At the prospect of leaving for the stonetin and more surprises, Mercet quickly gathers a bag of clothes and his toothbrush before rushing out of his room to wave goodbye to Undess.
“Leaving for the whole night, are you?”
“Thought we’d take a night out, yes,” Ethan states plainly.
“Mercet, I know your father doesn’t believe, but Dustian always knows when you’re lying to your mother. When you’re a liar to Him.” Ethan huffs. Always with her fatalistic nothing-matters-but-Dustian nonsense. “Be kind in your day. Approsh the sun. Approsh the moon.” She kisses him on both cheeks.
“I will, Mom.” He hugs her and then turns his back, rolling his eyes in view of Ethan.
Ethan stops him. “Don’t roll your eyes. Appize to your mother.”
Embarrassed to be caught, Mercet’s face distorts. He turns, sheepish. “Apory, Mom.”
“I told you, you can’t hide from Dustian.”
“Dad’s not Dustian,” Mercet replies sarcastically.
“Certainly not, child. Certainly not.”
The boy giggles and leaves the room, followed by Ethan.
“Have a blessed night, Undess,” Ethan says as he walks away.
She closes her lips and breathes with disapproval.
Outside, Mercet hops into the carriage before Ethan enters and closes the door behind them. They set off. Mercet behaves as if enamored at the turn of events and watches as they pass various bodies and small horsals along the cobblestone streets. “We’re not headed to the stonetin?” he questions as he pokes his head out.
“We’re meeting someone.”
“Who?”
“Soon enough.”
At this, Mercet rolls his eyes once more. “You’re incorrigible.”
“Incorrigible? Where’d you learn that?”
“My teacher said that’s what I was.”
At this, Ethan laughs heartily. They continue along until they reach the Salsman Gates, where they park along the side road. Mercet jumps from the carriage and rushes through the massive city doors. On the other side, a cliff overlooks the shifting sands and a setting sun. Almost dusk.
“Can you tell me now?” Mercet asks.
“They’ll be here soon enough.”
Unimpressed, Mercet looks around. He hops over to a small boulder to see farther down the trail but catches nothing. After a major, the gates open and a large horsal with short brown matted fur wanders by, carrying a large family of six on its broad, flat back. It pads quietly along the road winding down toward the sands.
Mercet grows impatient. “Where are they?” And then he spots her as they come around a corner. He starts to run.
“Mercet, watch out now.”
He doesn’t listen and Ethan dashes after him. With Mercet being quicker and younger, Ethan quickly gives up the chase. The city’s night bells ring out as the sun disappears over the crest.
When Sanet catches sight of Mercet running, she hurdles off their little horsal and greets him, grabbing him up in her arms and swinging him in a great circle. Ethan eventually catches up. Sanet looks as magnificent and fresh as she always did, wearing her signature green hood.
“Sur Ethan, a pleasure.” They embrace.
“Is that your cog?” Mercet points to a strange looking frek sitting on the shoulder of the older gentleman.
“This is Brute,” the man states. “Not a cog. He’s a creshwillow.”
A creshwillow? Aren’t those the pets of protnuks?
“This is Bernard. Bernard, this is Ethan and his son Mercet.”
Bernard stands and hops down off the horsal. Up close, Bernard looks much younger than he appeared from afar, athletic with thick, muscular arms. He holds the air of the Land about him. A Radibian, if I had to guess.
Sanet continues, “We met in the Highlands. He’s helped me find the brass.”
She did find it. His mouth forms a wide and beaming smile as he speaks, “We now have two things to celebrate.”
“It’s also my paseday,” Mercet interrupts.
“Paseday?” Bernard questions.
Mercet answers with indignation, “Yeah, it’s my paseday.”
Sanet interjects, “To celebrate the day you’re chosen.”
Bernard nods with understanding. “Well, hopefully, your paseday doesn’t end in a bunch of fire.” He ruffles Mercet’s hair.
“Don’t ask,” Sanet responds to Ethan’s confused expression.
