The Hickory Staff e-1

by Rob Scott

  ‘So if Steven didn’t see them coming-’

  ‘Right,’ he confirmed quietly, and continued down the hillside.

  Mark, desperately worried, started cursing Steven for running off alone. ‘Hang in there, Stevie,’ he muttered under his breath, ‘I need you healthy so I can beat the holy shit out of you. You ever do this again and I’ll kill you, I swear to God I will.’ Gilmour pretended not to hear.

  It was late in the day when they finally crossed the valley floor. Mark slowed to look towards the peak Steven had dubbed Toilet Brush because of the oddly shaped glacier adorning its craggy ridge. Gilmour watched as Mark’s gaze moved back and forth between Steven’s trail and the distant mountain.

  ‘He’s moved off course?’

  Mark nodded. ‘But I’m not sure why.’ He motioned ahead along their current path. ‘The going here is easy. It’s not like Steven to get turned around – he’s one of the best climbers I know. He’s got a really keen sense of direction.’

  ‘Then we must assume his thoughts were elsewhere,’ Gilmour said quietly. ‘He was angry and frightened when he left. Perhaps he forgot to check his progress against the mountains.’

  ‘I’m afraid you’re right. We’ll just have to pray he’s not gone too far east.’ He drew his hunting knife and cut a length of red wool from his sweater. Tying it to a nearby tree, he went on, ‘We’ll have to come back here. It’s the most direct route to the pass above. Hopefully, Garec will see this marker, see the change in our path and realise they need to make camp here.’

  ‘Perhaps this will help as well.’ Gilmour gestured with one hand above Steven’s footprints and flame burst from his fingers. The heat was so searing that Mark was forced to turn away as Gilmour burned a long black line through the snow and into the frozen earth below. Smoke rose from the deep wound that delineated their change in direction.

  ‘Yeah,’ he commented dryly. ‘That ought to work. You’ll have to teach me that one someday, Gilmour.’

  It wasn’t much later when Mark came to a stop and pointed towards a set of footprints moving at an angle up the hill.

  ‘There,’ he told Gilmour, ‘that’s where he realised his mistake. Looks like he was trying to cut the corner to make up time. Let’s keep moving before it gets too dark to see.’

  Gilmour wiped his forehead. Mark guessed the sorcerer was mentally tallying a list of spells, searching for something that would ensure Steven was alive and unhurt. How ironic: here was one of the most powerful people in Eldarn, and yet he was unable to cast a spell to get them through this predicament. Mark gripped him by the shoulder and squeezed. ‘I’m sure he’ll be fine.’

  As a light breeze began to blow Mark found himself increasingly irritated at the incessant whisper of the pine tree branches. He bent low over the snow, struggling to follow Steven’s tracks in the dim light. His back ached and he realised for the first time that day that he was hungry, as well as emotionally exhausted. He was ready to collapse.

  ‘We need light,’ he groaned as he clambered to his feet. ‘Can you make a torch or something for us?’

  Borrowing Mark’s battle-axe, Gilmour moved to the nearest tree and hacked off a bough thick with green needles that were quickly fading to black in the waning daylight. No sooner had the branch come away in his hand that it ignited, seemingly of its own volition, with a pleasant yellow flame. Gilmour handed the branch to Mark. ‘Will this do?’

  ‘Thanks,’ Mark answered wryly, ‘ I didn’t mind spending the last hour stooped over looking for disappearing footprints!’

  ‘It was not an hour.’

  ‘You don’t remember how long an hour is. Gettysburg was one hundred and forty years ago,’ Mark reminded him. ‘I’m surprised you remember-’ Mark stopped in mid-sentence and stared at the scene before him now illuminated by the burning branch. It looked like the aftermath of a violent battle, and there was a circular patch of ground that seemed as if Eldarn itself had been wounded: an open sore left infected and festering in the Blackstone Mountains.

  ‘Good God,’ Mark whispered. ‘What on earth happened here?’

  The snow had been dyed a deep crimson and the trees around were splattered with gore. Mark looked around and swallowed, hard. All his previous optimism vanished in an instant. There was no hope of finding Steven alive.

  Pieces of something – maybe a grettan, or perhaps a pack of grettans – lay strewn about: a random collection of limbs, entrails and patches of fur. It looked as if the beasts had exploded with enormous force. Squinting through the thin yellow light thrown out by his makeshift torch, he saw the hillside was dotted with bloody fragments. They looked oddly out of place, red splashed on the otherwise unbroken blanket of snow.

