The hart bled out onto the snow, Luthr’s arrow deeply embedded in its throat. Having been a man of judicious violence, he found peace in the purity of hunting.
“Your kingdom must be safe,” said Olfonse, “if it employs men like you to uphold its laws.”
Luthr grinned at the older man. “I’m better than most.”
“Ha! Then I’ll write my bandit brother and tell him to ride for Par Galen before you leave us.”
“Maybe I’ll leave tonight.”
“So long as you leave this buck.”
“And you call your brother the bandit.”
Olfonse chuckled. “I call my brother all sorts of things.”
"Do you call him often?”
No one skinned game like Olfonse. He worked his knife like it was one of his fingers. He spoke as he dressed the hart.
“You’re only about six months in, so you’re probably still struggling to get all your memories back. You’ll come to a point when you’ll realize that you never lost them, and that what happened is that your heart became blank. Then, when you understand that, and I don’t mean when you know, but when you understand, then you’ll be able to let those memories back in.” He paused his work and looked through the trees into the valley, then pointed at Luthr with his knife. “When that happens, you’ll feel different about everything and everyone than you did before. That will be the most difficult time of your entire life.”
He stood, half a head taller than Luthr and twice his girth. The pale and distant sun shone in his hair, which, as blonde hair does, fought against his years. “You’ll need help, Luthr. Don’t be afraid to ask for it.”
He leaned against a tree to scratch his back. The tree sagged beneath his weight. Then he sat back down and resumed his skinning. “Now, as for my brother, we were inseparable, a scourge on all lands. You tell me that you’re a cut above the other Iudexes. I agree. And I would know. Par Galen is fat with Iudexes and Provosts and Galliards. So fat that you had judicators to spare. Par Maven was a peaceful little fishing hamlet when I was a boy. Your novices came in droves, out of work back home. They contrived infractions when they ran out harmless misdemeanors to flog us over. We had no call to crime before that, but my brother and I decided that if we were going to be treated like knaves, we may as well act the role.”
Luthr spat into the nearby brush, then knelt down to collect the hide while Olfonse wrapped the meat. “So you took to banditry.”
“We played the role. But that was enough for bored junior Iudexes desperate to excuse their commissions. So, we went south, across the sea, and found ourselves in a savage land. That’s when we took to banditry in earnest. We were frightened at first. The unkindled were terrifying. But nothing frightened us as much as when we saw ourselves in a mirror one day and looked at our own eyes. When Jurat brought me back, I tried to end my own life. He wouldn’t let me. Then I remembered my brother, and our friendship gave me strength. But were I to see him now, I’d kill him, and if Iyegas were good, my brother would kill me right back. We did awful things, Luthr, and I can’t excuse them anymore.”
“What does that have to do with rekindling?”
“You’ll see, Luthr. You’ll see. Remember what I told you, and don’t feel ashamed to ask for help.”
They made their way back to the town. Luthr stopped on a hill where a tree, crone-like bent, heaved a tall root out of the rocky ground. Luthr climbed the root and found the view more open than the rest in the valley. There he saw a beam of gold rise above the mountains. Its fingers reached over the peak in a feeble attempt to grasp it. The gold beam seemed tinted with yellowish green, like vomit.
They dropped their game off at Miz Bellitte’s cookery, Luthr’s three bucks to Olfonse’s single doe, then parted ways for the day.
“I’ll see you at the feast, lady killer,” Luthr said.
Olfonse laughed and waved.
Luthr spent the afternoon on his porch, writing whatever words found their way through the veins of his arms into his fingertips. Only the strongest oozed from his pen, and when he was done he read them, aghast. Iyegas will burn and the flames will free us. Iyegas is the king of carrion. The tree, the disease, the vampire. The pale distant sun has died. Take us across the farthest sea and let the pale corse rot. And at the end; I wish I could have known my grandchildren.
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He was quiet at the festival, making short, polite comments at most. He found himself sitting against a tree just outside the light of the torches. He looked longingly at the aurora.
