Stone Clad: Song and Story [2]

Song and Story

         Talla was not soon to warm to his presence. She seemed to grow more and more cross with him with the moon’s phases. It seemed he could not go within five arrows of Carmilla without a growl and a snap from the wolf’s strong jaws. Talla seemed to be under the impression he was a better meal than a companion.
         “You would think one would have the courtesy to call off one’s mongrel after some rogue rilfeman saves them. Do you not think that reasonable?”
         “Talla is not the stupid beast you assume her to be. She hates you because you insult her honor and assume she has no higher functions. She also does not trust easily. You could imagine this is a toxic and unfortunate mixture on the part of this rogue rifleman.”
         “Pardon if I do not show respect a beast who wishes to make me into dinner.”
         “Pardon her if she does not wish to consort with those who think her a lesser being than them!” She snaps back, a harsh wind seemingly sweeps her hair backward as her fury grows. He could not feel the slightest breeze however.
         They walk in silence for a time; the rifleman in distant thought and Carmilla in deep loathing of every breath that hissed from his lips.
         “You are not from anywhere near here nor…. From the Stone Waste at all.”
         “I never recalled the moment it became your concern where I am from.”
         He would not back down that easily. “I merely wish to know what sort of trouble I am to face. May I have that in the least?”
         “I know not what you mean. I am where I always was and ever will be. Why should I grant you more? I know not you name, your title, nor your quest.”
         “Perhaps I possessed no quest.”
         “There is no such thing! One without a quest is dead.”
         “Perhaps I am dead; forever cursed to endure Satan’s Hell bitch and her fellow mongrel bitch… Those of the Sky wished me to be more of a chaste lad who wishes to fuck his Mum.”
         At this Talla snarls and lunges at him. He spins out of the way with a yelp but she has grasped hold of the tail of his woolen cloak. Tugging and tearing as if he were a leg of lamb she toys with him while he shrieks and yells like a maid being chased by a rabid hound.
         At first Carmilla watches this with grim satisfaction but then her face bursts into a full blown grin and she strangely beings to hoot with laughter.
         “OH! IS MY PERIL AMUSING TO YOU NOW?!”
         “No, it’s that I just realized you’re absolutely nothing to be threatened by.”
         “I THINK ANYONE WOULD PANIC WHILIST A BEAST WAS ATTEMPTING TO RIP THEIR ARSE OFF!”
         “She is not trying to harm you. She is merely scolding you as if you were an unruly pup.”
         He stops flailing around and to his immense surprise the wolf-dog lets him go and trots over to Carmilla.
         “I bet you enjoyed that.” He grumbles as he fiddles with his coat.
         “She does not. She merely wishes you would stop being so unruly and let her trust you.”
         His voice catches in his throat. He wasn’t expecting that of all things.
         “I…. uh, I…. that’s nice.” Nothing else would come to his mind.
         “It is. She expresses an uncustomary willingness to let you redeem yourself.”
         He stares blankly at Carmilla then down at Talla. The wolf-dog licks her chops and cocks her head as if wondering if he understood.
         “That would be… pleasant… Talla.” It made him feel uncomfortable to talk directly to a thing that could maul him in an instant, but he did it for the sake of a peace between them.
         “You need not be nervous as long as you understand and respect that she is an intelligent being. She may not be able to use vocal speech like you or I but she can read emotions as if they were words. The body and emotions speak more volumes than our language. She is as conscionable as you or I.”
         “I… did not know. I apologize.” He looks to the side and rubs the back of his neck to rid himself of the crawling nervousness that trailed his skin.
         Carmilla laughs once more. “Talla will give you a chance. Just don’t expect her to rush to your aid anytime soon.”
         “As long as she does not want my hide I am content.”
         “We will oblige.” Suddenly she stretches out her hand and grasps his. Lightning strikes and currents flow up his arm. Her touch is so forceful he struggles to maintain it.
         “Something the matter?”
         “No, no not at all.” He swiftly removes his hand from hers before lightning bolts could shoot out of his arse.
         “What a queer little man you are.” That sly grin curls her features and she reminds him strongly of a leopard leering at its prey.
         He lets out a nervous chuckle. “What whimpy insults you have. Come on, I have called you both Hell bitches, surely you can fling more acid than that.”
         “I would not. It would be in bad form if I were to make you wet yourself.”
         “Oh ho ho, much better, mi’lady. I will make you a real coarse-tongued wench yet.”
         “I would rather be a wench than a frightened little boy who’s afraid of his own pecker in the dark.”
         He adopted his own sly smile. Talla bark-laughs and bounds around in a play stance.
         He could only imagine what kind of insults the wolf-dog was slinging at him.


