The Unwanted Winter - Volume One of the Saga of the Twelves (50 page)

The Swüreg warrior turned
stiffly to look back at Anthony and his sisters, frowning in
thought. “Well, my Lord, that is most prudent, since we will soon
quit this place for the future site of the Encampment. Don’t you
think?”

“
Most prudent, Band
Sergeant, most prudent indeed,” the man-wolf trailed off into
silence for a moment, then turned back toward the gray-skinned
creature somewhat quickly. “Where is that disgusting Prēost,
Vallüm. He should be here to control his pet Nixy.” Fenris seemed
very annoyed of a sudden and fidgeted slightly on the misshapen
rock atop which he sat.

“
He awaits her arrival
outside the cave, my Lord, with her meal in hand, so there will be
no… How shall we put it…? Unfortunate delays to our
plans.”

Anthony watched a hard
smile spread across the Swüreg’s face as he finished his final
sentence. Fenris, on the other hand, merely growled in accent. He
abruptly stood, crossed he leather-armored arms in front of himself
and waited.

He didn’t have to wait
long.

His heart beginning to
thud in his chest, Anthony saw a shadow began to emerge through the
snowfall and the glare. At first, it was a slightly darker spot
amongst all the white, but it grew larger and then larger, and yet
larger still. As the shadow grew distinct, Anthony could see it
wasn’t just one creature. It was three to be exact – one was
massive and could only be the Isighünd he had seen earlier in the
week; another was small, tinier than either Elena or Mikalah. That
had to be Nixy. His head rose from the ground involuntarily, anger
replaced the fear in his chest, but it squelched suddenly when he
recognized the third figure. Utter shock had struck all other
emotion from his mind. He found himself looking at the sodden,
haggard form of his childhood friend, Andrew Ibarra, nearly iced
over with cold, shivering uncontrollably from his lack of warm
clothing.

Fenris took one look at
Andrew, who cowered back in revulsion at the site of the man-wolf.
His muzzled face hardened with rage, scaring the boy even more. “I
thought my orders to keep these children unhurt and unspoiled were
well understood by all involved in this operation?” It was a
question, though spoken through clenched teeth and didn’t sound
like one. Fenris’ eyes blazed with fury as he glanced at those
around him. Each one flinched under the power of his stare. Even
Jätung whimpered quietly when the Storm Lord’s Hand peered into his
eyes. Yet, it was the Prēost, Vallüm, who spoke and broke the tense
mood at the mouth of the cave.

“
My Lord, my Lord,” he
implored with a soft touch of his gnarled hands upon Fenris sleeve,
who shrugged it off as if the small wizened man was rank with
disease. “Inghëldir had few choices last night and was forced to
hole up in the temporary structure atop what used to be the Street
of Milbur. She’d done this out of fear the boy’s father might raise
alarm at the disappearance of his son. There was no time to gather
sufficient coverings for the boy against this wonderful cold, my
Lord.”

“
I
saw
the
boy’s father incapacitated by the force of Jätung’s blow to the
front door of his dwelling,” growled Fenris through a very
wolf-like snarl. To Anthony, it looked as though the man-wolf was
just barely controlling his anger.

“
He was, My Lord, for a
time, but when the Rending was completed, the man did not phase as
he should have, but awoke instead upon the ground here in the
Melded World, to find his home gone as well as his son. He began to
search and shout almost immediately. Since you ordered no one was
to be slain last night, Inghëldir thought it better to wait until
morning and the onset of the snow, in hopes the boy’s father would
wander off and perish in the storm. I agreed with her. She stayed
in her domicile until sunrise, making her way here with the utmost
haste, as soon as it was possible to travel stealthily.” He
finished with a wicked smile, exposing razor sharp, yellow-molted
teeth.

“
You agreed…?” Anthony was
sure Fenris was very near to striking the small, old
man.

“
Yes, I did…, my Lord,”
the smile on Vallüm’s face didn’t falter an inch.

Fenris’ gaze went back to
the small, petite girl in her ever-present white dress and the blue
lace ribbon she wore for a belt. Inghëldir stood there with her
face downcast, appearing meek and tiny, ready to receive any
punishment Fenris might’ve doled out. “Very well,” Fenris muttered,
after a while. The fury in his frame released, but his tone
remained the same, deadly. There was nothing stolid about it. “Get
the boy something to keep him warm,” was the man-wolf’s first
order. Then, “Vallüm, get out of my sight and feed your Nixy before
she causes any more trouble. Jätung, you stay here and guard the
entrance to this cave.” The beast answered with a muffled, rumbling
grunt from deep in its throat. “The rest of you, outside, we have
plans to make and I do not want these
brats
of the World of Man to know of
them.
NOW MOVE!
”

Anthony stared on, as they
were all abruptly a flurry of movement. Before long, Andrew had a
warm pelt of some animal draped over his shoulders. All the others
left, while Jätung lay down across the entire expanse of the
threshold of the cave. He had his huge head resting upon his
forelegs, his head facing their direction although he kept his eyes
closed, as if sleeping. Anthony was certain he wasn’t asleep, but
wanted to give the impression that he was.

Andrew trudged his way
toward Anthony and his sisters. At his approach, all three of the
Herrera children sat up facing him. Elena motioned for him to sit
and between the four of them. They formed a small circle of
friends, their knees brushing one another as they sat there,
cross-legged, looking into one another’s faces. It wasn’t too long
after, a grateful smile began to spread across Andrew’s
face.

