Chapter 2 #2
I didn’t know where I was or how far the river had carried me.
I was surely more than a day’s trek from my village.
It was possible I was in Third Territory, and its Princeps, Koerlyn, had a fearsome reputation of cruelty, particularly toward trespassers.
Harthon of Fourth was the only Princeps with a more terrifying reputation, and I sure as skies didn’t want to come across either of them.
Shivers wracked my frame as I hugged myself.
Without my cloak, I was left in my tunic and trousers.
While the air never dipped to freezing, it was cool, and the river water that soaked my clothes was frigid.
Shelter and a fire were my first priority.
I would worry about soldiers if I came across any.
I ignored the tired plea of my body, dragged myself to my feet, filled my flask, and began to walk. I was still walking hours later as the sun began its descent, and even as the sky became black, the stars and moon smothered by clouds, I didn’t stop. Stopping without shelter would get me killed.
My exhausted body was about to force my hand when unnatural, bulky shadows rose before me. Not shadows—structures. Or, just one. Squinting hard, I made out the shape of a short wall and a hut just behind it. The structure was alone, probably on the outskirts of a village.
I clumsily dragged myself over the wall and picked my way to a window hole. It was missing the heavy fabric that usually draped across the opening for insulation during the night. Hopefully, it meant that no one was home.
The entrance was covered by a thin slab of wood that easily moved. Sliding it to the side as quietly as I could, I listened. Though I could hardly see, there were no sounds of life in the open space.
Wasting no time, I shuffled toward what looked like a fire pit along the wall. Wood already sat in it, and I felt along the dusty floor until the hard edges of flint dug into my palm. The fire started easily, and I adjusted the logs to better control the flames.
Blessed heat breathed into the air, licking the stiff skin on my face. Then my body collapsed onto its side, and sleep swallowed me whole.
* * *
My eyes snapped open.
Soft light. Packed earth floor. Burnt embers. Damp clothes.
I jolted up, regretting the quick movement as muscles groaned, pain flaring to life in my leg, my ribs, my everywhere. Never had I felt this kind of ache. It was as if someone had pushed me off the Princeps’ tower.
Taking a ride down a violent river would do that to a person.
I scanned the small cottage. The open room was bare-bones but tidy. There were two thin beds, a few dusty chests, a wash space, and a basic kitchen, which I’d slept in. Clearly, it wasn’t abandoned. I’d gotten lucky that no one was home through the night, but they could very well come back today.
The urge to lie down for days was too tempting, but I needed to drink, eat, and leave before I was discovered.
Standing was as painful as I’d imagined, and I didn’t hide the cusses that spilled as I limped to the stacked woodpile.
Merelda always smacked me when I cursed, but she wasn’t here to chastise me.
Worry for her overwhelmed the physical pain as I set the fire and placed a water pot over it.
By now, Marsik would have sobered up and begun to help her.
One cold night without dinner wouldn’t kill her, but worry might.
No matter how sharp and stubborn she was, Merelda cared for me as a child.
Ever since the warrior with the spiraled scar had raided the village, killing my birth parents and everyone else, Merelda had become my caretaker.
She’d raised me, taught me to read, showed me everything I knew now.
I knew she never wanted that responsibility.
She’d avoided marrying and having children for a reason.
But her damned love for kindness had made her into the closest thing I had to a mother.
I owed her everything, and I needed to get back to her.
I removed the pot when the water bubbled, letting it cool as I scrounged the wooden counters for something edible. Lifting a brown cloth, I found a whole loaf of fluffy, risen bread. There was no mold. No insects, either.
Frowning, I poked the crust. It gave, a clear sign of freshness.
That was…odd. The moisture in the air rotted most baked grains within two days. It made no sense for someone to depart their home for a night and leave an untouched loaf behind.
Not bothering to tear off a piece, I stuffed the loaf into my mouth and moaned.
Skies, that was good. Far better than the dense flatbreads we made at home.
I’d always thought yeast was a frivolous delicacy, not worth the expense. I was so, so wrong. I was going to sell so much firewood and buy so much yeast when I returned home.
Cradling the loaf in my arms like a child, I ate as I sipped the warm water and weighed my options.
Returning home would involve crossing the river where I had exited, following it upstream to where I’d jumped in, and retracing my flight from there.
The fallen trees I’d slid beneath would be a reliable landmark, and once I reached the boulder I’d hidden behind, walking back would be simple.
Unless, of course, the tree men were still searching for me in Second Territory.
Even if I made it to the village without crossing their path, they could very well search the town.
It was smartest to wait a few days, maybe even a week, before returning.
Granted, the men could have come into Third Territory, but they couldn’t know where I escaped the river.
The greatest danger I faced here was being caught for trespassing.
I’d need to find an unoccupied shelter, but if I gathered supplies here, I would figure it out.
Life in Second Territory was hard, but it had taught me a thing or two about making do with the bare minimum.
