Chapter Thirteen

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Serpent’s Grotto

“?????????.”

FOY

Provinces
Bryce Valley
Diamond (April) 26

Malcolm plucked the arrow free and slid it safely back into his quiver, picking up his cloak and draping it over his arm. He took a step forward as if to follow, and Cleo grabbed his arm just as quickly.

“Wait, you’re just gonna go with him?” she asked.

“He’s walking in the direction we need to go, isn’t he?”

“Well, yeah … but…”

“Then let’s go,” Malcolm said starting after the man.

​“Well, what if? …” she lowered her voice to a whisper. “You don’t think this is a little weird?” After he took a few steps he realized she would not follow, turned, and drew closer, all the while aware of the sound of the old man's easy tread as he went.

​“What choice do we have?” he asked, spreading his arms.

“What if he tries something?” she asked, agitated.

Malcolm shrugged. “Well, it’s not as if you’re a damsel in distress,” he said with a wink, and then turned away in pursuit of the man, who had covered a surprising distance in such a short time.

Cleo rolled her eyes and jogged up to Malcolm’s side. Together they quickened their pace up behind the old man, leaving him just outside arm's reach. Just as they came closer up to his back, he began to speak again.

​“Thought you kids might be Outriders at first. I’ve seen their sort here lately. Seems my valley has become a favorite spot of the Republic of Veil’driel.” Malcolm and Cleo exchanged a glance behind him but said nothing. “Not outriders, though. Could have never gotten the drop on one of those lads.” He stopped suddenly and turned, looked Cleo in the eye. “Or lasses, beggin' your pardon, Miss,” he said, tipping his straw hat before turning around and starting to move again.
“I’m sorry,” Cleo said, and she cleared her throat. “Did you say … your Valley?”
“I did indeed,” said Gabriel as they walked under a rock formation that arced like a bridge high above them. “Figure of speech is all.” He looked back to Malcolm. “No, not Outriders. Nope. But your enemy fears you almost as well. Your kind has done them damage and gives them pause. Even the most prideful. Makes them hate you worst of anyone.”
They came around another bend, and Gabriel disappeared for half an instant. Yet in that blink of an eye, the old man had turned around, and when Malcolm and Cleo rounded behind him, they found themselves unexpectedly face to face.
Cleo yelped at the shock, and then looked over to Malcolm after regaining her composure. Malcolm was motionless, focused and calm, as if he hadn’t been surprised in the slightest.
“They call you Whistlers,” Gabriel said, and he stepped forward so that he was less than a foot from Malcolm’s face.
“Yeah?” Malcolm asked. “Well alright.”
The awkwardness of the moment seemed suspended in time as the old man took a good while before speaking again. “You can use your bows as deadly weapons, I’ve seen it. Yes, a bow in the hands of a Whistler is a fearsome thing, indeed. Even with no arrows about.”
Malcolm’s eyes narrowed on the man ever so slightly, and he seemed abruptly unconcerned with the awkwardness of their proximity. “You know a lot about us, it would seem,” Malcolm said. “Gotta say I find that more than a little unnerving in light of the fact that we just lost one of our own up here.”
“One of your own?” Gabriel asked, with no hesitation. “No, not one of you. He didn’t have a ring. Can’t be a Whistler without the ring.”
Cleo took a step back, slowly reaching for her weapon.
“You won’t be needin' that blade of yours, girlie.”
“How do you know so much about the man we lost?” Cleo asked.
“Because I watched you come up here the last time,” he said. “Watched him go in. Watched him never come out.”
“He didn’t have a ring, you said?” Malcolm asked. He was far calmer than Cleo, a fact that seemed to annoy her greatly.
Gabriel’s eyes were back on Malcolm. He shook his head.
“Who was it Creed sent up here?” Malcolm asked, twisting away from the old man to face Cleo. Her eyes widened and she nodded back towards Gabriel as if to remind Malcolm of the threat. But the bowman was too curious now. “Who was it?” he asked again.
Cleo sighed. “Shane Bevan,” she said impatiently. “What does it matter?”
“Shane Bev-,” Malcolm looked away for a moment. Then back. “Shane Bevan isn’t even a sharpshooter!”
“Look, can we have this conversation later?” Cleo said, angry. “Or do I need to remind you that you’re due to be somewhere!”
“Oh, I get it,” Malcolm said, nodding slowly with a tone so calm it mocked Cleo’s. In fact, that may have been the point. “Why risk the asset of a Veil’driel sharpshooter when you can just send a poor archer kid! Hey, if he gets killed it’s no big deal, right? Just a-”
“Will you please just shut up!” Cleo yelled. “Just because you’re so damned intuitive, doesn’t mean you have to find conspiracies everywhere you look! If you could keep your brain from eating itself for just five seconds, maybe you would realize that the threat level for a mission like this was initially very low. The Outriders had found no enemy activity, and the shot was not so difficult that a sharpshooter had to be ordered in. Shane Bevan requested the mission! He requested it!”
Malcolm’s mouth dropped open just a bit, and his eyes widened. “I .. I, uh…”
“What’s a matter, Mal, nothing to say? Why don’t you accuse me of not being a real part of this war! Or maybe you’d prefer insinuating that I slept my way into this position again, hm? How about that?”
“Hey!” Malcolm yelled, pointing at her, and for a second it seemed as if he was on the verge of arguing back.
