The warforged stared back at him like a statue. Kandler thought he saw him incline his head at him ever so slightly, but it could have just been a trick of the torches’ flickering light.
“Unless you have pressing business here in Metrol, then, I suggest we get moving,” said Ikar. “It’s not safe to be out in Metrol by night.”
“You don’t say,” Burch said.
The half-orc narrowed his eyes at the shifter. “Had you not stirred up the ghostbeasts so well, we’d have already been safe on the other side of the river. You’re fortunate we let our curiosity get the better of us. Otherwise, they’d be feasting on your souls.”
“Lucky us.”
Despite Ikar’s warnings, the streets of Metrol stretched out wide and empty all the way to the shores of the Cyre River. The bandits took the straightest route possible, sticking to the widest roads with the most space around them. They kept their new guests surrounded at all times.
Kandler wondered for a moment why Ikar hadn’t bothered to disarm the lot of them, but when he saw how many bandits there were, his consternation faded. They outnumbered him and his friends at least five to one. If they’d tried to fight their way through them, they’d have been slaughtered.
The river seemed to sneak up on Kandler. One moment, he strolled along wondering when he might see it through the mists that seemed to thicken as they worked their way to the east. The next, they turned a corner, and the mighty river lay there, rolling silently past its banks as it had for millennia.
“We’re not heading for a pier?” Kandler asked.
Ikar snorted. “If you think the ghostbeasts are bad, you should see what waits beneath the surface of the river. The beasties like to congregate around the piers where they think they might find fresh prey. We moor our boats in a new place every day.”
The half-orc pointed to a long, low ship tied up near the water’s edge. It resembled a large cutter in shape and size. Green and gold paint limned its sides, and the polished wood of the deck gleamed in the flickering torchlight. The name Salvation spanned the stern in gold-leaf letters.
As Kandler took in the handsome ship though, he noticed there was something odd about it, although it took him a moment to place just what. Then it hit him: the ship had no sails. It had no rigging and no oars, nor any other visible means of moving through the Cyre’s murky, mist-shrouded waters.
“She’s a beauty, isn’t she?” Ikar said proudly. “She takes us up and down the river as fast as an airship, in any kind of weather. We liberated her from the King’s Pier shortly after the Mourning.”
“It—it’s a sprayship,” said Xalt. “It’s amazing.”
Burch smacked the warforged on the shoulder with the back of his hand, then looked at the startled Xalt and jerked his head at the watercraft.
“Ah, yes,” the warforged said. “This is a magically powered craft. It works something like the—um, like an airship. Instead of harnessing a fire elemental, this craft uses a water elemental bound into the aft of the ship. At a command from the person at the tiller, the creature spins rapidly, spraying itself into the water and then spinning back up into the air to do so again.”
Xalt gestured toward a large wooden box that spilled over the ship’s stern. Arcane runes covered its surface, carved deeply into the wood and illuminated with red and gold paints. “The water shoots out of the holding box like it was cascading from a waterfall. The force pushes the ship forward at amazing speeds.”
“Well put,” Ikar said, slapping Xalt on the back hard enough to rattle the warforged’s iron carapace. “I can tell right now you’re going to be an excellent addition to my crew.”
Something grated deep down in Xalt’s chest before he spoke. “I’m sure I’ll make a large impact on your efficiency very soon.” Then, with a saluted touch to his forehead at Kandler and the others he left behind, the warforged crawled on to Salvation’s polished deck.
Sallah squeezed Kandler’s arm. “We can’t let them take him,” she whispered in his ear, low enough that he hoped Ikar, who was busy directing Salvation’s launch, couldn’t hear.
“Patience,” Kandler murmured back to her. “This hasn’t had a chance to play itself out yet.”
Many of Ikar’s scavengers scrambled after the warforged and on to Salvation. At the touch of a green-skinned orc who wore a rune-covered poncho, the ship leaped to life, water flowing slowly out of the end of the box where it spilled into the river’s surface.
