The Brat's Final Gambit

The Piper’s Flute, with the largest room available in Havel’s Dock, served as both an inn for travelers in that part of the Lake Valleys and the town’s meeting place for civil matters. Tonight, Davin thought it was packed like a bag of squirming crawfish. He had never seen so many people upset and restless. The air hummed with simmering pressure, and he could hear it plainly in the voice of Havel Dock’s mayor. “Quiet everyone, quiet!” Mayor Niemen called out to cut through the cacophony of agitated townspeople. “Lord Joachim has kindly come to speak with us all about this issue, so please listen as he addresses some of our concerns.”

There was something about the fidgety man that Davin did not like.

From the center of the agitated crowd a farmer stood up. He coughed nervously and held his hands squeezed tightly shut. Talking tapered off into an expectant hush. When the man spoke, his voice was heavy with grief. “I’m just a farmer, sir. We live on the outskirts of Havel’s Dock, and it took me two full days travel and sleeping in barns to get here. That thing that’s been loose has eaten nearly every one of my sheep. We’ve got nothing left. Nothing. No one goes out at night. No one goes out in the day . . . and no one has seen a single one of the patrols that was promised us. Not that far out. Only in towns and villages, mind you . . .”

The farmer’s lip quivered. Davin knew the man had never seen, let alone stood in front of a count before. He smiled at the man’s courage. Joachim waited patiently for the farmer to continue, but when the man’s nerves got the best of him, the Count nodded and stood up. Joachim wore a thick coat covered by an even thicker cloak bearing his family crest—a golden griffon ascendant with a blazing star in its talons upon a red shield in a field of black. His tall frame dominated the front of the room and his grizzled features looked more at home in a roomful of farmers and peasants than in any court in Pallodine.

When he spoke, his rough voice only added to the image of what Maerillus always described as a farmer-lord, a workingman’s king. “What is your name, sir?”

The farmer looked around and licked his lips nervously. “Chason, sir. And I didn’t mean any offense—“

“And none was given,” Joachim reassured him. “It’s a good question that’s on the minds of every man, woman, and child that braved the bitter cold to get here: when will help arrive for you?”

Everyone was now so quiet that the only sound in the room came from the creaking of floorboards as people shifted in their seats. Joachim went on. “You want to know when help will arrive? I’m here to tell you that if that trall is standing outside of your door, your help is too far away to do you any good, and that’s the truth of it.”

The room sat in stunned silence as Joachim allowed this to sink in.

“What should we do!?” A man shouted out angrily.

People looked around nervously, and Davin was among them. Niam leaned over and whispered, “And I always thought I had my foot in my mouth a lot.”

Joachim continued talking. ”There is a creature on the loose—maybe even more than one—that no one in this area has had to deal with since we fought to rid this land of the Guldeen.”

“Whose fault is that?” someone demanded.

“A Sorcerer who went among us until he was discovered,” Joachim said. “He evaded capture and fled the kingdom . . . and unfortunately he retaliated by loosing this monster on us.”

Again the room went quiet as everyone absorbed what he said.

“That’s easy for you to say,” a surly merchant dressed in a coat as fine as any nobleman wore spat. “You’re surrounded by your guard and your troops and your Hammer. We don’t have anyone here for us!”

Joachim remained standing, with a small, unreadable expression on his face. “That thing killed my son,” an old man so stooped by age and arthritis that he seemed to be hunchbacked stammered. “Tore him apart!”

Someone at the back of the room cried out, “Where’s the justice? My cattle are all dead. My neighbor’s been killed. There ain’t no justice in this! None! We’ll be ruined if we’re not hunted down!”

On the other side of the Count, one of his sergeants shifted nervously as the crowd became more emboldened. Joachim put a hand on his shoulder to keep him still. The Mayor rose to calm everyone as furious shouts burst out across the room, but Joachim leaned over and spoke into his ear. The fidgeting man looked at him, nodded his head so quickly his jowls shook, and sat back down.

“Why did you refuse to help us?” a mousy woman in a long, thick wool dress called out over everyone else. “Men came and talked to us, saying that there was help before the snows fell, but you didn’t take it!”

“That’s right!” another man encouraged her.

“Did you do it? Did you turn down help when we needed it?”

Beside them, the Mayor of Havel’s Dock drummed his fingers rapidly against his thighs. Niam looked at Davin and said as quietly as possible, “Does he look guilty? I’m guilty all the time, and I know guilty—and he looks guilty.” Maerillus addressed the issue peremptorily by punching him in the shoulder.

