King of the Bastards (6 page)

“Damned if I forgot my paints,” Rogan grunted. “Still, scavenge
what you can from the beach. It looks as though the seas don’t want items that
went to the bottom. We will need all we can if there is life here.”

“Surely the cache of weapons in the rear chamber is intact? If I
swim under the ship, perhaps I can retrieve them.”

Approving this idea, Rogan waded back into the water, and waited.
Piece by piece Javan retrieved armor and weapons from the rear of the boat,
which was still underwater. The youth then tossed them to Rogan, who carried
each item to shore. He was stunned at how many times Javan dived and returned
with knives or swords.

At last, Rogan called, “Do you need to breathe, boy?”

Javan winked and dove again. This time he returned with a blade
in his teeth and a round shield in his left hand. In his right hand was a
bottle of wine. Rogan grabbed the bottle and his perpetual scowl gave way to a
slight smile.

“You see?” Javan laughed. “Just what we needed.”

Rogan unsealed the canister of wine and said, “We? Dive again for
your own.” He waited until the youth was underwater, and then mumbled, “I
swear, the boy is half fish.”

They carried the weapons and water flasks up the beach. Rogan
drank deeply from the wine while Javan heaped the weapons in a grassy area out
of the reach of the surf.

Rogan sat down and looked back at the water. The alcohol coursed
through his veins, easing his pain.

Javan pointed at the sea birds and crabs. “At least there is
wildlife in abundance. And I found a fishing rod amidst the weapons.”

“Wonderful. So we’ll not starve right away.”

Rogan squinted at the sky. In the distance, he thought he saw the
bat-winged bird again, but when he blinked it was gone. He cursed his fading
senses, disregarding it as a trick of his mind, brought on by exhaustion and
the wine.

“We will only have to survive a brief time, sire. Surely, you are
correct and others from the southern part of Olmek-Tikal will search for us
when we do not return!”

Rogan shrugged, nostrils testing the sea air. “Probably. If they
find us it’ll be a miracle all in itself. We traveled a long way. They may give
up in despair before ever reaching this point.”

“The natives in Olmek-Tikal practically worship you,” Javan
reminded him. “They would not desert you any more than I would.”

Brooding, Rogan drank more wine. “Perhaps. We’ll just have to
wait and see. They may be happy to be rid of their white king. Bah—I’ve grown
tired of such primitive ignorance, anyway. I came here for adventure, not to be
a god to a pack of red-skinned farmers and fishermen.”

“They will send others if we do not return, sire. I am positive.”

Rogan spat, eyes to the ocean.

Javan paused. “Uncle, may I speak freely?”

Rogan rinsed his mouth with wine and spat it onto the sand.

“Speak.”

“I feel that your mind is on what Karza said was transpiring in
Albion.”

“Damned genius, you are. Of course, boy. The thought that my
eldest son is dead and my kin suffer under the damned heel of southern
invaders—by Wodan…that’s hard to swallow. How could bright Albion fall so? It
isn’t as if they could sneak up with legions of troops.” Eyes closed, he saw
the dream images of the black teamsters by the grand palace in Albion and his
joints ached anew.

Javan took up a bow and a single arrow. “But sire, even if we
turned the bireme back over we could hardly sail back to the port of Argos in
her. She barely floats, after the assault from both the creature and the
corsairs. Such open seas would swamp us. It is a gift from above that we
survived the night swells.”

Rogan again gazed to the sky. “That’s why we hugged the continent
and rode it out slow to land. Woe as I am to admit it, our foes found us, half
a world away, with the power of Damballah. There’s no other explanation.”

Javan stooped, smelling a patch of flowers blooming from a dune.
“The bird-thing was an eye in the sky for a wizard?”

“Perhaps.”

“You certainly have no love for magic.”

“Stupid men allow their fears to be made large by wizards, Javan.
Consider our companions from Olmek-Tikal. They took beating hearts out of
living men for their gods.”

“Until we stopped them,” Javan said, “and taught them another
way.”

“I think all wizards tend to cavort with minions in darkness
because no woman will have them.”

Javan laughed at the jest. “That doesn’t make them any less
powerful.”

“True. But they bleed just like any other man. I wonder about
that bird we saw. It was unnatural—but not an illusion or some parlor trick. It
looked like the stone idols of Damballah I saw as a younger man. And Karza said
it served them.”

