Husk: A Maresman Tale (15 page)

Terabin Sweet, naked as the day he was born, was flailing about wildly with his massive arms and screaming like a teenage girl.

At first, Jeb couldn’t see his assailant, as Sweet’s hulking form was in the way, but when the big man staggered back, cold shock cut Jeb to the bone, and his lagging brain struggled to make all the connections.

It was Maisie, her dress ripped down the front, exposing her breasts.

She was laying into Sweet with vicious slaps, spitting and cussing with every breath.

“Rapist!” she screamed. “Rapist!”

The shadowy shapes of the brazier singers darted behind Sweet and Maisie and disappeared into the night. Seemed Portis wasn’t that much different to Malfen in that respect.

“Do something!” Jeb willed himself to say, but no sound came out. “Somebody…”

And then he snapped out of his stupor and surged forward.

Sweet turned his face to Jeb, eyes wide, mouth even wider. Bloody streaks lacerated both cheeks, where Maisie must have fought him off.

“No!” Sweet managed. “Not true. Not—”

Maisie sprang, but Sweet threw out a straight that dumped her to the ground.

That was the instant Jeb plowed into him, cracking him a good one under the jaw. Sweet’s head rocked back, and he raised his hands in defense, but Jeb followed up with a crunching blow to the ribs. As Sweet covered that side with an elbow, Jeb crashed a head-butt to the bridge of his nose, losing his hat in the process. Blood sprayed, and Sweet staggered back on wobbly legs.

Maisie got to her feet and started prowling round like a predator waiting for the best moment to strike.

Sweet swore and grabbed both of Jeb’s arms, trying to grapple him to the ground. Jeb kicked out at a kneecap, felt it pop, then ripped one arm free and chopped at the side of Sweet’s neck. The big man grunted and tried to shift his weight onto his good leg, but Jeb was relentless, shoving him off balance and launching a barrage of punches that split his face wide open. Sweet got off a left hook, but Jeb took it on the arm and kneed him in the fruits. As Sweet’s head came down, Jeb caught him with a clean uppercut, and the giant fell. Seeing nothing but red, Jeb was on him in a flash, pounding away at his skull with blow after blow. Hands grabbed his shoulder, tried to pull him off, but he just snarled and redoubled the violence.

“Stop,” someone said.

Jeb grabbed Sweet’s hair and slammed his head into the road.

“Jeb, stop.”

Marlec?

Sweet’s mouth was a bloody mess, and his jaw hung slack, but the shogger was still breathing.

“That the only way you can get it?” Jeb growled, punches growing slow and leaden. “By force?”

Sweet moaned. He was barely conscious.

Jeb leaned into him, put his hands round his throat and started to squeeze.

“Stop it. In the name of the Lord, stop it!”

Jeb craned his neck to see Marlec through the crimson haze. He opened his mouth to tell him where to go, but something cracked against the back of his skull, and he rolled off of Sweet in a daze.

“You’ll stop, shogger,” Sheriff Tanner said, brandishing his crossbow. He must have hit Jeb with the stock. “But not because this shogging Wayist says so. You’ll stop in the name of the law.”

Jeb’s hand flew to his saber, but the sheriff reversed his crossbow and took aim.

“Go on, Maresman,” he said. “Try me.”

“Are you blind as well as stupid?” Jeb said. “He shogging raped her.”

“Who?” The sheriff’s eyes roamed the area.

Jeb rolled to his knees and cast about, scooping up his hat when he saw it, crushed from one of them treading on it during the scrape.

Maisie was gone.

He straightened out his hat and put it on. With a grunt of effort, he got his feet under him and took an unsteady step toward the open door of the Crawfish.

Marlec stopped him with a tug on his coat sleeve. “Gone,” he said, with a flick of his head up the high street. There was no color to his face, and his eyes communicated a wordless dread.

“What?” Jeb asked him. “What is it?”

Marlec nodded toward Sweet’s prone form. The big man’s chest shuddered as it rose and fell, and his head lolled to one side.

“I heard the commotion,” Marlec said. “Came down from my room.”

Jeb hadn’t figured the monk was staying at the Crawfish. Maybe the Sea Bed was too pricey. Either that or too rough.

“Word is, you took a beating from Sweet here,” the sheriff said. “Want to know what I think?”

Jeb didn’t. His eyes bored into Marlec’s, trying to read what was going on, imploring him.

“What I think,” the sheriff went on, “is that this is revenge, pure and simple.” He slung his crossbow over his shoulder and rested his free hand on the hilt of his broadsword.

