Two chapters from God Wars Book Two, picked up for publication by Swimming Kangaroo Books. These chapters have not yet been through the editing process so they are probably a bit rough. If you want to listen to the entire God Wars series look up The Hell Hole Tavern in your favorite podcast directory. Remember to give it a vote or a review if you do.


Chapter 3: Scruples





With his eyes half open, Caleb listened to the sounds of children playing and smelled the mixed fragrances of baking bread and a too early autumn. Overhead, the afternoon sun beat down on him, warming his old bones.

Caleb flexed his arthritic foot gently against Greenswale’s only boardwalk so his chair would continue to slowly rock. Off in the distance, he heard the faint echoes of a child‘s playful scream, and inside the bakery his granddaughter sang while kneading bread. Beside him sat the stranger in the rickety willow chair Vista had been nagging at him to turn into firewood.

Tall and scarred and missing one hand, the stranger was the sort of person who could easily make a fellow nervous, but Caleb was far too old to let small matters like his continuing good health bother him, which, considering the origins of his silent companion, was probably a good thing.

“You will give me food,” the stranger said quietly, “or I will kill you.”

Half-smiling at the foolishness of the young, Caleb continued rocking while enjoying the sensation of the sun warming deep into his sore bones. Beside him, the stranger stirred and leaned forward as if he were contemplating doing something unpleasant.

Sighing, Caleb turned his head to look upon the sadly ravaged face. “Now that’s a strange way to open a conversation. You’ve been sitting here for the last half hour and the first thing you can think to say is that you’ll kill me if I don‘t give you food? Does that seem like the right way of introducing yourself?”

“I don’t care about introductions,” the stranger said. “I am hungry, and I am being hunted by demons. I need food if I am going to live.”

Caleb rubbed a thoughtful hand across his chin. “Now that,” he said, “is better. We now know that you are hungry and desperate. We know that you are running and that you need help to escape from demons.” Opening his eyes fully, he studied the stranger, noting signs of hard usage and deprivation. “We also know that your clothes are not much more than rags so you‘ve obviously been cold lately since we‘re heading into the winter months before too long. Can’t help you there. Clothing is hard to get in these parts. Got no flax or linen, and the only sheep for miles around have the wrong sort of fur for weaving, so you won’t find many people who are willing to part with the few bits of clothes they possess. No, the way I figure it, your best bet is to visit the miller who lives more than two villages up the road. Word is that she has a few chests filled with a bunch of castoffs, but I‘d be careful approaching her because she‘s supposed to be something of a vamp.”

“I can take the clothes you wear,” the stranger said. His voice was flat, but dangerous shadows swirled deep within his eyes.

“You could,” Caleb agreed, turning his head back to its former position so he did not have to look into those unnatural eyes. “Wouldn’t do you much good. You’re almost a foot too tall for the ones I wear, and there are thirty men-folk in this village who are of an age to do something if you get too feisty. Besides, it won’t be long before these clothes are too light for the weather. Nope, your best bet is to throw yourself on my mercy and ask for a bit of help.”

“I see none of these people,” the stranger said.

Caleb nodded. “Now that is a fact, Jolson. Most of the folks around here are taken up with a fellow who came into the village last night with six wagons and some drivers. Fact is, they’ll be holding a meeting in the hall shortly, but I want nothing to do with that man’s nonsense, and that‘s what I told Vista‘s beau, Dern, when he tried to talk me into going to that meeting.”

Beside him, Jolson‘s breathing stilled. “I never told you my name.”

“Ain’t many people running around with a green hook attached to the end of their arm,” Caleb explained. “About a month or so back a woman named Tessla came through here. She had an interesting tale to tell, and a good bit of that tale was about you. She said that you sort of got yourself turned around and mixed up. Said you were wondering all over the countryside while trying to make your way to the King’s City. Said that eventually you might come by this way and that if you did, we had best see you safely along. When we asked her why we should be concerned about a Damned stranger she said that you have an important task to do, and maybe something even more important to learn, but she didn‘t know what that something was. Most of us figure the woman is touched in the head because she claimed that her god told her all this, and truth to tell, I lean that way me own self. Still, can‘t see no reason not to help you along if it might hold off trouble, so I‘ll just pretend this Tessla wasn‘t a bit simple.”

“Your Tessla is wrong,” Jolson said. “I have no task but to survive.”

Caleb chuckled. “Most folks would consider that to be some important. This Tessla, an’ she ain’t mine by any means, she told me some other things about you too. Can’t say that I liked what I heard, but we here in Greenswale don’t pay much mind to what somebody has done in the outside world so long as he behaves himself here.” Raising his voice, he called out. “Vista!”

“Yes?” his granddaughter answered from inside the bakery.

“We got us a hungry man out here. You got anything in there that you can feed him?”

“I’ve salt rolls that just came out of the oven,” she called back. “I can throw a slab of ham in the middle of a couple of them an‘ see if he kin choke it down.”

“Now see there,” Caleb said to Jolson. “All you had to do was ask. Wasn’t that a lot easier than getting folks all riled up by threatening them?”

“I never thought about asking,” Jolson admitted. “Is that a common practice?”

“A lot more common than threatening to kill people.” Releasing a groan, Caleb painfully levered himself out of his chair and then stood, swaying for a moment until he was sure of his balance. Of late, his arthritic foot had a habit of seizing up every time he stayed off it for longer than an hour. On top of that, for the last year his back ached so much that it usually refused to straighten fully unless somebody grabbed him from behind, lifted him by his elbows, and shook him up and down until something about two thirds of the way down made a cracking sound.

Being old, he reflected, was one long ordeal of small pains, but those pains were a price he had been more than willing to pay since they allowed him to live long enough to see his granddaughter grow into a fine young woman.

Directing a rueful smile at his family pride, Caleb rubbed the back of his bald head with a work-crippled hand before reaching for his cane.

“Let’s go see if she can throw another of those bread and ham things together for me. Can’t quite remember the last time I bothered to eat, so I‘m feeling peckish. Afterwards, we can go down to the hall and let people get a look at you. Somebody might have some extra clothes, though I doubt it. Still, winter‘s coming early and you could easily freeze to death in another week or three if you continue running around in those light things.”

****

When Jolson opened the cracked wood slab door that lead into the village hall, Caleb painfully hobbled within. Just before stepping over the threshold he gave the hook handed man a thin smile of appreciation, but inside, he did not feel that smile. Instead, his attention focused on a new pain that seemed to have settled in his hips. The short walk over from the bakery had been almost more than he was capable of making. If he continued failing at his present rate he might not make it to spring, and that worried him because he desperately wanted to live long enough to see Vista married to Dern and with child. If the gods favored him, he might even live long enough to see that child delivered.

Once inside the meeting hall, he nodded towards a couple faces that turned his way, limped over to the first table that got in his way, and waited patiently until one of its occupants emptied a chair for him.

The meeting room, he saw once he took time to look around, was not as full as he had expected. Only twenty or so of the village’s men were here, which meant that the women-folk had talked some sense into the heads of the missing. Most of the hall’s occupants sat around square oak-topped tables, though a handful leaned nonchalantly against the west wall. Since over half of the men were smoking on long stem pipes, the air within the room possessed a multitude of thin white clouds of rising smoke rings that eventually broke apart and joined themselves to the general haze. Unlit pipe held casually in his hand, Kerrad Traveler, the trader, sat on the front table, a confident expression on his weather worn face. Three of his drivers stood near him.

“I thought you weren’t coming,” Dern said to Caleb as Jolson approached. “Way I remember it, you said you were too old to invest in anything new.”

“Won’t live long enough to see any return,” Caleb agreed, “an’ if I did, I’m too creaky to enjoy it.” Grinning, he accepted a spiced ale from the young man, knowing that if Vista heard of this she would tear into the both of them. The concoction would probably tear up his stomach, but by the gods, when a man was too old to have a drink he might as well be dead, no matter what his over-protective daughter thought.

After taking an appreciative sip, he gestured toward Jolson, who now stood at his back. “Have a fellow here I want to show around. Jolson is on the run from something nasty. He needs food and money and maybe some clothes.”

Dern frowned. “This the fellow that Tessla was talking about? Don’t have any spare clothes. Have an extra copper or two, an’ I might have a couple extra eggs if the damned rooster ain‘t broke em yet.”

“I’ve some potatoes that are growing spots,” Rafin Knacker said from the next table over, “and I know that my brother can spare some oats.”

“Well there you go, Jolson,” Caleb said, smiling. “Most of your needs are taken care of right there.”

“Um,” Jolson replied, looking confused. “Thank you.”

Caleb thought those were the most insincere sounding words he had ever heard, but at least the words had been said, so the forms of a polite greeting had been met, if not the spirit.

“You seem hesitant,” Dern noted. “Is something wrong?”

“I have recently been changed,” Jolson said. “I’m finding it difficult to adjust.”

“We all change, given time,” Rafin noted. “Look at me. I’m a grower with six acres to his name. Nothing like the impulsive always in trouble scamp I used to be. After I got married and had kids I had no choice but to become respectable and look to the future. So, Jolson, what was it that changed you, an‘ what kinda change you talking bout.?”

“I gained a conscience,” Jolson admitted. “Even though I have sealed it away within a small portion of my mind, I am finding it a very uncomfortable thing to own.”

His answer was met by silence and confused expressions.

At that moment Kerrad Traveler pulled back the fur-lined hood of his heavy cape, tugged at the tails of his woolen shirt, and cleared his throat to gain attention. “If you don’t mind, I need to get through this now. I’ve other places to go real soon if I can’t get the grain I need here. The thing I want to talk about is the new mine. It’s an important find, and there are plenty of people who want to work it, but the thing is that those people have to eat and they’re quickly running out of food. Now I’m telling you, these are desperate, hungry folk who happen to be sitting on a gem mine the likes of which I’ve never heard of before. With a little persuasion and some fast talk, I’ve no doubt that we can get a promise of half their find for a few wagon-loads of grain and maybe one of salt.” He peered at them with steady eyes. “Think of it. We’ll all be rich. This mine has jewels of every type you can imagine. Why, just two or three of those gems are enough to pay for the grain and the salt. Everything else would be pure profit, and the profit will only get better when they are forced to come to us again.”

“I don’t understand it,” Dern muttered. “Why does everybody who comes through here want our salt?”

