Well of the Damned

by K. C. May

  The thought occurred to her to run now, shackles and all, but with four horses and a mule and the rain, the others would catch up to her fairly quickly if they had the most basic of tracking skills. No, she needed to get a horse and the journal first. The map to the wellspring was in that book. Besides, Vandra’s sword was still beside the tree where she’d been dozing, and Cirang didn’t want to flee without a sword. She cut the rope from around her waist, sheathed the knife and strapped the sheath to her own calf.

  As lightly as she could, she circled around the sleeping battlers to approach from behind. They were conveniently lying in a neat line so she could incapacitate them one by one with a minimum of noise or movement. Brawna was nearest, but the gems in Kinshield’s sword were glowing brilliantly. She was afraid it would awaken him, and so she went to him first.

  Cirang took a large pinch of the serragan powder and let it fall into the ’ranter’s face. With a quick step to the side, she did the same to Daia. She was just about to take another pinch of it when Brawna opened her eyes. Cirang blew the powder forcefully into her face.

  To her left, Kinshield opened his eyes. She had to hurry.

  Brawna tried to sit up, but struggled to get her elbow beneath her. “Whoa. I’m tho dithy. Oh, no. Thiran!” She reached for her sword but had difficulty pulling it from the scabbard. Cirang kicked it out of her reach.

  “Thop,” Daia cried, swatting at Cirang. “Gavin, wook out.”

  Kinshield reached for his sword. Before his fumbling hand could grab it, Cirang trapped it on the ground with her foot. She blew another large pinch of powder into his face. He was so big, the second dose was needed to fully subdue him. He immediately shut his eyes and mouth and turned his face away.

  She bent to pick up the glowing sword. Without its gems, his magic was less effective, making her more difficult to follow with his gaze. The hilt heated up so quickly, it nearly burst into flame in her hand. She dropped it, hissing from the pain. Smoke rose from the blistering skin on her palm. “Damn your heathen magic.” She kicked the sword away from Kinshield and kept pushing it with her boot until it was hidden in the grass and weeds, while she held her hand out, palm up, in the rain to let the water cool her burnt palm.

  “Thirang, thop o die,” he commanded.

  Now the others were scrambling around, trying to draw weapons or crawl on their knees. Daia swung a sword at her and missed, and swung again. Cirang laughed, easily deflecting Daia’s lame attempts to fight her. “If only you could see yourselves. You look ridiculous.” Ignoring the pain in her hand, she picked up Vandra’s knapsack and rifled through it, found the shackle key, and freed her hands. First, she disarmed everyone and tossed their weapons into the weeds. “If you’re not careful, you’ll put an eye out before you die.” For amusement, she shackled Daia’s right wrist to Brawna’s left, and then threw the key into the dark brush as hard as she could. “Good luck finding it.”

  Kinshield’s language grew coarser, though it was honestly difficult to make out what he was saying under the effects of the powder.

  “Save your breath, Kinshield,” she said, pulling their cloaks off them and tossing them behind her. Beneath the king’s was Sevae’s journal, which she tucked into Vandra’s knapsack, along with the remaining serragan powder. “No one can understand you anyway.” She drew her knife, bent down and picked Brawna’s head up by her hair, intending to slit her throat. “I wanted to kill you first, but Vandra drew that straw.”

  “No!” Brawna screamed. She struggled and slapped at Cirang, but her efforts only served to wound her with several cuts.

  A powerful force hit Cirang from the left side. The ground fell away and raced beneath her. Her body slammed into a tree and fell to the ground. Pain shot up her spine like the scream that burst from her lungs. To even think of moving was excruciating, but she had to get a weapon. With elbows and knees, she crawled on her belly to where the knife lay in the grass and grabbed it. Summoning every bit of her will, she clenched her teeth against the pain and pushed herself to her feet.

