The Children of the White Lions: Volume 02 - Prophecy (50 page)

“
Fine
.”

She moved to the body of the dead horse, taking a wide, circuitous path around Okollu. As she bent down to untie the rope from the mare, Rhohn faced the mongrel, praying that he was doing the right thing. Holding the mongrel’s steady gaze, he demanded, “Why did you save us?” He waved his hand at the bloody scene around them. “Why did you do this?”

Okollu rolled onto his back and made to sit up, but halted instantly, his black lips curling into a painful snarl. Rhohn saw the shoulder wound actually continued to the middle of Okollu’s chest, deep and raw. Giving up, Okollu lay flat, wincing.

“The message you carry is too important, smooth-face.”

Rhohn glanced up quickly to find Tiliah glaring at them, having clearly heard what Okollu said. She stood, retrieved the burlap bag from the grass, and moved back to them, rope in hand, her gaze locked on Rhohn’s face, a thousand questions dancing in her eyes. Okollu turned his head at the sound of her scuffling steps. She stopped on the opposite side of Okollu, her eyes still skeptical.

“You are sure you want to do this?”

“I am,” answered Rhohn.

Tiliah nodded once and turned her full attention to the mongrel’s wound.

“If you promise not to bite, I can help you with that.”

“No!” growled Okollu. “Leave me.”

Tiliah lifted her gaze to Rhohn.

“You heard him, Mud Man. Let’s go.”

Ignoring her, Rhohn stepped closer to Okollu. Eyeing the meaty gash, he said, “You are losing a lot of blood. You’ll die soon if we do not bind it.”

“I murdered my pack mates,” growled Okollu, his ragged voice thick with disgust. “I deserve to die.”

Rhohn could not let that happen. He wanted answers. Drawing his Dust Man blade forth, he stepped forward and pointed the tip at Okollu’s neck.

“Let her bind your wound.”

Soft, puffing growls slipped from the mongrel’s throat. He was laughing.

“Go! Shove your blade into me! I
want
to die!”

Rhohn withdrew the sword tip from Okollu’s neck. He had not thought that through. He stared at the mongrel, wondering how to threaten a soul who welcomed death.

In a clear, calm tone, Tiliah said, “If he doesn’t want help, he doesn’t want help. Leave him to die and let’s go.”

Staring up into the sky, Okollu said, “Listen to the she-man.” His voice sounded weaker than just a moment ago.

Rhohn shook his head.

“No! I need to know about that message! And why you are out here, chasing us for a blasted gemstone?”

Okollu twisted his head to stare at Rhohn again.

“Stone? What stone?”

“The one in the bag,” answered Rhohn.

Okollu rolled his head to stare at the burlap bag gripped in Tiliah’s hand, hanging freely at her side.

“There is a stone in the bag?”

“Of course, isn’t that—?”

“What does it look like?”

Rhohn was confused.

“You were hunting for something yet you did not—”

Okollu whipped his head back around to glare at Rhohn, his eyes intense and burning.

“What does it look like?!”

Rhohn hesitated, sharing a quick look with Tiliah before answering.

“It’s black. Smooth and glossy.”

“Black?” replied the mongrel. That detail seemed to surprise him. “How big is it?”

Rhohn frowned, wondering at the mongrel’s sudden interest in the rock.

“The size of my thumb.”

The bloody fur around Okollu’s muzzle twitched.

“Does it smell wrong to you?”

“I’m sorry…does it ‘
smell’
wrong? It doesn’t smell like anything. It’s a rock.”

“Do you squirm when you look upon it?”

Rhohn’s face twisted up in confusion.

“What are you—?”

“Yes,” answered Tiliah. Rhohn glanced up to find her staring at Okollu, nodding, her eyes just as intense as Okollu’s. “It’s wicked.”

Confused, Rhohn asked, “What do you mean it’s ‘wicked?’ It’s a
rock
.”

Tiliah shifted her gaze to Rhohn and spoke with complete confidence, “Something is wrong with that stone.”

“What?”

“I don’t know, Mud Man,” said Tiliah, exasperated. “But…I just know that—”

Okollu interrupted her, growling, “I would like your help now, she-man.”

Tiliah stared down at the mongrel and snapped, “My name is Tiliah, not ‘she-man!’”

“Whatever your name, I would like your help now.”

Wondering at the mongrel’s sudden shift in attitude, Rhohn asked, “Do you know what the stone is?”

