by Devon Vesper
Branis seemed to visibly deflate where he stood and his eyes trailed from staring at Valis to focusing on the flickering flames that danced in the center of the circle of leadership. It wasn’t his fault, though. Valis knew where his anguish came from, for he felt it, too. He felt like a failure for not getting to the estate sooner, for not doing more, doing it faster, for being too slow, too focused on other things, no matter how important they were.
But duty remained that the anchor teams weren’t exactly their objective for this mission. The true objective was neutralizing Braywar and his nest of Qos adherents. Cassavin and Nevesar weren’t as important in the grand scheme of things, but they were important to Valis, and to the reliquary guards who called the women their friend.
“What will we do?” he asked. “Surely you know they’re being tortured. There is no way Qos adherents aren’t taking complete joy in breaking their minds and bodies to get information.”
Valis sighed and rested his hand on the hilt of his sword at his hip. “I know you are worried about them. I am, too. But we need to wait at least until we have a good idea of what’s going on inside that compound.”
“And that’s what we are here for,” Jintas said. “My men and women will get the information Valis needs to form a plan for both the eradication of the nest and Cassavin and Nevesar’s rescue. They know that, if they deem it safe to do so, they are to get the women to safety, but their first priority is information retrieval—how many are there total? How many are in each building? Where are the leaders? Where are the girls located? They have many questions to answer but rest assured, they will be quick, efficient, and thorough. You have my word of honor.”
“And what are you going to do while the scouts are out?” Branis asked.
Valis raised a brow at him and stared him down until Branis looked away. “I’ll be resting and conserving my strength for the battle ahead, as you should be doing during this time. Or do you think yourself invincible?” Crossing his arms, Valis sighed and continued staring him down. “Why are you so ornery now? Normally you’re so quiet and laid back that nothing phases you. What happened?”
Branis shook his head and rubbed at his eyes. “Cass is my sister, and Nev might as well be, too.”
“Ah.” Valis let his aggressive posture relax. “They are strong, capable women. They knew what could happen going into this mission. And they can withstand this for another day. Rest your heart, because it’s likely they will need your love and care once we rescue them.”
Nodding, Branis took a step back and seemed to fade into the background as he normally did. How could Cassavin be related to him with how confident she was? Valis couldn’t fathom it, so he let it drop.
“Jintas, I want all of your people out there to get a solid idea of their numbers,” Valis said.
Jintas nodded and scratched at the shaggy red beard he hadn’t been able to trim in months. “I’ll send them all if you cloak them with your invisibility spell. That would greatly cut down their risk factor.”
“Agreed.”
Valis turned to the Kalutakeni who had joined them. “Venabi. I want you and your people to go with them. Secure the perimeter, hide the bodies, get in there, get your counts, and get back here. No heroics. I don’t want any more of my friends dead on this trip. Understood?”
“Sir!”
Valis took a deep breath and willed shields to envelop those in the scouting party. Once he turned them invisible, Valis added a parameter so they could see each other, then broke it off from his magic reserves. When he finished, he nodded, “Go now. Your shields will mask your footsteps. You can see each other, but no one else can. Be careful.”
“What do we do while we wait?” Tavros asked.
Valis laced his fingers with Tavros’s and gave a firm squeeze. “We get our armor on before anything else. Everyone should keep a few layers on, but this means shedding layers so we can still move freely.”
A few of the men and women groaned, but everyone went to their gear and started pulling off layers so they’d fit into their padding and armor. At least the padding would afford a bit of extra warmth. Valis only hoped it didn’t negatively affect Tavros after he’d been so sick only days before.
And that thought nearly killed him. Valis started debating the pros and cons of telling Tavros to stay back with the horses. But he already knew how that argument would go down, and he didn’t want to alienate his husband. Still, as Tavros took off his first shirt, Valis stepped closer. “Tav—”
“You’d better not be trying to ask me to stay behind,” Tavros growled. “I know that look. That’s your worried look. That’s your ‘I think it’s the right thing, and I’ll browbeat Tavros into doing what I want one way or another’ look. That’s your fucking ‘I just want you to be safe and well’ look.”
