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Hero Historia: Jericho Rising 9

Jericho Rising is the first 12-part story arc of the Hero Historia historical superhero weekly web serial.

For the first time in months, Trip was smiling while plowing the soil outside the south gate. It did not go unnoticed.

“You are in fine spirits,” Bignose said, stopping to watch his fellow farmer work.

“The sun shines bright on my back,” Trip said. “The breeze is cool and crisp. The work is hard, but feeds my family.”

“Your family,” Bignose turned back to his own task.

Trip stopped and stood straight, stretching back to crack the stiffness from his spine. “Did you not hear the news?”

“News?”

“Long Fang has been killed.”

Bignose stood. “Really?”

“Can you not see why the sun smiles?” Trip’s grin was wider still.

“Your son?”

“Returned to me!” Trip spun in place, arms outstretched. “My family is whole.”

Smiling was not Bignose’s way, but he couldn’t help but grin for his friend’s good fortune. “That is good news. How did it come to pass?”

Trip caught the eye of the overseer across the fields and quickly returned to his labors. “You have heard of the Hunter?”

“Which hunter?”

“THE Hunter. The tribal hunter-champion.”

“Oh yes. The one who sent Mad Words into the desert.”

“The same. The Hunter saw that Long Fang had taken children, and saw fit to slay him.”

“Really? Well.”

“It is so.” Trip said. “All of the children have returned to their families.”

“I would not expect a tribal to care about the children of Jericho.”

“I would not have thought anyone to care,” Trip said. “But this is a world with some good people in it.”

Baldy the overseer arrived, a grim look on his face. “Why is it you two keep stopping?”

“We are talking about the Hunter, the one that killed Long Fang,” Bignose said.

“Oh, I heard about that,” Baldy said.

“How did he withstand Long Fang’s venom?”

“My brother was guarding the east gate.” Baldy turned towards the desert. “He says that the Hunter went into the desert, tamed Mad Words, and returned with him.”

Trip whistled. “Truly a great man, to force the insane to his whim.”

“He is a Champion,” Baldy said. He looked to the sky. “It’s almost noon. Come, to the drinking hall, we can talk of this and drink for some time.”

Trip squinted up at the sun. “Would you mind if I worked through and went home early?”

“His son was returned,” Bignose explained. “But I will drink with you.”

Baldy slapped Trip on the back. “Of course, of course. You can go home when Bignose and I return.”

“Thank you, sir,” Trip said.

Bignose shouldered his plow-stick, and departed with the overseer towards the gate.

It was with an almost unbearable glee that Trip returned to his labors. For the first time in months, he was feeling positive about life in Jericho. He had lived in the city all of his life, as had his wife, but when the monster Long Fang had taken his son, he had started to hate the place, with its small streets, with its well-meaning but nosy neighbors, with its Elders who could not protect the children. He was a farmer, his sweat fed the city, and for what? They could not even keep his boy safe.

And his wife, his poor Redpalm, she could no longer work her wheel, could no longer make pots, so deep was her grief. Every day he came home to see her paler, thinner, more shadowed of eyes. All he could do was watch while she, too, was taken from him.

But now? But now with a protector like the Hunter, Jericho was a safe place, a place a child could grow without being taken. His wife was lively, and maybe, soon, they’d have another child to raise. Their family would grow, and with it, their joy.

Trip was happier than he’d ever been in his life, and remained so right up until the point where he was eviscerated by an unseen claw.

***

The Tower of Jericho stood tall above the flat-topped clay storehouses and homes of the city, rising above its grand walls to the height of the tallest trees. Standing there below the stars of the night sky, Clay could see the cooking fires of the city laid out below, and off beyond its walls, the occasional campfire of a traveler or hunter, on his way to, or away from, the gates.

Dawn stood by his side, watching silently. He was acutely aware of her body’s heat even through the thickness of his lionskin pelt, returned to him without comment by the gate guard he’d bribed with it what felt like a lifetime ago.

“It’s so peaceful.” Her hand closed on his in the darkness. “I’ve never seen the city this way.”

At first the height had made the hunter uneasy, but now his companion filled his awareness. “You’ve never been up here?”

“No,” she said. “It is not forbidden but… as a girl I was encouraged not to. Father said it was unsafe.”

“Safe is not the word I would use to describe the stairs we climbed to come up here.”

“It has not been much repaired since the days of my father’s fathers’ fathers,” Dawn said. “No one remembers what it was for anymore.”

“Now it is for us. But Squint was right. We should get someone to repair it, the way is not safe.”

She moved closer to him, pressing herself against his body. “Daughters are often attracted to what their fathers tell them is unsafe.”

“You will be safe with me.” Clay’s mouth went dry as he put his arm around the shepherd. “I won’t let anyone harm you again.”

Her slender fingers found his arm. “I believe you.”

“If I could convince your father of it…”

Dawn’s laughter was musical. “You saved my life! Father sings your praises to the council.”

Clay stepped away and turned towards her. “Saved. You are a Champion now. Your old life is over. Does he not understand?”

She pulled him back. “He understands that I yet live. That is enough for him. If you were to ask him for his daughter, he would not hesitate.”

“You are no longer Dawn Spring the shepherd.”

“Just as you are no longer Clay the hunter?” She rested her head against his shoulder. “I am stronger, but now Jericho is my flock. You continue to hunt those who would harm the people of our city, and I will protect them as I did my sheep.”

Clay was silent, not entirely agreeing, not wanting to spoil their closeness with an argument. If Dawn did not recognize what she had said – that naming Jericho her flock placed her outside it, as a shepherd herself was not sheep – she would come to that understanding soon enough.

But the night was cool, and she was warm, and that was enough for now.

He changed the subject. “I have never heard of a clan with three champions. You, me, and Mad.”

“Can we trust him?”

“Mad?” Clay considered. “Maybe. He… in the desert, he helped me to understand that I was a hunter and a champion both.”

“Is that such a secret?”

“It is a new thing, I think.”

“What were Champions before?”

Clay’s eyes swept the stars, watching their twinkle, wondering which was his father. “In the Smoke Mountain Tribe they were the clans’ protectors. The essence of the spirits’ favor.”

“Your totem was Bear?”

“Does Jericho have a totem?”

Dawn shook her head. “We do not deal with the spirits here.”

“I cannot understand that. How do you know when they are displeased? Who tells you what to do about them?”

“It is not something we are taught,” Dawn said. “When our ancestors built the city, they were tribes like yours. Father says they were tired of wandering the world like animals.”

“Broad thinks you built the city because it is easier to make beer that way.”

Dawn giggled. “Your brother places all importance on beer. But maybe he is not far from right.”

“So they forgot the spirits?” Clay asked. “Your ancestors.”

“We know of them,” Dawn said. “Some say we learned to do without them. We learned the arts of medicine. Of farming. Of making walls.”

“Still,” Clay said.

She wrapped her arms around him. “I do not say it is the best of ways, just that it is our way.”

And now, with the three Champions, Jericho had a new way. With Dawn at his side, Clay would have to learn a new way, too. One that he did not mind discovering, not if it was with her.

“I will talk to your father in the morning,” Clay said.

She squealed and clung to him, hands laced around his shoulder, lifting herself to nuzzle his ear.

New ways were not all bad.

***

Clay did not meet with Squint the next morning.

The tower was large enough that each of them had their own floor. Mad slept at the top – not on the open roof, but just below it. Clay slept on the middle floor. Dawn’s floor was below his, though he hoped they’d be sharing it soon enough.

There was, after all, plenty of room. While it was wider at the base than at the top, even counting for walls as thick as the average man was tall, each floor was as large as any hut in the village Clay had grown up in. It was true that the structure was in poor repair, but the council had promised to send over workers to make the place more safe.

Clay didn’t mind, as long as the tower didn’t collapse in on itself. The walls were drafty, but he had plenty of furs to keep himself warm.

For now Clay’s brother Broad was living at the base of the tower. No one had asked him or invited him to move in, he just sort of had, and neither Mad nor Dawn had objected. Indeed, all three Champions appreciated the way that Broad greeted visitors, accepting their gifts and their gratitude for removing the threat of Long Fang from the city without disturbing those that lived above him.

Clay had been thinking of paying Squint a visit to ask for his daughter’s marriage when Broad came up the stairs to see him.

“The city Elders are here to see you,” Broad said. “I tried to get them to leave, but they say it is important.”

“See if they will come back after lunch.”

“They want to talk to the others too,” Broad said.

Clay hesitated. The Elders had been content to deal with him in the days that had passed. If they wanted to speak to all three of them, it had to be important. “Mad is out in the city, but I will fetch Dawn. Tell them we will be down soon.”

Broad disappeared back down the stairs.

***

The expressions on the Elders’ faces were grim when Dawn and Clay descended into the tower’s base to see them. It had been bare when they had moved in, but Broad had turned the ground floor into a welcoming greeting room where visitors could wait to meet with Jericho’s champions.

Darkbeard, One-Eye, and Snakespit, the Elders of Jericho sat on comfortable straw mats before a round wooden table across from Broad. They half-rose when the Champions joined them, but Clay gestured that they stay seated.

Broad stood up when he neared, and Clay took his place, Dawn sitting next to him.

“We trust you are settling in well?” Darkbeard asked.

“Well enough,” Clay said.

“Have you recovered from your battle with Long Fang?” One-Eye asked.

“We heal quickly.”

Dawn had been near death due to the Snake Champion’s toxin, but the power of the Old Ones’ charm had restored her almost instantly. Clay and Mad had been bruised and bloodied, but in the few days that had passed they had returned to a state of ready health.

“That is good,” Darkbeard said. “There is another troublemaker we need you to take care of.”

“Who is he?”

“We don’t know,” Snakespit said. “Someone or something is preying on the farmers in the south and west fields.”

“Preying?” Dawn asked.

“Killing them. Mutilating the bodies. Maybe eating them,” Darkbeard said.

“Eating them?” Clay asked.

“We cannot tell. They do not come home from the fields at night, and in the morning are found torn apart.”

Dawn’s hand flew to her mouth. “That’s awful!”

“Very,” One-Eye said.

“And it is a Champion?” Clay asked.

“It might be,” Darkbeard said. “Or a rogue lion from the Sea of Grass. Or an angry spirit.”

“Whatever it is,” One-Eye said. “It is preying on Jericho, and we need you to stop it.”

“How long has this been happening?” Dawn asked.

“Three nights,” Snakespit said. “One man killed each night.”

“Three nights, and you only now ask us to stop it?”

“One night is a roving dog or crime of passion,” Darkbeard said. “Two murders may be coincidence. Three? Three we need you to stop.”

