Year 3043 AGD
Month: Ragnós
Second Sixthday
Continent of Terroval
Southwest of Asylum
Victor awoke with a start. Was I dreaming? He knew it was more than a dream, but he couldn’t wrap his mind around the concept. I have to do something. Rolling out of his bedroll, Victor went across the camp to where Nim sat on watch.
“Nim, I have something I want to talk to you about.”
“What is it, Victor?” Nim asked. “Here, come sit down.”
Victor sat next to Nim, trying to figure out how to phrase what he was about to say. Nim sat and silently stared out at the land below. The sun was starting to light the sky, but it hadn’t yet crested the horizon. Victor knew that Nim would give him time to think about what he wanted to say. Think first, speak second, Nim had told him what seemed like a long time ago.
“I think… No, I know that Shawnrik, Ashur, and Dunnagan are in trouble,” Victor said cautiously. “I had a… dream, but it wasn’t a dream,” he added quickly. “I talked to Shawnrik. He’s in pain, Nim. I don’t know if Dunnagan and Ashur are, but I know he was. It was dulling his speech. He couldn’t remember things. Nim, it takes a lot of pain for that to happen, doesn’t it?”
Nim’s attention had turned to Victor. “You say you dreamed of Shawnrik?”
“It wasn’t a dream though,” Victor said. “I couldn’t see him. Everything was white, but I could hear him.”
“I don’t think it was a dream, Victor,” Nim said quickly.
“I told you it wasn’t… you don’t?” Victor looked cautiously at his mentor to see if he was being lied to, but he couldn’t detect it on his friend’s face.
“No, I don’t. I have heard of this before. It’s not common, but every once in a while, someone strong in the blood can develop a bond with a person. When they are in distress, it can trigger the bond, allowing them to communicate on a different plane of thought.” Nim was deep in thought, considering what to do next.
“That sounds… ridiculous,” Victor said finally.
Nim laughed. “So does talking to your friend in your sleep, Victor.”
Victor had to concede that point, so he left his mind open to considering the prospect. “That means that Shawnrik is really in a lot of pain, Nim. I think something was dulling the pain, but I don’t think it works all that well.”
Nim knew what was probably occurring with Shawnrik, but he had been feeling uneasy for a while now and all he needed was Victor’s dream to tell him something wasn’t right. “We should be back in camp two days from now. We can ask Zander if he will scry the location of our friends. I’ll ask Bredwin if he will divine their location, but I don’t think he would be strong enough to break through any interference we may encounter.”
∞∞∞
As it happened, Nim was right. Bredwin had been able to discern that the three were in fact southwest of Stalwart, but he couldn’t pinpoint their exact location. For the last two days, the dwarf had been enjoying a rather pounding headache.
“I hate orc runes. They can’t be like dwarven runes and just keep ya’ out, they have ta go an’ make it hurt, too.”
He had been complaining ever since they had asked him, but Victor knew that it was just to mask the fact that he had failed. No one out of this group liked to admit defeat. No one blamed Bredwin for his not being able to break through the barrier. It seemed all of them had met Ashur or Dunnagan at one time or another and they knew that if someone was strong enough to capture them, then they were strong indeed.
As they reached the tents their squad had left for sleeping quarters, Nim dropped his gear and motioned for Victor to do the same, and then started off towards the command tents. Victor quickly followed and caught up after a dozen paces. Nothing had changed in the last eleven days, but Victor felt different. Since their encounter with the dracair scouting party, Victor had become a more intricate part of the squad. Each member seemed to take the training they had been giving him to a new level. He was exhausted, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to sleep again until he knew where Shawnrik was, or until his body gave out from being so drained of energy.
The guards were the same two that had been at the tent’s door last time he and Nim had gone in, and they both quickly saluted. Victor saw the smirk that came to Nim’s face just then, but he didn’t comment on it. He was too busy hoping that Zander had come back from his patrol before theirs had and hadn’t left again yet. When Nim opened the tent flap and they entered, Victor let loose a sigh of relief that almost landed him on the floor as his body released all of the tension he had unknowingly been storing. Nim placed a hand on Victor’s shoulder to steady him.
Zander stood at the right side of the giant table, which was also a map. He looked up from the map and smiled, but his grin quickly slid from his face when he saw how tired Victor looked. Stewart Cantel stood as he had the last time, with his back towards the door, examining the map that showed all of the intel they had gathered thus far. Victor had heard stories about Stewart Cantel over the last two weeks from Nim’s squad. According to them, there were very good reasons that this small man was High Commander of the Knights.
