Westhaven by Rowan Erlking (ebook audio reader .txt) 📖

saw him also. And when they reached the open circular center where the driver let them out, the general led his woman and child servant into the decorated plaza as graciously as the Sky Lord would have done himself. Everyone parted for them.

“Welcome!” The mayor of Barnid lifted an arm for a hug. Undoubtedly it was a sneaky gesture to allow him to brush across the general’s face and steal a thought. He rushed at the general with the full intention to do so, but the general merely nodded with a smile, not extending his arms to receive him.

“Thank you for the invitation.” Gailert also bowed to the mayor’s wife.

Opening his arms wider, the mayor said, “Will you not give me a celebratory hug?”

Bowing once more, his eye steady on the mayor, Gailert replied, “A general does not expose his back to hands he cannot see.”

Freezing, the mayor lowered his arms. “Not even in the light of celebration?”

His smile spreading, Gailert shook his head. “A general must never have his guard down—especially during a celebration. I hope you understand.”

Forming a disgruntled frown, the mayor nodded. “Of course. Your reputation for being an exemplary general is, as always, well grounded in practice.”

But he turned from the general like a sullen child, annoyed entirely that his fun had been ruined.

It wasn’t the last time someone tried to sneak a taste into the general’s thoughts. Perhaps during the entire evening only one blue-eye managed to get in a touch. But the thoughts that came at him were fierce with a shouting command to stay out. That blue-eyed Sky Child staggered away, trembling.

Most of the evening consisted of music, dancing under the lights, and a great deal of gaiety—with games for the children, and gambling for the adults. The general’s young boy ran back to him in the middle of the games sobbing and clutching the general’s side as the young blue-eyed children chased after him. They stopped when they saw the general, backing up almost immediately.

“What is it?” Gailert asked, patting the crying boy’s head. “It was only a game.”

“They were telling me scary things! Make them go away!” The boy clutched the general’s pant leg tighter.

Sighing, Gailert pulled the boy from his leg and said, “Alright. Why don’t you go to the automobile and sit in it while we are here?”

“Can I go home?” The boy whimpered.

“No!” the general snapped. It was irritating to be contradicted by this boy too. Gailert half reached up to slap him. “Go to the car. They won’t leave you alone if you walk back by yourself.”

Nodding, the boy looked to the left and then the right before running towards where they had parked their auto. The local boys chased after him, but his human servant really was faster than they were. The child was soon hopping to the doors and yanking them open. When he climbed inside he slammed the door and locked it, making a face at the Sky Children boys his age.

There was something in that which made Gailert blink. The move was so childish and yet it reminded him of how his first boy never fought back. It was strange thinking of that scoundrel after a month of his complete absence, especially after not hearing one word of him being sighted, though someone claimed to have found a footman’s vest and a pair of leather shoes on the shores of Holm Lake. But cast off clothes was not proof that the boy was alive on the run and not a demon’s nest.

He then blinked. His eyes focused on a cloaked figure standing in the shadows behind his automobile on the skirts of the party. Glittering blue eyes stared back at them, watching the dancing and frivolity with a brooding posture. Gailert rose, but it was too late.

A ghost white man leapt high over the vehicle with a sword in his clenched grip slashing at the children that pounded on the door where the general’s boy was hiding. The children fell. Screams erupted throughout the square. The demon sprang into the crowd, his bloody blade high.

Gailert felt his side for his pistol. But it wasn’t there. Foolishly, he hadn’t put it on that evening.

He looked over to his automobile where his driver lay slashed on the ground as the white demon continued his slaughter. The demon aimed for any and every Sky Child within the reach of his sword. The driver’s sidearm, Gailert could see, was still in its holster.

Gailert rose, getting out of the way of the white-faced blue-eyed man that hacked at the Sky Children in the plaza. It killed a woman with a slice across her chest, a man with a stab to his gut, and went for the throats of several Sky Children around him as they fled. As pandemonium broke loose, the people screaming and scrambling over tables, under tables, and knocking down chairs and others as they fled from this demon, the white-skinned creature jumped, slaughtering every blue-eyed person with in his reach.

It didn’t even look at him.

Three cracks from the gun in Gailert’s hand echoed over the plaza.

A woman screamed.

But there in the center, the white-faced demon dropped.

“Stay away from it!” Gailert shouted as the people gathered to look more closely at the monster that had attacked them. “It will grab any one of you and try to suck you dry.”

They all backed up. The crowd watched the general march from his auto. His pistol was still aimed at the killer.

“Is it a diseased Sky Child?” The mayor ran over to the general, bleeding from a shallow cut.

Shaking his head, Gailert pulled the trigger again, putting another hole into the demon’s chest to make sure it was dead. “No. It is a Cordril.”

