That One Time I Went on a Quest
Iborus

In the distance, between a pair of willow trees swaying in the sunlit breeze, is a log cottage with a little red door. My feet carry me towards it, each step deliberate and slow.

I’m going home; I’ve never seen this place before but my heart is racing – for too long I’ve wandered the world, not knowing where to go. It would be good to sit down. When I walk inside there’ll be a rocking chair by the granite-laid fireplace, and there’ll be a book sitting on it, waiting to be read.

I reach for the door but a voice stops me – my voice: Don’t. There’s nothing here. Do you not see the wild flowers bursting from the walls of bark, the red paint piling up like shed leaves on the front steps? This place is abandoned. Empty.

But…

Where am I to go, if not here?

Upon the threshold I stand, arm half-raised, eyes helplessly fixed upon the old-fashioned keyhole. An eternity pass.

‘I’m home.’

No one hears me. The sweeping willows bend low in the breeze, beckoning.

Soft sheets move against my skin. They smell of lavender – fresh ones, not the powdery twigs the palace cooks used to hang on the rafters.

There’s shouting, coming from somewhere below. ‘Fly!’ someone yells, and an eerie whistling rides above the breeze – arrows?

A wet towel runs from my brow to chin, lingering unnecessarily long over the nostrils. Stop that. Water is coming up my nose and there’ll be sneezing if you don’t stop oh too late now –

‘Tch!’

‘You sneeze weird.’

Of course it’s Haylis; a sensible person would’ve wrung the towel before rubbing it on the face of an unconscious person.

Argh, so bright – the room is overrun with sunlight. There are curtains on the window across the bed but Haylis had not drawn them. Where did the rain go? Judging by past trends it should be pouring every single day.

She is sitting on the end of the bed with the sinister towel in one hand and a jar of green liquid in the other. Next to her is a tray of surgical tools – bone saws and such – all mercifully clean-looking.

I look about the room. This is no infirmary, but some sort of private suite: bed, table, mahogany cabinet, and a bathtub fitted with porcelain taps. A gold-threaded tea set sits upon a corner table along with three paper satchels, each printed with the red seal of…Lord Maarakir of the Vassal States, I think.

‘You’re not allowed to drink that,’ Haylis says as she swaps the towel for a spatula from the tray.

Drinking fancy tea is quite possibly the last thing on my mind. ‘How – where – what – why are you – what is going on? What is this place? Wait, no, before that, can I swap you for a real physician? No offense.’

‘Why do you need one?’ she asks with a raised eyebrow.

I open my mouth to tell her that I’m gravely injured and require urgent medical attention. Then I see my right arm: no cast, no bandages, only smooth skin with nary a scratch. Bending it feels like…nothing. There is, however, a dark patch on the sheets beneath it; in fact dark patches are everywhere.

Oh Maker don’t tell me I’ve wet the bed during –

The tinkling of glass makes me look up; Haylis is stirring a pinch of yellowy powder into the jar. ‘All the physicians are tending to Aunt Kath,’ she says, ‘even though there’s little they can do for her now.’

My heart skips two beats. Haylis must’ve seen the shadow of death pass over my face, for she hastily adds, ‘no no, not like that. She’s fine – well not exactly fine but she’s in no danger.’ Her hands fumble and almost let go of the jar. ‘Wow. That look scared me. You sure you’re not an imposter?’

She chuckles, but I don’t hear it; in my head Rutherford’s voice is ringing all over again.

‘Imposters will burn.’

She blinks. ‘What?’

‘Nothing.’ There’s the drill outside the window again: one, two, three, four, whistling sounds. ‘We’re at…Iborus?’

‘Why do you even ask?’ Haylis frowns as she examines the back of her left hand. There are smudges of ink on there, as if she had tried to write on it. ‘Whatever, I think I got it.’ She shuffles toward me with the jar, crumpling the bed sheets into a messy pile. ‘Drink this.’

I take the jar and almost retch; the stuff inside smells like curdled milk. ‘What is it?’

‘Suppressant, for your firestroke.’ She looks serious. ‘You’re to drink it twice a day for a week, with at least fifteen pints of water per day. Orders from Aunt Kath.’

