James Clemens: Hinterland

The answer was not long in coming.

From the depths of the canal, a tall black fin split the waters and rose, steaming, into the frigid air. The bulk of the underwater vessel splintered ice as it surfaced, one of Tangle Reef’s undersea crafts. It appeared like a small wooden whale, fueled by the blood of Fyla, the god of the watery Reef.

A hatch behind the wood fin pushed open and was thrown back by an arm scarred by branded sigils. The owner of those brands climbed out next and balanced on the wet back of the vessel. Tylar stepped forward, recognizing his old friend. But it seemed Rogger’s time abroad had wrought ill changes in him. His scraggled red-gray beard framed a face gone gaunt. Bony cheekbones poked from beneath green eyes, his lips were cracked and split, and his skin shone with a yellowish tinge. Tylar prayed this last was just the reflected sheen of the flickering torchlight.

Rogger shivered and huffed into the night. “Curse me black, it’s cold enough to freeze my arse cheeks together.”

Tylar lifted an arm in welcome.

But Rogger ignored him and bent back to the open hatch and called below. “Oy, careful with that, you overgrown dogfish.”

Another figure, scowling sourly, half-climbed up through the hatch and hauled up a roughspun satchel. He passed it to Rogger, who swung it over a shoulder.

“Much obliged, Kreel,” the thief said.

At the hatch, Tylar recognized the leader of Fyla’s elite Hunters. There was no mistaking his fishbelly pallor, his smooth skin, and the throat lined by gill flaps. Like all the denizens of Tangle Reef, Kreel had been forged in his mother’s womb by an alchemy of Graces. Kreel’s presence concerned Tylar. What was so important that the god Fyla would send her personal bodyguard to deliver Rogger safely here?

Kreel’s gaze settled on Tylar. The man’s eyes, usually stoic and cold, flashed with a mix of worry and relief, as if glad to be rid of Rogger…and whatever burden his presence entailed.

Without even a nod, Kreel dropped away and hauled the hatch closed after him. Rogger barely had time to leap to the dock before the watercraft sank under him. The tall fin slipped back beneath the dark waters.

On the dock, Rogger joined them, looking rangier than ever. He bowed deeply toward Delia and took her hand, kissing it with exaggerated pomp. “Ah, to allow my unworthy lips to grace the knuckles of the regent’s Hand of blood.”

Delia shook her head as he rose, but she still hugged him warmly. “I missed you,” she said in his ear.

“Truly?” He feigned shock. “And I thought I had experienced all manner of miracles during my pilgrimage. But this is indeed the most wondrous of all.”

Tylar gripped him next, by the hand, then in a full embrace. Tylar was surprised by how glad he was to have the man at his side again. It was as if a missing limb, long gone, had returned. But Tylar also noted how wasted of frame his friend had become; the embrace was like hugging a stack of bones. Concerned, Tylar broke the contact.

Rogger quietly shook his head, silencing the question on Tylar’s lips.

Tylar read something behind the usual amused warmth, something dark with dread.

“We need a place to speak in private,” Rogger said, shedding his easy banter and glancing warily around him.

“We are far from the castillion,” Tylar said. “It will take us the better part of a bell to return.”

“I’d as soon unload what I must now.” Rogger nodded toward an old shipwright’s shop turned crow loft, windowless, with windblown refuse for a door.

Rogger strode off down the dock toward it, drawing Tylar after him. He kicked his way inside, scattering a few nesting rats. Tylar collected a torch from one of the pikemen and waved Kyllan and Eylan to stand guard.

Delia made to follow them, but Rogger held up a hand. “Only Tylar for now,” he said apologetically.

Frowning, Tylar climbed into the dilapidated shop after the thief. Rogger marched them past the front entry room, through a narrow hall, and into the wright’s workspace. It was empty and stripped, except for the broken-keeled frame of some abandoned project. Wings flapped up in the open rafters. The hay roof had long rotted away, leaving only the old ribbed joists. Between the beams, a few stars glinted down at them.

Tylar propped his torch between two boards. “What’s this all about, Rogger? Why all the secrecy?”

Rogger turned and shrugged off his satchel. Judging by the sag in the cloth, only one object weighted down the bag. Rogger hefted it in his palm and deftly fingered the satchel’s knot. Once it was undone, he shook the satchel, shedding the cloth and revealing the content within.

Tylar caught the whiff of black bile.

Rogger noted the crinkle of his nose. “Needed to shield it with bloodnuller shite,” the former thief said, confirming Tylar’s thought.

All the various humours of a god bore special Graces, but black bile, the excremental humour of a god, nullified any blessing. Why such a ward here? Tylar also noted how Rogger was careful never to allow what he bore to touch his bare skin.

“What is the meaning of this?” Tylar finally asked, brows pinched as he examined the strange talisman, the yellowed skull of some beast.

Empty bony sockets stared back at him.

The skull was missing its lower jaw and most of its teeth-except for two prominent fangs, glinting silver. It looked like some beast, except that the brow rose too high.

Tylar’s lips settled into a sneer of distaste.

This was no animal’s skull.

Tylar met Rogger’s eyes over the crown of the skull. “Is it an ilk-beast?” he asked.

Though the Battle of Myrrwood was a year old, city patrols still rooted out the occasional ilk-beast. The poor creatures had once been men, but had been forged by Black Graces into daemons.

“Aye,” Rogger said, “you are right to recognize the taint of Dark Graces, of a form twisted and corrupted.”

Tylar read the unspoken behind Rogger’s words. “But what?”

Rogger bent down to the ground and gathered a pinch of windblown dirt from the floor. Rising with a stifled groan, he sifted the dirt over the crown of the skull. Where the particles touched bone, tiny spats of fire erupted. Rogger lifted the skull and blew upon it, dusting off the dirt and thus dousing the flames.

Tylar’s eyes widened at the demonstration. The very soil of this land burned the bone. The implication iced through Tylar’s veins. Chrismferry was a settled land, imbued with the blood of the god Chrism. And like all other god-realms, its soil was a bane against the trespass of all other gods.

“It was no man that was corrupted here,” Tylar mumbled, watching the last of the flames waft away.

Rogger nodded, confirming his worst fear. “It’s the skull of a god .”

Tylar fed a broken chair leg to the crackling fire that now burned in the center of the shipwright’s workshop. Rogger had returned the skull to his satchel and carried it over his shoulder, keeping it from touching the ground. Even though the skull was coated in black bile, they dared not let it come in contact with the land here.

To the side, Delia warmed her fingers over the fire’s flames. At Tylar’s bidding, she had joined them in the shop. The three gathered around the fire. The others kept guard out in the streets.

Delia stared at Rogger’s shouldered satchel. “The skull must have come from one of the rogue gods out in the hinterlands,” she said.

Rogger nodded. “Aye, my thought, too. With Myrillia as tensed as a maiden on her wedding night, I’d have heard if any of our illustrious settled gods had gone missing. But at last count, all of the gods were secure in their castillions.”

“But secure for how long?” Tylar asked.