The Legend of Asahiel: Book 02 - The Obsidian Key (44 page)

Darinor tucked his chin into his beard, making what sounded like a low grumble, but kept his tongue to himself.

“You must forgive the rough treatment,” Jasyn apologized, turning back to Marisha and then Allion. “We have learned the hard way that given the nature of our enemy, our trust cannot be afforded lightly.”

His gaze shifted again to Darinor, who nodded. “The Illysp infest your ranks.”

“More than once, our dead have risen against us,” Jasyn confirmed, then seemed to realize the pall he had cast upon their proceedings. “But we need not talk of such things just now. Soldier,” he said, speaking over his shoulder to one of his attendants, “bring supper, for myself and for my friends.” Then to Allion, “Tell me instead, what brings you here?”

“The issues are one and the same, I’m afraid,” Allion replied, his gaze trailing after the departing attendant.

“I see,” Jasyn said, and seemed to lose a good measure of his enthusiasm toward this reunion. “In that case, if you would pardon me for but a moment?”

The general signaled to his remaining attendant, who stepped forward to unbuckle a spiked pauldron covering the general’s left shoulder—an injury, Allion recalled, suffered in the Battle of Kraagen Keep. Without a trace of self-consciousness, Jasyn allowed the attendant to remove also his armored leather jerkin and the shirt beneath, revealing the thick wrap of bandages helping to keep that shoulder in its proper position, and more scars than Allion could count. Once those bandages had been removed, Jasyn flexed and stretched muscles and joints while the assisting soldier brought forth a basin of water and, with a soiled rag, began helping the general to wash himself down.

About halfway through this process, the general motioned to Allion to begin his account. The hunter obeyed, keeping silent his suspicion that Jasyn had been using this time for something more than making himself comfortable. Cordial reception aside, the general was contemplating matters of his own, as if trying to decide what he could—or could not—share with his unexpected guests.

Allion tried not to be troubled by these suspicions as he related the story of his visit to Atharvan and the concerns of King Galdric over the lack of communications from the legion’s foremost division. When the lieutenant general did not respond right away, he went on to divulge their intent to speak with Corathel and persuade him to abandon this course for that which Darinor insisted they must take in order that all might survive this unnatural plague.

Once he had concluded, Jasyn considered them carefully—Darinor in particular—before tendering a reply.

“We have in fact been receiving messages from His Majesty, King Galdric,” the general confessed, “the last not two days ago.”

“And his order to withdraw?” Darinor asked pointedly.

Jasyn stared at the other, his eyes piercing. “Yes.”

“Then why haven’t you done so?” the Entient demanded.

“On my order,” the commander declared, suddenly combative, “we’ve ignored these summonses and offered no response.”

“Why would you do that?” Marisha asked. Unlike her father’s, her voice held no accusation, merely gentle concern and a desire to understand.

Jasyn blew out a long, slow breath. He glared briefly at Darinor before turning back to Marisha. “We entered the Kalmira a little more than two weeks ago. At that point, General Corathel began leading an expeditionary force with which to chase down scattered groups of Illychar. A week later, they failed to return from one of their forays. Evidence suggests they were captured by the jungle savages.”

Allion gulped. He had known that the Mookla’ayans would come into play here eventually. Though he’d been befriended by one of their kind, in many ways, he still feared them worse than he did the Illychar. Perhaps because he knew that death at their hands promised to be slower—and far more painful—than at the hands of some raving ogre or goblin.

“The division has continued to push southward ever since,” Jasyn added, “while I myself have been spearheading a forward detachment in pursuit of the chief general, following the trail of him and his men.”

“So why not report this to Galdric?” Allion asked. “Why leave him to guess as to the fate of an entire division?”

Jasyn shook his head. “His Majesty will not permit one man’s disappearance to serve as an excuse not to return—not even Corathel’s. He has replaced chief generals before; he will not hesitate to do so again.” The commander leaned forward, eyes glittering in the light of candles used to illuminate the interior of the tent. “But I refuse to leave the man in the hands of those savages, to see him devoured like some wild animal. I will see him freed, or else slain with dignity—by my own hand, if necessary.”

