《A Walk in the Ruined World》


 0 - the ashen

    He loved the rout of battle where most men die.


    The men of his company scrabble in the dust and some almost lose their footing in their haste to pursue, seized with lust and their spears searching for death. When previously the lines had faced and each side had pushed to and fro and dared the other, each had been equal and stood in equality, and in one moment the men would hold the enemy in contempt and in the next they would fear the enemy¡¯s supremacy and doubt their own power. Then they would see the same uncertainty in those they stood against, the uncertainty of the battle¡¯s outcome and of their lives. They would rattle their steel tipped spears and feint in the hopes that the opposing force break, knowing that the fear they suppressed in their hearts was alike in the other.


    But when the enemy turned and fled all this changed at once. When they threw down in their fear their shields and weapons, giving up their right to the battle, they became then as slaves were, withdrawn of all social state. The men of his company saw suddenly they were greater and beheld the enemy with hardhearted contempt. Then joy filled their coarse souls and strength filled their limbs, these veterans of the spurned company, and they hurried to the work of war.


    His spear first finds purchase in the groin of a man running ahead and the man falls in the dust, shocked as all men are when their limbs that had ever obeyed them before refuse and lie unyielding to the will. The Ashen frees his steel and goes on, leaving the wounded for others behind him. Soon he finds the next. A man running with a limp, having taken injury already. The foe turns to defend as the Ashen comes closer, but a shield finds the man across the chest. He loses his balance and falls in the dust and he lays on the ground and waves his dagger stubbornly refusing death, though his hope is already lost. And Linhe the Ashen pierces through his layers with a strong strike, bearing his weight into the point. The man¡¯s arm descends under the weight of its own substance, the panic has left him and as he lies in the dust he looks around as though he had no part in the fighting or the world.


    And the Ashen sees a massing of bodies ahead where the rout is cut short. He runs toward these defenseless men, his lungs sweet with exertion, and hurls his spear whose steel finds purchase in the back of a man who does not yet fall. His sword cuts at the legs of the group ahead, the limbs blurred and fumbling like kittens bunched to nurse. The Ashen sees blood black and new running down the length of the limb and at the cruel sight he feels the desire to hurt all enemies of their just cause. The mass of fleeing bodies become each a prison, suffering under his hard blade. He no longer has to run or hustle after the enemy. He walks forward steadily, his arm throbbing with healthy work. He does not know who they are or see their faces but his sword finds the opposition of living bodies and he is satisfied in his labor.


    A man falls and he is wearing plate and Linhe the Ashen is glad. He bends and wrestles the weaker man¡¯s arm, gripping his wrist tightly, and he takes the fastenings of the man¡¯s helmet with his other arm, and he shows the man¡¯s face. He regards the man¡¯s exhausted fear, the face painted with sweat, and the weakness of the man¡¯s arm in his own.


    He does not pursue the fleeing enemy. He has had a taste of the rout. He wants now the happiness of possession. And there is treasure beneath him.


    He strips the exhausted man of his armor, this man who had been distinguished on the battlefield by show of magnificence, but now lies for the usage of the victors. The Ashen gives thanks to the gods as they have blessed the day. He sees that his blade had cut by chance through a weakness in the joint and as he tears the fastenings impatiently away he sees the dark slick cloth beneath the iron. The Ashen throws away the belts holding their daggers and he presses his chest against the man¡¯s back feeling the soft flesh and with his free arm he guides himself into the man. And like a chisel being struck on the same spot, he finally enters the man and takes the pleasure that he had long postponed in the days leading to battle. The resistance gives way like the routing of battle played out in miniature, and the Ashen steals the brief interlude of sweetness as the labor of war goes on around him, planting kisses on the damp neck of the enemy. He senses above the soft chaos of men yielding to defeat, and feels faceless joy and faceless despair joined as one. Then with his seed sown he notices for the first time that a dagger had fallen in the dust near their heads, near the hand of the man he pinned below. The Ashen takes it and gives the man their death, breaking through the nape where he had moments before lain his cheek.


    Then he gathers the spoils and returns to the labor of war, free of thought and shame.


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    ¡ª


    The commander of the host holds conference and a man from each of the five companies is brought to the pavilion of command. The spurned company though hated by all is nonetheless due the like honor and the Ashen is chosen as their representative for he is the only one who can read and sign for them and their leader had taken ill with injury.


