For five days, Royce, Hadrian, and Thrace made their way north through the nameless sea of trees that made up the eastern edge of Avryn, a region disputed by both Alburn and Dunmore. Each laid claim to the vast, dense forest between them, but until the establishment of Dahlgren, neither appeared in any hurry to settle the land. The great forest, referred to merely as either The East or The Wastes, remained uncut, untouched, unblemished. The road they traveled, once a broad lane as it plowed north out of Alburn, quickly became two tracks divided by a line of grass and finally squeezed down to a single dirt trail that threatened to vanish entirely. No fences, farms, nor wayside inns broke the woodland walls, nor did travelers cross their path. Here in the northeast, maps were vague with few markings and went entirely blank past the Nidwalden River.
At times, the beauty of the forest was breathtaking, even spiritual. Monolithic elms towered overhead, weaving a lofty tunnel of green. It reminded Hadrian of the few times he had poked his head into Mares Cathedral in Medford. The long trunked trees arched over the trail like the buttresses of the great church, forming a natural nave. Delicate shafts of muted light pierced the canopy at angles as if entering through a gallery of windows far above. Along the ground, fans of finely fingered ferns grew up from last year’s brown leaves, creating a soft swaying carpet. A choir of birds sang in the unseen heights, and from the bed of brittle leaves came the rustle of squirrels and chipmunks like the coughs, whispers, and shifts of a congregation. It was beautiful yet disturbing, like swimming out too far, delving into unknown, unseen, and untamed places.
Over the last days, travel became increasingly difficult. The recent spring storms dropped several trees across the trail that blocked the route as formidably as any castle gate. They dismounted and struggled through the thick brush as Royce searched for a way around. Hours passed yet they failed to rejoin the road. Scratched and sweaty, they led their horses across several small rivers, and on one occasion faced a sharp drop. Looking down from the rocky cliff, Hadrian offered Royce a skeptical look. Usually, Hadrian never questioned Royce’s sense of direction or his choice of path. Royce had an unerring ability to find his way in the wilderness, a talent proven on many occasions. Hadrian tilted his head up. He could not see the sun or sky, there was no point of reference-everything was limbs and leaves. Royce had never let him down, but they had never been in a place like this.
“We’re alright,” Royce told them, a touch of irritation in his voice.
They worked their way down, Royce and Thrace leading the horses on foot while Hadrian cleared a path. When they reached the bottom, they found a small stream, but no trail. Again, Hadrian glanced at Royce, but this time the thief made no comment as they pressed on along the least dense route.
“There,” Thrace said, pointing ahead to a clearing revealed by a patch of sun that managed to sneak through the canopy. A few more steps revealed a small road. Royce looked at it for a moment then merely shrugged, climbed back on his horse, and kicked Mouse forward.
They emerged from the forest as if escaping from a deep cave, into the first open patch of direct sun they had seen in days. Standing in the glade, beside a rough wooden wellhead, stood a child among a pack of eight grazing pigs. The child, no more than five years old, held a long, thin stick, and an expression of wonder on a little round face covered in sweat-trapped dirt. Hadrian had no idea if it was a boy or girl as the child displayed no definite indication of either, wearing only a simple smock of flax linen, dirty and frayed with holes and rips so plentiful they appeared by design.
“Pearl!” Thrace called out as she scrambled off Millie so quickly the horse sidestepped. “I’m back.” She walked over and tousled the child’s matted hair.
The little girl-Hadrian now guessed-gave Thrace little notice and continued to stare at them, eyes wide.
Thrace threw out her arms and spun around, “This is Dahlgren. This is home.”
Hadrian dismounted and looked around, puzzled. They stood on a small patch of close-grazed grass beside a well constructed of ill-fitted planks with a wooden bucket resting on a rail wet and dripping. Two other rutted trails intersected with the one they followed forming a triangle with the well at its center. On all sides, the forest surrounded them. Massive trees of dramatic size still blocked the sky, except for the hole above the clearing through which Hadrian could see the pale blue of the late afternoon sky.
Hadrian scooped a handful of water from the bucket to wash the sweat from his face and Millie nearly shoved him aside as she pushed her nose into the bucket, drinking deeply.
“What’s with the bell,” Royce mentioned, climbing down off Mouse and gesturing toward the shadows.
Hadrian looked over, surprised to see a massive bronze bell hanging from a rocker arm that in turn hung from the lower branch of a nearby oak. Hadrian guessed that if it were on the ground Royce could stand inside it. A rope dangled with knots tied at several points along its length.
“That’s different,” he said, walking toward it. “How does it sound?”
“Don’t ring it!” Thrace exclaimed. Hadrian pivoted his eyebrows up. “We only ring it for emergencies.”
