Trials (12 page)

“Something to be proud of, isn’t it?” said an unpleasant voice behind him in a barely audible murmur.

Lasgol turned slowly, aware that he would encounter Morksen’s ugly face. The veteran Ranger winked at him with his good eye and grinned, showing teeth as black as his soul. The sinister one-eyed character was a living legend among the King’s Rangers. Word was that no one had ever managed to dodge him and that his hunting expeditions always ended with the prey at his feet. It was also known that on practically all occasions that prey never returned alive. Lasgol knew that as a man-hunter, the expert tracker was as unscrupulous as he was skilled.

“Yes… a great victory,” Lasgol admitted in a whisper.

Morksen came to his side and Lasgol looked at him with concern, he was middle-aged, nimble and very strong, ugly as a bulldog and one-eyed. But what really worried Lasgol was the intelligence behind that one black eye, and especially his lack of scruples. It was well-known in the whole realm that “One-Eye” Morksen would sell his own mother for a handful of coins, and some even claimed he would for less. But he was legendary as a capturer of men, and King Thoran personally entrusted him with certain
delicate jobs
. That was telling enough in itself, and worried Lasgol no end.

“Shall we go on, my lord tracker?” Morksen said in a voice filled with sarcasm, inviting Lasgol to appreciate him in all his crooked malice.

Lasgol looked at him, trying to hide the frustration and rage he felt in his stomach. Morksen was there to help him in the pursuit and capture of the Assassin, General Rangulself had told him so. But that was only a part of that unpleasant human worm’s mission. He was on to something else, and Lasgol could feel it. It gave him chills every time he chanced to look at that ugly face. He did not know what the man was hiding, but he was convinced that his own life was in danger. Morksen’s mere presence made the hair rise on the back of his neck.

“To the West,” Lasgol said, ignoring the other’s comment.

“As the expert Ranger commands,” he replied in his insidious tone as he grinned maliciously. “After all you’re the boss…”

That much was true. Rangulself had established it clearly, which had surprised Lasgol. But if he had been surprised, Morksen had been furious. After all, he was his senior and had more decorations than Lasgol. Therefore “One-Eye” took every opportunity to remind him of the slight he felt he had suffered.

Lasgol motioned him to follow, and they began to crawl through the underbrush, trying to minimize the noise as they made their way through ferns, roots and brambles. They had already crossed half the forest when Lasgol stopped. Both Rangers crouched simultaneously, like a man and his shadow, blending with the thick foliage. Lasgol looked through the brush, searching for what had alarmed him.

And he found it.

Armed men, Rogdonians, making their way through the forest.

He looked more closely from his hiding place and saw at least two hundred soldiers in blue and silver, with behind them more than a thousand of what he guessed were refugees from Drasden. They were the survivors of the siege, carrying with them their scant belongings as they fled. Lasgol thought they would be hungry and exhausted, and must have gone through true hell. There were wounded people dragging themselves along or walking, supported by friends or family. They were trying to escape from the enemy army by sheltering in the forest.

New sounds, this time metallic ones, reached Lasgol’s ears from the East, and he turned his head slowly. A line of men stretched across the whole width of the forest. Winged helmets, round wooden shields and scaled armor filled the horizon under the trees.

Our soldiers beating the forest in search of survivors…
he thought, shaking his head.

The Rogdonians also realized the situation and urged their own people forward to try and get out into the open before they were caught by the endless line of soldiers. It did not bode well for the fugitives, for if they did not manage to hurry, no Rogdonian would survive. The two Rangers remained in hiding under the thick vegetation of the underbrush. The situation unfolding before their eyes did not concern them.

The fugitives, with difficulty, managed to reach the edge of the forest. The Rogdonian soldiers formed at their rear so that the enemy soldiers at the front could not reach them. The wounded were carried or dragged. The Norghanians advanced faster, crushing everything under their boots. They already had the fugitives in sight, which made them keep on with the prospect of catching their prey.

A voice rose from the forest.

“Charge, men of the Snow, let none escape!”

