Esmeree sighs and finishes off her mug of courmi.  With a despondent finger, she shoves it beneath one of the countless leaks over the bar.  Slowly, the mug begins to fill with dirty rainwater.  Despite the incessant rain outside, she suspects there is more mud and water inside the Orphan’s Bag than out.

To make matters worse, her ember has been acting up all day.  Phantoms swirl across her vision—she keeps hearing voices and dodging things that aren’t there—and her homunculus won’t answer questions as to why.  It’s like an itch she can’t scratch.

Ongram shifts slightly across the bar from her.  “Sä, how was yer trip tä Ceilbyrig?”

“Other than wet and pointless?” she sighs.

“Yäh.”

Esmeree shakes her head.  “It wasn’t hard to find the information I needed…  It just wasn’t the information I wanted.”

“What do yä mean?”

She shrugs.  “Hiisi’s slavers booked passage on the EroBernac steamers that sail out of Ceilbyrig every month or two.  They piled our sorcerers in as cargo.  Called ‘em slaves.”

“Sä where did the ships go?”

Esmeree grimaces.  “It’s a regular route.  South to Ehre, then to Mut, across to EroBernd, up to Palpin, and then back here.”

“Sä…”

“So, the sorcerers could be anywhere!  Ehre, Mut, EroBernd, somewhere in-between.  I’ll have to travel to all their ports, ask around if anyone saw any slaves unloaded...”

“That’s a lot of travellin’, uh?”

“Yäh.  Travelling I can’t do no more.  Not with Myrdd, not with Iall.  Not with the price on my head.  It’s a dead end.”  She sighs deeply, “I’ve failed him, Ongram.  Surely the boy is dead by now.”

Ongram grunts.  “Perhaps, perhaps not.  At least yä’ve narrowed down yer options, yäh?”

His smile deteriorates beneath her glare.  Looking back down at his cards, he mumbles, “’S yer play, inigena.”

Esmeree stares down at the cards in her hand without enthusiasm.  Playing maru-catu isn’t much fun in the first place, but when you’re not even wagering money, well, what the Hells is the point?

She draws and plays her discard without much consideration.  EroBernac maru-catu conveniently omits the folklore aspect of its Brackish cousin, but its rules are consequently more onerously complex.  At least she has Myrdd to help her.

The old man leans closer.  “Ah!” he exclaims, “The four of gæsum reinforces the pilgrims of the dunum.  Interesting.”

Ongram grunts in surprise and takes a closer look at Esmeree’s discard.

As Ongram ponders her bafflingly arbitrary—and yet somehow brilliant—strategy, she looks over at the only other occupant of the bar.  The solitary ahrounoi remains where it has sat all day, its grotesque automata standing dutifully nearby.  The dwarf drinks regularly and copiously, desperately trying to get drunk on human alcohol.  The automata is completely immobile, blasting air flatulently from strange vents in its fleshy joints.  Aside from the rain and Myrdd’s running commentary, it’s been the only sound in the bar for hours.

Esmeree has never seen an ahrounoi before—at first, she was even tempted to summon Iall for a look as well—but its continuous lack of interesting behavior has dampened her enthusiasm.  For some reason, however, her ember keeps drawing a glowing aura around it.

Ongram sighs and throws down a card with disgust.  Myrdd purses his lips and clucks as he contemplates the play.  Turning back to the game, Esmeree leans forward and stares at the card Ongram just threw.  It portrays a man who, eyes heavenward, is about to step off a cliff.

Every suit in maru-catu has a cuall card, but the cuall of the man suit is the most powerful in the deck—or the least—certainly the most enigmatic.  It is for good reason that it is called the Pure Fool.

“Ha!  Ha!” Myrdd giggles.  “What will my child play now?”

She picks the card up for a closer look.  Her finger thoughtfully traces its border, her mind no longer on the game.  She’s been handling maru-catu cards for most of her life—ever since she became the Lady’s apprentice—but she’s never really looked closely at the Pure Fool.  Now she sees the blue designs running up and down his arms and legs.

“Huh,” she sighs as she tosses the card back on the table.  “He’s got tattoos just like you.”

Ongram raises his eyebrows and picks up the cuall of man for another look as well.  Esmeree uses the opportunity to steal some cards from the deck.  “Uh,” he grunts as he examines the card closely.  “Seems he does, yäh?  Never noticed that before.”

Esmeree plays the seven of man—the Incunabula—and the ten of bri’ua—Faith—to counter the Pure Fool and then lays down two more number cards as an attack.  Ongram laughs.  The Pure Fool will make the rest of this game unpredictable, and Ongram is better at EroBernac rules than she is.

“Hmmn,” she groans with ennui as Ongram begins shuffling through his cards again.  “I’m not sure how much more of this rain I can take.”

Ongram nods as he peruses his hand.  “It’s the season.  Probably won’t let up much ‘til after Frost Season when the cauaros migrate, uh?”

“You know,” she adds, “I saw a man with tattoos like yours back in Cliffs Reach.”

“Yäh?” he asks, only partially interested.

“Yeah, ‘cept he had a lot more than you.  He was covered in them.  Head to toe.  Had a big sword too.”

Esmeree toys with her courmi mug, now nearly half full of rainwater.  Outside, she can hear Iall laughing and playing in the muddy downpour.  Damn pektus.  She never tires.