He looked back at the bell noting the relief images of Maribor and Novron, along with lines of religious script circling its waist. “Seems sort of extravagant for…well…” he looked around at the empty clearing.
“It was Deacon Tomas’ idea. He kept saying: A village isn’t a village without a church, and a church isn’t a church without a bell. Everyone pitched in a little. The old margrave matched what we had and ordered it for us. The bell was finished long before we had time to build the church. Mr. McDern took his oxen and fetched it all the way from Ervanon. When he got back, we had no place to put it and he needed his wagon. It was my father’s idea to hang it here and use it as an alarm until the church went up. That was a week before the attacks started. At the time no one had any idea how much use we’d get out of it.” She stared at the huge bell for a moment and then added. “I hate the sound of that bell.”
A gusty breeze rustled the leaves and threw a lock of hair in her face. She brushed it back and turned away from the oak and the bell. “Over there,” she pointed across the rutted path, “is where most of us live.” Hadrian spotted structures hidden in shadow within a shallow dip, behind a blind of goldenrod and milkweed. Small wooden frame buildings plastered with wattle and daub-a mixture of mud, straw, and manure. The roofs were thatch, the windows no more than holes in the walls. Most lacked doors, making due with curtains across the entrances that fluttered with the wind, revealing dirt floors. Beside one, he spotted a vegetable garden that managed to catch a sliver of sun.
“That’s Mae and Went Drundel’s place there in front,” Thrace said. “Well, I guess it’s just Mae’s now. Went and the boys-they-were taken not long ago. To the left, the one with the garden is the Bothwick’s. I used to babysit Tad and the twins, but Tad’s old enough now to watch the twins himself. They are like family really. Lena and my mother were very close. Behind them-you can just see the McDern’s roof. Mr. McDern is the village smith and the owner of the only pair of oxen. He shares them with everyone, which makes him popular come spring. To the right, the place with the swing is the Caswell’s. Maria and Jessie are my best friends. My father hung that swing for us not long after we moved here. I spent some of the best days of my life on that swing.”
“Where’s your place?” Hadrian asked.
“My father built our house a ways down the hill.” She gestured toward a small trail that ran to the east. “It was the best house-best farm really-in the village. Everyone said so. There’s almost nothing left now.”
Pearl was still staring at them, watching every move.
“Hello,” Hadrian said to her with a smile, bending down on his hunches, “my name is Hadrian, and this is my friend Royce.” Pearl glared and took a step back, brandishing the stick before her. “You don’t talk much, do you?”
“Her parents were both killed two months ago while planting,” Thrace told them looking at the girl with sympathetic eyes. “It was daylight and like everyone else they thought they were safe, but it was a stormy day. The clouds had darkened the sky.” Thrace paused then added, “A lot of people have died here.”
“Where is everyone else?” Royce asked.
“They’ll all be in the fields now, bringing in the first cutting of hay, but they’ll be coming back soon, it’s getting late. Pearl minds the pigs for the entire village, don’t you, Pearl?” The girl nodded fiercely, holding her stick with both hands and keeping a wary eye on Hadrian.
“What’s up there?” Royce asked. He had moved down off the green and was looking up the trail as it ran north.
Hadrian followed, leaving Millie with the bucket, her tail swishing vigilantly against a handful of determined flies. Moving past a stand of spruce, Hadrian could see a hill cleared of trees rising just a few hundred yards away. On its crest rested a stockade style wall of hewn logs and in the center a large wooden house.
“That’s the margrave’s castle. The Deacon Tomas has taken on the responsibility of steward until the king appoints a new lord. He’s very nice and I don’t think he’d mind you using the stables, considering there aren’t any other horses in the village. For now just tie them to the well I guess, and we can go see my father.
“Pearl, watch their stuff, and keep the pigs away. If Tad, Hal, or Arvid come back before I do, have them take the horses up to the castle and ask the deacon if they can stable them there, okay?”
The little girl nodded.
“Does she talk?” Hadrian asked.
“Yes, just not very often anymore. Com’on, I’ll take you to-to what used to be my home. Dad’s probably there. It’s not far and a pretty pleasant walk.” She began leading them east along a footpath that ran downhill behind the houses. As they circled around, Hadrian got a better look at the village. He could see more houses, all of them tiny things, most likely single rooms with lofts. There were other smaller structures, a few crated feed bins built on stilts to keep clear of rodents and what looked to be a community outhouse; it too lacked a solid door.
“I’ll ask the Bothwicks to take you in while you’re here. I’m staying with them myself, they-” Thrace stopped. Her hands flew to her face as she sucked in a sudden breath and her lips started to quiver.
Beside the path, not far from the house with the swing, two wooden markers stood freshly driven into the earth. Carved into them were the names Maria and Jessie Caswell.
