Epic Fantasy Adventure: The Angel's Blessing: Holy Paladin's Quest: Book 1 (Sword and Sorcery Epic Fantasy Adventure Book With Dragons and Magic) (3 page)

On our seventh day the cool winds became lively. They twisted and ran this way and that and the Annas and I were hard pressed to keep our course. Anna barked one order to me and the other Anna would yell another. I did my best to obey but the more the
Chaos
reeled and careened the more the twins blamed my incompetence. With the winds came a low, thick overcast sky and that day Anna couldn’t see the sun to take a fix. The air became chilly. That’s when Kell stirred from his reverie.

“I would never think to tell you how to captain your ship,” he said. “But my humble experience tells me that your work is futile. Strike your mainsail and trim your jib. The water is steady and the wind can’t toss us if there’s no canvas.”

The Annas looked at one another, then at Kell and then at me.

“Well what are you waiting for?” Anna said.

“Get on the main-haul,” the other cried.

The other Anna and I set to the task. Kell went below. But even as the other Anna and I were working the jib the winds calmed. By the time we were finished there was not a stir in the air. That was when the fog began. I hadn’t noticed it creeping in until it was growing over us. It merged with the sky and slowly enshrouded the ship. The sea was still.

“What’s happening?” I asked.

“Dunno,” the other Anna said.

“This is creepy,” Anna said.

“It’s weird.”

“Unnatural.”

“Not really,” Kell said.

The three of us looked to the man. He had transformed. The simple herbalist was clad in leather armor. The breastplate was the color of oxblood and laced to the back with rawhide. Beneath he wore woven grey chainmail, gauntlets wrapping his arms. His britches hugged his muscled thighs and he wore boots that ran up above his calves, gathering in folds around his knees. Long daggers were sheathed in his boots and short swords crossed his back. And he held his beloved hammer Ashrune in his left hand.

“There is nothing unnatural about magic,” he said.

For once the Annas stood speechless. I looked on my Master, and I saw the proud paladin grin a slight grin. He reached a hand into the water and splashed us. We all jumped away from the water.

“Warm water,” he said, “and cool air make fog. Or had none of you listened to your elders?”

Anna chuckled. So did the other. So did I.

“The problem is,” Kell said. “It’s spring. We are in the middle of the Sassty Sea. The air here should be cold.”

He waited. We just looked at him like school children

“The air here should not be warm.” he said. “Still with me?”

“To hell and beyond!” Anna cried.

“To the gates of Eternity,” the other Anna echoed.

“How about to the tiller,” Kell suggested.

“Absolutely,” they said in harmony.

“I’ll do it.”

“No, I will.”

“No me!”

“Tend to your sails.”

“There’s no wind.”

“So?”

“So!”

“Enough,” Kell cried. “Put your tongues to better use and blow wind to the sails. Longo, come with me.”

I followed my master to the prow. The sea, sky and fog were slate grey and the water was like glass. I watched the gentle ripples roll silently away from the bow. For a long time the only sound was the slow creak of the mast. And then off in the distance we heard someone screaming.

The Annas started to speak but Kell cut them off with a wave of his hand. I heard one of them scurry below, but I was listening more to the ocean. The cries were faint as we drifted, and we strained to find a direction. Sounds can be tricky in the sea fog, but after a time Kell turned his ear, then he pointed and Anna steered.

“The waters are shallow,” she said softly.

“I see,” Kell answered. “And now I see.”

I peered into the mists. Land began to form. Through the shroud of fog I saw low trees, then a short beach. A moment later the ship ground to a halt. The screams were much clearer. We all looked a little to port and Kell nodded. Then there was a long wailing shriek that cut off quick. The silence that followed was chilling.

Quick as quick the Annas leapt off the bow and splashed into the water dragging the mooring line. Kell and I followed, and we soon had the Chaos dragged aground and anchored to a tree.

“You wait here,” Kell said to the twins. “Mind the ship.”

“No,” they said in harmony.

That was when I saw that the two were armed. Anna had a bow and quiver slung on her back while the other Anna wore a belt with no less than six slender throwing daggers. They both held short broad swords.

“Listen,” Kell began.

“No,” Anna said.

“This way,” the other said pointing to the jungle.

And before my master could say a word the two plunged into the undergrowth. Kell just shook his head and we followed. The girls were like vixens in the woods, bobbing and weaving along and under the foliage. A few times I thought I heard them sniffing. They soon struck an ill defined path and urged us on. They disappeared on either side of the trail as my master and I moved low and quiet. Sometimes one of their heads would pop up through the leaves and the other would quickly appear nearby.

