Perlude

Chapter 39

Multi

Captain Jonus, Keeper of the Holy Book

The vermin were beginning to run out of their inhuman stamina. A cheering sight after four changes of horse and a week of driving them across hard country. The last two hadn’t even occurred at an official outpost but had been a matter of commandeering them from peasants. A dreary affair that had cost time and coin.

In good spirits, my fall from them back into annoyance was a lofty one. Ahead I could see a reddish smear at the foot of the mountain range. Named for some local harlot goddess it was known to have a labyrinth of stone at its base. One that had managed to swallow a hero’s party. On another day I might have given up and considered it enough to have driven them from Stromholt’s borders.

Yet, we were close, and they were visibly breaking. It wouldn’t hurt to press on and bring back a few ears as trophies. As if Strom smiled on my resolve an arrow finally found a favorable wind and struck down one of the demi’s. Two dropped back to tend to it before resuming their flight, slower for the pointless mercy they had shown. Taking it as an omen, I didn’t give the sign to retreat. We continued onward in the name of Strom.

We slowed only enough to enter the stone maze in an orderly manner. The road before us was wide enough to ride in two columns at first, but soon narrowed and began to branch. With forty riders in the band we could afford to break up into smaller groups and formed three new ones.

In rearranging ourselves we found the mercenaries riding with us were missing. My second looked enraged by the sudden disloyalty, but I only scoffed. We hadn’t lost anything worth concerning ourselves.

“Lesner, just look at it as saving money,” I advised him and slowly he calmed down. It would be something to laugh about over drinks. The mercenaries who’d ridden with us for nearly a month only to ditch a week before they were due the balance of their pay were obviously fools.

Each took a branch of the maze and started to ride. We would regroup at sunset if none could find our quarry and use smoke signals to indicate if one of us got lucky.

As we prepared to leave, I met with my vice-captain and one of the men I favored as a future leader. As was tradition, we stood a sword at the crossroads and let how it fell determine our path. I smiled, playing fair but feeling blessed. As I hoped, the sword fell to the left along a shady but narrowing path. It was just the sort our quarry might choose. The others looked at me enviously as I left. It was better to let them finish privately rather than rub their noses in my good fortune.

My grin only grew as I noticed a little blood on a stone a few yards in. It wasn’t certain yet, but it seemed I would have the honor of finding and slaying our quarry. Riding in, I felt good and didn’t mind the way time passed by leisurely as we followed the trail. After an hour the trail narrowed, so we had to leave our horses in a small blind alley in order to progress, but I’d found more blood.

On another day I’d have sent up the smoke signal to let my fellows know I was certain I was on the scent. Today however, I was feeling good and we continued forward. The way twisted, turned, and forked but it didn’t matter. Worn down, the demihuman trash was too panicked to cover their trail.

The blood was getting fresher each time I found traces of it and the amount was growing.

I smiled, remembering the one who’d taken the arrow. They’d have been better off leaving it to die in the desert. Instead, they had, in their foolishness, left a trail of red blossoms for us to follow. Eager, I searched and found a steady trail of droplets.

Following it, I found myself coming to a new intersection of paths with a large stone in the center. The trail of blood continued to the stone and on its face was drawn something strange. Stepping forward, I had to tilt my head a few times before I caught on to what I was looking at. It was a crude smiling face, like a child might draw, rendered in blood.

Vice-Captain Lesner

I could have cursed when the sword granted the captain the most likely path. He’d treated us fairly in not just taking it as his privilege, but it stung not to get a chance. When it came my turn, I was rewarded by a sunny and open path. It was the least likely one for anyone with half a mind left to choose. As I started down it, I could only sigh. It was a hot trudge to nowhere as the path meandered and turned.

One path looked very much like another and they split, merged, and ended in the senseless way of natural paths.

“Sir, should we mark the path back?” One of my men said nervously. I was too hot and annoyed to think much about it and gave him a curt nod as permission. We found signs of prior travelers but nothing conclusively suggesting we were on the demi’s tail. To my left, a thin plume of smoke rose with a greenish tinge to it. That was the captain's signal.

We’d come to an area of thin winding caves carved into the stone. I wasn’t keen on getting off my mount and risking an ambush in them anyway.

“Fall back,” I said unhappily. Even if we hurried, there wasn’t much chance of there being any fight left. Following the chalk markings on the stone, it wasn’t long before we were right back to the caves again. My annoyance soured and we followed the markings once more, yet didn’t find ourselves moving significantly toward the exit.

