A Joust of Knights (Book #16 in the Sorcerer's Ring) (11 page)

Loti woke to the sound of slamming metal,
and she jumped up and looked all around, wondering where she was. Her throat
was parched and her eyes had a hard time adjusting in the dim light as she
tried to shake the dreams from her mind. She had been dreaming of a
never-ending journey, dreaming of riding an iron carriage off the face of the
earth, falling off cliffs and landing somewhere in the ocean.

Loti woke on high alert, looking all
around, trying to remember. It was stifling in here, hard to breathe, dust
swirling in the air, and she looked all about and saw that she was encased by iron
bars. She was in a cage, so low to the ground that she slammed her head as she
tried to stand—and immediately knelt back down. She looked around and saw a
dozen other bodies lying listlessly on the dirt floor. She turned and saw,
beyond the cell bars, the dusty desert, waves of heat rippling off of it; she
saw that she was in the center of a small, busy village, horses and carriages
racing back and forth, slaves shackled and being paraded everywhere. She heard a
sound, and her heart filled with dread to realize it was one she recognized all
too well: a taskmaster stood close by, lashing a slave across the back.

Then she remembered: her mother. She had
set her and her brother up, had sold them as slaves to this caravan. It was an
act which she would never forgive.

“Sister,” came a voice.

Loti’s heart soared as she recognized it
and turned to see her brother Loc, bound in shackles beside her. Her eyes
filled with tears of relief.

They embraced, and she hugged him tight.

“You have been sleeping the entire day,”
he said. “The slave traders brought us here the night before and threw us in
this cattle pen. Now we await our fate.”

Loti was horrified as the reality of
what their mother had done sank in.

“How could she do this to us?” she
asked.

Loc sadly shook his head.

“She must have some reason,” he said.
“She must have thought it was best for us.”

Loti shook her head in outrage; Loc had
always stood up for their mother, regardless of what she had done.

“Better for us?” she asked. “How could
this possibly be better than anything? We are slaves again.”

He shrugged.

“Perhaps she thought that if we stayed
with Darius, our fates would be worse.”

There came a clanging of keys, and Loti turned
and watched with horror as a taskmaster yanked out several slaves from the
holding cell, grabbing them by their ankles and dragging them across the hard
desert floor. With a kick and a shove, the shackled slaves were sent off to the
fields of labor—joining hundreds of others who were chipping away at rock.

Two more taskmasters approached their
cell, and Loti, burning with fury, reached down felt the dagger hidden in her
waist. She would not succumb to a life as a slave—never again. This time she
would go down fighting.

As the taskmasters approached, she
turned to Loc.

“Not this time,” she said with steely
determination. “I shall never be a slave again.”

Loc reached out and placed a reassuring
hand on her wrist and shook his head in the darkness.

“Please, my sister. Don’t do it. I beg
you. For me. Save your fight for another time. You will kill one of them, and
you will die.”

“I will die anyway,” she said. “And at
least I shall kill one of them. Why should I not?”

“Because,” he said quickly, urgently, “I
want to kill
many
of them.”

She looked at him, surprised by his
response and by the deadly seriousness in his eyes. Slowly, she released her
grip and slipped the dagger back into her waist.

“How?” she asked.

The taskmasters arrived at the cell,
unlocking it, and as they reached to extract another slave, this time Loc
rushed forward.

“We wish to volunteer!” he called out.

There came a stunned silence, as the
taskmasters looked him over disparagingly.

“You?” one asked, laughing, mocking him.

Loc flushed.

“Do not pay attention to my hand,” he
replied. “I can mine as well as any man. I’ve been mining my entire life.”

“What are you doing?” Loti whispered to
him—but he ignored her.

“Mining!?” the taskmaster asked. “You
know it is a job from which most slaves never return. No one volunteers for it.
Nine out of ten will not come back.”

Loc nodded.

“I know,” he replied. “And I volunteer.”

The taskmasters looked at each other,
then one finally nodded to the other, and they pulled out Loti and Loc.

“What have you done?” Loti asked him, as
they were led off.

He smiled back, a furtive smile that
only she could see.

“You will see, my sister,” he replied.
“You will see.”

Erec stood in the village center, one
arm hooked around Alistair’s waist, and smiled wide as he relaxed for the first
time and allowed himself to enjoy the festivities taking place all around him.
He took a sense of pride in seeing these Empire villagers free from the grips
of the Empire, all of them so jubilant, dancing and cheering all around him, such
expressions of joy and laughter, the likes of which he had not seen in years.
These people had been oppressed and enslaved for so long—he could see it in
their faces—and now he had granted them the greatest gift: freedom.

