The Shadow Realm (The Age of Dawn Book 4) (3 page)

“You have pleased me once again, Alena.”

She looked at him over her shoulder, her scowl becoming a smile, revealing bloody teeth. “I live to serve, master.”

N
yset held
the gelding’s reins loosely in her hands, the soft leather riding gloves covering the scars inflicted at the Tower. Her hands had apparently been burned by someone’s Dragon fire, leaving her with mangled flesh from fingertip to elbow. She worked her left thumb around. It still didn’t move the way it once had. She had broken it and hadn’t felt the pain of it until hours after their fortuitous escape from The Silver Tower. The slaughterhouse. The butcher’s block. She wasn’t sure which name she liked best yet.

She wore sky blue silks trimmed with shimmering gold that flowed around her body and down over her riding boots. She had to admit they were not only beautiful, but also wonderfully comfortable. They kept her feeling cool in the heat as the gentle air moved easily through the overlapping layers and over her skin. They were more valuable than anything she’d ever imagined wearing. As the new Arch Wizard, she had to look the part. People expected boldness with a dash of ostentation and she delivered.

Over her skirts, she wore a sword belt studded with small rubies. The hilt of her short sword was wrapped in new chestnut leather, soft in her light grip. She frequently found her hand there, either caressing the crosspiece or white knuckling the grip. She had to remind herself it was there. If she ever lost touch with Dragon again, she would not be defenseless. Never again.

The scrubland outside of Helm’s Reach was choked with thorny bushes and weeds clinging to dry rocks. Occasionally, the gelding’s hooves spooked a violet lizard from the open and into its den, usually a hole under a rock. The clouds stretched out like torn cotton, the air torrid in her nose.

She shielded her eyes in the sun, peering out at a plot of land the Earl of Helm’s Reach had granted them. In the middle was a patched tent of canvas bags, discarded cloth, and moldering trash. The makeshift tent flap cracked open and a muffled groan came from within. A yellow arc of liquid shot out, spattering onto a thorny shrub. The arc lost steam and became a steady dripping onto the tent’s edge. Apparently, the Arch Wizard of the Tower had lost some respect here over the years.

“Lovely.” Nyset’s eyebrows bobbed up at Grimbald, saddled on his scarlet Blood Donkey.

Juzo stood beside him, arms crossed and his eye a red slit. His gray hair had grown, flapping in the sighing wind and finally settling between his shoulder blades. “Want me to get rid of him?”

“I suppose we’ll have to.” Nyset cocked a brow at the house. It sat in shambles about thirty strides from their land. The door, window frames, and roofline were all in skewed angles. The whole of the house seemed to be leaning sideways as if pushed by the wind. There was an ancient block used as the foundation, seeming square, speckled with dead lichen. Maybe they could salvage that.

Grimbald leaned over his saddle, following her eyes. “The new Tower will surely have to be built better than that.” Nyset wasn’t one to cringe at a blade, but the massive axe Grimbald always wore over his back was a terrifying instrument. Corpsemaker he had called it. It seemed to be designed to split men in half. It had the marks of hard use, each curved blade chipped in spots. He had recently had a few additions made to it along with the smith’s repairs. Along the flat side of the axe now were a series of four menacing spikes glinting out on either side. The unadorned pommel was replaced by a steel skull, grinning at the sun. She’d watched him use it in battle before. She was glad he was on her side. “Does the weather get bad here?”

Nyset tapped her lips with an extended finger. A chill wind blew in from the Far Sea, wood creaking from the dilapidated building. She sincerely hoped no one was putting their life under that structure. She supposed not, given the tent.

“Certainly don’t want a Tower that will wash away in the next rain.” What sort of Tower would that be? “It will be hot most of the time. It’ll have to be able to withstand the rainy season, when the floods come.”

“I know some carpentry. Helped my Pa with the Hissing Gooseberry. I think that with Juzo and the help of the other survivors, we’ll be able to make something nice. My men should be here shortly with building materials.”

“At what price?” Her father’s instilled negotiating skills bubbled to the surface of her mind.

“Price? Do your friends normally charge you for help?” Grimbald raised a bushy brow and grinned at her. His bald head reflected the bright of the sun into her eyes.