“Where do we ride?” Kandler asked as he scanned the length of the ship, looking for the most strategic place to sit.
Ikar and his crew would be at their most vulnerable during the crossing, and the justicar hoped to come up with some means of exploiting that. A full-scale attack in the middle of the river seemed foolhardy, but he refused to rule it out. Once they reached the other side of the river, he feared that Ikar might change his mind about letting the four of them go. He hoped to figure a way to bring Xalt along with them, but making sure he didn’t lose any ground to the bandit leader came first.
Ikar cackled low and loud as he pointed to a small dinghy floating in the water behind Salvation. Kandler hadn’t even seen the low, dark boat in the dim light. Now that he could, it looked as if it might roll over at any second and let the river’s powerful current suck it under and away.
“Special guests like yourselves get your own private accommodations,” Ikar said. “Careful not to tip her when you climb in, and be sure to hold on tight once we get going. At speed, the nose lifts right out of the water.”
“I’ll sit on the bow,” Burch said.
Ikar laughed again. “The last time someone tried that, the whole boat got dragged straight down to the bottom. Just sit in the middle as best you can and enjoy the ride. If we see anything unusual happening back there as we cross the river, we’ll be forced to cut you loose.” As he spoke, the half-orc stared out into the swirling dead-gray mists that threatened to engulf the shore at any moment. “It’s a long, hard row across—assuming you make it.”
Within minutes, they were underway. Kandler, Burch, Sallah, and Brendis rode in the leaky dinghy, clutching the creaking sides for dear life as the thing skipped across the waves like a stone thrown by a giant. Ahead of them, towing them along, Salvation sliced through the water, Ikar the Black at the bow, barely visible through the Mournland’s border mists, more like a suggestion of himself than the actual bandit.
Kandler whispered to the others. “As soon as we get in the middle of the water, we’re cutting the tow rope.”
“Are you mad?” Brendis asked. “We’ll be trapped in the mists.”
“I’ll take my chances with them instead of Ikar,” Kandler said, fishing a pair of rickety oars out of the bottom of the boat and fixing them in place. “For all I know, he wants us to do it rather than force him to deal with us in front of his entire camp. If we show up in his headquarters, I don’t think we can expect mercy, no matter what kinds of deals we think we’ve cut.”
“What about Xalt?” Sallah said. “We can’t just leave him with them.”
“They can’t treat him worse than that warforged patrol we found him with,” Burch said. “This’ll be a step up for him.”
Sallah ignored the shifter, focusing her emerald eyes on Kandler. “You told him. You said, ‘No one gets left behind.’ Were those just words?”
Kandler growled in frustration. “We can’t do him any good if we’re dead. Unless you think you can walk along this towline like a tightrope, we can’t get to that ship until we reach the shore, and—”
“Hold it,” Burch said, holding up a hand. “Something’s wrong.”
A cry went up from Salvation, and a loud crack followed it. Peering into the mists, Kandler saw Xalt stand up next to the elemental restraining box at the ship’s stern.
“By the Flame,” Sallah said, “what is Xalt doing?”
With another crack, Xalt tore a rune-covered plank from the restraining box. The ship shuddered violently and began pitch
ing left and right as it raced blindly through the mists. Kandler heard a pair of splashes as two of Ikar’s crew pitched off the edge of the fast ship.
A sharp voice started to bark out something in an unnatural tongue, but the boat’s pilot stopped short when Xalt slammed into him. The warforged knocked him back into the restraining box, splintering it even worse.
Ikar roared as the ship bucked up and down. “You’ll pay for this, you tin-plated traitor!” He stumbled back toward Xalt, but the deck fell out from under him, sweeping him off his feet.
“Cut the line!” Xalt shouted. “Now!”
Kandler didn’t pause to question the order. His blade came out and sliced through the taut, waterlogged towrope with a single, powerful blow.
