"Eyyyy diiinn dooo naayy thaaaannnggg." Jiure looked at the two men in confusion. "Whhhooo arghhhhh yoooou?"
"I'm her uncle. This is her guardian. Did you rape my niece, boy?" The duke's words were as sharp as the sword he fluidly drew from his hip. The boy had seemed so large and powerful before, but as the duke took a few steps toward him he shrunk in size.
"Nooo. Nooo. I diiiddddnnnntintt aaapppee errrrr." He looked at me with panic in his eyes and sank to his knees. The movements made his opened belt rattle like clinking coins.
"Then I'll kill you quickly instead of torturing you." The bearded man's mouth set as he pulled his sword arm back to deliver a cut to the boy.
"Beltor!" Greykin hissed in an urgent whisper. The duke stopped his swing and looked at the giant man with a question in his eyes. Then they grew wide and his hard face frowned.
"Fuck." I realized he was looking toward the village.
"Can we escape into the forest?" the Bear asked.
"It’s too late.”
I pulled away from Greykin’s chest. The small village of Merrium was home to one hundred and fifty families, mostly small dairy and cattle farmers. The farmhouse I had shared with Jiure and his family was on the outskirts of town, at a slightly higher elevation. From the open field where we stood, we could see the entire village, all the homes, stables and people.
And the dozens of Ancients that filed into the town on horseback.
And they could see us.
Chapter 4-The O’Baarni
"What's your name, stranger?" the wizened old man hissed through the gaping holes in his toothy grimace.
"Stranger is fine," I replied. "What do you have for trade?" It had been a few weeks since I had spoken to anyone and my mouth slurred the words.
The trader grunted and cocked his head over his shoulder at the dilapidated cart. Torn and dirty sheets dangled from the pillars of the wooden gurney like sails. I didn't see a horse and I wondered if the old man pulled it with raw willpower and limited aid from the wind.
"Few pans, pots, lizard skins, salt, packs. I came from Deadflats, so most of my wares are gone. Taking salt up to the Green Mountains." He grinned again and squinted. I figured he was trying to see through the wrappings around my face and shoulders. After a few seconds with no response from me, he spat on the dry salty ground of the desert. The spittle splattered purple and smelled like a week old crow carcass.
"Any water?" I brushed my hand past the three skins I carried and shook one. It rang half empty and I had been told that the town of Deadflats was still another four days’ walk from the middle of the Salt Desert.
It was the last place I believed she fled.
I could run there in six hours, but it would be mildly uncomfortable without a few more sips of water.
Then again, I was used to discomfort.
"Not trading water." The old man was suddenly suspicious and he glanced at the short hunting spear I carried. He journeyed in a group of half a dozen other travelers that I crossed on my way to the town. The other men were not traders and apparently not his kinsmen. His heartrate rose, he had little confidence they would protect him if I decided to steal his water.
There was so much fear. With the Elvens gone, we had turned on each other instead of working for a better future.
This was not the world Shlara wanted.
"Relax, Old One. I'm not going to take any." I put a smile to my lips, and although he couldn't see it through the wraps on my face, it came through my words. This seemed to make him more nervous, so I quickly changed my tactic. "Could you trade me some information? I'd like to know more about Deadflats. That is, if you know anything about the place." I added the right emphasis to my voice so that it would seem that I doubted his expertise. This was an effective strategy I had honed while traveling around the world speaking to humans. After the eradication of our masters, we were left with nothing but our knowledge. People were proud of what they knew and eager to prove it to anyone who would listen.
"I've been traveling this route longer than you've been alive, boy." He spat on the ground again. I almost laughed. He couldn't have known that I was probably older than him, that I was once the leader of the greatest army this world had ever seen, and what I was doing in this desolate place at the edge of the habitable world.
"How many people live there?" I asked quickly.
"Two thousand. There is a big underground river that flows beneath the hard pack of the mesa, fresh water that is untouched by the salt." I nodded. It sounded more like a city than a town and I wondered how I would be able to find her.
