The Gold Falcon - Katharine Kerr [25]
“They’re not far, about three miles,” Gerran told Cadryc. “Do you think it’s worth a look?”
“I do,” Cadryc said. “I want to hear what he can tell us.”
When they rode out, the warbands clattered across Lord Samyc’s bridge, then headed out into the meadowland on the western side of the river. They found the last man from the village long before they reached the wild wood, along with the site of what must have been one of the raiders’ camps, judging from the trampled grass, fire pits, scattered garbage, and the like.
The villager, however, could tell them nothing. About a hundred yards west of the camp, they found a lumpish low mound covered with blankets that had been pinned down at each corner with a wooden stake. They all assumed that it was a dead Horsekin, covered to protect him from scavengers. With a dragon hunting their mounts, the Horsekin would have had no time for a proper burial.
“Let’s take those blankets off,” Cadryc said. “Let the ravens pull him to pieces.”
Gerran dismounted, and Salamander joined him. Together they pulled up the wood stakes and threw back the blankets. Flies rose in a black cloud of outraged buzzing. For a moment Gerran almost vomited, and Salamander took a few quick steps back.
The corpse was human, naked, lying on his back, and he’d been staked out with thick iron nails hammered through the palm of each hand and the arch of each foot. Judging from the amount of dried blood around each stake, he’d been alive for the process and perhaps for a little while after. He was bearded in blood, too, because he’d gnawed his own lips half away in his agony. Where his eyes had been black ants swarmed. At some point in this ghastly process the Horsekin had slit him from breech to breastbone and pulled out his internal organs. In a pulsing mass of ants they lay in tidy lines to either side of him, bladder, guts, kidneys, liver, and lungs, but the heart was missing.
“What—who in the name of the Lord of Hell would do such a thing?” Gerran could only whisper. “Ye gods, savages! That’s all they are!”
“In the name of Alshandra, more likely.” Salamander sounded half-sick. “I’ve heard about this, but I’ve never seen it before, and I thank all the true gods for that, too.”
“What have you heard?”
“That they do this to selected prisoners, always men, and usually someone who’s been stupid enough to surrender. They send them with messages to Alshandra’s country. That’s somewhere in the Otherlands, I suppose.” Salamander paused to wipe his mouth on the sleeve of his shirt. He swallowed heavily, then turned away from the sight. “As the prisoner’s dying, they tell him he’s lucky, because their goddess will give him a favored place in her land of the dead.”
“I hope to every god that he lied when he got there.”
“That’s why they keep the heart. If he lies, they say, they’ll torture it, and he’ll feel the pains in the Otherlands.”
Gerran tried to curse, but he could think of nothing foul enough. He turned away and saw that even Cadryc had gone white about the mouth.
“Let’s bury him,” the tieryn said. “And then we’re heading home. There’s naught else we can do for him or any of the other poor souls they took.”
“Good idea, your grace.” Gerran pointed to a pair of riders. “You—take the latrine shovels and dig him a proper grave.”
As they dismounted, Gerran heard a raven calling out from overhead. He glanced up and saw a single large bird circling—abnormally large, as he thought about it. With a flap of its wings it flew away fast, heading east. Gerran turned to mention it to Salamander, but the gerthddyn had walked some yards away and fallen to his knees. He appeared to be ridding himself of his breakfast in a noisy though understandable fashion. And after all, Gerran told himself, there’s naught strange about a corpse-bird come to carrion. He put the matter out of his mind.
Everyone was very kind. Perhaps that was the most painful thing of all, this unspoken