  Brawna, too, had tumbled across the ground and lay covered in dirt a few feet away. Kinshield was on his knees, wobbling with one hand raised, palm towards her. Cirang quickly assessed her options. If he was able to fight her using magic, even with two whiffs of the serragan powder coursing through his veins, it was best she get the hell out of there. Brawna’s sword was closest, and Vandra’s knapsack lay a dozen feet away. She couldn’t leave it behind — the journal was inside. She limped as quickly as she could, hoping she was moving too fast for his jerking eyes to keep pace, scooped up the knapsack, and went for the sword. Another gust of magic wind hit her as she reached for it, but it was poorly aimed and only spun her off balance to fall to her knees. Pain flared again in her shoulder and hip. To hell with the sword. His next attack might not miss.

  She hobbled for the nearest horse. Though they snorted and blew nervously at her approach, they didn’t try to bolt. She’d never had trouble with horses before, but these were downright skittish around her, and they were supposed to be warhorses, calm and obedient. She cut the reins of all but one, a brown gelding, and they quickly scattered. She untied the gelding — Vandra’s horse — and mounted.

  She rode hard to the east, towards the dim pink glow rising over the mountains in the distance. towards freedom and a chance for whatever power and riches the Well of the Enlightened had to offer.

  Chapter 26

  “Vandra,” Gavin called out, unable to pronounce her name more clearly than Fah-a.

  “Cirang’s getting away,” Brawna cried, sounding as if her mouth was stuffed with stale bread.

  Gavin knew he could catch up to Cirang later. Right now he had to find Vandra. “Vandra,” he yelled. Her lack of response meant either she was dead or close to it. He hoped it was because she didn’t recognize Fah-a as her name, but the chance of that was slight. Cirang had been intent on slaying Brawna. If Vandra was still alive, even barely, he could save her, but with the world spinning this way, she could be standing in front of him and he wouldn’t see her. He shut his eyes and tried finding her with his hidden eye, but without the gems in his sword to aid him, he felt weak and ineffective. With Daia’s help, maybe he would do better. “Daia, help me.”

  “Is she dead?” Daia asked. At least, that was what Gavin thought she said.

  Answering the question was too much effort, and so Gavin said nothing. He used his hidden eye to find Daia by the brilliant orange tendril that snaked outward from the center of her otherwise clear blue haze. When he took hold of it, wrapping a thread of his own haze around it, his mystical strength renewed.

  If only his magic could heal this affliction. It wasn’t like an injury — more like getting drunk, and he’d already tested his ability to get undrunk using healing magic. Several times, every one unsuccessful.

  With great effort and concentration, he lifted his hidden eye’s vantage point and searched, turning in a slow circle to find Vandra. A dim haze wavered to the west. She was alive. Gavin crawled as best he could in that direction, swaying on his hands and knees. He had to stop every few feet to regain his balance. “Hold on, Vandra,” he said. “I’m coming.”

  From the dark forest ahead, he heard a muffled wheeze and tried to crawl faster, though he often went off-course or stumbled onto his side from swaying too much and had to veer back. The sound was closer now, and he made out the dim form of her prone body. His hand touched her foot, and he patted her leg as he felt his way to her shoulders. The injury was a bright red pulse on her haze. “Hold on. I got you.” He put his big, heavy hands on her — one on her belly below the wound, the other on her upper chest — and let the magical force begin to flow through him. His hands warmed quickly, growing so hot, he gritted his teeth to force himself not to pull back in reflex. When the pain became almost unbearable, everything in his consciousness turned white like a fog and the pain vanished. A fluttering sensation resonated within him, starting in his gut and moving up his torso through
his arms. Her haze grew denser, and the red spot dimmed as its throbbing slowed. At last, when his hands cooled to a gentle warmth, he collapsed to the ground, panting, and looked up at the night sky through the trees.

  “Gavin?” Daia called. “Where are you?”

  “Over here,” Gavin said, though it came out sounding like oar ear. “Found her.”

  “What?”

  If ever Gavin wished for the ability to communicate the way the Elyle of the mid-realm did with their complements, through thought, it was now. “Hell,” he muttered. “Wait... there.” Beside him, Vandra stirred. He pushed himself up, resting on one arm, and put a hand on her arm to comfort her. “You’ll be awright.”

