The Journey to Karrith

by Ted Neill

  “Welcome back traveler,” Chloe said as Haille stirred.

  “Haille, you had us worried.” Katlyn moved next to him and took his hand.

  “How . . . long?” Haille was finding it difficult to make words.

  “Half a day you have been at rest,” Val said, taking a cup of tea from Cody and handing it down to Haille. Haille took it and sat up with some effort while the jays alighted on his shoulders.

  “The raiders?”

  “Repelled, except for one we saved from drowning.” Chloe nodded to the stern where Victor Twenge sat wrapped in a blanket, far removed from the warmth of the brazier and the companionship of others.

  “Why did you save him?” Haille asked Val.

  “All life is precious, even the enemy’s. It’s what makes us different,” Chloe said.

  “And the best way to eliminate an enemy is to make him a friend,” Val added. “He was no longer a threat. Without his sword or his men, he was just a drowning man.”

  “He sure seems less than grateful,” Cody said.

  “‘This changes nothing,’ is what he said to me when I pulled him from the water. Which is why Adamantus is over there keeping an eye on him.”

  Haille looked around again and noticed the elk seated between Twenge and themselves, his head turned and his eyes fixed on the bounty hunter.

  “Is he a prisoner?” Haille asked, sipping his tea and savoring the warmth in his body.

  “Can’t really say. We’re all prisoners of this boat now. Castaways so to speak. Our status will be determined by where we land,” Val said.

  “Or who finds us,” Cody said.

  Gunther was looking into his teacup with hunched shoulders and a drooping head. “I’m sorry, my friends, to have caused so much destruction. My powers . . .”

  “Are great and valuable,” Val interrupted him. “You saved your wife’s life and all of ours. We’ll get out of this yet.”

  Cody clapped Gunther on the shoulder. Chloe leaned over to kiss him on his temple.

  Two days passed while they drifted, carried by the currents. The ship was still well provisioned and the Hand Sea was a fresh water body so they did not want for supplies or water to slack their thirst. The greatest burden was simply the tedium of riding the swells without any notion of when it would end. Twenge kept up his wall of silence between the team and himself, not even breaking it to thank Gunther or Cody who brought him food while he sat in isolation on the stern.

  On the third day they spotted a tower of sails to the north east bearing down on them. They signaled for help with smoke signals, flapping blankets over the brazier and burning wet cloths to make the curls of smoke rise up dark against the slate sky. Haille was relieved when the ship turned towards them, its three tiers of sails and flying pendants holding the promise of rescue.

  The spyglass had been lost in the attack and subsequent crippling of the Tameramb but when the ship—a large galley—came close enough, Val called out, “Those are Karrithian colors flying from the mainmast.”

  Haille took note of the green and white pendants, the same forest green of the cloak he had seen the ranger from Karrith wearing that day back in Antas—it seemed a hundred years before. With grapples and mooring lines, the crew of the galley pulled them alongside and tossed down a sling to bear them up, even Adamantus, who caused no small stir on deck. The sailors were reticent, well-disciplined, and helpful. Their captain was a tall man with salt and pepper hair and striking violet eyes. He stood at the middeck and greeted them.

  “I am Captain Jonathan Ruane. This ship is the Swift Wind, a craft of our majesty King Oean. We are on our way to the Haines Point.”

  “We thank you for your rescue. We are travelers seeking passage south. Our ship was crippled in a storm,” Val said.

  “We are glad to assist but the south is dangerous, you must know. The king’s forces have fallen back to the city—” Captain Ruane stopped abruptly. “By the stars above, it’s Victor Twenge,” he said as the sailors helped Twenge aboard. “Long time since we’ve met. Many a straying sailor you have helped me track down. I am glad to have you aboard—”

  Twenge interrupted him. “Captain Ruane, you are a sight for sore eyes. These are brigands, pirates, and killers, you must arrest them.”

  Chapter 27

  The Haines Point

  At a signal from Captain Ruane, the sailors and soldiers closed on them, stone-faced, their hands resting on their daggers and swords. They were a mixed bunch, this crew of weathered seamen in patched coveralls and soldiers dressed in mail and boiled leather armor. As a soldier took Haille by the shoulder, Val spoke up.

