Oathbreaker: A Dark Fantasy Web Serial

Arc 3: Chapter 12: Thaw

Spring came to Urn like the ending of a long, strange dream.

I felt it in the stilling of the bitter winds off the heights. I smelled it in the air, in the ghost-scent of budding leaves to come. I heard it in the murmuring dreams of the trees.

There are times it’s not so bad, being an Alder Knight. The Sidhe gave me the power to hear the land, and it can be a blessing.

Urn is colder in the south, and warmer in the north. Traveling north felt like chasing the spring, and indeed the fields grew greener as we went, the crawling carpets of snow thinner. The north is also more populated, and soon enough the villages and walled townships became more plentiful, the sight of high white castles reaching for the bowl of the sky the norm rather than a rarity.

We skirted along the edges of the Bannerlands, keeping to the tall hills along its eastern edges so the fertile fields and crystalline lakes of that country spread out below like a rich tapestry. Then, taking the Pilgrim’s Road straight north, we made way for the coastlands.

We were three weeks from Oria’s Fane when I caught the scent of the sea on the wind, and felt the sharp anticipation of an approaching storm.

That spring brought violent storms.

***

The nightmare slipped from behind a tree. Standing ten feet tall, it looked hardly real — its flesh was a hazy gray, like a frozen blur, its spindly arms hanging almost to the ground. It had too many fingers, a swollen belly like a starved man, and flesh that hugged tight to gnarled bones. When it blinked down at me, it did so with mournful white eyes veiled by stringy gray hair, set in a bald, shriveled head too small for the rest of it.

Emma went for her sword, but I stopped her with a gesture. My eyes remained on the emaciated thing. It had moved onto the path to block our passage across an ancient bridge of moss-covered stone. The scent of mildew and feces hung heavy in the air.

The creature let out a rasping moan, staring down at us with a sullen blankness.

Damn. I hadn’t been this way in years — was this Widower’s Cross or the Bridge of the Mourning Man? Or did I have those names mixed up?

“We’ll pay your toll, sentinel.” I nodded to the troll, keeping my hands well clear of the axe hanging off my belt — I’d had to shave the handle down to holster it like that, but I didn’t want to be toting a weapon in hand all the time where we headed.

Problem was, I couldn’t remember what the toll was, and most bridge trolls absolutely hated being asked. Rubbing at my chin, I shrugged and reached into my pouch, producing three silver coins. I held them out to the towering creature.

The eld studied the coins a moment. Then, in a disturbingly smooth, painfully slow motion, it reached out with one serpentine limb and plucked them from my hand. It cupped them like a cherished treasure, then slid back into the trees. It kept its profile toward us the entire time, so it had to shuffle sidelong back into its nook. Soon enough, it had vanished into the gloom of the coastal forests.

“That was disturbing,” Emma noted casually, when it had gone.

“It was scared,” I said, beginning to make my way across the bridge. My thoughts were on another troll I’d found butchered the year before. “The Eld aren’t good with fast change, and many of the ones humans find more unsettling are at risk of violence. All it takes is for one angry preoster or reckless noble to point the finger and say there, that monster is the problem, and then you have the torches, the pitchforks.”

I glanced back at my ward. “Their kind lived in this land long before we did. It doesn’t take much effort to be polite.”

Emma frowned, glancing back toward where the troll had vanished. “That thing was scared of us?”

I didn’t blame her for her skepticism — had I seen the being we’d just encountered as a small child, it probably would have scarred me for life. “Yes,” I said. “We’re two well armed travelers. There’s a reason why so many old stories in Urn are about the folly of slaying monsters. I’m certain you’ve heard more than a few. A brave warrior meets something sharp and angry in the forest while traveling or embarking on some quest.”

We crossed over the bridge, stepping back onto the woodland trail. A breeze stirred the trees, making the fresh-budding leaves rustle with a million secretive whispers.

“The creature’s always been there,” I continued as we walked. “It’s part of the land. Maybe it’s not friendly or benign, but the forest, the mountain, the lake — wherever it is, it belongs to the Eld. Then the warrior appears, and the monster is in the way of whatever he needs. So he kills it.”

I stopped and turned to face my apprentice. “Then his whole life goes to shit.”

Emma considered this with a thoughtful expression, though the twist of her lips told me she felt more than a little of her usual skepticism. “I always just assumed that was hogwash about disturbing the natural order. The monster is an allegory for sovereign rule, by lords or gods, and disturbing the natural order is something the land’s authorities don’t like. Hence, it’s always a problem when the hero does it.” She shrugged.

I forgot sometimes that Emma had grown up highborn, and had a full breadth of education on history and lore. I’d learned what I had from folk stories as a child, or from personal experience throughout my life.

