Читать книгу Jovan's Gaze - Aaron Ph.D. Dov - Страница 6

By the end of that day, with the wolves long since turned away from us, Erik's anger had settled into a quiet burn, like a fire hidden from view. I knew he was still angry. I could almost feel his thoughts, as though they battered me about, stabbed at me, and carved me up. From the outside, to a stranger seeing him from afar, he might have seemed at peace. He might have looked as though he was taking a quiet walk through friendly fields, daydreaming. His face showed no anger. Not even his eyes, on those rare occasion when he turned about to look my way, betrayed annoyance. No, none of that.

He was angry, though. I could feel it. Perhaps he was right. Perhaps he... no. Absurd. It was absurd. I was no more drawn to that place, that terrible keep, than any other place on Theris. Why would it be so? What draw could it have? There was no power to be taken, no riches, no great knowledge to arm myself with. I had no material reason to go there, nothing to gain.

Sure, there were spy reports. Kronan power, so alluring, drew far too many to betray our fair land. Spies sent in reports from all over our kingdom and theirs. Indeed, Kronan spies spent as much time watching their own people as they did us. The spy reports, so very detailed, so very plentiful, spelled out the very essence of life across two kingdoms and a thousand years. I read those reports, sometimes for days on end, absorbing the minutiae of Krona's shadow-army of spies and murderers. Even Erik, one of the great soldiers of our age, was watched and noted by the Kronan spies. I set those notes aside, somehow sensing it an intrusion to look into the life of a man I knew and respected. The others, though, those who were dead or had fled into the doom of the eastern desert, the reports of their lives were mine for the reading. What harm was it to read those papers?

Reading those reports made me feel as though I were the center of some great whirlwind of forbidden knowledge. It was fascinating to wonder what had been done with that information. Did the great generals, and the Lords they served, use it all, or did it merely sit and gather dust? Was the possession of knowledge power in and of itself, or was it merely another tool, along with the doom-wrought blades and cruel armor of the keep?

To me, contemplating such things was fascinating. A mental exercise. I could gain nothing from it. No power, nor knowledge that matter anymore.

No, Erik was reading far more into my excursions to Skyreach Keep than he should.

***

We walked through the day, and well into the night. The moon was full and bright in the cloudless sky, occluded by nothing more than a flock of bats racing skyward in search of their evening meals. The winged creatures cast terrible profiles as they swarmed about the sky in search of field mice and such. Their shrieks were a strain to the ear, but ultimately harmless. These were not the bats of the far west, thankfully.

When the moon began to find its way downward, Erik and I stopped in a small clearing, far from anything that might act as a hide. Still not speaking to me, he settled down on the soft ground and slept. His sword in his hand, he simply lay his head down on the ground, closed his eyes, and fell asleep. Thus was the habit of a trained soldier, even one as far removed from service as Erik. I was not so fortunate. I tossed and turned. I was not uncomfortable, having long since learned to sleep in such fields. That was not the issue.

No, I was tormented by dreams.

The eyes of a Dark Lord, this one different than the others, seemed to glare at me as soon as I began to sleep. I recognized the eyes from the statues that lined a courtyard at the keep, though I could not place them, nor give them a name. What did it matter, really? Evil was evil, regardless of the name it used, or the title it carried. Perhaps it was the nature of that particular statue that made its image stick in my mind. The long line of Dark Lords stretched back for centuries, and each one was remembered by the statue carved in their likeness, silent sentinels which seemed to glare down on those who saw them. Each statue was arrayed in fierce armor, with cruelly-wrought swords or axes, war hammers or other such weapons. Each was carved to seem more terrible than the last, as each successive Dark Lord sought to establish themselves as the most feared, the most powerful. Even in death, the Dark Lords of Skyreach Keep sought to exert control through fear.

Yet there was that one statue, just the one, different than the rest. The dates of that particular Lord's reign had been scratched away, the stone chipped and gouged, along with his name. It was as if someone sought to erase his place in history, yet feared removing the statue itself. One could not simply read the other dates and deduce his place along the black road of Krona's history, since the script on the statues was not Esian, but the darker Kronan tongue. In my early days, I could not read that language, and only barely spoke it. It was only after many years of visiting the keep that I came to understand it.

This unknown Lord, who's eyes glared at me in my dreams, was not as the others were. No armor, nor a cruel weapon at his side. This statue-Lord wore a simple tunic and pants, simple shoes, and covered his face with a swath of cloth which hid all but the eyes. At first, I had thought him not a Lord at all; perhaps some memorable adviser or other such minion who had earned the right to stand eternally beside his master. Yet his statue was not with the others, but off to one side, close to nothing. Indeed, the statue even faced away from them. Any doubt that it was a Dark Lord was swept aside when I closed my eyes. I knew it, I felt it. I sensed fear. The other statues, stone though they were, feared this statue. This was a Dark Lord, one whose crimes and horrors had been swept aside by history. The statue itself was old, weathered, and worn down from centuries. Still, it was his eyes which found me now.

