The Tales of the Wanderer Volume One: A Book of Underrealm (The Underrealm Volumes 4) by Garrett Robinson (elon musk reading list TXT) 📕

Dryleaf gave a tired sigh. “I suppose you wish to strike out upon the road as soon as may be, without even giving an old man a night to rest?”

Mag paused for a long moment. Her mouth worked, her lips twisting around each other, as though words were fighting to escape.

At last she simply said, “No.”

I gaped at her. “No?”

“No.” Mag shook her head. “Kaita led us here step by step. Always she left us a clue, pulling us along until we reached Tokana, where she hoped to have done with us. That game has finished, and she has lost. Now we have no more clues, no signs by which to pursue her. So why should we hurry back to the road? Besides”—and she gave me a gentle smile—“you have returned home after far too long. You have reunited with your family. You should take the time to enjoy that.”

“I will,” I said. “But my aims have not changed. In Northwood, you and I said we would make Kaita pay. I said I was with you. That promise still stands.”

“I am glad to hear it,” said Mag, and I could hear how deeply she meant it. “Then enjoy your return to your homeland. Kaita will still be out there when you are done, and we will find her together.”

“I, too, am still with you,” muttered Dryleaf from his chair. “Though I suppose it sounds less heroically inspiring coming from me.”

The rest of our Yearsend was rather pleasant. Ditra’s rangers were kept very busy hunting down the Shades in the mountains. When Kaita abandoned them, they melted into the wilderness, trying to hide from all sight and retribution. Most did not succeed. Ditra’s forces hunted the Shades down in every hole where they tried to hide. And those who passed farther into the mountains, and were discovered by trolls … well, I did not like to imagine their fate then, and I still do not.

We stayed in Kahaunga for more than a week. When Ditra was not too busy rebuilding her city, I spent most of my days with her, and when she was, I would visit Vera instead. Sometimes I would take her riding beyond the walls of the stronghold, and I discovered to my great delight that she seemed to love the mountain wilderness almost as much as I had when I was her age.

My time spent with Ditra was mostly pleasant. In the very first days, we were so thrilled at Kahaunga’s salvation that we thought of little else. After that, our conversations turned back to our past and our family. We still had some angry words to say to each other then, things we had not had time to say before the trolls attacked. But I will not repeat it all here, for it worked itself out in the end—the way it usually does, with family. One’s true family, at any rate. We found peace with each other, and I took every meal with her and Vera, with Mag and Dryleaf joining us more often than not. Ditra had, you remember, been rather cool towards Mag when she thought she was a sellsword. That was no longer the case, and they grew to like each other greatly in a very short time. Ditra found great amusement in Mag’s frequent jokes at my expense, and sometimes the two of them would join forces against me, doing their utmost to make me blush, and falling into peals of laughter when I retreated, muttering, into my wine. On one such occasion, Dryleaf gave a sudden, barking laugh.

“Sky above, I have just realized it.” He reached over and patted Mag’s arm. “Mag has become your new Ditra.”

That sobered both women up rather sharply, and they glared at him. “I certainly have not,” said Mag.

“She certainly has not,” said Ditra, at the exact same time.

This, of course, sent both Dryleaf and me into hysterics, and Vera giggled at her mother’s side. When I had recovered enough to talk, I patted Mag’s hand.

“I think he is wiser than either of us, my friend.”

It was Mag’s turn to retreat to her cup of wine.

Ditra and Vera got to hear Dryleaf sing often during that time. We would sit in her chamber, Vera on my lap or her mother’s, Mag by the window with Oku curled at her feet, and listen as Dryleaf shared songs we had never heard before. I never failed to marvel at how many he seemed to know. I thought I could learn a new one every week for the rest of my life and still not match him. The years seemed to fall away from him when he performed; his face shone in the firelight, his stance was firm, his shoulders straight. And as I watched him, and listened, I reflected on a conversation that he and I had had more than once in the last few months.

One day, nearly a week after the battle with the trolls, I saw him alone in his chamber after the others had gone to bed. I had just helped Ditra put Vera to bed; she had fallen asleep on her mother’s lap, and I carried her to her room while Ditra tucked the blankets in around her.

“What is it, my boy?” said Dryleaf, brows raised in curiosity.

“I … I wanted to share something with you, if you do not mind staying up a while longer.”

Dryleaf frowned. “Of course. Is everything all right?”

I took a deep breath. “It is. I have … this is still dear to me, and I am reluctant … it is the song. Jordel’s song.”

Dryleaf understood at once, and he nodded solemnly. “Ah.”

“I told you of my journey with Loren in the Greatrocks. I spoke more of her than of Jordel, but Jordel was dearer to me, and I promised that I would make a song for him. I … I would be honored if you were the first to hear it.”

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