Venten coughed again, understanding exactly how the sergeant felt. He’d been with Aurec since birth and had earned his place during the opening campaign of the war. Unfortunately his health continued to decline since the fall of Rogscroft. He couldn’t take to the field any more than the wounded Thorsson. “We all have new jobs, Thorsson. I was just a bodyguard until Grunmarrow. Now I’m the chief of state.”
“Don’t forget hero,” Mahn added.
He frowned.
“There must be something we can do to convince the Pell we need them. It’s not a matter of just getting them to fight. Any fool can do that, but we will lose this war without their full support. Mahn, how were the Goblins equipped?”
“Heavy infantry. They were hunting,” he answered. “Though for us or the Pell I don’t know. We didn’t have much time to analyze the battlefield afterwards.”
Aurec shook his head and placed both hands on his hips. “Keep working on them, all of you. We have to find a way to get them to fight. Otherwise…”
Venten laid a gentle hand on Aurec’s shoulder, much the way a father would his son. “Go and take some rest, sire. We’ll figure out how to break them.”
“I hope so, for all of our sakes,” Aurec said and returned to his hut. His thoughts had already turned back to Maleela and the broken love they shared.
THREE
Doubts
Far away, at the southern end of the Murdes Mountains, rambled the much abused wagon carrying Maleela and her companions. They’d set out from Venheim a week ago and were still trapped in the dark limestone and granite mountains, all despite Groge’s assurance that he knew the correct paths down out of the mountains. Of course, he’d never been out of Venheim before, a fact none of the others bothered to consider before setting out.
Maleela wasn’t herself. She doubted any of them were these days; especially after all they’d been through. Kidnapped by the love of her life from her very bedchambers, she’d been hunted ever since. Bahr, her uncle, unwittingly aided her father in stealing her back, thus paving the way for his invasion of Rogscroft. She felt helpless; like it was all her fault. Worse, she discovered a dark hatred festered deep in her soul, but for what she didn’t know.
“You seem troubled,” Anienam Keiss, the odd wizard, commented from his driver’s seat on the wagon.
“We should all be troubled, Anienam,” she answered. “How does any of this make sense to you? We’re chasing ghosts.”
The wizard snickered softly. “What do you mean?”
She shot him a withering glare. “Seriously? Look at us. A boy. Two sell swords that I still haven’t decided if they are mentally capable or not. A foreign woman who’s killed more men than any of the rest of us except perhaps Boen.” She gestured towards the massive Gaimosian Knight riding at the front of the group. “I’m convinced you’re borderline insane and I don’t know what I’m doing. That brings us to our Giant wonder boy who’s never left home. And what are we doing? Travelling halfway across Malweir in search of an ancient weapon that may or may not exist to defeat powers that have existed since the dawn of life. Have I left anything out?”
“Our friend Ionascu,” Anienam added. “He’s perhaps the most broken of us all. I truly don’t trust him.”
“Precisely my point! None of us belong together and you expect us to save the world from something that seemingly can’t be defeated. What’s the point?” she asked.
A few of the others paused to look her way, but were wise enough to stay silent. They each faced demons of a personal nature.
“The dark gods will enslave the entire world, Maleela. Nothing will be left sacred to their depredations. Right now, at this singular moment in time, we are all that stands between total annihilation and at least the opportunity for peace. Daunting, I know. Destiny rarely calls upon us at moments of our convenience. This is one of those times.”
She listened to his explanation but remained angry. “Why us? What makes any of us so special the fate of all Malweir should fall into our hands?”
“I like to think I’m fairly special. Leastwise my father and his kind were. But that’s not my point. Perhaps none of us are truly special, which is what makes us all special if you following my meaning,” he said.
“You’re talking in circles again,” she growled.
He snuck a cautious glance before acting indignant. “What? Circles? How dare you, young princess! I am the last of my kind and have been granted a certain amount of flair in my manner of speech. It’s not my fault that you can’t follow!”
