The Innkeeper's Son

by Jeremy Brooks

  Baneur licked his lips, opened himself up to his power and made the first of what would be nearly one hundred trips that night.

  Chapter Twenty Nine: Dark Clouds

  Jerron yawned deeply and stretched. With the back of his hands he wiped moisture from his eyes and looked around. Peters stood on one end of the trail, Cano on the other. After two nights in the forest, he had finally gotten a little sleep.

  The first night had been horrible. Besieged early on by creatures that seemed to be made of wood, no-one had slept in the aftermath. They had sat together, tightly huddled around a small camp fire until light first began to show through the thick forest canopy. Despite a strong pace, fueled by fear, they had been unable to make it through the forest and eventually were forced to camp in the trail.

  Same as the first night, their camp was attacked by all manner of dark creatures. First there had been at least a dozen rovers. With the sudden appearance of white light shining from Cano’s dagger acting as a signal of danger, they had been able to overcome the attacks without Maehril’s help. Jerron’s axe had tasted the flesh of four of the gruesome beasts.

  Next came a swarm of Purro Bats. There were so many, and they moved so quickly that Maehril had been forced to react. The exertion had weakened her greatly, but she managed to thwart the threat with only Mueller taking an injury. The veteran guardsman had refused healing despite Maehril’s objections, and carried on with nasty gashes on his left shoulder and neck.

  Then just before morning a new evil arrived to test their strength. No-one had a name for the hideous creatures that swung down from the trees with arms longer than their bodies and teeth that could have sawed through wood. All of the horses were killed and dragged away into the darkness of the forest. Hartsohn had nearly died, but Maehril had enough strength left to restore him, and aid in the camp’s defense. Jerron had killed two of those beasts, taking only a gash beneath his ribs in the battle.

  Now the light of morning was starting to peak down around their camp in the trail. Two days and two nights in the forest had taken its toll on everyone. The mood of the group was tired, gloomy and on edge. Peters snapped at anyone who spoke to him. Hartsohn had taken to grunting as a form of communication. Mueller barely spoke at all.

  They needed desperately to get to the other side of the forest and walk once more in the full warmth of the sun. The gloom of the forest had begun to infect them and Jerron secretly feared that if they stayed much longer it would break them as well. It was certainly breaking him.

  Since the first night he had carried the pain of his parent's murder through the stifling darkness of the forest. He fought every moment to contain the sobs that threatened to crack the rigid foundation he had built around his emotions. Only Maehril knew what he held inside. He could feel her eyes on him constantly. Sympathy poured from her, filling the air. From anyone else, Jerron would have resented the pity, but from Maehril, he felt only reassurance and compassion. It was the only thing holding him together.

  “On your feet!” Peters shouted.

  Jerron slowly stood and looked around. Creaking bones and exaggerated yawns broke the dark silence of the trees that surrounded them on either side. Jerron looked ahead hopefully for some sign that the trail was coming to an end, but all he could see were trees. They grew so thickly, right on top of each other. It was suffocating.

  He felt a small hand on his back, rubbing him gently. “Good morning, Maehril,” he said without having to turn around.

  “What’s so good about it?” Peters snapped harshly.

  Jerron didn’t like the dark look in the guardsman’s eyes. Peters was descending into madness. He had the look of a rabid dog.

  “We’re still alive,” Jerron answered, fingering the hilt of his axe.

  Peters eyes watched Jerron’s cautionary gesture. He spat on the side of the trail, snarled, and said nothing.

  “We need to keep an eye on that one,” Cano whispered.

  “We need to get out of this God forsaken place,” Jerron replied, warily.

  With no horses left, they worked their way down the trail on foot. Mueller took the lead, a silent figure setting a fast pace. Cano went second followed by Jerron and Maehril. Hartsohn and Peters guarded the flank. They moved with the taciturn sullenness of a funeral procession. No-one spoke. No-one had anything to say.

  For hours they walked the thin trail. Jerron had begun to feel as if there were something behind them, following in the shadows. He looked over his shoulder constantly, scanning the forest. Rationality told him it was the foreboding sense of the Imperial squadron closing the gap in their hunt. Intuition told him it was something else. Something dark.

