A Hero's justice

Chapter 3

From the sparse woodland, the town of Juramona wasn’t much to look at. An agglomeration of buildings, some stone but most wooden, clustered around the base of a large, man-made earthen mound on which stood a palisaded citadel. The town wall was weathered timber, strengthened at intervals by squat stone towers. Here and there outside the walls were piles of rough-hewn granite blocks. Grass grew tall around the stones. While marshal of the Eastern Hundred, Egrin Raemel’s son had begun to convert Juramona’s wall to stone. After he was forced from his post by Ackal V, his successor allowed the ambitious plan to languish. Given the current state of things, no one was likely to disturb the blocks any time soon.

Crouched at the base of a leafing poplar, Zala surveyed the scene. Her journey from Daltigoth had been nightmarish. The countryside between the Caer River and Juramona was infested with roving bands of nomads. Too many times she had to watch from concealment as marauders laid waste to farms, sacked caravans, and put hapless Ergothian captives to the sword. It grieved her, but she could not risk entanglements that would delay her progress.

She stared at the gates of Juramona and pondered how best to enter the town. Night offered the best concealment, but it was only now midmorning. She dared not waste an entire day waiting for darkness. Not only did her commission require speed, but the nomad warbands were gathering nearby. Juramona might be attacked at any moment, making her mission that much more difficult.

Eventually fate, the gods, or sheer luck provided what she needed. A convoy of wagons came thundering down the western road, together with an escort of half a hundred cavalry. The wagons were drawn by teams of horses rather than the more usual bullocks or oxen. Horses meant speed. The convoy must be carrying something vital. Zala noticed the escort was bunched together at the head of the caravan. No one was paying attention to the rear of the procession.

When the last wagon passed her, Zala raced from cover and swung herself into its canvas-shrouded box. She was under cover again in the space of a few breaths. The wagon was filled with assorted casks and crates, all firmly nailed shut.

Once the speeding caravan was inside the city wall, Zala’s wagon pulled hard to the left and stopped, throwing her to the floor.

“Close the gate! Close it!” bawled a hoarse masculine voice.

Zala peered out. Clouds of dust, churned up by the wagons, roiled high into the air. Taking advantage of this cover, Zala slipped out of the wagon and quickly vanished into the unfamiliar streets.

Juramona was preparing for a siege. Lanes nearest the walls had been cleared of obstructions, and the roofs of the houses were covered by green cowhides that could resist fiery arrows. Buckets of sand or water were placed at every corner, and everyone-men and women, youths and oldsters-wore helmets, but there seemed to be few real warriors present. Zala kept her own head firmly covered by her hood, to conceal her upswept ears. One never knew how humans would react to the sight of even a half-elf.

The skills she employed to travel invisibly through field and forest worked just as well in town-perhaps even better, because the town-dwellers were not so in tune with their surroundings as country folk. Many humans credited elves with the ability to make themselves invisible. This was legend, but enjoying the advantage such beliefs gave them, no elf would deny this supposed power.

Zala’s techniques were simple, but required great dexterity. To follow someone unseen, she matched their footfalls so no stray noise would betray her. When standing still, she turned edge-wise from people and, whenever possible, moved toward the left. Most folk, being right-handed, tended to look to the right first before setting out. Taking advantage of this habit allowed a stealthy tracker to keep from being noticed. When looking around trees (or here, the corner of a building), she kept low. People expected to see heads or faces at their own eye level, not close to the ground.

In this way Zala passed like a ghost among the anxious Juramonans. Not till she reached the location described by the empress did she relax her woodland stealth.

The house before her was old and looked long abandoned. Shutters were closed, and crossed timbers were nailed over the front door. Concealing her true purpose, Zala hailed a passing laborer and asked if the house was available for rent.

The youth shifted the hod of bricks he carried off his shoulder and regarded her in wide-eyed astonishment. “The barbarians are coming!” he cried. “Who needs a house at a time like this?”

“I do. Does anyone live here?”

“No! No one’s lived there since Lord Tolandruth left it, before I was born!” The fellow hurried on, shaking his head at the stupidity of strangers.

By such oblique queries, Zala gleaned information about her quarry’s rumored whereabouts. In one street she pretended to be a soldier’s wife seeking news of her husband. In another, she was a peddler trying to collect a debt, and further along, a healer searching for a delirious patient.

