With an impatient snort, Dinah’s horse slowed. Her wagon creaked to a stop. She shared the horse’s frustration. It had been a stop-start morning. Three wheels had come off the other wagons. A narrow, rocky valley carved by a powerful river surrounded her, a great cliff towering over her nearly a hundred feet tall. The Gullet, the only way onto the High Plain of Urhsas from the empire.
Despite everything, Dinah had been rather excited to see the Silver Run River and the Gullet, as it was called by everyone but the empire’s most tedious cartographers. They reached it that morning. Their caravan of thirty or so wagons and two hundred men (Dinah was all too aware that she was the only woman in the caravan), had just entered the valley.
The Gullet let her down. It was a grey day; the stones matched the sky perfectly. The cold spring day clung to the memory of winter. Here and there the cliffs were pitted and caves had been dug into the stone. There was no activity up there. Dinah didn’t need to guess whose work that was. She only hoped the caravan would go unnoticed.
At least the river lived up to its name, noisily crashing down from the heights and into the wide Lyliac Empire. Though loud, the sound was rather pleasing. Almost like music. Dinah held hope that on a brighter day the valley would be a beautiful place.
Letting go of the reins, Dinah lifted her skirts to avoid a snag and hopped down to the stony ground. She had to find the cause of the delay. If another wagon wheel had broken, it might just be her chance. She noted the wagons she hadn’t inspected yet. The evidence had to be in one of them.
She sighed. How had the Temple of Many Truths been caught so flat footed? It was their duty to know, yet here she was, alone, unsupported.
As she walked, the men called out friendly words to her. They were trying to play their farce as merchants. Some of them actually were, and Dinah could pick them out with a glance. Those were softer than the disguised soldiers, both in physique and in their eyes. At a guess, there were around seventy merchants.
As she passed them, she felt hungry eyes on her. Her fingers went to the pouches around her waist and fingered a little knife. More of a needle, really. She couldn’t just use it yet. For safety, she would need to start carrying her butcher’s knife.
“Any venison today, good butcher Desmara?” a cheerful voice asked.
Dinah looked over and saw Tevran, a smaller man powerfully built, stepping out from behind a wagon. His face was squat, and he would have looked unremarkable in an imperial crowd. Olive skin, black hair, light brown eyes. He played the farce better than the others. Dinah wasn’t sure if he was a knight or man at arms. Probably the latter. Tevran had walked or drove a wagon. The ones she marked out as knights had their own horses. They had an air about them which Tevran lacked.
Dinah fixed him with her best smile. He had been kind and protective of Dinah since she joined them, and easily manipulated. She noted with satisfaction the corners of his mouth moving to a smile, which he tried and failed to suppress. “I’m afraid not, good trader Tevran. At this point in our travels, I could only prepare it if you hunted it down. All my stores are low.”
Tevran made a show of being crestfallen. Dinah fought back a laugh. This poor fool. “Then I am afraid that we won’t have it the rest of our journey,” he said.
That was a new piece of information. “Why?”
“Because we will be reaching Last Hearth by sundown, so long as everything goes to plan.”
“Is there any reason to believe something will stop us?”
Tevran allowed himself a small chuckle. “I’m surprised at you, Desmara. For a southerner out here, you are surprisingly poorly traveled.”
“I am not used to the wilds,” Dinah said defensively. She had been taught how to play men. “And I still wouldn’t be if my husband hadn’t fallen ill.”
Tevran’s face fell a step, as it always did when she mentioned her fictitious husband. “But then we wouldn’t be blessed with your company.”
Dinah gave the man a small smile. “Yes, well, I would prefer to be at home watching over the shop. All things being equal. What might delay us out here?”
Tevran walked up to her. Side by side, his short stature was stark. Dinah was taller than him by a few inches. Tevran gestured and Dinah understood that he meant to escort her wherever she was going. Men who contented themselves to being hangers on were a terrible inconvenience. Especially for her.
“I think we’ve arrived at Lowbridge,” Tevran said meaningfully. Noticing the lack of comprehension from Dinah, he continued. “The river has carved out the valley, but it didn’t do so evenly. Here and there it is close to the cliffs. Too close for a road. So the road zigzags from side to side where it is easiest to build. There are three bridges, and you know what that means.”
