David Wells - Cursed Bones

Her arrow penetrated to the feathers through the last man’s head, spraying the clean snow with blood and brain. He fell with a thud. When the other five turned at the noise, Anatoly stepped out of his hiding place and swung his axe, taking the point man’s head with a stroke.

The remaining four men drew weapons as one, shattering the calm mountain air with a collective battle cry. An arrow silenced the next to the last man in line, driving into one side of his neck and out the other, blood dripping from its fletching as it came to rest in the snow along the bank of the rivulet, the soldier slumping to the ground a moment later.

The second man in line attacked Anatoly without hesitation, but without forethought either, his broadsword sweeping from his scabbard and arcing toward Anatoly’s midsection. The big man-at-arms stepped into the blow, allowing the blade to fall harmlessly on his dragon-plate armor as he stabbed the man in the heart with the top spike of his war axe. The next man in line lunged forward into his dying companion, pushing him into Anatoly and sending them both crashing into the foot-wide stream of warm water.

The last man standing took an arrow in the side of the chest, staggering forward a step before going to his knees, blood sputtering from his lips. He toppled into the snow with a groan of pain and resignation.

Abigail was up and running through the snow toward Anatoly. He lay pinned under the combined weight of a dead soldier and the last living enemy. Zuhl’s man dropped his sword and drew a dagger, angling to stab Anatoly in the face. When he raised his hand to bring the dagger down, Anatoly heaved against the weight of them both, tossing them aside into the snow bank next to the stream with the corpse now on top of the last remaining soldier.

Abigail reached the opposite bank a moment after Anatoly regained his feet, water flowing from his armor. Both faced the soldier, Anatoly with his axe, Abigail with her bow. Seeing that he was beaten, the soldier tossed his dagger aside and spread his hands without making any move to free himself from the corpse still splayed out across his chest.

“I surrender,” he said without any emotion.

“Why should I accept your surrender?” Abigail said

“I can’t think of a reason,” he said, slowly pushing his dead companion off his chest and coming to his knees. “If I am to die here, I would ask that he kill me.”

“What difference does that make?” Abigail asked, incredulously. “Dead is dead.”

“Women are not suited for battle. To be killed by a woman, especially with a bow, is a dishonor, but a clean death at the hands of a man wearing armor and wielding a battle axe, there’s honor in that.”

“These people are all crazy,” Abigail said to Anatoly.

“They definitely have a different perspective on war.”

“Look around you,” Abigail said. “I don’t see honor or valor or glory, all I see is blood and death.”

“You ambushed us, killed us without facing us, attacked us by surprise. You fight like cowards, not warriors. In a face-to-face battle, you wouldn’t stand a chance against me or any of my brothers.”

“Want to try me?” Abigail said.

“You would face me, sword to sword?”

Abigail stuck the end of her bow in the snow and drew the Thinblade, pointing the ancient badge of the Island Kings at his heart. “I’d be happy to. I saw what others like you did to the people of Fellenden. As far as I’m concerned, you all deserve to die.”

The soldier looked at the Thinblade for several moments, confusion transforming into understanding and finally into fear.

“Maybe he could be useful,” Anatoly said.

“How so?”

“Ixabrax mentioned that he’s getting hungry and I don’t want to carry these corpses up to the cave, do you?”

“And after that?”

“After that, I suspect he’ll be much more inclined to provide us with some useful information about his unit and their mission.”

Abigail chuckled, nodding her approval and sheathing the Thinblade. “Pick up your friend there and start walking.”

When they entered the cave, the man looked around, assessing his situation, then staggered back, dropping the corpse of his companion and backing away until he was pressed up against the wall. Ixabrax opened his eye, then raised his head and sniffed at the corpse.

“I see you’ve brought me a snack. Any chance you could unwrap it for me?”

“Take off your friend’s armor,” Anatoly said to his prisoner.

The soldier hesitated, still staring in disbelief at Ixabrax.

“I don’t understand,” he said. “Lord Zuhl is the dragon god, how can you betray him?”

Ixabrax extended his giant head until his snout was inches from the soldier’s breastplate, regarding him steadily until the man started trembling and wet himself.

“I worship no human. Zuhl is a dark and evil wizard who has enslaved my family by means of his magic, nothing more. Once the enchanted collar binding me to his will was cut from my neck, I was free of his influence, and given the chance, I will eat him just as I’m going to eat your friend here. Now take off his armor.”

Ixabrax withdrew his head, still eyeing the man like a cat eyes a mouse, but the soldier didn’t move, standing transfixed, frozen by fear.

“I suggest you do as he says,” Anatoly said.

Still trembling, the soldier slowly started to unbuckle his dead companion’s breastplate. When he was finished and backed away, Ixabrax’s tail rose over the dead man and suddenly skewered him through the chest, then casually lifted the man to the dragon’s mouth where he took his time chewing, all the while looking intently at the captured soldier.

“Are there more where this came from?” he said, stifling a belch.

“Come on, let’s go get the next one,” Abigail said, motioning to the cave entrance.

The soldier swallowed hard, his eyes wide, sweat beading on his brow despite the chill air, but he obeyed. An hour later, they had a pile of armor and weapons stacked up in one corner of the cave and Ixabrax was snoring contentedly. All five of the enemy soldiers were gone and the remaining man was standing against the wall, looking at Ixabrax with a mixture of fear and awe.

“Everything I’ve been taught for my whole life is a lie,” he whispered, a look of horror on his blood-stained face.

“Yes,” Abigail said. Anatoly nodded. Both were sitting next to the fire. The soldier had been disarmed and his armor removed, though given his fear of Ixabrax, Abigail suspected that both precautions were unnecessary.

“But why?”

“Because Zuhl wants to rule the world,” Abigail said. “And you can’t do that if you tell people that that’s what you’re trying to do. Tyrants have to lie, they have to fabricate fear within the hearts of their people and then promise to protect them from the imagined threat they’ve created.

“Zuhl has been working toward this for centuries. He’s kept your tribes stirred up and at war for generations so he would have just the kind of men he needed to fight in his army. He’s used every sort of propaganda known to humanity to fabricate the myth of Zuhl as savior when he is the perpetrator of war, the cause of your suffering, the reason for the plight of the people on this island. And the worst part is, your people believe the lie so completely that most will never be persuaded to believe otherwise.”

“But the Reishi have returned, as he said they would,” he said, trying to hold on to his crumbling beliefs.

“Yes, but Zuhl only told you half the story,” Abigail said. “Phane Reishi is an evil bastard who needs to die … yesterday. But he’s not the real Reishi Sovereign. My brother is and he sent his army to Fellenden to protect the people there against Zuhl’s army even when our home of Ruatha is under attack by Phane’s forces.”