As Empress Valaran had surmised, Tolandruth was not in Juramona and hadn’t been for years. However, an intriguing bit of gossip kept coming up. Several people mentioned a man who was said to know Tolandruth well. No one spoke his name; he was referred to as “Tolandruth’s captive,” “the special prisoner,” and most frequently as “the unsightly gardener.”

Inquiring into this mysterious person’s whereabouts, Zala was directed to a rather squalid part of town. She arrived at a row of houses buried beneath the frowning shadow of the High House. Although the day was waning, a few shafts of sunlight still pierced the scattered clouds. At the indicated door, she knocked. No one answered.

The narrow street was empty except for herself and a bony cur gnawing at something dead in the gutter six doors away. Zala inserted her knife in the gap between the door and frame, lifted the latch, and slipped inside.

The room beyond was dark and uninhabited. When her eyes had adjusted, she crept through the room toward the rear of the house. An open window framed a swatch of green and brought the scent of flowers to her nostrils. Remembering the fellow had been called a gardener, Zala slipped warily out the back door. What she saw stopped her in her tracks.

In the small area behind the house, where most folk would have a chicken coop, pig pen, or privy, there was indeed a garden, and no mere kitchen plot for herbs or root vegetables. A verdant carpet of jade-colored grass covered what soil was not already filled with flowers. And such flowers! Sunflowers taller than Zala herself with heads so heavy they had to be supported by strips of ribbon tacked to the lath wall behind; roses, with blooms large as soup bowls and the color of ox blood, filled the air with their dense perfume. Creamy white lilies were beginning to close for the day. Cornflowers, yellow daisies, irises in bold purple and pale gold, violets, and marigolds stood in serried ranks like perfect soldiers. Most remarkable of all was a stand of enormous dandelions, with puffy white heads as big as Zala’s own.

In the center of this magnificent display grew an apple tree, its branches still covered in white blossoms. Fat bumblebees buzzed through the branches, and narrowly avoided collisions with a profusion of butterflies in nearly every color of the rainbow.

Zala’s astonished trance was abruptly shattered by a scraping sound. It came from only a few steps away, from behind a screen of trumpet lilies, their white blooms spotted with red, like blood on snow. Although she circled around the screen with customary stealth, the figure kneeling on its other side knew she was present, though his back was to her.

“You needn’t skulk there. Come forward,” he muttered, continuing to dig the point of a small trowel into the black earth around the lilies.

She advanced, but halted when he turned to look up at her. Her shock was mirrored on his face, and both of them recoiled.

The gardener was a Silvanesti. That fact itself was startling enough, here so far from the elf homeland. But what truly took her aback was his appearance.

Never in her life had Zala beheld such a homely member of the ancient and elegant race of Silvanesti elves. His long hair was a dull dusty gray, tied at the nape of his neck by a scrap of ribbon. Eyes the pale blue of Quenesti Pah’s crystal staff might have been arresting, if they hadn’t been set so close together. Add a long, thin nose, and pale skin covered by too many splotchy brown freckles, and she fully understood the sobriquet he’d been given: he was an unsightly gardener indeed!

For his part, the strange elf recovered quickly from his surprise and said, “So, you’ve come to kill me.”

“What? Why should you think that?” Zala stammered.

“You have the tread of a hunter, but you’re a female half-breed. Such a combination speaks of desperation, so I take you for an assassin.”

Zala folded her arms and put her nose in the air. “I am a tracker, not a murderer. Who are you, that you expect assassins in your own garden?”

“You don’t know me?”

Zala shook her head. He stood, brushing dirt from his Ergothian-style trousers, and said, “I am Janissiron Tylocostathan, formerly general of the armies of the city of Tarsis. Among humans, I am called Tylocost.”

“You’re the one called ‘Tolandruth’s captive?’ ”

“I am. I was defeated in battle and taken prisoner by Lord Tolandruth.”

Time weighed heavily on Zala. Abandoning discretion, she asked, “Where might I find Lord Tolandruth?”

Tylocost smiled, revealing an uneven set of teeth.

“So that’s why you’ve come. I’m sorry. I don’t know where he is.”

He stooped to retrieve his trowel. When he straightened, Tylocost found himself staring down Zala’s Made. The length of polished iron drew nothing more than a shrug from the former general.

“I still don’t know.”

“I think you do. Silvanesti never forget an injury, and this Tolandruth did you a grave one when he humbled you by defeat. You know where he is.”