“I’m just saying . . . “ Niam hissed.

Davin watched how the man looked around the room in a calculating way. “Yes,” Davin whispered in annoyance. “Now keep quiet will you?”

Niam watched eagerly, as if he were on the lookout for something else to mistrust. “Quiet! Please get quiet so I can talk!” Joachim called out. “Who told you that we have been offered help?” his words were dead calm. “Someone speak up. We need to clear the air right here and right now.” And then Joachim pointed at the mousy woman, whose narrow eyes darted rapidly around the room as she realized she had called too much attention on herself. “You, miss. Who told you that?”

“I had to ask, for my children, Lord.”

“I’m sure you did,” he told her.

“There were some men from Kalavere . . . Lord Eason’s men. They’re the ones that told us you refused help.”

“That’s not all they told us,” a man made an ugly face as he spoke up. “They said all kinds of other things, bad things. Snakes they were, and I told people they were up to no good, I did. You mind them . . . all of you. They’ve been all the way from here to Old Flood spreading their poison.”

Davin watched as the Mayor’s face turned scarlet.

Joachim turned to the man calmly, and his voice was as smooth as fresh eastern satin. “I’m sure that the good mayor here has these rumors well in hand.”

“Well actually—” someone started, but the Mayor leapt up so quickly that Davin wondered if Niam had lit the bottom of his seat on fire.

“—Actually!” Mayor Neimen broke in before the speaker finished his thought. “I am sure that these rumors are baseless,” he said, working his fingers nervously.

Joachim raised his voice even louder. “I know what is being said. Several days ago Karin Ledge was attacked. Not by a trall, but by someone who wanted it to look that way.”

“The Mayor of Old Flood blames you!” a voice called out.

Joachim nodded his head. “Mr. Ledge is distraught, no doubt about that. And to make things worse, men dressed as my guards were seen running from the scene. But I will tell you here and now that those were not my men. I know you have only my word, but there are people who would exploit this situation for their own benefit.”

Joachim paused for a moment.

“I am grateful Lord Eason has offered his help, but I have noticed that from here to Old Flood and Pirim Village, I haven’t seen a single one of his men. And I’d like you to ask yourselves if he is so eager to help, where are they?” Joachim looked around defiantly. “Don’t all of you find it suspicious that his men are willing to speak in secret with you but aren’t here now? “

“Well . . .that’s because they’re saying your soldiers have been harassing them,“ said the Mayor. His face was scarlet. The room went deathly silent again.

Joachim arched an eyebrow. “Then I invite Eason to write a charge and nail it to the Abbey door in Pirim Village as has always been the custom. I will happily meet him in any court of his choosing and charge him with treason.”

Nobody said anything until Joachim spoke again.

“If you want to be safe, you’re going to have to share your lands. Move closer to the villages and towns. Until this is over with, you will have to rely on one another. I simply do not have enough troops to contain this, and help from Eason will not be the help you think it is. If he is willing to allow his soldiers to work under my command, I will welcome all the help he sends and rescind my charge, and I will welcome any investigator from Pallodine to assist the Wizard’s Hammer sitting here with us. And if Eason turns this down, I tell you plainly that he is a coward and a traitor to the realm.”

For several heartbeats a long silence ensued.

Then, from outside a woman screamed shrilly. Joachim’s head jerked toward the door as several people burst in. “Murder! Murder! Dead bodies in Lord Joachim’s carts and they’re wearing Count Eason’s colors!”

Count Joachim looked down silently at the cart bearing his colors and insignia, a griffon of gold clutching a star as it launched itself into the air. Within the cart were two bodies covered in a dark sheet, beneath which one foot and calf lay exposed.

“How very coincidental, Jolan Kine said beneath his breath. Surrounding the cart, a large semi-circle began at the steps of the Piper’s Flute and continued around into the icy cobblestone street. The soldiers accompanying Joachim formed a protective circle around their lord, and to his side, Niam and his friends huddled around Jolan Kine.

On the other side of Joachim stood the Mayor, who looked as if he were about to break out into a fit of palsy. “What . . . what . . . IS THIS?” he spluttered.

Niam could see what was running through the some of the townspeople’s minds. They had heard everything Joachim told him, but now here sat evidence of the claims Eason’s men had made.

