Curse: The Dark God Book 2 (8 page)

River cut in. “Master Kish, I’m sorry, but we need to report. Uncle, our situation has changed.” Then she looked at the Kish in a way that suggested they move to a different location.

“It’s all right,” Argoth said. He put a hand on the Kish’s shoulder. “This is Eresh the Horlomite—dreadman, terrorman, and all around bane. He’s as bloody as they come. And he’s going to get this army ready to battle Divines. He’s an old friend who has left his tidy den of aged iniquity at my request.”

“And a fine den it was,” Eresh said.

“But not finer than being able to strike such a blow that the enemy may never recover. Eh?”

“I told you I wouldn’t commit until I’d seen what I needed to see. You’re no match for Mokaddian terrors. Not yet. But that can change. Especially if we can grow the ranks as that Shim thinks he can.”

“So you accept?”

“You will provide me a cook and a woman. The cook will be mine and mine alone. The woman will need a little bit of brain about her, but not too much.”

“We can provide the cook,” said Argoth. “As for the woman, you’ll have to convince a willing victim on your own.”

“Mokaddians,” Eresh said with disgust. “I’ll do it without the woman then. But I tell you this: the cook had better rotting well be able to serve up the stars and moon every morning, midday, and night.”

“You’ll have lark tongues for breakfast,” said Argoth.

“I don’t like lark,” said Eresh.

“Then you’ll be served worms. Isn’t that what you Kish eat?”

“Only when it’s time for love making.”

“That’s right. I forgot the Kish needed help.”

“Do you know why Mokaddian don’t eat worms?” Eresh asked.

Argoth waited.

“Because they have nothing to enhance, which explains why your women are so unsatisfied.”

Argoth groaned. “Ah, yes, I had forgotten the dizzying intellect. May the Six save us.”

“I can assure you,” Eresh said, “the Six will have nothing to do with it.”

“Zu,” Oaks said and inclined his head at Eresh. “I have heard many things about the Kish. Were you in the Eastern wars under the Red Lord?”

The Red Lord had been savage. He’d expanded the holdings of the Kish, but only with extreme blood and terror. It was said he beheaded two-thousand men, women, and children in one day with his own hand. His troops had shown no mercy. Nor were they shown mercy by their commanders.

Eresh spat. “The Red Lord was nothing more than a great wobble of pudding. We murdered the Eastern hordes despite him.”

Talen spoke up; they were wasting time. “Uncle, we were betrayed. Sugar is missing. As far as we know, Black Knee is still out there as well.”

Argoth’s eyes narrowed.

“I want to go after her,” said Talen.

“Come into the main chambers,” said Argoth. “We’ll discuss it there with Matiga and Shim.”

Argoth turned back the way he’d come, and they all followed him, filing past the clerk to clomp up a stairway that led to a chamber above. In that room, three tall windows opened onto the inner bailey, letting in the smell of the cooking fish, the sounds of the carpenters banging away, and the early morning light. Shim and the Creek Widow stood at a large table in the middle of the room where two oil lamps glowed, illuminating a map. Across from the windows, the plastered walls were painted with a scene of a woodikin battle.

When everyone had filed in, River and Talen proceeded to report what had happened at the village of Plum. When they finished, Shim said, “Felts is one of the last I would suspect.” He shook his head.

“Was Felts wearing any odd necklaces or collars?” Argoth asked. “Any rings? Anything that might be a thrall?”

“I saw nothing,” said River.

“Nor I,” said Talen.

“Send someone to talk to his family,” said Lord Shim. “Felts wouldn’t sell out for money. Somebody got a lever on him.”

Eresh said, “I’ll tell you somebody who would sell you out for money. That maggot of the Hand.”

“The Hand?” asked Argoth.

“That blond pustule outside with a dead man on his horse.”

“Flax?” Talen asked.

Eresh’s face filled with disgust. “The Hand is not to be relied on.”

“We will see,” said Shim.

Eresh grimaced but held his tongue.

“Send Urban to find Sugar,” said the Creek Widow.

Urban was another one of the few sleth that had heeded Argoth’s call. He had a crew of men that did not mingle with the rest of Shim’s soldiers. In fact, they quartered themselves elsewhere, but none had seen where. Talen said, “I want to go with him.”

“I think not,” said Argoth.

“It’s important to me.”

