Return To Sky Raven (Book 2) (27 page)

“That’s the third time I’ve tied those two up,” she muttered. “I don’t know why I even bother.”

Suddenly, Somnus threw up his head as if he had heard something and snorted out a puff of blue flame, his eyes fixated on the amulet draped over the stick by the fire.

Lin jumped up and ran to the horse, rubbing her hands over his head and tilting her head as if listening.

“He’s refusing to talk to me again,” Lin complained, as the huge horse started walking right past her and closer to the fire, still staring at the amulet hanging from the branch. “Hey, buster, now is not the time to get all holier-than-thou on us about the amulet…hey, where are you going? I swear you should have been born a donkey; at least you would have had a clear conscience for being an ass!”

Somnus stopped and swung his great white head in an arc toward the druid and sneezed. A gout of snot and icy blue flame caught her right between the eyes and dumped her on her backside in the dirt.

Wiping her face, a very angry Lin catapulted up from the ground and stomped her foot. “Hey now, that was just rude!”

The Vakha whinnied a horse laugh and continued his slow calculated march toward the fire and the amulet. Reaching it, he stopped and brushed his nose on the metal as if tasting its magic. With another snort, the flame level on his hooves and mane increased tenfold and soon blue flame was running across his entire body. We all leaned back as he became a four-footed inferno of blue flame; you couldn’t see his coat anymore as it was all flame. Finally, he touched his nose to the amulet again and the flames seemed to jump across and set the metal itself on fire!

“Somnus, stop it!” Julia screamed, but the great horse would have none of it. He backed up a few steps, snorted out another puff of blue smoke, reared, and charged toward the amulet. Amazingly, the blue flames on the amulet widened in a large circle as the warhorse approached. As he entered the ring, Somnus reached out and snagged the amulet off the branch with his massive teeth, pulling it and himself through the portal just before the fire extinguished and the portal snapped closed, leaving only a hint of icy blue smoke wafting in the still morning air.

“Great, now I can’t even return his shield to his mother,” I whispered, wondering why the Vakha had acted so strangely.

We all sat there dumbfounded for a short while, unsure if we were waiting for the Vakha to return or if he was lost as well. Both druids grilled poor Kaima about Somnus’s behavior, but he apparently didn’t bother to tell her anything either, and she returned to grazing nonchalantly in the long grasses.

Finally, I could wait no longer; my people had to be warned of the impending invasion. I packed a few essentials in a shoulder bag, barked my last instructions, and awkwardly hugged all three girls one last time before I set out across the fields in the direction of my home. I had made it a scant couple hundred yards when Winya broke through my mental barriers with one word, “Alex!”

……………………………………….

Alex

For the four hundredth and sixteenth time, I paced off the distance between the walls of Hell’s arena and assessed my situation. For months, I have analyzed the magic of this place and have finally come to the conclusion that demon magic is not like enchanter magic and is, therefore, beyond my understanding. There is nothing here like the matrix I found in the wizard’s arena that I could manipulate; it just is. When I finally woke up after my fight with the demon, I was still slumped up against the rock wall, horn still in my hand, a complete mess both inside and out. The first day or two, I was concerned that replacement challengers might appear to fight me again. But there had been nothing, and while I feel the pain of thirst and hunger, my body doesn’t seem to be wasting away, either. All of the wounds I received from the demon have, in fact, fully healed in time. So I have come to theorize that this place is not really Hell but some sort of a testing arena between Heaven and Hell. Perhaps the home team, in this case the demons, get to set the game parameters. But, as there is no way to prove this idea, I may never know. I frequently examined the second remaining horn from the demon but it yielded no insights, nor did it seem to be any sort of key to escaping this plane.

It’s still very hot, and I have experimented with taking off all my armor, some of the armor, or just leaving it on. Surprisingly, as long as I am not doing anything strenuous, I am more comfortable in the armor than out; usually I go without the helm, though. There is no morning, day, or night in this place, but I force myself to spend at least half my time trying to devise a way to get back home. The other half of my time, I allow myself the pain of thinking about my friends who I may never see again and, of course, Maya. Memories are both a blessing and a curse in this dimension, and I relive every conversation I ever had with my dark elf beauty in vivid detail. Sometimes, if I linger too long in memories, the pain becomes unbearable...so I sleep whenever possible.

