by RW Krpoun
“She is just a little doll,” Hatcher gushed, taking the infant back.
“She is sweet,” Provine Sael stroked the baby’s cheek. “So innocent.”
“Supper will be ready shortly mhm,” Pieter noted quietly. “Should I wake Hunter?”
“I’ll do it,” Provine Sael stood.
We washed up in the creek, which was shockingly cold, as Hatcher had noted, and gathered around the fire to eat. Hunter was awake, perched blearily on a stool, but he did not seem inclined to talk.
“How are you?” Pieter asked him, bringing the ‘slinger a bowl of stew and a round of fresh flatbread.
“Like a bad hangover, and believe me, I have had a lot of hangovers. But I’ll sleep it off.”
Hatcher started to say something, put Provine Sael hushed her. “We’ll discuss things tomorrow, when Hunter has a clear head,” she noted in a voice that brooked no nonsense. “Torl, are there any immediate dangers in this area?”
“None I have detected; the local predators have an ample food supply.”
“What hunts around here?” Hatcher asked.
“Wolves, and I’ve seen signs of a big mountain cat, but it was days old. There’s bears, but they aren’t any danger unless you corner or provoke them.”
“What do they eat?”
“Bears? Roots, berries, occasional small game, fish, carrion. They’re neither picky, nor overly ambitious. The wolves hunt deer and elk, the big cats deer and mountain goats. The big cats range for hundreds of miles; we might attract one out of curiosity, but it won’t be looking for trouble, it will just want to look at us.”
“Lions?” Burk asked hopefully.
“No, they’re smaller than lions, and solitary. They’re sleek, and generally dun brown with yellow eyes. People call them by many names: catamount, panther, mountain lion, puma.”
“So what awaits us tomorrow?” Hatcher asked, rocking Rose’s cradle.
Provine Sael stirred the greens on her plate. “That will have to wait until Hunter and I have a long discussion, which will have to wait until he feels his normal self. But the core of our situation is that when Hunter and I tried to extract information from the…well from the Place of Mounds, it transferred us across the continent.”
“Which is impossible,” Hunter muttered.
“Which has long been considered impossible,” the Dellian nodded.
“Is today even the same day?” Hatcher asked.
“Yes.”
“So the thing in the crater moved us because you mhm irritated it?” Pieter brought Hunter a second helping of stew.
“No. The thing in the crater is just a device, a created object. But one that was, as you saw, active and uncontrolled. When Hunter and I made our attempt, the thing, or device, simply performed a task intended by its creators.”
“So the thing’s purpose was to move people?” Hatcher shook dark Bekker sauce into her stew.
“Yes, from its position to here. I expect that somewhere nearby is a mound with a similar device which could accomplish the reverse trip.”
“Are we going to look for that?” I asked.
“No. Coming here was an accident, but a relatively harmless one; we could just as easily been killed. Tampering with the relics of the Elder Ones is a fool’s game.”
“This is…well, a momentous discovery,” Hunter noted. “That this sort of movement is not only possible, but that the Elder Ones used it on a regular basis, however infrequent, has staggering implications.”
“Is that what the Dusman are planning?” Hatcher adjusted Rose’s covers. “To move troops or assassins around?”
“No,” Provine Sael shook her head. “In fact, the Dusmen may not even know that what happened to us is possible.”
“If they had any idea of what the device could do, they would have been studying it,” Hunter noted. “I think they have been empowering as many First Folk artifacts as they could, and have been for a while now. I believe that is what woke the staff in the Emperor’s tomb.”
“As a theory, it is gaining credibility,” Provine Sael conceded. “And it ties to my theory that these are intended to distract anyone seeking clues to the nature of the aura around the invaders.”
“So this undertaking has failed?” Burk asked.
“No, we have learned several very useful facts. For one, whatever is creating the aura around the invading army did not come from the Place of Mounds.”
“But we can’t get word back to anyone,” Hatcher pointed out.
