The Starfall Knight (15 page)

Devan hiked onwards and Alessa soon realised that he had been following an old road, long overgrown with creeping brush and prickling weeds.  It wasn’t long until the path led towards a wall of green.  Alessa paused for a moment, drinking in the sight of the tall cypress and pine trees – while Centara had similarly deep forests, Alessa and Vantanis had stayed to the main roads between the city and the way-station.  Sirinis had been a rocky landscape for as long as Alessa could remember so she had never seen such a lush woodlands before.

Under the high canopy of the trees, the hard-packed road still cut a clear path towards Devan’s destination.

“Why did no one stay on Verovel?” Alessa asked.

“Bad memories, bad blood.”  Devan hopped over a log and paused to help Alessa.  His hands were warm and firm.  “No one wanted to stay on Verovel longer than was necessary.  It was a graveyard.”

“Not even the Centarans?”

“No,” Devan said.  “I suppose our superstitions rubbed off on them.”

Just like their strange reverence for longwings, Alessa thought.  Out loud, she said, “What about wanderers?  Outlaws?  If this aerock is abandoned, what’s to stop them from hiding out here?”

“Ranger patrols.  It’s not a large aerock, either.  Perhaps the size of your Dwer, or even smaller.”

The canopy thinned as the trees grew further apart.  The path led to a ridgeline and as Alessa approached, the town of Verovel rose into view.  Next to her, Devan paused and let out a long sigh.  He began the trek down to the valley floor and Alessa followed.

The buildings jutted from the earth like broken teeth, with grass and vines intertwining broken walls and fallen roofs.  No larger than a small Centaran borough, there could not have been more than a thousand inhabitants.  They passed a wooden sign, moulded over, but still legible as ‘Verovel Town’.

The dilapidated cabins and cottages were silent.  Alessa could not even discern bird-calls nor insects in the air.  Even animals had forsaken this place.  Ahead, the town hall loomed over the main road, a ragged sun-bleached banner hanging from the roof.

“If it’s all right, I’d like to pay my respects,” Devan said.

“Of course,” Alessa said.  “I understand.”

Devan nodded his thanks and headed onto a side road with deep ruts that still had yet to be smoothed over by nature.  A cold breeze chilled Alessa’s ears as she peered at the empty buildings, the gaping windows and doors.  Despite the exertion of the hike across Verovel, she pulled her rough-spun cloak more tightly around her shoulders.

The road wended between the plots of land, eventually leading to a cemetery outside the town.  Fallow fields extended to the south, where the forest encroached on the abandoned land.

Alessa stepped through gap in the cemetery’s iron-wrought fence, the gates hanging off broken hinges.  Decrepit wagons filled the area just inside the cemetery’s entrance and Alessa realised why the ruts in the road were still so deep – the wagons had travelled to and from the cemetery countless times, empty one way and full the other.  At the end of their toil, the survivors had abandoned the wagons and carts, perhaps believing that they were now irrevocably stained with the stench, if not the spirits, of the dead.

“Which way?” Alessa asked.

Devan said nothing and pushed past the timber derelicts.  Alessa followed him deeper into the cemetery.

Like everywhere else, grass and weeds had taken over the terrain, wrapped around the headstones and markers.  They passed one of three mass graves, now mounds of dirt with lacquered wooden signs displaying the names of each buried Verovelian.  So much effort for their dead, Alessa thought – Sirinese simply tossed them over the edge of the aerock.

Devan halted next to a headstone that lay a short distance away from the larger burial sites.  He pulled away the weeds, revealing the names Actinen and Serain.  Devan said, “Most of the people in the mass graves had no immediate next-of-kin, or if there were, they were children.  My brother and I dug out a new plot for our parents.

“I remember back then, seeing the bodies, thinking and hoping that there would be a miracle and they would return to life.  We have these stories with knights and heroes and magic and I’d be damned if I didn’t think that we deserved a little.  It was just the fanciful thinking of a teenager.  But the thought was always there – they could come back.  Maybe I’d wake up the next morning and they’d be alive again.  There could still be magic, right?  Not just for me, but for all of us.  I kept wondering and dreaming – right up until the moment we had to bury them.  Wrapped them up in a sheet of canvas and put them in the hole.  When I threw down the first shovelful of dirt, I cried with the finality, that they weren’t coming back.  There was nothing to save them.”

