The barkashad spat down on Luton again. Shek nodded at the other barkashads to release the boy and then the warrior prodded Luton with his boot.
"Get up!" came the quiet order. Luton got shakily to his feet, brushing at the spittle on his face with a trembling hand. "Well, Karek, what did you do? Answer!"
Luton pointed to the two slaves, then to the outside, before he pointed at the barkashad and shook his head. Amusement crept into Shek's eyes.
"You saved two slaves when you were told to leave them, is that it?" Luton nodded, saw the look of deepening amusement and didn't like it. He tossed his head. "I have offended you have I, Karek?" Shek actually smiled. "Who cares about two slaves? You, maybe, but nobody else. It seems foolish to be flogged for something of no real consequence." Shek looked over at the barkashad, saying calmly, "I shall deal with him, I promise you." The barkashad muttered under his breath and then turned viciously on the nearest slaves.
Shek pushed Luton in front of him and kept pushing the boy until Luton stumbled, tripped and fell. He tried to rise, but a heavy boot on his diaphragm kept him where he was. Shek's voice was still amused.
"I appreciate your concern for fellow slaves, Karek, but you can not be permitted to fight with one of the barkashads whatever you consider to be the provocation. That would set an unfortunate example. Nor do I believe the whip is merited in this instance. You do understand me, do you not?'
Looking down at the sprawled boy Shek noticed the fire was gone from the black eyes, all fight drained from Luton. The boy shook with fatigue. The boot was removed and Luton was led to a discipline pole. Five were always erected at every stop. They were the first thing slaves put up and already three were occupied by hanging figures who'd offended in some way during the day. It was a form of punishment all slaves were familiar with and though it was painful, if prolonged over many hours, it was considered infinitely preferable to a flogging with either whip or cane. Luton was taken to the fourth post.
Luton transcended physical distress for the first time. He found he was outside himself, staring down at a body that hung quite lifeless. He wasn't conscious of pain; indeed, he felt numb, had no sense of actual time and seemed to float in a vacuum that was pleasant. He was happy to be where he was at this moment.
Luton didn't feel the water sponges Autchek pressed to his lips every so often, nor did he see the intent look he received or feel the gentle touch that caressed his face. He never knew Shek was called over to look at him and was unaware the warrior lifted his limply, hanging head. Luton's eyes were wide open but they didn't see.
~~~
Malekim was stooped over an experiment in his study at the time Luton's essence fled to the aethyr. The sorcerer never knew why he raised his head and sensed the unusual, though infinitesimal, disturbance in the outer plane. He stood straight and sent out a scanning probe that sought to put meaning to the fibrillation he felt.
And then he found it. It was a fragile essence that teetered, confused, on one of the closest aethyr lines, not knowing where to turn or how to move in an atmosphere it didn't know. Malekim was intrigued. He was drawn to the delicate emerald green colour that hung there, wavering. He followed its line to a boy who hung on a pole and there he saw a child very like a young boy he'd known, cycles ago, in Ortok. The resemblance to Sarehl was unmistakable.
Malekim withdrew, rubbing his hands with sheer delight, his depthless eyes alight with a ferocious and terrifying gleam.
~~~
Autchek looked gravely over at the hanging figure that hadn't moved for half an hour, then he glanced at Shek.
"I suspect," he said sadly, "that boy is beyond us." Shek looked thoughtfully at Autchek.
"You sense something, Old One. What is he?" Autchek shook his head.
"That I cannot tell you, Shek, but I am sure he is destined for a purpose beyond your understanding or mine. Do not ask me why I know this."
"Is he feeling anything?" Autchek shook his head.
"I do not think so. I have felt, since the morning he went to jump, that something profound was happening to him." Shek frowned.
"He has suffered no more and no less than any other. Some die, some survive. Why should he be so different?" Autchek glanced over at Luton again. He gave an involuntary shiver.
"Shek, the evening you flogged Karek he was going beyond emotion. I saw a child - yes, Shek, that is all that boy is, whether those like you consider otherwise - try to yield to the elements. It did not happen as one would expect. And when you made him promise not to jump, Karek repressed welling tears. I saw him do it. He has taught himself not to respond." He saw Shek stare at him and added almost savagely, "Try to understand. That boy has not reacted in a normal way to any situation he has found himself in, has he?
