The Things We Bury Read online

  Powders and perfumes dusted the vanity and floor. Her wig, however, sat unmolested. She needed to get out of here. She needed to find people who knew how to treat each other like the sacred gifts of Airim they were. She needed to find people who weren’t her father.

  By the time Lelana entered, Isabell had donned her basest riding cloak she owned, the one she kept hidden so her father wouldn’t take it from her, angry at its shabbiness. No daughter of mine…

  As soon as Isabell saw Lelana—the way she took in the room, the bed, the broken mirror, the wig in Isabell’s hand—her heart sank. They were going to argue and there was nothing Isabell could do to hold herself back from it.

  “Not tonight, my Grace,” Lelana said. My Grace. She was trying her best.

  “I’m going into town. To the Stop. I’m thirsty.”

  “He doesn’t understand,” Lelana said. “Give him time. Maybe he’ll realize how important this is to you.”

  “Ha! You were there. You saw exactly what he thinks about what’s important to me.”

  “Maybe it’s for the best?” Lelana cringed as she said it. “The Lances…they’re always at the wall. They’re the one group that’s called first, every time. Would you really—”

  “Yes!” Isabell hissed, cutting Lelana off. “With everything I have. Yes.”

  “Maybe Olisal isn’t so bad…He’s the richest—”

  “Enough,” Isabell snapped. “I can’t…I need to get out of here.”

  “Please, my lady. He’ll be so furious if he finds out.”

  “He can suck a sheep’s cock if he thinks he can keep me here.”

  “I’m begging you, my Lady.”

  “Beg. I’d expect nothing less from you.”

  Lelana blinked at the cut, her face a courageous mask against the hurt, and Isabell was instantly filled with regret. But that’s the thing about anger, it and regret are common bedfellows.

  “He’ll be furious,” Lelana said. “Remember last time.”

  “I’m not afraid of him.” She didn’t know why she bothered lying to Lelana, the way they could see through each other. It was easier to lie to herself.

  “I’m not worried for you, my Lady. I’m worried for them.”

  Adon on the floor. The sickly wet thuds of her father’s kicks. The boy not even grunting with each blow anymore.

  Everything I’ve trained for. All the mornings and nights…. She closed her eyes to keep from crying and in the darkness she saw Earl Olisal’s face. He was leaning in for a kiss…

  Isabell covered her face and before she knew what was happening, she was sobbing, deep racking gasps. She felt Lelana’s arms wrap around her, her hand on the back of Isabell’s head, holding her. She didn’t say anything.

  What words could she say?

  8

  Anaz didn’t need the hsing-li to feel the fear at the elf’s words. Like a boulder tossed into a pond, terror radiated out in rings, leaving a wake of angst. The questions bubbled, louder and more insistent, each fighting for the messenger’s answers.

  Anaz didn’t know what this bone wall was that they feared. He had begun pulling pieces about living dead and war from the Sunell girl and bartender, but he was hesitant to put them together. The more he understood, the more he would care and that was the one thing he’d promised himself he wouldn’t do.

  “What do you mean it’s moving?” a man with a grey beard shouted.

  “A week, maybe two,” the messenger said, “and it’ll be on Fisher Pass. Knowles in three, at best.”

  “The hell,” said a dwarf sitting next to a middle-aged woman with brown hair that had been braided with tiny spiral shells. “That wall ain’t moved since my father’s father was a baby. And we’re dwarves. That’s a long time.”

  “The King orders the Blackhand Barony to fall back. Go north to Earl Ventner’s lands.”

  Malic stood at the door to the kitchen working a towel between his hands. He slid a cleaver into the pocket on his apron and walked into the hall.

  “A Tellich has risen and they push,” the messenger said. This launched a new wave of terror. Several people stood from their spots at the trestle tables, gathering together their cloaks and coins. Everywhere noise. Anaz caught whispers of “Tellich” and “like Lindisfarne.”

  Their fear cemented itself inside of Anaz, dragged at him.

  Their fear is no concern of yours. This is no concern of yours. You don’t have to care.

