A convoy was running steadily along a dirt road toward the Jewel of Loderan, city of Soalde, as clouds of dust rose in their wake. A long line of travelers rode or walked along together like a herd of animals, and like most creatures, they felt safety in numbers.
The braying from beasts of burden was minimal; each horse, donkey, and other domesticated breed felt wary of causing a ruckus in the presence of what lay at the convoy’s lead. At the front, leading the precession were two armored salamanders that caused the ground to tremble as they crawled with limbs like tree trunks and bodies like river boats. The creatures pulled an intricate carriage that resembled a house, with door, windows and even a roof. Sage symbols covered the vehicle in a coat of crackling magic.
A painted emblem on the side of it read, “Verdinant Transportation Company”.
The vehicles surrounding this carriage had sage symbols crackling as well, and each pulled by beasts typically found out in the wild, each a monster with its own life core. The sight was something to behold—a vision of what Soalde was—powerful, innovative and pressing ever onward. None of the wild beasts seemed strained, the pulled vehicles were soundless, and everyone riding within them could not feel the ride at all—sage symbols keeping everything within cut off from the dreariness and harshness of travel.
Behind these technological marvels, trudging through the dirt and eating the dust the main body of the convoy kicked up were those that joined up to use the Verdinant Transportation Company’s strength for protection. Neither bandit nor beast would wander too close to the convoy with all the power that it possessed, which created a safe haven around it for those on the road that moved with them.
“Bleh,” a person the size of child gagged, tasting the dust in the air and looking with narrowed eyes at the swaying rear ends of the magical beasts at the front. Their large forms and the size of the vehicles they pulled caused a near sandstorm worth of dust. “Fat, stupid animals and those pompous carriages…”
An old man with a brush of a moustache looked to see the small person and with friendly smile, advised, “Little girls should talk like the ladies they will become one day.”
“I’m not child,” the small person coughed awkwardly, staring up at the gray old man.
Under the hood of a traveler’s cloak, the old man could see mature golden eyes and a tan face without the softness of youth. The sides of the person’s hood stuck out slightly in an unexplainable way. Near him, a woman wearing a bandanna to keep sweat off her face recognized the shapes sticking out of the hood as ears. She cupped her hands against the side of the old man’s head and whispered something. The old man turned back to the short person and scowled, “Filthy elf.”
The woman in the bandanna pulled against his arm to move elsewhere, not wanting to make a scene. She muttered, “Let’s just go over there, Harro.”
“Why should I move? I fought these damned elves in the war. I’ll be damned if I move for one,” he shouted. “Let go of me, Jiel!”
The woman eventually pulled the old man away, but not without glaring at the elf underneath the cloak. The elf kept her face forward and held her head with pride but inwardly, she felt lost.
Nature’s mercy, I don’t want to be here.
For comfort, she readjusted the straps on her shoulders, straps which led to a bulky pack that outsized her. The pack was full of her things—the only things that she was able to fit after being kicked out of her home. More than anything, she desperately wanted to be in her hut with her things and to be singing woodland melodies, but she was no longer welcomed. She had committed a grave sin that none of her people would defend her for.
She bit her lip. Why didn’t anyone stand up for her? She could still see the faces of her friends retreating into the crowd as she called out their names, her parents both looking away in shame when she sought succor from them.
I don’t belong anywhere now, and no one cares…
Rumor of an elf being among them had begun to spread around their part of the convoy. People began shifting away from her like she had a disease. The isolation clawed at her senses and made her feel like she was drifting in the middle of the ocean with no land in sight.
The elongated ears on elf heads weren’t just for show. She could hear the people around her whispering and cursing under their breath as they wished her harm. She could feel them stealing glances at her, disgust and hatred emanating from every stare.
A shadow suddenly covered her short form. Someone had approached from behind. The elf felt this was the time of her demise. She knew of the hatred between Loderan and elves. After the war all those years ago, elves have been all but ousted from these lands. Some were out rightly killed.
She thought she would be ready to die after all that she had been through, but now, with death looming over her head, she found she didn’t want to perish. Fear robbed her of her balance, and she crashed into the dirt. Hurriedly, she rolled over to face the human that would take her life.
She screeched, “I’m Ahweldi! My people didn’t fight in your blooming war. It was the Hyynul clan!”
Above her, a man with a narrow face stood looking down on her like an executioner. He had short, stylized hair as dark as ink that shone in the sunlight. Piercing blue eyes could be seen behind thin spectacles as the man gazed upon her. The sun cast glares off sparse metallic armor that covered the vulnerable parts of his body while what was underneath seemed like silk.
But the elf’s entire focus was on his waist where there hung a thin blade taller than she was.
He didn’t go for his weapon however, and instead said, “We are walking.”
“Huh?” She responded, perplexed.
“You have fallen and we must keep walking.”
Those around them watched, waiting on something to transpire between the two, but everyone kept a move on whilst doing so. Getting left behind and being away from the safety of the convoy would be ill advised. Beasts and bandits always targeted those that couldn’t keep up, like predators that hunted the slowest among a herd of prey.
