Death Comes To All (Book 1) (12 page)

Before
he could move she had completed her first rotation, sliding her
wooden weapon across his side in a smooth, gentle slash as she did
so. She continued her revolution a second time, rolling against his
back to end on the opposite side of his body, the stick in her hand
poised feather light, hovering less than an inch above his forehead.

"Much
better," she laughed, removing the stick from above him. He
exhaled loudly, not realizing that he had been holding his breath
until she had taken her wooden sword away. He knew without asking
that either of her strikes would have killed him had she been using a
sharpened blade. Even the wooden one would have hurt if she hadn’t
pulled her attacks.

He
did a quick mental inventory on himself, making sure that her blows
were really as gentle as he had first thought.

Everything
seems to be in order,
he
thought, breathing an unconscious sigh of relief.

He
could feel a slight stinging where her stick had slid against him.
Gratefully, she hadn’t put enough power into it to do any real
damage.

"That
time you attempted to use your strength to your advantage, but you
didn't rely on it. Quite a few men I've fought before have died from
the thrust I attacked with right after my false vertical blow, but
you managed to avoid it completely." She seemed pleased with his
success, if her wide, toothy grin was any indication.

"Granted,
I didn't use my full speed, but that's still quite an accomplishment
after only a month of practice. Your training has really only been in
attacking. You haven't done any sparring, and haven't been able to
study much defense yet, which means you avoided that blow naturally.
With enough training you could potentially become an excellent
swordsman. I'm impressed, and I'm not impressed easily, or often.

"You
lost that last round when you did only because you lost your balance
after your wrap shot. You might have lasted longer if you hadn't been
so far out of position. There wasn't any way you could block my
attack afterward. You need a lot of work on your defense, but you
have quite a bit of natural ability that you haven't tapped into
yet."

Roland
nodded vaguely.

Why
was I out of position on that attack,
he wondered?
Did I
really lose my balance, as Tara had said?

For
some reason he couldn’t quite remember it.

The
adrenaline must be affecting me,
he thought.

Now
that the sparring was over, he barely remembered what had happened
during the fight. He shook his head slightly, trying to dislodge the
cobwebs that seemed to be covering his memories like a veil. As much
as he tried, however, he found that he couldn’t shake them.

Next
time I’ll have to pay closer attention to my movements,
he
vowed to himself.

The
light of the day was beginning to fade, so Tara decided it might be
best not to spar any longer. Instead she spent about another half
hour helping him with his footwork, which she had said was where he
needed the most work. Having the correct footwork was a
quintessential part of a proper defense, she insisted.

Malik
has been telling me the same thing,
he recalled.

"Mind
if I ask, why the sudden interest in my training?” he asked
Tara suddenly. He had wondered why Malik wanted him to stay with
them, but he didn’t think he was going to get an answer from
the assassin any time soon.

Perhaps
I might have better luck getting answers from her.

"For
some reason Malik has taken a liking to you. Judging by what he was
saying to you earlier, it looks like he hopes you'll stay with us for
a while longer." She seemed a bit reluctant to give him more
information, but at the same time understood why he wanted to know
more.

"I
don't really know why," she said. "Sometimes I have no idea
why he does things the way he does. I've known him for a long time,
and one thing that I've learned is that there's always a reason for
the things he does, even if no one else can understand it until
later.

"If
he wants you around, I can almost guarantee there's a reason for it,
but he's not going to tell you what that is. You'll have to figure it
out for yourself. I can suggest one thing you might want to consider.
If he thinks you should go with him to see the client, you should
listen to him. Whatever you learn there might be important to you
someday."

"What
about you? Do you like having me around?"

Tara
chuckled. "You certainly do ask a lot of questions, don't you?
You seem like a pleasant enough person to me. Still, whether or not
you stay with us longer is not really my call. Malik is in charge,
and I'll go with whatever he suggests. If you're asking for my
opinion alone, I can't say I know you well enough to trust you yet,
but you seem all right so far. I think that you could find a place
with us, and if he wants you to meet the client, I'm guessing he's
probably thinking the same thing."

Roland,
who had spent all of life with another name, considered that.

A
place with them,
she had said.
Someplace where I could fit in;
where I belonged.

He
had spent his entire life thinking that no such place would ever
exist.

He
certainly had never fit in with the sorvinians where he grew up, not
even with those his own age. His parents farm had seemed like home to
him, but he never felt any desire to become a farmer. He would not
have stayed there all his life, even if he could have. Finding a
place with people who accepted him, even people living the insane
life these two seemed to live, certainly had an appeal to it.

Perhaps
I’ll go and meet with Malik's client after all,
he thought.

Tara
said that it could be important to him, she just didn't know how.
Roland certainly didn't either, but he couldn't see how it could hurt
anything. He knew only one thing for certain; Malik wasn’t
going to tell him anything until he was good and ready to.

He
looked over at Malik, who was busy feeding Trick small strips of
venison saved from an animal they had killed two days before. The
dragonling sat, perched heavily on his shoulder, its thick tail
wrapped tightly around the assassin’s neck. The orange crest on
its neck was folded down so that only the deep red on the outside
edge was visible.

Each
piece of meat that Malik fed him was taken gently from his fingers,
either by a carefully placed tooth or picked up daintily in one of
Trick’s bird-like claws. Roland had watched Malik feed the
animal every night the same way. Never once had Trick accidentally
nipped his master, and Roland was certain that the dragonling took
pains not to.

