The Wounded Shadow

by Patrick W. Carr

  Dukasti shook his head. “No, Eldest. The north has fallen. When Cesla delved the forest, he loosed evil upon you. You and what survives of the northern Vigil will be welcomed here, but we will not risk ourselves.”

  Before Pellin could respond, Mark’s laughter interrupted their conversation. Elieve, unable to understand the exchange, joined in anyway.

  “You surprise me, Eldest,” Dukasti said. “I would have thought an apprentice of yours would be more politically astute than to laugh at such an inopportune moment. It is difficult to wring concessions from those who have been mocked.”

  Pellin turned, anger and embarrassment heating his face. “Mark, you will apologize.”

  Mark blinked, then turned toward their host. “My apologies for laughing at the crudity of your bluff, watchful one.”

  Dukasti spluttered. “Do you not know, child, that it is within my power to expel or imprison you?”

  Mark nodded. “I assumed as much. I also know that if you’re like most of the Vigil, you’ve been trained as a priest. Yes?” At Dukasti’s sharp nod, he continued. “Then you know the nature of evil. If the north falls, you cannot hope to keep it from your shores.”

  Dukasti, taller than Mark by several inches, looked down upon him. “And how would a youth of ten and five know this?”

  Mark smiled. “My education is more informal than yours, watchful one, but no less thorough. Evil is a hunger that consumes those who practice it. I know this because I’ve seen it in practice countless times. I’ve watched men and women sample the alchemist’s potions, consuming more and more of their art. I’ve seen men give themselves to their basest desires with night women until no amount of traffic or feigned intimacy could satisfy them. Evil is a fire, watchful one, that consumes all. When it has devoured the north, it will come for your continent, and you cannot win.”

  Dukasti gazed at him, his expression no longer dismissive. “And are you a captain as well as a theologian, that you should know this? We can defend our shores.”

  Mark shook his head. “No, you can’t, because you have no margin of error. You must win every time, but the evil of the Darkwater needs only to win once and all is lost.”

  “There your logic defeats itself,” Dukasti said. “If that is the case then all is already lost.”

  “Not so,” Pellin said, drawing Dukasti’s attention back to him. “There is a chance that we can kill Cesla and restore the north. I have something to offer the southern Vigil in exchange for your aid—information Igesia will want very badly.” He held out his arm and brought all his collected memories of the Fayit out of the depths of the sanctuary within his mind where he’d kept them locked away—his last bargaining chip. “Touch me once more.”

  Dukasti’s delve was abrupt. Pellin didn’t bother to greet him as he had before. There was no need. When he withdrew, Dukasti’s eyes had widened until white became visible all around the blue. “Is this true?”

  Pellin nodded. “It is. I wouldn’t risk a phantom memory here. Not now.”

  His eyes narrowed. “You must get to the interior quickly. Igesia is old and his time approaches. He doesn’t travel anymore.”

  Dukasti’s tone said plainly there was more he wasn’t saying, and Pellin asked for it.

  “We don’t speak ill of the dying, Eldest,” Dukasti said. “Igesia hasn’t left the village of Oasi in years, and his habits have become strange. He spends much of his time gazing into the desert at night, speaking to his memories.”

  A desperate fear wormed through Pellin’s mind, but he kept himself from voicing it. Dukasti’s aid held a tenuous air that one wrong word or comment might destroy. “Do the sentinels still patrol the outskirts?”

  At Dukasti’s nod, Pellin’s fear eased, but then the southern Vigil member stepped toward the rest of Pellin’s company with his hand outstretched. “I am bound to delve everyone who passes through the gate, Eldest. Without exception.”

  Pellin couldn’t protest without surrendering what he’d come to Erimos to accomplish. But he couldn’t allow Dukasti unfettered access to Elieve’s mind either—her importance to their mission couldn’t be sacrificed. He stepped in front of the girl while he delved Allta and Mark.

  Dukasti rounded on him, his face livid. “You would knowingly bring this pestilence here?”

