by CW Thomas
BRAYDEN
“Dana!” Brayden called. “He’s back.”
Sliding out from under the shady covering of evergreen branches that he had woven together, Brayden crossed to the other side of the sun-dappled glade. The tall grass tugged at the fraying pant legs of his slacks, the hems of which were filthy and torn.
Seven days had passed since he had watched with horror as the ocean storm ripped Lia’s ship apart, and four days since Khalous had sent Pick to search for survivors who may have washed ashore.
Pick plopped himself down on the grass. His face was sunburned and peeling, his cream colored tunic mottled with sweat stains and new smears of dirt.
“Water!” Khalous said.
Brayden came alongside Pick at the same time as Dana, Ariella, and a gregarious Efferousian priest named Placidous. He and Sister Ariella had helped several dozen children from Aberdour’s orphanages escape during the high king’s attack.
Stoneman brought some nearby stream water in a leather-drinking pouch. After Pick had downed several sizeable gulps he offered his short and disheartening report. “Nothing. There were pieces of the ship strewn up and down the sand, broken barrels and empty crates, but that was all.”
And like a gust of wind his words extinguished the fire of hope Brayden had harbored in his heart. For days he had prayed to the Allgod that Pick might find Lia washed ashore on a piece of driftwood, or maybe see her footprints leading to a secluded cave where she had taken shelter. She was clever like that, tough, a practical thinker.
“How far did you travel?” Khalous asked.
“Two days fast walk south,” Pick answered, unfastening his dingy green cloak to allow his damp tunic a chance to dry. “I came to a hilltop overlooking West Galori. I could see the harbor, but it was another day’s walk to get there. Most of the wreckage I found was further north anyway, and I didn’t want to risk going into the city.”
“That was wise,” Khalous said. “The Black King will be dispatching his soldiers to Efferous soon. They’ll be searching the cities and towns for survivors.” He gestured to Dana. “Our fearless princess here sent out broadwings before she left Aberdour declaring to the realm that the Falls’ children were alive and would return.”
Pick grinned. “I bet that will piss off His Royal Blackness.”
“I’m sorry,” Dana said. “I feared that with the fall of Aberdour the rebellion would grow discouraged. I wanted to give them hope.”
“No need for apologies, my lady,” Khalous said. “You did well. You kindled the flames of the rebellion, but you also stoked the ire of the high king. We all need to stay clear of places where his vipers might search.”
“We can’ stay ’ere neither,” said Stoneman in his usual slurry drawl. “Vipers goin’ be searchin’ all up and down dem shores. They come ’ere. You wait and see.”
Khalous agreed. “We need to move further inland.”
“We have too many injured,” said Ariella. “At least give them a few more days to heal and rest.”
The captain’s brows drew in and he scratched his iron colored beard. “Three days, but no more.” He put a hand on Pick’s shoulder. “Get some rest.”
“Yes, sir.”
Brayden turned to look at Dana, but she had already peeled herself away from the discussion. He saw her walking back toward her lean-to dabbing her cheeks with her fingers. Her green dress patterned with raised leaves and gold thread, once one of her favorites, hung in shambles off her pale shoulders. One sleeve bore several long tears, exposing her delicate arm, while there was little left of the once tightly braided hem.
He caught up to her under the shade of a giant sugar maple. “Khalous isn’t mad at you about the broadwings, Dana. I hope you know that.”
He caught her just as she fell into him in an explosion of quiet sobs.
Surprised, Brayden wrapped his arms her and held her for several moments.
“How much more can we lose, Brayden?” she said. “Bryn, Scarlett, now Lia, too.”
Brayden couldn’t recall ever seeing his older sister so distraught. Dana was strong, logical, a lover of fine details with a mind as sharp as the best investigator. For as long as he could remember she had been there to take care of him. It felt strange taking care of her.
“If any of us could’ve found a way to survive a shipwreck like that, it would’ve been Lia,” he said. “She may yet be alive.”
