Under A Colder Sun (Khale the Wanderer Book 1) (11 page)

“You didn’t have to kill him.”

“No, I didn’t, but I did,” Khale said. “Never forget who I am, girl. Most killers are made, I was born this way.”

Chapter Sixteen

Khale and Milanda travelled on towards Traitors’ Gap. The going was much easier on horseback. The farmer’s family had not protested as Khale took some small provisions for themselves and the steed. As they passed through the decayed ruins of villages, where the eyes of starved skulls watched them from the dirt, Milanda found herself glad of the dry, salted meat and water-bags though she hated the way it had all been taken.

Hunger made the horse’s feed smell good, at times.

The wild grass wore away to withered land. Everything seemed layered in coatings of red and yellow grit that danced in the wind’s fingers.

They pressed on. Khale told her there were people out here who filed their teeth, so they would not need to cut the meat they caught. And that the meat they caught was that of travellers and lost wanderers. Out here, there were none of the few laws that governed the Small Kingdoms. This stretch of barren land was a boundary between the Small Kingdoms and what lay beyond the mountains. If all of the barons, lords, and kings knew there were worse things waiting out there, they never said so, but still they left this nameless strip of desolation unmolested.

The old legends held that the mountains were ancient pillars, keeping the skies of the world from falling down on its peoples’ heads. And the same legends said that beyond the heights and weather-carved wynds of the mountains stood the lost dwelling place of the Over-Kings: Anaerthe Morn.

Milanda glimpsed small, hairless vermin scratching in the dirt before fleeing into their burrow-holes when dark-feathered carrion turned overhead, ever watchful for the blood and death that would mark their next feeding ground. She could not forget the face of the farmer’s son: the fierceness and hate in his eyes, followed by the shock then emptiness as he was struck down. Khale had saved her life, but the boy’s death made her skin crawl. It should not have happened that way.

“We are being followed,” Khale said.

“By whom?”

“I have an idea, and it is not one I like.”

“What do we do?”

“We draw them out. Take it slow across the desolation. They will come on us in the night, and I will make them wish they hadn’t.”

More killing,
she thought,
more death
.

She wondered if it would ever end.

*

The night was dark and the sky remained as dull and overcast as ever. Milanda could not remember the last time she had seen the stars shining clear. It felt like a long time ago, even though she knew it was not. She looked at Khale and wondered how it went with him.

“Where are we going, Khale? You haven’t told me yet.”

“That’s because I don’t want to.”

“Then tell me a story, at least.”

His eyes glowed in the firelight, making her stomach lining crawl.

“Do I look like your nursemaid?” he rumbled.

“No, but you have lived a long time. You must have a lot of stories.”

Khale looked at her. The colour of his eyes seemed to shift, becoming heavy with the rheum of old age.

“Stories. Yes, my life has many ... stories. Very well,” he said, “would you like to know who I am, girl? Who I really am?”

She nodded, although she didn’t like the cruel tone edging into his voice. His demon-soul was showing itself.

“I was born when the sun in the sky was still white and newborn. I sailed the seven seas of the world and crossed its lands. I stole and I killed because that’s what I do. And then I saw her: a girl, not much older than you are and just as innocent, or so she seemed.”

“Did you fall in love?”

“No,” he said, “I raped her. I was the first man to do such a thing. I stole into her home after dark. I saw her. I liked what I saw. I took her, there and then.”

Milanda didn’t say a word as he went on. “It’s all a lie, you see. I know my legends well enough, because I made most of them up myself. I never faced Death in battle. Death is the sound of your last breath, your heart failing, no more than that. It doesn’t dress up in a black hood and go hunting for near-corpses to harvest for some golden hall in the sky. Death is your last lover and your last friend. I thought that I was Death back then, as I cut my way through life, not caring for this soul or that. I did as I pleased. So I raped her in the dirt, and she screamed at me and scratched my face.” He lifted his fingers to his face, feeling for the ghosts of old scars.

