by Peter David
I nodded once more, then raised a finger to indicate that I would be right back. I walked a short distance away and found some ragged bushes, possibly the former hiding place of the dead woman whose name I had never even learned. Once behind the bushes, I shook loose the creature perched upon my arm, the one they’d called Mordant. Mordant looked somewhat annoyed with me as he lifted clear of my arm and flapped a short distance away. And then I finally succumbed to the roiling of my innards and unleashed what was within. My guts spasmed until I felt I had surely vomited up not only the contents of my stomach, but possibly the stomach itself. I was bent over, my breath coming in ragged gasps, and it was only then that I noticed the dagger strapped to my left calf.
I did not hesitate. I yanked out the dagger and held it over my breast. Right then and there, there was nothing that I desired more than to take my life. For either I was already dead and in hell, in which case my actions were really irrelevant to the proceedings. Or else I was alive and had become—through no fault of my own—the sort of monster that I had spent my life fearing.
It has been said that suicide is the coward’s way out. Well, I can tell you with assurance that such is not the case, for I am an inveterate coward, and I couldn’t do it. The knife was poised, ready to be plunged into my heart … provided I still had one, considering the number of times I had been accused of being heartless … but I simply could not bring myself to complete the act. I’ve no idea how long I remained like that before, defeated by my own weakness, I slid the dagger back into its scabbard on my leg. I then made my way back to the men, who looked at me questioningly.
“Call of nature,” I said simply, not being able to bring myself to look upon the bisected woman who had stained the ground dark with her life’s blood. I should have given the order to bury her, or … or something. But I couldn’t think of anything to do. All I wanted was to leave that appalling place as quickly as possible.
Mordant flew around me, but I made no effort to raise my arm, which felt as weak and useless as the rest of me, so he circled one more time and then headed off in some damned direction.
“We’d best be heading back, Peacelord,” said Skullface. “Nothing more is to be gained here. The city is fallen and sacked, its leaders dead. You have successfully overseen another campaign. There is no reason not to break down camp and return home. Certainly,” and he laughed knowingly, “your lady misses you.”
“My lady,” I echoed.
“Yes, Peacelord. We passed Entipy on the way, but she would not come with us. She only comes when you call.”
I was leaning on my staff, trying to make sense of the world. I was so cloaked in ash and soot that I felt as if I could sit and soak in water for a full day and still not wash the grime of the place from me. Nevertheless I heard what he had just said, and it made absolutely no sense to me. “En … tipy?” I asked.
“Yes, Peacelord,” the black spoke up. “She awaits your summons.”
They all looked at me expectantly, and so—still not understanding, but feeling as if I should do something—I cupped my hands to my mouth and called, “Entipy!”
At first there was no response, and realistically I had no idea why there should be one. The only Entipy I knew of was miles away back in Isteria … unless …
A horrible thought occurred to me. What if … what if I was, in fact, back in Isteria somehow? And I had ransacked it with some sort of army at my command, and now Entipy was my slave? I didn’t know which was a more hideous notion. That I had conquered my former homeland, or that I had been so insane that I had actually gone out of my way to hook back up with the demented little princess.
But all my questions dissolved when I heard an answering whinny, and a few moments later a magnificent white horse with a mane of hair that was almost flaming red galloped up to me and stood there, awaiting my pleasure. She wore a gorgeous, ornate saddle with lions and dragons etched within it. “Good Entipy,” said Skullface approvingly.
I’d named my horse Entipy. No doubt so that I could finally control her and mount her without guilt whenever I wished. Well, whatever the hell had happened to me, clearly I had not lost my sense of the ironic. I slipped my left foot into the stirrup and then hauled myself up and over, swinging my useless right leg into place. Gods, from that vantage point she was an even more glorious piece of horseflesh than I’d thought. I could sense the muscles and power beneath me. I wanted to snap the reins, start her galloping, and ride away from this insanity as hard and quickly as I humanly could. I wondered if there was a way that I could leave these brutes behind, even leave the memories behind. But I had every reason to assume that they would easily be able to overtake me, and once they did … then what? What pretext could I possibly come up with to explain my turning and bolting?