Lasgol recognized the voice of the Norghanian officer: it was Captain Jonansen. At his command the line broke and the thousand men began to chase the fugitives like a pack of white wolves after wounded deer. The end was close. The soldiers ran like fiends, yelling and howling in anticipation of the bloody outcome.

The refugees came out onto the plain that opened to the West, running as fast as they were able. Tall grass covered the plain like a sea of jade that swayed in the afternoon breeze. Soon blood would turn it red. A dozen men ran past Lasgol, never noticing him or Morksen. The fugitives finally stopped, exhausted, on a small rise in the plain. There they would make their last stand and die. The two hundred armed men formed a circle around the wounded and waited for the attack.

A thousand Norghanians ran out of the forest yelling like madmen, driving fear into the fugitives’ hearts. Lasgol got to his feet slowly. He did not wish to witness the carnage, but as if he were hypnotized, he was unable to take his eyes off the scene that was about to unfold.

Suddenly, a loud tremor ran through the plain. Lasgol felt it under his feet even inside the forest, and it made him start. He turned to Morksen, who by the look on his face had also felt it. The tremor grew steadily, strong and sustained. And Lasgol finally understood.

“Retreat, Jonansen! Call the retreat!” he shouted in warning as he ran towards the last trees before the plain.

From the south, behind a steep hill on the plain, appeared half a thousand mounted lancers.

“Retreat, Jonansen! Enemy cavalry!” Lasgol shouted again at the top of his voice. But it was too late.

Almost at the same time that the Norghanians attacked the fugitives, the Rogdonian cavalry came to the rescue.

Jonansen saw the Lancers at the last moment and shouted: “Shield wall! Make a shield wall!”

The Norghanian soldiers planted their feet firmly on the ground, flexed their knees, and joined elbow with elbow and shoulder with shoulder behind their shields, making a solid wall which protected each man and the one to his right. This shield wall was the elite defensive formation of the infantry. The soldiers waited and prayed to their Ice Gods for a safe delivery.

“Hold it! Do not break the formation!” Jonansen shouted a second before the brutal crash.

Lasgol was speechless, his eyes wide. In full gallop and with the entire weight of the charge behind it, the Rogdonian cavalry hit the enemy infantry. The Lancers penetrated the barrier, spearing their enemies seeking protection behind their shield-wall. In the clash between men and warhorses, the men were thrown in the air like broken puppets. The Lancers, with absolute mastery, breached the shield wall at a number of points carrying death at the tip of their spears from atop their great war-mounts. The survivors of the initial impact tried to fight back the Lancers by surrounding each rider with several men to prevent a new charge. But the Lancers were perfectly trained. At an order from their commander, they spurred their horses and left the field at once.

“Reform the shield wall!” shouted Jonansen again.

The Norghanian infantry might have lost a third of its men, but they hastened to stand elbow to elbow and shield to shield once more.

Once the Lancers had ridden far enough, they re-grouped, turned their horses and prepared to charge for the second time. They galloped towards their enemies in a wedge-formation which left no opening.

“Hold!” Jonansen shouted.

Silence reigned over the plain for the briefest and most intense of moments.

The rumble of horses’ hooves filled it next.

The new attack was even more overwhelming than the first. The Lancers crushed the defensive wall, throwing the men in the air, stepping on the fallen as the deadly spears went through enemy bodies.

The fugitives, seeing their opportunity, ran downhill to join in the scuffle.

Jonansen fought fiercely but fell under the Rogdonian swords with the last of his men.

“For Norghana!” he cried before dying.

Lasgol hid behind a fir tree as he watched the scene unfolding on the plain. They had all perished. Not one Norghanian was left standing. Their bodies lay scattered around, staining the green plain with their blood: good soldiers from his homeland, every one of them dead, all in what seemed to Lasgol to have been a mere few moments.

Once again… the horror of war…
he thought bitterly, shaking his head.

A discordant whisper at his ear made him start.

“I found the tracks of the Assassin, he’s heading south-west. Let’s get on with our mission, this doesn’t concern us.”

