“Sorial found this?” asked Alicia, her voice hushed.
“From the other side,” said Rexall. “I doubt more than handful of priests know about it. And Warburm.”
He removed a torch from a nearby sconce and motioned for Alicia to step through the hole. She hesitated, smelling the damp earth and stale air beyond, but steeled herself and moved forward. Rexall entered close after her, shutting the door behind him.
In front of them gaped a maw of blackness that extended far beyond the immediate reach of the torchlight. The tunnel was little more than a hole in the earth, although there was a floor of sorts comprised of rough paving stones. The hard-packed dirt of the walls and ceiling was buttressed by timbers. Standing here, with countless tons of rock and dirt pressing down from above, Alicia felt the stirrings of claustrophobic panic. The distant drip-drip-drip of water helped to calm her nerves. It was oddly comforting, almost musical.
“It’s a long walk,” said Rexall once the temple entrance was several hundred feet behind them. “Same distance as if you walked from the temple to The Wayfarer’s Comfort above ground. It’ll seem longer, though. No reference points.”
“Is this place safe?”
Rexall shrugged, although the gesture was invisible under the voluminous priest robes. “As safe as it needs to be. Sorial said the main tunnel was used as an escape route but the secondary passage, where we are, is recent, possibly commissioned by Warburm after he purchased the inn. It explains why he spent so much time in his cellar. Sorial and I used to joke that he went down there to take long naps. Little did we imagine he was sneaking out for assignations with Ferguson.” He paused, then asked, “How does it feel?”
“What?”
“Freedom. You did what you set out to do. You escaped.”
“True,” mused Alicia. “But that was the easy part. Finding Sorial and preventing him from killing himself without being dragged back to the city by my hair will be the hard part.”
“I doubt they’d do it by your hair.”
The continued for a while in silence. Rexall was right about the distance. It felt like they had been down here forever. Alicia half-expected them to emerge into bright daylight. By the time they reached the entrance to the inn, she believed she could have made the trip twice-over on the roads above.
They removed the priest’s robes once inside Warburm’s cellar and stowed them in a half-empty crate of pewter mugs.
“You go upstairs first. Head for the front door and walk to the stable. Vagrum’s waiting there. Act natural. I’ll be close behind, but I’m too well known to avoid a few casual words. That would be suspicious and we don’t want to arouse curiosity. Wait in the stable till I get there.”
Alicia nodded. She glanced at her clothing - the same dress that had distressed Rexall when he first saw it - and realized with a grimace how out-of-place it would seem in an establishment like The Wayfarer’s Comfort, but there was no help for it now. Maybe she could replace it along the way.
To her relief, no one spared her a look, even though the inn was packed almost to overflowing. She threaded her way through the crowd of half-drunken farmers and laborers and existed into the warm, dry night air. She had no trouble locating the stable; she had visited it often enough. Seeing it now brought back fond memories, although she hadn’t thought of them warmly at the time.
“Vagrum?” she asked upon entering.
“Milady.” He was off to one side, doing his best to appear unobtrusive in the shadows. “You made it. Till now, I didn’t really trust him. Thought he might turn you in and claim some reward.”
“Rexall may be many things, but he’s an excellent scoundrel and knows secret places. Although he says he came by knowledge of this one from Sorial. If only I’d known about it before he left...”
“It wouldn’t have made no difference. You was watched till he was well clear of Vantok.”
She was still watched, at least during the day. The temple was a place of hidden eyes looking and concealed ears listening. What if some watcher had followed her tonight? Rexall was counting on at least a half-day’s head start but, if she had been observed escaping, a contingent might already be on its way.
“Big man, are they saddled and ready?” asked Rexall, breezing into the stables with a careless air.
“They are, little man.” He had taken care of everything, even brushing down the horses.
“What if we were followed?” demanded Alicia, voicing her concern.
“We weren’t followed,” said Rexall.
“I’m under constant watch at the temple. If they saw...”
