Crossroad Read online

  It took Ermolt a moment to realize they’d been walking in silence for nearly a kren. The Rise of Numara loomed ahead. With every step they took closer to the stone spire, there was a sense of mounting tension in the air. The people on the street grew quieter, and many of the shops they passed were already closed, even though it was not yet a bell past nightfall. When Elise finally led them into a tavern—forebodingly named The Darkest Night, despite the cheerful smile splitting the moon on the placard—it was crowded, even this early.

  The tavern itself fit well with the neighborhood around it. While the well-off lived on the south end of town, the northern districts had a higher concentration of ramshackle rowhouses and other inexpensive living quarters. The Darkest Night was in fine shape, but clearly in need of more maintenance. Paint chipped off the wood, and some of the outer walls on the upper floors had been cracked and warped as if they hadn’t been properly sealed against the weather. Ermolt did not expect this place would be a pleasant place to stay this close to the start of winter, but perhaps the chill would reignite his rage. And anywhere would be better than sleeping on the street.

  Without word, he and Elise split up once they were inside the door. He wound his way through the crowd to a small open table near the exact center of the room. Elise joined him shortly after, having secured them lodgings and dinner. When she saw where he was sitting, she grimaced, but Ermolt only shrugged and gestured around the room. He knew she usually preferred to sit where there weren’t people behind her, but the place was busy, even so early in the evening, and there were no seats near the walls available. The ex-Conscript only nodded, maintaining the silence between them, as she settled for dragging her chair around the table so that it was facing the entrance.

  They sat in silence, listening to the bustle and hum of the patrons around them. There was some joy in the crowd, but mostly sorrow, and it hung overhead like a bubble about to burst. Ermolt could hear the tales of the Temple of Numara and of the power fading from it.

  Elise motioned to Ermolt and in response he pulled Athala’s book from his hip. He put the thin volume on the table between them. Its featureless black cover was foreboding in a way Ermolt couldn’t say.

  It was clear Elise had something to say about it, but she didn’t speak. Instead she just ran a finger across the outer edge of the cover until she reached the binding, and then crisscrossed the leather straps that held the book together. The book was a tool, but more than that, it was their only hope for getting Athala back. And at the same time, it was a weapon that could turn in their hands if they didn’t handle it properly. If they didn’t respect its power.

  A man brought them their food. It seemed such a short wait, considering they were the only ones in the tavern who had ordered solid food. The rest of the patrons seemed to be busily drinking their worries away. But Elise didn’t seem concerned, and the ex-Conscript tucked into the meal of stringy braised meat and lumpy potatoes as if it were a glorious dish served on platters of gold.

  The silence that hung over them grew more awkward as time went on.

  After nearly half a bell since the last words they spoke, Ermolt found himself unable to stand it any longer.

  “What are your plans for getting Malger to work with us?”

  His words sounded like the rumbling thunder that followed unexpected lightning. Dangerous, and deep. Elise grimaced, but just kept chewing her food.

  “If he’s the last of the Dohn family in Lublis,” Ermolt said, “he’s our only option. We need to have a plan.”

  “And I don’t have one.”

  Ermolt frowned, but Elise didn’t look up at him.

  “I had a plan to deal with the Overseers.”

  “But now we’re not doing that.”

  “Just so. I had also been toying with the idea of hiring someone from the Hall of Records to help us. Perhaps there is something of historical significance that was only written down in some old Dohn’s diary, and so a key to the cipher might be available. There could be someone there who has made a career of deciphering their notes, and is very good at it.”

  “That seems a bit farfetched.”

  Elise poked at her meal, finally seeing the lackluster dish for what it was. “Yes, but it saves us from having to deal with Malger.”

  “He’s the only guarantee we have.”

  With a frown, the ex-Conscript returned to her meal. Her utensils scraped the bottom of her plate loudly enough to draw a few glares from the tables around them.

  Ermolt wanted to argue. He wanted to push. Elise had to understand, had to see that this was the right choice. That failure wasn’t an option, and every moment they delayed was akin to failure.

  Instead, he took a deep breath in through his nose, and out through his mouth. And then he too returned to his meal.

  This wasn’t the time or the place.

  It wasn’t like they had argued pointlessly before. They’d done it often, in fact. And it always got out of control. He told himself that she was stubborn, and couldn’t admit when she was wrong out of foolish pride. But he knew she thought the same of him.

  If he forced Elise into an argument now, it would escalate. They would raise their voices and make a scene. The tension in the tavern among the worshipers of Numara was almost palpable, and a noisy disturbance could ignite a brawl that would have them all rounded up by the City Guard and brought off to Damlas, the inescapable prison hidden far beneath Lublis.

  And that’s if their argument didn’t mention the events in Jirda.

  Which it would. Without Athala to mediate the conversation, or to conspicuously vanish or otherwise intervene, they would start calling back to older, unfinished arguments. Old disputes would resurface.

  It could only end in one way.

  One of them would blame the other for Athala’s death.

  And that would be the beginning of the end of their friendship.

  Chapter Three

  The sun was barely lighting the sky the next morning, and Ermolt was already causing trouble. Elise tried to keep pace with the stomping barbarian, but his longer legs and considerable anger propelled him forward at a rate she couldn’t match.

