The First Life of Tanan (16 page)

CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

Tanan was up early and heading for Yants Bay.  The road between Port Billen and Yants Bay was really just a wide path through the woods.  Once each year, a crew of men would walk the road and cut tree limbs and brush.  He reached a fork in the road late in the afternoon.  To the left was Sothport and to the right was Yants Bay.

At the junction, there was a large clearing that was commonly used as a campsite for travelers.  Tanan thought it would have been a smart place for someone to build an inn or a restaurant, but for one reason or another nobody had ever done it.  A small garrison of King’s Legion had set up camp in the clearing.  Tanan had no intention of camping near them, so he took the fork to the right and kept going toward Yants Bay.

He spent another night camping in the woods and arrived in Yants Bay early the next day.  The military presence wasn’t heavy, but the boat construction was going just as strong.  He spent an hour chatting up random locals.  The only thing people were talking about was the war effort.  People were convinced that the Lataki were a problem that had to be dealt with and the overwhelming opinion was that the world would be better once the Lataki were removed from it.

Tanan also learned that the use of magic had been completely banned on Komisan and ‘Abbot’ was a dirty word.  The former doctor in Yants Bay had been a little too outspoken with his opinion that magic, in and of itself, wasn’t a bad thing.  People who had been his patients for years hung him by the neck from a tree for that opinion.  The doctor’s entire family disappeared the next day and nobody was sure if they had just left town or if they were taking up space in a shallow grave.

One thing Tanan was sure of was that the people of Yants Bay had changed dramatically in the ten years since he had last visited the village with his father.

That night he booked a room in the local Inn.  He enjoyed a hot bath and a good meal before slipping into the comfortable bed.  It was probably unnecessary, but Tanan put up his protective bubble before he went to sleep.

•        •        •

From Yants Bay to Cosh’s Springs was a good three day trip over low mountains.  The eastern and western sides of Komisan were almost like two different countries.  The east side was more rural and often looked down on by the westerners, who thought of easterners as uncultured and uneducated.

The western half of the island was more developed and more densely populated.  Before the ramp up to war, the only regular travelers between the two halves of the island were merchants with ox carts full of food and other goods.  When Tanan had been a boy in Port Billen, he’d never heard of anyone from Port Billen traveling any farther west than Yants Bay.  The trip from Port Billen to the capitol city of Panna was a week’s journey on foot.

An ox cart stacked high with crates of vegetables, and driven by an obese man, overtook him a dozen miles west of Yants Bay.  The man offered to give Tanan a ride.  Tanan gladly accepted the offer and climbed up next to the man.

“Got to help the war effort!” the man exclaimed.  Tanan and his tired feet were grateful for the ride, regardless of the man’s reason for offering.

“Name’s Lodd,” the man said.  “What’s your name, son?”

“Lieutenant Howt,” Tanan lied.

“Glad for the company, Lieutenant.  This trip gets awfully boring, you know.”

The man was enamored by his own voice.  Tanan rarely had to interject more than the occasional, “yeah?” or “really!” to keep the man going.  This wouldn’t have been bad if not for the fact that Lodd was a disgusting man.  Tanan had never met anyone who farted as frequently and loudly as this man.

Every half hour or so, Lodd would dig into a box behind the seat and produce something to eat, usually chicken that had been fried in fat and wrapped in greasy paper.  Lodd offered to share and Tanan politely declined each time.

What Tanan couldn’t comprehend was, as disgusting as the man was, he bragged at length that he had a wife and six children in Cosh’s Springs on the West side of the mountains and another wife and three kids in Yants Bay.  He would spend a day or two with each family at each end of his route.  Tanan couldn’t imagine how this foul man had managed to attract even one wife, much less two of them.  The ox pulling the cart was more pleasant than Lodd.

