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42. Left Behind

42. Left Behind

“When the duel began, King Zalak leapt higher in the air than I could ever have imagined. Bone knives ready in either grip, he seemed set to open Chief Tuku’s thick neck from either side only a few moments after the fight had begun.

But Tuku did not seem to suffer such a lapse in imagination. He readily snatched Zalak from the air, hoisting him over his shoulders, and then brutally snapped the monarch’s spine. Dropped to the floor, I thought Zalak was dead, but he murmured and moaned on the ground. There was a fear in his keen eyes that I had never seen before and I almost felt regret. Chief Tuku’s heavy foot soon covered the sight and caused an awful crunch.

Tuku was swiftly pronounced King, but declared himself instead as Great Chief.

Events unfolded at pace. The Chiefs of Zalak yielded without further bloodshed, and then they all left our small settlement, the Great Chief leading the procession, to return to Zalak’s former domain.

Magar and I were simply left here, and Tuku instructed me to care for the younglings. In his stead, he explained that I had charge of the modest clan.

For the first few nights, I felt relief. Now nearly a Cycle has passed, and I wonder if the Great Chief is returning or if he is even still alive.

The young shaman appears completely unperturbed. He is feeding up goblins so they can regurgitate sacks into his great pool. And he is having others gather strange ingredients that stink of salt and the sea.

So sure was I that Tuku would fail and I would be taken as a prisoner, I destroyed all my things in a spiteful rage. I wanted to burn my recordings, so King Zalak would never possess them. Not that he even knew the language written therein. But I found that the journal was already missing, and have begun again in my second journal instead.

It seems that the robed human told the truth when he said he would steal my work. This marks him as yet another in my long life that I will likely never see or speak with again.”

Smiler sat in his shack, staring up at the hole in the roof. The fire had long burned to an end, and dozens of bottles had been rolled atop of the ashes. Ten stools had been arranged to face him and they were all vacant. He didn’t mind that, because he preferred to keep company with unburdened furniture. And, right now, he was busy in waiting for an answer. An answer that would come in form of an arrival, or in form of absence.

He stared at the glistening glass and the scattered ashes. He reached down for the greasy flakes, smeared them on his cheeks and then he resumed his wait.

Smiler’s answer came as no more than a mutter, a fearful utterance between conspirators, followed by the soft, hard-to-hear steps of a dozen men venturing forth as assassins. “I know you’re out there!”

Stilted silence.

“You’ve good hearing, then.”

“Ah, hah. Come in then, my hooded half. I won’t lash out. Not quite right yet.”

Footfalls drew close to the door. Wood shuddered now it creaked open.

The hooded man stepped into the room. He looked down at the stools. “Had a gathering planned?”

“A celebration. One of irony. True irony. Difficult to explain. I don’t need the chairs if I’m going to celebrate… because I only celebrate the rule of Gudmund. But if there’s folk here for the stools then Gudmund is dead and there’s no celebration to be had. Do you understand? I only need the chairs if I don’t need the chairs. Isn’t that peculiar?”

The hooded man sighed. “And it’s nonsense like that why I can’t leave you living and breathing.”

Smiler’s grin was vicious. “I swore that man an oath. On my honour. You have lost me my honour!”

“You never had any. You’re a vicious animal cutting out people’s teeth. I’ve seen you sing songs while you dismember men.” The hooded man upturned his gloved palms. “The problem here isn’t what I’ve done but what you’ve done. You’re mad. You’re rabid. And it’s time that I put you out of your misery.”

“My friend,” Smiler snarled, his eyes feral and wild. “There is no man alive that could cure me of my misery.”

“We are not friends,” the hooded man said, stepping back out of the doorway. “We never were, we never would be, we never will be.”

Smiler’s mad cackle echoed through the darkness of the city slums. He rose from his chair and walked out into the open streets. To his disappointment, the hooded man was gone. So he danced, danced alone with those other dozen men, them offering him their daggers blade first only for him to refuse and apologize with his own dangerous gifts.

“Stab stab stab,” Smiler thought. “Gone are the necks, gone are the smiles, gone are the lights in the eyes. No friend, no friend, no friend… please don’t cry. What do you mean stop? I’m stopping you right now. It can’t get any—ah, that was a coward’s attack and now I’m bleeding. Hah! And now you’re bleeding! And you’re screaming! You’re an odd one! Show some courage, man!”

Smiler realised he was shouting aloud. He parried a blade, sawed through a woman’s wrist then twisted and punched through her neck. A chorus of groaning had sounded out around him like the tales of the risen dead. He turned to see nine bodies lying on the dirt outside the shack, bleeding, choking, clutching at guts or crotches.

