Book 4, Chapter 34: A Light Less Fantastic
“Well, we’re not going to be underway anytime soon. What, with so many injured, horses run off and the wyvern’s offspring to find.” Brundle took off his pack from his horse, placing it on a nearby log, then patted the animal. “In fact, we’re probably losing this day. If it was summer and we had wagons, we’d salvage some time, but as it is, best we stay here one more night.”
“Morry’s rounding up the horses.”
“He’s probably almost finished then, but there might be some stragglers.” Looking down, he paused, then looked me dead in the eyes. “Why, my lady, did you go put yourself in danger?”
“Oh, I just, ok, it was stupid. I wanted to see what they look like and thought Gun would simply capture it.” Yup, then I’d triumphantly mount the beast, we’d become best friends and sail on the winds. Of course, had he done it, he’d have become its best friend, ridden the airways with it, and I’d be relegated to the love interest.
“Capture? They’re extremely dangerous.”
“Yeah, stupid. That was stupid of me. How many casualties? How many men did it kill?”
“Twenty-one, so far. Probably sixty or more wounded.”
“Damn.” I turned away, looking at my hands. Had I been unafraid of the consequences, I could have just blasted the thing. Though it didn’t occur to me at the time. Perhaps because this was all so new, perhaps fear froze my brain. I didn’t know what to think, still processing but, some part of me said, most of those men would have died before I’d gotten there. “Where were the mages in all that? Why didn’t their magic hold it off?”
“Your Highness, it must have been a gap in the magical obfuscation. Mages couldn’t have gotten there any faster than you did.”
“I’m going to talk to Etienne about this.”
Brundle clasped his hands in front of them, “It’s awful for our soldiers to perish in this way, certainly, but these things happen. It is spring, wyverns are more active at this time of the year. And the soldiers are trained to handle such events.”
“Yeah, I guess. They used rope to tie it down, threw spears and shot it.”
“Shot? I can’t imagine that doing anything, I’ll have to talk to Gun about those men.”
“Sorry, I mean ‘loosed,’ they loosed arrows and bolts into it.” It was taking me forever to unlearn gun related words for sending missile weapons at opponents. Loose, loosing. Ugh. I’d just have to invent a gun and then correct their language.
“Then they acted appropriately. We’ll have to send parties out to see if any nest is nearby and kill the young.”
“Can they be tamed?”
“Many have tried. But they’re wild. Once they become adults, well, sometimes they simply fly away. But most times, they eat their owners before flying away.”
“Ah.” Kind of like trying to ride a crocodile as a personal kayak. I stared at my feet a moment, then realized I needed our schedule, “How long will this take?”
“At least until late afternoon, but probably longer. We’ll have to ask the nurses on the state of the injured.”
“Hmm. I think you’re right. We should just stay one more night. I don’t like it, but what’s the point in traveling three more hours only to set up camp again.”
“The soldiers will appreciate the rest and it’ll give us ample time to butcher and process the wyvern and whatever cattle it killed.”
“Wait. We’re going to eat it?” Visions of spider meat floated in my mind.
“Yes, certainly. As princess, Gun will most likely bring you the heart.”
“Oh fu . . . dge. Fudge. Seriously?”
“It’s a rare delicacy these days, my lady.”
***
“There’s no way I’m eating that raw.” Staring, horrified as Gun removed the lid off a silver platter with a flourish and flutter of his left hand – no idea where he got the platter from – the beast’s heart resting inside and, yes, it was uncooked. A large predator. Trichinosis, full of trichinosis to be sure. I couldn’t see them, but just knew the little white worms were wriggling around, happily waiting for their chance to live inside my body.
Gun smiled at me, “Come now, Warrior Princess, the spirit of a great beast resides in this heart! Surely, it will add to your legend.”
“But parasites!” I couldn’t stop myself. Of course, of course these people ate raw meat from apex predators. For that’s where the danger lay! Maybe it was the combination of toxins they consumed that protected them, maybe the lead in their diet beat the trichinosis down. Now that I was thinking about it, I probably had helminth worms already. Yeah, no real sewage separation here. I started turning green and feeling sick.