“It is awful, whatever the cause,” Dawn said. “We are your Champions. Your protectors. You should have come to us sooner!”

Snakespit stood. “We trust you to serve the city in your way. You must trust us to serve it in ours.”

Clay put his hand on Dawn’s, under the table.

“If this killer is a Champion, stop it.” One-Eye stood as well. “Drive it away. Kill it.”

“And if it is a beast? Or a normal madman?”

“If it is other than a Champion, let us decide how to stop it,” Darkbeard said. “You must save your energy for things that we cannot handle ourselves.”

“We are your protectors,” Dawn said.

“You are our Champions,” Darkbeard said. “And we trust you will remember the difference.”

Clay walked to the tower’s entrance and watched them go.

Dawn wrung her hands. “What difference? Men are dying. We must help them.”

“I don’t know,” Clay said, moving to her side. “Jericho still confuses me sometimes.”

“They fear you,” Broad spoke quietly.

“What?” Clay asked.

“They fear you. Fear your power. I could tell.”

“I thought they trusted us?”

“They trust you as far as they can control you,” Broad said. “While you have been running around fighting snake-men and being Champion, I have been watching and listening.”

“I don’t understand,” Clay said.

“I know,” Broad said. “But we were wrong. This place has its spirit, its totem, its taboo. Even if the people who live here have forgotten. The spirit of the city. The will of the people who live here.”

“You sound like a shaman,” Clay said.

Broad grinned. “I should have been a shaman. Easier than hunting or farming. I guess I am now.”

“What?” Clay asked. “How are you a shaman?”

“The shaman strides between worlds.” Mad spoke as he walked into the tower, basket full of bread over one shoulder. “He keeps the balance. Your brother brings Jericho’s words to her Champions.”

“You make it sound like we’re not of the city,” Clay said.

Mad pointed with his chin. “Dawn knows. A shepherd is not part of the flock. It can’t be.”

“I still don’t understand why the Elders don’t trust us.”

“They’re part of the flock. And even if the sheep knows the shepherd protects her, part of it knows it is destined for the stewpot.”

Clay’s face twisted with disgust. “Have you been drinking?”

“No.” Mad handed his bread to Broad. “I have just been a Champion for a long time.”

“How long?” Broad asked.

“Long enough. And I have traveled far. Further than you can imagine.” Mad Words looked away. “Just know that it is always this way. The Elders. First they will want to use you. Then they will fear you. Then you must either defeat them or move on.”

“Is that what you have chosen?” Broad asked. “To move on.”

Mad started up the steps. “Sometimes. I will meet you by the fields.”

Dawn watched him go. “Clay…”

“Do not worry.” Clay picked up his spear. “They call him Mad Words for a reason.”

“He was right about you fighting like a hunter,” Broad said.

“Get your sling,” Clay said to Dawn. “I will wait outside.”

He did not trust the Elders, but not because of Mad Words. He did not trust them because they had not come from one of the tribes, because they did not venerate the spirits, because their ways seemed centered around a belief in their own superiority. It was this way, he had seen, with all of those of Jericho. They lived their lives, they worked hard, but they lacked a true understanding of what it meant to be one season away from survival. What it meant to hunt besides your brothers and sisters.

They had easy lives. As long as they worked hard, they were guaranteed survival. Where Clay had come from, where Broad had come from, where Mad Words had presumably come from, there was no such surety. Men like them understood that to live was to court death, that the end could come from any misfortune.

Men who walked knowing that death was postponed were men he could trust. He loved Dawn Spring, but she had never learned this lesson. He hoped she never would have to. He hoped that the children they shared would never need to know the honor that came with living with the harmony of a life lived heartbeat to heartbeat. He hoped they would be men and women of Jericho, knowing soft easy lives. He could, he believed, teach them some of the champions honor.

Men like the Elders, though… it was too late. They could never be taught.

Clay hoped, for their sake, that they had as much wisdom as they believed themselves to hold. That they had the sense to understand that Clay served the city, but he was not their creature. He hoped they would not test him, or he would have to teach them the difference between free men and the men of Jericho.

Questions? You are invited to either leave a comment below, or ask directly through the comment form.

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Galvanic Century Video

Here’s a video in which I ramble on about my steampunk series, Galvanic Century.

Questions? You are invited to either leave a comment below, or ask directly through the comment form.

The post Galvanic Century Video appeared first on Michael Coorlim.

Hero Historia: Jericho Rising 8

Jericho Rising is the first 12-part story arc of the Hero Historia historical superhero weekly web serial.

As Clay and Mad Words neared Jericho’s East gate, they saw a figure waiting for them, standing among a flock of sheep.

Dawn Spring. She was standing. Watching. Waiting between them and the city, only a few hundred yards from the walls.

Clay’s feelings were mixed. He had gone into the desert to die, never thinking he’d see her again, so was overjoyed to think that he might once more. On the other hand, there was a good chance that even with Mad’s help he could not overcome the venomous Long Fang. He walked with his spine straight, showing no fear, unwilling to worry the girl he’d grown to love.

“You return,” she said.

He stopped in front of her, spear’s shaft across his shoulder-blades. “You knew I was gone?”

“I saw you go. You went to get him?”

Mad Words stared up at the walls, a sour look on his face, seemingly ignoring the two youths.

“I did not go searching for him, but he is the answer I found.”

“He is mad. And dangerous. Maybe more dangerous than Long Fang.”

“She’s not wrong,” Mad said.

Clay wasn’t entirely sure why Mad had accompanied him back to the city. He had made the choice to return and face his foe as a hunter, and the hermit had wordlessly accompanied him back through the desert. Unstable while drunk, Mad Words seemed sober to Clay, and he was truthfully grateful for the help.

“A wise hunter does not hesitate to accept help once offered.”

“Good,” Dawn said. “Then you will take my help as well.”

Clay shook his head vigorously. “Absolutely not. Long Fang is a dangerous monster. Mad and I are champions, and you–”

“Are a shepherd,” she finished for him. “And a wise shepherd does not abandon her flock to predators.”

“It’s too dangerous,” Clay said. “This is a battle between Champions.”

“And if you are wounded?” Dawn asked. “Poisoned? Do either of you know the healing arts?”

“I don’t,” Mad said.

“Do you?” Clay asked.

Dawn scowled. “I care for the sick and injured in my flock all the time. When the wolves attack, or when an asp bites.”

Mad lay a calloused hand on Clay’s shoulder. “This is one of those battles you cannot win toe-to-toe, hunter. If you refuse her, she will follow. And resent you for it.”

Clay slapped the hand away. “What if I were to allow you to wait outside? Out of danger, but nearby if we are hurt.”

The shepherd’s eyes narrowed. “If that is how it must be.”

“So it is,” Clay said, striding towards the city.

 

***

The men at the gate didn’t question Clay’s return or why Mad was with him. Perhaps they didn’t want trouble from the dangerous hermit, or maybe they just saw the dark look in the young man’s eyes. He had slipped into the hunter’s mindset, gaze sweeping everything that came into his sphere of personal awareness, evaluating his environment and everything in it for threats and opportunity. That which was neither was ignored.

Except for Dawn.

The girl’s presence worried him, concerned him, kept him from slipping fully into his role as hunter. Knowing she was close was a distraction, and potentially a lethal one. Even if she was outside, his thoughts would remain with her.

And yet, her nearness was a comfort. She made him feel less alone than he had been since his clan had been destroyed, in a way that even his brother Broad did not. She was a reminder of why he had to win, why he wanted to stay in Jericho.

Clay and Dawn exchanged a look and a brief caress of hands when they reached the granary, but no words.

Mad Words went in first, smashing through crates, shattering pottery, sending children screaming and scrambling from him. The paths inside had been arranged into a narrow maze, but he disregarded it, clearing a straight path to the center.

Clay took a slower, quieter, more circuitous route, crouched low, keeping his eyes on his companion.

“I am Mad Words!” Mad shouted when he reached the center. “This is my territory now! You children and your snake-pet must leave, or I will destroy you!”

“Long Fang will kill you!” A young boy had climbed the side of the granary to one of the higher shelves. He threw a stone towards the challenger.

Mad Words caught it in his fist and squeezed, crumpling it to dust. “You think I will not kill you because you are a child?”

There was the slightest of sounds before Mad Words had his legs swept out from below him. He crashed to the ground, and Long Fang rose from his hidden crouch.

“Two challengers in one day,” the Snake Champion said. “Children, we are blessed, for the city elders have sent us fresh meat.”

A cheer rose from the children surrounding the sides of the granary.

Having spotted his quarry, Clay slunk down, between the boxes, and began to creep closer. He could barely see the top of the serpent-man’s head over the edges, but it was enough to stalk him by.

He could hear Mad Words. “Nobody sent me, snake. I will reclaim this granary not for Jericho, but for myself.”

“Only a fool tries to steal a serpent’s den.”

“My name is Mad Words! It says I am mad, right there in the name!”

Long Fang darted back as Mad Words struck out at him. Clay could not see the attack, but he could hear the wind of its passage.

“Your madness will find only death.” Long Fang’s head dropped out of view.

Clay resisted the urge to rise to spot him again. He trusted in his instincts, in Mad’s ability to keep the Snake Champion occupied.

There was the heavy sound of flesh striking flesh.

“Someday,” Mad said. “But not today, monster.”

“You, who would invade my home, threaten to kill my children, call me monster?”

The hunter reached the end of the crates and saw that Long Fang had wrapped his long torso around Mad. The madman’s face had reddened, and it was all he could do to keep the Snake Champion’s fangs from his throat. If he used his spear, there was a good chance he’d pierce through the snake-man’s scaled body and strike his ally.

Clay leapt through the air towards the entwined pair, bringing his fists down on Long Fang’s spine, feeling the impact, feeling a give.

The snake man recoiled, twisting and sliding away from Mad Words to try and face this new attacker.

“You took your time, hunter!” Mad grabbed for Long Fang, getting a hand around his ankle. “Do not let the snake back into his hole!”

Clay grabbed one of the snake-man’s arms and wrenched it back, pulling it behind his back at an angle that would have snapped a normal man’s shoulder. The limb writhed in his hand, sliding through his grasp and almost escaping. With his free-hand he grabbed Long Fang by the bony hip, a surer grasp.

“Kill you!” Long Fang bellowed, snapping his jaws inches from Clay’s bicep.

Mad Words slapped him on the back of the head.

“Kill you both!”

Clay remembered, once, seeing wolves hunt a much larger water buffalo. Half the pack would snap at it from one side, and when it turned to confront them, the other half would attack. They would go back and forth, harrying their prey, until it was worn down.

