Michael did his best to understand the sailors without constantly interrupting them, but the way they spoke Meroan was very strange, and they all spoke it in different ways. Ditch’s rapid slang baffled him the most. “Yeah, we all got pretty much the same story, man. It goes, oh crap zombies, oh crap, oh crap, oh crap and then maybe somethin’ about Zeke. We just woke up on a boat. Nobody saw him before we saw him, you know? Then he’s gone.”
“Ah... I see. Well, what does he look like?”
Drake said, “He’s a white guy, like Ditch.”
“Man, I’m not white! What’s wrong with you?”
Andalynn said, “Personally, I do not remember him at all, but everyone has described him as very much like you, Michael, black hair and light skin, although… younger. He was young, was he not?”
Biggs said, “Yup, lil’squirt. Just a kid.”
Andalynn said, “Michael, forgive me for asking this, but, why are you so… mature?” At forty-five years old and with much gray in the black of his tidy cut and thick mustache, Michael looked like a chaperone among the sailors.
He pretended to be paying more attention to the path than her odd question but he suspected she was about to reveal something about the curious senescence he’d noticed in them earlier. “Don’t people grow old oversea?”
Andalynn said, “We did, until we met Zeke. I am fifty-two. But after waking up on the Grace I appeared to be thirty years younger than that.”
Biggs said, “Maybe twenty.” Andalynn glanced at him sideways and let a smile slip.
Drake laughed and then blurted out, “Ditch is so old, he’s bald!”
Ditch frowned. “I’m thirty-seven, man. I’m not old. But, yeah, my tats look older’n me now. Look at ‘em. Ink’s all faded.”
Drake persisted. “It’s really funny when Ditch’s stubble comes in. He looks like a little bald kid.”
“Man, you are a kid. And you’re gettin’ on my nerves.”
Andalynn redirected the conversation. “Does your ability not restore youth, Michael?”
Michael had stopped trying to find a way down. He was just standing there, thinking about what the sailors were saying. They were describing athanasy, deathlessness, another thing that didn’t exist. “No… it doesn’t.”
Ditch whistled. “I guess Zeke’s hospital’s a beast!” Michael frowned, not convinced that any of them were telling him the truth. Ditch said, “Oh, sorry, man. Yours is good too.”
Michael said, “Did any of you witness him give hospital, as I did?”
Andalynn had always been suspicious of Zeke. “I did not. What Ditch said is true. Most of us simply woke up on a boat.”
Ditch said, “We been talkin’ about Zeke, man.” He said it like it was the only thing they’d been talking about for the last eleven months. “It doesn’t look like nothin’ anyway, right? Like, when you put the hospital on Biggs, he just, kind a’ went out for a sec. Isn’t that what Zeke did to us?”
Michael couldn’t say.
Andalynn said, “My first assumption was that he had administered some sort of an injection, a medical antidote for the infection, but that did not explain the change in my appearance or how I had escaped the situation I last remember.”
Michael said, “What do you mean?”
“I had been traveling with a small group of survivors for twelve days. The last thing I am able to recall is being trapped against a locked door, burning from the infection and surrounded by the bauran that were killing my companions. I cannot imagine Zeke trotting in to save me from that with a hypodermic needle.”
Michael started looking for the way down again, thinking about everything they’d said. It was all so unbelievable, but they told it like the truth. He said, “What do you know about my order?”
Andalynn said, “Only the impossible. That you are capable of curing the infection by some sort of putative energy manipulation.” The look on Michael’s face prompted her to clarify, “That you are psychic healers?”
Ditch said, “Yeah, that was real weird for us. Cap got us all together after Zeke split and said there’s these guys with magic powers that are gonna help us. At first I was like, whatever, man, but then I was like, whatever, man! You know? There’s already zombies. Wizards? Pfft. Sure!”
Andalynn said, “Not long before that day, I would have considered Captain’s story laughable. Since then I have only hoped it was true.”
Michael took out the note. “Did anyone see who wrote this?”
