Book Two - Chapter Fourteen

With their hurried pace, it took Lusya and Ander half the time to return to Larsev that it had to reach Nearfield. Ander drove the carriage straight to the barracks where he had originally reported the bandit problem. The crowded streets of the city forced them to slow, but they still made good time. As soon as they arrived, they leaped off the driver’s seat.

Ander stopped to pat one of the horses, while Lusya headed for the door.

“Sorry for all this,” he said. “I’ll make sure to treat you when this is over.”

The horse snorted and gave a shake of its head. Ander then hurried to catch up with her as they reached the door. She pounded on the door. In cities like this, guard barracks often doubled as a place to report crimes and conduct any other business one might have had with the guards. Lusya had always thought perhaps living quarters and place of business should be separate, but it wasn’t important.

The same tiransa guard Ander had originally spoken to peeked his head out the door. Lusya did not know if it was his duty to answer the door or if it was a coincidence. Nor did she care at the moment.

The guard yawned, then his eyes widened in apparent recognition, and he fully opened the door to step outside. “You two? I’d heard you left the city. Did something else come up?”

She suspected it was uncommon for guards to recognize a random reporter and his companion from weeks ago, but they had done plenty to make themselves memorable.

Ander grimaced. “You could say that.”

“Have the scouts that were dispatched returned yet?” Lusya asked. She had no interest in small talk.

The guard almost flinched and took a step back, as if her speaking was the most shocking thing he had ever witnessed.

“Well, some of them, yeah,” he said, nodding. “Why?”

“I have need of what they have learned,” she said.

Ander stepped forward. “Let me explain.”

He gave a brief recollection of everything that had happened since they had left Larsev with much of the details trimmed out. He skimmed over the first village’s fate. While he mentioned that the bandits used motomancy, he did not go into detail on their strength, and did not mention that Gisala was a former Sacred Knight captain. The guard listened closely, nodding along and occasionally asking questions. As Ander finished, the guard scowled pensively, rubbing his jaw as if stroking a beard he did not have.

“I understand the situation,” he said. “Still, you really should let us handle it instead of—”

“That is not an option,” Lusya said. “You will tell me what you have learned.”

The guard held up his hands as if in surrender. “All right, all right. If you’re so determined, I won’t stop you. That said, it’s not up to me whether or not to tell you, and I don’t know much anyway. I’ll send for the captain.” He opened the door and waved toward the inside. “Would you two like to come in while we wait for the response?”

“That would be great, thank you,” Ander said, nodding.

If she had known his location, it would have been faster for Lusya to find this captain herself. However, she did not know where to look, and she may have ended up going through some intermediary and waiting anyway. It was doubtful the captain was available for anyone to meet with at any time, and it was probable that administering security for a city this size had him too busy to drop everything and speak with her immediately. There were ways to get to him right away, of course, but making an enemy of this kingdom to save a few minutes did not seem prudent.

“Very well,” she said.

The tiransa guard held the door open and allowed them to go in ahead of him, then led them to a sort of common room. There was a sofa against one wall and several chairs, stools, and tables scattered throughout. Most of the furniture was austere in design, consisting of nothing more than undecorated finished wood. The sofa was the only thing with any sort of cushioning to speak of, and it looked rather thin.

There were seven guards already present. It was doubtful that was the whole population of these quarters, considering the size of the building and the available seating, but there were only two other mortals elsewhere in the barracks. Four were playing cards, another pair was chatting over drinks, and the last was slumped over in his chair and appeared to be sleeping. A few of them gave questioning looks as Lusya and Ander entered.

“These two have some urgent business,” the tiransa guard said.

That seemed explanation enough for the onlookers, and they returned to their activities without any further delay or questioning.

“Have a seat,” the tiransa guard said to Lusya and Ander. “Anywhere is fine. I’ll be right back.”

Once that was done, he went into another room, while Lusya and Ander took a seat at a table with two chairs. From the other room, Lusya heard papers crinkling and the scratching of a pen, then the tiransa guard spoke to someone else, and the door opened and closed again before he returned.

“I’ve sent a messenger to the captain,” he said. “Now we wait.” He waved at a central table with a few glasses, pitchers, and plates. “Help yourselves to drinks or snacks.”

“Don’t mind if I do,” Ander said. His stomach audibly growled as he stood.

He made his way to the table. After a moment’s consideration, Lusya joined him. She was adept at tolerating hunger but saw little reason to do so at the moment.

There was not a large selection. There seemed to be water or ale to drink, and some kind of cracker to eat. Still, it would be enough to take the edge off. They each grabbed a couple crackers and a glass of water, then returned to their prior seats to eat.

“I’m kind of surprised you have ale here,” Ander said as he sat down and bit into a cracker with a loud crunch.

“Oh, is that not allowed where you’re from?” the tiransa guard asked.

Ander shook his head. “No, it is. I’d always heard guards couldn’t drink outside of days off in a lot of other places.”

“That is likely the proper way to handle it,” Lusya said. “For many reasons.”

