The Wasteland Soldier, Book 3, Drums Of War (TWS) (4 page)

“This is nothing to do with you.” He winked. “But one day I will take you away, Quinn, I can promise you that.”

Chuckling, she fetched herbs from the garden, pinching them between finger and thumb.

“There are some very clean and comfortable boarding houses in Touron.”

“Is that another name for whorehouse?”

He laughed. She drew her own pipe, filled it.

“Anyway, you’re
really
not my type.”

Smoke curled around his coarse lips. His face was crunched, scarred and weather beaten, his body stocky, muscular, hard; the perennial soldier, witness to all kinds of madness across the land.

“Sal Munton?” she asked.

“It was winter the last time his gang looted,” said Duggan, puffing. “I thought they’d turned over a new leaf or something but last week a merchant was robbed near Great Onglee. Had all his spices and coins taken. They broke his arm and crushed his hand. Vicious little bastards.”

“So they’ve started again?”

“Seems that way.” His dark eyes scanned the land. “Did I tell you Ossie is fat again?”

Quinn, straddling the wall, shook her head.

“What am I supposed to do?” he grumbled. “That’s number eight.”

“You’re supposed to ram it up something that won’t give you babies. Won’t one of your men oblige?”

Duggan rubbed his jaw, smoked. Quinn couldn’t imagine herself stuck in one place doing the same thing over and over again like his wife. It would be better to put a noose around her neck.

“Congratulations,” she said.

He raised his pipe.

“What did Jeremy want? I saw him sniffing around. Is he still trying to convince you to go?”

“He’s a good boy.”

“He’s after your bush.”

Quinn feigned disgust. “You’ve been a soldier too long. Did you see him with Pretan?”

“Pretan can be a bit loose with his hands. Mind you, some youngsters need a clobber from time to time.”

“Not Jeremy.

“Did he tell you the Archbishop is coming?”

“Yes, he thinks it’s because of me. Is it?”

“It’s the time of the Summer Blessings. You know that. I’m riding to Touron tomorrow to escort him back here.”

“Is that the only reason you’re going?”

Duggan hesitated. “What do you mean?”

“Nothing.” She cleared her throat. “Just seems a lowly task for a veteran Captain.”

“What are the rumours?”

“I don’t listen to rumours.”

“That’s because most of them are about you.”

She smiled, puffed on her pipe. “True.”

The villagers inside the Holy House broke into song. Sweet harmonies floated around the village. Clouds edged across the sun. The light rain continued to fall in the mid morning gloom.

“But if I was to listen to rumours,” she said. “I would’ve heard about a new treaty with the Kiven. A trade agreement. Something to do with food for iron.”

Duggan’s eyes lingered on the Holy House. He raised his pipe to his mouth.

“Touron politics don’t interest me, Quinn. You know that.”

“Is there a new treaty?”

“All I know is they want my signature. Along with many others.”

“You’re not happy about it, are you?”

“I just do my job.”

“Are the iron mines running low?”

“I’m a soldier, Quinn, not a politician. But I thought Ennpithia had a strong enough economy meaning we wouldn’t have to trade with those bastards.”

He hated them and she understood the hatred. He had served in the Churchmen Regiment for more than thirty years and his son, Devlan, had followed him into the service only to be killed in the civil war a decade ago. Ruthlessly cut down at the Place of Bridges only hours after a peace treaty had been brokered and cemented by the Archbishop. But it had taken nearly a day for the order to reach the battlefront where the senseless fighting had continued to rage and Devlan had died for absolutely nothing.

“So there is going to be a treaty with them?”

Duggan jabbed his pipe toward the Holy House. “You keep badgering me and I’ll order you to attend Reverence Morning.”

“I’m a servant. You know that.”

He looked at her. “Bollocks.”

“Now you’re being nasty.”

“Will you be gone when I get back?”

“I’m leaving this afternoon. Jeremy will keep an eye on Daniel. I need to understand what happened to her.”

“Your niece died a pointless death, Quinn. That’s what happened. I’d hate to see you suffer the same way.”

He lowered his pipe.

“She probably went up there on a dare.”

