The Spirit of Revenge (27 page)

“Eat quickly,” Malecai ordered, “We leave soon.”

The Warriors drew out their morning meal, gnawing on the dried lamb in silence as the songs of distant birds filled the trees.

“Damn,” Silas cursed. He pulled his boots off and held them upside down. “It’s cold as hell. There’s snow in my boots.” He shook them vigorously and a small shower of snow fell from the openings.

Joshua walked over to him, removed a boot and held it over his brother, snow cascading over his head. “So do I.”

He laughed and walked towards his rucksack as Silas shook the snow from his hair, hissing with disdain.

Malecai laughed and turned from the group. He kicked snow over the remains of their fire and slung his broadsword over his shoulder.

The company at last left the cluster of pines behind and trudged through the snow before ascending the side of a hill. They climbed higher and higher, slowly working their way above the forests.

They eventually reached the top and came to a long ridge of rock that formed a kind of bridge towards the foot of a distant mountain. Its peak loomed far above the earth, an avarice hand reaching boundless for the heavens.

Dark clouds swathed its girth, a cloak of shadows draped over its shoulders. They spit snow across the wilderness below, an eternal storm of unremitting fury. The tempest soon blew over the Warriors and swallowed them in its blinding gale. Wind whipped around them, buffeting the travelers with snow and ice. The storm lashed savagely around them as they struggled to see through the sheets of snow.

The hours passed as they battled their way through a dogged storm. As the veiled sun began its arcing descent, the Warriors could scarcely make out the outline of Ilross in the cradle of distant mountains.

They began the slow struggle through the mountains, flogged right and left by ruthless winds. They followed the edge of the peaks and peered through the snow to the cragged gorge below.

The Warriors continued for hours in silence, trudging through the ever-growing snow.

They eventually passed the mountains and descended their treacherous slopes. They soon reached level ground.

A band of green appeared through the snow and the Warriors stepped into this forest, shielded from the storm by mighty pines. They breathed a sigh of relief and continued through the trees, the time wasting away to the crunch of their boots.

The storm eventually subsided, and as the sun finally began to dip its gilded feet over the horizon, they left the forests and came before Ilross.

Through the faint flurry, they could see a large field stretched out before them over a mile in every direction. White capped mountains encircled the field, their jagged peaks clawing at fading sunlight. A city sprawled across the expanse, its stone buildings barely perceived in the growing dark.

“Ilross…” Malecai murmured and gestured for them to follow. They traversed the field and soon their boots met the smooth brick of a road. They followed its straight path towards the town, stepping through the piles of snow that covered the street.

Two guards armed with glaives saluted the Warriors as they walked between the first two buildings of the city. The Warriors nodded curtly at the soldiers as they passed.

They stepped into the town, instantly encompassed by its many buildings. Brick and timber shops and homes lined the streets, their doors and windows all facing inward. Row after row of these structures lined the road, many two or three stories in height.

Columns of smoke rose from the chimneys of many of these, the hearths inside of which were filled with simmering food and crackling fires. The city was silent and somber, as quiet as the snow that fluttered to its streets.

They soon came to a tall building that stood a floor or so above the surrounding buildings. A wooden sign hung above its entrance, rickety in the wind.

Malecai halted under the sign and wrapped his fingers around the door’s iron handle. “From here on you are to be cautious. Speak to no one. The Iscara has spies lurking in every rat hole in Erias.” With that, he pushed the door open and walked inside.

They came into a large tavern, the floor and ceiling made entirely of dark gray stone and its walls of timber planking. Several round tables were scattered across the room, an inadequate number of wooden chairs surrounding each of them. An over-sized hearth stood opposite of the entrance, a fire burning vivaciously inside its open maw.

A long bar stretched along the wall to their left, stools placed haphazard along its length. Massive kegs lined the bar’s wall, lying prostrate on a heavy iron rack. Few people filled the room and even less awake or sober.

The few awake glanced up from their drinks to the door flying open with a burst of frigid wind. Their eyes bore into the Warriors as they walked into the room. The remaining guests of the inn stood up from their tables and quickly left the room.

