Part 3 Chapter 1

PART III

 

“…BURDEN, IT IS A CITY OF MURDERERS AND PILFERERS.”

 

 

  

CHAPTER 17

 

 

T

horne has seen the coming storm clouds a little late and therefore didn’t find a good place to hide from it. He finds a cluster of tall thick trees and stays under them for a while, but upon seeing that lightning and thunder are with the clouds he leaves there in search of another. For a few hours through the night he finds nothing, getting soaked through. The rain pelts both him and his horse as if barrages of steel-tipped arrows are being shot at them. He tries manoeuvring his horse to find cover whenever possible but it is not much help.

  He is getting tired.

  His equally soaked horse soon tires as well and when a thunder sounds too close for either’s comfort the horse rears, Thorne holds on for dear life and both fall to the ground.

  Thorne yells as his horse squashes his trapped foot, he tries to free it but the horse’s position on the ground as well as his own make it difficult. He takes his free foot out of its stirrup then, with great pain and struggle, uses it to lift the horse slightly then forces his other leg out of the other stirrup and, while still  holding the horse up, drags himself out from under it.

  He lets the horse fall with a wet thump mostly deafened by the pelting rain. He checks his sore leg; he moves his hands up and down it and tries to move it. Nothing seems to be broken. He then checks his fallen horse; the poor animal hasn’t made a sound or a movement since falling. He soon finds out why: the horse is dead, probably happened when they fell.

  He backs away using all but the bad leg, he isn’t sure where he is going since it is so dark but he just wants to get away from the corpse.

  Lifetimes pass by in seconds making counting down time between lightning strikes next to impossible. The only thing the lets Thorne know he is alive is the pain from his leg.

He hates what is happening, he just wants to catch his brother and stop him from becoming the new king of the Highlands. Stop him; kill him if necessary but only as a last resort. ‘I just think I would be better at it, make Tov’ra and the Highlands greater than it has ever been’. But instead he is stuck in a storm and his brother and that worthless Cultist woman is far away, maybe too far for him to catch.

  He hears a faint noise from far away which brings him out of his thoughts; he leans forward as much as he can to see what the noise is as where it is coming from. He cannot see anything due to the storm but the noise is becoming clearer, it sounds like another horse trotting his way. Fearing the worst he unsheathes his sword and with both hands points it out in front and waits for whatever comes. He knows that in a fit state he can defeat whoever is out there, but isn’t in a fit state, his leg will slow him down and that might be enough to get him killed.

  Soon he finds a silhouette of what looks like a horse but there is something else there. It soon comes into focus and he realises that it is a wooden wagon. There is a person completely covered sitting on the from directing the horse and the wagon itself is long and covered at the top with a thick sheet that is tied to four posts and goes over the person on the wagon, and it looks like it is doing its job but not completely. Thorne slowly lowers his sword believing the wagon and its rider to be no threat; in fact they might be his salvation. He sheathes his sword, slowly to be silent, and waits.

  The horse and wagon slows and Thorne realises that his now dead horse has been spotted.  This is his only chance.

  “Hey!” Thorne yells out but is not sure he has been heard. The wagon doesn’t slow down but it doesn’t speed up either. Whoever is riding he wagon he seems to be ignoring the dead horse. “HEY!” he shouts loud as he can. This time the wagon stops, Thorne must have been heard that time. Though Thorne can barely see the wagon or whoever is riding it, he can just hear the rider get off the wagon and move in his direction.

  He soon does, and realises the rider is an old man. After staring at each other in the rain for a while Thorne gestures to his bad leg which the man understands; he moves in closer and grabs Thorne by the waist then, with some force, picks him up and carries him back to the wagon. The old man carefully drops Thorne in the back of the wagon, which he finds soggy and hard, then the man gets back on the wagon and they move forward again.

  Soon Thorne feels the need to sleep and thinks it safe enough. His eyes close and another strike of lightning from the storm is the last thing he hears.

 

ø

 

Three days after hiding in the cave the two finally reach sight of Burden. 

 The city Burden is not exactly a polar opposite to Tov’ra but it is close. While Tov’ra is not completely clean it does try for all it can, but Burden doesn’t try unless the rich force a slave to clean their master’s home or a small store owner cleans the area around the door to that store.

  The biggest difference between Tov’ra and Burden can be seen even at a distance: Tov’ra, while it has certain magnificence to its architecture, is rather modest and in some areas mundane, whereas Burden in some parts of the city is anything but mundane. There are towers so tall that seem to be touching the sky, homes look like palaces and are filled with needless extravagance. But in spite of all this appearance of wealth the city is filled with poverty. The number of homeless rises every week it is hard not to see at least five sitting in a corner in every street, there are areas in quarantine due to diseases. And, of course, crime is all around from simple theft of gold or food, to cold blooded murder.