He finished with a stern harrumph. Maleela watched him with vicious eyes, suddenly tired of the mirage being played. She’d been through more than any other woman her age and still had so much more to go before the end. Emotionally she wasn’t sure she had the strength to last. Traumas heaped upon her like waves breaking against the rocky shore. Hope started to fade, leaving her in a position of mass confusion.
“You can’t carry the deeds of others on your shoulders,” Anienam said after noticing the internal battle wage deep in her eyes.
“What choice do I have?”
He smiled softly. “Doing so will only bring you low, drag you down into an impossible hole you can never climb from. I know, for I’ve done it too many times. This world is not a kind one, no matter how many times we try to make it so. Oftentimes our good deeds get reduced to tragedy, or worse. I’d like to tell you that it will all work out in the end, that each of us will go on with our lives unchanged. I can’t.”
“That doesn’t give me much hope for the future,” she countered.
He shrugged. “Hope is what you make of it. Have I ever told you the tale of how I managed to talk a group of Trolls out of waging a civil war? Silly creatures really. They’d come upon a claim in the Bairn Hills that the Dwarves had missed. Gold is a powerful thing, especially to smaller minds. Why, I recall how they…”
Maleela rolled her eyes and tried to focus on the strong back of her uncle Bahr, riding alongside the Gaimosian.
“She should not have come,” Boen grumbled to Bahr.
Bahr nodded crisply. “I agree, but where else should she be? The One Eye will kill her if she stays in Delranan. We can’t take her back to Rogscroft. The list of safe havens seems rather small.”
Born without a home, Boen spent his life roaming the kingdoms of Malweir, paying for a crime he wasn’t alive to commit. The fall of ancient Gaimos was the most storied legend in all the lands, a tragedy unrivaled. The idea that any Gaimosians survived this long provided testament to the strength of their convictions. He, and those few hundreds like him, were a scourge on the world.
“At what point does your charity turn to liability?” he asked. The thought of continuing to babysit the princess and a few others almost insulted him.
Bahr felt his cheeks flush. “She is my niece, Boen. No matter what else happens I can’t ignore family.”
She’s the only true family I have. My brother has finally become a tyrant and I am as much of an exile as you are. He knew something about being displaced as well. The black sheep of the family, Bahr left home at an early age, leaving the kingdom to Badron. The open sea called and he gleefully threw himself into her bosom. Decades of pirating the northern coastline earned him the nickname Sea Wolf but, despite having an impressive estate on the outskirts of Chadra, he never truly felt at home in Delranan.
The decision to return home at last hadn’t been of his choosing. Harnin One Eye, first among Badron’s lieutenants, bore special hatred for the forgotten son and used deception to enlist Bahr in rescuing Maleela from Rogscroft. It had all been a ruse. She’d never been kidnapped. The kingdom never in jeopardy. Harnin and Badron used him to start a war. Now neither Maleela or Bahr could go home. Images of Bahr’s estate burning to the ground haunted him continually: a visual reminder of what might have been.
“You are letting your emotions compromise the mission.”
“We’re trying to save the world, Boen,” Bahr replied. “I thin
k a task like that will need all of the help it can get.”
Boen scowled. “You know what I mean. This is no game, Bahr. What we’ve seen and done is nothing if what the wizard says is true. This is going to get messy before the end.”
“Is there a choice? Neither of us was looking for a war, but one has been thrust upon us. My home is gone. My kingdom taken over and turned into a dictatorship and my brother has gone to war with a perceived enemy for the sake of his own vanity. I feel like Maleela and that bothers me deeply.”
Boen almost suggested the old man get back into the sea where he was more comfortable but the Dragon’s Bane had been burned to the waterline for Harnin’s amusement. Nothing had gone right since. “Bahr, you aren’t used to this life. I’ve spent my life going from one bad time to the next without any hope of finding a home. I know the risks. I accept them. You should take her and find a place to settle down while you still can. This quest will claim us all.”