He got up in Valis’s face, but instead of yelling, he cupped Valis’s cheeks and kissed him softly. “I know you’re worried. But I had Dawn give me a bottle of that putrid shit she kept shoving down my throat. And I’ll take it after we’re done, okay? I won’t complain. … Well, I won’t complain much. The shit is nasty, Valis.”
Valis let out a breath and nodded. “All right. You’re right. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry, my love,” Tavros said as he pulled away. He shed another shirt and put it on top of his pack. “I’d do the same to you if our positions were reversed.”
Leaning in, Valis whispered against the shell of Tavros’s ear. “I think, after this, our positions should be reversed.”
“Insatiable shit,” Tavros muttered, but his grin lit up the cold, gray evening.
“Can’t help it if I didn’t get to thoroughly enjoy you back in Venoz because of our friends.” Valis kissed Tavros’s ear and went back to shedding layers until he shivered and raced to put his padding on over top.”
“Valis!”
Valis paused with his padding and turned around. “What is it, Maph?”
Maphias jogged over, his breath puffing out in huge, cloudy plumes. “Something’s coming.” He pointed back where they had come, and Valis could just barely make out a black dot in the distance. Whatever it was, it was huge to make such an impression from so far away.
“How fast do you think it’s moving?” Valis asked. “Your best guess.”
Maphias glanced up, studying the black speck. “Best guess? It should be upon us by midnight, possibly later. It’s not moving all that fast.”
“Right.” Valis rubbed his eyes, fighting against an incipient headache. “Send a team out to greet whoever it is. Two reliquary guards, four Aesriphos, and ten laymen.”
“Yes, sir.” Maphias smirked at the honorific. “And if they’re hostile?”
“I doubt they are,” Valis said. “I’m not getting the precognitive pitting. It could be anyone, but my guess is it’s the rest of our army. We spent so long in Venoz City waiting for Tav to heal that they could have caught up with us. If it is them, then we should hold off our attack until they rejoin us.”
“And if it’s not?” Shyvus asked. He walked around Maphias and gave Valis a hard look. “You are sending off a team who could be going to their deaths.”
Groaning, Valis went back to putting his padding on. “Would you feel better if I scried after them? Because no matter what we do, they will be upon us soon, and judging by the mass of that black dot, I’d be willing to bet they would greatly outnumber us.” He shrugged and turned to help Tavros get his breastplate on as he continued, “I’d rather deal with the initial conflict away from the estate where we’re about to lay siege. Too much noise will take away our element of surprise if we still have it at all.”
“You’re being awfully flippant about it,” Shyvus said in a disapproving tone. “How would the army even know how to get here?”
Valis glanced to the side at the giant furrow they had melted into the snowbanks to get to where they now stood. Then he turned to Shyvus with a perked brow. “Seriously, Shy?”
Shyvus snorted. “Point t
aken. But that also means our enemies could follow us. What if that town we stopped in for maps decided to come help Braywar eliminate us?”
“What’s your real fear?” Valis asked. “This isn’t about the black dot on the horizon. What’s going on?”
Shyvus glanced over his shoulder at the steep hill and raked his fingers through his hair before adjusting the shirt he had about his head as a makeshift hat. They couldn’t wear their cloaks into battle because they would get in the way and hinder movement.
Sighing, Shyvus shook his head. “Just a bad feeling.”
“I’ll scry after them, Shy. Just let me get my armor on.”
“Thank you.”
“At least I didn’t send out the team,” Maphias cut in. “That would have been awkward.”
Valis snorted. He finished with his armor in short order, and when he stood tall, he pulled his pocket watch out and focused on the black mass that steadily crept closer.
