Portals of Infinity: Book Three: Of Temples and Trials

by John Van Stry

  “Oh,” she stopped and thought a moment. “Would you like me to stay here with you?”

  “You’d just distract me,” I said looking down at her. Her ears went flat and she blushed. “Besides, if anything does happen, I wouldn’t want you to get hurt.”

  “Okay. I will have someone bring you your supper however.”

  I smiled at her, “Thank you.”

  It was late. I had donned most of my gear and weapons. I had no idea what, if anything, I was expecting, but in any case, I didn’t want to be caught unprepared. Most of the carts had been taken back to the barracks to be locked up and guarded for the night; there was also the possibility of things being pilfered of course. After what had happened to the two stones however I now wanted to be sure no one snuck in to do any further damage to the supplies.

  There were two carts left here, as well as a large pile of planks for the building, nothing that you could easily steal without the city guard taking notice. Tomorrow I’d have Carso detail a temple guard to watch the grounds from this point forward. But for tonight, I was just curious if anyone was going to cause problems, and if so, I wanted to see if I could find out just whom they were.

  Besides, it had been pretty boring, all this talking to the town council who all knew that they had no real choice and were just putting on a show, and then watching people put up a building. I really would rather be with Rachel and my son, but Fel wanted me here, so here I was.

  I spent my time sitting in a dark shadow, where the few lights around the outskirts of the building site wouldn’t illuminate me. Even with the lanterns, things were rather dark. I had a cloak on to soften my outline and I did my best to meditate and not fall asleep. I think Fel was helping me with that, as I never started to nod off as the night dragged on.

  When one of the lights suddenly guttered and then went out, I figured if anything was going to happen, it was going to happen soon.

  Twenty or so minutes later, I felt it. A feeling that something wasn’t right, with a direction attached. I carefully made my way through the shadows until I saw it, several figures trying to pry up one of the slabs.

  “Right, so what’s all this then?” I called out rather loudly as I got within twenty feet.

  They dropped their things and ran, which was not what I had expected! I had figured they’d attack me, thinking I was just a local guard.

  Swearing loudly I took off after them, and they all split up, each into a different direction. I got maybe a block away when I realized that if I spent the night chasing one of them, I’d be leaving the grounds unguarded. So with a heavy sigh I turned around and trotted back.

  As the tools they had dropped were now gone, I realized that coming back was a good idea. I also realized I should have just tried to ambush one of them, instead of announcing my presence.

  I took a few minutes to examine the rest of the grounds and found nothing out of place, and then took up my position again to wait until morning. The rest of the night passed quietly however and when the work team rolled up with the carts and the tools in the morning, everything was as they had left it.

  “Any problems?” Tareassa asked as she came up to me with Jezza and Second Carso in tow.

  “Someone tried to tamper with one of the stones,” I said leading them over to the spot where I had encountered the figures last night. “But they ran off before I could catch them.”

  The builder and Tareassa spent a few minutes examining the spot.

  “Well nothing looks damaged, and the blessings seem to be intact.” She stopped a moment and picked up a small object. “What’s this?” she asked and handed it to me.

  I looked at it; it was a small piece of bone, flattened shaped like a triangle. A guitar pick?

  “Let me see,” I said and taking it from her, I examined it, and then put it in a pocket. “I’ll look into it,” I told her.

  She nodded, “Well let’s get the footing for the altar placed, and then they start on the sacristy cover.”

  Jezza agreed with her and I went off to get some breakfast and to think about what I had found.

  Six

  (Saladin – Tradeson)

  The treaty signing took almost three hours. They all wanted to make a speech, and once they got started, some of them didn’t seem to want to stop. I’m not a fan of speeches to start with and I’m even less of a fan of long useless speeches. Having to sit though all of this while tired didn’t make it anymore enjoyable.

  When they finally finished and signed and I had witnessed it all, I gave a sigh of relief. At least they laid out a nice spread of food, beer, wine, and ale. I suspect the only reason so many people had sat through the whole affair was the promise of free booze and food at the end of it. It did appear that all the beer and other spirits did help to sell the populace on the idea, not that I doubt many really cared one way or the other.

  By the time I had managed to free myself from my obligations and headed back to the building site for the new temple, I was rather impressed. The entire delegation that had come with me was working on it, even the priestesses and priests. They had also apparently hired quite a few locals to work on it as well, and one of the things I saw them building was a perimeter fence to control access to the temple.

  As I walked inside the boundary of the ward stones I could feel Fel’s presence, this was definitely holy ground now, which meant the altar must have been set. Coming around from the back of the site, where I had entered, I could see it indeed had been.

  “William!” Tareassa called and waved from off to the side of the sacristy, which several workers were still finishing. I walked over and joined her.

  “I see you’ve made quite a bit of progress today.”

  She smiled, “Well we’re spending enough gold to get the work done as quickly as possible. Jezza told me we’ll have the frame of the entire building done in two weeks as well as the roof and external walls.”

  “Wow,” I said looking around. “Guess he hired a lot of people.”

