The Darkness Comes (The Second Book of the Small Gods Series) (25 page)

Kuneprius’ breath grew short and a thin sweat moistened his armpits beneath the binding shirt. He took three steps straight ahead toward the forest where the clay Vesisdenperos awaited him, but stopped. The night before, he’d come from that direction and seen no gardens. He amended his path and walked around the side of the inn, seeking fertile ground on which to lay his seed.

Tucked in behind the building, he found a herb garden.

He crept up on it like a hunter stalking prey, careful to move as quietly as wearing blocks of wood and chunks of dead animal on his feet allowed. As he neared it, he inhaled the aromas of basil and mint, saw green-gray sprigs of rosemary and wide bay leaves—a few of the same herbs growing in the seed garden at home.

Kuneprius stepped up to the garden’s edge and fumbled with the buttons fastening the front of his breeches closed. The top one came open easily enough, but the second proved more difficult and a sliver of panic ignited in his stomach. What if he got trapped in these gods forsaken breeches? After a brief struggle, the second button finally popped free. He breathed a relieved sigh and pulled his manhood out of his trousers.

With the scents of fresh herbs filling his nostrils, Kuneprius allowed his eyelids to slide shut and his mind to wander to the curves hidden beneath the young girl’s formless smock. His rod responded and he began to stroke.

Onetwothreefourfivesixseven.

He imagined reaching beneath the hem of the dress, touching the soft skin of her inner leg.

Twentytwotwentythreetwentyfour.

Both hands moved farther up her thighs, then stopped, unsure what to imagine he’d find where her legs came together, but he didn’t let it deter his rhythm.

Fortyfortyonefortytwo.

Even with the aroma of mint strong in his nose, he imagined he tasted the saltiness of her skin on his tongue, heard her panted—

“Oy! What in the hell does you think you’re doin’?”

Kuneprius snapped his eyes open and spun around, his manhood still in his hand, but the count lost. He’d seen the man before—he’d been pouring drinks behind the bar last night when he arrived, a cheerful smile on his innkeeper lips and a laugh ready on his tongue.

The barkeep was neither laughing nor smiling now. He must have risen early to split kindling for the fire, because he held a wood axe in his hands. His eyes went wide at the sight of Kuneprius with his cock out, but the look of surprise slipped readily back into an expression of anger.

“Get that thing away from my bay leaves.” The man growled and brandished the axe.

Without a word of explanation or apology, Kuneprius bolted, attempting to tuck his erect-but-deflating manhood into his pants as he did. He got it stowed, but couldn’t button his trousers while he ran, so he grabbed them by the waistband to hold them up.

His foot slipped as he rounded the corner at the end of the inn and he went to one knee. As he scrambled to regain his feet, the damned uneven boot heels slipped in the dewy grass. He stole a glimpse of the axe-wielding man bearing down on him.

Kuneprius jumped up, grabbed his breeches, and sprinted for the trees.

In his youth, he’d been one of the fastest runners in Murtikara, but the shirt binding his breath, the breeches sliding off his hips, and the boots turning his ankles all conspired to slow him. The footsteps of the man with the axe grew closer.

Kuneprius leaped over a fallen log, teetering but keeping his balance when he landed on the other side, and entered the coolness beneath the branches. The uneven boot heels scuffed through moss and desiccated leaves, leaving divots in the dirt. He ran past a few trees, dodged a stump bleached gray by seasons of weather, then dared a glance over his shoulder.

The axe man still pursued him.

“Ves,” he cried out, voice shaking with the pounding of his feet. “Help me!”

Ahead of him, the forest floor climbed a short hill. He drove straight up it, but the soles of the unaccustomed boots slipped in the carpet of needles fallen from the trees above. Kuneprius hit the ground elbows first, saving himself from knocking the breath out of his chest. He scrambled to keep going, soles scuffling, and heard the axe man’s steps take to the rise.

With nothing else to do, he flipped onto his back to face his death.

The man’s face twisted with a rage that didn’t befit catching a fellow who planned to leave a few drops of seed on his mint. Narrowed eyes glared from his reddened face; he gripped the axe handle in both hands in the manner of someone familiar with swinging it.