         He was awakened one fog drenched morning by a sweet melody. The sweet melody of a
irrepressible compulsion he had experienced before saving Carmilla, so he listened to her song, closing his eyes once more so he looked asleep.

Underneath your Willow tree
I look for thee, I search for three.
A single bloom to be in season,
A single smile to give me reason
And one more glance to pine for.
Yet you have left me another
Blessed three.
They still remain all for me.
Yet these three reflect not
Mine pure love for thee.
You give me one thousand flayed men,
Their heads mounted on pikes.
You give me one thousand burning acres.
And most of all you give me
A thousand lands conquered
By thee.
After all is said and done
After all the lands were won,
Do you cherish your blood-soaked three?

         It sang like a poem more than a traditional song yet it was magical all the same.
         For a long moment through the slits of his slightly open eyes he watches her as she gazes over the landscape. He can see by the tension in her shoulders that something has deeply unsettled her about this place. It was something far beyond the mere dreariness. It reached far deeper.
         He let himself drift into fitful slumber, the notes of her haunting song floating in and out of his dreams like effervescence.


         “We must.”
         “No we do not. I am not required to risk my life any more than what is mandatory for daily life. Besides, I am dying anyway, so why would I want to shorten my lifespan even more?”
         “What? And why would you not? What other purpose do we have than helping the helpless, giving a voice to the mute, sacrificing one’s own-“
         “I fully comprehend your statements with you repeating them over and over.”
         “You clearly do not; you should be ashamed and you should not call yourself a Knight.”
         “Wait what? You also do not seem to understand what I mean by my life is shortened and surely yours is as well. Let me see your hands.”
         He held out his own, she hesitates for a moment. “Oh, bother, come on, I saved your sorry skin, so why would I chop your hands off?” He grabs her hands impatiently. That same current of highly charged energy flows into his hands but he has learned to not react to it.
         But her hands are soft and pliant, it makes him jump and drop them anyway. “How… how did I not realize it….”
         “What is it? What is the matter?” She says, urgently searching his awestruck face for the answer.
         “Calm yourself, you do not have the plague… no, you have something more fortunate than that.” He steels himself and tries to ignore the unbearable wave of envy that yearns to drown him in bitterness.
         “Then tell me!”
         “You are not turning to stone!”
         “What do you mean? Why would I be turning to stone?”
         “You would be for every person in the Stone Wastes is!” He yells, the dangerous envy seeping into his voice even though he wills it to leave.
         “I…. I did not know.”
         “Where are you from?” He had been longing to ask her that very question from the day they met but never had the courage up until now. He was strangely fearful that if he did a Pandora’s box of misery would be opened.
         “I truthfully… I do not know.”
         “Flaming dragon droppings, how in the Nine Hells do you not know from where you hail from?”
         “I don’t know! I merely awakened in the darkness of a deep cave with no memory of what had happened before. All had glowed around me for a few moments but then it went to a dull grey. I didn’t my own name until I saw it upon my sword hilt. Even of this I am unsure, it could very well be the sword’s name and not mine.”
         She withdrew a long sword gilded with rubies and silver forms of wolves emblazoned upon its hilt. The name Carmilla was scrawled longwise under the wolves in golden lettering. He flinched as she withdrew it for it had the most menacing and powerful air he had ever felt from a weapon.
         “Well… that surely is one frightful sword.” He unconsciously takes a step away from it and grips his rifle a little tighter.
         “Oh, come off it, I’m not going to slice you.” She sheaths the magnificently terrible sword once again.
         “I could not help it.” He grumbles miserably.
         They stand in silence, neither willing to look at the other for one reason or the other.
         “Well, you cannot help where you are from or where the land is.”
         “Yes… I… am sorry about…”
         “No, please, I don’t want your sympathy. It just salts the wounds. Come, I feel suddenly idle. I wish to spill the blood of a couple religious hooligans.”
         Her face brightens when he says this. He did not know how she did it but she had finally worn him down into giving in.
         “Might as well take a few bastards into the grave with me, eh?” He attempts a weak smile to match her beaming face but soon it falls.
         “You had not found your Quest yet, this is a magnificent opportunity then.”
         “You keep talking about Quests. What is that exactly?”
         “I am not sure. I simply know that every person should find their own for that is the path our lives are meant to follow always. Without a Quest one is lost and meanders through the land as if dead.”
         “It must be a belief of your lands… I know not what your predicament could mean, but I promise I will fight by your side.”
         Color rose and flushes her cheeks when he says this. His face softens a little at her vulnerable expression.
         “You… you never told me your name.”
         “I possess no name.”
         “How can that be true?”
         “I belong to no clan, therefore I possess no name. One must be given a name.”
         “Did you ever have a clan?”
         “Once, but they are no more. Therefore I retain no claim to my former name. You may call me Remington if you would like, the name of my rifle, for it is the only heritage I have now.”
         “I wish to know your true name. The name your people gave you.”
         “Then you will wish for a long time.” He does not say this unkindly yet his mouth sets into a hard, resolute line.
         “It is a terrible thing to not have the name you were born with.”
         “There are things far more terrible in this world. You will surely have known this quite well by now.”
         A strong gust blows through the barren landscape around them. The misshapen mounds of rock that were once trees seemed to close in on them like a noose tightening around the neck. The weight of their presence seemed to place a pressure upon her that was not there before she knew. Even the wind that blows is toxic: it stings her skin as it passes. Her traveling wine red traveling cloak swirls around her. It is emblazoned with a pair of leaping wolves whose meaning is lost to her.
Watching him, Carmilla examine the tense line of his shoulders and how stiff they seemed to her now that she knew. She saw his fingers and how they were tipped with grey stone. She could only imagine how much more of his body was consumed by it.
         “You may think of yourself as a coward, Remington, but you possess more courage than an army of Knights facing what you do.”
         He did not respond for a time, clenching and unclenching his fists as he tried to work the feeling back into his rock clotted blood. “Knights… Those only exist in fay stories yet you go on and on about them.”
         “They maybe more real than you think, rifleman.” She strides up to his side and places a hand on his shoulder. She feels firm stone underneath his woolen sleeve and silently grieves for it. The electricity comes back but this time it is almost pleasant to him. It makes his body seem lighter and his limbs loosen a little.
         “You are a mystery to me.” He tells her, his face relaxing as he feels more at ease with her hand on his shoulder.
         “And you insist on remaining mysterious of your own volition.” She grins and holds no grudge against him for keeping secrets.
         Talla gets to her feet and trots up to them and looks back and forth between the two. She sits on her haunches and howls a long, mournful melody that mysteriously sounds similar to the song Carmilla was singing before.


