7
“What did you do to upset Calnin?” Pendin asked as they stood outside the barracks.
The hazy gray daylight common to the mountain city didn’t make this part of the city any more welcoming. Strange shadows still shifted and slid across the street, almost as if intentionally keeping the area darkened. The inky oil lamps hanging along the street did little more than thicken the haze, creating a wispy veil of malodorous smoke.
Pendin continued, “He seemed quite pleased with your assignment.”
Endric looked over at his friend. “You mean you’re not?” He tried to keep the question light but couldn’t keep the strain from his voice.
Pendin frowned and didn’t look over. “More patrol in Stahline. I’m beginning to think I’m being punished for knowing you.”
Endric sighed. “I’m sorry, Pendin.”
Pendin shrugged, the movement a slight heave of his broad shoulders. “At least it’s daytime.”
They walked in silence, their boots clomping along the stone. They rarely saw another person, and those they did see quickly turned and ran. Probably to warn any others that a Denraen patrol neared.
“Did you know the Magi confirmed the selection of general?” Endric asked, breaking the silence.
Pendin glanced over at him and frowned. “They do? I thought the council chose the general.”
Endric shrugged. “They do, but the Magi approve it. Urik mentioned it yesterday.”
Pendin narrowed his eyes. “Before or after he gave you this plum assignment?”
“Before, I think. And it was Calnin who gave us this assignment.”
“But Urik that assigned patrol.”
Endric nodded once, not wanting to argue. “That means my father was confirmed by the Magi.”
Pendin grunted. “If you two could ever remember you’re father and son, you might have learned that. Maybe we wouldn’t have to be on patrol. And maybe you could have served under Andril. And maybe—”
“Maybe I could have done many things differently. I don’t think it would have mattered to him. He blames me for my mother leaving. Probably Andril does as well.” Endric blinked slowly, telling himself it was the smoky air that bothered his eyes. “At least Andril is more like him. Even looks like him.” He shook his head. “I’m not like my father at all. Just a constant reminder of her absence.”
Pendin slowed and turned to him. “Endric…”
Endric took a deep breath, pushing the dark thoughts away. “I’m sure Andril knows all about my father’s promotion,” he said softly. “But I do not.”
Pendin watched him for a moment before they started off again. “I just don’t know what it’s like to have family and not even speak to them.”
“And you’re still so close to yours?” Endric asked.
Pendin nodded. “I still see them,” he said quietly.
Endric fell silent. The admission was more than he usually got from Pendin. “How do they feel about you serving the Denraen?” he finally asked.
Pendin shrugged and said nothing. For a while, Endric figured that was all the response he would get.
“My parents pushed me to leave Stahline,” he said. “For a time, I worked the mines. In Stahline, everyone works the mines. That wasn’t the life my parents wanted for me. Or my sister.” His voice fell off toward the end. “I got out. She didn’t.”
“She’s a miner?” Endric asked. He didn’t think many women worked the mines.
“Not anymore,” he said, his words soft and laced with a hint of pride. “Seamstress now. Doesn’t pay much, but enough.”
“What did she do in the mines?”
Pendin looked over and frowned. “Women can only work cart or candles in the mine. Laboring is left to the men.” He paused, shaking his head. “Teralin mining is dangerous work. Not just the heat of the ore, though scorchers have killed many a miner. Air will sometimes suck from the caverns, suffocating you. And sometimes mines just collapse suddenly.”
Endric shivered, thinking about the different dangers of the mines and suddenly thankful for the relative safety of the Denraen.
Pendin shook his head. “Now I don’t think I could even go back in. Once, I thought nothing of it.”
“Why would you have to go back in?” Endric asked.
Pendin didn’t answer and Endric didn’t press.
They turned a corner where the shadows deepened. Their boots echoed strangely, and after only a few steps, Endric heard a sound behind him. He stopped and turned quickly, hand falling to the hilt of his sword. Pendin took a few more steps before he realized Endric had stopped.
The street was empty. Most of them had been, but he had heard something.
Endric took a few steps in the direction they had come, sliding carefully and with all the silence he could manage. The shadows seemed to deepen and the air around him seemed darker. Thicker and almost inky.
A sense of nausea in the pit of his stomach returned. Unsheathing his sword as quietly as possible, he swiveled his head as he searched for movement. Anything that would explain what he’d heard.
“Endric?” Pendin asked but saw the naked steel in Endric’s hand and unsheathed his own sword.
Endric answered with a single shake of his head. Pendin understood and fell silent. They moved carefully, their steps muted, until they reached a small alley. Endric paused and cocked his head, listening. Something was off, though he couldn’t yet put his finger on it.
Then he heard it. Soft. More like a hiss than anything. He turned to face the sound with his sword held steadily in front of him.
“Show yourself,” he demanded. He put all the authority of the Denraen into his voice, and even Pendin glanced over at him.
There was nothing for long moments. Finally he heard a quiet laugh that sounded like stone squealing across stone. A dark figure stepped from the shadows of the alley. A long cloak covered his face and was pulled tight around his waist. Another figure followed, shorter and thinner. Neither appeared armed.