The dinghy skittered across the surface of the river for a moment before slowly sliding to a rest. Before it sloshed to a stop, a pillar of water exploded somewhere in front of the leaky boat. Dozens of people cried out in the mist-shrouded darkness before their splash into the water cut them off.
A moment later, some of the voices restarted, renewing their earlier complaints. As Kandler listened, he could hear the current pulling the disaster’s survivors farther and farther away into the mists. Even if he’d felt inclined to save some of them, the idea of wandering around lost in the mists for hours with them would have put an end to those thoughts.
“May the Flame take those poor souls,” Sallah breathed.
“Kandler!” Ikar’s voice rang out in the darkness. It seemed to echo in the mists, making it hard to tell from which direction it came. “Kandler, you low-down, sleazy carrion crawler! You’ll pay for this! If I ever get my hands on you, you’ll pay!”
“Flame save us,” Brendis said. “What—what do we do now?”
Burch handed the young knight an oar.
When Esprë awakened, the stabbing pain in her head still threatened to send her reeling back into unconsciousness. For a moment, she hoped the darkness would take her again, that she could fall back into the peace of oblivion. Perhaps her head had hurt as badly while she slept—she didn’t feel rested at all—but at least she hadn’t known the suffering so well.
The sun shone down warm and welcome on her face. She felt her skin pinking in its heat, and she wondered how long she’d been asleep, and what had woken her up. She peeled open her eyes and found herself lying on the airship’s bridge, unprotected from the sun.
Then she heard the screaming again and recognized it as the sound that had dragged her from her troubled dreams. She tried to get up to see who—or what—could make such a miserable sound, but she discovered her hands were bound to the ship’s railing, making it impossible for her to rise past her knees.
Still, as she got to her knees, she spied Te’oma slumped over the ship’s wheel. The changeling’s shoulders shook as she sobbed into the polished wood.
“What?” Esprë said. “Did you run out of homeless orphans to torture?”
The changeling’s head snapped up, and she glared at the young elf, her blank, white eyes tainted with veins of red. For an instant, Esprë thought the telepath would mentally hammer her back into unconsciousness. Although she’d hoped for such a fate just a moment ago, she gritted her teeth and steeled herself to fight the changeling’s invasions again. She might want peace, but she refused to let the changeling get the better of her once more.
Te’oma just looked at the young elf though, her eyes locking with Esprë’s sparkling blue orbs. Then she bowed her head to weep again, her screams fading to heartbreaking wails.
Esprë let the changeling wallow in her sorrow. Although the young elf’s first instinct was to reach out to help comfort anyone in such pain, she hardened her heart to the noise. She hated Te’oma for everything she’d done to her. She had no sympathy for her.
At least, that’s what she wanted to believe.
“What?” Esprë said after the changeling refused to stop weeping. “What, what, what?” She didn’t bother hiding the irritation in her voice.
Te’oma let loose one last, hideous scream, this one rooted more in frustration than despair, then snarled out at the young elf. “You couldn’t understand.”
Esprë winced at the noise, shook her head, then shrugged. “I don’t really want to. My head hurts—which is your fault too—and you’re hurting my ears. If you have to cry, just please be quiet about it.”
Te’oma pushed herself out of her slouch and wiped away her tears with the sleeves of her outfit, which Esprë noticed now was the same color as the clouds that coated the Mournland sky. The changeling spoke, her voice worn raw with emotion.
“I should just toss you overboard and be done with it,” she said, weary misery etched into every syllable. “It’s hopeless anyhow. Hopeless.”
Esprë wanted to roll her eyes, but she feared the gesture might set the changeling off. With Te’oma clearly staggering along the edge of sanity, the young elf kept her own anger in check.
“It’s not that bad,” Esprë said. As the words left her lips, she heard them ring hollow. She wanted to fill them with more feeling, empathy even, but she didn’t know how.
“You know nothing!” Te’oma said, her voice rising to a scream again. “It’s worse than you could possibly imagine.”
Esprë jerked her head at the bonds chafing her wrists. “You still have me.”
