Legends of Dimmingwood 02:Betrayal of Thieves

by C. Greenwood

  “Were you even listening to a word I said?” I asked. “My friend is innocent. He’s been mistakenly assumed guilty of crimes he never committed and is in danger of suffering a punishment he doesn’t deserve—if he hasn’t already. If that doesn’t constitute a miscarriage of justice, I don’t know what does.”

  The stress of the past days came rushing in on me and my anger gave way to despair, so I stopped short of the insults I was about to shout in the priest’s face. Instead, I sighed, scrubbed a weary hand across my face, and said, “But maybe I’m wrong. Maybe you have the right of it and I should just stand back and allow my friend to suffer while I escape and live free for another day. What makes Terrac’s fate my responsibility? He had just as much chance to escape as I.” Except that he had come after me that day to say farewell. If not for me, he would never have run into the Fists. That made all the difference.

  “You truly believe in this boy’s innocence,” Hadrian said quietly. “You care about him.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you seek no gain for yourself?”

  “None,” I said.

  “That is very un-scoundrelish of you. In fact, you’re in danger of doing a thing some would call noble,” he said.

  “I’m glad you find that amusing. But what am I standing here for?”

  I would have turned away but suddenly Hadrian was blocking my path.

  “Don’t be so hasty,” he said. “Put away your bow, sit down, and we’ll talk things over carefully. This time, I promise to reserve judgment.”

  As he spoke, he moved to take the bow from my hands. I tightened my grip, surprised at the flare of possessiveness I felt at another person attempting to handle the weapon.

  Hadrian noticed and dropped his voice so that not even Fleet could hear. “I’m not forgetting there are other things we need to talk about as well,” he said quietly.

  CHAPTER TEN

  We spent the remainder of the daylight hours and sat up late into the night discussing Terrac’s situation and what should be done about it. It didn’t take me long to realize enlisting the aid of the priest may have been a mistake. At this point, it appeared Hadrian might do our cause more harm than good. Once I had convinced him Terrac’s worst crime was to become involved with the wrong people, he was nearly as determined as I to see him spared a wrongful fate. Unfortunately, his ideas on how to go about the rescue were a little more legal than anything I had in mind. He wanted to meet with the Praetor, have Terrac brought forward for a chance to defend himself, and bring me out to shed light on the truth.

  He seemed oblivious to the fact the only witness to the boy’s innocence was a bedraggled woods thief who, the moment she admitted her association with the band of Rideon the Red Hand, would be clapped in irons herself. I wanted to save Terrac all right but not at the cost of my neck. For that matter, I wouldn’t endanger the band either and it was certain I would be doing so if I complied with Hadrian’s plan. Maybe in the world Hadrian liked to imagine, the authorities would gratefully accept the testimony of an admitted outlaw and allow me walk free. But this wasn’t that place. The nearest authority in the region was the Praetor, a man not known for his tolerance of outlaws, particularly those associated with the Red Hand. I didn’t want to imagine what Rideon’s reaction would be if he knew I was even contemplating such an action.

  Fleet promoted an altogether different approach. I should storm the dungeons and slaughter the guards, rescue Terrac, and carry him back to the safety of Dimmingwood. Or, even more brilliant, I could force my way into the keep at the heart of the city, murder any opposition, and take the very Praetor prisoner, holding him on threat of death until he ordered my friend freed. I would be carrying all this out alone, of course, because Fleet would have no involvement with either plan, despite both having been his idea.

  What none of us wanted to mention was the possibility all our planning could prove to be for nothing. We couldn’t be certain Terrac was even alive, considering the last time I saw him he’d had an arrow in his back.

  We finally decided our first action must be to learn exactly what had befallen him since then and, once his position was known, we could build our plans from there. Here our consensus ended, because no one could put forth a reasonable suggestion on how this information should be attained. The priest and the street thief were at odds on every possibility, and as the night drew on, I developed a splitting headache from listening to their bickering. The candles the river woman lit around the room had burned low and still Fleet and Hadrian worried at one another’s plans like a pair of dogs at opposite ends of a bone. Seephinia had long since retired.

  My eyelids drooped, the voices of my companions growing distant, as the failing light carved deep shadows across their faces. I leaned my head against the wall, sleep crept in to claim me, and I slipped blissfully into a place where cool forest shadows enveloped me and the only sounds were the singing of crickets and the familiar rustling of leaves and creaking treetops swaying overhead.

  ***

  The next three days found the situation scarcely changed. I eventually talked Hadrian out of his foolish plan and together we persuaded Fleet to see the flaws in his schemes as well. We decided Fleet would spend the days hanging around the taverns in Selbius, picking up gossip from off-duty city guardsmen frequenting those places, as well as pursuing information from his less reputable connections in the city. He didn’t speak of it, but I knew he was also checking the pillories in the market square daily and that he made it a regular practice to walk past the east bridge in the common district, where executions routinely took place.

  We were living in uneasy times, and the Praetor believed the only hope of curbing the rising lawlessness of the province lay in taking swift and decisive measures against crime. Light pickpockets were strung up alongside violent criminals with little distinction between the two and, from what I heard, on little more evidence than rumor or a doubtful witness or two standing up at a mock trial. The more I considered these things, the more the fear grew within me that I had arrived too late for Terrac.

