The Girl with No Name Ch. 28

The conspirators were ready to finalize their mission to avenge the betrayed nymphs. Ernockt returned to the safe house to summon Jeskéckta, who already had changed into a medical apprentice dress. In the Vice Duchy, injured and sick women could only be treated by female medical healers: protocol prohibited male practitioners from touching female patients. So, there was nothing suspicious about Ernockt bringing Jeskéckta with him to treat Oana's injuries. Besides her guild dress, Jeskéckta wore a loose-fitting shawl that partially covered her face. When the moment was right, she'd push it back.

Ernockt and Jeskéckta entered the dark storeroom where Oana was being kept. She had calmed down enough to be aware of her surroundings, but was still horribly spooked. Also, she was shaking from the cold and would need a blanket. For several minutes Jeskéckta left the shawl hanging over her face as she dressed Oana's cuts with an herbal paste solution to sterilize them and stop the bleeding.

Several curious guards quietly stepped inside to see what had happened to the Beelzebub-possessed woman, but they stood against the wall and were barely visible in the dark room. Now that she had witnesses, the moment had come for Jeskéckta to strike. As Ernockt held up the lantern, she lifted up her head to allow Oana to get a partial view of her face. Oana screamed and pulled hard against her chains, desperately trying to move away. Jeskéckta smiled and held up a dab of medical paste.

"Get her away! In the name of the Destroyer, get her away from me! She has no right to be here! Get her away from me!"

Jeskéckta spoke in quiet soothing voice, so softly the onlookers couldn't hear what she was saying, They simply assumed she was trying to comfort the mad-woman.

"But why, Defender Oana? Why are you yelling at me? I just want to help you. You don't remember who I am?"

"Get away from me! I'm not coming with you! You're dead!"

"Dead? How could I be dead? What would make you think such a thing?"

"I'm not coming with you! I don't care what happened in the Kingdom! It's not my concern! I'm not coming with you!"

"But... how can you say that? You really don't know who I am?"

"You're a dead nymph! You're dead! Yes, I left you to die, but so what? You're dead! You're dead! You're dead! Now get away from me!"

"But a nymph would never do that. So I couldn't be dead, could I? You'd never leave me... you were our squad leader, and we knew you'd come back for us. We knew..."

"Well I didn't! I didn't go back for you, and because of it you got what you deserved! All of you!"

Ernockt quietly extinguished the lantern. The next light was a faint eerie blue-green light that illuminated Danka's face. She and Tanélickt had slipped in while Oana was screaming at Jeskéckta. When her face lit up, Oana desperately struggled against her chains. Danka slowly approached.

"Defender Oana, you do need to join us. But why? Why did you do it?"

"Because I hated you! I hated all of you! I wanted rid my life of all of you ungrateful, disrespectful, whoring, slut-bitches! I wanted you dead! I didn't want to see you again, so that's why I did it! And I hope you suffered! I hope the Blue Moons stuck you good!"

The city watchmen, who had until that moment been silently watching the spectacle, gasped is disbelief. They had know Oana had been a Defender and was recommended as a competent fighter, which was why the town council contracted her to lead the convent security detail. They also knew that she had survived the battle of Aksheriri Ris, so they understood what all the screaming was about. Oana, in her own words, had just admitted to the most heinous crime that any member of the Danubian military, especially a commander, could possibly commit against others in their unit or under their command.

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The next day the city guards convened a military trial for former Defender and squad leader Oana Adonckta. The charges were six instances of dishonorable abandonment. The witnesses included Tanélickt and Jeskéckta, but their testimony was hearsay, so it had to backed up by a first-hand witness. That witness was Danka. Oana was shocked, horrified, and infuriated that Danka was not a ghost at all: she was very much alive. Standing only a fathom away from her nemesis, Danka described in detail what happened in Aksheriri Ris. The experience of her and her three injured companions verified that if Oana could deliberately leave behind a fellow squad leader and three nymphs, there was no reason she couldn't have done the same thing to Jeskéckta's sister and the other woman. When a skeptical guard asked Danka to detail how she escaped from the city, Danka openly admitted to poisoning her injured squad-leader to prevent her capture and walking out of the city at night.

