The Prisoner of Carronne - 11. Chapter 11

-- Chapter Eleven --

The first sign had been a whisper, no louder than the faintest of breezes, a soft rustle of movement as it drifted out from the village of Elderwood, in the Valley of the Ancients and below the Caves of Erasmus. It travelled over mountains high and down valleys deep, to waiting eyes and ears and hearts.

Candles guttered in their cups as it slipped beneath cottage doors and crept through shuttered windows. Winter-thin beasts snoozing in their sheltered places shivered as it skated over their iced backs, laughing softly as it touched them, before crossing tarns and low moors.

By dawn the birds had it.

A blackbird, eyes as bright as beads, landed on a branch and sang a song that wasn’t quite a song; a robin bobbed on the shaft of a plough and tipped its head, as if listening to an answer no one else could hear. Far away, on a cliff path above the Sea of Darkness, a wheeling knot of terns threw their cries into the wind, and a salt-haired man with a scar on his cheek – once an honoured knight, before he took to fishing – stilled his net and bowed his head.

‘Erasmus keep us,’ he breathed. ‘They’re calling us home.’

And so, the word travelled, as words of weight have always travelled: on the wind and the wing; by the breath of those old enough to remember; by the pulse that beats in the wrists of men sworn to a thing and not yet released from it. And those who bore the dragon on their skin felt their arms prickle, hotly, as if the ink had come alive, and the blood in their veins had remembered their vows.

*     *     *

Chandar heard it before the birds did. The message was clear,

He was at his table in the Caves of Erasmus, in the hills above the village, where bent trees of Oak and Elder stood at the edge of the common. He was turning the Sword of Erasmus slowly in his hands. He turned it not to polish it – for it did not tarnish – but to listen. Some blades hum, and this one had always been alive, humming for him. It hummed for very few. Only those who are chosen.

A draught whistled through the carved tunnels of his cave home, like the sound made around the eaves of a cottage when winter leans against it.

‘It’s time,’ he said to the empty room.

The sound of footsteps on the dirt floor came to him, and looking up he found Luther filling the doorway, broad-shouldered, cloak wet with the last of the night. Jamal came close behind, eyes bright from the chill and from the walk, then Garrett; the lean, dark-haired knight who had once laughed too easily until the world had taught him to measure it. Each stood with their backs to the doorway, as if to hold out all mischief for a breath longer.

‘You heard it too,’ Luther said.

Chandar did not rise. He simply placed his hands flat upon the sword which lay flat on the table in front of him and let his hands rest upon it, as if feeling its vibration.

‘I have been hearing it for days,’ the old knight replied. ‘But it was not mine to answer first . . . and now there is no time to waste.’

Luther’s jaw worked.

‘Rae lives,’ Chandar said. The words hung in the cavern like a warm lantern. ‘Lives, and kneels, and does not bend. So, there is hope.’

Jamal let go the breath he had not known he held. Garrett’s mouth tightened; some anger left him, some settled purpose took its place.

‘Then we go,’ Luther said. ‘We take the boy at his word and smuggle ourselves into the city.’

‘We go,’ Chandar allowed, ‘but not all the same way, and not all at once. The wind carries two messages, Luther of Triellium. One is for those who must gather. One is for those who must travel and return to their roots.’

He looked then to Jamal, and the boy – no, the young man; the page now almost a peer – lifted his chin as if his ears were pricked to the sound of a horn.

‘Say it, Sire,’ Jamal murmured, and found a smile. ‘Say what is on your mind.’

Chandar’s eyes creased. ‘You shall be my legs, Jamal, son of Lucius. The birds have told many, but not all. The Order is scattered still, from the reed beds of Shalamar to the chalk roads of Xanthus and the iron towns beyond Pardonne. You must carry the last of the call; you will put your face to it, and your word, and your courage, and you will bring them to me.’

‘Bring them where?’ Jamal asked.

‘There is a place in the mountains, close enough to Carronne,’ Chandar replied simply, tapping the tabletop. ‘It has the name Highshaw. A village, to the west and to the south of the Plains of Ashmere, that has known long peace and minds its own business. It makes a good anvil for the tempering of war. There is a place nearby where we can shelter and gather our strengths.’

