The Silver Tower (The Age of Dawn Book 3) (6 page)

Baylan cleared his throat, seeming to have difficulty speaking. Baylan glanced over his shoulders and Walter did too. No one appeared to be eavesdropping, but Walter had learned a lot about not trusting appearances lately.

“Lillian and I called a meeting with the Silver Tower House Masters,” Baylan continued. “There are three of them. The Master of the Phoenix, Dragon, and the Master of Arms.”

Baylan beckoned, hunching over his ale. “Come closer.” He waited until Walter had leaned in. “They tried to imprison us before the meeting began, dragged us down to the dungeons in chains.” Baylan took a deep breath. “Lillian fought back. Killed the guards that escorted us. I—we didn’t know what to do, so we ran.”

“Shit,” Walter breathed. Baylan was a killer, at least close to someone who had slain his own kin. Things were starting to fit together now. That explained how he could fight the Cerumal so easily, or maybe it was just part of his training at the Silver Tower.

“Now that’s a fucking story,” Juzo said, breath stinking like blood. Wait—blood? Why does he smell like blood?

“You want to go back to root out the infection,” Nyset said, hand on her chin, gorgeous eyes gleaming in candlelight.

“Don’t blame you,” Grimbald said quietly, then downed half a glass of ale in one swallow.

“Yes—the Tower must not fall. Without the support of the wizards when Asebor launches a full strike…” Baylan trailed off, letting the quiet fall heavily around them.

“I’m in,” Walter nodded, sliding his fist out across the table. Nyset’s fist, now ringed on one finger with a simple band of wood symbolizing the sisterhood of herbalists, met Walter’s. The other’s joined in, five fists touching together in the center, the strangest set of hands Walter had ever laid eyes upon.

“Okay. We leave tomorrow. At sunrise then?” The other’s agreed.

“Baylan, could we use one of your portals to travel?”

“No, it’s probably not a wise idea,” he said shaking his head. “Now that I know they’re still looking for me, any sign of Phoenix power will give us away. That’s probably how they found us in the first place. Portals aren’t safe for long distance travel, at least I’m not capable of that ability,” he said, his cheeks reddening.

“How?” Nyset asked.

“How what, Ny?”

“How do they detect Phoenix power?”

“The Tower assassins have a couple abilities that distinguish themselves from the average mercenary. Elite fighting skill and the ability to sense the god powers. There’s another reason too… traveling through portals isn’t always safe. Sometimes strange things happen. People have emerged appearing changed, missing body parts or worse. Others have tried to travel a short distance from the Tower only to dump themselves into the Abyssal Sea. I’m not saying it can’t be done, but extreme care must be taken.”

“That settles it for me then,” Nyset said, cringing back in her chair. “I like my limbs just how they are.” Walter wasn’t sure if she realized what she was doing, but her eyes drifted to Baylan’s cloth wrapped stump.

Baylan poked at the charred Shroomling on his plate with his fork. Walter could make out a bit of its mushroom shaped head, a bit of uncooked yellow on the end.

“Don’t know how you eat those Baylan. They’re like rats back home,” Walter said, nose twitching with disgust.

“They’re an acquired taste,” he replied, sawing through a blackened piece with an all too dull knife.

“It makes me sad that we eat everything living. They’re such cute little creatures, even though they can be a nuisance on occasion,” Nyset said.

“It’s the way of things. Most things have predators, except men I suppose.” Grimbald shrugged.

Juzo coughed and sputtered on his first sip of the ale, spitting it back into his glass. “Excuse me,” he said, wiping his arm with his coat and clearing his throat.

“I suppose you’re right, Grim,” Nyset said.

“The Tower doesn’t like its secrets being spread or its assets out of its control. There’s a fair chance there are others… like those we cleaned up today about,” Baylan said, picking at a bit of dried blood buried deep in the creases of his palms.

“Right,” Walter said. He reached for the Dragon and the Phoenix, reminding himself of its presence. They were a comfort, a place of refuge in what he now considered a cruel world. He didn’t have to harness their energy though, just knowing they were still there was enough.

“There was an apprentice wizard in Lillian’s house, the house of the Dragon, who quickly rose through the ranks, a star in her own right, truly gifted with the Dragon. She now serves as Bezda’s advisor, a little too closely if you ask me. There was just something off about her. She’s someone we’ll need to keep eyes on when we’re there,” Baylan said, his eyes staring off across the bar.

“Bezda?” Walter asked.

“Bezda Lightwalker, the Arch Wizard of the Silver Tower,” Nyset chimed.

