The Foundlings (The Swords of Xigara)

by J. Mark Miller

  Zalas found a fine scabbard of black leather and checked Nephali’s fit. He smiled at the sight of the sword’s gold and silver resting against the embroidered black leather. He slipped the scabbard over his shoulder and hooked it into a back harness, then checked his reach a couple of times to ensure he could draw the blade if necessary.

  Then the ground shook with violence, nearly throwing Zalas off his feet. Tenna bolted up as arms hanging along the wall rattled and the building shuddered. Doulos ran to a window and peered outside as the trembling dwindled.

  “He’s here,” the mage hissed.

  The walls rocked again. A voice wailed in pain down the street. Somewhere close by, a building collapsed as shockwaves shook the street.

  “Grab your packs,” Zalas cried. “We’ll escape through the tunnel.”

  Tenna bolted to the door and pressed its hidden release. The door slid aside and she was driven back by roiling clouds of thick brown dust as it was thrust into the office.

  “The tunnel’s collapsed,” she coughed.

  “The quakes,” Zalas said as he covered his face with his cloak. “We’ll have to go out the front.”

  Zalas led them through the shop and out the front door. Citizens were running in terror as black smoke filled the suddenly humid air. Fires burned up and down the street.

  Tenna looked up to see the shape of a giant serpent circling overhead, its mouth spitting dragonfire. Imperial soldiers launched spears and arrows in a futile effort to drive the monster way, but that only drew his attention, bringing about sudden immolation and adding the buildings they stood upon to the inferno.

  “Keep you heads down and try to blend in with the mob,” Zalas said. “Make for the alley across the street, then hide under the awnings until we can regroup. Go!”

  They integrated themselves into the panicking crowds and push their way across the street. Tenna thought she’d be carried away by the press, but Onahim put his bulk at her back, serving as her bulwark as they struggled toward the alley.

  The dragon’s gigantic tail whipped through the top of a nearby building. Debris rained like hail on their heads. Dust and smoke billowed down from the north end of the street as buildings collapsed and the fire spread. Tenna knew they’d be caught like flies in a web if they couldn’t win clear soon.

  Then the dragonfear came.

  It descended in waves as they fought clear of the crowd, driving them to their knees beneath the awning. Dread swept over them. Terror dominated their senses. There was nothing but an unreasonable desire to flee followed close by a malaise so deep there was no strength left to run. It was all they could do to clutch at their chests and hope for another breath.

  The dragon moved down the street and fear abated. The company caught their breath and struggled to their feet. Out on the street the mob had disappeared, either forced away by the fear, or crushed beneath the rubble.

  “We’ve got to move,” Zalas ground his teeth. “We’re dead if the dragon finds us.”

  “Yes,” Doulos agreed. “I need to draw his attention away from the group.”

  “What?” Tenna said in dismay. “How?”

  “Simple,” the mage shrugged. “I’ll challenge him.”

  “You’re crazy,” Zalas said. “He’ll kill you.”

  “Death is always at hand,” Doulos said, “but who else but me can hope to hold his attention and live? He needs a target of some kind, or else he’ll tear the city down looking for Nephali. Thousands would perish.”

  “How will you get away?” Zalas grabbed the mage and gave him an angry shake. “You’re the only one who knows where the other Swords are hidden.”

  “Don’t fret over me,” Doulos grinned. “I’ve played with lizards a few times in my long life. I don’t expect this one to present a real challenge. Besides, I made arrangements before I came to town. I only need to survive until her arrival.”

  “Who’s arrival?” Zalas asked. The old man’s words didn’t make any sense.

  Doulos moved toward the street, then turned back to say, “Stay put until I say move.”

  Doulos turned and walked up the street until he was nearly out of sight. He drew his hood over his head and cried in a voice far too loud for a mortal.

  “Z’eb!”

  “Z’eb?” Tenna wondered aloud. “Is that a magic word?”

  “It’s the yellow dragon’s dwarven name,” Onahim said. “The elves call him Kitrinos, but my people name him Z’eb. The word means sallow. Doulos is issuing his challenge.”

