Keeper of the Books (Keeper of the Books, Book 1) (24 page)

“You’re lucky they only used a regular knife on you,” Colten told him as he sat on a chair next to Devlin’s bed. “Could have been an enchanted knife to make you feel like your eyes were on fire or to cause your arm to rot off.”
 

Devlin only gave a slight smile to Colten. The Ranger was little more than a boy, just barely a man, but he had passed his training better than most Rangers ever had, or so Devlin had heard. He was the only one out of the nine other Rangers that did not turn his nose up at Devlin as he passed. Devlin felt like he belonged with them whenever he was with Colten.
 

“I really wish I would have seen them coming,” Devlin said. He tried not to look at Colten for fear of being discovered. He did not want his eyes to give him away. He did not want the only Ranger who seemed to like him be disappointed at his cowardice.
 

“I bet she was ruthless,” Colten said. “The president should have just ordered the execution when they caught her. Then we wouldn’t be in this mess.”

“I agree,” Devlin said. “Marum is a danger.”

“I wonder why they didn’t kill you,” Colten said. “If you were unconscious from the first blow, don’t you think they would have just cut your throat?”

Devlin shrugged. “Who knows how gray elves and crazy men think? Perhaps she was just trying to get out as quickly as possible. Maybe they wasn’t looking when they stabbed me, thought they stabbed my neck instead of my shoulder. I can’t even really guess.”

“Perhaps it would have been more noble,” came the voice of Ranger Gibbons at the doorway, “if you had been shot off your horse and killed instantly.”

Ranger Colten stood from his chair at attention.
 

Gibbons nodded at the young Ranger. “Let Devlin get some rest.”

“Yes sir,” Colten said. He gave a sympathetic look to Devlin and turned to exit the room, leaving Devlin alone with the president’s right-hand man.
 

“Would you have preferred my death?” Devlin asked him.
 

Gibbons shook his head and walked slowly toward his bed. He pulled the chair to him, sat in it, and crossed his legs, seemingly making himself comfortable. “Regardless of how you came to be among the most talented Rangers ever to exist in Galamore, you are still part of us. I would never wish harm upon one of my brothers unless he were meaning harm against my president or country. Of course, if you wished such a thing, you would no longer be considered one of my brothers.”

“I could never wish such a thing,” Devlin said.
 

“I should hope not.” Gibbons looked Devlin up and down from his head to his toes and shook his head. “I know you have talked to the other Rangers, and I know you need your rest, but I need to hear from you what happened at the bridge. How is it that Marum and that man maimed you and stole your horse? How is it you are still alive?”

“They was quick,” Devlin said. “I bent over to look at some tracks near the riverbank. I thought they might be theirs. I wasn’t sure if they might have already passed before I got there. The moment I looked at the grass, one of them came at me with a rock. I was stunned. I don’t remember much after that. I walked some distance, but I can’t recall it. I woke up on Rickston’s horse with a terrible pain in my shoulder and face.”

“You said you think they missed your neck and hit your shoulder by accident?” Gibbons asked with an eyebrow raised.
 

Devlin shook his head. “It’s speculation. Your guess is as good as mine. You asked for my report, I haven’t had the chance to contemplate the motives of Marum or the other man. I don’t know why they didn’t kill me. Perhaps to feign innocence. Marum had always claimed it. It wouldn’t help her case to kill a Ranger of Galamore.”

“It would not,” Gibbons agreed. He bent forward and rubbed his eyes with his palms. “I have spoken to President DalGaard about it already. He is most displeased at Marum’s ease of escape.”

“I do apologize, sir. I didn’t see the attack coming.”

“Well,” Gibbons said, his face very serious, “if you had been trained as a Ranger like all the others instead of being appointed based on popularity, then perhaps you might not have been so careless.”

“A point well made, sir.”

Gibbons stood from the chair and began pacing the floor. “Marum is a powerful enemy, and it was very important to President DalGaard that she be executed. The act was meant to be a message to her brother that we were not going to take his insubordination lightly. Now we have been made to look weak and foolish.”

“I’m very sorry, sir.”

