The Journey Home: The Ingenairii Series: Beyond the Twenty Cities (43 page)

“I know whose blankets I want to share, my lady, and pretty as you are, yours are not the ones I’m trying to get to,” Alec said stiffly.

“A bit of a diplomat, aren’t you?” Roslyn laughed.  “How do you come to be a beat-up, shoeless vagrant, when you’ve got both a sword and a silver tongue that should keep you out of any trouble?

“Here,” she flipped, a pair of silver coins to Boris.  “You’ve given me a prospect, and you’ve earned your money.  Now don’t go drink it all away tonight.”

Boris brightened at the sight of the coins, which he tucked away in a small inner pocket on his dirty vest.  “Thank you, great lady.  And thank you, time over time, Alec.  I hope we’ll meet again someday.”  He sauntered away at a brisk clip.

“Here,” Roslyn flipped a pair of coins to Alec.  “It’s an advance on your salary.  Go get yourself a pair of boots, and anything else you think you need for this trip.  I’m ready to go; we can head out today if you’re ready.”

Alec looked at the money in his hand, startled by the amount she offered and by the proposal for an immediate departure.

“I’ll go do my shopping and be back as quickly as I can.  Which way to the nearest market place?” he asked, and slipped away to follow Roslyn’s directions.  It took him a half hour to reach the market, and another half hour to bargain for the boots he sought.  He had a generous handful of coins left, which he used to buy another bandolier of knives, a bow and arrow, and a leather bag that he filled with a few basic healing herbs, applying some to the bruises on his face as he walked back to the staging area where the caravan was waiting.

By early afternoon he was back at the campsite.  “Thank you for your trust,” he told Roslyn.  “I’m ready to go.”

They took down Roslyn’s tent, folded it, and stowed it on the back of a mule, then strung the lead rope through the halters of the animals, creating two parallel lines of nine animals each, few of which carried much merchandise.  A small cart on two wheels was pulled by the last animal in Roslyn’s line.

“What exactly do you propose to trade in the Dominion?” Alec bluntly asked as he appraised the light weight of the empty bags on their animals.

“We’ll pick up most of our cargo on the way, in the mountains.  It’ll be a little work in a couple of weeks, but the travel’s pretty easy until then,” Roslyn told him.  “There’s sunlight wasting, so let’s move out.”  She gave a tug on the lead rope, and began leading her string of mules through the field, heading towards the adjacent road that led straight north, out of the city of Michian, and towards the distant mountains that separated Michian from the Dominion.

“You’ve been through here before, judging from your accent,” Roslyn commented again on his speech.  “How long’s it been since you took this road?  Do you remember anything, or am I going to have to teach you your job?”

Alec thought about his early life as Jeswyne’s consort, when he’s led a group of Stone ingenairii to improve the trading path that had formerly wound through the mountains.

“It’s been a long time,” he replied.  “I’m sure it will come back to me.”

Roslyn nodded her head, and they walked on in silence.   Two hours later they exited the city walls and the less desirable extended sections of the city beyond the walls, before they finally entered a countryside that grew increasingly rural as they passed through.  Alec stopped once when he noticed that one of his mules had a hitch in its gait, then dislodged a stone from the animal’s hoof, speaking soothingly to the creature as he tended to it.

“We’ll be in the flat lands for eight or nine days, maybe less since you seem to know what you’re doing,” Rosslyn said when they resumed travel.  “Then we’ll hit the mountains, and travel for another two weeks or more.  After that we’ll be in Bondell’s hinterland for another eight to ten days, and that’ll get us to South Harbor, since you haven’t asked about our schedule,” she told him.

“We can do faster than that,” Alec said. “depending on how long it takes to load your cargo.”

“In a hurry to get to somewhere?  If you fought for a girl here, and you love her so much,” Roslyn emphasized the word ‘love,’ “why are you in such a hurry to leave?”

