The Scarred God Read online

  ‘It is warm,’ she said.

  Vedic nodded. ‘The forest offers most of what we need. You just need to be mindful of where.’

  Vedic went easy on her with the climb. They carefully walked a little distance until they found a tree gently tapering upwards. The wood felt a little rough underfoot, but the mud helped soften the scratching of the bark. The tree itself was warm to the touch, a low heat that was very welcome after the cold of the river, and she would have hugged the trunk left to her own devices.

  The trees here were larger than most of the ones they had come across, with the possible exception of the evergreens on the edge of the Corden. You could walk comfortably across most of the branches, and the leaves were the size of plates, big enough to catch and hold the rainwater, and of a luscious waxy texture. The scent of them hung in the air. At first the smell was pleasant, but after a few hours, Anya just felt light-headed.

  Vedic made them carry on until Anya started to miss her footing. The second time she did, she tripped, sitting down on the branch in shock, and he knelt beside her.

  ‘You need rest,’ he said. ‘If one of us falls from up here, it will hurt.’

  Anya looked around: there was no platform from which they would not roll while asleep and do as much damage.

  Vedic smiled. ‘I didn’t lose everything.’

  The woodsman unwrapped a roll of rope from around his torso and looped it around the trunk once and round his waist before he tied it off. He repeated the exercise with Anya.

  ‘If you lie with your back against the tree,’ he said, ‘you’re much less likely to roll off.’

  Anya drifted off the moment she lay down. Her last observation as she did so was that she could have sworn she saw eyes blinking at her from the dark of the canopy above. What a strange dream …

  The sun is a burning fire of molten gold in the azure sky.

  Yet the stone under my hands feels cool. The glare reflecting from the stone walls and marble floor makes me squint in the midday sun. I have never felt heat like this. It is oppressive, stifling, and I long for soft grass beneath my feet, to feel cool spring water slide down my throat. The ground seems too far away. There are no trees that I can see, nothing green within sight at all. This feels wrong. I realise I am not alone: all around the stone and the dirt-streaked marble are people, more people than I’ve ever seen before in my life. I am Anya and not Anya. Where am I?

  I appear to be on a podium. A sick feeling spreads through my stomach as the noise of the crowd fills my ears. It is disorientating, a tornado of sound that bounces off every surface. I’m standing in a town square. I am the focus of everyone’s attention. I feel like I am cooking in the sun, or perhaps under the gaze of the crowd. The world is as hot as the forge. I lean heavily on the podium, but I did not will the movement. Perhaps I am about to faint. Will they bring me water if I do?

  This isn’t right. I feel heavier, my chest feels … different – as if I am carved from the stone. Smooth curves of thick muscle move under my robe; my arms flex against my skin, threatening to split it with the movement beneath. Fresh scars catch on my rough clothing. I push back into an upright position, but again I did not perform the action. I feel more aware of the world as a thing outside of myself.

  My host begins to speak, and I cannot understand the words spilling from our face. I only know that they are not Shaanti. The crowd falls to silence as my voice grows louder. I can feel their eyes on me – I can see the light in their faces as they hang on my words like a rope that is holding them safe above a terrible chasm. I believe I could say anything to them and they would follow me. An exultant feeling. I feel their attention flow through me. This is delicious, like warm spiced wine, and my head spins with it as if I have had too much. My host continues, expounding on their theme, hands rising and falling on the podium. No one has escaped the net of words my host has cast with the skill of a master fisherman. Once again I have no control. Who is speaking?

  The crowd has filled the square and is made up of every type of person: small children, old men, wives, smiths, merchants, peddlers, whores and warriors. They all stand shoulder to shoulder, cheek by jowl, all looking at me, all listening to me. I have them utterly in my power, and it is good. There is no revulsion here, no bloodshed and death but only adoration, an energy flowing in translucent pulses to me. The mob hangs on my every word – not that they are my words. This must be how gods feel.

  The crowd parts.