“You’re sounding like that cracked wizard,” Bahr said. “My brother won’t stop with Rogscroft. And if the rumors are true, he’s got an army of Goblins working for him.” He shook his head. “None of this makes sense to me. There’s no way he should have been able to gain so much power without anyone knowing.”
“A spy?” Boen suggested.
The implication lurking behind the comment disturbed Bahr. He’d known Ionascu was one of Harnin’s lackeys and had taken appropriate measures to keep him neutralized. At least he had until Harnin turned on his spy and left him a broken shell of a man. Ionascu remained haunted, something sinister lurking just under the surface. No one else seemed capable of turning against Bahr. They’d been chosen for their friendship, loyalty, and knowledge of combat. Only Rekka Jel and young Skuld remained mysteries. The boy was easy enough to figure. He’d overheard a conversation between Dorl Theed and Nothol Coll and decided to try and get rich on their coattails. Rekka Jel, however, was an enigma from the moment she arrived on the docks. Bahr didn’t like surprises. Between the strange woman from the southern jungles and the wizard she looked up to, Bahr didn’t know where he stood. What began as a quest to rescue his niece quickly spiraled out of control and left him mired in an unending string of misery.
“After all we’ve been through I can’t see how anyone is working against us. Even young Skuld was tortured by Harnin’s men,” the Sea Wolf answered. “I don’t know, Boen. Explain to me how the enemy always seems to know what we’re doing before we do.”
For once the Gaimosian had no answer. His well-honed combat instincts whispered of being watched, forcing him to look back over his shoulder far too many times. No matter what he did he couldn’t shake the feeling and that perplexed him terribly. He was a man that needed to fight, more comfortable in battle than civilization. The thought that some darkness haunted him and stayed hidden was beyond infuriating.
“I would like to get my hands around the neck of whoever it is,” he finally said. “I feel like we are running away. That doesn’t sit well with me, Bahr.”
“Running don’t sit well with any of us but this isn’t like anything we’ve seen before. The whole damned war is unnatural.”
Boen shifted in his saddle, his lower back sore. “I need a stand-up fight. Never been any good with sneaking around.”
“Agreed.” Bahr decided to shift topics. “What about the wizard? How much credence can we put in his theories?”
“I think the old man has had too many mugs of bad ale. He’s half cracked and taking the rest of us with him. Still, I get the feeling that he might know what he’s doing. Found Venheim, with the help of that book of course.”
Bahr nodded slightly. “He’s mad, that I agree. I still can’t figure out why he showed up on my doorstep that night, but he’s guided us true the whole time. I suppose it’s better to have a wizard with us than against us if this war is going to continue.”
“War, that would be nice. Instead we’re going halfway across Malweir for a weapon that might not even exist,” Boen grumbled. “All those Giants and they send us a mere apprentice. I don’t know about you but they’d have given us a more experienced person if they believed their own tales.”
The Giants had been reluctant to accept their small band and more than eager to get rid of them. Venheim was one of the last true hidden places in Malweir, and for good reason. Giants were largely extinct throughout most of the world. Poor breeding contributed to increasingly low population numbers. Whatever they might have been, the Giants of Venheim were now a secluded, superstitious clan cut off from the rest of civilization and mired in their own demons, self-created or otherwise.
“Groge seems a good enough lad,” Bahr said. “What better way to get experience is there than by going out into the world? His size and strength will definitely come in handy if and when we get into a real scrape.”
“Size doesn’t make a good fighter. That boy hasn’t swung a sword in his life.”
Bahr carefully peered back over his right shoulder to the Giant walking casually alongside the wagon. “He doesn’t need to. Very few have ever seen a Giant and I’m guessing they’ll wind up pissing themselves when they do. We have a small advantage at least.”
“He’s also big enough that we can’t hide if needs be. Groge is twice as tall as I am. He’ll be a liability.”
“One I’m willing to accept. Legends say their hides are so thick no mortal weapon can pierce them. He doesn’t need to fight well if there’s any truth in it. Damnation, he can step on a man and kill him!”
