“Very well,” the creature gritted. “You have my promise. I swear on Zamorak himself that I will do all in my power to aid your friends, with the aim of returning them to safety. And I will keep silent about your presence here.”
Doric removed his foot.
Imre sat up and scowled.
Finally, he stood and limped from the island. He gave a last look back at Doric before vanishing into the swamp.
“How did you do that, Doric?” Karnac asked. “I thought he was going to kill us all but you bested him by yourself, and with ease. How?”
Doric shared a look with Lord Despaard and Arisha. The nobleman nodded and Doric revealed a familiar two-pronged dagger. He explained its origins, then sheathed it quietly.
The onlookers gazed at the three strangers in wonder.
“Well, I am glad of it,” Karnac said, and he looked longingly at the weapon. “But it is time we were moving. We must reach Hope Rock before midnight. Come.”
And with that, Pia forced herself to stand, her caked boots an unwelcome reminder of the journey ahead.
Pia lost count of the miles and the hours. She lost count of how many times she stumbled and fell, of how many times Jack staggered behind her, or of how many times Arisha pulled them up and encouraged them to walk ahead of her.
The land was against them, too.
From the island they set off through another swamp where what seemed to be an old road, long since broken into stepping stones, made their way less treacherous. Once, they had to wade across a foul-smelling river, their belongings held over their heads. The water had risen to Pia’s chin, and although told not to drink anything she was sure she had swallowed a mouthful or more.
For Doric it was even worse. Lord Despaard waded through with the dwarf upon his back, and Vanstrom did the same for Jack.
“If you tell anyone of this, Despaard, especially that wizard,” Doric said from his perch, “then I will likely have to kill you.” The lord nodded solemnly.
When they emerged from the other side they found their bodies covered with black leeches, each the size of Pia’s thumb. She cried out in disgust, and it took them several minutes to remove the wretched creatures.
Her brother remained silent throughout.
She kept her eyes on him, for she could tell that he was weak and exhausted, hungry and cold. They all were.
“Never a rope, Jack,” she said. “Not us. Not for you or me.”
“What does that mean, Pia?” Arisha asked. “Why do you say that?”
Arisha had lasted the journey better than most. She had swum across the river, her clothes bundled above her to keep them dry, and although she was obviously tired, she did not seem exhausted like the others. Now, her dark hair was slick, the silver band that held it more brilliant than usual, and her blue eyes shone in a face that was reddened from exertion-a face that had been challenged but not beaten.
Pia’s respect for her had only grown, and she responded to the question.
“We were born and raised in East Ardougne. We were thieves. There, ‘never a rope’ is a saying. You are trained as a thief by one of the guild-masters. You trust your brothers and sisters absolutely, and you can never steal from them. If you betray them, it is certain death. The rope is what we are taught to fear-the hangman’s noose. Any other death is to be welcomed, for it means you didn’t get caught by Lathas’s Justice, and you haven’t told on your brothers and sisters. Anything else is a death with honour.”
Arisha looked at her curiously.
“So you think anything other than hanging is an honourable death?” she asked.
“To hang you have to be caught,” Pia explained. “If you are caught by the Justice you will be tortured into telling on your brothers and sisters. Therefore, we are told it is a dishonourable way to die. That it is the way of cowards and traitors.”
“You have been told that by wicked men who would use you,” the priestess said, “to ensure that you are so afraid of hanging that you would throw yourself into an army of swords rather than give yourself up. It keeps them safe.”
“I don’t know,” Pia whispered, embarrassed by her ignorance. “I don’t understand.”
“The world is not just, I’m afraid,” Arisha said. “Even an honourable person can hang. That does not undo the good work they have done in life.”
Ahead, Karnac called a halt and stared into the distance.
“There it is,” he said. “Hope Rock.” He pointed south, to a mesa that stood above the swamp like a pointed finger, barely visible in the darkness. “That is our home. It is a natural fastness surrounded on all sides by water.
“Come, if we make haste we will be there within a few hours.”
Pia’s energy returned with every step she took. Now that she could see their destination, her will to be there powered her on. It was the same for Jack, as well, and the party as a whole moved more quickly.
A boat waited for them at the edge of a still body of black water. In the darkness behind them, through the swamp, several lights came and went.
“Marsh lights,” Karnac commented. “We all thought they were ill spirits before he came from the west and told us otherwise. Now we know they are a natural phenomenon.”
“Who came?” Lord Despaard asked.
“You will see soon enough. Now, the people from Misthalin will go in the first boat with me. In we get!”
Pia didn’t like boats or water. In Ardougne, in the winter- when traders and merchants were scarce-she had been forced on occasion to work the river, hacking out ice blocks with her brothers and sisters to earn what little they could. It had been cold, painful work, and once she had seen something in the water, something big.
She looked at the black waters and sat Jack down beside her in the middle of the boat, as far from the sides as possible. It was cold on the water-colder than on land. Then as the oars beat their steady rhythm in the rowlocks and the boat moved forward, she closed her eyes.
She only opened them when they ground to a halt on a beach of oily gravel. There, at the bottom of the sheer rock, a lift awaited them.
“Don’t be scared, little Pia,” Doric said, his eyes scanning the heights above them. “It is safe. I am sure of it.” Yet when they were in the lift and it began to move upward, the dwarf closed his eyes and gripped his axe tight.
When they finally arrived at the top, they were greeted by a group of people, nearly twenty in all, dressed in rags, their eyes shining with hunger and their bodies unwashed.
“It is a time of miracles,” a gaunt woman muttered from the rear of the onlookers. “Small folk drop from the sky, and visitors cross the river from the west to make war on the undying. Blessed be these days, for change is coming.”
Karnac led them to a small fire close by that gave little warmth. The inhabitants closed around them in a ring, as if fearful they would vanish if they lost sight of them. It made Pia nervous. She took Jack’s hand and sat down with Arisha on one side and Vanstrom on the other.
“Are you all part of the Myreque, like Vanstrom?” Lord Despaard asked.
“We are,” Karnac confirmed. “We fight the Undying Ones any way we can, and we seek a way out of this dreadful realm. We escaped from the ghettoes of Meiyerditch, nearly two years ago. I led over two hundred of us out then. Now we are less than thirty.”
