*****
Their small caravan reached the castle gates with the rising of the sun. The Battleborn took turns carrying Kaltor on his stretcher. A few other men from the vault and even bandits rode alongside them, all Sight Seekers, to gain entrance into the castle. Four guards stood resolutely outside the iron gates, with a dozen archers on either side atop the wall, bows at the ready.
They all relaxed visibly when Gereth’s eyes flashed with blue Sight Seeker power. "I am Lord Gereth," he announced. "Royal advisor to the king. Move."
The soldiers glanced over to their leader, a tall, rugged man with a small plume of feathers to mark his rank. "Search them," he grunted. It did not take long for the guards to inspect the horses and stretcher. Finding no sign of deception, they confiscated the group’s weapons and nodded their approval to the lieutenant. He waved them through.
Gereth rode alongside the feather-marked Sight Seeker, flashed his eyes dangerously, and said, "Inform Regent Vengral that I will meet him in the council room, and kindly bring Warden and the Battlescorned to me as well."
"Sir!" the lieutenant replied, saluting smartly and turning to carry out the orders. Guards scampered off in every direction to carry out other demands. Judging by the soldiers’ fatigue, they had been up all night expecting an attack. Sight Seekers lacked the regenerative powers of Varadours. Inside the courtyard, the townspeople were huddled around small tents along the back wall of the castle, as far from the gates as possible.
"Hello, boys," Selene said soothingly, emerging from the dungeon. She still wore the clothes of a maid, but she walked like a predator, beautiful and dangerous. A knife was strapped to each arm and leg at her calf and forearm.
"I think we’ve rubbed off on her," Honmour commented, and the Stunts snickered. Kaltor barely heard them. An odd emotion flooded his system, like some kind of strong wine he could drink in just by seeing Selene’s confident stance and simple linen dress.
By the Gods! he thought in amazement. Is this the kind of influences the Seal was holding back? No wonder she’s gotten reactions out of the Stunts all this time! What am I going to do if she sticks around after all this? Perhaps the scariest moment was realizing that he really wanted her to stay, despite her status as a Battlescorned. In the face of this driving need to see her, it meant next to nothing. For a brief moment, he dearly wished the Seal were still in place.
Warden followed her, clad in full military array, a roll of parchment in hand. His eyes filled with relief when he saw the Battleborn accounted for.
"Lord Gereth," he reported. "I believe Regent Vengral has been working with the insurgent Prince Melshek," He handed over his records with a bow of respect. "Please see to it that the king has the chance to read these."
"I will do that, soldier," Gereth promised, folding the parchment into a square and stowing it into a pack on his belt. "Where is Regent Vengral now?"
"In the royal chambers, last we knew, sir," Selene cut in. "Supposedly, he was negotiating with Prince Melshek’s messenger."
With a wave of his hand Gereth signaled their small convoy toward the keep. Two Sight Seeker guards at the door flared their eyes, but relented when Gereth and half the convoy’s eyes all glowed back with Sight Seeker power.
"Welcome, my Lord," they echoed, backing away with respectful bows. Servants emerged from the inner keep, taking what few horses they had and leading them to the stable.
Honmour glanced toward Kaltor. "Are you sure we should bring him? If there’s trouble up there—"
Gereth scratched his chin for a moment, glancing toward the keep. "He is one of our prime witnesses," he finally said. "Can you Battleborn protect him if there’s trouble?"
"Of course, sir!" rose the unanimous answer.
"I can as well," Selene added, drawing nervous glances from the other Stunts.
I really need to talk to Master Taneth about additional training against women in particular, Kaltor thought. She’s far more dangerous than they realize. Gereth simply nodded contently and led the way into the keep.
Inside, servants bustled about as if a war had never threatened to consume the city. They nodded and curtsied respectfully as the small procession passed. The group climbed a few flights of stairs, making Kaltor’s situation on his stretcher a bit precarious, and turned a corner. The same four guards who had imprisoned him earlier stood guard outside the chamber, hands on the hilts of their weapons.
"Halt!" they cried. "We have orders to imprison all who attempt to interrupt the negotiations," Their weapons were half drawn by the time they caught sight of Gereth’s eyes, along with those of the other Sight Seekers, though they were not dressed in royal attire.
"I am Lord Gereth!" His voice rang through the corridor as he walked steadily toward them. "Either let us apprehend the traitor, or you, too will be hung for conspiracy and murder!"
The courage fled from their eyes and, with a respectful nod, they unlocked the doors and swung them wide. Nothing moved in the room’s center, though there were a few overturned chairs around the grand meeting table.