“Who has done this?” Smiler roared. “Who has killed all of my friends?” He blinked. “Wait, no. Not my friends. My enemies. But my friends are in danger,” he frantically declared. “Save them, Smiler. Save them!”

Frightened folk had watched the maddened slaughter through rag curtains and cracks in shutters. They thanked all Eleven Elders when the knife-wielding maniac ran off down the dirt street, shouting at himself in encouragement all the while.

***

Engli and Alrik had chosen to sit in the taproom of Sifa’s Tavern along with the rest of the Black Hands. There were eight other men, Sifa, and Sifa’s young daughter, who shared her mother’s name. Engli wondered if that was planned from the beginning to avoid renaming the tavern. He sniffed, finishing a stone mug of ale, and squinted around the smoky surroundings of grey walls and black-clad folk drinking at tables.

A fire burned ahead, up against the wall, and the sight made him hungry. The sheep that had burned there had long been eaten and the bones and scraps remained on scattered plates, shadowed beneath huddled mugs and cups.

Engli found the air stifling, even though he was too drunk to pay mind to most the smells of folk around him. He hadn’t even wanted to drink, but then they all seemed reasonably certain that this was the day that Jarl Thrand would die. And there was no doubt among the gathered folk that such a thing would be worth celebrating.

So Alrik had drank and Engli had drank and all the men had drank.

And now they were all drunk and rowdy and Engli was hanging his head at the corner of a stone bench, elbows resting on a table of the same make.

“Engli.”

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Engli was surprised to see Alrik’s scarred face. The young man had spent most the night with Young Sifa. “Yes?”

“Are you all right? You look like you’re about to throw up.”

Engli forgot the words after he heard them. He mumbled and nodded.

“I’ll take you outside, then.” Alrik pushed up and offered his hand.

Engli grabbed it and managed to get to his feet. He thought it odd how many of the Black Hands were watching him, as if they’d never seen a man drunk before. Then he had the odder thought that none of them looked much drunk. He then saw the bulky man collapsed on his back in a puddle of his own sick, and decided he was mistaken.

“Where are you two going?” Sifa asked.

Alrik steadied Engli’s swaying weight before he turned. He held the woman’s hard gaze, but he could still see men growing tense along the benches. “He’s going to be sick all over. I thought he could use some fresh air.”

“No need.” Sifa’s arms were crossed over her apron. “I’ll fetch him a bucket.”

“No need,” Alrik echoed. “I’ll take him outside.”

“I’ll take him,” a slender man offered. “No need for you to do it, boss.”

“Damn,” Alrik thought, “That’s me dead.” He considered leaping the counter, or fighting for the door, but then chuckled in assent. “I suppose I’m just not cut out for being the man in charge. And I thought that Brolli was too hard on them. Wish he was here now.”

Engli toppled back when Alrik let him go.

Alrik had to kneel to slow his fall. “Easy there, Engli!” He leaned close to his ear. “Be ready for a blade.”

Engli’s sweaty face creased. “For—” He seemed to sober. “I’m going to throw up.”

“Hold on,” Alrik urged, lifting him and handing him over to the slender man. He patted Engli on the back and watched the pair of them stumble towards a door that lay open to shadowed streets. “Fetch me a drink, Sifa.”

“What do you want?”

“Surprise me.” Alrik turned back to a crowd of rough and restless men that were closer to standing than sitting. “I’m going to go for a walk.” He shrugged, and smiled. “I’ll be back soon enough.”

The Black Hands traded glances with the hard woman behind the bar.

They all seemed ready to move but Alrik was making a slow effort of stepping backwards while still smiling at them. He decided to run to the door, look for Engli, cut the first bastard’s throat and then either hunt for the rest or go and live in another region. He was about to act when he bumped into a large belly.

He almost laughed but a bear hug crushed the air from his lungs.

“Joyto’s Piss,” Alrik thought, “I’ve been had by a man that just spent the night sniffing his own sick.”

“Ease up,” Sifa said. “They offered to pay more if we bring him alive.”

Alrik managed a wry exhalation. “Who offered to pay?”

“Your good friends the Crooked Teeth.” Sifa didn’t even bother to walk around the counter. She stood there wiping dry stone with a dry rag while the black-clad men strode forward with a sack and rope. “Are you surprised?”

“I am.” Alrik nodded into a pair of burly arms. “Didn’t think you had it in you.”

Sifa answered with a shrug.

“I don’t think Gudmund’s going to like it when he hears—”

“Gudmund is dead.” Sifa smirked. “I wasn’t afraid of the man and I’m not afraid of his corpse.” She shook her head. “Did you really think that’s how this ends? That Gudmund of Horvorr, of all people, trades places with the Jarl of Timilir? That a man as soft as you gets to fill the boots of Brolli the Black?”

