The God-Stone War

Chapter 39

A week had passed since my encounter with Gareth Gaelyn and I found myself still restless. I had gone to explore the Gaelyn ruins in Agradden primarily to assuage my feeling of motionlessness, but I had been fooling myself. The true source of my unease was my continuing avoidance of the darker memories contained inside my head.

I had spent several evenings at the Muddy Pig, after the more formal dinner at the castle was finished. Penny hadn’t reproached me on the subject yet, for she usually supported my need for socializing, but I could tell she thought I had spent entirely too many evenings there that week. One or two… that was fine, four or five… and it was apparent I was brooding or possibly depressed.

Even my newfound drinking companion, the huntsman Chad Grayson, had noticed my darker mood. “Are you going to stare into that empty cup all night?” he asked me acerbically. He almost never bothered using the proper honorifics when addressing me, which suited me just fine.

“What else should I do with an empty cup?” I asked, in a half-hearted attempt at wit.

“If you’d let go of it long enough, the barmaid might be persuaded to fill it for you. She keeps watchin’ for the chance, but you’ve not let go of it yet,” he replied blandly.

Cyhan was sitting on the other side of me and he chose that moment to interject, “That’s your biggest problem half the time.” It was the longest sentence he had offered up all evening, a sure sign that he’d had more to drink than usual.

I showed him my grumpy face, “I didn’t come down here to have you two catalog my faults.”

“Didn’t say it was necessarily a fault,” answered the veteran knight, “… just that it was a problem half the time.”

“Me hanging onto my cup is a frequent problem?”

Chad spoke then, “Don’t be daft, he means your habit of holding onto everything.”

Cyhan nodded in agreement.

“Alright, fine!” I said suddenly, “Maybe you two geniuses can find the answer to my problem.”

The master huntsman replied, “Better’n you mopin’ about it all the damn time.” Cyhan merely grunted.

I had already had several cups of wine, or I’d not have been so forthcoming. “I need something, but I can’t see it or look at it directly. I know it’s there, but I can’t grab it with my own two hands.”

Cyhan snorted, “Wizard problems,” dismissing the conversation.

Chad was not so quick to surrender, “Maybe, but there’s often more than one way to skin a cat,” he told the bigger man. Focusing on me he said, “Is this some magic thing or something more run of the mill?”

I took a sip of my newly filled cup. “What do you consider run of the mill?”

“Like wantin’ to tup the barmaid without the wife catchin’ on,” he elaborated.

Looking at my words from that angle, I could see how something like that might fit them, so I decided to clarify things for him, “It isn’t a woman and it isn’t really magic, though it’s related to magic in the end… it’s information. I know where it lies, but I can’t look at it myself. It’s like a book sitting on my desk, but I can’t read it, whenever I try my eyes close, whether I want them to or not.”

“Get someone else to read it for you,” said Cyhan, before setting his cup down and resting his head in both hands. He had definitely drunk more than was wise.

The huntsman nodded in agreement but I stopped them there, “No one else can read it. It’s in here,” I said tapping my skull.

Chad frowned, “If it’s in your head already… I don’t see the problem.”

“It’s there. I just can’t look at it. My mind’s eye refuses to gaze upon it. I just get glimpses from the corner of my eye whenever I least expect them,” I explained.

“Told you… wizard problems,” repeated Cyhan.

“And that attitude is why he never asks you for advice on ‘em!” said the huntsman, pointing a finger at the Knight of Stone.

“Just the way I like it,” said the warrior.

“Weren’t you the one advising him to talk to people instead of keepin’ it all to himself?” rebuked Chad.

Cyhan belched before replying, “I just said it was his problem… I wasn’t offering to fix it.”

The hunter burst into laughter and I was considering retiring for the evening when he fixed me with a serious stare. “You should think of this thing like it was your quarry,” he told me.

“And what’s that supposed to mean?” I asked.

“You know why deer stand still when they hear somethin’?” he said cryptically.

My brow furrowed, “I don’t think that really relates…”

“To keep from bein’ seen!” Chad said loudly, ignoring my comment. “The eyes are tricky and they get bored quick. Most hunters rely on movement to spot their quarry. When you hunt from a stand, you’re waiting on your prey to move… that’s when you see them. If you’re slip hunting, you hope to get close enough to flush them out, either way its movement you’re wanting.”

I decided to play his game, “Well this quarry won’t be moving on its own, and I don’t see how I’m supposed to ‘flush it out’.”

“You already know something, or you wouldn’t be trying to learn more,” replied the slender outdoorsman. “That’s what you use. You follow the signs and markings. Once I learn where the deer are feeding, where they travel in the morning, I make sure I’m close by to catch ‘em.”

The ‘when’ of it all was deep in the past, but his words made me think of the door beneath my house in Albamarl. I already knew it was related to my hidden knowledge, but I had never spent much time investigating it. In fact I hadn’t gone near the door in many years, possibly because of my subconscious dread. If it wasn’t possible to force my reluctant mind’s eye to look directly at the source of my anxiety, discovering what lay behind that door might force some of the knowledge out into the open.

“There’s probably a place like that…,” I ventured.

Chad looked at me intently, “But you haven’t been there, have you?”

“Briefly, before I knew anything about it. After that I was always too busy. Over the last few years I’ve learned some things that made me uneasy about it, but…,” I trailed off, leaving the sentence unfinished.