Dinah nodded. “Orges.”
The largest of all the peoples of the world, excepting only dragons, ogres had a penchant for finding themselves a bridge and guarding it, taking a toll from whoever crossed. They were vital to the Lyliac Emperor’s control of his nation, and thus nothing was done about them. Some exacted a heavy toll, others guarded small footbridges and asked only for a song. They were a strange people. They seemed to feed on the traffic over their bridge, with the most busy boasting guardians nearly forty feet tall. Dinah wondered the size these would be.
“Just so,” Tevran said. “And I’m sure that you’ve seen the caves.”
“Goblins,” Dinah answered with a note of apprehension. This job was exceptionally poorly planned.
Tevran laughed again. “Why, Desmara, you have been tricking me. Not the butcher’s wife at all, but a traveler.”
“My village had a number of them,” Dinah answered. “Civilized, of course.”
“Yes,” Tevran said, nodding. “The empire takes all peoples. These, however, live outside the empire’s purview. Savage as any people you are like to come across. From what I understand, the two tribes on either side of the valley are frequently at war. They shoot arrows at one another and the arrows fall on us. That’s the biggest worry. Don’t be afraid, we merchants are strong enough to push them away.”
They were approaching the head of the column now. Tevran sidled closer to her. Dinah looked up. The space between the two cliffs was nearly two hundred feet apart. She tried imagining being caught out in the open during one of those battles.
“I noticed. All of you look strong for merchants. I’ve known my fair share of them.” Dinah watched his eyes closely, and as expected, he looked away at the mention of deception. Not much of a liar, this one.
“The hardships of the road have made us strong. Ah, here we are. Head of the column.” He gave Dinah a pat on the arm, as though he were leaving, but he stayed at her side. Tevran was going to be a problem.
The caravan had stopped at a bridge, just as Tevran had predicted. Ahead of Dinah were five men, all heavily muscled, dressed in warm trader’s clothes. Wide, circular hats on their heads.
Sir Uva Testaforte was there, the leader of the expedition, seemingly conversing with his feet. He looked like an imperial, his hair dark and well-groomed. It rolled like fields of grain to the nape of his neck. He was nearly a head taller than her. She thought would have been a handsome man if it weren’t for his nose, which was bulbous and squat, ruining the rest of the appearance. There was something about his bearing that frightened her, something in the way he moved. A lion in a hat might look funny, but it was still a lion.
Uva was a famous man, one Dinah had seen some years ago in a tournament. A renowned jouster, he had killed the leader of the Almeline Revolt. Loyal retainer of Lord Thevandris, he was rich and powerful. The choice for him to lead the caravan was a strange one given his fame. Perhaps Lord Thevandris felt that no one could complete his task, whatever it was, better than his favorite pet. Still, the man was wearing the famous boar broach of his sigil while supposedly disguised, and he went by the name Uva, not a false one.
Beside Uva was his favorite. Dinah wasn’t sure of his name, but she was certain it wasn’t John as he introduced himself. For one thing, it had taken him nearly a full minute of stumbling to reach that name. If Uva was a hammer, then this man was an axe. His face was even shaped like one, angular and sharp. Sometimes, on the long and boring ride to the High Plain, she imagined his nose on Uva’s face. That would have been a handsome man. John was a dark man, not in color but in bearing. Dinah got the impression that this John was one of those few men with a violent temperament who had the good fortune of being born a knight. The more violent he was, the more he would be praised for his deeds. His hair untamed and greasy. She did her best to avoid him.
The third leader of this disguised military expedition was a thin man. He was pale and his eyes were green. A northman, rare in the empire proper, but common on the fringes. Much like Dinah’s dark Tesmokan skin, but from the other end of the empire. Dinah hadn’t talked to him in the week she had joined the caravan, and she was glad for it. She could tell at a glance that he was a weasel. His name was unknown to her.
The other two men were not worth much thought. They were soldiers, not the leaders of this merry band. Dinah could see their battle scars. Both kept swords at their sides.
