Oathbreaker: A Dark Fantasy Web Serial

Arc 1: Chapter 10: Shadows Over Caelfall

I woke just before dawn. We cleared the Irkwood not long after, and moved into the domain known as Caelfall.

My first impression of that small country was that it was a gloomy sort of place. Small lakes and marshland were scattered across a dreary, mostly uncultivated stretch of pseudo-wilderness. Dead trees burst from murky, shallow water in many places, bare limbs stretching toward the sky like the grasping fingers of the dead, and hungry growth threatened to choke the narrow road. Morning mist coiled sullenly beyond the path, shrouding the terrain in a jealous haze.

Maybe my opinion of the place was spoiled by the knowledge that a warlock ruled it. Even still, my companions didn’t seem much more enthused than I did. Lisette watched the mist-veiled country with quiet concern, and Olliard kept his calm gaze fixed firmly forward, his eyes unreadable behind the semi-opaque lenses of his spectacles.

As we moved closer to my destination, I considered the task ahead of me. My dream-audience with the onsolain was as clear in my memory as any real event — clearer, even. It had been no phantom theater of a sleeping mind, I knew. The way I saw it, I had two problems; the first was that I needed to learn more about the lord who ruled this dreary country. Unlike with Leonis Chancer, who I knew by well-established reputation as the instigator of terrible atrocities before his tenure as a bishop, I’d never even heard of an Orson Falconer.

I needed information. An enemy unknown was dangerous, and the only advantage I had was anonymity. The healers I traveled with helped in that regard.

That was the second problem. Olliard of Kell and his apprentice had done me a good turn, and they were unknowingly traveling into danger. I doubted I could turn them away from it — what would I say? That a demigod had warned me this land was inhabited by a dangerous apostate and it was my task to stop him? They’d think me a madman.

But I didn’t want the two to get wrapped up in my task, either. Because they had saved my life, I was obligated to protect them in turn.

You are no longer a knight, I reminded myself. You said so to Eanor yourself. Stop pretending like you’re still bound by that creed.

Better to focus on my task, and keep the two of them from getting involved.

My injuries might have posed a third problem but — as it turned out — Eanor’s cryptic comment toward the end of our meeting hadn’t just been idle banter. I realized soon after waking that my wounds no longer troubled me.

The onsolain had healed me, I was certain. Perhaps I should have felt grateful for that, but it mostly just led me to suspect I had more pain to look forward to.

***

“Here we are,” Olliard said with forced cheer.

I could hardly blame him for his lack of enthusiasm. The Village of Caelfall was well matched to the country for which it had been named. It was large, practically a small town, and hugged the shores of a wide, ominously still lake. Lengths of dock stretched out into those waters, moored fishing boats aimed into its foggy interior. Buildings of wood and gray stone pressed for space within the bounds of irregular marshland, or clustered at the edges of low canals fed by streams congregating from the surrounds. A low stone wall enclosed the village, and our road led right into the maw of its fortified gate.

“This used to be a significant trade town,” Olliard said in a more subdued voice, studying the grim looking settlement. “The flooding didn’t use to be this bad, even when I was a boy.” He ran his eyes across the sprawl of buildings a moment longer before pointing to a large gray structure with a belfry tower. “That church there is where Preoster Micah lives. Lisette and I will probably be staying with him while we’re here.” He glanced back at me. “What of you, Alken? I’m certain Micah won’t mind you staying with him while you recover.”

The doctor wasn’t aware that I’d already made a full recovery. “I’ll find an inn,” I told him. “Soldiers and priests don’t tend to mix well.”

Olliard nodded slowly. “Very well. In any case, don’t be a stranger while we’re all in town. I’ll check on you when I’m able. A good physician doesn’t ignore a recovering patient, after all!”

He flashed a smile that faded when I wasn’t quick to return it. He cleared his throat and pointed to another larger building not far from the church. “That’s the Cymrian Sword. A reputable inn, at least back when the town had more traffic… the owner should treat you fair. Give him my name, tell him you’re here as my hired hand, and he’ll give you a fair price. You have money?”

“A little,” I said. “And thank you. That’s very kind.” I felt a pang of guilt at the doctor’s generosity.

We passed through the gates without incident. Lightly armored guards watched the cart from the wall, and three more questioned Olliard below. They showed no indication of recognizing the old man, but their suspicion seemed to lessen when their eyes fell on Lisette. Even still, they checked the cart with a calm, quick efficiency that didn’t seem characteristic of an out-of-the-way fishing town. They eyed me warily, but none of them tried to start anything and they left the apprentice be.