  “Z’eb!” the mage’s voice rang out again. “Hear me!”

  A sudden hush fell across the city. Then a rush of wing-driven wind kicked up a thick mantle of dust as it blew down the street toward the mage.

  “Who dares?” called a voice that sounded like burning trees.

  “One of your betters,” Doulos said. “Come face me, if you dare.”

  Vertigo overwhelmed the company again as dragonfear pulsed from the sky. They grabbed hold of one another and fought to keep to their feet. Doulos, however, stood his ground, unaffected by the onslaught.

  “You waste my time, little mammal,” Kitrinos said.

  The mage flexed his hands. “Yellow scales befit you, Z’eb. You’re coward to the core.”

  The dragon’s saurian head dove into view, filling the street only a few paces from the wizard. Sulfurous smoke billowed from his nostrils, flowing back over his horned head and filling the air with the smell of brimstone. He roared, and the dragonfear was replaced by a storm of conflicting emotion.

  Tenna felt despair and euphoria, love and hate, lust and loathing all at once. She thought herself mad, so overwhelmed by feelings she couldn’t complete her thoughts. Even Doulos was forced back a step. He thrust a hand toward the dragon and braced himself on bended knees.

  Streams of purple-blue fire flared from the mage’s hand. Kitrinos snapped his head back, screaming in pain. The dragon spiraled up into the open sky. Doulos threw himself flat on the ground, narrowly avoiding the dragon’s razor sharp tail as it whipped overhead.

  Kitrinos coiled like a spring in mid-air then launched himself like a smoldering arrow back at the mage. Doulos leapt to his feet and drew a sword from beneath his cloak, holding up over his head in a double-handed grip. The dragon spewed fire as he descended, sending it to slam into the old man’s weapon. Kitrinos watched in confusion as his fire was consumed by the sword, its blade licking up the flames until nothing remained.

  The dragon spread his wings and pulled back from this new threat. Fear touched his eyes as he looked at the old man and his dark blade. He’d underestimated the human, thinking him a momentary distraction.

  Who was this man? He hovered in indecision, watching the old man stand in steady defiance.

  Then the old man turned his head and yelled, “Run!”

  Kitrinos narrowed his eyes in confusion. He turned to see who the mage was yelling at and failed to see the auburn bulk of his sister streaking in his direction. She slammed him into the street, and they rolled into a ball of scales, talons, and leathery wings. Teetering buildings crumbled under the shock of their passage.

  Tenna was frozen, staring at the dragons as they battled. Kitrinos and the larger dragon were soon wrapped in a lighting infused ball of flame, tearing into one another with fang, claw, and magic. The copper dragon seemed to gain a momentary advantage, and latched her rear talons onto Kitrinos’s pinions. She sprang into the air, dragging the spitting yellow serpent into the sky.

  A hand shook her from her trance. Doulos was shouting at her. “We’ve got to move, girl.”

  She looked at the old man as if seeing him for the first time. She looked down at the hilt of the sword in his hand. She recognized its markings, having seen them on another sword for the first time earlier in the day.

  “Y…you,” she stammered, “you really are Doulos.”

  “Well, who else would I be?” he winked. “Now, run!”

  9

  Hocsaros

&
nbsp; The Sunset’s Trace drifted into Hocsaros with watchmen manning every station. They had spent a week on the tower island burying the dead and effecting ship’s repairs before setting sail for familiar waters. The tann woman had survived, though she remained unconscious in a tub of sea water in the cutter’s quarters.

  Stile watched the port drawing closer, but his thoughts were still on the island and the atrocities he’d seen there. He and Cyril had searched the burned out tower chamber by chamber and found nothing of use. Whether taken by the raiders or destroyed by fire it was hard to tell. The found six floors of rooms filled with the ashen remains of spartan wooden furniture. Accounting for the bodies strewn across the beach, each room likely housed two occupants.

  The top two levels differed from the ones below. One seemed to have been a communal dining area and kitchen. A rough-hewn staircase hugged the curve of the tower’s inner wall, leading up the to top level.

