At least he was making no attempt to avoid her questions. And, she thought, I can learn as much from his lies as the truth. “And do you know where Sara is now?”
“No,” he admitted.
Mirien exhaled slowly. She couldn’t tell if he was lying, but the answer reassured her a little. “So, what now?”
“Mirien,” Kyran said, leaning forward, “I distrust the gods as much as you, and like you, I believe their injustices must be stopped. But understand, I am new to this world and dare not let myself be swayed by any one faction, not without first ascertaining the truth of their words for myself. I promise you, if Iyra proves the monster your Brotherhood seems to think her, I will not ally myself with her.”
Mirien ignored his words. Nothing the free agent said could be trusted anymore. “What now, free agent?” she repeated.
Kyran sat back, and seemed to sigh. “That is up to you,” he said, shaking his head sadly. “If you still wish to travel with us, you may do so. But if you wish to part ways now, I understand. We will share with you any provisions you need.”
As much as Mirien wanted to throw his words back at him and be gone from his presence, she knew she could not.
Duty, she reminded herself. She had a duty to the Brotherhood and her people—a duty she had almost abandoned on the escarpment to save Gaesin.
“I will stay,” she said, biting off each word. She rose to her feet. “Now, if you will excuse me, I will go get some rest.”
“You don’t wish to discuss our next step?”
“No,” she replied curtly. “I will follow where you lead.”
Kyran looked like he wanted to object, but after glancing at her frozen posture, he swallowed his words and only nodded in response.
With none of her usual grace, Mirien walked stiffly to her sleeping pallet in the back of the cave. Just before she passed out of earshot, Kyran called out to her again. “Mirien?”
She stopped, but didn’t turn around.
“I’m sorry. I should not have lied to you.”
She kept walking. Reaching her pallet, she lay down and closed her eyes. Only then did she let the fury that she had been suppressing during the conversation flood into her. She was angry. At herself for allowing herself to believe in the free agent, and at Kyran for…betraying her hope.
How could he have been so foolish as to give himself over to Iyra? And all for the sake of this champion, Sara? Did he not understand the consequences of what he did? Kyran, the journey through the mountains had taught her, would one day be stronger than many champions.
Perhaps strong enough to rival Yiralla or even the legendary undead king, Zarr. She shuddered to think of what Iyra could accomplish with him added to the ranks of her champions. The fool.
Why, she wondered, had she let herself believe in him? Why had she begun to believe that there was hope yet for Myelad’s people? She wiped away the tears streaming down her cheeks. It had been a silly dream.
And she should have learned by now to not let herself fall prey to such futile hopes again. Her thoughts circled each other, picking at everything she had done wrong, everything she should have done differently since meeting the free agent.
At what she would have to do now.
A softly spoken voice interrupted her. “Mirien? Mirien are you awake?” It was Gaesin. She kept her eyes closed and turned away. “Mirien, I know you think we’ve betrayed you, but it is not the case. Kyran is only trying to do the best as he knows it. Give him a chance, please.”
Mirien kept her back resolutely turned away. Heaving a sigh, the half-elf dared to lay a comforting hand on her shoulder. “Good night, Mirien,” he said forlornly. “I hope you can find it in yourself to trust us again.”
Mirien waited for the youth to leave before rolling onto her back again. I’m sorry, Gaesin, she thought, fingering the hilt of her blades. It is too late for that now.
✽✽✽
Yiralla gazed up at the south gate.
She had spent lifetimes planning how to storm it. And she had never envisioned a future where the gate stood undefeated, but no longer a threat. How she wished the city still stood. It would be a glorious battle, she thought dreamily, to storm Durn Duruhl.
Behind Yiralla, her soldiers moved about studying the signs and trail left behind by the free agent. One approached her. “Yes, Captain?” she asked without turning around.
“We found the trail, Champion. Three elves, one wolven, and a great bear cub, just as you said. They’ve headed northeast into the mountains.”
