Blood Loss: The Chronicle of Rael (7 page)

How much longer must I hold?
, Rael wonders in his thoughts.  He thinks of stories he heard as a boy, stories about great toothy beasts called sharks that can supposedly smell the smallest amount of blood in water.  He had seen one once as a boy.  Some of the fisherman had caught the monster in a net, and it eventually drowned because it could not keep swimming.  They hung it from a hook on the dock, showing it off.  It was as big as a man and had a mouth large enough to swallow a boy.  The teeth…

Rael starts as he realizes that he hears nothing but the soft sound of the surf against the shore and rocks.  Ever so slowly, he peeks around the edge of his shield and sees nothing and no one.  His torn and bloodied tunic is nowhere to be seen, but neither are the villagers.  He listens carefully, straining to hear anything at all that isn’t normal to the sea.  He moves from around the rock, finds footing and eventually pulls himself onto a large flat stack of stones. 

Alone, he examines his leg in the growing gloom, and he surely sees a small round bite perhaps only two inches around.  It hurts, but the wound is nothing for him to fret over, especially well cleansed by the saltwater.  Blood only trickles down the back of his calf toward his heel.  The skin of his feet and toes has tightened from the exposure to the salt water.  Rael idly finds that fact interesting as it would normally grow wrinkled in a bath.

Rael waits on the rock until the sun drops well below the horizon, and stars fill the night sky.  He finds it treacherous moving up the water’s edge without light, and the water level already rises from the increased tide.  He takes his time, moving quietly until he can pull himself up onto dry land.  Rael skirts the village, moving quickly between houses and outbuildings and using anything he can find to conceal himself from the soft light of the moon and stars. 

Finally, he finds himself at the docks, and his bare feet make it easy to move quietly past a snoring fisherman.  Of course, the wineskin on its side at his feet may have also contributed to Rael’s apparent stealth.  Rael finds a small boat, a fine looking sloop and boards it.  After releasing the moorings, he pushes off and sets sail in what he hopes is north.  Fortunately, it doesn’t really matter so long as he simply puts some distance between himself and the island.  When the sun rises in the morning, he will know for certain what direction is north, for the sun always rises in the east.

7.

Rael sits at an ornate oak table directly across from his employer, an Akorite merchant named Pret.  Middle aged, Pret keeps his face clean shaven and keeps his dark hair trimmed in the fashion of a bowl, common to Westerners.  Most successful Akorites are heavy, if not simply fat.  They eat well and many, even the men, conceal the tits of good living under their silk or wool tunics, but this is not the case with Pret.  He keeps his body fit and tone, for he says that if his body goes soft, then his mind will be shortly behind it. 

Early in the day, Rael had asked if they could speak, and the merchant replied by inviting the Dahken to sup with him.  Pret often ate in his own well lit quarters instead of the ostentatious halls and grand gardens preferred by many lords and rich merchants.  Servers bring fine stoneware platters featuring slow roasted chickens basted with butter, garlic and other herbs.  To the side is creamy, garlic smelling smashed tubers common to Akor.  Similar to potatoes, they’re more orange and slightly sweeter.

“My Lord I am sorry, but it is time for me to leave your service,” Rael says contritely.

A fork and knife in hand, Pret looks up from his food in stunned confusion.  Seeing no hint of humor or duplicity, the merchant leans back heavily into his cushioned chair and stares at Rael’s face for a long moment.  “Why?” he asks quietly, calmly.

“I cannot say,” Rael replies honestly.  “I just simply need to leave.”

Pret sits forward again and begins to tear at his chicken with the silver fork.  “I’ve come to rely on you, Rael.  I really hate to lose you.  Perhaps you are going to my competition?  If it’s an issue of pay…”

“No,” Rael replies more firmly than he meant.  “No, it is not an issue of coin.  It is not other employment I seek.”

“Always a man of few words,” Pret muses, again peering into Rael’s face.  “Rael, I don’t know what race of man you are.  I’m not familiar with your people or from where people with your skin come from, and I’ve done business with all colors of men.  But I do know what kind of man you are, and I know you’ve never lied to me.  If you must go and you don’t know why, I believe you.  Should I expect you to return?”

“I do not know,” Rael replied.

“Know that my door is always open to you.  That is how I pay my loyal servants,” Pret says.  Receiving a nod from Rael, he asks, “Do you know to where you’re headed?”

Rael’s face takes on an aspect of frustrated confusion, and he takes his eyes from the merchant lord to stare into the distance slightly off to the right.  Of course, he can see nothing beyond the stone of Pret’s eastern wall.  “I wish I knew.  I must go east, but I do not know where or how far.”

