The Sworn

by Gail Z. Martin

  Jonmarc had been slumped in his chair. Now he sat up and leaned forward. “Walked?”

  The farmer nodded, wide-eyed. “My eldest son saw it. Ran home babbling about wights, but at the time, we just thought a trick of the moonlight spooked him.”

  “Is he with you?”

  The farmer turned and summoned a young man from the back of the room. This was the last judgment of the day, and the room was otherwise empty of onlookers. The farmer’s son bore a strong family resemblance, with a wide face and a strong jaw and an unruly shock of straight, brown hair that stuck out at odd angles. The boy looked to be about sixteen summers old, old enough to testify in court as a man.

  “Tell us what you saw,” Jonmarc said.

  The boy spoke without looking up. “I wasn’t supposed to be out that night. But I’d slipped out to see Molly Rimmin. We’d agreed to meet up in a clearing that’s just out of view of the village.”

  “You always meet your girlfriends in the burying grounds?”

  The boy winced. “We weren’t actually in the burying grounds, but the crypts aren’t far from there. We’d been… busy… for a while, when I heard a noise, like something crashing through the underbrush. I was scared that it might be wolves.”

  “If it had been wolves, you wouldn’t have heard them until they were on you,” Sior, the representative for the vyrkin, spoke from his place behind Jonmarc. The boy blushed scarlet.

  “We didn’t have all our clothes on,” he admitted in a mumble. “I didn’t want to die naked, and I was trying to put my pants back on when I saw them.”

  “Who?”

  “I saw the dead. I know my own uncle. And I knew he was dead. But there he was, and behind him were others. I didn’t stop to count. I grabbed Molly and what clothes we could gather and we ran.”

  “What did they look like?” Jonmarc pressed.

  The boy made an impatient expression. “They looked like themselves, only dead.”

  Jonmarc shook his head and silently counted to ten. “Was there anything unusual about how they moved?”

  The boy shook his head in frustration. “Did you not hear me? They were dead and they were walking—that’s damn unusual where I come from!”

  The farmer cuffed the boy on the side of the head. “You forget yourself. That’s the lord you be talking to.”

  “Sorry,” the boy mumbled, looking down.

  “I once saw a dead body able to move when a ghost possessed it,” Jonmarc said. Even now, the memory sent a chill down his back. “Is the area around the crypt haunted?”

  The farmer shrugged. “No more than any burying ground. We have our ghosts, like all villages. Our ancestors lie in there. They stay with us.”

  Jonmarc struggled to make himself understood. “Do you have any bad ghosts? Ones who throw things or try to hurt people? Anyone who was murdered and looking for revenge?”

  The farmer thought for a moment and shook his head. “Old man Velnost hung himself in his barn a few years back, and he soured the milk when his wife remarried, but our ghosts are quiet folk, like they were when they were alive. I don’t imagine my sister’s husband was happy about dying, but he wasn’t the sort to trouble the living.”

  “Has anyone other than the tinker come to your village lately?” Sakwi’s question was unexpected, and everyone turned to look at the land mage.

  The farmer thought for a moment. “Just the two holy men who blessed the village.”

  Sakwi and Gabriel both stepped closer, and Jonmarc leaned forward until he was nearly eye-to-eye with the farmer. “What holy men?”

  “They came two days after I did,” the tinker spoke up, eager to clear his name. “I was staying at the inn, trading odd jobs for my room and board. Not much coin to be made as a tinker these days, with the plague and all. The inn was pretty empty, which is why I remember. Folks aren’t going from place to place anymore, and they don’t welcome those who do. I knew the innkeeper from my last travels, so he took me in, but I think he would have turned these two away if they hadn’t been scholars.”

  “Why did he think they were scholars?” It was Gabriel who spoke. The vayash moru had moved close enough to meet the tinker’s eyes. Jonmarc guessed that Gabriel was using the compulsion vayash moru could use on most mortals to enable the tinker to tell his story more coherently. While Jonmarc was better able than most to resist that compulsion, he understood its power.

  The tinker’s eyes widened just a bit, and Jonmarc was certain Gabriel was nudging the man to examine his memories closely. “They carried satchels with them that looked heavy. The innkeeper asked what was in them, and they told him it was books. They said they were going to see the Sisterhood, and the innkeeper stopped asking questions.” He made the sign of the Lady to ward off evil. “We don’t have anything to do with the likes of them.”

