The Northern Approach Read online

  “I have terms of my own before I would help,” the man noted, the knives disappearing into his sleeves with a flick of his hands.

  “Name them. You’ve already survived a battle I doubt many could. You may not be who we were looking for, but we need the help.”

  Grinning, the gypsy pulled a copper cup onto his lap that appeared to be tied to his belt with a short leather thong. “You find better drinks and share. I already search your bags and neither of you brings anything but water. How do you think you face down an army of dead men with nothing but water? My people know the cowardice of city-folk and you will need stronger drink to stand and not run.”

  “Is that all?” Raeln demanded, sheathing his weapon. “We give you booze and you help us fight a war? On’esquin, this is insane. Send this old man away.”

  “Is not wise to insult honored guest,” the man said, unrolling the parchments and shaking his head. “Your people need to learn to write. Is all scratching and pictures, but no words. So many bad habits, yes? Why are your people able to conquer these lands when you cannot write and cannot greet guests like civilized folk? Is old tongue and you wrote it badly.”

  On’esquin’s eyes narrowed and he gave Raeln a meaningful glance. “What can you read of these?” the orc asked and reached for the parchments, but the human kept them out of reach.

  “Here,” the gypsy said, tapping part of the flowing text. “Is flowery style, like turning letters into art, but is the name of my clan. See?” The gypsy held up the copper cup and pointed out a nearly identical symbol embossed in the stained old metal. Setting it back at his side, he glared at the parchments as though they were difficult for him to make out. “Were it not for all the sharp pointy bits in your writing, I would think you steal from my people,” the man noted. “My clan’s motto even is written here. ‘Seek companionship in all that you find.’ Is good saying, yes?”

  Sitting down hard, On’esquin chuckled, shaking his head. He looked to Raeln and said, “I still don’t believe in coincidence. The words he is reading literally translate to ‘Seek out your companions where you may find them’ in ancient Turessian. This man has to be one of the ones we were meant to find.”

  “Do I have any say in the matter?” asked Raeln, resheathing his weapon. “I have enough problems traveling with you, but him?”

  “I listen in…by accident, I assure you,” the gypsy told them, tossing the parchments back to On’esquin. “Grumpy wolf is Raeln. I did not hear big green man’s name.”

  “On’esquin,” replied On’esquin, offering a hand in greeting.

  “Bandoleer Yoska, though not so much bandoleer with many of my kin dead,” the gypsy said, ignoring the hand. “Where is our army if we intend to fight the dead men? Three foolish people will not go far, no? I have already done this once with small group and they end up—” Yoska’s joking manner faded abruptly and sorrow crossed his face for a moment. “—they did not win against greater army. Many good people die, as always happens in war. I have done this too many times and I wish to not watch more people die.”

  “You will have your army before we face the enemy directly,” offered On’esquin, flipping through the parchments and then smiling to himself as he tapped a page. “Help us and we’ll find a way to make this work out.”

  “Very good,” Yoska said, leaning back against the tree. “You two should sleep next shift. You keep me up very late, so I take first shift sleeping. I know, I know, Yoska is very interesting, but you must give him some time to rest as he has been stabbed very badly. Tomorrow we will talk about how I will win war for you, yes? Go to sleep and trust friendly gypsy to watch over you when you are defenseless.”

  Without another word, Yoska closed his eyes and began snoring, though Raeln was certain he was feigning sleep. The man reminded him of his deceased sister, pretending to sleep so she could sneak out after the rest of the family settled in…though unlike her, he was a mystery and incredibly dangerous if ignored.

  Three men against a hundred thousand undead and immortal Turessian leaders, Raeln thought as he sat down to rest. This had all the makings of a lost cause. Raeln wanted to object, to argue about even continuing this farce, but he really did not care. Getting himself killed trying to accomplish the impossible was a fine ending for him. He only hoped the others understood he had no expectation of living to see another winter and they would die with him if they continued with their plans.

