Bayne's Climb: Book I of The Sword of Bayne

  Chapter II: The Village

  Through the rest of the day and the night and into the next morn, Bayne marched without rest. He did not stop to eat. He did not stop to sleep. The heavy muscles in his legs continued to work up and down like some mechanical construction. He never seemed to tire. Not so much as a sweat broke upon his brow.

  The dirt road had been flat enough at first, then gradually rose around the edges of the mountain. The trek was an easy one, especially for Bayne.

  A hoary wall of ancient stones rose upon his right, outcrops of sharp boulders and hanging greenery highlighting the natural barrier. On the left were trees. Eventually, as he slowly rose higher and higher, Bayne found he could look down upon the tops of the trees. Leafed greenery rustled near the edges of the cliff, not too far from the warrior’s own steps, and every so often the song of a bird could be perceived beneath the shadows of limbs.

  Out in the distance, beyond the mountains and the trees, the curving brick road stretched away through verdant fields and into Bayne’s past. The village that was not a village could no longer be seen, lost around the curves of the mountain.

  The night was cold, though Bayne seemed not to notice as he walked. The hoot of an owl rose to him from the tree branches, and several times he believed he heard the distant howls of wolves.

  When the sun appeared the next morning, it began as a thin, red line on the horizon, then abruptly sprang to life and shed its glowing warmth upon the land and the mountain and the warrior’s skin.

  It was soon after Bayne came across three youths sitting atop boulders against the rising wall of the mountain to the right of the dirt road. They wore expressions of arrogance upon pale faces beneath mops of hair as black as emptiness. They were dressed in dark, loose leathers with dark boots rising above their knees. Each wore a thin sword on a belt around his waist, a matching dagger on the opposite hip.

  Before Bayne had an opportunity to pause before them, to wish them a good morn or to ask directions or to make any number of other verbal approaches, the tallest of the three shoved away from his perch and stood with legs spread wide across the big man’s path. The youth’s hands strayed about the pommels of his weaponry.

  Bayne stopped several yards away and eyed the fellow, then glanced to the others. The two still reclining atop rock seats sneered with an evil delight, as a cat would watching a mouse.

  “You are out early this morning, father,” the one across Bayne’s path uttered, his words slipping from his tongue with distaste.

  The brows of Bayne’s eyes descended, angling above his nose. “I am no father to you, young one, nor to any child.”

  “Did you hear that?” the youth in the road asked, looking back to his friends. “This old man thinks I’m a child.”

  The two sitting burst into guffaws familiar from the throats of young men boastful and full of themselves. They bent over in their laughter and slapped one another around the shoulders.

  The youth in the road straightened and faced Bayne directly. His right hand tightened on his sword and his left on his dagger. His eyes flared. “Perhaps I should show this fool just how much of a man I am.” It was not a suggestion.

  The other two went silent and still, the only movement their eyes flowing from their companion to the big warrior and back.

  “Dying to prove your manhood is foolish,” Bayne pointed out. “There is no need for this.”

  The wisdom was lost on the youth. He snapped out both hands, the sword in one and the short blade in the other. Rapier and dagger sprang forward.

  Despite his size, Bayne was faster. His bulky arms flashed out with his own, heavier blade. Steel rang on steel. Bayne’s sword knocked aside the lighter weapons of his foe with ease.

  The youth took a step back, stunned by the quickness of the older, larger man. But it only took a moment for him to catch his momentum. He sprang again, bright silvered points aimed at the chest of the big warrior.

  “This is foolish.” Bayne’s heavy blade slid along slender steel, at the quillons twitching the thin sword to one side, slashing the youth’s hand and sending the rapier spiraling off the side of the mountain.

  The young man’s momentum carried his other attack, the dagger striking home between metal links, embedding in the thick muscles of Bayne’s heaving chest.

  The big warrior stood motionless, staring down at the weapon’s pommel protruding from his breast and the growing circle of red beneath where the dagger had penetrated his chain shirt.

  The youth was stunned that his foe had not fallen. He shook his wounded hand and took a step back, his eyes fastened on the bleeding wound he had caused. His two comrades sat silent, their own eyes wide.

  Bayne’s eyes came up, hard as steel and as black as a cave. “I gave you every opportunity.”

  His sword stabbed out, piercing the youth’s stomach.

  All arrogance abandoned the young man’s face. Forever, his mouth formed into a screaming O.

  Bayne shoved with the sword, sliding the blade further through the boy nearly to the big weapon’s hilt, then he jerked back slightly and lifted.

  The lad’s eyes winced as he tried to scream, but there was only drool and blood spewing from his open mouth as he was raised above the warrior’s head. Soon enough, the young man’s head drooped and his dark hair hung in his still face.

  As if the youth’s weight was no more than a sack of flour, Bayne slung his weapon to one side, sending the body rolling and sputtering blood before coming to a stop at the feet of the young man’s friends.

  The youth did not rise.

  The warrior walked to the body and leaned down, wiping his blade clean on the lad’s pants. Returning his weapon to its sheath on his back, Bayne’s other hand grabbed at the knife still sticking from his chest. He yanked.

  The blade came free with a spattering of scarlet.

  “Damn nuisance.” The knife fell to the dust at his feet.

