Strife & Valor: Book II of The Rorke Burningsoul Saga by Regina Watts (red queen ebook .TXT) 📕

As the first few wolf spiders bumbled past and scurried along the scepter to learn its dimensions, I’m embarrassed to say I was more startled than Branwen and recoiled upright from where I knelt. The druid, though surprised, was far more intrigued, and marveled around her as readily as though the little creatures were squirrels or fawns.

“How helpful,” she commented with a laugh, offering a more approving and warm-hearted look toward Valeria than I think I had then seen her give. “It takes a spectacular heart to see the creativity of spiders and call on them without fear.”

“And Valeria’s heart is most certainly spectacular,” I agreed while more spiders flooded merrily into the quarry. Fuzzy tarantulas scuttled down from the mountains while trapdoor spiders crawled from their holes and raced to hear news from those comrades who were first to the scene. Jumping spiders sprang out of shadows and even a few plane-shifting spiders the size of large mastiffs vibrated into the visible dimension. Their purple eyes studied me warily until I moved back from the Scepter to let the arachnids do their work. These demi-alien spiders had to be about as careful as I was when it came to avoiding their tiny brethren; but, somehow, their silk threads were no less fine!

The weaving had begun before I even realized it. It was the nighttime hour, I think, coupled with the arresting sight of all the many spiders. One became focused on the arachnids and not necessarily on what they were doing. But what they were doing, I was soon to find, was incredible.

Strand by strand, the spiders created a silk shroud long enough to wrap around the Scepter of Weltyr. It tucked into itself with ease, allowing the concealment of the sacred object’s either end. The cloth shimmered in the light nearly as brightly as did its charge. When it was finished, it wafted down into my hands as lightly as would have the veil of a bride.

When the work was finished, the spiders remained only to assure themselves that I understood what to do with their gift. As I approached the relic with the cloth over my arm, they dispersed. Rather than the awesome waves in which they’d come, they left the area in a gradual black trickle as though rejoining the pool of night’s darkness. By the time the plane-shifting spiders phased out of the third and fourth dimensions back into whatever one they preferred to spend time in, Valeria’s song had reduced to soft chanting. A few wolf spiders remained to watch us finish what they started, and when satisfied that their work was a perfect fit, they scurried off to resume their business.

“I have to hand it to them,” I said, stepping back from the wrapped scepter to admire its new cocoon, “they really are capital tailors.”

“That was such a beautiful prayer, Valeria,” said Branwen, still in that tone of genuine compliment. “I never would have thought of calling on spiders for assistance…we druids tend to favor mammals, but now I feel like it’s some kind of prejudice!”

Smiling thinly, visibly tired to call upon so great an act of magic without the aid of Roserpine’s ring, Valeria swayed up to her feet and permitted me to take her warm, sweet-smelling body in my arms. “Perhaps it is something like that…but, in the Nightlands, the animals we know best are snakes, bats, and spiders. Roserpine loves all those creatures that move through the darkness.”

“Then please pray to her as well as to Weltyr that such love has been shown to the people of Soot. Branwen, take the lantern…”

I paused. My chest grew pained to look on Strife, broken there amid the rocks. If we were met with trouble I would have only my own prayers with which to defend myself. None of those could be said to be directly offensive in nature except, perhaps, for Weltyr’s occasional willingness to bring about undead entities through me—always temporary in nature, and usually only something automated like the severed hand of Al-listux. I supposed, in a pinch, I could always lead my enemies back to town and around to Soot’s small cemetery.

Luckily, no such thing was necessary. After all—I had just been told that, in my greatest need, a new sword would be mine for the taking. I trusted I would not require a weapon until then, although my heart still ached while Valeria tenderly took Strife’s pieces and, as I had, pressed them to her heart. She looked at me curiously, but did not ask me any questions. That quality of Valeria’s—her ability to perceive when it was not yet time to ask a question that seared her with intense curiosity—has always been the one I most appreciated in her.

Then, with the Scepter snugly in its silk wrapper, the women and I set out to find the citizens of Soot. Valeria bore Strife in one hand and the lantern in the other. I, the holy relic. Branwen, meanwhile, carried her reclaimed crossbow.

“Yelp returned it to me when he saw you run off,” she explained.

“Do you suppose that fellow’s still around the town?”

Branwen shook her head, uncertain.

Together, the three of us took to the hills. The mountain nearest the town of Soot, the very same down which we’d come, was a natural place to look. We had not long wandered toward the base of the mountain and the altitude that was richest in trees when our calls of, “Hello? Hello? Erdwud? Rigan? Mr. and Mrs. Dardrie?” were at last answered by a hopeful response.

“Who’s that?”

“Rorke Burningsoul,” I shouted into the trees. “Lively called for us.”

“Lively!”

Erdwud thundered through the trees and underbrush, bursting out through a pair of trunks and regarding us with wild eyes. In spite of his obviously haggard appearance—malnourished, unwashed and scruffy to say the least—the tavern-keeper looked desperately at us. “Is she all right?”

“She’s in perfect health,” I assured him. Erdwud wept in relief, his hands clasping before