I Know Not (The Story of Fox Crow) (3 page)

      Of course I didn’t notice any of this either; there were other things on my mind, such as it was.

      My progress slowed to a crawl, the sounds of rage and death ahead pulling me on like a current. The Beast chuckled evilly and padded my steps. I was already wounded, no need to rush headlong into ‘dead’. Roots reached to trip me as branches clawed at my eyes, but I was a wraith in their midst, untouchable. I reveled in the exultation that came with action. The pain and the uncertainty, the rush swept them up and then began to blaze. It was a furnace, burning away the chaff to leave only behind a red hot Beast inside of me. I reached the edge of the brush and used the tip of my blackened sword to push a branch aside. It was the eyes of an animal that peered from the shadowed hearth of the wild.

      Fifteen men were assaulting a coach. Surprisingly, the raiders were not Westerners, though you could never tell the way they butchered their prey. They had swathed their faces in cloths, and fought under no heraldry or banner, but their weapons and voices were definitely Eastern. Three of the ten defenders were already dead, their entrails, brains and other vital internals conspicuously external. My heart turned to steel as a defender was held by two attackers and savagely worried at by a third wielding a short, spiked club. Blood and gore flew in thick gobs as they had at him. The rest were merely being kept at bay by the remaining bandits so no one attacker would have to fight alone.

      The Beast approved: The bandits would soon have the defenders picked apart, and ravage the coach for anything of value. It was also a little jealous, and it weighed the odds of waiting until the end of the battle and picking off the survivors to keep the carriage for itself. It said while this plan may have worked while I was healthy, it was a bad gamble with my wounds.

      I recognized no one here: Not the defending guards in their white and silver, not the pretty noble woman being dragged from the carriage in her silks and velvet, and not the bandits in their varied greens and browns. My heart was not moved by the carnage before me. My soul did not cry out for justice. In fact, the word never occurred to me. The Beast scanned back and forth, and as much as it wanted some action, it saw nothing but great risk against the reward. I turned away. The forest enveloped me with protective arms as I crept off–

      A crystal scream, pure and resonant, called out. It slammed into me, billowing the Void and obscuring the Animal within. It caught in my mind and funneled into my chest where it built up power, echo after echo; a crescendo that shattered the hardened fortresses of ice within me.

      My soul emerged red and raw, bleeding and screaming like a newborn babe. I trembled and fell, random shocks running through me. A stabbing pain thundered from between my shoulder blades and I fell to my knees, retching bitter bile and half digested cheese. My stomach convulsed and sent a torrent onto the forest turf. My head erupted in blinding misery before a cool rain washed it from behind my eyes. It felt like something inside me had been freed from a prison. It was dark, and it was dangerous, but it was controlled. Were I thrown from a cliff face over the pitiful massacre, I could not have been directed there more quickly, or more inevitably. I was allowed only three breaths to take stock as five defenders fought ten masked men.

      My hand tightened upon my sword, then loosened as I took a deep breath.

      I knew then that I wasn’t a hero because a hero steps forth, challenging all comers with sword in hand. He howls the name of his family, or his lady, or his god. Of course the next thing he does is die messily; but at least he will be forever remembered in song and stage as the man who played his part to type. I, on the other hand, struck from behind, and without warning. My flared blade took the Coward, the one hanging back letting everyone else do the work while avoiding possibility of injury, in the leg. It sheared muscle from its moorings and I felt the grinding slide of the steel across bone seep up my weapon and into my arm. It was a very familiar sensation. He fell backward, mute with shock and instantly pale with blood loss.

      Then it was my time to kill again, and my body did it as easily as breathing. The next was sent sprawling as quickly, my sword entering his side just below his ribcage. The blade was held correctly, parallel to the ground, so when he turned in surprise to face me he neatly slit his own stomach from back to navel. A vicious kick to his chest dislodged the Phantom Angel and sent him sprawling into a pile of his own entrails.

