The Blood Hour (Ulric)

[Naama]

A surge of panic wracked her body as her head was lifted, and she meant to fight to her last breath if she had to, until she heard the voice... she knew that voice. "Ulric," She choked, red, sticky fingers clutching his arm and the cloak that did little to stem the tides of cold air. She trembled in his arms, head pounding, back aching, gut throbbing. It was all she could do to keep from falling unconscious from shock. "I petched up pretty good this time," She managed a weak smile, but the action made her wince. She tried so hard to lift herself up, but every limb felt like a heavy-laden stone and the pain only intensified. "They weren't slavers," she added, "There were no slaves, just men and more men." What had she done to him? She remembered only a blur of darkness after those cold, dead eyes drove into her. The flash of fangs and scales, but attempting to recall any more resulted in a painful head ache. "That bastard... He used magic on me.... didn't he?" Her breaths came short, and suddenly the cold felt far more embracing. Her lids began to grow heavy, the prospect of a deep sleep ever more enticing. "I'm so tired, Ulric. So... so tired."

[Ulric]

Ulric clasped her tighter, his face drawn, smeared by red, desperately gazing into her inky eyes. “They’re dead,” he grated, as if that could make anything better. “They can’t hurt you any longer.” He cast around, but there was only the sprawl of torn corpses, and the harsh raving of crows. Go away, he growled, pressing the wad of frayed wool against the ruddy seep.

“Hang on.” He crawled away, taking up the fur cloak, and spread it over her body. “I’m going to make a fire.” He clutched at her jaw again, making sure her eyes hadn’t closed. The gray, murky haze was coming over them, though. That was always how it began. The waxy skin, the tremors. The turgid beating of the heart. He’s seen dying men before, and come near enough that knew what to look for.

“Think think of the sea,” he said shakily, prying up a fall of frosty timber, not caring about the cruel thorns. “Just think of the breakers crashing on the shingle, the gray ridge of a cliff rising up just beyond, the foamy spume on the crests of the waves as they slap against the prow.” Tearing away a grimy tunic from cold, dead shoulders, he ripped it into strips, then yanked off a gauntlet, reaching into the pouch at his belt until his fingers closed around a cold, flinty knob. He struck a shower of sparks, but they didn’t ignite. “Hear the flap of the sails as they catch the wind, the snap of the yards and lengths of tarry rope, the creak of the masts. That’s going to be ours, one day.” He curled around the crude fabric, trying to shelter it from the cruel gusts, but the tiny sparks defied his mastery. He kept trying, futilely, lashed on by a vicious desperation. “Roving the seas, answering to nobody.”

Then, the prick of orange finally caught. Ulric leaned nearer, urging it to an ember. Tongues of flame crept over the rag, strong enough for him to feed it pieces of dry bark, twigs, larger chunks of decaying wood. Then, he drew her closer to the flames, tearing off his bloody armor so he could warm her with his body. “Don’t die, you harpy” he snarled. “Don’t you dare.”

[Naama]

The frigid breeze tore through her skin and bones with cruel icy claws and in response, Naama curled closer to him, drawn in by the only shred of warmth he shared. No, don't leave me, she wanted to cry, but the cold stole her breath away, sending it whirling into the air. As he spoke, she could only gaze up at the dreary blue sky, imagining it to be a vast sea where Zulrav's kindly winds would caress her hair, and the scent of the salt water filled her nose. That would be nice, wouldn't it... To sail beyond the world. She sank into exhaustion, straining to keep her eyes transfixed on Ulric's almost futile attempts to spark a fire. But gradually, her vision began to seep into darkness. Sleep. Rest. That is all you need. The whispers echoed, lilting words that seemed to coincide so well with Winter's cold embrace. And for that single moment, she closed her eyes. The shadows came, dark and foreboding. They were always there, threatening to lure out past horrors, to torment her dreams. But now they did not come. There was a solitude she longed for in so long, just for that moment. Is this what it feels like to die? To feel peace at last? No, but you cannot die, Naama. Not yet, not until you find her. A burst of red, a crackling of embers. Naama felt them, she heard them, and among them all she could feel the warmth of him, seeping back into her bones. She opened her eyes to the painful brilliance of the flames and found enough strength to lift a trembling hand to his cheek. "This harpy.... was only resting. You're... stuck with me... for a good while longer."