“Maybe there’s some of that,” I admitted, starting to walk again. “But there’s a practical reason for teaching that sort of thing too. The land’s full of magic, and its older inhabitants have tied themselves deeply to that power. You go around killing them, you end up with curses, spiritual instability, a whole breadth of other problems.”

I sighed, glancing back at the bridge falling further behind us. “Even still, sometimes a band of adventurers or a party of men-at-arms come to the realization that it’s easier to just kill the scary thing in front of them than figure out what it wants. Used to be most folk knew better.”

We walked a ways in silence before Emma suddenly spoke again. “How do you always have money?”

I frowned, taken off guard by the question. “Why do you ask?’

“Well…” she padded up to walk alongside me, adjusting the strap on her pack again. “Every time you need it, you just… pull out some coins. I wasn’t aware you were paid for, you know.” She nodded to my axe.

“Oh, that.” I turned my attention back to the road. “I do a lot of traveling. I’m not always lingering at the Fane between tasks. Sometimes a village has a wild chimera problem, or a lord’s son is being ransomed by brigands, or any number of things like that. And I gotta eat.” I shrugged. “It adds up.”

Emma didn’t say anything for a long while. Finally she said, “Alken… are you quite certain you haven’t chosen the wrong line of work?”

I grunted. “I’m asking myself that same question all the time.”

No point agonizing over it any longer. I’d made my choices. I’d sworn my vows. I ran a thumb along my freshly cleansed ring, my mind bent on what lay at the end of this long road.

***

“It is a good idea,” Rysanthe said.

I blinked, surprised. We stood along the edge of the frozen river beneath the cottage hill, just as we had in the fall before I’d met Emma. Both moons were high, and the air’s sharpest edges seemed to have dulled. A sign of spring finally pushing back, perhaps.

Several days had passed since I’d spoken to Lias, and I’d made up my mind. Even still, I’d sought my senior Doomsman’s council.

The drow turned to me, the corners of her violet eyes crinkling in fond amusement. “They will have no trouble finding you when they need you, my friend. If you see evil at work in the cities, and your heart tells you to face it there, then you should go. Only…”

She trailed off.

“What is it?” I’d asked.

Rysanthe frowned and shook her head. “I do not know. I do not know this magi, or this mortal queen. They are your comrades of old, but even still… trust your own heart, Alken, and make your judgments with your eyes and your ears.”

I scoffed. “I haven’t trusted my own heart in a long time. As for my eyes and ears — you’re an elf. You know the world’s full of phantasm.”

She’d shrugged and flashed me an ivory smile. “Maybe so. Even still, insight is all I have to offer. Ah! And this.”

She’d handed me my ring. As I took it, she closed my fingers around the trinket, holding my fist up between us. “Do not let this stray from you. I do not believe it’s been tampered with, but there are curses stronger than mine.”

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I slipped the ring on and nodded, flexing my fingers. “Thanks, Rys. It’s… nice, knowing I’m not alone in this work.”

“It comforts you, that Death is on your side?” She let out a fey laugh. It lingered in my ears long after she’d vanished into the night.

***

Maxim had been less supportive of the decision to leave. He’d ground his teeth in frustration and tried to convince me to change my mind.

“This is idiocy, Hewer. You can’t trust that wizard — any wizard. They’re all insane, it’s part of what they’ve made themselves.”

Emma donned her chainmail shirt and her Carreon saber in the corner of the spacious room. I whittled down the haft of Faen Orgis, smoothing out the burs and adjusting the grip — something I had to do more often, lately. Settling the whittled axe against one wall, I put on my black armor and strapped on all my daggers and other accoutrements.

I bit down my reply — more than half of me wanted to defend Lias — but Maxim wasn’t done. “There’s too much noise in cities,” he insisted. “Your powers won’t be reliable. More than that, if there really is an inquisition in progress…”

He took a calming breath. “This is stupid. Even for you.”

“Noted.” I wrapped my cloak around my shoulders and nodded to Emma. She looked far less skeptical about the whole thing — she’d practically leapt at the prospect of leaving the Fane.

“Ser Alken.”

I stopped just before opening the door, glancing back at Maxim. He sniffed at the irritation in my face — he’d known I’d hate being called Ser.

The knight stood from his desk, walked to his bed, and pulled a wooden case from beneath it. Unclasping the catches, he pulled out his ancient sword in its bejeweled leather sheath. Approaching me with the blade held in upraised palms, he offered it.

I might have gaped at him, but I had no attention to spare for my own expression to know for certain. Maxim’s sword was… it was legendary. Every individual ornamentation on the hilt, from the entwined branches of the gilded crossguard to the stern troll at the base of the blade were repositories for aura. The arm nearly hummed with power, spared the same instability its master had been afflicted with.

