The Ravenous Siege (Epic of Haven Trilogy Book 2)

by R. G. Triplett

  Nevertheless, Cal woke to find that Astyræ was no longer resting beside him where she had been when he fell asleep. He jolted upright, worried that she had either been taken from him or worse, that she had left him; relief washed over him when he saw her glowing eyes watching him from just a few paces away.

  "My lady, were you not able to rest?" he mumbled groggily, still waking from the heavy sleep.

  "I slept well enough. I am eager to be on the move again," she whispered, nodding at the sleeping Sprite who lay atop Cal's cloak. "But we can wait until everyone has caught up with their rest."

  Cal smiled at Deryn. "It seems as though this one never rests; that cave was not the first time he has saved my life."

  "Nor hopefully the last. He is a brave companion, Cal. You are lucky to have him." Astyræ's face grew serious then. "More than lucky, I suppose. A Sprite, I don't … it is hard to believe a child of the Jacaranda is here before my very eyes," she said, and as she stumbled over her words, her eyes filled with unexpected tears.

  Cal paused, confused as to the reason for her swell of emotion and equally unsure of what he was supposed to do to comfort her.

  A sob escaped her then, and Deryn awoke with a start.

  "It's alright, Deryn," Cal murmured as his concerned eyes directed the Sprite's attention to their crying friend. Cal moved towards Astyræ, who was still sitting a few paces away, ashamed of her tears and yet unable to contain them. "My lady," he offered as he placed a comforting hand upon hers. "I ... I don't … I didn't mean for all of this, I only ever wished to help, from the day when we found you locked in that awful tower. I am sorry for dragging you into a story that wasn't yours to begin with."

  She looked at him, and her tears slowed as her expression changed from sadness to confusion. She wrinkled her nose as she thought on his words. "You misunderstand my tears, dear groomsman," she said, wiping the tears from her face. "You didn't drag me anywhere. You rescued me, and more than once at that! No, Cal, do not apologize for anything. I am but grateful for the invitation ... grateful for you."

  "But all the trouble, the damned fool of a knight, the hoarder, the mess—is that not why you cry, my lady?" he asked sincerely.

  "No, it is not," she said as she took a deep breath to steady herself.

  "Then why, lady Astyræ?" Deryn asked as he flitted over to rest upon her lap.

  "My sorrow is much deeper than bullying men and fading trees," she told them both. "I fear that I deserve whatever trouble finds me, and I fear all the more that my trouble will become your own trouble, too."

  "I don't understand," Cal said. "No one need resign themselves to trouble, Astyræ, that is not what the THREE who is SEVEN made us for."

  "That's just it, Cal," she said as a tear rolled down her pretty, pearl cheek.

  "What is?" Cal asked again, his brow furrowed in frustration. "I don't understand ... just tell me."

  Deryn, sensing something deeper and perhaps darker brooding behind the surface of her tears, flew up from his perch upon her lap and met her sorrow-filled eyes with his own azure gaze. "Go on."

  The moment went tense and silent, like a storm of wounds that was about to break. Astyræ swallowed hard. Then, with shame coloring her voice, she began her telling. "Before our city fell to the will and power of Nogcwren, my father was the steward of Dardanos. He cared for many sacred and special artifacts housed in the vaults of the treasury. The most important part of his duties was to watch over our most precious treasure; it was because of this treasure that our city thrived, seemingly unaffected by the ever-growing darkness of this world. We became the object of the malevolent desire of the sorceress, for the brightness of this forgotten magic somehow chased away her shadows."

  "A treasure that warded off darkness for a whole city?" Cal asked incredulously. "What could it have been?"

  She winced, and then replied. "The last remaining un-ripened fruit of the long-vanished Jacaranda trees."

  Deryn looked to Cal in worried wonder, and a knowing expression came across his face.

  "My father resisted her offers of power and sight, for he had no reason to bend a knee to her when his people could still see in this darkened world. It wasn't until ..." her voice caught in her throat. "It wasn't until I nearly died that he finally and reluctantly succumbed to her treacherous offer."