  Hadrian did his part. Having made it clear from the beginning he had no intention of going through illegal channels to restore Terrac to freedom, he nonetheless set about the endeavor in his own way with a will. Like Fleet, he put the word out among a number of friends in the city, ones he trusted to be discreet, that certain parties would be interested to know of the condition and exact whereabouts of a priest boy named Terrac, suspected to be under the custody of the Praetor’s Fists. He also enlisted the help of Seephinia and a small number of others in the river folk community. I don’t know how he persuaded them to take an interest in our affairs, because they usually bore nothing but contempt for drylanders. But they nurtured an inexplicable respect for Hadrian and at his request agreed to brave the noise and confines of the city, where they kept their eyes and ears open for news of Terrac.

  What was I doing while the others were working so industriously to save my friend? As it turned out, I was the only member of our little conspiracy remaining idle through those long days. Hadrian felt it would be the wisest course to keep me on the river rafts and away from the city as much as possible. I had an air about me, he said, which screamed woods folk and as these were regarded with a measure of suspicion by the city dwellers, it might be best not to call unwanted attention on ourselves by waving me like a flag beneath the noses of the city guard.

  I protested, of course. I had more right to be involved than anybody, and I was no more a risk than Fleet, who couldn’t resist slipping his hand into the pocket of every fifth passerby on the streets. But my protests did me no good. Hadrian said Fleet had that skill only street thieves possessed of pulling off his business effortlessly and blending into the milling crowd before anyone took note of him. He knew the backstreets and allies of the city as well as he knew his own dear mother’s face, whereas I would only blunder around, slowing him down and attracting attention to his actions.

  I couldn’t argue wit
h that, no matter how I wanted to.

  And so, this was how I came to find myself living in the tiny hut, a semi-permanent guest on a river folk barge. Life carried on somewhat monotonously for me during that time. I suffered moments of sickening anxiety on the occasions when Fleet visited to report his lack of progress, but between these times stretched long hours of boredom, as I found myself trapped on a not particularly large vessel with a handful of strangers, most of whom didn’t speak my language.

  Seephinia could speak the Known tongue when she was of a mind to, but most of the time she was not. Her initial dislike for me hadn’t faded and she showed no inclination toward friendship. At least I had that part cleared up now. It hadn’t taken me long to realize the hostility she harbored toward me was the result of my acquaintance with Hadrian. She was as jealous as a hawk over his dinner.

  But she had nothing to worry about there. My friendship with the priest was so new I hesitated to call it even that, yet how could I call a man who was risking everything by mere association with me less than a friend? One thing was certain. It was no good making denials to the river woman. She had already made up her mind about me, and in all honesty I almost enjoyed her jealousy. From the beginning, she hadn’t been especially pleasant toward me and if I found the occasional opportunity to drag the priest off alone and leave her to sweat a little, I did.

  Such opportunities weren’t hard to come by because Hadrian and I had much to talk about. One afternoon we talked of the bow. It was a chilly day. We were well into autumn and already a bite could be felt in the wind off the water, offering a foretaste of the winter to come. Back in Dimming, the trees would be stripped mostly bare this late in the season and the forest floor would be littered with dry leaves. I wished I were home to see it.

  Hadrian and the river woman had gone out fishing, leaving me alone to pace and worry because Fleet hadn’t come to update me on his efforts for over a day now. I didn’t know if he had bad news and feared to tell me, if he had been taken up by the city guard and hauled off to prison himself, or if he was just having too good a time in his taverns and had forgotten all about me sitting here anxiously awaiting news. I made up my mind to punch him in the head whenever he did decide to come back and sat down to watch the door with that very intention in mind.

  This was the state of mind Hadrian found me in when he returned some time later. A more cautious man might’ve taken a look at my face and found an excuse to turn around and leave, but Hadrian wasn’t easily intimidated. If he even noticed my dark scowl, he pretended not to. His attention was immediately drawn to one thing and, as was often the case with him, it was the thing I least wanted him to notice.

  “You keep that object close these days, don’t you?” he asked.

  I knew what he referred to. My bow was propped against my knee, not because I was intending to use it, but because I felt anxious lately when it wasn’t near.

  “Just the force of habit,” I said. “When you were a Blade of Justice you must have slept with your sword in your hand. You never know when you’ll need it.”

  It sounded better than the truth, that I had developed an unreasonable fear my bow would be stolen if I let it out of reach.

  “That’s different, we were in constant danger in those days, whereas you’re safe here. Who do you think you need to defend against? Seephinia? The river people? Or maybe you just don’t trust me?”

  His intent look made me uncomfortable.

  “Mind if I take another look at this peculiar weapon?” he asked abruptly.

  Before I could refuse, as he must have known I would, he took the bow from me. Having it plucked out of my hands and seeing it in those of another produced a sharp, unexpected ache inside me and it was all I could do not to snatch it back immediately. But I resisted the impulse and, feeling like an anxious mother wolf watching her pup being sniffed over by a stranger, allowed Hadrian to examine the weapon. He handled it with great care, tracing his fingers along the carvings on the golden-hued wood and remarking on the workmanship. I was pleased he appreciated its uniqueness even as I worried he might admire it too much and decide he wanted it.