“And then she spoke before I slit her throat. She said, “You will live to see the world you have created this day, and how it will come to nothing.” It sounded like some whispered madness to me, in those days. I didn’t understand, nor think anything more of it, until the night that came after. My eyes betrayed me. They had become as you see them now. I can still hear the screams, those people screaming that I was possessed by a demon from Hell.

“Perhaps they were right. No, they were wrong. I was much worse than that. Because they hounded me and they slew me, but then I came back. I hunted them down for doing that to me. I tortured some of them for weeks, fed them their own entrails and strangled them. I spent years adrift in murder and blood.

“When I had slaughtered enough, I began to search and to study. I needed to know what had been done to me. It took a century for me to acquire the knowledge of what had happened, but I could not find the words of the curse she had laid upon me. That is until I spoke to one very old mage, who told me that the words of the curse died with her. Every witch and mage has their own language for conjuring with, which they tell to no other. Such a language is a part of their soul. Without her words, no counter-spell could be woven. I finally understood what she had done, and I heard her laughter in my ears that night. I am damned to Life, not Death. There is no greater punishment a man can endure. I cut the mage’s heart out when he told me this. He did not deserve to die, but then I do not deserve to live—so what did it matter if I roasted his insides and made them into a meal, eh?”

Milanda’s eyes asked the question she did not dare to speak.

“What would you rather have others think of you, girl? That you defeated one of Man’s deepest fears in mortal combat and were given immortality as a reward for your prowess? Or, that you were cursed for taking someone who was not yours to take? For being the Father-Creator of such an act? No, you’re safe from me, girl. Never fear me in that regard. But beware the men of this world above all things. They have a darkness born to them that not even the Gods can fathom. I know this because I am its root and seed.

“I have lived, and I have seen the giants of humanity brought to their knees. I was there the day they nailed the wrong man to the cross, and I saw how he wept at his fate. How forsaken was he. Yes, they conquered much, they achieved so much, but always it was born from death, darkness, and pain. The one thing they could not master was themselves. They spent centuries in fear of creation, only for themselves to be the ones who laid waste to the world. Humanity undone by humanity; ever has it been so, girl, ever shall it be. And it all began with me. Would you like to hear more?”

Milanda quietly said, “No ...”

Chapter Seventeen

Leste’s horse spent the morning tramping over the land and there was barely a sign of life around them. How many days travel now, was it? Six? Seven? Eight?

Had she missed
Subote
?

Are the Gods angry with me,
she wondered in black humour,
is that why things have gone so  ill?

She was losing count of the days and growing sick of subsisting on roots and bitter berries plucked from thornbushes. Pale tufts of brittle grass thrust through the cracked ground at irregular intervals, and when her footsteps disturbed them, they collapsed into dust. She was coming close to the mountains. They were no longer a roughness on the horizon, they towered over it, though she was not yet in their shadows. Clouds continued to creep across the sky, creating an unbroken monotony that mirrored her journey thus far. Leste was glad of the robe she had packed, as it fended off the worst of the elements, but she would have killed for a moment of shelter and sanctuary by the time noon came around, when the wind began to pick up, driving blinding sand and stinging grit into her face.

As the day wore on, the wind eased, and she stopped to let her horse rest. She was chewing on a mouthful of bland, dried meat when she saw a small black form moving towards her across the horizon. It was coming over the hillocks at speed, bobbing, ducking, and weaving.

A man
—a young man in rags. It looked like he was running for his life. Leste took a step forward, her fingers stroking the hilt at her waist when she saw his pursuers appear. A group of men, no better dressed than the one being pursued, but mounted and armed. Leste recognised scythes, short swords, and clubs swinging from their hands.

Then, there were the cries coming from their victim, mingling with their own bloodthirsty shouts. Leste shivered at the harsh sounds and gripped the hilt of her sword more tightly.

