Pathfinder Tales: The Crusader Road

by Michael A. Stackpole

  paizo.com #3236236, Corry Douglas , Aug 10, 2014

  Chapter Sixteen

  The Measure of a Hero

  Jerrad sidestepped the staff-thrust. He slapped the baton in his left hand against the wooden shaft, then whipped the other baton down and around, aiming for a knee.

  Kiiryth leaped away and spun the staff around his back, transferring it from right hand to left. He arced it in with a sweeping blow at Jerrad's midsection, but the boy ducked low beneath it. He tucked and rolled forward, then lashed out at the half-elf's right shin.

  Kiiryth drew his leg up, letting the batons sail past, then snapped a kick into Jerrad's side. The blow landed solidly, pitching the youth six feet away. As he came down, Jerrad tucked his right shoulder and rolled, coming to his feet a couple steps later. He brought the batons up in a guard.

  The half-elf, leaning on his slender staff and breathing heavily, peeled a lock of white, sweat-stuck hair from his cheek. "You're getting better."

  Jerrad swiped a sleeve over his forehead, but kept his eye on his teacher as he did so. "I better be. You've had me going through the same basic forms for the last week, two hours a day with you, and an hour by myself. I know I'm faster."

  "You're getting hit less often."

  "But kicked about the same amount." Jerrad rubbed his forearm against his ribs. "I'm still not seeing how this will make me a good archer. You said you'd explain that."

  Kiiryth nodded. "You've come far enough to understand the answer. When you look at it objectively, what's an arrow really?"

  Sweat stung Jerrad's eyes as he frowned. "A stick with a sharp end, I guess, that can kill at a distance."

  "It can hit at a distance."

  "You do well with the killing."

  "Wolves and goblins are small enough that the arrows open big holes. Something the size of an ogre, well, I've seen ballistae whose bolts would only be an annoyance." The half-elf walked over to the base of a birch tree, reached down, and tossed Jerrad a skin of water. "Once you've shot all your arrows, what have you got?"

  He caught the skin, then glanced a the half-elf's bow. "A stick?"

  "A stick, just like the one you've got in each hand."

  "But if I kill at a distance, as archers can do, I'm not going to have to worry about beating something with a stick."

  "So much to learn. Let's look at what you just said." The half-elf stroked a hand over his chin. "Can you guarantee that you'll never face more enemies than you have arrows?"

  "No, not really."

  "And if your bowstring breaks..."

  "I have a stick."

  "Which is easier to find: a strung bow and sheaf of arrows or a stick?"

  Jerrad held his hands up. "I get your point."

  "But we're not done. You're learning to be a wizard. You'll find magic can be very effective for killing."

  "That's just the problem." Jerrad drank from the skin, then splashed a little more water over his face. "The only thing the book teaches me is how to fool people and make light. It's all illusion. I can't do anything."

  "Ask yourself this: in battle, which is more important—the ability to kill, or the ability to survive?"

  "That's obvious."

  "Only if you have the right answer." Kiiryth sat and leaned back against the tree. "If the enemy wants to destroy you, you win by surviving. Bards would make you think that battle is all about killing, but there's so much more. Deception, eluding, evading—they're all part of it."

  "You're talking about running. That's cowardice."

  "Is it?" The half-elf pointed north and slightly west, toward the Worldwound. "In the Crusades, a very brave commander took his force toward a demonic horde. Scouts reported that the horde outnumbered his troops five to one. Terrain gave him no advantage. To stay where he was would be to condemn his troops to death or worse. So, he had his men pitch their tents and light fires. He had volunteers stand watch and change the guard. Then, in the darkness, his troops slipped away. Is that cowardice?"

  Jerrad rubbed a hand over his forehead. "That's different."

  "That's not an answer." Kiiryth held up a hand. "Now, this commander, he didn't flee, he stayed behind with the volunteers. His subordinate commanders, without his knowledge, hooked east and north. They fell upon the enemy from behind, catching them unawares. They inflicted a serious defeat on the enemy—all because they benefited from deception. They slaughtered three times their number of demons. Would that be a cowardly act?"

  "No, of course not. But..."