  All these things go through Olraym’s head as he and Trugaime ride their horses up to the front gate. There are guards at the gate but the two guess (correctly) that they have been bought by some rich criminal. Since Olraym has been in the Tervunmal Islands for some years and he never really has come to Burden before none of the guards recognise him and let them through without much trouble. Trugaime can feel one of guard’s eyes on her; she looks over to him and can see lust in those eyes. She gives him a hard stare that tells him not to try anything; he gives a smirk but gets the message.

  The street they enter is draped in melancholy: people walking slowly slumped over, and shouts of anger can be heard all over, both of them can taste blood and human waste in the air. There do seem to be a few shops set up but no one is buying anything and the ones selling know it is a waste of time. 

  It is all so depressing so the two speed up.

  “I thought it was Divinwood we’re heading to,” says Trugaime as she watches all around her, “this place is fun and all but I’d rather get whatever we’re gonna do over with.”

  “We need to do something first.”

  “Yeah, what’s that?”

  “We need to deal with your old Cult.”

  Trugaime halts her horse, Olraym continues for a few feet then he realises she has stopped. He turns his horse around and goes to her, he watches her and she watches back.

  “They are my friends, my family,” it doesn’t come out as any kind of plea, more as a simple statement of fact as if it is all she needs. For her it is, but not for Olraym he wants more.

  “Your friends and family are trying to kill me and after what you did you might be next,” she looks away, Cultists don’t really go after each other unless they have done the Cult wrong, and she definitely has.

  “But why come here? Do you think they are here, in Burden?”

  “I know they aren’t here, but someone might know where they are and, more importantly, they just might tell me.”

  Without waiting Olraym turns around again and rides off. Trugaime thinks of running off, away from him and just leave everything and everyone she knows. Go somewhere unknown, somewhere new. ‘It could be fun’. But no, she follows Olraym through more and more streets, more and more depressing things that invade her senses.

  Olraym is afraid of finding somewhere to rest even though they all need it because doing so will make him realise that he won’t do this so easily, it will take hard work, take time. It will take him away from his dreams and the evens in those dreams longer than he wants. Plus the longer they are in Burden the more chance that someone would steal from them and probably kill them afterwards.

  But the fact is that a place to sleep is needed for them and better to get one sooner rather than later. They find a few small taverns with rooms available but they all look run down, like places only the brave or the stupid would enter willingly.

  Trugaime suddenly feels something grab her arm; she grabs a poison dart without thinking and looks to whatever has grabbed her. It is an old man covered in dirt and mud, he is homeless and Trugaime realises he is just begging money from her. At the sight of the dart and beggar lets her go and jumps back then shuffles away as fast as he can. She puts the dart away embarrassed and is thankful Olraym did not see any of it.

  A few minutes later they enter a sector of the city that is different, has a different smell and different look, a different feel. It is almost a different city altogether, step a few feet and be somewhere else entirely. But Olraym knows it is still Burden and can guess that this sector is where all the major criminals and criminal gangs live and work. The two don’t want to be in this sector but have little choice, crime may still happen here but the gangs make sure only a miniscule amount happens their sector, just to please the guards and law enforcers a little.

  The looks the two get is different: instead of begging for gold or food, there is fear and suspicion from those around. Olraym gives no attention to them but puts one hand closer to his sword, Trugaime does the same.

  They find a fancy three-storey building with a sign hanging next to the door that says ‘THE WEEPING CHILD’. It looks as good as any for a place to stay. They stop outside it and wonder if entering is a good idea, it isn’t the only tavern in sight but even from the outside it looks the best. But the name of it gives them pause. Is it a simple name? Or is there something more to it?

  These questions go unanswered, as much as they both hate it. There is a man standing next to the door, he stands with an air of superiority but Olraym thinks he isn’t the owner, the superiority is towards anyone that passes that looks in worse condition than him, who is poorer than him. He notices the two staring at him and gives them a ‘what-you-want?’ kind of look. The two are silent, staring blankly, until he actually asks what they want in an indignant tone that mixes in with his superior expression.

  “We want a room,” states Olraym.

  “Talk to the guy inside,” the man gestures to the door just as a couple exits, the couple laugh at some private joke and take no notice of the man or the two on horseback. Neither Olraym nor Trugaime move, the man notices this and it irritates him and he rolls his eyes. “What now?”

  “We need a place for our horses,” says Trugaime, mimicking his indignant tone. He gives her an angry look which makes her smile as if she has won something.

  “It’s ‘round the back.”

  Trugaime nods and she and Olraym ride slowly around the tavern. When they get there they see a small stable only able to hold seven maybe eight horses at a time. They see a manager for the stables so they get off the horses and enter the stables. The stable looks well-kept which is strange with no one around; there is plenty of hay lying around and the horses inside look healthy enough. The manager tells them it costs seven silver coins a day to leave the horses’ in. Olraym feels this is extortion but pays anyway.