  For the first time in long seconds, Bayne took notice of the other two boys.

  They sat where they had. Motionless on the rocks. Their eyes wider than ever.

  Bayne pointed down the road in the direction he had been heading. “Go.”

  The two went, jumping off boulders and shuffling away as if a devil were on their tails. Perhaps one was. At least they seemed to think so as they kept glancing over their shoulders.

  Eventually the two disappeared around the next bend in the mountain, the dark-garbed youths mingling into tall trees climbing up and up.

  Bayne sighed and watched for some little while to make sure the two were not fools planning to come back. Perhaps they were brave enough to ambush him further along his path, but he thought not. If so, however, he would deal with them when the time came.

  He knelt next to the dead youth at his feet and shook his head. Such a waste. He grabbed the ankles and pulled the body to the side of the road.

  Without a shovel it was not easy digging in the gravel-like soil, but Bayne used the dead youth’s knife and eventually had a shallow grave into which he dropped the corpse. Covering the body was a much easier task, and by the end Bayne was covered in a gray dust.

  He glanced to the grave and shook his head, then marched down the road.

  As morning passed to day, the sun rose higher and beat down upon the chain-clad walker, drying the ring of red on his chest and leaving behind a crust which was nonchalantly brushed away. Of a wound to Bayne’s chest, there was no sign.

  About mid-day he came upon a village. It was a true village, not like the village that was not a village he had pondered at the foot of the mountain. Here Bayne paused long to take in his new surroundings.

  The path that had been his road widened into a broad expanse big enough to house the dozen or so buildings that made up the village. These structures were two stories and built of dark wood beams and slate roofs; windows stood open to allow inside the day’s warm breeze, the shutters painted greens and reds having been tied back with string attached to nails on the o
uter walls. The buildings formed a rough circle of sorts around a central area of packed earth, the middle of the small town, where was a well made of rock and mud binding. To Bayne’s right, the backs of houses were built directly up against the stocky gray of the mountain. To his left, the houses sat on a giant lip of rock and dirt hanging out over a long drop to treetops below. Across the open middle of the town the road appeared to continue between two houses, turning from packed dirt into loose gravel beyond the structures.

  Smoke flowed up from several chimneys. Black birds flitted by overhead. Curtains danced in open windows

  No one was to be seen and silence ruled.

  Bayne did not trust the tranquility. But he had to follow the man who wanted him killed.

  He began to walk once more.

  Bayne had not made it very far, not even past the first house, when a door creaked open at the second house, a dark structure to his left.

  Just inside the door, leaning against the frame, stood a tall man wearing a broad-brimmed hat that shaded his eyes. Bayne felt menace from the stranger’s look and stopped in his tracks to return the fellow’s hard stare. Taking in the man’s plain, dusty garb and the heavy, gray cloak hanging from his back, Bayne recognized the fellow as a Caballeran, one of the band of horse riding warriors from the far north and west. But those eyes, like worn granite in the midst of a storm, told tales of battles won and lost, blood strewn upon many a field, and bodies tossed aside as so much meat, even the bodies of companions and loved ones. This Caballeran wore not the eyes of a warrior, but the eyes of a man who had seen too much and done too much, a man not broken but only because he no longer recognized any differences between wrong and right.

  When the man stepped from the doorway into the street, his cloak flitted to one side revealing a heavy sword hanging from his hip. He took only a few steps before coming to a halt, seeming intent not to block Bayne’s path, then tilted his head back as if to get a better view of the big man in the road.

  Two other figures appeared in the doorway behind the Caballeran. These two were younger, their faces not as gruff nor their eyes as cold, though their simple garb and broad hats revealed them to be of the older man’s clan.

  Bayne ignored the two. The old man was nearer, and the others seemed in no hurry to leave the safety of the house.

  The older man hitched a thumb around the hilt of his sword. “You would be the one who killed the Gath.”

  Gath. It was a term vaguely familiar to Bayne, and it explained the three youths on the road. Mercenaries from eastern Ursia, young warriors who powdered their faces and clad themselves in black to show their disdain for death. Until today, Bayne had never confronted such fighters. He was not impressed.

  To acknowledge the speaker, Bayne nodded to the man. “The Gath sought his own death.”

  The man grinned, showing straight teeth stained brown. His eyes also grinned, but there was little mirth to be found in those deep orbs. “That is the way of the Gath,” he said. “They fear not death, and seek to prove it at every opportunity.”

  “All men fear death,” Bayne said. “Any who says otherwise is lying or insane.”

  The other man’s grin widened as he touched the brim of his hat with a finger. A Caballeran sign of respect, Bayne knew. Two warriors sharing wisdom and respect.

  The fellow with the hat glanced over his shoulder to his younger companions. “Plates. Drink.”

  The two youths disappeared inside.

  The Caballeran pointed along the road to a shadowed alleyway between two houses. “Would you do me the honor of lunching with me this day?”

  Bayne’s eyes narrowed as he gazed at the lane with suspicion.

  “I give my word as Masterson, sergeant of the third Caballeran infantry, I will deal you no harm within the confines of our meal.”

  Bayne believed the man. There was an aura of honor about him despite his steel eyes. Besides, to a Caballeran, dismissing such an invitation would be a great dishonor, and Bayne had no wish this day to shed blood unless there was little choice.

