“Well, it impressed me,” I said. “You’re damn good. Who trained you?”
Marcus sat down on the other side of the road and started cleaning his blades. He sighed and looked at me for a moment. “My father taught me most of what I know. Life, the rest.”
“He must be good,” I said.
“The best.”
“What does he do?”
“These days? I have no idea,” Marcus said. “When I was young, he was adviser and bodyguard to King Leonel.”
“Oh…” I said with a grimace. The former king of Prylea had been one of the first casualties of Solas’s ambitions.
“When the king and his family died… it did something to my father. He was with me when it happened. I think he blames himself for not being there. Gods above…” Marcus gripped his blade tightly through the cloth. His muscles strained, and it looked like he was trying to bend it. “I think he blames me as well. But Leonel organized a secret meeting with Solas, when Solas was but a king himself. When the alarm was sounded, my father hid my mother and ordered me to stay with her. He ran to the king’s chamber and returned covered in blood, having barely escaped with his own life.”
Marcus sat still for long seconds. “What happened?” I asked.
“My father sent me away with my mother and set off by himself to find answers. That was the last I saw of him.” He looked at his hands as they rubbed at each other, twisting and turning like his thoughts no doubt were. “When my mother died, I went searching for him, to ask why he abandoned us, but each time I tracked him down he was already gone. I gave up years ago, but part of me is always looking.” He sighed. “He’s probably made his way to another continent.”
“I doubt it,” I said. The histories showed that travel to other continents had once been commonplace. For reasons that could only be guessed at, it had become increasingly more difficult, and by the time my father was born, only a handful of trips were successful. Now, none were. “If he has, he’d be the first in a long time, I’d wager.”
The conversation was halted by the clattering of hooves, and the warden soon arrived on a mottled mare. The man dismounted and surveyed the scene, hands on his hips. He was not what I expected of a warden. He looked more like an accountant than a lawman. He was too well-groomed, his stomach too round, and he wore a wide-brimmed hat that looked out of place. Besides that, he looked awkward, as though he’d just woken up with no memory of how he got there.
“I thought the elf said there were five dead?” the warden asked. “I see two.”
“The others went for a swim,” I said. I went on to explain what happened, and Marcus pitched in to amend Malvin’s role in the affair.
The warden introduced himself as Adair and knelt beside the dead leader to search him.
“This bastard has been a thorn in my side for several months,” Adair said. “I am not sad to see him in the dirt.” Adair, too, looked at the tattoo. He snorted. “By the Beloved’s balls… I should have known he was of the Clenched Fist.”
“The Clenched Fist?” I asked.
“You’ve not heard of them?” Adair asked. “Most notorious gang in the empire. They sprung up out of nowhere a few months back. Now you can find them in every town. It’s the damnedest thing. I am yet to hear a believable explanation of how they pulled it off.” He shook his head. “No matter, there’s five less of them now.” He retrieved six silver coins from the man’s pouch and held them in his hand. He looked at Marcus, then the coins, then back to Marcus. He sighed and handed them over. “Call it a reward. I’m surprised you didn’t help yourself.”
Marcus stared at the coins in his hand. Did he feel guilty for taking the dead man’s coins? I had no such qualms and snatched them from his hand. “We’ll need that,” I said.
Adair helped himself to the remaining man’s burden, then started dragging him to the river.
“No burial?” Marcus asked.
“I won’t waste my efforts on the likes of these,” Adair said. “Take the other one.”
CHAPTER SIX
Sagemont
Sagemont came into view a few turns of the road past the bridge. From above, it was the very picture of tranquility. The large port lay at its center, as was apt. According to Marcus, Sagemont owed its existence to the port. The rest of the town spread out in both directions from that point, hemmed in by the mountains to its rear and the large lake to its front. The lake stretched into the horizon and beyond. It’s hard for me to get across what that much fresh water, just sitting there, looked like to a man who was raised on the dry plains of Ubrain. It struck me as unnatural, made me uneasy. Several ships lay at anchor off the port, with a multitude of smaller vessels closer in. I wondered if any of the ships carried my cargo.
