Valley of Embers (The Landkist Saga Book 1) (24 page)

There was a stairwell—stone, like everything else in the barracks—and Kole took the winding way to a pine door at the bottom. He passed into what had been the mess hall two days before, which now resembled a makeshift infirmary. It surprised him to see the wounded soldiers belting on swords by the wall, checking over their weapons. These were not the grievously wounded, then, but merely those taking their rest between shifts.

They glanced but did not stare. Only one, a small boy with eyes darker than his hair, watched from the doorway, gaze unwavering. He followed Kole out onto the street, where a light mist greeted him along with the bravest hound in the Valley. Shifa jumped at him, whining enough to draw eyes.

“There, girl,” Kole said, patting her wet flanks as the boy watched. He supposed he was some messenger working on behalf of the Captain. He certainly lacked subtlety.

Kole made his way west, his two followers taking up his gait at waist-height. The braziers still burned, casting their red glow onto everything, the armored soldiers resembling rubies in the dusk. The clouds had rolled in even thicker than before, blanketing the skies to the far horizon.

Talmir Caru was not at the gate, nor was he on the battlements. Kole walked them, the boy dogging his heels determinedly. The Dark Kind still churned en masse below, black shapes pouring indistinct from the distant trees. There would be no end to them, Kole knew, but Hearth’s defenders threw them back, wave after wave, faces matching the steel of their helms.

“Looking for the Captain, boy?” a booming voice that he at first mistook for Tu’Ren’s shook him. He turned to see a man that stood a head shorter than the First Keeper of Last Lake, which still made him a head taller than Kole. His broad chest nearly doubled Tu’Ren’s.

“First Keeper Balsheer,” Kole said, extending his hand, palm up. He had never met the man, but who else would it be? Who else carried a weapon that was more fallen oak than staff? The ends had been dipped in iron and still glowed a dull red.

Garos switched the mighty weapon to his left shoulder, soldiers nearly diving out of the way as the hot stone passed overhead, and extended his right hand, grasping Kole by the wrist. They each flared a bit during the embrace, and Garos smirked, raising one brow.

“No wonder,” Garos said, releasing him, and Kole did not ask what he meant.

“You’re holding, then,” Kole said, looking out over the field and taking stock of the wall as it sloped up toward the cliffs.

“Well enough,” the First Keeper said. “Not that it matters much.”

They considered one another, and Kole was acutely aware of the black, broken earth leering up at them from the space below the gate. Garos noticed.

“You’ve given the lads on the gate a reprieve, at least,” he said, all good humor. “That was some light show. Your flames nearly took down the gate. I had to put a bit of my own stuff into them to keep them off.” His look changed then. It was only for a moment, and then the easy humor returned, but Kole thought it was something like fear.

“The Captain will want to see you,” Garos said, color rising to his cheeks.

“My companions—

“Healing,” Garos clipped. “Right now, you’d best meet with the Captain. Were you not supposed to tell him so?” he asked, looking over Kole’s shoulder to where the dark-haired boy stood by the top of the stair, Shifa sitting near. The boy bristled and started forward, and Garos raised both brows at Kole.

“That one’s a spitfire,” Garos said, “no matter what he looks like.”

“What would pull Captain Caru away from the wall at such a time?” Kole asked as the boy began tugging at his sleeve.

“I’ve heard it said that in other lands, war is profit,” Garos said. He turned and swept his free arm out to encompass the dark ocean before the walls, which stood like the caps of waves. “Not this sort of war. You folk of the Lake have your fish. You keep to the old ways. I respect that.” He turned back, his smile falling to one less enthusiastic. “Hearth is the engine that makes the Valley turn. Here, the man who wields the quill is more influential than he who wields the flame.”

“I imagine he thinks so,” Kole said, spitting and drawing a throaty laugh from the barrel-chested Ember.

“Off with you then,” Garos croaked out, waving his hand as if he were shoeing a fly. “Jakub, off with you. Take him to see the wielders of ink and parchment. Take him to the Merchants, and do bring back our Captain if he still lives. Your father is there as well.”

Kole only remembered flashes of having spoken with Karin when he first entered the city with the twins. He had to get north, but seeing the state Hearth was in, it seemed as though that road was closed to him. As First Runner of the Lake, perhaps Karin would know a way.