  Pellin jerked his head at Mark and Allta. “Get her out of earshot.” When they were gone, he stepped forward to meet his counterpart’s anger with his own. “Don’t you understand what you’ve seen, Dukasti?” He pointed toward the door his companions had exited. “She lives.”

  “And she shouldn’t!” Dukasti yelled. “She’s a creation, spawn of a war that should never have been. You took the gifts of domere and devotion and turned them into an abomination.”

  “I know! Don’t you think I know?” He clenched his fists, but brought his voice under control. “But she’s more than that now. Willet Dura is the first man to come into the gift of domere who has a vault, and the Fayit told me there is knowledge within it that we must have to defeat Cesla.” He pointed toward his hidden companions once more. “She’s more than a creation, Dukasti. Elieve is the third person I know who’s survived a vault, but more, she’s the first dwimor ever who’s been restored.” He clutched at Dukasti’s arm. “You’ve seen her. As far as that girl’s mind is concerned, she’s been raised from the dead.”

  Pellin watched a hundred different responses chase across Dukasti’s expression without finding voice. At the last, he shook his head. “No. This burden is yours, Eldest. My responsibility is to my people. I cannot grant you passage to the desert if she goes with you. There are no guarantees you can give that once out of my sight she will not kill you and yours and wreak havoc.”

  “Then come with us,” Pellin said.

  Dukasti’s eyes bulged, showing white above dark smudges of fatigue. “Has she poisoned you already, Eldest? You’re actually suggesting I shut down the merchant traffic in Erimos?”

  He shook his head. “You will have to at any rate, my friend.” He pointed to a mirror that lay on a table by the entrance. “Have you seen yourself?”

  Dukasti massaged his eyes as if he could rub his weariness away. “I know what I look like, but ‘what must be done, can be borne.’”

  Instead of answering his objection, Pellin chose to assume his agreement. “How long would it take us to reach Igesia?”

  His counterpart shook his head in denial even as he spoke. “The edge of the desert is over a week with a constant change of horses.” He barked a laugh. “You think I look bad now? I ride poorly, Eldest, and the desert is merciless beyond description. Your solution sounds like undeserved penance.”

  Pellin lifted his hand, gesturing toward the sea. “The traffic is so slow through the gate now it might as well be stopped already. The Fayit, Dukasti! Think of it! The oldest questions we have lie within Ealdor’s knowledge. Where do we come from? What was the world like before men came? We could have answers to questions we’ve scarcely dared to dream.”

  “Are we supposed to have them, Eldest?” Dukasti asked. “Did knowledge of the Darkwater bring peace or power to your brother? He’s a slave to the evil he tried to understand, all because he broke the first commandment.” He turned away from Pellin and started toward the door.

  What would they do now? What could they do except take ship back to the north and pray for some other solution?

  “Come, Eldest,” Dukasti called from the entrance. “I will make arrangements for those merchants we’ve already delved to provide the traffic needed to keep the port open.” He shrugged. “They will scream as if I’ve taken their firstborn, but they are nothing if not resilient.”

  “We’re going to see Igesia?” Pellin asked, not sure if he heard or understood correctly.

  Dukasti nodded. His gaze, blue like the sea, still wore the fatigue of too many uses of his gift, but something else burned in the depths now as well. “I am as guilty as you. The knowledge of the Fayit is too tempting to forego. I pray to A
er in three that I have not brought ruin on my homeland.”

  Chapter 24

  Three days out from Hylowold, the incessant trot they used to eat up the ground had turned Toria’s saddle into an instrument of torture. Yet she hated dismounting, because it meant she would have to walk, and her legs refused to bear her weight. When they came to Treflow another four days later, the city she’d visited beyond counting had been transformed. Carpenters worked to install heavy scaffolding, makeshift parapets, inside the walls while river boats and carts delivered food and armaments before departing empty.

  But it was the people who told her war had come again. They moved with the stiff posture and ground-focused gaze of those who lived under constant threat. The sound of smiths’ hammers merged with the commands and acknowledgments of soldiers, and the smell of burning sulfur and quenching oil mixed with the more normal scent of roasted meat.

