Winterfinding (7 page)

“
It needn’t be your
concern.” Vikram dismissed.

Tobin now refused to break his gaze from
Matis, “Indeed, it is exactly our concern because you were
instructed to collect the Novosar forces before advancing
west.”

“
The remaining Novosars
will come after us; there aren’t enough of them to make it
worthwhile to delay here any longer. Besides, it’ll do our Bandran
friends good to get to know the Novosars. They’ll meet up and join
us soon enough.” Matis shrugged, “But why are you here today,
Tamas?”

Tobin blinked and turned away, “We have
discovered some new information that changes the nature of our
enterprise.”

“
Speak plainly, lordling.”
Evness growled.

Tobin turned to look at Evness; his hand was
outstretched with his palm open. He raised his hand slowly, stuck
out his thumb, and added his index finger, his middle, and then his
ring finger, “We have discovered four very interesting
persons.”

“
Who?” Vikram
asked.

“
I can’t imagine it
matters to us one way or the other.” Evness scoffed.

“
Go on, Tobin,” Matis
sighed, “Finish your little drama.”

“
We have recovered an alm
and a paladin.”

“
That’s just two persons.
Rather poor math there.” Matis scratched behind his ear,
unimpressed with Tobin.

“
It turns out the alm is
the ward of Vicegerent Somerled Sinclair. Assaulted on the high
road, kidnapped, ransomed, escaped, hunted down by the same,
escaped again, and finally finding her way to us.”

“
That’ll please The
Cathedral, may even afford us more crusaders than we were expecting
for our campaign.” Vikram said to Matis.

“
More likely it’ll simply
give us what we asked for, but that will be something.” Evness
added.

Matis waved them both to be silent, “How
does this affect us, Tobin?”

“
The alm made it clear
that they weren’t set upon by ordinary outlaws, these men had been
hired and sanctioned by a rogue faction within The
Cathedral.”

“
I’m still not seeing how
it matters,” Matis leaned back in his chair, “Our march on Heveonen
will continue unabated.” Then an idea came to Matis, “However, this
certainly sounds like something that needs to be handled by skilled
diplomats, by three experienced Silvincian lords.”

“
The Cathedral will be
notified soon enough,” Tobin ignored Matis last comment, “Just as
the Kyria will be.”

“
And when you finally
return to us with updated instructions,” Matias stood, “I will
faithfully carry them out. Until then, I have a campaign.” Coming
around the map table, he gestured that it was time for the Kyrios
to leave. Tobin and Ewan didn’t move and although Mikkel stuttered
incoherently while shuffling back and forth, he didn’t leave
either.

Tobin moved closer to the table placing a
finger on the star denoting the city of Sulecin, “We aren’t more
than a few days from The Cathedral. You need to go there in person
and explain we have the alm.”

Matis laughed, “Why should a Grand General
concern himself with a lowly alm?”

“
Because if this alm’s
report is true, and I see no reason for it to be false, we could
quickly see the sanction for our move against Essia
dissolve.”

“
The death or ransom of a
single alm could do nothing of the sort.

“
She’s no ordinary
alm…

“
Even if she’s a daughter
of a vicegerent, it can’t impact us.”

“
She is the ward of the
man who many think will be the next Patriarch.”

“
So return her, Tobin,
curry the favor your superior Tamas wants. It will not change my
intent.” Matis said sternly.

Vikram approached his general and tugged
slightly at his sleeve, whispering, “Sending them alone…we could
lose leverage.”

Matis thought for a moment and asked Tobin,
“Who did she say was responsible for her abduction?”

Before Tobin could respond, Mikkel did,
“From her story it’s clear the outlaws had some connection with the
civics in Rikonen and a rogue sect in Sulecin itself.”

Tobin raised a hand, “It’s not quite…

Matis cut him off, “Why didn’t you come out
and say so at the outset?”

“
We did.” Mikkel looked
confused but Matis ignored him.

