The Huntsman of Adamos (Quartet)- draft
WINTER

CH WINTER

Protector Corbin slammed the door of Guardsmen’s office, waking the two of the six young men he had retained as guardsmen for the winter. Both looked hungover. The late morning winter sunrise glowed pale gray outside.

“When I leave you in charge, can you please stay sober until I return?!?” Corbin demanded hotly.

“Sorry, Protector Corbin, there was a quarrel at the Stone’s Throw last night. The bartender thanked us with all we could drink ale.” One explained, and Corbin could have punched him, now if he presented a fee for enforcement to the owner, he would get a bill for the alcohol consumed by his men.

“Go back to the barracks, both of you and send in two of the others,” Corbin growled.

“But sir, they actually drank more than we did.”

Corbin suddenly regretted keeping only the most easily manipulated and foolish of his summer hires. He had wanted an easy to control squad, so his other sources of revenue would go undisturbed. “Get out of here before I fire all of you.”

After his stooges left, he logged into his computer and sent a request for information on Rieth, son of Riles to the central Guardsmen Headquarters on Aetheria . He would verify who the man was, and then once he found the man’s weakness, he would be rid of him. After he talked to his other associates, he realized he needed find out exactly how the woodcrafter had killed five before he had the help of Fleur and Yuli. Corbin had never seen Fleur wield a sword himself, but he had heard rumors that she was almost as good as Lord Shadz of Odini. Tapping the surface of his desk, he wondered when the Black Swordsman would visit his pet project on the coast. Every spring and fall, he came for the medicinal herbals harvest and to visit the veterans of Soldiers Cove.

Corbin only had two months until the end of winter lumber harvest and three until the spring crabbing and fishing season which would bring Captain Vole back to the islands. Fleur’s cousin was particularly protective of her and disapproved of Corbin’s attempts to woo her. Corbin was beginning to regret the more aggressive criminals he had selected this year. Robbery and ransom were one thing, but a forever murder could bring unwanted attention from the Guardsmen’s Corps and Mariners’ Security Unit. Looking out at the lightly falling snow, Corbin decided he might need to retire Woren and Muick sooner rather than later if they killed someone. He had left them with a warning last night, no more using cursed blades and no more throat cutting or they might find their own throats forfeit.

Corbin’s eyes narrowed at the blatant threat to summon the Guardsmen command made by Veteran Banth. The old man had been particularly harsh with Corbin and informed him that the veterans would be starting their own patrols which would force his thieves to work the western side of the island or sail to Golden to find marks. Thinking about it, he knew he had no choice. It meant no profit to be gained from the miners traveling to and from the Terryall Mines in Westfalls, or the fishermen and farmers who came to Lumberton weekly to sell their produce before returning to their homes on the eastern shores if the Veterans of the last war were patrolling and captured his men.

Looking out at the light, he realized he needed to get to the morning meeting at the mayor’s office. It was time to act the politician. As he fastened his coat he wondered if perhaps he should campaign to become mayor or governor general, then a wicked smile crept across his face. He’d send his crew to the western isles of Brightwater and Golden for now. If he played his cards right, he could keep all the profits, become a hero for killing the murderous thieves that plagued the Southern Star Archipelago, and win Fleur before seeking office of governor in the spring elections next year. It was an ambitious plan, but Corbin had never lacked for ambition.

A month after he was attacked, Rieth was sitting in the Cat’s Soup, eating a bowl of creamy fish chowder and soft sweet bread. The flavors brought back many happy memories, the chowder recipe was one his late brother Kaleth had created because of the kitten Fishlover’s preferred food, and the bread was one that he had eaten every time he visited Davin and Fianna. Meara’s older sister had been a professional chef and café owner. Rieth still missed her perfect, warm chocolate cake for breakfast with Davin’s strong coffee. Going back Jura for their funerals, had been two of the more difficult days of his long life. The human custom of remembering the dead and celebrating their lives helped his grief, but it also showed him the truth of something Karstien often said, “Immortality sucks.” For a moment, he felt so sad his heart hurt like his healed wounds had.

Fluer passed by and put a hand on his shoulder. She leaned down, whispering, “Are you okay?”

