The Legacy Builder (The Chronicles Of Lincoln Hart Book 1)

by Ember Lane

  “I can only tell you of the indigenous races of the region. I have no specifics for this area.”

  “It’s tree elves,” Crags said, sitting back against a rocky outcrop. “They’ve been watching us ever since we came into the vale. They seemed quite disinterested until the sawmills started going up, then they got a bit angry.”

  “But they won’t attack us?”

  “Wood elves?” Crags belched a laugh. “No spine!” he shouted. “Not like gnomes.”

  Lincoln heard a rustling in the trees not ten yards away, but it soon settled and died down.

  “Told you,” Crags said. “They’re a timid bunch, but then, they might just be waiting until there are enough of them.”

  “The gnome makes sense,” Aezal muttered. “If I was them and saw all the copper-colored folks roaming around, I’d be a bit hesitant. It’s a meet you shouldn’t put off.”

  “Tomorrow,” Lincoln muttered, adding it to his list.

  After chewing on some salted hare and drinking a good gulp of water, they carried on toward the ridge. Soon, they were staring up at its sheer sides, wondering how they’d ever clambered down the fissure opposite in the middle of the night.

  As promised, Bethe had led them straight toward a cave. She told them that she could go no farther as she’d reached the ends of her influence and was tied to a certain radius around the settlement’s center. Aezal lit a torch, as did Crags, and they ventured toward it.

  The cave’s mouth was no bigger than a set of double gates. They all slipped on loose scree as they scrambled down a small slope that led to it. Once inside, it became clear that it was no natural cave. Chiseled, regular walls and an arched ceiling welcomed them. The stone underfoot was smooth, as though it was used to constant traffic. Yet it was no mine, there were no side tunnels, no exploited seams.

  “This is definitely an access to our vale,” Aezal muttered, treading forward, carefully. “You can even see where they once bolted torches to the wall.” He pointed to a pair of holes, rust stains streaking down from them like fallen tears.

  “They?” Lincoln asked, but Aezal merely shrugged.

  “Like I say, this land has many secrets. Just keep it at they, else your mind will turn over and over with questions.”

  Lincoln accepted Aezal’s words. He had enough on his mind anyway. Any peace had gone since he’d activated the city token, and worse, he didn’t know whether it’d get easier once he’d allotted his spare attribute points. He assumed so, but that was what it was, just a guess. The only reason he’d left them unallocated was because he was unsure. Build speed, at the minute, wasn’t an issue, and he guessed the politics attribute affected that. Research speed, well, he wouldn’t need that until he had students, an academy or whatnot, so he didn’t have to pump points into that attribute yet. Defense, well, he had little to defend. Starting out was the worst, he thought.

  “Nice cottage,” Crags suddenly said. “We get a nice cozy cottage and what do we do after a week on the road? I’ll tell you what we do. We walk away from it, that’s what we do.”

  Aezal grunted. “You’re not wrong. It would have been nice to rest up for a day.”

  “Why did I need to come anyway?” Crags asked.

  “I’ll tell you, Crags,” Lincoln replied. “It is because you are essential to this mission.”

  Crags stopped in Lincoln’s path. The gnome looked up at him. “Essential?”

  “Essential. If this is to work, it’ll be because of your efforts as much as anyone’s. You’ve got a big role to play.”

  “Big role,” Crags repeated.

  “Of course, if you’d rather go back…”

  “Nope, no, I wasn’t saying that. I was saying… I was about to say how those creature comforts others seek are just not for the likes of me, no, not I.” Crags spun on his feet and marched after Aezal. “Digberts used to say that about me. He used to say he’d never met a gnome as useful as me when I wasn’t around. Liked me to be off and doing things, did Digberts. That’s why he trusted me with this mission.”

  Aezal stopped in his tracks.

  “What mission?” his voice boomed around.

  “Mission? Did I say mission?”

  Aezal hadn’t turned. He was just standing, torch in hand, his back to both Crags and Lincoln.

  “What mission? The one where you spy on us? The one where Digberts inquires where you are and what we’re up to? The one where you blab like a caught-out child? That mission?”