  “As you suggest, Masterson.” Bayne strode forward heavily, watching the other man as he passed and entered the dim shade of the passage.

  A black iron table awaited, its surface a scrollwork of flowers in bloom and birds upon the wing. A pair of matching chairs faced one another across the table, each also of black iron but cushioned with a scarlet pillow.

  As he felt was appropriate, Bayne moved to one side and allowed Masterson to approach the opposing seat. Together, facing one another, each man eased onto his own chair, Masterson pausing long enough to remove his wide hat and hang it on the back of his seat, Bayne twisting to one said to allow for the long sword on his back.

  A door behind the sergeant screeched open and out walked one of the younger Caballerans, now without cloak and head covering. The young man carried a pewter plate in each hand, atop each plate resting a mass of cooked greens, a slice of what appeared to be grilled chicken and a flour-draped biscuit. The young man placed a plate before each of the sitting men, then returned inside.

  Bayne and Masterson continued to stare at one another without moving. Without blinking.

  The other young Caballeran, he too uncloaked and hatless, exited the building and placed a pale cloth napkin next to each sitter’s plate, then set iron forks and knives on the napkin. He too returned inside the building, but was back momentarily with wooden mugs.

  Each man at the table was handed a mug, then the youth was gone.

  Bayne sipped his drink. It tasted of apple with a hint of liquor.

  Masterson held his mug up between himself and the other warrior. “Caballeran cider. My family’s recipe.”

  “A fine drink,” Bayne said, sipping again.

  “I’m glad you find it to your liking.” Masterson quaffed a drink of the liquid.

  They ate in silence. The only sounds were the clinkings of forks and knives against pewter and the distant ring of the wind over the treetops below.

  All the while their eyes were upon one another as if wolves sharing a carcass in the dead of winter.

  Finally, they were done with their repast.

  “Thank you,” Bayne said, easing his chair back from the table. “That is the first meal I have had in several days.”

  Masterson too scooted his chair away from the table. “It is a pleasure to hear.”

  Both men continued to sit, staring at one another.

  “How long since he came through?” Bayne asked.

  Masterson seemed to ignore the question. He turned sideways in his chair to glance at the door behind him. “Orrville! Coffee and cigars!”

  As if he had been waiting just the other side of the doorway, the taller of the two young Caballerans burst out the entrance with a pewter tray on one hand. He proceeded to place a pair of short tan ceramic mugs onto the table. Next to each of these he placed what appeared to be a brown roll of field leaf.

  Masterson nodded to the younger fellow, who paid no mind to those sitting and returned inside.

  The Caballeran twisted in his seat so he faced Bayne properly and reached out to retrieve his cigar. He grinned as he bit into one end of the cheroot and spit most of that into the dirt at his feet. He then retrieved a small brass box from a pants pocket, flicked the box open to retrieve a wooden match, snapped the box closed and returned it to its hiding place. He scratched the match on the side of his pants leg. It lit immediately, flaring up bright.

  Masterson twisted the cigar in his mouth as he held the flame to the far end of the leaf. He sucked in air and the brown stick belched smoke from its burning end. Holding his breath for a moment, he flipped the match to one side where it died in the dirt, then he exhaled. A ghost of gray fluttered out between his lips and the man smiled again.

  Bayne watched all this with much curiosity.

  The Caballeran continued to smile as he removed the cigar from his mouth and held it out. “Finest Caballeran smoke weed there is.” He used his cigar to point at its
twin next to the coffee mug in front of Bayne. “You should give it a try. The coffee, too, though it’s only local blend brought up from the fields below.”

  “Thank you,” Bayne said, his hands remaining in his lap, “but you did not answer my question.”

  Bayne had not accepted the cigar as a gift. Normally this would have been an insult worthy of raising the ire of any Caballeran warrior. A duel would have commenced, a quick and dirty though formal affair that would only end with the death of one man or another. But Bayne had trapped Masterson. Before the offering of the cigar, Bayne had posed a question. He had not received an answer. Under the rules of the Caballeran code, if anyone had been affronted, it was Bayne. Masterson owed an answer.

  The older Caballeran appeared to immediately recognize his position. He flicked the end of his cigar to send ash twirling upon the wind, then lay the smoke on the edge of the table.

  He tilted his head forward so his eyes faced the ground. “My humblest apologies, good Bayne. I meant no disrespect to yourself.” It was the only option available, a sign of Masterson’s honor, other than open combat.

  Bayne tapped the end of the table and retrieved the cigar, sliding it into his belt. He had accepted the smoke, but had not lit it in the company of the old man. This too was a sign, that the big man had been mollified but was not entirely at ease. It also could have been a sign Bayne did not know the use of a cigar, but Masterson was too polite to make a point of such.

  The Caballeran raised his head and stared at the warrior across from him.

  “How long since he came through?” Bayne repeated.

  “Two days ago,” Masterson said. “Riding a black horse. Showed a bag of gold. Promised it to the man who would kill you.”

  “Do you plan to collect?”

  Masterson did not blink. “I do.”

  “You have an odd way of killing a man,” Bayne said.

  “How do you know the food was not poisoned?”

  “You know of me,” Bayne said, “so you must know poison would do little good.”

