by Tracey Alley
right things but try to stay their own people, retain their old way of life. Most of the people here still even worship Niord, the sea god, but they’re some of the last.”
As the others walked wearily into the boarding house Slade paused for a moment on the doorstep, looking around. Never before had it been made so clear to him the damage that had been wrought in this once beautiful island paradise. Now finally, seeing this small village with its villagers hiding in their darkened houses, Slade was coming to understand his father’s fervent desire to reclaim this land. Breathing deeply of the sea air Slade vowed to Suelta that if ever the time came where he could help to free these people, he would do it. A sudden breeze through the treetops caused the leaves to rustle; a subtle sign from Suelta that she had accepted his vow.
Turning Slade walked inside, closing the wooden door behind him. The main room of the boarding house was a large, square room taking up most of the lower floor. To Slade’s left was an open fireplace against the wall that had obviously not been used in many years, with uncomfortable looking high-backed chairs ranged in semi-circle around the fireplace. On his right was a long, scratched wooden table with two low benches placed on either side, evidently used for communal meals. At the back of the room a set of doors probably led into the kitchen area, and likely whatever bathroom accommodations this building possessed, and the remaining door would likely lead to a storage room. In the far left hand corner was a set of rickety looking stairs. After the austerity of his cell in Diablis prison it seemed almost as luxurious as the palace at Anglia to Slade.
“How secure is this Malachi?” Nikolai asked.
“For a night, fine. I wouldn’t risk any longer than that but you won’t have to, I have the ship ready to leave at first light. There’s food by the way, nothing fancy but something to fill your bellies,” Malachi continued indicating the rickety staircase, “There are beds upstairs, again nothing fancy but good enough to stretch out on for a few hours rest. Once you’re on board ship, of course, you’ll have a couple of days to really recuperate…”
“It doesn’t take more than a day to sail from here to Saxenburg,” Slade interrupted.
Malachi and Nikolai exchanged a quick glance, causing Slade to abandon his initial idea of postponing his questions for later in favor of getting some sleep; now he saw clearly he would not have that luxury.
“You said there was food?” Slade asked, continuing when Malachi nodded, “we’ll eat first and then talk. All of us.”
The meal was simple and easily prepared and soon they were all sitting at the long wooden table, drinking spring water out of rough wooden cups. Slade smiled slightly as he noted how the group had arranged themselves. Trunk, due to his size, sat at the narrow end of the table furthest from the door; beside him on the bench nearest the wall were Nikolai, then Malachi, Lara and Roulibard. Sitting on the opposite bench Tares sat closest to Trunk, with Darzan next to him, Slade sitting next to the beautiful pirate woman and Wulfstan opposite Roulibard. Almost, Slade thought to himself, as though it were the ‘good guys’ versus the ‘bad guys’; if the situation had not been so serious Slade might have found it amusing.
“I would like to start by telling all of you,” Slade said quietly, “that I do not begin to understand why the gods have seen fit to throw this rather unusual group together, but I believe in my heart that it’s important. While we were still inside the prison Nikolai, you told us certain things, most of which I now know were not strictly truthful. Since then you’ve told me some other things, again you weren’t completely honest.” Slade held up one hand flat for silence when he saw Wulfstan open his mouth, “He did not lie, Wulfstan. Let me make that plain to everyone, to the best of my knowledge Nikolai has not told any of us an outright lie. Although he has,” Slade paused, searching for the right words, “rearranged the truth somewhat. What he has told me is more than enough to disturb me. What I want to do now, and I realize that we’re all tired, I’m tired, but this is important. So, what I’d like to do is have every one of us come clean. We all have elements to this story but for probably a lot of reasons, we, and I include every one of us is keeping something back; even me.” Slade was wryly amused at the sudden rapt attention his statement had generated, particularly from Nikolai.
“I will share my ‘secret’ with you but first I would like Nikolai to share a few secrets with us,” Slade concluded.
All eyes turned to the necromancer as Nikolai sat with his back against the wall. The efforts of the day could be seen clearly in the dark shadows under his clear blue eyes and the fine lines around his beautifully modeled mouth. Slade could not claim to actually like the necromancer, in fact the young druid found him slightly repellent, yet to his surprise he felt he was coming to respect Nikolai.
