Edgelanders (Serpent of Time)

by Jennifer Melzer

  “He called me the Light of Madra,” she paused for a moment to let that sink in, more in her own mind than for Finn, who she still wasn’t even sure could actually hear her. “I don’t know what that means either, but maybe they do have answers. Just please, Finn,” she tilted her eyes upward to look at his face, “whatever you do, don’t try and be a hero this time. I know it won’t be easy for you, because you obviously didn’t earn your name just standing around doing nothing, but please, don’t try and live up to it right now. We are severely outnumbered here, and if you try anything they might kill you. I don’t know what I would do if I lost you right now. Especially after everything we’ve been through together in the last few days. So, please, Finn, keep your cool for me and let them chain you until we figure this all out, okay?”

  While she was talking to Finn, Logren’s men moved in around her and began shackling the wolves. Stepping back and out of the way, she signaled for his men. In a matter of moments she was surrounded by a host of soldiers who worked quickly to chain the wolves in silver. She found her attention drawn to the hooded figure in black who stood unmoving several feet away from the site of the battle they’d been engaged in. Arms raised in front of his chest and palms tilted toward the sky, she swore she saw the vaguest hint of purple essence spiraling from the tips of his fingers and into the air.

  She felt drawn to him, starting toward the mage without even noticing her feet were moving until Logren reached for her shoulder to hold her in place. “It is a very complicated spell he is working and his concentration cannot be broken.”

  “He’s using magic,” she marveled.

  “He is.”

  ““Who is he?”

  “Brendolowyn Raven-Storm. My right hand.”

  Logren lowered his hand onto her shoulder and steered her away from the mage to avoid breaking his focus. She stood apart with the man who claimed to be her brother, watching his men put her enemies and her friends in chains. Finn was the last one to be restrained, and once his chains were in place Logren signaled for his mage friend to lift the spell with a whistle. Lorelei watched him lower his arms, realizing for the first time they were trembling, and then he collapsed into a puddle of black robes in the snow.

  Logren went to him, helping him to his feet, but her attention was immediately drawn back to the wolves, Finn, in particular, who snarled and railed against the chains that bound him. Running over to where he seethed, she put herself in front of him and reached out to touch him again. He immediately calmed, staggering backward to look at her. He was grinning at her, at least she thought it was a grin. The wide corners of his mouth stretched to reveal gleaming rows of sharp teeth within. His ears perked up before he lowered his gaze to her hand upon his shoulder. Self-consciously, she withdrew her touch and took a step back to watch as three men grabbed hold of her only friends in the world and escorted them past the battle site to reclaim their clothing and their human form.

  “Please don’t hurt my friends,” she called after them.

  “They will not be harmed, so long as they cooperate.” Logren appeared beside her again.

  “That’s what I’m afraid of,” she said softly. Turning her gaze upward, she watched the wisps of his wavy, shoulder-length red hair drift across the wide bridge of his nose. He lifted a hand to tuck those stray hairs and the warrior braids entangled within them behind his ear. “Finn can be… I don’t know, he can be a bit extreme.”

  “He is the one they call Mad Finn the Reckless?”

  “How did you know?”

  “Along with the stories of your coming, our seer has told us tales of your mate and the deeds he is meant to perform.”

  There was that word again. Mate. It was the third time she’d heard that word, somehow tying her to Finn. It caught her off guard and she felt a breath hitch in the back of her throat, stuck there while she tried to swallow against the pressure of it.

  “He will be a valuable asset to our cause before all is said and done, assuming he cooperates now.”

  Finally able to swallow, she lifted a curious stare toward Logren and asked, “How?”

  “Those are not tales I am permitted to relay to you. They are for Yovenna to tell.”

  “He saved my life,” she stated matter-of-factly. “Twice now he’s thrown himself in front of death to spare me. That’s all I need to know about him.” She hadn’t thought it so simple before, the distrust from her experience with Trystay carrying over into every moment of her life in the last few days, but in the wake of that moment it seemed to make perfect sense. The parts of her that hadn’t wanted to trust Finn had been whisked away by that simple realization.

