Gendred have fallen.”
The Shaman closed his eyes. He coughed again spattering bright blood across his pallid cheek. His head rocked back and forth slightly in protest or denial or both.
“Can you heal yourself?”
“No.”
Khirro looked up and down the healer’s prone form. “What can I do? How can I help?”
“You cannot help me.” As the Shaman spoke his face contorted and his body tensed then went limp.
“Where did they come from?”
“They found the tunnels, came out at the drainage ditch.”
Khirro glanced at the ditch and the small opening in the fortress wall feeding it. The iron gate that should have covered it hung from one hinge, canted at an awkward angle. Khirro’s breath shortened in realization there was nothing to stop more Kanosee coming through to kill them all.
“The entrance is sealed,” the Shaman said reading Khirro’s thoughts. He took a shuddering breath and air gurgled through the wound in his chest. “Take this.”
Khirro didn’t see the Shaman move his hand, yet he held the vial, arm shaking as his strength waned. Khirro stared, mesmerized by the crimson fluid ebbing and flowing inside with the quake of the magic man’s hand.
“No.” He shook his head as much to tear his eyes from the vial as to indicate dissent. “I can’t.”
“You must.”
“I’m not strong enough or brave enough. I’ll return to the fortress. I’ll get someone capable.”
Khirro went to stand, but the Shaman gripped his wrist. Khirro winced, surprised the injured man still had such strength.
“No time,” the Shaman rasped. “You’re the only hope.”
“I can’t do it.”
Khirro’s head sagged, unable to meet the Shaman’s mismatched eyes. Another gurgling breath shuddered the man’s body. His strength flagged and the hand holding the vial slumped to the grass, though he maintained his grip on Khirro’s wrist with the other. The vial rolled from his fingertips and came to rest against Khirro’s boot with a soft clink.
“Come close.”
Khirro hesitated, worried the man might still be dangerous.
It wouldn’t make sense for him to harm me.
He chastised himself. This man kept him alive when Gendred would have killed him.
Khirro leaned close to the magic man’s swollen lips, close enough they brushed his ear as the fallen healer whispered non-sensical words. Khirro listened, brow furrowed, attempting to hear the quiet voice, comprehend the words. It took only a few seconds for him to understand why the Shaman beckoned him.
“Gods!”
Khirro pulled away, but the healer grasped him by the back of his neck, pulled him close with strength impossible for a dying man. Unintelligible words flowed from the Shaman’s lips as Khirro struggled to get free and images flashed through his mind: a wizened old man, an ancient stone keep, a ruby dragon, vast forests, uncountable hills, windswept waters, unknown towns, and finally the meadow outside the fortress walls. Vivid and real, it seemed as though he saw them right here, right now. Sweat beaded Khirro’s brow, his hands shook. The Shaman completed the incantation and released him. Khirro fell back.
“What have you done?” Khirro demanded with shaking voice. “What have you done to me?”
The Shaman’s eyes slipped shut. Only his lips moved as he spoke. “He who seeks entrance to the keep must face the keeper alone.”
Khirro shook his head. “What have you done?”
“I’ve shown you the way to Darestat the Necromancer.”
“I won’t go,” he insisted, voice louder. He glanced over his shoulder—Ghaul continued his search of a fallen Kanosee soldier, unaware of the exchange. “I told you I won’t. I’ll find someone else.”
A pinched smile contorted the Shaman’s lips into an ugly purple gash across his face. “You have no choice, Khirro.”
He stared at the magic man, wanting to believe he hadn’t heard his words. He crawled closer to the Shaman again. “What do you mean?”
“You’re bound to save your king.” The Shaman coughed another gout of blood.
“No. This can’t be.”
Breath rattled from the Shaman’s throat, the gurgling in his chest ceased. Khirro looked past the fallen man, his attention drawn away as the shimmering curtain of air surrounding them faded. Meadow sparrows chirped, but, to Khirro’s ears, it wasn’t the happy sound that makes one glad to be alive, not now. Perhaps not ever again.
“Your friends are dead.”
Khirro whirled at the sound of the man’s voice, grabbing for his dirk. Ghaul took a step back, holding his hands up defensively.
“Whoa! Hold on, friend. What’s the matter?”
Khirro’s strength fled and he fell to his side on the grass, hand contacting the warm glass vial. Ghaul rushed to his side.
“Are you all right?”
Against every feeling in his body