To his right Brayden noticed Stoneman approaching Placidous. The muscled soldier tapped the small priest on back. “Do I know you from somewheres,” he said, his voice deep and somewhat ominous.
Brayden thought he saw a look of nervousness flash across the priest’s face.
“Oh? Well, I have been a member of the church for—”
“Ever been in front of the magistrate?” Stoneman asked.
Brayden saw the priest’s throat force down a large lump. “I think you have me confused with someone else.” He pushed past Stoneman and wandered over toward Ariella who was making rope out of willow bark. He sat down and began to help her.
“That was odd,” Brayden whispered.
Dana picked her head up off his shoulder. “What?”
“Nothing.”
With no survivors found from the wreckage of the second ship, the number of refugees stood at twenty-six, a pathetic figure, Brayden thought, when considering almost three times that many had fled Aberdour. There would have been twenty-eight, but two more had died in the storm. One, a six-year-old girl, had been washed out to sea, and the other, a young man, had split his head open against the forward mast.
A man named Alec Craigson had captained their ship. At the first sign of the incoming storm he veered south away from the rocks and into deeper waters, though he had been unable to avoid all of the storm’s rage. Once they had reached the western shores of Efferous, Khalous ordered Captain Alec and his crew to take the ship south to keep it from being seen by black vipers.
In the days after hiking inland, Khalous dolled out tasks to everyone, sending some to search for fresh water, others to gather wood for shelters and fire, others to hunt for food. He had placed the orphaned and injured children in the care of Ariella and Placidous.
The survivors of Aberdour now occupied a small camp that had been constructed deep in a forest in northern Advala, the westernmost province in the empire of Efferous. The camp had been built in haste and was exceptionally unsophisticated. They had made a few coverings of forest branches to provide shelter from the sun and rain, and some sleeping mats of leaves for those with minor injuries.
“Make it tight, boy,” said Stoneman as he grabbed Brayden’s cluster of evergreens and crushed them together. “Now rope it off.”
Using a strand of the willow bark rope that Ariella had made, Brayden tied a quick knot around the ends. The sleeping matt was almost complete. It just needed to be wider.
“You knot ’em tight. That’s good,” Stoneman said. Brayden took it as a sincere compliment, especially from a man whose massive fingers fashioned knots so strong they were immune to even the fiercest storms.
“My grandfather spent lots of time on a ship when he was a boy,” Brayden said. He lashed a few more branches together. “He taught Broderick and I how to tie many knots.”
“You ever think abou’ sailin’?” Stoneman asked, pushing a lock of stringy black hair behind his ear.
Brayden shook his head. “Not really.”
“What do yeh think ’bout?”
“My sisters, mostly. Lia, Brynlee, and Scarlett. I worry about her the most. She’s only seen five winters, and she can’t speak. Brynlee will be all right. She just needs a history book to read and she’ll get by.” He pictured his seven-year-old sister huddled by the fire pouring over the boring old books she loved so much. “As for Lia,” Brayden started to say, but his throat locked. He didn’t want to think about what had happened to her.
A little girl walked up to him. She was a tiny thing, around the age of ten, he guessed. She wore a d
irty brown and cream-colored dress. He saw the points of maroon boots peeking out from under the hem.
“Lord Brayden,” she began in a sweet sounding voice, “can I help you with your work?”
He looked down at the fir branch bedroll he was making. Roping together the branches required strong hands, hands even stronger than his. After a quick glance at the girl’s tiny fingers, he knew she wasn’t up for the task.
Finally, he said, “Umm, no.” He paused, and then added, “But thank you.”
The girl stood in front of him for an awkward moment, her hands clasped behind her back. “I’m sorry about your papa and your mama.”
He looked up and was struck by how blue her eyes appeared. They were like lakes of sparkling water, piercingly blue, shinning out from a dirty face framed by thick locks of brown hair. When he realized he was staring, he blinked and looked away.
“Oh. Thank you.”
