Firehurler (Twinborn Trilogy) (15 page)

“Well, now you get to the meat of the question, so to
speak. Yes, I have learned a few tricks over the winters. Any crazy old coot
can talk to animals, but it takes some skill to get the animals to talk back.”
Rashan looked around to all the soldiers who were gathering their belongings,
and then he began to walk eastward. “Come on. We can afford a more leisurely
pace now, but since you have no intention of indulging me in a second game, I
suppose we should be on our way.”

Iridan was feeling much improved after having eaten,
well enough to walk on his own, much to the relief of all those who had been
taking turns bearing the litter that had carried him for a day and a half. The
sorcerer chose to walk with Rashan, and the two conversed through the long
hours of the journey that afternoon. It seemed to Brannis that the hermit had
taken an unusual interest in Iridan, which gave further credence to his growing
suspicion that Rashan had at least some minor training in sorcery, whether he
would admit it or not. He also could not help but notice how similar the two
were. Iridan was only the taller of the two by a little, and heavier only by
grace of a healthy diet and little strenuous exercise. Both were thin-limbed
and fair of complexion, though the hermit was far paler than appeared healthy. Rashan
most likely saw Iridan as a kindred spirit, Brannis decided, one who made his
way in life by wit and magic, just as the hermit seemed to.

The day turned foul some hours after the break for
replenishing the group’s water supply. The trees that had thoughtfully allowed
the warm sunshine through their leaves to cheer them all day had now permitted
the dark clouds that gathered above to soak them with a cold rain—more typical
of the late autumn, but far less welcome. The storm had come on them suddenly, sneaking
up from the west at their backs, unnoticed until they were caught up in its
midst. The winds that brought the storm also blew the rain hard at their backs,
the only blessings being that it gave them a tailwind and kept the rain from
their faces. To the knights and soldiers wearing heavy armor with thick padding
beneath, the rain soaked them and was absorbed in great quantities by their
undergarments, chilling them and weighing them down even further under the
weight of their packs. Iridan seemed to have the worst time of it, just
recently having recovered the strength to walk on his own, worrying Brannis.
The hermit Rashan seemed entirely unconcerned and unbothered by the weather.

As they traveled along the rolling forest terrain,
they came to a shallow valley between hills where the rainwater had pooled and
made mud of all the ground. Men grumbled as the ground sucked at their boots
while water splashed into them, drenching their feet. Then a few of the men
stopped, whispering to one another. Curiosity and gossip quickly brought the
whole group to a standstill, with the first few who had stopped all staring in
the direction of the hermit. Soon all eyes turned to Rashan, who stood with
raised eyebrows, seeming to wait quietly for someone to mention why they were
staring at him. One of the men pointed to the ground behind him, and the hermit
turned and looked down. So did everyone else.

There were no tracks.

There was an uncomfortable silence as all eyes turned
once more to the hermit. The commoner soldiers seemed to be extremely wary,
unconsciously leaning away from the hermit, but not taking so much as a step
away. Iridan seemed more surprised than wary, thinking that this was something
he ought to have noticed, or at least felt, if magic was about.

Brannis was the one to break the silence: “Well, care
to explain this?” he asked, trying not to sound too accusatory.

The hermit cocked his head to the side. “Explain what?
You really ought to try being more specific. You give me more credit than is my
due if you think all is known to me.”

“The footprints … Why are there none? Is that specific
enough for you?” Brannis said.

The foul weather had worn his patience thin.

“Ahh, there we go, a proper question. Well, it seemed
rather bothersome to trudge about in the mud, so I chose not to.”

“Well, stop it. You are making us all uneasy, working
strange magics without letting on that you are doing so … and now that I look
closer, you are not even wet!”

Rashan rolled his eyes and blew a long, weary sigh.
“Very well, I shall muck about in the mud with the rest of you, but I will not
get rained on just for your peace of mind. I hate going about in wet clothes
for no good reason.” And with no warning, the hermit sank a finger’s-breadth
with a soft splash and a squish of mud. He crossed his arms over his chest and
asked, “Better?”

“All right, but let me know before you use magic
again,” Brannis said, a little bothered by how easily the hermit performed such
minor feats of magic.

He had heard of woodland sorcerers before—those who
called themselves druids—but he had been taught that they lacked any real
talent with aether. Supposedly they only drew on the aether in living plants,
and very rarely the aether of animals. Such limitations combined with no
organized training reputedly made them an insignificant force compared to the
sorcerers that the Academy trained. If Rashan was a druid, then druids were
more adept than the masters at the Academy had let on.

