by Billy Wong
Finn nodded in agreement. "So when are we going to try and contact him?"
"Now's good," Howard suggested. "He's hurt himself, so he'll be less likely to just try and kill us."
Loreen peeked outside. "They're still fighting out there."
"Good," Finn asked. "Let's send a Sevrian to give him the message. It wouldn't be wise to risk one of us."
"How are we going to convince one to help us?"
Finn left the tent leaving his friends to wonder about him, and came back after a few minutes. "Done. The message is on its way."
Loreen puzzled over it for a moment. "You beat one up and let him go with the message, didn't you?"
He answered her with a grin, and they awaited the reply. A soldier soon came to their tent and informed them of a dreadful delivery. A Kayland soldier's body had been launched over the barricade with a catapult, a message carved in its flesh. Sure enough, it instructed Finn to meet Joghra between the camped armies at night.
"Damn," Howard said, "look at what you started."
Finn felt a bit of anger at the defiled corpse, but concern for Rose eclipsed his moral indignation by far. "We'll get Joghra for it someday, I suppose. For now, let's concentrate on saving Rose."
#
They found the Sevrian general sitting on a wide carpet set on the trampled grass by his retainers, who stood all around him with readied weapons. Finn felt like he walked into a wolf's den as he stepped past two towering bodyguards to sit before Joghra. The general still wore his armor, as well as his leering mask which bore a scar from his battle with Rose. Loreen and Howard stood by while the Death General spoke in a neutral tone.
"So, you wish for a cure for your lover's plight. What do you have to offer me in return?"
"You saw the power of my magic," Finn began. "The removal of such a weapon from the field would benefit your side greatly."
"And what will stop me from removing it, myself?" Joghra asked calmly, with a glance around at his throng of bodyguards. Fiona was nowhere to be seen, probably too hurt to come, but the odds would still be against Finn's group if a fight broke out.
Finn had known it wouldn't be so easy. "How about I write down some spells for you, so you can practice and learn them?"
"How would I know whether these spells actually work, until I learned them?"
"You could try some of them first to make sure." So he'd have to at least give Joghra one or two working, if weak, spells.
Joghra's eyes gleamed deviously. "I have a better idea. You can stay with me, until you have taught me all your magical knowledge."
Finn was taken aback, and felt an urge to panic. "But then who will give Rose the antidote?"
"Your friends will. And as for how you'll know whether it works, they'll come back and tell you. In the meantime, you will be staying here."
Finn didn't like it, since this would put him at a severe disadvantage if the general decided to go back on his word. But he had little choice in the matter, at least for now. Once he knew Rose was safe, though... "All right. I'll stay with you."
"Wait," Loreen said, "we need more of the antidote than it takes to cure one person, by at least half." Finn knew she didn't trust the Death General, and wanted to test whatever he gave them before using it on Rose.
"All right. Phemu," Joghra commanded, "fetch the antidote for the mage's friends." One of the guards ran back to the Sevrian camp, and returned with a vial of yellow liquid. He handed it to Loreen and she and Howard left, leaving Finn to wait in fear.
#
Loreen looked worriedly at the vial. She wasn't about to give it to her friend until she knew it wasn't more poison Joghra intended to finish off the tenacious Rose. She smelled the liquid and found nothing amiss, but then, not all poisons smelled bad. She had to test it on something living—but what? She decided to catch a crow feeding on dead soldiers and put it into a makeshift cage. She coaxed the bird into ingesting the thick liquid by sprinkling it on a piece of Sevrian corpseflesh, then watched it for a few hours while Howard kept an eye on Rose. Nothing happened to the crow other than it falling asleep and waking up again, but she still worried the "antidote" could be a slower-acting type of poison.
She wanted to watch the bird a while longer, but Howard insisted they give Rose the antidote before it became too late, and Finn was waiting for them to return with news. So she slowly raised Rose's head and tipped the contents of the vial into her mouth, encouraging her to swallow.
"It's working," she said after a minute. "The pain's going away."
