* * *
The storm had blown itself out at last, an evening wind picking up as the sun descended over the Kingsmount’s western flank, scudding clouds into high wisps above. The temperature was falling fast this high up the mountain, and Jherrick shivered in his soaked jerkin. Rubbing his chest to keep warm, he huddled with the others in a small circle upon the lookout, hunkering behind the berm to break the wind. He kept silent, seemingly loyal, devoted to his Captain-General and his Second-Lieutenant. Hanging upon Olea’s every word, he voiced no doubts at breaking from the Guard to follow a band of Kingsmen outlaws as they decided what course of action to pursue next.
“Fenton and I have a network in the city.” Aldris spoke next to Jherrick. “We should make contact with them.”
Olea shook her head, calm and collected, in command once more. “It’s too risky to go back to Lintesh. They'll be looking for us. Every Guardsman knows me, and you, Aldris. Vargen they'll remember from the palace. No. Where else?”
“The only other contact I have is up in Vennet,” Aldris growled. “But that’s a good two weeks from here! We need horses to travel hard, supplies. How are we going to accomplish all that without going back to Lintesh? Every hamlet for leagues is emptied, everyone flooding to the city for the coronation. We’ll not be able to trade for what we need.”
Olea tousled her damp curls. Jherrick absorbed that motion with his eyes. He would take a sword in the gut to hold her. Just to touch those curls even once. Olea nodded suddenly at two sets of steps leading from their lookout, one up the Kingsmount, one down. “Aldris, how far have you taken the upper path?”
Aldris shook his head. “Only a few leagues. There are some ruins of a fortress about four leagues up, probably an escape for the royal family at one time. The stairs go further, but Fenton says they just dead-end at an unclimbable wall of sheer volcanic glass. No way around, no way up.”
“Well, that won’t get us supplies,” Olea murmured. “We’ll have to take the lower path.”
“What about going back into the underground?” The big Kingsman, Vargen, spoke. “That river must be the one that lets out beyond the First Tier.”
Olea gave him a tired look. “Unless you are very expert at surviving getting drowned, I don’t suggest it. There are no places to walk beside that torrent. It does come out past Lintesh, though. Flows right underneath the entire city.”
Aldris grunted. “No good. There’s no way to float that beast. But we could backtrack to the tunnels and take the Unterhaft.”
Olea shook her head. “The palace will be crawling with dogs by now. If we backtrack, they’ll catch my scent from the cells, and our advantage is lost.”
“So, the lower path?” Jherrick chimed in, playing his part of young ignoramus. “Where does that go?”
Aldris’ mouth quirked. “From here to just behind Roushenn. There’s a gate behind the barracks. We keep Guardsmen on it at all times. But no one ever uses it, except huntsmen for game and the kitchen girls for herb-gathering up the mountainside.”
“Serpent’s maw or serpent’s maw,” the big Kingsman rumbled. “Either way we go, leads straight back into Roushenn.”
“We could take the path most of the way down,” Olea began, “then split from it through the woods, track around Lintesh on the mountainside. That would put us near the Alranstone grotto in the Kingswood, at the foot of the mountain on the eastern side.”
“And then what?” Jherrick’s question was innocent, but it caused thoughtful scowls.
“Is there a Stone near Vennet? We might be able to travel through the Stone here to Aldris' contacts.” The big Kingsman Vargen asked quietly.
“Not that I know of.” Aldris murmured. “But there’s a Stone near Quelsis.”
Jherrick resisted narrowing his eyes upon Aldris. He had his suspicions about who and what Second-Lieutenant Aldris den'Farahan truly was. And they were being confirmed this day, bit by bit, with the things the Second-Lieutenant knew. And by how his jaunty demeanor had turned today into cold, ruthless steel. But Jherrick had seen Aldris shirtless in the practice yards, and the man wasn't Inked. But then again, technically, neither was Jherrick.
Olea pursed her lips, and the sensual motion distracted Jherrick. “That’s nearly a hundred leagues northeast of Vennet. I could run that in two days.”
“That far?” Aldris den’Farahan’s smile was lecherous. “I knew you were in shape, but damn.”
“The problem is,” Olea retorted, giving Aldris a stern eye, “that you all can’t. Vargen, how far can you run?”
The big man shrugged. “Maybe fifteen leagues at a stretch. But it’s been a long time.”
“Aldris?”
Aldris made a sour face. “I run when I’m being chased out of taverns for being too good at dice.”
Olea scowled at him, her regular commander’s air returning more and more. “Jherrick?”
Jherrick rubbed at his stubble, and lied. “We jogged ten leagues armored once in training. I did it, barely.” It wouldn't do to tell anyone how far he could carry dead bodies. Or just how many wolves he could fight off at once. Or how many people he had assisted in torturing.
