Arrangements were made hurriedly as to what to do with Jenna. The captain refused to keep her below, insisting she had to be considered part of the “treasure.” In the end Haleth volunteered to have a harness rigged so that he could carry her. Heao and Jevan worked with the Aerisians to modify a child’s harness that was available. Haleth and Thenele checked it, then it was fitted to Haleth and Jenna strapped in. Heao gave Jenna a worried look and covertly squeezed her hand, and she smiled back thankfully.
The captain ordered a hatch opened in the ceiling. Then the travelers were marshaled onto the stairs, through the hatch, and out onto the ladder. Stuart led the way, and Heao and Jevan pulled up the rear just behind Haleth. A full platoon preceded them, and they were followed by another.
Heao soon learned something worse than the ache he’d felt in his feet: the rasping pain that began to grow in his arms as they went higher and higher and the buildings below became more and more dizzyingly small.
The sun reddened over the western mountains. The whole air over the mountains changed from blue to green to gold, finally into every hue of red and violet. The colors seemed to seep into their very natures, to sing silently from a place within confused by the violent urgency of matters before them and behind. But for a moment there was no urgency at all: there was only air, and the tingling of the rungs.
They reached the first isle trembling and sore, permeated by and longing for the peace of the sunset. The guards gave them two minutes. Haleth transferred his load to Piachras. Then they continued.
The colors faded away into pale lavender and went dimly out. A cloud blew through them, and the icy wind redoubled against their dampened skin. Darkness came inexorably, swallowing the ladder rungs one by one. Then Heao could not even make out the form of Jenna in front of him, and he was left to darkening dreams.
The lights of the palace of Aerisia flickered late into the night. The walls glistened gold and crystalline beneath silvery arches; solitary guards now and then appeared on their rounds, refueling lamps and ensuring that all was well.
At three o’clock the clarions sounded. Torches marched through the outer courtyards, awakening a flutter of cooing feathers. A lone bird in the palace gates sang a few plaintive notes, then disappeared before a hoarse, shrill scream. The palace doors closed heavily behind the prisoners, echoing down the halls after them.
Anthaenor, king of Aerisia, shuffled into the throne room surrounded by columns of lamp-bearers and high guards, who spread out around the chamber, lighting the lamps and securing the chamber’s salient points. Behind the king’s procession came another, easily twice as large: Jaeae Esaear Daeaean, chief of the Daeaeans, surrounded by a deadly phalanx of raven-haired women clad above in black leather cloaks accoutered with dozens of knives and short-swords and clad below in tight, gauzy wraps that left nothing concealed. Two black-speckled drakes flew with them.
Opposite, the clarions sounded and the prisoners, now stripped of their weapons, were led in. The king began at once, “I am to understand that this gross breach of protocol,” he waved his hand toward the prisoners, “is due to information these prisoners have concerning the shard-bearer?”
“Most noble King Anthaenor, allow me to introduce my company,” Stuart began.
“If it is pertinent,” the king said coldly.
“Very well,” Stuart replied. “Briefly, we are friends of the boy you seek. This man here, Jevan by name, is his legal guardian, and this, Landrial, is his brother-in-law. He is a good and honest boy, but bears a heavy burden as you are aware and is in much need of guidance and help. Our group was attacked by beasts in the wilderness and the boy, Alik, escaped while we were hard-pressed, believing us dead. We managed to trace his trail as far as your bounteous kingdom, and have come to you now to seek out news of him and to offer our assistance in finding him.”
“This is as much to say nothing at all, which is what I perceive you offer,” the king rumbled. “I have the thousands looking for the boy—Alik, as you call him. I do not need eleven more...including a boy, a cripple, and a traitor. As for the rest of you, I have no reason to believe you are what you claim to be and more than ample reason to suspect citizens of nations antagonistic to the cause of Aerisia.”
“Let not our nationalities or former nationalities condemn us to your judgment,” Stuart answered, growing more annoyed. “If we are southerners, we are useful to your cause insomuch as the boy was a southerner. The fact remains that we can find him if you let us. You have thousands, you say, but it may well be that ten who are informed may succeed where a thousand cannot.”
