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Erik felt the hairs rise on his neck and arms. Biggo made a sign warding off evil, while Jadow and Jerome both drew their swords and crouched low.
Calis stood motionless, while Robert de Loungville pointed a thumb at the creature with a backwards wave of his hand. ‘I think he means it,’ he said with a grin.
Facing the advancing creature, de Loungville said, ‘Why don’t you come on down here, me darling, and I’ll give you a big wet kiss.’
Erik’s eyebrows shot up, and Calis smiled at his friend. The creature tilted, as if the brashness of de Loungville’s words caused it to lose its balance; then Erik was astonished to see it collapse.
He saw long wooden sticks fall within the hooded robe, and a small man emerged from inside the folds of black cloth. He was a bandy-legged fellow, obviously an Isalani from his appearance, and he wore a tattered robe of orange cloth, slashed at the knees and sleeves. ‘Bobby?’ he said. Then his face split in a grin and he let out a yelp of pure joy. ‘Calis!’ He raced down to the sand and almost leaped into de Loungville’s arms. Erik thought the two men daft as they slapped each other on the back.
Calis embraced the little man. ‘That’s quite a show you have going there, Nakor.’
The little man’s face split into a grin, and suddenly Erik realized that he was standing with his sword drawn, while his heart was still beating rapidly. He glanced around and saw the others were also holding their weapons ready.
The man called Nakor said, ‘Had some trouble with some Quegan pirates a few years back. That little blue light didn’t scare them away, so I added those lightning bolts. Impressive, I think,’ he added with a self-congratulatory note. ‘It starts whenever someone gets close enough to see the island on the horizon. But when you kept sailing toward us, I thought I had better come down here and scare you away.’ He pointed to the fallen contraption of robe and sticks.
‘The Black Sorcerer?’ said Robert.
‘For the time being,’ answered Nakor with a grin. He glanced at the four guards and said, ‘Tell your men I won’t hurt them.’
Calis turned and, with a wave of his hand, said, ‘Put your weapons away. He’s an old friend.’
‘Where’s Pug?’ asked De Loungville.
‘Gone,’ said Nakor with a shrug. ‘Left about three years ago. Said he’d be back one of these days.’
‘Do you know where he went?’ asked Calis. ‘It’s very important.’
Nakor shrugged. ‘It’s always important with Pug. That’s why he left, I think. All the troubles down south –’
‘You know?’ said Calis.
Nakor grinned. ‘Some. You can tell me the rest. You want something hot to eat?’
Calis motioned yes, and Nakor waved for them to follow. Calis told the two sailors, ‘Take the boat back to the ship and tell the captain he’s to do as I instructed. And have him send word to the Ranger, as well.’ To Erik and the other three guards he said, ‘Follow along, and don’t be alarmed by anything you see. There are some very odd-looking creatures about, but none will offer you harm.’
The little man named Nakor led Calis and de Loungville up the path. Erik and the others followed behind. They reached the crest of the ridge, but rather than follow the path toward the castle, they paused. Nakor closed his eyes and waved his hand in the air, and the lightning suddenly stopped. He put his hand to his forehead a moment, then said, ‘Oh, shutting that off gives me a headache.’ Then he turned and led them all down another path that led into what appeared to be a small valley overgrown by a thick forest.
Then suddenly the forest vanished, and Erik almost tripped, he was so startled. Instead of thick woodlands, he was now staring at a pasture that stretched away for nearly a mile. In the middle of it sat a large, sprawling estate, a low, white house with a red tile roof, and several outbuildings, all surrounded by a low stone wall.
In distant fields, Erik could make out horses and cattle, and what might be deer or elk. Around the estate, figures moved, but they didn’t appear to be entirely human. But, keeping in mind Calis’s instructions, he decided to trust his leader and follow orders.
They reached the small yard before the main house and Nakor opened the gate in the low stone wall. They entered, and from the door of the house a creature appeared. Erik glanced at Jadow, Jerome, and Biggo, and judging by their expressions, all were as astonished as he.
The creature was tall, man-size, and had blue-tinged skin, large ears, and a bony, heavy forehead. It smiled, revealing an impressive array of teeth; its eyes were black and yellow. Erik wasn’t sure, but the creature resembled every description of a goblin Erik had ever heard.