She took a bite of a cracker. It was rather dry and packed with salt, but it was not unpleasant. For a simple snack, its quality was more than enough.

“It’s fine, as long as you control yourself,” the tiransa guard said. “If you actually go and get yourself drunk on the job, you’ll find yourself in a world of trouble real quick.”

“You know, some people actually think you fight better when you’re a little drunk,” Ander said.

Lusya tilted her head and blinked. “Putting aside the many other issues, that seems unlikely. Decreased coordination and impulse control do not seem advantageous in battle.”

“You’re probably right, and I’m not going to test it,” he replied. “But tradition in Nordhem and a lot of countries near us says a good drink makes you unstoppable, and a lot of people still buy into it.”

“That is foolish.”

“I’m with her,” the tiransa guard said.

“There is actually some logic to it, kind of,” Ander said. “Lowered inhibitions and dulled pain make you more vicious and harder to hurt, basically. Harder to predict, too.”

Lusya blinked. She had not considered that angle. “I suppose that may offer some boons depending on one’s fighting style. For most, it would not be worth the trade-offs.”

Ander chuckled. “Yeah, probably.”

Lusya nodded. That conversation seemed to have come to an end, when another matter occurred to her.

“Did you secure the horses?” she asked.

“All-consuming shadows!” Ander cursed as he sprang out of his seat. He rushed out the door and returned about a minute later. “I can’t believe I keep forgetting to do that.”

“If they are loyal and you spend much of your time in isolation, it is an understandable habit to develop,” she said.

He sighed. “I guess so…”

“It still needs rectifying.”

“I know.”

The tiransa guard laughed. “You two sure get along.” He put a hand on Ander’s shoulder and leaned in close to whisper something.

“It’s not like that,” Ander protested.

The tiransa guard laughed again, causing Ander to flinch at the proximity and volume, and stood.

“How long will it take to receive a response?” Lusya asked.

The tiransa guard shrugged. “Maybe a couple hours. Half the day if things are busy. On the bright side, if the captain agrees to share information with you, he’ll probably just send someone to tell you right away.” He paused. “You two have to be pretty strong to have fought those bandits, huh?”

“Not to brag, but yeah,” Ander said. He wore a rather proud grin that faded into an embarrassed one as he scratched his head. “Mainly her, really.”

The tiransa guard gave a knowing smile for a moment, then his expression turned stern. “That doesn’t mean you should be sticking your noses in guard business, though.”

“It is our business now,” Lusya said. “Do not try to dissuade me again.”

The guard sighed. “Yeah, I know. Sorry.”

The rest of the wait passed in silence, more or less. The guard attempted to make further small talk. Lusya ignored him unless he addressed her specifically, and gave short, clipped answers when he did. Ander replied, but they said nothing of substance.

Finally, after two hours, the door opened. Shortly afterward, a new man strode into the room. He was tiransa, tall even for one of them. Like many of Larsev’s buildings, the ceiling here was extra high, enough for tiransa in excess of ten feet tall to stand comfortably, and this new man still had to stoop. He was dressed in elaborate metal armor with gold-colored detailing and a blue cape flowing from his shoulders.

His black hair was short and meticulously styled, accompanied by a neatly trimmed beard and mustache.

“Captain!” the first tiransa guard said, shooting to his feet and placing a hand over his heart in salute. “I didn’t expect you to come down here personally.”

“Normally, I wouldn’t,” the captain said, turning his gaze on Lusya and Ander. “And normally, I wouldn’t share information like this with civilians, let alone foreigners. Consider this repayment for your report and your aid, however misguided.”

“Thank you,” Ander said. “We won’t forget this.”

“It is appreciated,” Lusya said.

“That said, I would like to hear a little more of what you’ve learned as well,” the captain said. “It seems you told Corporal Deniv here a little bit, but I get the sense it wasn’t everything.”

“We weren’t trying to hide anything,” Ander said. “Just expedite things.”

“I’ll trust that’s true,” the captain said. “But now I want the whole story.”

Lusya nodded. “I have no objections to that.”

“Good. Now, what did you want to know?”

“Anything that could help us locate them,” Lusya said. “They seem to have been heading north for some time, but I need more information to determine where I might be able to find them next.”

“I think I can help with that,” the captain said. “We think we know why they’ve been going north. If you two hadn’t met them, we couldn’t say their next move for sure, but you said you injured the leader? How severely?”

“I slashed across her back, cut off an ear, and beat her,” Lusya said.

Ander chuckled. “You kicked her in the head and drove her to the ground from fifty feet up. You ‘beat her’ like Nordhem gets ‘a little’ snow.”

The captain raised an eyebrow. “What now?”

“Nordhem is cold. People say a little snow when we get—”

“Not that. Kicking someone from fifty feet? In the air?”

Ander blushed and scratched his head. “Oh, right. Their leader is a former Sacred Knight captain.” He gestured to Lusya. “And, apparently, Lusya is at that level.”

The captain scowled in confusion. “But you two aren’t…?”

