Scarred Man (17 page)

‘Go and get him,' the Misabeq barked to the guard who had brought them in.

‘I wouldn't do that,' Keshik cautioned, laying hold of the man's arm.

‘Why not?' asked the Misabeq.

‘I don't think he will take kindly to being brought back. In truth, I think you'd just be sending this man to his death. I don't know anyone who could make Slave do anything he doesn't want to do.'

‘Could you?'

‘No,' Keshik admitted. ‘And if I tried, we'd fight, and neither of us can afford to die yet.'

‘None of us can afford to die, Keshik of the Tulugma.'

‘We have things we need to do.'

‘Maybe you should both leave.'

Keshik gave the Misabeq a curt nod and left.

Slave had unhitched his horse and was mounted, ready to leave. He scarcely looked as Keshik joined him.

‘We could have had food. Warm beds. A hot bath,' Keshik chided as they urged their horses away from the barracks.

‘The food would have been good,' Slave agreed.

‘So why leave?'

‘I will not be under any man's command. Ever.'

‘Is there any way I can convince you to stay, at least for a day or so?'

Slave turned that disconcerting silver eye on Keshik again. ‘Why don't you stay if you want to? I am not stopping you.'

‘Because no matter how good you are, how strong, how fast you may be, there will be someone who is better, faster, stronger than you, and on that day you will need another blade at your back.' Keshik returned Slave's gaze with all the strength he could muster. ‘And we have things to do that we cannot do if we are dead.'

‘Are you saying I need you?'

‘No. I am saying I need you,' Keshik admitted.

‘I will not be under any man's command.'

‘We can solve that.'

Slave shook his head. ‘No, we can't. It is an army and armies function on orders and chains of command. I have studied tactics and military history; no army can operate any other way.'

Slave had allowed his horse to slow to a stop and they faced each other squarely.

‘Armies work by command because most soldiers need to be ordered to do what they should,' Keshik explained. ‘I think you just need to be told what is needed, and you would do it. I don't think you need to be ordered. If you want to do what this Misabeq wants you to do, there are no orders involved. You just get paid for doing it.'

‘Doing what?'

‘This village is under threat from something out there,' Keshik said. ‘I think we both know what it is, or what it might be. These villagers need warning if it comes. We just have to take our turn walking a post to give that warning.'

‘If it comes, you know we are all dead, if we are lucky.'

‘True. But can't you pretend to make a difference for a couple of days?'

‘No.' Slave put his heels to the flanks of his horse and galloped away. He did not even hesitate as he swept past the gate, into the howling wasteland beyond.

Keshik watched him leave, torn. He was tired, hungry, filthy and cold. Walking a post for a few days was a small price to pay for the food and shelter of an army barracks. On the other hand …

‘Ice and wind!' he shouted as he drove his horse in pursuit.

He thundered past the startled guards, ignoring their cries of protest, putting the welcoming lights of the village behind him as he followed Slave's rapidly fading figure into the darkness.

 

They rode south-east through the night. Slave drove his horse on as if in anger. The beast was straining hard and Keshik could hear it blowing over the pounding of hooves. Even in the dark, he could tell it was in danger.

‘Ease off!' he called to Slave. ‘You will kill the horse at this pace!'

Slave did not answer. Keshik bellowed again, sensing that his own mount was beginning to
struggle under the forced gallop. This had to stop soon, but how? If he let the maniac get too far ahead out here, there was no telling where he might end up, but if he didn't slow down soon, there would be two more dead horses on this unforgiving wasteland.

In the end, it was taken out of his hands — Slave's horse gave an agonised squeal and collapsed as its heart gave out. Slave cried out as he was catapulted from his saddle and over the dead horse's head to … Keshik could barely believe his eyes as, in the near total dark of a Grada night, he watched Slave execute a perfect tumbling roll and land on his feet, Claw out as if to face an enemy. He hit the ground running and kept going.

Slave on a galloping horse was fast, but Slave running was little more than a canter for Keshik's struggling horse. He reined him in and allowed him to slow to a walk for a while. Slave ran on. Before he vanished into the darkness, he started to flag slightly, slowing to a jog, then a walk. Keshik caught him up just as he started to stagger slightly with exhaustion. He dismounted and grabbed Slave by the shoulder.

‘Ease up, Slave,' he said. ‘What's …?' Keshik's voice faded as he saw the glow of silver. He stepped back, his hands going instinctively to his swords. Slave spun around with a feral snarl. The Claw glinted dangerously in the gleam from his glowing eye. There was no mistaking Slave's murderous intent as he advanced on Keshik.

