Brotherhood Saga 03: Death Read online

  Looking into the young man’s eyes, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of longing and need rise up within his chest, pushing all other inhibitions away from him.

  You can’t sleep with someone who works in a bar, he thought, trembling, his arm shaking enough to vibrate the area of the bar before him. For all you know, he could have slept with a dozen other men before you.

  Did it matter, really, or was he just being absurd—cautious, in a sense, for his own human desires?

  “Like I said,” the young man replied, leaning forward once more to separate the distance between them. “I can be up there and back in a flash.”

  “There’s no need for this,” Odin said, rising. “Please, just leave me alone.”

  “I know what you want,” the young man whispered. “I can see it in your eyes.”

  “You can’t see my eyes.”

  “It doesn’t matter. I can still tell when someone’s so lost within their head that they need a moment to take it all away.”

  Odin shook his head.

  When he turned and made his way back toward the stairway, he felt no regret for having not paid for the shot or half-empty glass of wine.

  As the rain came down that night in sheets that seemed to shadow not only the city and stars, but his thoughts, feelings and emotions about life, Odin drew the sheets and blankets around him and tried desperately to contain the emotions that threatened to overwhelm him. Fingers tightened almost painfully, joints ready to fire from their prisons and ricochet off the walls, he rolled onto his back and allowed himself to seemingly collapse within the worn-out mattress and stared at the woodwork ceiling above him.

  For what seemed like the worst possible moment of his life, he considered what could have been the most carefully-unguarded thing he had ever felt.

  No more than a few moments ago, he had been propositioned by someone of the same sex.

  Does this really mean what I think it does, he thought.

  No—it didn’t, not necessarily. Just because he’d never had a fleeting thought about another woman did not mean that he was, in fact, queer, nor did it mean that he desired anything more than companionship from a fellow human being.

  You wanted to, his conscience whispered, stroking his collarbone with one dainty, sharp nail. You know you did.

  “So what?” he whispered. “So what if I wanted someone for the first time in my life!”

  Throwing himself forward, he reached up, tugged at his hair, then tossed his head back and forth as if to shake from his body the spirit of evil that wanted to overtake him.

  With fresh tears burning down his face and rivers of unease trickling throughout his body, he wrapped his arms around himself and began to rock back and forth atop the mattress. First forward, then back, then side to side, he resembled what could have been a child troubled by something he could not understand. Such was his emotions in that moment he felt just like that—like a child, strangled by doubt and unable to wrap his head around the situation at hand.

  A knock came at the door.

  Odin froze.

  Two more followed shortly after.

  You can go back up to your room and I can follow you.

  To think that he was even considering sleeping with such an openly-promiscuous person was almost impossible—outrageous, even, for he’d never considered himself among such lowlife men and creatures of lust and need.

  I can knock once, then twice. You’ll know it’s me.

  Closing his eyes, Odin leaned back and reached up to brush his hair from his eyes.

  Didn’t everyone need someone eventually, at least once in their life?

  “Sir,” the voice at the door said.

  “Go away,” Odin replied, pulling the blankets tighter around him.

  The doorknob clicked.

  Odin threw himself from bed and drew his sword just as the door open to spill light into the room.

  The bartender stood in the threshold with his arms raised and his hands at the side of his head, face unsure and startled.

  “I said to leave me alone,” Odin said, training the sword on the young man as carefully and steadily as possible.

  “You’re not decent, sir.”

  “I was trying to sleep,” he replied, only briefly considering the fact that he wore sleeping trousers and an open, button-up shirt.

  “Can I say something without you threatening to stab me in the heart?”

  “Go ahead. Just don’t try anything funny.”

  “You’re the loneliest person I’ve ever seen in my entire life.”

  “You think that’s funny?” Odin laughed. “You really think it is?”

  “I never said it was funny,” the bartender said, closing the door behind him. “What’s happened to you that you don’t have an ounce of happiness at all?”

  “You really want to know?” Odin asked, reaching up to pull the two sides of his shirt together.

  “I was enjoying the view.”

  Odin growled under his breath.

  The bartender offered a smile and crossed his arms over his chest. “Seriously, though,” the man said. “What happened?”

  “My father just died.”

  “No shit?” the man asked, seating himself in the armchair at the side of the room. “Damn. I’m sorry.”

  “Yeah. So you can see why I’m in no mood to grow attached to someone who I’ll likely leave behind anyway.”

  “Come here.

  “No.”

  “I just want to see your face, maybe even your eyes.”

  “No one wants to see my eyes.”

  “No?” the young man asked. “I do.”

  I do.