“I see you’ve been studying the books I gave you, Ny. I knew you would be a most excellent student,” Baylan said enthusiastically, breaking the hushed whispers.

“Walter tells me you have good tidings?”

“Oh yes! Does anyone know what this means?” Nyset said, waving her hand around the table with the wooden ring.

“It means you took a child’s discarded ring from a garbage heap?” Grimbald guessed, laughing with self-amusement. Walter couldn’t help but join in, adding his chuckle to Grim’s deep laugh. Grimbald rubbed at a red scar across his forearm from the battle hours ago and worked his hand open.

“Close. I’ve joined the sisterhood of herbalists,” Nyset said, beaming.

“Well that’s excellent, Nyset, most excellent!” Baylan cheered.

“Nice,” Juzo said, seeming to perk up a bit. He flagged the barmaid for a round of ginger whiskeys for everyone, himself excluded.

“Speaking of celebrations,” Grimbald added. “I met with Field Marshall Jast. The crazy bastard made
me
an
officer of the Midgard Falcon, a Captain!”

“Wow! That’s fantastic, Grim. I’m amazed you were able to keep that quiet for so long,” Walter said, accepting his whiskey from the barmaid. It was amber in color and had a corkscrew of ginger root in the glass as a garnish. Walter took a sip, wincing as it burned like acid down his throat before warming his belly.

“So what is your charge, Grim?” Juzo asked.

“As it happens, there’s a company in the Silver Tower that needs a leader. Apparently, Jast saw me fit for the job. Lucky tiding then, isn’t it?”

“That’s perfect,” Nyset’s hands drummed with excitement. “I’m glad we’ll be able travel together.” She took a sip of her whiskey, her eyes scrunching up as she swallowed.

“How long a ride is it then?” Juzo asked, taking a nibble of something under his nails.

“Not too long, about a fortnight,” Baylan said. The muscles around Juzo’s jaw tensed and bulged.

“It’s alright Juzo, we’ll keep each other company,” Walter said.

Juzo leaned on the brightly polished table, setting his elbows down and crossing his arms. “It’s not that. I have some secrets I’ve been keeping too. I suppose since we’re baring our worst, I ought to share mine.” Juzo’s hand fell onto that awful sword’s hilt that seemed to signify the things wrong in the world. Walter couldn’t pinpoint why that sword bothered him so much. It was just a weapon after all, no different than any other, excluding the hypnotic effect it had on Juzo months ago in the Shiv Fang’s den.

The barmaid filled ale glasses, casting wide smiles about the group who ignored her, all attention on Juzo. Nyset gave her a polite nod, quickly returning her eyes to Juzo. Grimbald took a sip from his glass, holding it frothing in the air, tiny bubbles rising in front of his closely trimmed beard.

He had changed no doubt. Walter looked Juzo over, recounting how fast he’d moved the last time he saw him fight. Faster than any man he’d ever known. He looked sick though, the same way he had when he found him in the Tigerian Bluffs, like he’d picked up a strange new ailment in those great peaks.

Juzo let out a long held breath. “You’re not going to believe this, but you must. There’s so much—I don’t know where to begin.”

“Start where ever you’d like. We’ll stay for as long as it takes,” Nyset said, placing a comforting hand on his forearm.

Juzo’s red eye met his and Walter wanted to turn away from its strange color. Walter held his gaze though, ignoring the prickling along the back of his neck.

“I stayed with—was captured by, by what I think was a member of Asebor’s generals, the ones you called the Wretched. Walter, that was where the man with the mask, Terar, brought me through the portal.”

“Shit,” Walter breathed.

Juzo’s eye flitted around the table and then fell onto his full glass. “He wanted to break me, to make me his pet. He hurt me, abused me, beat me every day until I stopped resisting. I had no other choice,” Juzo said, his hands forming tight fists, his eye lost in some far-off nightmare.

“Then one day, I thought it was over. I thought that once I had been able to convince myself I wasn’t me anymore… that I had become someone else, he would stop hurting me.” A drop slid from Juzo’s cheek, rolling into his beer. “He bit me, and drained my blood, drank it,” he stammered.

“What?” Baylan said, his fork slipping from his fingers and tumbling from the table to the floor.

“Then my skin changed to the ghastly color you see before you, then other things changed. I’m stronger, faster than I ever was. My skin heals like the Phoenix resides within me, but in me there is no light. Only blackness.”

“You—you’re a Blood Eater?” Baylan whispered quietly.

“I am,” Juzo said with a heavy weight in his voice. “Without it, I think I’d die. The food I once enjoyed has no sway over my senses. In fact, it repulses me. I’ve tried it a few times, and each time I spend days vomiting.”