“You’re haunted by something, Rael,” Pret observes.  “But perhaps I can offer some fair tidings.  I must also head east in a few days.  I have to travel to Martherus to complete a deal with a lord there.  Travel with me as the final terms of your employment.  I will pay you well, and when my business in Martherus is complete, we shall go separate ways as friends.”

Unable to find flaw in Pret’s logic, Rael silently nods his assent.

*              *              *

As a boy, Rael had heard about the great cities of the Shining West, how beautiful and powerful they looked.  He’d heard of paved roads and huge buildings made of fine marble and granite with silver and gold accents.  He’d heard of mighty castles and their towering battlements and of the great walls that protected them.  Somi had been nothing of the sort, but Martherus… Martherus lives up to every boyhood ideal of what a city should be.  He has never seen anything so great, so impressive as this place.  Even Theron in Akor with its palatial estates and finery amazes not so much.

Pret had selected accommodations for his party well ahead of time, for apparently he uses this particular inn exclusively in his dealings in Martherus.  The Green Gourd, named so for the pale green limestone used in its construction, is a massive three level establishment.  A rich common room containing inhabitants who do not appear so common takes up most of the lower level, the rest consisting of a well-stocked kitchen and a semi-exclusive taproom.  Rael finds the sleeping rooms rich and luxurious in sharp contrast to the other inns in which he has stayed in years past.  Plush cotton mattresses with mahogany head and footboards, clean silk sheets and basins of marble adorn every room.  Rael has never slept as deeply as he does that night.

In the morning, Rael dresses plainly in a wool tunic and breeches, for his sword and chain mail are unneeded in a business deal with a Lord of Aquis.  After a fine breakfast, he escorts Pret through the great city, or rather, the merchant leads Rael as he gawks open mouthed at the wondrous buildings of Martherus.  In an hour’s time, they stand before a miniature castle that gleams brightly of white marble in the morning sun.  Heraldic symbols of Martherus, Aquis and Garod adorn it, and a forty foot tall statue to Garod almost as tall as the castle itself stands outside.  The main entrance, double doors of a dark hardwood and banded with iron, stands ajar to admit entry to any who pass by.  Inside, they find an area in which to worship that is no different from any of Garod’s other temples, except for the sheer size of it at well over four thousand square feet.

A thin, short man robed in plain white robes shambles quickly toward them upon their entry.  He is clean shaven of both face and head, a task Rael would never dare undertake for the pure maintenance of it.  It is hard enough to keep one’s face clear of a beard; he cannot imagine how hard it is to keep one’s head smooth.

“Lord Pret I presume?” the robed man asks in a nasally voice.  “My Lord commanded me to bring you to him.  He awaits your arrival.  Might I ask you to follow me?”

As quickly as he had come, the man turns around and strides through the middle of the temple.  Neither Rael nor Pret had expected such an abrupt action from the man, so they find that they are already fifteen or twenty feet behind before they start to follow.  The two men rush to close within a comfortable distance.

“Your name?” Pret asks of the man’s back.

“My name is unimportant.”

“You serve Lord Pagus then?”

“I am an Acolyte of Garod, and I serve Him as I am told,” their guide replies as if all questions are now answered.  He leads them through a door in the temple’s rear and down a crisscross of halls.  He stops at a set of double doors, identical to those that lead into the temple, though much smaller.  Two plate armored men flank the door, and their surcoats and shields present symbols of Aquis and Martherus. 

“Lord Pret of Akor,” the acolyte announces, and the guards open the doors in response.

Grand decorations furnish the room beyond.  It is divided into three sections by lode bearing pillars, for it is one great room when it should be several.  In the back, Rael sees the largest bed he has ever seen anywhere, even in Pret’s own chambers, and he does not doubt its softness.  To the right is a marble tub, ten feet across, and a beautifully carved dining table with four matching chairs, all made of ebony.  Standing before them in the room’s main section is a twenty foot long table of elm, perhaps, and a dozen matching chairs.  Highly detailed tapestries with brilliant colors hang around the room such that the walls can barely be seen, and plush carpets and obscure animal skins cover the floor.  With no windows to the outside air, the room is well lit by torches that glow with an unflickering white light and give off no smoke.

As they follow the acolyte into Lord Pagus’ grandiose chambers, one last decoration catches Rael’s attention.  Against one of the marble pillars and encased in a rectangular prison of glass stands a gleaming suit of plate armor.  While plain, its workmanship is truly flawless, and it appears to have never been in battle, for not a scratch mars its surface.  A rather plain double edged longsword leans in the corner of the glass box, and a medium sized kite shield with a blue gemstone the size of a man’s fist lay at the armor’s feet.  Rael stares at the armor and sword as if enthralled, perhaps for the odd blueness of the steel, as he and Pret follow the Acolyte to the long table.

