A Flutter In The Night (Kyrn's Legacy Book 1)

by Michael S. Gormley

  That was too much to hope for, though. She knew that none of them would return to Grimmrich with the same innocence they had left with.

  To Abellia, that was what crushed her heart the most.

  Chapter Twelve

  From the Ice

  “Where have you seen the amulet before?” Kyrn asked, as he followed Syonne. To his surprise, they still hadn’t entered the forest as day was beginning to break in a stunning orange glow that cut through the mists of the morning. Instead, they had simply skirted around the edge of the woods.

  “Oh, no,” Syonne said. “I have never seen such a thing before. Only stories of the Scarab soldiers, dark as night.”

  “Scarab soldiers?” Kyrn asked, but his voice was so quiet he may as well have been talking to himself.

  “That is why we must get you within Castreeth. You are not safe with that necklace, not within this realm.” Syonne smiled down at Kyrn as she floated next to him.

  “We’ve been traveling all night and haven’t entered the forest,” Kyrn panted. “How much longer?”

  “Not long, you could say. But, still, longer than you would like, I would imagine.”

  Kyrn stared blankly at her, wondering whether or not she was speaking in riddles.

  “Look into the woods, here,” Syonne said, and she extended her short, blue arm into the still dark forest.

  As Kyrn let his eyes follow her direction, he saw the swirling mists rising from the frosted grass, mixing with the newborn rays of light cutting through the thick canopy. It wasn’t quite a path that he saw, but a less dense area of trees, spread only a little more unevenly than the rest.

  As his eyes focused on the early dawn, he saw the ground in the forest become more snow-covered than he had in the past few days. But, it was only so in the direction Syonne led his gaze.

  The ground within the forest rose, slightly at first, becoming a steady incline. Eventually, it formed some sort of snow-covered hill within the woods. At the base, where the hill met the forest floor, a rough hole, large enough to fit the entirety of Skinny’s Lodge, seemed to have been carved into the center of the hill.

  Kyrn noted that it surely wasn’t a natural formation.

  Though the entrance to the formation was dark and shadowed, an uncertain glow came from within, like the dancing lights of a small fire.

  Outside, white as the snow, so much so that Kyrn had missed them with his first inspection, sat two large humanoid figures on a stump each. Perhaps large wasn’t the correct description, but Kyrn stood in awe. They sat with their backs hunched, gnawing and ripping at a deer carcass. Their faces and bellies were pale and clean, yet a coarse, dirty-white fur ran from the tops of their heads and down their backs.

  “Are those…?” he asked.

  “Snow giants,” Syonne finished for him, her smile wider than ever.

  Kyrn had heard tell of giants, coming down from the mountains to steal the farmers’ livestock, but, like so many other things in the vastness of Einroth, Kyrn had never truly seen such a beast.

  “And we’re to get in there?” he asked, and he pointed towards the cavern.

  “We must,” Syonne said. “It is the only way through.”

  Kyrn relaxed his shoulders, loosening the grip on his cane. He’d been through so much worse already, he knew. This only required a great deal of planning, with a calm mind. “How do you suppose we pass?” he asked.

  “Easy!” Syonne bounced in the air at his side. “These are friends.” With no further hesitation, Syonne whipped her wings, pulling her through the forest, as she gracefully weaved in and out of the trees.

  Kyrn saw the comfort in her body movement. She was nearly home, and he couldn’t question her demeanor. How he’d bounce when he finally returned to Grimmrich. It would be as if he, too, could fly.

  Syonne fluttered so that she pulled the mist from the ground in her wake, spiraling it up and around the bodies of the snow giants. They didn’t look up from their cold and raw feast, but one of them slowly swatted at Syonne, like a horse’s tail whips a buzzing fly.

  As Kyrn stepped into the small opening, the entrance of the cavern now clearly in view, the giant who had his teeth sunk into the deer’s ribcage stopped his biting, tilting his eyes to meet Kyrn.

