Winds of War

by Rhett C. Bruno

  Maybe Rand was permitted to drink, but Torsten knew a dangerous vice when he saw one. He only hoped he wasn’t too late. “I haven’t been Wearer long,” he said, “but you were the finest of the few recruits I trained myself.”

  “And my sister is the finest barmaiden this side of the gorge.” He snickered and went to take another drink. Torsten ripped the mug out of his hands and flung it against the door.

  “Would you listen to me, Rand!” he shouted. “You took an oath. To shield Iam’s chosen king and Country from whatever evils would seek to undo them. Until your dying breath, it cannot be broken.”

  “Then hang me!” Rand snapped. His grin faded and his face contorted with anger that instantly rendered Torsten silent. Beyond his training, Torsten didn’t know the young man personally, but he’d always been restrained, disciplined. Always followed orders.

  “Do you know what I did when I was Wearer?” Rand whispered, lips trembling. A tear rolled down his flushed cheek. “I hanged them all. Everyone who disagreed with her. Everyone who couldn’t save her precious boy. Because that’s what we’re supposed to do, isn’t it? Serve the Crown? I wasn’t the Wearer; I was a gods-damned executioner!”

  “Rand, I…”

  “You’re what? You’re what!” He slammed the table. That was when Torsten realized his hand was quaking as well. “You’re sorry you weren’t there?”

  “You weren’t ready.”

  “And you are? Ready to hang men simply for doing their jobs? Then you might as well do the same to me because I’m not coming back.”

  “The Queen was grieving,” Torsten argued.

  “The Queen deserved to be strung up over that wall with the rest of them.”

  “By Iam, keep your voice down! That’s treason.”

  “Iam turned his back on us, Torsten. Don’t you see that?”

  “No, he is still with us. I saw it with my own eyes, Rand. He sent the prince back to us. Offered us all a second chance.”

  Rand scoffed. He leaned back in his chair, eying the bit of spilled ale pooling across the floor. “Did you visit their graves?”

  “Pi’s? I was there, Rand! I saw the miracle of his rebirth with my very eyes.”

  “Not him,” Rand whispered. “All the people she hanged—I hanged. Deturo, and Holgrass, and Tessa…If Iam is with us, why didn’t he bring them back, too? Why only bring back a mad prince who mutters evil in the dark.”

  Torsten’s heart leaped into his throat.

  “You thought you were the only one who ever heard him?” Rand asked, clearly noticing the change in Torsten’s expression.

  “It was the curse of Redstar that made him do such things,” Torsten offered.

  “No, that boy is cursed. Everyone who goes near him... they... they end up dead. I’m never going back to that place. I don’t care what you do to me.” He swung his hand as if shoeing Torsten but fell off his chair.

  Torsten’s fist clenched, but he bit back his response. Instead, he watched as Rand pawed at the cabinets again, searching for something else to drink on his hands and knees like an animal.

  Torsten wasn’t sure why he kept returning to this tavern. Perhaps it was because he too had risen from the shog of Yarrington’s poor to the height of King’s Shieldsman, But the boy he helped train was clearly gone—deader even than King Pi ever was. In some ways, deader than King Liam. Only a sniveling coward remained.

  Without royal edict stating that one was no longer fit, either by age, injury, or worse, serving the King’s Shield was a lifelong vocation. Deserting the post, as Rand had, was punishable by death. Had he cursed the Crown so profusely in public, Torsten would’ve had no other choice but to drag him to the dungeons. But they were alone, with only the soft whistling of wind through the cracked window and the sizzle of a candle nearing wick’s end for company.

  Torsten couldn’t help but pity him. He knew Rand never should have been left alone to deal with Oleander’s unhinged fury, and if Torsten hadn’t chased Redstar to the Webbed Woods, perhaps he could have kept her from killing so many. It was only that guilt which prevented him from turning Rand in.

  “The light of Iam is with you, brother, whether you feel it or not,” Torsten said as he backed away. “Should you ever find the strength to hold it again, there will always be a shield waiting for you in the Glass Castle.”