Provine Sael exchanged a glance with Hunter. “In fact, the remaining pigeons we have can still find their way home. But…it may not be wise to report exactly what happened. Secrets are hard to keep, and if the Dusmen found out that this sort of effect is possible…well, there are many ramifications.”
“Better to pretend we are still near the Place of Mounds,” Hunter nodded. “Just report our theory about the Dusmen activating artifacts as a distraction, and leave it at that.”
“Enough discussion,” Provine Sael forked up the last of her greens. “We all need sleep. Tomorrow Hunter and I will confer, and a new course of action will be plotted.”
“Let’s hope the new plan works better than the last one did.” Hatcher carefully gathered up Rose.
Chapter Ten
I stayed especially alert on my watch in hopes that I could see a mountain lion, but I had no luck. I thought about how we had been moved so far, but it really didn’t seem real, and I dismissed it as something that Provine Sael had to deal with.
Turning to naming my sword, I gave that careful consideration; it was very plain, so that was no help. After an hour, I turned to Fall, the strange man who had given it to me; he had done it in a sort of off-hand, casual way, the way you might let someone keep a length of rope they had borrowed.
So much had been going on when I had gotten the sword, I hadn’t really given it much thought, any more than I had given a lot of thought to the hand axe I had taken off a bandit I killed the same day. I had fulfilled my obligation to Fall, as befits a member of the Ebon Blades, and had set about finding a way to reunite with Provine Sael and the rest. It had not been a pleasant time.
Looking back, it was obvious that Fall was a practitioner of some Art or another, although that certainly didn’t affect the sword in any fashion.
As my watch drew to an end, I decided to name the sword Fallsblade; that seemed an appropriate way to acknowledge Fall’s generosity and his saving of my life, and it sounded sort of ominous, as a weapon should.
And it sounded a little like my home. I missed Fellhome.
The next morning Hunter was his old self, and after breakfast he left with Provine Sael and Torl. Before they departed Provine Sael told Pieter to oversee the destruction of the dolman in the cavern and to deface specific carvings in the cavern as well.
We had tools, and we had the mule to help with the pulling, but it was still a tough couple hours’ work to bring down the structure and split the slabs. Ruining the carvings in the walls were just a few minutes’ work with a sledge, though.
Pieter impressed me, or rather, impressed me more than he had to date; Burk and I were inclined to approach the task with brute strength, but the engineer showed us how to use a six-foot prybar to move the slabs, and how a steel wedge applied at specific points on a slab could split stone with much less effort.
Finished, we trudged outside, stowed the tools, and washed away the sweat and stone dust in the cold stream.
“More mystery,” Hatcher observed as we washed, cuddling Rose; it was cooler here than it had been out on the grasslands, and she had bundled the baby into two of her shirts, tucking the excess cloth in tight. “Every time we turn around, it’s something else that isn’t behaving like it should.”
“We’re supposed to be guarding her, but she leaves us in camp,” Burk noted in a grumbling tone.
“There’s no way the Sagrit could possibly know we’re here,” I pointed out, although I didn’t like the situation, eith
er. “And with Torl along, nothing is going to sneak up on her.”
“She’s not helpless, you know,” Hatcher pointed out. “You two need to learn when your skills are required, and when they’re not. On the other hand, our cart, gear, and Rose are very vulnerable, and much easier to find. You two were fighting Undead yesterday; can’t you go one day without violence?”
“I wouldn’t mind finding some Sagrit,” Burk shrugged. “It has been a while since we faced any.”
“You would be amazed at the number of people who live their entire lives without having to deal with members of the Sagrit,” Hatcher shook her head. “The exact sum would be ‘nearly all’. Most people live their lives without killing anything bigger than a chicken.”
“Before I was injured, I had never even killed mhm a chicken,” Pieter agreed. “The trouble is, when you are skilled with a hammer, every problem mhm starts to look like a nail.”