  “That sounds about right,” Crags said.

  Aezal started to turn.

  “Except,” said Crags, backing up. “Except we’re guild members now—not hostile—nothing like that. My first allegiance is to Lincoln now—Lincoln, so it is, it is.”

  Aezal’s white eyes narrowed. “Better be your only allegiance,” he growled.

  Crags looked around at Lincoln, his expression pleading, but Lincoln planted his feet wide apart, and crossed his arms, inclining his head, his stare stern. “We could make sure of that now Aezal. There’s only me and you, no one need know.”

  Crags fell to his knees, his hands clasped over his heart, his eyebrows lofted. “Harm little Crags? Now, yer wouldn’t want to do that. We’re nearly family.” He grinned a wide smile.

  “Might be messy,” Aezal said.

  “Be a shame to break up the gang,” Lincoln pointed out.

  “The gang, yes, the gang,” Crags cried, springing to his feet. “You’re right, why split up the gang, especially when I’ve got important tasks to perform—especially then.” He stamped his little feet. “Stupid Digberts and his meddling.”

  Aezal turned and walked on. Lincoln shooed the gnome forward. “Just what did Digberts want you to do?”

  “Ah, well there’s a thing, you see. Digberts, he thinks he can see into the future—thinks he knows yer fortune.” Crags laughed. “Reckons he can read the foam on your ale or the trail of yer smoke, but we all know that farseeing is just lies ‘n muddles ‘n nothin’ else, eh?”

  “Lies ‘n muddles ‘n nothin’ else,” Aezal repeated.

  Lincoln could now see the end of the cave, or rather tunnel end as it clearly was. Looking over his shoulder, he couldn’t see the entrance way, so concluded there was a slight curve to the passageway. If the land on the other side was a swathe of woodland, like Bethe had hinted it would be, he would somehow need to transport lumber through it. He began to wonder about the feasibility of rails and trucks and decided that a smithy was top of his list of required buildings, assuming the settlement workers couldn’t just make rails. He’d need to make sure his new city, if indeed he could form one, could spread its influence into this tunnel, if at all possible.

  Aezal’s cry threw his train of thought off its own tracks. The warrior was now standing in the tunnel’s entrance, Crags by his side. Lincoln picked up his step and soon drew aside them. As he saw the land beyond the ridge, he started laughing. “It’s like an ocean of green,” he said.

  They were standing on a red rock ledge around six feet deep. Behind them, the sheer face of the ridge reached up another thirty or forty feet. Before them was a rolling ocean of green treetops. It spread both to the north and south, and westward until it butted against a green cliff face some half a mile away.

  “That is one weird cliff,” Aezal muttered and pointed across, and Lincoln followed his gaze.

  The rocky formation was too angular to be natural, and looked like a mass of carved stone that had been clad by generations of ivy, creepers, and moss. Lincoln guessed it must be part of the great mountain from which their vale spawned, though he couldn’t quite see the mountain from where he stood.

  “What we seem to have here,” said Lincoln, “is a gorge filled with trees instead of water.”

  “And our vale is higher than this land. Will that cause a problem?” Aezal asked, but Lincoln was just staring at the block of stone over the treetops, consumed by its unnatural presence.

  “What the hell is that?” he asked. “One of
those things… Hang on.” He fiddled in his tunic, pulling his sack out and retrieved the map he’d brought from Spillwhistle. “It’s marked, a big square of black—but no name.”

  “Then I wouldn’t worry about it now. If there’s something to be revealed, it’ll show itself in time,” Aezal said, and he began walking along the ridge and southward.

  The ledge carried on and on, the sea of green below appearing endless. Lincoln knew he had found his source of lumber, but wondered if he hadn’t found much more. A plan was forming in his mind, one to make this second settlement as important as the first. The ledge carried on and on, and eventually, the arc of the ridge had bent around enough for them to be able to see over Southern Irydia. The great forest beyond was like a thick green belt, and in the distance, they could just about see the rolling dales that surrounded Brokenford.

  “Sawmills, Aezal, Crags. We can site sawmills all around, then start the settlement back there, where the tunnel spills out.”