It seemed so tempting to turn back toward the keep and investigate the mystery of those eyes. Veined red, wide open, with brilliant whites and terrible blackened centers. It was so very tempting to go back and figure it all out, but I did not. I knew that to turn back was to walk away from Erik and Jeannine, and the village which barely tolerated my presence as it was.

In my sleepless night, I came to understand that Erik was right. I had to leave the keep be. The dreams would soon be gone. The eyes would soon leave my dreams. They had to, surely. Surely.

***

Clearlake was a small village. Even before the war, before the magic plagues, it was a small place. A small hamlet, it was off the main roads, away from the trade routes traveled by merchants, and the grand roads paraded by soldiers and nobles. The locals had always been happy about that. The owner of the local tavern, Gern, sometimes told stories of the people who settled there; quiet fishers who sought a simple life.

Clearlake took its name from a small pond sitting on its western edge. The water was so clear, one could see the fish swimming about. Other than that, Clearlake was a collection of small houses and shops, circled around a central square of cobblestones, just like the single road which looped about it. At its height, in the days before the war, Clearlake had boasted a population of perhaps two hundred. The war has swelled that number to thousands. The exodus across the mountains and the desert had reduced it to perhaps one hundred, most of which were refugees who could not, or would not, flee eastward. Jeannine had been among those who stayed, not because she had no one, but because she stubbornly awaiting the return of her fisherman uncle, who did not return from the war. Instead, a father she barely knew returned to stay in the village. Erik took me in soon afterward.

I spent much of those first few weeks as most people did. I wallowed in a morass of pity and sadness. I awaited the end. My injuries were slight, but like most royal guards, I had been sent out to fight, and then abandoned by a cowardly commander who felt that his own Lordship title, earned only two days previous when his father perished in battle, was worth more than his men. It was a small comfort to survivors like myself that our fearful commander had died in the retreat, trampled by an enemy that was faster than he. Those of us fortunate enough to walk out of that terrible battle had been granted extended leave, and told to return to duty when we felt we could.

Soon afterward, word came of the changes around us. I watched the messengers of the royal court thunder into the village on their proud horses. At first, they came with reassuring news; Esis and Krona had signed a peace treaty, in order to focus their energies on the magic plagues which seemed to be sweeping the lands of both monarchs. The king and his greatest advisers were working tirelessly to end the plagues, fear not. The terrible Lord had sent his mages to work alongside our own. A cure would soon come. Pray for your king, that his wisdom would see us safe.

Then the messengers came less frequently, their words less reassuring. It was perhaps two months after the treaty was signed that the first word of an exodus began to reach us. Rumors grew, and then one day a messenger arrived. He was haggard, his cloths tattered. He did not carry the great flag of the kingdom with him, fluttering in the breeze. He gathered all the villagers and refugees about him, and read a simple proclamation; our great king, still suffering from the sudden passing of his beloved wife, had ordered his kingdom abandoned. All subjects wishing to follow him to a forlorn hope in the east were to wait until the day after the moon was next full in the sky, and then began moving eastward.

One week later, our kingdom began to empty. Krona likewise spilled out its people, like blood from a great wound. Erik stayed because Jeannine would not leave, would not believe that her uncle was not returning. I stayed as well, if only because I trusted the judgment of my old teacher, Erik, over the uncertainty of the endless desert in the east.

Now Clearlake was a quiet place once more. The villagers and refugees made do with what they had, what we had. We settled into a routine of survival. We gathered what we could, helped each other however we could, and survived. Slowly, mere survival was slowly making way for life, real life. It was now fifteen years since the exodus, and our lives had begun to return to some semblance of normality. Everyone had their lot in life, filling some need within the village. Erik was the villager's protector, and a good carpenter besides. I ran messages between Clearlake and the other villages. Jeannine helped out at the mill, producing flower for the village. Others fished. Gern, an old soldier, ran a tavern where he sold strong drink made in his cellar.

There was life here, and as the rising sun cast our long shadows into the village, I knew that it was time to really start to live it. It was time to stay home. It was time to make a life.

