Thawed Fortunes (The Guadel Chronicles Book 2)

by Murray, Dean

  Va'ma's voice wasn't quite the cold, uncaring thing it had been a few seconds before. "None of us will be harmed?"

  "Not so long as your ransom is paid in a reasonable amount of time."

  One by one, the Guadel all dropped their weapons and then walked forward to have their hands and arms bound. The guardsmen around Jain stirred uneasily, almost like they would resist the order to lay down their arms, but an officer called out several of their names, and repeated the command.

  There were tears on many of the young men's faces, but they finally nodded and dropped their weapons to the ground. It took Jain several seconds to understand the tears. Jain was confused for a moment but there was really only one answer. Their courage hadn't failed them, they weren't crying because they were afraid of capture or death. Instead they were crying because for the first time in hundreds of years, the Guard and the Guadel had been overcome without dying. In the long history of the People none of her protectors had ever given up without a fight. Their present circumstance was impossible, but it still felt uncomfortably close, even to Jain, as though they'd just betrayed everything Tor'h and the other heroes had fought and died for over so many years.

  Once the men were all safely restrained, the women were brought forward one at a time to disappear into the ranks of knights. Each woman went full of the power, grasping it with all her strength as her only remaining protection, but shortly after they left, the women still huddled with the gurra would feel the power slowly leak away from whoever had just been called. Gradually losing hold of the power was how Jain had always imagined death would be, but it seemed impossible that not even one of them would have a chance to either scream out or use the power to actually do something before they died.

  The passing minutes brought no answer, and the fear around the women continued to grow until it seemed like a living thing skittering across Jain's skin. When On'li was motioned forward, she paused for a second to look at Mar'li and Jain before calmly walking forward to whatever fate awaited her.

  The Councilor's example did nothing to lessen the fear arcing back and forth between the trembling females, but it did stiffen the knees of most of the remaining women, and when Jain's turn came she marched forward with her head held high to mask the terror threatening to leave her curled in a ball on the ground.

  As soon as she was out of sight of the few remaining women, a soldier approached with a skin of something. "Drink, and be quick about it, or your friends will be the ones to suffer."

  Shaking slightly, Jain raised the bag to her mouth and took two bitter, burning swallows. The soldier took the skin back, and then looked at her as if waiting for something.

  Jain opened her mouth to ask what she was supposed to do, and then the ground seemed to reach up and hit her. She had time to find it funny that nothing hurt, that she couldn't feel anything. I didn't think dying was supposed to feel like this.

  Almost before the thought could be completed, blackness swallowed her up, leaving no room for anything else.

  Chapter 19

  "...absolutely inexcusable that you would allow them to speak that way to me."

  The self-loathing that had covered Va'del for so long had boiled away during the last couple of cycles, replaced by a desire to scream back at his wife. The only thing stopping Va'del from acting on the urge was the fact that, given Vi'en's towering self-certainty, there was almost no chance anything he said or did would actually get through to her. Vi'en had demanded that he stay and talk with her after everyone else was gone, and once they were alone, had launched into a scathing attack on nearly every aspect of his character, most of his recent actions, and the fact that he hadn't slapped On'li down for 'rebuking his wife in front of everyone.'

  "Bob'ae never would have allowed that to happen. Any differences of opinion should stay between a man and his wife, not be aired out for everyone to see."

  Suddenly Va'del realized that Jain was right. Vi'en was never going to let him marry Jain because nothing he was ever going to do would be good enough for her. Vi'en always talked about Bob'ae like he was a patron saint, but more and more Va'del was certain that she'd found just as much fault with her first husband, just for different reasons.

  "You're right, things shouldn't have ever gotten to the point where I let On'li scold you for failing to fulfill even the slightest part of your duties as a wife. I should have told you when we first got married that you are a sorry excuse for a Guadel. You're more concerned with impressing your friends by insulting me than with cultivating the trust required to fulfill your vows."