“I don’t know that we have the grain for you,” Hasty Wags said. “Most of our crops is still in the fields. It’ll take us a couple days to bring it in. Besides, most of what we have is intended to feed us and provide seed for next year. Some of us are going to go hungry if we give it all to you.”

“But you won’t be hungry.” Kerrad leaned slightly forward. His voice became insistent. “Think of the gems that you’ll receive. You can use those to buy all the food that you desire. Your wives and children will be fat and strong come spring, while those in the neighboring villages will be scrawny and too weak to work their fields. You can use more gems to buy those fields and to hire workers from other villages. Before long, the people of Greenswale will own everything for miles around. This is an opportunity that only a fool would pass by.”

Snorting contempt, Caleb hoped nobody was idiot enough to listen to this hornswaggle. “Pipe dreams,” he scoffed. “There ain’t nobody dumb enough to give us all those gems for a few loads of grain. You’ve given us pretty words, but that’s all you’ve given us.” He looked at his neighbors and felt glad that Jolson had sat down beside him outside the bakery. That sitting had led to them being here, and being here meant that he could attempt to protect the interests of people he had watched over since they were children.

“Words are nothing but sound, just the same as passing gas,” he told his friends. “There’s nothing left behind once the air clears.”

“There is this,” Kerrad said. He held up his hand to display a jagged pale pebble. “This is a diamond. They let me have it so I could show you a sample of what they have to offer.” He held up a hand to halt a protest. “Yes, I know it doesn’t look like much now, but that’s just because it hasn’t been cut and polished yet. This single stone is worth more than everything that I’m asking you to deliver. I could get ten times what I’m asking if I sold it in the King’s City. King Vere would probably buy it from me himself.”

“The King’s city is a long way from here, Dern pointed out. He held up his hand. “Throw me that thing.”

With a chuckle, Kerrad tossed the pebble across the room. Dern caught it and then held it up close to his eyes so he could study it. The gem was, Caleb saw, at least an half-inch across. A small spot of shine showed past a cracked part of its outer crust.

“Sure is different,” Dern said, turning the gem slowly around in his fingers so he could peer at it from every angle. “Ain’t never seen nothing like this before. Are you sure it’s a diamond?” Looks a little bit like salt.” He licked the stone and grimaced. “Nope, it ain’t salt.”

“I’ve held dozens of diamonds,” Kerrad said. “This one is real.”

“You’re the oldest man here,” Dern said to Caleb. “You ever seen one of these things before?”

“No,” Caleb admitted. “I’ve heard of diamonds though. Thing I heard is that they glitter and are mostly clear once they are cleaned up, and that thing sure ‘nough has a little shine to it, so I guess it might be a diamond, but I wouldn’t trust that it is. This man is too easy with words and promises. Why, you just heard him say he was going to do some persuading and fast talking with those miners. What makes you think he isn‘t doing the same with us?”

Dern looked at him with eyes that were sad. He made a brief gesture with the hand holding the small stone. “He’s given us more than words, an‘ we‘ve done business with him for a good many years.”

“As you love me,” Caleb insisted, “I’m telling you--”

Dern shook his head. “But I don’t love you. I love Vista. I’ll give you honor and respect because you’re her family, but we both know that you’re not what you once were. You are old and crippled and not much good. Your mind has become weak and suspicious an‘ that‘s why you lost the last election. No Caleb, your time to make decisions is over. It’s my turn now. I was elected headman of Greenswale so this is for me to decide.”

He looked to Jolson. ““How about you. Ever see a diamond?”

“Yes,” Jolson answered. “I walked on them in hell.”

With a decisive gesture, Dern closed the hand holding the pebble into a fist. He kissed his knuckles, grinned, and tossed the stone back to the trader. “I don’t have much land planted. None of us do because so much of the ground around here won’t even grow weeds, but what I have is yours. I’ll start harvesting my grain first thing in the morning.”

“Now that,” said Kerrad, “is what I wanted to hear.”

***

Dern worked his fields and cursed the weather for two days while Caleb rocked in his chair outside the bakery and voiced his worries to Vista. She, in her turn, passed those worries to Dern when they met in the early evenings. Caleb fumed when he watched the two of them laugh at the wandering mind of an old man, but he kept his anger to himself because venting now would only give them more reason to doubt his sense.

Those two days of harvesting saw much work done. At the end of them the trader’s wagons were mostly filled and the crop land was stripped almost bare. Much of the grain still clung to the ends of stalks that had been tossed into the wagons at the end, but Kerrad claimed that he was not particular about how clean the grain was. He did not even care that a good bit of the grain was wet, and so in danger of growing mould in a week or two. The miners, he said, were desperate and hungry and they wanted food now. They did not want to wait until the grain was properly prepared. Nodding his understanding, Dern led the party of salt collectors who filled the last wagon half full with salt in less than three hours, though why people would get all that excited about salt he did not know. The stuff was rather common…too common in fact. It was that very salt that made so much of the land around here unplantable. Many of the villagers wanted to fill the wagon all the way up, but Dern judged that half a wagonload was all that the mules could pull.

On the morning of the third day Kerad gave them a hearty wave just before he motioned the wagons to begin rolling. Once the wagons grew small in the distance, Dern, standing in the center of the track, peered through the haze of dust that wagon wheels had cast into the air. The air was sharp, unseasonably cold, and a few flakes of snow fell from the clouded sky, all signs of an early and hard winter. Usually, that would be enough to cause worries about famine and disease.

Dern patted his pouch where the diamond stone resided and smiled because with this gem to sell they had nothing to fear. Stepping off the track, he turned to the watching villagers and called for a celebration.

“Ain’t got nothing to celebrate,” Caleb sourly told him.

“Sure we do,” Dern insisted. “Why, we’re the next thing to rich. Fact is, we will be rich in a few more weeks.”

“We’ll be hungry in a few weeks,” Caleb predicted from his chair. The ragman, Jolson, sat beside him, shivering. “Most of our winter supplies just went down the road.”

“We’ll get more,” Dern assured him. “Harrowville will have their crops in by now, and they always grow more than three times what they need. I’ll just grab a wagon and head out that way tomorrow to see what kind of a deal I can make. Way I see it, they’ll pretty much give me anything I want since this diamond is worth more than their entire village.”

“In what direction does this Harrowville lie?” Jolson asked.

Dern pointed. “It’s west, the same way as the trader’s wagons are traveling. I might even catch up to them before nightfall tomorrow since I’ll be traveling unloaded.”

“Caleb told me that the King’s city lies that way,” Jolson said, “and I have been told that a miller along the way might have warm clothes that I can wear. I will go with you.”

“Second village on that road is more than fifty miles away,” Dern warned. “Most of that land is used by herders, and that means people are few and far apart. Most of the people and villages in this area are to the east and south of us.”

“That doesn’t matter,” Jolson said. “It is on my way. I must get to Grace if I am to survive.”

He shivered again and Dern felt an instant wave of sympathy for the poor wretch. Jolson was about as strange as a man could be, but it wasn’t in Dern to be unkind to such a scrawny, miserable being. A wagon would be faster travel for Jolson, and he would be able to huddle beneath a couple blankets while he rode. Besides, Jolson had spent too much time deceiving Caleb with his impossible tales. The way Dern saw it, the sooner Jolson was down the road, the better. During these last few months Caleb had been failing fast, so the only people he needed talking nonsense to him was his friends and family.

It is a sad thing, Dern thought, to watch a man’s mind grow weak from age.

“I wonder,” Jolson said, “if Harrowville has so much excess grain, why the trader stopped here instead of there. After all, he is traveling there anyway.”

***

Several days later, with Jolson beside him, Dern looked into Harrowville’s community storage cellar and stared at the pile of not yet cleaned grain. Unbelievably, the pile was only three-quarters as large as it should have been to feed this village for the winter. Nowhere was there any sign of the excess grain that Harrowville normally owned.

“I need warm clothes,” Jolson said.

“You won’t find them here,” Wills Thatcher, Harrowville’s headman, replied. “We sometimes spend the winter carding wool and making thread because we had the only sheep anywhere around with the right kind of wool, but we won’t have no excess this year on account of we sold all our sheep to a fellow just a couple days ago. No, I‘m afraid that you‘ll have a hard time convincing anyone to let go of something when they don‘t have the means to make more.”

Stunned, Dern turned his gaze away from the inadequate grain supply and onto Thatcher. “What happened to your harvest?”

Wills shrugged. “We had a bad year all around. A good part of our starter seed was moldy and didn’t sprout. “Bout halfway through the growing season we had us some bad weather that washed out three fields and half of another. There was a fire ’bout three weeks after that what took out a couple more fields, and then this early cold caught us by surprise. Bunch of deer and other critters started feeding early, so we lost more that way.

Shaking his head sadly, he looked into the pit. “No, I’m afraid that it’s going to be a rough, hungry winter for a lot of our people.”

“There’s always fish,” Dern said. “Folks have always been envious that you have a lake filled with fish.”

Wills shook his head again. “Nope. We lost everything there too. Got some kind of red colored growth that spread over the entire surface of the lake. Pretty much killed off all of the fish. Fact is we‘d be starving before much longer if it wasn’t for that trader, Kerad, what drove through here yesterday. He sold us most of this grain and the wagons it sat on for our few sheep. The strange part of it was that Kerad didn’t take none of the sheep for himself. He gave ’em to the people what drove the wagons for him. They took off late last night, taking the sheep with them, and Kerad, he headed off by himself early this morning, driving the last wagon he had. Don’t know what was in that one. It was covered by a tarp.”

“Salt,” Dern said bitterly. “The wagon held salt.” His stomach roiled and he wanted to puke. Caleb had been right. There was no gem mine. There would be no riches pouring in. The people of Greenswale, his people, would starve because Dern had been unwilling to listen to the village’s previous headman.

Wills scratched his head. “Funny. Don’t know why he would want to cart salt around. The stuff makes food taste a bit better, and its good for curing hides and meat, but there’s so much of it around the area you come from that it’s cheaper than dirt.”

After fumbling for a moment at his belt, Durn pulled his pouch loose and poured the diamond into the palm of his hand. “My people need to eat. Will you take this for the grain? You can sell it for more than twice, or even three times as much as the grain is worth if you do the selling closer in towards the bigger cities, and you have the mules and wagons needed to transport the food you buy back to Harrowville.”