  *

  Raeln had rested fitfully, unable to sleep and unable to relax and meditate as he once had during times when readiness had been required. Upon hearing On’esquin get to his feet, Raeln blinked wearily, his vision blurred and eyes stinging. Every morning seemed to be a struggle anymore.

  Yoska was already standing over Raeln, tapping his foot impatiently as Raeln looked up at him. The man’s side had been freshly coated with the mud mixture and he winced when he moved, but he handled himself well considering the wound Raeln had seen before it was covered. Most men would have been curled in a ball, waiting to die.

  Nearby, On’esquin had already gathered his belongings to begin traveling again. They had little among them, so it took Raeln only a few seconds to finish collecting things and stand up.

  “We don’t have enough food for the trip back to camp,” Raeln announced as he rubbed his eyes, trying to wake up. “I can probably find enough for a few days if we spend the rest of today hunting.”

  Walking over to kneel between Raeln and Yoska, On’esquin spread out a worn sheet of parchment covered with maps of nearby lands. The sheepskin was old, cracking and crumbling to dust in spots as he applied pressure to it, attempting to flatten it.

  “We are not going back to the camp, Raeln. We lost our other companions, so we will go on without them,” the orc explained, searching the mountains on the map with the tip of a large finger. He finally tapped a spot and kept his finger there. “I suggest a direct route, taking us north through Altisian lands and past, into the foothills and plains. That region is uninhabited, so once we get beyond the forces in Altis, we should make good time toward the city of Urlenna.”

  “Is no city by that name,” interjected Yoska, though he did not look at the map. Instead, he rubbed a torn scrap of blue silk between his thumb and first finger, glaring at it. “You know nothing of these lands, do you, old man?”

  On’esquin frowned, his tusks giving him a furious look despite Raeln knowing he was likely confused or disappointed instead. “Where would you have me go, gypsy?” he asked, motioning broadly at the map. “I’m guessing you have traveled more than either of us.”

  Taking a knee beside On’esquin, Yoska looked over the map and drew one of his knives. He tapped a spot a little north of where they stood. “We are here, not there,” he noted. “Map is wrong, yes? You wish to go north, but here and here are lands controlled by the dead. Here, we lost old camp and many good people. The clouds that consume things roam near there now. We will not go there.”

  Leaning forward, Raeln studied the locations the man was pointing out and added, “He’s right. I’ve been to their old camp. That area is heavily patrolled, and where it isn’t, a large black cloud like the one near Lantonne was drifting around.”

  “All right,” On’esquin said, sounding frustrated. He put one finger on the city he had called Urlenna. “Even if the city has fallen, it had good walls. The ruins will be a usable location—”

  Yoska made a loud click with his tongue and reached out with his knife, slicing away a section of the map containing the city before On’esquin could stop him.

  “City was ripped down and stones used for homes and shrines of tribal peoples,” he explained, swatting On’esquin’s hand when the man reached for his weapon. “My people sold some of the wall stones to Altis nobles as holy relics. City-folk do not know where old things come from, but my people do.”

  “Then show me where we can go and what of these cities still stand,” the orc asked, gesturing broadly at the map.

  Raeln grabbed a mud
dy stone near his feet and used it to cross off Hyeth and the surrounding area. “My home,” he explained, sitting back. “The Turessians turned our leader…my father…into one of them. He controls that area from what I was told. Everyone there is dead.”

  “Is much worse than one city,” Yoska told them, tapping one city after another on the map with his knife. “None of these exist anymore. Map is too old.” Tapping a few more locations, Yoska added, “These spots are cities that were once good for stopping when no one was upset about trades gone bad. All are now held by dead men or those who are likely controlled by them. These over here I think are controlled, but I do not see with my own eyes.”