  Maehril seemed to sense it too. Worry crested her thin eyebrows and set into her hazel eyes. A few times Jerron caught her looking back as well.

  “Do you feel it too?” he asked her.

  He didn’t need to elaborate on his question. She nodded tensely.

  “What are ya talking bout?” Cano asked.

  “There’s something following us,” Jerron said.

  “What?” Cano asked.

  Jerron turned up his hands and shrugged. “Something. I’ve been feeling it all morning. Maehril feels it too.”

  Cano glared around at the trees. He pulled his knife out of his belt sheath and inspected the blade expecting to see a white glow. The blade was plain. Cano took a minute to contemplate what that meant, before returning it to its sheath. “Stay on yer toes, boy.”

  More time passed and still the trail dragged on with no end in sight. Jerron vigilantly watched their sides and back. After a time he began to understand what he was feeling. Behind them, the forest was getting darker. Like an illusion, the shadows around them seemed to move. The trees appeared to edge in, leaning toward them, closing off the trail in steady increments.

  Abruptly, Mueller ordered them to stop. Something was blocking the trail up ahead. A large black form lay motionless. Jerron craned his neck trying to make it out. It looked to be some kind of animal.

  “Peters,” Mueller ordered with a harsh whisper, “come with me. The rest of you stay back.”

  Peters pushed through to Mueller’s side, and the two men cautiously closed the gap. Cano had his dagger in his hand and couldn’t resist the urge to follow them. Jerron slid closer to Maehril, reaching back with his hand to make sure she was there. The panic he felt slid away in an instant when he felt her small hand take his in a tight grip.

  “It’s a horse,” Peters called out.

  “It’s your horse, Jerron,” Mueller added.

  “It is. It’s Starcryer,” Cano cried out. “Damned shifty beast must have met his end.”

  “Doesn’t make sense,” Peters was kneeling down inspecting the lifeless horse. “I can’t find a wound anywhere. And he’s still warm.”

  “Is he breathing?” Mueller asked.

  “My dagger…” Cano suddenly said as the blade burst into light.

  A sound like air being sucked into a vacuum suddenly filled the forest around them. A dark mist, like a shadow with substance, rose up from the ground. Jerron instinctively fell on top of Maehril while the others stood agape. The mist swirled above them growing larger and blacker. The trees along the trail seemed to move back, giving it room to enlarge. Then it shot like an arrow at the horse in the trail. It absorbed into Starcryers flesh and disappeared.

  For a moment it felt as if the threat had passed. Jerron stood, offering his hand to pull Maehril to her feet. Looks of fear were exchanged among the group.

  Then the horse's body began to move and twitch. Its hair ignited in flames burning down to its flesh. The exposed skin started to bubble and expand. A mutation began. What had been Jerron’s horse was slowly transforming into a dark horror. The hoofs formed into clawed hands attached to long muscular arms and legs. Wings sprung from its back, stretching out wide, a canvas of black membrane slung over bone. It stood on its new legs, a blood chilling cry releasing from its mutating jaw.

  Jer
ron put his arm out to keep Maehril behind him, and pulled his axe from his belt loop. Horns like a ram's, black as a sky without moons, topped Starcryer’s head finishing its conversion. He stared the beast right in its cold black eyes. For all of its transformation, the eyes still belonged to his horse, and Jerron would swear that he could see sadness there. Or was it self-loathing?

  Starcryer reached out with one of his new arms and pointed at Cano. It roared a guttural shriek with such force that Mueller and Peters, standing closest, fell backwards.

  A song, like a choir of a million children lifting their voices to the heavens, broke the panic. Jerron looked back at Maehril and fell to his knees. She was bathed in white light, beaming from her eyes, her mouth, and her fingertips. She was floating above the ground.

  A ray of light, pure as fresh snow, tore from her outstretched hands aimed lethally at Starcryer. The dark beast managed to dodge the attack, jumping into the air and soaring with impossible speed into the canopy above. Maehril followed his flight, lacing beam after beam at Starcryer. But her power continuously missed its mark. Starcryer darted and weaved through the branches above, too quick to be struck.