Loreen smiled with relief. "See, we did it. We got the antidote for you, and now all we have to do is rescue Finn."
"What?!" Rose demanded. "What happened to him?"
"He offered to teach Joghra magic in exchange for the antidote," Howard said, "and is being held by the Sevrians in the field."
"Idiot! Why couldn't he listen?!"
Loreen argued on Finn's behalf. "He was the one most against getting the antidote at first, because he believed in you. But we made him go, because you needed it."
Rose tried weakly to sit up, but fell back onto the bedding. "So who's going to save him?"
"Joghra might not do anything to him. He does need him to teach him magic." Then Loreen saw the problem. "But Finn plans to trick him, and if Joghra realizes that after they bring him to a more secure location, even he might not be able to escape. We need to get Finn back before they take him to their camp or farther."
Again Rose tried to sit, and this time forced herself up with a mighty effort. She looked terribly fatigued, though pain no longer filled her eyes. Fighting the drowsiness with all her iron will, she reached for her armor. Loreen tried to stop her. "No, Rose! You may not be badly poisoned anymore, but you took awful wounds just earlier today! You can't go out there against Joghra like this!"
Rose shook her head as she began to dress herself. "I hurt him pretty bad too. Even though my wounds are more dangerous, both his arms must be quite weakened. I think I could take him. After all, he did run away when it came down to it."
"He is not nearly alone," Howard warned. "He brought a large team of bodyguards."
"Then I have a plan. I'll shoot down as many bodyguards as I can from afar, and you two go help Finn against the rest. As for the general, I'm scared, but in his wounded state we all should be able to handle him. I'll make sure no bodyguards get you while you're distracted, and shoot Joghra in the back if I have to."
Loreen smiled. "Let's do it, then. Kayland's army lost its leader today, so it wouldn't hurt to make things even."
Rose finished putting on her armor in silence, and Loreen marveled at her willingness to fight the Death General again for the sake of her love. After watching her stand up, struggling against exhaustion but so very determined, Howard remarked, "What a tough girl!" Rose flashed him a coy smile, and they headed out.
#
Finn sat wondering why Loreen and Howard took so long. Was the antidote working or not? He looked at the man who might soon be his master, and hatred welled up in him. This was the fiend that had almost taken away the love of his life, and might still do so. Even if he couldn't escape right away, Finn promised himself, Joghra would only enjoy his teachings until he killed him. He came back to reality and saw his friends return. They looked happy, and Finn supposed that, at least, Joghra hadn't gone back on his word. Then he spotted a figure far away from them, raising a bow.
Rose? Up already? As he tried to make certain identification of the person, a huge arrow felled a crossbow-wielding bodyguard near him, and his friends drew swords to attack the Sevrian group. Finn eagerly sprang into action, blasting the two nearest guards with an icy gust that froze their eyes shut to leave them blind and helpless, and the fight was on.
#
Rose struggled to remain awake while she shot at the Sevrians, and had to force herself to concentrate on aiming her arrows. She knew she'd been badly wounded, but shouldn't have been this tired. Perhaps it was a side effect of the antidote, but i
t had felt worse than the first time she'd been poisoned, although she was a little less sleepy now. Well, at least the pain was gone. But only seconds after that thought, world-shattering agony flared up anew all throughout her body.
#
"Liars!" Joghra screamed as he sprang up and swung a hammer at Finn's head. He ducked, countered with a mace blow at the Sevrian's leg followed by a shield strike to the chest. The gold-armored general, smaller than he'd thought before, stumbled away, and Finn wondered at how well the fight was going. Then again, Rose had hurt Joghra pretty bad. He stole a glance at his companions to see them doing quite well. Rose's arrows though came surprisingly far apart, sometimes barely in time to save Loreen or Howard from an unseen attacker. Still, Finn knew they were winning and continued to press his opponent, driving him off his fancy carpet which blood now soaked.
He knocked the hammer from Joghra's hand with a mace blow to his armored forearm. But the glancing hit failed to do much damage, and the masked general grappled him. The two big men struggled for a few seconds, then Finn dropped to a knee and threw his opponent overhead, slamming him down hard on his back. Finn raised his mace for the final blow. In a much higher voice than he'd used before, the downed man yelled, "No, mercy, mercy! Don't kill me! I yield!"