“Mosscar is a long way to ride for a dare. I need the truth.”

“You do whatever you need to do but no more arson attempts on Holy Houses. There are only so many things I can blame on Sal Munton.”

“Thank you for protecting Daniel.”

His hand went to the cross on his armour. “Lord forgive me for lying but I know what it is to lose a child. It can break a man – or a woman - more than any blade or arrow.” He paused. “I questioned everyone, Quinn. No one knew why she had gone there. Daniel was working. He didn’t even know she’d left. I couldn’t find any answers. Your brother said she’d become very secretive. He thought something was troubling her but she never told him what it was and you were on the road.”

“Thanks for that,” she said, flatly.

“You bloody know I didn’t mean it like that. Look, whatever you do, just make sure I don’t come across any bodies.”

“You won’t.”

Duggan nodded and smoked and continued to listen to the Reverence Morning service.

“You might find that it was nothing more than a tragic accident.”

“No one wanders into Mosscar by accident, Duggan. That would be the same as throwing yourself off a cliff or sticking your head in an open fire.”

He gestured helplessly with his hands. He had no answers for her.

“What about Boyd?” he asked. “How’s the fat shopkeeper going to cope without you?”

“Be nice. He’s my friend. And he’s hiring Dobbs and Farrell.”

“That pair of wankers. Both of them are not worth half of you.”

“Thank you, but there’s no one else. Not unless you can spare a few Churchmen.”

Shouts suddenly filled the air. Duggan sprang to his feet. He ran toward the centre of the village. There was more shouting. Quinn narrowed her eyes. A number of children burst into view, clutching sacks, some of them bulky. Yelling, they scattered toward the trees. The Churchmen unleashed a barrage of arrows and three bodies went down. The remaining two looters swerved and looped over the grassland, not looking back. Duggan barked orders at his men and a group of soldiers gave chase into the trees.

Quinn was about to rush over and help but the commotion had stirred Daniel.

“Liss? Liss? Lissa? Is that you, Lissa? Lissa? Lissa? Where are you, Lissa? Liss? Lissa?”

His voice began to crack into ragged splutters and coughs. As she reached the cottage door she heard choked sobs.

She closed her eyes, clenched and unclenched her fists.

“I’m coming, Daniel.”

The Churchmen yanked a scrawny boy to his feet. Two of his fellow looters lay unmoving in the grass, peppered with arrows.

“Little bastard’s still alive, Captain.”

He wriggled and spat and cursed but they pinned his arms. Duggan ignored him for the moment and crouched beside the bodies.

“Collect up everything they stole,” he said, lifting the head of the first looter, revealing the pale face of a boy, possibly ten or eleven years old, eyes wide open and staring. He let the head drop. “Make sure it’s returned before the congregation have finished.”

The second looter had stringy black hair. He snatched a handful, tugged the head back and saw it was a girl, only seven or eight years old. Face down, it had been impossible to discern any difference. One of his daughters was the same age. He placed a gloved hand beneath her chin and carefully lowered her lifeless head into the wet grass.

Grim-faced, rain drilling against his helmet, he turned to the prisoner. An arrow was lodged deep in his thigh. Blood trickled along the shaft and down his leg. His blotchy skin was filmed with perspiration and he was panting heavily.

“Didn’t you fancy attending Holy House this morning, Billy?”

“You killed Daisy and Roger,” spat Billy. “You’re dead, knee bender.”

His lips were drawn back across an uneven row of yellowed teeth. His gnarled eyes brimmed with hate.

“Where are you camped?”

“Fuck off,” he shouted, beads of sweat dribbling over his nose. “I’m not telling you a thing, knee bender.”

Duggan slapped him hard across the face, shocking the insolence from the stupid boy. His men were in the woodland, hunting down the remaining two thieves. Sal and the rest of the gang wouldn’t be too far away. He hoped they would return soon. It had already taken too long.

“Tell me, boy.”

“Get fucked, knee bender.”

“Where’s your Dad? Where’s Sal?”

“You killed my brother and sister. Bastard knee bender.”

