The Precious Quest Read online

  I pushed back the material, releasing my own warmth into the night. “He gave nothing willingly.”

  Moving away from my General, I approached the nearest bound woman. She was sleeping, curled in the dust like a wood rodent. I pushed her with my foot. She awoke, looked up at me standing in front of the flickering torch and gave a short whine. Quickly pulling her legs to one side under her, she sat on one hip. I looked down to her frightened face with intent.

  “Open,” I pointed at her mouth.

  Her head shivered.

  Using my hands, I motioned for her to open her lips. She continued to shake, but stubbornly set her jaw.

  Pulling my dagger from my thigh sheath, I dropped on to her body with my knees. She grunted and fell to the side, her bound hands useless. Grasping her chin with one hand, I pressed the cross guard of my dagger into the space behind her molars and pried. She released her jaw muscles with a whimper.

  “Pull out her tongue,” I demanded.

  My general had stood watching me in silence, but now he moved. Kneeling beside me, Rserker pressed the heat of his shoulder against mine and pushed his large fingers into the woman’s mouth, while I held her teeth apart. She shook her head, dislodging my dagger.

  “Hound’s death!” Rserker cursed and yanked back his hand. He put his finger into his mouth to suck at the bite she had given him.

  Angry at the wasted time, I laid my full weight on her, pushing her head into the dirt with my forearm. With my other hand, I pried with the dagger until I was sure I had her mouth secured.

  “Her tongue!” I barked at Rserker.

  He leaned in, practically on my back as he reached into her bruised lips. His breath was hot in my ear as he struggled with her.

  The captive gagged on his hand, and I felt her body heave up under mine.

  “And a slippery one it is!” Rserker laughed, pulling the end into view.

  I looked closely. It was not pierced.

  “Leave her.” I sheathed my dagger and stood.

  Turning to the others, I saw they were all awake, watching in silence.

  “The next!”

  Rserker motioned for his guards to aid. Each stubborn, tattooed mouth was pried open, but none had a tongue jewel like the leader.

  In the captive’s memory, I had heard two tunes, and I was sure two notes were needed to straighten the wood. But where was the other one?

  I looked around the group for the answer. The first woman’s eyes slid a little to the side. I followed her gaze and saw the slumped shadow far from the edge of the campfire light.

  “There.” I pointed.

  He shook his head. “Dead. I had her dragged away from the rest.”

  Rserker and I moved toward the still figure. As his torch’s light led the way to her body, it rose on the mound of her stomach, hard and round. I faltered, and he turned in Goddess speed, slow and ethereal.

  Rserker spoke quickly, “She bloats from the acids within her. Her stomach was flat when she fell.”

  Relief washed over my skull, leaving my hair prickling on my head. If we had killed a woman with child, after everything we had done to find one...

  A chill ran down the outside of my arms, and I blinked to clear my thoughts. Rserker jabbed the torch’s handle into the dirt and knelt by the woman. His beard cast a shadow on the death-wound. It gaped in her breast, the fat pressing out of a slit above her dark, round nipple. In death, the woman’s neck could no longer support her head and it lay awkwardly on her shoulder. She looked much like the man in my tent, but her face was tattoo-free.

  I knelt to the task and turned her face to me. Her mouth was slack, easy to open. Rserker moved the torch closer. A sparkle winked in the black hole within her face. The jewel was there.

  I lifted her soft tongue, but as I pulled, a liquid squirted out from underneath and struck my face with a wet slap. I fell back against Rserker’s knees, smearing the mucus across my skin. Rolling, I spit in the dust trying to free my mouth of the bitter tasting paste.

  “Laywren!” Rserker stood over me, ready with his water flask.

  As if from far away, I could hear the captives chanting in low voices.

  I got up on my knees and tilted my face up to him, opening my eyes for the washing. The warm water showered over my skin and into my eyes and mouth. This time it was I who latched onto the water flask like a calf, sucking until I could fill my mouth with the liquid. I rinsed the water around my teeth and spat it to the ground. Rserker knelt before me and used the corner of his cloak to wipe my face. His brow was creased with concern.