“We weren’t followed.” The certainty in Rexall’s voice brooked no argument. He went to the stalls where four hale, healthy horses were waiting to be ridden, their saddlebags bulging with provisions.
Noting the animals’ good condition, Alicia said, “They’re stolen.” It wasn’t a question.
“I prefer the term ‘borrowed without permission.’ After all, it’s our intention to return them at some point, assuming we don’t lose them in our travels.”
“To this point, we haven’t done anything illegal,” said Alicia. “As much as my escape from the temple will be looked on unfavorably, I wasn’t breaking any laws. Horse stealing, however, is punishable by death. If we do this, we’re outlaws.”
“Milady,” began Rexall his words dripping with sarcasm. “Would you like to wait here all prim-and-proper in your ‘simple’ dress while I return these animals to their rightful owner? How do you plan to catch Sorial, who has a week’s head start, if we travel by foot? Will you run the whole way cross country? Or perhaps you’d like to buy four horses? Just give me the money and I’ll be happy to get them, although we’ll probably have to wait till morning. The only horses being sold at this time of the day are stolen ones.”
Alicia glared at him but said nothing. He had made her look like a fool far too often for her liking.
“As for your assertion that stealing the horses will make us outlaws, that betrays a degree of naiveté I didn’t expect from you. Your absence alone will be the cause of alarm; no one is going to care about the stolen horses.”
“Milady,” interrupted Vagrum. “I recognize these animals. They’re your father’s. This here’s Valor, the horse I rode while in his employ.”
“You stole the horses from my father?” Alicia was incredulous.
Rexall flashed a toothy smile. “Ingenious, no? What father’s going to bring his daughter up on charges of horse theft? Besides, the duke’s stable was unguarded.”
“That was Sorial’s duty. I guess my father hasn’t replaced him yet.”
“All to our advantage. Now, if your conscience is salved, can we mount up and be on our way? We’re still one shy of our full company.”
As they rode into the warm night air, Alicia exalted in the sense of being unfettered. She longed to bring her horse to a gallop and feel the wind in her face, although such an indulgence would reinforce Rexall’s already poor opinion of her. Caution was required here, not rash acts of self-satisfaction. Her stallion, who wasn’t much older than a colt, was of a mild temperament, but she assumed he would welcome a run as much as she would. The time, she supposed, would come soon enough. Alicia didn’t know the horse’s name, not having spent much time with any of her father’s animals other than her pony and a few of the older mares. She resolved to call him “Sorial.” At least I can give this Sorial orders and he’ll obey.
She was surprised at how easily Rexall rode. Being around horses wasn’t a guarantee of horsemanship; Sorial was proof of that. He could ride but he was clumsy. Rexall showed no such awkwardness. Either he was a natural or he had spent more than a little time riding the animals he was supposed to stable. The latter seemed likely.
They rode the horses slowly through the benighted streets, moving at the fastest pace they could afford without attracting attention. It wasn’t only that they wanted to avoid being stopped by a member of the Watch, but they didn’t want to be re
membered by any passersby. The more invisible their passage, the greater their chance of success. Alicia kept glancing behind, worried about a possible pursuit - a potential that didn’t concern Rexall - but there was no indication they were being followed. Ruefully, she privately admitted that she wouldn’t be able to detect any shadowing unless it was clumsy.
Noticing her backward looks, Rexall said, “Don’t worry. We ain’t being followed. Have a little faith. Remember, I got a lot more to lose if we’re caught than you do.”
Once they were beyond the boundaries of the city proper and into the farmlands that created a deep, wide perimeter around the urban center, they increased their pace to a canter. Vagrum lit a lantern hung from a pole affixed to his saddle. With less than two hours remaining before the first rays of the new dawn lit the eastern horizon, they reached the door to Kara and Lamanar’s farmhouse.
