Page 31 of The Merciless Ones
“Don’t, Deka,” she protests, turning her face away when I do just that, but I persist anyway.
Her body may be as stiff as a board, but she isn’t pulling away, which is how I know she actually wants me to touch her. Belcalis rarely seeks physical affection – avoids it like the plague whenever she can. Still, every once in a while, she needs to be touched, just like the rest of us. Now is obviously one of those times.
After some moments, she does pull away, back to her usual no-nonsense self. “That’s enough of that,” she says, wiping her eyes so quickly, I almost miss the motion. She glances around. “So where’s the parchment for the boys, then?” she asks. “We’ve all had a good laugh at ours.”
“We didn’t find any,” Kweku says, shrugging his now-massive shoulders. It’s almost startling, actually, seeing how much the past few months of battle have changed his appearance, from the plump and indolent city boy I met just over a year ago, to the hulking warrior who now stands in front of me.
“That doesn’t make sense,” Belcalis says, frowning.
“It does if they’re expecting us.” These soft words come from tall and quiet Lamin. He glances pointedly at the men gathered on the hill beside us, the jatu who are pretending to not be jatu.
I’ve been watching them all this time, and they haven’t spared our wagons a second glance, which is a relief. “They don’t know who we are,” I say. “If they did, they’d have already made a move.”
Lamin nods, but his eyes remain fixed on the men.
I turn to Keita. “Tell us what you learned.”
“It’s as we were told. Elder Kadiri and his priests rest in the castle every night. Thankfully, they lock the gates at night, so we won’t have to deal with the rest of this rabble when we take him.”
He nods his chin towards the swelling crowd at the bottom of the hill: groups of carousing men, a few masked and hooded women among them. They’re all milling around the wooden platform where the girls’ corpses are, the gold slowly draining from their skin. The sight sends a wave of immeasurable sadness through me.
Those girls will wake within the hour, perhaps less. But we won’t be there to rescue them. Not today, anyway.
The crunch of footsteps on grass pulls me away from my depressing thoughts. “Hail, fellow followers of Idugu,” a voice says.
I turn to find a group of soldiers approaching us, these looking distinctly more slovenly than the ones camped nearby. They’re all regular soldiers, not jatu in disguise. As they near, Britta ducks her head, pretending to be shy, and I quickly follow suit, as do the other girls. Oteran women – especially the young ones – generally don’t look at or speak to strange men for fear of their reputations. One bold glance can be all it takes to send a woman down the path to temples or pleasure houses, especially if she doesn’t have powerful male guardians.
Keita puts his arm around me and pulls me closer just as the tallest soldier steps forward, the odour of mead drifting from him in waves. Beside us, Melanis stiffens but remains committed to her busybody-grandmother guise.
“Newly-weds, are ye?” the soldier asks, squinting blearily at our matching robes.
Between the way his words move fluidly up and down and the leathery texture his pinkish skin has taken from the blazing summer sunlight, it’s clear he’s from the more remote Northern provinces, perhaps even a village near Britta’s. He must have travelled here with Elder Kadiri, as did most of the soldiers milling about this field.
Li steps forward, positioning himself in front of the group. “All of us are. We’re on our way to Senlín Hú.”
“Ah, the city of wine and honey! A fine place to spend time after a wedding,” the soldier says, waggling his eyebrows at the boys as he takes another swig of his mead. “But the Festival of the Half Light is upon us. No more travels as Idugu makes his journey.”
Idugu… Just the name is enough to fill me with anxiety. We’re finally here, so close to our goal I can almost taste it. All we need to do is take Elder Kadiri and use him to discover the location of whoever holds the angoro. Then we can find and destroy it so that the mothers can regain their power and annihilate the cult of Idugu for ever, ushering Otera into the new golden age it so desperately needs.
I hold on to this thought as Li strokes the long moustache he’s worn as part of his disguise.
“Idugu?” he asks, pretending not to understand what the soldier is saying.
The soldier laughs. “Ye must truly be in the depths of wedded bliss if ye dinna know, friend. The priests have been announcing the news for the past few months. Oyomo has changed aspects. He is now Idugu – vengeance upon those who would claim to be the true gods of Otera.”
I glance at Li, tense, but he only nods slightly before turning back to the soldier. “And how does he aim to enact this vengeance, friend? Forgive me my ignorance. I’ve been preoccupied these months, you understand.” He squeezes Britta tighter to him for emphasis.
The soldier laughs drunkenly. “No apologies needed, friend; I understand. Idugu is gathering armies to march to the mountains of the unbelievers. Imagine it: all the men in Otera, moving together as one.”
The words jolt through me, as do the images. All those men attacking us, lifting their weapons against the mothers. I already knew this was their plan, but to hear the soldier say it so cavalierly… It’s all I can do to keep my head bowed, so powerfully is rage washing over me. I’m not the only one affected. I hear a low rustling sound as Melanis’s wings move under her cloak.
Thankfully, the soldier does not notice. “We’ll pull those cursed mountains to their foundations an’ put every alaki we find to the slaughter, no matter how long it takes. So much gold will flow in Otera, it will be centuries before anyone knows poverty again.”
Murderous visions dance behind my eyelids: my atikas ploughing through that man’s gut, then cutting down every human here.
I clench my fingers so tightly, my nails dig into my skin. Melanis’s wings are shaking even more noticeably now, but the man just keeps on speaking, oblivious to the danger. “In the meantime, friends, you must come for the gathering. The Wumi Kaduth is speaking. It’ll be very beneficial for your new wives to hear her speak, learn from her wisdom.”
“The Wumi Kaduth?” Li repeats, his ignorance genuine this time.