Realm of Ruins

by Hannah West

  Mercer opened one eye. “If you don’t sleep, tomorrow is going to be a flogging.”

  “Reminding a sleepless person of why they need to sleep is always helpful,” I grumbled.

  He chuckled and closed his eye again.

  I’d thought fleetingly of the woman he’d mentioned, but now that we were practically alone, I heard myself ask, “Who’s Lundy?”

  Both of his brown eyes opened this time.

  “You mentioned her and a baby,” I said.

  Silence stretched through the seconds until they felt like hours, but he finally said, “She grew up with us in Aldirn. That was our village. She was two years younger than Tilmorn and two years older than me. The three of us were always together. From the time we were children, everyone teased her about how she’d never be able to choose which Fye brother to marry. She loved us equally and in different ways, it was plain to see. But once I became an elicromancer, I wasn’t content to live a simple life in Aldirn like Tilmorn. I wanted to sharpen my gift so I could one day serve as an advisor to the King of Calgoran. I didn’t want to marry, I wanted to go on adventures. And I didn’t love Lundy the way she did me. But Tilmorn did, so they wed. She was pregnant when the Moth King’s men took him.”

  “And you helped care for her and the baby?” I asked.

  He nodded. “And it was my pleasure, even though times were hard. But Lundy wanted more than I could give. She wanted me to be a father and husband. She even wanted to tell their son that I was his father so he wouldn’t feel the lack. We assumed Tilmorn wouldn’t return the same man, if he ever returned. But lie to the boy and tell him I was his father? As though Tilmorn had never even existed?”

  He stopped, cleared his throat before continuing. “I refused to let the boy’s true legacy be forgotten. I said I would help provide for the two of them and keep them safe until my dying breath, but part of keeping them safe was wresting the realm back from the monster that had taken Tilmorn. I felt it was my first duty. I materialized to the elicromancer hideout in Yorth often, until I’d seen too many people die in traps. I asked Lundy to come to Yorth with me so we’d be farther from danger. But Lundy refused. The last time I saw her, she hated me for being willing to leave without them. But I had to.”

  “You don’t know what became of them, do you?”

  This time, he didn’t try to force down the weakness in his voice. “No. Thanks to the elicromancers’ contract with the sea witches, I assume they lived out their lives until they died of old age. If Halmer inherited Tilmorn’s elicrin blood, he might have survived the Water.”

  “Halmer,” I said, trying the name on my tongue. “There was a famous Halmer who fought in the Elicrin War, but it was centuries after your time. He had the gift of stealth and conducted most of the reconnaissance missions before the good elicromancers defeated the traitors. He was one of the oldest elicromancers at that time, and one of the few from his generation to remain loyal. They say time corrupts, which is why we have an age of surrender for elicrin stones.”

  “Was Fye his family name?” Mercer asked.

  “No,” I said, regretting that I had spurred erroneous hope. “No, it was something else. I’ll ask Glisette tomorrow to see if she remembers from history lessons.” Though I doubted I would bring it up again.

  Mercer closed his eyes. “We should sleep.”

  Disheartened, I turned over to look at the stars again. But before I could glare into the void of sleeplessness once more, I said, “Halmer Gladforth.”

  Mercer jolted to a sitting position, hair perking out in all directions. “What?”

  “That was his name.”

  “Gladforth was Lundy’s family name.” He laughed in disbelief, and the sound was round and full. It made me want to laugh too. “That can’t be coincidence, can it?”

  I found myself smiling. “I doubt it.”

  “That’s unbelievable,” he said, breathless as he spread out on his mat and tucked one hand behind his head. The other rested on the exposed hollow space between muscle and bone above his pelvis. I thought of those brief minutes when I had permission to touch his bare skin, how distant that reality seemed at the moment. “He was a little lad to me just a few weeks ago. A war hero…” The joy faded from his voice. “How did he die? In battle?”

  “I believe he gave up his elicrin stone with the others after the war. He would have lived out the rest of his days among friends who aged as mortals after giving up their stones, probably in Darmeska.”