    There the commander is waiting for the group by a basin of a black liquid and the fires of several braziers. Before the gathered delegates a prisoner of war is made to come near and place their hands in the basin. The spectators draw instinctively closer. They see the black liquid slough away repulsed by the touch. They see the miracle. A blue rectangle forms before them like a perfectly hewn piece of stone and upon it are words and numbers written in light. A vision shared by all, yet shorn of substance as the private dream.


    The commander speaks as the prisoner is taken away. ¡°These are the levels I have spoken of, engineered by their mage. They give a holy assistance to those that are by it blessed, a strength that daily grows and gives advantage. We have speeded through the country and forced battle but there is a limit to what we can achieve with this alone... The lands we have gained cannot be held. Our successes will only turn to ash, unable to be exploited. Each day their army grows stronger by the life of these enchantments. Half a year ago they were at 2 and 3 and now they are at 9. Their levels increase as they gather the powers embedded in the world, drawing them like plants of the soil. Each day that passes our chances grow smaller.¡±


    The Ashen listens to the words of this great leader half-comprehending just as he had read the text of the status screen half-comprehending.


    ¡°Where is the vyer?¡± one of the delegates demands angrily. ¡°It is he who presumed upon the war and rallied us under his mage¡¯s right. It is he who must reply, his magic against theirs. Give us this same enchantment and we will master these foreign dogs as we have ever done.¡±


    ¡°If he does not show himself the host will soon lose faith in the cause.¡± The adjunct stands nearest to the commander, and looks toward the leader pleadingly. ¡°It has been a year since we rescued him and we have seen him not once. Is he still recovering from his wounds?¡±


    ¡°We have not. We have not seen him once.¡±


    The commander holds up his hands and he looks over at the men and his gaze lingers for a moment on the Ashen, who is the stranger in their midst. Then he places his hand in the basin, the liquid engulfing his hand and hardly moving in their displacement. ¡°Among the spoils the vyer has found indication of its magic.¡±


    In the morning the delegates venture once more to the pavilion on the hill. The trade winds blow in from the east and the smell of the battlefield has been swept away.


    Inside the tent there is the commander and and the mage whom they call the vyer. The commander is tall, towering over the common soldier, and when he stands next to the mage the latter seems more animal than human. All had heard how the vyer had been tortured. But all had heard how the powers of mages were as mysterious as they were great. All had assumed he would soon heal. Yet they came now upon a broken body bearing the marks of the torturer and stinking of corruption. Once long ago the mage had been known as the Giant of Angduen. Nothing of that name remained in the atrophied form. The hair of the skull was white and withered. Silken wisps fell over a lipless mouth. A dry translucent film covered the eyes.


    ¡°Are you certain it¡­he understands?¡± asks the adjunct.


    ¡°He will not reply but he does understand what we have enjoined of him.¡±


    As all true enmages require an altar, the commander had one set one up in the tent. The braziers no longer light the interior. A beam of sunshine floods through the smokehole and onto the stone table. The commander places the food and bows his head and utters the words ¡°House Oeval¡±. The mage raises their head almost imperceptibly. The commander whispers rhythmically, his head bowed toward the table. After a time he stops whispering and gestures with a hand, the other taking hold of the altar.


    At this signal the Ashen approaches the altar. When he comes close the commander seizes his neck. The Ashen does not have time to react, for the strength begins to drain from his muscles and all within him falls limp. His heartbeat and his breathing barely sustain him, his organs soften and fail. But something in his soul keeps the darkness at bay, though it threatens to flood his eyes.


    A strong hand holds his hip, another holds him under his shoulder, another holds his wrist. His eyes are too weak to look other than straight ahead. A circle of black liquid, a sloughing away, the pale ceramic below his palm.


    The next man who enters the pavilion is a spurned brother. When his neck is seized his body seems to wilt and the commander lets go, gritting his teeth in pain. The man screams for half a second, the sound coming as likely from his suffering as from a madness to breathe. The fingers of one hand spread outward so violently that they break and splay like the legs of a broken spider. The teeth shatter and redden his slightly parted lips. A joint breaks from spasm. The delegates watch. The man has long been dead but it is a while yet before his body rests.


    With the next man they do not wait. The Ashen throws the corpse to the side before the body settles. Each of the spurned brothers enters. One by one they are brought there by the Ashen. And when they have all been brought to the altar there are half of the number left.

 1 - the follower

    When the Ashen returns to his tent he gives thanks to the gods. He knows he is strong and pure of heart compared to ordinary men and he knows if any deserve the favor of gods it is he.