"I acted under orders then, and I'm acting under orders now. Defender Dalibora's last words to me were to find Defender Oana and avenge what she did to us. So, that's what I did. As for my escape, I am a Follower of the Ancients and it was the Ancients who guided me out of the Kingdom of the Moon. Not the Lord-Creator and not Beelzebub the Destroyer. If that makes me a heretic, then so be it. But that's how I got out. The Ancients showed me where to go, and I simply followed their guidance."

The tribunal asked the defendant if she had anything to say in her own defense. Oana, still shocked by the fact Danka was not killed in Aksheriri Ris and by the complicated trickery she had used to entrap her, couldn't think of anything. She sullenly responded she had nothing to say to anyone and no need to justify anything she had done.

Danka expected the guards to execute Oana, but her punishment would be much more horrible than the simple separation of her soul from her body. Instead of tying her to a stake and shooting five arrows into her, the guards brought a large male pig into the hearing room. The pig was cleaned up and happily grunting as the guards led him to a bowl of left-overs. While the pig munched on his meal, the leading member of the city council signed a certificate making him a citizen of the Duchy, and another certificate reclassifying Oana as property belonging to the pig. She knelt quietly as a nun loosened her hair and put a collar around her neck and shackles on her arms and legs. From that point forward Oana no longer was human. She was less than an animal. The pig officially owned her, and for the rest of her time in the Realm of the Living it would be her Path in Life to live among the convent's swine and pay special attention to her new "master's" needs.

The commanders grabbed Oana's chains and kicked her as they dragged her outside. They tapped the pig to move him out the door as well. A crowd of spectators started chanting:

"The Pig is your Master! Serve him well!... The Pig is your Master! Serve him well!..."

The guards forced Oana to crawl to the convent's pigsty while they continued kicking her and hitting her back with sticks. The spectators continued to chant:

"The Pig is your Master! Serve him well!... The Pig is your Master! Serve him well!..."

Danka sadly watched the spectacle. Her mission to avenge Dalibora and the other nymphs was completed. She had fulfilled her squad leader's final orders. She knew that she should have felt triumph, but all she could feel was disgust with everyone and everything in Novo Sókukt Tók. More than anything else, she was disgusted with herself.

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The following day was a happy occasion for Tanélickt and Jeskéckta. He proposed to her and she accepted. Ernockt gave him two gifts: new identification papers and the money he needed to buy a set of engagement jewelry. Former Defender Tanélickt disappeared from the Realm of the Living. Under a new identity he would travel with his fiancé to her village, join her brother's guild, and eventually purchase a plot of land so he could marry her. He would never return to the capitol, never serve in the Grand Duke's Army, and never again see the Great Temple. The couple departed from Novo Sókukt Tók in the middle of the night, given they did not want anyone from the Grand Duke's Army or the Old Believers' faction of the Danubian Church to know where Tanélickt had gone or what became of him.

Danka was left alone with Ernockt. She spent a couple of days with some farmers' wives, helping them prepare preserves and dress a couple of slaughtered pigs. The sight of the pigs tormented her, reminding her of Oana, condemned to spend the rest of her life chained inside a pigsty. When the farmers' wives departed and their food was safely hidden from the tax collectors, Danka decided it was time for her to leave as well. She had completed her squad leader's final command, her traveling companion was starting a new life, and she had seen what she wanted to see of Novo Sókukt Tók. Ernockt was skeptical, pointing out there was no way she could return to the western valley until springtime.

"I know I can't go over the pass. I know that. But I don't want to stay here either. I guess I'll go to Rika Chorna, to see the city of the Vice-Duke. I'll stay there, wait for spring, and see what happens. I don't know what else to do with myself. But I can't stay in this town."

