Royce nodded.
She paused a moment, thinking, then said, “Darkness surrounds you, death ez everywhere, et stalks you, hunts you and you feed upon et—blood begets blood—dee darkness consumes you. In dis darkness, I saw two lights beside you. One vill blow out and in dat same breeze, dee other flickers, but et must not go out. You must protect dee flame against dee storm.
“I saw a secret—et ez ah…et ez ’idden. Et ez covered, dis great treasure. A man ’ides et, but a woman knows—she alone knows and so she prepares. She speaks in riddles dat vill be revealed—profound truths disguised for now. You vill remember veen dee time comes, dee path laid out for you—in dee dark.”
Joqdan spoke something in Tenkin, but Fan Irlanu shook her head and pushed on.
“I saw a great journey. Ten upon dee road, she ou vears dee light vill lead dee vay. Dee road goes deep into dee earth, and into despair. Dee voices of dee dead guide your steps. You walk back in time. Dee three ’zousand year battle begins again. Cold grips dee vorld, death comes to all and a choice ez before you. You alone stand in dee balance, your veight vill tilt dee scales, but to vich side is unclear. You must choose between darkness and light, and your choice vill affect many.” She paused, shaking her head slowly. “Like trees in a forest, like blades of grass—too many to count. And I fear dat in dee end you vill choose dee darkness and turn your back to dee light.”
“You said she,” Royce questioned. “Who did you mean? Is it Gwen?”
“I do not know names. Dey are mere feelings, glimpses of a dream.”
“What is this secret?”
“I do not know, it ez ’idden.”
“When you say there are two lights and one blows out, does that mean someone will die?”
She nodded. “I dink so—yes, et felt dat vay. I sensed a loss, so great I still feel et.” She reached out and touched Royce’s hand and a tear slipped down her cheek. “Your road ez one of great anguish.”
Royce said nothing for a moment, then asked, “What is this great journey?”
She shook her head. “I vish I knew more. Your life—your whole life ’as been pain and so much more lies ahead. I am sorry, but I cannot tell you more dan dat.”
“She rests now,” Joqdan told them. From his firm tone they knew it was time to go.
They walked out of the hut and found Wyatt watching out for them.
“Waiting up?” Hadrian asked.
“Didn’t want you to step into the wrong hut by accident.” He gave a wink.
“The rest bunked down?”
He nodded. “So, you’re an elf,” Wyatt said to Royce. “That explains a lot. What did the lady want?”
“To tell me my future.”
“Good news?”
“It nearly killed her. What do you think?”
Chapter 17
The Palace of the Four Winds
Thranic was furious. Wesley refused to take any action against Royce, and the sentinel railed that under imperial law all elves were subject to arrest. Wesley had little choice but to acknowledge this, but added that given their circumstances, he had neither a prison nor chains. He also pointed out that they were not within the bounds of the New Empire, and until they were he was the sole judge of the law.
“It is my duty to see this mission to completion,” Wesley told the sentinel. “A bound man will only be a hindrance to this effort, particularly when he is injured and exhibits no desire to flee.”
Royce watched all this with an expression of mild amusement. Thranic went on relentlessly, until finally Wesley gave in and approached Royce. “Will you give me your word you will not attempt to escape me or Sentinel Thranic before this mission is over?”
“On my word, sir,” Royce replied. “There is nothing that could make me willingly leave Sentinel Thranic’s side.”
“There you have it,” Wesley concluded, satisfied.
“He is an elf! What good is the word of an elf?” As Thranic straightened and rose above Wesley the look on his face caused the young captain to take a step back. “As Sentinel of Erivan Affairs, appointed by the Patriarch, it is my duty to purge the empire of their foul influence. I demand you place the elf under my authority at once!”
Wesley hesitated. The challenge of a sentinel broke the nerve of many kings, and Thranic was more intimidating than any Hadrian had encountered. His hunched vulture demeanor and piercing glare were more than daunting.