     
It’s always comforting when a partner knows the steps to your favorite dance
. This one, however, let loose a scream that would give a moral man nightmares. Two men dead in four heartbeats, but now the rest were aware of me and they turned.

      Time seemed to expand like a confectioner’s ribbon. I had time to see the woman in the rich, blue dress being released and the bandit that had been holding her come at me on my right side. I had time to see that even the five guards knew: when the dung–headed murderers turn their back on you, even if it is to face the long–haired wild man who bursts from the bush, YOU KILL THEM. You kill them by striking at their backs, fronts or whatever side he presents to you. You kill them and you do it without flinching. That is how you will live, and they will not.

      I could say I valiantly battled all eight to the death (hopefully theirs) but that would be a lie. I back–pedaled, putting space in between them and I as the five carriage guards struck, killing three and heavily wounding two. The other three came at me. Then I knew from the whispering of the Fog that there is a special tactic for fighting three armed men: Don’t, you will die.

      I ran at the one who had been dragging the woman from the carriage by her hair, a few paces away from the others. Just a few paces turned three-on-one into one-on-one, for just a single second. As long as a second is all you need, this plan works.

      It is a well–known fact that once a sword is in motion, it will continue in motion with very little effort lest it meet an obstacle. So as I bolted I set mine to spinning, my wrist twirling it with minute corrections as I sought a proper strike. It not a well–known fact that idiots who watch stage performers parrying every strike
believe
every strike should be parried, even those that wouldn’t ever have hit. It was a simple trick to swing far to his right. He was inexperienced enough to try to parry it and even simpler to triple the force behind the handle and spin the sword in a screaming vertical arc to take his over–extended sword arm from his body.

      That’s the nice thing about the arm. There are dozens of nasty creatures of the night that will fight on mangled and mutilated, but humans tend to stop and scream. He did, and thus lost any interest in harming me.

      I heard the thump of booted feet behind me and I spun, dropping into a crouch and swinging my weapon low. The Spiked–Club bandit had been aiming for my head. Never aim for the head. Aim for the groin. Heads duck, but groins don’t usually go anywhere until the very last moment. I was a little high, unable to get the blade to bite into his legs. The shock of the phantom crashing through his ribs like matchsticks and collapsing his lung removed the embarrassment of my slight misstep. Dead, after all, is dead. The sword slid from his vitals as if oiled, and I was back to en garde before the shock of his instant death had lifted.

      Three, as I had dubbed him, was more cautious. He slowed, having seen his two mates felled in seconds, he was confident he could take me while his comrades watched his rear. His comrades happened to be the one screaming and dying behind him, but I was too busy killing him to tell him that.

      The guardsmen held back, making them smarter than the hoods they had just watched me dispatch. Entering a fight was always risky because a back swing aimed at an enemy in front can kill a friend behind just as easily. Unfortunately, that meant I would have to kill him alone.

      Great Western sagas tell about warriors trading blow after blow, never slacking in their will to win. I know different, thankfully so did my arms. Real men parry because blows that kiss flesh hurt, my only complaint was someone had obviously told him as well. Our blades having met and shaken hands, we circled around to begin our personal war in earnest.

      He felt me out, and I him. Cuts and stabs were sidestepped and dodged. He was the inferior with steel; he was the more tired, he had a shorter reach and less powerful weapon with no shield to make up the loss. All the coins tallied in my favor and staring into my eyes, he saw that I knew it, too. Had he came in quickly like his partner, it would have been quick. Now he would have to wait for me to kill him slowly and safely. He knew his business, attacking quickly and cleanly, not like Mr. Spike Club—too eager to kill to live. I could not count the number of inbred bastards who had rushed in to end their life on my blade, too dumb to realize–

      WHAT?

      His steel slid into my vitals like a firebrand pushed into my belly. I felt wet things once attached slide away from one another in ways that cannot be described. The Fog had betrayed me, letting an image flit past when most I needed clarity. He began to retreat whirling his blade in a flourish, savoring a victory that was not won.

