Fire Within: Book Two of Fire and Stone (Stories of Fire and Stone 2) (41 page)

“Captain Langson,” Esset greeted him warmly once the captain was in earshot.

“Summoner Esset, good to see you again,” the captain replied, extending a hand. They clasped hands firmly and the captain pulled Esset in to give him a thump on the back.

“Heard tell you were dead. Nice to see news lied,” the captain said, eyeing Esset up and down.

“Not a lie, precisely, but it’s good to be among the living,” Esset responded with a grin. The captain turned and the two of them began walking towards the inner courtyard.

“And your brother? It’s strange to see the two of you apart,” Captain Langson inquired.

“He’s well,” Esset assured him.

“Well let’s catch up over a flagon of spiced ale,” the captain said cheerfully. “I can give you the latest news on what’s been going on up here, and you can tell me what you lads have been up to since last I saw you.”

“As tempting as that sounds, I didn’t just come to pay a visit,” Esset said. Captain Langson measured him with a calculating look before shrugging.

“Well, these are the cold reaches of Baliya. We don’t talk business without spiced ale either.” With that, Captain Langson refused to speak further until they were seated in his office with said flagon and they’d each taken their first sip. Esset had never cared much for spiced ale, for all that it did wonders for chasing away the cold, but he took a small sip just to get conversation moving again.

“How much do you know about a mage named Moloch?” Esset began.

“Moloch, eh? I’ve heard the name. Thought he was some kind of bogeyman made up to scare little ones into good behavior. ‘Eat your greens or Moloch will get you!’ and stuff like that,” Langson replied, watching Esset carefully, since he now knew from Esset’s question that he’d been wrong.

“Unfortunately, he’s quite real. He’s a Dark Mage of incredible power and cruelty. Toman’s predecessor died fighting him, and the two of us nearly followed suit a little over two years ago. But recently we managed to strike a hefty blow against him and sent him on the run. Now we know he’ll try to rebuild his power base and seek revenge,” Esset explained.

“And you think he’ll come here,” Captain Langson added, extrapolating from the information he’d been given.

“It seems likely,” Esset confirmed. “This is where our names first became known.”

“Hmm.”

Esset remained silent while Captain Langson mulled over the news. Esset knew the captain had a sharp mind, one skilled in putting together disparate bits of information to form a whole picture. And given that Captain Langson liked keeping tabs on every bit of news he could glean, no matter how trivial-seeming, it was likely that if Moloch were here, the captain would have heard evidence of it.

“Since we wrapped up the war, it’s been blessedly quiet in our mountains,” Captain Langson finally said. “But in the last week there’ve been reports of folks going missing and turning up dead. Problem is, by the time we find the bodies, it’s impossible to tell how they died. Up until now we’ve been assuming that the animals eating them were killing them too, but maybe not. Folks have only been vanishing from outlying areas.”

“That’s likely how he’d start,” Esset said, not wanting to jump to conclusions but acknowledging that Moloch’s involvement was possible. “He’d need to kill a few discreetly to stockpile a bit of power before he starts laying waste to whole towns and villages and going after bigger targets.”

“Bigger than a whole town?” Captain Langson asked, his narrow eyebrows rising.

“I think he’d try to level Castle Ballan. And I think he’d have more than a chance at succeeding,” Esset replied.

“Lad, we have mages here at the castle. He’d have to—” Captain Langson began, but Esset stopped him with a shake of his head.

“It doesn’t matter. I told you—he’s powerful and he’s cruel, but more than that, he’s smart. He’d get your mages one way or another,” Esset assured him grimly.

“This castle has stood for hundreds of years against foes of all kinds, mages included,” the captain said. He couldn’t seem to wrap his head around the concept of a man as powerful as Moloch.

“Be that as it may, Moloch is in another power bracket entirely,” Esset replied.

“Then what do
you
plan to do against him? You’ve got some handy magic, lad, but you’re not that strong,” Captain Langson said.