“Speak plainly, now,” the king commanded. “You are here under a traitor’s claim to the treasure-finder’s right, which she well knows is inviolable if it can be proved. What special value do you offer as seekers after the boy that I do not already possess?”
Jevan stepped forward. “Your Loftiness, we offer understanding of the boy Alik. We know how he thinks, what he desires, and, more importantly for you, where he would go. Moreover, we are his friends, and he trusts us. He will come to us.”
The king snorted scornfully but did not at once answer. He scanned the suspicious company before him, then lowered his gaze, removed his crown to scratch his rumpled hair, and held the crown in his two hands for a moment, considering it.
At last Jaeae Esaear Daeaean spoke, one malignant drake sitting on either shoulder. “King of all Aerisia, that which the foreigners possess is indeed a treasure, if it is true.” Heao narrowed his eyes in surprise. “However, it is a treasure which will fly from you as surely as a wild falcon, the bird the Ristorians after all worship, if you let it go. Therefore if their claim be true, they will find the bearer and escape with him, while if their claim be false they will simply escape, mocking both our laws and your power. Better to use the treasure they speak of here—in prison. Then if their claim be true, the boy will indeed come—to us, when he hears of it—while if it be false, you may execute them all on the third day.” He smiled sinisterly at Stuart. “King, this is the only way.”
“And what about my right as treasure-finder?” Thenele gasped.
“Naturally, the traitor must not be separated from her ‘treasure,’” Daeaean added.
“But he is nothing but a low-down sting-fish and a slave of Morin!” shouted Heao.
“Heao, silence,” Jevan ordered.
“They have to see it!” Heao shouted. “He has sold them all to Morin! He wants to be king himself, but he is a slave! This whole land will be destroyed,” [at that, although it may have just been imagination, a tremor went through the ground] “and it will all be because of him! All will fall! All, everything will fall!”
The king waved his hand wearily to the guards, who closed in around the group. Daeaean was already leaving, undismissed. “The suffering of your people will be upon you!” Heao shouted after him, backing away from the guards to stand between them and Jenna—but Jevan drew him reluctantly back.
The king remained to watch as they were dragged away. Strangely, Xaeland seemed the least perturbed as they were marched off. He nodded to the king on his way out and said, “You’ve had your warning, King. Heed him.” They were led down a dark corridor with torch-bearers before them and after. Sparks floated over them in draughts. The gate into the prison compound was tall and wide, the stones uneven from wear. The commandant admitted them with only the most cursory check. Then they were led past hall after hall, level after level, barred steel door after barred steel door, high into an immense stone edifice that must have rivaled the palace in size. Once or twice some miserable face appeared as a flash through the bars of one of the doors, but for the most part the population could not be seen.
At last they reached a set of empty cells that the guards opened and thrust them into in pairs: Stuart and Sianna, Haleth and Jenna, Jevan and Heao, Xaeland and Caelhuin, Piachras and Rigel with Thenele. Brisk footfalls were approaching from the opposite direction. The last door clanged.
“I thought you sai
d you had an understanding with the captain!” Rigel immediately started onto Thenele.
“I knew what I was doing. I had the treasure-finder’s right,” she replied.
“And what exactly is that?”
“The right of a treasure-finder to appeal to the king in any case of harassment by legal administration aimed at the plundering of their find,” she said. “The Aerisians base their culture so strongly on economics, and especially on mined treasures, that they have always held that one law immutable. Without it, Aerisia would collapse.”
“Are you not from Aerisia?” Haleth asked through the bars.
“I’m from the mountains originally,” she replied. “Southern Tomeria.”
“A Northerner!” Rigel exclaimed.
“You know, I’m just about sick of your pig-headed bigotry,” Thenele shot back.
“And what are you up to now, Sir?” Piachras demanded, turning to Xaeland, who had fished a bit of wire out of his pockets and was playing with the lock on the door.
“Hang tight,” Xaeland silenced him.
