The days that fall were idyllic. Oakley found him before long, and they spent the days messing with the goats, finding good pasture, and practicing their slinging. Angus had a tough time mastering the sling. He kept hitting himself in the stomach or, if he wasn’t paying attention, the face. It was a fairly unpleasant weapon, in his opinion, but Oakley was a sling master and Angus wasn’t willing to admit defeat.

Oakley also taught Angus to chew tree gum, which was a great deal of fun. People always assumed they were chewing tobacco, and as it was discouraged in the hills of Imeall, often shook their heads in a disappointed fashion.

There were other things, too, to learn about the forest. Like how to move quietly.

“You’re super loud,” Oakley had explained. “Just move like I do.”

Oakley was a terrible teacher. If he hadn’t been such a good learner, Angus told himself, he would have never learned. But he did.

They usually gathered wild blackberries and cattail roots while Zeka hunted, maybe basil or chive as well, and when a pheasant or hare was dragged in, they cooked them all together. It made for an enormous lunch, which Angus was glad for. He got the sense that his aunt and uncle were not well off, and he tried to eat little at breakfast and dinner.

Eistir noticed of course.

“Eat a little more,” she’d tell him. “You’re going to shrivel like an old carrot.”

He didn’t shrivel, but the scolding became a kind of dinner table ritual. She liked having someone to mother, he thought. Garid looked on it all with a certain fondness, although he didn’t comment. Eventually it had to be admitted that Angus wasn’t shriveling, though, as he began to grow broad and much taller. His clothes were quickly becoming unusable, so he asked for some cloth, needle and thread. His aunt acquiesced, looking surprised.

“What are you going to use them for?”

“For clothes.”

Eistir laughed. “My Bronah,” she said, shaking her head. “Taught a boy to sew.”

Angus hunched his shoulders and left. He was glad for the cloth and things, though.

With them, he made an over large shirt, and trousers that had to be folded up at the bottom. He made his front pocket gigantic, and stroked Zeka’s head while he did so.

“You won’t fit,” he told her, “But it’s in your honor.”

Oakley was growing, too, if that was possible. Angus was infuriated by the kid’s ability to always be taller than him. It was somewhat superhuman. Oakley hated it, too.

“Had to take these clothes out of my salary.” He complained to Angus. “And I couldn’t make mine—so it cost me labor, too.”

It seemed like the only fancy terms Oakley knew-- like cost for labor, or raw materials, or other such things—were economic.

“My mom is a great tradeswoman,” he explained when Angus asked. “It’s silly, the things people end up paying her.”

“I’m sure.” Angus was a bit concerned. He was concerned, a bit, about everything Oakley had learned from his family. The fighting was typical, of course, but Oakley also knew the best way to roast a human being.

“Do you eat them?”

“Oh no, it’s ceremonial.”

Angus raised an eyebrow.

Oakley shrugged. They were sitting under a pine tree, chewing its needles and shooting the breeze. The tree overlooked a sunken meadow, almost a small ravine, where the goats grazed.

Suddenly Angus tipped his head. “The birds have gone silent.”

Oakley nodded, “Yeah. Probably a wolf, keep an eye out.”

Angus grunted, scanning the forest around them. Something didn’t feel right.

“Oakley, I’m usually the last to notice things. If you’re not telling me something…”

“I don’t know.”

They studied the valley.

“Zeka.” Angus called, unwinding his sling. He had stones for it in a belt pouch, and he got one out. “Gather.”

Zeka brought her tail up to wag proudly, then began herding the goats into a circle. The goats were ornery, sending up a chorus of protests. Oakley and Angus slid down the short slope—Oakley fell. Angus turned to help him up, but a gigantic panther had leaped from the bushes, straight at Oakley. The boy’s face was scratched open immediately, although he had the presence of mind to roll as the creature dropped onto him.

