Spiderhunter (Ages of Argainen Book 1)

by Robe

  -

  The day passed with little event. Dalk, Reon, and Thraun made several patrols around the market, just to ensure nothing terrible was befalling the people of Abelenst. Mostly, the heroes rested and planned. For the better part of the day, Joan, Kandon, Ziem, and Auric labored to help repair the damaged windows, a relaxing pastime compared to their usual activities. Veese told them he was going for a stroll and that they should not worry about him should he be gone until late, and he disappeared for the rest of the day. Joan and Kandon might as well have been joined at the hip, both of them constantly flirting and fussing over each other’s battle marks, no matter how superficial.

  After a satisfying dinner which Tolsien provided in thanks for the assistance with his windows, Kandon left to use the washroom and Ziem made off mysteriously, leaving Joan sitting by herself at the round table in the corner. Auric approached and sat opposite her, leaving her looking somewhat uncomfortable.

  “I need to apologize to you,” Auric said. “I’ve been meaning to.” Joan’s face visibly paled, and Auric saw her swallow. She made no response during his pause.

  “What I did to you was vile, and I cannot be sorry enough,” Auric continued, his eyes wide, sincere, and searching Joan’s face for clues as to what her reaction might be.

  “Auric,” Joan began. “You were consumed by your emotions. We’re all stressed. There isn’t any point in making it worse than it needs to be,” Auric nodded without looking from her, surprised at her words. “It does count that you apologized, though. Thank you.” As she finished, Kandon appeared at the other side of the room and began making his way toward them. “Just don’t let it happen again,” Joan warned, and then she half-smiled at Auric before rising from the table.

  Ziem returned a short while later and was met by Auric, who scolded him for vanishing without saying a word. Presenting a deck of cards, Ziem smiled. “I thought we were due for a game of Chakzat,” he said, referring to a card game usually associated with gambling.

  Auric, being no stranger to the game, grinned as well, and the pair chose a table on which to deal the cards, soon playing away at each other. At some point, Kandon became interested, and upon Auric being defeated for the fourth time in a row, the mercenary demanded a shot at Ziem. Kandon played well but was still outdone by the youngest member of the group. He stood and congratulated Ziem.

  “It’s been a long time since someone beat me that quickly, if at all,” Kandon said, passing Ziem what remained of his betting coins. He returned to Joan who had little enthusiasm for such activities.

  “How did you grow to be so masterful?” Auric asked Ziem as he shuffled the cards.

  “I… was often left unattended when I was younger,” Ziem said. “When you have to do something to survive, you become pretty good at it.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Auric said. “In a way, it has made you stronger, though.”

  “In a way,” Ziem agreed, and he passed the cards to Auric so he could deal.

  Later in the night, Dalk, Reon, and Thraun returned, and later still, Veese also came about. The group chatted for a while, theorizing over what Argain’s next move would be and how they should respond. The day having been so quiet, it seemed only natural the following day would produce twice the turmoil. Eventually, the group members drifted off to bed until only Auric, Veese, and Ziem remained.

  “Did you find your day productive?” Auric asked Veese.

  “I did,” Veese said. “The more I understand my power, the more I feel we can catch Argain before it is too late.”

  Auric nodded, and Ziem spoke up. “I feel similarly. Controlling bolts of lightning is proving difficult to practice. It’s hard to find a good time.”

  “Solitude,” Veese stated simply.

  “Should I meditate?” Ziem asked.

  “If you think it would help,” Veese said.

  Ziem looked at Auric for approval. “You don’t need my say-so,” Auric said.

  “But can you spare me tomorrow?” Ziem asked.

  “If you feel you will be of better use with a day of self-reflection, then take the day,” Auric said.

  Ziem nodded. “Thank you.”

  “Well, I’d better head to bed like the others,” Auric said, and he stood. Ziem and Veese followed suit. “Maybe tomorrow we’ll be lucky and Argain will slip up.”

  -

  “I cannot believe we’re doing this again,” Joan griped as she and Kandon stalked down the streets of the residential area. A tedious attempt at spotting one of their targets, Auric had agreed, but it was better than sitting about doing nothing.