From all that Victor had heard, he thought that if he threw his knife at the man’s back, Cantel would be able to catch it without looking away from the map. Victor had seen some of the man’s speed when he was under his tutelage for a short period of time, and even that little bit had been astounding. He may not have the brute strength that General Theromvore possessed, but his speed ensured that he would be in and out of an enemy’s defenses before they knew what was happening.
The high commander must have noticed Zander’s frown, because he turned around and quickly headed straight for Victor. “What have you been doing to the boy, Nim? He can barely stand.”
Nim rolled his eyes when Victor ineffectually tried slapping away Stewart Cantel’s hands as the man picked him up and brought him over to a cot in the corner of the tent. “Don’t coddle the boy,” Nim said defensively.
“Coddle… Coddle! I’m just putting him here so I don’t have to see him pass out halfway through our conversation.” High Commander Cantel had his hand on Victor’s chest so that he couldn’t sit up.
“I’m fine,” Victor said before a big yawn overtook him.
“If you’re fine, then Nim is the worst card player I’ve ever seen,” Zander said, laughing.
“Hey,” Nim said, sounding even more defensive. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Just that I don’t know anyone who knows you who’ll play cards with you anymore,” Zander said, the grin evident in his tone.
“I don’t cheat,” Nim said in a sulky voice.
“I have no doubt of that. It is a little amazing how you seem to know a deck so well, though, but that is beside the point. What have you been doing to the boy?”
“I swear to Thom, if people keep talking about me like I am not here, I’m going to cut out some hearts,” Victor said angrily. All three men looked at Victor with surprise, before breaking out into laughter as he yawned once again. Victor quit trying to force himself up in a great sigh of defeat.
“No disrespect meant, Victor,” Cantel said, moving his hand away. He looked at Nim, expecting an answer.
“Well, the squad decided that they were going to teach him when we had breaks. Though Trenton took him firmly under his wing after he had been injured by the Magnus Dracani,” Nim said.
“Trenton… that’s the half-ogre battlesorcerer in your squad, right?” Zander asked.
Nim nodded. “Victor was very interested in some of the Shapings that Trenton was enacting, and when everyone found out that the boy had a knack for… well, just about everything, they all took it upon themselves to teach their trade to him. That didn’t leave much time for him to rest, but he was sleeping well until two days ago. That’s when he had an extrasensory communication with Shawnrik. He hasn’t been able to sleep since.”
Zander, Tetriarch of the Sorcerers, and Stewart Cantel, High Commander of the Knights of the Protectorate, both turned their heads back towards Victor. He didn’t like the looks they were giving him. He knew that as military men, they would both think first of how they could use that ability to some greater purpose. The next thing he knew, Zander would be trying to study him like a bug under a looking glass. The next question that Stewart Cantel asked surprised Victor.
“You said Victor had an interest in the Shapings Grimbash had enacted? From what I remember, his skills are rather specialized. What were you fighting?”
“Oh, didn’t I mention we ran into a dracair patrol our third day out?” Nim said nonchalantly.
“Why Nim, no you didn’t,” Cantel said with a look that said he would brook no foolishness.
Nim sighed. “We ran into a patrol about three leagues southeast of Asylum, near Undrik’s Rise.”
“What’s Undrik’s Rise?” Victor asked Nim, but it was Stewart Cantel that answered him, with a hint of pride in his voice.
“It’s the rise where Undrik Raffalion fought off two dracair patrols alone before succumbing to his wounds. When they found the bodies, there were other dracair tracks that had come along afterwards, but they hadn’t disturbed the ground. If there is one thing the Dracair respect, it is strength, and that day, Undrik showed his strength with four warriors and two dreadnaughts headless on or near the rise. The Protectorate buried him under that rise, even though it was in dracair territory.”
Victor watched as the three men in the room bowed their heads in a moment of silence in remembrance of an honored dead. It was the tales of men like him that kept the Protectorate strong, and it was men like that who were the strength of the Protectorate.
“So, you met a patrol?” Zander asked when the moment of silence was over. “We didn’t see even a track farther south.”
Nim nodded. “Normal patrol, two Dracani and a Magnus Dracani.”
“I wish you wouldn’t call them that; why can’t you just say warriors and a dreadnaught, like everyone else?” Stewart Cantel said peevishly.
“Just because we give them a different name doesn’t eliminate the first. Ignoring that something exists is just the first step to ignorance,” Nim chided.
“Always instructing,” the high commander said, shaking his head. “Did you find out what the patrol was after?”