None. None at all.
For better or worse—and it was most definitely leaning toward worse—I had to play this insanity out. I had to determine just why all this had occurred, and where I was and for that matter, who I was. Where was home, and who was this “lady” to whom they’d referred?
As we set off, I afforded a final glance behind myself at the two corpses lying on the ground, forlorn and tragic, and I swore right then and there that—whatever had happened while I was not in my right mind—no more lives would be lost now that I had regained control of myself.
How little I knew.
Chapter 2
The Woad Home
We proceeded at a brisk trot, and I learned a few things along the way. The first was the names of my “companions.” The Skullfaced monster, the one who had casually split the woman in two with no more thought or effort than if he’d been chopping wood for a fire, went by the name of Boar Tooth. Somehow I had a feeling that wasn’t his birth name. Boar Tooth, as near as I could tell, served as my right-hand man. I immediately resolved to spend time trying to determine the best way to cut off my right hand. The black riding alongside him sported the daunting name of Salaahaahkim, although Boar Tooth tended to refer to him simply as “Slake.” And since he answered to it, I took that to be his accepted name of battle. He hailed from a land called Uhfrika, and was a rather convivial sort when he wasn’t laughing over the misfortune of others. And the third fellow, the one who seemed to have nothing to say about anything, was simply referred to as That Guy since no one had ever learned his name and he’d never bothered to introduce himself. He’d just shown up one day, joined up, and had proven himself to be a formidable fighter who followed orders without question. He seemed to care about nothing except doing as he was told, ravaging and pillaging as it was convenient, and otherwise just waiting around for the next order. It was unknown whether his tongue was cut out or he knew no language or if he was just bone stupid, and no one much seemed to care since it had no impact whatsoever on his performance.
The second thing I learned was something rather significant about myself.
We were riding along, the burning city already fading into the background. We had made our way over toward what appeared to be a main road of sorts, and were pounding down it when I chanced to reach up and scratch an itch on the side of my face. I was astounded to discover that there was blue clay under my fingernails. As quickly as I could find convenient, I signaled a stop when we passed what appeared to be a well. My men looked at me questioningly. “I want to water the horses,” I said.
“Peacelord,” Boar Tooth said reasonably, “the animals are not in need of—”
“Entipy is. I can tell. “Keep it light, keep it light, my inner voice warned me, and it always seemed to have more intelligence than I in these matters. These men are stone-cold killers, and if they think that you are no longer of use to them, they might serve you up as they did that unfortunate women. So keep it light. Doing my best to sound as casual about the matter as possible, I added, “And we wouldn’t want the other horses to get jealous of Entipy’s special treatment, would we?”
This caused some brief laughter among the men, which I reasoned was better than a
cry of “Kill him!” Moments later That Guy was pulling water up in a bucket that was hanging conveniently on a rope, and I took the bucket from him in order to bring it over to Entipy.
Except that wasn’t the real reason I’d ordered the stop.
I stared into the water and saw my reflection.
I looked at least a year older than I remembered myself. Whether that was because of the actual passage of time, or because of emotional draining that had occurred as a result of my apparent change in vocation—going from tavern and inn owner to slaughtering overseer of death and destruction—I had no way of knowing. Either way, it was difficult for me to tell just how much time had passed because my face was covered with the same blue makeup as they were sporting. Parts of it reached all the way across my face, while others came only part way. Most curious of all, there was what appeared to be a sort of demented smile etched in blue in the middle of my forehead.
“Peacelord?” The curious prodding came from Boar Tooth, and I looked up at him and was glad that my face was painted, because I was sure that I was pale beneath the makeup. “Is something wrong?”
“Wrong?” I echoed.
