The Ravenous Siege (Epic of Haven Trilogy Book 2)

by R. G. Triplett

  "No, your Brightness," Chaiphus confessed. "But surrender? Without a fight? Our bowmen have yet to loose a single arrow, and our cavalry has yet to ride into their Raven hordes."

  Jhames gazed through Chaiphus, looking at something beyond him as if he saw the very scene unfolding in a vision. "Our archers are already lost, and our riders have already done their worst out beyond the North Gate, and the winged serpents still mock our efforts and consume our ardor." His eyes slipped closed for the moment as he envisioned a different unfolding of events. "But if we yield to their request, they promise power anew, Chaiphus. Magic … in the darkness."

  The Priest King wiped at his ears with his trembling hands and noticed the traces of bright red upon his pale flesh. He clenched his fist and summoned what resolve was left in his frail and fearful body. Chaiphus looked about the skyline of his city, then over his shoulder to the gathered army of the Raven Queen, then back again to the Priest King. An agreement passed between them there, a half-spoken conspiracy.

  "If we are doomed to dwell in darkness," Jhames said, "perhaps we might avoid doing so as slaves."

  "Agreed, your Brightness." Chaiphus said with a desperate, reluctant gleam in his eye.

  The two turned to face the enemy herald who waited for them upon the Kings' Bridge. "Very well," Jhames called out. "We shall agree to your request for parley."

  WHOOSH! The jolting sounds of the dragons' wings buffeted the dark sky as the beasts left their perch atop the dead tree and soared high above the city they presumed to possess. The sound of the pounding wind against their leathery wings left every citizen of Haven with a feeling of utter dread.

  WHOOSH! WHOOSH! Again and again the sounds came as the mighty serpents circled the city. The guardsmen aimed their drawn longbows high into the black sky as the small convoy of knights escorted the Priest King and his Chancellor past the iron teeth of the massive portcullis and onto the white stone of the Kings' Bridge.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  THE SOUND OF THE GROUND beneath the hooves of the two horses changed not long after Cal and Yasen had parted ways; the dull thud of clomping earth transitioned to the stony, sharp, crunch of the iron shoes upon the pebbled creek bank. Cal had not risked the torchlight, but alone, out here in the utter darkness of the wild Wreath, his violet sight was dim at best. He was afraid he would not notice the creek until it was too late, so the sound of the sure shod feet of his silver mount upon the gravel bank woke his heart with joy.

  "Oh, bless you, Wielund!" Cal whispered. "I've never been happier to hear the sound of your handiwork than I am right now!"

  As he breathed a sigh of relief and tried to get his bearings along the creek, he heard the unmistakable sound of riders calling out behind him. He froze, turning back in his saddle towards the not-so-distant braziers of his woodcutter brothers, and the sight of approaching torches caused his previously elated spirit to feel a knotted pang of nervousness.

  "Alright you two, keep it easy here," he whispered to the horses. They remained hidden only by the cover of darkness as he strained to hear and see what the Citadel riders would do with the brothers who had aided in his escape.

  "Where is he?" Pyrrhus growled at the chief woodcutter. "Where is that damned traitor?"

  "Who are you talking about, fire knight?" Yasen said without pause as he continued to bury his double-bladed axe in the white flesh of a massive pine tree. "Who have you lost now?"

  "You know well enough who it is that I am talking about!" he shouted at the top of lungs, his frustration echoing through the wild land about them. "And I have lost no one … justice has been stolen from me!"

  "I am not sure if you plan to be speaking in riddles for the rest of the day or not, but I haven't the time for your tantrums!" Yasen said, annoyance dripping from his every word. "In case you haven't noticed ... the whole of Aiénor has gone dark. So unless you're going to pick up an axe and help ..." He let the insult linger there for just a moment as he freed his blade from the massive trunk. "My brothers and I have some pretty important work to be about."

  "What are you going to do with him, Yasen?" Pyrrhus spat in a rage as his horse spun around, clearly feeling the agitation of her rider. "Do you plan to just hide him and feed him like some stray dog, hoping the whole colony will forget what he did and just ... just let him back in?" Pyrrhus held the stub of his arm up and gritted his teeth as he spoke. "I will NEVER forget, North Wolf! And as long as there is breath still in my lungs, I will see to it that he—that traitor of a groomsman—pays for his injustices. I don't care if I have to run through every last one of you ignorant northmen to find him … I will have my vengeance!"