“All life is magic, Brannis. Shall I inform you each
time I breathe?” the hermit asked.

It was a simple enough question, and the logic flowed
right from Brannis’s remembered lessons from the Academy: Life is magic. Aether
flows from life.

“Never mind. Just do not hide things from us anymore.
You have proven yourself to be a friend by your help in tending to Iridan’s
affliction. You need not worry that we are ungrateful, or frightened of small
bits of sorcery worked about us. Now enough of this gawking; we are not getting
any closer to Kadris this way.”

Brannis turned away from the sideshow at the back of
the group and resumed his march. The men about him were less trusting of the
hermit now, though, and were slow to turn their backs on him, but eventually
had to return to their duty to keep up with their commander.

*
* * * * * * *

Iridan and Rashan were the last to resume their march,
hanging back from the rest of the company. Rashan took hold of Iridan’s upper
arm and held him gently at bay. With feigned innocence and a mischievous little
grin on his face, Rashan seemed to rise up a finger’s breadth, and there was a
slight sucking noise from the mud beneath his feet. A heartbeat later, Iridan
felt his own body lighten suddenly and his feet pulled free of the mud in which
they had been mired.

“Since they already know about this little trick,”
Rashan whispered just loudly enough to be heard over the noise of the storm,
“it is hardly a secret anymore. Let us take the day’s walking in leisure and
leave the mud to them.”

He cast Iridan a conspiratorial look. There was a
twinkle in the hermit’s icy blue eyes that told Iridan that he was not taking
the matter nearly as seriously as Brannis had made it out to be.

Iridan considered for a moment and decided that the
hermit was right. He had just regained the strength to walk, and he had begun
to tire some time ago. Complaining did not seem likely to buy overmuch sympathy
from the men who had been carrying him in shifts in addition to their own gear,
so he had not mentioned anything to Brannis. With the help of the hermit’s
magic, he would be able to keep up with the soldiers’ pace as they slogged
through the mud. A grin slowly spread across Iridan’s face as he returned the
hermit’s gaze. Suspicion remained in the dark recesses of his thoughts, but
Iridan found himself liking his strange new companion. The two men hurried
their steps, splashing along the surface of the shallow, muddy pools of water,
and tried not to attract too much attention as they caught up to everyone else.

Chapter 10 - The Time to Act

He was all alone in the dark cell, sitting on the edge
of his bunk. He rested his elbows on his knees, and his hands were clasped
tightly together; his heart was racing in eager anticipation.

The day is finally here.

Denrik’s men had been taken from the cell shortly
before dawn as part of a work detail that would unload the supply ship that was
to make its monthly visit to Rellis Island that morning. All told, a dozen men
would take part in the job of carrying the food and other goods ashore and
stocking them in the small warehouse that held the penal colony’s supplies. The
guards picked the fortunate prisoners based on behavior, bribery, and often on
a whim. The rest—a group that unfailingly included Denrik—were locked in their
cells until the ship had once again departed. The fact that all five members of
Denrik’s crew happened to have been selected this once caused no concern among
the guards, for of all the prisoners on the island, only Denrik was deemed to
warrant extraordinary precautions.

The waiting was necessary but growing tiresome on
Denrik’s nerves. He needed to time his maneuvers properly, even if he had built
considerable leeway into his plan. Inside the cell block, there was no light
from the sun, and judging the passage of time was tricky—in fact impossible
with any degree of precision. Since he had never been on one of the supply
details, he had to make countless inquiries of the other prisoners who had. Not
all the prisoners were friendly with the former pirate, and some had taken to
taunting him with tales of their little treks aboard the supply ships, knowing
that it bothered him that he was not allowed to accompany them. Bitter though
the stories were, Denrik milked them for all the information he could gather
about how the operation was run—and that was quite a lot.

*
* * * * * * *

Jimony glanced all about as he walked, fearing that
the guards knew what he was preparing to do. To his mind, guilt was written
clearly upon his features, and he was a doomed man. The guards were not so
perceptive that they made anything of it, and merely thought the prisoner to be
fearful of the bared weapons that they carried. Normally the guards on duty
carried just whips and clubs, lest the prisoners rise up in numbers and
overpower them should they get hold of anything truly dangerous. When a ship
was docked, that changed. All the guards were on duty, outnumbering the
prisoners unloading the ship twofold, and they carried swords. In the hold, the
ship’s crewmen were similarly armed, ensuring that the workers caused no
mischief to the ship or the cargo.