  Rand grunted an unintelligible response without looking back. His tear-filled eyes went wide as he found another jug of ale.

  The young man looked much like Pi had when Torsten found him pacing his room, muttering madness, thanks to Redstar’s curse. As Torsten backed out of the tiny apartment in the shog-end of Yarrington, he couldn’t help but trace a circle around his eyes and ask Iam to forgive the boy.

  The worst curses come from within.

  He could imagine no worse fate than having his faith shattered. He’d rather deal with twisted Arch Warlocks like Redstar any day. Because, try as they might to break him and the faithful masses, he knew they would always fail as Redstar had. The man who tried to unravel the Glass Kingdom now sat chained beneath the castle awaiting execution. And now that the coronation had passed, the time had come to rid the world of him and turn the pages on a new chapter.

  II

  THE MYSTIC

  “This is a stupid idea,” Sora said.

  “Just trust me for once?” Whitney groaned. “‘World’s Greatest Thief’ twice over, remember?”

  “That’s great, except I feel like I am doing all the real work.”

  “You’re right, looking pretty must be really difficult for you.”

  Sora punched Whitney in the arm. “No, but acting helpless is. Why are we targeting these men again?”

  “Because,” Whitney said, feigning exasperation, “they have a horse and a wagon, and I’d rather not walk the rest of the way to Winde Port. I’m tired from slaying monster-gods.”

  She punched him again, harder this time. “And what, we just leave them stranded in a gorge? I told you, we’re only going after people who deserve to lose what they’ve got. Like Darkings.”

  “But where’s the fun in that?” Whitney smirked.

  Every time Sora saw that look on his face, she wanted to slap it right off, but the next thing she knew she was knee-deep into one of his asinine plans.

  “I don’t like it,” she said.

  “Trust me, Sora. I’ve dealt with a million caravans like that.” Sora raised an eyebrow. “They stop in small towns like Troborough and swindle everyone with worthless ‘trinkets.’ They can keep their wagon and trash if it makes you happy. All we need is one horse, they have two. Would you rather steal one from some poor stableman?”

  “If you didn’t toss all our gold onto the streets of Yarrington we could have just bought one.”

  “Sora!” he playfully shook his head. “I never thought you’d be so against my autlas-giving nature.”

  “I... You are the most maddening person I’ve ever met. A single gold autla, that’s all we’d have needed.”

  Whitney crossed his arms. “There’s no lesson in that! I promised to help you become the second best thief in Pantego, and that’s what I plan to do.”

  “I don’t remember that promise.”

  “It was something like that.”

  Sora sighed. “Fine, but this better be worth tearing my tunic. I liked this one.”

  “There she is!” Whitney clapped his hands, then wrapped his arm around her. “Now, do you remember the plan?”

  “Of course. ‘Use my assets,’ as you so eloquently put it.”

  It was lesson number who knows how many since she found Whitney in that dwarven ruin, kidnapped by Redstar’s Drav Cra followers posing as cultists. When she decided to go with him to steal the Prince’s lost doll, she didn’t think he’d treat it like a real apprenticeship. But his ‘lessons’ were endless—and endlessly obnoxious—as if thieving were some great art.

  Back in Grambling, the last town they passed through, he’d swindled a drunken ta
ilor out of boots. Played him in a game of gems, even though he’d swiped all the good cards before and hid them up his sleeve. Sora asked what the lesson was in that and he might as well have shrugged when he said, “Always check your stack before you deal.”

  It wasn’t that he’d changed terribly since their time together as children in Troborough, but now, he had a one-track mind. In her experience, all young men had one track minds, but Whitney’s was different. All he seemed to care about was stealing and making a name for himself. And none of what he took even mattered, he was happy just to throw it away. It was an obsession.

  What’s worse, in the thrill of their few jobs together she’d forgotten herself, but afterward, she always questioned if Wetzel had spent the final years of his life training her so she could become a thief. She’d grit her teeth and look up to the sky, then sigh and follow along behind Whitney. Because she cared about exactly one person in the world, and as incredibly irritating as he could be, he now stood right beside her wearing that goofy smile he always did when he thought he had a bright idea.

