* * * * *

Legolas glanced over his shoulder repeatedly, expecting to catch sight of those officers in black with gold buttons at any moment during the subsequent hour of flight. They didn’t converse and verbally agree to keep going once they had left the valley behind, but it was silently understood that as much distance as possible needed to be put between them and Kirsoden as quickly as possible. So they made a detour back to their previous camp, grabbed the items they had hidden, then went directly south, avoiding the valley entirely. It would be crawled over by now, no doubt. But they themselves saw neither hide nor hair of the search party and this did not sit well with Rowan.

When they finally slowed down, when the horses were spent, it was mid-day. Legolas stopped first, reigning in his horse near a single twisted tree whose bare branches stood out against the blue but apathetically empty sky. Here and there, these trunks, gnarled and weathered like weary old men, dotted the plain of grass whose feathery fingers reached clear up to Rowan’s waist when she dismounted and, before then, had made her legs itch horribly, scratching against any skin that might show for a second as they rode. Kai landed clumsily beside her, unaccustomed to riding so far, and wobbled on numb legs. He, too, was overwhelmed with the tall grass. Fortunately, the area right around the tree was barren of any growth except the thick, knobby knees jutting up out of the light dirt. Kai sat on one and began again to trace shapes in the loose soil.

“Now...what now?” Will ventured after everyone had settled, silently agreeing to rest a moment. He glanced enviously at the food sacks, his stomach emitting a low growl, but said nothing; yes, he was a little hungry after all that mad dashing about, but he sure wasn’t going to be the first one to mention breaking into their food supply.

Rowan tossed the command in, “We figure out where we’re going first. We don’t really know what we’re doing, do we? I say you take a look at those maps of yours and figure out where our first stop needs to be.” Though she gave this order to Will, she herself pulled the maps from his saddle bag and knelt down on the cleared ground to spread them out. Will crouched down beside her while Legolas remained standing, peering over her shoulder, and Kai looked at the maps upside down disinterestedly.

Everyone kept quiet for several minutes, either in thought or not wanting to disturb those that were.

Finally, Will asked, “Anything? Anyone?”

“This land is strange to me; the meaning of these maps is all but lost on me,” Legolas admitted with a frown, unhappy he couldn’t be of more help. Will didn’t know the land, but he at least understood the strange language everything was in; Rowan didn’t understand the language, but she knew the land and the people. He, however, knew nothing.

It was then up to Rowan to come up with something, some kind of starting point. She narrowed her eyes studiously and let her face slip into a thoughtful frown, taking in as many details of the four maps as possible. She did very well at not letting on that the maps, for the most part, were a puzzle to her as well. The first, marked ‘outdated’ in fancy red script across the top left corner, was a purely physical map, showing rivers, mountains, valleys, etc. –things that one would draw if merely walking all over the country and jotting down exactly what their feet tread upon. The second included a majority of these physical features, but also had the names of cities strewn across the yellowed surface; most of these were not current cities and, whether they had or hadn’t ever actually existed, Rowan recognized very few of the names; this was also the map on which Rowan’s symbol was marked, but she didn’t pay much attention to this at the moment, deciding to study that aspect closer later when she didn’t have curious strangers breathing down her neck. The third and fourth maps were more than a little confusing: one looked to be nothing but a jumble of lines, dots, and other shapes in a seemingly random manner; the other the same, a mess of unidentifiable shapes and markings.

“Where do we begin?” Legolas inquired, deciding to see if he could urge an answer out of Rowan. Hopefully somebody here had at least some idea of what they were doing.

Something...they had to start somewhere...Rowan pointed to the second map where a dark brown ‘x’ was marked on the coast to the east. Will and Legolas understood it to be a bit south of where Will’s ship probably still lay, waiting patiently for whatever was to come in the ever rocking waves.

“Here; what does this ‘x’ mean?”

“As if any of us know,” Kai retorted, then presently over-balanced and fell backwards onto his seat. He laughed at himself, but his three companions were too intent on the map to have noticed.

