Waylander by David A. Gemmell

‘You are not a priest,’ she said.

‘No. And you are not a whore.’

‘How would you know?’

‘I spend my life around whores,’ he answered. Lifting his leg over the pommel of his saddle he slid to the ground and approached her. He smelt of stale sweat and horseflesh and close up he was as terrifying as any of the raiders she had known. Yet strangely she viewed the terror from a distance as if she were watching a play, knowing that the villain is terrible but comforted by the thought that he cannot leave the stage. The power in him encompassed her without threat.

‘You hid in the bushes,’ he said. ‘Wise. Very wise.’

‘You were watching?’

‘No. I read the tracks. We hid from the same raiders an hour back. Mercenaries – not true Hounds.’

‘True Hounds? What more do they need to do to serve their apprenticeship?’

‘They were sloppy – they left you alive. You would not escape the Hounds so easily.’

‘How is it,’ asked Danyal, ‘that a man like you travels with a priest of the Source?’

‘A man like me? How swiftly you judge, woman,’ he answered equably. ‘Perhaps I should have shaved.’

She turned from him as Dardalion approached.

‘We must find a place to camp,’ said the priest. ‘The children need sleep.’

‘It is only three hours after noon,’ said Waylander.

‘They need a special kind of sleep,’ said Dardalion. ‘Trust me. Can you find a place?’

‘Walk with me aways,’ said the warrior, moving some thirty feet down the trail. Dardalion joined him. ‘What is the matter with you? We cannot saddle ourselves with them. We have two horses and the Hounds are everywhere. And where they are not, there are mercenaries.’

‘I cannot leave them. But you are right – you go.’

‘What have you done to me, priest?’ snapped the warrior.

‘I? Nothing.’

‘Have you put a spell on me? Answer me!’

‘I know no spells. You are free to do as you please, obey whatever whims you care to.’

‘I don’t like children. And I don’t like women I can’t pay for.’

‘We must find a resting place where I can ease their torment. Will you do that before you go?’

‘Go? Where should I go?’

‘I thought you wanted to leave, to be free of us.’

‘I cannot be free. Gods, if I thought you had put a spell on me I would kill you. I swear it!’

‘But I have not,’ said Dardalion. ‘Nor would I if I could.’

Muttering dark curses under his breath, Waylander walked back to Danyal and the children. As he approached the girls clutched Danyal’s skirt, their eyes wide with fear.

He waited by his horse until Dardalion was with the children. ‘Anyone want to ride with me?’ he asked. There was no answer and he chuckled, ‘I thought not. Follow me into the trees yonder. I will find a place.’

Later, as Dardalion sat with the children telling them wondrous tales of elder magic, his voice softly hypnotic, Waylander lay by the fire watching the woman.

‘You want me?’ she asked suddenly, breaking his concentration.

‘How much?’ he asked.

‘For you, nothing.’

‘Then I don’t want you. Your eyes don’t lie as well as your mouth.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means you loathe me. I don’t mind that; I’ve slept with women aplenty who’ve loathed me.’

‘I don’t doubt it.’

‘Honesty at last?’

‘I don’t want any harm to come to the children.’

‘You think I would harm them?’

‘If you could.’

‘You misjudge me, woman.’

‘And you underestimate my intelligence. Did you not seek to stop the priest from aiding us? Well?’

‘Yes, but …’

‘There are no buts. Without aid our chance of survival is next to nothing. You don’t call that harm?’

‘Woman, you have a tongue like a whip. I owe you nothing and you have no right to criticise me.’

‘I don’t criticise you. That would suggest I cared enough to improve you. I despise you and all your loathsome brethren. Leave me alone, damn you!’

Dardalion sat with the children until the last was asleep, then he placed his hand on each brow in turn and whispered the Prayer of Peace. The two girls lay with arms entwined under a single blanket, while Culas was stretched out beside them with his head pillowed on his arm. The priest concluded his prayer and sat back exhausted. Somehow it was hard to concentrate while wearing Waylander’s clothes. The blurred images of pain and tragedy had softened now, but still they kept Dardalion from the uppermost pathways of the Road to the Source.