The light came from another single candle; this one was burning in a small room with three tiny cots, a table, and four chairs. The candle was sitting in the middle of the table, with wax running down and securing it to the rough, wooden surface. There was bread wrapped in cloth on the table and a large pitcher of water.
“We’ll stay here until your friend arrives in the city,” Wilamet said.
“How will we know he’s here?” Brianna asked.
“We have friends. They’ll pass on the information to Bron upstairs. He’ll pass it along to us, with food and anything else we need.”
Brianna felt as if a huge weight had been lifted off her shoulders. The pain in her hands from the climb down the castle wall flared to life as the first hint of safety washed over her. It wasn’t as if she was safe with Zollin, hundreds of miles away, but at least she had a good hiding place and she was away from Branock and Simmeron.
She dropped into one of the chairs, exhausted and hurting. She examined her hands. They would be stiff and sore for weeks, she thought. The skin was almost all rubbed off by the rough surface of the rope, and her palms were an angry, red color.
“Tomorrow we will get a healing salve for your hands,” Wilamet said in a quiet voice.
“You’ve already done so much,” Brianna whispered. “Why would you risk so much for me?”
“I’m not doing it for you,” she said. “I have many friends who serve the King. Our future shouldn’t be in the hands of that spoiled bully of a Prince.”
“But you could lose everything. You could even be killed for helping me escape.”
“Sometimes you have to take a chance to get what you want. You were my chance.”
“I wish I had your courage,” Brianna said.
“You have plenty of courage,” Wilamet said. “You showed that by having dinner with Simmeron. And then you climbed down the castle wall,” she said, waving a hand in a dismissive gesture. “I could never have done that.”
Wilamet wrapped her cloak around her shoulders and sat down on one of the cots. “We better get some sleep. That’s the only candle we’ve got.”
Brianna stood up and moved the chair she had been sitting in. Then she blew out the candle and stepped back until her legs brushed the edge of her own cot. She wasn’t cold, the room was warm enough, but the darkness felt overwhelming, so she pulled her own cloak around her and lay down. She was tired, and sleep came mercifully swift, but her dreams were as torturous as the rope had been on her hands. She dreamed that Zollin fell and the city of Orrock burned to the ground while the sound of thousands of marching soldiers shook the ground.
Chapter 36
Mansel woke Zollin shortly after dawn. They took the time to eat a big breakfast. Then they each set out in a different direction. Their plan was to enter the city from different directions, learn as much as they could, then rendezvous back on the little hilltop they had camped near, late in the afternoon. Zollin walked his horse and Lilly. He could have ridden into the city, but he wanted not only distance, but an interval of time between his arrival and Mansel’s.
It was difficult not to be awed by everything he saw in the communities around the city. Venders called out to him as he passed through the muddy lanes. Children ran and played while parents worked. The sound alone was so unusual to Zollin that he had trouble concentrating. Then there were the blank stares and vacant expression on the faces of the poor. They sat in hovels, either alone or in pairs, never speaking, just staring. Zollin was sure that they saw him, although they showed no interest. They didn’t turn their heads or even follow him with their eyes. They seemed like lifeless hulls just waiting to die. Seeing them was both depressing and sad. He felt sorry for them, but Quinn had taught him that happiness in life lay on the far side of hard work, without it there would be no joy.
Thinking of his father made him even more melancholy. He wished that he could go back in time and handle things differently with Quinn. He didn’t mean to leave his father angry, his parting words an indictment of the perceived failures Quinn had made as a parent. Zollin loved his father, and he was fairly certain that Quinn loved him, too. He just had never really shown Zollin love, not the way that Zollin needed him to. Sometime in the future, once he was no longer hounded by the Torr or busy rescuing Brianna, he would return the Great Valley and make things right with his father.
He focused his mind on the task at hand as a group of soldiers came marching past. He realized then that if Branock was here and waiting for him, a young man with a staff and two horses probably fit his description perfectly—at the very least they made him stand out. He needed to find a livery stable or an inn where he could leave the horses and hide his staff. He stopped a young boy who was hurrying past.
“Can you point me to a place where I can leave my horses?” Zollin asked the boy, who had wide eyes and an eager expression.
“This way, sir,” he called. “I know just the place.”
The boy led him down a side path, between mud huts and shacks that looked like they were made from scrap wood. Finally they came to a rather sturdy looking building; it was old, but well kept. There were goats in a pen out front and a chicken coop to one side. A man was cleaning the hoof of a horse as they approached.
“Soll,” the boy cried. “This man needs a place to stable his horse.”
The man looked up. He had a patch over one eye, and his shaggy hair was tied back with a leather strip that ran around and around the hair, finally ending in a tassel that Zollin recognized as some sort of religious garment.