The Wood farm appeared down the footpath. Several acres lay cleared of trees, most at the bottom of a hill where lush wheat grew in perfectly straight rows. A low stone wall built from carefully stacked rocks ran the perimeter. It was a beautiful field of rich dark earth, well turned, well planted, and well drained.
The homestead itself stood on the rise overlooking the field. The house was a ruined shell, its roof gone, thatch scattered across the yard, blown by the wind. Only a few timbers remained-splintered poles jutting up like broken bones punching through skin. The lower half of the building along with the chimney were both made of irregularly shaped fieldstone and remained mostly intact. Some stones lay in piles where they slipped from their stacks, but the majority appeared eerily untouched.
Little things caught Hadrian’s attention. Mounted beneath one window hung a flower box with a scallop-edge and the image of a deer carved into it. The front door, made of solid oak, had a latch formed of hand-beaten iron, revealing not a single peg or visible joint. The stones that created the walls, alternated colors of gray, rose, and tan, each chipped to a fine flat profile. The curved walkway was bordered with bushes trimmed to resemble a hedge.
Theron Wood sat amidst the ruins of his home. The big farmer, with dark leathery skin, had a short mangle of forgotten gray hair that crowned a face cut by wind and sun. He looked like a part of the earth itself, a gnarled trunk of a great tree with a face like a weathered cliff. He rested on the remaining wall of his home, a grass cutter held between his legs, slowly dragging a sharpening stone along the length of the huge curved scythe blade. Back and forth the stone scrapped while the man stared down at the green field below, an expression on his face Hadrian could only describe as contempt.
“Daddy! I’m back.” Thrace ran to the old farmer hugging him around his neck. “I missed you.”
Theron endured the squeeze and glared at them. “Are these the ones then?”
“Yes. This is Hadrian and Royce. They’ve come all the way from Colnora to help. They can get the weapon Esra told us about.”
“I have a weapon,” the farmer growled and resumed sharpening his blade. The sound was cold and grating.
“This?” Thrace asked. “Your grass cutter? The margrave had a sword, a shield, and armor and he-”
“Not this, I have another weapon, much bigger, much sharper.”
Puzzled, she looked around. The old man offered no insight.
“I don’t need what lies in that tower to kill the beast.”
“But you promised me.”
“And I am a man of my word,” he replied and drew the stone along the edge of the blade once more. “The waiting only made my weapon sharper.” He dipped the stone into a bucket of water that sat beside him. He raised it back to the blade but paused and said, “Every day I wake up, I see Thad’s broken bed and Hickory’s cradle. I see the shattered barrel that Thad made, the fields I planted for him-growing despite me. Best season in a decade. I woulda reaped more than enough to pay for the contract and tools. I woulda had extra. I coulda built him a shop. I might even have afforded a sign and real glass windows. He coulda had a planed wooden door with hinges and studs. His shop woulda been better than any house in the village. Better then the manor. People would walk by and stare, wondering what great man owned such a business. How great an artisan was this town’s cooper that he could manage such a fine store?
“Those bastards back in Glamrendor who wouldn’t let Thad hang a shingle. They would never have seen the like. It woulda had a shake roof and scalloped eaves, a hard oak counter and iron hooks to hold lanterns for when he needed to work late at night to complete all his orders. His barrels would be stacked in a storage shed beside the shop. A beautiful barn-size one, and I would paint it bright red so no one could miss it. I’d ’a got him a wagon too even if I had to build it myself, that way he could send orders all over Avryn-back to Glamrendor too. I’d ’a driven them there myself just to see the shock and anger on their faces.
“Morning! I’d say grinning like a lipless crocodile. Here’s another fine delivery of barrels from Thaddeus Wood, the best cooper in Avryn. They’d cringe and curse. Yep, that boy ’o mine, he’s no farmer, no sir. Starting with him, the Woods were gonna be artisans and shopkeepers.
“This village, it’d have grown. People woulda moved in and started businesses of their own, only Thad’s woulda always been the first, the biggest, and the best. I’d seen to that. Soon this here woulda been a city, a fine city and the Woods the most successful family-a merchant family giv’n money to the arts and riding around in fine carriages. This here house woulda been a true mansion ’cause Thad woulda insisted, but I wouldn’t care ’bout that, no sir. I’d been content just watching Hickory grow up, seeing him learn to read and write-appointed magistrate maybe. My grandson in the black robes! Yes sir, Magistrate Wood is going to court in a fine carriage and me standing there watching him.
“I see it. Every morning I get up; I sit; I look down Stony Hill and I see all of it. It’s right there, right in that field growing in front of me. I haven’t hoed. I haven’t tilled, but look at it. The best crop I ever grew getting taller every day.”