  Sakwi looked lost in concentration, but he roused himself from his thoughts. “What did these ‘scholars’ look like?”

  The tinker frowned. “They were plain-dressed and clean-shaven. Couldn’t see much of their clothing under the black robes they wore.”

  “Black robes,” Jonmarc repeated, feeling his heart sink. What he’d assumed had been petty tomb robbing or a prank had just taken a turn into serious business. “You’re certain the robes were black?”

  The tinker nodded vigorously. “Black as night, m’lord. That didn’t strike me as odd, but this did: For scholars, they paid their fare in gold.”

  “Whose gold?”

  “That’s the other thing that was strange,” the tinker said. “The innkeeper didn’t recognize the coin. It was gold, no doubt about it, but strange looking. When he asked them, they said it was an old coin that had been in their citadel’s treasury.”

  Jonmarc pressed his fingers to his temples, trying to stop the headache that was now throbbing. “Great. Just great. Walking dead, Black Robes, and a coin no one can recognize.” He felt the weight of a long day that was just about to get much longer. “I don’t know where your dead have gone to, but I’ve got a good idea who took them. We need to see the crypt, and I’d like to know whether your innkeeper still has that coin. Will you take us to your village?”

  The farmer and the tinker exchanged glances. The animosity between them had been exchanged for a sense of foreboding that Jonmarc could read clearly in their faces. “Yes, m’lord. We would be honored.”

  Jonmarc looked to Gabriel, Sior, and Sakwi. “I think you need to see this, too.”

  Gabriel nodded. “Clearly so.”

  It took half a candlemark on horseback to reach the village. Synten, the farmer, led the way, followed by the tinker, Val. It was a small farming village, perhaps only three dozen homes, and Jonmarc was willing to bet gold that all of the inhabitants were related by blood or marriage. It was the kind of village that dotted the countryside across Dark Haven and Principality, not so different from the village where Jonmarc had grown up. The inn probably also doubled as the village bakery, Jonmarc guessed as they rode into town. Unlike the larger taverns that, in better times, did a brisk business along major roadways, the inn looked as poor as the village.

  Val the tinker led them into the inn. Everything about it was small, cramped, and hard used. In his smuggling days, Jonmarc had stayed in many inns like this one, and he could guess that its ale was watered, its food middling at best, and its mattresses buggy. The innkeeper was a wan-faced man with a sallow complexion. He looked up as the newcomers entered, but his eyes held no welcome.

  “What brings you out here?” he asked, his voice carefully neutral. Jonmarc was certain the man had spotted Gabriel as a vayash moru and Sakwi as a mage, and while it was less likely for him to guess that Sior was vyrkin, it was clear that the innkeeper was wary of strangers.

  “This is Lord Vahanian,” Val introduced. “He’s come about the… problem.”

  Fear flashed in the innkeeper’s eyes for a moment before he locked down his expression once more. “Honored to meet you, m’lord, and your friends,” he said wi
th a glance toward Sakwi and the others.

  “He’s interested in the two men who came here a couple of weeks ago. The ones in the black robes.”

  The innkeeper made the sign of the Lady in warding. “Pox take them! Wouldn’t have let them in if I’d known they were hocuses. Had to whitewash the room to be rid of their markings, and my dog went missing when they left. Sprinkled salt all around the room they used, and salt’s not cheap, but my wife says nothing less will cast out dimonns.”

  Jonmarc asked the innkeeper to lead them to the room, and the man did so, reluctantly. It was a small room, barely large enough for a bed. As the innkeeper said, it had been freshly whitewashed, both floor and ceiling. Despite the clean appearance, Jonmarc shuddered. An ominous feeling clung to the room. It seemed unseasonably cold, and he wondered if something about the runes had called ghosts. Whatever it was gave him an instinctive urge to flee. Neither Gabriel nor Sior seemed to be affected, but Sakwi looked both thoughtful and concerned.

  “What did the runes look like?” Sakwi asked.

  The innkeeper’s eyes widened. “I did my best not to look at them.”

