Chapter 4: Sly Tongues Aplenty     Chapter 6: The Price of Hunger

 

Chapter 5: Secrets in the Storm

 

Pent sighed as he reviewed the latest news from Douglas the previous night in camp that morning, somewhere in the mountains. The clouds were thick overhead and the air was cool and moist. “Well, that’s not the best of news. Unless Rhost finds us, in which case we’ll be happy to have him along. And it’s important to know that Lorad is abroad as well.”

“At least he’ll stop bothering the girl General Douglas is taking care of,” Priscilla said hopefully in her soft voice. She was swathed in a heavier cloak than usual.

Pent smiled. “Yes, that’s true. Well! Let’s get going, shall we? We have a lot of ground to cover today. We’re going to search the next dozen mountains before dark!”

They searched three small mountains, the foot soldiers for caves, the magic users for traces of magic, and Fiora just for anything that looked odd, when they noticed something odd. But it wasn’t the landscape around them.

Fiora fluttered down near Pent and Caddie. “We’re being followed, sir.”

Pent looked up. “Are we? I thought they were other hunters of magic. Why do you think they’re following us?”

“Some of them have this insignia on their tunics or armour,” Fiora said, drawing it on the cliff with a finger.

Pent raised an eyebrow. “Duke Ocery, huh. That doesn’t change anything. Well. Perhaps it does. Ceniro!”

“Yes?” answered his tactician, appearing around a bend in the path beneath a large pine.

“If our people run into a soldier, we need to conceal ourselves or knock them out. They’re from our present rivals.”

“I understand.” Ceniro got out his farseer and spoke into it.

Progress was slower around the next mountain. Fiora still flew, since Ceniro pointed out it was rather difficult to know where something was in the air without being up there yourself.

Then it suddenly got very cold and snow began to fall. Within a few minutes the ground was white, though the snow was only as yet falling gently.

Ceniro regularly checked his farseer to make sure no one was stuck or left behind. He could also see some of the strange soldiers, but not many. They were fading out as the snow clouds thickened. There appeared another figure from the east, moving fast across the landscape in green.

Immediately, he called to the entire party. “There’s a traveler coming from behind us along the road. Could everyone please make sure you can’t be seen from the road and wait until I give the word? Thanks. Don’t freeze.”

The young tactician struggled up to where Pent was making his way carefully past a frozen waterfall.

“I don’t think it will be a problem, but it would be better if we were not seen, right? Even by travelers.”

Pent looked at him quizzically. “Certainly. It might even be safer for the travelers. …Ceniro, I don’t think we’re going to get twelve mountains done today.”

“Yes, this snow is going to hinder us as long as it stays.”

“Which could be a few weeks,” Pent told him with a sigh. “Oh well. We’ll make the best of it. I’m glad I hired Fiora, now. I’ll remember that for next time.”

The green figure passed the two of them, and Ceniro looked down on the path to see him. He was dressed in dark robes with splashes of light blue and yellow, and a yellow hood.

“A shaman,” Pent whispered beside him. “A user of elder magic. Fascinating characters, some of them.” Ceniro put a hand out warningly as the shaman glanced around, but he continued on his way without stopping.

“Well,” commented Ceniro. “Everyone can continue the search,” he said into the farseer.

“Keep an eye on him,” Pent suggested. “Let’s see what happens when he runs into the soldiers.”

“If he begins to fight them…”

“We will help him.”

And then the shouting started.

When Pent’s company arrived – Fiora first, of course, even through the snow – the shaman was standing on a little knoll beside the road. Five or six soldiers were watching him, their weapons at the ready, and two had been killed already by dark magic. The shaman’s hood had fallen back, revealing very close cropped red hair and a lean, weathered face.

“So you are with them!” one of the soldiers exclaimed, seeing Pent and his guards.

“No,” said the shaman patiently. “I have no idea who they are.”

“We just heard shouting and came to see what the matter was,” Pent said cheerfully. “Is there a problem?”

“…” The soldiers and the shaman both stared at Pent in slight disbelief.

“Of course there’s a problem,” the shaman said at last. “I have been attacked by these clueless idiots, thinking I am obviously with you, whoever you are. I suggest they take their quarrel up with you and let me go on my way.”

“Certainly,” said Pent. “Look here, he really isn’t with us. He’s just a traveler.”

“That’s what you’d want us to think, isn’t it?” asked one of the soldiers suspiciously. “We’re not buying that. Attack them all!”

