by James Duvall
“Who are the ra-” Joshua started to ask, but Rickthicket shushed him.
“I'm sorry,” the mouse said, earnestly. He was looking up at Syrrus from his perch on the stump, and was holding his hat in both hands against his chest. “I didn't mean to bring up bad memories.”
Syrrus took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “It's fine. It is an important lesson for Joshua. He needs to know who the enemy is,” she said. Her voice had changed. The air of confidence was gone, replaced by something more primal, a cold hardness, distant from the peaceful clearing she stood in.
“The ralians believe that magic exists to serve their fire god, Kalthiress, the Forgemaster. We are heretics in their eyes. Humans and Fendians alike have been at war with them since as long as we could look across the Rilrath and see the fires burning in their temples. They have a special hatred for panthers that use magic. We are of the beasts in their eyes. Those of us they kill they cut in half. Part is burned, part is fed to their beasts of war.”
In her eyes, Joshua could see the embers of a distant war drifting past. Beneath the surface was a cold fire, not unlike his own. She had not seen the white dragon, but she had seen battles that brought him to shepherd the righteous dead into their glory.
Syrrus shifted uncomfortably and looked toward the east, toward home. “When I found Grimlohr I saw the chance to turn the magic Ralia reveres back against them. I've been working for him ever since.”
“And he drags you all over the place, it looks like,” Rickthicket said, ever the cynic. “I hope he pays you well.”
“Well, if you want to be a wealthy mage, you stay in Andrlossen, rather than strike out to face the ralians alone. I'm sure you understand what. How does Marreth pay you?”
The mouse crossed his arms and looked up at her with his beady little eyes. “He doesn't!”
“Mm hmm,” Syrrus chuckled. The iron had gone from her tone. “I thought as much. How is he doing?”
“He doesn't much like the potions we've been making; says they taste like swill. He thinks Grimlohr's right, some sort of ralian curse. It's certainly nothing I've ever seen a lightning bolt do.”
Up the hill, candlelight flickered in Marreth's window. Joshua had rarely seen the injured mage. Marreth emerged only briefly in the evenings for a constitutional, and took his meals in private.
“He hardly ever sleeps,” Rickthicket said and sighed. “Marreth fixates on his projects, but I've never seen him so driven as this. He's burnt the candle at both ends for so long. I worry he will burn out.”
Part 2
The Sorrows
Chapter 14
A City of Ashes
Fort Sundor, Fendiss
By Royal Decree, the Emberfall Mage known as Morgen Dekker is hereby an enemy of the crown for her role in the attack on His Royal Majesty's caravan carrying traitors and criminals found to be conspiring against the Crown. Any persons that know of her whereabouts should report to the city guard. Those found to be harboring fugitives shall be considered complicit to their crimes and made to account.
Public Notice Board, Camden, In the year of the Lord, 762
Snow had been falling only lightly falling when Marreth Stormwood first woke. It fell in earnest by the time he saw Sundor Tower rising in the distance. The storm spat little bits of ice at him like grains of cold white sand. They chewed at his skin like sandpaper and he drew his cloak up tight around him, peering out through the gap beneath his hood. Through the haze he could still make out the vague silhouette of the city, dark stone walls and black iron gates standing out in sharp contrast to the iced-over trees. Any approaching enemy would see the jagged features and the black smoke pouring from the foundries and know that they were damned. Sundor was a machine of war, a great sleeping dragon that would come to life at any moment and consume them with perdition's fire, leaving their corpses to freeze in the snow and be scavenged by wolves.
Marreth approached with the confidence of a man that had fought from inside those walls. The blue and white flag of Fendiss hung down across the brickwork above the archway, welcoming those loyal to King Tygus into his realm. Above it was the place he had stood, raining down brimstone and reaching out with tongues of deadly flame. Those beside him heaved rocks and burning tar over screaming ralian soldiers, beating their way in through the Soldiers' Gate with a battering ram as they died.