He reached out a long arm and plucked a white rose from its trellis. “You have a fair face for a half-breed,” he said, smiling. The smile vanished as Zala pushed the point of her blade through his cloth jerkin.

“I didn’t come here to kill you, General, but that doesn’t mean I won’t hurt you to find out what I must know!”

He stepped back. “I believe you, my dear.”

“I’m not your ‘dear,’ ” she snapped. “My name is Zala.”

Pigeons flew low over the rooftop. Tylocost glanced up.

“Day is done,” he murmured. “Come inside. We’ll talk.”

She followed cautiously, mindful of treachery. For a Silvanesti and a general, this Tylocost was certainly an odd one. He didn’t seem proud or martial. He seemed-well, very like a gardener.

Tylocost blew on the cinders in the hearth grate until they glowed. With these he lighted a thick, stubby candle. He took a wooden mug from a shelf, filled it with water from a bucket, and placed his white rose in it. He set this on the table. Pouring more water into a tin pan on the table, he carefully washed his hands and face. Zala bit her lip and waited, determined not to betray her impatience. In the course of his ablutions, Tylocost stripped off jerkin and trousers, until he was standing in only a loincloth. Unclothed, he was even more unsightly. The brown spots on his face continued over his body.

Seeming unconscious of his appearance (or at peace with it), the elf donned a light linen robe and fixed a gilded band around his forehead. He seated himself at the table and gestured for her to take a chair. She did so, and asked again for Tolandruth’s whereabouts.

“Time is running out, General-for you and this town,”

she added. “The nomads may attack any day now.”

“Within three days, I estimate. And I doubt the town will survive. The garrison was withdrawn by Lord Bessian after bakali destroyed Lord Hojan’s hordes. Fewer than eight hundred warriors remain. The townspeople have taken up arms, but they won’t delay the nomads for very long.”

“However,” he added, “I’m not worried, because you’re going to get me out of here.” His upraised hand cut off her protests. “That’s my price, dear. I’ll lead you to Lord Tolandruth, if you take me out of Juramona and get me away from the human savages beyond the walls.”

With a disgusted snort, Zala stood. She pulled her hood over her head again and turned to go. He waited until her hand was on the door latch before he spoke.

“Empress Valaran does not brook failure, I’m told.”

She froze. “How do you know my patron?”

“Logic, dear, logic and reason. Someone very powerful wants to find Lord Tolandruth.” Tylocost laid a bony finger alongside his nose. “Ackal V would never send for him, not for any reason. His hatred of my captor is well known. Who then would go to such lengths? The Empress of Ergoth, of course-Tolandruth’s lover.”

Zala blinked in astonishment, but would not he sidetracked. “Who the empress loves or hates is not my concern. My task is to find Tolandruth and return him to Daltigoth as soon as possible.”

“Or else-what?”

In the dim little room, redolent of the flowers in the fantastic garden, Zala felt her world shrink, like a noose drawing tight around her neck. She clenched her teeth. Despicable, homely, Silvanesti. What choice did she have?

“I’ll bring you out of Juramona, if you guide me to Tolandruth,” she said. “In seven days or less.”

“Why the hurry? Do you think to fetch him back here to save Juramona?”

Zala shrugged, but did not share her thoughts. How could a stranger understand that it was not merely her honor on the line, but her aged human father’s life as well? The empress knew where he lived. If Zala failed to carry out her mission, she knew her father would pay the ultimate price. And he was far too old and weak for Zala to consider spiriting him away from his home in Caergoth.

The unsightly elf rose and took a heavy glass decanter from the shelf. He poured two libations from it and offered one cup to Zala.

“Nectar,” he said. “My only remaining contact with the homeland.”

Zala drank. She resolved to slay this smirking Silvanesti if he caused her any more than the promised delay. As she lowered her glass and beheld his misshapen features again, she realized he knew exactly what she was thinking.

Egrin lingered in the Dom-shu village, hoping to convince Tol to change his mind. Since Tol spent his days chopping wood and many of his nights roving the forest, Egrin saw him only rarely. His heart seemed closed to his friend’s urgings.

Life in the village had resumed a normal rhythm. Egrin glimpsed the chief one day as Voyarunta held court. Though his hair was as white as ever, the old fellow sat straight and moved easily, radiating health and strength. Miya had explained that the Repetition of Births ritual involved every male warrior in the tribe giving up a small part of his vigor to renew the chief.

