himself for it, hoped to the High Gods that there was a tavern.
The village was small, a central square with hall and tavern and a few shops. All seemed closed and empty and dead on this cold winter evening, another apparent victim of the Army of Iron. Kell and Saark had Skanda wait by the outskirts as they rode in, weapons drawn, eyes wary as they searched for albino soldiers. Nobody walked the streets. Most of the houses seemed deserted.
'Has the Army of Iron been through, do you think?'
Kell shrugged, and pointed to the tavern where thin wisps of smoke eased from a ragged, uneven chimney. 'I don't think so. No bodies in the road, for a start. But let us find out.' He dismounted at the tavern, and thumped open the door. Inside was warm, a fire crackling in the hearth. A long bar supported three men, all stocky and dour, who jumped as the door opened, their eyes casting nervous to the intruders, hands on sword hilts. A tall, thin barman gave a nod to Kell, and Kell entered.
'Do you have rooms?'
'How many?'
'Two.'
'Yes. It'll be five coppers a night. Will you be wanting warm water? 'Cos that's another copper.'
'Warm water is a prerequisite to cleanliness and holiness, my man,' said Saark, entering the tavern and smiling, leaning forward over ale-stained timbers.
The barman stared at the ragged, bruised, tattered dandy, without comprehension.
'He said 'yes',' grunted Kell, and dropped coins on the bar. Then to Saark, 'Go and get the boy, and stable our horses.'
When Saark had left, Kell eyed the barman. 'You have a cosy little town, here, barman.'
'And we would keep it that way. An army passed through, killing everyone in surrounding towns,' his eyes were bleak, his mind full of nightmares, 'of this we know. We would ask you to keep your knowledge of Creggan to yourselves. We have nowhere to run, you understand?'
Kell nodded, and ordered a whiskey, which he downed in one. Then, when Saark returned after stabling the horses and Mary, Kell pushed past him on his way to the door.
'Hey, where are you going?'
'Out.'
'Out where?'
'Just out,' grinned Kell, but it was a grin without humour.
'Old horse, I have a question. Why did you only purchase two rooms? A little odd, I thought.'
Kell's grin widened. 'You love that damn creepy Ankarok boy so much. Well. You can bunk with him. Maybe he'll stop you behaving like an idiot!'
It was later. Much later. Darkness had fallen, and with it a fresh storm of snow. Kell had returned, brushing flakes from the shoulders of his heavy bearskin jerkin, and now sat eating a meal at a corner table in the tavern. It was a pie filled mostly with potatoes, a little ham, and thick gravy. Kell also had a full loaf of black bread, which he sliced thickly, smothering each slice with butter. Skanda sat, facing Kell, eyes fixed on the old warrior, watching the man eat. On three occasions Kell had offered the boy food, but the thin-limbed urchin waved it away.
'You need something warm inside you, lad,' said Kell, relaxing with a full belly, eyes kind now he was out of the cold, the wind, the snow, and immediate threat of battle. He was getting old, he realised. Damn it, he was old! And, thinking of their pursuit after Nienna, he realised just how ancient and worn he really felt. To the core.
'I am not hungry,' said Skanda.
'You must eat something.'
'If you could ask for a little warm milk?'
Kell nodded, and called over a serving girl. She returned shortly with a cup of warm milk, and a tankard of ale for Kell. Both Kell and Skanda sat, drinking their drinks and watching the tavern gradually fill. The village of Creggan was not as deserted as it first seemed.
'Where's Saark got to?' said Kell, after a while. He was watching a group of men in the corner, and noting their ease of movement, and how they hardly touched their drinks. They seemed like military men to Kell, but one had a taint to the lips, as if he might be a blossoming Blacklipper. Blacklippers were men, and women, who had found a taste for the illegal and hard to come by blood-oil, so revered and necessary to the vachine. Most Blacklippers had little idea the narcotic juice they purchased was refined from human blood. Nor did they realise it was destined for a market so… esoteric: that of the vachine civilisation deep within the folds of the Black Pike Mountains. Most Blacklippers simply lived for the moment, and took their pleasure – including blood-oil – when and where they found it; the one downside, of course, being that the more a person used blood-oil, the more their lips, and eventually, fatally, their very veins stood out black from their skin. When a Blacklipper's veins stood out like a battlefield map in ink, one could count their remaining weeks on one hand.
Skanda sipped his milk. 'He went out.'
'Where to?' Kell frowned. 'He said he was having a bath.'
'He said he had things he needed to buy.'
'Hmm,' said Kell, and placed his chin on his fist. By his boot, no more than a hand-span away, Ilanna leant against the edge of the rough-sawn table. And under his left arm lay sheathed his Svian knife; usually, his last resort weapon on the few occasions he was parted from his first love. Ilanna.
The tavern was crowded now, but curiously subdued. They all know, then, thought Kell. They understand that Falanor has been invaded and they have missed the network of searching soldiers through sheer luck. No obvious roads led to Creggan. They had been overlooked. By the villagers' demeanour, they understood what would happen if a second pass came upon this little haven.
Kell's practised eye picked out that every man wore a sword, or long knife. Even the women who came in wearing thick woollen dresses and cotton shirts were armed. This was a town living in fear. It was palpable, like ash on their skin, like plague in their eyes.
Skanda finished his milk, and stood.
'Where are you going, lad?'
'I'm tired. I am going to sleep.'
Kell nodded, and watched the thin boy weave his way through the crowded tavern. Smoke washed over him, and a serving girl approached. She asked if he wanted a drink. Kell looked down at his ale. He looked up at her. And he considered.
'Bring me a whiskey,' he said at last, voice hoarse.
Saark sat in hot water, the wound in his side stinging like the fires of the Chaos Halls, his limbs bruised like a pit-fighter's, but still happy as heat flowed through his damaged flesh and aching bones. He settled back with a sigh. The stench of blood, and sweat, and dirt, of battle, of cankers, of sleeping in the forest, of albino brains and albino gore, all were scrubbed from his now pink and raw skin. And even better, he had asked around, and purchased some rich bath herbs, and perfume, none of it as fine as the scents used in the Royal Court in Vor, but a damn sight more refined than stinking of horse-sweat and death.
Saark sighed again. The water lapped the edges of the bath rimed with excised scum. He stared happily at the new clothes – clothes he knew, in his deepest of hearts, were a wasteful extravagance, and certainly not geared for travelling across the country – but still of necessity to one such as Saark. He was addicted to buying clothes and perfume as some men were addicted to whiskey, or gambling on dog fights. Because, he knew, with fine clothes and perfume matched to his natural beauty, the whole heady mix led to one thing, and one thing only: amorous meetings with pretty young ladies.
Saark closed his eyes, picturing the many women he had conquered. And yet Katrina's face kept returning, invading his imagination, pointing a finger of accusation. I am dead, she seemed to be saying. You told me you loved me. Now I rot under the soil and you did not stop it happening!
Mood soured by ghosts, Saark climbed from the bath and towelled himself dry. He stood, shivering a little and staring at himself in a full length brass mirror. The wound was healing in his side; it still leaked blood occasionally, but it was getting better. The stitches were holding fine. The swelling in his face had gone down, so he no longer looked like a horse had danced on his features, and many of his bruises had faded to yellow, and many, incredibly, had gone.
I heal fast, he thought with a smile. But not mentally, he realised, with a grimace.