So that’s what the wet patches are – sweat. With eyes squeezed shut I knock down the whole thing in one gulp. The taste is disgustingly familiar; someone must’ve been forcing it down my throat while I was out. Speaking of which –

‘How long have I been sleeping?’

‘Two days.’

‘Uh…come again?’

‘Two days.’

‘That doesn’t add up. It would’ve taken at least four to get here from where we were, and I don’t remember anything in between.’

‘Well...that’s...’ Haylis begins fidgeting with the bone saw, out of all things. ‘But you walked…walked…you’re saying you don’t remember?’

‘What?’

‘I knew it,’ she mutters.

‘Knew what? I remember holding off the brood with...with the big Thrall, the roaring head. Reinforcements were coming and I...I drew the dragons’ attention so they could use the white light thing and...then I passed out. They must’ve carried us back.′

Haylis looks at me. ‘No they didn’t. The company was annihilated. No one made it back except you and Aunt Kath.’

The room is suddenly spinning. What was it again, that dream I had? Three obelisks, and between them a dragon set in stone.

‘But how...how...?’

‘I was there on the wall, I saw you,’ Haylis says. ‘You walked up to the front gate carrying her on your back.’

Ten seconds of silence, of silent screaming inside my head.

A knock on the door.

‘Ma’am, you’re needed at the mines,’ says an official-sounding voice.

Haylis gets up. ‘Can’t deal with this nonsense right now. You’re right about needing a –’ She raises her voice. ‘I’ll be right there. And call a physician.’

The voice calls her ma’am again – with complete sincerity – and marches off, boots echoing.

She gives me funny grin. ‘Yeah, you heard it. Commander Kayran died a week ago and Arkai isn’t back yet from...wherever he is now. Before Aunt Kath gets better I’m supposedly in charge so the Phalanx has someone to blame when things go wrong.’

I raise a hand. ‘Wait, you can’t just change the subject like that. What happened to me?’

‘Ask Aunt Kath. She probably knows. Whole other deal to get her to tell you though...’

With that Haylis dashes out of the room, slamming the door shut only to poke her head back in a second later. ‘Just talk to people if you need anything, and...and...’ her face reddens; in the name of the Maker is she blushing?! ‘...and thank you for saving her.’

The white-haired physician explains – with a grating voice that could only come from chewing tobacco for half a century – that Kaishen had ‘modified the fundamental rhythm of your cardiovascular economy’, as if that’s supposed to make sense. The resultant shock to a body newly adapting to such a change might include (a list of long words that might mean something to someone who pretends to be clever).

‘Arm looks fine. So does the rest of you.’ Five minutes in the room and he’s already packing up. ‘Don’t call on me again unless you fall out of a window. I have to look after the Lady.’

‘Is she –?’

‘Go see for yourself. What are you, waiting for permission?’ he mutters as he walks out. ‘Wasting my time…whole infirmary of wounded...ridiculous...’

He leaves me with two more doses of suppressant and a jar of skin ointment that smells of oven grease. I put them aside and stare at my hands for a good five minutes: they’re red and covered in sweat, but otherwise perfectly healthy.

Have to replace her. Ask her what happened.

Someone had dressed me with a sleeveless shirt and shorts while I was asleep. The material feels unnervingly smooth against my skin – treated with tundra essence, no doubt.

I look out the window.

Wedged between sandstone cliffs and the dusty plains to the south is a sprawling fortress girded by two rings of shiny walls. In place of spires and towers there are squat bastions – roofed with gleaming mirrors – built at intervals along the wall and the cliff face. This room, along with what looks like a hundred others, is hewn straight from the mountain rock.

The cliff bends around in a gentle concave, and directly opposite this window is a fast-running waterfall. It spills from the mountains in silver drapes and collects in a swirling lake just inside the first wall. A great canal, wide enough for two barges to pass abreast, leads off into the southeast through a triple set of sluice gates. There’s not a single boat in sight; the dockyard covering a good third of the lake’s surface must have them hidden.

Directly below is a great courtyard, in which soldiers clad in blazing red-white raiment are doing target practice in groups of ten. They carry no sword nor spear, only unwieldy crossbows and massive backpacks apparently filled with coils of rope. The targets they’re aiming at are segments of tree trunks dangling from hooks, with bark still intact.