  This must have been what Athala felt like.

  “Was that really necessary?” Elise asked, slightly breathless, as she followed the barbarian down the remaining path away from the Dohn manor. He paused at the gate, and Elise found it much easier to catch up. She appreciated it, even if she wasn’t about to say so aloud.

  “It made me feel better.” Ermolt casually tossed the door handle he was holding aside, where it landed on the manicured green grass of the manor grounds. “And it does make it harder for the staff to shield him from us. If he comes home and a chunk is missing from his front door, he’ll ask about it. Malger will know we came looking for him, no matter how many solicitors usually get turned away without his knowledge.”

  Elise laughed under her breath, mostly to keep from encouraging him. “It sounds like you’re making excuses and justifications after the fact. Admit it—you weren’t actually thinking that when you announced we’d ‘see ourselves out.’”

  “Just because it wasn’t my original thought doesn’t mean it’s not true. Or a good idea.”

  In an attempt to hide her smile, Elise turned back to the manor and watched as two servants fretted over the door.

  They had refused to allow them in past the foyer. In that sort of double-talk that only the nobility of Lublis and their servants had mastered, Elise and Ermolt had been informed that Malger was too busy to talk to them, meaning that his time was too valuable to waste with them, no matter what he was actually doing or what they could offer in return. Elise had even mentioned Athala, but they hadn’t reacted at all. Had Malger just erased her from his family?

  It had taken nearly a half a bell of arguing with the staff to finally figure out that Malger wasn’t even home—he was at the manufacturing house. The servants had launched into some obviously rehearsed speech about how his working on t
he weekend was a sign of why he—and the rest of the nobility—were deserving of their higher station.

  Elise wouldn’t admit that she was grateful that Ermolt had interrupted loudly that they were leaving, and she definitely couldn’t admit that she found a lot of satisfaction in their horrified expressions when he ripped a chunk out of the front door on his way out.

  It wasn’t just that it would encourage behavior like this in the future, although that was one of the reasons.

  Things had been different between Elise and Ermolt since Athala’s death. They were missing something. Like a sword without a grip, they were functional but incomplete, and more susceptible to catastrophic failure. She was never sure now which teasing comment would set him over the edge, and it was likely that he felt the exact same way.

  “So, to the manufacturing house, then?” Ermolt finally asked, pushing himself away from the archway that separated the manor grounds from the street.

  Elise didn’t turn towards the sound of his voice. “I don’t know if that will work. We’re likely to get the same treatment we got here.” She picked at the cuticle of her thumb and then shook the limb as if she could shed the behavior so easily. “Did you see how they didn’t even flinch when I mentioned Athala? That should have earned us something—she was the older sibling.”

  “It’s been years. Perhaps he already assumed her dead.”

  With a frown, Elise looked over her shoulder at the barbarian. “Or perhaps he erased her from the family. It wouldn’t be too hard to replace the whole staff once she left.”

  “You assume so much about a person you’ve never met.”

  “Athala was terrified of him, and I’ve never known her to jump at shadows unwarranted.”

  “No matter what happened between them, I find it very hard to believe he would want her to stay dead.”

  A shout from the house tore Elise’s attention that way. One of the servants—a woman much too thin and old to be running at a full jog—was coming their way, and Elise motioned for them to leave. Ermolt said nothing, but started down the street towards the northwest, where the manufacturing house would be, instead of to the northeast towards The Darkest Night. She frowned, but joined him.

  “Do you remember how she reacted when we were on the road south from Jalova? She went into a panic when we so much as mentioned stopping in Lublis for supplies.” Elise frowned, settling into a wearing pace that kept up with the barbarian, even if it winded her slightly. “I think she believed her brother to be a danger to her life.” She shook her head. “It may end up he’d be happy to hear of her death, and might actively stop us from trying to bring her back.”

  “That’s nonsense.” Ermolt waved a hand dismissively, though he slowed his pace so Elise could keep up with him without her asking. “You may not understand, being an only child. Sometimes siblings just joke and play rough. They don’t fight like that.”

  “And you may not understand, being a barbarian, but our nobility does fight like that. Bloodlines and inheritance make siblings a threat, not a friend.”

  Ermolt looked at her thoughtfully for a moment, and Elise wondered what words hid behind those pursed lips. “Then we make him talk. Human nobility is soft and squishy. Throw him in a sack, tie it off, and drag him to Marska. By the time we get there, he’ll be begging to translate Athala’s notes for us, just to have something to do besides thump his head against every tree root in east Neuges.”

  The resulting bark of laughter caught Elise off guard, and she wasn’t able to hide it. Ermolt grinned at her in response. “Alright, let’s call that our last resort. I think we have some other options to explore that won’t get the City Guard called upon us.”

  Ermolt shrugged, nonplussed. “As you say.”

  “If the manufacturing house is a dead end, we can start at the Hall of Records. If they don’t have anything that can help us, there are always the Overseers. But if their price is something we can’t meet, then—and only then—we can revisit the idea of abducting a nobleman and subjecting him to the ‘unspeakable torture’ of the world outside Lublis’ walls without proper guard and servants.”

