Oracle (Book 5) (30 page)

“Werewolves?” Tomas stamped his feet, his teeth practically chattering.

Kendril raised an eyebrow. “You sound skeptical.”

“It’s my job to be skeptical,” Tomas replied sharply.

Kendril turned his head away with a snort. “I’m not lying. I’ve got the bloody bruises and cuts to show for it. That Jombard turned into an eight-foot tall werewolf. Almost took my head off.”

Tomas raised both hands. “You have to admit, it’s a pretty tall tale. When I came to, all I found was the messy remains of a Jombard. Not even a lick of fur on him.”

“Obviously,” Kendril said slowly, “he reverted to his natural shape after I killed him.”

“Obviously,” said Tomas.

Kendril glared at him. “Shouldn’t you be back with Bronwyn? One of us should be watching her.”

Tomas shrugged. “Marley’s there.”

“Like I said,” Kendril repeated, “one of
us
should be watching her. Even tied to a post, she’s tricky and manipulative.”

Tomas sighed. “All right, I’m going.” He looked sharply at Kendril. “You coming?”

Kendril gazed at the black form of the gravestone. “Give me a minute. I’ll be along.”

Tomas nodded. “All right. Take all the time you need.” He started to move away, then stopped and turned back around. “Kendril, for whatever it’s worth….” He stumbled a bit, as if unsure of what words to use. “I’m sorry.”

“Didn’t stop you from digging though, did it?” Kendril replied nastily.

Tomas opened his mouth to respond, then thought better of it. He turned and walked off into the darkness.

The trail that led down from the old Ravenbrook manor to the grist mill was lined with old wooden fences, rock walls, and overhanging apple and cherry trees. In the darkness the branches loomed out like the elongated fingers of old hags seeking for victims. A partial moon was out, and provided some silvery light to see by.

Tomas walked along, finding his footing carefully on the uneven path. Somewhere in the woods to his right an owl hooted.

Something tugged at him the wrong way. A feeling that he couldn’t quite shake. It was a slight sense of foreboding. An ominous threat that seemed to stay in the shadows just out of his sight.

Tomas put a hand on his dagger hilt. He glanced off the trail to each side.

A long rock wall was to the right. To the left was a small open space, bordered by what had once been a well-kept apple orchard.

A branch snapped off to the right, beyond the rock wall.

Tomas whirled, his senses strained to the breaking point.

It hit him in a flash, an intuitive sense that he couldn’t arrive at empirically. Somehow, he just
knew
.

He was being
hunted
.

Tomas took a cautious step back, silently. He quickly weighed his options. He could try to duck into the shadows to the left, make for the mill. Or he could double back and try to find Kendril.

Either way, he should never have come down the main path, open and exposed. He had been careless. Stupid.

Tomas edged over towards the side of the road, trying to make as little noise as possible.

The black shadow of a figure rose up from behind the rock wall. It aimed a musket in Tomas’ direction.

The game was up. Tomas whipped out his dagger, ready to throw it.

Something cracked into the back of his head, sending purples sparks across his vision.

Tomas slammed face-first into the dirt of the road. His vision swam. White stars flickered at the edges of his sight. He tried to rise, but he already knew it was too late.

His last conscious thought was that whoever it was that had snuck up behind him was good.
Very
good.

Tomas never even felt the second blow.

The old garden behind the manor house looked much different than Kendril remembered it. The bushes were overgrown, the side paths choked with thorns and weeks. Even the fountain that had once stood proudly in the middle was now toppled, a victim of wind, weather, and possibly young vandals.

He stepped his way carefully towards the rear of the house, feeling a strange mixture of feelings at the sight of the old estate. In one way it would have felt strange and wrong to have seen it again in the prime of its glory, with carefully-tended rose bushes and a sparkling fountain in the moonlight.

On the other hand, it filled Kendril with an overwhelming sense of sadness to see the estate in such disrepair. Every turn in the path, each overgrown flagstone held countless memories to him.

Kendril moved through the waist-high grass, kicking aside some of the more pernicious thorns.

The area by the back door of the manor house was a little clearer than the rest of the garden.

Kendril stepped up to the back door of the large manor house. He felt a surge of emotion run through him, and tried his best to choke it back down.

