by Lee LaCroix
“You had me worried,” she spoke.
“Well, I’m glad you’re with me then,” Novas stated and looked around. “So where are we?”
“I’m not sure. I think we’ve drifted south a ways. I think the port city is that way,” Kayten pointed northwest over the horizon.
“Could you help me out?” Kayten asked as she broke her plank in two and handed a piece to Novas.
He nodded, and then they made their way to opposite edges of the debris and began to paddle towards shore together. By the time it was dark, it seemed they had made it no closer to the shore.
“I think I can still see it. See that dark strip where there are no stars?” Kayten called out to Novas, pointing to the black beyond.
They paddled again for some time, but Kayten soon found herself beginning to tire as a fire built in her arms that she could not extinguish with momentary rest. She laid back middle of the debris, and Novas made his way to the narrow front. With both paddles, he continued to row with his energy undiminished due his period of unconscious slumber.
Kayten awoke and rolled over, reaching for Novas as she would in those days spent at the cabin. As consciousness returned to her, she remembered that she was not in bed. Kayten caught a fearful breath as she recalled the makeshift raft on the murky sea and the precarious drop to the deathly bottom. She attempted to open her eyes, but the sun is too blinding, and she raised her hands to block its glare. As she came back to all her senses, she realized the gentle bobbing of the seacraft has ceased. She looked about to see that the debris actually sat upon a golden shore of sand. Novas had probably paddled all night to get them here, she thought. Where was the man who liked to sleep so hard? She sat up and stared about.
“Novas! Novas!” she called out when she noticed he was not there.
She shuffled her way off the debris, and the water of the shoreline lapped at her boots as she made her way further up the shore. The sand is the finest she has ever seen, much less rocky than the stony shores of Bell’s Beach where she learned to swim as a girl. She saw no sign of Novas but eventually found his possessions stacked against the first of many trees. His armour and his sword were piled under a jagged palm tree. She looked into a small grove made up of reedy grasses and bleach white boulders that sat beyond the reach of the waves that would wear them down. She sat down near the armour and picked at a white flower that reminded her of lilies and inspected its white pedals and purple crown. She did not do this long before she began to wonder where Novas had gone to again.
She went down to the debris to look for clues but found none. Under her inspection, the sea looked just as clear as it did after the turbulent battle. As she turned around and headed up the beach, she came across a second pair of footsteps that she missed in her initial grogginess. She followed them up shore into the green where they disappeared in the grasses. She frowned but looked up with hope as she heard the rustle of brush parting ahead of her. To her delight, Novas appeared through the green recesses with a pair of jackrabbits in his grip. Novas spread his arms wide as not to bloody her when Kayten ran to embrace him.
“You’ve done well,” she stated.
“I know,” he said with a smirk and a smile as he lay the game down upon the grasses.
“Much debris has been washing up on the shore north of here. I spent most of daybreak sifting through it and looking for things. This was the only thing I found, thankfully,” Novas explained as he whipped around a circular canteen from behind him.
“We wouldn’t get very far without one of those in this heat,” Kayten said and then recalled that their travelling packs had been lost in the cabin of the Amberclast.
Novas nodded and then began to scrounge around the brush for dry tinder. Kayten soon took over that duty, and Novas sat down to skin the game. Before long, the pyre and spit was built, and the meal was prepared for cooking. Kayten wedged two Y-shaped branches deep into the sand and placed a sturdy branch across them to skewer their pieces. Novas patted up and down his body and over his pockets as he looked for something. As he fished out a small sliver of flint from one of his inner pockets, he finally came to rest and breathed easy. He lit the pyre, spiked the meaty pieces on the spit, and watched the meal as it cooked. Kayten grabbed hold of the canteen, thirsty after thinking about such food, and took a refreshing gulp.
“There’s a spring a ways into the brush here. Against my reservations, it turned out to be fairly clean water. I have to guess that is why this wood has grown in such a place. As I’m sure you’ve seen, up the shore it does not continue, and it only continues inland a short ways,” Novas explained, nodding to the water.
