I’ll have minutes, maybe more, before the alarm is rang, Kirin calculated, and even if I get passed the guards, those giant doors will be locked, ruling out any chance of my escape…
The alley was empty save for the tan walls, and clotheslines hanging high above. Nearby, in the damp sand, lay the pendant. He grabbed it and rose, moving to leave when he felt something. He looked back. There, in the shade of the alley, lay the sword. Kirin wished he could toss the cursed blade in the darkest well and not think of it again. Instead, he reluctantly strapped the blade to his back, sheathing it where he once put his trusted sword, and with a deep breath he stepped into the desert street.
Before he knew it, his feet moved as if of their own will, guiding him through the streets, and press of bodies. Fear pounded in his veins as sounds crashed in his ears, and a thousand bright sights paraded before his eyes.
At one point, his feet stopped in the crush of people. His mind railed, heart thumping against his ribcage. What’s going on? A voice yelled in fear, blood pumping in his ears, and a cogent thought shot through like an arrow. It’s happening. Is this what it feels like to go insane? But then it was gone. As he moved through the streets a voice grazed his consciousness, screaming to wake, but always it left and he kept moving.
People crashed into him, bustling, moving, the indistinct blur of pockmarked streets rutted from daily wear, the shouts of loudmouthed hawkers, of watchful guards standing in the crossroads and flanking bridges—he avoided their gaze especially, pulling his wool hood forward, but then he heard the blood, pounding in his ears. His feet flew even faster, as he pushed and shoved his way through the crowd.
Above, the sun turned a dark, ripe orange. He was losing time and something deep, something primal told him he had to move faster or all was lost. He had to make it. Then finally, at long last, the crowds thinned and he saw it—the tip of the tall, bronze colored gates. Abruptly and violently it sounded, cascading over the buildings and echoing through the streets, deep and ominous—the intoning of a bell. The alarm had been sounded.
Kirin, lost in a fog, didn’t know what it meant exactly, but something inside him tensed. All around him, others stiffened. Their eyes panned up as they listened. Far ahead, at the gates, there was commotion. He ran.
He neared and watched as guards flocked to the doors, blocking the giant, arched entry that led out of the desert city. He watched, confused. Something inside him fell, disheartened, but still his feet told him he had to continue. And so he did, not sure what he was doing. As he approached the giant outer gates, his steps slowed as he remembered something dangerous. A dying part of him yelled at him to flee and run from this place. You bear the mark! Kirin looked down to his arm, and peeled back his sleeve to see a strange black insignia. He couldn’t understand it. All the lines of it made sense to him, but the whole of it was strangely unreadable. He fearfully eyed the row of armored men, their halberds crossed, sharp edges catching the light of the setting sun. They will not let you pass! They will kill you if you try! Still, Kirin’s pause lasted only a moment and his feet moved again, slowly forward. He tried to stop them, but to no avail. His eyes flickered to each of the tall sentries garbed in plated metal and black cloth. They stood before the immense open doors like a wall of muscle, and metal. He swallowed. For a moment, their eyes locked onto him. He stood frozen, surely caught, and then, just like that, they passed, brushing over him to watch the milling crowds beyond. It was as if he was never there, no more than a wisp of desert sand, visible, and then gone the next moment.
He took another step. Still, the guard’s eyes never shifted. He ducked beneath the crossed halberds of two tall guards, crossing the threshold of the gates and something deep hit him. He turned and looked at the city for a moment, but that tie fled too and he turned away once more. Kirin continued. He felt something in the pit of his stomach, as if he was losing something important and long held with each step.
With the next step, he forgot his name, but even that worry and strangeness passed away like a desert breeze, as if it was just a trifling memory. As he walked, the young man watched the giant sand and stone archway overhead, and then before he knew it, he was beyond, and looking into the blustery, cold winds of the Reliahs Desert. Behind him, there was a thud as the huge gates slammed shut.