She rocked back and forth in her saddle, wondering what to do. It did not take her long to decide. She would help him. Whatever he had done, she could not imagine it being so vile as to deserve being ridden down in this manner.

She came to the man just as he collapsed, exhausted, before her horse. Leste dismounted and laid a hand upon his shoulder. “I’m here to help.”

“You can’t. Run,” he gasped. “You can’t help me. Flee. Those men want me. I ran from them. Days and days they’ve hounded me. I don’t know how much longer I can go now they’ve found me. They’re here to kill me.”

Leste got to her feet and faced the approaching hunters. She stepped over the fallen man, making a shield of herself between them and him. The hunters stopped short. Their eyes regarded the traveller who intervened between them and their quarry. Leste could see the men were poor, and yet they were hunting this man: for what reason?

“Give him up, traveller. Our quarrel is not with you.”

“Why should I?” Leste asked.

One of the hunters dismounted and stepped forward. “It is not your concern. This is our matter, and we mean to see it through to the end. Now, get out of our way, so that we do not put your head in a bag along with his and take it back to our ’steads.”

Leste said nothing. Blood was thundering in her ears. Her heart ached from a tightness closing around it. “I will not stand aside and let you kill him.”

“Then we will ride you down also. You know not what you are protecting here, woman.” The hunter lifted a barbed whip in his right hand. “Now, move, before I take your skin from your back.”

Leste did move. She drew her sword, stepped quickly, and drove it through the man’s chest. It grated against bone, and she had to pull hard to draw it back out before he took it with him as he fell.

The other hunters shouted their horror and made to dismount. Leste dashed in and, with swift slashes, hamstrung two of them, sending them squealing to the ground to twist and writhe, bleeding into the dust. She moved away as their horses whickered, rearing and bringing their hooves down hard on the skulls and chests of their masters.

The two hunters left dismounted before she could get to them. One circled out to the left, and the other to the right. They meant to play a game with her, but they were ill-armed for it. One hefted a cumbersome scythe and the other wrestled with a sword that was old, rusted, and notched. There was no skill in how they stepped towards her.

Leste went for the one with the sword. He fought without craft. He swung it as a child swings a sword while Leste parried and slashed until he left himself wide open and she pierced his stomach with a brutal counter-riposte.

The hunter with the scythe tried to take her head off, but he overstepped his mark, stumbling over his own feet. The curve of the blade whistled and then stopped silent as it slit him open, spilling the pale ropes of his insides onto the dry earth. Leste cut his throat to put him out of his misery.

She looked down at the dead and felt no victory or good in what she’d done.

A voice came from nearby—the young man approaching her. “Thank you, Mistress. You saved my skin.”

“Who are you?” she asked, not feeling the tightness around her heart lessen any.

“I was a prisoner of those men.”

“How did you escape?” Leste asked. “And why were you being held by them?”

“Food becomes scarce in these parts,” he said. “Outside of Colm and the like, we needs must fend for ourselves, and when the livestock are gone, people turn on each other. First, babes, women and children, then old folk, and then the unwary.”

Leste eyed him. Now that the other men were dead and he was this close to her, she saw there was something in his manner that she did not care for.

“Can you lead me to the mountain-pass?” she asked.

“Why in the world would you want to go there?”

“I am on a journey to rescue someone much like yourself. She was taken against her will.”

“Then I will certainly help you.”

“How long will it take to find the way?”

“A day, or so.”

“What’s your name?”

“Kereth.”

“Then lead on, Kereth,” she said, not offering him a place on her horse or giving her name.

*

Leste followed Kereth until it was time to stop and rest.

After a frugal meal of jerky, berries, and water, they sat together and talked.

“You know, when it’s quiet like this, it’s beautiful in its own way. This wilderness,” Leste said. “There’s something about the emptiness, the soundlessness of it.”

Kereth nodded, making no reply.

They sat on in silence for a time, each chewing at their jerky. Leste watched him out of the corner of her eye, until her eyes became heavy.