Oh, wow. This could work.
Can you do that again?
Once, perhaps. I have little energy left.
Jais smiled. That was all he needed.
He leveled his father’s sword at the remaining kroll.
Now.
The light glistened around the chamber as the last kroll fell.
“The big one’s all yours,” Jais said and fell to one knee. He was spent and huffing hard. He hoped Caerwyn could finish off the krolloc as he certainly had nothing left in him.
Caerwyn heard Jais’ comment and nodded. She didn’t really know what Jais had done, but her senses told her there were no more krolls trudging up behind her, and there had been two bright streams of light. She would ask him about it later, for now her attention was solely on the krolloc.
Her previous attempts at talking to the krolloc, distracting it, had allowed her time to recoup some energy. She could feel that vigor slipping away now though, fighting this thing required a lot of movement and effort. She needed to finish it off quickly.
With two hands on Barami’s sword she kept the krolloc moving by swinging the long blade and dancing around its attempts to crush her. Several more times it reached out and made a grabbing motion at the air, but nothing happened to her. She wasn’t going to question it, not while in battle, but she was thankful that whatever the krolloc was trying to do wasn’t working.
Around the room they moved. She cut chunks out of it, while it grew weaker and weaker. It landed one solid blow on her. A fist slammed down on her, and she didn’t have time to move out of the way, she blocked with her sword and hoped her muscles would hold. The sword bit deep into the thing’s fist, and the force of its strike slammed her down to her knees. She had to use two hands, one on the blade of the sword to keep the blade from chopping down on her as well. Still the blade had come down at her. She’d had to lean back to avoid it splitting her head. Instead it bit into her chest, scoring a line of pain, but that was where the force of the blow dissipated, and she was able to throw the fist off after that and scramble to her feet again. Her one hand was bleeding now from a deep gash, as was the long cut across the top of her chest. But still she charged in at the krolloc, unrelenting. Her energy was waning. This needed to end… now.
Both of its ankles were chewed up. She kept working on them, hoping to bring the big thing off its feet.
She saw her chance and took it. The krolloc had stepped forward with its left foot and wavered slightly, she dove in, rolling and came up with a swing of all her might to that ankle.
For a heart-rending moment the sword stuck, unmoving.
Then the krolloc’s own fist slammed into her once again. The force of its own hit drove her sword through its ankle.
It bellowed as she rolled away from its crushing blow.
She’d been knocked to one side of it and for a moment she couldn’t breathe. Her vision blurred. Her back and right side were awash in pain, sharp and stinging, broad and throbbing, it was nearly too much. But her mind registered the sight before her, the krolloc fell to its knees, its head turned back, mouth open in a bellow of pain, though she didn’t really register the noise.
But it wasn’t dead.
She grimaced as she tried to rise, but pain lanced through her and darkness danced around her vision, threatening a blackout. She couldn’t risk it.
Desperate she called for Davlas, but the spear did not come. She had no other ranged weapon… except…
She dug into a pouch and pulled out her sling and a smooth stone.
She still had one good arm, so she propped herself up to a sitting position and loaded the sling, quickly getting it up to speed. She wasn’t as accurate with her left hand, but she prayed to Davul, the god who had guided her spear so many times, and let the stone fly.
It sank into the krolloc’s good eye as the beast was regaining itself. It was a small thing, nearly insignificant against a creature so large, but yet again the krolloc wailed in pain, covering its eye.
But it still hadn’t been enough.
“Caer, my sword!”
She knew that voice.
Without really knowing where he was, other than off to her right, she slid the sword along the rocky ground to where Barami must have made his way over to her. Rolling her head to one side she caught sight of him. He looked worse than she felt. But he picked up his sword slowly and for a moment seemed to glance from it to the krolloc, as if gathering the courage to do… something.
Then he cried a wordless yell of desperation and determination and ran an awkward hobbling charge toward the beast, raising his sword high and holding it with both hands, blade out before him in a reversed grip. He jumped so he could catch the thing in the chest and caught it unaware. The sword drove deep into the thing’s chest. It toppled backwards with a useless swing in Barami’s direction.
Despite the pain, Caerwyn lifted her head to watch the beast fall. Then she saw something which made her smile, teeth still clenched from the soreness radiating through her.
Jais had been on his hands and knees, trying to find some semblance of strength or at least catch his breath to help Caerwyn. But all he felt like doing was collapsing into a long sleep.
He too heard Barami’s cry and lifted his head to see what the man was doing. In his condition, any sort of attack would be crazy.
What Jais saw was more than he expected.
The krolloc, on its knees, loomed close. When had it gotten here? Had he been so distracted he hadn’t noticed it? He scrambled to pick up his swords from where he’d laid them on the ground. But it was facing away from him and wasn’t a threat… yet
But then Barami hit the thing in the chest sinking his large sword so deep the tip of it, just an inch or so, pricked out of the thing’s back. Then the krolloc fell backward… toward Jais.
He raised his swords, blades crossed above him, in a desperate block. His father’s sword blazed to life with light as the krolloc’s neck caught the two blades. Jais couldn’t take the impact and was pushed flat…
But not before he’d seen his swords sever the head of the krolloc. It bounced once, then rolled away.
Jais lay, semi-pinned by the heavy body of the beast, its viscous black blood leaking onto him, but he didn’t much care.
It was dead.
And by some miracle all three of them were still alive… he hoped.
Where was Caerwyn?
He didn’t have the strength to get up, but he rolled his head around and caught sight of her, half-propped up, looking beaten and battered, but smiling grimly at him.
He smiled back… then he blacked out.
31
Two weeks later, thanks to the increased healing of a drahksan, they were close to well again. Barami was a different story.