When Long Fang snapped his head towards Mad, Clay grabbed him by the neck and shoulder, below where the Snake Champion could comfortably bite.

Mad planted his feet and caught Clay’s eye, then darted his gaze towards the wall.

Clay nodded.

Together the men hefted the taller Snake Champion and began running, rushing with him, smashing through crates and jars towards the wall.

“Jump!” Mad yelled.

Clay obliged, and the two leaped, putting their weight against Long Fang as they smashed into the wall.

The clay-brick walls of the granary were no match for the might of the champions, and the Serpent Champion hit the wall with enough force to break through it in a great cloud of clay-dust and brick fragment.

***

Clay lost his grip on Long Fang as he tumbled to the street outside the granary, Mad Words rolling by his side.

Through the great cloud of dust he could see the Snake Champion’s death spasms, his spine twisting and snapping like a whip, fanged maw biting at whatever it came near, powerful limbs thrashing.

Clay backed away carefully, not wanting to be struck.

“His spine is broken.” Mad Words watched Long Fang carefully, then lashed out with his hands. He grabbed the champion by the sides of the head and smashed his skull against the clay street once, twice, three times until he was still.

The dust cloud settled, and Clay could see that a crowd had gathered, most likely due to the commotion in the granary. Dawn Spring stood among them. He started towards her with a smile, flushed with adrenaline and victory, and noticed she was clutching her arm.

Blood dripped from between her fingers. “Clay, I–”

He rushed forward, grabbing her arm, adrenaline spiking again. “What happened?”

“I don’t know.” Dawn looked into his face, but her eyes seemed glassy, unfocused. “You came through the wall, and Long Fang… I felt a sting…”

Clay lifted her arm and saw a pair of puncture wounds near the wrist. “You’ve been bitten!”

“Oh, Clay,” Mad Words said quietly.

The hunter felt a strong spike of fear lance through his chest. “We must get her to a healer!”

“I don’t think–”

Clay grabbed Mad by the shoulder. “I do not care! Get her to a healer!”

Dawn swooned, and collapsed into his arms.

“Help me bring her back to Forkbeard’s,” Clay said.

Mad seemed to search his eyes for a moment before nodding once, curtly.

***

“The bite is not deep,” Bright Eyes said, emerging from the cool room where Dawn Spring had been placed. “Long Fang did not inject much venom.”

“Thank the spirits,” Squint said, nearly collapsing.

Clay, Forkbeard, Broad, Mad Words, and the three Elders had been waiting in Forkbeard’s courtyard with Dawn Spring’s father while the healer-woman had done what she could for the poisoned girl. Squint had been enraged with grief, yelling at Clay, striking him, blaming him for the condition of his daughter. The hunter hadn’t objected or moved to defend himself, not even when the furious shepherd had bloodied his nose. Forkbeard had restrained Squint after that, but silently Clay agreed with the older man.

Dawn Spring’s condition was his fault. He had allowed her to accompany them. He had failed to keep her safe. The old man could have him exiled, tortured, executed if Dawn died. It would be no less than what he deserved.

Before Bright’s words could give him any relief, she continued. “The venom spirit is strong. Very strong. Even the small amount she took… I am sorry.”

“What?” Squint said, his voice a child’s.

“The healing arts cannot save her. I can make her comfortable in her last moments, so her death is as a dream, but that is all we can do.”

Squint fell to his knees, hands clutching at his face, a terrible wail emanating from his lips, a sound of sorrow more pure and more true than Clay had ever heard. The Smoke Mountain Tribefolk mourned their dead, but lived with the prospect too closely to be so hurt… yet Squint’s keening reverberated the sorrow in the hunter’s own heart.

Darkbeard stepped quietly to Squint’s side and helped him to his feet. “Forkbeard, do you have a room–”

“Of course,” Forkbeard replied quietly, leading the grief-stricken father and the elders inside.

“Clay–” Broad said quietly, stepping to his brother’s side.

Sympathy was the last thing Clay needed, or deserved. He turned his head quickly to Bright Eyes. “May I see her?”

“Yes,” Bright Eyes said. “But she is beyond us, now. She won’t recognize you.”

“I understand.”

“Do you need…” Broad trailed off.

Clay shook his head, pushing past the beads into Dawn’s sick-room.

***

When Clay had returned with Dawn to Forkbeard’s home, he’d brought her to the room he shared with Broad. He hadn’t thought about it. He hadn’t been thinking about much of anything, just dwelling in the fear that he might lose the girl. It was where she had cared for him after his battle with Mad Words. It wasn’t more than a storage room, but it was cool and comfortable.

She lay on his furs, sweating in the darkness, small breaths coming from her mouth.

Bright Eyes put a hand on her forehead. “It won’t be long.”

Clay nodded, staring at the girl.

The healer stepped back to the door. “I will let you say your words alone.”

Dawn Spring looked so small, so fragile now, a shell of the girl he had been falling for. Her biggest part, her best part, that spirit, that Dawn-ness was locked away inside her fever dream.

What good was a champion if he could not save the one he loved? What good were any champions if all they could do was hurt and kill and fight? The Old Ones had said their time was over.

Good.

The world did not need more of this. More innocent shepherds hurt in their battles.

Clay knelt next to Dawn, taking her clammy hand in his own. “I am sorry, beautiful one. You deserved more than this. You deserved more than me. More than a Champion’s life of battle. More than a hunter’s life of death.”

Tears stung the corners of his eyes. The obscenity of it was almost unbearable. This was not life. Champions’ battles. The world and its petty conflicts.

If only Long Fang had killed him during their first battle. What did it matter that he survived, to fight another day, to fight more pointless Champion battles? The world needed more shepherds, more healers. A Champion’s powers were good only for fighting other Champions.

His hands felt heavy, leaden.

Clay looked up past Dawn towards the shelf where his few meager possessions lay. The bauble the Old Ones had given them, the one Broad hadn’t wanted. Broad had been right. The power was wasted on him, when the good people, the useful people, died all too soon.

Clay stood, reaching for the clay sphere.

He glanced down at Dawn.

Would it work?

He knelt by her side once more, looking from the bauble to Dawn’s clay face.

It might save her.

No normal person could withstand Long Fang’s venom, but a Champion. A Champion might.

And if not… well. He would have no children to bestow the gift on anyway. He wanted no wife but Dawn Spring.

Clay crushed the sphere gently against Dawn Spring’s forehead.

***

“There are three of you now,” One-Eye said. “You understand that some find this a matter of concern.”

Clay, Mad Words, and Dawn Spring stood in the courtyard below the great tower before the Elders of Jericho. Several days had passed since Long Fang had been defeated, and all three had recovered from the ordeal. With her new Champion’s power, Dawn Spring had fought off the venom spirits and recovered stronger than ever.

“Particularly as we had ordered Mad Words exile,” Snakespit said.

“Mad Words helped me defeat Long Fang,” Clay said. “I could not have done it without his help.”

“Be that as it may,” One-Eye said. “He is Mad Words.”

Mad Words offered the council a grin. “If it helps, I am not drinking. Much.”

“You now have three Champions where before you had one,” Dawn Spring said. “I do not see the problem.”

When Clay had crushed the Old Ones’ bauble on her forehead, Dawn had gone into terrible convulsions, such that Clay feared he had killed her. He ran to fetch Bright Eyes, and in the moments he had been gone from Dawn’s side, the shepherd had calmed, her fever had lifted, and awareness had returned. Bright had declared it a powerful miracle, and Squint had been summoned.

Clay hadn’t seen Dawn in the days that followed, not until he found himself summoned by the Elders. He had tried to catch her attention, but Dawn had kept focused on the old men before them.

She looked good. Better than good. She was taller, as tall as any of the wild tribesfolk, more solidly built, but with a greater grace. Clay could not quite articulate it, but her power went beyond that, beyond her body, into a nearly physical force of personality. Dawn Spring’s presence extended well beyond her flesh.

“Problem?” Darkbeard said. “No problem. Just… some concern.”

Mad Words snorted.

“It is not concerns for you,” Snakespit said. “Not Dawn or Clay. Clay has proven himself. Dawn is well known to Jericho. And if you say you vouch for Mad Words, then the council trusts you.”

“And will hold you accountable,” One-Eye added.

“Then what is the concern?” Dawn asked.

“The people of Jericho do not fear you – in fact they hold much respect for your defeat of Long Fang – but they fear what Champions mean.”

“They are not your way?” Clay asked.

“A good way to put it,” Darkbeard said. “You are not farmers or crafters or shepherds–”

“I am a shepherd,” Dawn said.”

“You are more than a shepherd now,” Darkbeard said. “But we have had shepherds and farmers for generations. Champions are new. They do not fit.”

Clay began to see the problem. “We are like Shamans. Useful. But dangerous.”

“So how do we make us fit?” Mad Words asked.

“That is our second concern,” Snakespit said.

One-Eye folded his hands. “We trust you. Dawn and Clay. But as more and more come to Jericho, more and more Champions arrive from far off lands. Champions who might lack self-control, like Mad Words.”

Mad Words shrugged.

“Champions that might want to take what’s ours,” Darkbeard said.

“Like Long Fang,” Clay asked.

“Yes,” One-Eye said.

“You need Champions to protect you from Champions,” Dawn said. “I am no warrior.”

“It’s all we’re good for,” Clay said.

“More than that,” Darkbeard said. “We need Champions to protect Jericho. From armies that covet our crops. From the thieves who steal bread. From what dangers we face.”

One-Eye looked at Clay. “We need hunters.”

He looked at Dawn. “We need shepherds.”

He looked at Mad Words, and closed his mouth.

Dawn looked down at the cracked clay courtyard, then up at the Elders. “If Jericho will be my flock, I will be her shepherd.”

“I will protect your city,” Clay said, “If you accept me as your own.”

Mad Words shrugged. “I have nothing better to do.”

“Then you will be our Champions,” One-Eye said.

Snakespit turned towards the tower behind them. “In ages past, the shamans of the tribes that settled Jericho built this tower as a beacon to the spirits. We give it to you now, that you may live there and keep a watch over our people, and see danger before it comes.”

“The tower?” Dawn’s mouth gaped.

“Your tower now,” Darkbeard said. “May you prove worthy of it.”

Clay found words to speak. “We are flattered by your generosity.”

Mad Words laughed and clapped his fellow-champion on the back. “Don’t worry, Clay. I am sure they’ll make us earn it.”

Previous – Hero Historia – Jericho Rising – Next

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WXH 10.1: Where do you get your ideas?

I’ve been following the Writing Excuses Podcast for years now, and this season they’re going to be following a writing master-class format, including homework. Sounds like it might be fun, so I’m going to be following along and doing the writing exercises that they assign.

