The Hidden King
An extract from the above.
CHAPTER XXII
Red, livid streaks covered his exposed neck and the backs of his forearms. His sweat-soaked body was dirt-covered, and he stank; stank of swamp water and unidentified vegetation. He itched everywhere. Reaching up with a swollen, thick-fingered and puffy hand, he scratched at his ruddy neck with black, mud-encrusted nails, leaving behind a fresh set of red weals, raw and irritating. From a face turgid from the heavy, boiling heat, he studied with penetrating eyes the squat, broad-shouldered man standing calmly in front of him.
‘So you ran again, did you?’
‘We all run, Excellency, when our arses are exposed, naked in the air.’
The reply was not said in a presumptuous way, just a statement of fact.
‘Lippy as always, eh, sergeant? But I take your meaning. The past is the past. However, I’m more interested in where you’ve hidden my barges and, even more importantly, the rations inside them.
The governor had been on the run since his troops had deserted him on the battlefield over three weeks ago. He had been hunted every inch of the way and was not allowed to regroup, much less draw breath. Fighting a desperate rearguard, hounded by hit-and-run tactics, he had finally fled, mostly by accident, into the sprawling, cooking pot of a delta, a spreading unforgiving place of savage, unrelenting insects with an unnatural taste for blood. Added to this unsavoury stew were lurking reptiles bent on pulling any unwary living creature under the briny, fetid waters in which they lived and sly, silent natives who would prefer to put a poisoned arrow in you rather than spit at you. His prized horses, including his beautiful, mighty, grey stallion, had all succumbed to this pitiless environment — quartered and devoured by their riders and a fair number by the spiteful denizens of this watery hell-hole. Now he was hungry and had lost most of the dominating bulk that had identified him. He and his men had taken to raiding the stilt-raised, thatch villages which lay scattered and hidden among the mangroves. Falling on them as righteous men should, they had burnt these rude, offensive dwellings to the ground but not before they had taken everything and anything useful, killing the men and children, raping the women, old and young, then discarding them like refuse. These instances brought the governor alive again, he revelled in his dominance, and anyway, it was a sensible military option where survival mattered. Then he had run into Sergeant Cuttlefish, seemingly calm, well-fed, clean and in possession of two provision barges; luck was turning finally.
‘Mostly all spoilt now, your honour, and certainly too little left to feed all your men; perhaps enough for one good meal.’
The governor felt rage breaking into flame and beginning the process of consuming him. Unable to breathe, he struggled to suppress and overcome it.
Sergeant Cuttlefish watched the governor, who seemed rooted rigidly to the spot, his body twitching with involuntary spasms, his eyes clenched tightly shut, and his mouth working to gasp in the fetid air. He fought the urge to step back.
‘Are you well, Excellency?’ he failed to hide the alarm in his voice.
The governor’s eyes snapped open and, after a brief look of confusion, fixed him with a savage stare.
‘Don’t you ever do anything right, man!’ he accused.
The experienced sergeant decided it was wise not to respond.
The governor continued to stare for an inappropriately long time at Cuttlefish, who waited patiently under the scrutiny. As the seconds dragged by in silence, an air of anxiety began to rise in the sticky heat. All present were visibly relieved when they heard the sloshing boots of the returning scout as he waded across a shallow rivulet leading to their relatively dry little island.
With one last stabbing look, the governor broke away and turned his attention to the scout.
‘Report!’ he barked.
‘Sir! We’ve sighted another village. About three hours west of where you’re standing.’
‘Good! For what are we waiting? Let’s go! Cuttlefish, you too. Fall in!’
Four hours later, their wet clothes steaming into the air, mixing with the fish-like smell of rotting swamp vegetation; five hundred men, the last remnants of a once-proud, elite cavalry force, crawled forward on their bellies. They wormed their way through wet boggy ground, stunted swamp trees, and razor-sharp swamp grass, positioning themselves to surround an as-yet unaware village.
‘Why are we doing this?’ whispered Sergeant Cuttlefish to the man next to him.
‘To find food,’ the man whispered back.
‘Never heard of fishing?’ Cuttlefish grumbled back in return.
The man looked him up and down and grinned.
‘If he says anything stupid,’ thought Cuttlefish, ‘I’ll thump him hard.’
They were all gathering themselves, waiting for the governor’s signal to rush forward, when all hell broke loose.