Caerwyn had been the only one able to do anything of consequence after the battle. Knowing that the krolloc might have called some krolls back to the cave, she’d dragged the other two, both unconscious, to a smaller cave. Then she too had collapsed and rested.
But she needn’t have bothered moving them. There was no sign that anyone had been back to the larger cave when they checked later.
Once they were feeling strong enough, Jais and Caerwyn had carried Barami back to the statue of Thadros for him to touch it and be healed. For whatever reason, it hadn’t done much. There was some minor effect, but nothing as strong as the first time. So even with Jais’ healing during the battle, the aged human would need a lot of time to recover.
Jais had said that suited him well as he couldn’t leave just yet.
They left Barami to heal, and Caerwyn went with Jais as he tended to what he referred to as ‘his duties’. First they found the body of his uncle and buried the man. A grave in the forest would have suited the huntsmen well enough. They found a quiet glade with a spot of sun, dug up a sapling growing in the spot then Jais had replanted the tree over his uncle’s body.
As he stood there over the man’s grave he told her, “Uncle Perrick t
aught me to take only what was needed from the forest.” He’d sniffed away some tears and with a sad smile said, “Even in death my uncle will give back to the forest. His body will help feed this tree, make it strong. I think Perrick’s spirit would appreciate that.”
They had searched for Alnia’s body, but found nothing.
Then Jais had returned to his home. It was a shambles and mostly burned down, but he dug through what remained for the better part of a day, coming out with some not-as-charred clothes and a jar of his aunt’s healing gel he’d found rolling on the floor. He’d brought out a few other items as well, personal things, and stuffed it all into a pack.
Caerwyn watched him, his face grim. He knew he wouldn’t be coming back here for a while… perhaps ever. She sighed for his loss. He’d lost so much: his aunt and uncle, his love, his home, his village.
She couldn’t understand it, but he’d insisted on going to see Klasten’s Green as well. So, they had made their way to a hill overlooking the village and there they lay watching the activity below.
There seemed like precious few people.
But they were rebuilding.
“Where did the krolls go?” Jais asked shaking his head in confusion.
Caerwyn shrugged. “My best guess is that they went their own way once the krolloc was dead. It was his influence over them which was making them act as a unit. It must have been. It’s the only explanation for why they would have acted as they did, fighting together, helping each other. When the krolloc died they would have gone back to their own ways and probably began fighting amongst themselves as much as anyone else. You saved your village, Jais.”
Though she wasn’t sure how much of a consolation that was, given what the village had done.
After they had lain there for some time, Jais finally sighed a heavy breath and said, “Let’s go.”
So it was that Caerwyn took this boy from the only home he’d ever known.
In the back of her mind her initial reason for coming here… coming to him, niggled at her. She wouldn’t bring it up now. It wasn’t the time. Perhaps she never would. How could she ask more of this young man who’d given everything he had?
Three weeks later, with Barami mostly recovered, they’d moved on.
Then, one afternoon a few days after that, as they travelled a rough wagon-way, with a peaceful river on one side and a sparse forest on the other, Jais spoke.
“Caer?”
It was odd to hear him call her by the shortened name which only Barami had ever used. It was the first time he had. Perhaps he felt familiar enough with her now to do so. She searched her feelings about this closeness and found she liked him using the nickname.
“Yes?”
He let out a bit of a laugh, it wasn’t much and it wasn’t really mirthful, but it was the most hopeful emotion he’d shown since leaving. “You came here to find me, right? To… mate with me?”
It felt suddenly awkward to have him saying those words. She was thankful Barami was up ahead, scouting the trail.
She swallowed a lump in her throat. She could get over this awkwardness. She’d been a general for the gods’ sakes. “Yes.”
“Do you still want that?”
Did she?
They walked in silence for a while as she considered. The truth was that despite everything that had happened she still wanted a child. Whether it was with him or not…? She wasn’t sure.
“I still want to have a child, a drahksan child, yes, but I don’t feel I have any right to ask such a thing of you. I’m sure we’ll find other drahksani, eventually.”
He nodded. “Good. You’re a friend. I’ve been through too much with you for you not to be. I…” He hesitated for a long moment. “I don’t know if I’m ready to have a child… yet. But I think that, perhaps, if you still wanted one when I am ready, I might be… I could be the man you… have it with.”
She nodded. “Then I’ll wait.”
He smiled over at her, a genuine, kind smile, and it warmed her heart.
But perhaps she wouldn’t have to use Jais in that way. Already she was sensing another drahksani somewhere ahead. The pull wasn’t as strong as Jais’ had been, but it was something.
So, they walked together, side by side, but still… distant as their shadows stretched long on the road before them.
And a new thought began to bud within Caerwyn’s mind. Perhaps in addition to a child she had a new quest: to find other drahksani and help restore her race to glory once more.
To learn more about R. Michael’s books and to sign up for his newsletter to receive exclusive announcements and new release notifications visit: www.rmichaelcard.com
Other Books by R. Michael Card
BLOOD OF DRAGONS
Book 1: Soul Seeking
The King’s Outlaw
GUARDIANS OF LIGHT
Book 1: The Last Scion
Book 2: Scion Rising
Book 3: Scion’s Sacrifice
TALES OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS
The Goblin King
The Swordmaster’s Apprentice
About R. Michael Card
R. Michael Card has loved fantasy since he read his first Dragon Lance book so many years ago. He has been writing for twenty years but has only recently decided to start sharing his work with the world. He has always enjoyed the lighter side of epic fantasy, the grand adventure, and has infused that love into his works.
He lives near Toronto, Ontario with his beloved wife and their cat. He has had a plethora of careers, working in software, insurance, trades, and education, with jobs ranging from washing cars to career counseling.
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