The Duelist

by Eric Vall

  “We don’t want any more trouble, Asher,” the figure on the far right said.

  “Then let go of my wife,” I snarled like a pitbull at the end of my chain and patience.

  The guy on the right nodded, and the other two released Zoie as if she was a hot potato, and she sprinted away from them the second they were no longer in her way.

  I dropped Gul’s bloody dagger in the dirt and opened my arms as she crashed into me, and then I wrapped her up in a relieved embrace as I buried my head into the curtain of her jasmine scented hair.

  We broke apart but kept hold of one another as the remaining three mercs approached us once more. I took a step back and pulled Zoie behind me, but the one who spoke to me earlier stopped, and the other two fell behind in a non-threatening way.

  “You fight with honor, and it pains me that one of our clan fought you in the coward’s way,” the new boss of this merry band of thieves said and then extended his gloved hand.

  “Yeah, well,” I grunted and shook the offered hand even though I had a chip on my shoulder the size of Texas. “I suggest the rest of you fuck off back where you came from, and if we ever cross paths again, I won’t be so merciful.”

  “Let us hope if we ever meet again, it will be as allies,” the hooded man replied.

  “Horus,” one of the others said to him as he stepped forward. “He can never be an ally to us because it is known he is of Traveler blood. Do not make bonds with your words that you can never hope to keep.”

  “We are in strange times, Tok,” the merc named Horus mused. “One should never say the word never.”

  “There is a scent of another mercenary clan nearby,” the third hooded figure suddenly spoke up. “We must go.”

  “Head east to the river, and you both should avoid any more trouble,” Horus advised. Then he motioned with his fist, and the three men vanished soundlessly into the forest.

  Zoie and I stood there frozen for a moment to make sure the threat was truly gone. When nothing else jumped out to try and kill us, I released a breath.

  “Are you okay?” I asked Zoie.

  “Are you?” she said back as she cupped my face and brushed her thumb under my swollen right eye that was still stinging from the dirt.

  “I’m fine,” I said and tried to grin it off like I usually do, but now that the danger was over, I felt like a wrung-out sponge.

  “You’re right,” Zoie said as her eyes narrowed. “The word ‘fine’ is a vague, inaccurate, and unsatisfactory answer.”

  I laughed as she pouted cutely, and I embraced her once more just to feel the comfort of her warm strong body against mine.

  “We should get going before the sun goes down, or something else tries to kill us,” I said and then went to gather my things.

  “I agree, but before we go, let me do something first,” Zoie said. Then she rooted around in her fallen pack for a sword shorter and broader than the one basically just on my waist for show.

  “Hey, cool, new sword,” I said when she handed it to me. I pulled it out of its scabbard and held it up to feel the weight and balance. The design reminded me of a Roman sword like a gladius with its big round pommel, and it felt comfortable and secure when I gripped it.

  “I wanted to give it to you when we made it to The Gate’s Inn,” she said as she swapped out the blades and secured the roman one to my belt. “It was my mother’s.”

  “You really want me to have this?” I asked as I grabbed her hand to prevent her from moving too far away.

  “I really do.” Zoie flashed me a small smile I just had to have a taste of, so I leaned in and tried to show her how much I appreciated her gift with a deep kiss.

  “Let’s go,” I said with a smile when we broke apart, and then we hiked off the path toward the east like Horus advised us.

  The rest of the journey through the forest was uneventful. Zoie and I took a break once we reached the river, and Zoie helped me use the purifying tithe stones so I could wash my face and soothe my eyes that were still irritated from dirt and grime.

  “Keep them open,” Zoie instructed as she stood between my knees as I sat on a boulder. I tilted my head back, and she then wrung out a rag full of clean water onto my upturned face.

  “Ugh,” I groaned as they still burned.

  “Okay, now close,” she said as she folded the cloth and rested it over my poor eyelids.

  “That feels wonderful,” I sighed and blindly reached out for her so I could rest my hands on her hips. “You really do take good care of me.”

