by J. C. Staudt
“We’ve decided to stay with you until your friends arrive. The men are preparing food.”
“You needn’t hold yourselves up on my account,” she said. “I would be most grateful for a bite of food and some more water, but I can see you’re in a hurry.”
“Not at all, madam. Stoya, did you say your name was?”
“That’s right.”
“We are more than happy to help. These mountains are dangerous, as you seem to have discovered already.”
“Yes, I have.”
“Will you tell me who or what you’ve run afoul of?”
Just then, one of Caelor’s men gave a shout. He was pointing up the hill, toward the rocky outcropping where Alynor had left Draithon. The boy was climbing out. He began to make his way down the slope, moving with a child’s unsteady bearing.
Alynor tried to rise, but her head swam and she plopped back down. She took another long drink from Caelor’s waterskin, hoping to curtail the faintness a little longer. Before she could try getting up again, Caelor’s men were rushing up the slope. They scooped Draithon up and carried him down the hill while he cried and squirmed.
“Is this your child?” Caelor asked when they set the boy down beside him.
Draithon darted into his mother’s arms.
Alynor looked up at Caelor and the other men, crowded around so thick they were nearly blocking out the sun. Rough men, and ragged. Warlike men with scowls on their faces, bleeding beneath bandaged wounds. The charade was over. Alynor had no secrets left; no choice but to tell them. “Yes. Yes, he’s mine.”
“Don’t be afraid, my lady,” Caelor said, crouching down. “Had I a child to protect, I would’ve hidden him away, too. There is no shame in that.”
That was when Alynor began to cry. “We’re all alone out here,” she said between sobs. “No one’s coming for us. I’m trying to get to my friends, but I don’t even know where they are. They mentioned staying in Galmeston for a time, but I thought I might look for them in Westenreach along the way.”
Caelor turned to look up at Abran. Alynor thought she saw the corner of his mouth draw up a little, a secret sort of smile. “You won’t want to be going there, madam,” he said, turning back to her. “Westenreach lies in ashes.”
“Earlier you spoke of an infestation.”
“Brain eaters,” said Abran. “Wicked things. Whole town went mad with them.”
“Mind your tongue around the boy, Abran,” said Caelor.
Abran waved him off. “He don’t understand.”
“He does,” Alynor said. “He’s nearly four. Surely the whole town wasn’t infested. I mean, there must’ve been survivors besides yourselves.”
No one spoke.
“Rest you, now,” Caelor said. “Eat, and get your boy some nourishment. There’s no sense in you worrying over that.”
“I must know,” Alynor said. “My friends may have been there.”
Abran cleared his throat. “The people of Westenreach—them what was left, leastwise—they done just what you or I would’ve done in a spot like that. They ran for the hills.”
“The downs?”
“Aye, madam. I reckon few of them made it far, and the ones what did… well. I’ve said too much as it stands.”
“You haven’t. I’m going there, and I’d like to know what I can expect.”
“With the boy?” Abran asked.
“Of course.”
Abran smirked. “I don’t reckon Caelor will allow that.”
“He’s right,” said Caelor. “I won’t let you go, whether or not you mean to bring the boy.”
“I thank you for your help,” Alynor said, “but it isn’t yours to tell me where I can and cannot go.”
“Yes, well that may be, but what if we were to advise you against it? I doubt you’d listen. You strike me as a woman of will, and women of your sort tend to get in over their heads. You look as though you’re there already. Don’t make it worse by ignoring good sense.”
Alynor spread her arms and looked down at herself, scratched and stained and bruised. “This was no fault of mine. I was made the victim of a most unfortunate circumstance.”
“You’ll find more of the same if you go north.”
“I must go north. I’ve nowhere else to go.”
Caelor smiled. “Nonsense. You have us now.”
“With respect, I do not know you.”
Abran cocked his head and feigned a pout. “You needn’t be cold to us, madam.”
“We’re harmless,” said another man, fondling the hilt of his dagger.
“Wouldn’t hurt a speck. Would we, boys?” Caelor gave Draithon’s nose a playful tap.
The men laughed.
“Here’s what we’re going to do,” Caelor said. “Noontide is nearly upon us. Sit with your boy here and have yourself a bowl of stew. After you’ve had a rest and a good meal, then you can decide if you want to stay with us, or take your chances with the downs.”
Alynor hadn’t changed her mind, but she didn’t say so. She simply nodded and took Draithon over to the cookfire. The plump bald-headed cook ladled her a generous helping and handed her a wooden spoon.
It was good. There were chunks of meat and plenty of vegetables along with just the right amount of salt. Draithon was normally a picky eater, but he was so hungry he ate half the bowl and asked for more.
Caelor and his men lined up to receive their portions and sat down to eat. They spoke little during the meal, an odd sort of quiet hanging over them, like any group who has undergone a harrowing experience together. One man started telling jokes. The others humored him, though their laughter was muted with fatigue. Caelor silenced him after the first bawdy one, gesturing toward the boy.