It wasn’t until they entered the room that they saw the bodies. The web-woman lay against the wall, her blood completely solidified. A few other Perversions lay at her feet, wearing the clothes of servants. A small figure sat with his back to them, bound and gagged to a chair, whimpering as they entered.
"Regent Vengral, I presume," Gereth muttered.
Glancing toward the Stunts, he said, "Now we know how Melshek’s reach spread so quickly. Each web-woman was in charge of gathering her own forces."
"Melshek’s last-ditch effort," Kaltor realized aloud. "Build up a force of Perversions in the castle itself and use the entire city to swarm you."
"Indeed," Gereth grunted, walking over to Vengral’s struggling form. A few trickles of blood ran down the legs of the chair. Bruises and burns covered his body. They had not gone sparingly on the torture they had subjected him to.
"Thank the Gods you’re here!" Vengral gasped when Gereth pulled his gag free. "You have to help us! Your son is leading renegades though the city! He has to be stopped!"
"Really?" Gereth said, spinning Vengral’s chair. "Renegades, you say?"
Vengral gulped, taking in the scene. "M-m-melshek!" he cried. "He’s poisoning the citizens! We have to find him and stop him!"
"He’s dead," Honmour said. "Decapitation has that effect on people."
Vengral sputtered, reaching in vain for another desperate excuse.
"Warden," Gereth said calmly. "Would you please keep Vengral safe and contained until we can deliver him to the king for judgment?"
"I would be honored, my lord," Warden said with a sadistic grin and a respectful bow. "He will be quite well tended to in my care."
"The king will need him alive and not— maimed, in any way," Gereth added.
Warden grunted in understanding, but he glared at Vengral hungrily, like a child considering how to put a puzzle together with the most pleasure possible. He glanced Selene’s way and she passed him a green-hilted dagger. His smile widened.
Vengral fainted.
"Well, that’s one less concern," Gereth said simply. "Come on, we’ve got a city to put back together," He walked out of the room without so much as a glance over his shoulder.
When they reached the courtyard, Warden dispatched soldiers to imprison Vengral, but he did not see to the matter personally. He and Selene accompanied the group back to Gereth’s camp outside the city. Many led their horses by the reins while a few rode. A feeling of relief spread through the camp, leaving men joking and working together to rebuild what was lost.
Along the eastern wall, bandit and miner alike helped bury the dead. Fellow soldiers were buried in separate graves, but the Perversions were thrown into one freshly dug pit and set aflame. Thankfully the wind blew away from the city, carrying the stench of death and decay out of reach of their nostrils.
"How did you get them to work together?" Honmour asked Gereth.
"
Compromise," Gereth answered. "The bandit princess Kaltor refrained from killing on our first encounter helped us a great deal. I convinced them that for saving this city they could receive royal pardons and perhaps even titles— a place in the kingdom."
"‘A place in the kingdom’?" Warden asked, eyeing the pile of Perversions nervously. He never had gotten the chance to fight any of them, and their larger size and black veins were not a pleasant sight. "Shouldn’t they be locked up? What if they take to burning and pillaging again?"
"The king’s thoughts exactly," Gereth said with a grin. "Should we ever be invaded, they will be dispatched to help protect our supplies from similar attacks and perhaps engage in a few of their own."
The Stunts grinned. Everyone knew that before Master Taneth’s heroic efforts during the last war, he had been a simple thief and a scavenger. A horn sounded a few hundred yards south of them, announcing Taneth’s return from the city. One of the Stunts sounded a horn in answer, and in a few minutes they found Taneth sitting upon a log before a campfire in front of Gereth’s tent.
The Battleborn Master wore leather armor similar to that of his students. Over one bicep a half dozen throwing blades were sheathed. A large number of daggers were deposited in his armor as well, some visible, some not. His exposed skin was coarse and weathered by the elements, but his eyes were still young and vibrant.
He was twenty years older than Kaltor, but the Blood Breaking had left his body much older, making him appear to be in his late-forties. He sharpened a long hunting dagger, a large, dead Perversion lying next to him with its face on the ground. Krin stood beside him, smiling in warm relief at their approach.
"Glad to see you boys again," Taneth said with a smile. Turning to Gereth he continued. "The city is secure. We’re gathering what few bodies of the Perversions were not over the wall attacking us. The townspeople have been assured that all is well, and most importantly," he kicked the body next to him, flipping it over to reveal Melshek’s deformed fangs and claws. "I brought this one back, too," he finished.