“What business do you have here?” Endric challenged. Seeing a cloaked figure a second time on patrol seemed a strange coincidence. At least this one didn’t appear to be Denraen. Or Magi.
The figure in the cloak pulled back the hood, and Endric frowned as recognition dawned on him. It was the miner who had attacked him in the tavern. Though the man was unarmed, Endric still tensed a bit when he realized who it was.
“You.”
The man nodded and his mouth opened in a sneer.
“What business do you have here?” he repeated.
The miner snorted. “I need no business.”
His voice was rougher than Endric remembered and sounded as if he had been screaming for days. “Are you following us?”
“Why would I follow Denraen?” He spat the last word.
“We’re tasked with keeping peace along these streets,” Pendin said.
“And we are here peacefully.”
“I doubt that,” Pendin suggested, his tone hard and edged with a hint of anger.
The miner leaned back and pushed up the sleeves of his robe, revealing the strange tattoos once more. Again they appeared to swirl as if alive, though Endric was sure it was just the way the light filtered through the streetlamp smoke. They were more extensive than the last time he had seen the man, nearly blackening his arms. His neck appeared tattooed as well, though he couldn’t be certain.
“Did you enjoy your night in jail, Denraen?” he asked, again spitting the last word. Then he smiled, his yellowed and pointed teeth making it look like the snarl of a wild boar. He turned away from Pendin, ignoring him completely, and focused on Endric, who blinked and tried hard to keep emotion off his face.
Somehow, this miner knew what had happened after their fight. It was a fight that should not have gone on nearly as long as it had. No miner should be able to move the way this man had.
“Did you enjoy your beating?” the miner asked softly.
With that question, Endric knew who
had ambushed him when he tried to leave the tavern. “At least I wasn’t beaten in a fair fight.”
The miner’s dark eyes fell on him with a nearly palpable weight. “It will not happen again,” he said. The hoarseness in his voice turned it into a growl.
“No. It won’t,” Endric agreed, resisting the urge to thrash the man again. There was no doubting what his punishment would be for fighting with the miner again.
The miner narrowed his eyes a moment and then laughed a low and harsh laugh. “No? Then perhaps you’re afraid.”
“And why should he fear you?” Pendin asked.
The miner slid his gaze over to Pendin and a dark smile crossed his face. “Answers will come soon enough, traitor,” he promised.
“Whatever you think you will accomplish will fail,” Pendin said as he took a step forward. For a moment, Endric feared he would attack.
The miner laughed again, the harsh sound grating. “You know nothing of what will be accomplished.” The man smiled, his pointed teeth bared like a snarl.
Pendin started forward and Endric put an arm up to restrain him. “Go,” he said to the miner. “Or I will have every right to detain you. Forcibly.”
The miner sneered. “You can try.”
“Go!” Endric said and raised his sword.
The miner glared at the blade a moment. “Another time, Denraen,” he spat. Then he turned back down the alley.
The smaller person with him had remained silent but had lowered the hood of their cloak at some point. Endric glanced over and recognized them as the other person from the tavern, the thin one who’d left immediately. He had taken the person for a boy but realized from the full lips and slightly rounded frame that it was a girl. Thin and plain-looking, she wore her short-cropped hair tangled and unkempt. Only her dark eyes were remarkable, staring intently at him for a long moment before she turned and followed the other miner.
Endric inhaled deeply and shook his head. Sheathing his sword, he asked, “Did he come only to taunt me?”
Pendin stared after the miner for a moment. “I’m not sure that was all there was to it.”
Endric flicked his gaze back to the alley. He saw nothing but darkness and hazy smoke. “What else is there? Does it have to do with him calling you a traitor?”
Pendin shook his head but didn’t meet his eyes. “I’m not sure,” he admitted. “My family won’t speak of it. Especially to me.”
Endric narrowed his eyes. “What does that mean?”
Pendin shrugged. “I didn’t think much of it until…” He motioned after the departed miner. “With his comments, I’m forced to believe the miners are up to something.”
“Your family won’t speak of it?”
Pendin shook his head. “I can’t ask them to. The miners can be a closed community. Sharing something like I’ve heard is a sure path to retribution.”
“What have you heard?” Endric asked, not wanting to know what sort of retribution the miners would exact.
Pendin hesitated. “Rumors—probably nothing to them—suggest some of the miners are organizing. Threatening some kind of revolt.”
Endric looked at his stout friend. The light cast strange shadows across his face, leaving the long scar along his cheek looking more pronounced. “What would a revolt achieve? Couldn’t the Magi just find replacements?”
“Not without effort. Teralin is not easily mined and takes a certain skill to extract.”
He believed that, especially after what Pendin had said of the dangers of mining. “What do they want?”
Pendin shook his head. “Don’t know. Better wages? Shorter days? It’s dangerous work, Endric.”
He paused and grunted, careful he didn’t say anything that would upset Pendin. “What could they do anyway?”
“Withhold the teralin.”
Endric met Pendin’s eyes and knew his friend was serious. He knew the man well enough not to ask how he had heard these rumors. Not from his family, but Pendin’s hesitation to speak told him enough. “Why would that work?”
