by RG Long
Serinde almost felt bad for the women, knowing that the prophet was going to be swearing up a storm and cursing the day they were all born.
Almost wasn’t enough to make her stop. She helped Jurrin get a good footing and then they were off. The city of Grellis was in uproar getting ready for a siege. Hopefully, that meant that three escaped fugitives could find a decent place to hide.
USING THE SPEAR’S TIP, they cut themselves free of their ropes. It was hard to tell if the commotion going on all around them was because of the siege or because of their escape. Serinde assumed both were partially responsible. The problem wasn’t going to be hiding Holve. Many older men were running about the castle grounds, carrying spears, holding shields, and preparing for battle.
The issue was with her and Jurrin.
Not a single elf was present in the city, save for her. She looked and looked to see if there was any kindred spirit around, but to no avail. Holve seemed to know this city less than he knew Arranus. He kept stopping at intersections, judging both directions and then waving them on after making a choice.
It seemed that he kept choosing the more run-down option each time. It made sense to Serinde. Stay out of the well-polished part of the castle and hope to avoid anyone who knows the Prince and his mission. But there was a catch and she knew it.
Finding the roughest parts of the castle grounds meant being surrounded by others who didn’t want to be seen. And they might willingly give up three strangers if it meant their own standing would improve.
The city was crowded for sure. Serinde had seen the refugees and recognized their faces. Men and women who had fled the quiet villages and towns that surrounded the castle in order to find protection inside it. But that protection came with a cost. Serinde had already seen many men taken away to be turned into defenders of the castle. And the women would probably be put to work in some way or another.
She supposed there was a way to look at the situation in a positive light. A whole country coming together to defend itself against an invasion. That sounded nice in her head. But she had seen whole populations forced into labor and guarding a city they did not love nor people they identified with.
She had been a part of such a country once.
The faces of the people they passed now were worried and downtrodden. They had the distinct look of people who were trying not to be noticed. Though they were in a rather dirty part of town, it seemed that the streets weren’t as empty as they could have been. Because of the swelling of people who had come to the castle, many had either found their way here by accident, or had used the same tactics that Holve was employing.
Get to the rough part of town. Look at the dirt on the path, not at the people around. Walk quickly and with purpose.
There was a small voice in her head telling her that this was no different than the struggles of her own past and that these people were trying to avoid a government who didn’t care much for them until they saw that they were old enough to hold a spear.
Holve finally waved them into what looked like a pub, though the sign was hanging onto the side of the wooden structure with a single nail and possibly the hope of a bartender who didn’t care much if people knew his place or not. It seemed that most of the shop owners in this part of town had either forgotten their stores had an exterior or they just made no effort to clean them.
Most of the buildings here were two stories, though some went up to a third. The pub they were about to walk in was one of those taller buildings. It was made of wood mostly, though some stones lined the bottom. Grimy windows were dark in the floors above, though Serinde wasn’t sure if that was due to the lack of light inside or the lack of cleaning on the outside.
“Don’t say anything,” Holve whispered as they crossed the threshold and found a pub that was quite full.
Serinde felt like she didn’t have to.
The pub was dark. By the time they had made it to this part of town, the suns had set and only the three moons lit the night sky. It appeared that whoever owned this bar wanted to make sure they had enough candles to light up the pub for the entirety of a very long siege. Only three or four were lit across the whole bottom floor.
Men and women alike sat at tables that were small and roughly put together. A few sat on a bench that ran along the far wall. No table was there in front of them, though this didn’t seem to bother any of those who sat there. They seemed content to sit and drink with a cup in their lap and stare at any newcomers.
Then again, everyone was staring at the newcomers now.
After about five steps, every eye in the pub was on them. She felt each of them burrowing into her pointed ears and sharp, elvish features. A glance down at Jurrin confirmed that he felt just as uncomfortable. It was clear that these humans had never before seen an elf or a halfling.
“Rooms are full,” the woman behind the bar said without looking up from the glass she was cleaning. “And the ale is twice what you’re thinking it’s going to...”
The woman looked up at Holve, Jurrin, and Serinde with wide eyes.
...be.” she finished flatly. “Dad!”
“Why did it get so quiet out here?” said a rounder man as he backed out of the swinging door to what Serinde assumed was the kitchen. “Feri, darling, did you scare off all the... customers?”
He finished his sentence much like his daughter, staring wide-eyed at the three newest patrons to his bar.
Slamming down the barrel on the counter and putting his arm on it, he shook his head in what Serinde thought looked like disbelief. A small grin crossed his lips.
“About time,” he said.
“I’M NOT GOING TO SAY you picked the worst time to come,” the man who Holve introduced to them as Forst said. “But you could have picked a better one.”
Serinde took a sip of the off colored water and was thankful for it. She knew how bad sieges could be. Silently, she wondered where the city got its water from, if the army outside could tamper with it, and if they would all be paying the highest price for such a luxury in the coming days.