When the clouds stopped swirling and showed him a herd of riderless black horses followed by a few Kalutakeni who rode close to keep the herd together, Valis grinned and snapped his watch shut, ending the scry. “They’re ours. Rest your heart, Shyvus. It’s our army.”
He turned to Maphias and nodded. “Send a few laymen and two Aesriphos to escort them in and apprise them of our situation. Try to get them to ride harder so they’re here before we head in to crush this nest.”
“At once.”
As Maphias left, Valis focused on that black amorphous blob in the distance. Had everyone made it, or would he find some faces missing?
He had to shake it off. Thoughts like that would drown him if he let them. This was war. People die in wars. Valis sighed as he tried to force himself to let it go, but he still hoped, with all his being, that his army was whole.
Valis heard the shuffling of snow behind him. He quickly whirled around, drawing his sword, only to find Jintas. The mercenary leader bowed. “I have news.”
“Go ahead.” He waved for Jintas to stand upright. Having people bow to him still felt strange. “Report.”
Jintas stood tall. He was slightly out of breath, but he otherwise seemed fine. “My team is still dispatching sentries. We’ve infiltrated the compound, and it’s full, Valis. I mean… in each house, there are people sleeping multiples per bed, people on couches, in chairs, on the floors in every room. It’s the same in the manse.” He shook his head and twisted a lock of his beard in an uncharacteristic show of nerves. “Right now they greatly outnumber us. Even if we had the rest of our army, they would still outnumber us by a large margin.”
Valis frowned and started pacing. “Are they all asleep?”
“A few, but not all,” Jintas said. “Most of them are getting ready for something. We weren’t able to ascertain what it is, but my mercenaries are working on finding out.”
Nodding, Valis glanced back toward the incoming army. “We’ll have backup soon. But for now, I want your assassins to be extremely careful, but kill as many of the sleeping adherents as possible without alerting the others. I want them dead without sending up an alarm. Once we shake that nest, we’re going to get swarmed. Let’s take out as many as we can before they realize what’s happening.”
“At your leave, Grand Master.”
Valis nodded and renewed his invisibility shield. “You’re dismissed. Be careful.”
Once Jintas was out of earshot, Tavros clanked his gauntlet-covered hand onto Valis’s pauldron. “It never gets old, does it?”
“What?” Valis asked. “What do you mean?”
“The deference people show you,” Tavros replied. “You always got so uncomfortable about it, but now you just smirk and move on.”
“I’m surprised they don’t do the same to you.” Valis grabbed Tavros’s hand and led him to the middle of the tents. “They don’t seem to show you any deference even though you hold the same title.”
Tavros shook his head. “I’m not a leader, and they know it, even if not consciously. They look to you to lead, and me to keep you from falling victim to the magic you wield.”
Sighing, Valis nodded. He couldn’t dispute that. So, pushing that thought aside, Valis motioned for Seza to come, and when she got close, Valis ordered, “Assemble the leaders, please. Time for a briefing.”
“Yes, sir.”
And having his friends show deference was weirder than anything else.
It took a few minutes for the leaders to assemble. The only one missing was Jintas, but he had a mission to accomplish first. Valis took a deep breath and pointed toward the oncoming black blob in the distance. “Keep quiet, but our army is on their way. They should be here in a few hours or less. I’ve dispatched a team to welcome them and light a fire under their asses to get here soon.”
A few of the leaders chuckled, but most had that hard, cold look of a warrior about to go into battle. They knew, just as Valis did, that some of them wouldn’t make it out of the compound with their lives. The reality of war shrouded everyone, even those trying to find a little light in an unintentional joke before they faced the darkness to come.
And Valis could already feel that darkness growing like a boil under the skin—festering and getting ready to explode. It took a few moments to realize what he was feeling wasn’t his imagination. It stemmed from the compound on the other side of the hill that protected them from view.
