by Jason Jones
“Lady Kaya T’Vellon, sire. She is quite adept at, scouting, if you would. The best choice for such a mission that requires us not being seen, yet disabling any enemies on the field.” Sir Leonard nodded to Kaya, then to the others. No one objected.
“Lady Kaya, you accept rank on this endeavor?” He looked to her, knowing so little of her, but he had to trust and have faith. Cristoff knew they were all here by Alden’s will.
“I do. I will need fifty men, and fifty archers. No shields, no horses, and no heavy armor, my lord.” Kaya knew how to move unseen, to operate in covert fashion, and even how to kill quietly. Out in the open, or in a tight alleyway, shadows and stealth were her allies.
“Done. Send word to father Garret, Brunnwik, and Drodunn Anduvann of our movements. Who will protect the caravan while we are gone?”
“That would be me, sire.” Julia raised her blade. “My Peasant Swords and I have been mercenary detail to refugees, merchants, and even nobility throughout the free cities and beyond. My men are well trained to defend caravans of people that cannot defend themselves. I did it for coin, for too long, now we do it for honor.”
“Done. You have the caravan, Lady Whiteblade. You have the northern watch, Lady Kaya. And, we have a route to find. Dismissed.” Cristoff waved his hand, received bows, and the trampling of horses going in three different directions echoed in the forgotten foothills of the Kaki Mountains.
“Ye’ have a lot o’ faith in folk ye’ hardly met there, Cristoff.” Tannek took another swig, knowing he was headed into the mountains regardless, and as the whiskey hit his lips, all he thought of was Azenairk Thalanaxe.
“You think that an error, master Anduvann?” Cristoff dismounted, seeing ahead that his steed would likely not handle the rocky climbs well.
“Nope. I like it, I do. Where I be from, puttin’ women in charge o’ things beyond kids and cookin’ is unheard of. But, ye’ got some pretty vicious women out here on this here trek, they seen as much action as me veteran outguard, they has. I’d o’ done the same thing.” Tannek put his flask away, and marched ahead with Aariss and his elven scouts.
“Truly?” Aariss Diravis whispered to the red bearded dwarven warrior beside him.
“Naye, shart naye, but we don’t need him thinkin’ bout that out here with us. Keep his confidence up, ye’ see?” Tannek chuckled. “If yer leader be supported no matter what, on the field that is, yer forces be unstoppable and his judgement be clear.”
“Is that dwarven logic then?” Aariss sneered.
“Aye. Quick decisions, fight hard, and whoever be left alive can argue o’er what shoulda been done different while we pound mead and sit over a vanquished enemy.”
“Remind me never to be near you in battle, Tannek Anduvann.” Aariss patted him on the shoulder.
“Ahhh, don’t ye’ worry there bout’ that. When me boys fight, ain’t no room for sticks n’ arrows nor silky elven clothing. Just steel, blood, and plenty o’ skull smashin’ there be. No place for an elf.” Tannek smacked the archer on the back, a little harder than friendly.
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“We are going no further, Rosana, no more bumps and wheels. Rest easy child.” Garret D’Ourmas motioned for his growing followers of the feathered cross to set up the tents and cloth, bring someone to fan the air, and fetch fresh water.
“Aye girl, we be close enough to the Kaki Mountains now, journey is over. Ye’ need to eat more though, ye’ still skinny for havin’ a baby.” Drodunn Anduvann handed a loaf of bread to the former queen of Harlaheim, and then it went spinning across the wagon and out the window.
“Ahhh, come now Rosana, yer’ baby needs to eat. Ye’ be bleedin’ heavy and it’s near time now. Try and relax and---“ High Hammer Brunnwik was cut off.
“Shut your mouths! Ahhhh! Ooohhhh! Alden help me! Ahhhoooohhh! I do not want any more bread, understand!?” Her hands were kneading the sheets into clumps of cloth. Her legs were never still, toes and ankles gripping and moving in constant discomfort, and her neck seemed to not go where her angry face was looking when she spoke. It was hard to tell who she was talking to in between the painful contractions.
“You need to eat, you need to take deep breaths, and try to---“ Garret ducked a goblet that flew throught the air.