“Forward!” Ceniro called, pointing at Caddie, George, Cavven, and Albert. Priscilla, Andy, and Frank were hindered by the deep snow. Suddenly, Fiora shot out of the sky and skewered an enemy soldier on her lance, and Pent called down lightening on another.

“Sir, you can go on your way,” George said to the shaman. “We’ll stop them here.”

“My name is Lence,” replied the shaman. “And I will help you, after all, especially since there seem to be more soldiers ahead.” He pointed to the dozen or so cavaliers emerging from a wood ahead. “It would be stupid of me to head straight into them by myself.”

More cavaliers began to close in from behind.

“My goodness,” said Pent, casting Elfire, “aren’t we all supposed to be searching for something, not trying to bash each other’s brains out?”

“Stupid soldiers,” agreed Lence, fighting shoulder to shoulder with George. Black strands boiled out of the ground near one soldier and enveloped him in a sphere of black murk. When it evaporated, a lifeless body lay on the snow.

“Oh, look there,” Pent said, pointing through the falling snow at the following group of knights. “It’s Lorad. How bizarre.”

“He’s arrived quickly,” said Andy, catching up to the main group. “Wasn’t he the one that just ran away from Aquleia yesterday?”

“He and another,” replied Caddie shortly, joining the yellow cavalier to begin making a defense against the horsed knights from the forest, along with Albert and Cavven.

“How do you know it’s him?” asked Ceniro, confused, adjusting his farseer. “Keep moving, everyone! Don’t let those knights get good angles!”

“The heraldry,” answered Pent. “Son of Lord Jonathon.”

“Oh,” said the tactician.

The following knights struggled through the snow up to where Pent was keeping a wall of flame. “Hey! Count Reglay!” called the one named Lorad.

“What is it, Son of Jonathon?” Pent called back, tweaking the flame with small hand gestures.

“Let me through! I gotta meet with Duke Deis!”

“Er… aren’t you just here to kill us all?” replied the sage, sounding confused.

“…No!”

“He’s lying,” Albert said instantly. “I can tell.”

“Well?” Lorad said, riding up to the wall and batting at it with his sword. Pent made part of it billow out at him, making his horse rear back, and Pent chuckled. “Sorry, but Ocery’s determined to ruin my day. I can’t let you through.”

Lorad spat. “Then we’ll go through the hard way. Come on, boys!” His horse plunged, rather unhappily, through the fire and back into knee-deep snow drifts. The other cavaliers followed suit, all but one, who hung back and could not make it through.

Lorad advanced slowly, swinging his sword as Albert and Cavven moved to block him beside Pent.

Just then, the wind rose, bringing blinding snow sheeting down, and Lorad cursed at the top of his lungs as he faded from sight.

“Everyone gather together!” Ceniro shouted urgently into the farseer and into the snow. He could hardly see Pent, a few feet away, and the farseer wasn’t doing much better. He could hear nothing except the wind, howling like a wolf.

“We need to find shelter!” Pent shouted back to him. “Fiora! Did you see any caves recently?”

“Yes! Close by – mountain to the north! Follow me!” Her manner was somehow familiar, reminding Ceniro of someone he had met before…

“Everyone follow Fiora north!” Ceniro called.

The pegasus knight led them to a wide dark opening in a cliffside. Pent and Ceniro stayed at the mouth, shivering, counting the men stumbling past them. “Albert; Frank; Cavven; George; Priscilla – oh, good, you have the pack-horse; Caddie; Lence; Andy…”

“Is that everybody?” Pent called to Ceniro. “No one got lost?”

“Yes, it is!” Ceniro replied. “Let’s get inside. I’m freezing!”

They stacked some of the wood – soaked, of course – that the pack-horse carried and Pent set it on fire, deep inside the cave. They clustered around it, shivering, some checking their weapons and others shaking the snow off everything.

Pent was going through his small bundle of equipment when the contact staff began to quiver slightly, the orb on top glowing the tiniest bit. “Oh, it’s a call to us,” Pent said, curious. “I wonder who it is…”

“Hullo, Erk, what’s the matter?” The usually solemn mage looked more solemn than was normal even for him.

“Oh, are you all right, Lord Pent? Has it been snowing?”

“Yes, indeed it has. We’ve found shelter in a cave, though, so all of us are safe. What’s up?”

“Sorry to bother you, Lord Pent, but we have a little problem. Lord Lesil was visiting again, and, well, he is making advances towards Lady Louise. She’s making a brave face, but she’s disturbed and even, I think, frightened.”

“Frightened? By Lesil?” Pent’s face lengthened. “Can I speak to her? In private?”

