Serpent in the Mist

by Cleave Bourbon

  “I forgive you.”

  “What?” Trendan was taken by surprise.

  “I forgive you for trying to poison me. I know you were only trying to protect your friends. You thought I was evil and that I would be an instrument of destruction for your cause. I get it; I really do.”

  “It was nothing personal.”

  “I have seen you looking over at them, you know.” She indicated both couples across the hold. “It’s an interesting duality. Kelle and Bren are fierce warriors and can hold their own on a battlefield, but she is frightened to be up here with seemingly nothing holding us up, nothing keeping us from plunging to our deaths. It will be years before she learns enough of the dragon magic from Shadesilver to understand it. The two of them only stay down here because Shadesilver commanded them to. And then there is Fayne and Vesperin. I don’t think she’s said anything to him about marriage or love; she has just made sure she is there to capitalize on any opportunity to get close to him. He resisted at first, but he is slowly getting the hint, especially after she joined him in his daily prayers. Both of them are healers and deadly warriors. Both of them pray and have faith that Loracia’s will keeps them safe or orders their deaths. Either way, they are prepared to accept it.”

  “Everyone is the good guy with the belief that what they are doing is just and important, Kimala. No one starts out believing they are evil and misguided. At least, not at first.”

  “Is that how you think Devyn is feeling right now, like he is justified?”

  “Of course I do. He very well may be, did you ever think of that? Why are we trying to keep him from getting to the Tome of Enlightenment? Maybe he has better reason than we know.”

  “Is that what you believe?”

  “I believe it’s possible.”

  Sanmir entered the hold as the ship swayed and dipped again. “Morgoran wanted me to convey that we may need to leave the ship. Make preparations to take the fight to ground. We may need to make a stand.”

  “What is happening to the ship?” Kelle asked.

  “The dragons are still pursuing us. Lady Shey and Lady Enowene are constantly enchanting the hull to keep us in the air. We are getting closer and closer to the ground now.”

  Bren stood. “I will put on my armor. Where are we?”

  “Over the grasslands, near Shadehollow.” Sanmir went back above deck.

  Bren and Kelle both found their armor and hastily donned it.

  Kimala whispered into Trendan’s ear so that the others were sure not to hear. “Nothing is ever as it seems. Morgoran trusts me as much as Naneden, and neither should trust me at all. I have my own agenda.” She put her index finger over Trendan’s mouth so he would not interrupt her. “I can’t let the events in my life tarnish the lives of my children any more than I already have.” She moved away from Trendan and secured her daggers. Trendan looked at Fayne and thought about Kimala’s words. Whatever had happened in her life before, she was obviously dedicated to her children now. Then it dawned on him. She said children. Trendan had heard of her talking about Fayne’s sister before. He checked his bow and made sure his quiver was full. His twin short swords on each hip, he was ready.

  “Here, let me help you with that.” He watched as Fayne helped Kelle fasten on her dragon-scaled breastplate. Kimala joined them and worked to fasten a bracer. Trendan saw that when all three women were standing next together, they all had similar features.

  The ship jerked and thumped. Trendan felt it slow, and then the bow of the ship tilted up. “I think we are about to . . .”

  All six of them tumbled to the front of the hold as the aft of the ship hit the ground. Lady Shey and Enowene had managed to slow the ship enough to make the impact more bearable. Trendan helped Bren up first as he was closest. Bren helped up Kelle. The ship listed to the left, but the ground had been soft enough to make a furrow in which the ship rested upright.

  Upon exiting the ship’s hold, Trendan could see that the dragons were already upon them. He pulled an arrow from his quiver and delivered it to the nearest dragon’s exposed eyeball. It screamed and rounded on him. He bounded out of the path of the oncoming dragon’s breath and rolled over the tilted wooden deck to relative safety.

  “Kim—Fayne, get your mother to a safe place,” Morgoran yelled. It would be tough to explain to Naneden if Kimala showed up with battle wounds, Trendan thought.

