Reclaimer

by J. C. Staudt

  “I am no Korengadi soldier,” said Darion. “Nor do I intend to bring your men across the Strait of Thraihm clad in Korengadi red. We will be as wharfsmen, looking for work aboard a merchant vessel.”

  “Wharfsmen with spears and platemail?” came the translation.

  “Wharfsmen in simple furs, with the smell of salt in their cloth. Unarmored and plausible.”

  “They would attract attention nonetheless, as they do not speak the realm-speech,” Vaeron said. “Other suggestions?”

  Rylar Prince spoke up. “Think good. I like.”

  “Tell him that,” said Darion. “Tell him you support my idea.”

  Rylar turned to his father and exchanged words with him. “He say you go. They think other way.”

  “You go, and they’ll think of another plan,” said Vaeron.

  “I do understand my own language,” Darion said.

  “Sorry. Sometimes I forget who’s speaking what.”

  “Rudgar really said I could go?”

  “Actually,” said Vaeron, “he says you are free to return home, if you like.”

  “Home? But our crusade stands unfinished.”

  “You have given all the help you can, he says. We are lost here, at our own threshold.”

  “We are not lost,” said Darion. “If he will only let me execute my plan, we have a hope.”

  “He does not think so. He thinks it is time you returned to the southern realms.”

  “I am exiled from the realms. Olyvard King promised he would strip me of my lands and titles if I turned from his will. I have no doubt he has arranged some punishment to that effect with Tarber King of Orothwain. I cannot go back.”

  “Maergath would be in ashes were it not for your sacrifice,” Rudgar said through Vaeron. “You gave of yourself to save Dathrond from destruction. Surely your king has seen that.”

  “It would be one thing if I had been accused of a crime I did not commit. But that is not so. Of treason, I am guilty.”

  “A Warcaster is guilty only insofar as the mage-song convicts him. Do you not have a wife and child you wish to return to?”

  “My family will wait,” Darion said. “This will not.”

  Rudgar gestured to his son as he spoke. Vaeron’s translation came a moment later. “You will spend no further time apart from your family on my account. I have a Warcaster of my own. See?”

  “Are you refusing to accept my service?” Darion asked.

  Vaeron gave an uncomfortable grunt before he translated. “You have been an ally to me, Darion of Ulther. More than that, a friend. You are of good heart and pure intention. Yet your talents are wasted on me. I thank you that you have remained true to your word. By your sword and your song, we have all but reclaimed our homeland, and you have ransomed yours. Now I bid you return, and make right the wrongs which have been done you. I have kept you away long enough.”

  “You cannot do this,” Darion said. “I gave you my word. I will not leave your side until I’ve made good on it.”

  Rudgar pitied him with a look. It made Darion feel like a beggar being tossed a cut copper. “I release you from my service, Darion of Ulther, to seek your own fortunes, wherever they may lie.”

  “This—this is…” Darion broke off, lost for words. He stood, lifting the red tabard of Korengad off his shoulders to send it fluttering to the ground. “You dishonor me, Rudgar. You have cast me out not as friend, but as thrall.”

  Vaeron Shask was silent.

  “Tell him,” Darion said. “Tell him what I said.”

  Still Vaeron said nothing.

  “Very well. I see now what the tongues of disgrace refuse to speak. I’ll take my leave, then, and never shall I return to these shores.” A few of the king’s officers laughed when Darion tried to storm out and snagged his armor in the folds of the tent flap.

  A biting tundra wind carved through him as he emerged. He shuddered to think of the long march south, not toward glory and battle, but toward an uncertain future. He went to his tent to gather his things. As he was hoisting his pack onto his shoulders, Rylar Prince and Vaeron Shask entered the tent.

  “Do not be angry with my father,” Vaeron said on Rylar’s behalf. “He offers you kindness, not disgrace.”

  “That is not the way I see it. To have come this far only to be cast aside when we are so close to victory is the greatest disgrace I can imagine.”

  Rylar clasped Darion’s hand and pulled it to his chest. “Go you to home. To life you make.”