Hadrian was tense. He knew the sentinel was already dead, but would prefer his partner to pick his own time and place. If Wesley agreed to surrender Royce, there would be a battle here and now that would see one of them dead. Hadrian let his fingers slip slowly to the pommels of his swords, and he marked the position of Defoe in anticipation.
Wesley locked his jaw and returned Thranic’s glare. “He may be an elf, sir, but he is also one of my crew.”
“Your crew? You no longer have a ship. You’re nothing but a boy playing pretend captain!” the sentinel bellowed angrily.
Wesley stiffened.
wit what were you playing at in the hold of the ship, sir? Was that what you call administering your authority?”
This took Thranic by surprise.
“Oh, yes, the officers knew of your nightly visits to the cargo. It’s a small ship, sir, and the officers’ bunks are just above. We heard you every night, torturing them and I fear a good deal more than that. I am no great fan of elves but, by Maribor, there are limits to the abuses conscience permits! No, sir, I don’t think I will be turning Seaman Melborn over to your authority anytime soon. Even should I trust you to treat him honorably, I need all the hands I can get and, as we both know, you are not an honorable man.”
“It is a pity to see such a young, promising lad throw his life away.” Thranic fumed. “ I’ll see that you are executed for this.”
“To do so, we must return to Avryn. Let’s hope we both live to see that day.”
***
At dawn the crew of the Emerald Storm left the village and once more plunged into the jungle, traveling northeast of the Oudorro valley, by a narrow, barely visible path. The rain left the ground swamped, but it had stopped at last. On the third day, cliffs and chasms barred their path. They followed ridgelines where a stumble could send a man falling hundreds of feet, walked perilous rope bridges that spanned raging rivers, and followed rocky clefts down into dark valleys. In the lower ravines it was dark, even at midday. Trees created phantom images. Rocks looked like crouching animals, and stunted, gnarled bushes appeared like monsters in the mist.
Royce’s health steadily improved, though his disposition remained unchanged. He was able to walk on his own most of the day and thanks to Fan Irlanu’s balm, his wounds no longer required a bandage.
On the fourth day out of Oudorro they found the bodies. Corpses laid on the path, dressed in clothes similar to those of Dilladrum and the Vintu. Flies hovered and the stench of decay lingered in the air. They had been dead for some time and many were missing limbs or showed evidence of bites.
“Animals?” Wesley asked.
“Maybe.” Dilladrum looked off toward the east. “But perhaps the Panther is not able to contain his beasts, just as Burandu told us.”
“You’re saying the Ghazel did this?”
Dilladrum paused to study the jungle around them. “Impossible to say, and yet these bodies are weeks old and it is not like the jungle to let them rot. Animals don’t like the smell of Ghazel and will avoid an area with their smell, even if it means passing up a free meal.
“This man is Hingara.” Dilladrum pointed to the body of a swarthy little man in a red cap. “He is a guide, like me. He set out for the Palace of the Four Winds with a party like ours, weeks ago. He was a good man. He knew the jungle well, and as you can see, his group was large—as many as thirty men in all. What kind of animal do you think would attack so large a company? A pack of wolves perhaps? A pride of lions? No, they would never attack a party this large. And what animal could kill without leaving a singl
e body of their own behind? Ghazel, on the other hand…”
“What about them?” Wesley asked.
“They are like ghosts. Hingara could not have seen them coming. Imagine beings as nimble and at ease in these jungles as monkeys, but possessing the strength and ferocity of tigers. They have the instinct of beasts but the intelligence of men. On a rainy day, they can smell a human three leagues away. This was a safe path, but I fear things have changed.”
“There are only about eighteen bodies here,” Wesley observed. “If he set out with thirty men, where are the rest?”
Dilladrum let his sight settle on the naval officer. “Where indeed.”
Wesley grimaced as he looked at the bodies. “Are you saying they took them to eat?”
“That’s what they do.” Dilladrum pointed to the torn and mutilated bodies. “They ate some on the spot in the fever following the battle, but I think they carried the rest back to their den where I can only guess they feasted by barbequing the bodies on spits and drinking warmed blood from the men’s skulls.”