As Dinah surveyed the scene, a great pale hand reached up from under the bridge. It was wet and warty. Slowly, the spindly form of an ogre pulled itself up. Dinah had seen ogres across the empire, and this one was young. It had little fat to it and was short, only around fourteen feet tall. Like all ogres, this one was naked. Warts, moles, and odd patches of hair covered his body. Loose skin hung in a pouch under his throat. Dinah thought she could count all the ogre’s bones. His dull eyes swept over the caravan.
“I am Shok,” the ogre said slowly in a deep voice. Ogres were slow people. Dinah had yet to meet one that didn’t struggle with language. Perhaps that’s what happened when a people spent their lives living in rivers and not going to school. “Five Lylics to cross my bridge. Do not give me any with Martnius’s face.”
Smart ogre, then. Emperor Martnius had lowered the gold content of the Lylics. Shok wanted his money’s worth.
“Five per person?” Uva asked, a tinge of outrage in his voice. That was an exorbitant amount.
“No, five for group.”
“All of us?” Uva’s tone had changed from outrage to disbelief. Five Lylics for two hundred men and wagons was practically free.
Shok shook his head back and forth. The pouch of skin under his neck inflated and he stomped his feet rhythmically. Both men with swords grabbed the hilts as Shok made strange sounds. “Uuuub. Uuuuub. Uuuub. Brrrrrrgrum. Yes. For all.”
Uva reached into his money back and pulled out five coins, inspecting their faces to be sure he didn’t hand over any offending coins. Shok took all five, then picked out one and put it in his mouth. Great broken molars chewed over the gold. Everyone watched, curious for the verdict. Shok was satisfied. After a moment he swallowed and smiled, revealing a mouth of many broken teeth. This ogre might not live all that long.
“You may pass,” Shok said, and then clambered down under his bridge without another word. Dinah heard a splash come from the river below.
“Ogres eat gold?” Dinah asked aloud.
Uva turned and saw her. He gave her what she supposed he thought was a flattering smile. “Ah, Desmara, didn’t see you there.” Uva’s voice was not a soothing one. He gave a signal with his hand and his men returned to the wagons. “Yes, I believe they do. I don’t quite understand it myself. I’ve heard tell that people pan for gold down stream of ogre bridges. It’s a grubby way to get gold, for sure. Some just don’t have the breeding for decent work.”
“How could that little gold sustain a creature so large?”
Uva shrugged. “I don’t know, but I imagine that they eat other things, or they are sustained by treasure like dragons. Either way, it’s not that important. We pay them to use their bridges and they keep them standing.”
Dinah shook her head. “What a strange people.”
Uva laughed. “Not so near the bridge, please. It’s best to talk of these things out of earshot. You haven’t seen much of the world, have you Desmara?”
“If my husband stayed healthy, I still wouldn’t have.” Tevran, standing at her side, looked distinctly put-out.
“You,” Uva snapped at Tevran. “Go drive Desmara’s cart, she will walk alongside me to the next bridge.”
Dinah flushed. She had been taught to do so on command. “No, it’s alright. I can’t have someone driving my cart on the last day. A Wagoner has her pride.”
“As do I,” Uva said. “You have dutifully fulfilled the contract your husband was unable to. We have been fed by you since we left more settled lands. All of us are grateful. I insist you walk alongside me, at least for a short while.” There was a force in his words that sounded like a battlefield command. Uva was a man without any softness.
Dinah hid her disdain behind her flushed cheeks. After so many years in the Temple, she had perfect control of her features. When she spoke, she sounded suitably awed. “If you insist. Thank you Tevran for minding my cart.”
She watched a crestfallen Tevran walk down the line. Dinah didn’t care for his feelings. In a day, he would probably be trying to kill her. All is fair in love and war, after all. Tomorrow, Tevran would realize that what he thought was the former was the latter.
Uva got the caravan moving, then mounted his horse. Dinah looked around for a horse to ride along side, but none was forthcoming. Uva’s words played through her mind again. That bastard meant what he said, Dinah realized. She was going to walk alongside him.
Gallantry was dead.
Doing his best to look dashing, Uva spurred his horse over the bridge. The ogre below didn’t make a peep. Dinah crossed just ahead of the first wagon. She then caught up to Uva, who was setting a slow pace as though this dismal valley were a parade ground. Even in the wilds, men found time for useless pomp.