“No,” said Argoth. “Work it through. Tenter’s weave was empty. All the weaves of the Fir-Noy dreadmen were empty. So who filled it?”

Only Divines and sleth knew the lore.

“There are no Groves or orders among the Fir-Noy,” said Argoth. “That means it was filled by a Divine. But I do not think Mokad would send a solitary Divine to these shores. Not after losing two Divines already. They’d come in force, which means—”

“Which means you don’t have until next spring,” Eresh said. “If the Divines are already here gathering Fire for the weaves of their dreadmen, then you don’t have any time at all.” He spat. “We’re all swimming in the cesspit.”

Shim sighed heavily.

His and Argoth’s plan had been to build up an army of a two thousand dreadmen by spring. But these would have been more than simple dreadmen—they would have wielded the lore. It would have been more like an army of Divines. With such a force, the clans would have had to rethink their opposition. They would see brothers and cousins and fathers wielding the lore. They would hear the stories of those abominations that held the reins of the Divines. They would see with their own eyes the lies they’d been told. The ranks of Shim’s army would have then swelled, and they would have been joined by the ranks of sleth—loremen and lorewomen of great power—from lands all across the Western Glorydoms. It would have been an army unlike any other in the world.

Then another thought struck Talen. If a Mokaddian Divine was here, he would have brought all his ranks of protection, which meant it wouldn’t be some idiot Fir-Noy lord they’d be rescuing Sugar from. It would be a Divine and his acolytes, who also knew the lore, all guarded by a whole force of mature dreadmen.

“We need to find Sugar now,” Talen said. “Before it’s too late.”

“That dreadman singled you out,” the Creek Widow said.

“I don’t know that he singled me out.”

Oaks cleared his throat. “He said, ‘The boy’s mine’.”

“Anyone else in the party mentioned?” asked the Creek Widow.

Talen gave River a pleading look.

“Sorry son,” Oaks said. He turned to the Creek Widow. “It was just Talen.”

“I’d say that was singling out,” said the Creek Widow. “And why would he do that?” she asked rhetorically.

Talen wasn’t going to answer that. They both knew why. But how would that dreadman know that Talen was the one the Mother had claimed as her own down in her cave? The only person who knew the full details of that awful fight besides those that had taken part was Shim. For everyone else, Talen’s role had been played down. In the public version, it was all Argoth and Ke and the others who’d played the parts of heroes.

“You’re going to stay here for a bit,” said the Creek Widow, “until we sort out what’s going on.”

At that moment there was a commotion on the stairs. Shim’s clerk knocked, then opened the door to the room. “Black Knee has returned. And he’s going to need some doctoring.”

* * *

Talen and the others found Black Knee on the far side of the bailey looking pale. He lay on the ground, a number of women crowding around, cutting off one blood-soaked leg of his trousers.

A blood-soaked strip of cloth was wrapped tightly about his leg. One of the women took a knife and cut through it. The wound underneath was a wide puncture that went right through the side of his thigh.

The Creek Widow pushed past Talen and knelt by the big man. She felt his forehead, checked his wrist for his pulse. “Are there any other injuries?” she asked.

He looked at her wearily, the sunlight blinding him. “Just my pride,” he slurred looking away. “Tell Lord Shim it was a trap. They got Rooster.”

“We know,” said the Creek Widow. “River, Oaks, and Talen made it back as well.”

“What about the girl?”

“Don’t you worry about her.” She looked up and pointed at a group of women. “You two, clear the cabbages off that table.” The she turned to Talen and River. “Help me get him up.”

Two women moved away the cabbages. Talen and River each slid their hands under an armpit while Oaks and Argoth took his knees. Then they hefted him onto the table that was still strewn with cabbage leaves.

The Creek Widow turned to River. “Fetch me my bag. I’ll want some wine and oil, and warm water and soap. And bring me the opium with goat’s milk.”

“This leg is going to want some maggots,” Black Knee said.

“Not yet,” she said. “First we’ll clean it and make sure it’s stitched up right. Then we’ll see.” She bent his leg up and examined the exit wound. “Did you get the whole shaft out?”

“Aye,” said Black Knee. “Pushed it through. That was a delight I won’t be wanting to try again anytime soon.”

She smoothed back his hair. “You’re going to be fine. A weave and a couple of days of rest, that will see you out of the woods.”

The Creek Widow looked at Argoth. “We really could use Harnock’s skills here.”