“Well, then, there. Let’s go there, first. There’s obviously something important about it. We may as well check it out and see for ourselves.”

“It’s not that far, either,” Legolas added, glad to be able to put in something. Rowan nodded.

Kai suddenly gave an excited laugh and grinned for all he was worth, and, to Rowan’s curious stare, commented, “The ocean! We’re going to the ocean. I’ve never seen the ocean before.”

“Your plantation is very close to it.”

“And? We didn’t take too many day-trips as slaves.”

They packed everything back up and set off, Kai once again settled loyally behind Rowan, Will and Legolas riding behind her, the former holding the map and answering questions when she asked them concerning their route. They headed due east and didn’t talk much other than those questions, letting an awkward silence seize hold of the little group. The divide between the two pairs –Will and Legolas, Kai and Rowan– seemed to only be growing instead of shrinking as they traveled farther and farther away from their starting point. Legolas hoped this would change soon since he had learned from experience that a divided group falls too easily.

Shortly before sunset they reached the shore and it was all Kai could do not to run out among the waves, but he stayed obediently mounted behind Rowan, fearing he’d get left behind if he went running off. They then continued South for a ways until the sun had most nearly finished its grand exit from the sky. A small copse of trees loomed up, oddly out of place on a relatively large outcropping of rocks, and set on the opposite side from the ocean of those trees was a small stone house surrounded by a low stone wall. Between the trees and the ocean, at the very edge of the rocky outcropping, sat a huge pile of wood, charred black as if it had recently taken part in a bonfire, but not currently burning. The lack of smoke denoted either a strong wind or several hours, at least, since burning.

“This is it,” Will announced, bringing his horse around to step closer near the edge of the ledge they stood on. He looked out over the water and was extremely disappointed not to see anything that he could think would be worth marking on the map. Just miles and miles of water stretching out ahead of him until melting into the sky in the distant horizon.

Kai jumped down from behind Rowan so he could see, walked around to the front, and asked, “What are we looking for? I don’t see anything.”

“Unless it’s under the water,” Rowan suggested, squinting her eyes in attempts of noticing any spots in the water darker or lighter than those around her. The setting sun made it difficult, though, as everything took on a red hue, and nothing sticking out of the water gave any clues.

“Are you sure this is correct?” Legolas asked, leaning over to see the map. Will handed it to him and Legolas looked it over for a moment before nodding, “I do not see where we could have gone wrong.”

Rowan sighed, “It must be under the water then...”

“You must be right,” Will agreed, also looking rather disappointed that the simplicity they had thought would accompany the ‘x’ had dodged them. “Unless the ‘x’ isn’t marking a specific spot, and instead just means this general area... but still, the only thing I see is that bonfire and that house.”

“I’ll go diving over there tonight,” Rowan suggested, looking closely once just to make sure she hadn’t missed anything.

Kai nodded, “If there’s something out there, Rowan can find it.”

“Well, we might as well wait for morning. It’s getting too dark now, and then we’ll be able to poke around here, as well. See if we’re just overlooking something...” Will suggested.

“Do you believe there is someone in that house?” All eyes followed to where Legolas was looking at the stone cabin. “I believe I hear someone, but I am not positive.”

Rowan nodded slowly, “I think I do, too.” She motioned for Kai to stay there (an order he in no way planned to obey), then she stepped slowly and carefully towards the house, her footfalls completely silent on the dusty ground. Legolas stepped just as quietly alongside her, while Will and Kai tried their hardest to keep their heavy feet soft several steps behind.

The stone house was torn apart, like there had been a struggle –the buckets and table in the yard had been overturned, broken, and tossed around; the grass was torn up; the door had been ripped off its hinges; inside the house looked just as broken apart, though Rowan and Legolas didn’t step inside, but instead walked around to the side where they pinpointed the noise. Hard breathing, though too quietly for either Will or Kai to pick up.

