Mystic: A Book of Underrealm

by Garrett Robinson

  Gem said, “Cursed beggar rat! Some children should learn when to keep their mouth shut.”

  Loren avoided the obvious retort. “We have to leave, now.”

  “Out the back,” said Xain. “We shall have to leave the horses.”

  Annis gaped at the wizard. “I thought you meant to sell them to purchase supplies for our journey.”

  “Would you like to stay behind and barter with your relatives? We must leave them or let ourselves be caught. Come!”

  He rose to a crouch and slunk to the doorway. Loren hastened to follow, keeping Gem and Annis on either side. Together, they slipped through the door, feet squishing in the discarded food with a meaty slurp.

  “Is there a back staircase?” Loren asked. “The front will take us into the common room, and there they will find us.”

  “There is,” said Xain. “I found it when fetching our dinner.”

  Gem’s stomach rumbled at the word and kept on as they ran down the hallway behind Xain. Loren thought darkly of their missed meal. Poorly had they eaten upon the road, and their supplies had run low. She did not know how long the voyage to Wellmont might take and feared they would run out of food on the water.

  Xain led them down the corridor, which turned left twice before ending in a steep staircase. Loren offered Annis a helping hand to keep her from tripping over her skirts as they descended to the kitchen’s stone floor. A cook and two servants barely looked up as they walked hastily to a back door.

  Outside, Xain said, “We could run blind, but I think it would be wiser to spend a few moments discouraging our pursuers.” He turned to Gem. “Little master, can you repeat your earlier trick and abandon them in the alleys?”

  “Of course. Only take care to keep up. I cannot lead effectively if I am looking behind me around every corner.”

  Gem ran ahead, and they followed. The alley behind the inn was scarcely wide enough for two to walk abreast and did not split before reaching the street. Gem burst out into the wide open space and there ran straight into another man in a green waistcoat and trousers, who cried out in surprise. Gem stared up at the man in horror.

  Loren took in the man’s clothes in an instant—surely another agent of Yerrin. She lunged forwards as he gawked in confusion. One foot darted behind the man’s heel, and she gave his chest a great heave with both hands. The man tripped over her leg and crashed to the ground with a shout. His head hit the cobblestones hard, and he rolled stunned onto his side. But his shouts had roused others, and Loren saw them emerge into the moonslight from side streets in every direction.

  “Run!” she screamed. Gem needed no further urging, and Loren seized Annis’s hand to yank her behind them. Gem found another gap between buildings, and they slipped inside.

  “Does Yerrin pursue us with an army?” growled Xain. “Where did they all come from?”

  “I knew we had a strong presence in Redbrook, but I did not think there were this many.” Annis’s voice came quick between deep gasps for air. “I would wager my cousin has hired more men to pursue us.”

  Loren turned to Gem. “Why do we not take to the rooftops? Could we lose them more quickly from above?”

  “Look at them!” he cried. “Thatch!”

  Loren saw his point; Cabrus roofs were wood, shingle, tile, or stone. Some thatch might hold, but they might sink through others, and they could not know which would be safe.

  “Then our only hope lies in reaching the docks,” said Loren. “Do not try to confuse them, Gem. If they know who we are, they know we visited Brimlad today. Get us there quickly.”

  Gem swerved left without answer. From alley to street to narrow winding road to the gaps in wood fences, he ran with the scuttling pace of a mouse, never charging at full speed but never slowing. Then, sudden as a thunderclap, they reached a dead end in a long alley—a wooden fence, twelve feet high.

  “Turn around!” Loren cried.

  But it was too late.

  Four men skidded to a stop at the alley’s mouth. Only one wore green and had Annis’s dark skin, but all carried naked broadswords that glittered in the moonslight.

  Loren thrust Gem and Annis behind her.

  “Stop!” said the man in green. “You are fugitives from the King’s justice and will come with us!”

  Loren looked wildly around. They must have stopped near a brewery, for all around them stood tall stacks of empty wooden barrels with spigot holes punched in each.

