The Stiehl Assassin

by Terry Brooks

  He looked again. He didn’t see anything this time. But a second later, one of four Federation soldiers who had stationed themselves at the back of the room disappeared.

  Moments later, a second was gone, snatched away with such swiftness there was almost nothing to indicate he had ever been there at all.

  A fierce joy swept through the boy. If Seelah was here, they had a chance. The changeling was a force of nature, and even a dozen soldiers might not be enough to overcome her. Shea decided he would do what he could to help.

  “If you agree to let me go,” he said to Zakonis, “I will tell you something useful about the old man.”

  Tindall gave him a surprised look, but Shea ignored him. “I know a few things about him that you might be interested in.”

  Zakonis didn’t bother to look at him, apparently mesmerized by Annabelle. “You’re in no position to bargain with me. A few days in the Deep, and you’ll tell me everything anyway.”

  Off to one side, a third soldier disappeared—then, an instant later, the fourth as well.

  “Rocan isn’t coming back,” Shea continued, in his efforts to draw the Federation commander’s attention. “But I know where he is.”

  This time, Zakonis did turn. “You don’t know anything.”

  Shea shrugged. “Have it your way. But you’re wasting time waiting for him.”

  “I’m not letting you go, no matter what you tell me.”

  “But if I tell you where he can be found…”

  A fifth man was gone. Suddenly one of the soldiers said, “Where’s Huett? Huett?”

  The other soldiers joined in, calling for companions who were no longer visible, and a sense of panic crept in when there were no answers. Zakonis turned, an angry look on his face.

  A sixth soldier disappeared, right in front of the others, and seconds later the core lights that lit the cavernous room went out, leaving everything shrouded in hazy shadow. A swath of dead gray daylight still revealed Annabelle and her surroundings through the skylight, but the walls and corners of the chamber were almost buried in gloom.

  Sounds suddenly erupted from everywhere at once, and the remaining Federation soldiers lost what composure remained and began firing their flash rips in wild bursts. And what had moments earlier been a calm silence evolved quickly into chaos. Shea grabbed Tindall by the shoulders and pulled him to the floor, holding him there forcibly.

  The old man struggled to get free. “Let go of me!”

  “Stay still!” Shea hissed in his ear. “You’ll get shot!”

  Flash rips continued to crisscross the room with fiery ropes and loud explosions, but other than destroying equipment and supplies, they seemed to be doing nothing useful. Another soldier disappeared and one more was shot by one of his companions. Zakonis was screaming at his men in fury, trying to restore order, but they were not listening.

  Then, abruptly, the firing of flash rips ended, and everything went silent once more. Smoke and the smell of char hung on the air, filling the chamber with haze and stench, giving it a demon-like, surreal look. Zakonis was still standing, wheeling this way and that, searching for movement and calling for his men. None answered. Realizing he was alone, he turned toward Shea and Tindall, raising his weapon. “On your feet! Now!”

  A second later he lay prostrate on the floor, his weapon lost, a slender foot pressing down on his back with such force that, even though he struggled mightily, he could not move.

  Shea released his grip on Tindall and allowed him to get to his knees. The old man stayed there, staring at the apparition that pinned the Federation commander in place.

  “Seelah,” he marveled aloud.

  Shea, grinning from ear to ear, couldn’t even manage that much.

  * * *

  —

  They bound and gagged Zakonis, relieving him of his weapons and throwing him into a corner where they could keep watch on him. Seelah had killed the rest—or they had killed one another—so there was no one else to threaten them. Nevertheless, Shea went back down to the first level of the building to make sure no one was lurking at the doors. But Zakonis had apparently believed strongly enough in himself and his men not to bring further backup, and Shea returned to Tindall confident that—for some time, at least—no one else would be coming.

  Seelah, satisfied that they were safe enough, allowed Tindall to go back to gazing at his precious machine and curled up with Shea on the bench, nuzzling him with a sustained and deliberate passion. The boy wasn’t all that unhappy to have an incredibly exotic and alluring young woman fawning over him—whatever her species happened to be—even if all the attention she was lavishing on him did make him feel more than a little embarrassed. Soon enough, he kept telling himself, she would tire of this game and move on to something else.

  Which, in fact, she eventually did. But it took her an uncomfortably long time.

  The morning hours passed, and Rocan failed to return. Midday came and went, and as the afternoon hours lengthened, Shea became increasingly worried that something might have happened to him. If something had, it was difficult to say what Tindall and he might do—together or separately—about the future. He wondered if he should send Seelah out looking for him, and even went so far as to suggest it. But the changeling merely smiled and licked his face.

  Zakonis, slouched in the corner, bloody-faced and seething, was studying him with undisguised hatred as he worked at loosening the ropes that bound him. But Shea had learned a few tricks over the years, and one of them was how to tie ropes that, when worked against, simply drew tighter. After a time, the Federation Commander stopped struggling and leaned back against the packing crates in baleful silence. Probably, the boy thought, making his plans for what he would do to him once free again.

  It was getting close to twilight when Rocan finally returned. He entered cautiously, edging the door to the chamber open with a blade tip and looking inside until he spied Shea sitting with Tindall, and Zakonis bound and gagged to one side. A grin split his smooth features, and he came all the way in with a hearty laugh.