“You don’t know that!” Wesley challenged, a look of disgust filling his features.
Dilladrum shook his head. “As I said, I am guessing. No one truly knows what goes on in their camps, any more than a deer knows what goes on in the dining halls of a king.”
“You make it sound as if they are our betters.”
“In these jungles, they are. Here they are the hunters and we the prey. I told you the trip would be harder from now on. We will burn no fire, cook no food, and pitch no tent. Our only hope of survival lies in slipping though unnoticed.”
“Should we bury them?” Wesley asked.
“What the animals do not touch neither should we. It would announce our presence to the whole jungle. It is also not wise to linger. We should press on with all haste.”
***
They traveled steadily downward now, following a rapidly flowing river through a cleft in the mountains. The lower they went the higher the canopy rose and the darker their world became. They camped along a bank where the river swirled around a break of boulders. With no fire or tent it was not much of a camp. They huddled on a bare sandy patch exposed by a shift in the river’s bend eating cold salted meat. Royce sat at the edge of the camp and watched Thranic watching him.
They had played this game each night since the village. Royce was certain Defoe had filled Thranic’s head with numerous stories about his reign of terror against the Diamond. Thranic appeared aloof, but Royce was certain Defoe’s words wormed in nonetheless. Without Staul, and with Defoe no longer a trusted ally, Thranic was dramatically weakened. The sentinel’s confrontation with Wesley revealed Thranic’s growing desperation—his failure another setback. The balance was shifting, he was slipping from the hunter to the hunted, and with each day Royce grew stronger.
Royce enjoyed the game. He liked watching the shadows growing under Thranic’s eyes as he got less and less sleep. He savored the way Thranic spun whenever an animal rustled branches behind him on the trail, his eyes searching rapidly for Royce. Mental torture was never something Royce aimed for, but in Thranic’s case he was making an exception.
Royce’s quick turn had saved his life. Although he might have bled to death if Hadrian and the others had not found him or died from fever if the Tenkin woman had not helped, the wound itself was relatively superficial. For several days he had portrayed being weaker than he was. He had pain when pressing on his side, and was still experiencing some lack of movement, but for the most part he was his old self again.
Royce might have continued the game longer, but it was becoming too dangerous. Wesley’s defiance changed the playing field. The sentinel’s options were diminishing. That play to force Wesley’s hand was his last civil gambit. As long as Wesley remained a legitimate leader, those like Wyatt, Grady, Derning, and Poe would side with him. It would be obvious to Thranic that Wesley was a pawn blocking his forward movement, one that would need to be removed. It was time to deal with Thranic.
Royce curled up to sleep with the rest of them, but selected a place hidden by a small thicket of plants. In the darkness he lay there only briefly, before leaving his blanket filled with brush and melted into the jungle.
Thranic had chosen to bed down near the river, which Royce thought considerate since he intended to dispose of his body in the strong current. Royce slipped around the outside of the camp until he came to where Defoe and Levy slept, only Thranic was missing.
***
Thwack! A narrow tree trunk splinteredAt the last moment Melborn had moved. A crossbow bolt lodged itself in the wood, where a second before he had been crouching.
Thranic struggled desperately to crank back the string on his weapon. “Did you think to find me in my bed?” he hissed. “Did you really think killing me would be that easy—elf? ”
He cranked back on the gear.
“You shouldn’t fear me as much as you do. I am here to help you. It is my burden to help all of you. I will cleanse the darkness in your hearts. I will free you of the burden of your disgusting offensive life. You no longer need to be an affront to Maribor. I will save you!”
“And who will save you?” Royce replied.
He was just a few feet from where he had been. Thranic glanced down to set the bolt in the track. He lifted the bow but when he looked up Royce was gone.
“What do you mean?” Thranic asked, hoping Royce would reveal his position.
“You see awfully well in the dark, Thranic,” Royce said from his right.
Thranic turned and fired, but the bolt merely ripped through an empty thicket.
“Well, but not perfectly,” Royce observed, appearing once more, but much closer and Thranic immediately began ratcheting back his bow.
