“A fight?”
“No, it looks more like we’re getting within a day or so of the city. Probably smoke from the city hanging in that low valley ahead.” He looked around. “We should camp soon, and get an early start. If we push it, we’ll be in Shamsha by sundown tomorrow.”
The area through which they passed was lightly forested, with farms scattered around the countryside within an easy ride of the highway. Several streams cut through the landscape as well as two rivers of sufficient size to require that bridges be erected over them. They found a patch of pastureland not too far from the road, next to a stream, and Kaspar was thankful for that; he was planning on a hot bath in Shamsha, but a quick rinse in the cold stream before then would be welcome.
So often had they made camp together that the four men followed a well-worn and silent routine. Kaspar watered the horses, and watched the other three fall into easy rhythms, Kenner starting the fire, getting ready to prepare the evening meal, McGoin seeing to the horses’ fodder when Kaspar brought them back, while Flynn unloaded the bedding and foodstuff from the wagon.
Kaspar was developing a strange relationship with these men; he wouldn’t call them friends exactly, but they were comrades, and he realized that throughout his entire life he had little experience with such. His only exposure to this kind of thing had been as a boy, when spending time with his father and watching a few of his father’s close friends at an intimate supper, or out on the hunt.
As a boy Kaspar had always been painfully aware of the issues of rank that surrounded him as the sole heir to the throne of Olasko. He had numerous playmates as a child, and no true friends. The older he got, the less sure he was if someone sought him out for the pleasure of his company or to simply gain an advantage. By the time he was fifteen, Kaspar found it easier to assume everyone, save his sister, was seeking personal favor. It kept things simple.
Kaspar returned to where the others waited and turned the horses over to McGoin who helped him stake out the animals. Then the two men portioned out the grain to the four horses.
This done, Kaspar declared, “I’m going for a swim.”
McGoin said, “I think I’ll join you. I have dust in places I didn’t know I had places.”
Kaspar laughed at that; and even though McGoin had said it a hundred times, each time Kaspar chuckled.
The two men stripped off and waded into the stream. It was cold, but not bitter. They were far enough south in early summer, and it was refreshing.
As they swam and bathed, McGoin said, “What do you think?”
“About what?”
“About this curse business.”
“I’m no master of dark lore, McGoin. All I know is that since the moment I met you lot I’ve felt cursed.”
McGoin hesitated for a moment, blinked, then started to laugh. “Well, you’re no Princess of the Festival, yourself, Kaspar.”
Kaspar nodded. “So I have been told.”
McGoin said, “If you don’t mind me asking, what was it you and the general were on about after supper those nights?”
“We played chess. And talked about being soldiers.”
“I figured something like that. I never served. I’ve had my share of fights—started out as a cook’s monkey on caravans down into Kesh my father organized and worked my way up from there. Had more than one run-in with bandits along the way.” He pointed to a nasty scar that ran down his left side from armpit to hipbone. “Got this when I was only seventeen. Damn near bled to death. My father had to sew me up with a bloody canvas needle and twine. Then I damn near died of the fever when it festered. Only a priest of Dala saved me that time, with some medicine and a prayer.”
“They have their uses, the priests.”
“Seen any of the temples down here?”
“Can’t say as I have,” Kaspar replied.
“Mostly in the cities, but once in a while you see one out in the middle of nowhere. Really strange bunch of gods. Some of the ones we know, though they’ve got different names. Guis-Wa here is called Yama, for one. But lots of gods I’ve never heard of. A spider god called Tikir, and a monkey god, and a god of this and that, and more demons and whatever you call it…just a lot of temples.
“Anyway, I was thinking, if you want a priest to look at what’s in that coffin, seems to me we ought to think just what sort of priest we’re talking to.”
“Why?”
“Well, back home I tithed to Banath.”
Kaspar laughed. “The god of thieves?”
“Of course. Who better than to keep thieves from robbing me blind? And I also made offerings to other gods, but what I figure is each is concerned with their own…I don’t known, call it a plan.”