  She felt her belly, now scarred but healed. “Thank you.” As she struggled to sit up, she said, “I’m so dizzy.” Her voice was raw and raspy.

  “We all are. Rest. It will pass.” He pulled her cloak over her and then cast another canopy spell to keep them dry.

  He didn’t remember falling asleep, but when he awoke, he was covered with a cloak, though underneath it he was wet. The rain canopy had vanished at some point, perhaps when he’d fallen asleep, since he hadn’t stored the spell in a gem. Vandra was sitting nearby repairing the cut bridle reins. Beside him was a patch of darkened earth where her blood had spilled. The sun had risen, though with the dark clouds overhead, it was difficult to tell how high it was in the sky. Sounds of conversation came from the camp site.

  “Glad to see you’ve recovered a bit,” she said. “I don’t know how to thank you for what you did.”

  “Don’t mention it.” In years past, he’d have explained that saving people was how he made his living, hinting that payment as valour-gild would have been sufficient thanks. For some reason, that embarrassed him now. People should help each other because it was the decent thing to do, not because there was money to be made. Now that he was king, it was his responsibility to keep people safe, even those charged with guarding his life. “Let’s see your wound. Does anything hurt?”

  She lifted the bottom of the mail and her tunic. “No, it doesn’t hurt.” The injury was healed, but an ugly scar remained, bumpy and jagged. It looked more like the scar from an animal attack than a stab wound.

  “Sorry about the scar,” he said. “I’m no surgeon.”

  “No, you’re my king who saved my life. I don’t know how I could ever repay the debt except by renewing my pledge to serve you for all my remaining days, though—” Vandra hung her head. “It’s my fault Cirang escaped. I’ll understand if you no longer want my service.”

  Gavin thought it was ironic that Daia had objected to Brawna coming along because of her rawness, but the elder, more experienced fighter had been the one to let her guard down. It wasn’t a mistake she was likely to make again. “O’course I still want your service. We’ll find her. Don’t worry. We’re lucky no one was killed. How did she get the serragan powder?”

  “I don’t know, my liege. She never got close enough to the shelves to get it from there. The little wooden box was empty when I found it, else I wouldn’t’ve let her have it.”

  Gavin nodded. It was a moot point, he supposed. What was done couldn’t be changed now. The dizziness had faded enough that he thought he could stand, though he did stumble at first, and his steps were unsteady. Vandra took his arm as if he was a feeble old man, and he pulled away. “I’m fine.”

  “Good,” Daia said. She was sitting with Brawna beside the fire warming some bread. “You’re awake. Are you all right to ride?”

  “Once I find my—”

  She picked up Aldras Gar and smiled.

  “—sword.” When Gavin took Aldras Gar from her, the relief of having it back in his hand made his shoulders relax. It wasn’t alive, but his bond with it was just as strong as the one with his horse. He slipped his arm through the strap and positioned the scabbard on his back. He went to Brawna. “Hold out your hands. Let me see.”

  Though the bleeding had stopped, the cuts on her hands from Cirang’s knife were raw, red wounds that could break open at any moment. He grasped her wrists and focused through the gems in Aldras Gar, noting to himself how much easier it was to heal with their aid.

  Once her cuts had sealed closed with new, pink flesh, he said, “I see you haven’t found the shackle key yet.”

  “It’ll be difficult to ride like this,” Daia said, “but we can manage until we get to the Lucky Inn and find a smith to make one or cut the cuffs off.”

  “Damn that bloody bitch to hell and back,” Vandra muttered. “She’d better not let anything happen to Argo or, Yrys help me, I’ll pound her to death with my fists.”

  “Awright, Vandra. Calm yourself. We’ll get him back for you. Let’s get moving. Every minute we waste is a dozen yards Cirang gets farther away.” Golam, with his bridle removed, had begun to wander during his relentless pursuit of food. He was going to get his foolish self lost. “Golam,” Gavin called. “Come this way, mule.”

