The Hekamon (2 page)

Alyssa looked on, from one to the other and then at the
grippers, with their shimmering and engraved metal adornments.

The engravings bore a resemblance to those on her own most important possession, her necklace. A gift from her mother.
Her only reminder of her mother.

As so often happened when she
thought of her, she raised her hand to her neck, to touch the fine
silver chain and the silver pendant that hung from it. As she did, Alyssa noticed the tradesman seemed to be mimicking
her gesture, but he stopped abruptly when he caught her eye.

At that moment, Kormak slowly bowed his head and let out a soft sigh.

Had her
brother decided against making an offer, or trying to acquire them?
His expression seemed to be one of resignation, a despondent air took
hold of him.

"Why don't you have a look around and see what else
you can see," he suggested to her, before looking back at
Tansley, "while we discuss matters."

The man seemed to think this a good idea, "Yes, you
certainly have an eye for quality, why not look around at some of the
clothing I have to offer." Tansley said, walking her over to the
curtained doorway that lead into another room.

Their unorthodox entrance, meant they had emerged into
the store room at the back of the trading post, where the
tradesman kept his more specialist merchandise. The more commonly
purchased and less expensive items, were in the shop at the front.

Alyssa happily obliged, flattered by the man's
description of her good taste. It had not been the intention to buy
anything on this trip, other than some supplies for their sparse
armory. But if acquiring those iron grippers put her brother in a
good mood, then might he buy her something, too? Maybe he would.

Alyssa began looking for anything else that might
catch her eye. She was under no illusions, though, and would look for
something inexpensive.

Decarius stepped carefully. The stone ledge narrowed at
this point and there was a long drop into the darkness below. He
stopped and waited, while his two companions drew closer, he was the
torch bearer and they would need the light. Once together, they moved
on again, with their backs pressed against the cavern wall, both for
guidance and to keep as far from the edge of the precipice as
possible.

The uneven columns of rock that formed the mountain
range did not give the easiest kind of wall for them to use has a
guide. The mountain wasn't so much a solid a mass of rock, but more like an intricate construction. Giant six sided columns, packed
tightly together, rising like colonnades of some vast ancient temple.
A crevice was followed by a jutting outcrop, pushing them closer to
the edge before they could, in the next step, move back to the
relative sanctuary of a cavity in the rock.

At that moment, a chill gust of wind blew along the
tunnel from the direction in which they were heading. Decarius
stopped once more, this time to steady himself, as the wind pulled at
his clothes and hem of his cloak, while the flame he carried
flickered and threatened to extinguish.

He knew they were getting
closer to the exit of the cavern but the wind outside might be
picking up as well. If it was, their descent down the mountainside
would be all the more difficult.

"Watch your step," he said to Aegis, the
youngest of his two companions, as he started moving again, "this
is the most treacherous part."

The young man inched along the ledge behind him, a few
lose stones breaking away and disappearing into the depth's below.
"Why did we have to come this way," Aegis asked. His voice
cracking, betraying his nerves.

"It's safer this way, Aegis. We're nearly through
the worst of it."

"I think I would have preferred if we'd taken our
chances through the pass."

"We'll head back that way when it's daylight, right
now, this route is better, trust me."

He had wanted to avoid the mountain pass if at all
possible. Disguised as civilians, they were lightly armed and since
they were traveling at night, it would be unwise to chance their
luck. There might be thieves roaming around, and guards, too. This
path would help ensure they reached their destination undetected,
although it did bring some risks of its own.

"If you think you are going to fall, stop and
steady yourself. You know what it would mean if you were to slip
here." Decarius said, the warning had been sincere, but it was
coolly received.

"I know what it would mean," Aegis replied
icily.

It took Decarius a few moments to realize why his
warning might have been considered insensitive. When he did,
it turned his mood, and not for the better.

It was a fall into crevasse such as this, that had
changed the balance of power in Coralai. Aegis had entered a cavern
under the Halvyon Temple with his cousin, Pandolin, and only Aegis
had walked out again. With Pandolin dead, the line of succession
changed, and Aegis was the main beneficiary.

"A fall into the abyss? We can't have the heir to
the sacerdos meeting such a fate, can we?" He said, with more
than a hint of sarcasm.

Aegis shot him a glance, the torchlight reflecting in
his eyes, but Decarius ignored it. The death of Pandolin two years
earlier, and the changes it wrought, were never far from his mind. It
was what had brought him to this point. An injustice had occurred and
it needed to be corrected.

"And if you do fall, whatever you do, don't drag me
down with you," he said, looking at Aegis and meeting fire with
fire. It infuriated him to see the boy, he barely considered him a
man, not only returning his look, but doing so with a smile, a smirk
even.

Suddenly Decarius had to fight an overwhelming urge. Why
not throw Aegis off the ledge right now? The expression on his face
as he plummeted into the shadowy depths would be worth the
complications it would cause by itself. The thought didn't subside,
it intensified.

He could feel his heart pounding in his chest, hear
it in the echos of the tunnel. His grip on the torch tightening. It
could become a club, a divine scepter delivering justice. A strike to
the head, then another, the boy unbalanced, hands raised in
protection. A well placed kick and over he would go, Pandolin avenged
and order restored.

His building rage brought on palpitations and dizziness,
and it was the feeling of his own balance slipping away that brought
him back from the brink. With his free hand, he searched for and
quickly found a fissure in the rock, which he used to steady
himself.

It took him a few moments, but eventually his anger to
subsided, his twitching abated and his breathing returned to normal.

Decarius thought the depth of his agitation might not be
so obvious. Yet when he looked at Aegis
again, the smile on the boy's face was gone, replaced instead
with a look of concern.

With their progressed stalled, the man bringing up the
rear spoke.