  “You do yourself a disservice, for he is the Prince of Antas.”

  It was the first time in their travels that Val had so readily volunteered Haille’s true identity to a stranger. On a vessel of King Oean, on the edge of arrest, it made sense, but nonetheless a shiver danced across Haille’s skin. He tried to stand a bit straighter, rounding out his shoulders, pushing out his chest in hopes that even in his tattered traveling cloak and battered clothes, he might project at least some royal bearing. He felt the eyes of the men around them shift to him, Ruane and Twenge most of all.

  “Prince?” Ruane echoed.

  “Prince Haille Hillbourne, of Antas. We are on a journey to Karrith to reach my father.”

  Twenge and Ruane exchanged a look. In the long pause that followed the ship rocked over a swell, boards groaning as if they were aching in their arrangement. The rigging twisted.

  “Put them below,” Ruane finally said, nodding to Val and the others. “Bring the children to my estate room.”

  Ruane was seated behind a desk, Twenge standing on his right, still with the look of a man many days at sea, his face dark with whiskers, his hair disheveled. But he had regained some air of menace and authority as he glowered down at Haille and Katlyn. Haille’s eyes tracked through the cabin. Aside from rolled maps, sextants, and a glittering sword leaning in the corner, he noted shelves of books, not unlike the oversized folios he and Katlyn knew from the Academy Library.

  Aware that his time to explain was running short, Haille turned to the captain. A cup of tea rested in front of him, untouched, although Twenge drank eagerly from his own cup, both hands wrapped around it for warmth. An officer—one of the soldiers in a green cloak—set a tray with tea before Haille and Katlyn. Haille did not move to take any even though he was hungry and thirsty. Katlyn followed his lead.

  Ruane sat upright, his hands resting on his hips as if he were still standing astride a shifting deck. “Well ‘Prince,’ that is no slight title our outlaw friend has claimed for you.”

  “It is quite a claim, I understand, but it makes it no less true,” Haille said, noting the way Twenge scowled at him.

  “Might you have evidence of this claim?” Twenge asked.

  “Only my word and our story,” Haille said, then offered an abbreviated version of their story, explaining his own efforts to seek the Font of Jasmeen and leaving the city without permission. He was open about the letter his father had written to Lord Chambridge to take him in at his orphanage because of his “condition” and his “lack of character.” He mentioned the other letters he had seen that night, as well as the Karrithian Ranger who had been dressed much like the soldiers aboard the Swiftwind. He chose not to include the more fantastic elements of their story but he was sure to include their imprisonment at the hands of the Redmont clan and Val and Cody’s loyalty throughout. Adamantus he described as a loyal, clever beast, nothing more. Then of course there was the journey through Sidon. Haille’s eyes met with Katlyn’s and he sensed an understanding with her. He included their battle with the vaurgs but mentioned not the elves. When he had finished, he had explained their journey up to the very moment.

  Twenge tipped his cup, swallowing the dregs of his tea. Ruane’s mouth was a straight fine line until he puffed his cheeks and blew out a stream of air between his lips.

  “That is some . . . journey. And you, y
oung lady, vouch for it.”

  “Completely, sir.”

  Twenge’s eyes slid sideways to his old friend while Ruane considered them, his chin resting on his hand while he took Haille’s measure.

  “Victor,” Ruane said, turning to Twenge, “Am I to believe in these fearsome beasts of the woods with needles for teeth and talons for hands?”

  “I saw them with my own eyes. I lost near half my men to those nightmares,” he said, grudgingly.

  “And you said this swordsmith, Pathus Sumberland, recognized you immediately as your mother’s son?”

  “So he said.”

  “May I see the blade he gave you?”

  Haille slid Elk Heart from his scabbard and handed it across the desk, hilt first. Ruane took it, looked down its blade, shook it in his hand, testing the balance, slid his finger along the blood channel then rubbed at the initials at the base of the blade with the ball of his thumb.