  The two find two empty spaces for them; they lead them in, seal them in and after Olraym gives his horse a pat on the side while Trugaime rubs her hands through her horse’s mane they leave them in.

  They return to the front and this time walk in, passing the man who gives and unfriendly smile and wave.

  Inside is a wide and open room.  The walls are a light brown and have some landscape paintings set high on them. The floor is bare but has a big animal-skin rug in the middle; it looks clean but heavily used as well. There are a few circular tables with three chairs each; they all look simple and mostly clean like the rug. There is a set of stairs in the middle of the far wall, from their position it is hard to see where it leads. There are some patrons in the room and two servant girls and another man working at the bar in the far left corner. The bar has plenty of drinks on the shelves on the wall and there are seven stools near it. The customers (three at the bar and five at the tables) are mixed between looking a little miserable and a little merry, while the servant girls and bar man are giving small closed-mouth smiles, fake smiles, as if not doing so is dangerous for some reason.

  The bar man and the servant girls look up as Olraym and Trugaime enters then turn back to their work. The two move to the bar man. The bar man gives Olraym a hard once-over but at seeing Trugaime he instantly looks away and works faster, trying not to see her. Obviously he knows her and obviously he doesn’t know of her failure. When the two reach the bar Trugaime places her hands flat on the bar, the bar man seems to take this as a sign of trust and after a minute Olraym understands how: the flat empty hands show no weapons and must mean that she has no intention of harming him, he is not a target.

  “Target in here?” asks the bar man watching Trugaime as she shakes her head slowly. He lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding and relaxes while still working.

  “We need a room,” says Trugaime. The bar man walks to a cabinet on the wall next to him and opens it revealing a set of hooks, most are empty but some have keys hanging from them. The bar man picks one near the bottom right of the set that has the number twenty-five below it and walks back and holds it out to her.

  “Room sixteen, on the top floor and it is the second door on the left.”

  Trugaime takes the keys but instead of walking up the stairs they walk back out again.

  “Hey!” shouts the man as if he about to stop them.

  “We’ll be back.”

  Once out the two look around, they get stares from those passing by and sometimes stare back if it is from someone looking particularly ominous. Letting them know they mean business.

  “I want to have a look around,” says Olraym, as if excusing his sudden leaving of The Weeping Child. Trugaime simply nods.

  They leave the immediate area, keeping a distance from everyone around them. Olraym takes note of all he sees and hears whenever they turn onto a different street or come to a stop for one reason or another. The areas they go to range from a middle class look and feel all the way to abstract poverty.

  Olraym thinks this city is vibrant in its own way. There are plenty of beggars sitting in the mud or standing in it, asking any who get within a few feet for coin. Some of them have their hands out while others use a hat. And then there are thieves. Indistinguishable from everyone else Olraym can see some in almost every street prowling the crowds stuffing their claws into whatever they can get into. Whenever one comes close Olraym takes hold of his sword and Trugaime grabs hold of one of her poison darts.

  The two move quickly so a thief never has the chance but when they come to a sudden stop at a dead end they turn back. A thief, who has been watching them and following them for a while catches up to them. Trugaime has known of their stalker and has had her hand on her darts. The thief takes several moves to stay with them while staying with crowds, thinking they cannot see him. ‘He is young, inexperienced. Stupid.’ With a hand on the shoulder Trugaime tells Olraym to slow down and take a left into an empty alley between a storefront selling cheap shady fabrics and one selling fruits. Without glancing back Trugaime knows the thief is following them into the alley.

  Trugaime arms her crossbow with the dart she is holding then she waits. Since they have slowed down and the thief hasn’t he catches up to them before they get to the end of the alley. The thief grabs Trugaime’s shoulder and spins her around thinking she is an easy target his actions will have scared her enough, when suddenly he falls back in shock and pain as the dark is shot into his chest. His breathing becomes shallow and his eyes wide. He looks at Trugaime and spots the crossbow. His breath comes out is gasps, his eyes lose their focus and his arms, which at first are on his chest as if trying to grab the dart at pull it out, now fall to his sides. The thief is dead. 

  Olraym and Trugaime take a good look at him: he is definitely young, barely out of his teenage years. He looks skinny, very skinny; he hasn’t eaten for several days or perhaps weeks. He has light brown hair that dangles just above his shoulders. His light blue eyes give a kind of tenderness and innocence but the rest of his face, with its muck-covered cheeks, stubble facial hair on the sides and a small faded scar on his chin seems to disrupt it.

  His clothes are faded and torn. Made from a mixture of leather and animal furs, the leather is brown but most of the animal furs are grey and black. His boots look new and clean, most likely stolen.

  “What do we do with him?” asks Olraym.

  “We leave him; someone else will find him and deal with him.”

  “You mean like a family member.”

