Blue Words - Part I Read online

collecting the glorious dead. Their yearning to join in the carnage would become so great that a bloodlust would take them. It is said that once a Valkyrie’s feet touch the ground their wings are shed and never again can they leave this realm. The enraged, rogue spirit is then left to roam the lands; bringing death to any and all it touches.

  That was what sent Scurt seeking us. However, Scurt was resourceful, inventive even cunning, he had a plan. His clan had crafted an amulet of materials considered the most powerful when dealing with beings of the other realm. A large brass pendant was forged. On one side six night stone shards were set along with six beads of amber. The reverse, was a mass of tiny runes scripted in pure silver. Together they formed the twelve spirit tongue words of an ancient binding chant, taken from old legends of the fallen Valkyrie and the heroes who defeated it. Banishing something as potent as a Valkyrie was far beyond us, no matter what numbers or artefacts we could muster. Instead they would attempt to bind the spirit to the amulet, forever trapping it and its destructive nature within.

  My father and I agreed instantly to assist. We were Varth-lokkr after all. It was what we did. We were a proud and honourable kind. I guess we still are.....well I am. We were dedicated only to our duty, to our blood oath. But to this day I still believe, as much as my father and the others would protest, that we were also driven by the belief that we would one day be remembered in song like Jäger, the last Varth-lokkr to lead a clan against a rogue Valkyrie. At dawn we broke camp and rode toward our death or glory.

  Inscribed

  “Inscribe your values onto your chest and wear them with pride.”

  The last thirty minutes or so of travel were quite rough and much slower going. The van bounced, scraped and jittered. It was a coastal road which clearly did not see regular traffic. But just when it felt like the axels might give way, the van came to a halt outside a small, corrugated iron shack.

  A large fire crackled away in a wrought iron brazier, the flames cast a warm, flickering veil of light over the area. Shadows waved and danced over an old shed which sported a distinctive drunken lean. Two other vehicles were parked in the dark beside the shed.

  Kahn immediately slid out of the van, signalling for Gudrik to wait. Two men emerged warily from inside the shed, but at the sight of Kahn the uneasy men relaxed. They walked out and embraced him. From the car Gudrik watched them huddle in discussion, until something flickered in the corner of his eye. Creeping slowly through the thick black beside the drunken shed Gudrik could just make out a figure, a man. He was well hidden, cloaked in the dark, but as the flames flickered and surged in the brazier an odd mist of light illuminated him. Kahn’s earlier words echoed in his mind, “With you free his agents will appear when we least expect it, so be on your guard.”

  Gudrik leant over and gently placed his hand on George’s shoulder. He whispered delicately in her ear, rousing her. She groggily looked about, not really understanding at first where she was. “Wait here,” he rumbled in the softest rasp he could muster. He carefully opened the van door and crept out. The Warlock moved quickly behind a patch of small woody shrubs which lined the driveway. Using the plants as his cover he easily circled around until he was but a few metres behind the concealed figure using the same blackness to shroud himself. The shadow rose from its crouched position and moved towards Kahn. Gudrik leapt from the dark and tackled the figure into the light. The Warlock jammed his left arm into the shadow’s throat and drew Scurt’s wand, resting the blade hard against his cheek. A small trickle of red blood leaked out. “Who are you?” roared Gudrik.

  Kahn and the two strangers spun in shock. The shadow gave only an indecipherable mumble. Gudrik repeated his question. “Nooo! Stop!” called Kahn. Gudrik looked up at the tall, dark man, frantically waving his arms along with the two strangers. He drew the wand slowly away from the man’s cheek and lightened the weight from his throat. Before Gudrik could climb off the shadow, two screaming women burst out from the house. With the grace of a tiger, the smaller, dark haired one loosed two small, serrated kitchen knives at him. Both embedded themselves deep into his face with moist thuds, rolling him back off the shadow.

  “Teefa!” screamed Kahn. Gudrik climbed slowly up to his knees. He glared brutally at this Teefa while painfully levering the first knife from his eye socket, cursing her in a language which few understood.

  “What? He was gonna kill Paw!” Teefa argued as Gudrik popped the second blade from deep in his sinus; he tasted blood. He got to his feet and joined the others who had by then helped the shadow up and gathered in a group. There was a soft squelch as his wounds sutured themselves closed, leaving nothing but a few wet streaks of blue running down Gudrik’s cheeks. He sheathed the wand and dropped the knives to the ground.

