The Tomni'Tai Scroll (Book 1) Read online

  “Governor Gandle sent a unit of men out to reclaim it. We hold it now.”

  “Very well, then send the additional patrol I have requested.”

  “Yes sir,” the patrolman replied with a quick salute before he exited the hall.

  “As for the rest of us, I want three Rangers to go to Kobhir to search for Kai there. Since we just escorted his sister to Kobhir, he may decide to go there. I want to make it clear that we will not harm or harass his sister. We are only going to look for Kai. Another three Rangers will go to Khatthun, and three more to Blundfish. I will remain here to assist Acting Governor Bhan in Rasselin until Queen Dalynn appoints a replacement. The remaining Ranger will search all of the small settlements and villages throughout Zinferth. We will not rest until Kai is brought back to this city, dead or alive.” Digg’s face grew cold. “Kai will pay.”

  Jimik and Gainer stepped close to Diggs. Jimik spoke first. “I ask that we be allowed to hunt for Kai in Blundfish,” he said.

  Diggs cocked his head to the side. “Why?”

  Gainer poked the air with his finger. “If I was Kai, I would head south, for the sea.”

  “He would reach the sea faster by going north,” Diggs countered.

  “True, but then that makes going south to Blundfish the smart move,” Jimik deduced. “There are plenty of villages and forests to hide in along the mountains as he travels south. Then, he charters a ship to one of the Elven Isles and it would be hard to find him again.”

  “What about Kobhir, to see his sister?” Diggs asked.

  “Nah, he’s too smart for that,” Gainer said quickly. “He’d know that we would search there for sure.”

  Diggs nodded. “Very well, you have my leave to go to Blundfish. Pick another Ranger to go with you.” Diggs then turned away from them and briskly walked out of the hall.

  “When we find him, I aim to kill him,” Jimik told Gainer.

  Gainer nodded. “It’s time to put the dog down.”

  *****

  Pendonov glanced around. Satisfied that no one had seen him duck into the alley, he slipped into the house across from Sebina and Jenedina’s home. He could hear muffled voices coming from upstairs. Pendonov moved lightly through the hall, careful not to make any noise as he slid a dagger out with his left hand and let his right hand hover over his sword. Cullen had just informed him about Kelden, so who was Yeoj talking with? A few ideas ran through Pendonov’s mind, none of them good.

  As he reached the bottom of the stairs a strange odor wafted down to him from above. Pendonov raised an arm over his nose to filter the pungent aroma out of the air, but it did little to mask the scent. He pushed onward, not sure what to expect. Pendonov reached the top of the stairs, sticking to the wall where the floorboards were less creaky, and made his way down the upstairs hall to the room. He could hear the voices clearer now. There were two men. One was clearly Yeoj, but the second was unfamiliar.

  “Thanks for your cooperation,” Yeoj said.

  “This is a dangerous game you’re playing,” replied the stranger.

  “You let me worry about that,” Yeoj scoffed.

  The floor squeaked beneath Pendonov’s feet with a creeeak that would wake the dead.

  “What was that?” the stranger asked. Pendonov noted the apprehensive tone.

  Yeoj emerged from the room, crossbow leveled at Pendonov’s chest. Pendonov froze, searching Yeoj’s face to discern his motives. Yeoj held the crossbow for a moment, then winked and lowered the weapon.

  “Didn’t expect to see you,” Yeoj said with that devilish grin. “Haven’t heard from Kelden either.”

  “Kelden has been temporarily assigned to something else,” Pendonov replied pensively.

  Yeoj glanced at Pendonov’s dagger and winked again as he slung the crossbow back over his shoulder. “You can put that away,” he said pointing to the dagger. “I caught one of the little worms and I have him in here. Been grilling him for a couple hours.”

  “What?” Pendonov asked incredulously. “How did you?” Pendonov replaced his dagger into the sheath and followed Yeoj into the room. A man sat naked on the floor with his hands bound at the wrists behind his back, and his ankles bound in front of him.

  “This is Frey,” Yeoj said as he motioned to the captive.

  Pendonov said nothing as he took in the scene. Frey sat silently, with narrow set eyes shifting quickly between Yeoj and Pendonov. He had a few scars across his body, but no apparently recent injuries other than a few welts and bruises. Frey’s face, on the other hand, had probably seen better days. Pendonov realized what he smelled as soon as he noted melted patches in Frey’s beard and hair.