Dinah was grateful at least for the pace he set. Any faster and she would struggle to keep up in her skirts and boots. The costume was burdensome, but no one questioned it. Looking the part was the first trick. She had an apron tied to her, suitably stained with blood, her belt of pouches overflowing with various herbs. No one looked twice at her belt.
“A strange and savage land we are in now,” Uva said.
“Is Last Hearth savage?”
Uva chuckled and ran a hand across his mustache. “No, no. There at least we will find some comforts of home. Meat and grain. Songs such as weary traders can sing. A last bastion of civilization before the mountains.”
Dinah gave a girlish laugh which echoed emptily off the valley walls. “You seem to be in good spirits, good merchant. Have you been there before?”
Uva glanced at her sideways. “Never, but I have heard of the riches this route can provide. There is great wealth on the High Plain of Urhsas.”
“That I doubt. You must be clever,” Dinah said playfully. Uva seemed to enjoy sycophants, so she played the part.
“It may not look like much, but this is a wide land which produces many magical components. Poorly developed, but that will be changing.”
Changing? That was new. Dinah had to be careful with it. “Magic comes from this place?”
Uva puffed himself up impressively. “Oh aye. Plants and animals and magical stones, they all can be found here, though for centuries the wizards used other lands because of how difficult it is to get anything out of Urhsas.”
“Is it dangerous?” Dinah looked up at the imposing walls of the valley. She thought she saw something moving high up there, near the caves.
“Terribly, especially for the empire. Great orc hordes roam these lands. The goblins are always fighting one another. All sorts of creatures. This land has been savage too long. That’s why Last Hearth was built, to give us some control.”
Dinah fell silent for a moment. There was something there. It sounded like these knights were the vanguard to some larger force, aimed at conquest. But the High Plains were massive. That it had no single master only meant there was no person to defeat. Lord Thevandris was trying to gain land or favor, but there could be someone else involved. Dinah had a hard time imagining he would be so brazen as to launch the attack on his own. An unsanctioned military action was asking to get exiled by the emperor. Whatever was happening here was worse than the Temple had suspected.
She looked back to Uva and found him watching her closely. Something like suspicion danced across his eyes. Dinah gave him a queasy smile. “I don’t like the thought of heading into orc country.”
Uva looked up at the cliffs. “You have nothing to worry about. Last Hearth is right on the edge of the plain. We won’t be going into their country. At least, you won’t be. Once we reach Last Hearth your contract will be fulfilled and you can return to your…husband.”
His tone. A wave of panic raced through Dinah, only to be bottled up and stored in a corner of her mind. Panic got people killed. Dinah had no intention of being killed. Dinah had a mission, and she had never failed before. This oaf would not beat her.
“Do you mind if we change the subject from murderous hordes?” she asked in a faltering voice. She began wringing her hands, which went some way into defusing the panic.
Uva waved his hand graciously.
“What goods have you brought to the High Plain?” she asked.
“Weapons.”
Dinah stopped in her steps. Yes. This was an invasion, or the start to one. How had the Temple missed this? A somewhat inelegant excuse for their arms, but they were here. This thin vanguard would be strong on a wide plain. Dinah didn’t know how the people of the plain fought, but they would have a hard time against armored knights.
“What is it, good butcher?” Uva asked from up ahead. He didn’t turn his head to ask.
Dinah cast around for a reason. “You’re…delivering weapons to the dangerous orc hordes?” She smoothed her butcher’s apron and hurried to catch up. The road was not well maintained, the largest stones being removed and filled in, but the path was still bumpy. It was difficult to keep up. Dinah felt her annoyance spiking, though she acted dismayed to Uva.
“Yes,” he said with a casual air, not noticing Dinah struggling along beside him. “Do you have an objection?”
“You’re making them more dangerous. How do you plan to get your goods out of here when a powerful host of orcs has your weapons?” Plans. Control and plans. That’s who this man was. Dinah grew comfortable now she knew what she was dealing with.
Uva laughed. “And who do you think they will use their weapons on? One another, of course. They couldn’t hurt the empire in the state they’re in, but each other, sure. They’ll weaken one another, and won’t pay attention to us merchants.”
