A Dangerous Traitor
The shadows cast by the fire danced and flickered on the ceiling of the tiny bedroom. Guthram Friemann watched Torvald, his newborn son, nestled in the arms of his wife, Lifa, as she lay on the small bed. As he gently pushed his finger onto his son’s nose, it was grabbed in the baby’s vain attempt to put it in his mouth.
“He’s a strong one,” Guthram whispered.
“Then he is already taking after his father,” said Lifa, with a warm smile.
Guthram slipped down beside his wife to get a closer look at his son and kiss Lifa’s forehead. He could not take his eyes from the three-month-old child, as the baby stared back at him before smiling. This was a smile Lifa had seen many times on Guthram’s face, rare though it was these days. The parents stared at the child they had tried so long to conceive, but the child’s smile reminded Guthram there would be many happy times ahead he might not be there to see. A chilling grief filled his heart.
“I cannot stay much longer. I’m sure I was spotted on the docks,” he grumbled, rubbing his wind-hardened face with both hands before running them through his brown shoulder-length hair. “Curse that weak-minded bosthoon!” he hissed through gritted teeth as he stood.
“Calm yourself, husband, no one could know where you are. As I told you in my letter, I did notice someone watching either the house or me as I came and went for the first month, but I have noticed no one this past while. You did not do the things they say you did, and we will find a way to prove it. You still have many friends. They can help us.”
“Half the city thinks I am guilty of murdering three of my friends in cold blood, friends who were trying to help us leave the city once the child was born, I might add, and I would not put the friends who are left in the same kind of peril. I have been branded a pirate for seeking help from a fellow captain. Seven of my crew are imprisoned on Ilak Rath – or at least they were, I have no idea where they are. We have few safe ports left, since the legitimate port authorities will turn us in, and the more questionable ports are full of bloodthirsty criminals and pirates who would sell us out or kill us for vengeance.
“The mad ‘Stone Bear’ and his maniacal son will no longer listen to reason. I must discover why someone wants me out of the way and why someone is trying to disgrace the Krakens. This is too big for mere pirates or corrupt merchants, Lifa.”
Lifa could see the sorrow and frustration in her husband’s eyes, and she reached out her hand, which he gathered.
“Hold him,” she ordered, offering up the bundle to the big sailor. Guthram was reluctant. “Go on, you will not break him,” his wife teased, her pretty face lit with a smile. Guthram reached down and lifted the baby gingerly from her arms.
“Mind his head...that’s it,” she said. “I know things seem dark at the moment, but we will not let them tear us from each other. We must have faith. Oln will not abandon a new father, not one who is such a good and just man.”
Guthram looked on his wife’s face with complete love. “How do you always do that, my love?”
Ever since they were children playing together while their mothers worked in the corn fields, Lifa had a way of making him feel better about difficulties in his life. When he had killed pirates for the first time as a child crewman in the Krakens, Lifa had reassured him those men made their choice to murder and steal and that Guthram was protecting innocent people from being terrorised. Years of such reassurance had left Guthram with no more moral dilemmas of this sort. He had become an accomplished swordsman and trusted captain, reputed to be a lucky charm for the fleet after many critical interventions in sea battles, and his keen ability to predict and sail through storms in his twenty years before the mast.
With these accusations of murder, the execution of a rear admiral who had been his friend, and being forced to flee the city – not to mention his newfound responsibilities as a father – Guthram was starting to feel like his luck was fast running out. However, as he stared down at his tiny son nestled between his chest and arm, a sense of hope stirred in him.
There was a light but urgent knock on the door of the bedroom as a boy no more than twelve years old and looking as if he had skipped too many meals entered.
“Captain. There are men looking for you in Fozzwald’s, and it is only a matter of time before they check here…” stated the boy in almost a whisper. “You must go.” The sailor closed his eyes and kissed his son on the head, and with a gentle movement, handed him back to Lifa. He looked at his wife, saying nothing as he caressed her face. Lifa was about to speak when Guthram brushed her golden hair back from her face and kissed her lips.
“It will all be well, my love. I’ll send word soon,” he assured her, before he stood and moved to the door. Looking back at his family, he smiled reassuringly. “I will be back before you know it, and then I’ll swallow the anchor and we will all leave this place for good, once it is safe and our boy has strength to travel. I love you my pretty Lifa, my life.” He turned his back to her and left, led by their visitor, Fozzwald’s boy, Jon.
As they made their way to the back of the house, Guthram glanced through a window to see a group of armed men dressed in black cloaks through the well-lit windows of Fozzwald’s tavern. He could also see three men at the rear of the tavern waiting for someone to attempt escape. The boy opened the back door of the house and walked out and across the street.
