by Ember Lane
“I myself,” said Krakus, “wanted some more time with you. I wanted to start tutoring you on our ways, to fill your healing tree. Unfortunately, there is never enough time to complete these things, but I can at least make a start tonight.”
“I want to come with you,” Glenwyth blurted. “It’s why I left. It’s what I think I must do.” I told her she was welcome, and she got up and walked toward Elleren. “We must talk, I need to tell you a few things about Lincoln.” They left our little circle.
“Well, I’m coming with you too. You’re practically my Petreyen sister,” Star said, and nudged Shylan. “You got any leaf? I fancy a smoke.”
I knew Star would be a treasured traveling companion.
Crags jumped up and ambled over to me. “I’d like a word,” he said, scanning the group. Star and Shylan were already in deep conversation, as were Aezal and Krakus. Mezzerain gave me a slight nod as if he were giving me permission to talk with the gnome. Crags pulled me up—some of the way—and we walked off a few yards into the dark woods. He sat on a newly sawed stump and bid me do the same.
“Crags?”
“Alexa,” he said.
Silence.
“You asked me out here…what do you want?” I eventually said.
“So I did, but it’s hard, you see.”
“What is?”
He looked at me. No matter what his mood, what his expression, mischief wasn’t far away from him; I could tell that.
“Treason,” he stated, emphatically.
“Treason?”
“Indeed. Treason. What I am about to tell you is treason. If word gets out, I’m a dead gnome.”
“Dead gnome…”
He jumped up and then faced me, boot to boot. “So, I want yer to swear t’me that you’ll keep what I tell yer t’yaself. Understand.”
“Cross my heart and hope to die.”
He furrowed his brow. “Why would yer wanna do that. ‘Sides, dying comes easy to yous lot. Swear on somethin’ that’s important to you.”
“I swear on Joan’s Creek, and I swear on Lincoln.”
Crags nodded. “That’s good enough. So, tell me, what’s yer second quest?”
“Catch a thief.” It was common knowledge, so I didn’t see why I shouldn’t tell him.
“And you have the navigation skill to enable you to catch a particular thief. Now, have you asked yerself, ‘Why that thief’? I mean t’say, there’s loads of thieves out there.”
I thought and thought hard. “Is The Thief going to steal something special?”
Crags clicked his fingers. “You got it. It’s The Thief and the stuff The Thief would steal that’s important. It’s the stuff The Thief is driven to steal that’s important.” He sat back down next to me. “And as luck would have it. I have an inkling of what that is.”
“An inkling?”
“How much do you know about Poleyna? Not a lot? Most folk don’t. Do you know, fer instance, how she cracked the Earth?”
“No.”
“Few do. She used The Prism of Light, or to be more precise, she destroyed it, decimated it into nine pieces. The thief seeks to remake it. There, its that simple.”
“And I must stop him?”
Crags sighed. “Nope, you must catch The Thief—that’s what the quest says.”
“But…”
“But don’t make things more complicated than they are. The quest is simple. Catch a thief. No more, no less.”
At the exact moment of his proclamation, lightening cracked across the sky, lighting it up with hundreds of brilliant flashes. Then nothing, nothing but our heartbeats as we waited, until a vast explosion of thunder, and yet there was no rain, no storm, no anything. The trees around us shuddered; the earth trembled. The stars blinked and then went out, leaving the night sky black, but then it gradually lightened until it was deep azure blue, and the dusk had returned, even if only briefly. The blue faded to midnight, and shadows filled the air once more, and the stars shone again. The bluster of warm wind near blew me off the stump, swirling around us, and silence fell, like that moment before a storm when the air becomes heavy and full of threat.
Crags hopped off the stump. “It is done. The first piece is uncovered,” he whispered.
“Wait,” I called after him as he ambled away. “Are you coming with me?”
He spun around, hands in his pockets, his wool hat askew. “Nope, too cushy in Joan’s Creek. Besides, someone’s got to look out fer the Builder.”
I sat there for a while, but eventually returned to the camp. I slumped by the fire, exhausted. At some point Mezzerain put a blanket over me, and I remember muttering a thank you. I remember looking up and seeing Krakus staring down at me, the reflection of the fire’s flames licking at his face, and I remember being mesmerized by it, and I remember him muttering all the night through till dawn until I opened my eyes.