Of course, there were other reasons to want to speak with his father. The dream had yet to fade from his mind. It had stuck there like a jagged stone in a mire. But father and son rarely spoke of such things. If there were to be a time, however, Kole thought it might be now.

Kole allowed himself to be dragged away. As they walked, he reflected on how strange it was that he knew so little of how Hearth worked despite living in the Valley his entire life. But then, traveling the roads and ways was only safe in the Bright Days. In the distant past, the Dark Months had merely held the small possibility of encroachment as the World Apart drew closer to their own. As the packs had turned to swarms and now the swarms to armies, the Bright Days had changed from periods of celebration to preparation.

The Emberfolk were tribal by nature, Kole knew from the tales from the desert. According to Ninyeva, Hearth and Last Lake were actually more intertwined than the various tribes had been in the north. The Scattered Villages of the Valley were a more apt representation of their former communal habits. Kole wondered how those villages were faring right now. He wondered how many of the army come against them carried the blood of the Valley peoples and how many had been victims from other lands.

An image of the burned and broken earth before Hearth’s gate came up like bile. He noted now what he had skimmed over during his talk with the First Keeper: the twisted limbs poking out from the ash and dirt, black paint all washed away to leave pale skin where the fire had not reached.

And then he heard it. Fihn’s screaming amidst the flames. He heard it as if for the first time, and it made him double over in the middle of the courtyard, struggling not to retch as soldiers watched him and made their private judgments. His vision blurred, clearing a bit as Shift moved into his line of sight, whining softly. He noted the boy’s muddy boots.

“Jakub,” Kole said, straightening a bit. “I need to see my friends. Take me to them.”

The boy known as Jakub frowned, shaking his head slowly.

“Captain Caru,” he said in a rough voice at odds with his appearance. He could speak, then.

“Yes,” Kole said, standing up straight and wiping the drool from his bottom lip. “In time. But now, take me to the sick and wounded. Take me to my friends.”

Jakub shook his head again, looking panicked this time, as if he feared retribution. Kole thought he might fear the Captain, but everything he had heard of Talmir painted him as a thoughtful and kind figure, if a little stern. Was it Kole the boy feared?

“No,” Jakub said, repeating it several times as he shook his head back and forth.

Kole sighed.

“Very well, then,” he said, closing his eyes. “Lead on. First to Captain Caru and my father, and then,” he emphasized the last, “to my friends.”

Jakub almost smiled then and took off at a walk that bordered on a run. This caused Shifa great stress, as she doubled back continuously, barking at Jakub to halt for a spell as Kole strode through the cobbled streets, staring in wonder at the city he had only been in as a child and held no memory of.

They walked a wide street that sloped steadily upward, as all roads in Hearth did. Unlike the rural brown roads of Last Lake, those here were inlaid with flat stones that grew slick in the mist. They allowed for the easy passage of carts and other wheeled contraptions, many of which now sheltered under dripping awnings.

Where the homes and buildings of the Lake were largely horizontal, Hearth’s confining walls had forced new construction up. It was like a forest of odd replicas of Ninyeva’s own tower, one leaning in on the other, the orange and red tints of the candlelit windows flashing their own brand of beauty.

“Where is the meeting place?” Kole called out, and while Shifa’s white tufts perked up, Jakub’s barely twitched. Kole sighed.

As he walked, his thoughts could not help but turn back to the dream, and, curiously, to the Faey Mother. Kole had stated his intention to venture north to the peaks after the great ape had breached their timber walls. Ninyeva had not openly championed him, but she had certainly not stood in his way. He remembered the night his mother had died. It was the first night he had the dream, and he woke to find the Faey Mother in their home, consoling a father gone mad with grief.

Did she know of the White Crest’s presence? Did she know what Kole planned to do if he found him?

None of it had ever made any sense to Kole. After all, the White Crest was thought to have fallen in battle against the Eastern Dark. Even if he hadn’t, why would he turn against the people he had sworn to protect? Perhaps it truly was the Eastern Dark he saw all shrouded in light.

