"Oh, he was afraid all right, lass," the old man said as he shook his head. "But he was even more unnerved to just wait and let his fears hunt him down."
"I wonder which of us are the bigger fools, then," said the miller's daughter. "Those of us who hid and waited, or those who dared to meet this darkness head on."
"I don't think it is really a matter of foolishness," the white-haired corporal chimed in. "Fear will force our hands, one way or the other. Some have hidden and some have run and some have fought. But evil does not seem to give favor to one strategy over another, does it? Its teeth bite all the same."
"Aye. And eventually," Keily said as she finished filling her quiver with spent arrows, "eventually our fears will find us all. We'd best be ready to meet them face to face."
Their conversation ceased as they felt the weight of Keily's words. The group looked upon the carnage on the Melania, and the darkness both on the bloodied field and in their discouraged hearts threatened the feeble, violet strength that their vision dared to muster.
"Lieutenant!" came a distressed shout from one of the guardsmen. "Lieutenant! Lieutenant, come quick!"
Marcum nodded to his white-haired corporal, and the two officers rushed to see the forlorn face of the shouting sentry. "What is it, soldier?" Johnrey asked the man at arms. "What have you found?"
The sentry removed his pointed, silver helm, and with heaviness to his voice he sighed, "Oh, Captain."
Marcum and Johnrey looked each to the other and then quickly at the tangled mess of steed and soldier, whose once silver mail was now blackened by the blaze of dragons' fire.
"I had hoped," Johnrey whispered. "I had hoped he had somehow made it back to the city."
Marcum gazed at the dead body of his friend and his captain. The once ruddy face was now a wash of blistered flesh and blackened soil, and Marcum could not help but feel his already broken heart split a little further with each gut-wrenching pang of grief. A crowd began to gather around as the curiosity and nervousness of the remnant grew, and the people pressed in around Marcum and Johnrey to see whom it was that they were mourning.
"Lieutenant?" asked the young voice of a boy not yet ten years of age. "Lieutenant, who is he? Who is this man?"
"Shhh! Hush now!" quieted a woman standing nearby. "That is the lieutenant you are talking to. Let him mourn in peace."
"No," Marcum said, the grief in his face turning almost instantly into a fortified resolve. "No. Death will not be permitted the last word here. Though its toll seems numberless, its victims—our kinsman—they will not be nameless."
Marcum knelt beside his slain leader and picked away the rubble, wiping the dirt from the captain's soiled face with his shaking hands. "This brave warrior is Armas, captain of the Citadel guard—my captain, and my friend."
Keily peered in through the crowd, the understanding of this moment nearly robbing her of her breath. "Oh, Armas," she whispered.
"Should we bury him?" the young boy asked. "Should we bury them all?"
"Aye, son, that we should," Marcum said as he approached the sandy-haired lad and knelt to meet his gaze. "But alas, evil has robbed us of the honor to do so, for the Raven Army is not far from our position and we have no place to take refuge from their advance."
The boy furrowed his brow, deep in thought, his confusion and frustration evident in the wrinkled, smudged expression of his young face. "Well, that doesn't seem fair! None of this does. How can such an army do this to our home, to our friends and families? How can Raven arrows rob us of our warriors and not even allow us peace long enough to bury our wasted dead? Wouldn't the THREE who is SEVEN want us to honor them?"
"You are right, son. None of this is fair," Marcum said as he rose to his feet and addressed the people. "I do not understand the motives behind such bloodshed, nor the fates that have willed them to the theater of this war. I only know that they have found us here." He reached down and held the shoulders of the boy, meeting his furrowed gaze with his own wounded yet determined stare. "Make your peace and your gratitude to these brave, fallen men of Haven, but be quick about it, boy, for I do not wish for you nor any of us to join them just yet."
"The lieutenant is right," Keily said as she wiped away her own tears. "We have hardly begun our trek upon this North Road, and I would very much like to put as much distance between us and those Raven infested walls as we might."
