by Riley Tune
“I don’t trust you,” I blurted out. “You left us in there just to see what would happen, and I’m like this because of you.”
He opened his mouth to speak again, but before he could get the words out, Ember drew his dagger and threw it at Jolin. The blade passed just by Jolin's face, and stuck into the back part of the carriage. Jolin froze as he held the his tools in one hand. A small drop of blood appeared on his face.
Jolin cleared his throat, using the back of his hand and wiped the blood away. “Mr. Ember, may I ask why you did that?” he said as his voice rose a little. Ember stood in a slumped position and removed his blade.
“Don’t do that. Not to me, and not to Lox. Do you understand me? I won’t tell you again.”
“Very well,” Jolin said as he returned to working on my leg.
“Do what?” I said as I looked at Ember.
He put his blade away. “Jolin here is what we call a Tongue.”
“I personally hate that term. It’s offensive,” Jolin said, without looking away from my leg.
“A Tongue?” I asked.
Jolin let out a deep breath, but didn’t stop working on my leg. “Tongues are people, able to use the tones of their voice to put a person in a—” He thought for a moment. “Euphoric state. Once in these states, a person must always tell us the truth. Even if they don’t want to. I’m sure you have noticed a funny feeling consume you when I ask certain questions. Well, now you know why.”
Jolin glared at Ember and stuck my leg. Funny feeling? I thought to myself. Is that how he thought it felt? It was more than funny. It was enjoyable.
“What he’s leaving out is that tongues, rare as they may be, always find themselves working as spies or secret collectors for higher authority. A Tongue, with years of secrets, can take a Kingdom down as efficiently as any blade can.”
“We have a long trip ahead of us. Can we just ride in silence until we get to Pradeep, please?” Jolin asked as he looked from me to Ember. His tone seemed to have changed. Before he had been upbeat, fun, and seemingly confident; now he seemed isolated. Was he ashamed of what he was? In comparison to a person destined to kill, it didn’t seem so bad.
Ember said nothing as he slouched back and relaxed in the carriage chair.
“What’s in Pradeep?” I asked.
“Not what, but who,” Jolin replied. “Our employer. The person who has hired me, you, Mr. Ember, and the other members of our team. I encourage you to drink that—the numbing agent will be wearing off before I can finish closing your wound. That will put you into a deep sleep until it’s over.”
I considered my options. As if I had many. And then felt a tingle in my leg. The feeling was slowly coming back, and so was the pain. Jolin stuck my leg with the needle, and this time I winced. Quickly, I uncorked the vial and downed the blood-like liquid. It tasted horrible. Like a mixture of dirt and metal that went down slow and stuck to my teeth in the process.
“Relax. Allow it to work,” Jolin said. I gave him the empty vial back and leaned back in my chair. Ember was still awake; he wasn’t going to go to sleep in front of a stranger, but I had no choice. Within what seemed like seconds, my eyes became heavy, and so did my head.
I could see visions running through my mind in almost in a blur. Showing me all of the faces of those people that were either killed or hurt at The Clarkton. Suddenly it didn’t feel so bad. I wasn't sure if it was just the sleeping agent kicking in, or if I was starting to accept that, in this world, in this line of work, people simply died, and many were killed.
My head grew heavier as it slumped to the side. My eyes were barely able to stay open. This stuff worked fast. The pain that had returned was slowly fading away again. There was also a creeping blackness, as Jolin, Ember, and even the carriage began to vanish. Then there was nothing.
9
I screamed as I was shocked awake. My head was buzzing and my nose was burning on the inside, making it difficult to breathe. Jolin was moving another vial, this one yellow and thick, under my nose.
“This wakes you up, as you can see, Mr. Lox,” Jolin said as he corked the liquid.
“No time to worry about that,” Ember shouted as he handed me my dagger. “We got work to do.”
He didn’t seemed panicked, but then, Ember never did. Still, I knew him well enough to see something was wrong. He was quickly checking his bracers and greaves, making sure they were tight. It was something he usually didn’t do unless he was about to engage a target. I was hoping that I was wrong, and that he was simply checking his armor, but in that same moment he checked his dagger and knives on his belt. I wasn’t wrong.