They were moving faster on the cart than Tanan could walk and by midday they had reached a place where the road split off toward the mountain town of Istra.  When they reached the fork, Lodd stopped the cart and climbed down.  Tanan climbed off the cart too and turned around to see Lodd squatting, not a yard off the road, to deposit a generous portion of digested chicken into the grass.

Tanan retched at the sight.  It took all his will not to vomit.  Instead, he started down the road toward Istra, raising his hand to wave and calling back over his shoulder, “Thanks for the ride, Lodd!  Give my best to your wives!”

He jogged a quarter mile down the road toward Istra.  His grandfather had always told him, “It takes all kind of people to fill up the world.”  Tanan was pretty sure he had just met the foulest of those people.  The thought of Lodd squatting on the side of the road made him retch again.  Tanan didn’t want to risk running into Lodd again, so he decided to rest for an hour before walking back up to the main road.

CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

Tanan cut through the woods to get back on the main road toward Cosh’s Springs.  Several ox carts passed him, but he chose just to walk.  Sometimes solitude could be a good thing.

He crossed the summit of the mountain pass that evening and spent another night sleeping in the woods before continuing on to Cosh’s Springs the next morning.

As he got closer to town, the landscape changed.  The forest was replaced by wide expanses of rocky pastures full of cows and sheep.  Cosh’s Springs was a glorified wide spot in the road.  There were a few restaurants and taverns along the road and two streets crossed it.  There were several shops that dealt in leather goods and a large cattle yard at the edge of town.

Tanan stopped at a place called The Wretched Wench for an early lunch.  It was a dirty place, but the food was good and inexpensive.  He ordered a steak and it came smothered in beans, which was the local custom.

He listened to the conversations of the few other people in the tavern.  Most of the talk revolved around the cattle business, which was in the middle of a boom thanks to the war effort.  There was a huge demand for dried meat.  The Legion boys had to eat, and Cosh’s Springs was doing their best to supply them.  Like in the other towns he had visited, the people here supported the war and wanted nothing more than to see the Lataki wiped from the face of the earth.  The rhetoric in Cosh’s Springs bordered on fanatical.

Tanan left Cosh’s Springs and followed the road around Lake Larin.  The lake was to his left, and the right side of the road was a series of King’s Legion training camps.  As he got closer to the town of Larin, the amount of Legionnaires on the road skyrocketed.  He blended in well enough that nobody bothered him.

Larin looked like a brand new town.  There were taverns lining both sides of the road and a large King’s Legion building had been erected right in town.  The road was virtually swarming with soldiers, most of which looked like they should be sitting in a school room pulling pigtails instead of wearing military uniforms and carrying swords.  Tanan overheard much boasting about how many Lataki each boy would kill once they reached the mainland.

Tanan walked right through Larin.  From Larin to Panna was about a two hour walk, but there were plenty of shops and homes along the way.  As he got closer to Panna the buildings got closer and closer together until Tanan realized that the city had crept up around him.  He had never seen so many buildings so close together, and most of them were two levels.  None of the structures were as impressive as the tower at Jesera with its marble walls, but there was no contest when it came to sheer numbers of people.

The streets of Panna made no sense to Tanan.  They seemed to angle off in random directions.  He asked several times for directions to the Royal Palace.  He wondered what the people would think if they knew they were giving the infamous Tanan directions to the palace so he could kill their king.

CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

Tanan discovered that the street he’d followed into the city eventually crossed a very wide and straight avenue that would lead him straight to the front gates of the Royal Palace.

The Royal Palace was a wide building of grey stone, surrounded by expansive lawns.  There was an ornate iron gate blocking a wide cobblestone path that lead right up to the palace.  Tanan thought the palace was unimpressive.  As a boy, he had imagined the Royal Palace would be much grander.  This was oddly disappointing.

The gates were closed, but there was a smaller gate off to the left side of the main one.  A group of King’s Legion with shiny gold armor were stationed around the gate.  People were coming and going through that gate.  Some of them walked in completely ignoring the guards, but most were stopped and required to show papers before being allowed to pass.  Some were turned away.