  Gavin started towards his horse, intending to lead him back to the campsite, and on the way, he scanned the ground. Finding the key in the grass and weeds would take hours of scouting around, one square foot at a time. He wondered whether he could pull it to him using his magic even if he didn’t see it. One shackle key looked like the next. With the memory of its shape in his mind, he pulled with his will. Nothing happened. Nothing substantial, though he did sense something... twitch. Was it a movement in the weeds? He tried again, this time turning in a slow circle, pulling the key with his thoughts. The grass behind him whispered, and then something hit him in the shoulder blade hard enough to sting. It fell to the ground with a light thump. He turned around to find the key lying at his feet. “Heh. Look what I found.” He picked it up and showed it to his companions. “It was almost under your noses.”

  “You found it over there?” Brawna asked. “We were looking in the wrong place.”

  “You cheated,” Daia said. “I can feel when you use my gift to cast magic.”

  Gavin chuckled as he tossed it to her. He hadn’t consciously tapped into her conduit gift, but thinking back on it, he had drawn strength from her to pull the key. It felt more natural to do so than even using his own gems did.

  They packed their belongings and mounted. “Vandra’s lost a lot of blood,” Daia said, “and she’ll be weak until she recovers. Maybe Brawna and Vandra should ride back to Tern.”

  “If Cirang’s going to the wellspring,” Vandra said, “you’ll need me to guide you.”

  “You know where it is?”

  “I saw the map in the journal, and I remember it exactly.”

  Gavin chuckled and squeezed her shoulder. “We’re lucky to have you with us.”

  “She could draw it for us,” Daia suggested.

  Vandra pleaded with her eyes. “I’ll regain my strength with a couple good meals, my liege. I prefer to come with you.”

  “Then she comes.” Gavin looked to the east. That was the direction the freshest set of hoof prints went. Cirang would surely turn north or south at the crossroad rather than continuing east towards Tern. With Vandra’s memory, they could predict where she was heading. With Daia’s help, he could find her haze. “To the Lucky Inn. If we ride hard, we can make it by dark.”

  Chapter 27

  The Lucky Inn sat at a crossroads in a village Gavin never learned the name of, with the road to Ambryce leading south, Lalorian north and Tern east. Under normal circumstances, he would have enjoyed an evening drinking ale and relaxing with his friends, but with a dangerous fugitive on the road, his only thought was to take a meal and keep riding. They had another couple hours of travel ahead, but his growling stomach insisted they stop.

  “We’ll stop to eat,” he said, “and ride on for a couple more hours.”

  “Agreed,” Daia said. “Cirang’s probably expecting us to stop riding for the night. It’ll let us close the distance.”

  After passing through the gates, they were met by an enthusiastic pair of stable hands with little
enough to do. When the boys took the names of their newest arrivals to ensure the right horses were returned to them later, their eyes went round.

  “Gavin Kinshield the k-king?” the older one asked.

  “The same. See that Golam gets a handful o’alfalfa and no more, will you? He’ll want more, but too much will make him sick.”

  “Yes, my lord— um, I mean, Your Majesty. O’course. He’ll receive the best o’care, Your Majesty. Right away, Your Majesty.”

  The other, meanwhile, had fled towards the inn, yelling, “Papa! Papa! Come quick!” The innkeeper, almost as tall as Gavin but slimmer than Brawna, came out, being dragged by the hand by the younger boy. “It’s King Gavin. See? I told you!”

  Gavin knew him by sight, having stayed at the inn countless times, but had never learned the man’s name. In fact, he might owe for unpaid visits. He held out a hand, which the innkeeper shook heartily.

  “Welcome back, Your Majesty,” he said. “It’s always a pleasure to have you stay with us.”

  That was doubtful. Gavin had gotten stumbling drunk here on more than on occasion. “I wasn’t sure you’d recognize me. I might owe you a few coins.”

  “Think nothing of it, my liege,” the innkeeper said, bowing. “I’ll have our best room prepared for you, though had I known you were comin’—”

  “We’re not staying the night, just stopping for a meal.”