Warrior of the Void (Fantastica Book 4)

by M. R. Mathias

  Cryelos was given a sword as well. It was a short sword that seemed to like him. Chureal was given a long dagger. Hunter stuck with his bow, and Sneak with his crossbow and, together, the two of them hunted each morning for grouse, hoppers, or anything else they could find worth eating.

  Cobalt hunted, as well, while the rest of the group went through their exercises. Though Braxton didn't think it was very hard for the dragon to swoop down into the herds and snatch a meal. It was probably more like fishing in a barrel.

  During the morning routine, Cryelos was so graceful that he appeared to be doing some sort of dance. Braxton found the movements awkward and sometimes hard to do, and Chureal mostly giggled at them the whole time. Even so, she learned several different ways to defend herself and attack with her long dagger without realizing it. And after traveling with the knights, who wore full plate mail armor, all day, every day, she stopped complaining about how hot her chainmail smock was. She wore it with a little more pride, too. Especially when Sir Jory called her the "Little Warrior."

  The two knights heard about and saw firsthand some of the things she and Cobalt had done to defend Grey Rock, and they put her on a pedestal. Only Cryelos was wise and gentle enough to push her off it every now and then, but he did so for her own good. Braxton was glad, because someone had to keep her from getting too cocky.

  Braxton tried to keep his mind on the Island of Skorch, and the Staff of Aevilin, but couldn't stop his heart from racing away from him when Nixy crossed his mind. He wanted to see her so badly that it ached. The giant hole that had so recently been an empty pit inside of him swirled and tingled with emotion. He found it hard to believe she was still alive, but he knew she was.

  He kept the information to himself, but Chureal mysteriously informed him late one night that she knew as well. She told him that Zyken-Whay came to her in her dreams now, through the ring he'd given her. He was teaching her things she needed to know, things Braxton couldn't show her.

  Oddly, he felt a pang of jealousy about this. Taerak had once come to him in dreams, and in the void, but no longer. The old warrior had become the lake creature, a process he’d called an ascension. Braxton knew so little about the jewel's magic that he felt he needed help far more than Chureal did. And the other thing Zyken-Whay had said to him wouldn't stop nagging at the back of the mind. He needed to get a dragon. But how?

  He'd spoken the words of summoning once, to call Emerald, the mighty green wyrm, to aid he and Chureal, but they were written in Taerak's journal, which was back with some of his other gear in the dwarven tunnels. The words were long forgotten to him. Several times he laid awake trying to recall them, afraid to misspeak something so important in the void for fear of summoning something other than what he intended, or worse. He thought about asking Chureal to ask Zyken-Whay in one of her dreams, but his pride, or maybe his stupidity, he wasn't sure which, wouldn't give up on his memory just yet.

  Dawn was breaking, he could tell by the way the sky was lightening. Cryelos had not awoken Sir Monster and Chureal for their watch again, as the elf had not done on any of the nights he had second to last watch. He was quiet in those long stretches and spent most of the time studying the sky and the angry little red moon.

  Braxton watched him as he lay awake, and his friend seemed no worse off for the lack of sleep. No one said much about it, at least not after the huge knight Sir Monster wondered why no one woke him, and Sir Jory explained that it wasn't an issue of trust, but a matter of personal space. Sir Monster accepted the explanation and didn't seem to mind the full nights of sleep he got every other night.

  Sneak, though, started to give Braxton the creeps. The odd way the small man stared at him while he lay silently thinking through the night. It was as if he was contemplating his murder or something. Braxton didn't really think that, but Sneak's silent movements and slow beady gazes seemed to always be on him. It was such an issue that Braxton started taking extra care to speak certain thoughts and ideas to Cryelos and Sir Jory well out of earshot of the thief.

  Hunter was aptly named, for he hadn't yet failed to return from his morning trek without a hardy's meal worth of meat, or a shirt full of eggs.

