Bastial Sentinels (The Rhythm of Rivalry: Book 5) (14 page)

“I understand,” Micah said.

All of Jek’s worries had been left at the door. He was glad Micah felt the same way. Perhaps they actually could relax for an evening.

The innkeeper put Jek and Micah in a second-floor room with two beds. The guards shared rooms as well. The men seemed happier without their armor and swords, all smiling as they took an entire table for themselves and waited for their food.

That left little room for Jek and Micah, so they sat at a small table for two in the corner. The bard had begun to play and sing. He had a soothing voice and didn’t sing so loud as to demand attention. Jek recognized the song immediately. It had become popular in just the last year, though Jek had learned the words when he was a child.

The bard was at the middle of the song—a surprising bridge that turned the love story toward a sad ending. Jek thought it was an odd choice of song, as everyone in the common room was in high spirits, many with their hands clasped around mugs of ale. Jek decided to join them in ignoring the lyrics, listening only to the swaying melody, light and hopeful.

Servers wearing wide and seemingly genuine smiles brought in plates of steaming meat. Applause broke out, drowning out the song. But the bard simply grinned and continued.

Glimpsing all the happy faces, Jek smiled, too, until he sensed someone glaring at him. The stranger wore a cloak, its hood putting his face in shadow. The moment their gazes locked, the man looked over at a woman seated beside him. She turned to glance over her shoulder at Jek. Without even feigning a smile, she held him with her gaze for a heartbeat before turning back to her companion. The way her stare had burrowed into him reminded him of the Elven woman who’d killed Danvell. The hooded man’s eyes kept drifting back and forth between Jek and the woman. The lack of subtlety made him nervous.

A server came between their tables with two plates of food and set them down for Jek and Micah.

“Thank you,” Micah said.

She curtsied and returned to the kitchen.

“Did you notice the woman and hooded man seated a few tables to your left?” Jek whispered.

“Yes.” Micah began to eat without looking up. “They’ve been glancing over here.”

“So let’s go over there and ask why,” Jek said, shifting as he readied to stand.

“What?” With wide eyes, Micah looked at Jek as if he’d suggested they remove their pants and dance on the stage. “No.” He used his whole face to gesture for Jek to stay in his seat. “Just give it some time to see what we can figure out. Remember that we aren’t exactly welcome here.”

Jek tried to ignore the urge to confront the man, focusing instead on his delicious meal and the singer. He soon found it impossible to relax. If he wasn’t going to get up, he felt he at least should talk to Micah about Fatholl or Lake Mercy.

On second thought, he was in no mood. The hours of worry had exhausted him.

After Micah stifled a burp with his hand and pushed his empty plate aside, he discreetly turned toward the hooded man and woman, watching silently.

“Can you use psyche?” Jek wondered.

“I am. Give me a moment.”

Jek knew patience was one of his biggest weaknesses. There were some people who could ignore a dubious hooded man who kept glancing over, but Jek had hardly enjoyed his meal because of it. Lisanda had compared him to a dog, ready to bark at anyone who looked at him the wrong way. Micah was the opposite, like a leopard using the cover of night to stalk his prey. Even the way he glanced over was inconspicuous, making it look like he was intently listening to the lute player’s song.

“Damn,” Micah muttered. “Both of them are psychics.”

Jek stood out of reflex, unsure what he had planned.

“Sit down,” Micah demanded, furious desperation in his eyes. Once Jek obeyed, Micah whispered, “I’m not sensing any aggression. But they certainly know I’m a psychic now.”

Jek couldn’t keep his gaze from darting to them again and again. The psychics were plainly looking back now, without a care of being noticed.

“Is there any way for you to tell if they’re Elves?” Jek asked.

“Not from psyche, though I believe they are. I’ve never encountered two Humans together with psyche as strong as those two. She probably has her ears pinned back and hidden by her hair. And whatever his hair doesn’t conceal, his hood is doing the rest.”

“What are the chances two psychic Elves aren’t part of Fatholl’s army?” Jek asked rhetorically. “Probably none.”

“But there is a chance they don’t know who we are,” Micah answered, “and an even better chance they wouldn’t hurt us if they did. Let’s just ignore them.”

Jek was dumbfounded. “How can you say that?”

Micah’s eyes rolled on their way to Jek’s face. “What would you have us do instead? Attack them in the middle of this inn?”

That would be better than ignoring them,
Jek wanted to say, though he held his tongue and took a few breaths to think.

“Let’s at least go over there and see what they want,” he suggested.

“And then what?”

Jek hadn’t thought the rest through. “It depends on what they say.”

“It’s better if we don’t. They’ll probably just tell us they needed a place to eat and sleep.”

“But you can tell if they’re lying.”

“Yes, but they can do the same to me. They’ll ask who we are if they don’t know already. I don’t see how any good can come from the conversation. It could lead to aggression, and fighting two Elves in the middle of an inn in Hillwak would be foolhardy. Whatever they’re doing for Fatholl, our going over to their table isn’t going to stop it. Don’t you see that?”

“I do.” It was just so hard to let them sit there, though. Jek felt the need to leave the common room in order to control himself. He stood. “I’m going to request a bath and then settle into our room for the night.”

“That’s a good idea.”

Like every other night, his darkness came and killed him in his sleep, this time slicing open his stomach with an ax. He awoke with his heart racing. Micah was sitting up in bed beside him, his dark hair hanging over his forehead and ears, his eyes black in the moonlight.

“Did this happen to you last night when we were sleeping on the grass?” he asked.

“Yes. You slept through it.”

“I was so tired, I’m not surprised.” Micah fell silent. “I’ve never seen it before. It’s…terrible. I’m sorry I haven’t found a cure yet.”

“It’s fine. Go back to sleep. I need to clean my wounds.”