She smiled back, resting her minuscule hand on his rocky shoulder. “Thanks, Grim. We’ll need all the help we can get.” Nyset puffed her cheeks out, tendrils of worry once again creeping in at the formidable task ahead. She had to pretend to be a leader of the most respected authority in the realm. Or perhaps formerly respected, she thought. Her gaze fell compulsively to the east, the dark remnants of the Silver Tower stabbing into the sea-foam horizon.

Juzo clicked his tongue against his savage teeth. “I know how to use a hammer. We’ll get it done, Ny.”

A woman stumbled out from the patchwork tent, tearing off a piece of thin cloth from the flap. She wore a threadbare shift and squatted down. A puddle of wet formed from between her legs and crept under her bare feet. She wore a loose fitting leather belt around her shift. She then unsheathed a knife half the length of Nyset’s arm that dangled from it.

“No better time to start than now.” Juzo uncrossed his arms, striding towards the tent, the great sword’s hilt poking out from his airy, unadorned cloak. His face hadn’t healed without leaving him with a new set of scars, permanent scratches and deep pocks studding his jaw. It was amazing that he survived after all the arrow wounds he took at the Tower.

It was an abysmal failure. The siege of the Death Spawn haunted her dreams and scourged her days. What could she have done differently? She should have studied harder, slept less. Every time she asked herself that question, new answers arose.

She found a spell to detect wards in the library of Helm’s Reach, two weeks too late. It was true what Baylan had told her when she asked why he read so much, “What you don’t know can hurt you.” Now she understood. Now she would never forget.

She always had thirst for knowledge, now it was unquenchable. She eyed the tome in her saddlebag.
The Lost Spells of Zoria.
She wondered
if now was one of those moments where she should could squeeze in a page or two.

She let her gaze wander back towards the rows of low fieldstone walls before Helm’s Reach. Dry wind tussled her sun kissed hair, pulling a wavy tendril around her neck. If—no, when—the Death Spawn decided to come here, there wouldn’t be enough herbs in all the realms to assuage their pain.

“Good morning!” Juzo called, holding his arm up to wave. The vagrant woman bared her teeth at him, squinting like she was just seeing him for the first time. Perhaps she was. Nyset was just noticing the jug of mead corked outside the tent, likely spoiling in the sun. Nyset followed Juzo on her gelding, pulling up beside him. The gelding’s hooves hissed through loose shingle where the floodwaters had carved deep furrows in the scrubland.

“Good morning,” she scoffed. “Got a fucking drink, asshole?”

“Doesn’t suit my tongue these days.” Juzo smirked and sauntered a step closer.

A man with a tangled beard poked his head out of the tent, blinked at Nyset, then sucked it back in like a turtle into its shell.

“You better have some damn good reason for botherin’ me at this hour you damned fucks.”

“There’s a reason. I’m afraid you won’t like it.”

The beggar’s narrow hand fell to her dagger, resting there, staring fire at Juzo. Her greasy hair crawled around her face, grinning with missing front teeth.

“The Earl gave us this land to build on, which means you have to go.”

Nyset frowned, noticing the woman’s shift was exposing far more of her than she wanted to see.

“Me and my man been living here for years. We’re here, not movin’. How’s that gonna happen?”

“I was hoping you’d move.” Juzo spread his arms in a gesture of friendliness.

The woman stared down at her shift, tugging it down to cover her lady parts. She squatted down, picked up an empty bottle and tipped the remaining drop into her mouth. She flung the empty bottle at Juzo, who let it bounce off his chest. “We ain’t movin’ without no drink.”

“This plot belongs to the Arch Wizard.” Juzo nodded towards Nyset. She could see the signs of violence brewing in Juzo’s flexing fingers.

“Who said it was hers?”

“I told you—”

“Don’t snap at me, boy.” The woman drew her knife, appearing much larger in her small hands. It was sharp and well oiled, a stark contrast to her living conditions. “Who said so?” she repeated.

Juzo gazed over to Nyset, his raised eyebrow seeking her counsel.

“I said so.” Grimbald cut in, his voice booming behind her. He slung the double-bladed axe Corpsemaker over his shoulder, gripped in one meaty hand. She had almost forgotten he was there. “You could ignore the Arch Wizard, and her friend.” Grimbald’s face spread into a wolfish grin. “But you might find that cute little knife in your neck.”

Nyset had forgotten how fierce the gentle man could be. It was something she should not forget again.

