HeatMarie

Section II: Beneath the Old Ways

The drip, drip, drip of water seeping from the stone above irritated Caius almost as much as following the Stranger. They had left their horses with one of three small boys at the cave’s entrance, which the thieves had turned into a stable.

Leaving Thorne with the boy felt like neglect. Caius gave him three extra coins and a small bag of sugar-glazed carrots before launching into a series of detailed instructions. Thorne needed fresh water, but not too much otherwise he will get a belly ache. His saddle must be removed, his coat brushed three times a day, and his hooves checked and cleaned. The boy was not to pull too tightly on the reins, stand directly behind him, or let any of the other horses crowd him. Caius followed each instruction with a question to the boy about his experience and then barely gave him a chance to respond. 

Thorne, however, showed no concern about being abandoned. He was already eating an apple from the boy’s hand, paying no attention to Caius at all.

“Look around here, sir. Ain’t no dead horses lying around, is there?” the boy said with the kind of attitude only a thief would dare show royalty.

Kali pressed her lips together, clearly trying not to laugh, and pulled Caius away before he had the opportunity to make a comment they would both regret. They followed the Stranger through a small door and into a narrow passage. Lanterns lined the walls as they walked in silence.

Every drip that struck the ground made Caius want to scream, and when one landed on his head, he muttered a few words that made the Stranger chuckle. There was so much Caius wanted to say to him, but refrained. The same way he refrained from grabbing Kali by the arm and telling her they were going back. They would retrieve their horses and be on their way.

They had all they needed anyway. They didn’t need this man. Without a doubt, they could defeat Darkness alone, without him or the slovenly demon-creature he insisted on calling a horse.

The passage opened to a chamber larger than any room had a right to be beneath the earth.

A long bar had been built against one of the cave’s moss-covered walls, its counter made from the curved hull of some long-dead ship. Barnacles still clung to the wood. Frayed ropes hung from iron hooks above it beside fishing nets, rusted bells, animal teeth, and coins with holes punched through their centers.

Bottles of every shape crowded the shelves behind the bar. Some held familiar shades of amber and red. Others glowed faintly blue or green beneath lantern flames that burned without wicks or oil.

The chamber smelled of saltwater, sweat, musk, and spilled ale. Somewhere beneath the drunken cheers and boisterous conversations, Caius could hear the distant pounding of waves against stone. The thieves must have had another entrance hidden near the coast. One large enough to bring in whatever goods they had no intention of paying the crown for.

It was a perfect place for people like these.

Thieves. Smugglers. Pirates. Misfits and outcasts who had made a home beneath the earth because there was no place for them above it.

It was not a place for Caius.

He knew it the moment he stepped into the chamber. Conversations lowered as he passed. A dice game paused. A woman with a scar running from the corner of her mouth to her chin leaned back in her chair and studied the silver stitching on his coat. Another man noticed the sword at Caius’s side, then the polished leather of his boots.

Even without a crown, they knew he did not belong among them.

Their attention followed him as he followed the Stranger through the crowd. The madman did not appear bothered by it. He moved between the tables as though he had walked the chamber a thousand times, accepting raised cups and crooked smiles from men who looked as though they would rob their own mothers.

Caius glanced back toward the tunnel through which they had entered.

A ring of pale stones had been set into the ground around its mouth. Thin markings had been carved between them, each filled with something that shone like powdered silver. Beyond the circle, the passage was dark. Not the ordinary darkness of a cave, but something thicker. Something that seemed to crawl along the walls.

A man at the nearest table whistled as Kali passed.

Another joined him.

Kali did not look at either of them. She had drawn her hood farther over her face, hiding most of her hair and casting her features in shadow. Her shoulders were stiff, and one hand remained close to the knife at her belt.

It was not the men she watched.

Her attention moved over the walls instead.

Symbols had been carved between the patches of moss. Spirals. Stars. Crescent moons tangled between the roots of trees. Twisting branches that resembled antlers. Some had been cut so deeply into the stone that Caius could have fit a finger inside them.

Kali slowed whenever she found another.

He had seen similar markings in some of the old books he was forced to read. If his memory served him right, the symbols belonged to the old ways of witches. Some type of magical practices passed down long before kings decided which forms of magic were allowed.

Ways the Witch had known before anger and bitterness twisted her into the hag of a Witch she had become.