Seriously, where do you get your ideas?

Episode 1 has been all about idea generation and evaluation. I’ve never had a problem coming up with new ideas. I’ve always had notebooks or text files stuffed full of them. They come to me in my dreams, while I’m showering, while I’m working on something else.

Until recently my concern was that I’d never have time to finish them all. If I wrote 4 books a year for the rest of my life and never had another new ideas, those in my current idea folder would last me until I was 70. Then I realized that as my skill improves as a writer, so do the quality of the ideas that I have, and I become better at figuring out which ones are worth tackling.

The Homework:

Write down five different story ideas in 150 words or less. Generate these ideas from these five sources:

From an interview or conversation you’ve had
From research you’ve done (reading science news, military history, etc)
From observation (go for a walk!)
From a piece of media (watch a movie)
From a piece of music (with or without lyrics)

Got it.

Idea from an interview or conversation you’ve had

I’ve been doing a lot of interviews lately, and on Magic Radio Chicago up came the idea of the city of Chicago personified as an individual, an old but tough African American homeless woman. The genius loci of the city. Mulling on it lead me to the desire to do a series based on the mystic occult underground of the city, full of spirits and cabals and all kinds of such.

Idea from research you’ve done

I was researching something (I don’t remember what) and I came across the institution of the barber in 19th century America – specifically the freed black barber. They served the most important members of the community, bankers and businessmen, but were treated as if they were invisible. What if one heard too much? What if he had to choose to take the step of trying to resolve a terrible situation? What if the men he served feared that he would?

From observation

Walking around Chicago I was given a religious pamphlet by a gentleman on the street, passing out such paraphernalia to passers-by. What if you saw this happening, but when you passed he put the book back in his pocket, shook his head, and said it wasn’t for you? Would you investigate further, or pass on by?

From a piece of media

Last movie I watched was Snowpiercer. What if there was a train like that, only nobody remembered how long they’d been riding or why? What if it was an afterlife?

From a piece of music

This is a favorite of mine. I’ve come up with book titles and stories that way. I was on a Muse kick the other day, and it inspired my current work-in-project, Shadow Decade. Other times I can identify a character I’m writing by their musical tastes; Infernal Revelation’s Gideon, for example, is a big fan of 70s and 80s punk despite having grown up in the late 90s.

Questions? You are invited to either leave a comment below, or ask directly through the comment form.

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Hero Historia: Jericho Rising 7

Jericho Rising is the first 12-part story arc of the Hero Historia historical superhero weekly web serial.

Darkbeard, the tallest of the Elders of Jericho, lead Clay to the other side of the city. They’d offered him much honor in exchange for serving the city as her champion, evicting troublemakers like Mad Words and standing fast against the raiders who sometimes came to harass the walls. He would be given his own home, food, beer, and the respect of those he protected, without needing to farm or perform other labors.

Clay wished he could have consulted with his brother, but Broad was off at the fields, and he didn’t want to give the Elders the chance to change their minds. Even though his injuries still ached from his battle with Mad Words, the hunter had agreed to prove he was worthy of the task by evicting another troublemaking Champion, Long Fang.

“Fang comes from the river plains to the southeast,” Darkbeard told Clay as he escorted him across the city. “A clan of snake-worshipers. He came to Jericho some months ago, telling the same story you did — a foreign tribe arrived and killed his people.

“They will empty the world at this rate,” Clay said, hands restless on the spear they’d given him to complete the task.

“He was strong, a good worker,” Darkbeard said. “We were glad to have him. At first.”

“What happened?”

Darkbeard let out a long sigh. “He began to tell stories. Tales of his people, of his exploits as champion, of his deeds. The boasting that men do. But your kind… the young of Jericho find tribal ways, the ways of their ancestors many generations ago, fascinating. And the way of the totem-touched doubly so.”

“Did his stories lead them to misdeeds?”

“Lured them into his own misdeeds,” the elder said. “They began to see him as their leader, a separate tribe within Jericho. They left their families to move into a granary he took at his own, and they have been demanding tribute for the grain.”

“What?”

“An inconvenience, but it wasn’t an important storehouse. The city can do without. It is the children that concern us.”

“What has become of them?”

“We cannot tell. They never come out. Their parents demand their return, but any any who go to retrieve them — you know what a champion can do.”

Clay nodded. A grim situation.

“Go. Kill Fang, or force him to flee the city, and Jericho will adopt you as champion.”

“And the children?”

“We do not know if they are his prisoners or willing allies. Save them if you can, and their parents will be grateful.”

“If he has killed them?”

“Show no mercy.”

***

The granary stood almost as tall as one of the walls’ lesser towers. Round in construction, its main gates were blocked off, wooden crates and clay vessels set in front of it.

Clay and the elder watched it from a nearby storehouse doorway. “What do I do?”

“Do what it is your kind do.” Darkbeard stared past him towards the structure, lip curled. “Fight him until he submits, or until you’ve killed him.”

Clay nodded. This was the life of a champion. “Will your warriors support me?”

“Jericho has no warriors, no army. The men take up weapons when raiders attack, and we take turns at the gates, but we are farmers. Brewers and laborers, clothmakers and herdsmen.”

“So I face him alone.”

“It is why we need you,” Darkbeard said. “It is the only reason.”

The hunters never helped the champions fight, back in the land of the Smoke Mountain tribes, but their presence at the battlefields was important. They reminded the champions of the stakes, of their loyalties, and let them know they would not die alone.

The people of Jericho were not Clay’s people. Not yet. Would any mourn his passing if he lost? Broad. Dawn, perhaps. That was it. Clay was nothing to the others. And he would risk much for them, to save their children?

Their children.

Taken in by the Snake Champion. Taken from their families to assist him in extorting the city.

It was not their fault. They knew no better.

Fang had broken one of the sacred laws of Clay’s people. You did not harm another clan’s children. It was unthinkable. As unthinkable as the new way of war the foreign tribe had brought to the Mountain, and just as worthy of being punished.

Fang had to be shown that one did not do such things.

“Are you ready?” Darkbeard asked.

Clay nodded. He might be hurt, but he was ready, in his heart, for the task.

“Then I wish you luck, Champion.”

***

Clay stepped into the dusty street and cupped his hands to amplify his voice. “Long Fang!”

There was no immediate response from the granary.

“Long Fang!” he called again, shaking the spear overhead. “Stealer of children! Hoarder of grain! I challenge you.”

The silence boomed in Clay’s ears after his proclamation. He felt exposed in the middle of the street, not only to Fang’s eyes, but to the eyes of the nearby residents of Jericho. More and more were appearing in doorways and on rooftops, watching him with a mixture of curiosity and fear.

He slowly lowered his spear, feeling a bit foolish.

Movement caught his eye. A young boy, filthy, his clothes in rags, moving the boxes in the granary doorway aside. He was thin, but not starved-looking.

“Boy!” he hissed. “Come!”

The boy finished moving the boxes out of the way and turned, waving to Clay briefly before dashing back inside.

“You going in after him?” a stout man asked from a nearby rooftop.

“I have to save the children.”

The man nodded. “A good thing. I wish you luck. None of the others who tried have come out again.”

“The Elders have sent others?”

“No. Fathers. Older brothers. Your son in there?”

“No kin of mine.”

“Then why do you risk yourself?”

Clay hesitated. Champions fought, it was what they did. They did it for honor. They did it because it was what they did, it was how they served the clan. Jericho wasn’t a clan, but they would honor him. They would give him comforts. But Clay hadn’t been a Champion long enough to think like one. He was a hunter, and hunters who took big risks didn’t last long.

Lions notwithstanding.

But he wasn’t going into the granary because he wanted to be Jericho’s champion. He was doing it because Fang held these children from their families. Living in the dark with a monster was no life.

“Because someone must.” He choked his grip up on the spear and set off across the street.

***

The granary was dark inside, and it took Clay’s eyes several moments to adjust. The crates and jars had been arranged to create a single path for the champion to follow. It made him nervous, reminding him far too much of the hunter’s tactic where game was flushed towards men with spears. There wasn’t much to be done for it… if he tried to divert by climbing the crates, they’d just collapse on top of him.

Clay would be ready for Fang’s trap.

He came to the center of the granary, a wide area surrounded by boxes and jugs. Little light filtered in from cracks in the roof overhead, mote-filled beams of light that enabled Clay to see the children watching him. They came in all ages, from those who could barely stand to those who would soon be men, both boys and girls, sitting on high stacks of crates and on shelves high on the walls.

They all watched Clay in silence.

“Where is Fang?” He brandished his spear. “I have come to defeat him and free you.”

“We are free,” a little girl said.

A younger boy pulled himself up along the wall on a rope. “Fang lets us do what we want.”

“We love him,” the first girl said.

“He has poisoned your mind,” Clay said. “You must return to your families.”

There was a soft sound from behind the hunter, and he spun to see the Snake Champion emerge from between two boxes that seemed far too narrow for a grown man to fit between. “You are the one who comes spewing venom.”

Long Fang was taller than Clay, but slender, like a normal man stretched out. He was bald, with narrow eyes, and a thin pointed beard. His arms and legs seemed too long for his body, and as he stepped through a shaft of light his skin glistened like scales. “You would come to kill me? Take my children?”

“They are not your children.” Clay watched, transfixed, as Fang moved with a sinuous grace towards him.

“You think not?” Fang raised his eyes to the children, pointing towards Clay. “Show him.”

The children moved, standing and reaching into their crates, coming up holding stones.

“Children–” Clay began.

The first stone struck him in the thigh. The second, his chest. He deflected the third with the shaft of his spear, but then they really started to rain down upon him.

The stones were more startling than painful, an unexpected barrage from an unexpected source. They might have been lethal to a man without the blood of champions running through his veins, but to Clay they were merely a distraction.

A distraction was all that Fang needed.

The Snake Champion was upon him, long fingers wrapping around his neck, sharp fanged maw snapping at his face. Clays scrabbled at the smooth dry grip cutting off his airflow, anxiety pushing up from his chest. He grabbed Fang by the throat just under the champion’s jaw, doing what he could to keep those terrible teeth from slicing his flesh.

Clay could hear the children shouting and jeering from above them, but dared not take his eyes from his opponent. Fang’s jaw lengthened as he watched, his mouth stretching impossibly wide, lower teeth hooking towards Clay’s forearm.

The hunter strained to keep his elbow locked, but felt his foe’s sharp teeth scrape against his flesh, felt a burning in its wake. With a strangled gurgle of revulsion the hunter kicked a foot up into the snake-man’s gut and shoved him back.

