XIV
"Ragnar, Ragnar..." Someone was calling his name and the dream slipped away. He exhaled deeply as if he had been holding his breath, licked his lips and opened his eyes.
"I wasn't sleeping," he lied.
Emiel stood over him, looking down with an amused expression.
Ragnar rolled out of the thick blanket he'd wrapped around himself and began to rise, grabbing Emiel's offered hand and drawing himself to his feet.
The light in the chamber was dim, the room cold and the time very late. Ragnar yawned, a great leonine yawn. He scratched the back of his neck and ran his fingers through his beard, pulling the tangled hair straight. "What is it," he mumbled.
"Time to be going," Emiel said. "We need to make an early start."
Ted was busy repacking the supply bags they had brought with them from Hochoch. He'd emptied their contents out across the table, then picked out several items and moved them to the empty shelves lining the walls. Now he was in the process of putting back what remained.
"We always try to leave more than we take," Emiel explained. "Ted, hurry that up. I want to be well away from here before daylight."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah..." Ted grumbled. "Almost done."
"Where to now?" Ragnar turned to Emiel. "It seems that we are not to wait?"
"Waiting would be foolish. And useless," Emiel said. He paced back and forth in a distracted manner, deciding what to say and what to keep secret. "Those orcs and goblins will run crying home to their masters, but I doubt they will return here before daybreak at the earliest. My people either did not arrive or left in a rush. I expected some message to be here, perhaps even Lilith, my wife, to be waiting."
He paused, some random thought or worry distracting him momentarily. "My people maintain an outpost about a half day's ride to the north. It should be occupied and we should be able to find out what has happened."
"Alright," Ted spoke up. "All done here. Grab your packs and let's get going!"
* * *
It took more time to leave the hide-away than it had to enter. Emiel and Ted performed a complicated ritual of resetting traps and removing all signs of their presence. Finally, they left through the hidden entrance in the side of the wall and spent a few minutes to disguise it once again.
They set out on foot, leading their horses over the rough ground, making slow progress, but better slow-going than have the horses stumble and come back up with a break or a sprain. It was a cold, silent walk. Ragnar was kept fully awake. His ribs sent out sharp bursts of pain, each jarring him like a splash of icy water and dispelling any touch of sleep which came over him.
Clouds had rolled in after the fog had lifted and the night was black as pitch. Ragnar had to keep a hand against the side of Emiel's horse to avoid losing his way and his companions.
* * *
Morning came as a surprise.
Ragnar had lost all track of time, stumbling along over unseen ground, unable to see anything more than a few paces away except as a dark blurred outline moving in the night. Slowly the dark began to pale then separated into shades of black on black. Then there was a bluish outline dividing objects, one from another.
Sometime during the night they had passed over a roadway, old and overgrown, but not yet swallowed by the encroaching fields. Emiel had turned them, moving along toward the north-west. Just before dawn, they veered off onto a track no wider than a deer run. As the sun appeared, its light revealed a narrow valley before them. To their right the land rose, ahead the path led them through a sparse patch of woods and down toward the valley floor.
A small stream flowed beside the path. It had eaten a deep bed into the oerth over the years, revealing boulders the size of a dragon's head in its midst. The water barely rose to a man's ankle, till the spring floods came at least, but it had followed this course a long, long time. The banks were the height of a tall man and wider apart than two men, head to feet. Trees grew along its bank opposite the path, the rise of the land there was gentle and wide enough for the roots to spread, deep and secure.
Alongside the path the land sloped upward at a steep angle, covered in a thick scrub. The brambles reached out and caught at Ragnar's cloak and boots as he rode by.
The three riders made good time, keeping at a quick but unhurried pace. The pathway, while narrow, ran true and the ground even.
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