by Stefon Mears
Ehren bristled at the mention of the order of assassins.
“My point is,” Amra said, “each time they’ve come closer and closer to killing Cavan. Maybe killing all of us. He’s too good to leave alive and functional at our backs.” She shrugged. “You insisted on alive, so I did something about the functional part.”
“You should have discussed it with us,” Ehren said.
“Why?” Nothing mocking in her voice. Just honest curiosity. “Taking a limb was the simplest answer. By the time he learns to adjust to this, we’ll have either saved Kent and his family, or gotten ourselves killed trying. Did you think it kinder to discuss which limb to take? Right in front of him?”
Ehren opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out, so Amra continued.
“Ever try to cut the limb off a struggling man?” She shook her head. “Even when they know it needs to happen. When they’ve got a corrupted wound. They still fight like hell.” She shook her head again. “My way was quicker. Cleaner. Made sure I didn’t cut too high and get an artery.”
“We could have discussed it privately.”
“No,” said a rough, groggy voice off to one side. “Her way was better.” The southerner sat up. “If you’re going to take one of my limbs too, I’d request the left leg, also below the knee.”
Cavan downed the rest of his soup and stood. Ehren did the same and Amra was on her feet so fast her empty mug clattered on the blue stone floor.
The trio moved over to stand between the southerner and their campfire. He was closer to the ledge than the lead huntsman had been, but he looked comfortable enough with his position. And Cavan was amazed to see his blue eyes, a rare trait in a southerner. And they weren’t any of the paler blues found here in the north. They were a dark, almost royal blue.
“I am Qalas, son of Mitala, daughter of Mitaka, so you may count me properly among your defeated enemies.”
“Well, Qalas, son of Mitala, daughter of Mitaka,” Cavan said, “do we need to take one of your limbs?”
“I can tell you, you won’t,” Qalas said, shrugging against his bonds. He didn’t move or sound like a man in pain, but the tension in his face and around his eyes suggested he still felt the effects of Ehren’s blow to his head. “But you have no reason to believe me.”
“Convince us,” Amra said.
Another attempt at a shrug. “Tohen failed as chief huntsman. Failure means death. For him, and those who were part of his failure. That includes me, in case you doubted it.”
“Couldn’t you redeem yourself by finishing the job?” Ehren said.
“How?” Qalas said, simple bitterness in his voice. “The four of us, with surprise on our side and a magical edge couldn’t kill you. I’m supposed to do it on my own?”
“You’re an archer?” Amra said. “One good arrow—”
“Might kill Cavan, yes, but I’d be just as dead when you two caught me.” He looked at Ehren, eyes full of respect. “You were unarmed, and I still couldn’t do more than scratch you.”
“Felt like more than scratches,” Ehren said, but he was smiling. “Still, no one who walks under Zatafa’s beneficence can easily strike her priests. You were fighting yourself as much as me.”
Comprehension spread across Qalas’ face, respect following in its wake.
“Swear you will not come after us,” Cavan said.
Qalas gave Cavan a grateful look, and spoke slowly and carefully while Amra stared into his eyes.
“I swear in the name of my mother and my mother’s mother to leave you and yours in peace unless the day comes when you bring a fight to me.”
“Well spoken,” Amra said, with a nod. “We can trust that.”
“All right,” Cavan said. He pulled a dagger from his boot, but thought twice about cutting bonds with his hurt muscles. He handed it to Amra, who cut Qalas loose.
The first thing Qalas did was tear the duke’s sigil from the leather of his left shoulder. He tossed it over the ledge, and watched it fall.
Ehren handed the former hunter a mug of soup, which he drank greedily.
“There’s more,” Ehren said with a smile.
“Your leader,” Cavan said, “Tohen you said?” When Qalas nodded, Cavan continued, “he said you wouldn’t know anything that could help us. Was he right?”
Qalas looked from one to the other of the trio, then back at Cavan.
“What if I do?”
“We beat you,” Amra started, but Cavan cut her off.
“We could hire you as a guide.”