Legolas looked over his shoulder and saw that Rowan had squared her back to his and looked in the opposite direction, her steps a mirror image of his so that they remained covering each other’s backs, positioning herself exactly as a trained warrior would, but not how a common slave should think to do. The more time he spent with Rowan, the more questions he came up with for her.

The longer they stood there, shuffling around, the heavier the breathing got until finally a person sprang up from behind a bush Rowan had been staring at, brandishing a strange weapon, shiny and black. Before Rowan or Legolas could react to this person’s presence, though, a painfully loud sound led to an eruption of muddy water as a pot behind Will exploded. Will yelled and yanked Kai to the ground, and Rowan and Legolas jumped to counter any more attacks, but there was no need. The girl holding the weapon had already shrieked, dropped the thing, and jumped back, clutching her hand to her chest and staring alternately between the weapon and the four with horror.

“G- go! Get away from here!” she yelled, though her words lacked any ferocity. Rowan sighed and put her sword back in its sheath, and Legolas lowered his and put the arrow that had been pulled in the blink of an eye back in its quiver. The girl couldn’t have been but a year or two younger than Will, though her long, light brown ringlets that started halfway down her back (wild from the humidity) and framed her round face, her freckles light by contrast to her face flushed with exertion and the blood running down the side of her face from a cut in her forehead, and her simple country dress, ripped in places, all gave her a sweet, gentle, younger appearance. Even when she had been holding the weapon, and more so now as she nursed her hurt hand, her big eyes prevented her from looking even a fraction as intimidating as she wanted. When nobody moved, she demanded, “Go! Leave me alone!”

“We are not here to hurt you,” Legolas offered, taking a step forward and holding out his hand. She immediately took a step back and looked around like a cornered animal, glancing frantically between the four of them. When Legolas took another step, she reached down and picked the weapon up again in her other hand and pointed it.

“Go! Or I’ll...I’ll...”

Legolas immediately stopped moving and Rowan reached for her sword, but Will shook his head and suggested, “If you’re going to shoot, you have to cock it.”

“W-what?” she asked, momentarily losing her focus and looking over at him.

“You have to cock it, or it won’t fire.” This advice apparently threw her off and she lowered the weapon and pushed a curl back from her face.

“Why– why would you tell me that?” she asked, obviously confused.

“Because we aren’t here to hurt you. We’re setting up camp for the night and came to see if anyone was here.”

She gave a short, quick shake of her head and replied, “No, they aren’t here anymore. They already moved on.”

“Who is ‘they’?” Legolas asked.

The look the girl gave them showed her confusion had grown as she answered, “Those... those men... they... you aren’t with them?”

“No. I tell you the truth, this is all that is in our party,” Legolas promised her, motioning to them all. “I am Legolas from Mirkwood in Middle-Earth and my companions are Rowan, Kai, and William Turner.” The girl looked between them all as he said this, studying each person as if trying to decide if he was really telling the truth. Rowan’s arms were crossed over her chest and she was looking around disinterestedly as if, once any possible threat was gone, she had grown bored with the situation. However, Kai and Will both watched her closely, though more for curiosity than alarm of any kind.

She couldn’t find anything alarming about them –they didn’t have weapons drawn or anything, and she couldn’t see that a group with a woman and a child could be in confidence with those others– so she finally put the gun down completely and returned, “I’m Kennocha, but everyone calls me Menna.”

“How do you get Menna from Kennocha?” Rowan asked, raising her eyebrow at Menna.

“I don’t know,” Menna explained with a slight smile, looking to the ground as if recalling him from memory. She quickly snapped out of it and asked again, “You really aren’t with those other men?”

Will shook his head, “It is only us in our party.”

“Then how do you know what this is?” she pointed out, holding the weapon up. “I’ve never seen one of these before until they came.”

“You’ve never seen a gun?”

She shook her head, and Legolas added, “I have not, either.”

