The Ruens of Fairstone (Aeon of Light Book 2)

by Sethlen, Aron

  Cray and Hawke, both sitting at the table next to theirs, Pard whispers in Deet’s ear, “That’s them.”

  “I see, don’t stare, mind your own business.”

  Pard glances at Miles over the flickering flame rising from a long precariously perched candle tilted slightly at an angle in a pewter holder. “Not bad—this place. Seems decent enough for the night.”

  “I’m so starving,” Miles says, leaning back and rubbing his belly, “any place would do, even a gutter hole in the Badlands that serves rat.”

  Pard nods. “Me too.” He scans the room looking for whoever serves the food.

  “I hope you both enjoy this meal,” Deet says in a hushed tone. “It may be the last you ever eat.”

  Miles rolls his eyes. “Way to break the good mood, party pooper. Just chill out.”

  Deet grunts and continues to scan the room and patrons for any signs of danger.

  A middle-aged fat man with a thick black beard with occasional strings of white carries a tray filled with large wooden bowls and places one in front of Hawke and Cray. “On the house for you, good sir,” the man says, nodding eagerly at Cray.

  Cray snorts. “Much thanks,” he says in a raspy voice, then he picks up his spoon and slurps the stew.

  “On the house,” Pard says to Miles, “nice.”

  “About time we got something to go our way,” Miles says.

  The fat man wobbles over to their table and slings the dirty towel in his hand over his shoulder. “What’ll it be for you gentlemen tonight?”

  Miles pinches his chin. “I think I’ll have a steak.”

  The fat man twists his face and makes a sucking noise as he swirls his tongue over his teeth. “Don’t have any steak.”

  “Uh, all right, how about a chicken?”

  The fat man coughs then another sucking noise. “No chicken.”

  Miles scoffs and leans forward. His eyebrows rise. “Pork then?”

  The fat man shakes his head. “Nope.”

  Miles opens his arms. “Then what do you have?”

  “Stew.”

  “All right then, the stew. Why didn’t you just say that was all you had before you asked me what I wanted?”

  “I asked what you want, boy, as in drink.”

  “Oh.”

  The fat man looks at Pard. “For you?”

  “Stew, bread, and water.”

  “Same here,” Deet says.

  Miles sits up straight. “Ale.”

  Deet’s eyes snap toward Miles, and he glares at him.

  Miles backs down. “Or not—water then, no ale.”

  Deet shifts his gaze, again scanning the room and all in it, on guard like a sheepdog searching for anything out of the ordinary.

  Miles gestures toward the fat man. “So stew is on the house tonight?”

  The fat man makes a sucking noise and snorts.

  “What? Did I say something funny?”

  “What makes you think your stew is on the house tonight?”

  “Well, you said the stew was on the house for those guys sitting next to us.” Miles points at Cray.

  The fat man swats Miles’s hand down. “Don’t point, boy, unless you want to lose your hand, or worse. That there is Cornelius Cray.”

  “Yeah, so what, am I supposed to know who that is? As a matter of fact, I’m—”

  Deet’s glare snaps back at Miles, and he pounds his fist once on the table rattling the silverware and candle.

  Miles coughs. “I’m a nobody who has no idea who Cornelius Cray is.”

  The fat man leans in over Pard. Beets, barley, and body odor lingers over the table. He whispers, “Cornelius Cray, previously Major of the Iinian Red Guard and holder of the golden daggers of Teane; and the most famous warrior and renowned bounty hunter and creature killer alive in the world today. Not one to be trifled with,” he glances at Miles, “and not one to be pointing a finger at neither if you catch my drift. He may interpret your intentions the wrong way and blow your head off with his famous rifle or six shooters.”

  Miles and Pard both suck in a vocal breath and sit up straight, scared stiff.

  “Now, now,” Cray says in his slow raspy voice from the next table over, “no need to scare the boys, fat man, besides, it’s not them I have my eye on.”

  Deet wiggles in his chair and his hand inches inside his jacket and toward the pistol fixed to his belt.

  Cray continues to shovel his stew into his mouth and doesn’t look over at Pard or the others. “Don’t worry, Yaz Roe, I mean you no harm as long as you behave yourself and keep your hand off that pistol you’re reaching for.”

