Ianthill suddenly seemed agitated. “We just don’t know what became of the Oracle. He is presumed dead, and that’s the way I like to think about him. However, I’m beginning to catch on to the fact that not everything we thought we knew at the end of the war holds true. Morgoran came across evidence that the wielder Migarath lived in a village called Roseshade. The Temple of Loracia there used to be his home. He is supposed to have built the first Migarath Portal there.” He looked Veric in the eye. “After I leave here, I plan to go there and investigate it.”
“I will go there with you.” Veric surveyed the area. “Your theory is that the Oracle has somehow been manipulating events from the grave. Perhaps he never met his doom in the first place. Is that your assessment?”
“Aye, from the moment the Sacred Land began its renewal. Imagine you control a vast army and you can see your defeat looming. He is called the Oracle for a reason, you know. You also see the creation of a new source of tremendous power coming from your defeat, meaning the Sacred Land. The smart play would be to go into hiding and wait, lurking in the shadows, letting your enemy
think
he has won, biding your time for a more opportune time to strike, a time you know you could win with little doubt. I met with Queen Sildariel earlier. She and her people are headed to meet with the Defenders. We may need their help in the near future if we are right about what is happening here.”
“If you are correct, our time may be running out faster than we thought. I need to contact Sylvalora. She needs to know your thoughts.” He sat down on the boulder and took out a small piece of parchment and a stubby little quill with no ink. He wrote dry on the parchment and released it into the air. It disappeared with a hiss of the wind.
Chapter 10: Roseshade
The temperature began to fall as the sun went down and there was the distinct hint of moisture in the air as Lady Shey and Gondrial followed Veric’s trail on horseback across Symboria toward the Sacred Land.
Taking a moment to reorient on Veric’s trail, Gondrial and Shey let the horses graze on some prairie grass. Now on foot, Lady Shey looked up at the low-hanging grey clouds as the last light of day faded. “We need to hurry on. I think it might snow.” She knew the snow would obscure any tracks within hours unless the snow fell heavily, and then they would only have a few moments. “Do you see his tracks, Gondrial? It isn’t too dark now for you to see them, is it?”
“Aye, I still have his trail. I can see his tracks well; he isn’t trying to hide them from us or anyone else,” Gondrial said. “He is headed straight for the Sacred Land.”
“I forget you have great half-elven night vision.” She said. “This route takes us near Signal Hill. Are there any buildings left there for shelter, you think?”
“There were several stone buildings there. I doubt Dorenn was able to burn them all down.” He took a few more steps and stopped. “I’m not one to shy away from trouble, but that place gives me the shivers. I think I would like to avoid it, if possible. Signal Hill isn’t a good place to bed down the horses, either.”
“Well, there are the border villages. I haven’t visited them much on this side of the Sacred Land, but if I remember right, there is a little farm village about three leagues east of the border.”
“Aye, it’s a village called Roseshade, and as I remember it, the place is three times the size of Brookhaven. It isn’t exactly what I would think of as small.”
“Roseshade, that sounds pleasant enough. Why don’t we make for that village?
Flurries of snow began to fall, and Gondrial bundled the scarf he had around his neck tighter. “I believe we should. The snow is beginning to fall. It makes sense for us to seek shelter. The snowfall will cover up Veric’s trail, and the horses won’t be able to graze for a while after this.”
Shey nodded and walked to a grassy clearing where their horses were munching the tall stalks of winter prairie grass. She grabbed the hanging reins and mounted her horse. Gondrial followed suit.
After about a half hour, the scant trail they followed was made more difficult by the now accumulating snow. Gondrial and Shey rode at a fast, steady pace. The snow had begun to fall in heavy flakes when they sighted the home fires and soft glowing light of the village of Roseshade ahead. Instinctively they increased speed to get there faster once their goal was in sight.