“Daddy, please come back with us to the Bothwicks. It’s getting late.”
“This is my home!” the old man shouted, but not at her. His eyes were still on the field. He scraped the blade again. Thrace sighed.
There was a long silence.
“You and your friends go. I swore not to seek it, but there is always a chance it might come to me.”
“But, Daddy-”
“I said take them and go. I don’t need you here.”
Thrace glanced at Hadrian. There were tears in her eyes. Her lips trembled. She stood for a moment, wavering, then abruptly broke and ran back up the path toward town. Theron ignored her. The old farmer tilted the blade of his grass cutter to the other side and resumed sharpening. Hadrian watched him for a moment, the sounds of the stone on metal drowning out Thrace’s fading sobs. He never looked up, not at Hadrian, not to glance down the trail. The man was indeed a rock.
Hadrian found Thrace only a few dozen yards up the trail. She was on her knees crying. Her small body jerked, her hair rocking with the movement. He placed his hand gently on her shoulder. “Your father is right. That weapon of his is very sharp.”
Royce caught up with them carrying a fractured piece of wood. He looked down at Thrace with an uncomfortable expression.
“What’s up?” Hadrian asked before Royce said anything callous.
“What do you think of this?” Royce replied, holding out the scrap that might have been part of the house framing. The beam was wide and thick, good strong oak taken from the trunk of a well aged tree. The piece bore four deeply cut gouges.
“Claw marks?” Hadrian took the wood and placed his hand against the board with his fingers splayed out. “Giant claw marks.”
Royce nodded. “Whatever it is, it’s huge. So how come no one has seen it?”
“It gets very dark here,” Thrace told them, wiping her cheeks as she stood. A curious expression crossed her face and she walked to where a yellow-flowered forsythia grew at the base of a maple tree. Taking a hesitant step, Thrace bent down and drew back what Hadrian thought was a wad of cloth and old grass. As she carefully cleaned away the leaves and sticks he saw it was a crude doll with thread for hair and X’s sewn for eyes.
“Yours?” Hadrian ventured.
She shook her head but did not speak. After a moment Thrace replied, “I made this for Hickory, Thad’s son. It was his Wintertide gift, his favorite. He carried it everywhere.” Plucking the last bits of grass from the doll, she rubbed it. “There’s blood on it,” her voice quivered. Clutching the doll to her chest she said softly, “He forgets-they were my family too.”
Royce guessed it was still early evening when they returned to the village common, but already the light was fading, the invisible sun quickly consumed by the great trees. The little girl and her herd of pigs were gone and so were their horses and gear. In their place, they found a host of people rushing about with an urgency that left him uneasy.
Men crossed the clearing carrying hoes, axes, and piles of split wood over their shoulders. Most were barefoot, dressed in sweat-stained tunics. Women came behind, carrying bundles of twigs, reeds, thick marsh grasses, and stalks of flax. They too traveled barefoot with their hair pulled up, hidden under simple cloth wraps. Royce could see why Thrace made such a big deal out of the dress they bought her as all the village women wore simple homemade smocks of the same natural off-white color, lacking any adornment.
They looked hot and tired, focused on reaching the shelter of their homes and dumping their burdens. As the three approached the village, one boy looked up and stopped. He had a long handled hoe across his shoulders, his arm threaded around it.
“Who’s that?” he said.
This got the attention of those nearby. An older woman glared, still clutching her bag of twigs. A bare-chested man with thick, powerful arms lowered his pack of wood, holding tight to his axe. The topless man glanced at Thrace who was still wiping her red eyes, and advanced on them, shifting the axe to his right hand.
“Vince, we got visitors!” he shouted.
A shorter, older man with a poorly kept beard turned his head and dropped his bundle as well. He looked at the boy who first spotted them. “Tad, go fetch your pa.” The boy hesitated. “Go now son!”
The boy ran off toward the houses.
“Thrace honey,” the old woman said, “are you alright?”
The bearded man glared at them, “What they do to you girl?”
As the men advanced, Royce and Hadrian moved together, each one looking expectantly at Thrace. Royce’s hand slipped into the folds of his cloak.
“Oh no!” Thrace burst out. “They didn’t do anything.”
“Doesn’t look like nothing. Disappear for weeks and you pop up crying dressed like-”
Thrace shook her head. “I’m fine. It’s just my father-”
The men stopped. They kept a wary eye on the strangers, but shot looks of sympathy at Thrace.
“Theron’s a fine man,” Vince told her, “a strong man. He’ll come around, you’ll see. He just needs some time.”
She nodded, but it was forced.
“Now, who might you two be?”