  Va'del had thought Vi'en's eyes had gone wide when On'li had dressed her down, but that was nothing compared to what he was seeing now. The Guadel tried unsuccessfully to breathe for several seconds before finally gasping.

  "How dare you, you jumped-up candidate. The only reason you're even here is because I agreed to marry you out of pity, and give you the legitimacy you've never been able to gain on your own."

  Va'del shook his head. "No, I suspect you married me because nobody else in your bloodline would have you. Even your friends no doubt shuddered at the thought of sharing their husbands with you, so you were dumped off on me, despite the fact that after all the bleeding I've done for my brothers and sisters, I most definitely deserved better."

  Vi'en looked at him, the contempt she'd held him in for so long beginning to be replaced by the same kind of hatred she'd displayed towards On'li, but Va'del found he didn't care. "I want to serve the People as much as anyone, but right now you have no right to enter my mind, and I rather suspect that will continue to be the case since I don't see you ever really changing."

  Va'del turned and started walking along the trail. It felt like he should be happy or at least have the satisfaction of feeling justified. The fact that he didn't have to try and continue to meet her expectations should have lightened his step, but instead he just felt angry. Angry, and in some way less innocent. Even with Cindi he'd always managed to maintain a small but firm belief that someday she'd come around and stop hating him.

  He'd somehow maintained a core belief that it was impossible for someone with power over him to be completely unjust and therefore his dreams had never quite died. That was gone now. The only way for him and Jain to be together now was for Vi'en to die of old age in the near future before Jain got tired of waiting and married another.

  Before the sub-Guadel could take more than a few steps towards the caravan, Vi'en gasped behind him, and he reluctantly turned back to look at her. Some kind of trick, no doubt.

  The expression on his wife's face, and the fact that she'd collapsed to her knees, quickly convinced Va'del of her seriousness. "What happened?"

  "The female Guadel are holding the power. For me to be able to feel it this far away, they must all be linking. Something's wrong."

  Va'del helped Vi'en up as he thought. "There wasn't anything this way that could possibly threaten the whole caravan. Everything the villagers told us pointed towards this area being safe enough that Si'mon agreed to leave the two of us alone by ourselves."

  Vi'en nodded, hurrying to keep up with Va'del's longer legs. "It can't be bag'ligs this low unless they passed the village and then circled around from the west."

  Va'del didn't say anything, but picked up the pace slightly as the pieces of this particular strategic puzzle began to fall into place for him. The danger had to be either bag'ligs or the Baron. There wasn't anything else in the area that could possibly threaten a group that big.

  Vi'en tripped and nearly fell, but Va'del grabbed her arm and kept her up until she'd regained her footing.

  "It's getting weaker."

  "Good, that means that they've dealt with whatever the threat was. We should still hurry though."

  Vi'en jerked away from him. "No, you don't understand, it isn't the sudden weakening of victory as everyone drops out of link about the same time, it's the steady weakening that results when Guadel are killed a few at a time while the survivors continue to pull
in as much power as they can hold."

  Va'del's mind tried to reject the idea. "They have wounded who have to be healed--that would explain it."

  "No, they are all dying, and it's your fault. If you hadn't rejected my attempts to link we could have been there and helped, or at least died with them. Instead we're all that remains."

  All kinds of responses made their way through Va'del's mind, but he kept his mouth shut and kept walking.

  "Don't walk away from me."

  "I'm not walking away from you. I'm walking towards where I'm needed. You can stay here or you can follow, it doesn't matter to me."

  ##

  In the end Vi'en chose to trail along, but Va'del could feel the disapproval and fear radiating off of her for the entire two cycles they were walking. The sub-Guadel knew he should slow his frantic pace and be alert for traps or ambushes, but couldn't bring himself to do it. The worry that Jain might be somewhere ahead slowly bleeding to death made him hurry forward on the slight chance that him arriving a few minutes earlier might be enough to save her.

