Assassin's Shadow (Veiled Dagger Book 2) Read online

  Chapter 4

  Save for the wind, the desert landscape was silent. A thousand pairs of dark eyes stared at Rothar and Taria, some with bewilderment, some with rage, some with an indefinable mixture of curiosity and admiration. The stench of burning flesh filled the air, borne on the black smoke that billowed from the fire.

  Finally, the warriors seemed to collect themselves and broke forth into the stone circle, drawing their swords. No words were spoken, but a conditioned impulse seemed to carry the mercenaries forward. Taria clutched Rothar’s arm as he braced himself to die protecting her.

  As the men drew near a deep voice from behind Rothar shouted out a command in Caltanian.

  “Halt!” demanded the voice.

  The soldiers hesitated, but looked past Rothar and Taria with a certain amount of contempt.

  Rothar turned to see a large Southlander walking into the arena. The man was unarmed and did not wear the typical battle garb of the mercenaries. He looked to be about the same age as Rothar, and walked with a steady gate that belied a long possessed confidence.

  “Listen to me!” the man shouted, as much to the onlooking crowd as to the encroaching warriors. “This man is not to be harmed. He challenged Bakal and defeated him, that is all there is to know, and all there is to see.”

  One of the mercenaries sneered in retort. “He is a northern pig and a danger to us all. He must die.”

  The intercessor spread his hands out wide. “He is a warrior, the same as any of you, only better.”

  The soldiers bristled at the insult.

  “Bakal preached of perfection in brutality, and he searched for it in every one of you, never finding it,” the man continued. “But he found it here today, in the process of his own demise. He would be incensed to think that any one of you would kill the one and only perfect soldier in all the land.”

  The mercenaries looked at one another, unsure, but a murmur of approval seemed to be growing in the surrounding crowd.

  “This supreme warrior has no more business here among us. Let him take his prize and be gone,” the man shouted, gesturing towards Rothar and Taria. “And let us remember this day, not only as an example of what pure brutality looks like, but as a lesson in what is worth fighting and killing for.”

  The crowd grew louder, and some of the soldiers reluctantly sheathed their swords. The man motioned for Rothar and Taria to walk ahead, and as they did, the crowd parted to let them pass. The man walked with them. As they walked between the divided throngs of Southlanders, some reached out to touch Rothar, some to feel Taria. Reverent eyes searched Rothar’s face from all about. He thought he heard some of the women calling Taria “mother.”

  Once they were beyond the crowd, Taria spoke to the man who had saved them.

  “Chanter, thank you! Oh thank you!” she said to him, grasping his hands. Her remaining chains made a rattling sound.

  “You do not need to thank me,” said the man called Chanter. “But you do need to be gone before they change their minds about my little speech. You, of all people, Taria, know how fickle this lot can be.”

  “I do indeed,” replied Taria. Turning to Rothar she said, “They would have taken your horse to the stables to keep as their own. We must go now.”

  At the stables, Rothar took up the blacksmith’s tools and set to work removing Taria’s manacles and chains. As he labored, he asked Chanter why he had helped them.

  “It is simple,” Chanter answered. “Taria is the single decent person I have known in all of my life in this infernal desert.”

  “That is no surprise to me,” said Rothar, “but why did you help me?”

  Chanter looked confused. “Why, because she loves you.”

  Silence reigned in the stable for a long moment as both Rothar and Taria turned matching shades of scarlet.

  Chanter mercifully broke the silence. “And also because you did our land a great favor.”

  “I am surprised that so many of your people would turn against Bakal so readily,” Rothar said.

  “It is not him I speak of, although you might be surprised to know how many people will be quietly celebrating tonight.”

  “Who do you speak of then?”

  “You killed my brother at Twistle,” Chanter told Rothar, looking him straight in the eye, “He was the commander of the battalion at Miranda’s Manor.”

  Rothar was shocked. He certainly would not forget the man he had slain as the other devils rained down upon the King’s City.

