by A. C. Cobble
Ben jumped up to peer over the fence and saw that it shielded an open-air tavern. A sea of tables and benches were braced by a small stage and a row of ale and wine kegs.
“That place will be packed as soon as the sun sets,” mused Ben.
Amelie nodded and pointed to a balcony behind the stage. “Anyone up there can see every detail in this yard.”
They circled the muddy yard one more time, looking for inspiration.
Finally, Ben admitted, “This is probably the quietest the yard ever gets. If we’re going to do anything, now is the time.”
“What do you think, just climb up the side of the building and sneak in?” questioned Amelie.
“That’s what we usually do,” agreed Ben.
“Do you think it’s strange we have a usual way of breaking into buildings?” asked Amelie.
Ben shrugged and then sauntered over to the barrels against the side of the building. He knelt and boosted Amelie up. She scampered higher until she was standing on the tallest barrel. With a short jump, she reached a window on the second floor and gripped the sill, hanging in the air until she set her feet against the rough mortar of the wall.
Ben, looking up at her, tapped the hunting knife on his belt. “Need this to jimmy the latch open?”
Amelie glanced down at him and wiggled her fingers. She set her hand against the wooden slats of the shutters and there was an audible pop. The shutters swung open, and Amelie hauled herself higher, disappearing inside the darkened window.
Grumbling, Ben awkwardly climbed the barrels, reached up, grasped the sill, and then wiggled through the open window. Once inside, he turned and pushed the shutters closed.
A soft glow emanated from Amelie’s palm. She raised it high, illuminating the simple room. Two beds, a small table, a cloak rack, and a wardrobe. Both beds were unmade, heavy cloaks hung on the rack, and a pair of distressingly worn boots sat in one corner.
They opened the wardrobe and found travel packs and a few sets of clothing. The place looked exactly like a room should look when two soldiers were leaving behind gear to go on a day-long excursion.
“They expected to slaughter us quickly,” remarked Amelie coldly.
Ben grunted. “They had Eldred.”
There was nothing more to find in the room, so they crossed cautiously to the door. Ben eased it open and peeked outside into the empty hallway. It was dim, lit only by small windows at either end. He slunk out into the hall and edged over to the open stairwell. Peering around the corner, he saw the common room below was just like they left it.
He tiptoed back to Amelie and leaned close, whispering, “As long as we stay away from the stairs, no one should spot us. No one has any reason to come up here, but a creaking floorboard could give us away. We should do this as quickly as we can without rushing and making an inadvertent sound.”
Amelie nodded and padded to the door across from the one they exited. The door was locked.
Ben reached for his hunting knife again, but Amelie rolled her eyes at him and magically popped the latch open. Smirking, she led the way into the next room. It was much the same as the first. Standard issue gear for military men, a few personal effects, and nothing of interest to Ben and Amelie.
“We’re wasting our time on the soldier’s rooms,” she whispered. “We need to find Eldred’s.”
Ben nodded tersely and pointed down the hall. The dark mage would have taken the best room, which he figured would be on the corner.
Amelie led the way, stepping carefully to avoid creaking boards or stomps loud enough to be heard downstairs. As they approached the door, she held out a hand cautioning Ben.
He stayed close behind her and gasped as a series of glowing runes materialized along the door frame. Pulsating orange and yellow, the arcane script bled menace.
“I’ll take that knife now,” said Amelie.
Ben passed it over and watched as she knelt to scrape the steel tip into the wood near the bottom of the door. Slowly, the glow of the runes began to fade as the stored power leaked out of the ward.
“Glad I watched Towaal and Gunther do that so many times,” remarked Amelie as she passed the knife back to Ben.
He slid the steel blade into his belt sheath and held his breath as Amelie popped open the latch and pushed on the door. They stood in the threshold, peering into the dim room. Amelie raised her palm and directed a weak light around the space. No more runes flared to life, no stabbing pain, no violent explosions. They stepped inside.