The men and women agreed, and soon packs were slung over shoulders and weapons were brandished. The company slowly began to move northward once again, steeling their hearts for the passage through the bloodied field. The boy did not walk with them just yet, however; he remained with the fallen captain, so moved and yet so disturbed by what he beheld upon the outland fields of his former home. He was fixated on the injustice of it all, and his naïve mind was exasperated by his inability to amend it. Moments sped by as the whole of the caravan passed him there; finally it was the soft touch of the barmaid upon his all-too-burdened shoulder that woke him from his silent reverie.
"Armas would have agreed, you know," Keily told him matter-of-factly. "He was a man of both honor and dignity, even though he was often denied it in return. I think he too would have wanted to do something for his men, even if he knew that he couldn't."
"Then why shouldn't we do for him what he would have wanted for them?" the boy asked.
"Because honor and dignity at the cost of even more lives—that he would have called foolishness," she told him with a saddened smile. "And I never took him for a fool."
The boy looked around franticly, his eyes searching for something more upon the field of war. He surveyed the bloody ground around his feet until his eyes caught sight of what it was that they were after. Keily watched as he found the charred steel of an unbroken sword and carried over towards the fallen captain. He placed the blade in Armas' lifeless hands and then stood to his feet, not quite yet proud of his handiwork.
"He is still missing something," the boy said with both frustration and emotion thick in his voice. "He shouldn't be left like this, not for the ravens to feast upon his flesh!"
"We can't-" Keily tried to say.
"I know that we cannot bury him," he resigned. "But there must be something."
Keily's eyes blurred as she watched this young boy, so overcome with respect and care for a captain that he had not even known. Her own heart ached at the sight of this corpse of a man who had once so deeply cared for her, and she shivered at the thought that he was truly gone. She searched the wreckage of the battle, collecting herself, until she found a singed and soiled cape whose green fabric and silver tree were still reminiscent of their former glory.
"Here," she said. "This will befit the burial of a captain of the royal guard." And with a flick of her wrists she spread out the cape. It fanned into the air and then, in a flutter of short-lived ceremony, it came to rest upon his lifeless body. The barmaid kissed her hand and then held it high in the sign of the flint, saying her silent goodbyes to this defender of the North.
"Yes," said the boy with a sad smile. "It seems better that way, doesn't it?" His eyes looked up at hers with a newfound respect as a bit of trust was born between them. "I am ready now," he said. "Though … I don't quite know where you are leading us?"
She put her arm around his shoulders and ushered him forward so that the two of them could take up the rear of their exiled convoy. "I don't rightly know where we are going either, but something tells me that out there—somewhere out there—there is still a place for us in this world. A place for those who have not spilled their blood nor bent their knees just yet."
As they walked together in the grief-filled silence, an unexpected and rather unexplainable sound met their ears. Words, distant and ominous, echoed off the cold, northern air. Their origin was unknown to the small group of survivors, but their hopeful meaning was not lost on the wounded and the weary.
"What was that?" Roshan asked. "Some kind of ghost? What does it mean, 'look to the hills'?"
"I ca
nnot rightly say who that was or what he meant by his words," Keily spoke reverently into the dimness. "Though," she managed as she choked back a sudden depth of emotion, "I am glad to have heard them."
They walked in silence for the better part of an hour, following the ravaged and blood-soaked terrain, before the boy spoke again. "What makes you think that?"
"What makes me think what?" the curly-haired bar maiden asked in return.
"That there is a place that is safe, out here in these darkened outlands?" he asked. "Nothing has ever been safe out here! My Pa ... he told me that there is nothing out here but thieves and witches and shadow cats ... and now? Now we know that there are dragons too!" He furrowed his brow and wrinkled his nose; his skepticism was too great for a boy his age. "How can you be sure?"
She let his heavy words roll through her mind, for his simple questions were the same questions that every single one of them were trying either to silence or to answer. A small smile broke her stoic and determined stare, and when she opened her mouth to speak the very air around her seemed to glow and hum with a light much stronger than before. "I know a man, a friend of mine—a groomsman at that," she told him as they walked. "He was sent by the Priest King to make his restitution in the camps of the woodcutters. He saw shadow cats, and bears, and all sorts of dark and horrible things out here."
