The Way Knight: A Tale of Revenge and Revolution Page 8
‘The Goddess has lost everyone she loved,’ she told him finally. ‘But one day she will see them again. They will all be held by the Great Mother.’
‘I think it’s a bit confusing.’ Hem stroked at his furry chin. ‘Aren’t the Goddess and Great Mother Cerenox the same person? And then there’s curious Ceresoph and dreadful Cere-Thalatte!’
‘Is the child the same as the youth, or the youth the same as the adult?’
‘Yes.’ Hem shook the reins. ‘Well, yes and no, because if I met myself as a child, then I’m not sure how much we’d have in common. You know, playing with snails and the like. But if I were an old man…’
‘Sounds like you’ve understood it very well.’
Hem blushed. ‘We’re not all stupid in Littlecrook, you know. My ma reads us stories ’n everything.’
Hem waited for an acknowledgement but Daimonia said nothing. She stared at the path ahead as if hurrying the journey along. Sometimes she would watch the Way Knight riding ahead, whose formidable form reminded Hem of his own insufficiencies.
‘I expect you can read.’ Hem broke the silence.
‘Yes.’
‘I thought so.’ Hem blinked happily. ‘My ma always said I should marry a clever girl.’
There was a yell up ahead and Daimonia leaped from the cart.
Feeling that the rug had been pulled from under him, Hem slowed the horse and watched the girl running off. ‘It wasn’t a proposal or anything,’ he called uselessly into the wind.
Dismounting, Hem strolled towards Daimonia and the Way Knight. They were speaking with a finely dressed man wearing a feathered felt hat worn atop an extravagant golden wig.
‘I realise this is a terrible inconvenience.’ The man was twisting his blond curls as he spoke. ‘But I was robbed blind, and if I could just join you as far as Knave, I would be greatly obliged.’
Hem winced to see Goodkin pull off his helm and wipe his scarred brow. From here the Way Knight could not see Hem staring at the festival of wounds across his head. But nevertheless it felt safer not to look too long.
‘Pay the Way Knight’s fee,’ Goodkin told the traveller. ‘I’ll see you safely to Knave.’
‘You do remember the part about me getting robbed?’ The traveller went to put a friendly hand on Goodkin’s shoulder, but the Way Knight brushed it away. ‘You can’t mean to leave me here for the sake of a single denarius!’
‘I will pay his fee,’ Daimonia offered.
‘That’s what I was about to say.’ Hem caught up with them, breathless. He bent over gasping after the short run. ‘I was just going to offer to pay it. Can’t leave him here on the road to get robbed again!’
The Way Knight turned to Hem and held out his palm. Hem was confused for a moment, looking to Daimonia, who had offered first. Then with the least reluctant face he could manage, he gave Goodkin a denarius.
From the other cart Purtur let out a loud unimpressed rasp.
The traveller removed his hat and fanned his face. Beneath the glamour of his curly wig, his skin was saggy with age and his eyes bloodshot. ‘Most kind of you,’ he thanked Hem with an appreciative, albeit limp handshake.
Hem tilted his head curiously, sensing that he’d seen the fellow before. He had barely taken a step back towards the cart when it dawned on him. He froze, recalling the previous night’s horror and the thing thrusting lustily at him. Surely he was mistaken; that thing had been practically a corpse. He turned and gaped over his shoulder to see the wrinkled wigged thing smiling at him hideously.
‘What is that smell?’ Daimonia asked when the carts had set off again.
‘Horses,’ Hem whimpered. His bowels had let him down and a wet patch of pee now reeked from his trousers. I’m a damp wet idiot! A damp wet idiot! He let it circle around his mind until he was hitting himself in the face to the beat of it.
‘What are you doing?’ Daimonia yelled. She wrestled with Hem, trying to stop him. Hem tried to push her off and her palm accidentally sank into his soaking crotch.
Daimonia pulled away quickly, smelling her hand in revulsion and then wiping it roughly on his jacket. ‘You’re disgusting!’ She leapt off and ran to Purtur’s cart.
Hem watched her go and glared at the wigged thing that was making friendly conversation with his father. He wanted to shout and scream with all his might, but instead his anger curled and twisted and turned against him.
