Building after building, they search but to no avail. No sign indicating Morcyth or anything else is discovered. They continue to check back in by the horses every hour. Jiron suggests they could cover more area if they didn’t have to come back all the time but James says he would rather it take longer than have something happen to one of them.
During the last hour before they have to return before noon, Miko and Jiron are leaving a home where it looked as if a large family had lived. Within were many rooms, some still containing the remnants of fine furniture.
“I don’t think this town has what James is looking for,” grumbles Miko.
“Either do I,” agrees Jiron.
“Then why are we here?” he asks.
Sighing, he turns to Miko and says, “Because James says to. He’s proved us wrong before when we thought what he was doing didn’t make any sense.”
“True,” he agrees.
At one point Miko asks him if he plans on continuing the jokes on Jorry and Uther but Jiron shakes his head. “James is right, we need to finish this and get out of here.” He pauses a moment and says, “Of course if they do something then we should hardly just take it without retaliation.”
Miko likes the sound of that. So not only is he looking for signs of Morcyth but is keeping on the lookout for the next prank Jorry and Uther may pull.
Walking back onto the street, Jiron gestures to a rundown building across the street and says, “Should we try this one before heading back?”
“Alright,” agrees Miko just before his stomach sounds off with a loud rumble, “but let’s not take too long.”
Jiron gives him a grin and they cross the street. The door is closed but opens readily enough when Jiron turns the handle. It’s a three story residence and Jiron offers to check the upper floors while Miko searches the ground floor.
The one part of this Miko likes is opening all the old chests and boxes lying around. So far he’s found quite a number of interesting objects, not to mention the odd coin or two. As Jiron hits the stairs to search above, he leaves the front room and enters the kitchen area.
Opening the various cabinets he finds them all empty. A door is set in the far wall, and he walks over to it. Grasping the handle he pulls it open and finds a walk-in pantry on the other side. Old rotted containers still line the shelves, whatever they had once contained is long gone. He moves inside as he checks for anything which may have been left behind. He’s become quite the scavenger.
Not finding anything he turns to leave and takes two steps before coming to stop. A cold chill runs through him and his heart skips a beat at what he sees in the other room. Standing there, looking directly at him is a figure of a man, gaunt and pale. The skin is pulled tight to his bones and his hair is scraggly, looking like it has fallen out in patches. Clutched in one hand is a pickaxe such as a miner would use.
The instant of fright leaves him as he says, “Alright guys, enough is enough. You’re not fooling anyone.”
When the figure makes no reply and continues to stand there staring at him, his feelings of unease return. Fear begins to take him again as he comes to realize this isn’t Uther or Jorry.
Standing there frozen in fear, Miko is speechless as they both gaze upon the other. Then the miner’s mouth begins to move but nothing comes out as he turns slightly toward Miko. Taking a step forward, he reaches out his other hand as if to grab him.
The movement of the miner breaks the spell fear had over him and Miko lets out with a god awful inarticulate scream of fear as he backpedals into the pantry. Reaching out in panic, he takes hold of the pantry door and pulls it closed behind him.
Moving as far back as he can, he stands there in the dark, eyes locked to the door afraid the miner will open it and come for him. The darkness of the pantry does nothing to alleviate the terror that continues to rifle through him.
Suddenly, the door swings open and he sees Jiron standing there, knife in hand. “What happened?” he asks. Then he sees the wide eyed, pale expression on Miko’s face.
“He was standing there!” Miko says, pointing to the other room.
“Who?” Jiron asks. “Who was standing here?” Looking around the kitchen, he doesn’t see anything.
“A miner,” he says. “I think he was dead.”
Reaching his hand out to him, Jiron asks, “Were they playing another joke on you?”
Shaking his head vehemently, he says, “No, it wasn’t them.”
“Come on, let’s go tell James,” he says.
Nodding, Miko takes the hand and leaves the panty. Reentering the kitchen, his eyes dart around for the gaunt miner but other than him and Jiron, the kitchen is empty. Coming to where the miner had stood he says, “He was standing right here!” He takes hold of Jiron’s shirt and says, “He was reaching for me.”
“Calm down,” Jiron says as he leads him out of the building. “He’s not here now.”
On their way to find James, they run across Fifer and Qyrll who join them. Jiron gives them a brief rundown of what happened as they continue moving toward where James and Dave are hunting. Jorry and Uther are nowhere in sight.
When they reach the area, he calls out “James!”
From an upper window of a nearby building, they hear a “What?”
Looking up, they see James peering down at them. “Miko saw something!”
“It was a miner!” he hollers. “I think he was dead.”
“I’ll be right down,” he says and then ducks back inside. A moment later, he and Dave leave the building and join them in the street. Coming to Miko he asks, “What happened?”
He relates to him his encounter with the dead miner, as now he’s sure that’s what it was. “He was reaching for me and I panicked,” he concludes. “I slammed the door closed as I fled into the panty. When it opened again, Jiron was standing there and the miner was gone.”
