That evening the duo passed through a village and continued south after a visit to the inn turned up a merchant that swore a certain Cero had stolen his blanket before taking the southern road the day before. By now Urake was worried that Skeln had been going to the Draeld instead of the Forks. The main road to The Forks split off in the village that they were in. There was always the possibility that Skeln would try approaching The Forks from the south to throw off trackers but the chances of him being in the city were dwindling.
Emeck was fit and only appeared to need a little sleep every now and then to keep going. Half the night was spent in travel before a short rest refreshed them for continued walking. Their push through the night was sure to eat up the lead that Skeln had on them. By Urake’s calculations they were only half to a quarter day behind now. Another push was sure to catch up to Skeln.
It was mid-morning when they arrived in a village. There were people running all over the place and everything was turned upside down. Discreetly they found that a wanted fugitive had been sighted and a reward for apprehension was being offer for dead or alive. Urake’s blood chilled when he heard the fugitive described as blond and blue eyed.
Urake and Emeck began a search of their own and turned up a few clues. The story was that a couple men from the hills had joined the boy and had entered town as evening fell that night. They had met a soldier in the tavern who described their erstwhile travel companion. From that point guards had been set on the roads and a search had begun of the village. Urake found that nothing had been discovered of the boy in town. Emeck on the other hand found that the guards posted on the southern exit had called their friends and disappeared into the early morning. No one as yet had picked up on this. Urake and Emeck could ill afford the time it took to get a meal and rest their feet before they moved out going south.
The road was a poor dirt track in spots that still had the prints of five men and as many hounds over those of a youth. Urake moved as fast as he could but had to pause from time to time from exhaustion. The last couple days had been taxing in the extremes and now the sore muscles were catching up. In a couple spots Urake detected Skeln’s special brand of trail camouflage. In one spot all five men forsook the trail and traveled for a hundred feet through the heart of briar patch before returning to the road. This phenomenon was repeated a couple more times with variation depending on the terrain.
Evening caught them miles away from the village but not noticeably closer to Skeln. An hour or so after dusk set Emeck stumbled and gasped for breath for a few minutes with stark terror written on his face. When he recovered Urake questioned him.
“He was near here someplace. I sensed him and several others. I can’t explain it but there were more than the five.” Emeck sat recovering as he tried to tell what he had seen.
“How many were there?” Urake wanted to know if the men he was following had met up with anyone.
“I'm not sure but I do know that they had Skeln then other people came and then the five disappeared. Whatever it was that happened to them they were terrified. Then all of a sudden everything was gone. Now I can’t sense anything out there.” Emeck did however have a general idea of what direction he had sensed Skeln from. It was off the road and a distance had been covered when they saw an orange glow. They then were able to make for that point in the dim moonlight.
Emeck stayed back and Urake crept up to the fire with an arrow notched on the bow. Nothing was moving around the fire as he approached and no hound let off a warning surprisingly. When Urake had gotten close enough to see the space around the fire he understood why. All five men were dead with three of the hounds with them. Emeck was called over and a brief investigation uncovered a fourth hound a few paces away from the fire. Whatever had killed these people and hounds had left not a mark on them. There was a tree a couple paces from the fire where Urake found a frayed rope but nothing else. There was no use trying to follow a trail through the brush in this light so Urake and Emeck unrolled their bed rolls in a nearby gully. Sleep overtook them soon enough but was interrupted periodically by nightmares filled with unknown terrors. Sleep wasn’t as restful as usual.
When morning arrived Urake returned to the site of the fire and conducted a more thorough investigation. He again noted that not a mark marred the corpses however in the light he was able to see the blood that had flowed from eyes, nose and ears. Urake had never ever come across creatures of beings capable of doing this to a person. Investigation around the site revealed a fifth hound’s broken body in the bottom of a steep gulley. Of Skeln there was no sign to be found.
The land was broken rock and covered with patches of knee to head high brush and the occasional lonely tree. The sky was obscured by a wispy fog that hugged the ground preventing a view of the land and sense of direction. Finding a small knoll Urake caught a glimpse of a sea of fog broken by the randomly placed trees and a few sharp piles of rock. The Draeld swamps were foreboding when the sun deigned to shine but now it was an imposing landmark less wilderness.
Emeck was sitting with his back to the dead when Urake returned to the campsite. The signs pointed to Skeln having been there but a full search of the area hadn’t turned up a body leading Urake to believe that the boy yet lived.
“Did... did you find him?” Emeck still stared anywhere but at the dead trackers.
“Not a sign. Have you sensed anything since last night?” Urake debated giving the men burials or leaving them for others to find.
“No. I tried but it is like before. Not gone but hidden. Not like them. They are gone.” Emeck jerked his head over his shoulder towards the dead men.
“So he is still alive. Perhaps he witnessed the men die and escaped later. I doubt that he would have escaped before.” Urake thought aloud.
“Did whoever did this take him?” Emeck questioned.