Kuneprius clambered farther up the hill using hands and feet, his ass dragging and his loose breeches sagging, scooping dirt and pine needles into his crack.

“You’re the one,” the man exclaimed. “Knew I’d catch you one day.”

“I…I’m sorry. I meant no harm to your herb garden.”

“Ain’t my herb garden I care about, it’s Ellie’s lady garden. This ain’t the first time you been by looking to pay a visit, is it?”

Kuneprius shook his head hard enough he couldn’t keep count of the number of times he did. Four, he thought.

“It be the last time, dead right.”

The man stepped up and raised the axe, gripping the knobbed end in both hands. Teeth gritted, arms tensed to swing, he stopped. His eyes opened wide and his face went slack.

A gray foot bigger than any boot could hold thumped the ground beside Kuneprius, sending fallen leaves skittering away.

“Ves. Thank the Small Gods.”

The axe man seemed unsure what to do for an instant, but when the clay man took another step toward him, his indecision fled. The man jumped forward before Vesisdenperos had the chance to, and the axe head came down.

It entered the top of the golem’s chest with a wet splat. Droplets of moist clay spattered across Kuneprius’ cheek. He wiped at it, sickened as though he’d been splashed with his friend’s blood, then the clay man’s fingers found his attacker’s throat.

“No.” The word came out a whisper between Kuneprius’ lips.

Muscles flexed beneath the smooth gray skin of the golem’s forearm and the axe man’s eyes bulged. Desperate hands released the axe handle to claw at the clay man’s arms, but to no effect.

“Let him go.” Kuneprius scrambled to his feet. “Please, Ves. Don’t kill him.”

An ugly choking cough found its way out of the axe man’s mouth, and a spray of blood along with it. Kuneprius grabbed at Vesisdenperos’ arm, but the big man shrugged him off. He could do nothing but watch as the clay monstrosity jerked his wrist and the axe man’s neck broke with a sickening crack. He opened his hand and the dead innkeeper slumped to the ground.

The golem plucked the axe from his chest and stalked away, headed deeper into the forest and leaving Kuneprius standing over the corpse. He watched after his one-time friend, the gray flesh oblivious to the thorns and branches plucking at it, and wondered if any of Vesisdenperos remained inside the clay shell, or if believing so was a fantasy.

After a moment, he looked at the innkeeper’s face, his tongue lolling out of the side of his mouth. The face of the young woman he’d killed flashed across his mind, the way it did when he first woke each morning, and he blinked to dispel it. Once, twice, three times.

“You didn’t have to kill him, Ves,” he said and followed the golem into the forest, picking clay out from under his nails as he walked. “You didn’t have to.”

XXIV Danya - Unmasked

Your brother is not dead.

The words haunted Danya during her stay in the small room overlooking the courtyard. She tossed and turned in the bed after the setting of the sun, she paced the thin carpet when it rose again. The need to get away and find him, or to let Trenan know he lived and to continue the search might have consumed her, but the strange feeling brought to her by the room, and her curiosity about everything she’d heard, kept her from leaving.

After her second sunrise in the room, she stood on the balcony staring at the patch of blank earth in the middle of the courtyard. No matter how she squinted and strained, she saw nothing but dirt and rocks—no tender sprout grew from the Seed of Life.

Mother of Death. Seed of Life. What does it mean?

The chamber door opened behind her but she didn’t turn to greet the person who entered. Without looking, she knew it would be Evalal in her drab green robe and wooden mask. No one else visited her despite the bustle of activity that occasionally emanated from the great room below. Evalal tended all her needs, from bringing her food to emptying her honey pot and teaching her the ways of the Goddess, but she had yet to see the girl’s face.

“I’m not hungry yet,” Danya said gazing out over the courtyard.

Evalal didn’t respond. Footsteps whispered on the thin carpet as she entered the room, but she said nothing. Curiosity soon stole Danya’s attention from the mound of dirt and the seed hidden beneath; she faced her keeper.

The girl standing in the middle of the room appeared to have seen the seasons turn ten or eleven times. The skin of her cheeks was smooth, her lips ready to smile, but it was her eyes which identified her.