  Gilmour tore a second branch from a nearby pine and created a torch for himself. He moved rapidly, searching for any sign of Steven, but he could see nothing amidst the carnage.

  ‘What could have done this?’ Mark asked, his voice hushed.

  ‘Steven,’ Gilmour said.

  ‘But I though he couldn’t use the magic to destroy at will.’ Mark sounded confused.

  ‘It looks like that is no problem when he is protecting us, or the integrity of our eventual goal.’

  ‘But what about that tree this morning? Why did the staff respond then? That tree was no threat.’

  ‘That was strange, wasn’t it? I wondered if anyone else had found it odd that he was able to summon the magic by the sheer force of his will.’ Gilmour scratched at his beard. ‘He certainly is an interesting young man.’ He bent over to pick up a section of what appeared to be a grettan forelimb. Turning it over in his hands, he sniffed it, then added ‘This wound had begun to clot and heal. This is the same beast that came for us last night.’

  ‘Malagon?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’ Gilmour paused, and closed his eyes for a moment. ‘No, I didn’t detect Nerak’s presence earlier and I don’t now. I think this animal was injured, perhaps dying, and it attacked Steven out of fury, hunger and pain.’

  ‘So where is he?’

  Gilmour moved around the periphery of the carnage, still looking for evidence that Steven had walked away from the devastation. He hadn’t found Steven’s pack or the staff, so he still had some hope that the young man was alive.

  Finally, they came upon footprints, moving east through the forest. ‘There,’ Gilmour said, pointing into the distance, ‘that way. Let’s go.’

  ‘But why would he go east?’ Mark knelt beside the footprints and dabbed his fingers in the congealed blood trail that dotted the snow.

  ‘He wouldn’t,’ Gilmour stated, as if his conclusions were obvious. ‘He was carried.’

  A look of fear passed over Mark’s face and he felt for the battle-axe as he considered their options. ‘I’m going after him,’ he said finally.

  ‘Mark, look at these strides,’ he said quietly. ‘They’re long, much too long for the average man moving through snow, especially while carrying someone.’

  ‘What does that mean? Who carried him off?’

  ‘I’m not certain, but I do know you will never catch up with them in the dark.’

  ‘What should we do?’ Mark was trying hard not to break down. His best friend was injured, maybe dying, and had been carried off into the night by an unknown someone – or some thing.

  Gilmour put an arm across his shoulder. ‘We should collect the others, wait until dawn and then follow along this path as quickly as we can.’

  ‘Then I’m going ahead now,’ Mark said, resolute. ‘I’ll move slowly enough to give you a chance to catch up, but quickly enough to reach Steven if they stop for the night. If this is his blood, they won’t be able to get far without stopping to bind up his injuries.’

  It was obvious Mark would not be swayed, but Gilmour made one last plea. ‘Mark, it really isn’t wise to break up the group even more. Especially not in this weather.’

  ‘I won’t leave this path,’ Mark promised, ‘and if the trail splits, I’ll follow the blood.’


  Gilmour nodded. ‘Fair enough. We will be along as soon as possible. Do not take any unnecessary chances.’

  ‘Okay,’ Mark said as he hefted his pack. Holding the pine torch aloft, he asked, ‘Any chance you can keep this thing burning for me?’

  Gilmour waved once; Mark could see his lips moving slightly. ‘Done,’ he called, and waved again as Mark disappeared into the night.

  ‘Which one is he?’ Hannah squinted. The tavern was dark and a cloud of tobacco smoke billowed out when Churn pulled open the unwieldy wooden door.

  Hoyt joined her at the top of a short flight of stairs that provided a slightly elevated vantage point from which to view the entire great room of the Middle Fork Tavern. Alen apparently frequented this bar during the dinner aven. A great fire roared in the massive stone fireplace at one end of the room and a veritable maze of small tables dotted the landscape between it and the actual bar against the opposite wall. Behind racks of casks, ceramic jars and blown-glass bottles, two windows looked out on a broad thoroughfare running east to west through the village.

  The windows, though large, were made of many tiny panes and let little natural light into the room. Hoyt thought the Middle Fork Tavern was as close to drinking in a cave as one could hope to achieve without actually climbing into the mountains.