  "Wait, one more thing." Kiiryth half-smiled. "The commander gathered the volunteers and fled from the demonic host. They led them south and west, which helped the others win their victory—the swiftness of the demonic pursuit was what strung them out, overextended them and made that victory possible. But the commander didn't know what his subordinates had done. When pursuit flagged, he and the volunteers launched a suicidal attack against the demons, to prevent them from pursuing the others—or what's what he thought he was doing. Had he continued to run, he and his men would have been safe. Instead, most of them died, and a few were captured, hauled off and made to endure endless torments and tortures. Was that cowardice or bravery or stupidity?"

  "No, no, stop." Dropping the batons, Jerrad pressed his palms against his eyes. "You're confusing me. You take a cowardly act, then wrap it up in heroism, and then box it all up in wasteful stupidity."

  Before he knew what was happening, and before he could open his eyes, the staff's butt end smacked him squarely in the sternum. Jerrad stumbled back and landed solidly on his bottom, his head pitching back to smack a tree. Above him squirrels chittered mockingly, and one dropped an acorn that plunked off his head.

  Kiiryth towered over him, the staff ready to poke him again. "Deception is more important in war than killing. Creatures will fight hardest when they believe they have no hope of surviving; and when given the chance to survive will run away without a second thought. If you can make someone think he won't win, but he can escape, he'll escape. And even if he changes his mind, if guilt and duty drive him back, all the energy he used to escape will be gone. Every meal eaten, every arrow shot, just gone. So when you have to engage him again, you'll have him at your advantage."

  For a heartbeat or two, Jerrad entertained the idea of using magic to blind the half-elf, then gathering up his batons and knocking him down. But he's anticipated that. Kiiryth stood between Jerrad and the abandoned sticks. Even blind, he'd be able to thrash the boy solidly.

  Jerrad looked up. "Was the commander a coward? A fool?"

  "Not in my eyes."

  Jerrad caught a hint of something in the half-elf's voice. "You were there, weren't you? You've been in the Crusades."

  Kiiryth's eyes focused elsewhere for a moment, then he nodded. "I was. I fought. I scouted. I knew the man of whom I speak."

  "Did the demons kill him like they killed my father?"

  "There are many ways to die out there." Kiiryth turned away. "And worse things that can happen to a person."

  "What do you mean?"

  The half-elf sighed. "I saw things up there which would have made the ogrekin your mother killed flee in terror. Horrible things, demonic things with otherworldly powers for which many men do foolish things. At least when you and I die, we don't surrender who we were."

  He came back around to face Jerrad. "We need to deal with one more issue. You want to kill at distance. Do you know why?"

  "It's the best way to stop the enemy from hurting me and everyone else."

  "That's a valid reason, but it's not your reason."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Think back to the night of the attack. What did you feel when you stabbed that first goblin to death?"

  Jerrad fell silent and hugged his knees to his chest. He forced himself to think back. He saw the surprised look on the goblin's face. He could feel its warmth, smell its fetid breath and the weight of its body. He'd wanted it to leave him alone—which is different
from wanting it dead.

  He felt the blood spraying up his sleeve again, all warm and sticky, matting the hair and tickling the inside of his elbow. And when he stood, its blood ran from his arm. It didn't drip, it flowed like a river. Splashing down over a face frozen in pain.

  "It was an accident." He looked up. "I wondered what I'd done."

  "Killing a thinking creature isn't like killing wildlife. Hunt down a deer and you harvest it. You use everything: meat, bones, antlers, skin. If there's anything left over, bird, beasts, and bugs will finish it. Nothing goes to waste."

  Jerrad shook his head. "Not the goblins. Not the ogre." Silverlakers had gathered all the goblin bodies and burned them on a huge pyre. The ogre they dragged out onto a raft and sank in the deepest part of the lake. They worked hard to rid the settlement of any sign of the enemies that had attacked.

  "No. We don't eat them. We don't harvest their parts. Well, there may be some that do, necromancers and the like, but we show them that much respect. Not because we think they deserve it, but because it makes us think we're better than perhaps we are." Kiiryth's expression tightened. "Do you want to know why the grimoire hasn't taught you any combat spells?"