  “Spoilsport,” the barbarian said with a small laugh, although there was tension beneath the word. If the situation called for it, Elise knew that Ermolt would default to such tactics. And what was worse, Elise also knew that, if the situation arose, she would help.

  Silence hung between them as they crossed from the empty residential roads to the slightly busier main streets. They walked past the lifts that would bring passengers up to the top of the stone spire that housed the Lublis Hall of Records. Beyond that was the Rise of Dasis, the God of Fauna, and Elise was sure to keep a close eye on Ermolt as they entered the district. Not only was the Rise and the surrounding area the highest concentration of barbarians living in the southern lands, increasing the chances Elise would lose Ermolt if he saw a familiar face and tried to disappear into the only crowd he didn’t tower over. But it was also the Rise devoted to the patron deity of his hometown of Klav.

  Elise wasn’t sure of Ermolt’s devoutness to Dasis. She had never heard him pray, and he had almost exclusively only mentioned her name in vain. Ermolt had also actively ridiculed Elise for her overwhelming and exhausting devotion to Ydia. Barbarian culture viewed the Gods almost as an equal, or more like a friend than an omnipotent being.

  Or, so Elise knew.

  Athala would have been able to tell her exactly.

  Elise steeled her heart against the pit of darkness the thought brought. She missed Athala in a way too great for words. But she couldn’t slip into that comforting void and swim in her own sorrow, as she had done upon their escape from Jirda.

  There was too much to get done right now.

  A breath hitched in her chest as Elise swallowed the tears that threatened. Ermolt glanced her way, and Elise only shook her head at him. There would be time later. For now, they needed to find Malger.

  The manufacturing house they sought was only a few blocks from the river docks. It meant that the potions, once packaged up in crates, could be easily transported quickly and safely on riverboats through most of Neuges. The district itself was relatively empty, with only a few folks moving through the area to get from the north end of town to the Floating Markets, the popular riverside marketplace.

  Elise knew potion making didn’t require a lot of fancy equipment, at least from what Athala had told her about the profession. But she had assumed that, by the volume with which the Dohn family produced potions, the manufacturing house would be huge. Instead it was considerably smaller than the other workshops in the area.

  There was a part of Elise that expected the workshop to be empty, requiring them to return to the Dohn family manor to call the house staff on their lies. Ermolt tried the door but found it locked, and Elise’s frustration grew. While she wasn’t opposed to trekking across the city, she would like it to be fruitful.

  Channeling her frustration, Elise knocked as loudly as she could. If Malger was there alone, she wanted to ensure he could hear her even if he was in one of the farther corners of the building.

  There was no response for a long moment, and Elise was about to knock again, this time with the head of her mace, when she finally heard booted feet approaching the other side of the door. She dropped her hand away from her hip.

  When the door opened, the man who answered was clearly not Malger. Not only was he pale skinned—almost as pale as Ermolt—but he was muscular, with thick knuckles and an unkempt beard.

  If this man were a Lublis noble, then Elise was a barbarian.

  “Can I help you?” the man asked, looking first at Elise, and then up to Ermolt, behind her. His eyes narrowed at the sight of the barbarian.

  “We’re looking to speak with Malger,” Elise said before Ermolt could further stoke the fear in the man’s eyes. “We have important news about his sister, and we need his help.”

  “He’s not interested.” The man moved to close the door, but Ermolt reached ou
t over Elise’s head and caught it, his prodigious strength stopping it cold.

  “How are you sure,” the barbarian asked, his voice rumbling deep in his chest. “Have you asked him?”

  “No, and I don’t need to.” The man put his own strength behind closing the door, but Ermolt’s hand didn’t budge. He sighed in frustration. “You aren’t the first bounty hunters to try and cash in on that contract without the girl in hand.”

  Elise flinched back as if struck. “Bounty hunters? We aren’t—”

  “Unless he talked to you about it when making the contract, he doesn’t want to see you.” The man set his feet and leaned his weight against the door, straining against Ermolt’s strength. The door budged a rhen towards closing. “And if he did, you would know how to reach him without making a fuss.”

  “Fine,” Ermolt said, letting go of the door.

  Under the man’s full body weight, the door slammed closed with a bang, followed shortly after by the thud and curse of a man falling over under the sudden absence of pressure.

  “Well, that was a waste of time,” Elise said, turning to look up at the barbarian, who was currently glaring at the door.

  “You know, I was joking about throwing him in a sack earlier, but now it’s starting to sound like a good idea.”

  “We aren’t kidnapping a nobleman,” Elise hissed. “Resorting to violence at the first sign of a challenge just doesn’t work here!”

  “Every other option takes time,” Ermolt said, turning his angry eyes her way. “Time is something we don’t have. Every day, Ibeyar is spreading his influence and reinforcing his defenses, not to mention mastering whatever power he stole in the Temple of Numara.”

  “And your answer then is to commit a high-profile crime to not only announce where we are, but also get us whisked off to Damlas?” Elise was trying desperately to not raise her voice, but she wasn’t doing a very good job of it. “We have other options besides throwing a man in a sack and dragging him through the wilds!”