Derrek told us that, using his magical throne, our enemy now knew exactly where the court-in-exile was hidden. Our scouts reported, though, and we soon confirmed with our own eyes, that his generals were not so blessed. Knowing that the prince’s allies and army were in Liddarn was not the same as finding the long-abandoned mine, and the obfuscations that the loyalist wizards had built into the wards had not kept the place undiscovered for five years by sheer luck. That was small consolation, though, to those of us who left loved ones there as we set off across the plains toward the capitol.
Our diviners and scouts had told us that the majority of the army descending upon us was coming from due south, giving plausibility to the Usurper’s claims that the forces along the Naam river border with Naal were, in fact, the training exercises he claimed, not preparing for invasion. We, then, went southwest, in as straight a line as we could manage toward the capitol. We quickly learned that those were not the only troops in motion. Advance scouts were everywhere, crisscrossing the plains and fields of the northern principalities, searching for Liddarn. It was only on our second day when we ran into our first trouble.
The summer was yet young, but the sun already beat down upon us. The heat of the day sapped our strength and that of our horses, forcing us to ride hard in the mornings, starting before dawn, to stop and rest in the early afternoon, and then resume our travel when the heat had broken, riding into the dusk to make up for lost time. We evaded detection twice on the first day: once, more by luck than by planning; then a second time, hiding within an illusion of unbroken grassland that I hastily conjured when we spied scouts on the horizon. The second day was less fortunate.
Trouble came as we were slowing to stop to rest and eat, looking for a fold in the ground where we could hide. We had found just such a place and were dismounting to lead our horses down by the reigns when a trio of scouts emerged from that self-same fold. Our two parties had caught each other by surprise, and there was a stunned moment of inaction wherein the four of us – dressed, once more, in innocuous Vencari travelling clothes – and the three of them – in hardened leather breastplates over chitons, all textured and dyed to disappear into the landscape, very much like our own scouts but without the distinctive badge of House Traianum by which all loyalist soldiers marked themselves – just stared, dumbfounded, at one another.
Rennin recovered his wits first, completing his dismount by throwing himself into a roll that landed him in the middle of the scouts. He drew the Blade of Xadaer as he came to his feet. The first scout fell without a sound, without even drawing his blade. The other two got their short swords up and ready, but the oversized enchanted red bronze khopesh cut as cleanly through the Vencari steel as it did through hardened leather, flesh, and bone. Was he as fast as Veralar, with the Blade of Xadaer in his hands? Was it possible he was even faster? The charnel stink of death filled the air: blood and shit and piss and despair.
Rennin cleaned the Blade on a scout’s chlamys cloak, then we all remounted and went in search of an unbloodied patch of shade in which to rest.
We had spoken little the first day. The possibility of impending doom and the inevitability of change hung between Elana and Rennin. We were riding toward the final confrontation, the culmination of their lives to this date, and no matter what happened – even if we won, and even if Elana disdained the necessities of politics and married him as she intended – they would be different people with a different relationship on the other side of it. Between Derrek and I hung the specters of Rrii`aa and of all the secrets that he kept. We, too, would have a reckoning if we survived the coming weeks.
We spoke even less after that first encounter. It was not lost on me that every soldier we crossed and killed was a Vencarman who was supposed to be Elana’s subject. I could not imagine that knowledge did not weigh heavily on Elana and Rennin. There was something different, though, about the way that Derrek withdrew from the rest of us. He turned inward, yes, growing distant and aloof; but there was also something wild and hopeless in the depths of his eyes that scared me in ways and for reasons that I could not quite name.
Our plan had been to ride to the Calruah River, which we would follow to the Venn and then to Vencar City. We reached the river on our fourth day out, by which time the first of the Usurper’s armies might well have found Liddarn. Had battle yet been joined? Were the mines under siege? We didn’t know, and had made the hard and careful decision not to ask Derrek to scry out those answers.
Believing Liddarn to already be under siege, it came as a cold shock and a nasty surprise to find another army gathering at Eastern Bend, the Calruah River trade-town we had been aiming for. The river, town, and armed encampment were all clearly visible when we galloped over a ridge a little before noon. We had hoped to spend the night at an inn in Eastern Bend. I had been looking forward to a hot meal and a bed. That seemed ill-advised, now.