  The giant lifted its head with a deep humph, confused by the small man standing before it. He looked at the giant sitting next to him and, noticing that his companion was too engrossed by his meal, the alerted giant smacked his friend.

  “Little company,” the giant growled.

  The second giant dropped his food and raised his head with a similar, unsettling humph. “So small,” he said. “We can still eat it?”

  “No hurt to try,” the first responded.

  Kyrn raised his free hand with wide eyes and planted his feet on the hard ground. “Friends,” was all he could muster, with a mock chuckle.

  “Friends no eat friends,” said the first giant, as he rose from his stump stool.

  “No eat you,” said the second, looking at the standing giant, and back to Kyrn. “We eat the little one,” he laughed.

  Humph, the standing giant again growled and lifted a large stone before him. “Not before we smash and crush.”

  Kyrn looked at the cave, not seeing Syonne ahead of him. Have I been tricked? he wondered. Surely, Syonne wouldn’t have done such a thing after he set her free from Skinny; however, she must have seen his bewilderment over the glowing necklace. She had used him. She couldn’t go back to her elven masters.

  He braced himself, as the giant lifted the stone over his head and hurled it towards him.

  Kyrn gripped his amulet. He’d made it so far from home. Further than he’d ever been. Further, even, than Aldir had. He found a small gleam of comfort in knowing that surely none would find the necklace in the belly of a snow giant.

  A force hit Kyrn from the side. Hit him hard, with such velocity that he went sprawling and tumbling across the frozen grass, until his head slammed into a wide tree. His chest and ribs felt crushed, as though the boulder rested upon him, as he lay upon the ground. He wondered how he was still breathing to feel such pain. When he gathered the courage to open his eyes, Kyrn saw the blue-grey form straddling his chest, as he lay on his back. Her white hair still blew in the wind from her recent flight. And, behind them both, the large rock sat, half buried in the ground where he’d just been standing.

  “You said they were friends!” Kyrn shouted, nearly forgetting the giants before him, now both standing.

  “They’re my friends,” Syonne smiled. “We must move quickly now.” Syonne flitted her wings, as she helped Kyrn to his feet.

  He quickly glanced around, his bow still slung over his shoulder, but he found his cane in three pieces at his feet.

  “You must not worry about that now,” Syonne said, seeing Kyrn’s defeated stare, not truly knowing that Kyrn dreaded the loss of something that had saved his life, now more than once.

  Kyrn’s feet hardly touched the ground as he raced beneath Syonne, as if he were dancing astonishingly across the grass.

  The two snow giants stood firm before the entrance to the cavern, now holding a club each. The large weapons looked to be nothing more than fallen branches. Though they were large enough to smash Kyrn to pieces, and the thought alone quickened the young noble’s pace.

  Syonne flew upwards, circling the giant’s head like an annoying summer bug.

  The giant swatted at her again with his free hand, this time more maliciously. “Get the flying one,” he snarled.

  As the second giant considered its command, Syonne darted towards it, and the giant carelessly swung its club.

  Syonne halted the flapping of her right wings, tilting her out of the way of the giant’s swing. The club smashed fiercely into the first giant’s face, sending a stream of dark blood from its nose.

  Kyrn found himself beneath the staggering giant, so close to the opening of the cavern. He danced and dodged around the clobbering feet of the giant, unable
to advance closer to the cave. He had to act quickly, he knew. Syonne would have no trouble flying in circles around the giants, yet he wasn’t as agile. He reached to his back, not bothering to unsling his bow, and pulled an arrow from his quiver.

  Kyrn waited for one of the giant’s feet to land back upon the ground, and he didn’t have to wait long.

  When he felt the rumble of the landing foot, he held the arrow like he had his cane, the arrowhead facing behind him, and, with a spinning slash, he cut the back of the giant’s foot.

  The creature cried in pain, and began dropping to a knee.

  Being directly beneath the falling giant, Kyrn let go of the arrow, and he tucked and rolled, just avoiding the crushing weight of the giant.

  As he came again to his feet, Kyrn found himself face-to-face with the cavern’s entrance.