Wearing a look of perplexity, Wills took the stone and examined it carefully. “Well, I’ll grant that it’s pretty enough, but I don’t see how a piece of quartz can be worth nearly what you’re claiming.”

“Quartz,” Dern said flatly. His mouth suddenly went dry. A muscle twitched in the corner of his mouth and the world took on shades of red.

“There were some quartz mines about three hundred miles west of here,” Wills continued. “My pa took me into one once, back when I was still a boy. There never was much of a market for the rock so the mines closed down a couple of years later.”

“Quartz,” Dern said again while images flashed through his mind. He saw Vista’s rosy cheeks turn pale and hollow. He saw the skeletal bodies of Hasty Cobb’s and Rafin’s children spread out in the snow. Worst of all, he saw Caleb’s accusing eyes. “I’m going to run down that Kerrad Traveler and have a talk with him.”

Frowning, he turned to study Jolson. During all the short while he had know the unnatural creature, an uncomfortable aura had exuded from the wretch. Dern did not want to put a name to the nature of that aura, but he did know that it bespoke of something dangerous, and Jolson did have that hook attached to the end of his arm.

“He’s still going west,” Dern told Jolson, “so that’s the way I’m heading. Do you still want to come along?”

“Yes,” Jolson answered.

“What do you want me to do with your quartz?” Wills asked.

“Do whatever you want,” Dern snapped. “Throw it in your lake, for all I care.” He glared at Jolson, stamped off to the wagon, and climbed into the driver’s seat. Jolson managed to clamber in beside him only moments before Dern set the mules off at a run.

Kerrad Traveler had more than half a day’s head start, but he also had a heavy load. With a little luck, they would catch the bastard before nightfall.

***

An hour before dusk Dern’s right-side mule stepped in a hole and collapsed only minutes after Dern was able to make out the distant shape of another wagon on the road. Cursing, Dern leaped out of the wagon and soon had the injured mule cut free of its traces. Jumping back into the wagon, he urged his remaining mule forward.

Head hanging with weariness, dripping sweat even in this cold air, the other mule soon stopped in its tracks. Dern cursed both animals and jumped out of the wagon again.

“Hurry up,” he snapped to Jolson. “We can catch him if we run.”

Remaining in his seat, Jolson shook his head no. “I have no stamina for running. Catch him if you can. I will follow.”

“Follow then,” Dern snapped, and then he ran like he had never run before. His insistent feet pounded into the road with a steady rhythm that ate distance faster than the mules had managed for the last hour. Settling into the pace, he sucked in cold air that burned his lungs, coughed, and continued running because the wagon was closer. In fact, it appeared to be stopped. Looking over his shoulder, he saw that Jolson trotted far behind. From what Dern could see, Jolson’s body moved with a fluid grace that belied his claim of lacking stamina.

“Gutless,” Dern cursed, and he stretched out his legs so he could cover ground faster. The wagon drew close quicker than he had expected, and then it was close enough so he could see that, yes, it had stopped beside the trail. The wagon’s mules had been unharnessed and now grazed at the end of a tether. Leaning nonchalantly against the wagon’s sideboard, Kerrad Traveler drew on his long stemmed pipe and calmly watched Dern approach.

“You seem to be in a bit of a hurry,” Kerrad said when Dern finally reached him.

“Thief,” Dern panted. “Blackguard. Liar.”

Tapping his bowl clean, Kerrad set his pipe on the wagon’s rail and straightened. “Well, I’ll admit to being a liar. I’ll admit that there ain’t no mine, so there won’t be no more gems an‘ I‘m sorry about that, but I ain’t no thief. I paid for this salt and those crops all fair-like with that rock I gave you. I sold the grain at Harrowville for sheep, and my drivers paid me handsomely for them, which is why all of this started. They have a reputation as some of the best wool merchants, but a flux hit their herds. All their sheep died, so they hired me to get them some new ones an this was the best way I could think of to do it.” He smiled. “It wasn’t personal. You folks just happened to be part of the equation.”

“It’s personal to me,” Dern said while his breathing gradually eased and strength came back into his limbs. He took a threatening step towards Kerrad and felt powerful when the man moved back. “My friends and family are going to starve because of that worthless rock you gave us. There’s nobody who will give us food for it, let alone land.” When he reached the back of the wagon he lifted a corner of the tarp to peer underneath. Dirty encrusted chunks of salt lay within. Reaching inside, he lifted a chunk that was twice as big as his fist and smiled at the heavy weight of it. “You’re going to give me the money your drivers gave you.

Kerrad frowned and drew his belt knife. “Do you have the diamond with you?”

Dern snorted. “No, and I don’t have the Bad Fairy that steals children’s teeth with me either. Give me the money.”

“Sorry,” Kerrad said. “It’s my policy to never renegotiate a deal. People will get to expecting it every time they feel cheated. I paid you more than your crops were worth. I won’t pay higher; besides, the drivers didn‘t pay me with coin. I got myself another wife, an‘ I have to tell you, this one is really something else.”

“I’ll be sorry to tell her that she lost her husband,” Dern snapped, and he leaped forward. Kerrad raised the knife, but Dern dodged and gave the chunk of salt an underarm throw that drove it into the pit of Kerrad’s stomach. Kerrad blanched and gagged and started to jab out with his knife, but Dern had his hands around the man’s neck before Kerrad had a chance to recover. A leg snaked around Dern‘s, jerked, and Dern fell to the ground, pulling Kerrad down with him. Almost instantly, a sharp pain ran through his arm. A line of fire stitched across his side, and then Dern felt the tip of a knife press against his belly while he stared into Kerrad’s steady, angry eyes.

Growling anger, he released his grip on the man’s throat.

Raggedly coughing, Kerrad drew air into his lungs with rasping breaths, but his eyes remained steady, as did the knife. “I don’t renegotiate,” he finally said once his breathing steadied. “Are we finished with this nonsense?”

Dropping his hands to the ground, Dern frowned and then nodded. Blood was on his left sleeve and his side hurt. His fingers brushed against the chunk of salt.

“Good then,” Kerrad said. The knifepoint moved away from Dern’s belly. “Because I’m hungry. I only stopped here to fix a bite to eat and take a bit of a nap.”

“Eat this,” Dern cursed. He twisted to the side, swept his right arm up, and slammed the chunk of salt into the side of Kerrad’s head.

“Eat it!” he shouted. “Eat it. Make bread with it and eat it. Starve on it!”

Blood sprayed and Kerrad dropped to the ground. He moaned, tried to sit up, so Dern slammed the salt into his head again and again until a hand grabbed his wrist.

“He’s dead,” Jolson said.

Panting, Dern dropped the salt and started to cry. “I--I never--he deserved to die. He deserved it. He’s ruined us with promises and a chunk of quartz.”

“Diamond,” Jolson said. Kneeling beside Kerrad, he fumbled awkwardly at the fastenings of the dead man’s cloak. “The stone was a diamond. I told you I walked on them in hell. The headman was wrong, but that doesn’t matter to you because the diamond is likely gone by now. As we were driving away I looked back and saw Wills heading for the lake.”

Dern gasped and looked down at his bloody hands, at his killer hands. “Why?” he whispered. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

Rolling Kerrad’s body over, Jolson tried to jerk the cloak free. “I needed this,” he said simply. “The weather is becoming colder and I have been told I need warm clothes if I am to survive.” He fingered the cloak’s thin material and looked questioningly at Dern. “Do you think this material is thick enough to protect me from the cold?”

Dern felt his heart still. Looking up from his red hands, he studied Jolson’s impassive face. “A cloak,” he whispered. “All of this was just so you could get a cloak? Half my village is going to starve because you didn‘t tell me that the damned diamond was real.”

“Caleb said I would likely die if I didn’t have warm clothes,” Jolson explained again. His voice was even, but somewhere down deep, it displayed the faintest hint of a troubled mind. With a small shake of his head, almost as if he were shaking away troubling thoughts, Jolson rolled Kerrad back over and tugged at the cloak’s top clasp. “Could you tell me how to release this, and please don‘t think of violence. You are wounded and I am much stronger than I appear.”

“Caleb is going to die,” Dern said. “Vista is going to die, and so is Rafin. People who have helped you without asking anything in return are going to die because the only way you could think to get warm clothes was through murder.”

“Your murder,” Jolson said calmly. “I merely watched.”

“Have you no compassion?” Dern demanded. “You told us that you had gained a conscience. What happened to that? Why hasn‘t it told you that what you did was wrong?”

Jolson’s fingers managed the intricate twist needed to undo a clasp. Smiling thinly, he unfastened the rest and pulled the cloak away from the body while Dern helplessly watched. That done, Jolson folded the cloak into a bundle, stood, and started walking away. He stopped, turned, and looked down to where Dern sat on the ground.

Eyes shedding tears, Dern watched the spawn and saw self-loathing blazing from it’s eyes. Dark shadowed colors dripped from the hook’s tip. Jolson‘s face twisted with conflicting emotions when he held the hook up before him.

“I hate what this has done to me. It gave me a shadow conscience that I can’t keep sealed away. That conscience has made me weaker as it gains strength.” He stared angrily at the hook. Sweat broke out on his face, and Dern knew that he watched a tremendous battle when he saw Jolson’s trembling arm lower the hook down to his side.

Hanging his head, Jolson released an agonized groan. “This is worse than Hell,” he whispered. “How can men live with this thing inside them?”

“Uncomfortably,” Dern answered, “but a conscience is all that allows us a live as a society. Without it, we would soon tear each other apart.” He looked at his murdered man and tried to swallow, but his mouth was too dry.

Jolson raised his head and looked at him with haunted eyes. “In Yylse, salt sells for twice its weight in gold. The same must be true in other large cities.” He waved the softly glowing hook at the wagon. “Sell this, and you can buy more than enough grain to feed your little village. With work, your people will be rich. They will have everything they have ever desired, and more. Within a year they will look at you and call you a hero.”

Nervously licking his dry lips, Dern wiped away his tears and then nodded. “Thank you.” He looked at his bleeding arm and bent his head so he could see the blood that stained his side. “I’m bleeding. Can you help me bind my wounds?”

Jolson’s expression became brittle steel. “You ask too much.”

He shook out Kerrad‘s cloak, draped it across his shoulders, and then followed the road to the west.























































Chapter 4: The Breaking Heart





“Hanna! Hanna! WHERE ARE YOU!”

