The road was hilly and began to become slippery as a rain and snow mix speckled the ground. Trudging up a large hill, he looked back to Kersa in the distance. This was about where their run-in with Knasgriff had been. A burning on the back of his neck caused him to take a deep breath. He wished to calm the annoyance he felt toward Garoa. This was not what was supposed to happen, and a self-centered journey was not what needed to be priority now; at least, not to Sviska.
A few more hills passed, and Sviska saw the glimmer of the moonlight on the sea. Down the road, a lone structure that looked no more than an outline of black against a pale gray stood beside the water’s edge.
The sparse clouds that had dusted icy rain now began to smack the ground with large flakes as he made it to the structure. It was a simple house of no more than a door and a single window. The moss-covered roof of the house built into the hill rose sharply to a point, continuing up in broken rocks. A boat, or more appropriately raft, sat in the water, with a guide stick standing up near the dock to the left. A hooded figured stood on the raft looking out toward the water. The sound of a slamming door preceded an old man emerging from the dark hut with a torch. He wobbled toward the raft and then paused, looking back toward Sviska.
"Do ya need a ride to the mainland too?" he said in a crackling voice, tilting his head.
He looked past the man to the figure on the raft and said loudly, "I am following a friend."
"Very well, very well!" the old man replied. "Onto the ferry! We need to get across before the tides pull completely out!"
Sviska boarded a raft that was not much more than logs tied together and three posts with metal handles for passengers to hold onto. The old man took hold of his guide stick and pressed it into the sand below the raft, pushing them into the shallow bay.
"When ya come during the day we have to go to our bigger raft, but at night the waters go out to sea and a little bay forms between the two rock formations to our sides."
Sviska looked to his sides and noticed two rocky outcroppings that led from the island across the water to the sliver of land visible in the dark.
He turned his attention to the figure, and he knew without a doubt it was Garoa, as the coat given to him by Brethor was easily noticeable in even the dark.
"You can ignore me as you wish, but there is no point. I will follow you until I get you back on course."
He turned to Sviska and said, "But your course and my course are different. Perhaps you should take the trip back across with the old man. I am sure his path will direct you back to what you need."
"Aye! What you need is history! These rocky shoals are the foundations of bridges burned by the Legions long ago. But it is well, now you have the ferries!"
Sviska looked at the old man, who smiled a toothy grin and shook his head with a cackling laugh.
"I’ve come to take you back," Sviska said to Garoa.
"I cannot go back."
"But if you wish, you can with enough gold!" the old man interjected again. "Speaking of, I need two pieces for each of you!"
Garoa started to reach into his pocket when Sviska grabbed into his, pulling out the coins.
"For both of us."
He dropped the coins in the man's hand, and the ferryman quickly hid them in a coin purse at his side.
"Pay the ferry man, pay him fast.
Or your trip might be the last,
For thieves are one thing he detest,
He lays them down for eternal rest!"
The old man ended his rhyme in another cackling laugh as the shore came into a closer view.
There was another landing, and another man stood on the dock.
"Hullo, dear brother! A good night to see you so late!"
The man sat on the dock with his feet over the water; a simple stick and string went down into the depths. He tugged it every few moments.
"Good to see ya, too, my brother! How are the fish this night?"
He smiled, "Not very good! I believe they swam to your side, didn’t much like my shores!"
"Very well! I shall fish when I get back, and we can meet to compare!"
The raft came to rest on land, and both Garoa and Sviska disembarked. Garoa walked ahead, picking up his pace as he left the ferry landing. The two brothers laughed and carried on behind them as Sviska jogged to catch up to his distant friend.
Sviska grabbed his arm and turned Garoa toward him. Garoa bowed up, his right fist tightened, and he held a spark of flame in his right. As the bit of fire fizzled out, there was a twitch in his eye.
"And that is why we should be helping Slats and Berie."