As if it had just fallen out of the sky.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” Niam shouted in disgust. “You can’t honestly believe that two dead men just happen to show up in a cart we just happen to have NOT brought with us. I distinctly remember riding a horse for fourteen frozen, maggot infested miles through snow and ice, trying to keep my fingers from falling off and my eyes from freezing shut.”

Davin punched him in the arm, while everyone looked at him as if he had insulted their grandmothers.

“No!” Niam said angrily. “I’m not stopping. That sorcerous bastard killed my brother and sister, so there’s not a thing anyone in this town has gone through that I haven’t. And for anyone to fall for something this stupid, I’m not keeping my mouth shut! I have just as much stake in this as some of you and more than most, because when all is said and done, everyone else will be alive and half of my family will still be dead.”

Niam noticed as he was talking that many people surrounding him nodded their heads as he spoke. That didn’t make him feel any better. Not by a long shot. The Mayor moved his mouth as if he were about to say something, but a man with a long scar across his face spoke up before he could say anything.

“What’s your name, son?

“Niam Maldies, sir.”

The man nodded his head slowly. “I thought you were Brent’s boy. I live on the other side of Siler’s Gorge, in Lakeview. I helped look for your brother’s body.”

Niam was too taken aback by this unexpected turn, so he just looked down and mumbled, “I wish I could tell you how grateful we all are to you, sir.”

“You said that your brother and sister were killed by the same man behind the trall attacks?” A lady holding a small child asked, clearly shocked by the revelation.

“As far as we know, they were his first victims, ma’am.”

Regaining his composure, the Mayor blurted out incredulously, “We haven’t had time to investigate all of the facts for ourselves.”

Suddenly aware that everyone’s attention was focused on him, Niam’s face flushed. As he opened his mouth to say more, Davin moved to pull him back, but Jolan Kine stopped him and motioned for Niam to go on.

“If you need an investigation, you might as well start with us. Me. My friends. The Wizard’s Hammer, we’ve been right in the middle of the whole thing from the beginning, ma’am. We’re witnesses to what happened.”

“This is very improper!” the Mayor tried to break in.

“Let him talk!” someone shouted.

Underneath Joachim’s withering gaze, the man shrank back.

` “How do you know that this man made a trall?” the mousy faced woman who had spoken earlier squeaked as she rewrapped a shawl around her shoulders for more warmth.

“We were there. We talked to it, in Garrolus Kreeth’s own home. And Lord Joachim has done everything and more to stop this thing. One is already dead thanks to Mr. Kine here.”

This set off a flurry of conversation among the crowd. When the Mayor tried to break in one last time, over half of those present scowled at the man. “Go away you old fool!” someone hissed.

Some still looked on with stony faces.

Niam had a moment’s inspiration, and before he had time to think about stopping himself, he blurted out, “How much did they pay you?”

The Mayor stopped and looked as if he had been slapped, but the truth was written across his face, plain enough for anyone to see.

“I’m not putting up with this!” he cried out, but his hands worked at the hem of his pants in uncertain, fumbling movements.

“I think this is enough!” Joachim’s voice boomed.

Niam jumped. For a self-conscious moment, he thought the Count was angry with him. But when he looked up, the count’s angry eyes we locked on the Mayor.

“I knew that Eason’s men had already spoken with you. I hoped that you hadn’t thrown in with them, but I’ve always known what a conniving sack of fish guts you were. Get out of my sight before I change my mind and call you to account through duel. I’ll be happy to deal with you before I get to Eason.” Joachim’s voice was as hard as the ice lining the peaks of the Korse Mountains and shaper than their jagged edges.

The Mayor looked around desperately for help, but not even his supporters volunteered to step forward in his defense. In one gesture, the man managed to lift his nose up and spin around in place and walk away, clinging to what little dignity he had left. And a third of the people there went with him.

Joachim sighed. “That could have gone worse,” he said, sounding hollow and tired. Then he looked down at Niam and patted him on his shoulder. “Thank you, son. You have something I haven’t had since I was five-years-old.”

“What’s that, sir?” Niam asked.

Joachim smiled, and it was like watching a rock grin. “You’re cute, Maldies.”

Around him, everyone else laughed.

Many long, cold hours after they got back, Niam sat and let his feet dry by the fire in Lord Joachim’s library. He always loved books, and a room filled with them always soothed him. Why, he did not know. Maybe it was because people always told him that he thought too much. But when he was in a library, he was surrounded by thoughts set down on paper. There he would always be surrounded by more thoughts than he was capable of holding. In a library, he wasn’t such a misfit anymore.