  The sound of the tree line went silent as every blade was stayed and every eye turned its gaze upon the six riders that towered over their chieftain. The darkness did not conceal the tension in the air as each ear listened carefully to the hostile exchange.

  Yasen held his axe up, fingering the edge of his mighty blade as he spoke. "You are but one arm shy of a few guardsmen, Pyrrhus. Our axes and our arms still greatly outnumber your men, so do not be the fool that you are so tempted to be. The war we are waging is one against darkness, and I would just as soon keep it that way. But my brothers and I here, we are prepared to fight fire with fire if need be."

  A score of woodcutters with axes in hand came closer to the battle of wills. Their very presence nearly set the smoldering kindling of the situation ablaze, but Pyrrhus' men did not draw their swords. The fire knight fumed upon his agitated mount, but did not choose to wholly test the sincerity of Yasen's threats.

  "Now," Yasen said with the authority of one who was finished with the conversation, "don't you have a ship to see about sending off? Groomsman or not, that timber was hard fought and hard won, and our countrymen back home across the waters of the black are expecting this colony to deliver on our promises. We are all responsible to the duty we took an oath to uphold."

  "Do not presume to hide behind your calling, or your responsibility, as you would have it!" Pyrrhus spat in disgust. "The governor will not be pleased with your insolence, and if I have my way, it will be you in the bottom of the ship's hold in place of the groomsman that you released! Perhaps you are the true traitor among us!"

  "Well, perhaps the governor himself fancies a swing or two with my axe," Oren, the yellow-haired woodcutter, shouted from within the ranks of his northern brothers. "I'll say it, since my chieftain here is a bit too diplomatic to just go ahead and tell it like it is! If you right and proper Citadel fools can't treat the woodcutters with the respect we deserve, then you'll be felling the trees of the Wreath yourselves!"

  "You'd better watch your tongue, axe-man," Pyrrhus warned rather harmlessly.

  "The real power, the real strength of our colony belongs to me and my brothers! Without us, the world goes dark. I am not too sure if you have thought this through yet or not, fire knight, but I would wager that a one-handed knight is not going to last very long out here in the wild lands of this Wreath without any light to see by," Oren scoffed.

  "Treason!" Pyrrhus seethed through his gritted teeth. "All of you! When the Priest King hears about this, you will see nothing again save the inside of a prison hold!" He wheeled his nervous steed angrily around.

  "You tell him!" Alon, Oren's brother, shouted out after the retreating convoy of riders. "You tell him just what traitors we are, and when you do, be sure to tell him by the light of the timber we've sent him, then see what he has to say!"

  Pyrrhus and his men spurred their horses and took their offended leave back towards the wooden walls of the colony's stronghold. "I'll have my vengeance!" the fire knight shouted back over his shoulder.

  "Well, that went well," Alon said sarcastically as he and a score or so of his brothers watched the six angered knights riding back towards their outpost.

  "You sure do have a way of making friends, don't you, brother," Oren laughed as he pounded the back of his younger sibling. "Mother ... she would be so proud."

 
The men erupted in a burst of satisfied albeit nervous laughter. It was Gvidus that broke the irreverence of the moment with a serious thought. "This isn't over you know, Yasen," he said in an uncharacteristically serious tone. "A proud and angered man is one thing, but he is also a wounded man whose pride has born the brunt of the wound. And, well, those are the kind of men whose cruelty is unpredictable."

  "Aye," Yasen said, still in deep thought. "It could be that our welcome here in our western home has run out on us. And if it has not, we need be ever mindful that it could, indeed, in the blink of an eye."

  The groomsman and his horses continued to hold their position along the creek, far too close to the exchange for their own comfort.

  "They are leaving? Just like that?" Cal whispered to Deryn in a breath of relief.

  "Perhaps we should not tarry," the blue-winged Sprite warned. "It would be unwise to wait to see if their minds change."