  “And span a wall, from the ridge to the,” he pointed at the strange buttress, “to that, and have our village behind,” Aezal said.

  “And use the stone from the mountain to build the wall,” Crags added.

  “Exactly,” Lincoln declared. “Let’s track back and see if there’s a way down.”

  “Don’t doubt it,” Aezal said. “I wouldn’t be surprised to find out our little sanctuary and that block of mystery over there aren’t linked in some way.”

  “Humph,” Lincoln grunted, but it was much the same as he was thinking too.

  They walked back along the ledge. This time the curve of the ridge revealed a little more of what was upstream of this river of green. The flat mass of green was constant like a ruled edge, and so as the ridge arced, the valley trapped between them grew, until Lincoln finally saw where the mountain rose up, the block of stone joined it, and a waterfall fell to the ground between.

  “Well, I’ll be…” Aezal muttered.

  “Now that is something worth telling Digberts,” Crags said.

  Aezal swiped him with the back of his hand, but there was no force in it.

  “I think we’ve just found the site of our second settlement.” Lincoln started marching forward.

  He saw the ledge soon ended, and he slowed until a set of downward steps came into view. They were quickly swallowed up by the forest below, skipping down the steps two at a time, eager to reach the forest’s floor. But when they were back in its true clutches, the dank, dark of the thick woods haunted them again, and their enthusiasm waned as their view polarized to a few tree trunks. Gritting his teeth, Lincoln pressed on into the center of the green, determined to find the river.

  An hour of grumbling, swiping trailing vines, and brushing sticky webs from their faces, they eventually stumbled across an enchanting river. Lincoln knelt by its bank and took a great gulp of its glinting water. The river itself looked like a moonlight trail wandering through the deep green of night with just the occasional flicker of sunlight piercing the heavy, emerald canopy.

  “We could use this,” said Aezal. “I’ll bet it runs all the way to The Silver Road.”

  “Both a boon and a vulnerability,” Lincoln said.

  “If you build this second settlement how I think you are, it may not remain a secret for long.”

  “That might depend on Crags—I have plans for him.”

  “Like what?” Crags asked.

  Lincoln let slip a laugh. “Let’s just say folks don’t like traveling through haunted forests.”

  “Oooh, sounds like fun,” Crags said, smiling.

  14

  The Sacred Tree

  After going upstream for a few hundred yards, they decided they’d done enough exploring for the day. They’d come to a small clearing in the forest, and by Lincoln’s reckoning, it was near enough where he thought the center of the second settlement should be. Slumping to the ground, Aezal fished in his sack and brought out the last of their food, sharing it between them all. They munched away in silence, each lost in his own thoughts.

  This was the ideal place, but could he afford the distraction? Lincoln wondered if he could split himself in two, or would mistakes start getting made? He needed a steward, not a warrior or a gnome, a steward whom he could rely on to do the right job. If it wasn’t for his need for wood, he wouldn’t even consider it. Lying under the moody sky, he fought with his dilemma, shifting, fidgeting on the damp grass.

  “This is hopeless,” he growled.

  “Aren’t you going to flip the token?” Aezal asked, as Lincoln sat up and scratched his head, trying to reach a decision.

  At first Lincoln didn’t reply, just stared at Aezal, wondering if the warrior could do the task, could run the settlement, but he knew, deep down, it was not Aezal’s destiny.

  “Nope,” he finally said. “By my reckoning, we’ve got enough time to get back to the vale before the sun sets. If we try for the city now, we’ll have to build the cottages up to the doors and set the guide going. No, a day or two won’t make any difference.”

  “Sure?” Aezal asked. “I could stay here and get things going.”

  “I could too,” Crags added.

  Lincoln stood up again, restless, eager to get on, and put his hands on his hips, at odds with his choice, but knowing it to be the correct one. “You two will be at each other’s throats before the moon has risen,” he said, kicking at the grass, and then he started marching into the forest. “Come on, let’s get back,” he muttered. “Besides, Ozmic and Grimble have got the cottages down pat now. No, we’ll go look at the mountain tomorrow, see what we can find there, and then come…”

  When no reply came, he looked around, but Aezal and Crags were nowhere to be seen.