  Finn hadn’t just been kind to her; he sacrificed his entire life, even knowing the consequences he would face, to save her. She owed him her trust.

  “And now I’ve saved your life as well.” Logren’s sharp eyebrow shot up in question. “Does that tell you all you need to know about me too?”

  His question abashed her. Staring up at him skeptically, she didn’t know what to make of the man in front of her. Again she found herself caught up in the playful shimmer of her own eyes staring back at her as his mouth quirked into a soft grin.

  “Trust is not something a young woman in your position should hand out too easily. For all you know, I could be taking you to your death now.”

  The sweat that beaded across her brow chilled quickly in the wind, a nauseating clench tightening in her gut. “Are you?”

  “Would I answer honestly if I were?” Logren laughed softly, and reached out to touch her shoulder. She flinched a little, and though the shimmer of his amusement reached his eyes, he still scared her. “I’m not taking you to your death, of course, but you should consider that before you act in all situations, Lorelei. You have no idea how special you are. I can see it in your eyes. You are the turn of a very dark and heavy tide, and you hold the power inside you to change the world as we know it. Such power invites enemies. You will have many before all is said and done. You need to be cautious.”

  Lowering her head in shame, she listened to the sound of chains clinking and dragging, the heavy thump of metal plated boots and armor moving toward the road they’d come in on as Logren’s men began moving the hunters toward the mountain.

  “Who is the other friend you trust? What do you know of him?”

  “He is Finn’s brother, his name is Vilnjar,” she replied. “He…”

  “Vilnjar the Strong,” he interrupted.

  She followed Logren’s stare in the direction of the incoming men, who had been quickly dressed and bound once more in silver chains. Finn seemed surprisingly content with their situation, but Vilnjar wasn’t the least bit impressed. In fact, in the short time she’d known him, she’d never seen him so embittered, scowling and glaring as they approached.

  “Logren Bone-Breaker, as I live and breathe,” Vilnjar growled. “I thought you were dead.”

  “You wish I was dead.” The smile Logren exhibited was almost sweet, the two men staring at one another as the soldiers led Vilnjar toward Logren. “I’d heard you inserted yourself rather strategically into the affairs of the Council of the Nine. The youngest member in a century, but then you always were a little suck-up, Viln.”

  “And you were always just like your father, prone to striking first and asking questions later, even when we were boys.”

  “Wait,” Lorelei stepped back, moving closer to Finn and immediately taking comfort from the confusion in the shadow of his presence. He was cold, his clothes damp and wet from having lain in the falling snow, and she could hear the chatter of his back teeth, which he tried desperately to hide by pinching his lips tight together. “You two know each other?”

  “Know each other?” Logren bellowed. “Our mothers could barely pry us from each other’s company when we were children.”

  “Funny, I always thought it was our mothers who pushed us unwillingly together,” Viln scoffed.

  “We remember things so very differently, old frien
d. The two of us were going to take over the world together one day, set up our own kingdom, as I recall, and spend the rest of our lives battling over who got to wear the crown. Nevertheless, if you’ve been privy to council business, Hodon will definitely wish to speak with you.”

  “Hodon?” Vilnjar asked. “He lives?”

  “All in good time. As for you, little sister,” he turned back to Lorelei, “I think it would be wise for you to reserve your trust where this one is concerned. The Nine are not to be trusted, and it’s more likely they sent him along to spy on you, rather than protect you.”

  “My brother is not a spy,” Finn spoke up, a snarling edge to his voice that made Lorelei jump a little. “He is here of his own accord.”

  Logren took a step toward Finn, eying the monstrosity before him cautiously. “We shall see. In the meantime, we should make for the mountain. It’s three days journey to Dunvarak from our camp in the mountain pass, could be longer if the squalls rise on the trek through the mountain. You’re likely weary from the fight. Come, my men are camped in that ledge overlooking the valley, waiting for us to return. There is food and fire.”

