Beyond the Gate (The Golden Queen) (Volume 2) Page 5

  “Five pounds then, if we find anything,” Thomas said.

  The boy nodded in agreement.

  “Good lad,” Thomas said, and he turned, leading the way. The boy rushed across the street, grabbed a hatchet from the doorstep of a house-tree where someone had been chopping kindling, then hurried up, walking right at Thomas’s heel, gripping the hatchet in white fingers.

  They walked under the pines for a hundred yards, until the limbs of the tall trees began to block the sun. The humus was thick and held a print, and in no time at all, they came upon a trail that held stunningly odd prints: some of the tracks came from booted feet that couldn’t have been less than eighteen inches long and ten wide. Other tracks were handprints of some creature with a span of twenty inches, but the monster had only four fingers.

  Thomas stopped and surveyed the prints for a long time, found his breath coming ragged, and his mouth felt dry. He took a swig of his stale water.

  “Those are demon tracks, certain,” the boy said. “The ones that look like handprints are from the creature that walked on all fours.”

  “By all that’s holy!” Thomas mouthed. “To tell you true, I wasn’t certain we’d find anything.”

  “What do you plan to do if we get a demon skull?” the boy asked.

  “I’ll mount the damned thing on a wall in the inn,” Thomas said, perhaps being too forthright.

  “Aye,” the boy breathed, “that would be something! I’ll tell you, the reason I came is I want some of this stuff, too. A demon head maybe, or something from an angel. When the angels came through town, I climbed the steeple of the church and looked out over the woods. That night, there was smoke and fire coming from the forest, flashes of lightning. I reckon there was a fearsome battle, and I prayed to God and the saints something fierce. But what happened out here, no one knows—only Gallen O’Day. He came out to battle with an angel at his side, and he’s not breathed a word about what happened. But no angels came back, and no demons, either. I figure Gallen bested them all.”

  Thomas glanced up at the boy, saw that his face was pale, frightened. “What’s your name, boy?”

  “Chance,” the boy answered.

  “Well, Chance, if we find a demon skull, it’s mine and I’ll pay you the five pounds I promised. But if we find two, the second is yours. Beyond that, if we find the mother lode, I’ll give you some of the booty.”

  Chance smiled at that, and they took a pee, then hurried down the trail.

  Thin high clouds were coming in, making it darker and cool, promising rain. Thomas hurried, and the forest went silent. No birds sang, no squirrels leapt in the trees. It was a strange, ominous quiet. Even the trees seemed to refrain from creaking in the small wind.

  Thomas had been in the woods plenty of times when the forest was just as quiet, but this silence got his heart beating. He kept stopping, looking behind him. He felt as if he were being watched.

  “Sure this is an unholy silence,” Chance breathed at one point, loosening his collar.

  And Thomas stopped, his heart was beating too hard. He kept thinking of that nice warm inn, with its mugs of beer, and he wished he was back there.

  But they followed the tracks over a long hill, up a ridge, and back down to a creek. There the trees opened up, letting in more light. Still, the deathly silence reigned in the forest.

  Chance began slowing, and to hurry him, Thomas said, “Pick up your pace, you old cow—it’s not as if you’re pulling a plow!”

  The boy picked up his pace, and ten yards farther he grabbed a stick and walloped Thomas in the back of the head.

  Thomas turned so fast that he fell on his butt. The boy was so mad he was in tears. “I’ll not have you talkin’ down to me, like I was some cur. My name is Chance O’Dell, and you’ll address me proper, or you’ll find yourself in trouble with me and my clan! I’m Mister O’Dell to you!” The boy shook his stick in Thomas’s face, and Thomas took a moment, trying to think how he’d offended the boy. His mind was still foggy from too much rum, and it took a few seconds for understanding to burn through the haze.

  “I’m sorry if my rudeness wounded you, young Mister O’Dell,” Thomas said. “I meant nothing by it. I say such things by force of habit. And if you think me evil for it, think on this: what is in another man a vice, is in me a virtue. As a satirist, I walk behind the proud men of the world, making rude noises. And the louder and ruder I get, the more good folks like you pay me. So, it’s true that I’ve got no common sense when it comes to addressing decent, honorable folk like yourself.”