  “Do you feel ill?” He asked as he ran the cloth over my lips, cleansing them.

  I slipped inside, sending Lumen scurrying through my body. My blood flowed with even rhythm, my thoughts were sharp, my stomach’s acid did not rise or revolt. I looked at Rserker’s face, and it did not blur.

  “I am well,” I answered.

  Rserker stood and reached down a hand to pull me up.

  I ignored it and stood. “I am better than she.”

  He snorted, then picked up the torch. This time, we approached the woman with more caution. I walked around her twice, listening to the others chanting in words I could not understand. The guards spoke roughly to them, but they did not stop.

  Convinced nothing else would shoot out of her dead body, I knelt by her engorged stomach. The eerie thought of an unborn kicking against my palm crept into my mind. The skin was stretched tight across her bloat, widening what had probably been a smaller tattoo. Around her birth knot were three joining rings.

  “Look here,” I said to Rserker as I dragged a finger across the symbols on her skin.

  “The sign of the balance,” Rserker observed.

  “It is not balanced. Look closer.”

  He leaned over her stomach, holding the torch just above her brown skin. One ring was missing, and in its place, a snake was swallowing its own tail. I ran my hand across her distended belly to her hip bone, where a creature was drawn upon her in blue. The square muzzle on the creature marked it as a wound-hound. The hound was running, its legs splayed out as it leapt across her skin, a ring clutched in its fanged jaws.

  “What do you think is the meaning?” I asked Rserker.

  “I know not, Laywren.” He ran his hand down his beard. “Perhaps, Dorn is needed.”

  I gave a small nod.

  We needed to get past the twisted Hæsel and into the District, first. Then, I would consider these markings.

  I moved back to the woman’s mouth. Keeping my head to the side, I cautiously lifted her tongue to reveal the empty sack beneath.

  “Careful.” Rserker’s teeth flashed in the night, as he brought the torch closer.

  I shook her tongue to flick the jewel against a tooth. A note echoed within her mouth, lifting to my ears softly. Rserker’s expression did not change. I realized he could not hear it, but he had seen what I did.

  “Shall I cut her tongue out?” he asked.

  I released her tongue and nodded, dropping the jewel against another tooth. This time the note was different, thick and sweet like the Hum-fly’s song.

  “Hold.” I placed my hand upon his.

  Again, I lifted her tongue within the circle of her teeth and this time, I struck the jewel against a different tooth. This note rippled deep in my sinuses, unlike the first two sounds. I cursed at my near mistake. Taking out my dagger, I slit the end of her tongue, retrieving the ring.

  “I need her teeth in place,” I said to Rserker before rising and walking back past the captives.

  They had stopped their chant. I could feel the heat of hatred in their gazes as I passed them. The sound of Rserker’s sword cleaving the woman’s neck took their minds off me.

  Away from the group, I paused in the light of the moon to look closely at the little green jewel. Spitting on it, I rubbed it between my rough-skinned fingers. Its cut edges caught the silver moonlight and reflected the colour of the male captive’s eyes. I tucked the jewel into my pouc
h with the goddess statue.

  The captive’s people were strange, unlike any I had met. I had many questions about the markings on the dead woman’s skin. I was sure her tattoos were not just for decoration, for they held the rings of the cycle, and therefore must hold a meaning for us. I tapped into Lumen and sent a message to Rserker.

  ~ Do not allow the Griffain to take the dead woman ~

  For now, I would return to the captive in my tent to see if I could extract more knowledge. For that, I needed to be alone.

  I would have Dorn examine the woman’s tattoos in the morning. I also desired his thoughts on why these strangers had been in the District. They were clearly a different tribe from those who had battled us from behind the wall. Mixed tribes were rare in settlements, for strength was found in sameness.

  My people were mixed, only because we took on others through the borh-hand when our numbers fell to the battles. Though we were of different tribes, the Horde was one. Not because of our skin or our language, but because we worshipped the one true goddess and lived to serve her.

  I looked up at the moon that coursed its way to dawn and spoke a prayer of thanks to Goddess.

