The Trials of Caste (11 page)

Mynar’s wry smile twisted to a frown.  “I don’t
see why that would keep you from acting,” the sorcerer quipped off-handedly. 
“After all, when our allies from the north arrive, you should have the strength
you need.”

Khee-lar looked around the room to ensure only
those who knew of the orc horde were present.  This proposed alliance was one
of expediency, not one that would be popular with the uninitiated.  “
If
our allies arrive,” Khee-lar countered, “then they will keep our sister gen at
bay, and that’s it.  Unlike you and your careless approach, I’ll not have orcs
rampaging through our halls.”

“Well, then.”  Mynar shrugged off the reminder of
his failed attempt to use the Bloodhand Orcs to conquer their two gens just six
years now past.  “It appears that it’s up to you still to wrest the gen from
Karthan’s grasp.  How are you going to do that?”

“My lord?” Trelkar asked, but it was not a prompt.

Khee-lar looked around the room.  Troll stood
blank-faced, Mynar the Sorcerer seemed comfortable enough, though wary.  Kort
had left with his elite warriors, as had Raoros and the two chief elite
warriors from the Metalsmithies and Trade Warrior Groups.  The small handful of
elite warriors from the Deep Guard that Trelkar had quietly asked to stay behind
stood patiently waiting on their leader.

“My most loyal ones,” Khee-lar Shadow Hand
started.  “Without the support of half of our gen’s warriors, I cannot activate
the Covenant and take over the gen from Lord Karthan and his supporters.”

Several heads shook in frustration.

“However, if Lord Karthan and his closest
supporters died… well, then I would have to step in to claim the throne.”

All eyes were on Khee-lar.

“Then we go forward, my lord,” Trelkar stated.

“Wait, you do have a plan to kill Lord Karthan?”
Mynar the Sorcerer asked incredulously.  “And why have I, also a founder of the
Covenant, not heard about this plan before now?”

“It is what you wanted, is it not?” Khee-lar
snapped at his former mentor.  For a moment the tension in the room rose.  “‘To
eliminate Karthan’s claim to the throne of the Krall Gen’ and take him off the
throne of the Kale Gen.” 

Trelkar’s gaze was full of menace, causing Mynar
to back off.  “One of Karthan’s servants who lives and works in Karthan’s house
wants something of us,” Trelkar stated matter-of-factly.  “Something he’d be
willing to do us a service to get.”

“Aye, she’s a pretty one,” one of the elite
warriors said.  Others around the room sneered.  “But a bit young for that old
Krobo.”

“Enough!”  Trelkar glared at the offending
warrior.  After a moment, he continued.  “The time of harvest for Fang Cap
spores has arrived.  We know that Khazak Mail Fist is watching us, so we have
sent an unwitting pawn to harvest a large quantity of this poison for us,
following which we will have Krobo put it in Karthan’s house stew.”

Mynar the Sorcerer nodded.  “Simple enough, if
you’re not discovered.  I think Karthan and Khazak Mail Fist are more wily than
you suspect, my friend.”

Surrounded by Trelkar and his own elite warriors,
this was more than Khee-lar Shadow Hand would bear.  “You seek to lecture me?!”
he snapped.  “You who have been driven from your own gen, who showed up on our
doorstep sniveling like a whipped dog?  You pretend to lecture me?  Go get me
the Kale Stone!  We’ll see if you can do
that
!”

“I will bring you the Kale Stone,” Mynar said
firmly as he stood among the group he had helped found, his hand instinctively
covering the stolen stone of his own gen that he carried in his pouch.  “I can
see now that without it, you are not strong enough to take possession of your
precious gen.”  As he said it, suddenly it
was
very clear to Mynar.  He
could see the façade of strength for the weakness that it was.  While Mynar had
been away gathering allies from the north, Khee-lar had failed to get the rest
of the warrior groups’ leaders into the Covenant.

Khee-lar could not act without the Kale Stone.  He
didn’t have the backing to do it.  This ruse to poison Lord Karthan was just
that; a ruse.  It was a diversion meant to deceive Mynar into thinking Khee-lar
was fulfilling his part of the bargain.  Khee-lar didn’t want Lord Karthan dead
yet, because he wasn’t sure he would come out on top in the chaos that would
ensue, that someone else might not grasp the throne instead. 

Mynar wondered if there was one among the Covenant
that had the courage to act, yet could be dominated when the time came.  Certainly
not Trelkar, he was the action behind Khee-lar’s plans and much more deadly
than his master.