Allion wasn’t sure whether to admire the commander for his loyalty, or be repulsed by the man’s obvious hatred of the Mookla’ayan people—a feeling he knew to be born mostly of fear and misunderstanding. In this case, the hunter thought, both were understandable.

Darinor, however, did not seem to appreciate—or did not care about—the other’s dilemma. “Are you not sworn to obey your king?” he challenged.

“I am not some lowly conscript,” Jasyn argued. “As a lieutenant general, I am entitled—by oath—to use personal judgment where it concerns the lives of those I lead. I have consulted my battalion and company commanders, and they in turn have consulted their troops. All agree. Chief General Corathel will not be left behind.”

Allion decided then to forgive the man his prejudices, and view this instead as an act of supreme devotion. After all, were the chief general to be abandoned, Jasyn himself might be next in line for the man’s position. Yet here he was, risking his life and his professional future by shunning the orders of his supreme commander and electing instead to do what he could to save a personal friend. That the entire division had voted to support him in this spoke volumes as to
their
respect and admiration for the missing chief general. Given
his own experience in fighting for the man, Allion was not about to suggest that they had made the wrong choice.

“So we find and rescue Corathel first,” the hunter allowed, ignoring Darinor’s heated stare. “How long can that take?”

Jasyn was quiet while seeming to take measure of Allion’s sincerity. “Longer than I had hoped. The division moves slower every day as this cursed jungle gives way to wretched swampland. But sending smaller, advance patrols too far out from the main force makes them easy targets for the more nimble savages—and the Illychar skulking throughout this region. My own detachment numbers more than a hundred, and returns every night to the security of the division body. Each day we set out ahead, hoping to find and return Corathel to us. Each day we have failed.”

Marisha reached out to the commander, but before she could say something that might comfort him, he spoke again through gritted teeth.

“But I swear to you this: We will press on for as long as it takes, forcing our enemy into the sea, if necessary, before tucking tail and turning for home.”

Allion looked at Marisha, seeing in her ardent expression that she had already sided with the lieutenant general. He glanced then at Darinor, who fumed, but seemed to understand that in this situation, there wasn’t much he could do. If ten thousand soldiers were willing to defy their own king, they sure as blazes weren’t going to heed the wishes of a mad stranger.

“Your determination is well and good,” Allion remarked finally. “Except that by the time we reach the ocean, it may be too late to save Corathel.”

“What would you have us do?” Jasyn asked.

Allion didn’t know. They might try to venture on ahead—just he and Marisha and Darinor—as they had in coming this far. But he wasn’t sure the Entient would go for it, or that it even resembled a good idea. For up until now, they had been trying only to avoid their many enemies. In this instance, the goal would be to confront them.

“How many are we up against?” the hunter asked.

“It’s difficult to tell. Our trackers’ best guess is that the party we follow numbers more than forty. If they are making any attempt to hide their numbers, it might be twice that.”

Allion’s stomach plummeted. “Are they A’awari, or Powaii?”

The Second General’s brow furrowed.

“Clan names,” Allion explained. “To which do these belong?”

Jasyn spat. “Does it make any difference?”

Allion could only hope that it did. Based on his limited experience, they had a far better chance of bartering with the more peaceful Powaii than with the truly savage A’awari.

“Maybe not,” he said. “But I am known to the chieftain of the Powaii clan.”

The Second General raised an eyebrow, suggesting that this was a part of Allion’s story he hadn’t heard before—and that he did not necessarily approve of. “I couldn’t tell you,” he said finally, shaking his head. “But perhaps you can tell for yourself. For we are holding one of their party captive.”

Allion nearly leapt from his seat. “A Mookla’ayan? Why didn’t you say so?”

Just then, the missing attendant reappeared at the tent entrance, with a line of soldiers bearing trays of food. Jasyn considered the savory platters, but had taken note of the hunter’s anxious stance. Grudgingly, he rose to his feet, signaling for his other aide to fetch him a fresh shirt.

