Firehurler (Twinborn Trilogy)

by J. S. Morin

  “How bad should I allow things to get before seeking aid?” Iridan asked.

  “Ahh, now that is my son talking. Assume the worst when making your plans, and nothing can take you unawares. Well, I would expect the goblins to have some nasty surprise for you. If it looks as if you cannot counter what that turns out to be, I would think that qualifies,” Rashan said.

  “Any ideas what that surprise might be?” Iridan asked.

  “No. That is Brannis’s job. He is the mind of the army now. If I did not think he was up to puzzling it out, I would have to go myself and risk whatever chaos I might find upon returning to Kadris. Ruling an empire is a game more complex than chess, and you do not see all the pieces I have to keep track of.”

  “I have known Brannis most of my life. If anyone can figure it out, he can. I cannot imagine where he thinks of some of the gambits he tries, but it always seems he is one step ahead,” Iridan said. He had always been proud to call Brannis a friend. Even when it became clear that Iridan would become the more powerful sorcerer, he leaned on Brannis to get him through the harder classes at the Academy.

  Rashan just nodded and moved to pull Brannis aside before they left.

  “I am putting a great deal of trust in you, Brannis. You heard me stake quite a claim against my reputation last night supporting your takeover of the army. Make good use of it. Get those goblins out of my empire, by whatever means you must use.

  “Just be warned: those green-skinned devils are smarter than most men. Whatever they have planned, you must counter it, for they must be counting on the advantage they gain from it to succeed.”

  “The reports said that the goblins have some new siege weapon that obliterated the walls of Illard’s Glen,” Brannis said.

  “Yes? And?” Rashan sensed Brannis was on to something.

  “I am rather certain that they now have … cannons,” Brannis said.

  He waited for a reaction from Rashan. It was a gambit that he was not sure of, but if it went poorly, he would just muddle his way out of it somehow.

  Rashan’s face remained a mask. The normally talkative warlock said nothing for a moment, but studied Brannis.

  “I see,” was all he could say to Brannis’s statement.

  And from the way he said it, Brannis was not at all certain just what he meant that he saw.

  * * * * * * * *

  The first leg of their journey, still following the North Road out of Kadris, was somber and brisk. A light snowfall had begun overnight, and a thin dusting blanketed the countryside. As far south as the capital of the Empire was, it was unusual to receive the season’s first snow so late into autumn; the solstice would be in just fourteen days. As they were to be heading north and west, they could expect to see less of the wintry weather until they crossed the mountains. The Cloud Wall would shield the eastern slopes from most precipitation, but the western side, at higher elevations, would likely have already seen heavy snows.

  Brannis called them to a halt when they found a respite from the curious eyes sharing the road with them. They had just crested a hill in a lightly forested area on the outskirts of Podawei Wood, which the road veered northwesterly to avoid entering. Podawei Wood was on House Archon land, and the road had been blazed in ages long past, during a time when the emperor and the head of the Archon clan were not seeing things with the same temper. The wood was a prime hunting ground for elk and caribou, as well as the much rarer mammoth foxes. It was vast and deep and dark, and even experienced hunters only ventured so far within its grasp before turning back. The forest spirits had been driven out of it during the wars that resulted in the Empire’s founding, but it was commonly believed that some remained hidden away deep within and were responsible for the disappearances of many a brave huntsman.

  Brannis used the tree cover to obscure them from those to their north, while the bulk of the hill they had crested shielded them from view to the south.

  “I think we have found our opportunity to throw off any curious pursuers. Time for us to take our leave of the road,” Brannis called out to his companions.

  As Juliana and Ruuglor, who had been leftmost in the formation, brought their mounts about, Brannis held up a warding hand.

  “Wait. We need to have those horseshoes filled with aether. Rashan said that the horses’ hooves would not be touching the ground once they gained speed, and if we are careful, we may leave no clue as to where we left the road.”