[Ulric]

Relief surged through his chest, cloying his fears. Ulric laid his cheek against hers for a long instant. “Never leave me,” he grunted, and then he crept from under the ridge of fur, the edges swept by trenchant gusts. The flames were dying. He limped further into the jumble of gray trunks, cut more twigs and brought them over, flung the bundle on the ember worms. There was a crackle, a belch of cinders. They began to dance again. The warmth suffusing his gloved fingers. “We’re passing the night here,” he glanced at Naama, lifting the heavy sable of his cloak to probe at the edges of her gash, worried even though it was sticky. The gash would crust over, but he knew from her gray hue of face that she’d already been drained, and he wasn’t nearly hardy enough yet to carry her all the way back to the city. “Naama, don’t do anything rash.” Imploringly, he gazed into her inky eyes, for she was precisely that. Rash, like any other savage. Hard to predict her whims, unable to subjugate her will.

That’s probably why he liked her.

Ulric turned away, began to cut large, prickly boughs from the lower limbs of the tight ranks of firs. He dragged them over, along with a few spars he cut from young, green saplings, only to find his Gasvik on a jumble of boulders, watching over the injured Myrian. Desank’s face was slightly puffy, a daubing of crimson on his neck, his glumly hunching shoulders, as though he’d found yet another threat. His absence had nearly been their undoing, and consequently the evoked thought was badly unnerving. Ulric gave a frown, brushing at those broad slabs of shoulder. He seldom worried for the strange creature’s safety, but now he felt a twinge of regret, transparently shrouded by a quavering, yet blunt query. “Where have you been?”

“Hadin afd qwn fadub. Aibf oad quwb abdfb, adifn ty qwomnf fbdu ewub. Yasn adfibewb one ubafb qwubfd. Gsib a ifb faid ewefv dweron. Ubf aubew pqer ewrd.”

Ulric didn’t comprehend any of the garbled discourse, as ever. However, it was clear from the unusual breaks, slurring, and clacks of that unworldly tongue that he shouldn’t ask any further. There’d never been any glory in war, just a bunch of corpses, and a despair that forged chains around at his chest. The shelter began to rise, no more than a crude, uneven frame of spars, lashed together with hanks of rope, covered with pine boughs. He came away, hands sticky with gooey brown, redolent sap, to find larger chunks of timber by the fire. He fed them in slowly, as the day began to recede, the sky poking through a crazy jigsaw of branches smeared by crimson. The sooty, dented pot was already set over the flames, water bubbling. “Naama, I’m making soup,” he wagged a finger over her nose. “Don’t expect me to do this, ever. Don’t you whisper a word. Don’t die, too,” he chided for good measure, though the dour remark just brought up his choking fears again, made him uneasy. He jerked the cloak aside, gently tugging away the rag so he could scrub the gash with the steaming water. “You do enjoy soup, don’t you?”

Ulric ripped away another rag, used it to bind her, and laid about for something to eat. The problem was, he only knew how to prepare fish soup, and egregiously horrid soup at that. He just went through his pouch, taking out some withering turnips, a few crusts of bread, a wedge of dried, flaked scrod. He’d certainly wondered what the corpses had in their gear, but he didn’t want anything from them right now, least of all their moldy cheese and hard sausages. He just flung everything into the pot, began to stir it with the edge of his knife when he heard the groan.

Arshaz was rousing. Ulric began to growl, a feral rumbling from the depths of his chest. He thought back, to the despair that had been his captor when she’d come at him crazed, with swords swinging, a spray of red down her belly, her legs. He’d hurt her. He’d do it again.

That was enough.

Ulric forced away from the flames, making for the twisted, bloody enemy he’d left in the frost. He saw an eye widen, a bead of red wring through the corner of his lips, quickly growing. There was a forceful gasp, a twitch of fingers. “That’s shiny,” Ulric gave a snort, abruptly plunged his blade into the cavity of the agent’s neck, so forcibly that it grated on vertebrae. The legs gave a jerk.

Then it was over.

Ruthlessly, he curled his fingers under the ridge of armor, tore away a copper necklace, bearing a chunk of garnet. That was his right. The fingers, at least those that remained, had a few rings. He cut them off, though they were mostly copper, went to find the others. They turned up a gold signet, though it was strange to his eyes. He took the man’s sword, his purse, and went through the other corpses, mostly taking their purses, bands of jewelry, a carved bow, decently crafted daggers, a long cloak of coarse, dark bear fur. By the time he was done, the ravens were already quorking, perching on chests, on rigid, swiftly freezing cheeks, tearing at eyes, beaks tearing away pink slivers of meat, making bulges in their throats.

Ulric lowered himself with a grunt, draping the other cloak over Naama, and gave her a cruel grin. “Maybe we’ll get you a dress.”

OOCYeah, it’s incredibly boring, but at least that’s everything knocked out for not dying in the forest.