  “She didn’t pass on our name. Everything I did…I was striving to protect their futures. I couldn’t give her what she wanted. But I thought I could give her something more important.”

  I didn’t know what to say. Words hung unspoken in the air, but none of them were right, so I didn’t pluck them until a new thought crossed my mind. “Did the blacksmith remind you of her?”

  “Yes,” he said, lying back down. “Lundy was strong and sweet-natured. She liked hard work and good ale and company. She wasn’t afraid of anything until everything was taken from her.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “We’ve all suffered loss,” he said, his throat bobbing.

  “Why didn’t your visions show you Lundy and Halmer?”

  “They don’t exactly heed my wishes.”

  “I suppose not, if you know so much about me yet so little about them.”

  He didn’t reply, and I sensed a sudden coldness coming from his bedroll. The fire began to dim and I watched flecks of ash swirl in the smoke.

  “We’re crossing into Volarre soon?” he asked.

  “Yes. We’ll reach the border before nightfall day after tomorrow. There are two bridges that cross the gorge, and one of them is the main road. We should take the narrower, less-used bridge and steal horses after we’ve crossed.”

  He didn’t say anything after that. Calanthe left his side to curl up at mine and warmed me as the night grew cool. I drifted off to sleep.

  ORE and more trees cropped up over the next two days.

  Soon after crossing the border into Volarre, we would be free of the open fields and able to lose ourselves in the centuries-old trees. Upon reaching the Forest of the West Fringe, we could disappear entirely.

  At last, we approached the deep chasm of the gorge that followed the border. A glance from the edge offered dizzying views that made my knees feel as though they would drop out from under me. The grass gave way to steep rock ledges, none navigable. We hadn’t come upon the narrow bridge yet, but I assured the others it should be just around a westward bend.

  Clouds flew by on a quick wind, casting shadows across the dramatic landscape. We stopped for an early dinner, which Kadri declined. I realized that she hadn’t eaten breakfast either. It struck me that her abstinence had nothing to do with appetite and all to do with proving her value on this journey after insisting to Mercer that she would not be dead weight. She had combed any wild bushes we’d passed and kept a sharp eye out for game and berries even though there was plenty of food for her.

  “Kadri,” I said, coming alongside her and dodging her bow tip. “You need to eat something. We’re not strapped for provisions.”

  “It’s the principle. I promised I would be an asset, not a burden.”

  “If you grow too weak to walk you will be a burden.”

  “I’m far from that,” she said. “And we’re almost to the woodlands. There will be plenty of game there.”

  “In the meantime, eat something. Please?”

  She didn’t reply, but I decided would take up the battle again at the next meal.

  We walked on without seeing any bridge at all—yet I was sure I hadn’t led us astray.

  “What’s it like in Erdem?” I asked, to distract myself. “The land? Is it green?”

  “In parts, but other regions are arid. It was rainy and muddy where we lived and there were violent storms. Mountain ranges separate inland Erdem from the coasts and from Perispos, and there aren’t many passes through. When the mis
t rolled down in autumn, it felt as if there was no escaping that wall of jagged mountains. But it was beautiful on sunny days, and oh! The spices. You wouldn’t believe them. I know we have imports from Erdem here, but the colors and flavors aren’t the same. There were whole markets in Dogahn dedicated to spices and nothing else.”

  Kadri’s eyes took on a dreamy quality and she got lost in her thoughts, presumably of food, while Glisette stopped short. “I don’t think there’s a bridge,” she announced.

  I turned around. “There is.” If I’d made an error—though I was sure I hadn’t—I planned to fall on my sword. “We shouldn’t be far….”

  “Did you see that pile of rocks at the bottom a few minutes back?”

  “That little dam?” I asked with a sinking feeling.

  Glisette shook her head. “I think it was the bridge. Someone destroyed it. Maybe Mercer and I could levitate us across.”

  “It’s a hard spell to maintain for that long and I’m not willing to risk it,” Mercer said. “We need to take the main road.” I didn’t miss the way he gripped the hilt of his sword, or the way his gray-green elicrin stone seemed to glint with rapt attention to his movements.