On the count of one they begin winding back the levers; on three they take aim; and on four they send great bolts flying into – no, around their targets. Apparently the long rope is used to tie the ends of the bolts together, and, loosed simultaneously like bolas, they coil with incredible speed around their marks. Some fly with timing so perfect that the strangling rope crushes the thick logs into splinters.

Just like Oon’Shang, crushing the dragon’s neck with her bare hands.

As if answering that thought, a group of twenty or so little giants arrive in the courtyard with handcarts filled with what looks like tailings from a quarry. The one leading them practically explodes with muscle, while the rest are mostly lanky and shorter by at least a head – Arkai did get excited about seeing hunter giants. Guess they really are rare.

The hunter signals with a pair of black flags, and the others each pick up a fist-sized rock (their fists) and heave them onto their shoulders in shot-put position. Then the flags drop. A collective whoosh like swinging trebuchets; the rocks are thrown up so high they become invisible in the sun.

‘Fly!’ Someone shouts, and the crossbow groups immediately abandon what they’re doing and send after the rocks a volley of bolts. The little giants have their heads raised to the sky, and one by one they start putting up their hands, all except one. A good twenty seconds later the rocks return and are caught by their throwers. The second giant from the left raises hers and shakes her head: no length of rope around its girth, not even a scratch.

A voice shouts, ‘group eight, you’re all dead! Four laps around the curtain wall!’

No one complains. The group peeling off into a run – bags and crossbows in tow – look shame-faced and angry at themselves.

There’s another knock on my door. Without thinking at all I walk to it and yank it open with the arm that’s inexplicably no longer broken.

A young woman, wearing a maid’s apron. She seems my age, with a tanned face and scab-covered hands. Her black hair is tied back into a neat bun with a sash, the same sash around the waist of the soldiers that wear the shiny raiment, except hers is tattered-looking and charred black on the edges.

The look of surprise on her face is quickly replaced by a polite smile. ‘Sir Kastor, the Lady sent me to inquire upon you. She’ll be glad to know that you’ve recovered.’ From the basket hanging off her arm she takes out a bundle of fresh clothing. ‘Please put these on if you wish to head out. I’ve taken the liberty of applying tundra essence. I hope they’re to your liking.’

Her brisk manner of speech is at once intimidating and, for reasons I cannot possibly fathom, extremely attractive.

She tilts her head sideways a little bit. ‘Sir Kastor? Might this be a bad time?’

Blood rushes to my face. I take the bundle from her hands like a knight receiving a lavish robe from the queen. ‘No of course not I’m just distracted by your – by waking up, since you know I just woke up an...hour...ago?’

She looks apologetic. ‘I’m so sorry, Miss Haylis told me –’ the rest of that sentence disappears with an enigmatic grin. ‘Might I make you some tea? We’ve plenty of Lord Maarakir’s finest.’

‘I thought...she said I wasn’t allowed to...um...’ drinking fancy tea is supposed to be the last thing on your mind, remember?! ‘I – no, thank you, but I wish to see Lady Kathanhiel right away.’

She gives a brisk nod. ‘Of course sir. She’s in the commander’s quarters.’

I take two steps forward before realising I have no idea where that is. In a panic I look down at my feet, and see my shirt and shorts drenched in sweat and sticking to my skin in transparent patches. A different kind of fire tingles up my arms.

‘Could you...maybe...show me the way?’

‘Of course sir.’

‘Great! Just...let me...shut this for a second and...put these on...thank you.’

Later, I would realise that I had forgotten to ask her name. Too much later.

The corridors of Iborus are actually a labyrinth of tunnels dug into the cliff. Hole-like windows are carved into the thick outer wall at intervals, letting in stray puddles of sunlight. Cloudy lanterns hang on the inner wall, their feeble glow barely reaching the stone-cold floor.

The commander’s quarters is apparently four whole floors above my room. On the way up we pass by at least twenty doorways, some little more than gaping holes, others padlocked and heavily guarded. The maid names them without hesitation, as if recounting from a list: archives, finance, safe of little giants’ schematics (four different locks on that door), Ink Scout dispatch, merchant’s quarters...

