Linkershim sotsi-6 Read online

  “Perhaps, but I fear nothing short of imprisoning her would keep her here … and I can assure you that imprisoning a dragon is no easy task.”

  “So what are you saying?”

  “I’m saying that my daughter has made her decision and I must honor it because I have no better choice. She will not hear reason and I will not use force against her, even to protect her.”

  “I don’t know if I can keep her safe.”

  “Nor do I. She was almost murdered before she was even born, and all while under my care and protection. She lives because you risked your life to save her. If I must entrust my child to a human, I could do far worse than you. Please tell her that I love her and that I will miss her every day that she is absent from my home.”

  Alexander closed his eyes and nodded in resignation.

  Bragador settled in to her mound of treasure and closed her eyes, a single tear slipping down the side of her face as Alexander vanished.

  ***

  He stumbled and fell as he came back on deck, the ship lurching violently, a sickening grinding noise reverberating through the hull moments before the keel buckled against a reef several thousand feet from shore.

  Anja picked him up and stood him on his feet. “What did she say?”

  Alexander regarded her sternly but found his anger evaporating in the face of her childlike naiveté.

  “She said she loves you and she misses you,” Alexander said, turning away from her, looking for Captain Kalderson.

  Alexander found him organizing the loading of the longboats. Alexander grabbed hold of some rigging to steady himself when the ship shifted, listing to one side, water flowing freely into the hold.

  Kalderson pointed toward the aft deck and the captain’s launch. Alexander nodded, motioning for Jack and Anja to follow him. Several men were already there, waiting for the captain before casting off.

  “Shove off,” Alexander commanded.

  “What about the captain?” one of the sailors asked.

  “We’ll pick him up at the front of the ship.”

  Another shredder slammed into the aft deck just above the launch. All hesitation on the part of the crew vanished. Within a few minutes, the sailors had maneuvered the boat around to the front of the ship, using the hull as cover from the increasing barrage of enemy fire.

  Kalderson was the last man off his ship, sliding down a rope to one of the longboats and waving for Alexander to make for shore. The rowers rhythmically pulled the launch toward the inhospitable coastline, periodically aided by the waves washing toward the rocky beach. Unwilling to risk their ships, the pirates dropped anchor far enough from shore to avoid the hidden danger of the reef and started putting longboats into the water.

  Their caution provided Alexander and his friends a brief reprieve as they quickly moved out of ballista range. Alexander felt an odd sense of calm settle over him, but he knew that it would be shattered all too soon.

  “Why did they attack us?” Anja asked.

  “Because I’m at war with them,” Alexander said. “On board one of those ships are the men who stole you from your mother before you were even born. They used your life as leverage against your mother. And they did all of that to get to me. These people are serious, Anja. They’ll hurt you if they can.”

  The rowers tried to focus on the task at hand, but Alexander could see a mixture of curiosity and intrigue mingle with the fear already staining their colors.

  Anja looked out at the enemy ships with a fierceness and intensity that even Alexander found a bit unsettling.

  “Not if I kill them first,” she said. “If only I could change form without the Temple of Fire, I’d go kill them all right now.”

  “Anja, you can change into your true form right now and you know it,” Alexander said.

  “But then I wouldn’t be able to change back into a girl. If I take my true form, I’ll have to go home.”

  “Exactly,” Alexander said.

  She frowned deeply, her brow furrowing under her coppery-red hair, but she said nothing.

  “I count seventeen longboats headed our way,” Jack said. “Do we run or fight?”

  “We run,” Alexander said.

  “But they tried to kill me,” Anja said.

  “I don’t kill for vengeance, Anja, as much as I might want to. I kill to defend the Old Law. Even if we could kill every one of them without losing a single man, and we can’t, it would do nothing to win this war.”

  “I wouldn’t mind seeing Tyr bleed,” Jack said.

  “I’ve thought about that too,” Alexander said. “But I don’t want to kill him until I’m sure he’s not the last of his line.”

  “Why not?” Anja said.

  “I don’t want to extinguish the Tyr bloodline,” Alexander said, patting the hilt of the Thinblade. “This sword is one of only three remaining in the world. In the right hands, it could reunite the Isle of Tyr under the Old Law.”

  Jack chuckled, taking out his little pad and scribbling notes, nodding to himself.

  “You would give away your magic sword?” Anja asked.

  “To the right person, yes,” Alexander said.

  “Why?” Anja asked.

  “If I could give the people of Tyr protection under the Old Law for the price of a sword, I’d count that as a bargain.”

  “But your sword makes you powerful.”

  “Yes, and I can’t think of a better way to use that power.”

  The beach came into range of Alexander’s all around sight. He scanned for danger but found only craggy cliffs populated by gnarled and windblown trees clinging for dear life to the rocky bluffs.

  “There,” Alexander said to the sailor manning the rudder, “head for that draw. It looks like our best chance to get off the beach.”

  Several minutes later, they ran aground, the rowers jumping into the water and pulling the boat out of the frothy surf. Many of the other longboats had already reached the shore. Kalderson’s crewmen were converging on Alexander’s position.

  “How long before the pirates reach land?” Alexander asked.

