Fire And Ice (Book 1)

by Wayne Krabbenhoft III

  There was another thing that bothered him about the Karands. “Miko.”

  “Yes?” the trader replied as he struggled with the oars. He seemed to have a familiarity with them but out of practice. It wasn’t long before he settled into a steady rhythm that confirmed Coran’s suspicion that Miko knew something about boats.

  “Why is it that Ruan was so ready to trust us? He barely knows us.” It seemed an introduction was all that was needed. Midians would not trust so quickly. “And you gave your real name.”

  Miko chuckled. “It is true I did not know Ruan but I knew of the young men hiding in the hills. From Bayed. And you have to remember that my people are not very good at open deception. Ruan would not have said what he did about the followers of Sha’elt unless he meant them. He also knows that I would not profess to be loyal to She’al unless that were true.”

  Coran nodded and continued to watch the shoreline shrink behind them. The idea of a people who said what they meant was a strange one. Honesty was a trait to be admired, but to be always honest? He had received an education that included aspects of politics, which meant saying one thing and meaning another. He knew he was much better with a sword than with words but he at least understood the duplicative nature of politics. Did the Karands have nothing similar? Or was it reserved for the ruling class, people he had yet to meet. Then again, Miko was a trader. A man cannot be a successful trader without some lying.

  Coran switched places at the oars with Miko every hour. By midnight his muscles were beginning to protest. At least he no longer felt any weakness from his injuries.

  It was the lights that Coran spotted first, blinking points in the distance that continued to come closer until the shape of a ship emerged out of the night. He pointed and Miko stopped rowing to stare.

  “We will run right into it if we keep going as we are,” Miko stated and reversed the direction of his rowing.

  The ship came closer and Coran could make out the head of a person at the railing. He followed Miko’s lead and ducked down as far as he could get. With their dark robes there would be nothing to distinguish them from the darkness of the water. As long as no one looked down directly and saw the boat and decided to investigate. He forced himself not to glance up as he heard the passage of the ship through the water. The seconds ticked by, he expected a shout of alarm at any moment. The shout never came. They were past, and their little boat was tossed about in the wake. Water sprayed over them and at one point it came flowing over the side and around their feet. Another wave hit them sending more water into the rowboat. It was past his ankles now.

  “Bail,” Miko told him urgently.

  Coran cupped his hands and tossed the salty water over the side. They had nothing better to use. The boat’s rocking slowed as the sea calmed. They got enough water out to start rowing again. Coran took his turn at the oars.

  Suddenly there was a great light from the south. They both turned to see flames rising from the direction the ship had gone. The fire reflected red and orange across the water. The outline of two ships became visible, one of the ships was growing larger in his vision, the other was on fire. Coran quickened his strokes with the oars and the new ship passed far enough behind them so they were not seen. Coran recognized the large, sleek vessel that cut through the sea swiftly, and knew who the crew would be. Northmen. They must be raiding the Karandi coastlines. They were known to do that from time to time, and not just the Karandi. The recent tensions and restrictions of trade would only encourage their warlike tendencies.

  “Was that what I think it was?” Miko asked, in awe of the impressive vessel.

  “Northerners,” Coran confirmed, “the best sailors in the world.” Anyone who had any experience at sailing couldn’t help but feel anxious at the mention of the fierce Northmen.

  Miko could only nod as Coran returned to his rowing. They still had a few hours until they reached the far shore.

  Coran was at the oars again. He was ready to give up before his arms fell off when Miko pointed behind him. He turned his head and made out the looming shore about a hundred yards away. The sky was just beginning to brighten, so he could make out low, rocky cliffs, just like on the Crecy side. They waited for enough light in order to avoid the rocky outcroppings. Miko suggested finding a spot where they could hide the boat and wait out the day. He had decided that their best course, and safest, was to travel by night and hide out during the day. That would reduce the chance of coming across other people. Also, they had to cross the edge of a desert, and traveling by night was preferable because of the heat. The down side was that it would take longer doing it that way. The days were getting longer and they would have to stop earlier to find a suitable place to wait out the day.

  When the next night came they began their journey in Daes Shael. They each carried three canteens and small packs of food stuffed into a leather sack. Coran continued to wear the brown robe, since the nights here were colder than he was used to. They stopped for the day under an overhanging ledge in a shallow valley of rocky hills. The heat of the day was more intense than he had imagined. How a place could be so hot by day and so cold by night was beyond him. It was like winter and summer changing places in the span of a day instead of a year. Miko assured him it would take at least a week to reach the plains to the south and east.

  Over the next couple of nights, the rocky hills were replaced by shifting sands. Once again Coran was glad for the clothing he wore. It protected him from the sand that was constantly being whipped up by the wind. It was soon apparent that it would take longer than expected traveling on foot. After five days Miko said that they were not as far along as they should be. Their water was almost gone and it would be a few days until they reached more.

  “We will have to turn south,” Miko decided after a long deliberation. “There is water less than a day away, or night in our case.”

