The False Martyr (87 page)

Without any idea how,
Dasen did exactly as instructed. The crowd loved it. They cheered
him and the caravan all the way down the hill and into the
city.

In a surprisingly short
time, they were rolling past the last of the shanty buildings at
the northern outskirts of Gorin West. They had passed through
several blocks of quickly built wooden structures with barely a
slap of paint to keep the wood from rotting away in the suffocating
humidity. The road was a track of mud with dirt gutters running on
either side, but those appeared to serve more as garbage pits than
drainage. There were few shops here with only the occasional tavern
to break the expanse of packed cottages. The streets swarmed with
children who had nowhere else to play. They broke their games as
the wagons passed, stood to the side and watched them go then
resumed in their wake like waves reforming after a ship. And at the
front of the houses, the parents and grandparents of those children
watched and commented on the finely dressed lady riding among the
sacks.

After the last of the
houses faded, they had a long lonely ride to the camp. Dasen
realized only then that no guards were accompanying them. He asked
Valati Lareno about the lack of protection. “Even the craven
bandits around here wouldn’t dare attack a caravan from the temple
bringing food to those in most profound need,” he answered from his
seat on the bench. “I told the governor that we neither needed nor
wanted his soldiers. Besides, there will be more than enough when
we reach the camp.”

They rode in silence
through swampy low lands where two the world’s greatest rivers
joined. To the east was the expanse of the Alta shimmering in the
sun, blocked on its far side by the bluffs of Liandria and
spreading lazily beneath the grasses they passed where no cliffs
stood to restrain it. On the other side, the Orm was lost from view
but had the same effect on the countryside. Everywhere Dasen looked
was tall grass standing in stagnant water. The road was raised a
few feet above the floodplain, but occasionally dipped far enough
to allow the rivers to mingle in expanses of sticky mud. Barely
wide enough for two carts to pass, the road was the only passage
through the swamp – even if a man managed to wade, he would be
instantly lost in the forest of grass standing feet above his
head.

Birds swooped and dipped
throughout the plain feasting on the flies that seemed as numerous
as the blades of grass. For once, Dasen was glad to have the layers
of clothing as he watched the robed men around him swat the flies
and jump at their bites. Dasen could only imagine how much worse
the insects would be in a few hours when the sun had retreated and
the mosquitoes joined their brethren in the assault.

Of course, he would
readily trade the mosquitoes for a reprieve from the beating of the
sun. There were almost no trees along the road to block its heat,
and humidity seemed to rise almost visibly from the water all
around them to make the air into soup. It left Dasen nearly
drowning in his own sweat. A headache was building, and he was
certain that his disguise would come apart at any moment, but he
could do nothing about it but fan himself and hope that this was
all a part of Valati Lareno’s plan.

Between the heat and
jostling, Dasen was feeling quite sick by the time they arrived at
their destination. The smell almost finished him. It appeared even
before they saw the first structures on the horizon. At first, he
thought it was gas from the swamp or an animal that had died and
was floating in the grass. But the smell just got stronger until
Dasen found himself wrapping the muslin around his mouth and
relishing the strong scent of whatever oils permeated it. Yet even
that barrier could not block the smell of the camp. Soon, the
stench of sickness, diarrhea, and death was so strong as to
penetrate his very skin.

The caravan approached
what appeared to be an island in the great floodplain. Tall grass
still stretched in every direction, but in the middle of it,
someone had built an outpost on an expanse of raised land. Spanning
the island, which was round and perhaps a half mile in diameter,
was a crude split-rail fence. Standing only a few feet, it grew to
ten feet of actual wall where the road met the island. Guards stood
in short towers on either side with crossbows pointed back at the
island. Flanking what appeared to be a large, reinforced drawbridge
that could be lowered to cover a ten foot ditch that had been cut
through the road were two more soldiers in mail shirts and helms.
They held stout spears in their hands and, like their fellows in
the tower, had cloths pulled over their mouths and noses. They
seemed entirely disinterested in their jobs and barely moved as the
caravan approached the gate.

“
Lower the bridge,” Valati
Lareno called out when the wagons could proceed no further. “We
come in the name of the Order with food and water for the people of
this camp.”

“
It’s your death,” an
officer replied from the top of the wall. He turned to the soldiers
in the towers at his side and looked down the opposite side of the
wall. “Watch ‘em, boys. We’re lowerin’ the gate.” The soldiers on
the wall tensed, holding up their weapons and increasing their
grips. Satisfied that his men were ready, the officer walked to a
thick lever and pulled it back. With a deafening rattle, the bridge
fell into place, landing with a crash a few paces before the first
set of donkeys.

Dasen’s heart crashed with
it. The smell hit him like a wave he could almost see. Not even the
herb-soaked muslin could keep it at bay. He felt the bile rising in
his stomach and watched through watering eyes as a young man to his
side bent over the side of the cart to release the contents of his
stomach. Dasen barely forced his own sickness down, focused on
breathing from his mouth, and waited for his senses to acclimate
themselves to the gut-wrenching assault. They did not manage it,
but the misery that engulfed them as the wagon rolled through the
gate made the smell seem insignificant.

The bodies were the first
horror to welcome him. The wagon that held them was just inside the
wall, immediately in front of Dasen as they entered. Flies swarmed
it in numbers that almost obscured its contents. But there was no
mistaking the bodies stacked as neatly as logs on their way to the
mill. The faces of the dead had been covered with cloths and their
clothes remained, but Dasen still found the thin, white limbs, the
lolling heads, the motionless chests – ribs showing, stomachs
bloated. And worst of all, past the bodies of the adults, at the
back of the open wagon, were the children. Their small bodies were
stacked in three piles perpendicular to those of their parents.
Their small hands and toes shown in a sickly, white multitude
covered by black flies.

