The Prince of Exiles (The Exile Series)

by Hal Emerson

  But then he looked around him and saw the men and women staring blankly into the fire. He saw Autmaran talking to grim-faced Kindred and Roarkians, motioning across the lake toward the cave in.

  I’ll deal with it later.

  He went to Leah again. She was still unconscious, and Stannit was keeping watch over her. She was wrapped in as many blankets and cloaks as could be spared – many of the Kindred and the stronger Imperials had given up what little extra they had to the soldiers when they’d been asked to help the sick and wounded – but her skin still looked dangerously pale. He thanked Stannit for his help, and then dismissed him, but the man refused to go.

  “You may need to leave again my Prince,” he said. “I would like to be here for you when you do. I know she is important to you – I can see it from the way you look at her. I want you to know someone will be with her until we can get her to wherever we’re going.”

  “I’m not a Prince anymore,” Raven said softly, “but thank you.”

  Stannit nodded, ignoring the first part, and went to rest his back against a rock wall nearby, within earshot. Raven pulled up the blankets and lay down next to Leah, trying to warm her with his body. He knew if she were awake she’d probably knife him for being so presumptuous, but as it was he didn’t care. He’d worry about her modesty later.

  He must have fallen asleep, despite all that had happened, for the next thing he knew Autmaran was shaking him awake. He got quickly to his feet, careful to settle the blankets back over Leah to keep her warm.

  “What’s the situation?” He asked the Major.

  “We’ve cleared some of the cave in,” he replied, “and we’ve started ferrying people across the lake, those who are strong enough to help us. We tried to break down some of that house for firewood, but the thing is more stone than wood.”

  “Did you clear enough to get people through to the other side?” Raven asked. He didn’t know anything about caves really, though he had heard terrible stories about people digging through broken tunnels only to bring the rest of it all down on them.

  “I have a few men from Eldoras, the mining city of the Kindred,” Autmaran said. “It’s just south of Vale, they have experience with this sort of thing. They said it isn’t as bad as it could have been. They said they were almost through, and that was when I left them half an hour ago.”

  “Good,” Raven said. “Then we need to start ferrying more people across, as many as we can. And as soon as we have a clear path through the tunnel again we keep moving – we have no food, which will lead to a whole new set of problems if we don’t get them to Vale soon. Those strong enough should swim – all the soldiers at least, which is a sizeable number.”

  Autmaran nodded, watching and listening carefully.

  “Sorry,” Raven said quickly. “I keep giving you orders. You should be telling me what to do.”

  “No,” Autmaran said with a completely serious face. “I’m a military commander, not a civilian governor. I think we both know that you’re the one in charge – anything I do will take twice as long, and I’ll miss things along the way.”

  Raven opened his mouth to protest once more, but found he didn’t have the energy. All that had happened had stripped him of his anger and without it his limbs were heavy and it was all he could do to stand.

  “Did he die well?”

  Autmaran was looking out across the water now, his expression dark. Looking into his face, Raven realized that beneath his calm, commanding exterior, the man was barely holding it together. He remembered just how much Goldwyn must mean to the Major – Goldwyn had been his personal military mentor.

  “He did,” Raven said. “He died trying to teach me just one more lesson.”

  At all odds with the sadness he felt, his mouth quirked into a smile at the memory. The man just didn’t know when to leave a person be.

  “Then you’d better remember it,” Autmaran said. “He didn’t waste his time teaching lessons that didn’t matter.”

  They stood there together for a moment, looking into the distance. Looking around at all the men and women gathered here, and all the Kindred soldiers helping them with food or blankets.

  “It’s strange,” Raven said. “I was always told the Kindred were thieves and murderers. I was told that you were all criminals who reveled in anarchy. But it wasn’t until I returned to the Empire that I found those things again.”

  Autmaran grunted in grim amusement, before he turned and left, going to his lieutenants once more. Raven reached out again through the Raven Talisman, looking ahead for the missing Rogues. He could feel them along with a number of other people – it looked like they’d been stopped by the cave-in as well.

  Raven turned and began to help organize people into groups for the boats. He looked over and saw that Stannit was helping many of the wounded to their feet, accompanied by a dozen or so of the Roarke soldiers he’d had with him in the city. He was carrying Leah with him in an improvised sling that held her against his chest – she looked like she barely weighed a thing.

  Autmaran says you can trust him. You need to help get everyone to safety – make that your priority.

  He turned away and continued to organize the trip across the water. It would take a long time to get everyone across, maybe even days. Some of the stronger ones could swim it, and many already were under the careful watch of Kindred soldiers. But the wounded … that would take time. Word came that the cave-in had been breached. He spoke to Autmaran again and they relayed messages to the others that word was to be sent to Vale for food and supplies. They would need them before this was done. Raven found himself forced into one of the boats by Autmaran, the Major saying they needed someone in command on the other side. He went, but everything there was already taken care of. He passed through the house, and beyond the cave-in.