“Yes.” Boar Tooth smiled. He’d had that exact same smile on his face when he’d cut down the hysterical widow several hours earlier. “You look as if you’ve never seen woad before.”
“Woad.”
Slake was walking over toward us, and there was concern on his face. “Woad, Peacelord.” He took a bit of the blue makeup between his fingers and rubbed them together. “This. This is woad. Peacelord, are you quite all right?”
“Perhaps he sustained some sort of blow to the head in his battle with the chieftain,” Boar Tooth suggested, sharing Slake’s look of worry. “Peacelord … were you injured in any way during that fight?”
My reflex was to say no, but I immediately caught myself. Instead I slowly lowered the bucket and then fought to “remember” what had transpired. As if speaking from very far away, I said slowly, “In dodging one of his blows … I think I fell backward … struck my head. Difficult to be sure …”
Boar Tooth nodded as if this confirmed his worst suspicions. “We’d best have a healer take a look at him when we get back,” said Boar Tooth to Slake, as if I were not even there. “If he was injured in some way, we have to know …”
“No healer will be necessary. I’m quite sure I’m all right,” I said in a conciliatory tone. “I trust, however, that you will be understanding of me if I seem a bit, well … slow every now and again. Given time, I will undoubtedly be up to my old self.”
“Of course, Peacelord!” said Boar Tooth, and Slake echoed his agreement. That Guy just watched the proceedings while bringing the bucket over to his own mount to drink.
“Wuin,” I suddenly said.
“Yes, Peacelord?”
“That is where home is.”
“Well, of course, Peacelord,” Slake said. “Wuin, which was once an assortment of tribal colonies, now all under your rule. And now you are expanding your rule beyond the borders of Wuin. You will be the greatest Peacelord in the history of Wuin.”
“You … remember that, do you not, Peacelord?” asked Boar Tooth cautiously.
“Of course,” I said, and then forced a smile. “I just like hearing about it, that is all. “Good. Keep it light. Keep it light.
As we mounted up once more, my mind raced back to the words of the Visionary. The one who had spoken of a road to ruin … except it appeared that such was not the case at all. It had indeed been woad, not road, and it was with this bizarre blue face make-up that I was wearing which was bringing me to Wuin … or back to Wuin, as the case may be.
The creature called Mordant continued to track us overhead, although occasionally he flew on far ahead, only to return to us at random times. At one point he swooped down and dropped a dead rodent in my lap. Clearly it was intended as an offering of some sort, a desire to share his food. I tossed it back up to Mordant, who snatched the tidbit in midair and gobbled it, before emitting a squawk and flying off once more, his tail twisting in the air.
As we rode, we passed men along the way. My men. They, like we, were returning from the city that was in flames (a city which, I learned, had been known as Jaifa). They were loaded down with loot, and they were laughing and singing my praises, and were all the more overjoyed when I arrived in their midst. Eventually, as the sun went down and the shadows lengthened, we made camp and pockets of returning men joined us. There was plenty to eat, for much food had been stolen from Jaifa, and there were women, gods yes, there were women, who had been taken by the men to be used as they saw fit. Most of them were bound at the hands, and some walked free, but they all had a downcast and frightened look to them. Many of them were horribly, horribly young, and they cast apprehensive glances in my direction every so often. I couldn’t determine whether they were hoping I would intercede, or were afraid that I might take my pleasure of one or more of them. Well, the former was not really an option, and as for the latter … despite what Sharee might have believed, I was not a brutalizer of women and had no intention of taking up that occupation. Still, I felt terribly guilty about my helplessness. How incredibly tragic that I was apparently the commander of these troops—which had swelled to over a hundred in our encampment—and yet I was powerless to remedy these women’s plight. I dared not do anything, take any action, that would be drastically different from that which I had done before. I dared not arouse suspicions, and if the choice was giving precedence to the predicament of these women versus mine own, I knew who I was going to vote for.
