ARC: The Corpse-Rat King (31 page)

“It’s honest work,” Gerd replied. “Good work.”

“It speaks!” Marius clapped a hand on his shoulder. Gerd neither acknowledged it nor shrugged it off. It lay there, like a dead fish, until Marius coughed and removed it. “So why are you here, then? I thought you’d be tracking me to the ends of the Earth like a little dead bloodhound.”

“Grandma needs me.” Gerd swung the hoe towards another pile of shit, spraying wet refuse against Marius’ legs. “Sty needs maintaining, chores need doing. She’s getting old.”

“And she’s blind as a judge and crazy as a banana skin. It’s a tragic tale.” He leaned in, so that his mouth was less than a foot from Gerd’s ear. “I recommend a pillow, placed over the face.” He straightened. “Where are all your dead chums, then?”

“We had a difference of opinion.”

“Oh, really?”

“They wanted to hunt you down, no matter where on the globe you ran to, and tear you limb from limb and scatter you to the four corners of the wind, so that every moment of your afterlife was spent in torturous agony, never to be reconstituted and find peace.”

“I see. And you?”

Gerd swung the hoe upwards and brandished it like a pike.

“I wanted to do it myself.”

“Oh, you have to be kidding.”

Gerd wasn’t kidding. Without so much as a change in expression, he swung at Marius’ head.

Marius ducked, and skipped backwards, out of reach. The hoe is not a graceful weapon, and Gerd was a less than graceful wielder. Compared to him, Marius was a dancer, a prize fighter, a light-footed professional fencer. Then, just as quickly, compared to Gerd he was a man lying on his back in a slippery pile of pig shit. He rolled over and drew his hands underneath his chest, ready to push himself up. A cold weight pressed against the back of his neck, and pushed him down until he lay with his face deep in the warm, stinking manure. He squirmed until he could tilt part of his face out of the mess – an eye, and the corner of his mouth – and squinted upwards. Gerd stood above him, his weight pressing the hoe down onto Marius. Marius spat his lips free of dung.

“What are you going to do?” he managed to ask. “Kill me?”

Gerd reached for something just out of his field of vision. A moment later, a broad, heavy-bladed axe struck the dirt an inch from his free eye and sank an inch into the hard ground.

“Chop you up,” Gerd said. “into different pieces. Feed your limbs to the pigs, throw your torso down the cliff face. Give your head to the dead.”

The pigs squealed in excitement, as if the sound of the axe heralded a new meal. They butted against the wooden fence, giving Marius a new memory of fear to block in later days. He was fleetingly glad that his bowels had nothing to add to the already-covered ground.

“And what will that do?” Marius eyed the nicked and stained axe head. He had no doubt it would be capable of the task. “They won’t get their king that way.”

“It’ll make me feel better.” Gerd pulled the axe up, out of Marius’ view. He braced, waiting for the first heavy impact. Instead, the pressure against his neck lessened. He rolled over, conscious of the wet, sticky, mess across his face and hair. Gerd had replaced the axe on its mount, just inside the sty door. Now he did the same with the hoe.

“Get up,” he said without looking at Marius. “Wash yourself off. You stink.”

Marius sat up. “So?”

“You’re not meeting my grandmother smelling like pig shit.” He stepped over to a barrel in the lee of the shed, plunged his hands into the top, and splashed water on his face and upper body. “Hurry up.”

Marius stood. He edged over to the barrel and washed himself down, keeping one wary eye on Gerd.

“What makes you think I want to meet your grandmother again?” he asked. The last time he was in the village, he had met the old woman to explain why Gerd was leaving, and how he would look after the boy and see him safe. All the while he had been forced to swallow down the lumpiest, indigestible cabbage soups he had ever eaten. There were parts of it that still hadn’t digested properly. Two more minutes with the axe and the pigs would have been pulling bits out of his intestines like truffles.

“Because,” Gerd replied, turning his back on Marius and walking towards the village centre. “You obviously need me, or you wouldn’t be here. And if you don’t, I won’t help you. And I’ll take you apart with the axe.”

“Compelling argument.” Marius followed behind Gerd. Men were just beginning to exit the huts, yawning as the rays of the sun stretched the shadows across the open square. As they saw Gerd and Marius they nodded slightly, before averting their gazes and hurrying past, to their jobs. Marius watched them, and saw the cautious nods that Gerd gave back.