He pushed off Sviska's hand and shook his head. "I need not magic to further prove my worth. I will find better things in this life. If you wish to help me, fine, but know I do not walk the path you do."
Sviska nodded his head, agreeing. "I would hope not, but I would pray the destination would be near the same."
They began down the road side by side in a southerly direction. The thick, green grass on the rocky ground began to give way to a more typical thatch.In bunches along the road, white and bluish flowers could be seen in the moonlight like tiny torchlights on the ground. Their petals reflected the light in an almost magical glow.
As they came to a fork in the road at about daybreak, they took a southwestern path and continued. The land became flat. A long path was ahead for them, up and down the hills of the northern highland regions.
The sun was now high above them, beaming down on the Rusis and Sviska. The southwestern path had evened out and stretched before them. Leaving the hills behind, they descended near a brook that rushed downward to a large bay that was to their right and, from above, appeared speckled with gold.
Soon the road reached out toward the bay, avoiding a gully of rocks and pushing them toward the bay. Crabs snapped and chased after little mice that jutted back and forth between the rocks that lined the shore. The path came to two posts crossing a narrow waterway and continued on — only the bridge was no longer.
Garoa shrugged, leapt over, but struggled on the far end, slipping on the rocks and grasping for one of the posts. He steadied his feet and turned as Sviska leapt then, making it in a single bound.
"Good for a winemaker," Garoa said, shaking his head, "I have not asked, but I do know you are no winemaker. Your hands seem more fit for knife work than handling berries. What did you do before Elinathrond, Sviska? If that indeed is your name."
"Knife work," he replied. His eyes closed with a sour churning in his stomach. "I spent much time to the far west, the barren desert lands and yes, Sviska is my actual name."
Sviska thought for a moment, his memory still fresh with the small life he was to take before The Order sent him to Elinathrond, and he shook his head.
Garoa did not push him to speak any further of it, but grumbled to himself.
"What?" Sviska questioned.
"It was rude of me to ask about something I knew was not good memory for you. I do thank you for coming with me, but know I will not turn to help the others. I have a new path. With the curse likely gone, I can make a new life."
"We will make a new life and restore magic in time."
Garoa stopped and looked at him.
"If that is your purpose, I beg you, leave now."
Sviska stared at him, "I come to remain beside you in what you do. Berie and Slats will do the other. But I must know what it is you seek. How do you know that some child is here?"
"I do not. But I know of a woman that may be.” He stopped speaking to grimace. "I left her, and I mean to do as I should’ve then. We must go to Lokam."
Sviska raised his eyebrow and shook his head. "That is a central city of the Grand Protectorate in the northern lands,” he said. “I have never passed that way, but I know the Legions will be there. How would you expect to get past them?"
"I will walk as will you. The Legions do not know our faces; it is only our actions that draw them. For all the Grand Protectorate knows, it is
Berie and Slats they should fear more than ourselves. The First Legion will still be marching from Elinathrond, if they are even to return."
"Which they won't. Not that quickly, at least," Sviska said. "I know much of the Legions, but I still feel that going to Lokam to be ill-advised."
"I did not ask your advice, Sviska. I am no stranger to that place."
The Rusis turned and began walking again. Sviska exhaled, wondering what path he had chosen to follow in going with Garoa.
The road before them turned to cobbled rocks and then overgrown weeds, which partially shrouded stacked stones and splintered, rotting wood, at one time of use to the inhabitants of the area, but no more.
The road passed more ruins. Dwellings of different sizes, as well as pieces of pottery and bits of bones riddled the area. Opening up to a larger area in the ruins, a large stone, coated in now-rusted metal, rose above them.
"This was a place of magic," Garoa said. "I have been here, many, many years ago. I was only a boy then."
Sviska did not recognize the place; his work never brought him to this region. The north was nearly as alien to him as was Tar Aval, Tar Sol, and Elinathrond.
"We use to come here to seek herbs. My mother loved to make compounds for wounds and such that my father would get when he was working."