  “Now hold on a minute,” Malic called.

  “Where is Therentell ranch?” the messenger shouted. “I need directions to the Therentells.”

  The bartender looked up, then to the proprietor before hollering, “I am Daveon Therentell!”

  The cries and yelling eased as the elf spoke. “Daveon Therentell, the horse breeder?”

  “Speaking.”

  “Thank Airim I found you. You are to stay at your ranch until the King’s stable master comes for your contract. Everyone else,” the elf looked around the room, “must flee tonight.”

  “The hell they will,” the innkeeper yelled. His voice was small, but it seized the room.

  Anaz wanted to break something. Already it had happened. All he’d needed was a new axe, a hoe for his garden, some rope, some tallow candles, salt and, if he had enough coin left after selling his skins, some flour. That’s it. Come into town, trade the hides, buy the supplies and run. Don’t meet anyone. Don’t talk to anyone. Just make it forty-eight hours without getting sucked into their struggles. That’s all he’d wanted.

  And now this.

  “I’m scared,” Sunell whispered.

  Anaz closed his eyes and tried not to hear her.

  “I’m scared,” the girl says. She’s young, maybe eleven or twelve summers with light brown hair. She’s wrapped her arms around her little sister and clasped in her hands is an emblem of Airim. She’s grinding her thumb along its curved edge, her lips whispering a prayer. Their father crouches at the bottom of the stairs, shielding them, his whispy greying hair matted with sweat. He raises his sword, squinting against the light. When he sees Daveon, when he realizes the figure at the top of the stairs is mortal and not undead, not one of them, he lowers his blade.

  Daveon’s breath heaves, his legs quivering, his mouth filled with the taste of blood and dirt.

  With the taste of betrayal.

  His brother. Rayen. He left him. The gap hadn’t closed yet, though. Maybe he got out. How could Daveon have left him? How could he not? Then they’d both be dead.

  “Who are you?” the man cries.

  Daveon latches the door behind him, slides the crossbar into place and scrambles down the stairs and crouches next to the man. His own sword is clean. Not a mark on it. Not a smear of Wretched blood.

  “Did you see my wife? Brown hair, a mole under her left—” the man whispers.

  “Hush,” Daveon hisses.

  They crouch and they watch the dust motes in the sunlight sneaking around the door like fireflies.

  “Where is ma?” the older girl says. She’s looking from her father to Daveon and she rubs, rubs, rubs the emblem. There is fear there, in those eyes, but also something else. Daveon recognizes it. It’s the same thing that was in Rayen’s eyes when he spurred his horse into the gap.

  The thing that had been missing from Daveon’s own when he spurred his horse in the opposite direction.

  “You’re part of the Seventh?” The father is looking at the shoulder emblem on Daveon’s surcoat. “They’ve fallen then? You’re running?” No blame there. Just fear. If the soldiers are running…

  The door slams open, the shattered crossbar raining splinters. Light gushes into the room, slicing a shape standing at the top of the stairs.

  “Mother,” the littler of the girls cries.

  But it isn’t the girl’s mother. It’s nothing living. It’s one of them. A Wallwraith.

  The Wretched.

  “I’m scared,” the older girl says. She looks at Daveon.

  “I’m sc
ared,” Sunell whispered.

  Daveon blinked several times before Sunell’s face came back into focus. He couldn’t get that little girl’s face out of his mind. Those grey eyes. They’d seemed to have flecks of orange floating in them, like little motes of flame.

  “Have you spoken to Baron Blackhand yet?” Malic demanded of the messenger.

  Two Fingers leaned on his greatsword, looking only slightly less bored than normal.

  “I go there next.”

  “He hasn’t even spoken to the Baron yet,” Malic said, addressing the hall. “Nobody does anything until our Lord Baron Blackhand tells us to.”

  “These are the king’s orders.”

  Outside there was a rumble and hiss. The wall already? Daveon jerked his gaze to the window. Rain. Wind in the rafters.

  Anaz watched him.

