The Fountain and the Flame: Chapter Five

A READER-DIRECTED STORY

The Creator of All Things has opened a window to another world—a portal. We cannot step through this portal, but we may reach through with our minds. Concentrating, we see a young woman, Kaia, seated on a bridge of stone and ice, feet dangling over cobalt blue waters.

The Creator has invited us to act as Watch-keepers over Kaia and the friends she will meet along a dangerous path that lies ahead. The Watch-keepers must work together to help Kaia make good choices. These choices will not always be easy, and Kaia may not always do as we ask, for she is strong-willed. Will you accept this challenge with us?

If you desire to take on the mantle of Watch-keeper, please use the “Leave a Reply” box at the bottom to answer the question posed at the end of each chapter of Kaia’s story.

THE FOUNTAIN AND THE FLAME: CHAPTER FIVE

Click Here for Chapter Four

The river ran wide and fast beneath the bridge to Luco’s home city, Emen Yod, faster than it had appeared from the cliff trail above. What had Kaia expected, with those giant waterfalls feeding the flow?

“That fox of yours will draw unwanted attention once we’re inside the gate,” muttered Luco, casting a dark eye at Raz. “Mark my words. He’ll be a nuisance.”

Why did he have to talk so much like a lord—so high and mighty? Already, Kaia began to regret her decision to help this rich boy rescue his sister. “I didn’t see you complaining when Raz tripped that orc and sent him flying over the ledge.”

“You’re only proving my point.” Luco nodded toward a set of three uneven towers, high on Emen Yod’s central hill, nearly touching the two bright moons. “He’ll be underfoot if our time in my uncle’s manor goes ill.”

Luco called it a manor. Kaia would have called it a castle. He directed her gaze to a cluttered shanty town of driftwood and canvas outside the city wall. “We’ll enter from the wharf district. I don’t expect opposition, but hide that blue hair just in case. The only Frost Islanders we see here are icemongers, and you are neither tall nor brawny enough to pass for one of those.”

That blue hair—as if the color of her hair were a mark against her. Kaia raised her hood, anyway. The wind whipping across the bridge was chilling her ears. “My mother says mine is more silver than blue.”

Luco did not seem to hear. Her sleeve had fallen back as she lifted the hood, and he nodded at her bare forearm. “And keep your liege rune covered. That much should be obvious.”

Kaia yanked her sleeve down again to hide the triangular blue brand of House Advor. “I have no liege. Not anymore.”

“Try telling that to the city guards.”

The denizens of the wharf district offered no challenge. They lived by the code of Kaia’s class. Make no trouble and receive none for yourself. The guards at the city gatehouse, however, seemed to be seeking trouble with earnest. They checked every face in the cue of city entrants, tipping hoods back with the points of their halberds.

Kaia and Luco watched them from the corner of a shanty that reeked of salted fish. “They’re looking for me,” Luco said. “We’ll never get past them.”

“Are there other gates we can try?”

“At this late hour? Don’t be absurd.”

“Well there must be something.” She’d grown tired of his condescension. Kaia looked to Raz for support in her argument, but the fox no longer stood beside her. She glanced back in time to see him vanish down a muddy alley. “Not again. Raz!” She ran after him.

The fox led Kaia and a grumbling Luco on a muddy chase between shacks and tents to a channel cutting inward from the river. There, he turned toward the main city, bounded over nets and barrels, raced across a line of overturned carts, and dove into the water. He reappeared a moment later, riding in the wooden bucket of a waterwheel that split the city wall.

“You were right,” Kaia said, panting as Luco ran up beside her. “Raz is a nuisance.”

“No. He’s brilliant. He’s found us a way in.”

Impressive. Even when she gave in to him, this boy found a way to be contrary.

Luco jumped into the water first, catching the wheel with the bear’s head of his staff to pull himself over. But Kaia hesitated.

Luco slapped the water. “What are you waiting for? Can’t you swim?”

What a question. She rolled her eyes and made the plunge. The moment the hem of her coat came within the reach of Luco’s arm, he dragged her to him. He wrapped an arm around her waist, trying to hold her up. She kicked away. “I don’t need your help. Every Frost Islander knows how to swim.” A bucket broke the surface beside her, and she caught it, letting it lift her out of the water. “But we usually have enough sense to stay dry on a cold and windy night.”

