A Clash of Shadows (7 page)

Silly
.

“Well, what was I supposed to see here?” she asked once back at the campsite.

“Look around a bit,” Serdra said. She had sat down to eat.

Katja looked over the area again, feeling slightly insulted. Serdra had again and again stressed for her to pay close heed to her surroundings, especially when she thought herself safe. She had already checked for signs of danger.

She was about to demand clarification when she noticed that some of the bulges in the earth were quite straight for bulges. She peered between the young trees dotting the campsite and spotted another elevated row mirroring the first.

“Ruins?”

“Yes,” Serdra said. “A fort was raised here shortly after Baldur Reo founded Baldur’s City.”

“To repel Vegraine-men?”

“No. To repel the petty kings.”

“Ah, those,” Katja said with some surprise and began walking around to examine this long-gone fort.

They were hardly ever mentioned. People were just vaguely aware that various small kingdoms had risen near the Inner Sea between the Shattering and Jukiala’s eastward expansion.

These days Baldur’s Coast belonged to Amerstan. It was strange to think that once her little homeland had been the very periphery of civilization; the outskirts of Jukiala’s campaign to restore order to the world. And Amerstan had been dangerous, mysterious and unknown.

“Just how long has it been?” she asked after finishing her examination.

“Baldur’s City was founded in 190 after Jukiala’s founding,” her mentor replied. “I know one sister of ours who knew a brother of ours who was involved in those conflicts. The Coast dwellers who didn’t accept Jukiala’s rule went north and strengthened the kings remaining there. So the need was felt to plug passages through the highlands until the expansion claimed the area later known as Amerstan.”

Katja pushed on the foundations with her foot. That had been more than eight centuries ago. Amazing.

“This fort was probably built in 191 by the old calendar,” Serdra said.

“Do you know if there was fighting here?”

“Won’t you just check?”

Katja looked at her mentor to see whether she was serious. It certainly seemed so.

Serdra glanced at the mound in front of herself and then back at Katja. Katja arranged herself on it and began the fight to relax her mind.

She had never tried seeing something so old. Not even close. She tried to dismiss that thought. A battle in this rather narrow highland could hardly have been very big. She tried to dismiss that as well.

Katja lost her sense of time as she sat there. She lost sense of her body and the time of day. She had forgotten almost everything when she thought she heard something. Feel something. The screams of men and clashing of arms. Fires. Pain and death. A large event that shaped the future in its wake.

It lasted only a moment. Then she opened her eyes.

Night was falling in earnest and she could barely see Serdra as the woman sat and watched her.

“Did I really see that?” she asked in a slurred voice.

“Perhaps,” Serdra said and Katja sensed she would get nothing further out of the woman.

They finished eating and then crawled into the tent.

--------------------

Arvar sat reading when Vajan came to him.

“You have presumably been told the news?” Arvar asked when he looked up after a few moments.

“Yes,” Vajan said. “This is certainly interesting timing for such a thing.” The trained killer spoke with a smile but his eyes were serious.

“It certainly it,” Arvar responded.

Vajan looked around, at their comrades and brethren who were busily preparing the operation. The two of them were rather isolated in spite of the company. Everyone was tending to their tasks and some were speaking quietly. Friends exchanging opinions on the news.

“Any idea what’s going on?” he asked to get his leader’s thoughts.

Arvar watched him with his brown eyes. Then he looked at a wall, towards these distant troubles that might nonetheless upset everything.

“I think it’s best not to jump to conclusions in this matter,” he then said. “Not now. Assumptions have a way of stabbing one in the back.”

Vajan nodded. Many had suffered for assumptions. Sometimes at his very own hands.

“I can take a part of
the team to investigate,” he suggested. “You can postpone the operation in the meantime. Until we know just what is happening.”

“So you want us to divide our forces when our enemies are stirring?” Arvar said with obvious disapproval.

