I scowled at the foursome chuckling at me.
“Enough now. The lad’s upset. He looks like a dog that just licked the arse end of a skunk,” Asdren said, a smile on his face that did little to ease my upset. My frown deepened. The mercenary leader turned his attention to Aelir, who was lost in his thoughts, for it took Asdren clearing his throat twice to yank the king back to the table. “Your Majesty, now we’re all here and food and ale have been offered as it is customary under the shale, maybe we can get to why Porgo reached out to us? Time, as they say, is money.”
I rolled my eyes. Typical cutthroat sellsword. No cares above how much coin is being offered. The king, even sitting with this shady sort of hireling, spoke of how deep in grief ourking was, for Aelir would never lower himself to sup with such a band of greedy slugs were he not bound in loss.
“Sorry, yes, my mind was elsewhere.” Aelir thumbed a strand of long gold hair from his cheek. He looked thinner than when I had left to travel to the Glotte. “I am in need of a small band of stone brothers—” Smuta coughed. “And sisters to lead my scout through the Witherhorns to safety on the other side of the peaks. There, if you wish, you may remain with Beiro as he sets off to locate an elf that the court of Melowynn has great interest in bringing back to Avolire.” The four dwarves huddled up as the king stared at me. “Beiro, I know this is a large request, for this elf may not even be alive, but you, above all others, are capable of tracking this person down.”
“Eight thousand gold,” Asdren announced as I opened my mouth to ask the first of a few dozen questions. “Half now for provisions, bribes, and general goodwill. The other four when we get Chirp here—”
“Beiro,” I snapped. The king actually smiled slightly.
“As I was saying before the warbler began warbling, four when we get Chirp through the tunnels. If we stay with him to act as muscle for the trek across the tundra, the rate will double for them tundra folk ain’t nothing like the fine fancy elves here in Celear. They’ll lop off your cock and feed it to the gray eagles just as soon as they’d look at you.”
“Your Majesty,” I barged in, getting a cocked eyebrow from Smuta as she dunked her roll into her second kidney pie. “I do not require the assistance of a band—”
“Tread lightly, Chirp,” Asdren warned. The other three in his group tittered. “You don’t know me or my people well enough to be tossing around highbrow elven disparity.” He glanced at the king. “No disrespect, Your Eminence, but well, you know…”
“No, I take no offense. Many elves are beyond highbrow. My recently departed grandfather among them,” Aelir softly said.
“His hammer is still, but the echoes live on,” Asdren whispered in reverence. The others also murmured tender things about the Stonefather, the stone, and the path of unbreaking rock. “Sorry to have drifted from the outline of the prospective job.” He turned those gemstone eyes to me. “I’ll take you to the cauldron of the Ironmantle himself if the coin is high enough, but I will not brook any snooty elven shit.” He glanced at the king. “Again, my apologies.” Aelir waved him on. “There ain’t no way in the Hearthmother’s flame a skinny elf can cross the Witherhorns alone. If you go over, you’ve got to deal with the yeti. And I know their king has been making overtures of friendship for a few seasons, but we who call the Witherhorns home know they’ll just as happily eat your fucking spleen as shake your hand. Especially in the summer rut. Just ask your bronze warrior.”
The mercenaries all nodded, cheeks full like chipmunks, ale froth on their chins. I knew all of this. I’d ventured to the tundra once four or so seasons ago but had skirted the snowy peaks and traveled out of the Verboten Woods. Avoiding the yeti and their famed temperaments was key that trip.
“If you opt to try to go through and under the Witherhorns, you won’t get through the Iron Gates without a dwarven escort,” Asdren continued. “The queen don’t like elves, humans, or other types snooping around in her mines. Non-shale folk tend to get light fingered. Be a shame if them pretty little bird fingers got lopped off for plucking a diamond from a cart.”
“My fingers are not birdy! They are calloused from the bowstring, and I do not steal!” I flung back. The dwarves all smiled at me as one would a child. “I could just go around the Witherhorns and skirt Lake Falomar as I did previously,” Iargued, my stomach reminding me this was all well and good, but there was food that my gut wanted badly.
“Aye, you could, but then you’d be running a good chance of riding into a clan squabble. The tundra folks have been at war with themselves for the past two seasons since their highest-ranking head of state came up dead in his bed. Again, one skinny elf ain’t going to ride through a vast tundra filled with irate warriors and not come out missing a few body parts.”
I huffed. Granted, his reasonings were fine and probably true. I’d heard tales of the Bhaston uprisings a few times, but nothing that said the lake region was now a danger for outriders. I would have to pass that along to the other scouts.
“I can use the mountain pass,” I argued.
“No, not right now. It got taken out by an avalanche in the spring. Unless you’re a crag goat, you ain’t using that shortcut. Be a good couple of seasons before that’s usable again,” Asdren informed me.