  “He told me he’ll have even more here after the frame goes up, to do all the inside work and the finishing work.”

  “Great, then I’ll be able to leave here sooner than I had hoped.”

  “Awww, do you have to leave so soon?” she asked leaning into me.

  “Oh don’t worry; I’m taking you with me.” I smiled.

  “What!” She looked shocked.

  “Didn’t I tell you that there would be a price to pay for warming my bed?” I scowled and put my hand on my chin as if deep in thought. “Could have sworn I told you that.”

  She growled and stepped on my foot for a change.

  “I like it here,” she said.

  “Joel and Kayryn have been here for over a decade now. If anyone deserves the job of presiding over the new temple here, it’s them. Besides, I need you more than they will.”

  She stopped and looked up at me surprised. “You will?”

  “Of course, with a pretty little thing like you up there in Stongshold, the men won’t be able to stay away from services, and of course their women will all show up to keep an eye on them,” I said smirking.

  She growled and stomped even harder on my foot. “Wise-ass.”

  “You are also the most powerful of all the priests and priestesses here, and with one less ward stone, we’re going to need that power to get set up.”

  Tareassa sighed, “I’d forgotten that, you’re right.”

  “Well let’s go back to the inn and get some food, they seem to have things well in hand here and will probably be wrapping up soon anyways. Did you talk to Second Carso about setting up a guard?”

  “He’s detailed three shifts of eight men each. Most of the acolytes and other clergy are staying at the old church where Joel and Kayryn live, it’s just down the street a ways over there,” she said pointing as we headed to the inn.

  “I heard that place is pretty small.”

  “For a house, it’s not too bad. For a church, it is positively tiny. But
apparently they’ve been packing them in, so,” she shrugged, “obviously they’ve been doing a good job here.”

  I nodded and yawned. I wasn’t really all that tired, but after being up all night my mind was telling me I should be. Sometimes the champion thing didn’t exactly mesh with my body’s expectations.

  “You better not fall asleep on me!” Tareassa teased.

  “Oh I’m sure you’ll find a way to keep me awake,” I chuckled and stifled another yawn.

  I awoke to someone pounding on the door with Tareassa curled up against me. I tossed off the sheet and jumped out of bed grabbing a sword.

  “What?” I growled.

  “There’s a fire at the temple site!” Someone whose voice I didn’t recognize yelled.

  I swore and grabbing my weapon’s harness, I ran out the door. People were opening their doors and looking confused. I grabbed one of the guards and ordered him to watch Tareassa and then just bolted down the stairs and out the front door, running across town until I got to the site.

  As I watched, one of the sacristy walls, which was on fire came down, and it looked like it was being dragged away from the building. One of the adjoining walls to it that had also caught fire quickly followed.

  As I got closer, I remembered that they hadn’t put the walls up yet, just strung up some heavy canvass for tomorrow’s services. Somebody must have had the presence of mind to cut the canvas loose and others were hauling it away.

  I crossed onto the temple grounds and I couldn’t feel anything else wrong, so apparently nothing else had been damaged. But I heard the cries of pain from inside the building and quickly ran inside ready for the worst.

  I didn’t find any fighting inside, what I did find were several soldiers who had nearly all of the fur burned off their bodies and were covered in burns.

  “What happened to them?” I asked one of the soldiers who had apparently just doused one of them with a bucket of water.

  “They climbed up the framework to cut the canvas loose,” he said looking at me wide-eyed in shock. “While it was still burning!”

  I swore and went to the one who looked the worst and cast what healing spells I could on him. I could heal wounds, but something this bad wasn’t in my abilities unless I was casting it on myself.

  I was rather shocked then when the power kept flowing through me! I was able to get him fairly stable and I went and helped the one next to him, then the third one who was still smoldering. About that time, Joel showed up.

  I waved him over, “These men need more help than I can give them.”

  “You’re in your God’s house William; you should be able to draw on his power all you need.” Joel said looking at me as if I was one of the slow kids.

  “I don’t know how to heal burns,” I told him. “I’m not a healer, I’m a champion.”

  He tsk’ed at me and went over to the first one to finish healing him. By the time he got to the second the other clerics had all arrived and they spilt up, some going outside to heal the ones who’d gotten burns while dragging the canvas away.

  The city guard also showed up at that moment, a fire in a walled city was a dangerous thing, and they also wanted to know what happened.

  I went and found the guard in charge, turned out he was the one burned the worst. He looked a lot better now, though he didn’t have much fur left on his body, so they had wrapped him in a soft cloth.

  “What happened?” I asked him as Joel gave him a canteen of water to drink.

  “Flaming arrows came from the roof tops to the south of us,” he said weakly, and then took a drink.

  “That was a brave thing you did,” I told him.

  He smiled looking a bit pained still and very tired. “I figured it would hurt less than having the Godslayer pissed at me for not doing my job!” He coughed a bit and took another drink of water. “Besides, being on holy ground, I was sure that my God would take care of me.”

