Where Serpents Strike (Children of the Falls Vol. 1) (24 page)

“Well, I hated my father.”

“Why?”

“Didn’t you know? He was a madman. Half the
realm knew that he was nothing but a useless codger. It was
embarrassing.”

At that moment Broderick felt a strange
connection to his cousin, strange because he couldn’t recall them
ever relating over anything before. Yet he and Clint had both grown
up with distant father’s who all but ignored them, Clint’s due to
poor mental health, and Kingsley Falls because of nothing other
than disdain, or so Broderick assumed. He had never been sure why
his stepfather had resented him so much.

“Gross!” came Nairnah’s high-pitched squeal
when she saw the bloodied rabbit with the sword through its
neck.

“Clint!” Brayden scolded. “What are you
doing?”

“None of your business.”

“It is my business,” Brayden said. “We’re
all in this together. I’ve told you that.”

Clint snorted. “And now that you’ve said it
again you’ve become even more annoying.” He jerked his chin toward
Nairnah, his lip curling in disgust. “What’s
she
doing
here?”

“She followed us,” Broderick said.

“Don’t you know hunting is for men?” Clint
looked her up and down. “Stupid girl.”

Brayden stepped up to Clint, his fists
tightening. “Don’t talk to her like that.”

Broderick was surprised to see such
confidence in his brother.

“What, do you like her or something?”
Clint’s lip curled at the notion. “I’m telling Khalous. She
shouldn’t even be here. She’s too young.”

“I just wanted to help,” Nairnah said.

Clint waved them off with his hand and knelt
down to pick up his rabbit. He swung its bloodied corpse toward
Nairnah’s head, eliciting a horrified scream from her, before he
started back for camp, laughing.

Broderick stayed with Brayden and Nairnah
this time as they made their way back to camp.

According to Khalous it would be their last
night in the wild before they reached the temple, or Halus Gis, as
Placidous called it. He said it was a church where people like him
went to study, but as for what they studied Broderick didn’t
know—nor did he want to know. Halus Gis had food and warm beds, and
that was all he cared about.

They found the others camped within a circle
of fir trees near the edge of the northern cliff. Khalous nursed a
growing campfire while Pick and Stoneman entertained some of the
children with music. Pick kept rhythm with the rapid slapping of a
knife between his palm and leg while Stoneman’s deep voice provided
the bass. The children in front of them were spinning and dancing,
falling over and giggling whenever Pick sang, “
Boom, boom,
doom
!” The tune was an old children’s song popular among the
folk of Aberdour.

Sister Ariella saw Nairnah walking out of
the woods with Brayden and Broderick and hurried over to the girl,
shaking her head in disapproval. She took her by the hand and led
her away. “It’s not appropriate for you to be with boys,” she said.
“And I had told you to stay near me.”

“I’m sorry,” Nairnah said.

Ariella led her way.

Broderick looked at his brother. “So? Do you
like her?”

“Maybe.”

Broderick just rolled his eyes.

Preston and Ashton Stonefield came sprinting
toward them through the grass, whirlwinds of youthful energy. Nash
jumped toward Broderick as though he were going to tackle him, but
turned at the last minute and ran by.

“Made you flinch!” he teased.

“What is that?” Preston asked, taking one of
the birds from Brayden’s hand and inspecting it.

“A stone partridge,” he said. “We don’t have
them on Edhen.”

“Looks like a chicken.”

The boys neared the campfire where Khalous
was waiting to prepare their catch for stew.

“Good work, boys,” Pick said. “Thanks for
getting ours. Where’s yours?”

Stoneman feigned a wince. “Uh-oh. They gunna
have to get more.”

“Not funny,” Broderick said.

Khalous, Pick, and Stoneman proceeded to
prepare the pheasants for supper.

Placidous joined them a short while later.
The slender priest looking ragged in his brown and beige alb
stained with dirt and the blood of refugees that he’d helped. His
once clean-shaven head and face sported two weeks’ worth of a
stubby growth. Dark patches from many nights of uncomfortable sleep
underscored his eyes.

He sat down, Brayden noticed, as far away
from Stoneman as he could get.

“Do they eat this well at Halus Gis?”
Khalous asked as he seasoned the soup with some herbs.