  “Ruuglor, Faolen, see to it,” Iridan commanded, sitting back in his saddle with a little smile.

  He cast a sidelong glance at Juliana to see if she showed any sign of appreciating not having been assigned to work on the horses’ shoes.

  The two appointed sorcerers exchanged a knowing look as they dismounted their horses. The beasts were well trained and somewhat accustomed to the eccentricities of being handled by sorcerers. This included, among other indignities, grown men crawling around underfoot, fiddling with their horseshoes and making them tingle. Each shoe had to be touched individually and aether drawn and deposited within. It was not difficult work, and most children from homes where magic was common learned to draw aether for their favorite toys from a young age. But in the case of horseshoes, it was dirty and unpleasant work, at least for those who preferred feasts and courtly sitting rooms to stables and the road.

  Faolen was nimbler afoot—and crawling around as well—than his portly associate. He took care of his own mount, then attended to “Warlock” Iridan’s and Juliana’s horses, all before Ruuglor could finish his own and Brannis’s.

  Ruuglor grunted eloquently as he drew himself up to his feet after completing his job on Brannis’s mount. “I would bed the lad myself if it got me out of such work,” Ruuglor muttered beneath his breath, just loud enough for Brannis to be the only one to hear him.

  Brannis managed to keep his chuckle inaudible as he smiled in response. His back was to the others, and the exchange went unnoticed.

  Once they were all in saddle again, Brannis urged his horse at a trot along the road. He immediately noticed the effect of the shoes, as his horse’s strides seemed longer and the scenery began to move past at a gallop. After the first few steps, the noise of hoof on dirt vanished, and they rose a handspan above the road. Content that he was no longer leaving a trail of hoofprints, he veered left and headed off the road.

  “Follow as soon as you clear the ground,” Brannis called back.

  The others took off after him, following down the road until their own mounts managed to get ever so slightly airborne, then heading westerly after the grand marshal.

  The journey quickened once they were all together and aloft. Their passage was eerily quiet, with the sensation of riding normally being accompanied by the crash of hoofbeats and theirs marked by little more than the rush of air as they passed. Brannis had it the worst, with the flutes and openings in his armor catching the wind and creating all manner of moans and whistles, while the wool and fur that covered the sorcerers allowed them to ride largely in peace.

  The monolithic pale grey of the snow clouds hid the sun entirely and looked like it would persist long enough to obscure moon and stars alike come nightfall. Brannis knew the area well enough for the time being, but he feared that they might get turned off course if they did not find better weather by the morrow. At the rate the horses were tearing across the Kadrin landscape, they would be into the heart of farm country by midday the next day. It was unfamiliar land to Brannis, too far within the Empire’s borders for the army to bother with garrisons and too bland to be considered worthy of visiting for recreation or study; neither the Academy nor the knighthood had ever shown interest in sending him there.

  They kept the pace until shortly after what they imagined to be high-sun, when Brannis bid them stop for lunch. He watched as the sorcerers dismounted to see how the morning’s ride had treated them.

  Iridan looked stiff and walked awkwardly for his first few steps after regaining his footing on solid ground. His feet were shoul
der length apart and appeared content to remain so until such time as his muscles uncramped.

  Ruuglor had fared somewhat better. Though he had trouble mounting and dismounting the horse as a matter of course due to his girth, he seemed as if he had made use of one before, and after a brief stretch to work out the kinks in a back ill-treated by the jarring of his ride, appeared to be none the worse for their morning’s exercise.

  Faolen was in a worse state than Iridan even. He needed assistance to get down and was hardly able to walk without leaning on Ruuglor’s stout shoulder.

  Juliana appeared fine. She dismounted casually and showed no ill effects from the first leg of their trek. Brannis had once before underestimated her ability with horses, so he kept a tight rein on his surprise and settled instead for being rather impressed. The Archon family had large holdings in the countryside surrounding Kadris, with ample room for horseback riding where no one would bother you, but it was still a pastime more common among the less gifted members of the family, and those high-ranking servants who could afford the luxury in both time and expense to indulge in equestrian hobbies. Though he had intentionally not kept abreast of her activities, he had always gotten the impression that Juliana was more at home at court and in the city than out in the country, riding.