They had already made one trip, carrying barrels of
freshwater and sacks of flour into the storehouse. This next trip into the hold
was the one. Captain Denrik had told them all what to do, the five of them that
were loyal to him. If the other seven prisoners went along with the plan once
it was revealed, everything would be fine. If not … Well, things might get
bloody. Jimony glanced around to assure himself that his comrades were all
present. He fervently wished that the captain had not put him in charge of this
part of his plan.

The prisoners marched barefoot up the gangplank and
then down into the hold of the ship via a short flight of rickety stairs. The
ceiling of the hold was low, giving rise to fears of hitting one’s head while
merely walking upright. Sailors stood to either side of the door, and others
among the cargo, watching the prisoners’ movements with drawn swords.

Jimony cleared his throat. “Beggin’ yer pardon,
mister, but I’m not for thinkin’ we’re gonna get off this ship,” he told the
nearest sailor, trying not to sound scared.

“Huh?” one of the prisoners who had not been in
Denrik’s “crew” uttered dumbly.

“Of course, and you need not get off,” the sailor
said. “We surrender.”

The sailor’s words were matter-of-fact, and he laid
his sword carefully on the floor. The other sailors did likewise. Jimony could
hardly believe how easy it had been.

*
* * * * * * *

Denrik had waited long enough. Time or not, he was
unable to sit idle any longer. He would have rather tested his luck being too
early than see all his planning wasted were he to be too late.

He moved to the steel door that had caged him in for
so long, and smiled. Irrationally, he felt it was time that the door received
its due punishment for the all the years that it had held him captive. He felt
along the rough, metal surface to locate the lock. Satisfied that he had found
just the right spot, he took a half step back and crouched low, bringing the
lock to his eye level.

“Kohtho ilextiumane veeru,”
he spoke softly and then held the tips of his index
fingers just a hairsbreadth apart—no mean feat considering the darkness.

He felt the cool rush of aether into his body, a
welcome feeling that he was too seldom able to indulge in among the
superstitious fools with whom he dwelt. Being a pirate was a serious enough
offense—one that had nearly been enough for the Acardians to reinstate public
execution—without compounding it by being caught practicing witchcraft.

There was no visible change to the lock at first, but
slowly a red glow began to illuminate the gloom of the darkened cell. The heat
created enough light for Denrik to see what he was doing, as the area around
the lock grew ever hotter. The smell of burning filth wafted from the door as
the grime that pervaded the cell block caught fire inside the lock. Sweat
beaded on Denrik’s bald head, but from exertion and not the heat of the melting
metal. His skills with magic were considerable, but he lacked the power to make
much use of them. The spell he was using to heat the lock was fairly simple,
yet he felt as if he was straining to hold a cannonball over his head, so
quickly it sapped his strength.

With a gasp and a few heavy breaths, Denrik ended the
spell, and the red glow from the door began immediately to fade. He ran a hand
over his head to wipe away the sweat, a gesture that still felt odd to him with
no hair. He supposed that once he was free of the lice-infested prison colony,
he could grow it out again.

Foolish guards,
he mused,
they have not let me so much as see a razor. Did they ever wonder
how I managed to keep clean-shaven?

Denrik had been using magic to keep the stubble both
on his face and scalp at bay, not wanting to suffer the misery that so many
other prisoners went through with the biting parasites that infested the place.
He shook his head in derision at the thought that in the three years of his
captivity, no one had questioned how he managed it.

Regaining his strength after a moment, Denrik stood
and pushed gently on the door. It swung open just a crack, the locking
mechanism no longer in any shape to continue performing its duties. He peeked
out into the hallway, squinting against the sunlight that streamed in from a
barred window above the guard post. It was unmanned, of course, since all the
guards were out ensuring that the supply ship was protected.

How amusing: if there was someone on duty here, that
ship would be a whole lot safer
.

Denrik made his way down the hall, his bare feet
slapping against the stone floor. He did not care if anyone heard him or not.
The prisoners were of no concern; none of them would raise an alarm, even if
they did believe something to be amiss. There was no love lost among the
various inmates of the New Hope colony, but they all stood united against their
common enemy—the guards.

The door out of the cell block had no lock and really
never needed one before. The island was thought to be secure from escape, and
the locked cells were mostly to protect the guards. Denrik walked right out of
the cell block unopposed, leaving the door to his own cell wide open. He
relished the thought of the guards’ expressions when they eventually came back
and saw that their prized prisoner was gone.

