A Land Of Fire (Book 12) (18 page)

Thor, freed up, emboldened by all his
brothers at his side, slashed deeper into the crowd, forging his way, keeping
an eye on the distant well, hearing the baby’s screams, watching the tribesmen
standing menacingly above it. Thor noticed one of them nod to the other and
then saw them begin to turn a crank, and lower the screaming baby down toward
the fire.

Desperate, Thor stabbed a tribesman in
the chest, snatching a spear from his hands, yanked it backwards, then took a
step forward and threw it.

The spear sailed through the air, above
the heads of the others, and finally, Thor, with his perfect aim, killed one of
the tribesmen turning the cranks. O’Connor, picking up on his lead, fired off
an arrow himself, and hit the other tribesman between the eyes. They both fell
off the edge of the well, dead.

Determined to reach his son, Thor fought
twice as hard, cutting his way through like a man possessed. Something came
over him, a supreme rage beyond which he could control, and Thor leaned back
and let out an unearthly shriek, veins popping in his arms and neck and
shoulders, the sound of a desperate creature determined to rescue its young.

Thor moved with the speed of lightning,
a one-man killing machine, as he cut through the rest of the men, creating a
one-man warpath of destruction. The tribesmen were helpless against a warrior
such as he, a warrior unlike any they had encountered before. This was the
fight of Thor’s life, and he would stop at nothing to achieve his goal.

Within moments, Thor cut a path through
them, a pile of bodies lining up through the crowd’s center. It was like he had
entered a gap in space and time, and he was not fully conscious of what he was
doing, or even where he was. He was taken over by the killing.

Thor reached the village center, and he
wiped the sweat from his eyes, trying to understand what had just happened to
him. He had felt the power of a hundred men, even if just for a moment, and he
had been invincible.

The baby’s cries snapped Thor back to
the present, and he quickly turned and raced for the stone well.

With no one left between him and the
well, Thor scrambled to climb to the top of it, as sweat stung his eyes, his
heart pounding.

Please, God. Let my son be alive.

As Thor reached the top, the cries grew
louder, echoing in the empty well, and he coughed and gagged from the rising
smoke. Thor reached down and with shaking hands yanked at the crank, again and
again, the rope rising, turning, raising up the baby as Thor rescued it from
the heat and the smoke.

Thor pulled and pulled, anxious to see
that the baby was okay, and as it finally reached the top, Thor reached down in
the smoke and held the baby, lifting it up, and turned to look into his son’s
eyes.

Thor was elated to see that the baby was
alive and healthy. Yet as he examined the baby, naked, lying in the bassinet,
Thor was shocked to discover something: it was not his son.

It was a girl.

The girl screeched as Thor held her
high. He was glad to have saved her. But it was not his son. It was someone
else’s child.

Indra and the others reached the top of
the well, beside Thor, and as they did, Thor handed the baby to her, then
immediately turned and scanned the village, looking for any sign of his son.
From up here he had a great perspective, and could see the whole village spread
out below. The rest of his brothers were finishing off the last of the
tribesmen, and all of them were dead, bodies sprawled out everywhere.

But nowhere was there any sign of
Guwayne.

Thor was determined to get answers. On
the far side of the village he saw one villager, wounded, slowly getting to his
feet, and he leapt down off the wall, racing for him as he tried to crawl away.

Thor jumped on his back, pinned him down
to the sand with one knee, drew a dagger, and turned the man over and held it
to his throat.

“Where is my baby?” Thor demanded, eyes
bulging with panic and rage.

The man mumbled something in a language
Thor could not understand, panic in his eyes.

Thor, desperate, tightened the blade
against the man’s throat.

“MY BABY!” Thor shrieked, turning and
pointing at Indra, who held the screaming baby girl.

The villager finally seemed to
understand, and he mumbled something again.

“I don’t understand!” Thor yelled.

The man suddenly turned and pointed up,
over Thor’s shoulder.

Thor turned and followed his finger, and
he saw a distant mountain range, and near the top, winding its way up, a small
procession of men. They were heading towards the top of the volcano, and in
their center, raised above their heads, was a small case, born on poles,
gleaming gold, shining in the sun.