  Tears began to fill her violet and yellow eyes again, and Cal and Deryn could feel the palpable weight of her grief.

  "While I was yet in my mother's womb, she began to bleed," Astyræ continued. "She hemorrhaged for six days and my father grew desperate in his panic, desperate for his wife to be rescued and his child to be spared. Some say that it was the sorceress herself that caused the blood to flow, in hopes of forcing my father's hand. But regardless of the cause, the Raven woman told him how he might save us both."

  "What did she tell him?" Cal gently urged.

  "That if she, my mother, were but to eat the whole fruit of the Jacaranda, the magic of the ancient trees of beauty would heal her wounds and save both of our lives." Her face carried a massive guilt, and it seemed as if her very existence was suffocating right there in the telling of her history.

  "My father chose me and my mother that doom-filled day," she told them. "He chose us above the safety of our city. He spoke her vile words and my mother ate the holy fruit, and Dardanos ... well, Dardanos was never the same."

  "Is that why … your eyes?" Cal softly asked. "Is that why they are violet?"

  "That is also why they are yellow," she responded lifelessly.

  The telling of the story settled heavy upon them all, and quiet moments passed as the groomsman and the Sprite considered the meaning and the consequences found in this woman's words.

  Finally, Cal spoke with a charming hopefulness. "But love rescued you once already, my lady, and love, even when it has a price, is beautiful. You should not lament your whole story while it is not yet fully told; for perhaps some sort of beauty might rescue you a second time?"

  "Why would it ever?" she said angrily. "Dardanos fell one bended knee at a time! We were the last true opposition to the sorceress, and because of me ... because of me, my father Aius, the last steward of Dardanos, surrendered his will to hers."

  "Well, I am not going to judge you as harshly as you judge yourself," Cal said confidently.

  Astyræ looked to the Sprite in shame, tears flowing all the more now. "And you?" she asked.

  Deryn flew to her, and in a great display of costly forgiveness, he took her tear-stained face in his tiny hands and spoke confidently."None of us can know the complete plans of our Great Father. Perhaps your fallen city might yet prove to be a part of them."

  "But my father ... the fruit." Her eyes filled once again as her voice caught in her throat.

  "I do not hold your father's choice against you, lady Astyræ," Deryn told her. "How could I? For it was not your choice to make."

  She pressed her lips together in a moment of deepest gratitude. "Your grace is more than I could ask for, my brother," she whispered.

  Deryn nodded nobly and flew back to Cal's side. "Tell us, what happened to Dardanos after your father surrendered?"

  "It was as if the very marrow of our once bright and thriving city was slowly sucked out of its bones. The walls still stand unbroken, claiming their dominion of the valley, though now only as elaborate grave markers of a dead people."

  "The sorceress did not attack the city? I thought you said it fell to her will?" Cal said in confusion.

  "Not a single arrow was fired, nor blade colored red. When my father bent his knee, the city was already hers for the taking, for we no longer held the fruit of the Jacaranda. At first it was as if nothing had even happened. He submitted to her will, and my mother lived, and I was born. But over the next six years he became less and less my father and more and more her slave," she told them. "The light in his eyes changed from the pale blue that my mother had swooned over as a young maiden; at the end of it, one eye had turned a sickly green that hau
nted my mother in the night. I think he fought the magic with the goodness of his heart for as long as his failing strength would allow him to—longer than most—but he fell, as he knew he always would."

  "But what about the city?" Cal asked. "How did she take the city without force or show of arms?"

  "The light of the fruit was gone, and fear gripped and strangled the strength of my people," Astyræ continued. "She would come often to the city, her caravan encamped just beyond the entrance to the mountain pass. Scores upon scores of people would flock to her for the gift of her un-light, for I am not the only one in Aiénor that fears the darkness. And when they would return to Dardanos from the Itzal Valley ..."

  "Yes?" Cal coaxed.

