by Colin Taber
Marcus showed no surprise, instead he just met his gaze. “You always were the one to find some great danger, even if you had to make it up – and then charge off to defeat it. It’s why you joined the Inquisition to start with.” He shook his head, his mouth melting into a frown. “There never was anything humble about you. You always were too important, too busy, too this, too that...”
Anton began to rise. “I should go...”
Marcus also stood. “Yes, you should: Go and mourn for the family that has moved on from thirty years ago, the family which you not once cared to check upon.”
“I didn’t mean...”
Marcus raised his voice and growled, “I cared not then, and you know it, but Mother and Father did – and Tonio. He idolised you!”
Anton looked to the unknown faces around the table, finally he whispered, “My apologies.” And then left.
A long and sleepless night had followed.
So, as the sun rose the following morning, neither Sef nor Anton spoke as they left Adonis, each mounted courtesy of the Countess. With each moment, Sef became increasingly haunted by the road ahead, as it ran towards Kaumhurst and the ghosts of his past, while Anton fell deeper into a gloom borne of his family and a guilt built of neglect.
For both of them melancholy shrouded their homecoming – just as expected.
Adrift in such thoughts, Anton wondered why he’d gone to the Heletian Quarter in the first place. It’d been a bad idea, one with little hope of reward or grace. Yet, he’d still gone.
But why?
Deep down, he knew the answer; because he’d wished for a better outcome. He’d hoped that Juvela would grace him to make all things well. He’d thought that perhaps she’d help, that she’d make his past neglect of his family be forgotten or overlooked.
What he now realised was that while she could help show him the way, he still had to do the labour to achieve such things.
He could have apologised or arrived with a gift. He could have also sent for his brother and had a one-on-one meeting, something private where grievances could have been aired, instead of being paraded before family – family he’d never even deigned to meet.
He could hope for better things and he could wish for luck, but it was up to him to establish the foundations for good outcomes, not by waiting on the charity of others, but by setting such things up.
No doubt there’d be worse to come, worse for both him and Sef. Fletland was a land built out of the gloom; large swathes of the dark forest might have been felled, and the Wildlings, bandits and beasts of the woods pushed back, but none of that had done anything to clear the overcast skies. There were shadows in Fletland that would never fade.
-
The road started well enough, but as they moved further from the coast, narrowed, yet was still relatively well travelled and maintained. On the whole, the road followed the lay of the land, only rising at a gradual rate as it twisted and turned between wide sweeps of fields and the odd grove of trees – remnants of the huge woodland that had once covered the plain.
At noon, dark clouds rolled in overhead to bring drizzle, a constant if light wet that wouldn’t stop. Under its grey cloak, they passed through countless villages and hamlets. Streams crossed under the road by way of occasional bridges, or over it at countless fords. Those waters always ran off to head east, snaking away into the distance, seeking the river, and then, finally, the waters of the Evoran Sea.
Anton and Sef kept to themselves, something relatively easy to do. Sure, they were seen on the road, but aside from the Countess and the Seers of Adonis, none knew of their purpose – or so they hoped.
They stayed at a village inn on their first night in an effort to keep their saddle-sore bones out of the cold and damp. It wasn’t just a welcomed comfort, but helped put them more at ease as they travelled not just into Fletland, but their memories.
-
On their second day out, Sef knew that they’d reach the same river that those streams all sought as it swung around unseen ahead. If all went well they’d see its waters by sunset. Once there, they’d be halfway to the lakelands, where the cleared plain met ancient woodland, marking Fletland’s true frontier. From there, it’d be at least as long again until the foothills of the mountains – if the trails were good.
About them, pockets of trees between fields were thick where they remained, even though most stood leafless and wintering. Clouds passed darkly overhead, the heaviest bringing rain and the remainder drizzle. A Fletland winter, unlike in Ossard, was a place of cool winds and wet. There could be snow, but it was an exception. Some said that the milder weather was because of the warmth of the shallow waters of the Evoran Sea. Most didn’t care much for such explanations, they were just grateful.
-
Sef and Anton noted that life in the countryside seemed quite comfortable. For the local people it was a cycle of working the land to take a harvest of timber, crops or livestock, which was traded for similar goods or the produce of the artisans in market towns. If anything, a gentle prosperity showed through in the coastal districts and those that neighboured them.
To see such a thing came as a surprise to Sef who remembered a more desperate and bloody home, yet his memory was based on the lakelands and frontier bordering it.
On their third day out, as the road began to follow the river, it was Anton who first stated what both had been thinking. “Fletland seems to be enjoying a comfortable age, one without much trial or trouble.”
“Yes, the people look cheerful and well fed.”
“And while the villages grow smaller the further we go, and the traffic on the road less, it seems as though people still feel secure. I’ve seen little in the way of walls and guards and the like, not even much of a militia in the few market towns.”
“Yes, it’s winter and Fletland sleeps. I suppose some must be looking north and watching for gargoyles.”
