The Way of Ancient Power

by Ben Wolf

  Magnus shook his head. “I fear that is not the case, Lilly. The slave trade here has been in operation since even before my father was murdered. I had never encountered Oren before our meeting in your father’s throne room, so I had no idea who he was. But apparently, Oren is the slave trade’s prime operator, and perhaps its architect as well.”

  “This can’t be true.” Lilly stared at her boots. Had she been blind to this reality before she’d left the Sky Realm the first time? Had it taken her own capture and enslavement to reveal to her the bitter truth of it? Or had she been willfully ignorant all along? “How could anyone allow this to happen? Those slaves are people.”

  “Oren reports directly to Vandorian. That much is evident. That explains why Oren accompanied him to the Sky Fortress.” Magnus clacked his talons on his breastplate. “And it is not a stretch to assume that Vandorian receives a tribute every month to look the other way when it comes to Oren’s dealings, even though slavery violates Saurian law.”

  Axel huffed. “It’s against human law too, but that doesn’t stop the King from enslaving whoever he wants—for entire lifetimes.”

  “Yes, but when we free Lumen, that will change,” Calum said.

  “Slavery violates Windgale law as well.” Lilly focused her attention on Falcroné. Did he know anything about this? “You’re the Captain of the Royal Guard. Why doesn’t my father do something about this?”

  Falcroné’s mouth hung open for a moment, probably to Axel’s delight. “Lilly, I merely follow orders and relay them to my men in order to protect the Premier. I’m not privy to—”

  “Don’t lie to me, Fal.” Lilly pressed her index finger into his armored chest. “You’re in the same room with him almost every waking hour of the day. I know you’ve heard things that normal Windgales don’t hear.”

  “I—” Falcroné gulped. “I am not at liberty to divulge the content of the Premier’s dealings with anyone unauth—”

  “I’m his daughter, to whom you’re engaged.” Lilly hovered up higher so she could look him in the eye. “I’m going to rule the Sky Realm someday. If you think you can convince me that this isn’t my business, you’re wrong. Tell me what you know, Fal.”

  “Even if I could tell you what discussions he has, I wouldn’t say anything with them around.” Falcroné motioned toward their other companions.

  Lilly didn’t back down. She continued to stare into his blue eyes, unrelenting. He knew something, and she was going to drag it out of him.

  “Either you tell me now, or this engagement ends immediately.”

  She could scarcely believe the words had just come out of her mouth, but they had. Lilly didn’t dare look, but she imagined Axel was just short of all-out celebrating the potential death of her relationship with Falcroné, and Calum probably was, too, albeit less overtly.

  But she didn’t care. Right now, the issue at hand was far more important.

  “That’s unfair, Lilly.” Falcroné glanced around. His voice had taken on a calm but firm tone. “And inappropriate, too, considering those around us.”

  “You don’t have to worry about them,” Lilly asserted. “You have to worry about me. When all of this is said and done, they’ll go back to their homes, and you and I will go back to the Sky Realm. Whether you and I are still together when that happens is up to you, right here and right now. So tell me what I want to know, or we’re done.”

  “Please, Lilly.” Falcroné leaned in close to her with his voice lowered and tinged with desperation. “You are asking me to betray my oath to your father, and you’re doing it in front of these people.”

  “Relationships are built on trust, Fal,” she countered, not bothering to lower her voice as he had. “If I can’t trust you, then there is no relationship. Do you understand?”

  “If they could just grant us some privacy, or if we could go off somewhere to have this conversation instead, I—”

  “Anything you tell me, they will hear from my lips afterward anyway, so you might as well spill it all, here and now.” Lilly waited as the wheels in Falcroné’s mind turned.

  Finally, he sighed. “Your father is, more or less, unopposed to the slave trade.”

  Kanton shook his head, and Calum and Axel muttered between themselves.

  Lilly ignored them all. Her voice hardened. “What do you mean by ‘more or less?’”

  “It means that he lacks the resources and manpower to fully shut the slave trade down—” Falcroné paused. “—but also that he participates in it from time to time.”

