Azerick was surprised, not only that a noblewoman had deigned to speak to the rugged common men, but she actually treated them with courtesy and respect.
The speaker of the group swiped the knit hat from his head, began wringing it in his huge hands, and cleared his throat to talk. “Are you Lady Miranda of North Haven?”
“Why yes I am. How do you do, gentlemen?”
The big farmer turned to his friends. “Ya see, I told ya! I seen her last winter fair lookin’ like the goddess o’ winter herself!” The excited man turned back to face Miranda. “Milady, may I touch yer hand, like a gentleman don’t ya know?”
Miranda laughed loudly, got up from her chair, stood on her tiptoes, and gave the man a peck on the cheek. For a moment, Azerick thought the man was going to faint and fall atop their table, but he locked his knees before they gave way completely and stuttered his sincerest thanks before he and his friends returned to their table, talking excitedly about the encounter.
Azerick was stunned. Never had he seen a person of wealth, much less nobility, treat a person of such low status so kindly. The friendliest thing a nobleman had every done for him was to aim for the legs instead of the head when he had tried to whip him for being in the way.
“You seem to be very popular amongst your people,” Azerick said as Miranda took her seat once more.
“It is easy to be gracious when you have such wonderful people around you.” The earnestness of her words earned her several smiles from nearby tables.
“I am afraid growing up in Southport did not leave me with a very good impression of the nobility. I am glad to see not all are greedy, maligned scum who care only about their own ambitions and nothing for the people who they are supposed to protect and serve.”
“Is that your impression of all nobles, or are there some in particular you personally detest, such as Southport’s duke?”
“Nearly all nobles I have encountered fit rather well into that mold. It would probably be best for me not to speak out openly against the Duke. I understand that you have a certain political decorum to maintain.”
“Perhaps more than I show, but my mother certainly does. I personally think Duke Ulric is a selfish, treasonous pig of a man who will either one day be king or find his head on a pike. I personally hope for the latter,” Miranda stated unequivocally.
Azerick’s opinion for this noble-born woman increased even further while the other three at their table gave her imploring looks not to speak so openly. The inn’s door opened and another local customer came in. Before the man pushed the door shut, Azerick heard the unmistakable cry of a wolf.
“Was that a wolf I heard?” Miranda asked with more excitement than concern.
“I’m sure it was, but it is highly unusual for wolves to be this near the coastal villages,” Otis answered.
“I hope it is not a large pack, or the ranchers and farmers could be severely hurt by their predation,” Miranda said with concern for both the wolves and the welfare of the livestock owners.
Just one—make that two, Azerick thought to himself.
The two women bid everyone a good night, retired for the evening, and Captain Brague escorted them upstairs. Azerick got up from the table after the Captain and the women left him alone with Otis and made his way to the kitchen. He paid the kitchen staff for a heavy plate of food and any bone scraps they might have.
He took the sack of discarded bones, wrapped the plate of food in a towel, and ducked out the back door. He waited several minutes before he heard Ghost’s howl, which was quickly followed by the higher pitched wail of Wolf.
Azerick walked out into the night in the direction of the calls. He crossed the road running through the center of town and into the woods. The trees had been cut back decades ago for building materials and the forest began about two hundred yards from the edge of town.
Azerick walked only a few paces into the woods before setting the plate of food on a stump and setting the sack of bones and discarded cuts of meat and fat next to it. He looked around for a moment and thought he saw the brief glint of golden eyes in the pale moonlight. Satisfied, he turned around and walked back to the inn.
Otis was gone from the table by the time he stepped back into the inn and went upstairs. He entered the only other room the innkeeper had available and saw Otis sitting on a narrow bunk set against one wall. Azerick’s eyes quickly settled on Captain Brague as the man took two steps across the floor, stopped directly in front of him, and jabbed a finger into his chest.
“I don’t know what kind of game you are playing, wizard, nor do I see why someone like Lady Miranda treats the likes of you as if you were even close to being an equal. But do not mistake her friendliness and good nature as anything other than being polite. Do not encourage her or pursue her. I guarantee you that once we reach North Haven you will have enjoyed the last of her company. I know a miscreant when I see one. Despite your little conjuror’s tricks, that is what you are, and lowlife peasants do not mix with nobility!” The Captain emphasized each of his last words by poking Azerick in the chest.
If Azerick had been the least bit offended or outraged at the Captain’s behavior, not a trace of it showed on his face or in his reaction. Anyone with any ability to read a dangerous man would know that was when they were the closest to lashing out.
“You should know, Captain, that I killed the last person who called me a peasant,” Azerick replied emotionlessly.
“Are you threatening me?” Captain Brague asked, pushing his thick-jawed face to within inches of Azerick’s.
A malign grin spread across the sorcerer’s young face. “I am just letting you know that the largest piece remaining of him would have fit inside that metal brain bucket you call a helmet with plenty of room to spare. Now, if you are quite finished trying to see who has the bigger sword, I am going to get some sleep.”