“Can I see it?” Will asked, stepping around Legolas and Rowan to approach Menna. She seemed nervous at first, but after looking at him for a moment, she slowly handed it to him. He turned so they could all see and explained, “It’s a gun, exactly like the ones the men on my ship carry. You pour powder in here and after you’ve cocked it,” he looked at Menna, “it fires a bullet.” He popped the gun open and held a bullet out in the palm of his hand for them to see.

Legolas looked closely, then asked, “And this leaves a small round wound?” Will nodded. “That explains the wounds on several men on your ship.”

“And it seems the men on my ship were here,” Will mused, looking around. “They attacked you?”

“Well obviously,” Rowan snorted, stepping closer to look at the bullet, then turning away as if uninterested. She had seen bullets before, anyways. “How long ago were they here?”

Menna suddenly pulled into herself and, looking at the ground, answered, “They came and left earlier today. I don’t... I don’t know what time.” She pointed to her forehead. “When I woke up, they were gone.”

“Do you live here alone?” Legolas inquired. Surely not. In Mirkwood, a girl continued to live with her family until she married.

“No, no, I...” she fell silent and looked up, her eyes watery. “They took my father and my little brother.”

“They did?” Will and Legolas both grew in concern and Rowan, listening with calm interest, turned to look around the yard a little more.

Menna nodded, “Yes. I... I don’t know which way they went, but I was going to go looking for them after I got some things together, and then you came here...”

“You don’t know which way they went?”

“I... no. They said a city, but I’ve never heard of it. T-Tygar? I think that’s it, but I’ve never–“

”I know where that is,” Rowan interrupted, looking over her shoulder. “It’s about a day’s walk south of here, maybe a little further.”

Kai, having been silent so far, finally spoke up, asking, “But why did the men from your ship come here, Will?”

“Probably the same reason we did,” Rowan pointed out.

“But they don’t have the map, and we came here for the ‘x’ that was on our map–“

”But they know where they’re going,” Will interrupted, shaking his head. “They brought the ship here to find some treasure or something, and they set off, so obviously they have some idea what they’re doing.”

Legolas offered, “Then we’re on the right track.”

“Are we hunting for treasure?” Rowan asked, walking back over. “Or are we trying to find his shipmates? Or are we trying to solve the ‘mystery of Alrianto?’” When she asked the last question, she motioned with her hands and made a face to show she didn’t buy into the whole mystery. “We don’t even know what we’re looking for.”

“We’re following those maps...” Kai offered.

Rowan nodded, “Yes, and the map brought us here, by our guess, but why?” She looked at Menna and asked, “Did they say much about anything? Were they looking for something? Did they find it?”

“They said a lot. They don’t know as much about where they’re going as you made it sound,” she answered, looking at Will. “They have a map, but they don’t know how to translate it very well, so they’re going by what they’ve been told, but they kept fighting over it because they all remember differently.”

“And were they looking for something here?” Rowan asked, fearing that they might already have missed whatever it was the ‘x’ was marking here.

Menna nodded, “Yes, but they weren’t sure what. They... they thought we were hiding something from them. My father is a scholar, so they took him, thinking they’ll get something out of him. And my little brother....I don’t know why they took him.”

“But they left you?”

“Yes. They said it was bad luck to bring a woman along.”

“Pirate mentality,” Will sighed. He had hoped so much to get a crew together of honest men, but it didn’t seem he had done so.

“You said you have maps? That you followed one of them here?” Menna asked after the other four had looked at each other with great frustration for a couple silent moments. “May I see them?” Rowan eyed her suspiciously, so she explained, “I may be able to tell you what it is you’re looking for here, or at least why it’s marked on your map.”

“You have no idea what they were looking for? They never said?” Will asked as Legolas led the way back to their packs on the horses.

Menna shirked her shoulders, “Well, they didn’t know what they were looking for, but...”

“But you know?” Legolas stopped and looked at her.

“I might. Let me see your maps first.” She waited patiently as Will pulled them out of the bags, then spread them out on the ground to look. After a couple silent moments, everyone watching her, she pointed to the second map, “This is one of my family’s maps.”

