The Fire and the Forge by Jack Geurts

Author:Jack Geurts
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Jack Geurts
Published: 2018-03-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER NINETEEN

The Breakfast Of Monsters

Before dawn, they were on the river and heading west.

Away from Castellum, away from Longinus. Out to the Twin Cities of the Short Lake, where sat the squabbling judges of Nemeros.

At Bellona’s orders, the militiamen had left their dead unburied – a reprehensible crime in ordinary circumstances, but these were no ordinary circumstances. The funerals would have to wait, faced as they were with such real and impending danger. It had been the same during the war. Surely, Caelos would forgive them, and hopefully, the dead would also.

That was what their captain had told them shortly before they boarded the boats, even though she herself had lost no one, because she had no one to lose. The others might have thought that a little hypocritical of her, and certainly some of them were appalled by her instruction to abandon their dead, but no one stayed, and no one argued against her.

The sky had brightened a little with the promise of sun, but the earth was yet cold and dark. The river ran out before them like a vein of solid glass, a mirror for what little light there was. They could hear the water lapping gently on the banks as their collective wake spread in wide V-shapes behind them. That and the rhythmic splashing of oars at work was the only sound.

They travelled dark, silhouettes against the dawning sky for any who should care to follow. No lamp to give away their position to the Kem or the Qo-Hadast, who might be lying in wait behind the burnt trees on either shore.

Bellona stood on the prow of the foremost vessel and accompanying her were the three least hungover, least fortunate souls in her employ. The other boats kept a distance from her boat, because in her boat sat the prisoners, bound and silent.

Even the wolfhound had been muzzled, his paws lashed together like a pig about to be roasted on a spit. Gaius was allowed a free arm to pat the dog so he wouldn’t growl or move around, and every now and then, an oarsman would turn to make sure he wasn’t doing anything nefarious with it.

Bellona had also allowed Imharak to cauterise the gash on his master’s scalp, incurred when she had struck him with an empty clay amphora. The boy had done so while his master was still unconscious, though now, having come to, he was in quite a bit of pain. In sealing up the wound, Imharak had felt the stubble on Gaius’ neglected scalp and jawline, which were usually shaved smooth.

On the northern side of the river, the burnt forest gave way to trees untouched by flame. The south remained a charred hellscape, as least as far as could be seen in the dim light. That seemed to Imharak a good omen. The north would provide sufficient cover for them to make good their escape, and in any case, north was the direction they were headed.

The only question that remained was how to get ashore.

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