Pathfinder's Way (30 page)

“Ah, I see. Then let me educate you. I
wouldn’t want you entering the afterlife without knowing what sent
you there.”

There was a brief outcry at this. Several
women fainted, their men catching them before they hit the
ground.

“Several months ago when my men came upon
this Lowland cesspit, they gave you a choice. Fight and be sent to
meet your ancestors with honor, or submit and pay us a tithe for
however long we choose to collect it. Two weeks ago your tithe came
due. My men came and then returned to me empty handed. This was not
what we agreed. Now, you have one chance and one chance only to
make this right. Bring me what you owe and half more, today, and
face the consequences of breaking your word or…. Well I really
don’t suggest or.”

“I bet my last ration of Ka grass they’re too
scared to speak,” one of the Trateri just beyond Eamon said.

“I’ll take that bet,” said a man with a
yellow belt.

“My best knife they refuse to pay.” A third
man with braids on either side of his temples.

“All right,” yellow belt said.

“Eamon,” Shea started.

“Easy, Shane. They’re just blowing off
steam.”

She didn’t think so. They seemed way too
jocular. Bad enough they were terrorizing these people. They didn’t
have to be so damn happy about it too.

“No one will speak?” Fallon scowled down at
the people below him. His horse high stepped and threw its head
back. He brought it to an abrupt halt and stared at the upturned
faces. As if coming to a decision, he nodded and wheeled the animal
around. “Let that be your answer then.”

To the waiting Trateri, “Spread out and go
through all of the homes. Find anyone who is hiding and bring them
here.”

“Damn,” yellow belt said.

The first gambler let out a happy whistle

“Guess I’m getting a new knife,” the braids
said.

“They could still come up with the payment,”
yellow belt said.

“Unlikely,” braids said as he dismounted.
“Face it, you’re going to be giving that knife to me before we
leave this miserable cesspit.”

“Come on, Shane,” Buck said quietly at her
elbow.

Shea looked helplessly down at him. She
didn’t know if she could turn in anybody she might find.

“We have to help them look,” he said. His
eyes were understanding but resolute.

She closed hers and bowed her head. No
getting out of it. Time to grit her teeth and bear it. She’d help
who she could and if she couldn’t- well, that could be a matter for
a later time.

He waited as she dismounted. For the first
time since that first night, after her conscription into Fallon’s
army, her legs were unsteady and unsure they wanted to hold her.
She carefully laid her horse’s reins over its head before turning
and trudging after Buck.

They passed several of the mud huts, Buck
leading, Shea in the middle and Eamon bringing up the rear. It felt
strange not to be in front.

From the sounds coming from the huts, the
Trateri were being thorough in their search and not at all gentle.
There was a woman’s sharp cry and a triumphant shout. At least one
had found success in their hunt.

“Shane,” Buck said.

Shea pulled her attention away from the
direction of the shouts to find Buck standing in front of a
hut.

“In here,” he said.

She nodded.

He drew the short sword from a sheath at his
waist.

Ah, yes. Of course. Only made sense to take
precautions. These people almost certainly regarded the Trateri and
by extension, Shea, as enemies. They might act accordingly.

Shea fumbled for her own short sword. A
calloused hand stopped her before she could draw it.

“We’d prefer if you left that sheathed for
now,” Eamon told her with a wry smile.

Shea stared dumbly at him, not understanding.
Then suddenly she got it.

She snorted and let go of the blade’s hilt.
He had a point. She was still a new entity to the team, and these
were her supposed people. A person might think her willingness to
help in the field would undergo a drastic change when her fellow
Lowlanders’ lives were in danger.

Hell, they probably thought she was going to
turn on them in a blaze of misguided fury.

She held up her hands to signal her
compliance. Eamon removed his hand and stepped back, giving her a
chin tilt of approval.

“So are we going to do this or just stand
around outside all day,” Shea said, looking between the two of
them. “I’m good either way.”

Eamon raised an eyebrow and looked at Buck.
“The lad says he’s good.”