  “Why would you laud me for killing your brother, I must ask?”

  Chanter smiled sadly. “Because, besides Bakal, my brother was the most horrific and evil being on this side of the mountains,” he said. “And you did well to slay him. Bakal was going to give him Taria as a victory gift upon his return to the badlands.”

  Taria’s last manacle fell, and she was finally able to wrap her arms around Rothar fully.

  “You came back, you fool,” she whispered.

  Chapter 5

  Taria and Rothar said farewell to Chanter and set off into the Valley of Mourning. Taria rode a gray mare that had long been her favorite of the Southland stable. She called the horse Bedlam. Upon entering the Valley, Taria took one last look back at Rama.

  Her people still milled about the edge of the arena, speaking in groups. Her people - who she felt were never really her people - were at a loss; free, but not free. No one remained to tell them who to kill or torment, yet, it was all that they knew. She wondered what would become of the savage desert nomads, now that the head had been cut off of the snake.

  Taria turned her back on the desolate settlement. She would not miss the view, distorted as it was by the perpetual heat, and tainted as it was by the endless violence. She knew that each person that remained in that hell would have a decision to make.

  A new power would certainly arise - several of the elder mercenaries were undoubtedly plotting their rise to power already. There would be much bloodshed, but the ultimate decision would be that of the people. Taria hoped against hope that the people would choose no man, and would govern themselves. It was the only way that any semblance of peace would ever be known in the desert. But she knew this would not happen.

  Eventually, the most savage and unbending man would find himself in the throne of teak that Bakal had occupied for so very long, and the never ending cycle of death and brutality would continue in the Southlands.

  She looked at Rothar, riding next to her. For an instant, she wished that their circumstances were different, and that he could remain in the desert, with her, rather than her riding north with him.

  A man like Rothar was the only type of enigma that could save her homeland. He was a man so at home with violence and brutality that he wore it like a cloak. Yet, he possessed such a sense of honor that his violence could never be sustained. Rothar, despite his northern pallor, was the only man she had ever known who may be able to rule the Southlands properly, but he was not meant to do as such. Rothar’s destiny had always held so much more.

  “Will you miss any of it?” Rothar asked Taria, pulling her away from her thoughts.

  “Very little,” she replied. “Probably only the horses, and the children… the very young ones, not yet tainted by murder.”

  Rothar said nothing, only nodded. After they had rode a while, he spoke again.

  “Did you ever doubt that I would come back for you?”

  Taria thought for a moment, a melancholy smile on her lips.

  “I never doubted against it. I only hoped you wouldn’t.”

  Rothar turned in the saddle to look at her.

  “Why did you hope to die in the desert?”

  “Because it would be better to die alone in the desert than to see you killed.”

  Rothar almost laughed, but she saw a look of understanding flash across his face.

  “Well,” Rothar said, “I had no plans to let Bakal get the better of me. He was a man of great ferocity… and greater pride. I knew that, as long as I pok
ed at his ego, I had a chance of catching him with his guard down.”

  “And you nearly lost your neck doing so,” Taria said to him.

  “Perhaps,” replied Rothar, “but I wound up saving yours.”

  The two smiled at one another. Taria thought about how only two truly savage individuals could smile about such a situation. Perhaps savagery wasn't all ugly. Perhaps it was sometimes necessary to be savage, in order for good to prevail.

  The sheer walls of the Valley of Mourning rose on either side above them. The sun was descending in the west, and they rode in ever increasing darkness. Taria felt no fear, perhaps for the first time in her life.

  “Am I to go to the King’s City with you?” she asked Rothar.

  The assassin took a deep breath and released it slowly. “I had been considering that,” he said. “However, I think it may be best for you to stay in the Banewood, at least for the time being.”

  “The Banewood?” she asked. While she was not completely thrilled with the prospect of trading one wilderness for another, she was a little relieved to not be immediately thrust into the noise and crush of the King’s City.

