Once out of the village and on the lake, we got into a sleigh track laid down by dozens of carts before us and our “sailboat” dashed forward.
That whole night, Gorgie was our eyes. He warned us about every awkward obstacle and wandering refugee in advance. Based on the emotions he was sharing with me, the fast-paced dash was nothing more than a pleasant stroll to him. And no surprise with his Speed and Endurance figures.
We didn’t leave our little horses without magical support either. My potions of satiety, plus Mee’s Waves of Healing were a big help in perking up our steeds.
Speaking of healing, the gremlin’s healing was producing amazing results. The night of periodic thirty-point Regeneration boosts had transformed Gino markedly. His gaze was gradually growing clearer. A rosy glow appeared in his sunken cheeks. He stopped wheezing. With every hour the old man was getting better and better. It was clear even from his appetite when the happily smiling Midori served him food. He just wolfed it all down.
And Gino’s transformation wasn’t only physical. The apathy and quaver in his voice went away, and they were replaced by authoritative and harsh notes. I watched the ill old man gradually be squeezed out by a capital-city lanista – the true Gino Leroy. Understandably, the level-three spell didn’t fully cure the dark ailment, but the old man did get a reprieve, nonetheless.
And there he is now – speak of the devil. Gino’s raspy voice pulled me out of the pensive mood.
“You’re frowning,” he said, half making an observation and half asking a question as he wrapped himself tighter in a big fat comforter. I should note that it was quite chilly inside the wagon. An icy draft was breezing in through every little crack and crevasse. I’m afraid to even imagine what it’s like for Tusk right now, up on the driver’s box.
“The people still in the village,” I started without particular desire, “will become slaves of the orcs very soon.”
“And what’s so surprising about that?” Gino snickered, letting out a little cloud of steam. “The weak will die; the strong will survive – that’s one of the main laws of our world. And slavery is not the end of life. The chance of freedom always remains.”
“But these people just wanted to live a peaceful life. Without war.”
“Don’t mock me,” the old man grunted. “A peaceful life on the edge of the Wastes? That’s your lack of experience talking.”
“Do you mean to say the people moved here because of war?”
“All these people fled to these lands to escape taxes and fines. They wanted freedom. But freedom comes at a price. They knew what they were getting into when they dragged their whole families to the outskirts of one of the most dangerous baronies in the Kingdom. And now that it’s gone this far... Do you think those who managed to escape Tradepost will be able to avoid the war?”
“Do you not?”
“Of course not. When they reach the nearest city, they’ll be conscripted by the local authorities on the spot. The men will be put in the militia and the women and children will be used for general labor. Something can be found for everyone in a city preparing for siege. Although, who knows? Maybe the raid will end with the plundering of Tradepost. I think that’s what the Baron of these lands is hoping for.”
I shook my head.
“I don’t think the Baron is hoping for that precisely.”
The old man chuckled.
“So you have also filled your head with the tall tales all those chatterboxes were spewing? About the horde?”
“So the people have been warned about the Great Horde?” I asked in surprise. “How long have these conversations been happening?”
The mocking and self-confident smile gradually started creeping off the old man’s face. My tone and facial expression were clearly helping that along.
“Great Horde?” he asked.
“There is a Great Horde coming this way,” I began. “Thousands of wolf riders. With the Great Chieftain of the orcs at their head along with the Five Elect. I saw Sarkhaat, one of the Great Shamans, on the edge of the Wastes with my own two eyes.”
“Oh gods!” Gino gulped loudly. “So it was all true?!”
“Master Eric not only saw him,” Maya’s voice came unexpectedly from the depths of the wagon. Apparently the women were not sleeping, and instead listening to our conversation. “He valiantly took on the sorcerer of the orcs and defeated him, saving all our lives in the process.”
I cringed as if I’d just eaten an unripe plum. Somehow, we’d neglected to add that episode to the oath of secrecy Maya swore. There was no point – there were too many witnesses.
Gino and Midori stared at me, dumbfounded.
“You defeated a Great Shaman?” the dryad asked almost in a whisper. I won’t lie, the admiration in her eyes consoled my ego, but still I didn’t want to lie.
“No,” I shook my head. “He fled. And to tell the truth, that’s what saved me.”
“But thirty wolf riders weren’t so lucky,” came Mee, adding fuel to the fire.
I sent him an inquisitive gaze as if to ask, “why?!” But he just smiled, shrugged his shoulders.
“May the abyss swallow me up!” Gino exclaimed admiringly. “Do you mean to say that you managed to rout the Great Shaman of the orcs?!”
“I was a hair away from death myself,” I answered modestly and added: “But I was saved by Gorgie, which Master Mee left out.”
“Hold up,” the old man frowned, worked up in no small way. “Maya, the captain of the Gray Martens brought you to Tradepost, right?”