“
Who assaulted her is only
a minor point, something to be dealt with internally by the
Cathedral. If they find out we have the alm, safe and sound, and
never told them, we could incur more than mere disfavor.” Tobin
said more than a bit annoyed.

“
Worry not,” Matis threw
his arms out wide, “We shall return this alm. I shall deliver her
to the vicegerent myself.” Tobin was taken back. He hesitated to
say anything further. A wide smile crept across Matis’s face as he
turned to his lieutenants, “I will deliver her with the strength of
the Silvinician army at my back with which I will root out the
churlish fraternity.”

“
You would move against
the faith of millions?” Tobin said astonished.

Matis blinked and replied in faux shock,
“Certainly not. I will be rescuing our great faith from the poison
within it. I was elected as defender of the faith.” Moving towards
Tobin, Matis pressed his finger into the Kyrio’s chest, “By your
own spire’s precious golden boy.” Tobin staggered back
slightly.

Evness came forward and pulled the canvas of
the pavilion back, “I think you’re done here.” The kyrios slowly
began to leave.

Before they had disappeared, Matis called to
them, “You will of course inform the Spires of my decision. In
fact, it might be best if you left for Ardavass today.” He leaned
on the table crossing his arms with a self-satisfied grin. “Before
noon, I should think.” Mikkel reluctantly nodded as he was the last
to leave and Matis caught a glimpse of Tobin looking furious.

Once they had gone, Evness chuckled, “Well,
that certainly changes things.”

“
It certainly does,” Matis
turned to face his lieutenants, “Evness you will leave a small unit
here to collect Novosar stragglers and meet the Bandran justiciars,
but you shall lead our troops to Sulecin to camp on the plains
before the city. Vikram, find someone to escort those three back to
Ardavass or get lost on the way. I don’t want to hear any more from
them. They are an annoying remainder in my plans.”

“
And what is that plan?”
Vikram asked.

“
We have discovered a
cancer in The Cathedral, one feed by the Essians, and that we must
cut it out.”

“
Taking control of The
Cathedral by force is not the wisest move, sir.” Vikram
said.

“
This alm will be our
entry with the vicegerent and will accelerate his rise; we will
prop him up, take the whole of Cassubia under our wing, and then
move on Essia.”

“
You mean to win the whole
of the world for the Spires.” Evness’s eyes gleamed with a wild
passion for a moment then the reality of the idea crept into his
mind. He looked to Vikram who had a similar look of
anxiety.

“
I will,” Matis stared
hard at the map, “And then I’ll return to Ardavass, where my
dictates will be law.”

Stony Shore

There were several paths out of the Cruor.
Most routes simply disappeared into the forests, some came abruptly
to a dead end, and others were a circuitous knot. Jena never
enjoyed the place, and with what she had planted in the earth
there, she was more eager than ever to get away. She had done her
best to erase any evidence of the Silvincian troop, but there would
always be something. There was always something.

It had been weeks, so the trail of the
soldiers as well as her own group’s was cold. Any tracker that
could sniff them out would be unescapable, so it wasn’t worth worry
about any longer. Escape was what she wanted; she wanted to be done
with it all. But there was more she needed to do before she could
disappear.

The boy Colm had guided the soldiers through
the main pass. Roth had told her about the Novosar that had aided
him, Reg. Apparently the soldiers had stolen Colm away using him to
bring them to the Cruor. This meant that Reg was dead. The boy
didn’t speak much; when he did, it was usually in the cant of the
Athingani and only to Roth. Yet Jena could tell the boy was angry,
that the kind of anger that burned just under his skin. Thinking
about it made her flush as she remembered her father’s murder.

Jena shook her head, trying to banish the
memories. She made her way through the forest and then to a wider
path meandering along and fluctuating between hardly being a deer
trail to a rutted ox-cart path. Finally, Jena skidded down a
gravely embankment out of the trees and onto a proper road—level,
wide, and slightly raised. The blanched tiny stone made a
satisfying crunch beneath her boots.