  Sir Jory, of them all, seemed the most intense. He practiced with Sir Monster each morning angrily, not stopping until he was drenched in sweat. He was quiet unless spoken to, and his expression was full of grief and sorrow. It was an expression Braxton had come to know well. By then, it was obvious to all of them that Sir Jory was in love with Princess Trava. His eyes lit up with hope whenever the subject of her rescue or the defeat of Prince Venom, now King Venom, came up. When the hopelessness of her situation eventually crept back into his thoughts, the newfound fire of hope would extinguish, each time leaving him in a deeper brooding mood.

  Braxton felt sorry for Sir Monster every morning as he took Sir Jory's unleased rage and frustration during their sparring. The monster didn't seem to mind. He was as skilled with his blade and his defenses as he was big, and though Sir Jory was fierce and hard during those sessions, he refrained from going too far, and even if he hadn't, Braxton thought the bigger knight could've handled it. When their morning session ended, the two of them always grunted and cussed the approvals and disapprovals jovially though, and knowing how skilled the two of them were, it was enough to keep Braxton hopeful they might defeat whatever waited for them on the Island they were travelling toward.

  Hunter woke, and he and Sneak disappeared into the grass to find them all a morning meal. Braxton sat up and looked around the roughly circular area of grass they trampled down to form their camp the night before. The stuff grew between waist and shoulder high here, and the camp felt deceptively secure due to the wall of remaining grass that surrounded them. He noticed that Cobalt was already gone, probably in the middle of the buffal herd, feeding his growing body. Chureal was sleeping soundly but would wake soon when the two knights began their morning ritual.

  Quietly, Braxton got up and walked away out into the high grass to relieve himself. he came back into camp and stowed away his bed roll. Chureal was sitting up with her eyes still closed. She looked as if she were still half-asleep, but Braxton figured she was somewhere in the void, probably tracking or communicating with Cobalt. He thought about going into the void and saying good morning to her but decided to let her enjoy the empty calmness of the place undisturbed.

  Already, the two knights were strapping on their armor. As soon as they were done, they would begin a stretching routine, during which Sir Monster would grunt and point at each of them until they joined in. Braxton sat down beside Cryelos and watched the two struggling with their straps, laces, and buckles.

  "If these two exhaust themselves each morning," Cryelos said to them as much as to Braxton, "then what happens if we are attacked at midday and they are too worn out to fight?"

  "Good question," replied Braxton. He and Cryelos were both looking at the knights now, awaiting a reply.

  Sir Jory grunted his interpretation of Cryelos's words to Sir Monster and, after a moment, the huge man looked at them and laughed. He then grunted his response back to Sir Jory.

  "He says it's only the two of you who get exhausted in the morning," Sir Jory said with a grin. "Sir Monster and I can fight all day and through the night without even stopping to take a piss."

  "Your mouth is filthy," Chureal called from her bed roll, causing Sir Jory to turn bright red with embarrassment. If anything, he was gallant and respectful, and to speak in such a manner in front of a little girl shamed him.

  Sir Monster said something that Braxton didn't understand, but Cryelos burst out laughing. Apparently, he'd picked up on the language enough to understand it.

  When the bigger knight started frantically unstrapping all his leg gear Braxton asked Cryelos what was the matter.

  "He said that all this talk of pissing reminded him that he needed to go relieve himself."

  "Your mouth is filthy, too, Cryelos," Chureal said. She'd finished rolling up her blankets a
nd stood there looking at them all indignantly with one hand on her hip.

  "Can I trust you ruffians to stay put while I take care of my business?" she snapped. All of them reddened at that, save for Cryelos who somehow managed to contain the explosion of laughter that threatened to burst out of him. Hurriedly, they busied themselves with something that drew their attentions away from her so that she could go do her business, as she called it.

  Braxton was suddenly reminded of how hard life in the field was for the little girl.

  "She'll need a woman soon," Cryelos said quietly to Braxton as they watched Sir Monster make his way out into the high grass opposite the way Chureal had gone. Within moments, he was invisible to them.

  Braxton instantly thought of Nixy, and his smile wiped away the worry the elf was showing, probably concerned that he'd brought up a tender subject.