Dinah suppressed a shiver. He was a villain alright, though an honest sort. She lowered her head and followed him. Dinah was made to march beside him for some hours. The valley had not grown any more welcoming the further they went. On her left the cliff wall was twenty feet from her, and the river ten to the right. Grass and bushes grew strong in the valley, sometimes overgrowing the road. Somewhere high above the sun was trying to break through the clouds, but it didn’t have the strength to, not today. What a miserable place.
Her Temple had long prepared her for such conversations. The key was to subtly redirect the talk away from her and onto the other person. Most people loved talking about themselves because they were the only thing they really knew. Their interests, what they thought of the world, their feats of strength. That last one was particularly useful with soldiers.
Dinah managed to carry the conversation all the way to the next bridge. Time and again Uva all but revealed that he was a knight. His words betrayed him with every sentence.
Standing beside Uva, she did get an excellent view of the second bridge, and with it, the second ogre. She couldn’t suppress her smile when Uva called it out and it rose. A much larger hand reached up from under the bridge. At a guess it was nearly twice the size of the first. Then an arm, the other, a torso, and the head of the creature. The river was deep and swift, and had cut a gully out of the valley so that it was about ten feet to the water. The ogre stood nearly double the height of the first and was embarrassingly male. Where the other one had been long and thin, this ogre was nearly as wide as he was tall, his body built from equal parts muscle and fat. Water dripped from his skin as he watched them with eyes large as plates. His breath was so powerful that it made the air smell like rotten fish.
His lungs must be larger than a blacksmith’s bellows, Dinah thought. As impressive as the ogre’s size was, the stench of his breath was simply stunning. Dinah began timing her breaths opposite his so the air was a little clearer. Even so, her eyes watering.
“Mighty ogre. We are merchants traveling to the High Plain of Urhsas. We seek to cross your bridge. What is your toll?” Uva said this with a grand air, puffing up his chest. His horse was struggling before the great ogre, impatiently stamping its hooves and turning to get away. Uva struggled with the reins as he delivered his message.
The ogre didn’t answer immediately, but began rocking back and forth on his feet. Dinah felt as his irregular steps shook the ground. The great sack of skin beneath his throat inflated like a frog. “Gggrrruuub. Ouub. Uuuub. Shflugugugug.”
Dinah hadn’t noticed it on the smaller ogre, but the ears on this one were remarkable. They lay flat against the skull unless the ogre wanted otherwise. Then they came off and flapped like fans, being large and leaflike. When this ogre brought both his ears out, Dinah had to stop herself from laughing. He looked so surprised.
“I am Mon-Man. You can cross my bridge if you pay my toll. Ouuuugh.”
Annoyance flashed across Uva’s face. “Yes. How much is it?”
“Brrrrgum. One Lylic per wagon.”
Dinah winced. That was a steep increase in price. Uva clearly thought so. His face flushed red and his hand went for a sword that wasn’t there. “Good ogre, that is a high price.”
That was the wrong thing to say. A change came over the ogre at once. It lifted itself out of the gully and sat down on the bridge itself. Dinah shrank, expecting the bridge to collapse beneath the weight of such a large creature, but not a stone moved as the rolls of fat blocked the bridge entire, his feet pointed out towards them. The ogre made more strange sounds, shaking his head back and forth.
“Kill me! Kill Mon-Man,” the ogre said, “and you will never reach the plain. Pay me or kill me, but dead you will not make a coin.”
Dinah could see Uva was considering it. His men were coming up, armed or not. His furrowed brow gave his face a darkness which couldn’t be lifted. Dinah was certain he was going to order the attack. She doubted they would win, not on a bridge against an ogre. They weren’t in their armor.
“Good ogre. Your price is your price.” Uva reached his hand into his pouch and drew out a handful of gold. He counted out thirty and held it up.
The ogre reached out one hand and took the gold from Uva. Mon-Man didn’t move until he placed one in his mouth and swallowed it. Satisfied, Mon-Man stood and stepped into the gully, then Dinah heard a splash. Uva waved his hand.