  “I may not always understand you, my friend,” Darion said, “but I’ll always be grateful for the effort. We have lived through many trials together, and it is only thanks to you I stand here on two legs. You are my brother in battle. The shield at my back. Warmth for these cold foreign wastes. I shall never forget you.” He cuffed the prince’s shoulder and gave him a hard pat on the back before they parted. “As for you, Vaeron. You are the best interpreter and the worst negotiator I have ever met. Stick to your translations.”

  “Thank you, my lord.”

  “Take care, both of you,” Darion said. “I wish I could tell you to write me when you’ve won back your throne, but as it stands, I have no home at which to receive letters. Perhaps I shall send word when I’ve found one.”

  “Take safe travel, Darion of Ulther,” said Rylar.

  Darion left the tent and trudged off down the south road, gathering his heavy fur cloak around him to stave off the tearing winds. He followed the shoreline until nightfall, by which time his toes were freezing beneath his mailed boots and his fingers could barely grasp the folds of his cloak. There beside the road, with the waves crashing on the rocks before him, he collected a few wet twigs from beneath the snow and used the mage-song to start a fire.

  Sleep was a fleeting companion in winds so brisk, and he woke half a dozen times to find the fire gone out and in need of relighting, despite his having built it in a ditch between two large stones. In the hours between those stretches of fitful sleep, his memory-dreams were there to keep him company. They’d never stopped haunting him through all his years in Korengad. Even when the cold addled his mind or the horrors of war numbed his heart toward death and loss, there was always something lurking beyond the reaches of his sight, where the past refused to wither.

  Tonight it was Alynor, and through the memories of warm sunlight and better days came a precipice, and she backing slowly toward it with the child in her arms. Things unseen crept ever closer, blocking her way, and there was no escape. Then something large and black loomed behind her; a creature so terrifying and so abundantly evil that its presence alone was enough to wake him with a start.

  The tundra blushed with coming dawn. Darion despaired, stricken with the overwhelming sense that his wife was doomed. And if there was no saving her, why go back? Why return to a land where he wore the brand of traitor, only to find his worst fear come to life? Because I have no other choice, he told himself. So this was not a vision, then, but a nightmare. Not a memory, but a fear. I can stay here in the north and freeze, separated from the king I turned my cloak to serve, or I can return home and face what awaits me, grim though it may be.

  It was morning now, a cold yellow sun rising to paint the tundra sky in streaks of fire. Darion lit the fire again and warmed his fingers before pushing himself to his feet. He shook off the stiffness of his uncomfortable sleep, slid snow over the fire, and started down the road with a rasher of cold string jerky in his mailed fist.

  Halavard was six days south on foot. At a strong march he could’ve made it in five; with a good horse, four. As it happened, he staggered into the seaside city on the evening of the seventh day, its sulfurous stench reminding him of his first visit there only months before. He and Rudgar’s armies had been bound for Cronarmark by sea, confidence bursting in their breasts. He’d been warmer then, and in much better spirits. Now his fingers and toes were a deep plum color, and there was so much frost in his beard he might’ve resembled some great starving snow creature, daring
to encroach upon civilization for want of a meal.

  The first thing he did was buy a room at an inn whose name he couldn’t read, where he paid extra to have a hot bath drawn. The innkeeper didn’t understand a word, but Darion’s gold gleamed brightly enough. He sat by the hearth in the common room to thaw while he waited, dripping on the wood floor. When they summoned him to his room upstairs, he threw his armor and clothing on the floor and crawled into a half-barrel tub filled with steaming water. It was too small for him, and left his arms and legs dangling over the sides except when he dipped his hands and feet one at a time to ward off the frostbite.

  In truth he was nowhere near frostbitten, and would’ve called upon the mage-song had his risk become dire. There was little reason not to use magic here in Korengad. Once he landed in the five realms, though, he would need to travel with a low profile.

