“All is not lost,” Cliens said.
Ranus communicated by hand signals: How do we know they succeeded?
“Few have survived. It must have been a hard journey,” Cliens said. “And we don’t. But they have as best chance as any, and are they now not on the road to Fen-Stévock?”
Should we take them now? the next set of hand signals asked.
“No,” Cliens replied, “we will follow them. It isn’t wise to start a fight right in front of dwarvish guards.”
“We will attack tonight,” Ranus said, now using his language of hisses and clicks.
“Very well,” Cliens said with a smile.
****
Erik and his companions hadn’t traveled long along the road from Ecfast when it split into three distinct directions: west, east, and north.
“The road west leads to what was once Aga Min,” Wrothgard said, “and the one east to the Yerymann Steppes and, eventually, Crom and Bard’Sturn. North is Fen-Stévock.”
“North it is, then,” Turk said.
Some of the road, after it split and continued north, was simple packed dirt and hard ground—lined with flagstone and markers—but other parts were paved with large, flattened rock and it was well-traveled. Constant traffic consumed the road, and along the subsequent roads that crossed this main one. Even at night, there was little need for a fire, with all the campfires from other travelers giving off more than adequate light.
“Where do you think they’re going? All these travelers?” Erik asked the first night they camped along the road.
“Some to Crom,” Wrothgard replied. “Some to Ecfast. Most probably to Fen-Stévock. I am sure we will pass those on foot in the morning.”
The farther north they traveled, the more diverse the people became on what Wrothgard referred to as, the Merchant’s Road. Erik thought Finlo full of different people, but that was no match for the people of the east. He also saw different animals used to transport both persons and goods, large, gray animals with tusks and trunks, Wrothgard called elephants, and brown, hairy animals with a large hump on their back and funny looking faces, called camels according to Wrothgard. They almost scuffled with one group of travelers, even though they passed one another on opposite sides of the road.
“What was that about?” Wrothgard asked.
“Alfingas,” Demik spat.
“Goblins?” Erik translated.
“Aye,” Turk said.
Erik couldn’t help thinking the goblins were ugly creatures. About as tall as the dwarves with flat noses and gray-green skin, they had pointed ears and wide mouths that, when they yelled at them, Erik could see were filled with sharp, pointed teeth. Their eyes were small and beady and had a reddish tint to them that reminded Erik of the winter wolves.
“Goblins and dwarves just don’t get along,” Turk explained.
“Most creatures don’t get along with goblins,” Demik said. “They are the runts of society.”
“How long until we reach Fen-Stévock?” Erik asked.
“A day, two at most,” Wrothgard replied. And then he added, “Not soon enough.”
****
Ranus and Cliens followed at a distance, both covering their heads with scarves of cloth in case one of the mercenaries looked back and recognized them. Dusk was close at hand, and they had started seeing the signs of eastern life and small villages. Cliens had been devising a plan on how they would take the Lord of the East’s treasure from these mercenaries—and their lives if necessary—when he heard a grumble come from his friend. He had stopped, and Cliens almost ran into him.
“What is the matter with you?” Cliens asked. But then he saw them.
A group of half a dozen goblins stood a dozen paces from the road. They were normal travelers, with two small ponies and a hand drawn cart, but they glared at Ranus and Cliens. Cliens saw that Ranus had dropped his scarf away from his face.
“Not now. Put your scarf back up. We don’t have any time to worry about a group of stinking Alfingas.”
His plea fell on deaf ears. Ranus and his people hailed from the Shadow Marshes. So did goblins. And it was goblins, supported by Golgolithul, that destroyed Ranus’ village, killed most of his family, and displaced many of his people. The truth was, it was a rare sight to see one of Ranus’ people in the Shadow Marshes anymore, all because of goblins.
“They are looking at us,” Ranus clicked and hissed.
“We are looking at them,” Cliens replied, knowing goblins hated Ranus’ people as much as they hated the goblins.