Kiya, too, was often away, on her father’s business. Egrin’s time was spent mainly with Miya and Eli. One afternoon, Egrin noticed the boy playing in the shadows at the far end of the hut. Something in his hand glittered in the feeble light.

Egrin rose from his spot by the hearth. His knees cracked like dry kindling, and something caught in his lower back, sending a sharp pain through his hip. His Silvanesti heritage gave him a longer lifespan than a human, but it did not guarantee health or vigor for one who’d spent so many years in battle. Too bad there was no Repetition of Births for aging warriors. -. ¦

Eli shoved the shiny object out of sight as Egrin approached. When Egrin asked what he was playing with, the boy quickly said, “Nothing!”

Egrin sat and smiled at him kindly. “Your nothing gleams like metal. May I see?”

A small leather box was reluctantly produced. Egrin raised the lid, expecting to find a knife. The object within was indeed metal, but circular, like a bracelet. It rested on a scrap of black cloth.

“Don’t tell Ma I was playing with it,” Eli whispered. “Please?”

So, it was a trinket of Miya’s. Egrin was about to close the box when something about the object’s design caught his eye. He took it out to examine it more closely.

This was no bracelet. The circlet was made of three strands of metal-gold, silver, and a reddish one, maybe copper-woven together in an intricate fashion. The braid was as thick as Egrin’s finger, its ends joined by a polished spherical bead of the red metal. The bead was delicately engraved with whorls and lines, every line inlaid with gold. Strangest of all, the center of the metal ring was completely filled with a flat disk of polished black crystal.

Eli denied knowing its purpose, adding, “It belongs to Uncle Tol. I’m not supposed to touch it.”

The odd circlet was surprisingly lightweight, and the center crystal was just clear enough to allow light to pass through. Egrin turned toward the fire and peered at it through the crystal-

The object was suddenly snatched from his hand. Miya stood over him, eyes wide and cheeks crimson with anger.

“Where did you get this?” she demanded.

He would not have implicated the boy, but Miya divined the truth before Egrin could answer. “Eli! What have I told you? You’re not to touch your uncle’s things!”

Eli ducked behind the old marshal. His mother didn’t strike him often, but when she did, it was memorable.

Egrin tried to placate her, but Miya would have none of it.

“This was hidden,” she said, glaring at her son. “You couldn’t have found it unless you were looking for it!”

Rising, keeping himself between the two, Egrin said, “The boy shouldn’t have disobeyed you, Miya, but you have the trinket now. No harm was done.”

The formidable Dom-shu woman relaxed a little and he added, “What is it, by the way? I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“It belongs to Husband. It’s very old, very precious. No one’s supposed to know of it.”

Ah, Egrin thought, now he understood. The circlet must have been a gift from Valaran. The treasuries of the imperial palace were extensive, and all sorts of precious things were kept there, torn from their rightful owners by campaigns dating back to the days of Ackal Ergot himself. It made sense Valaran would have given Tol something to remember her by-as if he could ever forget her.

When romance bloomed between Tol and Valaran, Egrin had known nothing about it. Only later, after Tol’s exile, did the rumors reach his ears. Even so, Miya’s reaction seemed out of place. She and Kiya had always had a sisterly relationship with their ostensible husband. The sisters had known of Tol’s love for Valaran almost since it began, and no hearts had been broken by it.

As Miya returned the circlet to the leather box Egrin noticed her fingers were trembling. She ordered them both outside, not wanting them to know the box’s new hiding place.

Twilight had come. The fine spring day was ending. Wind stirred the trees, sending a flurry of blossoms over the Dom-shu settlement. The scene was so peaceful and pleasant that Egrin had to force himself to remember the terrible devastation going on a hundred leagues west.

Eli thanked him for acting as peacemaker. “Ma gets kind of wild when the stone turns up.”

Cocking an eyebrow, Egrin said, “Then perhaps you shouldn’t meddle with it.”

Eli grinned. “She’s just afraid Uncle Tol will find out she’s still got it. He told her to get rid of it after we came here.”

The situation made little sense to Egrin, but then he hadn’t been in love in-how long had it been? Nearly fifty years? A great span to be alone, by any reckoning.

“Will your uncle be home tonight?” he asked.

“Nah. He took a bow and possibles bag this morning, so he’ll be huntin’ all night.”