Ditch said, “Cap said Zeke did. At first I thought it was just like, illegible. Turns out it’s this whole other language.”
Michael realized he was going to have to speak to their captain if he wanted to learn anything about Ezekiel. Then he paused. “Another language... How is it all of you speak Meroan? Wherever did you learn it?” Meroan was one of the oldest languages in the kingdom, but there were towns only a few days away that didn’t use it at all. He didn’t know how it could exist oversea.
Andalynn wanted to ask the same question. “Where we are from, what we are speaking is known as Continental. It is the most generally accepted form of communication in all of the Great Nations.”
Michael’s confusion only deepened with every question he asked. He went back to scrutinizing the note.
Andalynn said, “I had not expected you to be completely unfamiliar with Zeke.”
Michael shook his head helplessly. “I’ve no knowledge of this man.”
They were all puzzled.
Andalynn said, “Michael, his primary concern was in guiding us to Meroe. He told Captain it was the shortest path by land to Antioch.”
Michael nodded. “It’s a three day walk, but that’s right. The coast is high and wild for miles in either direction. Any other way would take much longer.”
“More ships are coming. What are your plans? Are you going to stay to meet them? I do not know if they can survive three days of travel by land now that the bauran have a foothold.”
Michael went blank for a moment, so tremendous were his responsibilities. Then he shook his head. “I can’t. People are going to die no matter what I do, but I think the best thing is to return to Antioch as soon as possible, to inform the rest of my order. I’m only here by chance. The others sit there useless, ignorant of what is happening.”
Andalynn nodded. “May I suggest then that, before we leave, we burn Meroe along with the bodies? We should at least clear a path for any others.” She assumed he would have a problem with burning the town, so she had arguments ready to support the suggestion.
Michael drew back. “We can’t do that... It’s blasphemy to burn a body. They’ll be damned...” It was a lesson from his childhood that he had never challenged. Repeating it, in the wake of everything that had happened, he didn’t know if he believed it or not, or if it mattered.
Andalynn found herself in an awkward and unexpected position, arguing against religion. Not wanting to offend Michael, she spoke cautiously. “Bauran continue to spore after they are put down. The smallest particle of their haze is deadly and reproductive. We know of no other way than burning them to stop that process.”
Michael couldn’t respond. After years of distance from the faith in which he’d been raised, he had difficulty remembering even the shortest of its prayers. He didn’t feel qualified to argue against life on behalf of the soul.
***
They found a worn trail leading down to the waves. From there, the shipwreck leaned among jagged rocks a hundred yards out to sea. Its vast, square sails fluttered in a perpetual death spasm. Even from that distance, Michael knew it was the largest structure he’d ever seen. The hull loomed out of the water, taller than his father’s inn.
He started working toward it through the spray. “We don’t have much daylight left. I suggest you all come with me. The shore is certainly dangerous.” The sailors left everything but their rifles behind and followed him in.
They half-swam and half-scrambled over the rocks to reach the ship. Scali
ng its quaking height onto the angled deck was a wet hazard as well. It smelled of mold and decay. Its name, engraved on rusted plates, was Vesper.
As the others quietly helped each other over the rail, Michael stood with his caligan drawn before the dark openings to the hold and the deckhouse. No one needed to say the ship was deserted. They all knew it. With the last of them aboard, Michael raised his sword and shouted, “Come, devils!”
The sailors readied their weapons behind him and craned their necks to see. Nothing came. After too much of Michael’s unproductive shouting, Drake suggested, “Maybe you should try something else?” He pulled his chin into his throat, imitating Michael’s voice and manner. “Come devils.” Michael raised an eyebrow at him. The others covered embarrassed faces. Then Drake said, “Andalynn likes, ahoy!” copying her clear-call with a man’s screeching impersonation of a woman and a limp-wristed wave.
Ditch swatted him and hissed, “Don’t piss him off, dookus!”