  “That’s what a wife does for her husband,” she said, and I could hear the little smirk in her voice.

  “Man, I guess I would be completely lost without you,” I chuckled.

  “No, you wouldn’t because you are the one with the map,” Zoie said flatly.

  “Are you really teasing me right now when I’m poor and blind?” I asked her in mock outrage.

  “Another thing wives do to their husbands,” Zoie laughed and plucked the rag off my face so she could check my eyes.

  “How’s it look?” I asked as she peered into my face with all the seriousness of a doctor. “Will I live?”

  “For now,” she said and cupped my jaw as she frowned. “It really was close, though. I keep seeing Gul and his dagger every time I close my eyes. I thought he stabbed you in the heart. How did you get away?”

  “I used my time-trance thing,” I said but then furrowed my brow. “Only this time it was different.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “Usually, when it happens, I am able to make time slow down, but this time I actually made time stop,” I said as I recalled back to how much I willed for just one split second of time.

  “What was it like?” Zoie’s deep blue eyes laser beamed into mine as if she was willing herself to see my memory so she could dissect it like a schematic.

  “At first, the time-trance did its usual thing, but I knew I needed to do something else, so I concentrated harder,” I explained as I tried to put words to the strange ability I gained since being zapped here. “But I didn’t think I could actually make it stop completely.”

  “Thank the Goddess you did,” Zoie said.

  “I’m thinking there might be more levels to this skill than I realized,” I told her as the gears started to turn inside my head. “I think you were right about figuring out how to really understand the basics of the time-trance so I can summon it sooner, and I really want to master that before I attempt the time-stop thing again.”

  “Like any skill gained, it is only strong if you master the basic form as your foundation,” Zoie said with a stoic nod.

  “I love when you do your whole Mr. Miyagi warrior advice thing,” I snickered as I stood up and butted my nose against hers. “It’s hot.”

  “And I find it endearing when you reference things I have no understanding of,” she said so matter-of-fact I didn’t know if she was teasing me again or if she was being serious.

  She was so mysterious and intelligent, and it drove me crazy in the absolute best way. Like a Rubik’s Cube with missing center pieces, there was just enough challenge about her that kept me trying to figure her out.

  “You know exactly what you’re doing to me, don’t you?” I asked as I narrowed my eyes at my wife.

  “I have no idea what you mean,” she said and spun around so her tail would tickle me in the face. “Ready to go?”

  “You are a minx,” I said as I itched my nose, and then I followed that sexy tail as we continued on our way.

  We broke through the tree line just as the sun was starting to set, and Zoie and I took a moment to gaze out at the village in the distance. The street lanterns started to come on one by one, and they cast their golden reflections in the river that flowed through the heart of the village. It was romantic and otherworldly and looked like it could be on a postcard from Venice.

  Even though I was seeing it from inside this time, the massive wall that circled most of the island looked
just as formidable as before, and it loomed over the river village like a watchful giant. I squinted as I followed the gleaming ribbon of river to where it intersected the wall, and I noticed there was a rectangular gap missing as if someone removed a slat in their picket fence.

  “Is that the gate?” I asked.

  “Yes, and we are just in time to see them close it,” Zoie said as she followed my line of sight. “Nata Isle has the most impressive fortress structure of all the Isles.”

  “In what way?” I asked.

  “Come, let us get closer,” Zoie said as she tugged my wrist like a kid waiting for Disney Land to open. Her excitement rubbed off on me big time and gave me the energy I needed to keep up with her.

  We ran through the streets of the village, and I felt like I would get whiplash from how often my head was turning this way and that to try and take everything in.

  The village in Mec Valley was more rustic in a Middle Earth Tolkien way, but Gatetown was like the combination of a fishing village and a booming steampunk metropolis fantasy.

  The buildings were tall, maybe not New York City tall, but they were taller than the simple stone and log structures I was used to seeing so far. Carriages were still being pulled by manapillars and poracks, but there were also rusty iron pipes connected to various pump houses stationed up and down the river side.