Te’oma goggled for a moment, then she started to laugh, hard. She laughed until tears flowed down her face again.
“Thanks,” the changeling said when she could breathe straight again. “I needed that. You don’t know how funny that is.”
“Glad I could help,” Esprë said. “Now, if you could return the favor by setting me free …”
Te’oma giggled. Esprë wished she could stuff the sound down the changeling’s throat. Instead, she kept her face like stone.
“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” Te’oma said. “You have proven yourself too dangerous, child.”
Esprë tried a confident smile, hoping that the changeling couldn’t see through it. “What makes you think I need to touch you to kill you?”
Te’oma laughed again, but this time there was no humor in it. “Your bluffs grow more desperate.”
“Think about all those people who died in Mardakine,” Esprë said, letting her anger leak menace into her tone. “I wasn’t even in the same place with them when they—” Esprë found she had to swallow here before she could correct herself. “When I killed them.”
Te’oma wiped her face dry again. “If you could manage it,” she said, “I’d already be dead.”
The young elf noticed that the changeling had positioned herself well away from even Esprë’s feet, keeping a good amount of space between the two.
“Your dragonmark is still fresh on your skin,” Te’oma said. “The mark itself represents the control you have over the power that courses deep within you. Right now, it’s still small, no wider than a hand’s span. With time, it will grow, as will your control over your power.
“Right now, though,” Te’oma said with a bitter smile, “you’re no threat to me or anyone else.”
“Unless I happen to find you in my dreams.”
“I’m willing to chance that.”
Esprë shifted about on her knees, trying to get some blood flowing back into her arms, which had fallen numb as she slept. She suspected the changeling had tied her like this on purpose. Even if she managed to get free, her arms would be next to useless until her blood pumped through them again.
“So why all the tears?” Esprë said, hoping to change the subject.
“You don’t want to know.”
Esprë found that she did, despite her hate for the changeling. Perhaps the answer to her question would give her some sort of leverage over Te’oma. At the moment, no other path promised better.
“Tell me,” she said.
Te’oma’s lower lip quivered, and Esprë thought the changeling might burst into tears again. She’d never thought of Te’oma as weak before, but somethi
ng had shaken her to her core.
“My—my employer,” Te’oma said. “She’s done something horrible.”
“You are the company you keep,” Esprë said before she could consider what she was saying. “That’s what my mother used to say,” she added, embarrassed at her lapse.
“She is not my ‘company,’ ” Te’oma snarled. “Had I a choice, I’d never have crossed paths with her. She is a merciless mistress, her cruelty matched only by her power.”
“So why do you work for her?”
Te’oma grimaced. “That, my little elf, is the question at the heart of the matter, isn’t it? I once prided myself on having no ties to bind me to anyone. The life of a changeling is change.” She narrowed her eyes at Esprë and spat cold words like darts. “At least, that’s what my mother used to say.”
Esprë ignored the crack. “What changed that?”
Te’oma used the long, pale fingers of one hand to brush the hair from Esprë’s eyes. As she did, the young elf tried to reach out with her powers to strike the changeling dead. She imagined Te’oma falling to her knees, screaming, then collapsing in a lifeless heap. She felt the dragonmark on her back, square between her shoulder blades, burn. It ached with hunger for the changeling’s life, but nothing happened.
“I got pregnant,” Te’oma said. “He left me, of course, when he found out. No changeling likes to be tied down for long. Fathers never stay. Mothers often leave their children on the doorstep of a church or a kindly stranger.”
“Did you?” Esprë noticed tears welling up in Te’oma’s red-blotched eyes.
The changeling nodded, mute for a moment until she regained what little control she had. She reached out to caress the young elf’s soft, round cheek, then drew her shaking hand back.
“She was about your age—or at least the age you seem—when I last saw her.”
“Was?” A fist of dread clenched in Esprë’s gut.
“My …” Te’oma struggled to put her anguish into words. “I just spoke with my employer telepathically.”
The Road to Death: The Lost Mark, Book 2 Page 7