Michael frowned at Drake’s impropriety. “I don’t believe any are coming either.” Then he marveled for a moment at what he stood upon. “I’ve never seen anything so huge. Do you recognize it?” They did not, but suggested they could find out more by searching the deckhouse. Michael walked it through, making sure they were safe to search its scattered documents. He decided to explore below. “Perhaps one of us will discover something illuminating.”
Andalynn said, “I will accompany you. Since you have never been aboard a ship, I might be useful.” Michael nodded and they left the deckhouse together. The door locked behind them.
She followed him into the stairwell’s tilted darkness. In the divided light, they hadn’t been able to see that the ship was filled with smoke. Halfway down, he stopped and turned to face her. His eyes were glowing gold. Andalynn’s face opened and she backed away from him.
Michael said, “Go back to the others.”
She went on her heels up the awkward stairs, moving faster and faster as she approached the relative safety of the deckhouse. Michael’s eyes had come as a shock and now she was alone, exposed. Her body stiffened with fear. As she pounded on the locked door, that last memory before the Grace overcame her. She pounded harder and shouted, watching over her shoulder for the Vesper’s dead hands, knowing they were on their way.
Michael took a deep breath and plunged into the hold, his eyes like candles in the billowing darkness. Shadows leapt and shrank as he turned his head. The ship rocked in the wind and tide like a chair with a short leg. Every time it set down, thin, hovering clouds lifted from the walls and the floor.
He tried a door near the base of the stairs. It resisted but with a shrug he broke the wood around the handle. He went inside and closed it behind him. A starved corpse in the corner of the small room disappeared with the dimming of Michael’s light. He breathed.
Using cabins as pockets of air, Michael explored the vessel into its belly, where he heard the clinking and rattling of chains inside the rooms, an idle, metallic shuffling. The sounds stopped when he drew near. What was bound within had noticed him. The chains suddenly wrenched and caught, like they held ferocious, mute beasts.
Michael kicked a door in. Smoke surged out of the room. In the curling shadows of its cell, a skinless, human body struggled against shackles on its wrists and ankles. Naked muscle stretched tight and spare over its frame and made a sound like twisting leather as it lunged and strained. Its black eyes sparkled in the light from Michael’s.
Gunshots came from overhead. The bauran pulled forward, baring its chest on its restraints. Michael swung his sword. The chains went slack and the halves hit the floor.
He ran back through the smoky gloom, skipping the air pockets, lungs bursting before the orange light of the stairwell. Then he raced up the steps and onto the deck to gasp in the clean air. Hands on his knees, breathing, Michael looked over and saw the deckhouse door hanging open. The frame around the latch was splintered.
He hurried over, but stopped right before going through. He didn’t want to get shot again. “Sailors?”
“We’re in here! We’re ok!” Their weapons clicked and clacked as they stood down.
Michael peeked through the doorway, cleaning his blade with the lower front of his tabard. “What happened?”
Drake said, “I couldn’t figure out the lock fast enough for Andalynn, so she told me to shoot it off. She was freaking out.”
Andalynn’s eyes and lips were slits. “You could not open a door!”
A little burst of laughter escaped from Drake as he defended himself. “It’s not like I did it on purpose! It’s a foreign door!”
Ditch said, “Hey, shut up, man. It’s not funny…” but couldn’t look up from the ship’s log. He was discovering the tale of the hold.
Biggs said, “Michael, look here,” and handed him a crumpled, bloody sheet of parchment. Michael darkened - three lines and a signature in sacred script.
Ditch lowered the ship’s log with wide eyes and gooseflesh. “There’s a mess a’ bauran locked up down there, isn’t there, man?”
Michael nodded.
The sailors froze, suddenly feeling like juicy crickets on an ant bed. Welles said, “Um… are they coming?” Michael shook his head no.
Sunset was an hour off.
Biggs said, “Come stay with us on the Grace tonight. We’ll come back tomorrow with Cap, burn this thing to the water.”
It was a difficult decision for Michael. Every moment he spent purging the smoke, more people were going to die. But, he couldn’t leave those tasks behind or do them by himself in the dark.