The sun was high and hot by the time Caelor and his men had eaten their fill. Caelor came by and crouched beside Alynor as the men were packing up. “Well, Mistress Lyrent. Best we’d be heading off now. There will be room on the first wagon bench for you and your son.”
“I’m not going with you,” Alynor said.
“As much as it pains me to do so, I must insist. Whoever you knew in Westenreach—” his eyes flicked to the boy as he chose his words, “—they are no longer who they once were.”
“Yet I would find them nevertheless.”
“Madam. Do not force me to insist with greater enthusiasm than I already have. It would be no example for your son to witness.”
“If you wish to set an example for my son, let us go.”
“You are free to go,” Caelor said. “For your own safety, you will come with us and thank me later for having the foresight to know your wishes ahead of time.”
“You cannot do this.”
“I would tell you what awaits you up there, only it is too terrible to inflict upon the ears of an impressionable youngster.”
Alynor looked at her son. There was so much of his father in him. He was cranky as an old hermit at times, but he was tough, too. True, he had cried and fussed his fair share these last few days. But he had also kept quiet when other children might’ve screamed; he had stayed put when others would’ve wandered.
There was plenty of her in him, too. His curiosity; his boldness; his attention to the small things others seldom noticed. He was becoming, and would become, his own person in time, she knew. Yet she wanted to shelter him from everything vile and cruel in the world. Yet here she was, dragging him through the wilderness toward every conceivable danger, Sir Jalleth lost to them and the boy’s real father probably on a battlefield half a world away.
“Draithon, will you sit here and be good while Mommy talks to Master Caelor?”
“Don’t go away again,” he begged, reaching for her.
“I won’t be far. Just right here, see? Not far.” She put some distance between them, giving Caelor room to speak in a low voice without the boy overhearing. Draithon wiggled and squirmed, but remained by the campfire where she’d left him.
“The situation in Westenreach is quite dire,” Caelor
began. “The brain eaters—”
“Yes, what are these brain eaters you mentioned?”
“Insects. Burrowers. The whole town was overrun with them by the time we arrived. The infested… they were screaming. Not in fear, but in some wicked rage. They were breaking things. Breaking people. They say the rage subsides after a time. When the eaters have taken their fill…” Caelor tapped his forehead.
“What were you doing there? What is it you and your men do, exactly?”
“One might call me an opportunist. I prefer the term appropriator.”
“You’re thieves.”
“Well, now that’s not fair. Vultures, more like. We don’t steal, particularly. We simply locate things which are likely to cease belonging to anyone, and then wait until they do.”
“So when you heard of Westenreach’s plight, you pounced.”
“Not right away. We heard the brain eaters worked slowly; that the rage would soon fade to mild aggression, and eventually to outright stupor. We waited for the stupor.”
“So as to make the getting easier.”
Caelor threw his head back and slapped his thigh laughing. “Oh-ho… easy, you say? We’ve had it anything but. We numbered twenty-five at the start of last winter. Eighteen when we made for Westenreach. Now we are but eleven, and half of us were lucky to escape with our lives.”
Alynor looked around. “Was it the brain eaters?”
“For a few of us, yes. For the rest, it was the people.”
“What people?”
“The people of Westenreach. We found the town so thick with them we had to take refuge in a barn. It was days before we could fight our way out.”
“You killed innocent people?”
“Far from innocent, madam. Far from innocent. The madness that took them… it defies description. If you could’ve been there… if you could’ve seen their eyes…”
“I want to be there,” Alynor said. “You won’t let me go.”
“You really want that, knowing certain death awaits you there?”
“I do,” she said, though she was growing less sure of it all the time.
“Go, then. I’ve told you what to expect. Now you know. I can scarce stop you from throwing your life away if that’s what you mean to do.”
Alynor should’ve been relieved, but instead she felt a stone of anxiety in her gut. “Thank you for understanding.”
“I don’t. But I wouldn’t feel right about keeping you. I wish you’d come with us. I wish I were cruel enough a man to make you. My fellows and I have seen enough death for one year. Please, madam. Say you’ll reconsider.”
Now Alynor felt paralyzed. If only she knew where to find Kestrel and the others. Heading south with Caelor and his men would only take her back the way she’d come, toward Briarcrest and Linderton, where Dathiri Pathfinders were sure to be searching for her still. Given the choice between them and these brain eaters, she was not sure she knew which one would provide her the quicker end.
When she opened her mouth to speak, the words would not come.
Chapter 16
The door to Darion’s tower armory lay in splinters. Inside, a new door of fresh yellow wood lay across a pair of sawhorses, ready for mounting. The room was otherwise empty, though there were outlines in the dust where Darion’s tables and chests had once stood.
“You had the only key,” Albur Appleby explained. “Commander Tafford made us break it down.”
“They took everything,” Darion whispered, assembling his wits after a moment of speechlessness.
“All of it, I’m afraid.”
“Sent to Deepsail? To Tarber King?”
“Yes.”
Darion turned his head. He wanted very much to strangle Appleby where he stood. Perhaps the window above the winding staircase would provide the castellan a mercy. “Have you any idea what my personal effects were worth? One could’ve built a second keep beside this one and still had a fortune to spare…”
“As you say, my lord.” Appleby gave his head a shake, as if to scold himself for addressing Darion with respect.