Repeating the practice devised during his wife’s pregnancy and since the allegations had been brought against him, the captain waited for the boy’s signal before leaving the house. At every junction the same actions were carried out – the boy would walk unhurried through an area and then signal it was clear before Guthram followed. Before long the sailor could hear the waves in the distance. Checking the street he had just taken behind him, he was satisfied he was not being followed. He looked ahead again to follow Jon but could not see him. Jon had helped him further towards the docks than this before.
Guthram waited. He was about to leave the shadows and investigate when he spotted the boy in an alleyway in front of him. The boy’s face was troubled. Although he signalled, it was not the usual tap on his shoulder as before – it was a wave of his arm. Jon was in trouble. He signalled again.
Guthram rushed back down the alley and through darkened side streets and lanes to circle Jon’s position. Glimpsing around a corner, he could see a cloaked figure in the shadows holding a dagger to the boy’s back. The captain drew his sword slowly and quietly. He eased closer to the two at the end of the alley. He saw the boy signal again before turning to his captor to express his confusion. When Jon saw Guthram beyond the cloaked figure, his eyes widened.
The figure turned with the dagger, then threw it at Guthram, finding the captain’s left shoulder. Shock and pain ignited in the sailor’s arm. It threw him off balance, but he caught himself before he fell to the ground. He swapped his sword to his right hand. The attacker had a set of steel claws on each hand, and he swung at the sailor. As Guthram ducked, the claws sparked off the limestone wall.
The cloaked man’s other hand swept up from the left but was blocked by Guthram’s late response to the first swipe.
A wicker basket of fish heads, thrown by Jon, exploded on the back of the cloaked man, giving the Kraken an opening. As he thrust forward, the assailant used the wall to tumble over the captain, coming down behind him. The attacker grabbed the dagger still lodged in the sailor’s shoulder and twisted it. The pain wracked every part of the big captain, who dropped to his knees and lost his grip on his sword. The fight was over.
The cloaked man looked up at the boy now frozen with fear. A flick of his hooded head was taken by Jon as a sign to flee, which he did. The attacker kicked the fallen sword from Guthram’s reach while still holding the dagger.
The image of his newborn son flashed in Guthram’s mind. He battled through the pain and grabbed the attacker’s hand and the dagger hilt. With all his remaining strength he threw the cloaked man over his shoulder into the stone wall. There was a dull thud as the attacker’s skull met the brickwork, rendering him unconscious. The sailor ran to the end of the alleyway and called for his young scout.
“Jon! Jon!” he shouted, but there was no sign of Fozzwald’s boy.
Guthram pulled the dagger from his bleeding shoulder with a misty spray of blood and a guttural grunt. He was about to approach the assailant when he realised the error of having called out to Jon, and he heard hurried footsteps growing closer from several directions. Ducking back into the shadows, he could see two more cloaked men across the street searching for the source of the commotion. He cleaned the dagger on his tunic, noticing two jewels in its hilt. He slipped it into a sheath in his right boot, retrieved his sword and moved to the nearest alleyway dark enough to conceal him.
There, he tried to staunch the flow of blood by removing the black embroidered captain’s sash from his inner pocket and tied it as tight as he could around his wounded shoulder, using his teeth to grip one end. Guthram’s only choice was to make it the shorter distance to the docks.
Jon is a smart lad, he thought. I’m sure he is already home with the story. I must get word of my escape to Lifa and Fozzwald. Well, first I must escape. He checked his position and realised that he was closer to the docks, his two men, and the waiting rowboat than he had guessed.
The streets were not devoid of life – there were still around four hours until daylight. The occasional tavern remained open, the staff trying to remove the hardier drinkers. Hopeful sex-peddlers, men and women both, still clung like lichen to their respective buildings or beat a path from one corner to another, eyes scouring the shadows for drunken sailors with a few coins left. These night-workers were usually scarce but not non-existent on the dock streets at this hour, and Guthram estimated this might work in his favour.
The cooling air had caused a fog to form heavy on the warmer water of the ocean and it had been creeping towards the city since Guthram left the boat to visit his wife and new son; but still it hovered tight to the street paving. He had predicted a heavy fog this morning and was frustrated at how minimal a mist he found. The consistent light breeze was also forcing the mist back to the water.
Losing your touch, Old Salt, Guthram thought with a dark grin before the painful throbbing of his shoulder brought home his situation.