  On’esquin stuck his finger in the mud and drew a thick line across the map. “What you are telling me is that the Turessians have cut off the entire northern approach without going around to the east,” he said. “We cannot go through the mountains or it will take us a year or two to get anywhere. Dorralt knows the prophecies and is trying to ensure I cannot go home. He is likely trying to find his old generals and free them before I can get to him. This will become a race between him and us if we cannot find a direct route.”

  “Will he be able to find them?” asked Raeln.

  “Not for quite some time, I believe. The generals are in no condition to travel, and what is left of them has been hidden away where he will never find them. The last one to find them was the man who warned me to the Turessian war’s beginning. I have since hidden the remains again.”

  Yoska reached past On’esquin and traced a line through the mountains. “We go here, yes?” he asked the two other men, smiling. “Is easiest way and dead men would not dedicate large army there.”

  “In the mountains?” asked Raeln, shaking his head. “That’s months of travel before we’re even past Altis. They wouldn’t bother setting up patrols that far out. The mountains themselves will kill us.”

  “No, no, no,” the man told him quickly, tapping the line again. “Not in mountains. We go through old dwarf and elf halls. We go under mountains, yes? Many doors and walls that the dead will use to stop us, so few dead will be needed to keep watch. A smart man can go through in a few weeks, once he reaches the entrance, yes? I am smart man, and handful of undead not keep me out. Even if we cannot take halls all the way to far north, we can use them to get past Altis.”

  Raeln opened his mouth to object, having never even heard the dwarves maintained tunnels that long, but Yoska pointed his knife at him.

  “I say smart man, do not argue or you look to be exception, yes?” Yoska told Raeln, smirking. “Trust me. Closed doors not keep my family out when we wished to trade. I give us ways around closed doors and we go through with dead men none the wiser, yes? This will get us to northern plains…after that, I can help less as my kin did not travel that far. Other families, yes, but not mine.”

  “How far to the entrance?” On’esquin asked, picking up the map and staring at it as though intending to crush it. Sighing, he folded it and slid it into his pouch. “Your knowledge is of more value than my maps, it would seem.”

  “Two days at most. We will need food and drink if we are to go so far below dirt,” the gypsy said, pointing with his knife roughly southwest. “Raeln offered to find food, which was very kind. I will go get water and proper drinks from whatever is left in village, as undead were so kind as to leave food and drink behind in our tents. Magic green man, you collect weapons. Should be easy trip, but I am not fool to have lived this long. We all bring what we can carry.”

  “Then we collect today, rest, and leave in the morning,” Raeln said, pulling himself up using the tree he had been leaning against. His whole body hurt from traveling and he was not looking forward to doing it again so soon.

  “No, we collect during day and we leave at night,” countered Yoska. “Dead do not care about light or dark. At night, the animals come out and the dead get very confused. They attack everything. We use that and they do not find us so easily, no?”

  “Assuming we make it through the tunnels, how much farther is it from the northern exit onto the plains before we get to Turessi?” Raeln asked On’esquin. “I assume that’s where we’re going?”

  “Yes, it is. Dorralt has gone there and will have taken anything of importance to the prophecy that he has found. We will have to go there to confront him if there is any hope of breaking his control over the armies.”

  Raeln continued to stare at On’esquin and Yoska turned and gave him an equally expectant look.

  “Fine,” the orc blurted out a moment later. “Two months by horse if we can travel almost to the border underground. If Yoska’s plan works, we can be there before the first lowlands snow. In Turessi it never stops snowing.”

  “Then we need to get moving,” Raeln acknowledged, heading off toward the trees. “I’ll be back before dark with as much food as I can find.”

  Chapter Three

  “The Deep Dark”

  The land will be cast over with the shadow of destruction that takes its root in good intention. The monsters the world will face will believe themselves heroes who must commit atrocities to save the world in the long-run. My people revered their dead for generations, bringing them along as memories of those they had lost in their endless journeys. The very act of preserving our ancestors will be perverted and used against the nations and will create the nightmares that they will soon face.