“You know that teralin is found in only a few places. We sit atop the home to one of the largest known deposits. Probably the largest. The ore can be found elsewhere, but never in the quantities found in the city, and never as pure.”
The ore was important to the Magi. They claimed it necessary to help them speak to the gods. None but the Magi knew whether that was true.
But if it was withheld?
A thin smile pulled at his lips. “Clever.”
Pendin looked at him and shook his head. “Not clever. Dangerous.”
“Why? Because the Magi will have to go without?” He shrugged. “The strategy might work.”
Pendin’s eyes narrowed and hardened, and he held Endric in his gaze. “The Magi won’t stand for a disruption in the teralin.”
“Then what?”
“Who do you think will be asked to solve it?”
Endric didn’t have to think long. The Denraen would be asked to step in. If that happened, a confrontation and outright fighting was likely to result. Miners would be hurt or killed.
He couldn’t help but remember that the tattooed miner had a strange arrogance. Was there more to this than Pendin knew? More than he was letting on?
“It won’t come to that,” Endric said.
Pendin looked down the alley. There was no movement. Nothing but shadows and darkness. “I had not thought so,” he said, then shook his head. His broad face was drawn and tight with worry. “Now I’m not so sure.”
8
They finished their patrol without any further excitement.
Pendin became more withdrawn and quiet, and Endric didn’t bother him. Pendin was already disturbed by the encounter with the miner, enough so that his brow remained furrowed and the scar on his cheek contorted. Whatever role his family would play in the planned revolt clearly worried him.
The conversation with the miner had soured Endric’s mood as well. Patrol alone was punishment enough, but patrolling Stahline was more than degrading. Then to have Pendin drawn into it…
Endric didn’t know what Urik intended him to learn on patrol or what his intent was in forcing his friend to accompany him. As bad as Listain would have been, this seemed somehow worse, more devious.
And there was nothing he could do about it.
They were near the barracks when the rain came, making him even more angry. The sky darkened quickly and distant peals of thunder rolled toward the mountain like a drum signaling an attack. Sharp needles of cold rain struck in a sudden torrent. A violent shiver overcame him. The rain seemed to awaken Pendin, and he shrugged. Endric frowned at him a moment, then ran toward the entrance to the Denraen great hall.
Inside, he shook off the rain. An uneasy feeling gnawed at his stomach, made all the worse by the strange energy emanating from inside the barracks great room.
Usually it was full of noise and chatter from men just off patrol. Tonight was different. Conversation was muted. Many were silent. Most among the Denraen disliked the frequent rains of the city, but this silence was more than he could explain by the weather. All looked up when he came in and stared at him for long moments.
“What happened?” he wondered aloud, looking for a familiar face to ask.
It took a few moments, but he saw Senda sitting in a corner near the door. She held a book, but she didn’t appear to be actually reading it, and she stood as soon as she saw them. Almost as if she had been waiting for them, though Endric had never known Senda to wait for any man. She hurried over to them, leaving her staff leaning against the wall.
Endric frowned as she approached. “What’s wrong?” he asked without preamble.
She shook her head with barely more than a slight twitch. “See Dendril, Endric.”
He narrowed his eyes. “What is it? What did I do?” Andril had said the miner was the son of a Mage. Endric wouldn’t put it past him to claim insult. Dendril had little reason to believe Endric’s innocence.
She shook
her head more emphatically. “Please.” A pleading note entered her voice.
Endric’s pulse quickened. Senda never pleaded. Something was very wrong. “Senda?”
“Don’t make me be the one to tell you. See your father.”
He watched her for a moment more before turning and leaving the great hall. He said nothing to her or Pendin. His heart had started to hammer in his chest, and a cold sweat erupted on his brow. He brought an arm across his forehead and wiped a mix of rain and sweat away. The walk down the hall to his father’s office seemed to take forever. He resisted the urge to run. Or turn away.
Endric didn’t know what could have happened. A new worry struck him as he considered Senda’s words, her tone. What else could there be? Could something have happened to his father? He’d served as general for years and was still a relatively young man, but still…
By the time he reached the heavy door to the general’s office, his heart was pounding so loudly, he could hear it. The man posted at the door frowned at him for a moment, then nodded to the door. It was uncommon to see someone standing guard, though not unheard of. He knocked once.
“Enter.”
The voice behind the door sounded weary and tight. Endric was not sure it was his father until he pushed open the door and saw the man was alone. His face was more wrinkled than he remembered. His normally bright and piercing eyes were dull. He stood behind his desk, staring at a brown sack upon it. Otherwise, he didn’t move.
Dendril flicked his gaze up when Endric entered. “Endric,” he said, then looked back down to the sack sitting on his desk. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. When he opened them, he was suddenly the same cold general he had always been. “Endric,” he said again.
Endric walked carefully into the room, fearful of what brought him here. His father looked otherwise well, answering at least one of his questions.
That didn’t stop his heart from pounding. Nearing the desk, he said, “General. I was told to report. What is it?”
Soldier Son (The Teralin Sword Book 1) Page 6