  She followed the gesture of his hand toward Great Sontok, catching the flickering hint of a fire’s warm, welcoming light. It looked smaller than a firefly in that distance, but thoughts of it were enough to spur her onward. Her hands were freezing numb and she was so tired that fire called to her the way water calls to a thirsty man in the desert.

  Returning her eyes to Logren, a slow smile warmed at the corner of his mouth. He’d lectured her sternly on issues of trust, but should she trust him simply because their father had been the same man? She supposed there was only one way to find out, and positioning one foot in front of the other, the party began making their way toward the mountain.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Finn was in awe of the man who led them into the mountains, and Lorelei was skeptical about the claims that man made about their blood relation. Vilnjar was neither of those things. If anything at all, he was angry, and with good reason. Logren Bone-Breaker was dead, and so was his mother. Screaming in protest, Vilnjar watched over his shoulder as their burning cottage collapsed in a blaze of smoldering sparks when King Aelfric’s men laid waste to Vrinkarn. Eornlaith dragged him away to safety, telling him there was nothing to be done; it was too late.

  He kept asking himself, as they trekked through the icy mountain pass, who the man leading them really was. An impostor? Another of Rognar’s bastards that looked enough like the man himself to pass as the boy Vilnjar once knew and loved as a brother? It was no small secret Rognar had a great fondness for women of all races. To hear Deken boast of the other man’s conquests, Viln distinctly remembered his mother laughing and telling her mate she’d have his hide if she ever heard tales of bastards he’d whelped while off raiding and conquering with his lord. How Deken laughed at her then, stirring a strange fire in her eyes before she slapped him.

  Rognar never had a woman for very long; Vilnjar remembered that too. He’d set Galisa aside after returning from a long string of raids in the lands south of Leithe with a Kivtaryn pirate woman everyone in the village hated so much that it wasn’t long before she left and Rognar was alone again.

  “Not everyone is so lucky as me to find their mate,” Deken placated Eornlaith.

  “Not everyone without a mate fills the world with half-bred bastards…”

  “You’d be surprised how many unmated men fill the world with their little half-breeds.”

  It was ironic, he thought. In the years following the signing of the Edgelands Proclamation after the War of Silence ended, only three children were born in Drekne. No matter how hard the council pushed for non-mated unions in order for their race to survive, those unions did not produce offspring. Yet they could have filled their village with hundreds of half-breeds if only they’d been able to get out of the Edgelands. There was the slightest possibility the Logren who led them was just another of Rognar’s many bastards, but then how could he remember the friendship of their youth?

  Journeying to Logren’s camp in the mountains took hours. The squalling snow eventually transitioned into slow, fat flurries and the wind died down enough that he could hear the crunch of ice and snow beneath his own boots with every step. From time to time he found himself looking ahead, toward Lorelei. She clung close to Finn, the two of them murmuring quietly together so their whispers could not be heard over the slow whistle of the wind.

  They could have been plotting an escape for all he knew. It was madness, to be sure, but it was just the kind of foolishness his brother lived for. Oddly enough, Vilnjar wasn’t worried about his brother for once. His mind was preoccupied by Logren. The impossible man leading them through the treacherous stone passage carved into the mountainside juts couldn’t be who he said he was. Logren Bone-Breaker was dead.

  Staring at the back of the man who walked several paces ahead of him, he was the right age, and the familiarity of his features swept away any denial there might have been about his father. Logren was the spitting image of his father, from the fiery waves of hair rippling from beneath his helm to the mesmerizing amber eyes he shared with his half-sister. Had Rhiorna known who would meet them at the mountains? She’d spoken of the south, of the salvation that waited for the U’lfer there. Had she known all along that her nephew lived? Why hadn’t she warned them?

  Galisa the Fair had been an exceptionally beautiful human, and for a time Rognar’s fascination with her had been deeply personal. He brought her back to Vrinkarn with him, their half-breed babe strapped across her back, and though the council was displeased with the presence of a human among them, Rognar would not be denied. Eornlaith had taken to her instantly, to hear his mother tell it, and the two women becoming fast friends as she taught her the ways of their people. They pushed their young sons together when they were both old enough to walk.

