by Joe Jackson
At last he laid down his quill, and he sat back and took a long sip of his ale. He looked over the faces of each of his companions and nearly choked imagining what their expressions must have looked like after reading Eryn’s letter. He didn’t expect any of them to understand, despite the fact that it was no mystery that if Eryn wanted to do such things to him, she wouldn’t have bothered writing about it. He flashed a lopsided smile as he considered that there was a lot he had to teach his siblings and friends about speaking in code.
Aeligos glanced around the common room casually but diligently and the group finished their meals. He took account of the many human and shakna-rir faces around them and was satisfied that the town was unlikely to be full of Gaswell supporters. “I’m sure you all got a good laugh out of this letter from Eryn,” he said, and chuckles resounded around the table. “I can assure you there’s nothing sexual about it, despite what it appears to say.”
He spun the page he had been writing on and pushed it toward his companions, and their eyes widened at the sight of a carefully drawn map of a fortress. Marked with arrows and tick marks referring to a legend along the right side were more than a dozen apparent ways to enter it. The amount of detail was astounding, and even in the first brief minute many of the Silver Blades could see that there were further markings revealing troop positions, patrol routes, and notations of how high the walls and towers were. They continued to look it over with great interest for several minutes before Aeligos picked it up and sat back in his chair studying it.
“How do you know that’s what the fortress looks like?” Sherman asked.
“Everything I drew and wrote is in this letter,” Aeligos said, touching the fingers of his right hand to Eryn’s missive. He looked over his shoulder briefly to see if anyone was listening in, but there was almost no one near them, and those who were paid them no obvious or even subtle attention. “Trust me when I tell you: Eryn doesn’t talk about the things she wants to do, she just does them. Each of the things she described in this letter was a reference to sensitive areas of the fortress. Every time she described what sounded like a part of my body, she was drawing a verbal image of how the fortress is laid out. All the explicit stuff told me the best spots to invade.” He glanced at Sonja briefly. “I was wrong about her, as usual; the old girl really came through for us.”
“Old girl?” Katarina echoed as Aeligos shook his head at himself for show. “Isn’t she still in her teens, like us?”
The rogue laughed, as did his siblings. “No, she’s a half-brys,” he said. “She doesn’t show her age – doubly so because her kind are so small to begin with – but she’s sixty-two.”
The humans’ eyes went wide, and their half-demon friends smiled knowingly: the twins had much to learn about half-demons. Sherman and Katarina exchanged a glance and then began laughing, and soon the rest of their companions joined them. “That letter was...rather explicit,” Sherman said after a minute.
“I almost fell from grace just reading some of those things,” Katarina quipped.
“Of course it was explicit,” Aeligos said, and he gestured toward the group. “It’s written so that anyone who reads it will think it’s a proposition rather than a verbal schematic of how the enemy lair is laid out. Even if the letter was opened by a spy or other nosey third party, they likely didn’t get any more out of it than you lot did. Gaswell or one of his men probably read it before it was even sent, obviously to no effect, but that’s part of why it was sent here and not into shakna-rir territory or one of the bigger cities on the island. From what I gather, she’s actually serving in his castle, and so far he and his people have no idea she’s not what she appears to be.”
“So she hasn’t tried to kill him yet?” Sonja asked.
Aeligos shook his head. “No. One of the descriptive parts says he has two lieutenants who are very close to him and would likely take up his position if he were killed. She doesn’t think she could kill all three of them before raising too much suspicion and having to flee, and I can sense there’s something else going on there that she couldn’t make mention of at all in the letter. I suspect it may be the demon Kari and Erik are hunting, and that that’s what’s truly behind all this.” Aeligos held the letter up and gestured to a particular spot. “This seems to say that she’s expecting us to bring an army close to his home to draw his garrisons out, and then we can invade the fortress with a small force.”
“So that’s our plan?” Sonja asked. “Cause a small battle to prevent a massive war?”