***

Her arms wrapped around me, the warmth in her smooth skin such a contrast to my own cold flesh. Jeannine's eyes twinkled as they always did, and I found myself looking as deep into them as I could. So much of the world seemed better, after gazing into the hazel eyes which matched her shoulder-length hair. Her slight features, so untouched by the war and strife which surrounded her, reacted to my presence with a delight which I never truly understood. Why me? I did not ask that aloud, and certainly not now, as she embraced me.

"I missed you," she whispered in my ear, as she held me.

Her eyes had reached out to me from the edge of the village, where she had spotted us coming over a hill. Now she had me in her arms. Her embrace was not forceful, not desperate. I always returned, and she always expected me back, even if I was sometimes late.

She kissed me lightly on the cheek. Her lips were soft and wet, and seemed to melt through my defenses. As it had been the first day I saw her, fifteen years ago, so it was now; I was helpless before her. It was not the blind wonder of a first love, but the understanding that there was simply none but her. She was an anchor, and there were times when I might have been tempted to seek a home elsewhere, were it not for her.

I set down my pack and returned her embrace. Her body pressed against me, every soft curve remembered. Her cheek was against my own, her soft skin the touch of a spirit, blessing me with each slight contact. She was my height, slightly figured, lithe and graceful. She moved with more grace than the dancers of the royal court, and yet she had a fierce heart, and a resolve set in stone. Perhaps that was why she stayed with me.

"It is good to be back," I said, holding her tightly, as though she were a lifeline. Perhaps she was. I would certainly need her to be, if I were to stay in the village for months on end.

"I found him," Erik called out from behind me.

He dropped his pack just in time for Jeannine to embrace him.

"Hello, daughter," he said with a laugh.

He had always called her that, daughter. No pet names, nothing affectionate to the ear. He had sent her to live with his brother after his wife died, and the intervening years of service had kept him from this village for most of her life. Fifteen years after returning to Clearlake to collect her, he still called her "daughter". Still, he loved her dearly, and she him, even if his words had not yet caught up to his heart.

"He decided to stick around Meekwood," Erik said in a mock-whisper, "and spend some time with his mistress. You understand, of course."

Jeannine gave him a glare of feigned annoyance, which quickly beat down Erik's steady face and left him laughing his deep, loud laugh. She hugged him again, her slight body hanging off his massive frame as though she were still a child, and not a woman of thirty. He held her gently, his massive hands upon her back. He smiled at her, winking, before quickly sending a half-scowling glance my way. He was lying for me, giving me a way out, deflecting. I nodded.

As I slung my pack upon my shoulder, Erik released Jeannine and took up his own bag. Jeannine took his sword from him, holding its massive weight in both hands. Most people could not lift his sword, but Jeannine was no frail daisy in the fields. She set it upon her right shoulder, as Erik often did when he strode about the village.

"How long are you back for?" she asked of me, still holding onto Erik's waist as we walked toward the village. "The children are putting on a play for us next week."

"Oh, I think he will be around for that," Erik said knowingly. "In fact, you can go ahead and put away his pack for a long while."

Her eyes went wide, the sun reflecting in them. They seemed like jewels, priceless and sparkling. They were that, indeed. She was both those thing.

"Really?" she asked him. She turned to me. "Really? You're staying?"

I nodded. "I am staying."

Erik squeezed her to his side, kissing her on the head. "I need help this winter. I am way too old to be climbing up on roofs. Besides, I could use the company."

"So you're staying? Really?" she asked again, as though she did not really believe me. Her eyes reached out to me, pleading.

I grinned, a forced twisting of my mood, which was still grim in spite of Jeannine's embrace. "Really."

***

"Go!"

Jeannine's voice rang out in the cold air, the furious tapping of the rain not doing nearly enough to dull the sharp sound of her rebuke. The water poured down in torrents, the weight of it crushing me almost as much as Jeannine's glare. I was soaked through, and yet I stood there. I said nothing. I did not move, as though to do so would be to slip and plummet from a high precipice.

The heat from her breath lifted through the darkness, and she bared her teeth ever so slightly, as she always did when she was upset. Upset. No, she was not upset. Jeannine was enraged. Her smiles, the slight touch of her hand upon my shoulder, the way she whispered to me even though we were alone, all these things were gone. In their place was rage and tears and a voice so stinging, I could not bear to hear it.

The day had not started this way. Parting ways at the village square, Erik returned to his home. Jeannine and I returned to ours. Once the house of a local music teacher, we had taken the small home for ourselves when he left to follow our king eastward. The door still had the musical note painted on it, faded and scratched by fifteen years of wind and winter. Still, it was ours, and its one room was enough.

