Chapter 13 - Fire and Hope!

"John set the whole field ablaze. The fire will limit the rats' movements. Make sure to create choke points and let the tribe push the rats back to their masters," William said as he began to lay out his plan. 

"Ingrid, I need a distraction. Lead your men and charge toward the three commanders atop the hill. Due to the fire, they will be forced to spread the rats across the plain. Keep charging till you reach them!" William instructed Ingrid as he took a handful of her men as they began fighting off the rats. 

Ingrid and John followed his plan without question. Little did William know that his presence instilled hope within their hearts. Moments ago, they fought a losing battle against the rats and the bandits. Now they can turn the tide in their favor. 

Ingrid and John led their forces, circled the burning plain, and aimed toward the hill. 

The generals whistled in a different tone and began to divide the number of the rats into three groups aimed at Ingrid, John, and William. But with the fire raging across the plains, the rats have difficulty following their orders. Panic begins to set in at the generals as they realize the rats prioritize saving their own lives over following the line of attack.

It was a harrowing experience for the tribesmen. They had never seen such rabid rats as these. Their teeth are strong enough to gnaw off their hide armor and sharp enough to dig deep into their muscles. Ingrid and John are fighting the best they can, buying enough time for William, hoping their distraction will allow him to reach the generals. 

As the smoke rose, William charged into the flames. Using the full power of his Sense, he ran towards the thickest part of the rat army. These rodents began to tremble in fear when they saw William's dark visage in the smoke with red eyes looking back at them. 

At this moment, William noticed that the rats paid attention to his eyes instead of whistling their hearing. The rats began to give way and began bowing before him. 

"Why are they cowering before you?!" One of the generals yells from the hill.

"I fought with the likes of you before. He also used the rats against me, but they respect my eyes more than his whistles." William looked up as he showed his red eyes to the three generals. They were speechless the moment they saw his eyes. They, too, shared the same reaction as the one William fought on Lenato's Ball: confused about why there was another set of red eyes before them. 

"That's when I figure there's another of my kind, a Zonian. Somebody trained these rats to respect these red eyes. I reckoned that person too trained these rodents with whistling and pass on the knowledge how to command them." William says as he smirks. Seeing the shock in their eyes, William pieces together the puzzle about the Pentalium's play on the Kingdom. William began to run towards the general. Using the smoke as his cover, he moved like a blur. He jumped between the smoke to cover his movement across the field as he advanced toward the generals. 

As William drew the generals' attention, Ingrid and John managed to push thru the rats, and their army began to climb up the hill. The tribesmen cleared the path and began charging at them. 

The general hurried to whistle to call the rats to defend them. But William leaped out from the smoke and began to attack the three generals. As soon as they stop whistling, the rats lose their way and start wandering in the burning plains. Most of them were caught in the fire and burned. 

The tribe finally arrived at the hill and managed to capture the generals. John and Ingrid hugged William for successfully leading a battle against impossible odds. 

The tribesmen gagged and took the generals further north to their camp for interrogation, and for a moment, they could enjoy their victory.

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The boys arrived at the camp just in time for supper. They were greeted again like heroes, but not all were in a festive mood. Half of the tribe are sick and unable to move. Among them is the Elder. She is breathing heavily and in a high fever. 

"She wasn't like this when we left. What happened?" William and John's hearts broke from the sight of the Elder shaking in pain.

"Grandma's stones guide us to travel north, where the mountains there is a suitable replacement for their old home. One night, the swarm of rats ravaged our food and gnawed at our flesh. The tribe fought off the rats, but it came at a cost." Ingrid then briefed the two boys on what had happened since they left. 

The bitten developed boils, blisters, fever, and coughing. 

Despite this, the Elder pushed the tribe to move forward towards the north, where the rats could not follow us due to the cold. As the tribe continued to their destination, the tribe found caches of tea across the forest not far away from their current camp. These tea manage to relieve the pain of coughing and soothe the infected. 

"Let me guess. Those tea caches were from the bandits. And that's why they gave chase and attacked the tribe." John looked at Ingrid for an answer. The sadness on her face tells it all.

"For three days, the bandits hound us for stealing their tea. When my grandma was stricken, I led the charge to defend ourselves from those fiends." Ingrid said as she revealed one of the tea caches they found. William and John can confirm that these tea are Lenato's, the same tea that the bandit stole from Rolfe's knights and countless other shipments. 

John then told his friends about how he got here. His search for the cure led him all across the Kingdom; it took him from the highest seat of the elites to the nastiest scum of the Kingdom. It led him to a drunk who was merrily drinking to celebrate his recent medication for his fever and blisters. 

John joined him and bought more drinks to mellow him up. Soon the drunk gave his secrets and told John that he purchased the cure from an individual that wore a plague masked by the Rowing River.

"That river accommodates countless ships and traders of the Kingdom. That is a large river that travels all across the Kingdom. How did you manage to find your target?" Willaim asked.

"By wailing loudly in the night. I cry and scream that I might lose my family and would gladly pay any price for a drop of a cure." John replied as he smiled at William. John then showed a plague doctor mask.

"After days of screaming, this masked individual approached me. I immediately jumped and beat the man. At first, I didn't believe him to be the real deal until he asked me to pay a considerable amount. About 50 gold per vial. It was the same amount that the cured elite told me back at the Golden Garden." John replied and continued with his summary. After John beats the man, he gives up a piece of crucial information for his release: he was also a bandit. He doesn't have any cure with him, but another individual, wearing a red dress, would meet their clients on a different date with the medicine.

"He also reveals that the bandits wear plague masks and sell cures to the infected people of the Kingdom. The bandits don't know where the treatment came from, but they are happy they got a well-paying job." John then showed William and Ingrid the armor and weapon he got from the bandit. It was shiny, new, Glittering with a silvery glow.