  Falcroné’s admission hit Lilly like blow to her gut, and she felt physically sick upon hearing it.

  “But it’s not what you think,” Falcroné quickly added. “He only sends criminals, derelicts—people like that—which you already know. That’s exactly what they’re going to do with Condor.”

  Falcroné was right. She’d been right there in the throne room when her father sentenced Condor to life at the Blood Chasm, but…

  “Does he accept remuneration for the people he sends?” she asked.

  Falcroné’s jaw tensed, and he slowly nodded.

  Lilly closed her eyes and shook her head. Her own father, a willing participant in Kanarah’s slave trade? Even if it was only on occasion, it was still heinous. At the thought, Lilly wanted to vomit.

  Roderick had captured her and sold her into slavery, and she’d barely escaped with her life. She would have never seen her home or her family again. Now she’d learned her father had supported people just like Roderick and his men.

  It was wrong. All of it.

  “In my opinion, there is only one thing for us to do now,” Magnus said. “We must to venture to Oren’s fortress near the Blood Chasm and put a stop to his enterprise once and for all.”

  Axel scoffed. “Talk about a waste of time.”

  Lilly redirected all of her anger at him with a single glare. “A waste of time?”

  “Easy.” Axel held up his hand. “I mean we’re better off going to free Lumen. Won’t he just take care of this sort of thing anyway?”

  “And in doing so, do we forsake the people currently enslaved?” Calum asked. “I’m with Lilly and Magnus, here.”

  “I call that acceptable losses.” Axel cracked his neck. “Think about how many we’re gonna save once we free Lumen.”

  “Going to free Lumen instead of helping those people means we’re giving up on them. Is that what Lumen would do?” Calum stepped toward Axel.

  “Beats me.” Axel shrugged and folded his arms. “You’re the authority on ancient warriors. You tell me.”

  “He’s coming back to liberate all of Kanarah,” Calum replied. “He’s made that perfectly clear.”

  “Then that’s your answer,” Axel concluded. “He’ll take care of it.”

  “Practically speaking, it is wise for us to destroy Oren before he can rally a response to the death of his brother,” Magnus said. “If we leave now, we can still catch him by surprise. If we cut off the head of the serpent, the body will wither and die.”

  Axel kept shaking his head. “If we just head straight to Lumen—”

  “You still don’t even believe Lumen exists,” Calum cut in. “So why are you insisting on this now?”

  “Consider me swayed toward believing,” Axel replied. He still stood in the same position: legs spread apart with his arms folded across his chest.

  “Why?” Calum pressed. “What swayed you?”

  Axel began numbering his responses with his fingers. “The Premier certainly seemed to believe Lumen is real. Then he gave us a map that supposedly leads right to the Arcanarium, or whatever it’s called. Lilly wanted to come along, so she obviously believes there’s something to it.

  “Lastly, you won’t shut up about these dreams you keep having, so I’m starting to think he might be real.” Axel held up four fingers. He considered telling them about how Condor had hinted at knowing something about the Arcanum as well, but he held that one back. “There. Four reasons. Good enou
gh for you?”

  “I’m glad you’re finally on board with us,” Calum said. “And now that you’ve caught up to that point, catch up to this next one: Lilly wants to free the slaves at Oren’s fortress, so that’s what we’re doing.”

  Axel rolled his eyes again and folded his arms again. “Whatever.”

  When Calum looked at Lilly, she had to consciously stifle her smile.

  “This is what you want, right?” he asked.

  She nodded. “Yes. We have to help those people. Magnus and I know what it’s like, and so do you, Calum. Better than anyone.”

  “Yeah. That’s probably true.” Calum rubbed the back of his neck. “Magnus, how far is it out of the way?”

  “According to the map, once we reach the Blood Mountains, it is only a day’s journey in the opposite direction from the Arcanum, near where the edge of the mountains meets a forest. We can reach it there in about a week.”

