Progeny (The Children of the White Lions) (7 page)

Looking around one last time, Jhaell reached for the white Strands of Air, grasping them with ease, yet straining as he summoned a number of the deep, midnight-black ones. He was a Void mage, but not a particularly talented one. Having what he needed, he set to crafting the correct pattern, staring into the air, urging the Strands to go where they needed to go.

This particular Weave was complex and he took pride in knowing that he was one of the few mortals capable of such a feat. As he neared the completion of the Weave, he closed his eyes and drew forth the image of his office at Immylla.

The sound of a thick parchment sheet being torn in two filled the wilderness.

Opening his eyes, he spotted the telltale slit in front of him, hanging in midair. He reached out with a hand to touch the edge of the slit—an icy chill ran along his arm—and pulled it to one side, much as he would a curtain. Concentrated blackness waited for him inside. With one last look around—fixing the scene in his mind should he need to return—he stepped through the opening and disappeared into the void, letting the flap of reality fall back into place.

A few moments later, the slit disappeared with a small pop.

Once Kenders and Nikalys reached the bottom of the hill, they moved onto the road leading home. No longer made of yellow-tinted dirt, the way was instead a muddy mess that reminded Kenders of creamy butter. The muck significantly slowed their pace as they slipped in some places and got stuck in others.

Getting to this point had taken much longer than she would have liked. When the ijul had taken the slaughtered mages—aided by crackling white magic—from the bluff, they resumed their descent only to stop and hide in a bush when Kenders felt a surge of black and white. Since leaving their hiding place, Kenders had not felt any more magic.

A half-mile from the edge of town, they started to encounter debris. Muddied clumps of wet straw still tied in bundles lay scattered about, remnants of roof thatching. Splintered timbers and tree branches stuck up from the muck, forcing the siblings to go around them. Early, unripe olives dotted the ground. The wave had brought the harvest to town a few turns early.

Puddles and pools lay scattered about, some large enough to be considered ponds. The occasional bit of household furniture jutted up out of the mud: a chair, a table, a pot-stove. Spotting a child’s crib off the road a bit, Kenders turned her head yet listened carefully for an infant’s cry. There was none.

This terrain was both familiar and foreign. She had walked this path countless times before, but the destruction around her made it seem as if she were treading upon it for the first time. She shook her head without pause, caught in a state of perpetual shock.

It took them twice as long as it should have to finally reach the eastern edge of town. Or at least what had been the eastern edge of town.

Pointing to an empty plot of land, Kenders said, “Widow Johns’ house is gone.”

“All the houses are gone,” replied Nikalys.

Standing in mud, drowning in helplessness, Kenders muttered, “I don’t see how anyone survived.”

Nikalys clenched his jaw, sighed, and said, “Let’s go. I don’t want to linger.” He turned away and continued west. Kenders followed.

A short time later, they found the first body. Stopping a few paces from the corpse, brother and sister stared, silent. Kenders could tell that it was a man, but that was all. The poor soul lay face down in the mud, covered in yellow, slimy muck.

Fighting back the urge to get ill, Kenders quietly, “That’s not Father, is it?”

Nikalys hesitated—worrying her—before answering, “Father’s taller.”

“Jak?”

Shaking his head, Nikalys replied, “The hair is wrong.”

“Then who?”

Nikalys was quiet for a few heartbeats before sighing. “I don’t want to know.”

He stepped away from the corpse and continued into the village, squishing as he went.

Kenders followed, trying to scrub the image from her mind. Had they turned the man over, they would have surely recognized him, which was why she was glad they let him be. Not knowing his identity made the death easier to accept. The dead did not enjoy anonymity forever, however.

Kenders found Mrs. Bodsworth—her eyes wide and blank—slouched against a dented and toppled pot-stove. The woman had been the unofficial teacher in Yellow Mud, instructing children in their numbers and letters if their parents wished. Thaddeus and Marie had insisted all three Isaac children learn how to read, write, and work numbers, making them go four afternoons a week, even during the busy spring and harvest seasons.

Kenders moved to the overturned stove in order to close Mrs. Bodsworth’s eyelids. It took her three tries before she could bring herself to touch the corpse. Tears that had begun falling at some point now dripped onto Mrs. Bodsworth’s torn and soiled dress.