Buck smirked back. “Guess I’ll lead on
then.”

Shea didn’t know what she expected, but it
wasn’t to see Buck turn to the door and give it a solid kick,
sending it flying inwards.

“A little dramatic, but points for flair,”
Shea muttered following after him.

The interior of the one room hut was dim.
There were no windows to provide extra light. No doubt as a
deterrent to beast attack. A window would have only provided
another avenue for entry into the small home. They probably also
lacked the skill to create openings in the walls without also
creating severe weakness in the structure.

It was so stuffy and dark in the building.
Shea didn’t know how they could bear to spend much time in it.
She’d go crazy inside of a week. The walls already felt like they
were closing in on her,

“It stinks. How do they live like this?” Buck
asked, covering his nose.

It did stink. The pungent smell of the
morning’s meal still lingered in the air. It also smelled of
unwashed bodies, mold, and earth.

The floor was dirt and covered in dead
grass.

“No windows means no ventilation,” Shea
commented as she passed a small wooden table. “Smells get
trapped.”

Two bowls rested on it. One was half filled
with empty bean shells, the other with the unshelled beans. The
woman was probably preparing for that night’s meal. Shea hoped she
got the chance to make it.

Buck shook his head in disgust and started
opening and shutting what few cupboards there were. Eamon looked
under the only bed. There were no other places to search.

Shea was drawn to a baby’s crib in the
corner. What would the Trateri do with the children? Would they
face the same fate as their parents?

She ran her hands along the smooth, hand
carved edge. It was simple but finely made. The feel against her
fingers wasn’t right. She rubbed them together, noticing the slight
grainy texture that lingered.

There wasn’t enough light to tell what she’d
touched so she stepped closer to the door. The grayish film on her
fingers was easily identifiable as dust.

Her forehead wrinkled. That couldn’t be
right. Even a Lowlander wouldn’t lay their child down without
dusting the crib.

Could their child already be grown? There was
no other bed.

“Shane, you ready? I don’t think there’s
anybody in here,” Eamon said.

She rubbed her fingers together slowly as she
pondered this riddle.

“Just a minute,” she said in a distracted
tone of voice.

“What’s he doing?” Buck asked Eamon as she
strode to the crib and lifted the small baby’s blanket from it.
“There’s nothing here.”

She examined the material carefully and held
it up to her nose, inhaling deeply. She promptly sneezed. And then
sneezed again.

She walked back to the door way. Stepping
into the light, she gave the blanket a vigorous shake. Dust flew.
Enough to illuminate the small rays of sunlight.

“Okay, what’s the deal with the blanket?”
Buck asked, folding his arms over his chest. Eamon leaned against
the door, watching Shea as she thought.

“Did either of you see any children?” she
asked.

Buck shook his head. “I don’t think so, no.
What about you, Eamon?”

Eamon looked deep in thought before he shook
his head. “You think they might be hiding them?”

Hiding them? Possibly.

“How many people were supposed to live in
this village?”

Both shook their heads. “The party who first
came through here probably got a head count. It’s necessary to
determine how big a tithe they can afford to give, but we don’t
know what that number is. We’re scouts. We don’t need to know.”

“Right.”

So she’d have to do this the hard way.

“Either of you got a guess as to how many
people were gathered when we arrived?”

Shea paced in a circle counting the huts. It
didn’t take her long. The village wasn’t that big.

Buck shrugged. “Twenty maybe
twenty-five.”

Eamon nodded. “I agree.”

“I doubt your men recovered more than five
people hiding.”

“You’d be correct.”

“There’s, what, thirty huts I’d say. Unless
every person in this village has their own home, there are a lot of
people missing,” Shea said.

Eamon’s eyes shot to the huts, counting as
she had. He straightened as realization dawned.

“Buck, head back to the village center and
get them to do a headcount.”

Buck’s face was grim as he moved, without
another word, to follow Eamon’s orders.

“What’re you thinking? That they’ve got their
people stashed somewhere?” he asked, following her as she moved
through the village.