  "They were slaves to the un-light. No longer themselves. Puppets of the Raven Queen."

  Chapter Forty

  THE AIR ABOUT THE SEVEN travelers was strikingly cold within the broken, granite bowels of the once hallowed mount, but it was not dark. For although shadows still hung heavy in the passageway, hope itself had lit the air with its ever-violet light.

  "Do you know where we are going?" Kahri asked nervously as she held tightly to the hand of a young maiden named Georgina.

  "Yes? Margarid, do you know the way?" Georgina asked.

  "No," Margarid replied. "I do not, though it would seem that the only way available to us is directly ahead. So I will follow the path that was carved out of these ancient stones and pray that it leads us somewhere safe, somewhere beyond the reach of those dragons."

  The path they beheld was little more than a parting of the stone in the middle of the mountain, a crevasse created by the magic expelled from the dying Arborist. It was narrow, wide enough for one or maybe two people to walk through at a time, though it seemed to rise infinitely upward into the hallowed peak of the mountain. Whether by providence, or magic, or maybe just luck, something about their hope fueled a welcomed, violet illumination. For though they knew not what kind of enemy it was that pursued them into these suffocating bowels of the rock, they traversed this Elmer-path with the vision of a refuge in their hearts.

  "What of Engelmann? And Michael?" Harmier the merchant asked. "Are we to give up hope for their lives like we have given up hope for our city?"

  Portus put his large hand upon the shoulder of his auburn-haired friend, consoling her worried heart as he addressed the frightened remnant. "We cannot say, for there is no way to know what has happened to our friends."

  "But we also cannot just wait here in these cold, granite halls, hoping for even more miracles than we have already received," Margarid said resolutely, steeling her teary gaze forward on the path ahead of them.

  "But why?" Georgina asked in her still girlish voice that seemed to glide her words up to the calloused ears of her companions. "That is what I hope for: that we will not be alone in our journey, and that Michael and Engelmann will find us soon."

  "Well then, I will choose to join you, young lady," the tall tanner said kindly. "For that seems a much more pleasant thing to hope for than the realities that the rest of us have supposed."

  The seven of them walked quietly through the cold corridor of the mountain pass. The air about them glowed in a faint violet hue, but their hope revealed very little, for their surroundings consisted of nothing more than the sheer sheets of rock and their glittered veins of failing magic. They continued this way for hours, until finally their feet angered in protest and demanded rest.

  "We have been at this trek for what feels like a lifetime of steps," Kahri whined in exhaustion. "We must stop ... we need a rest, we need something to eat."

  Margarid thought hard about it, but although she too was weary from the Aureole road, she did not put much trust in the broken, iron willow doors to bar the Nocturnals from hunting them down. "But what if-" she tried to say before the farm girl interrupted her.

  "Please, Margarid?" Georgina begged. "I don't know how much longer the path is, but I do know that we must rest if we hope to find its end."

  Margarid agreed with the young woman, though fear would not let her wholly relinquish her watchful guard just yet. "I would like to put more distance between us and that green-eyed hell of an army that invaded our home." She sighed as she let go of her pack and released it to the granite floor. "But you are right, Georgina, we must recover our strength."

  "Me and Harmier, we will take the first watch," Portus said with gracious conviction. "Please, you five, rest while you can. The girl is right; we have no idea what still lies before us."

  The rest of them dropped their packs and eased to the ground, grateful for the respite. As they rummaged through their provisions in search of any food Elmer may have gathered for them, they came upon figs, hard tack, and half a dozen skins of wine, and at the sight of such provisions their bodies nearly groaned in utter relief.

  "Oh!" Harmier said excitedly in between mouthfuls of food. "Thank the THREE who is SEVEN, thank Him, indeed!"

  "I think that my gratitude is owed to Elmer, thank you very much!" Kahri said, making no effort to hide her disillusionment. "He seems to be the only one who has done anything praiseworthy as of late."

  "That's blasphemy!" Harmier retorted. "But this food is too delicious for me to waste a precious moment caring! Go on and thank whoever you like!"

