Enough Rope, Chapter 2

Fleta ran from the Bluff and was halfway to the gates of the city before she skidded to a halt on a cobbled street between ramshackle wooden houses. The betrayal of Parfrey left her almost breathless, her heart continuing to pound its sprint while her feet were still. However, if she ran to Lyntre to inform her High Skald right now, she’d miss the chance to follow the clues from the sorcerer she met last night. Fleta was reluctant to let that trail get cold. Or run a round trip from Seagate to Lyntre and back. Fast as she was, the week-long journey would still take her all day.

Instead, she collected her belongings from the trunk of the tavern’s back room, switching from her bright-red Valcot cloak into a baggy, dark gray traveling cloak with a large hood. It hid her hair and her sword, which were her most recognizable features. And a gray-cloaked Fleta wouldn’t look too out of place in the cool morning breezes of the docks.

The Hero’s Measure was on the edge of the market district, not far from the docks. Fleta could have searched the whole district in a few minutes, but everyone would have known she did it. Instead, she dragged her feet slowly through the streets, the smell of fish and exotic spices growing as she turned towards Mortimer’s Drift. The trade ships docked on the northeastern edge of Seagate, just behind the sheltering curve of Seagate’s stubby peninsula. Pockets of out-of-work dockers sat idly by, grumbling over the recent Valcot cranes that had replaced them, waiting for a chance to find work with late fishing vessels.

Buildings in Mortimer’s Drift were small and salt-stained, and the district always smelled of spirits since someone, somewhere in the district, was revarnishing a house or shop against the ravages of the sea spray on the breeze. And, of course, it smelled like fish. Fleta couldn’t bring herself to confront a group of hefty and disgruntled dockers, so she found a portly man patching and tarring leaks in a small finish boat. He stopped for a breather.

“Excuse me, is there a Lunavaran net maker around here?” she asked.

The man chuckled. “Several. Many Lunavaran fishermen and sailors, lass. Yer not from Seagate, I take it?”

“Right, silly question,” Fleta corrected herself. She didn’t need a red cloak to stand out. She tried to speak a little lower, so at least he wouldn’t recognize her voice. “He has a niece named Esperanza.”

“Ha! Popular name that. Two that I can think of. Young fella: long, light-brown hair. But you probably didn’t mean him. His niece is a wee ‘un. You probably want the older one, Pierdut. Lives around that street, take a right on the big avenue, then a left into the first alley. It’s a small one that’s easy to miss.” He wiped his forehead. “Don’t remember the last time I saw Esperanza around these parts, though. She was a striking one. Pale for a Lunavaran, but with true black hair and eyes like jade.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Sir, right!” The man chuckled. “Good day.”

Older man, missing niece: it sounded like the sorcerer’s clue. Fleta followed the instructions to an alley barely wider than her shoulders. Fleta knocked, and when a sandpapery voice invited her in, she stepped aside and swung the door open. The building was small, made smaller by being divided into two parts. The front room was a mosaic of driftwood and scrap, lovingly fitted into flooring and walls, with a little sawdust and pine pitch for cracks and sanded smooth. Nets were rolled and stacked on the floor, leaving just enough space in the tiny room to stand before a small salvage table with a net-in-progress draped over it.

The man sitting at the table before Fleta was deeply tanned and wrinkled by the sun. He was no stranger to fishing boats. His dark hair was graying and long but pulled tightly back into a tail.

“Sorry, I would stand up to greet you, but my hip’s acting up.” He nodded. After a pause, he continued. “Don’t look like much of a fisherman.”

“I’m not,” Fleta hid her face, pretending to examine the nets. “Someone asked me to find Esperanza.”

The old man dropped the netting, his eyes drilling into the back of Fleta’s hood. “Who asked you?” He raised his voice. “Who asked you to find her?”

“I…” Fleta began. Of course, she should have come up with a reason why she was asking. The gift that made her legs run faster, however, did not make her thoughts more swift or aid her with inventing stories. “I can’t say.”

“One of the cowards and jackals on the Bluff, isn’t it?” The Pierdut quieted. “Not your fault, I suppose that they can’t ask their own questions. Face a bereft old man themselves.” He shook his head, his fury draining from his red cheeks into a deep and cold heart.

“Esperanza was a simple woman,” he continued. “Not made for fancy games, pretty words, and ill intentions. Not like… not like some. All she ever wanted to be was a wife to a sailor and a daughter to the sea. When her sailor didn’t come home, neither did she.”

He placed his hand over his eyes. “If they want to find her, tell them to jump in the bay.”