I thought over the hammer and nail comment as I laid in the green grass after bathing, and it made good sense; it was like the way some fighting men never got past thinking with a sword’s edge and ignored the fact you could thrust as well.
The trio came back after a couple hours and we immediately gathered to hear what they had to say.
“This will be hard to believe,” Provine Sael announced somberly.
“We just got moved across the continent in an eyewink, and this is going to be tough to believe?” Hatcher grinned, rocking Rose.
“It may well be. About a mile to the northeast is a patch of what I can only describe as tropical growth.”
“Such as a jungle?” Pieter asked, a touch doubtfully.
“Yes, I expect so. My knowledge of such climes is strictly theoretical, but there is an area of about thirty acres which, for all appearances, is tropical jungle.”
“I’d ask how that is possible, but what’s the point?” Hatcher shook her head.
“There’s more,” Hunter announced. “Within what we’ll call the jungle is a long-abandoned city, and from a distance it looks like nothing I’ve ever seen.”
“And there is a camp near the center of the city, Dusmen or their vassals,” Torl added. “Not a large camp, to judge by the smoke.”
“So we’re going to have to go see what they are up to,” Hatcher sighed.
“Yes,” Provine Sael nodded. “Our mission to the Place of Mounds is complete, but our part in this war is not.” She paused. “Volunteers only, of course.”
“I volunteer,” Burk actually spoke over the last part of her statement, and I was only a second behind him.
“I don’t mind going, but we can’t drag Rose into yet another magical place,” Hatcher announced. “Enough is enough.”
“I agree. We will leave Rose and Pieter in a safe place Torl has located.”
“If we fail, Rose will starve before Pieter can reach friendly territory,” Hatcher objected. “We have to be at least three weeks northwest of the border, and that assumes that renegade Tulg don’t find them.”
“I can make arrangements for Rose,” Provine Sael sighed. “Torl, perhaps you should stay behind as well; you and Pieter could make it through.”
The scout scowled at that, but said nothing.
“How will you approach a Dusman camp without mhm a scout?” Pieter asked. “If you can ensure Rose’s food supply, I could abandon the cart mhm and move quickly, following the mountains south, mhm and then cutting east to Imperial territory. It would not be ideal, mhm but nothing ever is.
Provine Sael sighed. “Hatcher, if you wish, you can stay behind.”
“No point,” the Nisker shook her head. “I won’t be much help to Pieter, being a city girl.”
“All right, then we go with the original disposition, and pray.”
Hunter snapped his fingers. “By the way, Pieter, the reason your scars split is that they were the product of an enchanted device; the latent residue…well, anyway, being moved affected them. You’ll look a bit gruesome, but they ought to come away easier now. Use a pumice stone on the split edges.”
“Some good news,” the engineer appeared to smile.
We moved the mule and cart into a little glade further down the stream; it skirted a hill, and Torl said it should be safe from prying eyes.
“Do you know how to use of one these?” I asked, holding out my crossbow to Pieter.
“I’m no expert,” he admitted, taking it.
“I had the foot stirrup taken off because I don’t need it, but I kept the stirrup, so you can put it back on, and here’s a belt hook to make cocking it easier.”
“Thank you.”
I hesitated, trying to think of something to say. If Pieter had to try to get back to Imperial territory, it would be as if we had lost an escort, and that did not sit well with me, even though it would also mean that Burk and me would be dead.
“Go on,” the engineer’s eyes crinkled in a smile. “I expect you’ll be back before sundown.”
“All right.”
At the top of the hill we had a look at our target: a sizeable tangle of green, brown, and yellow that was dotted with scores of stone roofs so covered with moss that they weren’t all that easy to spot. We couldn’t see much of the buildings except the roofs because the vegetation was too thick; it, looked like a city had sunk into a swamp. There weren’t any trees that I could see, just tangled undergrowth up to the eaves.
“A city enveloped in jungle,” Hatcher nodded slowly. “You’re right.” She cocked her head. “How old is it?”