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Professionals, I thought.

Olliard was oddly quiet throughout the inspection, his talkative demeanor fading behind a neutral mask of patient indifference. The foggy surface of his spectacles didn’t linger on the guards, seeming to remain fixed on some point in the far distance. Lisette similarly avoided the eyes of the guards, though her demeanor bespoke more of anxiety. She pulled the thin woolen cloak she wore over her brown robes tightly around her shoulders, her eyes downturned. I could tell she was afraid.

So could the guards. I saw one of them nudge his fellow and turn a chin toward the doctor’s apprentice. The other said something under his breath and they both snickered.

I kept my hand carefully away from my axe and dagger. Starting something here would be bad, and I’d seen behavior of the sort plenty often. They would stare and make rude comments, but they wouldn’t try anything and I wasn’t going to risk undo attention for the sake of the apprentice’s honor.

Olliard also noted the attention and Lisette’s discomfiture. Casually, he told the captain of the watch — a broadly built, stark-faced man with the hard eyes of a veteran — that he intended to visit the settlement’s head priest, and the guard captain’s expression became remote.

“Father Micah is no longer with us, physiker.” The guardsman used an older term for a head priest, one occasionally used in more rural settlements like this one. “He died nearly three months ago from an ague.” His cold soldier’s eyes fixed on the doctor.

Olliard looked stunned. “Dead?” The old man shook his head, as though denying the fact. “But… no. He was a trained cleric, disease wouldn’t have easily taken him. Are you quite certain?”

“Deadly certain,” the guard captain said lightly, looking bored. One of the guards stifled a laugh at his joke before the dead-eyed man added, “maybe he wasn’t quite as faithful as you thought? Probably could have used your brews, eh?”

Lisette stiffened at the guardsman’s words and started to say something. I placed a hand on her shoulder, stalling her heated words. I noted two of the guards fixing the girl in their attention, and there was less humor in those looks.

Olliard’s face set into a neutral mask. “I’m a surgeon, actually. Was there anything else you needed from us, captain?”

The guard captain shrugged and ushered the cart through. “Not a thing. Welcome to Caelfall, Master Olliard.”

“Bastard,” Lisette cursed as we cleared the gate and left the watchmen behind. I lifted an eyebrow at her, but didn’t comment.

“I don’t recognize those men,” Olliard said. “Caelfall used to rely on a volunteer watch, supplemented by the baron’s men in harder times. Did you see their uniforms?”

It took a moment before I realized he was speaking to me. I nodded. “No House colors,” I noted. The guards had been wearing plain gray arming coats and light arms, with no insignia of any description. “Mercenaries, maybe.”

“Hm.” Olliard’s expression was nearly as cold and remote as the dead-eyed guard captain’s had been. “I’m going to head to the church and speak to whoever’s replaced Micah, learn more about this.” He nodded to a building ahead, dominating a corner of the settlement’s main street. “That’s the inn. I suppose this is where we part ways for now, Alken.”

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I nodded and hopped out of the cart. Both of the healers watched me do it, clearly troubled. I saw the looks and shrugged. “As I said, my injuries must have not been as bad as you thought.”

“Right,” Olliard said. His apprentice hid her suspicion less well.

I started to go, but stopped and turned back to the two of them. “Listen… you saved my life. I’ll probably stay here a few days while I rest. If you need anything while you’re in town…” what are you doing? I thought. Shut up. Just go. You don’t want any distractions right now. “Come and find me. I’ll do what I can to repay you.” Damn it.

I thought for a moment, then plucked a pouch from my belt and tossed it to the doctor. “That’s just a down payment,” I said, pointing at the coin pouch. Olliard’s eyes widened as he felt its weight. “For your services.”

Olliard cleared his throat. “I can’t accept this. It’s not like I gave you a choice in the matter, of my services that is. I know some in my profession tend to that sort of thing, but I won’t accept payment that wasn’t agreed upon beforehand.”

I started walking away, not giving him the chance to give the pouch back. “Keep it,” I said. “And stay out of trouble, doctor.”

I didn’t turn back to see the faces of my saviors as I left them on the street. Hopefully, my bribe would help them keep their mouths shut about me. If my luck was particularly good, I’d never see either of them again.