  In all of the commotion, Jerron realized that he had been dazzled by Maehril’s brilliant display of power. Slowly though, he understood that she was failing. To stop Starcryer, it would take muscle and steel.

  “Stop her Cano!” he screamed at the old sailor who was watching the spectacle with an open jaw.

  Cano came to his senses, shaking his head and looking around as if he’d been under a spell.

  “Stop her!” Jerron screamed again. “She can’t keep this up. We may need her still.”

  Cano seemed to understand. At a run he dove at Maehril, taking her down in his arms, then covering her eyes with his gnarled, bony hands. Immediately the light that surrounded her wavered and died. Cano took her in his arms and cradled her as she swooned wearily in and out of consciousness. The old man was careful to keep his dagger clear and his eyes on the beast above.

  “What manner of evil is this?” Hartsohn asked, aghast.

  Starcryer could tell that Maehril was spent and swooped down at them. Peters charged and met the beast in the air just as Cano rolled Maehril off to the side. Jerron saw Peters sword flash and catch a taste of flesh. Black blood sprayed Peters face before he was flung viciously to the side, crashing with lethal force into a tree beside the trail. The young guardsman fell in a heap and lay still.

  Starcryer stood and faced Cano, once again roaring its shrill battle cry. Jerron and Hartsohn charged next. Hartsohn led with his sword, arriving a step ahead of Jerron. Starcryer swung an arm and backhanded the soldier, sending him sailing into a tree just like Peters.

  Jerron didn’t hesitate. He dove and brought his axe down into Starcryers leg before it had a chance to recover from its attack on Hartsohn. Blood, thick and black, spouted from the gash, and Starcryer fell to its side, crying out in pain. Jerron made a move to swing again, but his axe had become embedded into the bone in Starcryer’s leg. He frantically pulled at his axe as Mueller came over his back, a sword strike aimed at Starcryer’s chest. The beast caught Mueller by his blade arm and diverted the blow. Then he picked Mueller up and heaved him down the path. The old guardsman landed roughly on the trail, nearly thirty feet away.

  Jerron made one last frenzied attempt to free his axe. Then Starcryer’s hands closed around his chest and lifted him into the air. The beast brought Jerron up to its face and sniffed him from his waist up. Jerron gagged on its hot breath. He looked right into Starcryer’s black lifeless eyes knowing what was about to happen. The beast opened its jaw wide and moved to rip off Jerron’s head.

  Just as the teeth closed in around him and Jerron closed his eyes to accept his cruel, gruesome death, the beast screamed and dropped him. Jerron landed hard on the trail at its feet and looked up. Cano had thrust his blade into Starcryer’s ribs. Maehril held his other hand, and white light surrounded them both, igniting their eyes, filtering into the blade. From the wound a network of white light, like a spider’s web, formed and spread across Starcryer’s torso, then to it’s arms, legs and head. With a final cry of pain, an explosion of light ripped the creature apart, scattering remains in an arc over the trees that surrounded the trail.

  Jerron lay on his back, staring at Maehril and Cano with utter astonishment. He tried to force himself to breathe, to overcome the paralyzing sensation of being within an inch of your life. Jerron watched unable to move as the light faded from Maehril and Cano and the two fell against each other on the ground right next to him.

  For awhile, they lay there, all three on their backs catching their breath. Slowly Cano sat up and reached for his dagger which lay beside him on the trail. He looked it over, shaking his head in disbelief.

  Maehril sat up slowly as well. She looked around weakly. When she was certain that Jerron and Cano were alright, she got to her feet and wobbled unsteadily toward Mueller. Jerron rose and took her by the arm, helping her along to the old soldier. They found him alive, but barely conscious. His eyes fluttered in his head as they called his name. Then Maehril drew from her power, what little was left, and poured it into Mueller. It took only moments, but he suddenly sat up and took stock of the situation.