  "You're right. She will," replied Braxton. "We need to settle this business with the Drar so we can go home. We left so much unfinished in Narvoza and the underground that we might not have a home to go back to."

  "Not to dampen your hopes, Brax," Cryelos said, putting his hand on Braxton's shoulder for comfort. "We don't even have the staff yet, and midsummer is coming quickly. And from what we've seen, these darkons and their darka aren't going to lay down and let us kill their god, or whatever this Drar is to them.

  "I know, Cryelos," Braxton nodded. "But if I don't look at what is beyond our immediate situation, then I think this all might swallow me up." He looked into the elf's wide yellow eyes for understanding and found that and more. "I never…we never had a chance to catch our breath after Pharark, we just—"

  Chureal's distant scream brought them both to their feet at a dead run toward where the sound had come from.

  "Chureal!" Braxton yelled as he and Cryelos, followed by a clanking Sir Jory headed out into the thick stalky Green Sea.

  "Over here," Chureal yelled in a way that let them know she wasn't in immediate danger anymore.

  When Braxton and Cryelos came upon her, she was red-faced. Embarrassed, and probably a little angry, for she was scowling at Sneak, who had apparently happened upon her and was equally red-faced.

  He looked guilty of something improper, due to his beady eyes and his lack of concern for the girl's awkward situation, but to his credit, he seemed to be more interested in the pair of fat birds he was carrying than the little girl, and proved it by holding them out proudly to Braxton and Cryelos.

  Cryelos grabbed him by his doe skin shirt sleeve and drug him back toward camp. Sir Jory followed, leaving Braxton with the embarrassed young girl.

  "Are you alright?" he asked quietly. "Did he–uh?"

  "No," she said as a stray tear ran down her cheek. "He just scared me while I was—"

  Braxton saved her from having to elaborate by cutting her off.

  "I'll stand guard over there," he pointed toward the camp. "Take your time." With that, he walked away before his own awkwardness became too apparent.

  It wasn't long until he heard her stalking up toward him through the grass.

  "Thank you," she said. "I'm supposed to let you wear this tonight so that Zyken-Whay can come to you in your dreams. He said it was important." She was holding up the ring Braxton had delivered to her.

  He took it and smiled down. "It's too small to fit," he said.

  "Even for your pinky finger?" she asked girlishly.

  He gave it back to her and held his hand out. With her tongue held sideways out of her mouth she got it to fit halfway up his little finger. "There," she said triumphantly.

  "You'd better hold onto it until we make camp tonight," he said as he jiggled his hand and the little ring slipped off into his other palm. "I'll lose it while we travel."

  "Alright," she said with all the seriousness a ten-year-old girl could muster. "Will we really make it to the lake shore tonight?"

  "You would know better than me," said Braxton. "You've seen it from Cobalt's back."

  "But I'm not good with distances yet," she said.

  Braxton admired the way she threw the word yet into her statement. She knew that someday she would be good with distances. Braxton thought it was a pretty safe bet she was destined to be good at anything she set her mind to.

  He ruffled her mop of dirty hair. "When Cobalt returns, fly up high until you can see our camp and the edge of the lake. That is about a day's easy ride on horseback."

  "All right," she answered with a smile. "But if you had a dragon, we could have already been there and back." She stopped walking and cocked her head. "If you had a dragon the size of Emerald, he could carry all of you, even the two metal bears."

  He couldn't argue with that. As big as Cobalt was, he was only a yearling. Emerald could put most of Cobalt in his mouth at once, and carry a dozen men if properly saddled for such. It was then that a thought occurred to him that was important, but before he grasped it, the sound of fighting erupted ahead, past the camp. At first, Braxton thought it was just the knights practicing, but the sound of Sir Monster growling out in pain and the terrified scream of a horse, followed by Sir Jory's panicked voice yelling, "Help!" told him that it was serious.