  “Commander Zakonis! What a pleasant surprise. I did not expect to have the pleasure of your company again so soon. But you look so uncomfortable! Don’t tell me an old man and a boy put you in this position? Not that I wouldn’t put it past them to manage it, of course.”

  Zakonis glared at him threateningly but could do nothing more.

  “Where’s Seelah?” the Rover asked Shea.

  Seelah had disappeared an hour or so back and had not chosen to reappear since, not even upon Rocan’s return, so the boy simply shrugged. Then he noticed the pair of men who had followed the Rover in. They were clothed in rough leathers decorated with colorful scarves and sashes, with various types of blades stuffed into belts, and sheaths strapped about shoulders and waists. It didn’t require guesswork to conclude they were Rovers.

  Rocan noticed him looking. “Cousins,” he explained. “Come to help us with our transportation problems. Some others will be here within the hour with an airship. I thought to lease a suitable vessel from within the city, but there are few within the Federation I’d trust. Family, on the other hand, is a different matter. In Rover life, we embrace and honor our kin; we do not betray one another for any reason. We would not survive for long as a people if we did. Having all of the Races in all of the Four Lands suspicious and mistrustful of our people at best, and antagonistic toward them at worst, serves to provide an important lesson.”

  He sat down beside Tindall and put his arm around the old man. “Of course, there are always exceptions. Some few deserve our trust and loyalty and love for what they have done for us, and for what they have risked. This man is one, Shea Ohmsford.” He squeezed the old man’s shoulders and looked at the boy. “You are another.”

  Shea shook his head, thinking of his plans for going home.

  “You risked yourself to
save him when I asked it of you. This is what I saw in you in Varfleet. Courage, fortitude, determination, and self-confidence. Now I am asking you to stay with us a little longer, while we attempt to accomplish something wonderful. I am asking you to join us in helping Tindall use Annabelle to aid the Four Lands—to help Annabelle provide something that was once only a dream. Will you come with us?”

  Shea looked at his feet, already wavering in his determination to leave. He thought again about returning to Varfleet. Returning to the life he knew before he fell under Rocan’s spell and came to Arishaig. Returning to the security and familiarity of his former life, where living hand-to-mouth meant forfeiting the possibility of garnering a small fortune but also meant being able to steer clear of places like Assidian Deep and men like Zakonis.

  He was stalling, and he knew it. But he could not make himself give an answer. He was torn between his choices once again.

  Then, in the midst of his confusion, he heard clearly for the first time the last thing Rocan had said. Will you come with us?

  He looked up questioningly. “Come with you where?”

  The Rover grinned. “I thought you would never ask.”

  * * *

  —

  It was another two hours before the promised transport arrived. By then, the last of the sunlight was fading into the west and the eastern shadows were beginning to overlap the city. Rocan had sent one of his cousins to keep watch on the warehouse roof, but the transport announced itself in a much grander way than he could ever have managed. Sliding silently out of skies gone dark and cloudy, it cast its vast shadow over Annabelle’s warehouse so thoroughly that any view through the skylight was blocked out completely. Everyone was looking skyward in shock when Sartren, Rocan’s cousin on the roof, came flying down the stairs, breathlessly heralding the airship’s arrival, bringing all of them charging up onto the roof for a closer look.

  What Shea found was beyond anything he had ever imagined—an airship of such size and scope that it dwarfed even the huge warehouses beneath it. The huge vessel had the appearance of a giant predator—frightening in its blackness, and massive beyond belief. Its prow was curved and blunted to form an ironclad ram, while its stern had been shaved flat and slanted inward to join with the long, deep curve of the keel. Four towering masts rose into the night like giant trees, spars and crosstrees extending like limbs to form a vast forest that secured the light sheaths that fed the giant parse tubes filled with diapson crystals to power the ship. The largest vessels Shea had ever seen hung yards of sheeting to form just half a dozen or so sails. But this airship easily hung twice that.

  Shea Ohmsford stood staring in disbelief. The wind blew wildly across the rooftop, scattering his long hair into ragged strands, and he could imagine himself sailing aboard the vessel above him, standing on its decks, looking out over new worlds and wonderful vistas. Even without thinking about it, he slipped off his headband and let his hair flow out, loving the feel, letting his imagination soar. He would not be traveling so far this time, but one day he might. And maybe sooner than later.

  “Nothing like her,” Sartren offered, clapping a hand on the boy’s shoulder as he came up beside him.

  Shea shook his head. “Nothing,” he agreed. He had not known until now that a vessel of this size could even exist. The excitement and wonder that coursed through left him breathless, and he found himself grinning like a fool.

  “Family-built, family-owned, family-sailed,” Sartren continued, as if unaware of his besotted look. “She’s ours and she’s ours alone. Bit of a reach, letting Rocan have a go with her, but he’s an insistent sort, and by the end of the voting, he’d gotten his way.”

  “What’s she called?” Shea asked.

  “Behemoth. It means something like ‘larger than you can imagine’ or ‘much bigger than life.’ Something like that. Rovers didn’t name her. We built her, but left the naming to a seer. The seer gave her that name, maybe two years ago.”