He moved from darkened street to darkened street, watchful for any movements ahead or behind. When called for, he acted drunk and stumbled across open areas. Time was passing, signified by the drops of blood rolling down his arm. His tunic started feeling cold on his skin where the blood had soaked into it. Blood was also dripping from his arm onto the paved streets.
When he was past the Dock Wall and no more than a handful of streets from the boat, he spotted a squad of Slithers from Dock Garrison conducting a patrol. As he rounded a darkened corner, he witnessed two men robbing some poor soul. It was only after he shouted and scared them away that he considered how foolish he had been. He knew he was being hunted and he was in no condition to fight.
You were lucky this time, you idiot, Guthram chastised himself.
The shout was heard by anyone in the area with a set of ears, he knew it. He quickened his pace to get to the boat, disregarding for the most part the confinement to shadows and the pretence of a drunkard. Soon he heard loud orders hoisted on the crisp morning air, being given to soldiers to spread out along the docks in two-man teams. He had been resting behind the final storehouse before the dock, but he needed to ignore the aching in his shoulder and the light-headedness to make it as far as the boat.
Checking its mooring position one last time and taking note of the soldiers, he noticed everything looked out of focus and blurry, so much that he could not tell if his two crewmen were nearby.
Despite this, he prepared to move. Leaning on a barrel, he hauled himself from his crouched stance and mis-stepped forward. As he did, Guthram was grabbed in a rough hold around the neck and pitched to the ground. Looking up from his back and trying to focus his vision once again, he saw a silent dark figure looming over him, claws on each hand.
“Guthram my boy, it is time I was leaving!” the hollow voice said from the darkness.
“Can I come too one day, when I’m old enough?” Guthram asked.
“And a fine, strong crewman you would make an’ all, my lad,” answered the memory.
“Where are you going this time, Da?”
“We may jus’ be goin’ to the ends o’ the known world, son,” said the forming image, the voice less hollow now. “We found a map ye see, and this map might jus’ lead us ta great treasure. And when I get back we’ll be rich, and you and your brothers an’ your sister an’…if we have room…your ma, will all live in a castle made of gold.”
“You can’t go! I can’t sleep. It’s too noisy outside,” said Guthram.
“Oh, come now, my lad. It is just a storm, it will pass, don’t be afraid o’ the lightnin’. It’s jus’ the Stormbringers.”
“That is just a story,” the young Guthram protested.
“Oh, you are wrong there by a league, lad. It’s as true as you and me.”
“Tell me the story again before you go.”
“Which one? Do you mean the one about the ‘Snakes of Shakra’? Hsssssssss! Or the one about the ‘Napping Night-Bear’? Raaaarrrrrh!”
“No, Da, the Stormbringers. Tell me again about the Stormbringers.”
“The tide won’t wait for me, son. I’ll tell you as many stories as you want when I get home and you will mind your mother until then. Fair exchange?”
“Fair exchange is no theft,” Guthram recited.
“Sure, you already know when the thunder rolls, the winds howl and the lightning flashes in the sky that we can sometimes catch a glimpse of Feykir and his host of immortal horses of the heavens acting under the will of Oln. That’s all you need. Now to sleep with you before your mother blames me again for waking you up.”
The fond memory smiled at him and tousled his hair. Guthram could not have imagined at the time that it would be the last.
“Now don’t be afraid, the horses are just stretching their legs up there. I’ll be home before you’ll miss me. Sleep,” were the last words Guthram could remember his father saying to him.
“Wake up...” was not Guthram’s father. This voice was lower and smoother than what he remembered of his father’s voice.
“Human! Open your eyes,” said the voice.
The warm bed Guthram had been lying in was made hard, cold and damp by reality. As he jostled to find some comfort, he realised something was holding him in place. A throbbing pain intensified in his left shoulder. Guthram opened his eyes and struggled to focus. The darkness all around him added to his confusion.
Where did that voice come from? What has happened to me? He reached for the source of his pain to find his wound bound and dressed. His arm was heavier. His fingers probed a small damp spot at the centre of his discomfort.
“Human.” The voice was distinctive, it had a strange melodic tone, and it was close.
“Hello? Wh-who is there?” asked Guthram.
“Listen to me,” said the voice. “Your right arm and legs are chained to a cell wall in the basement of Baron Radsvinn’s estate. There is still some time before dawn. You appear to have been wounded in the left shoulder, which has been bandaged, and I can only presume since you are here you would prefer to be elsewhere.”
“Who are you?” The question was sucked from Guthram’s lungs.
