“Back at Enrant Monge,” Aisling said, all trace of her embarrassment gone. “I believe the general will be along shortly.”
The smell from the woods was stronger now, Martaina thought, something obvious about it, the blood. She hadn’t heard anything, but that was hardly an indicator given that the camp noise was so prevalent. I wouldn’t smell anything either, but I’m here at the fringe, and the wind is just right. “Somebody died,” she said.
“Beg pardon?” Odellan looked away from Aisling, to her, and Martaina realized now she’d said it out loud.
“There’s blood in the air, a lot of it,” Martaina said with some chagrin. “I can track based on many factors, and that is one of them-one I don’t talk about much, obviously. It’s faint, but there, and it’s a ways off, so that means there’s a lot of it.”
“You’re saying-” Odellan began.
“Someone died?” Aisling asked. “No … someone was killed, if there’s that much blood.” Martaina could hear the young dark elf, and the slow line of reasoning as she drew it out in her head.
“How close by?” Odellan asked. “After all, there are armies encamped to our east, north and west-”
“Somewhere between here and Enrant Monge, I think,” Martaina said, sifting through it.
“Let’s go take a look.” Aisling’s hand went to her dagger, resting on the hilt, palming it. “After all, it could be-”
Odellan whistled, and a few nearby warriors came trotting over. “Short march. I’ll need a couple of rangers as well, as runners if need be. And a healer, so someone fetch one and bring them to catch up.” He looked to Martaina. “Lead on?”
“Yes,” Martaina said, and let her bow find her hand, and an arrow nocked itself. “Follow.”
She didn’t run through the trees, not exactly, but followed the path, the one that Aisling and the others from the northern expedition had come in on just moments earlier. The wind had shifted directions, now, and was blowing from the east. I hope what we’re looking for is on the path, because wandering afield on a search like this will be like trying to hit an apple at forty yards with a black hood on. She smiled. I can do it, but it’ll strain me.
The wind was fair but shifted again as they got closer down the path. It was all woods around them now, slight bluffs and rises on one side of the road. She ran along, her feet on the uneven path, the suggestion of rocks through the leather soles of her shoes. Hers gave flexibility but not as much support or protection. But neither were they as weighty as what the warriors wore, either, and she had to slow down to keep from outrunning the escort behind her.
The wind shifted again, and the smell was obvious now, close, a bend or two ahead in the road. Too many scents, mingled together to make a distinction about what she was smelling other than blood. The leaves whipped by her on either side, the string of her bow bit into her fingers the way it always had, the elven twine. It wasn’t a problem and hadn’t been in the thousand years since she first started to use it, but it was there, the pull of the string, just another feeling, a reminder to her that she was alive.
She came around the corner, a hard twist in the road just beyond a rise that blocked the view and there it was; blood, plenty of it, oozed out all over the road. The bodies were gone, dragged off, save one, the black armor so familiar that she knew the scent then, at least one of them. Martaina heard a hiss behind her as Aisling came around the berm, and she too saw what was there in the road.
The body was laid out, defaced in the cruelest ways possible, the head missing. The sword was still there, amazingly enough, and stuck in the body, which had been stripped naked, the armor left off to the side. It was still obvious, even so, whose body it was, being so tall and muscled as it was. She dropped next to it, felt the slide on the dirt road against her knees, as her fingers ran over the shoulder, as though she could offer the corpse some reassurance.
Aisling was across from her now, kneeling, not saying anything. There was a pall and quiet, the warriors who had followed them speaking only in hushed voices. It was obvious to them, too, who it was, and the rage and tension in the air was palpable. The words “The General” were bandied about, over and over, and she heard one of the rangers that had followed along running back to camp even as another ran down the road toward Enrant Monge.
“How long?” Aisling asked, jarring Martaina out of the long stare she had given the uneven cut around the throat, the place where the lifeblood was draining out onto the sand even now, aided more by gravity than the beating of a heart that had ceased minutes ago. Martaina looked up at the dark elf, who stared her down, and in the red eyes there was a fierce flame, as though the gates of the Realm of Fire had opened and all blazes had spilled loose into the dark elf’s soul. “How long?”