The fear in the elf girl’s eyes dwindled somewhat seeing the swordsman had no ill intentions.
“We are walking,” the swordsman said again.
“I can see that…” she murmured as she attempted to rise only to realize her heavy pack held her down. Feeling like a turtle turned over on its shell, she wiggled to and fro in attempt to get up.
“We are walking,” the swordsman repeated a third time, “Convoys are meant to move. We are a part of the convoy, so we move.”
Exasperated grunts and dust rose from the struggling elf girl as she tried her best to get to her feet. The swordsman watched emotionlessly. After a few minutes, the elf girl became tired.
The swordsman opened his mouth to speak, but she cut him off, “I know we are walking! But as you can see, I can’t move.”
“That is untrue,” he denied, “I saw movement.”
The elf wanted to curse at this rude human, but the hostility of this land toward her kind kept her words inside her throat.
The swordsman looked up to see the convoy begin to create distance. The elf girl made it to her side and then reached across to try and roll onto her belly. She decided she would push herself up in that manner. When she eventually turned over, the pack squashed her and put her face in the dirt.
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“I want to go home,” she cried, moistening the soil below with snot and tears.
“I don’t want to go home,” the swordsman stated, “I am wandering. Sir Wakkesh said wandering makes the swordsman.” He tilted his head to get a better view of the flattened elf beneath the heavy pack. “I’m a swordsman. Would you like to see my sword skills?”
“I can’t see anything,” the elf girl sniffed, her voice muffled by the ground, “Just this stupid dirt that’s a part of this stupid land where I have to stupidly pass through to get to the elven realm of Antherai.”
She began to ascend like a deceased soul toward the afterlife. Her gold eyes were fixed on a pale hand holding her up by her pack before lowering her. On her feet, she looked up at the tall swordsman, who nodded with satisfaction.
“Now,” he said, “Look.” He unsheathed his sword to the sound of ringing metal. A clear burst of mana from him pushed the elf girl back a step. Her breath left her body witnessing the power he exuded. Like silver streaks of light, his sword moved in a burst of cuts her eyes couldn’t keep up with.
The ringing filling the air abruptly halted when the sword found its way back into its sheath.
“That was some of my sword techniques,” he said with closed eyes, tilting his head up with pride.
The elf girl didn’t know what to say or why he was showing her this. Was it intimidation? Her golden eyes caught the sight of the convoy and it was nearly the size of her thumb on the horizon.
“The convoy…!” she squeaked.
“Hmm?” the swordsman murmured and saw that they were about to be left behind. “I have to stay with the convoy. My father said so.”
Dust exploded underneath the swordsman as some of it hit the elf in the face. When she cleared her eyes and spat out muck, she found the swordsman gone. In the distance, she soon spotted him already several yards away. He was moving with impeccable speed toward the fleeting image of the convoy.
She stood there alone on the road in the middle of the wilderness with no one around. From somewhere in the distance emanated the sound of a lonely wolf howling.
“I want to go home,” she bawled.
Hours later.
Night had fallen when the sight of a glowing city in the distance caused hope to seep into her tired bones. No longer would she have to walk endlessly. There in that marvelous city that surpassed the moon in splendor, she could finally rest.
Sometime later, the elf girl made it to one of the city’s enormous gates.
Just a bit further…She thought as her body trudged along, a walking stick she’d picked up in her hands.
Two white-armored guards stood at the gate, watching a hood covered, tiny young woman with a dirt-matted face approach them. “Halt, who goes there?” One of the guards barked.
The elf girl’s arms trembled as she held herself steady with her stick in order to reach into her pocket and produced a parchment, then held it out to them.
“My name is Poly, and I had received permission from the captain of the escort guard of the Verdinant Transport Company convoy to be able to travel alongside them,” she croaked, her throat parched.
Holding up the parchment and reading it, the guard replied, “They arrived some time ago.”
“I know. I got separated from them and then got lost. The wilds don’t speak as clearly here as they do back home.”
The guards stiffened. The elf girl, Poly, couldn’t understand their reaction. One guard closed the distance between them and pulled back her hood, exposing her pointed ears and dark hair that had a strange tinge of green.
“Damned elf,” the other guard said under his breath, but to Poly, her elf ears could hear his words clearly.
Pulling up her hood, she coughed to clear her throat and said, “If everything is settled, then I’ll be on my way.” Poly could only take a single step forward before an arm wrapped in white armor descended and blocked her path.
“There happens to be a toll,” the guard keeping her back said without expression, but in his eyes, Poly could see rage. He must’ve been another person affected by the past war with elves.
“How much?” Poly asked, willing to abide with their extortion. She had to get into the city tonight no matter what. She couldn’t sleep out in wilds that couldn't speak. As much of these lands as the humans transformed, they never truly tamed any part of it, allowing the area to become violent without a caring hand to guide it properly. There were also the roving bandit gangs that plagued the roads around the prosperous white city which only increased the danger of being outside the city’s walls.
"Six silver crupels," the guard said, his cold eyes unblinking.