Soon, the two had eaten their fill of meat and then drank more of the water. They swept away any signs of the fire, and Novas reequipped his armour and led Kayten into the thin green of palms and leafy brush. The passing slivers of shade from the needle-like palm leaves were a seldom relief to the arid air that surrounded them. It reminded Novas of the rocky plains around Bouldershade, but this time, the hottest season was in full approach. Novas found the water source eventually, where a babbling spring fed a shallow pool that drained through a length of worn down boulder until it met the thirsty forest floor. Novas put the canteen to the cold, clean stone and filled up the canteen as much as possible.
“Drink as much as you can. The heat will be exhausting to say the least.” Novas told Kayten.
Before filling the canteen one last time, they both drank deep and drenched themselves in water. They made their way to the northern face of thin forest and stood on its edge before the vastness of the sands before them. There was no green before them that they could see. The only trees that remained were blackened and bare and had branches that reached towards the sky with pointed edges. They began their trek north along the shore, found it only mildly cooler next to the sea, and tried to conserve their energy, not knowing how long they would go without rest or shade.
“Look. Over there,” Novas stated, pointing north towards the water.
Kayten raised a hand to cut the glare and looked into the sea.
“It’s been growing over the last while. They could be looking for survivors, amongst other things,” Novas explained as Kayten put eyes on the Vandarian ship.
“We might have to head inland before long,” Novas suggested as he stared over the sands.
And before long, the ship was getting closer, and they decided not to risk being detected any longer. They made their way into the valleys of the dunes, which were rippled like waves on an ocean of sand and splashed them with hot dust instead of cooling water. At the top of a dune, Novas peered out into the beyond. Like the ripples of sand beneath him, the peaks of dunes mirrored the inclination and recession of sea waves that extended into the distance without end. The jagged patterns of setting sand reminded Novas of the wrinkles upon Berault's face. They came across some of the higher mounds and were lucky to take shelter in the shallow shade as they passed by. Novas watched the progression of the sun through the sky as much as he did the developments on the horizon and found himself praising the falling of the sun unlike never before. He began to dread the weight of his armour as its weight made every step feel like two, but he knew he would regret leaving it in the days to come.
As the sky began to darken, they found themselves in a region of rocky outcroppings that jutted through the sands in every direction and angle. Small mesas and diminished buttes appeared, and the two found themselves in a region of varying elevation with plenty of shade and cover from the dry winds. Giant boulders of light stone poked out of dark sands like sets of broken teeth. There were stunted cacti that poked out of the sandy floor like tiny fingers. Pinnacles of towering stone formed long walls of layered rock, angular and erratic, almost as if a language was written there.
They eventually found a rocky cliff overhang with a sandy pit beneath it that formed a cave of cool shade. Kayten threw herself into it without hesitation, and Novas went around and flipped over boulders and rocks, looking for an
ything they might snack on. Before it was completely dark, Novas had managed to skewer three lizards with his hunting knife, and they cooked them over an even smaller fire. It was not Kayten or Novas’ favorite meal, for the skin so bland and salty and the meat so scarce and veiny, but they had to eat. They drank a small ration of water, hoped tomorrow’s trek would be more fruitful, and then found their way into sleep.
Garreth trudged his way out of the water with his cloth soaked and his limbs stiff and tired. As soon as the sand turned from wet brown to dry gold, he fell flat on his face and stayed sprawled upon the beach. He breathed through a slightly pursed mouth, keeping the sand out as he caught his breath. Another dark body flopped down beside him, and Ilsa clutched at her abs, aching from the swim. They had traveled quite a ways because the shore was still a sliver on the horizon when the Amberclast was torn apart, but they were healthy, fit, and uninjured and knew they could make the swim eventually. And so, they did.
“I never want to swim again,” Ilsa pleaded as she gripped at her stomach, sore from the powerful strokes needed to clear that distance and the current that pulled them further from shore.
Garreth rolled over and looked around. The shore led to sandy desert beyond, and he could see little else. After a while, he made his way to his feet.