  The preparation for war provided one unintended benefit. Few of the soldiers and fewer of the civilians took the time to note the sentinel walking next to their horses. “Why don’t they just leave?” Fess asked.

  She followed his gaze to the market, where a lieutenant in the Aille army organized the stalls and products with frequent references to a sheaf of parchments. “Most of them will.”

  He frowned at her. “I don’t understand.”

  The air carried too many scents that she associated with warfare and dying. “Unfortunately, I do. Treflow is the largest defensible city close to the forest. King Rymark is fortifying it in case he has to retreat.”

  She followed his gaze as he took in the walls, high enough to offer a decent defense, but nowhere close to the impregnability of the tor in Bunard. He turned to face northwest, where one of the interminable branches of the river that bore the name of the forest flowed into the city beneath the wall. Soldiers and engineers manned heavy winches, working to lower a black iron grate into the water. Then he shifted, looking toward the interior once more.

  Toria watched him, reading his thoughts, though her gloved hands held only each other. Wherever his gaze fell, he stilled for a time, studying the preparations before him, but in the end his response was always the same. He would give a small shake of his head before turning to inspect some other facet of the city’s preparations. “Hylowold would offer better defenses, Bunard and Cynestol even more so.”

  “True,” she said, “but those cities are farther from the forest. King Rymark understands the nature and strategy of war better than any captain on the continent. He cannot allow Cesla the space to grow his forces. The farther he withdraws from the forest, the more porous his blockade of it becomes. By the time he retreats to Hylowold—”

  “He’s already lost,” Fess said. He took a deep breath. “I see.”

  They made their way to Treflow’s north gate, where a squad of soldiers blocked the exit with stern glances for any who ventured too close. Massive beams of dark wood barred the heavy-timbered gates. “No traffic north of the city,” the lieutenant in charge said as they approached.

  “I’ve come from Cynestol,” she said. “My colleague and I are on our way to see King Rymark.” Even before she finished, she could tell her claim had no effect on the guard.

  “I don’t care if you’ve come from Aer himself,” he said. “No one is allowed north of Treflow except by the command of King Rymark.”

  She bent forward to speak to him more closely “Use your brains and take a close look at the animal accompanying us, Lieutenant. Have you ever seen a dog that big?”

  His face paled as he stared at Wag. Something in the sentinel’s gray-eyed gaze held him transfixed. “Is that—”

  She reached out to squeeze his arm, interrupting him. “Precisely. Now open the gate.”

  He straightened, licking his lips. “I’m sorry, my lady. Not without the proper orders.” He drew back, as if he expected her to command Wag to eat him.

  Fess dismounted and waved to the lieutenant. “A moment, if you please, Lieutenant,” he said, stepping a few paces away from the rest of the guards.

  Fess’s back blocked her view, but a moment later the lieutenant stiffened and turned toward her. “I’m sorry to have impeded you, my lady. I am Lieutenant Anbroce. You may journey north tomorrow morning when I take the next set of dispatches to the king. ”

  As they retreated to the center of the city to find lodgings, Toria tried not to grind her teeth at the delay. “How did you persuade him to let us through?”

  “I showed him my scrying stone and offered to let him speak with King Rymark directly,” Fess said. “I might have mentioned that the king’s not the most patient man when he’s interrupted.”

  “Clever,” Toria said, “but the scrying stones don’t connect us to Rymark, only each other in the Vigil and Brid Teorian. I don’t think the lieutenant would have been as impressed talking to the Chief of Servants.”

  He shrugged. “I doubt whether the king and queens bother to tell their subjects about who holds which set of scrying stones.”

  The next morning, the lieutenant joined them, mounted on a serviceable black horse and carrying a pack stuffed with reports for the king. Two pennants, the top one red and the lower one green fluttered on a slender pole seated into his left stirrup. Seeing their question the lieutenant nodded. “The patrols have orders to shoot anyone north of here without the colors of the day. King Rymark’s orders.”

