Previously…
The party found themselves in the Voerlund town of Saumark, learned of the approaching winter holiday of Viner’s Night, and procured a place in a Dunmarrow caravan travelling west. Meanwhile, Sepp was contacted by the myterious Macha sorceress, Aismere, to help heal a poisoned Dunmarrow during the “time of thresholds”…
Chapter 11 can be read here
“Thank you, Sepp, for coming tonight,” said Aismere, her accent came through a bit more naturally now that things were calmer, and he found she was quite talkative. “I don’t think that alone either you or I could have saved him from bad death.”
“Or death at all,” mused Sepp as he fiddled with the exact position of a hex bottle, as he’d done for the past two hours.
“They don’t mind death, these Dunmarrow,” she said looking down at the sleeping warrior, then her gaze turned away. “But poison is bad death. If die you must, they say go out well. Don’t want to be remembered dying helpless from poison. I agree with them.”
“I suppose I do, too." They were quiet for a moment as they looked over their patient, who, despite his rapidly returning health, still retained a corpse-like pallor. But, the young apothecary assured himself, that’s what they’re supposed to look like.
“We came through the threshold well,” she said, half to herself.
Then Sepp asked, "Hey, if you don’t mind my asking…”
“Hmm?”
“How...did you know about me, and my hexes?”
“I felt them when we passed in the apothecary shop,” she replied with a shrug.
"You felt them?"
"Well, yes. Can you not feel them?”
“I'm not sure I follow..."
“I can feel them now. They have a, I don’t know how you might say, a heaviness. I can even sometimes feel them in the ground, when Turach pass through, in the north. You seem to know these poisons. You must know them?”
“I’ve...spent my life around them. I guess don’t notice. How do you know about hexes? Just from your homeland?”
“Yes, but also I am, um,” she waved her hand trying to think of the right word, “priest? Sorcerer? Macha word for it is dryador. Or I am to become dryador. My eyes made it so, I said to you I was marked by our water god. Most Macha are blue and green for sky god and earth god. Our grey is rare. But you have gold eyes, why is that so in these lands?” she asked with intrigue.
“Oh, people joke that Voerlunders of old—uh, Silverden used to be part of Voerlund—people joke that they loved money so much their hair and eyes went gold. I don’t really know why, though. Maybe it’s been forgotten.”
“I think it noble. Many Voerlunders seem noble. Maybe a bit boring,” she chuckled. Sepp returned it.
“They are, I mean noble, seeing how they helped us out with the war.”
“There is war?” She seemed concerned.
“Aye, back home, in Silverden. I’m…a refugee actually,” he said somewhat sheepishly. Now she was definitely concerned. “The people up here took us in, our whole village.”
She didn’t dwell on it.
“I believe Silverden is very beautiful.”
“Oh, it is, at least the little I’ve seen of it. Never went far from home. The capital canton—the capital city is supposed to be gorgeous. I hope I can go back one day.”
They talked for a while about small things while every so often tending to the Dunmarrow who shifted in his sleep. They didn’t do much but wipe his brow and put a hand on his shoulder, which seemed to calm him. It was fairly suddenly that Sepp felt exhaustion wash over him. He blinked, and really didn’t want to open his eyes. He began to speak with some hesitation.
“My people will be looking for me soon...I hate to ask, but-”
“No apologies, hex man, you came to help me. But I must thank you first.” She got up and bit her lower lip in thought, and her eyes wandered. She gave a sharp breath of resolution, and motioned him to wait for a moment. She rummaged around in a pack and removed a piece of parchment.
“Please take it as my thanks. My woad. You might not be able to paint it, but its shapes I hope might help you.” She lowered a strap on her tunic to reveal the woad mark on her shoulder in full. Sepp was a little taken aback, but she sat him beside her on the floor. He was, despite his demeanour, intensely fascinated with the design, the likes of which he’d never seen. With some charcoal he lightly scratched down the swirling design, a kind of S shape with the two ends coiling inwards a great amount. At their centers, circles with little things like letters in them. “That woad is written nowhere in the world but on an ancient vellum roll in the north, the shoulders of dryador, and now that parchment. Be careful with it. The sign is power, and it flows through my arms, into my motions. It can flow into other things, too.”
Sepp rolled the parchment up very lightly and laid it into his pack after replacing his hexes from the bed. The Dunmarrow didn’t seem changed from their removal, and likely the poison was now inert, or wholly dead within him. At any rate, he had no doubt Aismere could look after him.
As he went to leave, they exchanged an awkward goodbye. This whole night had been a terribly tender affair, and Sepp couldn’t shake the feeling of it. He mentioned he hoped they’d meet again, but in truth, he was going north, she was going south. This was little more, they admitted, than a rather opportune chance meeting. But they were glad it had happened.
Sepp slunk back to the inn perhaps two or three hours before dawn, and avoided waking up Barosh. He collapsed onto his bed and thought of nothing else but rest. And that night he had strange dreams, of blooms and woad, of old northern magic, but his sleep was deep. He was awoken by a polite nudge from Barosh. Seva was outside rousing everyone to get breakfast and move out. He awoke with the same sense of heaviness and import only slightly behind him. It was over, but it still loomed behind him somehow. He got up and used his washing basin, and cupped his hands before the World Serpent sign on the door. Making a temple with your hands was the idea, he thought. It had come to him before, but not clearly. He wondered if the others had known he had left. No doubt Barosh would be interrogating him about it, and likely Seva, too.