“And you’re sure it wasn’t them playing another joke on you?” he asks.
When Miko shakes his head no, he says, “Take me there.”
Together they hurry along back to the building where the dead miner had been encountered. When they approach, James says, “You all stay here, Miko you come with me.” With Miko right beside him, he goes up to the open door leading into the kitchen and stops before entering.
“Now,” he says as he turns to Miko, “just where did this miner appear?”
Pointing to the spot, he replies, “Right there.”
Entering through the door, James comes to the spot and examines the floor carefully. If the miner had left footprints they were obliterated by Jiron and Miko walking over them when they left. He stands there a moment with his eyes closed but fails to pick up anything such as coldness or a sense of danger, things he heard always accompanies the supernatural.
Turning back to Miko he says, “Whatever it was, there’s nothing here now.”
“I tell you I saw it,” insists Miko defensively.
“I’m not saying you imagined it,” James tells him. “I’m just saying there’s nothing here now.”
With a tremor of fear in his voice, he asks, “What are we to do?”
“Let’s go have lunch while I think on it,” he says. “After that we’ll see.”
“Alright.”
They leave the house and rejoin the others. “There’s nothing there now,” he says when he draws near. “Let’s go back to the horses and have lunch. I want to comb this area after we eat.” The idea of searching a mine is forgotten after Miko’s encounter with the miner.
Moving down the street toward where they left the horses, Qyrll moves next to Miko and asks, “What did it look like?”
Qyrll seems to have a rather keen interest in this sort of thing and practically grills Miko about the subtle details. By the time they’ve returned to the horses, he brings his questioning to a close, for the moment satisfied he’s learned all there is.
Jorry and Uther have returned in the meantime and are filled in on what just happened.
They remove the food for their meal from their horses and take it inside a nearby inn where they sit at a table near a window. James sits there in silence while he eats, the others talking quietly among themselves.
Suddenly from outside, they hear the horses neighing and then see them racing away down the street. “The ghost!” cries out Miko as they all race out of the inn into the street. Weapons at the ready, they find the street deserted except for their fleeing horses.
“Fifer, Miko, you two go after the horses,” James says. As they race down the street after them, he says to the others, “Fan out and see if you can find anything. Dave, you stay with me.”
Qyrll returns his sword to its scabbard as he moves out quickly, Jiron right behind him. Jorry and Uther go down a side street. James motions for Dave to follow him as he goes over to where the horses were tied to begin their search from there.
Moving quickly, he races down side streets and ducks into buildings only to end up finding nothing. By the time Fifer and Miko return with the horses, they’ve all returned to the inn.
“Nothing,” Jiron says to James when they return. Jorry and Uther have likewise turned up nothing.
“What spooked them?” Fifer asks.
“Ghosts, that’s what,” replies Miko. Ever since his encounter with the miner, he’s been constantly on the lookout, head turning this way and that.
“I think we all need to be extra cautious from this point,” James says. “We still need to find what we came here to find.”
After securing the horses again, they return to the inn and finish their meal. Once over, they head back to the place where Miko saw the miner to start the afternoon’s search from there. “If any of you see anything out of the ordinary, call for me right away,” James tells them.
“You can count on that,” Miko assures him. Jiron just grins at his enthusiasm at carrying out that command.
“I still want us to meet back here every hour until dusk,” he tells them and then they head out to continue their searching.
Miko’s miner and the action of the horses have them all spooked, including James. He wouldn’t let the others know but he’s actually quite worried about the whole thing. Back in his world, these things wouldn’t bother him nearly as much. But here where gods are active and magic works, who knows what could happen.
Throughout the rest of the afternoon, several of them think they may have seen the miner out of the corner of their eyes, moving across a window of a nearby building. But each time after they called for James, a closer look revealed nothing.
When the sun at last hits the top of the western peaks, they call it a day and return to the same place they made camp the night before. While the rest get the camp set up and a fire going, James takes Dave and sees if he can’t bag something for dinner. Their store of rations is dwindling and he doesn’t want to run out before doing something about it.
Shortly after the camp disappears behind them in the trees, movement from up ahead catches his eye. Moving forward, they make their way through the trees until they see a deer-like animal standing still ahead of them. Its head swivels from side to side as if it’s trying to find something.
“He may have caught our scent,” Dave suggests in a barely heard whisper.
“I think you may be right,” replies James just as quietly. Removing a stone from his pocket he slowly gets into position and then cocks his arm back. Taking a deep breath to calm himself, he aims for the deer and releases the magic as he throws the stone.
The deer must have noticed his movement, for at the last second it jumps away. Its hindquarters are thrust to the side when the stone catches it off center, ripping a chunk out.
Dave jumps up and races after the deer, knife in hand. It isn’t dead, only injured. James rushes after.
The deer, though faltering in its stride due to its injury, still manages to lead them on a merry chase before finally collapsing from loss of blood and exhaustion. Dave comes up on it first having moved ahead of James during the chase. The deer raises its head off the ground as he approaches, it tries to get to its feet to run away but is too week and stumbles back to the ground.
