Thunder shook the tiny, three room hovel and rain beat the windows, trying to find its way in through any crack or seam that presented itself. The cold of the storm belied the fact that it was late summer in the South.

Nemii moaned from the other room, barely audible through the heavy drapes that separated the two rooms. She was ready to give birth any moment now and Jorinar had not yet returned with the midwife. Judging by the extremity of the storm, Torand feared they would be too late.

He, the soon to be father, paced the floor a few more times before stopping to lay a hand on the shoulder of the man he knew only as Kells Stromgald. Kells was the first person Torand had met with skin as dark as his since moving to Rizen, the southernmost kingdom on Ere.

“You seem even more nervous than I, Kells. At least I’ve kept the sense to stay near the fire when it’s cold.” The older man offered the tall, muscular journeyman as he stood his post by the window.
Kells shrugged, staring out the window. He had stood there since Jorinar left to get the midwife nearly two hours ago. Each moan from Nemii made his teeth grit. “She shouldn’t have to be in this much pain.” He said bluntly. “The midwife has herbs to ease it but Jorinar’s so slow about getting her -- I would have been back by now.”

“It’s the storm, Kells. You would not have done any better than Jorinar.”

“Don’t be so quick to dismiss my skill, Master Torand, I’ve come to rely on my speed and guile in all sorts of situations.” Kells squinted through the window, a flash of lightning revealing no one on the muddy wagon trail leading to the farmer’s house.

The older man motioned to where a teapot was brewing over a cook fire. “Come over by the fire, Kells, and take some coffee with an old man soon to be a father. I’m sure Jorinar will be here as soon as he can.” Kells hesitated, looking back out onto the road. “Come on, “Torand prodded, watching the road won’t help Nemii.”

Kells made an annoyed sound in his throat but allowed himself to be lead to the fireside and handed a cup of coffee. “So, friend, are you hoping for a boy or girl?” He asked after a pointed silence.

Taking a big gulp of the strong coffee, Torand nodded. “The visionary said the child will be a boy. I’m glad of it too; we soon won’t have enough money to pay you and Jorinar to help around the farm. Hell, if you asked for the normal pay of a journeyman, we’d be down to our last silver.”

Kells chewed his lip, feeling guilty for taking even the paupers salary for food he accepted for Torand for harvesting and preparing whey-weed in the fields. “So what are you going to name this boy?”

“It’s an old name, from the war; the visionary said it means ‘strength in the darkness’. He will be called Gage.”
The name rolled around in Kells’s head a bit, Along with Torand’s surname of Infernus, which, in the war-tongue, meant “Heaven’s Fire”. “Gage Infernus.” he said finally. “’Strength in the Darkness, Heaven’s fire -- sounds like a hero’s name to me. A warrior. Are you prepared to be the proud father of a hero, Torand?” He gave a half smirk that made one wonder when he was serious or joking.

Any normal person would have questioned Kells’s knowledge of the war-tongue meaning of Infernus but in the two weeks Torand had known him, Kells had said and done so many peculiar things that he hardly even noticed it anymore. He only laughed. “You mean the father of a knight?”

Stroking his goatee, Kells gave a soft chuckle. “Knights aren’t the only heroes, Torand. In my Journeys North of here, I visited a village in Callen where a group of laborers successfully defended their homes from the Wurm Tacyn’chinor.”

Torand snorted into his cup. “You fought a dragon, Kells?”
Kells wagged a finger at him. “Never said I did that, Torand. But if I had been there, I would have been proud to stand and fight alongside those men against Tacyn’chinor.”

“You would have run from her like any sensible man would, Kells, believe me.” Torand laughed mockingly.

“What ever made you think I was a sensible man?” Kells retorted with that wolfish grin. “Besides, if you’ve been where I’ve been, you’d realize that there are a lot more terrifying things than dragons.”

Torand raised an eyebrow, faltering when Nemii groaned from the other room. “Perhaps if you told us about where you’ve been ... “

Kells swallowed. It hurt him to lie to Torand, Nemii, or even Jorinar for that matter. They were good people and totally undeserving of any kind of deceit. On the other hand, there was no way in hell he would tell them the truth and mire them in the situation he was in....

