Risen

RISEN

By Sharon Cramer

Copyright 2014 Talking Bird Books
LLC/B & F Publishing

Smashwords Edition

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

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Copy edited by D. L.
Torrent

Cover design by Elana and Justin
Westphal

Publisher’s Note:

This is a work of fiction. All
names, characters, places and events are the work of the author’s
imagination. Any resemblance to real persons, places, or events is
entirely coincidental.

Author’s Note:

The backdrop for this story is
fourteenth century France and the Ottoman Empire. However, I have
interpreted, within this period, events, timelines,
characteristics, and people—both fictional and real—in a loose
manner that may not coincide with the actual historical course of
events. I have done this solely for the purpose of literary
embellishment. It is my greatest wish that the reader would enjoy
simple and gratuitous entertainment of this piece of historic
fantasy.

PROLOGUE

†

Ravan sat in the grave, arms around
his brother.

CHAPTER ONE

†

Stripping naked in the dim
starlight, he laid the priest’s robes carefully next to the corpse.
Ravan frowned. He’d never before undertaken such a task as this. It
was not that he was unfamiliar with death or even particularly
averse to handling mortal remains. No, he’d had his fair share of
exposure to the dead, on one occasion hiding beneath several fallen
men on a battlefield. Tonight, however, was different. He loved
this man, and the tender act he was about to undertake was as
difficult as anything he’d ever done.

Kneeling, he carefully undressed the
dead man. Shortly they were both naked—the mercenary and his
brother—one of them beautiful, cold, and asleep forever. Ravan
could scarcely bear to look at the thinner frame of his twin,
refused to recount the sorrow that had robbed him of his will to
live. Draping the robes over the naked body, he dressed himself
first.

Before long, Ravan again wore the
familiar clothing of a mercenary, absent his armor. Pulling his
boots on, the ones his brother had worn to the gallows, he prepared
himself for what he must do next. Kneeling, he handled his
brother’s corpse tenderly as though it were a lover, carefully
dressing him one last time in the robes of the church, enshrouding
his twin’s kindness along with his body.

It tormented Ravan to see the mortal
laceration on D’ata’s chest, the arrow launched by his own accord.
Frowning, he passed his hand over the wound, grimly lingering upon
it as though he might brush the mark away. He believed himself
unworthy of the sacrifice his brother had made…taking his life as
he had, for him.

He stood up, his back and knees
aching. Why did he feel so weary, so…old? He was a young man yet
felt as though he’d lived forever.

Pacing the distance just so, for he
wanted the grave to be perfect, he gauged where he must dig. Then,
minute by minute, hour by hour, he dug the pit, working well into
the night. It was nearly so deep that he could scarcely look from
it before he stopped. He dragged himself from the grave and brushed
the dirt from his hands as he considered the dead man who lay
nearby.

Walking to the gelding, the
mercenary pulled a bulky, wrapped item from the pack and returned
with it to his brother’s side. Carefully, he swathed the body of
his twin in the bolt of burial linen, bought with nearly his last
coin. It was Cezanne linen, although he did not know this, and
starkly perfect, bright in the darkness of the night. It seemed, in
some awful fashion, wrong.

Ravan gazed at the peaceful face of
his brother for a long time before pulling himself from the sad
limbo and willing himself to finish this awful task. Then, with a
broken heart, he draped the beautiful face of his brother in linen,
obscured now forever.

Never again would he see his twin;
never again would he look upon the kindness of the one who’d come
like an angel at his darkest hour. It was so awfully terminal, but
there was nothing that could be done.

He swallowed his grief and steeled
himself before stepping into the grave. Standing on tiptoe, he was
able to wrap his arms around the corpse. Easing his brother to his
final resting spot, he sat for nearly an hour, holding and rocking
the body of a man he’d come to love in a single night. His tears
fell freely, silently—streaks of salty mud on the tortured face of
the mercenary.

Now, quite earthen and weary from
such a heart-rending task, he hauled himself from the grave one
last time and entombed his brother. As the pit slowly filled, his
mind relived the one night he’d spent in the cell, the night D’ata
had come to see him, come to know his brother.

How had such a thing happened? How
had fate orchestrated such a string of events? He’d been sincerely
astounded when the priest appeared. Initially, he hid his surprise
from the holy man, unwilling to accept spiritual charity, instead
mocking the priest’s purpose and kindness.

It hadn’t mattered, though. The tale
of two brothers had escaped them both, and D’ata had, in the span
of a singular night, compelled Ravan to love him. It was that
simple. Then, his twin had tricked him, opened the gate to a life
of freedom, and sacrificed himself.

Sitting at the edge of the
gravesite, the mercenary whittled a small cross from the enormous
willow that towered, arms stretching greedily, over the grave.
Notching the pieces so that they were well joined, he held them up,
examined his modest efforts to see if it was acceptable, if it
would respect the final resting place of his brother. When it
satisfied him that it would, he secured the pieces together with
the silk cord cut from his own longbow. Without the bow, his arrows
were useless. The sacrifice rendered him weaponless except for his
axe and knife, but that mattered not at all. D’ata’s burial was all
important. Nothing could be considered until it was supremely
done.