Duggan could still hear the singing from the Holy House.
The congregation were blissfully unaware of what was happening. It was better that way. He did not want the pressure of a baying mob.

“If we don’t treat that wound you’ll lose your leg, Billy. Tell me where the camp is and we’ll help you.”

“I’m telling you nothing.” Billy was gasping for air. “We’re gonna get you, knee bender. You and … you and your fat bitch whore wife. We’re gonna …”

Duggan yanked at the arrow in the boy’s leg. Billy screamed. Tears poured from his eyes.

“Do you want to be a cripple? A cripple who pisses himself? Do you know what happens to a thief who cannot run, Billy?”

“Leave me alone.”

Duggan glanced at the bodies in the grass. He lunged at Billy and twisted the arrow a second time.

“Tell me.”

FOUR

“Clarissa?”

“She’s dead, Daniel.”

He was a bag of rippled skin pegged to weakening bones and stuffed into a rocking chair beneath layers of blankets. He was in the corner, in the shadows, curled beside the window, the wooden shutter closed and latched. Quinn stepped toward him. She could feel the heat of the open fire. His head was lowered. Spittle dribbled over his lips, tears wept from his right eye. The left side of his face was gone; merely folds of blackened skin. She stared numbly at what little remained of her brother, gritting her teeth and taking sharp breaths. She had come to terms with none of the past few weeks.

His mess filled her nostrils. He mumbled as she put on the water. She set out clean clothes and slowly unwound his blankets. She could hear a boy screaming in the distance but ignored it. Once the water had boiled she stripped and bathed him, her hands carefully gliding over his ruined body. She was silent and methodical as she worked. The fire had destroyed little of the Holy House. It had consumed nearly all of Daniel.

She dressed him and lay him down on the bed. She put the soiled clothes in a basket and put the basket in the garden. She took a hard bristle brush to his chair and scrubbed it furiously until the odour had faded. He talked as she worked but she ignored him. Finished, she bathed her hands. Waves of sickness swirled in the pit of her stomach and she buried her damps hands in her long thick hair, digging her nails hard into her scalp. The pain held back the tears. She had not cried since childhood. She would not cry in womanhood.

“I’m hungry,” he mumbled.

She put on soup and fetched a tray, a bowl, a spoon and a half-loaf of dried bread from the pantry cupboard.

Outside, the wind stirred and the rain tapped against the old stone walls of the cottage. She nudged open a shutter. Deacon Rush and Father Devon were on the steps of the Holy House, making the sign of the cross as they bade farewell to the congregation.

The soup began to bubble.

“Where is she?”

His voice was croaky, she could barely hear him. She sat him up and tied a cloth around his neck. “Where’s my little girl gone?”

“Clarissa’s dead. Do you remember, Daniel? She was sick and she died. You buried her in the grounds of the Holy House.”

Quinn set the tray across his lap. His right eye blinked at her. She saw the flicker of flames in his pupil.

“Why are you here? Where’s Lissa?”

She fed him. Some of the vegetables trickled from his lips onto the cloth. She broke off a piece of bread, soaked it and pushed it into his mouth. He chewed, laboriously, his tongue forcing the hunk of bread against his teeth. He swallowed and stared for a moment and Quinn saw a sudden flash of recognition in his only working eye.

“Annie?”

“Don’t call me that,” she said, poking him. “You know I hate that name.”

“Quinn. Always Quinn.”

There was a sharp knock at the door. Daniel tilted his head in anticipation. A half-smile spread across his moist lips.

“Lissa?”

“She’s dead,” said Quinn, rising from the bed. “You know that.”

Daniel nodded.

“I know that.”

It was Jeremy, babbling excitedly about the Munton’s botched raid on the village. She hushed him and told him to fetch a bowl if he was hungry. She settled back down with her brother but his hunger had waned and he shook his head as she raised the spoon. Jeremy noisily rooted out a clean bowl from the pantry cupboard. He stood beside the fire, feeling the warmth seep through his damp clothes and cold bones. It had been freezing inside the Holy House. And it was supposed to be summer.

