James West - Crown of the Setting Sun

A fly lighted on the Hunter’s cheekbone, wandered about, perhaps sipping from the raindrops and sweat that had collected on the man’s skin. Orit has come to feast on dead flesh .

As he knelt down by the Hunter’s side, it crossed his mind to smash the stone against the man’s temple, just as he had slammed another stone against the adder’s skull. The memory of the mangled mess he had made of the serpent’s head kept him from taking that action. It felt wrong to desecrate a corpse. Nevertheless, he held the stone overhead in one hand, and reached out with the other.

At the first touch, Leitos recoiled. The Hunter’s clothing was soiled, stiff, and greasy. Moreover, the man’s odor truly hit him for the first time, the stench of old sweat, rancid meat, and other unmentionable filth.

He had to know if the Hunter had any life left in him. He had to know. The sooner done, the sooner he could continue his westward journey toward the Crown of the Setting Sun, somewhere beyond the Mountains of Fire. For the first time, he was amazed to realize that the thought of that journey did not trouble him, but rather filled him with a glimmer of his grandfather’s hope….

Admonishing himself for delaying, Leitos pressed his hand firmly on the Hunter’s chest. His mouth fell open at the powerful thud of the man’s beating heart. His gaze flicked to the man’s face even as the Hunter’s dark eyes flared open, gleaming with a mad cruelty that destroyed his comeliness.

A squawk of terror burst from Leitos’s throat. Too late, he swung his weapon. The Hunter batted his hand aside, and the stone flew free. Then a massive fist clutched around Leitos’s throat, squeezing so tight that he could not breathe, let alone cry out. Leitos clawed at the man’s fingers. The Hunter drew him near, turned his head this way and that, as if seeking something behind his eyes.

The Hunter grinned, an ugly expression. “You should have broken my skull, boy,” he growled. “Would have been an easy kill-I was gone for a moment-and I deserved to die for misjudging you.”

He drew Leitos close. “Your third lesson, boy, is that mercy is for the weak,” he whispered, his thick fingers tightening around Leitos’s throat. The Hunter drew back his other fist and rammed it forward. Leitos felt no pain, no anything. In an instant, the day was made night.

Mercy is for the weak .… the words were soft, sinister. Leitos loomed over the Hunter, for some reason sure he had done this before. He shook his head, thinking that strange thought about mercy was fitting and so true. Mercy is for the weak … and I am weak no longer. He swung the stone, cracking it against the Hunter’s skull. The man’s eyes flared wide. He reached up and caught Leitos throat. Leitos tried to jerk back, tried to shout-

Agonies beyond count assailed Leitos as he started awake. He lay there taking deep, ragged breaths that burned his throat, wondering what had happened, why was he not battering in the Hunter’s skull….

A dream, he thought in despair, remembering his failed attempt to get away, as well as missing his chance to destroy his enemy. He tried to open his eyes, but the Hunter’s attack had left one swollen shut. The other cracked, just a fraction, and through it he saw a world painted in muddy red hues.

He lay on a bed of cool sand, deep in shadow. For fear of alerting the Hunter that he was awake, he moved only his eyes, trying to guess where he was. Overhead, aged daylight reflected off a curve of smooth rock. I’m in a cave .

As his awareness grew, he noticed that tight ropes bound his wrists together before his chest. He cautiously wriggled his legs, and found his ankles tied as well. Silence fell on his ears. No wind, no shuffling of ratty clothing, nothing. He could hope the Hunter had decided to leave him to die, but that was unlikely. The man had risked his life to snatch Leitos from perilous floodwaters, all on the slim chance that Leitos was the slave he hunted. For now, Leitos was sure he was alone.

By the time he had screwed up his courage enough to test the strength of the bindings, the light of day had fled night’s dark substance. The ropes held tight around his wrists, the same as those securing his ankles. Exasperated, he flopped and strained until he lay on his opposite side, gasping. Recklessness gave way to desperation, and Leitos heaved and pulled against the lashings. Dust rose and sand flew, the ropes tore his skin, but he came no closer to getting loose. Tears of rage coursed over his cheeks, and he spat every oath he knew in an effort to relieve the burning ache in his throat.

In the end, he went limp, panting, staring into a darkness that had become like a living entity pressing hard against his face. The desolation he had held in check fell on him in cascading waves, extinguishing the rage. Sorrow came after, flooding him.

Grandfather , he cried silently, is this my path, a life of suffering? No answer came. Spent in mind and body, he eventually slumbered again. Matching his thoughts, all was blackness before his eyes, all was loss….

Something jabbed against Leitos’s spine, once and again, rudely bringing him awake. Dawn shed its golden light over the land, filled the cave with warmth. A solitary bird trilled in the distance, but Leitos focused on the closer sound of something shuffling about in the sand behind him. The digging pressure went away. He remained still, thinking some desert creature was preparing to make a meal of him.

“For an escaped slave to sleep so soundly,” the Hunter rasped, “life in the mines must be better than once it was. Or is it that you are a slave of a different sort? Did the Alon’mahk’lar wash and perfume you, boy … did they make a whore of you?” he finished with a nasty chuckle.

Leitos went rigid upon hearing that unforgettable voice. Doubtless, the man would decide he needed another lesson for keeping silent instead of answering, or for anything else he did, as the Hunter seemed to crave delivering pain and terror on his captives.

A madness swept through Leitos, and he decided that he did not care what the brute did to him. In truth, the worse, the better. Remembering how the man had beaten him before, Leitos guessed that he could anger him again, drive the Hunter to snuff out his life. If he could not hope to carry out his grandfather’s wishes, then death, he concluded, was better than returning to bondage. But how to provoke the Hunter?

He had unwittingly learned the answer to that question just after the Hunter dragged him from the river. When they first met, he had insulted the man, earning some many of the bruises from which he now suffered. He suspected that had he kept antagonizing the ruffian, the Hunter might well have killed him.

Steeling himself for what was sure to follow, Leitos said in a cracking voice, “Suffering the pleasure of the Sons of the Fallen … you seem to know a good deal about that.”

Heavy silence met this. Leitos pressed on, wanting to infuriate the man, goad him to unrelenting violence. “I suppose not,” he said in a scathing tone. “Had you suffered , they would not have allowed you to take up a life of seeking after fleeing slaves. I suspect you enjoyed all they did to you … longed for more. I wonder, when you bring back a slave, is your reward to pleasure them?”

Instead of setting upon him with curses and blows, the big man strode to the mouth of the cave. Leitos blinked at the Hunter’s back, eyes swollen, gummy, and sore. The puffiness had retreated a little with sleep, and the reddish hue that had clouded the one was gone. The Hunter, his hood pulled well forward, stood wrapped in silence, looking placidly out into the desert, as if he had heard nothing of what Leitos had said-or was considering how best to destroy him.