“Tolemek?” Zirkander said.
“I’m coming.”
“No hurry, but it sounds like you might have the opportunity to examine some bodies after all.”
When Tolemek looked toward the trail, Cas nodded at him, her face bleak.
“A village?” Sardelle guessed, picking her way back to the trail.
“What remains of it,” Cas said. “The people are dead or missing. It looks like something happened recently.”
“How far ahead?” Tolemek asked as he returned to the trail. “Did the people die from wounds or in the same manner as the porters in the river?”
“I didn’t get that close,” Cas said. “I smelled… the smell of death, rotting meat, and went to look, but I wasn’t sure if it was safe. Aside from the bodies, it looks like most of the people left, and I thought they might have ordered the area quarantined. The trail goes right into the village, but I didn’t know if we wanted to investigate or… make a wide circle around it.”
Tolemek wanted to investigate, but he understood her reasoning. If there was something contagious, something that might affect their group, as well…
“Sardelle?” Zirkander asked softly. “My thought would be to avoid it so we don’t risk catching anything ourselves, but is it inevitable that we’ll continue to encounter people out here? People who may or may not be dead? Maybe we need to do our best to figure out what’s going on.”
“I’ll go,” Sardelle said. “I won’t be so presumptuous as to say I’ll be unaffected, but those with more dragon blood in their veins tend to have higher immunity from common pathogens that affect humans. Also, I can usually go into a meditative state and speed up my recovery if I’m ill or injured.”
Zirkander’s expression grew grim. He was doubtlessly reluctant to let her go—Tolemek wouldn’t want to let Cas risk herself, either—but all he said was, “Oh? You think we’re going to stop and let you meditate if you get sick? We’re on a quest here, you know.”
Sardelle smiled. “I assumed you would carry me while I meditated.”
“I’m already carrying two bags’ worth of gear, and I’m not at all convinced that Jaxi is making my load lighter. I think she’s teasing me, making it weigh something different from hour to hour.”
“I’d like to tell you that Jaxi wouldn’t do that, but… you’ve met her. I don’t think you would believe me.” Sardelle lifted a hand and headed up the trail. “Give me twenty minutes, and I’ll come back.”
“Wait.” Tolemek removed his pack and started untying his microscope case and tool bag. “I have dragon blood, too, right? I’m going in.”
Cas frowned at him. “Isn’t yours more diluted?”
“I don’t know, but someone needs to perform an autopsy on one of these dead people, try to figure out why they’re dead.”
Sardelle gazed back at him, her lips turned downward, too, but she didn’t object. Tolemek took his case and jogged after her.
“What do we do while we wait, sir?” Duck asked. “Have lunch?”
“Have lunch?” Zirkander asked. “When there’s a village of dead people over the next hill?”
“You think they’ll mind?”
That was the last Tolemek heard of the conversation, but he did give Cas a long look over his shoulder before rounding a bend in the trail. He was fully aware that by going into the village, he risked not only becoming a victim of some illness but also becoming a carrier. Sardelle may have been trained as a healer, but he didn’t know whether that had anything to do with diseases, or if she merely doctored wounds.
The smell of decaying meat left out in hot weather touched his nostrils. He could tell even before the village came into sight that these people had died days ago, and he feared the bodies would have already been mauled by predators.
A monkey jabbered from a treetop, but the jungle was otherwise quiet. Maybe it knew that death lurked here.
Two ancient, black stone obelisks marked the entrance of the village, but these didn’t carry any carvings. They simply reached up to the sky, their tops disappearing into the leaves and fronds. Beyond them, the trail widened into a cleared area where stone houses provided more permanent—and architecturally sound—structures than Tolemek would have imagined from the primitive people who had attacked them that morning. But perhaps this was another tribe, one more advanced than the others. In addition to the houses, there were elevated platforms in the trees, some open and empty, but some with wooden dwellings built atop them. The doors to many of the houses stood open, and here and there abandoned projects—baskets half filled and hides partially scraped—suggested people had left in a hurry.