Kali moved from one symbol to the next, slowly piecing together something Caius could not yet understand.

The men behind them whistled again.

Caius stared them down. One of them grinned and lifted his cup as if offering a toast.

Caius’s hand nearly moved toward his sword.

He stopped himself before his fingers reached the hilt for drawing a blade in a room filled with thieves would be foolish. Even touching it might be taken as an invitation, and there were too many swords in the chamber for Caius to challenge fate so carelessly.

Instead, he stepped closer to Kali, placing himself between her and the nearest table.

“We should not be here,” he whispered.

She said nothing.

Something was wrong. Kali was always watchful, but this was different. She had gone quiet in a way that had nothing to do with the men around them. Her eyes continued moving from one carving to another as though they belonged to a memory she had nearly forgotten.

Then again, how well did he truly know the Witch’s Daughter?

“Kali,” he whispered.

She turned on him so quickly that he stepped back.

“Do not speak my name,” she said. Her voice was barely more than a breath. “Not here.”

Caius swallowed.

There was fear in her expression. Not fear of the men surrounding them or the weapons within their reach.

She was afraid of something else entirely.

Before he could question her, the Stranger slapped one hand against the wooden counter.

“Three ales, my good man.”

The barkeep was a thin, sharp-faced fellow with a patch over one eye and several small bones woven into his beard. He did not ask for payment. He filled three battered cups from a black iron tap and slid them forward.

The Stranger didn’t wait for the foam to settle before he gathered the cups, and carried them toward a small table in the far corner. It stood apart from the mingling crowd beneath a cluster of pale mushrooms growing from a crack in the wall. Their rounded caps cast the tabletop in a faint, sickly glow.

Caius and Kali followed, though every instinct Caius possessed told him to turn around.

“Lovely place, isn’t it?” the Stranger asked.

He turned his chair backward before sitting astride it and resting his arms across the back. Then he inhaled deeply, taking in the smell of unwashed bodies and sour drink as though it were fresh mountain air.

Caius looked at the cup placed before him. Something dark floated near the bottom.

He pushed it away.

Kali did not take a drink, instead she wrapped her hands around the cup and gazed at the walls.

“Who are you?” Caius asked.

He had no interest in drinking with the man or admiring his collection of criminals. Every moment they remained in the cave was another moment wasted. 

The Stranger lifted his cup but did not drink. “You followed me all this way, and only now you think to ask?”

“I asked before.”

“Did you?”

“You did not answer.”

“Then perhaps I was waiting for a better question.”

“Caius, you do not have to be so rude,” Kali said quietly.

He glanced at her, then ignored the warning in her expression and returned his attention to the Stranger.

The man’s eyes were too bright. Too amused. There was something wild in them, but not empty. Caius had mistaken him for a fool when they first met. But even then he had his doubts.

It was far too convenient that the man had appeared among their belongings so soon after Darkness found them. He had searched their bags. He had known where to bring them. He had walked into a den of thieves without so much as glancing over his shoulder.

Caius had met men like him before.

Men who appeared where they had no reason to be.

Men who placed their hands inside other people’s bags.

Men who took what they wanted and smiled as though the theft were a kindness.

Caius looked around the chamber.

He was surrounded by such men now.

Thieves. Smugglers. Miscreants. Men who owed no loyalty to any kingdom and feared no law but their own.

“Dorian!”

The shout carried over the crowd.

Several people moved aside as a large man approached the table. His thick arms looked as though they had been cut from the same stone as the cave walls. His shoulders were nearly as broad as the bar, and a coarse gray-brown beard fell to the center of his chest. Silver rings had been braided into it, and a jagged scar disappeared beneath his collar.

No one challenged him as he passed.

A card player pulled his chair out of the man’s way without being asked. The barkeep filled another cup and handed it to the man without needing an order.

Caius watched the man as he made his way to their table where he seized an empty chair, turned it around, and dropped into it beside Dorian. His drink struck the table hard enough to send ale over the rim.

“I’ll be damned,” he said with an islander’s accent in a deep burly tone. “Looks like ya found the pair of ’em after all.”

Dorian smiled. “Of course I did. I told you I would.”

Caius held the name in his mind. Dorian. At last, the madman had one. More troubling was everything else the bearded man had said. Found them. Not happened upon them. Not rescued them. Dorian had been searching.

