by Nathan Roden
Simon stepped back inside the cave. He wore a new shirt, trousers, and a new pair of boots.
Helena folded her arms.
“How difficult can your lives be—clad in new clothes?”
“These are the first new clothes I’ve worn since—”
“I grew up in a house full of men,” Helena said. “I am not some frightened little girl—trembling at the sight of frogs and spiders. And you will need all the help you can get—unless your plan is to overthrow the Kingdom by yourself!”
“Plan?” Boone said. “What plan do you speak of?”
Helena’s jaw hung slack.
“You don’t…please, tell me that there is a plan. Surely, you have not hidden all of these years merely to continue to draw breath.”
“I have had to survive on my own since my sixth year, M’Lady,” Simon said. “Though I was on the verge of starvation when Boone saved me. He was only a boy of eleven at the time, but a skilled hunter—and braver than anyone I have ever known. Perhaps he chose to stay with me because of his own terrors—”
“Why do you lay bare our hardships?” Boone said. “Are we objects of pity—?”
“What does it serve us to hide, Boone?” Simon said. “Is this the time to hide the truth behind a wall of shame? I think not. Our friends are few, and our circle of trust is small. The time for secrets is past—if there was ever such a time at all.”
“If it is truth you want to hear, then I will tell you some,” Boone said. “Suppose the curse was broken, somehow. What good would that do? Do you think we could just walk the King’s Road into Morgenwraithe, march up to the castle, and tell Lucien and Sterling to leave? We will need an army of some kind, your Grace.”
“I know of an army,” Helena said.
Simon and Boone stared at her.
“Oh, you do,” Boone said. “Well, I wish we would have known about this earlier. I grow tired of sleeping on beds made of leaves.”
Helena glared at Boone and then at Simon.
“Clearly, you do not choose your friends according to manners.”
“Boone has manners. Sometimes,” Simon said.
“Please forgive us, if we are skeptical. What army do you speak of?”
“My father and his brothers used to gather together around the fire. They either thought I could not hear, or that I would not care about the serious matters they spoke of. They spoke of forming alliances with villages in the south. They spoke of an uprising—a rebellion.”
Simon ran a hand through his hair.
“I have never heard of there being a threat in the south. I always heard it said that the people of the Southlands were ignorant and backward barbarians. It is said that they barely tolerate their own neighbors, let alone present a threat to Morgenwraithe. They have few weapons and no knowledge of warfare.”
“We were always told the same thing,” Helena said. “But I heard different in the days before the King’s army invaded our village. King Bailin made a treaty with the people of the Southlands to supply them with goods from the merchant ships. The people swore to stay south of the border and stay out of the Kingdom’s affairs. But Bailin began to send fewer and fewer supplies to the South. And Sterling has treated them even worse.
“The Southlanders used to receive medicine from the bounty of the merchant ships. My father said that since the supplies have stopped, every time one of their people dies from sickness or disease their anger for the north grows.”
“Sterling will just send the army there and destroy them,” Boone said.
“It is not that simple—not at all,” Helena said. “The Southlands are surrounded by dense forests and treacherous canyons.”
“My brother ran away from home twice,” Boone said. “The first time he left, he traveled into the Southlands. I assume that he returned there. He told me that the only passable entry is a choke point between two mountains.”
“That would discourage an invasion, even by a superior army,” Simon said. “Any invading army could be surrounded and cut off from aid or supplies.”
Helena sniffed.
“If only…if only we could have avoided Sterling for a little while longer. If my village and their allies could have combined forces with the true King…”
“You believe that your people would have been willing to ally with a dragon?” Simon asked.
“My father, and the others in my village—they were desperate—but they were not fools. They would have listened to you,” Helena said.
“He is smart,” Boone said. “By far, the smartest dragon I’ve ever known.”
“We must take the sorceress, somehow,” Helena said.
“That will be most difficult,” Boone said. “She is practically untouchable. Besides her magic, she is protected by Sterling and by the throne. “
“They do not protect her,” Simon said. “They protect the curse. No one knows what would happen should Magdalena die.”
“Why is she loyal to Lucien? Or to Sterling?” Helena asked.
“I do not believe she is loyal at all,” Simon said. “She holds the power of my curse over them. And they do not fear her because her magic is of no use against the throne.”
Helena nodded slowly.
“Then her magic is also of no use against the Queen!”
“I do not know what you are saying, but I would never ask the Queen to risk—”
“To risk herself?” Helena cried. “The Queen murdered a guard to save you!”
“What?” Boone exclaimed. “The Queen murdered a guard?”
“Do you know nothing of her misery, My Lord—?”
“He is not a ‘Lord’, he is KING!” Boone said.
“You do not know the pain my Queen lives with! She does not love Lucien! Her only concern is her family and the people of Islemar. I live in fear that she may throw herself headlong into the sea, or put a blade into her heart like….like…”
“Like my mother did,” Simon said.