Despite the smell of death, Tolemek’s first thought was that everyone had left, because he didn’t see anyone, dead or otherwise. If Cas hadn’t said something, he might have been stumped, but Sardelle walked up to one of the elevated platforms, this one built on a wooden scaffolding rather than around the trunk of a tree. She climbed to the top of a ladder and frowned sadly over the edge.
“The bodies?” Tolemek guessed.
“Yes. They were painted and carried up here, probably as protection from predators. Maybe this is what the funeral ceremony consists of here.” She dropped her chin to her fist and closed her eyes.
At first, Tolemek thought she might be praying, but she must be using her magical senses to examine the bodies. He took his bag of tools and walked toward the base of a ladder leading to a similar platform. There were five in total. The entire village looked like it might house sixty or eighty people, so this wasn’t representative of an epidemic, but there were more dead than could easily be explained by a hunting accident or people succumbing to old age. Besides, those things wouldn’t have caused the rest of the people to abandon their village in a hurry. Still, someone had stayed and taken the time to build these platforms and lay the dead to rest.
Tolemek passed a toy, a doll lying forlornly in the mud, and a wave of sadness came over him as he wondered if the owner would ever be able to return to collect it. He struggled to find the emotional distance he needed to assume the role of scientist, to analyze the data here, no matter how gruesome it might be.
He climbed to the top of the platform he had chosen and found a pair of children, brother and sister their similar features implied. Their hands were linked, as they lay on their backs, their closed eyes tilted toward the jungle canopy. The bodies were in good shape still, and his nose caught a scent of some alcohol-like substance. He doubted they had been preserved in any way—the smell of decomposing tissue promised that—but maybe something had been applied to keep the aerial predators away. The bodies hadn’t been disturbed yet.
Not liking the idea of performing an autopsy on a child, he checked the other platforms. Sardelle’s head was still bowed as she considered the body of a woman. A man with graying hair rested on the next closest platform, his face gaunt in death, gravity pulling the skin down. His hands had been folded across his chest, and he wore a white funeral robe. These people were wearing more clothing—more neatly stitched clothing—than the crazies in the breechclouts. It definitely appeared to be a different tribe.
Tolemek climbed to the man’s platform and knelt next to the figure. The wood shivered beneath his weight, but the scaffolding had been assembled well enough to support two people. He touched and probed with his hands before pulling out any tools. Rigor mortis had long since passed, and putrefaction had set in. He breathed through his mouth to keep his stomach calm.
“There’s skin under this one’s nails,” he said, not certain whether Sardelle would hear him or was too lost in her own mind, but he tended to talk out loud when he researched and examined, especially when dealing with corpses. The undeniable nearness of death always made him want to hear voices, if only his own, since they promised life. Those who knew him as the Deathmaker would doubtlessly laugh to learn of his discomfort. “Bruises on his knuckles. Looks like he was in a fight before he died, or that he started one.” Tolemek unfastened the funeral ro
be. “He doesn’t seem to have taken damage of his own.” He pushed back the sleeves. “Oh, wait. There are a few bruises on his wrists. Someone might have been grabbing him, or these might be rope marks too. Yes, they’re more consistent than damage from someone’s grip would be. Perhaps the villagers tied him up to keep him from harming others?” Tolemek shouldn’t speculate at this point; he should only record evidence, but he couldn’t keep his mind from spinning hypotheses as to what had happened.
“But what caused him to act thusly?” He searched for lesions and other skin disfigurations that might hint of diseases he was familiar with, but found nothing. He pulled a scalpel out of his bag, apologizing to the dead man’s spirit, because he would have to check his organs and tissues in hope of finding the answers he sought. He told himself the jungle would take back the body eventually, anyway, but that never made this easier.