The ride to Cadwellion’s stonetin is lively. Sanet and Bernard recount their journey, detailing the abnormal pattern of the tormisand and the frightful encounter with welkings inside a temple of monstrous krakes. Mercet and Brute have fallen into a battle of wits, as Mercet attempts to hide parcels of meat from the creshwillow and Brute grows more and more agitated.
When they arrive at the stonetin, it stands ready with a grand welcome, the guards standing tall and quiet. Firelight and neon illuminate the walls in soft orange and yellow as the officer in charge greets them at the front gate and escorts them into the main hall.
“Shall we eat?” Ethan asks.
“That’d be wondrous,” Sanet answers.
Ethan looks to Bernard, whose eyes scatter from corner to corner. “Impressive?”
“Quite. I’ve heard of stonetins, been in a few since I’ve trekked out, but this is by far the most elaborate.”
Ethan looks around. Ornate windows, intricate tapestries over the walls. It is notable but perhaps much less so, at least to him, after his years of laboring inside.
Duskmeal is served. Lyn, mashings, and vegs with plenty of ale. Ethan allows Mercet to have a sip of the ale, which he spits out, after a toast to Sanet: “To your safe return. To new friends and celebrations of your success.”
As the evening draws out, Mercet is sent to sleep. And though he begs and protests the denial, Brute refuses to follow him.
They continue the night in a smoking room, Bernard and Sanet passing green.
“Sanet, you have to show me,” Ethan states, unable to wait any longer.
With an eager grin, Sanet nods and leaves the room. Bernard and Ethan sit alone for a major. The Radibian remains soundless, as he has been throughout the night, from his veneration of the stonetin. If anything, it is charming. Ethan is about to ask Bernard about the brown leather mitts he wears when Sanet returns, carrying a large fragment of brass.
She polishes it a bit before handing it to Ethan, who takes it cautiously in his hand. “Lincoln, I didn’t think it would be this large.” It’s nearly the size of his fist.
“This was found in the krake’s stonetin in the Carvinga Tunnels. With that key you replicated.”
“How marvelous. And the other one? The one at the manor in Misipit?”
Sanet pauses for a second. “Someone else found it.”
“Oh. Shame.” Ethan looks back down to the brass, turning it in his hands. It is inexplicably pedestrian after so much buildup around it. And then there’s a knock on the table. He looks up and sees Bernard holding a smaller sliver of brass.
“What is that?”
“I told you . . . someone else found it.” Sanet smiles.
“You? How?”
Bernard then recounts his trouble with the neox and how he met Sanet soon after. Sanet continues with her experience with the crimson men and chasing the neox through Carvinga. Ethan sits back in amazement. Never in his kiptales would he have made such travels. He spent hours and days on the pages of research, in conversations with odd and unsavory bodies. To go forth and see the Land seemed absurd and dangerous.
“Well, now that I’ve had a few drinks and Sanet plainly refuses to ask, I want to know why,” Bernard says.
“Why?”
“Why these are so unispar?”
Sanet sits back in her chair. “I told him it wasn’t our bargain.”
“I have to confess, I know little myself,” Ethan starts. His research did give him a little hint, but in truth Cadwellion knows much more about their significance, and
he seems to like it that way. “That said, I do have some notions.”
“Well?”
“Well, they form a larger orb. You see here,” Ethan leans in and rubs a smoother side of the slightly rounded brass, “this is likely the outside of it. And here,” he holds his hand out to take the smaller second sliver from Bernard, who hands it to him, “I bet you these two . . .” He begins to press them together as if they were engineered puzzle pieces. After a minor, they snap together, making a small clink as they do. It surprises all three.
“Lincoln,” Bernard blurts out, standing to get a closer look.
Ethan examines where the two pieces came together and finds he’s unable to distinguish a crack or even the slightest line. “Lincoln indeed,” he repeats.
“We had both those pieces all this time.” Bernard shakes his head. “So, it’s one big orb, but for what?”
“That’s the riddle, isn’t it?” Ethan stands. “I should show you something.”
