“Do you want us to get caught, you idiot? What the hell…?”
Gerd pointed to the corpse at their feet. Marius followed his finger. A face stared back at him: one Marius had swallowed on any number of occasions, every time he had lifted a purse from a careless Scorban passer-by. The velvet overcoat and the thin gold crown that topped the dead man’s helmet were only accessories to recognition. Even when caked with dirt and blood, the King of Scorby was unmistakeable. Marius reached out and grabbed Gerd’s coat sleeve.
“Down in the presence of your King, boy.”
“But…”
Marius yanked and sent Gerd sprawling over the King’s body. He knelt upon one knee, and when Gerd made to rise, pushed him back down.
“Marius, he’s dead.”
“I know that, you idiot.” Marius busied himself about the corpse, testing the welds of his fine plate armour. His gaze flitted about restlessly. Should anyone look their way, the stillness of his bent head would reveal nothing but concentration. “Do I look pious to you?”
“No, but then why…?”
“Because your goggling act has caught the attention of at least two of the soldiers, stupid, which means our day is over unless we can get away before they come within shouting distance.”
Gerd raised his head, and Marius’ fingers ceased their exploration long enough to flick him on the bridge of his nose.
“Stay down.”
Gerd flinched and dropped forward. His face hit the mud with a soft squelch, and Marius suppressed a smile. Gerd whispered from the side of his muddy mouth.
“Are they coming?”
“Not yet.” Marius separated a signet ring from the King’s hand with a tug, then tore a bracelet from his wrist with a practiced twist of his fingers. “They’re conferring. Shit!”
“What? What?”
“They’ve separated. One of them is coming.” He palmed his booty and slid it up a sleeve, then redoubled his efforts, reaching forward to snatch at the crown around the top of the King’s helm.
“Marius?”
“What?” The soldier was almost close enough to shout. He yanked at the crown, praying to Gods whose names he couldn’t remember that it was only placed upon the helmet, rather than welded. Kings did not normally wear such obvious identifying marks in battle: it encouraged enemy soldiers, rapacious for the largest ransoms possible, to make a beeline. But Tanspar, the young Scorban monarch, had been a man under siege in his own kingdom, and grandiose, crowd-pleasing gestures such as this one had become a signature. In this case, it had backfired in more than one way: the crown slid off the helmet with a soft scrape and disappeared inside Marius’ jerkin.
“What are you doing?”
“Shut up, boy. This is our fortune.”
“But you said… only steal what you can swallow, you said.”
“Shush.”
“But it’s not fair…” Gerd struggled to raise his head.
“Hey!” the soldier called out in a broad Scorban accent. “You!”
“Shit.” Both thieves froze, panicked eyes fixed upon each other. If the soldier had seen Marius slip the crown into his shirt front, all was lost. There was only one penalty for looting.
“You see?” Gerd wriggled one arm free, voice rising in panic. “See?”
“Gerd!” Through his lowered eyelashes, Marius watched the soldier stop and draw his weapon halfway from its sheath. There was no escape now. They were discovered. Gerd pushed against his restraining grip, trying to rise.
“Get off me,” he said. “Get off.” He drew his feet underneath him. Marius started to protest. Running was futile. Soldiers were everywhere, and where there were soldiers, archers would flank them in case a sudden flare-up between opposing parties occurred. The only way for a corpse rat to stay alive was through stealth. Slow movement, invisible progress across the field, sliding into woods or high grass when attention was diverted. That was the way to survive. Running from anything was an admission of guilt.
The soldier had drawn his sword now, and was striding towards the two thieves, calling for his compatriots. Gerd pushed up, drawing his back out of the mud, his arms straight and stiff. Marius’ eyes shifted from one figure to the other. They were caught, unless… he gritted his teeth. The timing would have to be perfect. Gerd was still out of the soldier’s view. He let go of the younger man’s tunic, and as he pushed himself up from the ground, Marius crumpled. He slid his head under the half-raised arm of the soldier to the side of the King and pressed his face into the mud, breath held. Gerd reached his feet and turned to run. Marius slid his face sideways until it lodged painfully against the edge of the dead soldier’s cuirass, so that he had half a view of the events as they unfolded.
“I’m sorry, son,” he whispered into the mud. There was no other way. Marius wanted to live. There really was no other way.
The soldier closed in on Gerd, weapon held out in front of him like a horn protruding from his midriff.
“I said stop and identify yourself, boy!”
Gerd threw his meagre booty into the air, squealed, and ran two steps before the soldier was upon him. The soldier lunged, and the sword slid into Gerd’s back and through him without the slightest impediment. Gerd stopped, impaled. His head fell forward, his eyes taking in the foot of metal protruding from his stomach. He opened his hand, and a glitter of jewellery fell to Earth. Marius stilled his breath. Please, he prayed, do not turn. Do not speak my name. Gerd opened his mouth. His head lolled towards Marius. His lips moved in spasms. Marius saw the beginning of his name: once; twice. Then Gerd’s lips lost their strength, his neck gave up its fight to hold his head upright, and the dead thief slumped off the sword and hit the ground. The soldier turned towards Marius, and Marius unfocussed his eyes, staring into infinity.
“Oh, God,” The soldier whispered. His face swam into Marius’ vision, blurred outline filling his sight. Marius fought the natural urge to blink it into focus. A metal-gloved hand reached out towards him, then beyond.
“Oh, God. Oh, no.” The soldier said again, then turned his head to shout. “Garion! Ektar! Here, for pity’s sake. The King! The King is fallen!”
Shouts answered him, and the squelch of several sets of footprints sounded from all sides of Marius’ head. A weight was lifted from across his shoulder. The soldier spoke briskly to his comrades.
“Take him, quickly. Get him to the camp.”
“What about the others?”
“For God’s sake, man. I’ll deal with them later. Take the King. I’ll bring the thief in. Lord Bellux will want the body for burning. Go.”
The light above Marius changed as the bodies moved, unblocking the morning sun. The King had been taken from the battlefield. Only common meat remained. Marius counted to forty, then let out a single, slow breath. He blinked once to clear the stinging from his eyes, then focussed his sight upon his immediate surroundings.
Less than a foot from him, a dead soldier stared back. A gash ran across the bridge of his nose from the left corner of his lip up into his forehead. A black pit gaped where his right eye had been destroyed by the killing stroke. Whoever had struck the blow had done so with strength, or desperation – most likely both. Marius could see jagged edges where the weapon had shattered the bones of the soldier’s face. The socket had half-collapsed under the blow and white shards peeked out from between the ruptured flesh like a hard-boiled egg dropped from a great height. Marius, used to death, gulped back a sudden rush of bile. Already, flies were congregating in the shattered orb. Soon, prompted by the rising sun and the increasing heat of the day, more would come, until the eye that had once shone white would become a crawling mass of tiny black insects, writhing and mating, then flying away to die, leaving maggots in their place. Marius closed his eyes upon the thought. When he opened them, it was to stare directly at the hole once more, unmoving and directly in his line of sight.