Tales from Helitheren

the Darkness of Khmol'ze Pt. 1

2015-06-20T02:59:00.000-07:00

Our story begins, as every good story should, in a place far away, actually you have most likely never heard about it, a village far up in the highlands. Right by the mountains rests the small village called Gimni, by the villagers and That-Place-Where-Our-Iron-Comes-From by the proud family of Befverhanskenhjelm who owns most of the mines around Gimni. This is where we find our first actor, Sir Gregory II Befverhanskenhjelm's eldest son, Leopold Befverhanskenhjelm, sent to That-Place-Where-Our-Iron-Comes-From by his father to learn to look after the family's business (and to teach his no-good son what the world looks like outside their estate down by Uinford).

Leopold walked up to one of the mines once, gave the unfortunate foreman a rant about all the dirt on the road (which was the road itself) and how dusty and dark the mine was, then walked back down towards That-Pla... Gimni. On his way back he realized that he should probably try to make the most of this useless trip and decided to go hunting. He had read it was a good thing to do as a noble, and a noble he was indeed. He paid the first hunter he saw handsomely to follow him into the woods, kill a boar for him and then praise him for the great hunt. Ah, the thrill of the hunt.

Back in the village he made way to the ferry with which he arrived earlier the same day to return to Uinford. This was where he heard the most outrageous thing so far; the ferry would not make the trip back to Uinford more than once a week! He could not understand why the poor ferryman, for poor he clearly was, would not take money for doing the trip right now.

Here he learned of our second actor, a seasoned (a generous word for this strange man) ranger who often visited Gimni, selling game, herbs and several different odds and ends he found or crafted in the forest. “As he is from the north he surely knows all the paths from here to Uinford,” said the ferryman, “go find him and he might help you.” As it happened the ranger known as Shrike was in Gimni, and after some convincing agreed to lead the noble back to Uinford. Between you and me, it was mostly to get Leopold stop talking.

Shrike was an... interesting... person. He was as skilled as a ranger as he was strange around other people. Luckily people were as strange towards him and, to his delight, usually stayed away. This wasn't solely because of the way he stared at you when you tried to talk to him, but also the fact his only friend was a panther named Bágra. As you can imagine people weren't really used to having panthers around. It was not in the same way they weren't used to having wolves around, for they knew what a wolf was and that they existed in the forests around Gimni, panthers didn't. No one in Gimni had ever seen a panther, apart from Bágra of course, so in their eyes he was a huge cat, this didn't help as huge cats were as rare as panthers in their corner of the world.

The ranger also had some mystery about him as no one in Gimni knew much about him at all. It was common knowledge that he was a survivor from a town destroyed in the great war some twenty years ago. He and his father were the only ones to get out when it was burned down. His father because he was out hunting, and Shrike through sheer, unexplainable luck. He had found his father’s hunting lodge empty and from there on searched for him. His father had taught him all the basic wilderness skills he had and over the following twenty years Shrike had perfected them. Having to learn to survive in the unmapped forests of the west he was hardened into what he was today, for better or worse that is. But what do I know? This is what they say in Gimni at least.

But Shrike was not alone when Leopold found him, our third and final actor had already sought his expertise to leave Gimni, a young would-be wizard named Ewyn. She was from an even smaller village some way east of Gimni, Croyne. Croyne was famous throughout the lands for being home to the world's best fighters. At first glance it looks like nothing but a small farming community, but everyone, men and women, have been trained in the art of war since they could walk. As you might expect young Ewyn was not too fond of revealing it to the rest of the village when she discovered that she had magical abilities. Nearby, however, lived an old crone who was widely regarded as a witch. She gladly helped Ewyn as much as she could. Ewyn was also able to hide her magic training when training with weapons. She chose a staff as her weapon of choice as it could easily be used for her two types of training. She innocently used it as a weapon when practising arms but as easily used it for magic when she was visiting the crone. Even though the crone could teach her to control magic, and was able to provide her with a spell book, there was a limit to how much she could teach Ewyn, as witch-magic is not like wizard-magic. “Wizardry is your call,” she told Ewyn, “staying here will do you no good, your power will grow and I cannot help you use it. You must find a real wizard to help you.” With these words Ewyn began her journey from Croyne to Uinford, the largest city anyone from these parts will ever hear of. This is why she had made way to Gimni, and after consulting the ferryman, found Shrike.

Shrike looked at his new companions for the road ahead. He was okay with the tiny wizard, she had at least seen a forest before. The noble on the other hand... it was going to be a long journey.

With the actors assembled and the stage set, we can begin.

Shrike led the party down to the docks, he knew there was another ferry going sail today. It wasn't going to Uinford but down the river nonetheless. “He's going halfway to Uinford, then turns east down the Semkan river to Riverfort.” He explained, after exchanging a few words with the ferryman. Not directly to his fellow travellers but just to say it, in case anyone was listening, “after a few days he will continue to Uinford.” Ewyn was thrilled by this, a few days on a ferry then getting to see the great city of Uinford! Leopold, however... “Harrumph! A few days of waiting?” He exclaimed, “We may as well stay here and wait for the real ferry!” Shrike avoided eye contact with the furious noble, not because of the fact he was furious, but because he didn't do well with eye contact overall. “It’s still faster than waiting here a week,” he mumbled under his breath. “I say we go as far as we can along the river,“ Leopold wasted next to no time breathing, even less time was spent on listening to others, “then get off and take a road to Uinford. That is what you forest-running folks are good for, no?” The ferryman who had been listening, it was hard not to when Leopold had something to say, met Shrike's glance and answered the question in it, “there is a place right where the Semkan meets Uin where I can let you off.” Shrike was about to comment, but Leopold was not one to be spoken over. “Ah! Now here is a man with a good head on his shoulders, take us there good sir!” He took a few fast steps past Shrike and the ferryman and on to the barge. “Um, yes, we can set out right away.” The ferryman said as he answered another glance. Shrike boarded and Ewyn, with no say in the matter, followed. Joining them was also the boar Leopold had “hunted” down earlier.

Down the Uin the small barge sailed. The poor ferryman was still worried about what he had gotten himself into as he looked at his passengers. The one called Ewyn, who he understood was supposed to be a wizard, was looking at everything as if each tree was a new and exciting experience. She had long since passed the distance of her previous longest journey. Shrike was sitting behind some crates rummaging through his bag, every now and then taking something out of it, looking at it only to put it back in. As a ferryman who often visited Gimni he knew who Shrike was and this was normal behaviour for him, sooner or later he would be satisfied with the content of the bag, take out a couple of specific items and craft something... useful... out of them. He was weird but crafty, mostly weird though. He had not seen many nobles this far south, sometimes people sent to represent them in checking on the mines and such, sure, but not nobles themselves undertaking the task. If this was how all nobles were he could see why. This one stood at the bow leaning on his halberd looking triumphant, over what he was not sure. Also this act failed every time the barge rocked even a little. He was not going to jump in when he fell overboard. What really worried him, however, was that Bágra sat next to Shrike. Staring at him with unblinking eyes.

The sooner they got off the better.

An uneventful day or so down the river they reached the aforementioned spot late in the afternoon. With Shrike's help, as he was the only one with any skills in this whatsoever, they moored the barge long enough for the passengers to get off with their belongings. This included the boar which Leopold decided Ewyn had to carry as she was travelling in his party. Ewyn was not very good at, or used to, arguing and before she knew it she was half carrying, half dragging a boar through the thicket on the riverbank. After getting it up on the bank she put it down and opened her spell book. She knew there was something there. Guided by the book's magical powers she opened the book on the rune Haschim, the invisible servant. Speaking out the magical words related to the spell she called upon the powers beyond this world, bending them to her will. Or... at least trying to. She felt the magic surge through her, building up and... a sound best described with the word “poof”. The rune in her book faded, its powers drained for some time forward. Looking around it didn't seem like any of her companions had noticed, she hastily closed her book and grabbed the boar again. Coming from Croyne, a village full of warriors, she was used to heavy lifting so this was not a problem per se, but she really wished she could just leave it behind. Leopold, however, would have none of it and was already questioning Shrike where the road is.

From the barge the ferryman witnessed all this as he was setting out. He heard Shrike sigh, say something about “no roads in the forest” Leopold answering with a “harrumph” and walking off deeper in the forest, followed by Shrike and Ewyn dragging a boar. He could not help but to think of what he was getting himself out of. He had never travelled the wilds much. But in the villages and inns he visited there were always stories of exciting adventures that had taken place as soon as normal villagers had taken a few steps from the tried and safe paths. He had sometimes dreamed of joining merchant caravans as they left Uinford for some distant and mysterious place. He soon realised, however, that he was looking at couple of strange people heading down to Uinford led by the most skilled, and at least as strange, ranger these parts had ever heard of. Their journey would take a couple of days down paths known only to rangers and then arrive at the gates of Uinford. If he ever went on a journey it sure wouldn't be one as boring as theirs.

“We are far from any road,” Shrike sighed as the noble was looking for the direction to the closest one, “we will have to walk through forest before we reach an old path I've heard of.” Leopold looked shocked by the outrageous condition of this part of the world. With a loud “harrumph” he stormed off in the vague direction Shrike had indicated when mentioning the path mumbling something about his father getting to hear about this and such. Shrike followed him slowly, letting Ewyn keep up with him. “Um,” she started, not getting Shrike's attention more than anything else human would, “what is this old path then. If you've only heard of it I mean.” In Shrike's eyes something that might have been joy could be seen, if his eyes would've been facing anything with eyes to observe this. “There was a large road connecting cities of some nation which, together with its cities, is long gone,” the tone of his voice was a different kind of mumbling now, it was rare that strangers took interest in his arts, “the path is the only thing left that the forest has yet to re-conquer. It is wide enough for us to walk abreast, if not considering the roots stretching over the path, digging their way through all that is left of the paved road underneath.” His voice trailed off into something that sounded more and more like a storyteller enthralling people around a campfire than an eccentric ranger who still have enough fingers to count how many people he talked to over the last ten years of his life. “It follows the Uin north-south. I know many... several... a couple of rangers that use it regularly when having to travel long distances along the Uin.” He ended the monologue staring at the ground.

They had caught up to Leopold who had realised he didn't know where he was going, he did not admit it of course. He had stopped because there was a small clearing in this terribly badly taken care of forest. “This is it,” Shrike said to no one in particular, “it apparently runs closer to the river here.” Ewyn looked down and saw a couple of rocks that were a bit too flat to be found naturally, she looked up to either side and when one knew it was there a tunnel through the forest could be seen. Leopold observed his companions and soon realised what was here. “Ah, but of course the... road... is here!” He exclaimed in a not so convincing tone, “Why would I have stopped here otherwise?” He did his best to look triumphant again, which was an art he had perfected over the years, he was arrogant if nothing else. “We should keep moving,” Shrike mumbled under his breath, not giving Leopold the attention he was fishing for, “we don't have a lot of sunlight left.” Ewyn followed right away, dragging the boar with her. Shrike soon left them to scout ahead, the path was easy for them to follow without him showing them every step. He didn't only think this was the smarter way to go about things, but he also enjoyed walking alone with Bágra, the way he usually moved in the woods.

But as the sun moved towards the horizon, shapes moved in the shadows under the thick foliage of this ancient forest.

Ewyn walked right behind Leopold in the ever darkening forest, she knew he was saying something but had long since stopped listening to his egotistical monologues. Instead she was focusing on their surroundings, as this forest was nothing like the one back home. Amazed at how much can change after only a couple of days on the road, or river in this case, she could only think of what could be lurking behind the closest trees. The darkness had come long before the sun was below the horizon, and now that the sun was gone it was impossible to see further than a trees closest to the old, broken road they walked. Shrike was nowhere to be seen, she knew he was somewhere ahead of them, making sure nothing would take them by surprise. But the howling took at least her by surprise.

The two stopped and waited, listening. It had been close. Leopold turned to look at her, looking for an explanation. She did live in the forest after all. “Well?” He asked uncertainly, “what is it, and why are we stopping?” She didn't answer but looked extremely focused on listening. Luckily, he had heard similar howling before. He tried to remember when and soon realised it was very similar to a dog or a maybe a fox. From there it was easy, only one of them lived in the forest! “Ah!” He exclaimed at this realisation, “I've hunted these before, back at our estate! No worries little one, I am not one to back down when it is time to hunt.” He brandished his halberd in a way no one who wielded a halberd would and looked extremely proud of himself, it was his time to shine. Ewyn didn't even spare him a look, where was Shrike?

Shrike had also heard it, he and Bágra were also listening. His trained eyes swept their surroundings. He had to find out if it was a lone wolf or a pack before deciding what to do. Finding a tree with low branches nearby he climbed it and nocked an arrow in his bow while Bágra prowled beneath. Another howl, from the same direction. He realised that they must have sneaked past them when they had scouted ahead, for him to sneak past animals was nothing new, travelling with companions was. Leaping from the tree he landed running.

Meanwhile Ewyn and Leopold now knew where the howling had come from, in front of them on the path a large wolf had appeared, followed by another. “Hah! Bring it on little fox!” Leopold, oblivious to the beasts' dark-grey fur and large teeth, took a stance showing some proficiency in handling his weapon. Ewyn, holding the boar and confused by the mentioning of the word “fox”, instinctively dropped boar and took up a defensive stance with her quarterstaff. This was it. She was actually going to fight these beasts, but quarterstaff wasn't her real weapon of choice, switching her stance she held the staff in one hand and let her book open in the other. This was more like it.

The wolves charged at them, one of them leaping towards Leopold. But after a somewhat clumsy, but efficient block by its target it landed on the ground without bringing Leopold down with it. As it was turning around for a second try it learned that catching a halberd mid-swing with your spine is not recommended. Ewyn couldn't help but be surprised by the noble's movement, for the first time, since they met at the inn, it looked like he knew what he was doing. Her thoughts were abruptly cut short by a third wolf leaping out of the bushes behind him. Its teeth being deflected by Leopold's armour but caught him off-guard enough to miss his counter attack. Ewyn realised they had two problems, the wolves and the light, which there was none of. At her will her book opened at the right place and she cast an illuminating spell on the closest object, this happened to be the boar. The two wolves hesitated when the boar suddenly had a soft light coming off it, which gave Ewyn the time she needed to pick up the yellowish boar and throw it at the closer wolf that had realised Leopold was about to do with it as he had done with the wolf before it. Acting fast she let another page reveal itself she cast a terrorizing spell on the boar and link the last wolf's mind to it. With the desired effect coming to pass the wolf shot away into the forest, tail between its legs. Ewyn took a deep breath as Leopold executed the pinned wolf. “Guess I just did that”, was the only thought that was able to formulate in her mind.

“How fortunate we are!” Leopold broke the silence exclaiming, “Two foxes mean double the fur! We need to bring them with us and give to my servants, they should know how to use these.”

The otherwise incapable noble look overly pleased with himself. Ewyn was having a hard time figuring out if he was still incapable or actually come from a place where there are foxes the size of wolves. Her mind slowly tried to form a question without knowing where to begin. Once again her poor thoughts were interrupted by the sound of six legs running towards them and soon Shrike and Bágra entered the small circle of light illuminated by the boar on top of a dead wol... fox.

“You two are okay.” Shrike did no effort to hide his surprise in finding his two companions intact. He, however, had not run here to have a casual chat. “We have to get out of here. The first ruined city of the old kingdom can't be far from here.”

He and his four-legged companion disappeared back into the darkness whence they came and soon the six running legs were the only thing bearing witness of their short visit. Ewyn's thoughts had nothing against being interrupted by something that would get them out of this wolf (as she did know the difference between them and foxes) infested darkness. She was off as fast as she could, leaving the noble behind. Leopold could not just run away from his trophies. He was sure fox pelts were quite valuable. But deep inside his troubled mind something awakened in him, his survival instinct. Soon the glow of a lonely boar faded over nothing but two dead wolves.

With her short legs the small would-be mage was slowly but surely catching up to her guide. Somewhere behind her the heavy steps of an armoured noble doing the same thing. Shrike clearly did not try to keep stick to his own pace. Being used to moving quickly and silently in the forest he could have easily outrun both of the ones behind him, but even though he preferred being alone he knew he had given (or Leopold had at least taken) his word and had no intentions to go back on it now. As he had anticipated he soon saw signs of ruins ahead of them, square stone formations faintly outlined themselves against the dark midnight sky. Leopold and Ewyn had caught up to him and he now kept a steady pace a couple of meters ahead of them.

Soon they passed what once must have been the city's wall for after it houses in varying stages of decay lined the now much wider path. Nature had long since re-conquered this land and now trees rose higher than most of the buildings. Most of these building could not be called houses as much as heaps anymore, but every now and then there was house of two or more stories defying the wilds. A house would be good. But running into a ruined house would do as much good as running into a cave; the wolves could still follow them inside. But luck was on their side.

“There!” Shrike exclaimed and cut across a courtyard, “a standing door!”

The other followed and following him across the courtyard they too saw the building they were aiming for. It was a large tower, once it may have reached for the sky, now it was in a crippled state of two seemingly intact stories crowned by rubble. Even now its silhouette proudly erected itself towards the moon, dominating the sky ahead of them as a last bastion of those who came before against the slowly advancing forest.

The massive gate was ajar and they all slipped inside into a large dark room. As far as they could tell this first floor spanned the entirety of the tower's round shape. But the moon only let them see a sliver of stonework on the opposing wall. Following Shrike's initiative they tried to close the reinforced gate that would not budge until Leopold put his back against it. Budge is the correct word. It moved, not by a lot, but it showed promise. No matter how promising it was, it was not before one of their furry adversaries showed it feral head inside the room. Shrike dashed away from the gate to release an arrow at it. This proved difficult. Not only due to the lack of light in the room, but he realized that he was not used to having allies that he shouldn't shoot arrows at. Ewyn was already in melee with the wolf as she had been closest to the opening. Without having time to ready spells she swung at it with her quarterstaff, doing not much beyond keeping the wolf from attacking her. An arrow eventually found an opening, whizzed past her and struck its mark with lethal effect. Leopold had stepped in front of the opening and had made short work of a second fox.

“Was that all?” he asked with uncertainty mixed with a dash of victory in his voice, when both foxes lay still.

Shrike stood silently and listened.

“No,” he finally said, “these were most likely part of the pack that attacked us earlier. The rest of the pack is surely on its way, so let’s close this gate for the night at least.”

No one questioned his decision of locking them inside as he was already lighting a torch. Soon the large circular room was lit by a couple of old torches on its wall. To their right were stairs going up along the wall with its opposite to their left. What really caught their attention, however, was the door right across the room. It was another reinforced door with a beautifully engraved vault surrounding it.

With the massive door shut behind them, the lack of windows and the gaping darkness of either set of stair their boundaries were set. This was all their world consisted of now.

Another short update

2015-05-21T02:30:00.000-07:00

With four empty months behind us I feel we owe you another status update. First of all I wish to thank, and apologize to, all you who come here every month in hope of finding a new story from the realms of Helitheren. Seeing the number of daily visitors skyrocket around the 20th each month is truly a motivator for the two of us in this period where writing essays takes up most of our time to push through and always try to get the finishing touches to the stories at hand in time for the next 20th.

There is, however, light at the end of the tunnel, summer is coming. This does not mean I will have the whole summer to write for you guys as I will be studying some over the summer months, but it does mean I will still have a lot more time than I have right now.