That day the sky had been bright but filled with embers and ash. Today it was bleak and gray and the gatekeeper did not look at all pleased to see him.
Because of the horse...
Or rather, what it meant. The approaching traveler was obviously human, after all, the fendian panthers could not ride horses. The gatekeeper gave him a look as cold as the frostbitten iron crossbars behind him. Standing tall and proud on the legs of a regal lion, the soldier had a slowing effect on the horse that rivaled a sharp tug on the reins. The mare came to a stop a half dozen yards from the soldier's paws without a single command from her rider.
The faryian soldier's dark leather armor bore the royal seal of Fendiss on the shoulder and again along the feral sides. It creaked with newness as the guardsman approached. Closer now, Marreth could see that the royal seal, painted in white, had a halberd and spear crossed behind it. This was one of the elite Shankari Guard.
“What is your business here, stranger?” the Shankari Guardsman asked. His golden faryian eyes fixed on Marreth hard as coins. The soldier's halberd proved distracting. Simple and brutal in its effectiveness, the blade was slightly curved so that as it cut through flesh it would glide along bone instead of becoming stuck fast within it. Marreth cursed his luck. If he had arrived earlier in the day there might have been others trying to get into the busy markets.
“I am tempted to ask you the same,” Marreth said respectfully. “I fought alongside the Shankari Guard in the War of Ashes. It is surprising to me to find them stationed in Sundor Tower.”
The guardsman narrowed his steel-gray eyes at the mage. Marreth could tell his story was not believed, so he reached slowly behind his back and pulled his mage's staff from behind his cloak. It was nearly useless to him, but it added some credibility to his story. The guardsman remained unimpressed.
“Your business,” he repeated. Despite the man's youth, he spoke with the cold and deliberate authority of a man many years his senior.
“My name is Marreth Stormwood. I am here to see Caedus Beldin, Lord Beldin's brother. He is an old friend of mine. I am sure you heard of him. He studied magic in Camden. I met him there.”
Two other guardsmen had come to their companion's assistance, likely due to the appearance of the mage's staff. Now, two faryian halberdiers and a sadean spearman had Marreth's full attention.
“I don't know, Vorsen, a human coming to see Lord Beldin's brother?” one asked quietly. Marreth tried to avoid looking like he was directly eavesdropping, but they were making very little attempt to conceal their words. Vorsen was the first, apparently a full guardsman. The other two were initiates. All three were several years younger than Marreth, but they conducted themselves with more gravity than even the most stoic of the Emberfall Order. There were no jokes, no idle remarks, just calm deliberation over who Marreth was and what ought to be done with him.
“I heard of this one,” the sadean said. “He's Silverwind. Must be looking for political asylum.”
“That's true,” Marreth interjected. “About being Silverwind.”
“Can you prove that?” Vorsen asked, sounding like he did not expect that Marreth could. Marreth hoped his feather would mollify the guardsmen, and was relieved to see the glimmer of recognition in Vorsen's eyes when he produced it. He tucked the feather away as quickly as he had produced it, though there seemed little reason to keep up the pretense of secrecy. It was simply familiar to him to do so, and it put his mind a little more at ease standing in the cold with King Tygus's hand-picked royal guard.
“Stay out of trouble,” Vorsen said, then stepped aside and gestured for Marreth to pass. It
took some prodding to coax the mare forward, her pace reluctant and then surging as the lions fell behind.
Inside, the walls provided some shelter from the cold wind, but the air was still heavy with the chill and softly falling snow. Decades-old fountains dribbled water into icy basins. Young men and boys shoveled snow from in front of shops. Young girls visited the lucky ones, bringing them hot cocoa before quietly disappearing back into the buildings where it was warm. Here and there, memories of the war came back to him.