  “You burned him?” Pendonov asked.

  “Nah, just singed his hair a bit,” Yeoj replied with a shrug. “Wanted him to know who was boss.”

  Pendonov turned on Yeoj and got right in his face. “We do not torture prisoners! Give this man his clothes at once. We are going to get him to a physician.”

  “Who died and put you in charge?” Yeoj mocked. “He stays right where he is until we have the information we need.”

  “No, Kelden said I was in charge until his return. You follow my orders,” Pendonov gruffed.

  Yeoj shook his head. “No.” Yeoj walked over to Frey and knelt in front of the bound prisoner. Frey reflexively pulled his head back and tried to distance himself from Yeoj.

  “I am ordering you to stand down,” Pendonov commanded.

  Yeoj shook his head and pulled a knife from his boot. “The queen personally assigned me to this group,” Yeoj explained. “As far as I know, she doesn’t even know that Kelden asked you to be a part of it.” Yeoj looked back to Pendonov. “She assigned me personally,” he repeated. “Because I can get things done that people like you can’t.”

  “Don’t do this,” Frey begged. “Please!”

  Yeoj raised the knife up and lightly pressed its tip into the soft flesh just under Frey’s left eye. “You can look away if you like, Pendonov,” Yeoj offered. “But I am under the queen’s orders to eradicate this threat by any means necessary.”

  “Kelden said I was in charge,” Pendonov said, though his voice was softer and less confident.

  “No,” Yeoj replied smugly. “I tried your way. Kelden couldn’t even keep track of a woman, and you have been sitting on your arse while I have done the real work. I caught this man sneaking to the house across the street. I captured him before he could get the women, and I am the one who has been working with him for hours digging up the information we need. Since I am the only one producing results, then I will be in charge. Take it up with the queen if you like, though I doubt she will support you considering you are not an official member of this unit yet.” Yeoj twisted the knife and opened a small hole in Frey’s skin.

  “Gah!” Frey yelled as he jerked his body back and flopped onto the floor, his skin slapping against the wood. “Stop, please!”

  Pendonov moved forward, his hand reaching for his sword. Yeoj stood up, placing the heel of his boot in Frey’s spine, just below the man’s neck, and mashing the prisoner’s face into the floor. Then, Yeoj winked and smiled at Pendonov.

  “Get out,” Yeoj growled. Pendonov stopped in his tracks and looked from Frey to Yeoj, and back to Frey. “Get out,” Yeoj repeated. “You don’t want to see what I have to do now.”

  “No, please, stop him!” Frey mumbled into the floorboards.

  Yeoj patted the air with his left hand, and gently tossed his knife up and over to Pendonov. Pendonov caught the blade and looked back to Yeoj perplexed by what was happening.

  “Go now, Pendonov,” Yeoj commanded. “I am going to get the information we need, by any means necessary.” Yeoj winked again and twisted the heel of his boot.

  “No, pleeef, dundo dis!” Frey begged with his mouth smushed into the floor.

  Pendonov nodded slowly and started for the hallway. “Do what you must,” he said, hoping that this spark of trust wasn’t misplaced.

  Yeoj cocked hi
s head and gave a slight nod to Pendonov. “Oh I will cut the truth out of him if I have to.” Yeoj pulled a spoon from his pocket and placed a finger over his mouth before motioning for Pendonov to leave.

  Pendonov grinned and let his boots thump loudly as he walked to the hall and then pretended to leave. Once in the doorway, Pendonov marched in place, letting his footsteps grow quieter to give the illusion he was abandoning Frey to his fate. He then turned and watched as Yeoj flipped the spoon over, holding it by the bowl of the spoon and then knelt down.

  “All you had to do was tell me when the others were coming,” Yeoj said softly. Frey tried to squirm. Yeoj placed a hand on Frey’s back. “Now I am a bit rusty, so I apologize if this hurts more than usual. I haven’t done this for a while.”

  Frey wrestled his face free from the floor and tried to wriggle away, but Yeoj had a firm hold on him. “Please, I don’t know anything,” Frey said. “I told you, I was just supposed to drug the two women and leave. I’m not involved any more than that, I swear!”