  “Aezal! Crags!” he shouted. “Aezal! Crags!” He began retracing his steps. Soon back in the clearing, he looked around but could see no sign of them. That feeling of being watched engulfed him, shadows darting around in the surrounding foliage, the rustle of leaves, the knock of branches. It was like there was a whole load of folks lurking, hiding, waiting for some signal. Then a soft voice called out, it almost floating on the air until it finally kissed his ears.

  “Are you the Builder?”

  Lincoln jerked, glancing around from trunk to trunk, from bough to bough, but he could see nothing.

  “Yes…Lincoln,” he shouted back.

  Silence, then… “Why do you stain our forest with the gnome? They are nothing more than a plague, a disease upon the land. Why do you blight us so?”

  “Crags? The gnome?” Lincoln still couldn’t see anyone, but his gut told him they were there—he guessed elves, and he guessed they had come in force. “He’s my friend.”

  Then he heard the nocking of a dozen or so arrows, and from the shadows, a circle of elves slowly emerged.

  Lincoln raised his hands in the air. Their faces still partly shadowed, but he could see their sharp lines, narrow eyes atop high cheekbones, nearly all with brown, raggedy hair down to their shoulders. They were a little smaller than him and dressed similarly to Crags, like rangers. Each had a whitewood bow, charged and leveled at Lincoln’s chest or back, dependent on his direction as he spun around, looking for a way to escape. He felt his breaths come fast, knowing he was about to die. He quickly pulled his respawn menu up, changing its location from the troll mound to the middle of the vale. Taking a breath, he prepared to die.

  “You think we’re here to kill you, Mandrake-kin?” the voice now sang out, much stronger than before, and Lincoln looked toward its source. Standing astride a branch was an elven woman. She rolled off the bough, somersaulting down and then walking straight toward him, a mist-like glow flowing all around her. “When has House Mandrake taken their alliance with the elves for granted? When has Mandrake marched onto our lands without an accord? Glenwyth, my name, well a name you can at least pronounce. And you are Lincoln the Builder. Tell me, Lincoln, will you answer my question? Why is Mandrake on our lands, eating our forests?”

  Tree
Elf. Name: Glenwyth. Level = 13 Status = Hostile.

  “I, er…” was all Lincoln could reply, mesmerized by her aura.

  The elf approached, closing the distance between them until she was standing just inches from him. “Are you wed to one of our sister’s? The smell of our kind is on you, and yet not. It is tainted, somehow.”

  Glenwyth had beautiful, green eyes that stared up at him, and her lips still seemed to hold unasked questions, trembling, trying to hold them back. He felt her breath on his neck, his chin. It tasted sweet, like almonds.

  “What have you done with my friends?” Lincoln rasped.

  “Friends? The warrior is safe. We are treating him with the respect of an ally. The gnome must die…eventually. We’ll play with him for a bit first.”

  Lincoln reared. “No!” he shouted. “The gnome must live.”

  “Gnomes are a stain on the land. Are Mandrake allied with those miscreants now?”

  “Mandrake? You keep saying that like it’s a chain that binds. All are welcome in my village. All are judged by their actions, not those of their ancestors—all, without exception. Gnomes, ceratogs, dwarves, and elves—everyone who proves their worth is welcome. I’ll not turn someone away because I don’t like the smell of his or her relatives.”

  Glenwyth took a step back. “Humans often say fine words and rarely stand by them. Maybe a test would be in order.” She smiled, skipped around and jumped back onto her bough as though it was only a couple of feet off the ground. “Tell me. Lincoln the Builder, will you accompany me to our village? I should probably show you where it is else you put a mill near it and tear it down.”

  Glenwyth jumped back down and grabbed Lincoln’s hand, pulling him with her toward the river, almost playfully, but with an underlying force.

  “What about Crags?” Lincoln asked.

  “Crags?”

  “The gnome?”

  “Like I said, he will be kept…entertained. The only reason he is alive now is that he is wearing the green of a ranger. No, he will live; all the while we think he can tell us where the bandit, Digberts, is. The king of the gnomes must die. It is written.”