“I don’t see any other choice,” Aeligos answered. “We don’t have the manpower to do anything while his army is sitting comfortably in and around his fortress. All we can do is our best. If war breaks out, there’s not going to be anything we can do about it, and the gods will have to seek other options. Our best course of action is to go forward with Queen Omalias’ plan, since Eryn is thinking along the same line with much more information.”
“I’m sure Erik would agree,” Sonja said.
“Anyone have any questions?” Aeligos asked. “I’m not going to go over everything I have here until our companions have had time to join us.”
“Yea, I’ve got a question,” Typhonix said, and he leaned forward on the table with his brows knitted. “Does Eryn really do those things to you?”
There were chuckles around the table, but Aeligos was not amused. He rose to his feet with a sigh and took up the letter and translation. He folded them carefully before putting them into a pocket inside his cloak. He threw the garment over his shoulders and walked out the door, and left his siblings and the two human teenagers staring after him in shock.
*****
Sonja saw that the others were all shocked, and their stares settled on Typhonix after a silent minute had passed. The blonde warrior shrugged and held his hands out to the sides.
“He has seemed on edge for some time now,” Grakin said with a yawn.
“Eryn can bring out the worst in him, but I think her absence specifically brings out the worst in him,” Sonja returned with a sigh.
The priest shook his head. “She is not what brings out the worst in him,” he said. “He worries about what we think of her, and of the two of them together, and that is what brings out the worst in him. Clearly your having read that letter when it was addressed to him specifically was a mistake. Now he is not only unhappy, he is embarrassed.”
“He’s too sensitive,” Typhonix said. “You’d think he didn’t grow up with four brothers.”
“A couple of months ago I might have agreed with you,” Grakin said. He rose to his feet, pushed his chair in, and gripped its back as he faced his siblings. He bit his lower lip for a moment, and then gave a slight shrug. “Now I think I understand the way he feels.”
Sonja regarded Grakin curiously, but he bid the group goodnight and headed upstairs. Sherman and Katarina followed his lead as they had done on many things since he had taken up teaching them several weeks before. Typhonix regarded Sonja for a moment before making his way to the bar, and the expression on his face said that he felt Grakin’s words were primarily aimed at him. Serenjols patted Sonja’s shoulder and made his way upstairs as well. Alone at the table, Sonja regarded the book before her only briefly. She wasn’t in the right frame of mind to read; she was more caught up in Aeligos’ words regarding Eryn, and Grakin’s words.
She turned toward the door and sighed, wondering where Aeligos had gone to. She thought about what Grakin said, and her brother’s words gave her pause as she considered it was entirely possible that Aeligos’ promiscuity was a result of the way his siblings treated him and his lover. She thought perhaps he spent so much time in strangers’ beds because he knew that no one would ever question who they were or what his intentions toward them were. As she thought about it, it made her think about herself and the reason she attracted so little attention from men. She wondered if it was possible – or more accurately, probable – that many men had been taken with her but were afraid to ap
proach her because of her siblings. Kari had said more than once that Sonja was beautiful, and though Sonja never thought of herself in such a light, Aeligos’ exit and Grakin’s words made her wonder. It made her consider her own happiness: she thought of how good Kari and Grakin were together, and whether she herself should look for a similar relationship away from her siblings.
As she thought about Aeligos’ words that he’d asked her to keep secret, Sonja ultimately had to wonder if everything she thought she knew about Aeligos and Eryn’s relationship was just a façade. If their fights during the voyage had all been staged, and all of the bumps and rough spots in their relationship were as well, then Sonja had no idea what to think of the two. She knew Aeligos and Eryn were both crafty manipulators – their skill at cards barely scratched the surface – but had they completely fooled Sonja for this long? Or was making her think they had just a part of the greater deception?