  The king makes his way through the gathering to the podium. He is dressed in a simple robe of white overlaid with purple, and the mob bow low to him as he passes. The man conjures images of bright burning buildings against a night sky in my mind’s eye. The man smiles at me on my podium, but the smile does not reach his eyes. The king’s gaze roams around the crowd, noticing everything and seemingly troubled by it. As he steps up, I find myself leaning forward to help him. He embraces me, kissing me on one cheek then the other. His voice is low as he mutters a message to me that I don’t comprehend, before turning to wave to the crowd. My host answers in an equally low tone before shouting one last sentence to the mob. The entire crowd erupts in a thunderous roar of approval that vibrates through the square and makes the king flinch.

  The king embraces me once more for the crowd. Then he gestures towards the interior of the building behind us as the crowd cheers. I feel myself face the crowd with a brief wave before following the man into the coolness of a stone palace.

  My eyes struggle with the darkness, but I can see that the chamber into which I have walked is a large hall. The air is cooler here, the marble cold, and I am grateful, though the sudden change makes my head spin. The king throws his purple cloak over the seat that lies at one end of the room and pours me wine from a silver jug. The guards who accompanied him to the podium appear to have been dismissed. I am trusted. The king is speaking. I hold the wine goblet awkwardly as if unsure what to do with the drink.

  My host replies in words I do not understand.

  The king laughs but waves his finger as if to remind me of a memory shared with my host that I, a passenger, have no recollection of. The man leads me towards the centre of the room. The chamber is not empty, as I first thought, but where I assumed lay nothing but bare stone, there is a large parchment map. The chart has been spread out across the chamber and appears to have been well thumbed. The purpose of the map is clear even without the notes that have been written onto it in runic script to mark where the invasion will begin. I move slowly round the map. I nod as I walk until my host spots a marker near the forest and I stop. I look at the man but point at the map, indicating the spot.

  The king shrugs and answers in a matter-of-fact tone that suggests he does not disagree with me. My host answers with more force this time, spilling wine onto the map in the process. The king does not smile this time. His answer is curt. I do not reply but look away. I can feel my host’s jaw working as if they want to speak but know it would be unwise. I feel a hand on my shoulder once more, and the king is standing next to me, talking in conciliatory tones. I nod once more as he leads me towards the door and out into the corridor beyond.

  I am to make my own way out. I pause. My host is troubled, and I am looking back at the king receding into the shadows before I make my way out into the street and all is lost in the light.

  The wolves were in the wall.

  Anya opened her eyes, certain that was the case. She saw no walls, only the trees and her memories stampeding through her consciousness. Vedic was kneeling a few feet away, looking down. He glanced up at her and placed his finger against his lips. Anya looked down and saw an undulating tide of fur as the pack ran through the forest beneath them. She pressed herself back against the tree trunk. Anya could barely see Vedic against the wood. Only his eyes revealed him, two points of marble in the shadows and leaves. What did that remind her of? She wasn’t sure. Behind Vedic she could see Fin’s ghost, head dripping and rotten from the axe wound that had killed him, staring at her. Thrac
e, her grandfather’s ghost, was on the branch above, bottle in hand. The pack seemed to stretch on forever. She daren’t move, and so she closed her eyes, but she could still feel them looking at her.

  Vedic sat back. ‘They have passed.’

  Anya did not look at him – her eyes were still on the ghosts. ‘They might return,’ she replied.

  ‘All the more reason to get moving,’ said Vedic. ‘Untie the rope and pass it here.’

  Anya forced her gaze away and down to the rope that kept her from falling. She did not feel properly awake as she moved to where the rope was secured.

  ‘What were you looking at?’

  Anya was startled. ‘What?’

  ‘You were looking behind me the entire time they were passing below and even just now. What?’

  Anya glanced back at the ghosts. They were still there.

  ‘Nothing. I was just thinking about Fin.’

  The woodsman stared at her. ‘Your brother?’

  Anya shook her head. ‘No, but he was like a brother. He was the grandson of my grandfather’s friend Falkirk. A year younger than me.’

  ‘He’s dead?’

