The Tessellation Saga. Book Two. 'The One' (3 page)

The tired horse
with his reins finally loosened, began nibbling at the long
dew-filled grass and Jed had to move away before the animal
accidently bit him, Varan’s sleepy old mount still tied to the back
of the wagon snorted and strained at his tethers unable to reach
the sweet green grass all around him.

Jed stood and
stared at his companions. Dotty, looking like an old gypsy woman
and Varan, brother to his friend, so alike that at times Jed found
himself talking as if it were the man he knew and trusted with his
life, then Lemba, his Lemba looking like a slim built boy standing
at the top of the rise staring back the way they had come. Jed knew
Lemba was hurting badly and that he and Varan had caused her pain,
he took a deep breath and sighed.

‘I need ter get
‘ome Varan, and as soon as possible. I ‘ave this feeling in me
belly that sommats wrong, real wrong,
nobody
is tellin’ me
anything an’ this magic stuff is all a bit too much. I mean it,
either someone tells me what’s goin’ on, without all that “later my
boy” crap, or I’ll be leaving now ter make me own way, bound ter
yer though I am…’ he said finally, as Varan, moving around the cart
sat down beside him.

Lemba was
staring back the way they had come, she was sure she had seen
something moving behind the trees. The sun finally broke free and
bathed the earth in its light casting away the shadows and
revealing the autumnal lush beauty of the hill country through
which they were travelling. In the distance, she saw swiftly moving
flashes of red amongst the green and they were moving rapidly
toward them.
Soldiers!
She thought with horror and looked
toward her friends sitting unsuspecting in the grass down below.
Immediately, she turned and ran, fiercely clapping her hands to
draw everyone’s attention, a fat round partridge ran from the copse
disturbed by the sudden noise, its white face in contrast to the
black tuft of feathers guarding its throat, red flanks and legs
moved quickly through the grass as the fat bird tried once more to
hide.

Dotty, watching
her sister as she ran down the slight hill looked puzzled as
Lemba’s fingers flashed and as she drew nearer, then she realised
what Lemba was trying to say.

‘Varan,’ she
called quietly in a panic, ‘Varan, soldiers from Devilly, Lemba
say’s they are about a mile away and coming fast.’

‘He’s found us
then.’ Varan replied quietly.

Toby sat atop
his stallion with almost the entire populace of Green Home Village
before him. Riders, soldiers all, surrounded the frightened people
and a number of slavers, professional men, hired for the occasion
from the allowance the king had generously given him had also
accompanied the group from Devilly. It amused him to see the
slavers eyeing up the people Toby had known all his life and
totting up their potential cut of the takings.

Several
cottages lay in smoking ruin, with furniture, clothing and goods of
varying description scattered across the green he had played on as
a child and fear in the village had become a tangible thing, Toby
could smell it, taste it, and he revelled in the power it gave him.
Silently he thanked Gath.

‘I don’t care
who else you kill, or whatever you have to do to get him…but get
him,’ Gath had said as he gave Toby Hollins, a nobody from the
Beaut Valley one of the finest, well trained bodies of fighting men
Derova had to offer. These men, fresh from the skirmishes on the
borders were ready for a little fun and Toby intended for them to
have it.

I’ll get ‘im
fer yer me lord, whatever it takes, I’ll get ‘im, he had answered
and true to his words, there had been nothing gentle in the way
Toby and the soldiers had entered his home village. As dawn came
upon the sleepy settlement, the noise of pounding and braking open
of doors joined in unison with the bird song and the early
cockerels’ crow. Fierce looking soldiers dragged women and children
from their beds as fathers’ fought to preserve their homes. Not one
soldier had spoken; adding to the fear the villagers felt and Toby
saw more than one young maiden dragged off, only to return weeping
and dishevelled.

‘Take yer time
men,’ Toby said before the raid began. ‘Gideon Green is fer the
King, ser don’t touch ‘im an’ should yer see him, bring ‘im ter me
un’armed, same as the inn, its outa bounds but the rest o’ the
village is yorn... Go,’ he had said, flinging his arms wide as if
bestowing a generous gift.

The elite unit
took Toby, their new commander, at his word and they had indeed had
their fun. Silence answered every question and violence was
widespread from the bloody and broken men attempting to protect
their families to the burnt out homes and crying children. Hours of
screaming had left this, this gathering of life, the inhabitants of
Green Home Village, all at Toby’s mercy. He was ecstatic.

