by Bruce Blake
No noise from the guard post, no door or window thrown open.
Carefully, Khirro rose. A figure to his left startled him and he turned toward it but it moved with him. He moved again and it did, too. With a sigh, he chastised himself for fearing his dim shadow and started toward the forest, careful of his footing. The yards of bare ground before him seemed to stretch on forever. His pack grew heavier with each step as panic grew within him. What if he reached the trees and couldn’t find the others?
What if this is a trap?
When he finally reached the brush, he crouched and glanced around but didn’t see his companions.
They’ve been discovered.
He searched for them, the bushes rustling with his movements, desperation festering in his stomach tempting him to shout for Ghaul. He parted his lips to call out when a hand covered his mouth, pulled him to the ground. Khirro clamored for his sword, unable to reach it. He ceased thrashing when Ghaul’s face appeared before his, a finger held up to his frowning lips.
Relief drained the tension from Khirro’s limbs and he grinned sheepishly, a smile Ghaul didn’t return. He imagined what the soldier must be thinking, but it didn’t matter, he was safe-for now. He clambered to his feet with no help from Ghaul, and scanned the darkness for Athryn crossing to join them, avoiding thoughts of the tongue lashing he’d have to endure from Ghaul later. His clumsiness had endangered them all, a trend he had to stop.
I’ll learn from this, be more careful next time.
Minutes passed, unease growing in Khirro as he waited. He shifted from one foot to the other, crossed his arms and uncrossed them, eyes darting, seeing nothing of the magician crossing the open land. But why did he feel so unsettled? If any of them could cross the border undetected, it was Athryn. Peering intently into the dark, Khirro ignored the growing notion something was amiss. He shifted again, careful to move noiselessly. The unease spread from his head and chest into his limbs, manifesting physically, weighing them down.
Something was very wrong.
As Athryn finally pushed through the brush, Khirro realized what. He slipped his hand beneath his tunic, hoping he guessed wrong, already knowing what he’d find.
Gone.
Ghaul tapped his shoulder, signaled him to follow. Khirro shook his head and the warrior gestured again. Embarrassed and afraid, Khirro didn’t want to tell but had no other choice.
“The vial’s gone.”
Ghaul’s face first slackened with surprise then went stern in anger.
“You dropped it?”
Khirro nodded minutely. With a shake of his head, Ghaul turned to the others and told them what happened. Without waiting for them to add their accusing looks to Ghaul’s, Khirro slipped shield and pack from his back and moved quickly back onto the open ground before they could stop him or he changed his mind. The Shaman made the vial his responsibility, for better or for worse, so he’d fix this.
After only a few paces, an out-of-place, insistent bird call caught his attention. He looked around at Ghaul motioning him back but Khirro shook his head and continued, hurrying back along his previous path as quickly as he dared. Ghaul would be angry with him for ignoring him, but he was already angry anyway. He put the thought from his mind as the guard posts loomed and he searched for the spot where he fell. He must have lost the vial when he rolled on the ground.
What if I broke it?
The thought startled Khirro and he touched his chest: no damp spot on his tunic. Gods be with him, the vial had only come free. He fell to hands and knees, scanning the dirt and brittle grass, picking up scraps of wood and rocks and tossing them aside.
The sound of wood scraping against wood froze him in his spot-it was the sound of a bar withdrawn from its place on a door. Khirro flattened, pressing his belly to the dirt. The door opened, torchlight flooded onto the brown scrub grass. A figure stood framed in the doorway, pole arm in hand.
“Who goes there?”
The man sounded stern and threatening but Khirro thought he heard a slur in the words, the result of one too many drinks. He held his breath, body tensed. A reflection of the torchlight off something lying on the ground a few yards away caught his eye.
The vial.
“I said ‘who’s there’?”
The guard stepped forward from the doorway, brandishing his weapon. Stretched upon the ground, Khirro couldn’t reach his sword, though it would be suicide if he did. The guard took another step.