Stomach twisted in painful knots, Valerai waited in tense silence for a reply. She strained her ears harder while cursing the sound of the wind and the heavy pounding of her heartbeat deep within her chest. She cursed those and every other sound that defeated her desire for complete silence so she could hear one small voice coming to her from the dead, snow dusted wheat. Her bare hands hurt from the cold. Her ax gripping fingers were bloodless and white with the force of her grasp. She did not care about the pain. She did not care about the cold. Hanna was gone. Another of her children was missing.

“Hanna!”

A sudden clang jarred her nerves.

Startled and angry, she turned quickly in the doorway. The ax jerked reflexively into the air above her head, thumped into the top jam, painfully jarring her elbows. Almost crying, she lowered the ax and hugged it to her chest.

“Roland,” she hissed. “I told you to stay still and be quiet!” Releasing an aggrieved wail, her four-year-old instantly dropped the pie tin he held. Valerai silently cursed once more and inwardly cried at the sight of her only remaining boy. She loved Roland and Hanna with every fiber of her motherly being, but she feared that before long they would die the same as her Gil and Adale had died, the same as her beautifully handsome Linner.

Turning her attention back to the fields, her eyes fastened hopefully and frightfully on the outside world where cold and snow and a beast that ravaged children might even now be killing another of her babies. Three of her brood were dead. Their father and his hired hand were out there in the cold and snow, searching for the beast that had killed them. Her men, her protectors, were out there searching when she needed them here, beside her, standing guard over Roland and Hanna, because Valerai’s heart could not take another loss.

“Hanna!”

Gripping the ax tight to her chest, she wanted to scream. Behind her, Roland still cried. The noise of his low sobs stretched her nerves tauter than strung wire. She wanted to turn around and beat him until he shut up. She wanted to smother his damned mouth with rags so she could listen to the subtle sounds the wind might bring to her. She wanted to hold him to her breast, to cover him with her arms, and promise him that no matter what, she would always keep him safe from the outside world.

Oh Gods, baby, please be quiet. Mama is falling apart.

Movement. Leaning forward, she stared at the field with terrified apprehension. There! A head bobbed in the winter dry wheat. A white ball bouncing on top of a green hat. Valerai’s breath caught with momentary hope, but that hope almost instantly faded because she knew this was not her five-year-old. That hat was too familiar. The design provided proof that its owner was a Wanderer, one of the little people who traveled the land for no reason other than a desire to know.

While she waited, nervously watching the Wanderer approach, the hat grew clearer, more distinct, showing the details of an image carefully created by colored thread. A mountain, she saw, with a stream running down its side, so this Wanderer belonged to one of the Hedgar tribes.

Before her, wheat parted on the edge of the field. A small figure emerged; another, smaller, figure was attached to it by the hand. Blinking away tears, Valerai stifled a sudden sob at the sight of Hanna reluctantly trailing behind the Wanderer. Hanna suddenly jerked back, tried to break free. In response the Wanderer hauled her closer to him, pulling so hard that Hanna momentarily lost her feet and was actually dragged for a few steps.

Alarm raced through Valerai. Instincts flared. Her ax swung out threateningly as she strode forward.

“Let go of my daughter!” she cried out. “You let go of her now.”

With a nod, the Wanderer stopped and released his grip on the child. He gave Hanna a small shove. “Go to your mother.“

Hesitant, Hanna stepped forward. Her hands clasped one another, fingers intertwined. Her face was excited and fearful and buried deep within her eyes was the knowledge that she had done something very bad.

Valeria had never seen anything so lovely in all her life. She sprinted the last three steps.

“Momma,” Hanna said when Valerai reached her. As usual, her voice was slurred and slow. Hanna was, Marvale sometimes said, not right. She had been born that way. Slow and brave and always questioning, she lived for each day. For her, remembering the previous month was an unwelcome chore. A year past was only misty memory, something almost impossible to recall, and tomorrow was something that she could never imagine.

“I looked for papa,” Hanna said slowly. “I got lost and was scared, and then the little man found me and promised to take me home, but I didn‘t want to come home because I knew you‘d be mad.”

Mad…yes. Mad with worry for her special child. Mad with fear that Mar would have to dig another grave into the winter hard ground. Yes.

Valerai let the head of her ax fall to the ground. Her left fist still gripped the worn wood of its handle, but her right hand was free for use.

She used it well.

“Momma!”

Hanna’s thin arm writhed beneath Valerai’s grip. Almost growling, almost sobbing, almost at the point of collapsing into the snow for the pure relief of knowing Hanna was safe, Valerai hauled the girl closer and bent low to stare into Hanna’s eyes.

“You are in more trouble than you care to think about, young lady! I’m going to tan the hide right off you. I’ve told you time and again that you’re not to leave the cabin! I’ve told you that it’s not safe out there, and here you go ignoring me--again.”

“But daddy--?”

“Are you arguing with me?” Vapor puffed from Valerai’s mouth with each spoken word. She felt like an angry dragon breathing smoke and fire.

“But--”

Hanna’s eyes were lost, confused. Looking into those eyes, Valerai felt that she had no choice but to bite back her temper. Yelling at the girl would do no good. In a day or a week the words would be lost inside her clouded mind. Though Hanna could learn, that learning followed a slow trail that possessed many wrong turns. If Valerai released her anger now, Hanna would detour onto one of those trails, perhaps never to step upon the right one again.

“Get in the cabin,” Valerai said, releasing her hold on the girl. “I’ll see to you later.”

Sobbing, Hanna took off at a run. Her little feet sent up small puffs of snow. The sound of her soft cries jarred on Valerai’s already frayed nerves.

“Perhaps I should come back another time,” the Wanderer said carefully. “I think ten, or maybe twenty years from now might be prudent. You should have your children fully raised by then so your temper might show improvement.”

Eyes closing, teeth clenched, Valerai shook herself and raised the ax until its iron head was several inches above her eyes. Spinning in a quick half circle, she jerked her arm forward and angrily threw the ax away from her. Metal and wood turned in the air as the ax slowly spun handle over head until the handle finally struck her lone maple tree three feet above the snow line with a solid clunk. Deflecting from the wood, the ax fell into the snow bank beside the maple’s trunk, burying its head deep in the soft snow.

Closing her eyes once more, she clenched her fists as she tried to draw herself together. Only after counting ten straining breaths did she feel satisfied that her nerves were sufficiently settled. Unclenching her hands, she turned around to face the Wanderer.

“I have to apologize,” she said with forced calm. “I was cleaning the house and thought Hanna was safely playing with her brother. By the time I realized they were being too quiet she was already gone, and I had no idea for how long. I tried to follow her tracks in the snow, but the wind had covered them so all I could do was worry and yell. It scared me. Scared me bad. I was afraid that I’d lost another one of my children.”

The Wanderer nodded knowingly. “Another of your children? This makes me think that you have lost children before. That is bad. We should not misplace those who are so precious to us. Perhaps if they were lost not too long ago I could help you find the missing ones.” Cocking his head inquisitively to the side, he stepped forward.

Valerai was struck by the fact that the little man was not much taller than Hanna. However, unlike her errant daughter, his face was weathered and wrinkled by several decades of wear. His torso was thick with heavy muscle, but his legs were slim and flexible. Runner’s legs. Like all Wanderer’s, he would be fast, she knew. Fast and tough. No beast could ever get the better of his kind, no matter how unnatural its appetite.

“I misspoke,” she corrected. “None of my children are lost, but three of them have been killed.” Voice growing tight in her throat, a sob threatened to break free. She clinched her hands into fists again, pressed her lips together until they hurt.

The Wanderer waited patiently until Valerai beat her grief back into the barricaded vault where she kept it hidden away during the daylight hours.

“You must be careful,” she finally warned. “There’s a beast out there. A killer. It’s killed my children. My husband is looking for it, but he’s hunted these last three months to no avail.” She felt stiff and cold and somewhat distant from the subject she was discussing. Sometimes, it almost seemed as if it were not her children she spoke of. Sometimes none of the desolation and isolation surrounding her seemed quite real.

“Worry not, milady.” The Wanderer pulled a long bladed knife from somewhere on his person. His hand moved so fast that she had not a clue where the knife had been hidden. He twirled the knife between his fingers, flicked his hand, and the knife was mysteriously gone. “A Wanderer I am. There be no beastie out there that can have the hurting of Old Tomtom. More than one has tried, and I’m here to tell you that none succeeded.”

Valerai nodded. His answer was the one she had expected, but the warning had needed to be given. “I’m afraid dinner isn’t ready. I don’t expect my husband until nightfall. Would you be interested in eating with us later?”

“Why, I do believe that I would be.” Tomtom flashed her a smile that had the sun and the moon and all the blessings of the virtuous Gods in it. “I believe I just might like to do that very thing. Is it that dinner will be at dusk then?”


“It won’t be until full dark. You’re welcome to eat with us, and to stay the night too.”

“Then I will see you when the sun falls down and the night air is filled with the delicious aroma of your fine cooking.” Tomtom lifted a hand to his head and tipped his ridiculous hat at her. “Until then, I will smell around to find a trace of this troublesome beast. It’s a mighty sharp nose us Wanderer’s have, and sharp eyes too.”

Turning back towards the wheat field, he loped off with an easy stride that put human running to shame. With a small swish and a slight stirring, his small body pushed into the stalks and quickly disappeared.

Valerai half raised her hand.

“Thank you,” she called belatedly. “Thank you for bringing my daughter back.”

Silence. Only the rustle of wind blowing through standing wheat answered her.

***

“Leave me alone!”

Still agitated, Valerai grabbed Hanna and pulled her back down to where she could get a good look at her daughter’s head.

“You’re going to stay still, young lady. I’ll not have you spreading lice to your brother.”

Parting the child’s hair with impatient fingers, Valerai began searching, but not for long. Hanna was infested. In only a few moments Valerai found half a dozen lice, and far too many nits.

“First thing after we eat, it’s a kerosene shampoo for you.” Letting the girl go, she looked to the fireplace in time to see that her youngest child was just as incorrigible as Hanna. “Roland! Get away from there!”

Roland giggled and willfully ignored her order. Pulling a burning stick from the blaze, he held it proudly overhead and waved it through the air. “Look momma.”

Valerai grabbed a wooden stirring spoon and whacked it against the tabletop to catch his attention.

“Put! That! Back! Now!”

Roland’s eyes grew large when she punctuated each word with a whack of her spoon.”