  It was easy to tell when they arrived at the site of whatever had happened. The previously hard-packed dirt road looked almost like the freshly-plowed fields they'd passed on their way out of Crimson Rocks.

  Va'del tried to make sense of all the confusing imprints, but although some of the Guadel learned basic snow tracking, he wasn't one of them.

  A mounting sense of helplessness threatened to wash away the last traces of rationality, but Va'del focused on the fact that there weren't any bodies, or even any blood, and used it to calm himself slightly. Whatever had happened to the caravan in this spot, it didn't look like anyone had died. It hadn't been bag'ligs, so the odds were that Jain and the rest were alive somewhere, which meant that there was still a chance they could be rescued.

  Vi'en had informed Va'del more than a cycle previously that she could no longer feel anyone touching the power. She hadn't said anything since then, and now stood staring challengingly at him as if waiting for him to ask for advice.

  "Let's follow the trail and find out for sure where they were taken."

  ##

  The trail, it turned out, was easy to follow, even for someone without any tracking knowledge. The Baron's horsemen hadn't bothered to stay on the hard-packed road, ranging off to each side, presumably to ensure that none of their prisoners were able to escape. Even if Va'del hadn't been able to follow the wide swathes of churned-up dirt, the corpses of gurra pushed too hard in the hot weather would have been sign enough they were still on the right trail. The pitiful forms tugged at Va'del's heart with unexpected strength, and he welcomed the need to concentrate on staying hidden from the increasingly heavy traffic on the road.

  The first time they'd encountered other people, Va'del had been so surprised he'd just frozen for a moment before returning their curious but largely-unconcerned wave. There was so much that was different down in the lowlands. In the mountains it was almost unheard of to pass anyone else while a party was moving between villages.

  After that first encounter, Va'del had done his very best to hide anytime he heard other people approaching. Vi'en hadn't liked diving into bushes, but hadn't been able to argue with the fact that their clothing was much too distinctive to blend in with the lowlanders. She'd accepted the necessity with her usual bad grace.

  Va'del wasn't positive that they'd been successful in hiding from everyone, but the only other way he could think of to go unnoticed would be to travel at night, which would guarantee that they would miss the spot where the tracks left the road.

  Of course given the lateness of the day, if he and Vi'en didn't find the caravan soon, they'd be travelling in the dark regardless. Already the sun was starting to disappear behind a distant set of mountains, and Va'del suddenly realized he'd never seen such a brilliant sunset during his brief travels outside. The way the clouds had taken on varying hues of dark orange was more than a little unsettling. It was beautiful still, but the way the light hit the rocks seemed to turn them the color of drying blood, as if a terrible battle had taken place just a ways away from them.

  Pushing away thoughts of signs, or warnings by the Bright Powers, Va'del closed his eyes for a moment, promising himself he wouldn't look at the sky as he opened them back up.

  Just before dusk, they came to the edge of the forest. A moderately-sized castle was just visible in the distance, but surrounded as it was by cleared farmland, there was no way for the pair to continue forward in the light.

  Vi'en looked at the complete lack of hiding places and backed further into the trees.

  "We can't go out there; we'll be seen and captured just like they were."

  "We'll wait until night. It will be fine."

  Va'del had underestimated just how scared the Guadel was.

  "No, it won't be fine. I came along so we could figure out where they'd been taken. We've done that. Now we need to go get help instead of charging in there and getting ourselves killed for no reason."

  Thinking quickly, Va'del shook his head. He'd never actually even thought of going for help. Considering it now, he couldn't escape the feeling that it was the wrong course of action.

  "No, without all of the proper gear, none of which we have, we'd never make it back up to the Capital. Even if we did, who would they send? As tightly stretched as we were when the bandits were attacking, the guardsmen and Guadel who were just captured have to pretty much represent everyone they would have normally been able to spare for a rescue mission. No, we have to free them ourselves, or they'll never get out."

