The Realm Rift Saga Box Set

by James T Kelly

  “We’ll go further in,” he said. “Get out of the cold.”

  “How will the others find us?”

  “They’ll find us,” was all he said before he began to clamber up the deck. Tom was faced with a choice of waiting alone in the dark or following him.

  The deck was in better condition than the hull although it was still broken in places. Bird droppings clustered on the wood below his hands and feet. It smelt of wine and rotten food; this must have been a cargo hold, its treasure spilt in the accident. Tom kept his eyes on the deck below, picking his steps carefully. It meant he wouldn’t fall through into the gulf below, but it also meant he didn’t have to look at the darkness around him and imagine what could be lurking in it. He couldn’t stop his ears from straining for sound.

  The light dimmed and he looked up. Dank was climbing a staircase.

  “We should wait,” Tom said.

  “We heard something.”

  “What?”

  “It sounded like voices.”

  “Then we should leave,” Tom said. “We don’t want to be discovered.”

  Dank grinned a grin too like Glastyn. “Voices in a derelict ship in the midst of the Western Kingdom and you aren’t in the least curious?” He shook his head. “Where’s your sense of adventure, Tom?”

  “So far adventure has had me chased by a dragon, imprisoned in a rat pit and kidnapped by merrow.”

  “Precisely.” He even sounded like Glastyn. It was unnerving. “This will only be a minor diversion by comparison.”

  “Wait.”

  But Dank continued, creeping up stairs that betrayed him with every creaking step, taking the light with him. That left Tom to either fumble his way back and risk injury, or stay where he was and listen to Dank meet whatever was up there. Or he could follow. He drew Caledyr. The hiss of the blade sliding free was lost under the sound of the wind. He felt ready.

  Dank’s voice echoed from the top of the stairs. “Shall we continue?”

  It made Tom feel silly, like a child scared of a storm. “Yes,” he said, too loud and too certain. He climbed onto the stairs, keeping one hand on the slanted steps to keep him upright and keeping the sword aloft in the other.

  He emerged into a narrow corridor, Dank a mere silhouette. It took him a moment to realise the sprite had abandoned its hiding place and flown ahead.

  “Whoever it is won’t be able to see her,” Dank said. “It makes her the perfect spy.”

  Spy. Is that why Maev had sent Glastyn to Cairnagan? Had he been spying on Regent?

  Had he been spying on Tom?

  The thought was banished in a moment; he could hear a voice. He could hear no words but it was no groaning of the wind or creaking of the wreck. It was speech, he was sure of it.

  “This is madness,” he whispered.

  “What is life without a little madness?”

  “What do you plan to do when we find these people?” Tom asked. “Anyone meeting in a shipwreck at night isn’t going to want witnesses.”

  Dank’s jovial tone turned to contemplation. “Not unlike ourselves,” he murmured. He turned to Tom but his expression was shrouded by the dark. “We may be kindred spirits.”

  Tom didn’t want to imagine what sort of spirits could be found in a shipwreck at night.

  The sprite turned a corner and the light vanished. It left them in complete darkness, the kind of dark Tom hadn’t seen since the Whispering Woods. There was that same sense of oppression, too, that same feeling that something unfriendly was close by.

  He heard movement ahead. Dank was walking away.

  “We should wait,” Tom hissed. But Dank didn’t stop, forcing Tom to follow. He inched forward, trailing fingertips against the wall and keeping Caledyr’s point down; the last thing he wanted to do was accidentally impale Dank on it. Without light, he was left only with the roar of the wind and a cacophony of scents; dried animal urine, sawdust, sand. A whiff of something burning.

  The wall disappeared under his hand.

  “Dank?” he whispered.

  Silence. Tom cast about with his free hand. There. The wall. He was at a junction. The hallway split to the left and to the right.

  “Dank, where are you?”

  No answer. Was the boy investigating the voices alone? But why leave him behind? He was armed.

  Perhaps this was a fay prank. Or a plan. Lure him in here. For what? For the purpose Fenoderee had talked about?

  He had thought himself the aggressor in that foresight. But perhaps the fay would turn on him? Try to take the sword by force?

