Hunt of the Bandham (The Bowl of Souls: Book Three) (35 page)

It was still foggy in his mind, but in the dream there was a human man. Fist could make out his face, the kind eyes, the easy laugh. The particular thing that he remembered the man doing was holding him close and saying comforting words. He didn’t remember why he had been so distraught in the first place, or how long he spent with the man, but it was the only time in his life before meeting Squirrel that Fist could remember feeling loved.

As Fist continued towards the keep, Squirrel scampered up to sit in his usual place on the ogre’s shoulder. The creature was content, having found a nice hollow in a tree near the farm house to stash some seeds. Squirrel did that quite often. It was his main occupation actually. He had little stashes near every location that Fist spent time in.

Squirrel usually stayed in the fur-lined leather bag that Fist carried around with him everywhere he went, but if the ogre was ever about to do anything strenuous, he would leave and go to the nearest tree to start searching for food. The children loved the little animal, but Fist had to do a lot of coaxing to get Squirrel to allow them to pet him. Squirrel wasn’t used to attention from people. He liked Gwyrtha and Qyxal, but stayed clear of Lenny and just barely tolerated Justan.

“You need to like Justan, Squirrel,” Fist chided for the hundredth time. He knew that the animal was jealous of Justan’s connection with him. “He is our tribe now. He is the leader of the Big and Little People. He needs . . . your respect.”

Fist smiled in pride. Respect was his new word that day and he could already spell it. Not that he hadn’t known the concept of respect. It was very much demanded in ogre culture, though in their minds it was more of a demand for an understanding of ones place in the tribe. But the human word “respect” meant more than that. In human culture, at least among Justan’s people, it meant consideration to others no matter a person’s status. It was a concept that Fist had always believed in. Now it was something he had a word for.

Squirrel gave a little snort and folded his arms in defiance. It was going to take more than Fist’s fancy new words to change his mind on the subject of Justan. But Fist wasn’t worried. His friend would come around sooner or later. He knew Justan’s character well enough to believe that Squirrel wouldn’t be able to dislike him for long.

As the road entered the forest that surrounded Master Coal’s keep, they came upon Samson who was heading the opposite direction on his way down to the farms.

“Good evening, Fist,” the centaur called out with a cheerful wave. He gave the ogre an appraising look. “Is that a new shirt you are wearing?”

“Yes! Miss Nala gave it to me today,” Fist said, lifting his enormous arms so that the centaur could get a better view of the long-sleeved shirt. In fact, Miss Nala had given Fist two shirts and three pairs of pants that afternoon and he was carrying them in a cloth sack over one shoulder. “It is warm. She makes good human clothes.”

“Good for you,” Samson replied. “She has made many nice shirts for me in the past as well.”

Fist had learned to prefer this human clothing over the heavier and bulkier furs that he used to wear. They allowed more freedom of movement and did not constantly itch. The only problem was his propensity to sweat through them, and the human’s insistence that they be washed often. With the new clothes he brought back with him tonight, he now had a different shirt for every day of the week.

“Are you still working tonight, Samson? You look big,” Fist remarked. The centaur was always much bigger when he was going to help with field work and much smaller when at the keep. He did not understand how Samson changed, but had decided to take it as a point of fact that it was something he could do and leave it at that.

“Yes, the men have been clearing some land at the edge of Coal’s property and there are still a few stumps that need to be pulled out. Would you like to join me?”

“Not tonight,” Fist said. “I am fight- . . . sparring tonight.” Sparring was one of the first new words Justan had taught him in the days after they bonded.

“Very well,” Samson said. “Good night then.”

“Good night.” Fist said with a smile. He enjoyed the human tradition of exchanging pleasantries. It was another way to show respect.

Squirrel felt that Fist was taking on too many human traits and was afraid that the ogre would start shrinking too. If it weren’t for all the extra food to be found around the humans, he would have taken more opportunities to scold Fist about it.

“I will not shrink,” Fist assured the squirrel as they approached the open gates of the keep. Justan had told him so. But part of him wished that he could.

If he could have the ability to shrink like Samson and grow back to ogre size only when going into battle, his life among the humans would be so much easier. He could go into regular towns with Justan without fear of attack from the people. He could ride a horse without hurting it. He could even sleep in a regular bed like the ones that Justan and Lenny slept in and be comfortable instead of sleeping on a pile of blankets and straw on the floor.

Fist entered the front door of the lodge and saw that there were only a few people still sitting at the long center table. Dinner was long over and it would be a few hours before everyone came back in for the night. Most of the rooms in the lodge were too small for his large frame, so an old storeroom had been converted into his quarters. He walked around the table and through the door at the far side of the dining hall that led to the kitchens. He headed past the sinks and ovens, but before he reached the door to his room, Coal’s wife Becca called to him from the doorway.

“Fist, dear. You are a bit late, but I . . . did set aside some food for you.” Becca was out of breath, as if she had run to get there.

“Thank you, Miss Becca, but I ate at Miss Nala’s house before I leaved-, uh . . . left. We had hot bread and tuber soup.”

He continued towards his door, but she hurried around and stood in front of him, blocking his path. “And where do you think you are going?”

“To my room. I need to change clothes and Squirrel wants to put some seeds away,” he explained, unsure why she was acting so strange. “Miss Nala made some new shirts and pants for me.”

