Among the Dead and Dying, Page 4

Chapter Two

  Dessidus and his Black Riders fled Golden Rock after murdering Adelaide Kessel. They’d been tasked with discovering the location of the girl, Saffi, who The Scholar wanted captured. The march to war had begun, although the battles would not be fought by Swords on fields with banners held high. This was a war The Five Walls would be woefully unprepared for.

  The capital city of the kingdom was perched high above rolling hills of grassland, and had earned its name from the way the landscape glowed golden in autumn. Two circular walls protected the city, one separating the aristocrat’s homes and a second, larger and more fortified wall that wound its way around the entire city, protecting even the farmer’s fields. Only merchants of the old world stayed outside of the city gates, daring to antagonize The Order of the Nine by selling artifacts dug up from the time preceding the Dead Age. It was one of these merchants, on his way between New Carrington and Golden Rock, who’d stumbled into the path of the Black Riders.

  “I told you, I don’t have any books,” said the old man as he watched the thieves loot his wagon.

  “Look at this,” said Dessidus as he picked up a metal toy that looked like a horseless chariot, with small black wheels. He showed the toy to Ebon, his closest ally and one of The Scholar’s most trusted men. “They called them ‘trucks’, I think.”

  “Cars, actually,” said the sheepish old merchant as he reached out with trembling hands to retrieve his property. “They called the bigger ones trucks.”

  Dessidus tossed the toy back into the crate and the merchant gasped as the relic clattered against the rest of the collection. “Bunch of junk,” said Dessidus. “Don’t you have anything good? I met a merchant once who had a crate full of books with pictures of naked women. Do you have anything like that?”

  “No,” said the elderly man as if offended. “I don’t peddle filth.”

  Dessidus laughed and said, “You’ve got an odd definition of filth. As far as The Order’s concerned, this is all filth.”

  The old man nervously stroked his long, wispy beard with one hand and then moved quickly over to the crate of toys to inspect them for damage as Dessidus moved on to the next. The Black Riders were pulling wares out of the back of the merchant’s wagon, and inspected each of them.

  Ebon stood nearby, his distinctive mask still covering his mouth and nose. The man rarely removed it, preferring that people saw as little of him as possible. It wasn’t for the sake of anonymity, because Ebon’s coal black eyes were recognizable to anyone. Dessidus imagined those eyes invaded more than a few nightmares.

  “We’ve got some books here,” said Jess, a young recruit of The Scholar’s army. “Looks like Davin… The Davin-eye.” He struggled to read the title.

  Ebon knelt beside the young man to look in reverently at the books. “’The Da Vinci Code’. We have that one. What else is in there?”

  “Nothing else, it’s all the same book,” said Jess.

  “I thought you said you didn’t have any books,” said Dessidus, grinning hatefully at the old man.

  “They’re just… They’re not… You shouldn’t touch those. They’re delicate.”

  “Keep searching,” said Ebon to Jess as one of the other members of their group handed down another crate from the back of the wagon.

  “I have pel,” said the merchant, furious and desperate to be rid of the brigands. “I offered you the robber’s tax already. Why are you still bothering me?”

  “We’re not interested in gold,” said Dessidus. “We want your books.”

  Sudden realization struck the old man and he asked Dessidus, “Are you The Scholar?”

  Ebon laughed, and Dessidus glared at him before looking back at the merchant and saying, “No, but we’re part of his army.”

  “You can have the books,” said the man, affording new respect to the thieves. “Take what you want.”

  “We will, and if you leave here alive then I want you to do a job for me.”

  “Anything,” said the terrified merchant.

  Dessidus set his hands on the top of the dual axes, one on each hip. “Tell your fellow merchants and smugglers that these roads are going to be flooded with The Scholar’s men soon, and we won’t be looking for pel. If you want to earn your life with a robber’s tax, then make it books instead of gold. Understood?”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” said the merchant. He grew more tremulous and asked, “He’s… He’s coming here? To Golden Rock?”

  Dessidus grinned and nodded.

  “With his army?”

  “Ten thousand strong,” said Dessidus. “Man, beast, and dead alike. Hordes of them, all bowing to his will, filling the air with the low sound of trumpets and drums, moving day and night without rest. Bones click-clack-clattering as the dead march.” His warning sounded like a tale told around a campfire. “It’s only a matter of time now, and the only thing that’ll save you is if you prove your worth. Find your smugglers and your relic hunters, and tell them to bring back books from before the Dead Age. Because when the dead army climbs these hills and lays siege upon The Five Walls, the only people left alive will be the ones who offer books as gifts.”

  The merchant nodded and then said, “I have one, hidden under my seat. Wait, let me get it for you.” His voice was meek and nearly a whisper, and he ran off to get the book he’d been hiding at the front of the wagon.

  Ebon moved closer to Dessidus and said, “Nice speech. Have you been practicing that?”

  “I think it’s good to put the fear of the dead in his type.”

  “If we let him live, he’s going to go tell the aristocrats that we’re coming.”

  “Good,” said Dessidus. “Let them prepare for a wave of dead at their gates. That’ll make our jobs easier when we hit them from within.”

  The old merchant was still searching the bin beneath his seat, and called back to them that he would only be a moment as he gathered the books hidden there.

  Ebon took the opportunity to continue the conversation with Dessidus. “The Scholar’s going to want to go for the girl first, which means we’ll be heading to New Carrington.”

  “That’s fine,” said Dessidus. “We already have Ferragut, Cerrus, and Madeline out in New Carrington farming bodies. They’ll be ready by the time we get there.”

  “I grew up in New Carrington, before I was exiled. I can get back into the city and keep an eye on the girl until The Scholar comes.”

  Dessidus regarded his friend with concern. “I don’t think that’s necessary. We should go back and report to The Scholar. Let him decide how he wants to handle the news of the girl’s whereabouts.”

  “But what about Cerrus and the others? We don’t want to risk them killing the girl by mistake.”

  Dessidus thought about his friend’s point and then nodded. “I guess you’re right. Do you want any of the boys to go with you?”

  “No,” said Ebon. “I work better alone.”