“How many lives did it take so I could know what bloody cinnamon is? How much blood is spilt in this cup? Son of a whore. Indeed, what are we doing here?”
“What are you saying?” Yager asked. “Yer making no sense.”
“No, I suppose I’m not,” admitted Del.
“You wanted to save the slaves,” Maktus said, “and we did that.
What more is there to do? You want to find these boys. They could be anywhere. They could be dead for all we know.”
“Don’t say that!” Del hadn’t meant to yell. Over his shoulder, he saw a bald man, large and broad and mean looking, eyeing him. He couldn’t remember which one he was, Tuc or Boz. Either one, catching their attention normally proved bad. He looked down and realized he had grabbed Maktus’ wrist. He squeezed so hard the man’s hand started turning white. He let go.
“Sorry. Sorry. I overreacted. I’m sorry.”
“What is the matter with you?” Maktus asked, rubbing his wrist. “What are you trying to do here?”
Del stared at his cup again. “Clear my conscience.”
He motioned for the serving girl.
“Yes.”
“Can you get Elena for me please?”
A moment later, the fat, old woman came waddling, flat lips and flared nostrils showing displeasure.
“What?” She placed her hands on the table and leaned forward. The wood creaked under her weight.
“I—we are looking for three boys.”
“No girls. No boys. Your best bet is Finlo if you’re looking for that kind of fun.”
“Please, let me finish.” Del Alzon, against better judgment, put a hand up to the woman, showing her his palm. Her cheek quivered, and Del could hear the air she breathed through her nose quicken. “They are friends. Three boys, young men really.”
“We get more young men through here than I can count.”
“They might have been with others. Sell-swords, I think.”
“I told you . . . No wait. Mercenaries. A while back, we did get quite a few sell-swords through here. Have no liking for gutless wonders who’ll sell their fighting skills to the highest bidder, but they did spend quite a bit of coin.”
“Too many to recognize three young men, I suppose,” Del said. He looked back at his cup of wine.
“Perhaps, you would be right, but not a few days after they left, maybe a week, another fellow came looking for them,” Elena Minx explained. “A westerner, from Wüsten Sahil. Samanian if I had to guess. Exceedingly unpleasant and his entourage looked dirty. Had to deny him service.”
“So, they are alive?”
“I don’t know if they are still alive. That Samanian seemed like he had other notions. What I can tell you is that the young men you’re looking for were with three other men, and when they left, they were with three dwarves.”
“Dwarves?” Del Alzon asked.
“Aye, that’s what I said. You think I’m lying?”
Del shook his head. He smiled. Dwarves. Gypsies then dwarves. Oh, Erik, what have you gotten yourself into? What have I gotten you into?
“I thank you, Ms. Minx, for your time and courtesy,” Del Alzon said.
She looked at him as if she didn’t know what to say. She gave him a quick smile.
“It’s Mrs. Minx. Don’t be thinking I’m available or anything. And you’re welcome.”
Elena Minx turned and left. Del sat back and finished the last bit of wine in his cup.
“Dwarves,” he muttered.
“So,” Yager said, “now that you know, what do we do now?”
Del shrugged. “Go home, I guess.”
“Good. I miss my wife,” Yager added with a smile.
“We’ll stay here tonight. Leave in the morning,” Del said.
“Sounds good,” Danitus added.
The serving girl refilled Del’s cup three times before he found himself to be the only one left in The Hill Giant’s bar. His legs felt a little weak. His cheeks felt hot.
“Where are you, Erik? Where are you, with mercenaries and dwarves and who knows what else? Wherever you are, I hope you are safe. I pray you are safe. For my sake and yours, stay safe.”
Chapter 42
ERIK WAS BACK IN THE large bath tub but also back to reality, and he was reveling in what felt like a pool of warm water. Washing away a week of dirt made him feel both refreshed and revitalized. When he returned, he found his room empty and, for many reasons, he preferred it that way. A clean pair of soft wool pants and a clean cotton shirt lay, folded, on his bed. He dropped his dirty clothes, threw his towel to the floor, and pulled on the clean ones. They were warm. A smile swept across his face, and he turned around and sat at the side of the bed.