Reaching its side, Dave strikes out with his knife across its throat and ends its misery. The strike sends a splatter of blood droplets across his face. When James reaches him, he looks a gruesome sight with his face covered in blood as well as part of his clothing.
Dave turns at his approach and says, “Let’s get this back to camp.”
“Right,” agrees James. “Then maybe you need to wash up a little.”
Looking down at himself a moment, he then glances to his friend with a grin and asks, “I am a mess aren’t I?”
“Oh yeah,” affirms James. He takes the hindquarters and Dave takes the fore, together they raise the animal off the ground and that’s when James comes to the realization that he doesn’t know which way camp is. In all the excitement of chasing the deer, he got turned around. “Do you know which way is the camp?” he asks.
Dave glances around a moment and then says, “Uh, no.”
Trees in every direction as well as rolling hills, every direction looks the same. The light is fading fast and if they don’t find their way back soon they may not get back until morning.
“Which way?” asks Dave.
“Let’s set this down and I’ll figure it out,” he says. Setting the deer down, he picks up a small stick from the ground and rests it on his palm. Concentrating on Miko, he releases the magic and the stick swivels upon his palm until coming to rest pointing off to his right.
Nodding in that direction, he says, “They’re that way.” Releasing the magic, he drops the stick back to the ground and then bends over to pick up the deer. Grunting from its weight, he and Dave begin hauling it back to camp.
They slowly work their way through the trees as the light continues to fade, winding their way between two hills. It isn’t far before the smell of smoke from the campfire reaches them and they breathe a sigh of relief. Following the direction from which the smoke is originating, they continue around the hill until the light from the campfire comes into view.
He’s about ready to call a greeting when he stops in his tracks. Grabbing Dave, he pulls him down against the side of the hill. “That’s not our camp,” he whispers to his friend.
“Are you sure?” Dave asks.
“Yes. There are more people there than there should be,” he explains.
Letting the deer lie on the ground, they make their way to the top of the hill to overlook the camp. Upon reaching the crest, they gaze down and find over a dozen men sitting around a campfire. They’re too far away to hear what the men are saying but who they are is apparent. The armor some of them are wearing reveals them to be from the Empire.
He glances to Dave and can see that he’s reached the same conclusion. They stay there a few minutes and watch the activities of those in the camp below them. There are fourteen men at arms and two dressed in civilian attire. The men keep their armor on and the horses remain saddled.
The area in which the camp lies is a depression between two hills which would hide them from anyone passing through. Unless of course they stumbled upon them as James and Dave did.
Having seen enough, he indicates with a nod for them to return back down the hill. He and Dave slowly and quietly make their way to the bottom.
“What are they doing here?” Dave whispers.
“Only one thing would draw them this far from the Empire,” James replies.
“You?” he asks.
“Can’t think of anything else,” he states.
“But how would they know you’re here?”
“I don’t know,” he replies. “Magic probably.” This is getting irritating! Going to have to figure a way for them to stop tracking me. “We better hurry back and tell the others.”
Leaving the deer where it lies, they move away from the hill and then circumvent the camp with the Empire’s soldiers before continuing to follow the general
direction the stick had indicated. About the time the light has completely faded, they see their campfire ahead of them through the trees.
When they emerge from the trees, Jiron is the first to notice them and comes to his feet in alarm. “What happened?” he asks.
James at first isn’t sure what elicited that reaction until he glances to Dave and sees that the deer’s blood still covers him. “He’s fine, just splatter from an animal,” he explains. “But we’ve got real problems.” He then tells them of the men camped less than a mile away.
“How in the world could they have tracked us here?” asks Fifer.
“Magic is the only explanation I can come up with,” he says. “What I don’t understand is, if they know we’re here, why haven’t they attacked yet?”
“They looked like they were settling in for a wait,” adds Dave as he begins cleaning the blood off. He glances at James then continues, “They kept their armor on and their horses remained saddled as well.”
Jiron gets a thoughtful look and then shakes his head. “It doesn’t make any sense,” he says. “They’ve never hesitated before.”
“They could be waiting on something,” suggests Qyrll. “Or somebody.”
“It’s possible,” James says.
“What if they were part of the force you encountered by Illion,” offers Fifer. “They may have reinforcements on the way.”
Remembering the creatures he fought, he doesn’t like the sound of more possibly being on the way. “It didn’t look like they were going to do anything tonight,” he tells them. “Let’s get some rest and post a sentry, not only to keep watch here but to keep an eye on the woods between here and there.”
“Good idea,” Jiron says. “If they move, we need warning.”
“Why don’t we just leave?” Dave asks. Every eye turns to him. “Hostile forces camped less than a mile away and you all want to just hang out until they attack. I don’t get you at all.” He glares back at them in turn.
Turning to his friend, James says “What would you have us do? If we leave we would pass right by them, and you can be assured they’ll have the pass south watched. It’s either here or go into Ironhold.”
The Star of Morcyth: The Morcyth Saga Book Five Page 35
