“My lord?” he spoke up for the first time.
“Oh, Kendel; I almost forgot you were there,” Flora said brightly. “We’ve been chatting away.”
“Erdonn, why are there no other travelers on this road? We haven’t seen a single person other than you and the robbers in the time we’ve been going to Headterre,” Kendel asked.
“It’s just a slow day. There are never a great many folks traveling; we’re an out-of-the-way corner of the country, but there are usually folks passing through,” the nobleman answered.
“Are there other robbers along the road? Besides the ones that attacked you?” Kendel felt he needed to be careful in what he revealed to Erdonn through his questions, although he wasn’t sure why. The more that the nobleman and Flora seemed to get along, the less Kendel wanted to like and trust the man.
“There might be the odd one or two,” Erdonn conceded. “But there can’t be many more other than the ones we faced today.”
The nobleman sudden began to whistle, giving a birdsong set of notes that sounded familiar. It was the same bird song that Kendel had just heard moments ago, he realized, a noise that had been in the background of the conversation.
“There’s a signal,” Erdonn continued. “My staff have spotted us and are preparing the castle for us now. They were concerned about my safety because of Cenchul and Barnnaw,” he mentioned the two dead servants on the other two horses.
Kendel sat back in silence, as he realized that the person he had discovered in the forest had been one of Erdonn’s servants, keeping an eye out for his master. There wasn’t an ambush being prepared ahead, only a welcome.
He relaxed and said no more, while they continued their journey, and minutes later, Erdonn pointed to the gates to his castle.
“We’re almost home,” he announced.
“Those are impressive walls,” Flora mentioned.
“We have a protective enclosure around the castle and the outbuildings,” Erdonn replied. “The gate is just ahead, and here come servants to help us.”
Kendel heard voices approach, and then heard conversations between Erdonn and the servants.
“Take our guests to the castle and show them to rooms in the east wing. I’ll go with you to place Cenchul and Barnnaw in the temple for mourning,” he directed.
Kendel let his awareness examine the scene from a hovering position above the arrival. The three travelers were in the center, with a pair of servants on either side of them to attend to their needs.
“Will you follow me?” a man’s voice asked.
“Can you help our associate down off the horse? He’s blind, and can’t see,” Flora replied.
“Be careful of him; he’s a sorcerer,” Erdonn informed the staff. “These two are on their way to see a wizard at Mount Cru Jolais.”
“My lord?” a servant spoke in a puzzled voice.
“Just help them to their rooms,” Erdonn snapped.
Kendel was given instruction to help him dismount from his ride, and helping hands steadied him as he reached the ground, then Flora tugged on his sleeve and led him into the castle. They crossed an open space in which their steps echoed loudly, then climbed a long set of stairs.
“My lady, your room is down this way. Lord sorcerer, your room is down this other hall,” the two servants announced, and they led them apart.
“Stop,” Kendel called after a handful of steps, suddenly uneasy about the changing circumstances.
“Flora?” he called.
“I’m here Kendel; what’s wrong?” she asked.
“Where’s your room? How far away will you be?” he asked.
“Her room is in the east wing and you are in the north wing,” the servant who was leading him reported. “You will see her at dinner, I’m sure,” the man added.
“I’ll see you at dinner,” Flora parroted. “Go and relax and enjoy a chance to be comfortable for a while. We’ll have a chance to get a good night’s sleep before we hit the road again tomorrow.”
“Alright,” Kendel reluctantly agreed. “Call for me if you need anything,” he added, and he imagined he heard a servant snicker at the thought of a blind man being able to help.
Within a minute he was placed in his room and told to rest and wait for a guide to come get him for dinner. And then he was left alone.
He carefully cruised around his room, after placing his heavy backpack – filled with the spoils he had confiscated from the roadway thieves – on his bed. He found a pair of windows and three doors, one of which was locked, while the other two went to a bathing chamber and a hallway.