“I wasn’t before, but I’ve grown a lot since the last time you saw me, and I’ve learned a lot about Moloch. I believe we can stop him,” Esset said. Captain Langson met his eyes and held him, once against taking his measure. Even as Esset held his gaze, the summoner wondered what the captain saw. Whatever it was, it seemed to convince him.

“Very well. So how do we go about catching him?”

“We start with the missing people. Hopefully we can find him before he escalates to slaughtering whole villages. If you show me on a map where to start, I’ll be off immediately,” Esset said. Captain Langson gave him another implacable look.

“Negative, lad. You’re in no shape to scout, and it’s almost dark besides.
We
start in the morning. Now you finish that ale and hit the sack. I think you’re done with barracks—it isn’t wartime anymore, after all—so I’ll get a servant to take you to a spare room in the keep. Crack o’ dawn, meet me in the barracks and we can get started. I won’t hear any argument out of you either. Dismissed,” the captain ordered him.

Esset had never been a soldier, not officially, but he’d learned to follow orders just the same. Besides, despite his sense of urgency, Esset knew the captain was right. Tired men got sloppy and made mistakes—they missed things. That was why he obeyed. Esset felt Captain Langson’s eyes on him as he downed his ale, nodded, and left.

A pre-dawn glow was just beginning to lighten the sky as Esset stepped into the courtyard. The cold bit the exposed skin on his face and the air he breathed burned with its icy tang. Esset stepped briskly across the courtyard, eager to be in where it was warm and then off on the back of one of his self-heated mounts. He knew it wasn’t truly that cold—he just hadn’t acclimated to this weather, having come so quickly from warmer provinces—but that knowledge didn’t make him feel any warmer. He didn’t waste time knocking before pushing open the barracks door.

The door opened to the mess hall, a long room with four long tables. Normally the room was quite busy, but given the early hour, there were only a few off-duty guards in the room. Esset scanned the faces, smiling and nodding as he recognized two of them, then walked over as the captain waved to him.

“I should have known,” Captain Langson said, smiling. “I say dawn, and you show up before.”

“I could’ve sworn you said we’d start at dawn,” Esset replied with a cheeky grin.

“Yeah, right,” the captain said. “Never mind. We’re up, we might as well get started over breakfast. Grab a bowl of gruel from the cook, and I’ll get the map spread.” A couple minutes later they were pouring over the map and Captain Langson pointed out where he’d heard reports from.

“Well, I’d best be going then. I’ll check in—tonight if I can—” Esset began.

“No, I’m going with you,” the captain said.

“But captain—”

“No buts. These are my people, and I won’t be some remote figure on a hilltop when my people need me. I would have ridden out to them before, but I couldn’t afford to be away for so long. Your fliers will make a personal investigation possible.” Captain Langson turned and waved to get another officer’s attention. The officer came over and saluted when he stopped before the table.

“Officer Vern, I’m appointing you Acting Captain until I return,” the captain said.

“Yes, Captain,” Officer Vern responded promptly, saluting again.

“Good, all taken care of. Let’s go, Summoner,” the captain said, rising. “I already briefed Officer Vern earlier, so we can be on our way.” Once again, Esset knew better than to argue.

The sun was just cracking over the horizon when they opened the door outside. The sky had a yellow fire all its own as Esset summoned their mounts, twin fiery birds that melted the frost on the stones into puddles beneath them. The raptors shifted distastefully in the wet as Esset swung up onto the back of one and waited for Langson to mount the other.

Esset watched in amusement at the captain’s hesitation. The creature was perfectly safe under Esset’s control, of course, but it was still intimidating. The fiery bird’s talons glowed with blazing heat, like blades fresh from the forge, and its viciously curved beak was of similar design. One blazing eye kept a sharp eye on Captain Langson, wide and unblinking. It didn’t help that the entire bird seemed to be made of coals and flame; without any further knowledge, common sense would rule not to touch the creature for fear of being burned. But the captain knew that they were safe to touch—as long as one avoided the beak—so after mastering that instinctive fear, he followed Esset’s lead and climbed onto the bird’s back.