  “Why didn’t we go that way to begin with?” Coran asked.

  “It lies along the path that people usually follow when they come into the desert. We have been paralleling that path.” Miko saw he still did not understand. “There will be people there. We will have to be careful.”

  They reached the spot just before daybreak, and just before the last of their water ran out. Miko was right to worry. Five men and their mounts surrounded the pool of water, which was in turn surrounded by rough-barked palm trees. They were eating breakfast, of what he could not tell from here. If they were locals they would have to be of the Shiomi tribe, if he remembered his lessons correctly. They were part of the same tribe that held Crecy. There were eight tribes in all, four followed Sha’elt, and four followed She’al.

  Miko found a spot to wait and watch for the men to leave. As the sun rose, approaching its peak in the cloudless sky, it baked the sand around them and the heat in the air was oppressive. They would not last the day without water. They waited, but the Karands made no move to leave. Their horses remained unsaddled and the men stayed under the shade of an open-sided tent they had erected beside the inviting water.

  “We have to do something,” Coran announced.

  Miko nodded reluctantly. “Give me your canteens and pack.” Coran looked a question. “I am not much good with a sword and they would only hinder you.”

  Coran understood immediately and his eyes went wide. “You want me to face all five of them?”

  Miko grinned back. “I am sure you can handle it.”

  “Thanks, but I think you are overestimating my abilities.”

  “Maybe, but what choice do we have?”

  Coran couldn’t argue with that and handed over his belongings. “The atiefa?”

  “Keep it on. You still need to hide the sword until you get close to them.”

  “The sash?”

  Miko paused to think. “Let them see it. They will figure out I am from the West. We cannot hide that, so let us see if your attire will help us.”

  Coran understood the idea. Their only chance to avoid a fight was if the Karands
thought him more than they could handle. He rose from the sand with Miko and followed the shorter man down towards the camp. They were spotted by the Shiomi half way there. The five rose and left the shade of the tent. They were all robed the same in whitish cloth and wore scruffy beards. They fingered the hilts or their curved blades as they watched Coran and Miko approach with keen eyes. One of the five stepped to the forefront.

  “You are a She’al.” It was not a question, but a statement of fact. “We have been ordered to kill anyone we find from the West.” The grin that appeared said he didn't need an order to do something he would greatly enjoy.

  “We only want some water. Not trouble,” Miko replied evenly. The red sash had not gone unnoticed. A couple of the Karands looked less sure, and one shifted his feet uncomfortably.

  The leader held firm. “Throw down your weapons and you will live.”

  “As slaves?” Miko replied fiercely. “I will never be a slave to the likes of you.”

  The leader smiled. “So be it.”

  Coran’s sword was out and striking before any others had cleared their sheaths. The leader went down with a great gash running from his hip to his shoulder. A second man barely deflected Coran’s first thrust, but not the second. The others were on him by then. He swung at their swords, knocking them aside, and danced backwards to gain some room. If the Shiomi had worked together and surrounded him, they might have taken him, but one held back, obviously frightened of facing an Anagassi. One of the Karands attacked, Coran blocked and punched the man in the face. He spun to knock aside the slash aimed at the back of his head from the second of the Shiomi. Coran brought his blade back and sliced through the man’s throat. Another swing came from behind and he ducked. He could feel the passage of the blade as it brushed the top of his hair. Coran continued the move by going to one knee, turning, and thrusting upwards into the man’s middle. The blade penetrated up under the ribcage, the man’s body jerked before he fell. Coran pulled his sword out and looked around for the fifth man. Miko was leaning over him, pulling his dagger out of the dead man’s back.

  “He was trying to run away,” Miko said. He wiped his dagger on the Shiomi’s robe. “We do not want anyone to know we are here.”

  Coran wiped his own blade before resheathing it. “I guess I should dispose of the bodies.”

  “Just take them off a ways into the desert. They won’t be found for a while.”

  Coran loaded the bodies on their horses, one dead Shiomi slung over each saddle. As he worked, Miko went through their pockets. He jingled some coins in one hand and glanced to Coran. “They will not be needing it anymore,” he offered as excuse.

  Coran could not disagree, but the thought of robbing the dead still seemed wrong somehow. Miko laughed at his expression. “You are young yet. You will understand someday.”

  Coran led the horses a quarter mile into the desert and dumped the bodies. He came back with the mounts and one of the Karandi blades and sword belt. “At least we can ride now.”

  Miko looked at the mounts and nodded, then at Coran. “It seems I did not overestimate your abilities by much.”

  The details of the fight were hazy in his mind, but Coran could remember how close some of the blades had come to cutting him open. “Maybe not.” But the difference had almost killed him.