  “Well,” Chance growled. “If you make more rude noises about me, I’ll pay you fair, all right. I’ll pay you with a stick!” He shook the stick in Thomas’s face, then threw it aside.

  Thomas laughed. “Well, next time I want a good spanking, I know who to come to. Come now, friend, help me up, and let’s go find us something grand!”

  The boy gave him a hand up, and they hurried along, and the boy seemed to calm down quickly. In minutes the whole incident was perhaps forgotten by the boy, but Thomas filed it away in his brain. A boy who was that brutal and quick to take offense likely came from a family with a strong sense of honor, and it wouldn’t be wise to ever cross one of them O’Dells again, or else Thomas would end up in a blood feud. And with only two Flynns left in the world, it would be a short feud.

  At the foot of a mountain, in the shadow of a glade, they came upon some booted footprints that were more proportioned to the size of a man.

  “See,” Chance muttered. “This is where the angels came on their track. It looks like there were four, maybe five of them, and they came stalking the demons.”

  “Some say that it was the sidhe who came, not angels,” Thomas ventured.

  “Angels, I think,” Chance whispered. “You’ve never seen people so beautiful, so regal. And Gallen said it was the Angel of Death that walked at his side.”

  Thomas just grunted. He had a hard time imagining angels that wore boots—slippers maybe—but he didn’t want to argue. Besides, he wondered, would an angel even need to walk? Didn’t they have wings? He thought it more likely that they would just flap about like giant white crows.

  They followed the trail along the creek, both of them stalking warily, looking about. Suddenly the brush exploded just before them, and Thomas’s heart nearly stopped. A stag leapt off through the forest, but Thomas had to stop to let his pounding heart rest.

  He looked back, and poor Chance had a face whiter than sea foam. “Come on,” Thomas said. “Let’s look just a bit farther.”

  A hundred yards on, they smelled the scent of burnt brush and left their trail to find a large circle of scorched earth. There, in the center of the burn, lay a huge pile of bones from some manlike thing that would have stood nearly nine feet tall. Its flesh had melted into the bones, and for all the world it looked as if it had been struck by lightning.

  Thomas walked around the thing, afraid to touch it. The giant was sprawled out flat on his belly, arms wide. He held a long black rod in one hand. Bits of metal were fused into his bones in some spots, as if necklaces and bracelets had melted into him.

  “So, this was a demon?” Thomas asked, circling the thing.

  “Aye, that was one.”

  Thomas went to the head, kicked it off, then rolled it over to look at its face. The skull was covered with a black tarry substance from the melted flesh, and the eyes had burned out of their sockets. The eye sockets were large enough so that Thomas could easily fit his thick fists into them. But it was the massive jaws and teeth that attracted him. Those teeth were big enough for a stallion, and twice as yellow.

  “They had orange eyes,” Chance said, “and skin as green-gray as a frog’s.”

  Thomas just knelt there, shaking his head in wonder. “Who’d have thought? Who’d have thought?” He sighed. “Well, here’s one oddity for my inn.”

  He tried to lift the head, but there was still a brain inside, and the thing was as heavy as a good-sized boulder. T
hey rolled it over to the edge of the creek, onto a worn path, and determined to leave it while they searched ahead.

  They hiked along for an hour heading up Bald Mountain, finding nothing more, and Thomas began to feel doubtful, and he began to rest more easily. They’d been out for hours and seen nothing horrific. He hoped, he’d hoped for the mother lode, but all he had to show for his day’s work was one misshapen skull.

  They finally climbed up past the road to An Cochan, and near the mountaintop they came to an old burn where there were no trees. The air was cold up here, and chunks of ice lay in the ground. Even now, it felt as if it might snow. It was beginning to get late, and Thomas was thinking of heading back, but they climbed up onto a log, looked up over a little valley where a fire had burned off the larger trees years earlier. Many great logs lay fallen, and ferns had grown chest-high in them. Here and there were clumps of snow from the two storms that had swept over the countryside in as many weeks. Thomas looked for any blackening in the ferns, any sign of a recent fire.