Dasen diverted his eyes,
but the images were burned into his memory, would not leave even as
he closed his eyes against them. He shook all over, retched, and
nearly pulled the cloth from across his mouth.
What, by the great and holy Order, am I doing here? Why do I
have to see this?
He wanted to run from
the wagon, run and never look back. His eyes rose to seek an
escape.

He saw the living, if you
could call them that.

The driver had prodded the
reluctant donkeys into a small open area next to the wall, leaving
Dasen with a view of the entire camp. It was composed of hundreds
of low, canvas tents big enough for four people crammed together.
They were arrayed around common cooking areas – a fire pit with a
pot over it. Dasen could not see that any of those pits had fires.
What’s more, he did not see a single piece of wood or clump of
charcoal to burn. In the center of the camp was a stout tower maybe
twenty feet high. Its door was barred and soldiers patrolled its
top with crossbows.

Next to it was a single
well that appeared to have been quickly dug. Dasen had no doubt
that it did not need to be deep to reach the stagnant waters of the
floodplain below. He also had no doubt that the holes in the shabby
wooden outhouses that bordered the camp led to the same water. The
smell from those outhouses rose even above that of the dead. They
reeked of sickness, were black with flies, and were surrounded by
moaning masses, many of whom could no longer stand and had clearly
not made it to the pits before their bodies lost control of their
contents.

Those that did emerge from
the tents to approach the wagons held their stomachs and watched
the counselors with wide, desperate eyes. They barely looked human.
They were streaked with filth, clothes little more than rags,
bodies skeletal. They looked like they had died days ago and failed
to find a place in the ground. Their eyes and cheeks were sunken,
bellies bloated, arms and legs reduced to sticks, hair in matted
clumps or shaved away altogether. Their clothes were black with mud
and excrement, torn, ragged, or gone altogether. Even women walked
about naked, filth so thick upon them as to nearly hide their
nudity. This was as low as humans could get. Even the dead had
seemed peaceful and composed in comparison.

Dasen absorbed each horror
with growing shock. He could not imagine such as this existing in
the world he had known. He had thought that the mutilated workers
in his father’s factories had been unconscionable. This was
inhuman, it was cruelty to the point of malevolence. If his father
was responsible for this, he would have nothing to do with him,
would denounce him without hesitation.

“
May I help you down, my
lady?” Valati Lareno held a hand out to Dasen. He brushed it off
and strode from the wagon in a bound that set the valati back.
Around him, the acolytes were unloading the bags of bread. Two of
the counselors had made their way to the wagon and were performing
the rites of the dead. As they said their prayers, two men carried
the body of a girl, her dirt smeared smock stained brown, to the
cart. One of the counselors stopped them and said a prayer over the
girl before she was added to the shortest of the piles. A woman
stumbled behind, barely able to walk. She fell, fought her way back
to her feet, doubled over in pain, and fell again. She remained
there, doubled, crying, and screaming a name that Dasen could not
hope to claim.

Dasen’s eyes bounced from
one person to the next – a child moaning in his own filth; a mother
leaned against a tent pole, head tilted back, cracked lips swarming
with flies; a bearded man stumbling and falling, he laid where he
landed staring at the sky in defeat. There were a thousand scenes
of misery, they existed in every corner and crevice. Nothing, no
one had been spared.

The guards moved through
it as if seeing none of it. They came from their posts along the
walls to take positions around the caravan, spears out as if
expecting an attack from these people who could not even walk.
Dasen’s jaw locked so tight he thought it might break. He wanted to
shake the guards, to slap them, to force them to look at the misery
around them and take responsibility for it.

And Dasen realized that he
was angry, was as angry as he could ever remember being, and that
anger made him strong, made him resolute. His father had abandoned
these people. He would not. The Order had brought him here to make
it right, and that was what he would do.

“
Good,” the valati said.
“Use that anger. Channel it. Not for your magic, but for good. Your
father did this. He created this. Now, it is up to you to fix
it.”

“
These people are dying!”
Dasen screamed, voice rising with his emotion so that he sounded
the part he was meant to play. “How can we let this happen? In a
country such as this. How can we call ourselves a civilized,
Order-loving people if we allow this?” He brushed away tears that
he did not realize he had shed. “You will come here every day!” he
ordered the valati. “You will bring clean water and food. Do you
understand?” He glared at Lareno.

Valati Lareno backed away
and held up his hands. “My lady, there . . . there is no more food
to spare.” He was playing it up, was cowering before the noble
lady, making her into the savior. It was all manipulation. Dasen
didn’t care.

“
No more excuses!” he
screamed. “We will find food, and we will bring it here. If we have
to go to every house in Gorin begging, we will find it.”

“
As you say, my
lady.”

“
And you will close that
well! These people have the Wasting Death. Everyone knows it is
caused by dirty water. You will bring water here for them to
drink.” Dasen was in a fervor, hands waving, pointing, and yelling,
barely aware any longer that he was supposed to be a woman.
Everyone from the counselors, to the guards, to the refugees were
staring at him.

“
It will be as you say, my
lady,” the valati reassured with calming gestures. “We have brought
water today and will strive to do so in the future, but it is up to
the governor. This is the first time he has allowed us to come
here. It may be the last.”

“
Then I will talk with the
governor! For now, get these people water.” He stomped to the wagon
that was packed with casks. He turned the spigot of one and began
filling a cup. He carried it to a man who had collapsed a few paces
from the wagons. He lifted the man’s head and helped him drink. The
holy men around him stared. “Help me!” he yelled when the man had
finished the cup. He dashed back to the wagon and started filling
it again.