With that said I do believe June will bring another story for you.

//RcaH

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The city of Midrod -part 2

2015-01-21T16:14:00.003-08:00

Part 2 (Part 1)

The trio waited silently in the dark basement. They heard when the outer wall of the building crumbled to bits and pieces. From the they could see how a large portion of the houses ceiling fell down, crushing everything on the floor above them, the room they were in became pitch dark. They waited in silence, as the noises of stone crumbling and woodbeams breaking continued. The beast seemed to be determined to ”meet” them, and the sounds indicated that it was removing wreckage between it and them.

Suddenly the trio saw a ray of light. A shadow and a large noise later, the opening grew to a large hole, bursting with sunlight at them. Then suddenly the light become blocked again, not by wreckage, but by a silhouette of the beast. Myrosi seemed to see a large eye staring at them for a moment. This was followed by much noise and movement. But the sounds and noises faded away, indicating that the beast was moving away from them. Awhile later the room stood all silent. No growling, no crumbling of stone, nothing to indicate of the large presence that had visited them.

In Myrosis mind this created a mass off confusion. Shouldn’t they be dead by now?

”What happened?” Bareks question broke the silence.

”Sssh, be silent, it may still lurk somewhere nearby”, Salena whispered.

”But why aren’t we dead? Why didn’t it dig us up, and maul us”, Myrosi added to Bareks question.

”I don’t know, maybe it didn’t see us, or we were not worth the effort. This is not the first time it has happened to me” Salena answered.

Myrosi was not satisfied with the explanation, he was sure that they had been exposed, and had been seen by the beast. And why give up the effort when they were just a few scratches away? It was like a cat giving up on a mouse, when having it cornered.

”Anyway, let us wait here for a moment to be sure it’s not waiting in ambush for us outside.”

Salena understood the silence as an consent to her suggestion.

”Hey, Myrosi, could you pass the water to me? all that running and this dusty air makes my throat feel like an desert.” Barek uttered. Myrosi started to dig in the bag with supplies. But he didn’t seem to find any water bottle in the bag.

”I need more light, I don’t seem to find the water supplies.” Myrosi stated. ”No need to search for it, I didn’t pack any water with us” Salena said with a smirk on her face. The both men started to express their protest on how a big mistake it was, and how they were accompanied by an most incompetent guide...

”You guys seem not to understand where you are, as long as we are in this city, we will have running water everywhere, as long as the pipes aren’t damaged by that beast.” Salena stated. Barek seemed to calm down, but Myrosi had it hard to contain his dissatisfaction, and concepts like running water was foreign to him. But only after a while, Salena had found an metal object settled in the wall, and after a swift movement, the room filled with the sound of water flowing through the object. Myrosi was slightly amazed, but more than that, his mind was filled with discontent. He deemed that the city had enslaved the water. ”This magic must be one of the reasons this city was judged by the gods, you use magic to enslave the river, and draw it here from its natural habitat” Myrosi spoke out in a slight enrage. This awoke a slight smile on both Barek and Salena. ”You simple minded foreigner, don’t you understand that this is just a small well, drawing water from the ground around us” Barek informed Myrosi. But Salena seemed to be quite unsatisfied with the explanation. ”Actually, this is a work of engineering; With gravitation, the water is pressurized and led with pipes to every household”, she explained. Both men stared at her in disbelief, but they didn’t seem interested in questioning her further. After sating their thirst, they started move.

The three figures crawled up from the basement, through the hole the beast had tired up just a couple of moments ago.

-Barek seemed to be interested in visiting a library, but both Salena and Myrosi deemed it to be a waste of time, since they both agreed that a formula to turn diamonds into coal didn’t exist. But Barek had insisted that it was the only place he wanted to visit, and he would pay a great amount, regardless of if the diamond-creation formula was found or not. Myrosi also seemed to be interested in the library for a reason that he would not reveal

Now when they had reached the city, moving from building to building seemed to be much less dangerous than their initial run from the wall. The houses were fairly close to each other, and Salena seemed to be aware of all the places that were safe and out of reach by the beast. This included other basements, military buildings and other kinds of sturdy locations. Other places she deemed to be safe were locations with a strong scent. This included latrines, places she called ’perfume shops’, and a place where she explained was the source of all the water in the city..

The library was located near the citys water source, which offered a good shelter for them. This gave Barek enough time to search the library for his diamond formula, they would stay the night at the water-source building.

The three figures dashed from house to house. In the buildings they searched for a hiding place and waited in silence a couple of minutes before continuing to next building. This would be their main way of moving through the city. Dashing, hiding and waiting, dashing, hiding and waiting. A couple of times they had to wait a longer period, since they could hear the beast nearby. While they were quiet most of the time, sometimes Salena broke the silence and explained something around their surroundings, about the city and its culture; there were lights that could be light by a mere twisting of a button, there were examples of art and furniture that seemed like from another world. But in everything they saw, there was something odd. Everything was in a good order. In a couple of houses it seemed like there were dinner tables decorated in an orderly fashion, ready for a dinner, except that the food had since years ago turned into moldy clumps. The floors were covered in dust, but underneath it could white marble stone be dimly seen, and walls were decorated with silver and gold plating. Myrosi wondered why everything wasn’t scavenged yet, clearly they weren’t the only scavenger group to explore these parts. A couple of instances while passing by, Myrosi took a knife and scrapped away the gold plating, but Salena and Barek seemed to not care about the gold plating. It was true that the plating was thinner than hair, but Myrosi thought it should still be worth something.

It took almost a half day to reach the library. It was a large building, big enough to fit the beast inside, and a missing wall indicated that the beast had at least visited it. Large golden decorations on the pillars indicated that this was not a mere library, it had been a center of knowledge, and a pride of the citizens. On the outside, several heaps of armor lay on the ground. Emblems of them indicated that they were originated from southern countries, Palor, Indor and Donir. But the armors were empty, and no corpses were to be seen. “They were probably eaten by the beast”, Barek stated. A shiver went down Myrosis back. And soon enough they were again spurting. Inside, and into hiding from the potential prying eyes of the beast. Both Myrosi and Barek were amazed by how easy it had been to infiltrate the city. Salena acted like a professional, and knew every corner of the city like her own pockets. After hiding in the library for a while. The trio started to search for Bareks diamond formula. Myrosi stated that he would be completely useless in searching for it, he was a simple man, and therefore quite illiterate. Well he could read a couple of letters, but not fast enough for a fast searching operation. So he got the position to guard near the library entrance, so he could warn the two others if the beast would come. Strangely enough Barek didn’t seem to be really enthusiastic about the task of searching for his precious book. After a while he stated that they should stop searching, since he was too tired from all the running earlier, and he suggested that they should search for shelter before sunset. The other two agreed, but both felt that something wasn’t right with Bareks unenthusiastic search for his treasure. Soon enough they had find a shelter that Salena deemed to be out of reach for the beast, a underground room in the vicinity of the water facility. Myrosi caught a glimpse of the sunset before going inside their shelter: The white city reflecting the last sunlight gave away the same feeling as an sunset at the sea. They divided the night in three different guard duty shifts, first turn was Barek, then Salena and lastly Myrosi.

Myrosi didn’t sleep well, but he had experienced far worse nights. At least this night he wasn’t alone. How much time had passed since he had experienced company? It gave him a feeling of comfort, despite being in one of the most dangerous places in the known world. He was awakened from his light sleep when Salena gave him a gentle puff on his side. “Your turn, Myrosi” She added. Quite quickly Myrosi rose up, and took his position near the shelter entrance. But Salena stayed at his side. “I don’t think I will benefit anything if I go to sleep now, since the night is short. Do you mind company while guarding?” Salena asked. Myrosi didn’t mind, and it didn’t cross his mind that he could have asked Salena to take the rest of the guard duty and let him sleep. “What are you really searching for here?” Salena asked, staring straight into Myrosis eyes. Somehow Myrosi felt an obligation to answer her thruthfully. After all, he could not afford mistrust between him and his guide at a location like this. Throughout his life he had learned to not trust people, but somewhere inside him were still a glimpse of something. It may be called naivety or goodwill, but the effect were the same. “Well, to be honest, I’m not really sure myself. I have lost everything dear to me, by the hands of bandits. My village was plundered and burned, and I was sold as a slave. I managed to escape, but the southern world didn’t offer a place where my owners hand could not reach me. So I considered that this was my best option, find something valuable here, sell it and start a new life.” Myrosi told Salena. She was silent a minute. Then she stated ”We seem to have a lot in common. I have also lost my home, twice in fact. First Thi’betor, fell to the hordes of Goblins, and then this city, my birthplace, in ruins…” This came as a chock to Myrosi. He, like many else had believed that all of the inner city citizens had disappeared seven years ago. “Are there others like you” Myrosi asked. Salena was quiet a while. “ I don’t know… I haven’t encountered anyone from the inner city in several years. But it’s hard to believe that the beast ate everyone. But so far, I’m the last living inner city Midrodian.”

A silence followed her confession. “Could you be on the lookout for a moment while I go get some water” Salena asked, as trying to change the topic to something else. Somewhere in the night Salena could hear a large growl from the beast. But it sounded far enough that they could feel quite secure for the moment. As Myrosi stared in the night, Salena reached her hand towards the water and filled with crystal clear water, Myrosi could hear how she took a couple of gulps, followed by the noise of her collapsing on the floor. Myrosi stared at her in shock. She was trembling, and out of her mouth came white foam. Myrosi grabbed her, tried to get her attention to ask what was going on, but she was unconscious. Myrosi lifted her up and run inside the shelter shouting with a large voice; “Barek, Help! Salena is dying!” Barek awoke in panic and tried to calm Myrosi down ”Shut up, or you will awaken the beast’s attention!”. He then saw Salenas condition. Without hesitation he picked up from his pocket a black flask, and poured some of its contents inside Salenas mouth. Salenas spasms calmed down. For a moment Salena seemed so calm that Myrosi feared that Barek had killed her. But then he noticed how Salena took a deep breath. “I cannot guarantee her survival, but if gods will, then she will awaken in the morning. To Myrosi nothing made any sense, but Bareks calm attitude calmed him down a little.

Somewhere in the night, the beast screamed loudly…

In the morning, Salena regained her consciousness. She looked confused at Myrosi and Barek. “What happened?” Myrosi explained to her what had happened, and Barek continued: I’m sorry for deceiving you. I was sent here on a mission from the King to kill the beast, and you happened to drink from the water source I had poisoned… Salena asked calmly: “you tried to kill the beast?” Barek answered: “Yes, and judging by all the screaming it did last night, I probably succeeded.” Salenas face turned more bleak than before. “You and your King should know what that means. The beast is the only thing that hinders the goblins from invading our city.” she said in a loud hostile voice. “The goblins are of no threat. In fact, our beloved king is at the moment on an campaign, getting rid of the goblin infestation.” Barek answered. “That idiot kid of a King is probably dead by now. You have no idea. I was in the kingdom of Thi’bethor a while before it was overrun by goblins, and this city's sack of armor wielders are nothing compared to Thi’bethors dwarf army, or the inner Midrods military might seven years ago…” Salena shouted.

Meanwhile, far outside the city, the screams of a dying beast had attracted an army of onlookers. One of the onlookers wore a gold-plated armor and his green hand raised towards the city of Midrod, followed by a large noise of shouting goblins. The time of the city guardian was almost over; that meant that the city of Midrod were to be almost unprotected…

End of part 2

To be continued...

-Sanlade

In the Archives of the University

2014-12-20T13:22:00.001-08:00

Going through the old archives I found a few pages from a journal written by some unknown scholar back in the early 1st Era. Not much is known of their journey, beginning or end, but a small parchment attatched, most likely written by the scholar called Mataijas here, hinting that only a few of them returned, and empty handed at that.

Day 302

Once we had the Dark Claw behind us we headed straight north for a few weeks, then turned northwest to reach the highlands between the Dwarven Mountains and the Goblin infested mountains to the northwest. If one can trust the tomes in the University's archives we should be the first men to walk these hills for at least three or four hundred years, but most likely much longer. Inspired by the
old tales of the lost tribes I have decided to name these lands the Highlands of Gormath or maybe the Gormathian Hills. I have to think about that before we return to Palor. It is said that the domain of the ancient dragon of the earth was indeed in the far northwestern reaches of Helitheren, I feel it would be e fitting name. I have not shared this knowledge with the rest, I have a feeling that fighting Ancients was not a part of the deal the Wise did with the mercenaries that I now call my companions.

Day 311

As we have yet to find any traces of our kin's great march north we hope that these very hills hold some evidence of them passing through here. If nothing is found we are out of leads for now and with the growing unrest among our sellswords I fear what could happen if our journey would not bear fruit. I overheard a seemingly popular topic by the campfire a few nights back. This search for a lost people seem to have filled their heads with ideas of hidden cities made of pure gold. Since I expect nothing more than a couple of caves with the Winged Torch, the crest of the Hakedim, it would be all the evidence I need to prove Haked led his family this way. But I don't know if that I would be enough to settle the hunger for gold that now resides in the hearts of my fellow men.

Day 313

Our journey from the White Mountains to here took longer than expected and I fear that winter could strike sooner rather than later by now. We are equipped to survive the cold, but it would slow us down even more, and I fear what effect it may have on the morale. We already have to move with care in these lands, both Dwarves and Goblins would most likely attack us on sight. These delays, I don't know how much longer I can keep everyone motivated. Mataijas, my fellow scholar is the only one who I know would follow me even when others decide it is no use going forward.

Day 319

It's now been almost a week since my last words on these pages, I must try to do this more often. Over the last days we have found several caves that would have proved useful for a traveling people. Some of them had evidence of someone, or something, staying there long ago but nothing I can tie to Haked, for all I know it may have been a Goblin outpost. While it fills me with motivation to move forward the sellswords are not convinced. We lost a couple of our Ourian men last night. They must have left during their watch. We have four or five other Ourians but I have heard them cursing their brethren for being so weak, it seems to have spurred them to prove not all of their kind are oath breakers. I only wish the other mercenaries would share their view, the morale is suffering from these kind of events.

Gormath's Highlands, that will have to do.

Day 326

Snow has begun to fall and as I feared the morale joined in. One day we had clear skies, the other a snowstorm that reduced our vision to next to nothing. We now have snow up to our ankles. While the storm left the snow did not, and we've had a few days of light snowfall and it shows no signs of wanting to stop. One of our rangers led us up along a winding path. “This path clearly isn’t a natural formation so if a minor people walked these lands they might as well be the ones who walked up here first,” he said. I had no reason to argue, any reasons was better than none at all, after all we were walking blindly among the hills hoping to find something. Maybe this was that something we had hoped to find. The path ended with a plateau, not a huge one, but large enough for us to be able to make camp far enough from the steep slope whence we came, to not fear falling over the edge in our sleep.

Day 327

We decided to stay here for the day, hoping the snow would give us a day or two to be able to look out over the land beneath us and maybe see something we otherwise would miss. The snowfall today was light enough to see almost all of the plateau, I have studied it and found a few points of great interest to me. It is shaped like a droplet almost, falling from the northwest. Our path reached it from the east, close to the tip of the droplet-shape, apart from the path most of the eastern side is nothing but a cliff, falling further than I can see in this weather. But on the west side there two mountainsides rising as straight up as the eastern side is falling, and between them are what is most extraordinary. A pass, in it self it is not much, but where it begins from our plateau are two pillar-like rock formations. The rangers and Mataijas were not as impressed by my finding, they once again thought there wasn't enough to tie them to Haked, Dwarves are of course famous for working with stone, and even Goblins could accomplish a feat this simple. But I am convinced they are made by neither. They are too roughly hewn to be Dwarven and Goblins never build anything above ground. Mataijas said that there is nothing to prove they were not made by lazy Dwarves or likewise. But there are other signs that I think disprove Dwarven hand in this; they are not made of the kind of rock these mountains hold, Dwarves never move rocks, they take pride in creating out of what is at hand. No one is convinced though. But I know this is the right path.

I have given the name of the highlands some thought again. Naming them after a creature no one has seen or heard about for thousand of years might be foolish. Am I only fueling a dying legend, causing fear where there is none to be found, at least not in the shape of an Ancient? These highlands are roamed by nothing but the Dwarves and Goblins that resides on their respective sides, would be more appropriate to name them after a more realistic threat.

Day 330

We had our day of clear weather, finally. We looked out over seemingly endless snow covered hills. Far to the northeast we could see the highest peaks of the mountain range where the Goblins have their dens. But nothing we could see from here was noteworthy and we decided the pass behind us was, despite no one believing in my theories about the pillars, the most promising way to go. Since no one wants to listen I will keep my other ideas to myself from now on. To make it easier to track our path I have named the pass Carsef, the pass of snow.

Day 331

I am now writing as we are walking for this cannot wait. As the first of our group walked between the pillars, their torches - as we have so little light for each day - shed their light upon the pillars and threw shadows beyond them. That was when I saw it. I swear by the gods that the pillars with a torch between them caused the shadows to resemble wings. I have not been able to find a crest engraved on any walls since we left the White Mountains but I have seen it now, hidden only to be revealed by a torch, the torch of the Hakedim. I will not tell anyone, the looks they give me as of now are enough, but I know the truth of this pass. I can almost hear the voices of their people walking through this pass so long ago, their footsteps echoing in these mountains through the ages.

We have made camp at a series of ledges where the path widened. I might have gotten a bit carried away before, but who could say I had not reason to? While walking I looked behind us several times, half expecting to stand face to face with Haked leading his people down this very pass. We are getting closer, I can feel it now. It is not only through all the signs we - at least I - have seen along the road here, but I can literally sense us catching up with past events. Everything is unfolding in front of us as we walk the same exodus as the Hakedim walked. Mataijas is distancing himself from me. The looks he and everyone else are giving me, they are doubting me. I will prove them all wrong. We will get up early tomorrow to be able to walk during the short period of light we will receive for the day. It will make it easier for me to see more of Haked's hidden signs. After all, this pass must have meant something to them if they made the pillars and carved them to hide their secrets, it was not something they could have done if they just walked through.

Day 332

Another fruitful night and day have passed. We are through the pass and have camped in a valley protected from the winds. There is a lake here, it held great significance to the Hakedim. While walking through the pass I could feel its history being revealed to me. The Hakedim had lived at the bottom of the winding path for a year or so before Haked called for their journey to continue. The pass had been like a sanctuary to them, down which only Haked and a few chosen ones walked, down to the lake. There they would meet with the gods and the spirits of the mountains to seek guidance. Then, one day there was a powerful sound coming from the valley and they found a new path in the far end of the valley, the gods had split the mountain for Haked to lead his people further west. Tomorrow all we have to do is walk down that path and we will soon find the city of the Hakedim. I have also learned that I was not the first one who called this pass Carsef, it was Haked himself that once named it such.