“He’s been dead ten, perhaps fifteen minutes,” Martaina said as she felt the arm again. It wasn’t cool to the touch, not yet, and wouldn’t exactly cool in the warm summer sun. “It’s possible that the head is around here, somewhere-”
“Unlikely,” Odellan said, and he was standing over them. “If someone takes a head, it’s either meant as spite to deprive them of resurrection or it’s a trophy. It’s not meant to be done just to kick it around a clearing.” The elf grew thoughtful, his helm held in the crook of his arm, his usually dark, sun-kissed skin a bit white. “Not in an orchestrated attack like this.”
“Hoygraf, then,” Aisling said, and she stood. “Actaluere.”
“That would seem the most likely.” Martaina stood, the wind blowing a few grains of sand from the road across her face along with a few stray strands of hair.
“This is not an opportune time or place for us to make war on Actaluere,” Odellan said, responding more to the sudden rumble that ran through the thirty or so warriors, armored and armed, standing behind him arrayed along the road and even up on the embankment. “Calm yourselves.”
“I don’t wish to calm myself,” Aisling said, though she kept her pitch well under control. “I wish to find the bastards responsible and collect their heads for myself while returning his to where it belongs.”
“This is not a moment for rash action,” Odellan said.
“This is not a moment when we can afford to wait and NOT act, either,” Aisling said. “We have less than forty minutes to find his head and have a healer reattach it or else he will not be coming back to life. I would have to guess that will put at least some kink in our efforts to defend Luukessia.”
“We cannot simply charge into the midst of the army of Actaluere,” Odellan said, “regardless of how strong our suspicions might be. What if this is some feint by Galbadien, some political game by the Syloreans? Or a simple, ill-timed and gruesome bandit attack?”
“This is about as likely to be a bandit attack as you are to sprout gills and start swimming about in the wellsprings under Saekaj Sovar,” came a voice from the embankment. Martaina looked up, but not far; Partus stood there, a few feet above them, along with others now arriving, trickling in from the encampment as the news spread. The clink of chains heralded the arrival of Mendicant, Terian in tow. The dark knight’s eyes flashed as he saw the body, but his mouth was covered by the gag and his expression muted by the cloth that covered half his face.
“What’s he doing here?” Martaina asked Mendicant. She saw the goblin start in surprise at being addressed.
“I couldn’t just leave him at the campsite,” Mendicant said. “They’re all heading over here, now. So I brought him along.”
“He’s probably getting a deep feeling of joy from seeing this,” Aisling said, leering at Terian. The dark knight shrugged then shook his head. “No? Must be because you wanted the joy of doing it for yourself.” She waited, and Terian looked at her knowingly then nodded once. “A finer friend I doubt he’s ever known,” she said, and touched the headless body with the toe of her shoe, delicate, almost a caress. “At least when he killed your father, he didn’t know what he was doing, that he was harming you. His excuse was duty; what’s yours? Spite
?”
“Enough of this,” Odellan said. “We need the officers, and we need them now.”
“They won’t be here for twenty more minutes,” Aisling said, wheeling about on him. “By then it’ll be too late to act. Do whatever you will, but I’m going to the Actaluere encampment. I’m likely to stir some trouble, and anyone who wants to come with me-”
“No,” Martaina said. “You know he wouldn’t want it. Not like this. Not a war without any proof, not a fight to no purpose. Odellan is right; we don’t know for fact it is Actaluere.”
“You’re a fool if you think it’s otherwise,” Aisling said, her eyes narrowed. “But since you make mention of it, there were other bodies here and now they’re gone. Why don’t we simply follow the trail, oh skillful ranger?” She indicated the drag marks in the dirt of the road that led off the embankment, back up into the woods, with a sweeping gesture that was as much sarcasm as grandiloquence. “You know … while we wait for the officers to appear and make their august rulings and decisions and whatnot.”
