The Cost of Betrayal (6 page)

T
hat night, as the two lay on bedrolls and stared at the ceiling, Harruq broke the silence.

“Hey, brother?”

“Yes, Harruq?”

“This whole thing…things are gonna be different now, aren’t they?”

“Yes,” Qurrah said softly. “I think they will be.”

Harruq rolled onto his side and stared at the floor. Yes, things were different now. He wasn’t sure how, he wasn’t sure why, but a new chapter had begun. The question was, what awaited him in those unwritten pages. And more importantly, why was he so troubled by it?

Qurrah fidgeted, remembering the death of Velixar, and remembering the dust his master had become, nothing but a swirl of gray and white piled underneath garbs of black. It was the fate of all things to become ash and earth, he knew, but what fate lay beyond? He remembered Velixar’s haunting words, and the thought of meeting him again did little to warm his heart. A soft voice, tiny and often ignored, dared speak up in his mind. All men turned to dust. Perhaps his life determined whether his soul, if it existed, would also turn to dust. The path he walked, dark and distant from so many, could it turn him to where the road faded into lightless forests of thorns and graves?

Neither slept well that night, despite their full bellies and warm blankets.

3

A
swift kick stirred Harruq from his dreams. He grunted, forced open a single eye, and then shut it when he saw Qurrah frowning down at him.

“What do you want?” he asked, the phrase coming out as a single, drowsy word.

“Sunrise nears. Get up.”

Then Qurrah dropped Harruq’s heavy leather armor onto his head. The warrior groaned in response.

“Why should…”

“My life depends on you,” Qurrah said. “You’ve never been trained before. Here is your chance. Now get up.”

“Fine. Fine. Fine.” The bleary half-orc rolled the armor off his face and glared up at his brother. “Remember, I’m doing this for you.”

“I doubt you will let me forget,” Qurrah said, vanishing down the stairs.

N
o games,” Harruq said. He stood behind the tower, his armor buckled tight and his blades in hand. Dew covered his boots. A soft breeze sifted through his hair, the scent of morning awakening his mind. It was still cold in the shadow of the tower, the grass short and thick. The King’s Forest stretched out before him, the woods wide, their branches intertwined along the top canopy.

“This is no game,” Haern whispered, his body an inch behind Harruq’s. The half-orc startled, then blushed red with anger and embarrassment.

“You said you’d be waiting for me out here,” he said.

“Do you always expect people to be where they say they will?”

“Only those not trying to kill me,” he grumbled.

Haern approached the forest, pulling his hood lower on his face. “The most deadly are the ones you think wish you no harm,” he whispered.

“Yeah, yeah,” Harruq said, motioning with his two swords. “Aren’t you all smart. So we going to fight or what?”

The assassin’s hands emerged from within his cloaks, his sabers drawn and ready.

“Have you ever been beaten before?” he asked.

“Of course not. Would I still be alive if I had?”

Haern’s saber was on his throat before he could move.

“Yes,” the assassin whispered, his breath warm on the half-orc’s ear. “Because I have beaten you, yet you still live.”

He turned away, blatantly putting his back to the furious half-orc. Harruq’s temper flared. Roaring, he charged. Condemnation and Salvation hungered in his hands. Haern waited until the half-orc was almost to him before leaping into the air, high above Harruq’s head. His knees curled to his chest as he looped around. When he landed, both his sabers stabbed forward, jabbing into armor without penetrating.

“Your hatred gives you strength, but it renders you stupid,” he whispered from underneath his hood. An elbow shot back, trying to smash the assassin’s nose. It caught air instead. Haern ducked underneath, spun on his feet, and froze, his sabers once again resting on Harruq’s throat.

“When I ask you something, I want a real answer, not some cocky bullshit,” he said through clenched teeth. “Do you understand me? Now have you ever been beaten?”

“Yeah,” Harruq said, his hate still churning like a trapped fire. “Just once, to an elf.”

“What was his name?”

“I don’t know! He had the strangest weapon I ever saw. It was a bow with blades along every which way.”

Haern stepped back, his sabers vanishing beneath his cloaks once more.

“Dieredon? You fought Dieredon and lived?”

Harruq shrugged. “Guess I have.”

A soft chuckle escaped the assassin. “You have fought one of the very best there is, half-orc. Your swords never came close, did they?”

“He ambushed me,” the half-orc countered. “Wasn’t a fair fight.”

“Of course he ambushed you,” Haern whispered, slowly shifting his body left and right, his cloaks swaying. “An intelligent fighter doesn’t give his opponent a fair chance. You think it fair you have the muscles of an ox while your other foes are mere mortals?” His movements picked up speed. Haern’s cloaks whipped back and forth through the air.

