CHAPTER TEN: CARAVANSERAI
After a second long stretch of flat plains, Kyle's party eventually found itself on rougher terrain, with snow banks making for uneven and unstable footing. Kyle could hear Sarek cursing as he stumbled along, forced to use his staff as a cane to support himself. "I hate getting old," the elder mage grumbled.
"How much further to the Graveyard?" Kyle asked.
"Depends how rough the terrain continues to be," Sarek replied. "Not getting tired, are you?"
"Yeah, tired of seeing nothing but snow for miles on end," Kyle grumbled.
Suddenly, Jessica stopped in her tracks, clenching her fists. "Anyone smell that?" she asked.
Kyle took a sniff and nodded. "Burning firewood. Somebody must be camping nearby."
"Could it be Rathbone's men?" Rayner asked. "They're sure to still be after us."
Kyle shook his head. "No way any of them could have made it past us. I'll go check it out. Follow a few feet behind me in case I need to signal you."
Slowly, Kyle followed the scent of firewood, careful not to make too much noise as he stepped through the snow. Hiding behind a conveniently placed snow bank, he peered over the other side and saw a group of armed men. There were about ten of them, dressed in white animal hides and fur mantles, and obviously grouchy. One of them was holding a special type of arrow Kyle recognized as the type used for sending messages across long distances. Another was reading a piece of parchment.
"I don't get it. Why can't we go back to camp yet?" one man grumbled.
"Wolfe's orders, accordin' to the note," another replied. "He wants us to keep our eyes open for some travelers. Four of 'em: an old guy, a girl, and two kids. When we see 'em, we've gotta signal."
"Why are they such a big deal?"
"I dunno," the second man who spoke said. "Something about a deal the boss made with a guy names Rathbone."
Kyle's eyes narrowed. He wasn't quite sure who they were, but he knew who they were looking for, and he had a pretty good idea who they were working for. Rathbone had found himself some allies, somehow.
"We don't need no stinkin' pirates to help us!" a third growled. "We can take 'em ourselves! There's only four of 'em!"
"Yeah, but this message from the boss said to signal, not to attack. And I ain't crossing Wolfe."
Kyle smiled grimly. While these scouts probably could be avoided, a fight would be the best way to make sure they couldn't send word to Rathbone.
Carefully, Kyle made his way back to the others and reported what he saw. "You say there are only ten of them?" Sarek said.
"Yeah, nothing we can't handle nice and quick," Kyle said with relish.
"Do we really need to, though?" Rayner asked. "Can't we avoid them?"
"If they spot us, they can send word to Rathbone or this Wolfe guy, whoever he is, and they can put him on our trail. We don't know how far behind they are."
"Kyle's right," Jessica said. "It's gotta be done. We'll need to be quick to make sure they can't send a signal."
"I can take care of that," Sarek said, sighing at the thought of being forced to take human life again. "An invisibility spell should do the trick. It won't last long enough to elude them completely, but long enough for an ambush."
Jessica nodded. "Works for me."
Sarek closed his eyes and raised his staff. "Ol-nerieh!"
With the party now invisible, they crept towards the bandit patrol, careful not to make too much noise as they approached. They slowly made their way into the midst of the bandits before Sarek undid the spell. The bandits were completely taken by surprise as their quarry suddenly appeared out of thin air.
"It's them!" one man shouted. "Send the signal, quick!"
A bandit grabbed for a bow and arrow, presumably their means of signaling, but a bolt from Sarek's staff struck the man dead. Three more charged at Kyle, but Kyle's sword scythed through the air, cutting down two of them, and his dagger finished the third. Another bandit made the mistake of leering at Jessica before attacking, letting himself get distracted by her beauty, before finding himself on the wrong end of her Iron claw. As another bandit reached for the signal bow, Rayner dispatched him with a Thunder Shot spell.
In less than a minute, half of the bandits were dead, and the others were now fleeing. 'Stop them!" Kyle ordered. "We can't let any of them escape!"
Kyle's party began to pursue their fleeing adversaries, Sarek bringing one down with a magic bolt. The men in white were used to traveling this uneven terrain, weaving through snow banks with impressive speed. Kyle and his party tried to follow as best they could, but the deep snow and rough terrain slowed them all down.
"We'll never catch up to them at this rate," Kyle muttered.
But as the bandits disappeared behind a snow bank and made it to more steady footing, Kyle heard one of them scream, followed by a hideous moaning sound.