“Brolli’s—”

“Don’t Brolli me, you pock-scarred runt. He’s as dead as dead gets. And Hjorvarth’s the same. He escaped the mines and they never found him. So either he’s living with the kobolds now or he’s just another dead man that can’t help you.” Sifa bared her teeth in a cold smile. “I really didn’t want to kill you, Alrik. But I gave you chance to leave and you didn’t take it. Instead you murdered Afi, his son, and his grandson. They were men of the Black Hands. More than you’ll ever be.”

“And you…?” a man’s curious voice asked.

The burly man lapsed in his grip so Alrik drove his head back.

Flesh met with teeth and he regretted the act.

He was shoved forward. A fist smashed into Alrik’s cheek and hard stone leapt up to meet his hands and knees. He coughed and reeled with the pain, squinting to see a young man standing in the shadowed corner.

“Good woman,” Smiler pressed, “you did not answer my question. They are men of the Black Hands… but you are not a man. A fault in him must be a fault in you, yes?”

The Black Hands drew knifes, clubs, and daggers. Then moved in on Smiler.

Alrik didn’t realize that the black-clad man was armed until he lashed out and the burly man clutched at his throat.

The other men paused for only a moment before rushing in for an attack but Smiler was already among them, ducking, dancing, incessantly stabbing and slashing. He was laughing as well, jeering and shouting at them.

Boots trampled over Alrik and a fat man collapsed atop him. He almost reached for his own blade but the outpour of blood from thigh and neck assured him of death.

Sifa’s daughter was screaming, while Smiler had started to sing.

Alrik couldn’t shake the thought that the leader of the Crooked Teeth was an able bard. “Don’t!”

“Don’t what?” came the curious voice of a man he could no longer see.

“Don’t kill the girl,” Alrik managed.

“I wasn’t going to.” Smiler paused. “I was going to kill the mother.”

“No.”

“No…?”

Alrik tried to force the dead man off, but he was half-dazed and the burden seemed impossibly heavy. “Don’t kill the mother or the girl.”

“Is that a threat, friend?” Smiler asked, his voice drawing closer. “I commend your ingenious efforts at stealth, but I can see your shoulder and boots and I fear your surprise attack might not work as well as expected.”

“I’m not hiding,” Alrik spat. “I’m being crushed.”

“Oh.” Smiler hooked his boot between two bellies, then kicked the man off. He offered a hand that glistened dark red. “Are you crippled, friend? Do you wish for me to end your existence…?”

Alrik grabbed his hand but the grip slipped. He struggled up on his own.

Smiler laughed. “Perhaps they should call you the Red Hands. You’ve made quite a mess here, friend.” He murmured in surprise. “Look at this one here, you’ve punched out both his eyes when he’s already had a mortal cut to the throat. What a senseless act of violence. You must be from Horvorr… are you from Horvorr?”

Alrik staggered when he reached his seat. He lay back on a stone bench. “I am.”

“That’s good.” Smiler’s grin creased cheeks and made wet blood mingle with dried ash. “I thought for a moment there I’d saved the wrong one,” he worriedly explained. “There was another man with the blond one, Engli, and I thought perhaps I’d killed one of the ones I was meant to save… but then I thought, no, why would they be trying to murder one another? And then I came in here to see the same thing, and I decided that I must be here to save the victims.”

Alrik only then realised he was standing amid ten butchered men. The stone tavern was suffused by smoky orange and dead gazes glistened with firelight. They were all still, not a one groaning or suffering a slow death. “How did you do all that?”

Smiler blinked. “What?” He glanced down at the floor and his eyes widened. “Lady below, what’s happened here?” He laughed. “My friend, you should bring down whoever has committed this atrocity. But I fear I must be away. I have mislaid my other half and now I need to go and find it and carve it out of me.” He started to move then froze, and glared. “My friend,” he growled. “You have not yet wished me luck in my quest.”

“Good luck.”

“Good?” Smiler spat. “I wish you the best luck, friend. And I curse you with remembrance of this uneven exchange.”

Alrik frowned. “You do have my honest thanks for saving my life.”

Smiler frowned at the dead men. “Did one of these lot save your life? What a shame that he died.” He tutted. “Goodbye, then, Alrik of the Black Hands. Engli of Horvorr’s Guard awaits you outside in a bed of refuse.”

Alrik wanted to watch the man go, to be sure he had left, but he started retching instead. He struggled up after he had finished, strode across the taproom, and told himself he would never return. He found the blond man lying in a filthy alley, fists bruised and face bleeding as if he had managed to a put up a drunken struggle.

“You did better than me,” Alrik muttered.

He hauled Engli off the ground, and started looking for a safer tavern.