Down the bar from her, the ahrounoi impatiently raps its mug against the wood for another refill.  With each blow, its aura pulses brightly.  Eventually, one of Ongram’s donas materializes to freshen its drink.  With a glare at Ongram (obviously wishing he’d pay more attention to his paying customers), the wife disappears again without a word.

But of course the wife doesn’t say anything, Esmeree muses, she has no tongue!  She frowns as a thought occurs to her.  Now why would Ongram have tongueless wives if he isn’t really a Brack?

“Hey, Ongram, wh—” her voice trails away when she sees the expression on his face.  “What?” she demands a little defensively.  He hasn’t moved since she last looked at him.

“What do yä mean he was covered in tattoos?”

She frowns.  “Just what I said!  Every inch of him.”

He hesitates before shaking his head.  “Nage.  How’d yä know that, uh?  Maybe his arms and legs, but yä couldn’t see through his clothes, yäh?”

Esmeree taps the side of her nose with her finger.  She can see Ongram’s testing her.  “By the Prophets, I do know it.  See, the man was butt-naked, and he was covered with the blue swirly things.  Head to toe.”

“I don’t believe yä.”

“Believe me or not.  I have his sword.  Brought it with me.  I can show you.”

“His sword?”

“Yäh, a mirain thing.  Long, slender, elegant.  Heavy as Gock’s scales though.  Couldn’t imagine how you’d swing it around.”

“Yä’d be surprised,” Ongram mutters.

“Did you know,” she says, leaning forward, “The damn thing doesn’t rust?  Had it up in our room for days in this damp weather.  Even my little Palpi blade’s needed oiling and polishing once in a while.  But not that monster.  Doesn’t rust, tarnish, or need sharpening.  It’s as sharp as the day I found it.”

Ongram blinks.  “Amazin’.  Tell me about him.  Where’d yä see him?  Where’d he go?  How’d yä get his sword?”

She shakes her head.  “Not much to tell.  The Inquisition killed him.”

Much to Esmeree’s surprise, Ongram looks shaken, stunned, as though he just suffered a personal loss.  “Nage…” he whispers pathetically.

Feeling the need to fill the silence that follows, she adds, “I saw him alive only briefly.  It was a… strange experience.”

He looks up blearily at her.  “Why was that?”

Esmeree frowns at the memory.  Her ember begins to tingle with sympathy, but she manages to stop it before it summons.  “He was being led through the streets, and he just looked at me.  It was… it was like he reached out and touched my anatlon, my stone, something…  I was filled with his magic all of a sudden, and I couldn’t see right.  My stone came alive and burned as though it was on fire.”  She looks at Ongram with confusion.  “It was as though he gave me a piece of him—left a piece of him with me before he died—because he knew he was going to die.  It’s happened to me before, but only with people who I had been close to and never so strongly.”

Ongram nods sadly.  “Asps are said tä be very powerful magicians, though I’ve never heard of one castin’ spells.”

“Asps?” she asks incredulously, “As in the castles game piece?  The little knight-horse things?”

Ongram shrugs.

“Asp is an Ulbandi word, Esmeree,” Myrdd pipes up.  “A class of mounted warrior, now unknown in the Seven Kingdoms.  In Bredbeddle’s Crusade, before the time of Kahedin, they were all driven out of Medianist lands.  Their only legacy is the castles piece that was named after them.  I told you about them years ago—but you were just a little girl—I don’t expect you’d remember…”

Esmeree looks at Myrdd with some alarm.  It has been a while since he’s actually participated in any conversations or shown any ability to discern the past from the present.  Perhaps he’s getting better after all.

Perhaps she’d better start watching what she says around him.

She looks back at the barkeeper.  “So, these asps are magicians?  Sorcerers?  What kind of sorcerer doesn’t cast spells?”

Ongram scratches at his beard as he nods.  “These kind.  There is a difference between castin’ magic and bein’ magical, yäh?  They are holy men, warriors, tricksters, and whatever else yä can think of tä call them.  The dragon coils they wear are bound tä their stones.  The more coils, the larger their stone.”

Esmeree is surprised.  She points at Ongram’s tattooed arm.  “So you’re a sorcerer?  You have a stone?”  It had never occurred to her to check.

Ongram grimaces awkwardly.  “Nage…  The asps hold the belief that everyone has some sort of stone, na matter how small.  They believe everyone is capable of some kind of sorcery, sä anyone can be rewarded with coils.  Just not that many of them, uh?”

“I’ve never heard of such a thing!”

“’Tis an old legend.  It tries tä explain why only humans have stones and why only humans can be sorcerers.”

“Do you know it?”

He looks uncomfortable.  “Not well.”

“I thought you were the one that was full of stories, odocos.”

He quickly clears away the cards of their game, laying down only the Pure Fool before her.  “Tä be an asp, a Pure Fool, means tä have a stone of great size.  It is said they are their stones.”

“That’s impossible!” Esmeree exhales.

“Sä yä says.  The coils protect them, sä they have little use fer clothes.  This is why they are called ‘sky-clad’.”  Ongram shrugs.  “If he was as covered with coils as yä says, then he was such a man.”

“How many asps are there?”

He shakes his head sadly.  “Not many, and now less one.”

He leans forward and taps the maru-catu card for emphasis.  “He came tä Cliffs Reach—tä you—fer a reason, Esmeree.  Knowin’ those paranoid Medianist lands would be the death of him, he came tä deliver a message.”

“What message?” she demands.