Azerick cast a glance at the terrified driver who was certain he was about to be caught up in the middle of a vicious battle between two men who each held a great deal of power in their own right. Otis let out a deep breath when the sorcerer and the warrior both stripped down to their small clothes and crawled into their beds, not once taking their hate-filled eyes off each other.
The night passed and the morning came with neither man attempting to kill the other in their sleep. After a warm breakfast, the party saddled up and resumed their journey north. Captain Brague had offered to commandeer a coach for Miranda and her maid, but the noblewoman refused and insisted that she would rather ride. They made better time by leaving all but the three horses used to carry baggage and provisions back in the small town.
Miranda continued to make small talk while Azerick provided even shorter answers. Azerick avoided Miranda’s questions about himself. He parried and deflected her seemingly endless queries with vague answers as a master fencer parries the blade of an opponent. Captain Brague tried to burn holes through the sorcerer’s back and out his chest with his eyes the entire ride.
They spent a second night at another inn at what was little more than a way station for travelers. The few patrons who were there also knew Lady Miranda and treated her with fondness. To Miranda’s credit, she never refused to shake hands or speak with anyone, and she always treated everyone with a courtesy rarely displayed between noble and commoner.
Azerick was relieved when it became apparent the Captain felt no need to renew any of his previous threats and settled for ignoring the sorcerer’s presence for the most part. Otis rarely spoke to Azerick, although he felt it was more a matter of the stigma associated with spellcasters and not due to dislike or unfriendliness.
Lady Miranda was even more cheerful and chatty than she had been before as they rode farther north. So warm and welcoming was her personality that even Azerick was having a hard time not opening up to her and divulging some of the personal memories he kept locked up tightly inside him.
“Azerick, tell me about your family. You said you from Southport. Are they still there?” Mirand
a asked, once again trying to elicit even a small shred of information from the taciturn sorcerer.
“I do not have a family,” Azerick replied shortly.
“Nonsense. Everyone has a family.”
“Not when men of power decide they are a threat or have something they want. I have had several families, and each of them was murdered by just such people.”
Miranda blushed deeply. “I am sorry. I had no idea. What about The Academy? Surely you have some wonderful stories of your stay there?”
Azerick looked up at the sky and then back at the road ahead of them. “Another person of power sought to take what was not his and I stopped him. For this, he tried to kill me.”
“What happened?”
“He failed; I did not. But since his family had wealth and power, my guilt and punishment was unquestionable, so I fled. Another person of power enslaved me and later murdered my wife and unborn child. Is there anything else you desperately need to know about the reality facing those who are not born into privilege?”
The look of pain and loss she saw in Azerick’s eyes instantly made Miranda lose her desire for further conversation. She spent the next two hours studying the countryside and occasionally pointing out areas of interest to Azerick, but not once did she resume asking him about his past, for which he was extremely grateful.
Just after noon, the small party crested a long slow hill and gazed down upon the city of North Haven nestled in its protective bay in the distance far below them. Azerick thought it was one of the most beautiful sites he had ever seen. The cobbled road descended into a small valley where the city lay at one end and spread outward from the crescent of the bay’s shoreline. Ships with their white sails bobbed peacefully in the calm waters of the bay. Some were tied to long, floating docks while others lay anchored hundreds of yards off shore.
Beyond the protective waters of the harbor, the sails of fishing vessels and larger cargo carriers dotted the open ocean. For a moment, Azerick let himself imagine his father aboard one of his ships sailing into North Haven to sell his rare cargo from Lazuul. He imagined himself at the helm, guiding the large, four-masted ship into the bay under his proud father’s tutelage. Azerick quickly wiped the pleasant fantasy from his mind knowing it could never be. Instead, he wondered if any of the ships he could see belonged to Zeb.
Miranda caught the smile creep onto Azerick’s face. “It is a lovely city, don’t you think?” she smiled at the dour sorcerer’s obvious enjoyment of the view.
“It is. You must be very proud of it.”
“We are. My mother and I both work very hard to keep North Haven the polished jewel my father helped to create.”
“How did your father die?” Azerick asked, taking the offensive in the question asking for once.
Miranda’s eye’s took on a distant, lonely look at the sudden turn of events. “The healers say it was a heart attack, and father did enjoy his drink more than some, but he was always very healthy. He could ride, fight, and hunt with any man. It is hard for me to accept that there was any such weakness inside him that could bring him down so quickly.”
“Was he a good ruler? Did the people like and respect him like they seem to do you?”
Her smile lit up her face once more. “Oh yes. The people loved my father a great deal. I said he liked to drink, and he did much of it at the various inns throughout the city. He always told me that if I wanted to know how people truly felt about their lords and their troubles, just go to an inn or a tavern, have a drink, and listen to them. He said that if the people were happy, then their lord was doing a good job. If they were not, then it was likely that the lord was not providing for his people and needed to amend his rule or be replaced.”
“He certainly sounds like a rare man. I have met few if any nobles who would share his view.”
“He learned that from his father who learned it from his father who was the one that turned North Haven from a small trading port into the wonderful city it is now.”
“What about your mother? Does she rule in much the same way?”