He rolled the sleeves of his clean, white shirt to his elbows and slipped on his boots. His eyes wandered to his pillow.
A tingle pricked the back of his head. A sting, almost painful, ran through his arms and back and chest and shoulders. He reached under the pillow and grabbed the dagger.
“It seems that, perhaps, I should always take you with me,” Erik said, stuffing the golden dagger into his belt.
I agree.
“Am I bound to you?” Erik asked. “Are you going to try and control me?”
He thought he heard the faint sound of laughter in the distance.
Are you so easily controlled?
“I don’t think so,” Erik replied. “But, I would like to know. Are you a good conscience, like Steel Axe’s axe, or are you malevolent, waiting to twist me and turn me into something wretched and then discard me?”
Erik waited a moment and felt nothing, heard nothing, and then said nothing.
The King’s dining room was all in an uproar of dwarvish arguing. Turk argued with Demik and Nafer. He argued with several noble looking dwarves that sat next to the King. They argued back and then argued with the King. But everything took a turn for the worse when Turk stood and pointed a finger at King Skella.
Erik couldn’t understand what any of them were saying. Turk and Demik had been teaching Erik some of their language as of late, but they were all basic words and phrases, and this was all too fast and complicated. And when Turk spoke to the King, he actually sounded like he was pleading. But then the moment he pointed his finger, the points of two spears waited just a hair-length away from the dwarf ’s throat. It was at that same moment that another dwarf, one sitting right next to King Skella—with bright red hair, a bright red beard, and a golden circlet centered with a ruby around his head—stood quickly, shouting angrily and giving commands.
Erik watched Wrothgard and Vander Bim and Switch. They looked uneasy. No one—at least none of the men—quite knew what was going on. They had started in on breakfast pleasantly. It was good food and reminded Erik of home. The red-haired dwarf had just sat there until the King introduced him. It was all in Dwarvish, but the dwarf stood and bowed, and Turk and Demik and Nafer did the same. The introduction was brief, the dwarf guest barely said ten words, and then the yelling started.
Turk sat back down in his chair, hands up in the hair submissively.
“Turk, what is going on?” Erik asked.
“Halt der mût!” the red-haired dwarf shouted, now pointing a finger at Erik, the veins in his neck pulsing against his high-collared jacket.
Wrothgard stood.
“What is the meaning of this?” the soldier asked as politely as possible but was met with spears now pointed at his throat.
“Is this what it’s come down to?” Switch said, kicking his chair back, knocking it over, and grabbing a knife and a fork from the table. “Come at me, and I’ll gut you with a damned fork, tunnel diggers.”
The red-haired dwarf stepped back and moved from behind the table, just as two more guards pointed spears at the thief. Everyone was shouting. Erik couldn’t hear a thing, and it looked like, at any moment, blood would be shed.
“That is enough!” King Skella shouted. He was old and white haired and looked almost frail, but at that moment,
he stood quickly, and his voice boomed louder than Erik would have ever expected. Silence consumed the room. “General, that is enough. These are my guests, and you will treat them as such.”
Without hesitation, the red-haired dwarf—the General—bowed to King Skella and sat.
“Your Majesty,” he said, then turned to the mercenaries, looked at them with hard eyes, bowed, and added, “my apologies.”
“Everyone, sit down,” the King commanded, taking his seat as well. “Guards, stand down. For the love of the Almighty, just leave us all together.”
The guards all stepped back, resting their weapons, but didn’t leave, rather looking at one another with confusion.
“Did you not hear me?” King Skella asked, again raising his voice. “Leave us. Now.”
Finally, the guards all bowed to the King and left, slowly and hesitantly.
“I am sorry, Skull Crusher,” King Skella said, his tone somber, “but this is the way it has to be.”
“A King owes his subjects no apologies,” Turk replied, and Erik was surprised by the callousness in his friend’s voice.