“Very old,” Provine Sael sighed.
Torl, who was kneeling nearby, smiled slightly.
“But...look, I can’t see any roads going into the city,” Hatcher pointed out. “How long does it take Nature to erase a road, Torl?”
“In this terrain, almost never. Parts may vanish, but if it has seen the traffic needed to support a city, the ruts will be visible for centuries.”
“It’s all one level, too,” the Nisker mused. “Not a single building of more than one story, and all are…well, small.”
“Like a city for Niskers,” the scout was still smiling.
“We know how to build upwards,” Hatcher shook her head. “It’s easier for us, we can get two stories in the space of one of yours. This doesn’t look right.”
“We have argued this point already,” Provine Sael snapped. “Yes, it looks odd from this angle, but the facts remain in front of us.” She pointed to a smudge of smoke near the center of the city. “And there is that.”
“How do we know that is a Dusman group?”
“Torl,” Hunter noted laconically.
“Well, he should know. How big a group?”
“Not very,” the scout noted. “Which is just one more oddity piled atop all the others.”
“The only way we will put answers to questions is to investigate.”
“No argument there,” the scout stood. “Everyone stay close.”
Things were normal as we approached the edge of the jungle-coated city, at least until we got close; the last fifty feet before the green tangle was just bare, dry dirt cut by erosion lines.
“Dead soil,” Torl noted.
I wondered how dirt could be ‘dead’, as opposed to any other kind, but I kept my mouth shut and my eyes moving.
We eased across the dirt, Torl in the lead, Hunter close behind, Burk and me on the flanks. There weren’t any bird noises, just a light breeze stirring the grass behind us and whispering through the tangled greenery ahead.
As we reached the edge of the jungle Hunter stopped, seeming to sniff the air. “Where is it?”
Provine Sael was frowning at the air as well. “I don’t know.”
“Where is what?” Hatcher asked.
“Whatever allows jungle this far north,” Hunter rapped his knuckles on a thick green trunk the color of the inside of a lime; I had seen a lime once, when I guarded Master Horne on a visit to a fancy café. The man he met had had a quarter of lime floating in his glass; I had had to ask M
aster Horne what it was, afterwards. “The application of the Arts, or some power.”
“I don’t feel anything,” Provine Sael shook her head.
“Neither do I. Torl, have you ever actually seen a jungle?”
“No.”
“Anyone else?”
No one had.
“I’m thinking this isn’t a real jungle.” Hunter stepped back and studied the greenery. “This could be natural.”
“In just one spot?” Torl gestured to the bare swath of dirt that seemed to surround the jungle. “Plants spread over time; they don’t stay put unless there are issues with the soil. You don’t just find them in one spot, either, and I’ve never seen anything like this.”
“I’m not saying it’s completely natural,” Hunter conceded. “But this isn’t the product of the Arts, not actively, anyway.”
“Let us press on,” Provine Sael gestured with her staff. “We will solve nothing listing what this place is not.”
I’ve heard stories of jungles; tavern talk and descriptions read out by our clerks when we faced beasts or warriors who hailed from such places. They all talked of dense plants and trees, heat, humidity, and a surplus of bugs, birds, and snakes.
But this place didn’t live up to that; while the tangled growth was a bit challenging to get through, it was actually cooler under the leaf stalks that ran from building to building, and there wasn’t anything else in there with us: no bugs, no birds, nothing. Just green, brown, and yellow vines running every which way, like a spider’s web, ranging from as thick as my thumb to as big around as my chest. No trees, no brush, nothing but vines. They reached up until I was pretty sure that I couldn’t get a hand above the top layer. The ground was dirt littered here and there with dead leaves, and the air smelled faintly of the citrus stuff Provine Sael used when she worked on bad wounds.
It made keeping an eye out tough, because you had to keep looking in every direction, including up. I had left the extra javelin I usually carried with the cart, and now I hung my kettle hat from my belt, because it restricted my vision when looking up.