Cleo just crossed her arms, a smug look on her face as she waited for him to say something. But he hesitated, and as desperate as he may have been for any kind of retort, his voice calmed. “I’m sorry for what I said at the camp,” he admitted, and by the time he was finished speaking there was nothing stern about his voice. “I didn’t mean it, Cleo.”
The apology took the general’s page by surprise, and she seemed unsure how to react. Her beautiful features softened, and with her arms still crossed, she bounced a little in place.
“I actually think you’re great,” Malcolm finished.
There was silence again, complete silence, but it didn’t last long as Gabriel spoke up in the space. “They say intuition is the language of the soul,” he said.
Malcolm held Cleo’s gaze for just a second longer before turning back to face the old man.
“But I find it’s more of a compass, don’t you? Used by the deepest of us to navigate the tides of our lives.”
“You’re one crazy old man, you know that?” Malcolm said, amused.
Gabriel reached up and grabbed the entire lower portion of Malcolm’s face.
“Hey!” he yelled, his speech muffled by the old man’s hand over his mouth. He couldn’t explain it, but he knew that Gabriel was no threat to him or Cleo. He felt at ease as he stared deeply into the stranger’s eyes, and watched in stunned disbelief as they shifted through every color of the rainbow right before him. When it was over, Malcolm couldn’t even be sure if it happened; the experience was like trying to remember the fleeting details of a dream upon waking.
“Not you, though,” the old man said, releasing his hold on the bowman’s face. “You don’t need to navigate the tides. People like you can breathe the water.”
Malcolm just vaguely realized that Cleo had come up to his side.
“What was that?” Malcolm asked. “What did you just do?”
Gabriel only smiled and tipped his straw hat. Spinning around on his heels, his hares almost caught Malcolm square in the face before the bowman used his quick reflexes to back away just in time.
“Yeah, I like Whistlers,” Gabriel was saying; now walking away again as if the entire business with Malcolm never happened. “You’re a contributive lot. It’s useless people I cannot abide. Cannot abide them in the slightest.”
“The caverns are just ahead,” Cleo said, and her voice seemed to bring the bowman back to the present in full.
Malcolm nodded, cleared his throat and took a deep breath. “Right,” he said. “Yeah.” He seemed tight, and so did Cleo, neither one of them knowing how they should act in the wake of their earlier exchange. “Well, I guess we should get this over with then,” he managed at length.
“Yes, definitely!” she said with too much enthusiasm.
Neither took a step yet, and then they accidentally made eye contact.
“Right, so, we’ll just-” Malcolm pointed in the direction after Gabriel.
“Yeah!” she said again, and the pair was quickly in pursuit.
​The old man was fast, they were both surprised to find, and they passed several more of the stone spikes before the sound of his passage grew louder again. Now and again they had to pause to scramble up stone slabs that had been gathered almost like stairs by natural forces, and find their way into cracks between large boulders that were noticeable only because Malcolm was intent on searching for them.
​Down a steep dip and around another bend, they came face to face with a giant dragon head carved into the rock, its scaly face contorted in fury and jaw full of once-sharp teeth open in a mighty roar. A few of the front fangs had crumbled away, but the monster still looked as if it could swallow either of the two travelers whole. The plate-like ridges of its body etched into the natural curve of the terrain gave the impression that it could rise up in anger at any moment.
​Malcolm stood just before it and looked up. “Seriously?”
​“Druids built these entrances,” said Foy, staring up at it with Malcolm.
​“They must have had some kind of dragon fetish,” Malcolm said.
​“Not dragons, not dragons at all,” Gabriel said. “Sea monsters.” The old man snapped his fingers, his attention diverted already. “Ah.” He examined the sapphire and crystal handing from Malcolm’s arm. “Well it would seem you have an acquaintance among those you fear. Precious stones, precious stones. I’ll leave you to your task.”
​And then, with a final tip of his raggedy hat, Gabriel Foy turned and continued on his way. Malcolm watched him go, part of him wanting to call out to the old man, part of him wondering what he was all about. “Just when you think you’ve seen it all,” he said.
Beside him, Cleo smiled, and he turned to her. “Alright, I’ll be right back.”
Cleo nodded. “Be careful,” she said. Reaching to Malcolm’s arm, she touched the crystal and it immediately sparked to life, shedding its arcane glow all around them.

​He dropped his cloak near the entrance of the cavern. “I won’t be long.”​

She just stood there.

​“You alright?” he asked.

​Cleo nodded.

​“Yeah?”

​“Yeah,” she said, a weak smile on her lips. “I just remember Shane going in there. And he…”

​Malcolm nodded, took a step into the mouth of the serpent’s gaping jowls. “No sense worrying about what we can’t control. I’ll be careful, and you do the same, alright?”

​The two stood just a moment or two longer, staring at each other, and while an understanding passed between them, there was nothing for it. There was nothing left to say, nothing left to do but turn towards the darkness.

​“Good luck,” Cleo said as she watched him go.

​Malcolm never broke stride, just held up his hand as he vanished into the void.

Chapter Fourteen  (E) Dark Horses #2190508 by Dan Hiestand