"And what did he do?"
"What did all Rusis do? Blend, hide, wait in the shadows, and then take every penny from unsuspecting persons."
"So he robbed people," Sviska stated.
"Well, when you say it with that tone . . . The Rusis were not always that way, but we became that."
They began to walk around the statue and follow the path out of the ruins.
"Robbed people," Garoa laughed, sniffing. "That isn't all my father did."
Sviska turned to his friend, who was now more emotional than he had ever seen him. His face was red, and although his eyes watered, he smiled.
"He was a great Rusis, and through two winters kept not only us, but two other families warm when we were hiding from The Order. As the other families did not know what The Order searched for, but hid anyway, as we all did in that time. Most magic peoples were gone, and so, when The Order sought us, no one knew, unless we showed them deliberately that we had powers. But he had to. He cooked and made light, as well as fought off the wolves of the woods not once but twice as they sniffed us out. We made it for a while after that winter, but then they died . . . both of them. I buried them myself, just ten years old at that time. I was alone from then on. Kept up my father's work, you might say."
Garoa trudged on, looking up straight now he quickened his pace. They neared Lokam, and Sviska stared ahead noting a single monolithic structure that reached into the sky. It was still a far journey ahead.
Passing a small farm tended by a man and a woman, they stopped, after an offering of snacks by a youngster at a roadside table.
"Now I told you, Mama, we would be sellin' some on this road!"
A young boy with a crooked tan hat offered rolled oats in a leaf, stuffed with some form of berry. The boy's father worked the ground behind him with a hoe, and his mother came over to see the transaction.
The boy's mother stared them up and down with a large but somewhat forced smile. The strangers’ clothes set them apart from the typical sort she saw.
"Not so often we have travelers this far to the east. Where are you headed?"
"Lokam," Garoa said. "We are pilgrims."
"Traveling pilgrims," Sviska added. "We have been traveling the roads, making maps, noting such finds such as a place to find a fine snack."
Sviska looked around and said, "I'd say we have found one."
His charade was cut short by the mother. "Please, Selu, go to your father," she said.
The boy backed away slowly, staring at them before turning and jogging toward his father.
"I'd warn you to avoid Lokam," she said, "There is much going on there, of late. A lot of fighting men have been there, and there are some unnatural happenings in the clouds, as of late. Out here, we see everything, and I swear that many days ago we saw a horrible creature in the storm clouds."
"What?" Garoa asked.
"Something like the gods of the stories my own mama used to tell. But angry. The ground has shaken in a way like the ground below you is going to erupt at any moment. If you can avoid that place, do so; but if not, be careful of whom you speak to."
Garoa tapped his foot and looked over at the woman and then to the man. "I head to the tavern of moon and star, the way of good drink and sour pipes. Where must I go to get some bread?"
The woman looked to her husband. His hands no longer held a hoe, but were at his side, rubbing the dirt on his shirt. The woman closed her eyes and looked down before holding her own head high.
She replied to him, "Might should go to the baker of the red morning, lest you will be as the dead baker's dough and not rise again."
Garoa nodded. "It seems something of old survives."
"You were a boy yourself when I last saw you. I did not recognize you after such time," the man said.
Garoa smiled and said, "Yes, Father Emun, be it fate I should find you."
"I thought you were lost long ago, both I and Telis here."
She smiled and said, "It is good to see you, Garoa."
"I am seeking Lucia," he said bluntly. "I have reason to find her."
A shocked look came across Emun's face.
"The girl from the tavern, the barmaid?"
"You know we had time together before. I wish to seek her out in Lokam. Her parents are there still, I hope."
"The tavern was raided shortly after you last departed. Tore apart everything searching for the tunnels, but we lucked out and they did not. I know not where Lucia could have went. We all went into hiding for a while after."
"After that," Telis said, "we feared to operate the guild anymore. Most members are scattered or mostly dead, we guessed ourselves."
