The Road to Death: The Lost Mark, Book 2

by Forbeck, Matt

  “Let me go!” Sallah said. “You can have her when I’m through softening her up.”

  “That’s not you talking,” Kandler said. “That’s your grief. Think for a moment. Think about who you are. Think about the morals you uphold. Cold-blooded murder doesn’t fit with any of that. Would Brendis want you to betray your vows as a knight like this?”

  He could feel the lady knight start to calm down, to hear his words and consider them. He knew he had her on her last legs. He pushed her right back off them.

  “What would your father say if he could see you now?”

  Sallah spun around, ready to slap the words out of Kandler’s mouth. He caught her hand as she brought it back to strike him, and he frowned into her face.

  The knight looked up into Kandler’s eyes for a moment, and then the pain, the grief, the agony all melted away into despair. She collapsed forward into his arms, sobbing, “Why?”

  Kandler held her in his arms until her body stopped shaking and she could push herself away from him of her own accord. “Thanks,” she said in a raw voice, unable to meet his eyes. She refused to glance back at the changeling as she gave Kandler a small kiss on the cheek and then staggered out of the room.

  “I have a burial to attend to,” she said as she passed through the curtain covering the empty doorway.

  “I have matters of my own to deal with,” Berre said catching Sallah by the elbow. “Stick with me, and I’ll bring you to him first.”

  The two walked out of the room arm in arm. Kandler noticed that the dwarf somehow seemed as tall as the knight as they went.

  Sallah gone, Monja leaped off of Te’oma as if the changeling might bite her.

  “Thank you,” Te’oma said to the shaman.

  “Thank the big human,” Monja said. “If he didn’t need you, I’d have finished you off with my knife.” She slipped toward the door. “I’ll go see if I can help Sallah with the last rites. You can’t be too careful about such things in a fort full of skeletons.”

  As the curtain flapped behind the halfling, Kandler turned his full attention to Te’oma. She stared back at him with wide eyes.

  “You don’t have to hurt me,” she said. “I’ll tell you what you want.”

  “I don’t doubt it.” Kandler cracked his knuckles for emphasis. Burch sat on the edge of the room’s lone windowsill, blocking that avenue of retreat as he checked the action on his crossbow and slipped a steel-tipped bolt into its home.

  Te’oma’s eyes grew wide, and she edged back on the bed. As she did, Kandler cracked his neck. Her hands flew up to her own neck as if to hold her head in place.

  “Where’s he headed?” Kandler asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  A bolt stabbed into the wall next to Te’oma’s head. She screamed in surprise.

  “Wrong answer.” Kandler grimaced at the changeling. “Don’t think you’re lucky that Burch missed there. Burch never misses, not at this range. That was your warning.”

  As the justicar spoke, the shifter slipped another bolt into its home and cranked back the crossbow’s handle. He worked the action slowly, and every click on the weapon’s wheel sounded like a breaking bone.

  “The dragon-elf betrayed me,” Te’oma said. “We were supposed to get away with Esprë together, but he betrayed me. He serves another master than mine.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know,” Te’oma said.

  Kandler clenched his fists in frustration. “Where is he taking her?”

  “I don’t—wait!” the changeling shouted at Burch, throwing up her arms to protect herself as he leveled his crossbow at her. Kandler waved him off, and the shifter rested the weapon back on his lap.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “He didn’t tell me.”

  Burch raised his weapon again, and Te’oma winced at the gesture.

  “I can find out!” she said. “After I caught up with Esprë on the airship, I forged a mindlink with her while she was still unconscious.”

  Kandler stared at her with a mixture of hope and horror.

  Te’oma shrugged. “She’s a slippery young elf. I wanted to make sure I could find her if I lost her again. I can contact her telepathically no matter where she might be.”

  Kandler’s heart started to crawl its way out of his heels.

  “Can you do that now?”

  Te’oma nodded, then closed her eyes for a moment. Her forehead knit with concentration, as Kandler imagined her reaching out to his daughter with her mind. The fact that the changeling had managed to establish such a link with Esprë appalled him, but that warred with his gratitude that they might be able to use it to find her again.