“Two elves and a half-elf,” Yiralla corrected him. “How long ago?”
The captain flicked his large ears back and forth uncertainly. “There is no way to say for certain. But at least a week.”
Yiralla, still staring the gate, nodded. “Send a few men to find their trail and prepare the rest of the men to follow.”
“Yes, Champion,” said the captain. Then he shifted nervously from foot to foot, not moving away.
“There is something else, Captain?”
“The dwarves, Champion. They still trail us. Can I send a few squads to deal with them?”
Yiralla bit back a curse and swung around. She grabbed the troll by his throat and swung him languidly aloft. “Captain, why do you persist with this nonsense? For the last time, a few grubby dwarves are unimportant. We will not waste time chasing them down. Let them trail us if they wish. We chase far bigger game that we cannot afford to lose. Xetil will skin us alive if we do so. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Champion,” the troll captain managed to gurgle through Yiralla’s strangling grasp.
She flung him backwards. “Good. Go see to your men now.”
Yiralla returned to her study of the gate, wondering if she should try contacting Xetil again. Her previous attempt a few days ago had, disturbingly, failed. Despite searching long and hard in the ether for her lord, she had not been able to find him.
Xetil had been there, of that she was certain, but his presence had felt withdrawn, masked somehow. She still did not know what to make of the experience. It was the first time in her long life that she had failed so utterly in reaching her god.
Even though she was reluctant to admit it, Xetil’s absence worried her. So troubled was she by her first failure that she had been hesitant to try contacting her god since. She sighed. Now, however, she had no choice. Xetil had specifically demanded to be informed when she reached the south gate. With a lazy wave of her hand, Yiralla flung out coils of divine essence into the ether and called out, “Xetil, sire, heed my call.”
Golden threads of essence coalesced about her presence in the ether. It was Xetil. Yiralla let out a carefully concealed breath of relief. Her god was back.
“Yiralla, what is it?” he snapped.
“My lord, I have reached the south gate. We have found the free agent’s trail and are about to follow him east into the mountains.” As much as Yiralla wanted to ask where Xetil had been and why she hadn’t been able to contact him a few weeks ago, she knew Xetil would not take kindly to being questioned.
“Very good. They are travelling through the inner mountain and attempting to cross over to the Crotana side. They are at least a week ahead of you.” Xetil paused. “There is an exiled ogre tribe in the range. Seek them out. They may be able to offer you aid.”
“Thank you, sire.”
“Is there anything else?”
Yiralla hesitated. She saw no reason to bother Xetil with news of the dwarves on their tail or questions about his absence. “Nothing else, sire.”
“Very well. Contact me again when you have more to report.”
✽✽✽
Hamen and his men were back on Yiralla’s trail. After reporting the news of the champion’s sighting to the thane days ago, Hamen had been ordered to keep tracking Yiralla.
The dwarven council wanted to know where Xetil’s champion-prime was heading. Even if Yiralla was not looking for the clan, her doings were too important to ignore.
> By now, Hamen’s band had far outstripped the rest of the dwarves, which was still weeks west of their position. With some twenty thousand people in tow, the clan was moving at a snail’s pace in comparison to Yiralla’s fast-moving company. Even so, it had been an uneventful and boring chase.
Until today.
Today, Xetil’s champion-prime and the Dread Spear company had reached the south gate. And despite the importance of observing what Yiralla and her troops were about, Hamen could not stop himself from staring in fascination at the gate.
Even from the distant peak from which they covertly observed the trolls, the gates appeared mammoth, dominating the landscape. For the first time in his life, Hamen looked on the ancestral home of the dwarves, and even if it was only a small part—and perhaps even the least part—that he observed, he felt himself swell with pride and awe. Here was testament to what the dwarves of old were capable of. And we will be capable of such again, and more, Hamen promised himself.
“Is that the gate?” asked an excited voice from beside him.
“Pipe down, boy,” growled Benin. “We don’t want those trolls down there to hear you.”