  “Or skirt the gorge completely,” I suggested.

  “There will be blights waiting for us no matter which route we choose. We may as well go the quickest way, over the main bridge. We’re closer to the road.”

  “So whatever we do, we will face an ambush?” I asked.

  Mercer’s eyes sparked with resolve. “It’s not an ambush if you expect it.”

  * * *

  My nerves hummed as we reached the point where the dirt road running north to south met the gorge running east to west. All we had to do was cross the bridge and pass beneath the guard tower. Then we’d be in Volarre.

  “What about the concealing spell?” Glisette asked, tucking her hair into her cap. Her curls’ clean shine had dulled. “We could sneak across?”

  “Some blights still have enough magic to sniff out spells,” Mercer said. “Let’s just hope the only eyes in the tower belong to Realm Alliance guards. We can pay a toll and be on our way.”

  “Paying a toll to get into my own kingdom!” Glisette harrumphed.

  “If they’re blights, you and I can take care of them,” Mercer said to her. “I’ve fought and killed many blights,” he reassured us when Kadri and I shared a panicked glance. “We’ll rest easier knowing we’ve picked off a few of them.”

  A peddler with a wagon in tow appeared on the road, heading north like us. “Let’s see what happens,” Mercer suggested, stepping back into the trees. “Get ready to come to his aid.”

  The peddler passed underneath the guard tower, receiving nary a greeting. He paused for a moment on the other side, perhaps curious as to why he hadn’t seen a face in the window or guards posted at the passage, and then moved on.

  “Are the towers always manned?” Mercer asked.

  “Ours are,” Glisette said.

  “Same in Calgoran,” I said.

  “It’s likely compromised, then,” Mercer said. “But we can’t stay here forever.”

  “I agree,” Glisette said. “I would rather face them in the light than wait for them to steal upon us in the dark.” She clamped her sparkling elicrin stone and its elaborate pendant between her fingers.

  We started forward, cautious, Kadri quietly drawing back an arrow. My gaze clung to the windows of the tower where I expected a pale, wasting face to appear, probably with a leering grin that would haunt my dreams.

  I gripped my dagger hilt as we took the first step onto the bridge. Any other day, the depth of the drop on either side would have unnerved me, but I trained my attention on the looming and eerily empty tower.

  And then we came upon it, crossing under the shadow of the archway with no trouble. My mind danced with the hope that we’d somehow outsmarted the blights or outrun them.

  But we saw the flagpoles at the far end of the bridge, and that hope fell to pieces.

  The blue flag of Volarre with its silver lily lay in a heap at the bottom of the right post. The green flag of Yorth with its bronze sea serpent lay tattered on the left. Two gray banners had been raised, each bearing the sigil of a white moth. And a bloody corpse had been bound to each pole.

  A cry of horror slashed its way out of me as I recognized the dark blond hair and leather apron of the body on the right, and then the gray hair and sturdy build on the left: the blacksmiths from Tully.

  With a roar of rage and sorrow, Mercer drew his sword and sprinted to the open tower door. But other than the hollow echo of his boots on the stones, there was only silence. The guard post was empty.

  “It could still be an attack,” Glisette said, her eyes scanning the sparse trees lining the road.

  It would have been a fine time for blights to attack. The dagger shook in my hands. I couldn’t have even gutted a fish with my shock-weakened muscles. But it didn’t matter. No attack came.

  Calanthe loped forward and sniffed at the red-stained grass around the posts, scaring away the birds pecking at the bodies.

  I trod onward out of a sense of duty and the others followed. Gruesome details became clearer with every step until a blur of warm tears blocked them out: discolored faces, missing fingers, bloody ropes tied around wrists and necks. I took a step off the bridge and stumbled to my knees in the dirt, my chest filling with sobs so intense I couldn’t find air to breathe.

  A hand squeezed my shoulder. Lingering whiffs of Kadri’s lavender perfume covered the smell of death.