As we crept along I started to feel useless. I didn’t know what we were heading into but everyone else was armed while all that I had were my wits and my hands. I looked about for a stout branch to use as a club, but all I saw was rotted wood. I wondered what use I might be in any fight.

Then the brush ahead shook in two straight lines. The Annas were on to something. Kell motioned me to hold still. We crouched and waited. Minutes later the twins appeared.

“Pirates,” Anna whispered.

“Never seen their likes,” the other added.

“Lean like Dorimans.”

“But dark like Shorethorns.”

“Five of ‘em.”

“Armed with strange swords.”

“They have a prisoner.”

“A lady.”

“Bound.”

“And gagged.”

“And they’re tormenting her.”

The other just nodded wide-eyed. Kell raised his hammer and led. The Annas followed in line while I brought up the lonely rear. Then Kell paused and motioned. The Annas fanned out on either side of him and I crept up to my master then went to my hands and knees to peer into the clearing.

It was as the twins had said. A woman hung by her arms. She was fair skinned with gleaming blonde hair, and she was half naked. Parts of her fine garments were strewn about. Her eyes were shut and she wept while five swarthy men jeered. The men were ugly and hairy, and to me they had weasel-like faces. One of them laughed as he held the point of his cutlass to the shard of cloth above the lady’s breast and cut it free, revealing an ample bosom. The woman shrieked.

With a piercing war cry Kell burst forth from the jungle, his hammer swinging. The first pirate froze -- an arrow in his back. As the others turned, one of the men’s skulls exploded under Ashrune with blood and bones spraying the others. Kell then whirled, the blade from the hilt of the hammer slashing another pirate’s chest open from shoulder to belly. He crumbled with an agonized gurgling. Kell recovered and planted himself before the last two, snarling. The pirates turned ghostly pale, then turned tail and ran. A knife caught one in the back as he disappeared into the foliage. Another arrow whizzed through the leaves.

Kell cut the lady’s bonds with the blade of his hammer and caught her in his arms. He yanked away the gag. I rushed forward, grabbing up a fallen cutlass. But even as I did I heard an unearthly cackle.

“Stupid fool,” the woman laughed.

And in that moment many things happened.

The woman’s eyes glowed. Threads of eerie green light flew from her to Kell’s face. My master wailed in agony, his body twitching and thrashing. An arrow flew from the foliage straight at the woman, but she snatched it from the air without ever moving her gaze from Kell. The man who had fallen by Anna’s arrow was encased in a sickly light, and before my eyes he transformed into a rat with the likeness of a small man. He snarled, got up on his hind legs, grabbed his fallen cutlass, and then dashed into the woods. I heard the Annas scream. Not a moment later another rat-man burst from the jungle and I was on my back. His forepaws were as big as my hands and he pinned me to the ground. It was strong as a man. Its ugly face within inches of my own, the beady yellow eyes glaring. I cried out and thrashed -- and then my head exploded and I knew nothing.

I woke to a cry of agony that went quickly silent.

My head hung low. I strained to look up. I tried to focus. It was twilight and the night was closing in. A roaring fire lit the clearing. The first thing I saw was my master. He was naked and bound. His wrists were tied with crude hemp across his belly. A thick rough branch had been threaded between his bent elbows and his back, and he was suspended by that stick. His ankles were lashed and pulled up tight, bound to the ends of the pole. His sweat soaked body gleamed in the orange light and his face was wracked in pain. In the middle of the bonfire Ashrune lay, its leather handle smoldering.

I fared no better. My hand and feet were bound cruelly and I too hung suspended so that my spine was arched backwards. The ropes were so tight I could feel my wrists bleeding, and the pain in my back was growing as I looked to my captors.

There before the fire I saw no beautiful lady, only an old ugly hag, dressed in a fine gown. The woman looked to be over a hundred. Her face was drawn with wrinkles that made sinister shadows. Her hollow eyes were sunken beneath sickly red folds that oozed pink mucus. She had neither pupil nor color, just milky dark orbs with the deathly stare of a shark. The tawny skin on her face was stretched so that the bones of her skull shown through, while her crows feet looked like a mask of deep spider webs. Her teeth were the color of rotten logs and her cracked lips were grey. Over the crown of her head her silver hair was sparse, but from the sides it fell about her shoulders thin and scraggly.

She stood holding a long stick in the fire. The three rat-men were hunched over their fallen comrade, gnawing on the raw flesh of the carcasses. One of them sniffed and then looked to me. Its hideous muzzle seemed to smile and my heart froze.

“The other’s awake Yasmeen,” she said in a high, whiny voice.