Music rang in the air, and they played
drums and smashed cymbals as they danced, each grabbing the other, locking
arms, dancing in circles. Erec soon felt a villager grab him, a tall muscular man
with no shirt, linking arms with him and dancing around in a circle. Erec found
himself caught up in it all, laughing as he joined in, while a woman linked
arms with Alistair and danced with her. Erec felt himself passed off from one partner
to another as he let his guard down and enjoyed himself. He noticed all of his
soldiers looking to him, to see if it was okay to join in, and as he nodded
back, they all, too, relaxed and joined. Erec spotted his brother dancing
beside him, and he felt his men all deserved a break, and a chance to celebrate
their string of victories.

Oppression was a terrible thing, Erec knew,
and having one’s freedom stripped was perhaps the worst form of oppression
there was. Freedom, the ability to master one’s own destiny, was more than just
precious—it was the essence of life itself. These people, now free, no longer
feared danger, even though they lived in a land surrounded by Empire; they were
free for
this moment
, and this moment was all that mattered. Whether
they died later or not, this moment made their lives worth it.

As Erec took a break from dancing,
though, he glanced back at his fleet, anchored in the river beside this village,
and he felt a flash of concern: far off in the distance, in the black of night,
he could still see the flames of those burning ships, lit up against the night,
a soft glow of orange. Erec knew that was a good sign—the Empire was still
struggling with their blockade. But he did not know how long it would last, and
he felt a responsibility to keep moving.

As the latest song died down, Erec
pulled aside the village chief, clasped him on the shoulder, and looked him in
the eye.

“We are most grateful for your
hospitality,” Erec said.

“It is we who must thank you,” the chief
said. “How can we repay you? It is very sacred for our culture.”

Erec shook his head.

“Seeing your joy is repayment enough,”
he said. Erec sighed. “I hate to say goodbye, but we must leave you now. I fear
if we do not move on, the Empire shall catch up with us.”

The chief’s face showed no concern.

“You have nothing to worry about this
night, my friend,” he replied. “Empire soldiers would never travel these waters
at night. They will wait for morning to pursue you.”

Erec looked back, puzzled.

“Why?” he asked.

“The snakes,” the chief replied. “Out
there, in those black waters, there are monster snakes, the size of a ship,
that surface at night. If they sense the motion of ships, they would drag them
down.”

Erec turned and examined the blackened waters
with a new respect; he saw no snakes, but he took the chief at his word. The
wonders of these Empire lands never ceased to amaze him.

“Stay this night with us,” the chief
added. “You will do us a great honor. You will be safer here—and we want to
thank you, to celebrate with you.”

He reached out and put a drink in Erec’s
hand, took a drink in his own, and clinked cups with him.

Erec hesitated, then finally leaned back
and they drank together. Erec felt the warm spirits going to his head, and for
the first time in a while, he felt relaxed.

Two huge moons hung over them,
illuminating the night, the smell of roasting food strong in the air, and all
his men were happy and relaxed. He nodded back and smiled.

“We will wait, my friend. Tonight, we
celebrate.”

*

Erec walked with Alistair through the
starlit night, the two holding hands, heading away from the noise and bustle of
the village’s ongoing celebrations, after hours of dancing and eating and
drinking. Erec felt lightheaded, the strong alcohol going to his head, and as
he held Alistair’s hand, they moved through the brush, heading down towards the
river. They had been in constant flux since they had departed the Southern
Isles, and he wanted some time alone with her.

Erec took in the skies and saw the two
huge moons had long since dropped, the sky now black and replaced with countless
twinkling stars, yellow, red, and green, punctuating the night, providing
almost as much light as the moons. It was the first time he and Alistair had
been alone together in he did not know how long. As he reflected on their past,
on how she had saved his life, he felt guilty that they had never had time to
wed.

“Do not think that I have forgotten
about our wedding,” he said. “One day soon, I promise, it shall come.”

Alistair smiled back at him.

“In my eyes, we are already wed,” she
said.

They walked in silence for some time,
and he could sense her breathing shallow, could sense her tension, as if there
was something she wanted to say.

And then finally, she broke her silence:

“After all, my lord,” she said, “our
child will need a legitimate father.”

Erec stopped and did a double take at
her words, wondering if he had heard her correctly.

“Child!?” he asked.

Alistair stopped, too, and faced him,
smiling back at him with a look of such joy and surprise.

“We are with child,” she said.

Erec felt a wave of ecstasy rush over
him, and he reached out and embraced her, holding her tight, spinning her
around, again and again, overflowing with joy.

“Are you certain?” he asked, looking
down at her stomach, his heart was slamming his chest.