When you have months with absolutely nothing to do but think, time weighs heavily on a person. I will admit the thought of just walking out into the lava flow and ending it all held some initial attraction, but I had to believe in my parents’ story about the threads of fate and how mine and Maya’s were intertwined. I was determined that I would not be the one responsible for breaking our thread, not now, not ever.

I was in the middle of a dream about Maya; she was so beautiful, so amazing with her light purple skin and curly silver hair. At the moment, she was nuzzling my neck, and I wrapped my arm around her shoulders and gave her a gentle kiss. I was puzzled though; for some reason her skin and hair were cold. In the middle of our lovemaking, she nickered loudly, a sound I don’t think I’ve ever heard her make before. Feeling odd, I opened my eyes, and a huge snout was blocking most of my vision. Startled, I backed up and banged my head on the rock face I was leaning against.

“Ouch…Somnus?” I asked, rubbing my head and wondering at the same time if this was the same dream or if I was dreaming about dreaming again. Well, either way, I’m awake now. I slowly got up, retrieved and clipped my helm to my belt and stretched nonchalantly. Cautiously, out of the corner of my eye, I checked to see if the apparition of my horse was still there, and he was. Next, I looked around the very familiar vista of the arena - yup, it still looked like Hell to me. All the while Somnus was getting impatient, stomping around as if he had somewhere to go. He kept going over to a small ledge in the rock face where I had killed the demon. Walking over, I noticed something unusual; it was the amulet I took from Kotoch!

“Somnus, did this bring you here?” He nodded, swinging his huge head up and down. “Can we use it to get back?” Another nod and suddenly his blue flames intensified, like a blacksmith had suddenly pumped up the bellows on a kiln. He twisted his head around and lowered his back for me to swing up and into the saddle, my leg colliding with my shield tethered to the other side. I quickly stuffed my trophy demon horn in a saddlebag, secured my hammer in its sheath, and slid my helm on. A few moments later, a large blue portal opened up in the middle of the rock wall before us, and as we plunged through, I remembered to snatch the amulet off the ledge and hold it tight. For a brief moment, I felt like we were in the blackness of space, that cold area between the warmth of stars and the imagination of men.

We blasted out of thin air, stomping right through a burning fire pit causing a huge shower of sparks and ash to cascade into the morning air. Somnus vaulted over a fallen log and I saw a couple of girls in travel clothes dive to either side to avoid the juggernaut. Once clear of obstructions, Somnus swung around and came to a complete stop, allowing me to slide off. I dropped to my knees and threw off my gauntlets and helm, reaching my hands into the cool damp grass, laughing like the village idiot - I was home!

I looked up to see Lin and Julia with their hands over their mouths in excitement and a pixie doing loops over their heads. I staggered up with a big silly smile on my face. Almost immediately, I felt my legs kicked out from under me by someone whose armor was of comparable weight and found myself on my back with a deadly serious dark elf straddling my chest. Maya looked down at me, her chest heaving with emotion. Lips curled, teeth bared, eyes frosty, she was every inch the predator that I only occasionally caught glimpses of. It was a jarring reminder that she was no mere human girl.

“Alex Martin, Prince of the Nova, if you ever scare me like that again, so help me, I will kill you myself!” she rasped painfully. She put both her hands tenderly alongside my jaw and brought her deep, emerald green eyes close to mine, searching my face for any trace of resistance. A second later, her lips crushed my own, and I felt warm tears of joy streaming down both of our faces. We couldn’t decide if we wanted to laugh, cry, or giggle hysterically the entire time we kissed, and we kissed for a very long time. Finally, she let me get back on my feet, but she kept a hold on me while I got wild, ecstatic hugs from Nia, Lin and Julia. At last, all four demanded to hear what had happened, and I relayed the story as I knew it. It was my turn to be surprised when I found out that I hadn’t been gone for months or even weeks, but more like twelve hours!

