Two hours passed, and the man fell into a fitful sleep, which relieved Wali. He watched the man regain some color, and the fever broke. The mug of broth sat on a stone next to the fire, keeping warm but no longer boiling. Wali had spent the time constructively, finding a sapling and cutting the straight springy tree into a crutch. The wound would need to be tended to by a real healer soon. Wali had been able to catch the infectious toxins of the Monitor early enough that the flesh had not yet started to mortify. He had also cut up the Monitor, harvesting the tail meat and roasting it on a spit after dragging the rest of the beast off some distance. Buzzards could be a menace as they sought after carrion. Having to defend the sleeping man from hungry birds would not be optimal.
With a snort and a start, the young man jerked awake. “Gah, help, help!” he shouted at first, still a bit delirious from the shock and fever.
“Hey, hey, calm down. You’re going to be okay,” Wali said calmly from the other side of the small fire.
Breathing heavily, the man looked around with fear. “Where is the monster? What happened? Am I dead?” He asked breathlessly. He wiped the sleep from his eyes and patted himself down, checking for wounds.
“The Monitor Lizard is dead, I killed it and saved you, and you are very much alive,” Wali said calmly. He indicated the cup of broth. “You should drink that. It will help fight the effects of that thing’s bite.”
The man took in Wali’s response and tried to struggle to his feet. “What about Dottie? Where is Dottie?” He looked around wildly.
“Who is Dottie?” Wali asked, keeping his composure. The herbalists always taught that staying calm was the best thing to do in a crisis.
“My horse, where is my horse?” The man asked, still trying to get to his feet. He lacked the strength, and his bad leg wouldn’t support his weight. The man slid down and supported his back against the tree.
Wali indicated behind him toward the road where a swarm of buzzards squabbled over the dead horse. “The horse didn’t make it.”
They looked out toward the road. The injured man watched the buzzards for a moment as tears filled his eyes. He tried to keep his tears at bay but soon began to sob. “I’m dead. He’ll kill me now.” He said as tears cut swaths through the dirt on his face.
“Hey now, calm down. You’re in no danger here. You are injured, and we are some distance from town.” Wali said carefully. “Who’s going to kill you and why?” Reaching out to place his hand on the man’s shoulder.
“Mark Jacobsen, he’s going to kill me. I work for him, and that was his horse.” Said the man between gasping sobs. He really thought he was going to be killed.
“Okay, and why would he kill you over a horse?” Wali asked, not understanding the complete picture.
“I was supposed to go down to the waystation and sell her. The money was going to be what kept us fed over the winter.” The man said. “Now he’ll kill me, and we’re going to starve!” The big man’s chest heaved. He breathed heavily and fast, almost hyperventilating.
“Hey!” Shouted Wali suddenly, surprising the man and scaring the birds in the trees who scattered off. That shocked him out of his emotional state for a moment. “Stop crying. You need to calm down. Now, pick up that cup and drink it.” Wali said firmly, dredging up his drill instructor voice from so long ago.
The man stopped crying, but his eyes still dripped. The voice of authority Wali had used moved him to take the cup and take a drink. He sipped the warm liquid and made a face. He thought about spitting it out, but the look on Wali’s face made him swallow it down.
“Drink it all! Don’t be wasting it.” Wali kept the authority in his voice. It seemed to break the man out of his emotional jag. The man drank and made a face but kept drinking till it was empty. “Good, now tell me your name,” Wali instructed.
“Yacob, sir.” The man said with some apprehension.
In a much calmer tone, Wali said, “I’m Wali. Nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you too, Wali. Thank you for saving me,” Yacob said.
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“You are welcome, Yacob. When the herbs in that drink set in, you will be very sleepy, but you’ll feel better when you wake up. The bite of those monitor lizards carries a deadly toxin, and the way to treat that is to let the herbs take the toxins away while you sleep. You are going to sleep for a while now.”
“Umm, okay,” Yacob said blearily as he slowly slumped to the side. He began to snore loudly. Wali shook his head. Yacob would be fine. He stood and set Noodle and Tag to watch over the sleeping man. He jogged down the road, keeping the screeching buzzards at bay with his spear. He investigated what was left of the horse and the man’s gear. The horse was mostly picked clean, the saddle and harness destroyed, along with the saddlebags and their contents. There was nothing worth recovering now. Saving Yacob’s life was a big enough win for Wali.