Esset bade his mount to take flight, and a moment after, got Captain Langson’s to follow. There was always a certain amount of lurching when taking flight, but on the whole, the flight of summons wasn’t natural. Where normal beasts that flew without magic would have to sometimes compensate or take measures, a summon could simply cut through the air. High winds were less of an issue for them, for Esset suspected a great deal of their flight was managed with magic—at least when they were in this world. Esset couldn’t speculate on their own. Fortunately, that meant that flights were smoother via summon than if they’d had a real-world creature to fly on the back of.

Once they reached a desirable altitude, Esset had the birds circle once so he could get his bearings, then sent them like arrows towards their target, a small village at the far edge of Baliya’s territory. It didn’t take long to get there by air, and soon they were interviewing the village folk about the last man who’d died.

“There’s been another since your guards came around,” the village healer told them. “And there’ve been…sightings.”

“You mentioned last time that wolves have been thick around here lately,” Captain Langson said, but the healer shook her head.

“Nay, not wolves. Well, we have, but that’s not what I meant.” She seemed hesitant to say more.

“What did you see?” Esset asked, careful to coax gently.

“Now I’m not one to buy into every folk-tale and monster story, but it’s real, y’hear?” the healer began defensively. Esset and Captain Langson exchanged the fleetest of glances.

“What did you see?” Esset asked again.

“Death. It’s Death. Little Milly saw him first, up on the cliffs, but we all thought she was frightening at shadows. But then old Glen saw it, and Morris, and Sadie, and… It ain’t no shadow, ’tis Death himself. He’s stalking around our little village, where our lives are all we have to offer,” the healer said.

Esset and the captain tried to get more information than that, but every person in the village remembered Death differently. Some said he was cloaked all in black, others said he was armored, and still others said he wore nothing at all, and was but a black skeleton. Some said he carried a hundred blades, while others said his hands were blades, and others yet said he was unarmed, but surely killed with his eyes if you saw them, deep within his cowl. Finally Esset and the captain gave up.

“You said there was another body,” Captain Langson prompted the healer, after they’d circled back around.

“Aye, ’twas Efrem, you remember that strapping young lad who was our blacksmith? Like the others, his body was torn to pieces, but… But it weren’t like last time. No animals did this. ’Twas Death, I tell you!” The healer was nearly hysterical; the captain just nodded.

“Thank you, Healer Tara. We’ll investigate this, never you worry. We won’t have Death lurking about our kingdom long,” Captain Langson reassured her. The healer nodded but didn’t look convinced as they turned to leave. Esset opened his mouth to say something, but the captain shook his head.

“Let’s take a look up the hills there, then we’ll talk,” he said. Esset caught his drift and nodded—best not to be in earshot of the village. Who knew what was happening.

They did a sweep of the surrounding area and found nothing, unsurprisingly. If Moloch
was
around, it was unlikely that he’d be so careless as to leave clues. After conferring on the matter briefly, Esset and the captain decided to keep going and see if the other reports were similar. They went to the next town, a farming community in a low valley, still along the edge of Baliya’s borders. Esset steered their mounts low over the mountains and landed the birds by the bridge on the side of town. Landing them in town tended to spook the locals. He didn’t notice the sentry until he heard the twang of a bowstring and jerked his head in the direction of the sound.

Reflex acted faster than thought; Captain Langson was closer to the archer than Esset, so he had been the target, but Esset didn’t even register that before the gem in his chest blazed and the arrow was reduced to ash. The arrow was so close that some of the ash drifted against Captain Langson’s tunic—clearly the uniform of a captain of Baliya. The incantation for a wolf spilled from Esset’s lips and the fiery beast made a beeline for the archer, who shrieked and dropped his bow. Only then did Esset take in the man’s appearance—plain clothes, work-worn and dirty, with just that simple bow as his only weapon. The summoner had time to direct his creature to grab the bow and snap it instead of attacking the man, and then Esset banished it.