Day 333

A series of unfortunate events occurred today. We woke up to being a smaller company by three, one of the deserters were a ranger as well to add to our misery. Then while we were getting ready to move out, our ranger that had gone to scout out the path came back reporting that we have to turn back for this valley is a dead end. I refused to believe him and urged everyone to not be disheartened but to come with me to the place where the hidden path was. It was the word “hidden” that was the only reason the ranger allowed me to question his so called expertise. But it was all for naught. When we reached the path it was indeed hidden from our unworthy eyes and there was nothing but a slight crack running down the mountainside. The ranger sighed and mocked me for doubting him but what really struck me was Mataijas placing his hand on my shoulder telling me to let the rangers lead and do their task. Mataijas, who I had once considered my brother, finally revealed his true face and turned his back on me! Finally the last event of our day was the most unfortunate, in their eyes that is, a storm outside of the valley blew straight down Carsef and filled the valley with so much snow that we had to take any cover we could find and hope it would pass. I can feel the spirits of the mountain communicating with me through the storm, for the gods walked on together with Haked, telling me not to be dismayed but to endure. This storm is but a challenge where I can prove my worth and they will open up the path once more for human eyes. I have to prove myself worthy. I must stay strong through this storm.

Day

They are calling me. It is time for me to join Haked at his court and learn the secret knowledge that he holds. The storm calmed down and I can once again see the lake in front of me, but now there is ice like a bridge crossing it to the other side. This bridge must be my final test of faith, for I cannot see the other side but I know Haked is there waiting for me. The spirits told me to leave these weak minds behind, for they did not believe when they saw. I will leave this journal behind as well, so they may know what they missed.

Mataijas, one day maybe you will join me at the court of the Hakedim.

Status update

2014-09-10T09:32:00.001-07:00

As you may have noticed the 20th of the past months has passed rather uneventfully here on the blog. Due to things like studies, work and marriage (you know, life-stuff) its been difficult getting our stories to the standard we would like to see them at and the level our faithful readers deserve. This does not mean work has come to a complete stop, we have about six texts that are close to being done of which three are already being polished to the previously mentioned standard.

On my own and Sanlade's behalf I thank you for hanging in there and recommend that you regularly keep checking for updates here and on our facebook page (www.facebook.com/TalesFromHelitheren).

//RcaH

The Withering

2014-06-23T06:02:00.000-07:00

From where the wide Uon slows down over the lowland to the coast where it washes out into the Sea of Donir there is nothing but inhospitable marshlands as far as one can see. In all of southern Donir, from Ferman Forest in the west to the eastern reaches of Ohren's Plains everyone has heard tales of strange inhabitants living deep inside the mazes of waterways and swamps. Most call them the Withering, for it is said that they are the remains of some ancient evil created by Eri-Ogori himself before he disappeared from Romesia.

When travelling these lands one will hear storytellers speak of heroes of old and their encounters with these creatures, but most of all the stories of Ohren himself.

As everyone surely knows, Ohren crossed the sea from the far west on his enchanted ship Ulthomar, the Sea Cleaver, and sailed into the mouth of Uon, braving the treacherous waters in the marsh. But as soon as Ulthomar entered this maze of reeds fog enveloped them completely. “Never in my days have I seen fog as this, Ulthomar. Surely there is something foul in the air!” Ohren said. “None like these indeed, evil powers are stirring around us. Alas, I fear our journey may be cut short!” Answered Ulthomar.

Slowly they moved forward, fearing shoals hidden by the fog. For so thick was the fog that Ohren could not behold the stern from where he stood at the bow. Long they sailed but the fog persisted and never did they reach the riverbed of Uon. “It is as I feared!” Sighed Ulthomar, “evil deeds are in the making and our passage is blocked.” Ohren peered into the fog ahead of them and indeed there were shallows closing in. In that moment the fog dispersed a little and Ohren beheld land on all sides. “Wretched forces have moved banks and water. Trapped us they have!” He cried, “what will come of us now?”

Ulthomar moved as close to the banks as possible without running aground and Ohren disembarked. He brought his great shield, his sword and a torch, for darkness was drawing near, and set out to find some way to escape their newly formed lake. But for no avail, the marshes had indeed trapped them. When he once again reached where Ulthomar was waiting it spoke to him, “Go on without me, Ohren, for forces that have captured me are greater than those given to me. Find your way from these accursed lands before you as well are caught in their grasp.” Ohren cried bitter tears for he knew this was true. He turned his back on Ulthomar. All the seas they had braved, all perils they overcame together, but this one proved too strong.

Long he walked in the marshes, hoping to find his way to dry land once again. Alas the night was long and the torch he held was soon casting its last flickering lights on his surroundings. Ohren cried out, “Okreber!” For she was the goddess who often guided him in times of need, “Have you abandoned me? Have you not seen the evil leading me astray? Have you not seen what befell my loyal Ulthomar? In these dark and desolate lands I walk, with no guidance and fear I might meet my end before my time.” Okreber heard his cry and answered, “Ohren, have I not always guided you through hardships? Have I not showed you the way when you have asked?” Ohren knew this was all true. “Why did you not ask for my guidance when your travels became perilous? Why did you not cry out when evil acted on your path?” Now Ohren turned away, this was true as well, “I did not think these forces were a threat. I could not foresee a challenge me and trusted Ulthomar could not overcome.” Okreber was merciful but could not undo manifested evil, “I will not punish you for thinking highly of yourself, for that has already brought sorrow over you. I cannot lead you back to Ulthomar for the wicked forces have already concealed all paths behind you, but my light will guide your step in the darkness.” With these words Okreber left him, but as she did she spoke her blessing over his shield which now radiated her holy light. As the shadows trembled and gave way for the light Ohren saw dark figures, taken by surprise by the sudden light, running towards the retreating darkness. “A fool I am for placing my own strength over that of this evil. I have now lost my trusted companion, alone in this world am I, this wretched soul, only saved by the mercy of the gods.” Lamenting he walk forward, led in tears by the light of his shield.

Before long tall shadows appeared before him. As he came closer he could see small hovels and huts making up a whole village on the islet ahead of him. He forded the waters and walked along rows of these small dwellings. Everywhere he could see the same wretched creatures he had seen earlier, hiding in or behind corners of their small houses, whispering dark words in their foul tongue. Walking forward he came upon a larger hovel, and entering he saw the first of their kind who did not hide. Clearly some chieftain of these it defied him, quivering but not hiding. Led by Okreber, Ohren drew his sword and pierced the ground. “I hereby declare my protection over these swamps through the power of Okreber, the lady of the Earth. Anyone entering these cursed lands asking for protection in my name shall not be led astray by your wretched acts and shall come of no harm!” He spoke and the chieftain trembled. When he lifted his hand from the sword he stood on the banks of Uon with the marshes behind him. Here he raised a monolith, giving thanks to Okreber and lamenting over Ulthomar.

To this day people who have heard of Ohren's blessing can still call upon his name to pass safely through the marshes. Some even say that his lamentations can still be heard deep inside the marshes as fog rolls in over the treacherous banks.

Rúh, son of Bann

2013-11-21T03:11:00.001-08:00

The door opened, letting the storm spray the room with rain, leaves and anything else it could carry. The lightning cast a large shadow into the room and one not so large. Their owners, Homen and Pep, stepped into a well filled room.

“Close the door already!” An angry fat man shouted, “if you were the ones to clean it up every time someone opens the door you'd understand why!”
The two remained calm, took a step forward and closed the door.

“You must be the innkeeper.” Homen walked up to him and extended his hand to greet him.
“And you must be new here. But yes, I am indeed the innkeeper, Ludor is the name. What do you want?”
Homen's hand was not met.
“Why would anyone in a storm like the present one enter an inn like this one?” Smiling he looked up at Ludor the innkeeper, for he was indeed the owner of the shorter shadow, “we simply want a room for the night.”
He held up a well filled pouch and Ludor's face lit up.
“Well you do know the way to my heart, and now that you mention it we do have available rooms for you and your...”
“Associate.”
“I am no one to ask questions, your business is yours alone.”
“We would also like to meet potential swords to come with us westwards when this storm has passed.”
“I see. I will bring the best we can offer.”

Homen and Pep were led upstairs to a room fit their gold, the room with the least amount of filth. Ludor left, gold in hand, to send word to every sellsword famous enough for their reputation to have reach Arad Don days before they actually stepped through a door to one of its many inns. During the night and the following morning several answered this call, never before had this inn's atmosphere been as tense as then. Fourteen men and three women, a group surely capable of taking down armies if enough gold was on the line. Every single one ready to kill the person in front of them, if the right price was paid.

Arad Don, the Red Harbour. This was the only place where merchants as well as mercenaries and cut-throats as these didn't have to keep an eye on the people around them. It was a safe haven. It was the place to turn to if you had large amounts of gold and a problem that could be solved by violence. One could hire whole armies or fleets, once again, for the right price. Everything could be bought here as its inhabitants were mostly people with an unending desire for gold and the complete lack of morals.

But the door of the potential costumers remained closed. The innkeeper's call had been promising enough for them to wait. A day passed and still the inhabitants of the upper room remained unseen, food and drink was brought to them and paid for so handsomely no one asked any questions.

The following day the storm was but a gathering of dark clouds disappearing towards the White Mountains, the door finally opened. Homen walked down the staircase to find a room full of eyes watching patiently, most of them anyway.

“Old man!” A man in the back stood up, “we have waited. The storm is gone and you'd better make sure our time here wasn't wasted!”

“Middle aged man.” He answered calmly, “get out of this inn or I will offer a temptingly large amount of coin to the one that dislodges your head the fastest.”

The man looked as several hands moved to their respective owner's weapons. Without a word he left, casting a last glance at the first man in almost twenty year to dare threaten him.

“Now, with that out of the way.” Still as calm he gestured for the remaining ones to form a line.

“These are the most respectable warriors and mages, the hireable ones that is, that you'll find.” The innkeeper walked up next to him, “not even I know which one to recommend, they are all worthy any amount of gold you choose to pay them.”
“How about the tall one?”
“Ah! You have a good eye. He is a famed warrior from the far eastern highlands, the blood run strong in him for his father too was a great warrior. He even...”
“Argabed imarni.” Hemon said and bowed lightly.
“Argabed orodet.” The mercenary answered and went down on one knee.
Ludor stood dumbfounded.
“You...” he began, “you know him?”
“No I do not know him. But I have travelled long among his people, a certain respect has formed, that is all.”
“I will go with you, asking nothing in return.” The offer came without the mercenary looking up, “I, Rúh, son of Bann, will protect you with my life.”
This didn't fall any lighter on Ludor's poor mind.
“Well seems like it is settled then. Thank you for coming.” Homen waved away the others who, without completely understanding what just happened, left the inn.
“Rise, Rúh, son of Bann.” He walked over to his newly acquired mercenary. “I appreciate your offer and trust you will live up to the praise this innkeeper spoke of you.”
“He will.” Ludor had gathered his thoughts, “that hammer is even more famous than the wielder’s name. No doubt Rúh can tell you of course.”

He added the last part after receiving a look from Homen that seemed kind, but the one that it was aimed at would easily notice the real meaning of it, he took a step back.

“I thank you too, you did well finding such a good follower for me and Pep. But as you surely can see I have no more business with you. We paid for the room and the food, so from my perspective you have no reason talking to me any more.”

All this with a smile and tone of voice that told Ludor that his services had been appreciated but if he had any will left to live it would be wise to mind his own business from now on.

“He speaks true, this sledge was my father's, it served him until his last breaths and was passed down to me.” Rúh picked up the thread, “it is called Diman.”

Diman was truly a beautiful weapon. It was a light grey color with the slightest hint of blue. Both faces had spikes in each of their four corners. The sides of the head had carvings picturing scenes of long forgotten battles. Its long carved handle equally beautiful. It all crowned by a spike, a hand's width tall, jutting out of the head.

“My father lived by the Frozen River, it runs from the town of the Hodekim down through the highlands where it turns west towards the sea. Amongst our people the Battle of the Brook marks the beginning of a new era, when the goblins and the trolls of the north were beaten and never again raided our lands.”

Homen walked over to a table, listening with great interest, and invited Rúh to join him.

“In that battle my father fought with Diman in hand.” His enthralling voice could've put any storyteller to shame, “during the day goblin archers had harassed the men gathered at the stream, the only place where one could cross the river for several days march north or south. But they all knew the attack would not yet come, they knew the goblins waited for reinforcements. As trolls cannot move during the day the real battle would not take place before the sun went down.”

Homen ordered two pints of the inn's best. Made it three as Pep had decided to finally join them. Then asked Rúh to continue.

“As the sun set they could see larger shapes moving amongst the trees across the stream, the trolls were awakening. Soon enough they stormed through the shallow water, but the men stood firm. They clashed and the losses were great on both sides, but they held the line. The goblins had chosen to let the troll attack alone, their brute force was expected to scatter our line, and indeed it did look grim. Rain began to fall. My father had been scouting further north when the attack had begun and was running back, but the night was dark and the rain made it hard for him to find the way. As he reached a large rock he walked up on in hope of seeing the battle, he was dismayed by what he saw, the trolls were winning. It was at that moment he raised Diman above his head and let out a war cry worthy of the old chieftains. He was not heard over the rain and the sound of the battle, but flashes of lightning lit the night sky behind him and his great shadow was cast upon the trolls. They all stopped and stared at this new foe and as he jumped down from the rock and ran towards them, sledgehammer on high. Many turned in fear, screaming names of fiendish gods in their foul language and the panic spread among them as many believed him to be a demon summoned by our men to aid them. As my father brought Diman down unto the fleeing trolls all knew the battle was won and the stream was safe again. But none could've hoped for my father's reputation to spread through the ranks of our enemies as it did. To this day no goblin nor troll has set foot close to the stream.”

Homen sat silent. He had enjoyed every second of listening to Rúh's story. Pep, hadn't been listening, he had missed the beginning and didn't bother trying to get up to speed. Instead he had tried to see how many pints he could empty, without forcing them down that is, before it ended. He had seven pints in front of him. He had calmly enjoyed each and every one of them. It had stopped at seven only because the innkeeper had began to refill the seventh one after he had lost a costumer because he had ran out of new pints.

“Rúh, son of Bann, I'll be honored to have you with us, Pep would too if he could convey such feelings.” Homen stood up, “we're leaving as soon as you are ready.”

He walked back to the their room. Rúh stayed, he had nothing but Diman, he needed nothing more. Pep stayed, asked for refills for all of the pints, he needed nothing more.

Homen soon came down the stairs, all his belongings in a bag over his right shoulder. He looked at his two associates, let out a smile that would've caused more questions than it answered if aimed at someone not a mercenary. Rúh stood up, grabbed his hammer and was ready to leave. Pep still sat, his back against Homen, he still had three pints left. Homen was used to this and walked out, Pep would catch up to them sooner or later. The sun was almost able to shine through the lingering clouds. He trusted Rúh with his life, there was no question about it. He felt safe to continue his travels, this was no change from before of course, but in his opinion safe was a good feeling. Homen walked on, the road stretched out beneath his feet.

He needed nothing more.

-RcaH

A Necromancer's Choice

2013-10-20T09:26:00.001-07:00

As the Goblins invaded the Dwarven kingdom of Thi'Betor year 1103 of the 2^nd Era no accounts of the events that took place at the capital of Maso Betorim, the last stand of King Daeken, survived. When the Goblin horde breached the gates no one got out alive, or so the Dwarven historians write. One month before the inner walls were soaked in the blood of both Dwarves and Goblins a series of extraordinary events took place that can only be found retold in one peculiar book, the chronicles written by a certain necromancer.

The invasion was a fact, by 1124 all bastion in the north had fallen to the seemingly unending flood of Goblins. They had cut of the remaining resistance from the rest of the kingdoms and were now forcing them to retreat to their last stronghold, the capital, from where they would have no where to run. In all tunnels the Goblins were gaining ground fast, raiding all chambers with settlements in them. As the horde completely encircled the last stand all seemed lost. No Dwarves had been able to stand against the relentless Goblins, but their new enemies feared not death.

To the South-West a large force of Goblins under the command of the warlord Zek'Hirm had just routed a small Dwarven force, trying to break their lines to be able to escape to the west, to the safety of the other kingdoms. His warriors were looting the bodies and feasting on freshly fallen corpses, and all seemed to go their way. But as one warrior grabbed the helm of a seemingly dead Dwarf it turned its bloody head and stared at him. First he jumped back in surprise but soon commenced to bash the helmet into the skull of the owner. To no effect. The Dwarf got up, grabbed the Goblin by its throat, who by now was very uncomfortable with the situation, and with only one hand broke its neck. Another warrior screamed to alert everyone to the threat, not this one Dwarf in particular but the fact that all their slain foes had gotten back up and had now initiated a counter attack. The numerically superior Goblins were taken by surprise and many warriors were slaughtered before they even could raise their arms, only to soon after bolster the ranks of their enemy. It did not take long before Zek'Hirm sounded the retreat, escaping only with a fraction of his initial numbers.

As they fled even more undead entered the chamber, in the midst of them walked the only living being left in this Dwarven hall: a necromancer. As the chaos abandoned the atmosphere and gave way to a calm stillness that one would not usually combine with a room full of corpses. The necromancer walked up to one of his newest subjects, one of the fallen Dwarves.

“Indeed the signet of Thi'Betor.” He sighed as he examined the armor worn by it, “has it really come to this, old Daeken?”

He mustered his forces and continued through the gloomy halls towards the heart of the kingdom. Years before he had visited the glorious halls of the easternmost Dwarven kingdom and been amazed by the architectural skill of their masons. Now all were filled with the stench of death and told only of the battles that had been fought. Wherever he walked he encountered Goblins, but none were able to stop his advance. The Goblins' trait that had broken the Dwarven lines, their ruthless ways, were to no avail here for their new challenger knew not fear nor pain. One after another opposing groups of Goblins fled in sheer terror of the undead.

During one clash a group of undead ran back to their master with a Dwarf, a live one, and dropped him on the stone floor in front of him. He was badly wounded and would most likely have been killed by his captors if the undead would not have stormed their camp when they did.

“I must apologise for their behaviour,” The necromancer told his the newly arrived guest, “I only asked them to ask the first Dwarf that we encountered, living that is, to come see me for I have questions in need of answers.”

The Dwarf coughed and looked up at the robed man.

“Anyone fighting these vermin is friend of the Dwarves, what do you want to know, stranger?”

“Ah, good to see you are willing to cooperate. You are correct in your assumption, partially at

least, about my allegiance. I am not here to fight you, but in truth nor to fight your battles for you.”

He was met with a questioning glance.

“Who would lead an army, even a cursed one like this one, into a war if not to help one of the warring sides?”

“My task here does not concern you, as you might recall I said I wanted answers not questions. So may I?” Without waiting for an answer he granted himself permission, “how fares the king?”

“I know not why you ask and truth be told I am not sure of the answer either. He is locked up in the keep of Maso Betorim with the last remnants of our army.” He coughed and seemed to be in great pain, “but for all I know he may be dead by now.”

“Grave news indeed,” he was greatly troubled by this and began to leave.

“Stranger!” The Dwarfs exclaimed, “tell me at least your name, I think I deserve to know who saved me.”

The necromancer looked at the slowly growing pool of Dwarven blood.

“Will you survive this?”

“I... I doubt it.”

“Then I need not tell you my name.”

He looked out at his ever growing horde of undead servants, in the midst of them a deep blue cape could sometimes be seen.

“The dead,” he said silently, as if only thinking out loud, “the dead does not remember.”

He turned his back on the dying dwarf and walked away. He had no time for the living, the task at hand was more important than the life of one mortal.