“I want you and the ones you need the most to hold still while the rest of us find out whether this could lead to us. If that turns out to be the case we can take proper action. That is the safest way, I think.”

Arvar looked him in the eyes.

“Also more
exciting
, I suspect,” he said critically.

Vajan smiled with a corner of his mouth and a boyish glint in his eyes.

“That may be,” he said and held his palms out. “But come now. I’m not about to jeopardise the operation for just that. It takes priority.”

“I certainly hope so,” Arvar said. He kept his tone friendly but let his face show his seriousness. “You proved yourself a while back. That should suffice for you.”

“That depends on whom you ask,” Vajan replied with a just a hint of bitterness slipping through the smile.

“I know,” Arvar sighed. “Some are stuck in an antiquated mindset. But we are after all trying to start a new movement.”

Arvar thought it over, but had a hard time coming up with a good counter argument. He didn’t like postponing everything. There was no way of knowing how long the peace with Kolgrim would last. But if these events came their way it might be the only sensible options. Best to deal with them directly.

“Very well. But do leave your trump behind. I may end up needing it.”

Vajan hesitated.

“The operation takes priority,” Arvar reminded him.

“True.”

Vajan handed over the leather wrapping with a bit of reluctance.

“Just look after this carefully,” he said. “I doubt I will acquire another one.”

“Hopefully not while the owner still lives, at any rate,” Arvar said. “Now gather your men.”

7.

The journey went well for the next three days. They made better progress than they would have in the lowlands and Serdra even suggested that they would reach Bag Harbour before Maron’s messenger.

They stopped around noon to rest themselves and the horses a bit. They let the beasts graze around a comfortable hollow while they themselves ate of the little remaining provisions.

Katja glanced at her mentor, as she had been doing since the previous day. The woman had to notice but hadn’t said anything.

“Old Maron chatted with me a few days ago,” Katja suddenly said.

“He tends to do that, yes,” Serdra said.

“He...” Katja hesitated. “He voiced the possibility that you would die before finishing my training.”

“That is entirely possible, Katja,” Serdra said calmly. “I believe I have always made it perfectly clear that I am...”

“Not invincible, I know,” Katja said. “He also said that in the event I should return to the homestead and stay there for a while longer.”

“It would be wise, but circumstances will have to determine that.”

“Indeed. So isn’t it time you told me more about the Death Lords?”

Serdra looked at her. Katja had no more luck than usual in reading her mentor’s eyes, but tried to link some feeling to those ancient foes of the world.

“I know that...” Katja went over the words in her mind. “I know that they somehow rose from the devastation of the Shattering, led armies of revenants and waged six wars through Jukiala’s history. And the seventh one finally broke the union and sent everything into chaos and internal wars. And now there have been three centuries with no sight of them.”

Serdra shifted her pose and continued observing her. Katja took this as an invitation to continue.

“I know they were originally nine, but three have apparently been slain.”

Serdra watched her.

“In the second war, the fifth and the sixth,” Katja continued. “What happened to the rest?”

Serdra continued watching her.

“Hasn’t there been an effort to find them?” Katja asked, and was getting tired of the lack of response.

Serdra gave a small shrug.

“Where would
you
search, Katja?”

Katja hesitated. She hadn’t expected to be put on the spot.

“Well... don’t the elders have incredible detection?”

“Yes. But even they have their limits,” Serdra said. “And the Death Lords are well aware of our abilities.”

Serdra leaned forward, assuming her teaching mien.

“We can sense demons more easily than the walking dead. The dead are after all partially of this world. And the Lords slumber, Katja. In a state on the verge of true death. It is almost impossible for us to detect them in that torpor.”

“So they just... sleep? In some hideaways,
somewhere
in the world?”

“Yes. That has been their strategy ever since their bastion in Kreven was brought down.”

Katja digested this for a few moments.

“Aren’t they vulnerable in that state?”

“Getting to a slumbering Death Lord would be a great prize. If one has the ability to destroy it and do so quickly.”