  After a long moment, the changeling frowned and opened her eyes. “She’s still unconscious,” she said. “I can’t reach her.”

  “How was she when you last saw her?”

  “Asleep. I knocked her out psionically.” She put her hands up in supplication. “At worst, she’ll wake up with a slight headache.”

  “You’re sure she’s not dead?” Kandler dreaded the answer, but he had to ask.

  Te’oma nodded. “The mindlink severs if she’s dead.”

  “Do you think he’ll keep her alive?”

  She nodded again. “She’s worth much more if she’s breathing.”

  “I suppose you could say the same about yourself.”

  Alone in the stables, Sallah knelt down in front of Brendis’s body and wept. The corpse lay there still half covered in hay, the top half twisted back at an awkward angle to expose its face. It wore only a thin set of undergarments worn to gray after repeated washings in open streams.

  It comforted Sallah to think of the body as an “it.” Brendis’s spirit had long since fled, she knew—or been forced out at the hands of that changeling bitch. Perhaps it had already joined in eternal communion with the Silver Flame, yet another in the infinite number of burning tongues of argent fire merged with the great god to whom she had dedicated her life. It dulled the edge of the pain that lanced through her soul, but not by much.

  Sallah had known loss in her life. Her mother had died when she was but a girl. With her extended family off fighting the Last War for Thrane, she’d lived with the threat of bereavement hanging over her head like a sword on a slender thread for years.

  To her, it had always seemed that the only way to deal with this ever-present threat was to confront it, so she had petitioned to be admitted to the Knights of the Silver Flame as soon as she could. As one of the youngest squires in the church, she had served as both swordbearer and mascot, but as the years passed she grew to be one of the order’s most promising young knights.

  Living in the shadow of her father, Deothen, had never been easy. As a father, he’d made a great commander. From as early as she could remember, he’d always treated her like a little soldier. Was it any wonder that she’d grown up into one?

  As a Knight of the Silver Flame, Deothen had become a legend in his own time. No one in Thrane could not know who he was, and that fame extended to his daughter by proximity, whether she deserved it or not. Everyone had always had high expectations of Sallah, and she’d done her best to live up to them, never questioning why. She saw it as her duty.

  Sallah pulled the body that had once housed Brendis’s soul from under the hay. She pulled one of its arms over her shoulder and carried it that way out of the stables. When she emerged with the corpse in her arms, Berre stood there waiting for her.

  “I’ve already set a detail to digging a grave,” the dwarf said. “Do you have any special instructions we need to know of?”

  Sallah shook her head. “Just show me where to bring the body. I’ll take care of the rest.”

  Berre stepped up under Brendis’s other arm and offered the corpse what support she could. Then she pointed toward a patch of open ground along the fort’s western wall, and the two dragged the body to it.

  The patch already featured a handful of headstones, low, stone markers on each of which a name had
been chiseled. The ground here was the only section of the fort’s yard in which grass of any kind grew, the rest of the well-trodden ground nothing but hard-packed dirt. The grass grew thick under the headstones. Only the section where two men worked was broken. It had been a long time since someone else had died here—or at least someone who warranted a burial.

  Sallah noticed that the two soldiers digging the grave bore flesh on their bones. “I’m surprised,” she said as she and Berre lowered the corpse to the ground beside the deepening grave. “I thought you’d have put some of your skeletons to such a task.”

  One of the men in the hole, a red-faced fellow with dark, receding hair, snorted at that. “This is hallowed ground, miss,” he said. “Those clothes racks can’t come near here.”

  Sallah sighed in relief. She’d feared having to leave her friend in an unprotected grave. With all the undead creatures running around this place, she worried that some Karrnathi necromancer might see Brendis’s body as fodder for King Kaius’s forces. While Brendis’s spirit might be beyond insult, his earthly form deserved a better, more peaceful fate than that.

  The lady knight looked down at both of the men in the hole and said, “You have my thanks.”