Ben jumped when he saw a white, porcelain mask sitting on a small table between the beds, but on closer inspection, it looked like it could have been a spare.
“Where does she get these made?” asked Ben. “Is there a creepy mask maker in the City that you know of? I don’t recall seeing one.”
“It looks safe,” muttered Amelie, ignoring him and peering down at the mask. “I don’t think this is magical at all.”
“I wonder why she needed two of them?” asked Ben.
Amelie didn’t answer. She turned and began to examine the rest of the room. Ben looked around, not seeing any obvious threats but afraid to touch anything.
The room was like the others, but neither bed appeared slept in. Aside from the mask, there were no personal effects or mementos scattered around like they’d seen in the soldier’s chambers. It was neat and tidy. Disappointingly to Ben, they didn’t see the wyvern fire staff sitting out where they could take it and leave.
After a brief moment pawing through a mundane cloak on the rack and peeking under the beds, Ben and Amelie turned to each other and then glanced at the wardrobe.
“If there’s anything in here, it will be in there,” said Amelie nervously.
She crossed to the wardrobe and held out a hand, sensing for wards.
Nothing happened.
She shrugged and pulled open the door, shining the light from her hand inside.
Ben gasped.
The light flickered out from Amelie’s palm.
“Harden your wi—” she started to yell, but she didn’t finish. The world erupted in light.
Ben blinked.
Above him, brilliant blue stretched across his entire field of his vision, interrupted only by a handful of small, puffy white clouds. His body tingled like the entire thing had fallen asleep and was just now waking back up. He heard faint sounds as if from under water, and he smelled something that tickled his nose. It was smoke, he decided dreamily, a lot of smoke.
He blinked again and shifted, fighting the tingling in his body. He felt something poking him and turned his head to see yellow pieces of straw. He was lying on a bed of hay. He blinked a third time, and awareness crashed back in. He realized just how strange it was he was on a pile of hay. The sound came again, muffled and weak. It sounded like, like, someone yelling. He raised his head and looked around. Down near his boots, he found where the smoke was coming from.
The pile of hay was on fire.
A jolt of panic shot through his body, forcing him from his stupor. He was lying on a giant pile of hay, and it was on fire! He fought to sit up, scrambling to pull his boots back from the licking tongues of flame. He glanced around wildly. Beside him, he saw someone’s legs thrashing. The rest of the body was stuck in the hay pile. The legs were kicking frantically, evidently also sensing the growing heat of the flame.
“Oh, damn.”
Ben scrambled across the hay, ignoring the scorching burn when he placed his hand down in the center of the quickly growing fire. He tackled the two legs and set his feet, the heat of the flame singeing his calves. He yanked with all of his might.
Ben and Amelie tumbled down the burning stack of hay and landed hard in the muddy wagon yard. Amelie, spitting out dust and straw, scrambled back on her hands and knees, cursing loudly. In front of them, the flames licked higher. In moments, the entire stack of hay went up, burning hot and fast. Shouts of alarm and a ringing bell intruded on Ben’s awareness and he glanced over his shoulder. The inn behind them w
as gone.
“Oh, damn,” he muttered again.
Amelie followed his look and her face lost all of its color. “We have to go,” she croaked.
Burning pieces of thatch floated through the air. Chunks of mortar and stone were scattered around the yard, and a few timbers still stuck up, skewed drunkenly where the inn once stood. The entire structure had been blown to bits.
Men began to stream into the area, carrying buckets and blankets, dousing the nearby buildings, protecting them from the floating, burning debris from the inn. Next to Ben and Amelie, the pile of straw burned merrily, safely leaning against the already torched stone structure of the stables.
“Not again!” came a shout from the bucket brigade.
Ben and Amelie scrambled to their feet and staggered away. Several people called out to offer assistance, but Ben waved them off. In the initial confusion of the blast, they were seen as victims instead of instigators.