“I do not want to breathe!” Rosana yelled, the pain was unbearable, the contractions were shooting down her legs and up her spine.
“Lass, ye’ need air now, otherwise ye’---“ Drodunn put his hands in front of his face and blocked two quick punches from the dark haired Caberran woman. Just as he thought she was done, he felt her fingernails grab a handful of braided red beard.
“I know I need to breathe, dwarf.” Her teeth were gritted so hard they might chip, her brown lovely eyes looked possessed by pure anger and evil for a moment, and she was intimidating to see and hear.
“I do not want to eat food. I want this baby out, and I want this pain to be over with. I have killed a man before, with a sword. If you do not stop trying to get me to breathe slow and eat, I will find a way to kill you with the next piece of bread you wave in front of my face. I will beat you to death with it.”
“Gulp.” Drodunn nodded slow, until she let go of his beard.
“That’s the spirit girl! Now we be getting’ close!” Brunnwik shouted and laughed, yet moved his chair back another foot from Rosana.
“By Alden’s grace, close to what?” Father Garret made the sign of the feathered cross on his chest.
“Dwarven childbirth! Once they start hittin’ and pullin’ beard, and threatening yer life, well by Vundren the baby usually follows. More painful it is, the stronger the child too. I can bet ye’ it’s a boy by her anger.” Brunnwik chuckled.
“She is not a dwarf, mind you. But it is a boy, you are correct.” Garret smiled.
“I know, don’t need feathers n’ stuff to tell me that now.”
“Silence! All of you shut your jaws, and get me out into fresh air, now!” Rosana tried to pull herself up, the pain forced her back down.
“Allright, hold on. No hittin’ though.”
Drodunn got on one side, Brunnwik on the other, and Garret led them out and held the flaps of the white canvas open. The tent was nearly finished, big enough for twenty nobles, but all for her.
“Meet ye’ in there father Garret, make sure they bring the water, the bread, and all the food and fresh cloths and---“
“Ahhhhhh! Ooooohhh!” Rosana spasmed again, the baby was kicking, pushing, yet the burning feeling in her womb was slow and intense. She needed to push, but it hurt to try.
“I have it all my dwarven priests, hurry now.” He waved them on. As Garret turned, his eyes caught the bed in the wagon. He dropped what he was holding and caught his breath. She had been spotting and losing bits of blood the last few days, but this was different. He looked to the sheets, there was a stain of blood at least a foot across. The blood was light, clear almost in places, and very fresh as it still soaked further into the white cloth.
“Alden help us, the water gave, the baby is coming, now.”
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“Right there, moving fast, he is alone too.”
“Very fast, like a deer or antelope in the wild. He is not trying to remain concealed too well, either.” Codaius commented as they peeked over the hill at a fast moving scout. He had green garments to blend with the grass, a large sword across his back, and had come from the northeast.
“You and Leonard take the right, Karai and I the left, surround him and strike quickly.” Kaya pointed to their spots, between two hills that this fast moving scout was surely headed between.
They did as she said, rapiers drew from Harlian knights and a greatsword from the Bear of Evermont was pulled loose as Kaya readied her shortblade. The scout was fast, too fast to be normal, the steps seemed effortless as if the winds were assisting his motion. Up the hills he ran, in between them, not even trying to hide.
Without so much as a word, two blades crossed in front of him, then one from the left and one from the right, behind his shoulders. His head was facing the ground, hands at his side, not even reaching for the hand and a half blade across his back. The scout put his hands in the air slowly, to about chest level.
“Watch for more, he is likely not alone.” Kaya nodded to Karai and Leonard.
“I am never alone, but there is no one else with me.” The female voice from beneath the green hood stated with perfect calm.
“A woman assassin, Queen Andora has been known to employ in such a manner.” Codaius raised his blade near the back of her neck.
“I am no assassin, and I am not in league with Armondeen, let me pass.” Angeline of Charity kept her eyes closed, sensing through her blade that she need not resort to violence, yet.
