“Are you certain they’re harmless?” Doubt riddled his question.
His experience with the dead so far always included the eater of ghosts. Siora understood his suspicions. “Yes. Memory brings them here. It would be impossible to forget the punishment of a fire goddess.”
She missed the hard comfort of his embrace when he released her and leaned to the side to search through one of the satchels tied to the cantle. A flask appeared in front of her.
“Drink this.” She did as he ordered, swallowing two mouthfuls of Karsa’s plum wine. It cleared her head and set fire to her gut in an instant. “Better?”
She nodded and coughed. “There is no possible way that stuff is just wine,” she said between gasps.
“True, but it’s effective.” He took the flask back and had a drink himself before closing and returning it back to its pack. “Ifwe push on through the night, we can reach Zaredis’s camp by late tomorrow, but the gelding needs to rest, and you look like you could use some as well. We can delay a few hours, eat and sleep and be on the road before dawn.”
“I don’t mind,” she said, “but can we put distance between us and here before we stop for the night?” She didn’t fear the dead. The living were much more frightening, but these lost souls, bound to an earth whose own violent memory of their deaths in the conflagration of god-fire wouldn’t let them go... The knowledge crushed her own spirit just by their proximity.
This was why, when she watched Kraelag’s immolation from the questionable safety of a Savatar army camp, she’d felt the very fabric of the earth ripple and warp around the living suddenly made phantoms in one cataclysmic moment.
“You’ll get no argument from me,” Gharek said. “I’ve grown more sick of the dead than the living lately and that’s saying something.”
They traveled until twilight edged the horizon, stopping twice to rest the gelding. A summer rain shower briefly darkened the sky with gravid gray clouds. They fractured open, pierced by bars of sunlight, to spill walls of rain across the land. It didn’t last long, and the storm galloped south, leaving behind two thoroughly drenched people and one equally wet horse.
Siora didn’t care. She was soaked to the skin but grateful for the unexpected bath that washed away the stickiness of sweat and heat clinging to her as well as the lingering despair that had spilled over her when she faced the ghosts at Kraelag. The words of the one spirit who acted as their speaker still brought tears to her eyes, as did the voices of phantom children crying for dead parents whoseown ghosts had broken free and no longer traveled this plane.We are all one name now. Forgotten.
The destruction of Kraelag had been on everyone’s lips for months after god-fire had consumed it. People who hadn’t seen it immolated talked as if they’d run for their lives through the gates to escape the flames, embellishing the fictional experience with a few details to give it more validity. They spoke of the colossal goddess made of fire, of the Kraelian army and the Savatar cavalry alike fleeing from the battlefield in terror, the fighting between them forgotten as they tried to escape the burning wrath of an angry goddess.
It was epic, dramatic, perfect fodder for storytellers and traveling bards to earn their keep by enchanting tavern patrons and market-day visitors with the tale. They didn’t speak of the dead, of the absolute annihilation of bodies, burned in a fire so hot it turned the sands of the infamous Pit into glass and left no remains to bury or mourn.
The dead made terrible subjects for storytelling. People wanted tales of heroic deeds and adventure, not the confused loneliness of the perished whose spirits hung trapped in an earthly realm where they remained invisible, unheard, and, after a time, no longer remembered.
Relieved to put distance between them and Kraelag, she was even happier when they discovered a way station on the road offering room and board—until she learned of the exorbitant price for a night’s stay. Gharek pointed to the patrons who entered or exited the building, then to a cluster of sedans and fine covered carts pulled by oxen or horses dressed in even finer harness.
“Even if we had the coin to afford a room, I’d be recognized inan instant. This is a tavern and inn devoted to the service of wealthy travelers. They wouldn’t let us near the stables much less through the tavern’s front entrance, and fighting off one assassin wanting my head for his master was one time too many.”
“There are abandoned places scattered throughout this area,” she said. “Especially this close to a large city, or what’s left of one. We still have a little daylight left. Can we search until then?” While she’d appreciated the rain bath, the horse blanket they used for bedding was as waterlogged as they were, and she didn’t fancy sleeping on wet ground.
Gharek reined Suti away from the tavern. “Tell me the way, and we’ll ride there.”
She was more familiar with this corner of the Empire than she was with Domora and its surrounding villages. She’d grown up not far from the old capital in a comfortable household of a mid-ranking Kraelian officer. That all changed in an instant when her father’s commander, resentful and wary of a subordinate’s climb through the ranks, named him traitor. Sold as a slave to the gladiatorial schools, Skavol had died in the bloodbaths there, never to see his wife or daughter again, at least not as a living man.
Siora and her mother had remained close to Kraelag, and Siora had buried her less than a league south from where she and Gharek were now. If she and the cat’s-paw completed this task successfully, and he managed to survive Zaredis’s promise to execute him, she’d invite him and Estred to see the breathtaking beauty of the land where her mother rested, under snow in winter and wildflowers in spring. It was a lovely thought that would never come to fruition, but she allowed it to remain in the back of her mind, a sweet delusion to distract her as they searched for dry shelter.
She directed Gharek to the remains of what had once been a free trader camp. All that was left were bits of refuse and an abandoned wagon, all four of its wheels gone, as was its entrance door and the carved decorations that were the signature styles of a free trader’s home.
Gharek brought Suti to a halt in front of the wagon. He stared at it for several moments before declaring, “Well, it has a roof and possibly a floor, and if you’re willing to fight the rats for a space inside, we can stay here for a few hours and have a fire.”
They set up their temporary camp, Gharek to face down whatever vermin had taken up residence in the wagon and she to gather kindling and bits of discarded wood to build the fire. There was plenty of tinder among the garbage, and she didn’t have to go far for sticks. When she returned, Gharek had Suti unsaddled, his lead rope staked to the ground with a loop at one end, the other end knotted to his halter. He grazed happily on the rain-drenched grass around him.
Siora set her bundle of scavenged fuel next to the spot Gharek indicated they’d have the fire. “Were there any residents in the wagon?” She imagined a floor covered in rodent droppings and dead spiders.
He set to work on building a small fire pit. “A few. They left without argument, and it’s cleaner in there than some of the tavern rooms for rent in Domora, though I can’t guarantee an absence of fleas.”
As wet ground was their only other option, she was happy to put up with a few flea bites in exchange for a dry place to sleep.
They used the fire he built to start drying the heavy horse blanket as well their outer garments. Siora stripped down to her shift,the thin linen drying in no time while she stood close to the fire’s heat but far enough from the flame to unbraid her hair and dry the wet locks.
Gharek stripped off his wet clothes as well. All of them. Unconcerned or unaware of how the firelight sculpted his nude body into a breathtaking example of male beauty, he reached for one of the blankets and wrapped it around his narrow waist, knotting the corners so it stayed in place. Siora watched him askance while she tended the fire and pretended the glorious sight of him had no effect on her.
“This wagon was a bit of good luck for a change,” she said, proud of her voice’s casual tone. “Maybe it will continue and we won’t be visited by brigands.” Truth be told, she had little concern over such a visitation. They were off a beaten path and in a spot where they’d see a party of riders coming from leagues away, especially under the bright quarter moon, but she needed to distract herself from gawking at her companion.
He lifted one shoulder, unconcerned, and dug through the nearly empty food satchel. “Most don’t plague the roads in the small hours, as there aren’t travelers to waylay this late. At least not ones with anything worth stealing.” He held up a shriveled orange and the last hunk of stale bread to prove his point.