Stormcaller (Book 1) (19 page)

“Eventually, all will enter my cold embrace.”
–from
Necromancy and Wolves: The Veiled Darkness

Hassan’s office was a cramped addition connected to the city guard barracks. The fading rays of the sun spilled through two small windows, casting deep hues of purple and pink on Walter, Hassan and Baylan. It was sparsely adorned with a painted map of Breden that hung behind his thick oak desk. The desk held a neat stack of paper on the corner. Three long swords with Breden insignias were mounted on the adjacent wall. An armful of worn books lined a shelf carved from brownstone. Walter glanced at their titles, having a sore spot for books.
Officers and Men
,
Companion of the West
,
Edges of Strength
,
Zoria Economics
were a few that caught his eye.

“It was a strange thing – shortly after they went through the town square, they left,” Hassan said. “I was afraid they had come for the sport of it, knowing we couldn’t defend ourselves or something.” He stropped his sword with a small stone, working out the gouges in the blade.

“Bastards split like they was searchin’ for somethin’, didna even stay fer a good fight,” an eavesdropping guard said from the main barracks. Hassan set the sword down and pushed the warped door closed, wedging it into its frame.
“
Damn city craftsman,” he mumbled, eying the door.

“Walter, I want to personally thank you for finding all those children, there are many distraught families that will finally get closure. So, thank you for that – your parents would have been proud.”

Walter nodded. “Just did what anyone would’ve done.”

“How did you know it was him? Did you see him add something to the food?” asked Hassan, folding his arms.

“I didn’t, Noah did, and I’d trust my life with him.”

Hassan bowed his head. “We lost a great man. He always had a strange sixth sense about people’s motives. I’m glad you followed your gut on this one. Gut instincts never lie.” He sighed. “Those kids that you saved, they’re going to have an hard road ahead of them.”

“Yeah,” Walter mused. Baylan scribbled away in his worn notebook, quill scratches sounding louder than they should have in such a small room. Walter realized it was the heavy silence that magnified his writing.

“They most certainly were,” said Baylan, scratching his head. It took Walter a moment to realize that Baylan had been thinking over the barracks guard’s comment on the Cerumal. “It was a classic three-sixty search pattern. The more pressing question is: what were they searching for?” He had a deep slash under his eye that oozed blood. He occasionally dabbed at it with a once-white cloth.
Why hasn’t he healed that?
Walter drummed his fingers against Hassan’s desk, watching Baylan write.

“The Black Wynch gave something to a Cerumal on horseback near my house, my parent’s house. It was quite strange,” Walter said.

Baylan looked into the remaining ellipse of the red sun, attention seemingly elsewhere. “What did it look like, Walter?”

Hassan stood, went out the door, and stuck a small twig in the hearth in the barracks, using it to light his pipe. He puffed on it, tending to his other men, some wounded physically, others mentally by the second reality-shaking attack.

Walter answered Baylan. “I’m not sure what it was, it had something wrapped in cloth.” He paused, perusing his most recent memories, searching for a clue. The image of his parents’ house before they came upon the Black Wynch kept returning to the forefront of his thoughts.
Something isn’t right with this image. Fresh hoof prints before the house. It was there. Yes, that’s what they were.

“It came from my house, the Cerumal came from my house.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“Let us go,” Baylan said, closing the notebook.

**

Torches burned and popped around Breden Square as a morose trail of sick townsfolk wound around storefronts, awaiting a dose of Death Adder tea. Beyond the square in the practice field, three large funeral pyres burned brightly, paying homage to the fallen. The moon hid behind dark clouds that threatened to unleash their watery payload upon the land.

Breden folk were a hard people, forged in the rigors of farming and fishing in scorching days and icy nights. They would patiently await their turn, even in the face of impending death. Nyset had at first felt victorious for discovering the antidote and killing the Black Wynch with Walter. There was, however, no celebration among these faces.

She ladled gelatinous yellow liquid into a wooden cup, handing it to a woman who thanked her profusely. “Of course, Lora, rest up now,” Nyset replied.