“It is I, Shyn,” another voice said, surprising both Khirro and the border guard. A tall man clad in Erechanian leathers stepped into the light cast by the guard’s torch. His hand didn’t linger near the sword hanging at his side.
“What are you doing here?” the border guard asked derisively, his threatening stance relaxing at the sight of the other man.
“Patrol,” the second man replied. “Go back to your merry-making. I’ll protect the border for you.”
The man’s foot came to rest inches from the vial. Another step and he might shatter it. Part of Khirro hoped he did.
“Go back where you belong, Shyn. The border is no place for the likes of you.” The guard spit in the dirt, a line of saliva trailing down his chin. “Go back to Tasgarad and concern yourself with drunks and thieves and whores. Leave the soldiering to real soldiers.” He retreated, slamming the door behind him, giving the other man no opportunity to reply.
Shyn stood his ground, fists clenched, fierce gaze burning into the closed door. To Khirro it felt a long time he lay on his belly unmoving, breath shallow as he waited for the man’s next action. After a time he crouched, wrapped his fingers around the vial and stood again. Khirro’s heart jumped into his throat. The man strode to where Khirro lay struggling not to squirm at his approach.
“Is this what you’re looking for?”
Khirro looked up at the man, blinking. No anger or threat showed on his face, his hand held no weapon. Still, Khirro neither moved nor spoke. Shyn knelt before him, offering him the vessel.
If he knew I was here, why didn’t he give me away?
“I don’t know what this contains, but it must be important for five of you to risk your lives like this.”
Khirro took the vial from the man’s big hand. Calm flowed into him, down his arm and into his chest. He wanted to thank the man, but fear and confusion kept him from speaking.
“Where are your friends?”
Khirro gestured toward the forest with his chin. The soldier nodded without looking.
“I’ll take you to them. Stay behind me and no one will see you.”
He offered Khirro his hand, helping him to his feet. The man stood a head taller than Khirro, making it easy to hide behind him. Carefully matching stride, they passed the tower without challenge but, when they reached the tree line, Ghaul stepped from behind a high bush, an arrow aimed at Shyn.
“Let him go,” he ordered, voice low and dripping with threat. Ghaul wouldn’t hesitate to kill his rescuer.
“I’m not his captive.” Khirro put himself between the two men
“Move, Khirro. Don’t get between my bow and an enemy. You’ll not like the outcome.”
“He saved me when I was sure to be discovered.”
Ghaul pulled the arrow back further, the bowstring creaking. Athryn emerged from cover and rested his hand on Ghaul’s shoulder.
“Come,” he whispered gesturing for them to follow.
Khirro led Shyn warily past Ghaul who stepped away to keep his arrow trained on the big man. Athryn led them deeper into the forest, Maes and Elyea hand-in-hand behind the others as they picked their way through fallen trees and tangled brush in the dim moonlight. Ghaul’s bow didn’t waver from Shyn’s back. With the magician satisfied they had put enough distance between themselves and the guard post, he spoke again.
“Who are you? Why did you save Khirro?”
Shyn looked from Athryn to Ghaul. “Tell him to lower his bow. I’ll harm no one. You can have my sword as proof, if you like.”
Athryn ignored him and nodded to Maes. The small man went to their captive and took his sword. Shyn looked a giant beside the jester.
“Lower your bow,” Athryn said. Ghaul acquiesced reluctantly. “Who are you?”
“Shyn,” he replied with a short bow. “A soldier of King Braymon’s army.”
“But why did you help Khirro?” Elyea asked. “Doesn’t the border guard keep people from crossing without permission?”
“Aye, but the guard has been turned into a collection of fools and jackasses of late, with all the officers and good soldiers taken north to bolster the Isthmus.”
“That explains why you’re still here,” Ghaul grunted. Shyn didn’t react.
“It doesn’t explain why you helped Khirro.” Elyea shot Ghaul an angry look.
“I saw what happened in Tasgarad.” He glanced from one companion to the next, his eyes shining an unusual shade of yellow, his complexion ashen in the wan light. “I would be no servant of the king if I let a magician, two fighters, a woman and a midget go on their way without finding out what they were doing.”