  Masterson gave a slight nod. “True enough.”

  Bayne waved a hand over the remains of their repast. “Then why this meal? The coffee and cigar?”

  “I like to know a man before I slay him.”

  Bayne eased back in his chair and slid out of the seat, standing next to the table. “Do we do this here? Or in the street?”

  Slowly and with caution, keeping his hands nowhere near his sword, Masterson took to his feet. He retrieved his hat from the back of the chair and placed it atop his head. “My manners would be remiss if I were to face you here after we have shared a meal. No. You are safe from me and mine as long as you remain in town. Once you take to the open road again, then you are fair game.”

  For the first time in many a day, Bayne’s lips curved into a smile. “That would seem to give me impetus to stay in the village.”

  Masterson returned the grin. “Or you could join us. Within the ranks of the Caballeran infantry, no assassins would dare approach you.”

  “You honor me,” Bayne said.

  “It would be an honor to have you among us.”

  “Alas, I cannot commit,” Bayne said. “My destiny lies elsewhere.”

  “It is the least I could offer under the circumstances,” Masterson said. “You have shown yourself worthy.”

  “And you have shown yourself to be an honorable man,” Bayne said. “I hope you will not hold it against me when I stand over your corpse.”

  The eyes of the Caballeran turned to ice. “We shall see.”

  Bayne turned away, his muscular legs leading him back toward the center of town.

  “Warrior!”

  Bayne glanced over his shoulder to Masterson.

  “Beware,” the Caballeran counseled. “There are still Gath in wait for you. And a group of Ashalites are about, likely with a wish to weigh themselves down with gold.”

  “My thanks,” Bayne said, saluting with a finger to an eyebrow.

  “No thanks are needed,” Masterson said. “I just don’t want them to kill you before I have my opportunity.”

  Then the Caballeran chuckled.

  Bayne let loose with his own lusty guffaw, then headed back to the streets, leaving the older warrior and his honorable ways behind.

  The air of the town square felt different than before. An unseen aura of menace lay upon the atmosphere. Bayne felt many eyes upon him, eyes with no good intentions.

  He looked over his shoulder once more, but found Masterson no longer there. The Caballeran’s cigar still burned on the edge of the table.

  Movement. Out of the corner of his eye.

  Bayne swung back upon the square.

  An addition had come to the scene, a youth in black leathers reclined upon stone steps in an open doorway across the square. The boy’s hair dripped like ink into his eyes and his face was the powdered white of a whore. His right elbow propped him up against the steps while his left hand played with a dagger, flipping the blade into the air, catching it, twirling it around his fingers, playing, playing, playing with danger.

  The Gath had not been there a moment before. Fast, he was.

  Without moving his eyes, Bayne allowed the sides of his vision to tell him the story. Another of the Gath stood in an open window above the one sitting on the steps. Two more tried to hide behind flimsy curtains of the same house on the ground floor.

  As a group they were nervous, though the one outside was trying his best to not appear so.

  Bayne approached, stopping mere yards from the relaxed youth with the dagger flying about his hands.

  The knife stopped, the weapon’s handle tight in the boy’s grip. “You killed Neil.” He didn’t look up.

  “If you mean the cur who accosted me on my approach to town,” Bayne said, “then you are correct.”

  “You shouldn’t have done that.”

  “He shoved a blade into my chest,” Bayne said. “He struck first. He lost.”

  The Gath glanced up. “I see no wound.”

  “You wouldn’t.”

  The dagger slid into a slim leather sheath on the youth’s belt. “And why would that be?”

  “I heal.”

  The boy slapped his gloved hands together as if knocking away dust, then he sprang to his feet. The motion was swift and balanced, like a mountain cat, the balls of his moccasined feet touching ground first, his arching legs and back straightening above. He came up facing the large, muscular warrior in the chain shirt, the lad’s dark head only as high as the big man’s chest.

  “Think it through,” Bayne warned.

  The boy didn’t.

  He lunged. A short blade hidden in a hand springing forward and stabbing. Missing.

  Bayne dove to one side, instincts taking the place of logic.

  A shattered window. Tumbling glass falling and breaking further.

  A crossbow bolt smacked into the ground, cracking into two pieces next to the downed warrior.

  The youth with the knife dropped to a knee, his weapon gripped over handed and swinging down from above. Bayne rolled to one side and kicked out, a boot connecting with the Gath’s chin and sending the lad sprawling.

  The two from behind the curtains charged out of the house, each with a rapier aimed for the chain-clad warrior. Bayne jumped to his feet, another bolt from the window above slamming into the dirt where he had just lain.

  He had no time to draw his sword, the two rapirists upon him too quickly. One stabbed. Bayne grabbed the long blade with a hand and snapped the other palm onto steel, snapping the weapon in two. The other Gath slashed in from the side, his metal raking against Bayne’s link shirt.

  The one with the knife was on his feet again. He sprang between his two comrades and thrust with his dagger. Bayne jammed the broken end of a rapier into the youth’s left eye, bringing a splash of red and squeals like that of a dying pig before the lad dropped.

  The two Gath still standing seemed in shock at their leader’s fate,
their jaws dropping and their eyes as big as coins.

  All backed off as the one who lost his eye squirmed and screamed on the ground, sending blood spraying around his entwining form in the dust of the street as he clutched at his face.

