Lament (Scars of the Sundering Book 2) (38 page)

Qaliah sat upright and slammed
her fist into her palm. “The perfect time to spring him and run! Why aren’t we
waiting around for that?”

Pancras eyed Gisella. “We feel
further antagonizing the law and people of Curton will lead nowhere good.”

“So you’re just going to abandon
him?”

“Those Edric wronged deserve
justice.” Gisella held Qaliah by the shoulders. “We won’t force you to leave
your friend, but the people of this city view you with suspicion, if not
outright contempt. It’ll be safer with us.”

“I get blondie here.” Qaliah
glared at Pancras. “But why are you so quick to abandon your friend?

How can I make her understand?
Pancras
rubbed his horn. “Edric is little more than an acquaintance. I am content to
let him travel with me, but I’m not willing to pay for every mistake he makes
and become a fugitive myself to ensure he doesn’t suffer the consequences of
his poor judgement.”

“I thought that’s what friends
do.”

“True friends have sense enough
to know when to not bring their friends down with them. Besides, he has often
spoken of his lack of enthusiasm for our upcoming sea voyage.” Gisella turned
from Qaliah and rattled the cell doors.

“We’ll return for you on our way
out of town.” Pancras waited by the cell door. “You have until then to decide
if you’re going to burden yourself with Edric’s punishment or come with us.”

Lady Aveline returned to let them
out of the cell. Qaliah lay down again on the cot, her back facing the door.

“Take us to Edric now, if you
please.” Pancras bowed his head to Lady Aveline. She locked up and then led
them to the dwarf’s cell, two doors away at the end of the hall.

“You can talk through the bars to
this one.” She turned and walked toward the stairs, stopping at their base, far
enough away to afford Pancras, Gisella, and Edric some measure of privacy but
close enough to observe them.

The dwarf sat on the edge of his
cot, his short legs dangling above the floor. His beard was tangled and
knotted, and his eyes were red and bleary from a lack of sleep and what Pancras
assumed was a hangover.

“Come to get me out?”

Pancras sighed, grasped one of
the bars of the cell, and shook his head. “No. The fines and damages you owe
are too great for me to cover.”

Edric laughed and hopped off his
cot. He stepped over to Pancras and Gisella. “That bad, huh? Ah well, I knew my
luck would run out sometime.”

Gisella furrowed her brow. “You
understand that we’re leaving, yes? Tomorrow?”

The dwarf shrugged. “Everyone
abandons me at some point.” He waved his hand. “I was serious about maybe
staying here. I didn’t want to get on that ship anyway.” He gripped the bars of
his cell. “Do you know why dwarves don’t like water?”

“You said yourself, dwarves are
poor swimmers. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.” Pancras never felt comfortable
in water that was deeper than chest height. “I’m a poor swimmer, too.”

“Sure, but at least you float.”
Edric’s eyes widened as they flicked to briefly focus on Gisella. “Dwarves sink
like stones.”

“You’d be on the ship, not on the
water.” Pancras was certain Edric’s exaggerations were based on unfounded
fears.

Edric grabbed Pancras’s sleeve
through the bars. “I don’t fancy an ocean voyage. One bad storm, one misstep,
and over the side I’ll go. Dwarves don’t go on the oceans.”

“You’d be the first dwarf, then.
A pioneer.” Pancras pulled his sleeve out of Edric’s grasp.

“I’ll be the next in a long line
of fools at the bottom of the ocean. There aren’t any Soul Forges there, and I’ll
be trapped in a stony corpse for eternity. No thank you.”

Pancras heard that dwarves turned
to stone after death, but he was not versed in their afterlife. “What are you
talking about?”

“We are of the earth. We do not
float in water. We sink. A few minutes after going overboard, I’ll be dead.
I’ll become a statue of a drowned dwarf, and no one will take me back to a
dwarven city to be consumed in a Soul Forge. My spirit will be trapped at the
bottom of the ocean until the world’s ending. I. Am. Not. Going.”

Edric quivered as he made his
point. Pancras rubbed his right horn and sighed. “Help me understand. What is a
Soul Forge?”

