Paul Thompson - The Forest King

Lofotan cursed again and stepped back out of the gore. Remembering that he was in the presence of a Haven girl, he apologized, saying, “Forgive me. It was stronger than I expected.”

The old soldier edged into the light. He was wounded. A long, bleeding gash ran from his left ear down across his throat. The front of his white tunic was soaked with blood. A patchwork of scratches covered his face.

“You’re hurt!” she exclaimed.

“It’s nothing.” He prodded the corpse with the point of his sword.

“What happened here?”

A new voice said, “It came to kill me.”

The servant and the girl looked down the stairs and saw Balif, bearing an oil lamp in one hand and a naked sword in the other. Lofotan instinctively straightened. Ignoring his hurts, he raised his bloody blade in salute.

“The other one got away,” Balif said, approaching. Mathi stared at the pair of unsheathed blades handled with such casual skill.

“Can this one talk?”

It was beyond speech. After a hard cut to the shoulder, Lofotan had run the beast through. It could answer only the gods.

Padding down the hall came more footsteps. Balif and Lofotan squared off, swords ready, until they recognized the scribe, Treskan. Judging by his appearance, he had been sleeping in his clothes. He took in the scene with wide eyes.

“My lord, shall I fetch the city guard?” Treskan asked. Death by sword was uncommon in Silvanost.

“This is no one’s affair but my own. Remember that. Whatever happens in this house is my affair and mine alone.” He sighed deeply. By the ruddy oil light, Balif looked aged and tired. “Let’s get this cleaned up.”

Lofotan held out an arm, blocking his general. “Don’t dirty your hands, my lord. Let us take care of it.”

“You’re wounded, my friend. The scribe is in shock, and this girl is too tender in years for such a task.”

Mathi held up her chin. “My lord, I was raised on a farm and lived many days as a captive. Blood is no stranger to me.”

Lofotan also dismissed his lord’s concern. “My wounds are nothing. Not like the Battle of the Burning Tree, eh, my lord? Come, scribbler. Lend a hand.”

Grimacing, Treskan took hold of one pair of the dead creature’s hands and feet. Lofotan took the other. Mathi went ahead with her luminar to light the way. They dragged the body to the top of the steps. Treskan suggested they roll it down the stairs, but Lofotan sharply squelched that idea.

“Do you want to mop every stone between here and the cellar? I don’t. Pick him up. Your clothes will wash more easily than a mile of white marble!”

They hoisted the dead creature to their shoulders and followed Mathi down. Balif trailed, carrying his lamp. In the entry hall, Lofotan directed Mathi down a side passage to another, narrower set of steps. Down the inky steps they went. Mathi could see nothing but winding stone stairs. She kept her shoulder tight against the cold stone wall and uttered a prayer as they descended.

“What is that you’re saying?” asked Lofotan.

“A prayer.”

“For this unnatural creature?”

“No,” said Mathi, struggling under the weight of the corpse. “I asked Quenesti Pah to guide my steps, so I don’t fall!”

The air grew cooler and damper. Far below ground level, the steps ended in a vaulted room crowded with barrels and draped shapes of uncertain purpose. They put the body down. Lofotan went alone to root around in the shadowed recesses of the cellar. Balif, standing on the last step, noticed the girl was trembling. Treskan the scribe scrubbed absently at the stain on his shoulder.

“Have you not seen death before?”

“Yes, my lord.” In her life Mathi had witnessed battles, murders, and all kinds of mayhem. “But I still shake at the sight of blood.”

Treskan remarked, “It was a heavy burden!”

“Burden.” Balif pursed his thin lips. “Try bearing the weight of a hundred such creatures.”

Mathi studied him. Was Balif boasting he had killed a hundred intruders like the one before them?

Lofotan returned, dragging an empty crate. They wrapped the body in a makeshift canvas shroud, put it in the crate, and nailed the lid on. Lofotan promised to have the crate removed later. The body would be taken out of the city unseen and buried secretly. Not even Balif or his majordomo would know where it would ultimately lie.

Mathi didn’t understand why they were acting like accomplices to a crime. Surely Lofotan acted in self-defense against an attacker of plainly unnatural origin. Why hide the incident?

“Too many questions will be asked,” Balif said calmly. “Guilt will be applied where none is needed.”

The four of them climbed the stairs to the entry hall in silence. Mathi’s mind was racing. If forces were arrayed to kill Balif, why didn’t the Speaker of the Stars send troops and magicians to protect him?

“Your head is full of questions,” Balif said sagely. “I understand. Some things cannot be explained in ordinary conversation. If you prove yourself worthy, the answers shall come.”

Balif made a graceful if weary exit. He did not go back down the corridor where he had previously gone. Having been disturbed once, he was off to find a different location to sleep.

“What if I don’t prove worthy?” Treskan asked.

“Then I shall personally cut your throat.” There was no animosity in Lofotan’s promise, just blunt honesty. Mathi believed him completely.

Wrung out, she returned to the couch in her vacant suite. Mathi was about to extinguish her luminar for the night when she spotted writing on the distant marble wall. It had not been there when she first came to the room. Someone had written it since-

The intruder. The intruder had been in the suite while she slept. Mathi walked slowly to the graffito. The runny red letters were not written with paint.

Honor demands honesty , it read. Survival needs secrecy .

A voice called out to her. For a brief moment, she thought she was back in the forest, but Lofotan’s gruff voice reminded her where she was.

“Up, girl. The sun may still sleep, but we who serve our lord must rise.”

Mathi sat up, stiff in strange places. The cunning couch, designed to be wonderful to look at, was not so wonderful to sleep on.

“Good morning?”

“The day begins. Come,” urged Lofotan.

“Is there water? I’m dry.”

“In the font.”

Lofotan was dressed in a spotless military tunic and kilt and heavy sandals. He wore an officer’s woven silver band around his forehead. No trace of the previous night’s blood remained, though the gash on his neck was still visible. Mathi padded behind him, pausing at the bowl for a hasty gulp of water.

“You have a light tread,” the old soldier remarked. “Were you born in the wildwood?”

Mathi explained her quietness by saying she’d had to step quietly around her human captors. If she disturbed them or drew unwanted attention to herself, she was usually beaten for it.

“Savages.”

He led her deeper into the house to Treskan’s room. The scribe proved harder to rouse. Lofotan’s battlefield bark hardly moved him, so the old warrior grasped Treskan by the shirt-front and shook him. The scribe awoke with limbs thrashing. Lofotan stepped back, out of reach. Treskan subsided after a brief struggle with himself.

“Arise, scribbler. My lord must be served.” Eyes clenched and mouth agape in a mighty yawn, Treskan followed.

The house was still cloaked in darkness. Unlike the dead hour when the beastly invader was caught, the predawn tingled with change. There was newness in the air. Early-morning flowers were open, releasing their scent to the rising sun. Shadows buried by the profound black of night slowly took on form again as the faintest rays of daylight penetrated the gloomy villa.