“Is that so, Nalan? Well I might have room. Are we trading or do you have payment?”
“I can pay,” Zollin said. “I’ve got a silver coin if you’ll check the horses’ hooves and give them a good rubdown, perhaps some oats.”
“For silver, I’ll make sure they get oats,” Soll said. “Come with me.”
He led Zollin into the dark interior of the building. There was a small room to one side which Zollin guessed was the man’s home. There was a stove pipe running up from the room and into a loft that was accessible by a wooden ladder. There were several stalls in the building, but most of them were empty.
“This is a fine place,” Zollin said.
“Aye, this was part of the original garrison when Orrock was nothing more than a fort. My father renovated it and now I run it.”
“Is it a livery?”
“It’s whatever you need it to be. There are some beds upstairs in the loft, plenty of space and no questions asked.”
It struck Zollin this that this was the kind of place outlaws stayed in after a big score. He pulled Soll aside and asked him a private question.
“Is there a back door for hasty exits?”
“Out of the hayloft,” Soll explained. “Across the roof tops and away you go. It will buy you some time if you need it. Plus the ladder is the only way up.”
“How much would it take for you to hold this place for me and few friends?” Zollin asked.
The man looked at him shrewdly, then held up five fingers. Zollin dropped five more silver coins in the man’s hand and led his horse to one of the stalls.
“I assume that buys your silence, too,” Zollin said.
“I don’t know you, and I’ve never seen you,” Soll said with a smile. Zollin bent down to the boy who had brought him to the building. He fished another silver coin out of his purse, which was starting to sag a bit. He hadn’t refilled the pouch since leaving the Great Valley. Still, the boy had brought Zollin to the perfect place. There were large windows in the loft that would allow him to keep watch at night and make a fast getaway if that became necessary. The boy had earned his reward.
“I’m going to give you this, but you have to promise you won’t tell anyone where you got it.”
“I can do that,” the boy said, his eyes glued to the coin.
“Good, don’t spend it all in one place,” Zollin warned him in a light hearted manner. He grinned as he remembered how often he’d heard his father say
the same thing to him.
The boy took the coin and tucked it safely away before running back out into the bright, spring morning. Zollin turned back to Soll, who was unsaddling Zollin’s horse. He set his staff just inside the stall and asked a question.
“Does my money buy me any information about the city?”
“Depends on what you want to know,” Soll said without looking up from the saddle straps.
“I need to know if a girl has been brought to the castle,” Zollin said.
“Could be, there’s lots going on at the castle with the King ill and all.”
“Have you heard anything?”
“Just rumors. They say that Prince Simmeron has a wizard in his service now. The city guard is on alert, and there are troops from the King’s army making passes through the outskirts. There’s lots of speculation as to what is going on, but no one knows for sure.”
“That’s good enough. I need to know the best way in and out of the city from here,” Zollin said.
Soll supplied the information as he began to rub down the horse.
“And who should I talk to about what goes on in the castle,” Zollin asked.
“That’s a tough question. There are folks that know, but I don’t run in those circles. I rarely get inside the walls of the city. I do most of my business with people who prefer to keep a low profile, if you take my meaning.”
“I do; can you point me in the right direction?”
Soll recommended starting his search with a vender close to the city walls. Zollin felt strangely alone without his staff. It was a powerful tool, but it had also become part of how he saw himself. He was wearing wool riding pants with a leather backside and the shirt and vest that Brianna had made for him. His hair was getting longer, but he had no beard, no robes, nor a long, pointy hat. Yet the staff was both a weapon and a fashion statement. You might occasionally see a traveler on foot carrying a staff, but even that was rare. For Zollin, the staff was a badge of office that he wore proudly.
He made his way through the muddy streets. The closer he got to city, the more crowded the communities became. Near the city wall he found a row of shops. One was a tavern. It had a sign above the door with a painting of a bloody sword. Soll had said it was a favorite of the King’s army, and the tavern’s owner was a man named Rawlings. It was still early in the day and the tavern was deserted. When Zollin entered the shop was quiet, but soon a short man with a bald head and thick arms appeared carrying a keg of ale.
“Hello, sir, may I be of service?” the man said.
“Are you Rawlings?”
“Aye, that’s my name. And what is yours?”
“My name is Zollin, and Soll said that you might be able to help me.”
“Soll is a good man and an old friend. I’ll help you if I can.”
The tavern had a long counter where drinks were served and several round tables with stools set up neatly around them. Zollin approached the bar and laid two silver coins on the counter. Rawlings poured two mugs of ale and handed one to Zollin, who took a sip of the frothy head.
“I was hoping for news of the castle,” Zollin said.
“Thought you might be,” said Rawlings. “There’s little else happening in the city just now. You the wizard?”
