Read Pilgrimage of the Sacred and the Profane Online
Authors: Hideyuki Kikuchi
Tags: #Fantasy, #Fiction
Seeing a slight movement of D’s lips, the old woman had to smother a smile of delight.
“Why would they want me thrown out of town?” the Hunter asked, though from his tone
it was completely uncertain whether or not he was actually interested. It was like
the voice of the wind, or a stone. Given the nature of the young man, the wind seemed
more likely.
“I wouldn’t have the slightest notion about that,” the crone said, smirking all the
while. “You should ask them. After all, they’re following along after you. But it’s
my hope that you’ll hold off on any fighting till our journey’s safely over. I don’t
wanna lose my precious escort, you see.”
Not seeming upset that he’d been appointed her guardian at some point, D said, “Soon.”
The word startled the old woman. “What, you mean something’s coming? Been across this
desert before, have you?”
“I read the notes written by someone who crossed it a long time ago,” D replied, his
eyes staring straight ahead.
There was no breeze, just endless crests of gray and gold. The temperature had passed
a hundred and five. The crone was drenched with sweat.
“If the contents are to be believed, the man who kept that note-book made it halfway
across,” D continued.
“And that’s where he met his death, eh? What killed him?”
“When I found him, his arm was poking out from some rocks, with his notebook still
clutched in his hand even though he was just a skeleton.”
The old woman shrugged. “At any rate, it probably won’t do us much good, right? I
mean, you must’ve gone as far as he did.”
“When I found him, he was out in the middle of the Mishgault stone stacks.”
Granny’s eyes bulged. “That’s more than three thousand miles from here. You don’t
say . . . So, that’s how it goes, eh? The seas of sand play interesting games, don’t
they? What should we do, then?”
“Think for yourself.”
“Now I’ll—” the old woman said, about to fly into a rage, but a semitransparent globe
drifted before her. The front canopy was in the woman’s way, so she touched its curved
plastic surface and it quickly retracted to the rear.
The thing was about a foot-and-a-half in diameter. It was perfectly round, too. Within
it, a multicolored mass that seemed to be a liquid was gently rippling.
“A critter of some sort,” Granny remarked. “I’ve never seen anything like it before.
Tae, get inside.”
Once she’d sent the girl into the depths of the covered wagon, the crone took the
nearby blunderbuss and laid it across her lap. With a muzzle that flared like the
end of a trumpet, the weapon would launch a two-ounce ball of lead with just a light
squeeze of its trigger. Pulling out the round it already contained, the old woman
took a scattershot shell from the tin ammo box that sat by the weapon and loaded that
instead. Her selection was based merely on a gut feeling, but it was a good choice.
From somewhere up ahead of them, more globes than they could count began to surround
the wagon and the rider.
“Looks like the Bullow Brothers are gonna wet themselves,” the old woman laughed as
she eyed one of the lenses in her mirror. “What the hell are those critters, anyway?”
“I don’t know,” D said simply.
“What do you mean?! Didn’t you just say they’d be attacking us
soon
?”
“There was nothing about them in the notebook.”
The crone’s eyes went wide. “Then this is something new, is it?”
The question was barely off the old woman’s tongue when their surroundings were filled
with light. Not only had the globes taken on strange colors, but they’d begun pulsing
with life.
“God, these things are disgusting. I’m gonna make a break for it!” Granny shouted,
forgetting all about the man she’d asked to guard them as she worked the reins for
all she was worth. The cyborg horses in her team kicked up the ground in unison. The
intense charge pushed the globes out of the way, leaving them spinning wildly in the
vehicle’s wake. Racing on for a good four hundred feet, the crone then stopped her
wagon. As her eyes came to rest on D by their side, she was all smiles.
“Stuck right with us, didn’t you?” Granny said to him. “Forget what you said—I just
knew you’d be worried about the two of us. Good thing for us. That’s just what I like
to see in a strong man.”
The old woman was about to lavish even more praise on the Hunter when suddenly she
stopped. D had taken one hand and slowly pointed to their rear. “Take a shot at them,”
he said in a low voice. Perhaps he’d only kept up with her to see what effect it would
have.