Without hesitation, Poly showed fourteen bits of afleurs—elven silver equal to six crupels. She had read about the human world before coming here and knew of the exchange rate between Ahweldi and Loderan money.
She could see in the guard’s face that she had guessed the amount correctly, but he didn’t bother with the money after it was in his hand. “Open your bag and let us search it for contraband,” he ordered.
Poly felt the sting of tears in her eyes. They weren’t interested in valuables. They just wanted to harass her for being an elf.
“Hey,” a voice said, coming up to them from the open gate, “Have you two seen my beard comb anywhere? When I finished my shift, I couldn’t find it anywhere…”
Poly saw another guard had come, this one with a curlier beard than the original pair.
“Hewy,” said one of the guards about to take off Poly’s pack.
The newcomer, Hewy, looked from the two guards surrounding Poly to the silver pieces in one of the guards’ hands.
“That’s illegal,” Hewy remarked solemnly.
The guard with the silver dropped the bits on the ground and gave Hewy a long look before saying, “I was just holding it for her.”
The other guard began frantically, “She’s a dirt worshipper! A damned elf!”
Without a word, Hewy bent down and picked up the dropped silver bit by bit and opened Poly’s hand and dropped the money into her palm. Looking at her, he gestured his head toward the open city gates and Poly ran off, and as she did, she gave him an emotional nod in thanks.
Hewy looked silently back to the two guards one by one before walking away, shaking his head.
“My pa died in the war,” one of the guards shouted at Hewy’s departing back. “Wasn’t your family killed by them as well?” Hewy had passed the gates. “What would they say if they saw you right now?!”
Pale light covered Poly as she stood under the glow of sage symbols protecting the white rabbit district. She had come this far, yet she couldn’t go farther.
What’s the point of high walls only to have a magic barrier right after it? She wondered, aching to have someplace to rest.
“Who’s this?”
Poly looked around for who was speaking and noticed a bald man clad in black with a single diamond shape of white scales on his tunic, the only piece of bright color on his attire.
“You lost, pretty one?” He asked, his eyes holding a devious light.
“I’m quite alright, thank you,” Poly answered and began to back away. Her pack got caught on something. Behind her stood another man with the same white scale diamond emblem on his clothes that also was black.
“You need help with this mighty heavy pack?” He asked, flashing at her a malicious smile with all his teeth.
Poly shook her head, rejecting the offer and made to move, but he wouldn’t release his hold on her pack.
“Come now,” he cooed, pretending to be caring, “Allow me to ease your burdens.”
A third man was with them and he unsheathed a dagger, its blade reflecting the crackling magic of the nearby sage symbol barrier.
At the sight of the weapon, Poly unlatched herself from her pack and ran. A hand gripped her cloak, almost tripping her, but she unclasped her cloak in time to escape his grasps. The two other men began to laugh.
“Nice catch, idiot,” cackled one of them.
The man who failed to grab Poly suddenly whooped, “That’s an elf!” The other two focused on the tiny figure with pointed ears running into the dark, greed filling their eyes. “One of you stay with that pack of goodies and the other with me. Elves are worth their weight in gold at the slave auction. We have to catch her!”
Two of the men chased Poly until they had to give up after seeing her exit the city through the eastern gate. Even thugs like them were wary to leave the safety of the city at night.
Outside the gate, Poly ran until she found a forest, the familiar sight of trees reminding her exhausted mind of home and luring her in. Once deep enough into the woods, she slumped down at the foot of a tree. She stared up at the canopy of the forest and whispered elven magic, but none of the nature here answered her. She tried again and the land remained quiet.
She didn’t stop speaking elven magic until sleep took her.
A constant sound of something being hit woke her. Poly groggily took in the fact that the sun had returned and morning arrived. The events of the night before came to her in a rush, causing her to hug her knees and cry. She had lost everything—her home, her family, her friends, her people, and now her stuff. It felt like the world was trying to destroy her sanity.
The sound of hitting continued.
What is that, she wondered as she sniffed with her dripping nose then wiped her tears. The sound was so rapid and continuous that it broke her out of her wretched state. Walking through trees, she noticed this forest was bare of fruit and animals. She was getting closer to the sound of whatever was being battered. Poly held a hand up to block out the bright sun as she walked out from the shadows of the forest.
The first thing she saw was a shirtless young man hitting a large sack of bulky cloth dangling from a tree limb by a chain. He had messy rust colored hair and his muscles were toned like a wild cat. His face seemed lost in the rhythm of his strange movements as he punched and kicked at the bulk of cloth.
His brown eyes turned to her. She took a step back in hesitancy. He stopped moving and awed at the sight of her.
“Whoa, man,” the young man spoke in a strange accent, “Looks like the universe took you for a wild ride, sister.”
What? Poly thought, confused. Why would a human call me “sister”?
“Alright, alright, alright,” he said, nodding like he was hearing music, “I’ve been there, sister. When you surf the waves, you’re bound to wipe out eventually, am I right?” He stuck out a thumb and pinky then wiggled his hand.
Poly couldn’t help it, finding herself mimicking the gesture as she wiggled her hand with her thumb and pinky out.
“Righteous,” the young man said, still nodding.