  They stood, heaving from effort, looking up the little valley to the mountain beyond, and a few pigeons began cooing from their roosting tree at the edge of the forest.

  It was silent, peaceful. A cool wind played with Thomas’s hair, and his breath came out and blew away in a fog from his mouth.

  Then for no discernible reason except to ease his stress, Chance let out a long howl, as if he were a wolf. In the center of the clearing below them the ferns erupted and a jaybird flapped into the sky, chattering angrily, searching for the source of the howls.

  Thomas and Chance looked at each other, both of them realizing at the same time that the jaybird had been feeding, and as one they jumped into the deep ferns below them, raced tripping and fumbling until they climbed on a wind-fallen tree and looked down. Chance hooted for joy, for there in the ferns lay a dead demon with one massive hand wrapped around the throat of the most beautiful woman Thomas had ever seen.

  She had golden hair that she wore in tiny braids, and over her hair she’d worn a net of silver with teardrop-shaped disks of gold. Even now, a blue jewel glowed in the net just above her eyes. She wore a cloak that was colored the green and yellow of ferns, and beneath it was some kind of armor made of a material that Thomas imagined to be some sort of exotic spun metal, like silver maybe. Her face was regal, and her arms were strong, with sensitive hands.

  For her part, she had thrust a magic sword through the heart of the demon before she died, and even now, the sword shimmered and its blade looked as if it were liquid quicksilver in motion, baffling the eye.

  Behind the demon lay its severed right hand and its magic rod, just where it must have fallen when the angel lopped it off.

  The bodies were well hidden from the sun. The icy ground had preserved them remarkably well. The jaybird had been having a go at the face of the demon, scoring on its huge eyes, which were glassy yellow-brown in death.

  Thomas caressed the flawless skin of the woman’s face, and she looked as if she were sleeping, her mouth in a tiny frown as if she had just had a disturbing dream. Her skin was stiff from cold, and the wind blew through her delicate eyelashes. Thomas saw that as he touched her, his own hand was shaking, and he sat and considered just how he felt right now.

  For years he had lived on the road, plying his trade as a minstrel and satirist, and though he had seen many beautiful women in the far corners of the world, he had never before seen anything quite so exquisite and wondrous as what he beheld right now.

  Thomas had always been a cautious man, unable to trust others. He’d never much believed in God. The imperfections of the world had always seemed ample evidence that there could not be a powerful and compassionate god. Yet now he quivered inside as he touched the dead angel, and he felt somehow transformed, holy.

  It was as if a great light welled up within him, burning away years of doubt and cynicism that he had carried as some burden, almost unaware, and he dared not look up at Chance, lest the boy see the tears forming in his eyes. This is as close to heaven as I may ever get, Thomas thought. And he wondered if this was the true reason he’d come back to Clere. In part he’d wanted to take care of his niece Maggie and spend a profitable winter away from the cold, but deep in his heart, he’d hoped to see this wonder, to see an angel and be certain.

  So, God, he thought. You’ve played a good joke on me, letting me go on in my doubts for all these years. And yet he wondered, he wondered what kinds of creatures these were—demons and angels as mortal as men. Perhaps their own immortal powers had somehow canceled each other out, so that they could kill one another. No doubt the priests would find some explanation. Yet here he was, caressing the cheek of a fallen angel, daring to hope that she would come back to life under his touch.

  “Let’s get into town,” Thomas whispered to Chance roughly, his voice tight from emotion. “We’ll hire some men and bring my wagon. She died to save us. I can’t let her sit here through another night.”

  * * *

  Chapter 5

  Just after dusk, Maggie served in the common room at Mahoney’s Inn. The place had filled up with fishermen who knew how to draw their own rum from the tap and could be trusted to leave the proper coins on the table.

  They were a nervous lot, wondering aloud how soon Thomas might come in from the woods, speculating as to whether it would be wights—a very common threat in this neck of the woods—or demons who got him.

  And of course there were many there who wished him well, for they’d come to hear him sing.