Tara
had walked downstream after their sparring, he had assumed to fish.
The feral woman ate any type of meat, it seemed, though in the time
they had spent together he had noticed that she seemed to prefer fish
or fowl over game. Even when they had meat in their packs she still
would often stop along waterways to gain for herself what she wanted
most.

Roland
was more certain than ever that the packs his companions carried were
magically enhanced. He had seen them put fresh meat into the packs,
then two days later take it out again without any spoilage at all. No
normal pack could do that. He hadn’t known that magic packs
could, but then he had not met anyone else who had them, so how could
he have known?

Shortly
after sundown, before the light had faded completely, Tara returned,
her form barely visible in the failing light. In her hand she held a
long, thin bodied fish with large, sharp scales and a narrow, long
toothed snout. Roland guessed the animal had to be nearly five feet
long from nose to tail, almost as long as the woman who carried it
was tall. He stood, assuming that he would have to kill and clean the
fish, but he wasn't going to have to take care of this one.

Malik
glanced up at her return, chuckling as she held up the huge monster
triumphantly. "So you've brought us back an alligator gar,"
he laughed. "You do realize it's going to take half the night to
clean that thing? Couldn't you have just brought us back a catfish or
two?"

"We
can always sell the scales to the fletcher," She replied
merrily, her tail twitching back and forth in excitement. "It'll
be worth the extra work. Besides, it's just so tasty!"

"OK,
I must be missing something," Roland said as Tara dropped the
fish, still flipping and flopping, on the ground next to the small
fire. "What's with the fish?"

"You
must have never seen a gar," Malik answered. "These fish
have scales as hard as iron and as sharp as razors. To clean them you
have to carefully cut down the belly, and then skin them from the
inside. Sometimes they are used as a cheap alternative to iron or
steel for arrowheads. They're not strong enough to use against
armored soldiers, but they are good enough for hunting.

“
Were
it up to me I wouldn't bother with it. We won't get much for these
scales. Unfortunately for me, this fish is Tara's favorite food.
She'll eat this entire fish in one meal if I let her. Tara doesn't
ask for much. Helping her with this is a little enough thing to ask
for."

Roland
couldn't disagree. He had been traveling with the pair for a month
and, aside from an irritable disposition when hungry, he had never
seen her act demanding, or really ask either of them for anything.
Now she seemed positively giddy with the prospect of having this
creature as a meal. The monstrous fish did not seem pleased with the
idea of becoming her dinner, however, and it turned this way and
that, snapping its long jaws together loudly.

Malik
turned the fish on its side and plunged a dagger directly into the
underside of its head, being unusually careful to avoid its sharp
teeth. The animal thrashed hard one last time before finally going
still. Malik didn't waste a moment. As the creature breathed its last
breath, he slowly and methodically slit it vertically down its belly.

Roland
could see it was a difficult procedure. Malik had to cut through the
meat and the skin from the inside, then carefully part the scales as
he cut. Roland understood what Malik had meant when he said that the
scales were as hard as iron. On the rare occasion that Malik's dagger
tried to go through one it stopped as if it had hit a reinforced
shield. As hard as the scales on the fish’s belly were, the
large triangular scales along its back and sides appeared to be far
worse, being both larger and thicker.

Roland
was grateful that his companions didn't make him clean this one. Once
Malik had finished gutting the giant he had set to work removing the
meat from the inside, cutting it off in thick slabs. Tara started
cooking the first piece over the fire, while Trick seemed quite happy
gorging himself on the soft organs.

Roland
finished off his own meal, a generous plate of the various, delicious
vegetables that he had picked while they collected herbs, and lay
down heavily, his broad back to the fire. He tried to ignore the
sound of sizzling meat behind him. It didn’t bother him really,
not like it had before, but it was rather loud for someone who was
attempting to go to sleep. Exhaustion can ignore most things,
however, and in no time at all he fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Long
after Roland had fallen asleep despite the rank smell of fish, Malik
was still cleaning the beast. Finally finishing after nearly two
hours of work, he laid the heavy scales out near the fire to dry.
Tara munched happily on the cooked fish steaks long into the night,
while Trick lay curled in a nearby tree, snoring loudly. Malik pulled
a generous portion of the meat off of the fire, savoring the strong
taste.

"So
why is it that you want to keep Roland with us?" Tara asked
between bites.

"I
have my reasons Tara," Malik answered. "There's more to him
than what you might think, at least if I'm right about who I think he
is."

"I
have a feeling that you're not going to tell me," She laughed,
tossing a thick rib bone into the water behind her.

"Not
until I know more," he said mysteriously.

"I've
known you long enough to know that there's more to what you've been
doing than you've told me. Are you ever going to let me in? Roland is
right about one thing. You have so many layers covering who you
really are, no one can ever figure out you out. Do you even remember
yourself?"

"I
know exactly who I am," he responded defensively. "I have
my reasons for keeping that hidden."

"Well,
when you're ready to tell someone else, I hope you know you have at
least one person you can talk to. I would like to think that the two
of us are friends. You might even be my only friend. You're the only
person I've trusted with the secret of my past, the whole thing
anyway. You can trust me with yours too you know."

"I
do think of you as a friend," Malik said softly. "Sorry if
I've sometimes been a little sharp with you. There are things in my
past I'm not comfortable talking about. Someday I'm sure that I'll be
ready to talk about everything. When I'm ready, you'll be the first
to know. For right now, it's probably safer for both of us if no one
knows, not even you."