  They had their hoods pulled over their faces and walked as if they had somewhere to be so as not to attract attention. It was a bright, warm day, the sun pummeling the surface of the New World with a constant volley of shining rays.

  “How many times must we walk this street in a day before we decide Argain is not going to go strolling by us? He’s too sneaky for that now!” Joan said.

  “At least you have me for entertainment, and not Auric,” Kandon said.

  Joan rolled her eyes at the notion; she had told Kandon of Auric’s behavior since he’d apologized, and after he took the information sourly, Joan made Kandon promise he wouldn’t bring it up to the group. Grudgingly, Kandon somewhat agreed, but his feelings toward the matter had not improved.

  “I still wish you’d let me punch him in the teeth,” Kandon said.

  “Well, I won’t,” Joan replied. “So get that wish out of your head.”

  The pair became silent as a group of older women enjoying the sunny day paraded past them. Walking on, the two entered the busy town square and dropped their hoods. People stood in groups all over the area, some talking business, some meeting for a friendly chat. As Joan and Kandon passed a particularly well-dressed group of important looking men, one of them removed the pipe from his mouth and lowered his head to them momentarily. The pair responded with a similar gesture, assuming the man was hailing them for their public service against Balanch.

  When they entered the thickest part of the square, Joan saw Dalk and Thraun walking along. She caught Dalk’s eye and nodded, confirming to him that there had been no trouble in the residential quarters of Abelenst.

  Having accomplished what they had entered the square to do, Joan led the way out of the mess of people and back down the street from whence they had come. Not long after leaving the square, Joan became aware of Kandon acting strangely. He wasn’t only staying uncharacteristically quiet, but his gait had grown more tense, and his head wasn’t swiveling to survey the area around them as it usually did. When she stopped to inquire, she felt his hand on her back, pushing her along again. After she gave him an indignant look, he replied with a silent, yet meaningful glance, and she quickly figured out something was up. She stopped resisting, returning to her carefree pace beside him. Casually, Kandon guided her around a corner into an alley and then took off running, pulling her arm as he went.

  “There is someone following us,” he said in a loud whisper as the two plunged down the pathway. Kandon pulled her around the other side of the building and then back up the street the opposite way, leaving some people staring. After passing a few buildings, he turned abruptly again, and the pair rushed down another alley so they were behind the spot where they’d first turned. Once they reached the end, Kandon slowed and peeked his head around the corner.

  “See for yourself,” he said and pushed himself against the wall so she could look past him. When Joan craned her neck around the side of the building, she saw a figure clad in a grey cloak. The person walked up to where Kandon had guided her into the alley and peered down it as though looking to see where the people he or she was tailing had gone.

  “Come on,” Kandon whispered and crept out from around the side of the building with Joan close behind. The figure vanished down the gap between the two buildings, and Joan followed Kandon as he hurried up to where the person had disappeared. When they looked down the alley again,
they saw the stranger standing confusedly at the end of it, unsure of which way his or her targets had gone. Deciding they had gone right, the person vanished again, and Joan and Kandon dashed down the path to catch their stalker off-guard.

  They turned the corner and were surprised to see the being had also turned. Facing each other, the three people were startled for a moment, but the identity of the stalker was immediately clear.

  Joan released a torrent of water at Balanch, knocking his hood off and throwing him from his feet. He sputtered and stumbled to get up, but Kandon was upon him. The two men grappled for a moment before Kandon kneed Balanch in the stomach. Although the armor that Balanch ever-donned had absorbed most of the blow, it was enough to knock the air out of him, and Kandon grabbed him by the back of his cloak to slam his face into the nearby building.

  “Look what we have here. You have some explaining to do, don’t you?” Kandon demanded, his forearm holding Balanch’s face against the wall.

  “I assure you, this isn’t necessary. I simply saw you leaving the market empty-handed and thought you might like to try some of my own brand of air freshening. It’ll put you in a haze!” Balanch quickly rattled off, and before Joan or Kandon knew it, a stream of black smoke slipped from Balanch’s hands, spiraling around and blinding the pair.