Three sets of stairs later, the maid leads me into a corridor covered in red carpet. There is only one door here, a mahogany one at the very end. On it hangs a bronze plague with not a speck of dust:

KAYRAN BELFAIR, FIRST APPOINTEE

ARKAI D’SHINGEN, SECOND APPOINTEE

Along the walls on either side are piles of various trinkets: broken sword handles, sashes, withered flowers...

The maid hurries to the door and puts up a hand to knock. Then she pauses. ‘The Lady has attendance,’ she whispers. ‘Perhaps we should return later.’

Indeed muffled voices are coming through the door; the people inside seem to be shouting at each other. If it weren’t for the thick stone walls the whole corridor would be filled with angry voices.

Wait, shouting? But Kathanhiel’s in there, and she’s sick.

The old Kastor – the one who got good at playing deaf at the dinner table, letting pointy words wash over him as if they didn’t hurt – would stand on this very spot with a pleasant smile on his face, so that when the door eventually opens the people inside might mistake him for having just got here.

That coward doesn’t exist anymore.

I raise a hand to knock.

‘Sir – wait!’ The maid looks at me worriedly, her hand half-reaching out as if trying to hold mine back. ‘Should we not come back later?’

It would be easy to agree with her: nod, turn around, walk down the hall, go to the canteen for food (Maker knows I’m starving), wait for the maid to tell me the shouting is over, and then come back with belly filled and courage renewed.

No one would reprimand me for that.

‘But I would hate myself,’ I mutter to no one.

Knock, knock.

The voices inside stops immediately. Then comes Kathanhiel’s, cold as ice. ‘We’re not to be disturbed.’

‘It’s Kastor.’

Muffled footsteps. The man that opens the door is a six-foot myrmidon with angry black eyes and a jagged scar running down the left side of his face. He too wears the shiny raiment of the soldiers in the courtyard, and upon his pauldrons are two rows of golden symbols shaped like dragon teeth, polished to a tee.

He sees me and frowns, as if my face is confusing to look at. Instead of addressing me, he turns to look at the woman standing behind him. ‘Is this him?’ he asks.

The woman, with eagle eyes and a steel-cutting jawline, looks old enough to be my mother. She’s a study in vigour; even her wrinkles look taut and read to brawl. ‘Show some courtesy, Master Rukiel,’ she says in the tone of a brooding queen, all prim and sarcastic. ‘It would not please our Lady.’

Sitting cross-legged upon the austere four-poster bed in the centre of the room is Kathanhiel, wearing a loose nightgown that does a poor job at disguising her wasted figure underneath. Her shoulders, once so powerful and built, look shrunken as if drained of blood, and her one remaining arm has the yellow sickliness of the emaciated. Powder and makeup has kept the colour of her face intact, but those black bags under her eyes have only sank deeper since the last I saw her.

She looks like death.

‘How are you feeling?’ she asks with a faint smile.

How can she ask how I’m feeling –

I feel my mouth moving but only a choking gurgle comes out.

The man named Rukiel is speaking, but he’s in my way so I edge past him, trying not to get hit by his stupid pauldrons. A hand grabs my elbow but for some reason it lets go instantly. Must be my disgusting sweat. As I walk past the woman she makes a tsk sound with her lips.

I draw close to the bed and see Kaishen lying on Kathanhiel’s lap, sheathed in a fancy scabbard encrusted in jewels and gold and jade and whatever else. She’s not paying it any attention; she’s looking at me and holding out her hand.

From behind me the man named Rukiel blurts out: ‘be careful my lady he’s still hot –’

‘To you, no doubt.’ Kathanhiel takes my hands in hers, and gives them a firm squeeze. ‘Kastor, please forgive me for all that I have forced upon you. I knew your body’s foundations were too fragile to withstand the Scouring but...I had no choice.’

Her hand feels cold. So cold.

This isn’t the time to choke up but I do so anyway. ‘I’m...I’m pretty alright but you’re...you’re...I don’t want you to die.’

‘Rest assured,’ she smiles. ‘Kaishen’s fire still resides within me. It can be easily rekindled.’ She looks over my shoulder. ‘Introductions are in order. Rukiel, Head of the Mirror Phalanx. Tamara, Head of Logistics. This is Kastor, my esquire.’

I bow, and surprisingly the two of them drop to one knee and put their right hands to their chests. ‘They are my appointees,’ Kathanhiel explains, ‘and since you’re my representative, Kastor, they will respect your judgement. In matters regarding Iborus however, Haylis is already rendering them assistance.’