A case just large enough to hold a baby.

Gwen ran through the ship,
panic-stricken as she watched her people turning to stone, one after the next,
and falling over the rail, into the water. It was like something out of her
worst nightmare. Quickly, she was losing her ranks, the thousands of survivors
of the Ring piled onto three ships, quickly thinning out.

Gwen saw Steffen about to look over the
edge, and she ran to him, grabbed him by the back of his shirt, and yanked him
backwards. He went stumbling and landed on his rear, and he looked up at her in
shock.

“Don’t look!” she cried. “You’ll be
killed.”

Shock gave way to gratitude, as he
realized. He stood and bowed before her.

“My lady,” he said, eyes welling with
tears, “you saved my life.”

“Help me save others,” she replied.

Steffen rushed about to help the others,
and he was joined by Sandara, Kendrick, Godfrey, Brandt and Atme, along with
the new Legion members, Merek and Ario, all of them racing with Gwendolyn
throughout the ship, saving people from looking over the edge, preventing
people from getting too close to loved ones who had already turned to stone and
were plummeting. Gwen watched a wife shriek as her husband had just turned to
stone. She watched him clutch his body, refusing to let go, trying to keep him
from falling over the edge, and then she herself inevitably looking over at the
water. She, too, turned to stone, her face frozen in a look of agony, and
together, her arms wrapped around him, as one big chunk of stone, they fell
over the edge and plunged into the deep.

Gwen looked out at her other two ships
and was horrified to see that one of them was now completely empty, all of the
people on board having turned to stone and plummeted over. The railings were
all broken from where the stones had smashed them, and there remained not a
sole survivor left. In fact, as all the stones begin to pile up on one side of
the ship, the ship itself began to list, and as Gwen watched, helpless, it
began to sink.

The ship sank with increasing speed, and
in moments it landed on its side in the water with a great splash, its sails
smacking against the ocean. It lay on its side, bobbing, all its people dead
before it even capsized, and Gwen felt sick to her stomach as she saw it sink
completely into the water below.

Gwen could hardly believe that there now
remained but two ships of the glorious fleet that had once set out from the
Ring. Gwen looked about frantically, fearing she would lose all of her people
here.

“Raise the masts!” she yelled to her
admiral. “Double the men on the oars! Get us away from these waters!”

Men broke into action as bells sounded,
taking positions, doing their best to move the ships along.

Gwen rushed to Sandara and grabbed her
wrist, desperate for answers.

“How long will these waters last?” she
asked.

Sandara shook her head grimly.

“They travel on the open ocean, my
lady,” she said. “These waters are like a school of fish, passing through. I’ve
never encountered them myself, but I’ve heard they pass quickly—especially with
a strong wind.”

Gwen turned and peered out at the
distant horizon, keeping her eyes up high, afraid to look down at the waters.
It was hard to tell where they ended.

She turned and craned her neck and
looked back up at the sails and was relieved to see them hoisted, and filled
with a good wind. Men grunted all about her as they rowed and rowed.

“They might pass quickly,” Gwen said,
“but we shall take no chances. You will all row until the tomorrow breaks!”

Gwen looked up, saw the sun at high
noon, and knew it would be a long, backbreaking day for them all. But she would
take no chances. It was still better than death.

Gwendolyn found Illepra, holding the
baby, sheltering her, and Gwen’s heart soared in relief as she took her back. On
the silent, somber air, all that could be heard was the lapping of the oars
against the water, the cries of the gulls, and the soft moaning and sobbing of
the survivors, heartbroken, mourning loved ones. They were the lucky ones. But
Gwen did not feel lucky.

Indeed, as she looked out at the horizon
and considered their meager rations, she knew this did not bode well. It did
not bode well at all.

*

Gwendolyn, bleary-eyed, sat up and
watched as dawn broke over the ocean, a thin purple line blending to scarlet,
burning the mist off the ocean. A lone gull cried up above, and as the sky
warmed, Gwen turned and surveyed her people: they were all bent over their
oars, sleeping in place, exhausted from their efforts. It had been a long and
harrowing day and night, and Gwen had thought it would never end. She had
handed the baby to Illepra late in the night and had finally fallen asleep.