Waterways and barrel lines crisscrossed the city and poured through its many walls. The two clung to fish barrels and floated toward the city’s central hill, gaining height through a series of locks. “My great grandfather built these locks to take advantage of the river,” Luco told her as they passed under a brick arch, entering the uppermost circle. “He oversaw the placement of every rope, chain, and wheel.” He gave her a not-so-bashful smile. “I have a similar mind for contraptions.”

The barrels brought them to a half-circle dock not far from the manor. Kaia climbed out to sit, dripping, beside Raz. She raised an eyebrow. “And yet a fox thought of using these contraptions before you did.”

Luco needed no help finding a way past the men guarding his uncle’s gate. He led Kaia through a door behind an overgrown hedge and up a short stair to the lower courtyard. “Nisa is up there.” He pointed with his staff at the highest of the uneven towers. “My uncle banished us to the upper rooms after my parents’ death. He’ll have guards watching the stairs, but we can get past them using the kitchen.”

He made it sound so easy.

Their journey to the fourth floor involved an old oak growing from the courtyard stones, a creaking window, a room set aside for dresses only and another set aside for spears and swords, and ended with a secret stair that left them crawling out from behind a tapestry into a passage lit with flaming sconces.

Kaia had never entered a nobleman’s manor, by invitation or otherwise. To her, it seemed as large as the whole of her island, with terrain far stranger. And the air felt almost as cold. So much for the warm fires form her childhood fantasies of manor life. “Does your uncle always keep his passageways so frigid?”

“Just this one. Ice chamber.” Luco tapped an iron door with the head of his staff. Frost covered its surface “Filled with ice blocks to keep the meat fresh.”

Before Kaia could make a comment about the foolishness of rich men bringing the cold inside, Raz whined. The fox cocked his head, listening.

Kaia heard it as well. Footsteps. “Someone’s coming.”

“Some-thing, more likely. Sounds like one of my uncle’s orcs.” Luco started in the opposite direction. “This way. The kitchen isn’t far.”

“Wait.” Kaia let the frosted iron of the ice chamber door bite into her hand as she jerked it open. “I have another idea.”

Luco protested, but Kaia pulled him inside. When he tried to close the door behind them, she smacked his hand away.

“Are you mad?” he asked. “The orc will find us.”

“Perhaps.” Kaia took his arm and backed up among the hanging carcasses of pigs and cows. “Let’s find out.”

The footsteps ceased. Raz pressed himself tight to Kaia’s ankles, and Luco readied his staff. The door opened wider. A massive gargoyle head peeked in. Kaia waved.

The instant the orc saw her, molten fire burned from the cracks in its hide. It charged.

“Scatter!” Kaia yelled.

The orc’s black sword whooshed past her head and sliced into a frozen carcass—and stuck there. It stood, yanking on the hilt, orange eyes fixed on Kaia. The fire in its limbs dimmed. Frost formed on its armor.

The orc abandoned the sword and took one slow step toward Kaia and Raz before Luco smashed it in the back of its head with his staff. The creature tried to roar, but only managed a muffled grunt. It tried to turn, but its legs would not move. Bewildered, it looked down at its frozen feet.

Its head remained there, forever bowed. Its eyes went black.

“How?” Luco asked.

“We don’t have these creatures in the Frost Islands. And now I know why. Their molten innards can’t handle the cold.”

He looked at her with admiration, and for the first time, Kaia noticed his eyes—green, flecked with gold. Without his usual haughtiness, they seemed bright and kind. He chuckled and poked at the creature with his staff.

“Don’t!”

Too late. The orc teetered and crashed to the floor, snapping off an arm and its gargoyle head. Kaia sighed. “Someone will have heard that.”

“Right. To the kitchen, then.”

Oh, what Kaia’s mother could have done with that kitchen. The pots. The whisks. The ovens. Kaia knew enough of the world of nobles to recognize the copper washbasin and the butter churns but not the strange cabinet Luco opened at the far end.

He clutched a rope beside it and tilted his head. “Hop in.”

“What? Why?”

“This is another of my great grandfather’s contraptions. He called it the Luncheon Lift. Climb inside. I’ll hoist you up to our chambers in the third tower where Nisa is waiting. Call to her. She’s ridden in this before, so I doubt she’ll argue. Tap twice once she’s in, and I’ll lower you both down. The guards watching the tower steps will never know.”