“Now, I have nothing against elves in general. But Elijah is up to no good, I just know he is,” Adair went on as we made our way along the path which meandered its way down the slope.
“I don’t suppose you have any proof of this?” Marcus asked.
Adair sighed. “If only I did. I’ll find out what he’s up to, though—you mark my words. Sneaky elf.”
When we finally walked into town, it became clear that, up close, its appearance did not quite hold up to first impressions. It was nice enough, I suppose, but a little run-down. The type of place a lot of money passed through without getting stuck there.
“It’s just as I remember it,” Marcus said with a fond smile.
“Do you come here often?” Adair asked.
“Nope, only been here once, but I had a blast. It was after my first and only voyage across White Lake,” Marcus said, nodding his head to the lake. “Rough trip, that.”
“They tend to be,” Adair said. “To be honest, though, Sagemont isn’t much of a town.”
“Are you kidding?” Marcus asked. “Great ale, good music, friendly girls—what’s not to like?”
Adair shook his head and reined in his horse as we came to a busy intersection. He dismounted awkwardly, again striking me as ill-suited to his job. Like a warhorse pulling a plough. Or perhaps more aptly, a plough horse being ridden into battle. “What’s the best inn round here these days?” Marcus asked. Adair sneered, turned his back on us, and led his horse to the warden’s office on the corner without answering. “That’s a bit rude,” Marcus said.
“I suspect its Elijah’s establishment,” I said with a smile. “Did you manage to catch the name of his inn?”
“Wish I did. I tell you what though, I know of a great tavern. Let’s go there first. I am fair parched, and it’ll get you off your feet for a while.”
I was happy to comply, and Marcus led us down the narrow cobblestone streets. Space between the steep slopes of the mountain and the shore of the lake was at a premium, and the timber buildings were closely spaced. It was a busy town, but I doubted it had more than a few hundred permanent residents. We walked past a group of weather-beaten men—sailors, I presumed. Two overdressed merchants going the opposite direction gave the rough-looking men a wide berth. Three of the sailors were dark-skinned, though fairer than Marcus and not as large. I even noticed a fellow Ubraian in their midst. We wouldn’t stick out in this town.
Marcus slowed down to look at two ladies who waved at us from a porch. They were leaning against the wall of what appeared to be an upmarket bordello. The sign above the door bore no name but depicted a blue blossom tucked behind a girl’s ear. Marcus waved back with a grin on his face. “The Blue Lotus,” he said. “A pricey establishment, but in a town full of sailors, it pays to be discriminating.” I shook my head. Marcus had told me many stories of his exploits with the opposite sex. More than I’d cared to hear. Whores featured prominently in these tales, and I got the impression that he would not easily be tied down by anything more lasting. I suspected that it had to do with the split in his own family. Don’t get me wrong; he was not unkind to these ladies of pleasure. In fact, he respected them quite a bit. They just provided companionship, as he called it, without requiring any ongo
ing commitment. He nudged me in the ribs. “Want to make a detour? I’ll pay.” I shook my head.
A short walk later, Marcus pointed at a building beside the lake. “Here we are, the Bleeding Wolf. Damn good ale awaits us.” I noticed a small crowd that was gathered on a patch of grass to the side of the tavern. A man was speaking earnestly to half a dozen people from the top of an upturned dinghy. His face was stern, but he spoke too softly for me to hear. His serious gray eyes fixed on me as I walked up the steps to the door, and I was relieved to be away from them when I entered.
The interior of the tavern was surprisingly nice. Well-crafted tables and chairs sat widely spaced, and they were missing the artwork commonly left by patrons of lesser establishments. The aroma of tobacco met me first, but it was the smell of cooking meat and baking bread that mixed together to make my mouth water. We’d eaten little over the previous week, and when we did it was road food, which was bland to the extreme. Even the slop I ate in the dungeon was better, if barely, and I was more than ready for a proper meal.