Micah looked as if he wanted to say something encouraging but couldn’t think of anything. So he lay back onto the mattress and shut his eyes.

Jek had put out clean towels, water, and bandages by his bed before going to sleep. He dabbed his wounds so that his blood wouldn’t run down to his underwear, gathered everything, and walked to the door. Upon opening it, he heard voices from the common room downstairs. Still behind the door, he sighed despairingly. He wasn’t about to put on his shirt and pants just to walk through the common room, only to remove them again once he was in the bathing quarters. It wasn’t worth the trouble. He just hoped none of the voices belonged to women.

Taking care to be quiet, he came out of his room and peered over the railing. Shocked, he found the sounds were coming from some of his guards. They were…walking out of the inn? They had on their armor, and their bags were in hand. They were leaving!

Jek set down the water and towels as quickly as he could, leaving them in the middle of the hall as he ran down the stairs. He stopped at the bottom and started back up to get Micah. But he changed his mind after only two stairs, turning and running to the front door of the inn. He wanted to stop the guards before they retrieved their horses.

As he ran outside, he halted once again, completely shocked. All seven guards were leaving, not just a few.

“What are you doing?” Jek called to them. It was twilight, and he could just barely see the grimace on their faces. The air was cold, causing him to shiver and wrap his arms around his bare chest. The wound on his stomach stung as the breeze hit it.

“Go back inside,” one man said calmly, “before you freeze.”

“But where are you going?”

They looked at each other. The first man who’d spoken took a step toward him. “Do you even know my name?”

“I don’t,” Jek admitted, suddenly struck with guilt.

“Do you know any of our names?”

Jek shook his head.

“I’m Henry, and we’re leaving now. I don’t recommend you try to stop us. None of us want to hurt you, but we will if we must.”

“You were just going to sneak out during the night and make us wonder what happened?” Jek asked incredulously. “Where are you even going? It’s a crime to abandon your task. And those horses belong to the Goldram Army! Leaving with them would be theft!”

“The Goldram Army and the Takary Army are no longer the same thing,” Henry said coldly. “These horses will still be used for the Goldram Army, but Fatholl will be leading it.”

“You’re traitors!” Jek wasn’t trying to insult them. He was merely expressing his shock.

“Some Elves approached us in the common room after you and Micah retired for the night,” Henry said. “They explained the purpose behind Fatholl’s actions. They convinced us he was the one we should fight for rather than abandon our families in The Nest, only to die at Lake Mercy. Who do you think is going to starve first when the food runs out, us or you and Raymess?”

Henry’s words hurt more than the cut along Jek’s stomach. He’d never felt this way before, privileged and set apart because of it. He still was used to being on the opposite side, feeling the same anger he could see on Henry’s face.

I should’ve taken the time to speak with them, learn their names and ask them about their families.
But it was too late now. All he could do was apologize. It felt so inadequate, but he did it anyway.

“I’m sorry.”

Henry nodded to him. “The Elves say when we see each other on the battlefield we won’t be enemies; we’ll be allies. Let’s hope they’re right.”

Chapter 12:

JEK

Micah hadn’t said much since they’d left Hillwak hours ago, just the two of them.

“It’s a straight ride to the forest of Lake Mercy from here,” he finally told Jek. “Now would be a good time for me to tell you what I know about the conflict there.”

So it looks like we won’t be talking about the guards anymore,
Jek figured. After he’d gone back inside the inn and cleaned his wound, he’d decided not to wake Micah, figuring morning would be soon enough to tell him the bad news. There was no point in disrupting his sleep.

At first, Micah was angry with Jek for not waking him. But after Jek explained the scenario, Micah accepted there was nothing either of them could’ve done. Jek thought the real issue was that they didn’t confront the Elves when they had the chance, though he didn’t share this with Micah. Jek would, however, take it upon himself to make sure nothing like that happened again. The next time such an issue presented itself right in front of them, he wouldn’t ignore it.

“Four weeks before Fatholl attacked the palace, Waywen and Presoren’s armies began marching toward Lake Mercy,” Micah explained. “It was clear they wanted the fort there, and we couldn’t let them take it. The position of the fort, being in the middle of all four territories and directly between us and our allies, made it the most valuable land in the war thus far. The number of enemies marching toward it made it necessary for us to send nearly a third of our army there, and Zav sent just as many. But instead of attacking, our enemies have kept their distance from the fort and surrounded it.”

“To starve us?”

“Yes. The commander of the fort is a man named Tobkin Pott. He and Danvell exchanged messages through pigeons, trying to find a way for the King to organize food delivery to the fort. Two times we tried getting a caravan to them, and both times we failed. Our men were killed, and our enemies took the food for themselves. We started considering abandoning the fort, along with other desperate measures, like poisoning the food in anticipation of being ambushed. But the logistics make it impossible, especially given that those delivering it would need to die in order for the trap to seem genuine.”

“Why can’t we just abandon the fort?” Jek asked.

“Losing the fort would give our enemies the advantage they need to win this war. Still, we’ll have to abandon if we can’t get food there soon. The only luck we’ve had is with small groups taking in bags of food on horseback. But there are about seventy thousand men there now who need to be fed. We need to wheel in hundreds of crates continuously if we can’t get larger deliveries there safely.” Micah stopped to let out a sigh. “It’s clear by now that Fatholl knew Waywen and Presoren were marching. He couldn’t have picked a better time to attack the palace.”

“I’m no expert in warfare, but why don’t our men just go out from the fort and kill the enemies surrounding them?”

“They’ve been fighting this whole time, but the trees make it difficult. We don’t know where our enemies are, and they’re constantly moving. Tobkin has ordered his men to cut down the trees, and they’ve managed to clear those around the lake, but it will take too long to clear the whole forest.”