The Blade Heir (Book 1) (26 page)

"You could not have known they were following you," Violet replied. She briefly met his gaze, but turned away to check on Homer.

He felt a pang of regret for keeping his secret from Violet. She had saved his life, and yet he still hid his identity from her.

"We should move deeper into the woods to a more secluded area. I can guard the camp for the rest of the night," Avani offered.

"All right," Silas agreed.

Avani picked up her sack and started for the dense forest beyond the copse at the foot of a ridge.

"Wait," he said. "Why have you left your home and disguised yourself as a lowly blacksmith in the middle of nowhere?"

Avani did not face him. "I was called to be a blacksmith, and my father did not agree. That is all I will say on the matter." She continued toward the forest without looking back.

Silas crossed over a dead Draknoir and approached Violet, who was rubbing Homer's nose gently. "I'm sorry, Violet," Silas said.

"Sorry for what, my lord?" Violet said, her back stiffened a bit and she squared her shoulders.

"I am sorry for all this," he replied, gesturing at the mess of bodies and weapons around them. Silas grabbed her hand and held it gently. "I'm sorry for not telling you who I really was. I owe you a great debt, and I should have trusted you."

Violet pulled her hand away and glared at him. "You lied to me, Cutter...or Silas—whatever your name is!"

Silas rubbed the back of his neck. "Violet, I—"

"I don't want your apologies," she interrupted. Her furrowed brow softened briefly and she opened her mouth to speak, but stopped herself. "It's late and we need to rest, my lord," she finally said. Violet grabbed Homer's reins and led the horse out of the copse toward the forest, leaving Silas to himself.

Silas watched both women fade into the darkness as he grabbed his belongings and trailed behind them. He couldn't believe the unexpected turn of events this night had taken. His amiable relationship with Violet had changed drastically in the course of an hour and timid Naomi turned out to be Numan elf princess. Their journey to Aldron had also become more perilous now with the Draknoir pursuing him. But how far would the Draknoir be willing to chase him? They were nearing the borders of Joppa, and surely Memnon would not be foolish enough to send his warriors so deep into hostile territory. The Draknoir leader was becoming more brazen, and Silas feared the worst if Aldron did not mount a massive attack on Nasgothar.

Despite his growing concerns, Silas found himself more preoccupied with Violet. The single kiss they shared had revealed a longing in his heart he did not know was there. War had torn at his life since his youth, and he knew little else, but he longed for something beyond the battlefield—he longed to love. Violet had awakened him from a long slumber, and he'd hurt her in return. Somehow he needed to make things right and become worthy of her love again.

TWENTY-ONE

A Dark Errand

Two days had passed since Rebecca Ravenmane had arrived in the port city of Tarshish from her long trek through the Onyx Mountains, Ithileo Forest, and the great Dulan River. The journey had exhausted her, but she did not have the luxury of time to rest. Her old tutor, Rekk, had always said, "Rest is for the weary, and a weary spy is better off dead." Old Rekk always had a way with words, and under his tutelage, Rebecca had become a very competent spy and assassin. She was closer than ever to avenging her mother's death. Rebecca could still hear her screams. 

Rebecca and her mother were traveling by wagon on the Barren Road, heading to their cottage in the Golden Plains when three hooded men walked out in front of them. Rebecca's mother refused to give up their belongings to the bandits and tried to fend them off, but she was stabbed to death before Rebecca's eyes. She fled into the woods near the road when the men turned to kill her next. After running for what seemed like an eternity, her pursuers lost her in the underbrush, and eventually they turned back to the wagon. Wishing to see her mother one last time, Rebecca sneaked back toward the road and waited for the thieves to gather their plunder before she walked out from the cover of the trees. From a distance she witnessed something she would never forget. The three hooded thieves took off their dark cloaks and revealed their vivid blue and white uniforms underneath—the standard colors of Aldronian soldiers.

She remembered crying there in the forest alone for hours as the corrupt soldiers packed all of their clothes, jewelry, and food in sacks. They scurried off with her mother's horse carrying the spoils, laughing at their victim's misfortune. The lifeless eyes of her mother were forever burned into Rebecca's memory that day. Grief-stricken, frightened, and alone, her only recourse was to run. She ran far to the east—far away from the cold corpse that used to be her mother. The way back home was unknown to her as a child, and even if she knew it, no one was waiting for her to return.