Gibbons held up a hand. “I don’t want anymore apologies. It is not your fault that we have not trained you.” He stopped his pacing and faced Devlin. “It is a sign that the position as a Ranger of Galamore is of lesser importance than it used to be. But as long as I lead the men, I will not allow it to be that way.”

Devlin struggled to sit up from the bed. His head pounded as he sat straighter, but his concern for what Gibbons might say next was too much for Devlin to take lying down. The leader of the Rangers watched him as he rubbed the side of his head.
 

“How old are you, Devlin?”

“I have walked this land for almost fifty years.”

“You are far too old to begin training as a Ranger,” Gibbons said. “For you to go through official training would make a mockery of the position. Since you saved the president’s life in the Annual Hunt, all the citizens think you are already an accomplished warrior. That is why they wanted you to fill our vacant spot so badly.”

Devlin was aware of the reason he had been chosen to be a Ranger, but his mask had been stripped from him. Here he sat, exposed to Gibbons. He was no warrior and now the Rangers saw it. The president saw it. But the people of Tel Haven and the rest of Galamore had not seen it. Not yet, anyway.

“I think any man, you included, would have been in the same situation as I,” Devlin said. It was a bold thing to say, and when Gibbons’ face began to turn red, Devlin knew he had said too much, but he had already started, so he continued. “I am a hunter. A good hunter. I know when a prey is near. The two of them must have used a spell to hide their coming.”

“And a trained Ranger such as myself would have thought of this scenario beforehand,” Gibbons came back. “What happened to you was not some kind of fluke. It was purely a lack of experience and training.”

Though Devlin did not dispute Gibbon’s words, he did not wish to go through training. Actually, the thought of staying on as a Ranger seemed unbearable. There was always the threat of having to take up arms and fight; always the chance of losing his life.

“We’re running out of time,” Gibbons said. “I came in here to assess your condition. To see if you’re healthy enough to ride.”

“As you can see…” Devlin began, but Gibbons cut him off.
 

“You’re well enough.” He started toward the door. “Perhaps today you will get a chance to redeem yourself.”

“Why is that, sir?”

“We’ve discovered who the man is who helped Marum escape. His name is Nathaniel Cole.”

Devlin searched his mind, but the name didn’t ring a bell.
 

“It may be true that you aren’t trained well as a Ranger,” Gibbons said, “but your reputation as a hunter is well known. Your ability to track is unlike any other.”

“Thank you but…”

“I’ve got a party outside, ready to go. Pack up what you need. We’re riding out after Marum and Nathaniel. And we need your tracking skills to guide us to them.”

Gibbons was out the door before Devlin could argue. He had thought that surely the beating he’d taken would render him useless to the service of the Rangers, but Gibbons didn’t seem to care. He cursed himself for not making his injuries worse. He should have tried to break his legs or back or something.
 

A growing fear crawled into his chest and his heart started to beat faster, which made his head pound all the more. There was no arguing with Gibbons. Refusing to go out on this mission could mean the same as treason. Devlin could go to jail, or worse, he could be killed.

He was glad no one else was in the room because tears came to his eyes, and crying was a very un-Ranger-like thing to do. He tried to swallow them back, but failed as he packed his belongings and stumbled out through the doorway.
 

Autumn, 903 A.O.M.

Whenever a man found himself in a shootout, it was vitally important to make every second, every movement count. If he looked in the wrong direction, if he aimed at the wrong target, if he so much as took the wrong step, he could be killed. Every moment in a gunfight mattered. Nate knew this better than anybody. He’d taken advantage of a man’s distraction on many occasions. There was one time in particular, a man had a pistol on Nate, and Nate didn’t even have his gun drawn. But the man had heard something to his left, a cat or a mouse or something. He didn’t move his body. He didn’t turn his head. But his eyes…his eyes darted for just a brief second, and that was enough for Nate to snap out his pistol and shoot the man through the heart.

This came to Nate’s mind as the sun burst over the horizon and mercilessly cracked him over the head with an ache so severe that he wasn’t entirely sure someone in his party hadn’t tried to kill him in the middle of the night. But he knew the culprit, and the empty flask in his coat pocket was there to remind him. The headache didn’t keep him from walking to the cart and seeking out another bottle of whiskey that Alban had so graciously packed.
 