“Sorry, sorry,” said Dhoven in a loud whisper. “I am not used to any of this.”
Borin rolled his eyes, while Hamen did his best to hide his own amused chuckle. The young apprentice enchanter had been a trial to his men the last few days. On more than one occasion, Hamen had been left to wonder how any dwarf could be so incapable in the mountains—the mountains, for Eld’s sake, their ancestral home.
Time and again, his men had had to rescue the young dwarf from one disaster after another. Benin had grouched—loudly—that perhaps they should just leave the youth behind. Hamen and the others had laughed, but somehow, Hamen didn’t think he had been joking.
Dhoven had been saddled with them at the insistence of his master, Thoril. With the expedition to reclaim the dwarven city underway, the old enchanter had grown in confidence—and importance.
The guild master’s position on the dwarven council had been reinstated, and none of the other council members had been ready to gainsay him on the minor matter of his apprentice joining Hamen’s warband.
Thoril had believed it would do Hamen’s men good to have the young enchanter with them, especially if Yiralla was heading to Durn Duruhl. Personally, Hamen couldn’t see the young apprentice being much use, but none of his arguments had been able to dissuade the master enchanter, or the thane, who had surprisingly been in support of the notion.
“Yes, it is the gate,” replied Hamen, though that should have been obvious already. “And they appear shut.” Hamen frowned. Dwarven lore had it that the gates had been the work of the enchanter’s guild. “Will your master be able to open it?”
Dhoven bobbed his head, his beard, half-grown and unplaited, waving distractingly in the wind. “Of course he will.”
Hamen eyed him askance. Despite his words, the apprentice did not look very confident, but Hamen didn’t blame him for that. Anyone beholding the massive structure of the gate would be beset by doubt.
Hamen turned to Benin and Borin, who had continued to observe Yiralla’s troops. “What are they doing?” he asked. “Are they trying to get in?”
“No,” said Borin, shaking his head in confusion. “They seem to be searching for something.”
Benin nodded. “Look there,” he said, pointing out a group of trolls heading slowly east. “They appear to be following a trail into the mountains.”
Hamen scratched his beard in confusion. What was Yiralla doing? In the privacy of his thoughts, the moment he had first seen Yiralla heading north, he had believed the dwarves expedition to Durn Duruhl doomed.
He had feared that Yiralla would attempt to occupy the city, or even worse, that she was heading to the city to join other forces of Xetil’s that were already in occupation.
He was sure that others, the thane amongst them, suspected the same. But the dwarves had no choice but to continue their march eastwards. The clan had already abandoned their refuge. There was no going back. The only course lay towards Durn Duruhl now. Even if it was only to attempt one more futile defence of their ancient home.
What he had not expected was for Yiralla to ignore the city. Even as he watched, the company of elite trolls, with Yiralla at their fore, turned away from the south gate and headed northeast, deeper into the mountains. “Where are you going?” Hamen murmured to himself.
“Maybe she is chasing after the one who activated the golems?” said Dhoven.
Hamen turned to stare at the apprentice. So, too, did Benin and Borin.
“What?” Hamen asked blankly. It had been an idle question. He had not expected an answer, especially not from the apprentice.
Wilting slightly under the attention of the three warriors, the apprentice licked his lips nervously before explaining, “Someone had to have awoken the golems. It was most likely a dwarf, and one who is a descendant of the guildmembers that fled east after the city’s fall. Whoever it was, they must have entered and exited the city somewhere near here.”
“Why assume it is a dwarf? And why would Xetil’s champion-prime herself be chasing them?” asked Borin.
“Because,” explained Dhoven patiently, growing more confident now, “whoever awoke the golems must have a pendant similar to the one my master has. Thoril’s pendant is not the only one of its kind. In the old days, each of the guild’s master enchanters had one. Thoril’s amulet is the only one that survived within the clan after we fled west to our refuge. But not all the masters went west with the clan into exile. Some fled east.”
