Secrets of Arkana Fortress (41 page)

              ‘I… lost my mother too,’ she eventually said.

              Breena lifted her head and gazed at her softly. ‘I’m sorry.’

              ‘It’s OK.’

              ‘What happened?’

              ‘Oh… erm.’ She paused for a second, resting a forefinger on her chin. She didn’t expect to have to tell the tale. ‘My mother disappeared years ago when I was 12. Never found her. Uncle Dedrick did everything he could, but got nowhere.’ The flashbacks started to flood into her mind – the frustrations her uncle had not been afraid to show, the sleepless nights, the tearful eyes; the angered exchanges with his scouts when they had turned up with no information to his sister’s whereabouts. There was a tugging in her chest, the broken feelings reforming into one wave of sorrow again.

              ‘I bet that was… hard on you,’ Breena said in a hush, sensitive tone.

              Evie noticed her eyes as she blinked, trying not to be taken aback by the two sets of eyelids. She shuffled about on the chair. ‘It was hard enough, I suppose; as hard as you’d expect it to be.’

              ‘What about your dad?’

              Evie’s mother having disappeared meant that she had never had to face the fact that she was dead, only missing. Her dad, on the other hand, was a different story and she clenched her fists together at the memory of it all. ‘I… my dad was… killed in a street fight along with my older brother. They worked together with my uncle, you see, and it involved some… well, you know what my uncle’s involved in.’ She dared herself to laugh at this, but quickly receded back into the dark reaches of the past.

              Breena set her bowstring and bow to one side, and turned squarely to the suddenly vulnerable Evie, placing a hand on hers. ‘At least you had someone there for you – that’s what’s important. I had my dad there for me… most of the time anyway. There was a spell when I didn’t see him for a long time.’

              ‘How long?’ Evie asked. She could feel tears welling in the corners of her eyes.

              ‘A few years; he was searching for my mother.’

              ‘That’s horrendous.’

              ‘The fact of the matter is that he’s been there for me since taking me away from Traseken – looked after me, protected me, guided me.’ She shook her head at herself. ‘I love my dad; I really do, but sometimes he can be an inconsiderate ass.’ She allowed herself to smile before laughing.

              Evie smiled as she took her hands away from underneath Breena’s, a reassured look in her eyes. ‘My uncle is a drunken bum, but I love him nonetheless.’

              ‘A drunken bum
and
an inconsiderate ass… no wonder they got on so well.’

              They both laughed, drowning out the creaks in the hull as the ship drifted onwards.

              ‘Do you… think you could show me how to use a bow?’

              Breena stopped and arched backwards in surprise. ‘You don’t strike me as a bow mistress type, Evie.’ She picked up her bowstring and bow, and began to restring it. It didn’t take her long before she had finished the task. She held it up in front of her while she pursed her lips. ‘It’ll do,’ she mused hesitantly before looking back at Evie. ‘Teach you? It’ll wile away the time we’re going to be spending on this barge, I suppose.’

              Evie clapped her hands like an excited child at festival time. ‘Where do we start?’

              Breena raised a finger and pointed to a cupboard on the far wall. Grab a spare pair of gloves from my backpack in that cupboard.’

              With an enthusiastic bound, the young girl made her way across the room and opened the small wall cupboard seeing Breena’s leather backpack at the bottom. She kneeled down and flicked the straps up to open it. She found the gloves resting on top of a small wad of papers, which she could not resist but peek at. She stood up with the wad and the gloves in her hands. ‘Not only a bow mistress, but a poet as well,’ she stated.

              Breena cursed and stood up from the bed. ‘I forgot they were in there.’ There was a flicker of annoyance in her eyes that swiftly died off into indifference. ‘Oh, whatever; come on then if you want to get acquainted with the bow.’

              Evie read down the page. ‘Have you thought about getting this published? It’s good; not that I know anything about the written word.’

              ‘Poems of a Mercenary’, Breena laughed. ‘I doubt it would do much for my line of work… going public and all that.’

              ‘You can always retire.’

              Breena fell silent and shook her head, her lips moving in some sort of silent cursing. ‘I’ll be up on the deck.’

Chapter 29

The island of Bolsil, not even half a day’s sail south of Donnol, was the stereotypical picture of a small body of land half covered with jungle and beach-laden coastlines – sunny skies, greedy gulls, wandering wildlife, and flourishing flora.

              A small fishing settlement lay on the northern coast with only a couple of dozen inhabitants. The village rarely had visitors who were not there to collect fish to take back to Donnol for a ‘fair’ price, so their reaction to strangers with other motives was yet to be witnessed.

              Byde stepped off the small cargo ship he and Mikos had bought their way onto and stepped foot on the wooden jetty. The ship was making its weekly trip to the village for the fish collection, and luckily it had had a kind enough captain at its helm. Most ship captains did not mind taking on passengers for free, but there had been a few hard-headed ones who got their pay one way or another, even if it meant killing the passenger in question.

              ‘Are you sure it’s here?’ Mikos asked, nudging Byde with his elbow.

              ‘I know it’s here, Mikos. It’s a question of whether or not it’s been discovered.’ Byde rubbed his chin gently and tapped back into his memories. ‘It would’ve been to the west of the island… if I recall correctly.’

              Mikos pointed at a few people picking out the bodies of dead fish from a gigantic net that had been used recently. All four of the people were slender women dressed in tatty tops and trousers, stained aprons, and they all wore bandanas on their heads. ‘Ask one of them.’

              Byde snorted. ‘Oh yes, of course; one of them is going to know where the shrine is.’ He shook his head with a sarcastic smile on his face.

