“Murderer!”
The cry was accented by the quick scrape of a sword yanked out of its sheath as Yaric charged the lone swordsman standing in the riverbed, looking down over the split body of a holy warrior. The warrior’s blood boiled and hissed on the metal of the man’s weapon, evaporating like water on hot iron. Yaric stared at it in disbelief. At its hilt it resembled a large double-bladed axe but each blade extended into a broad, precise edge just shy of his own height; the two massive blades mirroring each other on a single hilt. The man held it solidly in one hand.
Yaric’s eyes narrowed, leaves and twigs rolling under his boots as he slid into the ravine. The man turned as the Yaric’s feet hit the stream in quick splashes. He dodged Yaric’s swing and scaled the other side of the ravine in a single swift leap. Overbalanced, Yaric tried to grab the man with his free arm but only tore a black feather from his right shoulder. The man disappeared into the trees.
“Damn you!” Yaric scrambled back out of the ravine, digging his knees into the soil. Fledgling sprouts were stripped from a tree branch as he ripped away the reins of his chestnut cob, throwing himself onto the saddle. The animal was at a quick trot and into a canter before he settled into the stirrups, beating a path through the trees.
* * *
When the sun stretched its long, shadowy fingers the holy warrior’s body lay on the funeral pyre. A new tunic covered the rift that split man’s torso from his sternum through his back. Melania knelt there, her robes brushing the sand, reciting a low dirge in the tongue of the ancients. Within a cupped hand she produced a small flame and lit a clutch of tinder. The flame spread to the corners of the wooden tower. Through the curling smoke of the kindling a tall man in a white cloak stood at a respectful distance while she completed the rite and the warrior’s body dwindled into ash.
When only the skeleton of the pyre remained Melania concluded the rite. The man in the white cloak was gone.
Inside her modest shrine, Melania placed a small bowl of the warrior’s ashes onto a pedestal for kin to pay respects. This was for the benefit of the living; these dead burned as wheat husks. Three other bowls lined the pedestal. Melania looked to an effigy of Death but the god remained silent and compelled no prayer. She absently ran her hand over the curve of her abdomen, hoping the day would end without bringing her more dead.
A loud knock rattled the small wooden door. “Priestess, are you there?” Outside, Melania was greeted by a road weary man clutching the reins of a chestnut cob. He held out a tattered black feather. “Can you find him?”