  Deet’s hand freezes, then it slowly rises out of his coat, and he rests his palm on the table.

  “That’s a good boy, Yaz, smart move.”

  The fat man puckers his lips and grips his soiled towel with tension in his sausage-like fingers. “Right, so—so three stews and waters will be half a silver and be coming right up.” He steps away from the table.

  “On the house,” Cray says, his full spoon of stew stopping halfway between his bowl and mouth.

  “Right, uh, three stews, bread, and three waters, on the house.”

  Cray lifts his empty tin pint. “And more ale.”

  “More ale, yes.”

  Hawke smiles at the fat man and flicks his eyebrows twice, then taps his fingernail on his pint. “Me too.”

  “Sure thing.” The fat man wobbles off to the kitchen.

  Miles smiles at Pard. “Sweet, on the house.”

  Pard smiles back. “Nice.”

  Deet doesn’t move or say anything. His constipated face and posture is compressed like a spring ready to pounce at the drop of a hat.

  “Best relax there, Yaz,” Cray says, still with most of his back turned away from Deet, he talks as if he has eyes in the back of his head, “you’re so tense I may mistake your intentions.”

  Deet clears his throat. “No intentions, Mr. Cray, just tired after a long day of traveling in the cold with my nephews.”

  Cray lowers his spoon and lifts his gaze. He glances at Hawke. “The boy said he had no idea who Cornelius Cray is.”

  Hawke shrugs. “All right, if you want.”

  Pard eyes Cray and Hawke unsure of what to think, but an uneasy feeling besets him as they continue to talk about him and the others.

  Deet is holding his breath and his hands twitch.

  Cray jerks out of his seat, and he bumps the table which scrapes against the wood floor.

  Pard and Miles and Deet all flinch in unison.

  Hawke slowly stands.

  Deet grimaces and turns to face the men. He raises his hand. “Look, we mean you no disrespect and aren’t here to harm or bother you or anyone else.”

  Cray, now standing, slides next to Deet and sets his hand on Deet’s shoulder and leaves it there. He glances from Pard to Miles and back to Pard. A faint smile pokes through his leather skin and scruffy, grizzled exterior. Cray squeezes Deet’s shoulder as he drains the last of the ale in his pint. He raises his tin cup high in the air. “I said ale!”

  Crashing pans and pots echo from the kitchen, and the fat man pokes his head out through the crack in the door. “Yes, yes, coming, Mr. Cray.”

  Cray lets out a snort. “Hawke!”

  Hawke lifts Cray’s table then slams it down next to Pard’s table.

  Deet tenses.

  Cray squeezes Deet’s shoulder again. “Relax, Uncle Yaz, too much stress isn’t good for the body. You know they say if you’re tense all the time you won’t live long. You want to live long, don’t you, Uncle Yaz?”

  “Yes, Mr. Cray, I most definitely want to live long.”

  Cray let’s go of Deet’s shoulder and pats him on the back. He raises his hand and clicks his fingers. “Fat man!”

  The fat man pokes his head out the crack in the kitchen door. “Mr. Cray?”

  “Bring Uncle Yaz here an ale. He needs to relax, too much stress will kill him.”

  “Yes, Mr. Cray,
one ale coming right up.”

  “Three ales, fat man.”

  “Right, three ales, coming right up.”

  “On the house,” Cray adds as he looks at Pard and winks.

  Pard smiles at him, and Miles lets out a hushed giggle.

  “On the house, Mr. Cray,” the fat man says, “yes, of course.”

  Hawke adjusts the table until it abuts flush to Pard’s table, and he sits next to Pard with no one to his left and Deet angled across from him.

  Cray sets his chair across from Hawke and sits next to Deet and across from Pard. Cray unleashes a thunderous belch and pats his stomach. He points at the marks on Miles’s face with his spoon. “Something wrong with your face, boy? You joining a carnival or something?”

  Miles glances away embarrassed. “Umm.”

  Pard, remembering something he read about Rue children from certain clans getting marks as they reach adulthood, speaks up. “He’s honoring his ancestors.”