He leaves the dining hall. Sanet and Bernard follow, and they make their way up the stonetin stairwell to Cadwellion’s study. After they enter, Ethan closes the door behind them.
“You see, here is where Cadwellion keeps his own orb.” He moves to a cabinet and opens it. Along its empty shelf is a small rounded indentation. “A ranpart’s orb is used for many reasons. It’s what gives them their alleged power, though I haven’t seen any evidence of it. And some believe that ranparts can’t do anything out of the ordinary. That the whole bargain of being a ranpart is drawing power from fear and misinformation.”
Sanet shifts her stance. Ethan isn’t sure where his flippant dismissal of Cadwellion comes from—too many drinks—but he continues nonetheless. “In any case, the assumption here is that these fragments are part of a larger orb. And judging by this piece, it’s not something that’s the size of one’s hand, like his. This one could be . . .” He looks at the brass fragment once more. “Well, this could be over eight feet across.”
Bernard’s eyes widen, then he recalls, “You know, when we were in Smith Tunston’s shop, I saw an orb.”
“You saw an orb like this?” Ethan says curiously.
“It wasn’t eight feet, of course, but a smaller one like your ranpart’s.” He points to the empty case. “If I remember correctly, it was black. It had that same shimmer as the stonetin of krakes.”
“Fascinating. Finding an orb without its ranpart is rare. Where did you say you found it?”
Sanet answers, “There’s a smith in Radiba.”
“A smith? I’ve not met one of those. None here in Salsman. I hear they’re quite the entertainment though.”
“You could say that.” Bernard and Sanet share a knowing look. “So, you’re saying that this orb could bring power?”
“Perhaps. If anything, it’ll make for a nice collector’s item. But all this said, I do believe there’s a reward for its recover.”
Ethan leads them to another room with a desk. He places the brass piece down and pulls out an enormous note-lined ledger. He writes in it and then walks over to a locked cabinet and pulls from it a few bags of coin. “Sanet, my dear, you’re going to be a heavy girl.”
Sanet beams.
He hands her the coin, and she immediately passes a significant portion of it to Bernard.
“This is as much yours as it is mine,” she says.
Bernard rolls it in his hand. “And Logan’s and Iahel’s.”
“Of course, but you did hunt a neox for eighteen hours.”
“Eighteen hours?” He’s quadruple the man I am, thinks Ethan.
A voice says from behind them, “Apory to interrupt, but you received an urgent tap.” One of the guards stands at the doorway. In his hand is a small note. Ethan reaches for it, but the guard motions away from him. “Apory, Sur Mershner, but this is addressed to Sur Wells.”
Surprised, Sanet nods and takes the note. She reads it to herself before looking up at Ethan and Bernard with a look of puzzlement.
“It’s from Iahel. She says she’s in Carvinga and that there’s a battle between the tenfooters and Misipit. And she wants us to secure the brass. To keep it safe and as far away from Carvinga as possible.”
“A battle between states?” Bernard questions. “How can that be? That’s . . . well, that’s illegal, isn’t it?”
Ethan watches the two, his heart skipping a beat. “It’s not just illegal, it’s downright apocalyptic.”
Chapter 24
ETHAN AND THE WEONSLOW
The tap from Sanet’s friend Iahel, warning them of the conflict between Misipit and Carvinga, bewilders Ethan. Though the Three Laws do not explicitly proclaim that one state could not invade or attack another, their entire charge is to prevent war altogether. The revelation feels as if someone has gut-punched him with a daggered knuckle.
Once he’s read the note himself, Ethan looks up and suggests they part ways until the next day, as it is sure to bring on a series of lengthy discussions about what their next actions must be. “It’s best to get a good night’s rest.”
After escorting them to separate rooms, Bernard tittering at the elegant accommodations, Ethan retires to a sleeping room next to Mercet’s. Before slipping off to sleep, there’s a sudden and quiet knock at his door, which opens and then gently closes. He squints in the dark and makes out the familiar outline of Amil, one of Cadwellion’s guards. Ethan sits up as Amil walks in and, without much ado, removes the top layers of her uniform before getting into the bed next to him.