“Well, good for him!” Gaius said about Niam’s role in the day’s proceeding. “But how did you know that the Mayor had thrown in with Eason’s men?”

“I suspected he would. The man gets blind when he gets greedy, so I had your son go there ahead of us,” Joachim told him. Mr. Sartor closed his eyes and nodded silently. “I didn’t have time to tell you what I was up to. We may have lost Ledge. Karin’s death has him beside himself, and with the poison Eason’s men are peddling, I would understand if he blames me for not doing enough.”

Gaius nodded his head. “I know,” he said silently. But he knows you, man!”

Joachim waved a dismissive hand. “Oh, he won’t buy into the conspiracy nonsense, but he has every right to be outraged. There’s just not enough help to go around. My soldiers have to be everywhere. The trall only has to be right where it is.”

“At least you swayed many of the people there,” Gaius said.

“Not enough,” Joachim said. “But thankfully many people in Havel’s Dock knew none of us arrived in a cart. Still, many didn’t. One person’s word against another, and it gives that conniving toad the appearance of a legitimate reason to side with Eason when he makes his move.”

Gaius shook his head in disbelief. “Such a hostile grab at another province is unheard of now!” he said in exasperation.

“When the reye’s away….” Joachim reminded him.

“What will you do if Eason tries to come in?” Gaius asked apprehensively.

“This won’t go to arms,” Joachim reassured him. “I’ll force a personal solution first.”

Gaius let out a sigh of relief.

Niam chose the moment of pause to speak up. “Um . . . since I kind of helped this thing move along in our favor, any chance we can have some time off to rest? I’ve got saddle sores on top of my battle sores, sir?”

Joachim began laughing so hard he had to slap his hip in order to make himself stop. “Not a chance, kid.”

Joachim had one barn set aside on his property for the beehives during the worst parts of winter, and though the bees still managed to maintain enough warmth to make it through the worst snows, having the extra shelter of the barn helped ensure that the hives would make it through the bitter cold times. Two days later the three boys met with Bug, who had sent a desperate message to Niam through old Falion that there was trouble.

“They’re still buzzing,” Maerillus said with an obvious note of concern in his voice. “I’m not sure I’m liking this.”

“Well I told you not to touch them,” Bug said in a bossy voice.

Maerillus looked at the hive he had just bumped and wrinkled his nose unhappily. “I’m not too sure we should go sit up there and talk,” he said.

“Why not,” Davin asked, smiling at his friend’s discomfort.

“Oh you think this is funny do you?” Maerillus asked in dismay. “We’ll be up there,” he said pointing to the hayloft high above them.

“And?”

Maerillus let out a completely exasperated answer. “Those things can fly up there!”

“Boys can be such sissies sometimes,” Bug grumbled and began climbing the steps rapidly.

Niam groaned and noticed he wasn’t the only one. None of them had done well after little sleep and a hard day’s practice with several of Joachim’s guardsmen. The only good thing about the day was that Niam seemed to be excelling with the staff. He found security in holding a weapon that had two business ends to it. Swords only had one, and he constantly feared that he might try to put his blade in its scabbard too quickly and stick it in his leg instead. Besides, he didn’t have the kind of strength in his arms to be terribly effective with most blades. Jolan Kine assured him that they would build his arms up, but Niam liked to go with what worked, and made a mental note to bend all the practice blades one day when everyone thought he was too far away to be blamed.

“Okay,” Davin said once they were all seated—“What’s going on, Madeline?”

Bug let out an inaudible growl of indignation, but chose to ignore his use of her proper name. Niam saw by the expression on her face that she needed them to believe what she was about to say, and that meant she needed them to see her as someone who was now a year older. Her next words confirmed this. “I thought I was being followed, and I am. It started before the heavy snows hit, and I almost believed I was making it up until several days ago, and that’s when I heard him chasing me.” Bug paused a moment to collect herself, and then looked up at Niam and said, “I was stupid not to listen to you—I really was. I went into the woods alone.”

Niam felt his stomach twist, but he held himself back from choking her until she finished telling him bow she almost died.

When Bug was done, Niam sighed. Maerillus muttered, “Female version of Niam” underneath his breath.