Javan cleared his throat, inspecting the leaves of a squat bush.
A swarm of angry gnats arose from the branches and pestered him. His uncle’s
words weighed heavily on him. Would they be forgotten, abandoned here on this
forsaken beach?

“I hope the Olmek-Tikalize sailors come after us. If they do not…”

He choked down the words, not wanting his voice to betray the
fear he felt inside.

“Welcome home, Javan,” Rogan swept his hand toward the forest. “I
bet that when Thyssen sent you along for maturing, he never dreamed that you’d
be shipwrecked with his old king, eh?”

Javan shrugged and drew the string of his bow back. With one
shot, he struck a swooping ivory-colored seagull. Squawking, it flopped in the
water, and the young man ran into the surf to retrieve his prize, carefully avoiding
the body parts of their fellow sailors that were beginning to wash ashore.

“At least you aren’t skittish,” Rogan hollered. “That surf is now
thick with pieces of our foes or friends. Look how the sand is littered with
their limbs, in just the brief time we’ve been ashore. We can’t stay here the
night, this will soon smell worse than ass.”

Emerging from the water, Javan said, “Sire, I think you
complimented me.”

Rogan smiled. “Engrave it in stone, boy. It may be my only
testament in such a manner to you.”

A sudden gust of wind blasted off the ocean. Beyond the trees,
they heard a deep growl. It didn’t sound human. It did sound hungry. Exchanging
glances, both men took to the bushes and hid, waiting.

Out of the trees lumbered a gigantic black bear. As the sea gave
up the fruits of their awful triumph over the corsairs, the grisly bits of
humanity along the shoreline tempted the animal. It sniffed the air and slowly
padded onto the beach, devouring morsels here and there.

“What a beast,” Rogan whispered. Javan had to strain to hear him.
“This animal may be just what we need.”

“What say you, sire?”

“Look to that mountain range. Such conditions remind me of the
peaks south of Turana, not just Corithina. I would guess the temperature drops
here at night and in the higher elevations.”

“That is logical.”

“Of course, it’s damned logical. That bear’s coat is thicker than
the current late summer season in Albion. Perhaps we are farther north than we
thought. He grows it not for a coming winter, but for everyday warmth. Since
the sea has stripped us down to our loins, the choice is obvious. We must take
him for his hide. It will keep us warm.”

The bear raised its head, and looked around. Then it continued
rooting. Its snout was crimson, and its long, pink tongue licked at the
droplets of blood.

“How long since you last slain a bear single-handed, sire?”

Rogan shrugged. “I cannot recall. But I’m not hollowed out just
yet. Besides, I have you along. Why should I fear him with your bow at my
side?”

Javan breathed a heavy sigh and prepared. “I appreciate your
faith, sire.”

“Use the heavy arrows Karza’s warriors had.” Rogan rooted in the
pile of weapons. “The forked heads are a work of savage art. Those pricks knew
what they were doing.”

“As you command.”

“We have collected enough of those from the stray quivers on the
beach. Wodan knows what else will vomit onto the shore over time. With a good
chance we can pierce a lung in that hulk.”

“I will do my best, lord.”

“Keep firing if he doesn’t go down.” Rogan squeezed the handle of
a double-headed battle-axe they’d retrieved from the bireme’s mooring links. “I
shall do the rest.”

Javan mumbled a prayer to Rhiannon and stealthily positioned
himself farther down the line of bushes. Rogan ran down the beach in the open
for a few yards. The bear looked up from a rib cage that had washed ashore. It
spied the old man clearly, but made no effort to follow. It had no fear, and no
desire to hunt, since easier pickings lay at its feet. Instead, the beast
lowered its snout and continued licking the scraps of organs and tissue still
clinging to the bones.

Javan fired the first of his arrows into the bear’s side. The
beast grunted and then roared. Quickly, Javan drew from the quiver on his back
and fired three more times, striking the creature in the side, close to the
front quarters, and then the low-hanging belly. He expected the bear to drop,
but instead, it stood firm.

Rogan loped further out onto the sand with the smooth ease of a
tiger and fired his own long bow twice. The first shot missed, but the second
arrow struck the bear deep in the other flank. The beast rose up, teeth bared
as it howled. Thick flecks of foamy saliva dropped from its jowls.

