by J. M. Martin
Jehrid surged to his feet and sprinted for the falls, sparing a glance at the sentries to confirm none still moved and coming to a halt beside the one with the horn. His features were pale in the gloom, youthful prettiness rendered slack and ugly in death. There was something familiar about the set of his eyes, the smoothness of his brow stirring yet more unwelcome memories. Aunt Tilda’s eyes, Jehrid thought, scanning the boy’s body. A good mother would have spared him this.
“Just a boy,” a voice whispered at Jehrid’s back. He turned to find Sister Cresia staring at the corpse, eyes wide and face white. Something glimmered in her right hand, something sharp judging from the way it caught the meager light. She blinked, noticing his gaze and quickly concealed her hand in her robe.
Jehrid crouched and lifted the boy’s limp arm, pulling back the sleeve to reveal two black circles tattooed into the flesh alongside three vertical lines. “Two wrecks and three kills,” he told Cresia. “Youth is not the same as innocence, sister. Not on this shore.”
Brother Lucin led them to a notch in the cliff edge where a series of narrow steps had been carved into the rock, so weathered and softened by the seaward winds as to be barely visible. The climb down to the ledge below was short but not without peril, the damp steps and gloom making for some unnerving slips, though luckily there were none in their company sufficiently clumsy to completely lose footing, a deadly mistake judging by the roiling waves visible below. Sollis drew his sword and took the lead as they proceeded towards the falls, the cascade of water arcing down like a fluid glass curtain. The Brother Commander held up a hand to halt them in place and moved on alone, disappearing into the gloom behind the curtain. A second later came a faint sound of clashing steel then Sollis reappeared and beckoned them forward.
Behind the falls the ledge opened out into a grotto, much of it fashioned by hand judging by the worn but plain chisel marks on the rock. Sollis stood at the grotto’s deepest point, running his hand over the rock as if in search of something. Another sentry lay nearby, sword in hand and blood streaming from a deep gash in his neck. Jehrid was impressed he had managed to draw a blade before Sollis cut him down.
Lucin moved to Sollis’s side and peered closely at the rock, fingers probing for something. Eventually, he grunted in satisfaction and moved back, murmuring something to Sollis which Jehrid could barely catch, “Locks from the inside.”
The older brother gestured at Cresia, leaning close to her as she came forward, his words too soft to hear above the tumult of the falls. Jehrid saw the girl give a reluctant nod before moving towards the rock, laying both hands against the damp stone, her form becoming still, face blank with concentration. She remained like that for some time, the two brothers standing by with evident impatience. Eventually Lucin moved to whisper a question at which the girl turned to him, face flashing anger as she voiced a harsh rebuke. Jehrid expected the brother to respond with some form of admonishment, but instead he merely sighed and moved back, gesturing for Sollis to follow.
“Our sister may be young,” Lucin said, moving to Jehrid’s side. “But is well versed in ancient lore regarding these tunnels. To open the entrance requires pressure in one particular spot. She’ll find it soon enough.”
Jehrid’s gaze lingered on the girl, noting she had resumed the same statue-like stillness, her hands flat and unmoving on the rock. Abruptly she stiffened, leaning closer to the wall, eyes closed and head cocked at a slight angle. Her features betrayed a brief spasm before she stepped back, flexing her fingers, and a three foot wide section of rock swung inward to reveal a narrow passage. The sister stepped back, face paler than before though lit with a triumphal grin as she offered them a bow and bade them enter.
#
The width of the passage would permit only one entrant at a time and Sollis insisted on taking the lead. Jehrid ordered his Excise Men to remain and guard the entrance before taking his place at Sollis’s back, expecting some objection. However, the Brother Commander merely glanced at him and drew his sword before disappearing into the passage. Jehrid followed with Brother Lucin and Sister Cresia at his back. He had suggested they remain with his men but they merely shook their heads and fell into line, faces tense but, to Jehrid’s eyes, not so fearful as they should be. The passage was dimly lit with torches set into the walls every twenty paces, guttering in the breeze from the entrance. The walls were roughly hewn, displaying only the most workmanlike skill in their fashioning. Whoever had crafted these tunnels had displayed scant interest in artistry.