He had ignored all this far too long. It was time he dealt with it. He
needed
to deal with it. Celeste’s ghost would haunt him until he did. As hard as it had been to talk about it with Tomas, in a way it had been a kind of catharsis.

Kendril lifted a gloved hand to the back door of the manor house that had once been so familiar to him. It was boarded up, though several of the planks had long fallen off, and the others were gray with time and slimy with mildew.

He took a breath. This needed to be done. It wasn’t an accident that Bronwyn had come here, of all places, back to Jothland and Redemption. Kendril had to face his past, one last time.

It was the only way.

Kendril took a step back, then kicked in the door.

Tomas felt himself being dragged by his arms, which were wrenched behind his back and tied at the wrists. His head rang like a church bell. There was the warm, clotting feel of blood on the back of his head.

He was dropped on the hard, wooden floorboards of the mill. Without his hands to catch his fall, Tomas had to take the brunt of the hit with his chest and the side of his face. He coughed, trying to focus his vision.

Two pairs of boots tromped past his field of vision. A hand grabbed the top of his hood and yanked it down.

“Well, well.” A man with an unshaven face, dressed in buckskin and wearing a slouched hat, leaned in to look Tomas in the face. “That wasn’t very hard, was it?”

“There’s that other one, Colonel,” said another man. “He ran off before we could catch him.”

Tomas twisted his head around with a muffled groan.

There were several armed men in the mill. Two wore fancy, embroidered clothes, and had several pistols tucked into their belts. Their faces were completely identical, down to the same set of brown hair and brown eyes. Twins.

Another man lounged against the wall. He was dressed in chainmail and partial plate, with long blonde hair that fell down over his shoulders in the Baderan fashion. He oiled the blade of a greatsword, eyeing Tomas as he did so.

Two more men stood near the door of the mill. They were dressed in buckskin and leather like the Colonel. Both were armed with crossbows and swords.

A sixth man sat on the millstone by the gears. He was dressed in simple, rugged clothing and wore a red bandana over his face that hid his features. In his hands was a long-barreled flintlock rifle, even longer than the one that Kendril had.

The seventh and final man made Tomas blink with surprise. His skin was rich and black, like the men who lived far to the south of the Spice Lands. He was draped in a red tunic, and his dark face was dotted with strange tattoos. He cradled a long spear in his arms, and looked at Tomas curiously with heavy-lidded eyes.

Colonel Belvedere gave a severe nod. “I don’t want any of the Ghostwalker’s friends getting away. He looked over at the dark-skinned man. “Mkante, track him down. Bring him alive if you can, but kill him if you have to.”

The man nodded without a word, then moved towards the door.

Belvedere stuck out a finger at the two twins. “Janis, Hansel, go with him.”

The two men looked at each other, then at Belvedere. “Why can’t Mkante get this one by himself?” One of them said. He jerked a finger at Bronwyn, who was still tied and gagged in the center of the mill room. “I’d sure like a go with
her
, if you—”

“Now,” Belvedere barked. “And don’t shoot the poor fool unless you have to.” He turned to the man with the bandana and the rifle. “Gregor, get upstairs, and keep a watch out.”

Gregor rubbed a hand over his face with a disapproving scowl. “Black as night out there—” he mumbled with a sidelong glance at Bronwyn.

“And you have the eyes of a barn owl,” Belvedere snapped. He turned his own leering eye on Bronwyn. “I promise you’ll get a turn before we kill her.”

Gregor cast one last regretful gaze at the bound girl, then headed for the stairs that led upstairs.

Mkante, Janis and Hansel disappeared out the front door of the mill.

Tomas coughed again. He could already tell that both his daggers had been taken off him. Even without his hands tied he didn’t have much chance against a posse of armed men. “So,” he said, keeping his voice light and steady, “are you going to tell me what this is all about?”

“Honestly, Mr. Kendril? I haven’t the foggiest.” Colonel Belvedere pulled out his huge knife, and knelt down to look in Tomas’ face. “You’ve made yourself one too many powerful enemies here in Redemption, that’s for sure.”

Tomas swallowed, trying to ignore the pain that pounded through his head. “Have I?”