“No. From all I could gather, they were just scouting the area. Whoever is in charge of that rabble of orcs and goblin-kin probably requested a competent scouting party.” Nim walked over to the table that contained the map of all of the troop movements in the area as he spoke.
“I think they are going to move soon. You can only keep an army like that at bay for so long. From what I have gathered, you want me to scry to see if Ashur is in trouble?” Zander said, walking up beside Nim.
“No, my friend, I know they are in trouble.” Nim saw the questioning look that Zander shot him and forestalled any question by speaking quickly. “I had Bredwin, the dwarven cleric in my patrol, do a divining. Someone, or something, blocked him pretty hard.”
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“Oh, I see.” The Tetriarch of the Sorcerers walked to the tent flap and barked an order. “I need a mirror, a big one.” A moment of silence ensued. “Did I stutter?”
“No, Tetriarch Halcyon, I’ll get right on it,” the soldier said, followed by the sound of quick bootsteps.
“I think between you and I, we might scare that boy into retirement,” Nim said with a chuckle.
Zander turned back into the tent laughing. “He’s a good lad, just a little green. He’ll be back soon.”
The three men stood talking at the table about what was going to happen in the coming days. The soldier soon returned carrying a full-length mirror along with three other soldiers he must have picked up along the way.
“That is perfect,” Zander said, examining the mirror. “Good work, Private.”
“Thank you, sir.” The guard said with a salute, and the men with him did the same when they had set the mirror up. Stewart Cantel gave them a salute, dismissing the soldiers, before walking over to the mirror.
“I never liked the fact that mages could do this. It’s an invasion of privacy.”
“It may be that, my friend,” Zander said to Cantel, “but it is also a useful tool for finding things other people don’t want found.”
Unlike the preparations and incantations that Bredwin had gone through when he was divining, Zander’s use of the mirror was silent and almost instantaneous.
“I am scrying a general area to reduce the chances of interference. It takes a lot of energy to use this kind of warding, so the area won’t be very large.” The image got closer and closer until it stopped with a sound much like a pealing bell. “Ah, there we are.” The image before them was of a camp of blood orcs. They seemed to be in a box canyon, and they didn’t appear to be going anywhere anytime soon. “That’s a nice-sized camp. Ashur, Dunnagan, and the boy are in there.”
“Well then, I don’t see any reason we should wait; you have to go get them, Nim,” High Commander Cantel stated.
“But what about the war?” Nim asked cautiously. It was obvious that he wanted to go and rescue his friends, but he also knew he had a duty here.
“We need Colonel Theromvore here. He is one of the best morale boosters for the troops. You and Zander help morale, but if all three of you are here, the men will feel invincible. You must go get him without delay.”
“Yes, sir,” Nim said, saluting with a smirk.
“Zander, you go with them.” Forestalling any protest, Cantel held up his hand. “That’s an order. You can travel the lines of power, and it will be much faster this way.”
“Yes, sir!” Zander said, saluting smartly.
Rolling his eyes, High Commander Cantel turned back towards the map. “Leave in the morning. Tonight, we have some things to discuss…”
Victor tried to listen to the conversation, but he found blackness enveloping him. They were going to go help their friends; he knew he would need all the rest he could get.
Victor held onto the reins of his young charger as the party raced northeast. The last five days had been torture on his senses. Ever since he had spoken to Shawnrik, he had slept fitfully. He had tolerated the first two days, in which they had needed to get back to the Protectorate camp. He wasn’t so happy about the day they spent in camp resting and readying supplies and equipment, however.
They had finally left the next morning, taking the lines of power back to his home, back to Safeharbor. As they approached the platform to enter the lines, Victor had felt a brief thrill of anticipation at being able to travel the lines again. Even that didn’t last long, however. It felt good to be home, but he couldn’t wait to leave again.
To his bitter disappointment, their journey north had not continued that day. It seemed that it would take some time to find enough of the hybrid mounts that possessed enough intelligence to travel the lines. According to Zander and the grey elf wizard Za’kereth, only creatures with enough intelligence and draconic blood could travel the lines safely. The fact that they needed to find mounts for two full squads plus three extra people hadn’t made things any easier. It had taken Nim that entire day to find the twenty-three horses needed.
Victor had been glad that McDowell’s Vigilantes and Zander’s Blood Hounds had ‘volunteered’ to go with them. Soon, it became apparent that neither squad could be turned from the endeavor. Having so many well-trained soldiers was comforting, but the wait it had spawned had not been. To make matters worse, Bartholomew reported that Lia had left Nim’s manor a week before, and Jenn could not find out where she had gone.
