The House of Yeel (26 page)

Jymoor
froze
.

Do I engage a man without a weapon? Do I
care more for honor or victory?

An arrow sliced into the man from above. His
face stretched in shock, then he fell to the ground.

Jymoor stepped forward along the wall to find
the next one. She saw him twenty paces ahead.

This man offered no moral dilemmas. He saw
Jymoor approach and raised his buckler shield and spear to face
her. Scales protected his shoulders and torso. Thick animal skins
hung over his loins and thighs. Predictably, he moved forward and
thrust his spear at her visor slit.

Jymoor swept her sword to knock the spear
aside. Instead, her weapon cut through the spear, sending its head
flying. The barbarian growled and thwacked Jymoor across the helm
with the remainder. His buckler swung around and smashed into her
wounded left shoulder. The pain came back with crippling
intensity.

Her sword pointed off to her
left, way out of line with her opponent’s heart. In a flash of
inspiration she spun away from her enemy to her left, completing a
full circle to bring her sword back around, pointing at him. The
spear haft hit her as she turned but it wasn’t a good blow. Her
sword thrust through the scales on his torso. She quickly pulled
her blade back out even though it was agony to do so.

Jymoor staggered over her felled opponent.
She held her left arm to her torso, trying to ignore the throbbing
pain.

If there is victory today,
it probably won’t be because of me.

Jymoor didn’t see any
enemies nearby. She pulled her helm off to get a better look. The
rest of the barbarians were running away. Ascarans were pursuing
them around the perimeter of Maristaple. Though there were still
many of them, they’d been broken.

Jymoor sat down with her back against the
wall. She rested for minutes there until a squad of Rikenese
cavalry trotted up from the direction of the main gate.

“Are you wounded?”

“Moderately,” Jymoor admitted. “Thank you for
coming to check.”

“Gladly. We got word the Crescent Knight was
hurt by the wall and King Aruscetar sent us out to find you.”

“How goes the battle?”

“Well. The knights came out
to help the Ascarans. I think one gate was sundered and a bloody
fight resulted, but that’s far away.”

“I’ll be fine. Go help
elsewhere.”

“Sorry, but the king’s
orders,” the man said. They helped Jymoor onto one of the
horses.

“We’ve won,” Vot voice
returned to her head. “Though not without cost. Many Ascarans have
given their lives. Also, Tuluk lies among the dead. No doubt we owe
our victory largely to him. His body lies on the field with a
thousand wounds.”

Chapter 21: A New Library

The city of Maristaple
filled with revelers. Though everyone wanted to speak with the
Great Yeel, the Crescent Knight, the mysterious Vot, or King
Aruscetar, many had to satisfy themselves with only a glimpse of
these famous figures at a distance. After a brief victory parade,
they moved into the castle for a smaller celebration. Other more
subtle groups, less jubilant, had dead to honor and graves to dig.
The fallen were hailed as heroes who had saved the city in its most
dire hour.

Vot and Yeel dined with the
king that evening in a huge formal dining hall. Jymoor was present,
and much more comfortable than she’d been at the table of men in
Ascara-home, with Master Kasil at her side. Yeel had applied some
advanced first aid, fusing Jymoor’s broken bones back
together.

Before the meal commenced, King Aruscetar
turned to Yeel.

“Great Yeel. Would you
please accept the contents of the Library of Maristaple? We know
the trove of knowledge would be safe in your wondrous house. Of
course, you would be welcome to make personal use of any of the
tomes and scrolls.”

“My house? Really? You would let me have all
those books?”

“We ask only a few scribes and scholars be
allowed to access it from time to time.”

“I must first and foremost thank you for
trusting me with such valuable artifacts.”

“We owe equal thanks to Vot, for risking her
precious army to aid in our defense,” Aruscetar announced. Many
applauded.

“I’m glad Riken has been
saved,” Vot said. “However, we’ll be forced to leave after we dine.
The Ascarans can safely move out of the fortress and take up their
traditional homes on the coast. They may need my
assistance.”