“You… drink uh, blood from other people?” Walter managed to get out. The pieces were snapping together in Walter’s mind. His metallic breath and the late night walks. The nighttime slaughtering and blood devouring of men.

“I try not to,” Juzo said, shaking his head. “I’ve tried—” He laughed, a sick sort of thing, desperate and miserable. “I’ve tried animals of many types. Cows, sheep, horses, chickens, lamb… they don’t satisfy as well as the blood—the blood of man.”

“We can help you, Juzo. Right, Baylan? The Tower wizards will know what to do. You guys were able to help me with the Cerumal armor, there has to be a way.” Walter said, turning to see Baylan prying Walter’s iron grip from his arm. He released his hand. “Sorry.”

“How many—” Grimbald started to ask before Walter cut him off, speaking over him.

“It’s alright. We’ll get it figured out. Right, Baylan?”

“I’m sure the Tower will know what to do,” Baylan replied, the wrinkles around his eyes deepening.

“We all have demons to sort out… I don’t know you all that well, Juzo, but you seem like a good person. Good people sometimes have to do bad things to get by,” Grimbald said, looking over his empty glass.

T
hey woke early
the next morning and gathered up supplies, sundries, and weapons. Baylan eschewed sleep to work out the last of the ward he wanted to lay before the Lair’s entrance before they left. A wise idea to Walter, though he didn’t much like the idea of traveling without a lick of rest. After not sleeping a few nights, you would be much more apt to end up on the wrong side of a blade. Sleep kept you sharp, kept you from missing things you shouldn’t.

The narrow tower’s entryway didn’t have any sort of seal to the outside world. Baylan commissioned a heavy iron door, which had been put in place just a few days ago by local masons. Baylan drew lines and circles along the locked door to the Lair that apparently only he could see. There was a brief flash in the corner of Walter’s eye, causing Marie to snort and shuffle.

“Whoa girl,” Walter said, tugging on Marie’s reins and regaining control of the spooked mare.

“I think it worked!” Baylan said, his jaw hanging slack. “The Lair is now well protected by thieves,” he said, turning, his stump sitting proudly on his hip.

“You used the toxic cloud ward?” Juzo asked, standing beside Walter’s horse. Juzo declined a mount, preferring to walk. We’ll see how long that lasts when his feet are red with blisters, Walter thought.

“What will trigger it?” Walter asked.

“According to my research, anyone, or anything… trying to force this door open.”

“And you know how to disable it when we come back?” Juzo pulled his white hair into a pony tail, dropping it over the back of his duster.

Baylan opened his mouth then closed it. “I—I hadn’t thought of that.”

“We can deal with it when we get back,” Nyset said, securing at least ten pouches of herbs to her saddle. Some on their colorful contents spilled on the cobbled street, the grooves filled with black ash like the blood of a Death Spawn. “Let’s hope the King has dealt with the Purists by the time we return. I for one am glad to be leaving those lunatics,” she said, staring at the stone wall, still tainted with pink where the dead wizard had been placed.

“I’ll work out the solution on the road,” Baylan said reassuringly.

The horses were mounted and saddled, and the day was looking bright through Walter’s eyes. The prospect of new places and new adventures sent a course of excitement through his body. They passed through the bustling market square as they made their way out of Midgaard. The city seemed to mirror his excitement. People were already up and milling about their day. Some shouted out the latest price of elixir beans, another hauled a trailer filled with uprooted Sand Buckeyes looking dangerously docile, another chopped the head from a chicken and started skinning it for a burly customer. They bought extra water skins, conveniently already filled.

They traversed towards the Blood Gates, yawning open like red coffins in the distance. A group of disheveled looking Falcon soldiers lumbered through the gate, some on horseback and other’s limping beside them. As Walter drew closer, he could see their armor was dented, scratched, and crusted with gore. Red plumes that had once stood erect from gleaming helms were now bent or entirely missing. One man was missing his forearm, another bleeding from where an eye should’ve been, another had a gash across his cheek so deep that it left his teeth visible to the world.

Other people saw them now. Some screamed and other’s started weeping, while others ran to them to help the wounded. Shouts flew about the Commoner’s Square calling for help and others frantically asked the soldiers about names. The shouts carried beyond Commoner’s Square and into the heart of the city.

It all happened so fast, Walter’ wasn’t sure what he should do. He looked beyond the first group stumbling through the red arches. A long column of men trailed behind them in a loose semblance of the rigid formation the Falcon typically marched in.