Lasgol turned to face Morksen and said:

“You’re right, it doesn’t concern us, although it should… But you’re right, let’s go after the Assassin.”

The two Rangers disappeared among the vegetation as if they had been spirits of the forest, while the Rogdonians fled to safety carrying their wounded.

They went west, towards Rilentor.

Komir was drying himself in the sun, watching the lovely Healer out of the corner of his eye as she came into sight beyond the tall bushes. The water had been cool and his muscles and skin were taut. The warmth of the sun filtering through the thick surrounding woods relaxed him and brought on another pleasant feeling. Or perhaps it was Aliana’s presence…

“Forgive me, Komir, I didn’t intend to spy on you…” she began, apologetic and a little embarrassed. “I was searching for some medicinal herbs for Kendas… I hadn’t realized you were in the pond…”

“Forget it, Aliana. I know you weren’t spying on me. It was just a joke,” Komir said with a wide smile.

She blushed and her pale skin glowed. Komir understood the reason. “I didn’t know it was you… I didn’t recognize you…” she said.

Her embarrassment touched Komir, and her beauty, which had captivated him since he had first set eyes on her, took on such a touch of warm vulnerability that he felt totally defenseless, with a pang in his heart and hardly able to breathe, as if he had been pierced by the cold steel of an enchanted sword. A feeling of extreme anxiety engulfed him, followed by one of absolute wellbeing. He tried to hide what he was feeling so strongly, picked up the belt where his Norriel sword hung and buckled it round his waist with the sword to one side. He finished dressing without another word, letting silence fill the two paces that separated them.

Aliana went to the edge of the pond and remained there watching the still surface, a light breeze stirring her golden hair. Komir watched her, wondering at the beauty of the scene: Aliana standing by the silvery pool like a goddess descended from the moon. There was such a fairness and serenity about her that his heart was overwhelmed.

“It seems our destinies cross…” said Aliana thoughtfully, still gazing at the water.

Her voice broke the spell, and Komir looked at the medallion hanging around her neck.

“I don’t know if they cross, but I’m sure they point in the same direction,” he said in a deeper voice than usual.

“I’ve thought a lot about our encounters through the medallions,” Aliana went on, “about the bonds which have been formed between these magical Ilenian jewels, and between us, their bearers. I’m sure there’s a powerful reason why we’re in possession of these strange artifacts. More than that, I’m convinced that it’s not by chance that we, two medallion bearers, have met today in these woods.”

“Yes, I believe that too. For some reason I can’t quite understand, these medallions seem to communicate with each other, as if they had their own life… as if they possessed intelligence of their own… Just thinking about it makes me shiver. I don’t know, Aliana, somehow these medallions seem predestined to meet,” said Komir, a little crossly.

“The medallions or their bearers?” Aliana wanted to know.

“I don’t know… both?”

“Yes, probably both,” said Aliana.

“Then… do you believe we were fated to discover the medallions and meet in this place?”

“I’m not sure about us, but I do believe the medallions were. There’s a very powerful magic intervening here, Ilenian magic. We can’t even begin to imagine how powerful. All I know is that it’s an ancient magic which is guiding the medallions for some purpose, one that I guess will be of great importance.”

“And what about us?”

“I think we’re the vessels chosen to carry the medallions in their journey to their goal,” Aliana said thoughtfully. “Whether we were destined to be the bearers or it’s chance that has chosen us I can’t be sure, but I’m inclined to believe that we’ve been chosen for some reason that for the moment we can’t understand.”

“This isn’t by chance…”

“Why do you say that? What else do you know?”

“At least in my case, I seem to have been chosen… I don’t know if your situation or that of the red-skinned girl, the one who bears the blue medallion, are the same. I find it hard to explain, but my destiny seems to be linked to this ethereal medallion, although I don’t know why,” He took the Ilenian jewel out of his jerkin to show it to Aliana. “I left my homeland in search of justice… What I’m about to tell you doesn’t come easily for me… but I think it might help you understand why I believe this. You see, our farm, up in the Norriel highlands was attacked by foreign warriors, without any reason. They came by night, and they were a kind we’d never seen before: strange men with slanting eyes, wearing white tiger pelts. I survived by the grace of the three goddesses, but my parents… my parents… were murdered in that treacherous attack… That’s why I decided to set out to find those responsible for my parents’ death, to make them pay with their blood and see justice done. That attack, I now see more and more clearly, was aimed to end my life. Unfortunately, it ended the life of those dearest to me.”