Anton nodded, deep in thought about such things. “Tomorrow night we should reach Lake Haage. I suppose it’ll be there that we’ll see signs of a more defensive land.”
“You will, that’s where the spiked roof pieces start. People wouldn’t go to such trouble for a threat that was a myth.”
“Yes, I’ve heard of those. Well, I’ll see them for myself soon enough. We should also make more of an effort to talk to locals and see what they can tell us of their own experiences.”
“About the gargoyle raids? You think it’s all talk, don’t you; tales of what supposedly happened to other villages, of what people have heard that others have seen?”
“I don’t know. To tell you the truth, I’m not sure it even matters: What I’m really interested in is if it’s just part of an effort to keep people away from the heart of Kalraith.”
“But what a lie it’d be!”
“Yet there are still pieces of mystery; what then of the razed villages? How would you explain...” Anton’s words died, his mind stumbling upon a terrible possibility.
Sef’s face paled. “I think I know only too well how such things happen.”
Anton stopped his horse, a solid brown beast. “By the gods, you’re thinking that the attack on Kaumhurst was actually one of these supposed gargoyle raids?”
Sef nodded.
“You think Kavists carry out these raids in an effort to propagate the myth of danger emanating from the mountains?”
Again, Sef nodded, tears welling in his eyes.
Anton shook his head, appalled, as he put the pieces together of the terrible divine puzzle they’d become mired in. “The Kavists wiped Kaumhurst from the map. It would’ve just become yet another of the one or two villages found every year to have been razed during winter – and assumed to be a victim of a gargoyle raid.”
Sef again nodded, as tears began to mark his face.
“Yet, on that first occasion when Kaumhurst was to fall, Kave was distracted by a soul offered freely up; yours. He saw something in it he wanted, so he took you up on your offer, sparing the villa
ge and taking your service as payment – despite what it did to his plans. Later, he remedied that simply enough by reissuing the command for the raid the following winter.”
Sef gave a grim nod, not trusting himself to speak.
Anton continued, “During the second raid you fought against his wishes, turning from your deal as he also had. As punishment he forced you to witness the slaughter of your own family and people. His priest then ensorcelled you so that you’d never be able to speak of it.”
Sef found his voice, but it came as just a weak whisper, “Yes.”
Anton’s own eyes came over wet. “Oh, my friend, what you’ve seen! I’m so sorry to hear of it!”
Again, Sef whispered, “Yes.”
“Even as he first dealt with you for your offered soul, he would have happily fed on his followers, those that you killed while defending Kaumhurst in your berserk rage. All the while he still got what he wanted, and even more, I suppose. And the next year, time being such a meaningless thing to the gods, he got what he originally needed with Kaumhurst wasted and that stretch of forest emptied. It makes its own kind of perverted sense – and we’ll find confirmation soon enough.”
“How?”
“When we near Kaumhurst there’ll be tales in neighbouring villages of what happened and the cause of its demise. If the locals claim it to be the work of gargoyles, then we know how such a thing comes about.”
Sef brushed away tears.
Anton wiped at his own eyes. “My friend, while it’s true we’re in a hurry, tonight we’ll find an inn and have a drink. Tomorrow, we’ll leave a little later, for tonight we celebrate the liberation of truth and the memory of Kaumhurst and your family.”
That night when they stopped at an inn, Sef was drained and quiet, and not just because of the ride or the constant chill of the wet road. They said little as they arranged for a room and their horses to be stabled, then dried off and changed. Afterwards, they went down to the common room and ordered drinks and hot meals, before settling down at a table by the fire.
Finally, Anton looked to his friend and raised his ale. “To the memory of those lost in tragedy, all of them, most especially family.”
Sef nodded and joined him in the toast. He then went on to talk of his wife, daughter and mother, and their life in the village of Kaumhurst. He spoke of many things, but mostly the good times, a set of stories that lifted both of them above the gloom of the road.
It was a good evening.
-
The next day they started out later, but in high spirits. That the rain had stopped helped, seeing them on the road under the sun even if it was wed to a chill wind. Clouds raced above, but were light compared to the dreary skies that had haunted them so far. Such weather accompanied them for the rest of the day, which was long enough to see the river-following road deliver them to the shores of Lake Haage at sunset.
There, on the banks of the lake, a body of water dark and wide, a town crowded in the failing light. The buildings were exclusively constructed of wood, including a few with spires and towers that belonged to temples dedicated to the countless gods of the Flets. Above, the sky slipped into dusk’s colours, them reflected on the lake’s still surface, while to the northeast stood the silhouette of woodlands, sometimes in isolated thickets, but more often in broader spreads.
To some, Fletland was the coast and farming lands behind those dunes, a place of rivers, fields and brooks. But there was another Fletland; the lakelands of the interior. This was a dark place of woods, lakes and wilderness, a land untouched by the coast’s feared Reavers. If the Flets of the coast worried what might come sailing up from the south, in the lakelands it was the northern sky that was watched. The gargoyles were the threat, along with gangs of bandits, and – to a much lesser degree – the Wildlings of the deep forest.