Ser Maxim Larker had used this blade when he’d cowed the Parliament of Trolls. He’d held it when he’d hunted the Cambion’s monsters during the Widow’s Winter. He’d used it to slay the Wyrm of Lindenroad, and its sacred inlays had protected him from the creature’s blight. He’d carried it through more than a century of battle and duty.

“That axe is treacherous,” Maxim grumbled. “You should take a proper weapon.”

I felt Emma’s eyes on me from the door, but I only had eyes for the sword. Without thinking about it, I lifted my free hand toward the hilt—

In a flash, I was elsewhere.

I had another sword in my hand, my sword, covered in smoking blood. I backed away, shook my head in denial of what I’d done, what stood before me, what it meant.

“I didn’t mean to… damn it, why!? Why’d you have to be—”

I took a steadying breath and shook my head, dropping my hand. “No, Maxim. You might need that. I’ve got enough.”

He searched my face, his aged features pulled into a deep frown. I don’t know what he saw, but he nodded and backed away. “Very well. Try not to get yourself killed, lad. Don’t get Her Ladyship killed either — we’ve all grown rather fond of her, for all her thorns.”

Emma threw the old knight a smile that was all teeth. “I think I’ll be the one keeping our heads from getting lopped off,” she said in her most aristocratic voice. “I’ve attached a little bell to the door and taught the fairies how to ring it, in case you wander off and get lost. Do you need me to get you anything before we go? A towel to suck your soup? An extra chamber pot? I do know how those old bowels trouble you.”

Maxim grunted. “On second thought, maybe it’s all the same if you lose her along the way.”

Nodding to me, clearly still worried, the aged knight put his sword away and sat back down at his desk. I lingered a moment, knowing I should say something to take some of the sting from my mood of late, but not knowing what. Instead, I went out into the cold and closed the door on the hero inside the cottage.

***

We took long and winding roads on that journey. I’d grown used to doing just that — always better to avoid questions from patrols or encounters with other travelers. Over the years I’d taken to avoiding sleeping at inns and only rarely hitched rides with merchants or farmers. I didn’t want the spirits haunting me troubling anyone else.

Luckily, I’d learned many secret paths during my tenure with the Table, and expanded that knowledge in the years since. Not all of them were connected to the Wend — those I avoided like the plague — but there were others. Elf paths, ranger trails, pilgrim roads, troll crossings. The old blessings hadn’t all faded from the land.

I’d started teaching Emma how to use these same ways — the signs to look for, the tolls and cants that’d help her get around without angering the Eld, and other miscellaneous lore. It felt strange, having someone to talk to during the endless days of meandering. I had to admit, it made the voices of the angry dead seem quieter.

For her part, Emma had figured out I was haunted by restless shades early. She had a wicked angel as a godmother, and the noisome dead hadn’t impressed her. She glared at the eerie faces watching us from the woods beyond the old wagon path we followed, daring them to approach.

“We’ve been wandering these woods for two days,” Emma said. “I feel like we’re going in circles.”

“We are,” I said, without stopping. I kept my focus on the darkening forest — I felt eyes on me, but couldn’t pinpoint the source. Something had been watching us for more than an hour. We were near the coast, I knew, and could smell the sea. A mist had rolled in earlier in the day and lingered, heavy in the lingering cold of a winter that hadn’t expended all of its strength.

I heard my squire’s steps halt a moment, before she quickly rushed to catch back up. I could practically hear her lips pressing into a thinner line. “You know I absolutely abhor that. Fine, I’ll just ask — what is the plan, exactly?”

“First,” I said, glancing around at the misting woods, “we have a chat with something that goes bump in the night.”

Emma sighed. “I really shouldn’t ask. It just gives you an in to say something vague and ominous, every time.”

Before I could answer another voice said, “Personally, I think it’s hot. To each their own, I guess.”

Emma let out a very girlish yelp, and — less girlishly — drew her Carreon sword in a single smooth motion and whistled it through the air so its quivering tip aimed into the shadows, where the voice had originated.

I sighed. “Hello, Cat.”

The dhampir stepped out of the shadows at the road’s edge — the source of the eerie presence I’d felt. She had her hands up in surrender, watching my disciple warily. “Whoah there, Ser Alicia, I’m not armed.”

Emma didn’t miss Catrin’s too-pale skin or the glint of red in her eyes. “Not with a sword, perhaps. If you’re after my blood, you’ll find it runs very thick.”

Catrin propped a fist on her hip, studying Emma appraisingly through her messy brown locks. She ran her eyes up and down the younger woman, taking in her traveling garments — somehow, Emma had managed to retailor them to look stylish — as well as her impressive height and aristocratic features.

“So, you’re the highborn princess. Got a keen arm on you, little lady, but I can smell your nerves.” Catrin flashed her sharp teeth. “They seem a bit frayed.”