  His momentum carried him forward, and he dared not look behind him, hearing Syonne’s flapping wings following him.

  Kyrn and Syonne’s pace slowed when they could no longer hear the pain-filled grunts from the entrance of the cave.

  Kyrn fell to both knees, letting his lungs catch up with their struggle in getting so deep into the cave.

  “I wish we did not have to hurt them,” Syonne said with sorrow-filled eyes. “Their cries pain me.”

  “They tried to kill me,” Kyrn said. Like everything else in this world, he thought. “It hadn’t taken long for them to decide to try and kill us both.”

  “We were friends,” Syonne whispered.

  Kyrn scoffed and rose to his feet. “I don’t think you understand what friends are,” he said, as he walked past her. “Don’t mistake me for the same.”

  The two carried on silently through the caverns.

  Syonne flew a few steps behind Kyrn now, contemplating what he’d said before, and, at the same time, forcing Kyrn to find his own way through the tunnels.

  The walls of the cave changed and shifted the further on they went. At first, Kyrn had paid little mind to the rocky walls, staring down at his boots as he walked, only thankful to be out of the cold winds. He began to notice luminescent blue lights flowing through the walls, like a lifeline to the cave.

  As he walked, he let his hand run across the blue veins, feeling the wall smooth and warm. Step after step, the rocks felt as if they had been hand-polished, and they glowed entirely with the blue lights.

  Kyrn slowly spun in place, looking at the large, cavernous room they had entered. The chamber was too evenly carved to not have been man-made. Or, elven-made, Kyrn thought. His thoughts were proven as his eyes fell back upon the center of the room.

  Glowing a deep blue from the walls, sat a finely-carved casket, made of a deep, burgundy wood. Beside it, there was a large block of ice, shaped similarly to an over-sized diamond. The block of ice was nearly twice the size of the rock that had been heaved towards Kyrn earlier that morning. Impaled through the block was a large, black weapon shaped like a long spear.

  Kyrn inspected the weapon with amazement, as he stepped closer. More than half of the handle, dark as night, was free of the ice. From the end of the handle, coursing down to where it met the ice, were elegantly-etched lines and symbols, the likes of which Kyrn had never seen. The blade of the weapon was a faded grey, with hues of blue reflecting off the ice it was encased in. The blade itself was nearly as large as the short-sword he had trained with in Grimmrich, and it curved slightly, mirroring the etchings in its handle.

  “We’ve reached it,” Syonne said from behind him.

  Kyrn twitched, slightly startled. “Castreeth,” he said.

  “No. Of course not. Though, we are close. This is only the entrance. The Crystal Caverns.”

  Kyrn broke his stare from the weapon. They were trapped within the chamber. The only visible exit was the small tunnel they had just entered through. “There’s no other way out,” he said, confused.

  “The entrance is here,” she said slyly. “You only need to know where to look. Or, when to look.”

  Kyrn thought of what Aldir had told him of Northal’s advice. It is not where to look, but when, he remembered. It seemed as if he had been meant to cross paths with Syonne. Perhaps the elder Northal had known more than he cared to tell.

  “Before you lay the last king of the forest of Castrolyl,” Syonne said, seeing Kyrn fix his eyes upon the wooden casket. “King Mayhlan.”

  “The last king?” Kyrn asked, speaking softly to himself.

  “In the forests. As I told you, it is no longer safe in this realm. And that is why you must now know when to look for the new Castrolyl.”

  Behind the fallen king and his weapon, the blue veins in the wall stopped glowing. All but a single strand, forming the glowing shape of some symbol which seemed strange to Kyrn. It was a symbol that Kyrn did not know the meaning of, but he had seen before. The blue veins formed what appeared to be a key, a circular ring on the right, and two successively longer lines on its left.

  Kyrn glanced back down at the weapon in the ice, the crystal of the cavern. The same symbol was carefully etched into its curved blade.

