FARHAYVEN: VENGEANCE (63 page)

     “You boys will be the death of me,” said Castle in resignation.

     Hammer leaned back on his chair and scratched his head. Castle, however, was looking down at the floor, part in shame and part in anger over his two sons’ lack of better judgement.

     “Where would she have gotten the coins for it
?
” asked Hammer.

     “She must have saved the coins she earned from her tutoring services at school. She was a popular tutor for the juniors and I know she made a small fortune throughout the years,” concluded Serene.

     “When was she a tutor
?
” asked Hammer in disbelief.

     “She told you, darling. Four years ago, remember
?
Her teachers asked her to tutor the weaker students at school and she charged one silver coin a month for every student she helped,” said Fragrance.

     “She must have planned this many years ago
!
But why
?
” realised Hammer.

     That was a question that no one could answer, not even Serene. Yet that was the most important question they needed to answer in order to find Clover.

     The sun was directly overhead when Clover finally stopped by the side of the road. She dismounted and led her horse to a nearby stream to quench its thirst. Then she tethered it to a large, shady tree so that it could graze at the grasses. She sat down under another shady tree, and cooked her breakfast cum lunch. Her hands were shivering. Her heart was pounding. She had planned this for many years. And throughout the years, she was certain in her decision and confident with her plan. But now, she began to have doubts that she never had before. For the first time since the incident at the back alley of Timberstock, she was truly alone again. She knew where she wanted to go, but she had no idea of what she would find there or how things would turn out. Was she making a mistake
?
Should she just abandon her plan and go home
?
The Fallsian Guards Academy would not be too bad, would it
?
She was taking a leap of faith, this running away business; and she would hate it if she ended up falling flat on her face.

     Clover ate her meal heartily, but she hardly enjoyed it. Then she sat against the trunk of the tree and closed her eyes. She was tired. She was afraid. She was doubtful. She felt guilty. Her eye-lids felt heavy. She slowly dozed off. And into the realm of dreams she ventured, away from her tiredness, fear, doubts and guilt.

     She awoke with a start when she slumped sideways to the ground. Her head was spinning slightly and her vision was blurry. Then she slammed her fist onto the ground in anger when she realised what time it was. The sun had almost gone down and it was now dusk. Not only had she wasted precious time sleeping, but she had slept in an unguarded and unsafe environment. Thieves and highwaymen could easily have crept up on her and do all sorts of nasty things to her, including slitting her throat, or worse still, kidnapping her and selling her to the Serpentians. Maybe they would sell her to Smugglin’ Sam, whoever he was and if he was still alive.

     She packed up fast, mounted up and galloped her horse down the road. But a few moments later she realised that that was folly as she could end up injuring her horse or even herself if she continued at this speed in the dark. So she slowed her horse to a trot and hoped that her family would not suspect where she was and catch up with her.

     It would be dawn before Clover reached the first village on the road. The signpost beside the road said ‘Widecreek’. She trotted her horse right up to the village square, dismounted, tethered her horse, fed and watered it and bought some provisions from the locals. But she did not sleep or rest. She got back up on her horse and continued on at a gallop, hoping to make Southgust Town by nightfall. It was close to midnight when she finally got there. She was so tired that she just ate a piece of bun at the restaurant in the local inn, drank a cup of hot chocolate and went straight up to bed. And before the sun had even risen past the horizon, she was already on the road again, at full gallop.

     Mansion Genox was in chaos. In the living room itself there were at least five sketchers at work, sketching mini portraits of Clover in the form of posters, based on her graduation portrait. Castle Genox had roped in the help of his subordinates, and an entire river of volunteers in casual clothing sat out on the mansion’s porch getting a briefing on where and how to conduct the search for his niece. Serene was conducting a briefing of her own in the kitchen, after recruiting ten of her classmates to help in the search. Meanwhile, Fragrance was lying in her room after fainting from the stress. Chrys was there taking care of her mother, and in her heart she cursed her little sister for being so irresponsible. Axe and Halberd were in the stables shovelling horse dung, and would be doing so every day for the next three months. They were no longer grinning
!
Pike had accompanied Hammer to the nearby city garrison, where a formal report had to be made. They brought with them a stack of posters so that the soldiers could identify Clover when they conducted patrols, roadblocks and such.

     The search parties searched everywhere in Fallsene City, from the most likely of places to the unthinkable. Still, Clover could not be found. So they only thing left for them to do was to stick the posters of her at public places and hope that someone somewhere had seen her.

     The sun shone directly overhead, and Clover had just entered the fringes of Windswept Forest. Windswept Forest was dangerous at the best of times, and downright treacherous at the worst, she knew. It was a haven for thieves and highwaymen. Demons had been known to hunt in this forest as well. And then there was a rumour that a band of assassins kept their lair in here somewhere. Almost a quarter of the people who travelled through Windswept Forest never made it out alive. She slowed her horse down to a fast trot. She wanted to conserve energy for her horse, for if and when she was attacked, she needed her horse fresh and energetic to gallop the both of them out of harm’s way.

