The Jack of Souls (Multi-award winner!)

Chapter 31 - Father Kogan Fills His Belly

He makes a poor smith who fears sparks. He makes a poor priest who fears death.

— Arkendian Proverb

Chapter Thirty-One

Kogan stared at the sign post, chewing at his beard. There were letters on the sign, which made his eyes ache, and made him wish he had the Widow Larkin with him. She had a head for letters and would straight tell him what they said. The letters stood out clear and fresh painted, and there was a fresh painting of the crown in one corner of the placard, which meant it was the queen's sign. But under the paint was a faded mark. A hand print, it was. What you see when a guard bids you stop.

"Like as not it says, Turn back, queen's land," he muttered.  

He shifted the massive Phyros ax to his other shoulder, and took a long drink from his water skin. The water was still cold from the last stream he crossed, and tasted good in spite of the tang of the skin, which tasted like it once had wine in it. He'd been hiking without sleep since he left Marta and Miles. A day straight, that was, and he was dog tired. But no matter. He'd jog a while and get his blood moving.

He hadn't taken a step when he noticed the sound of hoof beats from the wood he'd just emerged from. Many hooves, and near, by the sound of them. He hadn't noticed their approach because he'd been puzzling over the sign.

Stepping behind a boulder the size of a shed, he hunkered down on his heels, cursing the invention of letters and signposts. The deep thud of the hooves and the ring and clack of armor told him it was a company of armored knights on destriers; if he'd been spotted, it would be a short battle.

When the company of knights drew adjacent his position, the leader called out, and the hoof beats quieted to the sound of blowing horses. He judged the nearest was so close a normal man could have stood where he was and spit on it, though he himself could likely spit on several, as he could spit farther than any man he knew.

He sunk as low as he could between his heels, and leaned his back flat against the boulder. Intending to hold his breath and listen, he was half way through a deep intake of air when a whiff of perfume struck him in the nose like an ax and he gagged on the foul stuff such that only the lucky approach of another thundering company saved him from being heard.

Two dozens of knights and retainers now, he judged. Holding the ax with one hand, he used the other to pull up a fold of his smothercoat to sift the air.

"Fire-cone pass," a man's voice called back to the rear of the company. "Sign says no open flames, and no spitfires past this point." A dozen men laughed in chorus.

"Good thing we don't have spitfires," said one.

"Indeed. Dismount! We'll break for a piss and a drink. Fetch wine!"

Someone dismounted so near that their shadow in the early morning sunlight flashed across the dirt next to Kogan. Kogan re-set his grip on the ax. This is it. The first to step around the boulder with his cob in his hand to piss would fall in two pieces. Then he'd make his stand against the boulder and he wouldn't be satisfied until he took at least twelve with him and he'd know when he lost count that he could rest.

"Hold!" the leader called. "Belay that order. Something stinks like a pig's ass here."

"Rot, you're right," said voice so loud its owner could be no more than a stride from rounding the boulder.  "It rotting stinks to the moons. That Phyros piss?"

"No. If we find confirmation of Willard's passing, I'll send you with word to his Holiness. Saddle up! I'll find a spot that doesn't fist rape my nose."

Kogan ground his teeth. Least I don't smell like a lady's pillow case, ye silk-button cockrel. Wouldn't know a proper man smell if I rolled you in it.

The company re-mounted and rode. When he judged the last had gone, he shifted until he could see their diminishing backs in double file on the road. A shining company of oranges and yellows and one green with lances and pennons flying. He counted them to twelve almost twice. Half were armored knights, the rest squires and grooms with heavy spitfires and crossbows balanced across their saddles.

Willard may have come that way, too. Gods leave me, I hope I haven't led them to ye, Will.

He sat back down against the boulder and laid the ax across his thighs. He wouldn't travel again until nightfall. No telling where the company would camp or leave spotters, or when they might send messengers back down the road.

He woke to the sound of creaking axles and the murmur of men's voices. By the sun's position, he guessed it late afternoon. When the source of the noise passed, he peered out and saw a cart full of work men and another full of tools and great piles of hemp rope like they were going to a siege. It occurred to him then that Willard could be holed up in the very tower Kogan had set out to find.  "I'll be a pig's ass after all," he chuckled. He toyed with the idea of following the troupe and causing mischief amongst their ranks. Not that I owes you anymore, Will. But I might like it if you owe me one for a change.

He waited till sun set and the Bright Mother rose, then set out hiking east on the road. As he chewed the last of the bread Marta had given him, he crested a ridge and got his first view of the fire-cone stand and its thunder-rod. He'd nearly make it there before sunrise, he gauged, unless darkness slowed him  or he encountered a camp of knights.

He'd scarcely thought this when a rider approached from ahead and he hid in the trees as a knight passed him, heading back down the road with a message. It occurred to him too late that he might have waylaid the man to take any food in his panniers.

The next time he heard a rider's hooves he stepped behind a tree and waited with ax in hand. Peering around the tree, he tried to determine if the rider were a knight or perhaps just a workman. He didn't want to take out a workman. Like as not they were good common folk forced into service by the knights. But the moonlight under the trees was broken and he couldn't get a clear look before the man got too close and he had to duck back. He could call out, "Who goes there?" but that risked revealing himself to a squire who could loose a crossbow bolt into his gut or spur past and alert the priest hunters.

Cursing, he'd resolved to let the man pass unmolested when the stink of perfume relieved all doubt of innocent workmen. When the horse's head passed the tree, Kogan grabbed the reins with one hand and swept the hapless squire from the saddle with the broad side of the Phyros ax.

The man crashed into another tree on the way down, and the horse went berserk. Kogan held the reins down and kept the beast's head low until it responded to his cooing and gentling and ceased to struggle. The man didn't move. Even the broad side of a Phyros ax left few survivors. He stroked the animal's nose, and spoke kind , and soon he was able to loop the reins over a branch and leave it to explore the saddle bags. He had a way with beasts that way. Never panicked himself, and they responded to that.

In the panniers he found cheese and bread and a flagon of wine, all of which he downed while the horse munched a handful of carrots. When he pilfered the rest of the food—a bag of dried beef and apricots—he set the horse free and left the squire his purse so it would appear he wasn't robbed but merely thrown from his horse. 

In a shard of light from the moon, the squire's dead eyes stared accusingly at Kogan.

"Don't blame me, lad."  He stepped over the squire as he proceeded up the road. "It's the gods' war, and you'd have done a sight worse to me In the name of Krato."

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