She gave a nod, and he continued, turning to me:
“So you’re from the same company?”
“Nope. We met the rangers after we left the Stone Forest.”
“Left what now?!” Gino and Midori shouted out almost in concert.
“It’s a long story,” I evaded the real answer. After that, the old man and dryad turned toward Maya at once. She just shrugged her shoulders in silence because, unlike the previous episode, she had sworn to keep quiet about the details of our trek through the Stone Forest.
Gino had seemingly guessed it all though, so he decided to come at it from a different angle.
“There’s just one thing I can’t understand... Something isn’t coming together. As far as I could tell from your stories, you took on the shaman and several dozen wolf riders alone. Right?”
“That’s right,” I answered, neglecting to mention the fact that there were many more than thirty orcs.
“And the Gray Martens were there, too?”
“Yes.”
“And they didn’t engage? How can that be?!” Gino exclaimed uncomprehendingly.
Mee and I traded glances. Heh... I’m reminded that the gremlin was tormented by the same question.
“They rode off to save the civilians,” I answered, nodding at Maya.
“And you stayed to fend off the orcs!” Again admiration in Midori’s voice. The dryad’s glimmering gaze sent a shiver over my skin. I felt an urge to tell them exactly what really happened. That I’m no hero or savior. Not at all. That I was very afraid just like the others. And I only had to fight because I was thrown off a horse. And that I only survived thanks to happenstance and my friends.
But I held my tongue. Mee and I came to the conclusion before that there was no reason for anyone to find out the truth about what the captain of the Gray Martens had done.
“Youngster!” Gino hailed, jutting his chin forward. “The capital must know of your feat of heroism!”
The old man’s last sentence made me shudder. Time to wrap this conversation up.
“I don’t want to disappoint you, but no one in the capital can ever know,” I objected, shaking my head. “Or anywhere else for that matter. As a matter of fact, the captain of the Gray Martens still thinks I am dead, and we may have assisted in that. Believe you me, for the sake of your and my safety, you’d be better off forgetting we had this conversation.”
The smile left Gino’s lips. He frowned.
“You must understand that you have to explain yourself.”
“With pleasure,” I said with a shrug. “After all, you must have already asked yourself what led to such an important figure as the Supreme Shaman coming to the borderlands. I can see by the look in your eyes that I’m right.”
“And just what brought him there?” Gino didn’t back down.
“An oath,” I replied and continued, looking the old man dead in the face: “He had sworn to avenge the murder of his grandson.”
Gino frowned even deeper and unwittingly rubbed his throat with his right hand.
“Do you mean to say his grandson was killed by...”
“Yes. I’m the one who killed Sarkhaat’s grandson, who was also a shaman. Two of our comrades died in that fight, both royal rangers.”
“Now I understand,” Gino said unexpectedly and rubbed his forehead. “It’s no secret to anyone that the orcs have their informants in human society. Yes-yes... You’d be surprised if you found out what influential people are sometimes caught red-handed in servitude to the orcs. There are barons and counts among them. The steppe dwellers are not quite the primitive savages we’re accustomed to imagining them as. Gold is no object to them. Sarkhaat will probably be informed of your ‘demise’ soon enough. So ‘resurrection’ is not in your best interest. For someone like Sarkhaat, hiring an assassin through a middleman would basically cost nothing. Heh... And now we’re also in jeopardy!”
“Only if you go running your mouth,” I corrected him.
I could clearly read on Gino Leroy’s pensive face that he was no longer glad to have linked up with such dangerous traveling companions.
Without a doubt, I could have kept quiet about the horde and the Great Shaman, but I decided to be honest. Based on the pensive gaze Gino shot at me, we’d be having a serious heart-to-heart soon enough.
After a brief pause, he wanted to say something more. But the wagon started slowing down, so he stopped.
Just then, I received a warning from Gorgie.
“Your beast is out in front!” the ogre shouted to me.
“Follow him!” I ordered.
Quickly standing to a half-crouch, I hobbled toward our wagon driver. The wagon was leaning noticeably to the right.
“What’s going on?!” Gino shouted, feverishly clutching the side of the wagon.
“Gorgie is leading us to the forest,” I answered quickly. “Ready yourselves – there’s an ambush up ahead.”
Chapter 11
HAND TO MY HEART, even despite all my disgust for people who resort to making a living on the suffering of others, I must admit: these ones made a sound choice of ambush location.
The river, winding like a giant snake, had just come to a sharp bend. While curving around a small rocky cape, it widened by almost three times. The steep left bank was densely forested, the branches of some of the trees creaked wearily under the weight of the snow, almost touching the ice. All told, it would have been hard to find a better place for an ambush.