Elana and Rennin put their heads together briefly, then turned due south. I sighed and followed. Derrek came too, a long moment after. The odds that we would be recognized were slim, but it was too likely that portraits of us had been distributed to the officers, at the very least. I, for one, had no desire to confront any larger military force than we already had, and every hope – however foolish – that we might make it to the capitol without further bloodshed.
Two days later, we came to a trade-town further down the Calruah River. This time, no military encampment blocked the roads, and we felt safe going into town to top off our supplies, listen to rumors, enjoy hot baths, and sleep in real beds.
Ildon Falls was a small town, but bustling. An inland city, far from any border, it had only one wall, meant more to block dust from the road than any human movement. The wall boasted a single gate to the highway. The main roads, lined with two- and three-story buildings, wooden walled storefronts rising from stone foundations and topped by offices and apartments, all lead from the docks to the Imperial highway. The cross-streets, where stone and concrete walls hid residential courtyards from public view, ran parallel to the river.
“Do you mind sharing a room with Derrek,” Elana asked me as we perused the markets and shops on our way into town in search of a suitably disreputable inn. “Now that you and Rrii`aa are … engaged to be wed?”
She stumbled a little over that, which amused me. Apparently, though she seemed to understand marriage circles in theory and although Vencari loved and fucked almost as they pleased, the situation between Derrek, Rrii`aa, and myself seemed to baffle her. What amused me even more was that she did not seem to intend to ask Derrek the same question.
“I do not mind,” I said.
In one of the open squares along the biggest road was a billboard where we found bounties for our death or capture. All six of us were there, even Orland and Veralar. The prices offered were flattering. The portraits, on the other hand, were so unflattering as to be almost unrecognizable: mine looked more like an uncanny nymph than an elf; Derrek’s looked like a stage villain, as did Rennin’s; Elana’s looked like a child’s vision of nobility. But it seemed bad luck to linger by them, and we moved on quickly.
After some discreet questions, we found an inn that boasted stables and a bath, but where we were more likely to be accused of being cutpurses or killers than to be recognized for who we are. Elana doled out coins for two rooms, for the stables, for an hour to ourselves in the bath, and for dinners in the common room.
We hardly talked over dinner that night. Instead, we listened. The war in the north was on everyone’s lips. No reliable word had come of actual fighting, yet, but almost everyone was convinced that fierce battles were raging across the northern principalities. Lord Gaius Linneon, it seemed, felt that his rights as prince were being trampled, and was threatening to throw in with the Lost Heir – as they seemed to be calling our prince – if he were not soon consulted in the movement of troops. Rumors had immediately begun that he had been a loyalist all along. (He had, of course; how else had the prince known of the abandoned mine and the ghost town that surrounded it, or concealed the court’s supply lines from the Usurper for so long?) Some speculated that the Usurper, himself, had started those rumors as a pretext to oust the overly independent prince once Elana had been disposed of. Similar streams of rumors abounded about Lord Rufus Drinnus, of the neighboring principality. That notion, however, was ludicrous: Drinnus had backed the Usurper in the names of the three sons he’d lost to the Wolfwood before Elana’s father had called that war to a halt, and he was destined to be a serious problem for her if she regained the throne.
Over the course of dinner and two rounds of drinks we learned nothing we had not already known or suspected. Tired and resigned, we retreated to our rooms early. Derrek and I lay down together in silence. In the next room over I could hear Elana and Rennin arguing – quietly, at first, then louder, until the fighting stopped abruptly as they seemed to have decided to vent their fear and frustration in more pleasurable ways.
We left Ildon Falls before dawn, and crossed the Ildon Bridge – named, according to Rennin, for the same hero of some long-ago war – over the Milosa River an hour after noon. Crossing the Milosa put us in the tall grass heartland of Vencar, so it came as a great surprise when we found another military encampment just outside of Boospolis, the next town down the river. Town and tents came into our view at the same time, and the encampment had been placed east of the city so as not to obstruct the road, so there was no short way to go around.
This time we took the first stabled inn that we could find, and took our dinner in our rooms. We could not risk the increased vigilance a military presence would bring, or the chance that their copies of our wanted posters might be more accurate. We discussed possible strategies over dinner, but in the end we were not able to come up with anything better than staying out of sight until morning, and acting as casually as possible on our way out of town.