“My Lord, the merchant and his associate have arrived,” the acolyte says.

Rael snaps out of his trance and focuses on the man sitting in a chair at the end of the table.  The chair itself matches the others in make, excepting for its seven foot high back.  Lord Pagus wears silk robes of the purest white that cling to the powerful, rigid frame underneath.  Rael cannot determine his age, as his head and face are smoothly shaven like his acolyte’s, and the priest’s jaw, chin and forehead are sharply defined and bold.  He has the appearance of a fighting man, though he wears the robes of Garod’s priests.

“I did not realize Lord Pret intended to bring an associate,” Pagus replies without looking up from the mountain of parchment on which he writes.  “It is of no matter.  You may attend to your other duties now, Hal.”

As the acolyte bows and exits the room, Pret and Rael wait patiently for the priest to acknowledge their presence.  After a moment, Pagus sighs and pushes his work to one side of the table.  He stands from his chair and smiles warmly as he looks at Lord Pret, but his hard gray eyes do not share the emotion.

“Welcome to Martherus, Lord Pret,” he says.  “I appreciate you coming the distance to finish these affairs.  It is a pleasure to finally meet you.” 

The men clasp arms as if old friends, and then Lord Pagus looks over Pret’s shoulder at Rael.  The warm smile vanishes suddenly, and the priest only stares at the Dahken, dumbstruck as if the specter of a relative long since passes hovers before him.  He almost whispers, “What is the name of your associate?”

“This is Rael, one of my best men,” Pret answers as he searches the priest’s face.  “I intend to release him from my service once we conclude our agreement.”

“Best men,” Pagus repeats.  “What does he do for you?”

“Occasionally Lord Pagus, a man in my position has uses for a sword.”

“Indeed.  I am sure he is able,” Pagus replies, his voice still low.  He seems to shake off the trance and asks with a cold smile, “Shall we sit and discuss the final terms then?”

As Rael takes a chair to Pret’s right, he notices that the priest’s eyes never leave him.  He instantly realizes that he may have made a serious mistake.  He should have asked with what manner of lord the agreement was to be made.  Had he known Pagus is a priest, he may not have agreed to accompany Pret on this final task.  From what Rael remembers in his reading, Garod’s priests warred upon the Dahken at the end of the Cleansing.  That he sits here now is most unwise, and yet, it feels as if lightning hits every nerve in his body when he notices that the longing to travel east is gone.

“Rael what?” Pagus asks forcefully, his voice pushing away Rael’s thoughts.

When he does not answer right away, Pret interjects, “Rael hasn’t a second name.  His people apparently don’t see the need for one.”

“And what are your people, Rael?  I am not sure I have ever seen the likes of you,” Pagus replies quickly.  His eyes, gray and hard as steel feel like lances straight into Rael’s soul.

“I hail from a city named Somi, across the Narrow Sea,” Rael lies, and it is a lie he has told so many times that he almost believes it in a way.

“You neither look nor sound like a Tigolean,” states the priest, flatly.

“Regardless, that is where I am from,” Rael replies, and Pagus falls silent for a long moment, seemingly lost in thought.

“If I may, Lord Pagus,” says Pret, breaking the silence.  “I’d like to begin the final negotiations.”  This is the part of Pret’s business where Rael’s eyes tend to glaze over and he half falls asleep, for he has no interest in understanding the complicated mind of the merchant.  The merchant lord, though baffled by Pagus’ reactions toward Rael, aggressively pursues his own ends, and it seems that the priest can do nothing but accede to all of his wishes. 

Rael feels the danger in Pagus’ sudden preoccupation, but at the same time, he knows he has been led here for a reason.  He’s fairly certain that reason stands encased in glass against a marble pillar.  But why this particular suit of armor and it’s odd blue steel?  He catches himself staring at it more than once as Pret talks, and he hopes that Lord Pagus has not noticed the same.

Within an hour, the negotiation ends with Pret beaming and thanking Lord Pagus heartily for agreeing to do business.  Rael ignored most of the conversation, as he usually does with Pret’s dealings, but he knows when the merchant has struck a very profitable bargain.  They stand from the table with courteous bows, though the priest lords does not deign to repay them.  Nor is there the clasping of arms as friends as when they met.

As they begin to leave, Pagus calls after them, “Master Rael, perhaps you would dine with me this evening?  I might have use for a fighting man with your… talents.”

Rael turns back toward the priest, who still sits at his long table with a twisted mouth as if something distasteful sits in his mouth.  The Dahken half bows and lies, “I apologize, Lord Pagus, for I intend to leave Martherus immediately upon collecting my pay.”

“Indeed,” Pagus replies, a hint of venom in his voice, and he returns his gaze to the length of his table.