  “What about the families to the south?” he shouted. The Evensons, Taness Monsole, the Skets. Somebody needed to warn them. And he needed to get his horses back from the Skets before the king’s stable master arrived. He couldn’t meet the king’s contract without them. And he couldn’t leave without meeting the king’s contract. And that meant riding towards the wall.

  It was getting hard to breathe.

  He wouldn’t run. Not this time. Never again.

  Malic glared at him.

  “South? Are you insane? I need to get home. Lisapell is home. We need to run. Everybody needs to run.” It was Evelyn Zela. Her powder was the only color left in her face.

  Chairs scraped against the stones as people began to stand.

  “Gods dammit.” Malic growled. He spun, looking up and down the trestle tables. There wasn’t an eye willing to meet his. “Nobody goes anywhere.”

  Going south when the wall was coming north. Through those mountains with the wiblins and the wolves. Barely a trail for a horse’s hoof. He’d have to leave Alysha. With the wall coming. She’d be terrified. She’d be alone and terrified. Like him.

  What choice do I have? Not this time. I won’t fail this time.

  He looked down and realized he was using his thumb to trace the mark of Airim on the bar’s surface.

  “Malic, if the king says to run, you can’t stop them,” Daveon said.

  “That’s exactly what I’m going to do.”

  “The king was explicit,” the messenger said.

  “King Felnis?” Malic said.

  “Of course.”

  “The same king whose father took the baron’s lands and moved him out here on the fringes of the settled territory?”

  Someone coughed and Daveon could hear a mumbled insult from behind the hearth.

  “Careful Malic,” he said, “you’re treading dangerously close to calling our king a liar.”

  The messenger watched Malic.

  “All I’m saying is tomorrow starts market days and we feast and enjoy the theatres and we wait until the Baron or Sir Nattic says what to do one way or another.”

  Daveon knew Malic would be sure to have something to say on which way that went. “Now go home. Sleep. Tomorrow you’ll see there’s no reason for anybody to be leaving Fisher Pass.”

  The messenger shook his head.

  People didn’t say much as they shuffled out of the inn. Malic hadn’t left much to say. Sir Nattic might be the Baron’s official bailiff, but everyone knew who ran Fisher Pass when the Baron wasn’t in residence.

  Anaz picked up his pack and looked at Sunell, then to Daveon. He opened his mouth like he was going to say something, but then closed it and forced a smile.

  “Right,” Daveon said. He untied his apron and draped it across the bar. “It’s a hike back to my place, Anaz, but maybe that’s okay. I’ll need the time to figure out how I’m going to tell Alysha about this.”

  Rain hammered the windows of the inn, a steady hiss from the open door. When the thunder cracked, Daveon thought he could hear the clacks of bones. It was out there. It was out there and it was coming to his home. Coming for his wife and his two sons. He wouldn’t run.

  Not this time.

  9

  “Moving where?” Alysha whispered. There hadn’t been an easy way to glide into the news, so Daveon had done what his brother had taught him in that final lesson—charge right into it.

  “Here, Alysha,” he said, touching her shoulder. “Two weeks at most, King Felnis’s man said.”

  They stood in the common room, the three of them, sipping at warm water flavored with pine needles. Anaz seemed to sort of hide himself, tucking into a corner near the stove. He was watching them and his face had a strained look on it, as if he were holding himself back or fighting against something.

  Alysha looked up from the table and out past Daveon towards the boys. “What do we do? Wake them? Leave now?”

  Daveon could tell from his sons’ breathing that Nikolai was awake, listening. It seemed more and more that the child was trying to carry his father’s burdens for him. Eight summers old and he was acting more of a man than Daveon ever had. Eight summers old and already braver than his old man.

  “Malic says everyone has to stay for Market Days,” Daveon said, “That nobody can go anywhere until tomorrow when the baron says so.”

  “Malic says.”

  “He was furious at the messenger.”

  “I bet. The king is the one man that even Malic can’t buy. He doesn’t get to run Fisher Pass no matter what he thinks.”

  Daveon didn’t want to talk about Malic anymore. “Well, anyway, we can’t leave.”

  Alysha frowned up at him. “The wall is coming.”