  ‘I don’t see him,’ he replied, ‘but the light’s dreadful. Let’s take a walk; I’m sure he’s here somewhere.’

  Churn gripped Hoyt’s shoulder and began signing.

  ‘Right,’ Hoyt agreed, ‘if we don’t find him, I’ll talk with the bartender. He’s sure to know where Alen has gone.’

  The room was oddly shaped, much longer than wide, and canopied with an arched stone ceiling. It looked as if some entrepreneurial investor had walled up an unused section of sewer and dropped a staircase down from the street. Great beams framed the walls and outlined the arched canopy in a corps of flying buttresses holding nothing aloft. Hannah shuddered: she felt as if the ancient stone and mortar ceiling might drop on them at any moment.

  ‘Tell me again what he looks like,’ she said, ‘then we can split up.’

  ‘Older than me, maybe four hundred and fifty Twinmoons.’ Hoyt did the maths for Hannah and went on, ‘I think you would say about sixty or sixty-five years.’ He pronounced the strange word like ears, and Hannah stifled a giggle.

  ‘He had short hair last time I saw him, greying – it’s probably all white by now. Not imposing, slightly shorter than me, and a bit heavy around the midsection. If he’s eating, his plate will most likely have a gansel leg, two potatoes with the skins on and half a loaf of bread dipped in gravy.’

  ‘You know him well, then,’ Hannah laughed. ‘Good. You check the bar; I’ll go towards the fireplace.’ She reached out for Churn and asked, ‘Would you come with me? I don’t like the look of this place. It makes me feel like it’s about to come crushing down on us.’

  Churn nodded and followed her through the crowd as Hoyt wandered over to the bar, smiling at several patrons and nodding to the bartender. He didn’t want to draw attention by asking for Alen by name, but if their search turned up nothing he knew he’d have to. Most people were drinking beer, but there were a few wine drinkers; Hoyt admired the heavy ceramic goblets they were using.

  From an antechamber off the room came the aroma of gansel stew, venison steaks and roasting potatoes. Hoyt’s stomach groaned a sotto voce complaint; he decided they would eat here, whether they found Alen or not. He completed a circuit of the bar, but there was no sign of his old friend. He paused momentarily to watch three venison steaks being laid in a pan; the cook poured a generous quantity of red wine over each and Hoyt’s stomach growled again.

  His mouth watering, he looked around for Churn and Hannah. When he spotted them they were near the other end of the room, moving between tables searching for the old man with the soft paunch and the white hair. Hoyt was heading towards them when he spied an empty space on one of the benches; he hustled to claim it before anyone else got there. As he sat down, more patrons rose to leave.

  He caught Churn’s attention and signed, ‘Come over here; let’s eat.’ The giant took Hannah gently by the upper arm and began steering her towards the benches while Hoyt moved to the bar and called above the din of the tavern, ‘Bartender!’

  A gangly young man with an unsightly skin condition scurried over and asked in a gruff basso, ‘What do you want?’ Hoyt was taken aback at the incongruity of such a booming, resonant voice from such a spindly body. For a moment he was speechless.

  ‘Come on, speak up. I haven’t got all day to stand around here waiting for you,’ the barman muttered.

  Hoyt shook himself. ‘Three beers, three steaks, three bowls of gansel stew, one loaf of bread, the hottest you can find above the hearth, and one dancing girl, preferably younger than two hundred Twinmoons.’

  The barman scowled. For a moment Hoyt wondered if the pox marks across the boy’s forehead could be connected to outline a map of the Pragan south coast. ‘For women, you need to see Regon,’ he boy said, gesturing towards a well-dressed patron sitting behind a corner table and speaking with two scantily clad young women. Hoyt estimated their age at just over one hundred and ten Twinmoons, far too young for that sort of work.

  ‘No thanks, I was just kidding,’ he said. ‘Just the food, thanks.’ He tried to manoeuvre himself onto the bench without kicking anyone: he needed to find Alen and he needed a hot meal – the last thing he wanted to do was get into a bar fight. He cast the bartender a friendly smile and adjusted his position on the bench. Shifting, his foot came down on something soft, a bag of laundry, maybe.

