Morgan Rice - Night of the Bold

Aidan slowly stopped crying as he considered Motley’s words. He felt, deep down, that they were true, even while he resisted them.

“Yet there is supposed to be justice in the world,” Aidan insisted. “You commit a crime, you get punished. You are good to others, they are good to you. Is that not how the world is supposed to work?”

Motley slowly shook his head.

“Life may show us glimpses of justice. But the vast majority of it, you will find, will be unruled, unregulated, and unjust. You must create your own sense of justice and act from it. Not because the world is just – but because you are just. After all, you are a microcosm of the world. You cannot prevent what the world shall give to you. But you can control yourself.”

Aidan pondered his words in the long silence, sensing their truth.

“My father was fair and just,” Aidan replied, calmer now, hollowed out. “And yet where did that get him? He ended up being treated unjustly.”

“Your father is fair and just,” Motley corrected, “and he was treated unjustly. That is true. But don’t you see? It does not take away from the life he has led. He led a life of justice. And no single act of injustice will ever strip that from him.”

Motley laid a hand on Aidan’s shoulder, and Aidan turned to him.

“Dwell on the injustice of life, and you will only create more of it,” he concluded. “Ignore it, and act justly yourself, and you will create a life of justice.”

Aidan considered Motley’s words, his tears gone now, as he began to see the truth in them. Cassandra reached over and held his hand, and he looked back at her. Her eyes were brimming with tears as she stared back.

“I love your father as the father I never had,” she said softly, sadly. “He may die before his time, yet he lives right now. Cherish your time with him. I never had a father. You still have more time, in your brief window, than I ever had. Do not give in to self-pity. There are many people, like myself, who have it worse than you.”

Aidan took a deep breath and felt foolish, realizing she was right.

“Be strong,” she added, “for him. He needs you now. His fate has been written. Now you must decide what to do. Will you collapse? Or will you be at his side?”

Slowly Aidan felt a calm arise within him. He felt a new sense of purpose, of determination. And he began to feel a new desire.

For vengeance.

Aidan stood, wiped away his final tear, and felt cold, strong inside. He knew that something had shifted within him. He knew now that he was no longer a boy, but a man. A man who would soon be without a father. A man who would need to stand on his own two feet, and to avenge him.

It was time to leave boyish ways behind.

“It is time to go,” Aidan said, taking that first step, “and avenge my father.”

Seavig galloped west, leading hundreds of warriors of Esephus, determined to fulfill Duncan’s command and wage war against the Pandesian fleet. He knew the odds were stacked against him and that the battle at sea would likely end in his death, yet it gave him no pause: it was the honorable thing to do for his country. And for Duncan, he would do anything.

As Seavig rode he thought of the vast numbers of the Pandesian fleet, and he knew this would have to be the most brilliant battle he and his men had ever waged at sea. He lived for times like this, times when his back was to the wall, when the odds were bleakest; he thrived when the situation demanded that he be not just a great warrior, but a crafty one as well. He was, after all, a man of the sea, and one needed great cunning to survive in the face of a storm.

The great stronghold of Esephus had stood for thousands of years because he and his fathers before him had managed to make it stand, had found a way to keep it alive, even exposed as it was to attack on the seashore. They were water people, and water people learned to move like the water, to rise and fall, to duck and weave. Water, after all, could flow even over the biggest rock in the world, and that was because it was malleable.

Seavig cried as he kicked his horse, urging him faster. Their destination, the western shore of Escalon, was but a short ride now, due west of Baris. It was the perfect place to enter the water, to begin the sail north, sail up the Sorrow, and eventually outflank the fleets of Pandesia. Where he was riding was a place no Pandesian would guard; it was not a town, or city, or stronghold. It was but a shoreline. It was nowhere, a coast uninhabited for hundreds of miles.

Seemingly uninhabited. There were no great strongholds or cities or even towns in this area, and the Pandesians would not guard the area. That was precisely the way this harbor was designed. For in times of greatest war, the ancient Escalonites wanted a hiding place in reserve. It was the secret place, known only to the commanders of Escalon, where the River Tanis met the Sorrow. Somewhere north of the Lost Temple and south of Ur, in the middle of seemingly nowhere, a secret meeting point had been designated for times of national emergency. It was a place where Escalon’s sailors could rendezvous for battle, could take to the seas to save their homeland. Esephus, a great water city, was a natural target, and Seavig had designated a backup plan in case his city was taken. When Pandesia was closing in, he had sent one of his commanders to lead dozens of men to await him in the great caves of the western shore, where they could hide for months and not be found. It was there Seavig had stashed a dozen of his finest ships for times of war. Times like this.

Seavig prodded his horse, galloping faster, leading his men ever west, and as the sun grew heavy they finally burst through the thick wood, riding alongside the gushing River Tanis. Somewhere up ahead, he knew, it met the Sea of Sorrow. They would sail north, under the cover of darkness, along the coast, to Ur, and ambush the much greater Pandesian fleet. He would be outnumbered a thousand ships to one, yet Seavig had no fear. He went where battle called him.

They crested a hill, and finally, the sky opened and Seavig was relieved to see his great love in life: the ocean. There were the vast, rolling waves of the Sorrow, the sun shining off it, but a few hundred yards ahead. Even from here he could hear the great gushing of water, and he looked out and followed the Tanis and saw where all of its tributaries finally met the sea, gushing out in a great flood. It was a sight that restored his heart. When he saw water, he knew he was home again.

Seavig lowered his head, kicked his horse, and completed the final stretch. He and his men soon reached the great caves of the sea, and as he rode alongside the enormous rock, fifty feet tall, he quickly dismounted. His men followed him as he walked toward the caves, dwarfed by the soaring, arched entrance.

Seavig entered the dimly lit cave, and as he did, his heart soared to see hundreds of his men awaiting him inside. They all sat around a fire, swords in their hand, brooding, and as Seavig and his men waltzed in, they all stood. Their eyes filled with hope. Seavig was elated at the sight of the small fleet he had stashed away here for times of trouble. They floated inside the cave, in the tributary that flooded it from the sea, creating a perfect canal for the anchored boats to hide.

All his men at once stood and rushed toward him. His commander, Yuvel, was the first to embrace him. Seavig embraced him back, then embraced his other men, so happy to be reunited with them all again. Here were two hundred of his finest warriors, the finest sailors of Escalon, all back together again, all ready to wage war any way they could.

As his men finished embracing, they all gathered around and looked to him, and he commanded their attention.