Faenella, Eganene
With the town lights receding behind him, Carl kept a keen eye on the forest, searching the darkness for shapes that didn’t belong. When his eyes became tired, he blinked and licked his lips. The taste of whisky and honey reminded him of the warm hearth he left. Had things been different, he would have stayed the night at Sally’s. It had been a day and age since he had been with a woman, and longer since he had been with a young and beautiful one.
He adjusted his seat on the horse, his eyes scanning the path before him. The last evening he had spent at Sally’s, he had stayed in her own bed. He smiled a little, thinking of that night. She was old enough to be his mother, but they had been lovers a long time and knew each other well. Kilynn had called them friends, and he supposed they were.
Good friends, then, considering the grace she had shown upon hearing the news of her son. He had thought that she would blame him for Anthony’s death. It was possible she still did, but she also let him stay. Most importantly, she was going to help him gather provisions and arm the men. Her assistance provided them a singular chance of success.
She was a strong woman, that was for sure. Nevertheless, he could see the pain in her eyes. It was probably better he didn’t sleep beneath her roof. On horseback, the trip to Charlie’s would only take a few hours. He would make it there before midnight, check the surrounding forest, and hopefully, manage a few hours sleep. If he was lucky, Melody might give him a few bottles of stout to send him off.
The horse beneath him snorted and tossed his head, feeling out his new master. Carl shortened the reins and made the beast lift his head. He preferred to walk, but he knew how to handle a mount. Either way, it was a lot better than being on the run. Those nights in the woods had been a nightmare.
His memory of the flight back was imperfect, the endless footsteps broken by moments of violence and exhaustion. The sun rising above him and setting again. The pattern repeated over and over as he walked. He had been weak, falling asleep mid-step, only to wake up on his knees with Malachi urging him onwards.
At night, they tried to move faster, to put distance between themselves and the guards at their backs. They worked so hard, gaining a mile here or there, only to stop and change directions, doubling back to erase tracks or to take out one of the Dogs.
He and Malachi had fashioned a litter from two thicker saplings and lashed their friend to it with rope. When they doubled back, they left him hidden in the brush, alone and undefended. They worked better as a team, luring the guards apart and ending their lives one by one. But Charlie’s wounds had bled, betraying them with a trail of scarlet drops. Carl knew it was a miracle they made it back at all.
But Charlie had survived! The man was a mountain. He had taken a sword wound and a gunshot, not to mention days of blood loss, and he had lived! The man must have Tod’s own luck, Carl thought. Nothing less could have seen him through. Sure as Sol, his injuries should have killed him. Carl had seen men die of a lot less.
Tod couldn’t take all the credit, however. Melody had done some amazing work with her needle. And the child, too.
Now, the poor man needed only to rest and recover. With his injuries, he wouldn’t be up and about for some time. His wife and adopted daughter would need to take care of him. It was better that they stayed at Sally’s; her girls could help care for him, too.
In the morning, once he explained the situation, they could all return to Faenella. Hopefully, the men Nadine promised would have started arriving. The weapons they had taken from the Facility guards would be put to good use. Carl prayed they would have enough steel to arm every man.
Charlie would want him to wait for a few weeks, would want to come along, but it wasn’t possible. The Facility needed to be destroyed. Now. Before more women and children lost their lives.
Timing was important. If they hit them now, the monsters wouldn’t be prepared, wouldn’t be expecting an attack. Not so soon after they had driven Carl and his friends away. He hoped they had sent most of their men after them. If he and Malachi hadn’t killed them already, they’d find them on their way back. It would make the place easier to take.
The air grew colder as he walked, the ground losing the warmth it had soaked up during the day. The path was familiar and empty. He spooked a few deer and they snorted and dashed off to find a new place to bed. The horse pranced, and Carl watched the graceful animals run, envying them.
It was a good sign. No one had been by in the past few hours. He usually relied on the forest, the little sounds and motions telling him who or what was beneath the trees, but he still couldn’t hear as he should. The wind was a low, dull moan, the birds and night animals hidden. Swaying gently in the saddle, he concentrated on the crunch of the horse’s hooves. The crackle of snow should have been crisp and loud, but all he heard was a soft thumping sound, as though everything had been swaddled in wool and buried from him.