Luckily, he didn’t have to do either. Just then, a biting wind swept in as the door banged open. Jorinar shooed a middle aged woman in before him and slammed the door against the wind. The midwife ducked her head hello and disappeared through the curtain into the other room.

Jorinar, dripping and sulky dropped into the chair next to Kells. “It’s like the world’s been shook up and turned on its side. “ He whined. Hard work had made him tan and stout for a Rizenian but he was a ghost of a man next to Torand and Kells.
In the other room, Nemii sighed as the midwife’s pain dulling magic took effect. The three men paused solemnly for the pain they knew was to come to a birthing mother. Thunder shook the house again and the hours began to tick by.

***

No one had bothered to put another log on the fire for some time now and Kells had only the dying embers to see the hands of the cheaply made water-clock by. It had been four hours since Jorinar had returned with the midwife. The other two men had fallen asleep some time ago but Kells remained awake.

The storm had died to a steady and persistent rain and at last the tiny house was quiet. Aside from Jorinar’s snoring, the only sounds for a long time had been from Nemii and the midwife.
It suddenly occurred to Kells that he didn’t hear either of them any more. He paused in his thoughts, puzzling over the sudden silence. Finally he heard something -- Nemii was sobbing.

As silently as he could, Kells left his seat and padded past Torand to the heavy curtain that separated the sitting room from the bedroom and quietly drew back the curtain to peer inside. He was nearly blinded by the array of candles that filled the room.
Nemii was on the bed, cradling something wrapped in clean bed linens. She cried softly, rocking back and forth. The midwife was drawing something in charcoal on a white plaque.

Making sure neither woman noticed him, Kells leaned over to see the birthing announcement the midwife was drawing. But he saw instead a different symbol. It was on of the sigils universal throughout the twelve kingdoms of Ere, displayed on the door to alert those who passed by of news of the family. It was also sign he had seen too many times on doors in his travels. The old midwife’s symbol wasn’t one of birth - it was one for death.

***

Young Gage Infernus, son of Torand and Nemii, had died in birth. The midwife called it still-born but all Kells knew was the boy had never lived to see his first sunrise.

He was buried the next day in a plot on the edge of the whet-weed fields in the shadow of the border mountains. The makeshift funeral was attended by his parents, his midwife, Jorinar, and a man called Kells Stromgald.

***

It was two weeks later when Kells decided that his time with the Infernuses was at an end. He had spent a month as their second journeyman, longer than he had spent anywhere in the last seven months.

Now, as the last of the whey-weed was on its way to market in Nevra, Kells was pressing north again across the now barren fields. As he walked, he chewed thoughtfully on a piece of cheese Nemii had lovingly packed for his departure.

Torand’s farm was quite literally the last bit of civilization this far north in Rizen. The whey-weed fields terminated abruptly on the edge of scrub forest that covered the foothills of the Aloun Mountains that separated Rizen from her northern neighbor, Te’ran.

Less than a mile from the edge of Torand’s fields, Kells Stromgald found what he needed to continue his journey. Only Kells could have picked out the pile of river tumbled stone at the edge of the shallow stream he had crossed earlier. He hand worked hard to conceal it earlier.

A few minutes of digging exposed the wax cloth wrapping that held what was now his life. His pack, containing a few goods “borrowed” from wealthy merchants, a small belt pouch, a gray traveler’s cloak, and his prized possessions; his weapons: two daggers, a short sword, and his father’s rapier - the Piercing Eye.

With the utmost care, he buckled and strapped on each piece. Last of all was his belt pouch. From he drew a simple, silver chain holding two signet rings and a plaque etched with the image of a beautiful young woman. Kells stared at her and then toward the Northwest before fastening the chain around his neck.
“I will return someday, Pinera.” He turned abruptly Northeast. “but I cannot today.”

He started across the river, his thoughts turning to Torand's son. Strength in the darkness. It was a hero's name -- and a fitting tribute to the defiant soul who had missed life by a heartbeat.

Kells Stromgald was left eddying in the tranquil waters of the woodland stream. It was Gage Infernus who would make the journey north and endure what awaited him there.