Kiya came striding across the village square, looking weary. She’d carried her father’s words to the chief of the Karad-shu and returned, a long journey, all in one day.

“Egrin. Boy,” she greeted them. She put a fist under Eli’s chin and lifted it. He responded by punching her on the arm.

Miya called for Eli and he went inside. Kiya asked, “Have you convinced Husband yet?”

The old marshal shook his head, frustration in every syllable as he replied, “If he cares nothing for the empire, you’d think he’d fight for Valaran! Her life is as much at risk as anyone’s!”

“I think he’s worked so hard for so long to stop hurting, now he hardly feels anything.”

Egrin fought back a wave of pity. There was nothing he could do to ease Tol’s pain, yet there was much Tol could do to ease the empire’s suffering, to help every man, woman, and child in Ergoth. Egrin had to break through the wall Tol had erected, stone by stone, around his heart.

“He must go! Everything depends on him!” he said, driving a fist into his palm.

Kiya regarded him in silence for a long moment, then said, “When you see him next, speak of her, not the empire. It’s Valaran owns his heart, not the land of Ergoth.”

She went inside, leaving Egrin alone in the deepening dusk.

Running hard up the leafy hillside, Tol pulled an arrow from the quiver on his back. This would be his last chance to take the deer. Light was failing and his quarry was outpacing him. He saw a flicker of white tail as it fled through the trees, each bound covering three paces. He drew the bowstring to his ear and let fly. With a thrum, the arrow sped through the intervening foliage. Panting, Tol waited for the tell-tale sound of the broadhead striking.

He never heard it. In truth he heard nothing at all, not even the rhythmic thud of the deer’s small hooves. Complete silence had engulfed the woods. Puzzled, Tol moved slowly through the stillness. His footfalls sounded muffled and far away. He nocked another arrow, his last. A good hunter never returned home with an empty quiver. Kiya, fine archer that she was, would have much to say about his sad performance.

The quiet was unsettling. Creatures of the forest became silent in the presence of great danger. Tol’s approach was not enough to cause such alarm. Something else had disturbed them.

He approached the hilltop with care. This place was known to him. On the other side of the hill was a wide, shallow ravine, filled with closely growing alder and beech saplings.

As he crested the hill, there was an intense flash of light. Heat seared his face and his bare left arm when he threw it up to shield his eyes. Hair sizzled away on the back of his exposed arm. For an instant he wondered if lightning had struck at his feet, but he felt no pain, and the brilliant light did not fade. Gradually, his eyes adjusted. Lowering his arm, Tol beheld a marvel.

The ravine at his feet had been transformed. In the midst of the slender saplings was a great orb of light, whiter than the sun. It hovered a few steps off the ground, its radiance hot, but not unbearable.

Tol took cover behind a nearby tree. Instinctively, his right hand went to a spot just below the waist of his trews. This was where, for decades, he’d kept the Irda millstone, sewn into a secret pocket in his smallclothes. However, he no longer carried the artifact. Not trusting himself to destroy it, he’d asked Miya to do it for him when they arrived in the Great Green.

Now, staring at the bizarre orb of light that pulsed, like some enormous heart, at the bottom of the ravine, he wished he’d kept the artifact. His dealings with the rogue wizard Mandes had given him a healthy distrust of magic, whatever its purpose. It had had no part in his life in the forest. Still, it seemed to have found him again, even here.

Tol…Tol…

Someone was calling his name, a faint, barely discernible sound. He raised the bow, his final arrow nocked, and prepared to draw the bowstring back.

Tol, where are you? Come to me!

Strange. The voice sounded female. In fact, it sounded like-but couldn’t be. It couldn’t be her.

Tol, it’s Valaran. I need you. Come to me!

He nearly dropped the arrow. It was her voice!

“Valaran,” he whispered. Then, more loudly: “Valaran!”

He hadn’t spoken her name aloud in years. Once his injuries healed, he hadn’t allowed himself even to think of her. Such thoughts were pointless, bringing only pain.

“Val! I hear you! Where are you?” He stepped out from behind the tree. The bark on the other side was beginning to smolder. Leaves scattered on the forest floor had turned brown, edges curling.

Do you hear me, Tol? A messenger will come for you. Hurry to me!

Tol called to her several more times, but it seemed that Valaran could speak to him, but not hear him. When the orb began to dwindle in size, Tol threw down his bow and raced down the slope toward the fading light. He had to let her know he had heard her message!