  “You said his name was Pathus Sumberland, but these initials are ‘PA.’”

  “The ‘A’ is for his wife Annette, whom he says he could accomplish nothing without.”

  “Romantic,” Ruane nodded, returning the blade. “It seems authentic.”

  “Is that evidence enough?” Haille asked.

  “No,” Ruane said. “I’m afraid not.” Haille felt his chest clench as he took the sword back. “But it is enough for a kernel of belief, a reasonable doubt. We will interrogate Mandaly himself and see if their stories corroborate.”

  “But that does not change the fact that he is an outlaw,” Twenge said, setting his cup down and holding it by the rim, his hand spread over it like a white spider.

  “No, it doesn’t. And I know your oath to upholding the law, but we have oaths to the crown and kings as well. And in a time of war those loyalties are paramount.” He grimaced, the corner of his mouth screwing up into a question mark of sorts. “You said it was an old woman who predicted that your father was in grave danger.”

  “Yes,” Haille said, a wave of heat passing over him, the sweat beading on his scalp. “Not a great deal to go on but it had the weight of truth, even prophecy.”

  “Wives’ tales and foolishness,” Twenge scoffed.

  Ruane raised his hand. “You forget yourself, old friend. You are in Karrith now. We are a bit more . . . believing in the old ways here.”

  Twenge snorted and crossed his arms while he waited for Ruane to continue. The captain took his time, steepling his fingers and tapping them together arrhythmically before saying, “We’ll question Mandaly, but whatever the case young man, you, your companion, and the elk will be allowed to remain above deck. Stay in sight, away from the rails, and mind that animal of yours. Keep his antlers away from my rigging. We’re sailing for the Haines Point where Commadant Marsch is stationed. He is my superior and we’ll see what he has to say to all this.”

  “It could have been worse,” Katlyn said to him later while they sat at the foot of the main mast beneath a canopy of sailcloth the sailors had erected for them.

  “True, but our friends are still imprisoned in the brig and who knows what this Commandant will do.”

  “What do you make of Ruane?”

  Haille shrugged. “He seemed decent, like he is trying to do the right thing. But it does not help that he is old friends with Twenge.”

  As they spoke, two soldiers escorted Val up from below. Despite having his wrists in chains, he wore a look of satisfaction, seeing Haille, Katlyn, and Adamantus seated where they were.

  “At least Val seems pleased,” Katlyn said.

  “We’re not in the brig, that must bring him some comfort,” Haille said.

  But after the meeting with Ruane, Val was returned below. The captain and Twenge emerged from the estate room speaking close to one another. Twenge gave a glare in Haille’s direction before returning to the cabins. The captain crossed the deck to them, his knees popping as he bent down to their level. “It seems your stories align. Strange tales indeed.”

  “Will our friends be set free?”

  “That is not for me to decide and even if you are the prince, they are still outlaws.”

  “Who have saved and protected us.”

  “Yes, a young man—a prince—who has run away from home, whom it is my duty to protect now. Perhaps even from himself and his own rash decisions.”

  They reached the Haines Point in the afternoon on the following day. It began as just a smudge on the hazy horizon but over time it transformed to a single sharp fang rising up from the Hand Sea. Here was the point in the crook of the hand where thumb met the palm. As they neared, the wind roared and whipped, the currents swirled, slapping waves against the hull. It was the confluence of elements one might expect where such a stubborn point of land ran out into the air and sea, challenging both in their own domains.

  But what land it was. The point soon towered over the highest of the sails. Haille was granted some sense of its scale when he noticed the mast of other ships rocking on the leeward side of the peninsula. The rock stretched many times higher, a dagger at the sky, with gulls circling on updrafts along its face, the cliffs spotted with their nests and streaked with their droppings.

  Closer still, he could make out the human-made part of the edifice. Balanced atop the cliffs, something of a crown on the crest of the ridge, was a round fortress and a single drum-like tower. It was a simple and stalwart-looking fortress and likely impenetrable. Key to its genius was a great wooden crane that reached over the curtain wall like a pelican rising from its nest. A sizable cage large enough to carry many men, even horses, rocked from the end. Ruane called it the “windlass.” “You’ll get a ride you never dreamed of today,” he said, nodding at the crane.