“Do you not know anything of
dwarven culture?” The dwarf threw up his hands.

“No. I’ve never lived around
dwarves.” Pancras glanced at Gisella. Her brow furrowed as she listened to the
dwarf. “They didn’t exactly leave history books lying around Muncifer when they
left after The Sundering.”

“I’m not a scholar. Look, our
stony corpses fuel the magical furnaces that power our cities. Burning a dead
dwarf in a Soul Forge releases his soul to the afterlife.” Edric waved his
hand. “Maybe I won’t fall overboard. Maybe I will. I don’t care what debt I owe
you or anyone else. I’ll risk my life but not my soul.”

“Qaliah thinks we should find a
way to free you, at any cost.” Pancras clasped his hands behind his back.

“It’d be nice to have friends
who’d do that for me.” Edric regarded them, his hands on his hips. “I ain’t
foolish enough to think we’re that close. It’s been interesting, but I think we
can agree it’s time to part ways.”

Pancras took a deep breath. “I
confess I’m surprised to hear this from you.” Regardless of Edric’s feelings on
being left behind, it still didn’t sit well with the minotaur.

“I know if I was one of those
draks, you’d burn this town to help them, but I’m just a dwarf, and you’re a
minotaur.” Edric nodded at Gisella. “Me and her don’t have enough history to
ruin our lives for each other. So, go. Take the fiendling and try not to get killed.”

“And what will you do?” Gisella
knelt so she was eye level with Edric.

“What I always do. Pay my debts.
Then find someplace else to live. There’s a dwarven city in the mountains south
of here. They haven’t heard of me, so maybe I can go there and stay a while.”
Edric shooed them away. “It ain’t the first time I’ve been in jail. It won’t be
the last. I don’t expect you to do nothing for me, and like I said, I ain’t
gettin’ on no ship.” He glanced over his shoulder at them. “If what you got to
do in Vlorey saves the world, then all I ask is you don’t fail. I like not
being undead.”

The dwarf climbed up on his cot
and lay down. Closing his eyes, he crossed his hands over his chest. Pancras
watched him for a moment. In Drak-Anor, most folk watched out for one another
and would not lightly abandon a friend in need. Edric was a dwarf, however, and
Pancras spent many years helping the city defend against them until Delilah
helped bridge the gap that divided them.
He accepts his fate. Who am I to
argue otherwise, when he clearly deserves to face justice, no matter how petty
his crimes may seem?
Pancras squeezed his eyes shut and took a deep breath.
He nodded once before turning and clomping down the hallway toward Qaliah’s
cell and Lady Aveline. He heard Gisella follow after him.

As he passed the fiendling’s
cell, he paused and turned his head. “We’ll be back in the morning. Think of
where you’d rather be: in a city full of people who want to hang you because of
what you are, or with us, going to Vlorey.”

* * *

Kale held the door open for Ori
and Kali. “So this is the storefront. We’ve cleaned it up but haven’t done
anything with it. The hallway leads back to a storage room and our living
quarters.”

“Those are off limits.” Kali
stood at the end of the counter as Ori glanced down the hallway.

“Both or just your living
quarters?” The blue drak knelt, disappearing behind the counter. He stood up
and surveyed the store, nodding.

“The living quarters.”

Kale stepped over to his mate.
“We’ve just been storing food in the other room but not enough to fill it.”

Ori ran his hand along one of the
shelves behind the counter. “If I wanted to make some changes up here, you
know, make the space more suited to my needs, would you object?”

Kale turned to Kali. She shook
her head. His eyes returned to Ori. “I guess not. You’ll have to pay for it
yourself.”

“Of course!”

Kali touched Kale’s shoulder.
Turning, she returned to the living quarters. Ori dropped his pack on the floor
behind the counter and stepped around to the other side.

“I’ll start immediately.” The
blue drak stopped when he reached Kale. “You have every right to think I’m
working for Boss Steelhand, but I’m not. I just want to make an honest living.
You’ll see.”