Several of the veterans he was sitting with looked at him, he wrote on the tablet. ‘Just remembering the ones, I lost. My brother made something like this. He loved to fish and sail and cook what he caught for us.’

“Was he older or younger?” Banth asked after reading aloud for him.

′My brother was four thousand years older than Brie and I, he died in the war.′ When Banth finished reading, they all sat silently as Fleur accepted their empty bowls. She never charged any of the veterans for their meals or Rieth, because to her, he was a veteran too, just of a different war.

Rieth had become accustomed to eating with the veterans and doing odd jobs until he ‘healed’. He often had to hide his emotions when they talked about his brother Kaleth, and he had realized they all had met the clean-shaven, short-haired Huntsman of the House of Adamos at some point. It made him more grateful to Serapha’s enchanted comb for keeping his hair and beard dark. To the veterans and residents of Soldiers Cove, he was Rieth, son of Riles, a woodsmith with a little magic, and nothing more.

No one knew his powerful huntsmen’s magic had allowed him to be healed completely after only three weeks. Cassie had come the day after the storm broke, she had been so sad Rieth’s injuries, but there was nothing to be done. She thought it was because of Fleur’s eyedrops that he had started to heal too quickly. She told him the scarring could only be reduced so much and warned him not to use his voice for two seasons. She would get him an appointment one of the master healers when he returned to Aetheria.

Later that evening, he had overheard Cassie describing his voice to Fleur and realized that getting his throat cut had been a good thing. Fleur had a natural ear for music and sound recognition, she would have recognized his voice even if she couldn’t see his face. He had only needed to see the horrifying effect of her remembering once to realize Asha had been right; if Fleur remembered all at once, the mental trauma would manifest physical side effects. He needed Serapha to come to Soldiers Cove, he needed her to tell him what the medications Fleur took every day were, and most of all, he needed his sister-by-joining to tell him if Fleur could be healed.

Fleur came to the veteran’s table with slices of warm cake and cooled sweet cream. They ate and talked. But today, instead of talking about their war stories, they talked about the upcoming harvest and Rieth’s attempt to secure a shop on Arbor Isle. Lumberton was the logical place, but the close-knit community of craftsmen and women made it difficult for outsiders to set up a shop. Rieth had insisted on paying Fleur for her time taking care of him, but she refused. Finally, they had come to an arrangement, he would make custom carved doors for the Cat’s Soup Café and new cabinet doors for her kitchen. The projects would be his first commission for his new shop, showing he had the potential to bring business to the town.

After she closed up for the day, she smiled at him while they walked. “Are you nervous for tomorrow?”

He laughed silently, and tapped on her hand, ‘No. I have confidence in my skills, and I have my three sponsors. They won’t deny me. The Mayor of Arbor Isle already wants me to make him a desk after seeing Healer Cassie’s cabinets.’ He opened her door for her, tapping on the frame. ‘Are you nervous about the school?’

Fleur sighed as she hung her cloak. “Free schools should be on each of the isles and not just Brightwater. I run my school, so the children don’t have to live away from their families in the dorms at the Brightwater school. The Kingdom provides all the materials and will pay the teachers if petitioned. The community only has to provide the building and its maintenance. They already collect taxes for the guardsmen and community services, it would only be a small increase.”

“Hey, Mom. Hi, Rieth.” Yuli was sitting at the kitchen table working math problems. He stretched, “I finished two extra pages and the weather is going to stay nice, can Rieth take me shooting? Please?”

Fleur favored her son with the look she had given Kalen so many times over the years and Rieth reminded himself again to send his nephew a letter as she scolded, “Don’t ask me, I’m blind. I’m not the one who will be chasing your arrows through the woods for hours.”

Rieth nodded, giving Yuli a thumbs up.

“Yes!” Yuli scrambled to put away his school work before running upstairs to get the new bow Rieth had made him when Reith was repairing his broken bow. He was easing Yuli into his Huntsman’s magic the way Forester Verlan, had eased him into his, but Rieth had to be very careful not to reveal how strong his magic was. Foresters often had tracking and woodland sense, but he had discovered his son had his same ability to scale vertical surfaces, even ice-covered cliffs. Soon Yuli would need to be taught to control his falls and landings.