Feet planted, Rogan let the bow slide from his fingers, and drew
back, hefting the double-edged battle-axe. He roared in answer to the bear’s
challenge. The animal paused, uncertain of what it faced. Grunting hard, Rogan
flung the heavy axe with all of his might. The weapon tumbled end over end, and
buried itself under the beast’s open maw, cleaving its jaws.

Staggering, the bear rocked back and forth on unsteady paws, but
still refused to fall. Rogan drew his broadsword and charged low, like a bull.
The mortally wounded animal tried to roar, but only a weak gurgle issued from
its throat. Rogan avoided the desperate claws and stabbed his blade into the
bear’s abdomen. Going to all fours, the beast lurched a few steps, handle of
the axe impacting on the ground, driving the blade in farther. It shuddered
before collapsing. Rogan danced away again, inadvertently stomping on the leg
of some partially eaten shark victim.

The bear shook, and then moved no more.

Rogan dropped to his knees and then rolled onto his buttocks
beside it. He greedily sucked the salty air into his burning lungs.

Javan ran up, whooping in joy. “I think that axe head found its
brain!”

Rogan eyed the boy and said, “I suppose you expect me to gut and
clean him as well?”

Javan smiled. “It
is
your kill, Uncle.”

“I’ll clout you for that,” Rogan promised. “But first I must
rest.”

§

It took them the rest of the day to skin and clean the bear,
and it was dusk by the time they were finished. They washed their hands in the
ocean, cleaning them of the sticky blood. They moved on down the way a piece,
and then Javan started a fire behind a dune to prepare dinner. The meat gleaned
from the kill ran tough and gamy. Gulls darted over their heads, begging for
scraps. Rogan growled at them, and the shrieking scavengers fled into the
night.

As they ate, Javan eyed the skeleton of the bireme in the
distance.

“I was correct, sire. The ship is deeper in the sand now and will
not be sucked out to sea.”

“If we ever see Albion again,” Rogan said around a mouthful of
half-cooked bear flesh, “I shall have Rohain give you a medal. After we’ve
defeated my bastard son’s plot against him, of course.”

“We will get back, sire. Some way, some how, we will.”

Rogan shrugged, sucking the marrow from a bone. “Perhaps my
destiny is to die here.”

“Banish such thoughts, sire!”

The fire popped, sending a brief shower of burning embers into
the night sky.

“If it is my time to die, you get to watch. Your father would say
it is a grand joke of fate, eh?”

Javan tilted his head to one side. “My father would never give in
to fate.”

Rogan nodded, thinking on old Thyssen and their adventures as
revolutionaries. His smile was faint. Old ghosts danced in the flickering
firelight. The night of a thousand knives. The whore with three breasts and the
secret she’d told in the dark.

“True. You are young. You have space in your gut for fighting
fate. My belly has wrestled that demon-whore for eons. She is a tireless bitch
and I grow weary of her.”

“I am not ready to die.”

“No man ever is,” Rogan replied. “Yes, you can cheat death, but
you can never be ready for it. Think of Wagnar and Harkon. Or Captain
Huxira—old as he was, I dare say he was not ready to die. When death comes, it
comes. All that you can do is to meet it.”

The fire crackled again. A second later, a twig snapped in
response. Both men were instantly on their feet. The hair on Javan’s arms stood
up. Rogan tensed, alert and ready for whatever new danger lay in store.

Javan pointed to the bushes, suddenly alive with creeping
shadows.

“Uncle—look!”

The shadows detached themselves from the bushes, and a group of
humans stepped forward, just outside the circle of light. They were slender,
clad in tan loincloths and deerskin cloaks. The strangers carried wooden staffs
with tied stone spearheads, and several sported bows of a style that neither
Rogan nor Javan had ever seen before. The flames flickered off their dense,
ruddy complexions and red-tinged skin. Their obsidian hair shone in the
moonlight as if their flat manes were slick and wet.

“Javan,” Rogan ordered, “your bow.”

But the weapon was already in the boy’s hands.

Silently, the group stepped into the dying firelight. A few of
the natives bore odd deformities; elongated heads, misshapen ears, one limb
longer than another, even bizarre double noses. None made a move to attack.
They seemed docile and curious. None of them spoke.