  Mercer winced up at Pearl’s body. “They haven’t been up there long,” he muttered, averting his eyes. “Scavengers would have…” He trailed off, sparing us. “The blights could still be nearby.”

  “Their fingers…” I said.

  “Clean cuts,” Mercer rasped. “Not scavengers.”

  “No,” I said, shaking my head as if the movement might jerk me out of this nightmare. The blights had tortured and murdered these people because of us. The creatures somehow discovered that we had lingered at the smithy in Tully, and perhaps assumed the blacksmiths could provide information regarding our whereabouts…or they had slaughtered these innocent people merely to show us there was no escape. Either way, they had to have known that we would recognize their bodies and that this horror would hit us hard.

  Holding his breath, Mercer sawed at the ropes around Pearl’s ankles. Pretending I was made of steel like my dagger, I started sawing at the ties binding her uncle’s body. “Umrac korat,” Glisette whispered, slashing a finger through the air to slice the ropes too high for me to reach. She and Mercer caught Pearl’s lifeless body with a levitating spell and set her gently on the ground before moving on to her uncle.

  I wiped my tears with my sleeve, stood up, and retrieved the trowel from the saddlebags. I marched past the bodies down the road—ignoring a strewn and bloody tunic that must have belonged to one of the the guards manning the tower—and dove into a patch of unsullied grass, attacking it ferociously in an attempt to dig a grave. I dug desperately, making little progress while Calanthe licked away my tears. When my power started acting up without my control and the nearby tree roots rotted and shriveled, Glisette seized me by the shoulders and backed me away.

  She and Mercer calmly chanted together in Old Nisseran, their elicrin stones bright, and the dirt churned and poured upward until two deep and perfect graves yawned up at us.

  The blights could have waited for us. They could have made sure to attack us.

  But the terror was enough for now.

  HE anticipation of an ambush hung heavier in the air with every step we took and every league we put behind us. Mercer and Glisette mumbled protective spells under their breaths. Our sleep was restless. None of us struggled to rise at dawn each day; we were already awake. We didn’t even mention stealing horses from the few lonely residences we passed, knowing that our mere presence could be a death sentence for those who dwelt within.

  Since encounter
ing the bodies, Kadri hadn’t skipped a single meal, and true to her promise, she had delivered a brown hare, a pheasant, and a few handfuls of unripe blackberries. But I could hardly tear into the meat without thinking of the flesh of the innocents we’d doomed with nothing more than a friendly encounter, the strewn parts of the Yorthan guard whose only crime was to man the wrong post at the wrong time. The Volarian guard had been left to die of the disease and was still breathing—barely—when we found him farther down the road.

  He had asked for mercy and we had given it to him. Kadri’s shot was the kindest way, and she made tidy work of it.

  Approaching the Forest of the West Fringe should have relieved us. Here we could more easily hide, and the magic of the ancient forest might abet our protective enchantments. But the blights could hide in the age-old shadows too, and mask their steps beneath the eerie creaking of old trees.

  The boughs were so dense and the trees so tall that we had to make camp an hour earlier than when we trod hills and fields. It was Glisette’s turn to keep watch, but when I collapsed on my bedroll, it was with my hand on my dagger and my eyes open. My muscles somehow remembered what it felt like to use a dagger every day in the wilderness, to wield it as naturally as I’d wielded a quill at the academy. My hand recalled the feeling of dragging the blade through hide and readying it in answer to the faintest threatening sound. Mother would have hated to know that these reflexes had survived my return to proper palace life. It surprised even me that my bizarre upbringing had proved useful.

  A chill wreathed through the air, licking up my arms and neck and through my hair. It felt predatory.

  I looked toward my companions. Kadri and Mercer were asleep, or at least appeared to be. Calanthe curled up in a massive heap of wiry gray hair next to me. Glisette sat with her back to the warm fire, but a shudder crawled between her shoulders.

  The memory of Devorian’s twisted features came unbidden: the bent shoulders, the rawboned fingers and ragged claws. If he hadn’t ventured down the selfish, dark road of trying to resurrect his mother and father, maybe the Moth King would have remained imprisoned and dormant forever.