Angus roared and jumped on the writhingly muscular back, throwing the taunt length of his sling around its throat. It roared, twisting and turning. His left calf burned as a claw caught it. He leaned backwards and leveraged the taunt cord with his foot, which he jammed between the things’ shoulder blades. It struck his right thigh, and he cried out. It mewled and kicked. He kept the leather length tight, breathing harder than the panther.

Then it stopped breathing all together. Angus stumbled off, collapsing. Oakley tottered to his feet. Wiping the blood from his eyes, he stared down at Angus for a long moment, face white and red and white and red. He called the dog over.

“Zeka.” He told, smearing blood on her face and chest, “Go home. Go home, girl.”

Zeka whined, running in a tight circle with her tail between her legs.

“Zeka! Go home!”

She stopped and looked at him, panting.

“Go home, Zeka. Find Garid.”

Zeka hesitated, then ran off.

“Let’s hope that works.” Angus moaned.

“You’re alive!” Oakley said.

“That’s nice. Alive should be nice.” He shifted then yelped in pain. “Always nice for niceness.”

Oakley cracked up. “There is something wrong with you.”

“Yap, it’s called hand me your pant leg or I’m going to die.”

Oakley ripped both his pantlegs off from a little above the knee. “You’re paying.”

Angus laughed, then stopped. Oakley handed him the long strips of cloth.

“Get me a stick, will you?”

Oakley found a couple, and Angus chose a short solid one. “Now,” He sobbed as he forced himself to sit up. He wrapped the impromptu bandage around his thigh and twisted it with the stick. He winced. His hands were throbbing, and he could see the imprints of the leather thong on his palms.

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“Oakley, could you— Jokim’s crying fist, your face.”

Oakley reached over and tightened the tourniquet for his friend. “It’s not going to kill me,” he said. “That’s more than I can say for you.”

Angus smiled, checked the tourniquet one more time, and passed out from the pain.

He didn’t remember Garid and the village men finding them, or Oakley’s worried, Ippeis lullabies. Didn’t remember the preacher, riding in on a horse, sweat beading down his face. Or his Aunt praying to Orpah, that if she cared at all “about her blood”, she would save Angus.

“He’s the last of this line,” she prayed fiercely. “You’d never let the Draibias die out completely—now prove it!”

He didn’t see Uncle Garid binding up Oakley’s face, or Oakley insisting that the priest treat Angus first, or Aunt Eistir refusing to leave as a woman ought to.

What he did remember was this.

He was walking down a long, long corridor with a doorway at the end. He pushed open the door, and entered a room made of red stone. It had no ceiling, and there were plants here and there in plots of black dirt. Cerias sat in a puddle of sunlight, a trowel and seed potatoes set beside her. She was older, maybe twenty, and was holding a toddler in her lap. He had a long, straight nose like hers, black eyes, and blonde curls.

“And then—” Cerias was telling him.

“And then!” The boy interjected. He was two or three, and fiddling with a wooden toy. “Then he got crown!”

“Yes. Then he got the crown.” Cerias turned to look at Angus, her face no longer her own. “And he’d better, if he wants to keep that leg, eh?” the old woman said in a hoarse voice. The courtyard, boy and plants had faded, leaving only the hunched creature who smiled knowingly. “It’s in Sloupec Koure, dontcha know.” She chuckled.

Angus frowned dreamily. “I can live without a leg.” He said, “Sloupec is a dark place.”

“Then I’ll just kill you. And I own your afterlife, lad.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“Ready to do my bidding?”

“Yes.”

“Good boy. Both of you are, really…” She started to wander off, then stopped. “And don’t let that brother of yours die. He’s a bit reckless, really.” Then she disappeared into a redness that pierced Angus. That was piercing his legs and body and head—he wished he really had died.

He opened his eyes. His aunt had her back to him, knitting and staring out the open doorway. She was making odd little humming noises.

“Eistir?” His voice was little more than a croak.

“Angus!” She turned around, eyes full of tears. “I’m so glad you’re alright.”

