The Coming Dawn: Epic of Haven Trilogy Book 3 Read online

  “The tree of Haven has lost its fire, my liege, but I am not so inclined to take the word of these runaways as evidence of the city’s ruin,” Hildræd said warily.

  “It is true, Lord Æsc.” Celrod spoke up. “Three, maybe four days ago, though I am not quite sure now, as we have lost count … our journey—”

  “You expect him to believe this?” came a slippery, thin-sounding voice from within the shadows of the hall. “That Kaestor’s mighty city has fallen?”

  At the sound of this strange voice, the room went cold, though no breeze had blown in through its lone door.

  “I barely believe it myself,” Michael said, his eyes peering into the shadows and searching for the stranger in the dark.

  “Who then?” Æsc demanded. “Who has that kind of strength, boy, to break those high, white walls?”

  “I do not know who, Lord Æsc … but I do know… what,” Michael replied, his gaze still fixed on the shadows. “I saw it with my own two eyes. I saw the burning and the breaking, I watched the guardsmen cut down the attacking forces … and… I saw my friend torn limb from limb by the demons themselves.” His voice no longer carried the air of fear, rather, anger had hardened the road-weary edges of his tone.

  “Speak plainly, boy,” Æsc growled in reply. “My patience for strangers and strange tales has already run thin enough. Do not test me further with your riddles.”

  “No,” came the sound of the cold, slippery voice. “He speaks the truth … I have seen it.” A pair of yellow eyes flashed sickly in the corner as a man walked out from the shadows and over to the tableside.

  “Margarid?” cried Georgina.

  “Silence, girl!” Æsc shouted as he pounded his fist against the table, sending a mound of crab apples rolling and skittering onto the floor. “I will not suffer a woman, no matter her age, to speak in my court! My grandfather made that mistake once. He and my father fell victim to the poisoned words of that witch, and sent our people into unending exile!” His angry eyes drilled into Georgina, and she began to cry.

  “Dragons,” Michael shouted back, drawing attention away from the girl. “It was dragons that took Haven.”

  “Lies!” Hildræd said, enraged now. He kicked Michael’s legs out from under him, and the groomsman fell hard upon the stone floor. Hildræd grabbed him by his hair, holding his stunted blade menacingly close to Michael’s face. “There are no such things as dragons. Do you know what we Walha do to liars and false-speakers? We rid them of their tongues!”

  “No, please!” Margarid shouted into the storm of offenses. “You must believe him, he is speaking the truth! Cut his tongue out, cut all of our tongues out … but if the dragons fix their gaze upon these black mountains, you will be the fool who refused the warning of the dogs of Haven!”

  “Greater women have died for lesser words than these!” Hildræd growled as he threw Michael to floor and stood to his feet, hands clenching with rage.

  “He speaks the truth … twins they are, moving in mirrored unison,” Ragnarr mused aloud, his pale, spindly fingers flicking and waving at the air about him as he spoke. “Winged justice, my liege!” he said as a yellow-toothed smile grew upon his bearded face. “I have seen them, and their green fires.”

  “Truth or no truth, Father!” Hildræd reasoned. “You cannot be taken by her words! Do not repeat the folly of Ealhstan, and do not suffer these runaways an audience any longer.”

  Æsc looked to his councilor and then back again to the frightened group from Haven that stood before him. “If what you say is true, wizard, then what is there to say that these dragons won’t turn their gaze towards us?” He looked contemptuously at the gaze of the auburn-haired woman who had dared to address him so brazenly.

  Harmier held Georgina close, willing her to keep her fear and her tears to herself. Portus, Fryon, and the rest clenched their fists and gripped their blades with hardened resolve.

  “There is nothing that any of us can do, Lord Æsc,” Margarid said calmly and defiantly. “If these dragons want to raze your homes, I doubt that your arrows have any more strength than the thousands of Haven’s bolts that were loosed and defeated.”

  “She is right,” Celrod, the schoolmaster, said humbly. “Our city and its armies could not keep those damned beasts at bay, and I fear that unless you have a magic greater than the strength of their talons, teeth, and green fire … hiding might be our only salvation.”

