Heir of Iron

"Boy, are you well?" he asked, and the darkness extended over him, its ichor dripped and sloughed over him — and yet the sellsword reacted not one iota. The gory slick of fluid dripped across them, onto the meat as Ishtar wolfed down her final portion, seemingly unknowingly sucking the rot and filth from her fingers as it stood above them. They couldn't see it. They had no idea. Bart clenched his teeth, his heart hammered at his sternum and he felt the same piercing, impossible pain fill his head as its voice echoed there like the ringing of a cracked, corroded bell.

COME BARTHOLOMUS — KNOW ME. KNOW MINE WORKS. I AM WITHIN THEE, I AM WITHIN ALL.

Bart flinched back from the sensation as it raised its hands over the two, the strange, hungry looks in their eyes seemed to intensify, both eyeing the meat on the spit a moment before turning their concerned gazes on the Knight-Brother as he pushed away from the fire. its smaller, skeletal fingers caressed each of the two, and Bart wanted to shout for it to unhand them, its gory black touch leaving streaks across Ishtar's doll-like face — but he had no voice, no strength.

"BOY!" Parias shouted... and just like that, it was gone. So was the darkness, the black, tarry stain. All of it. Simply gone. Bart found his breath in a gasp, and fell backward onto the grass — puffing like a bellows, shaking in the wake of a fit, a seizure... it hadn't been a dream, it hadn't been mere loss of blood or flesh. It was real. It was here. It followed him.

"You well, boy?" Parias asked, Bart blinked up from the ground, the grizzled mercenary was crouched over him, Ishtar on the other side of him, her dark eyes wide and unreadable. Bart felt the cold chill leaving him, and his fingers clenched in the grass, digging little furrows as he nodded curtly, dragging himself back upright.

"A fit... I am well. They are getting easier to endure, but it is still taxing." he gasped, leaning heavily on his upthrust knee, shaking his head to clear it. There was no sign of the monster, but he could feel it — like eyes on his back. It was here, in some way. Watching him.

A little, scarred hand caught his again. Bart's heart froze.

"Would you like something to eat, Ser Knight?" came Ishtar's reedy voice. There was a raggedness to its tones as she spoke that suggested her throat may be as ravaged as her scar-laced lips, turning her sweet tone sour like curdling milk. A primal need seized him on that guttural phrase, Bart's meals of late plagued by an incessant hunger that he could not sate — hunger, that now rose in him as Parias settled back by the haunch of meat. His bag of seasoning hand again. The smell drew Bart's attention, mysterious, sweet, and gamey.

"That isn't pork, is it," Bart stated in a dull voice, Ishtar's hand pulling him closer to the fire as Parias snorted a laugh through his nose, his teeth gleaming over the fire.

"How quaint, you remembered. Nay a haunch of lamb from the shepherds you presumed us to be." he stated, shaking the bag — its contents had a spicy, syrupy smell to them that whetted Bart's palate anew, "Spices are a personal touch though, one does spend one's pay on the finer things."

"Come, you need your strength, Ser Knight." Ishtar's voice wheedled, and she pulled him forward, Bart finding his seat by the fire again. That touch lingered past friendly and bordered on solicitous as she drew her hands up his arm, Bart felt famished — but more than anything, he was averse to the continued contact — the way her fingers seemed to feel at his pulse was suddenly hideous, causing his skin to crawl as the chill violation of the Wendigo's presence lingered, tainting any kind of comfort with an aftertaste of rot. Pulling his arm away, he found his feet in a light stumble, raising a hand to clear his head.

"More than enough for three, even with Ishtar's ravenous appetite." Parias offered, and the sizzling cut of meat drew Bart's attention again — yet his stomach curdled at the thought. The delicious scent suddenly nauseating as he remembered the rotten black resin drooling across it, fetid and viscous. Remembered it flowing out like poison between Ishtar's teeth as she had unknowingly devoured it. The crisping haunch tugged at his empty belly but his instincts screamed that he should not touch that meat. It was wrong somehow, tainted. Forbidden. He could not bring himself to voice his concerns, they were the flop-sweat madness of a cornered animal, an illusion by this monster doubtlessly called by his infested soul and mention of its name. Names had power, even those we gave to others. Parias wasn't someone he particularly liked but he felt responsible to draw this fell thing away from the pair nevertheless — personal qualms were a poor reason to visit misfortune upon another.

