The Sorcerer's Legacy (51 page)

“Don’t look like no wolfhound I ever saw before,” the guard replied scratching his head under his bassinet.

“He’s a special breed used to infiltrate the wolf packs and destabilize them from within their own ranks,” Wolf replied without missing a beat.

The guard looked at Wolf and blinked a few times in confusion. “Open the gate!” he shouted to his man inside.

With a clank of iron, the sally gate swung in and let them through the thick, stone wall. Once inside, Missy gave Ellyssa directions, telling her which way to go. The children drew a few curious and possibly hostile looks from other street people but one look at Ghost made them decide to keep to themselves and let the kids pass without incident.

Missy guided them through the streets and across the city into the wealthy part of the district near the castle. It was slower going the closer they got to the fine manors and mansion, having to avoid the increased number of city watch patrols.

“That’s it over there,” Missy said, pointing to a large white manor with the blue clay tiles with which the castle and the rich liked to roof their homes.

“How many guards?” Ellyssa asked.

“Just two at night, one during the day, and never in the house. Potsworth is too cheap to hire more and he probably does not want too many people to know that he buys children and how he treats them.”

“How are we going to get past them?” Roger asked.

“We need to get one of them to open the gate,” Ellyssa said. “Missy, do the guards know you and know that you ran away?”

“I’m sure they know I got away but I doubt they would recognize me. The guards aren’t allowed inside and we hardly ever got to go out.”

“I think I have an idea,” Ellyssa said and told everyone her plan.

A minute later, Ellyssa and Missy walked across the street from where they were hiding and strolled up to the gate. It was made entirely of wrought iron bars so the guard easily spotted them as they stepped into the light of the lamp burning brightly atop the square brick columns on each side of the gate.

“What are you kids doing out here?” the guard asked.

Missy stepped forward. “My name is Missy. I ran away from Lord Potsworth a couple days ago but I’m hungry and cold. Would you please let me back in?”

“He told us one of you ran off night before last. Didn’t say nothing about there being two of you.”

“She’s my friend. I told her Lord Potsworth might let her stay too,” Missy told the guard.

“Yeah, I suppose he would. All right, get you both inside, quick now.”

Ellyssa took a pinch of sand from her belt of pouches and spoke the words to her spell.

“Hey, what’s she do—,” the guard collapsed heavily as the sleep spell took hold of him.

Wolf led the rest of the gang across the street and inside the gate. Wolf, Roger, and another boy dragged the guard into the small open shed where he normally sat watching the gate while Ellyssa pushed it back shut.

“Get ready to take care of the other one if you see him,” Ellyssa warned.

She had barely gotten the words out of her mouth when the second guard stepped around the corner.

“Hey, what are you kids doing out here?” the guard demanded and strode towards them.

Two of the girls both took a pinch of sand from their own pockets and dropped the second guard onto the grass, sleeping.

“Try not to have everyone casting a spell all on the same person at the same time,” Ellyssa advised. “We don’t want to waste the few spells we each have.”

They left the second guard lying in the shadow of a large hedge where it was unlikely anyone walking down the street would see him. The kids sprinted across the grass, cut through a flower garden with no consideration of the damage, and stopped outside the front door.

“It’s locked, what do we do now?” Missy asked, trembling as she tried the door.

Coming back here even with the support of her new friends was absolutely terrifying for her. For almost half her young life, Lord Potsworth had been the ultimate authority and had broken her to subservience by the most cruel and painful methods just as he had with all the children in the house.

“I got it,” Roger said and stepped forward with a tiny key fashioned of bent wire.

Roger cast his spell and the lock on the door clicked open at the same time the little wire key the Source consumed the little wire key. Ellyssa pushed the door open and led her troops inside. The foyer was large with an enormous crystal chandelier hanging from the twenty-foot ceiling but was unlit. The floor was tiled in alternating black and white squares each a yard across like a giant chessboard. Rich tapestries decorated the walls, and busts and small statues stood atop fluted pedestals.

“Everyone lives upstairs,” Ellyssa whispered, pointed up a grand set of stairs that swept out to take up almost half the width of the floor at the bottom but narrowed to perhaps eight feet wide at the top. A red carpet with gold embroidery split the stairs in half, just slightly narrower than the top of the stairs.

They slowly crept up the stairs with as much stealth as they could muster, fearing with each step that one of the steps would squeak and alert Potsworth to the intruders. They need not have worried. The stairs were made of stone and marble veneer and would not make a sound if every child in the school jumped up and down on them.

“The kids are in those two rooms. My brother is usually in this one,” Missy pointed out.

“They’re locked too. Can you open them, Roger?” Ellyssa asked.

“I only had the one opening spell prepared, sorry.”

“Potsworth has the keys in his room somewhere,” Missy said, dropping the honorific as a show of defiance.

Ellyssa walked over to the door Missy said led to Potsworth’s room. She tried the handle and jumped back in surprise when the door suddenly flew open and a large fat man glared down at her with a stout cudgel in his hand.

