The Warden

Chapter 18

"Night Slayer!"

A man belted the words as Masis passed, rapping him on the back as he went. The man's wide smile, so full of hope, so genuine, begrudged one onto Masis' face. Smiles still didn't come naturally to him. He would smile, its glow warming him for a moment, before bitter memories assaulted him. How could he be happy when his family had not been avenged? His smiles always faded into grim lines.

Almost all the Shadows in the colony had taken to calling him Night Slayer. Almost all. Skinner had kept his distance ever since that night. He would exchange pleasantries and a few brief words, but no longer engaged Masis in the longer conversations he had come to enjoy. That gruff, weather-beaten wisdom. His matter-of-fact logic. His overarching need to protect those around him. That one act separated them somehow and Masis could not get the older man to confide his misgivings to him.

Wilo had started to descend. No more than four fingers of light remained of the day. Hotter than previous days, Werold had thickened the air with her heavy, damp exhalations, sticking shirts and trousers to everyone's skin. Even more than usual the colony reeked of unwashed bodies.

Masis had come from the latrines, the only partially enclosed structures in all of the colony, offset from the main settlement by at least half a Bolae field's distance, so as not to contaminate the area with its putrid odor. No one lingered if they did not have to and Masis had even jogged until he had cleared the miasma that surrounded it.

He headed straight to the pavilion. More shouts of Night Slayer echoed after him. He just shook his head. What he had done had not been achieved alone. Whomever had thrown that rock had afforded him the moment he needed to make the kill. No one would acknowledge having done it. Not a single person. Masis had his suspicions though—Kyla. She was the one person or creature that he could think of that could have possibly surprised a night wight. But he had no proof. But the mere thought of her made him reach for one of his seaxes, gripping it until his skin ached from the pressure. The green-eyed she-wight had to die. She would die for what she had done to his family. But Kyla would die as well. She would die for what she had not done.

Coming under the cover of the pavilion's overhanging eaves, Masis angled toward the basin of water reserved for washing hands which was refreshed every day. Linen shirt already rolled to his elbows, Masis plunged his hands into the cool water and snatched a handful of sand from its bottom to scrub his flesh with. The fine grit scraped away filth and skin alike.

Strangely, only one other person occupied the open space. Skinner sat with his back to Masis, slumped, seemingly occupied with the grains in the wooden bench upon which he sat. His nails, unseen, chipped away. The flexing of his shoulder and the noise the only evidence of his action. A task of distraction.

His hands now clean, Masis made to leave without disturbing the man from his thoughts. His step light. His breath practically held.

"I told everyone to leave the pavilion," said Skinner, not turning, but freezing Masis in place. "Told them I needed to have a word with the great Night Slayer."

The man turned, throwing a leg over his bench so that he sat staring directly at Masis.

"Night Slayer," he said, face blank. "Did you know they're calling you that? Did you?"

Masis shrugged. His eyes never locked with Skinner's for more than a moment at a time. This was not the Skinner Masis was accustomed to. His voice quavered as though unsure of itself but still it held the menace of coherence bordering on lunacy. Eyes that normally shined with an easy crusty nature, dug at him with a sharp aspect. A proud back normally erect, sagged. This was another man entirely.

"Skinner," said Masis, carefully, gently. "What's wrong?"

"What's wrong he asks," said Skinner. "Ha. What's wrong? Don't you have a single brain in your head or did all them fancy tutors rob you of all your senses when they was praising you to the skies, hoping your daddy would reward them for their bilge filled words? You know what's wrong."