My lady, words would not do justice to my story, and you wouldn’t believe me if I could tell it,” Alec replied.  “What is your story?”

“I am a simple merchant, making a living,” she replied.

“Surely there is more than that,” Alec asked.

“You know what you’re doing.  You took care of that mule’s stone quickly.  We may make the journey faster than I expect,” she said in response, and neither of them said any more for a while.

As the sun started to set, they passed a caravan headed in the opposite direction, towards Michian, carrying wagons of barrels – healing water, Alec suspected – then reached a patch  of woods, next to a brook.

“I’ll start making some vegetable soup,” Roslyn announced after they pulled off the road, next to the stream.  “If you think you can catch any game to add to it, I’ll take it.”

Alec dropped his bandolier of knives and his sword.  With his bag of medicines and his bow and arrow, he began to walk along the verge of the forest, watching carefully for small game coming out to browse in the fading sunlight.  He shot two hares, then slung them over his shoulder and started walking back to the road, looking along the banks of the stream for items to add to his medicine bag.

When he reached the camp he had his hands full of ferns and cress, which he laid atop his sword, next to his bag, as he began to skin the rabbits to add them to the pot of water that was gently boiling over a small, merry fire Roslyn had started.

She finished her own task of cutting a number of vegetables, which she added to the water, then stooped next to him and looked at his collected plants.

“What do you have in mind for these?” she asked, looking up at him.

“They can be used for cures –dried, ground to powder, and mixed with a few other items, they could each be used to treat a number of things,” Alec replied.

Roslyn picked up his bag and opened it without asking, holding it low next to the fire to see its contents.  “More medicinal plants, I see,” she said, looking up at him as he continued to dress the hares.  “My apologies.”

“For what, my lady?” Alec asked, adding the meat to the stew.

“I was sure there was a skin of wine or a flask of whisky in that bag, despite your protestations,” Roslyn answered.  “Instead,
you use your extra coins to buy
medical items, and you seem to know very well what you’re doing.”

Alec stood up, then reached down and grabbed his sword, pulling it from the scabbard, and holding it menacingly toward Roslyn.

“So soon, mysterious healer?” Roslyn asked, with a smile of her own that was mysteriously confident.

“Here,” Alec gave the sword a twirl, so that it flipped, and he caught the end of the blade, and held the haft towards her.  “Take it,” he urged.

The smile faded from her face, and Alec sensed a strange disappointment.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“I’m going to see what your sword skills are like.  Take the sword and I’ll get a stick from the forest,” he replied.  She took the handle, holding it inexpertly.  “If there are only going to be the two of us on this trip, we both better know how to handle a blade.  There’s no telling when we might both need to swing a sword.”

He bounded into the woods.   Seconds later Roslyn heard a sharp crack, and then Alec emerged with a stout limb.

“The proper way to hold a blade,” Alec began the lesson, standing behind her and positioning her hand and arm, and so they worked for the next half hour, until Roslyn left the practice to dish out the meal into two bowls.  They sat by the fire, eating with their fingers, as Alec continued to discuss the use of the weapon.

“Enough!” Roslyn said at last.  “It’s late, and you’ve surprised me enough today.”

“Very well, Roslyn,” Alec answered.  “You go make your bed and I’ll check the animals, then take the watch.  Since there’s just the one guard, I won’t set a rotation,” he said with a smile.  “Will we start early in the morning?”

“As early as we can,” she agreed, standing as well, and walking towards her cart to get some blankets for herself.

“Here,” she heaved a bundle towards Alec.  “Sin
c
e you didn’t buy booze or blankets to keep you warm tonight, you can use these.”

Alec smiled as he caught the bundle, which he dropped by the fire, then he went to inspect the mules, making sure that they were all secure, and giving them each a drink of water from the leather bucket Roslyn had provided.  He soothed them each with a few words, and when he finally got back to the dying fire, he discovered that Roslyn had managed to arrange her blankets in the middle of a briar patch he hadn’t noticed previously, on the edge of the campsite.  He sat by the fire, and watched the embers die, and thought about obstacles ahead.