[Naama]

An array of bruises bloomed along her shoulders, her stomach and her legs. They ached as her bones ached, and the pain of her raw wound only amplified it. But even as she lay in the makeshift bed, her eyes held onto Ulric, observing the extent of what he did to ensure they both survived. He is like a wildling. A true hunter. She meant to smile, but the shift of the cloak made her wince. "Being rash is what I do best, it's in the blood." The myrian wanted to sit up, to help him erect the shelter, to do something other than wallow in a perpetual state of pain, utterly vulnerable to anything and everything. It angered her, but the fatigue would not allow her even the luxury of raising her voice. "I'm sure the boy would appreciate your cooking expertise," She jeered. But the thought of her charge abruptly revealed a hidden fear, the thing she'd forgotten. With no regards to her patched injury, Naama sat upright, but the action forced an agonizing cry. She clenched her jaw, "Squirt, gods, I left him alone, he's alone." He'd returned with another cloak, but even now Naama was stubbornly shoving the other away, making to stand, even as her head felt light and her legs weak. The thought of the boy had given her a surge of energy, but it would not last long. A mother's strength, that's what it is. "He could have gotten himself killed by now, stabbed in the neck by a passing wanderer, kidnapped and sold off to some distant city, and we wouldn't even know."

[Ulric]

Ulric just crouched by the flames, giving the pot a desultory stir. “You shouldn’t do that,” he rasped, vaguely sparing her a sidelong glance. There wasn’t any use in her leaving, really. The boy wasn’t going to risk any trouble he couldn’t handle, and she’d just end up hurt even worse. “Naama, you’ve got to quit fussing over the boy,” he accused her. “You’re making him weak, just because of your fear. You were a child, once. You should know that you can't grow harder unless you’ve broken a few bones, come to embrace agony. You can’t swing a blade if you’re always dreaming of honey cakes, can you? That’s what you’re doing to him. There’s plenty of the boy in him, but he needs to be a man.”

The words were brutal. They weren’t what she wanted to hear, but he wasn’t going to stay his tongue. The edge of his knife scraped against the pot’s edges, swirling the tepid, soggy contents.

Vaguely, he glanced at the sprawl of corpses. They’d only bring down the wolves, but he wasn’t going to drag the away tangle of bloody limbs and ruined mail and leather, wasn’t willing to fling them over the brim of some rocky, desolate gorge. There wasn’t enough light. There wasn’t enough vigor in his body.

Ulric was limping worse than usual, too. He glanced at that tawny face, feeling angry at her. He didn’t want to worsen her fears, but she’d already known the perils when they’d gone reaving. “Squirt fended for himself before, I hear.” Then he rose, forcing back a grimace. “He’ll do it again.”

[Naama]

Even despite the nauseating pain from her gut, Naama's stubborness knew no bounds. She kneeled amongst the cloaks, the warmth of the fire searing away the bitter cold, and yet his words still stung like spears of ice. Is it true? Do I coddle him? She pressed a hand against her bindings, stiffling the throb, trying to keep the accusations from taking root. But Ulric was right. He usually was. Shaking her head in defeat, she allowed the overwhelming fatigue to take over, wrapping the cloaks about her as tightly as she could. There was a sorrow in her gaze as the myrian watched the flames lick the air, crackling embers and all. I don't want to lose him as I've lost her. My fear has made me weak. But she bit her tongue, instead glancing up to meet Ulric's weary eyes. "He is a boy still, and in time he will learn, but he shouldn't learn alone. In the wilds, the lone ranger is always assured a brutal death." And even a party of three can succumb to a single monster. "Are you hurt?" She asked suddenly, "Rest, Ulric, you've done enough, or at least let me help you." There was a chorus of howls, solemn and foreboding. A shiver coursed through her spine, yet the myrian would not relent. "Come, lay with me, let the wolves have their meals."

[Ulric]

The night was descending now, blacker than the sticky pitch he’d smeared on the hull of his father’s boat. Making him feel very tiny, though also stifled by its cover. There wasn’t any beauty in its hushed enormity. They were ringed by the corpses of so many foes, but he couldn’t keep from brooding on how near they’d been to defeat. Nearly lost her, he growled to himself. Nearly let him take me, too. Ulric thought of those steely eyes, and gave a shiver.

