“Captain Pal Turas?” Cagle asked Meagera.
“Seeing to the ships. Most seem seaworthy, but they’ve precious little cargo,” she said.
Precious little cargo. Cagle frowned. The lack of food was on everyone’s mind. And how am I to find more?
“Shall we?” Cagle said. Vlan held the door open.
“I will remain out here,” the Yoghen said.
Cagle eyed the interior. The ceilings were higher than those in a normal house, but too low for his friend. “I’m sure Meagera will let you know how it goes.”
The mage nodded and then followed.
Other than a small receiving area, the building was but a single room. There were chairs arranged around a wide table, and the shipping guild members sat squeezed shoulder-to-shoulder on one side. There were half-finished platters of cheese, bread, smoked meats, citrus fruits, buttered rolls, and winter vegetables in front of each of them. While the city outside starved, these people clearly hadn’t. A pair of brown, long-eared mutts gnawed over several fleshy bones near an empty corner. Even their dogs ate better than the ordinary people of Crow’s Bay.
Cagle looked over the guild. He recognized several from the first day they’d arrived, and he focused on the man who’d so casually dismissed him the first day. This morning he did not seem so arrogant.
The man’s eyes brushed over Cagle’s. Then he looked at Meagera, and finally the guards who accompanied them.
Sansaba had said the guild was afraid, and it showed. There was fear in these people’s eyes.
Cagle cleared his throat. “I am Cagle Niall. I am here to trade for food. Livestock, smoked meat, salted fish, grain. Whatever you have.”
“Are you the Man of Iron?” the man said.
The Man of Iron again, Cagle thought. Why do they look for him?
“I am not,” Cagle said. “Who is he? This Man of Iron? What does he mean to you?”
“If you are not the promised one then we have nothing to say to you,” a severe-looking woman said. Her hair was pure white, pulled tight to her scalp, and she had a long, pointed nose and a wizened look around her dark eyes.
Sansaba hadn’t mentioned there was a woman among them. He’d been preoccupied upon their first meeting at the wall and hadn’t noticed himself.
“I don’t understand,” Cagle said.
“That is not our concern,” the woman said.
She and each of the others took a dagger from within their cloaks.
Cagle’s hand fell to his sword. On instinct he started to draw, then stopped. If the daggers were meant for him they would have let him get closer first, and even twelve of them were no match for the wall of armor around him.
What are they hoping to accomplish?
Before he could ask, they turned the daggers and buried the blades in their own stomachs. They hunched over, groaning and gasping, then collapsed to the floor.
Cagle moved to the woman. He put his hands around the dagger’s hilt, fighting her hands away before tearing the dagger free.
“Meagera, help me,” he said, voice hoarse.
“Cagle…” The mage was at his shoulder. “I can do nothing for this. They are all torn up inside.”
“Why? Why did you do this?” Cagle said, grasping the woman’s shoulders.
Before she could speak, her eyes clouded over and she was gone.
He turned to Sansaba. The trader stood near Felnasen, hands held over her mouth, horrified.
“Why did they do this?”
She ignored him.
“Sansaba. Why?”
“I don’t...” she shook her head. “They said nothing of this when we met. They barely spoke to me at all.”
“Felnasen, find me someone with answers. I want to know what’s just happened here.”
Their families were of no help. Each of their spouses had died along with them. Most by poison, but a few walked to the edge of the pier with a length of chain draped around their necks and “stepped off into the blue,” as Pal Turas called it.
Their children, whether young or old, knew nothing. It took two days to track them all down. They said mother and father had placed them with a relative or close friend that morning and said a tearful goodbye.
It was unexpected, brutal, and above all, confusing. Cagle hated not knowing why.
Already, rumors flew in the streets that he’d murdered the entire Guild for stealing from the poor. It hurt his pride to hear the rumors. He’d been called many things, but never dishonorable.
Olinia reminded him that, in a way, it made things easier. He wouldn’t have to worry about the Guild conspiring against him, and even if, as he suspected, there was no food to be had here, he would still need to hold Crow’s Bay as a shipping point for whatever he captured inland.
Captured. Cagle shook his head. He’d been a fool to think that Crow’s Bay would be the end of it. If the granaries were as empty as Creighten suggested, he’d have to conquer a hundred cities to get what they’d come for. The bookkeeper had yet to make a full accounting. He kept finding a few bushels here and there, in hidden storerooms or musty old cellars. Half the town must have had some small stash.
Still, it isn’t nearly enough. He’ll have to find five thousand stashes for it to be enough.
Cagle decided to use the Guild Hall as his office. He didn’t like it. It felt like the scene of a crime, one he had played a mysterious part in, but the location was near the docks and large enough for his needs.
Three days after the confrontation with the guild, Zethul found him there.
“Cagle, we’ve found someone. A secretary,” he said. A wispy young man whimpered behind him. A pair of dwarves held him fast between them.
Cagle studied the young man. “Who are you?”
“My name is Paln. I...I’m just a secretary,” he said.