She stood there for another moment or two, twisting at her hips. Finally she dipped her head to him and trotted away.
“Ain’t tha’ all sweet,” Stoneman muttered with an amused grin on his chiseled face.
“What?” Brayden asked.
He heard a hushed giggle behind him. Turning, he saw Dana hanging some soiled clothes on a tree branch to dry.
“What’s so funny?” he asked.
“Someone likes you,” she said.
“Who is she?”
“Her name is Nairnah Kholoch,” Dana answered. “Her father builds…” but she caught herself. “Her father used to build wagons in the east corner of Aberdour. Her mother was a dressmaker. Nairnah said when her father saw Ariella and Placidous heading toward the tunnels with the other orphans he made her go with them.”
Brayden tried to make it seem as though such information meant nothing to him, when, in actuality, he had already committed to memory everything Dana had told him. In all his twelve years of life he had never paid much attention to girls, but, for some reason, he suddenly found Nairnah Kholoch very interesting.
Stoneman sprang up from his seat. His heavy boots pounded along the ground as he charged toward Brother Placidous who was standing with Sister Ariella, his hand on her back. When their bodies connected the mountain of muscle sent the priest twisting through the air.
“What in all the hells?” Khalous shouted from across the camp.
Stoneman stood over the terrified priest, who lifted his nimble hands in surrender. “Please! Please don’t hurt me.”
“Keep ’em paws to yerself, priest,” Stoneman growled.
“I–I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Khalous came between them, warding off the giant soldier who stood a good head above the captain, if not more.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Khalous asked.
Stoneman thrust a finger at Placidous whose sprawled position on the ground amidst his brown robes made him look like a puddle of mud. “Keep ’im ’way from’a girls.” Without another word he walked off.
“What was that all about?” Dana asked.
“I wish I knew,” Brayden said.
He had little time to think about it because in the days ahead Khalous kept him and the older boys busy with a number of duties that afforded him little free time. They hunted for boar and quail. They sought fish in the river to the north and set traps for rabbits and other small forest critters. They lugged water from the river in buckets they had acquired from Alec’s ship. They mended garments, built lean-tos, picked healing herbs, and scouted the surrounding hills for signs of civilization.
If Brayden had any time to miss home, his horse Arrow, or his soft bed, it was at night just before numb exhaustion whisked him off to a much-needed sleep. When he dreamed, he dreamed of Aberdour, of the wheat fields newly plowed, of forest streams running clear with spring runoff from the distant heights.
Dana’s hand on his shoulder broke up the vision, which ran away like water through his hands. His heart begged to have the dream back.
“I can’t find Broderick,” Dana said. The worried tone in her voice brought Brayden’s attention into a sharp and sudden focus.
He sat up, his squinting lids casting blobs of color before his gaze. Above him, leafy tree branches laced the paling blue of a new dawn.
“Clint’s gone, too,” Dana added.
Brayden’s mind ticked through a dozen different excuses for his half-brother’s absence—hunting, fishing, scavenging, exploring—but the fact that Clint was missing too worried him. His cousin was the spoiled child of a woman who had smothered him since birth and a self-absorbed father who went crazy in his last few years of life. Clint was, as Lilyanna had said, “a mischievous imp.”
Brayden first went to investigate Broderick’s lean-to, though he was unsure of what he could find that Dana hadn’t already looked for. Father had always called her a good detective. Her sharp eyes and keen mind missed little.
He lifted Broderick’s jacket off the ground. “Wherever he went he wasn’t planning to go far,” he said.
“Can’t believe I missed that,” Dana muttered.
Brayden walked to the next shelter where he saw Preston Stonefield squatting over a basin of water. The boy had suspended a leather jacket over a series of sticks he’d stabbed into the earth, forming a bowl in which he could wash his hands. Brayden had known Preston for years and was always impressed by his ingenuity, even if the young man was always a little too pristine and refined to ever be much fun.
“Have you seen Broderick?” he asked.