Wali banked the fire for the night, asking Tag and Gulli to keep watch while they slept. The totems would wake him if they sensed anything dangerous. Their presence would also keep most animals away. Most humans could not see totems or interact with them like the Colri or those marked with a spirit glyph. The weather looked like it would hold for the night. Wali put his blanket over the man and leaned up against a close by tree. His totems would keep watch for him. The night passed peacefully. They remained undisturbed. The pile of carrion down on the road was more than enough for the coyotes and buzzards and other night critters to fight over. When the dawn chorus swept across the land, Wali awoke and tossed some wood on the coals to make some tea. He nudged Yacob with his toe, and he awoke with a start. Wali offered him a cup of tea as he greeted him. “Time to get up, Yacob, tea?”
Taking the hot cup gingerly and scowling at it, Yacob said suspiciously, “Good morning. Will this make me sleep again?”
Wali shook his head, “No, my friend, it’s just normal tea. We need to get moving soon.” Wali moved to break camp and was soon packed up with practiced ease.
He offered Yacob some jerky and a hard biscuit. Yacob eyeballed the food for a moment before greedily eating it, obviously hungry. Wali handed the crutch to the man, “Think you could walk?”
“I’ll try,” Yacob said as he struggled to his feet; he leaned heavily on the crutch. They trudged back to the roadway. The collection of buzzards still picking at the horse’s corpse squawked at them.
Yacob almost burst into tears again, but Wali quickly barked at him, “Don’t do it. You yet live, do not borrow trouble from tomorrow.” The bulky man struggled to keep the tears in but did not make a sound. He sighed and, with head hung low, turned toward the town.
They moved along at a slow walking pace, the wound in Yacob’s leg did not fester, and the poultice Wali had applied had drawn the toxins out of the body. They talked as they walked, and Yacob told Wali the story of how he had gotten into this predicament.
Yacob was an orphan born on the Jacobsen farm to a milkmaid who died shortly after Yacob was born. The other farmhands had primarily raised him. Jacobsen farm was a small farm that mainly raised cattle and goats for cheese. The past few years had been rough on the small farm. Wolves had gotten at the goats, disease had ravaged the cows, and two years with just enough milk production to keep the family and hands fed meant little to no income. Most of the other farmhands had left for jobs that paid better or even paid at all. All that was left now was the Holder, named Mark Jacobsen. He was a fat bitter older man who was as cruel as the day was long. His son Ferd Marksen was not much better than the Holder himself. Yacob had nowhere else to go. He only knew dairy farming and running errands. The Holder had sent Yacob to the waystation to sell the last horse on the property to the hostler there. The money should have been enough to keep the three of them fed for the winter.
Wali put two and two together and understood that Yacob was likely Mark’s bastard by the milkmaid. If Ferd died, then Yacob would inherit as was right by blood. Yacob obviously didn’t know this. Yacob was built like a brick shithouse but had been beaten and bullied his whole life by the Holder and his son Ferd. It was the old tale of how to lead an elephant by a string. Holder was the lowest of the low when it came to nobility in the Harvest Kingdom, little more than an owner of a large plot of land with the rights to be the landlord for tenant farmers. Inheritance was through direct lineage, and Yacob was direct lineage if not acknowledged. They were equivalent in power to town mayors, who were appointed to their position by local governors who were often Barons or better.
The farm was a day-and-a-half walk or most of a day’s ride to the way station and half that from the town. At their walking speed, it would be two days from where they were. Yacob showed that he was a kind-hearted and friendly type. Open, honest, and sadly conditioned by trauma to be subservient to a voice of authority. Wali questioned him about his life on a farm, his father and brother, and the town. Mark Jacobsen was apparently not well-loved by the local mayor or any of his fellow Holders in the area. What little Yacob knew about the family wasn’t much more than that. Yacob was as uneducated as a farm kid could get. He couldn’t read, could only do very basic sums, and his whole world was encapsulated within the farm’s borders.
As they walked, Wali had Tag and Gulli range ahead of them. They were unseen by Yacob, which was something that Wali knew was normal outside of Colri lands. Life with the Colri, initiation into the spirit world through the blood crystal, and later with the Rituals the Colri used to mark growth allowed a Colri to interact with the Totem Spirits. Once a Colri bound a Totem, they could interact and see them without the crystal. He kept his sling in one hand and stone in the other. Tag would flush a rabbit or quail across the path as they walked, the spirit chasing the beast into Wali’s sling stone.