John Marco - The Forever Knight

“No, I didn’t,” I said quickly. “I came because I wanted to, Sariyah. I didn’t come for spices or riches or anything like that.” I put my hand out for him. “I’m sorry.”

Sariyah took my hand with a powerful squeeze. “Good-bye Bronze Knight.”

I knew how badly I would miss him. “North and east, right?”

He nodded sadly. “North and east.” Then he looked straight at Cricket. “And you, girl-mind yourself here, always. The men of these nations have no honor.”

“I’m not afraid, Sariyah,” Cricket told him. “But I’ll be careful.”

Then, after days and days in the desert, Sariyah and his sons rode away from the food and shelter of Arad.

“Now that’s dignity,” I whispered.

I wondered if I would see him again. Cricket looked sad, staring after them. The world seemed to shrink, growing silent as Sariyah disappeared.

“Now what?” asked Cricket.

“A bath,” I declared. “And food and a proper place to rest. How’s that sound?”

She smiled. “Let me pick the house. Men don’t know how to pick clean places to stay.”

She started off on her pony toward a square of buildings up ahead, some of them tidy, others dilapidated, each with a colorful, steepled roof. This, I supposed, was the best part of town. A building with a scarlet facade and a sign reading ‘Central House’ caught Cricket’s eye. She studied it, nodding approvingly.

“That one.”

I looked it over. The house was near some useful shops and the well in the center of the square, and there were enough women and children around to set me at ease. Certainly it was good enough for a night or two. I got off my horse for the first time in hours and handed the reins to Cricket.

“Take them to the trough by the well and let them drink. We’ll hire a boy to brush them once we’re settled.”

Cricket dismounted and almost stumbled on her wobbly legs. Eagerly she led the horses into the square. I pretended not to watch her as I headed for the house, but when I reached the door I turned to steal a glance. No trouble. And no one around to bother her. I headed in to the house where the proprietor took his time renting us a room.

But young girls in places like Arad are never safe for long, and why I didn’t listen to that little voice in my head. .

I stepped outside and looked for Cricket. She wasn’t near the well. It took only a moment for dread to hit me. I opened my mouth to shout her name, then heard her shouting from around the corner. I ran toward her cry, and when I rounded the alleyway I saw her panicked eyes, looking out from behind a giant body pinning her to the wall. Her hand shot out to reach me.

“Lukien!”

The big, bald wrestler had his fist around her collar. She was like a little bird in his grasp, terrified and fluttering to get away. Still half naked, I knew what he wanted even before his lust-filled eyes turned toward me. Like an angry bull, all I saw was red.

“You ugly gargoyle,” I hissed. “You shit-eating goat fucker. I’m gonna kill you.”

I wanted him to toss Cricket aside, to come at me and let her flee. But he held her as he came, dragging her by the collar to face me.

“One-eye, you own this girl?” he croaked. I could smell his drunken breath.

“I don’t own her. Nobody owns her.” My hand went to my sword. “Let her go.”

He stood up even taller. “I want to buy her. I have gold.”

A crowd gathered behind me, but no one moved to help. Somehow I had to get Cricket free of him.

“Let her go, and you’ll die in one piece,” I warned. “Otherwise you’ll just be a lot of little bits.”

His eyes were the color of stone. “Are you afraid of me, One-eye? You look afraid. Where’s your fat friend?” He look around for Sariyah. “That black-skinned hyena’s not around to save you?”

“You’ll have to let her go to fight me.”

“Not fair, little man. Your sword.”

All my life, my anger has made me stupid. Right then, all I thought about was my hands on his throat and how good it would feel to strangle him. As I undid my sword belt, Malator screamed at me.

No!

But I didn’t want his help. The wrestler gave a smarmy smile as he hurled Cricket toward me. She stumbled then bolted up again like a cat, spitting at the man. I pushed her aside.

“Take my sword.”

“No, Lukien, just kill him with it! Just-”

“Take it!”

I shoved the sword into her arms. Malator shouted in my head as I stepped forward. The crowd behind us swelled. I faced the wrestler, feeling my muscles coil. In a lawless place like this, no one would care if I killed him.

Faster. .

Big men move like syrup. I struck like lightning. My boot smashed his groin, my fist his shattered nose. His face came down, gushing blood. His arms encircled me. Beneath the fat of his neck, I targeted the vertebrae. My elbow a hammer, I struck. The wrestler faltered. . and held on.

Faster!

He lifted me, a doll on his shoulder, spinning me toward the ground. I reached back and found his face, clawing his eyes, holding him and sliding head-first down his back. I didn’t let go, dragging him, tugging his huge bulk back with me, sure he would tumble. My face smacked the street.

And still he had me.

On the ground he was an octopus, pulling me, his arms and legs like tentacles. I scrambled, rolling to avoid his hold, driving my fists wherever I could find him. But I was in a puzzle box, and the more I moved the more he tightened. Staring at the sky, I summoned my strength as his calves closed around my neck. Cricket was screaming. Malator tried to reach me. My throat closed up, and my sight went black, and I knew the wrestler’s next move would kill me.

He twisted, and my neck snapped. I heard it without feeling it.

And I was gone.

Gone.

To a place I couldn’t see or feel or comprehend. Floating in a space that terrified me. Blind, without a body or pain.

Alone.

* * *

I was dead, or very nearly dead, and I knew that my mind had left the rest of me behind. But my soul, if that’s what it was, didn’t drift freely up to heaven. I was trapped, suffocating in a blackness that went on forever. I searched the darkness but saw nothing, horrified that I had no eyes at all now.

But I could remember. I knew who I was and what had happened to me. I wondered where Cricket was, if she was dead like me. Or worse.

“Malator?”

My voice carried through the void. I tried to feel Malator, hoping he was somewhere in the darkness.

“Malator, I need you!”

He was gone. Like me, he didn’t exist any more. If I had eyes, I might have cried.

“Malator. Help me.”

* * *

After a while-after forever, maybe-I realized I wasn’t dead. I couldn’t be dead. The dead were like the Akari. Once the spirit leaves the body it dwells forever in its special place. Like Cassandra in her apple orchard. She wasn’t floating mutely through eternity. She had another life beyond her mortal one. She had a world around her.

I had only darkness, and that’s when I knew I was still alive somewhere. Barely, yes, but alive, although I couldn’t imagine what kept me from death. The wrestler had broken my neck. No one could have survived it. He might as well have decapitated me.

Yet here I was.

“I can’t stay here forever!” I screamed. “I’m alive!”

That’s when I felt him. Just a tremor at first, far away, invisible out there in the blackness.

“Malator!”

I put everything I could into my cry. All of it, all of me . Anything to reach him. Suddenly he was there with me, like a mother over the bed of a sick child. Still invisible, but I could feel him.