"How often does the town see new travelers?"
"You ask a lot of questions. You should leave him alone unless you want to trade," one of the other men of the group said with a guttural growl. He sat at a campfire behind me. Twilight was an hour away, but moving across the Salt Desert would sap energy from even the O'Baarni. These men were frail humans and probably beyond exhausted.
"Sorry, friend," I apologized and debated killing them all. It would only take me a few seconds and I would be able to have a more honest discussion with the old man. Then I sighed. Shlara wouldn't have wanted that either. I had to accomplish my goal without murdering anymore of my kin. "I'll be heading there. Thank you for your time." I nodded to the old, diseased trader and walked out of their small campground and toward the town. The heat bent the air coming off of the desolate plain and for a second I thought I saw a tree, or a person, in the distance.
"Wait, stranger," the old man called. "You can't leave now. It is almost night and the lizards will be out. Best wait with us till morning. The next campground with water is a ten-hour walk, at least."
"I better run then," I said as I increased my tempo into a slow jog. Five seconds passed and I heard one of the men call me a crazy fuck. Then I was half a mile away and heard nothing but the sound of the wind screaming and my booted feet slamming into the dry plates of the desert like a snare drum's paradiddle.
The Salt Desert lay on the southeast end of the continent, where our final battle had taken place. The land had been owned by the Elven tribe of Grlitar, but they abandoned the territory many years before the last battle. Their exodus and eventual extinction left their human slaves to fend for themselves and carve a life out of the harsh environment. These people had never seen one of my kind and only heard of our crusade through distant travelers. Now the Elvens were probably as much of a myth as the O'Baarni.
This forgotten piece of the world would be the perfect place for Iolarathe to hide.
It would be the perfect place for us to begin our life together.
The sun threatened to set and it cast a deep and angry fire of red across the endless sky. This empty land was surrounded by mountains, but they squatted thousands of miles before me and looked like I could crush them in my hands. The desert floor was dried dirt tiles mixed with salt. They glittered in the red light of the dying sun, and for a few minutes, it seemed as if I ran atop endless lava.
An hour of jogging passed, and the last rays of the sun turned a soothing violet and then a deep purple. The color clashed with the green glow from the moon and gave the barren land a sickly hue. Up ahead I spotted a gang of lizards feasting on the corpse of a fallen one of their own kind. I picked up speed and outpaced the wind past them. The creatures were the size of a small pony, covered in spiky scales. Their maws opened wide enough to swallow an adult wolf. I killed a few yesterday, but their flesh tasted horrible, it was tough and filled with bones. Soon I would be at Deadflats and could get a real meal.
Thoughts of food made me think of water. I grabbed at my last skin and drank a quarter of its contents while my feet continued their forward momentum. Before the Salt Desert, I traveled through hundreds of miles of hilly badlands. Food was almost never a concern for me since I easily killed whatever I happened by, but water was scarce and I could only go a few weeks without it.
The water from my skin poured warm, but it tasted delicious. I had planned on savi
ng some just in case the city somehow did not have a water supply. I reasoned that it was only a few more hours of travel, and if water was not a traded commodity in Deadflats, then life certainly would be. So I drained the rest of the bladder and picked up my pace.
There were no trees in the endless wasteland, so the wind had an unfettered path to scream across the desert. Most normal humans would need to duck low in an attempt to crawl under the overwhelming gusts. Even most O'Baarni would have found the intense gales hard to cope with and might have thought about setting up camp for the night. But most O'Baarni only harnessed power from the Earth. They used the magic to fuel their bodies, make them stronger, faster, and heighten their senses. O'Baarni who were more skilled could unleash the Earth externally and combine it with Wind to create Fire.
