A New Light (The Age of Dawn Book 5)

by Everet Martins

  “Are you well?” Senka joined him, facing the Black Wynch with Isa at her side.

  He was hunched over, arms holding his side. “It cut me,” he swallowed. “Badly, I fear.”

  “Can I?” She eyed his side. He met her eyes for a what felt like a long minute. He seemed to now be deciding whether or not he could trust her. Perhaps she was correct in her suspicions that they’d felt the same about one another. “It’s alright.” She nodded encouragingly.

  He snorted and slowly brought his bloody arms down by his quivering side. She peeled back his blood matted cloak and fought the urge to wince. Wincing only made the other person feel worse. There were four deep cuts going from his upper ribs down to his hips, weeping blood and showing pinked bones. The Black Wynch’s blades had turned his leather armor into strips at the wound site.

  “It’s bad?” he asked.

  She sniffed. Trying to dislodge some of the dirt made her sinuses itch. “It’s bad, Isa. Sit down, take off your cloak,” she said with an air of command. “You won’t make it back if we don’t patch you up now. Put your hands back on the wound and apply pressure while I get my supplies.”

  The Black Wynch writhed on the ground, moaning like a dying child. She knew the sound well from when the Death Spawn had raided the Scorpions’ village. It haunted her dreams every night, an echo that would never die.

  “Ssh,” Senka whispered, squatting down beside it. Her dagger rasped from its sheath, the sound of murder in her ears. She used it to draw a red line across its throat. The last of its corrupted blood pumped out, mixing pinks with the spreading water.

  She went back to the bushes where they’d been hiding and found her satchel where she’d left it, propped up against a tree. She opened it and grabbed a cotton bandage, clips, Ribwort oil, and a vial of crushed Mercy’s Mint.

  Isa sat hunched over on a rock and stripped off his torso armor, the blood bright and severe against his pale skin. His muscles were sinewy without an ounce of useless tissue on his frame. Red trickles rolled over his belt and wound down his thighs. She had to work fast.

  She uncorked the vial of Mercy’s Mint and sniffed it, ensuring its freshness by the sweetness of the aroma. “This will help with the pain and help to prevent rot.”

  He nodded and tension waved in his jaw.

  She shook out a small pile of the chopped green herbs into her hand. Senka snorted, coughed, then slowly let a long string of spit dribble on top of the pile.

  “What are you doing?” Isa asked, eyes bulging from his head.

  “Relax.” She furrowed her brows. “You’ll be alright. It needs spit to activate.” She stuck a finger into her palm, mixing and turning the spit and herbs into a green paste.

  “Thought you… the Scorpions only made poisons?”

  “No.” She continued working the spit into the Mercy’s Mint. She snorted and added another glob. The consistency wasn’t right.

  “No?” He gestured expectantly.

  She stopped mixing and frowned, not understanding why he repeated what she’d said. Once a thing was said it didn’t need to be said a second time. She worked the green goo into a ball and gently pressed it into a wound.

  Isa hissed and the tendons in his neck leaped out.

  “Sorry. Did I hurt you?”

  He gave her a ‘what do you think?’ look, but shook his head. “It’s okay.”

  “Alright.” She spread the mixture along the wound channel, sealing it up with green paste. Given the amount of scars on his body, she wondered if he was carved to life by a dulled axe. Some were old while some looked fairly new. A newish line of thickened skin traveled from his shoulder down to his navel, glowing with an angry red. “How did you… come to work for the Silver Tower?”

  He turned to look at her, eyes hard. She met his stare for a moment, bit her lip, then looked back at his cuts. Had she been too direct? She didn’t understand why people didn’t like some questions. If she wanted to know a thing, shouldn’t she simply ask it? A corner of her lip twitched up as she started spreading more Mercy Mint over his wounds.

  “Mm,” he moaned. “It’s working to reduce the pain. What is it? It’s amazing.”

  “Mercy Mint, Isa,” she smiled. “It’s one of my favorite salves.”

  “Haven’t heard of it. From the Nether, I assume?” He exhaled with a shaky breath.

  “Yes. You don’t have it here. I’ve looked… haven’t found any yet.” She decided to let the slight pass. He didn’t know better. No one did. Her people didn’t like that word, the Nether.

