The Restless Shore: The Wilds

by James P. Davis

  The grassland rose higher and higher until it met the edge of the distant forest. Its leaves seemed on fire in full sunlight, and beyond them, towering above the tree tops was the Spur itself. The central stone of the forest was farther west than her journey had taken her, its curling top hazy through the clouds that gathered around it. Dots rose and fell on the wind, birds that had taken up residence on its sides. It was an exact image from her dream, and she had little doubt that Tessaeril had stood in the same spot and looked back before moving on.

  She started at the approach of Vaasurri and Uthalion, collected herself and checked her meager pack. Uthalion wordlessly handed her a waterskin as he passed and moved toward the long sloping path into the broken grassland beyond. Seeing him in the light for the first time, she couldn’t say he was particularly handsome, but nor was he ugly, for a human. His face was rough and lined, his eyes piercing, confident, and strong. Curiously, despite his previous objections to helping her, he did not seem inclined to wait for anyone else, pressing on in the lead with nary a gesture or even a harsh word.

  Before she could take a first step to follow, Brindani passed her as well, his head down and his cloak pulled tight around his shoulders. Neither of the men acknowledged her or each other.

  “Worry not,” Vaasurri said and stood at her side. “I’m sure in a few days you’ll be hard pressed to shut them up for all their chatter.”

  She smiled briefly despite herself and fell into step beside the killoren.

  “Tell me more about this Choir,” he said at length as they descended. The land revealed its soaring cliffs and perilous drops, a massive field of shattered green and sparkling crystals.

  “Little to tell really,” she sighed. “Though I expect they are less the men they present themselves as and more … well, something else. They appeared in the city streets one day, only in the lower districts, with bandages around their hands and dirty robes. Their every movement, their smell, and the places they would frequent, made them seem little more than beggars. But their voices …

  “I was sober the first time I heard them singing, and the sound chilled my soul. It was like messengers from the gods pronouncing some judgment upon all who listened.” She shuddered at the memory. “After that, I avoided them at all costs, wishing they would move on as quickly as they’d arrived. But then, as they enthralled groups of those that found some kind of hope in their songs, Tessaeril began to listen as well.”

  “Did she go with them willingly?” he asked.

  “What are you implying?” she returned sharply, but she calmed herself, seeing genuine curiosity in the killoren’s eyes, “I’m sorry. No, I don’t believe so. Their songs are strange, very … persuasive. They escaped the city with a dozen other citizens without alerting even the sharpest-eyed guard.”

  Vassurri nodded and seemed to consider the tale as they journeyed deeper into the Mere-That-Was. Occasionally she glanced over her shoulder, expecting at any moment to find the dreamers—or even the Choir themselves—bearing down on them, calling her name. She’d expected the killoren to press her on the subject and was relieved that he did not. She was still trying to work out for herself why the Choir would come back for her. As the day wore on, and the sun neared the western horizon, she feared the evening’s dream would be stronger. She found herself both dreading and looking forward to the strange nightmare and the bewitching song.

  “Perhaps I shall learn more tonight,” she whispered, watching the sun slowly turn a deep orange.

  “Pardon?” Vaasurri said, overhearing her.

  “Nothing, just thinking out loud,” she answered quickly, still not entirely comfortable with the idea of sharing her dreams with anyone else. “What about Tohrepur?” she asked. “Has Uthalion ever mentioned …?”

  “Not much,” he said as they looked to the human, still in the lead and forging a winding path through the towering crystals. “He’s not usually one for speaking about that part of his past lightly or at length.”

  “So I gathered last night,” she said, recalling his argument with Brindani. “It’s something he and the half-elf have in common.”

  Uthalion stopped at the other end of a natural bridge of land, both sides of which dropped down into the shadows of the lower plains. He paced out an area, on the southern side of a hill, and let his pack fall to the ground. The sun had just dipped into a deep red edge on the western horizon, and the sky was beginning a slow purpling toward twilight.

