The Dark Cycle - Chapter Five

Chapter 5

Raeffe’s Decision

Raeffe spent the next seventeen miles trying to remember all of the curse words he knew, and then use them against Stephen Marshall, his brother Grey, and Lyle the bell-ringer. Of course, they could not hear Raeffe, as he showered oaths upon them, but it made Raeffe feel better.

“Mutton-heads,” he would mutter. “Sons of toads. Slack-jawed, simeon smelly-goats, and they can all go eat fish.”

Lander gave a breathy whine, signalling his bewilderment at such foul language.

Raeffe kicked Lander into a brisker trot. The horse’s only response was to skip a few steps before returning to a lumbering pace. When Raeffe had first left the forest bath-house, the horse had been nervous and jumpy, turning its muzzle to look backward, until Raeffe’s white hands were blotched red and chapped from yanking Lander forward. But now, the horse seemed resigned, adopting a morose attitude that Raeffe did not much appreciate. Especially now that they were out of the woods, and in open country.

East of the Crooked Arms Tavern was an enormous, windswept plain called the Stabby Moors, named so because of the high number of stabbings that occurred there. The landscape was covered with craggy hills that could easily conceal rogues and bandits. But besides these hills, the rest of the moors were flat and open. You could see almost from one side to the other, though the moor was over two hundred miles across. The ground was rocky and unsuitable for farming, and there was little water besides a few muddy streams that streaked through the colorful scrub.

The storm in the north was growing fainter, but it dimmed the morning light and caused howling gusts of wind to shake the delicate, dried-out blades of grass that shot up from the moor’s pebbly surface. Raeffe shuddered. This was no place for a person to travel alone, and he knew that. King Robber - the leader of the legendary Thieves’ Guild - supposedly lived here with his band of bloodthirsty brutes. But Raeffe remembered how angry he had been at Stephen Marshall, and felt his pride steel itself into courage. He urged Lander onward.

As they continued their journey, Raeffe tried not to think of the other, inhuman things that were supposed to be in the moors. There was one story, in particular, that he kept trying to forget - but it kept bubbling up in his memory, just the same.

The story went like this: The Earl of Arunhall was supposedly the lord of these lands, which he titled: The Arun Moor, though no-one called it that. The last earl, a friend of Raeffe’s father, tried to find a suitable use for the land. So he cleared out as many thieves and bandits as he could, and sent his shepherds and collies there to herd sheep in the vast open spaces. In particular, he sent a crack team of Welsh Corgis, as the little dogs could more easily navigate the tricky terrain.

The sheep thrived in the environment; but one night, a bandit who had not been caught sneaked up to a lost ewe and went to work stabbing it up. The bandit took the best parts of the sheep away with him to eat, and abandoned the rest of the carcass. When the shepherds woke up, they were astonished to find that the Welsh Corgis had dined on the remaining scraps of meat.

Now, with their newfound thirst for blood, the little dogs systematically killed and devoured the remaining sheep. When the shepherds tried to stop them, the corgis - being clever dogs - teamed up and took down the shepherd’s leader. The rest of the poor shepherds raced back to the Earl of Arunhall’s nearest castle, quivering in terror, and reporting that the corgis now had a taste for manflesh.

The Earl of Arunhall had no idea what to do about this, and never made another attempt to subdue the moors to conventional farming methods. Some said that herds of man-eating corgis still roamed the land, seeking out victims.

Raeffe’s tutors had told this story to him while Raeffe was growing up. He never believed it was real, but rather, a tale meant to instruct one simple lesson: Don’t ever go into the Stabby Moors. If the name isn’t enough to frighten you, maybe the idea of carnivorous corgis will.

And besides man-eating dogs, there were at least a dozen other mythical monsters that supposedly hung about in the Stabby Moors. The place seemed to attract all sorts of legendary baddies: Bopopo, the shapeshifter who found the souls of children unutterably delicious; Lupin Wolves, which were half-man, half-wolf and altogether unpleasant; The Bogeyman - who seemed consigned to tormenting children who sucked their thumbs, according to Raeffe’s tutors; trolls, black saints, and hairy demons.

The worst was almost certainly Papa Snake: a man with white eyes who kept a sack of souls around his neck, and rode around the moors in a cart pulled by tomcats. Raeffe found himself suddenly wishing that Gertrude was around. That chicken was annoying, but it certainly knew how to scare off a cat.

Still, Raeffe pressed on, trying to keep his mind focused. At the other end of this moor was the Castle Gavelgayne, which would surely grant him entrance. The castle was currently occupied by the Earl of Arunhall, who would supply Raeffe with an armed escort. Thus supplied, Raeffe would cross the Mottled Green Glass - a swampy forest - and then circumvent Lady Lake. After that, it was a straight shot to Rack and Ruin River, the crossing of which on the Bridge of Mirth would earn him entrance to the Ladies of March.

