Dawn of Swords (36 page)

Azariah’s horse reared back suddenly, forcing the tall Warden to clamp his hands down on the stag’s mane and hold on for dear life.

“Whoa, Thunderclap,” he said, his voice unusually shaky. The horse did not calm himself until Brienna steered her mare in front of him and began gently stroking the side of his neck.

“What’s wrong with him?” she asked.

“I have no idea,” replied Azariah, trying to keep his horse calm.

“Perhaps
that
has something to do with it,” Jacob surmised.

Roland noticed that the First Man’s eyes were glued to the horizon. He squinted, trying to see what his master was seeing. All he saw up ahead was what looked like a skinny mountain that had been cut in half.

“What is it?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” replied Jacob. Roland found the expression on Jacob’s face disturbing. He looked beyond worried, as if there were something about that skinny mountain that could mean the end of them all. Roland began to feel that way too.

Their fear was answered a moment later, when an arrow flew through the air, landing not five feet in front of where they had stopped to gaze at that distant half-mountain. Azariah’s horse reared back a second time, throwing him from the saddle. The Warden hit the ground with a thud but rolled quickly to his feet.

Pounding hooves sounded from their left, and six white horses raced into sight from within the canopy of stunted trees on the side of the small mountain, kicking up a massive spray of dirt and stone as they galloped. Jacob quickly steered his horse in front of Roland and Brienna, using the majestic beast as a shield in case anything went wrong. Azariah appeared beside him, a look of grim concentration on his flawless face.

The riders drew closer, close enough for Roland to see that the six men were dressed in heavy furs. They looked like what he
imagined the barbarians from the Wardens’ stories would look like, and he couldn’t help but inch his trusty mare back a few steps, just in case. But when the riders pulled up, stopping within shouting distance, Roland’s panic abated. The men might have worn furs and full beards, but they didn’t seem to be rough natured. Instead, they seemed just as concerned as his travel companions, with no obvious trace of malice.

“Who rides on these hills?” one of the men shouted, his horse trotting out in front of the others.

For some reason Jacob’s smile made Roland more nervous.

“No, I think
I
should be the one who asks who
you
are, considering we are heralds from Safeway, and the village we just passed through is as abandoned as a dried-up well.”

One of the other men urged his horse forward. “An envoy from Safeway, eh? What proof do you have?”

“Proof?” laughed Jacob. “What more proof does Ashhur’s most trusted servant need than his mere presence?”

“Not one for humility, are you, Jacob?” asked Azariah in an aside.

“Nor you for humor,” Jacob scoffed, brushing the Warden aside. “These men pose no threat to us.”

The six men across from them huddled together, discussing something in hushed voices. Eventually they broke rank and began to slowly approach. They all had clubs within reach, and two had simple bows slung across their backs.

Jacob urged his horse forward and greeted the men with a half-bow from his saddle. The grin on his face was wide as could be, which obviously made the advancing men slightly uneasy, as the tight formation of their horses faltered.

“By Ashhur, it
is
him!” one of them said.

The man threw his leg over the side of his saddle and jumped to the ground. He virtually ran up to Jacob, casting aside his bow and club as he did so, and then fell to one knee. Despite his beard, he looked very young. “I apologize, Master Eveningstar. We
knew not that it was you. Otherwise, we never would have fired a warning arrow.”

The others gaped in slack-jawed amazement. Roland found himself envying Jacob for his celebrity within the Paradise. He wondered whether folks reacted to him the same way in the east.

“Stand up, Bartholomew,” Jacob said, rustling the man’s unkempt hair with his gloved hand.

Bartholomew bounced to his feet, tossing giddy grins at the men behind him.

“You’re as silly as a schoolgirl,” one of the others said.

“He remembered my name,” said Bartholomew.

“Good for you,” said yet another.

The man who had first spoken to them dismounted and stepped forward. “You remember the boy’s name, but how about mine?” he asked.

Jacob smiled more widely. “Ah, Ephraim. Your boy looks just like you.”

Ephraim beamed. “So you
do
remember.”

“I never forget a face, my friend. Ever. However nice these pleasantries are, I must ask…why is the village deserted? It was an alarming thing to stumble on, especially for the boy.”