“If-If we hadn’t hardened our will…” stammered Amelie.
Ben squeezed her arm tightly.
“Oh, the people downstairs,” she quaked. She stumbled, and Ben barely caught her.
“Here, young man,” said a middle-aged woman who broke off from the crowd around the former inn. “Sit her down here.”
The woman kindly but firmly took ahold of both Ben and Amelie and directed them to sit beside the wall of a neighboring building.
“Wait here, dears. I’ll get ya some water,” she insisted.
Ben leaned back, his head bouncing against the stone wall. Everything sounded like it was coming through a woolen blanket, and his shoulder ached from where he must have landed on it. He patted himself, searching for additional injuries, but to his amazement, he seemed whole.
“What did we do?” moaned Amelie, tears streaking her cheeks.
“I-I don’t know,” mumbled Ben. “We can talk about it, but not here. Not where anyone can hear us.”
Amelie’s head fell into her hands, and Ben let her sit in silence. It was clear what they’d done now that he had time to consider it. They’d triggered some trap left by Eldred, and it’d blown up her room and the entire inn with it. By hardening their will, they’d survived the magical blast but had been thrown through the air. He didn’t want to think about the luck they’d used up by landing in a pile of hay instead of smashing against the side of a stone building. He suspected anyone nearby who hadn’t hardened their will had survived the explosion just as well as the inn, meaning they hadn’t.
As he was thinking it, Ben saw the bystanders find the first body. The first of many, he realized, his gut clenching like a fist. He closed his eyes, and his chin dropped to his chest. He drew a deep breath and then slowly let it out. He breathed deeply, over and over, trying to center his thoughts like Towaal had taught him. When he felt like he was beginning to get himself under control, he opened his eyes.
He was staring down into the mud, and there, between his legs, lay a palm-sized copper amulet. On it was the face of a young woman. She was smiling at him. The amulet was hanging from half of a charred leather thong.
“There ya are. Here. Drink this,” he heard.
Ben put his hand over the amulet and slid it into a pocket in his britches. He looked up and saw the woman who’d sat them down kneeling next to Amelie. She was holding a glass flagon of water. The woman fortunately mistook Amelie’s shock as a reaction to getting caught in the blast instead of a reaction to causing the blast.
Wordlessly, Amelie sipped the water. The woman offered it to Ben next, and he found he was incredibly thirsty.
“What happened?” she asked.
Ben shook his head. “There was an explosion right next to us. It sent us flying. I-I’d prefer not to talk about it yet if that’s okay. My mind is still reeling.”
“Of course, dear, of course.” The woman stood and looked around. “Tha men are getting the fire sorted, and tha constables will figure out what happened. In tha meantime, please, come rest at my inn. It’s just across the way from here, and it’s nice and quiet this time’a day. I’ve seen men act like you after a fight. They call it post trauma, or something. It helps to take a quiet moment and gather your thoughts. Please, come with me.”
Ben grunted and staggered to his feet. The woman’s inn was better than the muddy stable yard. He bent down and pulled Amelie up. The woman smiled at them and started pushing her way through the crowd that was forming to gawk at the destroyed building.
Amelie shot Ben a glance, distrust evident in her gaze, but he merely shrugged. He supposed it was possible this woman had some ulterior motive for bringing them with her, but they had to get away. Walking with a local seemed like a good idea at the moment. Being the only strangers standing around a strange and deadly occurrence was rarely a good idea in Ben’s experience.
True to the woman’s word, she led them to an inn just a block away from the explosion. Hanging above the door was a rusted metal sign featuring five peaks, the center peak rising twice the height of the other four.
“A mountain?” wondered Ben.
The woman shook her head. “Tha Goblin’s Finger. You’ll have more fun in here than anywhere else in Akew Woods. That’s our promise.”
“Goblin,” said Amelie. “Like in the stories?”