  There they found the charred remains of a heavy door hanging from wrought iron hinges. Inside was a chamber that was lined floor to ceiling in blackened shelving made of brickwork. The smoldering remains of books and scrolls littered the shelves, and a scorched desk sat beneath the room’s only window.

  But it was the soot covered block of white marble in the center of the room that drew their interest. It was square shaped and above waist high. The pedestal had a slot about the width of a man’s hand incised in the top. They had been unable to discern the pedestal’s purpose.

  Stile had ordered the bodies buried and turned the ship toward port. He’d hoped the tann woman would recover enough to give them answers, but she never stirred. They came to port at high alert because of her single whispered word.

  “Ulquiy.”

  Hocsaros was a free-trade port operated in cooperation between Maehdras and Ulquiy. Each nation considered it neutral ground, often conducting diplomatic liaisons there. The two nations had warred over the territory in the past, but peace had reigned for nearly a century. Ulquiy claimed the portion along the western banks of the Shalash, while the Maehdrasian imperials superintended the west.

  Ulquiy itself was a loose confederation of clans whose central government existed more for the benefit of the outside world than their own people. The clans remained autonomous, their chiefs gathering to form a council on matters concerning the entire confederacy, such as contracts with foreigners. If the girl’s last word was meant to implicate Ulquiy for the raid on her island, it could have been any one of the eight tribes who’d perpetrated the act.

  They couldn’t trust the empire, and he certainly couldn’t trust anyone from Ulquiy.

  Stile came back to himself as the Trace floated past the Ulquiy portion of the port. It was split into seven segments, each managed by one of the eight clans. The docks were marked by clan colors and totems. Only the Wolf clan held no stake in the port, due to a colorful event in Ulquiy’s past.

  The clans were once animists. The world was their Mother, and all living things, both plant and animal, were thought to have a soul. The clans had been distrustful of one another, raiding each other’s territory to steal food, women, and riches. Each clan worshiped a patron spirit animal, and called upon it for every need, including the destruction of their enemies.

  According to legend, a being known as the Lightbringer came to the clans, bearing the message of Onúl. One by one the chieftains were persuaded to lead their people away from the old ways and worship the Creator instead of the creation. The tribes listened and put their animistic practices aside, though they kept to their totems as marks of identity, and a celebration of Onúl’s diversity.

  Their unified faith led to the formation of the confederacy. Skirmishes over land broke out at times, but the chieftains worked to set aside clan differences for the greater good, and the glory of their Maker. Together they formed a council and elected a jelefe, a chief clan chief, to oversee the needs of their fledgling nation.

  A jelefe served for life as long as he remained mentally and physically hale. No maimed or sickly chief could serve, and those chosen for the post had proven themselves in some manner unparalleled.

  The Wolf clan gave up its rights to territory in those ancient days, all but a single fishing village on the coast. They became scattered among the clans to serve as clerics, ministering to the needs of all. Ulquiy entered a golden era, five hundred years of peaceful progress.

  Then came the mad jelefe named Bloodshrike. He stirred up the clans against Maehdras, leading them on a full-scale invasion of the empire. Bloodshrike was a secret worshiper of Sane, daemoness of war. He pushed the council to declare holy war on those not wholly dedicated to Onúl, calling them apostates who should die by the sword. When the Wolf clan clerics cried out against this heresy, they were slaughtered into silence.

  The war was short and brutal. Maehdras brought the full strength of its legions to bear. The Ulquiy clans were massacred and on the run in less than a week. In their revenge, Imperial commanders chased the fleeing clansmen back into their home territory, burning villages and despoiling families, livestock, and crops.

  Remnants of the Wolf clan captured Bloodshrike and executed him in the presence of the Imperial command. They begged for peace, and agreed to the terms of surrender. The Imperial legions left the Patriarchy to rebuild itself.