“I’m afraid you will find the eating customs
of my people quite different from what you are used to,” Placidous
said.

“I hear the Efferousians eat raw snakes and
lizard eyes and stuff like that,” Clint said, horrifying a couple
of the younger children seated by the campfire.

“That’s nonsense,” Nash said.

“Like you know,” Clint spat.

Placidous laughed. Brayden thought it was a
kind, pleasant sounding laugh, one that made it hard to believe
that this priest of the Allgod was an alleged rapist.

“I suspect some of the primitive tribes
probably do eat those things,” he said. “But, no, not those of us
in the church.”

“What do you eat?” Broderick asked.

“I think we eat pretty much the same things
you eat on Edhen,” Placidous answered, “but we do not place such a
high value on the manner in which it is served. On Edhen there is
much effort put into preparing a meal. The way a meal is served can
say a lot about how the host family reveres, or doesn’t revere, the
guests. I must admit your perceptions on food bewildered me the
first time I visited.”

“We like our traditions,” Stoneman said.

“Oh, yes, I know. Please don’t misunderstand
me. I am fascinated by the myriad differences between our cultures.
I just don’t want some of the young people in our company to be
offended when they are served food in a manner inconsistent with
what they were raised with. I assure you it will not be a
reflection upon how we feel about you.”

“How far is the church?” asked
Broderick.

“We should be there by tomorrow afternoon,”
Khalous said.

“Will they have enough room for everyone?”
Brayden asked.

“It will be tight quarters,” Placidous
answered, “but they will manage. Servants of the Allgod are not
known to reject those in need.”

Stoneman humphed. “I seen otherwise.” His
deep gravelly tone was stitched with contempt. “I seen a church
filled wi’ yer so-called servants shut its doors up good to a whole
town burnin’ to the ground. Men, women, li’l children, bangin’ on
’em doors, beggin’ for mercy, and those servants of the Allgod
never let ’em in.” Stoneman’s brief but haunting speech sucked out
whatever cheer was left in the air.

For a moment, no one said a word.

“I cannot presume to know their motives,”
Placidous said, “but in my fifty years of walking the lands of this
world I’ve learned one thing: no one is perfect.”

“Least of all priests,” Stoneman said,
holding Placidous’ gaze.

“Let us change the subject, shall we?” said
Ariella as she came and sat down around the fire. Her feminine
voice, such a stark contrast to the gruff qualities of the
male-dominated company, rang like a song over a battlefield. The
mood changed the instant she arrived.

“My lady, your gentle voice never fails to
soothe our hard-bitten souls,” Khalous said, stirring the soup.

“How come you don’t wear your hat anymore?”
Broderick asked, noticing for the hundredth time since they left
the western shores of Efferous that the middle-aged nun no longer
wore her head covering.

“It’s called a wimple,” she answered with a
half-hidden grin. “And it was, um, damaged in…” she paused, looking
ashamed. Her eyes went to Placidous who smiled as though he knew
something the rest of them didn’t. “No,” Ariella continued. “That
is a lie. High Lord, forgive me. I have left the church, and so I
do not need to wear the head covering anymore.”

“Does it feel strange?” Khalous asked.

“Yes, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything,”
she said, and Broderick noticed that she had the same distant look
in her eyes when she looked at Khalous that Brayden had when he
stared at Nairnah.

“We all have our journeys to undertake,”
Placidous said. “The Allgod will get us there one way or another.
We just have to be brave enough to take the steps.”

Night had settled in around the group by the
time the stew was ready. Khalous scooped it into what few bowls
they had brought with them from the ship. The bowls were then given
to groups of four and five where each was passed around so that
everyone could take a sip.

Broderick ate by the campfire in a small
huddle with Brayden, Dana, Preston, and Nash wondering, as he often
did when the night closed in, about Lia, Brynlee, and Scarlett.
Three nights ago he had asked Brayden about them, if he thought
they were alive, or if he thought they had been taken captive, but
the question seemed to upset Dana too much. As a result, Brayden
hadn’t answered and Broderick didn’t bother to ask again. The
answers that he conjured in his mind were too disturbing to
contemplate on his own, and so he made great effort not to think
about it despite how much he missed his sisters.