  I followed Zoie as she ran across a network of stone bridges, crisscrossed her way through a few streets, and then up a set of stone steps until we both popped up into a large circular plaza.

  “Look!” Zoie pointed to the sight of the giant gate and ran toward the end of the plaza.

  I caught up with her just as the sun finally set behind the big wall, and when I leaned against the stone ledge that looked out over the river, I sighed at how lovely the soft orange glow of the rock lanterns illuminated her wondrous expression.

  “Isn’t it breathtaking?” she whispered.

  “Yes,” I said, and I wasn’t lying. Gatetown was atmospheric and beautiful in an alien sort of way, but Zoie’s smile as she took in the sights was more attractive than the exotic scenic view, and I couldn’t get myself to turn away.

  A series of three booming drum beats suddenly echoed out, and a loud mechanical whirring sound could be heard. At the head of the river where the gap in the wall stood, a rectangular structure began to emerge from the dark water, and the sound of large stone slabs grinding together made the marrow of my bones rattle.

  This deep vibrating noise lasted about three minutes, and when it was over, the gate filled the gap in the wall like nothing had ever been missing.

  “Wasn’t that exciting?” Zoie turned to me, and the street lanterns sparkled in her midnight blue eyes like fireflies.

  “Do they close the gate every night?” I asked.

  “Yes, and then they open it every dawn,” she said and did a little excited wiggle where she stood. “What do you think they use to make it rise from the water like that?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said with a slow blooming grin. If Zoie was on Earth, I figured she might be an engineer because of the way she always wanted to know the mechanics of everything.

  One more thing I loved about my new wife.

  “Why are you smiling at me like that?” she asked as she cocked her head.

  “No reason.” I shook my head. “Why don’t we go find The Gate’s Inn and see if there’s any food we can afford? It’ll probably be a while before we have a guaranteed hot meal that isn’t dried woot fruit and porack jerky.”

  Zoie pulled the map out of my pack and unrolled it on the stone ledge.

  “Jenner marked the Inn for us,” she said as she pointed to a small inked star next to a giant water wheel on the river.

  “It looks like it’s close, look,” I said as I gestured toward the unmistakable structure of said water wheel churning away on the river’s surface. “Let’s go.”

  Zoie and I made our way back through the zig-zagging streets and down the chaotic alleyways that made absolutely no sense. Jenner’s map was great on a large scale, but locally it wasn’t very descriptive, and we were lucky we at least had the water wheel to go by. It was such a prominent structure we were able to see it pretty much anywhere we had a clear view of the river.

  It wasn’t all that bad, though, because it seemed as if Gatetown was a city with a vibrant nightlife. As Zoie and I walked through the streets, the village seemed to come alive as the night began to settle in.

  A mix of all kinds of people crowded the streets selling interesting metal crafted wares and gadgets that had purposes I wasn’t familiar with. Most of them had distinct bird-like features, but a good portion of the people seemed to be a mix of some type of marsupial like Jenner.

  There were a lot of kangaroo-type people stalking around on large back-bending legs and feet, rotund wombat people with stubby ears and big noses, and many white-faced opossum people with sharp teeth and naked worm-like tails.

  The more the night went on, the more it seemed as if the village came alive with a variety of sounds and smells, and Zoie and I eventually found ourselves on a main thoroughfare where some sort of night market was being set up along the river.

  Vendors popped open their stalls and called out their goods to any interested passersby, and Zoie seemed to want to stop at every single one.

  I smiled as I observed the wondrous expression on her face while she ogled everything like a kid in her first candy store. From what I already knew about her, I gathered life on Vartha wasn’t all that leisurely, and there was probably no such thing as vacations or window shopping.

  “Would you like to buy your lady a beautiful headscarf, sir?” someone inquired to my left, and I reluctantly tore my gaze away from where Zoie was admiring a vendor’s flowers from the other side of the thoroughfare.