‘The lake camp,’ Luther said, almost in a whisper.

Jamal’s eyes flicked to Luther, who gave a single nod. He found, as he always had, the steadiness he needed.

‘This will be where our forces, such as they shall be, will be waiting for Luther, Garrett and our Prince,’ Chandar added.

‘I will go,’ he said.

‘You must not go alone,’ Luther commanded. ‘Take two of Chandar’s village lads. The quiet one with the harelip and the tall one who rides like a willow. They will do. Ride light, speak true, and show your arms only when you must. No more than three together; a handful can vanish if needed, where a column may draw unwanted attention.’

Garrett made a sound that might have been approval. ‘And I?’

‘You ride with me . . . and the son of the blacksmith,’ Luther said. ‘To Carronne.’

For a heartbeat the only sound was the tick of the kettle and the long sigh of the winds, swirling through the caves.

‘Two paths, then,’ Chandar said, and his voice softened. ‘Both steep, but with the same ending. From Highshaw, we shall gather and strengthen, as we prepare to face what must surely come. I shall meet you there.’

*   *   *

They ate a hearty breakfast, of coarse bread, apples baked in their skins, and a heel of cheese, which was delivered by Christos, accompanied by Drake, the son of the blacksmith. Chandar poured out a black brew, a tea as bitter as the truth, yet just as welcome, while the plotting continued.

Luther repeated what he had dreamt; the vision of Rae kneeling, while Septimus smiled; the sense of a cell whose stench seemed as real as if they were standing within it; the cold of the steel bars. Chandar listened with his whole face, head tipped, fingers quiet upon the table. When Luther had finished, the old knight rose at last, stepped to a timber cabinet that was black with age, and touched a set of carved marks on the side – a small dragon with its tail looped back upon itself – before selecting a roll of vellum from the shelf.

‘Your dream returns and returns because it is the present. We must make it become the past,’ Chandar remarked, as he crossed the floor to his table and unrolled what were multiple layers of vellum upon it.

Tankards and candlesticks were set upon the corners to hold the curled material flat, while the knights gathered around, beckoning the boys in also.

The top layer proved to be a map that was not really a map, as so much as a memory pressed into the calfskin – the Five Lands of Candor laid out for all to see, between the Sea of Darkness on the eastern side, and spreading to the south, then the Cliffs of Thunderstone, spreading to the west and north. The Five Lands were held as if in the cup of two hands, surrounded by dread, yet strong enough to resist, even in these dark times.

Chandar let the uppermost document go, and it rolled itself once more, leaving the next layer visible. With a bony finger, the ancient one tapped a spot on the map, then slowly ran that finger across the smooth material. Finally, he tapped another spot.

In scrolling text beneath his finger, they all could read the word, Carronne, but the bony finger did not rest there, as it travelled west of the dreaded city, into the hills beyond, then tapping upon another location.

‘Highshaw,’ Chandar said to his companions. ‘You know this place?’ he then asked of Drake.

‘Yes, Sire. I have spent summers there,’ the boy replied.

‘Then you know of the old aquifer line that had fed the city when it was green?’

‘I do, Sire.’

‘But Carronne is parched,’ Garrett said. ‘Since the curse.’

‘This may be so, but the river still runs beneath a city long after it forgets how to drink,’ Chandar answered. ‘The aquifer, the old culverts and drains, they all remain, whether wet or dry. The poor and the brave keep their ladders mended, do they not, lad?’ directing his question to Drake once again, who nodded in reply.

Jamal leaned in. ‘Tunnels,’ he whispered, and then louder, in exclamation, ‘Tunnels!’

Chandar nodded. The others smiled. ‘The ones Septimus does not trust, he cannot see. The ones he does not see, he cannot close. You will find friends there, Luther. Is that not so, Drake?’

‘It is, Sire.’

Luther looked from the map, to the boy, then to the sword resting upon the table, before finally smiling at Chandar.