  "You are right indeed, my tiny guardian," Cal said with a chuckle. "Perhaps this reprieve is a gift from the THREE who is SEVEN, huh?"

  "Our Great Father uses all manner of emotions to bring about His will; anger, rage, cruelty and chaos do not find themselves exempt from His handiwork. But pride, both the wounded and the wealthy varieties, well ... that He uses quite often, though not necessarily in the way one might expect."

  "I am grateful for His gift at this moment, no matter what brought it about," Cal replied. "Now come on, my friend, and help me find this cave."

  And with that, Cal and the two horses turned westward into the heart of the thick wilderness in search of the lady Astyræ. They clopped cautiously along the stony riverbank for a few hundred paces before the ground beneath them began to slope upwards.

  "Do you see anything?" Cal asked his Sprite friend. "The ground is changing, surely there has to be a cave around here somewhere."

  "Nothing yet, Bright Fame," Deryn reported back as he flittered and zoomed out in front of Farran's head. "Nothing but trees, stone, and ... wait, just a moment," Deryn said as both his words and his movement came to a halt. "Do you see that over there?"

  "I don't," Cal replied. "It just seems to be getting darker and darker."

  "Exactly!" Deryn exclaimed.

  It took Cal a moment to connect the meaning of his friend's words, but as he did he spurred the side of his horse with an excited, "Come on!" He took off in a charge towards the darkened mouth of the massive cave that stood before them.

  As he and the two horses reached the entrance, Cal swung himself down in an almost effortless motion and within mere moments he had plunged into the thick blackness of this wilderness cave, leading the way with Gwarwyn held at the ready.

  "Goran! Astyræ!" he shouted in a hushed tone. "Goran, are you there?"

  He stopped and peered inside, but the faint, violet light of his hopeful vision barely pierced the darkness before him.

  "Goran, Astyræ, it's me, Cal!" he shouted again a little louder. "Are you in there?"

  But the cave was silent; not even the echo of his voice could be heard there in the midst of the hushed wilderness. "Goran!" he tried even louder this time, hoping that the riders would not hear his cry.

  There was no sound in return, save the noise of the two horses as their iron-shod hooves moved nervously upon the rocky hill.

  "Why do they not answer, Deryn?" Cal said, a bit confused. "Is this not the right cave? I mean, we did follow Yasen's directions didn't we?"

  "Caw! Caw!" came the eerily haunting cry of a green-eyed raven as it circled overhead and made its landing high above them, perching upon a massive branch.

  Farran snorted and Cal shivered at the feeling of being watched. "I do not like this at all," Deryn said as he drew his tiny, azure blade.

  "Neither do I, my friend. Neither do I," Cal replied. "That's the same sort of bird from before, the ones with the green eyes-"

  Cal was interrupted as the large chestnut snorted nervously at the sound of another pair of raven's wings beating against the darkened air. Cal and Deryn watched as yet another black bird joined his murderous companion, high above them, there upon the mighty tree.

  "Look at Gwarwyn!" Deryn said, breaking the tension as he pointed to the leaf-shaped sword in Cal's hand with a stunned expression. "The leaves! They are glowing!"

  "What does it mean?" Cal asked, dumbfounded at the very notion of such magic living still within his ancient, tarnished blade. "I have seen its withered, branchlike hilt bloom the silver and the violet, but this ... this magic is new to me too, my friend," he said as he raised the mighty blade of Caedmon and examined it in wonder.

  "Something calls to it, Cal," Deryn postulated. "Something nearby knows this blade, or perhaps ... Gwarwyn knows it."

  "Caw!" called a third raven, and then a fourth.

  "Come on, Sprite," Cal said resolutely. "Audiences do not gather for nothing." He turned his gaze back towards the darkened mouth of the massive cave. "Whatever it is those birds wish to see, my guess is that it has something to do with whatever waits inside."

  "But don't forget, Cal" Deryn said flitting up to look the groomsman in the eyes. "They are nothing more than carrion foul, and they might very well be gathering to feast upon the bones of the foolish."