  It was dawn of the next day when he emerged from the other side of the tunnel.

  The sun was rising in a clear blue sky, a sky that seemed hard and flat. The clouds of the night before had dissipated, breaking up and scattering once the force of the blizzard had blown itself out. The whole world was bright and covered in snow, and Raven saw, with no surprised, that the horse Leah had left there had long since bolted. He hoped the beast had made it back to Vale.

  He organized the men and women who were there, and they began the trek to Vale, moving as quickly as they could. Apparently some of the men had made it to Vale earlier in the night, bearing missives. Kindred in the green and silver of Vale rode in with the rising sun on horses bearing blankets and spare mounts. Raven got one for Leah, tired her to it, checked her bandages, and then told Autmaran he was taking her to Vale.

  “You can handle this,” he told the Major. “I highly doubt you need me.”

  The Major inclined his head toward him.

  “Ride safe my Prince. We’ll be right behind you.”

  “I’m not a Prince,” Raven growled before spurring his horse into motion.

  The ride was oddly quiet; no birds sang, and no wind blew, and Raven felt as though the entire land had been silenced. He rode along snow-covered paths with Leah tied to the saddle in front of him, holding her tight. His back began to ache and then to throb from holding this position, but he didn’t care. He would be damned if he let her out of her sight now that they were back in Kindred land. She was going straight to Elder Keri if he had to hunt the woman down himself.

  Hours passed – it was a long ride. He was hungry beyond belief – it had been a full day and a half since he’d eaten now, and he hadn’t realized how much strength lack of food could sap. But still he rode, pushing his horse as fast as it could go without endangering Leah on her precarious perch.

  And finally, he saw the slope that led up the entrance to valley. He was so relieved he felt he could both laugh and cry.

  He breached the top of the hill and saw a huge row of riders with carts full of supplies and food coming toward him. They saw him and waved him down, but he rode past, not responding to their cal
ls. He was looking for a Healer, but didn’t see any in their loose white robes.

  “Where are they - the Healers?” He asked of a man riding past with large sacks tied to his horse’s saddle, both full of bread and cheese.

  “They’re at the hospital, preparing beds, opening all the wards.”

  He nodded and continued on, heading toward the main boulevard, leaving the noise of the gathering rescue mission behind. The rest of the city seemed oddly quiet, though he supposed that made sense. It was hardly a good day to be out … only yesterday an Elder had been assassinated.

  Shadows and light. Yesterday.

  He tried not to think until he found himself outside the hospital. He dismounted, untied Leah, and held her in his arms, still wrapped in blankets. She was breathing – that was all that mattered. It meant she was still alive. It meant she would recover. The doctor had said she would. She had to recover.

  He shouldered open the door and almost fell on his face. He caught himself just in time, and realized he was breathing raggedly. He tried to take another step, but found he couldn’t. So he took a deep breath and shouted.

  “KERI!”

  The yell reverberated in the hall around him, causing a number of Healers to dash out of doors and look toward him in shock.

  “I NEED ELDER KERI!”

  His nerves were frayed, his strength nearly gone. He wouldn’t give Leah to anyone else; it had to be Keri.

  They should never have touched her.

  “WHERE IS ELDER KERI?!”

  “Here!”

  He looked up in surprise and saw that the motherly Elder had approached him, was motioning quickly for Healers to grab a gurney.

  “Quickly, Raven,” Keri said to him. “Tell me what happened to her.”

  “Tiffenal stabbed her, she lost a lot of blood,” he said thickly. “A doctor from Roarke sewed her up, but she’d been bleeding for a long time. The doctor said the cut hit her kidney, but he said he took care of it – you have to make sure she’s all right though. She lost so much blood … she can’t … you have to help her.”

  “I will,” Keri said, “I will. Stay here – let someone tend to that cut on your face. It needs to be washed and cleaned.”

  Healers took Leah from him and put her on the gurney and rushed her away. Raven reached up numbly to his cheek and felt crusted blood where Tiffenal had cut him. He must be a gruesome sight – half of his face was a cracked mask of crusted scabs.

  A Healer took him to the side and tended to him, cleaning the wound, as more people began to filter into the hospital, the first wave of those from Roarke. Some had burns, others severe frostbite. Some were coughing incessantly, the smoke having burned their lungs; others had been wounded by falling debris in the city, still more by sheer exhaustion and shock.

  “You’re good to go,” the Healer told him when he’d finished cleaning the cut. “It was a clean slice, and not deep. There’s no need for stitches as long as you keep it clean and covered.”

  He left, and Raven turned and made his way out the doors, not knowing where else to go. On the steps of the hospital he saw a huge form.

  “Raven!”

