“I will move among them,” Elbryan offered, and he slipped away from his “family.”
“Yer boy sick?” came a question almost immediately when the ranger moved near a group of five adults, three men and two women, fishermen, by the looks of them.
“We have been in the north,” the ranger explained. “Our home was sacked, as was our entire village. For a month and more we have been dodging powries and goblins, scraping for food where we might, going hungry more often than not. My boy, Belli… Belli ate something foul, a mushroom, I would guess, and has not yet recovered, nor may he ever.”
That brought some sympathetic nods, particularly from the women.
“And where are ye going?” the same man asked.
“East,” Elbryan answered cryptically. “And you?” he asked quickly, before the man could press the point.
“Just to Amvoy,” the man replied, referring to the city across the water, the destination of the ferry.
“We all live in Amvoy,” one of the women put in.
“Just visiting friends in Palmaris, now that it’s all calmed down,” the man added.
Elbryan nodded and looked away, out to the wide waters, the docks of Palmaris fast receding as the lumbering ship found some favorable and strong winds.
“Take care if ye’re going beyond Amvoy,” the woman offered.
“We are.”
“To St.-Mere-Abelle,” the fisherman reasoned.
Elbryan snapped an incredulous stare over the man, but was wise enough to hide it quickly, not wanting to give anything definite away.
“That’s where I’d go if I had a sick boy,” the man went on, and neither he nor his companions caught the expression on the ranger’s face. “They say them monks got cures for anything, though they’re not quick in giving them out!”
That brought a laugh from his companions, except from the woman who had been talking, who looked at the ranger earnestly. “Ye take care if ye’re to go east of Amvoy,” she said again, more deliberately. “There’ve been reports o’ powrie bands roving the land. And them monsters’re not to care for yer sick boy, don’t ye doubt.”
“And one nasty band o’ goblins,” the man added. “Rumor says they were left on their own by the powries, and now they’re running scared.”
“Nothing more dangerous than scared goblins,” another man put in.
The ranger gave her a grateful smile. “I assure you,” he said, “I am no novice in dealing with powries, or goblins.” With that, he bowed and moved about the deck. He heard again people expressing concerns about roving bands in the east, but garnered nothing truly valuable.
He made his way around, coming back to Pony and Juraviel. The elfreclined with his blanket tightly wrapping him, while Pony was at work tending the horses, for Greystone, in particular, had grown quite uncomfortable with the ferry rolling in the rough water. The horse stamped his foot repeatedly, snorting and whinnying, and sweat was beginning to glisten about his muscled neck.
Elbryan went to him and took a firm hold on his bridle. He gave a powerful tug, straight down, and that steadied the horse momentarily. Soon enough, though, Greystone was right back to stamping and tossing his head.
Symphony, meanwhile, had calmed considerably, and when Elbryan found the moment to consider the stallion, and Pony bent low against Symphony’s neck, her cheek to the magical turquoise, he understood. Pony had found communication with Symphony, an understanding, and managed to impress upon the spirited stallion the need for calm.
Greystone gave a tug that nearly launched Elbryan away. The horse tried to rear up, but the ranger dug in and pulled all the harder.
Several other people, a pair of crewmen among them, came over then, trying to help steady the beast, for a nervous horse on an open ship deck could be a dangerous companion indeed.
But then Symphony took control of the situation, pushing past Elbryan and laying his head across the top of Greystone’s neck. Both horses snorted and neighed, Greystone stamped the deck again and tried to rear, but Symphony would have none of that, pressing down harder, even lifting one front leg over the smaller stallion’s back, holding Greystone in place.
Then, to the amazement of all the onlookers, Elbryan and Pony included, Symphony came down from Greystone’s back and nuzzled up to the horse, snorting and shaking his head. Greystone issued a few more protests, but they sounded halfhearted.
And then both horses were calm.
“Good horse,” one man muttered to Elbryan as he started away.
Another asked if Elbryan wanted to sell Symphony.
“Avelyn’s stone proves itself useful now and then,” Pony remarked when the three friends were alone with the horses again.