Martaina wanted to slap her own forehead. Of course. Follow the trail. She didn’t waste time agreeing or disagreeing, but instead sprang into motion, her feet finding purchase on the embankment as she followed the drag marks. It was a short jaunt, only a few feet, as the bodies were tucked into the underbrush, covered by a few pine needles and a couple of fallen branches. Their livery was obvious, and the smell of the fish and sea that was so dominant in the soldiers of Actaluere that she had met was present.
“The most obvious conclusion is most often the right one,” Aisling said, and her daggers were in her hands now. “Actaluere soldiers, dead at the edge of Praelior.”
“How can you tell?” Partus shuffled through the brush next to them, his head peeking out from just behind Martaina.
“Because some of these wounds look like something cut through them in impossible ways,” Martaina answered, turning her head to look at him. “This one, for example-through the bottom of the jaw and out. You see many non-mystical swords do that?”
“Gold coin for the pretty she-elf,” Partus said. “Looks like you got your culprits, you got your general fighting with them, and … you’ve still got no head. You gonna ride out into their camp and raise havoc, or what?”
“Or what,” came a voice from behind them, and the surface noise that was filling the air, all the soldiers, the low hum of conversations, was interrupted with the sweep of Curatio into the woods, silhouetted against the light coming from the break in the trees where the sun shone down closer to the road. His white cloak billowed as he walked, reminding her of the priests of Nessalima back in Pharesia, their robes just as loose as the healer’s. “Windrider rode back to Enrant Monge in such a fit that the lad who tends the stables swore to me he had been possessed by powers of darkness heretofore unseen in Luukessia.” The healer took a deep breath and his nostrils flared. “We have a dead general, we have no head, we have assailants from Actaluere, and we have more problems than we can safely count without an abacus.” Nyad, J’anda and Longwell followed in his wake; the younger Longwell was flushed, his helm carried in the crook of his arm as well and his lance not with him.
“These are Hoygraf’s men,” Longwell said, heavy boots crunching in the greenery as he came to stand next to Odellan, staring down at the bodies. “Let there be no doubt.”
“So now we know who took the head,” Curatio said, “but we can’t prove it beyond doubt, and that’s a flimsy premise to start a war on now, when we least need to be ensnared in other conflicts.”
“We already had a conflict with Hoygraf,” Aisling snapped, “that’s plain. We just haven’t seen the end of it, yet.” She spun one of her daggers, twisting it fast in her grip. “I mean to see it through though, even if the rest of you don’t-”
“This will be fruitless,” Curatio said, holding a hand up to forestall her. “Even if we rallied the army and ran down the entire Actaluere force, which-given their size and ours, would be quite the endeavor given the time constraint-there’s still no guarantee his head is there, in their camp. They’d be foolish to be caught with it, after all-”
“He never was all that bright,” Longwell said, “but proud, though.” Heads swiveled to him. “Hoygraf, I mean. If Cyrus did take the Baroness’s charms in the Garden again before we left,” no one noticed the slight flinch from Aisling save for Martaina, “then that is the last in a long line of insults and woundings that our general has inflicted on the man. It’s more than his pride can bear. He’ll keep the head, and it’ll be dipped in tar and put in a place of special favor so that he can keep it together for as long as possible.”
“Well, that’s the sort of fixation that’s not grotesque and disturbing at all,” J’anda muttered so low that no one else heard him.
“I’m not hearing solutions, and the clock is winding down,” Aisling said. “So let me propose one-you don’t want to send a whole army into the Actaluere camp because you don’t think we should start a war now, fine. I’ll go, and I’ll sneak my way-kill my way to Hoygraf, if necessary-and retrieve the head.” There was a dangerous glint in her eyes. “And I can do it, too.”
“Far be it from me to suggest otherwise,” J’anda said, “but we might benefit from a bit of guile instead. An illusion, perhaps, to ease your passage. Less sneaking, more walking through the middle of the camp without any questions.”
“Then what?” Curatio asked. “Go to the grand duke’s tent and ask politetly to see him? Ask for the head back?”
