Ravenwild: Book 01 - Ravenwild (90 page)

Dozens of Trolls, hearing the loud crashes and bangs, now sprinted to the jailhouse from the area where they had been performing their morning maneuvers. Most were heavily armed. One, the first to arrive, attempted to strike her down with a large, spiked battle-mace that he expertly swung, aiming for her head. She caught the ball in mid-swipe and gave a snap of her wrist, causing him to stumble towards her, where she seized him by the front of his uniform with both hands and launched him easily a hundred feet in the air. All stood in awe as he plummeted back to the ground, screaming madly all the way. He landed with a ghastly crunch. Instantly she was beside another, whom she also seized in the same way.

“Would you like to give it a try?” she asked.

“N … n … no,” he stammered.

“I thought not,” she said, shoving him violently backwards. He tripped over his own feet and rolled to a stop.

She stood in a defiant posture with her hands on her hips, glaring at the jailers in front of her.

“Would anyone
else
like to give it a try?”

Nobody moved.

“Smart choice,” she said. “Now get me the captain.”

“H … he doesn’t arise until after nine,” said one.

Once again her movement was nothing more than a blur as she moved to his side and grabbed him by one of his large thumbs, snapping it like a carrot and causing him to shriek in pain.

“Don’t make me ask again,” she growled.

The Troll ran off to awaken the captain, blubbering all the way.

She didn’t wait long.

Orie, Jacqueline, and Cinnamon sat with Forrester, Brutus, and Patriachus in the shadows of a small stand of pine trees that bordered the valley to the south of

The Gate, on the Agden Forest side of the Agden River.

In front of them the battle raged, as the Ravenwild forces attempted to organize enough to retreat from the direct assault on the Troll army that they had launched earlier that morning. They had streamed out of the foothills to the northwest of The Gate at daybreak, confident in their numbers, but whenever the Trolls had counterattacked with their secreted reinforcements, they realized they had been baited and could not possibly hope to prevail in the campaign. So Dorin had ordered the retreat. Forrester studied the battle intently with a critical eye, ever trying to fathom a way that that he and the Wolves might help to turn the tide against the Trolls. Orie and Jacqueline studied the map that was spread out in front of them, Orie whispering constantly to her about the details, forcing her to concentrate on the parchment and not the horrific scene before them. Every once in a while, she would glance up, and he would gently grasp her by the head and lower it to take her eyes off of the fighting. As concerned as he was about her knowing where they were, and the locations of the rest of them in the event that they got separated, or something happened to him, he was equally concerned that she not watch the bloodshed.

Brutus and Patriachus merely waited patiently for the killing to stop for the day. Knowing there was nothing they could do about it, what they saw in the carnage in front of them was food for their mates and as yet unborn pups, nothing more, nothing less.

“Orie?” asked Forrester in a soft voice.

“Yes, Forrester?”

“We need to return to Cirrhus’s farm. Right now.”

“And why is that?”

“Well, it’s hard to explain, but I’m certain that the magic is failing. The magic required to use the portal, the magic to render you visible again. We suspected it before. Now, I’m sure.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Well, up until yesterday, although I’ve been unable to see you in person, you know, in the real world, I have been able to make out your image with the tell-all. A
faint
image, yes, but now you don’t even appear there. This is bad, Orie. I’m positive.”

Forrester handed him the stone. Orie studied it briefly. It was impossible for him to come to any definitive conclusion. He noted the obvious: that his image was clearly absent, and yes it did look dead, but in the end it didn’t matter. What mattered was they had to leave. Now.

He looked at Jacqueline, bent over the map, and nodded in the affirmative. Nobody saw, of course, but this didn’t matter either. They had gotten what they came for. It was time to move on.

“Look here,” he said, pointing to the map, forgetting for the moment that Forrester could not see what he was pointing to. This invisible thing was taking some getting used to. Fortunately, Forrester was bright. “Ryan and Gracie are right here about a third of the way back to Cirrhus’s. We need to see if we can get to them first. Then we can all go to Cirrhus’s, or straight to Mom and Dad. Why do we need to get back to Cirrhus’s anyway?”

“I believe it is safest,” he said. “It only makes sense that whatever power is left will be strongest at the source. If we try to go anywhere else, there’s no way of telling what might happen.”

“You may be right,” said Orie, “but there is no way we’re not going to try to get to Ryan and Gracie first. Absolutely no way.

“But let’s back up a minute. This magic, these spells that you say were laid down by the great wizards thousands of years ago, have lasted all this time. Why would they suddenly fail now? It doesn’t make any sense to me.”

“Nor to me,” said Forrester, “but now, we need to go.”

“Orie,” said Jacqueline, “You said these are Ryan and Gracie’s dots, and these are Mom and Dad’s. That means this one must be Nanie’s, right?”

Orie snatched the map away from her.

She couldn’t see it, of course, but he was grinning from ear to ear.

“Good job,” he said.