  He felt a powerful urge to keep the blade and he lifted the point, ready for an attack.

  A noise, a click, to the right. He turned, extended the sword.

  He could wait here for whatever would happen. Or he could meet it. He followed Caledyr down the corridor. Crept even slower than before, the wood beneath him barely making a sound.

  There. A voice, so quiet he wondered if he was imagining it. He couldn’t make out any words. Perhaps it was another language. The speaker couldn’t be far away but Tom could see no lights. That meant they knew he was there. That meant he was already discovered. And turning back wasn’t an option. He’d break his neck on the stairs. So he’d have to confront them. He swallowed, tried to ignore how tired his arm felt already. Tried to prepare for a fight, to remember the lessons Draig had given him and ignore the taint of guilt and regret and betrayal that now flavoured them.

  A noise, a shifting. To his right. He took a slow, shaky breath, as silent as he could manage, and turned. The tip of the sword caught a door, which creaked open.

  “If you are planning on murder in the dark, my intruding friend, I should reconsider.” The voice was deep, dark, precise. “There are many of us. How many of you are there?”

  “I don’t want to hurt anyone,” Tom said, as confident as he could manage. “But I will defend myself.”

  “Just one, then.”

  Where was Dank? Surely he could hear this?

  “And armed, from the sounds of it.” A light fizzed in the black and Tom thought for a moment Dank’s sprite had returned. But it was a small flame, burning at the end of a short stick held by a stubby hand. That hand held it to a candle and lamplight filled the room. “With a sword. How quaint.”

  Tom blinked against the new light and found himself facing three dwarfs. Perhaps as tall as his chest, with awkward limbs and heads slightly too large for their bodies. All clean-shaven, where Tom had imagined them bearded. They wore cheap clothes of rough hemp and leather. Two sat cradled between the floor and the lower wall and seemed afraid, shying away from him, armed only with papers. The other, older and greyer, with a razor sharp gaze and a smug, fat-lipped smile, sat at a desk on a stool. He was too short for both, and the awkward angle of the deck left him leaning one elbow on the desk to keep himself from falling. In the other arm he cradled an unusual bow, the string horizontal and drawn back onto a frame. But Tom was more worried about the arrow pointed at his chest.

  “Without wishing to seem rude, you present a problem.” The older dwarf blew on the little stick, extinguishing the flame. “These meetings require privacy, absolute. Your presence compromises that requirement.”

  “I desire privacy too,” Tom replied, eyeing the other dwarfs. One was male, his eyes downcast as if not seeing Tom meant Tom couldn’t see him. The other was female and watched him with a frank gaze. “Perhaps we could assist each other?”

  “Forgive me, but you don’t appear to be in a position to bargain,” the dwarf said. He seemed jovial, even friendly. It was at odds with that arrow.

  “There are more of us,” Tom said. “They’ll be here soon.”

  “And we will be elsewhere,” he replied. “Added to which, I don’t believe humans would risk harming a thrall. Wouldn’t want to risk the mighty anger of the West, now, would we?”

  Tom looked at the other two dwarfs but they were silent. No help there. “And if I left?”

  “And tell
no-one you’d seen us, I imagine?” The dwarf smirked. “You ask me to trust you, when I don’t even know your name.”

  That information was safe enough; no-one in the West would know who he was. “Thomas Rymour.”

  The dwarf’s smirk disappeared. “Your companions,” he said, carefully. Trying and failing to hide his sudden, greedy interest. “Who are they?”

  That information was not safe. “Just my friends.”

  “And that sword.” He nodded at Caledyr. “Does it have a name?”

  Idris would pay anyone, elf or dwarf, a handsome reward for delivering Caledyr. “Not many men name their swords these days.”

  “Very true.” His expression was too shrewd. “But that does not answer the question.”

  “If the sword offends you, let me sheathe it.” Tom made to return it to the scabbard but the dwarf hefted his bow.

  “Stop,” he said. He regarded Tom, as if trying to decide something about him. Finally he nodded to one of the other dwarfs. “Give the sword to Maurstenn.”

