Roads of the Righteous and the Rotten (Order of Fire Book 1)

by Kameron A. Williams

“No matter, I’m going to give you a demonstration.” The prince’s hand clasped around the black leather hilt hanging from his belt. “Apologies my men couldn’t be more of a challenge. Why don’t you try your hand with me?”

  “Just you?” Zar asked, brow raised as his eyes floated over to the two remaining guards who stayed at a distance , but fidgeted nervously. Last thing he needed was to get stabbed in the back while he was busy dueling with the prince.

  “No one will interrupt us.”

  “Ah, the honorable Prince Tharid who fights the rogue alone.” Zar stepped a few paces forward, his sword lifted at shoulder level and held in both hands, pointed straight at the prince across from him.

  Tharid moved forward slowly, his sword extended much like Zar’s—straight out with its tip pointing forward at the man. Both men inched forward with slow calculated steps, eyeing the body of the other, waiting and watching for movement. Then, for one short moment both men were still. Their eyes were clear and fixed, and it became so quiet it seemed the whole world had stopped, like the plants refused to rustle in the wind, like the birds stopped chirping and all the other animals of the wood knew that for those few seconds they ought not move.

  Tharid lunged forward, and Zar swung his blade to knock away the thrust. When their blades met the prince pulled his body back immediately, his weight still on his back foot. If Zar had put his full weight into the parry it would have left him no time to recover, and would’ve given Tharid time to shift his weight back forward to strike a blow. But Zar had taken a half step back and parried light, and the prince’s hollow thrust was brushed to the side while keeping himself balanced and out of range.

  Zar moved back into striking range and swung his sword from high. Tharid caught it and let the blade slide down his own. He pushed Zar’s sword to the side and Zar moved himself out the way of the slash that followed. Zar kept his strikes high, again and again, which Tharid parried, then attacked from under after the prince knocked away his blade—a strike to the wrist that usually surprised his enemy. The prince brought both arms up quickly and avoided the blow. He brought his sword down hard on Zar’s, who had quickly brought his sword up over his head to catch it.

  The match looked as perfect as an act, for each man blocked and countered the moves of the other, each moving their bodies nimbly, their blades gracefully. Feet light, stances heavy, the swords flew and crashed, and Zar grew frustrated as his best moves were left undelivered. It wasn’t long before both men grew tired from the dance. They seemed equal in skill and reach. The only thing left to do was outsmart the other.

  They stepped back from one another, both men now breathing heavily.

  “Good!” said the prince, panting and chuckling.

  “Would it be odd to say I’ve been waiting for a duel like this? Come, let’s see if we can finish this.”

  Zar was far too exhausted for words. He studied the man’s body, and thought quietly as they again moved toward each other. When their blades met again Zar found Tharid’s sword moving even faster than before, as if the man had been saving his strength for the final moments, and the prince’s sword worked its way under Zar’s guard, striking up at Zar’s hands, aiming to part him from the sword. When Zar released his left hand and swayed to avoid the blade, the prince turned the sword out and cut into his arm. Zar’s left arm dropped to his side, blood running down it.

  Both men lunged forward and stabbed at the other. Zar knew their blades were about the same length, and as the men drove towards each other, Zar released his wounded left arm from his sword-hilt, turned his body sideways and reached out straight and far with the right arm, gaining the perfect few inches he needed. The prince’s blade stopped a few inches away from Zar’s underarm while Zar’s sword point pierced the man’s chest, breaking a cluster of fancy links on the prince’s armor.

  Zar paused a moment with his sword’s point embedded in the prince, watching the busted iron links around his blade fill with red. His own armor cracked, and a blow to the chest stopped his breath and knocked him back a step. Zar looked down at the arrow shaft lodged in his chest, then at the prince who had fallen back with his hand over his wound, and at the two men who were now moving forward, one of them with a bow in hand.

  The prince yelled out, “Fools! Well, go on, kill him now since you’ve spoiled the duel!”