Finn looked around and saw the fight was over. He pulled the mask off his defeated opponent and groaned with the realization the man behind it was at least ten years too young and lacked the piercings to be the real Joghra. "Rose!" he yelled. "When you said Joghra was Wilner's equal, you were more right than you knew! If anything, this guy is Wilner's reincarnation! Both foreign leaders who want to take the Brushknoll, use doubles, cheat in battles, are feared the world over, almost killed you, prone to running away, tall, have black hair, wear fancy painted armor—anything else?"
"Got their arms messed up by me—and both dead, soon," Rose added while she limped over. She grimaced as if in unbearable pain, and could barely stand.
Loreen stared at her with concern. "What's wrong? I thought the antidote worked?"
"It was only a sedative to numb the pain," the faux Joghra said, "and put you to sleep. I see the latter effect didn't take." Hearing this, Rose groaned and fell into a sitting position on the ground.
"And just who are you?" Finn asked.
"My name's Phemu. I'm just a nobody. Please don't kill me. I was only doing my job. I would've been executed otherwise!"
"Rose wouldn't want me to kill a helpless foe," Finn assured him grudgingly, "not even one dressed up like you. I guess Joghra didn't want to risk himself trying out this bold plan. But I thought the guy you ordered to get the antidote was Phemu?"
Looking a little less terrified, Phemu explained, "I called him Phemu because I was playing Joghra's role, and decided to spice things up by ordering 'myself' around, as he does. And he loves to address me in particular by name."
"One of you take care of him," Finn said. "Tie him up or whatever, I don't know. He's nobody." At that, Phemu frowned. Ignoring him, Finn knelt by Rose's side. "I'm sorry I didn't get the antidote and caused all this trouble for nothing. Are you a little better, at least? Maybe time has helped a bit?"
Rose exhaled. "It's as bad as before. Damn, Finn, you better have gotten something good out of this."
He couldn't think of anything, but Howard said after a quick look around, "Some Sevrians dead and one captured?"
"Great!" Loreen said sarcastically. "Nothing that'll help Rose there."
Phemu had been looking at Finn for some time, and now asked meekly, "You know magic?"
"Yes. And?"
"I want to learn magic, too. Can you teach me?"
Loreen stared. "He just captured you, and you want him to teach you magic?!"
"I guess not," Phemu said after a pause. "Maybe someday?"
Finn regarded the young man. He seemed naive and decent enough, even if he was an enemy at the moment. "Fine, if we both get through the war alive, come to Gustrone and you'll find us pretty easily. But if Rose dies, forget it. I'd probably kill you on sight for being part of this then."
"I won't die," Rose assured him in a none too confident voice. "I mean, I can still walk, and fight."
Finn held her hand and gave a tender squeeze. "It kills me to watch you suffer like this. Phemu, if you know what poison Joghra used on her, tell us now or I'll do much worse than refuse to teach you magic."
The Sevrian's eyes widened, and without hesitation he blurted out, "I heard it might be called doomblade or doomraid or something like that—started with doom, at least."
"I think he means doombraid," Loreen said after a moment, "but... wow, Rose. That stuff's supposed to kill in less than a minute through sheer pain alone. Two shots right in the torso... you're amazing."
Rose had no heart for compliments, tormented as she was. "How do you cure it?!"
"I don't know. We'll have to do some research. Let's just go back to camp for now."
#
Dropping Phemu off at the prisoners' area, the group returned to Rose's tent to find Justin waiting for them. Noticing the deadly intensity in his eyes, Finn said, "If you're here to see Rose, she's horribly hurt. Let's talk outside."
"Not hurt enough to stop her from going off to fight again, apparently." His voice softened just a tad. "Fine, let her rest. I heard what horrible wounds she took."
"Thank you. Now what is it you want to talk about?"
"Were you there when my uncle was killed?"