  Kahn calmed the mood and commenced the introductions. The strangers, the women and the shadow were all what Kahn called ‘his familiars’. At his right shoulder stood Malaki, a pale, stocky man a head shorter than Gudrik. He had a heavily scared scalp. It was shaved like Kahn’s, though looked balder by nature rather than by razor. Malaki seemed to carry a look of perpetual annoyance and constantly cursed under his breath. Gudrik guessed him to be in his late thirties. He spoke with a gruff sternness and ruthlessly eyed the Warlock with suspicion.

  To Malaki’s right stood Dorian; Kahn’s only son. The son shared the size and many of the facial features of his father. However Dorian’s skin was lighter, with more of a caramel hue than his father’s rich, chocolate colouring. Short straight hair fell, black as night, onto his face and he frequently swept it to the left, in what had become a habitual action for him. It was his eyes though which truly set him apart. It was clear to anyone who had seen the father and son together that he had his mother’s eyes, green with an exotic, eastern look.

  The shadow was introduced only by an alias. Paw was named so due to the stumps on his right hand where fingers should have been. He had once had another name, but Kahn had never been able to say it properly so he had instead lived with a string of nicknames his whole life within the group. He was a strong man in his early forties with brown hair as long as Gudrik’s and a short stubbly beard speckled with flecks of salt. He did not reply to Gudrik when he apologised for the incident. Instead he simply bobbed him a cursory nod.

  “Paw was captured long ago,” Kahn explained. “After two days he felt that the torture was getting the better of him.” He looked over at Paw. “Fearing he may give us up, he bit his own tongue off and spat it in Kyran’s face.” Paw mumbled and clicked something while wildly signing.

  “He says he didn’t think it was such a smart move when we busted him out later that day though,” translated Dorian, snorting slightly as he held laughter at bay.

  “Was for the best,” added Teefa, “he only ever spoke shit anyway.” Dorian erupted into a bellowing cackle, unable to hold it any longer. The group joined in, even Paw queerly cackled along with them.

  Teefa was a beauty no older than seventeen. She appeared to be of Middle Eastern or Mediterranean heritage with cascading hair so black that it seemed to flicker blue in the right light. She stood no taller than Gudrik’s arm pit and would have been light enough for him to easily toss about, but as Gudrik could attest, Teefa was one of the most deadly marksman Kahn had ever come across and she was as hard as a coffin nail.

  “Finally, this is Neasa, the Mother of Bears,” said Kahn gesturing to an unassuming young woman. It was hard to see what about Neasa could have debilitated all of those men in the city. She was a tall, slim, leggy woman with flowing hair so red that it was almost fiery to the touch. Her name was familiar to Gudrik. A name which had been used in his time, in his home lands. However it was clear from her thick Irish droll that she was not of the northlands. She was not as strikingly beautiful as Teefa, but had a unique innocent look which drew the eye. Her milky white skin was peppered with fine speckled, freckles which clustered where her skin saw the sun. A softly spoken woman, she greeted him with a sweet and gentle voice.


  All spoke the modern English fluently, yet all of their words had a distant taint which hinted at past lives in far away places.

  “We are the Inscribed,” Kahn said, introducing the group as a whole.

  “Only six?” grumbled Gudrik. Malaki snorted angrily and mumbled a melange of curses about a ‘big, hairy blueberry’.

  “No,” replied Kahn. We also have a familiar embedded in Kyran’s organisation.” Again Malaki snorted contemptuously. “Not now,” Kahn snapped before glancing around quickly. “Where is Brood?”

  “Where do you bloody well think?” replied Malaki in his grim tone.

  “Well there is one more which you will meet later,” said Kahn. His voice crackled over masked frustration.

  Gudrik wandered the grounds of the Inscribed safe house. It was nestled into a nook atop a small flattened hill. Two larger grass and forest carpeted peaks sheltered it at the rear and beyond those to the west and north lay a waving green ocean of sugar cane. To each side stood two more hills, larger again which, while grassed on the western slopes, had sheer rock cliffs on the eastern seaward side where time and the ocean had eaten away at them. Extending from the cliffs out into the surf