The crowd of Sky Children drew in a breath.

Lifting his head, the general nodded with one eye on the demon’s face. Unfortunately, it wasn’t one of the three he had seen before. That meant, there were many more than just these. He said, “That is right. A descendant of Cordril. A real live demon bent on killing us. Not a ghost.”

“How did it get into the city?” someone called out.

“I don’t know,” Gailert said, turning. He marched back to his automobile. “But I am going to find out.”

He gestured for the boy to unlock the door. As soon as the boy did, the general opened it and grabbed the child by his vest collar, dragging him out.

“Come on. You got your wish. We’re going home.”

*

“Since you can’t go home,” Kleston said as he sat next to Key on the stoop of the washer’s shop watching her scrub the linens for an aristocratic family uptown, “and that blue-eye is looking for you, I was thinking that you ought to take up another trade here in Herra. How’d you like to be a tanner?”

Blinking, Key shrugged.

Kleston pulled a tanner’s cap onto Key’s head, which was leather with a flap on the back to cover his neck. “This will solve your hair problem, though I think we ought to cut it short to make sure it doesn’t poke out.”

Shrugging again, Key stroked the dagger in his pocket. He wondered if he would have the courage to actually kill General Winstrong when it came to it. Whenever he closed his eyes to picture it, he always saw the general standing over him with that hot poker to his chest, ready to ram it though. His breath caught in his lungs, making it hard to breathe. He wasn’t so sure that if he saw the general again he wouldn’t freeze.

“You are not really for that, are you?” Kleston said.

Key shook his head. “I wanted to be a smith.”

Kleston laughed. “Well, we don’t have as qualified teachers as your father and grandfather. They were the last of the great swordsmiths. The art is dead.”

Blinking, Key just shrugged. “I guess so.”

He then took out the dagger and turned it in his hands

Kleston pointed to it. “That there is a valuable artifact. You had better keep it safe. It is the last of your father’s weapons.”

Shaking his head, Key said, “No. The last of my father’s swords hangs in General Winstrong’s study in Roan. It wasn’t even finished.”

The leader of the band in Herra stared at him.

“I made this,” Key said, holding it up. “It was supposed to be the first of many swords and daggers I was to make.”

Taking the dagger from him, Kleston pulled it from the scabbard to inspect it. He then looked to the boy again. “Are you sure you made this?”

Nodding, Key reached out for it. “It was my first dagger. Grandpa said it was a piece of art, but I think he was just being nice.”

Kleston shook his head slowly. “No…he was not just being nice.”

Key stretched for the dagger, motioning with his fingers. “Can I have it back?”

“Can you make any other weapons?” Kleston asked, still looking at it.

Annoyed, Key huffed. “Yeah. Arrowheads are easy. I’ve been casting them since I was six. Grandpa taught me knives and that, but he said swords take longer.”

Nodding to himself now, Kleston handed the dagger back, thinking hard. Key hastily sheathed it then stuffed it back into his pocket.

“You can’t smith here in town,” Kleston murmured, mostly to himself. “I have no doubt that general would have his soldiers looking in smithy shops for you if he thinks you are still inclined that way. But I know a place where we can bring you iron ore and other ores. Can you smelt?”

Key emitted a small laugh. “First lesson. Dad was particular too. But it’s been a while.”

Nodding hard, Kleston rose up. “Alright then. I’ll take you there. If you can make the weapons, we can do the rest.”

“Does this mean the raiders are back?” Key rose up also.

With a tilt of his head, giving a half-shrug, Kleston said, “Ah, possibly. It depends on the weapons and whom I can contact. But, yeah, this might be the beginning of another uprising.”

Chapter Eleven: Acceptance

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Three days after the Emergence Celebration, Kleston took Key into the Herra Hills where he had allies. They hiked where there was no path or marking, through birch and oaks so thick and overgrown that Key could hardly tell the way they had come. Yet somehow Kleston seemed to know every tree. They did not stop until the sun was past its high point. There, they overlooked a hollow from the top of a hill.

“Here we go.” Kelston led the way down.

Even before they got halfway down, a man dressed in brown colors stepped out from a thicket, stopping them. Kleston nodded then greeted the man without a word. He shook his hand in a peculiar way. Just as quietly, the man beckoned to two others in even more forest-colored clothes who wordlessly greeted Kleston with nods.

Then Kleston gestured to Key. “He’s coming with me.”

They gave him hard looks, all of them suspiciously peering at Key’s face. One said, “Another outsider? He could be a spy. You know they take boys young and train them to—”

“He’s not one of those.” Kleston’s voice bordered on bite. “I thoroughly checked him out. Besides, he could be useful to us. He’s the son of a smithy. His name is Key.”

Key noticed that Kleston had not