Goblins were a common sight on the trading roads that led to Fen-Stévock—that was the problem with the east—and Ranus’ people were not.
“They will follow us,” Ranus said, “and kill us in our sleep.”
“You don’t know that,” Cliens said. By the Creator, he didn’t want a fight this night, especially before they were supposed to steal away this treasure.
“What you looking at?” one of the goblins called, speaking in Shengu. His voice was raspy and gravelly and, well, ugly.
Ranus hissed.
“Nothing,” Cliens replied.
“Don’t understand what he said,” another goblin said. “Still has some of the marsh stuck in his throat. Or maybe a rat turd.”
Ranus growled, and the goblins laughed.
“Keep walking,” yet another goblin said as they stepped closer to Ranus and Cliens.
“We plan on it,” Cliens said with a smile and a nod.
The last goblin to speak was bigger than the others. He wore battle scars on his face, a wide glaring one across his flat nose. One of his pointed ears folded over, causing him to squint with one eye. The handle of the sword he wore at his side looked well made, leather bound and strong. He watched Ranus and Cliens with suspicion as he stepped to within a pace of the two.
“Let’s go,” Cliens said, taking Ranus’ arm.
The other goblins laughed, and they were close enough that Cliens could hear them whispering in their native language. Clearly, they didn’t think that either Ranus or Cliens understood them. Both of them did.
“Shut up,” the one who must have been the leader said, and the other goblins complied. “Watch them … closely.”
“What do you want us to do?” one asked.
“Just follow them,” the leader said. “When they bed down, bring me a souvenir.”
“A tongue?” another goblin said, almost with childish excitement in his voice.
“They shouldn’t have looked at us,” the leader said.
Ranus looked at his companion, and Cliens knew that look. It was the I told you so look he gave him frequently.
“All right,” Cliens said, “but this is a waste of time.”
They both turned, Cliens with his sword drawn and Ranus with his two-pronged spear. People moved away from the road, seeing the fight about to ensue. Certainly, they were a common sight here, being far enough away from Fen-Stévock for any constables to patrol the area.
“Don’t worry,” Cliens said in the goblins’ language, “we won’t ever look at you again. No one will.”
Goblins were formidable foes in large groups. They swarmed their enemy and wore them down by sheer numbers. One might even call them brave, if they considered soldiers throwing themselves into the waiting spears of the adversary with reckless abandon brave. But individually, goblins were not very good warriors. They were strong for a creature as slight as a small woman and no taller than a dwarf, and there were certainly stories of goblin heroes, but normally a goblin in a small group or by himself was not much of a threat to a well-trained and much bigger combatant.
Ranus leapt over the group of goblins, his legs strong. He jabbed his spear into the back of one, drawing a knife and slicing the throat of another. Cliens yelled, causing one of the goblins’ ponies to rear up and run away. That spooked the other pony, knocking over another goblin. Cliens took the opportunity to run him through. Another one charged, and he was an easy kill.
The
goblin leader grabbed his remaining companion by the scruff of the neck and threw him into Cliens. It took the man by surprise, and he found himself on his back with the goblin on top of him. He was heavy for how he looked, and Cliens couldn’t lift his sword. He dropped his weapon and wrapped his hands around the goblin’s neck. Looking up, he saw the goblin leader training his blade over the two, and Cliens moved to the side as the leader ran his blade through his companion.
“You are scum,” the goblin leader growled in his own language.
Ranus, who squared up to the remaining goblin, simply growled as Cliens got back to his feet. Both he and Ranus stepped forward, ready to engage the goblin, but he noticed a crowd growing. Even without constables patrolling the area, and the relatively loose laws of Golgolithul, too much attention was never a good thing.
“We should go,” Cliens said.
Ranus didn’t move.
“Ranus, people are noticing,” Cliens added. “We should go.”
Now it was the goblin growling, angrily.
“Watch your back, swamp monster,” the goblin hissed as Cliens and Ranus backed away from him, pulling their scarfs over their faces again and leaving the scene.
