Quest Call

by Kirk Dougal

  “Not a journey I want to make at night in a storm,” Saleene said. DeBrest sneezed in agreement.

  “Let's see what our choices are for beds,” I said. “We can use tonight to find out more information on the castle and the last dragon slayer before we make the climb in the morning.”

  As I dismounted in front of the tavern, I glanced up at the sign hanging above the door. The gray wood and faded paint matched the weather's mood but the image of a short, bearded man with a pick over one shoulder and a mug in his other could still be seen.

  “The Miner's Keg,” Card said. “If this is a mining town, then where's all the miners?”

  “When I was riding with the Horde north of here,” DeBrest said, “there were rumors of old abandoned mines in this area. Something caused them all to close a long time ago.”

  I shrugged. “A dragon would be a good enough reason to close the mines.” I checked my sword and repositioned the shield on my shoulder. “But just in case it's something else, let's keep our eyes open.”

  Walking into the Miner's Keg was like stumbling into a meeting that you were not invited to. Only about a half-dozen patrons were sitting at two tables, mumbling conversations stopping short as the door swung open. Every head in the place swiveled to take us in, stares traipsing over us in plain view. The stunned silence continued for a three count before one of the men rose and walked over, a stained apron tied around his waist.

  “Greetings, travelers, welcome to the Miner's Keg. My name's Traxel.” He dipped his head. “What can I get for you this evening?”

  “Food and drink for now,” I said, removing my shield so I could sling off my cloak. “Beds for later, if you have them.”

  Traxel stared at Saleene for a moment. “All we have is a common chamber for sleeping. But I can set the missus up in a storage room for privacy.”

  Saleene laughed as she removed her cloak and shook off some of the rain. Traxel's eyes went wide when he saw her armor and weapons.

  “Chivalry isn't dead,” she said. “It's just been hiding in Coalton. I'll be fine with the others in the common chamber.”

  “How about our horses?” Card asked from behind me. “Have you some place we can get them out of the weather?”

  Traxel nodded. “Aye, there's a nice tight barn behind the Keg, but my stable boy has gone home for the night.”

  “That's fine,” Card said. “We'll see to them ourselves.” He tapped me on the shoulder and lowered his voice. “DeBrest and I will settle the mounts. See what you can find out.”

  Traxel was wiping down a table with a corner of the apron as they went back out into the evening. “Mary!” he yelled. “Mary, we've got guests.”

  “Quit your shouting, you old lug.” A woman walked through a doorway behind the bar. “I can see them. What'll you have, strangers?”

  “How's the ale?” I asked Traxel.

  “Not so bad you won't drink it,” he said. “The hard cider's better.”

  “Cider and food for four,” I said to Mary.

  I slung a leg over the bench and slid close to the table, letting my sword lean against the top within easy reach. Traxel stood straight after cleaning off the table.

  “It's not Coalton,” he said.

  “What?” I asked.

  “This isn't Coalton,” Traxel answered. “The missus said that you were in Coalton.”

  Saleene and I glanced at each other.

  “Well then, where are we?” she asked.

  “If there's a bright spot in Maegdon, you're the farthest place from it,” Mary said as she set down four mugs. “Food'll be ready in a bit.” She walked away.

  “What she means is that you're in the middle of nowhere,” Traxel said. “Our little place in this world isn't big enough to deserve a name. Sure, we get travelers like you every few days, but we're more a way station than a village.”

  “So where's Coalton?” I asked, staring over the rim of the mug as I drank the cider.

  Traxel hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “Up the road another mile or so, right at the base of the mountain. But no one lives there anymore. It's just a bunch of abandoned buildings ever since the troubles in the castle.”

  I counted to three, pausing so I did not appear too eager.

  “I think we saw the castle through the rain as we rode up. Looked like some of the walls had been knocked down.” I paused again. “What happened there?”

  “Ah, who really knows,” Traxel said. “I was just a bit of a boy, younger even than my stable lad, when everything fell apart there. One night, there's this terrible storm with lightning and thunder, not like tonight, but real ground shakers. It thundered so hard rocks slipped away from the mountainside and crushed some of the homes in Coalton. Killed quite a few people. Anyways, the lightning started a fire in the castle that killed everyone.”

  “Not everyone,” said one of the men at the nearest table. “There's still that crazy old man that lives up there in one of the shacks.”

  “Yes, but nobody can remember if he was living there before or if he moved in after,” Traxel said. “Anyways, after the castle was gone, the mines failed so the miners moved away. Then the sickness hit what was left of the people in Coalton and everybody else left. My dad and a few others built the houses here and stayed. He just couldn't bring himself to leave. Said it was too much a treasure to be left.”

  “That's all well and good, Traxel,” the other man said, “but Romm and I are dry over here.” He shook his mug for emphasis.

  The tavern keeper grabbed the mugs and went to refill them.

  “Thunder and lightning enough to knock down part of a mountain.” Saleene leaned forward, her voice dropping low.

  “And fire,” I agreed. “Sounds to me like a fight with a dragon and a little boy was too young to understand what was really happening.”