  The other male dwarf stood, walking carefully across the slanted floor. He still did not lift his gaze. “You told him my name,” he whined.

  “It will be of no consequence,” the older dwarf replied.

  Maurstenn reached for the sword, miserable and afraid. Tom flinched away. He could not lose the sword. Not again.

  “I will not ask you again. Give him the sword, lad.”

  The thought battered his mind like a gale assaulting a leaf: do not lose the sword. His hand clenched around the grip. “Why not let me sheathe it?” he asked. “I can’t use it anyway; you’ll shoot me before I can.”

  The older dwarf smiled. “I am a great believer in caution.”

  “My only interest is in leaving this place,” Tom said.

  “My only interest is the safety of our flesh and our ideas,” the dwarf countered. “Hand it over.”

  “The sword is important to me. I cannot lose it.”

  “Is it more important than your life?”

  A simple question. And the answer Tom wanted to say would not pass his lips. “Yes.”

  The dwarf squinted at him. Tom tried to meet that gaze, though it was difficult not to stare at the arrow instead. After a moment, the dwarf nodded and said, “Very well. Sheathe it. Then tell me who you are and why you are here.”

  Maurstenn retreated, relieved, and Tom slid Caledyr home. He felt a moment of uncertainty as he released the grip. But the sword remained a reassuring weight on his back. “How do I know I can trust you?”

  “As the one who holds a headsman’s axe over your neck, there is no more deserving candidate for your faith.”

  “Trust isn’t much if it’s demanded by force.”

  “How poetic.” The dwarf nodded. “Very well. I am Storrstenn. You know my esteemed companion, Maurstenn, and the lady is Sannvinn. We are thralls of the Western Kingdom and we are meeting, in secret, quite against the laws the elfs have imposed upon us.” He lifted a hand to the air, as if he were conducting music. “Now you have the means to have our elfish masters put us to death, should you escape. I have placed my trust in you.”

  If it was true. Why would dwarfs have elfish masters? Were they servants, apprentices? And, if it was true, trust meant little if Storrstenn was planning to silence him anyway.

  “You are unconvinced?” Storrstenn sighed. “Very well. Let me put it another way: if your purpose in coming here is what I imagine, you have my solemn vow as a gentle dwarf that I will not harm you, nor let harm come to you that it is in my power to prevent.”

  “And if my purpose isn’t what you imagine?”

  Storrstenn smiled the smile of someone who has seen his prey walk into his trap. “Then I will make a corpse of you.”

  Chapter 6

  It wasn’t quite the threat the dwarf imagined it was. Tom had known he risked death the moment he’d seen the bow. So when his expression didn’t change, Storrstenn frowned and looked put out.

  “Sit,” he said. Tom did as he was told, sitting against the wall with his legs stretched out and pointing down the slanted deck towards the other dwarfs. Maurstenn stared at his own feet, as if they might escape if unwatched. Sannvinn’s gaze moved placid and accepting between Tom and Storrstenn as each spoke.

  “Talk,” Storrstenn ordered.

  “Talking to you might mean my death,” Tom said.

  “Your silence will guarantee it.” Storrstenn shifted on his stool. Now that Tom was sat, the arrow had less to point at and Storrstenn didn’t like it. The dwarf tried to find a better position without falling from his seat.

  “Talking might betray my friends.”

  “When the elfs find out you were here, they will be betrayed anyway.”

  “How will they find out?” Tom asked. “You cannot tell them without revealing your meeting.”

  Storrstenn scowled. He clearly wasn’t used to being argued with. “All of these outcomes still involve you being a corpse.”

  Tom nodded, trying to look as calm as he could. The sword was what mattered. Someone else could carry it to Cairnagwyn. Someone else could break the monoliths and stop the West. If needs be.

  “We cannot wait too long, Storrstenn.” Sannvinn’s voice was high and clear. “We’ll be missed.”

  “We can’t be missed,” Maurstenn said to his toes, plucking at a loose thread on his apron. “They’ll kill us for sure.”

  “For the cause, brother,” Storrstenn’s growled the way a person does when he has repeated a thing again and again. Then he sighed, took a breath, and was calm once more. “It is all for the cause. Or do you believe it unimportant?”