Miranda sighed and thought about the question before answering. “Mother loves her people and the city. She rules justly, but she is not as open as father was even before he died. After father died, she walled up her emotions. She sort of reminds me of a certain wizard I know,” she said mischievously.
“I am a Sorcerer, not a wizard,” came Azerick’s usual, quick correction.
“Who said I was talking about you?” Miranda asked coyly. “It is funny how one immediately picks up on the negative and associates it with themselves. I find people who do such wear their negativity as a façade to conceal their true nature and to avoid more pain.”
Azerick’s face flushed. Fortunately, he spied a large ruin where a tall tower and crumbled walls and outbuildings still stood on a hilltop about two miles out of town.
“What are those ruins on the hill?” Azerick asked, quickly changing the subject.
Miranda shielded her eyes from the sun with her hand and looked at what her aloof companion pointed at despite knowing precisely to what he was referring. Everyone in North Haven knew about the ruins, and knew well enough to stay far away from them.
“That was once the keep from where the lord of North Haven ruled with his family before it became a major port of commerce. That was back when it was just a small trading town and a stopover for ships sailing the northern sea on their way to Southport. The keep was the first attempt at bringing legitimacy to North Haven, as well as to bring it into the kingdom as a serious city worthy of having its own duke. However, those were very tough times, and hard people roamed the land and the seas. Pirates controlled everything north of Southport and resisted any attempt from the kingdom to expand its influence into what they considered their territory.”
Miranda took a shuddering breath as she recounted the tale. “One night, several shiploads of pirates landed down the beach and made their way on foot to the walls of the keep. Over the previous months, they had been able to instill several of their own men in the keep as guards. Those men left a sally port open, and the pirates rushed unimpeded onto the keep’s grounds. The pirates attacked the guards and quickly overwhelmed them. The lord of the keep was said to have stood in front of his barred bedchamber where his wife and five children hid. Wave after wave of pirates charged up the stairs only to be hurled back by the lord of the keep.
“Finally, the leader of the pirate band ascended the stairs himself and challenged the lord to single combat, promising that if he won the pirates would leave him and his family alone for now. The lord accepted, and even though he was exhausted from defending the door to where his family hid, the pirate captain knew that while this man fought for the lives of his family he could not best him in a fair fight. So the pirate captain maneuvered the lord so that his back was to the stairs, and on his signal, one of the pirates threw a dagger at the lord’s back. The blade struck him low in the back and pierced his armor and flesh. The lord stumbled from the injury, and the pirate captain ran him through the heart, killing him instantly.
“The pirates broke the door down and gained entry to the room where the lord’s wife and children huddled in the corner begging for mercy. The pirate captain was so furious at the number of men the lord had killed, and who had very nearly defeated him as well, that he ordered the children thrown from the top of the tower. One by one, the Lady of the keep was forced to watch her children thrown from the balcony, their cries echoing all the way down until they abruptly ceased when they struck the courtyard. The pirate captain then forced the Lady to the same spot where his men had thrown her children to their deaths and offered her a chance at life. The Lady was still a very beautiful woman, and the pirate captain promised her that she would live in comfort for the rest of her life if she agreed to be his.
“When she stopped wailing and smiled, he thought the Lady was going to agree, but her smile turned into a hideous, manic laughter. She dug her fingers deep into the pirate’s fl
esh with inhuman strength and threw them both over the edge, cursing him all the way down. It was after that time that my great grandfather tried to claim the keep and build North Haven into what it is today, but the Lady still haunts the tower. Ever since, any living person who dares to go near the tower is killed, driven mad, or forced to flee in terror. So my great grandfather built a new keep that eventually became the castle of North Haven.”
“Interesting,” Azerick mused.
Miranda looked incredulously at the sorcerer. “Interesting? I tell you a horrific tale of murder, deceit, and eternal haunting and all you can say is interesting? I would hate to see what you would actually find terrible.”
“You certainly would. You seem to know an awful lot of detail of the event.”
Miranda smiled at the wizard’s skepticism. “The pirates loved to talk. The story was recounted many times in inns, bars, and on ships for years. I’ll admit, the bards and scribes who took up the tale likely romanticized it, but the outcome is the same. Pirates stormed the keep, murdered the Lord, Lady, and children, and she haunts the tower and its grounds to this day.”
“Interesting,” Azerick repeated with a smile.
When they drew near the gates of North Haven, a large contingent of armored men rode out to intercept them. Several of the lead riders put their spurs to their horses and galloped up the road ahead of the approaching forces. The riders brought their thundering mounts to a halt a few paces away and gave a sharp salute to Captain Brague and Lady Miranda.
“Captain, Lady Miranda, thank the gods you have arrived! The Duchess just sent us out to find you when your carriage did not arrive yesterday. What happened to your coach and the rest of your guards?” the soldier asked the Captain.
“We were waylaid by bandits just three days north of Southport. The coach was ruined, and though we slew and drove off the villains, we were the only ones to make it,” Captain Brague told his subordinate.
Lady Miranda saw the sergeant cast a glance at Azerick. “This is Magus Azerick. It is because of him that any of us survived the attack.”
The Sorcerer's Path Box Set: Book 1-4 Page 63