He remembered the bakery, one of the few shops kept open this close to the Soldier's Gate. The bit of bread he got for his breakfast had come from here. Through the window he could see a sadean man rolling out dough on a big wooden slab. He wore an apron down the front, and had another tied about his feral back to keep the silvery bits of fur from finding their way into his wares. A young girl, presumably his daughter, frosted little cakes with chocolate behind the counter. They were framed by a haze of fog on the window, and the girl looked up and smiled amiably before returning to her work.
During the siege the bakery had been thronged with over a dozen panthers, mostly young women and boys too small to fight, Then the shop's offerings had been only bread, and every third day a cup of soup to go with it. The lines had poured out into the street where men and panthers sat and ate and talked while recruits drilled in the crusader's square beneath a bright and open sky. Marreth waved quietly to the bakers before leaving the memory behind. He turned back to a cold and empty street, save the few still trying to fight back the snow.
A blanket of white snow covered most things, muddied in the cobblestone streets and on the corners where traffic was most heavy. Today the corner lamp was not yet lit and a cart, heavy-laden bags of fresh flour, waited to be unloaded where Caedus had rallied his men the day before the Soldier's Gate fell.
Archer vine still clung to the buildings all around. It was something that set Sundor apart from the other fortress towns Marreth had visited. It was a thick vine, dark green and leafy, with pods that would bud into flowers in the brief springlike season the Fendians called summer. Archer vine grew only about a foot a year, and was one of the few plants that could survive the harsh of winter, rare and strong as the people that had lived here on the icy frontier for over a century.
Further down the road, loom-shuttles raced back and forth, clacking at each end like coffin nails being pounded in. The sound came from a long building with a sloping roof. It was the last sound many of his friends had ever heard. The drying room had been converted into a makeshift hospital, and the looms pressed into service for bandages. Time had returned it to its old purpose with hundreds of colorful dyed fabrics hung from the rafters to dry, but Marreth could think only of the dead. Fallen allies, his friends, were carried out and lined up in neat rows along the street to wait for the cart. Every few hours it came and carried away the freshly deceased, lest they bring a pestilence onto those they had died to protect. Feeling he lacked the strength of heart to pass that corner, he chose another way to the market.
Marreth did his best to put the Shankari out of his thoughts as he lead his horse through the streets. To him, their presence was a sign of Arcamyn's great failure. His nation had turned its back while only a few days to the north, the War of Ashes had never really ended. Ralia and Fendiss still skirmished over the Rilrath River. Despite this, the elite Shankari Guard had been deployed to Sundor to watch over the Arcamynian border in case their ally's indifference turned to treachery. An alliance that had lasted more wars than Marreth could remember now stood in the greatest of jeopardy, all but broken by the boy king's fear. His fist tightened like a vice around the reins. A day would come when Fendiss would not have reason to fear its allies.
The bell tower dinged out the hour, and Marreth stopped to watch and listen. The old clapper swayed heavily, making a brassy clang that carried through all of the streets with ease. Seven years had come and gone since he had last heard it.
After booking a room, Marreth left his horse in the inn's stables. He would continue into the market on foot, using his staff as a crutch and a sign that thieves should be wary despite his limp. Marreth spent the bulk of the afternoon and into evening perusing Sundor's marketplace, restocking for the second stint of his journey, up north into the wintry lands of Andrlossen and on to the Frost Moors, the ancestral home of the Beldins.
In the early evening hours, Marreth retrieved his horse, legs aching from the strain of the day. He took the mare up and down the main roads until he found lamps that had not yet been lit, and then followed them until he found the lamplighter, hard at work. His breath caught in his throat when he first laid eyes on her. His mouth became so dry that he felt as though he had tried to swallow a mouthful of sand. There she was, working her way through the city streets in a humble red and white dress. He wasn't sure it was really her at first, but most girls in this city had graceful lioness's legs leaving twice as many tracks in the snow, and this one stood tall and thin. When he drew nearer, he could see her familiar face and bright shining eyes. In the failing light it was hard to see how badly the colors had faded and how thoroughly her clothes and cheeks were smudged with ash and soot. In place of a mage's staff she carried an old lamplighter's rod, the tip of which burned cheerfully, casting a flickering light over her. Despite her appearance, Morgen Dekker still had a certain vitality about her that Marreth remembered fondly. He found himself staring at her as though if he looked away for just a moment she might vanish like the light of a blown-out candle, leaving only a thin, smoking memory of its warmth.