Nate didn’t like to be a sneak, but he didn’t exactly advertise what he was doing in the back of the cart as the others ate their breakfast. There was something that drew him to the drink despite the splitting pain in his head and his sick stomach. It made things easier. He didn’t have to think about much whenever he sipped away.

But that was what made him think of being in a gunfight. Here he was with people out looking for him, wanting nothing more than to string him up and never think about him again, and Nate was getting drunk off Alban’s whiskey. If a gunfight ever did break out, Nate would be so sluggish and foggy-eyed he wouldn’t get a shot off because he’d already be dead. Still, he wondered if maybe he drank himself to death, he might wake up in Texas where he could get back to his plans of moving to Montana. He supposed then he’d just drink himself to death in the real world. He’d die alone somewhere in the mountains of Montana. Someone would find his bones sitting against a rock, an empty bottle in his skeletal grip.
 

He nearly jumped out of his skin when Alban said his name. The headache must have been so severe that Nate hadn’t even heard the man approach. No, he wouldn’t be worth a clod of dirt in a gunfight right now.
 

“You think that’s such a good idea?” Alban asked, almost as an echo to Nate’s own thoughts. “I brought along the bottles for times of celebration and perhaps for the colder nights to keep our bellies warm.” He shook his head. “I didn’t bring them so you could be in a drunken stupor the entire journey.”

“I’ll pay you back,” Nate said, unsure where he’d get any money.

Alban shook his head. “That ain’t what I’m saying, and you know it. I just don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be drinking before you visit the Foreseer. She might be less inclined to talk to you.”

Nate looked past Alban to see Rachel and Marum chatting next to the rekindled fire. Rachel stirred the pot of mutton stew slowly and smiled as she told Marum some story. He was glad neither of them could hear this conversation. Nate felt embarrassed, though he wasn’t sure why.
 

“You’re right,” Nate said. He set the cork back in the bottleneck and placed the bottle back in the crate. Nate shook the flask in front of him, as full as it had ever been. “If you don’t mind, I’ll just keep this on reserve.” He then slid the flask into the front left pocket of his coat over his chest.
 

“Do what you want,” Alban said, “but I don’t like traveling with a drunk. Don’t forget that I’m doing you a courtesy taking you to Cara. She will help you get back home, I’m sure of it.”

Nate nodded. “Sorry,” he said. “It’s been a tough few days.”

“Don’t get me wrong,” Alban said, “I like a draw now and again, but we gotta be careful and alert on these roads.”

Nate nodded and the motion made his head swim. This was all probably for the best, even though something inside of him wanted to reach for the flask right then and there to down it. He shook away the idea and sat with the others in front of the fire, its heat a little too much for his pounding head.

The stew, on the other hand, was exactly what his body needed. Over the course of a meal and as they started packing up the cart, Nate’s pain and sickness began to subside. And by lunch he felt better, but it would take another night’s sleep before he was back to normal, though he wasn’t sure what normal was anymore. He’d been carrying that flask with him for so long that he had started missing being drunk whenever he wasn’t. He figured this was a bad sign, but he didn’t like to dwell on bad things for too long.

They continued along the road. According to Alban, this particular road wasn’t traveled often. It served those who lived in these remote parts. Nate hadn’t seen a passerby since yesterday morning, and Alban told him not to expect another for a while.

The party was generally quiet throughout the journey, but for Alban randomly spouting off questions or offering little stories here and there. The conversation eventually veered to Cara, and Nate wondered how a person could be gifted with foresight.
 

Alban shrugged. “Magic,” he said.
 

“I don’t believe in magic,” Nate came back.
 

To this, Alban chuckled. “You mean to tell me that you fell through a book, woke up in a cell next to a gray elf, and you don’t believe in magic?”

Nate smiled. “I’m still trying to convince myself this ain’t a dream.”

“Oh, it’s not a dream,” Alban said. “It is a story. A story in which you somehow play a part. How big that part is, no one can know. Except, of course, the Foreseer perhaps.”