As if standing in another’s feet, the young man took one step and then another into the harsh desert, protecting his face from the fierce sand flurries, with the cloth of his tattered cloak. Moving, always moving, into the south and to another world, to the world of Daerval.
Awakening
G
RAY AWOKE WITH A STRANGE, BUT
familiar sensation.
It was like many mornings, but this time he felt the pressure of eyes on him so heavy it ripped him awake, tearing him from a pleasant dream. Normally the sensation was reassuring like being tucked inside a blanket, almost as if he were being watched over. But today the blanket no longer felt sheltering, but suffocating. He tried to shift his mind from it.
He looked around the dawn-lit chamber, reassuring himself with the familiar image. His room was small and simply furnished. Each piece of furniture was a rich brown, burnished from time and carved from Silveroots, the long-standing monarchs of the Lost Woods. His bed was tucked against the wall farthest from the door. Beside his bed was a small stand, his creation. A heavy bookcase lined the wall opposite. It was filled with tomes of Mura’s, most of which Gray had already read. His favorite book sat on his bedside stand, the pages heavily worn. He glanced to its leather cover, eyeing the gold lettering: Tales of the Ronin.
He sat up, letting the covers tumble, and then groaned in pain, noticing the welts on his body like purple snakes—outlines from Mura’s training staff. Suddenly, the door to his room burst open.
Mura stood in the doorway, garbed in forest hues, with soft leather boots suitable for stealth. A grimace lined his weathered face. “Still in bed?” In his right hand, Mura gripped a polished quarterstaff.
“Still? What are you talking about? The sun’s barely up.”
Mura grunted. “Barely and is are not barely different.”
“What? I don’t even think you know what that means,” Gray grumbled. “You should know better. Wine ought to be drunk at night Mura.”
“It means if you don’t get out of bed now, I’m going to take that bed out from beneath you, and your feistiness with it.” Mura thumped his staff on the floor for emphasis.
“All right, hold on,” he slowly pushed back the covers and—
In his periphery, he saw Mura heft his staff. Not good. He scrambled out of bed landing in a crouch balanced on the balls of his feet. His blood pumped and his covers were haphazardly draped across his half-naked body.
“I see you can move when you need to.”
“Now that you got me up, mind helping me out? Toss me those,” he said, pointing to the pair of britches next to Mura who glanced down, grimace deepening, then wordlessly used his staff and tossed the pants.
Gray snagged them from the air, and sat back on the bed slipping them on. Soft and worn, though fitted enough for hunting or stealth, his pants were one of the few articles that remained from his past, along with his much-treasured worn gray cloak. It hung from a hook upon the wall. He eyed its emblem of twin-crossed swords and wondered again, guessing at their significance. He often conjured stories about the mysterious insignia, imagining faraway lands.
The thought reminded him of the other item of his past. He pointedly avoided looking to the cubbyhole behind the bookcase, not wanting to attract Mura’s keen eye. He had not touched the blade for two years, but he still felt it. Its casing of cloth did nothing to dampen the fear that turned his stomach when thinking about it. It pulled at him, even now, like a moth to a flame.
“More training today?” he questioned.
Mura grumbled. “I’m not sure how to answer you when you ask foolish questions. Of course we train today. Now finish dressing,” then the hermit paused, revealing a devious smile. “Oh, and bring your sword. I want to see it now.”
The door shut behind him.
For two years, the man had known all along. Gray dove towards the bookcase and hauled it away from the wall. There sat an unassuming bundle of white cloth. It was more than twice the length of his forearm. He carefully examined the bundle’s surface. There it was. A single strand of his brown hair rested on the white fabric. It was just as he’d left it long ago, as if not a day had gone by.
“Tricky old man,” he muttered, running a hand through his hair. Grabbing the bundle, he unwrapped the sword. The bright steel glinted, dangerous and beautiful. Dried blood, a blackish red, caked its keen edge—just as the day he found it. Its silver hue glowed beneath the blood
His grip tightened, loathing the blade. With water from the washbasin, he scrubbed the blade with his bare hands, turning the bowl a dark scarlet, then inspected it under the light of the window. It gleamed as if brand new. He quickly wrapped the sword, running out of the hut.