“An agenda?”
“Yes, that’s it! They’ve got their own agendas…But what I’ve been thinking is what if that thing in the coffin is something that a temple might find useful—maybe even useful enough to cut our throats and dump us in the river (all the while saying a prayer for our journey on the Wheel, of course)?”
“I think we should talk it over with the others.”
“Good idea.”
They returned to the others as Kenner portioned out the evening’s rations. It was a staple diet Kaspar had grown inured to: dried oat cakes, dried fruit, dried beef, and water. Still, it was a banquet compared to the bitter fruit he had lived on for two days when first coming to this land.
Kaspar discussed McGoin’s idea with Flynn and Kenner; despite their concerns, they decided it would still be best to consult a priest in the next city. They chatted after eating and then settled in for the night.
Kaspar awoke. He had banged his head so many times on the wagon above that he came wide awake and rolled over, his hand grabbing the hilt of his sword, and crawled out from under the wagon before standing up. He looked around, his heart pounding.
No one was standing guard. “McGoin!” he shouted, waking up Kenner and Flynn.
Both men were out from under the wagon, weapons in hand, in an instant. Kaspar glanced around and saw no sign of McGoin.
A shout from beyond the firelight had Kaspar and the others racing. Before they were three steps on their way, a scream cut through the night that froze them in their tracks. It was McGoin, but the sound he made was a shriek of terror so profound, so primal, that each man’s first instinct was to turn and run. Kaspar said, “Wait!”
Flynn and Kenner hesitated, then came a gurgling, strangled scream that died suddenly.
Kaspar shouted, “Spread out!”
He had taken less than a dozen steps when he came upon McGoin, or what was left of him. Beyond him, a thing—roughly man-shape but of much larger proportions—stood in the darkness. It had shoulders twice the size of any man living, and its legs were reversed, like a horse’s or goat’s hind legs. The face was obscured in the darkness of a moonless night, but Kaspar could see there was nothing remotely human about it. At the creature’s feet lay the body of McGoin. His head had been torn from his shoulders, and the creature had ripped off his arms and legs, tossing them aside. The trader’s torso had been pulled apart so that no piece of his anatomy was recognizable; he had been reduced to so much bloody pulp and meat.
Kaspar held up his sword and shouted, “Circle behind it!”
He didn’t wait to see if the others obeyed his command, for the creature was full upon him. He struck out and the creature raised its arm to block. When Kaspar’s blade struck, sparks flew, as if metal was striking metal, although the sound it made was as if he had struck something made of very hard leather, and the shock that ran up his arm surprised him. He had never hit something this hard, even a man in armor in battle. He barely could hold on to his sword.
Flynn came at the creature from behind and struck it hard at the joint of head and neck, and all he did was achieve the same sparking display. Having no other ideas, Kaspar shouted, “Back to the campfire!”
He faced the creature as he backed away, fearing to turn around lest the thing prove faste
r. He sensed rather than saw Flynn and Kenner racing past, and he shouted, “Get brands! If steel won’t hurt it, maybe fire will.”
As Kasper backed into the circle of the campfire’s light, he could see the monster’s face. It looked like a demented ape, with fangs that were exposed when it curled back its lips. They were black, as were the gums. The eyes were yellow and had black irises. The ears looked like nothing as much as webbed bat wings, and the body like the torso of a man or large ape stuck upon the legs of a goat. Kaspar heard Flynn shout, “Step to your left!”
Kaspar did so and Flynn ran past him, thrusting a flaming torch at the creature. It recoiled, but it didn’t turn and flee. After a moment, Kenner shouted, “The fire doesn’t hurt it. It just seems annoyed by it.”
Suddenly Kaspar had a thought: “Hold it at bay!”
He raced for the wagon and leapt into the back. Pulling aside the tarpaulin, he used his sword to pry up the lid of the coffin. He reached in and took the black sword that had been placed with the armor and jumped down from the wagon. With three strides, he stepped between Flynn and Kenner and lashed out with the sword.