Slowly, an idea began to form, and as it grew so
did the smile that had begun to crawl back along his snout.  Mynar had no more
use for this council, for the moment.  For the first time since he’d been
driven out of his own gen, Mynar the Sorcerer knew the path he must take, and
the vision of it brightened his hopes.

Mynar excused himself, and Troll followed quickly after,
the pair ranging far through back-alley passageways to finally emerge in a more
remote corner of the gen’s caverns; where their presence would not be linked to
any meeting at the Deep Guard.

“You can’t let him threaten you.”  Troll seemed to
be testing the sorcerer’s resolve as they shuffled through the sand.

Mynar stopped and looked at the brute, his lack of
subtlety clear.  “Troll, before Khee-lar Shadow Hand had Trelkar, he was weak. 
When he was weak, he was a friend.  Now that Trelkar has organized the Covenant
for him, Khee-lar is strong, so now he is an enemy.  We must make him weak
again, so he will be a friend.”

This didn’t make sense to Troll.  “Why would you
want a weak friend?” he asked.

Mynar shook his head.  “Better a weak friend than
a strong enemy, don’t you think?  So, we must take Trelkar away from Khee-lar. 
Then he will be weak,” Mynar said.  “And we must do what Khee-lar can’t.  Then
Khee-lar and the rest of the Covenant will follow me.”

The pair walked along in silence through the halls
of the Kale Gen.  Soon they both were sitting in Raoros Fang’s home in the Leaders’
Grotto, sipping the fermented Wallaya root broth that his servant brought
them.  As they discussed the plans Khee-lar had put in place, and debated
whether or not Khee-lar had the strength to take the gen, Mynar talked much to
Raoros about how the Fates had thrown them all the very opportunity they didn’t
know they had been seeking.

“If you ride the winds of the Fates carefully,”
Mynar spoke subtly to the pair of warriors,

“Then the coming chaos could bring you claim to
the throne.  Indeed,” Mynar had continued his many flattering words, “the time
for action has come, and power waits only for one who is daring and resourceful
enough to claim it.”

Though Raoros received his words with reluctance
mixed with skepticism, to Troll the dreams Mynar laid out to them were like
precious water.  He eagerly lapped up every bit of it.

T
hat
night brought little rest to Durik, and the morning found him still feeling
unsettled.  He was full of emotions swirling inside him from his brief
encounter with the Lord of the Gen’s daughter, the strange vision of Troll deep
in the caverns, and the encounter with Trelkar and Trallik.

In the rare moments when the trouble in his heart
cleared enough, he couldn’t help but think of the look on Kiria’s face as she
had walked away from him.  The strange vision of the night before had faded,
including the emotions of it, but the memory of what had happened at the arena
had not faded, only growing in intensity as he thought of Kiria and indignity as
he thought of Trelkar.  Kiria he could do nothing about at the moment, but
perhaps the problem with Trelkar he could.

He was not one to let something so clearly wrong
as what Trelkar had done go unchallenged, even if he was a chief elite
warrior.  But what could he do?  If Trelkar had judged that Trallik was not
scouting out the obstacles ahead of the trials, then who was he to say
otherwise?  He knew he’d seen Trallik coming from the doors of the arena, but
what if he’d only been in the antechambers?

Durik shook his head.  He could no more lie to
himself than he could lie to anyone else.  The footprints in the sand behind
Trallik had led directly to the arena doors where he’d seen someone in a cloak
emerge, and Trallik had been guiltily stuffing a cloak into his bag.  He’d seen
enough guilty looks from Trallik over the past year to know he was right about
the situation.

But why had Trelkar, Chief Elite Warrior of the
Deep Guard, defended Trallik, a lowly yearling?  That was the question he
couldn’t answer.  That question, and the warning and unrest in his heart that
it brought, had led him to this moment.

“What do you want of me, yearling?” Raoros Fang,
leader caste of the Wolf Riders Warrior Group, stood with his hands on his hips. 
Behind him stood his rather large chief elite warrior Troll, a decidedly bored
look on his face.  A chill ran down Durik’s spine at the sight of the brute. 
He swallowed and proceeded anyway.

“Sire, I very much appreciate the opportunity to
apprentice with the wolf trainers, and I will do all in my power to make you
proud tomorrow in the Trials of Caste,” Durik forced himself to say.