His dreams, however, had other plans.

Later that night he woke on a portion of
earth dampened by his own sweat, haunted by images of his sisters
being whipped and abused. He saw Lia in a dungeon with chains on
her feet, being driven mad by the tight confines of her cell. He
saw visions of Brynlee being put to work in a field next to a long
line of other shackled slaves. When one of them fell, Brynlee
stooped to help her, and was whipped for her compassion.

When Broderick saw Scarlett, his heart broke
in half. The poor mute girl had been tied to a wagon wheel and
forced underwater. She opened her mouth and screamed, releasing a
flurry of bubbles that choked Broderick and shook him awake.

The campsite was quiet, offering no comfort.
Everyone was asleep. The stars were out, and he could hear the
faint sound of waves crashing against the cliff far below.

Broderick took a deep breath to calm himself
and lay back down. He remembered a time not too long ago when he
could visit his mother’s bedroom after he’d had a nightmare and she
would walk with him to the family’s fireplace and tell him tales of
pixies and talking dragons to ease his mind. He could never count
on Kingsley for comfort, but his mother never once withheld a
tender hug, never once missed a chance to speak a kind word.

He saw Lilyanna’s face just then, smiling at
him as it flitted through his mind. Broderick slammed his eyes shut
as tears gushed forward. He tried his hardest to hold them back,
but nothing could sway the avalanche of grief that erupted within
him. He missed her. More than anything else in Aberdour, he missed
her. Lilyanna. His mother. Everything else that he had loved could
be replaced—his horse, his bow and arrow, his favorite shirt, his
home—but the one thing he had loved the most was the one thing he
could never get back.

Morning came with the bitter breeze of an
incoming ocean storm. Khalous roused everyone, hurrying them
through breakfast and out of the campsite before the worst of the
storm drifted their way. By midmorning they had cleared the forest
and were traipsing over long, broad swathes of emerald hills that
permitted a view to the south where a bright green forest faded
into a distant fog.

Cold gray clouds had closed in around them
by the time the group came within sight of the monastery. Sitting
atop a hillside on the northern cliffs of Efferous, the stone of
the tiny village rose from the surrounding greenery like a gray
oasis. Among the many buildings visible from within the abbey’s
stonewalls was a church towering twice as high as any of them.

Khalous Marloch flopped his arm around
Broderick’s shoulders and sighed with satisfaction. “There it is,
lad. Halus Gis.”

“Why do they call it that?” Broderick
asked.

“Halus means chapel in Efferousian,” Khalous
answered. “Gis is the name of the holy man who built it many
centuries ago.”

The refugees behind them began expressing
joy and relief when they saw the sanctuary standing on the next
rise before them.

“How does it feel to be home?” Khalous asked
Placidous as the weary priest looked upon the monastery.

“Very well indeed,” he answered. “When we
arrive, allow me to go inside ahead of you. I will speak to the
duktori alone and explain your situation.”

“Duktori?” Khalous asked.

“Our leader. What you call an abbot. His
name is Bendrosi. He is wise and kind. He will help you, but I
should speak to him first.”

The monastery matched nothing that Broderick
had pictured in his mind. The grounds were far bigger, containing
more than he had expected, including a dormitory, a school, a
hospital, a library, barns, storerooms, workshops and acres upon
acres of gardens, orchards, and grain fields.

“How many people live here?” Broderick
asked, as they wandered through the western gate.

“That depends,” Placidous answered. “During
war times Halus Gis can be filled to the brim with the wounded and
the displaced. The servants here welcome any and all in need.”

“Servants?”

“That’s what we are,” he said. “All those
who follow the Allgod are his servants. We serve him by serving
others. It is our mission in life.”

While they strolled up the main road to the
church, Broderick noticed a couple of male lay servants fixing a
wooden fence surrounding a pigpen. The two men stopped their work
and eyed the group of passing strangers.

They approached the church, a tall structure
of solid gray stone with a steep angular roof from which hang long
tapestries of tan and brown. The symbol of Omneesah adorned the
drapes, a yellow circle presiding over a wave. Placidous had
explained that this signified the presence of the Allgod as he
transcended the world above and the world below.