  "I am curious," Margarid asked in between her own greedy gulps of wine. "Who do you suppose it was that prompted Elmer to set aside provisions for us?"

  "That's easy enough," Kahri said smugly. "Engelmann did! I overheard them talking one night back when we used to meet at the mill. He told him to gather what he could in preparation to leave the city, and my guess is that this is what he had already prepared."

  "I guess we owe a lot to them … the Arborists, I mean," Georgina interjected.

  "And who do you suppose it was that prompted those old tree-beards to plan for our escape?" Portus offered up the question, sensing even now where the fiery-haired friend of his was going.

  CRASH! A soul-jarring sound of iron against iron rang out in the distance, intruding upon their conversation.

  "What was that?" the merchant asked warily.

  "I don't know," Portus replied. "But it sounded far enough off at least."

  "We cannot rest here, then, not while the green-eyes are still on the hunt," Margarid decided with a resolute look about her. "We have to keep moving."

  "Come, you heard the lady ... and you know that she is right about this," Portus urged. "Chew your food quickly, for we are not armed enough to properly defend ourselves against a wild pack of kittens, let alone a whole invading army."

  "It's a wonder those old Arborists didn't think of that when they made all their preparations," Kahri said sourly. "A sword or two would have been nice, Engelmann, EH?"

  "Hush now. If they had meant for us to fight an army, there'd be weapons aplenty. Eat your food, girl," Portus chastised.

  She nodded sullenly, not offering a further response.

  They ate quickly and quenched their thirst happily with the wine that Elmer had provided for them, but their rest would have to wait. The sounds of the invaders reverberated in the distance, echoing between the silent swallows of the huddled remnant. The small group exchanged worried glances back and forth as they focused their attention straight ahead through the glittering, granite passageway inside the mountain.

  "Alright, everyone," Margarid said. "We need to put some more distance between us and the entrance to this tunnel. If they are desecrating the whole city of ours, I do not doubt for a moment that they will allow the hall of the Arborists to remain untouched."

  Portus nodded in weary resignation and gingerly rose to his tired, aching feet. With his large hands he grasped the hands of his fellow travelers and in turn helped them up from their all-too-brief rest.

  "She is right, you know," Georgina said to Kahri, who was staring at Margarid with the most displeased of expressions.

  "But how do we even know that we are going the right way? We can't even tell if we are h
eading north when all that we have seen is a sheer edge of granite for leagues upon leagues!" Kahri argued.

  "Have you seen another way?" Portus argued back. "If so, please, by all means, lead us there! But only one way was made for us through this mountain, and this Elmer-pass is a gift. No matter how taxing it may feel; it is still a gift."

  "But what about tomorrow? What about the next day, and the day after that?" she asked, angry and exhausted. "What if this Elmer-pass is nothing more than a granite road to our tombs?"

  "Did you not see what we saw?" Harmier asked the maiden with an incredulous raise of his brow. "Did you not see the brave sacrifice that was made to give us this road at all?"

  "Easy now, easy now!" Margarid called softly over the eruption of frayed nerves and raised voices. "Tomorrow I cannot speak for; none of us can. But, today? Today, I believe that the best way out is indeed through. All that lies behind us is death, or worse; if that is what you want then not one of us will force your feet any further upon this path." The remnant went silent at the compelling words of this auburn-haired maiden as she poured her own weary conviction into this unexpected moment. "But as for me, I will look with hope towards tomorrow, and the next morrow and the next if that is what this journey will require of me. I trust the hearts of our Arborist friends and I will still pray that we will not be alone on the other side of tomorrow."

  With that, Margarid gathered her strength and walked slowly forward, continuing the dimly lit march deeper and deeper into the heart of the mountain. Portus looked the others in the eyes. When his gaze fell upon Kahri, his eyes nearly demanded an apology from the seamstress. Kahri exhaled a reluctantly humbled breath before she obliged the tall tanner.