  “Xain, your fire!” Loren seized the bottom barrel of one stack and shoved. The stack wobbled but did not topple. Gem, seeing her intent, squeezed between the stack beside it, and together they heaved again.

  Barrels crashed to the alley, some shattering and sending their staves to scatter across the ground. Xain saw her intention and bellowed a word. His eyes glowed, fire flashed from his hands, and the line of fallen barrels burst into flame before them. The Yerrin men cried out and shielded their eyes with their hands, backing away from the terrible heat.

  “Up!” cried Loren. “Quickly!”

  “I said the roofs are no good,” said Gem.

  “We must risk them, or we are lost.”

  “There is another way.” Again, Xain spoke words of magic, and his hands flashed with fire. A great ball of flame slammed into the fence with a crushing blow. Splinters flew from the bursting fence. The blast nearly threw Loren from her feet. Annis and Gem were cast to the ground. Xain seized Gem while Loren grabbed Annis. Together, they fled through the burning hole while the Yerrin men shouted and cursed behind them.

  Loren heard a familiar murmur and looked ahead to see they were near the river’s edge. At the docks stood another four men in Yerrin colors, all armed, two with armor besides. The men looked up at their approach, and the air rang with the song of drawn steel.

  “Looks like a fight.” Though her stomach twisted, Loren heard an odd calm in her voice. “Annis and Gem, stay back, and board Brimlad’s boat at first chance. If we are bested, sail away.”

  “Spare us your paltry heroics, girl,” said Xain with a growl. For a third time, he spoke words Loren could not understand, but sparks did not blaze in his palms. Instead, he spread his arms, fingers splayed like a child stroking water on a riverboat.

  For a moment, nothing happened, and Loren thought that Xain’s magic had failed him. Then they were met by a breeze, dust, and discarded straw now swirling around them. The bluster turned to a hard wind, and then to a gale. Loren pulled Gem and Annis to her side for fear they might blow away.

  But though the wind buffeted her with terrible strength, the men on the docks got it worse. The wind slammed into their bodies like a battering ram, flinging them screaming into the water. Xain closed his fingers, and the glow died in his eyes. The wind faded to nothing.

  Loren could feel herself shaking. Everything she had seen from Xain seemed like parlor tricks next to his gale, and yet he had called forth the power in moments. What else could the wizard do? Even as she watched, Xain tried to take a step forwards and nearly fell to his knees. Loren took her arms from Gem and Annis and went to support him, lifting the wizard by one arm and helping him stand.

  “I am all right. A moment’s weakness only. Let us hurry, before they surface and find their way back to the docks.”

  Together, they stumbled and staggered to the docks, where they saw a line of boats still swaying in the river’s swelling waters, stirred by Xain’s mighty storm. No sooner had they descended the steps and found Brimlad’s skiff than the captain himself emerged from belowdecks, cursing mightily and squinting at them all in the meager light of his candle.

  “What in the nine lands was that?” he barked. “It felt like a sea gale come from nowhere. I thought I would capsize.”

  “A little devilry for the demons trying to plague us, nothing more,” said Xain. “But I am afraid circumstances have changed. We must leave, Brimlad, and now. Certain parties seek an uncomfortable conversation we would rather avoid.”

  Brimlad scowled, and Loren feared he
might refuse them. But then the captain growled and ran to the boat’s rear.

  “You! Boy! Are your arms as weak as they look?”

  Gem started as he realized Brimlad was talking to him. His chest puffed up, and he stood straighter. “I am strong enough to be a warrior, even if my mind is sharp as any scholar’s.”

  “Then run to the bow, and cast off the lines when I tell you to. You will find a pole there—use it to keep us from hitting the dock as we leave.”

  Gem looked back and forth, taking a step in either direction. “I . . . er . . . where is the bow?”

  “The front of the ship, you imbecile,” roared Brimlad. “Scholar indeed. Girl, get yourself belowdecks. I have no use for one as slim as you.”

  Loren threw her shoulders back. “I can help. I am as tall as Xain and mayhap stronger.”