  “Sorry, what?” I asked the stall owner, who looked like a grizzled billy goat.

  “Your lady,” the man said as he nodded his horned head in Zoie’s direction. “She has the most stunning shade of eyes that any one of my fine scarves would complement.”

  “Oh, I don’t actually have any gold…” I trailed off and then rested my hand over the pouch of tithe stones hidden under my cloak.

  “You are a Duelist?” The goat-man’s sharp beady eyes darted down to my hand and back up to my face.

  “Yep,” I said.

  “I think we might be able to work out a deal, my lord,” the shrewd man replied as he twirled the little white beard on his chin.

  “What kind of a deal?” I asked.

  “Three tithes,” the scarf vendor whispered as he leaned in.

  “Two,” I told him, and I pulled a pair of the gray rocks out of my pouch.

  “Splendid!” the goat-man said as we shook hands so I could palm him the illegal currency like some back-alley drug deal.

  Once the transaction was through and he stashed the pebbles out of sight, he then trotted over to a rack overflowing with brightly colored fabrics and began pulling out several in various shades of blue. When he gathered about half a dozen samples, he came back over to me and spread them out on a little display table on top of even more scarfs arranged for people to peruse.

  “See anything you like?” he asked with a proud smile.

  I looked all of them over, and each one was a work of art in itself with their intricate embroidered designs and silky soft textures. But it was the royal blue one with a silver galaxy of stars expertly woven through the fabric that my eye was immediately drawn to, and I picked it up so I could run the silky texture through my fingers.

  “E-E-Excellent choice, sir!” The man bleated in the back of his throat like an actual goat. “It really is the perfect shade of blue.”

  “I agree,” I said.

  I put the scarf inside my pack as I turned to look for Zoie, but she wasn’t over by the flower stand anymore, so I frowned.

  “Pleasure doing business with you, my lord!” the scarf vendor called out.

  “Yeah,” I mumbled as I s
tood up on my tip toes to try and find her, and I spotted a pair of familiar cat ears as they bobbed over by an alleyway before disappearing around the corner. “Thanks again.”

  “Come back any time,” he said, but I was already walking through the crowd in pursuit of my wife.

  Which was easier said than done because the thoroughfare was densely packed and only getting busier as the night wore on.

  “Zoie!” I called out as I wove in and out of street performers, skirted around vendor stalls, and dodged at least three different rickshaw-like crafts as they hauled passengers along the riverside. The whole chaotic and cultural experience was overwhelming in the way I figured Brazil’s Carnival was naturally like, so when I finally reached the alley where I spotted Zoie, it was a relief to say the least.

  “Zoie?” I called out again up the narrow gap between stone buildings, and then I assessed my surroundings with another frown. I swore I saw her distinctive cat ears travel this way, but maybe I was mistaken.

  Just as I was about to throw in the towel and head back out to the main street, a familiar eagle-man with a feathery brown ponytail suddenly rounded the corner, and I threw the hood of my cloak up so my face was obscured.

  Luckily, Ren was preoccupied with the paper he held in his hand, and he didn’t even look up when I casually strolled past him.

  I kept walking as if I was on my way to somewhere important until I rounded a metal domed pump house and pressed my back against it. Once I knew I was out of sight, I peeked around the structure so I could spy on the arrogant eagle-man.

  Ren stopped in front of a door and looked up at a hanging wooden sign with the image of an arrow carved onto the sign’s face. He looked back down at his paper, folded it up, and then glanced up and down the alley.

  My heart lurched up to my throat, and I ducked back behind the pump house so he wouldn’t spot me.

  I waited a few beats before I peeked around the corner again just in time to see the tails of his poncy robes disappear through the stooped doorway.

  I squinted down the dim alley as my mind raced. I wondered what Ren was doing all the way in Gatetown. It wasn’t like it was odd for people to travel, but the ponytailed douche was acting awfully shifty for someone simply on vacation.