"N-no, I should report back to my comrades, Naima will want to know of the fit and I am likely to take an earful for such an exertion in any case," he said, steadying himself and standing up straight. Parias' eyebrows raised in acknowledgment as he sawed into the haunch again.

"Northwest of here." he said as Bart stood; his eyes moving a moment to catch the Knight-Brother's gaze before focusing again on its butchery; "There's a settlement, same one I bedded down in during the purges. If you want to know more of Old Rawhead, ask there," he said, sucking air between his teeth.

"These were his lands, during the Black March. They know him here."

Those words froze Bart in his tracks as the pair dug back into the meal, and beyond them, he saw that skull-faced form looming in the shadow of the trees, its bare, bleached face simply gliding forward from a patch of darkness like a face emerging from a deep hood. It spoke not, but the bony grin seemed to mock him as it faded back into the inky darkness. The toothy, inhuman smile was the last to fade.

"I'll... bear that in mind. Take care, Parias." Bart said stiffly, remounting his horse. "The Queen's forces don't wage war as men do," he said, settling himself into the saddle and patting the black stallion's neck. The animal was nonplussed, only lending credence to the idea the fearful display had been only in Bart's mind.

"It's another day for me, boy. I'll see you up ahead," he said with an inscrutable half-smile, tearing into his cut of meat again as Bart turned down the path towards the road, perhaps at a bit more of a hurried canter than he had been at before.

The shadows lengthened, and they no longer felt empty.

~ ~ ~

Bart, you're pale as milk!" Naima's voice was the first to sound as the tall man rejoined the caravan some ways past the overgrown spire, the campfire's trailing smoke well behind them, Bart smiled in spite of his clearly haggard appearance.

"I had a mild fit, made me a bit breathless in the saddle is all," he said dismissively, the small woman nonetheless beckoning him over to feel his clammy cheek with the back of her hand as she handed the carthorse's reigns off to a wild-eyed Lidia, busying the little thief with guiding the vehicle rather than meddling.

"Chilled like the grave, a mild fit indeed," she said, turning him to pluck at his white surcoat — where it was not-so-white anymore with scuffs of green. Grass stains. She really did not miss very much at all.

"... I may have fallen, a little. I'm fine, really!" he said in earnest as Naima clicked her tongue at him disapprovingly. The caravan passed beneath one of the tall spires adjacent to the one he'd met Parias upon, its broken-off tip casting a stark shadow over the fork the fallen end had put in the road. In that briefest moment of darkness, Bart saw peering up from him in the crux of the crossroads stone that naked, grinning skull — leering down at him from the darkness of the overhang, like peering between two floorboards. He blinked momentarily, and it was gone. Naima's brow furrowed further. There was a pause, almost as if a foul smell had passed her by, before she turned those concerned amber eyes on him once more, her tone quiet but emphatic:

"Bart, you are still mending body and soul, we don't have much in the way of knowledge on those returned from the edge of death like you. It is... not a practice we oft find ourselves in need of," she said, her lower lip tucking gently, a quiet sadness to the iron-blooded woman's face.

"I know, I know. Neither you nor Lidia will allow me to forget!" Bart grated at her wryly, but he smiled as he did so, leaning heavily on his saddlebow as Naima touched her knuckles to his brow again clinically.

"I wish you wouldn't be so cavalier about it. It is no small thing to return from the dead, Bart."

"It is sort of my entire job to be cavalier about that sort of thing, Naima."

The healer sighed, her eyes rolling skyward a moment before she playfully shoved his face away from her, earning an earnest little grin from the haggard Knight-Brother and taking the reins back from Lidia.

"If you are to be so brash about it then understand the weight of the thing that has happened to you," she said, and there was a hint of that instructive tone about her as when she gave Lidia her lessons in letters and penmanship. Bart sighed, but the little thief perked up. Lidia loved a good story.

"I think I can grasp the weight of being dead. It happened to me." Bart answered laconically getting a sigh in return, Naima's hands wringing on the reins a bit — clearly, she needed something to occupy her hands.

"I appreciate your valiant heart, Bart, genuinely — but what I did to you is something of a taboo. It is a boundary not to be violated easily, why do you think it cost me so?" she asked, that slight undercurrent of sorrow touching her words again.