  Trendan nocked an arrow and looked for a clear shot. He knew a shot directly into one of the dragons would do no good; their scales were just too hard, so he waited for a moment when they opened their maws, exposing their soft tissue or when they exposed an eye. That’s when he saw him. Devyn was casting essence from behind a mound of the dirt thrown up from the ship’s furrow. He carefully aimed the arrow at Devyn’s head. The mortality of killing his friend welled up from somewhere inside him, and he hesitated. What had Devyn done that was so bad? Why should he trust Morgoran more than his friend that he had known since Devyn was a baby? Images of Della and Lourn Adair entered his mind.

  He re-aimed his arrow at a green dragon trying to get at Lady Shey. He fired, and the dragon moved away from her, although his arrow did little to nothing to the drake. He moved out of his position to find Morgoran. The wielder was casting cascades of fire at Devyn’s position. Trendan stopped and carefully lined up his shot. He loosed the arrow and grazed Morgoran’s shoulder, separating the old wielder from his side pack. Morgoran reached down to keep the pack from falling and took a direct hit of essence to his face. He fell to the deck, and Trendan sprinted for the pack as it fell behind Morgoran on the deck. Kimala was near enough that she also went for the pack. Trendan met her there at about the same time. He yanked the strap from her hand. “Nothing is as it seems, right?” He bolted from the deck to Devyn’s position. He couldn’t see her, but he imagined that Kimala had an irrepressible grin on her face.

  Trendan jumped over the mound of dirt to land beside Devyn.

  “Trendan, I almost incinerated you!”

  “I almost shot you in the head. Looking for this?” He reached in the pack and produced the golden serpent.

  “I don’t understand. I thought all of you were against me getting the tome.”

  “I thought about it, and I realized that I trust you more than I trust anyone else. If you truly know what you are doing, then my loyalty belongs to you, my friend.”

  Devyn nodded. “Thank you, my friend. Let’s get out of here; there is no need to keep fighting.” Devyn waved to the nearest dragon, and it landed at his side. Shadesilver flew in behind it, sending a torrent of fire down on the vicinity. Devyn countered it with a well-aimed block of essence. “Hurry,” he said, “get on.”

  Trendan secured his bow and joined Devyn on the back of the dragon. It took flight, and they flew in the direction of Symbor.

  MORGORAN RECOVERED from the daze of being struck in the face to see the green dragon flying away with Trendan and Devyn. Moments later, the other dragons broke away and followed. The battle was over. He stood there swearing for a few long moments and then turned to the others. “I don’t want to talk about it. Just get this ship, or whatever else fool thing we can fly, and get us to my tower. We still may have a chance to get to the king of Symbor before Devyn gets that last key.” He stopped next to Kimala. “I think it’s time for you to head back to Naneden. The more you are seen with us, the more you jeopardize your current station.”

  Kimala nodded. “Give me a time to say my goodbyes to Fayne.”

  “You have until we can get back on track to my tower.”

  Kimala searched around the site and found Fayne sitting on a mound of dirt near the furrow of the ship. Enowene and Kelle were with her. She joined them.

  “Enowene, Morgoran feels that I should get back to Naneden before anyone else comes in contact with us and sees me with you.”

  “I also think that would be a wise course of action.”

  Fayne met Kimala as she turned from Enowene.

  “Fayne, I must take my l
eave. I trust you will be safe here?”

  “If you are referring to what happened, I think I can handle it. It isn’t the first time Trendan has done something like this to us.”

  “I thought you would be. It’s only that I am your mother and I worry about you. You’ll see someday when you have children of your own.” She looked off at Vesperin binding one of Sanmir’s wounds. “How is the other plan going?”

  “The master was right—he is very shy when it comes to women. I have to work slowly and easy so he doesn’t scare. I will have him ready when the time comes.”

  “I am sure you will. You are certain the issue with Trendan is not getting in the way?”

  “Whatever issue there might have been, it’s gone now and has been since he tried to poison you.”