  And they did. The Swiftwind pulled in close and anchored beside the other three galleys. There were no docks, no pier, no quay, only the waves smashing into spray along the rocks and surging in and out of cave mouths. The fortress itself had disappeared above the cliffs but the windlass and its dangling cage swung out overhead, the passenger cage growing as it winched downward. The operator guided it down, past the furled sails, and placed it squarely on the center of the deck of the Swiftwind.

  No small feat, Haille thought, considering the wind, the length of cable, and the tall masts of the ship. The sailors and soldiers treated the mechanical wonder with indifference, as if long familiar with its workings. Instead they were focused on leading Haille’s friends up from the brig.

  Blinking in the sunlight, their hands bound, their faces pale from riding in the darkness, Val, Cody, Chloe, and Gunther climbed the steps from below. It saddened Haille to see them treated so, but Val’s spirits were strong, or at least he made show of it, winking to Haille across the deck. Cody was as defiant as ever, lingering on the steps to gape at the windlass long enough that the soldiers had to push him forward. Chloe was next, her jaw jutting out, her eyes smoldering fire except when she looked to Gunther, when her expression would soften with pity.

  A soldier swung the door on the passenger cage open and motioned for Haille and Katlyn to board. Adamantus followed, bidden or no. Next their friends were escorted aboard but remained silent, surrounded by a cadre of armed rangers. Finally, Twenge and Ruane stepped aboard. The sailors signaled the operator and the cage lifted from the deck with a jerk. Katlyn leaned into Haille as the cage rose up into the air and past the crow’s nest. Wind whipped at their clothes and turned the cage around on the cable. Haille fought his own sense of vertigo as they ascended alongside the cliffs and seagulls circled above and below them. The Swiftwind and the three ships to her port and starboard shrank to the size of toys floating in a tub.

  Just when Haille thought the height too great to bear, the cage shifted, moving sideways rather than upwards, and the weathered stone wall of the fortress came into view. Mortar wept out of fissures and down the sides, the brickwork merging without seam with the cliffs below. The great arm of the windlass, all triangles and polygons of reinforced beams, lifted them over the wall.<
br />
  Below them opened the bustling interior of a martial fortress. Soldiers moved to and fro on the battlements, their hands raised in salute or against the sun as the cage passed over. Longshoremen lifted heavy sacks of grains, rolled barrels of water, and stacked crates of supplies. A smithy clanged on hot iron, the smoke from his fire mingling with that from the scullery where the evening meal of fried fish was cooking. Casting a commanding presence over the entire bowl of activity was the drum tower Haille had seen from below. Unlike the rest of the fortress, which was brutal in its simplicity, the tower was ornate with flourishes, a peaked roof, and carved arabesques adjacent to fine paned windows.

  The windlass lowered them to the center of the courtyard where a cadre of soldiers—infantry men armed with spears—waited for them, forming a gauntlet for them to walk between. The cage door creaked open, Ruane leading the way, Twenge behind him. A courier boy met them. Ruane handed him a scroll, sealed with wax, pressed with his signet ring.

  “Take this to the Commandant,” he said. The courier saluted, turned with a quick step and ran towards the drum tower. Ruane waited for Haille, Katlyn and Adamantus to exit, then motioned for the soldiers to bring the prisoners forward. More than a few of the soldiers and longshoremen stopped in their tasks and chores and looked their way. They were a curious lot, with young people, children, and an elk with sparkling metallic antlers. A review stand had been erected on the far side of the courtyard and Haille half expected to be led to it, but instead they waited until the courier boy returned.

  “The Commandant will see you immediately,” he said.

  The courier leading them, they climbed a set of switchback stairs into the drum tower. The double doors at the top of the stairs had to be opened on both sides to accommodate the elk and his rack of antlers, but once inside they all waited in silence while soldiers shuffled in and out of doorways carrying messages, even furniture—mostly chairs—as if preparing to receive important guests. Finally an officer invited them forward into the chamber of the commandant.