‘You and Garrett, as we discussed,’ Chandar said. ‘Take four more who can keep their feet and their tongues, but they will need to travel a different path. Use leather, not mail. And no colours or flags. Use daggers, not halberds. Travel lightly. Travel soon. And if the Warlock is there . . .’

‘He is,’ Luther said, with more certainty than he had any right to have.

‘. . . then be careful.’

‘I hear you,’ Luther replied.

‘You always have,’ Chandar said, as his hand found Luther’s shoulder for a moment, the weight of benediction, and of farewell.

From somewhere outside, the long and baying sound of a horn rang out and so the conspirators made their way out into the early morning light. Below them, they could see the village clucking and starting; women shaking quilts, boys breaking ice in troughs, a dog arguing with a wheelbarrow, and it was into this scene that a lone horseman rode.

As one, Chandar and his group started down the hill towards the village action, curious as to who the visitor might be, but it wasn’t long before recognition dawned on at least some of their faces.

‘It’s Erhan!’ remarked Garrett. ‘I thought that old scoundrel was dead!’

As they watched the man come to a halt in the village circle, villagers and knights alike came to greet him.

‘Apparently not,’ replied Luther, a wry smile upon his lips. ‘Perhaps we should make ourselves known to him?’

*   *   *

‘What brings you, knight?’ Chandar asked of the newcomer, as a bluebird landed upon a branch nearby.

‘A little bird told me I was needed,’ murmured the newcomer, as he glanced at the creature, while the corner of Chandar’s mouth turned.

‘They seem to have been busy of late,’ the old man replied.

‘And not without cause, I hear.’

‘Yes, these are troubling times. I sense it is time for the Order to gather once more.’

‘What little of us who are left,’ Erhan stated, as he stepped forward to clasp the old man’s forearm in their traditional greeting, where dragon tattoos would touch briefly.

‘Sire, I have gleaned little of the purpose, however, so to what cause do we muster?’

‘To the return of our Prince,’ Luther answered, as he stepped forward.

‘In the name of Majid! I thought you were dead!’ Erhad decreed, before reaching for his old friend.

‘That was but a vicious rumour,’ Luther replied as they clasped right arms with right arms, and slapped the others shoulder with their left. ‘I had heard the same news of you!’

‘So, the Prince? Please don’t tell me that Rae has been captured . . .’

‘It is so. He is being held in Carronne.’

‘And your plan?’

‘Come, let us sit and talk,’ Chandar commanded. ‘You must be tired and hungry from your travels. You must eat and rest, and listen.’

*   *   *

Luther and Garrett would be ready to ride by noon, along with four men of Garrett’s choosing. Two were blacksmiths once, with hands like knotted oak; one was a boy grown hard far too soon, whose cousin had vanished into Daarkeeth in the third of the dark years. The last was a quiet farmer whose lands had turned to dust in a barren summer and who now had a point to prove. All were strong, and capable of almost anything but a backward step.

The six men would ride in pairs, taking separate routes, before meeting on the city outskirts. A seventh man, Drake, the son of Drago, would also be riding with them initially, returning to the city, accompanying Luther and his companion. He would be entering the city alone, however, and ahead of the others’ arrival, so he can gather the necessary support and meet the party of knights once they gained access to the sewers and tunnels.

The seven of them stood around the cave table with Chandar, their heads bent as the old man marked a series of circles like ripples on the map.

‘No other knights to accompany us?’ one of the men asked.

‘No,’ replied Chandar. ‘For this, just men with determination and strength will suffice. And urchins who will know those sewers and tunnels like the back of their hands, like young Drake here.’

Chandar turned his attention back to the map and stabbed at a spot with his piece of charcoal.

‘Here is the old sewer mouth,’ he said. ‘You will find it choked with brush. It always is. This will get you into the city undetected, and from there our army of urchins will lead the way.’ He then stabbed another spot on the map and said, ‘And here is where you shall reunite, after your journey, and where your horses will be held while you are inside the city. Enter one way, leave by another.’

‘Luck lives only with those having determination in their hearts and minds,’ Garrett said, and one of the smiths grunted.

Sensing movement at the doorway, Chandar’s gaze slid to Jamal. The young man had swapped his page’s belt for a rider’s sash and now stood there, knowing the road before him was a different one to that which Luther and these men would be taking.