“Certainly,” said Erk, and he vanished. Ceniro was shooing the company further down toward the cave mouth.

Pent joined them again a few minutes later. “That’s really not good,” he said after a minute. “If I could, I’d drop this right now and go comfort her properly… tell Lesil to shove off, too. But I can’t do that…”

Ceniro could hear the yearning in the man’s voice and suddenly, the sage was not just a sage but a mortal and a husband.

“Well, it looks like the storm won’t be letting up for a few more hours,” said Lence, turning back from where he squatted just inside the cave mouth. Ceniro wondered how much colder it was by the mouth of the cave than inside, but wasn’t about to go and find out.

“Let’s explore!” Cavven exclaimed. “Sir.”

“Sure, why not?” Pent replied, getting up and helping up Frank. “We can’t really do anything else right now.”

“Everyone have torches?” asked George, rummaging in one of the pack-horse’s saddlebags.

Some didn’t, and gratefully accepted one from the sensible archer. Priscilla had brought a torch staff, and Pent had a handful of fire. They put out the fire, gathered up the unused wood, and all set off slowly down the long dark winding tunnel, the horse mounted men and women on foot and leading their steeds.

It went on for about a kilometre without branching, and then there was a definite split in the path. Two tunnels of equal size led at about 45 degrees away from the original tunnel.

“Very interesting,” said Pent. “I don’t think this cave is entirely natural. Most of it is, but the right tunnel has been widened intentionally.”

“Which way do we go?” Cavven asked eagerly.

Pent glanced back and forth between the tunnels. “Well, not much to go by, but let’s go down the right tunnel first. We can come back later. Ceniro, marking that down?”

“Yes!”

The right tunnel, besides some pick marks at its mouth, didn’t look any different from the other at first.

Then Lence saw something written on the walls in a black substance. “Hey, look at this. Soot, I think. Ancient writing.”

Albert and Pent were right there with him. “Scrawls of workmen,” Pent said. “’Harnam was here’ and the like.”

“First century,” said Albert. The other two looked at him with interest and then continued studying the writing.

“I don’t think the rest of us will be able to make head nor tail of first century scribbles,” Cavven whispered to Caddie. “Let’s go on a little further.”

“I’ll come, too,” said Fiora. “If anything’s dangerous, my pegasus will let us know.”

“Go on,” said George. “We’ll be behind you in a minute.”

 

“Come quick!” Cavven shouted, running back to the scholars as fast as his legs could carry him. “We’ve found some really interesting stuff!”

“We’re coming!” Pent answered, rising and dusting himself off. George gave Lence a hand up and Albert was already on his way.

The rest of the group followed more slowly. Ceniro was at the back. “Why so far back?” Andy asked him. “I mean, you’re not going to be left behind, but… uh…”

“I’m wondering what happened to Lorad and Duke Ocery’s men. They might have found shelter here as well, and if they do, then they’ll find our fire and our wet footprints heading down the tunnel.”

Andy shrugged. “They’re probably too afraid to follow us. I know I would be, if I were facing you.”

Ceniro laughed softly. “I’m not a very formidable fighter.”

“No, but you seem to know exactly how to tell us where to go and what to do to utterly demolish the enemy.” Andy punched him in the shoulder, chuckling. “It’s scary, man. How do you do that?”

Ceniro thought for a minute. “I don’t really know. When I get better, I’ll know exactly what’s happening inside my head, but right now I mostly just direct on intuition. I see how each of you fight, and I set up what I think will work best against the forces facing us, assuming average enemy fighting ability and-“

“Whoa, whoa, I didn’t ask for a whole dissertation,” Andy said, holding out his hand pleadingly.

“Sorry.”

“No, it’s interesting, but – wow. You’re pretty serious for ‘intuition’.”

“I guess. I have to be, you know. My teacher was very serious.”

Then they rounded the corner, catching up to the others.

“Wow,” Andy said again.

The tunnel ended there, in a chamber carved into the rock. There had once been a door, but it had fallen open and anyone could enter easily. Someone had lit old torches at the back of the chamber, and now it was brightly lit. It looked like it had once been a hideout for a couple of people – there were two beds against one wall, and a sagging chest of drawers. The centre of the chamber was raised slightly, with a small altar in the centre. It was plain, but the walls were covered in fantastic tapestries except for a small smooth space at the very back of the room.

Lence was looking intently at the tapestries, Albert was hunched over the altar, and Pent was off in another corner of the room, examining a book.