Clay barely had time to draw breath before Fang was moving again, darting like an asp to swing a whip-like arm. It moved faster that Clay could react and struck him a powerful blow across the face.

Pain exploded from his not-yet-mended nose, and Clay gave a howl of rage and pain, staggering back to clutch himself.

Fang brought both of his limbs down across Clay’s shoulders, knocking him to his knees. The Snake-Champion twisted at the waist, slamming both of his arms against the side of Clay’s head, sending him spinning into a pile of crates.

“Should I kill him, children?” Clay could barely understand Long Fang’s words through the ringing in his ears.

The children shouted a motley of replies, clamoring against each other.

Clay felt himself lifted by one arm, dangled in front of Fang’s grinning face.

“You are lucky, outsider. The children bid me let you go, that you warn any who would press us.”

Pain lanced through Clay’s shoulders as he tried to lift his head, to meet his foe’s gaze.

Fang flicked his wrist, sending the hunter sprawling into the jars near the path to the granary’s exit. They shattered, sharp shards cutting his flesh.

“Go, weakling. Tell them to send more champions. We could use meat in our stew.”

***

The children’s jeers echoed in Clay’s ears long after he’d crawled from the granary, long after he’d left the city. He hadn’t gone to the Elders to report his failure. He hadn’t even gone to Forkbeard’s to tell his brother all that had occurred. He’d just crawled to his feet and limped his way out of the city, broken, beaten, defeated in body and spirit.

He was no champion. He was barely a man. What right did he have to live among others?

What right did he have to live?

Clay limped East, away from the city, through grassland that gradually gave way to sandy wastes. It was like nothing he had seen before, an endless stretch of sand and stone, but it fit his mood. Bleak. Empty. Worthless.

A place a man could go to die.

The sun bearing down on his back and shoulders seemed particularly cruel. In less than an hour his muscles were screaming from the thrashing Long Fang had given him. His throat burned with thirst. The sand below his bare feet seemed like it singed with each step.

He did not stop. He would not, until his legs could no longer carry him forward.

The sun had begun to set, finally, when he passed the cave. It wasn’t much, just a narrow gap between two stones above the earth. He would have walked right past it, had he not heard the grunting.

Human sounds, though not the speech he knew. More like the sounds Bluetooth had made when the clan shaman had left his body behind to commune with the spirits.

The idea that there might be a shaman within gave him pause. A shaman could help him. A shaman could tell him where to go, what to do… or at least, give him peace with his ancestors until he died.

Clay made his way towards the cave.

***

The cave wasn’t very deep, and Clay did not have to go far before he was intercepted.

“What are you doing here?” Mad Words barreled out of the deeper cave, a heavy stone club in hand. “You have come to the desert to finish killing me?”

Clay skidded back along the sandy cave floor, hands raised. “No!”

“You thought you would sneak up on me?” Mad Words darted forward. “Steal my secrets?”

Clay retreated, feeling the warm stone against his back. “No! I have come to the desert to die.”

Mad squinted at Clay and cocked his head. “Eh? You make no sense.”

Clay kept his eyes on the man’s club, noting that it was unnaturally straight, with sharp corners. “I have failed as champion. I deserve death.”

“Failed?” Mad asked. “You defeated me fairly.”

“Not you.” Clay hung his head. “After we fought, the council came and offered me the role as Jericho’s champion.”

“Stop.” Mad lowered his weapon. “This sounds like a tragic story. I never listen to tragic stories on an empty stomach. Go wait for me above in the shadow of the stones, and I will bring us soup.”

“I don’t deserve to eat.”

“Then I will eat for both of us. Now go. This cave is taboo.”

***

Mad emerged from the cave some time later. He thrust a bowl of watery stew into Clay’s hands.

It smelled delicious, but the young man had no appetite.

“Tell me your story.”

Clay did, slowly, starting with the Elders’ offer to make him Champion. At Mad’s questions – which were both insightful but also focused on strange details Clay didn’t consider important – he also spoke of the events that had brought the Bear Clan brothers to Jericho.

“Why did you head out into the desert?” Mad asked.

“I didn’t know what to do,” Clay said. “I cannot go to the mountain. There is no home. And I do not think I will find my answers in the past.”

Something about the words apparently struck Mad Words as funny, and he chuckled. “No. The past holds no answers. I know that now.”

“There is nothing left for me but death.” Clay stared hard at the bowl in his hands.

“That is stupid and you are stupid.”

“Maybe.”

Mad finished his soup with a loud slurp, then gestured towards Clay’s bowl.

The hunter handed it over wordlessly. Mad could not help him, but it felt… right that he should tell the story before he let himself die.

“Your death is your own choice, Clay. I will not convince you otherwise. I may be mad, but I am not a busybody. If you want, I will kill you.”

Clay looked up at him.

“It will be quick. It will be clean. You will not suffer. Your pain will end.”

Clay twisted to look back towards Jericho and his brother. He could barely see the city’s great walls in the distance. He nodded once, curtly.

Mad grunted, slapping his club against his palm. It did not look like stone in the fading daylight. The sun shone on it like water. “First, though, I will tell you why you have failed.”

Clay looked down at his hands. He knew why he had failed. He was not half the man his father had been.

“You are not a Champion.”

Clay nodded.

“You spoke of your champions. Big brave warriors who fight head to head, beating each other down, surrounded by cheering allies. Yes? It is that way with my people, too. It is a stupid way.”

“The Old Ones say it is a dying way.”

“Your Old Ones are stupid, too. But listen. It is not your fault you are a poor Champion. Men like myself and Snake Face–”

“Long Fang.”

“Long Fang, we have done this for years. Longer. You only defeated me because I was drunk.”

Clay didn’t argue the point.

“You are a hunter. A hunter does not fight. A hunter kills.”

Clay looked up at him.

“Does a hunter call out to his prey, challenging it?” Mad asked.

“No,” Clay said.

“Does a hunter give it time to ready itself?”

“No.”

“Does a hunter fight toe to toe against a dangerous foe?”

“No?”

“What does a hunter do, Clay?”

“A hunter stalks his prey.” A cool wind blew across Clay’s face. “A hunter strikes from hiding. A hunter wears it down.”

“Then why would Clay the Hunter try to fight like Clay the Champion?”

Clay didn’t have an answer.

Mad held out the bowl in one hand, his club in the other. “Choose, Clay. Die here in the desert a failure, or return to the city as Clay the Hunter.”

Clay hesitated for only a moment before reaching out.

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Questions? You are invited to either leave a comment below, or ask directly through the comment form.

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Book Nouveau Submission Guidelines

If you want me to review your books, you’ll need to learn to submit.

Questions? You are invited to either leave a comment below, or ask directly through the comment form.

The post Book Nouveau Submission Guidelines appeared first on Michael Coorlim.

Hero Historia: Jericho Rising 6

Jericho Rising is the first 12-part story arc of the Hero Historia historical superhero weekly web serial.

Clay’s palms stung with the table’s impact, a vibration that seemed to go all the way up his wrists and arms to his heart.

The drunk who had kicked it stared at him, bloodshot eyes wide, a furious sneer on his lips. Clay’s gaze was drawn to the man’s teeth, the whitest and straightest he’d ever seen. Other than that, he looked almost normal. Taller than the residents of Jericho, the height of one of the Smoke Mountain Tribe, but paler of skin, with narrower features, lighter hair, and eyes the color of the midday sky.

“You want some of this?” he slurred through many mugs of strong beer and a thick accent, advancing with his arms wide.

The others in the hall had hurried away, out the door or towards the walls. Only Broad, Dawn, and Dawn’s father Squint stood behind Clay.

“They call him Mad Words,” Squint said. “He is a troublemaker.”

“Why do they call him that?” Broad asked.

“He speaks madness when he drinks. It upsets people.”

“You let him stay?”

“He is strong and powerful, but hasn’t been violent… none of the guards have wanted to risk trying to exile him.”

Mad Words stopped, looking past Clay. “You call me mad? I say you are ignorant. I am trying to save you, but you mock me!”

“You will be cast from the city for this!” Squint called.

“I am the least of your troubles.”

Seeing the man becoming agitated again, Clay stepped forward, speaking softly. “You must calm yourself. We are guests in this city.”

Mad Words moved, standing toe to toe with the young hunter. “You telling me what to do, boy?”

Clay could smell the sour beer on his breath, and didn’t know quite what to do. It reminded him of the play of children, the way they’d push and shove each other to establish their places in the clan, but it was not a thing that men did. When children grew up, they put away the games of youth to take on the roles of providers for the tribe.

It was the way of Champions, he realized. The tribesmen supporting them would shout and jeer, puffing themselves up, and then the champions would fight. His mind flashed back to the violence he’d seen his father commit, long knock-down brawls so unlike the clean quick kill a hunter made, breaking your foe’s body until they couldn’t fight any more.

Mad Words was staring hard into his eyes, and Clay could feel the gazes of the others in the hall as well. If he backed down now, Mad would continue bullying the city, and the men sent to exile him would be killed. Worse, Clay would look weak in front of Dawn.

He tried one last time to calm the man. “Please. Go. Sit.”

Mad’s face reddened, and he swung a sudden loping overhead fist towards Clay. The blow was clumsy but it caught the young hunter off-guard, smashing into his neck and shoulder. Clay staggered from the powerful impact, pain shooting along the back of his neck.

The pale man struck him again and again, fists pummeling his chest, his cheek, his jaw before Clay even fully realized what was happening. The rich taste of copper enveloped his tongue as his teeth cut the insides of his mouth, and the world gained that same sort of crystalline clarity it had when the lion had attacked him on the Sea of Grass. He felt like he was floating, and even the pain from Mad’s blows was a distant curiosity.

Dawn’s screaming sounded like it was coming to him through a tunnel, and Clay reasoned that it might be prudent to stop the man from hitting him.

His vision snapped into focus around Mad, and he was aware of every line and crease in his attacker’s face, even as the rest of the dining hall faded from him. Clay wanted to react, wanted to strike back, but his hands felt numb, his limbs moved so slow.

Mad was throwing another punch, but Clay’s hands were already in motion, already swinging out, so he just lowered his head and took the side of the other man’s fist on the crown of his head, driving his own into Mad’s gut.

It was the first time he’d struck another person. Clay stepped back, hoping the strike had stunned his opponent.

It hadn’t. Mad grunted and brought his other hand around to strike Clay’s face.

The open-handed slap nearly spun him around.

He’d failed to stop the fight, but something about that was oddly freeing. Clay no longer had a responsibility to stop Mad. He no longer had to put on a good show for Dawn’s father. He didn’t have to worry about repercussions or exile. It was too late. There was nothing left but battle, and no way to avoid it.

