Jay said he didn’t agree but Senji said it didn’t matter as this competition was more for building something between the lands. She then said that her husband was still the kingdom’s best cook. Gon was just happy to have been in the competition to also have finally introduced his dish. He took Senji, together with his little daughter, Sophia and Isabel, who were smiling happily at him. They then headed out to the small piece of land he just had won. It was peaceful there and even if he didn’t believe he would ever do anything with it, he still owned a piece of the land. He looked at his wife who smiled at him and said she knew he was the best chef. Little Sophia also told him she thought his food was much more yummy than any other of the people that had come.
Gon laughed and took Sophia into his arms then asked if he wanted him to make some pancakes for her. She nodded and he told his wife they better get back then so he could prepare the food. King Lenchi was also happy because the competition had been successful and had eased the tensions between Grasoll and Redonia with Darcolia not flexing its armies as much. It turned out that Lenchi had done something great and had the intention to hold the competition each year. He had also been able to open a trade agreement with the land of Canteria. Darcolia was allowing him to trade inside of its border for the first time since the kingdom was taken over by the Redonian king a long time ago. There would be much progress in the land during the next couple of years he knew and intended to make the best of the situation he had been given.
Finding a Magic Stone
The years went, and there was no sign of trouble from anywhere in the land other than bandits that made the life of some hard. In a large forest reaching far and wide, lay on the land between Darcolia and Grasoll. The forest was so wide it would take long time to walk through it. People had been known to disappear inside it because of its size. There were always stories told about forests like this that had ghosts living inside or a people that ate those who ventured inside alone. The forest was known to respawn quickly when trees had been chopped down but because of the stories many heard as children, many hesitated to chop down trees there.
Rumours of magic and strange things always intrigued certain people, and it was just why the forest had received visits from some new men. Standing in the forest overlooking a village hidden within the forest were two characters assigned to find this village. They had, for two months, been scavenging for clues in other villages or towns surrounding the forest. They had gone through book and read scripts telling tales and songs about the village. Finally, they had found it and were now looking over it as the morning sun graced over the small houses and windmills located in the mist of the forest with the back against a small mountain sticking up.
The two trackers got the trace of the village from a lucky encounter with an old man who had lived closed to the forest as a young man and found people in the forest one day when he got lost for a couple of days. After they helped him out, they disappeared into the forest and he never saw them or anyone else whenever he wandered into the forest. With the information from the old man about where he last saw them and with the help of really old maps that showed how the forest had changed during the hundreds of years, they had an idea of where to look and after reading the old scripts, they finally had a closer path to follow.
They were almost ready to give up after circling the forest a few times, ending up at the same place. The forest itself would take several days to pass if walked in a straight line so they knew they were in for a challenge. But after taking a route that none of them would have noticed if it weren’t for an animal, they saw progress for the first time. After spending five days wandering in the forest, they then were standing there in front of a village surrounded by myth. They had seen another settlement not far from the village but ruled it out as the target after overhearing one of them talk about the village.
At first, both of the men agreed to search for the village because they believed it would not exist. They thought it would be easy money to earn looking for a village that would not be found. They wouldn’t be the first trackers to have to give up as others had been asked to look. When they then had found it, they wondered why the village was so hidden. The two trackers were looking around and scouting for a way down best concealed so they won’t be noticed by the people living in the village. These men were professional trackers and blended in with the surrounding very well. Not even the animals that they had met noticed them until very close. They were expensive to hire but always delivered results and this was why they had been hired.
They looked down and saw, all of a sudden, a figure from one of the houses. It was a man with long beard and short stance. He looked over the village and started to walk towards the windmill. The two men had seen a path they thought they could conceal them down to the village while they were watching the man walk from his house. As they proceeded down the slopes through the thick forest, they noticed more people coming out from their houses. There were 66 different houses all with similar style of grass on the roofs and there were some that had trees growing out of them. But the houses all differed in size and length as well as shape.
One of the houses seemed grander than the rest and had a tower in it. When the trackers reached the bottom of the valley, they stayed some distance away from the village so as not to be discovered. There were a few trees growing close to the wooden wall surrounding the village. As they observed the people wake up and walking around, they finally saw who lived in the big house with the tower. He was a small but wider sort of person, and when he opened his mouth, they quickly figured out that he was the man in charge of the village. The chubby little man talked loudly and gave orders to the other villagers and took a seat on the open space filled with square shape rock plates that went like a path through the village.