  She removed the cork from an amber colored flask. Within it sloshed Ribwort oil, clear and viscous.

  “And this is?”

  “Ribwort oil. Keeps the wound clean, aids healing, prevents further infection. The Scorpions, despite our name, make more than just poisons, Isa. We make antidotes, salves, healing oils of all kinds. Small settlements often bring, used to bring… their worst wounded to us when they couldn’t determine the solution to an ailment.”

  He solemnly nodded. She put a few drops on her fingers then delicately brushed it over the Mercy Mint paste.

  The wind howled, tunneling with fury through the swaying trees. She enjoyed the angry wind, finding it refreshing. She waited a minute for it to wane, then unfurled a length of cotton bandage. “Hold this,” she motioned to a spot above his wounds. He pressed his fingers over hers, warm, rough and tingling with life. She slipped hers out and he pinned the bandage there. She uncoiled the bandage, wrapping it around his back then over his fingers. He let them slip out as she drew it down tighter.

  “The Tower has secrets, dark secrets. What I tell you, you must not tell another. Is that clear?” Isa cleared his throat.

  “Yes, Isa.” She nodded. Did she want to hear what he was about to say? Were there secrets the Mistress did not know?

  “I was born there and brought up within the Tower’s walls. Lived there until my twenty-third name year.”

  She leaned close to him as she brought the bandage around his back again, doubling each layer. She slowly inhaled so he wouldn’t notice her taking in his scent. He smelled like sweet earth and leather. She fumbled the bandage and bumped his wounds.

  Isa grunted.

  “Sorry,” Senka muttered and shook her head. You’re a damned fool, she told herself.

  He smiled weakly. “I was never allowed to leave the Tower until sufficiently broken.”

  She met his eyes then broke off to avoid hitting his wounds again while she worked.

  “I was raised there. Had a sword put in my hand as soon as I was old enough to hold it. Some weren’t strong enough, had to drag it around the practice yard like a strange doll,” he snickered. “I didn’t have a regular child’s upbringing, no. Assumed everyone was raised like this until I spent some time away. Thorne, our trainer, drove us hard, eight to ten hours a day every day. Training, death marches, pushing us to our limits at least once a week. Gave us new limits all the time. If we hiked ten miles one day, the next week it’d be twelve and so on. Pushing, and pushing, and pushing it went.”

  It didn’t sound like a bad life to Senka, much like hers actually. She liked hearing him talk.

  “Had no family, no motherly love,” he said with a touch of scorn. “Thorne was the closest thing to a parent I had. Anyway,” he swallowed, “not sure why I’m telling you this…”

  “It’s okay, Isa, go on.” Sometimes it was just nice to have someone there to listen to you, regardless of the meaning or purpose.

  “Had my first kill when I was twelve. My first assassination, I mean.” His cheeks flushed. “The Arch Wizard sent me to a village on the outskirts of the Tower to kill a bandit leader. His house was along the coast, a beautiful spot, a shack really. Could easily see why he’d ended up on the path he’d chosen. Crept into his home in the cover of night, slid a blade through his neck beside his sleeping wife.” Isa wiped his palm from his forehead down to his mouth and held it against his chin.

  Senka eyed him and kept
wrapping him up, just the last quarter to go. The dark hair on Senka’s arm prickled with goosebumps, and it wasn’t because the air had grown cold.

  “I slipped out of their room, left him bleeding out beside his beautiful wife. She was beautiful.” He said with a few confirming nods as if seeing her face. “A child came in from outside, from the privy as I was leaving. He opened his mouth to scream… and I stopped him.” His throat worked with a tremor. “I had no choice, you see? No choice, no choice. Left the mother a widow and without a child. My doing. My hands. You’d think I’d have become okay with it by now, but I still remember the faces. The faces of everyone I’ve killed.”

  Senka bit her lip, watched him suffer through the memories, wishing there was something she could do to take away that pain. She knew there was no escaping it, excluding death. It was once thought that, in death, the scars of life were erased. From what she’d heard about Walter’s return, they only grew worse. She pulled the bandage tight around his chest. “Hold here.” She pointed at the end of the bandage. He held it and she secured it with tiny iron clips.