  “It’s settled. We’re going,” Calum declared. “And we can raid the place for supplies while we’re there, too. It makes sense to go. Right?”

  Aside from Axel, who rolled his eyes again, everyone in the group nodded, some more enthusiastically than others. Falcroné’s head barely moved.

  Lilly frowned, and he frowned back at her.

  “You alright with this, Falcroné?” Calum must’ve noticed it, too.

  “I am charged with keeping Lilly safe above all else. If she goes, I’ll go as well.” He reached out and placed a gloved hand on her shoulders, but she shrunk away from him.

  She wasn’t ready to receive anything from him other than space and perhaps more answers, at least for the time being. Falcroné wouldn’t like it, but he’d just have to deal with it.

  “Good. Let’s go.” Calum faced north and took a few steps.

  “What about Riley?” Kanton asked.

  Calum stopped and turned back. “I don’t know where he went. I hope he’s alright. Where should we start looking for him?”

  “Leave him. He ran away when we needed him.” Axel waved his hand in dismissal. “If he doesn’t need us, then we don’t need him either.”

  Lilly wanted to smack Axel upside his head.

  “Don’t talk like that, Axel,” Calum said.

  Magnus started toward Axel. “What if someday we decided we did not need you?”

  “Hey, I didn’t run from the fight like a scared little puppy. He did.” Axel met Magnus until they stood face-to-breastplate, with Magnus looking down at him. “Don’t pick on me for it.”

  “Spread out in groups and start looking for him,” Magnus said. “Call out his name. Wolves have excellent hearing. If he is nearby, he will hear us and will hopefully return. If we do not find him within the next hour, we will leave, and he can catch up to us later if he so wishes.”

  Calum gave Magnus a reluctant nod. Then he looked straight at Lilly and said, “Come on. Let’s start looking.”

  Riley? Rileeeeeeeey? Where are you, Riley?

  Friendly voices filled Riley’s mind first, and then his ears. He hid under a rocky overhang in a space totally shielded from the sun.

  Upon discovering the space, he’d chased a rock wallaby out of it and claimed it for his own. It was beautifully dark inside. The Saurians would never find him in there… if they even bothered looking.

  “Riley?”

  “Riley, helloooooo?”

  The voices solidified, now more real than imagined. He recognized them, distantly, as friends, but his mind refused to identify specifically whom they belonged to.

  In general, since the attack, his mind had refused to do a lot of things that it used to do just fine. Something in his head had severed along with Condor’s stab, and he couldn’t put it back the way it was.

  Nor could Riley go back out to them—his friends. Not after he’d fled and left them to fend for themselves. How many of them had died because he wasn’t there to help?

  How many of them died anyway, regardless of whether or not you’d been there? His thoughts countered.

  “Riley? Can you hear us?”

  “The fight’s over Riley. You’re safe now.”

  Safe. But for how long? They’d fight again.

  That’s all that ever seemed to happen to this group—fights.

  Fights with monsters in tunnels.

  Fights with pirates—at least he’d missed those.

  Fights with Windgale rebels that ended with him skewered like a stuck pig.

  Fights, fights, fights.

  He was better off hiding in here and waiting for them to pass him by. They were better off, too. If they couldn’t count on him for help, he might as well not weigh their group down.

  “Riley?”

  “Are you in there?”

  Calum and Kanton. His mind finally ascribed names to the voices—voices which were much closer now.

  Aside from Lilly, those two were his favorites. Calum had spared his life back in Eastern Kanarah, and Kanton had saved it after Condor ran him through.

  Still, he couldn’t go out to them. Even if they welcomed him back, he couldn’t face the shame of deserting his friends. His only friends.

  His only friends ever.

  “It’s dark in there.” Kanton’s legs came into view as he landed near the opening of the overhang. He bent down and peered into the hole right at where Riley hid in the darkness. “I don’t see too well these days. Maybe you’d better have a look?”

  Calum’s crimson armor showed up next, all scratched and chipped, probably from the fight. It certainly hadn’t been beforehand. If he’d taken that kind of damage just to his armor, how bad had the rest of the group gotten it?