  “That is all we are good for, isn’t it, Father?” Hildræd grumbled.

  “Do not disrespect your liege, young sentry,” Ragnarr seethed aloud. “Wise council is not always as rash as young men hope it to be.”

  “Aye, but it is not always as fearful as old fools presume!” He retorted. “Our people have been banished, hidden for almost a century, resigned to lead shame-colored lives in the black, barren rock.” He spat as he spoke.

  “That is enough, Hildræd.” Æsc demanded.

  “And for what?” he said, ignoring his father’s command. “Because your father fell in love with a king’s daughter? And foolishly thought he could make her his own!” He laughed. “We are nothing but outliers. But now, look! Don’t you see? We have been given a gift. Justice has come for our people, and these long, meager years will now grant us the spoils of war, if we but take it for ourselves!”

  “You don’t understand!” Michael pleaded. “Haven has been conquered. It is not just dragons, there is a whole raven army that occupies the citadel. You can’t … I mean there is … we have to flee for our lives!”

  “Who will be left to stop us, Father? Huh? A bunch of birds?” Hildræd reasoned. “Haven is ripe for the taking. Just look at your sons, your people … don’t we deserve the prize your father never had?”

  The hall went silent for the moment, save the crackling of the brazier fires and the pop and spittle of the roasting meat over the large hearth. The lord of these black hills thought on all that had been said, and finally spoke. “What do you say, Ragnarr? Do you liken your council to that of my war-mongering son, or do you say we choose to run and flee like these mongrels of Kaestor?”

  The wizard looked to the huddled remnant, his yellow eyes aglow with something sinister. “These dragons will not abide here long, my liege, for something ravenous compels them westward.” He looked deep into what seemed like nothing at all, his face glowing with the satisfaction of his clairvoyance. “I see it … her … she commands them!”

  “Did you hear what he said, Father?” Hildræd spoke up. “Something compels them westward? Once they leave this place … all of it will be ours!”

  The remnant watched nervously as this battle of wills raged uncomfortably before them. “I just want to be done with this place,” Fryon whispered to his brother.

  “Aye, me too,” Timorets replied.

  “We must not move too soon. We must wait for our moment, bide our time!” Ragnarr whispered.

  “And scavenge the leftovers like rats, like the exiles they treat us as?” Hildræd argued. “We have the chance to be the new kings of this world! We Walha are strong, Father. This is justice! Ravens or not, dragons or not … this moment is ours!”

  “Better to be a huddled and humbled rat who lives, than a foolish warrior who bleeds out on the stoop of his pride!” Ragnarr retorted.

  “Enough!” Æsc shouted. “The lot of you! Enough!”

  The room went quiet in the wake of the liege lord’s fury. It was Michael who broke the silence with his rather bold request. “Lord Æsc, whether you choose to claim our broken walls as your own or not is of no consequence to me and my friends.” He looked back over his shoulder towards the huddled mass of the remnant. “Our time in Haven has come to an end. All we have known and loved in Haven is lost. Our families, our friends … dead, or worse. There is nothing left there for us but heartbreak. We ask only for a bit of hospitality as we continue on our way.”

  “You, a stray dog of Haven, are asking the Lord of the Walha for the scraps from my table? Ha! And where do you presume
to be headed, dog?”

  “I am not sure,” Michael replied humbly. “But somewhere to the north.”

  “Father!” Hildræd begged, his annoyance at this audience evident to all.

  “Shut your mouth, lad!” Æsc growled at his son. He took a deep breath, pondering all the choices and tales that had unexpectedly stumbled upon his threshold. “If you flee northward, the only refuge I know is the Halvard, and it has long since been in disrepair. Even before my childhood it was but an echo, a ghost of ages past.”

  “But a strength still runs through the mountain door,” Ragnarr commented mysteriously. “A strength which is not unopposed.”