“This is Hadrian and Royce,” Thrace finally got around to saying, “from Colnora in Warric. I asked them here to help. This is Mr. Griffin, the village founder.”
“Came out here with an axe, a knife, and not much else-the rest of these poor souls were foolish enough to follow, on account I told them life was better and they was stupid enough to believe me.” He extended his hand. “Just call me Vince.”
“I’m Dillon McDern,” the big, bare-chested man said, “I’m the smith round here. Figure you fellas might want to know that. You got horses, right? My boys say they took two up to the manor a bit ago.”
“This is Mae,” Vince said, presenting the old woman. She nodded solemnly. Now that it was clear that Thrace was all right, the old woman slouched, the look in her eyes became dull and distant as she turned away with her bundle of twigs.
“Don’t mind her. She’s-well, Mae’s had it hard lately.” He glanced at Dillon who nodded.
The boy sent running returned with another man. Older than McDern, younger than Griffin, thinner than both, he dragged his feet as he walked, his eyes squinting despite the dim light. In his hands he held a small pig that struggled to escape.
“Why’d you bring your pig, Russell?” Griffin asked.
“Boy said, you needed me-said it was an emergency.”
Griffin glanced at Dillon who looked back and shrugged. “You find emergencies often call for pigs, do you?”
Russell scowled. “I just got hold of her. She gets riled up with Pearl all day, hard as can be to catch her. No way I’m letting her go with night coming on. What is it? What’s the emergency?”
“Turns out there ain’t one. False alarm,” Griffin said.
Russell shook his head. “By Mar, Vince, scare a body to death. Next you’ll be swinging from the bell rope just to see folks faint.”
“Twarn’t on purpose,” he dipped his head at Royce and Hadrian. “We thought these fellas were up to something.”
Russell looked at them. “Visitors, eh? Where’d you two come from?”
“Colnora,” Thrace answered, “I invited them. Esra said they could help my father. I was hoping you’d let them stay with us.”
Russell looked at her and sighed heavily, a frown pulling hard at the corners of his mouth.
“Oh, well-ah, that’s okay, I guess,” Thrace stumbled looking embarrassed. “I can ask Deacon Tomas if he’ll-”
“Of course, they can stay with us, Thrace. You know better than to even ask.” Tucking the pig under one arm, he placed his hand to the side of her face and rubbed her cheek. “It’s just that, well Lena and me-we was sure you were gone for good. Figured you’d found a new home, maybe.”
“I’d never leave my father.”
“No. No, I ’spose you wouldn’t. You and your pa-you’re alike that way. Rocks, the both of you, and Maribor help the plow that finds either of you in its path.”
The pig made an attempt to escape, twisting, kicking its legs and squealing. Russell caught it just in time. “Need to get back. The wife will be after me. Com’on, Thrace, and bring your friends.” He led them toward the clump of tiny houses. “By Mar girl, where’d you get that dress?”
Royce remained where he was as the rest started to go. Hadrian gave him a curious look but continued ahead with the others. Royce remained on the trail, unmoving, watching the villagers racing the light: fetching water, hanging out clothes, gathering animals. Pearl wandered past the well, her herd of pigs reduced to only two. Mae Drundel came out of her house, her kerchief pulled free, her gray hair hanging. Unlike the rest, she walked slowly. She crossed to the side of her home, where Royce noticed three markers like those of the Caswell’s. She stood for a moment, knelt down for a time, then walked slowly back inside. She was the last villager to disappear indoors.
That left only Royce and the man at the well.
He was no farmer.
Royce spotted him the moment they returned, his long slender frame leaning silently against the side of the wellhead, resting in shadow where he nearly faded into the background. The man’s hair hung loose to his shoulders, dark with a few threads of gray. He had high cheekbones and deep brooding eyes. His long enveloping robe shimmered with the last rays of sunlight. He sat motionless. This was a man comfortable with waiting and well versed in patience.
He did not look old, but Royce knew better. He had not changed much in the two years since Royce, Hadrian, a young prince Alric, and a monk named Myron, aided his escape from Gutaria Prison. The color of his robe was different, yet still not quite discernible. This time Royce guessed it shimmered somewhere between a turquoise and a dark green, as always the sleeves hung down, hiding the absence of his hands. He also bore a beard, but that of course, was new.
They watched each other, staring across the green. Royce walked forward, crossing the distance between them in silence. Two ghosts meeting at a crossroad.
“It’s been a while-Esra is it? Or should I call you Mister Haddon?”
The man tilted his head, lifting his eyes. “I am delighted to see you as well, Royce.”
“How do you know my name?”
“I’m a wizard, or did you miss that from our last meeting?”
Royce paused and smiled. “You know you’re right, I might have, perhaps you should write it down for me lest I forget again.”