“You worked for the Guild, though?”
“Y-y-y-yes.”
“Why did they kill themselves?” Cagle asked.
“Kill themselves?” Paln said, eyes wide. He shook his head. “No. They wouldn’t. You…you murdered them.”
“No,” Cagle walked across the room toward the man. “No, they killed themselves.”
“I don’t believe you,” Paln said, apparently having gathered his courage.
“They asked me if I was the Man of Iron. Does that mean anything to you?”
Again the young man shook his head. His eyes fell on the bloodstained floor. “Nothing.”
“How long did you work for them?”
“Not long. Less than a year, and only then a few times.”
“Did they have any letters or papers? What happened to Iridia? We haven’t even found any maps,” Cagle said. The lack of these items baffled him further. The Esterian map was fine and good so far, but it showed a few coastal cities only. As seafaring traders that made sense, though it didn’t help him much. There had to be documents of some kind. Some indication of what had happened here and why these people looked for the Man of Iron.
“There is a place—,” Paln started. A guarded look passed over his face. His eyes shifted to an oil painting showing a ship sailing through rough seas, and then he looked back to the floor.
“Go on,” Cagle said. “If you know something then tell me, or if you are of no further use to me...”
Cagle let his hand fall to the hilt of his sword. He didn’t like threatening people, he loathed it, but he was quickly discovering its usefulness.
The man gulped audibly. “I might know where their documents are. I’ve never been inside for sure, but one of the Guildmasters, Quelina, showed it to me,” Paln said.
“Quelina…Was that the woman on the Guild?”
“Yes,” Paln nodded. “She showed me the secret.”
Paln rose and mo
ved to the painting.
There was nothing behind it, Cagle knew. His men had torn this place apart searching for anything useful. The secretary was merely wasting time. Not that I don’t deserve it for threatening him. He recalled the look of horror on the face of Sansaba’s brother Bothar.
I am becoming all too good at threatening people. He scowled. This wasn’t how a proper general was supposed to act. He needed to keep his temper in check.
The Iridin put his index finger on the painted ship’s mainmast. He traced it down over the frame, and then down again over the wood paneling. A handspan from the floor, a piece of wood no wider than a thumb slid in with an audible click.
A section of the wall shifted and moved to reveal a narrow door and a black tunnel beyond.
Drawing his sword, Cagle moved toward it. He pushed the door wider and turned sideways to squeeze his shoulders through.
“There might be traps,” Zethul cautioned.
Cagle swept his sword high to low, searching for a wire or some other sort of trigger.
He paused and turned to give Paln a deadly look. “Are there traps in here, secretary?”
“Quelina n-n-never told me—” he stuttered.
Paln dropped his eyes for a brief instant, and Cagle knew then that he was lying. He started back out of the tunnel and raised his left foot in retreat.
Again, an audible click. Then came the fire.
Blue and purple, the flames rolled over Cagle, bathing him in a fiery inferno. He screamed. The roar of the flames was deafening. He couldn’t breathe. He could see nothing—feel nothing—but the searing flames.
He found himself screaming again before he realized that there was no pain.
Creator, I’m dead already. Felnasen and Olinia will have to carry on without me. I’ve failed. Failed at everything. Dead because I was too stupid and prideful and trusting to take care.
The light and sound were overwhelming. Then both vanished.
Hands clamped him roughly, jerking him back. Cagle felt himself crash against a table then sprawl over the top of it. He tried to rise, but someone pinned him down. He felt strong hands clamp over his shoulders, holding him fast.
How can dead men feel?
Zethul was screaming. “Get Meagera in here now!”
The door crashed open as the dwarves stomped out. “Please let him be alive…please…” Zethul was muttering to himself.
Then the room fell silent. “By the Great Forgemaster’s own,” the dwarf said softly.
Cagle opened his eyes and looked at his friend. The dwarf was white with fear; he stuttered and stammered and then stepped back.
With effort, Cagle stood. He looked down at his hands. They were tanned and strong still, and the flesh on them wasn’t even singed.
“How is this…?” he said, and found that his voice was clear and strong, not a hint of smoke lingering in his lungs.
He realized then that he was naked. Naked and not an inch of his flesh was burned.
“Zethul, what is this?”
The dwarf took a step closer, mouth agape, staring at him. “I...”
This doesn’t make sense. I saw the fire, I felt the heat of it. Was it only in my mind?
A burning smell hung over the room. It reminded him of a blacksmith’s shop. Inside the tunnel, his sword lay in a formless heap of red, glowing slag. His cloak and other clothing drifted around the room in wispy bits of black and gray ash.
His father’s words returned to him then. It’s enchanted. The man who sold it to me claimed it would protect the wearer from spells.
He felt for the green crystal. Both it and the leather thong were gone. Where it had hung on his chest, the skin shone in a perfect image of the missing stone. Cagle ran a hand over it. He took a breath and it glowed a brighter green; the light glimmered between his fingers. The green skin was warmer than the surrounding white, but other than that he could feel no difference.