  Cal gulped back his courage. "They are in there, Deryn, I can feel it. And something ... something is not right." He looked back over his shoulder at the growing murder of gathering birds before he finished. "Let's keep our wits about us then, huh? Whatever darkness drives them, I do not plan to be a feast for crows today."

  Deryn nodded and the two of them led the horses to the south side of the cave's entrance, tying them off to a leafless, gnarled locust tree branch before entering the thick darkness of the rock.

  "Goran! Astyræ!" Cal shouted again and again. "Goran! Lady Astyræ!" But no sound followed, save his feet upon the cave floor and the echo of his voice.

  "You are right, Cal, there is something strange about this place." Deryn's voice had a tone of suspicion and wariness to it that Cal had not heard before.

  Cal took one cautious step after the other, with the glittering point of his tarnished blade held at the ready before him. "Do you smell that?" he asked his Sprite friend. "Like old coals, a spent fire?"

  "Faintly, yes, I do," Deryn answered as a bit of excitement now began to color his nervous voice.

  "They cannot be too far from here, then?" Cal asked hopefully. His eyes were busy scanning the oppressively shadowed cave by the light of his dim, violet gaze and the blue glow that came from his guardian.

  "There!" Cal exclaimed as his eyes drew into focus what he had hoped to find. "There it is!" Cal ran towards the small ring of gathered stones and ashen logs. "It is cold, but its scent still lingers. This fire can't be more than half a day old," he said excitedly.

  "Where would they have gone, then?" Deryn asked. He flew about the stone room in search of answers, clues to point them in the direction they might need to travel.

  "Blast it all," Cal said, frustrated at the suffocating darkness of the cave. "I can barely see a thing in this place. Help me start a fire, will you? I have got to find them! If they are in here still, I don't want to miss their trail. "

  Cal bent down and gathered what straw and kindling he could find, placing it back into the ring of stones and hoping that whatever coals might still remain would serve as better fuel than damp wood and green branches. He struck two rocks together, intending to make a spark, but the cold, grey stones would not spark in the least.

  "I don't suppose you have some sort of magic that would get these rocks to light, do you?" Cal said rather playfully to his azure guardian.

  "Aren't you fortunate that I chose to come with you on this journey, young Bright Fame," Deryn replied with a teasing glint in his glowing, blue eyes. "Where would you be without me?"

  The Sprite landed upon the grey stones, and in a wordless song he sung a fire into existence. The air about them prickled and hummed with a holy energy, and within mere moments the ring was ablaze
and the walls of the cave were alive, dancing in amber and golden hues.

  Cal's eyes shone with wonder at the song and the flame of the Sprite. "Of course," he said with a sincere smile. "Thank you, my friend. And yes, I would be lost, utterly lost without …"

  Cal's voice fell silent as his violet gaze adjusted to the light of the fire. "What in the damnable darkness is this place?" His eyes beheld a strange and most disconcerting sight. It appeared to be the scrawling of a mad man, swirling about the walls of the cave in an illegible, maniacal pattern that sent chills down his spine. "What ... what does it say?" Cal asked nervously as his hands traced the patterns. "It seems to be the same thing, written over and over again." Cal reached for a discarded torch that hung against the cave wall, setting its tired fibers to glowing life in the fire that Deryn sung.

  "Indeed, it does," Deryn said, overcome with dread.

  "What does it say then? Come on!" Cal urged, trying to keep the panic from his voice.

  "Meus," Deryn told him.

  "Meus?" Cal said, rather perplexed. "What does that mean? I have never heard that word before."

  "Of course you haven't, Calarmindon," Deryn said as he flew back over towards the markings upon the cave walls. "It is in the forgotten tongue of the once-great city of Terriah."

  "Terriah! Of course ... Petros ... the mountain palace, that is where I first found you!" Cal said.

  "That it was, dear Cal. Though this is of the high tongue, reserved for and spoken only by the ancient nobility," Deryn said as he flew closer to the painted walls of the rocky cave, examining the maddened penmanship. "I have not heard these words spoken in ages, and I am still but a blossom in the years of my Sprite kind."

  "Then how is it that we have found it here? In the middle of this darkened wilderness, half a world away?" Cal asked as he continued to trace his fingers along the swirled lines of script.