She nodded, her eyes filled with joy.

“Yes,” she said. “I wanted to tell you
for so long…but…the moment did not feel right.”

Erec hugged her again, overjoyed, his
mind swimming with a million thoughts. He was going to have a child. It was
hard to fathom. He had always imagined this day, but had never imagined it
would come now, so soon. He thought of all the people he had lost, all the
hardship they had suffered, and this good news, the idea of bringing new life
into the world, made him feel restored again. As if hope could live on, no
matter what.

“You don’t know what this means to me,”
he finally said.

They continued walking until they reached
the river’s edge and they both stopped before it and looked out at the river,
hundreds of yards wide, like a vast lake, its black waters glistening beneath
the starlight.

“And do you sense if it’s a boy or girl?”
he asked.

She smiled, raising a hand and feeling
her stomach.

Finally she responded.

“I feel it’s a girl, my lord.”

The second she uttered the words, he
felt they were true. He smiled wide, reached out and placed a hand on her
stomach, thrilled. A boy or a girl—he was equally happy either way.

“I only wish we were not bringing her
into such a world, filled with war and strife and subjugation from the Empire.”

Alistair faced him.

“Perhaps it is up to us, my lord,” she
said, “to make our world free. To change the world she will enter before she
does.”

Erec felt the wisdom in her words.

There came a splashing in the river, and
Erec turned and looked out and was shocked as he saw the outline of a huge
snake, twenty feet long, rising up in the waters, only its body visible, a
curve, rising from the surface then disappearing beneath it. He looked closely
and saw the river was filled with the outlines of these huge snakes, splashing
as they surfaced; the waters were teeming with them. He felt grateful not to be
on board the ship, and realized the Empire the villagers had spared his life to
keep him from the river at night.

Alistair tightened her grip on his hand,
and he could feel her anxiety at being so close to the waters. He did not feel
comfortable here either, so close to these monsters, and together, they turned
and walked back toward the distant glow of the village and its revelries.

Erec was still spinning with the news,
and he wanted to shout out, to share the news with everyone, he was so
overjoyed. As they rejoined the festivities, though, the music slowly died
down, and the villagers and Erec’s people settled around the great bonfire in
the center of the village, and Erec thought he would wait for a better time. He
sat down beside Alistair, beside all the rest of them, and as they did, an old
woman, with long, braided gray hair, down to her knees, sat in the center, her back
to the fire, and looked out on all of them. She had the glowing, white eyes of
a seer, and all soon fell silent as she commanded their attention.

The village chief, beside Erec, leaned
over and explained.

“If she chooses to join us, as on this
night, it is an honor. Sometimes she will say nothing at all; other times, on
holy days or special days, such as today, she will choose to speak.”

As the drums quieted to a slow and
steady beat, the seer slowly turned, looking all about the circle, until she
finally settled her gaze on Alistair. She raised a finger, pointing at her.

“Your child,” she began.

Erec felt his heart beating as he saw
the woman pointing at Alistair’s stomach, amazed that she knew. He was both
eager and afraid to hear what the seer had to say.

“She will conquer kingdoms,” the seer
continued. “She will be powerful, more powerful than you both combined. She has
a great destiny. A special destiny. And her destiny will be linked with one
other’s….You have a brother,” she said. “And he has a son. Guwayne. Your daughter’s
destiny shall be linked to Guwayne’s.”

Alistair stared back, clearly shocked.

“How?” Alistair asked.

But the woman closed her eyes and turned
away. Soon, the drumbeats became louder, and it was clear that her visions were
done for the night.

Erec was baffled as he contemplated her
words. He was of course proud to father such a powerful child, and yet he did
not understand what it all meant. He looked at Alistair and could see her
confusion, too.

“Tomorrow, when you depart from this
place, you will have a choice,” said a voice.

Erec turned to see the village chief
beside him, his men gathered around, staring back at him earnestly, concern on his
face.

“As you travel upriver, it will fork,”
he continued. “The eastern fork will lead you to Volusia, to your people. The
western fork leads to a powerful Empire outpost, in our beloved sister village.
In it are hundreds of our people, captives to the Empire, needing freedom, as
we. If you free them, they will come to us, and we will be twice as strong, a growing
army. If you do not, the outpost will soon arrive here and kill us. We are no
match for their armor or weaponry. Our fate lies in your hands. I cannot expect
you to help us anymore. If the freedom you granted us is just for this night,
then even for this, we are grateful.”

Erec stood there, looking out into the night,
and he could feel all eyes locked on him. Yet again, he faced a difficult
choice. It would, he knew, be a long and sleepless night.