A feeling of homesickness came over her aching heart as she spoke.
"He did a very brave thing, and saved the life of an even braver man, but he got lost somewhere out here in these darkened outlands. Many of his friends gave him up for dead, sure that he had either been taken by witches, or eaten alive by a brood of foul beasts. But one day he walked back into the Knob, healthy and strong, well-fed and well-kept ... and with a glint of magic in his eye. And that day—well, I knew that there was something more out here than just the shadow cats and the green-eyed ravens. There was something good, too."
"Did he tell you where he had been?" the boy begged, the light of this story aglow in his eyes.
"Aye, he did ... sort of," she replied with curious smile. "Look to the hills; perhaps that is indeed precisely what we must do."
"Sort of?" he blurted out, the sheer volume of his boyish emotions beyond containment. "Well, what does that mean, sort of?"
"He told me that he had been befriended by a colony of Poets who had made their home in a mountain palace," she recalled to him while she gazed deep into the darkness about them, searching its imperceptible shadows for some sign of this hidden refuge.
"A mountain palace?" the boy said, wonderstruck with the magic of the very thought.
She returned his wide-eyed awe with her own girlish smile, for she too would very much like to see this place that the groomsman had once described to her.
"Is that where we are going now then?" he asked her.
"I hope so," Keily said honestly. "All I know is that he said he came from across the mighty Abonris."
"The Hilgari are even mightier, lass," Marcum interjected. His voice startled her a bit, for she had not realized that her story had gained an audience. "We could search the foothills and base lands for weeks before we find this palace of yours, but we might well starve or freeze to death long before we find it."
"I know, Lieutenant," she said, the youthful confidence disappearing into a distant memory. "I just pray that whatever it was that guided Cal, also guides us."
"Well, we will know soon enough, won't we?" Marcum said matter-of-factly. "The Northern Altar of the Priest is but a half day's march, and I'll feel better about resting our weary people when we have made it at least that far."
"Then what?" the young boy asked in exasperation, forgetting who it was that he was addressing.
Marcum looked at him for a moment, not sure whether to be amused or offended. Finally the lieutenant determined that exile does not leave much room for insult or offense when prior formalities are forgotten. "Well lad, your friend here believes that our hope is to the west. I imagine that the Altar would be as good of a place as any to turn and head that way."
Marcum held his gaze for a moment, and the silent words reestablished a bit of order with their unspoken message.
"Yes ... yes, sir, Lieutenant, sir," the child said rather penitently as the weight of his disregard fell heavy upon his boyish candor. "I'm sorry, forgive me."
Marcum just nodded his grace and then returned his attention back to Keily. "We haven't much provision, so let us also pray that whatever it is that is guiding us might either quiet our appetites or stretch what little stores we do have. If not, well, keep your eye out for any brambles of berries or any game, no matter how big or small. Johnrey tells me you are quite a skilled hunter, and that might just be our saving grace."
"Alright," she replied. "I'll keep an eye out, though I doubt the sixty of us slogging along will lean much in our favor of finding anything at all to hunt."
"Just as well," Marcum bantered back. "The THREE who is SEVEN just might go ahead and surprise us all with an answer."
"May it be so," she said under her breath.
"May it be so, indeed," the lieutenant agreed.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
CAL, ASTYRÆ, GORAN, AND DERYN found their way out of the hoarder's cave and were welcomed to the darkened wilderness that expansively rolled out before them. Farran snorted and stamped his worried welcome at the sight of his friend.
"Were you worried, my silver steed?" Cal said as he wrapped his arm around the well-muscled neck of the grey-coated courser. Farran lowered his head upon the shoulder of the groomsman in an embrace of sorts, conveying the relief that he truly felt upon their reunion. "You remind me of a mother Percheron I once had," he said with a wistful smile on his face as he tussled the silver mane of the mighty horse.
