The Destroyer

by Michael-Scott Earle

  The princess screamed in surprise and fear as the headless corpse began to slide off the saddle in a mess of spraying crimson. The horse bucked up in confusion and I watched as her blanket-wrapped form was tossed into the swiftly moving current.

  Shit. I hadn't planned on that.

  The other two Elvens spun their horses around and gasped in shock. The male drew his sword almost instantly and the woman looked in the water, either for her leader or for Jessmei.

  The river came up to my chest and tried to push me over sideways. This was another part of the plan that I didn't really think through. The leader was dead, but I still had to deal with her lackeys. They both had superior positions and mobility on the horses. Thinking as quickly as my frozen brain could, I ducked down through the water and wrapped my right hand across a smooth river stone, its surface slippery with algae.

  My throw went a bit wide and the male moved his head easily out of the way. The next rock would have hit him in the face, but he smacked it aside with his sword. I switched the target of my third fling, but the woman saw my previous attempts on her partner and she ducked down against the neck of her horse while she drew her sword.

  The horses were the problem. I picked up another stone and hurled it at the face of the horse the male rode upon. The animal screamed when the rock hit and it reared back on its two legs violently. The Elven hadn't expected the movement and he fell back off the saddle and into the water. His grip held steady on the sword though and he didn't drop it.

  Jessmei's head popped above the water to my right with a startled gasp of air. I was glad that she hadn't hit her head on a rock. Her eyes were wild, rolling around in panic like a startled horse. She flailed a little, the weight of her wet clothes and blanket made her movements small and ineffective.

  I launched the rock at the female, but she turned her horse sideways, causing the rock to harmlessly strike the beast's flank. It neighed in pain and shuffled away from me, but did not throw its rider.

  The male got up from the river and approached me cautiously. His leather armor made quick squeaking noises that I heard over the steady clamor of the river. His horse had flipped him off but now sat quietly in the river waiting for him to return and guide it somewhere.

  "You have no idea what you have gotten yourself into, human," he seethed Jessmei's language through clenched teeth. His limbs shook a little more than mine and I guessed that the coldness was penetrating his muscles.

  "I got myself into a river," I said in the old language we shared. "Once I kill you and your friend I'm going to get myself out of it." Both of their eyes grew wide as they guessed my identity.

  Before he leaked out a response I drove forward through the water with a slow cut to his right shoulder. I expected him to dodge back and deflect it and he did. My movement closed the gap between us though, which was my intent. The woman on the horse re-sheathed her sword and fished for her bow and quiver. The closer I was to her partner the harder it would be for an arrow to find my body.

  My opponent lashed back a counter strike aimed at the top of my skull, but I knocked it away with my blade and then stabbed forward with the tip of my curved sword. The point created a deep puncture in his leather shoulder pad, but he managed to twist out of the way before I could wound his flesh. He jumped toward me through the water and made a sweeping cut to my midsection. Before he completed the stroke I brought my sword down on his arms, cleanly severing them below the wrists. His sword flew off to my side into the water with his hands attached. His stumps sprayed blood across me and the moving water as he let out an ear-piercing screech. My weapon flashed diagonally upward across his body, slicing his torso in two and ending his screams abruptly.

  The woman had gotten her bow out and was reaching toward the quiver on the opposite side of the horse. I didn't feel like I had the energy to use magic, but I wouldn't be able to close the distance through the water before she would impale me.

  The energy of the Earth flowed up through the rocks in the river I stood upon, the Wind blew powerful and quick as it followed the speed of the river. The blot of flame, force, and hate left me and slammed into her upper body. Her head snapped back with a crack and her horse let out another loud scream as it bucked back and tried to get her off of its saddle. It paced around in a circle, trying to run, but the water kept it from really moving.

  My vision darkened and coldness enveloped me. I took in a deep breath and felt my nose and lungs burn as I sucked in half a gallon of water. I shot to the surface, suddenly conscious, and hacked up the mouthful of the cold river.

  Jessmei stood about a dozen feet behind, she tried to swim toward me but her lips were blue and she was shaking like a leaf in the middle of a tornado.

  Shit. The water is really fucking cold. I jumped toward her and pulled her into my arms. She looked into my eyes and tried to talk but her teeth chattered so loudly and forcefully that she couldn't speak.

  "Hold on Jessmei. I need to get you warm." I looked around and realized that I picked an ambush spot in the middle of the river. The water was too high for me to effectively lift her out of it, but I cradled her in my arms and made my way over to the leader’s horse. The animal seemed to have already forgotten that I had just beheaded its master. I easily took the reins, lifting myself and the shivering princess out of the water and on to its back. Jessmei seemed to be shaking even more now that we were out of the water.

  We did not have much time.

  I rode over to the other two horses and gathered up their reigns. Then I led them back south to the direction of Nia. They seemed as happy to get out of the water as I was.

  Jessmei was almost a constant seizure in my arms. Her eyes were closed, and I heard her heart beating twice as fast as it should have been. The coldness from her body seeped into mine like I was holding onto a stone wall.