There was much singing and rough laughter throughout the night, and many of the songs were about my exploits. I had been the subject of ballads and chants before, although invariably I was the butt of jokes or the target of scorn within them. Not this night. Every song, every chorus of every song, focused on some new great deed that I had performed. The Peacelord did this, the Peacelord did that, the Peacelord did some other damned thing. And all of the accomplishments of which they sang were uniformly brutal. I overcame some town, or overthrew some monarch, or slaughtered enemies right and left with a sword as unstoppable as a typhoon and the strength of a hundred demons spat from hell. I knew that the subjects of these songs tend to be exaggerated out of all proportion to their accomplishments, but I had to admit, if I’d been accomplishing even a fraction of what I was hearing about, I’d done far more than I’d ever expected to do in my life.
But all of it, all of it was destruction. No songs about creating anything. About building a city, or sparing people out of compassion, or inspiring great deeds and achievements not having to do with war. It was all bloodshed and slaughter, chaos and misery inflicted throughout the land of Wuin, all from me. I truly had no idea what I had become, but it sickened me.
As we sat around a campfire, our bellies filled with freshly cooked meat, I tried to turn my attention away from the piteous female cries in the near distance. Mordant had returned and curled up around my leg. Meantime Slake, seated a few feet away, was strumming a lyre. He hummed a few notes. Then he called out, “A newly written chant, Peacelord. Find favor in it, if it pleases you to do so.” And he sang out …
Sing ho, sing ho, for Apropos, he’ll conquer and he’ll slaughter.
Sing ho, sing ho, for Apropos, and lock away your daughter.
He cuts a path of death and blood throughout our land of Wuin.
The chieftains do not have a clue of any plans he’s brewin’.
Sing ho, sing ho, for Apropos, with hair so fiery red.
Sing ho, sing ho, for Apropos, don’t cross him or you’re dead.
The foolish Vladamore he thought to challenge our great leader,
Who knew that Vladamore would be so copious a bleeder?
His widow sought, through foul means, to kill him! What a laugh!
His sword cut through and now she is a woman and a half!
Sing ho, sing ho, for Apropos, the greatest of the great!
Sing ho, s
ing ho, for Apropos. Surrender! Ah, too late!
Up until that moment, I had held out hope that I wasn’t known for who I was. After all, they’d just addressed me as “Peacelord.” Obviously, however, my hopes were in vain. If my real name was in a song, then the identity of the Peacelord of Wuin was widely known in all the territories. But I didn’t betray my thoughts. Instead, as Slake bowed his head slightly, clearly waiting for approval, I nodded in acknowledgment and then joined the others who applauded in raucous approbation. Then I pointed out, “Well constructed, Slake, but not entirely accurate. Boar Tooth slew the woman, not me.”
Boar Tooth, seated just to the side of Slake, shook his head and shrugged. “It is of no consequence, Peacelord. The song works far better focusing on your deeds. Introducing me that late into the lyric … it serves no purpose. The joy of the kill was sufficient for me; let the songs be about others.”
The joy of the kill. The woman’s face, the sight of her dead next to her husband, haunted me long into what I anticipated would be a sleepless night, and those words followed me as well.
Boar Tooth offered to have a tent pitched for me, but I demurred, instead saying that I preferred to sleep under the stars this night. This got a rousing ovation from the men, who saw in that decision the common touch of their beloved Peacelord. As for me, I simply chose to be out in the open because if someone was coming for me with a sword, I wanted to be able to see them in enough time to do something about it.
I lay there for a while, Mordant curled up at my feet, staring up at the sky. I stared at the constellations, those great mind games in the sky, and wondered what it was about humanity that required that we see a pattern in all things. There were the stars, random bits of light caused by the eyes of gods, or souls of heroes who watched over us, or souls of villains who looked in frustration upon those whom they failed to annihilate, all of it depending upon what one’s individual philosophy was. And stargazers enjoyed looking to the skies and drawing imaginary lines to connect them, desperately speculating that the stars actually formed pictures. Pattern-seeking, as I said.