     Clover had skipped lunch, stopping only for a short while so that her horse could rest, drink and graze a little, before continuing on. But now it was near dusk and she needed to set up camp. She chose a ridge that was bordered by the river on one of its sides. After watering and tethering her horse so that it could graze the grass, she set up a series of wires around the landward perimeter of her camp. Each of these wires was connected to small cans with pebbles in them, so that the cans would rattle if the wires were disturbed. Only then did she get a small campfire going to cook her meal. And while her meal was cooking, she set up her small tent. By the time her tent was up, her food was ready. And as she ate, she set two mess tins of water to boil, for the next day’s requirements. Once she had finished eating, the water had boiled. She set aside the mess tins to cool and went to sleep hugging her sword. She was so tired that she was in dreaming within moments and she was sure that if indeed the cans had rattled, she would not even have heard them.

     Meanwhile, back at Mansion Genox, Serene was asleep too. But she fell asleep on the couch. She was too tired to climb the stairs to her room. She was not alone. Pike laid on the floor beside her, and so did her uncle and her father and a bunch of her friends. The sketchers were sprawled in the living room as well, although they were given pillows, mattresses and such. Between them, they had sketched approximately 300 posters thus far but their work was far from over. They would need to produce 1500 posters so that the Genoxes could cover every city, town and village in Free Falls.

     Fragrance had developed a fever from the stress and Chrys had her hands full nursing her. Halberd and Axe had the pleasure of sleeping on their dung-free and cleanly-washed stable floor, for they dared not step into the mansion proper and risk the wrath of both their father and their uncle.

     Came midnight, Retired Orgavian Boulder Genox arrived back at Mansion Genox. He had been away for a two weeks’ spiritual retreat at a temple of the Receivers of Light. He was both surprised and confused to find his two sons and a host of many others lying sprawled in deep sleep on the living room floor. So tired were they that no one noticed his return. He decided not to wake anyone up. He proceeded upstairs to his room. Up on the second floor hallway he ran into his granddaughter Chrys, who filled him in on what had happened. He just shook his head when Chrys was done talking, bid her goodnight and went to sleep.

     Five days later, Clover exited the north-eastern end of Windswept Forest. The first spot of civilisation she came across was Eastgust Town, the north-eastern counterpart of Southgust. It was mid afternoon, and she did not fancy riding through and making camp in the dark open road, so she checked in at a local inn. After a quick meal and a nice long soak in a tub of hot water, she had the best sleep in almost a week. When she had finally awoken, it was dawn the next day. After a quick stop at the local market to replenish her supplies, she galloped in a north-easterly direction towards her childhood home, Fort Eastguard. But she did not stop to pay a visit when she arrived there two days later. Instead she rode on through with her hood covering her face. She then travelled in a north-westerly direction towards Timberstock Town. When she reached Timberstock, she rode on through as well. She headed westward along the main road and did so for the next one week. Her destination was Earthfast Village, which lay at the outskirts of Eastpeak Town. It was there that she had hoped to find a guide who would take her to her final destination, Monune Ruby, home of the Fire Elementhars.

     The sun shone brightly overhead and Clover headed straight for the village square at Earthfast, espied an elderly man watching over some children playing, went straight up to him and asked him where she could find the Fire Elementhars.

     “You’re nine years too late for that
!
They were all massacred. Killed by some assassins or something. There’re no more Fire Elementhars left. Didn’t you know
?
” said the elderly man, who was actually the village headman of Earthfast Village and went by the name of Plough Sarrite.

     Clover’s jaw dropped. Her eyes stared blankly. She was at a lost for words and also for thoughts. She had planned for this all her life and now she had found out that her plans had led her to a dead end. Life was so unfair
!

     “I can take you up to their monune tomorrow morning if you’d like, so that you can see the graves. Tragic, what had happened, you know
?
They killed demons. That’s what they did. Didn’t bother any one. Don’t know who would want them dead. I lost two sons to demon attacks because the Fire Elementhars were gone, you know
?
Yes, the Fire Elementhars, they were good people,” said the village headman.

     “Yes, they were good people. I shall take you up on your offer, sir. Tomorrow morning I shall meet you here, so that we may go to their monune,” said Clover.

     “Tomorrow morning it is, then. But in the mean time, young lady, where’ll you be staying
?
” asked Plough.

     That was another question to which Clover had no answer.

     “I do not know. Is there a place here for a guest to stay
?
” replied Clover.

     “This is a small village. There’re no inns or guest houses here. But you can stay with me and my family, if you’d like. Or otherwise, you could set up a tent near the village hall. It’s safe. There’re no robbers here and very few demon attacks these days. The Water Elementhars have made it a point to travel through here every half a year or so, after we have made such a request of them,” offered Plough.

     Clover thanked the village headman and took him up on his offer. She slept through the entire afternoon, but managed to wake up for dinner with her host. After dinner, Plough gave her a blow by blow account of what had happened at the monune nine years ago, to the best of his knowledge; for he was the one who discovered the massacre and reported it to the Provincial Guards in the first place. He had even led a stream of soldiers up to the monune and had heard of their assessment of the massacre. According to him, the soldiers had suspected that there was a survivor, because someone buried the Fire Elementhars; but after all these years, no one had turned up to claim the monune.

     They were off early the next morning and after a three-hour ride on horseback, they reached Monune Ruby. Plough showed Clover every finger’s length of the place and explained what had been found and where they were found. She was now convinced that there was a survivor. She also felt so much grief for the cruel murders that happened there that tears rolled down her cheeks. Then she asked him if there were any Elementhars left anywhere and the old man told her of the monunes of the Earth, Wind and Water Elementhars. Two hours later, the both of them returned to Earthfast; where Clover thanked the village headman for his generosity, wished him farewell and rode away.