Esrahaddon raised an eyebrow. “That’s a bit harsh.”
“How do you know who I am?”
“Well, I did see The Crown Conspiracy while in Colnora. I found the sets pathetic and the orchestration horrible, but the story was good. I particularly loved the daring escape from the tower, and the little monk was hilarious-by far my favorite character. I was also pleased there was no wizard in the tale. I wonder who I should thank for that oversight, certainly not you.”
“They also didn’t use our real names. So again, how do you know it?”
“How would you find out your name, if you were me?”
“I’d ask people that would know. So who did you ask?”
“Would you tell me?”
Royce frowned. “Do you ever answer a question with an answer?”
“Sorry, it’s a habit, I was a teacher most of my free life.”
“Your speech has changed,” Royce observed.
“Thank you for noticing. I worked very hard. I sat in many taverns over the last six months and listened. I have a talent for languages; I speak several. I don’t know all the colloquial terms yet, but the general grammar wasn’t hard to adjust to. It is the same language after all, the dialect you speak is merely-less sophisticated than what I was used to. It’s like talking with a crude accent.”
“So you found out who we were by asking around and watching bad plays and you picked up the language by listening to drunks. Now tell me, why are you here, and why do you want us here?”
Esrahaddon stood up and slowly walked around the well. He looked at the ground where the last light of the sun spilled through the leaves of a poplar tree.
“I could tell you that I am hiding here and that would sound plausible. I could also say that I heard about the plight of this village and came here to help, because that’s what wizards do. Of course, we both know you won’t believe those answers. So let’s save time. Why don’t you tell me why I am here? Then you can try and judge by my reaction if you are correct or not, since that’s what you’re planning to do anyway.”
“Were all wizards as irritating as you are?”
“Much worse, I’m afraid. I was one of the youngest and nicest.”
A young man, Royce thought his name was Tad, trotted over with a bucket. “It’s getting late,” he said with a harried look filling his bucket with water. A few yards away Royce spotted a woman struggling to pull a stubborn goat into a house as a small boy pushed the animal from behind.
“Tad!” a man shouted, and the boy at the well turned abruptly.
“Coming!”
He smiled and nodded at each of them, grabbed his bucket of water and ran back the way he came, spilling half the contents in the process.
They were alone again.
“I think you’re here because you need something from Avempartha,” Royce told the wizard. “And I don’t think it is a sword of demon-slaying either. You’re using this poor girl and her tormented father to lure me and Hadrian here to turn a knob you obviously can’t manage.”
Esrahaddon sighed. “That’s disappointing. I thought you were smarter than that, and these constant references to my disability are dull. I am not using anyone.”
“So you are saying there really is a weapon in that tower?”
“That is exactly what I am saying.”
Royce studied him for a moment and scowled.
“Can’t tell if I am lying or not, can you?” Esrahaddon smiled smugly.
“I don’t think you’re lying, but I don’t think you’re telling the truth either.”
The wizard’s eyebrows rose. “Now that’s better. There might be hope for you yet.”
“Maybe there is a weapon in that tower. Maybe it can help kill this-whatever it is they have here, but maybe you also conjured the beast in the first place as an excuse to drag us here.”
“Logical,” Esrahaddon said, nodding. “Morbidly manipulative, but I can see the reasoning. Only if you recall, the attacks on this village started while I was still imprisoned.”
Royce scowled again. “So, why are you here?”
Esrahaddon smiled. “Something you need to understand my boy is that wizards are not fonts of information. You should at least know this much-the farmer Theron and his daughter would be dead today if I hadn’t arrived and sent her to fetch you.”
“Alright. Your purpose here is none of my business, I can accept that. But why am I here? You can tell me that much, can’t you? Why go to the bother of finding out our names and locating us in Colnora-which was really impressive by the way-when you could have gotten any thief to pick your lock and open the tower for you?”
“Because not just anyone will do. You are the only one I know who can open Avempartha.”
“Are you saying I am the only thief you know?”
“It helps if you actually listen to what I say. You are the only one I know who can open Avempartha.”
Royce glared at him.
“There is a monster here that kills indiscriminately,” Esrahaddon told him with great and unexpected seriousness. “No weapon made by man can harm it. It comes at night and people die. Nothing will stop it except the sword that lies in that tower. You need to find a way inside and get that sword.”
Royce continued to stare.
“You are right. That is not the whole truth, but it is the truth nonetheless and all that I am willing to explain…for now. To learn more you need to get inside.”
“Stealing swords,” Royce muttered mostly to himself. “Okay, let’s take a look at this tower. The sooner I see it the sooner I can start cursing.”