  “But you kept it?” Shea brushed away the hair that had blown into his eyes and squinted in the poor light.

  Sartren leaned close. “You don’t go against the word of a seer, lad. You don’t ever risk that.”

  Then he was gone, and Shea was left alone again, staring upward at the Behemoth. She was a fixed point beneath banks of clouds that rolled across the sky with ponderous determination, the stars appearing and fading in the wash. He had not thought he would go with Rocan tonight; he had been ready to leave him and Tindall and their wild schemes and go home. But you could never tell in this world how fate would change your life, and so it was here. What he had believed to be true yesterday was now as lost as the day itself.

  Off to one side, the skylight was sliding open, cranked back by pulleys and winches, the motors that powered them purring softly as they engaged. The banks of lights that illuminated the interior had been kindled once more, and chains were snaking downward from the Behemoth to secure and lift Annabelle away.

  By morning they would be gone, and Shea would go with them.

  “Where do you want to go most?” Rocan had asked him earlier, when the boy had pressed him on his intentions.

  And he had answered, “I want to go home.”

  “Then that is where you will go, Shea Ohmsford. That is just where you will go.”

  For the Rover had decided that while it was not safe to remain in Arishaig, it was safe enough to find a hiding place in the Borderlands and in Varfleet specifically. There, they would be able to go to ground more easily. There, they would be able to better conceal themselves from Federation eyes. And there, they had a safehold that not even Zakonis, with his nose for sniffing out those he sought, would be likely to uncover. Not that he could find them in any case, now that Rocan had extracted the tracker from the back of Tindall’s neck. That particular trick was no longer up the commander’s proverbial sleeve.

  So. Home to Varfleet. Exactly where Shea had wanted to go, and now he was to be taken there. The conditions might not be as he had anticipated, and he was not yet free of the strings that bound him to Rocan and Tindall and the wild plans they were bent on pursuing. But just at the moment, he was content to go along for the ride and see where he ended up.

  He was still a fifteen-year-old boy, and adventure was a lure he could not easily dismiss.

  EIGHT

  NOT TOO FAR NORTH from the banks of the Mermidon, an expanded two-man was making its way along the slopes of the Dragon’s Teeth. Having decided on a destination, Drisker Arc was quick to usher everyone on board the craft Dar Leah, Brecon Elessedil, and Tarsha Kaynin had flown to Paranor. He was adding himself and Tarsha’s brother to their number, but all were able to squeeze in by removing some of the supplies and equipment, which hopefully would still leave them with what they needed to complete their journey.

  He was slow to reveal where they were going, although Dar had guessed at the truth before the Druid finally came around to admitting it. By then, they were well under way.

  “It has been years since any Druid has made this journey, but I think we must go to the Valley of Shale and the shores of the Hadeshorn, to summon the spirits of the dead,” he told them. “If we are successful, the shades of my Druid predecessors will reveal what is needed.”

  They had lifted off by midday and flown south to the mountains before turning east. It was at that point that Dar, familiar with the Druid history and aware of their previous visits to the Hadeshorn, suspected that Drisker was going to attempt a communication. After all, Drisker had made it plain enough he did not know what he should do next, and a meeting with one of the Druid shades made sense. Sort of, because the shades did not always speak clearly enough for the meaning of their words to be understood—or even always speak the truth. Such a meeting, therefore, was always a bit of a gamble on the part of the supplicant.

  “I cannot promise I will be able to get the answers I am looking fo
r,” Drisker continued, ruefully. “Shades dissemble and riddle, but I might be able to extract enough information to determine how we should best direct our efforts and what means might be used to try to solve our problems.”

  No one had much to say to that. Except for Dar himself, no one had any experience with the Hadeshorn or the Druid practice of communicating with the dead. And for the moment, no one seemed to want to know more about how this was done.

  So they traveled in silence along the rugged cliff walls, oblivious to what was taking place just on the other side as they passed east, their attention focused on preparing for what lay ahead and the attendant difficulties they were facing. Tarsha was wrapped up in her efforts to help Tavo, and Dar could tell by the furtive looks she gave her brother as they sat across from each other that she was debating about how to proceed. The Blade sat in the front seat of the craft with Brecon, who was piloting, helping with the navigation—both of them listening to Drisker as he periodically offered directions from the bench he occupied just behind them.

  The day itself was heavily overcast, not much warmer than the previous night, and the snow was still in evidence on the ground below them, with drifts cradled in the rocks of the higher peaks. It was an unmistakable reminder of the weather that was coming. Winter in the Four Lands was bitter—especially in the far north—and the months it dominated were snow-filled and cold. South of the Mermidon, it held less sway, the snows more scarce and the cold of nightfall milder and quicker to warm with sunrise. In the time he had been in residence, Dar had never cared for winters at Paranor—although the Keep itself stayed warm enough. Venturing forth always required bundling up, for the winds blew the cold down out of the Northland with a steady persistence. As a boy, he had become accustomed to the mild temperatures of the Highlands, and the colder winters of the mountains surrounding Paranor always reminded him of what he was missing.