The Road To Kalbakar, Wyrms of Pasandir #1

CHAPTER 10 - BROOMER ACTION

Kellani sat at a table in the mess tent, sweating over the report for her superiors in Seatome, when Naudin's thought reached her. He sounded excited and she made a joke, her mind still half with her report. Then she caught Wastrels and Lyster murdered. Wastrels! She cursed. The dig site had no guards, no defense; nothing.

'Stay where you are!' she barked. She put the report away and rose. 'Cook, what's your alarm procedure?'

'That's Mage Ander's business,' the bulky woman said, looking up from her pots and pans. 'Why?'

Without answering, Kellani ran from the mess to the mage's little tent. She ducked through the tent flap and froze.

'Gods!'

Ander lay spread-eagled on his back, a look of terrible agony frozen on his face.

She checked his breathing. Just as she feared, the mage was dead. Mind attack? He looked like someone burned him out. She hurried back to the mess tent.

'Cook, how many people are in the camp?'

'Only Ander, me and Nurse,' Cook said with a nod to a wiry woman Kellani hadn't noticed before. 'Why? What's going on?'

'Trouble,' she said. 'Someone killed Lyster in his dig; the boys are there now. Ander is dead, too.'

Cook and Nurse exchanged glances and the wiry woman uttered a blistering army oath. 'Wastrels!'

No panic here, Kellani thought. Good. 'Is there a way to alert the others?'

Cook pondered for a second. 'Ander was supposed to broadcast an emergency call. I don't know what it is, though.'

'I'll do it,' Kellani said. 'No matter if those bandits hear it. I hope the others will take cover and not come running.' She closed her eyes and thought. 'Emergency all reclaimers! Wastrel attack. Broomer orders – Stay where you are and hide! Do not acknowledge. Broomrider Kellani out.'

In the meantime, Cook had armed herself with an impressive chopping ax, and Nurse carried a bow. Both women held their weapons like seasoned warrioresses.

'I must go for Eskandar and Naudin first,' Kellani said.

'We'll come with you,' Cook insisted, her lips thin.

Kellani shook her head. 'Won't work, I'm riding.'

'I can ride, too, Broomrider,' Nurse said. 'If you have the spell.'

Nurse was an older woman; a sparse, bony Vanhaari with gray hair. She looked tough, but a broomer?

'Where did you learn to ride?'

The woman smiled fleetingly. 'I was a combat medic with Lord Saul when he liberated the eastern provinces. Spent many a mile in the air, ma'am.'

Kellani gave a brief grin. 'One of those. Saul's Spearheads. Done, then. Have you got a broom?'

'Brooms in a desert. O' course I got them,' Cook said. 'Bless the bureaucracy.' She sniffed. 'Now you can prove all those tales of yours, Nurse.' She hurried to the back of the tent and came back with a tall broomstick. 'Here ye are. Stout enough to bear us both.'

Minutes later, they were in the air. Nurse, true to her word, rode like an old pro, one leg folded over the back of the broom handle. Cook sat before her, relaxed and soldierly.

Kellani steered up to get a good look over the area. Nurse pointed to four armed figures walking through the desert toward the tents. They all wore the flowing robes and pointed headdresses of the Wastrel tribes. It was clear they'd seen the three riders, for little puffs of smoke came from their guns.