It was hard to stay still now. I could feel the carriage moving faster than it had before, and as a result we were being bounced around a lot on the inside. It felt like we were trying to evade somebody, instead of simply driving to a location.
I peered out the window and saw a vastly different landscape than that of Thera. Where Thera had buildings and industry, this place had lush fields of green, gold, and brown, and trees as far as I could see. There were no tall buildings in view; instead there were farms, vast acres of grow shelters for food, and shelters for the livestock.
Most of the Prime Sovereignty received its produce from Pradeep grow shelters. Crops couldn’t be left to grow on their own naturally. The constant rain every night would hurt more than it helped. So would the snow in the day. To combat this, we had grow shelters, places like the one my mom worked in, where crops were grown, tended to, and harvested in controlled environments. We had been using grow shelters for as long as I could remember, and Pradeep had more than any other Kingdom.
The snow was still falling, but it had gotten darker outside; soon the rain would come. I must had been out for a while.
“Mr. Lox, welcome to Pradeep,” Jolin said as he put himself into a little ball on the carriage floor. While Ember didn’t look panicked, Jolin certainly did. He seemed jumpy; his words came out as stutters, and he had visible sweat on his brow and upper lip. This was not the same man who had approached us in The Clarkton with confidence.
I looked out the window once more to view the scenery of Pradeep and too see what had everybody so wound up, but this time I saw three arrows come flying by the carriage. I stood to lean over Jolin so I could look out the door slightly. Instantly I noticed my leg was feeling better. Glancing down at it, I could see it was still exposed, but the wound was clean and closed. The wound looked days old now, instead of hours. I made a mental note to get some of that stuff for myself after this job was complete.
Slowly, I opened the door to peek out.
“Careful,” Ember said, pulling his hood up. Behind us I could see men pursuing our carriage. These men were bare chested, with long black hair that fell well below their shoulders, and snarls on their faces. Their muscles seemed unnaturally pronounced as they came closer into view. There had to have been at least ten of them, and they all rode fully-mature caprongs.
I could feel my face twist in surprise. I had never seen a mature caprong before. They were something you only heard about. The older a caprong, the harder they were to tame. That’s why only young caprongs were used for service. The mature ones—they were menacing. Standing over six feet tall, with manes billowing in the air as they ran, and horns that stretched out over a foot long. These caprongs were nothing like the ones that pulled our carriages. These caprongs were out of nightmares.
All of the men had bows raised, except for the one in the front. He had no weapon at all, but he did have some sort of paint on his face and body, while the others didn’t.
I shut the door and turned to Ember. “What happened?”
Ember tossed my cloak to me. From instinct alone, I put it on.
“Those are Pradeep border guards,” Ember said to me. Thuds sounded around the carriage as he spoke. Arrows were slowly finding their mark, and a few actually pierced the carriage. Had Jolin not been on the floor, one would have hit him.
Pradeep border guards
were known to be violent, and overly protective. They were not bound to the same rules as Pradeep city or palace guards. Here on the border, they had unparalleled freedom, and laws were more of a choice to them. They could either obey or do what they wanted freely. They made sure people from other kingdoms didn’t cross Pradeep borders unannounced. They were mainly there to protect the grow shelters, and to engage possible attackers. Border guards were stationed at all entrances of Pradeep. I wasn’t a worldly scholar, and even I knew this. How could Jolin not have known?
“You didn’t know they would be here?” I asked him as he continued to lay on the floor, scared of our attackers.
“Our employer was supposed to handle passage into the kingdom. I don’t know why they would be attacking us.”
“Took your yolars and decided to kill us anyway,” Ember said. “Well, I’m not going to hide in a carriage and wait for them to let one of those arrows hit our driver.” Ember glanced out the window once more as the air around him shimmered for a split second, and then he was gone. This was turning out to be a long day.