  “The king’s man also had a message for us to stay until the stable master collects his horses.”

  “Stay?”

  “Sounds like they’re right behind him. Any day now.”

  Alysha laughed, looking from Anaz to Daveon. “With the wall coming. Stay.”

  “Only for a couple days.” This wasn’t going well. He hadn’t even gotten to the part of telling her that she would have to stay alone while he warned the southern families and recovered their horses from the Skets.

  “Daveon, you’re not seriously thinking we’ll stay here waiting for some king’s men who, even if they do come, will have the entire bone wall chasing them?”

  “Alysha, we can’t leave without meeting that contract…” …And getting the horses. Just tell her you’re leaving to get the horses. Tell her.

  “We can put the horses out to pasture,” she said. “They’ll be fine for two or three days if that’s what he needs.”

  “Who’ll collect the money? Who’ll pay back Malic? And besides…” Daveon took a sip of his pine tea, watching Alysha over the cup. “We can’t meet the king’s contract without those studs at the Skets.”

  “The studs…”

  “At the Skets,” Daveon finished.

  The skipping chirp of a screech owl hooted from outside, peppering the violent silence between them.

  “At the Skets. To the south,” Alysha said. A stunned smile stretched alien across her lips as if he babbled in gnome tongue.

  “The contract says twenty horses, Alysha.”

  “Towards the wall.”

  “It’s two weeks away.”

  “You can’t…” She laughed, then, buried by disbelief, said, “Is this about Lindisfarne? Rayen?”

  Daveon felt as if he’d been punched. Lindisfarne. Lindisfarne. Lindisfarne. The lies stabbed at him everywhere he turned.

  “Are you running back to the wall? You’ve done your part.” Alysha set her mug on the table and stood, grabbing Daveon’s hands. “You’ve done your part. Daveon, dear Airim, you’ve done your part. You of all people know what charging towards the wall means. You can’t fight them all. How many people did you save there? You already did your part and were everyone’s hero at Lindisfarne. Now be our hero.”

  Boiling water wouldn’t burn as much as listening to his wife live so deeply that lie. Daveon opened his mouth, held the confession there, hanging in his breath.

  He closed h
is mouth. Swallowed.

  Anaz cleared his throat. Scuffed the floor with his toes.

  “Yeah…..” Daveon sighed and swished his mug in a circle. “Let’s see what the baron says tomorrow.”

  Anaz scraped the curved blade along the horse hide, water and pinkish-white fat rolling in front of the edge. It made a raspy swishing sound, the flesh peeling away in sticky slaps. Anaz paused and Daveon repositioned the hide on the beam.

  “You’ve done this before,” Daveon said.

  They worked over the dead animal’s skin, Daveon stretching and repositioning the skin while Anaz did the fleshing. They had cleared a bed in the loft for Anaz and when Daveon had said he was going outside, since it had stopped raining, to flesh a horse hide he’d skinned a couple days ago, Anaz had offered to help. It was the least he could do for the shelter.

  Anaz was glad for the work. He’d tried not to listen to their conversation in the common room, to the fear in Alysha’s voice, to the breathing of the sleeping children—well, to the sleeping child, since one of them had been awake and pretending to be sleeping the whole time. Yet, words like bone and wall and Wretched burrowed under his thoughts. Would it come for him? Why was everyone so afraid?

  “Honestly, I don’t know why we’re doing this—what we’ll do with the hide, if we’re leaving.” Daveon lifted the hide and turned it to give Anaz a fresh angle. “I guess we’ll try to bring it with.”

  Don’t ask. Don’t ask. Don’t ask.

  “Your wife—everyone—is…deeply frightened. What is this bone wall?” Anaz asked.

  Daveon chuckled, giving Anaz a confused look. “Seriously?”

  “I’ve…lived quietly for the three years I’ve been here,” Anaz said.

  “You’ve been in the woods that whole time? Hunting? Free?”

  “The hsing-li has provided most things for me.”

  “The…I don’t know what that is.”

  “It’s hard to explain. It’s, in many ways, it’s everything.”