  "Because it doesn't contain any?"

  "No. It's because you're not certain you really want to kill anything. That's far from bad; its good you struggle with it. Killing shouldn't come easy to anyone—especially not those who can use magic."

  Jerrad wanted to protest, but he thought for a moment. If being able to work miracles makes me believe I'm better than everyone else, then other thinking creatures become as insignificant to me as wildlife. Killing them won't cause me any concern.

  "I'll have to think about this."

  "That's a good answer." The half-elf gave him a nod. "Now, do you want to know why I'm teaching you to fight with sticks?"

  "Because I can always find a stick?"

  "No. Because whether you want to or not, there will be times you have no choice but to kill. I want you ready."

  Jerrad rested his forehead against his knees for a moment, then climbed to his feet. "Better to have a skill and choose not to use it."

  "That's the spirit." Kiiryth levered the batons up with his staff and flicked them at Jerrad. "We'll start with the first form again."

  "Right. Just one thing."

  "Yes?"

  Jerrad stared down at the ground. "If the grimoire does teach me a fighting spell, do you want me to tell you?"

  Kiiryth leaned on his staff and chewed his lower lip. "I'd like to know—but not the nature of the magic itself. You should tell no one."

  "Not even my mother?"

  "That's not a judgment I can make, but certainly no one else. Your mother is wise. She knows that secrecy can be a source of great power."

  The youth nodded. In the week since Creelisk had arrived in Silverlake, his mother had told him to go into the wood to read and practice magic. She'd even stepped up the schedule of Kiiryth's tutoring him as a reason why he was removing himself so much from Silverlake. She clearly didn't want Baron Creelisk aware of his abilities. While the baron had been polite and even solicitous of Jerrad, something about him creeped Jerrad out.

  "Master Kiiryth, has my little Mouse learned anything?"

  Serrana, bow slung over her back, dressed in hunting attire, came along the trail which wound around the low hills surrounding the bowl in which they fought. Ranall Creelisk followed in her wake. He'd likewise donned hunting clothes of dark brown and green, and carried a boar spear. Taller than his father, well built, clean-shaven, and, by all accounts, handsome, he smiled at Jerrad and Kiiryth. He smiles enough to be a halfwit. Jerrad wanted to believe Ranall was addlepated, but his brown eyes brimmed with intelligence.

  Except when he looks at my sister in adoration.

  Kiiryth bowed. "My lord and lady, you would be surprised at Jerrad's skill. He's an apt pupil."

  Ranall's smile broadened, revealing even teeth. "You're teaching him to fight with batons. Since I was his age—and even younger—I begged my father to let me learn that technique. He maintained that nobles don't fight with vulgar weapons, but it always struck me that in even the most dire of situations, one can lay hand to sticks."

  "Your insight does you credit, my lord."

  Jerrad stared daggers at Kiiryth. "I thought we were practicing here."

  "Yes, please, don't let us interrupt you." Ranall took a step back. "If you wouldn't mind, could we watch? Just for a bit?"

  Kiiryth canted his head. "If my pupil has no objection."

  Jerrad was about to voice an objection loud and long, but a sharp glance from his sister warned of dire consequences if he refused. "Okay. But, you know, stand back. I don't want anyone to get hurt."

  Ranall reached out with a hand to guide Serrana back toward him, and she didn't seem to mind one bit. Jerrad shivered and focused on Kiiryth so he wouldn't puke. "I'm ready."

  "Commence."

  If Jerrad had imagined that the half-elf would go easy on him in the presence of witnesses, the first sharp attack dispelled that notion. For a heartbeat Jerrad felt betrayed, as if Kiiryth were trying to impress the spectators, but the youth forced that emotion away. He made himself focus on fighting the same way he did on magic. No emotion, just results.

  Jerrad ducked beneath blows and leaped above others. He parried with one baton and crossed both to block. Click-clack. He jumped back as the staff whistled past his midsection, then lunged forward, stabbing with both batons, forcing the half-elf to retreat a step.

  Jerrad fought faster and more fluidly than before. He didn't even imagine that he matched well with Kiiryth, but he was infinitely better than he'd been on the first day—and certainly the best he'd been yet. I might get hit, but not easily.