Victor spent most of that day sharpening his daggers and pacing. He had found two dagger belts in the room where Nim had put his cache of equipment they had procured from the Assassins’ Guild. Each belt had ten sheaths that held throwing daggers. It had taken some modification, but Bartholomew had finally gotten them so that they would fit Victor efficiently. The next thing he had found that was of interest was a belt buckle that hid four metal stars. When he had asked Bartholomew about them, the man had been very impressed with their quality. He had then continued into a dissertation on how they were used properly. It seemed that it was much the same as throwing a knife, with a few modifications on the flick. His ensemble had been completed by the two forearm sheaths, two boot sheaths, and the sheath for the back of his neck. At his side, he wore the dagger that Shaylyn had given him the morning before she had disappeared.
When the evening was wearing to an end, Victor had gone to practice while there was still good light. Going back to the yard where Nim, Ashur, Shawnrik, and himself had spent so many hours since the beginning of the year had made him feel a bit nostalgic. The yard had been set aside for training, and as he rounded the corner, he realized it was once again being used for that purpose as the familiar ring of metal on metal met his ears.
The fact that most of the soldiers were in the training yard made him feel better about his need to practice, but the thought of practicing in front of all of these professional soldiers made him flush with embarrassment. Practicality had won over his discomfiture, however. He needed the practice, and he had needed to get used to his new array of daggers, no matter what the squads would think of him. The first person Victor had really noticed was Elandria, who was shooting at an archery target next to a human male he recognized from Zander’s squad. Victor passed behind the two and continued onward towards the far end of the yard, as far away as he could get from everyone else. This was the part of the yard he normally used anyway, as it possessed target dummies roughly people-shaped specifically for the purpose of throwing practice.
Testing his new-found throwing daggers, he quickly learned that they were as well-balanced as the other daggers he had been using for the last year. Doing as Ol’ Man Walkins and then Nim had taught him, he had focused on his target, aware of his immediate surroundings but keeping his target always in sight. He did as Nim had shown him, imagining all of the different scenarios he could face and working on countering each.
So focused had he been on his practice that he didn’t notice the crowd he had gathered until he had thrown the last of the twenty daggers for the third time, from the new belts which were arrayed across his chest. It took a murmur of approval and a few soft whistles of appreciation for him to notice, and when he turned his head, both squads were standing about twenty yards away, just out of the area he had been focused on.
He felt his face flush, but his embarrassment couldn’t last long under the approval that was coming from the soldiers, as it quickly turned to a sense of pride. That was, until McDowell decided he had to play the role of Sergeant.
“Aye, nice work there laddie, but yer belts seem a bit empty to me,” he intoned gruffly.
“If anyone is alive after that flurry of metal, they deserve the kill,” Trenton Grimbash said with a grin, which was followed by a mirthful agreement from the rest of the soldiers assembled.
Victor had never taken criticism well, and his pride made something click inside of him. A grin spread across his face, and McDowell’s visage turned to that of curiosity. Before the sergeant had been able to voice any of that curiosity, however, Victor was a blur of motion. Diving into a roll, he pulled the daggers out of his boot sheaths, and let loose as he came around; a breath later, two more daggers appeared in his hands with a flick of his wrists, joining the first two on their way towards the second target. He dropped into a spin, pulling the last of his concealed daggers from the sheath at the back of his neck, and let loose.
All of it had felt like one smooth motion that Victor had never accomplished before that time, but his thoughts on the matter only lasted long enough to hear the thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, of his daggers hitting their marks perfectly. Not finished, he had released the latch of his belt buckle and removed the stars hidden within and smoothly flicked them at another target as Bartholomew had taught him to do. Earlier, it had been a clumsy motion, but now they left his hands as if he had done it a thousand times before.
Without watching to see the stars hit their target, Victor turned towards the sergeant, who was clearly trying to suppress the fact that Victor had impressed him. Pulling out the dagger that Shaylyn had given him with a deliberate casualness, Victor then turned towards another of the targets in the ring. He threw the dagger as hard as he could; they all watched as it struck deeply between the crude eyes that were carved on the dummy.
When he heard the chuckles that were directed towards the sergeant and the intakes of breath at his display, he found that he couldn’t help himself from showing off more. He Shaped a small amount of energy and turned towards one of the two remaining dummies in the ring, and in moments, four balls of compressed force sped towards the dummy.