  “Pity,” Yeoj said. “That isn’t good enough to save you.” Yeoj lowered the spoon handle down to Frey’s spine, just above the lumbar region and started to press in.

  “Wait! I’ll talk!” Frey shouted. “Vermut and Galion, that’s who you’re looking for. They hired me to drug the women then Vermut was going to come with three of his men at sundown and pick up the women.”

  “Who are the other men Vermut was going to bring?” Yeoj pressed.

  “I don’t know their names,” Frey squealed. “I only spoke with Vermut and Galion. I never met the others. That’s how they operate, they keep us separate.”

  Yeoj glanced up to Pendonov. Pendonov raised a brow and nodded his head respectfully before coming back into the room. “Where are they taking the women?” Pendonov asked.

  Frey’s eyes went wide as Yeoj flipped him around and roughly sat him up. “You heard the man, where are they going?” Yeoj inquired.

  “You… you tricked me,” Frey stammered as his eyes zeroed in on the spoon in Yeoj’s hand.

  “Make no mistake,” Yeoj continued grimly, “your life depends on your cooperation. Tell us where they are going, or I will slit your throat right here.”

  Pendonov stiffened. He could tell that Yeoj meant what he said. “I would prefer to keep this man alive,” Pendonov said.

  Yeoj shrugged.

  “No, I’ve told you too much already, you aren’t going to trick me again,” Frey said.

  Yeoj whipped out his sword in a flash and drove the point straight through the floor boards between Frey’s naked, pale thighs.

  For a moment none of them moved. Yeoj glared at Frey, while Frey sat wide-eyed and blanched, afraid to look below his waist and assess the damage. Pendonov sucked in a breath and held it.

  “Where?” Yeoj snarled.

  “Vermut was going to take them to Balder’s Arms, the blacksmith shop near the western gate. They are going to ship the women to Blundfish. That’s all I know.”

  Yeoj relaxed. “Thank you.”

  “If they keep everyone separate, then how does he know where they are taking the women?” Pendonov pointed out.

  Frey looked up to Pendonov with pleading eyes. “Because I make the potions, the drugs that will knock them out, and I have to know how long the trips will be in order to mix them right,” Frey replied. “If I knock them out for a few hours then there might be trouble as they leave the city if the women wake up near the gates and shout for help. For this, since they are going to Blundfish, I mixed two doses of drugs. The first I was to give them today would have knocked them out for eighteen hours, which is enough to smuggle them out of Kobhir and be on the road for several hours before they would have woken up. Then, the transporters would give the women the second dose a few hours outside of Blundfish to get them through the gates there.”

  “Why not one dose to keep them unconscious the whole time?” Yeoj asked.

  Frey shook his head. “No, you can’t travel that far without giving the women food and water. You have to allow them to wake up for the long haul trips, otherwise the merchandise is no good.”

  Yeoj ripped the sword free of the floor and stood up. Frey’s mouth fell agape, but he soon sighed when he realized he was still intact. “They aren’t merchandise,” Yeoj hissed. He kicked Frey hard in the temple. Frey went down with a thud and moaned as he writhed on the floor. Yeoj bent over and pulled a dark, glass bottle from a leather sack on the floor. “Give this to Frey, make him drink all of it,” Yeoj said as he tossed the bottle to Pendonov.

  “What is it?” Pendonov asked sharply.

  “The drug he was going to give them,” Yeoj responded. “We can’t carry him out of here without being seen, and we don’t want to spook anyone who might be watching the house. This will just make sure he stays quiet until everything is over.”

  Pendonov held Frey’s head up and poured the liquid down the half conscious man’s throat. Within moments his eyes rolled back in his head and his breathing slowed and became deeper.

  “So what’s the plan?” Pendonov asked.

  “Ambush Vermut and his men. We kill them, dress in their clothes, take two of their bodies to Galion at Baldur’s Arms and then take Galion down, and anyone else who is with him.”

  “That’s a lot of bodies to drop,” Pendonov said.

  Yeoj laid a hand on Pendonov’s shoulder. “We have one chance to cut off the snake’s head. If we miss this, we may not get another opportunity.”

  Pendonov nodded slowly and crossed his arms over his chest. “Well, I suppose Frey’s information confirms what Blacktooth Pete was saying.”