  “We’ll rest here,” he said, studying the area as Ghaelya surveyed the hill and cast yet another worried glance to the north. “Cold camp only, and we’ll break before dawn … make as much distance as possible between us and them before hitting the Wash.”

  The statement reassured Ghaelya as she knelt in the grass and eased her legs, but she kept a nervous hand on her sword all the same. The dreamers had surprised her more than once with their speed, and she wasn’t quite ready to trust being out in the open after dark.

  “I should start a fool’s fire,” Vaasurri said and shouldered his pack again. “Draw them off if they get too close, and the smoke could help cover what scent we’ve left behind.”

  “Your ears will serve us better here,” Uthalion said. “I’ll take Brindani with me, and we’ll set the fire.”

  Brindani paced at the edge of the site, staring west and keeping his head low. Vaasurri reluctantly nodded and rejoined Ghaelya. The human took what supplies he needed and turned to leave, though Ghaelya noticed Brindani took his pack, refusing to let it get more than an arm’s length from his shoulder.

  “We’ll be back soon,” Uthalion added. “If anything happens light the last of the flash-torches. We’ll spot it easily in the dark.”

  With that, the two set out, quickly disappearing among the hills and the crystals. Ghaelya watched the last of the sunlight slowly drain away as she chewed absently on dried fruit and a strip of salted venison. She tasted neither, her gaze darting at every sound, and her pulse jumping at every imagined movement. Scarcely a night had passed in several days when she hadn’t been running or hiding from things in the dark. And when she had managed to sleep, the dreams had left her restless and shaken.

  Any rest at all, she reckoned, would come uneasily and be spent fitfully. When Vaasurri mentioned taking first watch, she pretended not to hear him, listening only for the haunting howls of the dreamers and the beguiling voices of the Choir.

  7 Mirtul, the Year of the Ageless One

  (1479 DR)

  The Akana, North of the Wash, Akanûl

  Moonlight stretched dim shadows across the ground as Uthalion eyed the dark edge of the cliff on his left, its sheer drop disappearing into an endless ocean of black. Taking a deep breath, he beat back the imagery of teeth and tentacles swimming through the inky expanse of shadow, tore his eyes away from the limitless fall, and focused on the task at hand. Brindani remained in the lead, his half-elf eyes more suited to the pale light of the rising moon, though his occasional stumbling too close to the cliff made Uthalion more than a little nervous.

  The half-elf maintained a strange silence, his heavy lidded gaze wandering lazily from one patch of ground to the next as they searched for bits of deadfall. His skin was pale, and a constant sheen of sweat caused his forehead to glisten, a sure sign of fever. Uthalion said nothing, allowing Brindani his show of strength, a denial of whatever sickness had overcome him. But the farther they journeyed into the dark, the more he wondered if Brindani would make it back under his own power.

  Uthalion wondered at the myriad of poisons they might have come in contact with since leaving the grove. None of them matched the symptoms Brindani was displaying. Very few of the Akana’s toxins left a man able to even walk, but walk the half-elf did and purposely, as if he were searching for something in the dark. Slowly, Uthalion increased the distance between them, feeling uneasy and keeping Brindani just within sight.

  Low stone walls, overgrown with grass and weeds, rose from the ground on their right. They increased i
n number as the pair passed into a city fallen long before, victim to either the Spellplague or the war with the aboleths who had once laid siege to Airspur.

  Though there were no signs of the nightmarish beasts now, Uthalion still gritted his teeth at the thought of them lying in wait, keeping his sword handy and a careful eye on the seemingly oblivious half-elf.

  The remains of the town rose on buckled earth. Cresting its top, Uthalion turned north, studying the height and the slow rise of land leading up to the far distant Spur.

  “Stop,” he called to Brindani and laid down his bundle of wood at the top of the hill. “This place will do.”

  The half-elf paused, wavering unsteadily on his feet for a moment before turning back to the center of the clearing. He dropped his meager pile of deadfall along with the rest as Uthalion arranged what they’d collected into a suitable stack for burning. Brindani stood watching for a heartbeat, then turned back to his mysterious search of the ground.