Chandar beckoned him over.

‘Are you ready?’ the old man asked.

‘Yes, Sire. The lads are waiting with the horses. We are ready.’

‘Remember three names to begin with,’ Chandar decreed. ‘Find Sir Ansel in the birch country; he limps but his arm and mind are sound. Find Marin the Grey in the border downs. She keeps her hair short as a boy’s and her blade longer and sharper than her temper. Find Enoch in Shalamar, by the pebbled beach. Tell them I have called, and that I have no right to call, and that they are yet bound to answer.

‘And if they doubt you, then show them this . . .’ Chandar added, before removing an amulet and chain from around his neck and placing it around the neck of Jamal. ‘This will be proof enough of your purpose. After those three, the rest will follow like hounds with the scent of blood.’

Jamal picked up the heavy medallion and looked at it. Cast from a dark metal, which Jamal had not seen before, the medallion was the size of a peach, engraved on one side with the image of a dragon, whose eyes were chips of river-green stone. The back bore an old oath and the scar of fire.

‘They will know it,’ Chandar added, ‘and it will seal the message.’

Jamal nodded, then placed it inside his shirt, allowing it to hang close to his heart. ‘I will bring them, Sire.’

‘You will bring who you can,’ the old man replied, as the others looked on. ‘You are not the tide. You are the moon, and the moon gives light to those who have been in darkness.’

Giving a nod in response, the page turned to his master, who was smiling at him.

‘Go with grace and the blessings of the gods,’ Luther said, as he stepped towards the young man whose life he had shared for many a year now, then clasping the lad’s shoulders with both hands he pulled him forward in a hug, then kissing him briefly.

When he stepped back, Luther fastened Jamal’s cloak. He did it awkwardly, like a father with hands too big for the button, and Jamal stood very still and watched his master’s hands. Then Luther’s thumbs were at Jamal’s temples for a breath, and they were looking directly into one another, and nothing in the room made a sound.

‘Ride hard,’ Luther said, ‘and ride home.’

‘I will,’ Jamal said, and had to swallow before he could say the rest. ‘And you also. Bring him back to us.’

Luther nodded once. ‘We will meet at Highshaw.’

As Chandar and Luther accompanied Jamal to where the horses were being held by the other two lads, the young knight-to-be softly repeated the names of those he was to search for, until they sat right upon his tongue. He knew the birch country by smell and could ride the border downs blind. Shalamar he knew only by Luther’s telling, and by a longing he had never confessed.

‘Do not be too proud to ask the birds,’ Chandar added, eyes smiling. ‘They know the short ways.’

Jamal nodded as he took the reins handed to him by the boy, Tor, then with one last shake of hands he stepped up into the saddle.

‘See you at Highshaw,’ Jamal said, then turned his horse and dug in his heels.

Chandar and Luther, along with the parents of the other lads, watched proudly as the trio cantered way, until they eventually disappeared in a cloud of dust.

*   *   *

‘So, a rescue is planned then,’ Erhan stated, once Chandar had explained what lay ahead. ‘But you are assuming that the handful sent to rescue the Prince will be successful.’

‘We have no need to doubt them,’ Chandar replied. ‘The question will be, however, how to protect them once they are clear of the city. That is why we shall base what warriors we have at Highshaw. We will be close by, and in a position to defend them once they reach us, should that be needed.’

As this discussion was taking place, Luther and his men were making their final preparations. They would soon be ready to move out, but Luther had one final task to perform.

He sought out the boy Christos, whom he found talking to Drake, who was saddling his horse in preparation for his return to Carronne. The boys went quiet as Luther approached them. He felt as if he were intruding upon their farewells, but time was of the essence.

‘My apologies for the interruption,’ Luther said, ‘but I have a task for you, Christos.’

‘For me, Sire?’

‘Yes. Most definitely for you. Are you game for it?’

‘Of course, Sire!’

‘My stallion, Majid, will be in need of care while I am away, as I will need to be taking another steed, one which won’t be as noticeable. Do you think you can manage that task?’

‘Of course, Sire! I will care for him as if he were my own.’

