The second man laughed gruffly, “The toll for using this road, of course. You’ll pay us … what should we charge them, hey?” he called out to his companions.
“Why don’t you go easy on them,” the man working on the fire shouted out. “Only charge them a thousand in gold.”
The first man looked upon their stunned expressions and said, “What? You don’t have a thousand gold?” He clicked his tongue and shook his head at them.
“Lucky for you I’m a generous man, and fond of children. We’ll simply take whatever you have, and I’ll forgive the difference,” he said, finally exposed as the cold thief that he was. He pointed the end of his sword at them. “Drop everything where you stand. Money, food, packs, and all.”
“And if we refuse?” Morganne prodded cautiously.
“Then I’ll run you all through with my blade and take what I want just the same. It is, of course, your choice.” The cruel edge to his voice left no doubt in their minds that he would make good this threat.
“Please, at least let us keep our water skins, and something to feed the baby with,” Morganne pleaded. “That would be worth nothing to you.” No doubt Morganne was fearful now as to how they would manage the rest of their journey with no food or money, even should these men let them live.
As Morganne tried to bargain with the men, Elowyn noticed something strange. There were white points of light moving through the trees all around them. As the lights came closer, and emerged from the wood, she recognized them for what they were—the balls of white fire she had seen in her dream, though now she realized it had not been a dream at all.
The white fire hovered between the children and the men. The first one exclaimed, “What’s this, then? I’ve never seen the like.” With the men distracted, Morganne grasped Elowyn’s hand tightly and slowly began to back away, pulling them a good distance before the man noticed his victims were getting away.
“Where do you think you’re going?” he scowled. “You’ll pay for that.” He lunged his sword toward them, but as he did so, a ball of fire intercepted the blow. Blinding white light traveled down the sword and into the man’s arm. He screamed in pain as his body convulsed. He dropped the sword, lying panting on the ground for a few moments trying to recover his strength. At last, he rose up once more, snarling in an animal-like rage. Grasping his sword again, he flew at the light with full fury. The white fire struck him again and again with its agonizing blows until he lay motionless in the road, unable to rise, with saliva running from the corners of his mouth. His two companions grabbed their own swords and made a half-hearted attempt to come to his defense. After feeling the first sting of the white fire themselves, and seeing what it had done to their companion, they gave up and fled into the woods, leaving all they had behind.
Morganne and Elowyn clung to each other, watching the lights apprehensively. One of them approached Elowyn and spoke in the musical voice she had remembered from their last encounter.
“I’m sorry,” she spoke softly. “I don’t understand … I’m trying …” She shook her head apologetically.
The light moved ahead along the path, then stopped and spoke, and moved ahead again.
“I think it wants us to follow,” Elowyn said.
As soon as the girls moved forward, the remaining lights formed a moving circle around them. They dared not try to push past the beings to either go back or run ahead. The balls of fire pressed right up against their backs, attempting to nudge them forward along the path. The only thing to do was to go on, and hope that the intent of these strange creatures was more benevolent than that of the thieves. In spite of the darkness, and their obvious fatigue, the girls were only allowed occasional short rests before they were prodded to continue walking.
Morganne was nearing the end of her strength. Numerous times she stumbled on the path and whispered to Elowyn that she didn’t think she could go on any further. She was exceedingly pale and looked as though she might fall over at any moment. Yet she managed to keep moving. Even Elowyn’s practiced endurance was nearly spent. She wondered where they were being led, and why they were not permitted to make camp for the night. There were moments when she realized that she had fallen asleep on her feet, and her legs were still moving only because she had commanded them to.
“Please,” she begged. “We must rest. We have been walking all the day long. We cannot go on!” The beings of fire would let them rest for a short while, then gently nudge them forward once more.
The night seemed endless and unmerciful, and Elowyn felt sick with fatigue. In that moment, all past miseries were forgotten. She began to believe that nothing else ever had been, or would ever be, so terrible as this. The stars were no comfort. She could not focus on their glorious display. Her eyes were too blurred to focus, her head too heavy to lift up.