As the sun began to creep over the
horizon, Gwendolyn, who had stayed awake all night, rose and took the first
steps, the only one awake on the quiet ship. She made her way gingerly to the
rail, the deck creaking as she went, and braced herself to look over, to
examine the waters. She wanted to be the first to look, the first to know for
sure that the waters were safe. She didn’t feel it was right to have one of her
subjects test it. She was Queen, after all, and if someone were to die, it
should be her. She felt it was her responsibility.

Gwen crossed the deck, and just as she
reached the rail, a voice cut through the still morning air:

“My lady.”

Gwen turned and saw Steffen standing
there, dark circles beneath his eyes, looking back at her with concern.

“I fear I know where you are going,” he
said, his voice filled with worry.

Gwen nodded back.

“I will check the waters,” she replied.

Steffen shook his head and stepped
forward.

“That is no job for a Queen,” he said.
“I am your servant. Allow me to check.”

He began to walk forward, for the rail,
but Gwen reached out and laid a hand on his wrist.

He turned to her.

“Thank you,” she said. “But no. It is my
ship, my people. It is for me to check.”

His brow furrowed.

“My lady, you could die.”

“So can you. And who is to say my life
is worth more than yours?”

Steffen’s eyes watered over as he looked
back at her.

“You truly are a great Queen,” he said.
“A Queen like no other.”

Gwen could hear how much he meant it,
and it touched her.

Without further ado, Gwen turned, took
two big steps to the rail, clutched it with trembling hands and closed her
eyes, images flashing through her mind of all the people who had turned to
stone. She prayed she did not meet the same fate.

Gwen opened her eyes and looked over,
taking a deep breath and bracing herself.

The waters, lit by the morning sun, were
glowing blue. Gwen looked carefully, and she was elated to see no trace of the
lightened waters. The sea was back to the way it had been.

“My lady!” Steffen called out in alarm,
rushing forward to his side.

Gwen smiled as she turned and calmly
looked back at him.

“I’m alive,” she said. “There is nothing
more to fear.”

All around her, Gwen’s people began to
rise, getting to their feet, bleary-eyed. One by one, they looked at her in
awe, then made their way over to her.

“The waters are safe!” Gwen called out.

The people cried out with relief, and as
one they all rushed to the edge of the rail, leaned over and examined the sea
in wonder. It was just a normal ocean, like it had always been.

Gwendolyn was struck with a hunger pang,
and she thought of their dwindling rations and wondered when her people had
last eaten. She herself had abstained two meals a day, to save more for her
people, and she was starting to feel the hunger. She was almost afraid to ask what
remained.

She turned to her admiral, who stood
beside her, and she could see from the grim look on his face that it was not
good.

“The rations?” she asked, hesitant.

He shook his head gravely.

“I am sorry, my lady,” he reported.
“There is nothing left.”

“The people clamor for food,” Aberthol
added, beside her. “They are growing desperate. They rowed throughout the
night, and now they have nothing. I do not know how much longer we shall be
able to appease them.”

“Or how much longer we will be able to
survive,” Brandt added, grimly.

Gwendolyn took in the news, feeling the
weight of it. She turned to Kendrick, who stood beside her.

“And what do you propose we do?”
Gwendolyn asked.

He shook his head.

“If we do not find provisions soon,” he
said, “if we do not find land soon, this ship shall become a floating grave.”

Gwendolyn turned to Sandara, standing
beside him.

“How much farther until we reach your
land?” she asked Sandara.

Sandara shook her head and looked out
and studied the horizon.

“It is hard to say, my lady,” she said.
“It depends on the currents. It could be a day—or it could be a month.”

Gwen’s stomach tightened at her words. A
month. Her people would not survive. They would all die here, waste away, an
awful death in the midst of the ocean. Worse, they would surely turn on each
other, revolt, and kill one another. Hunger could make people desperate.

Gwendolyn nodded, resigned.

“Let us pray for land,” she said.