“No,” the wizard replied. He looked back at the ground where the sun had already faded. He glanced up at the darkening sky. “Night is coming and we need to get indoors. In the morning we will go, but tonight we hide with the rest.”
Royce considered the wizard for a moment. “You know when I first met you there was all this talk about you being this scary wizard that could call lightning and raise mountains and now you can’t even fight a little monster, or open an old tower. I thought you were more powerful than this.”
“I was,” Esrahaddon said and for the first time the wizard held up his arms letting his sleeves fall back revealing the stumps where his hands should have been. “Magic is a little like playing the fiddle. It’s damn hard to do without hands.”
Dinner that evening was a vegetable pottage, a weak stew consisting of leeks, celery, onions, and potatoes in a thin broth. Hadrian took only a small portion that was far from filling, but he found it surprisingly tasty, filled with a mixture of unusual flavors that left a burning sensation in his mouth.
Lena and Russell Bothwick made good on their promise to put them up for the night, a kindness made all the more generous when they discovered how cramped the little house was. The Bothwicks had three children, four pigs, two sheep, and a goat they called Mammy, all of whom clustered in the single open room. Mosquitoes joined them as well, taking over the night shift from the flies. It was hard to breathe in the house filled with smoke, the scent of animals, and the steam from the stew pot. Royce and Hadrian staked out a bit of earth as near the open doorway as possible and sat on the floor.
“I didn’t know the first thing about farming,” Russell Bothwick was saying. Like most men in the village, he was dressed in a frayed and flimsy shirt that hung to his knees, belted around the waist with a length of twine. There were large, dark circles under his eyes, another trait consistent with the other inhabitants of Dahlgren. “I was a candle maker back in Drismoor. I worked as a journeyman in a trade shop on Hithil Street. It was Theron who kept us alive our first year here. We woulda starved or froze to death if not for Theron and Addie Wood. They took us under their wing and helped build this house. It was Theron that taught me how to plow a field.”
“Addie was my midwife when I had the twins,” Lena said while ladling out bowls, which Thrace handed to the children. The twin girls and Tad, exiled to the loft, looked down from their beds of straw, chins on hands, eyes watchful. “And Thrace here was our babysitter.”
“There was never a question about taking her in,” Russell said. “I only wish Theron would come too, but that man is stubborn.”
“I just can’t get over how beautiful that dress is,” Lena Bothwick said again, looking at Thrace and shaking her head. Russell grumbled something, but with a mouthful of stew, no one understood him.
Lena scowled. “Well it is.”
She stopped talking about it, but continued to stare. Lena was a gaunt woman with light brown hair, cut straight and short, giving her a boyish look. Her nose came to a point so sharp it looked like it could cut parchment. She had a rash of freckles and no eyebrows to speak of. The children all took after her, each sporting the same cropped hairstyle, son and daughters alike, while Russell had no hair at all.
Thrace entertained them with stories of her adventure to the big city, of the sights and number of people she found there. She explained that Hadrian and Royce took her to a lavish hotel. This brought worried looks from Lena but she relaxed as more details were revealed. Thrace raved about her bath in a hot water tub with perfumed soap and how she spent the night in a huge feather bed under a solid beamed roof. She never mentioned the Tradesmen’s Arch, or what happened underneath it.
Lena was mesmerized to the point of nearly letting the remainder of the stew boil over. Russell continued to grunt and grumble his way through the meal. Esrahaddon sat with his back to the side wall between Lena’s spinning wheel and the butter churn. His robe was now a dark gray. He was so quiet he could have been just a shadow. During dinner, Thrace spoon-fed the wizard.
How must that feel? Hadrian thought while watching them. What is it like to have held so much power and now unable to even hold a spoon?
After dinner, while helping Lena clean up Thrace was placing the washed bowls on a shelf and called out, “I remember this plate.” A smile appeared on her face as she spotted the only ceramic dish in the house. The pale white oval with delicate blue traceries lay carefully tucked in a back corner of the cupboard with all the other treasured family heirlooms. “I remember when I was little, Jessie Caswell and I-” she stopped and the house quieted. Even the children stopped fussing.
Lena stopped cleaning the dishes and put her arms around Thrace, pulling her close. Hadrian noticed lines on the woman’s face he had not seen previously. The two stood before the bucket of dirty water and silently cried together. “You shouldn’t have come back,” Lena whispered. “You should have stayed in that hotel with those people.”
“I can’t leave him,” Hadrian heard Thrace’s small voice muffled by Lena’s shoulder. “He’s all I have left.”
Thrace pulled back and Lena struggled to offer her a smile.
It was dark outside now. From his vantage point at the doorway, Hadrian could not see much of anything-a tiny patch of moonlight scattered here and there. Fireflies blinked leaving trails of light. The rest was lost in the vast black of the forest.