“I’ll deal with the pup in good time,” the hag said in a voice that was like dry leather being torn. “As soon as you idiots catch me the bowman.”

“There’s two out there,” one said.

“Three,” another said. “And one’s a warrior elf, and no mistake.”

“I don’t care if it’s a troop of warrior-elves,” the hag said, kicking hot embers at them. “You just better find them if you value your skins.”

“Our cousins are sniffing them out,” the one said. “The island is small and flat. They have nowhere to hide. It will be dark soon. We’ll find them.”

Their words stirred some small hope in my heart. The Annas had escaped. But whether the frightened girls had taken to their boat or not I could not know. I clung to the thought that they may be lurking, waiting for the chance to send an arrow or a knife into the hag’s neck.

“And what about that?” the rat-man said nodding toward my master.

“That,” the old hag chuckled. “That is my salvation.”

She then rammed the fiery red point of a hot stick into Kell’s thigh. My master grit his teeth and clenched his eyes. His whole body tensed and he let loose a low, agonized wail. If there could have been any vestige of delight in the old hag, I saw it on her face then and there. The rat-men whooped and stomped their feet in joy.

“Scream paladin,” the witch taunted as she ground the stick. “Fill your heart with pain and fear. It will make things all the more delectable when the time comes.” She cackled evilly.

She then yanked the point out and Kell’s flesh smoked. The stench of his burn made me want to vomit when it reached my nostrils.

“Paladin,” she said, holding a freshly lit smoking ember under his nose. “You are a prize beyond my dreams. It would be a great thing for me to stand before the great Visalth holding the head of the fool who would seek to slay the mighty one. But it will be an even greater triumph for me to stand once again in the full glory of my youth and beauty.”

She grinned as she jammed the end of the stick up the paladins left nostril. Kell didn’t scream this time, but his eyes did start to go wild as the witch then took the sharp stick and moved it near his eyes menacingly. She then put the stick back into the fire.

“I know that you won’t speak,” she said. “You know that if you speak then you admit my claim over you, and once that happens, whatever pathetic power you have will vanish and then even your soul will be at my mercy. Truth be told, paladin, I’m counting on that.”

She cackled as she played with the stick in the embers, burning off the blood and flesh on the stick and getting it to glow brightly once again. I saw my master’s wracked form tremble, but his face was stern and set. I thought I saw his tense lips just slightly moving.

“Oh I know,” the hag went on. “I know that you are strong. I could hold you over the fire and watch your manhood shrivel to cinders and still you would not speak. And I might just do that. Just for fun. But that will come later.”

“You see, I understand your sort. You have empathy. You care. And while you care little for your own flesh, you are overwhelmed with concern for others; so concerned that you would risk your quest to save all of your people in the hopes of saving one poor damsel in distress from torment. Stupid fool.”

She turned to him. Her eyes sparkled green, and for a moment I saw the visage of the lady who we had tried to rescue. She batted her eyes innocently, then she turned and the ugliness crept back over her like a swift plague. She stared into the fire and the crackling light reflected in her murky black eyes. Her face seemed to glow with restrained glee.

“Rest assured, you will speak to me. In fact you will beg. You will beg for your companions as I slowly skin them alive before your eyes. My rats will gorge on their guts as they writhe and wail and your heart will burst with compassion, and when your soul is filled with evil thoughts and hate then . . .”

Then she plunged the fiery point into his chest.

“Then I will use the blade from your own hammer to rip out your heart and I will devour it as the last strains of life seep from you. And as I eat your heart I will be restored! Yasmeen de LaCroix will be young again! I will have the power of a holy paladin and my Dark Lord will see my beauty and power and I will take my place among the elite faithful as my master lays waste to all who would stand in our way.”

Kell wailed through clenched teeth. He writhed under the burning torment and the hag laughed as she twisted the stick cruelly. The rat-men howled with glee and my heart froze.

“Yasmeen the Beautiful!” a rat-man cried.

“Yasmeen the Terrible,” another echoed.

“Yasmeen the Asshole,” came a cry from the woods.

A dozen spears rained from above. They sank in the sand and each had a rat impaled. Then arrows flew. The rat-men clutched their throats. Yasmeen was stuck twice but the bolts didn’t stop her. She shrieked in rage and stomped her foot. The fire flared and engulfed the clearing in blue and white. The trees caught fire with her cry of fury.

Kell arched his back and thrust his arms. The branch binding him cracked, the fibers of the wood tearing into his flesh. He grabbed a broken shard of wood with his bound hands and charged at the hag with a furious bellow. He caught her square in the chest with the sharpened wood and she fell back with a guttural grunt. Looking around, the rat-men looked like pin-cushions as the woods around us burned.