  “Let us have our midday meal on the ground, rather than in the saddle. I know you fellows are unaccustomed to riding, so we will have an easy day of it today,” Brannis said, rummaging in his saddlebags for what was essentially going to be a picnic.

  “I can ride from the palace to the Academy and back just fine. This overland travel is a bit much. I prefer a quieter pace for long times in the saddle,” Iridan said as he began boiling away fresh-fallen snow to clear a spot for their meal.

  “Bah, better to make it quick, I say,” Ruuglor said. “Certainly there is unpleasantness to go along with any long journey, but if it must be done, get it over with rather than prolong it. Warlock Rashan said we could take another whole day off our trip if we press hard.”

  “Oh yes, you all look so refreshed after our morning’s ride that we ought to consider challenging ourselves a bit more,” Juliana deadpanned, drawing a chuckle from Brannis.

  “We still might reclaim that day, if I think we can manage it,” Brannis said. “But we must be careful of the horses. If we tire them out, we shall not only be searching out fresh ones, but they will be unaccustomed to meddling by sorcerers, and we would have to have them reshod as well. A good smith can make quick work of a reshoeing, but ten horses? That would be much of a day’s work, even if the new horses do not panic when the runed shoes begin their work.”

  “Just five horses, you mean. We would not have to wait for these five to be reshod, certainly. We could just leave them with the stable and instructions to have them returned to the palace stables,” Faolen said, easing himself down to the now parched spot on the ground that Iridan had just baked.

  “Where do you think they will get those shoes? We may not need to wait for these to be reshod, but the smith would at least have to make the time to remove the runed shoes from our horses first,” Brannis said.

  Brannis laid out a small spread of various salted meats and cheeses for their meal, and everyone partook, though Juliana and Faolen seemed skeptical, and Ruuglor seemed to be expecting there to be a bit more. Iridan had grown accustomed to the meager field rations they had been eating in Kelvie, and he and Brannis knew that the trail food the palace had stocked in their saddlebags was a world better quality than the hardtack and stale bread they had made do with in the forest.

  “So what is our plan once we get to Raynesdark, Brannis?” Juliana asked once they had settled in for their meal. She tore into a strip of jerky as she awaited his reply.

  “The true plan is to get there quickly,” Brannis said. “I have no doubt the goblins are already a step ahead of us in planning the siege. I will need to figure out as quickly as possible what they are planning to surprise us with and then find a way to counter it.”

  “Well, that is just what Rashan said at dinner last night. What is the real plan?” Juliana countered. “Surely there was more to it than that.”

  “Not as such, no.”

  “You mean that we are trekking across half the Empire and crossing the Cloud Wall at whatever spot we find ourselves at, just to figure it out when you get there?” Juliana seemed baffled.

  “You have a better plan?” Brannis asked. “If you know what the goblins have planned and a strategy to counter it, I am your attentive servant.”

  Brannis looked at her expectantly, with a carefully crafted expression of naïve hopefulness painted on his face. He winced in his head as he recalled having used this same annoying ploy on her countless times when he was courting her—when he was just a boy, really. It had become an almost reflexive response to her judgmental outbursts. If he had realized how much more ridiculous that expression looked when wearing gold-and-quicksilver armor with a demon-horned helm, he would have flushed with embarrassment.

  “No, but if it had been my duty to put one together, I would have come up with something better that ‘I shall figure it out later,’” Juliana imitated Brannis in a fair approximation of his voice.

  Faolen snickered.

  “Truly, if any of you have a plan, I am willing to listen,” Brannis said. “I cannot promise I will follow any set course of action until we arrive at Raynesdark and I can assess the situation, but I will give fair hearing to any thoughts you might have. It is a long road yet, and I expect you will have plenty of time alone with your thoughts as the wind carries our words off as we ride.”

