Wendigo Wars (7 page)

The man was almost as pale as Mathilde and had jet black hair, a strong jaw-line and straight, prominent nose. His face was covered in a thick stubbly beard which hinted at the amount of time he had spent away from his community, wherever that was. He looked to have at least a couple of months of a beard, maybe more.

“He seems stable now. He’s very cold, his wounds feel almost frozen, it must have been a wendigo attack” said Violette as she verbalised what they were all thinking. 

If the claw marks along his arms, chest and back had not been enough to tell them this then the frozen edged wounds would have done. This was characteristic of a wendigo wound as the frozen poison entered the body, seeking to create the blistering pain of frostbite if the victim managed to get away. Mathilde touched the scar on her cheek and felt the chill which still sat in the scar tissue making it difficult for her ever to get warm.

“How did he survive?” asked Violette.

Mathilde shook her head in confusion. “I don’t know. Very few people survive a wendigo attack when they are on their own. He must have had others with him who helped him to escape or who killed the wendigo while he ran. I wonder where they could be, whether they saved him at the expense of their own lives. Who brought him here?”

“No-one. I spoke to the lookout when he was being brought in. He saw something near one of the buildings that looked like a person and sent two of the Protectors out to get him. They thought he was dead until they got him to the gates and realised he was still breathing.”

Mathilde shook her head again, this time in a brief flash of annoyance. What a reckless thing to do, to send two Protectors out into unprotected land in the middle of the night to retrieve a supposedly dead body. It reminded her of just how much work needed doing before the Bucharest Protectorate were ready to go on any reconnaissance missions to find out more about General Zhu.

“He’s kind of beautiful in a strange way, don’t you think?”said Violette as she wiped the dirt from the man’s face.

Mathilde looked at him a little longer before answering. “I suppose so. I mean he isn’t too bad” Mathilde shrugged. Men and affairs of the heart weren’t something which she had ever had much time for or talent with. Too busy saving the world and trying not to get her head literally ripped off to bother with the dating and dreaming that she had seen some of the other girls she had grown up with going through.

“Huh! He’s a wimp, and an anaemic one at that. I don’t trust anyone that pale,” said Seb.

“Thanks. Where did you pop up from?”said Mathilde. Seb looked at her and widened his eyes before blushing.

“I just thought you might need my help. Anyway I mean men who are pale, not you, you are great, I mean you are ok, I trust you, you look just fine, he... you...” Seb began to get flustered in his belated backtracking.

Mathilde glared at him for a second longer before breaking into a smile.

“Chill Seb, I was joking,” she said, feeling a little guilty at the bright red which had spread over his face. He really was getting far too easy to wind up nowadays.

“Humf,” said Seb as he started to look more annoyed than embarrassed. “Well I am sure you two can handle this. I’m going to get some sleep. Call me if you need me” he said as he stood up to move to his sleeping pad which was now about fifteen feet away from the newly placed bed.

Mathilde and Violette shared a smile, though it annoyed Mathilde to see that there was a brief “I told you so” flash in Violette’s eyes.

Chapter Nine

Mathilde awoke to the sounds of people hard at work around her. Before she even opened her eyes she heard the mutterings of the elderly Florin and Flavius arguing over their game of chess and the noise of the settlement children laughing at a puppet show. As she forced her eyes open she realised that she had slept into the late morning and everyone but her was up and about.

Glancing over to the place where she had left Violette and the mystery man, Mathilde felt a sharp bolt of horror as she realised that they were no longer there. The bed had also disappeared. Had he died in the night? He had seemed to be struggling just before Seb took Mathilde’s place in helping Violette.

Mathilde stood up and rolled up her sleeping pad, surprised at her feelings of concern for a man she didn’t even know and her sudden yearning for him to live. He had been close to death when she had gone to sleep. His absence now confirmed her fears that he had passed away while she slept.

His injuries were so severe and his breathing had been shallow, yet she had stared at that face for several hours and she now realised that a strange, bond had formed. She had actually needed for him to recover. He was too much of a mystery to go unexplained and Mathilde hated unanswered questions. She set out to look for Violette to hear the news first hand.