“I’m so sorry, Komir… what happened to you is terrible… absolutely awful.”

“Nothing can be done now, but I’ll find out who gave the order even if it’s the last thing I do! You can be sure of that.”

“I see… I understand your pain, your rage… It’s only human… If they wanted you dead, did you manage to find out why?”

“No, I haven’t yet. But I know they wanted to kill me, and I must go on until I find whoever gave the order.”

“Men wearing white tiger pelts and with slanting eyes, you say?” Aliana said, intrigue in her voice.

“Yes, that’s right. Nobody has been able to tell me where they’re from.”

“That’s not surprising. I don’t remember any race in Tremia with slanting eyes, or at least not in the Tremia we know. On the other hand, Tremia is a huge continent and there’s a lot of wild, hostile territory, that’s still unexplored.”

“My knowledge of Tremia is very limited. Never before this quest had I ever left my own Norriel lands…” Komir admitted, slightly ashamed.

Aliana remained thoughtful, looking closely at her medallion. Then she looked up and inspected Komir’s.

“There’s something I don’t understand, Komir. How can these appalling events, I mean the attack on your household and the murder of your parents, be connected to the Ilenian medallions? And why do you believe you’ve been chosen to bear this one?”

Komir stood close to Aliana and touched the medallion of Earth which hung around her neck.

“I’ll try to explain it to you so that it makes sense and doesn’t sound as if I’ve lost my mind completely. At first I didn’t think of a connection. My destiny is to find whoever is searching to kill me and caused my parents’ death. I’m absolutely sure of that. But then, Amtoko warned me of something else…”

“Amtoko?” interrupted Aliana.

“Sorry. Amtoko is our tribe’s spiritual guide. We are the Bikia, of the Norriel of the highlands. She is… a witch. The Silver Witch, they call her.”

“I know of the Norriel. The fame of your people goes ahead of you,” said Aliana with the ghost of a smile.

“Good. Amtoko warned me that my destiny, the path I had decided to follow, was linked to one of much greater importance. If I chose to reject this destiny it would mean the end of our tribe, and the whole continent of Tremia would be plunged into pain and suffering the like of which it had never known before. I know it sounds exaggerated, and I have no proof of this, but that old Silver Witch is rarely mistaken in her judgments and predictions… I told her I didn’t want that weight on my shoulders, that my goal was to find my family’s murderers, not to save the world. But she warned me that if I chose not to follow that path, the threads of fate showed her a dreadful end for the Norriel. She spoke of a coming evil of such proportions that all Tremia would suffer. Thousands of people would die, and a bloody tide would sweep across the continent leaving death, destruction and pain in its wake. A devastating darkness would reign for a hundred years. This she convinced me of. This is the terrible destiny I must prevent in some way, even though I have no idea how. It’s the fate I must fight tirelessly against.”

“But this is a terrible story, Komir,” said Aliana with concern. She gave Komir such a tender look of sympathy that the pain was wiped from the Norriel’s heart. “Can’t you refuse this fate your witch has burdened you with?”

“She hasn’t burdened me with it… it’s all-powerful Destiny, according to her, which has chosen me. She told me my future is marked and overwhelmingly important if I decide to follow the threads of the tapestry.”

“And if you refuse?”

“Amtoko assured me that my search for justice is a part of the great design. If I want my revenge, I must play my part.”

“I see… you do carry a great burden. Are you sure that your Silver Witch isn’t mistaken?”

“More so every day, unfortunately… She is the one who has guided me here, the one who predicted we would meet. This means that my parents’ death is related to us somehow, and to that dreadful fate the Silver Witch has foreseen with her Gift. And yet, she didn’t talk about the medallions. Perhaps her visions don’t reach far enough to see them, or perhaps it’s because of the Ilenian magic itself, I don’t know… But I begin to see that my fate, whatever it is, is linked with this medallion, with the Ilenians…”

Aliana looked into his eyes, trying to see what was hidden behind them. Komir shrank from the Healer’s scrutiny.