“You might as well try to move a mountain.”

Harnock was a member of the Grove, hiding in the Wilds. He’d refused Argoth’s call. Talen had heard only bits and pieces about him. Foremost was the fact that he was not all man, but the result of Lumen’s attempts to create a new type of warrior. He was unstable and, from what Talen could gather, would probably end up like Pinter, eaten by crows.

Talen grabbed Black Knee’s hand. His relief at seeing his fist mate was immense.

The big man looked over at him. “Where’s the girl?” he asked.

“I’m going with Urban to find her,” he said.

“Not on your life,” the Creek Widow said.

8

The Queller

BEROSUS WATCHED THEM work on Black Knee’s leg for a moment. He watched Talen. The boy was a fledgling Glory not attached to any Sublime Mother. That is what he’d felt when he probed the boy. It was impossible, but there he stood.

If the Sublime of this Glory had been killed and consumed by one of her sisters, that sister would now hold the reins. So that meant the Sublime who had started Talen had not been consumed by a sister. Something else had killed her. And that posed another puzzle because if the Sublime of this fledgling Glory had died, it was impossible the one enthralled would survive it. Lesser thralls had been known to survive the breaking of their bonds. But those bound directly to a Sublime Mother did not. So what was going on here?

Before he’d been killed, Rubaloth the Skir Master had communicated through the bond he held to the Glory of Mokad. He’d communicated across a sea. Over such distances the link was always tenuous and difficult, but the Glory of Mokad had insisted he’d felt another Sublime Mother when Rubaloth had died. A Mother that had the power to raise a son of Lammash, although Berosus doubted that report.

Rubaloth had been a powerful Divine—one of Mokad’s mightiest Skir Masters. And he’d died in this place.

Berosus had been here two weeks now. Two weeks to study the sleth. They were using weaves of might, but none were in the pattern of any of the houses of Kains he knew. There were no Guardian Divines, no tethered skir, no Fire sacrifices. There simply were no signs that would indicate an enemy Mother was here, controlling this human herd.

It would appear the sleth claims were true. But who here was so mighty as to overthrow a Mother?

He was going to have to be careful. He was going to have to watch his back. True danger walked these shores.

But that wasn’t necessarily bad. In fact, the thought of it brought a rising joy. There was no bitter without sweet. No light without darkness. No peace without fear. And it had been some time since he had felt fear. It made him feel alive.

He felt for the Glory of Mokad across the sea.
There is no Sublime Mother here
, he reported.

He waited, listening intently, trying to shut out the banging of the carpenters in the fortress and the soldiers practicing their forms. The faint distant reply came:
Queller, you will destroy everything that has been infected
.

It was the Mother of Mokad that replied, not the Glory. He felt the wonderful thrill her attention always brought.

Save what you can of that herd. The rest we shall lay up in store against our need.

It shall be done
, he replied.

He waited for more, but the tenuous link faded.

The Queller—that was her nickname for him because he, better than any of the other Divines, could quell a rebellion. Better than any other, he was the one that could restore order to a herd and make it productive. She had sent him to clean this mess up. And that’s what he would do.

His first business was to secure Talen. You didn’t want a fledgling Glory running about as a loose end. That could come to no good. Once Talen was secure, he would identify who it was that defeated the Mother. And then he would begin the harvest.

It was going to be a big job—tens of thousands of souls. A small sleth nest could be useful at times in managing a herd or in attacking another Mother’s holdings. He himself had infiltrated one branch of the Hand and directed them as the Mother saw fit. But this army Shim was raising was a pestilence.

Ideas and knowledge spread like disease. In these situations, you couldn’t just kill the leaders because the infection didn’t end there. No, in these situations, it was best to simply destroy them all.

He took in a great breath of air and surveyed the fortress around him—the candidates, the cooks over by the fires, the soldiers upon the walls. Harvest wreaths hung above doors and on posts, remnants from last night’s celebration. Such wreaths hung above doors in villages all throughout the New Lands. He thought it ironic: they had indeed celebrated a harvest, but not the one they supposed.

After Black Knee was doctored, Shim and Argoth called to him. He led the priest over on his horse.

“He’s dead,” Shim said.

“He fought me, Zu. He was quite out of his mind. I’ve got a tidy hole in my gut to prove it. But if I recall, you didn’t specify that I bring him to you alive.”

“What would I want with a dead body?”