Eventually she did notice that the sky was a little lighter than it had been, and then lighter again, and then pinker, and brighter, until the horizon was splashed with full, vibrant color. Rays of warm sunshine peeked over the rim of the world and softly caressed her cold face and arms. She closed her tired eyes for just a moment, allowing her spirit to be refreshed by the cheery red color of the sun pressed against her eyelids. Surprisingly, even the sun could not quell the searing white of the fiery beings leading them onward. Suddenly they stopped. One of them approached Elowyn and spoke, though it must have known that she could not understand it. Then the lights vanished into the lingering shadows of the wood, leaving the girls alone on the path. Too tired to speak, Morganne’s face lit up with hope and she pointed forward, past the trees and into the clearing beyond. Where the trees ended, the road sloped downward into an open valley. Across that valley, Elowyn saw the walls and gates of a city rising before them, and just beyond that, the vast blue expanse of the sea. Elowyn now understood that the lights, whatever matter of creatures they were, had brought them through the night and safely into the hands of the next city. With the last of their strength, the girls crossed the valley and passed through the gates. The large banner hanging from the walls beside the gate read Greywalle.
As they stumbled through the cobbled streets toward what was apparently the only inn, Elowyn was trying desperately to remember something important. She knew nothing about Greywalle except that the name had awakened something in her mind that she needed to focus on. However, focusing on anything in that moment was close to impossible. Every muscle in her body ached. Faces, buildings, signs…all blurred before her into a confusing swirl of color. Sounds seemed loud and disjointed, making her nauseous. For the first time Elowyn knew what it felt like to reach the point where she could truly be pushed no further. She marveled that Morganne was standing. She who was not accustomed to this kind of life, and who had borne the extra burden of carrying Adelin, had somehow matched her endurance, step for step.
It was with great relief and joy that they at last came to the doors of the inn and pushed their way inside. They were greeted by a short, round, red-faced man with a kindly look about him. “Looks as though we have some weary travelers, mother,” he called out to a woman that was as round and ruddy as he. A young girl about Adelin’s age was clinging shyly to her skirts.
“Weary is not the word, father. They look half dead on their feet. Come over here my dears. Sit down by the fire while we find you a room.” The woman took Adelin gently out of Morganne’s tight grasp, as Morganne nodded compliantly. But Morganne never made it over to the fire. Once she saw that Adelin was securely held by the innkeeper’s wife, she collapsed onto the floor, and nothing they did could rouse her.
The Inn at Greywalle
The innkeeper lifted Morganne in his arms, carried her to one of the rooms and carefully lowered her onto a freshly changed bed. While he ran to fetch the village healer, Elowyn removed Morganne’s boots and the innkeeper’s wife covered her with a warm blanket. The innkeeper soon returned with the healer, who also happened to be one of the local monks. After examining Morganne and hearing the tale of their night-
long flight, he concluded that there was nothing seriously wrong with her. He left instructions to keep her in bed for at least three days, to feed her well when she woke, and to give her an herbal concoction to drink that he had made. The healer examined Elowyn as well. Food and rest were her prescription also, lest she succumb to the same collapse that Morganne had endured. He advised that the girls remain in Greywalle for a while, and then limit how many hours they spent on the road each day once they resumed their journey. His last request before he left was to be notified as soon as Morganne felt well enough to have visitors.
Thankfully, Elowyn had finally remembered what was so important about the name Greywalle. She had overheard Tervaise speak of the innkeeper as someone who owed him a great debt, and who would be happy to care for them on his word. She found the two seals Tervaise had given them in Morganne’s bags and presented them to the innkeeper.
“Mother!” he called out excitedly. “These are friends of Tervaise and his kin.”
His wife smiled genuinely. “Well, then, you are especially welcome. His friends are indeed ours. Do not fret for a thing! While you are here you will not be guests of the inn, but family.”