      “I’m still alive, you dog fondler.” I lashed out, again and again, a hail of blows like the rumbles of distant thunder.

      “Thomorgon take you.” he spat. Evoking the name of the God of Death to draw his attention to me.

      I growled a far more vile curse, calling upon a God far darker, “Isahd devour you first.”

      He parried and dodged, but found that there was nowhere to go. My life was pouring out of me and I knew it. There is nothing more dangerous than a man who thinks you have just killed him, because he has nothing left to look forward to except having company on the trip to hell.

      My blade batted his aside, sending it arcing into the bush, then swept back to his crown, smashing through the thinking part of the bandit until it rang against his bottom jaw. The phantom sword stuck and when he fell backward, I followed. I was mildly embarrassed again to find I could not find the strength to stand.

      I heard the guardsmen surround me…I heard the woman whimpering…I smelled her perfume, a scent of vanilla and lace…I felt the pain get very far away, as if racing off on a fast horse…I heard a clear voice that my mind couldn’t be bothered to translate into words…I felt my breath leaving me, bubbling up from within to scrape past the bile in my throat.

      “I’m not dead.” I said. Then I passed beyond pain.

      The Fog was still with me, though. A great bear of a man reached out of it and grabbed a younger me, shaking him like a dog with a rat. “ ‘eros die, boy! You’ve got ta be betta!”

      Then even that was swept away by the sound of beating wings.

3   

Superstitions

I awoke, again.

      I should have been grateful, really, but I was still “The Walking Bruise”, my head felt as if it had been split open several times by a particularly agitated woodcutter, my back ached between the shoulders as if someone had placed a live coal there, and finally there was a little ball of fangs and claws tearing at my insides that virtually guaranteed that I was going to die.

      So, no, I was not that grateful.

      In fact it would have been much more kind should I not have opened my eyes ever again. Belly wounds do that to a man. The stomach fluids begin seeping into less resilient organs and dissolve them into pudding and it is neither a quick, nor painless death. Lastly, no chiurgeon in the world can save you.

      I felt an intense desire to open my eyes and savor my last few hours of life, though something in the Fog told me to wait. People will speak the truth when they think you can’t hear. Then something alive shifted of my chest and my eyes clicked open like a pair of shutters.

      He was large and black; his glossy wings folded behind him like a gentleman’s cloak. His head turned to spear me with one, bottomless ebony eye. He was a raven.

      I heard a cat voice his distress. With a titanic act of will I shifted my head—bringing new heights to the ringing inside my skull—and saw a gray cat with a golden collar cowering in the corner. He watched the raven with eyes that were wide, a tail flared to the width of his own body curled in front like a hedgerow. His head twitched left and right, fruitlessly seeking a more secure hiding place, but always returned to watch the black bird perched on my chest.

      Peasants believe that death itself watches the world though his princes, the ravens. He tallies all the good and evils of life and renders judgment in the end. Then the birds come and eat the sins left behind in the body. If there is only corruption in a man, the ravens will devour him all. Of course the legends are silent on how he favors rooks or crows. Perhaps they are simply vassals, or even milkmaids. Or perhaps it is just a worthless superstition of the gullible created to explain why it’s useless to throw rocks at carrion birds. I moved my hand up weakly to shoo the bird away.

      Death’s Messenger shifted to look at me with his left eye, freezing me in mid motion. True and honest fear reached inside of me with calm, marble hands, and plucked from me my pride and disbelief. In its depthless black orb I saw myself captured, twisted and distorted by the curvature of the reflection. Or maybe it was myself that was twisted. I saw him reflected in my eyes, and myself reflected in his, and him reflected in mine, an infinite number of bent simulacrums spiraling into infinity. That is when the tent flap opened.

      I had not mentioned the tent?