Qalas looked Cavan up and down, as though seeing him for the first time.
“Are you really going to be a baron?”
“If I live.” Cavan shrugged then regretted it through a throb of pain. “And if the land isn’t too valuable to pass to a bastard.”
“But you’ll still inherit something. Some land. A title.”
Cavan nodded.
Qalas looked at Ehren the same way, then Amra. Maybe his gaze lingered a little on Amra.
“Just what exactly do you three do, anyway?”
All three of them laughed.
“We’re problem solvers,” Ehren said.
“I like ‘adventurers,’” Amra said.
“If you ask most people, we’re troublemakers,” Cavan said.
Ehren and Amra started to object, but Qalas spoke loudly.
“Keep your money then. I help you three with this, you owe me a favor.” He looked over the three of them again. “I get the feeling that’s better than gold.”
Qalas nodded. “All right, the first thing you need to know is where we stashed our horses.”
18
Cavan woke himself before sunrise again, and found that Ehren was already passing hardboiled eggs and hunks of good, strong cheese to Amra, Qalas and … Tohen was it?
Cavan couldn’t get away from this blue mountainside soon enough. Now that the battle was over, every moment’s delay felt like a great glacier between himself and Kent.
But he knew the wait was necessary. There were other hunters on the watch for him, and this resting area along the paths through the mountain was as secure a location as could be arranged.
Besides, he’d stiffened up. Not just his wounded and painful left shoulder and right forearm, but his back and legs as well, after a whole night on the cold stone.
On the whole, he felt as though he’d been on the road for weeks. Even though only the night before he’d slept on a comfortable bed in an inn. Eaten hot food, freshly cooked.
Seemed an eternity ago.
Ehren handed Cavan his share of the eggs and cheese, along with a mug of warmed soup. And once their fast was broken, Cavan joined Ehren and the chief huntsman over near the ledge. This Tohen was sullen and quiet this morning. Eyes full of resentment, and not only when he glared at the unbound, unmaimed Qalas.
Cavan couldn’t blame him though. The chief huntsman had gambled and lost everything. And if Qalas told it true, Tohen’d lose his life soon unless he got well away from Nolarr. In a hurry.
Not to mention that Qalas was matching him glare for glare. Cavan got the feeling that those two never got along.
But the chief huntsman held still where Ehren seated him, and he didn’t object to armed and ready Amra standing behind him. Then Ehren stripped their bandages away, from first his own wounds, then Cavan’s, then finally Tohen’s shortened leg.
Ehren turned to face east, raised his goldenwood staff above his head, and began to chant in ancient Penthix. From the corner of his eye, Cavan noticed that Qalas bowed his head. Was that a gesture of respect, or did he worship Zatafa?
When the first rays of dawn broke through the sky, Ehren looked like part of the sunrise himself, with his golden hair, his pale skin and his white, white clothes. A golden halo surrounded him, closing the cuts on his face and forearm while Cavan watched. Leaving his skin as unblemished as his clothing.
Ehren brought the tip of his staff down to touch Cavan on the wounded shoulder.
&n
bsp; Warm, blissful relief eased through Cavan as though he’d slipped his sore muscles into a hot bath. The image made him think wistfully for a moment of the inn back in Riverbend, the pretty serving girl, and the assignation that was not to be.
But under the touch of such soothing warmth, Cavan could not even regret the lost night of pleasure. He could only smile and hope that serving girl found love and a long, happy life.
Cavan’s forearm was next, and when the tip of the staff touched it, it was as though this spot of perfect warmth and comfort connected to the spot at his shoulder, and the blissful, healing relaxation of both spread through the whole of his body. Unkinking and unknotting his muscles until Cavan felt good as new.
As though he’d been born again with the new day.
While Cavan reveled in the lack of pain and stiffness, Ehren tapped his staff to Qalas’ head.
Finally, Ehren touched the stump of Tohen’s leg, and the man passed right out. Overwhelmed by the relaxation and bliss? Must have hurt even worse than Cavan had thought. It was a wonder the man hadn’t moaned and groaned all night.