“Mmm hmm. And have you bathed today?”

Fist winced. Miss Becca had a very strict bathing rule. All workers that stayed in the lodge at night had to bathe at least every other day. A bath house had been built out behind the lodge against the keep wall next to the infirmary. Large wooden tubs and showerheads filled the building and a wooden wall separated the women from the men. The water was pumped up from the ground below and was collected in a huge tank heated by a wood-burning stove.

The stove did an adequate job, but when many people were using the bathing area at once, the water was barely warmed at all. Sometimes Master Coal would heat up the tank with magic to give the stove some help, but that was only when he or Becca were about to bathe themselves. Most of the time, the temperature of the water depended on luck and timing.

“No,” Fist admitted. “But I can’t right now. I will be sparring with Just- Edge tonight. I would just get dirty again.”

“Alright then. Go ahead and spar in what you have on. No sense in you getting another shirt soaked,” Becca said, sticking her hand out. “You go ahead and give those new clothes to me and I’ll put them away for you. But when you are finished, I expect you to go down and bathe before coming in to sleep.”

“But the water will be coldest then,” he complained.

“Are you going to make me go in there and scrub you down myself?” she asked.

“No!” Fist said and handed the clothes to her. “I will do it.”

Her threat was not an idle one. She had nearly done so the first time he had refused her request that he bathe. He had been afraid that if the hot water made his fingers wrinkled when washing dishes, it might do the same to the rest of his body. He had unknowingly let her drag him to the men’s bathing room, but when she came at him with soap and a scrub brush, he had called out through the bond in a panic. Luckily Justan had arrived in time to intervene.

Fist had to admit that it felt nice to be clean and to smell good, but the act of bathing itself was the one human custom so far that he didn’t like. Squirrel found the subject endlessly funny and often chattered in squirrelish laughter when the subject came up, but when Fist replied that it would be very easy for him to give Squirrel a bath of his own, that usually shut the creature up.

Before coming to Master Coal’s, Fist had never bathed in the way that humans did and hadn’t known what to do. Ogres occasionally played in shallow mountain streams, but cleaning one’s body was just for the women and the wounded. Justan had to show him how to use the soap with the hot water to lather up and how to rinse it out of his thick hair.

Fist thanked Becca and was about to leave when he realized something. “I will need clothes to change into when I am done.”

She wordlessly reached onto the bag and handed him a shirt and a pair of pants.

Humans had another tradition that Fist hadn’t been aware of called modesty. The first time he went to the bath house by himself, he had not brought a change of clothes. When he had felt himself to be sufficiently clean, he had tucked the dirty ones under one arm and left the building intending to run back to the lodge quickly through the chill air. He had walked right into a group of women that were heading to the bathing area themselves. Fist had always been proud of his body. The women of his tribe always enjoyed watching him walk by, but the human women had a very different reaction. Their screams had chased him all the way back to the lodge.

After that embarrassing incident, Justan had explained the concept of modesty to him. It was not proper to be unclothed in front of females, because humans associated nakedness with mating. Fist thought the idea ridiculous, but after experiencing their response, he could not argue the point. Modesty was his new word the following day. Now Fist avoided bathing in front of anyone except his friends if he could. He found that the sight of his nakedness also made the other men uncomfortable.

The ogre, now in a foul mood at the thought of the bath that awaited him, strode towards the training area at the rear of the keep behind Master Coal’s study. The dirt dueling circle and training closet, along with accompanying archery range, had been built for Willum’s benefit as he prepared himself to enter Training School. After he left, it had remained in a state of misuse until Justan came along.

Since Justan’s arrival, weeds had been cleared, new training weapons built, and a few benches added for resting between matches. Justan, Fist, Lenny, and Benjo had been the only participants at first. Then Bettie and Samson began to join in from time to time. Soon the word had spread and people started to come and watch. Now there were ten strong men among Coal’s workers that participated in the sparring and training every evening until it became too dark to see.

Several people were there already when Fist arrived. He called out in greeting and the men waved back. Squirrel leapt from his shoulder and retreated to his customary seat in the tree next to the dueling circle. There he was able to watch Fist fight and stay out of danger while eating the food he had stashed high in the tree.

“Fist, are you ready for defeat?”

He turned to see Benjo walking over from the forge on the other side of the keep’s center road.

“I will try not to break your arm this time,” Fist promised. He had accidentally done so the week prior and as a result, Master Coal had asked Qyxal to begin attending the sparring just in case such an event transpired again. Fist thought it was wonderful to have such a convenient way to heal injuries.

“How nice of you.” Benjo laughed. “That was my fault. This time I won’t let you get me into such a tight hold.”

“We will see.” Fist was glad that Justan had gotten over whatever had occurred between the two humans in the past. Benjo was a good man and Fist liked him.

“Where is Sir Edge? He is usually the first one here,” Benjo said.

“I will find out.” Fist reached to Justan through the bond. He hadn’t bothered Justan since speaking with him about his parents earlier and the man’s current feelings surprised him. Justan was reading a different letter than before and was no longer sad, but this new emotion filled with hope and yearning was one that Fist was not familiar with.

Justan, what has happened?
he asked.
Your feelings are . . . confusing.

 He sensed Justan’s laughter.

Yes they are,
Justan agreed.
I am fine, though.