The Lone Rider

Chapter 12

Fire crackled and hissed.

Quiet mutterings and the wavering of parchment permeated within the cabin. Kell shifted his weight on the chair to the stronger of his two legs, wrapping his bare feet around themselves and placing them close to the fire to warm his numb toes. Most of his gear had been stripped off and now lay outside drying after a vigorous yet failed attempt at washing away the blood. He now wore only his underclothes, a rough and torn shirt and an equally rough and torn tight, sheepskin trousers. His hair fell over his eyes and he brushed it back, leaving his fingers to push up his falling brow as he stared into the flames, not quite paying attention to anything in particular but all the same—aware of his surroundings—as always.

Adaline and Waylon sat huddled together on the floor to his side, warming their backs with the fire and using the light to browse the various maps they had found earlier in the cabin. The young girl was dreadfully curious about the information the maps offered as Waylon held a face of joy explaining what everything meant in the best way he could manage.

"And this, this is Estimire," the boy said excitedly, having finally been able to find his use with a shallow yet admirable wealth of cartographical knowledge. "This is where we'll be heading in the morning. It's the largest of the six Telosian kingdoms, sharing its borders with Keltia, here, and Lakmire, there, and all the way up at the top, Rouche. As well as the Dresden to the south, though that isn't part of the six kingdoms... obviously."

"Wow," Adaline uttered. "It doesn't seem that far away."

"Well, it only looks that way on the map. In all honesty, it could take a whole month to reach the borders depending on the weather."

"And we're all the way over here?'

"That's right. All the way on the other side in the hellish landscape known as the Metimos Mountains, far, far in the north of Calbany. Truly a place no one 'cept the mad would dare to live or even travel. Yet here we are."

A moment of silence followed. Kell shifted his weight again, a cold sweat running down his nose he wiped away.

"The world's so big. I would have already imagined I crossed the entire thing when I came here," Adaline said.

"Not so much. Though I would imagine you went some distance. From your story, I'd wager you crossed the Tosarian ocean, maybe from Solerios or the like."

"Where's that?"

"Past here. Off the map."

"Off the map?"

"Yeah."

"Is there another map?"

"Not of Solerios, I'd think. Not many maps of that you can find, unless perhaps maybe if you were a sailor or a scholar."

Adaline seemed to think for some time as Kell heard nothing but the shifting of parchments and eager breathing.

"And you're from here in Calbany, right?"

"Mhm, further south in a tiny village nobody has ever heard of called Gallertown."

"Is it nice there?'

"As nice as any old small village, I suppose."

"Is your family there?"

"My ma, I suppose. Haven't talked to her in years, nasty woman, her. Got a brother in the capitol, he takes after me ma. At that time my uncle and I lived in Dell. Though he's gone now."

"Sorry to hear that."

"Naw, it's fine. He was a knight, first in my family. Only serving under a small house lord, but it was still quite the accomplishment for us Pickers."