  “It’s important,” Jonmarc said, fixing the man with a glare. “If you want to find your dead, we need your help.”

  The innkeeper grimaced, and then sighed. “All right. What do you need?”

  Sakwi motioned for him to come to the hearth, and he handed him a half-burnt stick. “Can you draw the runes you saw on the hearthstone?”

  “I can try.”

  They watched in silence as the innkeeper struggled to trace the runes that he had seen. Finally, he sat back on his heels. “That’s the best I can do. They seemed to move when I looked directly at them, and although I should remember what they looked like, they’re blurry in my mind.”

  Sakwi nodded. “They weren’t meant to be read by anyone who wasn’t a mage. Thank you, this will do.” He hunkered down next to the hearth as the innkeeper scrambled away as if the runes might burn him.

  “What do you make of them?” Jonmarc asked.

  Sakwi’s lips moved silently as his hands made warding gestures. Finally, he looked up. “Someone did blood magic in this room.”

  “I can smell traces of blood, even over the whitewash,” Gabriel said. “I’m betting Sior can, too.” Sior nodded.

  “I don’t recognize all of the runes. Rune magic isn’t my gift,” Sakwi continued. “But the runes I do recognize are words like ‘destroy,’ ‘destroyed,’ ‘destroyer.’ ”

  “Shanthadura,” Jonmarc murmured. Sakwi nodded.

  “Yes, I believe they stand for the name. I think that whatever magic was done here called to the dead.”

  “Were they summoners?”

  Sakwi frowned. “I don’t sense that strong a magical resonance. It’s not the same kind of signature as Tris’s power. No, this feels like blood magic, although it’s strong. Remember, a blood mage can animate a corpse, but can’t force a soul back into the body. Blood mages can also draw ghosts to them, but they can’t call specific spirits like a summoner can, or give them their final rest.”

  “So there are ghosts? I thought I felt something.”

  “Oh, yes,” Sakwi, Gabriel, and Sior all spoke at once. The innkeeper paled.

  “Can you get rid of them?” he asked, his defiance replaced by desperation. “We’ve got enough trouble getting guests to stay as it is without ghosts running them off.”

  Sakwi did not answer immediately. He took pinches of several herbs from the pouches on his belt and mixed them in his palm, then sprinkled them over the runes the innkeeper had drawn. He bade the innkeeper to bring him water and salt, which the man returned with promptly. Sakwi muttered under his breath as he sprinkled salt over the hearth, and then made small gestures of warding over the basin of water. Finally, he poured the water over the hearth, washing away the markings. When he was finished, he stood.

  “I didn’t think it wise to leave the runes. Such things, even badly copied, have power.” He glanced around the room toward the corners of the ceiling, places that looked empty to Jonmarc but that seemed to hold Sakwi’s attention. “Yes, whatever was done here called spirits, and I don’t think they’re pleased.” He thought for a moment. “As I said, my gift is land magic, not summoning. But I will do what I can.”

  Sakwi threw open the window and door, and checked to assure that the chimney was clear. Then he lit a fire in the fireplace. The night was too warm for a fire, and the hearth looked as if it had not been used in months, but it was stocked with wood and kindling, and the fire caught quickly. They stood back as Sakwi gathered items from his pouches. On a small nightstand, he laid out a disk of amber and a pendant of onyx. He drew wolfsbane leaves, dried witchberry, and sticklewort from his pouches, and sprinkled them with a few drops of an oil that smelled strongly of juniper. Then he carefully gathered the mixture and threw it into the fire, making a gesture of warding as he did so.

  “Go in peace. You are released. Go in peace,” he murmured.

  The air around them stirred. There was no sound, no other movement, but all at once, it felt to Jonmarc as if an oppressive weight had been lifted. The air had a heaviness, like a gathering storm, but in that moment, the sense of foreboding vanished.

  “I can’t send them to their rest,” Sakwi said, stifling another bout of coughing, “but I could free them from this place. They’ll most likely return to wherever they came from, if they lack the will or ability to cross over to the Lady.”

  The innkeeper, Val, and Synten stared at Sakwi in a combination of respect and fear. For Synten’s son, the look was complete panic. Val the tinker was the first to regain his composure.