  Calum got down on all fours and peered into the shadows. “It’s definitely Riley’s type of hiding spot. I can’t make out what’s in there, if anything. If he was in there, he’d have heard us by now, anyway.”

  “He would have heard us a long while ago,” Kanton said. “If he’s around, you don’t think he’d be too timid to come out, do you?”

  Calum shook his head and pushed himself back up to his feet. “He knows we’re looking for him. He knows we don’t want to leave him behind, but he’s gotta make the call on whether or not he’s coming with us, if he hasn’t already.”

  Leaving? They were leaving? They were going to leave Riley behind?

  How could they do such a thing? After all, they were friends… weren’t they?

  “Come on,” Calum said. “We’ve got a lot more ground to cover and only ten minutes before we said we’d leave.”

  “Alright. I’ll fly some more reconnaissance.” Kanton’s legs sprang into the air, and Calum’s walked off to the side.

  They’d left him.

  They’d been right there, and they’d left him behind.

  But it wasn’t because they wanted to leave him. They’d made that clear.

  It was because he hadn’t spoken up. He hadn’t made a sound. He’d hidden himself well—too well.

  At least he was still good at something.

  Riley raised his head. He was still good at something. And if they were still looking for him, even after he ran away, then they must still want him around.

  And, he realized, he wanted to be around them, too, shame or otherwise.

  Good enough.

  He stood to his feet and padded his way out of the overhang.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  A week later, they reached Oren’s fortress.

  Lilly hadn’t known what to expect before she saw the Blood Chasm. Its name conjured nightmarish images in her mind of a river of blood flowing through a fissure, but when she flew overhead for a look, the reality of what she saw dwarfed her imagination in both scale and terror.

  Instead of a red river in a crevice, Lilly found a half-mile-wide bottomless pit in the crimson rock around it. Networks of rope bridges with wooden planks stretched between anchors mounted to the Blood Chasm’s perimeter, and more rope bridges extended from those in every direction out over the chasm itself.

>   A ramshackle staircase, also made of wood and rope, spiraled deep into the chasm and ended in the first of many tunnels carved into its sides. Narrow walkways carved from the stone lined the outer edges of the chasm farther down.

  Inside the chasm, slaves of every race milled about. Some of them pushed carts of red rocks to the edge of the chasm and dumped them into the abyss. Others hefted bulging bags of usable materials like iron and Blood Ore up the spiral steps or across the rope bridges.

  How many of them had fallen into that Chasm while trying to carry their loads to the surface? How many had given their precious lives for a few pounds of raw metal?

  Lilly’s eyes narrowed. They would stop Oren tonight, and then they’d free these slaves. Every one of them.

  At sundown, a pair of armored Saurians pulled about fifty or sixty slaves from the chasm. The third member of their group, a man in dark armor, tallied their number on a piece of parchment. One Saurian anchored the slaves to each other, and the other collected all of their various tools into a big cart.

  Lilly couldn’t make out what they were saying from so high in the air, but she caught enough to realize that the tally-man’s hand signal—four fingers up—meant they had lost four slaves that day to the Blood Chasm.

  She shook her head and scowled. Had they managed to get there only a few hours sooner, perhaps those four slaves would have lived. She was too late to help them now, but she took comfort in knowing that no more slaves would die after tonight.

  As a unit, the Saurians marched the slaves toward the fortress, a two-story wooden structure made of vertical logs with their tops sharpened to points. The doors to the fortress swung open and swallowed the slaves, the Saurians, and the tool cart whole, then it shut again behind the tally-man, who entered last.

  Night fell, and several torches within the fortress ignited. A few armored men stood watch on the fortress’s flat roof, but mostly they gambled with dice for whatever small coins or trinkets they had with them. Probably property they’d taken from new slaves when they arrived.

  Lilly completed her round of scouting then nodded to Falcroné, who had completed his own scouting flight, and together they flew back to the rest of the group hidden in the trees at the edge of the Blood Mountains.