“Threaten him with the loss of his own as well as his manhood,” Aisling said, still twirling her daggers. “I think he’ll see the wisdom in parting with it.” She paused. “The head, not his manhood.”
“I don’t wish to be crude-” Longwell said.
“That hasn’t stopped anyone else,” J’anda said under his breath.
“But at this point, the grand duke’s manhood is inextricably tied to the head,” Longwell went on, grimly, “though I know that your Arkarian sense probably doesn’t understand or wish to acknowledge it. Cyrus has castrated Hoygraf-not literally, I would hope, but in a figurative sense, through everything he’s done, and the Grand Duke’s actions are absolutely in line with trying to regain his power and pride, as it were.”
“This is disturbing on so many levels I can’t even count them all,” Martaina said. “We have little time. You think he won’t give up the head?”
“I think he’d rather die,” Longwell said, “given the humiliations he’s been subjected to by our general. Stealing the man’s wife and having his way with her is well beyond the realm of embarrassement to be sure, especially since we all know-as he probably does-that she was with Cyrus more than happily.” Longwell shook his head. “If you want the head back, he won’t surrender it willingly; you’ll have to kill or cripple him further.”
“Done and done,” Aisling said, and turned west, disappearing into the brush.
“Dammit,” Curatio breathed, and Martaina cast him a look. “Go with her,” the healer said, “J’anda, you too. Find the head, bring it back. I’ll rally the army in case you fail.”
“You’re going to start a war over this, Curatio?” Partus said with muted excitement. “Ill-timed, but I admire that.”
“To hell with your admiration,” Curatio said. “I don’t care what time it is; if our general dies permanently, I will make an example of the Kingdom of Actaluere that even the scourge won’t find palatable.” He waved his hand at Martaina. “Go.”
She was off then and heard J’anda following behind, slower. She tried to match his pace, but the enchanter’s sandaled feet didn’t make for very fast travel and after a short distance, he said so. “I apologize, but this is going to be difficult.” They ran along the southern wall of Enrant Monge, the castle’s guards looking down on them from above on the battlements.
“It’s not far now,” she replied, and kept moving. “Just over that rise.” She pointed to a crest of the rough territory ahead.
“You know these woods already?” J’anda asked, keeping up with her.
“I’ve been hunting,” Martaina said. “What do you think the likelihood is that Aisling will wait for us?”
“Low. Lower than that, even, maybe. What’s lower than ground level?”
“Saekaj Sovar, as I understand it.” She met his weak smile, and they kept on, her quietly slipping through the woods and him crunching in the underbrush as though he were unaware of the noise he was causing.
They came to the top of an overlook, and down below was a camp. Not quite as simplistic as the Sanctuary encampment, this one had clearly been used many times over the years. It was open ground, with latrines clearly dug, tents set up in lines and in a careful order. “Looks like the same type of site that the Galbadien army uses,” Martaina said as the two of them hunched over in the bushes, looking down.
“Here,” J’anda said, and his hand moved over her. The light around them shifted, and J’anda became a human, wrapped in the same helm and armor as the guards they had found dead in the woods. The enchanter regarded her carefully for a moment. “The illusion is perfect; you look like a man.”
“Which is rather dramatically different for her,” came Aisling’s voice from behind them. Martaina looked to see the dark elf crouched only inches away, “Since that would doubtless scare off any of the five men she’s slept with since coming on this sojourn.”
Martaina felt her face redden, the heat coming to it. “You sound envious.”
“Not at all,” Aisling said, her face a mask, only the slightest edge of spite creeping out of her words. “I’m quite content with what I’ve got, and I’ll continue to be content with it if we manage to finish this out.”
Martaina shot a look at J’anda, whose hand was extended toward Aisling. A moment later, the illusion took hold and the dark elf was replaced with a dull-looking man of Actaluere, slack-jawed under his helm with its over-exaggerated nose guard. Aisling was off, down the slope with a cloud of dust trailing behind her. Martaina kept a careful eye on J’anda, who looked to her with a gentle shrug. “Five men?” The enchanter asked. “I’m envious.”
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