  Cray’s steely eyes shift to Pard, attention fully locked on and waiting to hear more.

  “His ancestors are from an ancient Rue clan.”

  Cray purses his lips. He shifts his gaze back to Miles. “Are they now?”

  “Yes. And before there sixteenth birthday, people in our family get marked as a rights of passage.”

  Cray points his spoon at Pard’s face. “So why aren’t you marked?”

  “My time comes over the next year if I choose to go through the ritual, but it’s not obligatory.”

  Cray shifts his spoon to Deet. “You, Yaz—” He circles his spoon in Deet’s face, “You don’t honor your ancestors like your nephew does?”

  “Well—no—I—”

  “It’s a personal choice,” Pard chimes in. “My uncle chose not to follow his brother and his son, Les here, on the ancient Rue path.” Pard glares at Miles. “Right?”

  “Right,” Miles replies.

  “I see,” Cray says. He circles his spoon in front of Miles’s face. “Well, kinda looks goofy on you, kid. The person who marked you up seems to have had a crazy shaking hand with no purpose.”

  Miles clinches his teeth and his face turns red.

  Pard pats Miles’s knee underneath the table, trying to calm him. “It’s just the beginning, more marks will be added to make the tattoo complete into a traditional form.”

  “Sure hope so.” Cray turns around toward the bar. “Dammit! Ale I said, fat man!”

  The fat man bursts through the kitchen door and waddles to their table while carrying two pitchers, one golden ale, the other oatmeal stout. “Here you go, Mr. Cray, on the house.”

  Cray glares at the fat man. “About damned time.”

  The fat man stands rooted in place waiting for Cray’s next command. A bead of sweat rolls down his temple, down his cheek, and into his unruly beard.

  “Well?” Cray says.

  The fat man’s nervous eyes dance back and forth waiting to be told what to do next.

  “Don’t you have stew to bring for the boys and Uncle Yaz here?”

  “Right you are, Mr. Cray.” Though the fat man still doesn’t move.

  Cray opens his eyes wide and tilts his head as if talking to an idiot. “And, get going before the young lads starve to death.”

  “Right, Mr. Cray. Coming right up.” The fat man wobbles back to the kitchen.

  “So you get a lot of things free on the house, Mr. Cray?” Pard says.

  Cray flicks his head at Hawke, and Hawke grips the pitcher of stout and fills Cray’s and Deet’s pints.

  Cray grunts. “We get enough to keep us motivated.” He eyes Deet. “Where’s your destination, Uncle Yaz?”

  “Ravin Town, catching a train to the Elemerin Coast, Cirin Town.”

  “Then a steamer back to Brenton?”

  Deet’s jaw drops, taken aback.

  “It’s your accent, slightly nasal, dead give away.”

  “Just to the port town of Cirin, vacation, we have family there. My kin moved from Bielston to Elemerin ten years ago.”

  Cray grunts. “Train? You’ll be waiting a few weeks. Only trains out of Ravin are south to the coast and to the Badlands delivering supplies and sorry souls to the coal fields.”

  Deet furrows his brow. “Since when?”

  “Since last week. Hawke and me just came from Elemerin, the damned contraption ran off the rails, bloody mess of tangled iron. Will be a good month till they get the line back up and running. Best plan on a long stay or find other means of transportation.”

  Deet frowns.

  Hawke sips ale then points his pint. “You can always take the boys on a vacation to the Badlands, that train is still chugging full steam.”

  “Not what I had in mind for a vacation.”

  Hawke chuckles. “I imagine not.”

  Pard eagerly looks at Hawke. “So you’re famous too?”

  “Ha!” Cray says, slamming his tin pint on the table, and Pard and the others except for Hawke flinch.

  Hawke smiles. “Not yet, kid, still working on the famous part, but someday.”

  Miles’s eyes narrow at Cray. And the old Miles, pre-star, returns for a moment, and he can’t help replying after Cray’s slight about his face. “Still, never heard of you, and I’ve heard of all types, so you can’t be that famous.”

  “Never heard of the Siege of Brast?” Cray says. “Or the capture of Droth the Mighty? Or the Battle of Siltz?”

  Pard and Miles look at each other and they both shake their heads no.