  "Bite this," I said as I put part of a leather strap in her mouth. I was concerned she was going to shatter her teeth, but I really needed to be worried about her dying in the next few minutes if I didn't get us someplace dry and warm. We needed an area with cover so I could take care of her. The clouds above portended rain, their underbellies dark and swollen.

  Instead, it started to snow.

  The horses cantered up the slope from the river at my urging. The road down to the river was on the side of a cliff that didn't have any sort of outcropping that we could use as a sanctuary. On the other side of the road lay a grassy field that stretched on for a few hundred yards. In the distance past the meadow I spotted the beginnings of a forest. I pushed the horses in that direction as I looked at the cliff face for anything I might use as better shelter.

  Jessmei's blue eyes were opened now. They were clouded but she was conscious enough to bite the hell out of the strap. Her hands shook and clutched at my wet clothes.

  "Hold on Jessmei. Almost there." She may have nodded, but it was hard to tell from the movement of the horse.

  The trees were sporadic for the first two hundred yards and then grew dense. I reached a point where it would be difficult to get the trio of horses any deeper and I pulled Jessmei to the ground. I flipped off the saddle of the horse and grabbed the large blanket that protected the animal's skin from the saddle; I put this on the ground and lay Jessmei down on it. Then I ran to the next horse and repeated the process. I'm sure there were other blankets and camping gear in the assorted packs but I didn't want to waste time looking for them, and the horse blankets, though damp, were warm with body heat. The wind had died down in the thickness of the trees. A few small snowflakes filtered through the feathery canopy of pine needles.

  I ran back over to Jessmei and tried to get her to sit up. She was completely unresponsive, her heart still beating quickly though. I didn't know enough about hypothermia to guess if that was good or bad. Considering I hadn't even started to get her warm I guessed that it was probably bad.

  I ripped off her thin nightgown and then carefully removed her undergarments. She wore a thin pair of slippers that I too
k off her feet, and then I put the other blanket on top of her. I ran my hands through her soaking hair and contemplated cutting it off, then I just decided to wring it out over the thin bed of pine needles.

  I was still numb, sore, exhausted, and starving, but I needed to set up this camp before I could rest. I quickly gathered pine needles and cones and put them in a pile near the wrapped up form of Jessmei. Then I reached my hand out and tried to channel the Air from my body. As soon as I tasted the power my vision swam and nausea hit me in the stomach like a hammer. I fell to my knees and vomited up river water. My body was done. I had pushed it as far as it would go. Or at least, as far as it could go and still harness the Elements.

  There must be some flint and steel in one of these packs on the horses. I searched through the first and found a large rolled up blanket, a tent pack, bedroll, multiple water skins, and some cooking gear. My hands shook as badly as Jessmei's now. I needed to start a fire in the next few minutes or we would both die. I went to the next pack and found a small hand axe, more cooking gear, another bedroll, and another blanket. On the last horse I found the flint and an oiled bag filled with waxed fire starters. I breathed out a sigh of relief, threw a fire starter on the pile of pine needles, and got a small flame growing on the first swipe of my dagger across the flint.

  I grabbed the hand axe and stumbled to my feet. There were plenty of dead branches on the ground that I hacked into smaller pieces and then dragged over on top of the needles. Each swing of the axe made my vision blur and bile rise up in my throat. After about ten minutes the fire was burning at a respectable rate and I had some more wood stacked up near Jessmei's blanketed form. Her heart was still beating quickly and she moaned in pain every half a minute.

  We really needed to set up a tent, but I didn't think I would have enough energy. There were still snowflakes drifting down through the thick cover of trees, and a serious storm would chill us further. I grabbed a pot from one of the packs and emptied a water skin into it. The pack came with a few carefully packaged sections of jerked beef. I threw those in the pot and then placed it on the ground near the fire in hopes that it would warm.

  Jessmei's teeth started to chatter again. I laid out two of the bedrolls, flipped one of the larger blankets on top, and then carried her body over to the better bed. She didn't weigh that much, but I was so weak that I almost couldn't lift myself off the ground. I stripped off my clothes, the same sweaty garments I wore that day, so many weeks ago, when I had exercised with Paug and Iarin. I secured the wool covers over us. It took a few seconds of maneuvering through the four different blankets before I had my chilled, naked body pressed against her frozen back. She was still shivering and shaking, but I felt the heat from the fire start to permeate the thick wool.

  "It's going to be okay, Jessmei," I whispered in her ear as I pulled her body into mine. My arms wrapped around her torso and grasped her slim shoulders. Her breasts pushed up against the inside of my arm as it wrapped across her chest. I didn't know if she heard me but I couldn't think of anything else to do. It had been too long since I had slept. Or eaten.

  I hope it doesn't snow too hard, the horses don't bolt, and the blanket doesn't catch on fire, were the last thoughts to crawl through my half-dead brain before exhaustion took me.

  Chapter 31-Paug

  "I'm sorry about this, Paug," Grandfather called back to me. "I know you will miss your friends. Sometimes life doesn't turn out the way we planned."