  As Sallah gazed down at the corpse of her friend, her brother in arms, she realized that something was missing. “I’ll be right back,” she said to no one in particular, then stalked back toward the infirmary.

  When she entered the room, Kandler was on his way out. Without a word, he took her in his arms again. She held him tight for a moment, thankful to have someone she could look to in this terrible time. He may not have been a Knight of the Silver Flame or even a member of her church, but she knew he was a good man. She could feel herself falling for him, but she stayed wary of such things. Alone, hundreds of miles from home, grieving for both friends and her father, she knew she was vulnerable.

  She surprised herself by not crying another drop. She had wept enough for today, it seemed. She had a job to do—burying Brendis—and she refused to let her emotions get in the way of that.

  “Don’t kill her,” Kandler said. “We need her.”

  “Where are you headed?”

  “To find some chains.” He kissed her once on the forehead and strode off.

  The lady knight took a moment to compose herself then walked into the infirmary. Burch still sat there, perched in the windowsill. Sallah couldn’t help but remember when she’d first met the shifter, how he’d sat the same way in the front window of Kandler’s house. She was tempted to smile.

  Then she spied Te’oma lying in a bed on the other side of the room, and the temptation faded away. She crossed over to the changeling, who cringed as she neared. The temptation returned, stronger than ever.

  Sallah reached down and plucked up Brendis’s sword, which lay on the bed nearest to Te’oma. It felt warm and comforting in her hands, as if she somehow had managed to recover a vital part of her lost compatriot.

  Then she glared over at the changeling. “Take off his things,” she said. “Now.”

  Te’oma opened her mouth to protest but no words came out. She climbed out on the other side of the bed from Sallah and stripped off Brendis’s tabard and armor, leaving herself in nothing more than a pitch-colored shift so black her skin glowed white in contrast. She lay them on the bed before her and then backed off so that Sallah could snatch them away.

  “I didn’t kill him,” the changeling said. “Ibrido was just supposed to …” The look on Sallah’s face made her falter.

  “I don’t care whose hands held the straps that strangled him,” the lady knight said. “You’re responsible just the same.”

  She turned and left before the changeling could respond, before she let her see again how much she hurt.

  Kandler met her at the door. “Hold on,” he said, hefting a set of manacles and a collar connected with thick chains.

  Sallah waited while the justicar went into the room and put the changeling in irons while Burch stood guard. No one said a word.

  Kandler emerged from the room, looking grim.

  “Do you think that will hold her?” Sallah asked.

  He shrugged. “It’s the best we can do for now.”

  With that, he took Brendis’s things from her, except for his sword, which she cradled in her arms like a lost child. She led him down the stairs toward the fresh-dug grave.

  One of the Karrnathi soldiers waved to them as they approached. “Just about finished,” he said, leaning on his dirt-crusted shovel. “It’s always slow going at the end. When you get so deep, only one man can work the hole.”

  Clods of broken earth arced up out of the grave at a steady rhythm, falling near the first soldier’s feet. The sound and scent comforted Sallah somehow, as part of the ritual to acknowledge the end of a friend’s life. She’d been to too many funerals, she knew, but it didn’t seem like that would end any time soon.

  As she and Kandler stood there, Berre strode over from where dozens of skeletons seemed to have redoubled their efforts to get Phoenix ready to fly. Sallah watched as a crew used a giant block and tackle to hoist the airship’s repaired rudder back into place.

  “She should be set to go by dawn,” Berre said. “Any idea where you’re taking her?”

  “She’s ours to take?” Kandler asked.

  The Captain of Bones nodded. “When we found it, Esprë was at the wheel. You’re her next-of-kin, right? It’s yours to return to her.”

  Berre sighed. “I’d send some troops with you, but I’m bound to have enough trouble here without wasting resources on what Korth could only see as a wild goose chase.”

  “Wouldn’t Kaius want his airship back?”

  “It’s gone. Even were Ito commandeer Phoenix to go after her, I wouldn’t know where she’s fled.” She narrowed her eyes and lowered her voice. “So don’t you tell me.”