“Uh-oh. Mommy Banger.”

Fighting back both a glare and a smile, Valerai pointed the spoon warningly at him just as the door opened.

“I thought I was the one who was supposed to do the knocking.”

Valerai jerked her head around to see Gerd limping through the open door. Cheeks red from the cold, a powdering of snow dusted his graying hair and a touch of frost lined his mustache. Stepping inside, he gently closed the door before pulling free of his heavy coat.

“I swear my blood flows slower every year,” he complained as he hung the coat up on a peg by the door. “Here I was congratulating myself on how well I felt today, and then the wind picked up. It seemed like the temperature dropped about six hundred and fifty two degrees in half a minute. I thought that was bad enough, but then the dad-blamed snow started falling again. Fell so thick I almost lost the trail.” Hands outstretched, he limped toward the fire where Roland had, thankfully, deposited his burning stick. His steps were slow, painful, speaking of damaged legs and ill-used muscles.

“Oh Gerd! Look what you’ve done to yourself.” Valerai jumped to her feet and hurried over so she could ease him into a chair near the fire. “I don’t know why you and Mar insist on going out there when you both know the weather is chancy right now. This cold is absolutely horrible on your leg.”

Gerd’s weight settled onto her arm as he eased himself down with a satisfied sigh. “Thank you Miss,” he said gratefully. He stared into the flames for a few quiet moments, sighed again, and then caught her eyes with his own. “Them was my kids too, even if they had none of my blood in them. You folks are all the family I ever had. I tell you, Miss, it just tears me up seeing the gloom around this place. The love you all had was something to see. Yes it was. It was something to see, and it‘s a crime that something this bad has happened to break it apart.” He rubbed a callused hand across his eyes. “Besides, cold or not, I’m more than needed out there. If it wasn’t for me, we never would have found that fellow half buried in the snow.”

Valerai started. “What fellow?” Could Tomtom have come to trouble?

Gerd hunched himself closer to the heat. “Tall man that was dressed like he had no idea what snow and cold are about. The poor fellow looks to be half starved. He’s some beat up, and that’s the truth.” Releasing a low groan, he stretched out his left leg, wincing with the movement of it. Valerai grinned with sympathy because she knew just how badly that leg was injured. There had been many an occasion during these last two years when she had worked her fingers into its knots as she rubbed liniment into Gerd’s reddened flesh. Every time she heard Gerd suck in a painful breath she was struck anew by guilt because his leg had been perfectly fine when he hired on with them five years earlier. Gerd had been a prime man with cattle and horses, an excellent worker when building needed to be done, until she asked him to break a wild stallion Mar had caught in a blind canyon.

Disaster. The stallion did the breaking instead of Gerd. The stallion tossed him like he was a broken toy, and then after Gerd hit the ground, it reared and stamped on him until Marvale leaped in to kill it with a handheld arrow. From where she watched Valerai thought it took close to forever for Mar to intervene, though in truth she knew it could not have been longer than a few seconds.

More than a year passed before Gerd regained much use of his leg, but even then there was nothing they could do to make it totally right.

“Mar’s bringing the stranger in now,” Gerd said. “Draped the man across his own saddle, and Mar, he’s walking real careful so as to not shake the fellow around too much. Told me to go on ahead and get myself warm. I think that maybe it would be best to have something hot ready when they get here. Broth maybe. Don’t look to me like the man will be able to take much more than broth for the next few days.”

“I’ll do just that thing,” Valerai instantly said, glad of the opportunity for doing something constructive. “Why don’t you sit there and get warm while I throw together something you can eat?”

Gerd nodded. “Thanks Val.”

Valerai went to work. Going to the cupboard, she pulled out the last of the smoked beef and unwrapped it from the parchment with mixed feelings. The steer it had come from was one of theirs, but they had not killed it. Like her children, the steer had been savaged and then ignored, by the Beast. The Beast, it seemed, killed for the pure enjoyment of the slaughter. Not once had they run across its work where it had actually fed. Every time Valerai ate a piece of that beef she thought of her children and her stomach became ill. She cooked it anyway because food was food, no matter the manner of its killing.

Valerai never heard the horse arrive. Her first clue that Marvale was home came when he stumbled through the door with a limp figure draped across one shoulder.

“Val, turn down the bed and pile up the blankets? We have a hurt man here.”

“Got it hon.” Why had she not thought of those things before? Gerd had mentioned broth, so that was all she had thought of preparing, but it was obvious that a man who had to be carried across a saddle was not capable of sitting up in a chair to eat. She wished she were as wise as Mar, and, like always, she wondered what he saw in her that set him to courting because she was only dull brass when compared to his shinning gold.

With a flick of her hand, she brushed back several fly away strands of russet hair out of her eyes before rushing to the back addition. Working quickly, she had the bed turned down before Marvale had time to reach the bedroom door. She stepped back when he approached the bed, and then stepped forward to help him ease the disheveled man onto her mattress. The man rolled limply when he was released. His arm flopped free, and then she was looking at one of the most horrifically scarred faces she had ever seen. He looked evil, wicked, but the shape and nature of his scars told her they were not from battle or high spirited devilry.

No, she was quite familiar with scars like those since Marvale wore a few of his own. In his younger days he had collected a number of battle wounds when he traveled the outlaw trail for a few short years. In fact, he still had contact with a few of the more successful bands, several of which sometimes tried to recruit Mar for some peculiarly difficult job. One of those, a fellow named Harlo, had attempted that very task only a the week previous.

So the scars she looked at now did not come from battle. That meant they had been deliberately applied through torture, which left the question, who had done the torturing, and why?

And were those people chasing him now?

Valerai shuddered at the thought and wanted to order Mar to toss the man back into the snow, but the maternal in her looked upon the still body, saw no slight rise and fall to the stranger’s chest, and knew that it would be his death if he was not cared for.

Mar pulled up the sheet and the blankets.

“Are you sure he’s still alive?” she asked doubtfully. “He doesn’t look alive to me.” He was certainly deathly cold. The frightened part of her hoped he was not alive, but the practical part hoped he was. The last thing Mar needed was the backbreaking work of digging another grave in the frozen ground. The seven and two knew Gerd would not be able to help with that task, not with his leg acting up the way it had been of late.

“He’s alive,” Marvale replied, running a hand across his forehead and front bangs, wiping away a few traces of sweaty moisture. “He’s alive, but damned if I know why. A man dressed like him, passed out on the trail at these heights, he should have been dead long ago.”

Valerai placed her hand over the man’s mouth and held still with concentration. Yes, she decided after a few moments. Maybe he was breathing. A touch of warm air seemed to brush her palm.

“Where are the kids?” Marvale’s voice sounded sharp with worry. Valerai winced at her callousness for not immediately letting him know they were safe. He was away almost every day, ignoring the demands of land and cattle because three of his children had died in the last three months. After sacrificing himself like that, he needed to know he was loved and appreciated and that the children were receiving good care.

“They’re in the loft,” she said. “I haven’t heard them screech at each other for a while, so I think they’re asleep.”

Frowning at his look of relief, Valerai knew she could not hide the day‘s events from him, no matter how much she dreaded his reaction. “Hanna ran off today, looking for you. A Wanderer found her and brought her home. We talked for a bit and when he found out about the children he said he would sniff around for scent of the Beast, and that he’d be back for supper tonight.”

Marvale’s body tensed. “What do you mean she got lost? Damn it woman, why aren’t you keeping an eye on our children? I won’t have it Val. You only have one job to do, and I expect you to do it. You’re to keep my children safe.”

Valerai cringed beneath the onslaught. He was right, and he was wrong. Yes, it was her job to see to the children, but she had food to gather and cook. She had laundry and dishes and chickens and cleaning and a thousand other chores that he did not see her do because he was seldom home. Seething on a low boil, she struggled between a desire to snap back at him, and the need to understand that he was cold and tired and frustrated and sick at heart. She struggled to voice her thoughts, could not. Cringing before the onslaught, she submissively bowed her head, resenting the harsh words that flowed over her while her own unspoken words caught in her throat.

Warmth flowed over the back of her hand. A stir of air. She looked down to see flat black orbs open, staring sightlessly up into the rafters of the cabin. The blankets stirred with the rising of the stranger’s chest, and then they lifted as his body arched slightly. A small cough broke free from between his lips.

“Is this the mill?” the stranger whispered. “Clothes.”

Shuddering slightly, his eyes closed, and then he was still once more.

Gently, Valerai pulled her hand back and gently tucked the sheet tighter to his body before looking at her disapproving husband. “I suppose I should slip some warm bricks in there with him. Once he wakes up I can probably get some clear broth down him too, but I won‘t promise how much.”

“Then you had best get to it,” Marvale said. “I want to see my children.” Turning abruptly, he stalked toward the bedroom door, pausing briefly to glace at the door’s locking bar, specifically built to give them privacy from the children. “I suppose we won’t be needing that anytime soon.” He left, without sparing her another glance.

Get to it indeed. More than three months had passed since they were last intimate, not since shortly before Linner was killed. It wasn’t her fault. None of this was her fault, but Mar sometimes acted as if it was.

Resentment bubbled up within her, but Valerai ruthlessly beat it down. Marvale was not always so abrupt or uncaring. He was tired and worried. She owed him consideration for the things he had done for the family. He was a good man, and she owned a short temper that sometimes did not understand reason.

Two hours later, dinner was eaten in strained silence. The Wanderer did not show.

****

Two days after he had been given the gift of a bed and warmth, Jolson decided that it was time to sit up. The effort called for all the energy he possessed and almost all of his will. Once he succeeded, he cursed the body weaknesses to which the surface dwellers were prone. Sickness and exhaustion were foreign to him. They were concepts he knew only from his talks with the dead during those few times when he was trusted to see to their placement within hell‘s deep caverns. He had listened and hardly heard their endless chattering because frailties belonged to others, to humans who were weak in body and mind. They were not things that happened to Demon-Changed mortals born to the Damned servants of Athos. In hell, the injured either quickly healed or died. There was no in-between.

Until now.

Jolson mentally cursed the weakness of his surface dwelling body and wished he could use the hook to heal himself, but that was impossible. His hell-wrought hook allowed him to effect the bodies of others. It allowed him to manipulate and to change those around him, but he could not use it on himself without filtering it through the body of another, for that use would mean his death.