“Whoever lived here was pretty well off for hiding out,” said George. “Everything’s all neatly laid out, so they didn’t leave in a hurry, and they had plenty of supplies, mostly bread and cooked meat, and water that used to be in those jars, and I think that sticky stuff is honey. There’s ventilation from that crack in the upper corner, so the air’s good.”

“I wonder who they were,” Fiora said, stroking her pegasus’ mane.

Pent turned from the book with a look of amazement. “Saint Elimine herself, and one of her first bishop-women. This place is from just before the Scouring. This book is her diary.”

Everyone stared at him in astonishment.

“The book is about ready to fall apart, but it’s still all right for now. It will take a few binding spells, and then someone can copy it and add its knowledge to the library in Aquleia. From what I can make out of these last few pages, she had been living here for five years, practicing light magic, when Roland of Lycia and Lord Athos came and asked her to join the army of the Scouring. She had the jewel we’re looking for, though it wasn’t part of the staff just yet.”

“Does it say what happened after that?” asked Priscilla.

Pent shrugged. “Presumably she went with them. And had the staff made. It stops right there.”

“Well, we’re close to that jewel, then,” said Lence. “What jewel?”

“We’re looking for the jewel that was in the Staff of St. Elimine,” Pent answered. “We finally know who has found the staff – it’s Lord Eshan, who lives towards the east of Etruria… but we’re looking for the jewel that crowned it.”

“Oh. That sounds interesting. Like I was telling George, there, I was headed for Ostia to see my nephews, but I can take a short detour to see you through this.”

“Are you sure?”

“Oh, yes. This is too good a chance to pass up.”

“Thank you, and welcome, again.”

 

Finally, Pent’s study complete for the time being, they headed back to the main tunnel. Everything was fine until Pent slipped on a patch of smooth rock and landed heavily on his back.

“Sir! Are you all right?” George asked quickly. There was no answer.

Priscilla quickly switched staves and raised her heal staff, but she shook her head. “He’s not hurt. Is he unconscious? I don’t have a Restore staff…”

“Yes,” said George. “He’s out cold. Damn.”

“Our fearless leader is down?” Cavven asked, and ducked a swipe from Caddie. “I always wanted to say that,” he mumbled to himself.

“Well, he won’t exactly thank us for continuing while he can’t study anything, but we can’t wait around for him to recover,” Ceniro said. “Frank, can we put him on your horse for a while?”

“Sure,” said Frank readily. “I’ll watch out for his head in the low parts.”

The silver-haired lord was bundled onto Frank’s horse, and they continued down the tunnel.

Pretty soon they heard voices, men’s voices.

“Soldiers?” whispered Priscilla, and Albert, beside her nodded.

“The same ones we fought before,” Ceniro said, looking at his farseer. “A few are missing, but some are still injured. …Lorad is with them.”

“Shall we help them or fight?” asked Fiora, in the lead.

“Fight,” said Lence instantly.

Fiora looked at the tactician.

“We shouldn’t attack them if they aren’t hostile anymore. Lorad may need subduing, but the others may surrender. We’ll see. Anyone good with lassos?”

All the troops shook their heads. It had been a rather silly idea anyway.

“All right, well, Cavven, I will need you to get up to him and knock him down. George will cover you. Leave the other knights to us.”

“Got it!” Cavven nodded emphatically, but in a louder voice than he probably should have.

“There they are!” Lorad cried, a few hundred meters away down the corridor. “Get them!”

“Uh-oh,” Ceniro took the luxury of saying. The tunnel, after a sharp bend to the left, was straight and fairly tall, and the enemy knights were still on horseback. “Cavven, go. Everyone else, weapons forward. Albert, Lence, I need something to slow them down so they don’t charge us at full speed.”

“Why not-“ Lence began.

“Just do it,” Fiora snapped at the shaman, gripping her lance in front of her with her left hand and twirling her javelin with the other.

Lence shrugged and cast sticky webs of black stuff in the path of the knights; Albert’s light magic blinded a couple of them.

“Frank, Fiora, you can throw your javelins.” A few enemy horses shied and slowed, and the pegasus knight and the cavalier retrieved their weapons with the wrist-cords attached to them. Ceniro checked his farseer. “George, shoot Lorad, in the shoulder if you can.”

The enemy horse-men finally met their bristling wall of weaponry, and for a few minutes everything was light and dark and nerves and blood. Priscilla kept her torch staff high, and the knights had no bows or javelins.

“Hit ‘im,” George grunted, ducking a sword sweep of a cavalier. “How’s Cavven, Ceniro?”