The men laughed. “Not hardly a parasite, but the most fearsome of monsters. You saw how many men it defeated today! My lady, this meat was brought to you at terrible cost. You must honor the memories of the men and their battle for you and consume its flesh.” He cut off a bite sized portion, placing it with an odd, gentle motion, on my plate in front of me.
I stared at it. White, wriggling worms wanting a new home. No. Nope. No way! Pushing the chair back, I stood up, put my hands on my face, mind racing to come up with excuses. “Uh, ok, wait.”
“Princess Cayce?”
Morry, Brundle, Rand, a couple captains, some lesser officers, all watching with approval. Calm, be calm, I told myself. Then it hit me: this was the time I’d been waiting for. I held up my hand, a finger, took a breath, “Alright, I was saving it until after the battle. But seeing as how we,” I inclined my head toward Gun, “how you and your men bested such a terror, now is the time.”
“My lady?”
I walked over to my pack horse, wondering all the while how long parasites would survive the death of their host and hoping it was less than the time it would take me to return to the table, but knowing otherwise. I grabbed one of two of the wooden quarter-barrels from the packhorse, lugged it over with great effort, breathing heavily, all but dropping it on the table when I got there, the men still watching and none offering to help with the heavy load.
“Whiskey. If we are going to eat raw flesh, I’m going to drown it in whiskey.” Yup! That would kill the parasites instantly! For sure it would, I told myself, that’s how alcohol works. Death upon touch. Oh, I was going to be so sick later. What were the symptoms? Elephantiasis? I couldn’t remember. I think that was some other parasite.
“Pardon me, my lady?”
I planted the barrel on the table. “Get your mugs over here. This is the spirit I’ve been working on.”
“You’ve been talking with spirits?”
“What? No, that’s just what you call it . . . never mind. You remember alejack? This is better.” He probably asked more questions, but I ignored him and focused. I had to breach the barrel and the wooden stopper was covered in wax and likely had expanded into the wood. Bunghole, that’s what they called it. I took out my dirk, chipped off the wax, plunged it into the stopper, and pulled and pushed and nothing happened.
“Princess,” Morry said, suddenly nearby, “if you’ll allow me?”
“Uh, ok.”
He rolled the barrel over to him on the table, then slammed his palm right beside the stopper. It popped out with a plunk. “Normally, we use a bung starter for this. It’s a wooden mallet.”
“A bung starter?”
“That’s right. You remember from the night of the ball.”
“Well, no. I just pulled out the stopper then.”
“Ah. Must have been newly plugged barrels. Rand, pass me a couple jugs.”
Forgetting about the parasites for the moment, I watched anxiously as Rand placed a few jugs in front of Morry, and the big man hefted the barrel over them, turning it so it captured the liquid rushing out.
It was still more clear than yellow, but it poured clean, free of debris and not at all cloudy, and I felt a sense of relief. At least something had gone right today.
After transferring it to mugs and cups, and each person had one, with way too much whiskey in it, full mugs for everyone – these people were used to drinking ale and wine and had no idea what was in store for them – I held mine up, “To you, gentlemen, and the brave soldiers who fought the vicious beast, and those who lost their lives.”
I sipped the four-month-old whiskey. Very oaky, notes of vanilla, with a hint of apple and berries, and a dark, robust, sweet taste. Sharp, for it was young. And not at all smokey, since it was unpeated. But not harsh, like the fusel alcohols of Bechalle’s alejack and that alone made me smile. We’d taken a narrow definition of hearts, for safety, and that made for a fine whiskey. Ok, not fine so much as drinkable. It really needed more time in the barrel. And I’d eventually have to figure out how to use peat on it. But drinkable!
The big man looked at the cup he was holding, shrugged, and took a sip, made a slight grimace, nodded, took another. The others weren’t so cautious. Rand doubled over in a coughing fit, Brundle made a face like a toddler trying lemon for the first time, and Gun was doing his best to politely cough in the manliest, sexiest, most rugged way possible.
“Princess,” Morry managed to get out, “you should probably warn people before . . .”
“Should I?” I took a bigger sip. “What do you think? A girl’s drink?”