He was worried, more now than before. Not because his hearing had grown worse, but because it didn’t seem to be getting better. He was home, in a forest that was familiar by sight, but the cocoon of ambient noise that had always surrounded him was gone. A week ago he would have been able to pinpoint an animal’s exact whereabouts. Now, he struggled on a general direction, needing to stop and concentrate just to hear the chattering of squirrels.
Squinting into the darkness, he tried to remain vigilant. If his ears were not going to help him, his eyes would need to pick up the burden. The woods were beautiful, cold and empty. Moonlight filtered through the pine boughs above him, shadow and light flickering along the forest floor. His mood began to sour. Weary and injured, he hadn’t given himself the proper time to rest. He knew what needed to be done, but he was so very tired.
He patted the beast’s neck, grateful for the animal that carried him. His thighs might ache from gripping the horse, but walking would have been worse and a sight longer. He considered making a small fire and resting for a bit, but he knew he was close.
Stripping some bark off a sapling, he chewed as he went. The taste of birch beer filled his mouth, reminding him of years long passed and childhood memories long since forgotten. An hour later, he crested the final rise and followed the path down into the clearing to Charlie’s cottage. The air smelled like burning pine. Carl shivered, thinking of the warmth of the fire, some freshly baked bread and a thick bottle of beer.
Across the gentle rise and fall of the white meadow, the little house sat. Pale smoke streamed from the chimney, hitting the colder air and settling like a shroud. Light shown from the picture window on the far side, illuminating the massive woodpile, the air grey and cloudy.
The tall pines rose up behind him like a fence as he stepped into the clearing and froze. Instinct screaming for him to be careful. Something was wrong.
Quickly, he dismounted and led the horse back into the forest, tying his reins to a tree. He crept back the edge of the field and scanned the area, looking for what had spooked him.
Motionless, weary, he cast an eye over the field, His eyes flowed over the lumps of snow-covered dirt that Charlie had piled so many years ago. Carl moved forward slowly, his hand on his sword. The forest was silent.
From within the tree line, closest to the house, men emerged. They looked like spider ants boiling from their lair. Carl’s breath caught in his throat and he counted quickly. Two, three. No, six men. Dogs? Guards from the Facility?
They could have tracked him, followed his prints as he fled. He had tried the best he could to cover their footprints, but he hadn’t done well. In truth, he had hardly been able to keep Charlie off the ground. He’d probably missed half the marks they made, especially near the end.
He shook his head and moved faster. It could be guards, true, but it could also be someone else. He was too far away to tell. Quickly, his mind went to work sorting any and every possibility.
Had Nadine told the men to come to Charlie’s instead? He’d spent the day at Sally’s. Perhaps they’d already made their way here? Perhaps it was Jamison and some men from town? He was grasping at straws.
Carl pulled his sword and started jogging towards them, listing and discarding names with each step. Soon he was close enough to see them, to see the shiny silver buttons that raced up their black jackets, to see the naked steel in their hands. Carl raised his voice, shouting for the men to come for him, hoping that Charlie would hear his call.
Two of the men broke towards him. Carl took a few more steps and then slid to a stop in the snow, angling his body so that only one of the men could attack him at a time. Fast as he could, he swung. The man got his sword up, but it didn’t matter. Carl’s blade brushed his away easily, and cut into the man’s arm.
Screaming, the guard dropped his weapon, scrambling to get away. Before he had an opportunity to finish, the second man was on him. Carl blocked his strike, using the momentum against him so that the man stumbled past. Lashing out, he kicked the man’s feet from under him and rammed his sword down into the xia’s guts.
The first man was on his feet again, his sword held poorly in his weak hand. Blood spattered the grass at his feet. He must have opened an artery in the man’s arm. Terrified, the guard was lurching backwards, his wide eyes on Carl’s face. With a quick glance to the house, Carl sliced open the man’s belly and left him to die.
There was no sign of the other men, but the cottage door was open, the glow of candlelight spilling out into the snow. Carl jogged towards it, his eyes darting and his heart beating a rapid staccato. Panic leaked into his belly, the muscles of his stomach grinding together in fear.