              ‘I didn’t mean that,’ Mikos replied sharply. ‘What I’m getting at is that a lot of things have probably changed since you were last here; might be worthwhile finding a few things out about what’s in the west.’ He looked in a westerly direction and frowned. ‘And by the looks of it it’s a pissing jungle.’

              Byde clicked his fingers. ‘Sounds about right… sorry I got short with you, I’m just tired that’s all; not sleeping too good at the moment.’

              Mikos nodded and stretched his arms out above his head. ‘I know what you mean,’ he replied, stifling a yawn back.

              The pair of them wandered onto the beach, offset by crystal waters and a warming sea breeze, and approached the women working on the net. They took no notice of the two visitors and carried on detangling the net’s aquatic residents. One of the women, the most rough-faced one, took out a makeshift knife and lopped off a head to make her job easier.

              Byde closed his eyes and covered his mouth. ‘I’ll never get used to watching stuff like that,’ he remarked, his voice sounding nauseous.

              Mikos waved it off with a chuckle and addressed the woman. ‘Excuse me? Can we ask you about something?’

              The woman glanced up at them with dark brown eyes that hid nothing from the world except the reluctance to answer strangers who started asking questions she did not want to answer in the first place. She licked her lips and snorted the air violently, making a noise like the back end of a horse. ‘D’pens. What ya wanna knows?’ She spoke in a disjointed tropical accent that was nowhere near as harsh as she looked.

              ‘Er…’ Byde began, but decided to leave the questions to Mikos.

              She sniffed the sea air again. ‘That ain’t a question, stranger.’ She tucked a lock of brown hair back underneath her bandana and went back to de-fishing the net.

              Mikos shook his head, looking highly amused at Byde’s lack of social skills. ‘Sorry about him – been on his own for a long time.’

              Byde puffed through his nose and folded his arms across his chest.

              ‘Looks like he gots company t’me,’ she said as she tossed a dead fish into a nearby pot. ‘What ya wantin’ t’know, anyways?’

              ‘We want to know about the western region of the island,’ asked Mikos.

              ‘Thinkin’ of going that way are ya?’

              Mikos nodded.

              ‘A’vise against it, I would.’

              Byde furrowed his brows. ‘Why’s that exactly?’

              ‘Place’s infested.’

              ‘Infested? With what?’ Byde asked, cocking his head to one side questioningly.

              The woman straightened her back, interrupting her task with the net again. ‘With beasts; horrifying creatures froms the dark. Y’see, nobody goes over that way; last person who dids just that ended up beasty fodder… get m’drift?’

              The casters looked at each other, bemused by such a tale, then nodded. ‘We think we get it,’ Byde answered. ‘Any idea where these creatures came from?’

              She shook her head. ‘No one knows where these creatures cames from; they’s been ‘ere since this island was settled on, buts they nevers venture outside a certains area of the jungle, so we counts our blessings.’

              Before Mikos was able to ask any other questions, Byde gave the fisher lady their thanks before pulling his comrade away to one side, an unsettled look on his face.

              ‘That’s got to be it,’ he said with certainty.

              ‘Are you sure about that? She was a bit vague y’know.’ Mikos ran his hand over his hair and sighed, fatigue growing in his eyes.

              Byde raised his finger. ‘I remember for a fact that the shrine is here on Bolsil. Think about it – big forested area, unknown creatures residing there, no person has ever returned.’

              ‘Could it just be a coincidence? You’ve heard of them haven’t you?’ Mikos looked around the small village again and breathed in the breezes of fish and salt.

              ‘Stop being so negative, Mikos. At a time like this you need faith in the smallest of hopes. We mustn’t waste time.’

              Mikos sighed, shrugging his shoulders before murmuring in sceptical agreement.

***

The sun blazed down on them from a clear, unhampered sky; the sand kicking up around their feet as they trekked west to the place the locals deemed dangerous.

              Byde was utterly convinced it was the right course of action. He had always been the coolest, most logical thinking out of his caster comrades, and now was a prime example. Mikos had voiced his worries about how lost they were after finding the unseen dangers that no one else on the island was aware of – and they were probably the reason why no-one had ever returned. They had, however, been able to pass through without much hindrance, which, Mikos assumed, was down to their caster magic. But with dangers such as magical voids, harrowing traps, and magically mutating wildlife it was no wonder he was on edge.

              Byde had listened to his friend’s concerns about the entire situation over a couple of drinks back in Hocknis, and had reassured him that things would find a way of working out. It was then that he had recalled the shrines, many of which he had not known the fates of. Many caster shrines had been raided and destroyed by the purge many years ago, and Byde knew about a majority of them – this one on Bolsil, however, was one that he did not personally know about… not yet.

              The beginning of the forest was thick with shrubs, close-cropped trees, and a strange eerie silence that seemed as sharp as an assassin’s blade in the night. There were no bird calls, no songs of nature; nothing at all. A soft wind was the only sound that wafted through the undergrowth like a ghostly presence. As Byde and Mikos waded through the thickets there was something that put them both on edge – voices; not audible enough to be heard, but they were definitely there, speaking to them; warning them.

              Mikos pulled a thin branch out of his face and rubbed his nose. ‘Don’t know about creatures of the night and voices in our heads; these branches are dangerous enough to our health.’ He sniffed his nose clear and grunted. ‘How the hell are you wearing that robe of yours still? Bit impractical isn’t it?’

              With a snort Byde looked over his shoulder at Mikos, his eyes tired. ‘My robe keeps me warm and protected… it’s all I need.’

              ‘But it’s boiling hot in here,’ Mikos explained. ‘Besides, what do you wear under that anyway?’

              ‘I’m not naked, so don’t have a heart attack back there,’ he chuckled. ‘What I wear underneath my robe is my business. Suffice to say that I could walk around without it over me; I’d just rather not, thank you very much.’