Everyone who could seemed to nod and to give their assent. And so it was done: they found a spot beneath the fold of the ridge which was a little less rocky and a little more stable. Then Jevan, Rigel, and Piachras transported Jenna, Sianna, and Haleth to the site. Heao, in the meantime, dug up whatever he could find of their water, provisions, and possessions from the rockslide. No one, however, could dissuade Xaeland from building a cairn for his fallen friend before looking to his own health. He ignored everything that was said to him and did not speak as he slowly and painstakingly transported rocks down to the grave with his one good arm. At last Piachras joined him.
“No grave is fine enough for such a noble man,” Piachras remarked critically over the finished cairn.
“Caelhuin! Caelhuin!” Xaeland fell to his knees. “Where are you going without me?”
“Into the realm of light and glory,” Piachras answered.
“Caelhuin, look back with kindness and see….” But he could not finish the refrain.
Piachras picked up the response anyway, “Let this light and glory lead your way.”
A stroke of light slipped through the intermittent fog to glow for a moment on Xaeland’s brow. Stuart watched the light play on the face of Sianna where she lay before him. For a moment before it disappeared, he thought he had a glimpse of the light outlining the peaks of the mountain range to the east before the growing fog buried it again. Last of all Xaeland watched the disappearing light fading off of Heao, who had come up beside him to watch the funeral. “Goodbye, my friend,” he said, laying his good hand on the stones. He felt a sense of peace returning to his heart: he knew what he must do.
“Goodbye, Caelhuin the Great,” Piachras said.
“Goodbye,” Heao echoed.
That night they camped in the shadow of the dragon and the cairn. After they had washed their injuries they passed around the water, and each had a few drops and proclaimed their satiety. It was Piachras who drank last of all, and with a joke about how much better he felt, he silently screwed the cap back on the empty canteen.
“A day’s hike from here a little south of due east is the Spring of Future Hope,” Xaeland told Stuart. “From there it is a moderate but winding hike up over the pass to Taravon’s Haven.”
“Yes,” said Stuart. “And there are the remnants of the three nations awaiting us, the kings and captains of Emeria, Therion, and Ristoria.”
“Hoping they all made it there safely,” Haleth breathed heavily.
“It will be good to leave Caranis behind,” confessed Jevan, “but I regret having to leave Alik after such trials and perils.”
“It is no good,” sighed Stuart. “The hope of the nations is now in the hands of fate alone, and in the hands of the divine One.” Absentmindedly he stroked Sianna’s hair where she lay, still unconscious but apparently dreaming.
“May the divine One have mercy on us,” said Rigel.
There was a moment of silence.
“Then it is agreed,” said Jevan. “Let us try to sleep as best we can so that we can start as soon as possible.”
“I’ll take the first watch,” declared Haleth. All eyes looked to him. He shrugged. “I’m in too much pain to sleep anyway.” But if he was in pain—which he should have been, with his injuries—it barely registered on his face.
“I’ll take second watch, then,” said Rigel.
“Third,” called Xaeland. Heao eyed him fearfully, but he only turned over and drew his cloak over himself. The others soon followed suit.
It was pitch black with swirly mist when Rigel carefully roused the somber warrior. Xaeland nodded wordlessly and drew himself to his feet. “Your leave, Sir,” Rigel requested in a hushed voice.
“Go to sleep,” Xaeland replied. “Nothing is going to disturb you before morning.” Rigel nodded and went to sleep. Xaeland waited until he was fast asleep, pacing and rubbing his injured arm. He looked into the company’s supplies and, finding them sufficient, took a bite of something in the dark.
He went to the dragon’s body and drew his sword. Grasp hummed ruddily as though drunk. The meat was not yet rotting but he would have rather starved. He sliced into the side through a weak spot and soon managed to widen the wound. Wrapping his hand, he reached in and cut out two ribs that would make a good stretcher. He went into the supplies and found a cloth suitable for the stretcher, then tied it together. It was not an easy task one-handed, and at last he muttered, “Bother, they’ll get the idea.” He went back to the dragon and removed its two fangs. One he kept, and the other he placed on Caelhuin’s cairn. Then he took what he deemed he would need from the supplies and returned to the dragon’s corpse. That strange chain on the dragon’s wing! It would be simple even in the dark and fog to track where the dragon had come from. And from thence, where Alik had gone. He gave one last salute to his friend’s grave, then turned to leave….