Sollis set a slow pace, keeping his steps soft to prevent any betraying echo. Jehrid noted a slight downward slope and a gradual but increasing curve to the walls, indicating they were following a spiral course deep into the bowels of the rock. The curvature of the passage became more pronounced the deeper they went, obscuring the way ahead sufficiently for Sollis to flatten himself against the wall and move forward in a sideways shuffle. He stopped at the sound of voices, softly spoken but echoing well in the tunnel. There were two voices, both male, engaged in some form of argument, the words indistinct at first but becoming clearer as Sollis began to inch forward once more, now moving in a crouch, sword-grip reversed so the blade rested against his back. He stopped when the voices became clearer, turning to Jehrid with a questioning glance.
Jehrid felt his hand dampen with sweat, knuckles suddenly white on his sword handle. Two voices, older men, one he knew, though it had been many years since he heard it.
“…speak to me of promises,” it said, a rich voice possessing the broad vowels of the shore-folk, but colored by a faint note of scorn. “Promises were made to me also. Promise of gold and jewels. Instead we risk much to scavenge no more than spices and silk. A tidy profit, to be sure. But hardly worth drawing the Lord Collector’s eye.”
“Gold will be forthcoming,” the other voice replied. It was mostly toneless but with an odd accent, the vowels distinctly Renfaelin but the cadence similar to the harsh babble of Volarian sailors. “When you give me what I came for. And don’t forget, without me you would have had no wreck to plunder.”
Jehrid frowned in surprise as the other voice fell silent. Since when did he ever fail to find a rejoinder?
After a pause, the first voice spoke again, this time betraying a discomfort barely masked by angry defiance. “We’ve talked of this enough. She’s mine. And she stays mine until you pay.”
There came a sound then, so harsh and grating Jehrid took a moment to recognize it as a laugh. “What do you imagine you are, little smuggling man?” the second voice enquired when his mirth had subsided. “What cards do you think you hold? You are no more than a maggot feasting on the dead before the tide comes to wash you away. You have seen what I can do. Give me the woman unless you would like another demonstration.”
A long, frozen pause. Now for blood, Jehrid decided. The insult and the challenge were too great to ignore. Jehrid could picture him standing there, face stricken with fury, fist no doubt clamping hard on a dagger, his other hand clutching a cudgel. ‘The Dance of Hard and Sharp’ he had called it; the traditional smuggler’s fighting style. In an instant all would be chaos and confusion. The perfect moment to attack. Jehrid inched closer to Sollis, readying himself for the rush.
So it was with no small amount of shock that he heard the frigid silence broken by the first voice. “Bring her.”
He’s afraid. Jehrid found he had to contain a gasp of amused realization. He’s actually afraid.
Footfalls echoed through the tunnel then another long pause, silence reigning until they returned. “Ah,” the second voice said, now tinged with a tense anticipation. “I was expecting someone…older.”
“She carried the amulet you described,” the first voice said, hard and sullen. “Worthless bauble though it was.”
“Show it to me.” Another pause, then a satisfied chuckle. “Worthless to you perhaps, but not to her.” The voice switched to Alpiran, coarse and harshly accented, but still fluent enough for Jehrid to follow. “
Isn’t that right, my dear? It must have taken a remarkable effort to earn Rhevena’s Tear at your age. Most don’t until they’re nearing dotage. Is your gift so powerful? I imagine not, since you remain bound by this scum.”
A female voice, tremulous but also defiant, the cultured accent contrasting with her interrogator’s grating vowels. “Free me, and I’ll be happy to show you.”
“Don’t trouble yourself, honored lady. I’ll shortly discover its nature for myself.” There came the scrape of a blade being drawn as he switched back to Realm Tongue. “Hold her still.”
Brother Lucin came forward in a rush, his steps drawing a loud echo from the stone, the bleached concern on his face betraying a desperate urgency. “He will do it!” he hissed at Sollis. “We cannot delay.”
An enquiring shout came from beyond the curve; Lucin’s footfall had not been missed. Sollis straightened, reversing the grip on his sword and glancing at Jehrid. “Secure the woman and take her out of here. Leave the others to us.”