  The next day, Darion exchanged his plate armor and longsword for some decent leather and a short blade he could hide beneath his cloak. He was sad to see Bloodcaller go, the sword which had borne him through so many battles and held so many of his spells. Rudgar King had promised to shower him with gold from Cronarmark’s vaults when they took the city back, but Darion had known better than to believe it. With the gold he added to his purse by selling Bloodcaller, he would be able to afford a comfortable voyage home, a strong horse and tack, and stays at every decent inn between Belgard and the Greenkeep.

  Reclining in his second warm bath in as many days, Darion decided that was where he must go. To the Greenkeep. To Alynor’s father, Lord Mirrowell. She must be there, hiding with him—or somewhere nearby. Perhaps Sir Jalleth was not too far off, and the old pepper-white gyrfalcon was stalking the skies over the Greenshore.

  Darion longed to be in the realms again. To smell the fields after a hard rain; to watch the bees trundle from flower to flower; to hear the whisper of wind through tall grass on a warm day. One could feel the mage-song where nature’s beauty was freshest, whether in the rustling of autumn leaves, the cries of a newborn babe, or the foamy hiss of the open sea.

  Home it was, then. He would leave aboard the first ship that could spare him a cabin. Home to king and family, and to the child he dreaded and hoped for at the same time. He only wished he’d thought to bring a tankard of ale into the bath with him to toast the enterprise.

  Chapter 4

  As the noontide sun of an early spring day shone through the Wildwood clearing, Stoya spoke the sigils of a new spell while Eldrek looked on. When she finished, the mage-song woke in a burst of violet before her. She tossed it at her feet and watched trails of glowing purple spiral up her legs. The trails dissipated, and a breath of warmth rushed through her.

  “Now, use it,” Eldrek told her.

  Stoya leaned into a run. Grass and wildflowers parted like ocean waves beneath her feet. Next she knew the clearing was behind her, thick forest ahead. When she turned back, she couldn’t believe how far she’d come. The clearing must’ve been half an acre or more, yet she and Eldrek now stood at opposite ends as though they’d arrived from separate directions. Stoya returned, slowing to a halt before him as the spell wore off.

  “How did that feel?” Eldrek asked.

  “I hardly knew it was happening,” she said. “It felt as though I were moving at a normal pace, yet the distance passed more quickly than I expected.”

  “That is because you were moving at a normal pace,” he said. “You neither slowed time nor gained the ability to run faster. You simply moved, and the mage-song cleared the way. It made a path through the resistance.”

  “That is a spell I shall have to remember, however brief it may last.”

  “With practice you may extend its duration a little, like most spells. But no, the shadow-walking spell will not last very long in the end. I’m pleased to see you’ve recognized its value. You’ve come a long way. Darion will be proud.”

  “You mustn’t say that name,” Stoya said, glancing into the trees.

  “I say it every time I tell stories in the village.”

  “And I wish you wouldn’t.”

  “Why? Because when he returns, you’d prefer that the people of the realms believe him a traitor?”

  “What I would prefer is his return, regardless of the circumstances. That is my only wish.”

  “Would I that there were some other solution but to wait.”

  “Could we not use the mage-song to locate him? Or at least to know whether he is alive?”

  “He is alive, my lady.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Not but that I feel it within myself.”

  “Isn’t there some way we can be sure?”

  “The ways in which to divine a life’s essence using the mage-song are few. You would be better served seeing a practitioner of the wild-song for such a task, suited to nature’s lore as it is.”

  “Why is it that everything I wish to do requires the wild-song?” Stoya said.

  “It isn’t the song required so much as the price. You may find it a steep one.”

  “We have a few coins in reserve. I would be willing to use a portion of them for such a purpose. It would bring me peace of mind.”

  “The cost to which I refer cannot be measured in gold, my lady.”

  “Do not speak so cryptically to me. Tell me what you mean.”

  “How do you suppose one may peer into the soul of another?”

  “Through some incantation. Some ritual.”

  “And in your breadth of knowledge about the mage-song and its counterpart, the wild-song, how difficult is it to perform an incantation?”