"What the hell was that?" Jessica asked, tensing slightly.
Picking up their speed, they found themselves on more stable footing, and finally caught sight of the white-clad bandits - who were now face to face with a cluster of man-shaped creatures made completely of ice. Each was about eight feet tall, and while their movements were slow and ponderous, their limbs were thick, laced with jagged edges. A single blow from one of them would certainly be fatal, as evidenced by what was left of the body of one of the bandits. The moaning sounds they'd heard earlier had apparently come from them.
"Ice golems!" one of the three surviving bandits screamed. Panicking, he raised his warhammer to strike at the golem nearest to him.
"Crowley, no!" another bandit called out. "Don't hit them or…!"
Ignoring the warning, Crowley struck the golem nearest to him in the knee with his warhammer, and the monster exploded, shattering into countless pieces and launching jagged blades of ice in all directions, many of which impaled the last of the men in white. Jessica shuddered at the sight. "I think we'd better go. No reason to stick around here."
"I don't think it'll be that easy," Rayner said, as he pointed behind them.
More ice golems had approached from behind, and were lumbering towards them. The party tried to back off, hoping to avoid making any physical contact, but the creatures kept coming. Before too long, they were surrounded by the ice golems. The monstrous creatures moaned hideously as they began to approach, flailing their arms.
"Anybody got any ideas?" Kyle said anxiously.
"Let's see how well these ice creatures stand up to fire," Sarek said. "Eish k'tannah!"
Sarek launched a pair of fireballs at two of the ice golems, but the creatures exploded on impact, just as the first one did. Only by Rayner reflexively putting up a magic barrier were they protected from harm as they were bombarded by the razor-sharp ice shards. But more of them were closing in on them, leaving them with no room to escape.
"Well, great," Kyle grumbled. "How do we stop these things if we can't touch them?"
"We don't have to worry about touching them," Sarek replied. "Only about them touching us! Rayner, on my mark!"
Rayner nodded, and put up magic barriers around the party. Sarek raised his staff high into the air, the crystal headpiece crackling with energy, and slammed it into the ground. "Barad hagibor!"
Instantaneously, a powerful hailstorm began to beat down on the ice golems, and there was a hideous howling as the creatures shattered, ragged ice daggers flying in all directions, battering away at Rayner's magic shields. The onslaught lasted for several moments, but the barrier held up.
When the maelstrom had subsided, Kyle nodded in appreciation. "You two make quite a team," Kyle said to Sarek and Rayner. "Reminds me of me and my old man back in the day."
Rayner nodded, displaying nothing more than his usual thin smile, while Sarek grinned broadly. "I take that as a compliment of the highest order."
Jessica, after sighing with relief that the danger was passed, suddenly gripped Kyle's arm tightly. "Kyle," she started to say as she pointed to the ground.
Kyle followed Jessica's gaze, and his blood turned cold at the sight of dozens of frozen corpses scattering the snow plains around them. "This island ain't just a graveyard for dragons, it looks like," he muttered. "Any idea who they are?"
The party examined the dead bodies curiously. Whoever these people were, they had been dead for years, their corpses partially preserved by the bitter cold. Although many of them were partially covered with snow, enough of the remains had been left uncovered to surmise that a huge battle had taken place here. There were spatters of frozen blood, and some of the dead men were holding weapons. Some were dressed like the men in white they had just encountered, while others wore clothing commonly found throughout the Katarina Zone.
"These poor souls," Sarek whispered as he glanced at the bodies. "This must be the remains of a prior expedition." His voice faded as he realized what he was implying.
As much as he didn't want to do it, Kyle darted towards the corpses, a sickly feeling in his stomach as he wondered if he was about to find his father among them. The possibilities of finding Gryffin's remains during their expedition had been lurking unpleasantly in the back of his mind since they'd docked. He frantically scraped at the thick snow covering the bodies with his hands, shaking slightly as he did so. As much as he was dreading it, he had to know what had become of Gryffin.
Kyle suddenly froze as he recognized one body, and then the one next to it.
"Kyle?" Jessica said softly. "Did you find...?"
"I know these two," Kyle said in a hoarse whisper as he pointed to the dead men. "Kurtis and Geddo, the guys who hired my dad to help them find the Graveyard."
"By Althena," Jessica shuddered as she put her arms around Kyle comfortingly. "But you...you didn't find...?"