  Chapter 4: Skulls and Scales and Hoarge Mount Tales

  It was still dark when I re-entered my tent. The flanks followed behind me, ready to bed down for what was left of the night. The captive lifted his head and his eyes tracked my movements. Lumen’s sleep had done him good, for he seemed more alert.

  The flanks snuffled and scuffed the tent as they settled in their corner. Hinfūs stirred and grunted, sniffing the air. I lifted the skin and he bounded off into the dark to hunt. On my way to the back of the tent, I stopped to test the tautness of the captive’s bindings. He sniffed the air behind me as I passed him. I wondered if he could smell his woman’s spit on my skin, or perhaps her death.

  When I was sure he was secure, I made my way to my sleeping furs, which were mounded on the tent floor. I thought of the woman’s bloated stomach. It was a vessel, but not for a child. Would that it had been a child, for to know it was still possible...

  A deep tiredness washed over me, thinning out any desire I had to question the captive. I drew in a long breath, expanding my chest until my armour became tight. I held it until my lungs ached. I feared the goddess’ light was leaving me. The darkness was pulling me down.

  The captive’s movements drew me from my thoughts. He pushed at the floor skin with his cracked heels, attempting to spin himself around the pole to better see me. I could not use Lumen when I was weakened. It was too dangerous. And, I was weakened—weakened by waiting, weakened by holding to my beliefs in something that was fast fading.

  Tomorrow, I would find a way to make the captive talk. Tomorrow, I would be stronger.

  Sitting on the floor, I unlaced my leather shin and forearm guards. Leaving my woolen shirt on, I settled down with my daggers within reach of my hands.

  Before falling asleep, I looked at the captive’s back where he was tied against the stake. He had stopped squirming and his hands were resting on the pole, palms out, his wrists red and swollen beneath the cord. Lying down, I closed my heavy lids as the air lifted the last drops of sweat from my body. Through my lashes, I saw the man’s fingers shaping themselves into signs.

  Quickly, I opened my eyes and rose on my elbow to observe the strange motioning, but his hands had stopped. I could hear the rough snoring of the flanks as they slept. I did not take my eyes from the man. He was cast pale in the blue light of the moon that shone straight down through the tent’s air hole. The moon’s light set the green stones in his hair glowing like fairy wings. A chill against my neck warned me to be cautious.

  I rose and carefully moved around him. His head was down, and I could not tell if he was asleep or awake. As I stopped before him, a quick twist of his neck brought his head up and he locked onto my face with his strange eyes. A brilliant green glow started up in the centre of his orbs and spread to the edges of his lashes.

  I was taken by the light. Without my command, Lumen tugged at my mind like a fish on a line.

  The man opened his mouth wide releasing the jewel’s shimmer from the cavern in his face. He flicked his thin red tongue against his teeth creating a sweet and longing tune of five notes. Lumen showed me an image of the wood unfurling from around the District.

  “I offers you this key,” he hissed.

  I leaned closer to see which teeth the man tapped the green crystal against. But his tongue slid out towards me, the jewel twinkling in the moon light.

  Understanding, I opened my mouth to accept his offer. As our faces met, his lips pressed against mine, soft and yielding. I felt the jewel knock against my tooth, the pitch rising and falling with each tap as he tuned my mouth. The notes journeyed deep into my skull, and my mind turned inward following the echo’s path.

  ~ I would hold you ~ his voice whispered in my thoughts.

  The last ringing note was muffled as his tongue swelled in my mouth. The thickness grew against my teeth, forcing my jaws to open until my joints crackled like popping tendons. I wanted to push him away, but my arms stayed lax at my sides. I could not command them.

  Inside the soft tissues of my mouth, his tongue lengthened, forcing its way down my throat. I gagged, twice, heaving on his flesh before I could control my reflex. I tried to stay calm, to breathe slowly, my nostrils sucking in what air they could. The slithering length worked its way deeper into my body, and I imagined the jewel glowing within my guts. I tried to pace my breath, maintaining a rhythm that would feed my life, but alarm was increasing my heart rate.

