Disclaimer: All standard disclaimers apply! Lodoss is not mine *sniffle* and I'm
making no money from this work.
Although, if anyone wanted to pay me I certainly wouldn't
mind….oops!
er, I mean…on with the story!
Chapter Ten: Unfinished. . .
He
was dreaming, with exquisite vividness, of Soul Crusher.
The
sword swam in his vision; it was the only thing he could see. It kept slipping out of his grasp, teasing
him by sliding out of his fingers just as they closed on the hilt. The more he tried to clutch at it, the more
it seemed to melt away from him.
He
could not remember wanting a thing so much as he did that sword. The desire to own it, to possess it, burned
in him. He had never felt such a strong
compulsion for the sword before, certainly not in the waking world.
Yet
it kept falling away from him.
You
want this, a voice he could not quite pinpoint whispered in his ears, even
as his fingers fell short of the hilt. This
is yours, by rights. Whose
voice? Whose voice was that?
Take
this. The sword gleamed in his
vision, and he dreamt the day he had held the sword for the first time, the
painful dark lightning of its power coursing through his body. Find this. It is part of you. You
are part of it. The incredible power.
The Demon sword.
You will have no rest until it is yours again.
Was that a threat? He did not like this dream, not one bit.
A dry chuckle filled his ears,
scratchy and otherworldly. Get used
to it, Black Knight. You've
regained your strength - the geas is awakened.
And then the sword was gone,
replaced by darkness. The sense of loss
he felt was nearly overwhelming and almost rivaled the bitter bereavement he
had felt when Pirotess had died in his arms.
He was floating in nothingness, his hands grasping at emptiness. His eyes ached to see the sword again.
Something brushed against him in
the darkness and he grabbed at it, hoping to find some answer, some relief….
* * * * * * *
Ashuram woke to find the Healer's
green eyes scant inches from his own.
They were wide and startled. Her
mouth was open and perhaps she had already let out a cry or had been too
surprised to utter one, for no sound issued forth. Tendrils of dusky gold hair fell about her face, framing her bemused expression.
He held her tightly against him,
her shoulder digging painfully against the still tender lacerations striping
his chest. He had twisted one of her
arms up behind her tightly, the other one pinned between them.
What the…? Ashuram blinked, and let go of her all at
once. The Healer stumbled back away
from him, wincing as she rubbed her shoulder and arm where it had been bent.
"Goddess," she said in a low
voice. "What the hell are you?"
"Don't
touch me when I'm sleeping," he growled, unsure what had
happened. He was in general a light
sleeper but one did not stay the Black Knight for long by merely sleeping
light. Too many assassination attempts
had trained him to come awake fighting if he were touched while asleep.
"I
didn't,"
she said, angry color rising in her cheeks despite her carefully controlled,
even tone. "My robe brushed
against you while I was checking on you.
You were making sounds in your sleep and I came to see that you were
alright."
Suddenly
he remembered the dream. Loss crashed
through him once more, with an almost ferocious desire to find the Demon
sword. He grimaced, fighting the
feeling. Where was this coming
from? He had never felt such a desire
before.
The
geas has awakened…. That voice…
"Ash? Are you listening?" The Healer was
asking him. He shook his head to clear
it, and the feeling subsided to a dull, bearable twinge.
"What
did you say?" He asked.
"I
said: if you're going to keep coming awake ready to kill me, it's
going to get in the way of my job."
"Don't
touch me while I'm sleeping," he said again, this time with
slightly more civility in his tone. "I
don't
come awake very well."
"No
kidding,"
she muttered, and now he could see the anger in her green eyes. "I thought I had bad dreams, but I
don't
think they're anything to yours."
Indeed. He sighed, rubbing a hand over his
face.
"For
your sake I hope not," he said. "I'm
alright now, Healer. I'm
sorry for troubling you."
"Well,"
she said, obviously softening. "I
suppose you can hardly help your dreams.
I made breakfast – come eat when you're up."
