Simon Hawke - The Seeker

“A sword does not make one a king!”

“That one does.”

“Then you take it!”

“Not I,” the thief said. “You are the one.”

“I tell you, I am not the one!”

“Could you two debate this later?” said Korahna. “The quarter is crawling with guards. We haven’t much time.”

“We will provide escort,” said the thief. “It is the very least that I can do to make amends.”

“You have already made amends,” said Sorak. “Just get us out of here.”

“We must reach the north wall, by the stone yards,” said Korahna.

“This way, then,” said the thief. “I know the shortest route. Trust thieves to know the back streets and alleys.”

They ran quickly down twisting lanes and through narrow, refuse-strewn alleys while some of the others hung back to cover their rear. The two women strained to match the pace set by the elves, who were merely jogging by their standards. Before long, they reached the stone yards, a wide and open expanse near the north wall of the city, where the large, quarried blocks were brought to be cut down for use by the city’s artisans.

Moving quickly through the moonlit yard, Korahna led the way through the maze of stone blocks piled up all around them. Most of the other elves hung back to cover them in the event of pursuit. Finally, they reached the north wall of the city and ran alongside it until they came to the hovels at the far end of the yard. Korahna paused a moment to get her bearings.

“This way,” she said, ducking down a narrow alley. She counted doors. It was not an alley but a street, though it was scarcely wider than Sorak’s shoulders.

They were in the poorest section of the city, where hovels were so crowded together that they made the warrens of Tyr look like the templars’ quarter. At the seventh door on their right, Korahna stopped and knocked softly seven times. They waited, tensely, then a moment later, three slow, answering knocks came from within. Korahna knocked once more, and the door swung open.

They entered a room that seemed little more than a closet. A small, cheap lamp cast what little light there was, illuminating a pallet on the floor and several crudely made pieces of furniture assembled from scrap, a low table pegged together from boards, and a small, three-legged stool. There was no room for anything else. The old man who had opened the door was dressed in rags, and his scraggly, gray hair hung limply to his shoulders. Without a word, without even so much as a glance at the stranger who had entered his cramped quarters, he shuffled over to the wood pallet on which he slept, bent over, and with a grunt, pulled it away from the wall, revealing a wooden trapdoor beneath it.

“It is a small and narrow tunnel,” said Korahna, “and you will have to crawl. But it leads under the wall and outside the city. From there, you are on your own.”

“Then we will say farewell again,” said Sorak, giving her a hug. “We owe our lives to you. And to you, as well, friend,” he said to the thief, holding out his hand.

Instead of taking it, the thief bowed deeply. “It was privilege, my lord. I hope that one day, soon, we shall meet again.”

“Perhaps,” said Sorak. “And do not call me ‘my lord!’”

“Yes, my lord.”

“Aaah!” said Sorak, throwing up his arms.

The old man opened the trapdoor.

“Hurry,” said Korahna. “The longer we remain here, the greater the risk.”

Sorak took her hand and kissed it. “Thank you, Your Highness,” he said.

“Go on! Hurry!”

He climbed down into the tunnel.

“Farewell again, Sister,” said Ryana. “I shall miss you.”

“And I, you.”

They embraced briefly, and then Ryana followed Sorak down into the hole. The door was closed behind them, and she was plunged into total darkness. She reached out with her hands in front of her and fell a small opening, barely wide enough to crawl through.

“Sorak?”

“Come on,” he called back, from inside the tunnel. “But keep your head down.”

She squirmed into the opening and started crawling on her hands and knees. She couldn’t see a thing. She felt incredibly closed in and wondered what would happen if the runnel collapsed on them. She swallowed hard and kept on crawling. The thought occurred to her that it seemed like a perfect place for snakes and venomous spiders. Why did that have to occur to her now? She was grateful that Sorak was crawling up ahead, because that meant if there were any spiderwebs inside the tunnel, he would break them before she crawled into them headfirst. It was not, perhaps, a very considerate attitude, she thought, but at least it was an honest one.

After what seemed like an incredibly long time, she finally felt the tunnel sloping up slightly. And then she reached the end of it. She found out because she ran into the wall headfirst. With a curse, she pulled back and rubbed her head, then felt around her. A shaft was open above. She crouched, then stood, and felt wooden rungs in front of her. She climbed up perhaps a dozen feet or so and then felt Sorak’s hand close around her wrist, helping her out. She breathed in the welcome, cool, night air and felt a soft breeze blowing. They stood in a thicket by what she first thought was a stream, then realized was an irrigation canal. They were about thirty or forty feet beyond the city wall. The distance she had crawled had somehow seemed much longer.

“I hate tunnels,” she said, brushing the dirt off her clothing before realizing that there wasn’t much point to it. After all that they had been through, her clothes were filthy and torn in places. Sorak did not look much better. In fact, he looked even worse. There was dried blood caked all over him, covered with a layer of grime.

“Don’t stare,” he said. “You do not look much better.”

They stood in a grove of agafari trees, sheltered from view. Ryana unslung her crossbow and unbuckled her sword belt, dropped her pack to the ground, and waded into the canal. It felt wonderful to let the cold water caress her face.

“Well?” she said. “Are you coming in, or do you intend to spend the rest of our journey looking like a corpse?”

He grinned, took off his sword belt and his pack, then waded in beside her. The water came up to their chests and they both submerged themselves, then scrubbed their faces and their clothes.

“It would be just our luck to be caught here, bathing, after all that we have been through,” said Ryana.

“I would not tempt fate if I were you,” said Sorak.

“Yes, my lord.”

He splashed her. “Stop that.”

“Yes, my lord.” She splashed him back. Suddenly, they were laughing and splashing each other as they had not done since they were both small children, playing in the pool by the temple. After a short while, they climbed out and rested for a moment on the bank, the water dripping from them.

“That felt good,” she said, staring up into the trees.

“Enjoy the feeling,” Sorak replied. “It is the last water we shall see until we reach the Mekillot Mountains.”

She sighed. “I suppose we had best be on our way and put as much distance between us and the city as possible while it is still dark.”

Sorak got to his feet and buckled on his sword belt.

“If it were not for the fact that I have no other sword, I would be sorely tempted to toss this one into the canal.”

“That would be a fine way to treat a gift from the high mistress,” said Ryana, shouldering her pack.

He drew the blade and looked at it. “The sword of elven kings,” he said dryly, then sighed. ” Whay does it fall to me?”

“You should be grateful,” said Ryana. “It has saved our lives.”