Book of Remembrance: The Forgotten Gods: Book One (18 page)

It was still making soft
chittering noises. Brant came to stand next to me. His face contorted with
disgust. He drew out his dagger. “It looks like this was an organised attack.
This thing looks more intelligent than an animal has right to be. Do you think
we can communicate with it? Get some information out of it?”

I sucked in air through my
teeth. “I do not think so. It has been making noises and I think they were
communicating between themselves, but nothing intelligible.” Without another
word, Brant plunged the dagger deep into the creature’s chest and drew it back
out. It gave a final spasm, then went still and quiet. Coldly, Brant wiped the
blade on the fur of the dead animal.

He looked around and his eyes
grew round. “How many were there? How did you manage to kill them all?” I
explained about the sentinel and how Grer and his men had come to our rescue.

He whistled through his teeth.
“It is a shame you had need of it so early on in our journey. I am sure that it
would have been very useful later on.”

I shrugged. “Without it, there
would not have been a later on.” He sighed and walked away.

 
I knelt down with a grunt next to one of the
bodies to get a closer look. As the Cha told me when he gave me the Book, it
was much wiser to know your enemy. I had never seen anything like it.

Its face looked uncomfortably
humanlike except its mouth was jutting forward too much and it did not have a
prominent nose, but only two nostril openings. I looked at its paws and saw the
claws were gone. Curious, I picked a front paw up.

I knew from the cat that lived at
the inn in Predaki that claws could be retractable. I squeezed at it and gasped
as five ferocious claws slid out smoothly from the tip of each finger. Each one
was fully as long as the finger it came from. I carefully ran my finger down
the edge of one; it was finely serrated. I shivered and let the claws retract
again.

I became aware of the pain
throbbing through me. The rain had finally stopped and a fine sliver of moon
was even showing through the clouds. Brant was digging through his bags.

When I reached him, he looked up
at me and pointing to my face said, “Is that your only injury?”

I grimaced. “I have several.” He
nodded and after a moment found what he was looking for. He gave me a small
tub. Opening the lid, the vile smell hit me like a fist. I sneezed, my body’s
automatic response to try to rid itself of the smell.

Brant was smiling at me. “Make
sure to apply a thick layer on all your injuries.” I nodded grimly. I stripped
down and started applying it, trying to hold my breath as much as possible. My
thigh injury was the only one I could actually see. At least it looked like a
clean cut and not too deep.

The cream made it burn like a
furnace and it made my eyes water. I clenched my teeth and continued to put the
cream onto my face and then my back. Trying to reach to my back though was
extremely painful. Brant took the pot out of my hand and started spreading the
cream over the wounds I could not reach. “Thank you.” He did not reply. “Let me
look at your head.”

He muttered, but nodded. I
turned towards him and saw his eyes widen. I realised my mistake. With
everything else going on, I had completely forgotten about my brand. He pointed
at me. “What is that?”

I grimaced. “It was part of my
Seeking.
Actually, perhaps not.
It was part of my
preparation for this journey.”

He shook his head. “You are just
full of secrets aren’t you?” After a moment though, he added softly. “I guess
we all are.” He turned on his heel and strode away.

Now that the threat had gone, my
attention turned back to Markai. Why had she not come? I tried calling to her
again. Within moments, she appeared. Instantly I could feel her hackles rising.
She looked around the area.

When she was certain there were
no more attackers, she strode over to me. I could feel her concern when she saw
I was injured, but the most prominent emotion was confusion.
Why did you not call me?

I explained what had happened
and while she listened, her concern grew. She had not even felt the slightest
pull to come to me. Not when I focused my Navitas and not when I reached for
her. I asked her whether she had come across this before.
No. I have never heard of this happening. It is concerning
.
I will ask my elders
. She disappeared
into the night.

I walked back to the stones
where we had been sitting and where my bags still were. Brant was looking at me
intently. I looked at him pointedly and took out the Book.

Thankfully, the sturdy leather
bag had kept it dry, although I wondered if the perdurability spells had not
helped as well.
 
I needed to know if
these creatures had been some unfortunate chance attack or whether it was all
connected to Rakadamon.

When he saw the Book, I could
see curiosity burning in his eyes. I gave him a small nod and he sat down next
to me. I started paging through it. His lips were pressed into a tight line. He
muttered, “Some more than others.”

I presumed he was talking about
secrets and I permitted myself a small smile. I was looking more at the
illustrations to see if I could match one to the strange creatures that
attacked us. His breath caught a few times while looking at the hideous
monsters staring back at us from the pages.

I turned another page, but he
caught it and turned back to where we had been. I looked again at the picture,
but it definitively was not a match. I started saying as much to him when he
held up a finger and pointed to the description on the opposite side. I noticed
he was pointing to a description of the smell of this particular creature.
 

The heading on the page was
‘Scavenger’. The illustration showed a human like figure wearing a full-length
robe. Only its hands and face was showing, but it looked like a corpse. The
flesh was rotting off its body. Bones were visible on its hands and its cheek
seemed to be partially gone, making his teeth and jaw clearly visible. That
explains the smell then.

I read the description, ‘The
Scavenger is not a battle unit, but used only for recognisance and retrieval.
As is evident in the illustration on the previous page, this is one of the
Twisted Ones. These poor souls thought that death had brought them their final
rest. They are bound to him in death after serving him, often by coercion, in
life. They work in stealth and have only rarely been discovered, although often
the smell they leave behind is evidence enough of their passage. They will not
attack first. If discovered they will attempt to flee, but when cornered or
attacked, they will defend. Although strong, they are slow moving and easily killed.
Note: beware that an injury sure to be fatal to humans,
may
only slow it down, therefore, decapitation is the recommended method of
eradication.’