As the missiles left his hand, he began pulling in more energy, a grin of sardonic amusement spread across his face the entire time. A ball of flame soon leapt from his hand towards the last of the targets, and as it hit, it enveloped the dummy and the area around it in flames. He decided at that moment that he was done showing off. His grin returned as he thought back to that moment. Never before had he felt the urge to show off, but as he looked back at the moment, he realized that he had no control over the matter. As a last act of defiance, Victor turned towards the first of the dummies, and he began removing his daggers from it so that no one could see how big his smile was.
They left Safeharbor the following morning and had now been on the trail for a full day. Leaving Safeharbor had not been the invigorating experience their trip through the lines of power to the Protectorate camp had been. It had started out nicely, but when he was forcibly ripped from the line and hit the ground hard, he realized that it was not the same kind of trip. He assumed it had something to do with the preparation of an area as an exit point. He had watched as the horses came through and landed almost softly, bending their legs as if they had done this before.
When they were getting ready to start out that morning, Victor had asked Zander how long it would take for them to reach the location where Ashur and Shawnrik were. The answer was a non-committal “four days.” The grin he had gotten moments before faded as he thought again about that destination. Wherever it was, Shawnrik was in pain, and they couldn’t get there soon enough for Victor’s taste.
Hold on Shawnrik; we are coming.
Year 3043 AGD
Month: Ragnós
Third Eighthday
Continent of Terroval
Southwest of Stalwart
Blood Orc Encampment
Hold on Shawnrik; we are almost there.
“Victor,” Shawnrik said, sitting up with a start. He had gained consciousness twice before from such a message, but he could not tell how long it was between messages. He had been in excruciating pain the last two times, so the only thing he had done was open his eyes and then fall back into unconsciousness. He expected it was days, but he was not lucid enough to tell for sure.
The unbearable pain that had been his bane had been abating little by little, and as he looked around, he realized that it was now almost completely gone. All that remained was a dull ache in his muscles, as if he had done a hard day’s work the day before. Looking around, he realized he was on the stone slab in the corner of the cell he shared with his two companions.
Shawnrik slowly sat up. His body felt unfamiliar, and he quickly realized, as the blanket fell to the floor, that he was also only wearing his under cloth. Quickly grabbing the blankets, he wrapped them about himself as he tried to stand. Shawnrik saw Dunnagan awaken at the noise he was making, and the old dwarf rose quickly and moved to Shawnrik’s side.
“Careful lad, don’t move around too much,” Dunnagan said, looking at Shawnrik as if he were made of glass.
Awakened by Dunnagan’s voice, Ashur came to suddenly. He jumped to his feet as Shawnrik swayed, the blood rushing to his head. Shawnrik sat back down carefully with the help of his friends.
“I told ya, lad,” Dunnagan said chidingly. However, he was smiling as he said it.
Both men stood there, looking at him as if they had not seen him in years.
“First question,” Shawnrik said slowly. “Where are my clothes?”
Both men let out a sigh of relief as if his speaking had been their cue.
“Lad,” Dunnagan began with a chuckle. “Ye’ve outgrown yer britches. We had ta cut ‘em off of ye. They were restrictin’ the blood flow through yer body.”
Shawnrik looked at his small friend as if he had gone insane but continued on anyway. “Alright,” he said, taking a deep breath. “Second question. What in the nine hells are you talking about?”
“Let me take this one, Dunn,” Ashur said, moving up beside Shawnrik. “Here, let me help you up, lad.”
Taking his friend’s arm for support, Shawnrik immediately felt that something was wrong. Standing shakily, his hands quivered as he looked down into Ashur’s eyes.
Deep Within Dracair Territory
“Everything is falling into place, Temendri,” Yandarian said with a grin.
“Yes, soon the trap will be sprung. It was ingenious to use bait to catch even bigger bait so that we could get him to come to us.”
Both of the men clothed in blood red robes laughed at their own deviousness.
“By tomorrow night, the boy will come to us, whether he wants to or not,” Yandarian intoned with sardonic amusement.
“Yes, I think he will enjoy what we have planned for him. If they only knew what they were riding into,” Temendri said in quiet glee as he looked into the pool of blood below him.
The image which was displayed over the pool was of a party of twenty-three men on horseback. Quickly, the image grew closer, and it became apparent that one of the party was a young boy. The image of the boy grew larger, and the boy in the pool looked around as if uncomfortable and scratched the back of his neck.
Later in his life, the boy would learn to be wary of such feelings. For now, he rode on with a look of determination, not knowing what was in store for him or his companions.