  Card and DeBrest walked in the tavern and spotted us. Within a few minutes, they had shed their wet cloaks and been filled in on the story behind Coalton. We stopped talking when Mary reappeared with the food and dug in, each of us lost in our own thoughts.

  “At least everything Yemaya said still matches what we've learned here,” Card said after he pushed his empty plate away. “Castle destroyed, probably by a dragon, a crazy old man still living there. If I was the last dragon slayer and wanted to disappear, that's the kind of story that would fit.”

  I nodded, but then gestured to the others to be still.

  “Master Traxel,” I said. The man had rejoined the group at the table from when we first entered the Keg. He walked over.

  “Yes,” he said. “Can I get you more cider?”

  I waved my hand. “No, we were talking about the ruined castle. My young friend here,” I pointed toward DeBrest, “has never seen a real castle before. We thought we might take a look tomorrow morning before we leave. Is there a way up this side of the mountain?”

  “Ah yes, down in Coalton. There's a road that leaves the west side of the village and travels back and forth across the face to the top. It should still be passable. At least it was a few years ago.”

  “What makes you say that?” Card asked. “Did you go up to the castle?”

  “Me? No. Every few years we get a handful of people like yourself who travel up to the ruins. But about three or four years ago, a man showed up with a whole army riding with him. Ate and drank me out of supplies, and I had to take a wagon to Larshire, to have enough for more guests. Anyways, this man and a few others took the road up and a couple of days later, they all rode out again. So, it must have been passable then.” Traxel walked away.

  “Sounds like nothing but good…”

  I held up my hand, cutting Card short. I had caught a snippet of the conversation from the next table, and I wanted to hear more.

  “It's gonna be a war, I tell you,” the first man said.

  “You're believin' too many traveler stories,” the other replied. “Besides, even if it is a war, it's so far away it'll never affect us here.”

  �
��Excuse me,” I said, swiveling on the bench to face the men. “Did I hear you say something about a war?”

  “Bah, just children's stories told to keep little ones like him in line.” The older man cackled as he spoke.

  The other man gave him a sneer, but then turned to me. “There's always rumors to be picked up on the road, and they all have at least a little kernel of truth to them,” he said. “I was talking to a merchant headed to Larshire last week. He had picked up a load of spices from one of the ports on the Windless Sea, and he said he heard about a Gargian army headed into old Bretonia. Seems that they were going to avenge most of a village being wiped out by someone claiming to be the new duke. Most of the women and children escaped but they paid for it with the lives of their menfolk.”

  “You can't have a war if there's only one side to fight,” the other man said. “No one's seen a Breton soldier in twenty years, least ways not since…who was the old duke? He had some kind of funny name.”

  “Bear Killer,” DeBrest said. He stared forward, his eyes shining.

  “Yeah, that's it. Anyway, the Gargians can't start a war with someone who doesn't exist.”

  The first man shook his head. “No, they were going after them and chasing them east of the White Mountains. The women said that's where they was headed after they killed everyone.”

  I nodded my thanks and turned back to my companions.

  “They're chasing the Horde,” DeBrest said, the words cracking with emotion.

  That means we can't take the southern route through Bretonia when we're done here,” Saleene said. “That means going through the pass again.” She shivered at the memory of the cold trail.

  “It also means no stop at the Oracle at the Temple of the Soaring Eagle,” Card said. “I was hoping we'd have a chance to stop and send a message to Tower and receive instructions.” He shook his head. “We won't have the opportunity to do that now.”

  “The situation is much worse than that,” I said. “We may need to fight our way through an army that's goal is to kill him,” I gestured toward DeBrest, “just so we can then take on a dragon and the army inside Dinas Farwolaeth.”

  Chapter 43

  The sun still hid behind angry clouds the next morning, blacks and grays swirling together in wind-blown waves marching across the sky, but at least the rain had stopped. That did not mean it would stay away all day, nor did it promise a dry road. Mud splashed with every hoof set down as we headed toward the abandoned Coalton and the castle above.

  “We never even asked what the name of the castle was,” DeBrest said, shaking his head.

  “Do we care?” I asked, my mood matching the weather. “It feels like we've been on this side trip forever. Meanwhile, people are dying on the outside. Let's just convince the last dragon slayer to go with us and get back to Dinas Farwolaeth.”

  The others fell quiet. Buildings loomed out of the morning gray, shadows darkening and taking shape until wood and stone could be seen. Unlike some of the villages we had seen in Breton that had been destroyed by the dragon, most of these homes and stores had seen weathering but were still standing silent vigil beside the mountain. Only as we neared the steep sides did we see some flattened, giant boulders remaining to confirm Traxel's tale the night before.

  Saleene and I rode through a few inches of standing water, the road soft beneath the horses. Card, never fond of riding, finally voiced what I had been thinking.

  “If the road is this bad down here,” he said, “what's it going to be like on the mountain? Should we wait?”

  I glanced over my shoulder at him. He settled back into his saddle, grabbing hold of the pommel.

  “He's got a point,” Saleene said, the words soft enough for only me to hear.