There was Heao, wide-eyed, waiting for him.
“Go back to sleep,” Xaeland said quietly.
“I can help you, where you are going,” Heao answered, not budging.
“Aren’t you afraid?” Xaeland asked him.
Heao swallowed. “Yes,” he admitted.
Xaeland faced him, but the boy made no movement to back down. Then he shrugged and went to get the additional food and supplies he would need. Tossing the sack over his shoulder, he gestured to Heao to follow and headed up the mountain. Heao scrambled up the rocks after him, barely able even to see where he was going. Farewell, Master Delossan, he thought to himself, and good fortune. Already the camp had disappeared into the darkness behind him and all that remained was the biting cold of the free air mixed with the muggy draughts of the earth’s steam leaking up from beneath his feet, and the only light, the dim glow of the partly-unsheathed demon sword before him.
VII.ii.
Snows drifted down in big, icy flakes as the wagon pulled up to the Tryphallian checkpoint. The red-barred pennant of Tryphallia flew over a small but sturdy stockade. The two soldiers standing out in the snow eyed the white fur-lined cart coldly and a little warily. The nearer one held up his hand to halt the wagon.
Nessak Lamartos, the wagon’s driver, reigned in the horses and pulled back a hood and a stocking cap from his close-cropped head. He was a little grizzled from days without a shave, but not unpleasantly so. “Good afternoon,” he told the Tryphallian sentry.
“Are you coming from Ferria or Anthirion?” the sentry asked brusquely.
“Through there,” Nessak admitted. “Glad to be back to the northlands. There’s been war down that way.”
“What’s your business?”
“Trinkets and curiosities,” Nessak replied, holding up a pair of trinkets he had tied around his neck like gloves. Or were those curiosities? He gave the sentry a disarming grin and added, “I have a pass.”
The sentry noticed a number of other odd artifacts on Nessak’s belt and on the arch of the wagon cover. He shrugged. “Let’s see the pass.”
Nessak handed it over, coming down from the wagon. The snow plunged to the top of his fine leather boots.
“’Nessak Lamartos and Averill Vrei’—which are you?”
“Nessak,” Nessak replied. “Averill is dead these past two years.”
“You are Brolethirian?” the sentry asked.
“My parents were,” Nessak replied. “They were traders as well. I’m basically from everywhere. I was wondering if I could stop in for a bit: grab some hay, some supplies, a good night’s sleep before tackling the plains?”
“Talk to the garrison commandant,” the sentry shrugged. “I’ll need to take a look in the wagon.”
“Of course,” Nessak replied, receiving back his document. “It’s just my niece and my stores in back.” He climbed back up to the driver’s seat, shaking snow off his boots, and called back into the wagon, “Saria, be decent: they’re going to look in for a moment.”
There was a moment of silence in return, then a thin, reedy, “Okay.”
The
sentry went around to the back of the wagon and opened it up. Crates upon crates upon crates were stacked everywhere, and in the middle, just enough room for two people to sleep head to head or to sit at a table made of crates to eat. The girl was bone-thin, wrapped in furs, with blonde hair hidden under a thick fur hat and a mat of bandages. She studied the soldier.
He found the girl’s gaze something unnerving, but he proceeded anyway to break open one of the merchant’s crates. He didn’t recognize anything in it. He wondered what kind of person bought this kind of junk. He had been thinking of helping himself to one or two pieces by way of a gate tax, but between the girl’s gaze and the uselessness of the wares themselves, he gave up the idea.
General Gradja Marrann was crossing the courtyard of the outpost from the camp, heading back to his personal quarters in the civilian inn beside the gates when he saw the gates opened for a lone merchant’s wagon. He paused—perhaps remembering or half-remembering some event from his youth, or perhaps simply intrigued by that lone merchant in a world of soldiers with his warm-looking wagon and carefree-looking slant, his easy control over his fur-coated horses and the strange objects tinkling from the wagon’s arch.