Kaia hated the way he never asked her to do things. He issued commands like any other lord addressing a peasant.

“Why don’t you go? You think I’m not strong enough to work the rope?”

“I don’t fit. And you’re wasting time.” Luco slapped the box. “Come on! Time is wasting.”

She did as he asked—or rather, as he ordered—but only for Nisa’s sake.

The box creaked and groaned with each of Luco’s pulls in the long ascent. If an orc or a guard interrupted him, Kaia worried she might be trapped half-way—or worse, she might plummet to the bottom. But those worries fell aside as the strains of a song reached her ears. The voice was young and sweet, and the melody seemed so familiar. Unbidden, the image of Kaia’s mother, clutching her hands through the bars of the magistrate’s cage, returned to her.

Remember the lullaby I sang to you as a child.

The box bumped the upper reaches of its track. Kaia threw open the door to find a little blonde girl clutching a dolly to her chest. The little girl froze, mouth hanging open.

“Don’t stop,” pleaded Kaia. “Sing it again.”

The box shook—Luco jiggling the rope to hurry her. The song would have to wait. Kaia held out a hand. “I’m a friend of your brother’s. Quickly. Grab your cloak and come with me.”

The ride down went faster than the ride up—too fast for Kaia’s comfort. At the bottom, Luco lifted his sister out of the cabinet. “I heard screaming. A maid found the orc. It’s only a matter of time before the guards search the kitchen.” He set Nisa down and used his staff to pry a floor grate loose. Mold and grime caked the stone around it.

“What is that?” Kaia asked, climbing out of the cabinet.

“A drain. And our way out.”

Raz gave the mold a sniff, wrinkled his nose, and then jumped in.

If the fox could do it, so could she. Kaia sat down with her feet dangling in the hole, set Nisa in her lap, and wrapped her father’s coat around them both. While she worked, Luco rummaged through pots and utensils on a cluttered shelf.

“What are you looking for?”

“Go,” he said. “I’ll be right behind you.”

She shot him a frown and dropped.

The fall did not last long before the drain curved to catch her, then entered a wide spiral. A few beats later, the girls splashed down into another of the city’s channels. A film of slime rested on the surface.

Luco splashed down behind them, and Kaia punched him in the shoulder the moment he surfaced. “We’re all wet again, thanks to you. And now we stink.”

Nisa laughed.

A dawn escape through the city’s water system left them soaked but washed the smell away. Luco led them to a cave in the forest hills to the south and lit a fire. Raz curled up beside him, watching with interest as he fiddled with an ivory box.

Kaia thrust her chin at the box. “Did you steal that from your uncle’s house?”

“It is not theft if something is yours.” He tilted the box, allowing her to see the metal quill and vial of golden ink nested inside. “And this, I brought along for you.”

“For me?”

Luco nodded. He opened his mouth to speak, closed it, then took a breath and started again. “I . . . I cannot pretend to know the weight or hurt of what I am about to ask, but I believe it is necessary.” The haughtiness had vanished, leaving the kindness in those green eyes as it had in the ice chamber. But this time, a sorrow came with it that stole the warmth from the fire.

Kaia swallowed hard. “I don’t understand.”

“I think you do. You’ve seen these instruments before. I’m talking about your liege rune. It will only cause us heartache on the road.” Luco lifted an amber medallion from beneath his shirt, showing her the silver, hawk-shaped symbol within. “However, if you were to take mine . . .”

“You want to brand me?” She jumped to her feet. He wanted to carve his family’s mark into her arm, joining it to the one she’d been given as an infant—a common practice when one noble purchased another’s thrall. The new family added their house liege rune to the old. Before her birth, Kaia’s father had been bought and sold so often that his arm looked like a chart of lineage of the northern cantons. “No! You can’t!”

“Please try to understand. Any guard in any town or city can check your mark against my medallion, and we can’t always depend on waterwheels to get us past them. By taking the liege rune of House Fulcor, you’ll keep us”—he cast a fleeting glance at his sister—“all of us safe.”

Watch-keepers, what should Kaia do? Should she:

1. Stand up for herself by refusing to take another liege rune?
2. Accept Luco’s family mark to protect her new friends and ease their passage south?

Comment your vote via the “Leave a Reply” box at the bottom of this post.

James R. Hannibal
Award-Winning Author & Former Stealth Pilot