As he pushed onwards, through ever increasing amounts of Goblin warrior, his hoped waned. If Maso Betorim had fallen and Daeken's stand had been in vain his task would be much more troublesome than he had hoped for. That was however not the case. Soon he entered the enormous mountain hall that was before the capital's ornate wall. On the other side he could see the still sealed gates, they had held off the Goblins up until now, but between him and Daeken was still one hindrance; the main Goblin force, some ten thousand strong. He had been prepared to fight some Goblins, but this was more than he had expected.

But something he had not foreseen took place.

Word of the new terror had reached the besieging warriors before he did. Screams about the dead rising and coming to avenge them were heard throughout their ranks and chaos took hold of the whole army. His close to a thousand undead stormed into the Goblin warriors who first tried to hold but it proved useless as every undead took down his own worth in Goblins and the necromancer walked behind his own ranks and raised every fallen Goblin to fight its own brethren. When all calmed down the Goblins had fallen back and the undead ranks lined up outside the gates.

“May king Daeken come out. For I require to speak to him!” The necromancer shouted.

A silence followed. Then slowly but silently the massive stone doors slid open and a dwarf in golden armor followed by hundreds of soldiers from the royal guard.

“We thank you for getting rid of the infestation for us.” He said when he reached the necromancer, “I am Dureq, his highness' right hand, and no matter how grateful we may be we can not let a cursed mage as yourself enter our town without explaining the cause of his visit.”

“Well then do tell, what is required of me?”

“Who are you? And why are you seeking audience to our king?”

“It is long since my name was spoken, for the dead does not use it. But the living used to call me Keemon of Deepwell. As for your second question I will not answer, for it is a delicate matter that none but the king may hear.”

Dureq had his eyes fixed on Keemon. In these grave times he would not let any one close to his king without a good reason.

“Then I have but one more question.” Dureq finally said, “if I do not like this answer you will not enter through these gates.”

Keemon was not looking worried.

“Ask away, master Dwarf, ask me your final question.”

The lines of undead were getting restless. Sweat could be seen on the Dwarf's forehead.

“This secret matter,” Dureq slowly began, “will it aid us in our struggle against the Goblins?”

“What else could someone in your position ask for?” Keemon smiled, “I am sorry, but it will not. But then again it will not affect you at all, good or bad.”

“Then I must now ask you to leave.” Dureq voice was again full with authority, “And I forbid you to ever cross our borders again!”

The talk was over. Keemon backed away as his warriors did the opposite. Dureq and the guards formed a defensive formation and began to move back towards the gates.

“I gave you a chance!” Keemon's voice was heard over the sound of thousands of undead charging, “you have left me with no choice!”

But as the two forces were about to clash a horn was heard from the town. The undead stopped. Out of the gate came more Dwarven warriors, ahead of them two banners with the emblem of Thi'Betor were carried. Between the banners walked the king himself.

“I speak as your king!” He shouted, “Dureq, stop this madness!”

Once again the undead backed away and opened a path through their lines where Keemon walked back to meet king Daeken.

“And you, Keemon of Deepwell.” The king spoke, “I think I know why you have come.”

“As expected of the king of Thi'Betor.” Keemon answered.

The king turned and signalled for Keemon to follow. The undead waited outside as Keemon and the king walked in through the gates, followed by the entourage of Dwarves.

King Daeken led Keemon to his throne room where they both took a seat. Everyone else were told to leave, and soon there were no one but the two, waiting for the other to speak. This was Daeken's 136^th year of rule and he had always been a just and strong leader, loved by his people. But being approached by this young necromancer made him speechless and left him sunken deep in his thoughts. The silence could not last forever.

“I have tried to go through all the reasons why a necromancer as yourself would seek me out,” he said slowly, “you told Dureq that the matter you wanted to discuss could not be told elsewhere. You have no interest in helping us nor helping the Goblins, that rules out any reasons concerning the war at hand.”

Keemon said nothing, waiting only for the king to guess why he was here.

“I find that only one reason remains, but I do not like it.” The king's eyes were set on Keemons', “why would you come looking for the Old One?”

Keemon was about to answer the troubled king but was interrupted.

“You must understand, necromancer, that my house is loved, respected and feared by our brethren to the west.”

Daeken's listener waited patiently for the king to continue.

“Loved as fellow Dwarves. Respected as guardians of the eastern borders.” He let out a sigh, “and feared for making that one trivial deal with your kind so long ago.”

His eyes had both sorrow and anger in them as he became silent once more.

“With all due respect,” Keemon did not hesitate to pick up at the end of the king's speech, “but are those three not the three single most greatest features you could ask for in your neighbouring kingdoms? None will ever dare to challenge or even question your judgement.”

“Silence!” The king had heard enough, “why would I ask my own kin to fear me? Why would I not want to ask my brethren for advice?”

Daeken had stood up and with heavy steps walk up to one of the many statues along the large chamber's walls. He took a deep breath and calmed himself.

“These statues...” he began, “these statues are the kings and queens of Thi'Betor's throne.” He sighed, “engraved on each statue are their greatest accomplishments, to set an example for our once proud kingdom. What do you think will be written on my statue once I'm gone? 'King Daeken, the one who lost Thi'Betor to the Goblins of the north'.”

In silence he walked back to the throne.

“Under any other circumstance I would deny you what you are asking, but as I might not live to see another day and the fact that no more statues will be added to this line makes me ask myself: 'what is the difference?' If I would tell you to leave, you could come back once the Goblins have eradicated every last one of us and force your way in.”

“I am glad to see that you can see the bigger picture in these dark times.” Keemon stood up, “I can sense something is approaching as we speak. What is this presence, can it be the Old One himself?”

“I cannot sense what you can, necromancer, but he would never leave his chambers.”

As they spoke Keemon could sense something filled with great power coming their way through a corridor he could see behind the throne. As the king had said, the Old One did not enter the room as Keemon had hoped but instead nothing but a small butterfly entered through the dark hallway. Wings as black as the night, beautiful and graceful as it flew but as it came closer Keemon saw its small wings were breaking apart into small black flakes. As it landed in his open palm he could see small holes in its wings, but its flying was as delicate as ever.

“I have only heard tales of these creatures.” The king looked in amazement at the insect in his guest's hand, “the Old One sent these to my predecessors when he wanted to see them personally. That was only on rare occasions.”

“It seems I am dealing with powers even greater than I expected,” Keemons whispered silently, “my lord, I have a feeling you are obliged to let me go now.”

With these words Keemon got up and followed his small winged guide into the dark halls, leading deep under the city. Soon Dwarven masonry gave way to crudely hewn rock. The flame in his hand was the only source of light in these ever descending tunnels.

How long he had walked he could not tell. Minutes, hours, days, all concepts of time erased by the underwordly darkness that surrounded the necromancer. His own footsteps was the only sound that stirred the otherwise still atmosphere. But as most other things, even this cave had an end, a humble wooden door, that his companion finally reached. The black wings had but a few black flakes left, and upon arrival at the door these final ones fell off and the bearer disintegrated. Keemon did not hesitate but walked up to the door which silently opened before him. Inside it was a whole different world. He entered a small dimly lit room which after a few steps opened up into a larger chamber, walls covered with filled bookshelves and old, even ancient paintings depicting gruesome scenes from forgotten wars. But the most curious thing in the chamber was lying between two chairs that were facing a fireplace, a pile of bones. The heap was seemingly not of a certain kind but bones from all kinds of animals and humans.

All of a sudden the bones stirred, rose and formed a twisted and terrifying creature. Head of something that looked like a giant wolf but the body like a bear, its eyes flaming green. Keemon prepared for it to charge at him but and outstretched hand from one of the chairs touched it and the creature instantly fell apart again.

“You must excuse him,” a low voice from the chair, “I am afraid we don't get visitors very often so he gets a little restless.”

The hand invited Keemon to take the other seat.

“I do enjoy the few visitors we have, they always come crawling to me for forbidden wisdom. But I find it interesting guessing what exactly they want and why.”

Keemon now could see his host, an old wrinkled man, his eyes sunken into their sockets and barely no hair on his hooded head.

“Come now, why do you seek me? To ask me for knowledge?” His voice was old and dry, but still full with power and something that forced one to respect him. Something Keemon didn't have much of.

“You have seen more than any one else and you hold the answer my question.” Keemon showed no signs of hesitations, he wanted one thing, and he would leave as soon as he got it.

“Your question? It is the same one your master asked me so long ago perhaps?”

“I have no master.”

“Maybe now you don't but to deny he existed after all he did for you is simply too harsh.”

“If he had done enough I would not be here now. No, he was but a part of the path I travel to fulfil my own agendas, we shared nothing.” Keemon was clearly insulted by the comparison.

“I think you shared more than you think since you too have come to seek me.”

“He saw no further than his own will to rule over those who came before him. I have plans for eras yet to come.”

“Some may arrive sooner than you want. The balance of the world is shifting.”

“I know not of what you speak, the alliance in the south is no more than words on paper, written by a starving hand.” Hints of irritation now appeared in his voice.

“Do not underestimate the needs of the many.” He took a break and his thought wandered off into some other direction. “But this is not why you've come. What do you really want from me?”

“The secret you have been guarding for so long.” A short, sudden sign of hesitation, “I know who, and what, you are. I must know how this came to pass and how to acquire the same power”

“You speak boldly considering your position. If you know who and what I am how dare you come here with such a request. You have nothing to offer and I have nothing to lose.”

“What would that position be?”

“Dying. Afflicted by a sickness called mortality.”

“I have no plans of leaving this world any time soon. This sickness is yet to take root in me.”

“One does not know tomorrow. The sickness has more than taken root, it is already in full bloom and will bear fruit when it sees fit.”

“If you think that is the case, perhaps you may want to help me?”

“Now we are getting somewhere. You finally seem to see where you, and more importantly I, stand. But why would I want to help you find the cure?”

“I think you would be interested in seeing how my plan unfolds.”

“Your plan? This agenda you mentioned? No, don't tell me, I shall think about it for a moment...” he closed his eyes and seemed to think over all possible scenarios, “No, it can't be, can it? Why would you want to...”

He once again turned back to his own thoughts, but in the end seemed satisfied with what his guess was.

“But interesting none the less, indeed very interesting. Some have tried before you but it has never worked, do you know why?”

He didn't wait for Keemon to answer.

“It is because we control the power over death, that is why!”

This sudden outburst took Keemon by surprise.

“I do not agree, our power is over life as well.”

“I see. You are one of those, you want to bring back someone you've lost. But it will not work! Life will never come from death! If you are truly this naïve this discussion is over!”

The Old One turned away and Keemon could see the heap of bones stir.

“There is no one that I have lost, no one I ever held dear. I am but a judge! One to tip the scales!” He got up and took a few steps away from the rising beast.

“You lie! You lie to me and to yourself. I will not help you resurrect her!”

The beast rose from the bones and moved towards Keemon.

“I know not of what you speak, none of this has anything to do with why I want your knowledge.”

“There was someone, wasn't there?”

He turned towards Keemon again, the beast stopped.

“27 years ago, you killed her with your own hands.”

This took Keemon off guard.

“Leave my past out of this, you know nothing of it.”

“I know much more, Keemon of Deepwell.”

Nervosity almost got the better of Keemon, but he managed to stay on track.

“I assume you have your means. But in the end this has nothing to do with my goals.”

“Maybe they do, maybe they don't. But you seem to speak true. Which makes me even more interested in your agenda. I might give you my knowledge, only to see what path you will choose.”

He now gestured for Keemon to take a seat.

“So... a city of undead is my only remaining guess if you speak true. You want to create a standing army of conscious undead.”

He looked at Keemon, who did not say a word.

“I take your silence as a yes.” He leaned back, “you must first understand what we truly are: a human is but a vessel for life to reside in. A necromancer is simply a person who can tap into this vessel and harvest its force.”

Keemon listened patiently.

“But what you want is more, you want to be able to harvest the power around you, not just your own. To access that you must first break this vessel so that you can merge and let it flow through you.”

“To break the vessel? Sounds like you're asking me to die.”

“Yes and no. This vessel is your life, when someone dies this vessel breaks and the life is released into the world. It is the second part you must avoid.”

“How can one die without life leaving the corpse?”

“It is simple, yet not easily accomplished. You must first empty the vessel and seal it so that it is not refilled as you walk the earth.”

“I do not see how I can empty my vessel. As I raise undead to serve me I cannot feel it emptying.”

“Are you not listening?” The Old One snapped at him, “you cannot feel it for one undead does not require much life, and as soon as you raise them you absorb more life from the earth around you. You must make sure your body stops absorbing, you must learn to control it.”

“I think I already can do this. My years of studying have led me to this knowledge, I have only never found use for it before.”

“You will now. The next step is the key your master never learned: once the vessel is empty you must open the seal and once again let it fill up. When you absorb then it will fill up so fast it will break all that is being absorb from but also the vessel itself.”

“And as the vessel breaks the body will still have life rushing in to it.”

“Yes, exactly.”

Keemon stood up, he got what he wanted.

“But...”

This stopped him.

“...there is one important part yet.”

Keemon turned towards him again, fearing what this last part would be.

“If you cannot absorb enough life when you open the seal you will only die.”

“No...”

“Yes... you must go where you can absorb enough life to survive when the vessel breaks.”

Keemon quivered for the first time in years, he did not like where this is going.

“There is only one place with enough life for you to absorb.”

“I have not come to kill innocent! I have come to be a judge!”

“If you want to be a judge you must first pay the price.”

Keemon had no answer. This was not what he had expected.

“You must go to the city north from here, their inner walls are protected by a barrier that will let you absorb all life inside the walls without anyone outside ever getting to know about it.”

As he got no answer he turned away again.

“Leave me now, you have the answer you came for, what you decide to do is now up to you.”

One last gesture sent the necromancer on his way. No words were spoken. He barely remembered the long walk up, or the king for that matter. He left Thi'Betor in silence, Goblins and Dwarves keeping their distance from him and his undead horde. Through the dark tunnels he left the fortress to its fate, walking back to his own chambers in Mag-Ogor. There he sat down. He now knew all he needed to know. His goal was in reach, but at what cost?

The city of Midrod -part 1

2013-09-20T15:42:00.004-07:00

go to The city of Midrod -part 2

In the history books the year 1127e2 is often called the ”Dark Year”. The year begun with Mes'Okreber spitting out fire. Ash and smoke filled the sky, covering the whole known world in darkness. The world of Helitheren fell in a coma like state. Hunger and sickness spread like wildfire. But in the North a city seemed unaffected by these circumstances. That city was like in another world. There was enough food produced to be exported to the hungry masses in the South. But in the streets of southern cities rumors and conspiracy theories filled the minds of people. The source of the high amount of food in the North must be produced by magic, and surely the mountain's rage was produced by the same people, for the food was not free at all. Someone in the North was making a huge amount of profit. To have that much food could only mean the Northern people were prepared for the year of darkness. So most historians recorded the Northern people as responsible for the misery of the people in the South. In the same history records the following year marked as the beginning of a new era. The year begun with the Southern people standing united at the gates of the Northern city Midrod, demanding the control of all the food storage. What happened next was a blank page in history. Our story take place at the seventh year of the third era. A lone man, standing at the ports of the same city. His name was Myrosi.

He didn’t have much on him. He had rugged clothes, a sack with some moldy bread and some dry edible roots, he had the appearance of a beggar. His arms were sunburnt, but his face was strangely pale. Around the city was a large wall, partly in ruins. Old siege constructions lay unorganized all around it. Some parts of the wall had crumbled, and the holes were filled with stone heaps and clay. On a hill to the west in the city was a castle, half standing, half in ruins. Through the city flowed a large river, dividing the city in two parts. On the east side of the river was a grand white wall, twice the height of the one Myrosi was located at. He had been standing there for a while now, shouting and bashing at the gate. He had almost lost hope on getting inside city, but going back was not an option. He had barely survived a goblin attack on his way here, and the goblins knew where he was now.

After a long time, the gates finally opened, a limping short guard stepped out to question Myrosi.

-“So, what is your business, traveler?” The guard asked.

”I’m here to search the ruins, and take shelter from the goblins.” Myrosi answered.

“Oh, another one that doesn’t seem to value his life… Traveling alone through goblin infested lands and going to search the ruins? That’s like stepping from the pan to the fire… Well, it’s not my business, and of course, everything you can salvage from there is an enormous gift to our people. Just hear my warning though: Don’t try to smuggle anything out without the authorities knowing. Every treasure seeker should report at the salvage office, at town square. If not, I will be sent to retrieve you, from wherever in the world you escape to. And know that in the war, I took down a hundred of the likes of you!” The guard said with a grin on his face.

Myrosi just ignored the provocative and arrogant parts, nodded and went in to the city. He was determined on his goal, and arguing with a guard would not help him at all. Despite the war was seven years ago, the impact of it could still be seen in the city. Not a single bridge had been repaired over the river dividing the city, and half of the houses stood still in ruins.

Myrosi found after a while his way to the town square. Despite the abandoned feeling the city emitted, the town square was as lively as in any big town, with people buying and selling food and items. Despite being so far in north, the market offered any kinds of foods any Southern city had to offer. After a while of searching, Myrosi found the “salvage office” the guard had mentioned. It consisted of a tent in the marketplace, between a fisherman’s booth and a butchers booth, making an abrupt difference to the surrounding. Myrosi stepped inside. A old white bearded man in an old, loose leather robe appeared.

“Another fortune seeker?” He asked, but without waiting for an answer he continued talking.

“You see, I can see in a person's eyes what he seeks, and I just know you are here to seek a treasure in the ruins. So, may I inquire what you are seeking? Immortality? Riches? Power? Or perhaps… a recipe to a deadly poison? If that is the case, you have indeed come to the right place.” Said the man in the robe.

“Well, good, I’m not far off. I would like to hire your best guide to the ruins. But what I’m seeking, is not of your concern” Myrosi answered.

The old man in the robe looked rather disappointed.

“Rather rude are we? Well, if you don’t want to tell me now it’s fine. But remember that you have to come and show me everything you take from the ruins, and I have the right to confiscate it if I want. Of course, we will pay you an appropriate sum if that is the case. And I really advise not to try smuggle anything out of the city. Our guards are a dedicated bunch, and will hunt you down to the ends of this world if necessary. I’ll show you our best guide, but it will cost you 60 percent additional for everything of monetary value you take with you from the ruins.”

Myrosi was not pleased with the term, but he knew that going to the ruins was really not recommended without a guide. He followed the old man, out from the tent, right to a market booth, which sold different kind of weapons.

“Hi there, Salena. I have a treasure hunter for ya!”- the old man shouted. “Too late, I already have someone to guide” - a female voice replied from the tent. A young maiden stepped out from the tent. “Awww, come on… You can guide them both! This one agreed to my terms, without any conditions of his own.” – the old man said with a smirk. “Agreed to your terms, you say? Truly, there are naïve people in this world.” The young maiden answered. ”And what do you offer to me, old man, for guiding your customer?”

"Could you just go with the usual reward...?”, the old man asked with a pleading voice.

”Hey, you know how big risk I'm taking here, guiding two not only doubles, but triples the risk.”

“You will be my death someday, you know I too take big risks while offering my services.”

“And you gain tons on the deal, double or no guiding”, Salena insisted.

Myrosi looked confused, he had no idea what they were talking about, but it didn’t matter to him much.

After some time of wild arguing, Salena and the old man seemed to agree on some terms, and Salena gestured to Myrosi to follow her. “You know, I can guide you the safest way, but I cannot guarantee your safety. So when we are in danger, you must obey my every word like orders from a king”.