  It took eight guards to lift the beam that secured the gate and two more to move it on its massive black hinges, but within minutes she and Fess and the sentinel stood with the lieutenant outside the walls of Treflow. The gates banged shut with a hollow boom that sounded too much like the knell of an iron bell.

  A day and a half north of Treflow, Wag went still, his nose pointed into the headwind and the thick fur on his neck bristling. Toria dismounted and put her bare hand on his head, closing her eyes to avoid the vertigo that came with the sudden shift in perception. “What do you smell?” she asked. But by the time the question left her lips, Wag’s answer was no longer necessary. She was already in the delve. Heavy on the wind came the smell of death, not the scent of a decaying animal, but the heavy cloying odor of men, unburied and left in the open to rot.

  She remounted and they continued north, but they encountered their first patrol before they came across any bodies. A squad of soldiers in green and white in the distance spotted them when they crested a hill and came thundering toward them at a gallop. Fess pulled his sword and palmed a dagger with the other hand. “You should place yourself behind me, Lady Deel.”

  With a glance toward the lieutenant, she shook her head. “If you’re going to be part of our company, Fess, you’re going to have to learn how to deal with others without drawing your sword.” She waited as the pounding of hooves grew more distinct, but he didn’t reply.

  The soldiers reined in and came to a stop twenty paces away, the five of them spreading so that they covered a broad arc. The lieutenant stepped forward, interposing himself between Toria and the squad. “What’s the meaning of this? Can you not see the flag?”

  The soldier in the center, dark-haired to match his countenance, nodded. “Aye, but security has been doubled.” His stare took in Fess, searching, before he looked at Toria, his gaze doing a slow pan from boots to hair, pausing at various times. Men had looked at her that way before, and she met the soldier’s stare with her own, cold and implacable.

  “Why?” she demanded, her voice cracking in the early morning air.

  Caught off guard, he blinked. “Why what?”

  She let enough of her frustration show on her face to make him lean back in his saddle. “Why have the patrols been doubled?” she grated.

  Instead of answering, he turned to Lieutenant Anbroce. “You will deliver your reports to me and return to Treflow.” He glanced at Toria. “And take them with you.”

  “We must see King Rymark,” Toria said.

  The squad leader snapped his fingers and the men on either side of him drew their swords.
“On the contrary, you must do as you’re told.”

  Anger flooded through her like a tidal wave, turning her vision red. At her side, Fess drew his sword, already leaning forward in his saddle, a preface to attack. She managed to reach out and put one restraining hand on his arm. Taking a deep breath, she spoke a single word.

  “Wag.”

  The sentinel exploded into motion. Blurring as he took half a dozen strides in less than a heartbeat, he leapt with jaws wide, taking the squad leader in the throat, bearing him to the ground, where he struggled to pull his dagger. Wag’s jaws closed a fraction, and the squad leader quieted, hardly daring to breathe.

  “Don’t move, Captain,” Toria said. “It would be unfortunate if Wag misinterpreted your struggles as a threat.”

  “Release me,” he said, his eyes burning. “Or I’ll order my men to kill you.”

  “Don’t be an idiot, Captain. Wag isn’t a dog, in case you haven’t noticed. He could dispatch you and the rest of your men before they came within sword reach. Now use your brains, if Aer has seen fit to give you any. If I have one of the sentinels, wouldn’t it be a good idea if I were permitted to get to the front where he could be useful?”

  “All the sentinels are dead,” the captain said in a strained whisper.

  Toria allowed herself a thin smile that she shared with the captain and the rest of his men. “Obviously not, or do you wish to report to King Rymark that you and your men were incapacitated by an ordinary dog? Our conversation has become tedious. I’m going to tell Wag to release you, and you’re going to escort my companions and me to the king. Wag will be following. Be careful how you move. As a sentinel, Wag is worth far more to the defense of the forest than a mere captain. Your death would be nothing more than a regrettable footnote. Understood?”

  At the captain’s nod, she called Wag back to her side. “How far is it to Rymark’s camp?”

  The captain rubbed his neck, his expression sullen. “Most of the day. If we push the horses, we’ll make it before nightfall.”