“There are no other tracks. I found Skeln’s for a little ways but lost them on a boulder field. He was alone at that point.” Urake responded.
“What did that to them? I never seen anyone die like that.” Emeck hugged his knees and shivered in the damp.
“Honestly I have no idea. There is no blood on their weapons so whatever did this to them wasn’t harmed.” Urake paused and thought for a moment. “Come to think of it, no wild animal could have done this. It had to have been someone Gifted. If that was the case then they might have taken Skeln with them. There isn’t any other tracks though.” Urake scowled at this flaw.
“They could still be out there somewhere.” Emeck peered futilely into the deepening fog.
“You are right. We should move on.” Urake concurred and they returned to their gulley to gather their packs and continued out into the vast wastes of the Draeld Swamps. Urake hoped that he would come across a clue that might help him. Until such time he was as much at home here as in a city.
The fog burned off near noon revealing a broken landscape. Here and there a spring emptied into a black pond that stank to high heaven of water that had been undisturbed for who knows how long. The rotting vegetation around the edges added to the smell. Urake knew that further south one could find bogs that grown men had entered never to be heard from again. The north Draeld was sunbaked in the summer and never saw the sun in the winter. The transition time between was now yet the dangers presented were not entirely negated. Urake cautioned Emeck to only step on stone if he could help it and never to walk across the occasional green looking clearings. These were mats of vegetation that hid deep pools of the black water underneath. If you didn’t drown the serpents that dwelt in these areas would probably be your end.
By afternoon Urake had three of these dreaded serpents headless in a sack at his side. Two had been beheaded for the simple crime of appearing within sword reach and the third had received an arrow for rattling on a boulder a few paces away. Emeck eyed the writhing sack and grew pale when Urake informed him what supper was going to entail. When they did decide to stop the day was nearly gone. A small fire was started and Urake set
about preparing the finally stilled reptiles for cooking. He had two of them skinned and gutted when he stopped and stared into the fire.
“Emeck, is that you?” The question was terse and startled the lad.
“No. What is it?” Emeck watched as Urake closed his eyes and concentrated.
“Someone is trying to track me. It feels familiar but I can’t place it. Can you sense it?” Urake still had his eyes closed in concentration.
Emeck opened his mind a little only to be impacted by a powerful mind. The entity tried to force its way past his defenses with ruthless force. It was only when Emeck barricaded himself deep within his own mind that he escaped the entity's grasp. Being a telepath himself he had found ways of preventing himself from accidently reading other people. These same skills it seemed worked at keeping others out as well. When he opened his eyes again he found that he was laying on the ground and Urake was shaking his shoulders. It took a minute before the senses he had abandoned returned. Sound and touch were among the last to assert themselves.
“I thought that it had killed you. You collapsed and stopped breathing. Even your heart stopped.” Urake sounded concerned as Emeck rubbed the lump that was forming on the back of his head. A head ach was already pounding.
“He wanted control of my mind like what I do when I see through someone’s eyes. I didn’t know what it was like to be on the receiving end.” Emeck rubbed his temples tenderly.
“Ungifted people never notice. It’s only a missing moment or two in their memory. Gifted especially telepaths or normal people that train their minds can sense what is happening. Did he get anything?” Urake was satisfied that Emeck would survive unharmed accept for the goose egg the lad had gotten when he fell down. He was still a little curious about how Emeck had appeared dead momentarily.
“I don’t think so. All I could think about was escaping and hiding from him then everything got quiet. That was when I opened my eyes again. It was really strange. Like floating in an ocean that was suddenly as still as glass. I almost didn’t want to leave.”
“Did you get anything else?” Urake asked.
“Not much. Just that whoever it was old and powerful. He was a long ways away. That way I think.” Emeck pointed almost directly north.
“I swear I recognized whoever it was. I think I encountered him a long time ago.” Urake mused for a moment before returning to cooking. Emeck’s headache was beginning to abate.
*****
Reigns paced his study with a parchment in hand. Fury was evident on his features. The captain who had been dispatched to track the boy from the Garoche highlands had returned to the castle. All the captains of the elite companies were trained on how to build a profile of an individual for a telepath to use in tracking. Reigns had not killed every one that had come under his control. Only those that were dangerous or simply too weak to be useful. A few were useful for his purposes and so they languished safely deep in the dungeon.
The captain had reported that the trail was far too old to follow. Reigns had decided that this warranted a different approach and summonsed a tracker telepath that he had acquired more than twenty years before. The man had been uniquely powerful but was equally harmless. His powers only extended to locating individuals and reading them. Confined deep within the dungeon the man was unable to contact anyone and as such was not a threat to Reigns.
In the past the man had been instrumental in helping track down numerous escaped Gifted individuals. Obedience was implicit. Each of Reign’s special agents knew that their life was worthless beyond their continued service. The half elf knew how to control these individuals. Some he broke and others he held people of value hostage in order to ensure their obedience. This tracker had been a natural slave and had submitted after only a little threatening. Now the man was pale and aged from his prolonged imprisonment in the bowels of the earth. Reigns knew that his valuable agents wouldn’t last long in small damp cells so he kept them comfortable and fed as long as they obeyed him.