“No.”

“Then why—”

“I cannot answer your questions if I am dead, smooth-face! I want your help now, so give it to me!”

Pushing aside his curiosity for the moment, Rhohn pressed his lips together and looked back to Tiliah.

“Do what you can.”

Tiliah stared down at the mongrel and asked, “You won’t bite me, will you?”

“I will restrain myself,” answered Okollu. It almost sounded like he was being wry.

Letting out a tiny sigh, Tiliah moved closer to Okollu, kneeled down, and inspected the wound.

“Without the correct tools, I can only bind it. And it will hurt while I do it. A lot.”

Okollu nodded.

“I understand. Do what you must.”

She reached out to touch the wound, prodding the edges around the open slice. Blood and clumps of fur quickly coated her hands and arms. Without looking up, she said, “Come here, Mud Man. I need you to hold his flesh together.”

Rhohn sheathed his sword and crouched near Okollu’s head. Tiliah explained what he was to do as she tore long strips from the empty burlap bag, laying them on Okollu’s chest. Throughout their exchange, Okollu lay quietly, eyeing them both.

When everything was in place, Tiliah peered down at Okollu.

“Ready?”

Snapping his jaws shut hard enough that they clacked, Okollu growled, “I am.”

Tiliah looked up at Rhohn and nodded.

“Go.”

As she had instructed, Rhohn jammed fur and skin together, jumping as Okollu let out an ear-splitting howl. After only a moment, the cry cut off abruptly. The muscles in the mongrel’s chest relaxed. Rhohn glanced to Okollu’s face and saw that he had passed out.

“Good,” grunted Tiliah. “This will be easier.” She quickly wrapped the strips of burlap over the wound and bound it with rope, pulling so tight that Rhohn was worried she might be cutting off blood flow. After one last sharp tug, she said, “You can let go now.”

Rhohn released the bloody fur and scooted back. As she inspected the binding, he stood upright and turned in a slow, stationary circle, studying every horizon and praying they were far enough from anyone that the mongrels’ howls had gone unnoticed. Seeing nothing besides grass, bushes, and sky, he turned his attention back to the bloody scene around them. Tiliah was rubbing her hands through the grass, trying to wipe off as much gore as possible. She glanced up, caught him staring at her, and nodded at Okollu.

“He will probably be unconscious for…” She trailed off, shrugged her shoulders, and said, “Hells, I don’t know. He’s a blasted mongrel. One day? Two weeks?” Placing her hands on her hips, she peered around at the ground. “And there had better be thornroot nearby else we just saved him today so he can die next week.”

“As soon as I get what I want, he is welcome to do just that.”

She lifted her gaze and fixed him with a steady stare.

“You have some explaining to do.”

“I do,” conceded Rhohn. “As do you.”

Arching her eyebrows, Tiliah said, “Me?”

“Hawk’s wing? Red, back two?”

“Ah…that.” A faint smile spread over her lips. “I did not spend every moment of my time tending to the wounded in Gobas. I
might
have wandered by the soldiers’ grounds a few times to watch drills.”

“A few times?” said Rhohn, incredulous. “You remembered the position calls, Tiliah.”

She shrugged and, with the tiniest flicker of embarrassment, admitted, “Some of the Dust Men were rather handsome.”

Rhohn could not hold back a smile.

“And the whistle?”

“A footman I tended to taught it to me. Some of the men used it to distract the mongrels. It irritates them for some reason. Took me a while to get it right.”

“Well, thank you for taking the time. It saved my life.
You
saved my life.”

“No, I saved
my
life. If that mongrel killed you, I was next.”

“Regardless, thank you.”

Tiliah took one last look at Okollu, stood from the ground, and crossed her arms. She set her gaze on Rhohn, direct and demanding.

“Time to start talking. How is it you know a mongrel? Why are you carrying a message for it? What is the message, who’s it for, and why in the Nine Hells didn’t you tell me any of this before today?!”

Rhohn nodded through the list, admitting they were all valid questions. When she was done, he let out a long, weary sigh.

“I’ll answer them all. But I’ll warn you…you might not believe me.”

“We won’t know until you start sharing, will we?”

“No,” muttered Rhohn. “I suppose not.”

Standing amidst the grisly scene, a bandaged mongrel on the ground between them, he told the truth of what happened in Ebel. From the final moment that he had seen Silas alive to when he had crawled from the earthen longhouse, covered in his friend’s blood. Halfway through his tale, he spotted a tiny ember of fear spark to life in her eyes. By the time he was done, it had grown into a glowing-red coal.