Myrosi didn’t react to Salenas words at all.

“Hey, are you listening? Do you agree, or not?” Salena inquired. Myrosi ignored her statement again. Salena seemed annoyed at first, but didn’t start to argue. “Well, it’s not my problem if you end up dead…” she added.

She led him through small alleys, through ruined houses and to the river. Well, I assume that you aren’t unprepared, since you come this far. We should meet another seeker here somewhere after a quarter of a day, so be sure to be here by then, because my other client seems to be in a hurry.

“Sure” Myrosi answered rapidly.

“Oh, you can talk, I started to think you were a mute or something, since you didn’t make a single sound till' now”

He didn’t answer her…

Salena went to get some supplies for the journey, and Myrosi sat down to wait for their departure. Maybe here, he thought, he would find what he was searching for. His eyes wandered on the white wall across the river. The walls was as white as the snowy mountain tops he had seen so many of during his journey. Large white towers seemed to merge with the white clouds above. But he knew, despite the beautiful and peaceful appearance, a dangerous shadow lurked inside those walls. He had heard the whispers and rumors about the events seven years ago. When the united armies of the southern people reached inside those walls, there were not a single person left in the city. No enemy army, not a single opposing soldier or guard, not a single elderly man or woman left in their homes, no beggars on the street or any other civilians.

But still, the city was far from theirs, since that creature was still there. After just a quarter of a day, the whole army, biggest in all of history till that day, was crushed. Trained soldiers fled in panic, and left the conquered city behind them. These soldiers ignored their duty, to the Kings, and nations, at the risk of execution by their own people, and deserted. But after the war no one of the soldiers were persecuted, instead every survivor were considered as heroes, since they had encountered a power above those of all mortal men, and survived.

And here Myrosi sat, prepared to depart inside those same white walls, where an unspeakable terror lay in wait. He could easily question his own sanity for doing this. But inside his mind, a blaze of fire and screams echoed. He remembered again clearly why he was on this journey, and his determination did not falter. Silently he waited till the sun was in position, a quarter on its path to behind the horizon. Soon he heard footsteps behind him. He turned around, to see a man, around his own height, clothed in a black robe and white and blood-red clothes underneath it. On his shoulder he had a marking of a noble family.

“Oh, I didn’t know my travel companion would be a dirty beggar” the man hissed.

“And I didn’t know my travelling companion would be an arrogant noble”, Myrosi thought silently in his mind. He knew better than many that uttering something out loud that could upset a noble, would mean a lot of serious trouble.

“Oh! And I didn’t know my customers were an arrogant noble and a coward”

Salenas voice sounded behind the noble man.

The man made a quick turn, and if a sight could kill, Salena would be more than dead. But then he just nodded his head, and responded in a graceful manner.

“Forgive me, my lady. I assure you my intention was just to give constructive advice to this peasant, on how to dress in front of a fair lady like you”, the man answered in a low voice.

Myrosi was a little confused about the noble man’s reaction. He had never seen a noble react to a non-noble like that. Did his reaction mean that Salena, their guide was also a noble?

“Well, boys? I assume you know what you are going to meet on the other side of the river, so I also assume you have prepared to face and embrace hardship and death, pain and your fears becoming flesh and bones in front of you. I, your guide will lead you through them. Your lives will be in my hands, so don’t you ever dare question anything I command you to do.“

Both Myrosi and the noble man nodded eagerly, like small schoolboys on their first lecture. Salena showed the two men to a small rowboat, half full with water and ordered them to climb in and drain it. As a surprise to Myrosi. the Noble man followed Salenas every order. Just awhile later, the trio where crossing the river by boat.

”So, now we have time to properly introduce ourselves. Tell me your names and motives for entering the city. You may call me Salena by the way…”

“I’m Barek, from the Aldruin family and I’m searching for lost wisdom which can turn ordinary coal into diamonds.”

Salena and Myrosi had trouble holding their grin from showing. If such knowledge would really exist, then diamonds would be used everywhere. And everyone could see that coal didn’t resemble diamonds at all.

After Myrosi had bit his lip awhile, he continued with the introduction:

“Well, my name is Myrosi, and I come from far south. The village I come from don’t exist anymore, so no point in introducing my background. And what I’m looking for… Let’s say that I can tell you when I have found it.”

The introduction was followed by a long awkward silence. The boat then bumped at the shore.

“So, what’s the plan?,” Barek asked.

“Oh, nothing complicated yet, we walk to the open gate, go inside and then run as fast as we can, to the nearest building, hoping that we don’t get ourselves eaten…” Salena explained.

“You mean the gate is open? How come it doesn’t come through, and attack the city?” Myrosi asked.

Barek, now adapting a less arrogant attitude explained:

“ Well, during the chaotic war 7 years ago, the monster didn’t pursue the escaping soldiers further than the gate, maybe it considers the wall to be the edge of its turf or something. But since all the inhabitants of the inner city disappeared, no one knows how to operate the gate mechanism, and no one wants to stay inside those walls long enough to research how it’s done. And a gate that big probably needs tens of operators, and a group that large would be discovered by that beast in a short moment. And if they would manage to operate the gate, they would have to shut themselves inside those walls, together with the beast, thus dooming themselves. And then there’s the fact that these walls aren’t a hindrance to the beast at all. Maybe it’s some kind of spell that protects the outer city. Nobody really knows. But only a few dares to live with the risk, so thus half of the outer city is empty.”

“I appreciate your history lesson, but could you keep your voice a little bit lower from now on? The beast can hear you miles away if you talk as loud as you just did” Salena comments.

“Oh, sorry! I didn’t realize that”, Barek whispered with a voice so silent, that Myrosi nor Salena could hear him.

After a while, the trio stood on the side of the gate, a solid metal gate, over 10 meters high. It was slightly open. Salena explained silently her plan in detail to them. When she gave the mark, they would run. Run through the gate, in the direction of the nearest building. And if the they would encounter the beast, they would split in three directions, allowing at least two of the group to escape alive.

“On mark of three, we run” Salena added.

“Three...” Myrosi was suddenly well aware of how strong the scent of sweat was from them.

“Two…”

He started to wonder about the wind direction. Was their location already compromised?

“One...”

Did the beast have a good enough hearing to hear their hearts beat?

“Now!”

Myrosi had hoped that his legs would be paralyzed by fear, making him unable to follow those two, but no. The gate was now behind them. They were advancing on an open area, all visible, with nowhere to hide. He didn’t know he could run this fast, still the running seemed to have no end. He felt as something was behind them, but he didn’t have enough courage to look back. Just a moment of hesitation could cost his life. He felt as a little kid again, running in pitch dark night, with monsters lurking in the darkness behind him. How come everything was so far away in front of him? Seconds felt like hours. Meters like kilometers, and the bag of supplies Salena had given him just a moment ago, suddenly felt heavy as lead.

-But suddenly it was over. They reached the first building, they rushed inside it, and Salena showed them stairs, which led them in the basement.

They waited a couple of minutes in utter silence. A smile spread on their faces, this time including Barek.

“We are alive”, he whispered silently.

“Maybe the rumors about the beast are exaggerated.”

“No, they aren’t. We just had a portion of good luck, that’s all. Let’s wait here for a while. It will probably get our scent, and come to investigate. Whatever you do, stay silent!” Salena added.

And a moment later, they could hear something large moving outside, followed by a loud, very low-pitched growl. Now Myrosi really hoped that it could not hear their hearts beat.

To be continued…

The city of Midrod -part 2

-Sanlade

A Necromancer's Disciple

2013-03-20T12:54:00.004-07:00

In the far east of the Dwarven Mountains, where the Black Ridge stretches south-east, casting its shadows upon the Old Alliance-Road, rises a high menacing dark claw. Mag-Ogor, the Mountain of Darkness, has always been home to a large variety of terrifying creatures and the 2^nd era was no different. Back then, when the Alliance had recently been forged, living corpses roamed its highlands and lurked in its many caves, all answering to their master; Arthom, Garfereas a'Har.

The winds were howling outside the mountain and their screams reached the heart through all the cracks and openings in the mountain's slopes. Through one of these tunnels a man walked, shadows played with the light from the torch he was carrying on the walls around him. Tall with black hair, proud posture and a longsword in his belt, a thin face with determined eyes, all these descriptions could fit any noble of the Indorim but there was something darker behind his cold eyes. He walked as if he knew the dark caves like his own home. He knew he was followed, and now he also sensed a presence in front of him, but he did not stop.

“Who goes there?” A voice called out. “Who enters the domain of the dead?”

The man ignored the voice and did not stop. Soon after his path was blocked by two corpses, standing with swords in their half decayed hands.

“Stop right where you stand. We will take you to our master.” One of them said, same one from which the voice came earlier.

“Get out of my way or I'll just cut you down.” The answer came with no fear or hesitation, more as if with annoyance.

“Reconsider.” The corpse said as several more entered the light behind the man.

The man did not reconsider. With a sudden flash his sword had been drawn and the first head rolled on the cold stone floor. In rage the other undead leapt towards him. But he proved too nimble. They all fell without him even dropping his torch.

“Seker!” He shouted, “control your minions! You knew very well that I was coming!”

No answer. With a sigh he sheathed his sword and continued through the tunnel. He was not stopped another time, and all corpses he met either stepped aside or already lay rotting on the ground.

He reached a large hall, lit with many torches and different kinds of ornaments in some wicked and twisted motives carved in the wall. From the hall there were several doors leading to other room or corridors, through which one he entered. He walked up a long staircase and reached a smaller room but more furnished. The walls had no ornaments but instead there were rows of bookshelves, in the middle there was a large desk with chairs on both sides, there were also a few books open there, as if some invisible person was reading them. In the far end there was a large opening leading to a balcony, looking down into the valley beneath and far to the south west the plain were the Clans roamed could be seen on days with a clearer sky than this afternoon.

Today was indeed not one with a clear sky. Not only was the wind enough to fell some of the mightiest trees in the forests covering the highlands, but there were clouds coming in from the west carrying rain, a lot of it. The first drops began to fall, creating the sound of thousands of small feet running on the balcony.

By a bookshelf along the wall on the left, with a large book open in one hand while the other was leading the eyes over the page, stood an old man in a large deep blue cape.

“Master Arthom! If Seker sends his decomposed pack in my way one more time I will make him die a second time!” He shouted to the man as he entered, walking straight to the table.

“Oh Keemon...” Arthom sighed, “you should appreciate it. His minions are no challenge to you so it is nothing more than practise for your blade. And please do not end him, he is one of my most important commanders.”

Keemon was about to answer.

“Also...” Arthom continued, “don't you dare go look into my studies. Step away from those books!”

Keemon had almost reached the desk but was stopped by two reanimated warriors clad in armour, wielding an axe and a spear respectively.

Arthom closed his book and walked slowly over to the desk and sat down facing Keemon. After looking over the open books he leaned back and waved his hand towards the books as if telling them to go away. Which they did, all closed and floated through the room to their respective place in the shelves. Then he looked at Keemon.

“Keemon, my dear son...” he began with a smile.

“I'm not your son, let us keep it as 'disciple' can we?” Keemon sighed.

“Whatever you prefer, young necromancer.”

“I thought I didn't deserve that title until I can control the power behind the green flame?”

“That is true. Not much of a necromancer if you can't control the power to control life?”

Keemon only looked at him, waiting for the old man to reach what he wanted to get to.

“Still as few worded as ever, I do enjoy that side of you. That is a good feature in a disciple, makes them easy to teach.”

Still Keemon remained silent, a silence which fell over the whole room. Arthom leaned forward and sighing he broke the heavy silence.

“Keemon...” he began, then pausing again, “Keemon, I am getting old.”

The atmosphere had change, it was grave and serious, the air itself seemed to be heavier and the light from the torches dimmer.

“Too long have I searched for a way to immortalise myself, in vain too, I am afraid. The only thing I've found have been legends, nothing that I want to risk my life over. But from my studies I might not have learnt much useful, but on the other hand you have grown to become a strong man over the years. Someone worthy of my legacy. Also someone strong enough to handle the wisdom that I now will pass down to you.”

Now Keemon was listening more eagerly, altough not showing it through his cold façade.

“What I am saying is that if I had not... say, 'wasted' my last years here in this library I would've thought you knowledge beyond your comprehension. Now that wont be an issue.”

“So this explains why you greeted me with 'necromancer' I assume.” Keemon answered, “so my time is here then?”

“Yes indeed it is. I want to meet you in the courtyard tomorrow morning to begin you training.”

Keemon bowed deep and turning around he left the room again.

In his heart he rejoiced. It was over ten years since Arthom took him in, sheltering him from the hate of men who couldn't understand his powers to kill by only touching his foe and therefore fearing him and excluding him from his own people. Arthom had promised to teach him how to control this power, and teach him the other side of it too: the power to give life where death came first. Up until now he had been trained in willpower and blade, but Arthom had always said: “It is to prepare you of what is to come.” When Keemon asked why this was more important than the power itself. Now he was finally going to reach that goal, to gain the power he had longed for all this time.

Upon reaching the large hall he was abruptly pulled out of his own thoughts as at least fifty undead came screaming with weapons drawn towards him. Swiftly he once again drew his sword and fought, flawlessly and swift, his years of training had rendered him untouchable by something as dim-witted as a living corpse.

“Enough, enough!” A voice from came from on of the doorways. Soon it proved to belong to Seker, clapping his hands he entered, “as Master Arthom said; nothing more than practise for your blade.”

Seker was no beauty, being one of Arthom's four commanders, he was an undead set to rule over a part of Arthom's army. He was a man who once had died from drowning and now his bloated rotten corpse was resurrected as a front figure of Arthom's domain, perfect to spread fear through his disgusting appearance.

“Indeed you are skilled, young Keemon.” He said with scornfully as his last seven still standing minions backed away from Keemon. “I see our master has finally agreed to teach you the secrets. How does it feel to...”

“Seker!” Keemon interrupted him. His eyes burning with hate, “I've had enough of your games. I have warned him, and heed my words, I will slay you here and now!”

Keemon suddenly leapt forward and slew the last minions and then his sword met Seker's. A duel erupted and though Seker had known Keemon to be skilled with the blade he had not anticipated what that really meant. In a beautiful flow Keemon moved around Seker's blade and their blades rarely even touched. This continued for some time, Seker's blows landed on nothing but the damp air while Keemon seemed to be both behind him all the time but also everywhere else. Finally Seker confronted him with an attempt to tackle him. Even though he did not touch Keemon he caused him to take a step back which Seker used to gain some distance from him.

“Stop this fooling around!” He shouted at Keemon, “I see you can move fast enough, but you seemingly can't land a single blow so let us end this and call it a tie!”

“I can't land a blow?” Keemon laughed a little, “you are full of opening to land any number of blows, even your own minions could outmanoeuvre you.”

Seker was offended by this grave insult, but before he could answer Keemon had buried his blade in Seker's ribcage, exiting between his shoulder blades.

“You... you...” Seker stuttered.

“I told you I would, and I am a man of my word.”

He pulled out the blade through Seker's left, cutting off his arm in the same swing, raised his blade and the final blow cleaved the skull of his foe. The sharp steel slicing through his rotten flesh with ease.

For a while he looked at his fallen opponent. He felt the eyes of his master upon him, standing at the foot of the staircase he had watched his disciple slay one of his most valuable commanders. Without meeting the gaze Keemon turned and walked away. Nothing more was said between master and his disciple that day, but Keemon heard screams echoing through the deeper tunnels, wondering what was amiss.

The night came and as soon as its veil was lifted from the world Keemon went to the courtyard of his master's enormous mountain fortress. Mag-Ogor was naturally a maze of cracks and tunnles. When Arthom settled there he used his hoards of undead as workers and over the years shaped a system of halls and chambers throughout the mountain's south-western slope worthy of Dwarven kings. The only thing the told those who ventured far enough into the mountain that they would not encounter craftsmen of Dwarven heritage was the difference in the architectural style of the gateways and wall ornaments. While Dwarfs prefer straight lines, sharp corners and order, Master Arthom's halls were filled with wicked creatures, horrific motives and chaos, also corpses, both dead and living. It extended from the depths of the earth up almost halfway to Mag-Ogor's mighty peak. The highest chamber was situated at the end of a naturally formed sudden inward bend in the mountain's side. Here was were the master chose to create a massive courtyard, flattening the area into a ledge. When Keemon reached this courtyard his master was already waiting for him.

“Master.” Keemon announced and bowed.

“Look.” Master Arthom extended his arm toward the edge and over the lands below, not turning to face his disciple, “see the gigantic shadow my realm casts upon the lands.”

Keemon walked over to him and looked, it was a clear day and you could see the sun rising over the steppes and the highlands at the foot of the mountain. As the master had said Mag-Ogor's shadow covered a large portion of the visible lands.

“Keemon” Master Arthom broke the silence, as if he suddenly became bored of the view, “do you know what we as necromancers does when we raise the dead?”

“We give them life, Master.”

Master Arthom frowned, “it is not as simple as that, upon our journey through life we absorb the life out of the world itself and that is what we infuse in the lifeless.”

“That would be the green flame?”

“Indeed. This,” he opened his hand and in his palm a flame burned, he looked at it in silence for a while, “this is what we force into the deceased.”

Keemon did not answer, waiting for his master to reach where he wanted to get.

“We bind their bodies to our will and only through us can they get their own will, before this they are mindless slaves.”

Now he looked Keemon straight in his eyes.

“Do you know what happens if a necromancer dies?”

His voice had changed, before it was thoughtful, almost dreamy, as if he was thinking back on times passed. Now he had a more serious tone, talking directly to Keemon and no one else.

“No Master, I would assume the undead return into their lifeless existence again as their source of life ceases to be.” Keemon answered after a moment of hesitation.

“No! No, no, entirely wrong!” Master Arthom shouted, “when you kill the one who has undead underlings they will only loose their bond to their master, nothing else!”

He stopped himself, took a deep breath and calmed himself.

“Do you know what this means?”

“I see, so me killing Seker resulted in...”

“... A quarter of my warriors turning into mindless beasts, slaughtering anything and everything.”

Keemon did not answer.

“Your silence,” He was now back to his thoughtful voice, “is truly golden.”

Before Keemon could get an explanation to this statement Master Arthom continued.

“Now for your training.”

Suddenly all his anger was nowhere to be found.

“You are gifted with the power to absorb the life that I mentioned earlier, but that will not make you a necromancer in any way. What you need is the mean to control it and be able to infuse it into the dead.”

Master Arthom produced a flame in his hand again, turning his hand over and watched it fall to the ground where it kept burning.

“Touch it with your hand.”

Keemon walked over to it, and with not the slightest hint of hesitation he extended his hand into the flame which now reached to the hight of his knees. When his hand touched the flame instantly began to flow into him. He felt the power move through his veins and slowly settle inside him. As the feeling of this force ebbed out Master Arthom nodded approvingly.

“That was pure life, concentrated into a form which is visible to the naked eye.”

He walked over to the edge.

“But is such a small amount it is not enough to make you truly merge with it, to give you the ability to control it. No, what you need is not to receive this form of life, but to take it.”

“Master, did I not just with my own hand take this flame, how is that not me taking it?”

“It was not you, it was the life being pulled into your hollow inside.”

Keemon did not continue, the master did not expect him to either.