They deserved better luck than that.

It was an unseasonably cold late morning, and mist stubbornly clung to the streets of the lakeside settlement. There were people about, but not as many as I would have thought. Tired-eyed men watched me, the armed and cloaked stranger in their home, with wary distance. Women tended to small, sickly looking gardens, doggedly trying to keep those reserves of food alive. The smell of rot and fish was heavy in the air. Crows lingered on rooftops and ivy-choked fountains, or circled overhead as though waiting for the town to finally breathe its last breath.

I recalled, on our approach to the village, that many of the boats along the docks had still been moored. That seemed odd to me, in a settlement that probably got most of its livelihood off the waters of the lake.

Something was off about this place. The guards, the wary looks of the locals, and the air of tension pressed on my instincts like a leaden blanket.

I found the Cymrian Sword inn — strange name, considering we were most of three hundred miles from Cymrinor — easily enough. It was a two story building with an attached stable for chimera. The acrid stench of some brand of beast I wasn’t familiar with practically boiled out of the side building. The main structure was old and worn, showing signs of ill care. The damp air of the marshes had not been kind to it. A battered sign on a post out front confirmed it was the inn Olliard had directed me to.

I entered and found myself in a large common room made cavernous by its near total lack of customers. Long tables dominated much of the space, and an unlit hearth formed the centerpiece to a brickstone chimney on the opposite side of the room from the door. Ordinary enough.

A distant-eyed girl in her mid teens was listlessly sweeping a broom near one wall. When she saw me, her devotion to the task became more determined and she avoided my eyes. I gave her the same curtesy and ignored her, instead fixing my attention on a man near as old as Olliard behind the bar, heavyset and nearly fully bald, a heavy beard grown to compensate. I’d seen nearly the same man in inns all across Urn, and felt a touch more at ease.

There were a few customers, most of them gathered around one table near the bar. Locals, I thought, the group consisting of mostly men with a few women. They had the look of fishermen, with light clothing and wide-brimmed sun hats of some regional design. Voices hushed mid-conversation as I entered.

My dagger and axe were hidden beneath my frayed cloak, a heavy garment of deep red-brown I’d worn for years that wrapped around my neck nearly up to my chin. I adjusted it, just in case, and walked to the bar. I could feel eyes on me as I moved, every click of my boots echoing within the common room with uncomfortable volume.

I didn’t want to make an impression, but that can be hard when you’re a finger over six-and-a-half feet tall and scarred like a blacksmith’s anvil. I avoided meeting anyone’s eyes, not wanting the people in the inn to see the glint of gold in them. I grew my red hair long and let it fall around my face for just that reason.

“Help you?” The innkeeper asked. He had broad shoulders and arms thick as any soldier’s I’d ever known, nearly every inch of skin covered in thick hair. His black beard and thinning hair were shot with gray. He looked tired, his eyes shadowed and unfocused, and he barely seemed to notice me as I approached the bar. “If you’ve got a beast, you’ll need to tie it up in the yard. No more room in the stables.”

I recalled the overwhelming stench in the inn’s side building. “The gate guards keeping their mounts in there?”

The innkeeper did look at me then. His jaw tightened and he nodded.

“I don’t have a chimera,” I said. I thought of Brume, but guessed Olliard would make his own arrangements for his beast. “I could use a room and food. Might be staying a few days.”

The innkeeper grimaced. “No rooms available.”

I lifted an eyebrow and ran an eye over the nearly empty room. “Let me guess — guards buy those out too?”

The innkeeper snorted. “Sure. Bought em.” He nodded to the mostly empty tables. “Listen, I can’t offer you a bed. You can sleep out in the common room if you buy a meal in the bargain.”

“How much?” I asked. He told me, and my eyebrows went higher again. He was charging me practically nothing.

“Seems fair,” I said. I paid him for three nights, deciding not to be too optimistic about how long I’d be staying. The exchange was quick and perfunctory, the innkeeper dispensing with old traditions of his profession like idle banter and thinly veiled questions about my business. I decided I liked him.

Before I moved off to one of the tables to rest — endless hours riding in a cart on rough roads had left me feeling like that same road after an army trod on it — the innkeeper drew my attention.

“Not going to ask you your business stranger,” he murmured low enough the fishermen sitting nearby couldn’t hear. “But I wouldn’t linger in town too long.”

I regarded the man thoughtfully and decided to risk getting more information. “This have to do with your gate watchmen?”