“We’ll see.” Kale, still unsure
if he should trust anyone associated with the minotaur, nodded. “We’re not
planning to go anywhere today, so come and go as you need.”

He waited until Ori left the shop
and then joined Kali in the hearth room. She was cutting up dried meat and
vegetables and throwing them in a kettle suspended over the fire.

“What do you think?”

Kali laid down her knife. “I’m
not convinced he’s on the up-and-up, but if he is, this could be lucrative for
us.”

“I guess I’ll work on a better
lock for the basement door. Those books and stuff are probably worth a fortune
to the right people.” Kale didn’t want to risk Boss discovering what was under
the store, assuming the minotaur wasn’t already aware.

“Shout if you need anything.”

Kale returned to the storefront
to find Delilah waiting for him. He embraced his sister and shouted for Kali.

“I can’t stay long, Kale.”
Delilah nodded her greetings to Kali. “I wanted to see you before—”

“What’s going on?” Kali took
Kale’s arm in hers.

“It’s long and complicated.”
Delilah’s eyes narrowed as she gave them a sidelong glance. “I’m not sure I
understand it all myself. The short of it is: I’m heading west into the
mountains to search for a dragon.”

Kale’s jaw dropped. “A dragon?
What dragon?”

“The archduke’s court wizard,
Theros, thinks it’s one of the Firstborne. Pyraclannaseous. She’s his sister,
Kale.”

Kali scratched her head. “The
court wizard’s sister is a dragon?”

“No! Terrakaptis, the dragon who
lives in Drak-Anor. Pyraclannaseous is his sister.”

Kale rubbed the mark on his
chest. “I have to go with you.”

“You’re not leaving me behind!”
Kali squeezed his arm.

Delilah paced in circles as she
held her head. “Ugh, this is such a mess! The archduke wants me to find the
dragon and convince her and the giants to be friends. The archmage wants me to
find the dragon and convince her to kill the giants. The high wizards just want
me to bring back as much information as possible, not kill the giants, and
avoid the dragon.”

“Why you?” Kali held her hand out
and shrugged.

“Drak.” Delilah pointed at
herself. “Stripes.” She pointed outside. “Dragon.”

Kale understood. “They all think
because you’re a Child of Destiny, you can make nice with the dragon and solve
all their problems for them.”

“But you’re just a novice,
right?” Kali shook her head and glanced at Kale. “This is insane!”

“The humans believe it worse than
the draks around here do.” Kale chuckled. The absurdity of it all might be
funny if their quest weren’t so dangerous.

“The archmage made me his apprentice
officially so he can boss me around without the other masters interfering.”
Delilah threw her staff to the floor and stomped her foot. “We should have run
away with Pancras, Kale!”

“And that slayer would have
hauled you right back here”—Kale pulled his sister into a hug—“or killed you.”

Delilah pushed him away. “We
could have taken her.” She wiped her nose. “Life was easier when we were just
hexing oroqs and fighting off the dwarves.”

The door creaked open as Ori
returned, carrying a crate of supplies.

“Oh no.” Kale slapped his
forehead. “What are we going to do about Ori and Boss Steelhand?”

Delilah eyed the newcomer. “Who’s
this? Who’s Boss Steelhand?”

Kale explained the situation to
her, careful to avoid mentioning his concerns about the minotaur finding out
about the library on the stairs and the moon gate while Ori was in the room.

Ori grinned and bowed to Delilah.
He placed his crate on top of the counter and then took her clawed hand in his
and brought it to his lips. “What a vision! I am most honored to meet you. I
assume you’re Kale’s kin?”

Delilah scowled and snatched back
her hand. “He’s my brother.” She leaned in close to Ori, baring her teeth. “My
twin brother. Better wash those lips before the curse consumes you.”

Ori rubbed his mouth and then
laughed. “Oh, I like her. Curse? Because you’re hatched from the same egg,
right?” He stepped over to the door and held it open as a stream of draks
carried in crates and stacked them in front of the counter.

Kale rested his head on Kali’s shoulder as he glanced at his
sister. “Your complications are even more complicated now, Deli.”