Niam ignored this. Partly because it was Maerillus being Maerillus, but partly because there was a ring of truth to it. Bug wanted to face her fears and prove herself to him—to all of them. Corey’s death had hit her hard, and maybe if he had spent more time with her she wouldn’t have gone out into the forest alone to tempt trouble. Niam couldn’t be angry with her. “I think we need to check this out.”

“Agreed,” Davin said. “Maybe Madeline can take us tomorrow after we’re done with our training.”

Bug’s face brightened at this. Though her face shone with relief, Niam fought to suppress a shudder. She had no idea that they were about to stick their necks into something that might be dangerous, and that scared him for her. He had been right about one thing, however: trouble always seemed to find them. Only, when it found Bug and dragged her along with it, everything became scarier. A lot scarier.

During the warming days, the snow had begun to melt slowly. At nights when it refroze, a shiny gloss of ice crusted over the white surface and hardened. Moving across the ground caused Niam to lift his legs higher than usual because the forward motion of his feet no longer displaced the ice. With each step the crust broke with loud crunching noises, and Niam strained to listen for any unusual noises that might be off cadence with the constant melt-water dropping from the tree branches above them. Loud crashes echoed through the woods as ice weakened and let go of its hold on tree branches, falling to the ground to shatter in an ecstatic crescendo of natural house cleaning. Niam held a long staff made of heat-tempered oak, and its weight gave him a measure of reassurance as they walked. Weeks ago, Joachim had insisted they go armed, though he found Niam’s choice none too pleasing.

“Here’s where I first noticed the footprints,” Bug said, pointing eagerly to the tracks in the ice.

“Looks like they’re average size,” Niam said.

“Definitely not a trall,” Davin agreed, “though melting snow makes reading tracks more difficult.” Then he turned to Bug. “Show me where they branch out and cut into the woods,” he said.

Bug led the way, and Niam saw immediately that she was right. The snow was worn by numerous passings, and furrowed grooves snaked through the woods in three directions. “These head off toward Joachim’s property and yours, Maerillus!” Niam said.

“Yes,” he growled. “Can’t help but wonder why . . . and who.”

“We’ll have to check the property lines to see if they come out or if someone’s been watching and try to figure out whether Bug was a target or just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“I heard him as I ran errands to Mr. Sartor’s,” Bug added.

Maerillus nodded his head slowly. “We’ll get this figured out,” he said. “I’m about tired of all of this.”

“The trail runs back this way, toward the back of Siler’s Gorge.”

Indeed, the trail did carry them farther back into the deepening gloom of the gorge. The path they followed continued to show that someone had made many trips along its descending trail. At one point, as the path’s incline began to increase, they had to grab ahold of the long, thin saplings growing through the shadows in search of sunlight. Rocks emerged from the damp, partially frozen ground frequently enough to allow footholds for a cautious traveler to maneuver himself downward. The only problem was that some of the rocks were solidly fixed in place, yet others had a less secure purchase in the hillside, and were naturally concealed deathtraps.

Only the most diehard fishermen ever came this way, and then only to the landing just at the waters edge, where a natural game trail continued on around the treacherously narrow bank of Siler’s Lake.

Niam moved quickly but carefully ahead of everyone else. There was no way he was about to allow Bug to scout ahead where the trail grew increasingly dangerous. Suddenly, without warning, his foot slipped out beneath him. His hands shot reflexively out at the last moment, and he managed to grab ahold of two tree trunks to swing over to a cleft in the steep hillside. Below him, the loose stones bounded down, leaping off of rocks jutting out from the face of the path, clattering into the shadows below. “Careful!” Niam shouted as he went ahead of everyone else. “The rocks are covered in wet ice!”

“You okay!” Davin called out to him in a worried voice.

“It’ll grow back, Niam called back through gritted teeth. “No worries.”

“I can’t imagine anybody doing this enough to make the paths we saw in the snow,” Davin said in a strained voice.

Something caught Niam’s eye before he had a chance to reply. It was a little thing—almost imperceptible among the frozen rocks and muddy earth.

A bolt of fear arrowed through him. “Um, Davin! Come take a look at this!”

Several long moments later, Davin leveraged himself between Niam and a large rock and looked over Niam’s shoulder.

“I only saw this because I happened to glance down after I nearly slipped. Look and tell me what you see.”

A subtle transformation took place in a line of the footprints winding down from above. Indeed, where the incline they traversed was more manageable, the smoothly rounded outline of footprints shifted and altered with each step, and what looked like the impression of long toes tapering to sharply tipped climbing claws emerged.