He went to his bed and sat down on it, then cautiously laid back and stretched himself out to his full length. The sensation was both relaxing and not so – the mattress was moderately soft, but the sheet on the bed was stiff and scratchy. He couldn’t find a pillow either, but he tried to relax in his quiet room, seeing only the darkness of his blind condition around him.
His mind slowly disengaged, and he began to enter a trance-like sleep, when a slight sound woke him. He let his consciousness rise again and became aware that there was another person in his room.
“Flora?” he asked. “Is that you?”
He heard the shuffle of feet on his floor, and he sat up.
“Who is it?” he asked.
There was no answer.
Kendel was fully awake, and he let his consciousness examine the room closely. He could feel that a person was present, but the character of the person seemed obscured, reminding him of the difficulty he had experienced while trying to observe the battle of the thieves upon the bridge, when he and Flora had rescued Erdonn.
“What are you doing here? What do you want?” he called out. He focused more intently on the other person and sensed their presence to his right. He rose from the bed and faced in that direction.
He let his hand wander along the edge of the bedside table until his fingers found his walking staff, and he grabbed it securely. If he was going to have to fend off the intruder, he wanted to have his staff and his powers ready to use.
“I know you’re in here. Tell me who you are and why you’re here,” he challenged.
There was silence, then the sound of footsteps retreating, and the sound of the door opening.
The intruder had left. Kendel stood and tried to sense the movements of the mysterious being, but he could not penetrate the strange fog that limited his abilities and lost track of the movements of the person.
He couldn’t imagine what anyone would be doing in his room, until he remembered the bag of money he had carried, the coins he had taken from the dead thieves at the bridge, as Shaiss had instructed. He reached down to the foot of the bed and found that his backpack with all the confiscated wealth was still in place and seemed just as heavy and full as it had when he’d placed it there.
Kendel considered leaving his room and going in search of Flora. He decided to first go to his window and breathe in some fresh air to relax, so that he wouldn’t take an attitude that was too high-strung with him when he went to visit his friend. He felt his way along the wall to the window, then opened it, and immediately discovered a foul and rank odor in the air, as if something unpleasant was burning nearby. He hastily closed the window and stepped back.
There was an unexpected sound behind him and Kendel whirled around, holding his staff in front of him and calling upon the powers within him to be ready to defend against an attack.
“Kendel!” Flora’s voice cried out in surprise. “It’s just me! What are you doing?”
He hastily lowered his staff and recalled the energy to his interior, embarrassed by his reaction.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I had someone sneaking around in my room earlier, and then there was a foul smell outside, and I’m just jumpy. Something about this place seems,” he groped for a word to describe his befogged perception, “it seems like it’s hiding something,” he concluded.
“As beautiful as it is, and with this army of servants all aroun
d, it’s no surprise there are a few secrets tucked around,” Flora said airily, as she came into Kendel’s room. “I’m all for staying here a day or two extra to catch up on sleep before we hit the road again. What do you think?” she asked.
Kendel had no desire to stay in the palace any longer than one night, but hesitated to openly disagree with Flora.
“We can see,” he hedged. “If the weather is nice tomorrow, we may want to take advantage of it and travel as quickly as possible.”
“Hmm, perhaps you’re right,” Flora likewise declined to openly disagree. “Well, I just wanted to see if your room was as elegant as mine, and I believe it is,” she said. “I’ll let you rest now, and see you in a little while at dinner,” she promised, then left the room.
Chapter 32
A servant fetched Kendel for dinner just a short time later, and he was led to a table where he was seated with Flora and Erdonn.
“You’ve both enjoyed the hospitality of my home, I hope?” the nobleman asked. “I haven’t had time to tend to much since getting home, beyond trying to make sure Cenchul and Barnnaw were treated honorably and prepared for final rites to be performed the day after tomorrow,” he explained quickly. “I’ll look forward to a walk in the garden after dinner, even if it happens to be a moonlight stroll; the garden is such a restful, peaceful place,” he sighed.