The woman glared down at her knife then back at Grimbald, her brow glistening with sweat. She looked like she was finding herself feeling a bit less thirsty now. She stuck the blade into its sheathe and stared down at her blistered feet. “I suppose we’ll just move along then. Just tryin’ to survive in this fucking wasteland.”

“Thank you, we’ll get you some new robes,” Nyset offered.

“I don’t want your pities. Can I get myself dressed now?”

Juzo gave a quick nod. “Seems like a fine idea.”

The bearded man came out, stumbling like he’d just taken a fierce blow to the head. He was buttoning the foulest piece of clothing Nyset had ever seen. It was stained with urine around his crotch and belly, and matted with shit on his backside. “We’ll leave the tent, not that nice a one anyway,” he chuckled in good spirits.

“You would leave such a treasured item?” Juzo chuckled.

Nyset had to fight the urge to laugh and elbowed him in the shoulder. “Stop,” she hissed at Juzo. When was the last time her lips had formed a smile? Too long.

The white beard stood staring at the tent. “Don’t suppose you have any beer or—”

“Water?” Nyset slid a full skin from her shoulder, held it in her hand for him to take. They were harmless, just trying to survive, like her.

“Beer?”

“No,” she said flatly.

“Get moving,” Juzo growled. The beggars skittered away like drink was just on the horizon, ignoring Nyset’s offerings.

“No one was really going to hurt them, right?” Nyset asked, watching the beggars make their way back towards the city’s gates.

Grimbald stuck his finger into an eye of the skull pommel. “Of course not.”

“Good. We don’t need any unnecessary bloodshed.”

Juzo grunted.

Grimbald eyed the undulating earth “After we clear out the tent, we’ll have to get rid of all the shrubs.”

Nyset dismounted, squatted down and dug her hands into the mix of clay and dirt, letting it sift between her fingers. “I truly appreciate your help. I don’t know what I would do without you two.”

“Of course, Ny,” said Grimbald.

Juzo nodded at her and forced a smile.

“I think the Tower has a vault here. I might be able to get some marks to pay you—”

“It’s nothing. Just glad to be here.” Grimbald swatted at a buzzing fly.

Nyset bit her cracked lip. “I have to warn you, being so close to the Arch Wizard will make you both a target.”

Juzo let out a hearty laugh with a touch of mania in his voice. “I think it’s a little too late for that. Besides, life would be a bore any other way.”

“I don’t need marks. Friends is the one thing I‘ve always been short on.” Grimbald frowned down at his wide-toed boots.

“You now have friends of the most esteemed class,” Juzo said, giving the back of Grim’s neck a squeeze.

“Oh, that feels good,” Grimbald crooned. “You don’t have to stop, really.”

Juzo slapped him on the back before striding off to the tent and started dismantling it.

“Uh, the horror.” Juzo groaned, covering his nose.

Grimbald extracted another vagrant from inside the tent, male or female Nyset couldn’t say. The beggar dragged a filthy sack of belongings behind as Grimbald shooed him along.

“I need to go into the city and meet with Vesla now,” Nyset said, deftly mounting the midnight gelding. The horse’s nostrils were already lathered by the mid-day heat. “Do you need anything from me?”

“Some—” Grimbald lowered his voice, watching the vagrant dragging his trash. “Some elixir ale would be nice.”

“I’ll send cheese and nuts with your men, if I catch them in time.”

Grimbald grinned at her and made an exaggerated slurping sound, tongue tracing his lips. “Might as well get to it then.” He strode around to a black leather pack on the Blood Donkey and retrieved the measuring string he purchased at the market earlier today. He tossed one end to Juzo and they started taking measurements of the stone block supporting the ruined house.

She turned on her gelding and left for Helm’s Reach. The city was all concentric rings, each ring containing a different class of citizens. It looked like a strange pastry at this distance.

The center rings were packed tight and rose up into the air like the gooey center of a honey bun. Her stomach rumbled at the prospect of food, but there was much to be done today and it would have to wait. In the central ring rose a small castle, Harwood Hold, a sort of miniaturized version of King Ezra’s palace, built for the Earl. It was immaculate by Breden standards. The King had commissioned the same architect to build it that had constructed the Midgaard palace. In the central ring was where the wealth, loungers and malingers were.