He
resisted the urge to tell her to bring his breakfast to him, just barely. It came naturally to him to give orders, of
course, but he had the feeling it would only make the Healer angrier. He was, as she had pointed out, not a
general here.
Instead,
he nodded, letting himself be somewhat distracted with thinking of the dream he'd
had. The Healer left him to his thoughts,
and he hardly noticed her leave.
* * * * * *
Veris
was pouring tea when she heard the door to the infirmary swing open
softly. She looked up to see Ash
padding towards her, his tall lanky frame moving forward with purposeful grace.
His
health had almost completely returned, and the pallidity of his skin was
infused with life, making him look less like a freshly-raised cadaver. Her eyes were drawn to him: he carried
himself with unconscious elegance that was hard to avoid looking at. Despite the fact he wore Garn's
borrowed utilitarian clothing, he still looked decidedly out of place. More like he ought to be striding through
a throne room, not my front hallway, Veris thought to herself with some
amusement.
Very
like a general. Her amusement died
suddenly. She rubbed her arm where he'd
grabbed it that morning, wincing slightly.
He had come awake so violently, hands reaching out to pin her before his
eyes had even opened. What manner of
man was it that was ready to kill before he was even awake?
As much as
she wanted to put the war behind her, she found it was hard to keep from
thinking about it when he was nearby.
He moved and spoke with such military precision she could not help but
be reminded of it.
She
had seen such terrible things in that war against Marmo. She wanted to forget, but she couldn't. Ash alone wasn't her enemy, nor had he ever
been. Wars were never about just one
person –
she knew that.
Despite
this, and despite her Healer's oath, she found forgiveness difficult. It was one thing to treat a person's
ills on a patient-Healer basis, but this man was staying in her house, eating
her food, causing resentment among the villagers. She noticed he hadn't fallen all over himself to say
much in the way of a "thank you" for it, either.
He
should be on his way soon, she thought to herself suddenly. If he stays much longer, the villagers
may come to violence. And I certainly
wouldn't want to choose sides in that kind of confrontation.
Ash
sat down at the table, and she felt the weight of his gaze on her. His dark eyes were as ever, intensely cold
and voraciously focused. He gave her
something of a measuring look, and Veris felt indignant color rise in her
cheeks. He often looked as though he
were deliberating when he looked at her, judging.
As
if he'd
been reading her mind, he suddenly said:
"Healer,
I think I should be on my way soon.
Tomorrow, most likely."
Veris nodded.
"Very
well,"
she said. Curiosity prompted her to
ask: "Where
will you go?" He gave a fluid
shrug, and his gaze looked directed inwards, as though something were
distracting him.
"I
have certain things I must take care of," he said distantly, and for some
reason Veris shuddered. That
certainly sounded ominous.
She
set a plate of breakfast in front of him, and he nodded absently, picking up
his fork and eating mechanically without even looking down to see what he ate.
"Well,
then you should be on your way," Veris agreed. Undoubtedly, the sooner this sinister
character leaves, the better. Vesper
will forget about him quickly.
He
didn't
answer, and Veris looked up to see him staring at nothing, obviously lost deep
in thought. His fork had paused halfway
between the plate and his mouth, hovering empty. His eyes were preternaturally bright and cold, glittering like
polished onyx. They looked feverish.
"Ash?"
She asked. "Are you feeling
alright?" He didn't seem to have heard her, and she
moved forward to wave her hand in front of his face once. "Hello?"
He
blinked hard, shaking himself out of his thoughts. She reached a hand out to touch his forehead to make sure he was
not fevered, and he avoided her touch as if it were instinctual for him to do
so.
"No,
hold still," she said quietly, but firmly, and placed the back of her
fingers against his forehead. His skin
was only slightly warmer than her own, certainly not fevered.
"Healer,
I'm
alright,"
he said roughly, long fingers removing her hand with no particular brusqueness
nor gentleness. Then, obviously
feeling he owed her some sort of explanation, he added: "I had…an
odd dream this morning, and it distracts me."
Veris
found herself moved to smile quickly.
