An Unexpected Deity (Book 7) (6 page)

“I understand a little better why the gnomes were trying to scare us away from this trip,” Wren said to Kestrel as they continued to climb, their path snaking along the contours of an outthrust of the mountain they were on.

“We need to keep going, and hurry,” Bradstree called back to the others.  “The sun will set in a few hours, and we have a long climb still ahead of us.”

He set the speed at a steady, unflinching pace, and the elves followed without complaint, until late in the afternoon.

“It’s getting cooler,” Putienne observed as their path swung into a dark canyon where they were in deep shadow.

“And the air is getting thinner too,” Stillwater chimed in as he swooped down close to Kestrel.  “My people are not enjoying this.”

“Send them home,” Kestrel said suddenly.

“What?” Stillwater asked.

“As long as one or two of you are with us, able to call the others, there’s no reason for everyone to make this climb. 

“The same goes for us,” he added.   “Would either of you like to go back to Oaktown, or to Seafare?” he looked at Wren as they strode up the mountainside.   “The imps can carry you there now.  As long as one of us gets to the cave at the top, we’ll be fine.”

“Creata would be surprised to see me return,” Wren said thoughtfully.

“Would you be safe in this place with only a few imps to guard you?” Stillwater asked.

“There is no threat here, no dangers that I see, except from growing tired in the thin air,” Kestrel answered.

“Would that boy at your home, Remy, be able to show me the land around your home?” Putty suddenly asked.

Kestrel’s eyes widened in surprise at the question, and at the unspoken implications he read into the question.

“Remy would be delighted to take you on a tour of Oaktown, I’m sure,” he answered.  “Bradstree,” he spoke loudly to gain the gnome’s attention, “we’d like to stop for five minutes.”

“Wren, I’ll send imps to pick you up in the morning,” he told his cousin.  “You go surprise Creata and have a good evening.

“Putienne, you and I will go to Oaktown, and ask Remy to give you a tour, then I’ll come back here and finish traveling with Bradstree.”

“Stillwater, would your people make these travel arrangements for us?” Kestrel asked.  “We’ll be grateful for this chance to have the luxury of making such trips,” he said.

“Of course, friend Kestrel,” Stillwater replied.  The imps began to descend and close around the travelers.

“I’ll be back in five minutes,” Kestrel told Bradstree, and the hastily arranged exodus began.

“Good bye Kestrel and Putienne!  I’ll see you tomorrow,” Wren called just before she disappeared from view.

“What is happening?” Bradstree asked in astonishment.

“Five minutes,” Kestrel answered, as he was swarmed by imps, and then he too was gone from the mountainside, and returned to his study in Oaktown.

“Stillwater, I’ll only need an escort back to the mountainside in a few minutes, and then your people will be free for the rest of the day,” Kestrel said.

“Remy!” he called loudly as he opened the door of his study, with Putienne following closely behind him.  He started walking towards his bedroom as he called for the boy.

“My lord?” Whyte’s voice sounded down the hallway.  Moments later, the steward appeared from a doorway.  “Is everything alright, my lord?”

“We’ve decided to handle our expedition a little differently this time, Whyte.  I’d like Remy to provide guide services to Putienne today, to show her around the manor and the village and the lands nearby,” Kestrel answered as he opened his door and led his impromptu entourage inside.

“I know he’ll behave in the most gentleman-like manner, of course,” Kestrel said.  “And I expect I’ll be back home tonight as well, perhaps with another guest.”  He reached into a closet and pulled out a fur cape, one that he thought would protect him from the mountaintop chill.

“That’s quite a busy agenda, my lord,” Whyte responded.  “I’m sure Remy will behave appropriately, and the young lady will have no complaints,” he said.

“Thank you Whyte.  Good bye, Putty, you have a good day,” he leaned over and kissed the girl’s cheek, as the imps quickly surrounded him once again, and then he returned to the chilly mountainside, where the confounded gnome was sitting on a fallen tree trunk.