Thinking it through in his head, though, Raeffe felt positively exhausted. He was so tired that, when he first heard the yips of little dogs, he told himself he was imagining things.

But then, Lander’s ears pricked up. Something was coming.

In a brief flash of terror, Raeffe imagined himself being torn apart by hundreds of tiny teeth. He shouted at Lander to charge forward.

Lander compiled at once, taking off with such speed that Raeffe was startled and promptly tumbled off Lander’s back.

For a terrible instant, the world went black and still. Raeffe saw grey bubbles in the general greyness of the morning sky. They bloomed larger, and then receded.

Something in his back felt strange. Raeffe held up his hand and tried to move his fingers. The light seemed too bright now, and something in his ears was screaming. It took his mind a moment to break through all of the sound:

“Get up, you idiot! Get up! They’re coming!”

“Oh drat!” Raeffe said, out loud. He was just scrambling to his feet when he realized it was too late. The dogs were upon him. Welsh Corgis. Their tongues lolling from their mouths. Their little black eyes sparkling with bloodlust.

Raeffe could think of nothing to do, except unsheath his dagger and call out: “Shoo! Shoo! Bad doggies!”

The dogs did slow down, but this was only to form a ring around Raeffe. They all sat on their haunches and watched him, awaiting some sort of signal. Curiously, they did not bare their teeth, but only sat panting. If Raeffe hadn’t been so terrified, he would have thought they were cute.

“Hold on there!” called a meaty voice.

Raeffe had been so focused on the dogs, he hadn’t even realized that there was a man a few yards away, waving his arms in front of Lander and trying to calm the horse. Lander reared up, but the man - a tall man, and covered in furs - seemed unbothered the horse’s dangerous lunging. When the horse finally calmed down, the man led it over to Raeffe and the ring of dogs.

He was a burly figure, with a mossy beard that gleamed a dull copper in the fledgling sunlight. His hands were enormous and stiff with callouses. They stiffly cupped the bridle. The man’s eyes were a stormy grey a few shades darker than the shadowy texture of his skin, and nearly matching to the dirty animal skins he wore. In fact, all of his coloring was some gradient of grey, the red beard standing out stark from the rest of him.

“Your horse?” he asked in a syrupy, islander accent.

“Thank you?” Raeffe asked, unsure of whether the man meant to give Lander back, or determine his ownership to solidify his claim once Raeffe was dead. “I don’t suppose you’ll call off your dogs?”

“What? Oh, they won’t hurt ye none. They’ve no predatory instinct,” the man explained, tapping one of the corgis with his foot to demonstrate. The little dog looked up lovingly, then licked the man’s shin. “That look like a predator?”

“It looks like it’s tasting you,” Raeffe said, holding out both his hands for peace. “Please - tell them to go do something else. The way they keep staring at me is spooky.”

“All right, ye’s. Git.” The man clicked his tongue and whistled. The corgis all raced off, nipping at one another’s heels as they went. The man then turned to Raeffe. “Ye know ye are in bandit country. This is our land. To cross it, ye must pay a toll.”

Raeffe looked about, trying to determine if the man had reinforcements of the non-canine variety. He did see a few tendrils of smoke winding their way across the sky, rooted a few miles off.

“I have no money,” he told the man.

“Liar,” the man said, though he did not sound angry, just as though he were pointing out a simple truth. “A pretty princeling like you ought to have something. Yer hat is worth more than I see in a month.”

Raeffe immediately pulled off his crushed velvet cap and threw it toward the man. But the cap was light, and though he clearly threw with his full might - even uttering an ‘umph!’ - it only reached about midway between them and fluttered down to the ground.

“That was really pathetic,” said the man.

“Well, pick it up,” Raeffe replied, flustered. “You said it was worth something.”

“Don’t be daft,” the man said. “If I try to tell that at a market - the cap of a young noble - they’ll will think I took yer head as well. And then I’d have some earl’s men on me. No, I only deal in proper gold.”

“I don’t have any,” Raeffe insisted, trying not to touch his pockets, where he had about a half-measure of gold coins.

When the man approached, Raeffe backed away, still brandishing his dagger. As he did this, his pockets jingled. The bandit went quiet, and listened. For a moment, Raeffe was sure the bandit had heard the incriminatory sound of coin.

But then, Raeffe realized he was listening to some shouting that was taking place beyond them, back at the campfire some miles away.

“Ye know what?” the bandit asked. “Perhaps it was the fates that brought us together. I bet you can speak the Fairy Tongue.”