A man a few paces back stepped out of line and vomited. Others helped him to his feet, each taking an arm and propping him up. Nyset’s mother, Aliza added the last of the Death Adder flowers to an oversized stockpot that had just started boiling. “Let’s hope this is enough for everyone,” she said quietly. She squatted with the grace of a Midgaard dancer and retrieved a few petals that had fallen.

Nyset handed a filled cup to a child who had dried blood on her nostrils. “Mom, I think I’m going to have to leave soon.” Nyset said.

Aliza stopped stirring the stockpot. “What do you mean you’re leaving? I need you, we need you on the farm. You know we have debts to be paid that we can’t manage without you. Have you forgotten about that?”

“No, no, of course not but–”

“Selfish child, you think of no one but yourself,” Aliza snapped, stirring vigorously.

“Mom, please, listen. We’re going to go to a place where–” She handed a cup of tea to an elderly man with shaking hands. “–where my
real
talents can be practiced.”

“I see. Well, I suppose that’s a good enough reason. If you can get into the Tower, you should be able to pay our debts with the money you would make there, wouldn’t you?” she whispered.

“I don’t know, Mom, but it’s what I have to do, and Walter, he has to go. He’ll need my help. It’s hard to explain, but please trust me.”

Aliza wiped tears from her tanned face. “I know, I need to let you go into the world. We’ll be OK, your father and I. I do trust you, dear.”

“Don’t worry, Mom, you know I can protect myself and–”

“I know, you’ll be just fine, I know.” Aliza wrapped an arm around Nyset, holding her close with one hand and stirring with the other. “You’ve made me proud, Ny. Without you, we would’ve lost so many more people,” she said, looking into her daughter’s eyes. “All the times I yelled at you for wasting time studying your plant books when I thought you should’ve been helping us tend the farm – well, I’m sorry. I see how it can be useful now.”

Nyset produced a half-smile, distraught over not discovering the poison earlier. Aliza grabbed two thick rags from her apron and transported the bubbling stockpot from the stove onto a stone slab set down to protect the wood where Nyset ladled cups. “How many people, how many did we lose from the poison?” Nyset asked.

“From the Pink Caps alone, a terrible count of twenty-seven. Mainly the sick and elderly fell… they burn on the pyres.” Aliza looked to the burning pyres, tiny pinholes of light reflected and danced in her eyes. “Hassan feared it may have been a contagion. It’s not right that they didn’t get a proper burial.”

“He was smart to do that,” Nyset said, remembering the histories of plagues that had decimated entire cities.

**

Walter and Baylan entered the foyer of Walter’s house. The moon emitted a faint yellow glow illuminating their path. Marie slowly pawed at the ground where she was tied at the stairs.
She’s probably hungry.
Focus
.
Here again – why am I continually pulled here? How many died that had recently slept here? Mom, Dad, Lillian. Three deaths within three days. This place is cursed.

“Now, think, Walter. Where would your parents hide their most valuable things?” Baylan said, interrupting his thoughts.

Walter stared down the hallway into the kitchen, red swathes of blood catching his eye.

“Their bedroom would be a good start.”

The master bedroom was undisturbed, the antithesis of the rest of the house. A large double bed with white linens lay in the center of the room, adjoined by windows on either side whose thin, white embroidered curtains lolled in the cool breeze. “I don’t think anyone, or anything, was here recently,” Baylan said.

They combed through each room, finding them in relatively the same state they had left them. Walter found charcoal sketches his mother had made, of various flowers in the garden, on the bottom of the trunk in her office. One was of a bunch of roses, one a lone tulip, and another a bed of sunflowers. He inhaled sharply at the sight of the last sketch in the small pile. It was a stunningly detailed drawing of a dragon, of
the
Dragon. It almost appeared to wriggle out of the page. It had four arms, each holding a weapon of fire. Its scales almost appeared to be waving flames.

“Find anything of interest?” Baylan shouted from a guest bedroom.

Walter stared at the drawing, bemused he hadn’t caught on to her ability earlier.

“No, nothing really,” he yelled, putting the drawing in his satchel.

They met in the second floor hallway. Walter said, “There is one more place we haven’t searched.” Baylan met his eyes. “The cellar.”

The stone steps leading under the house were worn in the middle from generations of use. Dim moonlight streamed in from small windows lining the walls near the ceiling, throwing a tremulous, uncertain sheen upon the floor. The encompassing silence of the cellar struck Walter, elevating his heart rate. He crossed his arms as he walked.

