Master Kelren groaned. His discomfort was noticed by one of the guards that Sergeant Cardan had been kind enough to provide him, but he raised a hand to silence any remark from the warrior. He didn’t need to stop. But his feet were sore. Kelren walked along the road that ran through the East Radregar forests and remembered the chaotic night of the hurricane.
He had led some of Cardan’s best and brightest into the hills near Velend’s Grove, a few lugging the crate of White-tongue poison. By the time they had dispersed the toxic stuff into the various caves, the rain had been coming down hard. Kelren had hoped the attack was going well as his troop hurried back across the hilltops. The rain and dark clouds had made it hard to see—they had stumbled right onto a handful of rebels, likely fleeing from town.
The skirmish had been quick. It had not been until after the worst of it that one of the men had fallen. The soldiers had returned to Kelren’s side to report that a crossbow had been fired upon them from a nearby hilltop. The next half-hour had been spent positioning for the right attack. The crossbow had been rendered useless by the angle of the wind when Kelren and his men had charged the second group of rebels.
“Good travels to you,” called a traveller, yanking Kelren from his reverie. The East Storm guards nodded to the passerby.
Kelren rubbed the small gash on his shoulder as he continued after the mercenaries. It had not been inflicted in that second attack either. The storm had grown worse and worse as Kelren and his soldiers had trekked circles around the hills, slipping in the mud and drenched to the bone. Velend’s Grove was built in the flatland though, where the wind had picked up fiercely. One man had broken an arm in a fall—most others had been battered and bruised by every piece of loose debris that was yanked up from the village by the force of the typhoon. It had been a scrap of wood that had grazed Kelren’s shoulder. Even now, the wound was nearly healed by Kelren’s own focus, though he was too weary from the road to work on it now.
“So, the rebels are broken?” asked one of the mercenaries that escorted Kelren along the road.
They would reach Eastpoint in the morning, no doubt. One more night in the woods, Kelren though. “Scouts reported they were fleeing north and west,” Kelren told his escort. “Some are even coming back to the town seeking a return to their homes and the peace they knew before.”
“Will they get peace?” asked another of the guards. “Why were they rebelling in the first place?”
“The Councillors that vie for control of Eastpoint’s districts often lose sight of the needs of their citizens,” Kelren offered. “But those that intend to work hard once more should be allowed to return to Velend’s Grove unharmed.”
The trek continued. Kelren thought about the news that had followed in the wake of the hurricane. Relis had sent a letter—it had been teleported direct from Saanazar, where Relis and Eltha had sought news of the Isle of Dusk. They had reported to Kelren once the storm allowed it: there had been an attack on the Isle of Dusk. The sorcerer that commanded the pirate fleets had killed many magicians and had forced many more to flee.
Despite this, just days before Kelren decided to return to Eastpoint, the spell chime in Kelren’s tent had activated once more, shining its subtle green light against the metal plate that braced the stone. This meant that someone was on the Isle of Dusk and had signalled it was safe. Kelren worried though—surely a sorcerer of such power would know what it meant and could use it as a trap.
Kelren was half done drafting a letter to Ma’relle, at her inland lodge. Ma’relle would know what the loss of the Isle meant for their operations. She might even know who was behind it. Ma’relle was very well connected, despite her rural headquarters. It was hard working with ink while hunched by a campfire, so Kelren would likely finish his correspondence once he reached his office in Eastpoint again.
Kelren’s loyalty laid with the East Storm Company, but the future of Eastpoint itself was of equal importance to Kelren. He watched the setting sun as they continued along the road and wondered what was going on beyond the vicinity of his city.