“Do you think that Jaclyn is safe now, Simon?” Boone asked.
“Oh, so you may call him by his given name, but if I call him ‘Lord’, you want to give me a spanking!” Helena cried.
“Perhaps a sound spanking would serve you well!” Boone said.
“Forgive me,” Simon said. “I thought that the two of you had just met, but obviously you have been married for years!”
Boone glared at Simon.
“Very fun—”
Helena swayed. Her knees buckled and she slumped against the wall of the cave. Simon and Boone jumped to catch her but Boone was closer. Helena’s dress rode up on her leg. Her wound was red and her leg was swollen.
Boone put his hand to Helena’s face. He gulped and looked at Simon.
“She burns with fever. We will need—”
“Water,” Simon said. “Clean water.”
Simon snatched up two buckets and ran to the stream.
Boone led Helena to the corner, and his straw bed. He spread his coat and his spare shirt and helped her to lie down.
Simon returned with the water. Boone gave Helena some to drink. He soaked a rag and put it on her forehead. He poured some on her wound. Helena jumped and tried to talk, but the fever made her delirious and sapped her energy.
Helena slipped into a fitful sleep.
“We are not far from the village,” Boone whispered.
“I don’t know what you are thinking, Boone, but I know I am not going to like it,” Simon said.
“The apothecary is near the edge of town. We need poultice and bandages.”
“So you propose that we knock on the door in the middle of the night—with every soldier in the realm looking for us. Have you lost your mind?”
“I’ll go alone. And I do not intend to knock.”
”In the dark,” Simon said. “You would have to be lucky just to keep from breaking your neck. How will you find anything when you cannot see? I know that you want to help her, Boone, but—”
“Listen to me, Simon. Her woun
d is bad. The fever is her body attempting to fight against infection—but she will lose that fight. My Gram died from much less of a burn than that.”
Simon put his hand on Boone’s shoulder.
“I know this is true. But getting yourself killed will not save her.”
“No. But if I stay here and do nothing, she will die. And I will see her face every waking minute, and every night—while sleep escapes me.”
“Take this,” Simon said. “Perhaps it will bring you good fortune. It did for me.”
“Is this the same dagger that you almost killed me with earlier this evening?” Boone asked.
“The very same. It belongs to the Queen.”
“The Queen?” Boone said. “This is the dagger that she—?”
Simon nodded.
Boone slipped the dagger sheath into his belt.
“The Queen’s dagger,” he said. “The songs that the minstrels sing of us will be rich indeed.”
Thirty-Eight
Boone ran down the mountainside in the faint light of the moon. He fell hard twice. The pain of a sprained ankle accompanied his every step, but did not slow him down.
He breathed heavily as he stood at the edge of the woods, staring into the silent street at the edge of the village. Three oil lamps lit the street corners. As he looked on, one of the lamps flickered and went out.
Boone had distant memories of the apothecary. He had been there three times that he could remember—with his mother. That had been several years ago, when his mother was still able to get around.
Boone’s mother begged him not to tell his father about their visits to the healer and his shop. Boone promised that he would rather die than betray her. And it was the truth. He was well aware that she suffered from his father’s regular abuse. He would gladly have taken it all upon himself to protect her. If he could not protect her, he would certainly help her to visit the healer and receive his medicine.
He was only a little boy. He could not fight. But he could keep secrets.
Another small building adjoined the apothecary. Boone squeezed his eyes shut and searched his memory.
No, it is not a shop, he thought.
The apothecary’s owner—the healer and his wife—they live there.
Boone noticed the faint glow of a light or a candle behind one of the windows. He crept around the walls of the shop and tried both doors. Locked. He pulled on windows. All locked, as well. Boone was not surprised. He went to the window furthest from the healer’s residence. He took out the dagger. Slowly and quietly, he began to work at opening the window. He jumped and cut his finger when he heard a dog bark in the distance.
After twenty minutes he had the window free. He pulled himself inside at a very slow pace.
Light from one of the two street lamps shone through two of the windows. Boone got on his knees and squinted to read the labels of the bottles that lined the shelves. He murmured his thanks for every painstaking moment that Simon spent teaching him the skill.
His eyes opened wide when he read a label that read,
Healing Salve. For cuts, burns—
“Make one move and I’ll run you through.”
Boone froze, but not quickly enough. He jerked backward and felt a sharp pain in the middle of his back. He held up his hands.
The voice was rough, but Boone was certain that it was a woman’s voice.
He sensed movement behind him, and heard something strike the floor. And then something else.
“Move backward,” the voice said.
Boone scooted back. There was an unlit lamp next to him. And something else that he did not recognize.
“Light the lamp,” the voice said.
“How?” Boone said.
“With the striker, Idiot.”
“St—striker? I do not know what that is.”