         “We have had our fill of excitement for the day. I think it’s high time we departed.” He attempts to rise to his feet but is pulled back down into a crouch by Carmilla.
         “Oh no you don’t, you’re not getting out of this. You agreed to fight by my side.” A broad mischievous grin spreads her face into something that resembles a hyena before it rips a chunk from its kill.
         “This was said in a time of intense confusion. I did not know what I was saying and your feminine wiles blinded my judgment.”
         She punches him in the arm. “Shut your mouth. That had nothing to do with it and I wasn’t seducing you.”
         “Bloody stumps, why must you be so violent toward your ally?”
         “Why must my ally say such things so devoid of intelligence?”
         “Excuse me for having a healthy prejudice against people who wish to flay me alive!”
         “What kind of Knight are you? One must fulfill their purpose no matter the risk to their life’s blood.”
         “Again with you Knight folly! Have you ever thought I am just a simple man instead of a Knight? I am as cowardly as a little girl when the night grows dark.”
         She looks him hard in the face and puts her face close to his. His cheeks blush a little as she stares him down. “You have more courage than that, Remington, and if a man is not a Knight than he is as human as his steed.”
         “Your people sure expect much from their own…”
         “And how else should it be? Should you abandon others to pursue your own selfish gains? What kind of dignity can exist in such a world?”
         “You have no need for dignity if you’re dead.” He grumbles, but he also knows that she has won this argument, just how she wins every argument.
         “You’re going to do exactly what you did when you rescued me. Fire a shot into the air and create havoc around the temple. While the guards are trying to get their prisoners in order I will run out and start the killing.”
         “Wait, you’re not planning on doing this alone are you?”
         “Of course I am since you will not assist.”
         “I am damn well going out there with you!”
         “What is with you? One moment you want to hide like a frightened maid and the next you’re ready to run headfirst into the fray.”
         “It’s one thing to hide while there is no one else risking their skin but when they are you run after them and at least lessen the chance of their death! I do have some morals you know.”
         “Oh, I could not tell behind the haze of your selfishness.”
         “There’s a difference between courage and stupidity.”
         “And you have to act a little stupid to have courage.” That sly smile curled her lips and she looked him straight in the eye. He thought that she didn’t even have to act to be brave: she merely radiated it just by breathing.
         He aims his rifle at the blackened sky. She nods and draws her sword from its sheath. The weapon begins to radiate white light that convulses like a ring of flame. She doesn’t seem to notice the change at all as she coils herself like a snake bound to strike. Shaking the shock from his limp he readies himself. Dear merciful Mother, please let me keep my sorry hide on my body. I promise I won’t drink… as much.
         He fired a shot.
         In a streak of white fire Carmilla leaps from behind the rock mound and charges upon the guards of the Temple.
         He decided to use the element of surprise and goes about his attack in a more stealthy approach. He slinks around other rocks until he is positioned at the side the guards had turned their backs to.
         At least she chose a band that has to sense when attacked. Keeping himself crouched over he darts over to the first sacrifice.
         “Leave. Run. And don’t look back.” He whispers into the young girl’s ear, she couldn’t be older than thirteen. She stares at him fearfully for a moment but then gains her wits back and takes off.
         He can barely make out where Carmilla, all he sees is a blinding flash wherever she runs and another man falling from his horse when she cuts him down. The ground is soon drinking the blood of at least a dozen men.
         'I guess she really could have handled this on her own.' All the same he kept on telling captives to flee and firing upon any guards that tried to stop them.
         That is until one of the man who had more battle sense than the others grabbed his arm and yanked them both behind his back. Coarse rope was swiftly looped around his wrists.
         “Kill me, it would save you trouble.”