Were Charlie and Melody all right? And where was Veri?
“Drop it and get against the wall,” a man shouted inside the house. Carl’s hand clenched the pommel of the sword, his fear boiling away in a wave of heat and anger. Before he could breathe, he was halfway across the field and sprinting.
One of the men stood inside the doorway. Dark pants and coat, his broad back was unprotected. Family or a guard, it didn’t matter. Carl didn’t hesitate. He ran across the slate walkway and up the carefully shoveled steps, his mind blank with rage. Without a word, he drove his blade forward.
The man must have heard him, turning slightly before Carl’s sword pierced his heart from behind. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a clean kill. Carl kicked him down, his foot slamming into the small of the man’s back. Heaving, he drew the blade out, blood spraying from the wound.
The guard tried to sit up, to turn and see his attacker. His body slid along the foyer floor, his hand slipping in the growing puddle beneath him. Carl took his sword in both hands, his jaw clenched. Someone in the room shouted, the sound raw and unintelligible, but he didn’t change course. His foot landed on the man’s throat, crushing his windpipe. Only then did Carl looked up.
Charlie was standing against the mantel in the kitchen. His friend’s face was blanched white, except where the ruined flesh was burned red. Carl couldn’t understand how he was standing. He shouldn’t have been able to get out of bed.
Charlie’s right arm was in a sling and his leg bandaged, but in his left hand he held steel. The sword was small and dainty in his massive fist. Beside him were Veri and Melody in their nightclothes. Charlie’s wife was concentrating on the gun in her hands. It looked like she was trying to get the safety off, her fingers fumbling in her haste.
Damn it, Carl seethed. How many times had he warned her to leave it cocked and loaded?
The child saw him. Her eyes were wide and frightened, her tiny arms wrapped around Melody’s leg. Her gaze went from Carl’s face to the men between them. There were three, plus the one dying on the floor. All of the Dogs had swords in their hands, but Carl didn’t see any guns.
Two of the men turned towards him, their expressions changing from surprise to hate. The last one went for Melody. Carl brought his sword up, parrying, and stepped backwards out the open door. From the corner of his eye, he saw Charlie move between his wife and her attacker.
Carl hacked at the men as they came through the entryway, the sound of steel on steel again filling the field. The bigger of the two men knocked his blade away and countered. Reluctantly, Carl gave ground, looking for an opening. Moments later, the second man was through the door and he was hard pressed to keep his weapon between their swords and his face.
“Get downstairs,” he heard Charlie yell.
He prayed Melody listened, but there was no time to check. The two men were professionals. Again and again, Carl dodged their blows, catching their steel on his sword as he was forced to back up. Desperately, he tried to find space, to give himself room to counterattack.
Silver light streamed towards him, the moonlight reflecting off the men’s swords, beautiful and deadly. Carl inhaled slowly, letting his muscles relax. Time slowed. The man closest to him, the heavier man, drove his sword towards Carl’s head, the overhand swing fast and deadly. Carl reached up and parried, sliding back, the weight of the blow bending his knees.
He didn’t know this man. The man’s face was scrunched up in concentration, his upper lip drawn back. A long mustache hung from beneath his nose, mixing with the hair from his nostrils. In the bright light of the moon, Carl could see him clearly, a hiccup of space and time seen acutely as the rest of the world faded to grey.
There was only the man.
He saw the sweat on his opponent’s face, could see him furrow his brow as he closed. He watched the swell of his chest, saw the slow inhale of breath. The man glanced left, too eager. He stepped in front of his partner, effectively blocking him from the fight.
The man’s blade swept down, and Carl checked the attack, catching the sword high. Caught off kilter, the man tried to right himself, his arms out for balance, his neck open and unprotected. Carl fist connected with his windpipe. There was a crunching sound, the feel of resistance and then, a sick give. Black eyes bulged, surprise and pain flashing across the ugly brute’s face.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
That felt good, Carl thought, already moving.
He had time to watch blood bubble from the man’s mouth, to see his knees give out, but the smaller man didn’t wait. He leapt nimbly over his collapsing partner. His eyes were on Carl’s face, his lips drawn back in a rictus of a smile. His wore a dark jacket, the hood of the coat drawn tight beneath his chin. Carl retreated, trying to put room between them. Time had sped forward again, leaving their motions a whirl of steel and flesh.
