A Respite From Storms

by Robert J. Crane

  “But I am not what you think,” he whispered.

  And before Jasen could gather his wits to raise his sword, Baraghosa shoved him aside—

  He fell, feet tangling—he pivoted, rolling an ankle—

  Baraghosa reached for the pewter pot.

  Jasen’s knees slammed the stone. Jarring pain shot through him.

  At the same moment, the light in the chamber’s center flared. As bright as a thousand suns, all brought to within kissing distance of the isle’s shores, it was so blinding that it overloaded his sight and seemed then to spill over every other sense he possessed. His entire body screamed against it—

  And then, as quickly as it had flared, it faded.

  Jasen blinked. His senses came back, one by one.

  He was on the stone floor.

  His sword was gone.

  Click … click …

  And as his eyes finally were able to see again, that vibrant, multicolored after-image fading, he saw—

  Baraghosa’s back, retreating through the door, then down the steps of the spire … and out of sight.

  29

  So he was dying.

  He could not process it. Death—a chasm that he would slip into, in less than a year’s time, never to return from.

  It should have frozen him.

  Somehow—perhaps in the same way Terreas’s people had continued living their normal lives, even growing their population in the small niche they had been permitted to exist in—it only spurred him on. Expand his life and efforts to fill the space allotted. He had to keep moving, had to.

  He was alive. All of them were.

  And they must move—after Baraghosa, again. He had gone; the click of his cane had faded as Jasen lay here and tried to process this. Now there was only silence.

  How long had he lain here?

  He did not know. Too long, surely. If he were to put his face to one of the slitted windows, he would see neither of Baraghosa’s trailing lights … and if he could see the dock from here, he was sure that it would only be the Lady Vizola out there.

  He hoped the ship was left untouched in Baraghosa’s parting.

  The part of him that had believed Baraghosa had destroyed Terreas, had killed his family … that part was certain that Baraghosa would throw fire and fury at the Lady Vizola, for he was a spiteful, murdering beast.

  Yet another voice had woken within him. And its murmurings … Jasen was not sure what to make of them.

  But he did have to move. This, he knew. So, slowly, he rose. His body ached. A deep fatigue had settled into his bones—like the thorns Baraghosa had mentioned, their roots pushing down, down into him, impossible to loosen.

  Truly impossible, though?

  This thought, he swept aside too. Healers were for another day. The only matter now was rising to his feet and pursuing Baraghosa once more. Now his spellcasting was complete, he was more dangerous than ever, and they could not allow this second failure to dissuade them.

  He rose on shaky legs. Gathered up his blade—his grip was weak—and stowed it.

  He surveyed his comrades.

  Who to rouse first?

  His heart said to go to Alixa, as he had when Baraghosa had tossed her so easily aside. Her or Scourgey. But he could do nothing for them—and in the aftermath of their first encounter with Baraghosa, atop the Aiger Cliffs, it had been Huanatha who had fashioned bandages for their wounds. So, mumbling an apology to Alixa and asking the ancestors to forgive him for bypassing his only remaining kin, he went instead to the blue-armored warrior.

  The plating had been crumpled in around her chest. To Jasen, it did not look far enough to break ribs, but the armor did not appear to have done much to protect her right arm. The blast that had broken Tanukke a moment before hurling Huanatha backward had forced her arm around at an unnatural angle. Now it hung limp at her side, pointing the wrong way.

  Jasen reached out—

  Huanatha gasped as his fingers made the barest of contacts. Shuffling backward and away from him, she said, “Do not touch it!”

  “S-sorry,” he wheezed.

  Huanatha looked down at her arm. She winced—trying to move it, apparently, but it would not go. In spite of her cry to Jasen, she reached out with her free hand and cradled it.

  She muttered something in her native language.

  Jasen began, “Are you—?”

  “Arm is broken,” said Huanatha. Lines crossed her face. After a moment: “Goddess, this hurts.”

  “Is your chest …?”