Kaya raised the cowl of her robes with her shortblade and flicked it off as she circled around the woman. The former Lady of Southwind looked at the red blonde hair in braids, her olive tan skin with light freckles, and into her green eyes as they opened.
“She is not Armondi. Where are you from?”
“I am northern Kivanite, if you speak of my heritage.” Angeline kept still.
“Why are you here?” Codaius paced around as well, noting the large decorated sword on her back, it seemed to be looking at him but was not.
“That is a long story. Let us say, I need to find Gwenneth Lazlette, and leave it there.” She looked to Kaya T’Vellon.
“I do not know what you are talking about. What is your name?” Kaya stared, her blue eyes did not flinch with the lie.
“My name is Angeline of Charity, and I have seen you before, Lady Kaya of Southwind. Six years past, in Vallakazz, you passed through on your way to Valhirst, with your twin brother.” She bowed slowly.
“You know this woman?” Sir Codaius blurted.
Kaya rolled her eyes, now that he assured this woman that she was correct on identifying her. “On your knees, show me the brand.”
“I am not with the White Spider either, m’lady. I am of the Knights Soujan, and I have been sent to find and help Gwenneth Lazlette. We have little time.”
Angeline calmed herself as the southern lady was feeling threatened inside and thought her an assassin from her past.
“No one out there Kaya, no one close anyway.” Leonard spoke as he returned from taking a view of the northern hills with Karai.
“No one yet. But you have five legions of Armondi soldiers en route, to here.” Angeline took off her robes, her shoulderplates with the triangle of vines of her order, then her blade. She laid them on the ground, and pulled her shirt back over her left shoulder, baring it to Kaya. There were many scars, but no brand of a spider.
“We are wasting time.”
“How do you know this?” Kaya lowered her blade.
Because the will of the Mother has blessed me. A long journey from Chazzrynn have I taken, just like you, and I follow the same people. Gwenneth will need our help, the earth has told me, so please, take me to her.
The voice was her voice, but it was inside Kaya’s mind. She looked to Angeline, not recognizing her at all from memory. Yet she believed her. She watched her put her garments and armor back on, and then swore she saw one of the little angel eyes on her sword wink at her.
“I will take you to Lord Cristoff, for we do not know where they have gone or how to get inside the ruins safely. But, show me this army first. I need to see it to believe it.” Kaya nodded for the knights to sheath their weapons.
“Very well, but again, you are wasting precious time.”
“If you want me to trust you, I need to see. On the way, tell me all you know.”
“If you do the same.” Angeline waited for the answer.
“Very well.” Kaya nodded tot his strange woman, feeling somehow that she knew her, but nothing from memory produced a reason.
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“Anyone seen Dalliunn? Damn lion always runnin’ off.” Tannek kept his pace with the others easily, his legs much more used to the mountainous climbs than Cristoff or Aariss, let alone their steeds.
“No, I thought he was sniffing out a trail toward the foothills, half hour back.” Cristoff nodded to the mountains.
“So, yer’ cousin watches a sword? For ten years at a time, with other elves that watch the same sword?” Tannek asked, knowing the lewirja always found his way back.
“Yes.” Aariss Diravis replied resolutely.
“Don’t sound too exciting.”
“They are priests of Siril, they are not seeking excitement, my bearded friend.”
“And this sword, does it talk?” Tannek raised his eyebrows as they followed the trail up and down the sharp inclines and through the dead brush and groves.
“No, it does not.” He replied. “Ssshhh.”
“Allright, quiet then. Right, we might wake the sword.” Tannek rolled his eyes.
“So, does it move, this sword?”
“No, it was placed there over two thousand years ago, by the king of Tintasarn. It will not move until it chooses a new king.” Aariss looked around, they were close, his cousin Arylius should have heard them coming. Something was not right.
“His priests bring nobility from the elven nations every ten years, but the sword has never chosen.”
“So, a sword that don’t move, don’t talk, is supposed to choose some noble stranger ye’ bring it every ten years? But, for two thousand years, nothin’ has ever happened?”
“If you put it in that perspective, perhaps it would seem odd. Yet, the way of Siril and of elven tradition and myth differs vastly from your culture, dwarf.” He smiled over to his stocky bearded traveling companion.