‘Where are yer
Gideon?’ Toby whispered as he thought of his triumph and continued
to stare around him at the frightened people.
No matter Gid,
I’ll be ‘ere fer a bit then me an’ the men’ll come ter yer woods
ter get yer.
He thought.

‘Why?’ Voices
were whispering from a dozen different directions, he ignored them
all revelling in the fact that not one villager recognised him and
knowing they all feared him, the man on the horse who sat quietly
watching.

He was no
longer the stumpy, plump youth with bad skin that drank too much
ale on the eve of Jed leaving to join the army. He, now, was strong
and fit, his skin had weathered and he sported a distinctive black
scar down the left side of his face stretching from the corner of
his eye to the side of his mouth. A scar he would one day repay
Mayan for giving him,
Mayan…,
he thought as he ran his
fingers down the scar, remembering how her nails had raked into his
face when he had tried to make her his. His father had stopped him
and left him in the dirt, the open wound on his face sucking up the
dirt like a sponge, the scar now pulled the side of his face
tightly and permanently into a sardonic sneer.
You should be
‘ere Mayan, where are yer?
He wondered as he again scanned
through the crowd of frightened villagers, angry that she was not
amongst them.

‘Please
Surr...’ a young boy called to him in tears as another house fell
victim to a blazing torch.
Drunner, you be one of the Drunner
boys...
Toby recognised the boy as the brother of one of the
men who had once laughed at him,
yer don’t know me either
,
he thought, knowing he had aged in more than just years,
they
really don’t know who I am!
Toby mused, relishing the power the
anonymity gave him. He fingered the simple blue stone in his
pocket, the stone he had watched Gideon tying around Mayan’s neck
and he ached to see her, imagining her here, kneeling at his feet
begging for his love and forgiveness in front of everyone. It was a
very pleasing thought.

At last, Toby
saw his parents as they stumbled into the village behind the
horsemen sent to get them, a line bound their wrists tightly and a
taut rope ensured they had to run to keep up with the huge animals.
Toby looked on, a happy smile on his face, he was not like the
lowly tanner his father was or the mistress of nothing his mother
had always been; he was special and he knew it.
Did I no’ tell
‘em that all along?
He thought as his mother tripped in the
dirt and losing her balance fell under the hooves of the great
horse that pulled his father, its hoof grazed her skull, the loud
sound was hollow and sharp as it connected. His father bruised and
bloody from resisting arrest tried in vain to go to her aid as her
bloody form quivered in the dirt and dust.

‘Toby…’ she
whispered her voice soft and low but still somehow reaching her
son, finally she lay still as Toby watched dispassionately, he had
dismissed his parents from his life long ago, just as they had
dismissed him. The soldier pulling his father cut the bonds holding
him to the rear of his horse to allow him to go to the old woman,
while Toby’s mind drifted back to the day his father had first
beaten and then thrown him out like garbage.

‘Animal,’ his
father had sneered as his mother cried for Mayan. ‘Animals rape
their mates,’ he said, adding, ‘yer ‘ave no ‘onour boy, an’ yer be
no son o’ mine…’ before he’d thrown Toby’s bleeding body on to the
floor of the barn. ‘Yer deserve ter be scarred boy, marked like the
animal yer be...’ Toby could remember him speaking coldly, even if
he could not remember the tears coursing down his father’s face as
he spoke them, but then, Toby himself had wept too, not for shame
but because he was disappointed, he believed his father had lied to
him.

“Next year,
we’ll try again lad, she’s no promised yet!’ Da had said,’ Toby
cried as his father beat him.

‘Yer promised
me Da,’ he had added as he finally realised Mayan was not his, was
never
to be his. Then after Mayan left, his mother hurried
after her husband and returned a little while later with a bag.

‘Yer gotta
leave now Toby,’ she said, still crying, ‘yer gotta go as soon as I
‘ave cleaned yer face up a bit. I love yer boy, always ‘ave but yer
were no meant fer this.’ Toby remembered her crying as she tried to
clean the dirt out from the nasty wound caused by Mayan’s nails but
he pushed her away violently causing her to misstep.