Or that he was Khehemni.
“A hundred leagues is a lot better than two weeks' worth of travel,” Vargen ventured in his rumbling basso. “We could cover the distance from Quelsis to Vennet quickly if we stole a few horses. But only if that Stone lets us pass through. The question is… is our need great?”
Olea met the Kingsman's eyes. Jherrick's gut twisted. He had never seen his Captain-General so broken. “Our need is great.” Olea murmured. “For who am I without a King or a Queen to guard? Who are all of us, Vargen, if we are not Kingsmen anymore?”
“Down the mountain, then,” Vargen rumbled. “And we split from the trail and head east to find the Stone-grotto. Let’s get going before this wind whips us off the ledge.”
The Kingsman stood, making for the wet-slicked stairs. Jherrick rose with the rest to follow. Tromping down a staircase carven out of sheer bedrock, they went brisk but careful. The carven stairs ran with little runnels of water, which gave way to washed out gulleys. Trying to beat the wind, they at last left the sparse, rocky moraine and came back into the hardy evergreens of the Kingswood. The path turned into a muddy track. Lips of stone hidden beneath mud snagged their feet. Twice, Jherrick pretended to trip and fall, if not for the strong, steadying arm of Vargen. He played his part, displaying nimbleness of youth, but sharply contrasting his ineptitude to the sure-footedness of the three trained veterans.
He wasn’t a Kingsman, and he made sure it showed.
A dim shadow had taken the forest by the time they split from the path and headed deeper into the woods. The sun was long set behind the Kingsmount, though the sky above still retained a violet light. Jherrick increased his stumbling accordingly, damp dripping from the cendarie making the mud treacherous underfoot, though there was ample moss to tread upon. Every tree began to look like all the rest, their torches long gone. Suddenly, Jherrick felt the spongy moss flatten out, and he knew a moment of fear. They passed only a hundred lengths from the clearing with the slope where he dumped bodies for the wolves. A hungry howl went up. Another. Jherrick wondered if they could scent him, their regular purveyor of meat. But the prickling at the back of his neck gradually subsided as they crossed through the wolves' pack-grounds and into a thick stand of silverbark.
At last, they heard the bubbling of the grotto’s spring. Only a thin band of starlight held court around the Alranstone, the clouds thickening again above. The night breeze was warmer down near the city, rippling tall grasses in the clearing. The dark Stone ahead was silent, inert as the four approached it. Jherrick felt that strange ripple over his skin as he passed a certain boundary, as if the Stone had identified him. He'd never liked being near the Stones. He felt watched, accused, judged for what he was, what he had agreed to. He saw Olea, Aldris, and Vargen shiver also, and as they put their hands to the stone, Jherrick felt a s
light thrumming in the air, as if it were singing, or purring.
Olea recited Kingsman words that Jherrick had never heard, imploring for passage. The stone’s vibration surged for a moment, then dimmed. Vargen recited the words. The stone surged, then dimmed. Aldris recited the words, confirming Jherrick's every suspicion. The stone surged, then dimmed.
Vargen heaved a heavy sigh, his hands falling from the Stone. “Well, that’s it then.”
But then, Jherrick felt the strangest sensation. The thrumming suddenly increased in his chest, humming through his body like the whir of owl wings. His heart thundered, his breath gripping shallow and fast. A vast touch brushed through his very soul, and Jherrick felt himself compelled. Shuddering from a fear that had no name, he stepped forward, placing sweat-cold palms on the Stone. His memory did not supply words. No, something deeper, something ancient, slid suddenly into his mind and whispered them right into his ears. Jherrick murmured the words, terrified, thrumming beneath that watchful, powerful presence. The thrumming of the stone increased, and stayed. He vaguely heard Vargen's astonished breath and basso voice.
“Something's happening! Everyone put your hands on the Stone and recite together!”
As they did, the shuddering gripped deep into Jherrick's very core, and the whispering voice solidified in his mind. Traitor. It whispered. Their need is great but yours is more. Do you deserve redemption? I taste blood upon your hands. I taste death in your heart. I taste fury in your mind. But there is only one thing that can make your heart truly weep, child. And only those tears will save you.
Suddenly, the lowest eye upon the three-eye stone blinked wide, a vicious, bloody red. There was a thunderclap of sound, a violent tearing of space. Jherrick screamed as he was threaded though himself, turned inside-out, his ears stuffed into his entrails and then viciously pulled through the Stone and spat out upon the other side.