“Tonight’s not a good night, Amil.”
“Mercet’s asleep. And I don’t think Sanet or the new sur will mind.” Amil says this as she leans over and kisses him.
The act itself gives him a bit of a rise, and he instinctively, unceremoniously, kisses her back. He immediately regrets it, stopping and pushing away. “Apory, it’s been an eventful day. I forgot we talked about tonight.”
At his remark, Amil sits up. “I can leave if you’d like.”
“No, appize. Stay.” He kisses her again. “Stay. I need a distraction.”
She smiles, a sight that still gives Ethan grenspimples, even after four years. He knows that at some point he and Undess will have to break things off. But he also knows that Amil is much too young for him, and beyond a good slip, they don’t have much in common. But Amil is kind and easygoing. A welcome reprieve from the uptight and difficult relationship with Undess.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“No, I just need to think.”
“The other guards are saying that Sanet received a tap. That some battle is brewing in Carvinga. Is that true?”
“She did receive a tap, from a friend who said she was in Carvinga, but it’s hard to believe she was able to survive around tenfooters, and it’s also hard to believe that the Misipit would be flam enough to start a war. So, it’s difficult to discern what’s true.”
“That’s wild.” Amil says this more to herself than Ethan. She reaches out and takes his hand, squeezing and rubbing it as she sinks under the blankets.
With the thought of war and Cadwellion’s secrets returning to the front of his mind, Ethan is unable to sleep. “Amil?” He squeezes her hand.
She opens her eyes, big and brown and innocent. “Do you think you could, perhaps get me a key to Cadwellion’s office?”
Amil sits up at the words. “Now?”
“If you can. I mean, if you can’t, don’t worry about it. It was just a thought—”
But before Ethan’s able to finish, Amil hops up from the bed, tosses on her uniform, and disappears into the hall. She’s wonderful. He sits in the quiet, unsure of what he aspires to find. Looking out his sleeping room window, he sees the moon lying in perfect alignment against the sand-lined crest.
A few majors later, Amil creeps back through the door, waving for Ethan to follow her out. Not ready to leave, he gets up and quickly dresses, with Amil waving her hand for him to hurry.
“Apory, I didn’t think this would happen so soo
n.”
“You know I relish this kind of thing.” She beams a flam and enthusiastic grin.
“I owe you a bargain.”
“I’m sure you’ll deliver. Now let’s go. Ren won’t be happy if he finds out I took his personal key.”
“You took Ren’s?” He shudders at the thought of the husky guard’s guaranteed overreaction.
“He ate like a prenog tonight. He’s going to sleep past alarm.”
At this, Ethan calms a bit and follows Amil outside. They sneak along the hall and up the tall staircase to Cadwellion’s master. Amil unlocks the solid burnished-iron door and turns to Ethan. “I’ll wait out here, in case anyone comes along.”
He nods before moving in. “I do appize for how I treat you. If the Land rotated west to east—”
“Just go, you big cog.”
Ethan smiles with tightly pressed lips and turns into the room.
Unlike the ranpart’s study, where guards and Ethan himself roam in and out, here is where Cadwellion keeps his most-guarded writings and memoranda. Ethan makes his way over to a large desk covered in inks and papers written in old and coded languages. He also finds illustrations and maps that do not correlate with any states he’s studied or in fact can remember as part of the hundred and thirty-three. Lines scratched across the maps resemble what might be words or letters but that look more like the sketches of a three-year-old child learning to write their curam.
The pile, organized in no intelligent manner, is sure to equate to each of the various mysteries: the impending assault in Carvinga; the pieces and fragments of the brass orb; the meetings between Sanet and Cadwellion without him. Even if Cadwellion is an absolute fraud, he at least has his reasons. A purpose to the madness. And then, underneath even more writings and letters that riddle along another road, Ethan discovers a promising lead . . .
Advent of the Roar (The Land Old, Untouched Book 1) Page 27