  Æsc looked at the warlock, confused and rather uninterested in his words, before continuing to speak to Michael. “Our people will not show hospitality to your people, for we were exiled from our homes by one of your mad kings. But although you will find no rest within my walls and no warm hearths from my people, I will not be like your king. I will not sentence you to die in the cold of your banishment. I’ll see to it that you have a skin or two of the juniper wine, and furs enough to keep you from freezing over… and here,” he said as he flicked his fingers and then returned his gaze to his own supper. “Some salted meat and a loaf of black bread for each of you, but that’s it.”

  Æsc nodded at his attendant and within a few long moments he reappeared with the promised provisions.

  “Thank you, Lord Æsc,” Michael said on behalf of his friends.

  “Those furs are moth-eaten and molded, but from one exile to another, I hope you find a land to start over again,” Æsc said as he drank deeply from his clay goblet.

  “Aye,” Michael agreed.

  “Ahhh!” The wizard gasped happily. “Movement, my liege! The dragons! She moves them!”

  “Father!” Hildræd interrupted. “Now is the time! Even your wizard sees it … justice has finally come for us!”

  “Show them to the foot of these black rocks, and I will consider your plan to take the broken city. But be quick about it, lest the warlock see some unfavorable change in the wind.”

  With that, Michael and the others bowed in gratitude and donned the old furs. Timorets and Harmier slung the two skins of juniper wine and the sack of vittles over their shoulders, and the remnant followed the sentry down past the rows of homes until they at last arrived at the base of the black-rocked mountains.

  “If north is where you are going, there is only one road that will get you there,” Hildræd said begrudgingly. “The River Ithelum will cut off your way, save for the Meinir at the center of it. Cross the land bridge if it still stands, and be gone with haste from our lands.”

  “Thank you, we will find it,” Michael replied. “Do you know what is beyond it?”

  “With that, I cannot help you,” Hildræd said smugly. “I have a city to claim.”

  Chapter Twelve

  After several days of searching, Marcum, Johnrey, and their group of surviving soldiers and woodcutters passed the fens of the Abonris. “I found their tracks again!” Johnrey reported back. “They have come by this way, and in a hurry at that.”

  Marcum listened intently to the corporal’s report, scanning the darkened horizon for any sign of Keily and the women and children. “Do you see signs of distress? Were they chased?”

  “Not that we can tell, but wherever she was leading them, she wanted them as far away from that road as possible,” Johnrey added.

  “Come on, lass,” Brádách moaned out loud. “Just slow down and wait for us already.”

  “Where are you taking them, Keily?” Marcum wondered aloud.

  “The best we can tell,” Johnrey answered, “Is that she is leading them west along the foothills here. And thank the THREE who is SEVEN, she looks to have gone completely unnoticed by the ravens.”

  “That is good enough news for so dark a day,” Marcum replied. “Thank you, Corporal. We will follow where she is leading us.”

  And with that, they made their turn west along the base of the Hilgari Mountains. They walked slowly but deliberately, their ears and eyes peeled for signs of their friends and their foes.

  “Lieutenant!” came the whispered shout from the front of the caravan. “Lieutenant, I think we may have found them. The tracks stop just ahead.”

  “Alright now, lass, take it easy,” Brádách said under his breath. “There are no ravens here, keep your bow to yourself.”

  Marcum looked at the old woodcutter, amused at his mutterings but also reminded both of the dire situation Keily had fled from and her skill as an archer.

  “Light your torches!” Marcum shouted to his men as he labored to sit up straight.

  “Lieutenant?” Johnrey asked.

  “We are friend, not foe. Friends will show themselves, foes will not,” Marcum replied.

  Understanding quickly registered, and the white-bearded corporal relayed the orders to all of his men.

  “Keily!” Marcum shouted into the darkened outlands of Haven. “Keily, it’s us! It is Marcum … we have been tracking you for days.” He winced at the sharp pain in his shoulder. “We found help, my lady. We are not alone.”

  Off in the distance, hidden behind an outcropping of stone and juniper bushes, came the flashes of three sparks. Johnrey signaled his reply with seven flashes from his flint, and eruptions of joy rang out from the silent dark before them. Gabriel, Annsley, Huckston and Ryder, the remaining children of their company, squealed in elation as they ran towards the guardsmen and called out to them. “You’re here!” “You’ve found us!” “We are safe now!” Their voices sounded in a chorus of hope against the darkness.