“See? He means to turn us in,” Ghaul barked, half-raising his bow. Athryn lifted his hand, stilling him.
“I just passed up the perfect opportunity for that, didn’t I?”
Ghaul frowned, jaw muscles bulging, but said nothing. Khirro glanced from one to the other, wondering who would come out on top should it come to a fight. He’d seen how savage Ghaul could be, but Shyn was taller, bigger and must have great skill to have followed them so far, so closely, without notice. He hoped they wouldn’t find out.
“But why?” Khirro asked.
“An unregistered magician wouldn’t perform magic in public without just cause. No soldiers of Erechania would be associated with a sorcerer not of royal decree. I can see no explanation for the woman and the little one. You’re either up to great evil or great good.”
“The difference is likely a matter of perception, Shyn,” Athryn said. “But either way, you are correct.”
“Never mind that,” Ghaul snapped. “We can’t trust him. We should kill him.”
The vial at Khirro’s breast blazed suddenly, startling him.
“No,” he exclaimed before he knew what he was saying. “There’s much bloodshed to come. Let’s not kill for the sake of killing.”
“If we let him go, he’ll reveal us,” Ghaul argued. “Speak some sense to the farmer, Athryn.”
There’s that word again.
Khirro ground his teeth. What would it take to show Ghaul he wasn’t the farmer he met two weeks ago? It wasn’t his fault the vial came free when he fell, it might have happened to any of them.
“We can bring him with us, see if he can be trusted,” Khirro said looking to Athryn. The magician glanced from Khirro to Shyn, then to Ghaul, but didn’t speak. “If he proves trustworthy, we can use his sword. If not, we can let him go when we’re too far from here for it to matter.”
“We’re at war, Khirro. No one can be trusted.”
“Khirro speaks sense, Ghaul,” Athryn said finally, then turned to Shyn; Khirro wondered what the border guard thought of this masked man. “You will accompany us. I will keep your weapons and you will be bound, but you will be alive. We will decide your final fate when we are safely away from the border.”
“This is a mistake,” Ghaul grated.
“No.” Khirro’s tone betrayed more of his anger than he intended. “This man had me at his mercy, now he deserves ours.”
He looked at the border guard but his face revealed neither relief nor fear, he simply nodded his thanks.
No lush forest or serene lake surrounded him in the dream this time, no slivered moon, no rocky shore. Khirro lay face down in dry grass, silence and darkness weighing on him, pinning him. Somewhere, somebody was searching for him; he knew this though he saw nothing but the grass before his eyes and heard naught but the wind bending its long blades. He wanted to stand and search out his pursuer, but knew it could mean his life. He lay there alone, afraid, staring at the ground.
“You chose your path well.”
The voice didn’t surprise Khirro. He craned his neck to see the tyger stretched out beside him, belly pressed to the ground in the same manner as his own. Its black and white striped body dwarfed his, its hot breath warmed his face and stirred the short whiskers grown on his cheeks in the past weeks.
“But I don’t know what path I’ve chosen.”
“It matters not if you recognize the path, or that a choice must be made. Trust.” The tyger’s head moved forward, its wet nose brushing Khirro’s. “Follow our heart.”
“Our heart?”
But the tyger was gone.
Khirro stood, thinking about the creature’s words and forgetting his earlier fear. Before him stood a one-eyed man, his face marked by uncountable fights. Khirro moved to his left to escape, but the man moved with him. He went right and the man matched him. Every move Khirro made, the man did the same, the two of them moving as though dissimilar reflections in a looking glass. Khirro reached for the hilt of his sword, but didn’t draw it as the other man did the same. Not knowing what else to do, Khirro closed his eyes, squeezed them tight and wished to awaken from the dream.
When he opened them, still asleep and dreaming, the man had disappeared. The field around him blazed, the tinder-dry grass consumed by flame sending gray smoke billowing up to cloud the moonless sky. Khirro spun and ran from the blaze with the heavy, awkward legs of dreams, heat pressing at his back. He cried out-in anguish, in fear, for help, for anything-and the tyger appeared, loping easily along beside him.