  He bent down and peered beneath the seat. The bag of clothes was actually a man, passed out, dead drunk – or maybe even just dead. He looked as if he’d been down there for several avens. He was soaking wet, stinking of beer, with shards of gansel bones caught in his matted hair. He appeared to have fallen asleep in a puddle of vomit.

  Hoyt’s stomach churned at the image of this foul-smelling old grettan first crawling under the bench for some rest, then throwing up, and finally passing out. ‘I do not envy you, my friend,’ he said to the inert heap, ‘you are going to feel like you’ve been pissed on by a demon when you wake.

  ‘But now, be a good fellow, will you? Bend your knees so I can sit down here without stepping on you all day.’ The man did not comply and for a moment, Hoyt thought perhaps the inebriated stranger really was dead.

  ‘Come on,’ he tried again. ‘Just a little now… bend your knees.’ This time the drunk obliged, rolling slightly to one side, and Hoyt gently nudged the legs out of his way. The corpse-like figure opened his eyes for a moment, peered out at a spot at the far end of the universe and then closed them again with a delicate flutter.

  Hoyt shuddered. He looked long and hard into the man’s ghostly features and grimaced. He had found Alen Jasper of Middle Fork.

  His heart sank. ‘Alen, oh rutting dogs, she is going to be furious.’ Churn and Hannah were making their way across the crowded room, eager for a hot meal.

  ‘Think, Hoyt, think,’ he commanded himself, then called for the bartender’s help.

  ‘What now?’ the boy said sullenly.

  Hoyt tossed him a thin silver coin and watched as the homely splotched face split into a narrow grin. ‘Keep the change, and-’ he pointed under the bench, ‘and keep him here.’

  Surprised anyone would be interested in the drunk, the bartender shrugged. ‘He’s not going anywhere. He hasn’t for quite some time.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘He’s been in here every day-’

  ‘How long?’ Hoyt interrupted. Churn and Hannah were nearly there; if the foreign woman were not to lose all hope he had to act quickly.

  ‘Oh, I’d say about ten or eleven Twinmoons now. I’m surprised he’s not dead yet.’

  Bleeding whores. Hoyt turned and unobtrusively signed to Churn, ‘We need to leave, now.’

  ‘Why?’ Churn recognised t
he need for stealth and Hannah did not notice the two men communicating.

  ‘Later. Just go.’

  Hannah smiled and took one of Hoyt’s hands, as if touching him would make it easier to hear above the tavern’s din. ‘This place isn’t so bad once you get used to it,’ she said, agreeably. ‘It’s a bit smoky, but we can wait a while if you think he’ll be along later. Should we eat? It actually smells quite good.’

  ‘No,’ Hoyt said quickly, ‘no, I know a better place down the street.’ That was an out-and-out lie, and Hoyt started praying to the gods of the Northern Forest that there was a reputable inn with hearty food within a short distance. Surely the gods owed him something.

  ‘I let the bartender know we needed to find Alen and he’ll keep an eye out for us.’ Gripping her hand, he turned Hannah back towards the stairs. ‘Let’s take a walk, find a room for the night and then eat someplace a bit less smoky.’

  Hannah, still none the wiser, smiled. ‘That sounds great. Let’s go.’ Mounting the stairs, she added, ‘You know, I’m beginning to feel more confident about my chances of getting home. I hope we find him tonight. I don’t think I could sleep knowing he’s somewhere close by.’

  Hoyt gave a half-nod, half-shake of his head and muttered under his breath, ‘If you only knew!’

  Steven woke screaming as the bones in his lower leg were set. The morning sun was blinding and he could barely make out the blurry features of the dark Samaritan lashing his leg between two heavy pine branches. He lashed out involuntarily, but only one arm responded; pain exploded from his shoulder as he struck his anonymous nurse a solid blow. His lungs ablaze with the fire of a smouldering Eldarni hell, Steven screamed again before passing out from the pain.

  Later, he was bathed entirely in white. No discernable line marked the delineation between earth and sky. Steven was moving slowly through a perfect ivory world. It was neither cold nor warm, and there was no scent, no fresh air, no colours. Squinting against the iridescent brilliance, he felt dizzy, and vomited across his chest. Sickened by the sudden foul stench corrupting this pure world, he attempted to move his head to one side, but discovered he was immobile, trapped in a chalky white dream. Unable to escape his own wretchedness, he vomited again, choking out a barely audible cry.