  “I meant the little one,” said Brimlad, pointing to Annis and burning Loren’s cheeks. “You I need. Join the boy at the bow, and use the oar to keep our nose pointed the way I told you. Have you ever rowed before?”

  “No. We had no boats—”

  “We have no time for a speech!” Brimlad bellowed. “Do as I say. You will learn the way of it soon, or we shall all be dead. Xain, can I count on your witchery?”

  Loren saw the wizard sag. “I am weary but will do what I can.”

  “We shan’t need much,” said Brimlad. “Just enough to get us free and clear in the open water. Blow when I tell you to.”

  Xain nodded and went to stand beside the captain. Brimlad turned his sharp eyes back to Loren and growled, “What are you still doing here, girl? I sent you to the bow.”

  Once she reached the front of the boat, Brimlad shouted for Gem to cast them off. Another breeze began to gather, and when Loren glanced back she could see the glow of Xain’s eyes in the night.

  Behind them as they floated away from the dock, a party of men reached the stone wall that bordered the river. One slight, foolish man thought the distance not too great. He leapt at them but fell like a stone in the river.

  “Girl!” cried Brimlad. “Steer us to port! That means row on the right side.”

  Loren had forgotten about the oar. She quickly found it lying on the deck and seized it, thrusting it into the water on the boat’s right side with a splash. She pulled until her arms were on fire, and to her surprise found the skiff’s nose turning easily beneath her. She topped at Brimlad’s order, and the boat coasted gently upriver. When they drifted too near the dock and the other boats, Gem pushed them away with his pole. And as the Yerrin men’s shouting faded behind them, they slipped out upon the water, through Redbrook’s northern rivergates with hardly a sound.

  A true wind rose as they slipped out in the darkness, and Xain ceased his magic with a relieved sigh. The wizard slumped, leaning against the railing that circled its rim. Brimlad lashed the tiller and went to unfurl another sail. Loren watched as the shore passed with gathering speed.

  “You are done, girl. If I need your help steering now, I am no fit captain for a rusted barrel.”

  Loren dropped the oar and went to sit beside the mast facing Xain. Annis poked her head out from belowdecks, and then emerged when she saw that the danger had passed.

  “Well, I know now what we were worried for,” Loren said. “I have had closer calls than that.”

  “Long miles of water stretch between us and Wellmont,” said Xain. “And closer calls we may yet have. Do not tempt fate, for she can be wily.”

  Gem said, “Wily enough for a lifetime recently.”

  “Yet we have been wilier still,” said Loren. “And will remain so.”

  Xain snorted but said nothing.

  thirteen

  SO BEGAN THEIR VOYAGE TO Wellmont, which Loren swiftly decided was the most miserable time she had spent since leaving the Birchwood.

  It began pleasantly enough. The river remained calm and peaceful, and a gentle wind remained ever at their backs. Brimlad traded his duty at the tiller with Xain, and the wizard took to the work with the ease of long familiarity. Loren wondered why he seemed so acquainted with boats and how he knew Brimlad. Yet she feared to delve too deeply into the wizard’s past—he had little temper for such things, and she did not wish to breach another sensitive topic as she had done with his son.

  But the pleasant calm soon turned to monotony. And with little activity to occupy their attention, their thoughts turned to dark wondering about their pursuers. Little did Loren think that the family Yerrin would simply let them escape without incident. Surely, there would be ships in pursuit even now. Brimlad assured them that few vessels in Redbrook could catch his boat on the open water when he had Xain’s wind to help them. Still, Loren often found herself looking warily over her shoulder.

  Xain cast his gale whenever the natural wind died, while Loren and Gem often took to the oars. But their efforts only worsened another problem: They were desperately low on food. Brimlad had stored enough provisions for himself and more, certainly, but held his passengers responsible for providing their foodstuffs. There had been no chance for that in their escape, so they rationed carefully and slept hungry each night.

  “How long will it take us to reach Wellmont?” Loren asked Xain on the first day of their journey, shortly after Dawn rose pink behind them.

  “Three weeks about.” Xain had turned away from the sun, and deep shadows filled every pocket of his face. Loren thought he looked gaunter, but it could have been her imagination.