Though her face made no secret of her apprehension, Granny must’ve shared his interest,
because she raised her blunderbuss. “Oh my,” she said. “Those two boys are coming,
too. Hold on a minute.”
“Now,” the Hunter told her.
“What?” said the old woman, her eyes widening. She then found out why D had instructed
her to shoot—the globes they’d knocked out of the way were now rising without a sound
to disappear in the high heavens. They were moving so quickly that hitting them would
be no easy task, even with scattershot. The globes that surrounded the galloping Bullow
Brothers also broke off immediately and headed for the sky.
“You are one scary character,” Granny muttered, not exaggerating her opinion of him
in the slightest. And as she spoke, she brought the blunderbuss to her shoulder and
leaned out from the driver’s seat. She didn’t have time to take careful aim. A blast
of flames and a ridiculously loud roar issued from the preposterously large muzzle
of the weapon, rocking the world. Globes shattered above the two brothers, sending
out spray. There wasn’t enough time to get off a second shot.
D and the old woman waited silently for the pair of riders approaching in a cloud
of dust.
Clay was the first to speak, shouting, “What the hell were those things? We’re not
even three miles out of town yet!”
Head still drooping, Bingo swayed back and forth on his horse. He was fast asleep,
but the fact that he’d raced this far without being thrown made it clear it was no
ordinary slumber. Bingo Bullow, after all, was a man who conversed in his sleep.
As Clay gazed up at the unsettling leaden sky, Granny Viper caught his eye. The old
woman was bent over in the midst of concealing her blunderbuss.
“Hey! You lousy hag!” Clay shouted at her. As he kept watch over D out of the corner
of his eye, he added, “That was a damn fool thing to do. Just look what you did to
my hat!” Pulling his cap off, he put one of his fingers into it. His fingertip poked
out of a hole near the top—a piece of shot had gone right through it. If he’d been
wearing the cap all the way down on his head, it probably would’ve hit him right in
the forehead.
And what did Granny do when met by a look of hatred that would’ve left a child in
tears? She grinned from ear to ear. The smile she wore seemed so amiable, not even
the sweetest, kindest woman in the world could’ve hoped to match it.
“What a piece of luck, eh?” the crone said with sincerity. She then told the astonished
Clay, “I wasn’t the one who decided to take the shot, though. Our handsome friend
here made the call. And I was sure he was likely to cut me down if I didn’t do like
he said.”
That was true enough.
“Is that right?” Clay asked D. In stark contrast to the tone he’d used up until now,
his words were soft. He seemed ready to have it out with the Hunter.
And D’s reply . . . was no reply at all. “Looks like you didn’t get any of their contents
on you,” the Hunter said, filling his field of view with the two brothers.
Clay gave a knowing nod. “So, that’s how it goes, is it? That’s your game, then? Well,
that’s too damn bad. If it was that easy to get the stuff on us, we’d be ashamed to
call ourselves the Bullow Brothers.”
“The next time they show up, you might not be able to avoid it. Besides, I doubt it
would’ve been life threatening, even if you got some on you.”
“And how the hell do you know that?” Clay cried out.
“A hunch,” D replied.
“Don’t give me any of that shit!”
“Give it a rest,” Bingo muttered in a tone as flat and gray as the sky over them.
“The Hunter D had a hunch about it. We would’ve been fine even if we got wet!”
“Spare me. I don’t need to hear it from you too, bro.”
In a soothing voice, Granny spoke to the frenzied Clay. “Settle down, there. No harm
came to you, so everything’s okay, isn’t it? We’ll have no fighting amongst ourselves
in this party.”
Silence descended. It wasn’t a quiet interval for introspection, but rather one brought
on by sheer astonishment.
“Who the hell ever said we’re in your party?!” Clay shouted, more blood rising to
his face.
“Why, you did, the second you left town. We’ve got the same destination, and we’ve
been traveling less than five hundred yards apart. What’s more, it seems our Mr. D
has a head full of info on half the nasty critters waiting for us out in the desert.”
Holding his tongue for a minute, Clay turned to his older brother and asked, “You
think that’s true, bro?” His tone was like that of a gullible spectator putting a
question to a bogus clairvoyant.
“I don’t know,” Bingo replied, his head swaying from side to side. “But under the
circumstances, traveling together could make things a lot easier later on. And you
know what they say: it’s the company you keep that really makes the trip.”