Caius’s body went rigid. “How long?”

Dorian tipped his head. “How long what?”

“How long have you been looking for us?”

The bearded man took a drink, watching Caius over the rim of his cup.

“How did you know where we would be?” Caius’ anger flared as he continued. “How did you know Darkness had found us? Who sent you?”

Dorian finally drank his ale.

Caius turned toward Kali. She was looking at Dorian now, the carvings on the walls momentarily forgotten.

“I think it is time we leave,” Caius said.

The bearded man leaned back in his chair. “Not fond of findin’ yourself in a thievin’ tavern, are ya?”

Caius said nothing. He pushed his chair away from the table and rose.

The scrape of wood against stone cut through the chamber.

A nearby conversation stopped.

Then another.

Caius felt the attention of the room settle upon him once more. This time, there was no idle curiosity in it. Hands moved toward sword hilts. A woman at the bar slipped a knife from her sleeve. Somewhere behind Caius, a crossbow creaked as its string was pulled back.

Kali remained seated, her hands still wrapped around her cup as though nothing was happening at all.

The bearded man looked around the chamber and sighed.

“Calm yer feathers, boy. We’re not goin’ to harm ya.” He jerked his chin toward Dorian. “I assume this bastard told ya nothin’. Just dangled the right bait and waited for the pair of ya to bite.”

Dorian smiled into his ale.

The bearded man turned toward him. “Told ya the prince would be trouble.”

The word moved through the chamber like a spark through dry grass.

Prince.

Someone near the bar muttered a curse. A chair shifted. 

A man with gold teeth leaned toward his companion. “Royalty’s worth more alive,” he said.

The man beside him shrugged. “Aye, but he’d be far quieter dead.”

Several people chuckled.

Caius’s hand came to rest on the pommel of his sword. “I am not here to cause trouble,” he said. His voice carried farther than he intended. “It is the last thing I need.”

A few more people laughed.

The bearded man slammed one broad fist against the table.

The chamber fell silent.

“Sit down, boy.”

Caius did not move. He had been commanded by kings, generals, tutors, and priests. He had endured instructions from people far more deserving of obedience than this overgrown smuggler.

Yet none of them had ever spoken while half a tavern prepared to draw steel on his behalf.

Caius looked toward Kali. She gave the smallest shake of her head.

Not yet.

Slowly, he released his sword.

The room did not relax immediately. Hands remained on weapons. The crossbow string stayed drawn behind him. Every eye remained fixed upon the table.

“Now, Horad,” Dorian said, “you are frightening the poor thing. Look at him trembling.”

Horad threw back his head and laughed.

Then the rest of the room joined him.

The man with the crossbow laughed. The scarred woman at the bar laughed. Even the two men who had discussed whether Caius was worth more dead or alive struck their cups together.

Caius looked from one face to another.

He was not trembling.

More importantly, he could not understand what any of them found so amusing.

Dorian wiped at the corner of one eye. “You should see your face.”

“My face?”

“Aye,” Horad said, still laughing. “Looks as though ye’re waitin’ for the arrow to find its way through yer royal skull.”

The crossbow creaked behind Caius.

He fought the urge to turn around.

Horad lowered his voice as though sharing a secret, though it still carried across the nearby tables.

“No one can kill ya in here, boy.”

Caius looked at him.

Horad spread his enormous hands. “Blade, arrow, poison. Makes no difference. This cave won’t allow one soul to take another.”

The crossbow string released.

Caius flinched and turned as the arrow spiraled straight for his chest. When it reached a foot from his body the metal point bent backwards as though it had struck something harder than iron, then fell to the ground.

The tavern erupted into another round of laughter.

Caius glared at the man holding the crossbow who gave him an apologetic shrug. “Couldn’t resist.”

“A protection was cast over this place long ago,” Dorian said. “All who enter the cave fall beneath it. No life can be taken here.”

Horad raised one thick finger. “Mind ya, that doesn’t mean a man can’t break another man’s nose.” As if to prove his point, a chair crashed somewhere near the bar. One man struck another across the jaw, sending him sprawling over a table. No one paid them any attention.

Horad lifted his cup toward the fight.

“Fists still work perfectly fine. Wouldn’t be much of a tavern without ’em.”

Caius stared at the bent arrow lying beside his chair as he sunk back down.