“Are you alright?” Garreth asked, offering his hand down to Ilsa.
“Yes, I wonder if anyone else is though,” she remarked as Garreth helped her to her feet.
Garreth looked out into the sea and didn’t see any more swimmers. In fact, he didn’t see many before after he dove into the water, but he figured that due to the height of the waves. He was worried most for his son and Kayten but knew that Novas was a strong swimmer and would look after Kayten. They waited on the shore for a time for more survivors to arrive. To their dismay, none did. With the pulsing heat of the winds and the sun, they knew they could not remain in the sun without shade or water for much longer, and they decided to continue on in hopes of meeting their company in Nacosst.
Garreth led them up to a high dune to look out over the horizon. Much to his luck, he could see the roofs and steeples of buildings in the direction of Nacosst. Garreth headed back to the shore, and they made their way to the rocky surroundings of the town. The sand-coloured buildings of brick and clay rose above the one-story wall that surrounded Nacosst. Several domiciles featured elaborate statuary or symbolic metallurgy atop their peaks and roofs. The windows were not closed with glass but with thick cloth tarps that prevented the elements from getting inside during windy or stormy weather. They found themselves walking in the shade of its walls, looking for an entrance. They were just nearing the end of sharp corner when Garreth, spun about, grabbed Ilsa and hid against the wall.
“Vandari,” he whispered and then glanced at the two guards stationed outside the city gate.
“Let’s find another way,” he suggested.
The two found their way onto the cliffs south of the city, and the two stared out over an overhang that stood a ways from the wall. It was about equal height, but the gap was quite the leap across, and the fall below would be met with a rocky bruising.
“Let me try first,” Ilsa asked and backed up quite a few paces from the edge.
With six steps, she bounded off the side of the cliff and nearly fell off the other side of the wall when as she landed. The gap from the overhang to the walls of Nacosst was quite large, and Garreth knew he was nowhere as light and agile as Ilsa was. Regardless, Garreth made his run and leapt from the cliff. He landed on his stomach against the wall and began to slide off of it as he grasped to its face, which was slippery with sand. Ilsa grabbed onto his hands as Garreth fell, and she was nearly pulled off the wall but managed to catch her grip on an edge. She breathed heavy as she held him against the wall.
“Okay. Try to grip with your feet in one, two, three,” she called out as she steadied herself.
Garreth climbed up the wall with Ilsa’s help, and they both collapsed on its floor. They turned their faces towards each other with a smile. They got up from the wall before long and found a safe way down onto some back alley crates. They made their way from the back of the buildings and stood in an alleyway facing an unoccupied street.
“We should look around for any of the crew. Perhaps, they’ve already made their way here as well,” Garreth suggested, and Ilsa nodded, and they made their way onto the street.
Nacosst was the eastern most port city of Kal’resh and saw many ships into its bay for trade or patrol. A tiny bay built into the city was surrounded by a bordering wooden dock. There, the imported goods were managed before they were brought to the city’s bazaar, which was the center of the town’s trade. Directly north of the docks, inside the city walls, and on a hill, a Vandarian garrison overlooked the sea, the town, and a prison on the dock’s southern side. To the north, west, and south, the residences of Nacosst surrounded the bazaar in a half circle. The homes were plain and similarly shaped with rectangular towers extending two to four stories. Many of them were smooth on the outside with a clay coating, and the majority of them had small, square cut outs for windows. Some of them even had ladders to rooftops where constructions of wood and cloth provided shade and a view. While some featured white artwork with caricatures of people in some activity, there were others with paintings and drawings upon their plain faces. Little did Garreth or Ilsa know, often the art was related to the professions of the people within. The two did not see anyone they recognized on the outer streets, so they made their way to the town’s midsection where voices bellowed and drew them closer.