She dropped her rucksack with a bit of
disgust and hooked her thumbs into her backpack’s shoulder straps.
This had to have been the way the soldiers had come, but Jena was
hesitant. In front of her, the road curved west, while to her right
it seemed to lose its luster descending slightly and disappearing
into the forest hemming it to the south. She pulled her pack straps
tighter, took a deep breath, and with effort picked her rucksack up
as she made her way south.

Tired and sore all over, Jena was beyond
foul tempered. There was nothing to be done about it; this was
simply what needed to be done. However, the blisters she felt
bursting in her boots and the throbbing, ever present ache in her
back made doing what was necessary necessarily shitty. She’d spent
the better part of the day wandering down this road. She needed to
stop, to rest.

Just as Jena was about to reach her limit
the trees disappeared and the road dissolved into a pasture. The
change was welcomed but quickly replaced in Jena’s mind with the
exhausting of having to tread through unfamiliar fields. She could
smell salt in the air and knew she wasn’t too far from the Novostos
Sea. She’d be somewhere along the Stony Shore, maybe not too far
away from where she had had to swim to shore after corsairs had
destroyed her boat.

It felt like it had been ages since then.
Being beached, she had dragged the paladin the Cruor to reunite him
with his precious alm. Thank the Light, Roth had been there, that
he made it through. Then the fight with the Silvincian soldiers,
riding hard fleeing north, riding hard back down to clean up the
mess, and now back to where she had made landfall. No wonder she
was so fed up. She wasn’t making any progress, wasn’t going
anywhere.

She snapped herself back from her reverie.
She’d been letting her attention wander off too often lately; she
needed to focus. Stopping she dropped her rucksack and sat down on
it as she shook her head. Pressing the palms of her hands into her
eyes, she leaned forward in her squat and let the weight of her
backpack press down on her. When she raised her head, she saw it
was nearly dusk.

“
I should just camp here.”
She said to herself. Still for a moment, she let out a long sigh
and forced herself up, grabbing her rucksack as she did so. “Nope.
Gotta keep going. Can’t be too far away from it now, can’t quit
just before the finish. Can’t.”

As she spoke, she caught movement off to her
side. Jena slowed her pace and turned towards the commotion, her
eyes scanning the dimming field. Just then coming over a gentle
rise were the syncopated bleats of sheep. Three sheep came trotting
towards her; all of them looked to be in need of sheering.

“
Well, what are you all
doing out? Is there somewhere you should be?” The sheep nudged her
as they circled. Jena continued but got the distinct impression
that she was the one being shepherded.

Over another gentle hill she saw it—a burnt
out house with a few bodies rotting in the garden between it and a
barn. This must be Reg and Colm’s home. Jena emerged from the
pasture through a break in the fence. She stood staring at the
front of the house. The foundation was there, the porch awning
somehow still intact, but the rest of the small building was
charred black. The walls were mostly gone or like the roof
collapsed in, Jena walked into the center of the husk and glanced
around herself. It would do.

She set her rucksack down and unlatched the
straps of her backpack sliding it off and onto the floor. She
rolled her head in slow circles trying to loosen her neck, and then
she arched her back hearing and feeling her spine crack and pop.
Rubbing her shoulders, she made her way back out of the ruin and
onto the lawn between the house and barn.

The barn was untouched. Apparently, the
Silvincians couldn’t be bothered to torch the entire homestead.
Jena tried to guess whether this was out of spite or laziness.

She shrugged whispering, “Why not both?” She
knelt next to one of the bodies, its face eaten away.

“
Dogs, birds, whatever,”
she muttered as she looked over the body, “This isn’t a
soldier.”

Jena let out a sigh, rested her chin on her
knee as she looked over the other two bodies. “Those aren’t
soldiers either but those are not common folk. Not like this one
here.” She looked closer; the man’s throat was cut. Jena lifted him
slightly and saw a stab wound in the back.

“
Reg, most likely. So that
makes those two…” She looked out passed the barn to where the land
ended and fell into the sea, “…probably the corsairs that started
this whole shitty drama.”