"Not yet," Kyle replied as he pulled away from her, saving her the trouble of giving voice to what he was dreading. He looked around desperately, frantically shoveling away piles of snow with his hands as he uncovered one ghastly corpse after another. But there was no sign of Gryffin.
"He's not here," he muttered after wearing himself out, clenching his fists angrily as he slumped to his knees. "He's not here! Where the hell is he? What happened to him?" He frantically repeated these questions over and over again, his voice continuing to rise until it reached a fever pitch. All kinds of what-if scenarios about his father's fate began to run through his brain, over and over again, and he felt like he was going insane. Had he even made it to the island? Was his body still waiting to be found? And then came the old question, the one that had haunted him for four years; wouldn't his father and all these men still been alive if he hadn't stayed in Nanza? Could he have defended his father? Shouldn't he have, no matter what?
"I should have stayed with them," Kyle rasped, his voice laced with anger and self-loathing as he pounded the ground furiously. "I could have saved them. I could have saved him! I COULD HAVE SAVED HIM!"
Finally Kyle wore himself out and curled himself into a ball onto the ground, quivering uncontrollably, not caring who saw him like this. Jessica knelt beside Kyle and cradled his head in her arms. "Shhh. It's okay, Kyle. It's okay," he said in a soft, soothing tone, knowing it would calm him down. This wasn't the first time she'd seen Kyle go through this.
-x-x-x-
Four years ago...
Jessica grumbled angrily to herself as she entered the "town" of Nanza. She hadn't heard from Kyle in over a week, which was most unlike him - at least since that one fight they had, after which Jessica rarely went more than three days without hearing from the big lug. She hoped, for his sake, that he had a damned good explanation.
She forced her way through a throng of thugs and bandits, ignoring their stares and snickers. They probably thought a thirteen-year-old girl walking through the streets alone would be easy pickings, either for robbery or something far worse. Jessica was almost hoping they'd try it. She was in the mood to thrash someone, and it would be good practice for when she got her hands on Kyle.
When Jessica arrived at the house Kyle shared with his father, it was deserted - or perhaps abandoned might have been a better word. The door was halfway open, and as she peered inside, the place was an awful mess. Furniture was strewn all over the place, and a thin layer of dust had settled over everything. Jessica was suddenly worried. Had something happened? Was Kyle okay?
Suddenly, a huge, callused hand clamped down on her shoulder. "Looking for something, honey?" a rough, sleazy voice said from behind her.
Without hesitating, Jessica scratched the man's wrist and slammed her heel into his shin, raking her heel down his leg and slamming in into where the leg meets the foot with all of her considerable strength, a self-defense trick Kyle had taught her. The thug screamed as he fell to the ground, clutching his foot.
"Where's Gryffin?" she demanded.
"Dunno," the thug gasped. "Word has it he got a major gig and left town for a bit."
That didn't sound right to Jessica. Kyle always told her every time he and his father were about to go on another adventure. He'd never shut up about it, come to think of it. "Did his son Kyle go with him?"
"Kyle? Nah, he's been in the bar ever since his old man left. Drunk off his ass."
That made even less sense to Jessica. Why would Gryffin not take Kyle along with him? And why wouldn't Kyle tell her about it? What the hell was going on?
She gave the man one final glare. "From now on, keep your hands to yourself, or next time I see you, you'll be wearing them around your neck."
As Jessica made her way to the Caravanserai, a horrid smell hit her full force, making her gag as she barged through the door into the dimly-lit bar. Her eyes widened in both alarm and anger as she spotted Kyle lying on the floor, his back propped up against a wall as he drank from a bottle, other empty bottles scattered around him. Kyle had always had an incredible alcohol tolerance for a fifteen-year old, something which annoyed and disturbed Jessica a great deal. She was appalled by his haggard appearance; he looked like he hadn't slept in a week, let alone bathed, and his eyes were horribly bloodshot. His shirt was gone, and there was an ugly looking bruise under his ribs. He didn't even have his weapons with him, which in itself was startling.
When the bottle was empty, he scowled at hit, shrugged, and tossed it across the room, where it shattered against the adjacent wall. "Barkeep!" he hollered. "Gimme annuder!" His voice was horribly slurred, and he sounded as if he was half-asleep.
"Kyle!" Jessica demanded, finally finding her voice. "What in the Goddess's name are you doing?"
"Drinkin'," Kyle warbled. "Whuzzit look like? BARKEEP! I SAID GIMME ANNUDER BEER, DAMN IT!"