Marcus walked to a table by the window and we sat down. Looking out the window, I saw a man and his son drag a small boat to shore. When on dry land, he pulled a fishing net from the boat and laid it on the grass to mend it. When he looked up to see the small crowd beside us, he narrowed his eyes, picked up his net, and led his son away a short distance before sitting down. I leaned my elbow out the window to get a closer look at those gathered.
“Have faith, my children,” I heard the man on the dinghy say in a low voice. “Yessa will tend to your needs, regardless of what Solas would have you believe.”
“Yessa doesn’t care for us,” a young man said.
“Of course she does. She cares for all things living.”
“The empire is as dead and soulless as this tree,” the young man said, kicking at the dead tree he was leaning against.
“Yessa can restore life to both, my son,” the man said. He looked to the tree, and his mouth moved around silent words, his brow furrowed in concentration. It was as though he sung a soundless song.
“By Svyn’s beard,” I muttered, my eyes wide. A green mist was gathering around the dead tree, swirling about it and through it. I could feel the words he sang coursing through me, though I couldn’t hear them. It felt like cold water running down my spine. The young man leapt back when leaves started sprouting from its dead branches. Flowers bloomed, and within moments, it was the healthiest-looking tree in Sagemont. As life returned to the tree, the grass around it withered and died. An older lady cuffed the man about the head, then quickly rushed him away. He was protesting, but she had him by the beard, and they were soon out of sight. The young man stood staring at the tree, much as I was, in wide-eyed astonishment.
“By my hairy balls,” Marcus said. “What just happened?”
“Magic,” I said. “Of a sort.” Magic was a rare thing in the empire. In the whole of Kor, really, but especially in the empire. I recognized what the man had done, even though I did not understand it. He knew how to sing the names of things. Or at least as much as it related to that tree. My experience with naming meant I could feel it when true names were used. “That man is a priest of Yessa. Or if he’s not, he was preaching on her behalf. I thought it was forbidden?”
“It most certainly is,” Marcus said. “The punishment is death.” Emperor Solas had outlawed worship of the seven Gods and proclaimed himself as divinely sanctioned. An intermediary between the mortal and the divine. You worshiped the Gods by worshiping him. The man had some nerve. Most still held to their beliefs in the seven, but it was a thing kept quiet.
A door opened to the side of the bar, and the man who came through it looked surprised to see us. It was still an hour short of lunchtime, and we were the only patrons. “Apologies,” he said. “I did not hear you enter. What can I get you?”
“Some ale would be nice,” Marcus said. “What do you recommend?”
“I have a very nice pale ale,” the tavern keeper said. “It’s a bit different from the black gloop most seem to prefer, but you might like it.”
“Two of those,” Marcus said. “Does your wife still make that duck pie?”
“Been here before, then? Yes, she still does. Not for me, mind you, but that’s a different story. The ale will be right up. I’ll fetch you some bread to tide you over while you wait for your pie.” He walked behind the bar and soon returned with two tankards. “Enjoy.”
Marcus took a sip of ale and nodded his appreciation. I picked up my own and sniffed at it. Now, I’ll be honest; I’d never had ale before this point. I did not want to admit this fact to Marcus, however. Silly perhaps, but what sort of man reached his thirties without having tasted ale? Of course, I’d been a slave for a decade, which afforded little opportunity for such trivialities. Still, I decided to act the part of a big manly man who drank ale.
The ale smelled odd. Not unpleasant, mind you—just not how I expected it to. It had a fruitiness, and something else. I took a sip and found it was sweeter than I’d thought it would be. Up front, at least. The sweetness was followed by a bitter taste that seemed to coat my mouth. I ran my tongue around my mouth, but the taste, and somehow the sensation, too, remained. I took another sip.
“What do you think?” Marcus asked.
“I think I like it. It has a bitter… thing going on.”
“Not used to that, huh? That would be the hops. Most in the empire prefer to use spices to preserve their ale, but he uses hops, like up north. A lot of them, too,” Marcus said, peering into his tankard.