The weapons had never been a true threat.

They had all known it. Even Kali who looked up at him guiltily. Everyone except him.

One by one, hands left sword hilts. The scarred woman returned her knife to her sleeve. Conversations resumed as though nothing had happened.

Caius turned back toward Dorian.

“I do not like you.”

Dorian raised his cup. “That wound may never heal.”

Horad laughed again, though the sound subsided when he turned toward Kali. He studied the shadow beneath the dark hood.

“Ya can take that down, lass.”

Kali did not move.

Horad’s voice softened, though it remained deep and rough. “No need for hidin’ in here.” The words were simple, but something beneath them made Caius look toward the markings around the chamber again. The old symbols. The circle of pale stones. The darkness that could not cross them.

Kali studied Horad for several breaths. Slowly, she lifted her hands and pushed back her hood. Her dark hair fell around her shoulders.

Horad went still.

He had known the Witch’s Daughter would be there and still he had not been prepared for her face. The humor left him. The hard lines around his mouth loosened, and his fingers went slack around his cup. For a moment, the great man looked older. Not weaker. Only weary, as though a door had opened inside him onto a room he had kept closed for years. Horad’s eyes moved across her face. “You look just like your mother when she was your age.”

Kali’s guarded expression disappeared. For one unprotected instant, she looked younger. Hope rose in her face so quickly that Caius almost looked away.

“You knew my mother?” she asked. The words came out hushed, as though speaking them too loudly might break whatever answer followed.

“Aye, lass. I knew yer mother.”

Kali’s fingers tightened around her cup.

“How?”

Horad looked down at his drink. One thick thumb moved across a dent in the metal.

“Me and the Witch go back farther than most folk in this cave remember. Back before the roads turned dangerous. Before kings started burnin’ anything they couldn’t command.” He lifted his eyes to Caius for a moment, before turning them back to her again. “Back when I called her Giannia.”

Kali’s breath caught.

He spoke the Witch’s name. The most protected secret a witch has. The name appeared to mean more than Horad could have known. No one had called the Witch that in Caius’s hearing. To him, she had always been the Witch, spoken of through rumor, fear, and old stories.

Giannia belonged to something else.

A woman who had existed before the title. Before anger and grief had transformed her into the creature the kingdom feared.

Kali looked back toward the symbols carved into the walls.

“The old ways,” she whispered.

Horad nodded.

Her eyes moved around the chamber again, but differently now. She was no longer searching without knowing what she hoped to find. She followed the markings from the crescent moon to the twisting branches, then down toward the silver-filled symbols surrounding the passage.

“My mother taught me some of these when I was little,” Kali said. “Before she forgot what they meant”

Horad leaned back. “Or perhaps she only pretended to forget. Giannia was many things, lass, but foolish was never one of ’em.”

“This cave belonged to her,” Kali said. It was not a question.

Horad nodded slowly. “Aye. Long before it belonged to thieves and smugglers. Before we built the bar. Before any drunken fool threw his first punch beneath this stone, this place was hers.”

Kali looked toward the ring of pale stones.

“She cast the protection.”

“She did.”

Horad placed one finger against a symbol carved into the tabletop—a crescent moon caught within the roots of a tree. It was the same mark Kali had been studying on the walls.

“She made a promise over this cave,” he said. “Any soul who crossed its threshold would be safe beneath it. Didn’t matter if they were king or thief, witch or priest. Once they entered, no one could take their life.”

“And Darkness?” Caius asked.

Horad’s expression changed. He looked toward the passage. The silver markings between the pale stones had grown brighter.

One of the wickless lanterns flickered.

The darkness pulled away and the light shined brighter. “Darkness cannot enter either,” Kali said. She stared at the symbols as the final pieces settled into place.

Horad turned his cup between both hands.

“No,” he said. “It can’t.”

Kali leaned forward.

“This place was not always a tavern,” Horad continued. “Wasn’t always a den for thieves either. Once, it was a sanctuary. Giannia’s sanctuary.”

His thick finger traced the crescent carved into the table.

“When she first brought me here, there was no bar. No ale. No songs. Just stone, seawater, and magic older than any kingdom still standin’.”

He looked at Kali once more, and a quiet sadness returned to his face.

“Let me tell ya the story of how yer mother made a cave even Darkness cannot touch.”