Walking across the snow covered ground, he makes his way to the meeting. Only four of them know of this meeting, secrecy is of the utmost importance. The inn isn’t far and he’s soon through the door and up to the room where the others are waiting.
“Good,” James says as soon as Jiron enters, “we’re all here.” He waits until Jiron has taken his seat before he begins. He glances around at them one at a time, Jiron, Illan and Delia. “You and I are to be the only ones who know of what transpires here,” he says.
They each nod in turn. “Why all the secrecy?” asks Delia. Her caravan is parked in the usual place, that clearing outside of town. When she received word that James had needed to talk to her, she quickly made her way back to Trendle.
“There’s something which happened when we found the Star that I have yet to tell anyone,” he begins. “I had a vision.”
He relates to them the vision in detail. His meeting with Igor, the High Temple of Morcyth and all that was said, including that the temple must be rebuilt in The City of Light.
“But how are we to do that?” Illan asks when he’s through. “The Empire now controls not only the City but a good portion of Madoc. And from what intelligence I’ve been able to gather, they are likely to launch another offensive in the spring in an attempt to break the defenders at Lythylla.”
He remains silent for a moment, knowing what effect his words are about to have. “Come spring, when the passes are once more clear, we travel to Madoc.”
“And then?” Jiron says in the silence that followed.
“And then,” he says glancing from one to next, “we drive them back to the Empire!” The death of his friend still weighs heavily upon him. They say paybacks are a bitch? Well this is going to be like nothing the Empire has ever seen before!