It didn’t take long for her to find what she
was looking for, a building with a rowan branch pinned to the door
and two revenant skulls with blue flowers threaded through the eyes
mounted on pikes on either side.

“If only that were the case,” Shea said
softly.

“Are those skulls? Revenant skulls? Shane?
Where are you going?”

Shea spun and took off, nearly running, as
she headed back to the villagers. Eamon, with one last look at the
skulls, trailed behind her.

“Shane, stop. Stop, right now,” Eamon ordered
when he saw where she was heading.

Shea didn’t listen, intent on her prey. She
didn’t know who it was yet, but she’d know him when she saw
him.

Pushing past the Trateri still mounted, she
paused to survey the crowd, barely noticing as Eamon stopped beside
her.

“Shane, you cannot do this. Whatever this is.
Tell me what’s going on.”

“In a minute,” she said in a distracted tone
of voice.

“What’s going on?” a Trateri asked from
behind them.

Shea tuned them out, not caring what was
said. She’d found her target. As she’d thought, she’d known him at
a glance. He stood out from the rest of the villagers. They were
simple folk. Not him though. His hair was bedraggled and untamed,
but the clothes he wore were high quality, if dirty. Most damning
of all, he wore a necklace made of the same blue flower as was
threaded through the eye sockets of the skulls. It was a pretty
flower by itself and harmless if not for what it symbolized.

In nature, the flower’s scent repelled most
predators as it deadened the sense of smell and lured its victim by
causing hallucinations. So naturally its likeness was adopted by a
religious sect who vilified and deified beasts, making them into
both monsters that needed to be feared and gods that could be
appeased through worship and sacrifice.

Their presence was more common in the
Lowlands than the Highlands. Shea’s guild would not deal with any
village that hosted one of the sect’s priests. They fed on
superstition and fear, building it until it reached hysterical
extremes and turning once decent people into a terror maddened and
crazed imitation of themselves.

“Where are they?” Shea snapped as she strode
to the priest.

A village woman stepped in front of Shea,
holding her hands up in supplication. Thrusting the woman away from
her, Shea continued, ignoring the building undercurrent of fear and
hostility, both from the villagers and the Trateri behind her.

“Where. Are. They?”

The priest, to give him credit, did not
retreat in the face of Shea’s onslaught. He held firm, looking at
her from behind eyes such a dark brown they almost appeared black.
Or perhaps that was how Shea saw them given what she knew of his
practices.

Reaching him, she grabbed his robes and
jerked him down towards her. His struggle was laughably weak,
barely even phasing her. Extreme fasts and safe living had made him
weak while she pushed her body to the limits on a daily basis.

Later she would be stunned by her actions.
Knowing that she could have easily been injured or killed by the
wary villagers surrounding her or the Trateri who had not a clue
what was happening, besides the fact that their scout had suddenly
turned crazy. Right now, none of that mattered. Anger filled her
near to bursting and cleared sane thoughts from her mind. Right
now, all that mattered was finding out how far these people had
gone in the pursuit of safety.

The priest maintained his silence, giving her
nothing but a blank stare. That stare said he wouldn’t answer to
the likes of her. No matter how she pushed or prodded, he wasn’t
giving the information up.

Fanatics. God, she absolutely loathed
them.

“Not gonna answer, huh?” She bared her teeth
at him, much like the revenants had days before. One by one her
fingers loosened their grip, letting go and then smoothing the
robes down on his chest. “That’s alright.”

She turned and walked away, only now noticing
Fallon watching her from his upright position on his mount. All of
the Trateri watched her, some with suspicion, others with
curiosity.

“What’s going on here?” Fallon asked. His
expression made it clear if she didn’t have a damn good reason for
her little outburst she would be sharing the villager’s
punishment.

“My lord, if I may?” Eamon waited for
permission to continue. Fallon tilted his chin down. “The scout
discovered the village is missing somewhere near a third to half of
its population. I believe he was trying to determine where they
went.”