by Henry Thomas
Norden just seemed to notice the weather for the first time and frowned. “How many of my horsemen can you take on with us to Torlucksford?”
She smiled. “I can take all of them, if they leave their mounts behind. But with the cargo in the hold, I can’t take on any animals.”
The man scowled incredulously. “Surely you can take a few on with their mounts?”
She kept her face as straight as could be, but inside Ryla was relishing the moment well. He was obviously bent out of shape with the news he had just received, but he also did not enjoy hearing anything contrary to his demands. She walked to the gangway and pointed to the hull. “She’s barely hovering here as it is, my lord. We need enough buoyancy to float up and catch the winds. Unless you wish to draw us along and hitch us to a team, then we cannot take on any more unnecessary weight.”
“Unnecessary? I shall decide what is necessary and what isn’t, Captain. If I say I need my troops conveyed to Torlucksford, then I expect nothing but ‘yes, my lord’ and accomodation from you, am I clear?”
She smiled. “Make no mistake, Norden. I am the captain of this airship, and once you step onto the deck you must acknowledge that. I will do what I must to help you along your way, but don’t think for a moment that I will forsake my crew and my ship’s safety just to sate your whims.”
The mage’s face blanched then reddened with rage. “You will take on my men and their mounts and transport us to Torlucksford!”
She stood on the deck and regarded him calmly for a long beat. “Right. As you say, Lord Mage.” She inclined her head slightly. “All hands!”
Norden was seething with rage, and he watched her warily as the crew fell in around her.
“We’ll need the ship’s crane back up and all this cargo off-loaded on the double boys.”
They all wore incredulous looks on their faces as they said “aye lady” and started off.
“Belay that order, Captain!” Norden hissed at her.
“I am accomodating your request to transport your cavalry. I can’t do both your cargo and your troops.” She said it flatly, matter-of-factly. She had him now, she saw it; and she saw that he realized it now too.
“Wait, then. Surely you can take on one?”
She just stared at him.
“Very well then, Captain. Keep my cargo aboard and convey me to Torlucksford.” He sighed, looking like a sullen child.
“Welcome aboard, Lord Mage.” She inclined her head and walked back to the helm. “Belay that order, lads. Make ready!”
Norden called his clerk over to him with an impatient gesture and stood with his hands on his hips looking out over his assembled Norandishmen and the haggling teamsters and carters as the thin scribe dismounted hurriedly and trotted up to him. She was attempting to eavesdrop on the mage when Kipren approached.
“There’s a problem in the hold, lady. You need to see it.”
She kept the forestalled question to herself and followed him to the hold, leaving Norden on the gangway, his clerk scurrying off to do his bidding. Kipren stood to the side and let Ryla pass first down the narrow forecastle portal with its short stepladder and into the hold.
Elmund and Galt were stood on either side of a crate looking down at someone sat atop it. Ryla had to look twice before she realized who it was.
Elmund looked amused beneath his stern attitude. “We found him hiding in this crate. Galt saw the lid moving.”
“Bellan? Seven bells, boy! What are you doing here?”
The boy went red and he looked as though he might tear up for a moment, but he took a quick breath and turned his earnest eyes to hers and pleaded, “I’m sorry for this, Captain. I truly am. But I been thinking a lot about a lot of different things really, and truly really thinking about them like, you see my meaning?”
“Bellan, what are you doing here?”
“Please, Captain, take me with you! I’m not an Ostler. I mean to say, I can do it mind you, I know all the ins and outs of it, the horse side of things well. I’m born to that, I can take care of horses all the livelong day should it be required of me to do so, but the truth is I’ve a taste for adventure, a calling like, if you take my meaning. And Grannock ain’t a tall enough beaker to quench my thirst, if you—”
“If I take your meaning?”
“Yes.”
“If I am to take your meaning then you wish to join the ship’s crew, or are you looking for a free ride to Torlucksford? You shouldn’t have come here. You’ve taken an awful risk. The mage may have learned of your involvement by now.”