“I will show you.”

Once again Master Arthom raised a flame, but this time he threw it out over the edge where it seemingly landed in the middle of its flight. As soon as it 'landed' it grew rapidly, towering over both of them. It easily was more than double Keemon's height, and he would be considered tall by most measures. Keemon had never seen his master's power in this way before.

“This is what you need to wield the power that you have been blessed with.” Master Arthom paused, “now, the only thing you need to do to complete your training is to take the flame.”

“How can I, Master? I am a fine swordsman but I have not yet learnt how to fly.”

“Save your wittiness! This is all I am telling you, that you need to take that flame, nothing else.”

With these words the master turned his back upon his disciple and left.

Keemon remained in the courtyard all day, trying to figure out his master's task to him. There was no way to reach the green orb of life from the edge. Not even if he tried to jump would he reach it, he did not try this, anyone could've judged the distance as too far. The once beautiful day dissolved into a cloudy evening and soon the flame's mysterious green light was the only thing that illuminated lone Keemon as he sat on the edge, staring at it, close, but yet unreachable. It was as if even when he close his eyes, everything from the length of a blink to the moments when he closed his eyes to gather his thoughts. He felt like he was being mocked, as if this inanimate object of pure life was there only to show him how feeble and helpless he was when met by a challenge. He stood up. Walked away from the edge and then turned and looked at it. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. There it was, right in front of him, refusing him his short pause. Eyes opened, the only thing that changed was that the flame now was surrounded by the sky, the edge, the mountainside, all these things it shared space with in Keemon's field of vision.

It was getting late, maybe even late enough for the morning to once again shed its light upon the world, marking the first day of defeat for the man standing in the middle of the courtyard in Master Arthom's mountain stronghold. Keemon walked back towards the massive door through which he had entered, next to the door were two benches, one on each side of the entrance. He sat down, tired physically and his mind exhausted but no progress on his task had been made. Leaning against Mag-Ogor cold stone his eyes closed and he was thrown down into a deep dreamless sleep.

When he woke the first thing he saw was his foe, the green flame which would give him the power to control life and death, unreachable to him. He was surprised to see that the world was even darker now than before, so dark the light from the fire could not reach the edge of the courtyard. But that was not it. He opened his eyes, finding himself completely enclosed in a thick fog. Somehow the flame made it inside his mind, even with his eyes closed it was not only visible, but as vivid as when his eyes were open. Except for now. He stood up, the fog made the flame barely visible, a green faded light was the only thing piercing all the way to Keemon. He closed his eyes once again, at once the flame was visible as clear as it was the day before. He felt something stir inside him. He felt as if he had made progress, getting closer to reaching the flame. With his eyes closed he looked at the flame. With his mind focused on the fire he took a step forward, then another one, his mind was telling him that he was walking forward but he did not feel his body move at all. He had halved the distance between him and the flame, then he opened his eyes. The flame was as far away as it was before he closed his eyes once again. He sat down again, making sure that he would not move. Then he closed his eyes again. He tried to look around, but before him was only the flame. Then he once again began to walk, once again only in his mind, his senses told him he was still sitting on the cold bench. The flame was getting closer and closer, he had found it, he had found the answer to the cryptic task his master had left him. He was now standing by it, it looked even larger this close. He hesitated, the power it was emitting was almost overwhelming, then he plunged into it.

What happened after he could never remembered clearly. There was an intensive burning inside him as his veins drank the life of the flame, when the first wave reached his heart it doubled its speed as if to spread the fire throughout his body as fast as possible, sending shocks of pain with each beat. He fell to the ground screaming, green tongues of fire surrounding him.

Only moments later Master Arthom arrived through the doors to find Keemon passed out. He sent four undead that had accompanied him to lift Keemon's still body and carry him inside. But as soon as they touched him huge flames rose from his body, nothing but ashes remained of the four. Slowly Keemon rose, flames intensively whirling around him. His eyes focused on his master.

“Master. I have completed the task you gave me.” It was voice filled with confidence and power, deep as if the ancient spirits of the world talked through him.

Master Arthom did not react at first, just looked at his disciple, on what he had become. Then he smiled, one of the few times Keemon had ever seen him smile.

“I am proud of you, Keemon.”

That was all he said, then he turned and walked away. Keemon's flames settled inside him and he felt renewed. He stayed in the courtyard for a while. Feeling the power of life moving through his body. He extended his right hand, palm facing up. He hesitated only for a second then closed his eyes and focused. As the flame rose in his hand he felt the life of thousands of beings all moving and merging within him, filling him, releasing all their power inside him.

Over the next few months Keemon practised daily to control his newly gained power. He soon realised that the hardest part of controlling and using his power was acquiring it, once he actually had it in him it was like, as his master had told him, it merged with him and all of his being. He could manipulate the power as easily as he would move his own limbs. To raise the dead gave him a feeling of control, being greater than the average man that is controlled by death, he had risen above it.

Years passed and his power grew stronger for each day. He had only a few hundred warriors under him even though his power could easily control thousand mindless slaves, mostly because Master Arthom did not enjoy the thought of having so many corpses around that weren’t under his command. But over the years did not only his power grow, but also the master's respect towards his old disciple. Soon he even treated him as an fellow necromancer and no longer like an underling. The times Master Arthom went down into the lands for any reason, personal affairs, war or what he called 'harvest', he left Keemon to look after the fortress and even allowed him to use his study. So as soon as his master left Keemon would go and study all of his master's books and tomes, often not leave the study for days, through this he learnt even more about the art of necromancy and about the life of the world. But even necromancers can not control time, and even they grow older.

Master Arthom came back from a war with the Clans, Keemon was in his study when he entered. Cursing the horsemen for slaying hundreds of his finest warriors. The war had not went in his favour and he had now been forced to retreat back to the highlands where they would not dare to engage his hoards of undead, a stalemate was reached once again and both sides returned to their respective homes. He sat down in a chair and sighed.

“If only there was a way to erase those pesky riders. Their footmen are no match to our numbers but their horses outmanoeuvre us, surround us and then slaughters my finest.”

Keemon did not raise his eyes from the book he was reading. Next to him were piles of books, read and unread.

“Maybe you should stop fighting them, it always ends the same way. You both loose a lot of men but still neither get anywhere.”

Master Arthom ignored this.

“I will need to strike directly at their heart. Their puny towns are barely fortified, under the cover of darkness I should be able to slay all their loved ones first, then turn to the enraged and disordered army.”

“Indeed, maybe it will work next time.”

“We will see, truly we will see.”

He sank back into some deep thought. Keemon closed his book and went to find its place.

“See I've been thinking about putting more focus on stronger folks, only harvest bigger brutes, not waste life on skinny corpses.”

Keemon barely listened at this point.

“I read somewhere about a way to infuse more life than one being is intended to have, was some way to do it without the body disintegrating. Would make my army unstoppable.”

He got up and began to search the bookshelves for some specific book.

“I am sure that it should be...”

That was as far as he got. The dagger Keemon held had been forced through his neck and out his throat. Keemon twisted it and ripped it out. Master Arthom fell to the ground, giving him one last terrified look before his life left him. Standing over his corpse Keemon absorbed all his power as it left its vessel in the search of a new host. When it was done he walked over to the studies doors, listening to the screams of tens of thousands living dead slaughtering each other. He locked the doors. Walked back to the large desk, sat down and opened another book.
-Rcah

The cursed cave

2013-02-19T17:13:00.000-08:00

“You will die today!” A voice echoed in Fenoam's mind. He was sitting in a pitch dark cave, leaning against a rock, barely breathing. It had begun as an ordinary day, and an ordinary hunting trip. He had hit a deer, but his aim had been a bit off and the wounded game ran into a cave. A cave that was regarded as cursed by many in Fenoam's village. There were rumours that those who had gone in there returned insane, or they hadn't returned at all. But Fenoam had considered the rumours as nonsense, nothing more than fairy tales to scare children from going into the cave, protecting them from cave-ins and such. So, without a second thought he went inside.

But when Fenoam caught the game something happened. Without him noticing he had stepped on a stone plate and a mechanism had triggered, a boulder now blocked his path back out. It became pitch dark. After a while in there, he started to hear noises of something big moving slowly somewhere in the dark. His first thought was that it probably was a bear, and the thought of encountering such a beast in the dark wasn't very amusing.

“Who dares to disturb my slumber?” The voice echoed against the cold cave walls.

Fenoam felt his blood freeze.

"Hmph, smells like man. Long time since a human dared to take a step into my domain." The voice had faded into nothing more than a whisper.

Fenoam tried to hold his breath. He couldn't determine where the whispers came from.

"I can smell where you are, human! No use in hiding, it will only prolong your agony!" The voice now sounded much closer.

Fenoam started to panic. The darkness felt claustrophobic, and the sounds did not sound like a human, but rather more like something from a very large beast. The sounds kept becoming louder and louder, and the voice talked calmly about how it would gently put Fenoam in a slumber, if he showed himself, but how his agony would be increased each second he prolonged this meaningless hiding. Fenoam realized that it had not pinpointed his location yet. But the noises indicated it was pretty close. Suddenly it stopped. Fenoam felt like his heart stopped as well.

"Now I know where you are, Human! I smell your fear. Now, come to me and feel my embrace and eternal sleep. If you don't struggle, I will end it quickly and painlessly!"

Fenoam did not move an inch, he felt all petrified, only feeling how his cold sweat flowed down his back. The creature made a quick strike, a move with the power to kill a bear instantly.

Dust and bits of rock filled the air. After a while the dust settled, revealing ripped parts of clothing, and in midst of it all, a creature feasting on flesh. But when the attack happened, no scream was heard, and the creature tasted flesh with different flavour than that of a man.

Fenoam had made a lure out of the deer he had caught, leaving his jacket on it for the sake of smell. He had made it when he thought he was encountering a bear. And by a stroke of luck the creature attacked it instead of him.

While the creature feasted on Fenoams game, he made an attempt to get away. The creature seemed to be between him and the exit, so Fenoam followed his instincts and went in the opposite direction, deeper into the cave. Because the darkness, he stumbled, and crawled, getting all beaten up on the way somehow navigating himself forward by following the cave wall. The only thing on his mind was to as far away from the beast as possible. Even though he had not seen the creature, there was something really terrifying about it. He had never felt such agony before like the agony that filled him from the short encounter with this creature. He had encountered several kinds of beasts before, but this one felt different somehow. He crawled for what felt like hours, but could not find any other exit. Suddenly his hands felt something in front of him. A wall that felt like man made. First Fenoam felt stirring within him, but he forced himself to calm down. Then he started to frantically feel the surrounding walls with his hands. He was practically a blind man in a lion’s den. He started to feel all the aching that the escape had caused, bleeding knees and hands, and beaten by everything he bumped into in the darkness. He had no intentions to turn back, for he would surely encounter the creature. He did not want to follow the other wall, since he knew that direction would only lead deeper into the mountain. He was feeling the man-made wall with his hands, and suddenly found an opening. By its height and shape, he assumed it to be a window. Why someone would make a window inside a mountain made no sense to him, but he climbed through it anyway. Well on the other side, he felt a strong and bitter stench, and he could feel with his hands that he was standing on a polished stone floor. But he didn't have much time to explore his new environment. Sounds from the other side of the wall indicated that the bait he’d left as a decoy had bought him only so much time. The creature had already sniffed out his new location. Desperately Fenoam tried to find any place he could hide in, but the only thing he could find was a fireplace, and some old furniture. But his mind and body were still functioning, so there was still a chance!

He realized that he somehow still had some arrows and his bow with him, so if he could pinpoint his exact location of the creature, then he could at least try to shoot it. The sounds on the other side of the wall indicated that he had no time to loose, he ripped his shirt’s sleeves off, and quickly gathered anything that seemed flammable and put it into the fireplace. In desperation he even threw parts of his own hair into the furnace. At the exact moment he hit his fire striker, he heard how the wall crumbled to bits behind him. The moment after, a large flame erupted seemingly from his hands, and engulfed the place. He fell on the ground, burnt but alive. The room had been full of flammable gas. Fenoam looked at where the man-made stonewall had stood just a moment ago, staring right into the darkness... He saw a reflection from an eye, reflecting light from the now slightly burning fireplace. He could not understand why he was still alive. What had stopped the creature? It seemed to just stare at him... Or maybe it was fascinated by the fire? Fenoam now saw his chance, he slowly took his bow, put an arrow to it, aimed between the reflexions, where he supposed the head of the creature was located. But it was all futile, he saw a quick flash of teeth, and heard how the arrow cracked. The slight silhouette indicated that the creature caught the arrow with its mouth, and Fenoam realized he faced a beast faster than an arrow! "Attacking me with toothpicks? How naive..." the creature whispered. Fenoam now felt his last moments come. He was like a wild animal cornered by a hunter. Everything seemed lost, he would die alone in a cave, and no one would know his fate. Thoughts of folks at the village popped up into his mind. Would someone miss him? Maybe his own mother, but probably no one else. Or maybe, just maybe, Aila? The nice woman, who always smiled and wished good hunting when Fenoam passed the villages east gate, on his way to the hunting grounds. They had occasionally met and spent some time together. And Fenoam had actually left a letter to Aila this morning. He had always hoped that their friendship would be something more than just friendship. The thought of Aila crying for Fenoam, somehow relieved him, but at the same time the thought was unbearable. Maybe this thought triggered something in Fenoam, a will to survive, a will to go one despite being cornered by death. Strangely the creature didn't approach him, even though there wasn't anything hindering it. So Fenoam had no choice but to wait. "Why Human, are you resisting?" The creature whispered... Fenoam was shocked about the question, "What do you mean?", he asked the creature. "You know what I mean, Human. Why are you clinging to what you call life? Your sheer existence is full of Pain, evil, poverty, sweat, sorrow and despair?", the creature answered. "What do you know...", Fenoam started to ask, but was interrupted by the creature; "How dare you, insolent worm, crawling on the ground, address me in such a tone? If you don't for wish a long and painful death, then address me with the politeness I deserve!". Fear gave Fenoam the wits not to provoke the creature. "Well, your... Fearsome shadow, If I may answer, I think our lives are unique, and therefore are valuable, and should not be wasted..."

"Unique? Is that a value at all? These rocks that are surrounding us, each and every one of them are unique! Every snowflake is unique, yet there is no difference at all if a snowflake falls into a burning fire and ceases to exist. Just as meaningless are you! Despair is what all your days will be full of, and meaningless. I can offer you a fast and swift end to your existence. Out of pure goodness and empathy am I offering this opportunity to you!"

"Wait, no! I agree with you, kind shadow, the life is full of despair and darkness, filling the soul of man, but still, there are things to make our lives valuable..."

"Such as..."

"...to be owned..."

"What foolishness am I hearing? Am I talking to a slave? If that is the case, I can bring you freedom, freedom from the slavery of everything!"

"No,not that kind of ownership. I'm talking about not belonging to myself, but I'm definitely not being owned by another person. You see, I'm not owning my life, because I have not earned it. I have been given life by others, therefore I have it only by rent. A human is given the value from what he is to others. Relationships. A child belongs to his mother, and a mother belongs to her child. And taking one away is like robbing the other of something really valuable. Therefore I have no right to end my life here, because that would be like stealing from everyone I value in life."

"Hmph, you are missing a point there, if every human is trash, then surely they won't gain value by giving value to each other. I will still take your life, and consider myself kind in doing so"

Meanwhile, in a village, not far from the cave, a maiden was sitting on the village border wall, looking towards the road. In her hand she held a bit of paper, a letter to be precise. She looked up at the sky, her eyes following dark clouds. From experience she knew that a storm was incoming. She looked back towards the road, her face expressing worry, and some emotions only she could identify. She had been there all afternoon, first waiting, longing and hoping, but now only worrying. In the horizon she saw the last rays of sun disappearing. She now knew something should be done, and she jumped down from the wall. Her bare feet moved quickly as a child’s in the neighbourhood, when she orientated herself through the narrow paths between the houses. She stopped at a house near the border of the south wall. She flung the door open and rushed inside. A man, carving a chunk of wood, looked shocked at her. "Aila, what is it? Have the goblins attacked the village?", the man asked. "No, nothing like that. It's just that Fenoam hasn't come back yet...!", Aila answered. "Oh, Come on! Fenoam the hunter? He is capable of taking care of himself."

"No, something is different today! I know he is in trouble!"

"Oh, how come?"

"Well... A storm is coming, and he hasn't come back. Fenoam is not a fool who would recklessly stay out in the forest in a storm"

"Ha, that’s not true, and you know it! You know Fenoam is fully capable of finding shelter, or even build one if need be. What are you hiding, sister?"

The young woman blushed, but after hesitating for a moment, she gave to her brother the letter she was clinging to. After reading the letter, the man chuckled, gave her the letter back. "I see why he had a reason to come back early today. Well, I'll go grab my sword and shield, let’s go find that man of yours!"

Ten minutes later, Aila and her brother was walking down the road, outside the village, with his dog with them. "Are you sure we don't need to ask any others to join us before we go?", Aila asked. "Oh, I'm pretty sure Fenoam would be quite angry if we alerted the whole village”, her brother said. “I'm sure he is stuck somewhere in a marsh, and that can be quite embarrassing... His reported hunting area today was near the forbidden cave, and there are a lot of marshlands there, not deep enough to make a man drown, but quite hard to get up from if you get stuck. I can't believe he actually made such a novice mistake though. He could be stuck under a fallen tree or something, but it sounds quite unlikely."

Soon, the two of them were searching for Fenoam. But despite their hardest efforts, they could not find any trail of the missing hunter. Not even the dog could find a trail. And before long, the storm started to brew above them. "Let's take a break, before we go back, we could rest in the Cave", Aila's brother said. "Is that wise, I wonder? You know the rumours as well as I", Aila answered. "Oh, are you scared? You know as well as me that those stories are just for children. No truth in them at all. And we don't have to go deep inside the cave, we need just a moment in a shelter to regain some strength. I have torch materials with me, I just need a dry place so we can light them." Aila was still unsure. "And, who knows, maybe Fenoam is in the cave, desperately waiting for our help..." her brother added. This convinced Aila to follow him into the cave, trusting in her brother's sword and dog to protect her from the darkness lurking inside the cave.

After a short walk, they came to the cave. Despite the rain and the storm, the man had managed to keep the torch materials dry. He assembled the torch, and soon the light illuminated the cold cave walls. “What a disappointment, I thought the cave would be much bigger. I can see all the way to the back of the cave from here. No way Fenoam could hide in here, not to mention any ancient monster”, Aila's brother said. “But, don’t you think your dog is acting strange?”, Aila asked. “Oh, that’s strange, it marks that it has found a trail. There actually seems to be a blood trail leading to the back of the cave…” Both Aila and her brother started to investigate the surroundings, where the blood trail ended. Aila let her hands wander along the rock wall. Suddenly she felt a more polished spot. When she pushed the spot a little, she felt how the rock moved. “I think I’ve found something!”, she whispered. “Let me see”, her brother answered, and pressed the stone into the wall. A sound of flowing water filled the room, and The stone wall started to move. Slowly, it descended down, leaving an opening towards a seemingly endless darkness.