  Bayne slid back and unsheathed his heavy sword.

  A crossbow bolt slammed into his chest. The head of the arrow sank deep beneath his chain shirt, sending links flying. Bayne took no notice.

  He jumped forward, landing with both feet on the back of the bleeding Gath. The breath burst from the dying youth’s lips and he could scream no more as air fled his lungs and his spine snapped.

  Bayne lashed out with his sword. A hand gripping a rapier fell to the ground. Again the warrior swung out his blade. This time an arm dropped.

  Blood flowed down the street. Young men screamed for their mothers and died in a shivering heap.

  Bayne burst through the door into the building from where the Gath had come. The crossbowman still awaited upstairs. Bayne thundered across a foyer of plank floors with dark beams for walls, blood dripping from along the lengths of his sword.

  A bloody sight brought him up short. Lined on the floor next to a darkened hearth lay three bodies, a man, a woman and a girl of no more than six years. A family. All were garbed in simple muslin. All wore a red line crossing beneath their chins.

  A curse from above drew Bayne’s attention to wooden stairs leading up. A roar as from a lion ripped out the warrior’s throat as he assaulted the steps three at a time.

  At the top was a closed door. He hesitated not, kicking and bursting through with his sword swishing before him.

  A familiar Gath youth, one of the survivors from the road, was huddled on the floor, a large arbalest fumbling in his hands. It was a heavy weapon with a strong pull and the boy was in too much of a hurry trying to wind back the weapon’s crank to reload another dart.

  Bayne bound forward screaming, his sword in two hands over his head.

  The youth tossed his crossbow to one side and skidded back on the floor beneath the shattered window. “Don’t kill me! Don’t kill me!”

  Steel chopped flesh to be buried in the wood of the floor.

  The Gath died with a gurgle and a sigh.

  Bayne planted a boot on the body’s chest and tugged his weapon free, trickling scarlet and leaving bits of gray lung caked along the sword. The warrior leaned down and wiped his blade clean on the pants of the youth.

  A cry from outside.

  Bayne leapt to the window. A story below, a Gath stood looking upon the three bodies of his compatriots. Though he could only see a corner of the youth’s face, Bayne recognized him as the last of those from the road.

  Bayne jumped.

  And landed on his feet, his sword lashing out in search of vengeance.

  The last Gath had luck, however, as Bayne’s sword found only empty air. The clamor of Bayne’s landing, all that chain rattling and the thudding of the warrior’s weight onto packed soil, sent the boy running in fear.

  Bayne pursued.

  Across the village square they loped, prey and predator, the big man gaining on the shorter, lighter boy in black.

  With a glance behind, the Gath saw death only moments away in the steel eyes of his follower. Seeking escape, the youth spun on a heel and darted between two of the village buildings.

  Only to find himself in a cul de sac. A wall of timber faced him.

  He spun back upon his fate.

  Bayne had stopped. He stood there, a trickle of red running down his chest from the arrow still protruding there. His sword was tight in a fist but hanging at his side, dripping gore and grime into the dirt.

  “I never hurt anyone!” The boy begged. He had nothing else to do. “I wasn’t truly a Gath. I just wore black to be among them. I didn’t mean to hurt anyone.”

  Bayne let his sword fall to the ground. He had no need of it here. He stepped forward, within reaching distance.

  The lad winced.

  “You were an imposter, then,” Bayne said. It was not a question.

  The boy nodded. “I wasn’t one of them.”

  “You were a mimic,” Bayne went on, “a pretender, a poseur.”

  The boy nodded faster and faster, his head bobbing on his neck like a chicken at feed. “Yes, yes. I’m no Gath. I’m a farm boy from western Ursia.”

  Bayne pointed at the rapier strapped to the youth’s belt. “You are also a hypocrite.”

  He wrenched the arrow from his chest, once more sending chain links and slivers of flesh flying, then jabbed out, stabbing the boy in the neck, burying the arrow’s head deep.

  The youth shrieked like a murdered rabbit.

  Bayne stabbed again. And again. And again. Each stab brought a new spray of blood, covering the youth in red and spraying Bayne’s front.

  With each blow, the youth’s hoarse throat gave out another yelp and cry. He screamed for his parents, for his home, for a girl he’d once loved. He screamed for God.

  In the end, he died in a bloody heap with a cracked arrow projecting from the mess of flesh and muscle that had once been his throat. The wounds were so garish his head was nearly separated from the trunk of his body.

  Standing over the chaos and disarray of killing, Bayne’s breaths came in sharp gasps. It was the hardest he had breathed in days, even after all his walking and climbing up the side of the mountain. He glared down at the bloody remains of the youth. There were no signs of peace in the warrior’s eyes.

  Bayne spat, his white phlegm spotting the ground near the dead boy’s head. “Don’t wear yourself like an outlaw and expect to be treated differently.”

  The clamor of two hands clapping brought Bayne around.

  Blocking the exit from the alley was a line of six men wrapped in sandy muslin from head to toe as if in burial shrouds. Atop their heads were many wrappings, all white but for the man clapping who wore a headdress of dusty scarlet. Even these men’s faces were covered but for the eyes. Skin tanned by a desert sun was revealed about those black eyes and on bare hands. About their waists were thick hide belts glinting with bronze, tulwars and scimitars hanging.