As the proprietor approached, Jessica furiously snatched the bottle from his hands and emptied it over Kyle's head. Kyle sputtered and shook the beer out of his hair as he glared at Jessica, not even able to recognize her. "Whodya think you are, keepin' me from my booze?" He tried to get up, but his legs wouldn't hold him, and he stumbled to the floor.
"It's me, Kyle," Jessica said, folding her arms. "Your girlfriend, although Althena knows why."
Kyle blinked stupidly a couple of times, and then he grinned broadly. "Heeeeeeey, honeybomb! C'mere an' have a drinky wid me! Barkeep, gimme two more! One for me, one for the lady!"
Jessica glared at Kyle in disgust, backing away from his rancid breath. "Kyle, what the hell is wrong with you?"
"Nothin', nothin'. Just havin' a liddle drink, is all."
"You've had enough. We're going home."
Kyle managed to give her a lewd smile. "Your place or mine?"
Jessica didn't respond, but she tossed a few coins onto a nearby table, hoping it would be enough to cover however much he had drunk. She then helped Kyle to his feet and helped him back to his house - a rather difficult feat, since Kyle was barely able to walk, and she had to bear his full weight on her shoulders. Once they entered his home, she unceremoniously dumped him on the floor.
"Baby, make th' room stop spinnin'," Kyle moaned as he crawled on the floor.
Jessica shook her head in disgust. "Kyle, what happened here? This place is a mess."
"Hadda blow off some steam," Kyle mumbled. "Had a bad day."
Jessica raised an eyebrow. "Must've been a hell of a bad day. Did you and your dad have a fight?"
Kyle shook his head as he sat up, wincing as he did so. "Nah, no fight. The ol' man jus' headed off into the Great Unknown, leavin' me all by my lonesome. I wanted to go too, to watch his back like I always do, but noooo. Said he didn't want me with 'im. Made me promise to stay put, sacred oath 'n everything."
"He left you behind?" Jessica said incredulously. She could scarcely imagine Gryffin abandoning his own son, considering how close the two of them were. No wonder Kyle was upset.
"Yup. Said he didn't want me gettin' myself killed on some stupid treasure hunt."
"Treasure hunt?" Jessica repeated angrily. The idea of Gryffin ditching Kyle for a stupid treasure hunt infuriated her, especially after seeing how it was affecting Kyle.
"Gone off t'find the treasure of th' Dragon's Graveyard. Or get his ass killed, whatever comes first." He gave a strained laugh at his own joke, which sent chills down Jessica's spine. "An' I get to stay here in Nanza, all safe and sound, with no idea where my ol' man is. Hell, he could be dead right now, an' I wouldn't even know it, 'cause I'm not around to watch his back like I'm supposed to be!"
Kyle's cackle reached a hideous crescendo before he suddenly slammed both his fists savagely into the floor, snarling like a wild beast. Jessica stepped back, horrified by what she saw. Kyle kept pounding the floor frantically, punching holes in the floorboards and sending splinters flying everywhere until his hands bled. "And it's gonna be MY FAULT! ALL MY FAULT!" he howled furiously. "I SHOULD'VE GONE TOO! HE'S GONNA DIE OUT THERE, ALL BECAUSE I'M NOT THERE WITH 'IM!"
Finally, Kyle's anger was spent. He collapsed to the floor, sobbing uncontrollably. Jessica had never seen Kyle cry, ever. He had always been so strong, always the tough guy, shrugging off anything with a grin and a shrug. He was in a lot of pain, and it hurt her to see him like this.
"Shhh," she said gently as she sat down beside him, resting his head on her lap and holding him gently. "Shhh."
"I should've gone too," Kyle kept repeating, gripping her arm tightly as she held him. "I should've gone with him."
"Shhh," Jessica repeated. "I've got you."
-x-x-x-
"I've got you, Kyle," Jessica whispered softly, holding Kyle tightly. "I've got you."
Kyle continued mumbling for long moments, his fists clenched tightly. Sarek and Rayner looked away, pretending to be occupied with examining the frozen bodies.
After a few long moments, Kyle pried himself out of Jessica's grip and got to his feet. His eyes were bloodshot, his expressions was slightly haggard, and there was a forced dignity in his eyes. He felt embarrassed by breaking down in front of the two magicians. "Let's move on," he said gruffly. "We still got a ways to go."
Nobody said anything in reply. They simply collected themselves, readied their weapons, and advanced across the icy wilderness.