Rob Scott - The Hickory Staff

‘Well of course not!’ The old man was suddenly indignant. ‘Garec, the bloody fool, burned my body to ash there in the Blackstones. I liked that body. That one suited me well.’ He grimaced. ‘I am glad he’s going to be all right, but did he have to burn me on a bloody pyre?’

Steven was speechless.

‘And what a fire. You missed it. He nearly took down the whole side of the mountain. Flames were leaping from treetop to treetop-’ He took a long draw on his pipe and the ashes glowed a warm red, like an old man’s last memory.

‘So you’re like him?’ Steven gestured over his shoulder in the general direction of the former royal residence.

‘There are aspects of my skills that are similar to Nerak’s, but he can live without a physical form, a host, if you will. I cannot.’

‘This body? Did you-?’

‘Absolutely not.’ He looked stern. ‘Never do that. Natural causes. I was on hand when this gentleman died. That’s why there’s no wound on my… his wrist, no forced entry.’

‘Has this happened before?’

He lowered his voice to a barely audible whisper. ‘Just once, long ago when I became-’ He paused. ‘When I became the man you met in Rona and abandoned my old body. Lessek helped me then, and thankfully, he made the decision to assist me in the Blackstones. One of these days, he won’t be there to patch me back together.’

‘What will happen then?’

‘Then I imagine my work here will be finished.’ He smirked.

‘So Lessek keeps you alive?’

‘Lessek – with some help from the spell table, I suppose.’

‘But I thought the table wouldn’t work without the key.’

‘It won’t, but that doesn’t preclude its power from continuing to affect us.’ He tapped his pipe ashes into the sand. ‘The spells keeping me alive – me and Kantu – were cast so long ago, I don’t even remember who chanted them. He chortled ironically. ‘It was probably Nerak.’

Steven forced a smirk himself, but he still felt as though he might be sick.

‘Anyway, I’m glad you’ve been working so diligently with the staff’s magic. When you return from Idaho Springs, I would be happy to help you hone your skills.’

‘You know I plan to come back?’

‘I know many things.’

‘I have to sit down.’ Steven slumped heavily in the sand beside the old sorcerer. ‘Well, it is good to see you.’

‘It’s good to be here – but come now, we have a great deal to do tonight.’

Brynne reached out to take hold of the stern line hooked fast to a deepwater mooring; it kept the great ship from turning with the tides and crushing unsuspecting smaller vessels in the harbour.

‘Tie it to this,’ Steven whispered, handing her a length of rope affixed to their bow, short enough to keep them in place; they just had to hope the gentle rise and fall of the waves would not run the skiff into the Prince Marek.

Steven, Brynne and the old fisherman prepared to climb up the line and ease themselves over the stern rail and onto the quarterdeck. Mark positioned himself against the narrow transom, a borrowed longbow and full quiver at his feet.

The trip through the harbour had been marked by several disagreements, the worst of which was between Mark and Brynne.

‘I don’t want you going aboard,’ he said firmly.

‘Garec can’t make it. I have to go.’ Brynne was equally adamant. ‘I’m much better at hand-to-hand fighting than you, Mark. Steven might need my help.’

Brynne bristled with knives, daggers, even Mark’s battle-axe. The light of the Twinmoon glinted on the arsenal of razor-sharp edges. Mark, still unhappy about her decision, insisted he accompany them in the skiff to offer covering fire should a Malakasian sentry approach while they were boarding.

Brynne stifled a laugh. ‘I’ve seen you shoot, Mark, remember? Trying to kill fish, you missed the river three times.’

Mark was not amused. ‘Funny haha. And you’re right; maybe I’m not a great shot, but their soldiers don’t know that.’ He wished he’d paid more attention to Versen’s lessons, but it was too late now.

The old fisherman came along as well – neither Mark nor Brynne knew why, but Steven insisted, and when the seaman offered the use of his skiff, they were happy to accept.

They couldn’t bear to leave Garec alone on the beach, in case whoever had shot him came back to finish the job, so he slept in the bow of the sailboat, wrapped comfortably in their collective blankets. He was definitely alive: his heart thumped, strong and steady, and his breathing, though slow, was deep.

Mark’s stolen vessel made the trip without incident, coursing across the harbour on a swirling southern breeze, the skiff skipping along in their wake. The raiders dropped anchor and reefed sail some thousand paces west of the sleeping giant. Darkness surrounded them, and with the old fisherman at the oars, their approach to the Prince Marek was as silent as a piece of buoyant flotsam on an incoming tide.

‘So far, so good,’ Mark whispered as he watched Brynne reach for the stern rail. She had gone up first, insisting – and even he had to agree – that if anyone saw her come over the transom, no one would be able to silence them as quickly and efficiently as she. Mark held his breath. It was a long climb, thirty feet of hand-over-hand ascent, but it was just a few moments later that she was there, draping one arm over the rail and drawing a slender hunting knife from her tunic belt with the other.

‘Damn, damn, damn,’ Mark cursed: in his concern for Brynne he had forgotten the bow. He quickly nocked an arrow and pointed it aloft, waiting for someone to appear. ‘Please God, don’t let me pierce one of my friends,’ he prayed quietly, but thankfully, none of the Prince Marek ’s crew seemed to have heard them. Brynne motioned for Steven and the fisherman to join her. Mark watched intently as she peered around, then hefted her lithe form over the aft rail and disappeared from sight.

Steven went up next, with the staff tied in a makeshift harness, nimbly pulling himself hand-over-hand until he reached the stern cabin. Mark and the fisherman exchanged a worried glance as Steven slowed his climb to a stop, dangling precariously above the water.

He had paused to look through the cabin window, into an enormous chamber, so opulently decorated that it must be Prince Malagon’s. Tapers burned around the main room, and through the dim, shimmering light he could see gilded artwork on the bulkheads, delicately woven rugs in a thousand hues on the floor, ornate tapestries hanging above a huge bed draped in rich brocaded silk and velvet, and a bookshelf lined with several hundred silver-embossed books – the first books he’d seen in Eldarn.

‘Silver,’ Steven muttered, ‘you bastard. I wonder where you developed a love for silver.’ The staff responded to his anger and flickered to life, its energy lancing though Steven’s jacket. He forced himself to continue climbing.

On the water, the fisherman grabbed the rope and prepared to follow.

‘You need a hand, my friend?’ Mark asked, dubious that the old man would make it all the way up.

‘No, thank you,’ he replied. ‘I learned to climb long ago, in another life. My history teacher was quite a mountaineer.’ He flashed Mark a boyish smile and scrambled up the stern line with the agility of someone less than half his age.

Mark allowed the bowstring to relax slowly and stared after the old man in wonder. ‘It can’t be,’ he whispered, and sat down clumsily on one of the skiff’s wooden benches.

Brynne couldn’t see any crew from where she crouched behind a stack of tarpaulin-covered crates. As Steven and the fisherman joined her, she motioned for them to get down. The raised deck stretched out in front of them: a barren expanse of oak planking. Several watch fires burned in large sconces mounted above the gunwales and a warm golden light cast dull, flickering shadows across the ship’s broad beam. Their most difficult move would be from their current position down the starboard stairs to the main deck, and then through the cabin door to get to Prince Malagon’s chambers below. Wisps of Brynne’s flaxen hair blew lazily in the cold evening wind. Thankfully, it had not yet begun to rain.