  These men in their white garb were known to Bayne. They were Ashalites from Pursia, an offshoot branch of a young cult, warriors who spread their beliefs with the edge of a sword.

  The one clapping stopped and strode forward.

  “Your punishment is harsh but just,” he said, bowing his head slightly while keeping his eyes on the big man before him. “Thanks be to Ashal for your strength and courage of conviction.”

  Bayne grimaced. “Ashal had nothing to do with it. And there was little just about it. They were paid to kill me. I killed them.”

  The leader of the Ashalites waved a hand to the brutalized mess at Bayne’s feet. “Surely this slaying was a fitting punishment for one of evil.”

  The breathing finally came easier to Bayne. He took in a great gulp of air and scratched at his chest to remove the blood drying there. As earlier in the day, his body bore no signs of a wound.

  With a boot he prodded the corpse at his feet. “Whether good or evil is of little interest to me. He was stupid, and that got him killed. He never should have joined with a band of Gath.”

  “You have no interest in good and evil?” the leader asked.

  Bayne shook his head. “Why should I? Men know the difference down in their souls.”

  “Men know good and evil because Ashal described it to them.”

  “I trust not your book.”

  “Blasphemy.”

  Bayne shrugged. “Reasoning.”

  “Ashal tells us --”

  “From what I have heard, Ashal was a man,” Bayne said, “though a remarkable one. He walked among other men and healed them. Whether he was a god or not, I do not know. Whether god exists, I do not know. But it will take more than the word of men such as you to sway me.”

  The leader of the Ashalites snapped forth a hand and pointed at Bayne. “Here I believed you worthy of entwining with
our host. Beware yourself, Bayne kul Kanon, named for a demon, as you tread dangerous ground. We are here as a righteous cause to bring all under Ashal’s will!”

  “Killing in the name of a god, any god, is detestable,” Bayne said, “and I was mistaken to believe you were here for a sorcerer’s gold.”

  The leader whipped forth his tulwar.

  Bayne stepped toward his own dropped weapon.

  “Do not touch that sword if you wish to live!”

  Bayne glanced up. His lips barely moved. “Very well. I do not need it.”

  The leader of the zealots grimaced. “You think we fear you? We fear not death! We have been promised bliss!”

  “Fine,” Bayne said. “At least I’ll no longer have to hear your blathering on this side of death’s veil.”

  “You mock us!” the priest roared.

  “Say hello to your god,” Bayne said.

  The warrior sprang.

  The attack was a surprise to the Pursians. It never entered their minds an unarmed man would do such.

  He did. And the Pursians were in disarray.

  Bayne reached the chief first, the Ashalite swinging his arms as he tried to backpedal. Bayne snatched the man by the throat and squeezed. The spine cracked and cartilage crushed, Bayne tossed aside his lifeless foe.

  Another Ashalite sliced with a sword, his bronze blade raking against chain before he too was grabbed, this time by the face. Bayne’s thumb dug in below the chin and two of his fingers found eye sockets. He squeezed. The Ashalite’s face imploded as if an overripe fruit caught in the clutches of a giant. Flesh, blood, bone, cartilage and muscle collapsed in upon itself. There was a scream. Then the gory chaos that had been a man fell away.

  By this time the remaining four Pursians had gathered their wits. Their companions’ deaths had been gruesome, but these were men experienced in war and terror. They were not shocked easily and overcame their fear to launch a counter attack.

  Two sliced at Bayne from opposing sides. One blade was knocked away by the flat of the big man’s hand. The other sword sliced against an arm, leaving a long cut that bled. The other two zealots advanced directly, thrusting with their scimitars.

  Bayne twisted to one side and kicked out, connecting with a man's wrist and sending a sword flying. The other Ashalite in front swung up with his weapon, coming from below for his opponent’s groin. Bayne was fast again, spinning to his other side and catching the blade against a leg. This wound too was long but shallow, tearing a gash along his pants.

  The swordless Ashalite screamed in the tongue of his native land and dove at his foe. Bayne caught him with both hands, lifted the fellow high and threw him at the others.

  Four warriors went tumbling in a pile.

  Bayne dropped to a knee and retrieved his sword.

  Then he stood and remained in place. He had yet to take or give an inch

  Fumbling amongst themselves, the four were soon enough on their feet. All again hefted long blades, but now they were wary, moving in with caution.

  Bayne's unblinking eyes focused on a spot in the middle of the group.

  With a shout, the men charged, all attacking at once. Four long, curving blades swept in at Bayne from four directions. One sword missed entirely due to its wielder’s fervor, driven over the large warrior's head. Two other blades were knocked aside by a sweep of Bayne’s own steel.

  The fourth sword could not be avoided. Bayne slung up an arm as a shield. The enemy’s sword bit deep, driving through flesh and striking with a metallic ringing against the bone. But that bone held, and Bayne’s arm remained true despite the new wound.

  Surprised once more at their foe’s strength, the four Ashalites drew back.

  Bayne done playing with these fanatical warriors. He jumped at them, slashing from left to right with a wide sweep of his heavy sword. Steel sliced cloth and flesh, spilling a man’s intestines as if a live serpent escaping his stomach to seek a home in the dirt.