I could see Ember now from where I was looking out the window.. He had appeared on a caprong behind one of the riders. In seconds his knife was buried into the rider's neck, and then he warped again. The rider fell off as his caprong stumbled and then began running off in a different direction. With no rider to control it, the caprong was free.
Reaching inside myself, I found my target and warped. The second of silence came, and then I found myself falling to the ground and rolling.
The impact as I collided with the ground hurt and knocked the air out of me. I had missed my target. Clearly, warping onto a moving caprong was harder that Ember had made it look. I could see the Pradeep border guards growing smaller as they chased after the carriage. Pushing myself off the ground, I warped again. I overdid it some, and this time I crashed into the back of a rider. Instantly, I began to fall off the caprong, but I grabbed the rider’s hair and brought him down with me, making us both fall to the ground.
The rider got to his feet before me as he looked to his fallen bow and quiver. He reached for one of the arrows and attempted to stab me with it. I could have stayed to fight him, but I needed to catch the others before they were out of sight and I wouldn’t be able to warp to them. As the guard slashed at me, I allowed my eyes to fall on the closest guard, still riding his caprong, that I could see. A slither of silence came again as I warped.
I knew this wasn’t going to be a good warp, and I was ready for it. My feet hit the ground running and, instantly, I warped again. As I reappeared, I threw one of my knives and caught a caprong in its hind leg. I was actually trying to aim for the Pradeep border guard on top of the caprong, but it was hard to aim coming out of a warp. Hitting the caprong was better than missing altogether, I supposed.
The massive beast let out a howl as it stumbled to the ground, sending its rider along with it. The howl of pain sent a tremor across my body and made my body feel a chill. I actually felt bad for the caprong for a moment.
Ember was still going from guard to guard, leaving only four left. I ran and warped again. “Yes!” I screamed as I landed perfectly on a Pradeep rider's caprong. The rider looked over his shoulder at me, and I quickly delivered my elbow to his nose. Blood gushed from it as if it was a popped grape. Before he could react to his nose, I grabbed his long hair—there was just so much of it, and it felt oily—pulled it back, and delivered another elbow to his neck that sent him to the ground as well.
Reaching for the straps used to hold on to the caprong, I pulled myself up to where the rider had been. I’m not sure if it was from fear or the sheer excitement of riding a caprong, but I couldn’t stop my hands from shaking, and my heart felt like it was about to explode in my chest. I’d never ridden a caprong before, and here I was now, riding a mature one. Close enough that I could touch the horns! If some of the elite nobles of Thera could have seen me then. The jealousy on their wealthy faces would have been worth the risk alone.
Wind pummeled my face, and I had to squint my eyes some just to see. It was only Ember, myself, and two other Pradeep guards chasing the carriage now.
“Carriage,” I thought I heard, over the wind hitting my face.
Turning to my left, I saw Ember riding alongside me on top of a caprong.
“Get the carriage,” he yelled as he pointed ahead of us. The carriage? I thought to myself. I looked up and saw that the carriage had detoured from the road, and it was quickly moving through a field. From where I rode, I could see the driver was no longer there. An arrow must had finally found him. For a second, I wondered where the body had fallen and why I hadn’t seen it.
The caprong wouldn’t catch the carriage. Not before it crashed, anyway. It was too far ahead. I was fairly sure I was going to die, but I had to try. I heard a scream from somewhere else close by. Ember was dispatching another guard. He would surely be more suited for this, but here I was. With teeth clenched so tight that my jaw hurt, I warped again, hoping to land on top of the carriage to regain control.
Naturally, yet again, I missed. I had intended to land on top of the carriage, but instead just missed it. As I reappeared, I could see the carriage moving away from under me. My fingers barely gripped the ledge as I extended my arms out. I was able to catch hold of the ledge, but my lower body slammed into the back of the carriage. It felt like a wall had just hit me in the stomach, and it took all the strength I had to hold on.
