Chapter 6
It would take their ragged band a few days to cross the Bahdjangal, and with luck, they would encounter no demons along the way. A slow-moving column like this, with children and elderly among it, would surely be a delicious snack for a sea demon.
With his superior senses, stamina, and speed, Ashok decided it would be best if he spent the journey ranging back and forth, scouting around the main body of the group. The Wild Men knew their swamp well and moved through it comfortably, always able to pick out solid ground from the treacherous muck, and they were seldom surprised by the venomous snakes or crocodiles that lurked within. Yet as good as they were, they were nothing compared to Ashok. That was not pride speaking. It was a simple fact.
He would run ahead, find a good vantage point, and then watch and listen, using the Heart of the Mountain to heighten one sense, and then another, until he was certain there wasn’t any danger. Then he would move to a flank and check there, and then run to the rear of the column to make sure no curious demon had picked up their trail. Throughout the day he repeated the process, and would continue to do so until they reached terrain less suitable for concealing demons. That activity meant that he had to cross three times as much ground as the rest of them, and at a much faster pace. It was tiring, even for someone who had touched the Heart of the Mountain, but he didn’t mind. It gave him time alone without anyone calling him General.
While he waited in a position of cover, observing and catching his breath, he caught glimpses of Thera’s army through the trees. On point were always Toramana and his Wild Men, because only they could easily navigate the treacherous paths. As long as they stuck to the trails the hunters knew well, the livestock they were herding wouldn’t flounder into the mud and get stuck.
Occasionally someone would find an isolated group living unnoticed somewhere outside the control of the Law, but those groups tended to be sickly and dimwitted. The Wild Men were robust and clever. Ashok assumed it was because they’d had a bigger population to start with. Inbreeding made for weak and stupid children, which was why arbiters checked genealogical records before arranging marriages. The occasional escaped prisoner from the House of Assassins who joined them had brought fresh blood as well.
It was surprising how many of the tribe had come from the Lost House over the years. The wizards made at least a cursory attempt to catch their runaways, but if they made it very far at all it was easy to declare them dead from exposure or eaten by demons in the unforgiving swamp, and give up the search. If anything, the haughty wizards had probably assumed their neighboring barbarians would kill any escapees they found, not take them in and offer them shelter. With nowhere else to go, far from homes they couldn’t really remember because they’d been kidnapped as children, most of them had been glad to be adopted into the Wild Men. From what Thera had told him, the wizards had been a cruel and nefarious bunch of plotters. Better to live a simple life in a swamp.
The tribe’s hatred of the wizards was palpable. It had taken Thera’s direct intervention to keep the Wild Men from murdering their lone wizard prisoner, Waman. Both groups had been of the same house once, but after the Capitol had broken the dams and flooded their lands, the wizards had left the lower-caste survivors to fend for themselves. Knowing that the wizards had only spared their lives because rumors of a savage tribe living the Bahdjangal helped keep their house a secret, had made the Wild Men even angrier at their wealthy cousins. Last night Toramana had said it was the prophecy of Mother Dawn that had told them to move to Thera’s paradise, but Ashok suspected the biggest reason the Wild Men had been so eager to join them was because with the House of Assassins destroyed, they had no one left to spite with their survival.
Satisfied that there was no significant danger ahead of them, Ashok leapt up and ran east toward the sea. For speed and stealth, he was dressed like the swamp hunters, shirtless and barefoot. The suit of Protector armor that they’d found in the House of Assassins—which Gutch had repaired and fitted for him over the winter using the Wild Men’s meager blacksmithy—was packed with their baggage.
At the flank, Ashok positioned himself between his obligation and hell. But today the distant waves were still. The meanest predators they faced now were the mosquitos. From his hidden position, he watched the column pass.
Even though Jagdish had left them that morning and gone north, the Sons of the Black Sword were still following their risaldar’s last orders. Warrior and worker both—from several different Great Houses, their divisions forgotten—had placed themselves protectively around the women, children, and animals of the Wild Men.
They were called the Sons because their organization had been born with the destruction of Angruvadal. Though for Jagdish, it was more like he was their father, even though he was barely older than they were. Jagdish was a fine officer, and Ashok would do his best to lead them as Jagdish had, though he knew he would fall short. Some men—like Jagdish—were born to lead others into battle. Ashok was battle incarnate. Where he led would be the death of a normal soldier. But he would try to keep these alive.
Scattered among the crowd were the dozen slaves they’d freed from the House of Assassins. Thera had told him about how the wizards kept their numbers up by stealing magically gifted children from all over Lok. Those who developed the proper skills and mindset would eventually join the ranks of their captors, while those found unworthy had their minds scrubbed by magic and were made into slaves.
The simpletons were easy to pick out, because the former slaves needed to be guided along or they’d wander off. They were really only good at simple repetitive tasks, and anything that required much thinking left them befuddled. Ashok found that their presence made him uncomfortable, so he had avoided speaking with any of them too much. Perhaps it was because what had been done to them sounded similar to what the wizard Kule had done to him as a child. The difference being that Ashok had been carefully reconstructed afterward into a perfect servant of the Law, while the Lost House slaves were left broken and simple.
It was unknown if their minds would ever recover, like the one who had set fire to the Fortress powder at the Lost House had seemed to somewhat. Waman, their captive wizard, had denied knowing the answer. However, regardless of their condition, Thera had declared that they were to be treated well. Life was cheap in Lok, but not in her camp.
As for their wizard captive, Waman had not survived the winter. Thera had wanted to keep him alive in case she could think of a use for him. Except even a prophet’s authority only extended so far when it came to a wizard prisoner being held by a tribe those same wizards had hunted for sport. They did not know which of the vengeful Wild Men had snuck into the prisoner’s hut and slit Waman’s throat late one night. Finding that answer was not worth testing the tribe’s loyalty.
However, the wizard’s presence had one lasting effect. In the weeks before he’d been murdered, Waman had testified to everyone who would listen about how he’d seen Ashok return from the dead and lift himself off the meat hook that had gone through his heart, a feat that should have been impossible, even with black-steel magic. The tribe may have despised the wizard, but they believed his tale about Ashok, and since Ashok would never deny the truth—and he truly had died and come back—his legend grew.
Though Ashok had lived among them for a season, most of the tribe talked about him as if he was a supernatural being more than a man. Luckily their reverence was not too galling. One could hardly worship the Forgotten’s warrior as some high and mighty being when he went hunting or foraging with them every day.
Ashok moved to the end of the column.
As he crouched there, waiting to see if they were being followed, an odd thought occurred to him. For a few months, life had been uncomplicated. This had been a brief glimpse into a mundane existence of survival and labor. He knew it was naïve, but he could almost picture he and Thera living out their days in obscurity, tilling the soil like workers, not leading a futile rebellion to certain doom.
He had never been allowed thoughts of a future. That had always been a nebulous concept at best. There had been only obligation, and when his service to the Protector Order was done, then surely there would have been new duties assigned by his house. There was no longer a plan. He did not have a place. Was it possible? Dare he make his own?
Only Thera had an obligation from the gods, and he had an obligation to her. In a few days they would be back within the civilized world, beneath the unflinching gaze of the Law, and in all likelihood their lives would be short, and never simple again.
He was going to miss the swamp.