If he died his soul would descend to the netherworld. Once there, it would become the unfleshed property of Athos. This he would not allow. He would heal. He would accept the care of the ones who had taken him in. He would learn.

The door opened and Gerd shuffled into the bedroom.

“Going out on the hunt again,” Gerd said. “I just stopped in to see if there were anything you needed.”

“I am hungry,” Jolson replied.

“I’ll take care of that,” the woman, Valerai, told him as she entered the room. “We’ll give you a little solid food today. Not too much, mind you. Too much food all at once will only make you sicker. Still and all, I’m willing to bet that you’ll be on your feet in just a few more days.”

“Then I need nothing from you,” Jolson told Gerd. He turned his eyes to the woman. “I do not want your small ones in this room. Their noise disturbs me.”

She bristled. “I’ll see what I can do. Just remember that they’re bored and frustrated children. You can also remember that this is their home, and that you’re our guest.”

The children, Jolson thought, needed to face the discipline of hell. These people were soft with their young. It was a wonder so many of them survived to adulthood.

“Get me some food,” he ordered. “I will not get stronger unless you feed me.”

Gerd grimaced. “I suppose I’d best get going. Val, Marvale and I are going to head in different directions today. He wants to travel a little further out, only my leg isn’t up to the trip.” He shrugged. “I suppose we both stand about equal chances of finding the thing.”

Val nodded. Jolson did not respond, so Gerd eventually left. Once the big man was gone Valerai met Jolson’s stare. She answered his rudeness with a smile. “I haven’t seen a bedridden man yet who wasn’t cross as a sore toothed bear. You wait right there. I’ll see what I can rustle up.”

She left for a short while, returned with food, and left again, closing the door behind her. That closing was not enough. Even through those two inch thick solid planks he could hear her working in the outer cabin while her brood squabbled and fought.

There was no understanding humans, but they were at least accomplished enough to provide him with food.

At first, his hands shook when he brought the soup-laden spoon to his lips, but he soon steadied because the soup was surprisingly good and provided some of the energy he desperately needed. When his bowl sat empty before him, Jolson set down his spoon and called for the woman to bring him more soup.

“You’re going to get sick,” she admonished when she came to see what he wanted, but, as expected, she did exactly as he desired.

The day was more than half over when Roland pounced into the room.

“Hi,” he said in a voice laden with baby tones.

Jolson swallowed another piece of broth softened meat and eyed the small child doubtfully. It looked tender and he was still hungry, but looks could be deceiving. Besides, he still needed the adult’s protection. “I don’t want you in here.”

Roland’s face screwed up tight. His eyes squinted and then his mouth opened and then he started crying. The high pitched cries pierced Jolson’s throbbing head until he wanted to leap from the bed and throttle the brat.

Almost instantly Valerai came bursting into the room. “Roland! You know you’re not supposed to be in here. You leave Mr. Jolson alone or I’ll swat your behind.”

Roland quieted and looked thoughtful. “Hanna gone,” he said in a wise attempt to redirect trouble.

“What! Where did she go?” Valerai turned to Jolson. “If Hanna’s gone I have to go look for her. You watch Roland.”

She left so quickly that Jolson did not have time to refuse her command.

Too weak to stand erect, Jolson eyed Roland doubtfully. Was the child too stupid to see to its own needs? What was he supposed to do with the boy?

“Stay away from me,” he ordered.

Still wise, Roland nodded.

***

“Hanna!”

“God’s curse that child,” Valerai trotted through wheat that should have been harvested months ago. Hanna could not be too far away. The girl was too young to have made much distance. On the other hand, though Hanna’s mind was slow, she was canny enough to realize that she would be in serious trouble once her mother caught up to her. It would be very like the child to settle down and hide when she heard Valerai’s calls.

“Hanna!” Her voice was dead to her ears. Thick air and old wheat and nearby trees muffled the sound. Could Hanna even hear her?

Oh gods, what was Marvale going to say this time? There was no way he wouldn’t blame her for Hanna’s escape, and he would be right. She knew Hanna liked to run. By the gods, if she ever caught up to the girl she would tie a rope around her waist. Just see if she didn’t.

Sweating despite the chill, Valerai left the wheat and crossed the small cleared edge of the field to enter the trees. For some reason Val did not understand, Hanna almost always went for the trees.

The stench of sour animal was in the air. It wafted around her, seeming almost thick enough to cling to her clothes and hair. Valerai‘s heart stilled with fear, and then she began running, screaming-“Hanna! Where are you baby? Hanna!”

“Momma.” Faint, but not too far away. Off to her right, so she had been running in the wrong direction.

Panting, Valerai stood still for several moments so her breathing would quiet. She listened to the sound of the woods. Rustle of wind through leafless branches and a creak when some of those branches rubbed against one another. Off in the distance several woodpeckers beat a staccato rhythm into dead trunks.

A branch cracked beneath something walking-and then another.

Jerking her head around, Valerai saw two does watching her curiously…until the wind shifted and the animal stench hanging thick around Valerai passed their way. Almost instantly, white flags went up and the deer bounded away.

“Hanna, honey,” she called in careful tones. “Where are you?”

The breeze swirled and snow drifted.

“Hanna?”

She held her breath. A whisper of sound touched her ears. Turning her head slightly, she caught more.

“Momma--momma--momma--momma--momma--”

“Coming baby,” Valerai whispered. “Keep calling mamma.” She followed the small voice with careful footsteps, cursing her unthinking panic. By the gods, she was an adult woman. She should have taken time for thought. She should have brought her ax, but she had been frightened and in a hurry because her daughter was missing and so she had acted instead of thought. Now she had nothing but her feet and her hands and a mother’s drive to protect her child because she been so stupid that she had left the ax laying in the snow beside the maple.

Movement. A flash of light blue.

Hanna!

“Momma--” Relief washed through Valerai’s body, making her knees want to collapse, only--there was still that animal’s musk in the air.

Tears lining the smooth flow of her face, Hanna stood before her. Eyes wild, Valerai grabbed her daughter and tried to see everywhere at once, but there was nothing to be seen. Heart pounding heavily, Hanna held tight to her chest, Valerai started backing away.

“Honey, we have to go back to the cabin. Hanna, we have to go.”

“What about--what about the man?”

Valerai’s eyes narrowed. “What man?”

“The little man.” Hanna tried to look brave, broke her resolve, and sobbed. Raising one small arm, she pointed with a shaking finger. “I think he’s deading, mama.”

Against her will, Valerai’s eyes followed the pointing finger until they rested on a dark figure laying amid dead and trampled ferns, half covered in snow. Pulling Hanna behind her, unbelieving, frightened, she started walking, slowly neared the body with a horrified scream caught tight in her throat.

Tomtom.

A dusting of snow lay on top of the Wanderer’s ripped open body. The corpse was not fresh. It was old and frozen and partially chewed by some of the smaller animals. He had lain her for some time. For days. Tomtom must have died only minutes after she had spoken to him. While they were talking, the beast must have watched.

She felt faint. The body before her could have been hers. Worse yet, it could have been Hanna’s.

By the seven gods and two, what kind of animal was it that could kill a Wanderer. From what she had heard, even hellborn avoided offending them.

The stench of the Beast hung in the still air. The thing was near. It was watching. Watching her. Watching them.

“Honey, we have to go. We have to go now.” Her voice sounded strained, her throat constricted.

“But what about--?”

“Your father will take care of Tomtom.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.” Valerai tasted blood. She had bitten through her lip. “Come with me. Now!”

Wuff

She backed away slowly, hating the loud sound of her steps on the crusted snow and underlying leaves, wishing there was more snow, softer snow to drown out the sound of their progress.

The air stirred. Musk assaulted her nostrils. Leaves rustled.

Wuff Wuff

Stopping, Valerai looked carefully around, saw nothing, and thought her knees would give out beneath her. Drawing in a deep breath, she took another careful step forward.

Wuff

A dark form briefly showed itself, and Valerai screamed.

She screamed and she lifted Hanna higher into her arms and she ran with everything that was in her soul.

“You can’t have her! You can’t have her!”

Her feet pounded on the forest floor as she dodged around skeletal trunks, and then the trees were behind her. Her running legs tore through the dead wheat. Stalks shredded before her. Behind her, she heard other stalks being torn and broken. A panting laughing wuff wuff, thudding of feet, the Beast was growing closer! It was almost on them!

“DAMN YOU!” she shouted, spinning on her heals, ready to kill the thing by ramming her own foot down its throat and to hell with the damage it did to her…

“MAAAMAAA!”

…but it was no longer there.

“Hush baby. Hush,“ Valerai whispered.

Wuff Wuff Wuff

“You Bastard.”

There was no question. The Beast was playing with her, just like it had been playing with her family for months, but its game was almost over. Before long, on this day, it was going to kill her and Hanna--and it was laughing. Most likely it would laugh right up to the moment when it tore their body’s open, and it would probably wait until just before they reached the cabin door before it did that.

Walking slowly backwards, she watched the wheat stalks around her, waiting for something to move, waiting for some sign of where the Beast might be.

Twenty feet to her right, stalks bent and broke when something suddenly surged forward.

Turning towards the cabin, Valerai ran like hell.

Cold air tore at her lungs. Her legs trembled with the effort of running, slipping on the snow, breaking ground through the wheat.

Hanna screamed. “MOMMAMOMMAMOMMAMOMMA!”

“Shut Up,” Valerai gasped. “Just Shut Up.”

Footsteps were close behind her. The sharp crack of breaking stalks. Panting breath sounded in her ears. Too close. Too close-and then it backed away, only to draw closer again.

Breaking free of the wheat, Valerai raced for the maple tree just as a roar sounded only yards away.

“Mamamamamama!”

Desperate, she flung Hanna from her and dove to the side. A laughing growl sounded as something large and clawed missed her by inches. The Beast’s shadow passed by her as her shoulder drove painfully into the ground and her hands scrambled beneath the snow.

“Hanna, run to the cabin!”

Teeth snapped and her thigh ripped open, but by the gods, her hands were on the ax she had thrown there on the day the Wanderer brought Hanna home.

Throwing back her head, Valerai screeched when teeth drove cruelly into her leg. Twisting to the side, she swung the ax with every ounce of her failing strength. The ax landed awkwardly. Its blade drove into a shoulder at a bad angle, but it landed and blood spurted.

Crying out, the Beast leaped back, jerking the ax from her hands.

Several feet away, the Beast howled misery.