“How did Tarber King know all your treasures were here?” Jeebo asked.
“It doesn’t matter,” Darion said. “He robbed this keep of items which were, by all accounts, not his.”
“The king would not take from his own keep,” said Appleby, “nor from the lord he appoints to sit in this seat. I will not say he offered a generous sum, given the apparent value of your collection. But he did send a fair amount in compensation for it.”
“He bought my whole collection sight unseen?”
“The treasures you amassed during your time as an adventurer are no secret. The size and value of your collection has become nearly as legendary as you.”
Darion stepped over a stack of wooden planks and circled the room, remembering. “There is no more magical a city in all the realms than Deepsail. I expect the king will find good use for my things there.”
“I expect he will.”
Darion stopped abruptly. “Master Appleby. I presume you had a hand in packing my things.”
Appleby gulped. “I did.”
“You would’ve gotten a good look at them, then.”
Appleby nodded.
“Do you remember seeing a horn among my treasures?”
“It has been so long, I can’t recall,” Appleby stammered.
Darion stared at him. “Try, if you would.”
Appleby crossed his arms and tapped his lips with a finger. “I believe I do recall a horn, now I think of it.”
“What did it look like?”
“It was… carved ivory, painted green, with a brass mouthpiece and a thick band of silver around the sounding end.”
“That is quite a lot of detail to remember,” Darion said.
“I did spend many hours cataloguing your hoard before it went out. The king asked that everything be documented to ensure there were no disappearances during transport.”
“During transport, you say. Would I be right in thinking you made one copy of that list for yourself and another for the king, to ensure parity?”
Appleby’s face went white. “You would.”
“And are you still in possession of your copy?”
“Why… yes. It’s somewhere in my books. I’m not sure where. I’d have to dig it out.”
Darion smiled. “Let’s pay your chambers a visit, shall we?”
Though it was Appleby’s right as steward to occupy the massive set of rooms Darion had once shared with Alynor, he’d kept his same chambers and left the high apartments empty for the keep’s next lord. The castellan’s rooms were spacious, but paltry by comparison. His desk and sitting area were cluttered with scrolls and books and papers, piled carelessly and beginning to overtake the room. Darion and Jeebo entered behind him and closed the door.
“Here they are,” Appleby said, pointing to a shelf of tomes on his bookcase, each as thick as a man’s hand.
“Where is it?” Darion asked.
“I’m not sure,” Appleby said, scratching his head. “It could be any of these.”
“Not the record book. The horn.”
Appleby’s eyes widened. “The—I beg your pardon?”
“You’re a dragon enthusiast, Albur. That’s even less of a secret around here than the value of my treasures. In all the years you were in my service, you hardly let me forget it.”
“This is true. But I would never steal from among your things.”
“They were not my things when you packed them away and had them sent halfway across the realms. If that’s the truth, show me the record. Show me where you wrote down that I owned the Dragon Horn, and it was carted off to Deepsail with the rest of my possessions.”
Appleby lifted his chin as if to stand the moral high ground. Before he could speak, his resolve melted. “Oh, alright. I took it. I hid it for my own, along with several hundreds of the gold whose absence won’t be missed, thanks to the tens of thousands more now lining the keep’
s coffers.”
“Show it to me,” Darion insisted.
Slipping his fingers into the gaps around a stone in the wall, Appleby wiggled until it came loose. It was so heavy he nearly fell over with it clutched to his belly, but he managed to set it on the floor without hurting himself. He reached into the hole and withdrew a sizeable wooden box with an iron clasp. This too he had trouble lifting, but he slid it onto his desk and stepped aside. “Here. Take it. It’s all yours anyway.”
Darion opened the lid. On a bed of gold pieces minted in every forge in the five realms sat the horn, carved ivory painted green, just as Appleby had described it. “Have you had the nerve to blow it yet?” Darion asked. “No, of course you haven’t. You’d be dead.”
“That begs the question,” Appleby said. “What was it about this particular item that made you want it above all the others?”
“I intend to be flown from here to the Wildwood, or die in the attempt.”
Appleby was impressed. “What for?”
“My wife.” Darion slipped the horn’s strap over his head and let it hang from his shoulder, leaving behind the wooden box filled with gold.
“Don’t you want any of this?” Appleby asked.
“If every lord dismissed his castellan for skimming the accounts, we might find ourselves with a deal more accounting to do. Hold onto it for me, Appleby. Hire the Galyrians I told you about. Use it to pay their wages.”
“I shall.”
“Promise me.”
“I do. I promise.”
“Then let us pretend I never knew you took anything from me. And let the dragons do with me as they will. Come, Jeebo. We’ve got a note to play.”
“Can it wait until morning?” Jeebo asked, following him out. “I should think it better if we could see them coming.”
“Them, eh? You’re optimistic about our chances.”
“Multiple dragons would not make me optimistic.”
“One to carry each of us, plus two more for the horses. Four is all we need, really,” Darion said with a grin.