The Thief Who Spat In Luck's Good Eye Read Online Free Page A

far behind us. I tried not to imagine what it looked like. Holgren fell to his knees. Walking backward, I dragged him by his pack straps the last few feet. His face had begun to swell. He looked at me with agony in his eyes. His lips were drawn back across his teeth and the only time he stopped screaming was to draw a lungful of air. I put all my concentration into pulling him forward to safety.
    Abruptly my heel touched cobbles. With a desperate grunt I yanked Holgren fully out of the jungle and lay him on his side. I tried to get the pack off him, but his entire body had begun to bloat. I cut the pack free of his shoulders, loosened his collar, his belt, his boots. I could think of nothing further to do.
    He screamed until the swelling closed his throat.
    I held his hand until it was over. When he was gone I sat there next to him for a time and thought nothing at all, felt nothing at all.
    I looked down at the swollen, blackened hand in mine and thought about how ugly it was. His hands had always been so thin and delicate, almost womanly, perfectly manicured, and no calluses. They had been gentle hands. Now his fingers looked like fat black sausages.
    I closed my eyes, turned my head, and vomited. When I was done I sat, still and cold in my soul. Then I heard it.
    There was movement in the jungle. I looked up and saw dozens of eyes looking back at me. Much rustling and shifting, but nothing ventured forth to finish the job. I could feel the hate pounding at me, silent, palpable. Perhaps those eyes could feel me returning it.
    I dragged him a little distance away and took a brief look around. Crumbling buildings, some grand, some humble. I searched until I came upon an overgrown garden, walled in on three sides. I buried him there, under a towering yew tree.
    There was no spade—it was in the pack that had been left in the death lands. Knife and bowl did the job. I don’t know how long it took—hours, certainly. The ground was relatively soft and the grave only about four feet deep. If I’d had the energy I would have dug a second grave for myself, since I was convinced I was going to die there in Thagoth. It just didn’t seem worth the effort.
    He was hideously heavy. I had to roll him into the grave. He landed face down, and I couldn’t stand that, so I went in after him and eventually got him facing the sky. Using the bowl, I started filling in the grave, but couldn’t make myself throw dirt on his face. I dithered about that for a good while and finally decided to cut a section of canvas for covering. It went better after that.
    I started to lose myself after the grave was filled in. I found myself smoothing the dirt with my hands, trying to make it perfectly level. I heard strange whimpering, realized it was coming from me. I made myself stop. I curled up there next to him, with my fists pressed hard to my stomach.
    Without Holgren to reopen the gate I was trapped, the last sorry resident of Thagoth.
     
    It rained that night, a slow, gentle rain that pattered on the leaves overhead and softened the bare earth of Holgren’s grave. The rain woke me, and I threw on a good wool cloak and sat under the tree, waiting for dawn.
    Something nagged at me as I huddled there. It was quiet: There was no birdsong, no rustling of animals large or small. I wondered if, over the centuries, the death lands had somehow claimed all the city’s fauna.
    By mid-morning the rain had passed. I’d begun to poke around the ruins a bit, mapping out the city in my mind, when I saw a hawk gliding and wheeling above the city. It was the first normal animal I’d seen anywhere near Thagoth. I stood there, watching it soar, envying it its freedom.
    It turned slow circles, gliding slowly lower toward the walled compound of the Tabernacle in the center of the city. I assumed it must have seen some small movement and begun the hunt. I watched with interest, thinking there might be game behind those high stone walls.
    The hawk descended, slowly,