Fleta clenched her jaw and hands as if struck. Her heart tore at her rib cage. She looked towards the door, as far away from the old man as she could. Had the sorcerer sold her a lie? Sent her to chase after a dead woman and readied an ambush outside? Well, if so, they were already in position. Let them come. She still had Alexei…

…But the sorcerer had picked up Alexei and handed him back to her. He had the most powerful sword in the kingdom in his hands, and instead, he wanted to know about a woman.

Fleta slowed her breath, willing her heart to relax.

“And if it wasn’t the nobles who were asking?” Fleta half turned to the man, still hiding her face in hood and shadow.

The man’s hand dropped to the table. His eyes were wide. “Are you… bound? That’s why you won’t show your face?”

Fleta didn’t answer.

“Did someone take her? Give her back! We have suffered. Our family has suffered enough!”

Fleta blinked away the stinging in her eyes. She wanted to tell the man everything, comfort him, and share his loss. Instead, she reminded herself that involving him in sorcerers’ business more than she had to would only endanger him and his niece.

“I cannot tell you anything except that I have promised to keep her safe,” Fleta said slowly, steadying her voice. “May I ask one last question?”

Pierdut was silent for a while. “If it will help. If you come and tell me when you find her. However you find her.”

“When was the last time you saw her?”

“Six years ago,” the man said, almost in a whisper. “She went to wait for her sailor’s ship to come in. When I went to look for her, I heard that the ship had been wrecked in a storm with no survivors. But no one had seen Esperanza.

“I thought…” the man’s voice creaked in harmony with his chair as he shifted to one side and back. “I thought she had joined him.”

Fleta nodded. “I’m sorry. What I know is this: someone thinks she’s alive, and if she is, I will find her.”

“Who are you? No, no, I don’t want to know. Just send word, leave a letter when you know. Don’t come back.”

Fleta nodded. “Goodbye.”

The man was silent as Fleta slipped out of the shop.

Fleta left the building in a daze, just for a moment, before remembering her fears of an ambush. She pressed herself to the wall, listened, and tried to watch both directions of the alley at once. Nothing moved except a mangy tomcat. She crept out of the alley. Each step felt as though time slowed like cooling honey. She wanted to run, to flee, but she couldn’t afford to let sorcerers and whoever else learn of her visit to Pierdut.

When she reached the city gates without incident, she relaxed. She trotted down the road a ways, behind a brush-covered hillock and out of sight from the city guards and other travelers. She stretched, readying herself to run a three—or four-day journey in a few hours.

What had she learned? Almost nothing. Pierdut had thought Esperanza had tossed herself in the sea. On the other hand, he implied that the family had dealings with sorcerers in the past and that he could believe they had taken her. No, all she really learned was that Esperanza had been taken six years ago, but Fleta had assumed the kidnapping of Esperanza was a recent event. How was she supposed to follow a trail six years cold? Should she go back and ask the old man more about Esperanza’s dealings with sorcery? But what if he recognized her? And he wasn’t keen on inviting her back anyway.

Now that her legs were warmed up, she crouched and pushed off the ground. She leaned forward at a steep angle to transfer as much power into forward motion as she could. Otherwise, she might accidentally become airborne. She pushed off.

Instead of shooting forward, Fleta fell on her face. Confused, she crouched into her sprint, leaned forward, and fell again.

Only then did she hear the rustling of the bushes and see a black-masked figure walk from the foliage, arm outstretched with palms toward Fleta. Fleta frantically waved a hand in front of her face. She was no longer fast. This sorcerer had some strange power to slow her down.

Fleta deftly pulled Alexei out of his scabbard. Last spring, she would have been useless without her speed—she had been nearly useless with it. Now, she trained daily with a magical sword. While Alexei’s communications as a sword were limited, having a sword that could tug her arms into the correct position and buzz whenever her stance was off was even better than the days she spent in training with a Karatuk sword master. Perhaps most importantly, she had the confidence to slay dozens of enormous beasts. She did not fear this fight, nor did she hesitate.

As Fleta turned to face the sorcerer, she saw another figure from the corner of her eye. She backed up, trying to keep both black-masked men in her sight. The second seemed to be pointing at Alexei, then beckoning, then shaking his fist. Fleta could see no effect and felt nothing except the usual tug of Alexei towards the enemy.