There was a freedom in that, and Clay let his thoughts fall away, replaced by a hunter’s instincts. All that mattered was stopping Mad, hurting him so bad that he couldn’t continue.

Clay crouched, lowering his shoulder, ignoring the blows raining on the back of his head and neck and slammed forward into the mad drunk. He didn’t stop, kept pushing forward, wrapping his arms around Mad’s middle to carry him along. He felt a shudder as he rushed his foe into the hall’s wall, cracking the mud-brick.

Mad gave out a wheezing groan, limbs stiff as the air was driven from his lungs.

Clay did not hesitate. Arms still wrapped around his opponent, he stretched and bent backwards, hauling the other man off of his feet in a short arch that ended with Mad’s face slammed against the clay floor. The sounds of impact echoed in Clay’s ears, and he twisted around to catch the other man’s legs as he slumped to the floor.

He’d hurt Mad, stopped him temporarily, but it wasn’t enough. He had to hurt him enough that he would be too afraid of Clay to cause more trouble.

Clay spun up and to the side, lifting Mad by his legs fast enough that his upper body folded over Clay’s shoulder, then turned and slammed his torso down across the nearest table. The mugs and platters atop it went tumbling to the ground.

The hunter stared down at his fallen foe, breath rattling, watching and waiting for him to move. He felt the pain from the many blows he’d taken, but they didn’t seem to matter.

Mad didn’t move. Clay couldn’t tell if he’d killed him.

The hunter felt suddenly tired, exhausted, his hands trembling. He felt sick and apprehensive.

Broad was beside him, pulling on his arm with some urgency.

“Come,” his brother said. “We must go!”

Clay looked around. There were a handful of locals staring at him, but both Squint and his daughter had departed.

“Clay!”

Clay nodded, numbly, and followed his brother to the darkening streets.

***

“This is not good,” Broad said once the brothers had returned to the isolation of their room at Forkbeard’s home.

Clay didn’t respond. His heart had calmed, but now his body was letting him know how badly he’d been hurt. Most of Mad Words’s blows had struck his head, shoulders, and neck, and the muscles were seizing up. His lip had split, his nose was intense agony if he so much as wrinkled it. Worst of all, he felt dizzy, nauseous, and his whole face was swollen.

He sat with his head between his knees, breathing slowly, trying hard not to vomit.

“Are you okay?” Broad asked. “That man’s fists looked like they could split stone.”

“Head hurts,” Clay said. Talking was effort. If he let too many words out, he felt like his dinner would follow. “Dizzy.”

“Maybe you should rest,” Broad said. “I will find a healer.”

Clay didn’t respond, focusing on his breathing.

***

Broad returned some time later, and Clay hadn’t realized that he’d been gone. Forkbeard was with him, along with a woman of the same age, possibly his wife.

“Tilt his head back,” she said.

Clay let Broad move his head, refusing to wince despite the spasm of pain running through his neck.

“Close your eyes,” the woman said.

He complied and she placed something cool and wet over the top of his face.

“Will this heal him?” Broad asked.

“It will keep the swelling down.”

“Is he dead?” Clay asked through swollen lips.

“Mad Words?” Broad asked.

“Guards were taking him from the hall. He was staggering, but on his own feet,” Forkbeard said.

“He may want revenge,” Broad said.

Clay didn’t care. He was in such pain — if the man came to fight now, he would let him kill him. He would just lay down and die. At least then he wouldn’t feel so ill.

“Just worry about your brother,” Forkbeard said. “How is he, Bright?”

“Dizzy,” Clay said.

“Spirits can get trapped in your skull when you take a heavy blow,” Bright said. “One is trying to find its way out. If it cannot by morning, we will have to help it.”

“How?” Broad asked.

“We will make a hole so it can escape.”

Clay groaned.

“Doesn’t his head have enough holes?” Broad asked. “Eyes, nose, mouth, ears?”

“Not on top.” Her cool hand pressed against his scalp. “Trust me. It is good medicine. If he survives.”

Once they’d left, Clay felt Broad crouch next to him. “Do not worry, brother. I have seen Father recover from far more severe wounds. Once the Elk Champion gored him through the throat – we thought he would die for sure, but in a week he was able to speak again.”

Clay wanted to feel comforted, but he just wanted to be left alone with his misery. He’d scared off Dawn, confirmed her father’s prejudices about outsiders, and probably gotten himself and his brother exiled from Jericho for their violent ways.

He just wanted the spirit in his head to swallow him up so he could disappear.

***

Clay slipped into a dreamless sleep at some point during the night but, much to his dismay, did not die. When he woke his head felt clearer, as did his problems. His vision remained blurry, and it was painful to keep his left eye open for more than a few seconds. He hoped he would not lose it.

“You did what you must,” Broad said.

“I’ve convinced Dawn Spring that I was a monster.”

“Mad Words is the monster,” Broad said. “You were protecting her. How does your face feel?”

“Swollen. How does it look?”

“Ugly. You must be healing.”

Clay laughed, then groaned in pain.

“The poultice Bright gave you was good medicine,” Broad said. “We must thank her.”

“If they do not exile us,” Clay said.

“You worry too much, brother.”

“One of us has to.”

Broad smiled. “Then I’m glad it doesn’t have to be me.”

***

Clay’s vision had largely returned to normal by the time Spring Dawn came to check on him in the early afternoon. Broad had gone to the field for the day’s labor once it had become clear that Clay was not going to die in his absence. He’d made the case for staying to watch over his brother, but had relented once Forkbeard had informed him that if he did not work, he would not earn any beer.

“Your clan totem must be powerful,” Dawn said, examining his head. “Bright will be disappointed she won’t have to cut into your skull.”

“Her medicine was powerful.” Clay was glad the girl hadn’t been scared off. “For a people with no shamans, you have good magic.”

She chuckled. “Ways passed from mother to daughter. But even so, you have healed fast.”

“Forkbeard is lucky to have such a skilled mate.”

Dawn cackled. “Bright is his sister, not his mate. He is not the sort that will have one, nor children. It is not his way.”

Clay was confused. “I have seen him with a man my own age. I took him for his son.”

“How do pairings work in your tribe?”

“Women leave to join the other Smoke Mountain clans.”

“Do men pair with men or women with women?”

Clay blushed. “I do not know the ways of womens’ secrets, but I do not think that men can make children.”

Dawn blinked. “What?”

“Childbearing is one of womens’ secrets. They go into the birthing hut alone and swollen, and come out with a new life.”

She stared at him. “You really… don’t know.”

“Do you?” Clay asked. “In my tribe the secrets of birth is something known only to mothers. Is it different here?”

“I raise sheep, Clay. I see them birth every year. So do the boy shepherds.”

“We do not keep animals in my tribe.”

Dawn laughed. “I do not believe I have to explain this to you.”

“Explain what?”

Dawn laughed again, a sound like bells in the spring.

***

Clay’s face was ashen. “Really?”

“Yes, really. What did you think mating was for?”

“I don’t know.” Clay’s voice was an octave higher than normal. “I don’t have a mate.”

“But you will one day, yes?”

His skin felt hot, and his scalp prickled, particularly where Mad had been striking him. “Some day. I don’t know how that works here, without a tribal moot to decide pairings.”

Dawn was sitting close to him. “Let us say, for purpose of example, that you wanted me as your mate.”

“Okay.” Clay was feeling dizzy again.

“You would go to my father and tell him this. If he found you worthy, he would accept you as his son.” He was very aware of her hip touching his. “And I would be yours.”

“You would?”

Her breath was warm in his ear. “I would be yours.”

Clay found himself trapped in her eyes.

A grunt came from the door, where Forkbeard stood, arms folded.

Clay stood abruptly. His head spun.

“Men are here to see you,” Forkbeard said. “In the courtyard. Elders.”

Clay nodded, face burning, and left without turning back to look at Dawn. He would face the consequences of his actions like a man.

A trio of old men — older than any in the Bear Clan, older than Bluetooth — were waiting outside.

Forkbeard followed. He put a hand on Clay’s shoulder. “Elders, this is young Clay, the tribal from Smoke Mountain. Clay, this is Darkbeard, Snakespit, and One-Eye.

“You are Clay?” the tallest, Darkbeard, asked.

Clay nodded. His gut felt like he’d left it back with Dawn, sunk behind him with foreboding, sure that they’d come to castigate him for his violent ways. They would exile him from the city, him and his brother, and he’d never see Dawn Spring again.

“You defeated the troublemaker Mad Words?” Snakespit, the shortest and eldest, asked.

“I did not want him to hurt anyone,” Clay said. “I did not mean to fight.”

“He saved father and I,” Dawn said.

“That is not how Squint tells it,” One-Eye said. “He asked that we exile you as well.”

“Please,” Clay said. “I will not fight again.”

“Then you are of no use to us,” Darkbeard said. “For we have need of your strength.”

Clay looked between the three of them and could not find words to say.

“Jericho brings a great bounty to us,” Snakespit said. “She brings us food. Beer. The safety of her walls. We live lives that you tribals cannot imagine.”

“I have seen this,” Clay said.

“But trouble comes as well,” One-Eye said. “If you would listen to Squint, every tribal refugee is a menace. He forgets that we all come from tribes, even those of us whose ancestors built these walls.”

“Trouble in the form of clan champions like yourself,” Darkbeard said.

“I am no trouble,” Clay said. “And I am no champion. My clan… my brother and I are all that remain.”

“And what would you do with your strength?” Snakespit asked.

“The shamans say that the Champion’s burden is to serve and protect his clan. His strength is not his own. It belongs to the clan.”

“And with no clan?” Snakespit asked.

Clay looked up at the midday sun, then back at the elders. They were watching him, judging him, like Dawn’s father. He was who he was, and he would not hide it, no matter what they thought of him.

“I am grateful for the hospitality of your city,” he said. “Jericho is my home now. You are my people, even if you call me outsider. I would use my strength to protect you as I would my own clan.”

The three elders exchanged a look.

“Good,” Snakespit said. “For Jericho needs your strength, young one. Mad Words was only one of the troublemakers she faces. If you would stay, then we have a task for you more important than farmer.”

Clay looked from Dawn to Forkbeard. “What do you ask of me?”

“Will you serve Jericho as her Champion?”

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Hero Historia: Jericho Rising 5

Jericho Rising is the first 12-part story arc of the Hero Historia historical superhero weekly web serial.

Clay stalked his prey with the focus and intensity of a lifelong hunter. He moved low to the ground, hunched, almost crawling, one foot crossing over the other as he crept across the recently tilled field.