Ongram nods.  “That’s fer yä tä discover.  He has done his work and has died fer it.  It is now up tä yä tä learn his purpose.  Fer his sake and yers, yä must see this through.”

“And how do you expect me to do that?” she snaps.

“There is another asp, one known tä the Bracks around here.”

“Another one?”

Ongram nods.  “I’ve heard tales of him fer as long as I’ve been in Ceilbyrig.  He’s been hauntin’ these Ymyl Gwland lands fer decades.  He must be very old by now.”

Esmeree laughs.  “And what makes you think he’s still alive, then?”

“Hope.  Prayer.  Faith.  Plus, I know of others who have sought him out.”

“And they found him?”

Ongram shakes his head.  “They never returned.”  He smiles at Esmeree’s stunned expression.  “He lived in a placed called the Locus Amoenus.  I can show yä how tä get there.”

“Locus Amoenus?” she snaps sarcastically.  “You know that means the Wonderful Place?  My!  It certainly sounds safe!”

“There is someone or somethin’ out there, Esmeree,” Ongram agrees with severity.  “I can only hope it is our asp.”

“You can hope?  How about me?  You want me to go running off after some crusty old legend—some bottomless pit that no others have returned from—and you are hoping?”

The old barkeep smiles boyishly.  “Well, yäh, but I imagine yer a bit concerned too.”

Esmeree pushes away from the bar with a disgusted snort.

“Esmeree,” Ongram asks quietly, “Is there any other way?  I was not there with yä when yä saw the asp, but I can see how it affected yä—”

“A lot of things have affected me since last we met, vitchoor,” she snarls.  “Shall I list them for you?”

“…but there is na other option,” he continues calmly.  “Yä must understand!  These men are rare!  Fer one tä sacrifice himself, it must have been fer an important reason!  If yä want answers, I don’t see any other solution.”

Without thinking, Esmeree kicks a stool angrily—a lot harder than she intended—and the wooden seat skids across the floor and, to Esmeree’s horror, comes dangerously close to hitting the ahrounoi patron.  At the very last second, its automata bends and plucks the projectile off the floor.  Almost daintily, it rights the stool and sets it back down.

“Talk, talk, paap knows,” the ahrounoi says, turning slowly in its seat.  Its voice is filled with inappropriate inflections and bizarre accents.  “Interesting paap, yes.  Ahrounoi paap knows asp knights.  Ahrounoi paap play castles game too.”

Esmeree and Ongram look at each other.  Ongram shrugs.

“I’m sorry,” Esmeree says to the ahrounoi.  “We don’t understand you.”

The ahrounoi blinks its large black eyes.  “Talk, talk, paap not you-paap.  Talk, talk, paap knows castles game.”

Esmeree looks at Ongram.  “What is it talking about?”

“It’s talkin’ about playin’ a game of castles, I suppose.”

Esmeree shakes her head.  “I’ve heard stories about these dw—”  She stops herself just in time.  “ahrounoi.  They’re insane.”

Ongram chuckles.  The ahrounoi raps its mug against the bar angrily.  Again, its aura pulses brightly.  “Talk, talk, paap not lukk-mad.  Paap play castles game too.”  It points at Esmeree.  “Talk, talk, black asp not capture white asp.”

Her ember buzzes almost uncontrollably.  Flickers of magic color her eyesight.  Ongram laughs at the meaningless words and shakes his head, leaving bright trails in the air, but Esmeree rocks back on her heels as though slapped.  Through the haze of magic clouding her head, she realizes the damn ahrounoi is right.  In the game of castles, asp can never take asp.  They are never on the same color square.  It is just a fact of the game, and it never occurred to her to wonder why.  It never occurred to her to think it was significant.

But maybe it is.

Suddenly, Ongram’s bar blurs away, only to be replaced by a vision of her castles game with Verole.  Asps, artillery, rukhs, infantry, sorcerers, sappers.  The pieces shift and jockey for position on the board.  Slowly, they change from pieces of ivory and ebony to men of true muscle and steel.  As each piece is tipped over, flesh and red blood spills across the worn stone of the castle.  This is no longer a game but a true war.

She looks up at her opponent and realizes that he is not Verole after all—he is the Deacon Mummenschanz… or is he Primate Klemm?  It is difficult for her to discern the two.  The first time she played with Verole, the stakes were her life.  What are the stakes of this game?  Esmeree is afraid to ask.

As she struggles to move her pieces, strengthening defenses or abandoning those that are hopeless, she quickly realizes the defenders of her castle are horribly outmatched.  Her defenders are few while the attackers bring a staggering array of soldiery to the field.  With only a crumbling dunum as her castle, her warriors are just brave, yet simple Brackish cings, striving to hold off the legions of Seven Kingdoms musketeers and cannon.  The Primate’s sorcerers are clever, lethal, and experienced.  Hers are confused, disorientated, and serving little purpose.  One is a dark-haired girl of great power but little experience.  The other is ancient, strange, and difficult to motivate.  She wants to use him but cannot understand how his piece moves.

Primate Klemm simply laughs, moving his units with speedy, lethal efficiency.  She can’t keep up, and sometimes he takes two moves to her one.  It is through her own inaction that her only rukh is slain.

Watching the carnage from high above, Esmeree screams to her sorcerers.  She sees the gambit the Primate is preparing, and she tries to warn them.  She tries to tell them their strength is greatest when they are joined—it is only in that way that they can hope to defeat the Medianists—but the sorcerers cannot hear her commands and instead try to lead their cings from different parts of the dunum.