  What could have been said to open a kingdom, ensnared in vines and snarled in iron—to have pressed within its lock a key made of silver with flowers and insects—and what, he questioned, could have perpetuated a need so deep that in this kingdom, so fresh with nothing, a seed that could bloom without water and nurture? It seemed, without a common doubt, that such things were impossible—that life, without care, was not allowed to flourish, for things on two legs could not survive on their own once free and born from the womb—but in that moment, cold and alone in a room with another man, that kingdom seemed open, reigned by not only a benevolent benefactor, but sheltered by animals of the utmost variety.

  “You’re serious,” Odin said. “Aren’t you?”

  “Of course I am,” the young man said.

  Odin fell back.

  Stepping forward, freeing himself from his place at the door, the young man crossed the distance between the two of them and crawled up onto the bed.

  Directly above him, hands at either side of his head, Odin stared up and into the young man’s eyes and tried to comprehend just what he was doing.

  “It’s all right,” the young man whispered. “There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

  The man leaned forward.

  Their lips touched.

  Odin closed his eyes and rolled over on top of him.

  Morning came late the following afternoon and with the sound of blackbirds in the air. Disoriented and all the more confused about the events that had taken place last night, he lay alone in the capably-two-person bed and tried to breathe in air that seemed stagnant, pale and without oxygen.

  What did I do last night?

  To anyone looking upon the situation, they could have answered simply. Of course, they would say, he’d had sex—’gotten laid’ a possible term, ‘knocking boots’ another. ‘A torrid night of loveless affairs’ could have been called the event that had transpired within the four closed walls of a room unlocked and perfectly accessible, and ‘mindless, needless fucking’ could have been another. To him, however, it seemed perfectly unnecessary, a matter of the flesh that could have been completely avoided altogether.

  “Does it really matter?” he asked.

  Not anymore. The young man had departed sometime during the night or early in the morning, leaving Odin not only with a sense of guilt, but the
reality that he’d just attached himself to a person who could not care whatsoever.

  He said he wanted to see my eyes.

  Yes, but had the bartender really gleamed anything from them?

  No longer sure what to think about life or the consequences that seemed so willing to come with it, Odin rolled over onto his back and closed his eyes.

  Travel could come later.

  For now, he could simply rest and enjoy what little time he had.

  Later that afternoon, after he’d fully recovered from the emotional affair that had taken little to no time last night, he rose from sleep, dressed himself in his trousers, shirt and cloak, then attached his swords at his side and slung his pack over his shoulder. More than ready to be rid of the place and not in the least concerned about the repercussions that could possibly follow, he marched down the stairs and started to make his way to the door before he stopped in place.

  Alone in the bar with no one else around him, he turned to find the young man standing behind the counter, hands pressed to the bar and eyes alight with mischief.

  “Hello,” Odin said.

  “I assume you’re leaving from the looks of things.”

  “I have to.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “The Whooping Hills.”

  “Why there?”

  Because it’s one step closer to my overall destination.

  “My heart leads me in that direction,” he decided to say, though as full of doubt his words were, they at least held some semblance of truth.

  “Are you feeling any better?”

  “Can’t say that I am.”

  “Last night didn’t do anything for you?”

  “Last night made me understand a few things about myself that I’ve never known before,” Odin said, shrugging his pack over his shoulder and making his way over to the bar. “So I want to thank you for that.”

  “No need to thank me.”

  “Question.”

  “Yes?”

  “How many others have you slept with before me?”

  “Just because I’m friendly doesn’t mean I’m easy.”

  “How many others?”

  “Look,” the young man said, leaning across the counter as though making a move for Odin’s neck. When he realized his action, he drew away, then sighed. “I have a thing for knights, all right?”

  “What makes you think I’m a knight?”

  “You act like one, look like one. Hell, you’re built like one—which, I have to say, is pretty nice considering the chums you get around—“

  “I get it.”

  The young man frowned. His lips a portrait on his face, his eyes two great, blue wells of doubt, Odin tried as hard as he could not to stare at him, but couldn’t help when he did.

  So, he thought. It really was for nothing.

  Then again, who was to say their first time was ever really something?

  “I’ll see you around,” Odin said, turning and making his way toward the door.

  “Will I see you again?”

  “Probably not.”

  “Good luck in whatever you’re doing.”

  Odin’s only reply was a simple wave of his hand.

  When he’d arranged his packs and gathered about himself everything he’d need for the trip, he mounted his horse and made his way to the southeastern side of Sylina, toward the second bend in the river that came before the whisker-like constellations of mini-streams that sprouted off from the tail of the grand construct. While he left the city with many doubts in his mind, particularly about the young bartender and the intimate moment they had shared, he had no doubts about his future, nor about the path he was currently making for himself.

  Soon, he thought.

  Once he cleared the Ornalan border, he would have very little time to consider his other opportunities before he crossed over into the Whooping Hills.

  What would he find there, if not ancient relics of the past?

  “Don’t get ahead of yourself,” he said, reaching down to tangle his fingers through his stallion’s mane. “You don’t even know if anything has taken over the area.”