The Warriors approached a man in dingy gray clothes who stood behind the bar, listlessly wiping the inside of a mug with a soiled cloth. He stared transfixed into the glass, clearly disinterested in the task at hand. “Rooms for seven,” Malecai muttered to the bartender as he drew a satchel from his cloak.

The man opened his mouth as Malecai took a handful of silver from his coin purse. He placed them onto the bar in front of the man, glancing up as he did so.

The innkeeper opened his mouth again but Malecai dumped half the bag’s contents onto the tabletop. The bartender lifted a brow, accepting the offer.

“Speak nothing of our presence here, we go unhindered and unnoticed,” he commanded as the man held out a hand to take the coins. “Understood?” He threw his hand over the pile.

“Not a word,” the man replied hastily.

Malecai nodded and withdrew his hand, allowing the innkeeper to grab the coins before he could change his mind. “We will take your largest room.” He returned his coin purse to the depths of his cloak and walked away from the bar, leading the others towards an arched hallway.

“It must have been a hard loss to accept,” a voice said from behind them. The others continued down the hall, unaware of the voice that called to them. Cain turned and searched the entrance room to find the source of the voice. The voice spoke again. “It must have broken you. Andaurel’s demise.”

Cain suddenly noticed three figures that had previously been overlooked. They sat around a large round table, curiously searching Cain.

The man in the middle was much older than the others, his face worn and haggard. Muddy russet hair fell over his dark eyes. A small, scraggly beard covered his gaunt face and he clenched a pipe between brown teeth.

The man on his right had a young, stalwart face, short black hair, and eyes of glazed emerald. He wore a full set of blackened steel armor over his toned frame. A woman in black cloth and leather sat on the left of them, long auburn hair flowing down her shoulders.

The man in the middle leaned back on his chair’s hind legs and propped his boots on the tabletop.

“What? It’s none of your concern.” Cain turned and began to follow his friends down the hall before the man’s voice stopped him in his tracks.

“Ah, but it is,” the middle man replied. “All of your concerns are Tarsha’s concerns. You are a marked man, Taran. There is no turning back.”

Cain stood frozen at this. He glanced over his shoulder at the man, and returned his solemn stare.

“What is it?” Adriel asked as she and the others returned to the archway.

“Warriors,” the man called as he noticed the others. “Please, sit with us. Drinks on him,” he said as he nudged the man on his right.

The second man laughed and stood up before approaching the bar.

“Please, take a seat,” the older man said, “The night is still young.” The Warriors warily approached and pulled several chairs up to the table. “I am Jiran, son of Siphus,” The man said.

He pulled his boots off the table, sending the front legs of his chair slamming back onto the stone floor.

“This is Shara, daughter of Ismond.” He gestured towards the woman.

“And this is Heric, son of Morein,” he nodded at the shorthaired man returning to the table with a tray laden with mugs of ale.

The two groups stared uncomfortably at the other for several moments, an uneasy tension filling the room.

“Please…drink,” Jiran gestured towards the mugs. Jiran and Heric reached towards the tray and removed mugs of their own. “It must be difficult knowing the Knights of Iscara haunt your every step. Even now, their spies may be watching…but as long as you are in Ilross, we will protect you.”

“Who are you?” Malecai asked as the Warriors cautiously took the remaining mugs. The man raised a brow at this. “Who are you, Jiran?” Malecai repeated tersely.

The man chewed on his pipe and pondered the question for a moment before replying. He blew a ring of smoke. “I am a captain of the Vilante. My company has been stationed at Ilross, for the time being at least.”

“Vilante?” Isroc asked as he wiped the frothy ale from his beard.

Heric interrupted his superior with sudden enthusiasm. “I’ll tell them. The Vilante were a division of the scouting force of Erias, but now we are largely a civilian force, an army of men and women who seek revenge and the blood of our enemies.”

“I have heard nothing of you,” Isroc replied, suspicion rising in his voice. “I was a captain of the twelfth regiment, I would know of this Vilante if you speak the truth.”