“Marreth?” Morgen asked, sounding as though she doubted her eyes. She wiped her hands on her sooty dress and shielded her eyes from the setting sun to get a better look at him. “Is that really you?”
Marreth swallowed hard and cleared his throat, finding himself at a loss for words. It occurred to him that he wasn't sure how long he'd been standing there.
“Morgen, how long has it been?” Marreth asked warmly. His impulse was to dismount from the horse and go to her, embrace her, but he did not want her to see him limp.
“How long has it been?” she asked.
“Far, far too long,” Marreth said distantly. “It's good to see you Morgen. I wish I could have arrived at a more fortunate hour.”
“You certainly could have!” Morgen scolded. “Look at me, I'm a horrible mess!”
There was the woman he knew. “Come now, I don't think I'd even recognize you if you weren't covered in ashes.”
“So what do you think?” she asked, planting her lamplighter's staff against the cobblestone road.
“Of?”
“My new job of course,” she said, giving a nod toward the little flame that crowned her staff.
“It hardly suits you.” Marreth recalled vividly the last time he had seen her at the Mage's Council in Camden. That night she wore her dress robes, a flowing medley of oranges, reds, and yellows, seated at the front table with other first and second order Emberfall mages, just a few seats down from him. A week later she had set fire to a royal caravan on its way back from Fendiss and promptly disappeared for a year.
“Exile rarely does,” she said with a forced grin. “But it's honest work. Keeps a roof over my head and helps me keep an ear to the ground.”
She paused to adjust the little flame. “I've almost finished my rounds. Care to join me?”
“Climb aboard,” he said and pulled her up onto the horse's back. Together they made their way up the streets, between buildings crowded so closely together two wagons could barely fit past each other without one being dragged up against the wall.
“So, have you heard anything interesting?”
“Nothing lately,” she answered.
“That's surprising. The Shankari Guard are here. Isn't that worth at least a mention these days?”
“Shame on you Marreth. I'm supposed to be the one with her head in the sand. The Shankari have been here for nearly two years. You should visit our allies more often,” she ch
ided playfully and wrapped her arms around him, hugging him tightly around the waist from behind. Marreth took one hand from the reins to run his fingertips along her soft hand.
“I lied actually,” she said. “I have heard something interesting. I heard you had recently found a road to exile as well. Did you miss me that badly? I heard about your little stunt with the dragons.”
“Of course,” he said, grinning. “I did it all to come see you.”
She smiled softly. “Come on Marreth, why have you really come?”
“I'm headed up north to see Caedus Beldin,” he said. “I need a favor or two.”
“It must be important,” Morgen said. She slid off the horse to tend to an unlit lamp.
“Very.”
Morgen topped off the nearly empty oil reservoir and trimmed the wick down to a nice, clean-burning shape. She closed the little glass door and set the latch. She smiled up at Marreth and took hold of the bridle, leading the mare down the street from lamp to lamp.
For a moment there was silence, only the quiet clip clop of the horse's hooves on the cobblestone road. It was a quiet, serene thing where for a moment it seemed as though no time had passed at all. They were young again, vibrant and wide-eyed, passionate. The world had not taught them it's hard lessons yet. They'd lost no friends, been dealt no wounds.
It would not last. In their line of work you could measure a life as an accumulation of scars.
Morgen looked up at him with worried eyes. The moment had passed.
“Marreth, are you sick?” The question sounded regretful.
Marreth sighed to himself. It had been a fool's hope to think she might not notice the scars or that weary look in his eyes that no amount of rest could soften away.