Driven by curiosity, Dinah walked to the bridge and looked over it. Ten feet below her she could see the river running swift, as well as the large blubbery body of Mon-Man mostly submerged. The river had broken its banks and ran through the gulley before returning to its course. Mon-Man regarded her disinterestedly.
“Incredible,” she whispered to herself.
Then she jumped back. The wagons approached without regard. This bridge was a much tighter fit than the previous. Dinah hurried to the other side, where Uva was watching.
“So who do you work for?” Uva asked without looking at her. “The alchemists seeking to swipe some crops? The wizards?”
Raw fear plunged through Dinah’s heart, but not a ripple of it crossed her face. How could he have known? “I’m afraid I don’t understand your question, sir.” Sir. That was a stupid mistake. She stopped herself from wincing.
Uva noticed, raising an eyebrow. “Sir?”
Dinah scrambled to cover herself. “You are a master merchant. Yes? And I am a wagoner.” She wasn’t afraid of being caught as a liar, her face was too practiced for that. She was worried that her face was too sincere.
Uva watched her closely, then turned his attention to the wagons, his face set in a hard look. When the third passed him, he looked it over and started his horse. He headed back to the front of the caravan.
Uva’s looked like a little home, and was painted as such. It stood out as was one of the few she hadn’t seen the interior of.
That was it. Whatever was going on here had to be stopped. She was the only one who could stop it. For evidence there was only one place to go. Uva’s wagon.
Dinah had enough of him anyway. She said she was going to her wagon to prepare a meal, which Uva waved away. As she waited for her wagon to cross the bridge, Dinah thought on everything Uva had told her and came to the only conclusion. This was a vanguard. That much was certain. However, she needed proof.
If she returned to the Temple with her suspicions, they would be listened to. The trouble was, the imperial court wouldn’t listen without evidence. Hearsay didn’t count. If she could get something, then she would be back down the valley tomorrow. Back in the empire, she would disappear. They would never find her. But only if she had some proof. Dinah took a deep breath as her wagon came into view.
She muttered pleasantries to Tevran as her last place wagon crossed the bridge, who gave her a sullen smile as she asked him to drive the wagon while she made a stew. Inside, Dinah got to work. She was a passable cook, a side effect of spending sixteen years learning how to poison people. The Temple had taught her how to make a meal, in case she had to kill a noble. Soldiers didn’t expect much from their meals, so her cooking was good enough for them.
Dinah only had one poison on her, and not enough to kill everyone. It was a rare poison, to be used on one person. As she made the stew, the poison rested inside the dagger hidden among the herbs on her belt.
Dinah was just about finished with the meal when the wagon stopped abruptly. Some stew sloshed out of the large pot. Dinah didn’t bother cleaning it up. She bolted out the door. They can’t have been at the last bridge, right? It didn’t take that long to make a stew, though she had no idea how far the next bridge was from the last.
Dinah found the men running to the head of the column. Trouble seemed to be in the air. At a guess, Uva had insulted the third ogre. She started running, quickly catching up to Tevran
“What’s the trouble?” she asked. Dinah could run a mile, but not in skirts. She clomped after him. Dinah made sure that Tevran heard her labored breaths.
Tevran didn’t respond, instead pointing upwards at the eastern cliffs. Goblins. They were peering out of their caves, sometimes preening for the others, walking along the edge and hurling insults at the caravan. There was nearly a hundred of them, and they were armed. The cliffs were lower, too, the threat of their bows more pronounced.
Dinah could see where the men were gathering, a hundred paces from her wagon. Her damned skirts were in the way and she was tired from walking with Uva all day. The men had bows and swords in hand. As they went to the front, a single wagon was moving back. It passed her by as it moved down. The driver was the northman.
Uva’s wagon.
Dinah muttered a quick prayer and stopped in her tracks. “I’m not about to fight goblins.”
Tevran spun around as he ran. “Go back to your wagon. We will protect you.”
Dinah made a show of going, turning to stalk Uva’s wagon. It stopped halfway down the caravan. She cursed under her breath. She moved to the other side of the wagon line until she was level with her target.
The Northman was in the driver’s seat. Dinah’s hand went into her pouch and pulled out the short, needle-like danger. The knife was as long as her pointer finger, the handle fit snugly in her palm. A small reservoir of poison, enough for one man, was in the handle. Dinah didn’t know how it worked, but it remained there until stabbed into someone.