  The land changed again, mercifully. The oven hot days and freezing nights became less extreme as they reached more hills of dark, brown rock. The further south they traveled the increase in the amount of vegetation. Patches of scrub brush appeared first in the loose soil, then low bushes, and finally trees. Some of them he thought he recognized like a tall oak and a few pines with a few spots where the needles had turned brown. Others he was not sure about, like an evergreen with drooping branches and short needles. He had to admit that he much preferred a landscape of trees, even strange ones, to what they had just traveled through.

  They stopped for water at the first real stream they came across. The water was only two feet across as it flowed southward. After a short break for the horses, they continued on.

  Coran was forced to rethink his opinion of Karands as a whole. He thought they were just zealots. The central part of their lives seemed to be the division between She’al and Sha’elt. Which one would dominate all of the Karands? What he came to realize was that all the Karands wanted was a god that would provide what they needed. That seemed to be a great many things. Eastern or Western, the people were poor. The majority of the people lived their lives in unhappy subjugation. From what he learned from Miko, the wealthy Karands were very wealthy, and they were jealous of sharing that wealth. That problem was more prevalent in the East. Miko himself was proof that in the West there were opportunities to improve oneself. He remembered Ruan and the people there and knew that it was not so in all the lands of the She’al followers. They had been poor before the Sha’elt ever came there.

  As he pondered the Karandi people, they rode into a small, run down town, looking around warily. They had no more encounters since the water hole, but now they were entering a more populated area. The people were shabbily dressed and as somber as the citizens of Crecy. The few children about did not run and play, but stayed close to their elders. Coran was careful not to think ‘parents’, since he did not know if the practice of men and women being taken away was happening here too. He was sure many of the children were being cared for by whoever could. He did notice that here, like in Crecy, there were few men of middle age to be seen. Luckily, they saw no one armed and hoped it stayed that way.

  Coran had removed the sash and robe upon nearing the town. They would not help them anymore, not in a town this far into enemy territory. They would have avoided it if they could have, but they needed information. They had no idea what part of Daes Shael to go to for the information he needed to find.

  Miko halted before a slightly more permanent appearing dwelling built out of stone. Most of the town was made of wood. The trader dismounted and Coran followed suit. Miko told him to stay there with the horses, and disappeared inside. As he waited, people passed by without acknowledging him in any way.

  When Miko came out a couple of minutes later, it was in a hurry. They mounted immediately. He did not speak until they were out of sight of the town. “My friend told me patrols come through here regularly, and today was a likely day for it.”

  “Would they have bothered us, with you being a merchant?” He had no idea what things were going to be like here.

  “Most likely. My friend told me that they are allowing trade to continue, but we are not carrying anything to trade with.”

  “So if we had something to trade, our disguises might still work even though you are from the West?”

  “Probably. When you are talking about traders, borders do not really mean anything except when it comes to taxes. You see there are Karandi traders who operate as far as Summerhall, or Ostis, and Midians who set up shops in Arencia, or Ithan. They would look more closely at me though.”

  It did make a sort of sense. They needed some forms of trade to continue, so they couldn’t just go around rounding up honest merchants who were actually helping their cause by bringing needed goods. That raised the question of why they closed all the ports. There had to be a reason for it. Something they were trying to hide. “Did you find out what we needed?” Coran asked.

  Miko nodded. “The Karands are gathering at Sha’Tor in the north.”

  “To invade through the passes,” Coran surmised.

  “Yes. Most of the Karands are being gathered there. The invaders from across the sea are there as well. The Etrani Karands are at Lornth with some more of the invaders. Lornth is a port in the south, on the Sea of Karand. He said that there was a fleet being built in the harbor there.”

  A fleet to the south when Summerhall would be looking to the passes in the east. “What else?”

  “New ships are still bringing in troops from across the sea. They are landing at T’loth, and joining the forces at Sha’Tor. Appar
ently the leader of the Easterners is one named Elthzidor. He is rumored to be at Lornth right now, but it changes, so no one can be sure of his location.”

  Coran was not surprised. “What of the Karands themselves? How do they feel about it?”

  “Most are not happy about it. They do not like invaders of any kind, and this Elthzidor is certainly an invader.”

  “What about the war against the Midians? Did you get an opinion on that?”

  “Some are blinded with the thought of victory, and will follow like sheep. Many understand that if the West falls then it will be worse for everyone. No one will be able to stop the invaders then. My friend has said that the following of She’al is growing here.”

  “Do you believe him?”

  “In part. I believe many consider that She’al would be better. They know that Sha’elt has done nothing but bring suffering to the common people. I also know that victory decides many men’s minds. If Sha’elt seems stronger then they will follow him.” He paused for a moment. “Do we go home now? You know where the enemy is gathering its forces.”

  Coran thought about it. A fleet in the south had to mean something significant. His journey here would be meaningless if he didn’t find out what. He also needed more information on the numbers of the enemy involved. Of course it meant traversing even more dangerous territory, going to more heavily populated lands. He might even have to enter a city reportedly filled with a hostile army. I knew it wasn’t going to be easy, he thought, knowing his duty was clear. “I am going to Lornth.”