by C.S. Fanning
proffering it to Riordan. There were tears streaming down Riordan’s face as he accepted this final gift.
“Come here you others” Liam whispered. “I cannot continue with you, so now you must carry on without me. There are more dangers on your path, and it doesn’t take an oracle to see that. Fianna knows the way, follow her to Mellan and he will give you further instructions.” Looking straight at Aeden he spoke one final time. “Fianna is to be your leader. You are charged with the protection of Riordan and get him safely to his new mentor. You have been given a rare gift Aeden; discover it and you will find the destiny you seek.”
With these last words the old Druid died in Riordan’s arms. “We need to move; there is a storm to the south and I saw signs of many more enemies moving in the woods on my way here” Fianna announced.
Aeden was too shocked to argue, so helping Riordan to his feet and gently laying the old man down, he whispered words that seemed to come from someone else. “Come Riordan, the forest will reclaim its own.”
Reunion
Aeden was confused and somewhat dizzy, but he had been confused so often this day that he never considered that the source was more than just events that he was not privy too. Why would old Liam put Fianna in charge? Aeden had done more to keep them alive than her had he not? The vague feeling of dizziness was growing and before long he was stumbling along barely aware of his surroundings.
He was not, at this point, even aware that of his own condition until he nearly ran into Fianna who had stopped to listen to the sounds of the forest. “What are you doing?” he said and to his surprise his words were slurred as though he had sipped too much mead at the Yule Feast.
Fianna clapped her hand over his mouth and drug him to the ground. Faolan, knife in hand, used his weapon to point at Aeden’s side. Fianna looked where he pointed and rolled her eyes shaking her head. “Fool, are you trying to kill us all?” she hissed. He didn’t understand what was happening, but when she lifted his head and pointed, he could see the encampment across the pasture that they had come to. There were several hundred pigs between themselves and the assassin’s camp on the other side, which fortunately had saved them from his bungling. Fianna lowered him back down. “Why didn’t you mention this?” she asked.
Before Aeden could answer, Faolan did so for him. “I saw it happen, and it looked to me like the blade must have missed him. He didn’t even flinch so perhaps he didn’t even know that he was cut.”
“Well you would think he would notice one whole leg soaked in his own blood. That cut is deep, and we can’t carry him, and we don’t have the supplies to treat him. I’m not certain how we are supposed to get past that encampment as it is, but with him stumbling around he’s sure to get us all killed” Fianna announced.
Aeden was drifting near to the void of sleep when the import of her words soaked through his addled consciousness. Evidently the “scratch” had been worse than he had anticipated, and now Fianna was suggesting that they leave him behind. He struggled to rise to tell them he could make it when a twig snapped behind them back down the trail they had followed. Faolan drew his knives while Fianna knocked an arrow while Riordan pushed him back down, shielding him with his own body. A figure, cloaked in brown not unlike the foreign druid was slipping quietly towards them. Fianna drew and took aim just as the figure looked up.
“Don’t shoot” Teagan said in her slightly annoying voice that Aeden had recently decided was more than offset by her developing figure. As the baker’s daughter approached them quietly she looked them over, her eyes falling on the blood soaking Aeden’s side. “Move aside” she said. No one questioned her and they all moved back from Aeden looking at one another confused. “Does it hurt much” Teagan asked, kneeling beside Aeden as though wounds of this nature were nothing new to her.
Aeden managed to shake his head from side to side. “I have to sew this up” she told him. Taking a needle already threaded with a course thread that Aeden recognized as the same intestine that he used to stitch injured pigs from her bag she began wiping away the fresh blood from the wound. Holding the needle up in front of him to let him know she was about to begin, she quickly and deftly began stitching the long wound.
Aeden grit his teeth against the pain and tried to breathe normally. The pain that had been only a dull ache before flared into searing agony that made lights dance before his eyes. Aeden was near to swooning when Teagan finally finished. He’d lost a lot of blood and the pain had been horrendous while she was closing the wound.
