Servants and Followers (The Legends of Arria, Volume 2) (4 page)

“
With any luck, we
might be able to travel the full 55 miles to Coe Anji, and be there
by tonight.” Sir Nickleby said as Basha caught up with
him.

“
Have we
been...dawdling, sir?” Basha asked.

“
We have been a
little slow.” Sir Nickleby said. “It is now the
9
^th
day of Markee, and we left Coe Baba on the
6
^th
day
,
three days ago. We have been traveling three
days, and we have only made a hundred miles. It is understandable
that we got off to a slow start on the first day, leaving late in
the morning, but the last two
…
we traveled just about as far on
each of those days as we did on the first!” Sir Nickleby exclaimed.
“I suppose the horses need to adjust to the long distances that
they shall be covering, and you two should as well, but
well, we still could easily make 50 miles a day
or so if we pushed ourselves hard enough.” He said,
continuing.

Basha hesitated to say anything,
because it seemed to him as if Sir Nickleby was responsible for
their dawdling, as he kept stopping them every five miles or so,
once an hour at least, to disappear into the bushes for a few
minutes. Perhaps he was incontinent?

“
We cannot lag too
much when we need to get to Coe Pidaria as soon as possible, or
else
we’ll never make this trip.” Sir
Nickleby said.

“
How long will it
take?” Basha said. “The whole trip, there and back
again?”

“
A year at best if we
survive,” Sir Nickleby said. “Judging by the distance we have to
cover, and if we don’t meet any trouble on the way.” He shook his
head. “Don’t forget to strap on your swords, wherever we go,
especially in Coe Anji
.
I advise you all to stay armed.”
Sir Nickleby said, turning away from Basha.

Basha watched Sir
Nickleby go
;
why was he so worried?

“
Oaka! Sir Nickleby!”
Basha called, searching for his friends alone in the forest with
just the horses for company. Never had he been this alone, ever
since the time he had run away from…the horses were skittish,
shying away from the forest.

“
Never is it this
quiet. Never
.
” Basha started to say, but then
he realized he had clenched his fists, and tightened his body. He
breathed in and out to calm himself down
;
it was going to be all
right, it was going to be okay. Basha would find his friends, and
Oaka would be fine.

He wandered back towards the road that
he and Oaka had strayed from when they began their race, several
minutes ago.

Oaka and Basha had
been waiting for the knight to catch up with them, sitting on their
horses Joko and Talan; the knight had gone into the bushes again to
take care of some business. “And he complains that we can’t make 50
miles in a day?” Oaka said, shaking his head. “Of all the nerve, he
should be
…
”

Basha had dismounted from his horse,
meanwhile, as he had noticed a side path leading off into the
woods. It reminded him of the tunnel he had taken a few days ago,
full of tree roots branching off in different directions and
skittering bugs creeping over everything, deep underground into the
Oracle’s cave. He had to look at it closer. “I bet you that I could
race you down to the end of that path, and back before Sir Nickleby
gets here.” He said with a smile.

Oaka had turned his head to see what
Basha was talking about. “Must be a hunter’s path,” Oaka muttered,
trying to sound nonchalant as he looked down the long trail that
seemed to lead into darkness. “Sure looks abandoned. Does it end?”
He asked. He was reminded of a tunnel as well, but the one that
Loqwa, god of death, was said to use to lead spirits into the
underworld, the world of the dead.

“
I’m pretty sure that
it does.” Basha said. “Probably won’t be half a mile or so before
the forest claims it again.”

“
Half a mile, and
then back
,
a full mile.” Oaka said, quivering in his heart.
“Not too bad. I suppose we can manage that before Sir Nickleby
finishes and gets back here. How about we make it a full mile down,
and then back, two miles?” He asked, wondering why he was acting so
brave. “For a real challenge?”

“
Let’s just see if it
goes that far.” Basha said, not certain anymore if it was a good
idea in the first place, but he was stuck with it since it belonged
to him.

They coaxed their horses into position
at the start of the path. Basha mounted Talan, and they gave each
other a moment and a half to settle down into position before Basha
and Oaka looked at each other.

“
Ready?” Basha
asked.

“
As ready as I’ll
ever be.” Oaka said, staring straight ahead at the path.

“
Go!” Basha cried,
and they galloped off.

For several minutes, they were side by
side, attempting to outmaneuver each other on the narrow path with
the forest closing in. The horses occasionally had to jump
obstacles lying in their way, as the path twisted and turned. Basha
lost sight of Oaka for awhile, and then he turned his head as he
heard a familiar neigh, only to find himself gawking at an empty
saddle.

Oaka must have fallen off.

Basha gasped and pulled sharply on
Talan’s reins, stopping the horse before he dismounted and whistled
for Joko. The other horse slowed down and turned around, coming
back as Basha grabbed the reins of both horses and led them back
the way they had come.

Basha was worried,
but he hoped to find Oaka just sitting up, none the worse for wear,
and shaken up only just a little bit from his fall off of Joko,
somewhere along the path. But there was no sign of him, nor of Sir
Nickleby as he reached the main road. He would have
thought
…
had Sir Nickleby already passed by here, or was he still
further back along the main road? And what would he say to the
knight if came back without Oaka? What would they do if they could
not find
…

It was awfully, terribly quiet, as a
matter of fact, Basha realized. He let go of the horses’ reins for
a moment, and squinted up at the trees, searching for any sign of
animal life. But there was no sight or sound from any of them,
instead only an unnatural calm filled his surroundings.

Other people in the
town of Coe Baba might not have noticed anything was wrong, people
like Hastin probably, but Basha, he had wandered the outskirts of
the forest his whole life. He had camped out a couple of times with
Oaka and Geda, not too far from home, and
he had run away that one time...he knew when something was
wrong inside the forest.