Keshik drew his swords and prepared to meet the attack. Slave continued to snarl, to growl, to
approach. With a spit, he sprang at Keshik, Claw high and slashing down while his right hand drove forward like a dagger. Keshik weaved aside, avoiding the hand, parrying the Claw with his swords. He was about to initiate his own thrust under the slashing Claw when a flying kick caught him unexpectedly under the ribs. The blow drove the wind out of him, sending him staggering back. Slave followed up, slashing diagonally downwards with the Claw while simultaneously driving in with his right hand. Keshik parried the Claw with one blade, but his own slashing counterattack was parried by Slave's hand slamming into the flat of the blade. The sorcerous, softly glowing weapon rang with the impact and Slave brought the Claw back across at Keshik's face. In a heartbeat, Keshik was being driven back by a flurry of blows and slashing thrusts. It was like fighting several opponents as every part of Slave's body became a weapon. His feet, hands, head, all moved in a complex series of attacking and defensive moves that whirled around Keshik's blades, dodging, striking — fluidly, inexorably battering away his energy. The Warrior's Claw with its three glinting blades was a blur, requiring most of Keshik's focus to keep it away from his flesh. Every blow that he parried with the steel blade sent a shock through his arm, while each time his own glowing blade met the Claw, an eerie cascade of sparks flickered in the air, accompanied by a sound not unlike a sigh.

Slowly, painfully, Slave drove Keshik back. Keshik lost track of time as he strove against the fiend that had so completely taken over Slave. The
stars above wheeled across the sky unheeding of the bitter struggle for life happening under their cold stare. For every attack Keshik parried or dodged, three landed — a punch, a kick, a head butt, or a slash from the Claw. Pain thrummed through his body, but Slave showed no signs of slowing.

Keshik knew he had landed good slashing blows, but Slave's heavy clothes absorbed most of the power of the swords. Still, both men were bleeding from many wounds, most little more than nicks and cuts, but some that would take time to heal, if either of them survived. Keshik was tiring; the days of hunger and cold, the time in the cage, the long ride since leaving the village, were all beginning to take their toll, but Slave kept coming at him. There was no humanity left in his eye, and the silver globe was glowing with an ever-increasing brilliance. Keshik's counterattacks were slowing down as his arms tired under the unflagging assault. If there had been any doubt that Slave was a berserker of uncommon brutality, this savage, unrelenting assault proved it. Grada set, taking her gentle light from the sky, leaving only the hard black of the uncaring night and Keshik in fear for his life. Never had he faced an opponent so implacable, so untiring, so fast.

As the pink of a new day touched the horizon, Keshik stumbled. Exhaustion, blood loss and hunger had stolen his concentration and he fell to another of Slave's low, swinging kicks. His feet went out from under him, sending him crashing onto the frozen ground. What was left of his breath was driven from him, his head hit the earth hard
and consciousness wavered. With what he believed to be his dying gasp, he looked up at Slave's bestial face.

The scars that ripped across it were running with blood like twin rivers, the silver eye glowed, the human eye was blank and the lips were drawn back in a snarl. He raised the Claw for the killing blow. Keshik let his swords slip from numb hands and faced the blades.

Slave hesitated in the downward swing. His face turned away from Keshik, looking at something beyond, something on the western horizon. Keshik gathered the last vestiges of his strength and scrambled away. He forced himself up onto his feet to stare at what had saved his life.

Three points of light whirled within a region of utter black, outlined against the lightening sky. The black within black took on shape, reduced and drew closer until it was a vaguely humanoid shape, barely twice the height of a man, standing less than twenty paces away.

Slave raised his Claw and turned to face Keshik. All traces of the bestial ferocity had vanished, leaving him looking oddly serene: a look that was made all the more bizarre by the blood splattered over his body. No words were exchanged; none seemed necessary. Keshik limped forward, picked up his swords, and stood at Slave's side to face the thing he had released into the world.

Unlike the last time he had faced it, Keshik heard no voice in his mind, no booming declarations, no intrusions into his memories, just a vast sense of malice, of anger. The waves of hate flowed out
from the being as if to overwhelm him with simple despair, but his exhaustion and pain had left him numb. No more emotion could touch him. He stood, swords hanging limply at his sides, staring up at it.

‘What do you want?' he asked.