If they weren’t put into prison, that is.
“How does Mister Holve seem to know everyone, Miss Serinde?” Jurrin asked quietly after taking a bite of the small bits of food they had been offered: a roasted animal that resembled a squirrel and some broth with two pieces of vegetables in it. “Don’t you think he knows everyone?”
Forst laughed.
“Holve Bravestead knows all the wrong people, little master,” he said with a nod of his head. “Prince Farnus, for example. It’d be better to not be known by him. Then again, you certainly do gain a reputation by being on the Prince’s most wanted list.”
He gestured to Holve over the small table the four of them sat at.
“Holve here has been a wanted man for thirty years, nearly since my youth.”
Forst lifted his mug to him.
“Keep up the good work,” he said with a sly grin.
The room he had brought them to was not above ground. After telling the patrons of the bar to mind their own business, he had escorted them up a flight of stairs in full view of everyone, then taken them to a room with a hidden door in one of the walls. A ladder had brought them down to a cavern-like hall right underneath the pub. The floor of the pub was above their heads. If Serinde strained, she could hear the muffled conversations of those above them, though she doubted Holve or Jurrin could.
A small, stone-lined hallway had gone out in both directions. Towards one end, Forst had taken them past a storage area, two doors with oil lit torches beside them and then finally into this room. It had two beds, a table, and a fireplace that Serinde guessed was vented by the fireplace above it in the main room of the inn.
Their table sat in the middle of the room, but only had two chairs. Forst had insisted Serinde take one and that Jurrin have the other. He and Holve sat on crates they had pulled from a corner of the room.
Serinde sat her wooden cup back down after another sip of the discolore
d water and posed her own question.
“Thank you for the food and drink, Forst,” she said tentatively. “But how do you know Holve? And why are you helping us?”
Forst looked at Holve with a furrowed brow and extended lower lip.
“Now see here, Holve Bravestead!” he said in a tone of remorse. “You haven’t even explained about what happened here in Grellis thirty years ago? I’m shocked!”
“We’ve been busy,” Holve muttered, taking a sip from his own cup.
Serinde sniffed at the simplicity of the statement and reality behind it.
“Grellis is the connecting city between the Theocracy and the Disputed Lands to the south,” Forst explained, a gleam appearing in his eye. “We’re the connecting point for the entirety of Ladis. If you want to go south, you stop here. Soldiers, princes, prophets, priests, merchants, everyone.”
Serinde nodded guessing at his intention but letting him continue on.
“Which means anyone sympathetic to Isol’s claim on most of the land the Theocracy stole from them is bound to come through and give off plenty of information. Or need a quick getaway if they get caught in the act of spying.”
He extended his hands.
“So that’s the family business,” he said, looking proud. “Smuggling information and people all over Ladis through my little tavern here. It may not look like much, but at one point this place was the hub of intelligence for Isol’s bid to reclaim Ladis.”
With this, he turned to Holve.
“Which shocks me even more than you’re just now getting here to tell me about the invasion of Yada and her army!” he said shaking his head. “Why wait so long? They’re nearly at our doors.”
Holve let out a chuckle that was lacking any humor.
“Yada and I are not seeing eye to eye at the moment,” he said. “I think she’d rather have me drawn and quartered than passing out information.”
“That’s fourths, right?” Jurrin piped up.
Forst laughed good naturedly.
“Yes, little master,” he said. “But I doubt even someone as brave and adventurous as you would like very much to be split into four parts willingly!”
“Is this about you disappearing after the last push on Prommus?” he said, turning back to Holve. “I knew it was rubbish, but there’s a lot of people who thought you had abandoned Isol.”
Forst shook his head and made a clicking noise with his tongue.
“Can’t be true,” he said with a tone of finality.
“I appreciate your faith in me,” Holve said. “I’m not working with Yada this time. Honestly, I had lost all contact with Isol and the old crew for some years now. As you well know.”
Forst shrugged.
“I just thought, given the timing of you showing up in my pub and all...”
Serinde thought she saw a little disappointment creep into Forst’s jovial expression. Holve sighed and appeared to relent.
“Alright,” he said. “You first. What do you have for me?”
Forst clapped his hands and rubbed them together.
“That’s the Holve I was hoping for!” he said, scooting forward on his crate and resting his elbows on the table. “I have about thirty years of information ready for you. Don’t happen to have a quill, do you?”
31: Family Ties
Octus held tightly onto Olma. It was hurting her shoulder a bit, but she didn’t complain. In the throng of people that surrounded them, she didn’t want to be separated from her uncle accidentally and caught up in the giant city.
She had never known so much stone existed, let alone this many people.
For years she had always heard of the large city of Arranus, with its ports and its ships and temple of Ladism. She had never imagined that she would be in a castle greater and larger than that.
It was overwhelming to her. The only comfort she found in the castle's walls was that they reminded her of the trees that had surrounded her back home. The sky was still overhead and, even in the darkness, the stars that shined through the black veil were a wonder to her.