  She had nowhere else to go. Nobody else to be with. No home.

  “Sora.” Whitney snapped his fingers in front of her face to get her attention.

  “What?” she asked.

  “I’m going to be just over there.” He pointed to a large boulder dotting the side of the dirt trail where the path fell off down a sharp slope into the Jarein Gorge. The rift in the land was massive and deep, a canvas of red and russet rock where snow didn’t cover it. At the far bottom, a river connected Winde Port with the Walled Lake which was half frozen by winter’s touch, and eventually through tributaries to Yarrington or east into the Panping Region.

  “If they try anything—”

  “I won’t be far,” Whitney interrupted.

  “I was going to say I’m going to roast you alive.” She smiled. She couldn’t help it around him, even when he was being a pest.

  “I’d expect nothing less from the great and mighty Sora. We need to get you a name.”

  “Can we steal that next?” she joked before realizing he might take her seriously. She had no interest in being ennobled. She had no parents that she knew of, no family connections, and she’d been fine living that way her whole life.

  “It’s on my list. And don’t worry, this is a merchant caravan with a guard or two. No way they’re going to try anything too nefarious.”

  “Easy for you to think while hiding behind a rock.”

  “You’ll be fine,” Whitney assured her. "When the time is right, you know the plan.”

  Sora took a deep breath and let it out. She could take care of herself. She drew a thin line of blood along her leg with her knife which once belonged to her late teacher Wetzel.

  Then she slapped it into Whitney’s waiting hand, harder than she needed to. Not only would the cut help with the illusion of being a damsel in distress, along with her purposefully ripped clothes, but it provided ready access to a font of sacrifice which would allow her to tap into the magic of Elsewhere.

  Blood drawn is never wasted, she told herself. Power from sacrifice. That was the main lesson Wetzel imparted in his teachings. The image of him crushed and charred under the roof of his shack after the Shesaitju raided Troborough flashed through her mind. She did her best to force it away.

  She stepped out onto the Glass Road which connected Yarrington, the capital of The Glass Kingdom, and Yaolin City in the eastern region. The further from the capital they got, the less impressive the road grew until it was just a narrow line of dirt skirting the cliffs and a peppering of gravel for footing. She scraped away the thin layer of snow with her hands, always gloved when in public to cover her blood mage scars, then lay across the road as if she’d been beaten and left for dead. She tore the shoulder of her tunic a bit more after she got comfortable, just in case, then closed her eyes.

  A few minutes later she was shivering. As she lay there, alone and vulnerable, she realized how much a gamble this was so far out in the middle of nowhere. The Jarein Gorge wasn’t safe territory for anyone, let alone a young lady. It was the quickest route to Winde Port by land and Sora remembered talk back in Grambling about bandits who nestled up in caverns along the bluff.

  She thought about building a tiny fire in her palm for both warmth and protection when she heard the creaking of wagon wheels and the thumping hooves of the leading horses.

  A harsh voice cried out. “Whoa!”

  The wagon rumbled to a stop. The horses snorted in protest, metal clanked, and footsteps approached.

  “She dead?” one voice asked.

  “She’s a pretty little thing,” said another, then added, “for a knife-ear.”

  “Knife-ears shag as well as the next, I say,” said a third.

  She could imagine the disgusting man’s grin as he spoke, but she held her tongue. Although she’d only been outside of Troborough a few times, she wasn’t naive. Her small village had its fair share of traveling bands and troupes passing through the Twilight Manor over the years, the kind of people who thought they were better because they’d seen things, who thought every woman in town was theirs, ripe for the plucking.

  Sora much preferred stealing herself away into the hollow below Wetzel’s shack, reading the dusty old tomes on magic he’d gathered throughout his long, friendless life.

  “She dead?” repeated the first one.

  “Dun’t think so. She’s breathing.”