    It is evening. He searches amid the tents and there amid the camp followers he finds a woman mending the armor of the spurned company. ¡°Show me how I am to praise the gods,¡± he begs her and she looks at him with a look that bids disquiet, for the Ashen does not understand what drifts through her soul.


    ¡°You would insult to thank them as you are now. First you must wash.¡±


    Then as he washes, filling two buckets with the residue of death and soil, the woman brings a mat from her tent and lays stones atop it and she brings a fire to each holy stone. The stones alight for a moment and the fire then vanishes and there is only candlelight. When he is clean the Ashen puts on the robes she lends him and he gives offering to the gods that had been loved of House Oeval and then to the gods of the lands they war upon, and these are the gods of their enemies. He gives offering to the god that the unsworn prince had taught to him and his company. Then he gives offering of food to the mage known as the vyer. ¡°I have shown many of the enemy towards death and I have so carried out the will of the commander and the adjunct, through whose blood House Oeval yet lives. Regard me therefore with favor, though I lack knowledge of your true name.¡± And to the unknown god who favors him he lays the beauteous helm he has won and presses his face deep into the fumes of the mat.


    The woman who they call Ainun takes as exchange his old clothes as that is her way. And he enters her tent and the world outside disappears from mind, the stench overpowering. There is the scent of medicine and smoke but the strongest is of the scent of stale sweat and of metallic blood and of rank corruption. And into this the Ashen watches her order the clothes he had worn to war and which he has paid and she holds each piece to her face and breathes them in lovingly. ¡°What would you have of me then?¡± says he for she had bid him inside. She eyes him with a look that bids disquiet, for it reminds him ever of he that made him and the spurned men what they are.


    ¡°They say that women with the gift are made equal or more to the force of men. I would you take me there and tell them I would be as foul as you. I will not be so ridiculous as to be alone and thus you will take me.¡±


    ¡°Ask us something else.¡±


    But she smiles and regards him in silence, knowing she will have her way. It has been that she is one of the few who would treat with the spurned men and the only one who will do their washing and so is she worth more than any one of them, yet he cannot refuse her after her sacred work.


    For when they first had found her she had been one of many thralls to a manorial lord. And the lord and his sons had been hung in gibbets and his castle put to torch. The winds had blown cold and lonely on the heath as the thralls that were freed came one by one to the shrine. Beneath a sky steel grey with cloud the emancipees had given oaths and thrown bones and tossed handfuls of grass onto the shrine. All had come to the shrine in fear for the gods were to judge whether they were traitorous or true to their word and the slain lay in the misted grass. But when the woman called Ainun came she showed no fear and came longingly for she knew that she was good in the eyes of the gods and wished only for this to be shown to the eyes of men as well.


    Thus when morning comes and the smoke ebbs from atop the pavilion the Ashen brings her.


    On the hill they are met by a scattering of men. Some are wounded and some lie on stretchers and some are merely frail and all are poor of dress. The Ashen knows that they are here to receive the gift. The men of the spurned company had gone to the altar and died or lived without knowledge or intention of their own. But that was not the case with the rest of the host. The captains had refused to do the same for their own men and those who gather now volunteer themselves thinking it is their own will and knowledge that decides though the Ashen sees they know but aught. And the force that goes through them will surprise them as he has always seen men surprised.


    Below them he sees the camps taken down and he sees the prisoners of war in cages nearby and he feels glad. When the adjunct comes forth from the pavilion the men closest to the entrance are brought in. And at the sounds coming from within some of those outside leave. And when the adjunct returns the Ashen calls for his notice and presents the follower Ainun.


    The adjunct says, ¡°It will be for him to judge.¡± Then he leads them within. And once more there are the dead to the side and the beam of warm yellow light through the smokehole while in the center there is the figure who is the mage. And Ainun looks around eagerly as all of them do until they find the small frail being and gaze in horror at this body from which their right derives. The tendons cut and the limbs splaying without will and holes where the skin was flayed. The figure deformed and the visage hideous. Behind them guards block the way out. The first man to approach the commander falls and his body becomes broken as piece by piece of it convulses, as though its entire vital power were gathering at a point and causing life to burst its confine. So it is with the next three each whom the Ashen and adjunct threaten with fists for they must walk forward of their own accord to receive. They fall with sharp cries choked and strength persisting beyond their will and death, storms raging through their flaccid bodies.