  “And how much food do you think we have?”

  “If we barely keep ourselves from starving? Mayhap two weeks,” Xain said with no emotion. Loren shivered.

  On the third day, they stopped at a small fishing village nestled against the river. There they spent the last of Annis’s coin on foodstuffs, but in their haste did not bargain as well as they might have and barely bought enough to fill their bellies for three weeks. Still, this improved their mood—until two days after their purchase, when they woke to find the fish spoiled and rotten.

  “Curse those fishermen and their families for six generations,” spat Brimlad. “When I return this way, I shall flay them all myself.”

  “I am sure you shall,” said Xain. “But we cannot do so now, and I find the rest of our voyage more pressing.”

  “I have some fishing line, but it is ill used and not likely to do us much good. Still, we can try.”

  Loren knew something of fishing, which she had done often with Chet beneath the boughs of the Birchwood, so this duty fell to her. All day, she would sit at the boat’s rear, dangling a bone hook in the water behind them, fixed with a scrap of meat. The first day she caught but one fish and on the second none at all.

  Days fell, and the passengers grew ever hungrier. They turned to conversation in hopes of distraction. In particular, Xain held intense, whispered councils with Loren, in which he again spoke of the magestones and urged her towards his mission.

  “Surely you cannot deny my need for justice. If nothing else, help me rescue my son. I would need little to do it. A few of the stones would suffice.”

  “I have told you, they are not mine to give.”

  “But Annis listens to you,” the wizard insisted, frustration growing in his voice. “And if you will not help me, neither will she.”

  Loren thought hard. “How can I know, wizard, that if we give you the magestones you will not use them to strike down your foes? I hear your anger and pain when you speak of Drystan and the Grand Magister. Can you swear an oath that you will bring them to no fatal harm?”

  Xain glared at her. “What are they to you? I have told you how they wronged me, and even the children have told you of that clan’s ill repute.”

  “Yes. And yet what have I seen for myself?”

  “Do you trust nothing but your eyes?”

  “Why should I? And even if I did not, why should I raise my hand against them when it is easier to avoid them altogether?”

  Xain surrendered with a frustrated growl, as he always did, and left Lor
en alone on the boat for two entire days, avoiding her eyes whenever they found themselves sharing the deck.

  Loren did not know whether the wizard talked to Gem, but soon the boy came to speak to her as well. He tried to make it seem natural, sitting beside her in silence a while before broaching conversation. But Loren could feel his tension and saw him fidget with his hands and feet as they watched the far-off riverbank coasting by. From somewhere far ahead, they heard shouts from a trading vessel sailing downstream.

  “I have meant to ask you something ever since we found that force of sellswords with the Mystic,” he said at last.

  Loren felt a qualm of anxiety. The mercenaries, Jordel had said, most likely made for Wellmont—the very city that was now their destination. With any luck, she hoped they could reach Wellmont and leave it again before the mercenaries found it, but still this made her uneasy.

  But she said nothing to Gem and instead showed him an open hand. “Ask me, then. But know that if your question angers me, I will not hesitate to pitch you into the water.”

  Gem scooted away from Loren. “You know I cannot swim!”

  She snickered and gave him a playful shove. “I jest, little master. What do you want to know?”

  “You cannot think to go through your life without harming another.”

  Loren glanced at him, unsure what to say.

  “That is not a question.”

  “Mayhap not, but you know what I mean.”

  “I have not failed to defend myself, or others, when necessary. Even Xain forgets that I planted an arrow in my father’s leg to save his life. But that does not mean that I will kill anyone. Death is a judgment and not mine to make.”

  “But why? Can you not see that you are the only one clinging to your rules, and with them you place yourself at an unfair advantage?”

  Loren shrugged. “What of it? Where stems this insistence of yours that I play by the rules you deem fit? A poor choice is mine to make.”

  “I do not ask for some idle debate. Do you mean to end up dead by some stranger’s blade? Because that is the only outcome I see for you, as foolish as you have comported yourself since we met.”