But it was dressed in the height of court fashion: a tight-fitting blue jacket cut at the waist, over a loose, billowing-sleeved white shirt, tucked into a wide waistband of black silk. Tight grey hose and ankle-high boots finished the ensemble, and the creature looked like nothing so much as one of Prince Nicholas’s court dandies.
‘Refreshments are served,’ said the creature.
‘Gathis,’ Calis greeted it.
‘Master Calis,’ replied Gathis. ‘It’s so nice to see you again. It has been too long between visits. And Master Robert. Good to see you as well.’
Calis said, ‘Did Pug leave you in charge, Nakor?’
With a squint-eyed grin, the little man said, ‘No, Gathis runs everything. I’m still just a guest.’
Calis shook his head. ‘Guest? For what, twenty years now?’
Nakor shrugged. ‘Lots of things to discuss. Lots of things to study. Let those fools in Stardock become constipated with their rules and vows of secrecy and orders and the rest of that foolishness.’ He made a chopping motion with his hand. ‘This is where the real learning is taking place.’
Calis said, ‘No doubt.’
Gathis said, ‘I’ll see to your guards, sir.’
Calis and Robert went inside, followed by Nakor. The creature turned to Erik and the others and said, ‘You men follow me.’
He led them around the building, and Erik was surprised to discover that it was larger than he had first suspected as they had walked down the path from the ridge above. The building was, essentially, a large square, with entrances in all four walls. Through one they passed, Erik could see that the building was also hollow in the center, a large fountain at the heart of a garden glimpsed briefly as they walked past.
Behind the building, a pair of very odd-looking men, black as soot and with eyes of red, hurried by, and as the four guards turned to gawk, Gathis said, ‘Come along, please.’ He led them to the door of a large outbuilding and motioned for them to follow him inside. ‘You’ll see many beings here you might count strange or fearsome, but none will offer you harm.’
That was again reassuring to hear, because within the building they found what could only be called, in Erik’s judgment, a demon. Jadow had his sword half out of his scabbard when the creature turned and struck him across the knuckles with a long wooden spoon. ‘Put that away,’ it said with a deep rumbling growl.
Jadow let out a yelp and released the sword hilt, letting the sword slide back into its scabbard. ‘That hurt!’ he exclaimed while sucking on his bruised knuckles.
‘Don’t talk with your mouth full,’ admonished the creature, motioning for the four guards to sit at a table.
Erik paused and realized he was in a kitchen. The ‘demon’ was a red creature, about as big as Jerome, looking as if its skin was two or three sizes too large. It seemed to droop around the creature’s body in folds and creases, and to be thick, like hide. A large head without hair was dominated by two horns, which rose in front of fanlike ears, to arch back to points just behind the head.
It appeared to be nude, save for the large white apron it wore. Pulling a big bowl of fruit from a shelf, it placed it upon the table and said, ‘I’ll have soup in a minute.’
Gathis said, ‘Alika will care for your needs and send someone with you to show you where you’ll sleep.’ As the cook crossed to the other side of the room, Gathis lowered his voice. ‘She’s very sensitive, so say something nice about her cooking.’ Then he hurried off.
Biggo said, ‘She?’ in low tones. Jadow grinned and shrugged, taking a large pear from the platter and biting deep into it. He closed his eyes as juice dripped down his chin, and made a satisfied sound.
Now Erik noticed the smells. Suddenly he was ravenous as hot spices filled the air, and he remembered what food not cooked aboard ship tasted like. He took an apple and bit into it, finding it crisp and sweet, and savoring the taste.
Then Alika was back with a large platter of bread and cheese. Placing them on the table, she turned away. Erik hesitated briefly before he said, ‘Thank you.’
The creature paused and rumbled, ‘You’re welcome.’
Soon the four men were eating as well as they had back in camp, with far more leisure, as the cook produced a thick soup of creamed vegetables with spices, a full roast chicken for each man, and steaming greens piled high, buttered, and spiced. Ale, cold and foaming in pewter mugs, was placed at each man’s elbow, and Erik hadn’t recalled drinking anything quite so thirst-quenching.
Between mouthfuls, Biggo said, ‘I don’t think I would have believed any man who told me of this place and these creatures.’