Such fears were reflected in the townscape before them, one bound by a defensive wall, but even more so by the roofline: All buildings were topped with wooden spikes designed to stop anything from settling. The larger structures also sat atop hidden cellars. At night-time windows were shuttered with light kept to a minimum. This was a land living under an ominous threat, a frontier land near an untamed and impenetrable forest, one all too familiar with violence.
Strangely, for the first time since they’d landed, Sef felt at home.
This was the Fletland he remembered...
In so doing, he sought out an inn, not wanting to be caught out after dark.
-
They found an inn and stabled their horses before going to the common room to have a meal.
With Sef feeling more familiar with his surroundings, his sense of caution came back alive: He knew that here in the lakelands they’d eventually run into cultists of Kave – and perhaps even Mortigi. They’d be able to walk by such people in the street safely enough, with only Anton’s Heletian looks drawing attention. But cult priests might be a different matter, particularly any held in divine esteem: The marks that branded Sef and Anton’s souls would blaze in the celestial as beacons to the right person. They’d have to be more careful.
Still, they made themselves comfortable and ate, while listening to the conversation around them, without looking to get involved. The talk was of farming, a feud between neighbours, the weather, and a tale of a great fish that had escaped more than one of the local fishermen.
Nothing was said of gargoyles.
-
They spent two full days heading north, following the lakeshore on a well travelled road. There were times they could see small islands in the distance, and sometimes the woods of the other side, but just as often nothing but a horizon of open water. The road passed through many villages, a few towns, most of them walled, yet it continued on. At every opportunity they listened to talk and sought out any sign that the gargoyles were active. Nothing gave them any fresh hints; the conversation, happenings, people, everything seemed unremarkable, if but rugged.
One afternoon they reached the town of Haagestrich, a place on the northern shore of the lake where people made their living either by fishing its waters or hunting for furs in the nearby woods. While not large, this was the last of the laketowns and where they’d been instructed to leave the Countess’s horses with her agent. After this night if they continued north, east or west it’d only be to travel on foot along narrow woodland trails. There’d be nothing but trees, though they might pass by some small and out of the way forest villages.
Villages like Kaumhurst.
They arranged a room at the town’s main inn and then settled down in the common room as the past few days of fine weather gave way to an evening of rain.
Anton had never been to the lakelands, while Sef hadn’t been back since his half-remembered flight from the frontier. For both of them this was a place of rough character and confronting truths; for Sef, because of Kaumhurst; and for Anton, because of his time hunting heresy. The lakelands were haunted by the very things Anton had been trained to hate and fear.
As they sat at a table awaiting servings of stew, they both looked about with a little trepidation at a place so rustic and coarse. Anton asked, “Are we likely to come across a Kavist priest out here?”
“Not in this common room.” Sef grimaced, but added, “Eventually, I suppose.”
A serving woman arrived with two tankards, following the ale with bowls of mutton stew.
Sef thanked her and took a mouthful of ale before going on, “We might see some out on the road, it’s quite likely in fact. There’ll be priests in the area who’re serving the local militia and Kavist patrols.”
“And they’ll know you – your mark?” Anton asked, before turning from him to begin to eat, his attention snagged by the stew’s aroma.
Sef answered before digging in himself, “Almost certainly. Only an unaccomplished or incompetent priest could miss it, I’d think.”
“Then we should be on our guard, more so than we have been.”
Sef nodded.
“Will we fi
nd such patrols in the deeper woods?”
“In the lands of the Wildlings?”
“Yes.”
“Perhaps, but only in a scattered way.”
“Are the Wildlings truly barbaric?”
Sef looked about, at the rough-cut tables and benches, at the patrons drinking, many still covered in the dirt of the road, lake or woods – and all of them armed. “Compared to the laketowns, you might be surprised. They live a hard life, but in their own way are quite civilised. I guess you’d know them more as worshippers of nature spirits and the like, the oldest faith.”
“Schoperde?”
“I think so, but they don’t call her that. They know her by a different name and as a much more primal force.”
“Do any of them subscribe to the Flet gods?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“Then, we should look forward to meeting such folk.”
“Why?”
“Because we might get some truth from them on the subjects of Kavists and gargoyles.”
Sef thought about it. Anton was right.
“For now though, we should talk with the people here. We’ve gained too little by hanging back.” Anton pushed aside his empty bowl and rose with his ale in hand. Sef did likewise. They then headed towards the bar and a growing crowd of locals.
Some stood in groups talking of their labours, families or the day’s late rain, others told and listened to stories of the coastal cities. One older man leaned back against the bar with a pot of ale in his hand, while telling his own tale, “It’s true, you know, just like what you hear from the sailors of the sea, but they’ll talk of mermaids; beautiful half-women crowned with golden coral.”
One of his listeners asked, “But this woman had no fish tail, instead she had legs and wings?”
“It’s true, I saw it myself! She stood tall and slender with the most beautiful curves, but out from her back, rising along her shoulders, sprouted great feathered wings. They spread white and yellow.”
