The hawk turned to the others and attacked in an exchange of wild talons and sharp beaks. As the last raven flew off, he caught his breath and a figure stepped out from behind the ruined wall.
The figure was half-lit by a shadowed moon. It loomed head and shoulders over Gray. Its broad shoulders hunched inward as its barrel-chest heaved in short, eager breaths. Gangly arms nearly skimmed the ground. Gray watched its claws that gleamed like tarnished daggers.
“Saerok…” he breathed.
Fox-like
“
I
THOUGHT THAT MIGHT ATTRACT YOU,”
the saerok said in a sinister hiss.
Gray delved into his mind reaching for the nexus. In his panic, it eluded him. He felt nothing, only a black void. An even deeper panic set in. On his back, beneath his cloak, was the weight of his bundled sword. He couldn’t reach it in time.
“You humans sicken me, the stench of your arrogance. But you are weak creatures,” the saerok hissed, extending and retracting its claws rhythmically. “You realize how weak you are, do you not? Your large stone cities, your shiny skin you call armor. All of it, a lie! You are frail things.”
Suddenly Gray’s arm shook with tremors of darkness. Panic took hold. Not again. His heart thundered inside his chest as his back pressed against a wall. “Why are you here?”
“I knew more would come, so when the others left, I stayed.”
Gray tensed as the creature took a long step forward. “But why kill me?” he asked, trying to delay the beast.
Rope-like muscles rippled beneath a thin layer of fur. “It’s simple. You are weak, so you should die.” The saerok lifted its gangly arm and the hawk appeared with a cry, lashing at the saerok’s eyes. Using the precious moment, he scrambled to his feet and ran. Behind him, he heard the hawk cry out in pain and he glanced over his shoulder. The hawk was nowhere to be seen, and the saerok was gaining on him, loping on all fours impossibly fast. Gray tore through a ruined archway and turned again. He skidded, one hand sliding along the ground as he took the corner. The saerok’s gangly arm swiped at him, skimming his head. Gray turned, taking another path and dread filled him. It was a dead end. The creature loomed in the corner of his vision, gaining ground. Gray sprinted, not slowing as the wall approached. In the last moment, he ducked. The beast flew over his head and slammed into a stone wall and rubble crashed around him.
He rose, not wasting a moment to see if the beast survived. As he sprinted, he peered over his shoulder. The saerok shook off the rubble, and rose to its full height. With a rumbling snarl, it took to all fours again, loping faster than any horse. Gray veered, sprinting down the maze of ruins, trying to slow the beasts’ momentum. Still the saerok gained with astonishing agility until he felt it hot on his back. He dove and gave a strangled choke as it gripped his cloak. Gray kicked and swung. His cloak pin broke, and he dashed behind the wall.
The saerok landed with a thud in front of him—it had taken the ten foot wall in a single leap. The beast ran its claws along the wall, creating a thin screech. “You cannot escape me! No human has been a challenge. But I’m going to enjoy eating your flesh. The others left, the fools, heading south to the city that shines. But, I knew more would come.”
Gray summoned a smirk despite his fear, “The people have been warned. This time you will fail.”
“I think not. Your own precious kind will let us in and my brothers will bathe in their blood!”
Our own people will destroy us… In the last moment before the creature struck, Gray reached for his blade. He pulled it from beneath the pack in one fluid motion. The saerok grinned, eyes widening for the final blow. With the power of the wind, the white cloth fell from Morrowil. The wind flowed over his arms and encased the blade giving it an impossible burst of speed. The creature’s eyes flashed wide as he sliced its chest, cleaving the beast from neck to groin.
The sword’s tip fell to the earth, limp in his hand. A soft rain fell from the night sky, coating the ruins of Tir Re’ Dol and the saerok who lay in a mangled heap. He knelt and cleaned the blood from Morrowil in a puddle of water.