I looked up to find Brant with
raised eyebrows slowly shaking his head. “This is a book of nightmares. Surely
not all these…things, are out there somewhere?”

I sighed heavily. “I think they
are. Or, at least I think they are all reappearing somehow. I don’t know where
they have been hiding so that no one knows about them, but I know they are all
coming back.”

He continued to shake his head
as if he simply could not believe that. “They told me of Rakadamon and his
servants, but I was told all knowledge of them had been lost.”

I nodded. “Rakadamon tried to
wipe out any memory and any trace of information, but this Book survived.”

I started paging through again,
but we did not find any illustration to match the creatures that had attacked
us. I paged back to the descriptions of creatures that had no illustrations,
but again came up with nothing. Brant looked a question at me. “Does this mean
that tonight’s attack was completely unrelated to the bigger picture here?”

I frowned thinking it over. “I
think we cannot be sure about that, but what that means then is that we cannot
accept this Book as complete. There may yet be things lurking out there that we
have no idea about.” I carefully stowed the Book back into my bag, shivering at
that thought.

We dragged the bodies of our
attackers away from where we were sitting. The night had cleared some and in
the dim moonlight, I could see Balder and Teeka some way off. I made my way
over and brought them back. They became a bit nervous as we drew closer to our
haphazard camp, but a few soothing words soon calmed them down again.

We sat on the stone again with
our backs together and thanks to the exhaustion that came from fighting off
killer animals, managed to get some fitful sleep in this way. Much too soon
though the sun rose bright over the horizon. Brant complained when I moved
away. I winced as pain flared all over my body. Dragging myself up, I made sure
all my belongings were back into my bags. I grimaced with the slight effort of
unhobbling the horses and mounting. Brant was clenching his teeth against his
own pain.

The day passed in a haze of
exhaustion and pain. We stopped frequently to rest. We ate as we rode, hardly
tasting the cheese and bread.
 
As we
travelled along, the landscape slowly changed as well. We passed the occasional
tree, small gnarled looking things. I was relieved when we stopped once more to
realise that we were now in the shadow of the looming mountains. The road
stretched on as far as the eye could see, but I wondered how difficult the
mountain pass would be. We pushed on until we were falling asleep in the
saddle.

This night we did not even
bother with a fire, simply eating some dried meat and I shared a bruised and
slightly shrivelled apple with Brant. I called Markai and she appeared in a
heartbeat, obviously fearing that we had been attacked again. As usual, we drew
lots to decide the watch. He drew the short twig and so took the first watch.
Gratefully I sank onto my bedding and was asleep within moments with Markai
curled up against my back.

The warm sun woke me the next
morning. I saw Brant half on and half off his bedding, clearly having fallen
asleep during his watch. I looked around anxiously for any signs of intruders
during the night, but Markai reassured me that there had been no one. I dug out
another apple from my pack and sat with my eyes closed while eating. I heard
Brant stirring. He jerked up. “No, no! I did not mean to sleep. I was simply
closing my eyes for a few minutes.” He scowled at himself.

I held a hand up. “No harm done.
I probably would have fallen asleep as well had I taken first watch.”

His scowl only darkened.
“Anything could have killed us in our sleep.
Careless!”
He hissed, shaking his head angrily. I let him be.

After a few hours of riding at a
brisk pace, we came upon a small stream and were all too glad to be clean and
shaved again.
 
I caught him looking at
the brand on my chest a few times. I wondered what thoughts were passing behind
his dark eyes at these times.
 
The horses
had a long drink and we refilled our water skins. Markai had disappeared again
sometime during the morning. Refreshed, we set off.

I looked at the map as we rode
along and for the first time noticed that we were not actually passing over the
mountain. The road divided with one branch going over the mountain and the
other snaking along its base. I was actually relieved. Master Haer had told us
stories of crossing the Hewel Mountains. Apparently, temperatures can vary
greatly with some nights dipping below freezing point. I shivered.

We were coming around a bend in
the road when we came upon a gleeman standing by his wagon. The wagon was
teetering to one side with a broken wheel. A man in a long red coat with
multi-coloured tassels along the hem jumped up when he saw us approaching.

His eyes went wide with surprise
and quicker than the eye could follow, the fellow had whipped out a knife.
Nervously, his eyes flickered between me, my sword, and Brant and his dagger.
There were also two women hiding behind the man.

I put both my hands in the air
to show we were not a threat. “We mean you no harm, gleeman.”

His eyes narrowed suspiciously,
but he slowly lowered the knife. He did not, however put it away. “Where are
you travelling to?”

I smiled reassuringly. “We
travel from Predaki and we are headed to Medirea.”

 
He nodded. He slid his knife in behind his
belt, but still kept a hand on the hilt. “Medirea is where we travel to also.
We have had some trouble with ruffians on the road so you will excuse my
caution.” He said it as a statement not a question. The women slowly stood up
behind them. They wore plain dresses. They looked as if they could be mother
and daughter.

The elder of the two had a
protective hand on the younger’s shoulder,
who
looked
to have seen around 12 cycles of the season. She had the expression of a scared
rabbit.

“I am surprised to hear of your
trouble on the road. I thought this area was usually quite safe.”

He nodded. “Ah, it was. Times
are changing though.” He paused briefly, giving us measuring looks. “I am
Nassarit and this is my wife, Harrit and my daughter, Mai.” He gave a small bow
and the women gave curtsies.