  “Yes,” said Rothar. “You may stay with Peregrin. I have already arranged it. That is, as long as it is alright with you.”

  Taria paused for only a moment. “Of course, so far as I am not putting out the huntsmen.”

  “They will be only too glad to have you,” Rothar said with a smile, barely visible in the fading twilight. “They said you may be called upon to cook a meal or mend a tunic, but Peregrin informed his brethren that you would be of better use in breaking their colts.”

  Taria laughed, although she knew that Peregrin was right. She was able to cook meat and could sew a bit, but her real talent had always been with horses. It was as though they understood her when she spoke, and she felt that she knew their language as well. Horses spoke with their eyes and their bodies. Taria often wished that people would do more communicating in the way of horses, and engage in less mindless talking.

  “Will we still see one another?” Her stomach leapt into her throat as she asked the question. Proclamations of infatuation had not been successful between the two, historically.

  Rothar halted Stormbringer, and Taria clicked for Bedlam to stop as well.

  She had to strain her eyes in the darkness, but she could see that Rothar had leveled an earnest gaze at her.

  “Always, dear Taria,” he said. “Always.”

  Chapter 6

  The darkness caused them to travel slowly and carefully through the valley, but Rothar was also in no great hurry to reach the huntsmen in the Banewood, so he prodded Stormbringer very little. He was allowing himself to enjoy Taria’s company. The new sensation unnerved him a little, deep down inside, but after the treacheries that they had survived in recent days, he felt no qualms about showing this woman that he cared.

  As dawn broke, they rode out of the northern mouth of the valley. Taria looked west, towards the towering wall of the King’s City.

  “When I go there, will I be scorned?” she asked.

  “When you go there, we will go together,” Rothar answered. “And I shall see to it that you are welcomed. But for now, let us get you to the huntsmen.”

  Peregrin had promised Rothar that the clan would wait at Heaven’s Falls for him to bring Taria. There had been no way for Rothar to know how long it would take him to return from the badlands, but the huntsmen were prepared to wait for several days.

  They rode east into the Banewood. Rothar watched Taria out of the corner of his eye as the Southland beauty marveled at the lush, green landscape. She had spent her entire life in the bleak, tan wasteland, and now she seemed overwhelmed by the bounty of life all around her. She reached out and caressed the leaves of bushes and the rough bark of the trees. She gazed in wonder at a trickling stream and laughed in delight at the sight of a doe, crossing the path with her fawns. Rothar pointed out to her the deadly Quietus vines, instructing her to never go near them.

  After a time, they came into a grove of towering oaks. Taria brought Bedlam to a halt and laid back on the mare, staring into the canopy. Slivers of sunlight broke through the thick canopy and painted pictures on her face and body. The light danced in her eyes.

  “Rothar, may we stop here a moment?”

  “I see no reason why we cannot,” he replied, and added with a wry smile. “If we are too long in reaching the huntsmen, they will only assume I am dead.”

  “Good,” replied Taria. “I feel a yearning that I have never felt before.”

  With that, she leapt off of Bedlam in one motion and landed on her feet, walking towards Rothar. Surprised and slightly panicked, Rothar hurriedly dismounted Stormbringer and stood, uncertainly in her path. Smiling, Taria stepped around him and walked straight to the tallest tree in the grove. With the skill of a born woodsman, she began to scale the trunk of the giant oak.

  Rothar stood, staring up at her, feeling a little foolish, but mostly glad to see this woman, whom he would - and nearly did - give his life for, climbing away from the shackles of earth and reaching for the heavens.

  Taria continued to climb until she was well beyond Rothar’s sight. He knew that she reached the top of the massive tree when he heard her yell out triumphantly. It was a sound like he had heard no person ever produce, a sound of such joy and such freedom that his envy was only overshadowed by his sense of happiness.

  These were feelings that Rothar, a man of death and discipline, was not accustomed to, and before Taria came back to earth, he made sure to temper his enthusiasm. He greeted her with a sincere smile and a mandate. “We really must be going now.”