"We can't stay here, Cal," Astyræ said as her eyes surveyed the darkened canopy above. "The darkness is fully upon us, and if we do not find shelter we will be hunted by more than just the soldiers of the tree men. We have to keep moving."
"Where will you go?" Goran asked, betraying the notes of worry that laced his deep voice.
"Will you not come with us?" Astyræ pleaded.
"No, my lady. Whatever journey the THREE who is SEVEN has called you upon, whatever roads your feet are draw to tread … he has not yet released me from my own." Goran spoke with more kindness than Cal had ever seen in the old mountain man. "Besides, the North Wolf would be lost without me! Someone has got to provide our once shining city with timber enough to shine again by. At least until you two find your new light, eh?"
"Thank you, brother," Cal said, embracing the massive man with both arms. "Thank you for keeping her safe."
"Well, I wouldn't say I did that," Goran said with a laugh. "But she is safe enough now, I suppose."
"All the same, you are a true brother, and I, for one, am grateful." The groomsman held the embrace a moment longer, and the woodcutter finally pulled back with a grunt.
"Aye, okay, okay. You're welcome. Don't you go getting all sentimental now, you'll set the woman to crying and then where will you be?" Goran said, his misty eyes betraying his generous heart.
Astyræ raised an eyebrow at the large man. "We don't want anyone crying, that's for sure," she said with a graceful smile. "Are you ready, Cal?"
"Do you know where it is that you are going?" Goran asked again.
"North," Cal said, turning to face the darkened wilderlands. "I don't know where it will lead us, but it's the only true direction I have for the moment."
"Well, here then," Goran said as he handed over the ancient shield with the bronze feathers. "You'll need this more than I will."
"Goran?" Cal tried to protest.
"I have no use for it! Besides, how would you suppose I try to explain something like this to the governor or his yapping dog of a captain? You take it. Use it to keep safe out there … wherever there is."
"Thank you, brave woodcutter," Astyræ said as she rose to her toes to kiss his smudged forehead. "It has been a rare o
ccurrence here in the west of the forgotten world to encounter such selflessness. And yet, here I am, thrice its recipient in less than a week's worth of days."
Goran blushed a deep shade of red, even by the flickering light of his own torch. "If you find this new light, I expect you to come let me know when I can stop the felling of so many trees, huh?"
"I will, brother," Cal said with an amused grin. "I promise."
They watched as the large, bald-headed woodcutter walked off, both torch and axe in hand, back along the stream bed and southward towards the tree line of his brothers.
"I will miss those woodcutters," Cal said to Deryn and Astyræ. "When I first met them, they were not much more than the wardens of my punishment. And now, well ... I am more sad to leave them than I was afraid to meet them."
"I know exactly what you mean," Astyræ said with a sincere smile.
"Come on, then," Cal said as he placed one boot in the side stirrup of his silver horse. "North is still calling us."
Cal and Astyræ mounted their horses and Deryn flew on ahead, illuminating the way before them with a protective glow. They rode in silence for quite some time, not wanting to attract attention to themselves, though there was much that they wished to say. After several hours of making their slow and deliberate way through the wood, the weariness of the last few days took its toll.
"There must be a place we can make our rest," Cal whispered to Deryn. "A cave, or something?"
"I haven't seen any shelter, Bright Fame," Deryn said, and the exhaustion could be heard even in his voice. "Perhaps we should just find a grove and keep quiet in the darkness."
Cal looked to Astyræ, and she nodded her weary assent. The group stopped near what looked to be a small clearing, and hastily made camp against an old tree. Sleep came upon them fast and hard, bringing with it a chance to put from their minds the enormous uncertainties that loomed in the distance.
Cal awoke sometime later. It was hard to tell day and night apart anymore; when he had been with the colony, they had kept track of the rhythm of their days with their meals and their work and their rigid schedule, so night was still distinguishable even without the subtle glow of silver to guide them. But here, in the wilds of the Wreath, with the great tree dead and gone, and no schedule to keep track of, time ran together in an unsettling blur.
The Ravenous Siege (Epic of Haven Trilogy Book 2) Page 35