“Teagan, we have to move, can he walk?” Fianna asked.
“He should be in bed for a couple of days, but I can give him something that will make him able to walk for a while, as long as he doesn’t have to run or fight” she answered.
Fianna seemed to be ready to leave him behind, but Riordan came to his rescue. “Liam put you in charge of the group Fianna, but he charged Aeden with my protection. I stay with him” he said.
Fianna was silent a moment. “Give him the herb, but if he falls behind, he gets left behind.”
The question of how to get past the camp still loomed and each of them pondered how it might be done as Teagan administered the herbal concoction that felt to Aeden like fire had been poured down his gullet. Almost instantly the dizziness began to recede and Aeden found his strength returning. Gingerly he sat up and peered across the field. “Fianna, what would you do if you had a few hundred dangerous men ready to attack their camp?” he asked.
Fianna looked from Aeden to Teagan, clearly wondering what she had given him. “I suppose I would charge right through them” she finally answered.
“That’s what I was thinking” Aeden said smiling.
It took him a few minutes to explain his plan, and though Fianna had her doubts, under the circumstances it was virtually the only option they had. Five minutes later they were in position, and Fianna advanced toward the herd of pigs for her part in Aeden’s crazy plan despite her grave concerns about the feasibility.
Aeden smiled as he watched each of his companions move into position. Fianna and Faolan were on the flanks of the herd, with himself in the center and Teagan and Riordan on either side of him between himself and the other two. Aeden understood pigs, as much as he didn’t want to, and one thing he knew was that once a panicked pig began to move in a direction it was hard to stop. When an entire herd of pigs panicked, it was advisable to be somewhere out of their path.
Aeden raised his hand and let it drop. Faolan and Fianna jumped up from the grass screaming and making all the noise they could as they rushed toward the herd. They had taken no more than a single step when Teagan and Riordan mimicked their actions, and Aeden followed suit a step behind yelling and waiving his sword in the air like a madman.
When it was all said and done even Aeden was surprised at how well his plan had worked. Over a hundred hogs had made the enemy’s encampment their personal escape route and the damage was incredible. Tents and supplies were scattered across acres of the adjoining forest and at least three of the camp guards had perished under the sharp hooves of the stampeding pigs. The number might have been higher had they taken the time to inspect some of the lumps hidden beneath the canvas of some of the ruined tents.
Of those that managed to escape the crazed swine, one fell hamstrung from a wicked blow of one of Faolan’s big knives and two more dropped with the shafts of Fianna’s arrows protruding from their backs. Others had escaped the slaughter, at least two that Aeden had seen, so they were still on their guard as they moved through the camp in the wake of the stampede.
Faolan, Fianna, and Teagan had rummaged through the supplies left unattended by the time that Riordan and Aeden made it to the timber on the far side of the encampment. They were all carrying packs laden with enough food and gear for twice their number to feast upon for a week as they regrouped and continued on along the path that Riordan found for them.
It was nea
rly an hour later when they came upon Mellan, Finnis, and Quinn. The storm that had been a cause for concern earlier had died away as quickly as it had formed and moments later the two druid adepts, along with a rain soaked Quinn, had appeared in the path as though they had always been there. Quinn seemed very agitated, and it was obvious that he had adventures to share as well, but Mellan took charge right away.
“We still have enemies about, despite their losses” he announced after Fianna gave him a very brief account of their harrowing escape and subsequent adventures. “Finnis and I will delay and distract them but I fear we must alter our original plans. Fianna will lead all of you to the river, and you will use the boat that waits to cross then cut it loose, making sure that the current carries it away. Should any of our enemies sort out that you are not with us and pursue you this should throw them off your track at least for a time. I know that some of you thought your part in this would end at the river, but if you return to Bretharc now you will almost certainly be captured, tortured, and once you are broken, you will be killed. You will all need to follow Fianna until this is settled. After we have determined that it will be safe we will send any that wish back home. If we do not find you
