Elk Riders Complete Collection

Chapter 2

The Servior

The ship was already at dock when they arrived, its red sails looming over the wattle and daub houses of the village. The square beside the docks was packed with people, so many that it was impossible to squeeze past them. Gabriella could tell that something was terribly wrong though, for no one was bartering over goods or bickering good-naturedly over prices. Instead the crowds of Harkenites were silent while they strained to listen to what sounded like an argument between two men standing where the cobblestone of the square met the planking of the docks.

Gabriella and Eloise tried standing on tiptoe but even then they were not quite tall enough. Other children occupied all the barrels and crates on the periphery already and all the choice perches in the nearest trees. Eloise had an idea. She motioned for Gabriella to follow her down under the docks. Gabriella pulled Dameon along after her. The three of them walked on the exposed shingle amid smells of rotting fish and waterlogged timbers.

Gabriella could tell Eloise knew this path well. Eloise had a way of blending in and hiding in the wide open, a trick of survival Gabriella knew well herself. That her friend could find a secret pathway into the heart of the village did not surprise her in the least.

What did surprise her was the sight of the foreigners, men of wealth and power, attended to by men of war with weapons of steel, not a simple wood club or bone spear among them. They were harsh-looking men, not dressed as sailors but rather as mages with black tunics and trousers beneath velvet, midnight-blue cloaks. Their belt buckles were a dull unpolished metal that did not reflect the light. In contrast to the sobriety of their dress, each wore a necklace with a broken ring upon it, hanging like a golden “C” against their breasts. These sparkled and shone in the intermittent sunlight.

Their attendants wore boiled leather armor and ring mail shirts. Some wore helmets. Those who were bareheaded had closely shorn hair that revealed tattoos coiled liked snakes around their scalps. Some had bones stuck through their noses and earrings that ran in shiny rows up the sides of their ears. Two of the visitors stood on pointe, in front of the others, just where the docks met the courtyard, halted as if by a sense that they were welcome no further.

Eloise led Gabriella and Dameon up a muddy embankment so they could get a better look. The two men at the lead were a great contrast to one another. One stood tall in a carmine cloak lined in black with what looked like silver lettering, runes, sewn into the border that Gabriella could not read. His skin was smooth and unblemished. He carried no weapon save a short sword with a jeweled hilt.

His companion was shorter, stockier, and wore sleeveless mail. His weapons, a throwing ax across his back and a scimitar on his belt, were nicked and scratched—the marks of many battles. The short man’s face was scarred and pitted, his nose flattened as if broken many times.

Yet, despite their differences, each man’s face—with high cheekbones and wide-set eyes—had a serpentine quality. Even their mouths were wide and thin lipped. Gabriella concluded that they must be brothers or cousins at least.

Chief Salinger stood, along with the elders of Harkness, to greet the visitors. Gabriella felt the heat rise to her face when she realized how close they were to the chief. His stance was wide, his shoulders squared and his chin pointed upwards, the expression on his face one of quiet confidence. He was young for a chief, but in that moment Gabriella saw why he had been elected out of all the Harkness elders: everything about him bespoke leadership.

“He is so handsome,” Gabriella said, clutching Eloise close to her, still shaking—whether it was from cold or pure excitement she didn’t know—but she did know that whenever she was close to the chief, her head felt as if it were full of wind, her stomach full of feathers, and her heart pounded like a smithy’s hammer.

The man in the carmine cloak introduced himself as “Sade, of the Servior.” Whether the Servior were a tribe or a state, Gabriella was not sure.“Perhaps they are an order of magi,” Eloise said.

“Shush,” Gabriella said, trying to listen. She wrapped her arms around herself, her wet clothes making her cold.

“We are here to offer a bid for the land that is for sale on the eastern side of the harbor,” Sade said. It was noteworthy that he identified the land this way, for everyone knew which land he meant: the land next to the dark tower, the Tower of the Dead.

“This land is not for sale,” Salinger said. “It is adjacent to grounds that are sacred to our people.”