Suddenly, my head started to burn like I was set on fire
. “Alex, you bastard! Maya might not kill you, but I certainly will!”
Rosa’s voice was threateningly loud in my head. “D
o you have any idea what you put me through? The pain that cutting the link like that caused me?”
I could feel the sadness flowing off of her as I did my best to comfort her. “Y
ou almost left me alone in this world again, you stupid fool! I don’t think I have ever been that scared in my life when you vanished, or so happy when you came back. Please don’t try anything like that again; I don’t think my old heart could take it!”

After calming Rosa down and promising to talk to her more later, I tried to catch up on what happened after I left. While I felt well-rested, the girls were a mess. Jules and Lin were still red-eyed and had exhausted so many of their spells that they could barely stand. Nia had greeted me enthusiastically, but was now collapsed, splayed out on Kaima’s broad back, snoring fitfully. Maya was the worst, her armor was more red and black than white, and there were layers of gore and filth everywhere on it. She was gaunt-faced and haggard and it looked like she had lost fifteen pounds since I last saw her. I could tell from her dark rimmed, deep set eyes she desperately needed sleep as well, but was fighting it in an attempt to cling to me as much as possible.

First to business; I managed to get ground cloths and blankets out of the packs and arranged them on comfortable spots on the ground near the replenished fire. And I ordered the two girls to lie down and get some sleep, promising to wake them with some food when I had it ready. They nodded off happily with relieved smiles on their faces.

Maya needed more work, a lot more work. I helped her remove the armor and set it aside for a good cleaning, and I mostly - sort of – averted my gaze as I had her remove the leather under padding and change into warm sleepwear. I wiped her face, arms, and hands with a cloth moistened from a water skin and, for the most part, she handled my ministrations calmly but refused to take her eyes off me for a second. I nestled her down into the warm blankets and just happily watched her inhale and exhale peacefully for a little bit before her eyes finally drifted closed. Walking over to where the horses were standing quietly, untethered, I first stopped by Somnus and patted him on his broad neck.

“Thank you, Somnus, you are amazing!” He nodded his big head up and down, in complete agreement. Unable to resist, I leaned in close and whispered, “But you’re not as good a kisser as Maya.” He snorted and looked away with a disgruntled huff. Chuckling, I dug through one of the saddlebags on the ground until I found Nia’s small pack. Retrieving her magically enhanced warm blanket, I carefully picked her up from where she had crash-landed on Kaima’s back and wrapped her in the blanket. I carried her back to the campfire area and placed her in a good spot; close, but not where she would get sat on or disturbed. The next order of the day was food! I felt like I hadn’t eaten in months, and the magic users and Maya had to be starving.

From a short distance away, I heard a mouth-organ playing a tune and I looked over to see the last of Belrothe’s wagons being loaded up. I jogged over and was pleased to see the same older farmer we had talked to after the attack in the forest. He came striding toward me with a big grin on his face.

“I was hoping to be able to thank one of you in person!” he bellowed. “We saw your camp over there but we didn’t want to intrude; we all owe you folks so much!”

“We were glad to help, even if we aren’t paladins,” I snickered thinking about Maya’s reaction.

“My name’s Jostin, but everyone calls me Jo.” He chuckled deeply. “We’re just packing up the last of the food and bandages and stuff to take back to the village, and we hope to never see this place again ever!”

“Food?”

“Yeah, we brought a ton of it along from the village, but most of the people weren’t interested in eating; they just wanted to get out of here as fast as possible.”

A few minutes later, I swaggered back into our camp fully laden with baskets of eggs, four arm-sized lengths of smoked sausage, loaves of fresh bread, a crock of butter and a bag of iced pastries, all of which the teamsters were more than happy to unload, especially to their saviors. In short order, I had the fire stoked and I was cooking again, smiling as I thought about how much I had missed this simple chore.

Waking Maya was easy; all I had to do was wave the huge plate of eggs and sausage in her general direction and she was sitting up, arms outstretched to receive it. Most of the food on her plate was already gone by the time I retrieved the toasted bread from the sticks I had placed next to the fire. She sighed contentedly, chomping on the thick slices of buttery goodness. Her big emerald eyes watched me as I played the fool and finally coaxed a small smile out of her.