The Fate of Jhonan Vornir
Kraljevic was alive with celebration, every street and balcony filled with feverish excitation. Adjurators and holy celebrants led a great procession of youths dancing through the crowd, parading the regal colours, silver and red. The capital city had never seen so auspicious an event; a great revelation was at hand.
Through the streets a beautiful white-veiled bride roamed. The woman was heavy with child and groaning with the pain preceding birth. She staggered bloody-footed through the streets, sometimes falling to one knee as the jubilant peasants righted her and sent her on her way with a cheer. While all others rejoiced, she alone was in distress.
‘Where are you?’ she cried, searching everywhere for her bridegroom. She fell again, bloodying the knee of her white dress.
A number of false suitors presented themselves, filling the air with their boasting. The bride turned from each one, growing ever more desperate as they pulled at her. Only she would know the true bridegroom.
Beyond a canal bridge a golden man stood watching silently. He made no boasts nor did he dance like the intoxicated fools. He simply waited for the bride to come. His face was stuck in a never-ending scream.
The Geld Knight Conrad Ernst awoke abruptly with a frightened whimper. He tried to sit and immediately seethed at the soreness of his wounds. Naked beneath the glaring stars, he carefully examined every part of his body. His hands probed tentatively around the various injuries inflicted by Jhonan Vornir.
The pit of his arm was a clumsily stitched mess, evidence that Fotter’s medical skills had been grotesquely exaggerated. Conrad’s fingers crept fearfully towards the bulbous mess that had been his testicles. They were fat with discoloured bruising and the texture was both damp and scabby. He tentatively tried to stoke his desire, but the pain was excruciating. He quickly withdrew his hand, an involuntary tremble emasculating him further.
‘Vornir bastard!’ he cursed.
The Geld Knight was camped in the forest beyond Jaromir, his mind chewing incessantly on a feast of self-pity and vindictive urges. He preferred to establish his own space a distance from his Geld enforcers, who were essentially poor and greedy criminals capable of anything. Some of the girls from the village had been foolish enough to follow these under-men out into the woods. Their screams and whines had now subsided into the groans of the forest.
Conrad considered sending as many as four men to slay Vornir, but he had the apprehension that none would return alive. He began to fastidiously brush and rebrush his hair while reflecting on strategies and general principles of revenge. A pleasant recollection uncoiled from the many branches of his memory.
After the High Adjurator had met with a hideous accident, Conrad’s potential had been recognised by an influential statesman and advisor to the prince. Advisor Pavel had been writing a justification of the atrocities of war and young Conrad was selected as his scribe.
They had laboured together in the austere chambers of the royal library, a place troubled by eerie Archonian relics indecipherable to scholars. Here Conrad and his new mentor had worked to make history more palatable through the artifice of words.
‘Why did Prince Moranion not lay siege to Lord Erleth’s castle after Erleth betrayed him?’ Conrad had asked Advisor Pavel.
‘Often an enemy will invite attack where they are strongest,’ Pavel had observed. ‘A knight seeks justification in a contest of arms. A scholar prefers a battle of wits, while a woman’s weapons are gossip and slander.’
‘Lord Erleth’s castle is said to be impregnable,’ Conrad acknowledged.
‘But what of honour, master? Did not the prince diminish himself further by repaying Erleth’s error of character with adultery?’
‘What is honour?’ Pavel was fond of perplexing questions. He would appear at times to know nothing about the most obvious facts, only to then expose some nuance or fallacy.
Conrad relished these little challenges. ‘It seems to me that honour is the way a man conducts himself so as to warrant the esteem of others.’
Pavel rewarded Conrad with a thin smile. ‘Honour is a noise, a sound. An utterance designed to connote a set of ideas. Who decides what is honourable?’
‘I suppose we do, master. We who write these histories.’
‘This is why I have chosen you,’ Pavel acknowledged. ‘You do not blush at the duplicity required of great men.’
‘I see that no man is great who cannot convince another of it.’
‘You grin like a girl, far too pleased with yourself. Do you think that is an original thought, boy?’
