Chapter 29

  The weather had turned bitterly cold, and Titus was thankful for the coat Snow had bought him. He wrapped it tightly around his body as he rode through the night alone, headed towards the next village and what he hoped would be a cheap bed.

  He also hoped that the people he would find there had not yet heard of what happened in Bellane three nights ago. How one inn was smashed in by a violent magician, and how the second one burned to the ground.

  The long ride had given Titus plenty of time to mull over everything that had happened twenty times over, and he was sure of it now, all of it was Kern’s doing.

  On that night, when Titus had eventually pulled himself from the hearth fire to make his way back to his room, he had stopped by Kern’s door. At first, he had half a mind to call the man out on his desire to whip up drama, but then Titus heard more than one voice beyond the thin pine door. Kern was speaking with someone in low tones and Titus put his ear to the crack to see if he could understand it.

  “Do you understand me?” Kern’s voice rose a little. “Waldron is dead. I might have been able to deal with Axl alone, but this Titus feels like trouble. It’s going to take time.”

  Titus didn’t waste a moment and went to Axl’s door. He rushed in and forgot about the man’s tender arms as he shook him awake from his bed.

  “Axl! Get up!” Titus shook him until he got a snarl more befitting a dragon than a wounded soldier.

  “What in the blazes…,” Axl’s voice was pained and angry in the dark, but Titus didn’t relent.

  “Kern. He’s in his room talking to someone. It sounds like he means to kill us. He’s a traitor. Get up and listen!”

  “Are you insane?” Axl groaned, but Titus could feel the captain getting up and stepped back towards the doorway and into the corridor’s dim candlelight.

  “Come and listen for yourself,” Titus urged as he tried to keep his voice down.

  Axl groaned more and brought a hand to the doorframe to steady himself. His tired face was visible now and he gave Titus an irritated, ‘this better be good’ look before he stepped closer to Kern’s door and gave a careful listen.

  Titus was silent as he did so. He feared that somehow Axl wouldn’t hear anything, and that Kern would only have more ammunition to call Titus a troublemaker or worse. But as Titus watched, Axl’s brow furrowed in concentration. Titus stepped closer to listen as well, but Axl raised a hand to stop him from taking another step.

  When Axl pulled his ear back from the door, Titus hoped he meant to kick it in and catch whoever it was in the act. There was some conspiracy going on, Titus was sure of it.

  Instead, Axl wrapped on the door loudly and then called Kern’s name. Titus let out a frustrated breath at the sight. Axl was letting Kern have the time to cover everything up – whatever that was.

  When Kern opened the door, he was rubbing his eyes as if the man had just been asleep with the room black as night behind him.

  “What’s going on?” he said in the same irritated and pained voice Axl had just given to Titus upon waking.

  Axl took a candelabra from the corridor wall and pushed his way into Kern’s room with it. Kern stepped back with a confused look before he noticed Titus behind him. Kern gave Titus a bitter scowl before he looked back to Axl scanning the small room from top to bottom.

  “Someone going to explain to me what the fuck you’re doing?”

  “We’re looking for the man you were speaking to just now,” Axl said it bluntly as he bent down and lit the dark area beneath the cot.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “What?”

  “You were reporting to someone,” Titus said as he followed Axl’s lead.

  “Reporting to who?” Kern put on a look of sheer confusion.

  “Weren’t you just speaking with someone?” Axl asked as he came to the narrow window and opened it to the night. He looked out into the darkness for any shape that might be human but saw none.

  “I was asleep. It must have been some dream you heard. I sometimes talk in my sleep,” Kern offered as an excuse.

  Axl looked back at him with suspicion. Titus looked at him as if he were nothing but a liar.

  Kern scowled at their hesitation to accept the answer. “You can plainly see no one is here. Now, I’m going back to fucking sleep.”

  Axl gave the small room one last look before slowly making his way back to where Titus was waiting in the hallway.

  “You’re right. It hardly makes sense. Perhaps Titus had too much to drink and mistook voices from another room for yours,” Axl said.

  “Whatever,” Kern grumbled before slamming the door on them both.

  Titus was ready to protest, but Axl silently gestured for him to take a few steps down towards their own doorways before saying anything.

  “He’s lying.”

  “I know,” Axl said it in a sober tone. “But we’re not going to wrestle with this now. We’re all in poor shape.”

  “If we wait, he might try something,” Titus argued urgently.

  “A few hours, Titus. That’s all I’m asking.”

  Titus wanted to continue arguing, but he saw the pain lingering in Axl’s eyes and wondered how much of it the man could fight through if they confronted Kern now. He was half tempted to let Axl return to his rest and take on Kern himself, but there was something sinister at work here. What if Kern had been gifted some strange magic that allowed him to talk over distances, or move earth like Waldron could do?

  In the end, Titus nodded to Axl’s request and returned to his room. He had no intention of sleeping, but the long day eventually made his vision dull and his eyelids heavy. He had laid down fully dressed with boots still on and it was the only reason he was still alive today when he woke to find the inn engulfed in fire.

  The smoke was choking. Titus kept trying to take in a clean breath of air, but he couldn’t. He wanted to call out, but it strangled his voice. Instead, he kicked his burning door open and a wave of intense heat hit him like jumping into a furnace. He managed to call Axl’s name once, but there was no reply. In the distance, he could hear screaming and men shouting, but in the burring hallway there was nothing but searing heat and cracking timbers.

  Titus grabbed his sword and coat before turning towards the small window in his room just as the smoke was starting to choke the life out of him. He stuck his head out into the night air first trying to take in a fresh breath despite all the smoke billowing out from behind him. Thankfully, he was on the ground floor and only needed to shimmy his broad shoulders through the tiny window to fall to the damp earth below. He dropped his sword to the ground before doing so and fell in a heap on the ground to cough the last of the burning smoke out of his lungs and rub his watery eyes.

  When he got up, he realized the village had mobilized a bucket line from the well, but they were not putting out the inn. The inn was lost. It’s roof was alight with flames as tall as the tallest trees. The villagers were throwing water on the neighboring buildings now to keep the whole place from burning down.

  Titus stepped forward to help until he saw Kern. The man was milling about in the street carrying his wounded arm tenderly as if it were his excuse for not joining in the urgent work, but Titus knew he was simply keeping himself free to scan around the building – looking for him or Axl. A terrible thought then entered Titus’s mind. What if Kern had set the blaze on purpose to kill them both? What if Axl never made it out?

  Again, Titus was tempted to confront him, but if his suspicions were true, this was a man who would stoop to any level and Titus had no idea what else he was capable of. While ever fiber of his being wanted to march up to Kern and beat answers out of him, Titus found his feet carrying him behind buildings and through back alleyways to the stable. Looking back on it all now, he kept telling himself it was the right choice even if it was difficult to leave the desperate villagers to defend against the flames.

  Since then, Titus had traveled as far and as fast he could manage; sleeping few hours whenever his anger surrendered to fatigue. Now, as night was giving way to morning, Titus knew the long road north was coming to an end. As the distant sun was starting to give the horizon a grayish blue hue, turning the world from black to gray, Titus could see the upcoming fork in the road.

  An old wooden sign stood at a crooked angle but it’s dual signs had been carved deep and still stood true to both left and right. To the left was the western province of Korinth – a newly founded savior stronghold. To the right, the road led east to Ilone Lake and the province of Vernin beyond.

  Titus pulled his horse to stop and considered which way to go.