There was a movement, a small rustle of something behind one of the squat walls. Gray’s pulse jumped, his senses spiking. The nexus came, and his power filled him, golden and dark. He threw his hand to the noise and a bolt of air flew from his fingertips. The corner of the wall shattered.
There was a frightened scream and a voice called, “Gray! It’s us!” Two shadowy figures appeared from behind the wall. Darius stood with his hands raised, and Ayva stood behind the rogue, watching Gray fearfully.
“Ayva… Darius…” Tendrils of wind quickly fell from his fingers. “I didn’t mean to…” his legs trembled and gave way, falling to his knees.
“Gray!” Ayva shouted, and the two rushed to his side. “Light, are you all right?” she whispered. He nodded and she smacked his arm, “Fool! Rushing off and getting yourself nearly killed! What did you think you were doing?”
“How?” he asked looking between the two.
She ignored him. Her eyes turned to the corpse behind him, mouth parting.
Darius cursed, flinching, “Is that a saerok? It’s even uglier than the stories say! It looks like something from a nightmare.”
“It is a nightmare,” he answered, and then shook his head, “what are you two doing here?”
“You killed that?” Ayva said, her blue eyes wide. “Are there anymore?”
“I don’t think so,” he said. Suddenly he remembered the hawk. Motri had saved him, buying him time to flee the saerok. “Motri…”
“Who?” Ayva asked.
“There was a bird, it saved me,” he explained.
“A bird saved you?” Darius scratched his head. “Where is it now?”
“He was back there a ways, near the dead,” he said, trying to rise. “I think he’s hurt.”
“Go check,” Ayva said to the rogue.
Darius grumbled but sprinted off, returning moments later. His face was drained of color as he wiped his mouth. He looked like he had recently vomited. “I saw the pile of bodies. The smell… I’ve never seen anything so awful. But no hawk.”
“He was there,” Gray insisted. “I’ll check myself.”
“I checked everywhere,” Darius replied in anger. “There was no dicing bird, just blood and bodies! Did you take a blow to the skull?”
“I’m sure it simply flew off to safety,” Ayva said. Safety… The word shot through Gray with a flush of fear. The Shining City. He groaned and tried to get up again. Ayva pushed him down easily. He felt so weak. Is it from using my power?
“Let me go,” he growled.
“You’re obviously hurt. You’re not going anywhere,” she replied.
“I have to warn them!”
“Warn who?”
“Everyone!” he answered, “They’re in danger!”
“Of course they are,” Darius grumbled, he nudged Ayva, “See? I told you, he clearly hit his head.”
“You don’t understand,” he said in frustration, “The saerok said our own people will let the dark army into the city. Mura and the others will be slaughtered!”
Darius cursed. “Treachery.”
“And what do you plan to do?” Ayva said, gripping his collar. “It took us two whole days to travel here. Unless you plan on flying, there’s no way you would reach the Shining City in time to warn them!”
“She’s right,” Darius said. “What are we supposed to do?” Gray shrugged the two off and rose to his feet unsteadily. “I’m all for half-schemed plans, Gray, but what you’re saying is plain suicide!”
He closed his eyes in anger, knowing they were right. “What can I do? I can’t just abandon them,” he whispered.
Ayva’s hand touched his shoulder. “Trust Karil, Mura, and Rydel,” she replied. “They will take the villagers and the others to safety.”
“How are you so certain?”
“Well, how do you think we got here?” Darius asked.
Gray shook his head, “How did you?”
“We had a little chat with Mistress Hitomi,” Ayva explained. “She knew about the Sodden Tunnels. Awful place by the way.” She shivered. “We couldn’t have made it without the torches she lent us to light the way.”
All of it made sense and he breathed a sigh of relief. He would have to trust the others. However, it didn’t answer one thing. He had left to keep them safe. He closed his eyes as exhaustion caught up with him. “But why?” he asked, “Why did you follow me?”
Ayva answered with a shrug, “You’re our friend, and we’re in this together.”
It sounded so simple. But they didn’t know what was inside him, the darkness that waited. He thought about what he had nearly done to her.