.
I
.
Night soon fell without further incident. After tethering the horses to hooks on the
back of the wagon, the whole group settled down for the evening behind a sand dune.
A certain air of dignity prevailed over the world. Though darkness had covered everything,
the heavens hadn’t lost their dull gray clouds, which continued to hang over the heads
of the little group. As the temperature fell rapidly, no one said a thing. White breath
alone spilled from their lips.
“A hell of a desert this is,” Clay groused as he warmed himself by the electronic
heater he’d set down in a firmer spot in the sand. “Hot as a bastard by day and cold
as a bitch at night. I don’t mind it cooling off some, but the damn temperature’s
dropped more than sixty degrees!”
“There’s a good side to it, though,” Granny interjected as she held her hands out
over Clay’s heater.
“Hey, don’t be sidling up to my stove like we’re best buddies or something. That lousy
wagon of yours has a heating system in it, don’t it?” the younger Bullow said harshly.
Not the least bit fazed, Granny replied, “That’s pretty tight-fisted talk for someone
who calls himself a man. Well, with a temperament like that, I’m not surprised you
start blubbering at the first little chill. Sure it’s cold, but see how the grains
of sand get heavier in the lower temperatures so it’s not blowing around like it does
all day? Of course, it helps there’s no wind, either.”
“Damn straight,” Bingo concurred in a deep voice from a spot some eight or ten feet
from Clay. Now the younger Bullow couldn’t possibly argue with Granny. But what kind
of man could his older brother be? He wasn’t by the heater. Why, he wasn’t even lying
down. He was still astride his cyborg horse, sitting in the kind of hard saddle that
ordinarily left a rider numb below the waist after three or more hours of riding.
Granny muttered, “Strange tastes your brother’s got.” And it came as little surprise
that she sounded a bit unnerved.
“Not really. You wanna talk about strange, there’s your guy!” Clay said, tossing his
jaw in the direction of Granny’s wagon.
Leaving his cyborg horse beside the vehicle, D had lain back against a nearby sand
dune with his sword in his left hand and his eyes shut.
“If that guy don’t look like the loneliest thing ever. And it ain’t because he’s turned
his back on the world. With him, everybody’s happy to see him coming, but no one’s
sorry to see him go. And anybody who catches sight of him is bound to step aside on
account of that intense scent he’s got about him.”
“Yes, the scent,” the crone said with a nod as she followed Clay’s gaze. “The smell
of blood. The scent of solitude. But you still don’t get it, do you?”
“Get what?” Clay asked, eyes opening wide.
“She’s right,” the slender black shadow on horseback said.
“Not you too, bro! You’re siding with an old hag over your own brother?”
Before Clay had finished airing his complaint, D sat up without making a sound. Grains
of sand spilled like waves down the slope he’d been leaning against. Eyes still closed
as he stood up straight, he then froze in place like a bronze sculpture.
“What is it?” Clay asked, squinting his eyes.
Granny’s face grew tense, too. There was no trace of movement around them—just the
night frozen solid. That’s all that was out there.
D’s silhouette shifted. With a movement just as brusque as the one that’d put him
on his feet in the first place, he seated himself again in the same spot.
Clay and the crone looked at each other.
“What is it?” Clay said again.
The old woman went over to D. “Did something happen?” she asked.
D didn’t raise his eyes. “It rained sand,” he said.
“Sand?”
“In this desert,” the Hunter continued, “what we know about the world doesn’t count
for much, it seems.”
“Did you sense something?”
“It’s going to get more dangerous. Try not to make things any worse.”
“Is that a fact? Well, we’ll be counting on you, in that case,” the crone remarked,
pursuing the matter no further. If she left things to the Hunter, she couldn’t possibly
go wrong. Her feelings on the subject were more a matter of rationality than trust—she
didn’t want to be burdened with too much information when she could have D shouldering
it all. Cold air suddenly snaked into her nostrils, and Granny sneezed loudly.
“Hey,” Clay called out to D. “You seem to know an awful lot about this desert. So,
why don’t you tell us what’s lying ahead? We’re in this together, and we’re all headed
the same way. Why not share the wealth, eh?” His tone was somewhat belligerent.