“It’s called Tyric,” Raeffe muttered. “But yes, I can speak it fluently. My tutors used to tell me I had a superior way with languages.”

“Good. Then how about instead of paying me the toll,” the bandit proposed, “you do me a little favor. Eh? For yer trouble, I will not only allow ye to keep yer money, but I will send some men with you to ensure you reach your destination, untroubled by any creature.”

Shocked and curious, Raeffe nodded sullenly. The bandit gave him Lander’s reigns.

“That’s a fine horse,” the bandit said. “My name is MacKenzie Glover.”

“My name is Raeffe - ” Raeffe panicked, suddenly remembering that his father’s name would not be popular among ruffians. “Em. My name is Raeffe Marshall.”

“Ah! Ye’re a descendant of the horse-tamers, then.” Glover squinted at Raeffe as he took Lander’s reigns. “Ye don’t look like one. The way you handle such a beautiful horse is really a fat shame.”

“The important thing is, I speak Tyric.”

“Right ye are!”

They travelled the rest of the way in gloomy silence. Raeffe could tell that Glover was worried about something. The bandit walked with a fast stride and wrung his enormous hands together, clapping them occasionally and saying something like: “Almost there - almost there. Just hang on.”

As they got closer, Raeffe saw the bandit camp. Until now, he’d only heard stories of the squat, dirty villages where these brutal men scratched out a living. The entire circumference was fenced with sharp poles. All manner of dogs - pointers, herders, and mutts - trotted between the fence and a half-dozen skin huts.

There was a lot of activity, but few people. Pots roiled, untended, over open hearths. A few men here and there looked up as Raeffe approached, but most kept to their work. They whittled arrows, whet leather bowstrings, or just chewed tobacco and stared off into the misty sun. Most just looked bored, and there were only ten of them altogether.

“I thought a bandit’s life would be more exciting,” Raeffe whispered to Glover. But in spite of the general lethargy, Raeffe kept his hand tightly curled around Lander’s reigns. One of the bandits bent low as they passed. Raeffe thought he was bowing, and was suitably impressed with this show of deference, until he heard the loud splat of spittle.

“This way,” Glover said, his voice heavy and somber.

He lead Raeffe to the center of the tents, where a yurt made of wolf-pelts sat, the entrance blowing softly open. Glover held this flap open for Raeffe to pass through, then beckoned.

Raeffe hesitated. He felt sure this was some kind of trap - that the bogeyman, perhaps, was waiting in the yurt. But something about the sadness in Glover’s eyes made him almost sorry to be afraid. He dropped Lander’s bridle and ducked inside the tent.

It took his eyes a few moments to adjust. But sitting there, tucked into a nest of furs and colorful blankets, was a woman. A dark woman, with blue Tyrician tattoos on her cheeks and throat.

The woman looked about his mother’s age, with fine wrinkles at the edges of her eyes. Her hair was a long black rope, thrown over one shoulder. The silver filaments of that braid caught the light and sparkled. Her eyes were closed, and she looked pained. A younger woman sat beside her, rhythmically whetting a cloth, putting it upon the woman’s forehead, and taking it off again.

Raeffe heard a gurgling, and realized the blankets around the woman’s arms were moving. The sick woman was holding a baby.

“My wife, Nustra,” Glover explained. “Three days ago, she gave me our first boy. But now, something’s wrong. And I don’t know what. She only speaks Tyric, ye see, and I speak not a word.”

“She’s your wife and you speak not a word?” Raeffe asked incredulously. “How did you even ask for her hand in marriage?”

“Ah, we communicate through signs - through gestures,” Glover explained. “Ours was a strange romance. I found Nustra, wandering alone, acting like she was running from someone. We managed to communicate with her, bit by bit, and she speaks a few words of the Usual Language. But not enough for her to tell us what is wrong.”

“I see,” Raeffe said, suddenly feeling intimidated by the task before him. Nustra had opened her eyes and was staring at him with dazed curiosity. Raeffe realized he had never spoken Tyric before to someone who spoke nothing else - someone who was born speaking it. He had only practiced with his tutors.

“Hello - hello,” he stammered in Tyric. To his relief, the woman smiled - a brilliant, warm smile. “My name is Raffe.”

“Hello Raeffe,” she said in Tyric. “I am Nusta Vastra. What is your familial name?”

For some reason, Raeffe did not want to lie. But he forced himself to answer: “Marshall.”

“That is...not the truth,” Tyric surprised, her smile growing fainter.

“You’re right,” Raeffe stammered. “I don’t know why I said that. It’s d’Piers.”