When they arrived at the village stables, they were surprised to find them empty. Not only was the stableman gone but all of the horses were missing as well. The front barn door swung back and forth, unsecured in the slight winter wind, and the stables appeared in disarray as if all the horses were evacuated in a hurry. Gondrial dismounted and led his horse into the stables. He took his sword out of its sheath after he secured a bag of feed for his mount. He laid the sword on a nearby railing while he led and fed Lady Shey’s horse as well. Lady Shey retrieved her daggers and dagger belt, strapping them on as Gondrial carefully locked down the stable barn door.
Gondrial whispered to Lady Shey. “This doesn’t look good. Stay close to me, and we will have a look around.”
Shey nodded but didn’t reply. Gondrial fetched his sword, and Lady Shey drew her daggers. She put them at the ready by her sides. They exited the side door into the village square. The snow fell heavily now, obscuring the view of most of the buildings across the way. There was lantern light in most all the houses within sight but no detectable movement. Usually when a family moved about their house, the light seen from outside the windows had a flickering effect. All the light Lady Shey could see was steady.
In the distance, behind some of the shops, came a clattering noise, like steel on steel. Gondrial signaled for Lady Shey to circle around the northwest side of the shops while he went northeast. Shey understood he wanted to meet up with whatever was making the noise in the middle. She moved stealthily through the narrow passageways in between the shops and houses until she came to a backlot clearing. She did not have night vision like the half-elven Gondrial, so she squinted to see. Three dark figures were locked in melee. Since she couldn’t make out any more than shadows, she decided to risk drawing in a small amount of essence. She spoke a few words and released the spell. Her eyes glowed a light blue for a brief moment and adjusted to see every dark nook and cranny before her. If the three figures could use essence, they were apparently too busy to detect her night vision spell. She could now see Gondrial sneaking up from the east.
One of the three fighters was a young woman that appeared to be about twenty seasons. She was dodging the wild swinging of a quarter staff. The person fighting beside her was a young man of about the same age with a wicked-looking broadsword. It had spikes on the hilt and curved slightly at the point. The last figure’s posture was distinctively male. He was cloaked, and he had his back turned to Shey
“We are not your enemy,” the female said. “We are just trying to find our way back home.”
“Everything is so different; we are merely lost,” the young man said.
Lady Shey thought they were talking to the man they were fighting, but when the battle moved them closer to her hiding place and the woman looked directly at her, Shey could see she was an elf, and she was talking to her. “Are you going to help us?” she said to Lady Shey.
Lady Shey contemplated her position for a moment. The woman was clearly elven, but her skin was much darker than any other she had ever seen, even darker than Sanmir. Just after the woman pleaded for help, Shey caught a glimpse under the hood of the man the two were fighting. He only had one eye; the other had popped out of its socket. His face was dirty and crumbling; skin only covered half of it. Lady Shey sprang into action, her two daggers swirling with near impossible speed. Gondrial was close behind the creature as well. Before his blade fell, Lady Shey pivoted on her center of gravity and struck. Gondrial’s slash caught the head just after Shey had severed it, and it flung far into the distance, shattering on the nearest wall. The quarter staff, complete with the corpse’s arm, fell to the ground as the creature’s torso fell backward while its legs fell forward. Lady Shey’s daggers had cut it in half. She sheathed her daggers on her belt in the last fluid motion of the attack and faced the two young people, her cloak repositioning around her dramatically.
Gondrial sheathed his sword and joined her. “I had forgotten how good you are with those things,” Gondrial said, grinning with appreciation.
“You only get to forget once,” she said. She looked at the face of the young man closely and realized he, too, was a dark-skinned elf. “Where are you two from, and what are you doing here?”
“And what do you know of the townspeople?” Gondrial added.
The male stepped forward after sheathing his sword. “I am Jot, and this is my sister Aela. We are from Silverston, the Arillian isles.”
“Silverston. That’s the sky city on the Western island, right?” Gondrial asked. “Impossibly high up on a mountain.”
“Aye, sir,” Jot confirmed. “Separate from the elves on the main island.”