He was bigger now that he was a Champion, but he felt like he was moving with more grace. Further, the wind was in his favor, and his approach lead directly through the shadow of Jericho’s walls, so his advantages more than made up for his larger profile.

The sheep didn’t appear to have noticed him, placidly grazing in the strip of grass between fields. They didn’t range over the Smoke Mountains, and those that he’d seen since his arrival in Jericho had remained largely oblivious to the locals that walked among them. Was this magic cast upon the sheep, to make them dull and easy to kill, or was it cast upon the locals, to make them invisible to the sheep?

Clay didn’t know, and he didn’t want to take chances. Farmers — that’s what he and Broad were now — were well fed with plenty of bread, porridge, and beer, but very little of the meat that that the tribesmen were used to eating. Meat that his new Champion body seemed to crave. He needed this hunt, this kill, this sheep. It was all he could do to keep from salivating at the prospect.

Closer and closer he drew, moving when the sheep lowered its head to graze, freezing when it lifted to look around.

Broad had spotted the animal, and it’d been his older brother’s idea to hunt it down. Clay had readily agreed; in addition to missing the taste of meat, he missed the thrill of it. Farm-work might suit his brother, but Clay was a hunter, and hunters hunted.

The sheep lowered his head and began grazing once more. Clay moved.

It wasn’t that he was ungrateful for the hospitality of the city and the opportunity to work. The labor had become a trifle since he’d used the Old Ones magic. He could have easily tilled a field on his own each day, but had refrained when Broad had pointed out that that’s exactly what would have become expected of him.

If their supervisor Forkbeard had noticed Clay’s increased strength and size he hadn’t said anything, though the hunter did catch the older man eying him speculatively a few times. If asked, Clay would have told him the truth, that he had taken some of Bear’s power into himself, that he was now more than most men.

But nobody had asked. That was just as well. It would have meant more questions, questions about what he intended to do now, and Clay didn’t know. He wanted revenge upon the tribe that had killed his father, but how he could accomplish such a feat short of leaving the city and tracking them down — an endeavor doomed to end in failure and death for one who had no experience in hunting men — he had no idea.

But now was not the time for thoughts of the future. He was hunting. All that mattered was the kill, and the meat that came from it.

Clay was close now. Close enough to smell the sheep, its scent of grass and mud and wet cloth. He hefted the till-stick, the only weapon on hand, and rose from his couch, ready to close the distance and crush the animal’s skull.

He was halfway through his lunge when the stone hit him in the forehead, smashing his sense away, knocking him off of his feet into the mud.

***

Spring Dawn didn’t know whether to be relieved that she hadn’t killed the tribal farmer or disappointed. On the one hand, he was trying to kill one of her sheep, and no one would think ill of her for stopping the theft, particularly from one of the city’s recent immigrants. On the other, she’d never killed anyone before, and wasn’t terribly keen to start.

There was a large welt on his forehead where she’d struck him, but he was breathing. He was lucky. She was no slouch with the sling; her missed shots could chip stone and crack mortar.

She realized that he was the tribal she’d seen coming through the gates the other day. He was larger up close, lanky but not as skinny, and almost unbelievably tall when he was laid out and not slouching. The tribal immigrants in the streets were all tall, but this one — it was almost hard to trust her eyes. His life as a hunter must have been a healthy one, for there wasn’t an ounce of fat on him.

Not so lucky, perhaps. He had several large scars, one on his shoulder that looked like two jagged semi-circles, and a thinner line across his chest.

Dawn’s breath caught in her throat as his blue-gray eyes opened. She scampered back as he sat up, holding her knife out, pointed at him, like a protective talisman.

“What hit me?” His voice was deep and bass.

“I did,” she said. “You were going to kill my sheep.”

“Your sheep?”

His eyes focused on hers, and she was instantly and entirely aware of the difference in them that her father had spoken of. They were wild and alert in a way that she couldn’t quite articulate, savage and untamed. Her stomach fluttered.

“I am sorry,” he said. “I did not know anyone else was hunting it.”

She broke eye-contact to look back towards her sheep. “I wasn’t hunting her, she’s part of my flock.”

“Your flock?”

“Don’t your people keep animals?”

“That is not a magic we possess.” He lowered his eyes. “Forgive me, shaman, I saw the one alone and did not know it had been bound to you.”

“Shaman?” Dawn said. “I’m not a shaman. I’m a shepherd.”

His eyes rose. “I don’t know that word.”

She couldn’t break away from his gaze. “I… it means one who cares for the sheep. I watch them. They are my flock.”

“Your children?”

“No. Not… sort of.” She tried to figure out how to explain the concept. “The sheep belong to the city. I watch them, and keep them safe from wolves and… people who shouldn’t take them.”

The tribal nodded, seemingly satisfied with the answer. “You watch them the way Forkbeard watches the plants to make sure they grow right.”

“Sort of.”

The tribal looked back over at the sheep. “Can I have one?”

She was startled by the question. “What?”

“I am of Jericho now. Do you mind if I take one of the sheep? Forkbeard doesn’t give my brother and I much meat.”

“You can’t just… take what you want,” Dawn said.

“It is of the city? I am of the city. And I need meat. Why can’t I take one?”

“You can’t just take what you want,” Dawn said. “Do you know how many people live in Jericho?”

“Many,” he said. “So many more than I have ever seen.”

“Then you realize that everyone cannot just take what they want when they want?”

The tribal glanced towards the walls. Dawn took the opportunity to look away.

“There are more men than sheep. Men would fight over who gets to eat them.”

“Yes! So you see why you cannot just take them?”

He rose to his feet, towering over her, almost half as tall as the city walls themselves. She felt small, tiny, like a rabbit in the shadow of a hawk, and it was exhilarating.

“How is it known who gets to eat sheep?”

She swallowed. “The elders decide how much meat, beer, and grain to give each household.”

“I see.”

“What do they call you?”

He looked down at her. “Clay.”

“I am Dawn Spring. My father said that that my eyes are the color of the rising sun reflected in the spring’s water.”

Clay stooped and looked into Dawn’s eyes with an intensity that almost stopped her heart. “Your father is a clever man.”

She clenched her fists, nails biting into her palms. “Why… why do they call you Clay?”

He grinned. “When I was a child I used to play in the stream alongside our camp, and would come out covered in mud. When it dried, my mother said it looked like I was turning to clay.”

Dawn realized from his smile that she was falling into a deep infatuation. She sighed in resignation. There wasn’t anything to be done for it. She held out her hand, and the tribal hunter helped her up.

Her hand felt enveloped by his rough warmth. “My father is important among the shepherds. We have meat. Maybe I can ask that he invite you and your brother over for dinner?”

Clay brightened. “That would be… my brother and I would be grateful.”

His excitement burned in her chest. “I will ask. Where do you live?”

“Broad and I are staying with the farm supervisor Forkbeard.”

She nodded. “You had best get back to your field, then, before he notices you are gone.”

Clay picked up his tilling-stick. “Thank you, Dawn. You are very kind.”

She felt her face redden. “You are welcome.”

She watched his long strides as he loped away, letting the color slowly flush from her face, and began leading the flock back towards the city gate. The further she got from Clay, the further she got from his smile, his scent, his muscles, the more acutely aware she was of the task ahead of her. Many men came to court her, both because of her looks and the power her father held with the city elders, and always Squint had refused their offers. They were not, he maintained, good enough for his daughter.

Privately she agreed, having never been particularly interested in any of her suitors. They were always rich but ugly, or coarse, or cruel, or boring. None had thrilled her in such a short time as the tribal refugee Clay had, and none had a more difficult path with her father. Squint had never made his disdain for the immigrants a secret.

Convincing him to host for the tribal brothers wouldn’t be easy. Convincing him to let Clay court her would be nearly impossible.

Dawn didn’t care. Her heart had found what it had wanted, and she wasn’t going to let mere impossibility deter her. She would have Clay.

He would be hers.

Oh yes.

He would be hers.

***

 

Broad wasn’t terribly enthusiastic about the meal invitation at first.

“Don’t you want meat?” Clay asked while the pair walked back through the city towards Forkbeard’s home.

“Of course I want meat,” Broad said. “But good honest hunted meat, not magic shepherd meat. They don’t have shamans here. Who will tell them what the spirits say is taboo? Is eating magic meat safe?”

“All of the grain in the bread and porridge is magic, too.”

“Ah,” Broad said. “But there is a difference between bad meat and bad plants. Eat bad meat and you get sick and die. Eat bad plants and the spirits send you on a terrifying vision quest.”

“I am sure that if the meat was bad half the city would have died,” Clay said.

“That is only my first concern. This girl. She likes you.”

Clay tried not to smile. “Do you think so?”

“Brother, she is giving you meat.”

“She likes me.”

“Of course she does. The weakest Bear Clan hunter is more man than the strongest Jericho guard.”

Clay nodded, watching as an old woman carrying a bundle of sticks on her back passed them in the street.

“Are you ready to take a mate? Have children?”

“Is that not what Champions do?”

“Yes, but think. Your plan. You want revenge on the men who killed father?”

“Of course.”

“And they will come here.”

Clay looked towards the western wall, towards the Sea of Grass, towards Smoke Mountain, towards where the foreign tribe lay. “Eventually. So the Old Ones told you.”

“Then would you bring a child into this world, only to be slain by your foes if you fail?”

Clay set his jaw. “I will not fail.”

“Father failed, and he was stronger than you. He had more experience fighting than you.” Broad put a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “Clay, all I am saying is that you should tackle one impossible task at a time.”

Clay shrugged the hand off. “We are meeting for a meal, Broad, not to mate with her.”

His brother grinned. “So you say, but who knows how these Jericho women do things.”

Clay laughed and gave his brother a playful shove, almost sending the man sprawling.

***

Forkbeard met the brothers in the courtyard. “Squint, one of the shepherds, has invited you to dine with him at the communal hall.”

“That is good news.” Broad grinned. “They serve beer there.”

“There would be beer with the meal no matter what,” Clay said. “But to meet there instead of his home. Does this mean that he does not trust us?”

“Squint does not care much for tribesmen,” Forkbeard said.

“That is a good thing,” Broad said.

Clay turned to his brother. “How is that a good thing?”

“It means it will take longer for you to win his daughter. You have more time to…” his eyes flicked to the overseer. “More time to settle in.”

“You aim to court Dawn Spring?” Forkbeard asked.

“The invitation was her idea,” Clay said.

Forkbeard frowned. “You had best be careful, young one. Squint is a powerful man with much influence. And he has tried to get the city elders to close the gates to newcomers.”

“I understand.”

“I do not think that you do. He will be watching you carefully, looking for any excuse to exile you and your brother from the city. Or worse.”

