“There’s citizens too,” Lerela said, jogging up to the travellers with clinking armour. The rolling beige fields of the savanna had given way to copses of trees and scattered swamps, but the denser vegetation did not hide the troop that was approaching Aralim’s companionship from the west.
“Citizens, marching at such a pace?” Grendar questioned.
Lerela wiped her brow, though her dirt-caked hands left a grimy streak in lieu of her sweat. “Workers, from the look.”
The Crimson Highwaymen overtook Aralim and his friends just after midday. Guarding or leading the civilians were nearly a dozen warriors of the red badge, and one horseman. The rider moved at the front of his group and as they neared Aralim—who considered absently if they ought to have hidden from the Highwaymen after taking the lives of Mulio and his henchmen, some three week’s walk ago—and the commander raised a fist to halt his procession.
Aralim stopped walking and leaned on his lantern staff as his guards positioned themselves in protective, but nonthreatening ways.
“Afternoon, travellers,” the horseman called. He was a broad-shouldered man with a small gut and a crooked, thrice-broken nose. “I’m certain you don’t mind presenting your red coin, for walking on these stones?”
“Of course.” Aralim palmed it and slid it out into the open. He didn’t pass it to any of them, of course.
With a beckon from their commander, one of the Highwaymen stepped past Yovin and Carrak toward Grendar and Aralim. The bearded fellow snivelled, peered at the coin, and then returned to his own ranks with a nod to his leader. “Excellent,” declared the rider. “We’re stopping soon for an early camp. Our supplies require some hunting and such, as it were. Will you and your companions join me for a meal? It’s not a requirement.”
Aralim glanced at a grimacing Dullah and Devran, and smiled up to the Highwayman commander. “A meal with a new face is always welcome,” he said, loudly.
The mounted man replied with a nod. The sun made it hard to gauge the tone of his hair between grey and brown, but he didn’t seem like an older man. “I will enjoy the company. I’m Ellas of the Blood Sky, and these are my men,” he declared. “And some laborers—we’re bound for a stretch of road just past the Crossroads where some repairs are needed.”
“Aralim, Walker of the Path. And this is my company. We’re bound for Tal’lashar.”
Ellas nodded. “Long way yet,” said he, waving his arm to the north-east, where the afternoon sun cast the trees in gold and red. “We’ve a few hours left today, I’m sure, before camp.”
“Indeed,” Aralim said, bowing at the waist. The two groups awkwardly began to move at once, before determining who would go ahead and who would take the rear. In the end, they merged together, with Aralim and his guards between Crimson-men and civilian labourers.
By the time the Highwaymen’s camp was built, Aralim and his friends had shared a dozen stories with the workers. In general, there was a weight upon these people. Their clothes were dirty and their hands calloused, but their spirits seemed laden too, somehow. One small boy, lacking any signs of toil, sat on his father’s knee as the campfire was kindled. From their stories, Aralim and his friends learned that they were already underway on their journey. Their packs were not just travelling and work supplies, but any possessions they needed to transport to their destination.
While Aralim had remained quiet for most of the campfire conversation, Dullah had responded to one or two questions and was now peppered with them. When asked where Aralim and his group were from, she looked to him for approval, raising her sharp eyebrows quizzically. Aralim gave her a nod and she answered a young man’s question, “We’re from Numa’nakres, from the capital city of Rema,” she replied, smiling. “My friend Aralim is the ambassador from there.”
“Ah…” The young man’s face lit up with understanding. “So that’s why you can afford such a long passage.”
Aralim smiled. “Yes, though I can say it’s one of the first times in my life that I’ve been able to pay for any sort of passage.”
“I paid for my wife’s passage,” the man explained. “Save for a while to afford it. I will take a month or two out here before I can head toward Tal’lashar and join her, but it’s worth it.”
Given the treatment Aralim had received from Mulio, he was a little surprised to hear a good comment about the Highwaymen’s system. Dullah told the man they were also heading that way, while Aralim remained deep in thought. He watched the flickering flames and thought of how far he had come and how different these traditions were.
The troop boiled a thick stew over their fires and soon everyone was slurping up vegetables and meaty broth. After a few moments, someone at one of the Crimson Highwaymen’s fires waved toward Aralim and his friends. It was Ellas. The commander sat alone at a fire, while his men crowded another. “Aralim!” he called.
As Aralim approached, he grabbed a brass cup from beside his fire and poured wine into it for the Walker. He had already been drinking from another; when Aralim accepted the second glass the Highwayman clanged his against it. Then Ellas took a sip of his, savoured it, and said, “I used to volunteer for missions like these, believe it or not, heading along the road for maintenance. Now it’s all I can do not to spend the whole journey stinking drunk or bored out of my mind. Will you tell me a story, from your travels?”
“I don’t know if you will believe me,” Aralim said, looking at the wine in his glass. He smiled back to Ellas. The man’s wide face and brown beard caught the firelight like the moon.
“All the better,” Ellas replied, smiling.
“To start,” began Aralim, “I became a Walker of the Path because I am the sole survivor of my hometown.” Ellas blinked and sipped his wine again, as Aralim explained his early adventures on the Path. He stayed in town after town, learning from the highborn lords and watching for those who knew much of the Path, those in castles and those in the low streets. “And finally, I came upon Lantern Town. Perhaps you’ve heard of it? I believe it’s on some of the maps in this land.”