“I understand the communication between yourself and Symphony, for we have each done that before,” the ranger said. “But am I wrong in believing that Symphony actually conveyed your message to Greystone?”
“Something of that nature, so it would seem,” Pony replied, shaking her head, for she had no practical answers.
“How full of arrogance you humans are,” Juraviel remarked, drawing looks from both of them. “Does it so surprise you that horses can communicate with each other, at least in a rudimentary way? How would they have survived all these centuries if they could not?”
Elbryan and Pony, defeated by the simple logic, just laughed and let it go at that. The ranger’s expression, though, changed quickly, back to serious.
“There is talk of powrie bands roving the eastern reaches of the kingdom,” he explained. “And of one band of particularly troublesome goblins.”
“Could we have expected any less?” Juraviel replied.
“From what I could gather, it would seem that our enemies east of the river are in similar disarray,” the ranger went on. “The powries deserted the goblins, so say the rumors, and the goblins are on a rampage as much out of fear as out of their generally wicked nature.”
Juraviel nodded, but Pony quickly added, “You mean that it would seem as thoughsome of our enemies are in disarray. And by my estimation, neither goblins nor powries rank as our worst enemy at this time.”
That painful reminder of their destination and the potential disaster they faced at the place quieted them all and cast a somber pall over the group. They spent the next, and last, hour of the voyage in relative silence, tending to the horses, and all were glad when the ferry at last docked in the small city of Amvoy.
The ship’s captain, standing beside the entrance to the gangplank, reiterated warnings about goblins and powries to all the passengers as they disembarked, bidding them all take great care if they traveled out of the city.
Needing no supplies, the friends cut right through the walled city to the eastern gate, where again they were warned about potential dangers in the open lands beyond. Their passage was not hindered, though, and so they rode out from Amvoy that very afternoon, the two horses quickly putting miles behind them.
The terrain here was far less wooded than that north of Palmaris.
The land was more cultivated, crisscrossed by wide roads, some covered in cobblestonesnot that any were really needed, for the grassy fields were easily crossed. Paralleling the road from a safe distance, the group passed another town that same day, and though it wasn’t walled, they could see that its defensesarchers on rooftops, even a catapult in the town squarewere securely in place.
Farmers stoically working the fields paused to note their passing, a few even giving a friendly wave or calling to them an offer of a free meal. But the friends pushed on, and as the sun moved low in the sky, they came in sight of yet another town, this one much smaller than the previous, as the land was more sparsely populated the farther they moved from the great river.
They swung around to the east of the settlement and camped with the black silhouettes of the buildings visible in the distance, deciding to keep a watch for the townsfolk that night.
“How far do we have to go?” Juraviel asked as they sat around a low fire, eating their supper.
Elbryan looked to Pony, who had spent years in this area.
“A couple of days,” she replied. “No more.” She took a stick from the fire and scratched a crude map in the dirt, marking the Masur Delaval and All Saints Bay. “St.-Mere-Abelle is no more than a hundred miles from the river, if I remember correctly,” she explained, and then she drew out the land farther to the east, marking Macomber Village and, finally, Pireth Tulme. “I was here, in Pireth Tulme, but after I met up with Avelyn, we went back to the rivernot near to St.-Mere-Abelle, but along a course to the south of the abbey.”
“Two days,” Elbryan mumbled. “Perhaps three. We should begin to formulate our plans.”
“There is little to decide,” Juraviel said with cavalier flair. “We will walk up to the doors of the abbey and demand our friends be returned. And if they are not, and promptly, we will knock the place down!”
The attempt at humor brought grins, but nothing more, for all of them, Juraviel included, began to recognize how daunting this quest really was. St.-Mere-Abelle was home to hundreds of monks, they knew, many of them proficient in the use of the magical gemstones. If Elbryan, or particularly Pony, was discovered and recognized, the quest would be over, and quickly.
“You should not bring the gemstones into the abbey,” Elbryan remarked.