“I’m in training,” Ander said. “She learned somewhere else.”

“I’ll accept that for now,” the captain said. “None of my business anyway. Still, bandits who use motomancy, and a leader who’s a Sacred Knight captain? We’re going to need to send for help.”

“Where are they going?” Lusya asked. They had strayed far enough from the point.

“If you’ve injured their leader that severely, I’m guessing they’ve fallen back to their hideout,” the captain said. “Most bandit troops are little more than roving bands of highwaymen, but it’s not unheard of for larger ones to set up a base of sorts to operate out of. Sometimes it’s a village, sometimes an abandoned fortress, sometimes they even build one from scratch.”

That much, she knew. There were plenty of records of past cycles, and it wasn’t as if banditry was nonexistent during turbulent ages, her father’s included. Knowing a thing or two about how they operated was a useful skill, one she had brushed up on before setting out on her journey.

“And you’ve located theirs?” Lusya asked.

The captain nodded. “We believe so. Some of our scouts found what seems to be the base itself, and, based on various reports and their movements so far, we’re confident this is it.”

“Where is it?”

The captain reached into a pouch on his belt and pulled out a roll of paper. He stretched it out on the table, revealing a map of Larsev. Alongside the various settlements, fortifications, and geography, there were a series of conspicuous markings of black ink, mostly lines and arrows. Lusya surmised they were some sort of tracking of the bandits’ movements, based on evidence and witness accounts. Among all the symbols, a large cross shape stood out some ways north and lightly east of Larsev.

“This mark is it,” he said. “From what I’ve been told, it’s not a repurposed fortress or anything. It’s a makeshift fortification they’ve built up themselves. Palisades made of wooden pillars and the like. Unfortunately, the area used to be more wooded, but thanks to them gathering lumber for construction, there’s now a good stretch of flat, open land around it, so no one could get a good look inside.”

“That’s not too far,” Ander said.

The captain nodded. “You’ll want to be quick, though. In cases like these, the ruffians often discard bases and move to new ones, or even keep several at once. It seems this one was still being used as recently as a few days ago, but you never know when they’ll leave.”

“You have not located any others?” Lusya asked.

He shook his head. “No, we haven’t. Nothing that seems like a current or former base. That doesn’t mean they don’t exist, though. Even if they don’t, they might move. It’s also possible that they’re exceptionally bold and will stay and wait for a fight, but I wouldn’t count on that.”

Lusya nodded. Counting on one’s enemy being a fool was rarely a sound strategy. Unless, of course, one knew them to be. In an actual battle, Gisala’s approach to fighting was suboptimal, but Lusya knew little about Gisala or her subordinates’ ability or acumen on a larger scale. Not enough to predict their actions.

“We will head for this base,” Lusya said. “It is the best information available to us.”

“I won’t try to stop you,” the captain said. “But now it’s your turn. Knowing how strong their leader is is helpful, but is there anything else you can tell me? Their strength, numbers, abilities? Any other sign of them you’ve come across? I’d like to include as many specifics as I can when I ask the stronghold for aid.”

Ander nodded. “Of course.”

“It is moot,” Lusya said. “I will destroy them. However, I have no objection to sharing information with you, so long as you withhold any specifics about your sources.”

The captain’s eyes narrowed, but he nodded. “I can do that.”

With that assurance, Lusya and Ander shared most of what they knew about the bandits, including their use of minor-rank demons and the town they had destroyed. The captain had already known about that last one. It would have been rather difficult for the scouts to miss, and the ones who had found it would have wanted to report back in as soon as possible. He gave them the map to keep—he had multiple copies—and they left the barracks.

Ander yawned as he climbed onto the carriage’s driver’s seat. “It’s pretty late.”

It was. Between the wait and their information exchanges, by the time they left, it was evening. The sky had turned its vivid mix of blues, reds, and violet, and the sun had taken on an orange glow. It was not night yet, but late was an accurate characterization.

“I think we should stay the night here,” he said. “We’ll start our pursuit tomorrow, rested and ready to go.”

She nodded. “That was my intention.”

She did want to go rescue Ariya, and was tempted to insist they leave, but she knew excessive hurry could become a hindrance. It was unusual for Lusya, feeling so impatient. It was not her first time experiencing the sensitivities of time. She had had tasks on tight schedules in Father’s forces. Nor was it her first time feeling such for a task that had no set schedule. She wanted to expedite Father’s revival as much as possible, even though he had given no time in which she had to complete her task.

There were practical reasons for that, like minimizing the opportunities for Ariya to become tainted, but she would admit that it was largely simple, if uncharacteristic, impatience. In life and in death, Father had often had a way of bringing our uncharacteristic behavior in her. Still, the urgency she felt now was unfamiliar. It did fade away quickly, as her emotions tended to, but it was more persistent in returning than most. She could not say for sure she had never felt it before, but she could not recall having done so. Its significance, if any, was just as lost on her.

“Good,” he said. “It’s good to see that you’ve calmed down a little. Same inn as before?”

She nodded. “That is fine.”