The horses were carrying us to the right bank, the gentler one – we’d be able to conceal the wagon and horses there among the trees.
“What did your beast say?” Tusk asked when I took position next to him.
“There is a large concentration of people there past the bend,” I motioned at the cape with my eyes. “Gorgie has picked up many scents.”
The ogre kept his eyes on the road and jerked the reins.
“Maybe the refugees setup camp there?” he suggested.
“No,” I answered confidently. “The wind carries the smell of fresh human blood. Lots of blood. Beyond that, there’s an observer sitting on top of the rock. Gorgie said there were two at first. Obviously the second has run off to warn the others.”
The ogre snickered and gave a respectful nod to Gorgie, who was loping alongside the wagon.
“I’m convinced,” he muttered shortly and asked: “What next?”
“They’ll see we noticed them,” I answered confidently. “That means the others will be here very soon to pay us a visit. There’ll be no avoiding a dust-up, so...”
“Better to meet them under tree cover than on an open field,” the ogre finished my sentence and, baring his teeth, asked: “Do you have any party favors for them?”
I understood Tusk was nowhere near laughter, and that he was just kidding around to get himself in a fighting mood, so I figured the right thing to do would be to joke back.
“Oh, they’re definitely in for some fun,” I smiled back.
Before we’d even reached the right bank, in support of my argument, several riders came around the cape hooting and shrieking loudly.
From the distance, it was hard to tell who we were dealing with. I couldn’t see their levels or equipment. The only thing that was clear was that we had very little chance of getting away without a fight.
At the shore, we discovered a wide inlet overgrown with tall gray reeds. After a moment’s thought, Tusk drove the horses into the natural pocket.
Just after we left our pursuers’ field of view, Gorgie obeyed an order from me and hid among the dense field of gray stalks poking up from beneath the ice. That would make a nice little surprise for the highwaymen.
After breaking through the reeds, the wagon hopped on shore, made it another couple yards and came to a stop, squeezed by trees on two sides. That’s all. We can’t go any further.
Hopping into a snowbank, I raised my knees up high and walked over to the backside of the wagon which Gino was already clambering out of quite nimbly. Wearing a vest of thick black leather inlaid with steel sheets, he had a small crossbow hanging on his shoulder and a short sword with a broad blade dangling from his belt – the old man was battle ready. I stood with my mouth open in surprise.
Noticing my bafflement, Gino gave a sprightly grunt and smiled through his gray beard.
“Am I to understand you counted me out? Hehe! No need to answer, I can tell by your eyes that I’m right!”
Midori’s limber figure appeared in the gap behind the old man. A long, carved bow in her right hand, a bulky quiver full of arrows on her back. I took in the dryad’s graceful movements and found myself unwittingly gazing in admiration.
She jumped to the ground without a word and disappeared among the trees. I rubbed my sleeve on my eyes in surprise and turned my head in hopes of seeing where the woman had gone.
“Don’t bother,” I heard a mocking growl from the ogre behind me. “The forest is her element.”
“We don’t have much time,” Gino distracted me. “What can we expect out of you?”
“A few attack spells,” I answered hastily. “And this...”
Gino and Tusk greeted the Lair creation message with a simultaneous gasp.
“A weak shield,” the old man commented. “But any little thing will help us now. Heh... But for long journeys that ability is simply amazing! You also mentioned attack spells? What’s the range?”
“Starting at fifty-five feet,” I answered.
The ogre and old man sighed heavily.
“We’ll have to let them come very close then,” Tusk said with no enthusiasm. “Let me guess, the spell is level five or six?”
I nodded in embarrassment.
To be frank, I was slightly taken aback by how casually they were reacting to what I had to say. That, by the way, said a lot. For example, it said that my companions were not mages but that they must have had some first-hand experience with magic. They were probably starting to wonder just how I had been able to rout a Great Shaman and take down thirty wolf riders at the same time.
* * *
Just a few minutes later, the first riders appeared around a bend in the river.
“All familiar faces,” the ogre muttered as he sat on the wagon’s tailboard. Gino’s head poked out from behind his broad back.
“Abyss!” the old man cursed. “That jackal has been driven mad by his own impunity!”
Mee and I were standing behind the wide trun
k of an old tree fifteen feet away from the wagon and could see perfectly exactly who Tusk and Gino were talking about. The band of a dozen riders was headed by none other than the Hornet.
I frowned.
No. Seeing the former “caretaker” of Tradepost didn’t surprise me in the least. As a matter of fact, I was prepared for something just about like this. But something else had me confused – I seemed to remember him having many more riders. It’s possible the Hornet sent some of his people around to flank us. As bad luck would have it, the wind is not blowing our way, and Gorgie in the reeds doesn’t smell anything yet.
The Dark Continent (Underdog Book #3): LitRPG Series Page 10