  Anya could feel the tears balling at the edges of her eyes. She hated herself for it. She just nodded.

  ‘When the village was ransacked?’

  Anya nodded again. In her mind she was back in the village, on the common, feeling the faint vibration of the ground as if a storm was breaking in the distance. She could see Fin lying down to put his ear to the ground to see if he could hear more clearly.

  ‘First time you saw someone you know killed?’

  Anya whispered, ‘Yes. It was my fault.’

  Fin stood. ‘It’s horses, lots of them.’

  He sounded awed even before you could see the Kurah streaming down the slope of the valley. He pointed in the direction of the noise. There was a shadow on the horizon where the Kurah force were lining up, ready for the charge. Anya felt her eyes straining – she had better farsight than Fin, but even she needed a moment before she could make out the glint of spears. The flag made her heart stop in her chest.

  ‘No,’ she said.

  ‘Who is it?’ asked Fin. He sounded like a child.

  ‘Kurah,’ she said, running for the alert bell.

  The bell sat in the centre of the village and was a leftover from the last war. It was to warn the villagers to take cover because enemy warriors were passing through on their way from one battle to another. The bell had moss growing on it now, and when Anya grabbed the ringer, it came away in her hands.

  ‘Damn the gods,’ she hissed, hastily trying to hook the ringer back on the inside with the hammer still functional.

  ‘There’s so many of them,’ said Fin. ‘We need to get out of here.’

  Anya glared at him. ‘We are Shaanti; we do not run. We must warn everyone and arm ourselves.’

  Fin looked unsure.

  Anya turned back to the bell and rang it with all her might. At first nothing happened. Then people started to emerge from shops and homes to see what the fuss was about. The arrow rain came shortly after, sending those too slow to seek cover to their end with shafts protruding from their heads, necks and cheeks.

  ‘Weapons!’ yelled Anya at Fin, who was taking cover.

  The boy scrambled to the outside of the blacksmith’s and grabbed two swords from a rack. He tossed one to Anya and lifted his own. Kurah appeared on horses throughout the village.

  Anya turned to defend herself from one and sent him crashing from his horse as another nailed her in the face with his fist. She crumpled onto her back and saw the man’s sword swing down. Fin blocked the strike and saved her life, but the warrior was so much bigger and faster. As his blade tumbled away, he swung down with an axe and embedded it in the boy’s skull. Fin’s last look was one of shock and confusion, and then he was gone from his eyes as his body collapsed.

  ‘Yes, that was your fault,’ said Vedic.

  Anya felt like she had been punched. ‘What?’

  Vedic softened his tone, but he did not back down. ‘You must have known that you had little chance with just two swords. The smarter thing to do would have been to withdraw and find other fighters to resist afterwards. You should have evacuated while you could.’

  Anya shoved the rope at him. ‘He did not have to stand and fight.’

  Vedic shook his head. ‘But he did. You may have been the better fighter, but he was the smarter warrior. I am sorry you lost your friend, but no one can take that guilt from you. You must take that feeling, turn it and try to use the pain for a cause bigger than yourself.’

  Anya blinked. He might have a point.

  ‘But remember to choose wisely. The righteous warrior is a terrible thing.’

  Anya looked over at where the ghosts had been, but all she saw now was bare bark. ‘We’d better move.’

  There was a hoot in the distance, like an owl but not quite, as if a creature was mimicking the bird. Vedic froze. An answering hoot came a way off, from their left.

  ‘Damn,’ said Vedic. ‘Move!’

  The woodsman grabbed her hand, and they were running across the trees as if the woods behind them were on fire. All care was gone. The forestal led them due north at the fastest speed he could. If he could have gone at a flat-out sprint, Anya suspected he would. When he stopped, Anya nearly died.

  There was no warning, and so she collided straight into his unyielding back, bouncing and landing hard on the branch. The surprise saved her. She made no attempt to stop her fall, and so she fell back onto the branch and landed in a perfectly seated position. The impact was hard, but on such a wide branch, she did not fall to the ground below. The forest floor seemed very far away.

  Anya looked up.