“Solveys,” he addressed his chief aide beside him, “go ask the sentries who that man is and where he’s come from.”
“Yes, Sir,” answered Solveys, and he hurried off toward the gates. Marrann continued to follow the merchant with his eyes until the wagon rounded the corner toward the depot.
Nessak bought hay and oats at the depot, paying a premium, then got a room at the civilian inn. “Some charmer you got there,” the innkeeper commented with an offhand gesture at Saria, who was scowling back at him from under her heavy coat and headcoverings.
“Be nice,” Nessak told Saria. “Don’t embarrass me here, too.” To the innkeeper he shrugged: “Kids.” He laughed. “Could I get dinner sent to our room?”
“Of course,” the innkeeper replied.
Nessak led Saria back to the room the innkeeper had specified. It was not as charming or elaborate as the innkeeper had made on. There was dust everywhere, one low, bare table, a cracked counter with a rusty water basin, and a row of dead insects in the window sill. The window leaked cold air, a feature he immediately remedied by stuffing the curtain sash into the crack. He looked around, nodding, and noted the second door leading out to the latrines.
Saria unfastened her coat and plopped down on the first mattress, sending dust motes flurrying across the rays of light from the window.
Home again? wondered Nessak. “It’s just for one night,” he said aloud. “Try not to draw attention.”
“I won’t,” she said as the door closed behind him.
She sat. An oil lamp faced her from the table, but she did not light it. Slowly the room became pinkish, then reddish, then purplish, then dark, the only lights coming from the watchlights reflecting on the snow through the still-open curtains, reflected by her own pale, glimmering, snowy skin. Slowly she fell into unconsciousness, still dressed in her coat and hat. Slowly she fell from unconsciousness into dreaming.
Nessak went back out to the common room to buy dinner. He was surprised to find a Tomerian general and his staff waiting for him. “General Gradja Marrann,” the man introduced himself. “And you are the merchant Nessak Lamartos. Allow me to buy you dinner.”
Nessak, feeling a bit more than a request in the dozen or so soldiers around him, bowed and followed Marrann to a table by the hearth. Marrann sat opposite him, facing the fire. “So, what can I do for you?” Nessak asked affably.
“First things first,” replied the general. “What would you like for dinner?”
Nessak shrugged. “How is the isou soup special?”
“Well enough for my tastes, but if you are a connoisseur, you may be disappointed,” Marrann said.
“That’ll do, then,” Nessak replied. “And a spiced cider.”
Marrann sent one of his aides to fetch it, then leaned forward. “I understand you came from the plains states. I want a full brief on the military situation there as you know it.” He smiled at Nessak’s look of sudden understanding and said, “No, you realize there’s no free dinner. But I’ll do you another favor that will be very valuable to you. I am leaving in the morning for Tomeria, and I will allow you to accompany my wagons. The snowy plains are a dangerous place, especially this time of year, and more than one merchant wagon has disappeared on that journey.”
Nessak nodded, considering the trade-off in dangers. “Well,” he said, “there is nothing I can tell you that isn’t common knowledge. Anthirion and Oris have been razed and are garrisoned by a Tomerian army—well, if that’s not true, at least it’s what everyone is saying. The coast is under blockade. There are reports that Ferria has capitulated to the siege of Tryphallia, but all the traders who have come from that direction say otherwise, and that the Ferrians continue to make a mockery of the armies of Tryphallia. “Yllan has made some sort of treaty with the north, they say. The plains cities are in turmoil and there is scattered war throughout, with roving parties of raiders or cavaliers from every state, some of whom are battling each other. And no word has come from the Western Isle, where they say the conflict began.”
This last comment, thrown in with barely a change in inflection, gained just the reaction Nessak had hoped it would, if only for the shortest of moments. “The isle?” Marrann asked. “Why, what do they say happened there?”
“They say—ah, but you must know—that a combined force of Tryphallians and Tomerians took over the isle by force. But nobody seems to be able to shed any light on the question, ‘why?’” And the way he leaned that word over the table turned it into a question for Marrann.