“We’re in your debt,” Jymoor
said. “Thank you for trusting us.”

“Come visit us again. See how peaceful it can
be, under the green sky, without the threat of the Meridalae.”

“What of Tuluk?” asked Jymoor.

“There are two young males in his pod that
will contend for mastery,” Vot said. “Though we will miss Tuluk,
life goes on.”

***

Yeel watched the remnants of
those Jymoor called his Companions. Of the fifty or so who had been
rescued from the stone garden, less than half remained. Many had
died in the fighting at Vot’s stronghold and then later at the
battle for Maristaple. Still others, having won the day, announced
their happy retirement or similar plans not involving Yeel. They
had all been very gracious and thanked Yeel for his role in their
rescue.

Yeel counted twenty-one
individuals down below near the fountain, including Jymoor and
Master Kasil.

“Please excuse my distant
perch,” Yeel called down. “I’m sure I could find my way down there
rapidly, but it occurs to me this is an easy way to address you all
anyway, so if you please forgive any perceived insult.”

Yeel had their attention. His Companions
looked up as one.

I must hurry the message
along. These ones have little patience for extended
discourse,
he reminded himself.

“My Companions, I feel
terrible to call upon you after two such desperate battles. Yet I
would be negligent to ignore the menace that made both these wars
necessary. You see, the Meridalae still have a foothold on your
world. They will come back someday and cause another war. Unless we
stop them now, while they’re weak.”

“I don’t think the
army…either army…is ready to be deployed again after such a bloody
time,” Jymoor said. She unconsciously rubbed her wounded shoulder
as she spoke.

“There will be no army. Only
myself and you Companions. You are all adventurers. You had to be
to make it as far as the stone garden of Slevander. I’ve…become
aware of…a hidden base from which the Meridalae directed this
attack against Maristaple. If we go there now, we may surprise them
and end this menace forever.”

“How do you know where to go?” Jymoor
asked.

“That’s a good question. A
really good question. I believe your predecessor knew I was once of
the Meridalae.”

“You!”

“Yes. I’m not proud of it. I
must have been fooled.”

“Must have been? You…you
don’t remember.”

“You see…my species…that is,
giant green cones of rubbery flesh with long tentacles such as
myself…we cannot form memories when very young.”

“Oh! Neither can we.”

“So, for the first hundred years or so—”

“A hundred years? As an infant?”

“…
for the first while, we
can’t form memories, then we slowly learn a trick here or there to
extend certain thoughts over time, and eventually, we learn to
remember something permanently. Or semipermanently,
anyway.”

“But I did eventually commit
to memory three of their lairs here on your world: Eight Rod,
Steelskull, and the Brown Moors. I’ve consulted with maps from your
library and found these places. The closest, the Brown Moors, is
probably where they are now, since in order to coordinate their
offensive, they would have moved to the closest base.”

“They may have fled by now.”

“Ah. No, at least not completely. You see, at
some point, one of my eyes was put into a reagent jar in the lair.
Something preserved it. I can definitely see movement there, as
recently as a couple of hours ago.”

“But you have both—oh.”

“Yes, as you have guessed,
my eyes are not exactly like yours, not even somewhat like yours;
in fact, they’re not vaguely like yours, in location, number, or
freshness limitations.”

“I’m afraid to ask. As long
as you lead us there, I’ll follow you though.”

“Thank you.”

“I will, too,” someone said.

“Yeel is green?” a voice asked quietly.

“And I,” another echoed
loudly. Soon it was clear everyone would join him, and many hadn’t
known Yeel was green.

Now for the hard
part.

Chapter 22: The Brown Moors

Yeel left with his
Companions early the next morning. King Aruscetar had wanted to
arrange for a grand escort of his remaining horsemen, but Yeel had
dissuaded the monarch, telling him they wanted to catch the
Meridalae by surprise. He had accepted horses for his Companions
and a wagon for himself to travel in.