He blocked again and again, giving ground. Now, only feet from the forest wall, he tried to slow their progress. The ring of brush and saplings was a fence he couldn’t back his way through. There would be no room to swing his sword, no way to maneuver.
Every foot Carl retreated, the man pursued him. His sword whipped out, cutting at Carl’s head, his stomach and his legs. Over and over the blade pounded him and each time Carl was a little slower, a little later getting his sword between them.
Carl sucked in air, feeling his chest swell. Tiny, white stars danced in his vision and the muscles of his arms burned with weariness. His sword point trembled before his face. He skidded to a stop, his knees bent. He couldn’t let the Dog back him into a corner.
Quickly, he jabbed towards the man’s middle and then spun, bringing the sword around his body, his momentum pulling the blade so fast the metal blurred in his vision as a shining, silver arc. In the darkness, it looked like liquid flowed from his hand into the night.
The man got his weapon up in time, the impact jarring Carl’s arm. Sensation exploded, screaming down his wrist to his elbow. Carl fumbled with his sword, taking it in his left hand. It was his weaker arm, but at least it had feeling. He had time to take a shallow breath and then he was moving, dodging out from beneath another blow. He had a second to wonder about Charlie and the others and then his back was to the cottage and he was losing ground, each step driving him towards the house.
A gust of wind swept by carrying smoke from the house. The grey cloud obscured the tree line, making it seem as though they were the only people alive. Carl shivered and banished the thought. His friends were going to be fine. He just needed to get to them.
Backpedaling, he tried to hear any sounds from behind him, but there was no time. The man would wear him out soon. Carl grasped his sword tightly, watching as the man rushed him again. He tried to counterattack, but the guard brushed him away easily. Carl pulled in air, fighting to remain upright. The muscles in his arms quivered with exhaustion and blood pounded in his head. He couldn’t take much more of this.
He struck the man with a series of blows, trying his best to kill him where he stood. But his opponent showed no weakness, countering Carl’s attacks with blows of his own. Carl backed up, his sword heavy in his hand and fear choking his throat. The man pursued him, his sword a rapid staccato of blurred silver and a sneer plastered to his face.
Carl parried, forcing the man’s sword past his shoulder. The man recovered faster than Carl expected and he was forced to dive and roll out of the way. The man didn’t wait, but rammed his sword into the ground inches from Carl’s face.
Carl lashed out with his feet, swinging his legs back across his body and taking the other man out at his knees. The smaller man screamed as he fell, the sound high. Carl scrambled to his feet and jumped on the man’s back, crushing him with his weight.
Before the guy could react, Carl’s knee came down on the man’s sword hand. The Dog’s weapon was abandoned in the snow, useless. Carl’s own weapon was lost as well, so he wrapped his arms about the man’s neck and heaved to the side. There wasn’t even time for a struggle. The sharp crack was soft and immediate.
Carl dropped the body and sucked in air, the rush of cold spiking the inside of his chest. Quickly, he found his sword and struggled to the house, his blood pounding through his veins as though he had run for miles. Everything seemed still and quiet. Only his harsh breathing filling the night.
Charlie, Melody and Veri must have made it to the tunnels, he thought, into that labyrinth of a basement his friend had carved out so many years ago. Once Carl got down there, he would need to be as silent as possible, the place twisted and turned without order. He would be as likely to run into the guard as the man was to sneak up behind him. For the hundredth time that night, Carl cursed his hearing.
His eyes raked the forest. He didn’t think there were other guards close-by. If there had been, they would have come running at the sound of steel. No, there was nothing, no one. The forest was silent.
Plat. Plat.
“Charlie?” Carl called out. He spun, looking in all directions at once. What was that that noise? He held his breath, straining. Nothing. There was no sound at all.
And then the world erupted.
The ground at his feet trembled, the house shaking violently behind him as the roof caved in, the hand-hewn shingles cascading down upon his head. Thunder filled the air, the rolling concussions happening almost on top of him. Before he could move, the great glass window exploded, the shards pin-wheeling off in all directions.