“You don’t have your bow, it’s at Finn’s,” Fleur pointed out.

Rieth had moved into the boarding house the moment Banth had heard a rumor that Rieth was taking advantage of the kind Veteran’s Lighthouse keeper.

He took her hand and tapped out on her hand, ‘We will stop for it. What would you like for dinner?’

She left her hand resting in his as she thought about it. “Venison stew would be nice.” Then she smiled mischievously, and teased, “I’ll make beef chili and spicy, cheesy biscuits, just in case you miss.”

He grinned at her teasing and reminded with a breath whisper down on her ear. “I never miss what I’m hunting.”

“Cassie said you shouldn’t speak.” She gasped and shivered slightly at the warmth on her face and neck. Turning her face toward him, as his arm snaked around her, pulling her close. She looked confused then her eyes saddened as his fingers traced her face. “Rieth, don’t...”

Holding her hand between them, he tapped on the back of it ‘I can’t help it. You’re so beautiful.’

Fleur pushed at his chest with her palm, creating distance between them. “Honestly, Rieth. Sometimes I think you are as blind as I am.”

He chuckled at her indignant scowl as Yuli came in. “What’s so funny?”

Rieth tapped on the counter, ‘Your mom said I was blind.’

Yuli snorted, “Right, Mom. See you later.”

“Don’t stay out too late, we are going to Lumberton tomorrow.” Fleur followed them out to the porch. Fang bounded ahead of them as Fishlover stared up at her expectantly. He chirped in a very hungry cat way and she laughed lightly hearing him.

“Yes, Fish. I brought you a bowl of your favorite soup, come in and I will warm it.”

Closing the door behind her, she made her cat’s soup. Her fingers touched where Rieth had run his fingertips over her scars. Pressing hard on the old wounds, she traced the strange swirling lines. As the gray feline lapped up his fish and cream, a tear ran down Fleur’s cheek. With a sigh, she began to get the beef, beans, onions, dried spices from her greenhouse, canned tomatoes and canned chilis out of her carefully organized pantry. She put them to slow simmer and began to mix sourdough biscuit dough with dried crushed peppers and shredded cheese before setting the balls of dough in the oven to proof.

Fleur turned on her assistive tabletop computer and pushed the button to work. Several of her students had sent in their winter session homework for the week. Her fingers made quick sweeps over the surfaces and she graded as she went, then she checked her messages. The first was from Shadz saying that Lady Asha was very close to having her latest set of twins and he would be stay on Aetheria this year. She sent back a note of congratulations and offered to help gather the medicinal herbals that the master healer used.

There was one from Vole about a violent typhoon moving across the Rising Sun Isles only a week after a series of earthquakes. His youngest daughter and son and their families were coming to Oceania to help select ocean life for two different world reclamation projects. The planets had been harvested by the Dark Nebulae during the war, rebuilding the biomes would take centuries. She shuddered at the memory that surfaced.

She remembered standing on a world as it was harvested around her.

A great dome of white light covered one made of blue fire. Black lightning pounded the domes and every strike felt like it was striking her physically. Dark vortexes sucked up everything around the domes, but every time they touched the light they disappeared. So many had died, but many more had escaped because He had sacrificed himself to kill the creatures sent to slay the rescuers. She couldn’t remember his face, only his blood on her hands and her dress over a large baby bump as she stood doing the math to convert the dark lightning energy into shield magic.

There was a loud high-pitched yowl. Her body stopped convulsing, and twitched painfully as she slowly came back to reality. She was laying on the floor of her workroom with Fishlover headbutting her and making distressed mewling noises.

“Easy, Fish, I’m okay.” Her voice was weak and tremulous. She cursed the seizures that came with each new memory.

She staggered down the hall to her room. In her bathroom, she injected herself with the medication the healers had given her from her memory seizures before sinking down the wall. Fish crawled on her lap and purred as the horrible sensations of her remembering passed. The presence of the giant cat was comforting. Soon she was able to get up and have a quick shower. She arranged her workroom as it always was and went down to the kitchen to finish making dinner.