Elowyn was given her own room, with her own soft bed filled with fresh straw and covered in clean linens. Adelin was well taken care of, and content to play with the little girl, who kept her amused and out of trouble.
Morganne did not awaken until the next morning, and only then was she finally able to sit up in bed, eat, and drink. Elowyn rubbed Morganne’s bruised feet and swollen legs with a special herbal poultice she had concocted in the inn’s kitchen, then wrapped them in cool damp rags. Elowyn was still sore and tired herself, but comfortable. She was faring the physical strain as well as she dared to hope.
“I suppose that I am not meant for this sort of journey,” Morganne said in a frustrated tone. “My spirit tells me that I must go on, that something special is waiting for me in Minhaven. But my body is giving up on ever reaching that place.”
“We will get there, if it is Aviad’s will,” Elowyn said thoughtfully. “Perhaps the innkeeper knows of someone who can ferry us by cart the rest of the way. I heard Tervaise say that he knew of merchants who would be willing, and he did give us his seal.”
“I am glad that you remembered it. I had forgotten.”
When Morganne was feeling well enough that she could rise out of bed to take meals with the innkeeper and his family, she sent word for the healer who had tended to her. He gave her one final examination and declared that she would recover fully in no time. He told her to begin taking regular walks about Greywalle for increasing lengths of time until she felt ready to continue on the road. Morganne thanked him profusely for attending to her and insisted that he take payment for his services.
“I will confess,” he said sheepishly when everyone else but Elowyn had left the room, “there is another reason for my visit. I wanted to speak with you further about the beings of light that guided you here. I know of no other creature that appears as you describe except for what we call wisps. They are considered to be sacred by many who follow the old ways. Rarely are they seen in these times, and even then, only in the most remote wilds or in the ancient places of power. To have seen a wisp once in a lifetime is a wonder, and some say, a sign of Aviad’s blessing. To have one speak to you is a dream. To have seen and heard more than one at a time is simply unheard of. To have actually been protected and guided by a whole host of them … the mere thought makes my knees quake! I know not whether I should fear you, or venerate you. Whether or not you believe in the teachings of the Prophets, my advice to you is that you seek out one of the shrines and give in prayer an offering of thanksgiving, for you have been profoundly blessed.”
“If you could give us direction, we would be happy to leave an offering at whatever temple you have here,” Morganne said.
“Temple? We have no temple here, child. I am speaking of the shrines of power, blessed by the Ancients and revered by the Prophets themselves in days of old.
“Do such places really still exist? I thought they had vanished along with the Prophets,” Morganne said.
“Most of the shrines are now buried in the wilderness—they are difficult and dangerous to find without a knowledgeable guide. But there are the remains of one not very far to the north, in the village of Evensong. There was once nothing there but a monastery on the cliffs overlooking the sea, and the orchards tended by its monks. They built a shrine there dedicated to Immar, the Lord of Divine Love and Mercy. It was destroyed when the Prophets were scattered during the Great War. The monastery is still in ruins to this day, but eventually a town was built below it that took its name. All that remains of the original shrine is a fountain. The spring that fed it went dry with the destruction of the monastery, and many consider it to be a dead shrine that has lost favor with Aviad. Very few pay it the honor it is due, even among those who live under its shadow in present day Evensong. But there are those among my brethren who believe it is still a significant place of power by virtue of its history, and when we cannot make pilgrimage to the greater shrines, we journey to Evensong. I think it would be perfectly appropriate for you to take your offering there.”
“Then that is where we shall go,” Morganne said. “What sort of offering do we leave?”
“That I cannot tell you. You must ask in prayer at the shrine, and no doubt the answer will come. I will pray for your safe journey, though if the wisps watch over you, I am certain you are already blessed.”