Carl threw his hands over his head and tried to run for the woods. The ground rolled beneath him as snow and dirt sprayed into the air. His feet slipped and he stumbled. Dropping to his hands and knees, his sword bounced across the heaving ground. He reached out to grasp it, but the ground bucked beneath him and it disappeared.
The sound of shrieking filled his ears, and he realized it was his voice. His fingernails dug into ground. He managed to inhale once, deeply, before a great gust of air yanked his head backwards, flipping him so that he lay on his back, gazing at the sky. Lady Wul trembled above him, her yellow orb swimming sickeningly in an undulating sea of black and blue.
The field detonated. Snow, dirt and frozen grass raining down from the sky. Rocks hit him as they fell. He cowered, wrapped into a ball, his arms protecting his head. The earth screamed as it was torn apart. Heat flashed over him, melting the snow beneath his hands and a great light burned his face. He could see it behind his eyelids, a glow brighter than sun. With it, a hot wind roar out, pushed out from Charlie’s wrecked home towards the woods line.
Sharp cracks split the air and branches, debris and dirt flying. Carl covered his ears, sending up prayers to the gods. When the ground stopped shaking, he looked up, wiping mud and water from his eyes. The darkness of night had returned and the forest had stopped heaving. Above him, Lady Wul was still in the sky.
The field was a nightmare. Boulders twice again the size of a man lay scattered about, and the tallest pines had crashed to the ground. Strangely, none had come down into the field, but all had fallen outward toward the forest. They were stacked one against another, the closest trunks ripped from the earth, their dangling roots poking into open air.
Carl felt warm liquid trickle into his eyes, blood from a cut no doubt. He wiped it away with the back of his hand, his eyes raking across the carnage. Deep rivets in the earth surrounded him. It was the remains of Charlie’s basement passages.
Carl was able to push himself up. He was relieved to discover that his injuries were minor despite the fact that his knees shook like those of a man twice his age and his heart galloped his in chest. He sucked air. He had survived whatever had happened, somehow. He needed to find his friends.
“Charlie?” he yelled, his hand shading his eyes. “Melody! Veri! Answer me!”
Silence filled the air, the wind carrying the scent of dirt and flame. A fierce light still shown from somewhere ahead of him. Carl started toward it. His body was a landscape of bruises, his head throbbing. No wonder he was having trouble thinking clearly.
He concentrated on the ground beneath him, weary of the open pits that scarred the surface of the field and the long trenches that had been Charlie’s basement passageways. He picked his way across the debris, careful, hoping the ground would not start trembling beneath his boots once again. Focused now, he moved to where light still shown, the glaring brightness filling the dusty air.
Half way across the field, he realized it was inside the ground.
There, he thought. It was almost at the edge of the forest. He took a few more steps, his hand still shading his eyes. The light was yellow and garish, but he could tell it came from one of the tunnels.
Rocks, tree-limbs and pieces of his friends’ home littered the ground. Carl chose his step warily, keeping an eye out for his sword. And for his friends. He didn’t want to think about it yet. He didn’t want to think about how Charlie, Melody and Veri had been down there when the caverns exploded.
But as his thoughts coalesced. He knew, and the knowledge bit into him.
He passed a piece of cloth and a chunk of carved wood, the edges blacked and smoldering. It was a piece of the cabinetry Lie had made for his wife. Carl kicked it out of the way, angry beyond reason. He wanted to look up. To see the extent of the destruction around him, but the light was too close now. It was blinding.
As he got closer, the air about him began to shimmer. It was warm, a dry heat. Kassam’s desert would have heat like this. His mind was wandering, avoiding the truth.
When he got as close as he dared, he knelt, using his arm to shade his face. The glow was definitely coming from beneath him. There was a cool, dark space across his legs. The light was angled upwards, catching the lip of the trench. Close to the source, the light touched his cheek and neck and Carl flinched. It did not burn him.
“Charlie!” he called. “Melody! Veri! Can anyone hear me?”
He didn’t think anyone was going to answer. What were the chances that someone was still alive after…after what?
What the hell happened, he wondered. One minute he was about to follow Charlie into the basement and then?
“It was a gun,” the child said from below him, letting the light fade around her.