"I
wondered if my cooking was that bad," she said, gesturing to his
plate. Ash looked down, as if suddenly
realizing he wasn't eating, his fork merely hovering.
"On
the contrary," he said with some sincerity, beginning to eat with
enthusiasm, "it's delicious."
Well, that was slightly gratifying, and Veris couldn't
help but feel partially mollified.
"I
have to replenish my stock of herbs today," she was prompted to say, "and
if you're
up for some exercise, you're welcome to come along."
"I
will,"
he said gravely.
* * * * * * *
Ashuram
walked slowly through the chill shade of the old forest, slanting afternoon
sunlight falling through the leaves and dappling his dark hair as he moved
carelessly between light and shadow.
An absorbed frown drew his cormorant-wing brows
downwards and his mouth was set in a pensive line. He was lost in his thoughts, his gaze cast downwards towards his
booted feet, hardly realizing he had outpaced the Healer by quite a distance.
He was in a mood for
reflection. Brooding, Lord Beld
would have called it, he thought to himself wryly. Lord Beld had hardly ever been a man for
careful contemplation – he held a philosophy that preferred action. It had landed him on the throbbing end of a
lightning bolted spear. So much for
Lord Beld's
philosophy.
The
wry smile left his features to be replaced by the frown.
Ashuram was thinking about the demon
sword.
Soul Crusher. He felt its absence keenly.
It's
just a thrice-blasted sword, he told himself fiercely. He hated the idea of being bound to
anything. Dependence of any kind was
just another type of weakness, and he could not stand the thought of that flaw
in himself. Yet where was this yearning
coming from? He wanted to feel the
sword in his hand again, to lift it and hear the demon song vibrate through the
blade into his bones, to feel himself the conduit and focal point of the sword's
power. He wanted to feel every hair
crackle and lift with dark energy, the fine-edged thrill of battle humming
against his nerves.
It was, he thought with disgust,
something like the craving that comes with addiction.
He
thought of the voice in his dream: that whispery, scratchy voice, which had
somehow been familiar. But who? Who had a voice…like that?
He
had to admit, however, even to himself, that despite the craving, finding the
demon sword seemed only logical. The
Valisian knight had no claim on the sword.
It belonged in the hands of one who could use it properly, and he knew
of no one else whose skill matched his own.
Ashuram was not flattering himself; it was simply the truth.
Beyond
that, it would give him some purpose to his days. Since the mere struggle to survive was unnecessary, he'd
been floating, purposeless. The
coldness that he had held on to all his life was still there, but it was much
thinner now. It came and went. He thought it might have started crumbling
when Pirotess had died, but he could not be sure. The events between her death and his own brush with death had
been a whirlwind of anger and action, one that had held little time for self
reflection. Truthfully, he had given
himself no time to think, for fear he would find that Pirotess' death had left a hole he
would never fill.
But
now, there was no rage sustaining him.
He no longer had illness to blame for his readiness to accept fate. Although he was recovering, if he truly felt
a sense of vengeance against Parn, would he not have left already and killed
the whelp, taking back the sword that had saved him? He felt no desire to kill the other knight. He merely wanted the sword.
Other
than that desire, he felt little. No
cold, calculating rationale, no battle-fire driving him. No decisions to make. No great sense of loss. He was floating, gently and easily, which
was something he'd never done. Give
it time, he told himself. You
are still mending.
Fool,
was his next thought. When had he ever
been so lenient on himself? He was
Ashuram, the Black Knight! He could do
things most people could only have nightmares of. There had been no time in his life when he hadn't had a plan, a goal to
drive towards, an ends to justify his
means.
Now,
he felt empty. It was a weakness –like all the others– he was unused to facing,
and he loathed it. Oh, for the
simplicity of the battlefield, he thought wistfully, just once – before his face hardened
in anger. Are you *listening*
to yourself, man? You sound like a
battle-addicted old veteran who can't put up his sword for the smell of blood still
clinging to it.