Savoring my last bite of bread, I tucked the rest into my pocket, filled my flask with the remaining water, and kicked dirt into the fire.
Guilt ate at my conscience as I dug through the chests and found a thick brown cloak to take.
It wasn’t an easy item to replace, and if it were mine, I’d be crushed to find it stolen.
I had no choice.
Flinging it around my shoulders, I picked through the room until I found a knife to replace the one I’d lost to the green-eyed man’s leg. Then I did my best to wrestle my frizzy, tangled hair into a braid and secured it with a stray hair ribbon on the floor.
I wouldn’t borrow anything else.
Steal, not borrow.
Swallowing hard, I opened the door and poked my head out. Well, damn.
What I’d thought was a home on the outskirts of the village was the complete opposite. While it was against a village wall, the front door faced five other dwellings that sat on the same dirt path. It was a miracle I hadn’t been seen last night.
I scanned for signs of life, listening for activity, but found…nothing. I looked and listened again, because that couldn’t be right.
Still, nothing.
Quietly sealing the entranceway behind me, I scurried to the closest home, its weathered stone walls and sagging thatched roof identical to the ones around it.
A glance through the uncovered window revealed nothing but another lived-in space.
I darted to the next cottage, peeking into the window to find the same thing.
If all of these homes were deserted, I could shelter here.
Carefully moving down the path, I checked every home I passed. All were empty, but they hadn’t been that way for long. Fresh bread sat on counters, half-filled pots of water dangled above dead fires, and clothes hung from strings to dry.
The path came to a sharp turn at the end of the row.
Peering around the wall of the final cottage, I studied the course.
Other rows of homes connected to the path, and at the end, dark lumps dotted the ground, hinting at a community wood or rock pile.
Our village didn’t have one, which is how I made coin chopping lumber, but I knew others did.
Still, there were no people. A rarity, but not entirely strange.
A village could be abandoned, temporarily or permanently, for a variety of reasons.
Disease was the most common. Second to that was war.
If a village was young and their boys and men were conscripted into the army, their families would leave and camp by their base to access the resources there.
Perhaps Third Territory was battling with Fourth.
But why not take the bread?
Uneasy curiosity nagged me as I examined the five cottages in the next row of homes and found them empty.
When I returned back to the main path, the lumps were closer, enough for me to make out their odd, round shapes and mismatched colors.
Not a woodpile, then, but rocks for building.
Then one of the shapes moved. Nothing extraordinary, just a slight shift, but enough to make me pause and study the field.
Cocking my head, I squinted at the form.
A moan traveled through the air.
For the second time in two days, the hairs on my neck rose.
The moan came again, and there was agony in the animalistic noise. Something moved again, a thin rod and a blur—
My stomach plummeted as my insides went cold.
“No. No, that’s not…” The words I wanted to believe died as I moved closer, the bumps and lines shaping into things too unnatural to be rock.
I was running forward before I knew that I was moving, my eyes glued to the—the bodies—
“Oh, no,” I choked, heartbeat pounding in my ears like an uncontrollable drum as I came closer and closer to the massacre before me.
Blood stained the ground, and finally, my legs stopped moving.
I stood, frozen.
Bodies, thirty—no, forty, maybe more—men, women, children, dark blood staining their clothes, the ground, the limbs that were not attached to bodies—
I bent to the side and vomited until I heaved up nothing.
This cannot be real. This is a nightmare, all of it is, and you’ll wake up now.
But when I cleared the tears from my eyes, the atrocity was still there, innards folding out of skin and onto the ground, faces carved beyond recognition.
This wasn’t just killing. It was cruel, unfettered slaughter. And from the lack of rot, this was less than a day old. The owners of my cottage hadn’t gone because of disease or war. They left the bread on the counter because they planned to eat it last night.
My stomach cramped, and I heaved again, coughing up air.
That dreadful moan cut through my shock, and I spun to my left.
An old man lay on his side, surrounded by blood that still seeped from wounds in his arms and legs.
I went to him, crouching near his face as his blood soaked into my boots.
His eyes were closed. Something drove me to place my hand on his cheek.
He moaned again, though his eyes didn’t open.
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered, wishing there was something, anything, I could do. Bloody deaths weren’t something I saw often. Starvation, disease, old age—those were the killers that took lives in my village, not swords and axes. But even I knew there was too much blood for this man to survive.
His head turned into my hand, seeking comfort I didn’t know how to provide. I was never a soft-hearted caretaker, and for the first time in my life, I wished I was. Cracked lips parted, a sigh escaped, and then his chest stopped its desperate struggle to move.
Not a breath later, the unmistakable sounds of hooves had me jolting to my feet. Horses and men galloped through the village’s center, their path set on me.
If I’d thought the strange-eyed woman was bad, this was…well, this was probably the end. It wasn’t because of the hard set of their mouths or the way their cold, beady eyes locked on me like a target, but because of the dark crimson splattering their clothes.
These men had done this to these people.