Well, shit on a stick, to quote Tezen. “Surely there must be—”
“Friends, we have little time to spend squabbling,” Aelir broke into the bickering. “Finding this elf is of paramount importance. He was spirited away from Renedith several seasons before my birth. According to the now excommunicated grand cloisterer of Renedith, the babe was named Coelum and born with a head of black hair and blue eyes. He would be fully grown and in his prime now. There is little else to go on, I’m afraid, other than the scribblings of my grandfather in an old journal where he mentions the Cadere bastard.” Aelir’s frow furrowed at the mention of Umeris. My curiosity about what had taken place grew as the king spoke. “Perhaps that is the mention of the father of this child, or the child itself. Seems my grandfather had little time or care for half-breed babes, but weall knew that. I just did not know how deeply that hatred truly ran.”
I could tell this was a mission of great import to the king, and so it would be to me as well. Aelir had given me much since that day he and V’alor had ridden into my barn on a rainy day. I have a good life now, free from the clutches of my past. I was an honored outrider, a respected druid, and a friend to many.
“Can you tell us anything else about this elf we’re seeking?” I timidly asked, for the king was greatly displeased now. Something large had taken place with Umeris and his grandson. That I was sure of now.
“The child and a wet nurse, who we are still seeking, were given over to a questionable conveyance where the child and she were to be turned over to the pirates of the Stormhold.” My mouth fell open. What kind of monstrous people would send a tiny baby and a mother who had lost a child to live among the Ice Pirates? Even the bandits of my family clan were not that ruthless. No, that was a lie. My father’s followers would slit their mother’s throat for a few coins. “The wet nurse may still live among the pirates, or she could be dead. The same for this Coelum. Perhaps both perished on the way to the Stormhold headland, where the Silvura and the Stormhold merge.”
I scratched at my chin in thought. I did not wish to bicker with the king but following a trail so long cold would be nigh onto impossible. There would be no signs left to follow after all this time. Why he felt me the better person to find this missing elf, I had no idea. His spies seemed a much better pick. Perhaps the shadowy clan could not find a way to skulk about in the tundra or even under the tops of the snowy Witherhorns. Yes, I had dallied about with the whispering ones from time to time, picking up some tricks to aid me when tracking prey with two legs instead of four. The king knew of this training. He had advised it. So perhaps this was why I had been chosen to makemy way to the fabled pirate lighthouse that guided the looters into the Stormhold during bad weather. And the weather was always bad on the Stormhold, so the stories go.
I possessed the best of both worlds. The talent to track prey and speak with beasts as well as the patience, discipline, and ability to survey without being seen. Also, I could hit a small target at a great distance from the back of a galloping horse. Plus, I had grown up around criminal elements. I knew how they thought, their names, and their locations. Many bandit camps had been raided thanks to my memories of their locations. That made me useful to the guards as well as the Shadow Master of Avolire. All of those traits that would have brought the king’s thoughts to me for this quest. There were many things left unsaid. I knew it, and Asdren knew it as well. As a sellsword, he would ask no questions that did not have import on this job. I, on the other side of the coin, would seek out the answers that were hiding in the foggy corners. The first person I would seek out when this meeting with the king ended would be the shadow master…
“I know you are wondering why I chose you, Beiro, to fulfill this task.” Aelir broke into my rambling thoughts. I nodded gently. “You are the finest of the outriders who serve under me. Your talents are vast. I trust you as deeply as I do Pasil. I know I have called upon you both to face dangers untold for the good of Melowynn. Pasil brought my children home to me, now I ask you to bring home my…Coelum.”
The twins? Where had they gone? By Danubia, I had missed a great deal in a short amount of time away from the castle. “As for the Sable Legion,” Aelir flicked his tired gaze from me to the dwarves who were chewing quietly to listen intently, “my scout requires a clever, powerful, forthright team to ensure he can do what he does best safely. I cannot send him off alone as you have said, for he would perish along the way. Yourgroup comes highly recommended by an elf who works for the Sandrayan ambassador. Your cunning, muscle, and drive to get paid will ensure Beiro is able to locate this elf I seek and bring him to Avolire. If you guide him through the mines under the Witherhorns, I shall pay you triple what you seek.”
All four of the dwarves gaped openly at the sum. They could retire with ease on that kind of coinage. “Beiro.” Aelir looked at me. “If you bring me news of Coelum Cadere, I will grant you a wish fulfilled. Ask it of me, and I will see it done. Be it a new home, a place on the royal court, an advancement in rank. If this elf is alive or dead, and you bring him or the proof of his demise to me, I will bestow the merit of hero of Melowynn upon you. My family…it is most precious to me. This elf could be as well. So, do we have a deal?”
The dwarves shook off their stupefied looks to nod at each other. Asdren rose, padded over to Aelir, spit in his palm, and offered it to the king. Aelir placed his much finer hand in the rough one. They shook heartily. Then all eyes moved to me, sitting there like a stunned ferret.
“We’re to leave at the arse crack of dawn tomorrow, Chirp. Meet us in the bailey ready to ride. If you’re not there when it’s time to depart, we ride without you.”