Kara was waiting outside, a small burlap bag of provisions on the ground next to her. Alicia breathed a sigh of relief. Despite Rexall’s assurances that Sorial’s mother had agreed to guide them to the portal, she hadn't been certain until now. Kara believed in what Sorial was doing. In fact, she had conspired with the others to send him on his current journey. Alicia wondered what words Rexall had used to convince Kara that they needed to reach the portal before her son.
As the pool of light from Vagrum’s lantern fell on the older woman, Alicia saw how worn and unsettled she looked. She had already lost three children, at least one directly to a portal. Was she having second thoughts about her youngest boy?
“Are you at peace about accompanying us?” asked Alicia. It was perhaps a foolish question. Providing Kara with an opportunity to change her mind put their journey in danger.
“At peace? No, not at peace. Never at peace, at least not lately. But I’ll come with you, if you’ll have me. If only because I must be there when he comes face-to-face with his destiny. You may think you go to stop him, but only he knows what he’ll do at that moment. He may need one or both of us.”
Kara’s words exhumed one of Alicia’s darkest fears - that even her presence, free and clear of the temple, might not turn Sorial aside. In her heart, she didn’t believe he would survive an encounter with the portal, but she suspected he might have been converted to think differently. How much of his mother's doctrine had he been exposed to? And, with the temptation of becoming a wizard so close, would he be able to turn away? Would anyone?
“Which way?” asked Vagrum, who had stepped down from his horse to help Kara onto hers. She gently rebuffed his aid and climbed into the saddle with practiced ease.
Noticing the big man’s nonplused reaction, she remarked. “I haven’t always been a farmer’s wife, you know. I’d wager I’ve been riding for as long as you, if not longer.” She reached to accept her sack from Vagrum and secured it behind her saddle. “We ride north, and we’ll be on the road for weeks.”
“How far north?” asked Vagrum.
“Beyond The Broken Crags.” That was the imposing mountain range separating the ‘sophisticated’ southern cities from the more primitive, warlike northern ones of Obis and Syre. “The portal is nestled in the remains of the city of Ibitsal, about midway between Obis and Syre, to the north of the main east-west thoroughfare connecting them. By the time we get there, you’ll remember what Winter is.”
“On foot, that trip will take Sorial two-thirds of a season. At a reasonable pace, we can get there in about five weeks,” said Rexall. “We’re going to have to wait for him.”
“There are villages around there that will take us in. I lived my whole life save for the last fifteen years in that part of the world.” Kara didn’t sound enthused about returning to lands where she had grown up and given birth to four children.
“What about the terrain between here and there?”
Vagrum, also a native of the North, offered his assessment. “Can’t rightly say about these parts. You’ll never get through The Crags unless you use Widow’s Pass or go all the way east to the coast, which would add five-hundred miles to the trip. Beyond the mountains, you can venture into the wilds if you want, but I can’t see a reason. Anyone coming after us will have either caught us or given up by then.”
“Are there inns along the way?” asked Alicia.
“Inns, waystations, of course,” said Rexall. “At least for the next several hundred miles. Where merchants travel, innkeepers set up shop. But inns cost money, which ain’t something you got.” The pale lantern light illuminated Rexall’s smirk. He thought it funny that the noblest member of the party was also the poorest.
“No, but I do,” said Vagrum. “I’ve been saving it up for years now. No sense letting it go to waste. As long as there are inns to stay in, Milady can sleep on a bed rather than the ground.”
“Once you’ve seen what goes on in some of those beds, the ground holds a certain appeal,” said Rexall.
Vagrum let out a gruff laugh. “The ground and me is old friends. But I’m afraid Milady might not find it so comfortable.”
“Wrap her in blankets and she’ll survive,” said Rexall. “In my experience, when a person is tired, he’ll sleep anywhere. The problem with the nobility is they ain’t never been forced to bed down on anything other than a mattress.”
