Paul Thompson - Alliances

Kerian knelt by Olin and took his purse. It contained steel coins, several large gems rolled in a silk scarf, and a ring with a dozen iron keys. She shook the ring of keys.

“We should see what locks these open. Prison cells, or treasure rooms, as he said.”

“Free the elf prisoners. I don’t care what you do with the rest. Let the people of Bianost have his stolen hoard.”

His continuing distracted study of the ceiling caused Kerian to look up. The arched ceiling of the audience hall was covered by a mural depicting Kith-Kanan flying on Arcuballis, his famous griffon. The pair soared across a blue sky dotted here and there with puffy white clouds. The painting was well rendered, but the scene was a common one in official Qualinesti buildings. Testily, she asked whether he was enjoying the artwork.

“Very much,” he murmured. He told them of Kasanth, the councilor he’d found being tortured for not revealing the whereabouts of a royal trove.

“He said the treasure was in the sky. I think Olin was closer to it than he ever imagined,” Porthios said, pointing upward. “We must get up there.”

The way proved fiendishly difficult. The Bianost palace was old, with a convoluted layout comprising many rooms. Only by rapping on the walls and finding a hollow spot did the elves locate the concealed door. Behind it was a dark, very steep stairway.

Gifted with excellent vision in the dark, the elves needed no torches. Porthios immediately entered, and the others were close behind. Kerian commented that although the door had been well hidden, the wooden steps were clean of dust. Someone had passed that way not too long ago.

The stairs reversed direction, obviously angling out from the wall and following the rise of the arched ceiling. As the party climbed higher, the stuffy heat increased. The passage ended abruptly on a stone wall with no door, no hatch, nothing.

“No one builds a stair to nowhere,” Kerian muttered. “There must be a hidden door.”

Porthios told his followers not to bother with subtlety, so the Kagonesti battered the walls until something yielded. Low to the floor, a thin wooden panel, painted to resemble stone, shattered under their blows. Wincing with stiffness, Porthios knelt on one knee and peered in, but even his keen eyes could not pierce the profound darkness beyond.

One of the Kagonesti produced flint and steel. A wad of cloth was tied to an arrow shaft and set alight. Porthios thrust the fitfully burning torch inside.

Kerian fidgeted at his silence and even faithful Nalaryn couldn’t bear the suspense. “What do you see, Great Lord?”

“Wonderful things!” Porthios said, hoarse voice filled with emotion. “I see the freedom of our race!”

Like a drop of oil spreading out on the surface of calm water, the bandits, buntings, and slavers expelled from Samustal raced in all directions, seeking other havens in Samuval’s stolen realm. Some went no farther than Griffon’s Ford, fifteen miles from Olin’s fallen stronghold, where they found another of Samuval’s lieutenants encamped.

Gathan Grayden was known as Gathan the Good, an ironic appellation earned by his carefully chosen appearance. Most bandit lords affected a fearsome exterior, with garish tattoos, gaudy armor, extravagant weapons, and a loud, blustering manner. Not Gathan. He dressed simply but in the finest style, spoke softly, and carried himself like a nobleman of impeccable lineage. In fact he was easily the most ruthless of Samuval’s underlings. His fief, centered on the town of Frenost, northwest of Samustal, was the most pacified in all of Qualinesti.

Once a month he led most of his troops on along, circuitous march through his territory. That kept his soldiers fit and reminded his subjects who was in charge. Gathan was returning from one of those marches when the first refugees from Samustal reached him at Griffon’s Ford. In two days’ time, several hundred bandits had gathered, swelling his total complement to two thousand soldiers. Behind the army, a mob of slavers, displaced buntings, and their lackeys gathered. They believed Gathan would restore order in no time, and they wanted to be close at hand when Samustal was recovered. Most had fled with no more than the clothes on their backs.

Gathan led his army south. As he advanced, he sent parties east and west to sweep the countryside for rebels. None were found. Scouts brought word the town still stood and was eerily calm. A few bold bandits entered the outskirts for a closer look. They reported no defenders in sight. Dead bodies there were in plenty but no rebels.

Sensing a trap, Gathan sent scouts to reconnoiter. The squalid squatters’ camp ringing the old town had been burned, but the city proper appeared only lightly damaged, although in Samustal it was hard to know what was new damage and what was mere decrepitude.

The scouts entered through an unguarded gate, the clopping of their horses’ hooves disturbing clouds of insects. The smell of death was familiar to all who took Samuval’s coin, and it overpowered even the usual stench of Samustal. The bandits rode past the bodies of comrades, slavers, and elf townspeople. Flies and vultures were having a feast.

The captain of the scouts decided the rebels had indeed chosen the coward’s course, fleeing Samustal after their coup. He summoned a rider to carry word back to Lord Gathan. The courier was just turning to canter away when an arrow took him in the side of the neck. Before he hit the ground, fifteen of his fellows likewise thudded to the dirt, arrows sprouting in necks, chests, and backs.

“Ambush! Withdraw!” the bandit captain shouted, wheeling his mount. A second volley arrived, and another ten men fell, and the captain finally caught sight of the archers. They were on the parapet of the stockade. The scouts had ridden right under them. The captain cursed the bandits who had reported the town empty of rebels.

Atop the timber wall, Kerian was doing some cursing of her own. The Kagonesti archers lined the parapet, while below several score townsfolk huddled out of sight, clutching captured arms. Since Olin’s overthrow, many of the bolder residents had come and asked to serve Porthios. He allowed them that honor.

“ You missed the commander,” she snapped at Nalaryn, crouching near her.

“We hit where we aim. The first rider would’ve carried word back to their general.”

“We ought to have taken them all,” she said darkly. Any that survived could warn their comrades as well as the first one.

The late-afternoon sun threw long shadows across the streets below, and bandits could be seen riding up the side streets parallel to the stockade. Roofs and chimney pots shielded the enemy. The Kagonesti ceased their punishing rain. Porthios did not send out his newly formed militia; the townsfolk would be no match for the mounted bandits.

“They must have more troops nearby. We should never have delayed. We should’ve left this place immediately.”

Kerian knew her grumbling was pointless. Liberating the secret cache from the attic of the mayor’s palace had kept them in Bianost when they otherwise would have made straight for the safety of the woodland. Nobody had expected bandits to return so quickly or in such numbers.

“Do you fear the enemy?”

Kerian turned. Porthios was climbing the stairs to the battlement. His ragged robe flapped around his gaunt legs like the wings of the crows that infested the town. She glared at him.

“Of course I fear them! Twenty warriors and a mob of civilians against an unknown number of trained mercenaries?”

He looked away, seemingly unconcerned, and her anger grew. She yelled down to the townsfolk below, describing the red and yellow livery of the bandits the Kagonesti had stung. She was told those were the colors of Gathan Grayden.