Basha could see the double-edged sword
shadows stretched out between the trees, uninterrupted. Still, no
matter how strange this was, he knew that the heroes of old
wouldn’t have been deterred. So, he inhaled deeper, and took a step
forward.

He heard a screech,
and lifted his head up, towards a gap in the entwining branches
that showed blue sky, and he smiled in relief at the sight of life,
for the sun’s glare was shielded from his eyes by the form of a
majestic falcon soaring right over him from north to south. It was
magnificent, the dark brown feathers of the bird, tinted with black
at the edge of its wings, tilted to circle around towards him. The
bird’s black eyes were now visible to him, glinting with razor
sharp perspicacity, and he was right underneath it! It was a
graceful sight, and, oddly enough, too close to the ground
and to him.

The horses neighed and reared up.

Basha blinked and yelped as the falcon,
diving straight through the gap at him, slammed right into his
stomach with enough force that he fell over backwards. He never had
imagined that a falcon could have such force. He landed on a pile
of leaves called a bush, and lied there, groaning softly as he
stared straight up at the sky. Wondering if he was prone to
disaster, somehow.

He managed to sit up, looking down at
the falcon perched on his lap. “Never is it a good sign when birds
start attacking you,” Basha muttered to himself; he knew that
well.

“
Wolves! Coming this
way! Get out of here, boy!” The falcon yelled.

Basha screamed as the falcon stretched
his wings out, and then flinched as the bird flapped away from him,
soaring off into the sky. The horses were still whinnying, almost
screaming.

Basha gasped and
shuddered, then thought about what the bird had said. Though
a talking bird
was an impossible occurrence, he leapt onto his feet, and
scanned about the area, as he thought that perhaps he should
take
the bird’s
warning
seriously. Then he heard the
bushes rustling close behind him, from the hunter’s path, and
whirled about, prepared to run if necessary, but Oaka emerged
instead, covered in leaves, bruises and scratches from the branches
and the fall he must have had.

“
Oaka!” Basha cried
out in relief. “There was
a falcon, a
falcon talked to me!” He said.

“
What
are
…
never mind that!” Oaka exclaimed, pointing behind him. “There
are wolves after me! I fell off of Joko while we were jumping,
and
…
let’s get the horses and get out of here!”
He cried.

The two young men managed to round up
their horses and mount them as Basha heard a howl not far behind.
The horses reared again, and galloped off, the two young men the
hopeless loads on their backs, pitched about in their saddles and
barely hanging on. Basha swung his head about, and caught a glimpse
of their pursuit.

The double-edged sword shadows were
filtered through the fleeting, flitting shades of black wolves on
the other side of the trees, loping in pace alongside the fleeing
horses. Everything was black. The leaders of the pack lunged out of
the intervals and swerved into their course, flanking their horses
and lagging behind. Basha felt like his horse was swimming against
the current, pushing him further and further back to the awaiting
jaws, while the wolves were being propelled forward by the same
current.

“
I can’t get any fire, I can’t get
any fire!” Oaka was crying for some reason next to him.

Basha’s head was
yanked away from the sight as he was twisted by Talan’s flight.
Larger than ordinary wolves, these wolves had despair-black fur
surrounding blood-shot eyes that hunkered down over canine teeth,
stretching below their lower jaws. These were monsters, like hyenas
and wolves interbred
.

He heard the hollow snapping jaws, and
managed to twist his head about again to see the foaming mouth of
an alpha male mere inches away from Talan’s back leg. Yet he was
relieved to see the horse give the beast a good sharp kick, and
send it reeling away, and he was also relieved to spot blood
streaming down the wolf’s nose. It proved, in the midst of this
crazed, jarring pursuit, that these monsters were mortal.

“‘
My lords and
ladies,’” Sir Nickleby said to himself in courtly fashion, pacing
back and forth as he waited amidst the trees. “‘I would like to
present
…’
no, better make it ‘ladies and gentlemen’,” He paused to
remark to himself, “sounds better. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I would
like to present myself, Sir Nickleby of Coe Baba,’” He bowed deeply
with a flourish, “‘and these two boys, Basha and Oaka, also of Coe
Baba,’” He gestured backwards at nothing.

“
Sir Nickleby, are
you already preparing yourself to meet King Sonnagh?” Nisa asked as
she jumped down from the tree where she had been watching Sir
Nickleby practice for the past minute, her bag hitting the ground
just after her.

Sir Nickleby turned
around, slightly startled by her appearance, but he recovered
himself and commanded a cool semblance as she stood up. “I am
merely preparing myself for the possibility.” He said. “It is a
long way off, and highly doubtful, but I hope that we are prepared
should we be given the chance. Besides, what else should I do while
I’m waiting
?
”

“
I told you not to
wait up for me,” Nisa said, frowning at him. “You are already
suspicious enough to these boys, especially Oaka. He does not trust
you.”

“
He finds it
difficult to trust.” Sir Nickleby sighed. “I probably deserve his
distrust, especially with what happened at the militia
tryouts.”

“
That was not your
fault
,
not entirely.” Nisa said to him. “And anyway, you cannot keep
stopping every few miles just for me. You won’t get anywhere that
way.”

“
We are on horse, you
are on foot. It is unfair to you that you should fall behind during
the daytime while we ride, and then you would have to catch up with
us during the nighttime while we slept. How can you keep up such a
pace?” He asked.

“
You are too much of
a gentleman. I have some stamina, but admittedly, I would have
fallen behind.” Nisa said.

“
You should have
gotten yourself a horse to ride before you left Coe Baba.” Sir
Nickleby said, pointing at her before he turned away. “You could
have asked to borrow one from me.”