Tanan loitered around across the street from the gate for half an hour watching people come and go.  He waited until a large group of King’s Legion approached the gate and slipped up behind them.  As he approached the gate he started gathering and compressing magical energy.

It was his turn at the gate.  “Lieutenant Howt to see the Commander.”

As the guard asked to see paperwork authorizing him to enter the palace grounds, Tanan unleashed a massive fireball on the second story of the building across the street.  Everyone, including him, jumped and turned to look at the spot where the explosion had just happened.

Another ball of flame exploded across the wide street, near another building.  There was instant chaos in the street.  Everyone at the gate crowded backward into the royal grounds and one of the guards slammed the gate shut.

Tanan sent another ball of fire twenty feet above himself, right on top of the guard tower.  Everyone scattered.  Tanan followed a group of King’s Legion that were running toward the palace, which was also in chaos.  When the group entered the palace, he broke away.

Tanan spotted a low ranking soldier and ran up to him, “Take me to the Legion Commander, right now!”

The soldier, who looked relieved to be given an order in the midst of the chaos said a quick, “Yes, Sir” and took off down a hallway with Tanan in tow.  When the young soldier stopped in front of a door and gestured, Tanan told him to go back and see if anyone needed help.  The soldier left at a run.

Tanan took a moment to catch his breath and then stepped through the door.  There were several people sitting at desks in the room.  One of them, a pretty red haired woman, looked up at him and said, “What can I do for you, Lieutenant?”

“I’m Lieutenant Howt.  I’ve just come from Port Billen with an urgent message for the Commander.”

“What’s the message?”

Tanan tried his best to look uncomfortable.  “I was ordered to deliver it only to the Commander.”  He shrugged.  “I don’t want to get into trouble.”

The woman stood up from her desk.  “Just a moment,” she said.  She walked to the back of the room, knocked lightly on a door and then leaned in.  After a moment she beckoned Tanan over.  “The Commander will see you,” she said.

Tanan walked into the room and the woman closed the door behind him.  He stood there looking at Commander Brakkas as the man shuffled through a pile of papers.

“I’m busy son,” said Brakkas without looking up.  “What’s your message?”

Tanan moved closer to the desk.  Brakkas looked up and turned as white as the paper in his hands.  Tanan held a finger up to his lips and whispered, “Don’t make a sound, Commander.”

Tanan sat in one of the chairs in front of Brakkas’ desk.  “I sent a message with you.  Did you deliver my message to your king?”

“I delivered your message.  He almost had me executed for it.”

Tanan leaned forward.  “It’s too bad your king didn’t take my warning seriously.”

Brakkas nodded his head nervously in agreement.

Tanan stood up.  “You and I are going to have a word with Dannap right now.  My name is Lieutenant Howt, and I have information from Port Billen that the king needs to hear immediately.  Do you understand?”

Brakkas said that he understood and started toward the door, looking like a condemned man.

“Commander,” said Tanan.  “Pull yourself together.  The lives of all the people in this building depend on you delivering me to your king without raising any alarms.  I believe that Dannap and I can find a solution to our problem, Commander.  Nobody needs to die today.”

Brakkas straightened himself up, squared his shoulders and said, “Follow me.”

Tanan followed Brakkas from the room, through the outer office and down a series of halls.  They came to a large set of doors.  There were guards on either side of the doors.  Brakkas addressed one of them, “Get Nim”.

One of the guards slipped through the doors and returned with a very short man a minute later.

“Nim,” said Brakkas, “I have urgent news for the King.”

Nim nodded and passed back through the doors.  Brakkas and Tanan followed the man into Dannap’s very large throne room.  He led them to a door at the far end of the room, behind the throne.

Brakkas motioned for Tanan to wait as Nim went through the door.  Several minutes later he returned and escorted them through the door, bowing slightly as they passed him.