“Perhaps because I did not want to spoil my supper,” he muttered.

U
PON THE CREST
of an endlessly shifting wave, Torin rolled through the undulating darkness. Reality had abandoned him, leaving him adrift within a sea of images—haunting vestiges of a life he had once known. Faces swam before him, of allies, enemies, and those who would ask of him the impossible. But he could no longer seem to separate past from present, nor friend from foe.

A shrill grating echoed in his ears. All at once, the clouds of confusion parted, and though the darkness remained, his vision drew sharply into focus. Even so, it took him a moment to recognize where he was, and to recall how he had arrived there. His understanding did nothing to ease his concerns.

He was staring at the vague outline of an ironwood door, set securely in a stone wall. At the top was a tiny viewing window filled with rusted metal bars. Beyond lay a long, dark tunnel smelling of mold and brine. Though underground, he felt at times like he could still hear the ocean’s roar.

The light of a lantern bobbed nearer, stinging in its brightness as it flooded the corridor and spilled through the barred opening in his prison door. Torin shied away, turning his gaze to the darkened corner where a chamber bucket lay. At the far end of the tunnel, the sharp squeal that had awakened him sounded again as the outer door to these dungeons slammed shut on rusted hinges.

Heavy footsteps scraped across the rough stone—sandaled and thick-bodied. He’d known few other sounds in this dank emptiness, and so recognized this one immediately.

Trolls.

One of them thrust its flat, shoulder-sunken face into view through the window bars, eclipsing much of the light. Torin glanced up out of the corner of one eye as its own beady orbs flicked about in study. A moment later, an iron locking bar slid free, and the door pushed open.

A pair of the brutes entered. They might have been the same ones that had checked on him before, but Torin couldn’t tell for certain. One hefted its knotted club while the other inspected the cuffs by which he was chained to the back wall of the cell. When satisfied that he had done nothing to compromise the integrity of his shackles, the trolls filed out and ushered the third member of their party forward.

It was the girl, Saena.

She had first come to him shortly after he’d been led down here, deep within the city, following the fight for Neak-Thur. While acclimating himself to the darkness and wondering why all his battles seemed to end with him in irons, Torin had been surprised by her smiling introduction. As his prison attendant, she had announced, it would be both her duty and pleasure to see to his needs. If there was anything he required, so long as it was within her limited power to grant, he need but ask.

Torin hadn’t known what to make of her then, and wasn’t sure what to make of her now. She seemed far too cheerful to be trusted, given the situation. Friendly though she appeared, he wasn’t going to fall victim to her charms.

And yet, for three days now, she had been his only human contact. Though he continued to anticipate an interrogation of some sort at the hands of Lord Lorre, thus far he had been left waiting. That isolation was beginning to exact its toll. Day by day, hour by hour, his moments of madness grew a shade deeper and lingered a little longer. In that regard, Saena had become a life-giving sun, visiting him regularly, bringing food and conversation—tending to his comforts, such as they were. It was quickly getting to be that he depended upon her more than he might care to admit.

“Hungry?” she asked, hefting her tray of meat and potatoes, bread and fruit.

“Any word of my friends?” Torin asked in turn, sidestepping as always even the most innocent of her questions.

Saena set the tray down upon the edge of the sleeping pallet on which he sat. She was near enough that he might have lashed out and caught her up in his chains, then threatened to strangle her unless her troll escort set him free. But would the impassive brutes even care? Would Lorre? Undoubtedly, the overlord’s halls were filled with slave girls. One would not be missed. More than that, Torin lacked the will to harm the only companion he had—least of all a young woman who had treated him with such kindness. In all likelihood, Lorre knew this, and had selected her for just that reason.

“The girls are well,” Saena assured him, having learned by now that it was Dyanne and Holly for whom he was most concerned. “I believe His Lordship means to decide what will become of you before he determines the fate of any of the others who attacked him.”

