Bart emerged from out of the trees behind them. “We can’t stay here long,” he said.
“What does he mean?” Kaitlyn asked her son.
Riyan gave them a quick rundown of what transpired back at the Magistrate’s manor. When she heard of the deaths of Rupert’s cronies, she gasped. With fear filled eyes, she looked to her son. “Oh Riyan,” she said. She knew their deaths would bring even more troubles their way.
“It couldn’t be helped mother,” he replied. Turning to Raestin, he asked, “Can you and your guards take my mother and the Kelons somewhere safe?”
“But,” his mother interjected before Raestin had a chance to reply, “you’re coming with us, aren’t you?” When he didn’t immediately answer, she said, “You have Freya now. There is no reason for continuing with this… quest.”
Riyan nodded. “Yes, I do mother. We have come too far not to see it through the rest of the way.” She reached up her hand and he took it. “The Horde has been hidden for centuries, and I mean to see it opened.”
Raestin came up behind Kaitlyn and laid his hand on her shoulder. “This is something he has to do,” he said. Then to Riyan, “Take my guards.”
“No,” Riyan replied with a shake of his head. “You keep them. Keep my mother safe.” Indicating the men who had traveled with him through so many adventures, he said, “We can handle ourselves.”
Their gazes met for a moment before Raestin nodded. “As you wish.” Stepping closer to Riyan’s horse, Raestin held his hand up to Freya. “Where he’s going is much too dangerous for you my dear.”
Riyan felt her grip around his chest tighten. “You must,” he told her. “I’ll come for you.”
“I don’t want to lose you again,” Freya insisted.
Turning in the saddle, he looked at her and gave her a reassuring grin. “You won’t,” he replied. “This is but a moment’s parting. I’ll meet you at…” Realizing he didn’t know where Raestin was taking them, he looked questioningly to the trader.
“Terix,” he supplied.
“…Terix,” Riyan finished. “And with the fortune contained within the Horde, we won’t have to worry about anything ever again.”
”Riyan,” Chyfe said. “We must leave.”
Riyan nodded. Taking hold of where her hands held onto him, he loosened her grip and placed one of her hands into Raestin’s. “Take care of her and my mother,” he said.
As he helped Freya to the ground, Raestin replied, “As if they were my own family.”
“Thank you,” Riyan said with great feeling.
His mother came forward. Leaning down to accept her kiss goodbye, he could see tears in her eyes once again. “I’ll see you in Terix mother,” he said. “I love you.”
“I love you too Riyan,” she said.
Then from not so far away where Chad was saying his own goodbyes, Eryl’s voice penetrated the night. “I want to go too!”
“Now Eryl,” his father said. “You are too young.”
“You’re always saying I’m too young,” he declared. Standing with a most determined look for one so young, he stared at his father. “The Horde is going to be opened and I’m not going to miss it!”
“Keep your voice down,” Bart said with growing impatience.
Casting him an annoyed look, Eryl returned his gaze to his father and said with much lessened volume, “You’re going to have to tie me up to keep me from going.”
Father and son stood their ground, neither giving in. Then his father said, “As you wish.”
“Yes!” he exclaimed. His jubilation was short lived however as his father took hold of him and threw him face first to the ground. Then with a knee in his son’s back and twisting his arm behind him, Ferrun looked around and asked, “Anyone have a rope?” Struggle as he may, Eryl could not break his father’s grip.
“Let me go!” he cried again, this time with a great deal of volume. “You can’t…mumph.” His cries were silenced as Bart shoved a cloth into his mouth. Turning to Eryl’s father, he said, “He’s not going to like you too much for doing this.”
“A father does things for his children not to make them happy,” he explained as he took a piece of rope handed to him by Chad. “But for their own good, whether they realize it or not.” Using the rope, he bound his son’s hands and with another, his feet. “I’d rather him live to hate me, than die.”
Once Eryl’s hands and feet were secured, his father picked him up and laid him before the saddle of a nearby horse. Then he mounted and laid a hand on his son’s back while he waited for the others to make ready.
Paul and the rest of the guards had returned by this time and were mounting. “Take the ford and ride fast once on the other side,” Bart told Chad’s father.
“We will,” he replied. “You boys be careful now.” He turned and cast a meaningful glance to his older son.
“Yes father,” Chad assured him. “We’ll get a new mill when I return.”
“Just return,” his father told him.
Chad nodded.
Glancing to those who were going with him, Chad’s father said, “Let’s go.” Lying before him across the horse, Eryl struggled in vain to escape his bonds. Sighing, Ferrun kept a secure grip on his youngest son as he nudged his horse into motion and led the others to the ford.
“Take care mother,” Riyan said to her.
“You too,” she replied. “Don’t take any unnecessary risks.”
“We won’t,” he assured her. Then as Chad’s father led the others away, Riyan glanced to Bart. “Now, let’s find the Horde.”
“Yeah,” agreed Seth as he came up beside them. “Before those Kevik gooed come after us.”
“How far is it?” asked Soth.
“A day,” he replied. “Maybe more since we’ll need to take a roundabout path to get there.”
“Are you sure we can find it?” asked Chad.
Riyan nodded. “Oh yes,” he replied. In his mind, he could recall every tree, every hill, and every landmark of the area wherein the Horde was hidden. Moving out, he took the lead with Bart next to him. Soon, the ford of the river disappeared in the trees behind them as they began the last leg of their quest. With his mother and Freya in good hands and on their way to safety, he was once again able to entertain visions of the treasures untold that awaited.
A group of riders hidden in the forest watched as first Chad’s father, then the rest of his group, crossed the ford. Once on the south side, they quickened their pace and followed the river east.
One of the hidden riders turned to another in magic user’s robes and asked, “Is he among them?”
Geffen cast his spell and the dart resting upon his palm rotated until it pointed toward the north. “No,” the magic user replied. “He isn’t.”
“Should we follow my lord?” asked another of the hidden riders.
Lord Kueryn shook his head. “The thief will be wherever that which was stolen from me is,” he replied. In silence they waited until those crossing the ford had disappeared further downriver. Then emerging from the trees, he led a group of riders composed of Tribesmen and Byrdlon soldiers across the ford in pursuit of the thief.
Despite their fatigue, they rode throughout the night and into the early morning. Everyone was tired, being up over twenty four hours began taking its toll. A couple times Riyan thought he saw riders off in the distance. But whenever he pointed them out to the others, they were gone. He finally concluded that between the fatigue and fear of pursuit, his mind was playing tricks on him.
If the riders he saw had been Rupert and the soldiers, Bart was sure they wouldn’t have been satisfied to simply watch. “After what we did,” he said, “Rupert’s going to want us bad.” And so, seeing as how none but Riyan had seen the riders, they were dismissed. That didn’t mean of course no one was keeping an eye out. On the contrary, they spent more time looking over their shoulders than to the trail ahead.
They followed the river west for an hour before turning to a more northwesterly heading in order to bypass Quillim. Keeping to the deepest part of the woods, Riyan worked their way in a roundabout manner toward the entrance to The Crypt and what they believed to be the Horde below.
It was still an hour before sunrise some distance to the south when riders discovered two arrow pierced bodies partially hidden in a thicket. They wouldn’t have discovered them at all if the appearance of a kidog hadn’t
