Читать книгу The Puzzler’s War - Eyal Kless - Страница 15

We found the dead bodies halfway up the hill. They were probably laid in a neater file before animals had dragged some of them aside. The smell was strong, but our bodies immediately reacted by reducing our sensitivity to it. Still, it was not a pretty sight.

“Between forty or fifty of them,” Galinak said. “A slaughter, yes, but where’re the rest of them?”

“Taken?” I said, then added, “Slaves?”

Galinak shrugged and we moved on.

We ended up spending the night in the highest house on top of the hill.

Looters had done a thorough job of going through the village, but still they left plenty of stuff behind for us to use. I found a pair of worn boots that fit. One even had real leather lining. In a different house I got a cloak and some clothes, old and torn but definitely a step up from what I’d been wearing.

On the downside, I was attacked by a dog who was either protecting its turf or had grown a taste for feeding off the remains of the slain. Galinak reacted fast, but not fast enough. The bite I received wasn’t painful—my skin healed surprisingly fast—and we did end up having dog stew for dinner. So I wasn’t complaining.

It was Galinak who found the three moonshine bottles in the cellar. He insisted I rub some of it over my rapidly healing wound. It stung a bit, and I used the cloth of the farmer wife’s dress to bandage my arm. The rest we drank.

“Are you going to do things different?” Galinak asked me unexpectedly. We were sitting around the burning hearth, trying to consume enough moonshine to be able to eat Galinak’s dog stew. My body resisted the first few mouthfuls, but with enough resolve, mind always triumphs over matter.

“What do you mean?” I took another swig from the bottle.

“Some Trolls I used to know, when they had a close call, a brush with death, they swore they’d do things different for the rest of their lives. A few of them actually changed their ways, but most of ’em couldn’t shake the habits.” Galinak drank some more. “You and I didn’t just have a brush with the grim reaper, we grabbed his bony arse and gave him a wet smacker on his lipless mouth, but now we’re alive again. That sort of thing changes your outlook on life.”

I did not know what to answer, so I reversed the question. “What are you going to do differently?”

Galinak shrugged and filled his mouth again, then passed the bottle. “Not sure. Guess I won’t take orders from nobody no more.”

“Was there ever a time when you did?”

He chuckled. “You only know the old, wise, and tender me, Twinkles. I used to be obedient, a little more respectful to authority, but now—” He sighed. “What about you?”

“I remember promising myself in the City Within the Mountain, just before we went on the mission, that if I ever got out of there alive, I’d find a nice lady and have a family of my own.” I gestured at my body. “Not going to happen with this body now.”

“You said you were from around here. Maybe go see your folks, visit your family?”

I took another deep pull from the bottle and shook my head. Things were starting to get misty in my peripheral vision. “My story is not so different from Rafik’s, you know. One day you’re living happily in some remote little village, the next day you wake up with these.” I pointed at my eyes, momentarily forgetting this was not my old body. “My dad had coin and influence where we lived, and the people there were not as zealous as in Rafik’s village, so no ax or hot pokers for me. But a marked son was a major blow to the family. I was locked in a room for a whole month before LoreMaster Harim came to our house. Then I was whisked away. I know now that this was the right thing to do for all involved, but for a thirteen-year-old boy who loses his family in the blink of an eye …” I took another pull from the moonshine. “I was … crying every night for a long time, then I got angry for a while, then I got over it. Years later I got word my dad had passed away—they didn’t even tell me how. My older sister was already married, and my mother and two younger sisters moved to another part of the land for some reason. That’s the last I’d heard.”

“Still. Family,” Galinak said. “Maybe once we figure out what to do and”—he wiggled his finger unsteadily at me—“what not to do. We could track them down, have a meet, you know …”

Even in my state I registered Galinak said we when talking about tracking down my long-lost family.

“I never got to thank you, Twinkle Eyes,” he suddenly said. “You saved my life, twice.”

“What are you talking about?” I swallowed another mouthful of the bitter drink, ignoring my body’s warning regarding my current condition.

“Back in the City Within the Mountain. If it wasn’t for you, negotiating like that, we would have just ended up Lizard chowder.”

“Ah, that, but we did end up as Lizard chowder.” I passed the bottle back, and Galinak drank some more before continuing.