Fleta sprinted towards the first enemy, her legs feeling like lead, and the world was as slow as her nightmares about running from the tarasque. Before she could draw close, the second man drew a sling, twirling it deftly while backing away. Alexei tugged upwards towards an ox guard, but with the tip drooping more than normal. Fleta realized in a moment that her friend meant to block the sling. While Fleta could easily cut an arrow out of the air with her speed, she balked, relenting only as the second man loosed the sling stone. She heard the clang of Alexei, then felt a sting as the ricocheting stone grazed her shoulder. 

When Fleta turned back to the first sorcerer, he was reaching slowly towards a dagger sheathed at his belt. A bead of sweat dripped from his brow. Fleta pushed as hard as she could from the ground but felt like she was barely moving. Then she saw a rider—also dressed in black, not the colors of the Seagate guard. Fleta reached for her own hunting knife and threw it at the first sorcerer. The knife fell short, but as the sorcerer flinched, Fleta felt his power disappear. In the blink of an eye, she was over the hill and speeding to Lyntre. 

Lyntre was a village of steep-thatched roofs nestled between the peaks of mountains and a clear lake that mirrored the puffy clouds overhead. The Lyntre valley sloped up, sometimes steeply, towards the marble Thorgarick temple and a marble pavilion containing a Gate to other worlds.

Fleta zipped past the town, hearing some cheers far in her wake, up to the temple plateau. Between the temple and the Gate, Hereward, master of arms, drilled a few of the younger disciples on well-trampled heather. He cuffed one of the boys for stopping to gawk as Fleta sped past.

In contrast, the new scoutmaster, Ivar, called for his handful of archers—mostly sworn men and women—to a halt. He turned his small head, with large eyes shadowed under a heavy brow, toward Fleta. She slid into a smooth stop and returned his stare.

“Anything I can do for you, Master Scout?” Fleta asked.

He stood silent, those horrible dark, shadowed eyes focused on her, set behind a sharp nose that pointed at her face like a blade. “What news from Seagate?” he asked slowly.

“Nothing of general import,” Fleta answered. “Just letting the High Skald know that her messages have been received.”

Ivar continued to stare.

“Any else, Master Scout?”

“Please, just Ivar,” he said. “If you do have any news of sorcerers anywhere, please let me know. Given what happened this summer, I would like your—our—swornmen to be prepared.”

“The High Skald will likely be the best source of news,” Fleta said. “She’ll know everything I do, plus her own travels and insights.”

“Indeed,” Ivar nodded slowly. “I prefer first-hand accounts.”

“I’ll indulge you when I can,” Fleta shrugged.

“Thank you, Disciple,” Ivar said. Fleta hadn’t caught him blinking once in their conversation. She turned towards the temple and didn’t look back lest she have to look into that dark, dissecting glare again.

The Thorgarick temple at Lyntre was a magical palace for Fleta when she was young. The temple was twice as tall as even the village hall, made of solid stone with thin stripes of gilding. Then, it became home for a decade, and she took it for granted. Now, it looked tiny in comparison to the temple at Seagate, lacking in domes and statuary. Remarkable only for its inconveniently oversized front steps and the number of bleached trophy skulls in the great hall. Fleta sighed. She jogged up the giant steps and tugged open the front door, which was heavy oak but nowhere near as impressive as ax-breaker wood. No winch required.

The great hall was a large room, some twenty-five feet high, to be able to hold the skulls of giant beasts taken from the Jungle world on the other side of the Gate. Behind the High Skald’s ceremonial chair was mounted a single tooth, as long as any skull. Fleta stared at it a moment, trying to convince herself that the tarasque was well and truly dead. Trying to feel it in her stomach.

She couldn’t.

Fleta pushed open the door at the back of the hall, turned right towards the dormitories, and knocked at the first door on the left. Daralis opened the door.

“I said come in,” High Skald Daralis complained. She was a willowy woman, pale and blond, with rings under her blue eyes.

“I didn’t hear you,” Fleta said.

“Oh,” Daralis slapped her forehead. “I keep forgetting. Terrell used to call people into his study from his bedroom, but he did the whole voice thing. Come in. Let’s catch up.”

Daralis had been aloof during most of Fleta’s training at the temple. A pale shadow, hovering close to the old High Skald, listening and advising. Only after they were stuck in the Jungle with a murderous 600-foot creature did Daralis let down her guard around Fleta. Daralis was still reserved and polite in front of other company, but around Fleta she dropped the titles, swore, and told jokes. It felt like having an older sister.

The study was much smaller and cozier than Chamberlain Parfrey’s, but that could be said about any room in the Lyntre temple compared to anything but the broom closet of the Seagate temple. Daralis sat on the well-worn cushion of an old polished chair before a feast that covered a small table. Half of the food was already eaten.

