The Captive Flame

He kept one hand on the reins and raised the other to show that it was empty. Then he walked his horse forward. Jhesrhi did the same, except that she lifted both hands and guided the gelding with her knees. Show-off.

They halted their mounts in front of the barricade. For an instant Gaedy

“Names,” rasped the kobold on the left. Like his comrade, he wore the crossed-scepter-and-wand emblem of Kassur Jedea. Kassur was the nominal king of Threskel, although it was common knowledge he took his orders from Alasklerbanbastos just like everybody else.

“I’m Azzedar,” Gaedy

Two more kobolds wandered out into the rain. They must have had a sizable warren under the hill.

The black mare wasn’t a war-horse. Possession of such a valuable mount would have immediately discredited Gaedy

“Coming from Chessenta?” asked the kobold who’d spoken before. The glint in his narrowed eyes belied his casual tone.

“Abyss, no,” Gaedy

“Where are you headed?”

“My brother’s farm. His bitch of a wife wouldn’t let Ilzza and me winter there, but they’ll need help with the spring planting.”

“Well,” said the kobold, “maybe they’ll get it. If you can pay the toll.”

“Toll?” Gaedy

“Maybe you haven’t heard, wandering around in the wild, but we’re going to war. And the Bone Wyrm needs coin to fight it.”

Gaedy

“I don’t have any coin,” he said.

“You’ve got horses,” the kobold answered. “True, they don’t look like much, but they’re something. How do you feel about walking the rest of the way to your brother’s place?”

“Wait.” Gaedy

The kobold slipped around the end of the barricade, opened the packet, and sniffed the few bits of brown crushed leaf inside. “You don’t have much.”

“Enough for you and your friends to have some fun,” Gaedy

“Oh, take it and let them go on,” a different kobold said. “We’re getting soaked.”

“All right,” said the first kobold, evidently a sergeant or something comparable. It waved a clawed hand, and its fellows started to drag the mass of brambles aside.

“Stop,” a new voice rumbled. Less sibilant and two octaves deeper than the kobolds’ voices, it spoke Chessentan more clearly. Perhaps because it issued from a throat and mouth better shaped for human speech.

Gaedy

The big creature yawned. “What do we have here?”

“Nobody,” said the sergeant. “Just vagabonds.”

His superior emerged into the light and the rain. Perhaps it was a kind of kobold too. It had the same sort of claws, fangs, and greenish leathery hide. But sorcery, or conceivably mixed blood, had produced something more closely resembling one of the hulking giant-kin called ogres.

The big creature looked at the weapon clipped to Gaedy

Wishing he’d made do with an inferior one, Gaedy

The leader grunted. “We’ll see.” It turned to the ordinary kobolds. “Search them. Persons and baggage both.”

If Jhesrhi knew a spell to change the creature’s mind, or to extricate herself and Gaedy

Since they’d reached the barricade, she’d sat silently with her head bowed. She was trying to look cowed and submissive before the kobolds.

But now appearance had become reality. She was trembling.

By the Nine Hells and every flame that burned there, what was the matter with her? He’d watched her battle foes far more intimidating than kobolds and ogres without flinching.

“Get off your horses,” the kobold sergeant said.

Gaedy

The sergeant jumped back out of range. One of the other kobolds cast a javelin. It flew past the black mare’s head.

Spooked, she reared. Caught by surprise, Gaedy

Kobolds rushed him. Luckily they had to maneuver around the barricade and the frightened horse to do it, in the moment before she galloped back down the trail. It gave him time to roll to his feet and meet his first attacker with a slash that split its belly.

Javelins jabbed at him, and he knocked them out of line. Back foot splashing down in a puddle, he retreated to keep the smaller reptiles from encircling him. Then, from the corner of his eye, he glimpsed something looming on his flank. He pivoted in that direction, and the big creature’s long, brass-studded war club whizzed down at his head.

His warrior’s instincts kept him from trying to parry, lest he break his sword and perhaps his arm with it. Instead, he sidestepped and slashed the officer’s forearm. The brute snarled.

Instantly, before it could heave the club into position for another swing, he followed up with a second cut. A poorly aimed one-it missed the officer’s torso but at least gashed its lead leg. The brute stumbled backward, and Gaedy

“Jhesrhi!” he yelled. “Do something, damn it!”

But she just kept sitting on the paint that, eyes rolling, looked like he’d bolt as soon as he discerned a clear path through the combatants. She wouldn’t even lift her head and look at the fight. Which likely meant Gaedy

The leader dropped its war club, turned, and ran at Jhesrhi. Perhaps caught by surprise, or simply still frozen with dread, she didn’t even try to resist as it grabbed her, dragged her out of the saddle, and held her up in the air like a toy.

“Drop your sword!” it bellowed. “Or I’ll pull her arms off!” Apparently Gaedy

It would be idiotic to surrender. By her inaction, Jhesrhi had forfeited any claim on his consideration, and yielding probably wouldn’t help either of them anyway. He’d likely be trading a slim chance for none at all.

Yet he didn’t know if he had it in him to ignore the threat. He was still wondering when she finally came to life.

Perhaps it was the awareness that she was actually being held, touched, that roused her. She suddenly screamed and thrashed, and though her frenzy had no art in it-no precisely articulated words of command or flowing mystic passes-magic answered her anyway. The officer’s face burst into flame.