Carl crawled forward, dropping his arm. Down inside the pit, the child sat. Her arms were on Melody’s body. Carl choked and clambered down towards her.
“Dear gods, Veri!”
He slipped in the mud, sliding most of the way and scooped her into his arms. “Veri! Veri! Child! You’re alive!”
Her nightclothes were shredded. Carl ripped off his jacket, bundling her inside it. She let him fuss, her blue eyes glassy, saying nothing.
“Veri, what happened? Oh, gods, Melody. What happened here?” His eyes scraped across the muddy floor, darting away from what he might see. The child shook pitifully. He drew her close, his eyes anchoring on her face.
She turned away, and he grasped her shoulders, hot, white rage sinking into his stomach. Carl swallowed and fought for self-control. Melody and Charlie’s bodies lay not feet away from him, his dearest friends dead in the mud. He could feel his teeth grinding together, the sound filling his head. He couldn’t look at them, couldn’t see them that way, not yet. He needed answers.
He growled, “Come on, child. I know you can talk. What happened? How are you alive? What happened?”
Panic twisted his stomach, his hands clenching and unclenching as though there was something he could still do, some way to make it right. He felt his gorge rise and choked it back down, aware that his breathing was ragged.
They couldn’t be dead, he thought, his mind stuttering over the word. Not dead. Not the man who had survived beyond all reason, whose wife had only just stitched him back together?
He should have never brought Charlie back here. He should have gone to town or brought a doctor out to see him in the woods somewhere. He hadn’t been thinking. He had rushed Charlie back to his home and then left the family unprotected.
His hands slid from Veri’s frame and he beat them against the ground. Again and again, until they were bloody. How could he have left them alone? How could he have been so stupid? So negligent?
It must have lasted for some time. He didn’t remember. Only somehow, there was no sensation. No thought, only grief, raw and uncontained.
The child started sobbing, her cries a quick staccato that broke through his rage. Carl blinked, his vision swimming and wiped the tears from his eyes. Blood smeared his face, mixing with the dirt and mud that covered him, but he did not know it. The girl looked up at him once, seeing a face strange and foreign and buried herself to cry some more.
The air had cooled again. His breath was a hot steam, a foggy cloud he peered through. The child sat in the dirt, Carl’s jacket covering her completely. Her body was shaking, her cries rocking her back and forth in the night. He went to her and lifted her up. She weighed next to nothing, but still his arms shook with the effort. Holding her close, he made soft soothing sounds, like he heard the townswomen do with their children. Slowly, her cries stopped.
Carl steeled his heart. They had to get back to Faenella, but his friends demanded more from him. He could not leave them as they were. It was his responsibility and this time he would be steadfast. There was no one else, not out here. This was the wild. He would not leave them for the animals. He would not leave them again.
Biting his cheek, he crouched beside Charlie’s body, seeing what he didn’t want to see. He could see the story, now that he was looking at it. They had run, Melody and Veri and Charlie fleeing through the tunnels, desperate to get away from the man who chased them. Slow, wounded, unable to keep up, Charlie had been cut down from behind. Lie was a strong man, but not on this day.
The woman and child had heard him die. The noise Carl had heard outside their cottage had been Melody. She must have finally cocked the pistol. Charlie would have told her not to shoot underground. The sound would have been deafening in those closed walls. The concussion enough to blast out their ears. Carl knew well enough that pain.
But the grieving wife would have had no such concerns. She would have heard her husband’s cry, turned and fired.
Carl walked over to her body. He couldn’t tell if she hit the guard. The man’s corpse was gone, incinerated in the explosion. Small, bloody chunks of flesh were splashed across the pit’s walls, the globs speckled with fragments of white bone. Carl’s eyes slid away from the mess. There were some things a man should never have to see.
Melody, though, lay at his feet. Her eyes were open. They were still the color of spring moss. Carl shivered to see her stare back at him. She looked as though she longed to speak, for her eyes had not yet lost the look of life. He took a steadying breath and passed his hand gently over her face. Her long eyelashes covered those vivid, green orbs only for a second. Then they popped open, unforgiving.
The child whimpered, and Carl patted her absently, trying not to feel. Now was not the time to grieve. He knew he needed to keep moving, keep going.