“Did you have company?” Fleta asked.

“This?” Daralis waved at the table. “I do now. I’m always so hungry after a busy trip, so I always over-order. Being in a new place, having to really lean into my gift, makes me ravenous.” Daralis’ gift was the ability to instantly notice details around her. She described it as a “flash” of insight in thematically Thorgarick terms. However, as the former master scout had pointed out, Daralis probably should have ended at a Luthfen temple. Luthfen was the Paragon of Insight, waning in recent popularity. “Feel free to have some,” Daralis continued.

After a brisk seventy or eighty-mile jog, Fleta had worked up an appetite. She skipped over a bowl of porridge and immediately took a bite of braised goat leg in thick herb sauce. 

“Oh, is the new master scout permanent yet?” asked Fleta.

“For someone who came to us asking for the position, he’s been pretty squirrelly about how long he sees himself serving,” Daralis said. “Shaw had mentioned him with respect, and his references from the Luthfen temple were good.”

“I feel like he hates me,” Fleta said.

“I think he makes everyone feel that way,” Daralis shrugged. “But the soldiers and scouts aren’t complaining about his training.”

“I miss Shaw,” Fleta said.

“I do, too,” Daralis spoke around a mouthful. “You should have kept him alive.”

For the second time that day, Fleta began to tear up. She bit her lip.

“Oh, Fleta, I’m sorry,” Daralis said and reached out to clasp Fleta’s hand. “I shouldn’t have said that. I do honestly miss him, too. I just… manage things by pretending it’s all a joke. And eating a lot. There’s just… so much going on, and good news is few and far between.”

Daralis let Fleta sit a moment before continuing. “I don’t suppose you have any good news?”

Fleta looked at Daralis for a moment. She didn’t dare bring up the mist sorcerer or his clue. If she couldn’t find a good excuse for an old net maker, she would never be able get a lie—or even half-truth—past Daralis.

“That bad, huh?” Daralis asked. “Let’s have it.”

“Chamberlain Parfrey didn’t give me any more leads for the sorcerers. They have set up an enormous scaffold in front of Hinrick Fountain—”

“How morbid. I’m surprised they plan on letting the rabble up on the Bluff, although I suppose it is a striking, visual reminder of their authority.”

“—and I overheard Parfrey telling the high steward that nobles were just going to fill the nooses with whoever they wanted to get rid of.”

Daralis laughed, almost spitting out her food. “You eavesdropped on Parfrey? And didn’t get caught?” Daralis slapped the table when Fleta shook her head. “Well done! I didn’t know you had it in you.

“Well, it’s easier to eavesdrop when people think they’ve just seen you leave,” Fleta half-smiled. “But you don’t seem that surprised about Parfrey.”

“Oh, Fleta,” Daralis blew a wisp of hair out of her face. “We already knew they weren’t taking us seriously. This just shows that Parfrey, in particular, is aware of what’s going on. Which is the least I would expect from a chamberlain on the Bluff. Besides, I’ve always known he’s a creep.”

“Wait-what?” Fleta asked.

“You know what Parfrey’s gift is, right? He used to be called the Iron Grip. Unlike Benwel, he doesn’t have an artistic bone in his body, but he could crush one quite easily between his fingers. Why do you think he’s so handsy with everyone? He pretends to be a doddering old grandpa, but it’s a power move, and anyone with any sense knows it.”

Fleta poked abashedly at her goat leg. She was panicking about non-issues and oblivious to real threats. She missed the days when all she had to worry about was Shaw and Hereward chiding her for failing to pay attention to lessons. Now, when she failed to pay attention, it might be the last mistake she made. And if she thought focusing on boring sword forms or hunting techniques was difficult, figuring out the myriad interests, gifts, and conflicts at the capital was much more opaque.

“Sorry again,” Daralis said. “I sometimes forget there are ways my gift moves faster than yours…” Daralis trailed off. “But there’s something else you’re not telling me.”

Fleta sat bolt upright. “Sorry! I was attacked by sorcerers.”

“And you didn’t lead with that?” Daralis asked. “What happened?”

“One came out of the bushes as I left town and did something to slow me down. A second came out, but if he did anything, I couldn’t tell. I was going to turn on them when a third person came on horseback, so I ran.”

“I assume you got your speed back?” Daralis asked. 

“Yeah, the slow effect stopped when I broke his concentration.”

“Did you see their faces? Or hear names?”

“No names, and they were masked.”