The morning sun was high in the sky, and a few fluffy
white clouds were the only ornament to grace the clear blue above. Denrik never
cared much for landscapes or trees, or any of the beauty that poets ascribed to
them, but there was something about a clear sky that he could appreciate as a
man of the sea. It was a fine day to set sail!

He headed straight toward the water, away from where
the ship was docked. He kept low and used the naturally rocky and uneven
terrain of the island for cover. The guards were likely preoccupied with the
prisoners unloading the supply ship, but he was too close to his goal to take
any unneeded risks. The chilly water of the Katamic Sea lapped at his feet at
he reached the shore, apparently without being spotted. Not hesitating in the
least, he plunged into the water. The sudden cold shock of the dunking felt
invigorating—he supposed in no small part due to the fact that he knew he was
nearly a free man. He slowly began to make a circuit of the small island,
swimming around to where his salvation was docked.

It was the riskiest part of his plan. Denrik was a
strong swimmer, but he could only make so large a concession to stealth. To
completely avoid detection, he might have swum out to sea a ways and doubled
back on the ship from the far side. But there was limited time, and he needed
to make sure he was on board the ship before it weighed anchor. He was going to
need a bit of luck to avoid being seen by the guards as he came within a
hundred yards of the shore and then approached the ship.

*
* * * * * * *

The guards were growing impatient. The lazy
good-for-nothing prisoners had been in the ship’s hold for too long. What was
the delay? There was a protocol to the business of the supply ships; the
sailors took great pride in their job and were touchy about the guards coming
on board to boss them around. It gave little comfort to the colony’s guards,
however, as they waited on the short pier for their prisoners to emerge with
the last of the supplies.

They heard no sign of a struggle from the ship’s hold,
and had heard no calls for help from the crew. There was nothing to be done but
wait for the prisoners to come back out, at least not without causing trouble
with the ship’s crew. There was going to be a debt to pay after the ship was
unloaded, though.

*
* * * * * * *

Denrik was almost disgusted at how easily he reached
the ship, named the
Bringer of Hope
as a reminder that the prisoners had
little of it themselves.. If the guards were so oblivious, he wondered why he
had not just stowed aboard one of the ships years ago. Of course, Denrik knew
better than to seriously think he could have succeeded. The crew would almost
certainly have discovered him and fed him to the sharks, even if he had managed
to get free from his cell without having his cellmates all out of the way on
work detail. He grabbed the rope that anchored the ship in the water and pulled
himself hand over hand up to the deck. It was just one more thing that was
going according to his plan; the anchor was not attached by a chain.

He crawled across the deck to the stair leading below
into the hold and slipped down into the belly of the supply ship. It was all
going as planned. There were his men, as well as the other prisoners, and the
crew of the ship all tied and seated against the wall.

“Cap’n, you made it!” Jimony exclaimed, his eyes
widening in disbelief. He somehow had not expected the plan to work.

“Yes, good work, men,” Denrik said to his crew. “Have
they been cooperating?”

“Uh-huh. They gived up them swords and let us tie ’em
up, real easy like,” Jimony replied.

“We have done as we were instructed, Captain Zayne,”
one of the ship’s crewmen said to Denrik. “Your man made everything perfectly
clear.”

“Huh? We didn’t tells ya nothin’ but we wasn’t
getting’ back off ’n this here ship,” Jimony said.

“Do not worry,” Denrik assured his men. “You were not
the one he was referring to. Some of my former associates have been quite
helpful in arranging this little jailbreak for us. The crew is being paid well
to go along with this little charade of a commandeering.”

“Huh?” Andur asked, the simple-minded one of the group
speaking the thoughts of several of Denrik’s men.

“This was all planned ahead of time,” Denrik boasted.
“My old first mate bribed these men to let us take over their ship. They say we
overpowered them, and pocket a king’s—or should I say pirate’s—ransom for it.
Now we have to make good our escape.”

After confiscating one of the cutlasses his men had
taken from the crewmen, Denrik headed back up to the deck. He motioned for his
men to follow, noting that four of the five at least had held his ground and
not followed the other prisoners back off the ship; it was better than he had
expected. Hopefully the rest remembered their role in the final part of the
plan.

Denrik slunk over to where the line for the anchor was
tied. The knot was too heavy and too tightly pulled for him to have any hope of
untying it, but there was little need. He used his new cutlass and began to saw
at the rope. Watching from the top of the stairs to the hold, Jimony waited for
Denrik to signal him. When the rope snapped free and slithered over the side
rail and into the water, Denrik turned and gave a quick nod to his men.