‘It is original to me,’ young Conrad had defended.
‘Understand this,’ Pavel asserted. ‘If your enemy be possessed of strong arguments, destroy his reputation. If he be not corruptible, have him slain in a duel. If he be a great warrior, have him die in his sleep.’
Conrad ceased his combing and allowed himself a private smile. He called into the forest, summoning the young enforcer Scorcher, who the magistrates claimed had a talent for this kind of task. Together they shared a drink and then the boy was sent to work.
Stroking his swollen testicles, Conrad watch Jaromir become gradually illuminated by a rising pillar of fire. The flames climbed and arched into the sky, lifting like a hot sword to challenge the very stars. The old watchtower made a magnificent furnace, more glorious than the Eye of Ceresoph.
Conrad watched long enough to be certain the old bastard and his precious granddaughter would have been cooked alive. He imagined he heard their screams rolling on the wind, smouldering husks of flesh crying out to their silent Goddess.
Conrad’s face was aglow with the victory, basking in the light of his superiority. He heard the voice of the Secret God whispering you are the one!
The Dispossessed
‘So you’re Catherine Vornir’s daughter?’ the traveller asked, tipping his hat graciously. His voice was rich, but his beautiful wig was infested with bugs, forcing Daimonia to lean away from him in the cart. The traveller had been speaking effusively about famous places and people whilst frequently touching Daimonia’s knee to punctuate his exclamations. Each time his elderly hand came near her leg, she would duck to avoid his writhing wig.
‘Purtur was just telling me you’ve a famous mother,’ the traveller enthused. ‘You know, the Vornirs had a fierce reputation when I was a boy. Cross a Vornir and you’d be looking over your shoulder forever!’ Beneath all his finery, the traveller was so extraordinarily wrinkly that when he frowned, his whole face seemed to sag.
He had introduced himself as Svek, a courier for the Seidhr and responsible for transporting documents, writs, occasionally even children on their behalf.
‘Do you know my mother personally?’ Daimonia asked cautiously. She was forced to dodge the wig again as the traveller leaned close to answer her question.
‘I’ve heard of her fine work fighting rebels.’ Svek nodded vigorously. ‘I hear Captain Vornir is a favourite of the prince. He adores great women!’
Daimonia suppressed a smile as she mapped her ambitions. She would find her mother and together they would mourn Niklos’ death, taking comfort in each other’s arms. When the time of tears was done, they would ride together to Kraljevic and bring their case before Prince Moranion. Sharing their anger as if it were his own, the prince would have the baron investigated. Volk Leechfinger would have to fight in the Meat Pit, to be scorned by everyone and slaughtered. Or better still, he would be banished to dread Archonia.
Daimonia could picture the baron as surely as if he were standing before her: his entitled gestures, his curling lashes and lusty smile. He was a man she would destroy in her brother’s name.
Niklos, she prayed, the Accord will yet yield justice on your behalf.
‘Miss Vornir?’ Svek was asking.
‘I’m sorry, what were you saying?’
‘I said is it your plan to follow in your mother’s footsteps? Leading men into battle, and rooting out traitors and spies?’
I’m going to root someone out, Daimonia promised.
A lopsided statue loomed amid clumps of moss, marking the territory of Garst. The sinking stone depicted a bald figure with a maleficent expression, gesticulating towards the stars. Birds had decorated the bald head with their offerings and some of the extremities were snapped off.
‘Who is that dreadful figure?’ Daimonia enquired.
‘Dreadful?’ Svek raised his eyebrows. ‘That is the likeness of Adjurator Garst, a great benefactor to the people of the southern shires. The village ahead took its esteemed name from his own.’
‘He’s long dead now, I assume.’
‘I would assume so.’ Svek nodded. ‘His career was ruined by malicious rumours and he had to retire from public life. His many kindnesses were forgotten because of the lies of boys!’
‘More likely he thought he was above the Accord,’ Purtur sneered. ‘People like that think they are better than the rest of us!’
Grave-grey smoke clogged the air as the day waned. A flock of refugee birds followed the coast, seeking fresher climes. The Eye of Ceresoph began to open.