“Evalal?” The princess stepped away from the balcony. “Is that you?”

The smile threatening on her lips broke across her face and she nodded. Danya took two quick steps into the room but then halted, quashing her urge to rush to the girl and embrace her. She didn’t understand the Sisters well enough to know if the missing mask signified a good thing.

“Where is your mask?”

“I got my blood during the night.”

Danya stared at her, uncomprehending. She wanted to smile along with the girl, but found herself unable. The princess raised a brow and shook her head.

“I don’t understand.”

The young girl’s expression didn’t falter at Danya’s confusion. “In our order, initiates wear the mask until their blood comes. Today, I am no longer an initiate. Today, I am N’th Evalal.”

“I see.” Danya crossed the room to sit on the edge of the bed, indicated for Evalal to join her. “But I don’t understand why the mask in the first place.”

“There are no men here.”

“None?”

Danya thought of the great room and the robed women working at their various tasks. She’d seen no men but had supposed them to be kept separate, somewhere else in the labyrinthine temple.

“None.”

“And this is why you wear the masks? To look like men?”

“Initiates are given the tasks men might normally do.”

Danya tilted her head. “Such as?”

“Going to market. Upkeep and repairs, that sort of thing.”

“If no men reside in the temple, where do young ones come from?”

This time, Evalal appeared confused. “What do you mean?”

“Both a man and a woman are required to create life. How do your Mothers give birth without a man?”

“Our Mothers do not give birth,” Evalal replied with a nervous chuckle. “The Goddess gives birth to initiates in other parts of the city, sometimes other parts of the kingdom. When people find them, they bring them to the temple and give them to the Mothers. Only the Mother of Death gives birth.”

Danya recalled her trip to the temple, passing the brothels of Sunset on the way. She doubted the Goddess gave birth to the initiates any more than she did. The temple, it turned out, was a place for whores to dispose of their unwanted daughters.

Better than the alternative.

The princess tried not to think about what might happen to their sons. She forced a smile on her face and rubbed Evalal’s arm.

“So this is a special day for you.”

“Yes,” she replied, nodding enthusiastically. “And for you, too.”

“For me? How so?”

“Today is the day you take the Seed of Life from the earth.”

XXV Trenan - Bloodhound

Trenan left Dansil standing by the tanner’s front door in case the woman and her son tried to escape through the cellar. He positioned Strylor at the far end of the alley and kept Osis with him as they headed toward the store room from the other end.

Godsbane in his hand, the master swordsman stalked along the alley, his boots sinking in detritus. The moon had turned through many seasons since he last spent much time in the outer city, but it seemed conditions had worsened. He didn’t recall it being quite so dirty, so rough, so poor.

He shooed the thought aside to concentrate on his senses and the feel in his gut. Intuition told him they were on the right track, that this woman and her son had information to help them locate Teryk. No solid evidence supported the hunch, but his soldier’s instinct had been piqued the moment he stood at the mouth of the alley gazing along its garbage-strewn length.

The door for which he searched should be the eighth from the corner, but the master swordsman determined which one it was long before he reached it.

Splintered boards hung at odd angles, protruding out into the alley, bent spikes jutting from them threatening any passersby. Trenan gestured with his sword and Osis stood on his toes to see past. The sergeant nodded and the master swordsman put a finger to his lips, urging him to keep quiet.

When they reached the doorway, Trenan saw someone had done their best to replace the door in its jamb. It hung from one hinge, the other twisted and broken, the lintel shattered. Now they were so close, he realized the boards protruding into the alley had been nailed across the doorway, presumably to keep someone inside the storeroom.

Except someone had desperately wanted to get out.

Trenan banged Godsbane’s pommel against the door, the weakened wood trembling with the impact.

“Open this door in the name of the king.”

He stepped back, weapon at the ready. Nothing happened. The master swordsman hammered the door again.

“Open the door,” he said, louder this time.

The sense of calm that always descended on him in violent or desperate situations fell over him, displacing any hint of fear or nervousness from his body. The only emotional reaction it failed to quell was his worry for Ishla and how all of this might affect the two of them. A moment later, the door hadn’t opened, so Trenan stepped back, raised his foot, and set his boot heel against the wood.