Mighty Hammer Down (30 page)

"So what do we do for cover beyond the
town?"

"I hadn’t really thought that far
ahead. I suppose we can cut across the land between roads in
places, but that is not going to make traveling very easy. I think
at that point we will be far enough away from the Mages that we can
start using the roads again."

"But aren’t there Mages in places
besides Brinn?"

"Of course there are, but do you think
they all know what happened back there? I don’t think word spreads
so fast. Besides, they’d have to know who I was in order to attack
us again. I am not that famous of a person."

She finished chewing before she asked
another question. "How close do you think we are to Vindyrion? This
isn’t exactly the way I came."

"Well I have never been that far east,
but the edge of these woods is where the plains begin, so it won’t
be long until we reach your land. Of course, we have quite a ways
to go north if we are going to end up in Reyth."

"Is Reyth still where you want to go?
Have you had any more dreams?"

"I have had a few dreams, but not
about Reyth." He immediately put food in his mouth and she assumed
he did not want to tell her about his recent dreams.

"Well what did you dream about?" she
asked, unable to resist.

He was quiet for a moment, but then
answered. "It’s nothing. I just had a dream about
Mirra."

She put a hand on his arm in an
attempt to comfort him. "I’m sorry Rommus. I didn’t mean to be
rude."

"It’s all right. I don’t consider that
rude. It was just a dream. I guess it’s just my mind dealing with
the fact that I miss her. I spend all my waking hours trying to
forget her, but it seems that I have a little less control when I
am asleep."

"That’s normal Rommus. It is not easy
to forget the people who have helped to shape our lives. Sometimes
it has to be done, but there is no easy way."

"It makes me wonder though," he said,
looking off into the distance. "Has anyone ever had to go through
such pain to forget about me? It seems like forgetting Rommus
Tirinius is an easy thing to do."

"I don’t think I would have an easy
time forgetting you Rommus."

"But you barely know me. We only just
met. I am not the person you think I am. I am trapped alone in a
world of gloom. My whole life is just a void. I look to the future
and see blackness, so I try to find comfort in the past. But I see
nothing but blackness there too."

She took her hand from his arm, not
knowing what to say. She watched as he continued to stare out at
nothing. Eventually she felt she had to say something. "I can see
it Rommus. I see that you have a darkness inside you. I don’t hold
it against you; I think it makes you who you are. Your struggles
have made you into the man you are. And you’re a good man; anyone
can see that."

"I am not trying to impress the world
by being a good man. I just wish the world wasn’t so comfortable
being so cold to me. I don’t know what I did to deserve
it."

"Maybe it’s everyone else who has the
problem Rommus, not you."

He finally turned to her and looked
her in the eyes. "I find that very unlikely. How could everyone
change almost overnight and dislike me? I must have done something
to change their view of me."

"Well if it bothers you, you can
always change something. Be more outgoing. Make new
friends."

He sighed. "We have been over this. I
will not convince people to like me. Maybe the change I need is
just to get away. Maybe getting out of Medora for a while is the
best thing for me."

"Well if that’s your plan, we are
already making it happen. And even if all those people don’t like
you, I still do."

"Thanks. We’ll see how you feel when
you find out more about me."

His comment made her feel sorry for
him and guilty at the same time. She wondered what he would do if
he ever found out that she was the one who tried to kill his
father. She wished that none of it had ever happened, but if she
had never come to Medora, she would never have met Rommus. She
wondered how Tachion could deal with arranging every event to make
things go according to plan. She could barely keep track of her own
agenda, let alone the actions of every living being. She shook her
head as she thought that being the god of time must be complicated
beyond measure.

He spoke and interrupted her thoughts.
"We’ll be in the town of Peorum in about an hour. We can buy
supplies there. Let’s get moving."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Peorum was a small town, not nearly
the size of Brinn or Taburdum. Most of it was made of wood,
although there were still plenty of marble buildings speckling the
town. None of the buildings were very large, and only a few were
more than one story tall. Still, it was clean and well organized,
with cobblestone streets crisscrossing between the buildings. Many
of them appeared to be inns, and Alana assumed that it was because
Peorum was a town built for travelers.

They weaved through the streets
looking for the shops where they could buy the items they needed.
Rommus had already found a place to purchase food for travel, and
he bought enough to last them a while. He was also able to buy
larger water skins there. They stopped and ate again, wanting to be
full before they left Peorum. It would probably be the last hot
meal they had for a while.

"Over there," Rommus said. "That looks
like a place that sells clothing. Let’s go in there."

They dodged the people on the street
and waited for horses to pass as they made their way to the shop.
The man inside looked to be a friendly fellow, and greeted them
right away.

"Good day to you sir and madam. What
can I do for you?"

"Hello," Rommus said. "Do you happen
to have any capes of black fabric?"

The man frowned and cocked his head.
"Black fabric? No, I have no black fabric. This is Medora, my
boy."

"I know we’re in Medora. I am
traveling into Vindyrion and I don’t want to stand out with a
bright color. What is the darkest color cape you have?"

The man grabbed his chin and looked to
the ceiling. "Well, if my memory serves me right, and it usually
does, I have some darker purple in the back somewhere. Let me go
look." The man turned and disappeared through a doorway.

"Rommus, you can always wait until we
get to Vindyrion to get one in black. You said we weren’t that
far."