The air was thick with musty humidity. A glowing blue shield materialized on Baylan’s intact arm, casting the room in a soft light. The cellar was mainly used for storing root vegetables after the harvest season. There was still a good supply of multi-colored potatoes and wine skins neatly organized on rickety-looking shelves along the back wall. In one corner there was a pyramid of elixir bean barrels. In another corner there was a small table with papers strewn about it. A bevy of rusted farm tools rested on a center column.

“What is that? This isn’t looking how it should.” Walter pointed. The cream ceramic-tiled floor between two thick support columns in the middle of the cellar had been broken up and the earth scattered around a hole an arm deep. Something, that Black Wynch, had clearly spent a fair amount of time digging through the tile and stone covering the soft earth below.

“
That thing was in my house, the Black Wynch was in my house,” Walter said, wrapping his arms tighter around his body.

“I’m afraid so,” Baylan said, squatting and investigating the empty, small chest in the cavity. It was a masterfully detailed piece, despite the chunks of dirt attached in some spots. Mounted on the lid was a dragon figurine in an apparent duel with an identically sized phoenix. The corners were marked with clawed feet like that of a dragon. The chest’s face was vertically bisected by the carving of a thick waving chain that branched at the top to wrap around that edge on all sides. Flanking the chain on the face were two engraved images, one of a dragon on its hindquarters blasting fire towards the chain, the other of a phoenix in flight engulfed in the dragon’s flames.

“It’s gorgeous,” Walter said. He carefully pulled it out of the ground, grunting from its surprising heft. “Heavy little bastard.”

Baylan squinted and moved his shield closer to the chest, illuminating its finer details.

“This certainly doesn’t seem to be an ordinary chest. What is it doing here?” Walter said.

Baylan’s lips moved as he read the nearly indecipherable script under the lid. He suddenly sputtered and backed away, placing his hand protectively before his chest.

“No, no, no, this can’t be happening,” Baylan said, wild eyes intent on the chest.

“What? What is it?”

“There was a weapon of incalculable power in this chest… called Bonesnapper, The Sundering Chains of Shattered Dreams, the only weapon known to be able to slay Asebor, also–” He paused, taking a breath. “Also called in other times, The Chains of the North, forged in the black furnace of The Nether.”

Walter stood. “What? So in addition to my mother and me being able to use the power of the Dragon, the weapon of all weapons was just sitting in my cellar?” Walter said.

“The evidence of these glyphs indicates it was once here, yes.”

Walter narrowed his eyes. “Now, the Cerumal have it.”

Baylan bowed his head. “This is not good. Your parents must have had a very colorful past – they hadn’t told you any stories that seemed a bit, perhaps, embellished?”

Walter rubbed his chin. “They did, but nothing that struck me as strange at the time.”

“Well, if it wasn’t them, then someone in your family must have had quite the tale to tell regarding the acquisition of this artifact.”

“My grandfather, Tomkin. He always had outlandish stories, but we wrote them off as symptoms of aging.”

“Where is he?”

“Dead,” Walter said flatly.

Baylan sighed and nodded. “Most likely one of Asebor’s generals was responsible. I have a suspicion who. Asebor can’t be strong enough yet to have pulled off something like this – I hope.”

“How? Who? What are you saying?”

“It’s a long story for another time. If it is who I think it is, she goes by Darkthorne now, but has gone by other names… in other times.” Baylan paced in a circle around the chest.

Walter inhaled sharply.
I should gut you where you stand for speaking to me like that. When I ask, you answer.
Walter shook off the thoughts that emerged from the bowels of his mind.
Get a hold of yourself, man!

“Other times? OK, now you’ve lost me, Baylan. We need to have a long chat soon,” Walter said, furrowing his brow. Walter’s eyes glowed a disturbing bright green in the reflection of Baylan’s blue phoenix-powered shield.

Baylan started towards the steps, allowing his shield to wink out as they came into the main hallway. Walter led the way to the study and plopped himself down, sinking into a fluffy feather-filled love seat. Baylan sat on a squeaky chair, hands steepled in front of his chin.