Ravenwild: Book 01 - Ravenwild (91 page)

It was a rousing speech, but all he got in return was a lot of grunts and groans. It didn’t bother him in the slightest. In fact, it only broadened his smile. This was indeed a historic day. The ship was floating upright and true, thanks to her thoughtful design, solid construction, and the pig-iron that they had labored so hard to get aboard to use for ballast. And with Jared’s miracle powder they would now, for the first time in the history of their nation, be able to stand up to the Trolls. All they needed was some way to harness the power of the explosive powder in order to direct it, and he had a plan for that too. Yes, this was a great day.

The Ravenwild forces, having fared far better than any had hoped in their attack on the Troll forces in King’s Port, now ran hard along the Emperor’s Highway, heading north. The air was electric with the sound of the thousands of booted feet striking the cobblestone thoroughfare, along with the nonstop rattle and clack of the weapons. Straight through Pyrrt they ran, a tiny town consisting of nothing more than a few houses to either side of the roadway, along with a central meetinghouse, schoolhouse, and town jail. As the racing army passed through town, the resident Gnomes, curious, eyed them through windows and from open doorways. Gnome youngsters waved, some of them hollering out greetings.

From there they sprinted all the way to Soledad, several hours up the road. Coming to the town limits, Thargen raised his arms, motioning for the troops to halt. Unlike Pyrrt, with its paucity of structures, Soledad was a fairly good-sized town with several fine, multi-level houses on both sides of the road, and, more importantly, branching off from the main roadway were several side streets on which dozens of simpler structures stood. Litter after litter of the injured was transported down every one of these to the healers that were expecting them in the shelter of the receiving homes. Sweepers meticulously removed any trace that anyone had ever so much as walked on by.

When the wounded had all been situated, Thargen ordered the remainder of the strike force onward to the east.

Continuing on their way, they left the Emperor’s Highway, following a well-worn trail to the village of Utt and arriving as the dual spring moons were beginning to show in the eastern sky. They were less careful than they might have been about concealing their point of departure from the Emperor’s Highway, but not so careless as to make it obvious. With the village directly in front of them, Thargen once again raised his arms, and the company halted.

What they looked upon was a grouping of around a dozen houses. Nothing like the elaborate homes of Soledad, these were simple, single-story homes and outbuildings that had once held the families, the animals, and the equipment necessary to tend the vast fields of crops that spread out like the wings of a giant butterfly to either side of them all the way to the moonlit horizon. In the pale moonlight they could see that the spring planting had begun, with dozens and dozens of neat rows of new shoots peeking out of the soil to both sides.

Directly behind the town rose a sizable hill several hundred feet in height.

All that could be heard was the heavy breathing of the thousands of Human, Elf, Dwarf, and Gnome soldiers. Many of them held their sides as they sucked in the sweet night air.

“Where is he?” asked one of the lieutenants, his question directed at Thargen. The squeak in his voice betrayed the unease he was feeling, knowing that as they stood there, a vastly superior Troll force was bearing down on them with lethal intent.

He had no sooner asked the question, when Rolan materialized in the doorway of a nearby house and strode briskly towards them. At his side walked Andar Gall. Much shorter, as all Gnomes were, he nevertheless carried himself in such a way that his shorter stature somehow didn’t seem so.

They crossed the short span of field in between the house and the troops. The soldiers all straightened at the sight of their King, who introduced his second in command to Andar Gall, then inquired at once about the casualties and how the soldiers were holding up. Thargen debriefed him quickly and concisely, at which point Rolan moved to a spot directly in front of his assault forces. Whereas a minute before the air had been filled with the sounds of their labored breathing, once he positioned himself, there was not a sound to be heard. The breeze itself seemed to still as he began to speak.

“My good and brave men,” he called out, “I am, as always, awed by your performance in battle today.

“This Gnome is named Andar Gall. He hails from Kohansk. Many of our Gnome allies present today know of him, and some may even know him. He is a good and honorable Gnome. I will need all of the officers and squad leaders to meet with him right now where he will instruct you on what your duties will be.

“Not a year ago his wife was brutally murdered by the Troll scum for the crime of having asked a simple question, and he has labored since that time for this day. We have a surprise for those that follow us.

“Obey him as you would me.”

Jessica awoke, Blake beside her. From the sound of his breathing she figured he was still asleep. Her first thought, after she shook the cobwebs from her mind, was that she would probably never again awaken for the rest of her life without a feeling of agonizing dread, worrying whether or not her children were safe. She could take the physical agony of the endless marching. She could suffer through the cold, the hunger, the thirst, the seemingly endless tedium of food that gave no pleasure whatsoever in its eating. But what did threaten to consume her every morning was not knowing if her child on this backwards planet was even alive. It was her worst nightmare come true with every sunrise, taking every bit of her iron will to come to grips with it, to stare it down, to fight through it, and to pledge to the very core of her being to never, ever, ever give up until they had found her and they were all together again in that place, worlds apart from where she now lay, called home.