Two forms, moving at unbelievable speed, erupted out of the sluggish river behind them in a burst of shimmering spray. Cuttlefish saw them first, doubting what his eyes were telling him. In that knife-edged balanced point in time, before his warning shout could reach the ears of his enforced companions, the apparitions were upon them. The first to get to them was a nightmare out of any madman’s dreams. It was tall and gaunt, with a broad, powerful, naked and very hairy chest. As it tore past the first soldier lying face down in the grass, it plucked him up as if he were a doll with one clawed hand. With the other, it grabbed him under his chin and, with a quick tug, ripped open the unfortunate soldier’s throat in a gush of gore. Cuttlefish felt his gorge rising into his throat and struggled not to throw up. The man beside him, sarcastic grin forgotten, was staring with bulging eyes. The second apparition was only a hairs breath behind the first. This one, at least, had the shape of an ordinary man, but all comparisons stopped there. He, too, was naked except for a loincloth, and his whip-hard body moved with an indescribable quickness. He leapt high, soaring over the body flung aside by his companion, landing on another soldier who was trying to rise and face this surprise attack. As he did so, he pinned the man to the ground with his knees, wrapped an arm around his neck, and with a swift casual jerk, broke his back, the loud snapping of backbones raising the goose-bumps on everyone, freezing them. In a heartbeat, he was up and moving again.
Then a wall of teeth chattering fear hit them. Cuttlefish, through all his long years of conflict, had never experienced such a thing. He lay there, unable to move, his limbs trembling in terror, and watched the soldier beside him roll his eyes upwards, his mouth a rictus-grin, until only the whites showed, then with an agonising groan, passed out, drool dribbling from his now open, slack mouth. Using every vestige of willpower that he had, Cuttlefish strained to keep track of the fast-moving, unstoppable pair as they weaved a path of utter destruction through five hundred men trained for war.
The governor, sword clenched tightly in his ham-like fist, staggered out into the speeding path of the half-naked man, slashing his weapon viciously at his neck. With consummate ease and without breaking stride, the brown-skinned man melted under the downward stroke of the sharp blade and flung the governor aside, sending him crashing into the undergrowth with as little effort as it would take a grown wolf to throw off a bothersome pup. So fast did they move that they were gone into the trees on the other side in what seemed like a blink of an eye, leaving men groaning and clutching broken limbs in their wake; quite a few did not move at all, and the sergeant suspected, some of these would never move again. Still shaking like a leaf in the wind, he pushed himself to his feet, only to have a whizzing arrow narrowly miss his cheek. Spinning around, he saw men streaming from the elevated straw huts, all sporting bows and, without doubt, poison-tipped arrows. This development was one step too far for most of the broken men, and many fled between the trees in every direction. The governor had managed to drag himself from his entanglement. Bellowing at the top of his lungs, he ordered the remainder of his men to fall in around him. Cuttlefish scrabbled over to join this group, knowing that it was his best chance of survival. Those who still had shields raised them defensively, and under the shouted orders of the governor, they withdrew in haste into the shelter of the stunted trees, thanking their god that the village men had chosen not to follow. Of the original five hundred who had started this latest venture, only about two hundred remained, and some of these clearly had arrows sticking in them; they were dead men walking, food for crows.
About half an hour later — after passing some of their members in one’s and two’s with torn-out throats and broken necks — the governor called a halt. The overextended men collapsed uncaring onto the sodden, squelching ground, ignoring the crawling, biting, stinging insects as they sought out this new blood feast. Suddenly, Cuttlefish started chuckling.
‘What’s so fucking funny, Cuttlefish!’ bellowed the governor.
‘Sorry, Gov, I was just thinking, that’s all. You see, we are a herd of buffalo. The wolves have split us to see how we run, and then they pick out the weak and the stragglers and bring them down. We are in the hunt, governor, and we are the prey.’
The governor stared at the solidly built sergeant contemplatively, then muttered.
‘Shut up, Cuttlefish!’
‘Yes, sir.’
Exhausted and frightened, with both their bodies and nerves worn down to a fraying edge, the soldiers struggled on, now and again encountering a grisly reminder of the sergeant’s ominous words.
‘Bloody appalling,’ mumbled the sergeant.
‘I said, ‘shut it’, Cuttlefish!’
‘Yes, sir.’
They spent an awful night huddled together. The vegetation was too wet and damp to start a fire with, and many of the day’s survivors were groaning under a burning fever, their bodies defences worn down to almost nothing. All those who had been unlucky, or maybe lucky, enough to be wounded by the poisoned arrows were now dead, left in the cloying heat to rot and stink.
‘Putrefaction,’ muttered Cuttlefish in the stinging, biting dark. ‘From mud, we comest, to mud we goest.’
‘Cuttlefish! I shan’t warn you again!’
‘No, sir. Yes, sir.’
About midnight, things started happening that caused the miserable group to descend into sheer panic. It began with a soldier who had wandered a little distance away to piss into the blanketing blackness surrounding their makeshift camp. As he fumbled to find himself by touch only, something reached out and yanked him into the trees; his startled shout led to a terrifying scream which ended abruptly, cut off by an ominous silence. Men drew closer together despite the heat in search of security, but they found none. At irregular intervals, men were snatched away, many finding death even before they could call out to their fellows. Fear covered the besieged group in a hot, sweltering, putrid miasma, making any attempts at sleep impossible and driving the distressed men into a world of hallucinations, into that no man’s land where the lost dead lurked.