Russell pulled over a stool to sit across from Royce and Hadrian. Lighting a long clay pipe with a thin sliver of wood, he commented, “So, you two are here to help Theron kill the monster?”
“We’ll do what we can,” Hadrian replied.
Russell puffed hard on his pipe to ensure it lit and then crushed the burning tip of the wooden sliver into the dirt floor. “Theron is over fifty years old. He knows the sharp end of a pitchfork from the handle, but I don’t ’spect he’s ever held a sword. Now you two look to me like the kind of fellas that have seen a fight up close and Hadrian here not only has a sword-he’s got three. A man carries three swords he, like as not, knows how to use ’em. Seems to me, a couple fellas like you could do more than just help an old man get himself killed.”
“Russell!” Lena reprimanded. “They’re our guests. Why don’t you scald them with hot water while you’re at it?”
“I just don’t want to see that damn fool kill himself. If the margrave and his knights didn’t stand a chance, how well will Theron do out there? An old man with that scythe of his. What’s he trying to prove? How brave he is?”
“He’s not trying to prove anything,” Esrahaddon said suddenly and his voice silenced the room like a plate dropping. “He’s trying to kill himself.”
“What?” Russell asked.
“He’s right,” Hadrian said, “I’ve seen it before. Soldiers-career soldiers-brave men just reach a point where it’s all too much. It can be anything that sets them off-one too many deaths, a friend dying, or even something as trivial as a change in the weather. I knew a man once who led charges in dozens of battles. It wasn’t until a dog he befriended was butchered for food that he gave up. Of course, a fighter like that can’t surrender, can’t just quit. He needs to go out swinging. So they rush in unguarded, picking a battle they can’t win.”
“Then I needn’t have wasted your time,” Thrace said. “If my father doesn’t want to live-whatever is in the tower can’t save him.”
Hadrian regretted speaking and added, “Every day your father is alive there is the chance he can find hope again.”
“Your father will be fine, Thrace,” Lena told her. “That man is tough as granite. You’ll see.”
“Mom,” one of the kids from the loft called.
Lena ignored the child. “You shouldn’t listen to these people talking about your father that way. They don’t know him.”
“Mom.”
“Honestly, telling a poor girl something like that right after she’s lost her family.”
“Mom!”
“What on earth is it, Tad?” Lena nearly screamed at the child.
“The sheep. Look at the sheep.”
Everyone noticed it then. Crowded into the corner of the room, the sheep were quiet through the meal. A content wooly pile that Hadrian forgot was there. Now they pushed each other struggling against the wooden board Russell had put up. The little bell around Mammy’s neck rang as the goat shifted uneasily. One of the pigs bolted for the door and Thrace and Lena tackled it just in time.
“Kids. Get down here!” Lena shouted in a whisper.
The three children descended the ladder with precision movements, veterans of many drills. Their mother gathered them near her in the center of the house. Russell got off his stool and doused the fire with the wash water.
Darkness enveloped them. No one spoke. Outside the crickets stopped chirping. The frogs fell silent an instant later. The animals continued to shift and stomp. Another pig bolted. Hadrian heard its little feet skitter across the dirt floor in the direction of the door. Beside him he felt Royce move, then silence.
“Here, someone take this,” Royce whispered. Tad crawled toward the sound and took the pig from him.
They waited.
The sound began faint and hollow. A puffing, thought Hadrian, like bellows stoking a furnace. It grew nearer, louder, less airy-deep and powerful. The sound rose overhead and Hadrian instinctively looked up, but found only the darkness of the ceiling. His hands moved to the pommels of his swords.
Thrump. Thrump. Thrump.
They sat huddled in the darkness, listening, as the sound withdrew then grew louder once more. A pause-total silence. Inside the house, even the sound of breathing vanished.
Crack!
Hadrian jumped at the loud burst as if a tree across the common exploded. Snapping, tearing, splintering, a war of violent noise erupted. A scream. A woman’s voice. The shriek cut across the common, hysterical and frantic.
“Oh dear Maribor! That’s Mae,” Lena cried.
Hadrian leapt to his feet. Royce was already up.
“Don’t bother,” Esrahaddon told them. “She’s dead, and there’s nothing you can do. The monster cannot be harmed by your weapons. It-”
The two were out the door.
Royce was quicker and raced across the common toward the little house of Mae Drundel. Hadrian could not see a thing and found himself blindly chasing Royce’s footfalls.
The cries stopped-a harsh, abrupt end.
Royce halted and Hadrian nearly plowed through him.
“What is it?”
“Roof is ripped away. There’s blood all over the walls. She’s gone. It’s gone.”
“It? Did you see something?”
“Through a patch in the canopy-just for a second, but it was enough.”