  Joan dashed forward to help Kandon keep hold of the villain, but Balanch had already slipped free. In the confusion, the two accidentally inhaled the smog and were left coughing. Joan pulled Kandon in the direction she figured Balanch had fled to, and together they stumbled from the suppressing vapor.

  As Joan swung her head left and right, she spotted Balanch dashing back into one of the alleyways. “This way!” she cried and dragged Kandon further from the smoke.

  The two raced after him, through the alleyway and down the street past house after house. He was a good ways ahead of them, and it was a long, trying chase to even keep him in sight. Regardless of the fact he was wearing pieces of armor, he was exceptionally fast, and in the rush, Joan found herself pulling ahead of Kandon. She didn’t know how she was sprinting so briskly or so tirelessly, but she questioned it little as the gap closed between her and the man she pursued. After running through the entire residential zone of Abelenst, past many gasping and shouting people, Joan found herself in range of her target. With particularly demanding effort, she launched a stream of water at Balanch’s legs, sending him slamming to the ground. Before she could reach him, he had recovered, but as he looked back at her, she could see his nose had been bloodied and the side of his face scraped by the pavement. With the knowledge she’d injured Balanch, she found the energy to chase on.

  It was clear now that Balanch was afraid, as his running was no longer precise and calculated, but clumsy and panicked. He continually looked back to see how much of a lead he had on his pursuers, and it only slowed him more. Joan sent another torrent at Balanch and pummeled him in the back, forcing him to the ground before a metal fence. Managing to grip the iron bars of the gate, he dragged himself over. Joan suddenly became aware that Balanch had taken them to the harbor on the southern border of Abelenst. With a graceful maneuver, she vaulted the gate and was in range to attack him again. Briefly distracted by the ocean stretching out before her, Joan took a moment to carefully aim for the back of Balanch’s knees as he dashed down a wharf, his boots clunking against the structure with each hurried step. The villain had nowhere to go.

  Another blast of water brought him to a kneeling position at the edge of the wooden platform. He rolled to his back and retaliated with a surge of tar. Joan was sent flailing backward and struggled to compose herself through the adhesive gunk that covered her. The tar almost seemed to be alive and actively trying to restrain her, and lacking the energy to immediately overpower it, she lay hopelessly, trying to free herself from the adhesive muck. She was startled by a knife slashing through the tar and then relieved to see who had rescued her.

  Kandon pulled her to her feet, and the two watched Balanch paddling along through the ocean water awkwardly as he undid his armor and let it sink. He swam toward a freighter vessel that had recently cast off, clearly trying to board the ship as a means of escape.

  “Gone again,” Kandon panted. “That rat.”

  “At least we know where he’s gone,” Joan said. “I hope no one in Martin wants your head.”

  Kandon chuckled, and the two quietly looked on as Balanch reached the ship and was thrown a rope to board.

  “Are you certain about your decision to accompany us?” Dalk asked Thraun as the pair began making their way back through the market the way they’d come. After seeing Joan and Kandon, they were to return to the outskirts of the swarm of merchants where Argain was more likely to strike innocents. Dalk had spent lots of time in the market at Lanair, and he had grown to think of markets as being such quiet and peaceful places that he could hardly even associate the noisy Abelenst bazaar with the word marketplace.

  “I’m certain,” Thraun replied. His head looked heavy, his shoulder slouched, and the act of keeping his eyelids up was enough to get him huffing and laboring for breath. The young man wasn’t in good shape so soon after the death of Kassidy. Half-circles darkened the puffy skin beneath his eyes. Earlier in the day, he’d been weeping, but once he and Dalk set off for their patrol at Auric’s suggestion, the tears had stopped. Dalk was glad of that.