***
Fifty sailors gathered around a bonfire near the shore, watching the Vesper burn through the next evening’s sunset. The blaze made an immense, roiling column of smoke. To the west, similar dark spires rose from the burning of Meroe. As the shipwreck collapsed, some swore they saw its demon crew dancing in the inferno.
8 Wizards
Daniel squinted up at him. “Uncle John, are you gonna be in trouble when we get to town?”
“What are you talking about?” John said. The two of them walked through wet, knee-high grass on a bright afternoon. John’s gauntlets hung from his belt and the fastenings swung loose with the mail on his forearms.
“You said you were supposed to be in Meroe, but came out to the farm instead.”
“Oh! No. Michael commanded me to go to the farm. I’ve been thinking about that quite a bit, actually. We were at the crossroads when we first discovered the plague.” John stared out across the field. “Michael officially commanded me to go home… He went on alone.”
“How come he can tell you what to do?”
“Well, it wasn’t… he didn’t…” John frowned at Daniel. “He knows a little bit about my relationship with your father. He knew I was worried and that I wanted to go to the farm but he also knew I wouldn’t go if I had the choice, out of duty I suppose. I was moved by Michael’s compassion and his courage, and I was proud of him. I was concerned for his safety but also thankful and somewhat ashamed of myself for that. I should have been someone he could rely on, not someone he felt the need to sacrifice for.” John scratched his beard, thinking about it even more.
Daniel hadn’t listened to any of that. “But how come he can tell you what to do?”
John’s face went flat. “Michael will be the next templar after Abraham. He’s already been consecrated. That’s why he can tell me what to do.”
“How come you’re not gonna be the templar?”
“Oh, no, I’d have been a bad choice. I’m almost as old as Abraham.” It was an old man’s exaggeration; John was twenty-three years younger. “I’d be consecrating the next templar during my consecration!” He laughed but Daniel just squinted up at him. “I’ve known I would never command the Circle since the day that Abraham was chosen, many, many years ago. And, honestly, I’ve never wanted the responsibility.”
“What’s Abraham gonna do when Michael’s the templar?”
/> “Well, Michael will take over when Abraham passes on. Abraham is very old. No one lives forever.”
“How old is he?”
“Eighty-seven.”
Daniel frowned with thought. “How come you’re so old, Uncle John?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Pa told me you can’t get sick or anything and you fixed my lip and stuff. Can’t you fix, um, how old you are?”
“Oh! No, I can’t do that. No one can do that.”
“How come?”
“People are simply meant to age.”
“But isn’t getting old just like getting sicker and sicker for a really long time? How come you can’t just…”
John interrupted him. “No, aging is not like being sick! What a thing to say!”
Daniel withdrew. “I’m sorry.”
“Yes, well…” John sniffed the air. “Stop.” Daniel’s eyes bulged and his ears pulled back. John stalked away from him, searching the grass. Then he stooped and started rummaging in it. Pulling up several bulbous plants from the moist soil, John said, “We can eat these! Here, hold them for me. I’ll get some more.”
Daniel held up the filthy vegetables and frowned at them. “How come we didn’t go back to the farm to pack some food yesterday? I don’t wanna eat these.”
“Oh, no, the farm is far too dangerous right now. And besides, I needed to secure these fields!” John gestured to the vast, innocuous fields of grass around them as he rooted in the ground. Daniel frowned at the fields and then frowned at John. The old man said, “Nothing can be done about it, son. We’ll just have to do our best.”
That evening they reached a tree line and a creek and stopped for the night. Though tired, Daniel left John by the water and went off on his own to find dry sticks. When John climbed back up the bank, Daniel had a campfire started and was sitting next to it, hugging his knees.
John said, “That’s a beautiful fire! How did you make it?”
Daniel showed him the tinderbox. “Pa gave it to me.” He didn’t look up. The pig carving was in his other hand.
“I found some good mushrooms by the creek, see?” John displayed the fungi. “Now we can roast them on your fire with the wild onions we found earlier!”