Blood of Angels, Wings of Men

By Jon Jacks

Most of the girls in my cavalry troop aren’t yet seventeen; but none of us expects to reach eighteen.
In my case, that might be for the best.
I think I’m pregnant – and I think an angel might be the father.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jon Jacks
• Release date: Jul 1, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370947331

Jon Jacks

While working in London as, first, an advertising Creative Director (the title in the U.S. is wildly different; the role involves both creating and overseeing all the creative work in an agency, meaning you’re second only to the Chairman/President) and then a screenwriter for Hollywood and TV, I moved out to an incredibly ancient house in the countryside.On the day we moved out, my then three-year-old daughter (my son was yet to be born) was entranced by the new house, but also upset that we had left behind all that was familiar to her.So, very quickly, my wife Julie and I laid out rugs and comfortable chairs around the huge fireplace so that it looked and felt more like our London home. We then left my daughter quietly reading a book while we went to the kitchen to prepare something to eat.Around fifteen minutes later, my daughter came into the kitchen, saying that she felt much better now ‘after talking to the boy’.‘Boy?’ we asked. ‘What boy?’‘The little boy; he’s been talking to me on the sofa while you were in here.’We rushed into the room, looking around.There wasn’t any boy there of course.‘There isn’t any little boy here,’ we said.‘Of course,’ my daughter replied. ‘He told me he wasn’t alive anymore. He lived here a long time ago.’A child’s wild imagination?Well, that’s what we thought at the time; but there were other strange things, other strange presences (but not really frightening ones) that happened over the years that made me think otherwise.And so I began to write the kind of stories that, well, are just a little unbelievable.

Book preview

Chapter 1

It’s the last village before the new border; how many of our dead troops have they seen come forlornly walking back through here?

You can sense the fear, the hopelessness here.

Is it any use me asking them if they’ve seen Bjorn?

He’s dead, I’m sure of it. Every soldier who’s gone out to the new border has only ever come back dead.

But I’m also sure he’d want to get a message to me; that he’d want to deliver it himself, if possible.

And now I’m so close to where he must have fallen, there’s an even greater chance of me meeting up with him once again.

Even if it’s only for him to repeat what he’d told me when he was still alive.

That my regiment should turn around. That, if they don’t, then I should desert my troop.

They’re all going to die anyway.

One less amongst their number is hardly going to make much of a difference.

*

I slip down from my horse with a grateful sigh, taking off my helmet and letting my hair tumble free, relishing the coolness of the air.

All around me, the other girls are doing the same.

Not that we can rest just yet. The horses have to be fed, watered, and gradually cooled down themselves to make sure they don’t fall prey to any maladies.

We ignore the iron-hard stares of the villagers.

Any solider is hated, but the female troops are abhorred far more than the men.

You could see that loathing in their otherwise blank, joyless eyes as we rode in, the lack of any horns rising up from our helmets the only thing to differentiate us from the male troops, but enough for them to regard us with an extra dollop of scorn.

The villagers know our sacrifice is a hopeless gesture. They don’t admire us for trying to keep the enemy at bay; they loathe us for our inability to send our foes falling back to wherever it was they came from.

And therefore they blame us for the danger they’re in.

They know that soon – even though they’re not trained for it; they’re just farmers, fishermen, carpenters – they’ll be the ones left to defend their village from whatever onslaught eventually comes their way.

The women, even the children, will be expected to lay down their lives in a vain attempt to prevent the village from falling. That’s why the women hate us so; because, of course, being mothers, they would prefer that their children at least were spared. Yet as girls like my troop have demonstrated that we can fight – that we can die – as well as any man, then they have no excuse to flee.

As for the men of the village; we make them feel even more especially worthless.

Girls defending the borders; while they stay home to plough the fields, or their fat little wives.

What use is food to keep us alive in a land that daily falls to the enemy?

What use offspring if they are soon to die?

If the children lived long enough to fight – then they might be of use to us!

On the sour faces of the villagers gathering around us, I can see they are thinking the same as I am; what’s the point of it all? All this striving to gain a living from a tormenting land, only to face death at the hands of a merciless foe.

They know we’ll leave only to – probably less than a week later – forlornly return, walking blankly through their village as we make our way home. Seeking out our loved ones, to see them one last time before we at last give up the ghost.