  “That is the king’s glaive,” Syonne said. “King Mayhlan fell to a dark and ancient evil long ago.” She smiled, as Kyrn looked up at her. “The same evil that lingers around you now, it would seem.”

  Kyrn fixed his eyes back upon the weapon. “Who… what are you?” he asked again.

  “Me?” Syonne questioned. “I am magic.” She laughed. When she saw Kyrn slowly reaching out to the black handle of the king’s glaive, she continued. “Night Rift, the king called his glaive. At least, it would be in your speak. The last weapon of the elves to fell the Black Knights. Though, none have been able to…”

  Kyrn found his hand wrapped around Night Rift’s handle, surprised to find it made of some sort of cold steel. As his hand tightened, a blue to match that of the symbol on the wall began to course its way down the veins in the handle of the glaive, until the symbol was lit within the blade.

  Kyrn slid the glaive from the crystal.

  “… remove it,” Syonne finished.

  Kyrn turned slowly to her, feeling some sense of power spreading through his arms to his chest, and his amulet began to shake.

  Syonne watched his eyes light blue with the king’s glaive, and a smirk formed on Kyrn’s lips.

  Kyrn raised the glaive, spear-like, over his head, and with a force that surprised even himself, he loosed it towards Syonne.

  She let her wings falter, finally stopping, and she dropped to the ground below. Looking up at the king’s glaive soaring over her head, she saw the dark mass falling from the ceiling above.

  The glaive pierced entirely through its torso before it landed, dead at her side, and the glaive stuck into the wall on the opposite side of the room with a clang.

  Syonne watched Kyrn bound over her, pulling the glaive from the wall.

  “This seems a good replacement for that shattered cane,” Kyrn said to Syonne, shocked as much at his own words as his deft actions.

  Two more of the beasts landed from the roof of the cavernous tomb. Their large fangs dripped with the yellow foam, and they howled softly to one another.

  “Draelor,” Syonne whispered.

  “The hunters I spoke of,” Kyrn said. “Quick. Get the door open.” He leaped quickly towards the beasts, envisioning Aldir lying beneath their sharp talons. He attempted the low, spinning maneuver that he had used with the old cane, and the king’s glaive guided him around effortlessly.

  Both hunters easily leaped over the swing; one used its leap to lunge over Kyrn, briefly slashing at his chest.

  Kyrn felt its nails rip through his skin, and, as it landed behind him, he found himself flanked. Again, the mystical surge of the weapon flowed through him, and he jammed the glaive into the ground, crackling and splintering the rocky floor around him.

  Kyrn fought to keep his balance, and he saw the hunter before him topple to its side. He leaped from the ground, as the beast’s nails slipped on the icy ground, fighting to
regain its footing. Before it had the chance, Kyrn landed at the beast’s side, forcing the glaive down through its neck.

  “The door!” Kyrn shouted.

  Syonne didn’t respond, but he saw her, both hands pressed firmly on either side of the symbol on the wall, mumbling in a language he could not understand.

  A sharp pain shot through each of his shoulder blades, and Kyrn found himself facedown, the hunter on his back, nails dug deep.

  Syonne heard his agonizing shriek. It had already broken her concentration, so she flew full-force, knocking the beast from his back.

  Kyrn’s ears rang from the pain as he stood. He stared at the glowing symbol on the wall, and a bright flash stole his vision momentarily.

  Standing before the wall, now blocking the symbol, was a dark suit of armor. The metal was grey as a winter wolf, and as he met the Black Knight’s face, the helm looked too similar to the amulet around Kyrn’s neck. The opening of the face was pure void. Nothingness.

  “Find… her,” the voice hissed. “Lose… her.”

  Kyrn lifted the king’s glaive, as he had before, and launched it towards the harbinger of evil. As the blue lights streaked before him, his vision returned, and the figure was no more.

  The king’s glaive pierced the center of the symbol, digging into the crystal wall. All around the symbol, the blue glow spiraled out, again encompassing the wall, and it shifted into a rippling image.

  Kyrn stood, marveling at the sight before him.