Bellan looked as though he had not thought of that until now.
“You’ll stay aboard, and you’ll stay hidden. No one says a word. At Torlucksford, when the mage is occupied, you will disembark. Understand?”
Bellan started to object but then thought better of it and just nodded his head. “Aye, lady,” he said, and it looked to her that Galt, Kipren, and Elmund almost broke into laughter then, for he had intoned it like a perfect airshipman.
“By law, we throw stowaways over the sides,” she said.
The lad gulped as Kipren stifled a grin.
“I’ll make an exception in your case, but you will keep quiet down here and stay hidden until I send for you. Get him something to eat and drink before he faints away.” She shook her head and turned away and climbed back on deck and made her way back to the helm. That fool boy had given her something else to worry about now, she thought. If Norden found out Bellan knew where Joth and Eilyth had gone, there was no telling what he would stop at to drag the information out of the boy. On one hand he was a liability, and on the other hand, they were a man short and she could put the boy to work learning the ropes once they were rid of this mage. Why not take the lad on for a few cargo hauls? He was earnest enough about his desire for adventure, and the airshipman’s life was an adventurous one indeed. A lad that young should have his parents’ blessing, she knew, and once this had blown over perhaps another few days in Grannock would not be so bad. But now the thought of inns and rooms made her skin crawl. She wanted to be up in the sky again.
She watched as the Norandian guards dismounted and handed their mounts off to the cavalryman whom had lately ridden in as a messenger. He gathered them and tied them together in a column and rode the lead horse off at a fast traveling pace as the men on foot took up their weapons and gear and strode up the gangway. The sky thundered and flashed ominously and a cool wind blew straight through her, making her wish she was already wearing her furs. It would be a poor day for flying, a rough one to be sure.
“Raise the gangplanks!” She called it after the last Norandishman had stepped aboard.
Elmund and Kipren hauled the boards up and stowed them.
“When can we be underway, Captain?” Norden whined.
“Immediately, Lord Mage.”
He smiled, satisfied.
“All hands, make ready.”
Ryla looked to the skies as the crew worked and she called out the orders by rote as the routine of taking to the skies unfolded and she felt the world fall away from her at last. She set heading for Torlucksford to the north, and the Skyward rose and plunged through the stormy skies above Grannock and away.
Twenty-Five
They sent him two women who cowered in fear every time he lifted his hands and who did not understand nor speak a word of Oestersh. Once he made them understand that he wanted food and a bath, one of them began sobbing, perhaps out of relief. Rhael did not know, nor did he care very much. After a few maddening moments they had set about their tasks and moved quickly. The bath had been most pleasant, and the slave had combed and washed his tangled hair expertly, almost painlessly—something of a near miracle in Rhael’s mind, for he had thought to simply cut it off when he had seen his reflection in the mirror and the tangled matted mess of his once beautiful, lustrous hair.
Now as he stood in front of the mirrors, dressed in his newly acquired alien finery, the scars and bruises diminished with his cleanly appearance. Rhael felt pleased to see some-thing of his old self looking back at him in his reflection. The clothes were strange and a touch on the small side, and the slaves were useless when it came to presenting him with choices, but he had finally settled upon an ensemble from the garments at hand that fit him fairly well and as he regarded himself, they made him look quite impressive and elegant. Next to his skin he wore a fine silken shirt, the finest he had ever seen in fact. It was cut in a strange fashion that left it open like a coat, prompting the wearer to fold it closed and keep it in place by tucking it into their hosen. Over the pale colored silk shirt he wore a deep silvery gray silken sort of doublet or close fitting jacket that was slightly too small for him so that he had to leave it open a bit more than he would have liked, but the doublet was a beautiful cut and chased with silver thread in embroidered accents along its lines. Its execution and style were completely different than anything Rhael had ever worn before, but he liked the way the garment looked on him. The hosen had been the hardest article to fit, and he had in the end simply cut the feet out of a fine pair of silken hose and forced them up over his thighs. Masking the butchered feet of the hose were a fine pair of soft dark leather knee boots with elongated pointed toes, almost the sort that noblemen wore for hunting or falconing. Over the doublet Rhael had donned a knee-length, open-sleeved velvet coat trimmed in fur in a rich dark color that complimented the silken doublet beneath it. It made him look regal, he thought. A broad silver belt held the coat in place, and from it dangled a jewel hilted sword, its strange hilt complex and ornate, encircling one’s hand almost when grasped. On his shoulders a fine cloak of wine-colored wool was draped, its borders woven in intricate patterns, pinned with a golden brooch set with amber and jet and coral.