‘Leave me
woman, yer lied ter me too...’ he remembered shouting angrily, he
was angry with both his parents, they were supposed to love him,
supposed give him everything they promised, he wanted the wound to
scar; a scar would remind him of his father’s worthless word and
Mayan’s treachery. He remembered looking at his mother through one
swollen eye, the side of his face a mass of congealed blood, his
broken nose crooked and equally bloody.

‘She be mine,’
he said as he looked for understanding and found none, ‘she be
mine, an’ Gideon ‘as ‘er, ‘e promised me… Da promised me, yer lied,
yer both lied.’ Toby scowled, blame for his misfortunes landing
squarely between his parents and Gideon himself.

‘No Toby,’ his
mother said through her tears, ‘Da asked Jack fer yer but Mayan ‘ad
ter choose you too, an’ she made ‘er choice, she chose Gideon!’
Again, she tried to comfort him but he shrugged her off not
noticing her weeping as if her heart were broken. He dismissed them
then as if they had never been and became consumed with hatred,
hatred for them, for Gideon and for the whole village, he vowed
that one day, one day, he would pay them all back, even Mayan.

After
all,
he thought absently, shrugging off his memories and
watching his father struggle to reach the body of his dying mother;
they all laughed, even as I crawled through t’ beer ‘an piss,
they laughed, even Mayan, my precious Mayan.
He saw himself
again as the young man he had been, hanging his head, staring at
the floor in despair and embarrassment, his Mayan, holding Gideon’s
arm, smiling at him, laughing and pulling Gideon away.
Where are
yer May, yer teasing bitch, yer’ll soon be on yer knees before me,
beggin’ fer me ter take yer,
he thought, remembering that the
token she had deliberately left for him so long ago, a token he
could easily have missed. A draft caused by his mother’s closing
the heavy barn door behind her had whisked briskly across the floor
playing with the loose straw by his feet sending it dancing and
swirling in gentle circles. The small blue stone with its broken
leather thong up to then hidden under the dust and dry stalks
became exposed and he had smiled knowing just what it meant
.
Mayan, yer do want me, yer still playin’ yer games...
he had
thought as he bent down stiffly and picked it up before kissing it
lovingly and putting it safely in his pocket. He had carried it
with him ever since.

A deep silence
around him pulled him from his reverie, even the children amongst
the assembled populace of his former home had become quiet, every
local inhabitant that could be rounded up, had been. Toby felt the
power over life and death at his fingertips and his cock hardened
painfully, he looked up, not trying to hide his smile.

The pall of
dense smoke from burning buildings became a blanket in the sky
above the village before reaching up like a great grey pillar and
stretching into the heavens. He could see more smoke rising above
the trees from the direction of his former home and as he stared, a
gentle whuff, from a nearby cottage alerted him to yet another
building engulfed by flames. The inhabitants, an elderly couple
Toby barely remembered were being supported in their grief by a
young man he also recognised but could not quite put a name too, he
watched as they were ushered forcefully into the crowd of villagers
by his men and left to stare as their home and worldly possessions
succumbed to the hungry fire. The boy who had spoken to him earlier
ran over to hold the old woman upright as her knees gave way and he
looked once more toward Toby, his eyes pleading. Toby dismissed
them as he continued to scan the crowd looking for Mayan. Until now
he had enjoyed himself immeasurably but he was beginning to get
bored, he had expected her to be here to witness his triumph and
for her to be grateful that he had prevented the ransacking of the
Inn. He had even spared her parents and sister in law from too much
abuse.
The fam’ly is all here… but where are yer my sweet
girl?
Toby asked himself silently. He could see the Brewster
family on the green, Apple wringing her hands together and tiny
Sámia nursing Jackie her husband, who was bleeding profusely after
being badly beaten. Jack stood with his arms around his wife
looking angry and confused, nursing a swollen eye that was rapidly
turning black. As Toby continued to survey the unhappy villagers
before him he realised he had not seen Gideon or his father Jed
either, though this didn’t surprise him too much as both were more
than likely to be within the confines of the great forest and he
was headed there next. He had been up to the boundary of the great
forest on numerous occasions since he was a child and then again,
often as a young man he would follow Mayan up past Sonal’s cottage,
always waiting for some sign that she knew he was there and waiting
for her.