General Marrann lowered his eyes for the briefest of moments. “I couldn’t tell you anything about that,” he murmured. Nessak believed him, as far as that went. Marrann’s voice returned to its previous tone. “What of the states to the east?” he asked. “Or is the conflict isolated to Tryphallia and the plains states?”
“There are rumors of war and destruction from the east, but nothing really definite,” Nessak shrugged. “Some say Therion has fallen. Others deny it and say Labrion has. Some say not only Therion, but Ristoria too, and that Morin is the de-facto ruler of all the known world.”
“And what do you think?” asked Marrann.
At that time the innkeeper’s boy brought over Nessak’s dinner. Nessak dropped him a coin and thanked him as he collected his thoughts. “General Marrann,” he addressed him, “these are the types of reports that are always likely to be exaggerated.” He stirred his soup. “All I know for certain is that all of the southlands are dangerous for businessmen and children.”
“Ah, yes, you have your…niece, is it? with you,” said Marrann. “I understand she was ill?”
“Injured,” Nessak corrected. “Grazed by an arrow in an attack one night by some raiders south of Yllan. She will be all right, assuming she doesn’t become infected.”
“A pity for your suffering and hers,” the general said. “One doesn’t like to hear of such things. If there is anything I can offer….”
“No, it’s all right,” Nessak said.
“Very well,” said Marrann, pushing back his chair. “Oh, one other thing I should ask: in your travels, have you seen anything resembling a crystal of about yeah-size?” he casually gestured with his thumb and forefinger.
He thought immediately of the reports from the other page knights of the scruffy young boy who had come to Xaeland carrying a crystal exactly like that, who had been attacked and had fled into the bogs south of the city. Slowly he replied, “Every two-bit Aerisian gem-peddler is carrying a bag full of such items,” he waved his hand.
“Quite so,” chuckled the general, amused by the merchant’s business-sense, “but this one might be identifiable by strange physical phenomena surrounding it, or by an owner who spoke in a strange language or with a heavy accent.”
Nessak gave a thoughtful look toward the cei
ling. “Honestly,” he answered, “I’ve seen a lot of strange things and a lot of strange people in this world, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like what you are describing.”
“Ah-hah,” sighed General Marrann, rising. “Well, if you do, I have a personal interest in this personage. Thank you for your time. Enjoy your dinner.”
“Sure thing,” smiled Nessak, digging into it. But the general had already left.
The trumpets of the Tomerian muster began long before dawn, loudly and insistently dragging Nessak and Saria out of bed. Saria said nothing. Nessak grumbled something that was drowned out, then set about cleaning himself up. Saria fixed her head-dress and went out, presumably to the wagon.
It was a brisk, bright morning when Nessak emerged from the inn. The general and his aide stood facing the square with several others, who were coming and going, barking orders, relaying messages, or running errands. “Drop in line, Master Lamartos,” said the general, barely turning to see him.
“Ah yes, okay, just a minute,” he mumbled, but the general took no notice. Nessak prepared the wagon (or rather, finished preparing it, for Saria had already hitched up the horses and given them their feed bags) and led it out through the gates past the Tryphallian sentries.
The thousand of Tomeria were arrayed in the snow, their light grey uniforms gleaming like silver, accented by the glint of the morning sun on swords and harnesses and by the white of arctic fox fur. War carts and warhorses, wagons and lances filled the field in perfect order, ready to march. War sleds with wolf-dogs armed with light helms, jackets, and breastplates gleamed around the perimeter. Numbered pennants fluttering in the breeze marked off the companies. A trumpet blast sounded the preparation, and ten riders separated from the ranks to give their reports to the commander, a dark, surly shape like a boulder seated on a warhorse at the front of the thousand. At the same time, General Marrann and Lieutenant Solveys rode up with the trumpeter from behind Nessak’s wagon. “Fall in line, Master Lamartos,” the general ordered. Nessak thought he saw a hint of a smile betray itself on the general’s lips. Yes, he knew it was an impressive sight, and yes, he took pride in it.
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