“Your palace is magnificent,” Flora offered enthusiastically. “I’m sure that if the gardens are any match for your home they must truly be a place of beauty.”
“They are indeed,” Erdonn agreed. “You’re welcome to join me if you like on my stroll. I can point out some of the features, although some things really need to be seen in the daylight.”
“I’m very tempted,” Flora spoke in a tone that indicated she needed little further persuasion, which Erdonn promptly supplied, and as the plates from the first course of the meal were cleared, the agreement for tours by both moonlight and daylight was settled.
“My lord,” Kendel spoke up after the conversation, “is the staff generally busy here?”
“They find all types of work to do. This old pile of rock gives them ample opportunity to clean and repair things,” Erdonn answered.
“Just cleaning the crystal and the glass must keep half the staff busy year-round!” Flora cried. “Kendel, if you could see how much there is throughout the building, you’d expect to see twice as many servants as you see, and we’ve seen swarms of them already.”
“Have you?” Kendel asked. “I’ve had a harder time noticing them,” he spoke discreetly, so as not to give away his secret ability to sense the presence of others.
“I’ll bet you have had a harder time!” Erdonn laughed.
“Do you have a temple in the castle?” Kendel asked.
A servant dropped a platter, which sounded a loud clap as it struck the floor.
“What temple are you looking for?” Erdonn’s voice sounded cautious.
Perhaps Shaiss or Miriam, or even Huem,” Kendel suggested. “It would be comforting to says prayers and give them thanks for their assistance on our journey.”
“I’m afraid such temples are a luxury we don’t have,” Erdonn said.
Kendel sat silently and ate his meal, wondering why Erdonn hadn’t just said he didn’t have a chapel in the castle, unless it was because the temple was to some other god or goddess. Kendel had named the three that he felt were most popular and whose temples he had most commonly seen during his journeys through the land.
“Look at how beautiful the sunset is, with the light coming in through the stained glass!” Flora gushed.
Was the light tinted with green, Kendel wondered? Was the green sun setting along with its larger companion? He couldn’t feel the disappearance of the green sun from the sky, but then the unusual atmosphere in the palace seemed to baffle his ability to sense many things.
The thought of the green sun made him think about the second sun witch, and he recalled the unusual phrase Dwad had used when Kendel had described the battle back in the time he had occupied Parker’s body.
“Have you ever heard of a tanithae?” he asked abruptly a few minutes later. He wondered if the term Dwad had used was a common one, or if the dwarf had coined a word of his own.
“Eh?” Erdonn’s voice sounded interested.
“Why do you bring it up?” he asked.
“I was with a dwarf, and he used the word, which I had never heard before,” Kendel explained.
“I’ve heard it’s another name for a second sun witch, but I only heard the phrase recently, and wondered if it was more commonly used,” Kendel explained.
“It’s a powerful word, used to describe a powerful phenomena,” Erdonn replied. “It’s a word from the ancient language.
“Of course, there are no such witches in the world. They were all exiled and swept away in those ancient days. Were there to be any, we’d all live our lives in fear,” Erdonn explained. “They are the things of nightmares.”
“But,” Flora began.
“It was just a bad dream,” Kendel interrupted her. He felt certain that Erdonn shouldn’t be told about their battle with just such a witch, in the very recent past. “I had a bad dream about such a monster,” Kendel explained. “And I told Flora about the dream.”
“Is the green sun setting?” Kendel asked.
“It just has, even as you asked. Quite a coincidence of timing,” Erdonn said. “Which means that the moon is rising in the east. Shall we go tour the garden now?” he asked Flora, as Kendel heard the baron’s chair slide back across the floor.
“Kendel, my inquisitive friend, the servants will show you to your room,” Erdonn suggested.