Morning found their numbers much reduced. Twenty-five men stood taken, and to the horror of those still alive, the early mist revealed them hanging macabrely from the twisted branches all around. Another fifteen, who had found themselves overcome with swamp fever, had died in the night. Their cold corpses propped up between the bodies of their unknowing comrades. Hunger and despair gnawed at the ever-shrinking survivors, and from the look in their eyes, Cuttlefish could tell that more, losing all reason, would slip away and try to run, thinking that their party lay cursed, that the governor sat cursed. He was undoubtedly a man fit to be damned.
Browbeaten into line by a bullying governor, it was apparent that most of the men had already given up and were ready to lie down and die. They made a bedraggled and sorry lot as they filed out. Cuttlefish wanted no part of it and kept a low profile. He watched everything with a keen eye, ready to sway in whatever direction necessary to get out of this septic pit in one piece. The governor could continue to play the great war general if he wanted to, but although he couldn’t accept it, he was already dead, like the rest of his men. It was only a matter of time. The two hunting them were not human. They were exceptionally skilled, incredibly strong and fast, able to see in the dark, and undoubtedly very, very patient. No mercy stood expected from that quarter for whomever or whatever they were. It was clear that they wanted the governor and his war party dead, down to the last man.
‘Our best chance is to make it back to the barges, sir.’ volunteered the sergeant.
‘Oh, finally, you have something useful to say!’ replied the governor nastily. ‘Lead on then, Cuttlefish! Lead us to where you’ve stashed your stolen golden egg.’
Not bothering to reply, the sergeant squelched forward to take the point on his sturdy legs.
The journey towards the hidden barges was uneventful, if you can call boiling heat, sticky, sucking mud, swarms of persistent, stinging insects, and slicing sawgrass, uneventful. About one hundred and twenty hollow-eyed, ragged, limping men trailed down the long gentle slope towards a slow-moving tributary whose banks lay covered with Manchineel trees. One of the now near-starving soldiers reached up to pick one of the small apple-like fruits and took a quick, savage bite out of it. At the crunching sound, Cuttlefish spun around and shouted.
‘Stop, spit it out quickly, man!’
The soldier gazed blankly at him and replied.
‘Fuck off, Cuttlefish! Go and find your own.’
The sergeant watched him and muttered.
‘Ah, mi mancinella, my little apple, your kiss is sweet; you burn my heart and lead me to my death.’
The soldier suddenly stopped chewing, spitting the mulched pulp from his mouth.
‘What the…!’
He fell to his knees, gagging and spitting, his spittle tinged with pink blood. Then he rolled onto his back, clasping his stomach and moaning pitifully, his eyes wide with shock.
‘What’s happening to him, Cuttlefish!’ demanded an alarmed governor.
‘The fruit is poisonous, sir, deadly. Even the tree itself will burn the skin off you.’
Swiftly men edged away from the cooling shelter of the drooping leaves.
‘Help him, man!’
Cuttlefish answered in a steady, deadpan, matter-of-fact voice.
‘Nothing I can do, sir. He is already dead.’
His fellow soldiers stood around in a loose circle and watched their comrade in arms die slowly and agonisingly with slack, expressionless faces.
With a look of disgust passing over his face, Cuttlefish turned away and continued towards the river’s shaded edge. The governor trailed after him, followed by the rest of the group, leaving the dying man to find his solitary way to the spirit world.
Walking along the shoreline for another five or so minutes, the sergeant stopped, wiped his wet brow with the back of a dirtied sleeve, stuck two stained fingers into his mouth, and blew a low, melodic whistle. After a short pause, a similar one, but much more rudimentary, flew back.
With a grunt, Cuttlefish moved towards the sound.
Draped and covered by cut and loosely organised vegetation, the curving lines of a barge came into view. Perched on it were two men with longbows drawn and trained on the approaching group.
‘You took a long time coming, sarge!’ was the greeting.
‘Found me a couple of guests. Stand, hup! Welcome, sir.’
‘This isn’t your damn house, Cuttlefish! These are my bloody barges, which you stole, remember!’ barked the governor, pushing his way past the sergeant.
‘Yes, sir. As you say, sir.’
The shocked guards, finally recognising the now ravaged-looking governor, drew themselves hurriedly to attention and saluted. Ignoring them, he clambered up the steep sides and made his way immediately to investigate the contents of the hold.
‘You’re a lying bastard, Cuttlefish! There is plenty of good food down here. I’ll have you strung up for this!’
‘Yes, sir.’