  “Do you still have the coin they gave you?” Val asked the innkeeper. “The gold one?”

  The innkeeper spit and ground the spittle with his heel in a gesture of warding. “Buried it, I did. Don’t want no more of the bad luck they brought. What do you want with the likes of them?” His eyes narrowed.

  “We’ve come to find out what happened to your dead,” Jonmarc replied. His annoyance with the innkeeper’s thinly veiled hostility was clear in his voice. “Can you find the coin?”

  A tug-of-war of emotion crossed the innkeeper’s face. On one hand, Jonmarc was quite sure the man resented being bothered, and it was clear that, for a man in his business, he didn’t like newcomers. At the same time, he wasn’t quite ready to disobey a direct order from his lord. “Follow me,” he said, and led them out the back door.

  The coin was buried beneath a large oak tree. Grains of salt clung to the dirt, and Jonmarc guessed the man had taken as many precautions as he could to ward against evil. At least he didn’t throw it down the well. The man handed it over to Jonmarc as if the coin would bite, and Jonmarc held the coin up in the moonlight.

  “It’s not Principality gold, that’s for sure,” Jonmarc murmured.

  “It didn’t come from any of the Winter Kingdoms,” Gabriel said, his voice unusually quiet. Jonmarc turned to him, and saw concern in Gabriel’s eyes.

  “You’ve seen it before?”

  Gabriel nodded. “I’ve seen coins with those markings, yes. A very long time ago. And either the Black Robes were telling the truth about it coming from an ancient stash of treasure, or we have a very big problem.” He met Jonmarc’s gaze. “The last time I saw a coin like this was when I was mortal, over four hundred years ago. Men brought them from across the Northern Sea when they came, first as traders, and then as invaders.”

  “Why would Black Robes have gold from across the Northern Sea? The Durim are following the old ways, but they’re from here in the Winter Kingdoms. None of the Black Robes we’ve fought gave any indication of being from somewhere else.”

  Gabriel shrugged. “We didn’t stop to interrogate them before we killed them. We weren’t looking for outsiders. Or perhaps someone from outside has found common cause with the Durim.”

  “I really don’t like what you’re suggesting,” Jonmarc replied. “Especially when it comes to th
e walking dead.”

  They thanked the innkeeper for his trouble and paid him in Principality gold the equivalent of one night’s lodging. That seemed to improve the man’s mood, although he didn’t offer them ale in the bargain.

  “I can take you to the crypts now,” Synten said. His son blanched, and it was clear that the young man did not want to go, and equally clear that his fear of the dead came second to his fear of his father. Synten and his son stopped at their small, thatched house long enough to gather torches, which they lit. Gabriel and Sior refused to carry torches, and Jonmarc knew both could see better by moonlight than most mortals could see in the day. Sakwi wanted his hands free for magic. Jonmarc took a torch, but he also unsheathed his sword, keeping it at the ready. Synten gave the sword a nervous glance, and then motioned for them to follow him.

  Sakwi walked in the lead along with Synten and his son. Although the mage said little, to avoid panicking the farmer, Jonmarc was certain that the land mage was using his power to sense for traces of magic.

  Jonmarc followed. No one had claimed that the missing dead were dangerous, but he had found over the years that it was much easier to negotiate with a sword in hand. Sior and Gabriel followed, but they each took a meandering route that often left the path. Both the vayash moru and the vyrkin had heightened senses, and Jonmarc wondered what, if anything, they were picking up from the trek through the fields. But if either of them sensed anything amiss on the short walk from the village, they said nothing.

  “There,” Synten said, pointing. They had walked along the edge of several fields that were almost ready for harvest. The ground rose on the other side of the fields, and Jonmarc could see several squat, stone buildings set into the hillside. It was grassy and open from the edge of the fields to the crypts, though forest edged the entire area. Jonmarc scanned the tree line for danger, but saw nothing.

  “Where were you and where were the dead?” Jonmarc asked, turning to Synten’s son.

  The young man blushed scarlet. “Molly and me were over there, around the bend of the trees,” he said, leading the way. If his trysting place had been a secret before, it was no longer. The set of Synten’s jaw told Jonmarc that the farmer would have a few choice words with his son in private, later.