Something happened to him in Ortok that was so devastating it nearly destroyed his mind and left him unable to speak. He told me, in his own way, that he could speak until the invasion. He survived a fever that should have killed him. In spite of continuous pain and despair, he keeps a promise to someone who nearly killed him and he fears to the core of his being - you, Shek.
He tried to save lives earlier and fought because of it, knowing he could well die himself. I have seen how Karek slips on the path and more than once witnessed how easily he could let himself go. Though the wish is there, he seems unable to." Autchek paused, while Shek eyed him reflectively. "Shek, listen to me. Let me say, again, that when you made that boy promise not to jump, he refused to cry. I can only guess at the state of his mind, but I think, because he has been unable to verbally express continuing anguish, he now closes to pain in an effort to cope. I do not mean just mental pain, I mean physical as well. He becomes, in a very real sense, untouchable. I do not know where he is at the moment, but the gods, I fear, Shek. I have great fear."
"How will we deal with him?" Shek gnawed on his lower lip. "Do you wish me to kill him?" He looked hard at Autchek, his respect for such a venerable seer profound.
"I do not think we can," whispered Autchek. "I am not even sure we Churchik will ever comprehend what we have done." He looked over at Shek and gave a very deep shiver. "For the gods, cut that boy down before it is too late! I truly fear it may be."
Shek looked at the old warrior very hard. He felt a slight shiver of Churchik premonition himself as he did, because he noticed how white Autchek was and how dark his usually light eyes were. Without a word, he strode over to Luton and took him down.
The boy fell in a motionless heap, his eyes still staring unnervingly wide open and blank. Shek bent steeply to lift the very light body into his arms and carried Luton to the mattress against the cavern wall, letting him down unusually gently. He tried to close the staring eyes but they remained starkly open. Instead, Shek checked the boy's breathing that he found to be faint but quite regular.
When Shek returned with orlos, he knelt beside Luton to lift the boy's head in his usual rough fashion. He made the boy repeatedly drink. He heard an inrush of breath, the boy's eyelids flickered and his eyelashes fluttered, sense returning to the black eyes that stared up into Shek's in a bemused way. Shek looked deeply into the eyes but saw nothing but exhaustion. He made Luton finish the orlos and then quietly covered him with cloaks, telling the boy to sleep. When the warrior returned a short time later to check on him, Luton was curled up, his colour normal and his breathing easy; he was deeply asleep.
Shek sought out Autchek and squatted down beside him thoughtfully.
"He is asleep," he told the older warrior.
"Good," was the reply.
"What do we do about him?"
"Just watch him," was the very grim response. "If my fears are right, and I pray they are not, you will simply find he goes back to doing everything he is told, with little reaction to external stimuli." He looked sadly at Shek. "For you it will be good, Shek. You will make a great deal of money from him, and, no doubt the sorcerer would probably do the same to him as we have, but in an even harsher way. Once he is with Blach, he will f
eel nothing, I believe, so he may well survive. Perhaps, you may have done the boy a service. Gods," he added on a strong shiver. "I hope so. Let us pray that if he survives, he remembers us one day with kindness." The old warrior had tears in his eyes and shook so badly Shek knelt beside him, deep concern in his eyes. He'd never seen the warrior like this.
"You sense something, do you not, Old One?" Autchek grasped Shek's hands, his grip convulsive. His words made little sense to the warrior.
"A warning was sent, aeons ago, through seers and those with farsight, though the origin is obscure." Autchek coughed and went on, "It is ancient, but the words are very clear, Shek. It says: `And the child that is made a shadow shall become a child of the dark.'" He glanced at Shek, his eyes suddenly dark again. "Let us hope it is not so." Shek lifted a goblet of wine to Autchek's lips and made the warrior take a long swallow, Autchek's colour slowly returning as he drank again. "Try not to let the boy go so deep again," he advised the warrior. "And try not to allow any further brutalisation of that child." Shek nodded brusquely.