  Kiiryth brought the staff around in a circular blow which Jerrad leaped above, then the half-elf retreated. He planted the staff on the ground and bowed his head to his opponent. "Very good, Jerrad. Very good indeed."

  Ranall applauded. "That was magnificent. Even at court, during entertainments, never have I seen such a display."

  Jerrad smiled, refusing to even blink though sweat stung his eyes. "I have the best teacher in the world."

  The young Lord Creelisk nodded. "Might I beg an indulgence, Master Kiiryth? Would you teach me how to fight like that? I'll convince my father that here, in the wood, where sticks are plentiful, it would be a useful skill. He'll still think it vulgar, but I suspect he'll acquiesce."

  "I should love to accommodate you, my lord, but the fact is that, within the week, I must away. I'll be gone a month, no more."

  Jerrad's mouth hung open. "What?"

  "There are tasks which demand my attention, Jerrad." The half-elf extended the staff toward the youth. "In my absence, perhaps you would undertake training Lord Creelisk in the basic forms. You know enough to do that. I would consider it a favor, and it would allow you to continue your practice."

  "I don't know."

  "Please, Jerrad, I would be in your debt." Ranall looked from him to Serrana and back. "Your sister has been a wonderful hostess, but I'm sure my constant reliance on her is a burden. Besides, she has archers to train and things to hunt. I will be a very serious student."

  Serrana's incendiary gaze made only one answer possible, so Jerrad nodded. "It would be my pleasure."

  "Thank you, Jerrad, you are very kind. And you, Master Kiiryth." Ranall's smile lit up that small segment of the forest. "I had never imagined that here, so far from Ustalav, I would feel so welcome and so much at home. I don't know how I can ever repay your kindness."

  Jerrad would have offered a suggestion, but another acorn bounced off his skull, and the resulting laughter kept still his tongue.

  paizo.com #3236236, Corry Douglas , Aug 10, 2014

  Chapter Seventeen

  Things Arcane and Odd

  Jerrad froze as Nelsa Murdoon lifted a hand. She'd crawled to the crest of the hill, and he wasn't far behind. He didn't like being
on his belly on wet leaves terribly much, but that kept their approach quiet. It also made him feel stiffer and more sore than he should have been from his last lesson with Ranall—who had learned much in just two weeks.

  Nelsa looked back at him, smiling. She held up one finger, then nodded.

  He worked his way up to her left and peered beneath a pale green fern leaf. His stomach fluttered, but he fought down panic. There's no mud, and I have a stick in my belt.

  Their position overlooked one end of an oblong depression. A single goblin bent down and smoothed a leather mat out. It had a series of concentric circles drawn on it and eight lines radiating out from the center as if it were a compass. Strange line drawings—animals mostly—filled the circles, drawn in black and a rusty brown Jerrad took to be blood.

  The goblin himself—and since he was naked, gender was relatively easy to ascertain—capered over to the leather satchel from which he'd drawn the mat. He pulled out four leather bags, each tied securely. Clawed fingers made short work of knots. The goblin carefully poured the bags' contents out, one bag per quadrant of the mat. The goblin flicked his fingers through the piles of bits, spreading them out, but didn't seem to put them in any particular order.

  Bones. Little, tiny bones.

  The goblin returned the pouches to the satchel and tossed it off toward the depression's far end. He returned to the mat and bowed once at each edge, then began to prance around to the left. He seemed to be stepping to a tune Jerrad couldn't hear. The jerkiness of the moves left Jerrad happy he couldn't hear it, but as he watched, he thought of magic, and carefully started slotting puzzle pieces together.

  The spell he invoked was one of the most simple, but the one with which he'd had the least amount of success. According to the grimoire, the spell would give him a sense of magic in the area. The few times he'd had any success with it, he heard what he took to be as a thin echo of a spell having been cast.

  Not so this time. The goblin's spell came discordant and loud, blasting into his head with harsh noises. Clicks and screeches ebbed and built, then twisted back on themselves, as if one strain mocked another. It sounded black and cold and wrong.