Risen (4 page)

Consequently, there was never a
wilder, more wretched creature than the one standing in the middle
of the small inn on this evening. All within had stopped whatever
they were doing and simply stared at the odd exchange between these
two. The miserable stranger and the butchered young woman were a
strikingly bizarre pair to be sure. It was dinner and a
show.

“Pardon? Oh, yes,” he
replied.

Ravan was unaccustomed to being
approached as a civilian. In truth, he never had! There was really
not a time that he could remember not being a mercenary…or a child
of bad fate. Now, he was a free man and seen by others as just
that—a free man! His brother had given this to him—a gift of the
greatest proportions! Even so, it was a difficult role to become
accustomed to, and he swallowed thickly, tasting richly the
unfamiliarity of it.

“I’m sorry. For a second I
thought…” He shook his head, began fresh. With conviction he said,
“Yes, I wish to take a room for the night, with dinner…and care and
lodging for my horse as well—the bay mare, just outside.” He
examined the girl more closely, and she looked away from him,
cowering from beneath his awful scrutiny. Ravan was oddly reminded
of the orphanage just then. “Thank you,” he said apologetically. “I
hope I did not startle you. I’ve been traveling for…” he shook his
head, “…for a very long time.” Truthfully, remarkably, he appeared
worse for wear than she, but he could not know this.

“Certainly,” she said in a small
voice, “please come with me, and I will see that your horse is
tended as well.” Motioning for him to follow, the maiden took up a
candle, crossed the room, and climbed a dim flight of planked
stairs to the second floor.

Ravan followed, stepping onto the
landing before peering beyond her down a narrow hall. It was dark
with only her candle to light the way. She walked slowly, holding
her stump so that an ill breeze would not douse the
flame.

There were rooms on either side, and
she led him to the very end, to the last one on the left. Opening
the door, she stepped aside and lifted the candle enough for him to
see in. There were two beds. In one, under the dim light of the
candle, lay two naked men, already passed out from their evening’s
frivolity. A fecal breeze crept across the threshold, and Ravan
turned away.

“I must have a room to myself. I’m
sorry…”

“There is only one single room,
sir. It will cost you.”

“I will pay.” Ravan reached for his
coin purse, but she shook her head at him.

“Pay downstairs when you come to
dinner. I assume you wish to bathe?” She stared at his silence and
offered considerable patience to the unusual stranger who claimed
to have currency and a horse. When he only nodded, she explained,
“I will draw water and be back soon. Warm or cold?”

“Excuse me?” he began, then
realized she was giving him an option of the two. He hesitated only
a moment before replying, “Warm, please, and do you have
soap?”

“Yes, for laundry. It comes with a
charge.” Then she indicated the room directly across the way.
Stepping around him, she unlocked the heavy door with the same key
and pushed it open, revealing a small, comfortable room. Using the
candle she held, she lit two more candles, both on a small dressing
table, then looked at him for approval.

“This will be fine. And I need
silk, several arms lengths.”

She eyed him suspiciously. “We have
nothing like that here.”

“Linen, then? As strong as you
have—can you bring me some linen…please?”

She paused, rubbed her chin with the
first two fingers of her only hand. “I have dress linen. I suppose
that might work. I can bring a spool of that.” As though reasoning
this would be satisfactory, she waved her hand. “Use as much as you
wish.” Apparently finished, she ducked wordlessly around him and
hurried back down the hall leaving Ravan to himself and the
solitary privacy of his room.

He closed the door and leaned his
head against it. A room—his room—paid for with stolen coin, though
it was. It was the first instance since he’d leapt from the
miserable cell that he had a sincere moment of quiet solitude, with
nothing but the wretched clothes on his back and the even more
tortured thoughts in his head.

He remained like this, simply
breathing—nothing else—for a lost amount of time. Tears threatened,
and he was surprised at the circumstances that found him most weak.
It was not crawling into a grave with his brother or wielding a bow
on a battlefield. It was the memory of loss, the exposure of his
heart to profound love. These were the things that tugged at and
tortured his soul now.

He was absolutely lost in his
thoughts when the soft rap came at the door, surprising him as
thoroughly as though an axe had struck him between the eyes. He
pulled the door open and stepped away. The maiden had returned with
the water, soap, and a single hand towel draped across her handless
arm. She flipped the towel onto the bed and set the basin and soap
on the only other piece of furniture in the room—a simple,
roughhewn dresser.

“Dinner is downstairs, if you wish.
I will see to the mare and fetch the linen on my way.” She didn’t
wait for Ravan to acknowledge this, only turned and closed the door
behind her.

The mercenary sat down on the edge
of the bed—the first time he’d sat on a bed since he’d worked at
Adorno’s estate. How long ago had that been? Ten, eleven months?
This was all that was needed for the memory of Nicolette to crash
down on his senses. Before this moment, he was driven by his need
to bury his brother and flee north. Now, he was again offered the
cruelty of a quiet moment in a space that he would not be disturbed
in.

Laying back upon the bed, he closed
his eyes, but this only made it worse. There was no sorting out the
how and why of things now. She was married to the monster, Adorno.
This belief gave him a grave, sour feeling within his gut, and he
sat up again. Stop this foolishness! Never mind! Married or not, it
would not stop him from his final quest! He would not have peace
until he stood at the castle gate. Then he would find Nicolette and
Adorno, he would take her again, just as he’d done before…and he
would kill him. And if he could not, it would be his final
stand.

To draw these thoughts so clearly to
mind was akin to surgically severing a limb. The wound was so
neatly opened, everything within so cleanly exposed. There was no
predicted outcome, only the need to go. And this need pressed upon
him with a murderous urgency. Nothing could rest until the
capitation was complete. Only then would the madness
cease.