“They are at peace,” Alessa said, remembering her role as a Sister of the Moons.

“I hope so.”  Devan rested a hand on the headstone and took a deep breath.  “We should go.”

He led the way out of the cemetery and they returned to the town.

“Did Verovel have any defences?” Alessa asked.

“We had a program similar to the Centaran rangers,” Devan said.  “Marshal Jarrell, at that time, was the weaponsmaster of the town and head of our militia.”

“No walls or forts?”

“We had watch-towers and a wall around the town.  But there were so many of them.  A horde.”  Devan kicked a dry twig from the path, splintering it into two.  “If I hadn’t made that mistake, we might’ve been able to hide in the town.  Maybe the marauders would’ve been happy with robbing the farmsteads and barns instead.”

“You were in a watch-tower at the time?”

“Yes.”

“Were you afraid of heights back then too?”

Devan grimaced.  “How did -”

“The way you rode the aercarriage,” Alessa said.  “It’s all right.  We’re not all perfect.”

They reached a small cottage on the southern edge of the settlement, past the crumbling town hall and the empty merchant avenues.  Devan carefully opened the wooden gate and ushered Alessa through, closing it after her as if he were a physicker caring for an elder patient.  This was, Alessa realised, his old family home.

Like the other buildings in town, the cottage remained a gaping relic from the aerock’s troubled history.  Vines had wound through the empty window-frames, invaded the lifeless interior.  Devan pushed open the front door and stepped inside.  Alessa followed, their footsteps dulled by the earth and grass peeking through the floorboards.

“Where is all the furniture?” Alessa asked.

“There was a shortage of firewood after we cremated the dead marauders,” Devan said.  “We didn’t want to go cold or starve.”

And, of course, there was the unsaid implication of all the dead Verovelians – in the aftermath, there probably hadn’t been enough people left alive with the expertise to fell trees or operate the mill.  What of the other trades and vocations, Alessa wondered.

A handful of ceramic bowls and plates lay on the shelf near the fireplace.  Devan rummaged through a set of low cupboards that would’ve served as a pantry or storage.  He muttered to himself but Alessa could not make out his words.

Devan crossed the living area and headed into the sleeping quarters.  Alessa followed, wondering if this were the best use of her time.  Perhaps she could’ve tried her charms on Jarrell or Benton.

Devan pulled open a standing wardrobe, revealing a ratty cloak, amongst other discarded clothing, some books, a rotting crust of bread and a small, unadorned chest.  Devan produced a small key and unlocked it.

“What is it?” Alessa asked.

“Some documents and writing that my parents had,” Devan replied.  “Not important enough for the official archives of Centara.”

“You didn’t bring it with you?”

“No.  Too many memories.”  Devan rolled his shoulders and met Alessa’s gaze.  “But I think they might’ve written about the dealings with the bandits – just something else I’m looking into.”

“Is it something I can help with?” Alessa asked.  “Followers of the Moons are well-read.”

“Perhaps when I’ve found out more,” Devan said.  He pocketed a small leather-bound book and returned the chest to its hiding place.  “Let’s go.  We can still tour the southern sector of Centara and make the East-Four Iselt outpost by nightfall.”

“That sounds wonderful,” Alessa said.  She brushed her fingertips across his arm.  “Thank you for showing me this place, this town.  I know it means a lot to you.”

Devan nodded and led the way out of the cottage.  “It’s a pleasure, morbid as it is.”  He shut the door as Alessa waited on the overgrown road.  “Though it’s all in the past, I’d be lying if I didn’t hope that we encounter those tattooed barbarians again.  With Centara’s swords and rifles, we’d make short work of them.”

Alessa’s nape prickled at the mention of tattoos.  She met Devan’s eyes and asked, “Did you ever find out what those maurauders called themselves?”

“Yes, they shouted it enough,” Devan said.  “Every person they killed, every person they captured, they screamed their bloody warcry.  ‘For Sirinis.’”  Devan spat.  “For Sirinis.”

Alessa’s throat ran dry.

Chapter Eight

The clang of hammer against metal rang out through the Tarian sector like pealing bells on Centaran market days.  Alessa strode towards Tarius’ smithy, the smoke guiding her through the press of people clamouring for the latest shipment of food.