They shared a laugh, the thought of Groge squashing a grown man to pulp oddly amusing. Nothing had gone right since accepting Harnin’s mission to rescue Maleela from Rogscroft and now, even with their recent additions and knowledge, the tunnel continued to lengthen. Bahr would have very much liked a platoon of Giants at his service but instead he only got a young apprentice smith. Something being better than nothing, he recognized their need to include Groge. If what Anienam said was correct, only the Giant was capable of handling the legendary Blud Hamr.
They only needed to find it first.
“What’s our next move?” he asked Boen, hoping the Gaimosian had a better sense of things than he did.
“Those snow storms kept us pent up in the mountains for too long, not to mention getting lost in the damned foothills. We’ve lost a lot of time. The quickest way is down the short road to the Kergland Spine and then the Fern River. Rekka says we can move faster by boat and I agree. The current will be with us on the voyage down. Getting back will be more difficult.”
Bahr considered the route. “The Kergland Spine takes us into Dwarf territory.”
“It’s the fastest route.”
They both knew the reputations surrounding Dwarves. Bitter and reclusive, the mountain dwellers were feared almost as much as they were respected for their craftsmanship. Bahr and the others would do well to avoid any run-ins.
“We’re most likely not going to make it in time, if the wizard’s calculations are correct,” Bahr said.
“A handful of months are far too short to make it all the way down to the southern jungles and back again. There is no time. We’ll be fortunate if we make it half that far.”
A cold wind shuffled through the rocky corridor, blasting them with unabated fury. Bahr, no stranger to fierce weather, ducked down into his bearskin cloak in a futile attempt to keep the wind out. His curses were lost on the low growl of the wind.
“You’re getting old,” Boen laughed. His deep voice boomed with each syllable. “There was a time when the mighty Sea Wolf would have spit in the face of such a breeze.”
“There was a time when he also had a boat, but look where he is now,” Bahr countered. “I think I’m going to go have a talk with Anienam. See if I can get him to reread that part in the book that basically tells us if we’re screwed or not.”
The Gaimosian nodded. “I will keep point. The way out of the foothills is clear now. We shouldn’t have any trouble.”
Bahr failed to
remind Boen he’d said the same thing a week ago.
FOUR
Doldrums
Every rock looked the same. Every grass-covered mound, lichen-covered rock, and moss-striped tree looked the same. The ground offered nothing new. The same sky continued to look down mockingly. The northern reaches of the Murdes Mountains might be filled with many foul and dangerous things, but the southern end drove men to despair. Not a single aspect of the mountains had changed since leaving Venheim. Nothing except it got much colder without the heat of the massive forges.
Dorl Theed took a long pull from his canteen, swirled it around in his mouth and then spit. The makeshift goggles cut out of pine bark helped reduced the glare from the snow to the point he found it almost manageable. Weeks of wandering aimlessly down from the peaks threatened to break his spirit though, a thing he never thought possible. Not even Harnin’s torturers managed to do much more than break a few bones.
He began to regret the decision to sign on with Bahr. Nothing good had come from it. The old man wasn’t the adventurer he once was. Nor did he seem to care too much about the fate of Delranan. Any other man would have snapped already. Home, boat, any chance at a normal life all wiped out on a madman’s whim. Dorl found himself growing angry over the indignity of it, and nothing had happened to him!
“Your mind is clouded,” Rekka Jel said softly from his side.
He smiled. He couldn’t help it. She was the one thing going right for him since leaving Delranan all those weeks ago though he still wasn’t sure what she saw in him. Rekka came from an entirely different culture far to the south, a tribe locked deep in the jungle and given the purpose of defending something more ancient than the gods themselves. She’d come so far on sheer faith, bearing a warning for Bahr. The selflessness of it impressed him greatly. Though he couldn’t help but wonder why she’d chosen him.
A Whisper After Midnight Page 3
