The Ruined City by Paula Brandon

Author:Paula Brandon [Brandon, Paula]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780345532374
Publisher: Spectra
Published: 2012-01-01T08:00:00+00:00

TEN

It was midday, and a blanched sun shone directly overhead. The light descended through a fretwork of branches no longer winter-bare, but knobbed with the first growth of early spring. Small green shoots were beginning to appear, and the old, faded mosses were taking on a brighter tinge of color. The world hinted at renewed plenty, but as yet the promise remained unfulfilled.

Along a narrow footpath snaking its way down out of the Alzira Hills advanced a solitary figure. Although he was still young, his steps were halting, and he required the support of a staff. His garments were ragged and filthy, his hair unshorn and tangled. A wide hat, its brim pulled low, partially hid the one-eyed ruin of Onartino Belandor’s face.

He must have been hungry, for he paused often to pluck new growth from the low-hanging branches, or from the brambles tangling alongside the trail. These leaves and stems he chewed at some length, but invariably spat forth without swallowing. Several times he paused and knelt laboriously to finger the damp soil in search of edible roots or fungi, but found none. Only once he uncovered a coil of worms beneath a rock, and these he devoured, but his hunger remained unsatisfied.

On along the path he hobbled, lone eye shifting dully to and fro, until the breeze delivered a recognizable scent. He halted. The nostrils in his shattered nose flared and his big chest expanded as he drew a breath to the depths of his lungs. Stepping from the path, he forced his way through thorny undergrowth until, several yards distant, he found the source of the smell.

Beneath a bush lay a trap, evidently forgotten. The metal was red-brown with rust, and the contents—an adult meecher of ordinary size—odorously decomposing. The animal’s corpse was riddled with maggots, but this hardly deterred Onartino. Despite their injuries his hands retained considerable strength, and he pried the jaws of the trap apart with ease, then tore the corpse of the meecher limb from limb. His brows contracted as he ate. Presumably the flavor of the meat failed to please him, but the pace of his chewing and swallowing never slackened until the meecher had been consumed down to the last scrap of remotely edible tissue.

He cracked the bones and sucked them dry, then set his staff against the ground and lifted himself to his feet. For a moment he stood as if uncertain, his eye traveling the surrounding wilderness without comprehension, then memory revived and he appeared to remember where he was, and where he wanted to go, and what he wanted to do. He made his slow but unerring way back to the footpath, which he followed downhill for a long time and a long way, until at last he limped from the woods out onto the VitrOrezzi Bond.

He rested for a while at the side of the road—he had no idea how long, for time held no meaning—then resumed his progress toward Vitrisi. The featureless hours passed. He took

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