  They said that the Whooping Hills, though ancient and mostly deserted, were held by creatures that could have defiled the imagination and filled great men’s dreams with horrible nightmares. Those things, with spiny backs and enlarged torsos, could have been described as something akin to a Werewolf—a large, bulky creature with patches of red fur missing from mange that so very often struck their kind and made them appear twisted and fragile. Not necessarily Werewolves, but not necessarily unlike them, they made the Hills inhospitable to any and all human settlements. How the Centaurs had survived them could be anyone’s guess, but when the Werecreatures had come no one knew. Odin himself figured they’d taken shelter in their caves once they found them habitable. Before, their Half-breed brethren could have very well fended them away from their families, but with the uprise of humanity had come the downfall of many other things.

  “You shouldn’t be worrying about this. It’s too far off for you to be getting this into your head.”

  While he couldn’t blame himself for thinking ahead, he knew thinking too far in advance would surely slow him down.

  Sighing, Odin bowed his head and pushed the horse into a slow trot.

  When his mount began to pass over the low bridge that crossed the expanse of the river, it marked a point in his journey where he would be leaving humanity behind for a very, very long time.

  Would he be swallowed by things dark and heavy, or would he become enraptured in things beautiful and mystifying?

  Chapter 3

  “I can’t believe it,” Nova said. “He’s gone.”

  “What’re you gonna do?” Carmen asked.

  “Honestly… I don’t know.

  Seated in the waiting room with his hands laced and his head bowed to avoid the Dwarf’s eyes, Nova tried not to shiver in the chill seeping through the room and prayed with all his heart and mind that Odin, wherever he happened to be, was all right. Thoughts of the past slowly creeping forward and swallowing him whole, he felt as though dipped in water so cold it burned and imagined all those years ago when he had, once upon a time, wandered through such hellish conditions and had nearly died because of it.

  He could get it, he thought. The chill.

  How he’d managed to get to Ornala that fateful night was beyond his measure, but were he to think about it, he would have to say that determination and the blind, watchful eye of some God had to have been the reason. Odin wouldn’t have been there had there not been some sort of clairvoyance, nor would the Elf who was now gone and scattered across the horizon.

  Could he possibly catch up with the young man were he to leave right now?

  No. It’s been a week.

  With the knowledge that there was nothing he could do firmly implanted within his mind and with the reality that his young friend would not likely be turning back, Nova stood, crossed his arms over his chest, then wandered to the glass doors.

  Outside—in the cold, shattered world—hail began to rain down and covered the ground like snow.

  “Nova,” the Dwarf said.

  “Yes?”

  “You’re not thinking about going out there to get him, are you?”

  “I’d say no, but… I really can’t.”

  “So you did think about it then.”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you going to do it?”

  “I can’t,” Nova sighed, running his hands through his hair and trying his hardest not to let his emotions get to him. “There’s no way I would ever catch up.”

  “I just want you to know that I’m glad you’re not going.”

  “You’re a great friend, Carmen. I really appreciate the support.”

  “Hey—you and Odin are friends too. I’m just sad to see how much this has devastated him.”

  How couldn’t it, Nova wondered, when a man who’d been in his life for the past five years just up and
admitted that he was your father at the moment of his death? To form a bond with such a man and find that it was so much more had to be horrible, a tragedy beyond all compare.

  If he tried hard enough, he imagined it felt like torture—comparable to being backhanded repeatedly and whipped until the welts in your back began to bleed.

  Don’t think about that, he thought, somehow resisting the urge to reach back and rub his shoulder blade. It’s over, done with and gone.

  He need not remember the eve of his torture, the night of his imprisonment, for Odin had saved him in his one moment of weakness.

  “What’re you going to do?” Nova asked, turning his head to look at the Dwarf, who’d since moved from her place near the wall to stand on a chair and look out the window. “Will you go home?”

  “Going home now wouldn’t be worth it,” the Dwarf sighed, brushing a strand of hair from her face. “I plan on contacting my husband, yes, but only to tell him I’ll be staying at the capital until this war resolves itself.”

  “It must be hard, being away from him.”

  “You tell me. You’ve been away from your wife too.”

  For far too long, Nova thought.

  Bowing his head, he closed his eyes and took a slow, deep breath.

  Regardless of whether he liked it or not, he would have to return home—soon, before the war resumed.

  Though he had no idea how long it would be until he saw Odin again, he had to return to his family.

  There would be no rest for his troubled mind until he was home and safe in Ornala.

  He decided it was best to return home on the dawn of the eighth day, when he realized without a doubt in his mind that there was no chance in all the Gods’ glory that his friend would be turning back. For that, he made it an effort to rise from his place along the floor, dress and make himself as presentable as possible, then cross the street and make his way to the hospital, where currently Parfour, the mage brothers and several other injured men were staying.