“The other battalion,” Walter whispered.

“The men King Ezra sent west to The Great Retreat!” Grimbald said with realization, fingertips resting on Corpsemaker’s haft.

“I must admit, I had forgotten about them in the midst of our own troubles,” Baylan said from behind Walter, worry touching his voice.

“What do we do?” Nyset asked, looking to Baylan for guidance.

Walter was glad he wasn’t alone in that thought. If this battalion fought the numbers we were up against, he’d guess most of them were quite lucky to be alive, especially if there was a Lord of Death on their front too. Our gifts from the god’s essences and Wiggles’ death saved all of us.

I saved all of us.
Walter didn’t like the taint of self-importance dripping from that thought, but there was no denying that he was the one who had rained burning lightning on the battlefield. Walter inhaled deeply, the images of shrieking Cerumal being roasted to char permanently scarred his memory. That power—that power was magnificent. They were vicious bastards, but he couldn’t help but feel a shred of pity for them. He didn’t want to think of himself as a killer, but he supposed we often deluded ourselves with fabrications of what we really were. Every man needed a pleasant story to tell himself so he could sleep at night.

“We go,” Juzo said flatly, his voice cutting through Walter’s thoughts and snapping him back to the moment.

“What? No we have to help,” Grimbald said, rolling his bulk from the Blood Donkey.

“Wait,” Baylan swallowed. Grimbald hesitated, his hand on his saddle’s pommel.

Walter understood Juzo. They had to be hard, had to make the difficult choice. They had to put the greater good at the head of their priority. That meant getting to the Tower and excising the rotting tissue. If the Tower fell, so would the rest of Zoria. People liked to think King Ezra ruled the land, something that made sense to them. But no—Walter could see that the Tower was the real pillar supporting realm. He could see it in how the King had treated Baylan with deference, something he hadn’t pieced together until now.

“Juzo’s right,” Walter nodded at him. “If there’s something, someone in the Silver Tower trying to stop the news of the breaking of the seal of The Age of Dawn…” Walter trailed off as a line of horses pulling carts sauntered through the Blood Gates. The carts were piled high with bloodied bodies, stinking and buzzing with Rot Flies having a feast upon the ghastly flesh. Mouths stretched opened and eyes stared into the great emptiness, looking with permanent expressions of surprise. Matted and swaying red plumes stuck out from the piles, giving them a look of a creature with strange feelers.

“By the Phoenix,” Walter said as the first of the carts rolled past, axles groaning under the tremendous weight, putrid stink of decaying flesh churning at his innards.

Baylan pulled his shoulders back and swallowed hard. “This will be the future of the realm if we don’t get moving,” he said, then urged his horse to gallop, heading for the one of the smaller gates on the flanks of the Blood Gates. The group followed in a morose clopping of hooves, leaving all that pain and misery behind.

T
hey rode
east from The Wall and on their second night setup camp in the last secluded spot of forest before the Tigerian Bluffs.

“Are you praying?” Grimbald asked.

Walter sighed. “No, I’m just cooking us a lovely steak and fish dinner. I’m also preparing elixir pudding for dessert,” Walter said, eyes closed. He hadn’t prayed to the Phoenix and Dragon gods in quite a long time and thought it well overdue. They had saved his skin quite a few times since then, though not without their own terrible form of compensation. He felt that by perhaps paying them homage, they would continue to allow him to continue walking this precarious tightrope. One day you’re a farmer, the next you’re killing demons only known to you through nightmares.

“Sounds delicious,” Grimbald said. “When will it be ready?”

“Would you like to join me?” Walter asked, parting an eye and looking up at him. He started drumming his fingers on his thighs, but stopped himself with a sharp breath.

Grimbald frowned down, spiked butt of Corpsemaker shining in the last of the sun. The volcano marking the bloody Plains of Dressna puffed away to the south. The smell of sulfur occasionally came with a gust, noxious in its own right. Baylan, Nyset and Juzo went hunting, leaving Grimbald and Walter to set up camp.

“I don’t pray. Don’t believe in the gods or magics,” Grimbald said.

“What do you attribute to this then?” Walter said, letting Dragon fire engulf his hand, flesh untouched.

Grimbald shrugged. “Dogs hear really good. Fish swim really fast. Some men are bigger, stronger than others. Some can control fire and wind. It’s just nature.”

Walter sighed and spread his knees a bit in the soft dirt. Their two heavy canvas tents sat propped up on either side of a fire pit, likely recently used by look of the remaining charred birch wood.

“What do you pray for then?” Grimbald asked, dropping to the dirt beside him.