At least she wasn’t open to the great expanse all at once.
Octus pushed her forward and she willingly went with him. The great crowds of people swallowed them up as soon as they had gotten off of Anders’ carts. Seeing so many come to collect the strange people who had gotten out of the first cart was frightening. Olma had expected to see some wild looking bandits or worse come fighting out of there. But it had been an old man, a very short person whose head didn’t even show over the crowd, and the most beautiful girl she had ever seen.
Her uncle had whispered under his breath to her.
“It’s an elf.”
Olma had never seen an elf before. Nor did she think they would look like that. She was elegant and sleek and, well, to Olma at least, she was perfect.
“This way,” her uncle said, trying to make his way out of the crowd of people. Olma couldn’t see over the horde that surrounded them, so she had to trust his judgement. It was nice to be guided along, without having to think of anything except the elf and making sure she stayed by Octus’ side.
The flow of people was becoming more and more chaotic, though Olma couldn’t see why. Shouting was going on just ahead of her but the bodies in front of her prevented her from getting a good view.
“Daddy! Daddy! No, daddy!”
“Mother! Mom!”
Sounds of children shouting for their parents made Olma’s heart start to race.
“This way,” Octus was saying, shoving her further along the path.
“That one’s old enough to fight,” said a gruff voice. “He can do without his mommy!”
“Hey! You there!”
Olma felt the hand on her shoulder tighten as Octus tried to guide her in a direction away from the voice.
“Yes, you!” the voice rang out again. “You’re fighting age. Over here!”
Octus’ grip on her was painful, almost to the point of making Olma yelp, but she dared not draw attention to herself.
“Please,” her uncle said in the most pleading voice she had ever heard him use. “I’m with my niece here. I’m her only family.”
“She’ll have plenty of company under the wall with the other families,” the voice said. “Prince Grantus’ orders. Every man inside the walls who is of age is to fight. No exceptions.”
“But, my niece!” Octus said again, pulling Olma to his side.
The crowd around them broke and she finally understood what was happening. Men were going one way, while women and children went another. Boys, not much older than she, were being pulled from their mothers and handed spears and shields. Some of them went with as much dignity as they could muster. It seemed that others had a harder time and were letting tears flow down their cheeks as they were escorted off to a part of the castle to defend.
Didn’t Ladis have an army?
Wasn’t the Theocracy the strongest nation in the world?
That’s what Olma had been told. It seemed so strange to have to force boys to serve as soldiers when there were actually soldiers to do the fighting.
“Your niece will be just fine,” the soldier said again. “Fight for Ladis and maybe you’ll live. Or, better yet, you’ll go on to guide us in death. Now get in line for a spear or watch mine go through your gut.”
The man didn’t look like a soldier to Olma. He had a black bandana tied around his head and a breastplate over his chest. The spear he held loosely in the crook of his arm as he directed people with his hands, sometimes shoving them one way or another. Several guards stood behind him, all with sour expressions and all making sure whoever the first pointed in a direction went that way.
Octus didn’t move quickly. He held onto Olma tightly as he bent down and looked her in the eyes.
There was deep sadness there.
“If I don’t go like they say, they’ll probably kill me or put me in prison, or worse.”
These were the most words he had spoken to her since
they had departed their hometown. Olma found sudden tears in her eyes. She tried to blink them away and be strong but found that the act was harder than the desire.
“I’m no good to you dead,” he said. “Perhaps after this is over we can find somewhere to live together and start over. As uncle and niece. My brother... Your father, I mean, was a great man. He wanted the best for you. So do I.”
“Hurry up!” called the soldier. “We don’t have time for sappy farewell speeches!”
The group of guards had begun to detach themselves from their leader and were edging towards them. Olma fought back the desire to look at them and instead, found herself looking into the eyes of her uncle.
His eyes were just like her father’s.
“Find a mother with her children,” Octus said, standing to his feet and moving before the guards could get to him. “Stay with them until the battle is over. Then come and find me!”
He turned and shoved the closest guard away.
“I’m coming,” he said forcefully. “You’ll not rush me.”
“Oooh,” the man with the bandana said. “We’ve got someone who thinks he’s better than us! Send him to the gates then! They need as many men as they can get there.”
Olma found herself watching her uncle walk into the building where spears and shields were being given out. He didn't look back. Perhaps that was best. She might break and run to him if she saw her father’s eyes looking for her. For the time being, she allowed herself to get swept away with the crowd of women and small children.
It was only then that she realized her shoulder still felt tender from her uncle’s firm grip.
Without it, she felt weak.
Without it, she found all her tears fell freely.
THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN were being ushered into several areas along the castle’s defenses. The walls of the castle were thick and tall. Olma knew from seeing the outside of the structure that a great chasm separated the plains from the castle itself. Only the bridge connected it to the land outside.