 During those first few days of running, she learned many things about survival. She learned how to forage for food: eating insects that dwelled inside logs in the forest or catching rodents that disturbed her sleep at night. Looking back, she recalled how primitive her efforts were, but as time passed she became more proficient in her methods. While searching for food along the banks of the Feilon River one morning, Rebecca came upon a Draknoir encampment teeming with warriors. She thought the end of her life had surely come when the lizard-like beings surrounded her, but she was surprised to find another human was among their company—an older man with graying hair and a hooked nose. He told her she was safe and no harm would come to her.

The man's name was Rekk, a spy employed by the Draknoir. He expressed more kindness to her than anyone she'd ever known, treating her as a father would his own daughter. Rekk had once been an illegal trader on the Sea of Lagrimas, importing Draknoir goods to spies and black market merchants in the cities of Aldron, Tarshish, and Haran. When the war with Aldron began to escalate, Rekk gained a promotion as a spy for his loyalty to the Draknoir horde. He always told her the money was good and that the Draknoir offered the one thing no man could ever give him—vengeance. Rekk's family were once nobles in the Court of Gilead, but they were exiled when Rekk's father was charged with treason for actively pursuing a peace accord with the Draknoir. Rekk's father hung for the crime, and his mother was left impoverished to care for four children in the foreign province of Ragnara. Rekk despised the royals of Aldron since—convinced that his father's dream of peace with the misunderstood Draknoir was the right course.

Rebecca came to share this dream since she equally despised the Aldronians for murdering her mother and destroying her life. As an adolescent, she embraced the Draknoir's customs and traditions from her surrogate father and eventually became a spy herself. She was taught how to gather information from the towns and cities she infiltrated, concealing her identity and searching for secrets in the most detestable of places. Rekk taught her most of his trade, but after he died, she learned much more from the best tutor among the Draknoir—Lord Memnon.

After losing Rekk, Memnon recognized the talents of his elite spy's adopted child. The charismatic Nasgothar leader trained her in concealment and the arcane arts, making her a vicious threat against the Aldronians. He nurtured her hatred and desire for vengeance, teaching her to wield her anger as a powerful weapon. In time she became more than a spy for the Draknoir, but also a formidable assassin—the best in Memnon's employ. It was the primary reason for her appointment to Tarshish. She was uniquely gifted to assassinate a high-ranking official like Baron Stendahl.

Rebecca had spent the past two days gathering information in Tarshish, and her findings were quite interesting. Rumors of a military retaliation by King Dermont were running rampant in many circles. A few unscrupulous Aldronian soldiers were keen to share information with her informants for the right amount of coin. Apparently, the King believed his son had escaped the attack in Ithileo and had sent scouts to the areas near the Dulan to find him. The same soldiers believed a massive offensive led by Baron Stendahl was likely to follow. Trusting her intuition, Rebecca would relay the information quickly to Lord Memnon, but first, she needed to know Stendahl's whereabouts. Only one person in the city knew the answer, and luckily, she had enough solidi in her coin purse to pay the greedy rat known as Durgan.

 After grabbing a meal at a local tavern in the evening, Rebecca made her way to the docks on the eastern shore. Tarshish's streets were rank with homeless beggars and urchins looking for charity. The night air reeked of rotting fish from the wharf nearby, forcing her to hold her breath. It was just past the ninth hour of the night, an inconvenient time for a woman to be wandering the streets. She caught a few stares from both drunken and sober men that revealed more of their intentions than she wished to know, but she was no simple village girl. She knew what they wanted and desired to take by force if the opportunity arose.

Come and get it.

To her dismay, no one did, but she recalled with amusement the few instances when men had tried to take advantage of her. Imagine their surprise when the seemingly frail woman didn't cower when they threatened her or tried to pin her against a wall. Instead, they found themselves thrown to the ground beneath her boot heel, regretting ever laying eyes on her. Yes, those moments always gave her a bit of pleasure.