  Kimala accepted the answer, but she didn’t quite believe it, especially when she saw Fayne glance up to the sky where Trendan rode away with Devyn. While pacing back toward the ship, she saw that Lady Shey and Gondrial had managed to lift it back into the air, the rope ladder dangling loosely over the side. Morgoran was striding up with a cloak draped over his arm.

  “Here, the boy left his cloak. Put it on and draw the hood tight. I thought you might go ahead and travel with us to my tower. I realized I can send you through the portal to Lux Enor, to Naneden.”

  “That would be better than leaving me out here in the middle of nowhere.”

  Morgoran turned without reaction and headed back for the ship. “I didn’t have to offer or bring her the cloak,” she heard him mumble.

  THE BRAE DAUN DUIL hunted along the Jagged Mountains and onward through the grasslands. He knew how to track Devyn by more than a scent—he knew how to track him by the magic he used and by the essence Melias had given him to help keep track of where he might be. He saw the strange shipwreck cradled in the middle of the grasslands, but he avoided it. He could not risk being detected. He traveled forward; he would reach his target soon enough.

  Chapter 24: The Dead of Winter

  Vesperin was thankful to be at Morgoran’s tower. He disliked traveling up in the air on an enchanted ship. The ship was not a pleasant place to be anyway. It no longer had any sails; it had a broken mast, a cracked and broken keel, and a giant hole in the starboard hull. As soon as they disembarked, Gondrial and Lady Shey left to take the ship back to Seabrey. Gondrial thought it might be funny to put the ship back on the dry docks where they found it. Morgoran protested them leaving, but Gondrial knew that he and Lady Shey would not be welcome guests in the king of Symbor’s palace. In fact, his and Lady Shey’s presence would have exactly the opposite effect of what Morgoran was trying to accomplish. After all, Lady Shey had taken a personal book from his library, and Gondrial had spent some quality time in the queen’s chamber, or so Vesperin was told.

  Fayne was still following him around. He tried to get away from her for a few moments after they arrived at Morgoran’s tower, but she always managed to find him. She was nice and very attractive, but Vesperin wondered about her motives, not to mention that she was a bit too smothering for his taste, which was to be left alone most of the time. The Trendan issue was also weighing heavily on his thoughts. Morgoran seemed to be almost obsessed with stopping Devyn from getting the keys to the Tome of Enlightenment, but he never gave a good, convincing reason as to why. Vesperin didn’t believe for a moment that Devyn was capable of turning evil or that he would use the tome for destructive purposes on his own. He watched Kelle as she was saying her goodbyes to Shadesilver, who was going to fly back to Draegodor to see if she could help with the damage. He wondered if Devyn knew about Kelle and Bren. It seemed all so silly. He vowed he would never get caught up in such a triangle.

  As they entered the chambers that led down to the Portal, Vesperin was disappointed that he would not get to see Kerad, Morgoran’s council and cleric of Loracia. He should have returned from Rugania by now but was nowhere to be seen. Morgoran opened the cellar-like door that led to the Portal, and they all entered the room, descending the narrow stairs one by one.

  Morgoran manipulated the circular outer ring and opened the portal. “Lux Enor, Kimala, and don’t forget to change the origin point on the outer ring. I don’t want Naneden seeing that you arrived there by way of the Tower of Morgoran.”

  “That is the fifth time you reminded me, Morgoran, I won’t forget.” She turned to Fayne. “Be safe, I will return when I am able.”

  “Goodbye, and look after yourself,” Fayne replied.

  Kimala bowed her head to Bren and Kelle, gave an uneasy smile to Morgoran, and then stepped through the portal. Vesperin contemplated what the uneasy smile might mean but quickly dismissed it as nothing. Maybe she didn’t want to leave her daughter and go back to that vile Naneden.

  “All right, let me adjust this portal.” Morgoran manipulated the outer ring again, and the portal changed from deep blue to light blue and back to deep blue again, each time making a swooshing noise like someone stirring their arm firmly in a barrel of water.

  “Enowene, I want you to look over your latest reports and get a message to me as soon as you can if any of your spies are reporting anything out of the ordinary.”

