The King's Thief

Chapter 9

Beck opened his eyes. Dawn had broken, and with it Beck’s concentration. He rolled from his seated position onto all fours, feeling stiff muscles protest at having to move. Staggering to his feet, he moved to the window and flung open the shutters, letting a cool breeze roll in. Turning to the form on the wheeled hospital bed, Beck took in the site of his efforts. The lesions and small bruises were gone, that been the easy part, but the silver orb was gone. The biggest change had taken place on the head of the body which had once been Sayela. The silver had flowed as if liquid to cover the ragged face, turning the charred landscape into a reflective half-orb. The effect was as if Sayela was wearing a solid silver fencing helmet, like the ones the recruits used in training. Standing over her, Beck could see himself reflected and oddly distended, and behind him, the grinning face of Kaliss. Whipping round, Beck’s hand went for his sword-belt, but it was lying on the bed where he had left it. The empty room taunted him. He blinked slowly; mental fatigue was getting to him, evidently.
The other main task Beck had undertaken was far from physical; he had mentally raped Sayela using a MindGlass aura of his own invention. Her brain was an empty vessel, and he had taken what he needed. The time she had spent with Kaliss was an open book to him now, part of his own memories, and although it would take him a while to properly assimilate the impressions and separate them from his own, he had the information he needed.

For several days Beck had tried to deal with the problem of Kaliss’s apparent void ability. This made locating the man very difficult. The man who filled his thoughts, who had robbed him successively of his rank and his possessions without so much as lifting a finger, the man who even now burned in his mind, taunting him and yet staying just out of reach. No matter that Malketh wanted him alive, he deserved death, or worse; Beck knew several techniques that his superiors would frown on, things that he learned at the front lines, for torturing a body well beyond its limits. For hours, a thousand imagined agonies had passed through the Private’s mind, all directed at one man. The first part of his revenge, the hardest part, lay completed on the gurney in his room, and thankfully the second required little preparation.
“Kalisssss…”

*    *    *

The same sun that reflected on the unearthly helmet also dawned on the warehouse, shining in through the skylights. Kaliss snapped into wakefulness, feeling as refreshed as he ever had. As he sat up on the mattress, he realised that there was a flurry of activity around him, but the bustling Sylvan workers had already cleared most of the warehouse. The desks were moved to the sides, presumably as they had been found, while there was only a patch of disturbed ground to show that the field had ever stood, exactly as Ryn had foretold. The hammocks were all down and were being used as slings for the men and women to carry various objects, for they had all flung their hoods back and Kaliss could now tell them apart.
Ryn detached himself from the main group, most of whom seemed ready to depart. He wordlessly handed Kaliss a black robe, identical to the others.
“So what’s the plan? We just walk out under the time-distorting spell?”
Ryn shook his head, blond hair dancing around his sharp features. “No. The stress would kill the Kinroc, and besides that if we collide with someone who is not desynced, the results could be catastrophic. Generally speaking we only use time ergnul in prolonged periods of hiding, or in absolute emergencies. There are strict rules controlling it.”
“But we will be using some sort of… ergnul, yes? I mean, you’re obviously Sylvan, and I’m a wanted man. Anyone catching sight of us will be ready to kill us…”
“No. It will not be so, for the robes we wear are not just to make sure that any humans who do see us are not made uncomfortable by our normal mode of dress. They have ergnul of their own, woven into their very fabric, present in the cotton plants that produced the material. They project an aura of hiding, causing people to simply not notice us, unless they have a particular talent.”
Kaliss nodded slowly. The Sylva seemed to have a logical answer for every impossible thing they could do. As he was about to walk over to join the main group, Ryn lay a hand on his shoulder. Turning to face him, he cocked a questioning eyebrow.
“So far, you have only talked to me, and that is good. But outside, you may mingle with our group. Not all of us are as tolerant as I am, Kaliss, some have lost loved ones and even their way of life to your armies.”
Considering his own lost love, Kaliss nodded his understanding. Together, the two men joined the main group, leaving the last one or two Sylva to form up behind them.
Kinroc Faergaldan looked around, his wooden eyes taking in each face. Finally he alighted on Kaliss and the two exchanged gazes for a quiet moment, before the Sylva broke the contact. He put his arms around the two nearest Sylvan black-robes, who in turn put their arms around another person each, the chain continuing until Kaliss found he had an arm around each shoulder. Faergaldan made a simple pronouncement, and suddenly there came the sound of bustling noise from outside the warehouse. The sun was up and the storage district was buzzing with activity. The group of black-robes, conspicuous yet drawing no attention whatsoever, set off towards the city’s eastern gate.