"I will not."
It was made clear to the overseers that Luton was not to be touched by any of them. It made them snarl if the boy was near but he never seemed to notice them. Autchek watched the boy closely, often with a haunted look in his eyes. Shek observed Luton too. He saw despair sometimes, pain and fear a little, but mostly all he saw was exhaustion and it made the warrior brusquely order the boy to rest earlier of an evening.
Luton found life easier but had gone beyond caring, nor was he aware what happened while he hung on the discipline post. All he knew was awakening with arms and a chest that ached, but as he'd become accustomed to pain of one sort or another, he ignored it. He was aware of dragging tiredness that oppressed him to the point where he found getting through a day a trial of endurance. With the passing days, his tiredness didn't lessen but left him, despite more rest, collapsing onto his mattress at night asleep on his feet.
Shek kept him so busy he'd no time to think of anything but moving from one task to another. He was told he was now responsible for all the warriors' destriers, a job that was strenuous and demanding. He was still expected to attend to all Shek's needs, as well as help with the other slaves on the caravan, tasks that saw him toil backwards and forwards across the cavern with water and food, give out blankets at night and collect them in the morning. He found he had to maintain the huge fire in the centre of the cavern all day and had to be up at dawn before everyone else to ensure it was blazing for the comfort of the warriors' early meal. Luton didn't transcend the physical again. He was too tired to do other than work, eat and sleep, a pattern of life he fell into for all the days they were confined to the cavern.
When the trek to the summit resumed, Luton's workload didn't lessen. He spent most hours of the day slithering on the icy path, hauling loads, pulling slipping, recalcitrant horses and dragging weakened slaves from the precipice. He even became accustomed to the cold that was cruelly biting. Ice overlaid the snow after the blizzard so walking of any kind was hazardous. He could hear avalanches crash in the distance. He even got used to seeing parts of the trail fall away as chunks of ice above the caravan crashed past the very edge of the trail, sheering bits off as they went.
While he struggled, panting and pulling, often sliding back two paces for each step taken forward, Luton could never decide who were the hardest to handle, the horses or the slaves. The top of the pass was reached by his part of the caravan in late winter.
Luton stood there, his breath curling in the air as he looked back to where they'd started the trail. He found it difficult to comprehend that so far distant was what had once been his home. It was irrelevant now. The panorama was awesomely beautiful. To the north were deep valleys and further beyond them, rolling hills, while to the south he saw plains extend for miles that he knew to the southwest turned into desert. Further south was Churchik land. He felt his guts contract at that thought, because it meant the slave market. Even though Luton accepted he was a slave and would probably die as one, he still felt sick fear inside. He pushed it from his mind, continuing to look south.
The alps this day had a deep blue haze about them, with the snow the boy had come to hate invitingly clean and deep. The trail had widened abruptly at the peak, so slaves were once again chained in pairs for the march down the mountains. Luton leaned against the wall of ice, pensively absorbing the beauty that surrounded him. Autchek came and stood quietly beside him, leaning back likewise.
"The air is very thin up here, Karek," he remarked. Luton nodded. "Do you find it beautiful?" The dark head nodded again.
Autchek looked over at the boy. Luton had grown very fast just recently and was almost as tall as a Churchik warrior, nor had the child reached full growth. In another cycle, the old warrior mused, the boy would be as tall as himself, Luton pitifully thin, with an abnormal frailty that never left the boy after the fever. Sometimes, Autchek thought with a shiver, the boy seemed wraithlike, his hair grown long though Shek cut it often enough, and the lovely eyes clouded. Luton never smiled and he still couldn't speak. He made himself plainly understood. No one could pretend they hadn't understood him.
Under Autchek's care the cuts from the flogging healed, but Luton would always bear scars from shoulders to hips. He asked for nothing and expected nothing. He obeyed Shek without hesitation and absolutely, as acquiescent as he'd ever been. Autchek thought the docility Shek spoke of was more apathy, but he made no comment. He continued to observe the boy, trying to read the oddly very attractive and appealing face. Luton looked up, a question in his eyes.