“Goblins ain’t just a story, girl,” chided the woman. “They’re out there in the dark places of the world. Nasty bastards they are, but you don’t have to worry about that in here. Though, I have to admit, we got more than our share of bastards, and being nasty is our stock and trade.”
The woman turned and laughed loudly as she led them through the doorway. As soon as they entered, a bevy of scantily clad serving women swarmed closer, all speaking on top of each other.
“What was it, Kate?”
“Wagon crash? I told you it’d be nothing more’na couple wagons got loose.”
“An attack! We’re under attack! I said that scallywag was telling the truth. He’s coming to murder us all!”
The last woman let out a high-pitched shriek and took off running toward the back of the tavern. The shock of her reaction silenced the rest of them.
Kate, evidently the woman who’d taken them in, held up a calming hand. “Tha Broken Wing exploded.”
Another round of squeals and wails. At the tables in the tavern, two score of unsavory-looking men watched either amused or too fogged by drink to care. None of them were stirring to see what the fuss outside was about.
“It looks’ta be some freak accident,” continued Kate. “There was fire, but it’s under control. Tha constables are there now, and they’ll get it sorted. It’s not an attack, or, well, whatever it was, they’ll get it sorted.”
“An explosion?” asked one heavily made-up woman.
Ben discreetly steered his gaze away from the copious cleavage the woman had on display. He smirked when, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Amelie was transfixed on her, making little effort to hide her amazement at how much skin the woman revealed.
The nearly naked woman and their host paid them no mind. They were used to such attention, guessed Ben, as he studied the rest of the room. Without a doubt, it was more of a bawdy house than an inn. Amelie appeared to be the only woman in the room who didn’t work there.
“I don’t know, Marie. The building’s just not there. I guess it went up in a burst of flame real quick like. These two were right beside it, but they can’t talk yet. Let’s settle ‘em down, and maybe later they can tell us what they saw. Give it a bell, and we’ll prolly find out more’n those useless sack constables will.”
Kate, their host, turned to them and steered them to an empty table away from the other patrons in the tavern.
“More water?” she asked.
“Ale,” croaked Ben. “If you have it.”
The woman smiled. “That we do, son, that we do.”
“Wine,” requested Amelie.
Kate smiled at them and whisked off to get their drinks.
As soon as she was out
of earshot, Amelie glanced at Ben. “We killed them, Ben. A dozen, two dozen, I don’t even know. The entire staff of that place and their customers.”
Ben shook his head. “We didn’t, Amelie. Eldred did.”
She opened her mouth to argue, but he cut her short.
“Amelie, if not us, someone else would have opened that wardrobe. Sooner or later, that explosion was going to happen no matter what. We got caught in the middle of it, but Eldred blew that building up. Eldred killed those people.”
She frowned at him.
“Believe me,” muttered Ben. “I’ve torn myself apart over plenty of our decisions, but we can’t shoulder this one. That… thing is what did it. I only wish we could kill her again.”
As soon as he said it, Ben paused.
“You saw it too,” remarked Amelie quietly.
He sighed. “I did.”
Kate returned with their drinks, but after one look at their faces, she scurried away again. Ben took a deep pull, finishing a third of the tankard in the first gulp.
“What the hell was that thing?” asked Amelie.
Ben grimaced. “Maybe we did kill her again. The extra mask, that desiccated body…”
He shuddered, recalling the horror that had flashed through him when they’d opened the wardrobe and saw what appeared to be a dried up husk of a dead woman. Its eyes had flared with a cruel red light. The next thing he remembered, he was blinking at the sky on top of a burning haystack.
“If there are more of them…” said Amelie.
They sat silently for a long moment, sipping on their drinks, thinking.
“If there are more of them,” finished Ben, “then we have work to do.”
“How would we even know?” wondered Amelie, a sick sense of dread lacing her voice. “If they’re, ah, manufacturing these things, there could be, I don’t know, a lot of them.”