  Through shadow, hope will travel toward light. The six will stand against the darkness and will redeem those who still remain. I watch them, scurrying like mice about the world, trying not to be seen, yet watched by me. These six will find strength in mere survival and through living from one day to the next, give hope to the world.

  To be honest, my friend, I do not understand these visions any more than you do. I speak nonsense and hope that it will change the outcome of what I have seen. Please let these words be enough of a guide that we can escape the worst of what these dying eyes were shown.

  - Excerpt from the lost prophecies of Turess

  “You have got to be kidding me,” Raeln muttered, crossing his arms and stopping at the head of the trail that snaked down into a cave-like crack in the mountainside. Days of hiking and all he wanted to do now was turn around and go back.

  Raeln had always heard the dwarves lived beneath the ground, but Yoska had cleared up that belief as they approached the entrance to the dwarven lands—at great length, regardless of Raeln’s attempts to put an end to his prattling. He had explained that the dwarves spent a great deal of their time below ground, working on their crafts and mining minerals for them, but their actual cities were always above ground. They had passed one such village earlier that day, smelling of death and seemingly empty. Yoska had steered them wide around it and no one had objected.

  Now they stood before the entrance to the dwarven tunnels, used both for mining and transportation through the mountains. Yoska had told them the dwarves had built vast fortresses underground as precautions against invasion by humans, with the belief that they could fall back from any of their above-ground cities to the closest tunnel network and hide out forever, if needed.

  Judging by what Raeln saw ahead of them, that is exactly what the dwarves had tried to do, not that he blamed them. If he had a hole in the ground available to him during the attack on Lantonne, it would have been very appealing.

  The path the three of them stood on was well-worn from the passing of many wagons and feet over decades. Having lived in a trading village for most of his life, Raeln knew the dwarven people were frequent traders, perhaps more so than Yoska’s family. They would send out wagons on a daily basis to the human and elven cities around the region. Now dried blood marred the path and weeds had begun to fill in the tracks from the wagons. Nothing had come down that path in at least a week, though with the recent rains, the weed and grass growth made estimating difficult.

  The road ran from the village at their backs down to a massive pair of stone doors set into the mountainside, made from
the same stones as the mountain itself. Dwarven text covered those doors, telling Raeln all he needed to know. His dwarven was sketchy at best, but two words he could make out roughly translated to “We’re closed, go away.”

  To add emphasis to the blunt statement carved into stone, a pair of twelve-foot polished steel statues stood with one on each side of the doors. At their feet lay the pulverized remains of either people who had tried to get into the tunnels too late or undead…there was too little of them remaining for Raeln to be sure. When the three travelers began toward the doors, both statues had turned their bearded faces toward them and watched them approach.

  “Golems,” On’esquin said, sighing. “Mindless constructs that will perform their given tasks forever. Do you think they will let us pass?”

  “Is only way to know, yes?” noted Yoska, dropping the heavy knapsack he had carried through the foothills with a loud sloshing sound. He put on his best grin and began walking confidently down the path toward the metal men.

  “Yes, I would rather like to see him die,” On’esquin said softly, once Yoska was out of earshot. “I believe he will stop talking after dying.”

  After two days of following the human through the wilderness and on to the roads the dwarves used, Raeln was still not certain he should interfere if the man got himself killed. The first task they had tried entrusting Yoska with was simply to collect and carry water for their journey. Instead, they had learned by halfway through the first night that Yoska had dumped out any water they already had with them and replaced every waterskin with wine and stronger alcohol scavenged from the destroyed village. As one who did not drink anything but water, Raeln had railed against the man’s foolishness, but On’esquin had simply shrugged it off and laughed. Having no appreciable recourse, Raeln had been forced to detour to find a stream when he was thirsty, something that had slowed them down half a day over the journey. In the end, he had stolen a canteen from Yoska and refused to let the man near it after filling it from a creek.