They all knew what was coming. "We were nearby," Loreen replied truthfully, "but none of us saw it."
"But Rose did. Did she not tell you what happened?"
"She said she saw General Lipner about to be killed, yes. She was far from the killer and could not throw her weapon to stop him, for she was being attacked by the Death General himself and already as wounded as she is now."
"I hear she had an enormous axe on her back in reserve, as she always does."
"Maybe," Finn snapped, "hurt bad enough to kill anybody else and with Joghra barreling towards her like a bull, she didn't think she'd have time to draw it."
Justin shrugged. "Maybe so." He looked Finn fiercely in the eye. "Or maybe, she didn't want to bother taking the risk for my uncle."
"What are you accusing Rose of? Letting your uncle get killed?"
"After the argument she had with him, and their subsequent refusal to talk to one another, it does seem like a plausible thing for her to do, doesn't it?"
"Rose would never let an ally get killed if she could help it," Loreen said with conviction. "She always does her best to save lives, even those of people she doesn't like. She saved your uncle's life just half a year ago, you know. She even let him use the magic healing device we got from Wilner, though we were all wounded badly as well and he never liked her. And what refusal to talk to each other? They never really had a reason to talk after."
It seemed the words dampened Justin's suspicion just a bit, but he countered, "But back then, they hadn't had such a dispute, nor Rose an easy excuse to let him die."
Then Loreen lost control and snarled, "And what if she did let him die? He would have let me die, if Howard hadn't saved me. I would've let him die if I'd been in Rose's place—that heartless bastard deserved his fate!" Finn swallowed.
"If you did that, you would have betrayed your country, just as Rose has if she did."
Finn took a deep breath in an attempt to refrain from punching him. "If not for Rose, your army would've been routed long ago. Wilner would've taken the Brushknoll before Joghra even got here, for that matter, and Sevria might be invading from all sides at this point. What of that?"
"I'm not denying all the great deeds Rose has done for Kayland—the world, even. I know of the ancient beings she—and you—destroyed before they could come to threaten the world. But Finn, I want to find out the truth about what happened to my uncle—if there was any way he could have been saved, and if so who failed to take that action."
"So if Rose did ignore your uncle's pl
ight," Loreen asked nervously, "what would you do?"
"I don't know yet," Justin admitted. "But I wouldn't let it go easily for sure."
Now Howard, who'd been silent since learning of Justin's suspicion, spoke up. "Brother, please leave these people be. The woman whose motives are suspect to you might be dying. She is a warrior with courage like no other, and a far kinder and more considerate person than our uncle. Let her have peace until she heals, if she does."
"You are a fool," Justin growled, "to side with a woman who might have stood by and watched your uncle die over your own brother. But I'll do as you wish. I have no time to waste over one treacherous warrior, when the duty of running this army has fallen to those of us who remain after today's devastation. Still, your friend can expect to hear from me when this battle is done."
"Fair enough. But if you accuse her, I will fight on her behalf."
"If she lives, you mean."
"If she lives." It was obvious he hoped she would, and Finn felt uplifted by his support.
"Our father will disapprove," Justin warned.
"So he will. Rose is a good friend, and I won't abandon her."
Justin turned with a sigh and walked away, leaving the friends standing there. "I like you," Finn said with a slap to Howard's back, and Loreen gave him a thankful kiss on the cheek.
"It's nothing, guys. Fighting alongside you gave me the chance to run off Joghra and Fiona twice. What could overshadow that? Let's find out about this doombraid."
#
Howard and Loreen went around camp asking for information about the poison called doombraid while Finn stayed by his stricken lover's side, comforting her with a loving touch and tender kisses as best he could. Rose expressed thanks for his support, knowing he suffered himself by watching her do so. Finally, their friends returned.
"So what'd you find?" Finn asked, but seeing their downcast faces already steeled himself.
"There's no cure, at least that's known," Loreen said, shoulders slumped.
Though he'd tried to be prepared, Finn felt tears burst from his eyes and rush down his cheeks. "There's no... cure? No, Rose, no..." He hugged her.