"Let's get off this ledge, this is not the place to
take a rest."

Gregario was right. Decarius loosened his grip on the
rock, before moving on again, with a more considered state of mind
returning.

If Aegis did fall to his death, order would not be
restored to Coralai, since the boy's mother would still be the
saceress. She would still control the levers of power and appoint her
acolytes to high office. If anything, the death of her son might make
her behavior even more unpredictable.

Not only that, Saceress Volusia had entrusted her son to
his care. Decarius had requested, and had been granted by Volusia,
that Aegis be assigned to this mission. Launching him into the void
would cause more than a few ripples in the mountain lakes a thousand
feet below.

No, it needed to be done with more subtly. The plans
were in place and his was not a difficult part of the task. There
were very few ways his mission could fail, and killing Aegis,
accidentally or otherwise, was one of them.

Decarius put the
murderous thoughts to one side. His focus needed to be on the purpose
of their mission and destination to which they were heading. The
trading posts of the Regis Highway.

Kormak watched as Tansley drew the curtain.

With Alyssa out of sight in the next room, but not
entirely out of earshot, Tansley returned, and spoke to him in hushed
tones.

"The herbs and the necklace, in exchange for the
gauntlets. No less."

"She will never agree," Kormak said wearily,
"ever, under any circumstances, to sell her necklace."

Tansley looked puzzled, glancing toward the other room
before turning back.

"Then why…"

"How much in herbs only?" Kormak demanded.

"Five pouches."

"Five? That will take three months to collect and
refine."

Tansley shrugged, "Or one pouch and the necklace."

"Four. I can't offer more than that."

"Four, and one vial of the empessence,"
Tansley responded, "I can't go lower than that."

Kormak considered this offer. The idea that one
particular herb was worth more than the others wasn't all that
surprising, it was true for them, also. But Tansley seemed to be
suggesting it was enough to split the difference, or worth half a
pouch on its own. It was not even the hardest or most time consuming
curative to make.

"Let
me think about it," he said, looking at the iron grippers.
He
could take them into his possession tonight
.
The thought was an alluring one. An idea came to him.

He could agree to the merchant's offer, then see if he
could work on getting more of the empessence. If he could, he might
then be able to renegotiate a repayment that would be closer to three
and a half pouches. At least, when measured by the amount of effort
that was required to produce it.

"That's a lot, but okay, we have a deal,"
Kormak said finally, before putting the iron grippers back in the bag
and starting to pull it towards him.

Just as he was about to take possession of his purchase,
the merchant placed a firm hand on the eagle adorned, leather bag and
stopped him.

"You can take them when you can pay for them, do
you have everything here with you to honor our agreement?"

"It will be two months at least, maybe more."

"Then I can't let you take them with you. I'm sorry
my friend, but I'm sure you understand how business needs to be done
in these parts."

Kormak nodded, he had expected this to be the case. Such
was the sensitivity to merchants here dealing with Fennreans and
their powerful medicinal herbs, that it was necessary for him to
enter the trading post at night and through a secret underground
tunnel. No merchant here was going to be offering any buy now, pay
later arrangements and he wouldn't be so naive to ask them to.

Still, he knew he had to take them with him now, they
wouldn't be here in two or three months. Tansley would angle for a
better offer in the mean time, however much he might claim to put
them to one side for him. Kormak's journey here was a risky one, he
planned to return, but knew Tansley couldn't be sure that he would.
This was why he'd sent his sister into the other room.

"What if I let you take the necklace as a bond?
Could I take them with me now?" Kormak whispered.

Tansley looked at him for a few seconds, before smiling
and nodding toward the next room, "Will she agree to that?"

"No," he replied solemnly, "but I will
make it up to her, and besides, it's only for a short time, and she
will get it back again, right?"

"Right," Tansley said, still looking puzzled
but interested all the same.

At that moment, the curtain opened and Alyssa walked in.

"Is everything okay? Have you bought them?"
she asked.

"Yes."

"No."

Alyssa laughed, "So which is it?"

"Tansley
has agreed to let me take them now and pay him as and when," he
said, giving a merchant a look that said,
play
along.

"That's kind of him," Alyssa said, smiling
warmly at Tansley.

The storekeeper remained impassive.

After a few seconds Kormak broke the silence, "So,
did you see anything you liked? I thought, with the colder weather
coming, you might like a shawl perhaps, or a scarf."

"What really? I can have something too? There are a
few things I saw, if that's okay?"

He watched as Alyssa headed back into the other room
before returning with a few pieces of clothing and fabric.

"This piece I especially liked, it's a find,"
she said, holding up a white piece of linen embroidered with gold
inscriptions.

"And you can throw this in, too," he said,
taking the shapeless and torn piece of fabric that could passably be
called a shawl.

Tansley raised an eyebrow and nodded but kept his hand
on the leather bag and its much coveted contents. His sister took the
merchant's response as a yes and smiled appreciatively, first at
Tansley and then at him, as he stepped toward her.

In one impulsive movement, he turned Alyssa away from
him, and swept the garment around her shoulders, tucking it inside
her jacket, and while one hand straightened a few creases, the other
emerged with the silver necklace. Discretely placing it on the rabbit
skin pouch, resting on the store's counter. Equally surreptitiously,
the tradesman closed the pouch and slid it across to his side.

Alyssa turned back, "Well?" she asked
hopefully.

"Very nice," Tansley said, pushing the leather
bag across the counter and moving the fur pouch onto a shelf
underneath, "be sure your brother treats you to more gifts, I'm
sure you deserve it."

Kormak lifted the leather bag by the strap, placed it
over one shoulder and turned to his sister, "We need to be
heading home, we have a long way to go and it would better to be back
across the Rhavenbrook before sunrise."