Again, we were up and on the road by dawn. Scouts from the unit were already on the road. They waved, we waved back, and at first we thought that was the end of it. Soon, though, it was clear that one of the scouts was following us. Not long after, a plume of dust rose behind them, and soon a contingent of cavalry came into view.
We didn’t run. For the first hour or so, there was some chance it was coincidence. After that, it was clear that running would be futile: their horses were fresher than ours, and could be replaced if they ran them to death in pursuit of us. And there was always the chance that they were merely going the same direction as us.
We stopped to rest through the heat of the day. They did not, and that was when we knew for certain that they were coming for us. There was no point in running, now: we would be tired, and they would be angry, when they inevitably caught up.
We watered the horses and ate a small meal. We agreed that we would try to bluff, if we could. And we waited.
There were enough of them that we couldn’t get a count at a distance. As they drew closer, three emerged at the front of the force. Soon I was able to pick out a dozen cavalry riders behind those three. Then another dozen came over a ridge to the east, only a little bit behind. In the Vencari tradition, each horseman would have a javelin, and no less than one in three would be carrying a bow.
Even with two wizards and a magic sword, six to one were bad, bad odds. I glanced over to Derrek, wishing I had taken better advantage of our last night in a bed. His face was as closed as I had ever seen it. Light seemed to shimmer underneath the skin of his too-young face, and his green eyes glowed.
The three lead horsemen came to the edge of shouting distance and stopped.
“Lord Derrek,” a young woman’s voice called. “Elana Traiana. If you and your companions surrender now, I promise you will be brought before the emperor unharmed.”
“My love,” Rennin addressed Elana in a low voice. “Speak your will.”
“I would rather die in hopeless battle,” she said, “than stand trial before my father’s murderer.”
I didn’t know that I felt the same, but I readied a shield spell in my mind as Rennin and Elana reached for their swords. Derrek raised his hand, and arrows flew as he and I spoke our words of power.
My shield shimmered in the air. Elana and Rennin’s blades had barely cleared their scabbards, and the horsemen’s arrows had barely left their bows, when fire fell down from the sky and exploded amidst our enemies. Right to left the fires ran, sheets of white-gold flame that moved with the speed of a summer storm. The ground erupted where the fire struck, throwing dirt and rocks and gibs of flesh into the air.
Horses and their riders died screaming. Those that didn’t die – half the cavalry, at best – were driven toward us, cut off from their most obvious avenues of retreat by the shimmering wall of sun-like flame that stood where the rain of fire had fallen.
My shield had done its job, deflecting the first round of arrows. I adjusted it as quickly as I could, just in time to catch a half-dozen hastily thrown javelins. Elana and Rennin stood with their swords, ready and waiting, as if there were any chance they could survive a cavalry charge.
Derrek called down another rain of fire, this time in front of the charging horsemen. None survived this second wave.
We stared at the carnage of burnt and shredded earth and flesh, watching in awe and horror as the towering walls of sun-gold flames shimmered out of existence, leaving only a few patches of mortal fire behind.
Derrek spoke a final word. The wind rose and the sky darkened with clouds. Just as the fire began to spread from the torn earth to the grassy plains, a hard, cold rain fell and quenched the flames. It was still a long minute before we could bring ourselves to turn and face our Great Wizard.
The glow I’d seen at the beginning of the battle had left him. No blood marred his hands or arms. Instead, he seemed to have aged at least a decade. This morning he’d looked like a youth, aging backward since we had crossed the Eastern Veil. Now, for the first time since we’d known him, he looked as old as, perhaps even older than, Rennin.
“Take heart, my prince,” he said, his voice choked and hard. “The gods are on your side. When you confront the man who stole your throne, you will do so armed and unbound, as equal a contest as can be arranged.”
We stared at him, dumbfounded and horrified.
“We should retrieve our horses,” he went on, turning away from us, “and then leave the main roads.”
< Previous Chapter| Home | The World | Next Chapter >
Thank you so much for reading!
New chapters drop every Sunday morning barring unexpected circumstances. New maps and art drop when I finish them, any time except Sunday morning. For the inside scoop, other stories set in Dathl’lyr, access to new chapters six weeks before they go public, and/or a look into all the other things I do, please consider joining my Patreoncampaign! Don’t like Patreon or just want to support my work? Drop a tip in my jar over at Ko-Fi!
Leave a Reply