  Maurstenn shook his head and Storrstenn tutted. But Tom saw a way out. A cause. They fought for something. Something it was against elfish law to discuss. And what had Dank said? We may be kindred spirits.

  Perhaps this was their way of getting across the Kingdom?

  He took a breath and hoped he was right. “My name is Thomas Rymour. I travel with my friends, two humans and three elfs, to Cairnagwyn. Once there we will use this sword, Caledyr, to break the monoliths, free the dragons, and stop the Western war.”

  Storrstenn was still. Maurstenn and Sannvinn said nothing. The wind roared around the ship, the wood creaked, and Tom began to wonder if he hadn’t just made a mistake.

  Then Storrstenn grinned. “You see, Maurstenn? Patience is a virtue. We draw our plans, and measure our supplies, and a charmed device falls into our laps.” He lowered the bow and Tom allowed himself a smile.

  “What if he’s lying?” Maurstenn asked. “What if he’s been sent to spy on us?”

  “I cannot lie,” Tom said. “A Faerie gift.”

  Storrstenn snorted but said to Maurstenn, “If he’s lying, he came well-prepared. Have you ever seen a sword such as that?”

  The dwarf shook his head. “We don’t make swords out of copper anymore. Not for centuries. Too soft.”

  “Yet our dear Proctor Gerwyn lost one mere days ago,” Storrstenn said. “Along with three humans and four elfs.” He lowered the bow to the ground and settled into a more comfortable position. “To be armed with the story is one thing. To be armed with the sword too?”

  “Perhaps we could help each other?” Tom asked, trying to steer the conversation away from bickering and toward something useful. Perhaps these dwarfs could provide food or clothing.

  “Perhaps, brother Tom.” He looked pleased with himself, as if Tom was something of his own making. “We too seek to overthrow the tyrant.”

  Tom nodded and, when Storrstenn didn’t say anymore, he asked, “Why?”

  “Why?” Storrstenn laughed. “Do I need better reason than our freedom?”

  “You’re slaves?”

  “They call us ‘thralls’, as if there is a very great difference.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “By the lady’s grace, where have you been for the past eighty years?” All malice and threat were gone. Without a bow in his hands, he spoke as if they
were dear old friends.

  “I spent a long time in a distant land.” Storrstenn had snorted when he’d mentioned Faerie.

  “A very great distance indeed,” Storrstenn replied, “to be unaware of the conflict that made us slaves. When we lost the war, the elfs forced us to sign a treaty. A contract. Now every dwarf, every one, spends three years as a thrall of the Western Kingdom.” Storrstenn clambered off his stool inelegantly and began to pace the uneven deck, waving his hands in a tirade against Tir itself. “Boys and girls are ripped from their mothers’ arms, stolen from friends and childish play, forced into servitude. And when we grow slow in advancing years, we are sent back to our people, a poor exchange for the sons and daughter sent away. And we are left to pick up the pieces of the life we left behind in the Provinces. A life we barely remember.”

  Storrstenn stopped in front of Tom, the slant of the floor and his short stature making him of a level with Tom. “The elfs tell us it makes of us skilled workers, learned scholars. But they have made themselves the masters of our lives. And every dwarf, man and elf deserves to be the master of his own life at least.”

  An entire people enslaved. And for what? Western hubris. What gave them the right? What made them think they could take these people’s freedom? What made them believe they could march across Tir like they owned it all? What made him think it was justifiable to take a city so he could eat grapes and drink wine while people languished in rat pits for questioning his right to steal their lands?

  It could not be borne. Tom reached back for Caledyr and the thought was strong in his mind.

  Fight. Kill the enemy.

  “They have no right,” he growled. “No right to do this to us.”

  “Their arrogance knows no bounds.” Storrstenn murmured.

  “It will,” Tom said. “We can break their magic, free the dragons, free your people.”

  “Yes.”

  “Bring their shining empire down around them.”

  “Yes.” The dwarf’s eyes shone with greed.

  “And show them that we are not lesser peoples.”

  Storrstenn held out a hand. “For freedom.”