 look in her eye, somewhere between reverence and fear.
He said gently, “Meelia?”
She responded instantly, still whispering. “We … my family … used that as a symbol.”
“Used?” asked Nakaz. “Did they change it?”
“No,” she said, still transfixed by the darningfly. “They … they disowned me.”
The insect lifted from Meelia’s hand with a buzz of wings, and the woman hastily said, “They didn’t. I ran away!” The bug landed again, becoming as still as a figurine. Meelia continued, “It was Joal. He showed me how life could be outside the rigid structure of my family, which was all duty and responsibility, no freedom or fun.”
Nakaz smiled briefly as he saw Aldan nod in sympathy. He said, “Go on,” eager to keep her talking.
“I thought that Joal and I would get married. We never even slept together. But he introduced me to Bresk and the rest. I never regretted running away. Until now.”
“Why, Meelia?”
“Because … I’m dying. Darningflies aren’t just our heraldry, they’re legend too. It’s said that they come to take the souls of the dying. I always thought it was a stupid legend; we come from a marshy area and there’s darningflies everywhere. It’s just a family superstition. But now …”
She fell silent again, but she still stared at the insect on her hand. Nakaz decided to try to coax more information out of her while she was in a loquacious mood.
“How did you end up in that cave-in, Meelia?”
She was silent for a moment, and then she sighed. “We were looking for one of the pieces of the Margre Chalisento. Voesh, the man you met yesterday, has been leading us all over the kingdom, looking. He came back from a trip to Pyridain with a scar and a quest. He got this old book in Magnus –”
“Very old?” interrupted Nakaz. “Blue binding with a small tear in the lower left corner?”
“Yeah, that’s it. You’ve seen it? Where? Oh, never mind, it’s not really important.
“Anyway, this book had clues in it that helped Voesh gather more information. That, and a small, oval stone with a gold star-shaped leaf inset into it. Somehow the stone helps him make decisions; it’s very uncanny when he does that.
“We’ve been chasing this legend for ages. For example, we spent two years piecing together enough information to locate a certain ring, which we hired a thief named Kale to acquire.”
Meelia paused, her gaze sweeping across Nakaz and Aldan before returning to the insect. She seemed to be gathering strength, and Nakaz let the silence stretch until she was ready to continue. A moment later, she continued, “The book helped lead us to Valdasly; the riddles narrowed down where to look; the ring led us to this cave and keyed open the hidden entrance. The map that your friend there interpreted showed the true tunnel and every trap along the way. We got to the end and found a cup on a little plinth set in an alcove with all kinds of carvings around it. The cup was stone, but it had a grain, like wood. Set into one side was a very small, very detailed stag-and-cat figure in gold. Voesh called it the ‘chalice of the body’, which was how we knew that it was what we had been looking for: part of the Margre. I guess that Voesh’s little oval stone must be another part, ’cause he told us that we only needed one more part, and that he was sure that it was to the north, somewhere in Dargon.”
Nakaz looked at Aldan, who was staring back at him. Dargon. Coincidence?
Meelia continued, “The last bit of the map was blotted with ink; I think that’s why the last trap got missed. Voesh did say something about a curse compounding itself as the parts were gathered together, but it was probably just Shan being careless. Of course, if we’d used the book itself, this wouldn’t have happened. But Voesh guards that book like it was his child.”
Meelia closed her eyes and suddenly coughed, convulsing her body and making her cry out with pain. She turned her head, hawked and spit, and the phlegm produced was heavily laced with blood. She tried to curl up but only cried out again.
Nakaz hurriedly fetched his phial and smeared more blue on her lips. She calmed down almost as soon as her tongue touched the color, and soon she was lying still, a smile on her face. Only her very ragged breathing, and the way pink froth occasionally bubbled to her lips, showed how badly off she was.
Nakaz knew that he didn’t have much time. He would have liked to learn more about Voesh’s stone, or about how the book that he had seen in the vaults of the College of Bards had been acquired, but Meelia wasn’t going to last much longer. If he couldn’t get the answers from her, though, there were still the others of her group.
“Meelia, do you know how your friends are getting to Dargon?”
“Don’t know,” she whispered dreamily. Nakaz wondered if he had given her too much prehidar. “But can guess. Direct route not using Royal Roads. Bresk, he’s our leader when Voesh isn’t telling us where to go, Bresk says that Royal Roads are too easy to follow and he doesn’t like to make it easy on any pursuit we might end up with. And we’ve been pursued a lot!” She giggled, spit out a little blood, and fell silent.
Nakaz almost missed the moment when Meelia died. He would have if the darningfly hadn’t chosen that moment to dart off, up over the cliff and away. Meelia’s chest fell with a faint rattle, and didn’t rise again.
Nakaz stood sadly, and walked a little way away to wait for the healer. Aldan followed. They stood in silence for a bit, and then Aldan asked, “So, did you believe her story?”
Nakaz said, “Yes. At the end, at least. She was telling the truth once the darningfly arrived.”
“But isn’t it a bit preposterous that they could have been guided all over the kingdom by some ancient artifact?”
For some reason, Nakaz’ mind flashed on the glass and metal-banded stone sculpture in his saddlebags. Thrusting the irrelevant thought away, he said, “The evidence is slim, but convincing. The ring, this canyon, the cave-in, and her story all fit together. And I’ve read that very book she talked about. I think we have to treat it all as fact.”
Nakaz walked out of the canyon with a final glance at Meelia’s body, leaving a thoughtful Aldan behind. He reached Aldan’s horse in time to see two riders approaching: Taych and another.
The healer confirmed that Meelia was dead of injuries inside her body. Nakaz thanked him, and asked him to let people know that the new cave was very dangerous and it should be blocked off as soon as possible. The healer left, taking Taych with him.
After putting Meelia’s body back in the cave, which was as fitting a burial as Nakaz could contrive, the two travelers returned to the horses. Aldan asked, “What now?”
Nakaz was ready with the answer. “We follow. There aren’t that many paths north that aren’t the Royal Road. They have half a day on us; we can’t let them get more of a lead. At any other time we could make up that time by riding at night, but this is the dark of the moon. At least they won’t be able to increase their lead.
“Do you have any objections to that? Chasing them north won’t even take us out of our way.”
Aldan said, “I agree. And if it ends up that we need to turn aside from my destination, I’ll gladly agree to it. Finding these people is more important than my business in Dargon.”
Nakaz nodded. He mounted Riesta and he and Aldan continued their journey north with an additional purpose.Anybody have info on this. I heard it was this weekend.
Your right it is this weekend. 16th-18th. I don't know when the gates open. But if you need mor inf, the number is: 732-446-7800. I may be there.What’s Your Favorite RPG Memory from the ‘90s?
I vividly remember sitting on the top bunk of my buddy’s bunk bed the first time I heard about a role-playing game. Two years older than me, he had the wisdom and patience needed to explain that, no, these games couldn’t be played through in one run. I relish these early days of RPG gaming, where I focused my time on exploring the opening areas of