“I am Thorn. Any minute there will be a set of keys pushed through the bars at the top of the door. Now, when I made my arrangement, I had no idea I would be chained to the far wall of this cell rather than where you are now. I was moved when they brought you in. You should be able to reach the keys.”
Still not quite awake, Guthram attempted to protest. Thorn interrupted him: “If you help me escape, I will help you. I will get you out of here, by my honour. But first, I need you to get me those keys. I cannot call out because my accomplice will not be alone.”
As he spoke, four bronze keys and two steel keys looped on a length of string with a small piece of wood marked with a burned-in ‘2’ fell into the cell, tinkling to the soft reeds on the stone floor.
Drawing the chain around his wrist to its full extent, the sailor reached as far as he could. His outstretched fingertips fell short of the group of keys. A thought occurred to him. He fumbled with his right boot, withdrawing the concealed dagger. His eyes had adjusted to the darkness, and he could see the slight glint from one of the keys in the faint light coming under the cell door. Reaching again, he used the dagger to drag the keys back to him.
He felt around on his right wrist for the keyhole on his chains.
“Be careful, if you break the key you will be stuck here,” said Thorn. “Give me the keys, I can see what I am doing.”
Guthram stopped. “How can anyone see anything in this dungeon? I don’t think you will fare better,” he said.
“I can see you are quite a tall man and broad by the shoulders. I can tell from the tattoos on your chest and shoulder you are one of the King’s Krakens and, from what I can see, have sailed as far as Katiz. Admittedly, I could have seen all of this when the two guards with torches brought you in, but I would not be able to see that rather confused look on your face.”
“But how…?” Guthram stopped himself, realising it did not matter, gathered up the keys and readied himself.
“Throw it to the sound of my voice. Keep it high,” said Thorn. “I am correct, am I not? You are a sailor and you have been to Katiz. You also picked up some ink in Attunda, it seems. An impressive voyage. Throw the keys when I reach three. One…two…three…”
On the count, Guthram lobbed the keys toward the stranger’s voice. The throw was sound, and Thorn caught the length of rope between his teeth. He swung the keys up and released them to catch them in his left hand.
Thorn released himself and unlocked Guthram from the wall. Climbing to the top of the door, he looked through the bars. A single wall-mounted cresset illuminated the far end of the corridor, and as far as he could tell, it was clear of guards. He found one of the steel keys and placed it in the door lock. Turning it, he waited for the inevitable pressure before the click. He paused. Listened. He pushed the key the rest of the way, and the lock sprung open with a muted shunt. The door was open.
Thorn pushed it and peered down the corridor.
“Thank you for helping me escape, human. May this bout of freedom bring you more fortune than your last. Follow me to the window at the end of the corridor and to the left. I can lift you to the window and then you are on your own,” said Thorn.
Thorn moved out of the cell and along the wall of the passageway. It was only then Guthram realised he had been sharing the cell with a cougari. He could not remember the last time he had seen one, as they rarely took to the seas.
Thorn beckoned to the sailor, who made his way to the end of the hallway and next to the cougari, where there was an open glass window.
“I’ll never fit through!” he whispered.
“It is strange what we are capable of when we have the need, and you, Kraken, have the need.”
“What about you? How are you getting out?” asked Guthram, still whispering.
“I do not intend to get out, at least not yet. Now up!” Thorn placed his back to the wall and formed his hands into a cradle to give the human a foothold. Looking again at the tiny window and pushing his breath through loose lips, Guthram resigned to give it a try.
As he placed his boot on the cougari’s hands, he was amazed by the ease with which the creature lifted him toward the window. Drawing closer to it, the opening looked wide enough to allow him through.
Mindful of his injured shoulder, the captain wriggled and scraped his way past the frame, almost getting stuck twice. Once outside he leaned down, his good arm outstretched.
“I can pull you up,” said Guthram, keeping his voice hushed.
Thorn gave the idea momentary life but shook his head.
“I am Guthram Friemann, Captain of the King’s Kraken ship, Stormbringer, and I will repay you someday, Thorn.”
Thorn, seeing the still extended arm of the captain, dug his claws into the wall and climbed high enough to reach it. He grabbed the captain’s arm by the wrist and shook it. “Farewell Guthram Friemann, Captain of the Stormbringer. Until then,” said the cougari, dropping back to the ground.
Guthram scanned the surroundings. He recognised the grounds of the Baron’s estate. He had been here before under more auspicious circumstances, when he and his crew were honoured for the valiant defence of a merchant convoy. Two pirate vessels were sunk by Guthram’s ship and the convoy completed its journey unscathed.
Better times, he recalled, before disappearing into the darkness.