Fed, healed and rested, the trio and their guide were ready to ride. They had three extra horses — even Ehren hadn’t wanted to leave the chief huntsman with a mount — but Cavan felt certain they’d find a home for those steeds soon enough.
They moved faster now. Apparently Tohen had been receiving reports of the movements of his other hunters, so Qalas led Cavan, Amra, and Ehren along paths and routes where the hunters weren’t.
For two days they rode swiftly across the Nolarr countryside. Avoiding the towns, and riding mostly through rolling farmland. Trading horses for food and information that seemed to help Qalas understand how the duke’s troops were moving, where they were situated.
Whenever Qalas interpreted what rumors they’d heard into solid troop movements, Amra seemed to nod along in agreement, so Cavan assumed they were right.
Funny thing about the farmers. They knew they were getting too good a deal for the horses. Cavan could see that in their eyes. But they didn’t question it, and if anything the knowledge seemed to make them more eager to pass along gossip. As though they suspected Cavan and his comrades were trouble, but didn’t seem to mind because they were trouble for someone else.
Cavan was getting the impression that the duke was not well-loved by his own people.
By the end of the second day, they could see the duke’s keep, sitting high atop a hill with a great lake at its back.
Keep wasn’t really a good enough word though. Not in Cavan’s mind. This was a castle. Cavan had only seen a few — and he’d only ever been inside the royal castle at Oltoss — but he knew the difference between a castle and a keep.
Castles were bigger, for one thing. The duke’s castle jutted high into the sky, hundreds of feet up. Seven towers that Cavan could count from where he and his group hid among a grove a yew trees. It had a gatehouse the size of the baronial manor of Juno, an inner wall just as tall, and an outer wall that looked to stand twice as tall as the guards.
The castle itself looked three or four times the size of its gatehouse. The original color of the stone was difficult to determine, because it had been enameled a dark blue.
The whole castle. Roofs and all. Every inch of it a dark blue. No simple craftsmen could have accomplished that. Not without mind-boggling time, effort and expense. No. Cavan had no doubt this was the work of magic, but why would anyone…
“Wards,” he muttered.
“Of course there are wards,” Amra said.
“You can detect them from here?” Qalas said.
“What kind?” Ehren said.
“No,” Cavan knelt in the thick, green grass, then flopped onto his back and stared up at the white, puffy clouds in the late afternoon sky. A deep sigh brought him the smell of trees and grass, but he didn’t find it cheery.
The other three continued to stand, looking down at him while their hobbled horses grazed nearby, but that didn’t matter.
“I mean the whole castle is warded,” he said. “Carved into the stones themselves. That’s got to be it.”
“That’s why the enameling?” Ehren said.
Cavan nodded.
“The roofs too, then?” Amra said. “The parapets?”
“Maybe.” Cavan shook his head. “You understand, I can’t be sure. And if I’m right, it still might not even be the whole castle. But my gut tells me the enameling does double-duty, protecting the spells and hiding how many there are.”
“The duke doesn’t keep a wizard,” Qalas said. “Tohen said not in a score of years, at least.”
“Doesn’t mean the wards are bad.” Cavan puffed out a breath and ran his fingers through his short brown hair. “If I were doing it, I’d ward against deception at the entrances, keep guards on the walls alert, and, of course, protect the castle itself from infiltration and siege.”
“So they slam the front door in our face,” Amra said, “What, we can’t break it down?”
“Probably not.”
“Those wards,” Qalas said. “How far do they reach?”
“I’d need to be close to know for sure,” Cavan said. “Get a chance to study the spells, but if I got that close—”
“They’d know we’re here,” Amra said.
“Best guess,” Qalas said.
Cavan dragged himself to a sitting position. Looked back at the dark blue castle in the late afternoon sun.
“Even the duke could only spend so much on his wards.” Cavan tilted his head in thought. “Smart way to go would be to let each engraved ward protect its stone. Maybe the surrounding stones, but not much farther out than that, unless he wanted to accept weak spots.”
