XI.
Toil and Trouble
Alrain escorted Daecrynn back to the empty meeting room of the Merry Jackals, as his suite awaited him atop the Silver Willow. Arduously, he fought his exhaustion climbing the stairs to his room. He stared at the number on his door. Six. He had no key for it, but remembered Calwain giving him that room. His head rang and the hallway spun. To his left, another door creaked open. Daecrynn spied Nadali looking back at him.
“Calwain told me you forgot to get your key from him,” Nadali said.
“So you have my key?” Daecrynn asked weakly.
“Uh huh—there’s a catch though,” Nadali said as she massaged Daecrynn’s shoulders. “If I give you this key, I turn mine in tomorrow. Either way, we are renting only one room.”
“You move fast,” Daecrynn grinned dizzily.
“Oh,” Nadali removed her hands, and playfully pointed at his chest. “I am sworn to protect you, remember?”
“Well yeah, but that was for the trip to the camp,” Daecrynn said.
“I was never formally relieved of duty,” Nadali asserted. “Therefore, I am not leaving your side. Is this a problem?”
“Well no,” Daecrynn said breathily. “Not at all, I mean—“
“Hush,” Nadali said as she stared into his eyes. Returning her gaze, their eyes were locked, as if they were exploring each others’ souls through their windows. Falling into an embrace, they retired to Daecrynn’s room and shut the door tight behind them.
* * *
After everyone had returned and was accounted for from the night’s missions of mischief, Calwain closed up the bar, locking the front door with a simple iron key. He hoisted his satchel over his shoulder, and walked into the dimly lit night, over the cobblestones of Elandrae Walk. The street was narrow, with tall ivy covered stone buildings along both sides, lined with street lamps and hitching posts. In an alley between two three-story-high shop buildings, he heard a whimper. Carefully, he readied his knife and slid into the alley to investigate. The whimpering turned to sobbing as he approached. He knew the voice.
“Tai’issa?” he asked.
“Calwain—they…” Tai’issa coughed, and whimpered painfully. “The soldiers. I didn’t yield, love.”
Calwain knelt in the mud, and put his hand on her shoulder. She breathed her last.
* * *
Daecrynn tended the bar in the morning after breakfast. He mostly cleaned up and dragged his feet through the whole ordeal having only been to sleep less than four hours in the last two days. He was surviving, albeit reluctantly. Calwain was nowhere to be seen.
An armored man sans helmet, with a silver chest plate and a sheathed long sword entered the bar with menace in his eyes. He glared about the tavern with cold metallic eyes that spoke of violence, be it intended or unplanned. His hair was black and his skin was brownish gray.
“This bar is filthy. I demand clean service,” the man shouted in Madrocean, with a Cirethian warble.
“Right away,” Daecrynn said lowly.
“You aren’t fast enough. Where is my order!” the man demanded.
“You haven’t ordered yet,” Daecrynn replied.
“You elves have magic powers—read my mind,” he smirked. “My order now or I’m going to set this tavern on fire and there isn’t a Set damned thing you can do about it!”
In the distance, there was a singing sound, almost like a high pitched organ pipe coming from above.
“What in the Underworld is that?” the man shouted upstairs.
With a spin, Daecrynn kicked him in the back of the head. As the man fell forward, he drew his sword. The tip of Nadali’s sword touched the back of his neck. The sound upstairs ceased.
“Here is your order. Get your insolent, ignorant, pig faced arse out of my bar now,” Daecrynn commanded. “That is an order.”
“I have very wealthy friends,” the man growled. “This isn’t the last you’ve seen of me.”
“Perhaps it’s not,” Daecrynn said calmly. “Now get out.”
The man glared at Daecrynn while Nadali’s blade closed in to the skin of his throat. He turned to the exit, and left the Silver Willow in a rage. The door slammed behind him. He kicked a child into the street. A horseman bringing in supplies of butter from Tanathiel recoiled as his horse spooked, and the child stood. He pushed his way through the thick crowds of Taergeni adorned in rags and older clothes long past their prime. In the corner of his eye, he took note of an Imperial wanted poster recently torn from a wall fluttering about the street. In stark realization, he turned back to the bar and grinned triumphantly.
‘I have found him! The Asat Takran will pay me well for this…’
XII.
A Revelation
“All things change,”
–Chenylde Murana
It seemed like an ordinary day, having been settled in Namakiera for a little over a week. Daecrynn came downstairs to help Calwain clean up from the breakfast banquet, starting his morning shift. Things were moving slowly, as Nadali had come home late the previous night from an exploitation run, and Daecrynn insisted she get an extra hour of rest.
Nobody but Daecrynn and an elder elf in spectacles, reading a satchel full of scrolls, sipping a cup of taku-bean tea were present in the bar. From time to time, Daecrynn would pretend to not notice that this stranger had been paying special attention to him.