  Yeoj nodded. He bent down and tied a gag in Frey’s mouth. Then he took Frey’s clothes, which had been heaped next to the leather bag and stuffed them inside. “When it’s over we can have the city guard pick Frey up.”

  “No,” Pendonov put in. “I will have the Merchant Guard pick him up. “It gives us better cover for my involvement.”

  “As you wish,” Yeoj replied. Then he motioned for the doorway. “Let’s go, we only have a little while to set up before sundown.”

  *****

  A cool, salty breeze swept away the remaining heat from the day as the sun dipped below the horizon. Purple, orange, and pink clouds gave way to the dark of night, seemingly reaching out to the first few stars with long tendrils as the sky turned black. Yeoj sat atop a roof next to Sebina’s house, exactly where Pendonov had been the night before.

  Pendonov was inside the house, as they had agreed beforehand it should be simple enough for him to gain the women’s’ trust as a Merchant Guard. Yeoj assumed that they had accepted Pendonov, since he hadn’t heard any sign of a struggle, and Pendonov hadn’t come running out of the house with a viper attached to his neck.

  Yeoj chuckled a bit as he thought of Kelden –the man who had taken down Theodorus— getting his rump handed to him by a six-inch long viper. His smile faded when he saw a pair of men emerging from an alley about fifty yards away. A bottle clinked in the alley below. Yeoj carefully slid his face along the brick chimney until he could just barely see around it and down to the alley. Another pair of men stalked along the shadows. Yeoj slid back and kept low to the roof line, keeping an eye on the men approaching from afar.

  “Good luck, Pendonov,” Yeoj whispered to himself. He could hear the men below fumbling with the lock on the door. It wasn’t a very loud noise, but he knew a lock pick set when he heard it. He hoped that Pendonov also heard it.

  The other two men reached the front door. One of them coughed three times. Yeoj then heard a bird’s call from the alleyway. That was the sign. The men at the front door opened it as casually as if they had been customers and then went inside.

  Yeoj sprang into action. He leaned over, seeing that the two in the alley were slowly opening the side door. Yeoj somersaulted and vaulted himself down to land on the men. His feet struck one man solidly in the back and he rolled into the other as the three of them crashed down. The door flew
open, bathing the alley in light from the lanterns inside.

  Yeoj drove his knife through one man’s throat and then slammed his fist into the second man’s jaw. The jaw cracked, and then gave way as Yeoj’s fist drove into the man’s face. The man writhed free and clumsily went for a sword, but Yeoj was up first. He pulled his sword and ran it through the man’s chest.

  Then he turned to go inside the building. He saw another man wriggling on the floor, a pair of crossbow bolts protruding from his chest and stomach. The other had his sword out and was engaged with Pendonov. Pendonov deflected an overhead chop, and then countered with a short feint before slashing at the man’s thigh, but he missed. Yeoj ran inside and stopped short just before a woman with dark hair wheeled on him with a crossbow. “Wait, I’m a friend!” Yeoj yelled as he ducked back with his arms up in the air.

  Pendonov turned to the woman, “He’s with me!” he shouted, but the move cost him dearly. His enemy seized on the moment and thrust his sword into Pendonov’s right arm. Pendonov stumbled back, dropping his sword and reflexively grabbing the gaping hole in his arm. The woman screamed and fired her crossbow at the last intruder, but the shot went wide.

  Yeoj sprang forward, launching his sword before him at the man to take his focus off of Pendonov. The ploy worked. The intruder was forced to back pedal to avoid Yeoj’s flying sword, rescuing Pendonov from certain death.

  The intruder turned on Yeoj and launched a flurry of deft, powerful slices that would have cut Yeoj in two had he not dexterously dodged each one. Yeoj ducked, then stepped to the side, and finally somersaulted forward, grabbing Pendonov’s sword from the floor as he rolled and spun to put himself between Pendonov and the last remaining enemy.

  “You will die for this!” the man hissed.

  Yeoj smiled and lunged forward. Their blades clanged together. Yeoj lead with a downward chop, but it was deflected by a counter swing. Yeoj quickly pulled his stomach back and then lurched to the left to avoid being run through. Then he dropped to his knees and lashed out with a savage swing that severed the man’s right leg, just above the knee.