At last, she prays, begging God to help her, and He answers.  There is a tingling in her ember, and she discovers she can now communicate through the stones of her sorcerers—in fact, she realizes she always has been connected to them—she just never was able to see it.  Finally, her sorcerers understand.  They come together, and their hands touch.

With a flash of magic, Esmeree stands face-to-face with the Primate, their hands closed around the neck of a fine chalice.  They struggle over possession of the grail, pulling and straining against each other with all their might.  Straining against the old man, Esmeree manages to tip the cup, and water pours over the castles board.  Some pieces are washed away, others are simply knocked over.  Klemm screams in horror and rage.  The game is ruined.

Or is it?

Suddenly, a third player joins the game.  One at a time, he places his pieces on the board, arraying them against Klemm’s army of the Seven Kingdoms.

Esmeree looks up into the eyes of an alf.

“Esmeree?”

She blinks and shakes her head.

“Esmeree?” Ongram repeats again, concern touching his voice.

She touches his hand and nods.  “It’s OK.  I’m OK.”

“Yä were gone again.”

“Did I say anything?”

He smiles and shakes his head.  “Not this time.”

He shuffles the thick deck of maru-catu cards.  “Anythin’ useful, uh?”

Esmeree laughs and shrugs.  “I don’t know.  I think so.  I hope so.”

At long last, her ember is calmed—the colors are gone—and she can see normally again.  She looks around the bar and frowns.  “Where’s that ahrounoi?  I’d like to thank it.”

“Ahrounoi?” Ongram grunts in surprise.  “Didn’t know we had any in the Orphan’s Bag.  Not the season fer ‘em, yäh?”

She looks around the bar.  Save her, Myrdd, and Ongram, the room is empty.  “But… it was drinking over there all day.”

He shakes his head.  “Been here all day.  Haven’t seen na dwarves.  Just yä—and yä just comes in and stares off in tä space fer a while—‘til yä wakes up just now.”

Esmeree numbly sags into her stool, and Ongram presses a full mug of courmi into her hand.  “Care fer a game of maru-catu?  EroBernac rules, o’ course.”  He begins dealing the cards without waiting for her to answer.

She finishes her drink quickly and sets the mug down.  With a despondent finger, she shoves it beneath one of the countless leaks over the bar.  Slowly, the mug begins to fill with dirty rainwater.

“Ongram,” she says as he picks up his hand and begins sorting his cards, “Tell me about the asps.  Tell me about the knights that wear the dragon’s coils.”

vvv

A gray sun briefly pokes its rays through the rain-swollen clouds.  Esmeree’s marka is impatient to be off, and she has to struggle to keep it in place.

“I still don’t understand why yer leavin’,” Ongram grumbles.

Esmeree squints up at the sun and nods.  “It’s hard to explain.  Suffice it to say most of my life, I’ve broken promises.  For once, I’d like to fulfill one.  And… I think this is something I have to do.”

Ongram chews on this for a moment and then nods.  “Fair enough.  Yä alsä goin’ tä this Locus Amoenus place of yers?”

She looks back at him and tries to blink the sunlight from her eyes.  “Sure,” she says.  “If I can find it, but I’ll not get my hopes up.  Ymyl Gwland is a big place.”

“Aye.  The Ongram of yer vision seems tä be more informed than this one.  I’m sorry fer that.”  He nods.  “Not tä worry.  If yer meant tä find it—and by the sounds of it, yä are—then yä will.”

Iall rushes up from the barn, her bare legs churning the thick mud.  “Esmeree!  Esmeree!  Don’t leave yet!”

Esmeree kneels and lets the little girl plow into her.  Ignoring the knee-deep mud, she holds her tight.  “I’d not leave without saying goodbye first,” she murmurs.

“Will you be gone long?”  The girl’s voice is muffled by Esmeree’s hair.

“Only as long as I have to, inigena,” she whispers.  She catches Ongram’s eye.  “Not a second longer.”

Gently pushing Iall away, she looks into her eyes and wags a finger.  “Now.  While I’m gone, you’ll be doing your exercises, right?”

“Yes,” Iall pouts.  She is near tears.

“And you’ll be doing the chores gwledig Ongram gives you, right?”

“Yes, Esmeree.”

“And you’ll help odocos Myrdd with his chores when he needs it, right?  You know how he gets confused.”

“Yes, Esmeree.”

Esmeree embraces the girl tightly one more time.  She’s never had a child of her own—and with her ember, she isn’t sure if she ever can—but somehow this orphan has touched her more than nearly any other fry she’s known.  Looking into her eyes, Esmeree is reminded of poor, sweet Baran, and her heart nearly breaks.  He would almost be a man by now had he lived.  Esmeree is resolved to see Iall grow to a fine, strong young lady.

Kissing Iall one last time on her muddy forehead, Esmeree rises and looks at Ongram.  “You take care of my child, man,” she growls sternly in Brackish.  “I come home and find her short a tongue, I’ll take something equally valuable from you, yäh?”

Ongram chuckles and nods.  “Yes, my daughter.  I’ll take good care of her.”

Esmeree swings into her saddle and then leans down to kiss him.  As they part, she grabs him by the beard and pulls him back to her painfully.  “One more thing,” she whispers, “You promise me now, no matter what the repercussions, you’ll never offer her up to the rraakks as tribute, yäh?”