The reaction was instantaneous. The black blade struck the creature and instead of just producing sparks, the edge cut into the thing’s arm. It howled in pain and stepped back, but Kaspar was on it, pressing his advantage.
He lashed out, first high, then low, and the monster stumbled back. Each cut brought a howl and finally the creature turned to flee. Kaspar leapt forward. He lashed out, taking it across the neck. The head went flying off in a graceful arc, and then dissolved into mist before Kaspar’s eyes. The monster’s body fell forward and also started to turn to vapor before it struck the ground. By the time Kaspar could kneel to examine it, it was gone. There was no sign of a struggle.
“What was that?” Kaspar breathed.
Kenner said, “I thought you might know. You’re the one who thought to get the black sword from the coffin.”
Kaspar realized the sword was thrumming in his hand as if he stood holding the rail of a ship which vibrated from slamming against the waves. “I don’t know why I did that,” said Kaspar. “It just…came to me to get this sword.”
All three men were staring out where McGoin lay and Kenner said, “We need to bury him.”
Kaspar nodded. “But we need to wait until dawn so we can find all…” He left the thought unfinished. All three men knew their companion was scattered over a wide area and the grisly task of gathering up all the pieces of him and putting them in a grave lay ahead. It was something better done by daylight.
They felt the presence before they heard anything. As one, all three men turned to see the black armor, standing upright behind them. Kaspar turned, the black blade at the ready, while Kenner and Flynn held up the burning torches and retreated.
The armor made no threatening gesture, but slowly held out its hands, palms upward, and waited. After nearly a minute of no one moving, Kaspar took a single step forward and waited. The armor remained motionless.
Slowly, Kaspar put the sword into the armor’s outstretched hands. Instantly it wheeled about and moved back to the wagon. With an inhuman hop, it jumped into the wagon, which bounced under its weight, then stepped into the coffin and lay down.
The three men didn’t move.
After nearly a minute of total silence and stillness, Kenner ventured to move to the wagon. The others followed. The armor lay in the coffin as it had when Kaspar had pried open the lid. For almost another minute they just looked at it. Finally Kaspar put out his hand and touched it, ready to pull back if there was any response.
It felt exactly as it had before.
The three men exchanged questioning looks, but no one said anything. Finally Kaspar climbed up on the wagon bed and replaced the lid of the coffin. He said, “Hammer,” and waited until Kenner handed him one from the tool box under the driver’s seat. Without hurry, Kaspar carefully realigned the heavy iron nails that had pulled out with the lid and then diligently hammered them all back into place.
Then he said, “We will find a priest tomorrow.”
The other men nodded. For the balance of the night, none of them closed an eye.
The wagon rolled through the streets of Shamsha, an hour before sundown. This was the first population center Kaspar would actually call a city. The walls could easily be breached by his Olaskon engineers in less than a week’s siege, but that was a week longer than any he had seen so far. The guards were called prefects, which struck Kaspar as odd, as that was the title give to a rank of senior military officer in Queg. At one time in ages past, this must have been a military post. The senior prefect gave the wagon a cursory inspection and then threatened to delay them for an indefinite period until Kaspar bribed him.
The three men had been silent most of the day. They had gathered together what they could of McGoin and buried him deep in a hole in the meadow. No one had spoken as they stood around the makeshift grave, until at last Kenner had said, “May Lims-Kragma quickly speed him to a better life.”
Flynn and Kaspar grunted agreement, and they packed up their camp and set off. It was nothing any of them could come to grips with. The monster and the armor coming to life were events so unbelievable that Kaspar knew the others were as reluctant to discuss it as he was; it was as if to speak of it was to admit the possibility that what they had witnessed was real.