  Trugaime nods.

  Olraym hesitates and doesn’t move. Trugaime doesn’t wait and stats down the alley, soon after Olraym finally decides to leave as well and they both walk through the alley. They backtrack through now-familiar streets. Still keeping a distance between themselves and others, but now they find no trouble.

  By the time they return inside The Weeping Child the sun is on its way down. There aren’t as many people sitting at the desks this time though are the same amount of servant girls. They look tired and one is leaning on the desks she passes to stay upright. The man at the bar looks relieved to see them, probably thinking they might have just taken the room key and left, stolen it. This time the two leave up the stairs. They climb one set then another which leads to a door; they give it a glance then head up the rest to another similar door. They enter through this one; it lets out a loud groan as they do, and enter a small hall. There are six doors in total: two on the left, three on the right and one at the far end. They follow the bar man’s instructions and move to the second door on the left.

  Inside is a room that reminds Olraym a little of his own room back in Tov’ra. It is spacious and clean, with a large cupboard that almost touches the ceiling in the corner next to a small arched window. There is a set of four thick candles but not candle sticks on a vanity table on the other side of the window as well as a small oval mirror which gives in its reflection of its corner of the room a sense of depth it doesn’t actually have. The floor is a shining dark coloured hard wood that looks recently cleaned with a small brown rug made from animal hides at the foot of the bed.

  All of this is far from their minds, what is at the front of their minds is the first thing they saw upon entering: the bed. It is large enough for both of them but the problem is there is only one. The two look at each other, waiting for the other to say something, to compromise.

  “Who gets the bed?” asks Olraym, sounding unsure of whether he wants the answer. “Then again why should that matter now? It’s still light outside.”

  “Exactly we won’t get anything done until night and besides,” she yawns and stretches her arms, “I’m tired enough as it is.”

  Olraym feels tired as well, “so again, who gets the bed?” he walks fully into the room to the cupboard and opens it. Inside is what he can guess is a complimentary set of night clothes, four in all: two for men and two for women. Given that this is burden Olraym guesses that these get stolen often.

  “Me,” Trugaime replies, raising her left hand.

  “Why?” Olraym closes the cupboard and stares at Trugaime.

  “I’m a woman.”

  “I’m a prince of Tov’ra!”

  Trugaime gives him a sarcastic ‘big deal’ look, “this is Burden, and no one cares about Tov’ra.” Olraym can see the point of her argument but doesn’t want to give her the satisfaction of winning. As he is silent she gives him a provoking stare with a hand on her hip which, since he cannot think of anything to say, he doesn’t let himself be goaded.

  “Alright, fine.” Trugaime nods and smiles gleefully, then walks to the bed and sits on it; the bed bounces a little at the sudden weight then it sinks down a little, she allows herself pleasure at the softness of the bed. She then takes off her boots and lets them lay on the floor then lifts her feet up and lies on the bed. Olraym meanwhile looks around the room and finds another problem.

  “There is no other place to sleep, no sofa or an extra set of bed sheets.” Trugaime lifts her head and looks around the room as well, and then she sees the problem too.

  She gets up on her elbows, “what about the floor?”

  Olraym wonders if she is joking even though her expression and tone suggest otherwise, he bounces on his heels on the hardwood floor, hearing it creak again and again, “is this something you would sleep on?” she is about to answer in what Olraym guesses as some other sarcastic remark, “if it can be helped,” she closes her mouth and shakes her head.

  “So what do I do?”

  Trugaime sighs and sits up and removes her hooded jacket and puts it on top of her boots. She the follows with her crossbow and poison darts. Olraym keeps his eyes on the crossbow and darts until they are out of her hands. “Well, I don’t want to say this…but we could both use the bed.”

  This answer is what they have both been dreading but both know it is the only way. With a long sigh he walks to the other side of the bed and takes of his shoes. Like Trugaime he doesn’t tidy his shoes or his coat when he takes that off.

  “How do you want to do this?”

  “Just stick to your side and I’ll stick to mine.”

  “That sounds fair.”

  With their backs to each other they don’t see that they have undressed although they know because they can hear the rustling sounds and know what is happening. Still not looking at each other they take the bed cover and lower it closer to the foot of the bed though not quite there. Then as they lie there still with their backs to each other, then bring the cover back up until it is up to their shoulders.

  “We have things to do. We shouldn’t stay in Burden any longer than necessary.” Says Olraym, hoping that will get them both out of bed and out of this situation.

  “We can do them later. For now we rest, I’m too damn sleepy to go gallivanting around this city again.”

  Olraym nods though it is unseen by Trugaime. One by one they close their eyes and try to sleep while still very much aware of each other’s nakedness and the small distance between them.

  At times Olraym can feel her moving on the bed, though doesn’t look around to see why. At one point her feet come close to his, he tenses and waits for her to stop.