“I pray for you. You seem like you need it,” Walter grinned, opening his eyes. “No, I’ve been feeling a little anxious, that’s all.” He started drumming on his knees again and yanked his hands away, back to his sides. By the Dragon, would his fingers not be happy until they drummed a hole through his pants? “Do you ever feel like there’s a heavy weight on your back, pressing your spirits down?”

“Sometimes. Try not to think about things like that too often.”

“This is how I get from under it, before the axe falls. When things start feeling too heavy, I find peace by looking inside my mind.”

Grimbald picked up three logs from a pile they chopped earlier and dropped them into the fire pit, ash puffing into the air.

Walter coughed and shielded his mouth. “Could you be a bit more gentle next time, you big bastard?” Walter said.

“I’ll try, don’t have a lot of gentle in me,” Grimbald said with a grin, sitting down on a yellowish boulder beside Walter.

“So I have come to learn,” Walter snickered. He pulled the cork off his water skin with his teeth and drank with a glug, using the hand not covered in fire. He offered it to Grimbald, who took a swallow and wiped his lips with satisfaction.

“I find peace in cold steel,” Grimbald said, his eyebrows raised. He slipped Corpsemaker from his back and got to work with a sharpening stone. “Reliable, deadly, and in my control. Thinking your future is controlled by something else is crazy. No way to live, my pa always said.” The stone hissed along the curving blade of Corpsemaker, singing death with each rasp.

“I look at it this way, Grim. If I’m wrong and there is no Shadow Realm, nothing after we die, then I’ve lost very little, other than the time I spent praying,” Walter said, moving his hand over the white logs, letting the flames around his hand pour into the fire like molasses oozing out of a jar. To deny this wasn’t a gift from the gods was as foolish as denying the sky.

The bark burst alight in brilliant blues and greens, sputtering and sizzling as the moisture was burned out of it. Grimbald grunted as he worked out a particularly bad dent in the blade. The Dragon fire continued to ooze over the logs, setting them all ablaze.

“If you’re wrong Grimbald,” Walter said turning to him, eyes dimly glowing with Dragon fire. “And you spent your life disparaging the Dragon and the Phoenix, things might not go so well for you in the Shadow Realm, assuming it exists. The way I look at, it’s a very low risk investment, as my dad would’ve said, compared to the potential downside.”

Grimbald paused, putting the sharpening stone on his thigh and scratched at his beard which was starting to become unruly. “The only reason you pray then is to avoid the anger of the gods when you die?”

“No, I know they exist. They’re with me, a part of me every day.”

“Or maybe you just have a wild imagination,” Grimbald said, resuming stropping his blade.

“Ah, that’s the beauty of it all. We’re all free to have our own thoughts,” Walter said, staring into the hypnotic flames, his stomach rumbling and growing anxious at the prospect of a meal.

Grimbald grunted his agreement.

N
yset crouched
low behind a bush with tiny red leaves. Her eyes were focused on the deer with an incredible crown of horns, nibbling on pink flowers the size of elixir mugs. There was a small valley of forest between the Tigerian Bluffs and volcano, just enough wood to support the life they were looking for. The sun cast dappling light across her face through the canopy of trees high above. Damp, cool wind filtered between the bush and around the back of her head, pulling a golden length of hair across her brow. She tucked it back behind her ear in its proper place. She sometimes thought it would be easier to shave her head like some of the soldiers did, but that just wouldn’t do.

The gurgle of the nearby brook was a pleasant reminder of hunting with her father. They had always stopped for lunch at the narrow river that ran from the Denerian Cliff’s down to the Woodland Plunge. He had named it ‘Ny’s river’. It was their name and their private place that only they knew about, at least that’s how she liked to remember it. The thought was warm in her mind, pasting a smile across her lips.

Baylan’s breath was labored as he carefully squatted down beside her, as if they had been running all day. He might find it beneficial to his health if he spent less time sitting on his horse, she thought. Or maybe that’s just what happens when you get old. She pointed towards the black and white spotted deer. The old man’s eyes crinkled with the wisdom of hundreds of years as he found it and nodded at her. He was starting to feel like a second father to her, mentoring her in her studies.

She held a finger to her lips and twisted on her ankles towards Juzo, whose red eye glowed from the edge of a tree about twenty paces back. Juzo trailed far behind, watching their backs. It seemed you could never be too cautious these days. She wasn’t sure about him anymore, admitting to murdering a man in self-defense. She liked to think she would have handled the situation better without undue killing. She wasn’t there though. She had to trust his word. If you didn’t have trust among friends, you had nothing.