  By the early evening they could begin to hear the thunderous cacophony of Heaven’s Falls in the distance. A falcon screeched overhead, and Rothar knew that their arrival would be heralded by the bird.

  When they finally came into the big clearing around the deafening falls, they were greeted by a large party of huntsmen, led by Peregrin himself, falcon on his shoulder, grinning widely.

  “Taria!” he shouted over the falls. “Alive and well! Not that I should be surprised!” he winked at Rothar. “Come away, let’s go somewhere where we can hear ourselves think!”

  They rode downstream with the huntsmen to the main camp, where about two dozen wild and wily men milled about small tents and campfires. Rothar knew many of the elder huntsmen, and they greeted him with open arms. It had been many years since he had seen his old clan in it’s entirety and it was a happy reunion.

  The group dined on venison and mushrooms and drank mead as the sun set - even Rothar allowed himself to imbibe. Peregrin, well into his cups, related the tale of how he and Rothar freed the children of the King’s City from Duchess Miranda and her Southland mercenaries. The huntsmen loved to tell stories of heroism and adventure, and Peregrin bowed his head when he told of Waya, mother of the giants, sacrificing her life to save them, and he shuddered a little as he spoke of the ghastly coachman who could be killed only with fire.

  When Peregrin finished regaling his kinsmen with a tale that they had surely all heard before in recent days, someone asked Rothar to tell of how he had freed Taria from the Southlands.

  Rothar looked humbly into the campfire and said only, “It is not much of a story. We are here now, that is all.”

  The huntsmen were incredulous; surely there was a great battle!

  Taria stood and walked to the center of the circle of men. All fell silent.

  “There was a great fight,” she said softly, her eyes sparking in the firelight as she looked at Rothar, and then at each man in turn. Taria began to tell of how Rothar had simply rode into Mara and demanded to see Bakal, and how he had goaded the chief into a duel, and how he had ultimately dragged the demon to his death, screeching and smoldering in his own proud fire.

  The huntsmen were silent throughout the telling, in awe. When Taria had finished, the men stood up, heads bowed in reverence to Rothar, and filed off to bed down for the nigh
t, for it was very late. One of the elders, a man named Wulf, stopped and grasped Rothar by the arm.

  “We are all very glad that Bakal is gone,” he said, his gray eyes on Rothar’s. “I can only hope that the new chief is no worse.”

  “I pray that no man can be worse than Bakal.”

  Wulf only nodded, and went off to his tent.

  When all the men had gone off, and the camp was quiet, only Rothar, Taria and Peregrin remained by the large fire in the middle of the clearing.

  “So, what happens now?” Peregrin asked. He did not ask it of anyone in particular, but of the night, or the trees, or himself even.

  “I must return to the King’s City, and I assume you have hunting to do,” said Rothar with a slight laugh.

  “I know all of that, and you know what I mean,” retorted Peregrin, kicking dust at Rothar. “There is always trouble in the kingdom and you are always chasing it. We, in the Banewood, live our lives and Taria is welcome to be a part of that, but how will you reconcile her life with yours? How will you make a life for her in the City, when you must go where you are called?”

  Taria spoke up. “Excuse me, but I am very able to take care of myself, whether it be here or in the King’s City.” Rothar knew that she had reservations about her ability to exist in the city, but her pride did not allow her to admit that to anyone but him.

  “Of course, Taria, I did not mean to offend,” Peregrin apologized. “I only meant to ask what Rothar plans to do in the future, in regards to your… relationship.”

  Rothar and Taria both laughed. The idea that they had something that could be confined within such a small and simple term was amusing to the both of them.

  “Peregrin, old friend,” said Rothar, “in due time I will make arrangements for Taria to stay in the city, and I will come to take her there. In the mean time, be grateful for her presence. It seems to me that you have more horses than you have patience, judging by the noise and stamping about in your meadow!”