The Butchers, The Menders

Part 8

“You wish to bargain again?” the butcher said.

“I do, for a set of gills.”  Only a slight tremor in his voice betrayed his fear.

The butcher reached around to its back and procured a pair of gills, silver and pink and red.  They moved as Dalen watched, expanding and contracting, never-ending.  Each was as long as his hand and just as wide.

“And what must I do in return?”

“In the cliff face are long, narrow holes.  A small worm lives inside.  It glows with a faint green light—you would not miss it.  Bring me one before the sun sets.  Do you accept this bargain?”

Dalen took a step back as the butcher's tentacles snaked out of the water, slithering through the grasses towards his feet.  “Perhaps.  With conditions.”

“What conditions?”

“First, I want to know why you won’t do this yourself.”

Again, the otter head bared its teeth.  “Eels live inside the holes as well.  They will shrink away from human hands, but they bite a butcher’s limbs.”

“They don't bite people?”

“Only when provoked.”

He’d exercised caution during the first bargain, but no conditions would protect him fully.  He would have to make this excursion as quick as possible.  “The worms live near the banks, here?”

“Yes.  They are on the opposite shore, below the tree with the roots that stretch into the water.”  The eyes of all three heads narrowed.  “Why so many questions and conditions?  Are you not desperate?”

Before Dalen could dance away, one of the tentacles latched onto his foot.

He couldn’t force his mind to blankness, and thoughts of Tayla threatened to surface, so he turned his mind to the only thing that could make him forget.  Narea.  He thought of her freckled skin, of her full lips, of her strong chin and large, dark eyes.

“So you do this for love,” the butcher said.  “How do the gills help you?”  Another tentacle slithered towards him.

Dalen sidestepped it.  “Enough!  Either you listen to my conditions, or you leave me in peace.”

To his surprise, the butcher withdrew.  For the first time, Dalen felt a trickle of apprehension over the things he fetched the butcher.  What did it need them for?  He shrugged it off and continued.  “You cannot interfere with my retrieval of the worm.  I want safe passage to the surface."

The hand at the center of the butcher’s chest clenched and unclenched.  “It is done.  Anything else?”

He ran through possibilities in his head.  “No.  I will accept this bargain.”

“As will we.”

Dalen took the gills and the butcher sank beneath the waves.  The gills were cold.  He lifted them to his nose and sniffed.  The smell of magic made his eyes water.

“So that’s what a butcher looks like.”  Narea emerged from behind a tree, her eyes wide.  The hand that held the tie around Beloved’s neck trembled.  “Dalen, are you sure?  It should be me bargaining with them, not you.”

“No.”  He tried to think of how to explain.  Tayla must have known the way butchers plucked a person’s thoughts.  Narea wouldn’t be able to withhold her love for Tayla, or to pretend she came to the shores for anything else.  But telling Narea this would necessitate explaining the butcher’s words, that he did this for love.  “Tayla is my family.  It is my obligation, my responsibility.”

“Yes, but—“

“I have to go.  We can’t waste any more time.”

Narea frowned but did not argue.

This time, he didn’t hesitate before slipping on the tail and making his way into deeper waters.  He held the gills in one hand, above the surface, as he swam out.  “Be ready,” he called to Narea on the shore.  “My spear is fastened to Beloved’s side.  Don’t hesitate to use it if the butchers prove treacherous.  I made no agreement to keep them from harm.”

“I will carry it in my hand,” Narea said.  “They are always treacherous.”

Before he could think about it any longer, Dalen slapped the gills on either side of his neck.  Almost immediately, the air felt hot, stifling, suffocating.  He dove beneath the surface.

Water filtered over his gills.  He breathed it in, then back out again.  No more bursting lungs or trips back to the surface.  He could spend as long as he needed beneath the waves, take his time in getting the worm.  This would be easier than the retrieving the violet plant.

Focus.  Dalen checked the banks and oriented himself towards the opposite shore, where the butcher had indicated.  He had to prepare for the worst.  The water brushed past his cheeks as he swam.  Below him, a school of fish, each as long as his arm, darted into the abyss.

It didn’t take long to find the tree with the roots that dipped into the water.  They ran along the cliff face, the deepest disappearing below, out of Dalen’s range of vision.  Instinctively, he drew in a long breath, and then swam down, following the roots.  With each swish of his tail, the water grew colder and darker.  He didn’t bother to look up, to check for the surface.  Any moment, his courage might fail him.  No holes in the cliff face yet, and still he swam.

Just as the light began to fade, he came across the eel dens.  Each was three times the width of his arm, spread across the cliff like pockmarks on an old man’s face.  In a few, the eels peeked out, their bodies swaying with the current.  Their mouths were hooked like Beloved’s bill, white teeth bright against dark skin.  They watched him from the corners of their eyes, pinpricks of red in the darkness.

The water down here chilled him to the bones, making him shiver.  Dalen started with the den nearest to him.  No glow emanated from within.  He checked the next, and the next.  In the fourth, he found them.  They clung to the walls of the den, worms as long and thick as his fingers—three of them.  The faint glow revealed the eel asleep within, less than a hand's breadth away from the worms.  Its mouth hung half-open, the teeth gleaming.

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The Butchers, The Menders is a completed novella. I'll be posting pieces of it every several days or so!

If you enjoyed this, please favorite! You can follow me on twitter @AndreaGStewart, find me on facebook, or visit my webpage at http://www.andreagstewart.com. I have several projects in the works, and some of my pieces are available or will be available in various online or paper publications.

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