“But… you were too damned afraid to look it right in the face,” he finished for me. Then he leaned over and patted Cyhan on the face to wake him up, “Hey! Wizard problems my ass… he just didn’t want to face the truth. Pretty much like most everybody else in this place.” Chad pointed unsteadily at the other patrons in the room. “Are you listening?” he added, once he realized that Cyhan had closed his eyes again.

I stood up to leave. “I’ll take your advice if you make sure he manages to get home,” I told the huntsman.

Chad nodded. “Big bastard can’t hold his drink. That’s what all that clean livin’ gets him,” he noted disapprovingly.

Clapping him on the shoulder companionably I made my way to the door, but as I left I heard the woodsman mutter again under his breath, “The big bastard ain’t got no home neither… a bed, aye, he’s got that, and steady work. Wizards ain’t the only ones afraid to face their problems.”

I mulled that over as I left, and decided that perhaps his perceptiveness extended to more than just keen eyes and ears. When I found my bed later that night, I could hardly sleep for the disconcerting sound of death’s voice in my mind. Lately it had gotten increasingly loud, particularly during the quiet hours.

I was unable to test my newfound resolve for several weeks, for a seemingly endless array of duties appeared, preventing me from slipping away to the house in Albamarl. When a lull in my schedule did appear, Penny and Rose decided to take advantage of it with a trip to the capital, which suited me just fine.

The only fly in the ointment was the fact that I was hoping for an extended period of time alone. I could have had that easily enough, by confiding in my wife, but my reason for wanting it would have raised some alarms with her. In particular I wanted the house empty, just in case whatever I discovered turned out to be a more immediate and direct threat than a dusty memory or long forgotten misdeeds.

As chance would have it, the perfect opportunity presented itself on our second day there. Rose and Dorian were to visit her family, the Hightowers, that day and they had invited us along. It was a family occasion and naturally the children were invited as well. Lord Hightower wanted to see his newest granddaughter and he was probably also curious to meet our children too, since he had never seen them. It might have been a perfect day, but for my obligations.

“I can’t make it,” I repeated again. Penny often had hearing problems when she heard things that didn’t fit neatly within her plans.

“Why not?”

I held up my hands regretfully, “I promised our King that I’d check on the portals at the World Road today; some of them have developed an odd shimmer and a humming noise. He worries that something might have gone wrong with them.”

She waved her hands dismissively, “Tell James you’ll look into it tomorrow. He’ll understand.”

I frowned, “He would, but I worry that something might be damaged. There’s no telling what might happen if one of the portals discharged itself in an uncontrolled manner.” Of course that was a complete fabrication, not only were the portals still functioning perfectly, but I had designed the enchantment to safely channel the energies they contained back into storage, should one of them be damaged unexpectedly.

It was a lie that I knew would be discovered eventually, had I not already planned to reveal the truth that evening. I merely wanted to make sure the house was empty during my planned exploration. “If things are in order I should be able to join you at the Hightower’s home in the afternoon,” I said placatingly, before adding, “I have a surprise for you later, something I should have given you almost a year ago.”

She gave me a shrewd look, sensing something fishy in my manner and tone, but if she thought I was being deceptive, she withheld the accusation. Her intuition was still uncanny, but since she had taken the earth-bond over a year ago, she was no longer able to spot white lies as easily as she once had.

“I don’t care about presents… you promise you’ll join us as soon as you’re free?” she said at last.

“Of course,” I said, pulling her in close for a quick embrace. As always, the smell of her hair brought me a feeling of peace and security. It was the smell of home, for where she was… that was where I belonged. She allowed me a short kiss before pushing me away brusquely at the sound of Moira’s laughter.

Our daughter was giggling as she looked up at us, while her brother could hardly conceal his distaste. “Ewww,” he declared.

“I think they’re jealous,” I said, glancing at Penny mischievously.

The twins had heard that line before, and they reacted in entirely different ways. Moira smiled, nodding her head in agreement, while Matthew shook his head in denial. “No… no, we’re not jealous at all!” he protested.

We ignored his objections and chased them both around the room, kissing and tickling them mercilessly once they were caught. Despite his insistence, Matthew was laughing and smiling the entire time. Not to be left out, Conall leapt to his brother’s defense, or rather he leapt onto my back. It really did nothing to help his older brother’s plight.

Squealing and laughing the five of us wrestled on the floor for several minutes before Irene started crying from her crib, either because the noise had frightened her, or perhaps because she was too small to join in the fun.

An hour later I bid them farewell at the front door of the house. Lord Hightower had been kind enough to send a carriage large enough to hold not only his daughter and son-in-law, with their two children, but my wife and children as well. I watched them board and Dorian looked back at me before stepping in behind them.

“Don’t take too long, I can use all the support I can get facing old Lord Hightower,” he told me with a smile.

“Don’t worry, I’ll hurry,” I replied. “Take care of them till I can catch up,” I added.

His eyes grew serious for a moment, “That will always go without saying.”

I watched until they had driven completely out of sight, before turning back to the door of the house. It gaped open, staring at me blackly, and I felt a feeling of dread wash over me. The feeling was helped not at all by the dissonant sound of death, which had been omnipresent since we had arrived in Albamarl. At home in Castle Cameron it tended to vary, growing louder more frequently at night, but here it had remained strongly present the entire time. While I was beginning to get used to it, much like the voice of the earth, I still had no clue why it sometimes seemed louder and closer than at other times.

It couldn’t possibly be anything good, I thought as I stepped through the doorway.