‘Thank you for bringing the Lady to us,’ Tamara says. ‘She has a tendency to…overexert herself. You stood by her side in the direst hour; for this you have my respect.’

‘Likewise,’ says Rukiel. ‘All would have been lost had you not persevered. We – all of Iborus – are in your debt.’

It’s so very bizarre for them to be so polite after that first impression, but before I could come up with an amicable reply, Kathanhiel speaks up, her voice cold:

‘I’ve no patience for such pretence. Speak your minds.’

Rukiel stands up immediately, his face set in stone. ’What more would you have me say, my lady? You drew the entire brood to yourself with no thought to the consequences; you chose an esquire so mortally weak a single use of the sword led him to the Scouring; and it’s a miracle that you’re here at all, having set off with no plan, no escort, and no prior consultation with any of us. The Elisaad campaign wasn’t like this. If I didn’t know better I’d think you wanted this quest to fail.′

Tamara puts a hand on his shoulder. ‘We’ve been through this.’

‘And we’ll go through it again and again until this stubborn woman gets the point,’ Rukiel snaps. ’If you’d died – have you thought of that? – if you’d died, the thirty thousand souls of the Mirror Phalanx would be forced to follow an infant.′ He points at me. ’Arkai had kept us up to date with the selection process. What in the Maker’s name were you thinking? How can you settle for this when on the last campaign you had Talukiel – ′

‘What we mean to say,’ Tamara interjects with a deep frown, ‘is that you’ve made a number of unorthodox decisions, my lady, and to end up in your current state is blatantly irresponsible when the survival the Realms is hinging on your success.’ Her voice turns soft. ‘I know it’s been hard, Kath, but you need to take care of yourself. This...recklessness...cannot continue.’

‘I’ll not be lectured by you, of all people,’ Kathanhiel says.

Throwing up his hands, Rukiel storms to the other end of the room.

‘We were prepared to die for you,’ says Tamara. ‘When the brood had Iborus surrounded, all of us took a vow of blood: to fight to the last man so that we could buy you time. You’re the one who wields the sword of Ush’Ra...you and your esquire.’ She gives me a quick glance. ‘If you fail, no one can take your place.’

From the far wall Rukiel grunts: ‘She doesn’t care. If she did her esquire would be trained to handle the sword.’

‘Must I repeat myself?’ Kathanhiel says. ‘Kaishen was given to him in utmost desperation. Kastor will not take on Rutherford. That task is mine and mine alone.’

Tamara looks exasperated, the lines on her face deeper than ever. ‘But you can’t, not like this.’

A massive force shoves me aside; Kathanhiel has unsheathed Kaishen and gotten to her feet. With one lopsided swing she strikes at the tea cup on her bedside table. Tink. The cup wobbles once, twice, then becomes still. She swings the blade up to a perfect horizontal with not the slightest tremble.

On Kaishen’s flat edge rests a flawless ring of porcelain the thickness of a finger.

‘I am perfectly capable,’ she says.

Tamara looks at it, then shakes her head. ‘You’ve always been strong, stronger than all of us put together, but this is not about strength.’

‘Kastor won’t take on the Apex, I won’t let him,’ Kathanhiel says. ‘Rutherford is mine.’

‘But you will die.’

‘So be it.’

My lips move on their own. ‘No...no, wait a minute.’

How have I realised it sooner?

Picking the most useless esquire in the Realms, giving him next to no training or tutelage, setting off alone against thousands of dragons, and repeatedly choosing the most dangerous course for herself so that she has to call on Kaishen’s power again and again until her body starts to fall apart...there is a reason for all of that.

Rukiel and Tamara are both looking at me. Are they going to tell me to shut up, that this is no place for an idiot to offer his worthless opinion, or are they waiting for me to point out what they’ve been skirting around all this time?

‘Say it Kastor,’ Kathanhiel mutters. ‘I can see it in your face. Say it so we can move on.’

She lays Kaishen aside. The porcelain ring she returns to the rim of the cup, and so neatly has she lined up the scraggy edges one could hardly tell that it’s broken, but one little nudge…

‘My lady I...I think...I think you want to die.’