As directed, Morganne began a regimen of daily walks about the city, with Elowyn always at her side to watch over her. Greywalle was a small, but lovely town. The streets were cobbled, and most of the buildings were fashioned of a dark gray stone that seemed to be in plentiful supply in that region. The coastline and surrounding fields were littered with it. There was no harbor, only a few scattered docks used by small fishing vessels. The waters were apparently too treacherous for shipping, and so everything that came into Greywalle came by road through the main gate. Morganne had noticed that there was no tower, no castle, and no visible presence of guards standing watch along the wall. In her usual practical way, she asked the innkeeper by what means the city was guarded.
“We’re not, exactly,” he told her. “It’s not like we’re of any interest to the Sovereign, with no port, and no other source of wealth to catch his eye. You’ll find that the order of things is somewhat different out here on the edge of the wilderness. We take care of ourselves, or we don’t survive for very long. We were once at the mercy of marauding orders of knights who were either vying for territory of their own, or trying to take territory for their lords in exchange for other favors. But the Kinship put a stop to that, and we’re under their protection now. It has been a long while since we had to defend our gates against our own countrymen. Against the terrors of the wilds, we have found our own swords to be sufficient.”
As Elowyn gazed about Greywalle’s charming central square, edged by small shops on three sides and a community herb garden on the fourth, she felt a sense of grateful wonder that this peaceful little village had so far escaped Braeden’s destructive gaze. Though they had invoked the name of the Kinship in order to find the innkeeper’s favor, Elowyn still wondered what the Kinship might be, and to what power it gave its loyalty. She had never heard its name before they had met Tervaise and Reyda at the trading post.
When she was able, Elowyn enjoyed sitting quietly in the herb garden. She breathed deeply of its earthy scents, wistfully missing her own garden back in Tyroc. Morganne, on the other hand, had found the local seamstress and was determined to make some heavier clothing to protect them through the next stage of their journey. The locals had given fair warning that winter always came on fast and early, and as the girls progressed northward into the foothills of the mountains, the nights would grow bitter cold. The innkeeper thought that they should winter in Greywalle and promised them a room should they decide to stay.
Though Morganne
prepared their winter clothing in earnest and spoke of leaving as soon as she felt well enough, Elowyn saw that her needle did not fly as swiftly as she knew it could. Morganne was fast making friends with the seamstress, who was predictably impressed by her skill and practically begged her to stay and work at the shop. Elowyn wondered at the back of her mind if Morganne was considering it, now that Greywalle was beginning to feel like home. The innkeeper and his wife, true to their word, treated the girls as their own family. They were gentle spirited, jovial, and hardworking people, though Morganne and Elowyn began to see that the inn was not very profitable, and the couple was wont to spend more on their guests than they got back in return. But the people of Greywalle liked it that way, and they were proud of the fact that they had an inn at all, so everyone in the village helped in whatever way they could to ensure that the inn remained, and that the innkeeper’s family was cared for.
Since the innkeeper would not take their money, Morganne and Elowyn found other ways to help repay him. Morganne took care of all their mending and made the innkeeper’s wife a new dress that so pleased her she nearly wept over it. Elowyn prepared their garden for the coming winter and helped make tallow candles. As much as she had dreaded helping with that chore back in Tyroc, she found that the innkeeper’s wife made it bearable. She sang merrily and told stories to help the time pass.
The girls might have stayed happily at Greywalle for the rest of their days were it not for a strange and sudden visitor who appeared at the inn. He wore the crest of the Sovereign and the uniform of the castle guard. He had a rough, unshaven face, with a dark beard and thin, cruel lips. His presence alone sent a chill wind blowing through the usually cheery inn and sent guests scuttling off to their rooms in haste. The guard approached the innkeeper, and with a gravelly voice asked if any guests from Tyroc had recently stayed at the inn. He claimed that he was searching for a rebel sympathizer who was in possession of a valuable heirloom that had been smuggled out of the castle at Tyroc. He was charged with the task of finding the heirloom before it could be sold, and bringing the sympathizer to justice.
Journey to Aviad Page 25