  Thus it was that Maggie’s uncle came bustling in a fluster, smelling of the road, with an odd expression—something between exultation and manic joy. Thomas just stood in the doorway for a moment, grinning.

  “I found them—” he said softly to the crowd. “A dead demon and an angel with it, and they’ll both be on display in the stable in an hour!”

  For one moment, no one spoke, then suddenly everyone was talking.

  Thomas hurried Maggie into the kitchens, and began pulling sacks of flour and sugar out onto the mixing table. He said urgently, “Old John Mahoney must have had someone who helped out during his busy season. You’ll need to round up those folks—anyone who’s handy at cooking and serving. Then you had better go to the butcher and buy a pig and a goose and get them roasting. We’ll need dinner for a hundred tonight.”

  “A hundred?” Maggie said in astonishment.

  “Aye,” Thomas said with a wink. “At the very least. I know you resent me, but I promise you, Maggie, I’ll make you a fortune at this inn. Between my singing, and heavenly hosts on display—this place will be a madhouse within a fortnight!”

  And Maggie said in frustration, “The larder is empty and I don’t have coin to buy so much food. The shops are closed or closing for the night—” Thomas reached to his belt and pulled out his purse, heavy with coins. “Hurry, then, and buy what you can for tonight and tomorrow.”

  Then he rushed into the night, out the back door. Maggie grabbed her shawl and ran to the butcher’s and the miller’s. She saw Thomas and four men go rumbling off into the dark in a wagon moments later, and half wished that the wights would take them all.

  In an hour the town was bustling and the inn was deluged. Whole families who had never set foot in the inn were too flustered to fix dinner for themselves, and they pounded on the tables. Maggie muscled a hundred-pound pig onto the spit, planning to carve off the meat as fast as it roasted. Ann Dilley came in of her own accord and began cooking potatoes and loaves of bread, while Ann’s daughters waited tables.

  Gallen came in just after dark, and he took Maggie’s hand, went into the kitchen with her, and stood beside the woodbox. “What is this I hear? You’ve got an uncle who has called off our marriage—and brought the bodies of a Vanquisher and one of Everynne’s guards into town, all in the same afternoon?”

  “Aye,” Maggie said angrily. “The jolly old bugger. He’s paid Father Brian to call off the marriage!”

  Ann Dilley ru
shed into the room at that moment, hurried past them. “You might as well bring the ale and wine out front and save us some trips,” she said, grabbing a small keg of whiskey, then she hurried out.

  “I’ll have a word with your uncle,” Gallen said.

  “Don’t stab him!” Maggie said, suddenly fearful at the note of anger in his voice.

  Gallen looked at her askance. “Stab him? What do you take me for?”

  Maggie realized it had been an unwarranted thought, but tried to explain. “You never know.” She shook her head. “He’s the damnedest man I’ve ever had the misfortune of meeting. I’ve thought of stabbing him today—more than once!”

  “Well, don’t!” Gallen laughed. Ann Dilley plodded back into the room, frowned at Maggie as she got a flagon of wine and pulled some rolls from the oven. “Look, I can tell you’re busy,” Gallen said. “Let’s talk tonight, after you close up. It’s important.”

  Gallen left.

  Maggie was grateful when the wagon rolled into town moments later, and for a while nearly everyone cleared out while Thomas displayed the corpses in the stable. That gave time for the meat to cook. And yet, it was only the beginning of the night. Soon the tables began to fill with villagers from An Cochan, three miles away. They were coming as fast as they heard the news, walking over the mountain road by lantern light, the wights be damned, bringing whole families by wagon.

  Thomas raised the price on his rooms and food and liquor and stabling, and by eleven he was selling sleeping space on the floor of the common room, and he’d rented out the lawn to campers.

  The amount of work to be done piled up like snow before an avalanche, ready to topple at any moment. There was more work than twenty people could do. Maggie was forced to just grit her teeth and bear it. She cooked and served dinner, took money, cleaned the cooking pots, churned the butter, and prepared the ingredients for breakfast. By twelve-thirty the common room was more crowded than she’d ever seen it, and Gallen came to help her wash dishes, while every other person who’d ever lent a hand during the traveling season helped prepare food for the morrow.