“Don’t worry about him, Ranus,” Cliens said.
Ranus just shrugged.
“Let’s find this thing for Gol-Durathna and the General Lord Marshall and get home,” Cliens added. “We’ve both been gone too long.”
Chapter 36
Bryon woke up to see the face of a dwarvish woman hovering above his. The features were hazy at first as Bryon tried to blink the sleep from his eyes, but they soon came into focus. She had a pleasant face, not necessarily a pretty one, but compared to the dwarvish men … Bryon would rather wake up to her than one of the several surgeons that had been treating him. Bearded and angry looking—always angry looking.
The woman dabbed Bryon’s forehead with a dry towel. He could feel the sweat that had collected at his neck and in his armpits and at the small of his back. As consciousness took a firmer hold of him, he could feel the heat. It wasn’t the room, though. That much he knew. It was him. He was hot, burning up as if he was lying in the hot sun in the middle of summer.
And then there was the pain. Bryon had forgotten about the pain which raged through his whole body but centered in his chest. It felt as if someone stabbed him over and over with a knife that was as hot as an iron from the forge.
Bryon tried to move, but couldn’t. He told his body to move, and it didn’t listen. He commanded his body to move, but it was unresponsive. The dwarvish woman put a gentle hand on Bryon’s bare chest. She smiled and shook her head ever so slightly. She said something in her native tongue, and at that moment, Bryon had wished he had paid attention to Erik’s language lessons.
The pain built and built, and Bryon groaned louder and louder until he was screaming. There was no other way to voice the situation, but the dwarvish woman put two fingers to his lips and hushed him gently as if he was a crying babe. She said something to him, but he didn’t understand. He shook his head, and he felt tears role down the side of his face. She said the same thing again.
“I don’t understand you,” Bryon murmured, shaking his head.
“Pain,” she said. Then she repeated, “Pain.”
Bryon began to weep. It was too much, and he had never felt anything so terrible. He managed to nod his head.
Still smiling, the woman left his side for a moment and returned with a tall, thin bottle. She uncorked it and put the bottle to Bryon’s lips.
“Drink,” she said.
Bryon opened his mouth. The liquid was cool, cold almost. It was sweet at first, but slowly turned sour and tart. Bryon wanted to stop drinking—in fact, he tried—but the dwarvish woman kept the bottle to his mouth. As he drank more, the liquid became hot and bland, losing its entire flavor. It began to burn his throat, and his stomach twisted, and he wanted to stop drinking, but the woman made him continue. Finally, she showed Bryon the empty bottle, patted him gently on the arm, and turned to move away.
“Wait,” Bryon muttered, weakly grabbing her wrist. The pain still seemed to swell through his body, and whatever he drank didn’t do anything. He thought maybe it was sweet wine, or something like it.
“Wait. It still hurts. Please. Whatever god is out there, please. The pain. Make it stop. Please, make it stop,” he said but the women simply smiled, took her arm from his grasp and patted his hand before she left the room.
Bryon cried and moaned and pled for his pain to subside; he just wanted it all to go away. Then, he felt comforting warmth, emanating initially from his stomach. It felt like a blanket held tight on a cold night, or the gentle embrace of a beautiful woman under the stars. Bryon smiled. The warmth spread to his chest and his back as the pain subsided there and the warmth spread to his arms and his legs. Now he felt numb—his neck, the back of his head, his cheeks, his lips. Then there was only darkness.
****
When Bryon woke again, he felt well enough to lift his head and look around the room. There were no other beds, just the one in which he lay. A small table sat in one corner with a candle burning faintly on it, and another one on a table next to his bed. Most of the room was dark, but despite the shadows, he knew he was the only person there.
Where am I now? Is this Thorakest?
He could move, and for that, he was glad. The pain was mostly gone, lingering in his chest and head, but it was manageable, and certainly no worse than he had dealt with in recent weeks. He put his hand to his chest, where it hurt, and felt padding. It was a patch, a bandage that covered his wound. As he pressed on it, a surge of ache throbbed through his whole body, and he clenched his teeth.