  Sora moaned, putting as much desperation into it as she could muster.

  “Well, don’t just stand there, help her into the wagon!” Hands fell upon her, sliding and groping around unnecessarily. Her muscles tensed involuntarily but she relaxed them and stuck to the plan.

  She cried out in mock pain. The men backed off. “Don’t move me, p-please. I-I think I’ve broken s-som-something.”

  She made believe the noon sun was blinding her like it’d been ages since she’d opened her eyes.

  “What happened, my dear?” asked a portly fellow in orange silks. He had the look of a trader—combed gray hair under a feathered cap and a calming smile. His accent reeked of Old Yarrington arrogance as he annunciated each syllable of every word.

  Two hunks of muscle and armor stood off to the side, whispering and grinning with one another. They were nearly identical. One made crude gestures toward Sora, the other snickered. Another man with ash-colored skin and a scaled leather cuirass knelt beside her. A Shesaitju... a Black Sandsmen like the ones who had ravaged her hometown.

  The sight of him made her lose her train of thought. She could feel the cut on her leg burning as if Elsewhere were begging her to draw on it and turn the man into crispy flesh like his kind had done to Troborough.

  Stick to the plan, she told herself. She’d felt terrible about robbing a group she knew nothing of, but a part of her now considered how nice it would be to ride south on two horses instead of one.

  “My wagon’s h-horse got sp-spooked,” she said. “Drove off the ledge. I-I barely… I barely j-jumped in time.” She eyed each one, in turn, looking for signs of suspicion but found none.

  “Over there?” asked the old man in silks, pointing toward the ledge which emptied into the gorge.

  Sora let out a soft moan and nodded.

  The twin brutes stopped joking long enough to walk with their leader toward the ledge. Their plate armor was impressive, but unmarked, meaning they were swords for hire keeping the wagon and its owner safe. Which also meant there might be something worth taking inside.

  Sora cursed herself for thinking like Whitney.

  The Shesaitju stayed by her side. He inspected her, eyes pale and gray like the sky after a rain shower. He said nothing, but Sora nearly shuddered under his gaze.

  “I see nothing at the bottom!” one of the mercenaries called back. “Nothing at all.”

  “H-how could you?” she asked. “’Tis only shadow down there.”

  “Oi, you know what it looks like down there? What’d you first crawl t
o the ledge to see the remains of your cart before you flopped over, girl?”

  The big men laughed.

  “And pray tell, what was a knife-ear wench like you doing out here all alone so far from your home?”

  “Looking for a real man, I say,” said one of the guards with a grunt.

  “Pick her up,” the trader ordered. “We can’t leave her here in this state.”

  Sora began to sweat more than she already was. The Shesaitju continued to stare, silent.

  The armored men grabbed her and yanked her to her feet about as gently as if they were hefting a dead warthog. She maintained her composure and groaned, even though her blood was beginning to boil.

  She could hear Whitney’s voice in the back of her mind, “Lesson three: never give up the grift until the grift is done!”

  She swore silently, wondering what he was waiting for.

  “Another member of our merry band?” one of the mercenaries said to the trader.

  A large hand slid over her breast and squeezed hard. She whimpered, experiencing real pain this time. Her eyes fell toward the cut on her leg. She imagined what it would be like to light the man on fire starting from his boots.

  “Something funny, girl?”

  She hadn’t realized she’d been grinning at the thought.

  “P-please,” she begged, “I’m just trying to get to Winde Port. M-my cart went over—”

  The mercenary squeezed her jaw and tilted her head up to get a better look at her like she was a prized steed. “You already said that.”

  “Enough,” the trader said.

  “Why? You think a pretty little thing like this wound up out here alone? What’s your game knife-ear?” He turned her head again, this time more forcefully. Instinct kicked in, and Sora bit down on the soft bit of flesh between his thumb and forefinger. He howled, and she broke free.

  “You wench!”

  The other twin grabbed her and threw her down near the wagon. Her head bounced off dirt and gravel and had her seeing stars.

  “Stop this, now,” the trader said.