21
^st
of the Turn of Luraana, 4999

Tiliah was hungry, tired and—once again—soaked to the skin.

The rain clouds had come shortly after sunset last evening and stayed the night, breaking up at dawn. She had thought the constant downpour would discourage scavenging animals, but it did not. A pack of carrion dogs hounded them throughout the night, fiercely determined to make a meal of the horse and mongrels. Rhohn repeatedly chased them away until the dogs left at daybreak, just as the first blood vultures arrived.

Rhohn was running after them now, waving his sword and shouting at two of the more persistent birds. The vultures snapped at him with their crooked, black beaks, clearly upset that he was interrupting their meal again. Were Tiliah not so miserable, she might be laughing at the display.

Okollu lay a few dozen paces away, still unconscious. The beast had not moved nor made a sound all night. Each time she had checked on him, she half expected to find him not breathing. She looked away from the mongrel, shaking her head in disbelief.

“This must be a dream…”

As Rhohn had shared his tale with her, she—at first—wondered if the Dust Man had struck his head on a rock in the tumble from their horse. Yet the more she heard, the more she believed. The message itself, the one Rhohn was carrying across the Oaken Duchies, convinced her that he was not mad. It explained so much.

Something had managed to bring the full force of the Sudashians—oligurts, razorfiends, and mongrels—together. Tiliah supposed that if any force in Terrene could do so, a God of the Cabal could. It also explained what she had seen the morning she left Gobas with thousands of others.

When word had spread through the city that the Sudashian force was on the horizon, Tiliah rushed to the western wall to see for herself. As she stood, gaping in awe at the army, an advance group of oligurts approached Gobas, riding their bullockboars and managing to stay just out of the catapults’ range. What appeared to be a man wearing a horned helmet led the group, only he was running on his own two feet, easily keeping a pace equal to a galloping horse. The whispered rumors were true: this army was led by demons of the Nine Hells.

Approaching footsteps, squishing in mud, whisked her away from the dry and dusty battlements of Gobas and back to the mushy present. Looking up, she found Rhohn trudging back to where she sat, stepping over one of the mongrel corpses. Upon reaching her, he sheathed his sword and collapsed to the ground like a sack of tubers dropped from a wagon cart. He looked as tired as she felt.

Rubbing his eyes, he muttered, “Gods, I truly hope they do not come back.”

Tiliah peered up into the gray sky. At least a dozen blood vultures circled high overhead.

“Oh, they’ll be back.” She glanced in the direction of the corpses and, with a grimace on her face, muttered. “It’s a feast for them over there.”

“And they are welcome to enjoy it once we leave,” said Rhohn. “But I don’t want to sit here and watch them eat.”

Giving Rhohn a sideways glance, Tiliah suggested, “We could start walking now and leave them to their meal…?”

The Dust Man gave her a sleepy smile and shook his head.

“Nice try. Again. But we are waiting for him to wake up.”

Frowning, Tiliah looked back to the mongrel and said, “And when might that be? Today? Tomorrow? Year’s End? Hells, he might never wake up. I treated soldiers with lesser injuries than he who went on to Maeana’s realm.”

Rhohn lay down, apparently not caring about the soaked ground, and let a long sigh slip from his lips.

“I’m not leaving as long as he draws breath. However, if you’d like to go—” he lifted a hand and pointed east “—Demetus is that way.”

“Don’t think I haven’t considered it.”

“I would be disappointed if you had not,” mumbled Rhohn “Truly? I am surprised you are still here.” He lifted his head off the ground and looked at her. “Why are you still here?”

“It’s safer.”

Rhohn cocked his lone eyebrow.

“With me, you’ve been attacked by a razorfiend and a pack of mongrels. How is that safer?”

Shrugging her shoulders, Tiliah said, “I’m still alive, aren’t I?”

Rhohn dropped his head to the ground with a soft squish.

“You speak true.”

Tiliah let out a long, heavy sigh and said, “Well, if we’re staying, I suppose I should check his wound.”

She made to stand, but stopped when Rhohn muttered, “Hold a moment.” He began to sit up. “I’m coming with you.”

“I can do this on my own.” All night long, he had accompanied her, sword drawn, whenever she went to check on Okollu. “Stay here and try to sleep. I would bet coin he’s still passed out.”