“Anything else you can recall about them?”

“Just that they were… all wearing black.”

“Well, they clearly wanted to send a message,” Daralis looked out the window. “I wish you’d caught them. By the Paragons, I wish I had your speed. With your gift and my gift together, we would have roasted those sorcerers on a spit by now.”

Fleta put down her goat, suddenly quite full.

“Where are my manners?” Daralis asked. “You’ve run a long way today. Any injuries?”

“Nothing too bad.”

“I’ll have Hertha draw a bath for you,” Daralis said. Baths were quite the luxury at the temple; most of the swornmen and disciples bathed in a “refreshing” mountain stream that fed the lake. When Fleta was really agitated, however, too much stillness too quickly unnerved her. She told Daralis she’d take a bath later.

Instead, Fleta jogged down to the village, towards the cottage on the east hill by the high pastures. She slowed to a walk—a regular walk—staring at the puffy clouds, breathing in the scent of mountain heather, thyme, forget-me-nots, and, of course, goats. The sun was already setting, and by the smell of it, a cream soup dinner had already been served. Windows were open, catching the last of the light.

Fleta popped her head in one of those: “Hi Ma! Hi Da!”

“Fleta’s here!” Shouted a chorus of the smaller children. The older ones nodded sedately.

“Come in! Come in!” Shouted her mother, Henli, throwing open the door and almost dragging Fleta in. “We still have some bread and cheese.”

As mother pressed food into her hands, Da brought her a stool to sit on. “Welcome back. How’s the work?”

“Slower than I’d like.”

“Nothing’s fast enough for my daughter, huh?” Da smiled, a crinkle of concern in the corner of her eyes. “Daralis doesn’t have you doing anything too dangerous?”

Fleta shook her head. “I’m fine, Da.”

“Nothing’s too dangerous for Fleta. She killed the biggest beast ever! What’s bigger than that?” Said Emery.

“I don’t know,” Fleta mussed his hair. “That sounds like a riddle. Hunger. I guess it was hunger because it could never outgrow its own stomach.”

Emery made a face at her, uninterested in riddle games, and she shrugged. Fleta turned back to her father. “Do you know much about Lunavarans, Da?”

“Your uncle was one,” said Da.

“You know, the one that married his sister and then disappeared into the Gate,” Ma added. “As you almost did.”

“How did I not know that?” Fleta asked, ignoring her mother.

“You’ve been busy training to hunt monsters and tracking down sorcerers. It’s been a while since we just chatted. Any particular reason you’re interested in Lunavarans all of a sudden?”

“I’ve just been running into them a lot in Seagate.”

“Sure, there are plenty by the docks. Not so much up by Hinrick Fountain.”

“Do you think I really only hang out with rich people, Da?”

“There was a scandal when we were young,” her father continued, ignoring Fleta’s complaint. “A nobleman fell in love with a Lunavaran woman who turned out to be a sorceress.”

“She was executed,” Ma said. “It was very tragic.”

“At least, that’s the song the bards sing,” Da said. “Makes a good story and reassures everyone that their nobles aren’t toying around with sorcery.”

Fleta was quiet for a moment. Her father’s skepticism sounded paranoid. But it also sounded uncomfortably close to what Parfrey had discussed with the steward: holding a big public execution of anyone they wanted to get rid of, whether or not they were guilty. Would they go so far as to hang innocent people to protect the guilty?

Fleta felt dirty. Her family home was not a place for conspiracies and politics. “Tell me more about uncle Alistair! He doesn’t have a Lunavaran name.”

“He grew up in the capitol. He was wiry, tan, graceful. He had the Lunavaran wavy black hair and studious brown eyes. Alistair was bookish, came here to study the Gate with some sort of noble patronage, and he stayed for my sister. Once, he almost picked a fight with a Thorgarick because he thought they were rude to me. He had that fiercely protective Lunavaran pride. I thank the Paragons he never took up dueling or swordsmanship; he would have been a terror, but we probably would have lost him sooner. Fleta—what’s wrong?”

Fleta had closed her eyes, trying to imagine her uncle. At first, she imagined the bard from The Hero’s measure, perhaps a little paler and taller. When her father mentioned the brown eyes, the image became Alexei. Not the Alexei, who was gray and bald with many arms, but the Alexei with light brown skin, wavy dark hair, and brown eyes, who fought a duel with Alber while trying to get Fleta home.

“Did he have a beaked nose?” Fleta asked.

“Yes,” Da replied. “Large even for a Lunavaran. Why?”