‘I knew you could be counted upon,’ the knight replied, while patting the boy on the back. ‘Come, I will say my farewells to my constant companion and introduce you to him, then, we must be off.’

It was as if the horse knew what was coming as man and boys approached, trotting over to the rails and nickering to his master. When Luther placed a hand on the animal’s broad forehead with its splattered white markings, the animal dropped his head and stepped in close.

‘My old friend,’ Luther whispered. ‘I will be gone for some days, but this boy, Christos, will care for you . . . as if you were his own, he said, so be on your best behaviour!’

At this, the stallion turned his head towards the boy, as if he had understood every word his master had said. Tentatively, Christos held out his hand, palm down and the horse sniffed the back of it, before then nuzzling the hand. Surprised, Christos pulled his hand back and giggled, and the horse stepped closer.

‘I think he likes you,’ Luther said quietly. ‘He won’t give you any trouble while I’m gone.’

With one last pat of the horse’s neck, Luther turned and led the two boys back to where the others were preparing to leave.

‘Say your goodbyes, lads, for we shall be leaving presently,’ Luther said to Drake and Christos. They had only just met, but Luther could already see the connection they had made. He smiled at them, both looking slightly embarrassed by the attention. He could also see Garrett grinning at them, as was Garrett’s page, Han, who would also be staying behind at this time.

Presently, Chandar came hobbling towards the men, using his staff to support him.

‘We are almost ready, Sire,’ Luther offered.

‘Very good. I have been talking with Erhan, and he shall accompany me to Highshaw, along with the remaining knights. We shall gather as many men as possible and will be ready for your return.’

‘Are you expecting trouble, Sire?’ Garrett asked.

‘I am expecting the unexpected, my Knight. If trouble brews, then those of us remaining will be ready. One way or another, the Order has returned. What happens from here, will be in the hands of the gods!’

*   *   *

The column of riders left after a hearty lunch. Luther, Garrett and Drake, and four trustworthy villagers, rode steadily upon the road that would eventually lead them to Carronne. At the place where they would enter the forest, and where sight of them would be lost by the villagers, Luther came to a halt and looked back.

He raised a hand to Chandar, who was standing at the edge of the village green, which the old man returned, then Luther turned and trotted after the others, with them all soon vanishing into the forest before them.

With days of riding ahead, there was no time to waste, yet they also couldn’t afford to ride too hard, lest they tire themselves and their horses. They rode north and then east at first – even though their destination would be to the south of Carronne – keeping to shadows so as to not attract unwanted attention, keeping talk only for when talk was needed.

When they made the far side of the forest the riders reined to a stop, before they parted. Three groups would now travel three different paths, yet with the one destination.

'I shall ride ahead and advise those who will be assisting us, and while they prepare a camp for you, I will organise my friends in the city,' Drake said to them.

The men nodded.

'If you follow this road, you will come to a cairn, once you near the city. This marks ten leagues of the journey remaining.'

'I know of it,' said Garrett.

'Take that path, which leads towards the bald hill. Once you cross the wooden bridge over the stream, be watchful for signs. Our friends will find you. There will be a campsite readied, far enough from the edge of the city so as not to attract attention. Once this band gathers once more, then we can plan to make our move,’ the boy promised them.

'Understood.'

‘We shall meet again near the edge of the desolate city,’ Luther said in parting. ‘And from there Drake will guide us.’

After they bade farewell to Drake, Garrett and one of the villagers followed at a distance, then two more villagers followed a short time later. Luther and the remaining villager – the boy, Dart, whose cousin had vanished into Daarkeeth – travelled together, setting off on a different path, which would lead them to the same destination.

The country dipped and rose and changed, but by the third night they had gained the low ridge to the south and west of Carronne, from which, on a clear day, a man may see the city: a shoulder of black stone, a fist of towers, and beside it, crouched and wicked, sat the squat bulk of Daarkeeth where the sun does not quite reach even at midsummer.

But today was not a clear day. As few days were ever like that in these times. Yet still, there were several days left for man and boy to travel, where their path was to end to the south of the wretched city.

To be continued . . .