Pony looked at him wide-eyed; her use of the stones was among their most potent weapons, and a valuable scouting and infiltrating tool, as well.
“They might detect any use,” the ranger explained. “They might be able to sense the presence of the stones even if you are not using them.”
“A surprise strike is our only chance,” Juraviel agreed.
Pony nodded her agreement, not wanting to get into that debate just yet.
“And if we are discovered,” the ranger went on in grim tones, aiming his remark directly at Pony, “you and I must surrender ourselves, loudly and publicly, calling for an exchange.”
“The two of us for the release of the Chilichunks and Bradwarden,” Pony reasoned.
“And then Juraviel will retrieve Avelyn’s stones and go with them to the west, and then with Bradwarden back to Dundalis,” Elbryan continued. “Then you take the stones back to Andur’Blough Inninness,” he explained to the elf, “and bid your Lady Dasslerond to hold them forever safe.”
Juraviel was shaking his head before Elbryan finished. “The Touel’alfar will not be involved in the matter of the stones,” he said.
“You already are involved!” Pony insisted.
“Not so,” said Juraviel. “I am helping friends, repaying debts, and nothing more.”
“Then help us in this matter,” Pony continued, but Elbryan, with his better understanding of the aloof elves, had already given up the fight.
“You ask for political involvement,” Juraviel explained. “That we cannot do.”
“I ask for you to uphold the memory of Avelyn,” Pony argued.
“This is a matter for the Church to settle,” Juraviel was quick to answer. “They, and not the Touel’alfar, must decide their own course.”
“This is a matter for the humans to settle,” Elbryan agreed, putting his hand on Pony’s arm to quiet her. She looked him square in the eye, and he shook his head slowly, deliberately, conveying the hopelessness of such an argument.
“I would ask that you retrieve the stones and give them to Bradwarden,” the ranger said to the elf. “Let him take them far away and bury them deep.”
Juraviel nodded his agreement.
“And return Greystone to Roger,” Pony went on. “And Symphony to the forest beyond Dundalis, his home.”
Again the elf nodded and a long moment of silence ensued, broken only when Juraviel began to laugh suddenly.
“Ah, but a hopeful group we have become!” the elf said. “We are planning our defeat, not our victory. Is that as you were trained, Nightbird?”
Elbryan’s smile widened across his face, shadowed with the stubble of a three-day-old beard. “I was trained to win,” he said. “And we will find a way into St.-Mere-Abelle, and be out of the place with Bradwarden and the Chilichunks before the monks can ever know we were there.”
They toasted that thought with raised food and drink. Then they finished their meal and went about organizing the camp and its defense, Juraviel going out to scout the night, leaving Elbryan and Pony alone.
“I fear this,” Pony admitted. “I feel as though it is the end of the long road I began when first I met Avelyn Desbris.”
Despite his earlier bravado, Elbryan could not disagree.
Pony moved close to him then, and he put his arms around her. She looked up into his eyes, slid up to her tiptoes and gently kissed him. Then she moved back, locking his stare with her own, the tension building. She came back and kissed him again, more urgently, and he returned the kiss, brushing his lips against her, feeling her strong back under the press of his arms, his hands massaging the muscles.
“What of our pact?” he started to ask, but Pony put her finger across his lips, silencing him, then kissed him again, and again, pulling him down to the ground beside her.
It seemed to Elbryan that they two were alone in the wide world, under the sparkling stars and with the gentle summer breeze blowing across their bodies, licking their exposed skin, tickling them, cooling them.
They were on the road early the next day, running their horses hard, as dawn pinkened the eastern sky before them. Any discussions of how they might get into St.-Mere-Abelle secretly fell apart before they really began, for they would have no practical understanding of the place until they had glimpsed it and seen its fortifications and its state of readiness. Were the doors opened wide for refugees from any nearby towns, or were they sealed shut, with dozens of armed guards patrolling the monastery’s walls?
They could not know, and so, putting their discussion off until it could produce something tangible, they heightened their pace, determined to make the abbey by the next morning.