He spooned in a large helping and began to tuck in, eating on his feet, talking incessantly. Quinn cleared away Daniel’s lunch and left him on the bed for the time being before dragging his chair from the window and planting it in the middle of the cluttered and gloomy room.

“Daniel,” she said, talking slowly. “I need to go away for a few days. Do you understand me?”

His single eye blinked at her.

“Jeremy will be stopping by to feed you. You’re all clean now. Remember to use the bucket when you need to piss and shit. Do you hear me, Daniel? I won’t be here to bathe you so use the bucket. Leave it outside and Jeremy will empty it for you.”

Daniel groaned, shaking his head.

“You can manage that. You’re not an invalid. You found the ale last night, didn’t you?”

Jeremy gulped down a mouthful of peas and potatoes. He had no problem checking in on Daniel and heating up food and feeding him but the thought of emptying a piss and shit bucket made his stomach lurch. He looked at Quinn’s brother, once a popular and good natured and likeable man in Brix, now more like a re-animated corpse. In a drink fuelled rage he’d poured out his pain upon the Holy House, dousing the building and attempting to set fire to it, blaming them for taking Clarissa from this world; but he’d clumsily ignited himself and was fortunate that Duggan had been on patrol that evening. The captain had saved Daniel’s life and spun a tale that pinned the crime on Sal Munton and his gang with Daniel an innocent bystander who’d stumbled across them. No one doubted Duggan’s word and the local people instantly believed that no sin was beyond the wild crime family.

Jeremy had noticed in the days after the fire there had been muttering through the village.
How could He punish Daniel by first taking his child and then mutilating him in a fire?

How indeed, thought Jeremy.

He licked his bowl clean, smoothed back his hair. He watched Quinn gather items and put them inside a battered rucksack.

“When are you going?”

“In a few hours,” she said, tipping the leftovers of the soup into a flask.

“You can’t go into Mosscar.”

She squeezed his shoulder. “You’re a good boy, Jeremy. Take care of my brother. He’s all I have now.”

“You have me,” said Jeremy, a sad look in his eyes. “The city will kill you.”

“I’ll be okay,” she said, passing him a small leather bag of coins. “This should take care of any food.”

He felt the weight of the coins. “But the sickness. It killed …”

“I’ll be okay,” said Quinn, firmly. “I know what I’m doing.”

Jeremy nodded, fell silent.

“Listen to me, Jeremy, Daniel has nothing and he’ll depend on you but he can manage some things so don’t do everything for him. And no drink. No matter how much he begs for it. Ale is bad for him. I know you won’t let me down.”

“I won’t let you down. I promise. I just …”

She dropped her voice to a whisper.

“I have to tell you something, Jeremy, something you must never repeat. It might stop you from worrying.”

She opened her rucksack, took out a much larger bag of coins. He stared at it. He had never seen so much money before.

“What’s all that for?”

“I’m meeting someone before I go into Mosscar. He can supply me with a piece of Ancient tech. It will keep me alive in there. I don’t have time to explain it to you – I just want you to stop worrying. I told you, Jeremy, I’m not stupid, I know exactly what I’m doing.”

Jeremy went pale.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

He grabbed a bucket and threw up. She massaged the back of his neck as he wretched.

“It’s against the law,” he said, panting, his face ashen. “They’ll hang you if you’re caught with Ancient tech.”

“Then you need to be a grown up and learn how to keep your mouth shut.”

He steadied his breathing.

“Do you want to help me sort out the weapons? Dobbs and Farrell will be here soon. They’re taking over from me …”

“What’s all that shouting?” said Jeremy, suddenly.

“You killed my kids,” hissed Sal Munton, veins popping on his craggy face, desperation in his eyes. “You murderers.”

Duggan looked at his six men, bruised and bleeding, wrists bound with rope, kneeling at the edge of the woods. Munton was surrounded by his gang of thieves, ten of them, all children, some no more than five or six years old, a mixture of boys and girls. Many of them were his own blood, his seed tossed into a host of different women, but a number of them were strays; orphans and runaways picked up from settlements and villages scattered through the Western Hills. Duggan wondered if any had been stolen, whisked away in the night, parents left devastated.