  Vi'en's laughter held an edge of panic. "I have heat stones, and we can get warmer clothing at the village. Even if there aren't people to send down for a rescue, surely we can come to some kind of deal with Vladir. You're just thinking about how badly you want to be the hero again. How everyone, especially Jain, will look at you if by some miracle you manage to pull this off. That's a stupid reason to throw away our lives and any real chance of freeing them. This is exactly the kind of foolish thing Bob'ae always wanted to do, but he at least was smart enough not to get everyone he cared about killed in an attempt to cover himself in glory."

  The words stung more than Va'del had expected, but he knew very well just how scared he'd been when he'd saved Jain from the bandits. "That's where you're wrong. I'm just doing what's necessary to keep the people I love alive. Go back up the mountain if you want, you don't need me for that, and I won't run away from my fears."

  Vi'en looked at Va'del with hatred in her eyes, and then turned and walked away. For several moments, the young man wondered if he should go after her. There was no denying that a part of him had wanted to drive her away, but there was simply no way Vi'en would ever make it back to the Capital by herself. Even together they'd have had almost no chance, alone she was as good as dead.

  Is that what I secretly wanted?

  The questions pulled at Va'del with a persistence that surprised him considering how much he disliked Vi'en, but finally, after half a cycle of waiting for the sun to go down, he shrugged and mentally set them aside. Whatever else he had or hadn't done, this was Jain's only chance for rescue.

  The moon was very nearly full, so there was an unusual amount of light, but Va'del set off towards the castle and just tried to keep to the shadows whenever he could.

  Progress was slow, but sensing that speed was more likely to be his undoing than almost anything else, Va'del forced himself to be patient as he steadily worked his way closer to the castle.

  When Va'del finally found himself at the edge of the open space he'd noticed before the sun set, he felt his heart sink. He'd somehow thought that at least a few of the houses would butt up against the castle walls. Instead it was as if the village just ended, leaving a cleared area that would have to be crossed to get into the castle.

  Va'del hadn't expected sneaking into the Baron's home to be easy, but looking at the naked expanse of grass, he started to get a true feeling of just how impossible a task he'd
set for himself.

  Maybe Vi'en was right. How can I possibly accomplish anything other than getting myself captured or killed?

  As Va'del started to scoot further back into the shadows, a loud yipping sound started up to his left. Turning to run, the sub-Guadel made it only a few steps before the night, and its protective shadows, were ripped away by a massive ball of harsh, white light that turned, floating towards him as he ran.

  The noise was closer to him now, and it had been joined by a deep thrumming sound that seemed to come from multiple directions. Va'del caught movement out of the corner of his eye and turned his head to see a pair of what the villagers had called dogs rapidly closing in.

  Va'del didn't have time to wonder at the difference between the friendly beasts he'd seen at Crimson Rocks, and the savage things pursuing him now. His heart beating erratically, the sub-Guadel jumped a low, stone fence and drew his weapons as he spun and confronted the first of the dogs. Unsure of the beast's anatomy, he guessed it was roughly similar to that of a snow leopard, and drove his sword into its body just behind the front legs, hoping to find something vital.

  The second dog was on him before he could pull his sword from its companion, and it was all Va'del could do to get his dagger around as it leapt at his throat. The beast was nearly as heavy as he was, and the impact sent Va'del sprawling, but the fact that Va'del was still breathing instead of lying with his throat ripped out told him his desperate, half-blind stab had miraculously managed to kill it.

  Drenched in blood, and slightly dazed from the blow he'd taken to his head when he fell, Va'del pulled himself back to his feet and started to run again, only to find that the light was still following him, and that mounted men were approaching from all directions.

  Va'del tightened his grip on his sword and was preparing to sell himself as dearly as he could when a shadowy figure suddenly slipped between the horsemen. The deadly grace of the newcomer's movements let Va'del know that the other man was linked, and for a split second, expecting a rescue, he looked around for the rest of the Guadel.