  I smiled, nodded, and resisted the urge to shake his hand or pat him, well anywhere. Even with the healing, I’m sure his body was still hurting all over.

  I turned to the head of the city guard who had followed me. “Might as well take a look at the roofs over there.”

  “Whoever it is, I’m sure they’re long gone.”

  “Still, wouldn’t hurt to make sure. Besides, if they left anything burning up there, we should go put it out.”

  He thought about that a moment and then nodded. “I’ll detail a couple of my men.”

  I stood up and looked around. I still had my weapon’s harness in my left hand; I’d re-sheathed my sword at this point.

  “You know, you look good like that,” Tareassa purred.

  “Hmm?” I said and looked down at my naked self. “Oh right, you didn’t bring my clothes, did you?” I asked noticing I was getting quite a few looks, mostly from the fems.

  “Sorry,” she blushed.

  I shrugged; we were all covered in fur already, so it didn’t really bother me all that much. “Well, let me check with everyone, then we can go back to the inn.”

  “Do you think they’ll try anything else tonight?”

  I shook my head. “Not at this point, there are too many people here now. But you should probably move a few of the clergy onsite now. They could have helped quite a bit.”

  Tareassa nodded, “I’ll go talk to the others while you make the rounds.”

  I went outside and took a few minutes to look around and check with the guards. Nobody could really tell me anything that I hadn’t heard already, so I gathered up Tareassa and went back to the inn.

  I moved onto the temple ground the next morning after the mass had finished.

  “Expecting more trouble?” Jezza asked looking at me as I put my gear and a bedroll back behind the altar.

  “Hoping to prevent any,” I replied.

  He nodded. “Well as long as you’re here, care to help?”

  “Might at well. What do you need?”

  He took me over to the team that was working on framing out the main section of the temple. “Got ya’ some muscle to help out today boys!” He said giving me a slap on the back.

  The foreman brightened up immediately, “Another pair of strong hands will definitely be a blessing Jezza! Thanks Sir Will for helping!”

  “It’s just Will,” I said and looked at the others on the team who were looking at me curiously. “So what do you need me to do?”

  I’d never framed out a large building before, and I was surprised at how tough a job some of it was. There were some pretty heavy beams that needed to be hauled up and set into place while the others secured them. Because of my enhanced strength, they were all rather happy to have me, and while it wasn’t the most challenging of jobs mentally, I enjoyed the work and spending time with the other workers.

  That night everything was quiet, but the next morning as they moved the carts from the barracks where some of them were kept at night, the wheels broke on two of them. Apparently, someone had managed to cut through the felloes, or the outside wooden rim, of two of the wheels sometime during the night. As both carts were heavily laden it made quite a mess and I heard from some of the others that Second Carso had some rather rough words with the soldiers who had been guarding the carts that night. It was suspected that the two damaged carts had been parked close to the entryway of the area they had been parked in.

  Later that afternoon, after the work for the day was complete, but it hadn’t started to get dark yet, I decided to go for a walk though some of the city and start looking around for wherever it was that the minstrels were meeting. I hadn’t gotten far when I heard a commotion, turning back I saw a small herd of suzhen, the demonic version of sheep they had here in Saladin, attacking the people who were packing up for the day at the temple site.

  Sighing I turned and ran back, suzhen could be pretty nasty and from the sounds of things, this group of them was. By the time we killed them all, it was getting dark. But at least we had lots of fresh meat for dinner that ni
ght.

  The next day was more of the same, only by the time we got done, it was already getting dark, so I decided to stay on the grounds and see if anything happened tonight.

  Nothing did and I wondered how long the break would last. I found out when I decided to spend the afternoon wandering the city instead of working. A runner found me and told me I had to get back to the site. Someone had tossed several beehives onto the grounds, and it was playing havoc with the work crews. Whoever was behind it had made sure to stir up the bees quite a bit before tossing them onto the grounds.

  That night I was rudely awakened by one of the priests who said there was someone lurking on the grounds. As soon as he said it I could feel it too, but it didn’t feel quite the same as the last time. That time it had a feeling of urgency to it. This time it was more like an annoyance.

  Grabbing my bow, I went outside and quietly snuck around until I found the culprit. They had their head inside one of the carts, and were obviously looking around. I noticed that they had one hand braced against the cart, so drawing an arrow on my bow I nailed it to the side of the cart, rather impressed by the sudden loud shriek of my target.

  “Unless you want the next one through the heart, I suggest you shut up and tell me what you’re doing here!” I called out as I walked up to them.

  “I was only looking! I didn’t touch na’thing, I swear!” They yelled, head still under the tarp covering the cart.

  “Come out from under the tarp, where I can see you,” I growled.

  “I can’t move! I’m stuck here!” They cried.

  “If you don’t move now, you’re going to be stuck there for the rest of your very short life!”

  “You’ll kill me!”

  “Five... Four... Three...”

  “Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!” They cried out and ducked out from under the tarp. I looked him over as he stood there shivering in fear, that only got more so when he saw who I was and his eyes widened.

  “You’re, You’re...”