I had learned to harness all of the Elements. I had mastered Water during the last battle between the humans and Elvens. Iolarathe had unleashed a surprise attack with three indomitable dragons who were decimating our forces with ease. By pulling the energy out of Water, I had defeated one of the dragons, ripping all the moisture from its massive alien body. Then I quickly learned how to pull Fire and Wind when his sire blasted me with a spray of liquid magma from an angry maw. I defeated him as well. The last remaining dragon, the female Recatolusti’catri, escaped, flinging me from her talon in mid-flight and sentencing me to death for murdering her mate and child.
Except I did not die. Iolarathe found me. We had made love and were discovered by Shlara.
I forced the painful memories out of my head. I had not thought about that day for many months, but it refused to be bottled up and discarded. The ordeal had taught me how to pull power from all of the Elements. The Wind that tried to thwart me on this salty plain was quickly harnessed into me and used to fuel my body.
I still did not know why Entas refused to teach us about the other Elements. He had not seemed surprised or angry when I showed him that I had learned how to pull from Water. He only cautioned me against using it, and forbade me from asking him about it. The other Elements felt different from Earth. Earth was slow, consistent and familiar. It felt as easy and soothing as the beating of my heart. Water and Wind felt chaotic inside of me. They tried to force their way out, like blood gushing through a thousand tiny lacerations. Fire was intense pressure, screaming for release, a breath held too long.
I had plenty of time to practice using them now. There was no army to manage. No people to train. No enemy to crush under my boot. I only wanted to find Iolarathe and continue to grow in strength and power.
I began to perceive a faint orange glow across the emptiness. My vision was as keen as an eagle’s and I guessed there were another forty miles ahead of me before I would reach the outskirts of the town. I had chased Iolarathe for so many years now, it was hard to remember my life before this. The years had been spent in solitude, which did strange things to my perception of time. I did not actually know how much time had passed since I killed Shlara.
I did not want to know.
Iolarathe remained a few steps ahead of me. Sometimes I missed her by months, sometimes by days. Once I saw her on a distant mountain range. The sight had energized me and I pushed myself to catch up to her. When I reached the spot where she had been, I found nothing but a few scattered footprints and the smoking embers of a hastily abandoned campfire.
Somehow she had eluded me and I never glimpsed her again.
But she left a trail. She was not simply evading me, she was searching for something. At first I believed it was for the remnants of her people, but the longer I tracked her, the more I came to realize she was seeking something more. The O’Baarni destroyed most of the Elven estates in our quest to annihilate their race. We had not even wanted to inhabit the same grounds as our enemies. The very buildings they had erected were tributes to the centuries of our oppression, and they were as important to destroy as the oppressors themselves. Iolarathe was searching for the remaining places that had not been razed by the O’Baarni.
I had not figured out why she was in Deadflats, but I would have answers soon. I slowed my pace a few miles from the city. I could not draw attention to myself with a superhuman approach.
And I wanted to take in the view of the bizarre metropolis.
Long ago, something massive had fallen from the sky and landed in the center of the Salt Desert. Whatever had collided into the planet had destroyed three thousand square miles of land. There was nothing to be found here but salt and gemstones. And survivors scraping by through grit and stubbornness.
At the center of where I imagined the collision to have occurred rose a large, flat-topped hill. The mass must have been pushed upward by the impact, and it only added to my belief that whatever hit the planet had been significant in size. The mesa was about five miles long and a third of a mile high. Wind had slowly eroded the top of the hill to its level tabletop after thousands of years.
The city was situated at the base of the mesa. An incongruously sturdy looking gate hung against wood stakes tied together by rusted barbed wire. Torches burned at the top of the posts, sputtering against the wind. Past the gates, squat, simple wooden structures were augmented by rough patches of stonework. The salty streets branched out from the gate as limbs of a tree, the farthest reaching dwellings carved out of a low-lying hill. Most of the homes were dark at this hour, but a few had torches or fireplaces lit, a warm pink glow visible through their windows. It looked as if half of the hillside was home to a nest of resting fireflies.