  Zar ran towards the river, grabbing the shaft sticking out from his chest and breaking it off until only a small wooden stub poked out from his broken chainmail. He could see the lip of the ravine, hear the water rushing below, but he was moving so slow that a guard caught up to him and he was forced to turn around and meet the man.

  He faced the man while still moving towards the ravine, parrying the blade while quickly stepping backwards around trees and over rocks. He slipped once, walking back over some rocks, but picked himself up and knocked away his attacker’s blade while still shuffling backwards for the river.

  The prince’s voice called out, “He means to escape into the river! Do not let him!”

  Zar blocked another blow and held it, then pulled his dagger out with his weak left arm and poked it under the man’s arm. The other wounded man hobbled up right after with a sword raised and Zar parried with what felt like the last of his strength, falling back as his body gave out, sinking into what seemed like nothingness as the man slashed at him desperately.

  The nothingness grew wet and cold. The next thing he was aware of was being swept in a strong current and swallowing water, then feeling the ground underneath him, cold and muddy. He crawled blindly as he tried to regain his senses. He saw shadows, blurred and hazy, and it felt as if every trace of air had been squeezed from his body and replaced by water.

  It seemed like leagues of scrambling through the water and choking on it before he finally found himself lying on a muddy bank, coughing water from his lungs and struggling to get back to breathing air again. His head stung in a place that seemed to be deep in his face, just behind his eyes. His blurred vision began to clear as he knelt on the ground, looking at the river beside him, attempting to figure out which way he had come from, and which way he needed to go. The current had carried him a good ways down, and he could hear nothing of the prince or any surviving guards.

  He wondered if they still pursued him.

  Zar left the river and cut into the forest. If they decided to follow him they would no doubt start by heading downriver, using the water as a guide then searching for tracks away from it. But the prince was wounded and his men defeated, and Zar imagined he was already halfway back to the castle by now. A few large rocks mottled the forest floor to the side of him, and Zar stepped lightly over them to break his trail of tracks, and started off in a different direction. The adrenaline from his fight with the prince and escape into the river was wearing off, and Zar grew weak under the pain of his wounds and the blood he had lost. He staggered along.

  Blood ran down his clothes and spilled onto the ground. His vision blurred like when he’d crawled through the river. He strained his eyes to find a secluded place to rest and moved his feet with the last of his strength. If any enemy found him now he would be finished.

  Zar stumbled over a root, picked himself up, and staggered into a tree. He thought he heard a noise and spun around to face it, but saw nothing but blurred images of trees fading in and out of his vision. He fell to his knees, too dizzy to stand, and peered through the forest, deciphering indistinct images that he had to focus on intently to make out. A large tree with a black hole—an image he pulled closer and clearer, straining his dimming eyes to indentify. It was a large, old tree, rotting, and hollow at the base. He crawled to it and sat himself inside, his back to the inside of the tree, his body facing out.

  Zar fiddled his hand up to his neck and lifted the thin leather band over his locks, pulling out the small bone whistle that hung around his neck and lay over his chest beneath his shirt. He brought the instrument to his lips and blew, and, as usual, he heard nothing. According to Ramla the wh
istle produced a sharp and shrill call that carried for leagues and leagues. She had made it for Asha and it could only be heard by Asha. Zar had been a skeptic when she’d first presented it to him, but upon his first chance to test the instrument he was made a believer. He’d left Asha with Barek and ridden Dancer into Karthin, and while doing a bit of drinking pulled the whistle out and started blowing it between drinks. He hadn’t expected much to happen that night from blowing the seemingly soundless whistle— besides the few laughs he got from thinking about the whole thing—and the more wine he drank the funnier the whole thing became. It wasn’t until he was leaving the tavern that Zar knew the whistle was exactly what Ramla had said it was, for he half thought he had had one too many as he saw Asha walking towards him.

  He blew the bone whistle for hours. Dusk came and darkened the forest air around him, and he continued to blow the whistle. It was in the dark of night that he sat there half awake, half sleep, or dead—he couldn’t tell—blowing the whistle intermittently, when he heard something approach, and looked into the darkness to see Asha coming to him eagerly.