As Mathilde walked into the side room which was used as a makeshift hospital, she saw Seb slumped in the corner with a mug of steaming milk and a face like thunder. Despite his grizzly bear appearance Seb could be a real big baby when he was deprived of sleep and it showed in his face now. Mathilde also supposed that he was as annoyed as her that the man had died before telling them how he had come to be so covered in wounds yet had escaped being dinner for a hungry wendigo.

“Morning Seb” said Mathilde in a low voice, not wanting to jar his tired brain with too much volume. “Where is he?”

“Huh? He’s right over there. Violette is in there too,” said Seb, gesturing towards the smaller side room running off from the hospital room. Mathilde had learnt on their tour of the settlement that it was the room that was used to hold the bodies of anyone who died until a grave could be prepared for them.

Mathilde walked to the side room to offer Violette some help in preparing the body. It wasn’t pleasant, cleaning dead bodies to send them off to the spirit world in carefully groomed condition, but it was necessary and all that they could do to help those that had passed before all chances to help had gone.

Mathilde walked into the room and saw Violette handing a plate of bread and dried meat to the man, who was very much alive. Mathilde gasped, causing both the man and Violette to look at her in bemusement. As they did Mathilde gasped a second time. As the man looked into Mathilde’s eyes she felt as if she were falling. For a second Mathilde felt that she was dreaming or coming down with a fever. She felt hot and cold at the same time and suddenly remembered that she hadn’t taken a breath for several seconds. This caused her to gasp a third time then gulp and quickly look away from the two sets of eyes staring at her. One set a violet pair identical to hers and one set the most beautiful bright blue. In the pale, serious face of man and fringed with thick, black eyelashes they were the most breathtaking sight she had ever seen. Annoyingly they were tinged with amusement at her reaction.

“You okay Mathilde?”asked Violette with a hint of laughter in her voice that made Mathilde want to pinch her.

“I’m fine,” replied Mathilde frostily, her senses quite recovered. “It’s just I thought he was dead. I mean I’m sorry – I thought you were dead,” said Mathilde as she turned her attention to the man, knowing what an imbecile she sounded and hating herself for it; hating him a little bit too.

“Sorry,” said the man with a slight smile. He spoke in English but his voice was heavily laced with a Romanian accent, far more so than Violette’s. This man was definitely a born Romanian not just someone who was raised here. His voice sounded chocolaty smooth but with a dangerous undercurrent to it. Mathilde couldn’t work out if this was purely because of his strong accent or if there actually was a streak of danger to him. He certainly looked like he could be dangerous yet Mathilde couldn’t help but be drawn to him.

“It’s okay. I mean, not okay, I am happy you aren’t dead. That’s what I mean. It was just, because you are in the side room. This room is usually for the dead.”

“I thought it would be more private for him,” said Violette “He needs at least a week of bed rest.”

“Oh” said Mathilde and continued to stand in the doorway, not quite sure of what to say. “Well I had better get to the training room. I have a Protectorate to improve.”Mathilde turned on her heel and quickly scarpered. As she left she could hear Violette answering an unspoken question.

“My sister Mathilde. You will get used to her.”

Mathilde frowned as she stomped past a smug looking Seb who was still slumped in the corner. She was sure that the rest of the day was going to be just as bad as the start had been.

An hour later the dubious collection of amateurs which made up the Bucharest Protectorate gathered in the training grounds outside of the Cantacuzino Palace and within the settlement walls. They stood in a loose and messy formation facing Protector Superior Paul, Mathilde, Seb, Arnold and Sian. Several members of the settlement had gathered around the perimeter of the training ground to see the action.

“Morning everyone, I hope you are well rested. Today we will do two hours of exercise then will break into two groups to practice defensive formations. After that we will have weapons inspection then break for something to eat before we move onto weapons practice and an hour of dream barrier practice.”

As Mathilde’s voice projected across her twelve new trainees, a grumble of disbelief went through the group and a few sniggers and chuckles could be heard from the audience. Even the watchers who had looked like they were just stopping by settled down and looked like they were here to stay. This Protectorate had never done more than an hour of exercise in their short Protector career. The audience looked like they thought that this was going to be fun to watch.