“What is going on, Turk?” Vander Bim asked.
“Perhaps I should explain,” the King said, standing and leaning his hands on the dining table. He looked to the red-haired dwarf. “General Balzarak, please.”
General Balzarak stood.
“I am sorry,” the King began. “You all have been honorable guests here in Thorakest and, even if you didn’t know of Turk’s intentions, you have willingly placed your map—the key to your agreement with the Lord of the East—in my hands. General Balzarak is a cousin of mine, from the northern dwarvish kingdom of Thrak Baldüukr. Balzarak Steel Fist is the general of the Eastern Fortresses and Commander at Fornhig. He has come here at my request and at the request of the Dukes of Gerburton and Strongbur.”
“And what does this bloody have to do with us?” Switch asked.
General Balzarak growled, but the King put up a hand.
“The discovery of Orvencrest would be monumental,” King Skella said, “not just for we southern dwarves, but for our cousins in the north, as well. And the fact that Golgolithul somehow knows of its location, and we do not, is problematic. That, along with the reason I have invited General Balzarak to Thorakest—something I will not discuss with you—has given us great concern. General.”
“Despite your allegiance to Golgolithul,” the General said, his Westernese rough and accented. He looked to each one of the mercenaries, his eyes resting mostly on the three dwarves with a disapproving glare. “I thank you for coming to us with this map—this information—but I must inform you, however, that you cannot continue on with your journey. I will oversee the expedition to Orvencrest with a group of handpicked warriors.”
The commotion that rose from the mercenaries after the General spoke was so loud, Erik couldn’t even hear his own thoughts. He didn’t think much anyway. He felt suddenly numb, as Switch and Vander Bim shouted obscenities, and as Wrothgard pleaded with the King. It was all for naught. Befel’s shoulder. Drake. Even Wrothgard’s companion Samus.
“This is hog piss, mate,” Vander Bim cried.
“You’re damn right it is,” Switch yelled. “Tunnel digger trickery. What have you done, Turk? Was this your plan all along?”
“No, no!” Turk replied. Then he turned to the King. “Your Majesty, please.”
King Skella put his hand up, and that calmed things down, but only a bit.
“I am sorry,” he replied. “After long thought and several sleepless nights, this is the way it has to be.”
“We will just leave then,” Wrothgard said with finality. “We will continue on our journey and see who gets there first.”
“No,” General Balzarak said. “You will stay here . . . at least for a while.”
“Now truly prisoners,” Wrothgard said.
“I am sorry,” King Skella said.
“No you’re bloody not!” Switch yelled.
“You will watch your tone,” the General hissed.
“Or what?” Switch replied. “You’ll kill me? Execute me? Better now than later. Better a dwarf ’s axe and a clean cut to the neck than being skinned alive by the Lord of the East’s bloody inquisitors.”
The arguing raised up again, this time Demik and Nafer joining in. Erik looked to Turk. The dwarf looked as numb as Erik felt. He just stared at nothing.
“I know you don’t believe me,” King Skella said, “but I am truly sorry. You will be kept here, in the city, for some time. I know it is not true freedom, but you will be cared for, and my personal escorts will go with you whenever you wish to go into the city proper, to keep you safe.”
“More like to keep an eye on us,” Switch huffed, sitting back hard into his seat and throwing the kitchen knife he was holding on the table. “Make sure we don’t escape.”
“Take it however you wish,” the King said. “When your time here is complete, I will have an escort see you safely home.”
“Only to find a knife in my back,” Erik heard Switch mutter.
“There are other mercenaries on this expedition, you know,” Wrothgard said.
“We are aware of the others,” Balzarak said. “My scouts tell me they are either dead or dispersed. Let me congratulate you on being the sole survivors of this mission from Golgolithul.”
The General’s face showed no signs of mirth or joy, and Erik suspected his compliment of being feigned.
“You already knew of the others?” Wrothgard said, crinkling his eyebrows.