Gereth nodded grimly, leaning down over Melshek’s body. "Did you find anything else?" he asked. "Anything that explained what happened at the vault?"
"It was an amulet he wore," Kaltor grunted from his stretcher. "He started to die when I ripped it from his chest."
"‘Ripped it’?" Honmour asked.
Taneth nodded, pulling a wadded handkerchief from his pocket and tossing it onto the ground. It fell open, letting the trinket roll freely upon the ground. When it stopped rolling they could all see the black tendrils still extending from one side like a plant’s roots, wrapped around fragments of flesh.
A few of the Stunts retched at the sight, realizing how the amulet had manipulated Melshek’s powers, integrating itself into the pouches of magical power around the Varadour’s heart. Gereth leaned over, studying the object. He suddenly gasped, sprinting across the ground and landing before the amulet, hands digging into his pack with a renewed sense of desperation.
Everyone watched as he drew out his mace and a piece of parchment with a loose sketch of the object. Kaltor recognized the record as one of those the king’s historians had made when they’d first entered the vault, when the amulet had lain around the throat of the sculpture at the vault.
Gereth poked the trinket with his weapon, pivoting it so the engraved top faced him, eyes bouncing between his parchment and the relic. "By the Gods," he muttered, his face turning white. "What have we done?"
"Gereth—what’s going on?" Taneth asked, fear slowly gathering around them like a light rain announcing an approaching storm.
"In my tent!" Gereth ordered. "Now!" He turned toward their small caravan. "Krin, Kaltor, and Honmour will come with us," He pointed a finger at them all. "If Taneth senses any of you trying to eavesdrop, I will take away your sense of touch," a few of the Stunts gulped.
They carried Kaltor into Gereth’s tent and set their patient on the nearby bed. All turned to face the anxious Sight Seeker, now in the process of tearing open various drawers from his desk and pulling out a handful of sketches.
He was muttering to himself now so quietly that even their enhanced hearing failed to pick up the details. Such was his mood when he arrived at a discovery, for good or ill. Finally, his internal tirade halted.
Pulling up a chair, he sat down, obviously trying to calm his racing heart. "Kaltor," he said seriously. "Exactly what happened when you killed him? Tell me everything."
For the next few minutes Kaltor related the events of the previous night. When he got to the part where he had cut Melshek’s amulet free, Gereth raised his hand to stop him and ordered him to repeat his description of the scene three times. He followed Kaltor’s every word with his quill on a fresh sheet of parchment. When he got to Melshek’s last words, he hesitated, shuddering as if from a chill.
"Well, my son?" Gereth prodded. "What did she say?"
Kaltor glanced toward everyone else. Did he dare tell them of the vision afterward? After the events of the last week they would probably believe him. With a gulp, he continued. "She, the demon, said ‘the plan worked perfectly.’"
"This was all AFTER you killed him?" Taneth pried. "After you beat him and his invasion failed?"
"Yes."
"What does that mean?" Honmour balked. "After all this, he’d PLANNED to die? What kind of sense does that make?"
"A lot," Gereth answered, his tone depressed as he tossed two sheets of parchment their way. Their drawings were very similar. A line was present in one symbol which the other one lacked. "The words ‘destroy’ and ‘decoy’ are very similar in the dead language," he explained. "Remove the center line and ‘destroy’ changes to mean ‘decoy’."
Taneth’s eyes narrowed. "What does this have to do with the amulet?"
Gereth held up two drawings. "The one on my left is a sketch of this device BEFORE it was removed from the vault," He waved that page slightly for emphasis. "You can see that the title ‘Destroyer’ was engraved upon the surface."
Putting that page down, he held his right hand and its precious cargo up for all to see. "What’s wrong with the amulet as it is now?" No one responded for a moment, realization washing over them like a sea at high tide.
"The center line is missing," Krin said, her voice numb with shock. "Now it says ‘Decoy’."
"Indeed," Gereth grunted. "In other words, Melshek’s antics here in the city were a distraction. The true threat, the Destroyer, is still out there. An actual shard from the amulet broke off to create the word ‘Decoy’, so I assume that that piece of this trinket carried the real threat."
Kaltor suddenly felt a lot weaker, their triumph over Melshek fading in importance. He thought of the vision of the woman attacking him and recalled her last words. ‘Their world will now burn.’
This isn’t over, he realized, suddenly feeling very tired. It’s just beginning.