Heric shook his head slowly. “The King has separated us from all military amalgamation, we follow a new creed. Our country is in desperate need of a defensive force to protect its dispersed and isolated towns. Millions of our people have been put to the sword in these four centuries of war. In response to the recent influx in enemy troops, the King pulled the Vilante from the Army and dispersed us across the country in hopes of defending our villages against the raiders of Andred.”

“So you’re a militia?” Isroc questioned the man.

“More or less,” Jiran replied, “we take every man and woman who seeks our ranks. With civilians being slaughtered everyday, their friends and family come to find solace by the sword. Our numbers swell daily with the blood drunk and vengeful.” Silence followed his words. The group sipped their mugs in thought.

Eventually Isroc broke the silence. “I was sent to my destroyed hometown to dispose of the bodies of our fallen countrymen. Thousands we had to burn…I will never forget such a smell.”

Shara nodded at this. “You are not alone. The Andreds will continue to bring death upon Tarsha, destroying and burning as they go. They will not relent. It is the Vilante’s solemn duty to defend our countrymen, down to the last man if we must.”

Jiran glanced over at the young woman and set his mug down before speaking. “Their attacks will never cease. However, the King; with good reason, senses an attack on Morven. This would be a tremendous undertaking for the enemy.

‘Morven is the largest and most heavily defended citadel the world has ever known. A siege on such a mighty bastion will take nearly all of his troops and vast resources. Abaddon has never before dared risk an open siege on Morven; it is a bold and risky play of his cards. However, if he succeeds in crushing Morven, then Tarsha will surely crumble, and the tyrant’s genocide will rage unhindered until all are lay to ruin.

‘With great reward comes great risk, and Abaddon knows this well. If we defeat him at Morven, then his armies will be severely crippled, and we may very well see an end to this war. Therefore, he must ensure his strength and gather his armies.

‘We see before us the eye of the storm. The Andreds have not been sighted in over a week. This can only be the result of their withdrawal. I feel they will soon begin their march for Morven.

‘Our capital calls for aid in this lull, but few come from our country, and even fewer from over our borders. Morven’s defense is slowly gathering, but at our present strength, we will wither if the enemy chooses to attack.”

Cain ran a hand through his hair as he gazed out the glass paned window beside them. “Wait,” he asked, “you said genocide…what do you mean?”

Jiran blew a cloud of smoke from his pipe and leaned across the table. “How is it that a man can live for over four hundred years? It is because he is immortal. He is beyond the confines of man. His body never ages, his mind never fails with the changes of the seasons. That is the essence of Abaddon, hardly human, not of death, not of life, always alive but never living. His vengeance never quenched, his anger never appeased.

‘I speak of the genocide he has brought upon humanity. At the hands of an angry god, we were cursed for our sins and sacrilege. We turned our backs on faith, and in return, were given Abaddon. He is our curse, our punishment, our destroyer. We may never escape it…”

Shara nodded at this. “You cannot cheat the will of the heavens, if there is indeed anything beyond this hell. If divinity calls for the death of man, then damned we will be. Abaddon is the vessel of heavenly order, and if he is called to purge us of the sins of our forefathers, then through death we meet our just reward.”

“Great…” Silas mumbled, “More of this shit.”

Heric ignored Silas’s remark and looked at Shara questioningly. “You speak as if we fight for nothing.”

“Who are we to question anything,” she replied, “we fight Abaddon because it is in our nature to do so. If we do not fight, then we die. It’s nothing more, nothing less.” Cain nodded.

The group soon fell quiet. The power of her words and the weight they carried sunk heavy in the hearts of the Warriors. The sound of rain began to patter against the tavern windows. Shara stood up and walked towards the bar.

“But why us…” Cain asked the Vilante. “Why Andaurel?”

Jiran took a swig of his ale before replying. “To tell you the truth, we don’t really know. No one knows why Abaddon so meticulously attacked your homes.” The four of Andaurel gazed into the hearth, its light flickering warmly against the inn’s walls.

“But do not worry,” Shara said as she returned with another tray of mugs. “Someone is sure to find out. The truth is bound to reveal itself to you eventually.”