James West - Shadow and Steel

Ignoring the warning, Ba’Sel called to the returning Brothers, “Gather all weapons, and enough supplies to last two days.”

“Stay here,” Adham told Leitos, and rushed off.

Ulmek glanced at Ba’Sel, then joined the Izutarian at the racks holding swords and hide bucklers, bows and quivers, spears and staffs.

“I have seen it a hundred times and more,” Ba’Sel said, “yet always the pain our departure brings is as my heart’s first breaking.”

“Then let us fight,” Leitos blurted.

Ba’Sel turned. “A new-made Brother, and already so full of wisdom?”

“Give the Faceless One the war he desires,” Leitos urged.

“Were it so simple,” Ba’Sel murmured dismissively.

As the Brothers began to regroup, Leitos leaned close to Ba’Sel. “Someone told me once that there is no place for weakness and self-pity in this world. She said that we die or survive, that life under the rule of the Faceless One is struggle and pain and sorrow. She gave me a choice to fight and live, or to quit and perish. I chose then to fight, glad for opportunity. Then as now, I choose to fight.”

“I would like to meet this woman,” Ba’Sel said absently.

“You trained her, and took her as your own daughter.”

“Zera?” Ba’Sel said in a stricken tone. At Leitos’s nod, he added, “I suppose I should have known. She was a woman of simple truths.”

“Is there any other kind of truth?”

“Perhaps, perhaps not, but I cannot see how any truth, save fleeing, will help us now. We cannot preserve our lives by fighting. At best, we would wake on the morrow, chained and bound for a mine, such as the one you escaped. At worst, we will all perish.”

“Flee this day if we must,” Leitos allowed, “but soon we- you -must begin to make ready for the war you told me was coming. If we continue running, the Brothers of the Crimson Shield may last out the year, maybe even the year after, maybe even a dozen more, but our order is dying a slow and certain death.”

“Wars are fought with armies, Leitos,” Ba’Sel said, sounding tired.

“Then it is time for you to raise an army. And if not you, then Ulmek would leap at the chance, and so too would Sumahn and Daris. Ke’uld and Halan as well. I would help, as would my father. All are willing, but you must allow it.” He searched Ba’Sel’s face, looking for any indication that his leader agreed, or was at least considering the possibility. He saw only indecision.

Adham and Ulmek trotted up, each carrying extra weapons and supplies. Without a word, Ba’Sel took an offered haversack and a staff.

“Your bow,” Adham said gruffly, handing the weapon and a quiver of arrows over to Leitos. “An Izutarian without a bow is but half a man.” Usually he smiled when he said this, but not now.

Leitos took the short, double-curved weapon that Adham had helped him fashion when they first came to Witch’s Mole. While the Brothers had seen to all aspects of his training, Ba’Sel had noted Adham’s unmatched skill with a bow, and left it to him to train Leitos in its use.

“Is all in readiness?” Ba’Sel asked, once the Brothers had gathered round. Grim nods met his question. “Very well,” he said, and set out.

One by one, some few holding torches aloft, the Brothers merged into a growing line. As they marched, the Brothers each took a turn coming abreast of Leitos. With approving grins, they gripped his shoulder, or thumped him on the back, each in their own way voicing their approval and acceptance of him into their ranks. Ulmek came last, and Leitos fought to conceal his surprise.

“I still do not trust your judgment, Izutarian,” he rasped near Leitos’s ear. “But then, I could say the same of Sumahn and Daris, and most of the rest of these motherless goats. You are one of us now, a Brother of the Crimson Shield, and I will guard your life with my own.”

Astonishment stuck Leitos’s tongue to the roof of his mouth. Ulmek noticed his surprise, and his smile widened, a brief flicker of wry amusement, then he strode ahead to join Ba’Sel.

Soon the way grew brighter, the scent of the sea filled the passage, and the Brothers crept from gloom into the dappled sunlight falling through the boughs of scrubby trees.

Leitos took a knee beside Ba’Sel, and was joined by Ulmek and Adham, Halan and Ke’uld. Leitos glanced around, feeling that something was out-of-place. He saw nothing obvious, and counted it as nervousness.

“The way looks clear,” Halan whispered, his rumbly voice matching his blocky frame. Sweat glistened on the dark stubble sprouting from his head. He looked a brutal man, but was known to be the most tenderhearted of the Brothers.

“That’s what worries me,” Ke’uld said, black eyes roving. Wiry and dark, he could have been kin to Ba’Sel. He tugged at the pointed tuft of tight black curls adorning his chin. “Even with so many sea-wolves locked in the passageways, there should be scores of sea-wolves crawling over Witch’s Mole. Yet I see nothing of them. Where are they?”

Ulmek looked to the sun, nearing the highest point of its daily journey. “Give it a little time, and you will have all the sea-wolves you could want gnawing at your heels.”

“They’ll find I’m not so tasty when I poke a blade in their festering gobs,” Ke’uld warned.

Ba’Sel caught the Brother’s arm. “We will not fight this day, unless forced to it.”

“Just so,” Ke’uld said with a sour expression.

Leitos listened with half an ear as he studied the scrub- and rock-covered hillside that led down to a cove a quarter mile away. With the heat of the day upon them, the waves beating themselves to a pristine froth along the shore looked inviting enough that he could almost forget their enemies were fanning out over the island. Beyond the cove’s inward curving points, the turquoise Sea of Sha’uul waited, empty of Kelren ships. In the far distance, the hazed bulk of the closest island to Witch’s Mole rose out of the sea like a great, bushy dome. The Brothers called it Giant’s Head.

“We need a scout,” Ba’Sel said, favoring Leitos with a pointed look.

“Of course,” Leitos said.

“Sneaking is best,” Ulmek advised.

Adham touched his son’s arm. “Have a care,” he said, speaking aloud the concern written across the Brothers’ faces.

Leitos could not find the words to express his gratitude. So, with a last nod, he set out down the hill, ghosting through the trees over several hundred paces. He scanned around, at once searching for enemies, and picking out a concealed route. All was still, but a tingle of unease troubled him.

After clearing the dense copse, a sense of nakedness fell on him. He darted to the nearest outcrop of boulders and lost himself amid their scant shade, and the tufts of tall grass growing at their feet.

Sheltered again, the feeling of eyes tracking him diminished, but the same disquiet he had felt when escaping the east passage came again. He paused, listening to the nearby boom of incoming waves. A cricket chirred nearby, then fell quiet. He tugged at his snug robes, suddenly feeling constricted. Not a breath of wind disturbed trees or grass.

Before anyone decided he had frozen in fear, Leitos shook off his worry, and scurried farther down the slope.

Coming to a thicket that stretched across half the hillside, he dropped to his knees and crawled under a wall of twisted branches covered with waxy leaves and thorns. A pace deeper in waited a neatly trimmed passage.

Leitos got off his belly and nocked an arrow. For a dozen paces, he crept along the living tunnel. Other than the Brothers’ footprints, the only sign that anything else had recently passed by were trails left by snakes, and the tracks of birds and mice.