“What the abyss is your problem?” Harruq shouted.

“You!”

Haern leapt, his body rotating at blinding speed. Cloaks whipped up and down. Harruq brought up his swords to block but had no clue where the assassin’s sabers were. Instinctively, he crossed them and braced his legs. One saber slid over the top, nicking his chin. When the mass of gray landed, the other saber cut upward, separating the two swords. The first, still high in the air, sliced straight back down, between the small opening the other had created, then thrust forward, unblocked.

Harruq stood there, swords shaking in his hands, as the tip pressed against his throat. A drop of blood trickled down his neck.

“Why did you bring me out here?” he asked. “To humiliate me?”

“So you may survive,” Haern replied. “Your strength is great, and your speed decent, but you are reckless. All your attacks are obvious, beginner routines.”

“I don’t need to listen to this.”

“You will listen!” The assassin’s leg snapped forward, smashing his foot against Harruq’s groin. The half-orc dropped to his knees. Haern bent down, grabbed him by the hair, and yanked his head back so that he stared straight into his burning blue eyes.

“We are to be a team,” he whispered. “We must trust each other. You’ve seen, and felt, what I can do. I have fought impossible odds, and I have escaped without a scratch. You possess greater strength than most alive, and ancient blades from a time long past, and you act as if these alone will grant you victory. It is arrogance, Harruq Tun, nothing more.”

“Go burn in the abyss,” Harruq spat. Haern’s kick broke his nose. He continued whispering as the half-orc moaned.

“I consider my point proven. I am the greater fighter, half-orc. I do not possess greater strength. My blades do not contain the magic yours do. I have spent a lifetime in training, and I have learned from those better than me.” He chuckled softly. “My very first master broke my nose on our opening day of practice. I guess I have passed on that tradition.”

Harruq struggled into a sitting position, glaring at the assassin as blood ran down his lips and neck. Haern tossed him a white rag. Neither spoke as he cleaned himself, then held the rag to his nose. The morning dew vanished as the sun climbed higher in the sky.

“Are you ready to listen?” Haern asked. The half-orc nodded. “Good. I hold no anger against you, so hold none against me. It will simply lengthen things. Go inside and ask Delysia for a healing spell. Then, if you are willing, come back outside. I’ll be here.”

“In the open?” Harruq asked.

“Yes,” he replied, his smile hidden. “Right here in the open.”

Harruq stood and sheathed his blades. He dropped Haern’s rag as blood continued to drip down his face.

“You’re a bastard, you know that?” Harruq said.

Haern nodded. “Yeah. I know.”

With that, the half-orc went in search of Delysia.

S
omething’s not right, Brug,” Tarlak said, staring at a map of Veldaren divided into several colored districts.

“What you mean, Tar?” Brug asked. He was dressed in his bed robes, and his eyes were still dark from sleep. Before the wizard answered, there was a knock at the door.

“Come on in, we’re decent,” Tarlak answered. Qurrah stuck his head inside, his robes clean and his hair straightened.

“I will be in Veldaren for a bit,” he said.

“Oh, alright, well you better take this then.” The wizard pulled open a drawer, closed it, pulled open another, and then took out a metallic pendant, which he tossed to Qurrah. A quick examination showed it to be a rectangle with a small yellow square in the center.

“What is this?” Qurrah asked.

“That’ll let people know you’re one of us,” Tarlak explained. “It’ll also get you in and out the gates without too much hassle from the guards.”

Qurrah bowed in thanks, and then slipped back out. When the door shut, the wizard turned back to his map.

“Lola’s not sent word to me since spring,” he said, continuing where he left off. “The Muggly brothers haven’t contacted me since summer, and Jerend’s offered no useful information for months now.”

“Perhaps because things are quiet,” Brug said from his seat in a comfortable padded chair.

“Thief guilds don’t stay quiet,” Tarlak said with a shake of his head. “Not even the neutered ones the nobles have created here in Veldaren.”

“Then what are you thinking?”

“I’m thinking,” the wizard said, tapping his red goatee, “that somehow my contacts are expecting more money by not talking to me.”

“You think they’re being bribed?”

Tarlak glanced at Brug, who seemed disgusted with the prospect.

“I hope that is the case. If it is, Haern can get us new contacts. I’ve got a more worrisome idea, though.”

“Which is?”

Tarlak frowned at the multicolored districts, representing the territory of Veldaren’s thief guilds. “That somehow the guilds have developed plans that make feeding me information no longer worth the copper.”