“They don’t seem too bothered by your current state.”

“I’m a hard worker,” Gerd replied. “I’m honest. I keep to myself. I built the chicken run, and repaired the sty. I’ve almost cleared another six acres of field in the lower valley.” He shrugged. “Dead isn’t the same as it is down on the plains. They may be a little spooked by it, but as long as I’m not lazy and I don’t touch their daughters, they leave me alone.” He paused at the entrance of a low-framed, ramshackle hut on the outskirts of the village. “Be nice.” He stepped inside. “Grandma? There’s someone to see you.”

Marius sighed, and put one hand on the door frame.

“I’m going to regret this,” he said to the wood, and followed Gerd into the hut.

TWENTY-ONE

“More soup?” The old woman stood above Marius, a ladle held in front of her like a white walking stick. Hot lumps of something that may have started out as vegetable matter dripped from it onto the back of Marius’ hand. He watched it slide off onto the table, wishing he had a cloth to wipe it away. There was no chance in hell he was going to lick his hand clean.

“Uh, no, no thank you,” he said, eyeing the bowl in front of him. It overflowed with the greasy, viscous product, the colour and consistency of pus. “I couldn’t eat another bite.”

“Are you sure?” the old woman waved the ladle about like a weapon. Hot liquid sprayed the table, the floor, and Marius. He held up a hand to ward off the attacking droplets.

“Quite sure. Thank you.”

“Well, if you’re sure.” She turned away, and filled hers and Gerd’s bowls with uncanny accuracy, before returning the cooking pot to its station next to the fire, and gaining her seat. Gerd picked up his spoon, and the old woman slapped his hand.

“You know better than that,” she said. Gerd dropped the spoon with a guilty look at Marius. Marius left his own cutlery where it lay. He had no intention of picking it up to begin with. The old woman intertwined her twig-like fingers and raised her hands before her face.

“We thank you, Lord Gods,” she began, and Marius could not help the slight hiss of derision that escaped his teeth. The old woman tilted her head so that her unseeing eyes fixed upon him. Marius stared back, until her lack of blinking began to make him uncomfortable. The moment he looked away, she continued. “For this blessing of food, and for the comforts of life which you bestow upon us, your humble servants. To your glory be.”

“To your glory be,” Gerd said in a small voice.

“Let’s eat.” The old woman raised her spoon and began to scoop the warm goo into her toothless mouth at a rate of knots. As she slurped and slapped her lips together in appreciation, Marius took the opportunity to examine his surroundings. Nothing had changed since his last visit. The single room that served as kitchen, living quarters and, he sniffed in horror, bathroom, still resembled a giant game of pick-up-sticks that had somehow ended up on their ends. Dried garlands of something that may have started off as plant life hung from nails, and if there was a right angle to be had, he couldn’t find it. The only thing more rickety than the furniture was the old woman herself, and Marius still wasn’t sure which of the pigs outside were her pets and which were her direct relatives. He stared in horror at the thick dribbles that escaped her maw and ran slowly across her hairy chin.

“You don’t pray,” she said in a spray of beige liquid. “Are you a godless man?”

“I have my own beliefs.” I believe you are disgusting, he thought. I believe I want to get the hell out of here. I believe I want to be ill.

“Hmph,” the old woman’s lip curled. “Too clever to need salvation, eh? Don’t feel the need to protect your immortal soul?” She waved her spoon at him like a sergeant major’s crop. “Too busy, too clever, to think about life everlasting?”

“Oh, no.” Marius stared at the chipped spoon as it swished about, dangerously close to the bridge of his nose. “Everlasting life is very much in my thoughts. Very much.” He twisted his gaze towards Gerd, head resolutely bent over his emptying bowl. “Life after death is of interest, and all its many wonders.”

Gerd peeked up from his meal, saw the look on Marius’ face, and quickly ducked back down.

“Gerd, darling?”

“Yes, Grandmamma?”

“I’m a silly old bissum, I know. But I‘ve gone and left the gate to the upper field open. Would you be a dear and close it for me?” She turned a toothless smile upon her grandson. “Please?”

Gerd glanced from her to Marius and back.

“You’ll be all right?”

“Of course, sweetheart. Mr… I’m sorry, what was your name again, dearie?”

“Spint. Mister Spint.”