  “What took you,” said Zar, his chest hurting. “I need the water.”

  Asha knelt in front of the tree and Zar grabbed the water-skin from her saddle. He was reaching for the other sack which kept the dried meats when he heard something else approaching, and saw the light of a small lamp. Zar reached hurriedly for the bow tucked in Asha’s saddle and nocked an arrow, wondering if he had the strength to draw it. The light moved around the trees and beside it the legs of the carrier could be seen. The legs moved forward, and the light floated up higher, illuminating the face it hung beside.

  “Is it you?” The face spoke.

  Zar pointed his bow at the face in the light, hands trembling. He hadn’t drawn it; he hadn’t the strength to. “My bow is drawn.”

  “I mean no harm,” the man called. “I seek only words.” The stranger looked at him with a face of wonder like he was a god, a demon, or some ancient novelty spoken of in books but never witnessed in real life.

  “My name is Stroan,” said the man as he slowly came forward, eyes wide and mouth ajar. And you are the man from the fire!”

  17

  ZAR’S EYELIDS DRIFTED OPEN SLIGHTLY until he caught the motion of the stranger across from him. His sleepy eyes sprung open and his body jerked up, his chest and left arm stinging as he rose. He smelled venison, and crawled out of the base of the tree he was curled up in, squinting under the morning sun as he tried to remember all that had happened. He eyed the man roasting meat in front of him, feeling that dull and nagging pain behind his eyes like when he had crawled out of the river. The river! He had escaped from Tharid into the river. He had crawled out of the water and…and hid himself in the rotting tree trunk. Then that man showed up. He said his name was Stroan.

  “You’ve slept long and well,” the man said.

  Zar rose to his feet, his balance shaky, and hobbled a few steps closer to the stranger. He kept his eyes fixed on the man until his eyes adjusted to the brightness and the picture of him became clearer. He was a tawny-faced man with short, curly hair sitting on the ground by the fire. Black stubble grew sparsely over his cheeks, and Zar felt he had the eyes of an assassin—not particularly unpleasant, but empty, uncaring. But the man hadn’t come for his blood, for if he had, it would have long been spilled while he lay weak and asleep. The man sat still, tending the meat on the spit, turning the pole that the flesh was skewered on, rotating it over the fire.

  “I had barely given you my name when you fell. You bled too much.”

  Zar looked down at his wounds to find them bound.

  His chest had been wrapped all the way around and stung much worse than before. Zar pried through the cloth to find a burn mark instead of an arrow hole. His arm had also been tied tight with cotton cloths. He could feel the pain in both of them with every movement, though his chest bothered him far more than his arm.

  “I had to seal it,” said the stranger, watching Zar examine himself. “You woke for a moment when I did it then passed right back out. You’re fortunate it didn’t hit your lung—went right above it.”

  “You did all this?”

  “Aye,” the man answered. “If you’re dead, I cannot ask you questions.”

  “Who are you?”

  “I told you, my name is Stroan.”

  “Your name tells me nothing of who you are.”

  Stroan’s eyes looked straight into Zar’s, wonder and passion reflected in them. It made Zar curious.

  “You burned Tiomot’s storehouse to the ground to save one woman. Who is she to you?”

  “I recall saving quite a few women,” said Zar.

  “You came to save one,” said Stroan, sounding as sure as if he could read Zar’s mind, “and saved many in the doing of it.”

  Zar smiled, intrigued, and replied, “So I did. What is it to you?”

  “I want to know why. You owe me that, stranger.”

  “Did I ruin your plans?” Zar asked as his hand drifted to the dagger on his belt and rested there. He had left his sword in the tree trunk. “Even as weak as I am I could stick this dagger between your eyes, I daresay.”

  “I’m certain you could, stranger, I’ve seen you fight.”

  “Been following me, have you?”

  “Aye.”

  “But not to kill me, obviously, to interrogate me. Has the lecher king sent you? My, that was fast.”

  “No,” said Stroan. “You mistake my intention.”