  “That was just the beginning of my career in the Tower. We were told if we tried to run or escape, we’d be tortured. I saw what their torturers could do…” he shivered. “We were… no, we are slaves. People fear us if they know who we are before they see our blades. But we can’t run, don’t know anything else. What can we do? Where would we go?”

  Senka stared down at her boots, unsure of what to say. Was she merely a slave? Someone’s dog to do the dirty work?

  “Thank you, Senka. Your work… is expertly done. You’ve had a wonderful trainer.” He brushed his hand up and down his bandages. He started working his leather armor back on, tightening buckles and cinching down straps.

  “The shadow ones killed my father, my trainer, as you say.”

  “Sorry for your loss, and about the water,” he said without a shred of pity in his voice. The shaft of light that had emerged through a crack in his iron wall had been patched up with his wounds. Was the world west of the sands always this callous?

  Isa limped over to the dead Black Wynch and snatched up his hammer and hatchet from the ground. He slipped them into metallic rings on his belt. Beside his weapons were three daggers, easily concealed in a palm, and his short sword. He made his way back to the shrubs and draped his bow and quiver over his back. “We should be going.” He pulled his hood over his bone-white head.

  “Right.” She nodded and exhaled, feeling a great weight forming between them. She pulled her hood up, blocking out the world.

  Nyset peered over the expansive practice yard. Their area was demarcated by a low fence that formed the shape of an enormous rectangle. It was divided into halves by a well-worn path running down the middle. There was one half each for both the Phoenix and Dragon apprentices. There were only a handful of veterans. They worked on a plot about one-third of the size, behind the great mound of earth built up in case the girls missed their targets.

  “Slower. Slow it down.” Nyset crossed her arms and eyed the fire dancing in the air. It was about the size of her fist, flickering and waving as if it were burning underwater. “Control,” she breathed.

  The red-headed apprentice scrunched her eyes and balled up her fists. Her hair was tussled and hung over her tanned cheeks. The fire she controlled drifted towards a practice dummy suited in Milvorian armor. Milvorian armor was used due to its ability to resist the ravages of Dragon fire. Upon its head was a Death Spawn helmet with three spikes.

  “Now release your strength into the target, Joy.” Nyset pointed.

  Joy bit her upper lip and grunted. Her fire puffed into wisps of black smoke, dissipating in the scouring wind. “I’ll never get it right,” Joy sniffed and pushed her hair out of her eyes.

  A fireball exploded into the practice dummy beside Joy’s, throwing sparks and embers into the air. “Woah, Dragons!” the apprentice beside them called out.

  Nyset suppressed a sigh and smiled. The dry air made her skin feel tight. She walked up behind the frowning girl and gently placed her hands on Joy’s shoulders. “You’ll get it. Keep practicing, you’re doing great,” She stared at the ever-burning smoke drifting out from the Silver Tower on the horizon. Was there really that much for them to burn? They would not keep her from taking the tower back. It was rightfully hers, everyone’s.

  “Really? You think so?” Joy turned to look up at her, blue eyes glittering with youthful optimism. Nyset wondered how long her optimism would last after encountering Death Spawn. These were hard times for children. Was it right to bring a new babe into such a cruel existence?

  “I do. I see a lot of potential in you, you’re a special girl.” Nyset nodded at her. She bent over with her hands on her knees beside Joy and looked at the practice dummy.

  “You’re just saying that.” Joy furrowed her brow.

  “Ssh. Come now, try again, will you? I’ll guide you through it.” Nyset gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze.

  “Yes, Mistress,” Joy said, resolute.

  A mighty gust pushed a veil of sand over the new Silver Tower’s practice yard.

  “Ah!” Joy squinted. She coughed and brought the neck of her robe over her mouth. Nyset closed one eye, the other narrowed to a slit. She tugged one side of her shirt over her nose and mouth.

  Nyset’s office was technically within a large house built by Grimbald, Juzo, Walter, and some hired help. Everyone took to calling it the new Silver Tower. It was the Silver Tower as far as she was concerned, at least until the true tower was reclaimed.