Breakfast was quick and on the go, mostly it was final purchases of cheap post-Viner’s Night foods, clinging to that celebration just a little longer. Most of the decorations were still up, but had that weary, uncomfortable appearance festival ornaments sometimes have in the time after. Of course the lanterns would remain for a while, but the winter season had been met, and Serpent’s Breath, Sepp thought, had it been met well. More than merrymaking, a life had been saved. Through the threshold had life passed untouched. That realization set him at ease.
The north gate to Saumark was bustling with carts coming and going, but amidst them were several that stood out. Black, with peaked covers, and about it, ghostly white figures in black, too. However, these ones were yawning and some even stumbled once or twice. Karel, their captain, was rubbing his forehead as he issued orders in a harsh northern tongue. None of them, not even Skivor, could quite suppress a smile. To see the bleak reputation of Dunmarrow thoroughly annihilated for them in a few quick seconds did much to set the tone for their voyage.
The group was settled into a fairly well-outfit wagon that Captain Karel insisted they take, after he glanced at Sepp. They had a good number of companion wagons and it turned out that the Dunmarrow were acting as ad hoc security for them, taking advantage of the situation and travelling together, the wagons acquiring formidable guardians, the mercenaries acquiring access to goods on the road. It was explained by the captain that some wagons would leave, some would join on later, but in any event, Sepp and his group were in it for the long haul. The Dunmarrow were heading home, catching a ship to Lundermark, and then onwards to their clanhold.
The four of them were sharing a wagon for the time being with two of the northerners. They were, of course, the brothers from last night, who introduced themselves Karmov, the brother, and Dorach, the healed man. Upon seeing them, Sepp had been met with a feeling of intense relief for the man’s recovery, but he was now also expecting to have to explain himself.
“We wanted to thank you once more,” Karmov said, “you have done something more than you realize, and Dunmarrow remember everything. You will be in our family story for many many years to come.” He clapped Sepp on the arm, who then turned to his companions and said:
“I’m sure Barosh has told you…” to which both Seva and, to his surprise, Skivor, both nodded in assent. “Aismere—the Macha girl—she was the one who called me there to help. I’m glad I was able to do it.”
“Fighting poison with poison, there was a poetry to it.” The second Dorach said this, Sepp’s eyes went wide with an instinctive response. The Dunmarrow’s voice became grave. “I have not made an error here?”
“No no, it’s okay, it’s just...you know they have a reputation,” Sepp said, looking down.
“No worse than we Dunmarrow have,” said Karmov, “but for us it sometimes becomes an advantage,” he added with a chuckle. “None of us will mind your poisons, worry not, we know of them.”
Good God, Sepp thought, did the entire caravan know?
Barosh used the mention of the Dunmarrow reputation, of which he said he was only dimly aware, to launch into a rather enthusiastic interrogation of a culture he’d barely any idea of, and it seemed the two of them were more than happy to talk to someone who wasn’t afraid of them. They learned, over about the course of an hour on the road, of the tight knit community, ancient lineages, and rich storytelling culture of the clanhold. During a short lull in conversation, Seva remarked on the slate amulets around their necks, and Sepp chimed in that he had been wondering about it, too. It was the only thing that elicited reticence from them.
“Ah...these are our gravemarks, they can represent us in our graves if we die in foreign lands.”
“I saw you, Karmov,” Sepp pronounced the odd sounds carefully, “using it last night.” The man gave his brother a look.
“I was was preparing to set the sleep on him. There is nothing after death, at least not for us. Just sleep. We keep what we want alive through story, not by spirits, and keep dead what should be dead by memory. Best not to forget anything, even bad things, lest it stir, hmm?”
Barosh was showing particular interest in their weapons, longswords of black metal. Sometimes, Karmov said, it was dye, or paint. Sometimes it was special ore from deep under the ice of the clanhold, heavy and hard, and nigh unbreakable. His explanation was suddenly shattered by a shriek far above. There was a call from outside from one of the other mercenaries. The wagon they were in had flaps that could be moved aside, and Karmov did so then to see outside. Not too far up in the sky was a group of winged, serpentine creatures, with long, pointed snouts, flitting about the air and spouting short gouts of flame excitedly.
“Firehawks, and a fair sized flock, too,” said Karmov. His brother shifted to see, and his brow raised in surprise.
“Odd to see them so close to a town.”
Skivor moved in to look, too. He gave a low hum of discontent.
“No, I don’t like that…” the woodsman’s voice was grave.
“What is it?” asked Barosh as he went to look through the flap as well. Sepp caught Seva’s glance of worry.
“Firehawks don’t go near towns, not like this. Only when they’re desperate. Or when something else has chased them out. I’ve spent weeks out in the wilds, I know these beasts, their movements.”
“Well...what do they look like to you?” came Sepp’s uneasy question.
Skivor turned his gaze back into the wagon.
“They look scared.”
Wow! There's a great flow to your writing. Very easy to read and definitely keeps me completely tuned in. I'm on the edge of my seat each week to find out more of this adventure! Thanks!