  “You’re intention being to ask me questions?” said Zar, eyeing him curiously. “What exactly would you ask me? And why?

  Stroan shifted restlessly, squeezed both his fists tight and let out a long sigh. Zar could soon hear the man’s breathing, and he looked into his face to find his eyes fixed and staring passionately forward.

  “What troubles you, man?”

  Stroan pulled his eyes from the distance and let them sink to the ground. “There is a woman…”

  “A woman?” said Zar, laughing. “Aye, of course there is.”

  “This is no joke.”

  “No, it never is,” said Zar, still chuckling. He crawled to the side of the fire until he sat across from Stroan, pulled out his dagger and cut off a slice of meat. “Tell me, what’s her name? Why is she not with you?”

  Stroan’s eyes stood grave, and they watered slightly while standing completely fixed without a blink or flutter. “Yuna,” he said with a longing smile, his lips curving at the sound of her name. “She sleeps with Tiomot because I am weak.”

  “This is good meat,” said Zar, smacking his lips after swallowing. “Stroan, take meat with me, and we’ll talk about your woman. Really, I don’t see how this involves me unless you think I’m fool enough to storm Snowstone Castle with you. As you can see,” said Zar looking down at his wounds, “the prince alone gave me quite enough trouble.”

  Stroan didn’t move. “You gave me hope that night. When I saw you leaving with her in your arms I wondered why I had not done the same. I wondered why I had not risked all for Yuna. You challenged the king himself for your woman.”

  “Not my woman,” said Zar, “but yes, I’d risk everything for her.”

  “For me to do the same for Yuna wouldn’t be as simple as what you did in Red Valley, I assure you of that!”

  Zar marveled at how the man had snapped at him, looking at Stroan with as much wonder in his eyes as the man had himself when he had first approached Zar. “This is all quite fascinating, I daresay. Might we backtrack to that part about her sleeping with Tiomot?”

  “I am not here to amuse you,” said Stroan with a glare. “And I cannot explain the specifics, but she’s in Snowstone Castle. She’s there, I’m here, and I can’t do anything about it!”

  “You can’t do anything?” Zar questioned, “Or you haven’t done anything?”

  “I can’t!” Stroan snapped. “You don’t understand.”

  “Then explain,” Zar urged. “Explain why y
ou can’t be with your woman. Explain why she’s with Tiomot instead of you. And please explain why you haven’t yet touched the venison. It’s delicious.” Zar pointed to the meat between them.

  “Hunger is a trifle,” Stroan moaned, “when she is in my thoughts.”

  Zar chuckled. “You sound quite lovesick, I daresay, but unless she is dead, there is no reason to be so.”

  “And why is that, stranger?”

  “My name is Zar, and I’d like to think we are no longer strangers. You’ve saved my life, and the least I can do is give you a bit of advice. Do something about this. There’s nothing worse than living with regret.”

  Stroan’s hands dropped to his side and fell to the dirt.

  The man dug both his fingers in and clawed at the earth, shaking his head stiffly. “You don’t know what you’re asking me to do.”

  “I certainly don’t. I don’t know a good many things you haven’t told me. I don’t know why a woman you love would be in Snowstone Castle. I daresay I’m entirely confused.”

  “I would have to betray them,” Stroan blurted. “My people.”

  “I am by no means an expert in love,” Zar stated, “but you should be willing to betray the world if you love her as much as you say. Isn’t that how it goes? I don’t know, do like the stories and run off with her.”

  “You speak nonsense.”

  “Maybe,” Zar replied, “but if you’re not a free man among your people, why shouldn’t you betray them?”

  Stroan looked up and sniffled, holding his head high as he glared at Zar. “I am a free man.”

  “Free? He’s free, he says,” Zar mocked. “Let us say if you wanted to marry this Yuna right now, could you?”

  “No. Because she’s not here—she’s in Snowstone.”

  “But if she wasn’t,” said Zar. “If she was here right now, could you go to a temple and get married? Well?”

  “Not now.”

  “Ah, not now. And why is that?”

  “There is more to do first.”

  “More to do for your people?”