‘Now then,’ he said, trying to sound the way he’d heard sergeant majors cajoling their belligerent or terrified men. ‘Let’s have this nice and easy, shall we? I mean to make this as quick as I can, if you’ll let me.’ He could feel the four men he’d chosen as back-up tensing behind him, and the weight of Mother’s attention.
Moccus came right up to him, still tall despite his stooped age so that the deserter’s face barely reached his chest. The god reached out a hand towards his face; he shifted stance and flexed his fingers around the knife haft but Mother said, ‘Steady, Butcher. Be still. The god seeks only to know you,’ so he forced himself to stand immobile as it took him by the jaw with arthritic fingers and turned his face this way and that. Its snout was only an inch away, its thick tongue rolling, nostrils quivering, its breath hot and wet. He could see the hairs in the ridges of its skin and the cracks in the yellowed ivory of its tusks – they looked razor sharp, even with age. It could bite the face off his skull like an apple if it wished. It was insane that he was just standing here without defending himself. He was in a perfect position to disembowel the beast.
He angled the knife slightly and prepared to strike.
To his surprise, Moccus released him. It stepped back, dropped to its knees and bared its throat. There was a collective sigh of relief from all around.
‘The god accepts you as his deliverer,’ said Mother. ‘Do your duty before he changes his mind.’
‘First flesh, first fruit,’ he said, and did his duty, opening the creature’s throat in a single swift sweep, and as he did so he saw the German boy’s face and remembered the taste of his flesh. The memory was so vivid that it blotted out everything else – he was back in the shell crater with the dying boy, only this time he was drowning in mud. It closed over his feet, then his knees, thighs, and hips, and he struggled against it but he was pulling against the sucking weight of the earth itself. As it reached his chest he felt arms slip beneath his from behind, elbows curling around his armpits, holding, steadying. Mother’s voice was in his ear: ‘I can’t pull you out on my own. You have to help me. You have to push. Come on, Butcher, push!’ So he pushed as hard as he could, until the sinews in his knees and back screamed, and the sucking weight relented a bit, then a little bit more, and then relinquished its hold all of a sudden and he flew backwards and found himself back in the clearing. He was sprawled in Mother’s arms and the other men were catching Moccus’ cruor in those great bronze basins.
He lay back against Mother’s breast, panting, exhausted. ‘That is what the death of a god feels like,’ she said, stroking his brow, and she kissed the top of his head. When he had caught his breath, she patted him on the shoulder and gave him a helping shove upright. ‘Please, Butcher,’ she said. ‘Will you prepare the first flesh for us?’
‘Yes, Mother.’ He retrieved his knife and set to work.
* * *
As far as everyone else seemed to be concerned it was all a tremendous success, but when Ardwyn came to him in his cottage afterwards he couldn’t bring himself to touch her.
‘What’s wrong with you?’ she asked, re-buttoning her blouse and making no attempt to hide the fact that she was upset and irritated.
‘Nothing,’ he said.
‘Really? Are you going to tell me that you’re “just a bit tired” or that you’ve “got a headache”? Because if I want that rubbish I’ll go to my husband.’ When she saw that her anger didn’t move him she softened her approach. ‘My darling, you achieved something awe-inspiring today. You should be proud of yourself! We should be celebrating!’
‘I find it hard to celebrate when…’
‘When what?’
He flailed, trying to find words to express something that he was struggling to understand. ‘Mother keeps calling me Butcher, but I’m still just a deserter,’ he said. ‘When things get too big, I run. I almost didn’t come back here at all. I wouldn’t have, if Gar hadn’t waylaid me on the road and got me drunk. I’m glad you’re married because it means I don’t have to try too hard with you; if you were after something permanent from me I’d run a mile.’
‘I know,’ she replied. ‘That’s why I’m with you, you dolt, don’t you understand? You have no idea how wearisome it is being surrounded by men who are always trying. I find them so, well, trying.’
He smiled at that, but it faded as quickly as it appeared. ‘Moccus, he submitted to me. Something that powerful, bigger than wars or history, that I have no right to approach – it knelt to me and let me kill it. What do I do with that?’
She scrutinised him, her lips pursed.
‘What are you thinking?’ he asked.
‘I’m trying to make up my mind whether you’re aiming for false humility or just melodrama.’
‘Ha. Maybe I should be humble. If he – it –