“There’s some swelling in the brain,” Sardelle said, almost startling him into dropping the tool. “I can’t tell the cause, but maybe you want to start your search there.”
“A tumor?”
“I don’t see one. Your man has the same swelling. The other organs look fine to me, aside from the usual decomposition you would expect to be taking place approximately three days after death.”
“I understand,” Tolemek said, glad for her calm, academic tone. He wasn’t glad she had told Zirkander they would be done in twenty minutes. He pulled out a handsaw, but his examination would take more time. “Sardelle, do you want to ask—”
Ssh, came a whisper into his mind.
He wasn’t sure if it had been Jaxi or Sardelle, but Sardelle was looking intently into the jungle to the left of them.
How often does Sardelle speak into your mind? The sarcasm that accompanied those words definitely belonged to Jaxi. We’ve got visitors again.
More of the disturbed natives from this morning? Tolemek looked down at his handsaw, wondering if he had time to extricate brain matter and make a few slides, and wondering, too, how much the people out in the jungle would object to it.
You’ll be able to judge by the number of arrows they pierce your chest with. Better hurry up. There are a lot more than this morning. I think the villagers may have come home.
Chapter 7
The jungle had grown quiet again. Cas watched the trail in both directions, but kept glancing into the brush, as well, unable to shake the feeling of being watched.
“It’s been twenty minutes, hasn’t it?” she asked. “Maybe we should check on the others.”
“I’m told Tolemek just pulled out a handsaw,” Zirkander said. He was leaning against a mossy stump so he could see both ways, up and down the trail, and his hand never strayed far from the hilt of his pistol. Maybe he felt the same uneasiness that Cas felt. “I don’t think you want to see what he’s doing in there.” He met Cas’s eyes. “Then again, you’re unflappable when it comes to shooting people, so maybe it wouldn’t bother you.”
“It would bother me,” Duck said. “I don’t want to see the Deathmaker cutting open anyone’s spleen.”
“Apparently it’s a brain.”
“Oh, even better.”
Leaves stirred at the edge of Cas’s vision. She frowned back down the trail and caught sight of something brown and hairy through the brush. An animal? No, too tall. That was someone’s head.
“Off the trail,” Zirkander whispered, pointing at the ruins. “Someone’s coming.”
Cas led the way between the plants, heading for one of the low walls, careful not to step on any twigs or branches. Duck moved soundlessly, too, and reached the remains of the building first. Zirkander came more slowly, walking backward, his pistol raised toward the trail. He reached the broken wall at the same time as someone spoke.
“Getting close,” a man said. “Fresh tracks.”
Zirkander ducked behind the wall. “I’m trying to warn Sardelle,” he whispered. “Unfortunately, I can only receive, not send.” He stared in the direction of the village, even though the foliage and a hundred meters or more separated it from them. “I should have run ahead to warn her,” he whispered. “They might be distracted.” He shifted his weight, as if he meant to do so now.
Cas laid a hand on his forearm and pointed between a gap in the crumbling wall. “Too late.”
The brown-haired person had come into view, along with four others, including an older man wearing a hat with a brim so wide a python could have coiled its entire body around the crown. Judging by the voices and the squishing of boots into mud, there were a couple more men farther back.
“Pirates?” Zirkander mouthed.
Cas thought of her alarm and nodded. This was the group that had likely triggered it.
The brown-haired pirate in front had his gaze to the ground, watching the tracks as he walked. Cas rested the barrel of her rifle between the gap in the rocks. If he was good, he would notice that the group had veered in this direction and that only a couple of people had continued onward. Getting into a firefight when the other side had more than twice the numbers wasn’t usually a good idea, but she, Duck, and Zirkander had cover. This might be the best place to ambush their pursuers. She glanced at Zirkander for permission to fire, but found him looking behind them instead of at the trail.