Torin didn’t know if this was good news or bad. He wanted to remind her that it was Lorre who had invaded Neak-Thur first. Instead, he glared at the open cell door, beyond which the trolls had taken post.

“They’re not so bad,” Saena said, “once you get used to the smell.”

Torin scowled at her perpetual smile. No matter how surly his disposition, he could not seem to shake her unflappable good cheer. “I don’t suppose you could dim that light,” he grumbled.

The smile remained as she dropped lightly to the floor, seating herself cross-legged and setting the lantern behind her back. “How’s that?”

“Better,” Torin admitted, chewing already on a mouthful of food. He was no longer surprised by how warm his meals were, or how tasteful.

“Good,” she said, practically beaming.

Torin examined her with a suspicious eye in the diminished light of the lantern’s halo. Under better circumstances, he might have found her attractive, with reddish cheeks full and round, eyes bright and inquisitive, and a billowing fountain of long, black curls. Drab leather attire nevertheless revealed her womanly curves, though never did he get the feeling that she was trying to draw that kind of attention. In fact, she seemed not to even realize how pretty she really was.

She was his age, he had decided, or near enough to it. He wouldn’t bring himself to ask, to show the slightest interest that might spark a friendship. Maddeningly enough, this, too, did not seem to bother her. A grunt here or there was usually enough to keep her talking throughout his entire meal, which generally determined the length of her stay.

“How are you feeling today?” she asked.

Torin’s frown deepened. “How do you think?”

Saena ignored his barbed tone. “Those melons there, they came all the way from Billak Mar.”

Billak Mar. The northern city nearest her home region. It was her favorite topic. With Torin’s reluctance to contribute to their one-sided discussions, Saena had taken it upon herself to share with him longing memories of the fields and orchards to which she’d been born, the friends she had left behind, and her fear that she might never again see either. Lorre’s intent was to press southward until all of Wylddeor—along with its plentiful natural resources—was under his control. Of that there was no secret. But how long it might take to subdue the lawless rogues that roamed this territory was anyone’s guess.

“Delicious,” Torin mumbled.

Saena’s smile broadened with delight. He rarely made such concessions. But while he tried to hide it, he did feel sympathy for this girl whose life had been uprooted, become a pawn in the games of a tyrannical overlord and his dreams of conquest. She didn’t speak of Lorre that way; she didn’t speak of him much at all. Probably because she dared not. Mostly she shared childhood tales of happiness and whimsy—a shield, Torin supposed, against the realities of her life.

For a moment, she seemed to be waiting, as if believing she had cracked his shell and expecting him to say something more. When he didn’t, she started in on one of her stories, this one having to do with the time she’d caught a cousin stealing melons from her father’s patch in a misguided effort to win first prize at the local fair for the region’s best-tasting jam.

But halfway through the meaningless reverie, while he sat there listening to the clank of his shackles as he ate, Torin decided that he could take no more of her unabashedly pleasant humor.

“How can you be so merry?” he growled, slapping his spoon against his plate and drawing a momentary look of interest from his troll guards.

“I’m alive, aren’t I?”

“You’re a slave,” Torin said. “That isn’t living.”

Saena appeared confused. “I’m not a slave.”

Torin hesitated. “You’re not? But I thought—”

“My father was conscripted as a sergeant in His Lordship’s army. Had I let him go alone, I might never have seen him again. So I asked for a position as well, and His Lordship granted my request.”

“Allowing you to haul food and empty chamber buckets,” Torin muttered dryly.

Saena shrugged. “Among other things. Better that than being shipped off to live with my uncle in Kasseri. Besides, this way, I get to meet interesting people like you.”

Interesting?
Torin coughed on a piece of bread. “You know nothing about me,” he reminded her.

“I know more than you think,” she said, and for just a moment her smile became mischievous.

Torin washed the food from his mouth with a swig of juice. “Like what?”

“I know that you do not belong here, fighting alongside rogues. I know that you are not just an outlander, but a king. Torin of Alson, the young man who braved the ruins of an ancient city to reclaim the legendary Sword of Asahiel. How’s that?”