The heavyset man immediately went still, his lips drawing into a thin line. I lowered my voice and leaned closer, matching his own tone. “I came here with two companions who did me a good turn. Healers. If you think I should warn them to skip town because of some trouble, they’re going to want to know why.”

“Healers…” the man’s eyes grew distant. He had dark blue eyes, more thoughtful than his burly appearance let on. “A doctor, you mean? Old man, keeps this ugly old chimera with a boar’s head?”

I nodded. “That’s him. We met on the road, traveled here together.”

Immediately the wary suspicion in the man’s expression eased, and he might have even drawn in a breath of relief. “Olliard’s a good man,” he said. “Haven’t seen him in years. Glad he’s still alive.”

I lowered my voice even further. “He said he didn’t recognize the men at the gate.”

The innkeeper’s shoulders slumped. “No, I imagine he wouldn’t.” His eyes flicked to the people sitting at the nearby table. I followed his gaze as casually as I could and saw an older woman with sun-leathered skin nod to the innkeeper. She murmured something to her companions and the lot of them stood and moved closer to the door, away from the bar, spreading into smaller groups at various tables.

Somehow, I knew they were keeping watch.

“Listen stranger,” the innkeeper said to me, speaking more pointedly. “I don’t know you, but Doctor Olliard has done more than a few good turns for this town, for people all over the demesne. Saved my girl when she was still on her mother’s milk.” He nodded to the teenager sweeping the common room’s floors. “So when I tell you this, I hope you understand that I don’t mean him or his any ill.”

He waited, and I nodded my understanding. The burly innkeeper continued after a moment’s pause.

“You should tell the doctor to get out of Caelfall, fast as fast.” His eyes focused on me. “Things have changed in the demesne. Those men at the gate…” he blew out a tired breath. “Mercenaries. Don’t know much about them, but I hear they’re part of some company based out west. Baron hired them and ordered the rest of us to cooperate.” His expression hardened. “I’ve seen the type, back during the House Wars. Killers.”

I guessed that cooperate included providing the mercenaries free room and board. Aloud I said, “usually lords hire sellswords when they’re planning to attack a rival or being attacked in turn. There a border war I should be worried about?”

The innkeeper’s frown deepened. “No. Strangest thing, but none of us know why the baron brought them in and gave them the run of the place. We haven’t been raided by any neighboring fiefs, and Lord Orson would have sent out a call for levies if we were, or if he was planning to start a fight himself. Nothing like that.”

“The baron give the order to keep the fishing boats moored, too?” I asked, pointedly not looking at the locals lingering in the inn in midday.

The innkeeper opened his mouth to speak, then closed it so abruptly I could hear his teeth click. His eyes went distant again. “Just tell the doctor to move on,” he said. “And I’d suggest the same to you, stranger.”

I knew I wasn’t going to get anything more out of the man. I could press, but I didn’t want him getting suspicious. I moved to one of the tables and sat. Soon after, the innkeeper’s tired-eyed daughter brought me a plate of food and some mead. I’d been on the road a long time. My mouth immediately began to water. I started to thank the girl, but she’d already scurried off. I shrugged and began to eat.

As I did, I considered what I’d learned so far. The villagers weren’t plying the lake, likely their main source or revenue in this barren, marsh-infested country, and the local baron had recently hired a gang of professional thugs to guard the settlement. The local cleric had died of illness, though I didn’t put too much weight on that news. It could be a coincidence.

Olliard spoke of the preoster like his was a local leader, I reminded myself. It was common enough in many smaller settlements for a member of the clergy to act in the role of mayor.

So, maybe not a coincidence. Especially since I knew from the lips of a member of the Choir Concilium itself that the local nobleman was a warlock.

I was also certain that these mercenaries were the ones responsible for killing the troll who guarded the woodland road beyond Caelfall. The same troll who was a vassal of the being whose domain, or at least part of it, comprised that ancient forest.

I didn’t know everything that was going on. I didn’t know why the members of a fishing town were avoiding their own waters, or the identity of the baron’s hired mercenaries. But some of the facts I’d gathered were already forming a clear and disturbing picture in my mind.

Orson Falconer, Lord of Caelfall, was securing his domain against the onsolain and their servants. I had a feeling he’d be just as aggressive when he learned they’d sent their executioner.

And there wasn’t even a nice big river to whisk me away this time.