“If I could have taken him alive, I would. But you saw him. People are talking. Someone like this was going make them uneasy.”

Shim considered him.

“I don’t mean to offend,” said Berosus. “But I came here because of a call. I’m sorry that he’s dead. But I know these types. They can’t be relied on.”

Argoth looked over at Shim.

“You’re wasting your time with that one,” Eresh said, his one good eye burning. “The Hand offers nothing but a knife in the back.”

“Fools will often blame others for their own misfortunes,” said Berosus. “I’ve found that to be especially true among the Kish.”

Eresh bristled. “It wasn’t foolishness that slaughtered a company of men at Amon ford. It was an ally that sat and watched other men burn.”

“You’ve muddled the facts,” said Berosus. “But that does happen with age.”

Eresh narrowed his eyes and moved his hand to his sword, but Shim held his hand up. “Hold, commander. We don’t need any blood today.”

“I told you one of your own would vouch for me,” said Berosus.

* * *

Argoth watched Eresh release his sword, then draw an apple from his coat pocket. He expected the Kish to give it a furious bite, but, quick as a snake, Eresh hurled the apple at Flax’s face instead.

Flax flinched but wasn’t fast enough. The apple smacked into his forehead and sailed into the wall of the fortress. Eresh followed the apple. There was a flash of steel and before anyone could move, Eresh held the point of his sword at Flax’s throat. “It appears I am not too old to take you, maggot.”

Flax grasped the hilt of his knife, the only weapon a stranger would have been allowed to carry inside the fortress. Eresh did not have the best position on the blond even though he held a sword. If Flax turned just so, he could stick his knife into Eresh’s belly.

But Eresh wasn’t someone to make such a mistake. It was sloppy, and Argoth realized Eresh was tempting Flax to pull his knife, to give him a reason.

“No!” Argoth said and stepped forward, pushing them apart.

Shim turned on Eresh, his face cold with anger. “We have within our grasp the opportunity, not of a lifetime, but of an age. It is not the time for squabbles.”

“The Hand needs to pay its debt of blood.”

Flax had not yet released the hilt of his knife.

Argoth said, “Listen, you two, if we are to fight our true enemy, we must put aside such issues—the blood between Eresh and the Hand is nothing compared to that between you and those that devour our souls. Would you stop to chase a horsefly when a ravening lion was at your heels?”

Eresh licked his chapped lips, then stepped away and sheathed his sword. “The next time I draw my sword on this walking goat turd, I will kill him.”

Flax shook his head ruefully and released his hold upon his knife. He put his hand up to placate Eresh. “Argoth speaks wisdom. Let us deal with our common enemy first. After that, you and I can settle our differences.”

“That might be far too late,” said Eresh.

“Commander,” Shim warned, his face iron. Then he turned to Flax. “You will come and state your purpose. And if you’re too beetle-brained to keep your smug arrogance to yourself, then I will loose Eresh. And may the Six have mercy upon you.”

Flax inclined his head, and Shim turned to walk to his chambers. As he did, Flax gave Eresh a level stare, and Eresh gave it right back, his milked eye looking like a horror.

Argoth had learned long ago never to trust someone you didn’t know. And even though Eresh had now confirmed that this Flax was actually a man of the Hand of Mayhan, Argoth was still wary of him. He would wait and see. Action, more than anything else, proved a man. And just because he was a man of the Hand, didn’t mean his goals aligned with Shim’s.

The group followed Shim to his upper chamber. They lit candles, then shuttered and curtained the window that looked out on the court so the conversation could not be overheard. Shim sat behind his mahogany table that shone with a dull luster from the candlelight. The tanned hide of a bear he had speared as a youth was draped over the back of the chair. Behind him on the wall hung the new device of his army. It was in the shape of a shield. The field was half blue, half white, and in the center, was a large sun made of brass. The blue for courage and loyalty. The white for purity. And the sun to represent knowledge and power.

Shim’s fathers had preserved it and kept it hidden. From generation to generation they’d passed it down. One of Shim’s ancestors had been a loreman who had been hunted down by the Divines. But a scion had survived the extermination of that line and kept both the tale and the device.

As they filed into Shim’s chamber, Matiga stood with Argoth. Eresh stood off to the other side, disgust on his face, never taking his one good eye off the blond man. Flax came in last and stood before them.

Argoth said, “I never sent a message to the Hand.”