Ongram momentarily looks surprised and angry, but then he blinks and nods.  “Of course not.  I promise.”

She rewards him with another kiss.  This time, it is Ongram who pulls her back.  “Yä’ll not reconsider this?”

“No.  This is something I have to do.”

“Very well then… I have somethin’ tä tells yä.  Yä know me, inigena, uh?  People talk, I hear things—they trust me tä keep me mouth shut—sä I risks a lot in tellin’ yä this.”

“What is it?”

“There’s talk that the Medianists know yer in Ymyl Gwland—in Ceilbyrig—maybe even in the Orphan’s Bag.  They say they’ll be sendin’ someone here tä bring yä back tä them.  Bounty-hunters and soldiers and the like.  The Inquisition in Cærimonia wants yä, Esmeree.”

Esmeree shudders briefly, reflexively.  “I doubt they’ll be able to take me so easily now,” she hopes she sounds more confident than she feels, “but thank you for the warning.”

“Yä take a ship tä Ehre,” he warns, “and they’ll know yer there almost as soon as yä step ashore.”

“All the better then,” she states.  “They’ll leave this place and you and my friends alone.”

“We can hope,” he nods.  “Sä yä’ll still be leavin’?”

She smiles.  “Yäh, of course.”

“Then the blessin’s of Hoël be upon yä, me inigena.  May Suptra guide yer heart and yer feet.”

They embrace awkwardly one last time.  With a smile and a wave to Iall, she spurs her marka out of the dunum.  Iall runs along side for as long as she can, waving and crying, but slowly she falls behind.  Esmeree doesn’t look back.

In winter, people rarely look happy setting foot in Ceilbyrig for the first time.  There is little here to look forward to, and even the optimists quickly discover the conditions onboard ship are preferable.  There is the mud, the rain, the smell.  It never quite gets cold enough to kill off the insects, and carpets of biting black flies cover anything that doesn’t move.

The tenor of the individuals preparing the leave is dramatically different.  The excitement in the air is electrifying.  It’s almost like a Harvest Festival.

Standing on the deck her small sailing ship, Esmeree is in a dark mood.  How could she expect Ongram to understand?  The dead-end here in Ceilbyrig shattered her.  She has vowed to herself to find Maponos.  She has vowed to wreck the plans of the Primate.  To come up empty-handed here in this desolate, muddy place was nearly more than she could bear.  Poor Maponos is most surely dead by now, and that is one promise she failed to keep.  By exposing the Viscount, she hopes she has slowed the murderous plans of the Primate, but she is far from thwarting them totally.

“Patience,” her ember urges.  “Refugees from the Bracklands will continue to fill Ymyl Gwland.  So long as they do, the Primate will still come to Ceilbyrig to capture their sorcerers.”

“Why would you say that?”

“The Primate is popular, but his circle rituals and demonic pacts are not.  Despite the pious rhetoric you may hear from the wizards and priests, his is a position of politics, not prayer.  Should news of his behavior become common knowledge, his rivals will most certainly remove him.  Therefore, until he can claim the title of Prophet, he must move in the shadows.  His ceremonies must remain hidden.  His enslaved sorcerers must be brought to him in secret.”

Esmeree nods to herself.  “And the only place these things can be done in the required numbers is here in Ceilbyrig.”

“Yes.  There are some other places in the Southern Territories, and it is possible he has privateers operating as slavers along the Brackish and Chroani coasts—plus, you never know about the Synesi—but for the most part, Ceilbyrig is perfect.”

Esmeree grips the rough wooden railing as her ship drifts from its moorings.  Catching the brisk winter winds, its sails fill, and it pulls away from the town.

She shakes her head.  The one thing her ember has never been able to admit is the distinct possibility of her getting killed pursuing her little crusades, but the vision of her crucifixion before the gates of Cærimonia still haunts her.  Who can blame her for having a fatalistic attitude?

One thing is for sure:  She will not die with so many obligations hanging over her.

“Rest assured, Esmeree,” her ember promises, “Agents of the Primate will be back in Ceilbyrig.”

She nervously passes her alf’s seed from hand to hand as she stares out across the choppy Skudd Sea.  “And we will be waiting for them.”

vvv

“Now, vere exactly are jû vantin’ us to take jû?”  The Captain’s eyes narrow suspiciously as he opens the rough map before Esmeree.  He is a lean Mynyddi, his face ritually scarred into a frightening grimace.  “Vee go from here to here!”  He indicates first Ceilbyrig and then the northern Ehrech city of Camboglanna.  “Elsevhere, ist not jûr business.”

Esmeree looks at the map he offers and tries to pick out landmarks.  The problem with maps is each one is drawn by someone different.  Rarely does one ever resemble another.  She picks out a likely inlet on the great Ehrech peninsula, one sufficiently far away from any major cities and yet still close to Ymyl Gwland.  She’d rather not have to deal with any Medianists and rather not stay on this ship any longer than she has to.  “Here would be fine, Captain Messer.”

He looks at the point she indicates with some surprise.  “Not many people there, mergâ.  Who’re jû looking to meet?  Alfs?”

Messer and his crew laugh, and Esmeree chuckles along with them.  She shakes her head knowingly.  “Everyone knows, man moves forward in the winter.  Come summer, it’s time for man to retreat.  Such is the nature of the war.”  She bites her lip, hoping she sounds like she knows what she’s talking about.