She threw off her blanket and half-walked, half-crawled, to the fire. She picked at the coals for a minute until she had coaxed forth some flame that she fed with bits of kindling. Lost in dark thoughts, she was not aware when Blake came to squat beside her. “I’d say good morning … ” he murmured.

“No such thing,” she said. “Not until … ”

“I know.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes when they were approached by Captain Pilrick, who laid a piece of venison on a flat rock that Blake had deliberately placed at the fire’s edge to serve as a cooking/warming surface. He said, “I know this must be extremely hard on both of you. I, for one, am encouraged that at least we are now fighting on the same side. We will make the village of Perpst today, certainly by nightfall, probably by late afternoon. I want you both to know I will do everything in my power to find any news of your child. I cannot emphasize enough the significance of the new alliance between our countries … ”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” interrupted Jessica in an annoyed tone of voice, “
Our
country is not even
on
this planet, remember? We’re not from here. This is
your
war not ours, and frankly I couldn’t care less … ”

Now it was Blake’s turn to interrupt. “Jess, Jess. Easy.” They made eye contact and he tilted his head slightly, arching his eyebrows. His look said, “I know you’re upset, but we need this guy, remember?”

“I’m sorry, Captain Pilrick, you were saying?”

“Yes, well, as I said, now that there is an alliance between the two lands, networking as to the whereabouts of a Human child will be a lot easier, now won’t it? Not that it will be easy, but at least not impossible.”

Blake nodded a somber, “Yes.”

Jessica stared into the fire, obviously seething with frustration. The captain stabbed the piece of venison, still ice cold, with his belt knife and moved away.

Knowing he would get nowhere by confronting her about the way she had spoken to the one Gnome who might be able to help them track down their daughter, he asked, “Did you make any progress with the little guy?” He nodded towards Jebwickett, who was having some sort of spirited discussion with Oddwaddle well away from the fire.

She shook her head, “No,” then said, “to be honest, I don’t care one way or the other how he’s doing. I just want to find Stephanie.”

“I know you do,” he said. “And I also know that you care about the little guy. I know because I know
you.
It’s a big part of who you are, and it goes all the way to your soul. It’s much of why I love you.”

They embraced briefly and got about the business of breaking camp.

They trudged steadily westward for the entire morning and much of the afternoon, stopping only to snack briefly and drink from the several mountain streams they passed on their way to Perpst. The weather was clear and warm. Each was surprised at how it had gone so quickly from the icy winter cold to early summer warmth, but they reasoned that this was probably normal and attributable entirely to seasons much shorter than they were used to.

The going was rough, up and down mountainous trails with loose rocks and scree threatening to break an ankle every step of the way, but mostly monotonous. Nobody spoke, all maintaining a state of battle readiness in case they ran into a squad of Trolls, but they arrived at the outskirts of Perpst without incident. They began to glimpse the rooftops of the houses in the distance when a Gnome scout appeared on the trail directly in front of them, holding up his arm and motioning for them to stop. He then made some gestures. It looked like some sort of sign language that neither Blake nor Jessica understood, but Captain Pilrick obviously did, and soon they had fallen into a single-file line and were hiking at a brisk pace higher and higher into the mountains surrounding the city. In about an hour, to either side of them on the steep trail, the rock walls jutted straight up for hundreds of feet. A short while after that, as the sun was diving hard for the horizon, their escort motioned for them to stop. He walked straight to the rock face on their right and grabbed one of the vines that grew along it. They heard the muffled sound of a bell ringing, seeming to come from inside of the rock itself. A minute later a large segment of it slid to the side, revealing the entrance to a spacious cavern.

The Gnome escorting them motioned for them all to enter. When they had, the rock slab slid soundlessly back into place.

While both Blake and Jessica had anticipated a dark and gloomy interior to the caverns into which they were led, nothing could have been further from the truth. As soon as the rock façade had closed, hundreds of miniature globes, most white, but many colored, illuminated their surroundings. And if they had been thinking that the cave structure would be cold, and smell of damp and rot, they were wrong on that score as well. It was dry and warm, and the air carried a hint of the smell of wildflowers. Underfoot, they noticed it was carpeted. Their escort, bowing respectfully, led them over to a rack of slippers in front of which was a long bench capable of seating four or five times as many as were in their small company, complete with a trough of flowing water, the source of the wildflower aroma, which was obviously meant to be used to wash their tired and filthy feet. He asked them if they would please remove their boots, adding that they would be cleaned and repaired as needed before their departure. So Captain Pilrick, Oddwaddle, Gall, Jebwickett, Blake, and Jessica all removed their footwear and eased their feet into the soothing warm water. All concentrated on their foot baths for the next several minutes with not a word spoken, at the end of which time the Gnome handed them all drying towels, also pleasantly scented, and invited them to select slippers of the proper fit.