  Some time later, the clans elected the first Wolf chieftain as jelefe. Named Strongwind, he was a visionary who reached out to the Maehdrasian empire with overtures of open trade, overtures Emperor Olin responded to in kind. Treaties were signed and trade began. That singular fishing village held by the Wolf clan began its transformation from insignificant hamlet to the largest seaport on the continent.

  The city of Hocsaros was born.

  Ulquiy had been a model of stability since those days, though individual clans had been known to go rogue from time to time. Stile at first reasoned the raid on the island had been carried out by a single clan, but which clan?

  More likely the onslaught came at the hands of pirates. Such bandits were rare, but not unknown among the tribes. Clansmen banished for their crimes were known to band together and become brigands. Stile and his men had been harried by them more than once on the waters south of Ulquiy.

  Stile shook his head in an effort to clear his thoughts. The best he could do is get the girl ashore and into the hands of her people at the tann embassy. Best to keep himself and his crew free of the whole affair.

  A niggling voice in the back of his mind told him it would turn out otherwise.

  10

  The Celadine Mountains

  Katalas and his band journeyed more than two weeks to reach home. Once they cleared the Fen of Ezrah, they rafted down the Qowmah, crossed two separate mountain ranges, and trod countless miles before finding sanctuary.

  Home brought rest and comfort for his cadre, but not Katalas. He made for the council room without stopping for rest or food. He knew word of his cadre’s approach would have made it to the Joint Council’s ears long before their arrival, and he would be required to give an answer for abandoning their outpost at the Dreadcrest.

  The Joint Council’s chamber rested at the very heart of the Celedine Mountains. He felt confined in the tunnels and caverns of his adopted home, preferring the forest and open skies of his homeland, the Isle of Nesos.

  He’d been sent from home to represent his people among the High Keeper’s honor guard at the Shrine, but she recognized his talent and thought him better suited to be a ranger. Though honored to serve at the Shrine, he was relieved when she recommended he be transferred to bolster the Cela elves’ forces. He’d served among them for nearly twenty years, rising to become a ranger commander. But for periodic briefings, he rarely set foot beneath the mountains.

  Foot traffic diminished as he approached the Curule—the subterranean city’s administrative levels. The passage narrowed to a bottleneck, and he was forced to announce himself at a pair of massive iron doors marking the entrance to the Spiral.

  The original dw
arven inhabitants had excavated the winding pair of tunnels in ancient times, back when yrch incursions happened almost daily. The Spiral was conceived as a final defense for the community. When the elves migrated into the Cela mountains and began their long association with the indigenous dwarves, they converted the Spiral into their administrative center.

  Twin parallel passages had been hewn from the rock, spiraling toward the mountain’s core. One of the passages began in the community’s northern sector, chiefly occupied by the elves, while the other approached from the dwarven south. Each passage was segmented by six pairs of heavy steel doors, each one posted with guards.

  The Joint Council chamber rested at the base of the Spiral, a place where every major decision facing the Celadine community was debated and acted upon. A final hidden escape tunnel was accessible from the chamber for those who knew how to find it. It led through the secret Hall of Records and from there out to the Barrhas Wood. The chamber could be collapsed at need, thus ensuring such exiles could escape to freedom.

  Katalas’s muscles were burning by the time he made it to the last pair of doors and announced himself to the blue-robed functionary. The man nodded his assent to the guards, and they opened the doors.

  The chamber beyond was bright, illuminated by long mirrored shafts that had been bored through the mountain, bouncing sunlight through carefully placed lenses that magnified the captured sunlight. That light was diffused by some method Katalas didn’t understand, spreading the light evenly throughout the room.

  Fourteen stone thrones, hewn from the rock of the chamber itself, sat in an even circle around the perimeter of the chamber. Luminescent crystals rested behind each throne, giving off a blue-tinged light used to illuminate the chamber when the sunlight faded. All but one of the chair held a counselor, seven elves and six dwarves who had gathered to hear the report from the Dreadcrest.

  By long-standing tradition, the two races alternated their seating around the circle, a practice instituted to foster unity between their peoples rather than allow the appearance of two opposing parties. It was a proven custom that had served the community well over the centuries.