But at that moment, the footsteps that had been approaching arrived. “This one, this one, and those,” a voice said, and keys began turning in the doors. Xaeland stashed the thing he’d had in the lock as the door swung open. The outside of the hall was filled with even more soldiers than had been there before. Two of these wore carved diamond signet rings; all of them bore silver diamond badges. “The Aeat demands your presence,” the leader declared.
“And what, Sir, is that?” asked Piachras.
“Aeat’s heir, chief of the mining guild,” Xaeland told him, eyeing the soldier.
“To say the least,” the commander answered. “Well, come.” The others were already being brought out of their cells on either side of them.
“And our weapons?” Xaeland asked.
The commander threw up his hands. “Would you like to stay in there?”
“Depends on the deal you offer,” Xaeland said.
The second commander intervened with a tactful touch on the first commander’s arm. The first spoke to Xaeland, “You will have your weapons back. You will need them anyway. We’ll have someone fetch them to you at Crith Aeat’s manor.”
Xaeland answered, “Send as many soldiers as you can expend, you will not bring my sword back. Only I may touch it and live.”
There were mutters amidst the guards. He thought he heard the word, “sorcerer” or something like it. “No one will touch your sword,” the commander said. “They will fasten a rope around it.”
“The more dangerous,” Xaeland said. But then he paused. “If you must fetch it, take a steel-bound chest padded on the inside. Set all the other weapons in it first. Then quickly overturn the table my sword is on into the chest and lock it before it awakens. If I am not present when it is opened, anyone who is will surely die. Understand?”
“I will see to it myself,” the commander assured him. Xaeland caught him by the shoulder and gave him an intense stare. The commander met it. “I understand,” he said. “I will see to it myself.”
“Bring my brother,” Xaeland said, setting his other hand on Piachras’ shoulder, “a fit weapon as well. His own was shattered not long ago.” The commander nodded and left, disturbed, without answering.
They took a more direct route out of the royal prisons, and when they reached the gates, a carriage wagon picked them up. Heao, for one, was asleep the moment he sat down.
Zenaea Genath, the Aeat Crith, reclined in meditation on a bed of floating white feathers over a thick red rug. A chaotic clattering echoed hollowly from out of sight. The room was spacious and lofty, sparkling but luxurious. From her position, Zenaea the Aeat commanded the whole room.
Two soldiers entered. She waved them away, and they left. At last the party she awaited arrived. She evaluated them coolly as they filed in. One: a grimy, calloused but resolutely neat Ristorian, powerfully built and very handsome. Two: a receding man in a long black cloak, pale-skinned, ragged-haired, by carriage and demeanor a warrior beyond any doubt. Three: his companion, a huge man, hairless and covered with burn scars—possibly blind? Four: a lithe, watchful, lively elven woman giving a good appearance of beauty and wakefulness. Five: another powerful elven warrior, a hero by every outward appearance, muscular, overstrained but ready to fight, handsome, his Ristorian outfit modified in an almost Narrissorean fashion for any adventure that might befall. Too tall and fair for a cave elf, but too...vibrant...for a Ristorian. Something unexplained there. Six, then: a Therian, a thickly-muscled rider with no apparent rank, carrying by a rigged harness a crippled girl—daughter? Seven: an old, bleary-eyed Anthirian general, his heraldry marking him as being from Taiz’. Eight: the foreigner lieutenant, Thenele, who they apparently had to thank for all this. Nine: a somewhat squint-eyed, greying man...the guardian? He could barely stand. And then there was the youth who was reported to have made such a fuss in the court: older than she had been led to believe but younger than she had guessed—must have been halfway from nine to eighteen at least. No, at least fifteen.
“Zenaea Genath, Aeat Crith,” announced her commanders.
“I shall come to the point,” she said. “I have freed you in order to take advantage of the offer you gave the king. Go and find your boy, the shard-bearer, and bring him to me—not to the king or to Daeaean. I would pay you what you liked if I thought you would accept it. You have nothing to lose; just give me your word; that will do.”
“Our weapons?” Xaeland asked.
“Have been delivered per your instructions,” Zenaea nodded toward the banging sound coming from outside the room.
“What is your interest in Alik?” the squint-eyed elder man asked.
