Arn sighed for the third time and leaned back against the wood-beam wall of Drowen’s meeting chamber. Dressed in a baggy green tunic, Arn marvelled at how far he had come. Aside from his scars, his muscles, and the occasional bubbling reminder of Gamden, little remained of the Arn that had fought his fellow tribesmen tooth and nail. But even this version of Arn was impatient when made to wait on the burly warlord’s business.
Again, Arn heard shouting through the wooden wall—he piqued up, hoping to catch a word. Even on Razaad, information was as critical as a strong spear. Again, he heard the bark of Tarro’s name. Arn had little reason to believe Tarro was real, but mentions of the grand commander’s name had not faded with Arn’s other delusions.
Vellek had given Arn some semblance of control over his life for the first time in a decade—and Arn would wait as long as he was asked, if it would help to repay his debts.
One of the ornately-armoured soldiers opened the door. Drowen’s guest of these last few days—Commander Elwar—emerged after his escort. When it seemed safe to enter, Arn approached the door.
The side of Drowen’s tattooed head caught an angle of sunlight as the broad-shouldered war-chief stood at the window. His breath rose his mantle heavily, and he let out a long sigh. Then he glanced back from the window and saw Arn. “Dangerous times, Arn. Even for the likes of me.”
Arn blinked and stepped to an adjacent window. “Is Elwar an enemy?”
“There are only enemies, Arn,” Drowen said, looking back out the window at Elwar’s departing party in the cobblestone courtyard below. “Some we choose for cooperation, others we choose for killing.”
He would do well on Razaad, Arn thought. “And Elwar?” he asked, again.
Drowen shrugged. “Cooperation, I suppose. Tarro’s table is fracturing in his absence. I would rather remain loyal to his vision, but parting ways with the majority of my peers…this would only sow more chaos. Chaos that is not part of Tarro’s vision.”
Arn didn’t know a few of the words, but he got the gist of each phrase. Even then, he didn’t understand Drowen’s loyalty—what had this Tarro done to earn it?
“I will be sailing soon, Arn,” Drowen said. “Vellek is coming with me—so you should come, too.”
“Sailing where?” Arn asked.
Drowen moved back toward the table in the centre of the room. He cleared a few markers off the map that was sprawled out and started to point. It didn’t mean a thing to Arn—he didn’t know where they were—to even begin understanding what Drowen was trying to show him. “A few of Tarro’s lieutenants have decided to make a move on the mainland,” he said, quietly. “We—”
A gentle shudder went through the room. The glass in the windows clattered quietly. Drowen glanced at Arn, frowning. Then the shake came again, stronger. The floor seemed to lurch to the side and Arn grabbed the table for support.
“Not again,” Drowen growled, as the tremor grew stronger.
The groan of timber, the distant popping of cracking rock, and the clanging metal grew into a din. Drowen sank to the floor as Arn was knocked against the nearest wall. “The door, try to get under the frame!” Drowen shouted, shuffling on hands and knees. Stronger than it had been yet, the quake jarred the room up and to the side, once again. With a tremendous bang, a crack rent through the stone wall, shattering the glass into shards small and large.
Massema, Arn thought. She was two floors down and on the other side of the stronghold, in their quarters—alone. When Arn got to the doorframe, he passed through it and kept going.
“Arn!” Drowen bellowed. “Get back here!”
Using the wall for support, Arn rose to shaky legs. The building lurched again, and the wood-beam wall splintered—spears of wood branching out at him. A chunk of brickwork collapsed from the ceiling overhead, breaking through the floor below as it fell. Arn rolled on his knees, scrambling to get away from the hole as splinters and shards of rock dug into his legs.
The next lurch slammed Arn against one of the walls, bruising his shoulder. In an instant, he was back. He was the Arn of Razaad once more—because he needed to be.
He charged down the wooden staircase—half-sliding, half-falling—and leaped over the steps that had already broken apart. The tremors were fading now, he thought, rising from one knee and wiping blood from his elbow. The stairwell had collapsed below this level and he couldn’t make the jump. He needed to cross the next chamber to reach another staircase.
The door to the chamber was jammed, but he eventually knocked it in with his shoulder, grinding his teeth until they hurt with each impact. A section of the floor above had fallen onto this room—Arn saw another slave clawing at the hefty wooden log that had settled across her waist. Others lay dead amid the rubble.
Arn marched past them and yanked the next door open—releasing a full weight of debris into the room. He tried dodging out of the way, but spars of dry wood soaked themselves in his blood as they spilled over his leg. He yanked himself out of the loose wreckage and waded up and over the pile, into the disastrous hallway beyond.
Glimpsing an opening in the next room, Arn forwent the staircase. With screaming muscles, he tore out a few planks from the opening, then dropped through the hole into the room below. He landed on his targeted bed-cot, but felt pebbles bite into his heels, thighs, buttocks, and palms. Someone was cowering in the corner of the room—one of the other high-ranking slaves. They watched him move to their door in wordless shock.
In the corridor, Arn found a guard trying to help one of his comrades from a pile of debris. Arn went the other way, at last fighting with his own jammed doorway. The wood panel groaned against Arn’s screaming muscles. The disaster threatened to undo Arn’s precarious sanity.
Then the door cracked inward and Massema cried out. Arn waited as she scurried away from the doorframe, and then gave the door its final slam. It burst inward, dangling off one hinge and coming to rest against the sagging brick wall. Arn staggered into the disheveled quarters and reached out for Massema. “Are you hurt?” he gasped.
“My arm,” she replied, cradling it. Her eyes were ringed with a layer of dust, caked there by the tears beneath.
Arn looked for bone, but couldn’t find any—only angry discolouration where the damage had been done. “They’ll set it. You’ll be fine. Let’s get somewhere safe.”
“Where?” Massema asked, pointing toward the windows.
Arn stepped closer, his worn sandals splintering the broken glass beneath his feet. He looked out, across Starath, towards the shore—and froze. Waves and white surf ran in the streets downhill from them. Men and women could be seen, clinging to the toppled wreckage of their homes. The Deep had come to claim the metal city, just as it had claimed the metal sword from Arn’s raft. He knew all this metal could not have been right—it was evil stuff that brought evil upon those who carried it.
“We’ll find somewhere,” Arn whispered and turned away. Drowen ‘Deathless’ would be fine, a few floors up—and if he wanted Arn to join him on some voyage across the Deep, he would guarantee Massema’s safety.