“Well first of all I owe you an apology Slade,” Nikolai began leaning forward with his elbows on the table, “I initially thought of you as someone weak, you couldn’t handle the pressure of court life so had run away to play in the trees. I see now that I was wrong, you’re not weak and I think you’re a real leader.”
“Slade good. Trunk like Slade,” Trunk interjected.
“Yes he is, my big friend,” Nikolai laughed, giving the first genuine smile Slade had ever seen on the mage’s face, “although he’s probably more to your taste than mine.”
“Trunk not eat Slade. Trunk not eat people,” Trunk said, his broad, grotesque face screwed up in disgust.
As everyone laughed and reassured the ogre-troll, Slade eyed Trunk speculatively. Trunk’s seemingly inept command of the Common tongue had gone a long way to lowering the rising tension level in the room. It suddenly occurred to Slade to wonder exactly who and what Trunk really was, and how he had come to be so inextricably linked with Nikolai.
“That said,” Nikolai began again, “if you will all bear with me for a moment I would like to start at the beginning. My beginning. A little over two years ago now my mentor, Lord Nexus, received some disturbing information that was, unfortunately, very incomplete. Nexus asked me to go to The Northern Badlands to further investigate. He also asked me to go with a companion.” Nikolai paused, looking at Trunk, his eyes shadowed with sadness.
“That companion was Sir Patrick san Decroix.”
An Unlikely Friendship
Slade found he was somewhat surprised, even though he had known that Nikolai was working with and for Lord Michael Strong it still came as a shock to hear that the necromancer had worked closely with Sir Patrick, second in command to Lord Michael and one of the most famous names in all The Kingdoms. Looking up the table towards Tares, Slade saw that this information came as no surprise to the minotaur priest. Nor, Slade noted as he glanced across the table, was it a surprise to the halfling woman, Lara.
“Patrick and I worked extremely well together, far better than I could ever have imagined. In fact, we became friends. Unlikely friends maybe, but still friends. And I mean that in every sense of the word, Patrick and I became closer than brothers. In fact, he saved my life, twice.” Nikolai stopped and stared down at the wooden table top. Watching him it was obvious to Slade that Nikolai’s friendship with Sir Patrick was not only very real, but had come as a complete surprise to the necromancer.
“In any case our mission was very successful.” Nikolai continued eventually, “We discovered that someone, at that stage we didn’t know who it was, was recruiting people of all races and that those people then seemed to disappear. It seemed pretty clear to both of us that someone was preparing a secret army. It also became very clear, fairly early on, that this was no ordinary army. Everyone that was recruited shared one common trait.”
“Witchcraft,” the interruption surprisingly came from Roulibard.
“Yes.” Nikolai answered, “Witchcraft. Every one who had disappeared had, at one time or another, been accused of witchcraft. As you can probably imagine, at that time, this left us with more questions than answers. After all witchcraft was just an anomaly,
something weird that happened sometimes with old women in villages. It wasn’t something that anyone took seriously, except to hunt them down and kill them. Well, from what we discovered they were still being hunted, but now they were being recruited.”
“Makes you think maybe we should’ve just kept killing them,” Wulfstan muttered quietly, his fear at the thought of witchcraft obvious to Slade although possibly not to the others.
“Only you Wulfstan,” Nikolai began; his face flushed brick red, his hands bunching into fists that left his knuckles white. Trunk reached out and laid one huge hand on Nikolai’s shoulder, almost Slade thought, as though the creature was comforting the necromancer. His upper lip curling in disgust Nikolai leaned back, obviously determined to ignore Wulfstan’s comment.
“As I was saying, we knew that an army was being formed but we didn’t know who was behind it, and could only guess at why. Just before we left the Badlands we also learned that there were people, we thought they were from the Silent Hand and they were looking for the Dragon Clans,” Nikolai paused dramatically.
“What?” Slade was horrified; the thought of the damage that could be wrought by a single dragon, let alone colonies of them was