He held a finger to his mouth. Cas hated to look away from the known threat, but she glanced back too. For a moment, she didn’t see anything except the trees and leaves, but then she spotted a brown-skinned man crouching ten feet up in a tree. He held a bow, with an arrow nocked. Zirkander pointed past Cas’s shoulder, and she followed his gaze, grimacing when she spotted a second man. These people weren’t painted and nearly naked the way the other ones had been, but they had shaven heads and grim faces that made them seem all the more dangerous. More deadly.
A scream of pain came from the trail. One of the pirates clutched at an arrow sticking out of his shoulder.
War cries erupted from the trees on either side of the path. The cries didn’t have the tinge of madness that had come from the lips of the attackers that morning, but they did sound determined—and angry. Several men leaped out of the branches, using vines to swing toward the pirates, daggers clenched between their teeth. Pistols fired, even as men cried, “Look out,” and, “Take cover!”
Cas put her back to the crumbling wall, expecting some of the natives would angle toward her team, as well. A man on a vine swung right over her head on his way to the trail.
Zirkander touched her shoulder and pointed toward the other side of the ruins. “That way. We’ll grab the others and get out of here while the natives are distracted.”
He didn’t give Cas time to argue, not that lieutenants were supposed to argue with colonels, anyway. Using the low walls for cover, he weaved through the ruins, paralleling the trail. Duck ran after him without hesitation. Cas followed, but kept an eye on the trail and the trees. If they hadn’t been attacked yet, it was probably only because they hadn’t been noticed—or because the noisy group of pirates offered a more obvious threat. There was no reason to think the natives would be less irritated with Iskandian intruders.
As soon as Zirkander reached the end of the ruins and pushed his way into the brush, Cas spotted another man swinging down from the trees. This one’s vine wouldn’t take him all the way to the trail; his eyes were locked on Zirkander. Not sure her commander saw him, Cas brought her rifle up to fire. Zirkander’s pistol arm whipped up, and he shot at the same time. Their bullets slammed into the man’s bare chest. The native released his vine, tumbling ten feet to the ground.
“Guns to our right,” someone near the trail called.
“Just worry about these damned—” The speaker’s words switched to curses.
“Arrows?” someone suggested.
Cas rushed to catch up with Zirkander and Duck. There was little point in stealth now. Anyone paying attention would know there were people out here.
More war cries came from the trees, and blue-feathered arrows sailed from the branches.
One whizzed past, not two feet in front of Cas. She lowered her head further, but kept running, jumping logs, squishing through mud, and nearly pitching into a sinkhole. Zirkander must have heard her startled squawk at the last, because he paused, turning back toward her. She waved him on and yanked her boot free, almost losing it in the process. He waited for her, then gestured for her to go ahead.
“We should be even with the village,” she said and pointed to the left, where the trees were thinner. “We should—”
Another barrage of arrows flew from the trees.
“Duck,” Zirkander barked.
Cas dropped to her knees, more because her foot slipped in the mud than because she wanted to be that low. She didn’t see any arrows that time, but heard a few zip past over her head. There had to be dozens of warriors out there, firing at her team and at the pirates. This was madness; it would be pure luck if they didn’t get hit. She much preferred being the one in the trees, sniping at targets.
“Sardelle and Tee are up ahead.” Zirkander helped her up, his words barely audible above the war cries ringing from the trees.
Cas scrambled through the brush, catching up with Duck. She spotted Tolemek beside a tree, as well as Sardelle, her arm raised and hand extended. They were surrounded by six men, banging knives and fists at an invisible barrier. Tolemek, scrambling to stuff tools into one of his cases, looked like he had been interrupted in the middle of his work. Two of the natives were pointing at his case and yelling as they banged their fists against the barrier.
Duck tripped on something and made a noise as he bumped into a tree. Half of the irate natives turned in his direction. Cas shot one in the knee before he knew what was happening. Zirkander’s and Duck’s pistols fired too. Two men pitched backward. The others surrounding Sardelle’s barrier hesitated, then ran, disappearing into the leaves in a blink.