      Well if you had been grievously wounded, then woken with the living symbol of Death itself on your chest, I daresay you would be distracted as well. At this point I could not tell you what was in the tent, other than myself, a cat, and the bird of Death. I could not tear my eyes away even to look at the newcomer that gasped. It seemed days before two pairs of heavily wrinkled hands gently moved the scavenger onto an offered arm.

      A voice, soft and yet rough like a summer rain sifting through sand, spoke. “Great Lord of the Dead, if it is your intention to take this one, please do; I know I could not stop you. My Patron, however, bids that I help this man. I seek not to defy You, only to do as my Mistress commands.”

      The tent flap opened, spilling undiffused light across the floor. The raven seemed to consider her words, studying her with his far eye while his near one was still stapling me to my cot. Then, entirely without preamble or glorious miracle, he took wing out of the tent and out of my life.

      The old woman left behind was wrinkled and plump, her pear shape accentuating her grandmotherly bearing. Her face, staring out after our visitor, was fixed in such a state of rapture I dared not speak. Truth be told, though, I was becoming less impressed with the raven the further away he went. The cat howled again.

      The old woman, coweled in a habit of white, turned to expose a red circle inset with a golden flame picked out in thread on her right breast. Against all odds, I had found a healer in the middle of the forest. Far better than any chiurgeon with his scalpels and books, their gifts were near miraculous in making broken men whole. I pasted a charming smile beneath my nose and tuned the perfect level of weakened gratitude into the chords of my voice, “My thanks for my care reverend sister…”

      I simply trailed off. Her eyes had latched on to me and her face had gone from rapture to disgust. I had imagined I would have to be a corpse, maggot ridden and cold, before eliciting such a response from a woman, any woman. I tried to smile ingratiatingly, but I don’t think I quite succeeded as her countenance only deepened in its righteous fury. The cleric of life and mercy stalked—Stalked! —across the tent to hover far above me like a statue of cold, uncaring Amsar over a gallows.

      She knelt down, craning a finger into my face and whispered in a rage–bathed hiss. “Now you listen, blood–shedder, I care for your body because both my oath to the Goddess Ethryal,” like most clerics she spoke the name of a Goddess boldly, “and my oath to my mistress call me to. The thought sickens me, but I am trapped in between letting Death take you and letting the Justice of Amsar send you to him. Do not take too much comfort; I know your secret and if you make any move to harm that girl I will let the guards at you like a pack of wolves.”

      As you might have noticed, my friends, I am prodigious in my verbosity, however my mouth failed me. I simply gaped like an air – drowning fish as she rose and turned to the entrance.

      I glanced about and saw the Phantom/Angel leaning in the south–west corner, near the tent flap and far away from my bed in the north east portion. I knew why too. It would have been an unconscionable insult to deprive a soldier of the weapon he had used to save your life; however, I know the Cleric had moved it from my grasp. If it had been in reach, this very moment I would have slain her from behind as I had the brigands.

      I didn’t know why, but more importantly, she did.

      I guess I was still looking like a plate of raw meat that had been dipped in the midden when the princess came in. She stopped in the entry, gazing at my bandage–clothed chest with some amount of flush in her cheeks, as the priestess of peered in over her shoulder like a demon of retribution, I decided to pull the sheets up to cover my partial nakedness. If there was anything I did not need, it was more complications.

      “You are well, sir?” Her voice was like crystal, beautiful but fragile. Apparently, being dragged from the coach by her ladyship’s hair did not agree with her—
and where in the hell did that come from?
The venom and callousness simply seethed inside me from some polluted spring. “Sir?”

      I had not answered her. That same mental closet filled with almost similar copies of me yawned wide at the edge of the Fog and I desperately shoved an imaginary hand inside. I came out with something that felt gallant, polite, and servile. I put the mental clothes on like a thief donning a dark cloak and spoke, “My apologies Milady, I am still addled. Some dreadful creature took umbrage at the shape of my head and sought to remedy it with a blunt instrument.”