“Y-You g-g-guys have n-no
i-i-i-idea, how g-g-glad I am t-to see y-y-y-you.”

~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼
}>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

Shock!

Day One, Thursday, 6:21
am…

“
So, do you guys have any
idea of what’s going on?” asked Andrew, after the thick fur of the
animal skin had taken some of the chill from him. At least, he
could speak coherently.

Anthony looked at his
friend and sighed. His hand ran through his tangled, matted hair.
“Well, Drew, all I know for certain is these jerk-offs have somehow
snatched us out of our world, using something they called the
Rending, and placed us here in… whatever place this is. I think I
could be going crazy, but I could have sworn Fenris used some sort
of spell to make that happen. I saw some very crazy shit at my
grandmother’s house let me tell you! They all seem pretty bent on
getting us to this place called the Throne.”

“
Yeah, that’s what that
Inghëldir chick said to me last night. She said we were to be taken
to this throne thing where the first battle or war will be waged,
or some horseshit like that. I can’t remember actually,” replied
Andrew, looking tired and worn from his ordeal. He was trying to be
brave with tough words, but he still shook visibly at the mention
of the little girl they had known as Nixy.

“
Who’s Ing-heldur?” asked
Mikalah, looking from boy to boy with big eyes, trying to be
brave.

“
I think it is said
Inghëldir, Mikalah,” answered her brother with a reassuring smile,
very aware his baby sister was scared and nervous. She was trying
her hardest to hide it, and it illicited a smile from him. “That’s
her real name, I guess.”

“
But, I thought her name
was Nixy?” Now it was Elena’s turn to pipe in with
questions.

Anthony sighed again,
adamant he wouldn’t lose his patience. This wasn’t the time or the
place to act like a child. “I think she
is
a Nixy like we are Human Beings
and I think her name is Inghëldir like your name is Bonehead.”
Anthony smiled big. The girls both seemed to relax a bit more as
they shook their heads at his bad joke, which had been his
intention. “She probably doesn’t give out her real name to many
people,” he added more to himself than those around him. He drifted
into a deeper level of thought.

“
So,” began Andrew
hunching his shoulders, dropping his voice, so only they could hear
him, “what are we going to do next? I mean, we just got here, so we
should just sit here for a while and think things through. You
know, until we know more about what’s happening. Am I
wrong?”

That shook Anthony out of
his reverie. He stared directly at his friend and recognized his
body language. It was the same sort of thing he used to do as a
young child when he wanted to convince him to not do something he
was either afraid of or might get into trouble over. He did have a
point, though. Anthony was amazed he could still read Andrew after
all of these years.
Some people never
change
, he guessed.

“
I agree, man, there’s not
much we can do at the moment,” Anthony said, unable to get his mind
around any course of action at this point. They didn’t know enough
to make any serious moves. “There seems to be a lot more going on
with these guys then they are letting on.”

“
What do you mean?”
inquired Andrew, very interested now.

“
Well, they aren’t all
powerful no matter how huge and scary they may look.”

Andrew frowned, but
motioned for Anthony to continue.

The girls just stared and
listened, unmoving.

“
I overheard them. Well
actually, I heard Fenris say they had to be careful of whatever the
Lord of the Light might have in store for them. You know, something
to disrupt with their plans, whatever that means.” Anthony
shrugged, knowing his hypothesis was thin.

Andrew shook his head in
confusion.

“
He also spoke of there
being twelve children being brought here. He called us all,
Guardians. But what we’re supposed to guard exactly, I have no
idea. He didn’t explain. All I can say is, I think it means there
are eight more kids out there like us, kids that he still has to
find.

“
The more I think about
it, I believe he still has to round them up as well. He has to get
us all together and have us all before this ‘throne’ thing when… as
you put it, Drew…‘where the first battle will begin’.

“
Again, whatever that
means, I don’t know, because I’m just mostly guessing at this
point.”

“
It does, sort of, make
sense, but where is this Throne? And where is this place where the
shit’s gonna break loose?” questioned Andrew. His was voice just
above a whisper, but filled with as much emotion as he could muster
without being too loud.

“
I don’t know, dude. I’m
as lost on that as you are right now.”

“
Shit
man, this sucks! I mean, I agree, we should just sit tight for the
time being. Still though, there’s gonna be a time when we can’t
just sit here and let them do to us whatever the hell they want!”
Andrew said vehemently, the thought overcoming his fear. “They’ve
got your sisters, bro! We
have
to protect them, you know, at all costs. We’re
gonna have to get are shit together and figure this out, because
I’m not going to let those nasty assholes mess with your sisters,
man. I don’t care how big or strong these dudes are. We can’t let
that happen!”

At the mouth of the cave,
Jätung growled deeply at Andrew’s raised voice.

“
Ssssshhh, man, you don’t think I know that?” began Anthony,
gesturing for Andrew to keep it down. “And that is exactly the
reason I will NOT do anything rash that might endanger them any
more than I have to. Do you understand that,
bro
?” Anthony arched his eyebrows to
emphasize his point.

Andrew nodded, but stayed
silent.

“
Our parents are gone,
Drew, I am in charge of them now. They are my responsibility. I
won’t let them down.” He looked at his sisters intently.

They both had tears in
their eyes. He could see the realization they were no longer under
the protection of their parents was dawning on them for the first
time.