“D’Piers!” the woman laughed, glancing at her husband. “You were right to keep that name hidden. But I know your father. He was good to my people, he is a good man.”

“I think so,” Raeffe agreed. “He was a good father, too.”

“He was always helping people,” Nustra murmured contemplatively, her eyes gazing up to the top of the tent. “Like you are helping me. You are good, like your father.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that.” Raeffe paused and looked away, feeling ashamed. He thought of Grey. “I left my own brother to fend for himself. To be really, really good, you have to be brave. And I don’t know about all that.”

“I do not think you’re giving yourself enough credit.” Nustra sighed, the sound mournful and reflective. “Does my husband know why I am dying?”

“No. Perhaps if you could tell me where you feel pain - ”

“I feel no pain, Raeffe d’Piers. And you should tell my husband so. Tell him, I am returning back to the open waters. But you must tell him that he needs to look after our child. For I have seen the darkness. And it is so much worse than he imagines.”

“The - the darkness?” Raeffe stammered. “Surely - surely you don’t mean - the storm?”

Nustra’s eyes suddenly flicked over to the door, and then back at Raeffe. Her lips formed a straight line. “You need to find your brother,” she said. “If you love anyone in this world, now is the time to be brave. To protect them.”

“Because of the storm?” Raeffe pressed.

But Nustra had lost interest in him. Her eyes seemed to have frozen over. She did not move. And yet, the moment of her death was so sudden, Raeffe did not realize she was dead until the younger woman began to wail.

Raeffe felt a shuddering seize his body. He’d seen dead bodies during the storm - people lying in the street like sacks. The dead seemed out of place in that world. But for some reason, this was more usual and yet worse, for it reminded him of that terror and also was terrible in its own, private way. She had been so kind.

In another instant, Raeffe was out of the yurt and trying to catch Lander’s bridle. But the horse was keeping a careful distance from his master. Instead of coming when called, he backed away from Raeffe’s outstretched hand.

“What did she say?” Glover demanded, his voice breaking with tears. “What were her last words?”

“She said to look after your child,” Raeffe told him, before calling: “Lander, come here this instant!”

“Oh, do not shout at the horse - what are you trying to do, frighten him to death?” Glover snapped, running behind Lander and approaching him gingerly, from the side. But he kept his gaze on Raeffe. “What else did she say? Huh? Anything?”

“That she is returning to the open waters,” Raeffe told him. “That doesn’t mean anything to me, maybe it is religious.”

But Glover’s reaction made Raeffe doubt his assumption. The man frowned, his eyes misty with tears. He managed to get Lander’s bridle and lead the horse solemnly over to Raeffe. “We were married at Breaker’s Pond. She always wanted to see the ocean - it was one of her signs to me. She would point to her heart and make the motion of waves. I always thought that was what she meant, but I was never sure…”

Glover clapped both his enormous hands on Raeffe’s slim shoulders. “You know what?” he roared. “I said I’d give you men. And I shall! Three of the my finest, and horses too.”

“Thanks so much,” Raeffe said, swinging into his saddle. “But I’ve decided to go back. Into the west.”

“West? What’s out there, besides the Dark Wold?” Glover asked, clearly bewildered. “Hey. Hey! Let me at least give you some provisions.”

He came back with a loaf of blackened bread and a sack of meal. “Take care of yourself, Raeffe Marshall,” Glover said. “I still believe that demons haunt these moors. Never seen one, but I think they are still about.”

“Take care of your baby son,” Raeffe advised. “These are dark days.”

With those words - which sounded downright heroic to Raeffe’s own ears - he urged Lander into a full gallop. For the first time in their journey together, the horse actually seemed enthusiastic. He sprinted through the moors with such force, Raeffe was frightened he would fall off.

But then, he began to lean into the horse’s gallop, until he was no longer fighting the wind, but one with it. Raeffe and Lander quickly surpassed the Crooked Arms Tavern, the wood with the Angivinian baths, and lurched onto the main road by mid-afternoon. Raeffe kept his eyes ahead, hoping to see Stephen, Grey, and Lyle.

He knew exactly what he was going to say to that pig-headed Stephen Marshall:

“You may have thought I’d let you take all the glory of this mission for yourself. But! No one ‘out-heros’ a d’Piers! Not by a long shot!”

And so Raeffe kept repeating this mantra as he rode. It helped, a little, in getting the sadness out of his stomach. For there was a weight on him, now, that was so heavy it seemed to drag him down upon the saddle. He knew, in spite of anything he would say, that this was just the right thing to do.

Which meant dumb, latrine-breath Stephen Marshall had been right all along.

Latrine-breath? Raeffe giggled to himself. He would have to save that one for later.