“Ah,” Messer nods.  “Jû got zum Ehrech sweetheart vaiting for jû in the thick Fée forests, jâ?”

Esmeree hesitates, a little too long perhaps.

“Hmmn…” Messer growls with realization.  “Ne lovags to meet the vîrinâ, jâ?  Zumthing zecret.  This is why jû take Messer’s ship, jâ?”

Esmeree curses herself.  Damn these bagaudas pirates.  “I chose you and your ship for the timeliness of your departure, the convenience of your route, and the speed of your vessel…”

“Jâ,” Messer nods laughingly, “so convenient vee are alzo zmugglers, jâ?”  He waves away Esmeree’s retort.  “It OK.  Vee all haf zecrets.  Jû keep jûrs.  Vee take jû to jûr zecret place.”  He taps the spot on the map where Esmeree indicated.  “Jûr silver is good with us.  Two days—maybe three—if winds are bad.”

With a flourish, Messer rolls the map up and slides it back into its waterproof leather tube.  No longer interested in what she has to say, he and his crew merely stare at her, evidently waiting for her to retreat below decks.

Esmeree turns away without another word, but instead of heading for her tiny cabin, she moves to the bow of the ship.  Straddling the stem with her legs, she sits and watches the incoming swells and troughs as the tiny sloop surges southward across the Skudd.

The water is rough and the air is bitingly cold—but her ember protects her from both—and she is able to enjoy the brisk spray across her face.  Glittering schools of tiny silver fish leap from the ship’s surging prow.  She watches as the rolling green hills of Ymyl Gwland slowly turn to rocky bluffs and jagged reefs.  The surf smashes into the coastline in spectacular fountains of foam and water.  Lounging high above the waves, fat slug-like animals worm their brown bodies around on the rock, jostling for the few patches of warm sunlight and barking at each other irritably.

She is grumbling irritably herself.  Fact of the matter is, she did pick this ship for its size and speed.  Of course, the fact that they specialize in smuggling and other acts frowned upon by the Seven Kingdoms also assisted her in her decision.  They would hardly consider turning her over to the Medianists, lest their own crimes catch up with them… or so she hopes.

But Esmeree holds no illusions about the company she keeps.  She’s seen the eyes of Captain Messer, she’s seen the eyes of the other nine men of his crew.  She knows she’ll have to keep her guard up.

She’s a long way from the dirty streets of Cliffs Reach.  These are sites she never thought she’d see, places she never thought she’d visit.  And now she’s heading alone into a Fée forest during a war!

She shudders fearfully.  This is just too much!

“You’re not alone, Esmeree,” her ember whispers comfortingly.

She clutches at her chest, feeling the reassuring hardness beneath her skin.

“You want food?”

Esmeree wakes with a start.  It is past sundown, the only light left is a fading maroon bruise across the western sky.  She notes with surprise that thick forests have replaced the rocks of the coastline.

How long has she been sitting here?

“You want food, fremder?”

She looks up into the eyes of the sloop’s youngest sailor.  Also being the smallest, it seems this Muttese boy’s given only the most hazardous of tasks onboard.  His unattractive face bears numerous scars, and his hands are missing fingers.  He moves among the other crewmen with a skittishness she has seen all too often in the Mill.  She surmises the crew takes their pleasure from him when women are unavailable.

The boy takes a step backwards as she rises.  Wiping the seawater from her face, she realizes she’s soaked to the bone and salt has crystallized in her eyebrows and hair.  By all rights, she should be near death from the cold, and the fact that she is not has impressed and terrified the crew.

Squeezing the water from her long hair, she smiles at the young sailor.  “Yes.  I am hungry.  Please have it brought to my cabin.  I’ll be waiting there.”

vvv

“Zo, tell me zumethin’, mangâ,” the big Mynyddi leans insolently into her tiny cabin.  “Vat ist really vaitin’ for us in Ehre?”

Esmeree glances up at him as she finishes tying her hair back.  The sailor is Heg, Messer’s brutally effective boatswain.  In her time since she’s come onboard, she’s seen him terrorize the other crewmen with regularity.  He could be Hair Thumb’s long lost offspring.

Standing up, she barely reaches his chin, yet she manages to look the big sailor in the eye and smile.  “Do you think I don’t speak Mynyddi?” she asks sweetly.  “Is that why you call me a mangâ?  Or are you just a elfajzott who doesn’t know any better?”

The sailor sneers toothlessly.  His left eye is milky white—that side of his face is an ugly mass of scars—the results of the injuries suffered when a hawser he was working near snapped free.  “So jû speaks the tongue?”  He shrugs.  “Maybe jû should proof me wrong?”

Esmeree grimaces as she goes about collecting her few possessions.  “I think you need to visit your pegboy first.  You have a bit too much energy.”

Heg laughs sharply, nastily.  “Jâ, maybe I vill, if vee zurfife.”

Esmeree pauses in her work.  “What is that supposed to mean?”

“So jû takin’ us to Fée lands?”  He gestures out her small window towards the dark green mass of forest covering the shores outside.  They passed the Fists of Gock yesterday morning, slipping unchallenged across the busy trade routes.  The lands they are passing now are Ehrech, the forests they are passing belong to the alfs.  Today should be Esmeree’s last onboard this ship.  “Fery dangerous, jâ?  Strange things happen in those dervâ—many Fée, many witches—ve’re thinkin’ vee need to know more.  Dangerous lands just ashore, vîrinâ.  Dangerous for a mergâ alone, jâ?  Too dangerous maybe for us to just to stop and let jû off?”