Shouting her name, slipping and sliding in the loose leaves, he lost control near the bottom of the slope and blundered forward. One of his outstretched hands penetrated the very center of the shrinking globe. He half-expected to be burned, but instead the orb exploded in a noiseless flash, lifting him off his feet and tossing him into the scorched saplings.

By the time he’d shaken off the impact and recovered his sight, he beheld a very different apparition. The pulsating orb of light was gone. In its place was a city.

Small as a child’s toy, the city lay dead center in the ravine, bathed in bright sunlight. The walls and towers were no higher than Tol’s knee, as though he viewed a real town across a great distance. The apparition was so perfect and life-like, Tol recognized the place immediately. It was Juramona.

Smoke billowed from various buildings, and flames topped the old wooden walls. The High House, residence of the Marshal of the Eastern Hundred, was engulfed in fire. Swarms of men on horseback galloped through the smoke and chaos. The south gate was breached, as was the east. Sabers rose and fell. Tiny figures on foot fell like scythed grain. Juramona was being sacked.

Gradually Tol heard the noises. Softly at first, and garbled, they soon sorted themselves into distinct sounds-the crackle of flames, hoofbeats, the clash of arms, and above it all, the wailing cries of the dying. A thousand swords struck down a thousand victims-men, women, and children. The smell of blood filled the air, an odor as thick as the smoke.

A new sound arose, slowly growing louder. At first he couldn’t credit it, it was so utterly out of place. Soon it drowned out all the other noises and there was no mistaking it: laughter.

A single male voice was laughing at the carnage. As surely as Tol knew his own name, he recognized that laugh. It was Nazramin, who now ruled Ergoth as Emperor Ackal V.

The laughter swelled in power and volume until it beat at his ears, pounding in his head like a relentless sea. Eyes squinting against the agony, Tol fell to his knees.

Was this the same kind of strange, waking dream that had tormented him on his journey to slay Mandes? If so, then Tol could make it stop. He could wake himself from it.

Lifting a hand high, he slammed his palm down on a sharp stone.

The burning town and killing laughter vanished. Tol was lying on his back, staring up at the stars through gently waving tree branches. Over the ringing in his ears, normal night sounds-tree frogs, crickets, birds-made themselves heard once more.

Tol sat up. Blood stained his right hand, and his bow lay in the leaves a short distance away. The bowstring had burnt in two. As he moved, the leaves around him disintegrated into ashes.

The vision was gone. The ravine was populated by nothing more than the closely growing trees, their spring foliage dark in the filtered moonlight. The taste of the experience lingered strongly: Valaran’s piteous call, the wails of the dying in Juramona, and the emperor’s malevolent laughter.

He wrapped his torn hand with a strip of leather, and started hack to the village. On the way he thought about what he’d seen. Valaran must be searching for him, which meant something had changed in Daltigoth. Why now, after six years, would she reach out to Tol? Were the twin invasions by bakali and nomads reason enough for her to risk the emperor’s wrath, should she be discovered?

The second vision was equally troubling. How could a town as large and as well-defended as Juramona fall to nomad tribesmen? Had Val sent him the second vision as well? It made no sense that he would be shown something that had already happened, something he could do nothing about. He must have been given a glimpse of the future-a future he might yet be able to change.

In spite of his rapid pace, midnight had come before Tol reached home. With a shout, he roused the inhabitants of the sod hut. Kiya and Egrin sprang awake with bare blades in their hands. Eli sat up, blinking in confusion, black hair wildly awry. Miya, sleeping next to him, only shifted slightly.

Tol briefly described his second vision in the forest. The first, of Valaran calling to him, he kept to himself.

Kiya was disposed to think it was a trick, but Egrin wasn’t so sure. The changes in the town’s defenses that Tol had described had been added only after Tol’s exile, by Egrin himself. Although not compelling proof, Egrin felt this was significant evidence the vision was a true one.

Whether trickery or truth, Tol had made up his mind already. If there was a chance he could prevent the town’s destruction, he had to try.

“I leave for Juramona. Tomorrow,” he announced.

Kiya felt he was acting hastily, but knew there was no point trying to dissuade him. Eli jabbered excitedly about horses and swords, journeys and battles. Egrin, still trying to absorb the news, asked Tol what he planned to do when he got to Juramona.

“What I can.”

From anyone else, this would have sounded pathetic. From Tol of Juramona, it amounted to a sacred vow.