A ball of pain had centered in his chest, solidifying until it felt as though his heart had been turned to stone. He glanced at the corpse again; he couldn’t leave her as she was.
He made her as decent as he could. He covered the pale flesh of her legs, softly pulling the fabric of her dress back into place. The white nightgown was stained black and red, and the cloth stuck to her cooling skin. His tears dappled the material as he worked, adding his own pattern. He wiped them away hastily.
He wished he could do more, but the man had run her through, opening a hole wide enough that Carl was sure she died quickly. He put Veri down and pulled Melody’s body over to Charlie’s. Quickly, he stacked stones on their corpses, trying not to think, trying not to feel. The girl tried to help, but the sleeves of his coat were too long. Carl knelt and folded them back for her. In silence, they piled the rocks.
It was still night when they finished, and Carl said a prayer. He didn’t feel the tears on his cheeks, but Veri came to hold his hand as he spoke. It had been a long time since he had prayed so much, but the day merited it. He tried to put his thoughts in order, to make some reason out of the madness, but he failed. His friends were dead, the guards were dead, and he was tired beyond reckoning.
He would have stood there until he dropped, but the girl had ahold of his hand. Her little fingers laced with his and her tiny palm was like a little, blazing sun. It brought him back. He said a final goodbye, wishing his dead friends a speedy trip to any heaven they were fortunate to gain entrance to. He hoped they’d be together.
He turned his back on them, feeling the knife twist in his stomach. Breathing deeply, he looked up, seeing Wul above him. They had to go. He held the child close and staggered his way up the muddy incline. It was tough going, the ground was a soupy mess. Veri wrapped her arms about his neck and he carried her piggyback style. With both arms free, it was marginally easier. The larger rocks embedded in the side allowed him some purchase.
He made his way back into the woods where the sight of the carnage wasn’t surrounding them and set the child down. He needed to see if the horse survived, but first he had some questions that needed answering. Gently, he used his fingers to tip the child’s face up towards his own. Using his other hand, he brushed the mud and refuse from her curly, black hair.
“Child,” he said softly, his voice breaking.
She shuddered, but met his eyes.
“Child, you must tell me. I can’t wait for you this time, girl. I need to know. They were my friends.”
She studied the ground, her shoulders shaking.
“Veri, please.”
He waited in silence. When he could take it no more and grasped her shoulders, shaking her lightly. “I care for you girl. More than you know. But you can’t stay silent. Not this time. Tell me.”
She sobbed once, the sound drug from her throat. “I did it.”
Carl’s heart missed a beat, “What?”
She shook her head, her little face scrunched up in pain. Then she met his eyes. “I did it.”
“What do you mean, you did it?”
“They were dead. That man killed them.”
“Yes, I saw. You didn’t do that. The man with the sword took their lives.”
She shook her head.
Carl had his hands on her arms and he pulled her closer, her face just inches from his own. “What did you do, Veri? What happened?”
She struggled with the words, her little mouth opening and closing like a baby bird’s. Finally, she brought her hands together in front of her. Her expression turned serious, and Carl took a step back. Her brow furrowed, little lines appearing on her smooth, black skin.
Nothing happened at first and then she closed her eyes. Within her palms a light sparked and grew, a ball of yellow flame appearing into thin air, the fire dancing just above her flesh.
Carl choked and sat down heavily, “I…”
Veri opened her eyes and looked down. The little flame fluttered and died, a shudder of white light and then nothing. Just two little hands, tiny fingers and empty palms.
Carl’s mouth hung open, his words having abandoned him.
She dropped her hands into her lap, her face a mask of sadness. “I couldn’t save them.”
Carl’s heart beat again and he took a deep breath. “It’s not your fault. You did nothing wrong.”
“The man killed them. And then I…”
“Yes,” Carl said, taking her hands in his own. “He was a bad man and he would have killed you, too.”
The child seemed to crumple in on herself, and Carl rushed to pull her into his lap, holding her while she cried. He sobbed too, unable to help himself. He didn’t know how long they sat that way, but when he had cried all the tears he had inside him, he stood, holding the girl in his arms. She was asleep, her curls resting against his shoulder.