  “Are you really going back?” Brindani called over his shoulder as he paced the clearing in slow circles, kneeling in places to inspect something before moving on. “Or is this just a show? Some kind of honor … or obligation …”

  Uthalion sighed angrily, breaking a long stick over his knee and continuing his preparation of the fire. He ignored the half-elf and cursed the desire to speak at all to one another, preferring to journey all the way to Tohrepur and back with nothing but dead air hanging between them. The very idea calmed him, but Brindani either did not share the sentiment or did not care.

  “Perhaps Ghaelya and I are just some noble excuse for you, eh?” the half-elf continued, his pacing becoming more erratic, his search slightly more frantic. “Maybe you’re using us … And not the other way around.”

  “What do you care?” Uthalion replied, breaking another stick, the sound of the snap swallowed by the night. “I’m here. This is what you wanted, right?”

  “What I wanted …” Brindani’s voice came slurred and weak as he stopped his pacing, stared at the ground, and swayed slightly. “Right …”

  “Get over it, Brin,” Uthalion said as he stood and surveyed the packed pile of deadfall in the moonlight. Turning sidelong to the half-elf he added, “Or get it out of your system.”

  Brindani was kneeling on the ground and fumbling with his pack, his back to the human. He did not reply directly, but Uthalion heard him mutter distractedly, “Out of my system …”

  Uthalion produced a tightly packed bundle of burn-moss and two chips of flint to start the blaze. The burn-moss ignited easily, glowing with a nimbus of flame as he placed it within the deadfall. He stood back as flickers of light illuminated the high ground of the clearing. Nodding in satisfaction, he froze as a familiar clicking growl reached his ears from the tall grasses in the northern end of the ruined town.

  With his hand on his sword, Uthalion turned slowly, studying the shadows at the edge of the light. Brindani did not rise or give any indication of alarm, and Uthalion cursed the half-elf, sorely needing Brindani’s eyes to help identify the threat. He cleared his throat loudly, an old signal from their time together as soldiers. There was no reaction.

  Indiscernible shadows shifted through the dark, rustling through the grass. Uthalion strode slowly toward his companion, drawing his blade and staring daggers into Brindani’s back as he listened for the unseen predators. The unmistakable sound of tiny claws scratching on stone seemed to surround them, punctuated by the clacking of tiny teeth and more of the little growls.

  “That thing we faced in the Spur … the kaia,” he said, still trying to get Brindani’s attention away from the dirt. “It eats its own young or runs them from the forest, or so Vaasurri tells me.”

  The half-elf’s shoulders shook, and his head nodded lazily, but he did not rise or notice the squirming bits of blackness at the edge of the fire’s growing light. Tiny teeth gleamed among the tall blades of grass, little mouths emitting the clicks and growls as the beasts circled and prepared to advance on the unsuspecting Brindani.

  “They start out small, he says,” Uthalion said as he turned his sword in a slow circle. “But they’re never pretty.”

  Slippery tendrils of darkness separated them from the gloom, crawling and hungrily whining for flesh. For half a breath Uthalion considered letting them have Brindani as their easy meal. Cursing, he charged at the first beast entering the light.

  Ghaelya gradually eased into the hushed quiet of the Akana, lying back uneasily under a moonlit sky full of stars. She anchored her attention upon their faint light, still not comfortable with the dark of the open land. Cursing all the expanse of the Akana within her field of vision, she knew if lack of sleep did not kill her, then the awful quiet surely would. Thin clouds drifted across the moon like veils of silk, drawing smoky shadows over the land. The grasses rippled and undulated in soft breezes, a deep green tide that stirred Ghaelya’s watery soul and made her long for the flashing waves of the Sea of Fallen Stars.

  Vaasurri sat on silent watch like a little tree, his coarse, grasslike brown hair whispering in the wind. He had spared her his questions since Uthalion and Brindani had left, leaving her to rest and make an attempt at sleep for which she had no desire. Restless nerves caused her arms and legs to twitch in frustration; she knew she should be on her way, racing across the wild lands to find Tessaeril. She crossed her legs, and folded her arms tight across her belly.

