Tivi's Dagger by Alex Douglas Page A

Gods, let’s just press on.”
Brin snatched the map from Kari and tucked it into a pouch on the
donkey. “We won’t get anywhere standing here biting air, and we
need to get to that village as soon as possible to offload these
wretched rolls of silk. The donkey has his limits.”
    “ Don’t worry, Lana,” Kel said, with a
smile of false bravado. “I’ll protect you from any
spiders.”
    “ How? Do you plan to write them to
death with your quill?” She laughed. “I have my daggers and no
intention of dying in the maw of any beast .”
    “ She’s not known as Lana Six Blades
for nothing,” I added with a smile. Lana met my eyes with a knowing
wink, no doubt recalling, as I was, her incredible talent for
pin-finger. The profits from her endeavors had allowed us to live
like kings on the Pirates’ Isles and garnered some respect from
even the most hardened and well-practiced of sailors.
    Brin kept up an unforgiving pace, marching
us through the trees as if he were leading a battalion, stopping
only to let us eat some dried meat and pickles in silence. Perhaps
his mind was on the poisonous creatures that lurked in the darkness
ahead, or the dizzying precipice I hoped we would not venture
along. I was less afraid of the darkness than of plunging to my
death down the side of the mountain. Had it come to this now,
deciding upon the manner of my death? What on earth had inspired
Brin to undertake such a treacherous journey? I had listened to
little of the detail while he was making his plans, and now I
wished I had paid more attention.
    Perhaps I might have avoided the Rite
altogether, had I just had the sense to rein in the worst of my
excesses until Brin had simmered down after his excommunication,
rather than flaunting them under his very nose.
    Stu-pid Ned-im,
stu-pid . My feet crunched out my thoughts on the
gravelly path. It’s a pilgrimage, it’s not
meant to be fun . Lana had remarked upon that fact before we’d even left the
gates of Azmara, with the smell of roasted rat kebabs from the
street sellers still lingering in our nostrils. Now, faced with the
prospect of necromancers and the walking dead, giant spiders and
the mysterious caverns beneath Khar Tam, I felt a rush of
homesickness and longed more than ever to be feet-up on my balcony
looking down at the world, rather than right in the middle of all
its dangers.
    As the peak ahead grew larger and the sun
sank behind it, the trees thinned and soon we could see the black
mouth of the tunnel yawning out of the dark gray stone. Near the
entrance was an oddly small hut, not big enough to house any weary
pilgrims, with no windows but a regular series of tiny square
openings cut into the wood. Kari brightened at the sight of it.
“Look!” he exclaimed. “It’s a message post. The Keeper’s home
should be nearby. Perhaps he will allow us to shelter there for the
night.”
    Cheered at the thought of not sleeping in
dangerous circumstances, the spring returned to my step. Kari
paused at the hut and peered through one of the openings. There
were noises coming from within, shuffling and cawing. Then he
opened the front face to reveal several pale birds sitting on
roosts inside, blinking sleepily in the sudden light. Their soft
feathers were puffed up and they were ready for sleep. Around each
of their ankles was a silver ring, one of which was stuffed with a
tiny roll of parchment.
    Gently, Kari lifted the bird and removed the
message. “I will bring it to the Keeper to save him the journey.
Come, let’s find the home. It must be near.”
    It was not a quarter mile after that we came
across the clearing. The Keeper’s hut was not large, but it looked
sturdy enough. A pile of wood lay half-chopped to the right of the
entrance, the axe propped up against the wall. There was a stone
well with a full bucket hanging from the rope; some tiny
red-feathered birds were perched along the rim, sipping and
ruffling their feathers. The door to the hut was open.
    Kari