Belvedere smiled. “I have to admit, I was hoping for more of a challenge when I heard that you were a Ghostwalker.” He looked up at the Baderan knight with a rough grin, then back down at Tomas. “I expected you to lead us for a bit more of a merry chase.”

“You never know,” Tomas said quietly. “I still might.”

Bronwyn squirmed in her ropes, her face red and flustered.

Colonel Belvedere stood back up. “And then there’s this pretty thing,” he said. He walked up to where Bronwyn was tied, waving the large knife under the woman’s chin. “You look like you want to say something, don’t you love? In a moment, in a moment.” He turned his gaze back towards Tomas. “And what exactly was your plan with
her
, then? She’s not from town, that’s for sure. No one’s been reported missing that I know of. You and your friend planning to sell her off to slavers?” He flicked his knife around, indicating the large mill room. “Or just keep her here awhile and have some fun with her where no one would interrupt?”

The two men by the door chuckled darkly.

Belvedere shook his head with a low whistle. “Blackstone said you were dangerous. He didn’t say you were deranged.”

Tomas slowly licked his cracked lips. “Blackstone?”

Belvedere grinned. “Truth told, Mr. Kendril, I was all willing to rough you up a bit and scare you out of Redemption. No use getting blood on my hands for no reason, is there?” He turned back to Bronwyn and caressed the side of her face. “But now that we’ve got
her
in the mix, it changes things a bit.” He tapped his knife thoughtfully on Bronwyn’s cheek. “Having a pretty thing like her that no one will miss sounds like a bonus to me. And the men are awful hungry. Ain’t you, boys?”

The two ruffians by the door gave a shouted affirmation.

The Baderan gave Belvedere a scornful look and continued oiling his sword.

Belvedere ran a thumb down the side of Bronwyn’s neck. “But I’m not sure I can let any of you go. “ He looked back at Tomas. “I mean, I wouldn’t want you tattling on us, now, would I? So I guess we’ll just have to tell Blackstone that you wouldn’t see the light of reason.” He looked at Bronwyn. “I’m sorry, love. You were dying to say something, weren’t you?” He took the gag out of her mouth. “There you are. Talk away, beautiful.”

Bronwyn glanced down at Tomas.

Tomas looked up at the bound girl, trying to keep his face from betraying his raging thoughts.

“Well, girl,” Belvedere said with a roguish grin. “What is it you wanted to say? Plead for your life? Protest that you’re a virgin? Beg us to have mercy?”

The men at the back of the room chuckled again.

Bronwyn took a deep breath. “You know what?” she said, her voice hoarse from the gag. “I’ve clean forgot.”

The manor house was dusty and dirty. Cobwebs hung from the ceilings and doorposts like shrouds for the dead. The air was thick with the smell of rotting wood and mildew.

Kendril put a gloved hand on the banister for the staircase, and brought it away covered in dirt and dust. He frowned and wiped it clean on his cloak.

Even in the darkness, even with all the disrepair and passing of time, it still felt strange to stand here again.

Kendril glanced up, surprised at first that the chandelier wasn’t there. Of course not. It had been taken away, along with most of the furniture. The only items that still remained were draped with white cloth. Slowly rotting away like the rest of the house.

Like Kendril’s past.

He turned, and his eyes fell on the space right before the start of the staircase. The wood there was still slightly discolored. It was almost invisible to the eye that wasn’t actively looking for it, but Kendril spotted the dark stain in an instant.

He could still see it the way it was, so many years ago. Red with a growing puddle of blood.

Kendril turned his head quickly away, his breathing shallow and rapid.

It had been a mistake to come here again. He should have left well enough alone, kept clear of this old place. Left his memories to die in the past where they belonged.

Despite himself, he glanced back again at the dark spot on the floor.

She was there. Standing just inside the door that led to the library.

Kendril felt something like an electric shock run through his whole body. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. He just stared.

She stared back at him. She was beautiful, and ghostly. She smiled.

Kendril couldn’t take his eyes off her. He knew she wasn’t real. She
couldn’t
be. But she was there all the same, the woman who had haunted his waking dreams for so long.

She continued to look at him. Expectant, waiting.