Davin looked . . . blinked . . . and looked harder. “Oh!” he said darkly.

“What now?” Maerillus’s asked.

“Nothing you want to see,” Niam said.

“Is it a trall?” Bug blurted out fearfully.

“Strictly speaking . . . I don’t think so,” Niam said thoughtfully. And then to Davin, he motioned with his hands, “Look here and up there—the transformations occur numerous times and so far as I know, tralls transform from human to beast one time.”

Davin looked over at him and asked, “What do you think it might be?”

Niam gave him the only answer he could think of. “Something else.”

“Once we hit the bottom I want everyone’s weapons drawn and ready,” Davin said. Niam and Maerillus both nodded. At the bottom, they came to a small clearing. To Niam’s back the hill rose like an implacable wall of rock and earth, and directly in front of him lay the lake his brother and sister had died in, black as death, cold as the grave, and as still as a dead man’s heart.

Niam pulled his staff from its strap and twirled it to limber up his arms after the tense climb. The wood whooshed in the air angrily. To Niam this was a good sound, the sound of wood and air conspiring to wreak bone-crunching havoc on anyone stupid enough to come within striking distance of his weapon.

Davin and Maerillus followed closely, and then Bug, who Davin had pushed to the rear. Niam insisted on taking the lead. When Davin protested, Niam said, “I have a better chance of feeling anything touched magic or sorcery.”

“My abilities kick in when danger’s close,” Davin argued.

Niam walked ahead without waiting to discuss the matter. “Sometimes yes, sometimes no. But when we’re storming a fortress you’ll be the first one in line.”

Davin huffed but left Niam enough room to employ his staff if things turned nasty. They followed the trail as it wound along the lake’s edge. Everyone grew quiet, because something dangerous might be waiting around the next turn. To the left, a narrow gorge opened up. Niam stopped and peered into the crevice. Because of narrow walls there, the sun rose late and set early in the gorge’s depths . . . and they were about as deep as they could go. Niam had never ventured this far past the little clearing at the foot of the steep and slippery path, and if they made this trip in summer or spring, the gap he peered into would have been concealed by the thick choke of shrubbery. Davin moved next to him and motioned with his head toward the opening. Niam approached the spot silently and edged his way between a series of boulders. Beyond them a path opened up, smoothed flat by occasional flash floods.

After several hundred paces, the trail tapered to an end, where a large fall of rocks had been pushed from the slope over thousands of years at nature’s incessant nudging. The footprints in the snow continued onward over the rocks, which rose like giant steps to a height above the trees.

One rock, however, caught Niam’s eye. A large boulder sat near the top of the rock fall in front of a bare spot in the hillside. Sunken into the stone was a recess that two men could walk through side-by-side, and the closer Niam got to it, the more the air seemed to hum and pulse, causing his stomach to clench to the rhythm issuing from above.

Niam jabbed his finger toward it and mouthed the word, “Sorcery” to Davin and Maerillus. His friends’ faces grew determined as they held their weapons ready.

Niam scrabbled up the rocks. Just before he made it to the deep recess above, he became aware that he was actually looking at was the entrance to a cave. Before he could turn around and say something, a hand closed on Niam’s shoulder and he nearly jumped.

“Let me go first,” Davin whispered. “We’re about to storm the fortress.”

Davin led them forward cautiously into the murky entrance. When he turned back to Niam, his eyes glowed like two yellow stars. Niam decided to take Davin’s lead, and closed his eyes for a moment focusing on extending his senses outward and into the cave before him, feeling for the lines of power he knew were there, seeking out the tale-tell signs of unmistakable sorcery.

As Niam did this, he realized just how much more finely attuned his senses were to the presence of magic. Behind them Bug gasped softly. Niam placed a finger over his lips and winked at her. Maerillus put an encouraging hand on her shoulder and mouthed the word, “Later.” Bug nodded her head, looking at their eyes in amazement.

Davin moved farther into the cave, and Niam’s feet crunched loudly on the pebbles carpeting the floor. If anyone was nearby, they knew someone had penetrated their lair. Yet no other sounds echoed along the stone walls.

As Niam inched his way along, Davin disappeared around a corner, and said in hushed tones, “I think we’re alone.”

Niam stepped up his pace and emerged into an opening about the size of Joachim’s study. “Somebody’s been living here,” Davin said. “For a while from the look of things.”