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    When it is follower¡¯s turn she approaches as fearlessly as she had that day she had been freed. The commander seizes her throat with a hand varicose and mottled and so does the strength of life leave the woman. And the commander winces as he had done and takes away his arm and the woman falls bearing the surprise of dying in her eyes. And as of the others her heart bursts and her lungs break like bows from the draw and her limbs crack as the bone is crushed under the hidden strength that she would not know. And the last man is a wounded man who had come by stretcher. He is made to crawl across the wide expanse of the pavilion and lift himself gradually on shaking arms until the commander can reach him with his other hand kept at the altar.


    The Ashen does not take the woman¡¯s corpse to the side of the tent but brings it outside and his steps falter, unsure where to go. He knows that his company already bears him hate and their hate and their cause will only grow when they learn of this. He beats his head. She had always done well for his steel and his armor and what had given him the confidence to bear the terror of combat. And he knew it was the same with each of the spurned. It was in the protection of that same old familiar armor she had unfailingly tended and the aegis of its stench that he had stood before the commander and withstood the horror of mages whose power is beyond ken. Now he is sick to death of mages and gods. The world of men he can bear and even in war he knows the full accounts of violence and pain and the due that he has given to many and will one day be given to him.


    Then he hears a voice calling to him and he sees one of the prisoners of war. ¡°The commander understands little¡­¡± the man says mysteriously and the Ashen hurries toward him and throws the body of the woman to the side and attempts to reach through the bars, for he sees that the prisoners have not been tortured enough. ¡°Stop! stop, man! I say, there is a way to keep them through the gift. Do you hear me?¡± The Ashen pauses for a moment, then he rushes forward and seizes the man¡¯s wrist in his strong hands and pulls him against the thick rough iron. ¡°She can live!¡± the man cries. ¡°Do you understand you brute? Do you think we saw half our own die as yours when we got the gift?¡± The Ashen regards the mans wrist and hands that have as yet been unruined and he tears the pinky finger and leaves it twisted like a bended branch. And he regards the arm again thinking what next he will inflict as the man gives cry pressed against the bars. He sees soldiers in the distance turning their heads and he lets go of the man, for he knows it is the order of the commander that the prisoners be allowed to sleep comfortably.


    The lust to hurt recedes in him and he says to the man, ¡°Interesting. Do you assert then the ritual is mistaken?¡± ¡°Aye, man! Why would you not listen.¡± And the man gnashes his teeth and he retreats to the far side of the cage, bounding like a pup beneath the low roof. The fear does not gladden the Ashen. He says, ¡°Do you say they died for naught?¡±


    The man holds his wounded hand in the other. He squeezes his eyes shut in fury and hate but in the end he answers. ¡°You think that your mage being the greater in deed and more powerful would see your complaint to expiation but that is not how it is. Greater and older as the vyer is, is he become darker and farther removed from human soil, and so it is that your commander does not understand him nor knows how to speak to him as now he bungles with great pomp and ceremonious death at his side. But the mage of our own court still knows the action of his name as it fissures the world in its effects and he has shown us the ritual as well as the amend. And, for I see you are a man who acts before he comprehends, I say explicitly that it is an offer. I will help you to bring her to full for the recompense of a favor. Even now the chances are diminished for I must be sound of body and mind to conduct the rite. That is why it is foolish to act before giving audience but I shall not begrudge you.¡±


    And as the Ashen considers these words the man says, ¡°I speak the truth. Each moment you take lessens it for the mending was to be done in the immediacy of the rite. Life still clings to your woman like a droplet drawn about the floor of a basin and the strength is still echoing through the chambers of her being though through each moment it is distorted. The life in her needs to be put to balance and once this is done it will no longer wreak fell destruction. If this may yet be done then she will be seen through as you have. The favor I ask is simple.¡±


    The Ashen listens to the man¡¯s oath that he swears by the gods and by the burrowed one his mage. And the Ashen gives his oath in turn that if he so forswear it he would know again that suffering at the altar and be destroyed. He says the basho that signs the address to the nameless gods affirming his good faith. Then the Ashen looks at the man and he sees the fear in the man¡¯s eyes and knows that the man sees the like fear in his own.


    The Ashen brings the body and the man takes the head and twisted face. It is quiet amid the two men though below them the camp is full of talking and life. The air between them fraught with fear and care for the two men know the gods and more watch them for their oath they have called.


    They bow quietly to their performing.