      A small smile cracked her brittle exterior. At about seventeen years, her hair was cut long, held up in a complex design that almost matched the knot–work patterns of her dress. She had never been party to violence or death until now, the experience did not sit well upon her. “It would seem your blade work was not affected.”

      “Not to be contrary, Milady, but I would say it suffered immeasurably, I am now dying.” My voice cracked because of a jolt of pain from my belly, ruining the care–free tone of my words. It was for the best, though, as the princess was now really concerned.
Four princesses beats four clerics in any card game in the Kingdom
.

      She turned to her cleric, “Nana?”

      The old woman’s demeanor smoothed to the placid calm of a still pool before the girl had turned to see. No one gets that good at holding back their emotions from their face unless they have to; a lot.

      “His condition is severe. His head has been broken along its left side, this is the reason it swells so. The belly wound has pierced his vitals and they are now leaking foul humors into his body to poison him. He has a remarkable strength, but it will not save him. If his wounds were not so severe, I might be able to help, but alas, my talents are not up to this level of mutilation.” Maybe it was just me, friends; but she didn’t sound as if it was too grievous a loss for her.

      The princess turned to me, almost catching my questing eyes. I could tell you I was questing her body in search of an appropriate cave to place my dragon, but it would be a lie. As much as I hate to admit it, I was marking the position of guards outside from the sound of their talking and judging the chances of my escape. The pavilion was expansive; enough to fit a knight and his page, and it was furnished much better. The candelabra next to me would fetch enough to by some health from a local healer, if one could be found, but the Fog did not give me good odds.

      “Then I shall help him.”

      “Your father purchased that potion at a dear cost for your use, not to be wasted on some drifter!”

      Her highness was properly scandalized, “Nana! How could you, of all people, deny this man, who has saved me, anything to insure his life?” A silence that weighed tons settled in until the cleric bowed her head, as if in shame. I saw only frustration there instead.

      The auburn–haired girl came forward and knelt beside me, her red dress spreading about her like a crimson halo. Dipping two fingers deep into her cleavage, she retrieved a silver vial that was carved in swirling patterns, stoppered, and sealed. She broke the red wax using one manicured nail and uncorked it with the smell of foreign lands, exotic spices, and blood. She leaned in, exposing a valley of pale flesh to me between her firm breasts as the vial clinked against my teeth. The bottle itself smelled strongly of woman and I felt my blood beginning to stir, but I could not watch her. I could not take my eyes off the cleric, who saw me and feared me.

      She could not be as afraid of me as I was.

      Lethargy stole over me, seeping in to mix with the fog, seeming to make it bloom and envelop me whole. I’m not against sleep, in fact I quite enjoy it, but enough was enough. When I wake up, I’m not sleeping for a week.

      And as if no time at all had passed, I awoke.

      This time there were no birds and no hurting. I was grateful, honestly. The only problem, if it could be said I only had one problem, was that Gelia, priestess of Ethryal, hated me with a passion reserved for blood enemies, rapists, and tax collectors. She would not speak to me when alone, and was cool, unhelpful, yet professional to me when the others happened in. She had sewn the rent in my shirt and tossed it in my face like it was the shroud of a leper. Most of the Ethryalite clerics I have met have been much nicer.

      That wasn’t strictly true, I can’t
actually
remember, but I’m fairly certain. One does not usually get to be a servant of love, life, and healing by threatening the lives of patients.

      I donned the shirt and stretched to test my wounds. My balance was perfect, my belly tender but serviceable. Apparently whatever eldritch concoction the Lady had bestowed upon me, it was enough to bring my battered body back into working order. As soon as I was fully clothed, I exited the ivory colored pavilion and found the early morning sun was much weaker than it had been in living memory, which granted for me was two days. Its rays warmed my face, but not enough to take the sting of frost out of the air. My breath made tiny clouds and my cheeks ached as if being stretched too taut.