  “I can assure you they will be. A lot has happened.”

  “I mean incidents that you know we had nothing to do with.”

  “Get along,” she said, pointing to the portal.

  Morgoran opened his mouth to speak, and Enowene gave him a stern face. “I know my job; now get along,” she repeated.

  Sanmir tapped Vesperin on the shoulder and whispered in his ear when he turned. “I want to have a word when we can get away.”

  Morgoran motioned for them to go through the portal.

  On the other side, the chamber was once again dark as night. Vesperin channeled some light in the palm of his hand so that Morgoran could see one of the sconces to light.

  “In the old days, these sconces were kept lit all the time,” he grumbled.

  “I don’t suppose there is any reason to keep them lit now,” Sanmir pointed out.

  Morgoran glared at him.

  Sanmir broke the stare. “Won’t the king’s guard react poorly to us showing up in the bowels of the castle this way?”

  “No, they will not, because I know a way out of here that will put us in the foyer where we can be received right away.”

  Morgoran led them through a series of stairways until they exited in the foyer that led to the massive doorway to the throne room. A steward stopped them short of entering.

  “Name and business, if you please.”

  “Morgoran of the Vale and party on urgent business.”

  “Is His Highness expecting you?”

  “Not unless he has a seer by his side.”

  “One moment please.” The steward entered the throne room. A few moments later, he returned. “The king is indisposed. Please return tom—”

  “Oh, for the love of fairies.” Morgoran pushed the steward out of the way and entered the throne room. “What is the meaning of denying us an audience, Occelot, king of Symboria?”

  Vesperin followed the others, who followed Morgoran into the room. An older, white-haired, thin man with a golden crown dressed in extricate purple robes and holding onto a gnarled wooden staff stood up vehemently.

  “That is Your Grace or Your Majesty, Morgoran Cleareyes!”

  “My eyes are blue, thank you, Your Grace. Now what do you mean by denying me an audience? I turned you into a hare long ago, and I will do it again!”

  The man shrank back onto his throne. “No, not that.”

  Two guards stepped toward Morgoran. “I’ll turn one of you into a wolf and the other one a hare if you take another step.” The guards looked to the king, who waved them back.

  Fool steward! “I told you not to admit anyone else today!”

  “I told them, Your Grace, but they overpowered me.”

  “You are useless. Leave us, steward,” the king commanded, his voice high-pitched and wavering. No wonder the
queen preferred the company of a dashing rogue like Gondrial, Vesperin thought.

  “What do you want, Morgoran? I am a tired old man.”

  Morgoran took a step closer to the king. “Has anyone inquired about your staff as of late?”

  The old man’s bottom lip curled up with attitude. “No one would dare. This is my most prized possession.”

  “Are you certain the staff is your most prized possession?”

  The king looked lovingly at the gnarled, wooden staff. “One of them, aye.”

  “I need to look at your staff.”

  “My staff? Why?” He pulled it to him like Morgoran was about to steal it from him.

  “You can keep ahold of it; I just want to look. May I approach?”

  After a long moment, the king finally agreed, and Morgoran examined the staff.

  “Well, it’s the real deal. That’s good news.”

  “Indeed it is the real staff. I would never let this staff out of my sight!”

  “King Occelot, Your Grace, we have reason to believe that someone is planning to come in here and take your staff from you. We would like to stay with you and make sure that doesn’t happen.”

  “That will not be necessary. I have had this staff for more years than I can count. It is safe in my hands.”

  “But, Your Grace, I know this to be a fact.”

  “No, no, you don’t. Now, if you will excuse me, I need to find my chamber man and use the chamber pot.”

  Morgoran did not move.

  “You are not following me to do my business, Morgoran. Guards, escort him out, and don’t you mind if he threatens to turn you into anything; he is all flash and show.” The king began to hobble toward an exit next to his throne. It was clear that Morgoran did not know what to do. He opened his mouth to speak at the same unfortunate moment the king dropped to the floor and turned into a long-furred hare. The staff fell to the floor.