 Rebecca walked past a row of squalid tenements and arrived at the townhouse next to the docks where her informant hid. Patches of mold covered the wooden door of the house and the daub walls were cracked, revealing the wattle underneath. A small rectangular panel on the door slid open and a pair of dark, beady eyes stared back at her inquisitively.

"Why does the gull nest on the dock?" the voice behind the door mumbled.

"A nest on the dock is better than a nest in the wolves' den," Rebecca recited.

The small panel slid shut, and she heard the bolts on the door unlock. A heavyset man with a ruffled mop of hair and stained clothing stood behind the door, waving her inside.

Rebecca walked down a dark, narrow corridor with the man following closely behind. They entered a large room with a circular table in the center, and the man asked her to sit in one of the two chairs beside the table. She sat down as the man disappeared into a connecting room. Overturned mugs and chopped tobacco leaves littered the tabletop. The entire room was cluttered with soiled clothes, fishing rods, and rotting bait in buckets. She coughed at the stench of it all. Voices came from the adjacent room and diverted her attention from the squalor around her. It sounded like arguing: one man shouting at another and then the sound of a fist smacking the side of someone's face. Seconds later, the man who had escorted her inside rounded the corner. He rubbed his hand over a welt below his eye and walked out the front door without acknowledging her. Another man came around the corner, taking a seat in the other chair across from her. She quickly recognized his stubble beard, bagging eyes, and widow's peak. It was Durgan, her greedy informant.

"Well, 'ello, love. What brings you to my shanty? A kiss and a nightcap perhaps?" Durgan said. He always sought to charm, but it was a wasted effort on her.

"Why do I always come, Durgan?" She forced a smile. "Information, my friend."

Durgan scoffed. "Well, I must admit you've got the worst timin'. I was just tellin' Troy out there how I'd specifically said no more visits today."

"Well, how many solidi will it take to change your mind?" She dropped a small coin purse on the table.

Durgan snatched the pouch from the table and counted forty solidi. "I think this'll do, love," he smiled, revealing a few missing teeth.

"I need to find Baron Stendahl. Tell me everything you know," she said, crossing her arms, awaiting a quick response.

"Stendahl is at Gilead Palace, o' course. Rumor has it he's been appointed to lead a campaign against your friends, the Draknoir, very soon. The Aldronians have been on the move for the last two days, and my sources tell me they plan to move before the week's end. The Captain of the Guard is most likely marching off with the king's army."

"Where is the King's host headed?"

"Ithileo, but who knows how they plan to get there. Dermont's airships can't carry more than a thousand men, so I doubt he'll use them. That leaves three options in my mind," Durgan said, fiddling with a coin from the pouch. "The army can journey northeast through the Golden Plains and cross the Dulan into Ithileo, or Dermont could sail them over through the Sea of Lagrimas on frigates."

"What's the third option?" Rebecca asked.

"Well, he might send half his army through the Golden Plains and half through the Sea of Lagrimas, which might make a nasty fight on two fronts for yer lads, the Draknoir. I'm betting my money that's what he'll do," he said, shaking the coin purse vigorously.

Rebecca leaned back in her chair and let out a heavy sigh. If Dermont was attacking on two fronts, the Draknoir warriors guarding Ithileo would fall quickly. There was also no way for her to know which front Stendahl would be directly leading. Aldron was a day and a half's away on horseback, leaving her with little time to find the Captain among all the commotion surrounding the impending departure of troops. She bit her lower lip, "That will do, Durgan. Thank you for your time."

"Anytime, love. Just try to be a lil' more courteous next time and announce yer coming, will ye?" He gave her a lopsided grin.

She rose from the chair, narrowing her eyes at him. His smile quickly faded, and he nervously escorted her out the door where Troy sat smoking a pipe outside. The burly man glanced her way, but said nothing as she walked past him.

Rebecca traversed the empty streets again, heading southward to the city entrance where her horse was stabled. A chilling breeze from the nearby sea caused her to pull her cloak tighter around her lean frame. She thought hard about how she might find Stendahl before he left for Ithileo. She'd be a fool to think Dermont wouldn't pursue an attack on two fronts as Durgan had suggested. And it was equally foolish to think she could make the journey to Aldron in time to find Stendahl, kill him, and escape without alerting anyone. Her mission was already a failure. Lord Memnon would never show her favor again if she returned now.