Taking a deep breath, Dinah walked briskly to the back of the wagon. The Northman turned to watch the men up ahead. The caravan wagons were tall and wide, their walls wooden and the roofs canvas. They had doors front and back. There was enough space in them for four men to sleep, but most were used for cargo. The Northman wouldn’t see her.
She tried the door. Locked. Dinah smiled. From her pouch she pulled out a lockpick. As she worked the lock, she crouched to avoid being seen from the road. The lock yielded without much work. Silently, Dinah opened the door. She had been expecting sleeping quarters. What she found was far worse.
Two narrow benches ran the length of the wagon, mattresses overflowed them. That wasn’t the bad news. The bad news was between them. An illuminated sigil burned in the air at the front of the wagon, set against nothing. A sinister orange glow filled the room. Standing in the middle of the wagon, his feet secured to the floor that he would not be jostled, his arms raised up above his head and his back to her, stood a Priest of the Red. In his left was a bundle of jagaweed, the tips of the stalks just starting to smoke. In his right between the thumb and forefinger a small ruby, his other fingers held a letter before his eyes. His words a magical language she didn’t know, his voice powerful but not carrying outside the wagon.
Dinah rushed forward and stabbed the man in his side, placing a hand over his mouth. He groaned. The sigil fizzled and vanished in the air as she did, cutting the light from the room save for a small window at the back. He struggled in her arms, but Dinah gripped him like a vice.
“That is the Last Truth,” she hissed. “No matter what you do, or where you go, it will kill you in twenty days. It is a painful death. The nearest Temple of Many Truths is twenty-five days from here. They have the antidote.”
Deftly, she pulled the knife from his side and slid it back into her belt. The burning perfume of the jagaweed rolled through the air heavily. She blinked. Her mind stumbled. Dinah took breath sparingly. With her now free hand, Dinah took both the ruby and the letter from him and stashed them hastily in her belt. When they were secured, she turned her attention back to him.
“You can make it, maybe, if you are quick. However, eighteen days walk from here there is a Priest of Many Truths waiting in a border town. I will tell you which tonight, only if you keep my identity secret. If I die, you die a most awful death. Stay in here. Say that the ritual was complete. Whatever you need to. I will give you the location and the password to the antidote tonight, in the town. Do you understand?”
The priest nodded. As soon as he did, Dinah let him go and walked out of the wagon, closing the door as silently as she could. She looked around and saw no one around. She could have killed the priest, but he was another piece of evidence. The Temple would imprison the priest after giving him the antidote. Her lockpicks came out again and she locked the door behind her. Taking a deep breath, she walked briskly down the line of wagons. There, she looked back. The Northman was still in his seat, watching the cliffs.
Dinah looked up. The goblins were watching, but not saying anything. A fight seemed to have been avoided. Not a lot of time left, then. Dinah made a little show of worriedly looking up at the cliffs and pacing for the northman, then retreated back to her wagon. The dagger, ruby, and letter all went into a secret compartment. A false cupboard, Dinah hoped it would pass scrutiny, but felt anyone who looked long enough would see.
She calmed herself, taking deep breaths as she had been trained to do, and returned to her stew. After a little work, it was ready. All it needed was to be placed on a fire. She stifled a grin as she cleaned her hands on her apron. She had evidence, three pieces. Now all she needed was to escape.
She should have disguised her voice. But then, she was the only woman on this venture, and the priest saw her hands. Even in the dim wagon it would be hard for the man not to notice that she was a woman. Nervous, Dinah retrieved her dagger and placed it in her belt.
Deep breaths. Her heart still beat quickly. It felt good to have a dagger in her belt, but really, she was a poisoner and an assassin, not a fighter. Any one of the poorly disguised warriors would kill her in a fair fight. That was a simple fact. Her dagger was only a few inches long. They had swords.
Her wagon rocked. Someone was out front. Dinah smoothed her apron. It was nothing. It would be nothing. She opened the front door and stepped up to the driving bench. Tevran sat there, a sword across his lap, reins in his hands.
“What happened?” Dinah asked as she sat down beside him.