“I’m ready to go,” he told Bradstree.

“What about the others?” the gnome asked.

“We’ll see them later,” Kestrel replied.  “I didn’t see any reason for all of us to have to make this journey.”

“But that’s not fair!” Bradstree protested.  “We’re going to do all the work, and they’ll get to the village of Proetec without doing anything!”

“They’re enjoying themselves, and that’s okay with me,” Kestrel said.  “They’re friends, and they are not taking advantage of us – we’re taking care of them.

“Let’s move on, and we’ll find things aren’t so bad at the end of the day,” he added.

“”Is everything alright?” Stillwater asked.  “If so, we’ll go our own ways now.”

“You may go,” Kestrel smiled at his friend.  “I’ll call you this evening when Bradstree and I have finished our journey, and perhaps we’ll go to the healing spring on our way home,” he offered a bonus to the imps for their services.

“We’ll come back the instant you call!” Stillwater agreed, and then the remaining imps disappeared, except for Mulberry.

“I’ll stay with you, to keep you out of trouble, if you don’t mind,” the imp told Kestrel, as he looked at her with a puzzled expression.

“Really, Kestrel-friend, I just want to keep an eye on you, to make sure you don’t have any problems,” she said in an exasperated tone.  “And to make sure you don’t break the hearts of any random female forest creatures you might run into and try to strike up a relationship with!” she added with a laugh.

“Let’s go, Bradstree,” Kestrel spoke in gnomish to his guide, and they started walking up the path.

“I want you to go someplace warm if this gets too troublesome for you,” Kestrel told Mulberry.

“And I’m glad you have remained,” he added sincerely.  For all the teasing that the imp aimed at Kestrel, he knew that she, and all of the others, were faithful to him, and had complete confidence in any decision he made.

Their route climbed a steep rise, gaining hundreds of feet in altitude in the next hour, and even the elven calf and thigh muscles Kestrel relied on began to ache and burn from exertion, while the air grew colder.  The effort reminded Kestrel of his run from Oaktown to Center Trunk while accompanied by Captain Lim and a squad of guards just a few weeks earlier, and he made himself continue to lift and move his feet forward and upward.

He glanced up at Mulberry, who was flying very low, nearly even with the top of his head, and he realized that she was fading from blue to gray in the increasingly harsh conditions.

“Mulberry friend, you should go to a warm place.  I don’t want you to suffer,” he told her.

“May I come inside your cape and ride with you?” she asked with chattering teeth.

“I think a warm spot in Blackfriars would be more delightful for you, but I would be happy to have you stay with me if you want to snuggle up.  Just be careful where you put your hands, or I’ll tell Acanthus!” he answered immediately.

Mulberry dove down, then rose up along his back, and poked her head out of the back of his neck hole, her hands wrapped around his shoulders as she clung to him.

“I’ll be the mature one in this matter, and ignore your baseless comments,” she said loftily, “especially since you feel so warm!”

Kestrel laughed, and continued to climb, relieved that the trail hit a short stretch of level progress, where he didn’t have to fight gravity so strenuously.

“Let’s stop and rest, Bradstree,” he called out, and halted to breathe deeply, his hands on his hips.

“We can rest for a little while; we’ve made good progress,” the gnome agreed.  “But we don’t want to have to try to climb very much after dark.  The trail is too treacherous, and we want to reach that cave.”

“Let’s move on then,” Kestrel said, breathing heavily, and they began to walk once again.

Over the next hour the sun began to sink farther and farther towards the western horizon.  Kestrel continued to climb, struggling and slowing down as the air grew thinner and the temperatures grew colder.  They entered a region of cold clammy, fog, and Kestrel could barely keep his eyes on Bradstree’s heels as the fog and the growing darkness reduced visibility to nearly nothing.