I set my pack at the door, the clank of the sword against the wooden planks a sort of clarion call, announcing my return. Many times, I had returned in the night, and that clank had awoken Jeannine to my presence. I pulled off my coat, and sat at the table at the center of our small home. Our bed was to one side, the hearth at the other. A smaller desk, likely where the teacher's pupils once sat, was covered in the sewing crafts Jeannine enjoyed so much.

Though I had desired some quiet rest, she insisted on feeding me. There was stew on the fire, but it would not be ready until the evening. Still, she had some of the simple white bread which I enjoyed so much, and fruit preserves from our neighbors. That was enough for the moment.

I sat quietly and ate, while Jeannine sat beside me. She often stared at me thus, as though she expected, through close examination, to discover some hidden truth about me that had not come to light in nearly fifteen years in each others lives. I often wondered what it was she was looking for, and sometimes even asked.

"Nothing," was her usual reply.

Once, after a passionate night, I asked her that same question. She replied, "Your soul. I'm looking for your soul."

"Do you see it?" I asked.

She smiled widely, her eyes so soft and soothing in the moonlight. "Yes, but it's not here," she whispered, her hand upon my chest. She touched her breast and smiled. "It's in here. It's mine, and I won't ever give it back."

I leaned in and kissed her. "You may keep it."

And so on this day I asked again, What are you looking for?"

Her reply should have been my first warning. "I'm not sure, but I see something in you. Something new."

I did not follow up that first question, instead returning to my small meal. Did she sense where I had been? Did she feel the crawling, creeping unknown which I was beginning to feel within me? Did she know about my dreams, sensing that my nightmares were keeping me from rest? Was it written upon my face?

I could have asked these things, but instead I finished my bread. I then sat upon our bed, and moments later, without even removing my boots, I was asleep.

The evening came before I awoke, and with it, the rains. It poured down harshly, mercilessly. I awoke with a start, those terrible eyes staring back at me from the depths of my dreams. I must have screamed. Jeannine was at my side, her arm around me as it always was after a nightmare.

"Tell me," she whispered into my ear, as though to share the burden of my dream, and lighten that load upon my shoulders.

I did not want to tell her. I did not want to recount my visit to Skyreach. I did not want to describe the dripping sound which drew me into the upper reaches of the keep, or the deer in a pool of its own blood. I did not want to describe the firestorm, brought on by the plague of magic which cursed the already cursed place. I did not want to tell her of the fire that I was certain had scorched my hand into ruin, yet did not. I did not want to speak of the terrible dreams which hammered at the backs of my eyes, as I slept upon the terrible throne of the Dark Lord. I did not want to tell her about the Kronan wolves.

I did not want to tell her, yet I did. I told her everything. I described, in detail, the eyes of the unknown Lord which stood, stone-still and silent, in the courtyard. I told her everything.

"Go!" she screamed, pointing away from the house. The rain beat against her outstretched arm.

She had thrown me from the bed, and then pushed me to the door. She was not sobbing. That was not her way. Instead, she burned with anger at me. Her tears flowed silently, as though her eyes alone felt sadness, the rest of her swept up in anger.

"I don't want you in this home," she shouted, furious. "I begged you not to go, and you went anyway."

"Jeannine," I began to say, but she would not hear me.

"Get out, Jovan." She shook her head. "I don't want to see you until you leave that horrible place in peace."

"I have," I started to say.

"You were just there, even though you had no reason to go anywhere near it!" Her voice carried, and I saw the nearest house stir through its window. Others were listening. "Do you know what people here say about you? Do you know what they say about us? I have to defend you. I have to say that you're a good man, that you're not really as obsessed with that place as you seem. They're afraid of you, Jovan. I'm not afraid, but stories like that are making me afraid. I don't want to be afraid of you!"

I opened my mouth, but she stabbed at me through the air with a finger.

"No!" She hollered. "No, I don't want to hear it. I don't want to hear your voice until you decide that this life," she looked around us, "is more important to you than that disgusting place. Now go!"

Without a word I turned and left. I hung my head, and the rain ran down my neck, down my back. It sent a shiver through me, but I barely noticed. I could feel the chill settle into my bones, but I did not shiver. I was in shock. Once, during the war, I took an arrow through the meat of my left leg. I carried on for hours before I noticed the pain. This felt much the same. Nothingness.

In the darkness, though I could not see it, I sensed those terrible eyes. I could feel them looming over me, glaring at me. Jeannine was right, and those eyes seemed pleased to note it. The keep was everywhere. It had followed me home.

I slowly walked away, the slam of the door like a sword through my chest. The rain made the world seem smaller, the blackness helping to drape the world in curtains of darkness. I felt lost, and perhaps I was. I cannot say how long I walked among the houses, nor how many sets of eyes glared at me, some fearfully, as I passed.