Mathilde raised her eyebrows and suppressed a sigh as she heard Seb tut in annoyance and Paul whisper “I know” out of the side of his mouth. There was a lot of work to be done.

The exercise session passed without event, though there were several points where Mathilde had to force exhausted middle aged men and pimply youths back onto their feet. By the end of the session there was a lot of huffing and puffing and several red, sweaty faces. The audience had all but disbanded. After the initial humour of seeing their friends struggle to keep up, the biting cold proved to be more pressing than the need to watch two hours of running, sit-ups and shadow boxing.

Formation practice was better received and the Protectorate became more eager and responsive at the hint of real action. The few stragglers in the audience sat back down to watch the motley crew go from an un-organised, uncoordinated rabble to a slightly more organized, vaguely more co-ordinated rabble. Mathilde split the Protectorate into two groups of six and taught them some of the basic moves; how to create a stretched hunting line, how to move from that into a close defensive circle and how to do the figure eight formation to get the archers in various positions depending upon the number of attackers. They were by no means as tightly coordinated as the Suceava Protectorate and there were several tangled feet incidents but they were making progress and so, by lunchtime Mathilde was satisfied with the progress made.

By the end of the day she was nervous again. Not many of the Protectors had made it all the way through weapons practice. There had been a mixture of older Protectors collapsing in exhaustion, younger Protectors lacking the strength needed to hold up a sword or axe for long and not one of the Protectors showed any of the aiming skills or depth perception needed to control a crossbow. It would take a long time to get them to a standard to be able to fight just one wendigo. Time they didn’t have.

Chapter Ten

Mathilde made her way to the hospital alcove. It was a week since Dash had arrived and Mathilde, Seb and Violette had fallen into a set routine of caring for him. Violette looked after him each day, Seb each evening and Mathilde from midnight until 6am. Mathilde had arranged the schedule. This way she rarely had to see Dash awake. Mathilde felt uncomfortable when she was around Dash. Her heart raced faster and she became breathless. It was even worse when he was awake. His piercing eyes seemed full of secrets and she couldn’t tell whether he found her interesting or despised her.

Whenever anyone spoke to Dash he smiled at them and made normal eye contact but when he looked at Mathilde he stared straight into her eyes and barely blinked. She always broke eye contact first, looking away embarrassed, unsure of what he was thinking or why he treated her differently. That was why it was better to take the night shift. It was still uncomfortable being so close to Dash, Mathilde wasn’t used to not being in control of the way her body reacted, but it was far easier to be with him when he slept than to face down those sapphire eyes every day.

Mathilde arrived at the hospital alcove and went into the side room. “Night shift is here Seb”

“Hi Tilly. Come to watch our security risk again? Just can’t keep away can we?” joked Seb.

Mathilde did not wholly trust Dash but her gut feeling was that he was no security risk. Seb was not so convinced, in fact he seemed to hate everything about him and Mathilde caught him glaring viciously at Dash more than once. He had been more than happy to take the evening shift so that Mathilde could do the night shift though. Mathilde wondered, not for the first time, if this was because he didn’t want Mathilde to talk to Dash.

“Found out anything more about him?”

“No. The freak is great at dodging questions. I’m pretty sure I could get some answers out of him but Violette would kill me if I got heavy with her patient.”

Seb chuckled in undisguised glee and Mathilde had no doubt that he would get some pleasure out of getting heavy with the person who he seemed to have decided was his enemy.

“Anything I can get for you before I leave you to it?” Seb gave Mathilde one of his usual one armed hugs as they looked at the sleeping Dash

“No thanks. Just have some breakfast ready for me in the morning.”

“No probs Tilly.”

With another squeeze of the shoulder and a kiss on the top of her head Seb reluctantly left. Seeing as he hated Dash so much Mathilde would have thought that he would have been more eager to leave. Then Seb was gone and Mathilde and Dash were alone. Mathilde took up her place in the corner of the room at a small table. She had meant to bring something to do tonight to keep her distracted, a pack of cards or one of the old books she had brought from Suceava, but she had forgotten again. Mathilde cursed her forgetfulness. Now she would have nothing to distract her from the body lying on the bed in the corner.