Fenoam was still alive, keeping up the gruesome discussion with the creature. There were two things Fenoam did not notice however; the flame was dying out, and the creature was much closer than before. The creature calmly whispered reasons why death would be the best option for every human, While Fenoam pointed out all the bright side of life, desperately clinging to his own value and right to live. But suddenly the creature changed tone, seemingly more intrigued than before, and asked a question: “What is the value of an abandoned tool? What is a dog without owner? What is a human without the people he belongs to?” Fenoam was surprised by the question, and without further thinking, he casually answered: “Well, a tool is useless without a worker, and a dog without an owner, is just a stray dog. But…” He got interrupted by the creature: “How do you know who is a human’s loved ones? Yes, the loved ones are searching for their beloved, even if they have to travel to the Valley of Death. We have to test what you just said. And if it happens to be true will you accept death as a friend, if you have no ties left to this world?” Cold sweat ran down Fenoam’s back, what did the creature mean? And in a blink of an eye, Fenoam was alone. For some strange reason, he felt more alone than ever before…

“You know, I’m starting to believe those stories! This cave could really be the home of some big human-eating monster! I would suggest we turn back, and go to the village. Not for my own safety, of course, but for yours!” Aila’s brother whispered. “No! This is the most likely place for Fenoam to be. He must have been trapped by that mechanism we saw earlier. So he must be here somewhere.”a bit too loudly.

The dog had refused to go inside the cave, and waited outside., so Aila and her brother walked around in the cave on their own, without any hint of Fenoams location. “But you do realize that he might not be alive any more, you saw the bloody mess earlier. Who knows, maybe it was everything that was left of Fenoam…”
“Stop it! Not a word from you anymore, you know even better than me that those remains were not of a human. I Refuse to believe that he is dead before I see the evidence” Aila answered. *Sigh*, “I hope you appreciate my effort. We are probably risking our lives every minute we remain inside this cursed cave”

-“yes, you are risking your life, and you have lost the game”, whispered a voice from the darkness. “The man you are so desperately searching for is dead”. “No! It can’t be true! How can you be sure!?” Aila shouted. The voice from the darkness answered: “Because I am the very beast that tore him apart. He wished for a quick death and came to me. It was of course difficult to fulfill his wish. Not the death part, but the quickness of it.” Ailas brother drew his sword and tried to pinpoint the location of the voice. He moved the torch around himself, and he thought he saw a silhouette of something big at the direction where the exit was located. He saw the reflection of his torch in the big creature’s eyes and a line of big yellow sharp teeth. His hands began to shake. He noticed also that Aila was shivering. “Don’t worry, we will survive this”, he desperately tried to calm Aila. Warm tears poured down her cheeks. The creature slowly approached Aila and her brother. “I think it’s afraid of the sword, so stay behind me” Ailas brother whispered to her. She did not respond in any way at first but suddenly she cried out: ”Fenoam? Where are you?”

Aila’s voice echoed in the cave, slowly weakening from every bounce of the cold cave walls. When it reached Fenoam, it was only a little Whim, so that Fenoam didn’t know if he was only imagining it, or if he really had heard his name from somewhere in the darkness. First he felt a glimpse of hope and joy, but in a moment it turned to fear. Was there really someone searching for him in the cave, in the darkness together with the beast? Suddenly he remembered the creature’s words just a moment ago, and the meaning stood crystal clear to Fenoam. Without hesitation, he took his bow, some burning rags from the fire, and his arrows, and with haste he ran in the dark cold cave. Even though he was running, the seconds felt like hours. The burning rags illuminated the cold cave, and somehow, it didn’t feel at all like the same cave he had been trapped in for so long.

Ailas brother desperately tried to hold ground against the beast, fending swiftly with his sword. But it seemed that after every swing, the creature was nearer, and he had to step back in order not to fall prey after the next sword swing. He couldn’t shake the feeling of being herded to a trap. The creature seemed to toy with them. And he was right. Soon he saw that the formation of the surrounding was not allowing any his surrounding allowed no escape. They had been herded to a dead end. And the creature came closer and closer. Aila’s brother’s movements became more and more clumsy. As he then swung his sword with too much strength, while not paying enough attention on the surrounding, he tripped. Aila screamed, her brother closed the eyes, and the creature attacked. But he did not feel himself pierced by the creature’s teeth. He felt an enormous burden on his heart; did the creature go for Aila first? He opened his eyes, and saw Aila… Intact! The creature had stopped a small distance from them; Between them ant the creature lay a burning arrow.

Aila and the man saw a glimpse of light approaching. It was Fenoam, putting another arrow on fire, and firing in the direction of the beast. The arrows did not seem to threathen the creature because of its immense speed, but it did avoid the path of the arrows, giving Fenoam a little possibility to fend off the creature from Aila and the man, if he kept aiming between them and the creature. And Fenoam kept firing, one burning arrow after another, though not a single one hit the creature. “You know the exit, so run! I follow you, and try to keep that beast at a distance!” Fenoam shouted. The creature did not give much ground, but the continuous line of arrows kept it just outside of range to Aila and the man. And, strangely, it worked; the three of humans managed to make their way towards the exit of the cave. But the creature followed. When the three humans were at the stone door, Fenoam had only one arrow left. He whispered to the others” After I fire this, run as fast as you can, and don’t look back!” The others nodded. Fenoam aimed his bow at the stone passage; the creature would not have room to dodge, if it tried to come after them. At the moment Fenoam once again saw the too familiar reflections of the creatures eyes, he fired his last burning arrow. Fenoam was sure of his aim, but the effect was a disappointment. It hit, but bounced off like it had hit a wall of stone or steel. The arrow did not even scratch the creature. The creature roared in anger, a roar exceeding that of a hundred angry lions roaring together. The trio ran for their lives, out from the cave and into the cold night. The rain was now pouring down. Their torches started to die out. The man was running the slowest, and he could hear how the creature gained on the distance between him and them. Different scenarios ran through his head. He looked at Fenoam and Aila. They were now both unarmed, since Fenoam did not have any arrows left, and by the sound of it, the creature was much faster than them. He made his decision: He stopped running, turned around, and stood firm, with his sword and shield. Maybe he didn’t stand a chance, but he would die, not hunted down like a prey, but standing, in combat, protecting someone. He could somehow accept his fate. Again, he started with a big swing, to make the creature stand back. But this time was different than that in the cave: the creature didn’t even try to dodge the swing. The sword hit the creature with full power, but it didn’t sink in: it stopped at the hard surface of the creature, not even scratching it. As a last action of defence, the man raised his shield. The shield was pierced and crushed by the line-up of big teeth, at the same time piercing his hand. At that moment the man felt the call of death, and he didn’t even try to defend himself any longer. But something distracted the Beast: The man’s dog was there, defending his wounded master, with all its might. Only for a moment the beast changed its focus, turning towards the dog. In a swift motion, the beast changed its grip from the man’s hand to engulf the dog. And the moment after, the beasts focus was again on the man. He closed his eyes, waiting for the final strike, knowing he didn’t stand a chance. But the strike didn’t come: he opened again his eyes, only to see Aila standing between him and the beast. She held something illuminating in her hands, and the creature stood paralyzed, only a few feet from her, almost revealing its shape. At her side was Fenoam, crouched, desperately searching for something in his bag. “Hurry! Find something dry! The creature seems to be afraid of fire!” –Fenoam shouted. Aila was holding a burning piece of paper, covering it with her hand. Fenoam covered a glowing piece of ember, but the glow was quickly vanishing. The man tried to find anything dry, but couldn’t find anything in the rain. “The paper is all gone soon! Start running boys!” Aila shouted. “No, we won’t leave you!” Fenoam answered with a determined voice. Everyone stood staring at the burning paper, knowing it was their last glimpse of hope, soon to be replaced by darkness. But suddenly the air was filled with another roar, not from the creature, but from somewhere impossible to locate. It sounded much louder than the creature’s recent roar, despite originating from a much farther location. The creature then whispered, as if to himself “Outside my Domain…” And the beast turned its back to the three humans, and crawled back into the cave. A last whisper was heard ”You know where to find me, when seeking death…” and the creature disappeared into the darkness offered by the cave.

They all stood still, in the rain. Aila’s hands were shaking. Fenoam …tried to comfort her, embracing her: “It’s over, we are alive…”. “No, that’s not it, the letter is gone…” she sighed… The man smirked, that sounded just like his little sister, worrying about a simple letter, the moment after facing death. He didn’t hear Fenoam’s answer, but Aila’s hands stopped shaking. “Hey now, I don’t want to ruin your moment, but I think I need some attention, before I bleed to death or something, the man said. After a moment, they were heading back to the village. Despite his injuries, the man carried his former dog on his shoulders. Fenoam and Aila held hands tightly all the way back to the village.

-Sanlade

A Necromancer's Path

2013-01-20T07:32:00.003-08:00

During a harsh winter in the early 2^nd Era a boy was born to the widow Ameni in the small village of Deepwell. Being as pale and cold as he was, no one expected him to survive his first night. But as a late spring reached Deepwell and as it turned into summer the young boy Keemon seemed as healthy as any other of the children around him. But everyone knew something there was different about him, something that was wrong.

As he grew up he never lost his pale skin or cold blood. He was a skinny boy with two tired ice-blue eyes and a thin face, framed by light grey hair.

It took several years until something happened.

That year, Keemon's sixth, spring came early to their small village. The forest was filled with flowers of many different kinds. On the hill south of the village the young Keemon had gone playing with another boy who was about the same age. But after a while the villagers heard the sound of a child crying and several of them ran towards the hill, only to find Keemon weeping next to the other child's lifeless body.

“Keemon!” One of them knelt down next to Keemon, “what happened?”

“He... he's... dead...” another one exclaimed as he checked the other boy.

But Keemon gave no answer, silenced by his tears.

When Ameni reached the growing crowd she took Keemon in her arms in an attempt to comfort him. Both children were brought back to the village, and during the walk back he was able to tell through his sobbing what had happened.

“We were playing in the forest and found a flock of birds. I stopped to watch them, but he picked up a rock.

'Let's see who can hit one of them!'

'Why? They haven't done anything to us.'

'Keemon, they're just birds, no difference if we hit them with rock'

'No! There is a difference! Drop the rock and let's leave.'

But he didn't listen and raised his arm to throw the rock, I got angry and pushed him so that he fell and dropped it. But...” his sobbing increased, “but he didn't get up after that.”

During this time there was a travelling merchant, a skilled healer, residing in the inn and to him they brought the dead boy. The merchant examined him for hours but even his expertise could not find anything that would take the life from a healthy boy in an instance.

“It is like life just left him.” Was the only thing he could say, being as confused as the rest of the villagers by the boy's sudden death.

When no other answer was found, Keemon got the blame of the loss, the merchant tried to defend him but the villagers wanted something or someone to blame, and to them he was the only thing that could've caused this death. From that day Ameni and Keemon were looked down upon by the other villagers and never regained their status as equals in the village. They lived like outcasts in their own home. This was a heavy blow to a widow and Keemon silently took the blame of his mother's grief upon him and carried it in his heart from that day forward.

One day five years later he was walking in the forest again, leaves being blood red as they were slowly giving way to the approaching winter. Being mad at the villagers for treating him and his mother like outcasts he often went here alone, to get away from it all. But for some reason this day was different, worse, in his heart an anger burned like never before, he wished for them all to disappear, he wished them all dead. Not paying much attention to his surroundings he tripped on a root and feel forward. As he rose again he noticed it, the grass had died and become dry under his hands. He stood up and stared at the two patches of dead grass, then at his hands. Not being able to understand what had happened he walked over to a large oak, hesitated a moment then put both his hand on it. As soon as he touched the bark he could feel the tree drying out under his hands and see the life leaving the tree slowly. Leaves losing what colour they had left only to the crumple and fall. Slowly the whole tree died. He took a step back and looked upon the colourless tree. As leaves were falling he began to think of what he had done. He had drained the large oak of all its life. He couldn't understand how, but he wanted more, it felt like it was a good way of calming the anger which still stirred inside him. He began to walk, touching bushes, high grass, flowers and trees as he went. Only to watch them slowly fade and die. Soon he noticed that the power waned and he needed to touch them longer before they died completely. Soon even grass needed time to fully dry out. As the power left him he felt relieved but also disappointed.

As he walked further and further away he could see the trees getting fewer and fewer around him, and soon he had reached the end of the forest. He had never been this far south before, nor this far from the village. He stood on a small hill looking out over the widespread plains through the last few trees below. The only thing that seem to cross the plains was the road leading west from Deepwell where most merchants and other travellers came from. To the west he could see Calm Water and the bridge over it. He could also hear the streams from the north-west, where one Calm Water's few rapid were.

“Keemon? What are you doing this far from the village?” Ormir, a hunter from the village approached him, “finally going to leave are we?”

He was one of those that wanted Ameni out of the village, for good. But he was different. He wanted it with a hate stronger than Keemon's hate towards the village. He was the father of the boy that died.

“You have no idea what it feels like to lose a son. After what you did, why are you and your cursed mother still living among us?” He calmed down for a while and said silently, “can't you do us all a favour and just leave for good?”

The hate began to stir once more, this time rising to become an uncontrollable anger. Keemon looked at his hands. He touched nearby flower, which died instantly as well as a patch of grass below it. He looked at his hands again, he did not want to hear another word from Ormir. Slowly he turned towards him and began to walk towards him

“What now?” Ormir asked with scorn in his voice, “I could kill you right now and rid the village of one of its biggest problems.”

Keemon kept walking. Staring Ormir in the eyes. Ormir was getting a bit nervous by this unexpected behaviour.

“Will you kill me too now?” He pulled his sword, “you can't do anything against me!” He laughed, “fine, do whatever you like. But after you're done it's my turn. Ameni will know what it feels like to lose a son!”

He held his hands to his sides. Keemon walked up to him and put his hand on Ormir's chest.

“What do you think you're...”
“wha... is...”

He became silent, in his eyes nothing but an empty stare. Then he fell down. Keemon looked at the lifeless man in front of him. He realised his power, the opportunities, everything it could do for him. He had never seen anything like this before, he had killed a man by just a touch from his hand. Then he remembered; he had seen something like this before, five years ago, the same scenario. Anger had made him push the other boy, killing him instantly. He had to sit down, take a moment to breath and to gather his thoughts.

“I can kill anyone that ever makes me angry, anyone!” It both scared him and encouraged him.

He walked down to the road and began heading back to the village. He was running, first slowly and the faster and faster to get home to his mother as fast as he could. On his way his caught up with a small group of travelers. One of them had a large deep blue hooded cape while the others were dressed differently, hoods that covered their faces so that only their eyes were visible. When Keemon was about to pass them the man with the large cape stopped him.

“Excuse me young man, but is Deepwell far from here?” He asked and turned towards Keemon, revealing his face. He was quite an old man, with tired eyes and a short but thick black beard.

“Yes, its just behind those trees.” Keemon answered pointing towards the next bend in the road.

“What would a young man like you be called?” The man asked.

“Keemon.”

“What a beautiful name. There's power in it, do you know the meaning behind it?”

“Not really, I've never thought of it as more than a name”

“It means 'the Cold Blooded', its an old eastern name, few speak that tongue any more.”

Keemon was getting a bit uncomfortable.

“I need to go tell my mother something important, if you would excuse me.” He began but was interrupted.

“I think it's better if you don't. See, I am here to talk with you, Keemon.”

“You can find me at my mother's house in the village, her name is Ameni.”

With these words Keemon left the travellers and began running towards the village again. The old man was going to say something, but stopped himself.

“Master, is it wise to let him go?” One of the others asked the man.

“Maybe it is best that he goes. Some have to learn the hard way.”

The company continued their walk towards Deepwell in silence,

“Mother!” Keemon shouted as he entered the house.

“Yes my son, what is it?” She came from another room.

“We can't stay in this village like this any more. Everyone hates us!”

She sighed.

“But Keemon, what would we do? Things here aren't that bad and after all it is our home.”

“I know everyone hates us because of me, but I want to make things right again.”

She was about to argue with him but found no words.

“If we leave I can get rid of any one that hurts you, mother.” His voice was different now, calm and serious.

“What do you mean?”

She began to look a bit worried.

“Ormir is dead, he was mean to me and I took his life the same way his son died.”

Ameni took a step backwards.

“Ormir... dead?”

“Yes, he hated us and wanted us dead. And you have wished for him to stop bothering us.”

“Yes I have, but... but not like this, he wasn't a bad man at heart.”

“He is... was a bad man!” Keemon shouted, “don't defend him! He hated us and wanted us dead!”

“But Keemon...”

Ameni came to embrace him but he pushed her away.

She fell silent to the floor.

“Mother...”

He got no answer. She laid still, she was as pale as Ormir. Keemon slowly backed away from her. When his back reached the wall he slumped down leaning against it. Scared, unable to take his eyes of his now lifeless mother. There was a knock on the door.

“Ameni! There is a stranger here to see you,” a man's voice was heard.

Keemon couldn't answer.

“She doesn't seem to be home. You can...”

“No worries, I can wait for her inside.”

“You seem to know Ameni?”

“Well not personally, but I have met her son.”

“Oh... Keemon...”

“Yes, if I'm not mistaken that was his name.”

Keemon could hear one of them walking away. Soon afterwards the door opened. It was the old man from before. He looked at Keemon, thenand Ameni, sighed but didn't seem surprised, like he had expected it. He walked over to Keemon.

“Keemon. Look at me.”

Keemon slowly looked up and met his eyes.

“You should come with me.” The old man calmly said.

No answer from Keemon.

“You're special, you have a power that is rarely seen in someone your age, you have potential.” He took a break and sat down on a nearby chair.

“This power you posses can make a huge difference in the lives of a lot of people, even outside Deepwell. Now it might seem like you wouldn't want this power, that it only brings you pain. It is because you can't control it yet, if you come with me I can teach you how to do this.”

Keemon shook his head, once again his eyes moved towards his mother.

“No...” He slowly said, “I don't want any of it...”

The old man sighed.

“If you don't come with me this will happen again. If you don't know how to use this power then more innocent lives will be lost. Come with me, and let me be your mentor.”

He stretched out his hand towards Keemon, who in silence observed it. A moment of hesitation, then he met it with his own. The old man helped him up, put his arm around him and led him out. Then hooded men were waiting outside. The man closed the door behind them and they all began their walk away from Deepwell. But as they left the last houses behind them a few villagers saw them and that Keemon was with them.

“Where are you taking him? And where is Ameni?” One of them shouted at them as they were walking past.

The old man ignored them, but the villagers walked up and blocked their way.

“You're not going anywhere without answering!” More villagers approached them. Now the old man turned face the growing crowd.

“It wouldn't be wise to try to stop us.” He said silently. He held out his hand towards them, palm upwards. “Turn around or you will all perish.”

Some of the villagers took a step backwards, some unsheathed their swords and daggers. The old man whispered a word, Keemon couldn't hear it but there was something sinister about it that sent chills down his spine. But as he said it a green flame rose in his hand. By now everyone took out any weapon they had on them, axes, clubs, pitchforks and bows. They also had now surrounded the group.

“Who are you?” One of the menshouted at him.

“Knowing my name will not make you live any longer if you stand in my way.” He answered calmly.

The villagers backed away a little.

“Keemon, do these men mean anything to you?” The old man had turned to Keemon again. Still with the flame in his palm.

With the death of his mother the last bond with the village withered with her. His mind was still blank. Seeing his mother die by his own hand made him unable to focus on the world around him.

He shook his head.