Preston stood, wetting his wavy brown hair back with his hands. “I saw him and Clint heading off into the woods around dawn.”
Dana yelped when an upside down head swung past her ear. “Why didn’t you say anything, you halfwit?” it said.
Dana scurried back.
Hanging by his knees from a branch, Preston’s twin brother, Ashton, whom everybody simply called Nash, crossed his arms. He looked at his brother. “You saw them headed off and you didn’t say anything?”
“They had Pick’s bow with them,” Preston said. “I thought they were going off to hunt.”
“Broderick hates using a bow,” Brayden said.
“And Clint couldn’t hit a hay bale an arm’s width away from him,” Dana added.
Nash back flipped out of the tree and cast a curious look at Dana. “I hope you don’t talk like that about me when I’m not around.” He winked at her.
“You scare me like that again and I’ll punch you in the nose,” Dana said.
“Did you see where they went?” Brayden asked.
Preston pointed in the general direction of the glade’s northern edge. Brayden hurried toward the trees with Dana and the twins in tow.
The four of them continued north, working their way up a gradual hillside packed with aromatic evergreens that, after a ways, spilled out into a sparse forest of maples and white birches.
“‘I thought they were going off to hunt,’” Nash repeated. “I can’t believe you actually thought those two would be doing something productive.”
“Are they not allowed to hunt?” Preston asked.
“And why would they do that? Because they’re such responsible, upstanding young men? Have you listened to more than five words out of Clint’s mouth lately? That lug can transna ort felin!”
“Nash!” Dana scolded.
“Watch your tongue in front of the lady,” his brother said.
“Bah!”
The twins had been polar opposites for as long as Brayden had known them. Where Preston liked to be clean and have his leather polished, Nash would roll in the mud and then give his brother a hug just to spite him. They shared little resemblance. Preston was taller, paler, with brighter eyes and wavy hair. Nash kept his hair short, which made it stand straight up on the top of his head. They bickered about everything and exchanged insults like most people swapped jokes.
Brayden continued to lead the way, circumventing a cold fresh-water brook where dragonflies buzzed until
he found a narrow place to hop across.
Over the next rise he found Broderick and Clint hovering over a dead fox. The animal lay next to a crude wooden trap—presumably the trap that had caught it—with its head crushed, the evidence of its gruesome demise on a nearby bloody rock. Clint was in the process of gutting it with a short dagger.
“There you are,” Dana said, relieved.
“What are you doing?” Brayden asked. He couldn’t help but notice that Broderick seemed a little pale, almost nervous.
“Clint caught this yesterday,” Broderick said. “He wanted a bow to shoot it with.”
Brayden counted the three arrows that had been plunged into the dirt around the wooden trap.
Dana raised an amused eyebrow. “Looks like someone needs to work on their aim.”
Clint Brackenrig shot her a dirty look over his husky shoulder, but said nothing.
“Breakfast?” asked Nash.
“This is mine,” Clint said. “I caught it. I killed it.”
“We have to share, Clint,” Brayden said.
“Who says? Khalous? He’s your Shield Captain, not mine.” The boy’s tone was tinged with contempt.
“He saved your life, too,” Brayden said. “We all have to rely on each—”
An arrow whisked through the air and struck a white birch trunk near Dana’s head. The arrow rattled to a sudden stop, bringing their conversation to an equally abrupt end. Brayden’s eyes flitted from the arrow to its source atop an adjacent ridge where he saw Khalous standing, his bow in hand. The captain raised a single finger to his lips.
With obvious caution that made Brayden fearful, Khalous crept his way down into the gap between the hillsides followed by Moreland Fields and Connell Stone. He hiked up to where Brayden and the others were gathered.
“The lot of you bicker loud enough to be heard in Aberdour,” he whispered through clenched teeth. He motioned back the way he had come. “There is a road over that ridge with a brood of black vipers riding by.”
Khalous’ voice carried just enough alarm and anger to make Brayden’s heart pump just a little bit faster.