Dragging himself away, he found a discarded, shaggy pelt, speckled with mud and blood, and furling it around his shoulders, went to her side. Those jet eyes rose up, washed by concern. “I’ve had worse,” he grunted, splaying his fingers over the dancing flames. They were cut, bruised by the crushing, bone-snapping rage that’d infused him. The skin already starting to scab over. “Not much you can do, except stay at my side.” He glanced away, not wanting her to discern the tremors of his vulnerability. He despised himself for it, knew she’d think him weak. He was weak, though. He was like any other man, with fears and doubts just as powerful, just as crippling. They nearly had her, he frowned, eyes partly glazing over as he thought back to that moment, that dreadful, clenching terror that’d stricken him when he’d turned around, gazed over the swords menacing her.

There hadn’t been anything he could do. That was what frightened him so badly. There wasn’t anything he could do, no way of consuming the gods’ mastery over the cruel vagaries of his fate. Not that the gods had anything to do with this.

“They’re just meat,” Ulric murmured in her ear, waving at the tangle of corpses. He pressed himself nearer, tender despite his brutish cast, the leaden weight of his armor, circling her shoulders with an elbow, as if trying to reduce the pain of her injury. “That’s all we are when we die, isn’t it? There’s only a sack of flesh, bloating with gases, writhing with fat, disgusting worms and turning gray as it slowly goes back to the muck. The soul flown.”

Ulric nuzzled at her hair. “What… did he do to you?” He hadn’t wanted to ask, but he couldn’t stop himself. There wasn’t any the animosity that’d spurted from her. The grotesquery, the wrongness of it hung over him like a discordant cloud, turgidly creeping over his thoughts.

He didn’t want to know, and yet, he had to find out why.

[Naama]

The flames licked the cold winter air hungrily. The cunning eyes of four-legged predators were hidden beneath a thin veil of smoke, but if Naama noticed them, she said not a word. What did he do to me? A trembling, tawny hand grasped for Ulric's own. The images returned, uninvited, penetrating her already worn defenses. The rearing serpent, the ruby eyes, the forked, venemous tongue. She stared into the fire and saw the lash of a powerful, scaled tail, the skull of a child crushed into a gruesome pile of blood and bone. And then she closed her eyes, closed them tight, so the tears would not come. "He made me see things that were best left unseen." She murmured, her black gaze drinking in the red inferno. "The thing that ruined my life." And then a flash of white, a clawed hand sinking into her gut, and she felt a wrenching agony explode in her abdomen. Naama keeled over with a cry, feeling a trickle of something hot and sticky between her thighs. Was I...? With teeth clenched, the myrian tore apart what clean rag she could to staunch the blood, hoping by some sliver of a chance the northerner hadn't noticed. She lay down and swallowed the pain. "I'm sorry," She said quietly, "If I hurt you. If--... If he made me hurt you. All I remember are his eyes. Those cold gray eyes. It's like he delved into my memories, picking the one that he knew would just... just..." Fill me with such rage. She lay still, listening to the howl of wolves.

[Ulric]

Ulric clasped her hand, feeling the cold in her bones, despising himself for asking that of her. There wasn’t anything redeeming in sorcery. The nastiest of its vagary had been wreaked on her, and he was inquiring about it with sort of a crudely sordid mania, urging her to relate every grotesque detail. “No, don’t,” he spoke softly, seeing the damage he’d already caused. Though it hurt him, he couldn’t look away. The cast of her face, waxen through tawny flesh, was already gripped by a demon of former dread, the betrayal of fear. They manifested, making him feel an utter vagik. “Don’t think of his eyes, of what he did to you. They did it to me, too.” He let a hush scour over him, as if scraping out his insides.

Kelhus, he grimaced, troubled by the awakening of his vision, the memories he’d long been denied. They could’ve just been dreams, but he wouldn’t relent, wouldn’t give them up.

By now, the wolves were circling, keeping away from the dancing sway of the flames, the red ember worms. They were scrawny, nearly shrunken by hunger. Their flanks were thin, the cages of their ribs jutting through motley, mangy pelts, but their eyes were a feral amber, a low growl erupting from their chests. They’d feast this night, gorging until their guts ached, and leave a grisly detritus for the crows.

Ulric felt the jerk on his hand, abrupt, like a band of iron trying to crush his scabbing fingers. There’s something wrong, he scowled, taking in the stricken look in her eyes. “Naama, what is it?” There wasn’t any answer. The savage was ignoring him, evoking a frantic, sullen worry. He jerked away the covers, half thinking that she’d be bleeding out again, but he found something far, far worse. The dressing was smeared, but not badly. That wasn’t the same for the rag she was clasping between her legs, nearly curling up against the agony. Holding back a grimace, he scrubbed his fingers over under her thigh, gazing at them, dismayed, when they came away smeared by red.

The coals of his eyes fastened on her. His tacit query in the gaunt, haunted sprawl of his face.