“You cannot work a striker but you are certainly able to invade my shop through a locked window, you piece of filth! Do you live in a cave?”
Boone picked up the piece of metal next to the lamp.
“I’ll…I’ll figure it out, My Lady. I’m not stupid.”
“You have a sword at your back and have committed an offense that will send you to the stocks, if not the King’s dungeon. You may not be aware of your ignorance, but it is obvious to me.”
Twenty seconds later, the lamp glowed.
“Get to your feet—holding the lamp,” the woman said.
Boone stood slowly.
“Turn around—and keep your hands where I can see them. You move too fast, and I’ll gut you like a fish.”
“No, M’Lady.”
“Save your manners, filth. It’s a bit late for that.”
Boone turned, with his hands held high.
“Set the lamp down,” the woman said. “Let me get a look at you.”
Boone recognized the woman immediately. He swallowed hard. He remembered standing in the corner of that very shop, as this same woman tended to his mother. The woman spoke to his mother quietly. They always left the shop with multiple bottles.
And Boone could never recall seeing coins change hands.
The tip of the sword was now at his heart.
The old woman squinted in the lamplight.
“Put the lamp on the table. I can’t see a bloody thing.”
Boone sat the lamp down and raised his open hand.
“Don’t I know you?” The woman leaned forward.
Boone said nothing.
The woman’s eyes opened wide.
“Of course…”
The tip of the sword fell.
“They killed them—murdered them both, didn’t they?”
Boone offered nothing.
“They spread the story that the dragon killed your parents and then burned down the house. The damned fools in this village choose to believe every bit of it. The story gets even better the more it’s told.”
The woman leaned toward Boone.
“They’re even saying now that the dragon bit off their heads. Your old man deserved whatever he got, he did. And I don’t give a tinker’s damn what you think about that.”
“He did deserve to die,” Boone said. “I would have done it myself, if I was able.”
The woman stared at her sword. She raised it to Boone’s neck, and then she laid it on a nearby table.
“You’ve stood in this room more than once, with your mother. If that little boy could raise a hand against me, then my faith in humankind is lost, anyway.”
“I should have killed him in his sleep,” Boone said. “In his drunken stupor, I could have done it.”
The old woman shook her head.
“It should never be that easy, my boy. There is justice, sure. But turning your back on family is the hardest thing a man is ever asked to do.”
“You helped my mother,” Boone said. “For which I shall be ever grateful. If you wish to deliver me to the King’s Guard, I will understand. I will not resist.”
The woman stared at Boone.
“They say that you have befriended the cursed heir of Morgenwraithe. Is this true?”
“It is.”
“My husband is away—he sailed on a merchant’s vessel because we’ve learned about new medicines available across the sea. That is the reason you are still alive, young Mister Blankenship. The corridor between our home and this shop remains open—and lined with snares. My husband sleeps with a loaded crossbow within two paces of our bed.”
“I understand, My Lady,” Boone said.
“The throne has been a poison upon our people since I was a little girl,” the woman said.
“I believe that it has, My Lady,” Boone said.
The woman leaned forward. She grabbed Boone by his shoulders.
“The true heir of Morgenwraithe. Tell me.
“Tell me that he is a good man.”
“He is the best man that I have ever known, My Lady. I swear it upon my mother’s life.”
The woman lowered her hands.
“Is he
hurt badly?”
“The medicine we need is not for him, My Lady. It is for—”
“Ah, ah, ah! I do not want to know!”
The woman packed a sack with several poultices, bandages, and salve. She added some bread and meat.
“Thank you, My Lady,” Boone said. “I will not darken your doorway again.”
“Wait,” the woman said.
She stepped forward and stared into Boone’s face for a moment. She walked to a rack of shawls and took one down. She put it back, and took down another that was lined with lace. She handed it to Boone.
Boone took the shawl and put it into the sack.
“How did you know?” Boone asked.
“Believe it or not, I was a young girl once,” the woman smiled. “And young girls become very good at reading the faces of young men.”
“Thank you,” Boone said. “I wish you well.”
“Take care of the girl. And take care of…him. I wish us all well.”
Thirty-Nine
Simon checked on Helena. She continued to sleep, with intermittent moans and words that he could not comprehend. Beads of sweat dotted her face despite the cool air inside the cave. Simon soaked the rag in the chilled water and placed it on her forehead.
He stepped outside and stared down the mountainside the darkness toward the village.
His friend had been gone for hours—on a dangerously impossible mission.
While his newest friend struggled to stay alive.
Simon thought he heard noises below, crashing through the brush. He prayed that it was Boone. He was without weapons and helpless.
If it was enemies that approached, his life would soon be over.
“Simon! It’s me! I’m back!”
Boone and Simon treated Helena’s wound, and then collapsed to the floor.
“You amaze me again, my friend,” Simon said.