Heg leans closer, “Maybe there is some kind of assurance?  Zomethin’ jû can tell us?”

Esmeree slips her scimitar’s belt around her waist.  She takes note of the careful way his eyes follow its hilt.  He’s worried that she’s preparing for a fight; that means he’s already ready for one.

“What’s the matter, jûrinîkas?”  She steps closer to him, letting neither his size nor his proximity intimidate her.  “Are you afraid?”

He tries to stand his ground but eventually finds himself taking an unwanted step backwards.  Esmeree can have a very intense stare when she wants it; it’s a lesson she learned from her Lady.  Off balance, Heg nods.

“Jâ, I’m afraid,” he mumbles.  He suddenly points at Esmeree, “and jû should be too.  I’m wonderin’ why jû’re not?”

“Where is that courage the Mynyddi are so famous for, huh?” Esmeree laughs as she pushes past him.  “You do your legendary lovags proud.”

She moves towards the ladder leading above decks but is stopped short when he grabs her by the shoulder.  The power in her ember flares, and she has to struggle to keep it from summoning.  No, not yet.

“Ve’re thinkin’,” Heg growls in her ear, “that maybe it too dangerous, jâ?  Maybe vee can’t let jû off out there.”

Esmeree doesn’t turn around.  “What are you saying?”

“Maybe vee take jû a bit further zouth?  Maybe to Camboglanna?  Nice and safe, and jû can walk back, jâ?”

“That won’t be acceptable.”

“Ne?” Heg clucks, “Shame.”  He moves closer, and she can feel his breath on her ear.  “Vell, perhaps vee can make zum zort of deal?”

“Like what?”

“Jû a good Medianist mergâ?  Jû not cavortin’ with Fée?  So jû must have gold in those dervâs, jâ?  Treasure?  Jû’re zuch a pretty, zmall mergâ.  It cannot be much?  Zmall, but very, very valuable, jâ?”

Esmeree’s silence is disconcerting to him.  He squeezes her shoulder painfully.  “Here’s the deal.  Vee let jû off, vee help jû find jûr treasure, vee take half.  Vee all part as friends, ginês, jâ?”

Esmeree’s ember discharges, the shock sending the Mynyddi sailor sprawling backwards.  She turns and looks down at him as he struggles to regain his feet.  “You tell your crewmates, we will be disembarking where I specified.  There is no treasure.  There are no alfs.  You will get your promised fee, and we will go our separate ways.  Friends.”

She turns and climbs up on deck.  “Vee shall zee, jâ?” he sneers behind her.

Beneath a misty rain, the sloop glides easily into the small bay.  Esmeree stands at her usual spot on the stem and eyes the thick forest.  Heg barks sharp orders, and in a flurry of activity, the crew drops their sails.  The anchor disappears into the dark water with a splash, and slowly the ship eases to a stop nearly 100 yards from shore.

The air is still, and Esmeree can easily hear the rain’s patter against the water.  Gulls screech overhead, and somewhere, waves smash against distant reefs.  Dark, heavy fog fills the air and clings to the mossy trunks of the trees on shore.

This forest is different from the ones Esmeree has seen before.  This late into Hard Winter, the trees of Gwrach Forest outside of Cliffs Reach would have totally lost their leaves, leaving it an eerie wasteland of snow-covered skeletons.  But here, though their limbs are bent and twisted by the ocean winds, the trees are still thick with dark emerald foliage.

Esmeree turns and discovers with some shock that the crew is armed.  Each carries a marlinespike or cutlass.  Some have pistols and rifles.

Esmeree looks at Messer.  “What is this?”

The reaver captain tests the edge of his heavy blade.  “It’s a dangerous land, vîrinâ.”

“Surely, the alfs couldn’t reach you this far off shore!”

“Ne,” Messer shakes his head thoughtfully as he approaches.  “But vee’ll zurely be needin’ our arms in those dervâ there.”

Esmeree struggles with her fear.  “As I told your man, Heg,” she says, a bit too quickly she fears, “I’ll need no escort into these woods.”

“Ne,” he says.  “I don’t play games like me bo's'n.”  He presses the point of his cutlass against her chest, just below her collarbone.  “Vee’ll be comin’ with jû into that dervâ.  Vee’ll be zeein’ vat there is, vat jû vant there.  If vee like it, vee’ll take our share and leave jû.”

The tip of the blade twists against her shirt.  “And if vee don’t like it, vee’ll take our share from jû, jâ?”

The Mynyddi cutlass is heavy and brutal, as much at home cutting rope or chopping down trees as it is dismembering opponents.  Esmeree does not relish the idea of meeting its power with her delicate scimitar.

She smiles.  Without hesitation or warning, she turns and leaps off the ship.

She surfaces to the shouts of outrage coming from onboard.  The water boils as crewmen dive in after her.  Kicking her legs, she swims hard for the shore, her ember powering her strokes.  Silently, she thanks Craig for his compulsory swimming lessons.

Distantly, she hears thunder rock the air, and tiny explosions shatter the surface of the water.  She realizes with some shock that they’re shooting at her just as something heavy tears through her back.  It feels as though a lance of molten steel was thrust through her body.  She screams as she goes under, and her stomach and lungs fill with seawater.  Opening her eyes, she sees bits of cloth and bone floating in the dark ribbons of her blood.  Even as she wonders where all the blood is coming from, her vision begins to darken.