“Yes,” the General replied. “We knew of the meeting in Finlo. Let me say that if we did let you continue on your journey, you would end up like the others. We have saved your lives.”
“You’ve prolonged them,” Vander Bim replied. “You know we’ll be wanted men, always looking over our shoulders.”
General Balzarak just shrugged.
“And what of General Al’Banan?” Wrothgard asked.
“Let me worry about the General,” Balzarak replied. “I have dealt with him before.”
Turk tried speaking with the General in their native language, but Balzarak would barely look at the dwarf. He then pleaded again with the King, but King Skella just offered up his open hands and shook his head with sad eyes.
“We willingly gave you the map,” Wrothgard said. “We could have lied, but we didn’t. And when our friend Turk told us of his plan, we could have tried to stop him, but, again, we didn’t. This does not seem just.”
“As one soldier to another,” the General said, the tone in his voice softening, “I do wish this could be different. I wish we could have discussed it more. I have nothing against your people. But there is more going on here than you know, and this is the safest way to do things. I am sorry, but there is nothing more to discuss. We have no choice.”
“I am sorry,” the King said. “I wish we could discuss this more. After you are allowed to leave my city, your involvement in our political dealings will be forgotten, of that, I can assure you. The Lord of the East would have to either have spies close to me or read my mind to know you helped the dwarvish people.”
“Coerced by, is more like it,” Switch whispered.
Erik felt his stomach knot even more. He looked down at a plate of half-eaten eggs and bread. When he had arrived in the dining room, he was ravenously hungry. Now, the simple sight of food made him want to retch.
“Will our weapons be returned to us?” Wrothgard asked as the King stood and called for his servants to help him back to his quarters.
“No,” the King replied. “I am sorry about that as well. They will be returned to you when you leave Thorakest. And Turk, I will need those swords back.”
Turk bowed slowly.
“Damn the gods,” Switch hissed.
As the King’s servants followed him out of the room, he stopped and turned.
“Befel, I understand you are in need of a surgeon.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Befel said, standing.
“When you return to your room,” King Skella said, “Enfberg, my personal surgeon will be waiting for you.”
Befel bowed as the King turned and left. General Balzarak bowed to the mercenaries and followed after the King.
“What a rat turd,” Bryon said.
“That is my King you are speaking of,” Demik replied with a red face.
“Oh, you mean the King that just imprisoned you in your own city and condemned you to a painful death?” Switch asked with a raised eyebrow.
Demik went to reply, but just sat back in his chair.
“We are doomed, mates” Vander Bim said. “I think I’ll go home, buy a little boat, and sail as far away as I can.”
“I’ll go with you,” Switch said and then spat on the table.
“Back to the farm,” Befel muttered.
“Shit,” Bryon added.
“If the Lord of the East is after us,” Erik asked, “won’t going home put our family in danger?”
“It’s them he’s after,” Bryon said, nodding to the other mercenaries. “They’re the ones who accepted the job, not us. We’re just stupid porters, right thief?”
“Oh no,” Switch said with a crooked smile. “We’re dealing with the Lord of the East, my son. You truly think he doesn’t know you are now a part of our little merry band? He’ll skin you up and serve you to the pigs or the dogs or the poor just like he will us.”
Erik felt sick.
“What do we do now?” he asked.
Befel just shook his head, and Bryon put his face in his hands.
“I cannot guarantee it will be the same.” Enfberg put a soft hand on Befel’s good shoulder after the surgeon had finished his work. “It will work mostly as it should, but its movement may be less than that of your right. Your strength may be a little less. It will be a while before it completely heals, and when I say a while, I mean longer than just a few weeks. Will you be able to raise a shield over your head, plow a field, chop wood, carry a child? Yes, I believe so. Not tomorrow, certainly, and not next week. Perhaps not even next month, but a year or two from now, your shoulder may be a simple annoyance at times, on a cold morning or after a restless sleep. A year after that, not even an annoyance, and five or six years from now, the only thing that would remind you of your wound would be a nasty scar and a vivid memory.”
Dark Winds Page 29