Chapter Twenty-Eight – Wenrik

Wenrik wasn’t used to waiting.

As a young boy running with one of the dozens of Borzerk clans scattered across the Grayscape, his parents had taught him how to hunt and survive, but how to wait? Never. The Borzerk were always ready for danger, whether it was from the bandits who roamed the area or the bands of elves or Skor who sometimes felt that the Borzerk were too widespread, and needed to be driven back into the wild.

Wenrik couldn’t suppress a grim smile at the thought. His people were savage, and he freely acknowledged it. But he missed those early days before the attack from the band of Fenmen who had come seeking revenge for the burning of their farms, their animals stolen and their homes destroyed. Wenrik couldn’t blame them for their anger, although his tribe had not been responsible. He could blame them for the particular cruelty that had not been satisfied by death, but taken a newmade orphan and sold him as a slave to silver miners.

The memory of that time made Wenrik’s blood burn. He would never forget what it was to work hour after hour in darkness until his muscles screamed for relief. Being so young, it had been his duty to deliver messages to the adult slaves from the miners, and to bring them food and water at particular times. It had been hard to run with his legs in shackles, but he had done his best.

It was one of the older slaves who had told him the legend of the Last Hero of Allerion. The slaves were not allowed to rest often, for their masters knew that exhausted slaves were less able to rebel. But in those early days when Wenrik had been frightened and alone, crying into his knees and terrified that anyone would notice him, he had been noticed, and someone had gone to him not as an enemy but friend.

Lindon. That was his name. Few of the slaves paid any attention to a child in their number, knowing he wouldn’t last long. But Lindon had dragged himself closer to the boy, his once-powerful legs hobbled together to prevent any dream of escape. His jet-black hair framed a strong-boned face, now sunken and thin. His eyes were hard as a whetstone.

“Enough,” he had said to Wenrik in a low, impatient voice. “Your tears are a waste. Others have wept before you and failed to profit from it. So are you homesick? Hurt? What is it that deserves this endless flow of tears?”

The child had stopped crying almost as soon as he was spoken to. “I—I’m hungry,” he said.

At this confession, the slave grunted a laugh. “An honest answer deserves its reward,” he said. Reaching inside his jerkin, he took out a small portion of bread he must have saved from their earlier meal.

Wenrik devoured the bread eagerly. It wasn’t much, but it helped. He blinked at the older slave with interest.

“Aren’t you a Fenman?” he had asked with a trace of fright.

“And you are Borzerk,” replied Lindon coolly. “Yes. I know there is no lost love between our peoples. None of that matters here. We have had many kinds here, elves, even gnomes. They do not last long.” The slave’s eyes flickered. “Neither will you, if you do not get some sleep.”

Those had been cruel times. Wenrik would never forget the horror of those months that felt like years. He would never forget the screams of a flogged slave, or when he had overheard the foreman after an inspection, saying that Lindon would not be of much use longer and would need to be replaced.

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He had told Lindon, but the Fenman only grunted in reply. He spoke less to the boy, but every night he scraped at the manacles on the boy’s feet with a rough-edged chip of iron ore. Sometimes his hands bled from the work, but Lindon never showed any sign that he felt the pain or cared.

Wenrik had tried to stop him. “You’re hurt.”

The Fenman shook his head. He wrapped his bleeding hands in strips of rag and went right back to his scraping.

“Have you heard of the Last Hero of Allerion?” he had asked.

“No.”

“It’s an old legend,” murmured Lindon. “One that has been passed down for generations among my people. They say the coming of the Last Hero was foretold by a dragon.”

“Who is he?” asked Wenrik eagerly. He might not have known the legend, but he knew the meaning of the word “hero.”

“The answer to that is a mystery,” said Lindon. “But when the Hero comes, the world will change, and for the better.”

“How do you know?”

“I dreamt it,” said the Fenman simply. “Now hush. Let me work.”

One night, Wenrik woke to shouts and panic. There had been a collapse in the mine, and hundreds of lives were lost. The foreman and his overseers were furious, forcing the slaves to mill like ants to repair the damage.

Lindon had been made to work until he collapsed. He was dragged back to the quarters where the slaves were kept and left alone, gasping between life and death.

Wenrik had found him. Seeing the boy, Lindon almost revived. He raised himself halfway and his dull eyes gleamed with fever.

“Now,” he said. “Now is the time. They will not be watching the entrance, boy. Do you understand me?”

He didn’t wait for Wenrik to answer. Lindon exercised all his strength against the links of chain that ran from one manacle to the other on the boy’s ankles. The chain finally snapped, and Lindon collapsed. He barely had the strength to clasp Wenrik’s shoulder when the boy bent over him.

“What are you waiting for, Borzerk?” he hissed. “Go!”

Wenrik wanted to. More than anything, he wanted to run. But Lindon was dying, he saw it, and he couldn’t bear to lose the one friend he had known in hell.

He brought Lindon water, but the slave dashed the wooden bowl brutally aside.

“Go!” he said again.

“Come with me,” demanded Wenrik, and this time he didn’t care if the tears were running from his eyes like fire.

Lindon’s hand closed over his. “I thought that I would never be free,” he said. There was no grief in his voice, no pain. Only a wan musing, as if he were only half awake. “But you are my freedom. I will go with you, but you must be my legs. Please. Please, run for me.”

Wenrik had run. He had run until the rough shoes he wore split and his feet were raw, and the breath tore from his lungs so fast it was agony. That wasn’t long before Elita found him, and brought him into her home. The little gnome had been astonished by his appearance and full of sympathy, but Wenrik never spoke to anyone of all that had happened in that time of cruelty and death.

Remembering, Wenrik felt the mirthless, wolfish grin returning to his face. He had gone back to that mine as a man, and this time Horon had been beside him, both trained in the art of swordsmanship. Even after so much time, Wenrik could not help searching for one slave in particular, hoping that Lindon might have somehow incredibly survived. But there was no sign of the Fenman who had saved him, not even a grave.

Wenrik rose to his feet, casting an impatient glance at the secret entrance to Narion Nightsong’s cave. He hated caves. He hated this feeling of being bound to one place, only waiting while others fought battles ahead of him. What made it most unbearable was the Last Hero of Allerion he had first heard described in a pit.

What would Lindon have thought of her, this gawkish young Borzerk woman? She was, perhaps, not the hero either of them would have imagined. Wenrik was not disappointed, but he was a little concerned.

If Tara MacQueen was the Last Hero of Allerion, surely she needed his help. Her reasoning about the need for a guard seemed reasonable on the surface. But…

Wenrik reached out, placing his palms flat against the stone slab that had slid so easily aside before. He was impressed and pleased when the entrance grated back into place.

“You’re safe, then,” he said aloud, and unsheathed his sword. “For me, I’ll take the mouth of the cave itself. Let’s see if we can’t introduce this necromancer to the true meaning of death together.”