  As it was, the worries were all for nothing. At the base of the rock wall, the road switched from a quagmire to stone. A narrow but solid pathway wound back and forth across the face of the mountain, most of the time wide enough for three horses to walk abreast. I understood now why it had taken a dragon to capture the castle. This rocky path was better protection against an invading army than any moat or walls would have been during an attack. Archers from above—actually, just a handful of boys with good aim and a large supply of throwing stones—could hold off a much larger force.

  The sun attempted to break through, testing the clouds with a few fingers of light, by the time we breached the top. We stopped to rest the horses after the climb, but also to take in the awe-inspiring sight.

  The ruins of a massive castle complex spread out before us, walls rising and falling with the undulating mountain plateau. The corner of wall and parapet that we had seen from the road below had only been a tiny corner of the whole. In the center, the base of what must once have been a towering citadel rose from the ground to twice the height of the nearest building, the crumbling walls long ago sheared off on a descending line, stones still clinging to each other to stay aloft and losing the battle. On the other side of the decay, a rounded peak rose like a fist toward the sky, challenging the gods and reminding me of how its devastation had come from above.

  “Wow,” DeBrest said. “It's huge.”

  “We're not here to sightsee,” I said. “Let's find the last dragon slayer.”

  The remains of the foot-thick doors lie in broken piles beside the main opening. Beyond them, wide avenues, made even more open because of their desertion, spread away from us like spokes on a wheel.

  “Where do we start?” Card asked.

  I opened my mouth to answer, but Saleene beat me to it.

  “This way,” she said, gesturing toward the next to last street on the right, away from the mountain's edge. She heeled her horse into motion, and I had to trot to catch up.

  “Not that any way isn't as good as the next,” I said. “But why this street?”

  She smiled. “Did you catch a cold in the rain? I smell burning wood.” She breathed deep, and then pointed ahead. “I also see white smoke. I'd say someone's keeping their fireplace warm to fight off the weather.”

  We rode for quite a while, each turn down another street making the smoke easier to spot. Finally we emerged from the city maze to find another section of the wall decimated, the blocks swept away so cleanly that the area opened like a village green before an odd-looking house. Parts of some walls used blocks fallen from the wall to find their form while mating to wood at impossible angles for the roof and sections of a second floor. The structure looked like a carpenter and a mason had gotten drunk together and decided they would build until they met in the middle.

  As we stared, blinking to ensure this house was not some sort of mirage, the front door opened and a man walked out, grabbed some wood off the stack beneath the porch overhang, and disappeared back inside without so much as a glance in our direction.

  “Not exactly one for security,” I said.

  Card lay his hand on my arm. “Something's not right here, Beast. I feel like a powerful river is flowing just underneath our feet and it might burst through to the surface at any second.”

  We dismounted, glancing around before I stepped onto the porch. My foot was still pressing down when the door flew open. The man stepped out again, white hair flying in five directions at once, an even longer beard trailing down his chest over a coat patched with so many different pieces of cloth it was impossible to tell where the original piece lie underneath. Despite his wildly frayed appearance, his blue eyes still shone clear.

  “And what would you four want from me today?” he asked. His words were flat, neither inviting us in or warning us with anger. I noticed, however, his right hand stuck deep in the coat pocket, moving every few seconds as if he was busy building something out of sight.

  I moved the rest of the way onto the porch, realizing all the hair and colors had hidden how small the man was, rising only to the middle of my chest.

  “We've come to talk to you,” I said. “We need you for a very important purpose.”

  “Ah.” His eyes twinkled for a
moment and then clouded, the light blue turning almost to the color of the deep ocean. “Suppose I don't want to talk to you? Hmmm?”

  He leaned to the side, staring around me at the others, his gaze traveling up and down each one.

  “It's a matter of death,” I said. “We need your help.”

  The man snapped up. “Death? What is life without death?” He shook his head. “Oh, come on. I can tell that even if I turn you away, you'll be one of those who hangs around moping for days.” He walked inside the house, and I followed, the creaking floorboards on the porch telling me the rest were right behind me.

  If I thought the outside of the house was a mismatched nightmare, then the inside was the place where crazy builders went to die. A stairway started on one side of the great room and ended in the wall a few feet up. Shelves hung at severe angles and one wall noticeably leaned in toward the center, while it was mated to one that tilted out. One chair was a barrel sawed in two and sitting on its end, a pillow used for its seat. A table loaded with books and jars had only three legs, the corner of the couch serving as the fourth.

  Banging and clanging tore me out of my stupor, and I glanced at Card, who was grinning like a madman.

  “Reminds me of my Aunt Lola's house when I was a kid.” He spun a finger in a circle near his temple.

  “You four are an odd lot,” the man said, reappearing from what I assumed was the kitchen with a skillet in one hand and a kettle in the other. He looked at me. “You wear the strength of the bear,” he turned to DeBrest, “while you have the speed.” He glanced down at his hand as if he just discovered he was holding the pan and let it drop to the floor. “The wizard has the Stones of Barath wrapped around his hand. I wonder what he thinks he can do with them here? Hmmmm?” He walked out of sight again. “Tea for everyone?” he shouted.

  “What about me?” Saleene asked. I thought her words were too soft to carry around the corner but the little man appeared immediately.