  Huanatha looked down at the impact point. It was driven in at least an inch. A spiderweb of lines ran throughout the buckled plates.

  Frowning, she said, “It did the job it was supposed to. Need new armor though.” A pause. She took a long breath. It rattled in her throat. “Constricted. Need this off. Help, will you?”

  “Okay,” said Jasen, nodding. “What do I …?”

  “There are buckles.” Huanatha eased over, and gestured toward a point along the side of her ribs where the plates all converged. “Reach under, and release them. Then lift it off.”

  Jasen obeyed. His fingers ferreted about, grasping at the underside of the armor. Confines were tight though—the armor was form-fitted, and gave him little maneuverability.

  “I think I’ve—” he said, finding something—then losing it.

  He bit off a curse.

  Someone wheezed—a laugh.

  It was Kuura. He lifted his head from the steps where he lay—and then coughed.

  “Ooh, that is painful.” He looked up. Eyes widening at the sight of Jasen fumbling under Huanatha’s armor, he said, “Am I interrupting something?”

  “Cease your jesting,” Huanatha growled. “My armor is damaged.”

  “So is your sword.”

  That was Longwell. He’d roused too. Beneath the column, he still half-sat in the position where Baraghosa had tossed him, looking almost casual rather than like a man defeated in battle. But his eyes had a distant look to them. His blinks took just a fraction too long. His pupils drifted. With effort, he forced his gaze upon Tanukke again—or at least the hilt, upon which only a jagged piece of metal remained. The rest of its fragments littered the chamber like the remnants of an exploded glass bottle.

  “Tanukke, Blade of the Victorious.” Huanatha considered what remained of it sadly. “She has served me well.” Then, a moment later: “Baraghosa will pay for this,” she growled.

  “The sorcerer,” said Longwell, as if remembering. “We lost?”

  “His body does not lie before us,” said Huanatha.

  Longwell closed his eyes. “Damn.”

  Kuura climbed onto unsteady feet. He braced against the wall. Then, moving for Jasen and Huanatha, he said, “Let me help with that.”

  He squatted at Jasen’s side. Carefully, with large hands, he braced Huanatha by her ribcage and the upper portion of her back. She grunted, sucking in haggard breaths as Jasen fought to find the buckle, whilst at the same time assessing Kuura’s injuries. He looked the best of them; no bloodied cuts or scrapes, and nothing bent out of shape.

  Alixa moaned.

  Jasen’s head snapped around, Huanatha immediately forgotten.

  “Go, boy,” said Longwell, pushing himself up too now. “I’ll assist with the armor.”

  Jasen scurried off to her—although in his state, a “scurry” was at best a quick stagger, not only chasing Alixa but also his center of gravity, which was determined to stay a half-step ahead of him.

  He landed hard at Alixa’s side.

  “Alixa,” he murmured, hands on her. He rolled her over—

  She groaned. “Ow, ow, ow …” Her face screwed up. It was very white—whiter still, perhaps, for the blood smeared down her face and which still oozed from her forehead. How much she had lost, Jasen did not know. The puddle was small … but it had leaked into gaps in the brickwork. Perhaps a half-pint of it was gone. Not enough to endanger her—but gruesome nonetheless.

  “It’s
okay,” said Jasen.

  “It hurts …” Alixa raised a hand to her head—

  Jasen caught it. “Don’t.”

  She looked at him with wide eyes near panic. Then her eyes shifted around—and found the blood pooled under her.

  Now she seemed to grey.

  “It’s okay,” said Jasen. “You’re okay. It’s just a little cut. Huanatha can—she can patch it up.”

  She closed her eyes, breathing heavily. But she nodded … and though she gripped Jasen by the forearm, so tight that she could stab crescents into his skin even through his clothes, she allowed him to sit her up, and then begin to wipe away the blood upon her face.

  When Huanatha had been stripped of her armor, she joined Alixa’s side and shooed Jasen out of the way.