Back to the problem that infuriated Reigns. The tracker had been ordered to find the lad. After taking what he needed from the captain, despite the limited details, he had begun searching down the continent. After a couple hours, he had discovered the village where Skeln had last been seen. He relayed to Reigns that a group of trackers had taken off on the trail but another group had found them today dead to the last man in the Draeld. Now no one was willing to risk swamp revenants and refused to enter the Draeld again. This was infuriating in itself but what happened next was worse.
The man had been instructed to begin searching the Draeld for the boy. This had progressed for a few minutes before the man mentioned having found a couple people. This became of further interest when the man said he thought he recognized one of the individuals. Before any further information had been divulged the tracker had jerked to his feet gasping for breath and holding his heart. One word was choked out before the tracker had fallen to the floor dead.
The death of the tracker was merely an annoyance. Another one could be found even though that particular gift was rarely manifested and since the now dead man not with that level of power. What was most infuriating was the man’s last word. This is what burned in Reign’s mind like a red hot coal in a bed of tinder. “Asgare.” That single word irked Reigns above all else.
Not that this was the only thing annoying him. The parchment in hand detailed that the two shadow hunters sent into the mountains had vanished without a trace and the elite squad sent after them had hardly set foot into the mountains before they had been set upon by a flight of dragons. Only one had escaped to carry word out but the letter had been sent by another who stated that the soldier had died of his injuries after delivering the tale.
Giving over to rage Reigns dashed the letter to the floor and swept half the contents of his desk after it. Feeling oddly calmed by the outburst he sank into his chair. Now he knew more than he had a short while ago. Now he knew that the Asgare yet lived and in all probability still carried Ice Heart. Also that the man was not alone. That he had somehow killed at great distance. This was a new skill to add to the list of already incredible things the assassin was supposedly capable of. That last entry in that list had been the ability to evade hundreds of the best trackers and hounds in the land combined with the manpower of half the army.
The issue of the dragons was not any clearer. Already Reigns had lost two of his best elite squads to the search for this rumored village. For some reason the dragons were especially protective of their borders in the last years and suffered no incursions. It seemed unlikely that an entire village existed behind these same borders.
Reigns thought back and unearthed a few details that may or may not have been relevant. That winter fifteen or so years ago when Reigns had been busy hunting down the Asgare the dragons had expanded their borders. At the time Reigns had been occupied and had thought nothing of it. If a village had existed in the area then it was likely that no one had survived the border expansion. Still if it was true then it could mean that they had figured out how to control dragons. If that was the case then immeasurable power was in the hands of mere peasants. Either way the odds were that any further forays in that field would meet with the same unpleasant results. Too bad the tracker was dead. He could have been useful in confirming a human presence behind the border.
Chapter Fourteen
Brounn was not behind the bar like usual. Right now he was seated at one of his tables engaged in conversation with a loyal patron. The man wasn’t an agent or anything of the like. Just a drunkard who frequented the ale house. He did however have a minute value in that he worked as a groom for the burgomeister of Warton. Every now and again a morsel of information of value fell unintentionally from the man’s liquor numbed mind.
Today a veritable wealth of information was being gleaned carefully by Brounn. It seems that the chancellor had given orders to myriad of his agents to be on the search for a blond haired blue eyed youth the length and breadth of th
e land. The burgomeister had been receiving and dispatching couriers all morning. It occurred to Brounn that he should place an agent in the household of the burgomeister in an attempt to intercept some of those dispatches. As is was any link in the chancellor's spy network was worth keeping an eye on.
As the Asgare’s network began waking up Brounn had received numerous reports that another network was active in the land. It wasn’t as secretive as the Asgare’s because the chancellor was at its head and had no reason to hide. Brounn had long suspected that another network was in operation but had not until recently had any kind of access to it.
The man was now too far gone in his ale to reveal any more useful information so Brounn began levering his bulk out of his chair. It was just at that moment that the door opened and a soldier stepped inside and peered into the gloom in a searching manner. Brounn hesitated before getting fully to his feet. If he had been found out a full squad would have been sent instead of the lone soldier in an under captain’s uniform.
“Where is Brawn?” The under captain addressed the serving woman near at hand.
“Brounn and it’s the fat one over there.” The woman didn’t pay any more attention to the under captain as she returned to dragging an insensible drunk to the corner. Brounn walked behind the counter and made his way over as the soldier looked him up and down.
“What’s your pleasure? I have a fresh keg of a nice bitter or a new bottle of the best red from a local vineyard. If you are hungry then there is some soup over the hearth in the back and some black rye to go with it” Brounn’s keen eyes caught the glint of the medallion that marked the under captain as an agent of the chancellor’s.
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