"Looks like the bandits are not only paid in gold but also in new armor and weapons. When I fought the bandits earlier, they were also wearing these. So that's why they easily overpowered Rolfe's knights," William deduced. With their new weapons and armor, the bandits would easily outmatch a company of guards. Even with a knight in their rank, he can only do so much against a horde of deadly well-equipped thieves. 

"I managed to keep the bandit talking. He told me their next plan was to ride north and steal back their stolen tea. I rode here and was shocked to see Ingrid's men engaging with the bandits. I joined Ingrid and led the men against the bandits. We manage to hold them off, but you saved our lives, man." John replied.

As for William, he summarizes his investigation and tells his friends that he is beginning to piece this whole story together, but it is not yet concrete. There are gaps in his theory, and he needs more info before making sense of what is happening. 

"Ayyiiieeee!" A blood-curdling screaming alarms the camp. Ingrid, John, and William hurried out of the Elder's hut and rushed towards the sound. It led them to the prison, where they greeted the slit throats of three generals and their guards. 

"I was just here to give some food to the guards. But all I found are their dead bodies and the prisoners." the woman said as the group arrived. 

Ingrid, John, and William approached the generals in their cage and saw no forced entry. Ingrid pointed out a bloody knife in one of the generals' hands. "Likely someone entered the prison, killed the two guards, and gave the generals these knives to commit suicide."

"Who not just leave? They can escape with their lives." John asked while pointing out that no footprints were found in prison except theirs.

"Loyalty to their cause?" Ingrid mumbles as she opened the cage.

John removed the masks of the dead generals. He was expecting some unnamed bandits but was surprised to see their familiar faces. 

"Dwight Roe, Manuel Webbe, and Edgar White. All from the old families of the Kingdom. They were exiled due to fraud and corruption cases." John says as he wonders how these three distinguished people are in league with Pentalium.

"The way they look into my eyes at the plains confirms that they have worked with another Zonian before." William begins to scan the prison with his Sense. 

"The plague masks, the ones I fought at the Ball, and the generals all have these masks. They also have these attires: green for males, red for females, and the plague masks are for the sellers of the cure." William says as he inspects the masks of the generals. 

"These masks have engraved letters: M, L, and H. They have 25 members, and the 26th is for their boss. Like the alphabets." John deduced as he looked over the masks. Ingrid nods her head in agreement, seeing that the plague mask does have any letters; they are considered a runt while the lettered ones are in higher ranking. 

Ingrid smelled the generals' green clothes and began to look for clues in them. "Their clothes smell of salt—natural salt, like in mines or the ocean. Like the masks, whoever weaved it, has a steady hand," she says.

"Another thing that caught my attention is how the bandits always know who to sell the cure. As if they were anticipating it." John pointed out as he assisted Ingrid in checking each pocket of the generals. Soon, they found a letter in one of the pockets with details of the generals' next mission: where they were to infiltrate one of the Kingdom's many social banquets, and they are to place one barrel of Chalice. 

John and William looked at each other as they slowly piece Pentalium's plan. "THE CHALICE!" both boys exclaimed!

"Pentalium has concocted the Chalice to spread the disease within the Kingdom. Then the bandits will infiltrate the Kingdom to sell the cure to the same who drank from the Chalice. They can track the infected as long as they know who attended the gathering." John said as he pieced the story together.

"That's why these red and green masked individuals are in the Golden Garden and at the Ball. Not only to place the Chalice but also to take notes on which family attended the event. That way, they can track which family is infected!" William adds to their theory.

"Pentalium knows that not all can afford to drink the wine; that's where the rats come in. They are sent into the Kingdom's sewage to spread the disease. The infected commoners will seek them out as I did in the Rowing River." John says as the two boys nod in agreement with their theory.

"Then the bandits will blindly rob the poor from the only thing that can fight off the disease, the tea from Lenato. Stealing away the tea to forcefully make the poor cough up their money." William finalized the theory. 

"And with the rats? How are they being commanded by the whistling of these three men?" Ingrid asked as she and John were still lost about how these generals have some magic to command these rodents.

"A Zonian trained those rats while wearing a masked. Thought them to follow these whistles as long as the one whistling wears these masks. That's why the generals wore these. And I'm sure that this Zonian trained them the proper way to whistle to control the rodents." William adds to his theory.

"But what of the ones who killed these our guards and gave the knife to generals to kill themselves?" John points out that they have not seen any prints or forced entry into prison.

"Zonian can use their Sense like the Chief to improve their prowess. Maybe this one has excelled in her Sense of moving while covering her tracks. She entered the camp, killed the guards, and asked her generals to kill themselves to prevent any information from being taken from them." William confidently says.

"She?" John asked. He was surprised how Williams knew the identity of the Zonian. 

"Hold on, are you suggesting you know the identity of a Zonian who orchestrated this attack? Then can we cure our people!" Ingrid looked at the boys for answers.

"Since the Chief is a Pentalium member and a Zonian, we can assume that sure every Pentalium member is also like him," William says and adds that only the Pentalium can orchestrate this plague. As for the cure, William divulged his findings of Margaret Strout, a businesswoman.

"Ingrid, the smell of salt is still present on their clothes, right? Then I believe that we are on track as her infirmary is by the coast. If our theory is right, Margaret has trained these rats, supplied the bandits, and stole gold from the Kingdom; then I am sure the cure is there!" William's words instill hope into John and Ingrid's hearts. 

Thou the night is dark, they are drawn to the light that William gave. He doesn't realize it, but he is becoming a man of the people. But can William push the darkness away? Or will he be swallowed by it?