During his recovery, Rieth taught Yuli more about climbing. They had found a large herd of deer wintering in a sheltered valley that was almost impossible for someone without Huntsmen’s magic to reach. Their first trek to the valley, Yuli killed a small buck with a twisted leg. His son repeated back words that Rieth, as Yuri, had said to Kalen when he was teaching him how to hunt and what to hunt. It made Reith’s heart ache that Fleur had shared his teachings with her other son unawares.

As they prepared the carcass, Yuli had explained about the island and its special wood. “Aunt Meara said the rough terrain created by volcanic nature of Arbor Isle is hidden by the forest growing in the rich soil. But the colored wood only rows in special place. The wood in this high valley grows slate gray with darker and lighter streaks like Fish’s fur. This is where I got the piece I gave you.”

When Rieth had asked Yuli what wood Fleur would like for Fishlover’s doors, Yuli had shown him a piece of wood from the valley and Rieth had carved it to look like a sleeping feline, they had laughed that it looked like a real cat. Yuli had asked Rieth if they could make the doors out of the stripped gray wood and every restday or chance they got, weather-permitting, they climbed the cliffs to the valley to cut trees, remove the limbs, sectioned the timber, and lower the sections down. While they worked, Rieth tapped out details to Yuli about the giant redwood forests of Meridian 4, the huge tropical and semitropical trees of Arborea, and the giant deciduous forest of Olympia. They bonded in a way Rieth never had with anyone, not his daughters, nieces, or nephews, not even Kalen. Each day he spent with Yuli was perfect.

Rieth dragged three sections as Yuli and Fang dragged one. There was a farmer who was willing to take the logs to Lumberton to be planed at one of the mills for a fee. And this afternoon, they had taken down a small doe, so they had fresh venison for stew tomorrow.

“Mom is going to be so excited,” Yuli talked happily as they hurried back for dinner. “Doors and a new bar top to match. Can we do the tables next? Those plain tan tables are booriinnnnngggg.”

Rieth tapped on the wooden sound box he made to amplify his current mode of communication. ‘Maybe next year, we can spend the winter getting wood for the tables. Or use black wood with a cat inset of the striped gray?’

“That sounds so cool! Fish’s bowl is enamel green, do you think we would do the bowl out of green wood?”

′I haven’t seen all the colors the wood grows yet, mostly the normal colored wood, yellow, blue-green, and red. But Callie said there is every color of the rainbow, even magenta.′

“Brightwater has mostly normal wood, Golden has everything from pale cream to ochre, and some yellow-greens and yellow-oranges. But Arbor has the most colored stuff, the two sawmills each have permits to harvest only certain sections and numbers. Nick told me how last year a tree fell wrong and broke two other trees, they tried to salvage what they could because it was blue-star wood but most of it was cracked. The cultivated plots are as closely regulated as the wildland growth. The mill owners pay bounties to those who find new colored woods because normal wood will grow around the colored wood.” Yuli sighed as if disappointed. “Wood Finders get a tag fee on every colored tree cut from their find in the forest, but no one wanted my gray and black wood.”

Rieth put his hand on his son’s shoulder, and tapped with the other, ‘They will once they see the doors I am going to make. Why is it important to you to get the fee?’

Yuli chewed his lip for a moment then said, “I need the coin to take Mom to the Master Healer’s Hall on Aetheria. Mom hides how sick she is from everyone, you’re the only one besides Banth who has seen her have one of her seizures. I told Healer Cassie, but she didn’t do anything.” Tears began to leak from the boy’s eyes as his voice dropped to a whisper. “What if she dies? Banth said he would take care of me, but he’s really old, like Auntie Meara was. When he dies, I’ll be alone.”

Rieth’s heart broke because of the secret he could not reveal. He knelt in front of Yuli and whispered, “You will never be alone as long as I live, I promise.”

Yuli hugged Reith’s neck tight enough it was painful as he cried but Rieth didn’t ask him to let go. Instead, Reith stood up, holding the upset Yuli and carried him back toward Soldiers Cove and his mother’s lighthouse. Someday he would tell Yuli the truth, that he was his father, and that he couldn’t be more proud of the man his boy was growing up to be.

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