The Tale Teller

Ch 38

 Vaun had laughed at The Bard when locked in the stocks in Faydura. He had taken pleasure in the dirt on the usually pristine man's face, the way his neck had had to twist to joke up towards Vaun's. Now, standing here with wrists bound in iron chains, Vaun failed to find his smile.

Ahead walked The Bard, Ash behind him. Lorel was left to trail the party. Her presence at his back did nothing to ease Vaun's growing nerves. She wasn't safe back there, and when bound he could do nothing to help her.

Inside the tunnel, he had yelled for the village to hear them. Once joined with the other's voices, they had.

Vaun hadn't known how they could be welcomed, but he hadn't imagined this.

They had been made to wait until their throats were sore and voices hoarse. Finally, the boulder had been moved.

With it came men, rushing into the tunnel armed with weapons and wearing expressions ready for war. Vaun had found himself tugged into a man's grasp and dragged to his knees. His mouth was forced open before fingers had probed his tongue and teeth. With a nod from his handler, the chains had been strapped into place and he was pulled towards the opening of the tunnel.

"Poison." That had been the answer from one gruff-looking villager at Ash's questioning of the mouth examination.

The Bard and Lorel had been checked too, all seeming to be clean from whatever filth the villagers were afraid of. The word 'poison' made Vaun think of that dreadful steam, of how it had caught in his throat and forced voices to echo in his head. That stuff wasn't normal, and it was far from healthy too. It was much worse than the pollen in the summer or the dust from a pile of straw. He knew that, but it was clear these people knew much more.

In total there were three men and a woman. One man held The Bard's chains, another held Vaun's, the third had been tasked with holding the two children, and he had lead them with much more sympathy than his friend lead Vaun. In seeing so though, the woman had insisted the girl move into the hands of Vaun's handler.

Vaun's mask was still around his neck, loosened from his mouth with his need to yell, and now left to bump against the jut at his throat. He caught the villager staring at it, likely as turned from the skull and rotting flesh as Vaun had been. No matter how often he lifted the damn thing to his lips, he had still to grow adjusted to it.

"It's for the steam." Vaun's guard cocked an eyebrow with question, but the woman who marched ahead spun back to point her long staff in his direction.

She was a nibble woman, slim with little curve to her rag-covered hips. It made her look younger, but the lines on her face told that she was battle-worn, at least to the ways of life and the horrors the west brought with it. With a bellow, she silenced him and the rest of their trope.

"You will not speak until questioned!" She spoke with an accent Vaun had never heard before, and he had heard them all.

This side of the mountain looked much like the opposite. It was covered in forest, with winding paths that seemed a little more trodden than those they had left. Vaun wasn't sure if it was the evening sun, but there seemed to be a light here that the other side hadn't processed. Things seemed greener, with a warmth that reminded him of home rather than the hole he now knew the west to be. It wasn't anywhere near as beautiful or fertile as the midlands though, or even the north or the south. It still held that echo that chilled the bones. It was something Vaun knew he'd never get used to. He prayed he wouldn't have to.

Eventually, the paths twisted and turned until the trees fell away to make space for a few fields. They were small, each laid out in similar shape and size, with pathetic plough lines up and down them.