Hungry men swarmed over the sides and shoving the sergeant aside, lining up behind the governor, peering avidly around him at the salted and preserved provisions stacked in front of them.
Pulling a knife from his belt, the governor stepped forward and cut himself a generous chunk of dry, salted beef, gave it a quick smell, and began to devour it. After what seemed like ages lost in mastication, he finally nodded to the drooling men, who rushed forward to help themselves.
Soon the men were full, their stomachs distended from the gorging. They lay around in heaps, dozing and snoring, happy and feeling safe for the first time in weeks. Cuttlefish sat at the bow of the lead barge in the shade, watching the idle soldiers with veiled eyes. The sweet, scented odour of wood smoke drifted into his nostrils, sending tendrils of irritation into his mind. The stupid bastards are having a cook-up on my barge, he thought. Hope they don’t burn them down.
‘Fire!’ he shouted, leaping to his feet in alarm. ‘Battle stations, you bastards! They’re burning the barges as you sleep!’
Men began to sit up and peer around blearily, and Cuttlefish saw the governor stumble up from the hold sword in hand, but he knew deep down they were too late. These two bastards were patient and bloody clever. They waited for me to decide to lead them right here, he thought, and they waited until we had stuffed ourselves silly. They knew I’d have to bring the governor here in the end.
‘Bastards!’ he yelled into the open sky, not caring if they all thought him to be a lunatic.
Yes, everything around them was wet and soggy, but these barges were as dry as tinder wood above the waterline, and like tinder, they would burn merrily. Angry flames were already leaping high over the cabin, and the crackling roar dominated the space, driving everyone back ashore to escape the solid wall of heat. As they stood there, non-pulsed, watching the fire, the added, extraordinary heat from the burning barges caused the canopied manchineel trees to blister and burst, releasing white, poisonous sap which dropped onto the heads and shoulders of the gathered soldiers. The viscous fluid burned painfully through hair and clothing, sending the terrified men into a frenzy as they ducked, ran, and twisted this way and that in a vain attempt to escape the deadly rain. This moment was when the two wolves chose to strike.
From opposite points, they came, like dark angels of vengeance, flying on wings of destruction. One came howling, sending waves of fear crashing ahead of him. The other was deathly silent, racing with an implacable will. Which was worse, which was better, none could tell, and none wanted to stay to find out. Cuttlefish watched them coming, and he knew their intersection point was the governor. The fool had not yet realised.
The governor was apoplectic with futile rage, shouting and bellowing at the frightened men to stop the bastards, to cut them down, kill them. They, instead, stood rooted in indecision and fear as they died. Some were so obsessed with avoiding the dripping poisonous sap that they did not even comprehend the greater danger. The two creatures weaved through the trees, tearing unerringly towards their target. About two dozen seasoned and brave fighters turned to face them. It was all for nothing, for the forces of nature bore through them, scattering them, breaking bones and rupturing organs with the fury of their passage. Alone, in the centre, the governor tried to track them both as they flew at him, mouth working soundlessly, eyes bulging in terror. They crossed him at the same split second as if it were a competition, a tied race — the one with a man-like form smoked behind the governor. A sinewy arm whipped around its target’s thick neck, catching his chin with an iron hand and then viciously yanking it as he flew by. The loud crack of breaking neck bones made Cuttlefish wince like a virgin girl. As the governor’s body catapulted into the air, the one in beast form slashed out with a rigid hand, tipped with sharp, black nails, eviscerating him from solar plexus to groin, spinning the body, complete circle in mid-air with a spray of dark blood and uncoiling intestines. The two came to a sudden stop, as one, as the body crashed into the earth, and looked around them, crouched and ready to kill. The remainder of the governor’s men fled.
Four intense eyes came to rest on Cuttlefish, the only one left standing in the poisonous, smoke-filled glade. Swallowing hard, the sturdy sergeant felt an urgent need to take a piss but decided his best course of action was to remain very still. Maybe they would overlook him. They didn’t. ‘Fuck’, he thought.
Without disturbing a single leaf, the two moved towards him on bare feet, impaling him with their alien eyes. Unable to look at the one in beast form, mostly because of the drool dripping from its maw, he turned to focus on the other, hoping to find more kinship there. As he looked into his eyes, he saw golden flecks swirling brightly in the deep brown pools. Cuttlefish blinked, unbelieving, but when he looked again, there were only deep, calm, human eyes regarding him. Before he could think of what to say, a wet snuffling sound emanated from the hairy other, distracting him.
‘Sharl we keel and eeet this one, broadarr?’
Cuttlefish wet himself.
The man regarded him steadily for another few seconds, then, without a word, turned and floated out of the glade. The other snuffled a bit more, and Cuttlefish realised that it was laughing at him. Then, it, too, turned and glided away.
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