“Well, I like it,” I said and took another sip. It was the truth. I really did like it, and I could see the appeal this beverage had. My father had preferred wine, as most in Ubrain did.
“I suggest we relax today,” Marcus said. “It’s been a tough week. Tomorrow, we can have a look around the docks and ask a few questions. Find out when the shipment is coming in, and where they will be storing it. Hopefully we can set our genius plan in motion before too long.”
“You have a plan you haven’t told me about?”
“Well… no. But I’m sure it will be pure genius. When it exists.” Marcus raised his tankard, “To genius plans!”
“To a plan that may one day exist,” I toasted.
The tavern keeper returned with a loaf of bread and some butter. The bread smelled delicious and was obviously fresh. “Like the ale?” he asked.
“Even better than I remembered,” Marcus said.
They both looked at me. “I like it.”
“Good man,” he said. “I am hoping to enter it at the town fair during solstice. My competitors are not very good, but my brews are a bit different from the swill the masses drink. Alas, there is no accounting for taste.”
“Speaking of taste, this seems more bitter than I recall,” Marcus said.
“That it is. The winning ale, as judged by a panel, gets sent to Morwynne where it is entered into a second round. I added the extra hops to keep it from turning before then. I think I overdid it.”
“No, I really like it,” Marcus said.
“What do you win?” I asked.
“At the town fair? Nothing but adoration. If we win at the second round, however, we get to supply all the ale for the following Harvest Festival at the capital. Now, that comes with obvious financial benefits, but it also means I get to be a guest at the palace on the night of the festival. What are the chances of someone like you or me getting in there, eh? Just imagine it. We go to Morwynne often, my wife’s family live there, and I always look up at that glorious palace. Ah, well… dreams are free, they say. Anyway, I’m intruding. I’ll go see how that pie is coming and let you get to your bread before it cools.” The tavern keeper turned and walked through the door to the kitchen.
I cut a slice of bread. It was hot, and as I spread the butter, it melted, with a drop spilling onto the table. I grunted, took out a handkerchief, and mopped it up. A mark remained on the otherwise unblemished table. Such things bothered me
more than they had any right to. I rubbed at it with my finger. I would have scratched it, but I had no fingernails. I moved my tankard, sitting it on top of the stain.
Marcus bit his lip and looked up from his bread. “If he wins, we might be able to hide in his barrels, wait till we are transported to the palace, sneak in and get what we need,” Marcus said.
“Seven hells, you are forever a stowaway. And how would we get out?” I asked. “No, you are hit and miss with that tactic.”
“Oh, come now. It worked the last time.”
I shook my head and ate some bread. When I looked up again, Marcus was staring out the window, and a frown creased his face. “What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Those men who tried to rob us on the bridge,” Marcus said. “They were all former rebels.”
“How do you know?” I asked.
“That stupid tattoo of the clenched fist. Months ago a few of the men got those. I punished them, but to no avail. Within weeks, most of my men had it. It’s stupid. Why make it easy to identify yourself as a rebel? Idiots…”
“Why didn’t they recognize you?”
“I can’t be everywhere. My efforts were focused elsewhere. There were commanders in each region.” Marcus sighed. “Well… it appears my rebels are no more. No, I trained desperate men and put together a gang that spans the empire. According to Adair, at least, but he has no reason to lie about it.”
We sat in silence for a while, staring out the window.
I was taking a sip of ale when a fish flew in through the window and landed on our table. Not a small fish, but one the length of my arm. Judging by the smell, it wasn’t fresh either. “Gods! What in the hells is this?” Marcus shouted.
The tavern keeper came running from the kitchen, just in time to receive a pelting as more rotten fish came sailing through the window. Looking out onto the street, I saw half a dozen men standing around a cart of fish. I ducked out of the way just in time to avoid taking some fish to the face. Marcus ran outside, and we followed close behind him.
Dark Legion Page 4