“We’ll have to stop here,” Bradstree said half an hour later, abruptly ceasing his climb at a point where the path was slightly sheltered as it ran through a small grove of stunted trees.  The sun was nearly down, and the chill was growing more pronounced.  Kestrel was thankful to have Mulberry riding silently on his back, the warmth of her body pressed against his torso.

The fog was clearing away, but bitter winds were starting to blow, whistling through the trees around them.

“How much further to the cave?” Kestrel asked, raising his voice to be heard over the noisy breeze.

“We’d need at least another hour, but we can’t see, so it might as well be forever.  We aren’t going to try to climb this trail in the dark,” he said adamantly.

“Why do we stop?  What does the gnome say?” Mulberry asked.

Kestrel quickly translated.

“Kestrel-friend, can you make light for us to see by?  Can you make a great glow?” Mulberry’s voice floated from behind him as she considered the news.

“Perhaps,” he murmured.  The idea had not occurred to him, his mind befuddled by the thin air and the day of heavy exertion.

He focused his attention on the need for light, and he thought of the glowing blue dome he had used to protect himself in the recent spate of battles he had waged.

The dome suddenly flashed into bright existence all around them, and Bradstree yelped in fear.

“Is that enough light to see the trail?” Kestrel asked.

“This is your doing?   You can make this glow?” the gnome asked in wonder, looking at Kestrel with respect for the first time in the day.

“This is my doing, but I will not be able to do it forever,” Kestrel replied.  “If you think you can see enough, then start walking, and let’s try to reach your cave.”

“I’ll try to do my best,” Bradstree replied, and he faced back towards the trail and started to slowly climb once again.

They made slow progress as they could only see a few feet beyond the border of Kestrel’s glowing dome, but Kestrel was happier to walk slowly as night fell completely and the wind grew from a nuisance to a problem.  The trail left the trees and was exposed to the open elements.  Small pellets of ice intermittently began to pelt them, and made the stony trail grow slippery and dangerous.

“Should we just stop and go home now, Kestrel-warmer?” Mulberry asked.

“Should we give up for the night?” Kestrel asked Bradstree in turn.  He was willing to be transported to the warm waters of the healing spring immediately, and didn’t need much persuasion to make the transition.

“It should only be a hundred yards away,” the gnome replied.  “I don’t want to give up now,” and so they crept ahead at their plodding, careful pace, Kestrel also feeling that the victory of reaching the cave was worth just a few more yards.

And then they entered a passage with stony walls on both sides of the trail.  The wind blew straight through the passage, directly into their faces, forcing them to walk with their eyes mostly shut, until Bradstree gave a sudden whooping shout.

“Here it is!  Turn left into here,” he spoke loudly over the sound of the wind.

Kestrel peeked forward and saw the guide disappear into an irregular dark spot in the side of the passage, and he followed him in.

There was immediate, blessed relief from the painful wind and the pelting ice.  Kestrel wiped his hand across his face to scrape away the deposited frosty coating, and exhaled  wearily.  They had reached the cave, and were safe from the night on the mountain.

The gnome gave a sigh of relief.

“It’s still cold, but at least there’s not sleet and wind,” Bradstree said.

“Let’s go someplace better,” Kestrel suggested.

“There is no place better.  This is as good as it gets.  If we’re lucky, in the morning the sky will be clear, and we’ll be able to crest the ridge to start down into the valley where Proetec’s people live,” Bradstree answered.

“There is a better place – a place that is warm and comfortable.  The imps can take us there tonight, and bring us back here in the morning to resume our journey,” Kestrel answered.

“Mulberry, will you call the others to come and carry us to the healing spring – me and the gnome?” Kestrel asked in elvish.

“Why would I want to let those flutterers carry me someplace?  How do I know they won’t drop me?” Bradstree asked, revealing once again the enduring distrust that existed between the two races.

“They won’t – they’ve never dropped me,” Kestrel assured him, as several imps appeared in the cave.

“This is unpleasant, Kestrel-winter-bringer,” Killcen complained as soon as he arrived at the cave with the other imps.