  I strained to send a siren to the flanks through Lumen, but there was no response. It was no longer in my control. My disc had become the binding bridge between the captive and my will. Making sound was impossible, and my eyes were blinded by the man’s face tight against mine.

  Blackness pushed in at the edges of my sight. Slow and steady, I calmed my heart, slackening my breathing until it no longer whistled through my nostrils.

  Suddenly, a seeking brushed my thigh. Something cold and smooth wriggled between my legs, pressing to enter. It felt more like a burrowing animal than a man’s urgency. I tried to squeeze my thighs together, but like my arms, my lower limbs were dead to my command.

  The thick length glided into my flesh, winding up through the warm cradle of my womb. The two ends of the man moved within my body, piercing me as the copper ring pierced his tongue. And, as I drowned for air, I saw a vision.

  Rows of green and black shields rose in the darkness. Four shields were flipped back and behind each was a skin pouch. In each pouch was a green gem—radiant within its crib. Within the gems, tiny peach-coloured, bean-shaped creatures turned, floating in the light. Intrigued, I watched the roll of one frail, curled body. The bones of its spine pressed out against its translucent skin reminding me of the dried carcasses spread throughout the desert. The tiny thing floated slowly around until it faced me with overlarge, black eyes, blank above a bulbous brow. Below its inverted nose, a mouth, an empty gape, opened and through it floated a cry that turned my blood to stone.

  “Módor,” it wailed.

  MY HANDS CLAWED THICK fur as I startled the rest of the way into wakefulness. My eyes burned with grit. I rapidly blinked to bring the inside of my tent into focus.

  All was silent and still in the early dawn light, but not in my memory.

  Rising quickly to my feet, I pulled my sword from its scabbard before the film of sleep could be fully blinked away. Attuned to my alarm, the flanks rose on their crooked legs, their bodies bent in a defensive posture as they sought to find the threat.

  In the midpoint of the tent, the captive hung from the stake, just as he had when I had fallen asleep. I mind-touched Lumen and found it open to my control.

  Narrowing my eyes, I cautiously moved towards the man, circling wide around the stake until I faced him once again. His chin hung down at a strange angle, hiding the rope that wrapped his neck. The cord on his chest held
his body upright, but his legs were lax, unnaturally so. The way the man’s body drooped made the hair on my arms crawl like beetles.

  “Wake!” I commanded him, jabbing my sword at the air before his heart.

  The flanks moved in close behind me, their claws extended.

  I jabbed at his chest, a second time. “Wake and speak, Wyccum!”

  The point of my sword slid without resistance into the man’s chest cavity, but it broke no skin. It just pushed his skin in. Dread pebbled the surface of my skull. I lowered my sword and reached out. The grey tones of my skin looked dead next to his faded copper tones. I pushed my hand into his torso. His skin yielded like an unfilled sack.

  Aghast, I stepped back and whispered, “He is empty.”

  The flanks clicked in their bug-like language. Lumen translated.

  Left Flank ~ He is gone ~

  I followed the flank’s gaze to the tent’s air hole. A delicate white fabric was clinging where the poles met. Reaching up with the end of my sword, I gently lifted it down. It was almost transparent, flat and thin, as long as my leg and twice as wide. Jagged along the edges, it looked as if it had been torn from its source.

  A scale pattern had been pressed into its paper surface, and that’s what told me it was skin—shed skin. Holding it closer in the dim light, I measured the scale size—each was as wide as my palm.

  Frowning, I looked at the man’s husk slumped against the pole and back to the tent’s air hole, which was not wide enough for a man to pass.

  “Check outside.”

  The Flanks moved out and I quickly donned my armour and strapped my arrow quiver to my back. I wasn’t sure what I was hunting, but I would be prepared. My bow would serve me at a distance, my daggers in close combat.

  ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF the camp, Rserker was kneeling and running his hand along the ground. As I approached, I counted the heads of the captives. All were present.

  “Here,” Rserker wasted no time in greeting, only showed me a track in the dust when I was alongside him.