She shook the thoughts off; trying to figure Aeligos and Eryn out was sure to give her a headache. She took a sip of her ale and opened the book before her. She’d been reading The Ascension of Saint Bakhor, as she wanted to see how often and how much the book mentioned her terra-dracon friend, though she had yet to come across any references. She was curious to see how her friend and the legendary saint first met, and whether the Karian described in the book’s pages would be like the one she knew. Her thoughts turned to Erik and her sister-in-law then, and she wondered if their mission was successful or if they were in trouble, hurt, or worse.
She swallowed hard, took a calming sip of her drink, and offered a prayer to Kaelariel in her mind. She closed her eyes as she thought of losing them. It would be especially devastating, for not only would they lose their brother and group leader, as well as their sister-in-law, but Grakin, who was already quite withdrawn, would be completely crushed. Sonja took a deep breath and let it out in a long but quiet sigh, and she looked up when Aeligos sat across from her once again.
Sonja looked him over as he sat before her silently, and he would not meet her eyes. She wondered if it had something to do with his late arrival from Kulthon, but even as she considered it, Grakin’s words came to her again. The priest wasn’t wrong: no matter who Aeligos spent his nights with, he received a hard time about it. When he was with Eryn, he had to deal with Erik’s disapproval and the attitude that came with it. When he slept with other women, he had to deal with the same, but also with Sonja’s disapproval, Typhonix’ harassment, and the anxiety of his sex life being the center of attention.
Sonja leaned forward, reached across the table, and gave her brother’s hand a squeeze, and some of the tension seemed to drain from his face. “Aeligos, I think you’re doing a great job,” she said. “Erik will be very happy, and proud, just as I am.”
He looked over his shoulder briefly and grimaced. “The others don’t respect me,” he said. “They’re more interested in what I’m doing on my time than what I’m saying on theirs.”
“I know,” Sonja said, partially cutting him off. “I’m sorry if I’ve come across as judging you too often. Just know that when I’ve been upset with you for being with other women, it’s because I felt bad for Eryn. I like you and Eryn as a couple, and I mean that.”
Aeligos fixed her with a hard stare that clearly said he didn’t believe her. “Just keep in mind that you don’t really know anything about our relationship,” he said. “What you think you know is just what we’ve let you see.”
Sonja pursed her lips and bit back a response; she understood that now and didn’t want to argue or press him when she was trying to ease his tension. “In the end, you’re only responsible for your own happiness,” she told him with a shrug. “What the rest of us think really doesn’t matter when it comes to choosing a mate.”
Aeligos smiled, and he rose and moved around the table to give her a kiss on the side of her snout. “I dropped off sealed documents from the shakna-rir at the mayor’s office while I was out, so our work here is done. We can get moving again first thing in the morning. Goodnight, Sonja,” he said. He made his way upstairs, and Sonja watched as Aeligos and Typhonix looked at each other briefly and exchanged nods.
Alone at the table again, Sonja’s thoughts turned back to Erik and Kari, though she wasn’t thinking so much about their safety as their ability to get along. It seemed that no matter what passed between her brothers, the boys always shrugged it off in the end and remained friends. With Erik, though, she knew he was distrustful of Kari, and that it was very likely that once they were away from the others he confronted her on her apparent “deception.” Sonja thought perhaps she could have done more to convince Erik that Kari really was who she said she was. She sighed, worried that the two demonhunters’ mission may have been sidetracked before it ever began because of personal issues.
Sonja left her book on the table and made her way outside. She looked down one of the town’s long roads toward the eastern horizon, which was dominated by the high mountains. The first of the three moons had crested the high peaks, full and bright, and as Sonja beheld its polished white surface, an incantation came forward in her mind. Her finger came up and traced the glyph she saw in her mind’s eye in the air before her, and a soft incandescent glow followed after it. Soon the surface of the moon appeared larger, and as Sonja made a soft turn of her wrist, the heavenly body likewise shifted. She closed her eyes and guided the lunar orb with thoughts rather than sight, picturing Kari and Erik in her mind, and after a few moments she looked up once again to behold their reflected images on the moon’s surface. Sonja smiled: they both appeared to be healthy and in good spirits, and she opened her fist slowly to widen the angle of her celestial eye. She could see that they were headed north, nearly clear of the rainforest, but when she saw that they were traveling with a brys, she wondered if they had even accomplished their demon-hunting mission yet. She sighed: her magical spying had created more questions, but she was thankful that the most important question had been answered.