The old man turned his hand and the flame fell from his hand. As soon as it touched the ground it grew to reach as high as their knees, and from it a circle of thin flame grew and expanded. Passing the feet of the group without burning anything. When it was about seven lengths across it stopped. The men from the village had moved away from it and now silence and a moment of stillness fell upon them.

“What is this fire? Sorcery? It doesn't seem to burn the ground at all.” The villagers asked themselves.

One of them walked up to the circle, hesitated, then stepped over the thin line of flame and into the circle. Nothing happened.

“So, this flame is just to scare us, old man?” He shouted proudly, “you need more than a cheap trick to stop us!”

“Murog, slay these fools!” The old man said to one of the masked followers, “Keemon, watch this. All that you see is what you have inside, you have the power over life and death.”

While he said that Murog had taken off his mask revealing a face that seemed to have fallen victim to lethal burn injuries. He unsheathed his sword, an old black blade, dull and covered with rust.

“Rise my warriors! Claim your rights!” He shouted and the ground shook once, then silence.

The villagers were getting nervous now. The ground inside the circle had a lot of small cracks in it. Then it suddenly began. An arm reached up from the ground beneath the 'brave' villager in the circle and grabbed his leg. He tried to scream but was too terrified to make a sound, too petrified to move. The arm was followed by a second one and then a head was revealed, a skull partially covered with rotting skin, with bare bone showing. Two empty eye sockets stared up at him while the living corpse rose as if it had awoken in his shallow grave. Soon it stood face to face with the villager. His face was pale and he only stood there, still unable to move from this new terrifying visitor. The corpse grabbed his arm, twisted it and took his sword to its own and stabbed it through its former owner. As he fell the ground inside the circle had become filled with other living dead. Keemon looked at the corpses standing around him and the others. They were in different stages of rotting, some still had clothes and flesh, some revealed bones as their rotten flesh had fallen off and some were skeletons with nothing but old pieces on fabric hanging from their skeletal limbs.

“You called for us, Murog?” The one with the blood stained sword asked, looking down at the bleeding villager was lying at his feet writhing in pain.

“Do not let them get away.” Was Murog's calm response.

“Understood.” The corpse smiled a broken smile, then shouted; “slay them all!”

At his command the other corpses unsheathed their weapons, if they had one, and stormed out of the circle. Some villagers dropped all they had and ran, others tried to fight but it was soon proved to be hopeless. Many fell victim to their fear of their undead foes and were slaughtered before they could turn and run. Those who ran were chased, some were cut down while other managed to reach the village.

“That's enough for now, Murog.” The old man said. Murog nodded and sheathed his sword. All the undead came back to the circle. “Now rest. You have done well.” As the old man said this they turned into dust and were scattered in the wind.

Once again all was still.

“That is what we are. We are masters of life and death.” He said to Keemon, “you were born with this power while other struggle to get it themselves. Now, will you let it ruin your life or will you take control over it.”

Keemon stood silent for a while.

“How are we masters over life? I have only seen death around me!”

“Hate and anger awakens the the power over death in you, this works the opposite way too. But you only assault the living in anger, you never embrace the dead in joy.”

Keemon was about to answer but he stopped. He understood that the old man was correct in his statement. He had only killed out of anger. He knew there wasn't even once that he had been happy as a person had died. When Ormir was killed he felt joy inside, but not happiness, it was the sweet taste of revenge. Now it all was silent again. Murog's warriors were long gone and the only villagers who were still to be seen around them lie lifeless on the ground, as if drowned in their own blood.

“Night will soon be here. Let us continue or journey before if gets dark.” The old man once again put his arm over Keemon's shoulder and led him ever further away from the village.

“What is your name? Who is my mentor?” Keemon asked after a short moment of walking.

The old man was a bit surprised by being called mentor this early but, “I am Arthom, Garfereas a'Har.” He answered with a smile, looking at his young disciple.

“Thank you, Master Arthom.” Keemon said silently.

As they walked the sky faded to a blood red sunset which soon gave way to the dark veil of night. The setting sun was only seen as a thin red line by the horizon and Deepwell disappeared in the darkness behind them. The living sounds of the day faded to be replaced with the whispers of the night, dominated by the rapids of Calm Water. The moon rose as they walked over the plains. The same plains Keemon had only seen from the hill by the village, the hill where he had committed his first murder and Ormir's now cold corpse rested in the dry leaves, robbed of its life.

-RcaH

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Alone in the Valley

2012-07-24T08:10:00.002-07:00

In our village we were about 120 inhabitants. Our families had lived in this valley for hundreds of years. I liked our village, I liked the people there and the valley itself. Everything could still have been exactly like it was then if that day had never taken place…but it did…

It was an ordinary day like any other. I was sitting with my family by the table eating dinner. It was around midday. Suddenly a man, one of my father’s friends, came rushing in and shouted; “He’s here! He’s here again!”. My father quickly reacted and stood up, grabbed his bow and his quiver and ran out with the man. My mother took me and my two sisters and led us upstairs where she told us to stay until they returned. I wanted to follow them so when my mother went I grabbed my dagger, a gift from my father, and ran out. It was a beautiful day, the snow lay thick and reflected the sunshine. I stopped for a moment. Everything was so beautiful. Then I suddenly remembered why I was out here. I heard voices from the other edge of the village. I began running in that direction. Then I saw him. Garfereas, the dragon who had punished our village for many years. His wings threw a huge shadow over the village; it almost seemed like the sun had disappeared. He was about 30 metres above ground and his flames consumed the snow beneath him and ignited nearby houses. He began to fly towards me. He crushed a house before he flew over me. I was thrown backwards. I laid still, scared. I heard the sound of houses crumbling behind me. I just couldn’t move. He seemed a lot larger when he was this close.

Minutes passed. The dragon had flown away at least ten minutes ago. I stood up, still shaking. I picked up my dagger which had been thrown away some meters when the dragon passed over me. I looked around me in shock. The whole village was destroyed, some houses were still burning and slowly falling apart. I began walking to the other edge of the village from were I had heard voices before; first with slow, shaking steps, but soon I found myself running. I came to the slope were our village ends. Then I knew why the dragon had flown away from there and into the main part of the village; his work here was done. I was looking at a morbid scene of slain men and women, all of the village’s adults were laying there scattered all over the area. Slain in the most ruthless ways. My dagger fell from my hand. I couldn’t move. I knew my parents were down there. I went down the slope. Some people had been charred unrecognisable by the dragon's flames, others had been shredded by his claws, pierced by his sharp tail or even bitten in half by his huge jaws. I wasn’t able to find my parents among the recognizable bodies. The snow was red. It seemed that the sky turned red too. My world trembled. I was left alone, alone in this world, alone in the valley…

Though all of this happened long ago it still haunts my heart. I was ten years old that day, I’ve now been alone for 27 years. I live in an old house outside the original village. Some years after the village was destroyed goblins dared to come into the valley. With no men they could roam over the lands almost unhindered. The dragon is still alive but the goblins were so many that it didn’t bother them even if a hundred goblins died daily. I don’t know if the dragon even knows I’m here, nor do I know what it’s like outside the valley. It is told that that is where we men in the valley originally came from. I’ve never been there and I don’t think I’ll ever go there. I’ll live my life in this valley where I was born. The goblins want me out of here but they’re afraid of me, I’m a lot stronger than they are. They attacked once, and I killed at least 50 of the wicked weak creatures before they ran away. Since I’m alone the only thing I do is hunt the animals here in the valley for food to survive and train to one day fulfil my one and only dream. I often visit the old village to remind me of what happened on that day. I can’t forget it, I don’t want to forget it. It’s the only reason for me to live: so that one day I can avenge my family and my village, I have to kill Garfereas. The goblins never move close to the old village. They think it is cursed and the dragon doesn’t care about the ruins so it’s quite a safe place for me. But I don’t want to live there even though it’s safe, because when I’m in the village I get so many different feelings at the same time. Good memories, bad memories, anger, hatred and sorrow. The village is almost sacred to me; it’s my only connection to the past. Except for one other thing; my dagger, my father’s last gift to me. It’s too short for me to fight with normally so it’s strapped to the upper side of my right wrist, with the blade sticking out about 5 cm forward from my hand, so I’m able to use it in close range hand-to-hand combat. The dagger didn’t slay any dragon on that day but it has slain many goblins since then and more will it slay before I die.

This is how I’ve lived until today. Here I am, still alive in the valley where my family and friends were slain. I often sit here on this place; a part of a house in the village where I have a clear view over the slope where it happened. The sun began to set; it was time to return to my house. But when I stood up and turned around I saw something that seriously shocked me; there stood several goblin warriors. I just couldn’t understand how they had entered the village area which they never used to even come close to. These thoughts stopped rapidly when they began running towards me with their weapons drawn. I drew my sword and began defending myself against them. The fight went well and I had the upper hand all the time. They tried to attack me on my right side but I was able to defend myself with my father’s dagger. The fight was soon over and one goblin tried to escape. I picked up a goblin spear and threw it through the last running goblin. The snow around me was coloured black by the blood of my fallen enemies. It was at that moment I realised that it was time. It was my turn to move. If the goblins now crossed their lines and entered “my territories”, they would soon overrun the village with me inside it. I went home to my house to get some sleep.

That night I saw myself on an open field. The ground was white and the sky was blue. Behind me there stood a group of people, maybe around a hundred of them. I turned towards them to ask them where I was, but suddenly the sky turned red and the sun faded. The people looked as scared as I was and began looking around to see what was happening. Then it happened; the people were ripped apart by some invisible force. They were screaming in pain as they were being slain. Soon all of them were lying of the ground bleeding and taking their last breaths. I couldn’t move. I had never seen anything like this…or had I? I suddenly realised that I had seen something like this, 27 years ago.

“Aren’t you going to help them?”, I heard a voice behind me. I turned around, but I didn’t see anyone there. “Are you just going to watch them bleed?” The voice again; it came from above me. I looked up. I was so surprised that I fell backwards when I saw who was talking to me; Garfereas himself. He began laughing.

“So you’re the one who will kill me?”, he said. “You’ll be dead even before it begins”. I stood up. In the same moment Garfereas swung his long sharp tail towards me. I couldn’t avoid it and at the moment it pierced through me I woke up. It was just a dream. It felt so real that I could almost feel the pain from the wound made by the dragon’s tail. This wasn’t a normal nightmare. I had to do something now. I stood up and looked out of my window. It was at least an hour before dawn. I strapped my dagger to my wrist, my sword to my right side, my bow to my back together with my quiver, grabbed a spear and went outside. I looked southwards and saw a hill by the horizon, Garfereas’ hill. There was no need to hold back any more. I began to walk. The walk would take maybe three days if the goblins left me alone. There were a lot of wild animals in the valley so there was no need for me to take food with me.

The first day went well. I didn’t see a single goblin that day. I rested in a cave that I had found when I walked up a hill to get a good view over the surrounding area. When I woke up the next morning I wasn’t alone in the cave. By the cave’s entrance there stood three goblin warriors looking out towards the raging snow storm. I stood up slowly. I drew my sword and began moving towards them. But at the moment I was about to cut down the first one, another goblin turned around and saw me and alarmed the others. I was able to cut down the first goblin before he even turned around, but after that I had to jump backwards to avoid the other goblins’ attacks. The fight was short but violent. The remaining goblins both fell for my sword. I was able to avoid getting any injuries from this fight. I had to be uninjured when it was time to fight Garfereas himself. I picked up all my equipment and went outside. The storm was fading more and more the longer I walked. After maybe an hour of walking the sun was once again shining over the valley. During my walk I climbed many hills which were in my way, but when I reached the top of one hill I saw something that made me change my plans; a huge goblin camp that lay between me and Garfereas’ hill. I sat down on the hill and began to think about my next move. The goblins were weak but faced with such numbers I couldn’t just walk down there and fight them. I had to either walk around the whole camp or then…were there any other things to do? Soon I realised that if I hadn’t sat down here from the beginning and instead began to walk around it directly I probably would’ve been on the other side already. I decided that it’s probably the only thing to do, so I stood up and began to walk around the whole camp. I had come about half way around when a goblin patrol spotted me. There were seven warriors that now ran towards me with drawn weapons. Two fell for my arrows before they reached me, and the rest fell for my sword. No other goblins seemed to have been alarmed by our fighting. Suddenly I realised that there were only six bodies lying on the ground. I looked down towards the camp and saw one goblin running towards it. He was already out of reach, even for my bow. By the moment he reached the camp at least a hundred goblins streamed out of the camp towards my location. There was nothing else to do than just run away as fast as possible. The goblins followed me for a while but after some time they stopped and turned back to their camp. Luckily for me it seemed like they didn’t want to run all day just to get one person. After this little incident I rested by a ridge in the eastern parts of the valley. The night was quite cold, and on the next day it was snowing lightly. I killed a deer to get some food and then I moved on. I followed the ridge for several hours before I reached a huge open flat field. On the other side if the field I saw it; the hill of Garfereas. I had nothing to wait for so I began walking over the field. It seemed to take years to walk over the enormous opening and the hill seemed to be as far away as it was when I began. But after some hours walking I arrived at the foot of the hill which seemed like a mountain when I now stood there. The sun slowly disappeared behind the horizon and I decided to rest in a small cave I found on the hill.

After several days of walking I woke up next morning and knew it was today it was going to happen; my revenge on Garfereas, the day I had been waiting for so many years was about to take place. I stepped out of the cave I had been sleeping in. It was a perfect day. I turned around and looked towards the hilltop. I knew he was somewhere up there, waiting for any easy prey that dared to come close to him. But this time it was his turn to be the prey. I began the last part of my journey half-walking, half-climbing up the hill. Almost half way up something terrible happened; I was walking along a small edge when I suddenly lost foothold and slid down. I was barely able to get hold of a rock sticking out from the hill, but my bow and quiver fell down, so far that I didn’t see or hear them land. It was too far to climb down there so I decided that I had to slay Garfereas with my sword, spear and dagger only. I looked upwards again and saw a small path between two huge rocks, I aimed for that passage and found that it was only a short distance to the top. I ran the last meters and came to a quite big plateau which was the top of the mountain. My heart began beating twice as fast as usual; somewhere here Garfereas laid waiting. I had my spear ready if he should try to surprise me. But he wasn’t the kind of dragon who would fall for that. As soon as he heard me he stood up on his legs and came forth from his hideout and unfolded his wings to show his greatness and maybe even scare me. After looking at me for a moment he asked curiously; “a man? I haven’t seen a man in many years. Who are you and how come you’ve climbed my hill armed as you were about to kill me?”. He wasn’t scared or even a little bit afraid, just happy because this meant that he didn’t have to eat only goblins today. “I’m here to avenge my village. To kill you for everyone you killed on that day”, I answered him to show him that I wasn’t afraid of him. “Your village?” he laughed loudly. “Are you trying to tell me that you’re a survivor of the village that lay in the north corner of this valley?”. “Yes I am”, I answered him directly. I held my spear ready to strike at any moment. He was still about 20 meters away from me. He didn’t say anything for a long time. Then he suddenly broke the silence; “if that is true you have to die…”. He suddenly flew up and flew fast towards me. He was flying too high and would fly over me. Then I suddenly remembered how he used to kill his prey; with an extremely fast swing with his sharp tail. By the moment I realised this he was almost straight above me, I jumped aside as fast as possible, but not fast enough… his tail pierced my right shoulder and almost ripped my arm of. I fell down on my knees. Was it over already? Wasn’t I strong enough to kill him? No… I couldn’t accept it and despite the pain I stood up. My spear was thrown away several meters and as I looked for it I saw it roll over an edge and fall straight down. I couldn’t fight him with just my sword because he would probably never would fly that close to me and always use his tail to pierce me instead. I couldn’t just stand here. I had to figure out something to do. I looked around me, Garfereas was on his way to turn around and come for the next attack. Then I saw it a few metres away from me; there was a opening, a small tunnel, too small for Garfereas but large enough for me. I took a few rapid steps towards it. It went straight down for about three meters. I hesitated for a moment; it was too deep for me to jump into with my arm this damaged. Then I heard Garfereas; “you have got nowhere to hide; I know every part of this mountain”. I stopped hesitating and jumped. I was quite lucky. The bottom of the hole was covered with snow that reduced the impact a lot, but not enough to protect my arm. The pain was almost unbearable. I was lying on the bottom unable to move because of the pain. “Either you will die down there or then you get out of here and let me kill you”, said Garfereas from above the opening of the hole. All my hope faded. What should I do now? It was too high to climb with one arm and what should I do if I got up there? Without my bow or spear I had only my sword to rely on. While I was thinking, I suddenly felt a cold wind. I sat up. I could feel the wind coming from deeper within the mountain, through a small opening beside me. I soon realised that there had to be another opening to the tunnel. I crawled trough the small opening and found myself in a lot larger tunnel. I was able to stand upright and walk the rest of the way. Soon I got to the end of the tunnel and stepped out on a ledge. I walked out to the middle and looked around. There was no way out. It was several meters straight down in all directions. “Trying to run away?” I heard Garfereas behind me. I turned around and saw him flying towards me for another attack. This time I was able to jump aside in time, but I landed on my right arm and almost failed to stand up after that. But I forced myself up and ran to hide behind a rock. Right before I reached the rock I tripped on something and fell to the ground. When I laid there I realised that I couldn’t hide. Blood from my arm would leave a red trail in the snow and show Garfereas exactly where I went. I sat leaning towards the rock. Then I began looking for what I tripped on. It was beneath the snow so I felt with my hand after it. It was root…no, it was too straight to be that, it was some kind of stick. I tried to figure out how long it was, then I realised what it was; my spear. When it fell it must have landed on this ledge. But now I didn’t have time to think, Garfereas saw me and came flying towards me with his jaws open. This time he was flying low to strike straight on his target. I did not have much time to think but I figured out a plan that could work. Garfereas had not yet seen the spear. So I stood up with my right foot on the spears end. Garfereas came closer all the time. This was my last chance to do anything. By the moment he almost touched me I grabbed the spear and raised its tip from the snow right in front of him. He saw this and realised that it was too late to turn away. The spear pierced his throat. The dragon in pain turned away from his target and flew over my right shoulder. But he didn’t turn enough. His huge claws hit me and I was thrown backward. I landed with my face turned towards the dragon. He wasn’t able to do anything about the spear which was stuck half into his throat. He was moving back and forth in pain and suddenly the end of the spear hit a rock and was pushed deeper into the dragon’s body and pierced his heart. He roared a last loud roar before he gave up his breath and fell to the snowy ground. Garfereas was no more. I had succeeded in my one and only task. But was it really this I wanted out of my life? I wasn’t able to move any part of my body, I was completely shredded and it was getting harder to breath. The snow around me was red, coloured by my own blood, the same colour as it was on that day so long ago. I looked at my lifeless right arm; my dagger was still strapped to the wrist. “Father, I did it. I killed the one that killed you so many years ago.” I was proud of myself. My life had existed for one purpose; to kill the one that took everyone I knew away from me. Now I had completed it. I felt death coming closer and closer all the time. I knew I had only minutes left to live, maybe seconds, but I wasn’t afraid of death anymore. Death had shown me its power 27 years ago, that was enough for me. It was time. I was drawing my last painful breaths. Before everything began to fade I asked myself the question again; “Was this what I wanted out of my life?”. Now I had an answer to that question… yes…

-RcaH