Fires of Prophecy_ Book Two of the Morcyth Saga - Brian Pratt [143]
After they’ve removed the rubble and the men are being taken to the surface to mend, Essin leads them back to their area. On the way back, Miko sees a group of men coming with timbers and hammers to shore up the fallen area.
Once back and again picking away at the wall, his mind keeps returning to the cave-in and he can’t get the picture of the man’s skull, crushed by the fallen stone, out of his mind. The tunnel feels smaller than it had before and every noise he hears, scares him as he thinks the tunnel is caving in.
When they at last head back up to their room, Miko is happy to be out of there. All night long, he has dreams of being trapped inside the tunnel as it caves in around him.
Chapter Twenty Five
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The day before, they headed south as directly as they could and had put many miles behind them. Several times they came across dead soldiers and horses, all having been flayed by the storm. Every corpse had a good portion of their skin removed, some even with bones exposed from where the flying debris had shredded the skin and tissue from them.
They remained out of sight of the road to the west while paralleling its course south. Once they detoured further to the east to avoid patrols and each time James had dreaded the thought of possibly having to do magic to escape them. But thankfully, they managed to avoid detection and hadn’t needed to use magic.
Close to nightfall, they come across a small spring and made camp. Barely three foot across and two deep, it held enough water to quench their thirst and satisfy the horses. By the time they were done with drinking and filling their water bottles, they had practically drained it dry. By morning, though, it had refilled to its previous level and they were able to top off their water bottles again before setting off.
Prior to leaving, James pulls out his mirror to see if he can determine Miko’s whereabouts. When the image begins to appear, he starts to panic because it is so dark. At first he thought he was looking inside a grave but then a light appears and he sees Miko with a pickaxe in hand, swinging it against a rock wall.
“I found him!” he announces excitedly. “It looks like they have him inside some kind of mine.”
“A mine?” Jiron asks. “Can you determine where?”
He tries to expand the image but to no avail. Shaking his head he says, “All I see is the inside of the mine, others are there working beside him.”
“Must be a big place then,” Jiron figures.
“Perhaps,” he replies. “I’m sure the locals would know of it, but we don’t dare inquire.”
Jiron nods in agreement, “Yeah, we would stick out all right, what with us not knowing the language. What do you propose we do?”
Thinking a moment, he takes out a strip of cloth and says, “I’ll keep using this to show us the way and eventually we’ll find him.”
“Even across water?” he asks. “Remember, he was on a ship a few days ago.”
“There’s no reason to believe he’s not on the mainland,” James says. “They could’ve simply used it for quick transport from one city to the next along the coast.”
Looking dubious, Jiron shrugs his shoulders and says, “Either way, sitting here isn’t going to get us any closer.” He tops off his water bottle and then allows his horse a last drink from the spring before mounting. Once mounted, he waits for James to do the same and then they’re on their way.
Jiron looks over to James and sees him holding the piece of cloth as it sticks straight out from his hand. It’s pointing to the southwest. “Should we head that way now or stay south until he’s due west?” he asks.
“May as well head straight there,” he says. “We don’t know if going south or southwest is the safest way. So we may as well go in as straight a direction as possible.” He looks to Jiron and then says, “Until our circumstances change that is.”
“Southwest it is then,” Jiron says as he turns his horse in that direction. As James turns to follow, Jiron asks him, “What do you plan to do after we find your friend?”
“First thing would be to get him out of wherever he is,” he replies.