He had two more bolts.
“You also managed to slip into the trees without me seeing you. And you crept up behind me. That’s remarkable indeed. How old are you, Thranic? I’ll bet you’re older than you look.”
The sentinel loaded the bolt, looked up, but once more Royce was gone.
“What are you driving at, elf?” Thranic asked, crossbow at his hip. Backing against a tree, he peered around the jungle.
“We’re alike you and I,” Royce said from behind him.
Thranic spun around. He saw movement slipping through the brush and fired. The shot went wide and he cursed. Thranic began cranking back the string once more.
“Is that why you do it?” Royce asked. “Is that why you torture elves? Tell me, are you purging them—or yourself?”
“Shut up!” Thranic’s hand slipped on the gear and the string snapped back, slashing his fingers. He was shaking now.
“You can’t kill the elf inside, so you torture and murder all those you find.”
He was closer.
“I said, shut up!”
“How much elven blood does it take to wash away the sin of being one yourself?”
Closer still.
“Damn you!” he screamed, fighting with the bow that refused to cooperate with his shaking fingers.
He drew the string back again only to have it jump the track and snap free. He put a foot through the loop at the bow’s nose and pulled. Now it was stuck. He pressed desperately on the ratchet handle. It refused to move. Crack! The winch snapped.
In horror, Thranic stopped breathing as he looked down. He struggled to pull the bowstring back with just the strength of his arms. He pulled with all his might, but he could not get it to the catch. He was giving Melborn too much time. He let the bow fall to the grass and drew his dagger.
He waited. He listened. He spun. He looked.
He was alone.
***
“Get up.” Hadrian woke to Royce’s voice as his friend moved through the camp. He knew the tone and instantly got to his feet.
“What is it?”
“Company,” Royce told him, “Wake everyone.”
“What’s happening?” Wesley asked groggily as the camp slowly came alive.
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“Quiet,” Royce whispered. He crouched with his dagger drawn, staring out into the darkness.
“Ghazel?” Grady asked.
“Something,” Royce replied. “A lot of somethings.”
The rest of them heard it now, twigs snapping and leaves rusting. They were all on their feet with weapons drawn.
“Backs to the river!” Wesley shouted.
Ahead of them a light appeared, then disappeared, then another blinked. Two more flickered off to the right and left, and sounds of movemen grew louder and closer. Dovin Thranic stumbled back into camp, causing a brief alarm. Several people looked at him oddly, but said nothing.
Everyone’s attention remained on sounds from the trees.
Shadowy figures carried torches within the thick weave of the jungle. Slowly they climbed out of the brush and into the clearing around the riverbank. Twenty approached from all sides at once. At first they appeared to be strange monstrous beasts, until they fully entered the clearing revealing themselves as men; stocky, bull-necked brutes with white painted faces, bone armor, and headdresses of long feathers. They moved with ease through the dense brush. In their hands were crude clubs, axes, and spears. They circled in silence, creeping forward.
“We come in peace!” Hadrian heard Dilladrum shout in Tenkin, his voice sounding weak. “We have come to see Warlord Erandabon. We bear a message for him.”
As they grew nearer, they began hooting and howling, shaking their weapons. Some brandished teeth, while others beat their chests or stomped naked feet.
Dilladrum repeated his statement.
One of the larger men, who carried a decorated war axe, stepped forward and approached Dilladrum. “What message?” the Tenkin asked in a harsh, shallow voice.
“It is a sealed letter,” Dilladrum replied. “To be given only to the warlord.”
The man eyed each of them carefully. He grinned and then nodded. “Follow.”
It was clearly the best they could expect, although Dilladrum mopped his forehead with his sleeve as he explained the situation.
The Tenkin howled orders. Torches went out and the rest melted back into the jungle. The leader remained as they quickly broke camp. Then with a motion for them to follow, he ran back into the trees, his torch lighting the way. He led them at a brisk rate that had everyone panting for breath and Bulard near collapse. Dilladrum shouted forward for a rest, or at least a slower pace. The only response was laughter.
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