“Oh no,” I said out loud, as I felt it hit my face, and then my hand. Between the warping, caprong-riding, and fighting for my life, somehow I hadn’t noticed that the snow had stopped falling. The sky erupted as it began to rain. My fingertips were starting to slip.
“Whoa! Whoa!” I heard a voice yelling over the rain. It was Ember. I didn’t know when or how, but he was on the carriage now.
His aim was better than mine, and he had control of the caprongs. The carriage was his now. Or it would be shortly. The downside—I was still slipping. I couldn’t simply warp, because I was hanging and couldn’t actually see the top of the carriage. I would likely just warp into the air, and come crashing down to the ground again.
Using as much strength as I could, I tried to pull myself up, placing my foot on a portion of the carriage for support. The falling rain had already done its part, and my foot slipped as the carriage jerked. With it went my hands and any grip I had had on the slippery carriage ledge. I began to fall. The ground came rushing up to me, and I could hear the carriage continue to run away as I prepared for impact.
10
“Keeper knows you’re pathetic,” Ember said as he stood over me. He kicked me in the side slightly, but I didn’t move. I was in too much pain, and it was a soft kick.
He kicked me again, this time harder, and then extended his hand as I grunted.
“Get up. Rain’s coming down unusually hard right now and I have no intentions of standing in it if I don’t have to.”
I reached for his hand and made my way off of the muddy ground.
The carriage was waiting close by, and from the looks of it, aside from a few arrows stuck in it, it had held up to the attack pretty well. I splashed through the new-forming puddles as I slowly walked to the carriage. Ember opened the door and lumbered inside as I glanced up to the driver seat. There, in his nice clothes, soaking wet, was Jolin. Clearly he hadn’t planned on driving the carriage, or else he would have brought a cloak.
“Hurry it up, Lox,” Ember shouted from inside the carriage.
He had left the door open as he waited for me, and apparently all of the action had made him thirsty. In his hand was a large bottle that he had likely gotten from the icebox, that contained a light brown, amber liquid. Ember’s drink of choice was wine, but in a tight spot he made almost anything work.
I knew Ember would disagree with me, but I did feel bad slightly for Jolin, even though I probably shouldn’t have. I cleared my throat a little too loudly to get his attention. Jolin turned and looked at m
e, his fine black hair stuck to his head and his wet clothes clinging to him.
“Ah, Mr. Lox,” Jolin said, almost casually. “Glad to see you held your own with those guards.”
“Take this,” I said, removing my cloak and tossing it up to him. He caught it quickly, and began to put it on without hesitation.
“Thank you, Mr. Lox,” he said with a slight nod. It wasn’t a water resistant cloak, like the nobles had, but it would keep him dry for the remainder of the trip, however long that might be. Jolin stood up and placed his arm through the cloak. Despite Jolin being a little older than me, I was larger and taller than he was. He seemed almost childlike as he closed the larger cloak around him and put the hood up.
My back still hurt. So did my side, my pride, and my ego. Everything hurt, except for my recently cut leg, it seemed. I looked inside the carriage and. instead of walking those few feet, I warped. When I reappeared inside, I fell into the seat across from Ember, who was still drinking. He had finished a third of the bottle.
“Shut the door,” he said as he leaned back and put his feet up. I leaned over and, as instructed, shut the carriage door. Jolin must had been listening, because as soon as the door shut, the carriage began to move.
Ember placed his bottle slightly to his side. “As soon as this is all over, first training session is warping to moving targets.”
“I can understand that. It’s a little difficult,” I said as I adjusted in the seat to relieve some stress on my back. After that, I put my feet up too. It was comforting to see that the wounded area on my leg was still fine.
“No, I don’t think you do,” Ember said as he shook his head. “It was horrible to even watch you attempt. Then, after you messed up the first time, you tried again, and yet again failed. As your teacher in the skill of warping, I almost wished one of those guards would have finished you off, just to stop the embarrassment.”
I knew it may not had been as flashy as his attack, but I had still taken some of those guards down, and almost caught the carriage. Considering it was my first time, I'd thought it wasn’t a bad display.