  “This weapon is a fascinating puzzle,” he told me. “The arms are smooth and unworn by handling, as if it were created only yesterday. Even the color of the wood is fresh and new. Yet when I hold it, I sense great age and could almost believe the thing is ancient. And these runes confuse me. I originally thought they were in the old tongue, but now that I look closer, I see they’re Skeltai, the tongue of your ancestors and their descendants across the border. Yes, it’s definitely Skeltai, but a very old dialect, which I don’t think many could interpret today.”

  “But you can?” I asked eagerly.

  He smiled. “You are very interested.”

  “I’ve often tried to guess what they say,” I admitted.

  “Then we’re fortunate I was obsessed with ancient dialects when young and spent years amassing such impractical knowledge,” Hadrian said. “These differ from what I know of the ancient Skeltai alphabet, but there’s enough similarity I can decipher most and take an educated guess at what I don’t recognize.”

  He traced a finger along the runes as he read aloud. “Power of death my master hath, let fly my arrows and loose my wrath.”

  He looked up, frowning. “That’s a rough translation, but Skeltai is so different from our language it’s difficult to pin down any closer. There’s a little more here, a short bit before and after what I read.” He indicated the lines with his thumbnail. “But I’m a little rusty at this and would need to dig out my old books to make sense of the rest.”

  He changed the subject unexpectedly. “I don’t feel comfortable holding this object,” he said. “It doesn’t trust me. Perhaps you’d better take it back.”

  I snatched it from him, hiding my relief at having it safe in my hands again. It seemed to me the bow preferred to be in my keeping. Maybe I had been unjust when I used to think it a cruel object, incapable of any but dark emotion. It felt peaceful enough now.

  Hadrian was speaking and it took me a moment to withdraw my mind from the bow and focus on what he said.

  “I don’t think there can be any doubt it’s a magical artifact,” he was saying. “The Skeltai are adept at contriving complicated enchantments and hiding them within everyday objects. I don’t claim to understand such things, but a mage might know more.”

  “I thought you were a mage.”

  “Me, a mage? Never, my young friend. I realize you’ve been left ignorant on subjects relating to magic, but surely even you know the difference between Natural and Trained magic.”

  The look on my face must have spoken volumes, for he sighed and smiled a little. “I can see the time has come for a little elementary lesson. Let us set aside your mysterious bow for a while and talk magic.”

  He took the bow from me and put it off to one side, shaking his head when I would have tried to take it back.

  “Leave it, Ilan,” he said. “It will be there when we’ve finished, and I think our lesson will progress better without it. Its very nature is in opposition to what I want to teach you.”

  Curiosity held me in check. “Is this the instruction you promised?”

  “I don’t see when there will be a better time for it, do you?” he asked.

  “I suppose not.”

  “Well then,” he said. “To begin with, there are two distinctly different types of magic. It will be best if you separate them in your mind right away. The first is Natural magic, the kind some men and women have from the moment they are born and from which they could no more detach themselves than they could cast aside their own limbs. You and I, we have that magic and both of us have a particular aptitude in the area of life force and emotion. We can sense them in others around us—can even seek them out if we choose. Not all Naturals excel in these areas, but they’re the abilities I can teach you the most about because they are the ones we share. It’s easier for a fish to teach a fish to swim.”
r />   “You said there were two kinds of magic,” I reminded him.

  “The other kind is the Trained art of the mage,” he said shortly. “Trained magic is wrong and dangerous and that’s all you need to know about it.”

  He had lost all traces of his usual good humor, his expression and tone leaving no doubt of his feelings on the subject, even if his words had.

  “Seems to me I need to know something about a thing, if I’m to know how to avoid it,” I pointed out, rather slyly, I thought.

  Hadrian sighed, a defeated sound that neither agreed with nor condemned my suggestion.

  He explained, “Mages use a man-developed form of magic that allows those not born with the gift, those never meant to possess it, to bend it to their will nonetheless. This includes the use of incantations, potions, and the endowing of certain objects with magical powers. It’s what makes me uncomfortable with your bow. As an enchanted object, it’s fascinating, and yet we must never forget it was born of dark magic and may be tainted by the purpose of its makers. Such a weapon could only have achieved its life by the enchantment of one knowledgeable in the arts of the arcane. And one of the few things we know of the Skeltai people is that they are highly possessed of both forms of magic. This is probably why so many of their descendants on this side of the border are born with magical talent. You, for example, may have received more than your silver hair from your Skeltai ancestors.”

  I focused on the bow, asking, “If it was made by Skeltai, how did it come to be here?”

  Hadrian shrugged. “Possibly, we’ll never know. But I consider it unfortunate you and that bow ever crossed paths. I have an unpleasant feeling about it.”

  “You mean because it was enchanted by a mage?” I asked.

  Hadrian winced. “I think we’ve spoken enough of the Trained magic. It isn’t a subject any Natural feels at ease with.”