Just as consciousness is about to wink out, her ember summons, and she feels her numbing limbs begin to move.  Without knowing how, she surges back to the surface, arms and legs writhing.  Sand is suddenly beneath her feet, and she struggles out of the surf.

Behind her, Heg and three other sailors swim towards her.  The rest of the crew is following in a dinghy.

Looking down, she sees a gaping wound beneath her left breast, an angry red blossom of pumping blood and shattered bone.  With giddy amusement, she figures there’s a hole straight through her, and as she runs away, she wonders if her pursuers will be able to see daylight through her.

Laughing mindlessly, she staggers into the forest just as the first of the sailors pulls himself from the breakers.

Esmeree crashes through the forest, mindless of where she is going or why.  The trees of this place are strange, with long sharp needles rather than proper leaves.  Their barks are wooly and of a color as deep a red as her blood.  The rich soil smells ripe and heady as it crushes beneath her feet.

She finds a trail of some sort, and though she frequently looses it in her delirium, she always seems able to find it again.  It’s as though it is finding her, and she laughs at the idea.  It steadily leads her higher and deeper into the forest, through thicker and thicker fog.  Behind her, the coast of the Skudd Sea is just an ever-present roar, though the cries of her pursuers grow louder.

She runs, and she runs.  The forest grows thicker, older, but the path is never more clear.  Though her vision blurs, and the trees around her have become indistinct, she now follows the path unerringly.  The fog fades quickly.  Her ember burns, and she knows it is doing its best to keep her alive and on her feet.  Somewhere, she hears its voice screaming at her, warning her, but she cannot understand its words.

At last, she staggers into a clearing of sorts.  The huge trees tower all around it—and smaller ones have sprouted everywhere within—but it is still obviously a clearing.

She recognizes it as the wreckage of an old dunum, perhaps an Ehrech garrison.  The skeletons of old walls and earthworks encircle her, through they are already being pulled down by the forest’s patient undergrowth.  Here, she sees an old stable—there, a dining hall and barracks—and at the center, a single wall is all that remains of a Medianist temple, the bisected circle on the façade now dirty and broken.  The roofs of all the buildings have collapsed.  The wood of the furniture and rafters has already begun to decay.

Everywhere, trees—mere saplings compared to the giants surrounding the dunum—rise eerily from this old habitation of man.  On one wall of the dining hall, a tattered tapestry still hangs.  Through the mold and dirt, Esmeree can still see the proud profile of EroBernd’s griffin.  This was a Seven Kingdoms fortress, no more than 10 years old.  How could these trees have grown here so quickly?

Limping back to the dunum’s center, her legs finally buckle, and she collapses to the ground.  Blue sky and sunlight wink down at her from between the branches of the trees above her.  Distantly, she wonders how this could be.  Wasn’t it raining just a little while ago?

Her hand twitches and eventually closes around something hard and smooth.  It takes nearly all her strength to lift it to her eyes.  It’s a bone.  Turning her head, she sees the ground is covered with them, mostly clustered around the trunks of the saplings.  Perhaps horse or cattle or dog, but probably human.  One sapling grotesquely cradles a whole ribcage, its trunk somehow having pierced the bones and carried them upwards as it grew.  Also littering the ground are rusting weapons and scraps of armor.

A boot kicks the bone from her hand.  A dirty and tired sailor glares down at her.  “Here’s the mangâ!” he shouts.

Moments later, Messer’s leer appears overhead.  “That was quite a run jû gafe us, jâ?” he smiles and prods her wound with his toe.  “Quite a hole jû got too.”

She smiles with new understanding.  “Listen,” she whispers.  “Do you hear the ocean?”

“Ugh,” the sailor grunts to Messer, “She’s dyin’.  Vee’ll never find the treasure now.”

Messer kneels over her.  “Jû dyin’ soon, mergâ.  Jû might as well tell me where the treasure is, zoh at least one of us can enjoy it.”

“Listen!” she says with sudden clarity.  “Can you hear the ocean?”

The sailor is about to make another comment, when Messer leaps to his feet and shouts him to silence.  “Quiet!” he barks.  “Eferyone quiet!”

He listens for a long time, turning slowly in all directions.  There is no ocean any longer.  “Where is the ocean?” he asks darkly to no one in particular.

“Can it be just the trees?” one of his sailors asks.  “Or the distance—”

“Ne,” Messer interrupts as he looks around suspiciously.  “Ve didn’t run that far.”

He looks back down at her.  “Vat kind of trick is this?”

Esmeree giggles painfully, and slowly she raises her hand to point to the sky.  “Where is the rain, Captain?  Where is the storm?”

Messer blinks up at the sunlight and sudden realization strikes him.  There is no ocean, there is no rain, because they have run that far.  They are far, far away from the coast.

Suddenly, there are the sounds of breaking wood and cries of surprise from the men.  Messer looks around with terror and draws his cutlass.  “Run!” he screams and leaps over Esmeree, knocking her arm back down.

Esmeree giggles as the cries of surprise turn to screams of terror and pain.  Everywhere are the sounds of snapping wood and tearing flesh.  Slowly, carefully, Esmeree’s hand fishes through her clothes, and finding its prize, she raises her fist.

The forest grows quiet.  All she can hear are the whimpering sounds of men dying slowly.  Rustling footsteps approach her from all sides.  She opens her fist, revealing her prize.  An alf stares down at her.