“Worse?” Clay asked. “But why?”

“Does a father need a reason to be protective? But there are many who would court Dawn. If you return her affections, you may make many enemies.”

Clay bowed his head. “I thank you for your wisdom, elder, but it is just dinner.”

“You are in Jericho now, tribal.” Forkbeard turned away. “Dinner is never just dinner.”

The brothers watched him go.

Clay turned to Broad. “What do you suppose he meant by that?”

“Maybe there will be beer with dinner?” Broad said.

Clay pushed into the brothers’ room, laying his tilling stick near the door. The girl was pretty, and she had been kind — after hitting him in the head, anyway — but was she worth risking his and Broad’s place in the city for? He had enemies to the West, he did not need more. The last thing he needed was to get himself or his brother exiled. The girl was trouble.

Turning her down would be trouble, too. His only real hope was to build a rapport with her father, this Squint. Perhaps if he made it clear that he had no interest in Dawn, the old man would take to him, give him a sheep. A highly placed ally would be useful.

A delicate matter, turning down the girl without hurting her, for that too would anger her father.

Clay sighed. Things were so much easier on the mountain.

***

Clay’s resolve lasted until he and Broad entered the dining hall, and he got a good look at Dawn Spring. She’d been pretty enough out in the field, but in the candlelight of the hall, in clean crisp linen, adorned with bronze and silver bands on her arms, her lips rosy, color on her cheeks, she was beautiful.

Broad looked at him. “You, brother, are in trouble.”

Clay walked between the long tables of the hall, acutely aware of the stares from the other diners as he passed.

“You are the one my daughter spoke of?” The man next to Dawn spoke, glaring up at the young man with a mixture of distrust and annoyance.

Clay bowed his head briefly in the manner he’d seen of the residents of Jericho, a sign of greeting or respect. “I am Clay.”

Broad cleared his throat. “You honor my brother and I with your invitation. We have heard that you are a great man in Jericho, and we come to you with respect, bearing gifts.”

Clay was in sudden appreciation of the way his brother was picking up the manners of Jericho.

“Oh?” Squint turned his gaze on Broad, seeming less impressed.

Broad gestured at the nearby table. “May we sit?”

Squint grunted and sat on the bench. Dawn sat next to him.

Clay’s brother still had the older man’s attention. “Clay may be bigger, but I am the elder brother. His only kin. He is my responsibility, and I want you to know he is a good man.”

Squint snorted. “I wouldn’t expect anything less from you.”

Broad’s smile didn’t fade. He put the basket he’d brought onto the table, effectively creating a divider between Squint and his daughter.

“What’s this?” the elder asked.

“Your gift,” Broad said. “To show our respect.”

Dawn leaned forward behind the basket, eyes on Clay. “You groomed your hair.”

“Broad thought it was a good idea,” he whispered back. “We wanted to make a good impression.”

“It looks nice.”

“You look nice. You smell like flowers.”

“Thank you. It’s perfume.”

“Perfume,” Clay said.

Broad pulled a pair of horns out of the basket. “Gazelle antlers. Collected by my brother and I as we hunted through the Sea of Grass.”

“Antlers?” Squint sounded taken aback.

“The only goods we came to Jericho with,” Broad said. “Clay insisted we give them to you, as a sign of respect.”

Squint picked one of the antlers up, with a grunt that might have been appreciative.

Broad winked sidelong at his brother.

Dinner went surprisingly well. Squint largely ignored the younger hunter, and instead spent his time talking to Broad. Clay felt like what they were saying was important, like he should be paying attention, but he was finding it difficult not to focus entirely on Dawn and her smile. She wasn’t anything like the women of the Bear Clan.

They’d brought roast mutton as well as strong beer, and Clay realized he must have consumed both, for his platter was empty, but he didn’t remember that either. All he could think about was Dawn’s eyes, the way they seemed to burn into his, and the shy smile she would flash him.

“Clay.” He realized that his brother was talking to him.

“Whu?” He turned and saw that both Broad and Squint were staring at him.

“Clay, tell him about the lion.”

“What lion?”

Broad’s eyes shifted to Squint, then back to Clay. “The one you killed. The one whose skin you took.”

“Oh, right,” Clay’s face burned and his scalp pricked. “The lion. Yes. I was tracking it through the Sea of Grass. Only it turns out, it was hunting me too.”

Dawn gasped, and Clay smiled at her, then turned back to her father. “It jumped out at me — bit me, scratched me, broke my spear, but I was able to wound it with the tip. The beast ran, but I followed it until it had lost too much blood. Skinned it and made a fine wrap.”

“Hunting a lion is dangerous business, boy. Some might say foolish,” Squint said.

“If I had known what a lion was, I would not have tried,” Clay said. “But I thought from the tracks that I was following a leopard.”

“The tracks are very similar,” Broad said. “And we had no lions in the mountains.”

“Do you have the skin?” Dawn asked.

“We gave it to the men at the gate as a gift,” Clay said. “And they sent us to Forkbeard.”

“That’s terrible,” Dawn said. “You should have kept it.”

“What brought you from the mountains?” Squint asked.

Clay exchanged a glance with his brother.

“It… is not a good story,” Broad said.

Squint chuckled. “Some say that any tribal coming to Jericho is an outcast from his tribe. Is that so?”

“It’s not that at all,” Clay said. “Our tribe—”

His words were cut off when a man across the room suddenly stood, knocking a wooden platter out of a servant’s hands. He was tall, like a tribesman, but his features were strange, and he was dressed like one of the locals. He snarled something in a language that Clay didn’t speak, then pushed the servant back.

“Please—” the servant said. “The brewmaster says you have had enough to drink—”

“I will tell your brewmaster when I have had enough.” The stranger’s voice was thick and slurred, heavy with a deep accent. “Bring more beer.”

Squint stood up and pointed at the man. “Be quiet, barbarian. Leave if you cannot drink like an honest man.”

The stranger focused on Dawn’s father. “Who are you to tell me what to drink? Don’t you know who I am?”

“You’re a drunken fool,” Squint said.

Others in the crowd agreed, loudly. “Get out of here, tribal.”

Clay looked at Broad, hoping his brother would know what to do.

Broad stood. “Please, let us calm ourselves. Shouting doesn’t help.”

“You can’t tell me what to do.” The drunk kicked the heavy wooden table away from himself. It easily weighed hundreds of pounds, and even as a champion Clay would have been hard-pressed to lift it, but it went skidding across the room towards them like it was made of feathers.

Clay was out of his seat instantly, grabbing it and stopping its slide before it could strike them. His hands stung with the impact.

“Clay,” Broad hissed.

Clay glanced at his brother.

“He’s a champion! And he’s drunk!”

Clay looked at the table he’d stopped, at the approaching drunk, then at the shocked faces of Dawn and her father.

“Great.”

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Ghosts of Shaolin Production Notes

Ghosts of Shaolin, the next Galvanic Century novel is set largely in China between the fall of the Qing Dynasty and the short lived Empire of China established in 1915.

James Wainwright always considered himself a working-class engineer playing at detective, never taking the vocation for more than an idle hobby and opportunity to test some of his steampunk inventions. His investigations have always been more of a means of humoring his business partner, idle toff Alton Bartleby.

That was before his adopted daughter Xin Yan was taken.

Never comfortable in social situations, James finds himself tracking his daughter’s kidnappers from London’s Limehouse to the gritty streets of Hong Kong, down paths where his mechanical know-how won’t serve him. Searching a foreign land, he’ll find that his greatest challenges aren’t those who have taken from him what is most dear, but letting go of his most treasured preconceptions about the world.

Interesting Times

The early 20th century is full of struggle and conflict, in few places moreso than China. For almost a century she’d been at the mercy of the foreign powers, slowly coming to terms with the fact that in clinging to the belief that nothing outside her borders mattered had turned the Middle Kingdom into an obsolete backwater.

There were many attempts within the Qing dynasty itself to modernize China and refresh her culture, but these efforts were hampered by the Imperial tendency to look to the past for greatness. They underestimated the foreigners both culturally and militarily, partially due to how isolated the Manchu leadership had made itself.

Truth and Fiction

While the story behind Ghosts of Shaolin is fictional, the elements it incorporates come from real history. The Triad gangs (so named by the Hong Kong Police) really did grow out of pro-Ming nationalist secret societies. The Empress Dowager Cixi really did rule China from behind the scenes for decades. Chinese living abroad really did abandon their traditional dress after the revolution. It really was sparked by an accidental explosion of a rebel armory.

The hardest part was choosing which elements of Chinese history to include and which I didn’t have room for. In the end I cut almost 80 pages of material that, while interesting, didn’t add enough to the plot. Even so, Ghosts of Shaolin manages to be the longest book in the series at almost twice the length of March of the Cogsmen or Dreams of the Damned.

LIES

Some elements are, of course, entirely fictional. Kowloon was a real walled city of refugees and anarchists, but certainly not as I’ve presented it in the book and not in 1912. The specific Triad gangs I use are pure invention and probably owe more to Hong Kong action films than historical organized crime. Yuan Shikai was real, and really the President of China, and he does eventually try to set himself up as Emperor, but the books other antagonists are either fully fictional or heavily fictionalized.

Research

The biggest boon in researching this book came from the China History Podcast, specifically the Qing dynasty episodes (035-41), the episode on Robert Hart (058), the episode on the Triads (072), and the Hong Kong history series (101-110).

I highly recommend the podcast to anyone interested in Chinese history.

I also watched a lot of Kung Fu movies. I can recommend Jet Li’s Once Upon a Time in China series, as well as the more recent films Tai Chi Zero and Tai Chi Hero.

Ghosts of Shaolin is due out on January 16th. Sign up for my mailing list for a notification of its release.

Questions? You are invited to either leave a comment below, or ask directly through the comment form.

The post Ghosts of Shaolin Production Notes appeared first on Michael Coorlim.

Smithsonian Art-Pocolypse

The Smithsonian’s Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery has made available a collection of over 40,000 digitized Asian and American artworks, mostly never before seen by the public.

Photos of statues, sculptures, reliefs, paintings, you name it. Thousands of prints, metalwork, jewelry… and best of all, the high-res photos are all freely licensed for non-commercial work.Go. Check it out. Create new art from humanity’s cultural heritage. Get something tattooed on yourself, or pick up a new desktop wallpaper.Examples:

Iranian daggers

Chinese Lion-dog incense thing

 

A Virgin, Abbott Handerson Thayer

Questions? You are invited to either leave a comment below, or ask directly through the comment form.

The post Smithsonian Art-Pocolypse appeared first on Michael Coorlim.