He pushed Adorno from his
mind—pushed aside the images of the tyrant wed to the woman he
loved—and let only thoughts of Nicolette to wash across his skin.
She knew him, knew him like no other. She knew the things he’d done
and chose not to judge him but loved him in spite of his black
history. This was better, much better. This was good, and he
allowed his memory to find that long past night in the starlit
meadow, the first time they ever lay together, the first time they
ever…

His mind was in a very good place
when the soft rap came again at the door. He leapt to his feet and
after a serious moment’s hesitation…and rearranging himself,
answered the door. The maiden had returned with a large spool of
linen fiber. She seemed mildly surprised that he’d ignored his bath
altogether. “The linen,” she said. “I assumed you might be ready to
eat by now.” She glanced at the basin. “I can bring fresh water if
you like.”

When Ravan didn’t comment on this,
only shook his head, she gave him a perplexed look and left him
once more alone. He was still affected by his warm memory of
Nicolette, and did not even bother to bar the door.

There was no mirror in the room,
nothing that could indicate to Ravan just how awful he really
looked. Stepping to the simple, wooden dresser, he drew the corner
of the hand towel through the still warm basin of water. This was
something he’d not felt in a very long time. He held his hands up,
stared at them, so blackened with filth that he scarcely recognized
them. Turning them over, he studied them as though they were
strangers.

Submerging both hands in the basin,
he savored the simple joy of warm water on his skin, rejoiced in
the feel of it, genuine as a lover’s caress. It was enough to break
him into action, and he set himself to a long needed
task.

Peeling from his jacket and tunic,
he reached for the soap and began to bathe. He scoured and scrubbed
for a good, long while. His body was bruised from the beatings at
the prison, and at times it was difficult to tell the bruises from
the dirt. When the water was a dark, murky grey, Ravan was nowhere
close to being clean.

Abandoning the bath, he focused
instead on his hair. The tangled mane hung black and filthy down
his back. He tried to straighten it, tried to pry a few sections of
it apart, but combing his fingers through it proved utterly futile.
His hair was so matted and flea infested that he gave up, wondering
briefly what to do next. All at once, he drew his knife. Grasping
the thick locks with one hand, he swept the blade, chopping his
hair off clean at his shoulders.

Nearly a foot of hideously tangled
mat fell to his feet along with the many creatures within. He
kicked the snarled mess aside. Next, he did the same to his beard,
grasping it as close to his chin as he could, curling his fingers
through the thickened mass of it. He drew the knife carefully,
cutting the hair off as near as was possible to his face. Along
with the beard fell more of the awful vermin.

All the while, he ruminated on his
dark days within the prison cell, the incessant persecution of the
fleas and lice. His mind wandered freely over the past year’s
imprisonment. This, of course, ultimately led his thoughts to his
brother.

He stopped his task, blade still in
his hand, and leaned heavily against the dresser that held the
dirty wash basin. His breath caught in his chest and the foreign
stab of pain—the one that so recently had begun to pierce his
heart—surfaced again with next to no notice. Closing his eyes, he
conjured up the lovely, sad face of the priest who’d sat with him
that wondrous and wretched night. “D’ata…” The broken murmur
escaped his lips.

The soft rap at the door went
unanswered. Repeated and more insistent this time, it finally drew
him from his melancholy reminiscence, and he spun about to discover
the maiden standing in the open doorway with a fresh basin of hot
water. She was frozen in place, eyes wide, mouth open in a silent
“Oh.”

The man before her was half naked,
only in his sagging trousers and boots. He could not see what she
saw—the broad shoulders, the clear and deadly eyes, the roadmap of
scars upon the lean and hungry frame. This one had seen battle, and
much of it—of this there was little doubt.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, I—I brought more
water. I thought that…” She looked away.

Lifting the soiled basin from the
dresser, Ravan approached her and traded the water, carefully
taking the fresh one before making sure she had a grasp of the
soiled one. It was only then that she likely realized how tall he
was, the size of him, even lean as he was.

With a soft smile, he said, “It’s
good that you did. And I will likely need a third before I am done
with this.” He indicated with one hand his general remaining filth.
Then, handing her a coin, he asked if she might find him a fresh
tunic somewhere.

Nodding dumbly, she backed from the
room, leaving him to a freshened bath. This time, he stripped
entirely naked and hung his jacket and trousers from the window,
outside in the cold, secured firmly by the sash so that they might
hang in the frigid night breeze. This was clever of him for the
last of the fleas would leave the pants in short order, bolting in
the close to freezing weather to search elsewhere for warmer fare.
When he later pulled them from the window, they would not be clean,
but they would be free of infestation.

Next, he use the lye ash soap and
lathered his head, body, and lastly his groin so thoroughly that he
was at last free of the wretched vermin that had persecuted him for
so long. His skin tingled with the raw cleanliness of it, and he
was beginning to feel half civilized.

The maiden returned a third time,
and Ravan snatched the throw from the foot of the bed, wrapping it
crudely around his waist and holding it with one hand before
responding to the now familiar knock on the door. Outfitted only in
his makeshift skirt, he answered her call.

She was only momentarily surprised
and looked him up and down before saying simply, “I’ve untacked,
rubbed down, and fed your horse.” Extending her mutilated arm, she
held a fresh tunic out to him and peered at him quizzically with
her one eye. “She is a fine one, as good as I’ve seen,” she pressed
him further. He again said nothing, but this time she appeared not
willing to let whatever was on her mind rest. “It is an exceptional
horse for one so…”

With that he glanced sharply at her,
and she held her tongue, perhaps fearing she might offend him.
Ravan thanked her, taking first the tunic and then the fresh water,
holding the blanket at his waist as he did. “Yes, she is worthy of
the small fortune I paid for her, and thank you for the
tunic.”