Then he was gone, blue cloak trailing as he charged from sight. Jehrid surged after him, the multiple echoes of the brothers’ boots like thunder as they followed. Beyond the curve, the passage opened into a large chamber, near twenty feet across with bunks covering the walls and several side channels leading off in various directions. Standing in the center were three figures, an olive skinned woman of perhaps thirty years of age, her arms bound behind her back, and two men. The man on the right was of middling years and unkempt appearance, his wiry frame clad in ragged, threadbare garb.
But it was the man on the left that captured Jehrid’s attention. He was older, of course. Hair now gray and thinning when it had once been thick and dark, face clean-shaven and lined with age, though he stood just as tall as Jehrid recalled and his waist seemed as free of paunch as ever. As expected, he had armed himself with a cudgel and dagger, swirling to face the intruders in a crouching stance, lips drawn back in a snarl, one that faded as he caught sight of Jehrid.
“Cohran Bera!” Jehrid called to him as he charged clear of the tunnel. “Stand and await the King’s Jus—!”
He ducked as one of the Red Breakers sprang from the shadows on the left, something fast and sharp cutting the air above Jehrid’s head. Another appeared on the right, axe raised to swing at Sollis and falling dead a heartbeat later as the brother’s sword delivered a single expert thrust to his throat. The Breaker confronting Jehrid was clearly a traditionalist, coming at him with a cleaver in one hand and a cudgel in the other, aiming well-timed blows at his head and legs. Jehrid sidestepped the cudgel, swayed back to evade the cleaver and brought his blade up and down to hack through the Breaker’s hamstring before he could recover for another swing. This smuggler was not easily cowed though, despite being forced to one knee and yelling in pain, he managed another lunge with the cleaver before Jehrid’s sword point sank into his chest.
Jehrid spun, sword levelled at Cohran Bera, now moved to the center of the chamber, eyes locked on his. “You’ve grown,” he said in a low growl before turning and issuing a shrill whistle. Only a bare second’s delay then a tumult of pounding boots, a dozen or more Breakers appearing from the side tunnels at a run, all armed. Four went down almost immediately, tumbling to the floor as the brothers’ throwing knives flickered in the torchlight. Those who managed to get close enough to exchange blows were scarcely more fortunate, most falling in the space of a few sword strokes though the momentary confusion allowed their leader time to run for the nearest passage, three survivors at his back.
Jehrid shouted in frustration, a familiar red tinge coloring his vision as he started forward. It was the woman’s shout that stopped his pursuit, his gaze swivelling towards her, now standing rigid and head drawn back, the wiry man’s fist in her hair, his other holding a thin-bladed dagger to her throat. Jehrid had time to catch Cohran Bera’s final glance, oddly somber and lacking in hatred, before the shadows swallowed him.
“Oh no!” the wiry man barked, addressing his words to Sollis as the brothers quickly surrounded the pair, closing in with swords levelled. He jerked the woman’s head back further, the edge of his blade pressing hard against her skin. “I require your consideration.”
Sollis held up a hand to halt the brothers, lowering his own sword to take a single step closer. Jehrid noted Sollis’s free hand twitch as it caught something that slipped from his sleeve. “Release her,” Sollis commanded in a flat rasp. “If your life has value to you.”
The wiry man replied only with another grating laugh. Jehrid frowned at the genuine humor he heard in that laugh, and the lack of any real hostility on the man’s face. For all the world he seemed no more than a man responding to a particularly well executed prank. “Ask him,” the wiry man said, nodding to Brother Lucin emerging from the passage with Sister Cresia at his side. “What value does his Order place on life? Did they bother to warn you what you’d find here? I’ll wager they didn’t.”
It was Brother Lucin who spoke, face grim and gaze steady as he regarded the wiry man, his voice now possessed of a cold, unwavering note of command. “Kill him.”
“Brother…” Jehrid stepped towards Sollis but the brother had already begun to move. His left hand seemed to blur, something small and metallic catching the light as it flew free. Jehrid shouted in alarm, knowing a killing blow might cause the wiry man’s arm to tense with dire consequences for his hostage. Sollis, however, had chosen his target well. The throwing knife sank hilt-deep into the wiry man’s wrist, the knife falling from his spasming grip. The woman twisted, tearing herself free and falling to the floor. Jehrid quickly moved to her side, sword pointed at her now prostrate captor.