  Vedic stood on the edge of the branch, where a large gap in the canopy opened up in front of him and shafts of sunlight cast patterns on the wood and forest around and beneath him. Vedic was looking not at the liquid light but at the figure on the branch opposite him. The person was almost as tall as Vedic, lithe, with eyes that glowed a faint yellow in the shadows. The man – if he was human – had skin that made Anya and Vedic’s improvised mud camouflage look like they had just rolled in the dirt. In what appeared to be his natural tones, his skin went from green to brown to yellow in a mottled effect that meant every time he blinked, he almost disappeared. Anya was confident this was a he, because the man was almost naked, his broad shoulders, narrow hips and his genitalia all on display. A sleeveless robe, which fell to his ankles, was open to the world and seemed to indicate a ceremonial role for the garment rather than serving any function against the elements. The man’s hair, shoulder-length, actually seemed to change colour depending on where he stood. He moved into the light, sending his locks blonde.

  ‘Vedic,’ spoke the creature. ‘You are a long way from home.’ He swept his hair off his shoulders as his serene yellow eyes stared intently at the woodsman.

  ‘We mean no offence,’ replied Vedic. ‘We are on an urgent journey for the lady. Wolves are hunting us, and this was the best way to avoid them.’

  ‘You admit to knowingly walking through our lands without permission.’

  Vedic sighed, heavily. ‘You know I do. Why ask?’

  ‘A courtesy,’ said the creature. ‘I am not unsympathetic to your cause, or I would have killed you while you slept.’

  ‘You’d have tried,’ said Vedic, shrugging.

  ‘Indeed,’ replied the creature. ‘Yet empathy stayed my hand.’

  ‘I sense a but approaching,’ said Anya, almost whispering.

  ‘Yes,’ said the creature.

  As Anya looked around, she thought she saw others like him, some male, some female, circling them from the surrounding trees. ‘Your companion is correct. You have knowingly broken our laws by taking this path, and so, at the very least, I must bring you in front of the king for judgement.’

  ‘Those rules were not meant for people cutting through your territory to render aid,’ protested Ve
dic.

  ‘No exceptions. You know Hogarth better than that. Especially now. If we did that, where would we be?’

  ‘Why won’t you help us?’ asked Anya.

  ‘We are Tream,’ replied the captor. ‘The original indigenous people of the forest, which your kind tried to eradicate. What do we care of your so-called gods’ petty squabbles?’

  Anya flushed. She’d always thought of the Tream as made-up creatures her grandfather or another enterprising storyteller had created to give extra spice to the gods.

  ‘You hairless apes are more trouble than you are worth,’ said the creature.

  Anya shook her head. ‘You sound like …’

  Vedic silenced her with a look. Anya wondered why mentioning Pan was a bad idea. The god did not have a good history with the Tream in legend, but that must have been a very long time ago, and it did not seem like they crossed each other’s paths very often by choice.

  The creature snapped his fingers. More Tream, dressed like their confronter – that is to say, naked save for a strange sleeveless, floor-length, open-fronted coat – broke apart from the trees where they had been hiding and descended on slender ropes, landing alongside Anya and Vedic. Vedic did not try to get away. He seemed resigned to their fate as Anya stared at him, willing him to speak, to do anything at all, but he just stood there as the creatures roped the travellers’ hands together. Anya and Vedic were prodded into motion without words as their captors led them away south and west, away from the glade and away from Danu.

  Periodically they stopped, and one or more of the Tream placed their hands on the surrounding trees, eyes closed as if in prayer. Vedic paid them no attention, taking the opportunity to squat down, stretching his hamstrings out and watching, amused, as Anya followed the break-off group of Tream out to where they stood by the trees, trying to work out what the interaction was achieving. She couldn’t stop staring at these strange creatures who looked like the characters from her legends and yet unlike them. They were darker than the pictures in her grandfather’s books, and when they got further away from her, they were invisible against the treeline. Likewise, when they placed their hands on the trees in silent prayer, they almost blended into the trunk altogether. The effect was utterly disconcerting.