“I’m
not
a boy,” muttered Roland.

“It’s not for me to say, Master Eveningstar,” Ephraim said, ignoring him. “Please, follow us. I’m sure Escheton will fill you in on the details.”

“So the great Escheton is here, is he?”

“That he is.”

Jacob and Brienna exchanged a queer look, but they followed the others just the same. Roland waited until Azariah was able to tame his horse, and then they trailed after the group.

As they neared the strange, skinny mountain, Roland realized it wasn’t a mountain at all. No, it had been fabricated by humans—a massive tower that rose up from a wide and round base in a gravelly
inlet close to the banks of the Rigon. People were gathered all around it, some raising heavy stones with ropes, while other stones seemed to be floating to the top on their own accord. Others were chiseling the great blocks, and still others were mixing huge vats of a strange gray substance. Hundreds of individuals were busily setting about their tasks—men, women, and children alike. Roland gave a low whistle of awe. Given the sheer number of people present here, it was no wonder the village had looked abandoned.

Even more amazing, however, was what lay in the tower’s periphery. It was as if the entire township had picked up and transplanted itself. The rock-strewn field was filled with tents and a few minor stone buildings. Roaring cooking fires peppered the encampment, and Roland could smell the sweet scent of roasting meat. His mouth watered and his stomach grumbled. He hadn’t eaten anything more filling than a few lean rabbits over the entirety of the journey north. He sure could go for a home-cooked meal, and soon.

The quartet was guided beyond the tower and past a collection of strangely robed men who chanted around a giant boulder. Their hands began to glow as they chanted, and the boulder started to change shape. It twisted and shifted, splitting into six pieces that became smooth and flat on all sides. It was a mesmerizing process; Roland had seen it a couple of times before, but not on such a grand scale.

“And that’s our…special craftsmen division,” said Bartholomew, his voice still giddy.

“Turock’s training spellcasters now,” Roland heard Jacob say to Brienna, which only made him all the more intrigued to meet this odd man.

Four of their guides stayed behind at the work site while Ephraim and Bartholomew led them into the encampment. They tied off their horses, dismounted, and followed the pair through the maze of fabric enclosures. Almost every face Roland saw lit up with a smile, but something wasn’t right. There was a certain darkness to the
complexions of these northerners, and the heavy bags beneath their eyes told of sleepless nights and constant worry. Roland felt for them and wondered what could cause an entire populace such agony.

They stopped at the largest of the tents, positioned at the center of the encampment. Bartholomew held open the flap, nodding for Ephraim to lead the others inside. Roland allowed his elders and betters to go in before him, entering last and exchanging a strangely cheery farewell with Bartholomew on his way past him.

The interior of the tent was spacious, but that space was being taken up by stack after stack of hand-printed tomes. A man and woman stood in the center of the stacks, arguing so intensely that they didn’t seem to notice that others had entered their space. They both had heads of wildly curly red hair, but that’s where their similarity ended. The woman was short and very pretty, looking dignified in her blue dress, her upper body covered in a finely made cardigan. The man, on the other hand, was quite tall and wore an outrageous robe made from a greenish-yellow material that was so bright, it seemed to glow. His beard was trimmed to be thin, but it stretched all the way to the top of his stomach, an odd look for someone so young.

Ephraim whispered something into Jacob’s ear and then stepped out of the tent. Roland and his travel companions stood in a line, looking on as the argument droned on and on. Finally, Jacob cleared his throat—loudly—and the man and woman rapidly turned toward them.

“What in the name of the three gods are…” said the man. “Wait—
wait!
Jacob?”

Jacob smiled wide. “Hello, Turock, Abigail. Good to see you two again.”

The couple’s demeanor shifted quickly—in a matter of seconds they went from scowling to cheerily rushing toward Jacob for a hug. They moved on to Brienna and Azariah next, embracing them just as emphatically as they had Jacob. The pair looked absolutely
shocked to see the travelers, and both of them kept repeating how surprising it was that Jacob and his band had
made it through
, whatever that meant. The separate parties then turned to Roland, who shifted uncomfortably as his master introduced him.