D didn’t move a muscle.
“Hey, don’t play games with me. You plan on keeping everything to yourself?” Clay
blustered, not giving up. In a desert crossing such as this, any information about
the vicious creatures it contained could literally mean the difference between life
and death. He was deadly serious.
“Wait just a second, you two,” Granny interrupted. “We’ve barely finished our first
day out here, right? We have a falling out this early in the game, then there’s no
point in traveling together in the first place. Think about it, D. There’s some sense
to what he’s saying. We don’t want to go plodding off across the sands without the
slightest clue now. Tell him some of what you know.”
“Not some of it.
All
of it.” There was composure to the warrior’s tone. He was ready to fight if need
be. His right hand drifted toward the harp at his waist.
“Come now, D,” Granny prodded.
Clay’s index finger was poised by his harp. He pulled back on one of the strings,
and then he stopped. He saw D open his eyes. Cold water rushed down from the nape
of his neck to the base of his spine—the Hunter’s glare was that powerful.
“If I tell you, you’ll have to go first,” D said in the kind of voice that crept along
the ground.
“Fine by me,” Clay replied with a magnanimous bow. It was no bluff. He seemed to have
considerable confidence in himself. “I wouldn’t be a weasel and ask you to go first
anyhow. I’ll plow dead ahead wherever we gotta go. So, just put your mind at ease
and tell me all about it.”
“The moving forest,” said D. Clay noticed that the cloud of white that spilled from
the Hunter’s lips with his breath was far fainter than that of the rest of them. “If
the notes I have are correct, it was about a dozen miles southwest of here. But it
is
a moving forest, after all.”
“Meaning there’s no telling where it’s gone? That’s a hoot!”
“The person who left those notes only saw it in motion from a long way off, but didn’t
go any closer. Whether or not he was lucky in that respect, I can’t say.”
“I see,” said Clay.
“And another thing—there are people.”
“What?!” Granny cried, her eyes bugging out. She’d thought whatever else slipped from
D’s lips couldn’t possibly surprise her, but she was wrong. “People out in this desert?
Stop pulling my leg.”
“That’s what it said in the notes,” D continued softly. “About thirty in all. Apparently,
they attacked on cyborg horses about a hundred and twenty miles south of here. Killed
almost a dozen of the traveler’s companions and made off with their goods and the
corpses.”
“What would they take corpses for?” Clay asked.
Giving him no reply, D simply said, “There’s more. It seems they were shot and stabbed
but did not die.”
Silence descended.
Bingo’s torso rose from his mount. “Immortal, are they?” he said in a low sleepy voice.
“That’s all I know,” D said. His eyes were closed.
Clay shrugged his shoulders. “That’s no big freaking deal, is it, bro?” he said to
the figure on horseback. He sounded thoroughly relieved. Perhaps a desert plagued
by beasts and immortal bandits was nothing to them. “That right there scares me a
lot more,” Clay said, tossing his jaw in the wagon’s direction. There was no one but
Tae inside, but everyone was well aware of what
the hidden
represented.
It was at just that moment that the wagon’s door opened. Clay grimaced awkwardly and
rubbed his scruffy beard. Tae’s head hung low; it seemed to be something of a habit
with the girl. Perhaps averting her gaze had kept the weight of her fate from crushing
her.
“Get back inside. It’s cold out here,” Granny shouted. The rebuff had a touch of animosity
to it. While it was her job to find children who’d been “hidden,” she was entitled
to feel however she liked about her charges.
“Aw, why don’t you just leave her be?” Clay said as he glared at the crone’s wrinkled
face from the corner of his eye. “It’s a hell of a lot more comfortable here than
blasting the heat in there. Besides, a person’s got a right to do whatever they damn
well please. She don’t have to take orders from anyone. And I’d be tickled pink to
have a cutie like her out here instead of all these ugly mugs I’m traveling with.”
Knowing as he did Granny Viper’s name, Clay also surely had a good idea of the girl’s
circumstances, but his tone held neither fear nor loathing. No doubt he’d be brimming
with confidence until the very moment he died.
Tae quickly ducked back inside.
Giving an appreciative whistle, Clay said, “Now, ain’t she a beauty. What’s her name,
anyway?”