“Even the second time, this is like drinking fire. Burns on the way down. What did you say about it? It’ll put hair on your chest and ink in your quill.”
“Yeah. It’s not bad. Needs to age more, to get more rounded flavors. Also, probably have to use old wine barrels. It’s way too oaky.”
“Your Highness,” Rand coughed out, “wine barrels are aged before using them. Water first, sometimes a charring.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Huh. Thank you. We’ll do that next time.” I stared at my mug, kinda proud of myself. To hell with the oak, it was whiskey! “Bottoms up.” I tossed the rest back. I couldn’t get hungover, so why not upstage some hypermasculine warriors? Definitely felt it going down and it warmed up my insides, making me wonder if it was a tad overproof. Possibly. I did not have a measuring device. Hydrometer! One of those, could do with one.
The world tilted. Placing a hand on the table, I pulled out my chair, unfortunately to be faced with the raw heart flesh. Sigh. And its parasites.
“I like it,” Gun said, looking at his mug. Then he picked up some heart with his hands, put it in his mouth and started chewing.
Right. The heart. Raw heart.
It was the alcohol hitting, at least that’s where I’m placing the blame. I stuck a fork in the meat, brought it up and placed my left hand over it. Then concentrated on the molecules rubbing each other, moving quickly, heating up - cook, damn you! Smoke rose from behind my hand and I quickly stuffed it in, screamed inwardly and silently as it burned my mouth, grabbed the nearest glass and chugged, started gagging as someone had refilled my whiskey, doubled over trying to swallow while coughing.
“Princess! Are you ok?”
Morry at my side on the ground, holding my hair up. What true friends do when you’ve gone too far, though in this case, it was entirely the fault of the parasites. Little bastards got into my mind. The grass beneath my gaze was blurry for the tears in my eyes as my sinuses and nose burned from the ethanol. “Yes, yes, oh god that was awful.”
“Maybe this drink you’ve invented isn’t fit for human consumption.”
“Just add,” I coughed a little, “some water.” Damn, when was I going to learn how to eat and drink? How many times did I have to burn my mouth? Next time I cook something, I told myself, it has to be done outside my mouth. But at least those parasites were all dead.
They had become calories.
“Morry . . .”
“Yes?”
“I’m going to get a fire going. I want normal, cooked meat. And maybe a lot of tea. Lukewarm tea, or even cold, if possible.” I wonder if they’d notice how quickly I could get a fire going. It’d be bad to be noticed.
“Allow me.” The big man went over to the fire pit, started working on it.
For me, the world spun. Took me a few moments to get used to it and steady myself. The danger of spirits. Yeah, I needed water. Boiled water, with crushed, long dead leaves in it. On reflection, I probably should listen to Morry’s advice and give a quick explanation on how powerful whiskey was. The soldiers were in the process of discovering that themselves.
“Lynnex, Hirsfelt, Dran,” said Maitlan, holding up a piece of heart. He continued reciting names. The laughter died and most of the officers around soon looked at the ground, though others held up pieces of the heart. Morry stood up from building the fire. At twenty-three names, he stopped. “Our dead, may they be remembered. We feast tonight because of their efforts and in their honor.”
Gun was giving Maitlan a sour stare, but shifted his gaze to me, and dropped the awfulness, as I stood, too.
After a long silence, Maitlan lifted the heart flesh and said, “To their memories.” He ate of it, then took a drink from his whiskey and calmly and forcibly swallowed.
Ok, alright, that was my cue to be a princess. “Gentlemen, tonight we are indeed resting and remembering our men, and also enjoying our time as among the living. I ask you to keep all these things in your heart, for battle is approaching. Also,” I held my cup up, “please be careful with this drink, whiskey it’s called. It’s very, very strong. Probably eight times stronger than ale. Best to mix it with water.” Or soda or coke, if you have it, but I couldn’t say that part.
A smile broke out on Gun’s face and he leaned forward, cup in hand, “No kidding! Eight times stronger? Well, it’d be a shame to add water to this fine craftsmanship!” and he and most of the men, except for Maitlan and the officers he’d brought with him, held their glass up, cheersed, and drank.
Whoops. Men and whiskey. I created evil.
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