Hamen studied the young dwarf. “So you think some other dwarf, true descendent or thief, with a pendant of his own, snuck his way into the city and awoke the golems? And this is what your master believes as well?”
“Yes, something like that,” replied Dhoven.
“And,” Hamen went on, “you think Yiralla is chasing whoever activated the golems for their pendant?” At Dhoven’s nod, he asked, “Why? What use would Xetil have for the pendant?”
Dhoven licked his lips before responding. “Because all the pendants are imbued with a control key. A key that will not only allow its bearer to open the guild’s armoury and control the golems, but may also give them control over many of the other structures in the city.” Dhoven hesitated, then added, “Perhaps even the gate.”
Hamen’s brows furrowed. “You are sure of this?”
Dhoven shook his head reluctantly. “No. A lot of this is supposition. We can’t be sure of exactly what can be done with the key alone. Many of the guild’s records were lost or destroyed during our long flight all those years ago.”
“And the thane knows of this?”
“Yes, Thoril has discussed all the possibilities with him.”
Hamen closed his eyes and digested the apprentice’s words. If what Dhoven said was true—and why hadn’t the thane shared this information with him?—then he could not just let Yiralla go unwatched.
“What do you want to do, Hamen?” asked Borin.
Hamen opened his eyes. “We split up the warband. One squad will stay here to keep watch on the gate, a second will report back to the clan, and the third will track Yiralla’s company. Borin, you and Benin will take command of the first two squads, while I follow after Yiralla—”
“No,” said Benin and Borin as one. “We go with you.”
Hamen smiled and looked over the twins. “Very well, then—”
“I’m coming, too!” said Dhoven.
The three turned to look at him.
The apprentice’s face flushed. Despite this, he spoke forcefully, “You will need me. To identify the key.”
Hamen raised one brow in query and looked at Benin and Borin. Borin nodded, while Benin shook his head sharply. “Very well,” said Hamen, “You can come with us.”
Benin groaned and buried his head in his hands.
Game Data
Base skill in air magic has increased to 22. Eff
ective skill: 56.
Base skill in telepathy has increased to 24. Effective skill: 49.
Base skill in beast bonding has increased to 24. Effective skill: 63.
Base skill in psionics has increased to 24. Psicasting cost reduced by 10.
Base skill in spellcasting has increased to 24. Spellcasting cost reduced by 12.2.
Remaining: 0 Combat SP.
Kyran’s Profile (Class Data)
Name: Kyran Seversan. Race: Elf.
Player type: Advanced player, free agent.
Combat level: 24. Civilian level: 23. Health: 240/240.
Stamina: 500/500. Will: 1020/1020. Essence: 1200/1200.
Attacks: 44.2 (slash), 49 (psi), 43.4 (fire).
Defences: 31.7 (physical), 23 (psi), 23 (spell).
Class: Jade wild druid (rank II, apprentice).
The wild druid is a psionic-magic hybrid with class abilities focused on beast mastery.
Class traits
Incompetent summoner (-1 summoned creatures): Current limit = 0.
Wild tamer (+1 tamed creatures per rank): Current limit = 7.
Class skills
Beast bonding (62.9), body control (40.8), light armour (24.0), psionics (49), telepathy (49), air magic (56.1), earth magic (51), supportive magic (51), spellcasting (61), water magic (51), nature lore (24.0).
Class abilities
Wild shift: Druids can shift into a beastform.
Beastform: Druids can learn the beastform of a befriended creature. Known beastforms: 1/4.
Other skills (0 combat and civilian SP available)
Fire magic (43.4), longsword (10.4), telekinesis (26.5).
Commander (16.0), governor (8.6), mage lord (48.0), scrying (14.4), travelling (14.4), feudal lord (0).
Vassals: 2 of 17.
Combat abilities (5 AP available)
Beast bond, rank II: Beast befriend.
Air magic, rank II: Shock wall.
Earth magic, rank II: Oil slick.
Sovereign Rising (The Gods' Game, Volume III): A LitRPG novel Page 25