“Beware the man with one eye,” it said in his head as they ran. “Fear not the fire.”
Somewhere above, a bird of prey cried out, its shriek drowning the snap and crackle of the conflagration.
Khirro woke with cold sweat streaming from his forehead and his hand clutched to his chest. He pushed himself to his elbows, breathed deeply to keep shivers from rattling his spine. Nearby, Shyn sat with his back against the trunk of a fir tree, hands bound behind him. Their eyes met, but neither spoke. Khirro lowered himself, rolled onto his side and closed his eyes again. When sleep reclaimed him, he dreamed of a giant gray falcon rescuing him from the fire, soaring above the flames, through the smoke, to safety and freedom.
A much better dream.
Chapter Nineteen
Shyn leaned his head back against the rough tree bark and cast his eyes skyward. Khirro had seen him do this a number of times during their hushed conversations of the last three days, each time a wistfulness seemed to cloud the border guard’s eyes.
“I’d seen but thirteen summers when I left my home,” he said looking at Khirro again.
“Why did you leave?”
“I no longer wanted to be there. And they no longer wanted me there. I spent a year wandering, fending for myself, before joining the King’s army.”
“At fourteen.”
“Big for my age.”
Shyn shifted, the rope holding his hands creaked with the movement. Khirro wished he could loosen the knots but knew Ghaul wouldn’t hear of it. He’d grown to like the big border guard, learning much about him in hushed discussions they shared as Khirro sat watch with Shyn lashed to a tree.
“The army was good to me at first. I felt things I hadn’t felt at home: accepted, needed. But it was short-lived. Eventually, people turn on you when you’re different. When they did, I was sent to the border like a broken tool discarded at the back of the barn.”
“Different? Because of your size?”
Shyn shook his head and looked toward the blue sky again. Khirro shared some of his own upbringing, even telling Shyn about his father’s accident and a much-edited version of what happened with Emeline and how he came to be a soldier, then felt guilty he hadn’t shared completely. The similarity in their circumstances made Khirro feel a kinship toward this man.
�
��One day, I’ll get back to Emeline. When all this is done. When the fighting is finished. And then I’ll-”
“Enough. It’s time.”
Ghaul’s words startled Khirro. While talking with Shyn, he hadn’t noticed him cross the glade toward them. Khirro stood.
“Time for what?”
“We agreed to bring him far enough from the border he’d be no threat to us, then let him go. I only agreed because you have no stomach for killing, farmer. Gods help us.”
“I trust him. We’ve spoken and I think he can aid us.”
Ghaul barked a derisive laugh. “What’s wrong with your head? It’s a spy’s job to earn your trust.”
Khirro glanced at Shyn and felt a twinge that the man should be party to this conversation, so he led Ghaul to where Elyea sat with Maes and Athryn, far enough away the border guard wouldn’t hear. Elyea rose from her seat and laid a hand on Ghaul’s arm to calm him, but he shook it off. Athryn watched in silence, his expressionless mask hiding his thoughts.
Why does he wear it when it’s just us? It’s only a scar. What else is he hiding?
“Why do you think he should join us?” Elyea asked.
Khirro looked at her, his heart palpitating as it always did when his eyes met hers. “I’m not sure.” His latest dream of the tyger came to mind, but a dream of a beast advising him to trust his heart wouldn’t convince the others. More likely the opposite. “He protected me when he could have turned us in. We treat him like a prisoner yet he holds us no ill. Having another sword arm wouldn’t be a bad thing.”
“Depends on who the sword ends up buried in,”‘ Ghaul said.
“If he intended to harm us, it would have been simpler for us to be taken to the gallows in Tasgarad.”
“True,” Athryn said. Maes crouched beside his brother, moving dirt with a stick, disinterested in the conversation. “But perhaps he has a different agenda.”
“Let me prove myself.”
They looked at their captive tied to a tree ten yards away. How did he hear us?