They stopped in an alleyway wedged between two vendors and looked about at the streets of the bazaar. Almost every booth was a tent, comprised of a square area where the merchant displayed his wares on a shelf behind a table, with a cloth overhang in front, offering shade for curious customers. The layout of the inside often changed due to what the vendor was selling, but the overall structure remained the same. There were many different vendors there such as a rug vendor with many rolling rows of product, cloth and bead merchant with a multitude of popular colors, and a camel salesman in one of the far corners. The two looked about at the people, and indeed, they appeared to be like Tamil and Sevrad and dressed primarily of robes and shawls in colors of tan, sand, and brown. With their dark black, closely-fitting clothing, Garreth and Ilsa knew they stood out in the crowd, but they had no choice if they were to look for their allies.
They made their way into the crowd and scanned many of the faces, looking between stands, vendors, and alleyways for any sign of their fellow Malquians. Just as boldly as they searched, they were followed by curious and suspicious eyes. The two had finished half of the bazaar in search before they heard a chorus of sharp yells and watched as a group of Vandarian soldiers push through the customers, sending the crowd fleeing and screaming. Before Garreth and Ilsa could turn around, another group had formed up behind them. One of the soldiers seemed to be ordering them to drop their weapons or get on the ground.
“We mean you no harm,” Garreth announced with his hands raised.
But the soldier screamed even louder and moved in with his sword ready to strike. As the soldier raised his sword and brought it down, Garreth withdrew Darkbreaker, deflected the blow with an upwards slash, and put both blades to the sky. The soldier raised his hands to the sky, and tried to cover himself from the blinding light that seemed more radiant than the sun, but it did not stop his allies to charge in to assist him. Ilsa was at Garreth’s back, and she moved forward towards the Vandarian before he did. The first of them rushed towards her with a lunge. She stepped to the side, rolled alongside his arm, unwound a solid elbow to his nose, and then attacked at his exposed chest. She barely had time after kicking him away to dodge the two blades that careened towards her. She ducked under a sideways slice, and let a slash from above slide right towards the ground before stepping in to cut at their necks. The last two on her side fell, but she could see another group pushing through the
gathered crowd.
Garreth looked around at the faces of the crowd that had surrounded them. Most of them were set with concern and others shrieked and were aghast while there were a few others that smiled with interest. He did not want to give the impression that he was an invading murderer cut from the same cloth as the Vandari that had once set Bouldershade aflame on the Malquian shores. He could not blame Ilsa’s lethal actions, for the Vandari had attacked someone she loved, and she responded in kind. Garreth lashed out with his sword against the raised Vandarian shields, but the soldiers were unwilling to drop their guard and expose themselves to the sword’s blinding glare. It seemed the Vandari were waiting for something, and when Garreth spied another large group of soldiers making their way into the bazaar, he looked about for escape.
“Ilsa, we have to move. There can be no victory here,” Garreth explained.
“You don’t say,” she replied as she fended off the swords behind him.
Garreth watched as the second group of Vandari joined their comrades, and they formed up in two rows of six and moved to surround Garreth from either side with shields raised and swords wound back to strike.
“You there! Yes, you! Follow me!” a voice cried out from the crowd.
It was the first time they had understood anyone’s words since arriving in Kal’resh. Garreth looked about, unwilling to keep his eyes off the approaching Vandari for too long, and spied a young man behind a crate in an alleyway nearby, waving them towards him.
“Come on!” Garreth called to Ilsa.
As Darkbraker let out a powerful flash of light, Garreth landed a solid kick to one of the shields and ran through the recess. When the young man had seen Garreth and Ilsa were following him with the guards shortly behind, he took off down the alleyway and disappeared behind a corner. The two Malquians followed him as fast as they could, but the echoes of their pursuers raced towards them even faster. Turning a corner, Garreth spied a makeshift balcony that connected two buildings above him. As he ran under it, he gave a spinning slice to three of its supports. The dry lumber cracked at the passing of his sword, and wooden ruins fell into the alleyway behind them, kicking up dust and sand. The Vandari stopped at the wreckage and ambled over it, giving the pursued a chance for escape. Garreth and Ilsa found the youth kneeled to the ground beside a building, holding up a thick cloth that covered a basement window.