He had a long journey to Bondell, and from there he would have a trying journey across the desert to find the spring of
J
ohn Mark, the hidden cave where he had first had a vision of the saint, and been healed from his injuries in Bondell.  He had to hope that the cave would be the place where John Mark would restore his powers; otherwise he would have to travel the length of the Dominion on a further journey to the cave in the Pale Mountains.

The greater the distance he had to travel, and the more slowly he traveled, the longer it would be until he could prepare to face Hellmann again – the longer Andi would suffer domination by Hellmann and the more time Hellmann would have to prepare and practice his dark arts.

The last embers of the fire fell into gray ash, and the last
available light disappeared.  Alec sat and listened to the darkness around the camp, the occasional restless movement of the mules and the rustle of small animals running across the leaves on the ground.  Roslyn’s breathing was steady, and Alec was glad she had fallen asleep.  He couldn’t imagine many women who would take a complete stranger on the road in the way she had, and fall asleep so trustingly.  Of course, as thick as the briars were interlaced around her, neither he nor anyone else would be able to reach her quickly.

Eventually Alec gave up the ghost of awareness, and rolled his blanket around him as he positioned himself against a tree, and fell soundly asleep.

He awoke the next morning to the sound of Roslyn starting the fire again.  The sky showed considerable promise for the arrival of daylight, as her eyes flickered over to him.  “So how was guard duty last night?” she grunted as she raised up from her kneeling position.

“It was the best kind,” Alec answered, throwing his cover open, and stretching as he rose.

“Boring?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Precisely!” Alec agreed.  “What are you so industrious over?” he asked as he stepped near the fire ring.

“I thought I’d bake a couple of potatoes for us to eat as walking breakfast.  If you want to go tend to the animals, we can get an early start today and maybe put a fair number of miles behind us,” she answered.

And that became their morning routine.  For the next several days they started their day with a minimum of conversation, as each knew what to do.  On rainy mornings there would be no fire, and breakfast would be carrots or other uncooked vegetables, or remains from the previous night’s meal, if there were any.

Alec complemented Roslyn on the quality of her mules.  Their travel was the easiest he could recall with a group of pack animals.  Every night they seemed to stop in a spot with plentiful fodder for the mules, keeping them content.  Alec cared for them carefully, brushing a pair of them every night, keeping them healthy, watering them and talking to them so that the animals were peaceful; thanks to the contentment he bred into the animals, they accordingly traveled far each day.  Alec and Roslyn practiced swordsmanship, and Alec collected plants that struck his healing fancy, but nothing in the way of personal interaction occurred between the two guarded companions.

They reached the rugged mountains, and began the steep ascent into the stony terrain.  There were other travelers along the road, but they encountered no problems.  As Alec’s wounds on his face healed he took on a more ominous, determined look that discouraged others from trying to interact with either of them.

Neither he nor Roslyn revealed anything to the other over the course of their journey; most of Alec’s conversations were internal, one-sided diatribes in which he berated himself as he tried to find something he could have done in the past to prevent Hellmann’s reemergence and Andi’s captivity, or he plotted and planned potential scenarios that might lead to righting the dreadful situation that existed.  As the days went by, his thoughts continued to churn and spin, but still he found no good solution to the challenge of fighting Hellmann in Andi’s body.

By the nineteenth day they were far into the mountains, past the last guard post on the Michian side of the unmarked boundary and approaching the first settlements that claimed loyalty to Bondell, when Roslyn called a halt late in the afternoon.

“I’m going to go up there,” she pointed to the left, up a narrow canyon that intersected the valley their road was contained in.

“My cargo will be up there.  Give me an hour head start, then bring the mules up along with you.  Take the cart only far enough so that it’s not visible from the road, and leave it there; we’ll pick it up on the way out,” the caravan leader directed.