*    *    *

Approaching the large gatehouse structure, the group’s pace didn’t let up in the slightest, but under his black cowl Kaliss began to sweat profusely. The sun was warm on the dark material, but that was not the sole source of his discomfort, for he could see a party approaching the gate as well as their own; a small honour guard surrounding the bent body of a magician, one dressed fashionably in canary-yellow robes trimmed with feathers. The profile of the man showed a crooked nose, a sharp chin and a tall forehead; it was one that he recognised, the deceptively weak-looking Malketh. For just a moment he was torn between continuing their daring escape from the city, straight through the main gate, and simply turning and running. Even one guard or magician noticing the group would cause the crowd to turn on them, and Kaliss didn’t think they would differentiate between robed humans and Sylva. Suddenly he felt a ripple of calm filter through him; he reminded himself that the magician was someone who had helped him, could still be of use in the future, despite his threats, and besides, was this not what the old man wanted? For him to go to Sylvanasher?
The magician had stopped, and was speaking with the Captain of the Guard at the gatehouse, and as they neared, the conversation grew clearer.
“…and you say he hasn’t reported for duty again today?”
“No, sir, he sent a message reporting a most dire situation, sir, a case of the flux that not even the infirmary’s healing magic has been able to halt.”
“Most unusual, he looked in good health when last we met. Strange. Ah well, Captain, I’m sure I will run into the good Private in the near future.”
“Very good, sir.”
The Captain saluted and as he did so, Malketh looked past the man’s face, seeming to look straight into Kaliss’s eyes, somehow impossibly picking them out under the cowl. Then the moment was gone, and the group of black-robes had moved on past the two men, under the gate.
“Carry on, Captain.” The magician turned to leave.
Kaliss left the city of Theria, reflecting that this was not at all how he envisioned doing so; in the company of a group of people that, were he of a mind to, he could consider to be his enemy. But then the thought was gone, and his journey truly began.

*    *    *

The land immediately around Theria, for many miles in every direction, was farmland. The valley in which the city lay had a much shallower ascent on the other side of the river, leading some in the city to wonder what had possessed the original settlers to use the steep side as their camp. However, once the group had traversed the side of the valley, the land became flatter and many dozens of large farms were revealed, all of which were concerned with supplying grain, livestock, poor-quality toba and wine to the city. The group walked brazenly down the dusty main road and met few people coming the other way. There was no conversation, and Kaliss was beginning to suspect that this was the normal way of travelling for these people, a silent unseen presence.
They walked through uninspiring scenes of fields and pasture for hours, and it was not until the sun was nearing the horizon behind them that they began to deviate from the path. They had not stopped for a midday meal, instead snacking on fruit and hunks of a light bready substance which Ryn had identified as nommas-bread, made from the impossible corn. It was satisfying in a way which the normal coarse bread Kaliss was used to could never be.
Moving away from the main path, Kaliss saw that they had passed beyond the last farm, a poorly-fenced field being the final marker. In front of them, the path wended between what looked like two halves of a forest, but the Sylva were veering towards the rightmost treeline. As they gained the forest, the sun dipped below the horizon, and the increased cover made their surroundings dim indeed. The troupe stopped, apparently for the night.
Kaliss stood to one side, observing with interest what happened next. The Sylva, as one, placed their hammock-packs on the ground, removed blankets and lay them on the ground. They then removed their cloaks, revealing that they were, indeed, only wearing the roughly-woven kilts. Kaliss was able to finally, and abruptly, see that of the twenty six people in the group, five of them were definitely female. Lithe waistlines lead to firm breasts, unashamedly revealed to the night-time air, and the cool breeze caused instant reactions. Meanwhile the men were mostly built in the same way, lean but muscly, blond hair shading to grey in some, the only outward appearance of age. Kaliss saw a range of quick impressions; one Sylvan man with a huge mass of scar-tissue from his hip to his pectoral muscle, as if a creature had clawed at him; one of the older women, her hair slightly grey at the roots, still young in her body as if age touched her lightly; the Kinroc, his somewhat larger frame sporting an array of scars to match even Kaliss’s.
“We do not expect you to disrobe too, Kaliss. We do not feel the bite of the wind, and in this way we are made comfortable. See, we are more carefree now.” Ryn was standing nearby, his own thin torso bare. He pointed to where a trio of Sylva had set up a cooking pot almost ridiculously fast, a fire already being built in preparation for the evening meal. Meanwhile two others had brought out what appeared to be a lute and begun an intricate melody that somehow put across beauty and joy at the same time.
“Come, we celebrate the natural bounty around us, thief. You are welcome in our circle.”
Ryn beckoned once, then went to take his place in the circle that had formed around the cooking pot.
Faergaldan stood up. “My brothers,” he began, “It has been many months indeed since we journeyed under Sister Moon, among the trees we know and love, and I say to you, it will be some months still to come before boughs of our homeland welcome us back. But tonight, let us celebrate our liberation from the self-imposed prison of the human city. Let nommas-bread be broken and shared, let spirits be brought out and imbibed, and let us chase away the chains of human pollution and dirt.”
Even though Kaliss knew that he himself was part of that humanity, he found himself carried away by the Kinroc’s words, and before long he was clapping as the Sylva began a dance which seemed to pass from person to person, gently missing out the thief, each pair of dancers moving in an out of each other with light, agile movements. Their acrobatic ability seemed to be fluidly mixed with a natural rhythm, and the effect was most pleasing, particularly, for Kaliss, in the women. There was no sexual rhythm to the dance, but the concept was very much in the mind of the watcher.
He turned away to contemplate the darkness after only a minute of watching, though; he felt hollow, as if part of him was left behind in the city, and the sight of so many people enjoying themselves and relaxing seemed to be almost a personal affront.
Shortly, the evening meal was served, and despite not having seen any of the makings for it, Kaliss was given an earthenware bowl filled with a vegetable stew. There was a delicious aroma rising from it, seeming to at once to transmit the freshness of the forest and the tempting tastes of lands unknown. Kaliss ate as the Sylva celebrated long into the night.
When finally it was time to bed down for the night, he was given a blanket by Ryn and told to find a soft spot to sleep on. “We have far to travel tomorrow, and this celebration will be our last for some time, but now we are truly brothers and sisters of the trees once again. You are fortunate, Kaliss, few of your kind have experienced this.”
Kaliss smiled honestly. “Then I thank you, Ryn, for I feel as though a weight has been lifted from my shoulders.” Bidding the Sylva goodnight, Kaliss lay down and was almost instantly asleep.