         “And not have a token to control your powerful friend? I think not.” A gruff voice told him from behind. He could feel that the man’s hands were completely encased in stone.
         “You believe murdering these women will bring you reprieve from the Stone wasting?”
         “No, I simply wish to murder and take as many with me into death as I may.”
         “I see your reasoning though I tend to disagree.”
         “Oh, you need not agree with me, little boy, you just have to scream.”
         The huge man swung a giant saber and it slashed down into the backs of his knees.
         He did scream.
         Carmilla turns toward the sound and sees him and his captor.
         “Carmilla, don’t turn your back on your foe for my sake!”
         “They dare not touch them for I will tear them apart!” Her fierce, enraged face turned on his captor. “As I will tear you limb from limb if you don’t relinquish him!”
         “Oh, the little lady has a fiery tongue I see. I fear that would be unwise for his throat would be open before you even reached me, wench.”
         “What kind of man hides behind a captive unwilling to fight? Are you so cowardly?”
         “Merely a man who knows when he stands no chance against one with your kind of power. Where did you get such frightful skills?”
         “You need not concern yourself.” Her eyes darted around as if she studied the huge man. He wondered what she was thinking.
         “Oh I do need to.”
         “Why is this?”
         “For I wish to know if this adversary would become an ally instead. Abandon this useless boy.” The huge man punches the rifleman in the back. “He is of no use to you in your caliber of strength.”
         She grins broadly. “I thought you were wiser than this.”
         Before the huge man could rebuke Talla leaps onto his arms and rips it clean off his shoulder. Blood drenches the wolf-dog but she does not seem to heed this. She wheels back around and goes for the man’s throat this time. The man tries to run but Talla is on him before he can even scream.
         He sat in the dirt in silent shock and awe, his mouth gaping open and his eyes bulging. Carmilla crouches near him and grins even wider as she watches the carnage.
         “I am enjoying this more than I should, I must confess.” She says with a hint of mischief in her words.
         “How did Talla reach us?”
         “I have a special connection with her. She was with me when I awoke in the cave. She can speak to me with her emotions and images she shows me in my mind. She has been the only thing I trusted for as long as my memory goes back.”
         “I can see that.” He whimpers, shaken a little by the wolf-dog tearing into the corpse as if it was doing it just for fun now.
         “You are… you are the first person I have grown to trust in my new life. There is no more darkness thanks to you.” Her face softens and she looks at him for a long moment.
         “No need to be so gracious. I am quite the worthless companion.”
         She shakes her head sternly. “You’re such a fool.”
         “That is very correct.” He laughs.
         She stands up and holds out a hand for him. When he takes ahold of it, his hand feels more pliant than before. He suddenly takes her other hand and the feeling comes to his other hands. When she tries to pull them away he holds them firm.
         “Were you frightened?” He asks.
         “I… a little.” She cannot look him in the eye while he’s so close.
         “You didn’t look it. Why didn’t you tell me you were such a force?”
         “I thought… I thought you would run away and think me dangerous.”
         He shakes his head. “How silly, I am lucky to have you.” His grip tightens on her hands. “You do something to me. When you touch me my heavy body feels… lighter.”
         She finally looks at his face. His skin definitely looks less grey than when she first saw him. His hair seems to have become a darker black where before it was a dull gray. His eyes were also brighter and more aware of her. His fingers are not as hard as they once were and they easily held hers. “Is that so? Then I guess you have to keep me around now.” She slips her fingers out of his and twirls away, sprinting and leaping over eroded holes.
         “Hey, not so fast, I’m not a spry young pup anymore.” He chases after her with Talla on their heels.
         “You’re not old, you fool, you could keep up if you tried a little harder!” She laughs and runs faster.
         “Women…” He grumbles but smiles all the same, running after her trying to keep up.