It howled and rolled on the ground, ax blade and handle turning and spinning as the Beast beat itself against the ground, driving the blade deeper until the handle struck against the maple tree. Jarred, the ax pulled free, dropped away, and blood spurted from a hairy shoulder. Stilling, the Beast turned its malevolent eyes on her. Black orbs smoldered dark hatred. It’s long muzzle parted, lost its snarl, and then the Beast silently laughed. Its wound shoulder bled, slowed, stopped. Unbelieving, Valerai watched torn flesh reseal. The Beast chuckled, dripping her blood from its open mouth.

With a jerk of her head towards the cabin Valerai saw that Hanna was gone. For once, the child had followed orders.

Valerai sprang to her feet, darting toward the cabin, stumbling when her wounded leg threatened to give way, but by damn if she was going to let it deny her. Cursing the leg, she forced it to obey her will. Limping, running, she looked desperately over her shoulder to see the Beast leap, but it landed on a leg that was not entirely healed. The leg collapsed, throwing the beast to the ground while it released a maddened howl. She turned her eyes forward just in time to grab the cabin door and push it violently open.

Gasping for breath, leg on fire, desperate and bleeding, Valerai pulled herself inside, slammed the door behind her, and threw her weight against it.

“Hanna, GET ME THE BAR!”

Outside, the beast howled, and then the door shuddered against her resisting weight, opened an inch, two, and then Valerai’s straining legs forced it closed once more.

“THE BAR HANNA! GET ME THE BAR!”

She jerked her head around only to see that Hanna and Roland were gone. The bar lay on the floor more than four feet away, too far to be within her reach. She yelled defiance when the door shook again, harder. This time it sprang open for several inches before she was able to brace her feet and shove it back closed, but it did not close. Instead, it banged awkwardly into the doorframe, held at an angle by the strength of her legs and the bruises on her shoulder.

Horrified, Valerai’s gaze followed the door’s outline until it fastened on a leather hinge that was ripped halfway through.

Gods no. Let it hold.

Her injured leg felt weak, was growing weaker. Stars swirled around her eyes. She could not hold this door for much longer, but the bedroom had its bar and Jolson was in there. The children would have run to an adult so they would be with Jolson.

Risking it all, she let go of the door and sprinted for the bedroom. Behind her the door opened with a splintering crash. A swift look over her shoulder showed the Beast throwing itself into the cabin. It was faster than she had imagined. Far faster. She wasn’t even halfway to the bedroom yet.

The Beast leaped through the air, long front claws stretched toward her. Valerai screamed, screamed again when claws sank into her shoulders, and then the Beast’s weight and momentum drove her forward, slammed her into the bedroom doorframe hard enough to crack a rib.

Mouth gaping open, Valerai fell into the room while her children’s terrified screams reached her. Claws tore into her body. With her face pressed tight against the wooden floor, the Beast’s claws ripped her back open. She tried to swing an arm around, but she had no strength, no leverage, and the world around her was black sparkles and bursting lights. She was dying, and her children were screaming, and--

The room suddenly filled with a flash of sickly green light.

The Beast released an anguished howl. Claws ripped free from her flesh as the Beast flung itself backwards, crashed into the wall, and howled again at another flash of green. It screamed, and Valerai’s immobile head was able to look on while the Beast’s claws tried to rip their way through the bedroom wall. Blood shot out of the wound in its shoulder, reopened as miraculously as it had earlier been healed. Collapsing to the floor, the Beast whimpered pitiously with pain. One front claw slipped around the open doorframe, and the Beast laboriously pulled itself through the door before Valerai’s failing lungs had a chance to draw their final breath.

The room stilled. The only sound she heard was the roughness of her failing lungs, the quiet sobbing of her children; her still living children.

“Hush--babies,” she whispered, feeling surprised that there was no pain. Around her, the world was a distant dream, misty and unreal. Valerai wanted to close her eyes and fade away, but her children were crying. They were crying.

Scraping, a fall, and then she heard the sound of crab crawling hands and feet. Jolson’s indistinct face hovered over her; his scars seemed to form a swirling pattern that somehow had form and meaning, but her failing mind refused to puzzle it out. Jolson’s eyes, however, were very clear. They were flat, dead, and uncaring.

She raised a shaking hand, lay it on his face, rested it on scars that spoke of more torment and pain than she could even now imagine. “Please. Don’t let it kill my babies,” she whispered. “Promise me. Don’t let it--”

Jolson’s voice was distant. It sounded frail and flat, but she heard it with all the mother’s hope she held within her soul.

“I can help you…for a price. I can help you live.”

She stared, uncomprehending.

“A piece of your soul.” His whisper was a low caress shivering against her dying skin. “Only a small piece--you will live and the Beast will kill neither of your children.”

Give? Her soul? Valerai felt like laughing and crying all at the same time. She wondered how much she had left to give. She had given everything. She was dying. Her soul was riddled shreds vainly clinging to life.

“Take what you will,” she whispered, closing her eyes for the last time. “Save…my…babies.”

Just as her last word faded away, jade light flared dully through her closed lids. It drew closer, pulled on her, forcing her to open her eyes again.

Only to see something that frightened her more than even the prospect of death. Jolson was fighting his hook. His wrist quivered as he forced the hook’s tip into her torn open body, but it fought back, fought to escape her flesh, fought remain true to its making. Weariness wracked Jolson’s face, but his determination did not waver.

The children were silent, still.

The hook sank an inch, and then two. With a monstrous screech, Jolson shoved and the hook deep and then Valerai screamed with lungs that held no air. Her flesh pulled back from the hook’s horrid touch; her soul quailed and she tried to scream out that she did not mean it. She did not want to divide her soul, but then that Damned Thing, wielded by a Mortal Damned, ripped precious parts of her being away.

Forever.

***

A month later Valerai sat set her crutch aside and gratefully lowered herself into her chair because even now the pain of her injuries made her forehead break out in a sweat. After settling into her seat, she wondered once again why she was still alive. Both Mar and Gerd agreed that her survival was impossible. It was miraculous. She had scars on her shoulders, a large chunk was missing from her leg, and her Beast chewed kidney had been found laying on the floor. She should have died from blood loss, from shock, from destroyed organs and flesh rot, but she lived, and for that living, she was grateful.

“Now what do I do?” Jolson asked from the kitchen countertop.

“You need to stir in the milk,” she said. “Don’t beat it up or the pancakes will be tough.”

Jolson looked rough. He looked almost as bad as she felt, but this month had seen a change in him. His eyes sometimes showed life. His voice was no longer empty of tone. Somehow, in some way, he seemed much more alive. It almost felt as if he had never been fully aware before.

Valerai smiled sadly as she watched the man. A month had passed. Her memory was clouded, but she was sure of one thing. The Beast was gone. It was gone because she had stood up to it, because she had put an ax head into its flesh, because she had overcome her fears to defend the lives of her children without help from her men.

Marvale called her a hero, as well he might, for where was he when she was fighting for the lives of their children. Gerd said he had never heard of such a thing, and then he lifted the very ax she had used. He now carried it with him when he hunted for the wounded Beast. For luck, he said. This ax was something the Beast would always remember.

They were hunting now. When they returned at night Marvale’s eyes were always black with exhaustion. Gerd’s limp had grown worse, but neither of them were willing to call an end to the chase. She seldom saw either man for more than a few moments each day. They were driven by a desperate need for vengeance against a thing only she had dared face.

Pointlessly driven, she was sure. The Beast would not be back. She had seen to that.

“A drop of water on the pan to check for temperature?” Jolson asked. She nodded agreement, stilling her angry impatience. Jolson deserved any learning she was able to give him. This last month had proved him to be a caring man. In fact, he was more attentive to the children than Marvale had ever been.

She frowned at the thought of her husband. Marvale was the one who deserved her growing ire. This month had torn the veil from her eyes.

Ever since they got married Marvale had expected too many things of her, and given back too little. He presented an appearance of warmth and caring, but inside, he was an empty shell. Jolson was different, almost an opposite. He looked and sounded cold, but he was good with the children. He took an interest in them, especially Roland. Jolson cared for the children while Marvale spent his days pretending to hunt a beast he was too frightened to truly seek.

Leaning her head back, Valerai closed her eyes while Jolson poured batter into the pan. She felt tired. She felt very, very tired. It was so hard to keep herself together when the people around her were falling apart.

“Would it be okay if I took Roland out today?” Jolson asked. “We’ve had a bit of a thaw this last week, and I want to chase down some roots.”

“Take him,” Valerai murmured, too tired, too weak for more. Of all her men, she most trusted Jolson with the children. “The Beast is dead. Go.”

She drifted and then she slept, and while she slept she dreamed that everything she knew was a lie.

Several hours later, she woke to the feel of a hand upon her shoulder.

“Where’s Roland?” Marvale asked quietly.

“Roland?”

“Valerai, how many times must I--?”

“Out,” she said with sudden memory. “He’s out. With Jolson--hunting for roots.”

“But Jolson could be stealing Roland, taking him to the woman at the mill. You know he is obsessed with going there. Then there is the Beast--”

“IT‘S DEAD!” Instant anger roiled through her. “I killed it. The Beast is dead. It’s dead, and Jolson is only hunting roots.”

“It’s not dead and Roland’s out there where--”

Anger exploding, Valerai half rose from her chair. Her back screeched with protest, but she damn well did not care. Her arm flashed around, palm cracking solidly against Marvale’s cheek. Jerking back, he cried out in surprised pain. She grabbed his hair, pulled his head down to her face.

“Leave me alone!” she shrieked, enjoying the shock on his despised face. “Just leave me alone!”

His face tightened, hardened. He moved away, set his hat on his head, grabbed his bow.

“I’m going after my son.”

The door was not silent when it closed.

****

Jolson walked at a carefully sedate pace. He felt weak, but time would heal the weariness within him. Spring had not yet arrived, but he was sure he would survive because there was a thaw and he had spent this last month learning the ways of the world he now lived in. When she gifted him with a piece of her soul, Valerai had given him the essence he needed to completely hide his mental signature from Athos’ hunters. Along with it she had given him knowledge that ensured his survival. In exchange he had warped her thoughts and stolen her child.

Strangely, those acts troubled him, and that troubling gave him worry. The little virtue he had pulled from her soul should have been lost amid the vast turmoil of evil that filled his being. Instead, that virtue had taken hold, had rooted, and now sought to grow like a cankerous nest of worms, sucking away his vitality for its own use.