  “Um, actually, Brannis, it is just you,” Iridan said. “The rest of us realized that it was that silly armor of yours making all the noise, and that once we hung back a few paces, we could carry on conversation rather easily. In fact, I won a hundred fifty lions for having best guessed when you would finally let us stop for a rest.”

  Brannis stowed his helm for the remainder of the day’s ride and was able to partake in the general conversation as their horses blazed a trail over the snow at a blurring pace, despite pushing the pace hardly at all. As there were only so many practicalities to discuss and hours aplenty to fill, they spoke of many other topics. Brannis felt better about taking men into a war with him if they were less than strangers to one another.

  They rode five abreast, with Brannis at the center. They spoke of their backgrounds and families—though Brannis’s, and now Iridan’s, family was already the subject of much gossip in the Empire—and of what they thought of the future of the Empire now that the ruse of the false emperor had been revealed. It was then that Brannis found out why Ruuglor and Faolen had been chosen to “volunteer” for this assignment.

  “Indeed, he gave us a choice, but it was Rashan’s Bargain come to life,” Ruuglor said, laughing despite not finding it particularly funny himself. “You know it is a trap from the outset, yet you are desperate enough that you have to take the chance that it is not. It was suggested that Faolen and I might begin to help make amends for our part in perpetuating the ruse, if we were to go along and help defend Raynesdark.”

  “So you both knew?” Brannis asked.

  “Of course,” Ruuglor replied. “I helped to craft and maintain the aether construct of the body. It truly is a masterwork. I cannot claim credit for much of it; I was one of several involved in the crafting. I would also occasionally repair bits where the construct started to fray.”

  “What of you, Faolen? What was your role?” Brannis asked.

  “I was an occasional puppeteer. I also consulted on matters of fashion and details of the face and jewelry,” Faolen said.

  “Aye, and he had quite the eye for it,” Ruuglor said. “Illusion is his specialty, and not many of them are to be had among the Circle. Our Faolen is an artist of aether.”

  “So you are telling me that you two are being sent along as punishment?” Brannis asked.

  “Not as such,” Ruuglor parroted Brannis’s own
equivocation back at him. “It was just strongly implied that it might forestall some potential future repercussions that might befall us.”

  “So he threatened you,” Brannis stated. It was not a question.

  “It was a privilege to watch a master at work!” Ruuglor announced, employing grace about the situation when bitterness might have been forgivable.

  “And what threat hangs over your head, Juliana? How did the old warlock convince you to come along?” Brannis asked.

  “He asked. If you must attach a threat to it, then the threat of never seeing my future husband again, should the battle go badly,” she replied, as if there were no more to it than that.

  Brannis had suspicions otherwise but kept them to himself.

  “And you, Iridan? I do not suppose you required much to get you to come along,” Brannis suggested.

  “Of course not. Rashan thinks I have it in me to become a warlock. He gave me some insights into how I should conduct myself on the battlefield, and I mean to put them into practice. If there is a chance I could be the Empire’s next warlock, I have to try. High sorcerers get portraits painted and busts carved and names written into the history books. Warlocks make the history,” Iridan said.

  Apparently he had overcome the initial shock of Rashan’s suggestion that he might become a warlock, and had embraced the idea. Brannis could not help but wonder if he was paying attention when Rashan explained what had become of the other sons he had tried training as warlocks.

  By evening, they found themselves too far from any inhabited land to find proper beds for the night. The roads in the western half of the Empire, between the capital and the Cloud Wall, were a tangle of mule paths, old trade routes, and north-south routes that funneled goods to and from the southern ports. Too few roads ran cleanly east-west for Brannis’s company to make good use as a guide, and they got themselves stuck somewhere in between Farfield and Marmet, smaller communities to be sure, but plenty large enough to find five beds at the command of the Inner Circle and the commander of the Imperial Army.