"I am supposed to preserve life, not undo death. Such a thing cannot be borne lightly, people must die. People must become comfortable with dying, in as much as they can. To break that cycle is to risk unraveling it all to nothing. As a healer, the fact I know how to do such is taught as a remedy to mine own efforts seeking it out in panic or worse — grief."

Bart nodded absently, his thoughts drifting to his... death. To how it had felt comfortable, welcoming. Until... until the Wendigo appeared.

"Why engage in such a taboo for my sake?" Bart asked — the inevitable question, Naima nodded with expectation and gave him a smile that took much of the sadness from her eyes.

"I cannot properly explain it — long have I been in service of The Learned One, and her way of seeing things is instilled into you at such proximity. You learn to see the patterns of patterns, a triage of sorts," she said and looked at Bart and gave a very simple, almost dismissive shrug.

"You were not supposed to die yet. Of that I was — and am still — certain. At that moment I knew I had to give whatever I had to save you, there was simply no way that someone who had willfully, joyously even, given as much as you had that night would not do greater things with more time." she said, and her eyes grew hard.

"Bart, I have seen many bright young men die beneath my hands and instruments, I am not some bright-eyed young chirurgeon out to prove herself. I am seasoned, I am aware of my place in the world. Such certainty does not come to me easily or lightly."

The Knight-Brother closed his mouth at that, taking his eyes away from her, lips pressed into a hard line as he considered that. Shame filled him, no.... Shame was just the mask it wore. Doubt had come calling once again. Doubt of his strength, doubt of his convictions. Doubt even now of his sanity, Parias' words came to his mind as he saw another pale flicker in a passing shadow. Had it been the Wendigo taunting him yet again, or a simple ripple of light and shade? Naima's mouth turned into a smile — a soft, motherly one, drawing his eyes back.

"That... is what I will tell the College of Alchemists when I am held to account for the taboo I violated." she continued, and reached a hand over to touch Bart's cheek again — this time her touch was not clinical or seeking, but reassuring. He did not rankle at it as he had Ishtar's unsolicited grasp.

"I can see it in your eyes, Bart. You are not so hard to read, you wear your heart over your armor. You ask: 'Why me?' you ask 'What did I do to deserve such sacrifice'." she stated, and Bart blinked, his eyes a bit haunted.

"Yes... I was mired in worries of worth." Bart admitted, and she smiled at him, a rueful edge to it as she stroked his cheek.

"I know. You have the same face as many survivors, it is normal. Even in your extraordinary circumstances, there is a symmetry to it. A comfort to see it on the faces of the valiant and the humble alike."

"I knew I was simple but I held out hope I was at least a trifle original." Bart groused and the healer laughed, pulling him closer and leaning over the edge of the cart to kiss the top of his head.

"None of us are, Bart. Not in that way. Besides, it leads me to my very real, selfish, and basic reason I gave up ten years of my life for you." she said, and turned his head forwards with hers, to the end of the caravan, where Nazir headed their line — telling an exuberant story to Salim and his fellows.

"You protected my brother, saved him even no less than twice with no thought to your own welfare. He is half of me, my ever-present shadow, and I am his. For that alone, ten years, a hundred and ten years — I would give it all for the man who saved him." she said and smiled; "A fair trade."

"Ever the merchant." Bart sighed at her, and she smiled and kissed the top of his head again.

"I knew you'd understand." she chuckled, leaning back into the cart, gathering the reins as they both watched Nazir's charismatic performance from afar.

"He's too good for this world, I couldn't bear to be responsible for his death," Bart said plainly, Naima's smile was warm and familiar.

"He is a bright spot in my often grim life, yours now as well." Naima agreed, "He is an interlocking series of imperfections and traits that drive me mad but for my love for him, but he has a heart that is stainless." she said.

"Does he often thrust himself into adventure like this?"

"Always. Wherever I go, there he is turning over rocks for gallantry and tales."

Bart smiled at that, his eyes caught Lidia's and she was beaming along with him. He saw the winsome ache in her eyes as well. The pain of being an only child. Naima sighed, her edge gone as they all seemed to relax in the shared warmth.

"That irritating popinjay is my best friend in the world and you saved him, for that he made you family," she said to Bart, leaning forward with her face in her palms, the reins tucked under her chin. "That he sees you as a brother is reason enough for me to as well," she said, a curious tone of finality to her words.