They were able to travel
part of the way by road. It took them two days to reach a small
trail branching into the wilds. It twisted and turned, eventually
narrowing. The trees pressed in, making the trail become ever
harder to follow. Everyone dismounted and proceeded on
foot.

Yeel led the way.

���It will be underground, and the entrance is
hidden. I recall a stony formation,” he said.

“You don’t remember it
exactly,” Jymoor said.

“Well, of course
not.”

The trees thinned. The ground became wetter.
A view opened before them of a rolling, grassy land.

“The Brown Moors,” he announced.

The column proceeded across the wet
grassland. Yeel meandered a bit, but headed always west. Then after
an hour, he headed for a rise where he saw a bit of exposed rock.
He paused to look in all directions. This spot was the only rocky
outcropping he saw.

“This is the entrance.”

“There’s nothing here,”
Master Kasil said.

“It’s
underground.”

“But the soil beneath our feet is drenched in
water,” Jymoor said. “How can anything be underground here without
being flooded?”

“It is flooded.”

“What? You do know we need
to breathe, don’t you?” Master Kasil demanded.

They’re so bound by
limitations. And fear of the unknown, poor creatures.

“It’s not completely
flooded. There’s a very clever system to harvest and pump away the
water. That alone is a fascinating aspect of the place. I don’t
quite remember—”

Jymoor cleared her throat. “I believe time is
of the essence, no?”

“Of course. Follow me.”

Yeel led the way up the
modest rise. They neared a cluster of rough, pocked boulders. A
tall stand of grass, with blades as wide as a human hand blocked
their way.

Yeel smashed it down and looked beyond.

A wavy black barrier obscured the way between
two large boulders.

“There it is,” he said. “Just as I
remembered.”

Jymoor stepped through the
bent grass camouflage and looked at the foreboding black
curtain.

“What’s that made
of?”

“The hide of a null dragon, perhaps,” Yeel
said. “Or it could be a photonic curler sheet.”

“Forget I asked. Let’s
go.”

“Wait but a moment…I have to
get something ready first.”

“Yes?”

“It’s a defensive
measure.”

“Of what kind?” hissed Master Kasil, joining
them at the curtain.

“Sometimes the best defense is a really good
reactive defense.”

“What?”

“A defense so good that it kills anyone on
the offense. Since we lack any real workers of magic, it seems wise
to employ powerful antimagic means.”

Yeel recovered three silver spheres from his
pack.

“These are vlure eggs. Each
houses a nascent vlure, a creature that feeds on magical energy.
Each time we encounter a mage of the Meridalae, I’ll release a
vlure. The creatures are rather nightmarish, actually. They will
mature within seconds of being exposed to magical effects, and,
once active, they typically proceed to draw a mage’s brain right
out of the skull. It’s very unsettling to watch, by all
accounts.”

“They deserve it, if
they’ve caused all that destruction on two worlds.”

“Oh, more than two worlds,
I assure you. But that’s good for us. They’re stretched
thin.”

“So, how do we go
in?”

“Not yet. First an
offensive measure.”

“Really?”

“Yes.” Yeel took a small
bottle out of his pack.

“Tuluk’s poison. Though
most was spent, there was still a little left in his body. He can
serve us one more time.”

“Its effect?”

“Violent spasms,
hallucinations, and death.”

Everyone put some of the
poison on their weapons. Jymoor filled up the sac in the end of her
fenlar. After listening to Yeel describe its dangers, the
Companions stood a bit farther apart, holding their spears and
blades more carefully.

“Can we go in now?” Jymoor
prompted again.

“You go first.”

“Oh, thanks.”

“Well, it’s simply that
you’re wearing heavy armor. Better than any of the knights we have
here among us. I’ll go in behind you. Actually we should arrange
the Companions so that our heavily armored fighters are in front.
The more…agile ones can follow behind.”