"Hullo, good people," Sviska said. "I do not know you as Garoa, but I feel a greeting is in order."
"So are you one, too?" asked Emun.
"A what?"
Garoa shook his head. "No, he is not a Rusis. But a good friend and one who is helping me."
"Very well, then," Emun said. "But yes, welcome to our farm. Please, take more of our son's bars. It is all we have to offer, as it is well before dinner."
He wrapped the oat bars in a sackcloth bag and handed them to Garoa.
"Thank you."
"We want to get to Lokam before dark," Garoa said. "If others like us past this way, or if you hear rumors of things happening in the land, know that our old creed stays true."
"Always," Emun replied.
Emun and Telis bowed, and Sviska and Garoa began walking again.
"I take it there is more to you in Lokam than you have told me."
"We both have our secrets, Sviska."
There was a silence between them for a moment. Sviska knew a breach of secrecy for most guilds was a punishable offense, but such guilds of secret were no more, he thought.
"You may have dirtied your blades on the necks of innocent or guilty be as they judged, but the occupation by the Grand Protectorate and the Legions in Lokam was not well received by the people long ago. Lokam was not always a place of the Legions."
Sviska had heard of Lokam before. The chief arm of the Legion for the northern forces resided there. It was large city and populated by many thousands of people, one of the largest cities of Order control.
"In the times before Elinathrond, I was a young man. After a few drinks with some others, including the father and his good wife back there, we had some ideas. We decided to use the old city tunnels to run raids on the Legions, spreading propaganda against the Legions, and causing issues everywhere we could. As silly as it was, thinking of it now, locking a gate behind a cohort of soldiers marching through and then locking a second gate sealing them between the two was good fun, but nothing more than child's play. More
of a drinking guild than anything, we called ourselves the Children of Lokam." Garoa smiled, paused briefly, then said, "A good time."
“Did the people of Lokam ever wish to rebel?”
“Yes and no. The Grand Protectorate did not do to Lokam as what the Island Nation deals with now, but the people did not care for them. The hands of dwarves and men alike built Lokam. It was in a time well before magic was threatened and well before my birth, perhaps even Slats’s birth. You have heard of the city of Finar, to the south?”
“Another place of the Grand Protectorate, I know of it only from rumors. It was a place of magic at one time.”
“A place of darkness, if I could point at one. It was a holy site for the Itsu in ages before. Beside the sea, its bounty proved profitable to other lands, and so, at my time in Lokam, many dealings happened in regard to trade and war with that city.”
“So the Children of Lokam did nothing else against the Legions?”
Garoa shook his head and said, “I know not much else. Apologies, but I am not too good with history. I will say that the children of Lokam harassed the Legions for a good while. Perhaps they became more violent after I left. I cannot say.”
"Why did you leave them?"
"What?"
"The Children of Lokam. You left."
"I had found a girl."
"This girl we are seeking? Lucia?"
"No," he whispered, "another girl . . . woman more, really. She convinced me to leave Lokam. According to Emun, they raided the tavern just after that. Anyway, that was just before I went to Elinathrond. The curse was always a fear of mine, and I feel given that I was at risk for it to find me, it would. Thankfully it never did."
"Who was the woman?"
"I don't remember."
Sviska glared at him.
"Really, I don't. There was a lot of drinking, and I followed her out the city, down the road, and away from Lokam. I always say it as my defining moment where I felt I should finally seek out the rumored city of our past friend Brethor."
"And this woman?"
"Oh, of the worst kind. Not a real woman, a beast actually. Curse likely wiped them out, but to their name I will not say in fear one might yet rise from the grave to find me. I will say more than one drunken man has been seduced and then eaten like does a wild dog with a fresh kill. I was lucky. As I said, I had a defining moment.
Saints of Wura: Winemaker of the North, Arcane Awakening, Reckoning in the Void (Saints of Wura Books 1-3 with bonus content) Page 35