David McAfee - After, Taras and Theron - Beyond Jerusalem

Taras’ hand reached the stem of the red flower, and closed on empty air.

Mary was gone.

His rational mind told him she was never really there at all, yet a small part of him wished she would come back, even if it wasn’t real.

Taras laid his head on his hand and tried to cry, but tears would not come. Their cleansing power was another thing denied him by his condition, along with true sleep and rest. The sunrise could not come soon enough.

The next time he heard rustling from the brush, he ignored it.

Right up until the moment the club cracked him on the back of the head.

When he awoke, his hands were tied behind his back, and he was propped against a tree. His ankles were lashed together by a length of twine tied to a stake in the ground. Clearly, someone did not want him to go anywhere. But who?

He lifted his head and looked around. He was in another clearing, albeit a smaller one, surrounded on all sides by trees and scrub brush. The ground under him was littered with pine needles and dried leaves, but no grass. In the center of the clearing a small fire crackled and spit. Three hunched figures sat around the fire, casting long, dancing shadows into the night. They wore coarse, dark tunics and black breeches with soft leather boots on their feet. Despite their clothing, they huddled around the fire to ward off the night’s unusual chill. Taras could not see their faces, but their conversation drifted to him over the noise of the woods.

“Not a damn coin on him,” said one. “We should have just cut him and left him.”

“Aye,” said another. “Poor as the desert is dry. Who’d pay a ransom for the likes of him?”

“Did you see his hair?” said the last of the three. “He’s not from Greece, or Judea either.”

“No,” said the first man. “If he has any family, they are far away.”

“Why did we keep him, then?” asked the second man.

“I’ll tell you why,” said a new voice. Taras turned his head and saw a large, heavily muscled man step into the clearing, dragging a woman behind him. Like Taras, her wrists and legs were tied with twine, but she had the additional misfortune of having a gag in her mouth. “Because there is someone who will pay us for him,” the big man continued. “Balize.”

All three of the men at the fire cursed, and one of them spat in the dirt.

“Balize?” he said. “You would trade with that creature, Grummit?”

“She will pay good coin for him, Hio,” Grummit replied. “The woman, too. At least a gold for the two of them, perhaps more.”

“If she doesn’t kill you first, you mean,” said another of the three.

Grummit dragged the woman over to where Taras sat, then proceeded to tie the rope around her legs to a spike in the earth, similar to the one with which they had tethered Taras. The bandit finally looked up and noticed his captive was awake.

“He lives,” Grummit said. “We wondered whether you would wake again, northman. You were so weak when we found you.”

Weak. Taras was weak. And hungry. And these four men, having kidnapped him and tied him to the ground, smelled of steel, sweat, and blood. He found himself looking at Grummit’s neck; at the pulsing rhythm of the jugular vein as blood pumped through it. The image made his belly rumble. The sound rolled through the clearing, loud enough for everyone to hear.

Grummit laughed. “Hungry are you? Don’t worry, northman. You won’t be hungry long.”

He turned his back on Taras while Hio and the other two bandits laughed.

“What about the girl?” Hio asked.

“What about her? She will go to Balize, as well.”

“Seems a waste,” Hio said, staring at the woman’s torn clothing and flashing a crooked smile. “Balize won’t have near as much fun with her as I would.”

The two men by the fire chuckled, and Grummit turned to take another look at the woman. The look in his eyes changed from greed to hunger, and his hand went to his crotch. “Balize probably wouldn’t care if we played with her first. Especially if she didn’t find out.”

“Yes,” Hio said. “What difference would it make to her, anyway? The Bachiyr will only be interested in her blood.” With that, he stood up and fingered his belt. The other two men rose to their feet behind him, smiling and reaching for their belts, as well.

Bachiyr? They planned to feed him to another Bachiyr? The men didn’t realize he was Bachiyr, but this Balize surely would. She might even recognize him if word of his existence had spread. If so, she wouldn’t kill him, most likely. Rather, she would probably turn him over to the one called Ramah.

Killing him would probably be kinder.

“I’m first,” Grummit said. The look Hio flashed his leader was one of pure contempt, but he said nothing.

Taras turned to look at the woman, whose eyes grew wide as Grummit approached. The gag in her mouth muffled her screams, and the rope around her ankles held her in place. She backed as far away from the lumbering bandit as she could before it snapped taut, then she could go no farther. Her sobs echoed through the clearing, generating another round of laughter from their captors.

Grummit passed Taras on his way to the woman. He looked down and winked. “Sorry, friend,” he said. “You’re not invited.” Then he kicked Taras in the face.

Taras’ head snapped back. The pain was accompanied by the sound of crunching bone as his nose gave way to Grummit’s boot. Blood leaked out of his nose as the bandit walked by, still smiling.

The smell of his blood was almost more than he could bear. It called to Taras like a mother calling her child home for dinner. His belly rumbled again, this time sounding like an angry wolf, and the pain curled him into a ball as Hio and the other two men shuffled by.

Taras watched their backs as they gathered around the woman, and realized that no one was watching him. They were preoccupied with fondling her breasts and talking loudly about the many things they planned to do to her. He tested his bonds. They were strong. He would be able to break them easily if he was at his full strength, but he was weak. Too weak to run from another Bachiyr. Probably too weak to fight, as well.

Grummit dropped his pants and knelt in the clearing by the woman’s ankles while Hio and one of the other men grabbed her legs and pulled them apart. She screamed again, and Taras saw her face. Her skin was dark, but not brown like the men from south of Egypt. She had the same coloring as Mary. Dark hair, brown eyes. A little thinner and smaller through the chest, but still lovely in spite of the gag and the look of raw fear on her face.

Was that the look Mary wore before Theron tore her apart?

Grummit climbed on top of her with a grunt, and the woman screamed through her gag. But it was not her voice Taras heard, it was Mary’s. Mary’s voice screamed for help. Mary’s face twisted in fear. Mary’s legs pried open by brigands. His beloved Mary, lying in her shredded blue dress as four men had their way with her.

Suddenly his hands were free, cut into tatters by claws that had appeared of their own volition. He cut through the twine around his ankles and turned toward the men. They stood a few paces away, huddled around the woman, who cried and screamed through her gag. Taras’ vision blurred, and the entire clearing faded. As he stepped forward, it seemed everyone else moved much slower than they should. Voices became deep and slurred beyond understanding, and the insects that buzzed madly through the clearing now floated gently between Taras and his victims, their wings beating a slow but steady rhythm in the air. The woman’s scream droned on, a slow, scared monotone as he watched his hands stretch toward the closest bandit.