He looked nervous, his eyes darting to the cliffs and then to her. He was sweating. “Goblins rolled a boulder onto the road. From the cliff straight down here. Insane. Nearly killed Uva.”
“An ambush?”
“As far as we can tell, they just wanted someone to mock. Kept insulting us as we moved it out of the road.”
Dinah relaxed as the caravan started moving. Tevran’s description didn’t seem so bad. In the moment it must have been tense, but really, not so bad after all. She settled into the bench, looping her arm around his. Tevran tensed.
“Good merchant, I wanted to thank you for all the help you have given me. You have made me feel welcome and safe this last week. I will make sure my husband commends you to the guild. You deserve to be on more lucrative routes.”
Tevran placed his right hand on his heart, the military salute, before changing it quickly. Lord Thevandris had not cooked up a cunning plot, but a brazen one. It was simply their misfortune that the Temple suspected them. Dinah passed the time to the third bridge, feigning worry of the goblins. It was fifty feet to the top now, they were getting close.
Uva ordered them to ride hard, so Dinah’s meal was not eaten. No loss for anyone there. Late in the afternoon the clouds began to break. The sunlight was not full, but the effect on the valley was remarkable. A grey, somber place was transformed into a valley full of color. The river shone white and its music became more beautiful. Songbirds darted from bush to bush. The stones turned from dull grey to a vibrant color that seemed almost white at the right angle. Over it all, the rushing river sang its joyful tune, and a voice in the distance hummed a low tune that harmonized with it. That voice grew louder and louder until Dinah saw the third bridge. The caravans were rolling over it. Uva had paid the toll for the third bridge. And Dinah saw why.
There was no fighting this ogre. Her head was as large as a wagon. Dinah guessed this one stood at about thirty-five feet, nearly as wide. Heavy set and covered in warts and loose skin, she was the first ogre Dinah had seen to wear an accessory. Large bracelets made of dock rope and studded with the skulls of oxen, a necklace with a pendant made of a boulder which had been drilled through, and a dozen circlets of fresh, withering, and dead flowers on her head. Her skin was pale like the others but had a greenish tint in the light. She was humming a tune that matched the river, was the river, the sack beneath her throat inflating and rumbling as she did.
Dinah leapt from the wagon and ran to the river as Tevran shouted after her. She had to. This was the most extra-ordinary person Dinah had ever seen. The enormous ogre regarded her through smallish purple eyes. They were cloudy, but still had life in them.
“Excuse me,” Dinah called up to the ogre. “I must know your name.”
“Errrrrrum. I am Madam Tauch, Mistress of Highbridge and soothsayer. Do you wish to know your fortune?”
“Err…” Dinah said, unsure of what to say. She had never thought such things were possible. “Perhaps. I just wanted to say that you are beautiful. Never have I met such an intriguing person. I am delighted to meet you.” She bowed low.
When Dinah recovered, she found Madam Tauch looking at her eye to eye, having lowered herself. Tevran and the wagon were approaching the bridge. Dinah didn’t have much time. Dinah had been right, the ogre’s eyes burned with life. It was hard to match it, but Dinah did.
“Humans don’t show humility on the plains. You are rare. For your words I give your future freely.” Her pupils grew larger and she sniffed the air. Dinah stumbled as the ogre took in so much air. Madam Tauch grumbled, gurgled, then spoke in a voice barely above a whisper.
“Daughter of No One,
Here you will become someone,
Here you will meet the one who can look at you as I do now,
Here, on my bridge you will face a choice,
You will choose wrong.”
Dinah shuddered before the eye of Madam Tauch. The Temple was not a kind place to be raised. Beneath her calm façade, fear swirled. Madam Tauch gave a satisfied nod and turned away, watching the last wagon cross her bridge.
“Sixty axles, sixty gold,” she rumbled and began to return to the river. “Welcome, Daughter of No One, to the High Plain of Urhsas.” She submerged herself in the river.
Dinah looked down the valley just as the clouds parted. The road back to the empire was alive. She could see flower patches which she had missed in the grey day. Before her was a painting. With a heavy sigh, Dinah turned away and ran to catch up to her wagon.
Michael Frutig 