Gods, the things she could have done to me. He felt soiled. She could have— No, no. Don’t even think it.
Why hadn’t she done something? He left her behind in the Afterdeath. He couldn’t even argue he didn’t deserve punishment. Hells, he’d have killed her if she abandoned him. Could it be pity? Could Stehlen have seen him lying there, scarred and ugly and taken pity on him? Hope and disgust did battle. If she pitied him, maybe she wouldn’t kill him. And yet he was disgusted at the thought of being an object of pity.
Avoided the mirrors in the tower, didn’t you?
“Shut up. It’s not that bad.”
Unbrauchbar was close. He’d find some women and charm them into bed. That would improve his mood, crush any and all thoughts of pity. He was fine. Better than fine. Bedeckt always blathered on about adversity either strengthening or breaking people. Well no one was stronger than Wichtig. Missing fingers? Pah! He was better than ever. I’ll cut a swath through the would-be-Greatest Swordsmen, leave a trail of bodies. Everyone would know his name.
I’ve been complacent. It’s time to ensure my place in history. It’s time to carve my place in the anus of time.
Was that the right word? Wichtig shrugged as he rode. It seemed right. Bedeckt would know.
Wichtig thought of the old goat’s hewn and hoary skull, the mass of layered scar tissue rendering his wooden block of a face damned near incapable of expression. He swallowed painfully when his eyes again strayed to his bandaged left hand.
Bedeckt.
Gods, imagine going through life looking like Bedeckt.
Wichtig shivered. Morgen could heal this. The little bastard better.
He brought me back from the dead. A few missing fingers and an ear will be nothing.
He remembered how Bedeckt refused to let Morgen to heal his scars, how he said they were a part of who he was, reminders of past mistakes. This was different. These scars weren’t due to Wichtig’s mistakes, they were just something that happened, unavoidable. Bedeckt’s an idiot. Wichtig scowled at the brown gauze wrapping his foot. Should he keep that scar, a little reminder?
“No,” he said. “I’ve always been perfect. I’ll be perfect again.”
The day crawled past like a beggar with broken knees. The sun, exhausted from its climb sank gratefully toward the western horizon, seeming to gather speed as it fell.
An hour before nightfall, Wichtig reined Bl?d to a halt and screamed bloody murder at the world when he slid from the beast’s back and the foot with the missing toe touched ground.
“Enough sticking pain. It’s gone. I know. Enough!”
The entire foot ached like a horse stomped on it. Webs of hot agony lanced up his calf muscles and into the knee. Limping and whimpering, Wichtig hobbled about gathering a pile of sticks and twigs, enough to keep a fire going all night. The thought of being visited by an albtraum tonight left his eyes stinging with tears of fear.
Sticking mind rapists.
His gut twinged and tightened around the puckered wound where the albtraum penetrated him.
Just don’t think about it.
Wichtig cried in gratitude when he found a flint, tinder, and char cloth in Bl?d’s saddle bags.
Night took forever. A thousand years of flinching at shadows and throwing more wood on the fire. Every time Wichtig’s eyes drifted closed his own scream of terror snapped him awake. Shapes danced sinuous horrors where the flickering light of the fire did battle with the dark. Sometimes Wichtig caught glimpses of Fluch, a young man, full of rage, hunting the father who abandoned him.
“I didn’t abandon you,” the Swordsman whispered each time his son coalesced from the writhing dark. “I had to leave. You’ll see. You’ll be proud.”
Fluch didn’t look proud. He looked like he wanted Wichtig’s blood.
What had the boy’s mother told him in Wichtig’s absence? What lies?
When the eastern horizon showed the first hints of morning, Wichtig again cried in gratitude, cursing the night between sobs, and screaming his victory over the night.
Bl?d glared loathing as the Swordsman dragged himself, whining and cursing, into the saddle. Once mounted, he sat blinking sweat from his eyes. He felt terrible, nauseated and dizzy. His left arm and leg throbbed, shoving muddy heat up his veins. The left side of his face, where his ear should have been, felt like it had been held against a hot fry pan. He swallowed thick bile and barely managed to stop from tumbling from the horse’s back.
Turning Bl?d south, Wichtig nudged him into motion.
The beast set a slow pace and Wichtig, focussed on staying in the saddle, was too tired to complain. Each plodding step the hateful animal took sent waves of fire through Wichtig’s body.