Chapter 21

Like a young novitiate, Borner dropped his head slowly and raised it gradually, aligning each of his vertebrae, each one on top of the other. Satisfied that he was in control of his body again, he hefted his staff in his right hand and felt its weight. Gently he lowered its tip to the floor.

Borner lifted his eyes and met the unblinking eyes of the new queen, her leathers coated with the sheen of blood and gore of her brother’s viscera. Her face was pale and drawn. She was wiping vomit from her lips with tears in her eyes.

“Salomet-Dura,” Borner said with a voice he thought should have been quavering with shock. “You have earned your name this day. Whatever the years may bring, your name will speak louder than any title you take.”

He bowed deeply and took two steps back. When he looked up, her eyes were wide and her mouth was open, not quite gasping for breath.

“Go,” he said, pointing at the throne with his staff. “Go and stand there. Take control of this room and then take the kingdom. The battle is won, and the snake is dead. End the fighting.”

He bowed again and walked away. Timmaus was collecting his men and women, letting them loot the fallen bodies and bringing the booty to him. Borner did not see Kanner, but there were piles of bodies both alive and dead, laying across the wooden floor. Borner had a hard time seeing clearly with only the sconces on the wall and moonlight from the exposed windows. At least that is what he told himself wiping away the tears.

He wandered around the room seeking his friend. In the back corner on the far left he found him, partially conscious, with a pike buried in his right leg. A small pool of blood was collecting under the man. Borner bent down to check the man’s vitals, touching the side of his neck for the beat of his lifeblood.

Kanner opened his eyes and gave him a wan smile. “It was stupid of me to think I was a fighter.”

“Stupid, brave, noble, or ignorant: they are just different sides of the same die,” Borner said. “The die was tossed, and you ran to embrace it. You will tell your children you were brave, and you will tell your grandchildren that you were stupid.”

Kanner laughed. “Now I know you are full of horse crap. What happened to you? What is that rent on the front of your robe?”

“Another scratch,” Borner said, looking around to see if anyone was listening. “Not much at all, my friend.”

“More horseshit, but it will have to wait,” Kanner said. “I can’t move my leg.”

“Which is a good thing considering there is a pike running through it, pinning your leg to the floor,” Borner said. He stood up and waved his staff until he caught Dal’s eye. She came swiftly to his side. “Do we have churgeon or a healer among us? My friend, the Sojourner...”

She nodded and ran to a bearded man who was bent over another body. She returned with him and pulled Borner up and away. “If he can save the leg, he will,” Dal said. “Let him do his work in peace. No one wants a prophet looking over their shoulder.”

Borner was going to retort, ‘That is an understatement’, but better judgment held his tongue. “Are you alright?”

“All apples and peaches,” Dal said with a sigh. “I lost friends tonight and I think ... I think I lost a lover.” She was looking towards the dais.

“She is now Salomet-Dura,” Borner said. “You may or may not have lost an intimacy, but you have affected the course of history for the better. Not bad for a scrawny cowherd girl from the unnamed hills.”

“You keep that observation to yourself,” Dal said with a squint in her eye. “I’m not scrawny either.”

“I need to find Andela,” Borner said. “Any ideas?”

“See that boy over there? His name is Derry. He did well tonight, but he needs to step out of this room if you get my meaning,” Dal said. “He is an errand boy here; knows the place like the back of his hand.” She walked away without another word.

Borner strode over to the teenaged boy and cleared his throat loudly. “Derry,” and the gangly boy looked up at him. “Grab your sword and come with me. We are seeking the High Priestess of Denarah. She is either here in the palace or in the Temple of Urutu.”

“Ain’t Urutu no more,” the boy said, picking up a sword after wiping the hilt with his shirttail.

“Very true,” Borner said. “Now let us seek”

They stepped out of the room and Borner looked both ways. Bodies were on either side. “I came from the left, straight down the long hallway and did not see her.”

Derry seemed to relax in the near darkness of the corridor. “There ain’t much point in running down the hallways at this hour. Most peoples are either dead or gone. Let’s go check the great hall up front. They must have bashed in the doors by now. The big boom and shake we heard could have been them doors blowing in.”

Borner agreed and they turned right, doing their best not to trip over the sprawled bodies that littered their path. Their route appeared seemingly random to Borner. Even though he had thoroughly memorized the model of the building, the real edifice was more confusing than he had imagined. They plunged down a spiral staircase made of stone down to the second level. The hallways were even murkier.

“This is the servants’ ways,” Derry explained as he grabbed a lantern off the wall and lit it. “No stinkin’ snakes bother to walk these halls because servants ain’t pretty enough for ‘em. At least that’s what MerryBerry says. It’s faster too, but a little narrow. Heck, no one is walking ‘em tonight anyways. Oh, ya gotta duck too; thick beams overhead.”