“Good night Kendel,” Flora stepped next to him and brushed her lips against his cheek. “Enjoy sleeping in a comfortable bed tonight!” she encouraged him, and then Kendel heard their footsteps recede across the room.
“Shall we go, my lord?” a man’s voice asked, and a hand tugged on his sleeve, setting him in motion. He was duly led back to his room, and left alone.
He wasn’t ready to go to sleep. He wondered what was happening in the garden, as Flora and Erdonn were walking in the moonlight. He worried that Flora might be too ready to be charmed by the nobleman and persuaded to stay at the palace for longer than necessary.
He opened his window, and found to his relief that the stench of burning flesh was no longer present. He focused himself on trying to project his consciousness out into the air beyond the window, to see if he could locate and track Flora and Erdonn, to keep an eye on his friend.
It was like a scene he’d lived through once before, he realized with a memory that made his head snap up. Parker had been disgruntled and exiled to an upper floor of a palace while Agata had gone for a walk with Lumen in the garden. Now, a parallel set of circumstances left Kendel in an upstairs room while Flora walked in the palace garden with Erdonn. The similarity of circumstances was uncanny, he thought. It was as if fate were sending a message, a warning that they needed to avoid being trapped in Erdonn’s castle, just as they had eventually avoided being trapped in Lumen’s castle.
Kendel would have to find a way to tell Flora his theory and persuade her that they needed to escape and move on.
His search for the strollers was fruitless. The inexplicable atmosphere of the palace grounds continued to foil his efforts to extend his awareness to any great distance.
He started to close the window when he heard a scream. He was convinced the voice was Flora’s.
Kendel picked up his walking stick and allowed the blue and green powers to flow into the staff as he extended his awareness once more beyond his body, only within the limited range that allowed him to awkwardly navigate across his room, and then through the door to the hallway beyond. He turned left and walked down the hallway as quickly as he could manage, until he found the staircase.
Using his staff and his external awareness and his one free hand that he placed upon the wall, he worked his way down the st
airs and then stopped while he tried to detect the exit to the outside.
“Well, if it isn’t our guest,” a voice spoke from nearby. The voice must have been a servant’s, for it wasn’t Erdonn’s, Kendel noticed.
“I’d like to go outside,” Kendel spoke. “I thought I heard a shout, and I want to check.”
“Everything’s under control,” the servant told him. The man was coming closer to Kendel, and he broadcast a confusing range of emotions that included pleasure and anger and hunger all together.
“Which way to the door?” Kendel insisted simply.
“I’ll show you the way,” the servant said, and then Kendel detected that the man intended to attack him.
He was already within an arm’s length of Kendel as Kendel brought his staff around in an instinctive effort to use the staff as a physical weapon. As he swung the staff it struck the servant’s arm, eliciting a shout of pain, and deflecting an attack with a knife, so that the blade sliced lightly across Kendel’s left forearm instead of plunging into his torso.
“How’d a blind man do that?” the servant snarled.
And then he said no more as Kendel released a short burst of energy that struck his attacker in the head and knocked the man unconscious.
Kendel himself reeled in response to the energy that returned to him as the after-effect of the attack. He felt a tremendous pain in his head, but he steadied himself and staggered ahead, swinging wide to step around the body on the floor. The door to the exterior was just ahead, and he grappled with it to fling it open and let him step outside the palace.
There were sounds of birds and insects, but no sound from Flora. Kendel tried to cast his awareness at a distance, but once again found that the environment of the castle tamped down his ability to discover and discern anything at any distance.
“Flora!” he shouted. “Flora! Flora Greene!” he called.
“Kendel, help!” the shouted cry was off to his left.
He turned in that direction and began to run, then tripped over a bush and fell, spraining his ankle. He felt pain in his head and in his arm and in his ankle, but he was so desperate to find and help Flora that he began to limp forward, using the staff as a walking stick, leaning on it heavily to help ease the pain he felt in his ankle.
The Blinded Journey Page 23