  “The wound is not so very deep,” she said. “For now, I can bandage it. We will have to return to the ship for it to be stitched, though.”

  “Stitched?” Alixa asked, voice rising.

  “She doesn’t like blood,” said Jasen.

  Alixa said, “I don’t like the thought of a needle being—”

  Huanatha cut her off before she became too shrill. “No one does. In life, though, sometimes we must endure things we do not wish to. Kuura? A bandage, if you please.”

  Kuura ripped off a strip of his tunic. Grinning, he said, “My taste in fashion has done us well, yes?”

  As Alixa let Huanatha bandage her head—quite roughly; her bedside manner left a little to be desired—she said, “How is Scourgey?”

  “I believe she will walk again,” said Kuura from beside her. He ran a gentle hand down the scourge’s shoulders. She whimpered softly. Lying almost in the same position she had landed, she looked as though her body had given out, and she was only inches from dying. Perhaps, Jasen thought with a stab of guilt, she was. “I would like to look at her more closely aboard the Lady Vizola.”

  “Is this where we are going?” asked Longwell.

  “For now,” said Huanatha.

  “And Baraghosa?”

  Huanatha turned a hard eye to Jasen. “What happened to him?”

  “He got away,” Jasen said simply. It was the truth, but the omission of their final conversation made him feel as though he were telling a lie.

  “He accomplished his spellcasting?” Longwell asked. He strode for the pewter pot in the center of the chamber. His body moved stiffly.

  “Yes,” said Jasen.

  Longwell looked sourly into the pot. Empty—no light, no purple fog, nothing. “Gone,” he muttered.

  “To what end?” asked Kuura.

  The question was posed to no one—yet Jasen felt as if he must provide the answer. “I don’t know,” he said.

  “What he has done has left traces,” said Huanatha. “It will take some time, but I believe …” She closed her eyes. “We might yet track him.”

  “Then we track him,” said Longwell instantly.

  Kuura said, “First, we should report to Shipmaster Burund.”

  Right. The Lady Vizola. They had injuries to patch up before leaving off … though, Jasen thought, Burund might not wish to chase Baraghosa a second time over these seas.

  30

  The rain came down.

  “I will follow him,” said Longwell. “Whether any of you joins me, I will follow.” Grinding a fist into his open palm, he muttered, “This debt will not be left unpaid.”

  They were on the way back to the dock.

  Every step, Jasen’s heart lurched. They could not see the Lady Vizola from here; the rock rose in jagged waves that blocked it, and much of the surrounding sea, from view.

  What Jasen could see were dark stormclouds.

  “We will follow,” said Huanatha, determination in her voice. “All of us.”

  Kuura was more balanced: “You cannot speak for all—”

  Huanatha rounded on him, nostrils flaring. “Backing out now, are you, Kuura of Nunahk?” Before he could answer, she made a cutting motion with her hand. Teeth bared like a wolf’s, she said, “I believed you a fine warrior, dedicated to doing what is right. You are hurt the least of us—and you wish to fall out of this fight?”

  “I am saying no such thing,” said Kuura quickly. If he had not been carrying Scourgey upon his shoulders, he might have thrown up his hands in surrender. “I just mean, yeh cannot speak for everyone. The children—”

  “Are just as determined and dedicated to honor!”

  “Let them have their own say,” said Longwell, words measured.

  So Huanatha rounded on them now, too. “Well?” she demanded.

  Jasen opened his mouth—

  Yet Alixa was first to answer.

  “We cannot let him go now,” she said. “I cannot.” Shaking her head, she added, “Baraghosa killed our countrymen. He must pay for that.”

  Longwell nodded.

  Huanatha looked satisfied at Alixa’s answer. Still, a slight moue remained as she turned to Jasen. “And you?”

  For once, the answer was not immediate. That little voice that had made itself known in the chamber, after Baraghosa’s departure—it came back, whispering doubt. For though he was certain that the sorcerer was a cruel man who must be stopped—and he was; he had confessed that he planned sins of his own—the pushing force behind Jasen had changed somewhat. Because, in spite of himself, Jasen believed him when he said he had not had a hand in the destruction of Terreas.