Somehow, the talisman had saved his life, but now it seemed to be a part of him. His father hadn’t mentioned that. Did he even know? What does this mean?
“Merciful Creator, spare me. I did not know. I did not know,” Paln said. He fell to his knees, but his eyes were wide with fright, and they seemed drawn to the green patch of skin on Cagle’s chest.
Recovered at last, Zethul seized the secretary by the collar and slammed his face against the floor. He planted his boot on Paln’s neck. He drew his knife and readied to stab the man’s throat. “He lies! He knew all along what would happen. He tried to kill you.”
“Wait,” Cagle said.
“What?” Zethul questioned, looking from Paln to Cagle with a righteous fury darkening his features.
“Let him go. He’s served his purpose. I glimpsed the papers before the spell set off. We’ve found what we were looking for.”
“What?”
“Release him, Zethul. I want him out of here.”
Reluctantly, the dwarf let Paln go, but the Iridin refused to rise.
Cagle watched him for a long moment. Enough blood had been shed here already. If invaders came and took my homeland, would I have done the same thing? Didn’t I do just that with the Fleure?
“Rise and leave us, Paln. Tell no one of what you’ve seen here.”
“Yes, my lord, as you command, my lord,” Paln said. In a flash the young secretary was up, across the room, and out the door.
Zethul watched him go and sheathed his knife. He looked at the sword glowing in the tunnel, then at Cagle again. The dwarf kept his eyes on Cagle’s face, but once they slipped down to the green marking and then snapped back up.
“Get me some clothing, please,” Cagle said to spare his friend’s questions.
Zethul spun on his heels and departed. Cagle heard him ordering the guards outside to find him a cloak. What must he be thinking?
In one corner was a mirror. Cagle studied his chest in it. He took a long, deep breath and the crystal glowed first green, then an almost white hue. It looked like a tattoo, but he’d never heard of one changing color.
“What just happened to me?” he muttered aloud.
Despite the secretary’s treachery, the hidden room was everything Paln had promised. Inside, they found maps and charts of all shapes and sizes. Cagle had his men carry them all out into the larger chamber where the light was better, and the table gave him room to spread it all out. Some of the documents were quite old, yellowed and torn around the edges. Some showed ancient roads or forests or walls. The names of various rivers and cities were scratched out and changed on many, but on some geographical facts they all agreed.
The entirety of Iridia stretched out like the spokes of a great wheel, with roads flowing out in ever widening circles for hundreds of miles. At the wheel’s central hub, the nexus of those roads and intersections, was a huge city, Irid, the capital—a sprawling place where, if the numbers were to be believed, over a million souls dwelled.
Cagle could scarcely believe it. A million people. A city of that size simply shouldn’t exist.
There would be food there, he knew. To support such a host, there will be many thousands of tons of grain. Could he take so large a city with just an army of less than fifteen Fists? Almost certainly not. He had to strike fast, then. If a city of that size mustered their forces, they would wipe his army out like crushing a beetle beneath a boot.
“Look here.” Meagera tapped one of the maps. “This has to be the most recent. It shows the trail through the mountains, the wall we tore down, Crow’s Bay, and here at the center.” She tapped repeatedly, then with her fingers circled an area on the map.
Cagle moved to join her. Irid, the capital, was scratched through with red. He could feel her eyes studying him, examining the mark on his chest. Meagera hadn’t asked him about either the crystal or
its effect; she’d looked at it once and then pointedly ignored the discolored skin. Cagle rubbed at it absently.
Next to the city, also in red, was a strange word. Karoon.
“There’s a letter here with this same word on it. Karoon. What does it mean?” he asked. “I don’t recognize it.”
Meagera looked pensive. “It is a very old word. The language is dead now, an ancestor of our own, few would know it,” she said. “If I remember correctly, it means lizard.”
“Why would they write it here,” he tapped Irid, “above their capital?”
“I do not know.” She pointed to another town on the map between Crow’s Bay and Irid. “What is this?”
Cagle leaned to study the map closer. “Washougle. It looks like another city.”
“Meagera, do you know anything about my...condition?” Cagle touched the marking on his chest.
Meagera studied him. For a moment he didn’t think the mage would answer. She stared, first at the green image, watching it glow and dim in rhythm with his every breath, and then her gaze swung up to meet his own.
She licked her lips, brows drawn together, and had just begun to speak when another voice interrupted.
“I’ve found someone who may be of help,” Felnasen announced.
Cagle steadied himself. The last Iridin who’d helped them tried to kill him. His hand rose toward the marking on his chest. It had been awfully close.
A sturdy man entered from behind Felnasen. “This is Huir. He is the captain of the guard.”
Huir’s face reddened a shade at the title. His gray eyes shone clear and fierce, but he bit into his lower lip.
Likely a bit of lingering embarrassment over the recent battle.
Felnasen went on. “Huir can answer any questions we have regarding the maps and letters, though he was not a member of the guild.”
Sons of Plague: Tales of Kartha Book One Page 11