  His mother told Viln that the first word he’d spoken clearly had been Logren, testament to the brotherhood bond they would most assuredly share when they were grown.

  “Like Deken and Rognar,” she said. “One day Logren will lead just like his father, and like your father you will gladly follow because you will be like brothers.” He’d been five when she said those words, and at the time he’d anxiously awaited the day he and Logren could make good on all the raids they’d planned together in the fort they built in the trees just outside the village. Viln was the brains behind every game they played and Logren the brawn, and together they believed that when their fathers were old and weary and tired of war, they would step in to rule the world in their stead.

  “You will be the mastermind behind our revolution,” Logren boasted, “adviser to the greatest ruler the U’lfer has ever seen.”

  At the time Vilnjar had been so eager to please his friend, so excited to serve at Logren’s side the way Deken served Rognar, but now he actually scoffed at the memory of that foolish innocence. The sons of two warmongering fools ignorantly plotting to follow in their father’s footsteps for gold, glory, land and freedom. He wondered if Logren’s plans were still so bold and stupid, if the man he’d become was truly as thirsty for battle and war as the man who’d sired him.

  It was like walking behind the man who’d single-handedly destroyed their people, who talked their father into sacrificing himself for a war they could never win. Then again, Deken’s arm hadn’t needed much in the way of twisting. Sometimes Viln forgot that, just as he forgot how much of a disappointment he would have been to his father had the man lived to see him grown, to hear him confess there wasn’t enough gold or glory in all of Vennakrand to tempt him to walk the path of war in his father’s footsteps.

  Lorelei, though she certainly held many of her father’s physical traits, had enough of her mother in her that Vilnjar only fleetingly thought about Logren when Rhiorna told him who she was. A deep sadness swelled in his heart upon remembering his lost childhood friend, but now that sadness felt like betrayal.

  The
devastation of losing his best friend had been quickly swallowed up by the pain of losing his home and then his father, but in all the years that followed he never forgot Logren Bone-Breaker.

  Seeing him alive and well, if it was truly him, made Vilnjar angry, and the silver burning away at the sensitive skin of his wrists wasn’t exactly helping matters much. How had he survived the burning of Vrinkarn? Was his mother alive as well? He’d mentioned Hodon too, and his mind raced for memories of a man who’d sworn loyalty to Rognar, who’d spent many a night feasting at Deken’s table, the three men boasting of war and spoils and sowing the seeds of future plans. How had they escaped, and were there others? And where had Logren gotten all those men? He hadn’t said much about where they were going, but dispensing fifteen men to retrieve a girl none of them even knew made it seem like he had an entire army at his disposal, and there were more men waiting in the pass. As they neared the glowing camp Vilnjar wondered if he really did have an army.

  Approaching the encampment, the tainted scent of their blood was overpowering. Half-bloods, every single man and woman in Logren’s scouting party was of the blood, but they were no U’lfer. Like Lorelei, their wolves slept beneath their skin and did not know how to wake.

  Shuffling the prisoners into camp, only four of the five hunters remained. Finn took one of them out in battle at the base of the mountain. The four survivors were led in a single line like slaves, their rattling silver chains clanking and dragging between them with every step. At least they’d left him and Finn with a small amount of dignity, allowing them to walk apart from the other wolves they’d captured, but the only reason they had given into that courtesy was because of Lorelei.

  She refused to travel beside her half-brother, staying close to Finn as if the turn of events suddenly shifted her wary trust to Finn’s favor. From time to time, Vilnjar caught Logren turning back to watch his younger sister mutter softly to her only friend in the world. Disappointment flashed in his eyes, as if he’d expected she would spend the journey talking with him instead, getting to know him. When Logren lifted his gaze to meet with Vilnjar’s, his stare lingered only a moment before he leaned into the mage that walked beside him and muttered some silent observation.