Granny met the man’s cheery inquiry with a stern visage. “Let’s be perfectly clear
on something,” she said, her voice rolling across the ground like a toxic cloud. “That
girl is my merchandise. Try anything funny and you’ll find yourself in hell trying
to get some action from a she-devil.”
“Well, that’d have to beat looking at your ugly kisser,” Clay sneered back. “Your
merchandise may be pricey, but that don’t mean it’s good. We all know what happens
to most
hidden
who go back home, so you’d best pray that she ain’t one of them.”
“You needn’t worry about it,” Granny replied snidely. “My job just entails getting
them home. What happens after that doesn’t concern me. On the other hand, until I
get ’em there, I’ll look out for them even if it costs me my life. And I’m not letting
anyone pull anything funny with her.”
“Interesting,” Clay said, licking his chops. “Well, just let me give you fair warning
then. Before this little trip of ours is done, I’m gonna leave my mark on your precious
goods.”
“Oh, is that right?” Granny shot back, her eyes growing wider by the second.
“Knock it off, Clay,” a sober voice said, shattering the tension. It belonged to Bingo.
“Well,” he continued, “it looks like the best thing to do is pull out of here as soon
as possible.”
Both Clay and Granny turned in the direction that the skinny figure indicated with
a toss of his chin. White sand was dropping all around a form of unearthly beauty.
Returning his weapon and sheath to his back, D stared out at one point in the darkness.
“What is it now?” Clay asked with seeming relish.
“Can you make something out?” Bingo inquired sleepily.
“Butterflies,” D replied, walking over to his horse without making a sound.
“Hey, Hunter! You just gonna turn tail and run then?” Clay sneered, as if he’d been
waiting for the chance to say these exact words.
“So, we’ve got no choice but to plow right through them?” Bingo added.
Not replying to Bingo’s query, D merely said, “I don’t think this is a job for me.”
He was looking right at the old woman.
“So you know what I have up my sleeve, then?” Granny said, her eyes going wide. “If
my moves have become public knowledge, I may have to learn a whole new bag of tricks.”
Just as D mounted his horse, Granny seated herself in the wagon. With an expression
that said he didn’t have a clue what was going on, Clay put his feet into the stirrups.
Though all of them strained their eyes, they didn’t see anything—the darkness drank
up every sound, leaving everything in a state of utter silence. D’s mount took a few
steps away from them.
“Hold up a minute. Won’t we be tackling this together?” Granny called out to D.
“I don’t remember asking you to follow along after me.”
“When you said this wasn’t a job for you, was that supposed to mean you’re leaving
the rest of us to our own devices then? You’re not a real compassionate man now, are
you?” Granny railed at the Hunter, but D had ridden his horse beyond the reach of
her abuse.
Perhaps nothing save the hyper-keen senses of a dhampir could’ve detected the paper-thin
presence that was closing in on them from the depths of the darkness. At long last,
the wind moved around them. The flowing air came from the beating of countless wings,
yet was still strangely light. The mass consisted of butterflies beyond number—a swarm
of thousands, or even tens of thousands. But where did they live, and what did they
seek?
They rushed at D, enveloping the tall figure in black with the color of darkness.
His blade flashed out. Without so much as the sound of a slash through the air, all
of the bisected butterflies started to drop to the ground as D galloped through them.
As the mount and rider advanced in a dusty cloud, the wave of black drifted away as
if frightened of the Hunter, but an instant later it became a broad band that began
following after him. It was only natural that the rest of the swarm set upon the wagon
and the other two riders.
“Damnation! What in blazes is this?” Granny screamed from the driver’s seat.
“These little buggers sure have some nerve!” Clay shouted as he plucked off a few
that were covering his face. The black butterflies relentlessly besieged his livid
countenance; Bingo had already been reduced to an ebony sculpture.
Suddenly the world of darkness felt a protest of orange light. Caught in three thousand
degrees of flame, the butterflies them-selves added fuel to the fire.
Pulling a tank filled with fire-dragon oil and a leather pressure-pump up onto the
driver’s seat, Granny waved the reinforced plastic nozzle around as she cackled, “Well,
how do you like them apples?! Have another taste of one of the Capital’s very own
flamethrowers. I’ve still got plenty of this fuel to go around.”