“Right. So odd as this is, have ye’ ever thought it might be broken? Maybe ye’ not doin’ somethin’ quite the way yer supposed to?” Tannek winked with sarcasm.
“I mean, if I had somethin’ not do what it was intended to do, for a couple millennia mind ye’, I might look into that.”
“The sword of the dancing king, Falonai ah Muin Loestiri it is called, is not broken. His dying wish, after Altestan butchered and cursed this realm and our home of Aloeste, was that the sacred blade of his wife was kept safe until another king came to restore Tintasarn. It is legend, written on the temple itself, repeated in elven scripture upon the blade, and it is not broken, dwarf.” Aariss Diravis glared at Tannek.
“It’s just very patient, then. Allright.” Tannek chuckled as they stopped, all three of them seeing stone towers of gray rise from deep within a grove of bare branches without end. The shadows of the mountains cast over them, despite the lack of sun, as if the forests were forbidden.
“Is this what I think it is?” Cristoff, who had been paying little attention to their conversation, spoke up upon seeing the sad and hidden place.
“This, is Tintasarn, fifth kingdom of the elven race. Much like Aloeste, it is a grim reminder of the hatred that Altestan holds for our people.” Aariss pointed to the overgrown forest with not a leaf on a branch, nothing grew anywhere in fact.
“So then Kakisteele is where, other side of these mountains?” Tannek queried, looking up the shadowy south side of the peaks behind them.
“Yes inside, if rumor be true. Mooncrest would be past the peaks as well, if we could traverse the storm.”
“I still see no storm, yet the weather is still, the shadows are strange here, and the sun is blocked by clouds that do not move. Where is your---“
“Avaray, toun ethrea dominae yaela rouniae, Aariss?”
Cristoff drew his longsword just as Aariss nocked an arrow and Tannek raised his shield. The voice, in elven dialect, was very close. Many blades drew around them, far too many.
“You bring poor company to such a sacred site, cousin. Only elven nobility, would be kings of our race, and the devout, are allowed.”
Arylius Diravas held his curved blade with two hands on the elongated hilt. His bark gray robes were tied tight
with swaths of purple and silver thread, his long dark hair was braided in five braids as were all priests of Siril, and his sky blue eyes glared with a seriousness that could not be ignored. His chiseled face, high cheekbones, and high slim pointed ears looked very similar to Aariss.
“Arylius, this is Lord Cristoff Bradswellen the Third, and Marshall Tannek Anduvann. They are enemies of Armondeen and seekers of Mooncrest and Kakisteele. I was showing them the way around the storm. I had hoped---“
“The storm has stopped, two days past. Lead them around the peaks to the ruins. You know they cannot pass this way.” Arylius Diravas sheathed the great elven blade at his side, then the fifty hidden priests around them unseen, did exactly the same.
“The storm stopped? How?” Aariss nodded to the other priests, knowing he was safe from harm.
“We do not know, but water is trickling from the fountains as well. It is a sign, cousin. We saw the moons last night, faintly, but we saw them through the shadows over Tintasarn. And…the sword moved.” Arylius, disappointed as he was at his cousin’s actions, could not help but smile.
“It did not.” Aariss grinned.
“It did, cousin. It moved nearly half a handwidth across the stone in the shrine to Queen Huliyas and King Akhirre, last rulers of Tintasarn. Loestiri, the blade of the dancing monarch, has sensed something. Blessings of Siril upon us.”
“Two thousand years, and it moved half a handwidth? I woulda’ expected a bit more---“ Tannek saw the glare from the elves, and from Cristoff. “Just sayin’ me mind, just sayin’ is all.”
“The blade of the dancing king moves, and if the moons can be---“ Aariss was cut off.
“Loestiri, the blade of the dancing monarch, cousin. I know you share not our faith, but please, use the appropriate names to our sacred relics.” Arylius corrected his cousin.
“Fine, as you wish. I have these two, and one hundred fifty of my Riverbows, may we enter?” Aariss smiled and pleaded with his eyes to his older elven cousin.
“They are good men, I will hold my honor upon it.”
“How long have you known them?”