“And the nakedness?” Marlec put in.

“Humiliation,” the sheriff said, scoffing at Sweet’s unimpressive tackle.

“So, where are his clothes?” Marlec asked. “No, let me answer. Why not try Maisie’s room? She was here a second ago, without her shoes, for one thing, and I’m no expert, but she didn’t seem to have a whole lot on beneath her dress.”

The sheriff glowered at him, gave a disbelieving shake of his head. “All I’m going on is what’s before me. You tell me he raped her,”—he was speaking to Jeb now—“then I gotta ask, why’d she disappear when help was at hand?”

Suddenly, Jeb understood the horrified look in Marlec’s eyes. “Because she did it.”

Marlec pinched the bridge of his nose. “I just can’t believe it. All this time she’s been serving me water, making up my room.”

“Did what?” the sheriff asked. “What I saw was you beating the holy shit out of Terabin Sweet here. No more than that.” He seemed to make a decision and leveled his crossbow at Jeb once more. “You’re coming with me till I get this straightened out.”

“She attacked Sweet,” Jeb said.

Marlec was nodding, but the sheriff didn’t seem to give a damn.

“Told you I didn’t want any trouble, Maresman. Told you I’d be watching. Now, move it.” He jerked the crossbow toward the alley that led to the cove and his office. “And you,” he said to Marlec. “Get help. Sweet needs some attention.”

“Shall I tell him?” Marlec said to Jeb.

Jeb’s mind was rushing too much to answer. Maisie had attacked Sweet. Sweet was naked. She’d fled when help had come. Help she presumably didn’t need.

“Demon,” Sweet moaned. Sounded like he was chewing gristle, what with his jaw being broken. He rolled onto his side and levered himself up into a sitting position. He started to breathe quick and shallow, and when he spoke, he winced at every word. “Her face… Shog, her face!”

Marlec knelt beside him, placed a hand on his shoulder. “Did you… Sorry, I have to ask, but did you…?”

“It weren’t rape,” Sweet protested in a voice like a child’s. “It was payment, she said, but then she tried to—”

Now the sheriff was interested. He stepped in close and said, “Payment for what?”

“Him.” Sweet nodded at Jeb. “To frighten him off.”

Jeb’s head was reeling. Maisie! The attraction. Her innocence. His desire to leave everything behind, run away with her to the wilds. So, it
had
been her on the stairs with Sweet that night. It was all starting to make sense, and his heart thudded at the realization that was forming.

Marlec was watching him, a look of cold dread spread across his face.

“What the shog for?” the sheriff said. “She a husk lover or something?”

Darn, he was slow. If that’s the best the law could offer, then Jeb’d sooner take his chances with Malfen’s brigands any day.

“She’s the husk, you moron. Don’t you get it?”

“Maisie Cornwaith?” The sheriff snorted. “Yeah, and I’m the Demiurgos’s shag-bitch. Known that girl all her life, I have. Maisie’d never even say boo to a goose.”

“It’s not Maisie now,” Marlec said. He gave the sheriff a sober look and drew in a deep breath.

“She a shifter?” Jeb asked.

“No.” Marlec shook his head slowly. “She—it… no, she—inhabits. Takes over a host, body and soul.”

Sweet lumbered to his feet, balancing awkwardly to shift the weight from his injured knee. “Then Maisie is—”

“Cast out,” Marlec said. “I’ve seen the results before, the spent bodies left behind.”

“But if we find her,” Jeb said, “drive the husk out…”

Sweet nodded. “Maisie would be all right.”

“Sorry,” Marlec said. “Maisie’s gone.”

Sweet hung his head, and Jeb did the same, till he realized he’d likely never met the real Maisie. Probably the husk had been there all the time, right in front of him. That’d explain the attraction, the strange obsession that had come over him. He felt a spark of resolve and just wanted to get on with the chase, when a question burst his new bubble of certainty. Why had she rejected him? If Maisie was the same husk that had lured, seduced, and then slaughtered three Maresmen and countless others, then why was he still alive?

Marlec was watching him, sad eyes riddled with guilt.

“You reading my mind, monk?” Jeb asked.

Marlec gave a chuckle devoid of humor. “Not your mind; just your face. Haven’t you worked it out yet?”

Because of his husk blood? His power over women? Isn’t that what Neumal had said would give him a chance?

“It could’ve killed me, Marlec, but it didn’t.”

“It couldn’t, Jeb. That’s why the Maresmen let you go blindly after it; why they thought you alone stood a chance. Not because of what you are, or what you can do, but because of who you are.”