The slaves bowed when they had finished dressing him, and he hefted the leather sack of orbs onto his shoulder and pushed past them. He left the bedchamber and made his way to the balcony so that he might check the progress of the airship. He turned to them as he left, clapping his hands and miming someone eating.
“Food! Bring me food to eat!” he said to them.
They bobbed and scurried. Rhael did not know from what sort of race these strange women had emerged. They had strange complexions, strange features. They spoke a strange language. Ultimately, it mattered not to Rhael, he decided. These were simply tools to further his goals, these slaves, these Kuilbolts, these “old masters” he was about to meet. He would use them accordingly, however he saw fit. He caught sight of his reflection once more as he passed out of the tower and onto the balcony and into the cold swirling winds that buffeted him as he surveyed the progress of his new guests. He would remedy problems of logistics such as tailors and other specialized peasants once he had secured his powerbase. For now, he was most concerned with the ornate green and golden airship that had just set down within the walls of the palisade and the figures he saw on its deck. They were too far away to make out in any clear detail, but Rhael could make out a dozen figures, at least, and all of them seemed to be helmed in gleaming bronze and wearing swords at their hips. Rhael narrowed his eyes and judged the distance between the tower and the airship. It was within a bowshot, and it would take them no time at all to close the gap between the wall and the tower.
Did they have a key to the tower gate, some means of circumventing his security within his tower keep? He reached down into the leather sack and removed one of the cool glass spheres and saw it swirling with a reddish blue light in his hand. Such power he felt within it, and all of it at his command. He looked back to the deck of the airship as one of the figures raised his hand and the others formed up in front of him in two neat ordered rows, then drew their swords as one and placed the blades on their shoulders.
The figure with the raised hand walked down the gangway, the soldiers following behind in formation. Rhael would enlighten them to the art of wielding power. The audacity of them to refuse his generous invitation to treat with him, the new lord of this fortified mine, this elegant tower. Soulspire, he had named it. Now they had come seeking to kill him or capture him; this was an assault on his person and his right to call himself Lord of Soulspire, Lord Uhlmet.
They were not Kuilbolts. He recognized that immediately by their stature and their bearing. No, they looked man-like, yet they moved weirdly. Gracefully and fluidly. It was unsettling, Rhael decided, and potentially deadly, given their numbers. Now, much to his dismay, the leader of the newly arrived soldiers was shouting orders to Rhael’s Kuilbolt soldiers and they seemed to be heeding the commands. Duplicitous wretches, he should have known not to count on the fear stinking monsters so soon after his coming to power.
Rhael felt himself begin to panic at the onset of a gnawing fear in his gut, a fear of the unknown in the form of these strangely clad and alien man-like beings marching up the hill toward his tower. They wore rich crimson-colored silken surcoats that shimmered as they moved, and beneath the coats shone their burnished bronze armor, ornate and gleaming like their crested helms. Their leader wore a helm chased with silver. His crest was variegated and transverse, and he carried a long bronze rod with a stone finial in his hand and a sword at his hip. He saw now as they marched that the soldiers carried bronze wands with mounted crystals in their other hands and they were already halfway up the hill. Rhael drew a deep breath. He stood at the battlements, where he could be seen and drew himself up to his full height and flung his cloak back to reveal his garments and the sword at his hip, the ancient signifier of nobility and martial power. They could not argue his right to have added this fortress to his holdings through force—after all, it was he who had been captured and he who had turned the tables on his captors and taken his share as he had seen fit. They would not doubt that to look upon him now in his new finery standing atop the battlements of the tower, holding out his hand toward the advancing knot of bronze and crimson soldiers below. They have no idea whom they are dealing with, he thought.