When the souls of the dead walk by you like this, it’s a disconcerting experience; if they pass through you, you’re left feeling cold, clammy.

There’s no warmth to them. No joy.

Their new mission is only to say goodbye, and they don’t wish to be interrupted from their self-appointed task.

Yes, you can stop them if you wish, to ask them the most fleeting of questions: ‘Is everyone dead?’ ‘Are you from the Eighth Legion?’

But what’s the point of asking such questions anyway?

You know the answer to the first, while the second answer will hardly enlighten you in any meaningful form; if the Eighth Legion were the last to pass this way on their way to the front, then the chances are the dead filing past you are their returning souls.

As the dead had silently passed trough our troop, I’d naturally looked out for Bjorn.

I’d flattered myself that it would be me that he would be searching out to say his final goodbyes to; not his parents, his brothers.

I must have been wrong, for I never saw him.

I have heard of the legend of the Twentieth Legion and the Ninth Troop.

It happened so long ago, supposedly, that no one could be really sure if it had happened or not.

I’d like to think that it did happen, of course.

As the women of the Twentieth had made their way into battle, the men of the returning Ninth had flowed through them; and there were so many lovers amongst them that both formations briefly came to a tearful halt as the living and dead enjoyed a last embrace.

Unfortunately, it seems there’ll be no such last embrace for Bjorn and I.

*

Towards the edge of the village, there’s a burst of excited cries as one of our patrols returns, escorting a dilapidated wagon driven by a miserable-faced farmer.

Two of our soldiers stand alongside him on the seat, clinging to the wagon’s partially covered, overarching steel frames. Their horses are being led by those still mounted, with tightly bound prisoners – two women, although one of them appears particularly tall, even seated – in the saddles. A large, mangy dog happily runs alongside, completely oblivious to the trouble his master and mistress are undoubtedly in.

They’ve probably fled their farm, though I can’t see why that’s led to their detention; no one expects anyone to attempt defending anything so small and worthless.

Then I catch glimpses of a heavy chainmail lying beneath the taller woman’s simple if overly long coat.

No farmer could afford that. Only a soldier.

And if she’s alive, then it can only be because she’s a deserter.

Not that she remains completely useless to us.

She’ll be made an example of; to make sure no one else even considers deserting the troop.

Even worse for her, that ‘example’ will entail a slow, extremely painful death: and not simply to make the ‘example’ more memorable for us all.

She will accompany and help transport our shaman into the otherworld, where we might obtain answers to more complicated questions than those we can ask our own dead.

I glance over to where I last saw our shaman; yes, he’s looking towards the deserter with an eager grin on his face.

Our shaman will have many questions to ask in the otherworld.

How many do we face?

Where are they most likely to attack us?

How long can we expect to hold them off?

There’s no point asking if we might win.

Once again, it’s one of the questions we all already know the answer to.

Our only hope is to take as many of them with us as we can. (The truth is, I’ve heard fearfully whispered, is that every enemy who falls takes out maybe forty, fifty of us.)

As the deserter undergoes her lingering death, no one watching could possibly wish to risk ending up in the same position.

I’ve seen it many times, as many of our soldiers have, cringing internally at the judicious slicing of skin and sinew, the severing of body parts, all of it as unhurriedly well-ordered as any other religious sacrament.

As the man or woman screams for mercy, you would willingly grant them the swift death they crave, if it weren’t for the fear that you’ll end up taking their place.

Anyone who’s seen such a thing can never fail to wonder why so many continue to desert.

Even so, of the two bound riders, it’s the other woman who appears to be the most ashamed and frightened. She hides her bowed head beneath a wayward tangle of hair she’s thrown forwards across her face.

The soldier rides tall and straight, despite any beating she must have undoubtedly suffered.

She holds her head high, as if in reality she’s some commanding officer only captured after a worthy and admirable fight.

As if she’s still worthy to be called a warrior, rather than the coward she really is.

As the troop and their captives draw closer, I at last begin to make out more of our deserter.

I was wrong when I thought this solider was a woman; it’s a man, but he no longer has the horns that would once have risen proudly up from his helmet – these have already been severed by his captors, the well deserved fate of any deserter.

The closer the deserter approaches, the more I can make out his facial features – and I’m surprised to see that, despite his deliberate humiliation, he’s keeping his jaw firm, while his eyes are set sternly facing straight ahead.

I couldn’t fail to recognise that