The hours stretched on, and
eventually Ravan placed the last of the stones around the grave.
Fitting the final one into place, he was surprised to be done. He’d
lost all concept of time as his memories played like one grand,
sorrowful loop in his mind. The stones were substantial, each about
the size of a man’s head. On some level, he’d realized this as he
hand picked them one by one, sometimes wandering several hundred
yards away to find just the right stone. It was a tedious
undertaking, taking most of the rest of the night, but he was
satisfied that it was well worth it in the end.

He brushed his hands together and
squinted, studying the final resting place of his brother. Simply
dignified, the grave was meticulously arranged, carefully dug, then
surrounded with the white and speckled stones. It was, he thought,
beautiful, and the best form of respect he could provide his
brother given such extenuating circumstances.

Nearly done, he took one of the
speckled stones in both hands and pounded the unmarked cross into
the damp, newly dug earth at the head of the grave.

Nearby, the horses pawed their
impatience. A clear and starry night, it was barely bright enough
to cast a sad shadow upon the lonesome scene. Although it was light
enough for Ravan to accomplish what he set forth to do, the lack of
any moon made the task of burying his brother just dim enough to be
miserable.

He lingered, arms crossed, staring
at the freshly turned mound of earth. Reaching up, he grasped
something and pulled it from around his neck. Bending over, he
carefully hung the small copper ring—the one he’d worn the better
part of his life—onto the little wooden cross. The ring was
sincerely significant, given to him as a gift when he was quite
young by an old man who’d loved him dearly. Years later, it was
strung on a silver chain when he outgrew it, by a woman who’d also
loved him like a son.

It was most fitting that his twin
brother should have it. His entire life he’d worn the ring and
chain. They’d become symbols for him. When his life was most out of
control, whenever he believed he could not persevere, it was the
soft grate of the ring on the chain—the ‘whir-whir’ as he’d run it
up and down—that calmed him, steadied his mind, and quieted his
heart. It pleased Ravan to be able to make such a small gesture for
his brother.

Now he evaluated his efforts.
D’ata’s grave was a good grave, deep and even, worthy of the man
laid to rest in it. Ravan hadn’t known D’ata, never even knew he
existed until three nights before when the young priest had come to
see him in the dungeon, to give him last confession.

At first, he’d not welcomed his
brother’s visit, had been unwilling to feed his soul to a holy man,
even if it was under such peculiar circumstances such as they were
twin brothers. But as the night unfolded they each shared their own
strange tales, both of them inconceivable but heartbreakingly true,
nonetheless.

Now, it was done. D’ata lay at last
next to his beloved Julianne and their unborn child. The hand hewn,
wooden cross was in odd contrast to the massive white stone at the
head of Julianne’s grave. The marble angel that perched on it had
watched, observed the strange visitor perform his ceaseless task.
Once Ravan had looked up from his undertaking and thought he saw
the angel cry. But surely it’d only been the night playing tricks
on his eyes.

A long night, a long life,
threatened to get the best of the mercenary. This was not right.
His brother wasn’t supposed to die in his place, wasn’t supposed to
take his place at the gallows. A crafty one his twin had been…and
compassionate, loving to a fault. That had been his weakness. That
was his undoing. Had it not been so? D’ata had given his life for
his brother—the hated one, the feared one, the
mercenary.

Clearing his throat, Ravan tried to
find his tongue, to offer some final respect, but words refused to
come, and for a long moment he simply stood between the two graves,
his head bowed, horribly matted hair falling across his battle
hardened face. I’ve known you such a short time but believe I’ve
known you forever, he thought just then and was surprised to feel
tears threatening again.

Brushing them roughly away, he was
angry, not so much for the tears but because his brother had been
so divinely successful with the ruse, sacrificing himself so
superbly in his stead. He was the warrior, not his brother! How had
one so tender fooled him so completely? I only just found you–only
knew you for one night. It wasn’t supposed to be this
way!

Dropping to his knees, he knelt on
the edge of the grave. The earth, turned and damp as it was and
packed on his brother’s body, was almost inviting. He pondered just
stretching upon the grave, sprawling above his entombed brother,
and remaining there forever. Ravan was weary. More than anything,
he was bone tired. When, he wondered, had things gone so terribly
wrong?

He struggled, tried to remember if
there was a time in his life when things weren’t horribly out of
control. Now, at twenty-four years of age, he was exhausted,
starved, beaten—and free. Wait…hadn’t his brother said that was the
greater good? That he would die so that his brother could be free?
He’d refused the terrible barter his twin proposed, but D’ata had
his way after all.

Ravan’s eyes narrowed. Would it be
for nothing? Would his brother’s sacrifice be meaningless? He shook
the cobwebs of the last few, harrowing days from his head and
forced himself to think clearly.

For the first time in his life, he
was unchained, unfettered, and most importantly, unknown. D’ata’s
deed, stepping to the gallows for his twin, had given Ravan the
greatest gift of all. Everyone thought it was the mercenary who
swung three mornings ago, when in reality it was his holy twin
brother who’d taken his place, leaving him drugged and sleeping in
the dungeon.