“There,” he said. “I have taught you all I can. We shall meet again, Alexa Drey.” The shaman keeled over.
I looked at my stat board.
Name: Alexa Drey. Race: Human. Type: Chancer.
Age: 24. Alignment: None. XP: 15,500.
Level: 8. Profession: None. Un/Al pts: 0.
Reputation: Known.
Health Points: 500/500 Energy: 170/170
Mana: 260/260 Shadow Mana: 0/750
HP Regen: 50/Min EN Regen: 17/Min
MA Regen: 19/Min SMA Regen: NA
Attributes: (Level, Bonuses)
Vitality: (12, 38), Stamina: (12, 5), Intelligence: (26, 0), Charisma: (6, 6), Wisdom: (11, 8), Luck: (7, 5),
Humility: (2, 0), Compassion: (3, 0), Strength: (3, 20), Agility: (7, 0)
Skills: (Level, % to next level, Boosts %, Level Cap)
Running: (6, 22, 25, 12), Perception: (5, 44, 0, 15), Commerce: (1, 0, 0, 6), Magic: (7, 0, 0, ∞), Concealment: (7, 12, 0, 15), Night vision: (4, 71, 0, 10), Blades: (8, 51, 0, 25), Spell Casting: (5, 0, 0, ∞), Close-Q-fighting: (5, 86, 0, 25), Archery: (7, 78, 0, 28), Swordsmanship: (7, 87, 28, 20), Staff fighting: (7, 91, 0, 60), Horseriding: (4, 20, 0, 8), Climbing: (3,8,0,14), Stealth: (4,18,0,22), Rope law: (3,28,0,4), Crafting: (5,0,0,5), Navigation: (3,15,0,14), Pickpocketing: (2, 45, 0, 5), Herbalism: (2, 22, 0, 12), Alchemy: (1, 0, 0, 8)
Healing tree: Level 4- Subskill – Poultices and potions: (6, 44, 24)
Subskill – Heal over Time: (4,0,10)
Subskill – Group Heal: (4,0,10)
Subskill – Solid soul: (4,0,10)
Subskill – Mana Drain: (4,0,10)
Subskill – Mana Transfer: (4,0,10)
Subskill – Stitch and Stem: (4,0,10)
Talents:
Tongues of Time, The Veils of Lamerell.
Quests:
Seek out the Legend of Billy Long Thumb. Status: Incomplete. Reward: Unknown.
The Veils of Lamerell. Status: Incomplete. Reward: Death.
Subquest: The master is now the slave, his command now his prisoner. Free the gambler, end his torment and confront one of five. Status: Complete.
Subquest: Catch a thief. Status: Incomplete. Reward: Unknown.
16
A Welcome Inn
Balazar’s Teeth had grown steadily bigger, now a sole tooth loomed over us. The mountains in this land were strange, oddly proportioned. They were impossibly tall, and impossibly thin at the top. They were shaped like gigantic stalactites, cones of rock, which shot up like fangs. I’d imagine just to climb one would take you a year, if indeed it were even possible. They were evenly spaced like a ridge of spikes and vanished south, and the other way, turned and marched east to Castle Zybond. Having now seen these mountains up close, I wondered if Zybond wasn’t just carved from a mountain itself, wondered if that wasn’t how its keeps stayed where they were, one above the other.
Star was riding next to me, Mezzerain and Glenwyth behind, and the welcome sight of a mountain village loomed. After a couple of weeks riding trails to get here, I’d learned a few things. First, horses don’t take kindly to galloping more t
han a few hundred yards at a time. Those bedtime stories I used to read where knights galloped across continents without stopping, well, I knew that wouldn’t really happen. Secondly, and I was already getting to realize this before, camping is no fun. Fortunately, the roads and trails accommodated this most of the time, and it wasn’t pure coincidence that a way station invariably appeared sometime late in the afternoon. All things traveled at the same gruelingly slow pace.
Fortunately, the same would be true of our target, or so we thought.
