The Sorcerer's Oath - Books 3-4

Chapter 8

The cold night air cut into their lungs as the little troop of woodfolk and sorcerers threaded their way up the steep mountainside between huge tumbled boulders. Because the woodfolk’s night vision was better, the sorcerers were spread among them so that they could be guided through the more difficult passages. As they rose higher, the valley floor spread out below them in a black carpet, dotted with warm golden lights pinpointing the location of the various farmsteads. Away in the distance, part of the horizon glowed from the strength of hundreds of lamps in Montraya.

At the rear of the line, Autumn Leaves and Running Feet kept an eye on Captain Harkell in front of them. After they had seen him stumble for the second time, Running Feet pulled up alongside him and realised that the soldier was gasping for breath as they climbed. The woodman relayed this information forward and a halt was called. As Tarkyn appeared from further up the line, a look of apprehension crossed the soldier’s face and he made every attempt to straighten up and present a strong front. But the darkness did not hide his labouring breath as he fought to regain his strength.

“Here,” said Autumn Leaves, handing him a cup of water.

The captain accepted the cup with a hand that shook so much, some of the water spilled. He eyed Tarkyn, waiting for a derisory remark.

“Harkell, I presume you are not usually so unfit.”

“No, my lord.” Harkell gave slight bow, and took another couple of breaths. “I apologise for holding you all up.”

“No. It is we who should apologise for force-marching you when you are still not fully recovered. Anyway, the children could do with a break.” He considered the soldier for a minute. “Would you agree to me giving you a little more esse? I think that will help to shore up your reserves of energy.”

esse“Of course, Your Highness. If that is your will.”

Tarkyn shook his head, “No, Harkell, that is my offer. You may accept or not as you choose.”

“I’d accept, if I were you,” said Autumn Leaves. “We still have a long way to go.”

“But what about you, Your Highness? Will it not weaken you?”

“Don’t worry about me. I replenished my power after healing you before and there are plenty of trees around. But a small boost to you will not tax me, anyway.”

“I’m not sure what trees have to do with anything, but thank you, I will accept your offer.”

Tarkyn placed his hand on the man’s shoulder and sent a wave of strength coursing through him. When he withdrew his hand, the prince looked thoughtful as Harkell gave a slight bow and thanked him.

“What are you leaving behind you, Harkell?” asked Tarkyn slowly. “Some of your physical distress is coming from a reluctance to move away from that valley below us.”

Harkell took a deep breath, “I am leaving behind my wife and two small children, Your Highness.”

“Oh no! Blast it!” exclaimed Tarkyn. “After all this, I still haven’t learnt to consider people beyond their relationship with me.”

“Yes, you have,” said Autumn Leaves, giving the young prince a pat on the shoulder. “It just takes you a while to think of it sometimes.”

Harkell watched this over-familiarity with interest but thought it would be a long time before he himself could trust this prince enough to similarly push the boundaries. He realised Tarkyn was speaking to him.

“I am sorry, Harkell. Did you realise you would be leaving the area when you made your pledge to me?”

Harkell shook his head, “No, Your Highness. But Danton made it clear that I must decide regardless of where it would lead me or what type of life it committed me to.” He gave a sad smile, “I did not think serving a fugitive prince would lead me back into the arms of my family, no matter how much I might wish for it. But now that I have fallen from Prince Jarand’s grace, nothing would.”

“We can’t leave them believing that you have died, though,” said Tarkyn decisively. “At the very least we must get word to them that you are safe. Then, in time, we will consider how to reunite you.” He smiled at the nearby woodfolk, “Of course, I have no idea how we can achieve any of this but it will give us something to think about as we climb, won’t it?”

With that, he gave Harkell a final pat on the shoulder and climbed his way between the resting woodfolk nearer to the front of the file. Unconsciously, Harkell let out a sigh of released tension as Tarkyn disappeared into the darkness ahead.

“I know what you mean,” said Running Feet, as though he had spoken. “The first time I met Tarkyn, he shot me up into the air with his magic and threatened to drop me.”

“Don’t be unfair, Running Feet,” protested Autumn Leaves. “You know he had just discovered he couldn’t leave the forest and was scared and angry. He hasn’t done anything like it since. And now I think about it, Tree Wind had just pinned him down with an arrow to his throat and tried to use mind control on him. So it was not surprising that he was a bit edgy.”

Harkell looked from one woodman to the other, “Things have not always been so harmonious between you then?”

“Oooh no,” replied Autumn Leaves. “We woodfolk have never had leaders, never sworn allegiance to the king or anyone, until we were forced to by Markazon, twelve years ago. Even after that, we carried on as before until Tarkyn turned up two months ago.”

Harkell raised his eyebrows, “Well, I suppose I don’t know how you all behaved before he arrived, but I must say that your culture seems to be the prevailing one. He has clearly not imposed the expectations of our culture on you all.”

“Except that we must ‘serve, honour and protect’ him and we have never done that for any man or woman in our entire history,” said Autumn Leaves. “It is totally alien to us.”

“Not even for a forest guardian,” added Running Feet. “Not officially anyway. In reality, I suppose people would have done all that for a forest guardian, but it was their choice.”

“We have just spun off onto some strange trajectory here. What is a forest guardian?” asked Harkell.

“In our myths, a guardian of the forest is someone with extraordinary powers who appears among us in times of strife to guide us through whatever ills beset us. Their appearances are very rare. Once every four or five hundred years.”

Harkell took a sip of water and frowned as he tried to understand, “And you wouldn’t even swear your allegiance willingly to someone like that?”

“Tarkyn is someone like that,” said Autumn Leaves shortly.

“Hmm,” Harkell’s gaze travelled between the two woodmen as he slowly sipped his water.

After a couple of minutes, when Harkell said nothing further, Running Feet asked, a little belligerently, “What do you mean, ‘Hmmm’?”

Harkell gave an apologetic smile, “I was wondering whether you thought the prince had extraordinary powers simply because he is a powerful sorcerer and you people are not sorcerers. Then I remembered you have Danton and Stormaway with you who are also powerful sorcerers. So I wondered whether you considered them to be forest guardians as well. On balance, I thought probably not, because it sounds like the appearance of this forest guardian of yours is a very unusual occurrence.” His smile broadened, “And then, having come that far, I was wondering what extraordinary powers were possessed by the prince that went beyond normal expectation…but I had decided not to ask because at this stage, you may not yet trust me enough to tell me.”

“You are very phlegmatic about the possibility of not being trusted,” commented Autumn Leaves, “Danton was very unhappy about it when he first arrived.”

Harkell noted that his unasked question had been avoided, “If Danton grew up with the prince, he would have expected to be trusted. I, on the other hand, have met none of you before and have clearly just changed alliances. So, it would be foolhardy to trust me at this stage.” Seeing movement further up the line, he drank down the rest of his water, stood up and handed his cup to Autumn Leaves with a nod of thanks, before adding, “Particularly if you yourselves have little experience of the value of oaths of allegiance.”

Autumn Leaves’ eyes narrowed, “We know exactly how much value to place on an oath and it is our own honour that binds us to Tarkyn. The question is more how much faith we should place in the honour of sorcerers.”

“I see,” said Harkell slowly. Without another word, he hunched himself deeper into his cloak and turned to follow the rest of the woodfolk up the mountainside.