Torin simply stared, speechless. By the time he thought to deny her claim, it was too late.

“We of Lorrehaim are not as uncivilized as those you may have encountered in Wylddeor,” she continued, flashing again that damnable smile. “Your story is well known—though I must admit, difficult to believe. I wasn’t sure that I did, until I heard what had taken place on the battlefield. By that account, at least some of what I’ve heard about you must be true.”

Again she gave him the chance to acknowledge or reject her declarations. Unsure which—if either—might benefit him, Torin kept to his silence.

“What remains unclear is what you would be doing here, taking part in a civil war so far from your own home.”

Torin cleared his throat. He was going to have to say something, he realized. There was no point in trying to make himself invisible if so much about him was already known—or at least suspected. Better to divulge the truth before potentially disastrous assumptions were made.

Still, he wasn’t sure what he could say that might paint him in a more favorable light. “I did not come to take part in any war.”

“The soldiers say you had His Lordship himself at the tip of your blade. Is that not so?”

Torin tensed. All of a sudden, Saena seemed to him far more than an innocent servant girl. Then again, perhaps he could use that to his advantage, pleading his case to one who might be more willing than Lorre to hear him out.

But before he could prepare a response, Saena continued.

“They say you could have killed him,” she said, “but stayed your hand. Why is that?”

“I didn’t know who he was,” Torin admitted.

“And had you known?”

“It would not have affected my decision. As I said, I did not come here to slay the man.”

“Then what
did
you come here for?”

Torin took a deep breath. “I came here to speak with him.”

Saena laughed. “Strange way to seek an audience.”

“I was given to believe that should I knock on his front door, I might end up in irons.” He hefted his manacles.

“Fine job you did avoiding that fate,” she replied with a smirk.

Torin glowered. He was quickly beginning to wish that he hadn’t opened up to her.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I only thought to make you smile. Your face looks as though it could use one.”

Torin shook his head and scraped up another mouthful. What cause did she think he might have to smile?

“Tell me,” she begged, leaning forward over her crossed legs. “What did you mean to speak with him about?”

Torin made her wait while he finished his food, though he had already decided to grant her request. “I came to speak with him about elves.”

“Elves?”

“The Finlorians, specifically. I was told that if they still exist, Lorre might know where they are.”

“Why would His Lordship know anything about elves?”

“Word is he has a fondness for butchery, especially when it comes to the older races—that he slaughters those who refuse to serve him.” He nodded toward the troll sentries in emphasis. “Perhaps it is the same with the elves.”

Saena’s features tightened defensively. “What you’ve heard is only partly true. From what I’ve seen, His Lordship does not slaughter for slaughter’s sake, but to protect his subjects from the often bestial urges of these animal races.”

“A matter of perspective, perhaps,” Torin allowed. “To be honest, I’m in no position to judge. Whichever, I’m at the end of my trail. If Lorre knows nothing of the Finlorians, then it may be true that no one does.”

“And why must you find these Finlorians?”

“Because it would seem that in desecrating their city, I unearthed an evil best left buried—an evil that only they may vanquish.”

He did not know that he could say it any plainer than that. Nor, he hoped, would he have to try. He stared at the woman, trying to impress upon her his shame and his need, hoping that she would accept the truth as he understood it.

By the look on her face, it seemed to be working. Her smile had been replaced by a thoughtful frown. “You make it sound so dire,” she remarked, trying out a chuckle.

Torin continued to stare until her attempt at merriment had faded.

“In that case, I wish you luck. Rest assured, His Lordship will wish to speak with you about this and other matters.” She got to her feet, taking from
him the empty food tray. “I’ll see you at supper,” she promised, before snatching up her lantern and exiting through the doorway.

Torin watched her go, his only connection to the outside world, until the cell door was shut and the locking bar thrown into place. He tried to catch sight of her again through the window, but the bodies of the trolls—blocky and hunchbacked to the point of near headlessness—obscured her from view.

With her went the light and his meager hopes, and when the outer door had closed, he was left with nothing.