Bart didn't have anything to say to that which his smile in response couldn't add. The chill had ebbed from him, but not left. No, even now he was tasked with the knowledge. The presence. Lidia's eyes gleamed from the cart.

"Oy, Hayseed. Who was it up on the rock?" she asked curiously, Bart's head coming up with wide eyes. His mind briefly vomited violent, intrusive images of the bone-faced monstrosity, the gushing black rot, and the winnowing of reality. An instant of madness that drew a surprised blink from him as it did.

"Fellow travelers, going eastwards now," he lied glibly, Parias... did not sit well with him, but he did not wish to entangle the man further with his life. Better to simply put him from his mind, and away from others.

"Ye warned 'em o' the ravenin' beasties then?" Lidia asked and Bart nodded, jerking his chin forwards.

"Yes, they mentioned a settlement to the northeast here past the fork," Bart said, deducing the only road out towards where Parias had pointed atop the crag; "They are undefended and exposed, having been made aware — my Lady would chastise me for leaving them unwarned, even for her sake," he said and furrowed his brow. "There was mention that this place was once in the grasp of The Wendigo, and they were well-acquainted with such monsters of the Queen."

Naima's eyes lit up at that, turning her head to him with a renewed intensity: "Whatever would bring such a topic to mind?" she said, her wits ever sharper than his. Bart made a face.

"Mention of the queen brought up the Purges," he said, shrugging his shoulders. "A first-hand account of the Wendigo manifesting, they described many of the creatures we've seen and the way it corrupts men with its hungers," he said — hiding his discomfort for the falsehood in the discomfort of the memories. Naima nodded, her eyes narrowing at a distant point.

"It tracks well enough to my knowledge of the creature, it and its fellow nightmares are as to the Empty Queen as our Triune is to The White God." Naima said in a considering tone, "It makes sense it would control territory and build a Throne as they did." Lidia's frame perked up at that as they veered towards the far fork, leaning over to the pair.

"Ye mentioned 'em in passin' before, but what do ye mean same as the Holy Ones?" she asked, Naima's eyes switching between the two.

"Yes I suppose you have not spent as much in the theology of things at yet in your training," she said to Bart, who shook his head humbly.

"No, we reserve the debates of higher philosophy for after we meet with the Lady." Bart said, turning his eyes to meet Lidia's questioning gaze; "Even if we are not chosen, she treats with all who earn the right to seek her blessing in the first place. It changes them all, you can see it in a man's eyes when he has conversed with the Lady." Bart explained, remembering the eternal warmth that always seemed to permeate those who had met her.

"The presence of The Divine," Rashid's deep bass rumbled, his patrol had brought him back closer to the group as they closed on the fork — one side carrying on as they had been, the other going eastward, beckoning Bart into the shady mysteries of the valley. The Akali's eyes gleamed with a knowing Bart recognized — that inner warmth.

"To be in it changes you. It changes how you see time. Space. Life." the big man rumbled with a nod, turning his gaze from Bart to Lidia; "Even those who do not bear a mantle seen a realignment of ideals after time in the presence of the True Divine."

"Truly, it affirms you in many unexpected ways," Naima spoke, also with that saidsame inner fire — both southerners had basked in the presence of their culture's central figure, The Learned One — and both spoke with the intractable authority of experience.

" 'Parently so," Lidia remarked dryly, folding her arms over the edge of the cart and catching a ghost of a grin from Rashid as he continued on past in his circuit, moving to the head of the two-cart convoy where Nazir's story carried on to laughter and jest.

"It's a fair reason to delay discussing the higher mysteries." Naima agreed, Lidia snorted, tossing a sidelong glance at her friend and mentor.

"Also explains why ye both seem twenty summers too old."

Bart chuckled quietly as Naima gave the young thief a narrow look before continuing on, "Nevertheless, the Empty Queen's champions number three — the forces our own Triune arose to counteract. We know their names and titles, but only one of them chooses to embody itself in flesh willingly."

"Guessin' it isn't this beastie else we'd be seein' a lot o' it," Lidia said, leaning over the back of the bench seat lazily, her body almost a liquid when she found a place she was comfortable, like a cat she was.

"No, the Wendigo and the Bird of Madness to all our knowledge remain agents of the Astral, like my Sikha is here." she said, fondly jingling the bracelet on her left wrist, "Riding a willing host or token as a foothold."