  “Ten, maybe fifteen minutes,” Jack said, shielding his eyes as he looked out over the water.

  Kalderson came bustling up, breathing heavily. “I have seventeen men left from a crew of twenty-nine. Most are sailors but a few can fight if need be.”

  “I’m hoping to avoid that,” Alexander said, trying not to think about the lives that had been lost protecting him.

  Chapter 2

  Alexander ducked behind a large rock to avoid an arrow just as the last of Kalderson’s crew scrambled up the little seasonal waterfall and moved away from the top of the bluff. A dozen or more pirates had reached the base of the draw and the few armed with bows were wasting arrows trying for a lucky shot.

  Alexander crouched behind the boulder, watching the pirates with his all around sight. When they began to move up the draw, he smiled to himself, remembering one of his father’s lessons: Position matters-where you’re standing in a fight can make all the difference.

  “Shouldn’t we be going?” Kalderson asked.

  “Soon,” Alexander said. “I need your five strongest men. Send the rest to wait just inside the tree line.”

  Alexander closed his eyes, watching the enemy advance with his all around sight. When the last of the pirates was well into the narrow confines of the draw, he said, “It’s time.”

  The five big sailors put their shoulders against a boulder perched on top of the bluff and pushed, straining with all their might against the prodigious weight of the stone. Slowly at first, it began to come free of the earth gripping its base, then all in a rush, it gave way and toppled over into the draw, crushing the pirates on its chaotic journey to the beach below.

  “That was effective,” Jack said, craning his neck to see if any of the pirates had survived.

  “It bought us some time,” Alexander said.

  They quickly moved away from the top of the bluff. The scraggly and windblown
trees gave way to a lush evergreen forest that blanketed the foothills of the small mountain range running along the coastline. The forest floor was mossy and cluttered with countless ferns fighting for the little bit of light that filtered through the ancient trees.

  The well-shaded forest floor was wet with morning dew. Within minutes, everyone was damp and cold, pressing forward out of necessity and a desire to stay warm. They moved inland along the narrow stream that had cut the draw they were leaving behind.

  While they walked, Alexander weighed his limited options and found them to be a list of bad choices and worse choices. He was trapped in enemy territory, being pursued by a superior force and he could see only two ways out: steal a ship or make for the Gate. Neither option seemed like it had a very good chance of success. He decided to wait until he could gather more information before he chose a course of action. Perhaps Talia’s people would arrive in time to offer assistance.

  “Why are we running away?” Anja asked.

  “What choice do we have?”

  “We should fight!”

  “To what end?” Alexander asked. If Anja was going to stay with him, he decided to educate her as best he could. She was childish and headstrong, but smart and passionate. Mostly, she was possessed of an innocence that he dearly wished he didn’t have to take from her.

  “If we kill them, then they can’t chase us anymore,” she said.

  “Others would come. If you’re going to stay with me then you have to understand this one truth: As long as I’m the Sovereign of the Seven Isles, there will always be people who want to kill me. And, as long as you’re at my side, those people will try to kill you too.”

  “But I never did anything to them,” Anja said.

  “Doesn’t matter. They’ll try to kill you for the same reason they tried to kill you before you were even born … to get to me. That’s why I keep telling you to go home. You’re not safe with me.”

  She frowned, looking down as she walked, falling silent for several minutes before responding.

  “I would rather be happy and in danger than miserable and safe. I’m staying with you.”

  “I know,” Alexander whispered.

  Sometime after midday, Alexander noticed several men watching them through the trees. At first, he was alarmed, but a closer look revealed that they weren’t pirates or soldiers but hunters, and from their colors, they were just as concerned about Alexander’s presence as he was about theirs.

  “We’re being watched,” he whispered to Jack.

  “Pirates?”

  “No. I don’t think they’re a threat, but I could very easily be wrong. They’re shadowing us a couple hundred feet off to the right. Just keep your eyes open and be ready.”

  “So just your average afternoon then?”

  “Something like that,” Alexander said with a chuckle. “We should probably stop for a few minutes so I can take a look around.”

  The sailors were happy for the break, most being used to hard work but not accustomed to walking for any length of time. All were struck silent when Alexander opened the door to his Wizard’s Den. He positioned it carefully behind a large tree to ensure that the four men following them wouldn’t see it. Jack handed out some food to the sailors while Alexander sat down in his magic circle and cleared his mind.

  He floated through the trees to the place where the men were hiding and he listened to their conversation.

  “Who do you think they are?” one said.

  Two shook their heads.

  The fourth said, “They don’t look like Andalians.”

  “They could be mercenaries.”

  “They’re not armed well enough, and mercenaries would have come from the other direction.”

  “So what do we do?”

  “We watch and wait. Their actions will reveal the truth of them.”

  Alexander was considering introducing himself when a shout of alarm shattered the tranquility of the forest. With a thought, he was back in his body. He stepped from his Wizard’s Den, Thinblade in hand, and found two sailors dead, arrows buried in their chests. Another sailor cried out when an arrow drove through his leg.

