Page 21 of Slaying the Shadow Prince
There was no more time to dwell on the mind games of Talemir Starling. Drue mounted her mare and rode out of the stables to find Adrienne and the rangers waiting, the two Warswords sitting stoically atop their stallions.
To Drue’s dismay, Coltan was among the rangers. Her irritation must have been obvious, because when Drue took her place beside Adrienne, the general leant across.
‘Your father insisted,’ she murmured in apology, thrusting her chin towards the gates, where the blacksmith stood reverently.
‘Great,’ Drue replied darkly. Her father held the misplaced belief that Coltan could protect her, that he’d grown up alongside her dead brothers and so would take her safety seriously. Drue hadn’t had the heart to tell Fendran that Coltan’s motives weren’t so pure and that it was often this that saw any measure of safety go flying out the window. She was sorely tempted to divulge that information now, though. Coltan’s actions on their last patrol had caused nearly catastrophic consequences.
Her father approached, holding something out to her. ‘This is for you,’ he said, pushing a scabbard into her hand.
Momentarily dazed, Drue took it. Using both hands, she half pulled the blade from its sheath, recognising it immediately. Her father had been working on this piece for over a week. She had assumed it was a request from Thezmarr, because if she wasn’t mistaken – and she never was about weapons – it was Naarvian steel. The strongest steel in all the midrealms.
‘Father,’ she murmured in warning. It was against the law of all kingdoms for anyone other than a Warsword, let alone a woman, to wield a sword of such material.
‘Hush,’ he said, his voice low, reaching up to push the blade back into its scabbard. ‘You have long needed such a weapon, Drue. And what sort of father would I be if I didn’t provide you with the protection you needed? I’ve been collecting scraps of the stuff for years to make this.’
‘But —’
‘Were it up to me, you and your mother would still be planning balls, commissioning gowns and arguing over your needlework from the safety of our home. Alas, we found no safety there, and that is not the world we live in any longer. That is not who you are anymore. So let me give you this.’
Drue’s heart seized. ‘But Father, one look at this and people will know.’
‘That is your smith’s eye talking,’ he replied with a satisfied smile.
Drue exposed a few inches of the blade again and saw what her father meant. The sword had been expertly and cleverly crafted to hide the distinct traits of Naarvian steel. He’d engraved embellishments, mixed two types of steel. Only a fellow blacksmith could discern such things. To the naked, untrained eye, it was simply a beautiful weapon.
Fendran Emmerson, the master of the Naarvian forge, was breaking the law for her, for his daughter.
‘Thank you,’ she murmured, strapping her new blade to her back. Did this mean she could kill a wraith now?
‘Be safe, Drue…’ her father said, suddenly hoarse. ‘You’re all I have left in these realms.’
‘We’ll be fine,’ she replied, eyeing the company now waiting for her just beyond the gates.
An impatient cry sounded from above and Drue looked up to see Terrence circling the skies overhead.
‘I have to go,’ she told her father, her chest tightening at his worried expression. She knew it was hard for him to let her go each time, knowing the fate that the rest of their family had met at the hands of the shadow wraiths. But he let her go anyway, and for that, she loved him even more.
With a final squeeze of his hand, she urged her horse towards the others.
When she reached the party, Adrienne cleared her throat.
‘It’s a two-day ride to the nearest watchtower,’ she said. ‘And here in Naarva, we ride hard. Warswords, I hope you can keep up.’
The unit of rangers looked to the two warriors, who both grinned in the face of the challenge. There was no denying the awe that seemed to radiate from the Naarvians. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience to ride side by side with one Warsword of Thezmarr, let alone two.
But Drue shifted, uneasy. For her fellow Naarvians didn’t know who truly rode among them – didn’t know that they had a monster in their midst, that the darkness they sought to fight was with them now.
Shaking off the feeling, Drue took up her place once more beside Adrienne. Both of them were eager to get to Gus at the watchtower, to check what sort of havoc he’d wreaked there, to chastise him for cursing and to whisk him safely back to the stronghold. Dratos had likely reached the end of his tether with the youngster, and no doubt had a report for them as well.
And so together, the two women led the company from the compound as the first rays of dawn bled into the sky.
The partyof rangers and Warswords rode south, a journey that always reminded Drue of how much the shadow wraiths from beyond the Veil had taken from her and her people. Once the kingdom of gardens, thriving with life, Naarva was now a shell of its former glory. As they left Ciraun behind and the weak morning sun shone down over the lands before them, a hollow feeling spread in the pit of Drue’s stomach. There was no escaping the evidence of her kingdom’s fall. They rode through what had once been a wealthy district just beyond the walls of the citadel, the manors there now abandoned and covered in dark vines, their gates broken, their stores looted. She had once lived in such a place, tending to the gardens with her mother, their grounds vibrant with colour, pristine with rows and rows of blooms. Drue’s chest hurt at the memory of it all, the memory of her mother, beautiful and resplendent whether she wore one of her glittering gowns or her apron and gardening gloves.
Drue pressed her mare onwards, keeping pace with Adrienne beside her. Her friend’s expression mirrored her own – grief for all that they had lost here. Much of present-day Naarva was akin to an overgrown, unruly forest. Green vines so dark they looked black crept along many a surface. The roads were cracked and decaying, and what little life remained – a hare bounding in the distance, a raven flying overhead – seemed out of place.
Further south were the empty villages. Farmsteads had slipped into disrepair after their inhabitants had fled. There was no telling who had survived and who had fallen to the darkness. Drue knew that the underground compound, their safe haven, was just a fraction of the people who had faced the blight of the wraiths.
Drue must have lost herself in her thoughts, for when she next focused on the ride, she found herself beside Coltan.
