“Haven’t decided,” Borenson averred.
“I’m afraid there’s not much here to salvage,” Baron Walkin said. “There are a few more casks floating inside the wreck. If you dive up into it, you can see them, but it’s hard work, and risky, trying to get them out. Broken beams, shifting tides. A man takes his life into his hands every time he dives into that mess.”
“Have you seen any other wrecks?” Borenson asked, “More lumber?”
“About two miles farther on the sea meets the land,” Baron Walkin said. “That’s as far as we got. The whole coast is submerged.”
In his mind’s eye Borenson consulted a map. The Hacker River wound through the hills here, but gently turned. That meant that most of the wreckage from the tidal wave should wash up south of the new beachfront—perhaps only five or six miles to his south.
“You didn’t try searching for Garion’s Port?”
“We were too tired,” Draken said, stepping up beside the two. “The land is pretty rugged. The water just sort of comes in and surrounds the trees, and the rocks are something terrible.”
Borenson bit his lip. Draken looked done-in, too tired to go for a rigorous hike. But Borenson felt optimistic. He’d searched in vain through the night for survivors. The tidal wave had just been too brutal, but he hoped to find a couple more wrecks like this one—perhaps with enough material to patch together a real ship.
“You gents see if you can get those barrels pulled out by noon,” he said. “I’m going to go down the coast a bit to see what I can see. . . .”
Baron Walkin peered up at Borenson, gave him a warning look. “Don’t order me about,” he said. “I’m not your manservant. I’m not even your friend. My title—such as it is—is every bit as vaunted as your own.”
Walkin wasn’t a big man. Years of hard work and little food had robbed the muscle from his frame, and Borenson had a hard time trying to see him as anything more than a starveling. But the baron held himself proudly in the manner of the noble-born.
But nobility was a questionable thing. Sir Borenson had made himself a noble. He had won his title through his own deeds, while Owen Walkin had gained his title by birthright. Such men weren’t always as valiant or upright as their progenitors.
This man believes that I owe him an apology, Borenson realized, and perhaps he should have one. After all, our children do want to marry.
“Forgive me,” Borenson said. “If anything, your title is of more worth than mine, for yours was a prosperous barony, whereas I was made lord of a swamp—one where the midges were as large as sparrows and the mosquitoes often carried off lambs whole.”
Baron Walkin laughed at that, then eyed Borenson for one long moment, as if trying to decide whether Borenson was sincere, and at last stuck out his hand.
They clasped wrists and shook, as befitted lords of Mystarria. “I’ll forgive your insults, if you’ll forgive my children for eating your cherries.”
“I’d say we’re even,” Borenson laughed, and the baron guffawed.
With that, Borenson went striding off.
Draken watched the giant lumber away, and fought down a knot of anger. In the past few weeks, he had gotten to know Baron Walkin well, and he liked him. Walkin was a wise man, hospitable. It was true that the family had fallen on hard times, and Draken pitied the family. But Walkin had a way of looking into a man’s eye and recognizing his mood that seemed almost mystical, and though he had little in the way of worldly goods, he was as generous as he could be.
“What do you think he’s after?” Draken asked as the giant loped away, following an old rangit trail.
“He’s heading for Rofehavan, unless I miss my guess,” Walkin said, then peered at Draken meaningfully. “You’ll be welcome to stay and make your home with us, if you prefer.”
Draken thought for a long moment. He was in love with Rain, that much he knew. In the past six weeks, he hadn’t had a day when he’d gone without seeing her. Already he missed the touch of her skin, and he longed to kiss her.
But he was torn. He had already guessed what had happened. Fallion had bound two worlds. Draken didn’t know what that meant precisely. He didn’t know why his father had changed, but he knew that something was terribly wrong. The binding should not have brought such a mess.
Draken had been trained from childhood to be a soldier. He knew how to keep secrets. And Fallion’s whereabouts and mission were a family secret that he hadn’t even shared with Rain. So he had to go on pretending that he didn’t know what was wrong with their world.
But he was worried for Fallion, and he felt torn between the desire to go to Rofehavan and learn what had happened and to stay here with Rain.
“I don’t know what to do,” Draken admitted.
“Let your heart guide you,” Baron Walkin suggested.
Draken thought for a long minute. “I want to stay with you, then.”
The baron waited and asked, “Why?”
Draken tried to find the right words. “I can’t abide the way my father spoke to Rain. He owes her an apology, but he’ll never offer it. He won’t apologize to a girl. He’s a hard man. All that he ever taught me was how to kill. That’s all that he knows how to do. He knows nothing of kindness, or love.”
“He taught you how to raise crops, didn’t he? How to milk a cow? It seems to me that he taught you more than war.”
Draken just glared.
“You’re being unfair,” the baron said. “You’re angry with him because you think he will try to keep you from the girl you love. That’s natural for a boy your age. You’re getting ready to leave home, start off on your own. When that happens, your mind sometimes plays tricks on you.
“The truth is that your father is raising you the best way that he knows how,” Baron Walkin said. “Your father was a soldier. From all that I’ve heard, he was the best in the realm.”
“He killed over two thousand innocent men, women, and children,” Draken said. “Did you know that?”
“At his king’s command,” Walkin said. “He did it, and he is not proud of it. If you think that he is, you misjudge him.”
“I’m not trying to accuse him,” Draken said, “I’m just saying: A foul deed like that takes its toll on a man. It leaves a stain on his soul. My father knows nothing about gentleness anymore, nothing about mercy or love.
“In the past few months, I’ve begun to realize that about him. I don’t want to be around him, for I fear that I might be forced to become like him.”
Baron Walkin shook his head. “Your father taught you to be a soldier. Every father teaches his son the craft he knows. He is an expert at warfare, and that craft can serve you well.
“But don’t think that your father doesn’t know a thing or two about love. He may be hard on the outside, but there’s kindness in him. You accuse him of killing innocents, and that he did. But killing can be an act of love, too.
“He killed the Dedicates of Raj Ahten, but he did it to serve his king and his people, and to protect the land that he loved.”
Draken glared. “From the time that I was a child—”
“You had to flee Mystarria with assassins on your tail,” the Baron objected. “What loving father wouldn’t teach a child all that he needed to know in order to stay alive?
“And once you were six, you went into the Gwardeen and served your country as a graak rider. You’ve hardly seen your father over the past ten years.
“Take some time to get to know him again,” the baron suggested. “That’s all that I’m saying.”
Draken peered into the baron’s brown eyes. The man’s long hair was getting thin on top, and a wisp of it blew across his leathery face.
“You surprise me,” Draken said. “How can you look past his appearance so easily?”
“Every man has a bit of monster inside him,” Walkin said, flashing a weak grin.
In the distance, Draken could still see the giant loping along, leaping over a fallen tree.
Perhaps the baron is right, Draken thought.