“Come no farther!” he yelled down to them. “I see you have refused my invitation to treat!”
They stopped and looked startled when appeared, but as he spoke, Rhael saw that the knot of soldiers was rippling with movement and jostling and he heard sounds drifting up from them. Soft sounds—a sort of laughter, perhaps? Rhael was not sure, but then he made out words on the wind.
“An ape-monkey?!”
“That’s a ladies garment, is it not?” a strange voice growled.
They were ridiculing him, belittling him, calling him names, guffawing in their ranks at his expense, doubting his birthright to rise and be a leader of men and lord of all creatures. Doubting his power. Rhael experienced a brief moment of shock as he realized that these beings were looking at him in the way that he viewed peasants, but it fled as soon as it arrived with rage taking its place. Rhael’s bony pale hand raised the orb with its swirling auras and brought it into view. For a long moment it grew deathly quiet and the laughter ceased as the leader straightened and leapt backward an amazingly great distance and raised the rod he carried up before him.
“Stagger lines and let fly!” The leader sang out in the wind, and the formation of soldiers began to fan out into two lines, one slightly forward from the other, both of them bearing at Rhael’s position on the battlements. He saw one of the soldiers on the far end who had already formed into his position level his bronze wand at him, and then he heard a low splitting sound and dodged a fist-sized chunk of stone as it cracked off of the battlement in front of him. Rhael dove behind the battlement as several more of the low whump whumping sounds cracked out and shook through his very bones. All around him lay broken rubble, but the battlements were holding and providing shelter for him. The loud cracking continued for another earth-shaking, bone-jarring, agonizingly long moment, and Rhael felt something trickling from his nose and realized it was blood. No matter
he thought, this will be over very shortly. He peered out through the crenelated wall and saw that most of the soldiers were now kneeling and removing the stones from their bronze wands, replacing them with others from somewhere within their costume.
Summoning his will and his courage, Rhael rose from behind the stone wall and brought the energies of the orb down to bear on the soldiers below, oblivious to the wall erupting into sprays of potentially lethal gravel around him. The power passed through him from within the orb, and it fell in an arc like sheet lightning over the soldiers, forking out and striking them multiple times and tossing them into the air like rags in the wind, one after another. Three stood behind their leader, who still stood with the rod he bore before him, and now Rhael could just make out a silvery nimbus emanating from the rod and extending out in a dome around them that crackled and spat like a hot skillet when the energy from the orb tried to penetrate it. Rhael watched as the three soldiers knelt and saw to the crystals atop their bronze wands, their leader looking to them, marking their progress behind his shield of crackling energy.
They were about to redouble their attack, Rhael realized. Perhaps the shield rod worked off of a finite source of energy as well. He poured more energy from the orb out at the shield in a torrential storm of electrical lashes, thinking all the while how he wanted to grind his enemies into powder, fry them into dust. He saw the leader struggle beneath the onslaught, pushing the rod out from him with both arms against the tide of energy thrown at him relentlessly. Rhael let go the energy for a moment and gazed down at them. The leader looked back to the others one more time and Rhael knew his moment was coming and that he would have to act fast. A low, thin laugh began to form in the pit of his stomach and he struggled to keep it in as the leader let the shield go and leapt backward again as the soldiers raised their wands and began to crack the energy out at Rhael where he stood on the wall, kicking up dust and debris all around him. But Rhael stood and faced the flurry of stones and stinging splinters and let go another wave of lightning so powerful that the orb he bore before him split with a sickening crack and a jet of hot vapor. He looked down and saw the leader of the soldiers writhing on the ground, his armor smoking and his once glorious crimson surcoat a blackened mess. All of them gone now. Dead. He was the victor. He was always the victor.