"I know that, but the nights are
getting cooler now, and I think we should both have something to
cover up with. Besides, I can’t have this sword gleaming in the sun
and attracting the wrong attention. I don’t want to risk having
Mages recognize it."

"Yeah I guess you’re right. And you’re
right about the cold. My shirt doesn’t even have
sleeves."

"We’ll get you a new one then. We both
will."

The man reappeared with a smile on his
face, carrying an armful of capes. "You’re a tall one, which one of
these is the best fit?"

Rommus held up a few of the capes
until he found the proper size. "This one will do. I need one for
the lady too, in whatever color she likes. We both need
long-sleeved shirts as well. I’ll take something in dark red if you
have it in my size."

"Of course my Lord. And what colors
does the lady like?"

Alana looked around her at all the
fabric in the shop. "Wow, you have so many beautiful colors. I
don’t know what to pick." She ran her hand over some fabric on a
nearby shelf. "I guess I will go with a dark blue for both. I am
fond of blue." The man bowed his head to her and disappeared
again.

"This is a lot nicer than what I was
picturing," Rommus said. "I was thinking something less
elegant."

"Elegant? That’s just an ordinary
cape. It doesn’t even have a different color lining or anything.
Just because it’s made of fine fabric doesn’t make it
elegant."

He rolled the dark purple fabric
between his fingers. "I guess you’re right. I’m just not really a
person to wear capes."

The shopkeeper appeared again with
several items for Alana to look at. She chose a cape that was
reversible, one side being a deep blue satin, and the other a
heavier cloth of lighter blue. It was hemmed in gold and looked
like something that royalty would wear. For her shirt, she chose
something simpler, and in fact it was pretty much the same shirt
she had on, except it had long sleeves.

"Is this shirt big enough for you, my
Lord?" the shopkeeper asked as he handed a dark red shirt to
Rommus.

Rommus held it to his chest. "I think
so. We also need some kind of travel pack. Do you sell those
here?"

"Yes my Lord, they are over in that
corner."

Rommus went and found a suitable pack
and brought everything to the counter and paid for it. They said
farewell to the happy shopkeeper and left the building. When they
came out into the sunlight, their breath caught in their throats. A
Mage stood against a wall across the street. He was facing them,
but he did not pay them any particular attention. Rommus nudged
Alana in the direction he wanted her to go and she
obeyed.

"Do you think he saw us?" she asked as
they rounded a corner.

"I don’t know. You can never see their
eyes under those big hoods they wear, and they always seem to be
standing in the shadows. But he didn’t react at all when we came
out of the shop, so he probably does not know who we
are."

"What about the sword? Did he see
it?"

"I don’t think so. I was careful to
cover it when I saw him. Let’s get these capes on so that we can
throw him off if he is following us. He won’t be looking for people
in capes."

Rommus put on the small travel pack
and they both put on their capes. They looked in all directions and
then cut through some alleys before emerging at another line of
shops on a different street. Their attention was immediately drawn
to a rather loud man in a white robe in the center of the street,
surrounded by people.

"Who is that man?" Alana
asked.

"I don’t know his name, but he is a
Noble."

"You mean he is royalty?"

“
No, we use the word
differently than you do. We don’t have royalty here, although an
Emperor is sort of like a King. In Vindyrion your Nobles are more
like an upper class of people that have royal blood. Here,
Nobles
¾
or Noblemen
¾
are part of the
Empire. They don’t rule anything, but they are part of the
process."

"I thought the Emperor was the sole
ruler of the Medorans."

"He is. But he believes in listening
to the people he rules. He can’t make time to speak with every
Medoran, so he speaks to the Nobles," Rommus said as he backed up
against a wall in the shadows, pulling her with him.

"So how is speaking with these Nobles
like speaking to the people?"

"Well, the people choose who the
Nobles are. Every two years, the people from different areas decide
who best represents them. Of course, it doesn’t happen everywhere
at the same time. Some places choose their Nobles one year, and
other places choose them the next year. This keeps things from
changing too drastically."

"I see," she said. "The Nobles in
Vindyrion are all gone now. There is no one left in the royal
family except the King and Queen, his sister and his niece. It’s
quite a problem for the King, and it’s all anyone talks about these
days."

"Well can’t the King just choose a
successor? That’s what would happen here if the Emperor didn’t have
a son. He would just choose a new Emperor that he felt was worthy
to replace him."

"I don’t know. I don’t think that has
ever been done. I am not sure that the Vindyri would support
someone without royal blood."

"That’s ridiculous. Blood does not
make you a ruler. It takes knowledge and wisdom, it’s not a
birthright."

She frowned up at him. "But isn’t the
Emperor’s son to become Emperor?"

"Yes, he is. When the Emperor dies,
Uritus will take his place. But the Nobles have ways of removing
Emperors who are unfit to rule."

"How do they do that?"

"I don’t know. I have never seen them
do it. In fact I don’t remember ever seeing them do anything more
than fight with each other."

They listened as the man’s loud voice
overpowered their own. "You see, good people of Medora, that the
Emperor has once again abused his authority and put us all at risk.
His desire for power will drain our economy and tax the Legions
beyond their limits, leaving us unprotected. We must do what we can
to stop this war with the Bhoors. They are a good people and we
cannot let the actions of a few condemn the entire
group."

A man on the street yelled a response.
"But the Bhoors are attacking the Vindyri. How can we allow that to
happen to our neighbors to the east?"