A retort died on Alicia’s lips as she realized he was right. In her entire life, she couldn’t remember one day when she had slept anywhere but on a bed. And the mattress was always stuffed with down and feathers, not straw, which was prickly and prone to rotting when damp. She also couldn’t remember going more than a handful of days without bathing. In the larger picture, the loss of such physical comforts would be a minor inconvenience, but she knew she would resent them. Sorial had once called her “pampered.” He had been right and now she was going to pay the price. Her companions, even the slightly built Kara, had all spent time living without the trappings of a noble’s life, but not her.
Her reality had changed, however. She was leaving behind an existence of comfort for one of hardship. She knew she had never done a day’s honest work, but for her to build a life with Sorial, she would have to learn a craft. They would be farmers or tradesmen or servants; her future would be as different from her past as night was from day. The grimness of that eventuality was something she had avoided confronting, but she no longer had the luxury of regarding it as “what might be.” Spending a night sleeping on a bed of cold, rocky dirt with the stars winking above was among the least difficult of the tribulations she was sure to face.
“No, but I’d better learn,” she said, much to Rexall and Vagrum’s surprise. “Keep your coins, Vagrum. We’ll sleep where we can. The next time I see a proper bed, I’ll have forgotten what it feels like to use it.”
“Are you sure you want to go through with this, Milady? It ain’t too late to turn around. You could be back in your chamber in the temple before anyone knows you’re gone...” ventured Vagrum.
Alicia smiled at him a little sadly. Vagrum knew the hardships that lay ahead of her - he had lived them - and he didn’t think she was strong enough to surmount them. But it wasn’t about her. If she turned back now and Sorial died in a futile attempt to become a wizard, how would she live with herself?
“No, Vagrum. This is my destiny. To find Sorial or die trying. He’s my future and if it means lying naked in the snow, I’ll do that.”
“We can probably arrange that, as long as we can find the snow,” said Rexall. Everyone ignored him.
“Whatever may happen, you’re worthy of my son. I can think of no better a life’s partner than you,” said Kara.
“Then let’s move out so the dawn doesn’t find us standing here nattering like old women,” said Vagrum.
So began their journey to the portal. The wrong portal.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO: DUNGEON
The blackness faded gently, giving way to a bleak gray that filled his vision and clouded his mind. But Sorial was aware of only one thing: agony. It was unlike any pain he had previously endured. His br
ain had difficulty processing it. It emanated from the ruin of his left arm, a lance of unrelieved, white-hot suffering that blotted out everything else. Concentration was impossible. Discerning who or what or where he was were impractical. The only thing he recognized was the undesirable continuation of his life - no dead person could possibly feel such torment.
He had enough presence of mind to recognize he wasn’t alone in this strangely benighted world. As dim as if from far away, he heard the grunts and guttural murmurs of a language he had no hope of deciphering. He was fluent in only one tongue and that wasn’t being spoken. It didn’t matter, though. Even if he had understood the words, his mind was too fragmented by pain for him to make sense of them.
Sorial supposed he might be injured in places other than his arm. He had been struck on the head and possibly stabbed or cut in other places. His memories of his last moments of consciousness in the clearing were confused. But if there was pain from other wounds, it was overwhelmed.
A cup of warm, foul-tasting liquid was placed to his lips. Thirsty as he was, he slurped it greedily, then choked as too much spilled down his throat. Sleepiness spread quickly through his mind and body and he reached toward the cool, pain-free embrace of blackness.
The second time he awoke, he was more himself. The arm no longer hurt as badly; in fact, it was more numb than painful, as if some deadening salve had been spread onto the wound. He opened his eyes and saw indistinct, fuzzy shapes - men, he assumed, although he couldn’t make out any features. The voices again spoke the unfamiliar language, but this time they were closer. His head hurt abominably, with the greatest area of soreness concentrated behind and above his left ear. And there was something else - a strange, throbbing sensation deep within. Not unpleasant, but insistent. Comecomecome, it seemed to say.
The Last Whisper of the Gods Page 41