  Another Ashalite tried to sidestep Bayne’s swinging death, but he tread in the gory mess that had once been a friend’s face and slipped to the ground. His tulwar went spinning away. Bayne stomped on the fallen man’s ankle, shattering bone beneath flesh and bringing a roar of pain. Bayne finished him with a slice across the throat.

  The surviving two Ashalites fell back further, now out of the alleyway and into the center of the town. Bayne followed at a run. One man turned to flee. The other brought up his scimitar. Again, Bayne swung out wide with his weapon. Two heads dropped to the earth. Two neck stumps sprouted blood. Two bodies fell into the dirt.

  Bayne paused to stare about at the destruction he had wrought throughout the village. An observer might have thought that steady gaze held pride, but it was not true. It was also not true those eyes were gripped by sorrow. If anything, Bayne’s gray orbs revealed an essence of completion. A task had been done, a bloody task that should not befall any man. Only fools would kill for gold, and only the deranged would kill for divinity. Such men might not deserve the fate Bayne had meted out that day, but it was they who had sought their own demise. They had had a choice, and they choose poorly.

  Bayne sighed. He stepped away from the gore that littered the street, the bottoms of his boots leaving a splotch of red with every step he took. Slowly, moving his way to the edge of town near the road where he had originally entered, his eyes and mind followed the conflict that had occurred over the last hour. Gath lay dead near one house. Ashalites were piled together near the entrance to the cul de sac. Another Gath and two more of the fanatics rested in bloody pools inside the stoppered alley.

  He blinked, then leaned down to grip a handful of dust from the road. He sprinkled the dry grit along the flats of his sword, watching the dust clump together the blood along the blade’s edges. With a rag taken from his belt, he smeared the weapon clean. He dropped the rag at his feet, adding more blood to the scene.

  Bayne then slid the sword into its dark home on his back.

  He glanced around. There was nothing living to see. He listened. The only noise was that of distant birds whistling among the trees further down the mountain. His tongue tasted of dust and bile. His nose was filled with copper. His skin was chill.

  He showed no signs of being wounded, and what blood sheathed his clothing was little of his own.

  There was no need to remain. Bayne walked across the town’s center, heading toward the exit between two of the village buildings. He soon enough came to the road again, this time layered in red, worn, cracked bricks from another age.

  A rock-toss away stood three men, Masterson and the two younger Caballerans. The old man seemed more ancient than before, his skin the color of ash and hanging from his face in folds. But each of the three stood planted, Masterson at the point of a triangle. Gray cloaks floated behind the three, and each gripped a long sword in his hands.

  “You do not have to do this,” Bayne offered.

  “Yes, yes I do,” was the reply.

  “You have witnessed my strength here today,” Bayne said. “Does that not give you pause?”

  “Boys.” It was one word, a simple word.

  The two young men moved around their leader and stomped forward, swords extended.

  Bayne backed a step. “Masterson! Stop this foolishness!”

  The sergeant said not a word and the two Caballerans continued forward. Grins of daring and assuredness lay about the young men’s faces.

  Bayne cursed. And then the two were upon him. One swung high, the other low. Bayne stepped into the men, so close their weapons would do little harm. He snapped out a flat palm, striking a chin with a crack and sending a youth tumbling back. Bayne’s other hand chopped out, connecting with a wrist. There was a yelp of pain and a Caballeran sword dropped to the road.

  The disarmed mercenary drew forth a long knife with his good hand. Bayne grabbed the weapon hand and squeezed, crushing knuckles against the knife’s bone handle. The youth screamed again.

  The other of the pair was on
his feet again, shaking his head as if to clear his sight.

  Bayne drew back his free arm and stared into the pain-filled eyes of the youth with whom he grappled. The boy was straining, trying to pull his pulped hand away from the bigger man. Bayne punched him square in the face, breaking the nose and splattering blood. The head snapped back and to one side in an unnatural position.

  Bayne let the boy drop.

  The other swordsman was suddenly there, swinging his lengthy blade down from upon high.

  Bayne slapped his hands together overhead, catching the blade only inches from his face. The Caballeran tugged on his weapon. It would not move. Bayne held the steel in a grip as strong as a vice.

  Once more, a Caballeran went for a knife at his belt.

  Bayne flipped the long sword around in the air, catching it with one hand, and lashed out. The cutting edge sank into flesh, nearly beheading the youth.

  Bayne kicked out. The dead mercenary fell away. Bayne dropped the borrowed weapon. And looked up to find Masterson had remained motionless.

  The old Caballeran continued to stand with his boots slightly apart, his sword gripped in two hands out from his chest. Where before there had been a tiredness to his eyes, now there was anguish. The corners of his orbs glistened with tears.

  “They were your sons,” Bayne said.

  Masterson nodded.

  “It did not have to be this way,” Bayne said. “You could have allowed me free passage.”

  “No,” Masterson said. “That was not an option.”

  “Your sense of pride is too strong.”

  Masterson nodded again. “Perhaps. Or my sense of honor.”

  Furrows grew above Bayne’s eyes. “Do not allow your manners to conceal your bloodlust. You are no better than the Gath, and your posturing sickens me.”

  “Regardless,” Masterson went on, “it would seem my weaknesses have slain all I held dear.”