“Maeana welcome you with open arms.”

The Final Friend waited for every soul that passed from this life, judging a person’s deeds before determining the next journey for the soul to make. In Kenders’ opinion, knowing a goddess welcomed you when you died was little consolation. You were still dead.

As they wandered the ruined field that used to be their village, her tears eventually stopped flowing. The overwhelming sorrow she felt morphed into the numbing throb of hopelessness.

At some point, Nikalys retrieved an old leather satchel hanging from an uprooted tree and poured water from it. Soon after, he picked up a hunting knife still in its sheath and put it in the bag.

“Kenders, I need you to search the bodies and see if you can find any beltpurses.”

“Why?”

“Just do it,” ordered Nikalys. “And don’t argue.”

His officious tone earned him a sharp glare from her, one he did not see as he was peering about the mud. “No! I am not a thief!”

Tossing something he had retrieved from the mud back to the ground, Nikalys replied, “What are they going to do with coin? They’re dead.”

She stared at him, open-mouthed. His callousness shocked her. “Do it yourself. I’m not stealing!”

“It’s not stealing.”

“I’m not doing it, Nik!”

“Fine.
I’ll
be the cutpurse. Try to find anything that might be useful if you were going into the woods for a time. Knives, flint, tools. Waterskins, too.”

Her eyes narrowing, Kenders asked, “Why?”

“Why do you think?” asked Nikalys. “Because we’re leaving.” Kicking over a plank of wood, he exposed a chest of drawers lying on its back. “And soon.”

“What do you mean ‘we’re leaving?’” asked Kenders, moving toward Nikalys, avoiding muddy puddles as she went. “We’re supposed to be looking for Mother, Father, and Jak.”

Scooting around to one side of the toppled chest, Nikalys said, “Here, help me tip this up.”

“Nikalys! Don’t ignore me! Leave that blasted chest alone and help me find our family!”

Nikalys’ visage of calm crumbled. He slammed his hand down on the chest so hard that she heard the wood crack.

“Blast it, Kenders! Look around you!” Gesturing in all directions, he shouted, “ There is nothing left!
Nothing
! Yellow Mud is gone! Our home is gone! Everyone—
everyone
—is gone!” His voice echoed in the empty hills.

Kenders stared at her brother’s wild-eyed face for a moment and then dropped her head, angry, bitter, heartbroken, and a dozen other emotions she could not hold onto long enough to name.

Nikalys let out a long, weary sigh. Squishing in the mud, he walked to her and wrapped his arms around her.

“Hey. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to yell.” His voice was softer, but still carried an edge sharper than any knife. “I’m just so…so…” He trailed off, never finishing the sentence.

“I know,” whispered Kenders. “Me, too.”

He held her for a moment longer, then pushed her back to arms’ length and stared at her. “There’s nothing left for us here. No one could have survived this. Mother, Father, and Jak are in Maeana’s hall now.”

The tears threatened to start flowing again.

His tone gentle, Nikalys continued, “It hurts, I know. But we need to get moving. That mage might come back. And I doubt he would treat us kindly if he found us here.”

“People might still need our help.”

“Short of burying them, there is no help we can give them. We need to get far away from here, as quickly as we can.”

She wanted to protest more, knowing that if she acknowledged that he was right it meant letting go the hope that their parents and brother were still alive. It took her a few moments, but that was what she did. She wiped away her tears with hands, leaving streaks of ochre clay on her face, and nodded.

“Fine. Let’s go.”

Giving her a final squeeze, Nikalys released her and moved back toward the chest of drawers he had been trying to open.

“Now, let’s get this up and see if there is anything inside worth taking.”

Together, they lifted the chest up and went through the drawers, finding ruined knitting supplies, old rags, and, luckily, a change of clothes for them each. Nikalys stuffed everything of use into his satchel. The bottom drawer held a pair of women’s boots that looked as if they might fit Kenders. Grabbing them, she moved off to see what else she could scavenge.