"Taneth," Gereth ordered, stuffing his papers back into his desk hurriedly. "I need to you gather the miners. Many sent their families away after the first night. We need to know where they went, and with whom. If I were to distract an enemy with bait, I would flee in the opposite direction."
"Me, too," Taneth grunted, ducking out of the tent.
"Krin, gather the other Peacebinders, please," Gereth said. "See if they’ve noticed anything out of place once Taneth is done with them."
"Should I talk to the Bandit Lords as well?" Krin offered.
"Doubt it," Gereth replied. "None of their people were close enough to Melshek. The princess was at the camp, but she hasn’t fled yet," He paused for a moment. "On second thought, see if she will let you examine her without telling her father. Just in case."
Adjusting her tasseled shawl, Krin left the tent as well. Kaltor sat up with a grunt of effort, his wounds still fresh, held shut by his steadying supply of Varadour power flowing from his heart. "What can we do, Father?" he asked.
Gereth glanced toward them as he withdrew a number of maps from anothe
r drawer. "Take care of your friends and keep training," he advised. "I have a feeling we’re going to need all the assassins we can get," Kaltor sighed with a fatigue that had nothing to do with his wounds.
How long ‘til Mom figures it out? he thought. How will she handle it when she realizes I went after Melshek, not the other way around?
"There’s one more thing, Dad," Kaltor said. "Honmour knows," He extended his right hand and, wincing in pain, forced it open. A silver scar the color of the moon radiated a faint light in a horizontal line across his palm, from the base of his thumb to the bottom of his pinky.
Gereth gulped, eyeing Honmour distrustfully. "Tell me everything."
Honmour nodded, looking nervously from Kaltor to Gereth. He explained his participation in the battle at first. Secretly, he’d guessed that his friend had gone after Melshek alone, and as he’d searched the city he had felt the massive use of a Varadour’s power. He’d followed it, keeping out of sight until the opportune moment. Then he described Kaltor accessing the Sight Seeker power to heal himself.
Gereth listened to the entire exchange, watching Honmour very carefully, his eyes burning brightly with Sight Seeker power in search of deception. "Now that you know my son is the Remnant of the Varadour Power, what will you do?"
Honmour bit his lip, glancing Kaltor’s way. "One thing I love about being a Battleborn," he said, "is the chance to really make a difference to my family and the people of our kingdom," He paused a moment, taking it all in. "This is bigger than even the kingdom, isn’t it?"
Gereth and Kaltor nodded. "My son is linked to his brother, the Sight Seeker Remnant," said Gereth. "It seems his Blood Break managed to shatter the lock I had in place to seal that connection. They both are connected now. They will need your help."
With a content smile Honmour patted Kaltor’s shoulder. "What better fighters to have guard your back than Battleborn, right?"
Kaltor paused at that comment, looking at his scarred hand. I couldn’t stop Melshek, he thought. Even after I tore his amulet free, he was going to kill me before he finally succumbed. Yet Honmour saved me, and my brother’s connection to me healed me.
He smiled up at his friend, nodding in agreement. What’s coming will be like nothing we’ve ever imagined. But together, we just might have a chance.
"Very well," Gereth said with a smile. "Keep this secret. Tell no one. Now, please take Kaltor outside before your friends’ curiosity gets the better of them," He tossed a wool glove to his son, the fingers removed so it would cover his hand without restricting the movement of his fingers.
Honmour called one of the Stunts over and they carried Kaltor outside to the warmth of the campfire and the crisp breeze. The rest of the Battleborn gathered around. Talen stood a bit taller than normal, Varadour power rushing through him as he stared at his hands with wide eyes, his fingernails much longer than normal.
Looks like you Blood Broke, too, Kaltor thought. It must have been quite a battle. "Can I borrow your knife?" he asked, holding his hand up to Honmour.
All present gawked at his hand, recognizing the growth in his fingernails. "That’s how you beat him, huh?" one Stunt asked. "You Blood Broke, too?"
"Yeah," Kaltor admitted, staring at his hand. That’s it, then, he decided. I will make the most of my time in life, even if it’s only half of what most people have. I can find and protect Keevan in that time.
"The fight’s only just begun," Honmour said, reciting Gereth’s discovery regarding the amulet to the Stunts. Their faces mirrored Kaltor’s feelings of fear, concern, and excitement.
Kaltor glanced to each one of his friends’ faces. The Destroyer is free. But I can’t imagine a better group to face her with.
Lying down gingerly, he closed his eyes and tried to enjoy the warmth of the fire, coupled with the cool breeze. Together, we might have a chance against the Destroyer.
Together, we just might manage to save the world.
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