"Yes, Karek?" asked Autchek with a smile. Luton pointed to himself and then to the warrior. "Why am I watching you?" Luton nodded, without responding to the encouraging smile. Autchek felt sad as he spoke, because he saw nothing but tired apprehension in the dark eyes. "You have grown very much taller, have you not?"
The head nodded again and turned away. Stifling a sigh, Autchek pushed himself erect and walked away, unaware of wistful black eyes that followed him.
The trek down the mountain was easier because it was the end of winter. The further down they went, the less they skidded on hard-packed ice and the more they slipped in soft snowdrifts. Green shoots appeared through the whiteness on the path and Luton could see trees rear up below them, their branches bowed with snow. It was a breath-taking view that made Luton's life, as he trudged daily lower down the mountain, less harsh and unrelentingly cruel. He found breathing easier and seemed to accomplish his tasks more quickly.
Halfway down the mountain they came to the beginnings of forest. Where the snow had melted, there were meadows of early spring flowers. Water, melted from ice, thundered down streams become torrents. The sun had more warmth and the days lengthened. Though Luton didn't know it, he was now fourteen cycles.
This evening, they pitched camp in one of the meadows. Luton had to run from one task to another. After he finished his round of the slaves he tended the horses, had to ensure that everything was set up as Shek would want, and then, once the warriors were fed, he was casually dismissed for the time being. The boy lay back on the grass, more at ease than he'd been for seasons, his eyes lazily watching the clouds roll above him in a darkening sky.
It was while he lay there that he felt a mental intrusion that was like someone carefully sliced open his mind. He opened his mouth to try vainly to scream, his hands clasped to his head for protection, and got an instant mental slap that nearly knocked him unconscious. The probing was delicate and expert. It made the boy remember things he never wished to recall. The sensation lasted for only a matter of minutes, but it left him more shaken and terrified than anything Shek ever did to him.
He lay there quivering and trying to get his breath, wondering, in the depths of his fear, if indeed this was the man to whom he'd be enslaved. Instinctively, he knew it was. Slowly he calmed, but the terror didn't completely pass. He closed his eyes. He went to sleep. Shek found him out on the grass and shaking him awake,
bade him come into the unsel for the night.
The weeks wandering along the meandering trail through the forest and meadows was a respite for everyone in the caravan. Luton looked healthier despite the paleness that seemed to be part of the boy, and there was less stress in the thin face. He loved the trees and flowers and was often found crouched by a stream, meditatively watching the eddying currents. He'd trail his hand in the crystal clear water, then scoop some to his mouth.
He lounged on a boulder early in the morning on the day the Churchik riders arrived, so he didn't know they'd come. He dreamily watched scurrying leaves float past, until he heard himself sharply hailed by Shek and was curtly bidden to bestir himself. Resignedly he crossed the stones. He anticipated another long day.
Reluctantly, he clambered up the bank, stood in front of Shek and waited for the warrior to speak or give orders. Shek looked hard at Luton. The warrior grasped his wrist with some urgency and made the boy almost run back to the camp where he was brought to a halt at Shek's unsel. There, five Churchik warriors stood in a group, two of them holding the reins of six horses.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Leaning on sticks, Sarehl walked confidently, though still somewhat erratically. He covered considerably more ground as well and could walk, without support, for short distances. It took him painfully long to develop strength in his legs and he struggled against impatience, curbing his desire to push himself too fast. He was unaware he walked with much less weight on his sticks though Kaleb saw the improvement.
Sarehl became conscious of a commotion some distance behind him. He had difficulty turning around, but when he did he saw a large group of horsemen rein in, dismount, and laugh among themselves, and once he got close enough to discern the riders more clearly, Sarehl thought some of them bore a resemblance to Ensore. He looked at them with interest. By the time he reached them, the garrulous riders had tethered their horses and were beginning to tease two of the foresters busy putting on water to boil for the preparation of more mulled wine. One of the newcomers poked at the fire at the same time as he bid his fellow riders quieten. When Sarehl hobbled over to the fire this man looked up, giving Sarehl a long and appraising look. It wasn't unfriendly. It was curious. The rider rose to his feet and held out his hand.