Zollin was caught completely off guard, and although he shook his head it was hardly believable.
“I know,” said Rawlings. “First there’s dragons come down from the highlands, and now there’s a wizard in the King’s service. We’ve got nothing but bedtime stories to tell,” he said laughing.
Zollin was relieved. He had been afraid that the tavern master had discovered him, but the man obviously didn’t believe the talk.
“What about a wizard?” Zollin asked, taking another sip of the ale.
“Rumor has it that the Prince has found a wizard, but most likely it’s a charlatan taking advantage of the King’s foolish son. Anyhow, the wizard’s calling the shots, from what I hear, and prepping the army for some kind of attack on the castle.”
“That is odd,” said Zollin, his fears confirmed.
“Aye, it is. And there’s a maiden in distress, just waiting on her lover to come rescue her, to hear the army boys tell it. Like I said, just bedtime stories.”
Zollin took a drink and tried to collect his thoughts for another question, but the tavern man didn’t need any help carrying on a conversation.
“The girl escaped though, at least that’s what I heard. Some of the troopers stopped in for a moment this morning and let me know. The wizard’s got everyone out looking for her.”
“She’s escaped?” Zollin said, trying to sound interested and not give away just how excited he was.
“That’s what I heard, but she couldn’t have gotten far. She climbed out the window using a rope. That’s no mean trick. Then clubbed a guard over the head and got clean away. She tried that trick once before, but she was found on the riverside. I hope she has better luck this time.”
Zollin thanked the man and finished his ale. It made him a little light headed, but it was worth the information. He went out of the tavern and pretended to browse through the other shops while he processed the information. He needed a way to let Brianna know he was here, in the city, but he wasn’t sure how he could do that. He had no idea where to look for her, but if he could somehow find her, they could escape without a confrontation. It was worth a try. He also needed to find Mansel and let him know what he had learned.
* * *
Mansel rode swiftly around the city sprawl in the opposite direct from Zollin. He was excited to explore the city. He rode through the muddy streets that led up to the city walls. He was impressed by the sheer number of vendors hawking their wares as he rode past them. They called for him to stop and see their goods. They had everything from weapons to jewelry, but he had no time to look through the exotic wares of the many merchants. He was convinced that the best information would come from close to the castle. If Brianna was being held captive in the royal castle, the people of the city would know it. His mother had always said that tavern maids know everything about a village, so why not a town, even a large town like Orrock.
He was challenged at the gate, but the guards only asked his businesses and then let him pass. He rode through the cobblestone streets and found an inn that looked like the kind of place he would enjoy. He went in and ordered a mug of ale from a plump maid, who flashed him a knowing smile. When she brought the drink, he laid a silver on the table and asked her to join him.
“You look like you could use a break,” he said. “Have a seat and I’ll buy you a drink as well.”
“It’s a bit early in the day for ale,” she said teasingly.
“Oh, it’s never too early for ale,” Mansel said, grinning. “Will you sit with me?”
She looked around and lowered her serving tray.
“Alright, but only for a short time. I’ve still work to do.”
“I’m sure you do. But first, tell me the news of the city.”
“What news?” she said.
“The best kind...” he said pausing for effect. “The castle gossip.”
She giggled and he chuckled, then they both took a long drink of ale.
“Well...” she said, wiping her mouth with her sleeve. “I hear tales of a wizard.”
“A wizard?” Mansel said, feigning surprise. He leaned forward and conspiratorially whispered, “Tell me more.”
“They say he has a young maiden held captive in the castle, and that she is as beautiful as any highborn lady. Some say that Prince Simmeron is smitten with her, others that she serves the wizard. The army’s all on patrols looking for her. I heard she ran off with one of the soldiers.”
“Now why would she do that?” he asked.
“Because she’s in love, silly.”
“Oh, love...” he said. “I don’t believe in it myself,” he said with a wink.
“The right woman could make you change your mind,” she said.
&nbs
p; Mansel felt her hand brushing his knee under the table and had a difficult time remembering what he was at the inn for.
“My name’s Reena,” she said. “I’ve a room in back. Would you care to see it?”
Mansel smiled and thought to himself how much he liked Orrock, as she led him away.
* * *
Zollin bought himself a flaky-crusted meat pie for lunch. He wasn’t sure exactly what type of meat was in the savory pie, but there were onions and peppers and spices that made his mouth burn. He drank a sweetened fruit juice that a different vendor kept cold with big blocks of ice brought down from the highlands and insulated with sawdust in a cellar under his shop. The juice was delicious, and Zollin had three cups of the sweet drink before needing to find a quiet place to relieve his bladder.
Five Kingdoms: Books 01, 02 & 03 Page 68