***

I cannot say how long I walked upon the cobblestone road that ran its circle about the village, but I do know where my journey ended. The goblet drawn upon the door was a familiar sight. I was at Gern's tavern. I pushed open the door, and allowed the night to pass in a blur of drink and sadness. Drink and sadness, the companions of many a man sent into the rain.

The evening stretched on, though only in flashes of memory. I recall Erik's angry look, and the grumblings of Gern's two other patrons. I recall a bottle, though I cannot say what was in it. Something strong, old stock from before the war. I recall the rattle of coins upon the table, and a glass pushed aside, shattering on the floor. I recall opening the door, and the look of displeasure on the faces of the three men inside.

All these things seemed to happen out of order, as if the events had been written upon cards, shuffled and dealt. I had trouble focusing, and what words I did speak, what I remembered speaking, came out in mumbled, slurred tones of anger and sadness.

I recall Gern yelling, "Get out!" His finger pointed toward the door, though I saw it through the bottom of an emptying bottle.

The world seemed to spin about me, angry words and broken glass creating a cloud which seemed to turn the world into an endless fog before my eyes. What was happening? Why was I back in the rain?

My mind seemed stuck on the image of the deer in Skyreach Keep, laying in its own blood. A terrible fall by a beast that should not have been there. Why did that memory suddenly seem so vivid? Why did I see myself standing over the corpse, a broken bottle in my hand? The deer looked at me, eyes pleading for... for what?

The world spun faster and faster. I was drowning. My confusion rushed over my head like a wave of water. Still, I could breath if I gasped, drawing in the air desperately. My eyes were wide, yet I could not see beyond the rain, the broken glass, and the blood of the dead deer which seemed now to loom over me.

And those eyes...

***

There was a tapping beneath me, somewhere at my feet. Tap, tap, tap. It intruded on my sleep, on my tormented dreams. Tap, tap, tap. It sent a pulse through my body, from foot to head, each tap more insistent than the last. Tap, tap, tap. Why did the deer still bleed? Surely, after all these days, the blood had gone cold. Tap, tap, tap.

I tried to open my eyes, yet every time I thought myself awake, I realized that I was not. I awoke in the throne room of the keep, yet I still slept. Tap, tap, tap. I awoke by the stream where I met up with Erik, yet I was still sleeping. Tap, tap, tap. I found myself in the forest, staring down the Kronan wolf, yet I knew I was dreaming. Tap, tap, tap. I awoke in Jeannine's arms, but it was not real. Tap, tap, tap.

Tap, Tap, Tap. What did it mean? Tap, tap, tap. Why would it not stop? Tap, tap, tap.

"Get up!" Erik's voice tore me from my endless, inescapable corridor of sleep. "Wake up, Jovan!"

The sun was harsh against my skin, and I closed my eyes against its rising glare. I felt someone kicking my foot, tap, tap, tap, as I lay on the ground. I held up my hand to block out the burning brightness, but a strong hand seized me, and hauled me to my feet. I felt myself pushed against a wall. My back hurt from striking it. My head smacked against the wall, and dizziness mixed with the fog that followed the inescapable sleep I had suffered through.

"Stand up!" Erik's voice again, angry and sharp. His hand gripped my left shoulder tightly, keeping me upright.

I slowly opened my eyes, fending off the feeling that the entire world was about to spin so fast as to throw me from it, like a child who does not hold on to his spinning platform. I feared being spun so fast as to be cast out of life itself. Everything seemed so twisted, so harsh.

"What is wrong?" I asked slowly, the effort of merely speaking almost more than I could manage.

"Ask Gern!" Another man's voice, equally angry and harsh, called out from behind Erik's imposing form.

"What?" I mumbled.

Erik shook me, and my head knocked against the wall again. I grunted in pain. His voice sliced through my fog like a honed blade.

"Wake up!" he barked, forcing my eyes wide open and my consciousness into focus by sheer force of will.

"Erik?" I asked quietly, "what is happening?"

Erik's face was twisted into a scowl, part anger, part disgust. The three men behind him, all armed, were equally fierce. I saw then that Erik held me with one hand, and in the other was his sword. It was not held casually. He was ready for a fight. Who had he come to fight? Surely I was not being sought to help, not in my condition.

"Gern is dead, Jovan." He muttered the words lowly, just loud enough for me to hear. "He was cut down late last night, as he closed up the tavern."

There was a silence, then. I tried to turn the words around in my head, examine them, understand them. The fog behind my eyes, despite Erik's words cutting through them, still made me slow to respond. Before I could speak, Erik did.

"After you left the tavern, where did you go, Jovan?"