Daecrynn was running his cloth over graffiti carved into the bar with a multitude of knife-points, arrowheads and other styli. He read it, spying the thoughts of many a local and transient who had passed through this bar. Many obscenities in the common dialect of Taergeni, and statements like: “Mogran rapes goats and burns villages.” “Borel Vordun is a friend of Dung Apes.” “Keserei loves Faralla L.” “Aleria gives great mouth.” “Have you killed a gah’raen today?” “Namakiera belongs to Tarligean, remember Andriel!” Scattered among these words, little eight-pointed stars—the forbidden symbol of Tarligean past.
“Another cup please?” the stranger asked.
“Yes sir, right away,” Daecrynn answered as Nadali wandered down the stairs.
“Your accent differs from the Namakiera drawl. Where are you from?”
“The southern edge of Tuitari, near the ashes of a village that the occupation burned,” Daecrynn explained.
“No, your accent’s too erudite for Tuitari. I’d wager you were a native of Andriel,” the stranger mused distantly.
Daecrynn folded his arms as he considered the stranger.
“Displaced in Tuitari perhaps,” the stranger continued.
“I have never been to Andriel,” Daecrynn insisted.
“As you wish,” the stranger conceded, his tone hinting at deference. “Nonetheless, I was sent to pass this on to you two, specifically. When the Empire razed Fidralinia, they executed Threis. He died as a King, and not a slave.”
Daecrynn dropped the tea he had prepared for the stranger. Nadali froze at the foot of the stair, her eyes glossing over in frozen tears.
“We arrived too late, and couldn’t call down the rains to stop the fires in time. There is nothing left but ash,” he revealed grimly.
The stranger turned to Nadali in his chair. “I am truly sorry.”
Nadali cast her head down, and shrieked in despair. She turned and ran back to her room upstairs, as Daecrynn followed.
“I must return to Tanathiel,” the stranger announced. “My friends will be pleased to hear that you are alive and well, but I must leave now”
Nadali pushed the door in, picked up her sword and threw it into the far wall. She wailed uncontrollably, screaming to her father, clutching the mattress. Daecrynn closed the door behind him as he entered, and from the bedside put his arm around her to console her.
“D’nani, I am so sorry,” Daecrynn cried as a tear rolled down his cheek.
“You didn’t kill him, that … messenger didn’t kill him,” Nadali cried in despair. “The gah’raen killed him! And I will slaughter them! I swe
ar it! I will slaughter every last gah’raen that marched on Fidralinia.”
“I will be there for you,” Daecrynn resolved. “When you march into the bowels of Verduhn with nothing but your sword and spirit, I will march by your side.”
“Just hold me,” Nadali sobbed as she sat up to lean into his shoulder.
“Just being there isn’t enough. I have to do what Kethral raised me to do. I have to do what my father had done.”
“Finish what my father started,” Nadali asked mournfully.
“I will.”
“This cannot be forgiven; the pain of death and the misery have gone too far. This cloak I shed now. I will take up the sword of my rite and reclaim Tarligean!”
“You heard the news then,” Calwain said through the door. “I was going to tell everyone tonight.”
“I cannot speak for Eliana, but I will be there. I am sorry we are unable to tend bar for you today,” Daecrynn apologized.
“May I enter?” Calwain asked.
Daecrynn looked down to Nadali, under the blanket and clutching Daecrynn’s side.
“I don’t think so right now, Eliana is not well,” Daecrynn said woefully.
“I understand,” Calwain sighed. “I’ll go summon Threstan. I’m not in the best of spirits myself.”
* * *
Later that night, Calwain was not escorted to the meeting, as it seemed that Daecrynn had fallen asleep. His head swam in vitriolic rage. Opening the meeting room door, he was greeted with an uproar. Cellan had left two days before to regroup with allies in Tuitari, leaving Alrain in charge.
Alrain stood atop the table. “Order!” he shouted. “There is no reason to panic—Cellan’s notes are more than enough information we need to execute the final phase of our operation!”
Threstan shouted up to Alrain, “With all due respect, we are not ready. According to Versinde’s notes, a battalion of Madrocean light infantry have been called from Fort Lyrem to bolster the Governor’s forces.”
“We can reinforce our troops faster if we take the city right now,” Alrain pleaded.
“And I want to shed some gah’raen blood,” Calwain snarled. “For Tai’issa!”
* * *
In the attic of the Silver Willow, Daecrynn quietly removed his simple shirt and trousers, and donned the suit made for him at the request of King Threis. Around his neck, he swung a crimson cape embroidered with the knot-and-square pattern of the House Tuvitor in golden thread. He tied his cape together with a brooch of moonsilver and orichalcum, a square interleaved with a four looped knot. He lifted up his satchel, and unwrapped Oro’quiel from its makeshift cloth scabbard, placing it into a fine leather scabbard gifted to him by Alrain a few days hence.
He slipped through the attic door, in front of a full body mirror that sat at the end of the hallway on the top floor of the Silver Willow. He adjusted his suit to make it more symmetrical and less wrinkled. He turned and march down the main stairs that led down to the ground floor. He rushed through the darkened tavern, into the background, and down the stairs into the chaos of the meeting.
“Well I am leaving! Perhaps we can find safe haven in Ciartha Tuitari, because without Cellan, our exploits are doomed! They’re pushing us out of the city, starting when Mogran speaks tomorrow,” Threstan shouted.