“I’ve not,” Ellas muttered. “Why’s it called Lantern Town?”
“It’s the last town traveling north that believes in the Path. Lanterns like mine line every doorway. It must be quite a sight to travellers.”
Ellas swallowed another mouthful. “Good name, I suppose. Carry on,” he told Aralim.
“Lantern Town is where I met a young homeless girl named Miresh. She sought me out, and asked to join me on my pilgrimage to the Orrish. She had no family, so I agreed. To my surprise, she had a vision not long after.” Ellas only tilted his head at that comment, as though gauging how entertained he should be by something he was skeptical of. Aralim brushed it aside and continued his story, including their choice to prioritize Miresh’s training over exploring the Orrish, the companions that had come and gone as they completed their journey, and what he had learned of the Path on the way. He left out the details of Miresh’s visions and his specific position in the Three Courts. “Finally, we reached Rema. We learned that we had to pass through two lower courts in order to meet the Emperor. But we succeeded through various means.”
“That sounds more complex than even the Highwaymen’s ranks,” Ellas drawled. He rolled his eyes and poured more wine into his glass.
Aralim blinked. “I wouldn’t know enough to compare. You said you were of a clan, but I don’t know what that implies.”
“The Crimson Highway is run by a brotherhood,” said Ellas, smiling. “We forsake our own family to join it, though most of us never knew a family we might regret losing. Our ranks are divided into families. This knits our loyalties tighter, in theory, but also makes the distinctions between ranks clearer.”
Delighted, Aralim leaned forward, peering over the fire at his fellow traveller. “Are the families themselves hierarchical? Or are they based on other attributes?”
“There’s no governance-enforced hierarchy, but the families share a lot of renown with one another. Stories,” Ellas said, grinning and waving at the fire between the two of them. “We either respect those we know are above us, or we in-fight. There’s a fair of bit of it, to be honest. The Blood Sun, the highest of the families, works differently, I think. No one really knows for sure.”
“The same happens in Numa. How does the Blood Sun function differently than the others?”
Ellas sipped more wine, excitedly. His syllables were beginning to slur together a little, and the crackling fire made it hard to comprehend. “Only a few of the Blood Sun have ever spoken to the other families. The governance of the Highway is handled by the second family, not the first. No one even knows who is in charge of this ungainly beast.” He takes a big drink of his wine and then gave Aralim a sly wink. “But you didn’t hear it from me.”
“That’s interesting. So you all, what, pay tribute in hopes of joining this mystery family?” Aralim asked. He took one of his rare sips from the copper cup. It was good wine, he had to admit.
“No tribute, really. We follow their orders because they work. Highwaymen are proud of our order, our might, our influence. To become part of the Blood Sun would be the greatest honour… and the greatest fun.” Ellas boomed, spreading his arms and splashing wine into the grass.
Aralim smirked. “More fun than drinking with strangers? You never know who you could meet on the road.” He turned to spot the Aura standing within earshot, but separate from any of the fires. Though it seemed Ellas could handle his own, from such years of drinking, he was looking into the fire with a rosy expression on his face and watery eyes. The Highwayman must have been drinking on the road as well. “You said you used to volunteer for these duties. What’s changed?”
But Ellas kept staring into the fire and said absently, “You don’t know fun until you’ve seen the Stronghold of the Sun.”
“You’ve seen it? You made it sound quite elusive.”
Ellas started and blinked at the Walker. “I—I shouldn’t say.”
Aralim knew he could get more than that. “I’m only curious as the Path is drawn to people and places of greatness. It’s how we grow into our own strength, by admiring that of others.”
“Your Path led you here, not to Rema… That is interesting.” Ellas sipped his wine and then shrugged. He shifted his little wooden stool closer to Aralim and leaned close. “Very well—it’s a damned good story. I have been there, it’s true. I was blindfolded and led for days, but I was there. I saw the Stronghold from outside only once, a castle larger than anything I have ever looked upon, built amidst hills, on a slope so tall they the sunlight can last thirteen hours! And then I was blindfolded again, and brought inside.”
“What brought you there? Are you soon to join their ranks?”
Ellas nodded and lifted the wineskin once more. He poured more in his own cup, and without really looking into Aralim’s, he poured some for his story-telling friend. Wine spilled onto Aralim’s thumb, and then into the dirt under his folded legs. “There is always a short list, and they taunt us with a visit. Probably to meet those on the list, or to make sure our competition is fierce.”
“Is that why you continue volunteering for this sort of duty despite your lost enthusiasm?” Aralim asked, after taking a small sip to settle the beverage under the rim of the copper vessel.
“It demonstrates I do the hard work on the ground as well as the more ambitious postings, but the real reason was to speak with Sergeant Kieb in Maga. I suspected he is also on the shortlist, but now I am certain. It’s no matter, he’s stationed five hundred miles from anywhere useful.”
“It sounds like you have this well planned,” Aralim said. Abruptly, the interlude of silence between words seemed uncomfortable, and it was dawning on Ellas that he had said too much. One of his men was looking this way, and he sat up straight again, glaring back before returning his expression to Aralim’s. “Thank you for the wine, and the company, friend.”
Ellas nodded and set down his brass cup. “We’ll be moving at first light. Pardon the early rise.”
“We have many miles left, so it’s for the best,” Aralim said, and took one last sip of the drink.