*    *    *

Beck slumped in his chair. Beer spilled over his table at The Badger’s Demise, and, drunkenly desperate, he quickly lowered his head to slurp at the small puddle, not wanting to waste a single drop. Patrons on the tables around him were beginning to quietly eye up his coin purse, which sat on the table. More intelligent men were ignoring him completely, having noticed the set of his shoulders and the way his eyes glittered under hooded brows. Private Beck did not make a convincing drunk. Through those same eyes he was watching the barmaid, Sibel, as she made the rounds filling up tankards from a jug she carried and removing used vessels to be taken into the kitchen. She was ugly, in the nicest possible way, a nose which had apparently been broken sometime in the past, too much makeup, muddy brown eyes and greasy blonde hair, but still the drunken men tweaked her copious rear and leched at her immense cleavage. It was the night after his work with Sayela; the redhead had obviously made it her business to find out about Kaliss’s life before they began a relationship and he was amused to find her memories slightly tinged with jealousy at his previous loves. In his time in Theria, Kaliss had proved himself to be shamelessly heathen, moving from woman to woman at will as he became bored. Sayela was his fourth such conquest, Sibel having been the third. Beck sneered slightly; the qualities the women saw in Kaliss could not be accurate, or else why would he have left them? The man was obviously callous, leaving these women, especially in their state, without any means of support. Beck’s mind burned with hatred for the man who used others in such a carefree way, although Beck himself had not yet found solace in the arms of another. His career as a soldier of the King had not given him the time to explore such weaknesses as love.

Shortly before last orders, Beck slipped out and pretended to be smoking one of the addictive toba sticks that were frowned upon in the Army, while really he was watching the inn. Soon his patience was rewarded as Sibel came out, putting on light cloak, and headed for the slums. Beck followed. Through several side-streets he trailed her, before he decided to make his move. Taking a small black leather cosh from his pocket, he quickened his pace, moving silently, until he was behind her; raising his arm, he brought it crashing down onto the back of her head and she collapsed like a felled tree. Picking her up, his well-trained body managed the extra weight admirably as he turned back towards the Barracks, and his quarters.

In total, three young women disappeared that night. Although apparently unconnected, Beck’s stolen memories told him that these three had all been lovers of the errant thief. He had indeed grown bored of them once their bellies had swelled, for all three were with child. As the sun rose, anyone looking into Beck’s quarters would have seen four naked women laid out, as if dead, on the floor, all four wearing a strange form-fitting helmet, although one was silver and the other three were brass. Their hearts were all kept pumping by wax seals, and though their lungs inflated, not a sound could be heard. All was ready. On the bed lay Beck, naked, sleeping soundly for the first time in a week, curled up tightly as if a child.