The villagers looked a little different from other people and were slightly shorter than average people. They seemed to be slimmer as well except for the leader who seemed to like to eat. One of the other people said the name Hun and they could see the little man react to it. The two trackers spoke quietly about what the next move was, and they decided they would have to confirm if the task they were set to do was at this village or would they have to continue on. They had been assigned to find a magic stone that could grow a forest in weeks or even days instead of years. Prince Theran gave them the task after he found out there was a legend about the magical stone and the people who stole it. The people in the forest now guarded it, and he believed he would gain great power if he had such a thing in his possession.
Theran would gain wealth in selling the raw material to the towns and villages and acquire the respect he wanted from his father. The two trackers knew that, should this be the right village, Prince Theran would take the magic stone and wouldn’t let anyone get in his way. The village would be doomed if they refused him and if he wanted to he would burn the forest down. The trackers that would get paid a great sum of money for finding the village or even bringing it back, thought more about the money rather than the people guarding such a treasure.
The two trackers that had been observing the village for a while decided to wait until nightfall to have a better chance to sneak in and out of the village. They walked towards the mountain looking over the village that was not too far away but enough to keep a good distance. When walking towards it, they noticed some other settlements inside the forest and they were built as square houses under the trees. This was the second settlement they had seen other than the main village and they suspected they were used as a defensive outpost. After some time walking, they reached the mountain and decide to set up a small camp near the foot of the mountain.
Afternoon came and the sun was very slowly sinking over the horizon and the two trackers got ready to head back and leave the temporary camp and headed towards the village. It was now dark with clouds in the sky and in the village, some lights in the windows were still shining bright but were disappearing as the people go to bed. The two trackers split up and headed down the v
illage. They looked around for any activity and looking through the windows and checking for any interesting place their target would be. One of the trackers headed to the mill and the other one headed towards the big tower house. The mill was full of flour and was creaking a lot but there was nothing to say this was anything other than one normal mill and was not hiding anything.
When the tracker who went to the mill came back, he saw the other tracker on the top of the tower and he joined him on the top. They sneaked in the house from an open door in the tower and start to look around. The leader of the village was snoring loudly and would not wake up easy. They searched through the house but still they could not find anything and they started to think this perhaps might not be the right village. Just when they were about to leave, one of the trackers noticed a painting on the wall that showed something interesting.
It was a shining stone in the display on the painting right over a well in the village. The short fat man turned in his bed and made some notice all of a sudden and the trackers hid away quickly. He started snoring again, and they could breathe out in relief. A wooden box that had the name Hun on it was big enough to fit the magic stone and was checked quickly. There was nothing in there but things someone would had put away if it wasn’t used. There was another painting broken in there that also had the magic stone on it but looked like it was drawn by a child. They exited the house and headed towards the well where they looked around. Standing at the well they then realised the clouds that helped to mask them had disappeared, and they now were well lit by the moon. They both jumped into the well that was empty of water and had a ladder going down. At the bottom of which was about 10 meter from the surface, they saw a door and tried to open it but it was locked and the wood material had a feel of it being very strong.
The trackers brought their tools out and started to pick the lock. The door might withstand a great brute force but the lock gave way easy to the skilled men. The door make a creaking noise when they opened it and as they walked in, they then saw what they had been searching for and this was the right village, indeed. One of them could see immediately that it was an Alumrylite stone of a size he had never seen before. Usually, they were smaller but the one in the room was quite large. The colour was also very different than the usual stones found around the world.
The Alumrylite stone that was sitting on a pillar upon an altar was shining of white and green. Knowing their time was short, they knew they had to work fast. They looked around for traps or anything that could stop them but found that the villagers did not spend time securing their target in the room and were most likely counting on that no one would ever find the village. The trackers took a bag out and placed the Alumrylite inside it. As they tied the bag up, the glow from it still shined and the bag was showing light. The trackers quickly ascended the ladder and looked around again for anyone but they could not find any villagers.
They jumped out and headed for the fastest way out of the village and in to the forest. They ran towards the mountain to pick up their gear that they left behind, and as they got closer, they got to a river that shone brightly from the reflection of the moon. The river went all the way to the mountain and was the fastest way there. They saw the mountain and as they headed down a small slop heading down to the foot of it, they stopped and a small feeling of distress came over both when they stood face to face with a person that looked like he was from the village.
The villager had been out in the night on his way back to the village after he had collected samples of mushrooms in the forest. And when the moon shone, some mushrooms exerted spores that had a healing power on cuts. The villager had come across the camp when he was heading back and was wondering who was there. He looked the two new people in their eyes, and they did not look like the trades people from the other villages and towns he sometimes saw from the edge of the forest as they went past in their wagons.