“So the spells don’t go far beyond the engravings?”
Cavan shook his head. “Probably not. If they did, they’d need to be refreshed, which would be difficult because—”
“Then they don’t matter.” Qalas smiled for the first time Cavan could recall. “The entrance we’re using isn’t enameled.”
* * *
Another half-hour on their horses, and Qalas led them to a ruined farm.
The whole place looked like a dead farm. Dry dirt fields, not recovered from someone sowing them with salt. Burnt out, dead fruit trees. The remnants of an old rail fence. And in the center, a burnt-out farm.
The barn might once have been tall and full of hay, but now it was a collapsed ruin. Half-burnt away and the rest ruined by rain. And near the barn, the vague structure of what Cavan thought might have been a two-story farmhouse.
Unfortunately for whoever lived there, only three of the walls remained, and a few of the crossbeams. The roof was gone, the second floor had collapsed. It was all such a mess, that Cavan was half-surprised it wasn’t still smoldering.
“Bandits?” Ehren asked.
“The duke,” Amra said, with quiet certainty. “This looks like a lesson to those who anger their liege lord.”
“Neither,” Qalas said, dismounting. “This was never a farm. Soon as it was built, the duke put it to the torch. Has the land re-sown with salt annually, to make sure no down-on-their-luck peasants think of settling nearby.”
“How do you know?” Cavan said.
“Tohen was the sort to look down on anyone he considered his lesser. Man would have killed for a title. Me, I like getting to know everyone. Never know when you’ll luck into a couple of dungeon guards who like to drink and gamble, but aren’t all that great at either.”
Qalas smiled.
“You’re telling us this is an entrance that isn’t guarded?” Cavan didn’t try to keep the disbelief out of his voice.
“Guards draw attention,” Amra said. “People see soldiers, they wonder what’s going on. So I’m betting we’ve talking about a tunnel that can be collapsed in at least three places.”
“Five,” Qalas said, sounding impressed. “And there will be tunnel patrols to worry about.”
“We’re not tying the horses here,” Ehren said
.
“There’s a perfect spot just inside the wall of the house,” Qalas said.
“There’s nothing to eat. They’ll die if we don’t make it back.”
“If we’re escaping with prisoners, we’ll need them as close as possible.”
“If we’re escaping with prisoners,” Amra said, “they’ll collapse the tunnel on top of us.”
“Only if they sound the alarm.”
“There,” Cavan said, pointing to a grove of oak trees that looked to have decent grass growing around them, and bushes with berries as well.
Not too close, but better than nothing.
“That’ll be a long distance,” Qalas said, “if we’re running.”
“If we’re running, that means they sounded the alarm,” Amra said. She imitated the sound of a collapsing tunnel.
“We leave the horses at that grove,” Cavan said. “And if we have to run, we steal horses from the duke to get us back to our own.”
“Why not just ride away on the stolen horses?” Qalas said, and something sharp in his tone made the question sound important.
“A horse isn’t a sword,” Cavan said, reaching down to pat Dzint’s neck. “These horses are our friends. We don’t abandon our friends.”
Qalas nodded, slow and respectful, and for once Ehren chose not to elaborate. So the four of them rode their horses to the grove, and tied them in among the trees, where they would have grass and berries to eat, at least. And they rubbed down their horses, and fed and watered them to make sure they had a good meal before being left to their own devices.
Then, back at the burnt out pretense of a farm, Qalas led them inside the standing walls of what was supposed to have been a house. Rubble everywhere, right down to details that made Cavan wonder if Qalas had the truth of this place. Who would think to include a half-burnt child’s doll for such a pretense?
Cavan’s stomach sank. He tried not to think about it. Tried not to imagine a happy family being slaughtered and having their farm pillaged for the duke’s convenience.
Qalas took some time looking around. Stomping with his feet on the desiccated wood and ash. Long enough that Amra got restless and Ehren checked on the sun, which was getting closer to setting than Cavan liked. Hunting around for a tunnel entrance in the dark didn’t sound like a good time, but he was too close to wait for morning.