For the first time, Danka felt her life had no purpose. She was adrift. She had no one she cared about, no responsibilities, and no goals. Perhaps if it were summer she'd feel better, because at least she'd have the option of putting on her collar and exploring a new place. In the Vice-Duchy she didn't have that option. A penance collar did not give her protected status and even if it did, winter was starting and there was no way she could move about, clothed or unclothed. She still had time to go as far as Rika Chorna, but there she would be stranded for several months.

She lay awake, wondering what to do. Oana's situation came back to haunt her. She knew that she couldn't walk away and leave Oana in her current condition. If Oana had been executed she would have felt justice had been served. However, the thought of her, or any person, no matter how heinous, chained up among pigs, eating their food and covered in their excrement, robbed Danka of her sleep. She had no desire to rescue Oana, but she did want to put a stop to her misery.

Danka shared her concern with her host: the need to end Oana's suffering before departing from Novo Sókukt Tók. Surprisingly, he understood and agreed to assist: first to resolve Oana's situation and then to help his guest leave Novo Sókukt Tók.

The next day Ernockt escorted Danka into town. In the safe house, Danka put on a nun's dress. The nuns would be in their mid-day prayers and the female guards would be eating lunch. Ernockt was friends with the city watchman who was posted outside the convent's gate, so he'd engage him in conversation. Meanwhile Danka, disguised as a nun, slipped in to do what she had to do.

When Danka saw her former squad leader, she was shocked by how much she had deteriorated. Oana was shivering among the pigs, her hair was filthy and disheveled, and her body was covered with foul-smelling mud. She looked very old, as though she had aged two decades during the week she had been living in her horrible circumstances. No, this couldn't continue. However evil Oana might be, this can't go on, thought Danka to herself.

Danka entered the compound and pushed back her hat. Oana sullenly glared at her.

"Defender, I've done what I came to do, what I was ordered to do by my squad leader. I'm leaving this town, and I'm never coming back. Before I go, I've brought you something, to let you escape from your misery. Drink this, and your soul will separate from your body. It's the same drink I gave Dalibora so the enemy wouldn't capture her. You can make your peace with the Creator, or the Destroyer, and then you can depart the Realm of the Living."

Danka left a small jar on the ground and stepped back. Dragging her chains behind her, Oana crawled over to pick it up.

"But why are you doing this? I thought the whole purpose of your trickery was to make me live in dishonor."

"No. The purpose of my trickery was to avenge Dalibora and the others. That's now completed. We've taken our revenge against you. But, now that I'm done, I don't see what good it will bring to the Realm of the Living to prolong your suffering. So... if you wish, you can end it... at the moment of your choosing."

"I don't know what to say. I ought to thank you, but I can't. I hate you more than ever: I'd break your neck if I could reach you. But I will use this escape you've given me. I guess I can say I appreciate having it. And I have something to ask of you."

"Go ahead, ask."

"I want you to leave before I take this and stay away. I don't want to give you the satisfaction of seeing my corpse."

"I'm leaving anyway. I'm not worried about seeing your corpse."

Danka made her way past the pigs, trying to avoid stepping in slop, mud, and manure. She turned to face her defeated nemesis to say goodbye. Instead, the words that came out of her mouth were as follows:

"You know... there's irony in our situation. When we met, I was a wandering vagabond. Now that we're parting ways, my Path in Life is still to be a wandering vagabond."

Tightly gripping the jar, Oana let out a loud hiss, an insult in traditional Danubian society. Her damaged soul cared nothing about ironies, nor about anything else apart from the unyielding hatred that had consumed it.

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Following their midday prayers, the nuns returned to their daily routine. When the church bell struck three, a younger nun decided to check on the pigs and make sure the pigs' servant had properly fed the animals and cleaned up their pigsty. It turned out the criminal was nowhere to be found. When the nun further investigated, she realized the criminal's soul had separated from her body and she was lying dead in the mud. The nuns dragged out the corpse and buried her in an unmarked grave. The woman's death was a mystery, but rumors later circulated that a mysterious nun, or at least someone in a nun's outfit, had been seen entering and leaving the convent. That was odd, because all of the nuns were present at the mid-day prayers.