  Just as he believed it when Baraghosa told him that he was dying.

  Yet Huanatha was fierce, and her wrath not a sort Jasen wished to incur. So he said plainly, “I will follow him.” She nodded, her lips tight, and resumed their route down the treacherous path to the dock.

  It was slick, and grew only slicker as they neared.

  Every crag Jasen believed was the last, the one that would peel away and reveal the waters around the isle of Baraghosa to them—and the Lady Vizola, which he prayed desperately was still there, that Burund had not turned away at the sight of Baraghosa descending to the dock, finally extricating himself from this awful chase he had become a part of …

  A bolt of lightning split the air.

  A bolt of vibrant purple lightning.

  Jasen stopped, stared—

  “The ship!” cried Longwell.

  And suddenly they were running. Kuura led the charge, then Huanatha and Longwell were passing him, he faster than her despite all the armor and the enormous lance he carried. Jasen beat feet to keep up, pushing himself as another peal split the air and the rain hammered down harder still. He threw a hand out as he passed by Alixa, catching her wrist. She was wrenched along in his wake, down the path they had picked out through the wretched, twisted onyx rock, and around a sudden fork, to see—

  A pure white blast exploding upon the sea. There, the sea swelled, rising terribly high—

  A wave surged to the shore.

  It towered high above the Lady Vizola—Jasen realized that there was nothing they could do. Yet he roared anyway, crying out as if his voice could carry the full mile down to the dock, could warn them in time—

  The water broke across the Lady Vizola.

  For a fraction of a second, the boat held her place.

  But the wave was too great. The boat was shunted, first into the dock—then the dock splintered, coming apart like a matchstick in a man’s fingers—and the wood and boat flowed with it into the rock, that jagged, sharp rock—

  “NO—!”

  The Lady Vizola smashed into it.

  Her hull broke apart—and then vanished almost immediately under the water.

  Jasen stilled. He stared in horror as the sea churned. Another bolt of lightning ripped from the sky. This streak was bright green. It exploded on the sea, whirling the waters into a terrifying frenzy once more. The sound came a couple of seconds later—a world-ending BOOM! he had hoped never to hear again.

  A burning scent came with it, overwhelming the salt in the air, cloying in Jasen’s throat.

  As the rain pelted down,
he turned back to the dark spire looming above them.

  Gooseflesh rose on his skin.

  “No,” he whispered, the word so terribly distant in his ears.

  No one would come for them.

  Here, on this forsaken island, trapped walled off by the rest of the world by strange fogs, and whispers of curses that kept even the most foolhardy away…

  They were trapped.

  Jasen and Alixa Will Return in

  A Home in the Hills

  Ashes of Luukessia, Volume Three

  Coming Mid to Late 2018!

  Author’s Note

  Thanks for reading! If you want to know immediately when future books become available, take sixty seconds and sign up for my NEW RELEASE EMAIL ALERTS by CLICKING HERE. I don’t sell your information and I only send out emails when I have a new book out. The reason you should sign up for this is because I don’t always set release dates, and even if you’re following me on Facebook (robertJcrane (Author)) or Twitter (@robertJcrane), it’s easy to miss my book announcements because … well, because social media is an imprecise thing.

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  Cheers,

  Robert J. Crane

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Editorial/Literary Janitorial duties performed by Sarah Barbour and Nick Bowman. Final proofing was handled by the Jeff Bryan. Any errors you see in the text, however, are the result of me rejecting changes.

  The cover was once more designed with exceeding skill by Karri Klawiter of artbykarri.com.

  Thanks again to my co-author, an amazing life-saver who makes my life easier in pretty much every way in which his life intersects mine.

  The formatting was provided by nickbowman-editing.com.

  Once more, thanks to my parents, my in-laws, my kids and my wife, for helping me keep things together.