“And that is?”

“Her son, Jeb.”

“What?”

“The husk is your mother.”

Jeb swooned and nearly pitched to the ground. “Not possible. My mother’s gone.” Mortis had said as much, hadn’t he? Back when he’d first come for Jeb, and every night since in his dreams.

The sheriff put a steadying hand on his arm, then turned his attention on Sweet.

“And you stuck your wick in it?”

Jeb snarled and hit him square on the jaw. It was like striking granite, and the sheriff barely even grunted.

“I’ll give you that on account of your distress,” he said. “But do it again, and you’ll be hanging from a tree come daylight, mark my words.”

Marlec insinuated his way between them and fixed his eyes on Jeb’s. “Mortis realized it was her from the bodies of the victims. Said she was the worst succubus he’d come across.”

“You know him, and you’re still breathing?” Jeb said. “Thought he only spoke to Maresmen, and then only to tell us what to do. Anyone else comes within six feet of him and he infects them with buboes. Either that or slices them up into bite-size pieces and feeds them to the wolves.”

Marlec puffed out his cheeks. “Then I’m lucky to be alive, I guess, but it wasn’t a pleasant experience. I wouldn’t exactly describe us as friends.”

“What’s to say it was her?” the sheriff said, clearly not happy about being kept out of the conversation. “What if there’s another of these sucky-bushes?”

“Succubi is the plural,” Marlec said through gritted teeth. When he answered the sheriff, he still held Jeb’s gaze. “She’s different, at least that’s how I understand it from what Mortis said. The other succubi he’d encountered could kill, sure enough, but when they did, it was using the host bodies’ attributes, along with a blade or some other weapon, not fangs and claws. This one—your mother—is unique. Mr. Sweet saw that for himself—”

“Horns like a ram’s,” Sweet said with a rasp. “And those eyes… fiery coals, they were. It was a demon, I tell you, straight from the Abyss.”

“Isn’t that what all succubi are?’ Marlec said. “Whatever she is, she’s powerful, and very, very dangerous.”

“And you want to speak with her?” Jeb said. “What is it, a death wish?”

“A duty,” Marlec said. “Wherever the Lord leads me, even unto death.”

“But how?” Jeb asked Marlec. “How can this thing be my mother?” He remembered her fair hair, her blue eyes. Didn’t matter what Marlec had told him about host bodies. How could you square that with real-life experience, with what you’d known as a child? He remembered her smell, her touch, how he felt being around her. “It’s in here.” He tapped his head. “What she looked like. Who she was.”

Marlec steepled his fingers over his mouth and nose, sucked in a long breath. “What you remember was the host, Jeb. I’m sorry. My charism… my mission is to seek out the lost, the damned, those without hope, and bring them back to the Lord. When news of the Outlands killings reached New Jerusalem, I went after the killer, but I found only the hunters pursuing it. I followed one of them back to Malfen. That’s where I met Mortis.” He almost spat the word, and paused for a moment as if recollecting. “He told me who she really was. He’d met her before, you see. When you were a child. He was the one who drove her away.”

Jeb reeled and fought to breathe. “Mortis? But he…” He’d told Jeb what his mother was, but never said anything about what had happened to her, just that she’d gone. He’d always made it sound like she’d abandoned Jeb.

“Mortis thought he’d killed her,” Marlec said, “but he only got the host. The husk itself must’ve fled back where it came from.”

Qlippoth.
But she’d left him behind. Dropped him off with a couple of strangers, told him they were his relatives. Was that even true? The thought occurred to him it wasn’t. Maybe that’s why Mortis had taken so long to catch up to him. Living relatives, if there’d been any, would have been the obvious place to look for the husk-child. Later, though, when Jeb’s blood had started to manifest, when he’d hit his teens, Mortis must have picked up the scent and come looking.

“She has no body of her own to speak of,” Marlec said. “Not if she’s what the Maresmen say she is. I never saw her true form for myself, but there’s someone who did.”

“Mortis again?”

Marlec shook his head. “Like I said, Mortis thought he’d ended her when he killed the host. No, it was Davy Fana, when the husk first arrived in Portis. It wasn’t easy getting the lad to speak, but a bag of pastries loosened his tongue. Like a cloud, he said. Lit red from within, and when she reached the high street, he saw a face like a demon’s—”

“Yes,” Sweet said, gasping for breath. “That’s what it was.”

“So why’s it need a body?” the sheriff put in, voice full of cynicism.