Page 28 of Amaros

“It looks uninhabitable here,” Amaros said with a hint of doubt.The mountain they were climbing had sheer cliffs and a narrow, winding road.He’d had to veer around rockslides a few times.

“You’ll see,” Zoe told him with supreme confidence.“The turnoff is coming up on the right.”

They’d just passed a familiar sign she’d seen in her latest vision.It warned of a steep climb and instructed trucks to use a low gear.Amaros slowed down, peering ahead.“I don’t see any driveways,” he said.

“That’s because there isn’t a driveway,” she said.“Turn there,” she instructed him, pointing at a huge boulder to the right.“The pathway is just behind that rock.”

Amaros made sure no one was coming in either direction, then drove past the boulder.He turned into what had once apparently been a track, but showed no signs anyone had ever passed this way.“There’s just the edge of the cliff ahead,” he said as he peered over the hood.

“Keep going,” she urged him.“We should be able to follow an old track along the edge of the cliff.”

Grace grabbed hold of their seats.“We’re going to die,” she predicted in trepidation.

Amaros took a deep breath, then gently eased forward.Sure enough, he followed the edge of the cliff around to the left and behind a cluster of boulders.“Someone cleared the rocks from the trail, but it was a long time ago,” he said.

A few shrubs had grown on the ancient trail, but the truck easily mowed them down.Grass covered the dirt and stone track, hiding the fact that it had ever existed.Trees were few and far between, since the area was so rocky.It must have taken a herculean effort to clear the debris out of the way.

“Careful!”Grace said when Amaros came a little too close to the cliff as he eased around another huge rock.He gave her a rueful look for backseat driving, then continued to drive around the sharp bend.

They all let out relieved breaths when the way opened up past the boulder.The side of the mountain receded on the left, leaving a large, flat area ahead.Trees grew densely about three hundred yards away, leaving plenty of room to park the truck.

“Welcome to your new home,” Zoe said, sweeping her hand at the stone structure that was hidden behind the trees.Even knowing it was there, she could barely make it out.

“There’s nothing there,” Grace said, scowling slightly.“Do you expect us to build a treehouse?”

“Is that a building among the trees?”Amaros asked, then opened his door.

“Yep,” Zoe said.“My visions showed me an old stone structure.It has three wings, but they’re probably in pretty bad shape.”

“How long has it been since anyone lived here?”Grace asked as the females exited from the truck.Completely hidden from the road back here, they didn’t bother to remove any of their gear from the vehicle yet.

“From what I saw, early settlers from the 1600s built this place,” Zoe said.“I’m not sure what happened to them, but no one has lived here since then.”

“You’re saying this building is four hundred years old?”the kid asked in awe.“How is it still standing?”

“Let’s take a look at it,” Amaros said, then loped towards the trees.

With glassless windows and no surviving doors, the stone building did indeed have three wings.Time and inclement weather had caused some damage, but the structure was in comparatively good shape.Zoe had expected it to be a lot worse up close, but it still looked habitable.

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Grace said in dismay after a few minutes of scouting.“It’s a ruin!”

“It needs a bit of work,” Zoe admitted.“New windows and doors will make it feel homier.”

“It doesn’t have a roof!”the teen exclaimed, gesturing at a large room in the main wing where part of the roof had fallen in.Any furniture that had been in this place had disintegrated long ago.A lot of stones in the center of the floor were missing, leaving a gaping dirt hole.

“It’s perfect,” Amaros decided with a nod of approval.“My team and I can repair the damage.It’ll be easy to fortify and it will be large enough for all of us to be our home.”

“How many knights are there?”Zoe asked.She’d caught glimpses of them, but she hadn’t seen their faces clearly.

“Twenty,” he said.

“Is that all?”Grace asked in surprise.“Does that mean you only have twenty enemies?”

He shook his head grimly.“Chaos spawned far more soldiers than Order created,” he explained.“They also have the habit of recruiting humans in their battles.That’s why it always takes a few years to win our wars against them now.Our numbers are slowly whittled down, while theirs inevitably grow.”

“You win more often than you lose, though,” Zoe said.That was the sense she’d gotten anyway.

“I believe so,” Amaros confirmed.“The details are hazy.I only remember flashes of the battles.”