“What is going on out here?” Potsworth bellowed.

Ellyssa sprang back towards to stand with the rest of the group as Wolf stepped forward with his bow drawn and Ethan, one of the larger boys, stepped up with Wolf’s sword tightly gripped in his sweating hand.

“You better put that little poker away, boy, before I brain you and take it,” the fat lord warned menacingly.

The master of the house may not have been intimidated by a bunch of children, even if one held a sword and another a bow, but the snarling, hundred and fifty pound wolf that stepped through the group of children was enough to make even the bravest of men take a step back.

Ellyssa had known Wolf and Ghost for a year now, and in that time she had only seen Ghost as a sort of friendly dog that always followed his half-elf friend about. She had never even seen his teeth except when he was gnawing on a large bone. But the animal that now bared a huge set of fangs and rumbled a terrifying growl from deep in its chest made even her nervous. Ellyssa always supposed Ghost was
capable
of hurting someone, but this was the first time she saw that the wolf was quite willing to do it as well.

“Drop the club, fat man, or Ghost tears your throat out,” Wolf ordered.

“How dare you insult me in my home and threaten me with weapons and a vicious dog!” Lord Potsworth railed indignantly. “Do you have any notion of what it feels like to take a man’s life, boy?” Potsworth asked, regaining his courage from the fact that no one has harmed him yet.

“Yes I do. I’ve killed two men and I sleep like a babe,” Wolf replied and loosed his arrow, taking off the top of the fat lord’s right ear.

Potsworth screamed, dropped his cudgel, and slapped his hand to his bleeding ear. He looked at Wolf who already had another arrow knocked before the one stuck in the wall stopped quivering.

“Now tell us where the keys are, fat man, or the next one goes through your beady eye and we’ll find them ourselves!” Wolf shouted over the man’s screaming, looking every bit as dangerous as Ghost did.

Potsworth ran into his room with Wolf and Ellyssa right behind him as he fretfully dug through the drawer of his nightstand. Lord Potsworth found the keys and thrust them at Ellyssa. Ellyssa handed them to Missy.

“Missy, Go unlock the bedrooms, tell the kids to dress for the night, and take whatever they want to carry with them. Potsworth will have no more need of his fine possessions,” Ellyssa said sinisterly.

“What are you going to do to me?” Potsworth blubbered.

“I’m going to fulfill a promise,” Ellyssa replied as she pulled out a scroll and a length of rope.

***

The entire house was up at dawn. Mother was in the kitchen fixing breakfast, pa was still shaving and getting himself ready for the morning chores, and the oldest boy, Chet, went out to feed the animals. Pa always said that the animals eat before the people since they ultimately provide the food.

Chet rubbed his eyes and looked out at the pigsty again. “Pa, did you get a hog yesterday and not tell us?” Chet shouted back at the house.

Pa leaned out the window of his bedroom with shaving soap still covering half his face. “Chet, you know we ain’t had a sow since Matilda done died last winter. Why ask such a fool question?”

“Cause we got one now, Pa, and the way Chet’s a goin’ at her, we’s gonna have a bunch of piglets real soon.”

CHAPTE
R 16

King Jarvin sat upon his throne trying his best not to let his emotions show as the lords from Brightridge and the mayors of Langdon’s Crossing, Edmonton, and several other small burgs spilled forth their tales of woe. He forced his face and voice to remain calm despite the seething turmoil the churned and burned his very core.

“My Lords, my Lord Mayors, please be rest assured that I will do everything in my power to see to the apprehension of these scoundrels who prey upon my citizens, and will ensure their protection as well.

“But what of Brightridge, Your Majesty? We must have someone appointed regent until young Thomas is of age,” Lord Whitfield beseeched.

“Do I have the word of every lord with claim to Brightridge’s throne that they will abide by my selection without causing calamity?” Jarvin asked, already knowing full well that should he choose one over the others all will call foul and create havoc.

“Your Majesty, if I may make a suggestion,” Bishop Caalendor interjected.

“Of course, your council is always most welcome.”

“The prelate who heads the church in Brightridge might be willing to sit the throne for a time until a more peaceful solution can be found and at a time less hectic,” Bishop Caalendor suggested.

King Jarvin rubbed his bearded chin thoughtfully for a moment. “Please forgive me, my friend, but I am hesitant to put a ranking member of the church as a head of state. We have worked long and hard to prevent such a conflict of interests.”

“I understand, Your Majesty, and it is a wise course to maintain, however, in this time of turmoil it may be the wisest course of action for the short term. He is well known and well liked by the citizens. If you are concerned about the prelate’s qualifications, I can personally attest to him. He has taken many studies on governmental policies and even military deployment and strategies. It has long been something of a hobby of his and I trust him to the fullest extent.”

“What say you, My Lords? Were I to place Brightridge in the hands of the prelate for the interim, just until a proper lord can be agreed upon and the lands settle down, would you accept that decision? Would the other lords of Brightridge do the same?” Jarvin asked, almost pleading with the obstinate lords.