Chapter Eighteen
When Donan left the Oracle Queen’s cave, he did so by a different route from the path by which he had arrived, emerging near a small mountainous Askari settlement he learned was called Vision’s End.
The villagers there were very kind, providing Donan with food and drink before directing him to the trail that would bring him back to where he had started his journey on Philios.
Near the Oracle Queen’s cave, water flowed more abundantly than it did elsewhere on the island.
Streams that began their lives as ice atop Mount Karcheus came winding down through dense forests, gathering here and there in pools that somehow seemed much deeper and murkier than they ought to be.
The trees that drank from those meres grew thick and gnarled, with enclosing canopies that stifled the air and blocked much of the light from the sun.
With every step along the road through the wood, Donan felt watched, as if the whole of the forest were alert to his presence, observing him with the all-seeing eye of the seers.
He felt some relief when the trees began to thin, the streambeds dried up, and the woodland path became a road that descended from the mountain toward the coast. Lycander could be seen on the horizon, green and wild, and Temis stood across the channel.
By the late afternoon, he could see the monumental Bridge of the Eye in the distance.
It was evening by the time he returned to Alenia’s inn, and he found her busy serving drink and food to the same patrons he had conversed with the night before last. He took a seat inside, and when she saw him, she brought over an ale and a plate of food, setting both down in front of him with a knowing nod.
He ate and drank slowly, waiting for the crowd to disperse, and after the last patron had gone, Alenia came over and sat down at his table.
“Did you learn what you wanted to learn?” she asked.
“Not yet,” he said. “But I learned where my journey takes me next.”
“And where is that?”
“I was told there is an abandoned Amazon fortress on Philios.”
“There is,” she said. “Why do you want to go there?”
“I’m following a trail,” he said. “According to the Oracle Queen, that is my next destination.”
“Ah.” Her brow leapt up and down. “I see.”
“The Oracle Queen also told me that you could take me to the fortress.”
At that, Alenia leaned back in her chair, fixing him with a direct stare. “Did she, now?”
“I don’t expect you to,” Donan added. “But if you could provide me with directions, that would be appreciated.”
“It’s not that simple. Prophecy is never that simple.” She folded her arms. “Did the queen tell you anything else?”
He hesitated before answering, keeping his eyes cast downward on the table. “She said you are her sister.”
A moment passed. “I am,” she said. “I was.”
Donan thought better of questioning the meaning of that.
“She said I would help you?” Alenia asked.
He nodded. “She did. But again, I have no expectation—”
“Yes, you do. That’s what a prophecy is. If she had said nothing about me, would you have even come back here to my inn?” She pressed the tip of her index finger against the table. “You are here because my sister sent you here. And for the same reason that you’re here, I will aid you.”
“You could refuse,” Donan said. “You have the freedom to choose—”
“You were free to walk right on down the road without coming inside. But you didn’t.
Are you sitting here with me because you want to, or because of fate?
Am I going to help you because I want to, or because she said I would?
” Alenia had become agitated, but seemingly about more than their discussion, as if she had begun to argue with someone other than him.
“I don’t know,” he said. “But I do know that I will travel to the Amazon fortress tomorrow, and I would be grateful for directions.”
The older woman’s shoulders slumped a little as she sighed. “You remember where your room is?”
He nodded.
“I left it as you did. I had a feeling you might return.” She stood. “We’ll head out in the morning after breakfast. Good night, Donan.”
She stepped into a back room. After sitting another moment or two, he made his way up the narrow staircase to the small chamber where he had slept two nights before, but he lay awake in bed for a long time, turning over questions of fate.
Then his thoughts wandered back to the vision he had endured on this path up the mountain: the death of his mother, his failure to protect her.
The Oracle Queen had been right; his path had indeed shown him the memory that most determined his present.
If his mother had lived, he would never have joined the Horadrim.
He would never have studied and learned all that he now knew.
He would have had no reason to. He would not have come to Skovos and would not be lying awake, beset by the vagaries of destiny.