Niam’s eyes rapidly took in his surroundings. The far end of the cave contained a fire pit against the stone face that had been built using loose rocks to make use of the reflected heat given off by a steady flame. Over the pit ran a makeshift roasting spit. Reeds and straw had been laid down for bedding to soften the ground for a bedroll. Various pots sat along the wall several feet away from the hearth, and Niam saw that one of the pots was stained dark red, and for a moment his stomach twisted. He looked closely. The stains were too light to be blood. Beside the pot sat a rounded river rock stained on its bottom with the same dye. Whoever had been holed up in here appeared to have been using the rock to grind up dried berries.

“What is it?” Maerillus asked, keeping his voice only a little above a whisper.

Niam shook his head. “Not sure.”

A stack of wood sat piled neatly beside the fire pit, and an axe rested against the wall. Farther along the way, his eyes continued around the cave’s perimeter, moving past a large, oval shaped rock. The longer his attention rested on the rock, the more sour his stomach felt.

As he walked over to it, he caught minute sounds of furtive and desperate scraping against stone. Yet the wall in front of him was bare. Only rock met pebbles, and except for the campsite to his right, all else was bare. Moving closer now, Niam tilted his head, trying to identify the origin of the sound. Suddenly, felt his eyes widen as he realized what he was hearing. “There are people back here!” he said, alarmed.

“What?” Davin said in a tone echoing his own.

“More people,” Niam said. “They’re behind this round rock. It must be sealing them in!”

“Who would do that?” Maerillus asked in disgust, and from beside the rock, said, “He’s right. There are gouge marks where the rock has been rolled into place.”

Davin looked at the impression left on the cave floor and grimaced. “Hello!” he called out. “Can you hear me!?”

They waited to see if anyone heard Davin’s call. Nothing. The insistent scraping continued.

“Maybe they can’t hear us,” Maerillus offered. “Hit the wall with something.” He then began looking around for a rock large enough to strike the cave side with.

“Got it,” Niam told them hastily, retrieving the river stone used to grind food in the clay pot. He carried it over to the seal and began striking the cave wall just to the side of it.

That got a response. The scraping stopped and was followed by a muted thudding from the other side.

“They heard us,” he said urgently. “Do you think you can help me move this?” Niam asked Davin.

His friend moved to his side and said eagerly, “I’ve been wanting to try something like this.”

Niam gave him space. Davin wiped his hands dry and got a solid grip on the sides of the seal. With a loud grunt, he put all of his weight into the stone, causing the muscles in his arms bunch up. The veins and tendons running down his neck slowly became taut, and his face reddened by degrees. Several long moments went by as sweat began to bead on his forehead.

Except for the sound of his friend’s labored breathing, the cavern remained silent. Davin roared as his body began to jerk against the seal. “Move you maggot infested piece of trash! Move!” he growled. Niam watched as Davin’s face grew scarlet and blood began to trickle down where his fingertips dug into the abrasive stone surface.

A rough, grating sound issued from the cave floor. Inch-by-inch the stone slowly began to slide forward. Niam rushed in to help, but Davin shook his head violently. “No! This is mine!” In his eyes a fervid determination burned.

Davin strained and pushed, and slowly an opening large enough for a man to stoop and crawl through on all fours appeared. Within, black deepening into more black waited. When there was enough room for anyone trapped to escape, Davin fell back, panting.

For several moments all was silent.

Straining to use his gift to see what lay on the other side, Niam frowned. That was odd. Glowing lines of power surrounded several shifting shapes. Nervously, he moved forward to get a better view and was at last able to make out a number of people crawling across the floor, groping their way forward.

“They’re coming,” Niam said with uncertainty. He had a bad feeling about this. Why would someone glow with enough sorcerous energy to be this visible? “I think we should step back,” he said quickly. “There’s something wrong with these people.”

Behind them, Bug suddenly let out a sharp, terrified scream. The first person within the darkness began to emerge, a man wearing work overalls that fit his frame too loosely. The skin on his face was pulled tightly across his forehead, and his eye sockets were impossibly hollow, as if everything behind them had been drained out of his skull. The poor fellow’s skin was pallid and splotchy, and as Niam’s mind rapidly processed the sight, he knew why. The person crawling toward him had been dead for some time. Behind them, Bug screamed again.

“Trall!!!” she shrieked. And everything went to hell.