“So they can wake like any other?”

“Not quite,” the woman said. “The death torpor is very deep. And a risen Death Lord would stand out as a beacon to all with sensitivity. But their spirit can rise up into the world of men and defend the body without attracting enemies from every direction.”

Serdra stared into her eyes for a bit, as a sign to heed her words.

“And that alone is more dangerous than many other things.”

“Are you speaking from experience?” Katja asked.

“Not personal experience. One of our brothers told me of an incidence shortly Post Dissolution. Around the time the search began.”

“A search has been going on for three entire centuries?”

“Not an incessant search. Various things have called for immediate action on our part through the years. But it has always been important to find the Lords as well as their servants, sleeping in a way similar to their masters.”

“And what is there to expect if one finds a Death Lord’s sanctum?”

“They are more powerful than any revenant. Terribly strong. Almost unkillable; it took great power and sacrifices to destroy Kverovrin, Torfoth and Bolihir. And they can raise corpses from death to do their bidding, from a long distance. It used to be customary to behead all corpses before burial to prevent that.”

Katja thought about the funerals she had taken part in. She didn’t like the thought of decapitating innocent people before laying them to their final rest. Such was for criminals. Perhaps that was why the peace rune had replaced the axe blade.

“But these are all matters for a later time. You are too young to battle apocalypse monsters.”

--------------------

When nightfall was around the corner they stopped on a high plateau and looked north, along a relatively clear way down to the lowlands.

Continuing on was technically possible, but the way west had become heavily forested and difficult. They had best seize even a difficult way down that the horses could traverse.

“Do you want to race?” Katja asked but didn’t put much effort into making the jest convincing.

They dismounted and led the horses down the slopes.

It was slow going but fairly steady as the growth wasn’t that bad in this incline.

“Wouldn’t...” Katja groaned as she clambered over a fallen log. “Wouldn’t this also have been a great place for a fort in the old days?”

She was eager to see another such sign of the old world.

“Yes,” Serdra said. “There apparently was another stronger fort here.”

Katja looked around the steep slope.

“Here?”

“Somewhere around here,” her mentor clarified. “But long forgotten and probably long since collapsed. Forests and highlands have always kept many secrets and many mementoes. And where these two meet one can expect anything.”

And I am better at rooting out the past than most
, Katja thought.
I must keep this in mind
.

They were reaching the lowland when Katja could smell smoke. It was stronger than could be expected of one fire.

“I take it you can feel that,” she said out loud and didn’t need an answer.

They locked gazes for a moment, before Katja handed the lead to Serdra. Then she found herself a thick tree with handy branches and began climbing it. No few times she had groaned over having to always brave the most difficult trees around the homestead, but had to admit it made this current climb much easier by comparison. She reached over most of the thicket and peered north.

“There is a village ahead!” she said.

“Oh,” Serdra said. “I see there have been changes since last I was here.”

“I...” Katja looked around. The slopes of the highlands pressed in on the village from two directions and a hair-thin fjord ended its inland advance in a bog east of it. “I see no easy way past it. Getting through unseen would be a trial.”

“We will take this as good fortune,” Serdra said. “I just noticed my horse has a loose shoe.”

“I won’t complain over stopping in a dwelling,” Katja said and climbed back down.

A young boy was the first to see them, a short distance outside of the village. He was dark of hair, thin and just beginning the growth spurt that would turn him into a man.

“Good day,” Katja said immediately and tried to put up her best smile. She suspected guests were a rarity.

The boy seemed downright startled. He glanced behind him. The village was still out of sight due to foliage.

“Good day,” he said after a slight hesitation.

“We are passing through. Can you announce our coming?”

The boy nodded and ran off with a child’s energy.

They continued at the same pace as before and once they arrived at the village a group of people stood waiting.