“Your family is mapmakers?”

“How do you know?”

“My family has always been scholars, back since the beginning of... well, I don’t know. But yes, one thing we used to do was make maps. My grandfather was the last mapmaker –he was killed for it, for ignoring the censuring. But see these symbols? They’re characters of a dead language. I don’t really know what the language is, but my mother used to speak it to me, and–“

Rowan’s head jerked at the mention of this as Menna pointed to her tattoo design on the paper, as well as several other symbols that had a similar style but that Rowan hadn’t paid attention to before.

“Do you understand the characters?” she demanded, kneeling down on the ground opposite from Menna. “Do you understand what they mean?”

Menna seemed a little surprised that Rowan was addressing her, then shrugged, “Some of them. I... I haven’t read it since I was very little. That one is my family’s sign –we used it to mark all our possessions a long time ago. It means ‘Scholar.’”

“What about that one?” Rowan asked, pointing to hers.

“I..” Menna looked closely, then sighed and shook her head, “I don’t now– I mean, I do! But I can’t think of it right now. It’s right on the tip of my tongue... I’m sure I’ll remember it when I stop thinking about it.”

“And what about what those men were looking for? Do you have any idea?” Will asked.

Menna nodded and smiled, happy she could give an answer for something, glad she had been right, “You said you followed this ‘x’? My grandmother’s family has lived in this house for hundreds of years, serving as a light for ships at see. That’s why we have a big bonfire on the other side of those trees. We light it at night and during the day, too, usually, so the ships know where the passage is through the rocks under the water. When my grandfather married her, he started marking the position on a few of his maps.”

“Why only a few?”

“Well, he only put it on the maps he gave to sailors. They were the only ones who needed it, and he didn’t want to show everyone in the region where we live since by this time he was wanted by the Royal Bureau,” she explained.

Rowan made a face, “Sailors?”

“Sailors... people on ships,” Menna explained.

“I’ve never heard of sailors, except from things he’s said,” Rowan shook her head and motioned to Will. “The only time I’ve ever heard of anyone leaving Alrianto is if they’ve headed west, and definitely no one coming in...”

Menna nodded, “I know. There aren’t many, and if they do, they’ve come through here. Sometimes lost ships would land and blend into Alrianto -ships from far, far east of here. The only people I know of that came and went was this one family, the Turners; they–“

”That’s me,” Will interrupted. When she looked up at him, he repeated, “I’m William Turner. My father, Bill–“

”You look like him,” she smiled.

“You knew him?”

She nodded, “Yes. When he would come here, he would bring me presents from his home, and he would tell me stories. He used to come a lot, but I haven’t seen him for years now.”

“He was killed.”

Menna frowned and nodded, “I was afraid of that.”

“But what were those men looking for? You never answered that,” Rowan cut in impatiently. This was all very touching, but they could have their little sap-fest after they got what they could out of this girl.

Menna looked over at Rowan and Kai caught her eye; she gave him an odd stare for a moment, like she was trying to place him, then shook her head and nodded, “Right. They were looking for whatever was marked on this map.”

“Which is?”

“The fire. It’s just the light. When the Turners or the couple others who came would get here, they’d usually leave their ship out there. The ‘x’ was so they could find their way back here when it was time to leave.”

“That’s it?”

“Yes,” Menna nodded.

“Well then this was a waste of a stop,” Rowan sighed, standing back up.

Will shook his head, “No, not really. We’ve learned more. We know where they’re headed next. We’ll rest here tonight and then continue onto Tygar tomorrow.”

“You four are welcome to stay here tonight. I need to... clean things up a bit,” Menna sighed, standing up and putting a hand to her forehead. Dry blood crumbled off and she made a face.

Legolas rolled the maps back up and put them back in the saddle bag, “We would be very grateful, Lady Menna.”

Chapter Eight || Main || Chapter Ten