I was spotted when I was an eighth of a mile from the front gate. Two men rode out on horseback. I wondered how they fed their animals, or themselves for that matter, as no crops would grow on these badlands. Then I wondered how they even got the wood for their homes. Finally, I asked myself how anyone could even think to live out in this forsaken land. It did not matter. I let my curiosity lie and directed my focus back to my mission.
"What is your business?" one of the men on horseback inquired. They wore dusty leather pants and long coats of gray wool. Their faces were dry and more weathered than the side of the hill.
"Looking for Deadflats. Is this it?" I asked the obvious question.
"Yeh. You travel in the night?" the other man asked with worry. His mount shifted sideways nervously. I recalled the various black and ill-tempered horses I rode during my life. The head of his horse would not have even reached halfway up the body of one of my steeds.
"Is there a place to get food and water?" I asked with a faked gasp. Hopefully they would think I was in distress, weak and not a threat. The gusts of wind had died down to a breeze so we could hear each other. The location of the city in relation to the hill must have been planned to reduce the effects of the wind.
"Are you diseased?" One of the men pointed to his face and I realized I still had my head wrapped in cloth.
"No, just keeping the sun and salt out." I unwrapped my head and showed them my face. I had decided to let my beard and hair grow long, but it would not fool anyone who knew me. "About that food?"
"Down the main avenue. First right. Left side. Lizard Breath Inn. What is your business here?" The first man beckoned me to follow him toward the gate and the light of the torches on the fence posts.
"Meeting a friend. Rock business." Rock could be taken to mean either gems or salt. That was the only reason people came here: to mine or to trade.
The men nodded and opened the gate to let me pass. For a second the two exchanged glances and I thought they would try to extort me, but the second passed and they closed the gate without another word. Only the creak of the salt-crusted hinges marked my passage.
The road was made of dried, crusted mud, but the wood homes lining the street had stone foundations built up out of the dirt. The light from the sputtering torches lining the street reflected off the salt coating the ground and the houses, making everything sparkle.
I heard heartbeats and gentle breathing inside of each home and I imagined that most citizens here were getting as m
uch rest as they could before waking up early to dig in the mines. I had never worked in a mine, but had freed many people who had slaved in them under the Elvens. While all of us had suffered as slaves, those men and women had a dead look in their eyes that was unchanged by freedom. They had lost themselves somewhere in the dark depths of the earth.
They were very effective in my army.
I heard the voices and laughter of the Lizard Breath Inn before I saw the place. The building was two stories high, and not at all stable. The corners were made of stacked, roughly-hewn stones. One side was a little uneven and it caused the inn to lean. A salt speckled post extended from the mud on that side in some futile attempt to prop up the structure in case the wind decided to change direction.
I pushed through a set of thin wooden doors to enter the lobby of the inn. The hinges squealed loudly, announcing my entrance and causing the conversations to halt as the patrons looked up at me. I took a few steps on a threadbare, salt-covered rug while I memorized the position of everyone in the room, their size, and if they were a threat. None were. A fat old man sitting by the door stopped me.
"No weapons." He pointed at my spear and then thumbed toward a table where a few small picks, a bare rusty short sword, and various clubs were piled in a heap. I nodded at the man, leaned my weapon against the wood, and walked across the room to the long bar that separated what I guessed was the innkeeper and his daughter from the rest of the patrons.
"You're new." The innkeeper may have been the son of the man by the door. He looked very similar, only thirty pounds lighter and greasier. I sat on a surprisingly sturdy stool and sighed in an attempt at weariness.
"Been traveling for a long time. From the Green Mountains. Water?" I shrugged off my pack and set it on the ground next to me.
"Metal?" He shot his daughter an angry glare when she tried to fill my request. His look stopped her like an arrow through a rabbit's heart.
"What will you take?" the Elvens had traded in various forms of metal and artwork. It made sense to keep some traditions.
The Destroyer Book 3 Page 6