Grass and thorny bramble had encroached on the road, obscuring the path, but Alenia knew the way.
Donan could see that the fortress appearing over the rise had once been a formidable bulwark against pirates and the Drowned.
But where those enemies had failed to breach its defenses, the endlessly patient plant life surrounding it had succeeded in its slow, creeping invasion.
Grass and scrub had found purchase in the crumbling mortar.
The inexorable expansion of their roots and falling rain had cracked stone, opening gaps in the walls and collapsing towers and vaulted roofs.
What had once been a beacon of strength and safety had fallen to a symbol of hubris and defeat.
“It’s even more overgrown than the last time I saw it,” Alenia said. “What did you hope to find here?”
“I’m searching for some associates who came to Skovos several years ago. Your sister said they were given leave to occupy this fortress.”
“Well, they’re obviously not here now. The only occupants of this place are likely to be beasts or bandits.”
Donan agreed with that assessment. An uncanny silence brooded over the ruin, and the dank odor of decomposing plant matter suffused the heavy air.
The darkened windows, doorways, and crevices held shadows thick enough to hide all manner of enemies.
“Thank you for guiding me here,” he said. “You are free to leave.”
“Wait, you’re not going in there, are you?”
“I need to find out if my comrades left behind any indication of where they went next.”
She glanced back and forth between him and the ruin. “Let’s be quick about it, then.”
“What? No, you should return to your inn. There isn’t any need to put yourself in danger—”
“We won’t know that unless I go in with you.”
“I don’t understand.”
“And I don’t want to take the time to explain. We need to get in and out and be away from here before nightfall.” She spoke with matronly authority, and before he could object, she marched toward the ruin.
He hurried after her. “Alenia, please, you don’t—”
“Shh,” she said. “It’s settled. And we should keep our voices down. Make as little noise as possible.”
Donan could not understand why she would risk her own safety for him, a stranger she had met only a few days before.
In his mind, the Oracle Queen’s offer of aid did not obligate her to endanger herself in this way, but for some reason, she insisted.
It even seemed that she had come prepared for the possibility of entering the fort, because she stopped before the broken gates and pulled a small torch out of her pack.
“Ready?” she asked.
He wanted to object, but he could see it would have no effect and took the torch from her. “I’ll go first.”
They entered the fortress yard through the gate.
The stables and other outbuildings had buckled some time ago, their wooden spines rotted away by rain, termites, and pale threads of fungus.
Vegetation had spread across the paving stones, covering them in a tangled net of leafy vines, and young bushes and trees had sprouted from the gaps, their roots grasping the rock like slender fingers.
“Your associates settled here?” Alenia whispered.
“Apparently,” said Donan.
They proceeded slowly, listening and watching for movement as they crossed the courtyard.
When they reached the central keep, they paused outside the entrance to light the torch, then crossed the threshold.
The interior smelled of damp stone. Swags of cobwebs drifted from the ceiling.
Grit and stray leaves littered the floor, carried inward by the wind and rain.
A few shafts of determined light entered through arrow slits and cracks, but the flickering torch did more to help them see where they were going.
They pressed forward through a passageway and came into a modest hall with a low ceiling.
Signs of previous occupation littered the floor.
Donan saw broken crockery, a bundle of kindling left by the blackened fireplace, animal bones, and other refuse, but none of it appeared recent.
He knew from a cursory glance that the chamber held nothing of interest.
“Let’s keep moving,” he said.
“Where to?”
Donan knew that if Sho-Ren and the other Horadrim had intentionally left anything behind, they would have placed it belowground, as secure from the elements as they could manage in a crumbling wreck. But he kept these thoughts to himself and simply answered, “The cellar.”
“If you say so,” Alenia said.
She had more familiarity than he did with the typical layout of Skovos architecture, so she led the way.
They found a spiral stone staircase and followed it downward into the lower level of the fortress, where the only light came from their torch.
Sound seemed to tighten around them in the narrower corridors, every scuff and scrape against the stone loud in Donan’s ears.
Even his own breath seemed to fill the tunnel with noise.