They wore simple clothes of goat hide and wool and Katja got a distinct impression that this village had little contact with the wider world. In the front stood a tall man in his fifties with a grey beard and thick bones. Presumably he spoke for the village.

Amerstan’s customs were quite similar to those of Baldur’s Coast and strange guests were expected to speak first.

“Greetings. We are cousins on our way west,” Katja said. “We have a horse with a loose shoe and seek your hospitality.”

It was sometimes better that she talk to people rather than Serdra. The woman simply couldn’t stop being strange and somewhat intimidating.

“Be welcome,” the man said. “I am Jonas and you have arrived at Twigs. We are just a simple farming community and do not have a farrier. But it is no trouble to lend you a hammer and nails. And we of course offer shelter to guests.”

“You have our thanks,” Katja said with a smile.

“And guests are a good sign on festive days!” Jonas said cheerfully and looked at his kinfolk and neighbours. “We celebrate the summer today. You are welcome to join us for dinner and spend the night here.”

“We will of course accept such an offer,” Katja said with a smile she didn’t need to fake.

“Be welcome and bring some joy with you.”

Katja smirked a bit at the formal politeness, but had to admit to herself that the man delivered it well.

Many of the villagers were busy preparing the celebration, but news of guests spread about the little hamlet as soon as some little girl shouted it out loud. Men and women and children stepped out of houses and looked up from their tasks to look at them.

It reminded Katja a bit of the arrival at Maron’s homestead. These villagers didn’t know that there was something very unusual about her, but on the other hand all of the Shades had been allies of theirs.

She waved a bit awkwardly in a few directions.

The residents seemed to be around one hundred in number. Perhaps five extended families. Three and even four generations living here in the most isolated area of the country.

Most of the houses were small and clearly not very old. Small wonder Serdra hadn’t known of this place.

They got to place the horses in a goat fence and a dark man of about three decades gave Serdra a hammer and nails.

“I will handle this,” Serdra said as she examined the loose shoe. “Take care of the luggage.”

Katja managed to get most of the bags into her arms and walked off with them.

Jonas returned from talking with the villagers and said he had found a dwelling for them. He offered to help with the luggage but Katja declined. She didn’t want to have to explain the helmets and mail shirts.

He led her to a house that was rather big on the Twigs scale. The door stood open and there was no one inside.

“My sister and her husband and children live here. You can use that extra bench over there.”

“Thank you,” Katja said, glad to get rid of the burden. She then pushed it under the sleeping bench she and Serdra would apparently be sharing. There was no reason to make the luggage
too
tempting.

Jonas departed to help with the preparations and Katja stepped out beneath the sky and examined the whole place a bit better.

She spotted hoes here and there so the forest clearly hid a field somewhere, but the tubs and shovels attracted her attention more and seemed to be in the majority. Gathering clay from the bog seemed to be the backbone of the village.

Forests really do hide many things,
she thought.

Katja fetched and arranged the rest of the luggage. Serdra was satisfied with the horseshoe and returned the hammer.

The looks didn’t let up and Katja suspected the swords played a part in that. But people adjusted to their presence as they aided in the preparations and Katja stopped having to mutter something about the roads being dangerous.

She carried barrels and baskets and hung yarn from trees where the feast would be. She worked with various people and couldn’t possibly keep track of all the names. She was asked for news from the east and about the journey and where they were headed. All very natural and conventional questions, which nevertheless reminded her of how carefully she had to tread. For the rest of her life.

Katja told a girl with a slight pregnancy belly general news of the capital area as they worked together arranging benches on the uneven ground. The villagers seemed to keep in enough contact to know the broad strokes of politics and national events, but little more than that. The girl was quite taken with the descriptions of the city market square and the crowds and the invincible stone buildings no storm could bring down.

Could Aron Vogn have made a difference here?
she thought to herself.
Made more of this area if he had pushed his policies through?

Some dark little boy came up to Katja and insisted on seeing the sword and she couldn’t resist unsheathing it.