“Yes, erm, me too. Where am I?”

“In the priest’s sickroom. How are you feeling?”

“Like I’ve wrestled a panther.”

She gave a sob-laugh.

“Erm… Oakley’s alright, right?”

She nodded. “Sick for a bit, and he’s got a nasty scar. But he’s recovering.”

“Doing well?”

“Walking about. You’ve been asleep for a… long time. We all thought you were— well, the priest said you were communing with the afterlife. Seeing how it tasted.”

“No.” Angus corrected. “How it sounded. Hoarse, and cranky.”

She eyed him, then checked him for fever.

“Hey, stop that.”

“You nearly lost your leg, you know.” She reminded him momentarily of the old woman. “Get some rest.”

“Yes sir.”

“Ma’am.”

“Ma’am.”

“Good.” She left, a bounce in her step.

She came back with Garid.

“Hey lad.” He looked as if he wanted to take off his hat. “How’re you?”

“Er, better.”

“Well, I s’pose anything’s better than half-dead and sleeping.”

Angus snorted. “I s’pose so.”

“Well, you tell us when visiting becomes too much, alright?”

“Ai.”

“Good, now the priest’ll be along soon, as well. Tell him anything that hurts, and such.” Eistir said in her hurried, worried fashion.

“I’ll tell him everything hurts.”

The couple laughed, leaning into each other like two scarecrows caught in the wind.

“We’ll come back later with your dog.” Eistir said.

“Did she lead you to us? What happened?”

Garid laughed. “She did, herded us more like. You can imagine what I felt when I saw you boys passed out like that. Blood loss, the priest says. I’m glad you two made it.”

“Where’s Oakley now?”

“Coming,” Eistir scolded. “Now get some sleep.”

Angus closed his eyes, hoping she’d stop bugging him if he did. When he opened them again it was dark out.

“Storms,” he said, “I haven’t slept another week, have I?”

Someone yawned, head burrowed into Angus’ spare pillow.

“Oakley?”

“Ai.” He turned. Angus gasped.

Oakley didn’t just have a nasty cut, he had a face-transforming nightmare. It went from the corner of his eye, next to his nose, to his jawline. It hadn’t scarred yet, but it would.

“Hya!”

Oakley laughed. “I thought you were Externi.”

“Nah, only when I need to be. Are you going to be able to live with that?”

“My face?”

“Yeah.”

“I dunno.”

They both sat in silence for a moment.

“I’m glad you kept your leg.”

Angus shook his head. “Not without a price, Oakley.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I could have died, but Orpah wanted me.”

“Hummm, she’s the death god, right? I mean, if she’d wanted you, you’d be dead, eh?”

“No, I mean. Wanted me to do something. Something about a crown.”

“You feverish?”

“No. I probably was then, but…” Angus shrugged. He didn’t mention Cerias, or the child she’d been holding. It had been too private. “I think it was real, some kind of real—you know?”

“Okay. So how do you get the crown?”

“Well. I have to go to Sloupec.”

“Hummm?”

“The black spot— you’re real close to it, the Ippeis are, I mean—you ought to be.” Angus said.

“Describe it.”

“Dead land—black city? The column of smoke?”

“Oh—Caedes Deserendi and Syrma.”

“What?”

“The city and the land. Syrma and Deserendi.”

“Oh. Well, I’ve got to go there, if I want to keep living,” he thought of Cerias and Bronah and Redmond and Oisin. Thought of that blonde toddler. “I want to keep living.” He decided.

“Okay.” Oakley said. “Can we travel south together?”

“Sure.”

“Good. I’ve got my pack and everything—Lochlan gave it to me out of pity, I think. I’m all set, as soon as I work up some food.”

“Well, good for you. I’m not.”

“Don’t be a wet blanket.”

Angus cracked up.

“You’re so weird,” Oakley said, stretching, then he put Angus’ pillow back and left.