“I’m afraid you’re stuck with us,” Darius said, gripping his shoulder.
“It seems so,” he said with a smile.
“So, it’s settled! Where are we headed?”
“The Gate,” Gray answered.
Darius choked, “Dice! The gate? Why don’t you just say Remwald, or the gates of the underworld! It’d be the same thing!”
“It’s our only salvation,” he said and looked north, “And if the others make it out too, that’s where they’ll be headed.”
“When they make it out, you mean,” Ayva corrected.
Gray prayed she was right. Together, they turned and looked north. In the distance, beyond a vast stretch of desert, the black towers of Death’s Gate rose, dark and looming. “Farhaven…” Darius breathed, staring at the Gate. “I can’t believe it.”
“Wait ‘til we get there,” he said.
A Deserted Night
A
YVA SNUFFED THE DWINDLING FLAMES OF
the campfire as dawn broke.
It was the second day of their journey after leaving Tir Re’ Dol. Each day had been filled with swift travel across plains of grass. They now made camp on a wooded hill. It was the last patch of green before an endless sea of desert. The Sobeku Desert, Gray had said. As they covered ground, Ayva’s mind raced with the stories she had heard as a child about the land of magic. Farhaven…
“Sleep well?”
She startled, jumping at his voice.
Gray was sliding his bundled sword between his pack. From the first moment she had seen him, she sensed he was not from this side of the gates. In his ragged cloak, he looked a wanderer, shrouded in mystery and haunted by his past.
His green eyes stared into hers and she nearly forgot he had asked her a question. “Great,” she said and gestured towards the rogue. “He’s the one being a princess. I never knew anyone who could complain so much over a few sticks and a bit of dirt.”
Darius was grumbling and picking twigs from his wild brown hair. He turned and gave them a sour look. She couldn’t help but laugh, and Gray chuckled as well. The rogue shook his fist. “What are you two laughing at? You’d be annoyed too if you just took a bath in these cursed things,” he said shaking a shirt full of prickly burrs.
“Put your shirt on Darius,” Gray said. “We’ve waited here too long.”
Tying her cloak tighter against the morning chill, Ayva hefted her pack, “If you don’t hurry, we’ll be travelling at nightfall, and we don’t know what’s out there.”
“We do know what’s out there is the problem,” Gray answered.
Darius stretched his arms with a loud yawn, passing them as he said loudly, “Welp! What are you two waiting for?” He slapped Gray on the shoulder, “Let’s get going laggards!” Ayva looked to Gray who shook his head with another chuckle and together they headed down the wooded rise. They crossed into the desert and a wave of heat blasted her. With Death’s Gate as a landmark in the distance, they traversed the shifting sands.
As they walked, Darius sang in a confident tenor,
Never have I met a man,
Who knows his merit in the sands,
Where blowing winds pick up the land,
And cast it far away.
The Ronin have traversed it once,
That ancient time so long ago,
Those warriors were made to pay.
The Sobeku Desert and its arid way
Two steps short of those stone Gates
Where blowing winds pick up the land,
And cast it far away.
By the time they made camp that evening, the sun was an orange ball, shimmering just above the horizon. Exhausted, Ayva collapsed where she stood, sitting cross-legged. “I can’t move another step,” she slipped off her boots and rubbed her tired feet.
The rogue kicked off his boots, examining his soles and cursed, “Dicing blisters.” Meanwhile, Gray unpacked a set of sticks from his bag, and set up a small pile for a fire.
Ayva eyed the burning sun. “A fire? But it’s still bright outside.”
Gray shrugged. “I have a memory of the desert being a cold dark place,” he said, breaking sticks. Ayva read his eyes—they seemed lost in the memory.
“You’ve been here?” Darius questioned.
He gripped his chest and answered, “It feels like a dream, but I’m certain of it.” He scraped the flint against stone, but to no avail and he grumbled.
“What’s wrong?” Ayva asked.
“I can’t get it to spark,” Gray said.