  He felt himself suddenly engulfed in Tomaz’s arms, and he felt again the desire to both laugh and cry. Either seemed appropriate.

  “Where’s Leah?” he asked quickly, shaking Raven. “Where is she?”

  “I – I brought her in,” he said haltingly. His thoughts were coming slow and thick, making it hard to grasp them and form them into any sense of coherency. “I gave her to Keri. She’s being cared for. She was wounded … but they say she’ll recover. She will. She’ll be fine.”

  “Oh … oh good,” Tomaz said, his rough face deeply lined with worry. There were dark shadows under his eyes, and he looked as though he hadn’t slept in weeks.

  “I’m so sorry,” he rumbled. “I held on giving you strength for as long as I could, but in the end I lost consciousness. It’s good I didn’t come with you, the strength you were pulling from me left me barely able to stand. And the farther away you got, the harder it was to keep the connection going. In the end … I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t worry,” Raven said thickly, smiling weakly. “It got us through the worst of it. It got us to the other side of the mountains. If we hadn’t been there, these people might all have died in that blizzard.”

  “You, Leah, and Autmaran saved an entire city,” Tomaz rumbled. “I just wish I could have been there to help you.”

  “Me too,” Raven said with a heavy sigh, feeling weighted down by so much. “But it’s okay … I just need some sleep. A few hours, and then I can face this all again. But not yet … not until I sleep.”

  “You can’t yet,” Tomaz rumbled to him and Raven looked up, confused.

  “Why not?”

  “Autmaran sent out the Call.”

  “He … what?”

  “He’s gathering a Forum.”

  Chapter Eighteen: The Second Call

  “No,” Raven said. “No he can’t – not after what just happened. We just lost Roarke! He’s not even back in the city yet!”

  “I think losing the city may be why he’s doing it,” Tomaz rumbled. “And he galloped in just after you. The rest of the group is filtering in, though that doesn’t matter. The Call is for the citizens of Vale, not for the citizens of Roarke. We have to go. We have to hear him out.”

  Raven nodded numbly, and found himself following in the giant’s footsteps. He was so tired he could barely stand, but he knew he had to go hear what was being said.

  “What about Leah?” He asked.

  “You took her to the Healers,” Tomaz reminded him, looking concerned. “Don’t you remember?”

  “Oh – yes,” he said. He shook his head to clear it – that helped a little. He wished he could have some of the kaf from Goldwyn’s manor.

  Shadows and light … he’s gone. Who will lead us when the Empire invades?

  And then he understood the full measure of his brother’s actions; the Fox had not only taken Goldwyn, he’d destroyed the illusions, the one thing preventing a full-scale Imperial invasion, the Exiles’ last line of defense.

  The Kindred are dead.

  Soon, in a haze of stunned, forgotten memory, Raven found himself at the Odeon. Many of the Kindred of Vale had already gathered, and more were coming in now from outside the city. They had brought some of the Roarkemen with them – the common citizens as well as the soldiers. In fact, all who didn’t need medical care seemed to be making their way into the space. Soon the stadium was filled, thousands upon thousands waiting to hear Autmaran speak.

  And center stage, on a simple pyre, was the body of Elder Goldwyn.

  A lump rose up in Raven’s throat as he looked at that body, and he felt once again a deep, overwhelming sorrow. But before he could get lost in his thoughts once more, there was motion down below as a figure detached itself from the gathered crowd.

  The solemn silence deepened as Autmaran crossed the threshold of the stage. He hadn’t waited for the Elders to announce him – it looked as if only half of them were present: Crane, Ishmael, Spader, Lymaugh, Pan and the Dragon Lady. Keri was at the hospital, the others probably helping with the refugees.

  Autmaran strode right past them. He was still in his smoke-stained armor, his dark skin made darker with soot. Something seemed to radiate from him, something dangerous and powerful. All traces of self-consciousness were gone, all vestiges of doubt.

  “When I last stood before you,” he called out, fury and rage radiating from him in almost palpable waves, “I spoke of three things.”

  No one said a word. Not a single person moved.

  “I stood here and I said that now, NOW, was our time to act!”

  Raven felt shame welling up in him, and grief, burning his eyes and pounding against his chest. He was unable to look away from Autmaran, even though he desperately wanted to, even though he wanted to forget about everything that had happened.

  “I spoke of the
castle of Roarke, and the city around it. I spoke of the abundant resources we now had at our disposal – I spoke of a new addition to the Lands of the Kindred, I spoke of new Exiles that, if shown our ways, could not help but be converted to our cause. I spoke of the illusions that protected us, I spoke of the proof we had that the Children were mortal, I spoke of hope and security in a free life we have never been allowed to live!”

  Kindred around the Odeon had begun to weep.

  “Now,” Autmaran said, contempt lifting the corners of his upper lip, “I can speak of it no more.”