The Holy House service had finished and hundreds of villagers had gathered behind him but the children were unflinching with cold menace in their eyes as they stood brandishing wooden clubs fitted with coiled wire or pieces of razor sharp metal, ideal for close combat. None of the children carried the bows stolen from his men. It took years of practice to develop the muscles to handle one of those. Duggan had a dozen Churchmen soldiers with him, arrows notched. There were more at the barracks but a dozen was all he needed.

Father Devon and Deacon Rush waited breathlessly for Duggan’s response. The captain boasted superior numbers and superior strength but none of that mattered; all that counted was the forbidden weapon of the Ancients held in Munton’s thick grasp; a long, twin barrelled shotgun.

“We need to treat Billy’s leg,” called Duggan. “No one wants him to end up crippled, Sal.”

“I don’t care what you fucking want,” said Munton, spittle flying from his mouth, the shotgun swinging toward the captured Churchmen. “My poor boy, Roger. And Daisy. How could you kill an innocent girl like Daisy? She’d been through so much and no one believed her. You don’t understand, Duggan, I saved her.”

“How? By introducing her to a life of crime? You should have placed her with the Holy House.”

“The fucking Holy House,” spat Munton, jabbing the shotgun. “I’m going to even the score and slaughter your men.”

“That’s not the answer, Sal.”

“Shut up,” roared Munton, scuffed boots angrily stamping across the dewy grass. “Just shut up.” Tears spilled from his eyes, mingling with the lightly falling rain. “My poor kids. I take care of them, you know that. I never hurt them. Why did you do it? Why, you bastard?”

“You know why, Sal. You started robbing again, sending them here to take from folk who don’t have much.”

There were heckles from the villagers.

“Kill them all! They make our life a misery! Thieving scum! Little bastards! What are you waiting for?”

The children seemed unfazed by the cries. Duggan held up his hand, took a step forward.

“You hold it right there.” Munton cocked the shotgun, finger curled around the trigger.

The captain stared into the black muzzles. He had not faced a weapon of this type for ten years.

“You’re the one who killed them, Sal. I warned you what would happen. I told you to stop stealing.”

“What else can we do? You understand nothing about us.”

There was growing dissent amongst the onlookers, noisily suggesting that the Churchmen should fire their bows at Munton and his grimy faced looters. Duggan could sense this was going to turn very ugly unless he found a solution. He could not bargain with a man like Sal Munton. There was no reasoning about rights and wrongs with a man who had lived an untamed existence for nearly forty years, ploughing that doctrine of chaos through generations of his extended family. Duggan knew Munton would happily murder the Churchmen he’d captured - even if that meant sacrificing his brood or himself. But he’d fought in the war to stop faithless men like Munton. He knew there was only one answer.

He opened his mouth to give the order for his men to fire, knowing he was risking the hostages, but it was Father Devon’s voice that was heard.

“Mr Munton, I understand your pain.”

Duggan glared but remained silent. The priest was one of the most senior men in the village. Only the retired Father William was older. Father Devon glided through the wet grass, tall and spindly, clad in black. His darkened skin was testament of his passion for gardening. Watery blue eyes angled toward a curved nose and his lips were tight and bloodless, hardly moving as he spoke. His sedative voice was nothing like the fiery rage often brought to Reverence Mornings.

“Our Lord has taken your two innocent children from the very soil on which we now stand. But there is always a reason.”

“I know the reason, preacher man,” snarled Munton. “Duggan and his bullies are the fucking reason. They were only children, Father.”

“Children who know how to rob and kill! It’s your fault they’re dead! Shoot all the little bastards!”

Billy had turned white. He was panting, the arrow still lodged in him.

“Do we all not carry the stain of sin?” said Father Devon, sweeping his arms toward the soldiers and the villagers. “We walk in a world that was shattered by our many sins. But the Lord forgave us and gifted us Ennpithia to begin again. Do we know better than Him when it comes to forgiveness and understanding?”

He looked to the skies, made the sign of the cross.

“There is no man, woman or child here free of sin. Our very souls are black with sin. This is why we pray.”