I touch his wrist; a waxy loop of guts brushes my finger. “Thom!” It feels wrong to shout at a man so brutalized.

  I swallow, choking back my meager lunch, and lay a hand to his brow. He shies away all his body can.

  “Thom. It’s Ewan.”

  “Ewan. Don’t fight…” His words dry up.

  My hands shake so badly that I drop the canteen twice. I wet a finger and paint his lips, trickle a few drops into his mouth. Thom puckers for more. I pretend not to see and stopper my canteen. Thirst is a temporary discomfort now. And look at his damned gut. A mouthful of water would be agony. I stow my canteen and salve some guilt by sitting against the post and pulling Thom to my side.

  He’s drenched. From collar to what’s left of his breeches, Thom is soaked with piss. With humiliation.

  I squeeze him tighter. He lays his head back on my shoulder. “Tell me, best you can,” I say.

  “Don’t fight. They said...don’t fight.” He pauses. “Soldier? Don’t fight?” A sound scrapes from his throat.

  “How did they get in?” Braemar has survived this far north for a reason.

  “We let them.”

  “Who!”

  “Iron collars. Iron.”

  It’s so hard to not shake him. Who has my brother and sister? Who took our village? “Thom.”

  “Ears, bones, skulls. They wore them...armor.”

  A tear smears the blood along his swollen eye socket. “Ewan. I didn’t see. Didn’t see.”

  He didn’t see them leave, which direction the bandits traveled. This is why they took his eyes.

  “It’s not your fault, Ewan.” Thom’s lips tremble out the words like a night-bird song. “You were welcome here.”

  “What do you mean?”

  His pause stretches into forgetfulness. “I didn’t deserve to be mayor.” Thom’s words are fuller, but his voice comes like a far-off echo now.

  “You fought for us. I think that already makes you mayor. Better, even.”


  He doesn’t hear me. Thom’s already stopped breathing. Color leaves the wounds on his face.

  Ora, take him into your infinite, forgiving darkness.

  ***

  I wrap Thom in the remains of his striped tent. Bought just for the wassail. It feels fitting. Besides, it’s not a tarp.

  Darkness falls fast. I hurry to dislodge spear from post, fumbling to free Thom’s body. In my fumbling I shake the post. Something smacks the back of my head. A bat, a demon, the hand of a slaver grabbing for me? In the light of a single torch, I believe anything possible.

  My heart slows and I crouch deeper, lean in for a better look.

  Right until I pick it up, dead bat seems perfectly plausible. A wing, maybe.

  The object is black and leathery but also gossamer. What I mistook for long bones are lines of black silk, fine stitching. It’s a glove, slim and long fingered.

  I expect to find a tear from the nail that hooked the glove. It must have been caught by the wrist; there’s no damage. Curious, I grip thumb and finger, and pull. Its seams hardly strain. This glove isn’t from here, or anywhere near here.

  It’s armor, a woman’s armor.

  3

  I give up looking for clues and admit well before midnight that not even I can track these marauders in darkness. After what happened to Thom, I don’t know if I should track them at all, not alone. Governor MacTallum is coming, and he’ll bring men. He can summon more and better help than I ever could.

  First things first; I have to get my head straight and do this right, for Bri and Keldan.

  Even holed up here, I’ll need supplies and rest before sunrise.

  I fill my canteens at the river. Food I can manage, between Bri’s dry goods in the kitchen and game in the Fortingall. Some sort of fortifications have to be made. With damage to the walls and no defense, our village is open to bear and boar, and the most ruthless of all b’s: bandits.

  This means tools, herbs to treat wounds, flint and steel, spare arrow heads and something for hand-to-hand. My range camps would have everything I need but that’s not helpful now. I don’t have time for a five-mile bypath.