  The wind tore into the earth and hurled sand with an almost cutting amount of force. The minute of quiet gave her worries room to bloom. She felt her heart lurch for Walter, yearning for the touch of his roughened hands. Where was he? Was he still okay?

  She missed looking into his eye, his face, uncaring of his recent deformities. She missed his scent. It reminded her of feeling safe, protected, like she was home again. She loved him, she knew. She hadn’t mustered up the courage to tell him yet. Why was it such a difficult thing to say? He could’ve made it easier on her by saying it first. Damn him, she sighed. She wished she hadn’t left things so bitterly between them when they parted. It was a stupid argument. She needed to see him to make everything okay again.

  She thought about Juzo and his Blood Eater surrogates. Could Walter and Grimbald handle them? It wasn’t right for him to make more. How many lives had he ruined with his curse? It was a vicious ripple that spread out over the ponds of eternity.

  Her jaw tightened at the thought of her parents back home. Were they well? Did they wait for her? Had they heard of her new position? They would be so proud. She felt warmth spread in her chest. She had always wanted to raise them up to a higher station in life. Now she had the means to do that. Once the Tower’s coffers were filled with marks, she could buy them a new house. It would be a house where doors properly fit into frames, windows would open, and the roof wouldn’t leak. No more wondering if there’d be enough marks for elixir each year. She nodded to herself. She would be able to take care of them, finally.

  Nyset wore a loose blood-red silken top, trimmed with golden thread around the cuffs and neck. The sleeves came down to her elbows and hung low to let air in. The neckline dipped low between her breasts. It was flamboyant and showed more skin than she would have liked, but comfort and freedom of movement were more important to her than fashion now. Half of her shirt was tucked into rugged trousers that hugged her hips and showed the lithe, muscular curves of her legs. The untucked half flapped in the wind and a rivulet of air cooled her back. She wore a dark leather belt with her Breden stamped short sword on one side. The other side of her belt was studded with three pouches filled with herbs and four vials filled with prismatic liquids.

  She sold all but a few of her expensive silken robes, swapping them for tops and pants. It was something she’d been meaning to do for a long time since she’d taken on the role of Arch Wizard. Some people preferred robes, wizards
and the gentry of Helm’s Reach mostly. They were fine for walking, meetings, but not for riding a horse, and certainly not for fighting.

  The gust settled down and she sighed. She bent over to Joy, who was scratching her head and brushing the sand out. “Now, you need to remember that using the power of the Dragon is a lot like learning how to consciously move a muscle, or more accurately, make your body perform a movement it is unfamiliar with. Learning to back-flip would be a good example.” She tapped a long finger to her lips.

  “But, but, I don’t know how to do a back-flip!” Joy protested and wrung her hands.

  Nyset snickered. “It’s okay. You don’t need to know how. That was merely an example, child.” Child? What was she becoming? “The point is this: you don’t learn to back-flip with just a few tries. It takes hundreds if not thousands. Don’t be discouraged by a few failures. Anyone who does anything notable in life fails… a lot.” Her eyes wandered back to the Silver Tower.

  “I see.” Joy nodded and tugged on her hair.

  “We’ll try again together. Go ahead and conjure your fire.”

  “Right.” Joy grinned and her waving blob of fire danced in the air.

  “Good. Now hold it there, affix it in your mind. Make it as real as the ground you stand on.”

  Joy closed her eyes and her mouth worked without producing sound.

  “Hold it… good, then use your mind to move it the same way you would a ball.”

  The burning mass started drifting towards the dummy. “I’m doing it! Wow!” Joy shouted.

  “Concentrate, Joy.” Nyset wished she could go into Joy’s body and somehow show her exactly how she did it. It was something each person had to learn on their own, as each person felt the Dragon uniquely. “Maintain your hold on the Dragon’s fire, don’t let it go. Then add the final push.”

  “The final push,” Joy repeated.

  Nyset folded her arms and watched Joy’s fire. She remembered the patience her parents had shown her when they’d discovered she was given the Dragon’s touch. Every night, they had dutifully taken her to the Woodland Plunge to practice out of the view of unwelcome eyes. It was only a year ago, but it felt like tens had passed. It was a time when people of the west were wary of those touched by the gods. The world had forgotten about Asebor and Death Spawn. They could not forget now.