“Is it just me, or are there more marks?” Someone asked. I looked over at them and forced myself not to nod in agreement. I had a stick of reddish chalk in my bag while the men only had white. I’d made a single mark with mine yet now I could see a second one on the path ahead.

It was a clever thing to do, but not something the desperate band we’d been chasing would have had time for. Looking about, I felt rather than saw something moving around us. I thought I caught the faintest sound of laughter carried on the breeze.

Hubert, Soldier

When the Captain and Vice-Captain set off, I held up my hand to keep the ten men I’d been assigned from heading off down our assigned trail. The dodgy math of how I’d ended up with ten aside, it was hot, and we’d been riding hard.

“Everyone eat and rest for an hour, then we'll get to it,” I said, which earned me looks. I wasn’t what anyone would normally consider officer material. Low born and barely educated, what set me apart from most was I could recite the book of Strom from memory. A thing which the captain considered a significant virtue. That I’d learned it reading to customers of my father’s print shop buying verse pamphlets hadn’t bothered him.

Despite looking down on me, the lot of them obeyed properly. They didn’t dare do otherwise until the captain returned. Thinking I was an up jumped peasant joke was one thing, disobeying the captain was another altogether.

“Think we’ll get some ears sir?” Cabson, one of the friendlier seekers, called out to me.

“Dunno, and I wouldn’t bother. They won’t keep until a prayer day and I don’t fancy burning my bag,” I replied. It wasn’t unusual to take trophies but proper seekers who came out of noble houses were particularly hot for them. My answer got a round of grudging laughs. One of the younger seekers had taken a paw off a bear mixed demi but hadn’t known how to preserve it. His kit had stunk so bad he’d had to burn it even after washing it twice.

“Alright, let’s see if we can flush ‘em toward the captain if they went the wrong way,” I said when the break was up. Even if we did find the band we’d been chasing, I didn’t have any serious thoughts of taking the kill for myself. That was how idiots ended up with a story to tell at the bar but no promotion. I had my sights set squarely on riding the Captain’s purebred coat-tails right up to a nice soft position doing paperwork and fetching tea.

My father had raised me well enough to recognize I was of an indifferent intellect, but I had an affable face. So long as I made the right connections and put a bit of effort into not offending anyone, I’d have a nice smooth career once this rough business was over. For all of his pretense of being the good seeker, the captain was almost as fond of comfortable chairs as I was.

“Alright, two men each. Come back if you hit a fork or find something,” I said when we came to a three-way split. It was a half hour since our break, and I was starting to feel uneasy. The demi’s were rabbits, but they had been run hard and had injured. They shouldn’t have been able to outpace the captain and vice-captain for such a long time.

That suggested I was on the correct trail, but I doubted it. I hadn’t seen the kind of signs I’d have expected. It was more likely they’d turned to hiding and been passed by or hadn’t been found yet. A turn of events that would probably lead to the captain having us extend the search to include the next day. I sighed, not interested in staying in the desert any longer than necessary.

An hour after the three groups of my men left, none had returned. It wasn’t impossible they were stupid and simply going to ride until something interesting turned up. I regretted my instructions, but didn’t move to follow any of the paths. With three men left and me, we couldn’t afford to split up any more.

“Since we might have to wait a while, why don’t we pray?” I suggested. Cabson gave me a questioning look. The other two were eager to take me up on the offer. You had to have prayed recently or had someone pray for you to be accepted into Strom’s embrace in death. Few knew the prayers fully and would just pay a priest to do it for them.

If it came down to it, they would fight harder since they’d recently been absolved. Without it, they might have hesitated for fearing damnation if they died before being prayed for. Doing this would give them peace of mind and vigor if they had to lift their blades.

That I was going to cut and run to save my own skin was a given.

Tim, Mercenary Leader

Riding into a stone maze would have been the dumbest thing I’d done in a career of questionable decisions. Half the day was already gone, and the zealots were chasing beast folk into ambush country. I slowed my horse down and my men did the same. Carefully disengaging from the group, we stayed a good distance from the entrance to the stones.

“Boss, won’t they turn on us?” One of my men asked. There were fifteen of us and forty of them. Signing on with Stromholt had been a mistake in the first place. That we’d been “blessed” in being selected to help the “seekers” had been a slap in the face on top of the kick in the balls of working for them normally.

“Fuck’em,” I said and the men around me nodded. Cutting out before we got paid stung, but you had to be alive to spend it. We turned and rode toward the opposite direction we’d come from. The further we got from Stromholt, the better.