‘I NEED TO FEED. NOT SINCE I DEVOURED SONDELLE HAVE I EATEN WELL.'

‘We would be poor fare for you,' Keshik said. ‘Especially after Leserlang.'

‘THEY WERE LESS THAN THEIR NAME SUGGESTED.'

‘Go back to where you belong,' Slave said.

The three swirling lights within the black shape darted sharply as if to fix Slave firmly in view. Slave responded by raising his Claw to his face in salute, the three blades catching the inhuman glow from his silver eye. In the reflected light, the scars down his face glistened red with blood. A sound not unlike a sharply indrawn human breath broke the silence, followed by a vast cry that split the dawn.

‘THIS CANNOT BE!'

With a howl of anguish that rang across the tundra, the dark presence of Kielevinenrohkimainen fled north.

A low growl of hunger stirred deep in her throat. She crouched, belly to the ground, staring through the undergrowth. Ahead, the fat rodent nibbled contentedly. It was completely unaware of its impending death.

She slithered closer, her paws silent on the leaf litter, until she was in range. Her tail twitched, not in anticipation but to get her balance right before she pounced. When everything was just so, she drove her body forward like a spear. The big cat shot through the air, crashing through the bush towards her unsuspecting prey.

At the sound of her approach, the rodent looked up, a momentary flicker of surprise on its face as its eyes widened and the hungry jaws crushed out its life.

Hot blood poured from the broken body, filling Tatya's mouth, trickling across her muzzle. She crunched contentedly, enjoying the sensations — the warmth, the taste, the tiny stabs of pain of the broken shards of bone on her tongue, the minute wriggles as the rodent's life faded — everything was satisfying, everything was as it should be.

She was a predator.

She hunted, she ate her prey. Her prey knew this.

It was the nature of things.

It was right.

Even humans knew this.

Everything was better now. The hateful cold was gone, the harsh frozen ground no longer bruised her paws and food was plentiful here in these dense forests. It was good to be home again. Even the dim, filtered light that seeped through the canopy was better, offering her camouflage, allowing her to move unseen, even when she ran.

And running was what she was doing now. Maida was far from her. The sense of her presence was fading every day, leaving Tatya on the edge of panic. She hated the feeling, but the compulsion drove her on. Maida needed her and everything else was subsumed beneath that one fact. Even now as she ate, the need to run, to keep running south, to find her, was already forcing her to move. She swallowed the last of her meal hurriedly and sprang forward.

She ran, leaping over the precious stream that crossed her path, dodging under the dangling vines, and skirting the occasional gaps in the canopy where the sunlight streamed through and would highlight her black form.

Deep in her mind, she knew she had to avoid being seen this close to humans. Her kind was never welcome where they ran their tame animals, and their scent was rich around her. Their bleating could be heard from time to time when the wind came from the right direction, and their spoor
littered the forest floor. No matter how easy they were, she could not hunt them: the delay would be simply more time wasted as she avoided their human keepers. Normally, she would hunt, then shift form and make use of the human fascination with her other form to evade them. But that would take days — days she did not have.

She kept running as new scents registered in her mind.

Horses.

Too many horses, being ridden.

An image of a group of people travelling slowly. She slowed to a walk and lowered herself to the ground until she was slinking beneath the level of the undergrowth, advancing on the group of horses and their riders.

They were men in uniforms, with one woman. There was shouting. The woman was shouting at one of the men and all the others were watching them. No one would see Tatya. She rose and continued running, a shadow amid shadows, black on black.

The end of the forest came abruptly, cut by the farmers who needed a straight line for their crops. She pressed on, running low beneath the top of the waving grasses. Ahead, the stench of human habitation grew strong, but over it, coming stronger now she was out of the forest, was the bitter salt bite of the sea. This place was on the coast, and Maida was here. She had slowed and was here. A rumble of pleasure formed in Tatya's chest.

All the running was coming to an end.

Maida was here, in this town!

The first arrow sliced through the air above her, hissing angrily past her shoulder. She threw herself to one side, rolling away from the attack, instinctively shifting into her secondary form, the safe form, the hiding, scurrying form.

The form humans did not shoot at.

In this form, she moved quickly through the ruts and furrows of the farm, past the sentries who stood watch over the fields for anything that might threaten them. As she scurried, unseen and safe from their arrows, she heard and dismissed their cries and pounding boots. They would never find her and, even if they did, they would dismiss this form as she dismissed them. She would slip past them and reach the city walls before dark.