“Friends, this is Roland Norsman, my humble steward and an upstanding young man. And Roland, standing before you is Abigail Escheton, once Abigail DuTaureau of Ashhur’s First Families. The man beside her is her husband, Turock Escheton, student of the mysterious arts and one of the most bewildering men you will ever meet.”

“Been called much worse,” Turock said with a laugh.

Roland bowed, his heart thumping wildly in his chest as he stared at Abigail. The woman was striking, her small stature accentuating her sprite-like beauty. He’d run across Bessus Gorgoros and his wife many times, and Bardiya, their son, as well, but this was the first time he had met someone from Ashhur’s other First Family. The Gorgoroses were of larger stock, and Roland had always felt intimidated by their combined intensity. Abigail, on the other hand, was all charm.

“An honor to meet you, my Lords,” Roland said in reverence.

“Oh, stop that shit,” said Turock, waving a dismissive hand at him. The grin on his lips was infectious. “We’re no gods here. Just men and women of the north, trying to make our way, learning and screwing and doing all sorts of things you could never get away with down in Safeway.”

Abigail slapped her husband’s shoulder. “Turock, watch your language.”

“What? We have six children, Abby.” He raised an eyebrow. “Well, to be fair, the fornicating is rather abundant in Safeway as well. Fine. But it’s the other stuff that really matters anyway!”

Abigail rolled her eyes.

Jacob placed a hand on Turock’s wrist. “Friend, the pleasantries are all well and good, but there are dire matters to speak of, not the least of which is why you’ve abandoned the village.”

Turock’s lips twisted into a thin, white line, as did his wife’s. For the first time Roland noticed creases of age around both of their mouths and fading streaks in their hair that would soon turn gray. Now that their smiles were gone, their troubled demeanors were as plain as the day was bright. It seemed as though all joy had left the tent.

“Sit, Jacob,” said Turock, his voice little more than a whisper. “We have much to discuss.”

Abigail handed each of them a finely woven sitting rug, and they all settled down on the gravelly earth as the couple started to tell their tale.

“It’s been—what?—a month?” Turock asked, glancing at his wife to confirm the date. “It started with wolves howling. Nothing strange about that, but these howls were territorial; they were vicious. Most nights, it sounded like the wolves were dying. Chilling, let me assure you. Later we found grayhorns slaughtered, their innards torn out and splayed across the grass like someone was playing a sick game. We started setting out patrols, keeping a closer eye on our livestock, but it never seemed to matter. And now.…”

Turock let out a sigh and shook his head. Abigail patted his leg, squeezing his knee.

“They started taking children,” she said when her husband would not. “Then finally, yesterday, a whole family.”

“The Rodderdams,” Turock said softly. “We found a trail of blood, and it led from our village to this very spot.”

He fell silent, and Roland winced in sudden discomfort. Children taken at night, but by what? It sounded like a bad campfire story, one meant to scare him…but there was no glint in their eyes, no smile to betray the amusement of a storyteller. Just exhaustion, frustration, and fear. Roland glanced at his master, wondering what Jacob thought of their tale. To his surprise, he saw a smoldering fury in the First Man’s eyes.

“You’re both wise beyond your years,” Jacob said. “What do you think is happening?”

Turock shrugged.

“Up here in the north, the Gihon’s a torrential force. I’ve seen its waters carry off a man before he knew he was even wet. But everything we’ve seen indicates that something
is
crossing that river. The blood trail ends at the narrowest passage between our lands and the dead place on the other side. More convincing, we found tracks leading
into
the water.”

“Tracks of what?” asked Brienna.

“We don’t know,” Abigail said. “They’re strange—cloven. I’ve never seen anything like it before in all my life. No one has.”

“You have to realize something,” Turock added. “The Tinderlands beyond the river are an altered land. Before Celestia reworked Dezrel, they used to be the homeland of the elves—many apologies about that, Brienna. It seems the arrival of humanity was trouble for everybody—for the humans themselves especially. But it seems as though something is living there…and that something has found a way to survive in a wasteland where even crows and vultures stay away. What manner of beast is that? What creature? What monster?”