“I think I see what you’re trying to say, and it’s deeply serious,” Aliana said without taking her eyes off Komir’s. “You’ve been chosen to prevent an awful fate. Your path, the search for revenge: it all leads to that terrible destiny, whether you like it or not. If that’s the case and your Witch is right, then the medallions must be a part of that fate you have to prevent. It can’t be a coincidence that you have found an Ilenian medallion. There has to be a connection between you, that destiny and the medallions…”

“Yes, that’s what I believe too… although I can’t imagine what it might be…”

Aliana raised her hands to her face.

“Incredibly interesting, and at the same time very frightening.”

“I know, and I’m sorry…” said Komir, looking away.

“You’re sorry?”

“I am. Because if what we believe is true, that means that you’re embroiled in this mess too.”

Aliana looked at Komir again thoughtfully. Her face had lost its usual serenity. There was a growing concern there, which brought deepening shadows to it.

“I need to go over all these things you’ve shared with me, Komir, and meditate on them. It’s a lot of information, and so serious it makes my soul shrink.”

Komir nodded in silence.

A mottled fawn came to the pond from the other side and began to drink, not suspecting their presence. They both watched it with surprise, and for a moment the weight of their decisions and the burden of having to face an apocalyptic fate lifted from Komir’s tired shoulders. Aliana looked into his eyes and smiled. The sun made her hair shine like gold and for an instant Komir lost himself in the beauty of her face and the quiet of her blue eyes.

In that moment, Komir understood that his heart was no longer his own, it had been stolen.

Some noise inside the thicket made the fawn scamper away with the grace and stealth only those animals are capable of. Komir put his hand on the pommel of his sword and tensed. Aliana, also wary, nocked her bow. The bushes parted to reveal a huge boar. Komir, startled, was about to bare his sword when he noticed something was not right. The boar was being carried above the huge shoulders of…

Hartz coming out of the bushes.

“Look, guys! See what I caught!” he said with his booming voice and contagious smile.

“Hartz!” Komir relaxed as he returned his friend’s smile.

The giant came up to them and nonchalantly dropped the boar on the ground.

He offered his bloodied hand to Aliana, “Hi, I’m Hartz,” he said.

Aliana looked at him and made a small curtsey: “Pleased to meet you, Hartz. I’m Aliana, a Healer from the Temple of Tirsar.”

“The pleasure is mine, I’m a Bikia, of the Norriel,” replied Hartz proudly.

Aliana smiled at the big man.

Hartz pointed at the boar and addressed Aliana with a grin: “Ugly, isn’t it?”

“It’s absolutely disgusting,” she replied catching his humor

“Who is? The boar or Hartz?” said a woman’s voice behind them.

They all turned to see Kayti in her white armor coming out from the woods, smiling mischievously.

“What are you doing here?” Komir demanded.

The redhead reached the small group. Looking at Aliana, she said: “The wounded man, Kendas, is awake. It’ll be better if we go back to the cave and the Healer tends to him. And I didn’t want to miss this little gathering, either. Any news?”

Komir bit his lip but did not say anything. Aliana slung the bow onto her back again.

“Komir and I have been exchanging points of view… and experiences…” she said.

Kayti looked at them.

But neither said anything else.

“Well, now that you’ve exchanged ideas, we should eat something,” said Hartz as he rubbed his stomach. “Afterwards, when we’ve had our fill, we can decide what to do. Or do you already know where we should head, Komir?”

“Hmm… that’s a good question. I haven’t really thought about it yet… The thing is I don’t really know…” Komir held the medallion in his hand and stared at it, allowing his thoughts to drift. What should his course be? Amtoko had guided him to Aliana, but now that they had met, what was the next step? “I’m totally lost, that’s the truth of it. I’ve no idea where to go, what to do, what direction to head in…”