  “You know, of course, that it will be dangerous,” Dalk continued. “I attribute our current success to luck. We barely avoided much of the trauma bound for us. Battle is a nasty thing. You can never be sure what your opponent will do to try to harm you.” As he spoke, he removed his palm from the hilt of his sheathed sword and rested it on his shoulder beside the wound he’d sustained. It only hurt when he bumped it, and during his clash with Balanch, he’d hardly noticed any discomfort.

  “Pipes, knives, knife boxes, and pipe boxes! Deep iron, azure bedrock, and exotic gold all for less than you can get it anywhere else! How about you, sir? You look like you could go with some sublime shinerock to cheer you up!” a seller belted his advertisement at the passing pair, but Thraun waved his hand dismissively, barley acknowledging the merchant.

  “I want to help,” Thraun replied, but he didn’t sound enthusiastic about it. “If you and the others are in danger, my power might be able to do something about it.”

  “Our hunt is likely to take us away from Abelenst,” Dalk proceeded, “maybe very far away. You’d be leaving everything you know behind. I can’t tell you where we’ll end up.”

  “The girl I was going to marry is dead,” Thraun responded to Dalk’s barrage of reasons why he shouldn’t join them. He glared up at the taller man with his watery eyes, and Dalk could see the determination hiding past the wetness and the tiny, red veins populating those orbs. “Any reason I had to stay here is gone. I don’t care if I get hurt, or if I die. I want to help make sure something so awful never happens to anyone else.”

  Despite the fact Thraun was shaken and upset, it was obvious to Dalk that he was thinking rationally. It was something Dalk was sure he couldn’t do himself: amassing one’s anger and anguish and using them for something productive. When he gave Thraun a slow nod of understanding, the young man’s shoulders slumped further, and the frustration left his eyes.

  Thraun had a long way to go. Dalk hoped any other possible confrontations with the Evil God wouldn’t permanently scar him further. He’d already suffered enough.

  18

  “He escaped on a supply freighter?” Auric exclaimed incredulously.

  Kandon blinked at him, refusing to repeat what he had said.

  “He means that once we cornered Balanch, he leapt into the ocean and managed to board the ship that was leaving,” Joan responded.

  Auric put his hand to his forehead and let out a groan of frustration. Shortly after the escape of Balanch, Joan and Kandon headed back into town to gather their allies, first running into Dalk and Thraun and finding Auric and Reon soon after.

  �
�Well?” Dalk asked. “What are we going to do?”

  “We should retrieve the other two members of our party before discussing anything further,” Auric said, and he led the way back to The Solid Coin where Veese and Ziem were to be waiting.

  -

  Veese sat crossed-legged, watching Ziem as he influenced small sparks of energy to arc from one hand to the other. He could not deny Ziem’s control over such a volatile element was impressive, and it was sure to prove useful when combat was required. Closing his eyes, Veese took hold of the wind around him, and in a deep concentration, he pushed the air up underneath him, lifting himself upward. It was easy to get into the air; the difficult part was remaining steady. The wind beneath him swirled wildly, supplying a continual force that kept Veese from descending.

  “Woah,” Ziem said suddenly, causing Veese to open his eyes and compromise his concentration. He toppled clumsily back to the ground. “I’m sorry,” Ziem said. “I’ve just never seen anyone fly before.”

  “It is far from flying,” Veese said, “but in time, I feel it may be so, yes. How is your training going?”

  “Slowly,” Ziem replied. “I’m reluctant to release too much energy. I may not be able to control it.”

  “Find a peaceful place in your mind,” Veese suggested. “You may never improve unless you are willing to take risks.”

  Ziem nodded, and together the two practiced for several more hours in their hiding place in a cleared field, just outside the Abelenst walls by The Solid Coin. Both of the young men made noticeable progress as the day grew older, and before long, Veese was able to levitate himself with much less concentration.

  “You were born in Rathelstat?” he asked Ziem as his companion sent a minor bolt of electricity leaping and snaking between the gaps in the fingers of his left hand before it danced to the right and did the same.

  “Yes,” Ziem said.

  “Tesremin, you said?” Veese asked, causing Ziem to nod. “Is it as wealthy there as it is here, with paved streets and jewelry selling at every second market stand?”