Raoros sensed Durik’s reluctance and frowned. 
“That’s not why you sought me out here in this passageway, though,” he replied
flatly.

Durik shook his head.  “No, sire.  I have a
greater concern,” he said hesitantly.

“Well, out with it then!” Raoros said impatiently,
his arms crossed.

Durik looked briefly at Troll, then spoke.  “Sire,
last night Keryak and I found Trallik sneaking out of the arena.  We’re sure he
was looking at the obstacles and trying to get an advantage for tomorrow’s
trials.”

“Why haven’t I heard about this yet?  Did you pass
that on to Khee-lar Shadow Hand, his warrior group leader?” Raoros was
obviously concerned.

“Well,” Durik grimaced, “as we were talking,
Trelkar, Shadow Hand’s chief elite warrior came up and told us we were wrong. 
He said he would drag us before the council and accuse us of scouting out the
obstacles ourselves if we said anything more.”

Raoros’ countenance changed.  For a moment,
uncertainty passed over the muscular warrior’s face.  He looked sidelong at his
chief elite warrior.  Troll just looked at him without understanding.  Then an
idea struck Raoros, and he spoke.

“Durik,” Raoros said after a brief pause.  “You’re
young, but I’m sure you can see that there are problems in our gen.”

Durik looked at his leader caste quizzically.

“In other words, not everyone supports Lord
Karthan.”

Standing behind Raoros, Troll got an alarmed look
on his face.  Durik was confused.

“In fact,” Raoros Fang continued, “there have been
attempts to replace him, all of which have obviously failed.”

Durik was shocked by the revelation.  Having lived
most of his life in the cave complex of the Wolf Rider’s Warrior Group, he’d
not been aware of much outside his little world.

“So Durik, the next one to try…”

Troll put a hand on Raoros’ arm and looked at him
with warning in his eyes.

Raoros looked at his chief elite warrior sternly,
until he withdrew his hand, then he looked back at Durik.  “As I was saying, the
next one to try we think will be Khazak Mail Fist.”

Durik was stunned, while Troll looked relieved. 
Lord Karthan and his chamberlain, Khazak Mail Fist, were rarely seen apart. 
Khazak had always appeared to Durik to be Lord Karthan’s most loyal supporter. 
How could he possibly do Lord Karthan any harm?

“But sire, how can that be?” Durik began to
object.

Raoros held up his hand.  “Durik, the older you
get, the more you’ll realize that everyone wears a mask.”  Durik didn’t know
what to say.  “But I’ll offer you proof that he is, in fact, conspiring to kill
Lord Karthan,” Raoros continued.  “Do you know the mushroom called Fang Cap?”

“Yes, sire.  It’s a small, red, flat-headed mushroom
that turns poisonous when it gives off spores,” he recited, remembering a
lesson given by the Herb Master during the year of training.

Raoros nodded.  “Partially correct; its
spores
are poisonous.  The mushroom itself is very good… when it’s not in cycle that
is,” he said.  “And if you accidentally eat the spores, you will die quickly
and painfully.  So, tell me, Durik, where does it grow?”

Durik shook his head.

“It grows in mud, but not in just any mud.  It
needs a lot of heat, like the heat that rises up from the underdark to warm our
caves.”

Durik had heard where there was such mud, a whole
field of hot mud, with air bubbling up through it from some hidden fissure
below it.  That massive cavern was a growing place for all sorts of mushrooms
and fungi, and other more dangerous things as well.

“Aha,” Raoros exclaimed, “I can see by the look in
your eye that you know exactly where I’m talking about.  Go to the mud cavern
where it grows.  Find the stands of Fang Cap that grow there and discover
whether they’re shedding spores or not, and if any of them have been harvested
or if they’ve had their spores scraped from under their caps.  Bring me some
that have been scraped, as well as some that still have their spores to prove
that they’re in cycle.  This will provide the evidence I need to protect our
lord.”

“But sire.”  Durik’s confusion was evident on his
face.  “How will this prove that Khazak Mail Fist is conspiring to kill Lord
Karthan?”

“He is chamberlain, is he not?” Raoros Fang asked,
none too softly.  Behind him, Troll seemed overly aware of the volume of his
words.

“Yes, sire.”