The townsfolk of Novo Sókukt Tók spent many idle hours during the final weeks of 1758 talking about the strange possessed woman who briefly led the convent's security detachment and the even stranger group of former militia members who testified against her. As soon as the possessed woman died, the others disappeared without a trace. They must have been servants of Beelzebub the Destroyer, because somehow they knew they needed to escape. It turned out the Senior Priest of the town had been planning to arrest Danka and put her on trial for heresy, given that she openly admitted to being a Follower of the Ancients. For a True Believer, being a Follower of the Ancients was infinitely worse than paying homage to Beelzebub the Destroyer. But the young woman disappeared the day before she would have been arrested and no one had a clue where she went. The other nymph (or sister of the nymph, depending on who one believed) and the Defenders' musketeer had vanished without a trace as well.

The captain of the city guard kept transcripts of Oana's trial, but when the witnesses vanished, the records were not where the commander remembered having left them. Without the documents, he could not compile a final report to send to the Vice-Duke. Faced with a situation that made him look incompetent, he decided not to file a report at all and pretend the trial never happened. Everyone directly involved was either dead or vanished, so it would be best to forget the entire incident.

The nuns, the female convent guards, and the city watchmen debated their own memories of Oana and the avenging ghost-woman who destroyed her. After several months, most people forgot there had been two women at the trial and they combined the identities of Danka and Jeskéckta. There was confusion over the name of the mysterious avenger and disagreement over what she actually did. Everyone, including the nuns, agreed the nameless visitor was the most beautiful woman they had ever laid eyes on. They also agreed the stranger possessed supernatural powers, but there were as many variations concerning what those powers actually were as there were people telling the story. Everyone did agree Oana's house burned down, but there were conflicting versions over how the fire started and why. Because Oana was buried in an unmarked grave, some witnesses doubted she was actually dead. Some people even speculated the possessed guard-woman and the avenging stranger were the same person, with the Lord-Creator and Beelzebub the Destroyer battling over her soul.

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Meanwhile, Jeskéckta had her own interpretation of what happened to Oana and how she managed to avenge her sister. Because Danka had completely vanished, Jeskéckta claimed complete credit for uncovering the former squad-leader's treachery and tricking her into confessing. It certainly sounded better to the grieving family members and the village's other young women, to have such a heroine living among them, the loyal sister who had so stealthily brought her sibling's betrayer to justice.

Her fiancé said nothing. He didn't want to impress anyone: he just wanted to conceal his previous identity, evade his obligation to the Royal Guards, work his land, be a respected citizen of the village, and raise responsible children. More importantly, he had no desire to offend anyone from the family he was planning to marry into. So, he let his fiancé (and later his wife) spin whatever tales she wanted to spin. Whatever stories swirled around the village made no difference, not when he had a field to plow and a harvest to bring in.

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Note: The Great Swamp of Misery contained numerous bogs and quicksand traps, which resulted in the Danubian belief the land was cursed and ate humans. It was also true large populations of mosquitoes, midges, and biting gnats made any effort to enter the area during the summer nearly impossible. For thousands of years the swamp was universally hated throughout the Duchy. In the 1920s the Danubian Parliament approved plans to construct a hydroelectric dam where the Rika Chorna exits from the swamp's former location into the canyon. The dam project was deliberately over-sized because the engineers wanted to completely flood the area and destroy all traces of the swamp. The project was completed in the 1930s and the Rika Chorna Reservoir remains one of the largest artificial lakes in Europe today.

Due to a recent flooding scare, the Danubian Ministry of Natural Resources concluded the Rika Chorna Reservoir is too big and its surface area should be reduced by a third to lower the danger of potential flooding downstream. Engineers have increased the water flow through the spillway and the water-level is now kept 6 meters below where it was kept throughout the late 20th Century. The Ministry is attempting to restore some of the original wetlands around the edges of the reduced lake.