Olfonse lumbered over to him and belched as he sat down. He had a steak of venison on a wooden plate.
“Lady killer,” Luthr said, forcing a smile.
“Bah. This is one of your bucks. You rob the woods of sons. I’ll take the daughters. Why are you wallowing over here, Luthr? Is your heart remembering things sooner than mine did?”
“Might be so. I’m just tired.”
“A common lie, if not a clever one. But I believe you. Men our age shouldn’t be doing the work of adolescents.”
“I’ve wondered at the lack of young ones here.”
Olfonse sighed. “Yes. They’re harder to turn back. Or so Jurat says. Our soft old brains squeeze the poison out like sponges.”
A train of ladies danced by, arms locked and eyes reflecting the torches. “I miss my wife,” Luthr said.
“Huh. Never had one. There’s one gal I miss, though. She told me ‘No’ a thousand times. But, I asked her a thousand and one.”
“What happened?”
“Jurat found me.”
Luthr raised his brow. “That’s cause for violence.”
Olfonse chuckled. “I would, were there not such a strange aura about the man. I have this feeling that he could end me with a sneeze.”
Luthr simply nodded. “I was going to ask you something earlier.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“You were talking enough for the both of us.”
Olfonse raised a brow. “I do carry on. Well, you better ask your question before I get started again. I might just use up all this thin mountain air if you don’t stop me.”
“You’ve been here for years. Why haven’t you gone back home?”
Olfonse chewed on his venison, then pointed at one of the ladies he liked the looks of. “She’s married, though.”
“To who?” Luthr scanned the crowd. He hadn’t seen her close to any man for more than a moment or two.
“He doesn’t live here.”
“Then why does she? Will no one take us back?”
“Can’t say. None of us have ever tried.”
Luthr began to feel a little frustrated. “You do like to talk. Can you answer me plainly?”
“Sure. But I’d rather answer you effectively. You told me just now what answer you’d accept. Why would I try to give you a different one, knowing how your thoughts are inclined?”
“I think I know how you and your brother worked. You talked your victim’s ears of while he snuck behind them and emptied their coach of valuables.”
“Willfrey hardly said a word. So, I developed my oratory skills for when a sheriff came by and asked us questions.”
“They have sheriffs in the unkindled lands?”
“Some are less unkindled than others.”
Someone shouted. Luthr turned sharply to the sound.
“Easy, Iudex. There’s no bandits here.”
He heard loud laughter, people hollering at those still dancing, and people talking loudly to hear each other over the band. He settled down. “I suppose I’ll need to wait till my mind heals some more, and then I’ll understand the answer myself. Righ?”
Olfonse was ignoring Luthr and looking back towards Jurat’s compound.
“Do you hear something?”
Olfonse raised his hand to shush Luthr. Luthr stood. He did not need to listen anymore. He knew the sounds of a disturbance. He reflexively reached for his hammer.
“Here!” Olfonse stood and ripped a pair of stout branches off the tree. He handed the heaviest one to Luthr.
They went together to the compound, and that’s when the confused shouts turned to screams. People were gathering in a circle, then two went down and there were louder screams. The band stopped playing.
“Move!” Luthr boomed. He pulled people out of his way with his free hand, keeping the branch over his shoulder and ready to bring down on someone’s skull. His heart quickened when he saw the cause of the screams. One of the unkindled had escaped and had snapped the necks of three people. He was on all fours like an animal, blood dripping from his mouth and broken nose.
Luthr moved forward quickly and swung his branch. It struck the dead-eyed beast across the face, but he darted backward and missed the brunt of Luthr’s force. Luthr’s follow up blow turned the Unkindled’s face to the side, and the third knocked him unconscious. He put his knee between the wildling’s scapulae and pulled his head back with the tree branch. He would have killed the beast, if Olfonse had not lifted him clean off the ground and set him down outside the circle. Luthr was about to protest, but something in Olfonse’s eyes silenced him.