“What in the ashes of Ishrak are you doing here?” Gondrial asked.
“Our family is merchants and traders. We were with them traveling from Symbor to Gondolan, where we were to board a ship to Silverston,” Aela said.
“We were on a ferry that got blown into Lake Trenan by some terrible force,” Jot added. “We fought the waves and ended up coming ashore. We walked for leagues until we saw the lights of this village.”
“It is strange that we set off on the ferry in summer and when we got here, it started snowing. How is it snowing in the summer?” Aela asked.
“It’s not summer. It’s the first months of winter,” Gondrial told them. “Tell me, when you left Symbor, were you going west or south to Gondolan?”
“That’s a silly question. South, of course,” Jot answered.
Gondrial gave Shey a strange look, and then he drew his sword on Jot. “Gondolan is little more than a ruin, as is Old Symbor. You two are not merchants. No one would travel that route through the Sacred Land. The Defenders would never allow it. I happen to know that Silverston trades directly with Symbor anyway, far to the east of where you say it is.”
Aela and Jot looked at each other with confusion. “We have no cause to lie,” Jot said. “We have no idea what you are talking about.”
Shey put her hand on Gondrial’s arm so he would lower his sword. “You traveled from Lux Enor through Old Symbor?”
“I have never heard of
Old
Symbor. We always just knew it as Symbor.”
“Are you saying you traded in the Sacred Land?” Gondrial asked.
“What is the Sacred Land?” Jot asked. “Once again, we traveled from Symbor, stopped briefly at the Temple of the Oracle. We then traveled south, boarded a ferry to cross the Snake River on our way to Gondolan.”
“The Temple of the Oracle!” Shey said. It suddenly dawned on her. “They are describing the countryside before the war!”
Gondrial sheathed his sword and surveyed the buildings around him. “There.” He pointed. “Over there a house is burning a fireplace. Why don’t we go and talk over a nice warm fire and get out of this snow.” He led them to the house. The door was not locked when he tried it, but it was barricaded with furniture from the inside. “Hello,” he called. “We are friendly if anyone is in there. We won’t hurt you. We can protect you.”
“Go away!” a voice called back.
Lady Shey stepped up. “We only wish to know what is happening here so we may help you. Please, sir.”
“Wait one moment.” There was rustling and moving of furniture and then a round face peered out of a crack in the door. Shey smiled She kicked Gondrial, who was standing there with his mouth open. He, too, smiled.
The round-faced man opened the door and admitted them. “You don’t appear to be one of
them
,” he said.
Lady Shey let her night vision drop as soon as she entered the well-lit room. She looked around at all the lanterns and candles scattered here and there, almost haphazardly. Candles were burning on top of books, on all the tables, on about every flat surface she could see. “Forgive me if I sound rude, but you had the door barricaded as if you were hiding from something, yet you have a source of light in every corner.”
The round-faced man looked at her. “Forgive me if
I
sound rude, but do you live in a cave, under a rock, perhaps?”
She gave him a blank face. She wanted him to know she was not amused. After all, she did have to put up with Gondrial, and he was much more clever.
He must have noticed her mood. “The light keeps them away for the most part. Some of them have a way of coming out of the shadows.”
“What exactly?” Gondrial asked.
“Things, creatures, spirits, all of them out of the Sacred Land, mostly at night, mostly deadly. I am the mayor of this village and one of the last to stay behind.”
“Where do they go? This is the first I am hearing of them,” Gondrial said.
Jot walked around the room, and the round-faced man eyed him suspiciously. “Your manner of dress is strange, friend,” the round-faced man said.
Jot smiled. “Oh, is it? I wear trousers and a cloak just as this man does.” He gestured to Gondrial.
The man made a feeble attempt at a smile. “Aye, but yours is of a style gone by.”
Aela stood behind Shey, and Shey moved to where she could keep an eye on both Aela and Jot. Their manner of style was of a time gone by, in fact. She had not seen it since before the War of the Oracle. She was sure of it.