“They get stranger,” Star said, suddenly. “If you thought that place we slept in night before last was full of odd-uns, wait till this group.”
I knew what she meant too. We’d actually ended up traveling along the Silver Road with Shylan, Aezal, and Krakus for much of the day after it had been decided I should pursue The Thief. It was one of those awkward goodbyes where you realized you were both going the same way. As soon as the road had veered south toward Brokenford, though, we’d finally gone our separate ways. Star was right; the folk had been getting progressively weirder as we stumbled across more secluded places.
The hamlet we were headed for was sandwiched between two rocky crags that pinched the valley’s width, making the river that flowed down it white with rage. Through the pinch, I could see a strip of bright green, like someone had stripped the valley above of its trees. My navigator pointed straight toward it.
“What’s this place called?”
Star laughed. “You got the navigator, not me, but if my reckoning’s right, it’s White Water. Folk aren’t known for inventive names up here.”
The road was hard underfoot, each hoof-shod pace crunching on stone, the trail no more than two tracks in the grass, sometimes not even that. We made for a strange party and drew suspicious looks everywhere we went. Mezzerain was clearly a soldier, and we’d decided that no guise would change that. Star, Glenwyth, and I, well, some took us for his concubines, others for his daughters. and in the end, we’d settled on adventurers. We told any that inquired that we were on Muscat’s business and that the crown had reported a dungeon had become active in the area. We told them that we were going to bind its fairies and send the demon back to its fiery home.
That usually shut them up. They usually let us be after hearing of dark magic. Folk were scared of demons and ghosts up here. Folks were scared of most everything up here mostly because practically everything could kill you. White Water was a scattering of a couple of dozen buildings and by all accounts the last place to rest up. According to my map, the valley split into five smaller valleys above White Water and ended at the tooth-shaped mountain. White Water was the end of this land’s civilization.
But at least it had a tavern and a large room with eight guest beds—all of which were empty, and a barroom no bigger than some folk’s hearthroom. It was run by a sour-looking man who clearly liked our bronze but clearly hated the inconvenience of having to earn it. Gold didn’t seem to exist this high up. No one appeared to have a need for it.
“Dungeon, you say,” he muttered, leaning heavily on the bar. He was as scrawny as a mountain goat—most everyone up here was, and his full beard did a good job of hiding his intent. “I reckon it’s up the Thumb.”
The Thumb was one of the five valleys above. I guessed it was the short and stubby one.
“Odd things been happening in that valley,” he continued to say. “Strange things, talk of a demon, a fairy and a banshee. Couple-a-few up there farming, maybe a dozen huts. No one’s seen a soul come down since the sky glowed day in the night.” He leaned even farther forward and lowered his voice. “Any of you got a god on yer side? Don’t reckon it’d matter which one, but I reckon you’ll have half a chance if you got one of ‘em with you.”
Then he served up swill for ale and mutton or goat broth. It was about the extent of what we expected. As night rolled down the valley, so more folk drifted in, and the tales from The Thumb grew even stranger.
“Heard they slaughtered Grandma Lumin,” an old single-toothed hag told us.
I noticed Star tried to stop smirking but failed miserably.
“So, you church or mercenaries?”
“Adventurers,” Mezzerain said, trying to stick to our fragile story. “Though if a faith is needed, I would say mine heralds from Speaker’s Isle.”
“The old ways,” One-Tooth said, and slurped on her swill. “That might get you farther than the other ones. Then again, Grandma Lumin was a witch, and she ended up burning. Could smell her stench all the way down here.” One-Tooth cackled.
“Others?” Star said, shifting forward, suddenly attentive.
“Wizards,” One-Tooth spat, “Three or four of ‘em. They came here then they…”
“When?”
“’Bout… How long was it, Greg? When? I don’t remember…” The hag seemed truly lost.
She turned to her companion, a chinless old man with ruddy cheeks and more than his fair share of teeth. “Probably remember fer an ale,” he said. “You city folk?”
Mezzerain signaled for more ale, and the barman huffed but brought it over. “You got no legs?” he asked Mezzerain. I expected the big man to rear, to put the innkeeper in his place, but he just gave him a cold stare and muttered his thanks.