His gaze met Jehrid’s for a moment, bright with pain and fury, then softened as it shifted to the throwing knife embedded in his wrist, and he began to laugh anew.
“Kill him, brother!” Lucin commanded in a yell, his voice suddenly shrill with panic.
Sollis moved to the wiry man, sword drawn back, then stumbled to his knees as the floor shuddered beneath his feet.
“You put too much trust in these deluded mystics, master,” the wiry man said, blood now streaming in rivulets from his nose. “Far too much trust…”
A great booming sound shook the surrounding rock, a jagged crack appearing in the floor, stretching the length of the chamber. Jehrid saw Lucin grab Sister Cresia’s arm and drag her towards the passage as the chamber shuddered again, the floor becoming a jumbled matrix of cracks, the brothers reeling from multiple fountains of shattered rock. The wiry man was laughing again, writhing on the shuddering floor in uncontrollable mirth, blood now streaming from his mouth and eyes. Sollis lurched towards him, sword raised for a slash at his neck…and the chamber floor exploded, stone shattering all around into a fog of dust.
Jehrid had time to catch hold of the woman before the floor gave way beneath them, air rushing past his ears as they plummeted, swallowed by the welcoming dark.
#
The docks once again, his only reliable dream. It was always the same. The same pier, the same hour just before nightfall, every detail perfect and vivid even though the memory was over twenty years old.
He crouched behind a wall of stacked barrels in a quiet corner of the South Tower docks, peeking out at the end of the pier. There were people there, dim shadows glimpsed through twilight mist, four standing and one kneeling. The kneeling figure was bound, face concealed with a sack tied at the neck. Even so Jehrid knew whose face lay beneath the sack, knew without any shred of doubt the face of the woman who knelt with head bowed in numb expectation of her fate. Just as he knew the name of the man who drew a knife and stepped to her side.
He turned away then, knowing what was coming, reeling through the streets as his gorge rose to spill his guts on the cobbles. His treacherous ears caught the sound of a body tumbling into harbor waters, the splash carrying well in the clammy air. He ran, through the streets and the city gate and out into the fields beyond, blinded by tears, running until his lungs turned to
fire and his legs gave way. He lay out in the fields until morning, and when the sun rose to wake him with its warmth, he got to his feet and started north. The road was long, and he grew to know hunger and danger as close friends for the wild country was ever rich in threats, but eventually, a thin, ragged boy staggered into Varinshold and sought entry to the Realm Guard.
“Has to be your real name, boy,” the sergeant told him, quill poised over parchment, a somewhat wicked glint in his eye as he added, “King Janus wants only honest Guardsmen…”
He awoke to the taste of blood, iron, and salt stinging his tongue and provoking a convulsive retch as his senses returned. His dulled vision, hampered by eyelids that now seemed to be fashioned from lead, could see almost nothing save a faint impression of tumbled rock, though the sound invading his ears prevented any return to slumber; a muted but continuous, echoing torrent of rushing water.
“Not alone after all,” a voice muttered nearby, a female voice, speaking in Alpiran.
It took a moment before he made her out, crouching in the gloom, on her knees, arms still bound and eyes pinpoints of light behind hair hanging in damp tendrils over her face.
Jehrid paused to spit the blood from his mouth, tongue exploring where his teeth had left a ragged impression on the inside of his cheek. “Nor, it seems, are you, honored lady,” he replied in his coarse but functional Alpiran.
She straightened a little in surprise, then spoke in accentless Realm Tongue that put his Alpiran to shame, “Would you mind?” She turned, crouching to proffer her bound wrists.
Jehrid realized his hands were empty, his sword no doubt lost somewhere in the fall. He fumbled at her bonds, grunting in frustration at his shaking hands, forcing himself to draw a series of deep breaths until the tremble subsided, though the cause was obvious. He laughed. He bled and he laughed…He did this. He brought down the chamber. The mystery of it all was absolute, but for one signal and reluctant conclusion: The Dark.