Yet what troubled Kaspar most of all was the familiar feeling he had recognized. Something about all the carnage and evil had a recognizable quality to it. An echo of an earlier time in his life pressed into this mind, as if trying to remember a song once heard and barely remembered, yet associated with a memorable event, a festival or celebration perhaps. But in the field at night, it had been something unknown and unknowable, and like a man struggling to remember that nameless tune he at last grew tired of the process and push it aside. Better to concentrate on what to do next than dwell too long on what had already happened. It wasn’t as if he could change the past.
They found an inn with an impressive stabling yard and before retiring, Kaspar inspected the wagon and watched as Kenner and Flynn hauled the chest up to their room. When he had finished with the horses, he sought out the innkeeper.
The owner of this establishment was a prosperous man of advancing years, given to wearing a gaudy waistcoat over his puff-sleeved white shirt and almost pristine apron. He wore a knit cap that came to a long peak which fell over his left shoulder. He saw Kaspar regarding the odd red-and-white-striped hat and said, “Keeps me hair out of the soup. What can I do for you?”
“If a traveler needed to see a priest about something dark, which temple would be the right choice?”
“Well, that depends,” observed the innkeeper, his pudgy face set in a smile as his watery blue eyes regarded Kaspar.
“On what?”
“If you seek to do something dark, or if you wish to prevent something dark from happening.”
Kaspar nodded. “The latter.”
With a wide smile, the innkeeper said, “Out the front door, turn left. Go down the street until you reach the square. On the other side of the fountain lies the temple of Geshen-Amat. They will help you.”
“Thank you,” said Kaspar. He hurried up to the room and informed his two companions of what the innkeeper had told him. Flynn said, “Why don’t you and Kenner go, and I’ll stay here?”
Kaspar said, “I think this is the type of inn where our gold will be safe.”
Flynn laughed. “This chest is the least of my concerns.” He motioned with his head to the window outside. “It’s that thing we are burdened with that I fear. And I just feel better with one of us being close at hand.”
Kaspar said, “Then open the chest. I don’t know a lot of temples that work magic just because you ask nicely.”
Flynn took the key out of his purse and opened the lock. Kaspar said, “Give me your belt-pouch,” to Kenner, who did as he was asked. Kaspar picked over the odd sized and shaped coins, fetching o
ut a few coppers, and half a dozen golden coins, then loaded it up with silver. “Any more and it’s robbery,” Kaspar observed.
Kaspar and Kenner bid Flynn farewell and headed down the stairs and out of the door.
As evening fell, the streets of Shamsha were crowded. Inns were alive with laughter and music, and many merchants were trying for that last sale of the day before closing up shop. The streets were festooned with banners and garlands, as the populace made ready for the Midsummer’s Festival that was less than a week away. Street lamps had been wrapped in colorful paper covers, bathing the ground in a soft glow, lending a gaiety to the scene that put in stark contrast the dark mood Kaspar and Kenner felt. As the two men reached the market square, they saw carts being loaded up as merchants shut down their stalls to head for home.
Across the square they saw the temple of Geshen-Amat. It was a large building with wide steps leading up to an ornately decorated marble façade, a bas-relief of gods and angels, demons and men.
On either side of the base of the steps rested statues. One was a man with the head of an elephant, and the other was a man with the head of a lion. Kaspar paused to inspect them for a moment as a monk walked down the steps. He had short hair and wore only a simple brown robe and sandals.
“You seek entrance to the temple?” he asked politely.
Kaspar said, “We seek help.”
“What may the servants of Geshen-Amat do for you?”
“We need to speak to the leader of your temple.”
The monk smiled, and Kaspar was suddenly visited by the odd notion that he had seen this man before. He was short, balding, and had the odd cast of features you saw on certain Keshians—dark eyes, high cheekbones, and dark hair, with an almost golden tone to the skin.
“The Master of the Order is always pleased to speak to those in need. Please, follow me.”
The two men trailed after the monk as he led them into the vast entrance of the temple. On both walls more bas-reliefs were cut into the stone, and every few feet a hanging lamp of oil burned, casting flickering shadows that made the bas-reliefs look as if they were moving.