“Then if Lord Karthan’s servant was found
attempting to poison Lord Karthan and his household, wouldn’t that point the
finger at his loyal chamberlain?”  The chamberlain was charged with taking care
of the lord of the gen in all ways, from running the lord’s house as well as
his court, to serving as his principal bodyguard.  That control extended to the
various servants and warriors who served as Lord Karthan’s personal staff, and
included his role as leader of the Honor Guard Warrior Group.  This connection
between Khazak Mail Fist and Lord Karthan’s servants was not lost on Durik.

“Yes, sire.  But how will this errand prove
anything?” Durik asked.  “If you already know who is attempting to kill Lord
Karthan, shouldn’t you be stopping him right now?”

Raoros Fang held up a hand, surprised at the
impetuousness Durik showed.  “Durik, I already am.  Much work has gone into taking
care of Lord Karthan’s enemies already.  However, I need a couple of facts to
back up what I’m about to do.  You, yearling, will provide one of those facts. 
Understood?”

Durik nodded his head and buckled the belt with
the long knife around his slender waist.  “Sire, I’ll not fail you.”

“Good.  Now, you know it takes a while to get
there and back, so hurry it up but be careful as well.  And remember, Durik,
these types of things take discretion, so be quiet about it.  Do not talk to
anyone
else about this.  Now, off with you.”

Durik turned and hurried off down the passage, urgency
evident on his face, having quite forgotten about the business with Trelkar and
Trallik for the moment.

Spider smiled to himself, a twisted, smug smile of
vindication.  It had been years since he last remembered smiling.  And when his
smile had reemerged from its long suppression, it was not the innocent thing
that had brought such joy to his mother, but was instead a self-serving,
selfish thing that mirrored its master’s soul.

Pulling the knife from his belt, he threw the hood
of his cloak back to get a better view of such a delicate task.  Carefully
lifting up the red mushroom, he scraped the dull blade across the delicate
nodules on the underside of the cap.  Like delicate snow, the deadly spores
gently floated down onto the cloth he had laid upon the ground for just this
purpose.

Shifting gingerly on his lame leg, Spider twisted
the mushroom cap a quarter turn and continued his harvesting.  Before long
there was more than a light dusting on the cloth, and two mushrooms later there
was enough for the task his unwitting accomplice had agreed to perform.  Spider
smiled again.  He’d never liked Krobo, and it only made it better that the
servant would be blamed for the killing of his lord.

Carefully lifting the edges of the cloth, he
rolled it slightly into something of a funnel and poured the poison into a
small leather bag, turning away quickly when a bit of the dust rose up from the
ad-hoc funnel.

“Can’t be too careful, now,” he muttered to
himself as he tightened up the strings to the bag and began to tie it onto his
belt.

Suddenly, Spider heard a noise off toward the entrance
into this hot, muggy cavern.  His ears perked up and he unwittingly looked back
toward the entrance without covering his face.  He barely caught a glimpse of
something retreating back into one of the small tunnels that riddled the walls
of this fungus-laden cavern.  The heat of the cavern and the dim green light
the phosphorescent minerals gave off combined to rob him of the heat vision his
race lived by in the darkness of the deeps.  He thought it might be a kobold,
but the little glimpse he’d gotten of a fleeting tail and a foot could just as
easily have been one of the large, feral rats that inhabited these lower
caverns.

Sheathing his knife quickly and grabbing the heavy
walking stick he used, Spider threw the hood over his short adolescent horns and
immediately began hobbling quickly toward the entrance to the cavern.  As he
passed the hole he had seen the creature enter, he hefted his makeshift club
and limped past with a menacing look on his face.  To his relief there was nothing
to be seen there now.

In a few moments, Spider was safely on his way,
and Durik and Keryak could breathe again.  Despite the sensitivity of what
Raoros Fang had charged him with, Durik couldn’t keep it from Keryak, his
truest friend.  Besides, he’d wanted to know what else Keryak knew about Lord
Karthan’s daughter.  Despite his insistent needling, however, Keryak had only
seen her once walking about with Lord Karthan, which is how he knew Kiria was
Lord Karthan’s daughter. 

It wasn’t enough for Durik, who was doing a miserable
job of appearing coolly disinterested, while at the same time his mind kept
trying to spin out of control, thinking of ways to impress her, of how she was
just coming of age like him, and… of how she had looked at him!  It had been
all he could do to keep quiet while they waited for Spider to do his business. 

It had been a day since he’d met Kiria, however, and
with so little to go on his mind soon began to run out of fuel and started to calm
down, allowing him to focus more on the moment.