“Hungry,” Roland said.

“Shut up,” Jolson snapped. He detested the child. His ill-conceived oath to protect Valerai’s hateful brood had trapped him because the Beast still lived but was not returning, so Jolson could not fulfill his part of the bargain unless he forced the issue. If matters remained unchanged, he would be trapped in that cabin until the minions of Zorce and Athos came to rend his soul.

So now, Roland by his side, he hunted. For the last several hours he had followed a trail of Evil that only eyes trained in hell could see. That following had led him here, to this snow filled clearing where dozens of the Beast’s trails merged. It was here that he found a hole cut deep into the earth beneath the spreading branches of a huge pine tree. The Beast was intelligent, but like all things of nature, instinct would often rule. That instinct would insist that it own a lair on the remote chance that a female of its kind happened by.

“Stay still,” he ordered Roland as he released the boy’s hand. He reached out with his senses, feeling, drawing, calling them both in. At the end of his arm his hook glowed faintly, casting eerie shadows against the stark outlines of winter stripped trees. Beside him, Roland cried softly, and that was as it should be.

There was a shifting of shadows, movement, the soft sound of careful footsteps.

Jolson stiffened, extinguished his hook, and turned slowly.

“The little fellow is a bit far from home,” Gerd said amicably from twenty feet away, his hands wrapped around the handle of Valerai’s ax. “I’m surprised Valerai allowed him to come this far with you.”

“She doesn‘t know how far I‘ve brought him,” Jolson answered.

When Gerd’s eyes narrowed Jolson wondered if he should have spoken at all. The words he had said were not those he had intended to use. They were truth, and at this moment truth was the last thing he wanted Gerd to hear. Within his mind, thin worms slithered onto new pathways.

“You took him then,” Gerd calmly observed. “You stole their child from them.” He chuckled. “How ironic, the guard becomes a thief.” Cocking his head to one side, he looked Jolson over with a steady predator’s gaze. “It‘s almost as ironic as the hunted becoming the hunter.” He smiled, and Jolson saw that his mouth already held fangs.

Gerd’s thick fingers reached up to unbutton his shirt. “Look,” he said, pulling his shirt open and pointing to his left shoulder. “Healed up by nature instead of magic. Right now, there isn’t a thing you can do to me with that devilish hook of yours unless you cut me open first.” He chuckled again. “The chances of you doing that are slim. You’re in no shape for a fight against something like me.”

“I won’t try to kill you,” Jolson promised. “I want you to let me leave.” He shrugged and gestured toward Roland. “I brought the child as an offering to the Beast.” Pausing, he gave Gerd a knowing look. “You want him, don’t you? You want all of them.”

“I want them,” Gerd admitted, “though I doubt you know why.”

“They were happy and whole, and you are alone and wretched,” Jolson answered. “The sight of their happiness curdled your gut. Every time you saw them laugh, and every time you saw them embrace, it made your bitterness grow. You wanted to kill them because your curse will never allow you to know joy or contentment or peace that will equal what they once owned.”

Shrugging, Gerd smiled and pulled his shirt together. “Close enough,” he admitted. “You sound like you’ve been there yourself.”

“You are controlled by Evil. I control it,” Jolson said. “Your blood runs hot where mine is cold. We are different, but we are the same because our lives are ruled by foul designs and perverse pleasures.” He gestured to the woods and the sky around them and frowned. “The world offers you nothing better than what you already own. There is no hope for more.”

Lowering his eyes, he studied the hook attached to his arm. Black depression flooded through him. Life and circumstances had gifted him with a foul soul and a dark heart. Desperation and curiosity had driven him to replace his hand with a hook of damned metal so he could free himself from hell.

Roland started crying louder. Looking down on the child, Jolson allowed his dark mood its outlet. He gestured toward Gerd.

“Roland is yours.” The invading worms crawling through his being demanded truth. “I give him to you,” he added, “for now.”

“For always,” Gerd answered. “All of them are mine. I’ll kill him, and then I’ll kill you, and your hook can be damned.”

“It already is,” Jolson warned, but his words were ignored for Gerd was completing his change.

Within moments, Gerd’s face elongated. A muzzle poked forth. Hair grew, and Jolson watched with dispassionate interest as clothing absorbed into a body that was suddenly twice as large and four times as heavy as it had been before. Hungry drool ran from the Beast’s rat mouth.

When he saw this, Roland began screaming in earnest. Almost as if the screams were an unbearable enticement, the Beast took a step toward them, and then another. At that, Roland sprang erect, tried to run, but was stopped by Jolson’s hand on his shoulder.

“There is no escape,” Jolson said. A flicker of something strange ran through him. Could this be emotion? “You are for the Beast.”

With a jerk of his arm, he flung Roland away.

The screeching boy hit the ground at Gerd‘s feet. He tried to scramble away but his small body was too slow. Clawed feet pinned him roughly to the earth. Roland, screamed once more, and then he quieted, shaking, looking up to the changed features of a man he loved.

The Beast looked down at the boy, chuckling deep in its throat. It looked back to Jolson, still chuckling, opened its mouth. “I like the suffering best. I like to hear them scream.”

“I know,” Jolson said truthfully. “I wouldn’t have brought the boy with me if I thought you understood quick death and mercy.”

Lowering its head, the Beast slowly sank its fangs into Roland’s shoulder. Instantly, Roland stopped screaming. His mouth opened in silent shock. His neck arched while teeth ground deeper into his flesh. After several shocked, unbelieving moments, Roland’s lungs released another long scream. The sound of his shriek tore at the worms creeping near Jolson’s heart.

When Roland’s lungs emptied and his scream became a piteous squeak, the Beast released its hold on his shoulder and raised its grinning mouth. Blood stained its jet black lips, glistened on its tongue. “She struck me there,” Gerd said conversationally. “In the shoulder. She tried to kill me with her ax, but you and I know I can‘t die from mortal wounds.” It laughed again, lowered its head to lick with a forked tongue at the blood streaming from Roland's shoulder.

Jolson smiled tiredly because the Beast had just sealed its fate. Seeing the smile, the Beast raised its head to look at him suspiciously.

“It’s over,” Jolson told it.

Leaping erect, the Beast lunge towards Jolson, paused, and released its own howl of rage and pain. Still smiling, Jolson moved forward, closing the distance between them. The Beast reared on its hind legs, swung a huge forepaw at Jolson, but Jolson casually ducked beneath its slow swing and grabbed the boy. Frustrated, angry, the Beast screamed again. Its flesh shifted, flowed, and then the Beast fell to the ground as Jolson pulled Roland further away from its reach.

Except for a muffled whimpering, the boy was pleasingly silent. Jolson bent to lay the child on the ground and then stood erect to see what he had wrought.

The Beast was no more. Interposed parts of animal and man twisted throughout the whole until the thing that was left was neither Beast nor human. It tried to rise, but its human crippled leg was too weak for the weight it now supported. The thing glared at Jolson with eyes that were puzzled and enraged and confused.

“How,” Gerd growled from a human mouth. He tried to pull himself toward Jolson, drawing close enough to swing a massive arm. The tips of human fingers brushed harmlessly across the fabric of Jolson‘s shirt.

Jolson continued smiling a practiced smile that moved no further than his lips. He stepped back two paces. The hook flickered to life, glowed briefly, dimmed, and then Jolson answered with a voice that was flat, without emotion or care.

“Evil feeds on Evil. I touched the boy’s food once each day with the tip of my hook. When he ate the food his body became polluted beyond that of almost any human presently living. When you tasted his blood the influence of the hook entered into you. The effects that you are presently suffering because of that tasting should last most of today and halfway into tomorrow.”

Laughing bitterly, Gerd stretched out an arm and tried to crawl closer to Jolson. “You can‘t kill me. This flesh is immortal. It will never die.”

“The Beast,” Jolson said loudly when he sensed that the second object of his calling had finally drawn near, “is immortal. The human is not.” In the distance, running footsteps crunched dead leaves.

The brat now lay still. Looking through his hell wrought eyes Jolson saw that Roland’s soul was connected to his body by only a tenuous thread. Within minutes the boy would die.

Satisfied by what he had wrought, Jolson started to leave, paused, and then cast a silent curse toward Athos. Roland’s wounds were Beast made. His death would be Beast wrought, something Jolson was bound by his soul sealed oath to prevent.

Sighing wearily, he knelt to shove the hook’s glowing point deep inside Roland‘s wound.

With a pure act of will, he sent pulses of evil energy down through the hook and into Roland’s body. Inside the wound, foul hook and Beast saliva met, intermingled, combined. The boy started shaking. Still pierced by the hook, Roland’s shoulder twisted and jerked. Flesh pulled itself together, sizzled and then sealed as Jolson lifted the jade green point free. Roland’s eyes shot open, two wide roads looking into torment so deep that the child could barely remember that he lived. The eyes rolled back into his head, and then the lids closed.

After half a moment, the boy slowly reopened his eyes. Dark shadows roiled within his gaze and a small contented smile formed across his lips.

When Jolson looked away he saw that Marvale now stood by his side.

“Thank you,” Marvale said quietly. Tears ran freely, cutting through tired furrows cut into his wind chaffed cheeks. Leaning down, he touched tentative fingers to his son’s healed wound. The pale eyes he raised to meet Jolson’s were a study of exhaustion and relief and grief held too long in abeyance. Reassured that his son lived and was whole, Marvale straightened.

Jolson gave Marvale a nod and gestured toward Gerd.

“I understand,” Marvale said mistakenly. “The God who allows you to heal forbids your taking life or breaking a vow.” His gaze drifted meaningfully toward the discarded ax and then back toward Gerd. “This is my chore.”

Jolson turned and walked away before the man thanked him once again. The worms writhing inside him did not want those thanks. Because of Jolson’s actions Marvale’s life was forever changed. His once loving wife was now a bitter harridan. His last living son would become something dark and passionately evil until time and care and growth eventually washed the evil from him, but that would not happen for many years. Decades, perhaps, would pass before Roland was once again clean. Taint free, Roland would still have to live with the memory of what he had done.

“Mar! Wait! You don’t understand! He’s the one who--”

Jolson walked, and as he walked, viral worms of faint remorse wiggled their way through new-made cracks in his almost human heart.

Thunk

“Marrrr!”

Thunk

Jolson was not pleased.