Of course every villager in Harkness knew this. Every soul in the archipelago knew Harkness by its other name: the Isle of the Tower, the tower that stood as a portal between the world of the living and that of the dead. The coins of Harkness were stamped with it. Ships sailed past the mouth of the harbor so crews could take a look for themselves. It was the center of life for those who lived here and legendary in the islands of the Northern Sea. By their accented Oceanic, Gabriella could tell these men were not from the archipelago.

“We heard otherwise,” Sade said.

At this point a voice called out from the crowd, “You heard correctly, my Lord Sade.”

Mab Miller, merchant, miller, and owner of the land, stepped out of the wall of Harkenites gathered on the cobblestone to a chorus of “boos.” A rich man, he normally wore rings on every finger and fat medallions on chains around his neck, but this day he had forsaken the ostentatious and was dressed modestly in skins and furs, like an ordinary Harkenite.

“He’s making a show of being indigent,” Eloise said.

Gabriella agreed and wondered herself what Mab was up to.

“The price is three pounds of gold,” Mab announced.

The crowd broke into a fury. Harkenites screamed and cursed Mab for his greed, his disloyalty, his betrayal. A head of cabbage flew through the air and landed at his feet, the leaves spreading out on the cobblestones. Salinger called for silence. His people obeyed.

“Mab,” the chief said. “You know the law as well as I do. A Harkenite might not sell land to foreigners unless the people of Harkness have had one moon to raise an equal amount. If the Harkenites produce such a sum, the land reverts to them.”

“It is an old law,” Mab said.

“Because it is old does not mean we shall not follow it. Our forefathers put it in place for a reason, to keep our lands in the hands of our people.”

“We trade with foreigners all the time. It is the lifeblood of the island.”

“Not land. Not these lands. Not so close to the tower.” Salinger said it, the subject they had really been talking about: the tower and its traditions. No one actually owned the land where the tower stood. It belonged to the people of Harkness, but for generations, they had passed through the Millers’ lands to reach it. There was no other way.

“Isn’t it about time that, as a people, we did away with superstitions and old wives’ tales?” asked Mab.

More shouts from the crowd. Mab raised his arms to fend off another cabbage, this one brown and rotten. Salinger called for silence again and turned back to Mab, his eyes narrow this time. “Careful, Mab, those are your ancestors you speak of, too,” said Salinger, making the sign to avert evil.

Mab was not cowed. “You have all been fooled by spectacle and fairy tales,” he said, flipping his wrist and mocking Salinger’s sign. “Fellow Harkenites, I tell you now, such an arrangement, such wealth flowing into this island would benefit many.”

“It would benefit you!” said Tarmac, an elder who was a former chief.

“Does not the prospering of one business bring profits to others?” Mab countered. More insults followed, but not as many this time. Gabriella knew there were some islanders who did not cling to the old beliefs, who would be interested in doing business with a wealthy partner like Mab. Three pounds of gold would be more riches than all the coin in the village coffers. Mab did not have the entire island on his side, but he might have had enough. Enough that the people fell to conjecture and conjecture led to bickering.

All of this, the brothers of the Servior watched. The shorter one’s expression was unchanged. He studied the crowd the way a fighter assessed an opponent, cold, calculating, searching for weaknesses while projecting strength. Sade, in the carmine cloak, was more relaxed, a self-satisfied smile splayed across his face. Everything about him—his upturned palms, his open stance—conveyed sincere beneficence.

Gabriella felt it to be a lie.

It took Salinger some time before the crowd was again his. Some of the other elders had to join him in the call for order and silence. The people eventually quieted but not before energy rose up among them like the hum of wasps in a nest. Salinger turned back to the Servior, their ship, their weapons, their jewels, all their symbols that bespoke of power, in such contrast to the simple homes and plain dress of the people of Harkness. His voice sounded smaller now, his eyes darting about, unsure. “Lords, I beseech a moon of you, as is our custom.”

“Granted,” Sade said. “The people of our order are patient. We will wait.” He turned to the shorter Servior, the one who could have been his brother and said, “Come, Vondales.”

“Your graciousness is noted,” Salinger said as the Servior turned their backs and returned to the ship. “The people of our island are devout. We will consult our ancestors.”