The dragon wound. How long until this damn thing heals?
He laid his head back again, welcoming the envelopment by his pillow. It was soft and warm and seemed to wrap itself all around Bryon’s face so his vision became tunneled. He watched the shadows cast by the candles dance along the ceiling of the room, and it reminded him of the candle in his room back home. His stomach immediately tightened, and he sat up quickly, despite the discomfort it caused in his head and chest.
Leaning on both his elbows, Bryon found his breathing quicken. Sweat poured from his brow. He closed his eyes tight, shook his head, and then opened them, watching the swirling grays and purples and reds dance about in his vision before disappearing quickly as his vision refocused.
Does home hold so many bad memories?
He slowly rolled to one side, swung his legs over the edge of his bed, and pushed himself into a sitting position. He hadn’t realized he was naked and, even though he was the only one in the room, he pulled his blanket over his lap. The floor was warm to his feet, and he thought he might walk around a bit. Bracing himself with both hands set firmly at the edge of the bed, Bryon tried to stand, but immediately felt dizzy and sat back down.
For a moment, pain raged through his head, and he grimaced and held his breath, which only made it worse. As soon as he started breathing again and relaxed his face, his headache went away. He found a small cup sitting on the table next to his bed. He lifted it and put it to his nose. It smelled indiscriminate, and in the faint light he couldn’t really tell what color it was.
Are you water? Or, are you some drink that is going to make me pass out again?
Finally, he shrugged his shoulders and took a sip. Water. Just a sip ended up not being enough, and Bryon drained the contents of the cup, immediately wishing for more—perhaps a whole pitcher.
They’ll be around soon, I hope, to refill my cup. Maybe I can ask them for a pitcher then.
He made one last attempt to stand before relinquishing to the fact he would have to remain sitting. He finally lay back down and closed his eyes and tried to fall back to sleep but couldn’t. Every time he closed his eyes, he would see home, his mother, his sisters … his father. He would hear the low moan of mooing cows and the baaing of sheep. He heard the buzzing of bees collecting nectar in the early
morning and the gentle cooing of a dove. His mother loved that sound and would sit outside in the morning, just as the sun peeked over the horizon, and listen to them, drinking her tea and eating buttered bread. He always found them annoying sounds, a sign that work was just moments away. But now … now he wanted to be there. He wanted to be home.
“You’re a damn fool,” he cursed, and his voice echoed off the walls of his room.
He tried thinking of the work, from sunup to sundown. He tried thinking of the blisters on his hands and of biting flies and stinging ants. He tried thinking of the smell of pig food and horseshit and hearing his father curse and yell and scream as orange brandy consumed his senses. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t remember how his muscles ached when he worked, or the feeling of pestering insects, or the smell of manure. He couldn’t even think of some of the colorful curses his father would come up with.
Instead, he smelled fresh baked muffins, juiced oranges, and the sweet bitterness of squeezed rind. He heard his sisters giggling and remembered how the sound would bring a smile to his face. He felt his mother’s hand on his cheek, soft and gentle. He even heard his father … he heard his father tell him what a good job he had done. He felt the clamp of a strong hand on his shoulder, the embrace of a strong arm as his father hugged him.
Bryon propped himself up again, leaning on his elbows and shook his head.
When, by the Creator’s beard, was the last time that happened?
He rubbed his eyes with the back of one hand, surprised to find tears.
When was the last flaming time my father ever said something bloody nice to me?
He shook his head. Fool. Idiot. Naïve whelp.
When was the last time I was happy to be home? When was the last time my father was sober enough to hug me?
But then, he remembered with great clarity the day before he left home. His mother had baked fresh muffins, and his sisters were playing in the back of the house with dolls and a little play hut he had built them—a thatched roof, wooden porch, and even a washing basin he had made from one of his mother’s old sewing thimbles.
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