  “It’s on the complicated side of things,” she admitted.

  “It is on the perilous side of things. While a simple spell may require something temporary of its caster, many rituals take something and never give it back.”

  “I know there are risks.”

  “Then I will not treat you as a child. Though I know it is what your heart desires, I can only advise you against taking this course. In the end, you must make the choice for yourself.”

  “I’ve spent too many days worried sick over my husband’s fate.”

  “I would sooner that than see you spend your days sick in other ways.”

  “Yet you put us all in danger with your tales and legends. You are too free with your tongue. You speak as though we are not in hiding.”

  “I will not be silenced by the likes of Olyvard King,” Eldrek said. “The moment we allow him that victory, Darion’s fate is sealed. For the nonce we must hide, yes. But we needn’t consign ourselves to the king’s lies. The people need a reason to trust in their hero again.”

  “This is a reckless way of giving it to them.”

  “No more reckless than practicing magic in an open field half a league from the village.”

  “Are we done for the day, then?”

  “While I have you here, and Draithon is at play with the cooper’s children, we ought to keep going.”

  “Don’t you have stories to tell this afternoon?”

  “Perhaps I’ve decided teaching you is a better use for this free tongue of mine.”

  “If that is what you think best.”

  “Not best. Only more agreeable. I am, after all, a mere creature of the skies. I must show my gratitude to those with the power to free me from such bonds, however temporarily.”

  “You must placate the only person capable of making you human, you mean.”

  Eldrek nodded. “Though I fear I’ve failed on that score.”

  Stoya ignored that. “What’s next? Show me another spell.”

  After several hours of practice, Eldrek finally ceased his lessons for the day. As they entered the forest and headed toward the village, there was a rustling in the underbrush a distance off. A shape moved beneath the darkened canopy of late afternoon and disappeared into the forest.

  “Did you see that?” Stoya asked.

  “I did.”

  “What was it?”

  Eldrek shoo
k his head. “At times I wish I had Ristocule’s eyesight. Alas, I find myself burdened with the eyes of an old man. What did you see?”

  “A shadow. Perhaps two.”

  “Could it have been three?”

  “It’s possible, for all I saw.”

  “Stay vigilant as we enter the village. For watchful eyes, habits are hard to break.”

  Stoya did as instructed, but she did not notice anyone paying particular attention to them as they fetched Draithon from Ithric the cooper and his wife Rhilde. Draithon cried when they took him from his playtime with the cooper’s children, but no one gave them more than a parting look as they left the village bound for home. When their meager hut came into view past the bridge on the forest road, however, she found reason to be alarmed.

  Three figures stood in the front yard, crowded around the door as if in wait.

  Stoya caught a glimpse through the branches and stopped Draithon, touching Eldrek’s arm. “It’s Kent Norch and his cronies again,” she whispered. “I thought you said you’d straightened out your little dispute.”

  “I thought I had.” Eldrek clutched the ivory pendant around his neck and glanced at Draithon. “We must get inside. This is due to wear off soon. Stay here. I’ll talk to them.”

  “I’m coming,” Stoya said.

  “It’s too dangerous for Draithon. Stay here. I’ll handle this.”

  Stoya agreed, albeit reluctantly.

  Eldrek crossed the bridge and approached the hut.

  “Who are they?” Draithon wanted to know.

  “Master Norch and his friends.”

  “No.”

  “What do you mean no?”

  “Master Norch has a big nose. That man has a small nose. And that man has bigger hairs.”

  “Longer hairs, sweetheart. Hair. And gods, you’re right.” Stoya’s heart raced. Should I warn Eldrek? she wondered. Should I call out to him? No, she decided. She’d alert the strangers to their presence that way.

  Eldrek stopped in front of the hut, holding his walking stick close, and addressed the three figures. They were too far away for Stoya to hear what they were saying. One made a loud grunting noise. There was laughter. What have I done? she thought. He’s an old man wearing an enchanted talisman that makes it impossible for him to use his own spells. They’ll tear him apart.