  Chapter Seventeen

  When Braxton and Chureal stepped back into the area where the grass had been trampled what they saw was sickening. One of the horses was down but still kicking and screaming on its side. It was ripped wide open, showing a splash of slick red in the midst of all the green. Doing the ripping was a long, thin, dog-like beast with golden brindled fur. It was nearly as long as the horse it was feasting on, but much lower to the ground. Its muscles rippled, and its fierce, toothy mouth snarled at them, showing plenty of sharp bloody teeth.

  Braxton couldn't help but wonder at the creature. It looked like a starving mountain cat with a wolfish head. It had green vertical stripes along its ribs and haunch, and he imagined that it could move through the Green Sea out here undetected quite easily.

  A shadow leapt far too close to his left and snapped him from his musing. These were the same things he'd seen carving lines in the Green Sea below him when he was soaring overhead before the ogre attack. There wasn't just one creature, it was a pack, and how many there were he couldn't be sure, but already two others had joined the one eating their horse. One of the three now in the clearing left the fallen mount, moving towards he and Chureal. The other horses were pulling at their hobbles with wild rolling eyes, jostling and trying to keep themselves as far from the predators as their tethers would allow. One broke free and bolted away.

  Chureal made a weird noise Braxton had never heard her make before, and a thick, thorny bush sprouted up below the creature that was approaching them. Suddenly engulfed in prickly branches, the terrified thing yelped and thrashed in the shrub's grip and only managed to shred its own hide to the point that it finally fell still and whimpered while it bled.

  The distant twang of Sneak's crossbow sounded just before the thump of the bolt's impact caused his target to yelp in pain and charge awkwardly out of the camp into the high grass. Some of the others were battling even more of the creatures, but Braxton couldn't see them. Braxton and Chureal were left facing two of the beasts, and they looked none too pleased as they left their meal to defend it from the human intruders.

  Out in the grass, Sir Monster lay on his side underneath Sir Jory. The bigger knight's unarmored leg was torn open at the thigh, but he was still managing to keep his huge sword up to protect Sir Jory's back while Jory fended off the two creatures before him.

  Cryelos was in the grass, too. He was trying to circle around behind the creatures to get position on their flank. He wished for the tenth time in as many moments that he had his bow in hand instead of the short sword he'd been training with, but his favorite weapon was stowed away in one of the bundles the extra horses were carrying. He also cursed whatever god created this treeless abomination of a place.

  "Blessed Arbor protect me," he said. "I've become an elf with no forest and no bow. What I'd give for a tree
so that I could get a favorable position on these —"

  His words were cut short as a whoosh of air hummed past him and thumped into one of the creatures. It had been right beside him, and he hadn't even seen it stalking up, but he saw it now as it yelped and bolted off toward the camp.

  A glance toward where the help had come from revealed Sneak grimacing and hunched over as he pried back the action on his crossbow to re-cock it.

  Cryelos gave the little thief a nod of appreciation, turned back to what he was doing, and silently thanked Arbor before charging out and swinging his sword into the hind section of one of the creatures Sir Jory was defending against.

  It was a strange sensation feeling the blade bite into the creature's flesh. There was only a small bit of resistance at first, but then it slid through meat and gristle as if it was butter. The creature slinked away, leaving a trail of bright red liquid.

  Cryelos's thoughts went immediately to Chureal and Braxton. Sir Jory and Sneak seemed to have this situation under control, so he left them with the remaining beast and charged through the grass toward the camp. He saw them there faced off with two of the bloody, muzzled creatures. He wasn't sure about the third thing trapped in the bush, but it didn't look to be any sort of a threat.

  Just then, another thorny bush erupted underneath the creature nearest Chureal. But the creature leapt away and was only scratched and angered by her creation. It charged her just as the other one charged at Braxton.

  Again, Cryelos would have given anything for his bow because he could see a third of the grassland predators sneaking up behind them, and they clearly had no idea it was there.

  He ran with all his speed and strength and prayed to Arbor again for help as he went. He had to hope they could handle what was before them because he knew they were defenseless against the beast coming up behind. That was the one he was going for.