  A silence settled between the two. It was an uneasy quiet, filled not with determination, anger and hate as is often the case with harbingers of violence. Instead, this quiet spoke of an ending that had gathered slowly over years, like the death of an old one sick and alone at home in bed.

  Eyes traded more than glances across the short distance. Bayne’s eyes spoke of hard knowledge, but of an uncertainty of the future and the past. Masterson’s gaze told a different tale, a weary tale. The Caballeran had seen much in his many days, but most of it was of cruelty and harshness and death.

  The distant wails of wind scratching along the sides of the mountain ruined the silence.

  “Before you slay me, I would have a question,” Masterson said.

  “Ask.”

  “This rider you follow, the one who would have you slain, why do you chase him?”

  The wind’s torrent built in power, moaning along the rents and rocks of the mountain. The very crags and cliffs seemed to want to shutter Bayne from speaking further.

  But Bayne held to no superstitions. He would speak. “The man has answers I seek.”

  “Very well,” Masterson spoke, tightening the grip on his sword. “I asked but for a single answer. You provided.”

  “Ask further,” Bayne said. “I have no wish to speed your death.”

  Masterson’s eyes narrowed and dried. “I have witnessed your skill and strength, but mayhap this old dog has tricks of which you’ve never witnessed.”

  “Do not be a fool,” Bayne said. “You know who I am. That has been the problem since I entered the village.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “There would have been no gathering of mercenaries if I had not been the prize.”

  “A bag of gold speaks much,” the Caballeran said.

  Bayne scoffed. “This was no contest over mere gold, old man. You know this, as do I. The Gath, the Pursians, even yourself and your kin, all were here in hopes of bringing down the mighty Bayne. This was a contest to decide who was the strongest. It was a foolish game, a contest of cultures.”

  Masterson’s eyes narrowed further until they were slits. “How so?”

  “All men die,” Bayne said. “It matters little how strong their arm, how mighty their feats, how high they are held in esteem. It matters little from which nation they come. Gath, Caballerans, Ashalites, all can be fine warriors, but all die. Warriors, soldiers, kings and emperors alike. Training and experience help to extend that life, to protect it, but eventually we are placed beneath the stones and the dirt. Seeking death early is the highest form of audacity.”

  Now Masterson’s eyes widened. “Perhaps seeking death is all that is left to some of us after a lifetime of butchery.”

  Bayne glanced back to the village, the two-story houses he had left but minutes earlier. Streams of smoke no longer rolled above the chimneys.

  “You may speak truth,” he said, “or at least a truth for yourself. But that is no excuse for the killings of innocents. I witnessed a family carved unto death within one of the village homes. Would you deny Caballerans are guilty of such?”

  Masterson shook his head. “I would not. It is customary when mercenaries roll into a foreign town. It is cleansed.”

  “It is laziness,” Bayne spoke. “Easier to slay those who might rise up against you than to treat them civilly. There is no honor in that. Honor is found among brothers who stand beside one another, but this can not be found when you butcher all who could be your brethren. You are left with nothing but honoring yourself, and that is narcissism.”

  The old man's eyes grew befuddled. He appeared uncertain of further words.

  “Do you have more questions?” Bayne asked.

  “This rider you follow,” Masterson said. “Who is he?”

  “Verkanus.”

  “The emperor?”

  Bayne nodded.

  “He is dead.”

  “Only rumor,” Bayne said. “His body was never recovered. He fled to the desert after the final battle against Trode.”

  A grim smile crinkled Masterson’s face. “The powerful mage finally met his match with the Trodans, eh?”

  “After three battles,” Bayne said, “the final one decisive.”

  “You seek revenge, then?”

  “No,” Bayne tried to explain. “I seek answers.”

  “To what?” Masterson asked. “You were said to be one of his generals, one of his strongest assassins. You stood alone against hordes and wiped them away with a swing of your sword.”

  “He … he brought me into being,” Bayne said.

  “What?”

  “It was the final conflict with Trode,” Bayne went on. “He summoned me from … elsewhere … and used me against his foes.”

  “Then what answers do you chase?”

  “Who I am. What I am.”

  “What you are? You are a man, plain and simple, as any other.”

  Bayne shook his head. “No. I have not the same … requirements … as other men. I need little rest and sustenance, though I can enjoy both. I have found my thoughts are not the same as other men. I am not as distracted as they when it comes to connections to this world.”

  “What are you speaking of? I understand not your words, warrior.”

  “Your clans. Your gods. Your links to other men. I have them not, nor do I wish them. If anything, I see them as distractions.”

  “Distractions to what?” Masterson asked.

  “To life itself. To a sane mind.”

  Masterson used his sword to point at one of his dead sons, then to the other. “You would consider these distractions?”

  “Only if you allow them to be.”

  “And have I?”

  “You have.”

  “Then let me be distracted no further.”

  The Caballeran strode forward.

  A fist smashed into the old man’s face.

  Masterson dropped to his knees, the sword plummeting.

  Bayne hit again. And again. And again.

  The downed mercenary no longer wore a face. His features were fla
ttened, looking like a butchered side of beef. With a last gasp that forced a red bubble between the crushed slash of his mouth, Masterson fell over on his side. Dead. Unmoving. No more.