  Kandler lowered his head for a moment. “Thank you.”

  The chunks of earth stopped coming, and a shovel followed them, landing atop the mound of fresh dirt. A hand came reaching up after that, and the soldier above helped pull his friend from the hole. As he dusted himself off, the soldier gave Sallah and Kandler a solemn nod.

  The soldiers had already laid Brendis’s body out on a tarpaulin nearby, with ropes slid under it so they could lower the corpse into the ground. Sallah knelt down and spread the young knight’s armor over him, then laid his tabard over that. Kandler helped her wrap the body in the canvas sheet.

  When only Brendis’s head was left exposed, Sallah leaned over and kissed him on his pale forehead. Then she covered his face and stepped back so the soldiers could put him in his grave.

  As Brendis’s body went into its final resting place, Sallah spoke. “By the grace of the Silver Flame, my brother, may you find peace in its warmth and illumination in its eternal presence.”

  “Amen,” Kandler murmured, reaching for her. She turned in his strong arms and let him hold her as she wept what she promised herself would be the last tears for her fallen friends—at least until she completed their quest. Tomorrow, there would be no time for grief.

  Esprë awoke to the sound of someone screaming. It took her a moment before she realized it was her.

  She stared around with wide, terrified eyes. She was in a cabin of some sort, a room made entirely of wood stained mahogany-dark and polished to a glistening finish. She sat up on an overstuffed couch of crimson velvet, clutching at its back and arm.

  A stiff wind blew in from the windows at the front of the room, which had been smashed through. The back of the couch had shielded her from the night chill. She stared out into the darkness beyond and could see nothing but a black, featureless void.

  Several everburning torches lit the cabin, their magical lights guttering in the wind but never going out. A four-poster bed crouched in one corner, a paper-cluttered desk in the other. The wind had strewn the papers all about the room, most of them ending up near the door opposite the windows.

  Esprë swu
ng her feet off the couch and on to a carpet the same shade of red as the couch. She felt something wet on her hand as it brushed along the couch. She brought it to her face and saw blood on her fingers.

  She inventoried her body, checking for pain or wounds but found nothing. Her head ached a bit, and she remembered the last thing she’d seen before falling asleep had been Te’oma’s face. The changeling had mentally battered her into unconsciousness as a pair of hands held her in place, hands that could only have belonged to Ibrido.

  The cabin door opened, and a pair of Karrnathi skeletons stalked into the low-ceilinged room. An elf with dragonish features crept in behind them, keeping them between himself and the young elf. He wore a black cloak with the Karrnathi wolf embroidered on one breast. A triangle of knucklebones hung just below that, white and pure against the cloak’s dark fabric.

  “Welcome to Keeper’s Claw,” the dragon-elf said. “Make yourself comfortable. You will be with us for some time.”

  “I-Ibrido?” Esprë said. “Is that you?”

  The dragon-elf nodded. “The time for masks is over. I have captured you, and no one can stop me from disposing with you as I please.”

  At first, Esprë had wanted to scream again. Now, noticing how carefully the dragon-elf treated her, she had to struggle to keep a wry smile from her face. Ibrido knew of her dragonmark, and he feared her. She enjoyed knowing that.

  “It’s hard to be comfortable with the wind blowing in like that,” Esprë said, pointing at the windows.

  Ibrido grimaced. “I will have a detail assigned to repairing that right away. In the meantime, please keep yourself far from the windows. Come daylight, you’ll find that it’s a long, fatal drop to the ground.”

  “Where are we going?” Esprë asked. She surprised herself by how calm she felt. Perhaps the growing power of her dragonmark came with a bit of maturity, or maybe she was just used to getting kidnapped by now.

  “To visit an old friend. Someone I’ve not seen in many years but who is very eager to meet you.”

  “Kandler will come after me. They all will.”

  “How? In that battered airship you crashed to the earth? By the time they get that rowboat in the air, we will be leagues from Fort Bones, and they will have no idea which way we went.”