  The remaining women and the elders came out from their hiding, smiles spreading across their faces.

  “Lieutenant?” Keily spoke as she lowered her bow. “Is that you? I thought … I thought for sure you were lost. All of you.”

  “Some unlooked for friends found us, and came to our rescue,” Marcum answered her with a warm, albeit wounded, embrace.

  “Woodcutters!” she exclaimed. “But I thought …” She trailed off as grief washed over her face. “I thought you were gone from this world.”

  “Only the bravest of us, lass,” Brádách said as he made his way down from the timber cart, limping over to behold the fiery barmaid.

  She smiled and hugged him with genuine gratitude and surprise. “Oh, Brádách,” she said with matronly sternness in her voice. “Tell me that I am not going to have to make you eat with the dogs ever again, am I?”

  “I thought you said it was one of the old lads?” Marcum asked, grinning as the truth of the story came clear.

  “Easy there, lass!” he said, holding his hands up in surrender. “That was many years ago, and I have repented of my waywardness. And I am truly glad to see that the niece of my chieftain is alive and in one piece.” He squeezed her shoulders tight.

  “I saw him, Brádách,” she said, her smile fading. “Hollis … his lifeless head was flung upon the battlements of the North Gate in a wash of green fire. I don’t know if I can ever rid my thoughts of that horrible memory.”

  “He was the bravest of us all, lass; braver than I’ll ever be,” Brádách replied gently, his voice catching in his throat.

  “Keily?” Marcum said, interrupting their reunion. “Are you, are they … is everyone alright?”

  She turned and looked at the wounded lieutenant. “Yes, we are all safe. Except … except for Roshan.” Her eyes fell as she mentioned his name. “We ran as fast as we could, and I was trying to find him. I wanted to make sure he was safe,” she said worriedly. “But that horse took him, and I don’t know where they went. We’ve been hidden here for days now, and there is no sign of him.”

  “There now, lass,” Brádách said kindly. “I’m sure the lad is alright. Come on now, we can’t be chasing ghosts out here in the cold north.”

  “He is right, Keily,” Marcum answered. “He could be anywhere now. Besides, we have got to find shelter and mend our wounded.”

&
nbsp; “Aye,” Brádách agreed. “Our camp is now a half a day’s walk back eastward, and we have some provisions and some shelter, enough for all of us … enough for now, at least.”

  “But we can’t turn back … he is just a boy!” Exhaustion colored her protest. “He is just a lost boy with no light out here in the darkness.”

  Just then a flash of light came from the edge of the perimeter, one of the guardsmen signaling a warning. “Did you see that?” Brádách asked nervously.

  “Yes, I did,” Marcum answered. “Corporal?”

  “Right away, sir.” Johnrey answered.

  Marcum motioned for his men to surround the ox cart, while the women, elders, and children climbed inside or hid underneath, seeking shelter and preparing for whatever was out there to meet them. The guardsmen drew their bows and held their blades at the ready.

  Three flashes came then out from the western darkness, and Marcum answered it with his seven. “What is it? What do you see?” Came Marcum’s whispered demands.

  “Lieutenant,” came the breathless response of the guardsman runner.

  “What is it? Tell me, quick,” Marcum ordered.

  “It’s … it’s an old man.” the guardsman replied.

  “An old man?” Marcum said. “Out here? All by himself?”

  “Well … in a way,” said the guardsman incredulously. “He is in a mule-drawn cart, only … only he is not by himself.”

  Marcum looked off into the west, and Keily and the rest followed his gaze. What they beheld captured their hearts with wonder. A small light was held aloft, swaying back and forth with the rhythm of the mule cart, and yet the glow that emanated forth was not of candle or torch. Rather, it lit the mountainside with a deep, violet glow.

  “What in the damnable dark is that?” Marcum asked.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Michael and his remnant made their way northward by walking east through rocky lands at the base of the black mountains. They were tired, and their weary feet were in much need of rest, but their hearts were grateful enough to have left the lands of the Walha with as little injury as they did.