Emma’s expression darkened, and she swept her blade down into a low guard, placing her other hand behind her back in a fencer’s stance. “Little?” She hissed.

“Peace,” I told her, gesturing for her to put the steel away. Then, looking to Catrin I said, “Enough teasing. What have you got for me?”

Catrin tore her eyes from my ward and flashed me an apologetic smile. “Cities a hive,” she said. “People were already braving the snows to get there by the time the thaw came, for the spring fair. There’s also talk of a delegation in from the peninsula, and a new batch of ships from across the Riven.”

She folded her arms. “In essence, Garihelm is near full to bursting. Going to be easy to blend in. That’s the good news.”

I nodded, accepting her implication of bad news. There was always that. “And the Inquisition?”

“Oh, they’re about. That leads me to the bad news — the gates got closed a couple weeks back over some commotion behind the walls, left a lot of farmers and merchants to tough it in camp cities outside. The Priorguard — that’s what they call the heretic hunters, apparently — have been in the streets and the camps, almost like they’re looking for something.”

Catrin spread her hands out in a nonplussed gesture. “Least, that’s the word I’ve been getting through the Backroad.”

I grunted. “The gates are still closed?”

She nodded, to my dismay. “Only the parties of lords and a few high value merchant types are being let in. Everyone else is being told to wait. Atmosphere outside the walls is getting tense — apparently the cold killed more than a few people while they were waiting their turn.”

Emma frowned, having sheathed her sword but not her distrustful eyes. “Why would they lock down the city? Is it the Church’s doing?”

“Can’t say for certain,” Catrin said, inclining her head to the younger woman. “Word is there’s some big meeting of the Accord taking place soon, so there are a lot of high and mighty types inside the walls right now. Whatever the case, it’s got everyone in a stir. There are nobles and merchants clamoring for the city to reopen, but orders came down from someone near the top of the food chain to keep the city under quarantine. Some folks are even starting to toss around words like plague.”

I couldn’t think of much else which might lead to the city being locked down. Even still, Lias would have mentioned something like that, certainly.

It had been almost a month since I’d seen Lias. A sickness could have started in that time and spread to catastrophic levels. I had a hunch it was something else, though.

Catrin didn’t miss my pensive look. “What’s on your mind, big man?”

Both women turned their eyes to me. I shook my head, unable to make a certain guess with what I had to go on. “I found out recently there’s been violence in the city,” I said. “A series of killings. You heard anything about that?”

Catrin’s eyes widened. “You’re talking about the Carmine Killings.”

“You know about them?” I asked.

Nodding, the changeling explained. “Been going on near a year now. Started out as a few mid-profile deaths — a group connected to the cities restoration, including some architect. It caused a stir, but then things settled down for a few months.”

She leaned forward, just as she might if we were sitting across from one another at a table in her inn. “Then it started up again. Almost all the victims were members of the Renaissance. You heard of it? Big movement of scholars and artist types that’s all the rage in the northlands these days. Had its start in the continent, in Bantes I think.”

I took that in, considering. Had there been another string of killings? Had the Church or the Emperor, the only two powers in the city I could think of with the authority to place it under martial law, decided to take action?

“I need to get in there,” I said. “What else can you tell me?”

Catrin shrugged and winced apologetically. “Not much, big man. Only this — my kind are scared. Changelings, feykin, mongrels, whatever you want to call us. I’ve got friends in the city, mostly those who blend in easier with humans, and they’re all terrified the heretic hunters are going to root them out.” She shook her head and pressed her lips tight. “I haven’t heard from anyone in the walls since several weeks back.”

We’d discussed it before, when I’d visited the Backroad not long after my talk with Lias. Still, Catrin seemed more nervous now than she had then.

“Can you help us get in?” I asked her.

Catrin nodded, smiling a wicked smile as her brief show of worry vanished behind her familiar mask of easy confidence. “I can, but you’re not going to like it.”

She stepped close to me, lowering her voice so Emma couldn’t hear.

“Karog’s getting impatient, Al. I’m not certain I can keep him from going rogue much longer.”

I frowned. “Is he in the city?”

“Just as we discussed,” she confirmed. Then, rapping her knuckles on the steel links of my hauberk just over my chest she added, “We’ll talk about it more later. Time’s wasting. You still sure about this?”

I nodded. We’d already talked about it, even if I knew I hadn’t adequately explained my reasonings to her. “I am.”

She nodded, serious for once. “Then lets get you in there.” She turned and beckoned to us, lifting her voice into a more theatrical tenure. “Come along then, brave heroes.”

So it was we followed the vampire into the mist, knowing the moons would soon rise high over our destination — a city full of secrets, fear, and a legion of hidden dangers.

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