“Yeah, city folk,” he replied.
The ruddy-cheeked man swiped his mug of ale, bringing it close. He began to growl under his breath like a dog might, coveting a bone.
Like the rest of the buildings in this hamlet, the place was a wooden lodge, and everything radiated from the stone hearth. There were maybe a dozen other folk in, all of whom had fallen silent, all eavesdropping without bothering to hide it.
“Use the elf well,” he finally said. “She knows the ways. You’ll find things change above White Water—the old ways come to the fore. Dungeon? That’ll be the least of your worries. The others, well, they won’t be coming back down, not now—too long. If I were you, I’d go back to where you came from and pick up some trinkets in its market. Give those t’the king, and tell him the dungeon’s gone.”
He sat back, his eyeballs bursting from their sockets, his mouth twisted in pleasure as if our impending doom pleased him. I began to wonder what fresh hell awaited us, now seeing White Water as a gateway to some dire land.
“What of the other valleys?” Star asked.
I noticed Glenwyth had shrunk into Star’s shadow. She was like a frightened mouse, was Glenwyth, and I wondered why she’d come. I couldn’t imagine the courage it must have taken her to uproot herself from Sanctuary, from Joan’s Creek, and I wondered how I could coax that courage out of her.
“The others?” One-Tooth said and cackled. “They survive. They graft, but you rarely see them here—once, maybe twice a year. Victor will cart down from Little Finger, Mary-Bethe from Five-Farms, the middle valley is just rocks ‘n falls ‘n the bones of hopeful prospectors. Louis sometimes makes it through the steps of Mountain Root.”
“But no one from The Thumb?”
“Not since the sky cracked day in the night. Tunpeg used to trade. He used to bring us mutton, but folk say last time he was twitching like a mad-un. Ever since the family traveled to Brokenford, their luck’s gone. The city infected them; the old gods left them. Most likely? Only Grandma Lumin’s magic was savin’ them.”
Ruddy-Face shushed her. “Enough of that talk. Their’s makes more sense. An enchanted dungeon spawned, and the devil was let loose in The Thumb. Demons slaughtered them all once Grandma Lumin fell. We should send fer a wizard, and get the place sealed—blow the valley’s head with magic, and be done with it—ferget it ever existed, afore its crawling evil takes over this place too.”
“Aye!” said a few around the bar, many banging their mugs on their tables. “Seal it and ferget it before we lose our minds,” one chimed in.
One-Tooth was twitching like she was about to explode. Something felt very wrong with the place, and I began to wish we’d just rode through.
“And what then?” a voice
from the shadows called.
I looked over, but a plume of pipe smoke obscured its origin. As it cleared, it revealed a man, but little of him. A fur hood hung low over his face—white-gray fur, same as his long coat. His booted feet rested on the table in front of him.
“I said, ‘What then?’ You seal it up like a beaver dams a river, but the water always gets through. Nope, Edwin, you gotta rip the problem out.”
“You volunteerin’ Sedge?” Ruddy-cheeked Edwin barked at the stranger.
“Just sayin, Edwin, just sayin… Not exactly my problem, because it’s not exactly my valley. You know that. If the creatures do get through, I’ll be long gone.”
“Runnin’ away eh, Sedge?” One-Tooth jibed.
“Wanderin’, Martha-Rose, wanderin’.”
“Have you found what you’re looking for?” I suddenly blurted.
“Might have,” Sedge replied, and though I couldn’t see, I knew his eyes were boring through me.
Edwin leaned in. “He’s more trouble than he’s worth. Steer well clear. Wandered up here a couple of months back and been wandering ever since. He might even be the reason…” Edwin nodded knowingly, tapping the side of his nose.
Sedge pulled his hood lower and puffed on his pipe, the ensuing smoke cloud hiding him again. I took a drink of my own ale, nearly spitting it out, and pushed my plate away. This was no Joan’s Creek that was for sure.
Glenwyth shivered, and grabbed hold of my cloak and pulled me close. “Something’s wrong with this place. It’s not what it seems,” she whispered in my ear.
Then I noticed the silence as if the preamble had run its course, and the main show was about to start.