“But you did send one to Bream of Darkbridge,” Flax said. “The grove I’m in is affiliated with his. Bream himself could not come, but I have his token and a letter.” Flax retrieved a piece of parchment from his pocket along with a plain scarf.

Argoth took both, then walked to the window and pulled the curtain back and unshuttered the window. He examined the seal of the letter in the strong light. It looked like it hadn’t been tampered with. Furthermore, it was Bream’s special seal featuring three horse heads with a line across the bottom. He motioned Matiga over who examined it as well.

“That’s Bream’s,” she said.

Argoth broke the seal and read the note. It simply said, “The bearer returns your token at my behest. We are interested in your proposed venture, but feel reluctance. Convince him.”

Argoth held the scarf up and found the corner. In it was stitched the simple figure of a bear. Matiga pulled out her knife and cut the stitching on the back to reveal the smaller image of a stork.

“This is the token that was sent out,” she said. Then she and Argoth stepped back from the window, shuttered it, and replaced the thick curtain. Argoth handed the letter to Shim and nodded. It all could be faked, but someone would have to be deep in Bream’s counsel to get it all right.

Shim read the note and said, “Reluctance?”

Flax said, “Bream is being watched. He dared not risk come out of hiding. I volunteered to come here and see if this was a trap or an opportunity.”

“And what have you found?”

“I don’t know yet,” said Flax. “With all respect to your efforts, what I see is, well, not an army of dreadmen. Your candidates wear weaves that are poorly made. What’s worse, they’re almost all running dry. And how many lore masters do you have here that can replenish them when they do fail? Half a dozen at the most. There’s no way so few can sustain an army even half the size of this one.”

“You have no idea how many lore masters we have,” said Eresh.

Flax continued, “And even if someone were able and willing to bleed his life away to fill these weeds you call weaves, you don’t have the right ratio of full, seasoned dreadmen to candidates for proper training. Five-to-one is ideal. You have, what, twenty-five or forty to one? So I don’t know. Joining such a”—he searched for the word—“hasty operation might lead to our doom. On the other hand, having a whole hammer of loremen who are intimately versed in blood and Fire might tip the balance in your favor.”

Argoth had to give Flax credit. He’d opened his negotiation strongly. Shim’s army
was
in desperate need of more loremen.

“I don’t see a hammer,” said Eresh. “I see a single man.”

“If I send word, they will come.”

Matiga folded her arms. “This Kish is bad enough. I do not think we want men of the Hand.”

But if Shim were to succeed, they needed more loremen. Only a handful had come so far. Perhaps they were too wary, or perhaps they were on their way. But weeks mattered. Numbers mattered. And they couldn’t be choosy.

She continued. “The Hand, for all its will to fight the Divines, has never created the opportunity you see here. But even if it had, we wouldn’t allow you to join us.”

“The Order of Hismayas disapproves of some of our methods,” said Flax. “Tell me something new.”

“You have no conception of who your real enemies are,” said Matiga.

“My life has been dedicated to throwing off the yoke of the Divines. I’ve lost brothers, parents, friends. I know whom I fight better than anyone here.”

“No,” said Matiga. “You don’t.”

Flax’s mouth set in annoyance, but he didn’t give voice to it. Or was this the ruse of an expert in these games? All men wore masks, but there were some who never took off the mask. Argoth could not tell which kind of man Flax was.

Matiga said, “You may kill every Divine, but you will still lose the war because the Divines are merely tools, thralls, of far more powerful masters. Kill the Divines, and the masters will simply raise up others in their stead.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Humans are ranched like cattle, Handsman. Their souls harvested to feed the creatures that rule over us.”

Flax narrowed his eyes. “Harvested?”

“Shocking, isn’t it?”

“I would need proof.”

“Why would we lie?”

“Because lying’s useful,” said Flax.

“We are eye-witnesses. We have fought one of the Devourers and prevailed. But you don’t have to trust our testimony alone. We have tangible proofs. And I will tell you this—killing a Divine is an easy thing compared to fighting one of their masters.”

“If these masters do exist, then why don’t we know of them? Why do we never see them?”

“If our cattle knew they were being bred for slaughter, do you think they would feed at our very doorsteps, docile and trusting? The Devourers are not stupid. They raise human overseers to rule over us as Divines, breeding them to be able to wield great powers. And so well have the Divines spun their lies that humans go willingly to their various harvests.”