The travellers continued on, keen to make Garst village before night descended. The horses pulled through boggy mud, enduring mosquitos and gnats. Here the forest was gnarled and full of natural trenches. Conversations waned and a weary silence fell over the group.
At the tail of a muddy track, a huge weathered tree loomed like a veined hand exploding from the earth. Pairs of blood-clotted shackles were nailed to the scarred and bloodstained bark. A tangible sensation of suffering lingered around the tortured wood.
‘Some terrible crime was done here.’ Daimonia’s breath became short and she found herself clinging to the wagon as if to prevent falling.
‘More accurate to say a crime was redressed,’ Svek corrected. ‘Is there no hurting post in Jaromir? No place for answering minor infractions of the Accord?’
‘Answering them with what?’
‘Well, it depends.’ Svek curled his golden wig in his bony fingers. ‘A troublesome neighbour might be restrained here and pelted with rotten fruit. More grievous offences could incur beatings or even lashings.’
‘I don’t like it,’ Daimonia decided. A shiver crept along her shoulders.
‘Neither do I,’ Hem added timorously. He drew his cart alongside Purtur’s and seemed highly agitated. Daimonia’s horse was tethered to Hem’s cart and tried to pull away as they stopped.
‘You’d be glad of it,’ Purtur butted in, ‘if you lived in as miserable an arse-pit as Garst! You ain’t never met a more suspicious people, distrusting their own neighbours and bolting their doors at night!’
‘You’re not filling me with confidence,’ Svek moaned. ‘I was hoping to draw some funds from the local scir and have neither seal nor papers left to establish my authority.’
‘Well, I ain’t calling ’em backwards or anything,’ Purtur explained. ‘But this one time a fellow came here to build a kiln. The locals thought it was a shrine to Gorach Baoth and they roasted him to death!’
Beyond the hurting post a sooty wind writhed and danced. As they pressed forward, the travellers wept and coughed, choking on the saturating smog. They emerged from the trail to meet a scene of ashen gloom.
The village had been eradicated, pulled apart like the toy of a malicious infant. Frames and rafters were splayed like broken fingers. Joints of human flesh lay chewed in the grass. Clusters of shambling f
igures haunted the dereliction.
‘Baoth have been here,’ Goodkin snarled. ‘Could be here still. We’ll find another way.’
‘Nonsense!’ Purtur frowned defiantly. ‘You know what I smell?’
‘Smoke?’ Daimonia coughed.
‘Opportunity!’ Purtur cackled. ‘These people have lost everything and I’m in a position to sell it back to them!’ He rode his cart directly into the village, flashing his tongue at the knight.
‘Bloody fool!’ Svek shouted, trying to climb over Purtur to get out. ‘Go back!’
A skulking shape leapt from the shadows, hands touching ankles like an ape. Tendrils swung from its head, flapping as it moved. It let out a hiss as it leapt onto Purtur’s cart and landed on Daimonia.
Daimonia pushed her hands into the creature’s wet face. Beyond its savage eyes, Daimonia could see that it was a man clothed in the hair and skin of other men. Its teeth were like nails, its breath venomous.
‘Get it off!’ she squealed.
The Baoth raised a weapon hewn from bone, then dropped it again as Goodkin galloped past, hewing its head with his broadsword. The neck vomited profusely.
Daimonia screamed and shoved the carcass off. More shapes were emerging from the smoke, brandishing spines and skulls, hooked blades and tusk-white scimitars. They were everywhere, like a colony of ants swarming from the ground.
‘Ride!’ Goodkin roared, racing ahead of the cart and turning his horse around. Dusty figures leapt at his mount, fastening themselves to the horse with sinuous arms and hungry teeth. The animal collapsed and Goodkin vanished into the dust.
‘Chrestos save us!’ Purtur wailed, steering the cart around. He was shaking as if wracked by lightning, his nose streaming with runny mucus.
Daimonia turned to see the Way Knight silhouetted in the smog. He fought like a series of pictures in a book; his sword raised high in the air, then plunging to split flesh, every flash of movement alive with muscular force.
‘We can’t leave Goodkin behind!’