“Mister Spint and I will just chat while you’re gone, dear. Be a good lad.”

“Yes, Grandmamma.” Gerd rose, wiped his mouth on his shirt sleeve, and made for the door. Marius watched him go, while the old woman kept her sightless gaze pinned to his chin. As soon as the door closed behind him, she coughed.

“Right, now. Let’s cut the bullshit, shall we?”

“I’m sorry?”

“You heard me, sonny.”

Marius blinked. The old woman was staring right at his eyes, her blank white orbs appearing to look right through his skin to the lies beneath. “Mister Spint indeed. You think I’m stupid? Like I never went to the theatre?”

Marius raised an eyebrow in acknowledgement. “Well, it didn’t seem likely.”

“And what am I then? Mistress Comiglia?”

Marius’ eyes widened. Mister Spint and Mistress Comiglia were married, in the play from which he had taken the name. The play was bawdy, and their marriage was, depending on the production… explicit. “Wait a minute,” he said hurriedly. “If you think that’s why I chose…”

The old crone cackled. “Don’t be stupid.” She leaned forward, her cabbage breath washing over him. “I know who you are, boy. You think I don’t recognise your voice? Lack of sight doesn’t make a woman stupid. It sharpens the senses, and the memory.”

“I–”

“Tell me what happened to my grandson.”
“What?”

“You heard me.” She leaned back, and crossed her arms. “You’re the one who came here with stories of gold and adventure, and stole my boy away from me. I know that. He’s changed, and I don’t mean he’s grown up.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m not stupid. I can hear. He doesn’t sleep. He lies there, pretending, those nights he remembers to, but he can’t fool me. He’s not that bright.”

“You’ve got that right,” Marius muttered.

“Watch it.”

“Sorry.”

“So?”

Marius kept his gaze fixed on the door. He could feel the old woman’s eyes looking through him, feel the muted heat of her dislike washing over him in waves. She sat, immobile as a weathered rock, as if she had all the time in the world for his answer.

Finally: “He’s dead.”

“What?”

Marius sighed. “He’s dead. Down on the plain. A soldier. He’s animated, he thinks and dreams and carries on like he always has, but he’s not alive. He’s been to the Kingdom of the Dead, and… he’s dead.”

The old woman should have exploded, called him a liar, or worse. She should have swung a gnarled hand at his head, tipped back her chair, spat in his face and accused him of sins innumerable for his falsehoods. Instead, she raised her hands to her face, and breathed deeply into them, once, twice.

“I knew it,” she said as she lowered them to her lap. “I knew it.”

“How? How could you possibly–”

“The villagers never talk to him.” She swung out of her chair and shuffled over to the single window, raising her face to the shaft of sunlight that came through as if basking in the early morning heat. “They show him respect, of course. He’s a good worker. He pretty much rebuilt our corrals by himself, and re-ploughed the upper fields, since he came back. But they don’t talk. Not to him.” She turned from the window, and tilted her chin towards Marius. “If you’re old, and blind, people think you’re deaf as well. They forget to stop talking when you come near.” She sighed, and a fire seemed to dim inside her. “What did you do to him?”

“I didn’t…”

“You took him away, and got him killed, and now…” she returned to her seat, slumped into it. “What is he going to do when I’m gone, eh? What then?”

“I… I don’t know.”

“No. I don’t suppose you do.”

They sat in silence for long minutes, until the door opened and Gerd stepped through. He looked from Marius to his grandmother, and back again, frowning.

“You told her,” he said finally.

“Yes.”

“You
told
her.”

“Yes. I did.”

“What on Earth did she–…?”

“I’m in the room.”

Both men turned towards the old woman, sitting upright at the table, staring at something immeasurably far away. In an instant, the anger left them.

“Sorry.”

“Sorry.”

“Right,” she said, standing. She felt her way along the edge of the table towards the chopping block and cooking utensils stacked in the far corner. Marius realised that it was the first time he had seen her need assistance to move around the room. If Gerd noticed he said nothing, but it was obvious to Marius that something had left the old woman, some spark of resistance towards the fates. “Mister…”

“Spint.”

“Spint, says you’ll be going with him.”

“Grandmamma, I don’t want…”

“You’ll be needing something to tide you over.” She busied herself rummaging amongst the bags and baskets, emerging with a cobb loaf and small bag. “This should see you for the day.”