Jadow said, ‘Man, it’s far easier to imagine evil spirits and black sorcery than this.
‘“And you say the creature could cook?”’ he mimicked someone questioning him.
‘“Ya, man, she cooked better than me own mother!”’
The others laughed. Jerome said, ‘I wonder why we came here?’
‘Wondering’s not good for the health,’ said Jadow.
Jerome said, ‘One thing we learned in camp. You follow orders, you stay alive. Don’t volunteer, don’t cause trouble. Each day after the gallows is a gift.’
Erik nodded. He still had trouble not wincing when he remembered that fall with the rope around his neck. The sour taste of fear in his stomach was one he wished never to repeat.
The cook came back with more bread and Biggo said, ‘Alika?’
The cook paused. ‘Yes?’
‘Ah, what are you?’
The creature fixed Biggo with a narrow gaze, as if weighing the nature of the question, then she replied, ‘A student. I work for my instruction.’
‘No, I mean, where are you from?’
‘Targary.’
‘I’ve never heard of Targary,’ said Jadow.
‘It is far away,’ she said, turning back to her work.
They ate in silence after that.
When they finished, a young girl, no more than ten or eleven by her appearance, but with grey hair and maroon eyes, escorted them to a room. In a voice tinged with alien nuances, she said, ‘Sleep here. Water there.’ She pointed at a basin and pitcher. ‘Relieve yourself outside,’ she said, making a general down-the-hall and out-the-door gesture. ‘You need. You call. I come.’
She bowed and departed. Biggo said, ‘I swear that child’s feet weren’t touching the ground.’
Erik removed his baldric and sat on the nearest bed, a thickly padded feather mattress with two pillows and a heavy comforter against the chill. ‘I am through with being amazed.’ He lay down with an exaggerated stretch. ‘This is the first bed I’ve been in …’ He stopped and grinned at his friends. ‘This is the first bed I’ve been in!’
Biggo laughed. ‘You’ve never slept in a bed?’
‘With my mother, when I was a baby, I guess, but I’ve been sleeping in the hayloft as long as I can recall, then prison, the camp, and the ship.’
‘Well, enjoy, Erik von Darkmoor,’ said Jerome as he lay down on his bunk. ‘I plan on sleeping until someone makes me get up to work.’ With that he closed his eyes and raised his arm to cover his face.
‘Man, that is a fine notion,’ said Jadow.
Erik and Biggo followed suit, and soon the room was silent, save for the sounds of heavy breathing and snoring.
Erik awoke to the sound of voices. Sitting up, he was disoriented for a moment, then remembered where he was. The voices were coming through a window, one that looked out upon the garden.
The familiar voice of Robert de Loungville carried through the night as he and someone else approached. ‘… never seen him like this before.’
‘He has a great deal on his mind,’ said another; Erik recognized the speaker as being their host, Nakor.
‘He took that last mission hard. We’ve had setbacks before, but nothing like that. If he hadn’t carried me half the way, I’d have died on the banks of the Vedra River. Of the two thousand of us who went, only sixty returned.’
‘Ah, I had heard it was difficult.’
‘Whatever you heard, it was worse.’
Erik felt awkward. He didn’t think it was proper to eavesdrop, but this was the room he had been assigned and Nakor and Robert weren’t taking pains not to be overheard.
‘I hear this and I hear that,’ said Nakor, and Erik could tell they had stopped moving.
‘It was the biggest battle so far. Calis put us in with Haji’s Red Hawks and a half-dozen other companies that usually work out of the Eastlands. We joined up with the other defenders at Kisma-hal, a town between Hamsa and Kilbar. Ran into the Westland army skirmishes as we beat them back. Then their leading elements rolled through us and drove to the gates of the city. We fortified the garrison and beat back three assaults on the walls, and we sallied a few times, burning their baggage train and causing them a great deal of pain. Then the second wave of Westland infantry showed up and we were surrounded.
‘Two hundred and sixty-five days of siege, Nakor. And those damn magicians. Nothing like those Tsurani during the Riftwar were supposed to have done, but enough to make a man hate all magic. The King of Hamsa’s magicians barely kept us free of most of the worst, the lightning, fires, the freezing spells. But they couldn’t protect us from the rest, and it was almost as bad: flies and mosquitoes in clouds appearing out of nowhere. Every barrel of wine in the city turned sour. After the first hundred and fifty days, we ate hard bread and drank foul water and we survived. After two hundred, we ate maggots in green meat, and we ate insects when we could find them and were thankful. We were close to eating our dead.