“Who is with us then? Who will stay behind and fight the Empire’s oppression, even to the last man?” Alrain cried.
“I am with us,” Daecrynn declared, as he unsheathed Oro’quiel and plunged it into the table before him.
“The Son of Meldehan is with us!” Alrain proclaimed, his tone shifting from despair to jubilation.
The doors swung open, and a grim feminine voice shouted over the uttering of the crowd. “As is Nadali Murana, daughter of the late King Threis.”
“And Kalrys Kretali, Lord Protector of Fidralinia, and First Knight of Andriel under Ariandi the Steadfast,” Kalrys affirmed.
XIII.
Changing of the Guard
“The tyrant’s fist and the forerunner of revolution are one—fear,”
–Meldehan Tuvitor
The Gerellei Contract
“My liege,” Alrain said quietly. “You have the floor.”
“Today the news had reached me that Threis the Warrior-Sage, King of Andule was executed by beheading. To this date, since Cassadina, we have been a divided people. We hide in the shadows and run from the threat, and know little of the freedom we deserve. This is to change, beginning right now,” Daecrynn declared as he approached the table, retrieving the sword plunged in the table’s center. “Now that I have your attention, this is what we’re going to do. We are taking the city—tonight. By dawn the Ki’ronyx flies over Namakiera.”
“What of the Governor’s plan to exile the remaining Taergeni in the city?” Threstan asked. “And what of the reinforcements called in from Fort Lyrem?”
Daecrynn paused for a moment, not knowing of the plan. “The governor should be making an escape plan at this time. When I get my hands on him, I am going to cut his throat.”
“If I may interrupt,” Kalrys requested quietly.
“Go ahead,” Daecrynn replied.
“The purpose of Cellan’s departure is simple—and was done so on the advice of myself and the same individual who informed us of the Lyrem contingent. He has gone to Ciartha Tuitari to call for reinforcements. The time to move is now, and with our Kestiel Prince among us, we have no excuses to stall.”
“Hail Daecrynn, son of Meldehan! High Prince and Lord of Tarligean,” a voice in the crowd shouted. More cheers erupted in response.
“We have courage, we have heart. I know this because I have seen all levels of our people from the rogue houses that drift in exile to the common laborers and men-at-arms of Tarligean, to the farmers of the high plain. We have been burdened by Madrocean hegemony, but we are proud. I know our heart, do you?” Daecrynn pleaded.
Where there had been division, there was but one mind. The time had come for war in Tarligean.
Daecrynn ordered the maps, including the layer of Cellan’s annotations. They discussed the many weaknesses in the city’s defenses. He ordered twelve separate exploitation teams be formed to strike after the meeting’s close, as well as a main strike team that Daecrynn himself would lead. Not one able-bodied member of the Merry Jackals would be returning home tonight; not until the Ki’ronyx flew over Namakiera.
Before the meeting’s close, Daecrynn addressed the crowd one last time.
“After today, we need not be spat upon, we need not run and hide. We can be what we are, and stand tall,” Daecrynn proclaimed. “I shall not rest—we will not rest until all of Madrocea is driven south of Alvanea. Not until our banner is hoisted above the Palace of the High Kingdom in Andriel, flying high and proud.”
The crowd cheered, and dispersed as the teams prepared for battle. As the men gathered their swords and bows for battle, they sang a traditional Taergeni battle hymn. The room had become a command center as exploitation team leaders discussed their tactics. Daecrynn spoke with the team leaders, coordinating them into twelve different tasks. The core team under Daecrynn included Threstan, Nadali, and two others from Daecrynn’s first exploitation team.
“The whole city is going to be up for grabs when we take the tunnel on the north side of the eastern artery. We will go on Alrain’s signal Striking the grain silos belonging to the Cityguard’s camp, his mission will be tactically important, as it will draw the attention closest to the palace. Of all the distractions, his is the most important. When we learn of his success, this is when we move into the palace, and into the Chamber of Harvest, where his banquet will be held this morning. We will enter shortly before the banquet begins. After the second helpings, he will make his announcement and a toast. We intend him to be removed from power long before then,” Daecrynn explained as he briefed the core team. “The west wall should be unguarded, as it is the wall closest to the Cityguard’s camp. We will come up beneath it, into a storage cellar con
nected to our network of tunnels, and then up to the surface, across the west wing of the palace and into the Chamber of Harvests. Threstan and Damarien will slip up to the mezzanine, where they will support us with cover fire, engaging any guards near the target.”
“Understood milord,” Threstan acknowledged. “I hope you can forgive any seeds of doubt I may had sown before your arrival.”
“Your caution can save lives, even on the field tonight—I am sure you know the difference between wisdom and cowardice. There is no need for apology.”
“Thank you, milord.”
* * *
They moved through the labyrinthine tunnel system built beneath Namakiera, setting up distractions, setting fire to guard posts throughout the city and creating an elaborate distraction to keep any possible reinforcements occupied.
The Legacy of Tirlannon: The Freedom Fighter Page 10