There
was no war to fight, but somewhere there was a Demon Sword, waiting for
him. If he wanted action, he would have
to find the Knight of Valis and take the sword back. If he wanted power, he merely had to possess the sword once more
and the Demon power would be his. After
that, he did not know – perhaps he could rebuild Marmo and start again. It would be almost possible to do so with
Soul Crusher. Without it, a mere
indulgence of whimsy.
A very thin core of
resolve began to harden in him. He
would take the sword back. The longing
for it throbbed in his very veins, and he gritted his teeth against it
impatiently. It was the only thing he could
do. What came after that would be
another matter for him to contemplate another time.
"Ah, Ash, there you are," the Healer's voice came from behind
him, and Ashuram felt the mask come down as he turned to face her, the signs of
his inner struggle carefully hidden.
She had a half-full basket hanging from her arm and balanced on the hip
that had no sword hanging by it.
Her reddish hair was lit
up by a stray glimmer of waning sunlight, the grey robes of her station making
her look as though she had risen up from the forest floor. Her thin face held a slight smile, and her clear wide eyes were an inhumanly
vibrant jade. She looked very fey
standing there, more elemental than real, as if he stirred quickly or made a
loud noise, she would melt back into the forest.
Here
was someone who would understand what it was like to miss the battlefield, he
thought to himself. If anyone could
empathize with the emptiness that still remained despite his new-found resolve,
it would be her. He wondered what she
would do if
she knew who it was she had so much in common with.
"Healer,"
he acknowledged, nodding slightly.
"We've
been walking all day, she said, her look sobering to be replaced by one of
professional concern, "how do you feel?"
"Myself
again. Almost," he amended, thinking of
the past day spent in contemplation.
She nodded.
"Good. If you tire yourself out too much, you will
undo my Healing; although since you made it to Vesper in the first place, I
imagine you can survive almost anything."
She gave him a suppressed grin.
Survive
anything…Her words made him think of Pirotess' words to him when they had
talked in his hallucinatory dream state.
She had spoken of the Demon Sword, and how it would drag him back from
death while he was the Bearer. Did that
mean…he was immortal, as long as he kept the sword? Now he wondered.
"I
am, as they say, only human," Ashuram replied.
It wasn't quite the truth, of course.
"We
can't all be perfect," Healer Veris sighed modestly, rubbing one gently pointed
ear.
Ashuram
looked at the Healer thoughtfully. She
was nothing special, really, he reflected.
True, she had a startling, inexplicable beauty that appealed to him, but
while that was pleasant to look upon, it was ultimately not important. She was a capable fighter, but that, too,
was a small accomplishment. She had no
great strength, no position of power (save in the tiny village of Vesper), no
aspirations that he could ascertain of becoming something bigger than she
was.
And
yet, somehow, he respected her. She
Healed him and continued to treat his minor wounds despite the fact that he had
told her he was her mortal enemy. He
once might have found this loyalty to her Healer's oath pathetic, but he, too,
understood loyalty of a sort.
Furthermore, she was never afraid of him, never deferred to him or
treated him with any higher respect than she treated the dirtiest, mud-smeared
farmer that came to see her.
If
he had been on Marmo in Lord Beld's castle and she had been his to command, he
might have had her killed for her impertinence. He had done such things before.
Or, he might have promoted her for her refreshing directness. Yet, this was Alania and he could do
neither. He could only wonder at the
strange fate that had led her to find him.
The
Healer opened her mouth to say something else,
and a twig snapped some distance away, stopping her words before they
were formed. The sound was amazingly
loud in the relative stillness of the forest.
They both froze, instinctively crouching, listening hard. There was silence for a moment, and then,
the sound of motion.
Something
heavy walking, Ashuram realized. Not
bothering to be stealthy. Something
big.
Then
he smelled it. Orc stench.
* * *
Author's note: geas, by the way, is word of good old Gaelic
origin (I believe), and simply means compulsion to do something, usually
against one's will. It's sort of like a
curse. I'm not trying to insult anybody's
intelligence by defining it here or anything – but it certainly wasn't in my
computer's dictionary! Hmph.