An early morning fog was fading, unveiling the clearing. The hut sat in the center of a glade, surrounded by the dense Lost Woods. Mura stood near an old stump used for chopping firewood, where a stubborn piece of oak sat which Gray had been unable to hew.
Wordlessly, he handed the blade to Mura. The hermit assessed the blade, scrutinizing it with a careful eye. If Mura knew the origin of the blade, he might uncover more of his past. “Does it look familiar?” he asked.
Mura’s peppered hair swayed. “I’m afraid not. Where’d you get it, boy?”
Such a simple question, but when Gray reached into his mind to answer, he saw nothing of his past. As if it was shut behind a door that he didn’t have the key to. “I don’t know,” he replied.
Running a finger along the blade’s edge, Mura shrugged. “Your past is your own, lad. I’ve never asked, and I never will.”
Gray gripped the hermit’s arm, stopping him before he continued, “I wish I knew. I have nothing to hide from you, but I simply can’t remember. My last memory is holding the blade when I entered the woods. Other than that…”
Mura rubbed his jaw. “Sometimes things are forgotten for a reason. Now put your sword away. We won’t need it today.”
“I doubt it’s much good anyway,” Gray agreed.
Mura twisted and the blade arced faster than light. It cleaved the stubborn hunk of firewood, slicing like molten iron through paper. The two halves tumbled to the forest floor. “It can cut well enough, but this is a weapon of death, and it has seen much blood. I’m afraid it would not suit for our practice today.”
Gray tried to hide his surprise. “Then we’ll train with staffs?”
Mura winked, handing back his sword, disappearing into the hut. He came back with two strange looking blades, constructed from light wood. Mura handed him a blade. “Today I want to test your skill and limits with a sword. These are made of yen boughs, so they should only smart a bit. It won’t do to be slicing each other to ribbons just yet.” Mura turned, walking away.
“Wait, where are you going?” he asked. “Aren’t we sparring here?”
Mura looked back with a wink. “I have something else in mind. Today, we’ll train like never before.”
Kail’s Tree
K
AIL WAS A STATUE OF CALM,
sitting cross-legged beneath the shelter of a yen tree. The blades of grass leaned away from the wanderer, but the shadows drew nearer.
A tiny speck shot into the night sky like an arrow. It slowed to a stop, as if stuck in the starry web, and then suddenly it burst into golden rain. A chorus of good cheer erupted. Eyes closed, he listened to the sound of laughter as if hearing it for the first time. How long has it been since I’ve felt the warmth of an inn, the taste of wine, or even shared the company of another? Ages, he knew. The chill darkness was his only comfort now.
Shunning the thoughts, he closed his eyes and sought relentlessly. Not with his eyes, but with an entirely different sense. Outside his mind, the shadows from the ground and tree inched closer. The black tendrils reached for his limbs.
As he had done many times, he stalked closer to the nexus within his mind. Others had reached for the flow before and been less than lucky—grasping the power too quickly could incinerate one’s body, like a burning ember to dry tinder. Once he embraced the nexus, he was gone.
His vision flew forward, over the green fields. He raced toward the Eastern Kingdoms. The grass turned to sandy plains, and then to the rocky Crags. It was an impenetrable terrain of rock and towering boulders. In its center was a deep chasm called The Rift where it was said the world split thousands of years ago, before even Kail was alive, and now tiny Crag beasts dwelled. Somewhere in that land, the ancient Kingdom of Stone, Dun Varis, still existed. Kail had heard the rumors. A whole city and its people, resurrected from the ashes of the Lieon, but even his eye could not attest to the truth of it.
To the north, the land was just as pitiless. The rocky Crags became the white plains of the Merkal Desert. There, the cruel sun took out its aggression on the sunbaked people, the foul-mouthed traders of the east. Still, there was nothing. No sign of what he sought and time was wearing thin, for he could only hold the vision for so long. Where are you?