“Yea, but they extracted our minds.” He pointed at his head. “That’s because of you. And now, here I am back in the living, again because of you.” He passed the bottle back.

“To be honest, Rafik told me you were coming with me before I managed to ask,” I said, and checked the bottle I was holding. It was empty.

“I’m sure that those rust-fucker Tarkanians wouldn’t have just sent me alone on this mission.” Galinak opened the second bottle. “Nah, I know why I’m here, Twinkle Eyes. Here’s to you, and here’s to life.” He raised the bottle and drank deeply.

I vaguely remember slurring words of infinite wisdom as we went through our second bottle. The rest of the night was a bit of a blur, containing many old stories, tales of Salvationist adventures, more than a few lurid songs, then smashing through a wooden door and eventually passing out blissfully on the stairs to the cellar.

Waking up in a bunker filled with poisoned air was worse than what I felt the following morning, but not by much. Galinak was nowhere to be seen, so after washing my face and drinking boiled well water, I slowly began exploring the rest of the house. On the second floor I found an old hunting rifle under a pile of debris. There were no bullets, so it was probably more useful as a club, but I kept it anyway.

The makeshift ladder leading to the attic creaked, but bore my weight. The roof tiles had several bullet holes, and rays of light penetrated the gloom. Still, without my enhanced sight I would not have noticed the footsteps marking the dusty floor and the fact that one of the floorboards was slightly cleaner than others. Moving it earned me a splinter but was absolutely worth it. As if the bag of fifty metal coins I found, the two water skins, and the steel hunting knife were not enough, I carefully pulled out two other items of interest. The first one was a live snap, not a drawing, of a family of seven who hugged and smiled happily at me despite the creases. I guessed the snap had sentimental value to whoever hid it here or whoever was meant to find it. I kept it without really knowing why. And there was a map. This, too, was not a crude hand drawing, but rather a pre-Catastrophe-era, fully detailed folding map.

Memories surfaced and flooded my consciousness as I spread it on the floor. I knew maps like this. My LoreMaster was an avid collector and used to spend hours in his tower, bent over with his nose stuck in them. I heard his voice lecturing in my ear, “Great cities fall into great ruins in a matter of years and towns or villages vanish into the woods in even less time, but mountains, rivers, and lakes remain, more or less, in the same place. With enough attention to detail, old pre-Catastrophe maps could prove extremely valuable.”

Before we parted ways, LoreMaster Harim gave me a map and list of his hideouts, telling me to use whatever I found to keep the Guild of Historians alive, but I had failed both him and the Guild by being torn apart by Lizards in the City Within the Mountain.

I turned my attention to the map I was holding and magnified it tenfold with my sight. This newly awakened memory gave me an idea of where we were, and I marked the village on the thin paper with a circle made by a piece of coal I found on the floor. Now I just had to figure out where we needed to go.

I looked up and examined the roof of the attic, and I spotted a trapdoor. There was no ladder in sight, but a successful, and quite daring, balancing act over several pieces of piled-up furniture meant I could open the trapdoor and stick my head through. Getting my body up there required a bit more work, especially when Galinak still hadn’t shown up, but I didn’t care—I was acting like a man possessed. When I finally made it to the top of the roof I was in a kind of euphoric ecstasy. Childish. Stupid. I know. But it felt good to seek a solution to a mystery and then solve it. I desperately needed to know why I’d been given my life back, and walking away without finding a way to answer this question was not an option for me. I began experimenting with my vision, zooming in and out, trying to see as far as I could and to memorize the topography.

At the edge of my enhanced vision I saw the distinct silhouette of the City of Towers, my old home.

“Hey!”

I stopped zooming and turned my head down.

“Look what I found.” Galinak was sitting bareback on a horse. “Took me ages to tempt him to come over, but once I got my hands on him, he became very obedient.” If Galinak was suffering any setbacks because of last night, it didn’t show.

This was definitely the best day of our new lives, so far.

“Well done,” I shouted in reply. “Now let’s gather what we can carry. I know where we can go and gear up.”

“Really?” He danced the horse in a circle. “And where is that?”

I didn’t bother to shout back. Instead, I turned to study the hills to our north.

“We are going to visit an old friend,” I whispered to no one in particular.