“Doing what?” she asked. “I didn’t do anything.”

She and Cinnamon spoke their silent goodbyes to Brutus and Patriachus, Jacqueline finding it extremely difficult to disengage from the hug she gave Brutus as giant tears rolled down both cheeks. “I hope we see you soon,” she said in her mind to both of them.

“You just might,” returned Brutus. “Keep us in your thoughts.”

“Always,” she said. Cinnamon, listening in, agreed.

The next thing she knew, they were all back in Ravenwild, in the woods near a town called The Forks, so named because it was where two great rivers, the Kennebec and the Dead, met. Forrester stood guard while Orie spread the maps out on the forest floor. He and Jacqueline studied them intently. “Here they are,” said Orie. “And here we are, less than five miles from them. Good shootin’ Forrester.”

Forrester nodded. He was studying the trail. There had definitely been movement along it within the last twelve hours. Trolls, about a dozen of them, maybe half-again that. Headed the same way they were headed.

“We’ll definitely need to keep our wits about us now,” he said softly to them. He showed them the footprints.

“Forrester, check the tell-all and see if you can see me.”

“Yes
,” he said. “I can. Definitely not as strong as before, but I can see you.”

“Good. Watch the tell-all. I’ll walk twenty yards ahead. I’ll wave like this if I see anything suspicious.” He moved his arm up and down in front of him. “Don’t forget, we’re more concerned with silence than we are with speed.”

“You know, Orie,” he said, “you’re turning into a pretty fine soldier.”

Orie grunted and said, “Move out,” with a chuckle.

Jacqueline only rolled her eyes.

Saviar Murlis, as well as most of the crew of the Mexyl Wynn, lay on her decks unable to rise or move to any significant degree, owing to the overpowering grip of nausea that had seized them like an Agden Wolf seizes a plains buck in its fangs. No matter what he tried, he couldn’t shake it, and every time he did try to struggle his way upright, he only retched all the more.

At first, as the ship had drifted away from the shore on its own thanks to the onshore breeze, the sentiment aboard had been nothing short of ecstasy at their triumph. They had set the mast, with everyone cheering loudly as the mainsail unfurled, but in the face of the motion sickness that now held him and the crew in its clutches, it was a short-lived victory. Fortunately, Titan Mobst seemed to be immune and stood unwavering at the tiller, guiding the ship further and further from the shore until, to the Trolls, it became nothing more than a tiny dot.

The brigade leader, a monster of a Troll, half of whose face had been hacked away in one of the many battles he had fought on behalf of his Emperor, ordered the patrol back to the city itself. He figured if they tortured enough of the citizens there, somebody would squawk like a chicken, and he would have something to tell his Excellency other than how they had let the Gnomes get away with this outrageous act. He needed something to save his
own
head now. The problem was, when they got back to the town, it was completely empty. High and low, from building to building they searched and found not a single occupant. All had gone somewhere. The question was, where?

Jared came up from below, carrying a bucket of fresh water that he used to wash off the faces of the utterly miserable crewmembers. He forced them all to drink some.

He and Diana had parted company, she traveling with her father to provide yet another trained sword arm in his service as they pressed forward in the western campaign, and he to the coast. Having begged a little fishing skiff from one of the locals, he had rowed his way out to the great ship.

After tending to the forty or so sick ones, he served the dozen who, like he and Titan Mobst, were unaffected by the ravages of motion sickness.

“I feel like I’m dying,” said Saviar, as Jared got him to take some more water.

Titan laughed a belly-laugh and said, “And I’ll bet you wish you could up and get it over with, don’t you lad?”

He offered a faint smile, mumbling, “Aye, that I do.”

“Not to worry, my good Gnome,” he continued. “It will pass. It will take longer in some than others, but it will pass. It happens to many of the Gnomes who use the little boats to catch the fish in the harbors. It used to happen to my brother when my father took us out as boys. Never seemed to bother me, though. But it will pass.”

“How soon?” asked Saviar, after a particularly nasty spell of dry heaving.

“Not more than a week or two.”

Saviar’s head snapped up. “A
week
or two?”

Titan laughed again. “No. Bad joke, that. You’ll be better in a day or two.

The thing is, once you’re comfortable on the Mexyl Wyn, every time you go ashore the land itself will do the same thing to you.”

Saviar groaned. “Great. Just great,” and retched again, almost as if to emphasize the point of how truly miserable he felt.

Jared carried the bucket the last few feet aft and offered a mug full to Titan who drank it with delight after he offered a toast. “To the Old One,” he said. “Today is a historic day. May the seas be calm and the winds fair. We make for the castle at Ghasten, where we will lay siege to the very lair of the Emperor himself. May the Old One grant us safe passage.”

He lifted his mug towards the sky. Jared filled one and did the same.

Smacking his lips, he bellowed, “Get well lads. Get well. We have a mission. We have a purpose. The Trolls will wish for all time that they had never invaded our homeland.

“We go now to kill the Emperor himself.”