“More tolerable to you and he than Daeaean’s interests,” she replied.
The company exchanged dubious glances. At last Stuart came forward. “We will do what you ask if it is in our power, but if you have designs to harm him once he is here, know that we shall surely protect him with our lives.”
The Aeat smiled. “Fair enough,” she said. “Caelion will give you whatever details you need to find the shard-bearer...Alik. Given the time-sensitive manner of the situation, I might think you would start at once.”
Caelion, the commander who had brought their weapons at Xaeland’s request, came forward, a strong, tan, burnt-blond figure in dress uniform with a diamond signet and a harness of fine but high-quality climbing gear. “Your...equipment...is this way,” he said.
They followed Caelion out of the audience chamber. Heao met Zenaea’s eyes on the way out and blinked. She was smiling at him. He could not concentrate or understand.
They entered a tall, richly-tapestried antechamber outside the room. True to the commander’s word, a treasure chest lay rattling with repeated bangs in the middle of the room. A guard stood at each of the three exits facing inward. Two squads followed them in, but that did not concern Xaeland in the least. He went straight to the chest, threw back the hood of his cloak, and unlatched the lid.
Silence fell, and a warm red light seeped out of the chest, giving Xaeland the appearance of a praying monk. He lifted the sword, cold and dark, out of the chest, belted it on, and began distributing the rest of the weapons to their owners with a faultless memory for every detail.
Caelion breathed a sigh. “Smuggling this weapon out of the palace was not inexpensive. It will not be long before word of it reaches Daeaean or the king, and when that happens it will be a matter of minutes until they learn that you are also no longer in custody. The king will not hear till dawn, but Daeaean will not be sleeping.”
“His movements concern me not,” Xaeland said.
“It is the movements of the boy you call the shard-bearer that concern us,” Jevan said. “What can you tell us of him?”
“He was carried into Aerisia by Anaerias’ lieutenant,”—he glanced at Thenele—“ah, but you know that. Shortly after, General Krythar’s emissaries arrived, offering the throne of Aerisia and all our land’s r
iches to anyone who might bring to him that boy. It did not take long for Daeaean to learn from his minions, who control all trade through the Climb, that a boy exactly fitting that description had passed through there that very day under the custody of Anaerias. He sent his spies to Anaerias’ Capitol Island estate. He must have found him, because before anything else could happen, Anaerias was killed and all the world fell apart.”
“Then we must go to Anaerias’ estate,” resolved Piachras.
“No,” Thenele said.
“It has been leveled,” Caelion said. “He is not there.”
“Commander,” Xaeland spoke up.
Caelion turned toward the man, who gestured toward the weaponless Piachras. “Ah,” Caelion said. “I was unsure what to get for him, but he may have his choosing of the arms hanging in the next room.” He ushered them all through the guards at the door on the left into a fine, bare room decorated sparsely with glaives, halberds, pole-axes, swords, cutlasses, pick-axes, and other weapons less familiar. Piachras made a cursory scan of all the weapons, then smiled broadly and pulled two large glaives off the wall. Caelion nodded and led them on into a series of grandiose passages to a different gate than that which they had entered the manor by.
Two guards at the inner gate came to attention. “Commander Caelion,” the first spoke, “there are reports of Daeaeanites watching all the gates.”
“That’s nothing new,” Caelion told the others. “I have had our cart brought around already; that will give some cover.” He led them out into the courtyard where the cart was waiting. The outer gates were dark across the court. Four of the Aeat’s soldiers followed. Caelion himself took the driver’s seat.
Out of the dark a voice shouted, “Where are you going, Aeatan, with the king’s prisoners?”
“Hyah!” Caelion whipped up the horses. “Captain Chaelan, they’re in the courtyard!” Four dark shapes darted across the courtyard as the horses burst forward. A torch flared to life, illuminating for a moment a hefty Aerisian soldier, who hurled it at the cart. Sianna rolled to her feet on the cart as it rocked back, drew her sword, and slashed the torch out of the air with a puff of sparks. The Aeat’s soldiers poured out of the entrance behind them but Caelion only spurred the horses faster. They plunged in between the first of their attackers.
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