“He’s all right. Lorad can’t hit him. Dancing…” Ceniro backed away from a cavalier as Caddie jumped in front of him to attack.

“All right!” Cavven called finally. “He, uh, he’s dead. I think. Not to plan. Sorry, sir.”

“Listen up!” Lence shouted at the enemy cavaliers. “Your young boss is dead, and you’re outnumbered and outclassed. Stop fighting and I won’t have to strip the life from your worthless bodies.”

Ceniro winced. “That’s one way to put an ultimatum.”

“Wasn’t an ultimatum,” the shaman told him coolly. “Are we gonna stop ‘em or what?”

Some of the cavaliers were putting down their weapons. A few did not, and were quickly brought down. The ones who surrendered were clearly exhausted, perhaps suffering from frostbite.

Ceniro walked over to where Cavven was cleaning his sword. “I’m really sorry, really I am, sir. He just pushed and pushed and then I reached too far and he fell off his horse.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Ceniro told him. “It’s not your responsibility. You did take him out of action, and we got some to surrender. I’ll see what Lord Pent thinks when he wakes up, but you don’t have to worry about anything.”

“All right,” Cavven said, much cheered. “I won, anyway. That’s good! I think I’m improving.”

“Yes…” Ceniro bent over the enemy cavalier.

Lorad was still breathing. Cavven had stabbed him in the stomach below the armour, but he was still alive, only just.

The youth’s eyes fluttered open and he reached up and grabbed the tactician by the collar venomously. “You… you… my father will… Lord Eshan…”

“Priscilla!” Ceniro called as well as he could. “Come quick!”

Lorad smiled, a smile with a snarl in it. “You – if you heal me – more fools you… Must win… stupid squire…”

Priscilla came running up just as Lorad sighed and fell back, dead.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I wasn’t fast enough…”

Ceniro sighed as he sat down heavily. “Don’t worry about it. He was pretty much dead anyway; probably beyond your ability to heal on your own. I just wanted to take the chance if we could.”

“I understand.” The rose-like girl sat down beside him. “It’s been a long day, hasn’t it? And Lord Pent is a little bit out of it…”

“Our fearless leader awakens!” Cavven cried, popping up in front of him. “No, it’s true. Just now. We managed to get a fire going for those surrendered knights and he twitched and woke up.”

“Thanks, Cavven,” said Ceniro. “I’d better go tell him what’s happened.”

“Lence and George are doing that,” Cavven said cheerfully. “Oh, Miss Priscilla, Andy wants a cut healed, if you could. Thanks!”

“Lorad is dead, hmm,” Pent said to himself a few minutes later. “…Well, looks like you had a pretty good time of it, from all the bodies strewn around… Lots of horses standing about. Do we get to keep the ones they don’t need?”

“…I was thinking the surviving knights could keep them,” Ceniro answered, glancing at his farseer. Lence and George had finished their summary and left the count and his tactician to talk. “We’re not going any faster on horseback, and we don’t need another packhorse. Besides, if we’re looking for the jewel underground, horses definitely won’t help.”

“I guess I concur,” Pent said, laughing. “What are the soldiers going to do?”

“They have enough food to get them to a village. They’re going to turn mercenary rather than go back to Vork. They say it was someone named Vork who sent them.”

“Vork…” Pent thought. “He’s a cleric. Pretty high rank, too. Odd, him getting involved in force of arms. His usual strategies are more insidious.”

Ceniro squeezed one eye shut like Lyn sometimes did when disgruntled and didn’t ask what he meant.

“Oh, lad, you are easy to read,” the sage told him, laughing some more. “Not all Etrurian nobles and politicians are evil. Just the ones causing trouble. There’s a lot of power-playing going on, and a little dirtiness, but mostly we’re fairly civilized for a continental kingdom.”

Ceniro smiled ruefully. “Sorry. I guess I don’t know much about courts. It just seems that talk of assassinations or theft or backstabbing is pretty casual, and I think more about straightforward combat.”

“Ever had to sneak into an enemy mansion?” Pent asked him, leaning towards him conspiratorially. “No, I was kidding. I know you haven’t. With a heart like yours, it would be a mercy mission, anyway, and good on you.”

Recovered, the count stood. “Well, can’t sit around jawing all day. I hope I haven’t lost us too much time with my ineptness. Shall we go down the other tunnel?”

“We’re all ready,” George reported, saluting briefly as he finished marshalling Pent’s company.

“Let’s go, then!”

Chapter 4: Sly Tongues Aplenty     Chapter 6: The Price of Hunger