“Who are you?” Geran challenged. “What are you doing here?”
The sorcerer’s nostrils flared. “Who I am is no business but my own. As for what I’m doing here, well, I’m looking for something. But if this barrow’s empty, then it would seem I am in the wrong place. I will trouble you no more.” With an eye over his shoulder, he turned away and started back down the thready trail.
“Not so fast!” Kara called after him. She hurried after him. “In the name of the harmach, stand where you are! I will have some answers from you!”
The sorcerer glanced back in irritation. “I think not,” he said, and he struck his staff to the ground. “Arkhu zanastar!” he cried, and then he leaped up into the air. His scarlet coat rippled behind him as he soared off into the sky.
Kara swore and dashed over to where Dancer neighed and pranced nervously, reaching for the bow cased by the saddle. But by the time she retrieved the weapon, the horned sorcerer was only a distant speck in the sky, speeding away over the moorland until he topped a low rise and vanished from view. “Damn,” she snarled. “If that… person… was not involved in this somehow, then I’m an orc. What was he, anyway? Some manner of devil?”
Hamil shook his head. “No, a tiefling. They come from the distant east. They’ve got some infernal blood in their veins, but they’re not really devils.”
“On the other hand, that fellow was clearly a sorcerer of no small skill,” Geran added. “I think you ought to be glad that you didn’t have your bow closer to hand. If you’d shot at him, he might have taken offense.”
“I don’t care who or what he is, I won’t stand by and let him spite the harmach’s laws,” Kara retorted. She returned her bow to its case, still looking after the vanished sorcerer. Her brilliant eyes glowed with anger, and she turned away to collect herself. After a moment she shook herself and looked at Geran. “We should at least take the bodies back to Hulburg for a decent burial. I don’t like the idea of leaving the woman out here for Aesperus, and I intend to ask Darsi Veruna how one of her men ended up dead at the scene of Jarad’s murder. She still hasn’t given me a good answer about the business at Erstenwold’s, anyway.”
“We might as well get started then, since the afternoon is getting on,” Geran answered. They’d have to wrap the bodies well to keep the horses calm, double up on one of the mounts, and they wouldn’t make very good speed returning to town. “I’d just as soon not be out on the moors after dark.”
“What’s our next move, then?” Hamil asked Geran.
“I’m not sure,” he admitted. “But I think I’ll follow Mirya’s advice and try to figure out why Veruna’s mercenaries are suddenly interested in barrows.”
EIGHT
14 Ches, the Year of the Ageless One
Sometime in the cold hours before dawn, snow began to fall around Hulburg. When Geran awoke and looked out his window, the higher hilltops were covered with a dusting of white, and fat, wet flakes were sticking along the castle’s turrets and rooftops. He performed his morning exercises in a fitful flurry that stopped and started several times as he practiced his forms. Spring snow was not at all unusual for the northern shores of the Moonsea, but it rarely lasted long.
The cold air spurred him fully awake and chased the last dregs of sleepiness from his mind. It had been a long ride back to Hulburg from the barrow the previous evening and a longer night of explanations, as Kara insisted on setting down their recollections of the discovery inside the mound before allowing Geran and Hamil to retire for the evening. She’d also been careful to set down their descriptions of the sinister sorcerer they’d encountered too. Geran had no idea if anything would come of either account. He sincerely doubted that anyone at House Veruna would admit that the dead man was in the barrow on company business, and as for the sorcerer, he doubted whether the Shieldsworn could arrest and hold such a creature against his will. It seemed unlikely that he had anything to do with Jarad’s murder or the deaths of the Veruna armsman and the townswoman, simply because Geran couldn’t imagine why the fellow would return to the scene or ask them whether they’d found a book. He finally gave up with a shrug. Strange folk roamed the Highfells at times; either they’d see him again, or they wouldn’t, and there was little point looking for him.
Geran bathed quickly, dressed himself, and headed down to find himself some breakfast in the family great room, turning events over in his mind. By the time he’d finished his breakfast-and games of dragon’s-teeth with the younger Hulmasters-Geran had decided on his next course of action. He clapped Hamil on the shoulder and said, “I think I’d like to seek gainful employment for the day. If you’re done with allowing Kirr to instruct you in grand strategy, why don’t you come with me?”
“Gainful employment?” Hamil raised an eyebrow. “Very well, then.”
“But I was winning, Geran!” Kirr groaned.
“Nonsense!” Hamil replied. “You were but one tile away from falling into my insidious trap. You’ll see when we resume this contest.”
The halfling bowed to his diminutive opponent and followed Geran down through a servant’s stair into the depths of the castle kitchens. In a few moments the two travelers came to the laundry room, where a couple of servant girls worked at a big tub of warm water, washing the castle’s linens.
“Oh, so it’s the wash, then,” the halfling said glumly. “All right, I suppose I have to earn my room and board somehow.”
“Some honest work would do you good,” Geran answered him. He spoke briefly to the young women working at the tubs, and they directed him to a large storeroom nearby. Battered old trunks packed with old clothing filled the room. Geran removed his sword belt and began to rummage through the trunks. The swordmage found a threadbare old tunic and a nondescript cloak of plain gray and held them up for a look.
“Ah, this should do,” he said.
“For mucking out the stables?” asked the halfling.
“Not a bad idea, but that’s not what I had in mind. I was thinking that we might look for some work as teamsters, and House Veruna might be a good place to look. I’d rather not be recognized. Here, try these.”
Geran and Hamil soon enough patched together mismatched working garb to reasonably disguise themselves as common laborers. They stopped by the Shieldsworn armory, and Geran replaced his elven blade with a plain short sword of the sort that a poor driver might carry for defense against bandits; Hamil found a well-worn crossbow. Then they visited the stables and harnessed a simple buckboard wagon and a pair of mules and drove down from Griffonwatch into town, joining the stream of cart traffic and wagons rumbling along the Vale Road in the wet snow.
They stayed east of the river down to the Lower Bridge, crossed over to Bay Street, and drove along the wharves past the tradeyards of various merchant costers-the Double Moon, House Sokol, House Marstel. Then they came to the Veruna compound and drove through its gates into the bustling yards beyond. Like most other trading companies in Hulburg, Veruna owned several storehouses that were enclosed together by a sturdy wall. Barracks, offices, stables, a smithy, and the stone-and-timber houses of Veruna officials clustered together within the Veruna holding, a town within the town.
It seems ordinary enough, Hamil said silently. This could be the Red Sail yard in Tantras. What are we looking for?
The mercenaries, Geran answered. He looked around, sizing up the place. A handful of armsmen in the green-and-white tabards of the House watched over the business in the yard; they seemed bored and disinterested. I expect that most of the Veruna operations here are perfectly legitimate, so I’m not worried about what’s in the storehouses or where it’s going. I’m more interested in the sellswords. Mark them well-I want to find this man Urdinger, and I want to see if any of them are riding off into the Highfells to go poke around in barrows when they don’t think anyone is watching.