Not too far away, she found a tinderbox still sealed tight. She opened it and was surprised to find the firesticks inside were dry. Unlike traditional flint and steel that most people used to start a fire, these sticks could be struck on the rough interior of the lid and would catch fire immediately. The wagon merchant who had brought them had needed to work hard convincing the townspeople they were not magic. A handful of people had bought some, but most were too afraid the Constables would hunt them down.

After carefully sealing the box, she dumped the firesticks into Nikalys’ leather sack.

A screech from overhead pulled the pair’s attention to the sky. Circling above them were three birds, their silhouettes black against sky.

“Blood vultures,” mumbled Kenders.

“We should leave,” Nikalys said. “We’ve been here too long.”

After a bit more hurried scavenging, they found some snare wires, a simple leather sling, and a pair of waterskins, one of which she removed from the boy with whom she had danced during Horum’s Leisure Time festival only a week past. He had been a good soul, polite and honest. Father had liked him. Closing his eyes, she said a quick prayer for him.

They collected a small sum of coin from the mud: three silver ducats and seventeen copper. More was surely scattered in the debris, but they did not have the time to look for it.

The shrieking cry of the blood vultures cut through the air again. Kenders stared up just in time to watch two birds swoop down, gliding to the ground. As horrifying as it was to be standing in a wet, muddy field filled with her dead neighbors, the thought of watching the carrion birds pick the corpses clean was worse. Kenders looked to where Nikalys had been rummaging through a dead horse’s saddlebag. The horse was still there, but Nikalys was not.

“Nikalys?!”

“Over here.”

Scurrying around a large pile of rubble, she found her brother standing on the other side, staring upward. A lone tree had somehow survived the raging torrent and was still standing, most of its branches stripped bare.

Nikalys glanced over as she arrived and said, “This is where our house was.”

Seeing only debris and the remains of broken buildings, Kenders asked, “How can you even tell?”

Nikalys pointed at the trunk. “That’s the ash tree.” Turning west, he gestured to a pile of stones, saying, “And there is the water basin that was between our house and the Turners.”

Once she got her bearings, she realized he was right. “Gods, Nik.”

Not a single log, board, or timber remained.

“We need to get moving,” muttered Nikalys.

He took her hand and led her east, back in the direction from which they had come. Neither of them said a word. When they reached where Widow Johns’ house had been, Kenders stopped. Halting beside her, Nikalys stared at her, his eyes full of worry.

“What is it? More magic?”

She shook her head.

“No. No magic.”

She turned in place to face the remnants of the town. She stared long and hard at the Yellow Mud’s destruction, burning the image into her mind. “That mage will answer for this, Nik. I swear it.”

Spinning around, she marched away, leaving Yellow Mud behind her. Setting her eyes straight ahead, Kenders strode east, down the muddy road.

Nikalys followed.

The road leaving Yellow Mud ran east for a few miles, through vineyards and olive groves, before giving way to the wilder, natural terrain of the area. Upon reaching the pinnacle of Baldtop Hill, the way swung south and they began their trek back down to the well-traveled Southern Road.

Nikalys trailed Kenders, one eye on her and the other searching for any sign of danger, despite having no idea what to do if something happened. As they trudged along in silence, Nikalys’ mind churned. They needed a plan.

In town, he had taken charge of the situation because instinct told him they needed to move. Now that they were out of immediate danger—or so he hoped—he had no idea what to do next. They had no other family to whom they could run. There were no grandparents, cousins, uncles, or aunts. The entirety of the Isaac family had been five people.

Thaddeus had been an orphan and Marie’s parents had died in a massive fire in Fernsford, a city in the distant Southlands. The tragedy had happened less than a year after Nikalys’ parents had married, forcing the young couple to leave the city and head north to Lakeborough. There, Thaddeus worked as a blacksmith and Marie as a tailor. It was there that Jak, Nikalys, and Kenders were born. Shortly after Kenders’ birth, the young family left Lakeborough, came to Yellow Mud, and lived a good life. A life that was gone now.

Nikalys looked ahead to his sister’s back. “Kenders?”

She answered without turning around. “What?”

“I think we should head to Lakeborough.”

She still did not look back. Sounding surprised, she asked, “Lakeborough? Why Lakeborough?”