The wave of dark power nearly overwhelmed Valis, but no one else seemed affected. Valis was about to say something about it when he heard someone approaching behind him. He turned and Jintas bowed, his right hand clenched over his heart.
“Report,” Valis prompted since it seemed Jintas was awaiting permission to speak.
Jintas relaxed, and only then could Valis see the fine tremors in the mercenary leader’s hand. “Apologies, Grand Master.” He took a deep breath and clenched both fists by his sides. “There are bodies piled in the cellar, their blood collected in a circular trough. Most are Aesriphos, the rest seem to be villagers or Qos adherents. I could not tell.” He shuddered hard. “It’s a maze down there. We almost didn’t make it out.
He swallowed hard and spat to the side. “I can still taste the blood in the air. Can almost feel the miasma coating my skin. It was horrific, and I have seen many horrors in my short life.”
“I’m sorry you had to face such horrors.” Valis gave Jintas a moment to collect himself and calm down before asking, “And the others?” He took out his pocket watch. “There should be survivors.”
Jintas nodded. He straightened his spine and held his wrist behind his back, squaring his shoulders. “There are two women tied to a pole in another room of the cellar. They are battered and bruised, but alive. However, there were too many Qos adherents to rescue them safely. There were at least twenty in the many cellar rooms of the manse. And the cellar is a veritable warren of rooms and filled with supplies, gold, and a dungeon that most likely held some of the people who I found as corpses.”
Valis stared into middle distance for a moment and pinched the bridge of his nose. “The women. Did one have waist-length auburn hair, an oval face, and hazel eyes? The other half a head shorter and bulkier with muscle, short black hair?”
“Yes, Grand Master.”
“Good. That’s Cassavin and Nevesar.”
“Should we advance?” Jintas asked. “What these shits are doing is heinous and evil. We should eradicate them while they are oblivious.”
“Are all your men and women out of the buildings? I don’t see them, and I can see through the shields I created.”
Shaking his head, Jintas motioned toward the hill. “They await us on the other side of the hill, making sure we stay unnoticed.”
“Thank you.” Valis then motioned to the growing blob in the distance. “Our army approaches. Get your people ready. We’ll attack as soon as the army arrives.”
Venabi came to stand next to Valis now that he was done talking with Jintas. She looked out at the approaching mass of horses and riders. “My peopl
e fared the same as the mercenaries.” She knocked on Valis’s breastplate. “If we can attack in the middle of the night, they should be tired and drained from whatever foul magic they are wielding. Perhaps just before dawn.”
“Agreed.” Valis gave her a short nod. “Then I want everyone to rest until two in the morning. Scouts will take shifts in turns so that everyone is at least a little fresher.”
She gave him another rap on the chest and a smirk. “I’ll arrange it.”
“Thank you.” Valis opened his pocket watch and stared at the reflective golden surface of the cover a moment before scrying. He still couldn’t see inside the compound. “Thank you.”
Venabi tapped the watch face. “You don’t need to scry. You have eyes everywhere.”
“Then get rested and get ready,” Valis said. “We must succeed with this anchor where the first team failed. Only then can I rescue my father. Failure is not an option.”
“It never is,” Venabi said. “Rest well, Grand Master.”
Chapter Twenty
“Grand Master, the army approaches.”
“Thank you, Phalin.”
Valis got up from his bedroll, stretched, and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes from his nap. He yawned so hard his jaw cracked, then quickly tossed his armor on. Once presentable, he and Tavros exited the tent just as the first horses made it into camp.
“Thank you for clearing our way,” Brogan said once he’d dismounted. “You do know that any Qos adherent could find that giant furrow in the snow and attack, right?”
Not rising to the bait, Valis waited until Rylas joined Brogan and the others started filling in the camp, setting up their tents without being ordered to. Before he did anything else, Valis added another layer of soundproofing to the shield. He couldn’t risk the Qos nest overhearing them and sounding the alarm.
“Okay, everyone. Cassavin and Nevesar are—”