  Though she was no stranger to falling asleep on hard ground, it had usually been her bedroom floor after a long night of drinking and not after several days of running. No howling dreamers or singing Choir came to rouse her from her rest and send her running into dark places to hide. There were no calls of the city watch or bawdy songs sung in seedy taverns, no screaming mother or disapproving father to let her know that all was normal. And above all, no Tessaeril to find her and bring her home when she’d strayed too far or had too much to drink, to wince at the sight of a new bruise or cut earned while being foolish.

  Am I foolish? she thought. Am I out here for no reason other than my own guilt? A fool’s errand to ease my mind?

  As the sky slowly turned before her weary eyes, stars exploded into fragments amid the facets of distant crystals. Night flowers bloomed, unfurling long stems to rise above the grass. It was an alien place to her, as most places were when she ran from the things she should have done. She’d lived so long in the shadows of life, the dark places between responsibility and obligation, that she hadn’t known true darkness until running away was all she had. She closed her eyes tightly, holding herself still and tried to pretend that in time sleep would come quickly and easily.

  “You should get some rest,” Vaasurri said, causing her to exhale a held breath and smile despite herself.

  “How do you know I wasn’t already asleep?” she asked. “Perhaps you woke me up.”

  Vaasurri shifted in the moonlight, his fey eyes studying her closely as he leaned forward.

  “Most people don’t act tough when they’re really asleep,” he answered. “Also, your breathing is too fast, your pulse too strong, and unless you intend to engage your dreams in mortal combat, that grip on your sword was a giveaway as well.”

  She released the tension in her hand in surprise, unaware she had been prepared to draw the blade. Sighing, she relaxed somewhat and shook her head.

  “I used to have no problem at all falling asleep. No matter what trouble I’d get myself into, I knew it would all go away by the next day or the day after that,” she said, picturing her soft bed at home with a twinge of guilt. “Out here though …”

  “We don’t call it trouble,” Vaasurri replied, sitting up and returning to his watch. “Trouble is temporary. This is survival, and it is constant, one moment to the next, from rest to hunting to being hunted … The blood and the bloom.”

  She turned to him at the last, wondering where she’d heard the familiar expression before and fearing the answer. Though it slipped away from her wakeful mind, she somehow knew her ans
wer would be forthcoming if sleep did indeed find her. She rose on one elbow to face the killoren.

  “How did you meet Uthalion?” she asked.

  “Actually, he saved my life.” He turned and smiled. “By trying to kill me,” he added.

  “Ah, that’s reassuring,” she said, eager to hear the rest of the story. But the sound of distant howls, weak and echoing through the broken land, reached her ears like the first rumbles of thunder in a coming storm. Vaasurri turned to face the sound as Ghaelya swiftly rose to a crouch, her sword drawn.

  “But that,” she said, “is not.”

  Two of the infant kaia charged into the firelight, squealing and snapping their jaws, their whiplike tails propelling them forward behind clawed little arms. Uthalion’s blade intercepted the first, splashing its ochre blood into the grass and splitting its wriggling body in two. Others, smaller than their dead sibling, pounced on the twitching body and dragged it back into the dark, growling and fighting over its flesh. The second kaia made straight for the kneeling half-elf even as more of the beasts crawled from their hiding places to surround the pair.

  Wide jaws revealed gleaming teeth dripping with spittle as Brindani finally looked up and saw the beast advancing on him. Uthalion could not see the surprise in the half-elf’s eyes, but dearly wished he could have witnessed that one brief moment of clarity. He hurled his dagger, sending it end over end to sink into the little kaia’s body. It squealed, a keening that was a blessing compared to the thunderous voice of the adult beast.

  The creature flopped away, bleeding yellow fluid from around the knife embedded in its stumpy neck. Its siblings saw their opportunity and charged in at the half-elf who’d managed to rise on one knee and draw his sword. Uthalion rushed in, cursing the bleary look in Brindani’s eyes and split the tail of one kaia before skewering another, throwing it from the end of his blade to smash upon the stone wall.