  The enemy had caught up with them. Several pirates were hiding behind a fallen log some sixty feet away while two of their number attacked with bows and arrows. Alexander was grateful that only two of them were armed with bows; had they all been, the first volley would have killed most of his men.

  Alexander charged, racing as quickly as the stiffness in his leg would carry him. One of the archers smiled, releasing an arrow. Alexander took it in the chest, the shaft shattering when it hit his dragon-scale armor. The pirate stopped smiling. His companions raised their weapons to meet Alexander’s attack just before he reached the log, leaping atop it, then crashing into their midst, felling the first with a stroke through the skull before he even hit the ground. Alexander’s momentum carried him into another man, stumbling when his injured leg failed under the demands he was placing upon it, but not before he swept the Thinblade through another enemy’s legs at the thigh.

  He fell sprawling face first onto the mossy forest floor, rolling to his back quickly and sitting up, taking another man at the knees with a wild defensive stroke. The man’s scream was suddenly drowned out by a guttural, animalistic roar that stunned everyone as Anja leapt over the log, landing on a pirate and crashing to the ground on top of him. The remaining men watched in shock and bewilderment as a girl of a mere hundred pounds repeatedly bashed the man’s head into the ground until blood and brains flowed freely.

  Alexander used the distraction to regain his feet. In the same moment, the spell of confusion created by the brutality and ferocity of Anja’s attack was broken. The nearest pirate raised a broadsword in preparation to cleave her in half, but before he could bring the blade down, he stiffened in surprise and fell to his knees, Jack flickering into view behind him for just an instant.

  Three of the pirates faced Alexander, two moving to each side while the man in the middle tried to draw his attention with a feint. Alexander closed his eyes, stretching out with his all around sight, smiling mirthlessly at the looks of triumph ghosting across his attackers’ faces just before they rushed him from three sides.

  He launched forward with his good leg, cutting the middle man’s spear off at the haft, taking several fingers in the bargain, and barreling into him with his shoulder while the two men attempting to flank him attacked the empty air where he’d been standing. Before they could regain their balance, Alexander spun, reaching out with the Thinblade and catching each across the shoulder just deep enough to cut the bones, leaving their arms attached by only muscle and sinew. Facing each other, they screamed in terror and pain before turning in unison and fleeing into the forest.

  Anja swept up the broadsword, three inches wide where it met the two-handed hilt, the stout blade nearly four feet long, and brought it around with such force that it cut the nearest pirate in half at the hip. One of the remaining two men moved behind Anja, but she didn’t notice … she was totally focused on the pirate in front of her. Alexander didn’t fear for her because he also saw Jack moving up behind the man, swift and deadly.

  Alexander killed the pirate he’d taken fingers from just before Anja stabbed the last man through the chest with a battle cry worthy of the most hardened warrior. She spun in a crouch, her sword, nearly as big as she was, held in one hand like it was a simple dagger, a streak of blood splatter mingling with the freckles across her nose and cheeks, fury and purpose burning in her golden eyes.

  Alexander stretched out with his all around sight. These pirates had come alone, probably scouts sent to track and slow Alexander and his people. More would be coming.

  “What about these two?” Jack said, motioning to the two men Alexander had cut off just above the knees.

  “Leave them,” Alexander said. “I want Tyr’s men to see what’s in store for them. I want them to be afraid.” He picked up the cloak of one of the fallen and cleaned the blood fr
om his sword.

  Kalderson’s men were standing on the other side of the log looking at the carnage scattered over the forest floor, eyes wide, breath held, fear evident in their colors.

  “How many wounded do you have, Captain?”

  “Two dead and one with an arrow through his leg.”

  Alexander went to the wounded man and knelt at his side. “Looks like that hurts.”

  “Nothing but a scratch,” the sailor said through gritted teeth.

  “Good man,” Alexander said, motioning to the nearest two sailors. “Help me roll him onto his side so I can get the arrow out.”

  A few minutes later, the sailor was being carried to a bed in the Wizard’s Den, the arrow removed, his wound cleaned, treated with the last of Alexander’s healing salve, and bandaged. Alexander left another sailor to care for the injured man and closed the door.

  As evening approached and the shadows deepened, it started raining-not a downpour but a drizzle, constant and relentless, soaking the world with seemingly deliberate thoroughness. By the time they stopped for the night, everyone was soaked through and shivering.

  It was cramped, but all of them were able to find space enough to sleep within the Wizard’s Den. While the men were at first awestruck and somewhat fearful of stepping into the magical room, they soon relaxed after Alexander closed the door and built up the fire. Hot tea and a hearty stew erased all hint of fear and replaced it with a symphony of snoring.

  “How’re you doing?” Alexander asked Anja before going to sleep.

  “I’m all right,” she said with a shrug. “Why?”

  “You killed three people today.”

  “So?”

  “Some people find it hard to sleep after killing, especially the first time.”

  Alexander remembered the sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach the first time he’d killed a man. It seemed so long ago that he had loosed an arrow in the hallway of some nondescript Southport inn. He still remembered how it smelled, a hint of smoke mingled with sweat and fear. He remembered the mottled color of the walls. But mostly, he remembered the look in the man’s eyes in that moment when he realized he was dying.