‘Then, when the city surrendered, Calis took the head start rather than sell out the contract and join the invaders.’ Erik heard bitterness in Robert’s tone. ‘Half our men were injured or sick. Half of those still living, I should say. We got our one day’s grace; then they turned their cavalry after us. If we had headed south along the river, they’d have run us down for certain. We turned east and hid.’ Robert was silent for a time, then when he spoke again, Erik could hear the barely held-back emotions in his voice, as if he had never told the story to anyone before. ‘We killed our own wounded rather than leave them behind. As it was, the rest of us barely made it to the steppes. The Jeshandi covered our retreat from there, and the snakes were smart enough not to get into a running fight with them in their own territory. The Jeshandi fed us and nursed us, and we eventually got back to the City of the Serpent River.’
Nakor said, ‘I remember the first visit, twenty-four years ago.’ There was a moment of silence. ‘Calis was very young then. He still is, by the measure of his race. Now he has much responsibility, and lacks Arutha or Nicholas at his side to instruct him.
‘And now you plan this very dangerous thing.’
‘Desperate thing,’ said Robert de Loungville. ‘It was a long time in the planning, and getting the right men for the job was harder than we thought.’
‘These men, these “desperate men,” they will be able to do this where so many experienced soldiers could not?’
There was another long silence. De Loungville finally said, ‘I don’t know, Nakor. I don’t know.’
Erik heard the sounds of the two men walking away and after a moment he could hear them speaking again, though he couldn’t understand what they were saying.
Erik lay awake a long time trying to puzzle out the significance of what he had overheard. He had never heard of those places, Hamsa or Kilbar, and didn’t know who the Jeshandi were. But there was a note in de Loungville’s voice he had never heard before. It was an overtone of worry, perhaps even fear. Erik found sleep came slowly, and when it at last found him, he didn’t rest well.
Nakor, carrying a travel bag slung over his shoulder, was waiting with Calis when Robert de Loungville called Erik and the others out of their room. The four guards said nothing but fell in behind Calis and the others.
Nakor kept up a nearly nonstop narrative of some of the things he had been involved in since the last time Calis and de Loungville had visited. From what Erik overheard, it sounded as if Nakor and Calis had known each other for a very long time. Erik remembered Nakor’s having said something the night before about a visit somewhere with Calis twenty-four years earlier, which hardly seemed possible to Erik, as Calis didn’t look much older than twenty-four. Then Erik remembered what Nakor said about ‘his race,’ meaning Calis’s, and then the other remarks made in camp about Calis not being human.
Erik was so caught up in these reflections he hardly noticed when they climbed out of the vale and crested the ridge. He was surprised to see that the beach was covered with men, his own shipmates and the full company of soldiers who had been aboard the Freeport Ranger. They stood quietly waiting on the sand. Erik recognized a few faces from the Ranger’s company as guards who had served at the camp, but now they were dressed in all fashion of clothing, in the same manner as the Revenge’s company.
De Loungville motioned for Erik and the others to go over and stand next to their shipmates and he mounted an outcropping of rock next to the trail, so he could look down on the men. ‘Listen up!’ he shouted.
Calis took his place on the rock and said, ‘Some of you know me well, and others here have never spoken with me. Most of you know by now who I am, or think you do.’ He glanced from face to face. ‘I am called Calis. I serve Prince Nicholas, as I did his father before. Some call me the Eagle of Krondor, or the Prince’s Bird of Prey.’ He seemed amused by these titles.
‘Twenty-four years ago a great raid was launched against the Far Coast. Some here might remember the destruction of Crydee, Carse, and Tulan.’
A few of the older soldiers from the Ranger nodded.
‘Those events led us to travel halfway around the world, to the land called Novindus.’
None of the men from the Ranger said anything, but Erik’s company looked at one another amid a few muttered questions.
‘Quiet, now!’ commanded de Loungville.
‘What we found down there was a plot to destroy the Kingdom.’
Again there was some stirring among the men from Trenchard’s Revenge, but no one spoke.