  Jerron could feel Maehril’s weakness as she struggled to her feet and moved toward Hartsohn. She had barely made it several steps when her legs gave out. Jerron took her in his arms, still shaking from the adrenaline of the fight, and carried her the rest of the way to Hartsohn. Sadly the poor man was dead. His back had been broken and blood poured from his mouth. Tears stained Maehril’s cheeks as Jerron turned to bring her to check on Peters.

  They walked back across the trail and inspected the woods, but could not find the young man’s body. Cano and Mueller came and joined them in the search. They found a tree stained with blood, both black and red, but Peters was nowhere to be found.

  “This doesn’t make sense,” Mueller was shaking his head. The old soldier knelt down by the bloody tree inspecting the ground. “There are tracks here. Peters tracks, I’m sure of it. They lead off into the forest. Where did he go?”

  “I saw him hit that tree,” Cano said, peering into the forest’s depths. “No way he could’ve survived that.”

  Mueller nodded in agreement. He stood and followed Peters' tracks a few steps into the forest. “Peters!” he called out. “Peters!”

  Cano joined him, calling the young guardsman’s name. Neither man was willing to venture any deeper into the woods though.

  “We can’t just leave him out there,” Jerron said. He readied his axe and made a move for the forest. Maehril grabbed his arm and stopped him. “We can’t leave him, Maehril. Not here,” Jerron implored her.

  Exhaustion was plain on Maehril’s face, but she shook her head adamantly. She didn’t want Jerron to follow.

  Jerron searched her eyes, trying to find a reason that she would abandon the man to the darkness of forest. She gave him nothing but steadfast insistence that the cause was lost.

  Suddenly Cano was at his side with a bony hand on his shoulder. “Peters is lost, my boy. Lost to the darkness that rules this place.”

  “But we can find him,” Jerron pleaded. “We have to try.”

  “Ya don’t understand, Jerron,” Cano looked him right in the eye. “The darkness already has him. He’s gone.”

  Jerron wanted to call the old sailor a coward. He wanted to tell Maehril the same thing. How could they leave him to die? Then Maehril stepped forward and took his face in her tiny, soft hands. She commanded his attention, implored him to see what he was missing.

  He understood. Peters had become possessed by the same evil that had claimed Starcryer. That evil had used Peters as a vessel to flee. He was beyond rescue.

  “How did you know, Cano?” Jerron asked, feeling as though all of the emotions he had bottled up inside might explode.

  “Maehril knows,” Cano answered quietly, compassionately. “Sometimes I feel as if I
know jest what she’s thinking. And jest now, I understood. She’s the light, my boy. In matters of darkness, we must trust her, always.”

  “Maehril is right,” Mueller said. He gave the small girl a fond look. It was the first smile Jerron had seen on the man’s face in days.

  Maehril went back to Hartsohn’s body and knelt down. She laid her hands over him, and an aura of white light shone from her body. Hartsohn erupted in white flames, burning like a cocoon around his body. It was a controlled cremation. In moments the former guardsman was nothing but ash. When the flames had died out, Maehril went back to the trail.

  “Why didn’t you bury him?” Jerron asked.

  “If she buried him, his spirit would have been trapped within the darkness of this place. The flames released his spirit to the air,” Cano answered.

  “So what now?” Jerron asked.

  “We continue moving forward,” Mueller stepped back down onto the trail. He looked east as though he could see an end, however far it might be. “We will always be pursued. We will always court danger. It is the mantle that we must bear if we are to hold true to our oaths to protect her. People will die. We have lost enough, to be sure, and in the end any of we three may meet an end as gruesome as our companions. But we will continue pushing forward. Until Desirmor breathes his last cursed breath, and a true king sits upon the throne of Fandrall, we will push forward, and we will fight.”

  Mueller turned from them and began to walk down the trail. Cano gave Jerron a wink, then followed. Maehril took Jerron’s hand and gave it a squeeze. A smile lit her face. Jerron smiled back, but he knew that Maehril was wearing a mask. He had witnessed her capacity for love first hand when she had buried the two dead soldiers back at the fishing hole. She carried every death like a wound across her heart. He knew she was in pain. Peters, Hartsohn and Cressler had died for her. That was no small sacrifice.