  Miles chimes in, “I’m not one for history, but my friend here’s read more history than most his age. If he hasn’t heard of those things then they must not be that famous.”

  Deet coughs and kicks Miles’s shin under the table.

  Miles lurches forward at the jolt and lets out a puff of air.

  Cray growls then chugs the black stout. He slams his pint on the table and a stream of dark liquid shoots over the brim and splatters in front of Deet. “What’s with you boys, locked up in a private school away from the real world?”

  “Umm—” Miles says.

  “Umm—” Pard says.

  Cray twists his lips. “Anyway, guess there’s always a few stragglers who haven’t heard the stories.”

  The fat man bumps into the table and sets the bowls of stew and a plate of sliced bread in front of Pard and the others. He stands in place for a second waiting for orders, then opens his mouth, but Cray dismissively waves him off before he can say a word.

  Pard and Miles dig into their bowls and dip their bread into the steaming stew.

  Hawke leans forward and talks with his hands and transitions into a storyteller. “This here is the famous Cornelius Cray, otherwise known as Major Cray of the Reds, the Eighth Legion of the Iinian Guard. He’s slayed the terrorizing Bearinef of Wickermon and captured the Scourge of Lorgmere; he’s fought in the Border Wars and the Alir Excursion; he’s sought for his services by lords and kings alike, emperors and senates; they all bow to the major who was also the Iinian Royal Ambassador to Lasteane. He is feared by all matters of men and creature, and no bounty or glory or prize is out of his grasp or to big for his purse.”

  Pard and Miles, eyes fixed on Hawke, both have their chins almost in their bowls. They continue to shovel the warm stew into their mouths with urgency as they hang on Hawke’s every word.

  “And the prize we seek now is big, boys, very big.” Hawke jerks upright and suddenly points to the door, and both Pard and Miles flinch. “A tikba roams near these forests, and not just any tikba, this beast is tena.”

  “Tena?” Miles says.

  “Fearless leader,” Pard says, “or a more appropriate translation would be tikba who is born to lead.”

  Miles shrugs nonchalantly as if expecting Pard to know the answer.

  Cray and Hawke both shift their bewildered attention toward Pard.

  Pard ignores them and continues to slurp more stew.

  Hawke furrows his brow. “You haven’t heard of the famous Major Cray t
hough you’ve heard of the tikba and the tena?”

  Pard shrugs. “Read it somewhere a while back.”

  “Where would you read such a thing, boy?” Cray says with a choking rasp.

  “In a book.”

  Cray chuckles. “Yes, because what else could you read that would tell you of the tena or tikba.”

  “I said we are descended from the Rue, we know this sort of stuff.”

  Cray twists his lips. “Still, not the most common knowledge floating around for a—how old did you say you were?”

  “I turned fifteen last week.”

  “Right, fifteen-year-old boy, Rue or not. What else do you know of this beast?”

  “I know it’s strong.”

  Hawke and Cray both adjust in their seats and look at each other, then they let out a bellowing chorus of laughs.

  “Did I say something wrong?” Pard goes still, his spoon frozen in midair.

  “No, no, keep going, boy,” Cray says, wiping a hysterical-induced tear from his eye.

  “I think it’s a man or woman, but it can also turn into an animal or something sometimes too. But that’s all I could make out, the text was hard to read.”

  Hawke leans in and goes back into storyteller mode. “Indeed the tikba is strong. Whether in male or female human form, it is as strong as the strongest man or woman you ever did come across. And in tikba form, it can have the strength of two grown men, but the tena, that there is a glorious piece of beast, it has the strength of two strong men in human form and of three, maybe even four men in tena form.”

  “Cool,” Miles says, slowly nodding with a straight face and sopping up the last of his stew with a piece of bread.

  Deet gulps down the stout. “Tales and nothing more.”

  “Tales you say?” Hawke says, taken aback. “All true, and there is one in these very woods. We’ve been tracking his movements for weeks.”

  Deet snorts.

  “You don’t believe in the strange and magical creatures of old, Uncle Yaz?” Cray says. “The ones that slither and linger in the dark within the ancient forests throughout Vetlinue, where only the brave or stupid venture and live to tell the tale?”