She ceased her concentration on the spell and the moon’s exaggerated proportions dissipated from her sight. Sonja glanced around briefly and then made her way back inside the inn. She bounded up the stairs with unusual grace for a woman her size and soon came to Grakin’s door, and she knocked gently on it. Thankfully, he didn’t appear to have gone to sleep: he was still mostly dressed, and he let her into his room.
“I got impatient,” she told him. “And a little practice with divination is never a bad thing. I saw Kari and Erik! They’re both fine and appear to be on their way north, hopefully to us. I don’t know if they finished their other mission yet, but they were close to leaving the rainforest.”
Grakin smiled and closed the door gently behind his sister before he returned to sit on his bed cross-legged. “That is good to know,” he said. “Could you tell how far away they are?”
Sonja shook her head. “Not just from looking, but based on our own travel time…,” she said, and she thought to herself. “If I had to guess, I’d say they’re probably two weeks from us, maybe a little more.”
“Did Aeligos return?”
“Yes, he’ll be all right,” she said. “He’s upset. He doesn’t think the rest of us respect him. He doesn’t appreciate the fact that everyone followed Erik’s orders without question but seems to be fine with second-guessing his. Honestly, he’s just not used to being in charge.”
Grakin shook his head. “No, he is used to working alone, or with people like Eryn. I do not imagine he expected to be put in charge of the rest of us. He feels trapped for many reasons, and when treated with disrespect – even jokingly – he takes it very much to heart, as he is afraid of bringing us to harm should he make the slightest misstep,” he explained, and Sonja nodded in full agreement. “I do not suppose you could summon my mate to me tonight, could you?”
Sonja chuckled. “If only,” she said, and she took the cue and opened the door to leave. “I’ll let you get back to your meditations. Sleep well, Grakin.”
The
priest bid her goodnight, and Sonja returned to the common room to continue reading her book. Early in the morning they would continue west toward Raugro, the largest city on the island, whose jurisdiction on military matters covered nearly the entire northwest. She imagined they would find the remaining help they needed to enact their plan against Gaswell there, and then Aeligos would divulge Eryn’s information to the rest of them. If Sonja’s calculations were anywhere near accurate, Erik and Kari would reunite with them shortly after they reached the metropolis.
A smile dominated her features as she skimmed through her book, and when she found the spot she’d left off at and continued reading, she finally came across what she was looking for:
We weren’t really sure what to expect, even with the assurances I’d received from CB. Before that point, I had only ever met demonhunters on a few occasions, none ever higher than perhaps the fourth or fifth rank. To be instructed to seek out someone of Kari’s renown was humbling, in a sense, as we needed to ask her for her help and had no idea what type of reaction we would receive. Given who my deity is, it was quite possible the woman might’ve looked at me as a “demon servant” and attacked; given that she allegedly slew an erestram in single combat (gods, I’d have hated to face one with my entire group at that point), we knew that we might be heading into a volatile situation.
What we encountered could not have been further from expectations. When one is told to go introduce themself to a ‘devil-slayer,’ it puts many images into the mind. The mere mention of Turik Jalar’s name strikes fear into the hearts of demons everywhere: they know he is Avatar of Vengeance, and one wonders what they imagine when they hear that title. When one thinks of a devilslayer, I imagine they think of a giant, imposing, muscle-bound warrior with fire in his eyes and scars that tell tales of his glory. Not so with Kari. I have met bigger, stronger, prettier, and smarter women in my life, but still none has ever left an impression upon me the way Kari did. I can still remember that first meeting as though it were yesterday.