Somewhere it was day, not night. He sprawled, retching, falling into hot white sand beneath a high-noon sun. Blistering heat accosted Jherrick. The touch of air upon his skin was scalding like a forge. Blinding white sand smote his vision, searing his hands where he touched it. He stumbled quickly to his feet, the others doing the same, brushing off white sand beneath a cloudless azure sky. And suddenly, a clarion call rang through the white desert heat, deafening, the ancient tone issuing out of the Alranstone that had spat them out upon the baking sand. And to its ear-splitting call, a tirade of armed warriors flooded from the shade behind a circle of tumbled stones that ringed the plinth. Jherrick found himself surrounded by dark-haired, grey-eyed men and women. Clad in desert leathers with loose white headwraps, they bristled with keen razor-tipped spears, all those spears now aimed directly at Jherrick and the other’s throats.
“Taile arabine ghenya shefan!”
Spears still leveled, the warriors parted, to let a tall man stride forward, demanding, his silver-worked helmet with its mane of red bristles showing his leadership. Well-muscled though slender, he set the butt of his spear in the sand in a graceful, authoritative motion. Jherrick heard it clink upon stone beneath the drifts. A sheer wrap of white fabric with a silver and red-edged border draped his shoulders to keep off the sun. A harness and breastplate of leather was beneath that, woven with the red bristles, and leather gauntlets graced his wrists. A leather-paneled skirt came to mid-thigh. Light leather boots laced to his knees, with shin guards of the same silver metal as his helmet. The warrior-captain’s spear was taller than he. Short curls of obsidian hair escaped the helmet around his temples.
His grey eyes were hard as stone. “Taile arabine ghenya shefan!”
“Anyone have any idea what he’s saying?” Aldris murmured. “I’d like to not get my throat slit today.”
“I think it’s a form of Ghrec,” Olea murmured. “We must be somewhere on their trade routes? Aeon, how far did that stone send us?!”
“Do you speak Ghrec?” Aldris murmured back.
Olea lifted up her voice, stepping forward slightly. “Talim enenya khoum vhris.”
The warrior-captain blinked, studied her a moment. “You are Menderian dogs!” The words seemed to twist his tongue, as if he was unused to their language. But all the same, his meaning was clear. They were quite unwelcome. He leveled his spear with a snarl. “Did you come to bribe us again with your worthless emeralds? You stink like the eel you serve…!” He turned his head and spat into the white sand. “Go back through to your slippery master and I will spare your worthless hides!”
Jherrick's insides twisted. There was only one man to whom such a phrase could refer. Olea stepped forward carefully but with obvious authority, positioning herself between the spear-captain and their group. The man with the crested helmet shifted his spear, its point right to her throat. Olea never flinched, her grey eyes steely.
“We do not know of what you speak, fellow,” she murmured in a calming tone. “My name is Olea den’Alrahel. I’m a Kingsman. Alrashemni. These are my comrades. Was there someone else you were expecting to come through that Stone?”
The man startled at Olea’s words. A ripple went through the surrounding spears. He paused, then lifted his spear decisively from Olea’s throat. Striding forward, spear still in hand, he stepped up close to Olea. Jherrick could see the tension of Olea’s stillness, resisting going for a weapon. The spearman reached out, tracing her face with his fingers, running his fingers through her blue-black mane, holding her chin to peer at her storm-grey eyes.
And it hit Jherrick suddenly, how similar they looked.
“Alrashemnari… Alrahel?” The spear-captain murmured.
Olea held his gaze. “Yes, Olea den’Alrahel. Alrashemni. Kingsman.”
“Olea dihm Alrahel?” The spear-captain’s fingers traced her face again. And suddenly he was transformed. Wonder spilled over his features. His face idolatrous, he sank to one knee, laying his spear upon the white sand. Slowly, he lifted his crested helmet off with both hands, then unbuckled the leather breastplate with its red weavings, setting those aside also. And beneath, Jherrick's eyes widened to see the most beautifully Inked Mountain and Stars. But this was done in twelve different colors and had twelve stars rather than five, tendrils twining and weaving through the rest, interspersed with sigils and symbols spilling over the warrior's chest and collarbones. The spear-captain placed his palm flat upon his multihued Inkings, bowing his head.
“Sei Olea brethan khoum tantha Alrahel.” He murmured, reverently.
Like sighing sand, the rest of the spearmen and women sank to one knee also, laying their spears aside, pressing palms to their chests. Jherrick resisted the urge to run. The Stone had put him through, right into a nest of Alrashemni vipers.
“What just happened? What did he just say?” Aldris murmured.
Olea’s eyes had opened wide in astonishment. “He said, She is the Olive Tree that brings peace with the Dawn.”
EPILOGUE – DHERRAN
Blackmark (The Kingsmen Chronicles #1): An Epic Fantasy Adventure Sword and Highland Magic Page 61