She passed Grunos and his thrashers rationing the supplies and stepped into the smithy, such that it was without a wall and missing most of a second one.  Vantanis had already arrived, listening to Tarius as the Imperator hammered at a horseshoe.  Leonus stood to one side, with Elina, Pelio and Brunos loitering near the smithy’s wall.  Dene and Nasius stood in the open air while their thrashers waited nearby, watchful of the proceedings.

“There she is,” Tarius said.  He set aside his hammer and tongs, letting the horseshoe rest on the anvil.  Sweat beaded on his face and arms, vine-like tattoos glistening.  “Took your time, Alessa.  Your father got here an hour ago.”

“I’m a Sister of the Moons,” Alessa said.  “I couldn’t rush off without raising suspicion.”  It was a half-truth at best.  She had been loath to leave her appointed room without one last hot bath and a filling breakfast.  She couldn’t count on such things on Sirinis.

“Fine.  But speaking of which, how much longer must we hold this charade?”

“For as long as we wish to trade peacefully,” Alessa said.  Each of the major Sirinese factions had forced the inhabitants near the edge of the aerock to move away in order to maintain the illusion of a peaceful community.  The dense living on Sirinis became even more tightly packed – not that Alessa had experienced any of it while she remained the liaison on Centara.

“We grow weary,” Tarius said.

“As do our people,” Dene added, flipping back her long hair.

Nasius stepped forward and rapped a knuckle on the anvil.  “Alessa, tell us what you have learned.  Either we make our move or we move on.”

“What exactly have you been planning?”

Leonus snapped, “You’d know if you cared enough to return.”

Alessa ignored him and turned to Tarius.  “I can give you more useful information if you tell me the basics.”

“We will raid them at night – just as we spoke before.”

Alessa nodded.  Tarius did not want Nasius and Dene to know about the rifles just yet.  But, what if they did?  Out loud, she said, “The raiding teams will need to be careful.  These Centarans are a strange lot, holding to old superstitions and sentimentalities that I don’t quite understand.”

“Like what?” Dene said.

“I saw them mourn over dead longwings,” Alessa said.  “They’d obviously been cooked and eaten.”

The Sirinese laughed – even Vantanis chuckled but he did not meet Alessa’s eyes.

“So baby-like,” Tarius said.  “And what of this dead knight?  Vantanis mentioned it earlier.”

“I heard only rumours from the pages and cleaning women,” Alessa said.  “They found a dead body and are holding it to examination.”

“What interest could there be in mummified garbage?” Tarius said.  “A corpse!”

“Throw it over the side and be done with it,” Leonus chimed in.

“Exactly.”

Alessa shrugged.  “It is just as I said – the Centarans are strange.  They find importance in unimportant things.  And that is where we must be alert.  They have an organisation called rangers...”  She told them of the rangers and the military, their patrol schedules and experience in combat and survival.  She had also learned of the barracks and storage areas, the stables and armouries.

“This young man has proven fruitful,” Tarius said, nodding at Vantanis.

Vantanis returned the nod.  “Young men are predictable.”

“Will the raids be bloody?” Alessa asked.

“You worry for them now?” Leonus said.

“If the raids go poorly,” Alessa said, “the Centarans will bring down the full force of their might.  Were you not listening to anything I said?  Do you think you can stand against their steel?”

Leonus snorted and spat into the forge’s fire.  He turned on his heel and joined Elina and the others smoking virid.

“They may have weapons and armour,” Nasius said, “but what good is it if they have not faced enemies like us?”

Alessa pondered her reply with the knowledge that Devan had survived a previous Sirinis attack – as had Benton, a captain of the rangers, and Jarrell, now Marshal of the Centaran military.  Alessa had been a mere child during the raid of Verovel and she knew little of the attacks until recently.  Alessa and her father lived on Sirinis but it did not mean that they had to be completely consumed by it.  Tarius did not need to know about Verovel.  And every morsel of information that Alessa kept from him was something that Nasius and Dene might value.

“They drill, day and night,” Alessa said.  “And perhaps their appearance of fine weaponry and armour is intimidating but still, I would not want to face them in combat even if I were a warrior.”

“Warriors make war,” Vantanis said.  “This will not be a war.”

“Precisely,” Tarius said.  “Nasius, Dene – pick your best men and women.  We strike tonight.”