The seconds felt like minutes for the trackers who knew if they got discovered, it was going to be big trouble to get out of the forest. The villager looked at the bag that had drawn his eyes. He pointed to it and screamed out with an angry voice to let it go and started to walk towards the trackers. In a split second decision, one of the trackers brought out a knife and with a swift move, he jammed the knife in the heart of the villager who fell to the ground lifeless. The tracker was breathing heavily and looked at his companion who had a stressed look on his face.
They both quickly grabbed their gear and started to head out towards the edge of the forest. The forest was big and in the dark, it became even harder to see. There were big trees with bulky roots to climb and jumped over, and one in a while they tripped but they were very anxious to get out fast. It took them a five days’ walk to get in where they were with all the side tracks and closed paths they encountered. At the speed they were running, it should take them 2-3 days to get back on the road. After morning had come and they could see more clearly, it became easier but they were both tired and knew if they didn’t stop and rest, they were going to tire and make mistakes.
They decided to stop and rest on top of a tree just to be sure they didn’t get interrupted. The man who killed the villager had carried the magic stone all the way and gave it to the other to keep until they rested again. They fell asleep and as the hours faded, so did the sun and when they finally woke up, the sun had but two hours left. In the tree, they could see nothing but forest for as long as they could see. They climbed down the tree and started heading out again but this time the moon was covered by clouds and it became all the more difficult to walk in the forest. Not only did the road feel harder, it had become more terrifying as a lot of sounds had started to appear and the tracker who saw the villager got killed felt the forest closing in on him even more, and he could not wait until they left the thick and dark forest.
After walking a whole night, the sounds from the forest were making a lot more noise from animals which should mean they were then closing in on the edge of the forest. The two trackers felt relieved that they were close and as they climbed up a hill, they could finally see something other than trees. It was a village in the far morning sun light, and they gave out a relief of air and the first tracker asked his friend to please carry the stone for the remaining way. And gave the other tracker the bag made of sheep skin with the Alumrylite stone to him.
The sounds of the forest were alive and vibrant and then the joy of making it and the thought of all that reward hit the mind and they talked about what to do with all that wealth. They walked and it was not too long then. The birds were singing and the sun was not covered by any clouds, and as the sun went higher, the warmth was coming in. They walked and the tracker carrying the magical stone said he couldn’t wait to have some wine and go to bed, and they laughed loudly but stopped suddenly when every single sound in the forest disappeared. There wasn’t a bird, bee and even the forest itself seemed to have stopped moving. They stood still listening and got a big chill through-out their bodies when all the sounds that were there had all gone.
When they studied all the stories and myth surrounding the village, they learned there used to be a much smaller forest there before they came. The forest people must have a special relationship with the forest and controlled everything with their knowledge, they thought. The two trackers started to run towards the exit of the forest and were then not more than 300 metres away. The trees became less and the sun became more visible as the crowns of the forest opened up.
The trackers were almost at the end of the forest when the tracker holding the Alumrylite stone suddenly stopped and stood still. The other tracker screamed to him to hurry up and not stop but as he finished screaming, blood came out of the other’s mouth. He looked at his friend, terrified, and then stood there bleeding from his mouth. He started to walk towards him but as the other tracker fell forward, he then saw what had happened. And when the tracker hit the ground, a big spear sat deep in his back. Panic set in, and without thinking, he rushed to the then dead tracker. H
e grabbed the bag and as he looked around he could see shadows in the forest.
The tracker did not run more than a couple of seconds when another spear hits next to him followed by several arrows. He took cover behind the tree and changed trees as fast as he could. The voices and noises all came closer and they would soon be upon him. He decided he had only this chance and took the bag and made a run for it. He did not come far until he felt the sharp tip of an arrow hit his shoulder. He stumbled but kept going as another arrow cut him on the side of his body and another hit him in the arm carrying the bag. He didn’t let go but when a spear hit the bag, it flew out of his hand and he then had no other choice than to run for the exit.
The arrows were still hitting around him but when he exited the forest, he had come out where there were high rocks and they created excellent cover that hid him so the arrows stopped flying. He didn’t stop until he came to the village he saw earlier and went to the local medical man who was the animal carer. The medical man was old but worked once in the stables of the king and on the battlefields. He had to remove arrows sometimes from the horses so he was used to it and knew exactly what to do.
With the tracker paying well, no questions were needed to be asked. When the operation was done, the tracker left immediately for the stables. He asked to have a horse which he got after payment and took off back to Castle Kiwen to Prince Theran who would hear off what had happen. The tracker was worried because he knew the prince was not, at all times, calm. He had a bad reputation of being harsh against those who failed him. If he would run away, he could never return and it was possible he would be recognised by someone. The prince would want to find out what happened and it could become much more dangerous for him. With little choice, he set off towards the prince who was waiting in his castle.
World of Taroo Page 18