Calis continued. ‘Twice since, I have traveled to this far land, the last time with some of you.’
The men from Trenchard’s Revenge, almost to a man, turned to regard the guards from the compound, veterans from many different garrisons around the Kingdom. Those looked at Calis with a steady gaze, as if they understood exactly what was being said.
‘So you who weren’t with us know, I’ll tell you a few things. Ten years ago word reached Prince Arutha that a great army was massing in that part of Novindus called the Westlands. That army swept down from an unknown place along the shore of an ocean they call the Green Sea. The first city to fall was Point Pünt. In this land there is nothing like our Kingdom Army. Cities may have militia, but most fighting is done by mercenary companies. There are rules of conduct and established protocols for how they are treated by those who are victorious in warfare. The conquerors gave the defenders of the city called Point Pünt the choice of serving or one day’s grace to withdraw. That is normal, but what wasn’t normal was that every man in the city was ordered to serve under arms or watch his wife and children, mother and father impaled before his eyes. After the first executions, the entire male population of the city joined that army.
‘They then marched on the city of Irabek, and after bitter fighting it fell. Then Port Sulth, then all the towns along the Manstra River.’
Erik had never heard of any of these places, but he listened, fascinated.
‘From Point Punt they launched an invasion along the river Dee, seeking to enter the area known as the Midlands, and they were unopposed until reaching the foothills of the Ratn’gary mountains. Dwarves – much like the race who live in the west of the Kingdom – turned them back for three years. At last this army of invaders threw up a stable frontier of fortifications and sought another way across Novindus.
‘They came through the Forest of Irabek, darker and more fearful than our own Green Heart. They died in numbers getting through, but at last they did and then they struck the city of Hamsa. The King of Hamsa warred for five years with this army and hired mercenaries from as far away as the City of the Serpent River at the other end of the continent. We have dealings with this city, which is how we came to hear of this invading army.’
Calis paused. ‘Prince Arutha suspected who was behind this invasion and sent agents to discover if he was correct. Of thirty men, one returned, barely alive, and confirmed our worst fears.
‘Six years ago I was given command of two thousand men and sent to bolster the defenses of the city of Hamsa.’
Every man listening to Calis was motionless. Only the sound of waves breaking on the rocks below the castle and the cries of seabirds broke the silence.
‘There is a race of creatures who live somewhere on Novindus. Some of you may have heard of them as creatures of legend. They are called the Pantathians.’
Erik turned to look at his companions, and saw Jadow make a sign against evil. The Pantathians were called the Snakes Who Walk Like Men and were creatures of lore conjured up to frighten children into behaving. Unlike trolls and goblins, who were natural creatures living in the distant wilds of the frontier, the serpent men were legends, like dragons and centaurs, and no one believed them real.
As if reading Erik’s mind, Calis said, ‘These are not legends. I have faced them, and so have these men over here.’ He motioned to the company from the Freeport Ranger. ‘You aboard Trenchard’s Revenge will have the opportunity along the way to talk to these men, your former guards, and to get the benefit of their knowledge. They can tell you from bitter experience how all too real the Pantathians are.
‘Two thousand men in ten ships went south to Novindus to battle the enemy as far from home as we might, and only sixty men came home. If you want the full story, there are others who will tell it. Of that sixty, the fifty-eight still living are here.’
Looking directly at Erik for a moment, then at the other former prisoners around him, he went on. ‘Less than one in twenty who went before returned, and now, five years after returning home, we go to find these invaders again.
‘Only this time they are more powerful, more entrenched, and more aware of our part. Each town they conquer joins with them or dies, and when Hamsa fell, of six thousand defenders, four thousand swore oaths to the invaders.
‘Those mercenaries who would not were given a day’s truce before they were hunted down.
‘This army means to conquer all of Novindus. More, it means to sail here, to the Kingdom, and conquer us after.
‘Some of you might think that such chaos would be your perfect chance to escape.’
Erik glanced around and saw that more than one expression confirmed Calis’s remark.
‘If you attempt to leave without permission, at any point along our line of march, Robert de Loungville and I will personally hang you from the nearest tree.
‘If you manage to escape, know that you are living on stolen time, for eventually that army will reach any part of Novindus you may hide in and you will serve or you will die.