The Magus by Ted Neill

Author:Ted Neill
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tenebray Press
Published: 2016-12-12T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

Rivertown

Adamantus scattered the piles of burning brush aside and cut the ropes binding Katlyn and Tallia. Relieved and abashed, Katlyn wrapped her arms around the elk’s neck while Gail chased the last of the Candelin away, the bodies of those who had chosen to fight stretched out upon the forest floor. Gail wiped the blood from her blade using a dead man’s scarf, then slammed the sword back into her sheath.

“I don’t even know if I have the words—” she said, glaring at Katlyn through the branches of Adamantus’ antlers.

“Gail, Adamantus, I’m sorry . . . it is just, I felt we couldn’t wait. I was tired of waiting. I was impatient.”

“You were overconfident,” the elk said.

“You were fools,” Gail said, kicking a smoking branch aside and yanking one of her arrows out of the dead chief’s back. “Had we been moments later, you’d be dead.”

The irony that Gail, who had essentially killed her once, was now so concerned about her well-being was not lost on Katlyn. Humbled, she dropped to her knees. “I’m so sorry, to you both.”

Gail let out a loud snort and then blew the bangs off her forehead and rifled through the supplies the Candelin left behind. She upended satchels and rucksacks, throwing them, once empty, into the bushes. When she was out of earshot, Adamantus turned to Katlyn. “She will calm down, in time.”

“She’s a long way from wanting to enslave or kill me,” Katlyn reflected.

“The font may have powers we don’t even understand,” Adamantus said, swinging his head around to Tallia to inspect her head to foot. Seeing that no injury seemed to hinder her as she stripped the dead bodies of weapons, rings, and other valuables, he turned back to Katlyn. “You were going north.”

“To Antas. Adamantus, the vaurgs have left the forest. I need to know what happened to my family,” she said, tears filming her eyes.

“Indeed. We need to help but it is safer if we travel together. For now, gather what you can.”

Katlyn was a model of obedience, well aware that she had indiscretions to make up for—if not with the elk, certainly with Gail. She helped scavenge what they could from the dead before she mounted her horse and began a long, silent ride. She followed Gail and Adamantus without question or complaint as they pressed north into the evening, long after the violet sky had turned indigo and the stars came out over the mountains in the east. Gail finally stopped when the moon had risen, wrapped herself in furs taken from the Candelin, and said nothing before falling into a deep sleep.

Katlyn set to making a fire with Tallia. When she had brewed some pine needle tea, she turned to Adamantus. “Should I wake Gail for some tea and supper?”

“Let her rest. She has not slept in days.”

Katlyn swallowed a guilty lump in her throat and sat down with a warm cup in her hands. She struggled to find words. “Did . . . did you find what you were looking for in the south?”

“No,” Adamantus said.

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