Kole tried to cast the thoughts away like a rotted cloak, but they would not quit. He tried to turn his mind to Linn and the others, but his heart simmered, calling for the same thing it had for over a decade: revenge.

Kole felt a tug on his sleeve and looked down to see Jakub, his expression irate. He had slowed too much for the boy’s patience, whose tugging only ceased when Shifa tested a growl low in her throat. Jakub’s worst fears of dalliance were about to be realized, as a figure broke the plane from road to sky, his profile framed in the light of a neighboring tavern.

The figure stood a bit shorter than Kole, but he may as well have been looking at an aged mirror. Karin’s face broke into a broad smile, white teeth showing. He came down the slope in a gait lighter than matched the mood of the city, but for now, all that mattered was their embrace. Shifa wagged her tail and barked excitedly, while Jakub was the picture of frustration, his arms crossed as his mission experienced an unexpected delay.

Karin pushed his son to arm’s length.

“You’re looking none the worse for wear,” he said, looking Kole up and down. “I know he’s late,” he tossed over his shoulder to Jakub, “but I thought it important to catch him before he entered that pit of vipers.” He smiled at Kole, but now it was the strained look he knew so well. “Come,” and he took Kole by the shoulder and turned him east, continuing up the rise.

Jakub skipped off ahead, weaving in and out of passers-by with Shifa close at his heels. He never let Kole out of his sight, but their forward progress seemed to have appeased him some.

As they crested the rise, the streets grew thicker with traffic. Men and women very young and very old went about their business, but there was undoubtedly a note of panic to their movements. Karin watched him.

“This attack is unlike any other,” Karin said. “They go about their days as if the dark tide will recede, as it always has.”

“It won’t,” Kole said.

“No. It won’t.”

They walked in silence for a spell, watching Jakub and Shifa disappear and reappear in the snaking crowds as the land began to slope steadily downward.

“I’m wasting time,” Kole said.

“You’re lucky to be alive,” Karin answered, more sternly than was usual. “I did not make for Hearth until I was certain you were on the mend. Even so, I never thought you’d be fool enough to leave the Lake in the state you’re in—in the state we’re all in.”

“I’m fine. You said so yourself.”

Karin stopped dead in his tracks and Kole turned to regard him. His father had closed his eyes, squeezing them tight and clenching his knuckles at his sides. Jakub and Shifa paused farther ahead, but they held their peace.

“Kole,” Karin started. “Which one is this for, this quest of yours?”

“Which one?” Kole asked, incredulous. “It’s for all of us.”

“What is?” his father sounded exasperated, desperate even. “You’re going to take on the Eastern Dark yourself? You’re going to fight the Sages?”

“I’m going to fight whoever’s responsible,” Kole said, his tone a challenge.

From their position on the hill, they could see straight to the walls, Garos’s glowing brazier lighting the crenellations, the churning fields beyond alive with movement. Kole swept his hand out.

“This isn’t the Dark Kind,” Kole said. “This isn’t some random incursion from the World Apart.” He pointed up at the sky, at the roiling clouds overhead. “That is the work of them,” he said, nearly shouting. Some of the traffic slowed or stopped around them, but he did not care. “You know it is.”

As he finished, he felt a pang of guilt. His father’s anger had blown out, leaving him barren. He looked at Kole with nothing but love and the fear that came with it.

“Linn, or your mother?” he asked, stepping closer. “Which one are you going for?”

Kole’s mind worked, steam rising from his skin as the mist grew thicker.

“Linn,” he said, not knowing if it was the truth. “They’re out there now. Out there,” he pointed beyond the walls. “And I’m here.”

Karin nodded and took his son by the shoulder. “They need as many as can be spared here.”

“I can’t be spared,” Kole said.

“I know.”

There was another pause, but Jakub was relieved to see them continue on, taking the slope down into the Bowl that made up the central market of Hearth.

“You looked like an Ember of old out there,” Karin said, keeping his voice low. “Even the Dark Kind, or the Corrupted—whatever the wretched things are—seemed stunned. They backed off from the walls for half a day, and none have tried for the gate since, something that’s been irking Balsheer.”

“The twins, father,” Kole said past the lump in his throat.

“Taei is fine,” he said.

“And Fihn?”