  "I understand, Grandfather." I looked back over my shoulder again. The castle had ceased to be even a small dot in the distance a few days ago, yet I still looked back toward it. "I just feel like I am deserting my friends. It feels cowardly to leave when they need help the most. To save ourselves and leave them to . . ."

  "It isn't our fight. We are simple teachers, historians, writers, and educators. What use is it if we die in battle or even observe it?"

  "If we observe a battle, can't we write about it with better accuracy? Wouldn't it be best that way?" I asked him, with hope in my voice.

  "No Paug. It is too dangerous. Besides, everything we would want to document about the siege that will happen at the capital can be accounted from the refugees and the people that were there. It is not worth risking our safety to be there when the battle happens." Grandfather looked back over his shoulder again. His horse strayed to the side of the road as he ignored it. "Also, consider how important your insight is! You have actually spoken the Ancients’ language with someone from that time! You witnessed a pivotal moment in history. We must document the knowledge for future generations. This will be an important task that we will set ourselves upon as soon as we get home."

  I looked at his hopeful face and nodded. The thought of diving deep into my books didn't seem as appetizing as it once had.

  "I still feel remorse Grandfather. I should be with my friends now."

  "Those feelings will fade. Remorse always does."

  "I think regret does. Not remorse," I said under my breath. He didn't hear me though. He was justifying our flight with noble arguments about preserving history, but the truth was that he could not bear to risk losing me. I was the only family he had, and the older he grew, the more he would rely upon me. While ostensibly his concern was for posterity, I knew part of his motivation was simply selfishness and fear. I could not fault him for that, I thought as I studied his hunched, frail form. The bones of his shoulder blades showed sharply through his clothes. I knew what it felt like to be vulnerable and weak.

  The air was blowing cold from the north and I snuggled deeper into my thick cloak. Nadea and her father gave us two stout horses and a mule to go home with us. The mule was carrying several hundred pounds of precious books that the dark-haired woman wanted to save.

  Greykin, Iarin, and Nadea saw us off almost a week ago. It had been an emotionally difficult morning. I couldn't find the right words to say goodbye. The four of us had been through so much during the past few months, even before Kaiyer had arrived.

  "I wish Kaiyer and Jessmei were here." Tears came to my eyes and I tried to blink them away. I had just finished packing and our friends had come into my room for the final farewell.

  "Me too lad," Greykin replied as he smothered me in a big bear hug. He smelled of aged tobacco and oiled chain mail.

  "Goodbye Paug. Please take care of yourself," Nadea said as she wrapped her arms around me, kissed my forehead, and ran her hands through my bushy hair. "You are important to Nia. I am counting on you to safeguard those books and continue searching for the O'Baarni." She smiled at me and then sighed as she looked into my eyes; her deep brown orbs were filled with sadness. We had spoken often over the last few days as Grandfather and I were preparing to leave. We had said goodbye many times, but this would be the last time.

  I looked at Iarin as the warm tears rolled down my cheeks. He was also leaving the castle. Nadea asked him to stay, even offered him some gold, but he had declined. He told us he would head to Brilla for work. I believed Nadea had been upset about his decision at first, but he wasn't born in Nia and did not have any obligation to defend it to the death. Iarin was a kind man, but he was a mercenary, with no family or home; his prerogative was to keep himself safe. One man would make little difference in the fight anyway, I reasoned so as not to leave feeling bitterness toward him. The tracker gave me a hug but said nothing. I saw a tear roll down his cheek as we parted.

  My friends looked at each other one last time before Greykin helped me into the saddle of the horse. Grandfather thanked them for taking such good care of me and then we set off through the city. My body felt numb, like I had no control over where I moved.

  The city was in a state of panicked motion as soldiers, citizens, and traders tried to perform what tasks they needed to before the horde arrived. The air was tense with anxiety and fear. Men hammered boards over windows and barricaded vulnerable street-facing doors, reinforcing them with heavy metal rods and locks. Women supervised as their husbands loaded parcels into carts or on
to horses in preparation for a flee to sanctuary within the castle walls or to family in a distant land. Oblivious children, sensing the charge in the air but unaware of the danger, darted about, playacting sword fights and squealing in excitement at the change in routine. Soldiers roamed the streets, conscripting young men and running drills to train their new recruits quickly. I saw a few boys, younger than myself, marching dutifully behind an officer, still wearing their civilian clothes, struggling to walk in formation while wielding and unfamiliar sword.

  More than once I wished they would have given us an escort out of the city. A few times beggars eyed our horses lustfully. But just as I suspected Grandfather and I would be mugged, a guard happened to walk by and the desperate men thought better of the affair.

  Now the city was a memory. Like Nadea would be. Like Greykin would be. Like Iarin, Jessmei, and Kaiyer.

  A memory like my mother was. Someone I remembered for a few seconds before her smile turned into smoke and fog. She was gone until something external conjured up her ghostly image. I recalled Nadea's beautiful face now if I tried. I imagined Kaiyer's dreamlike smile easily when I thought about walking around the castle with him. What would happen in a few months though? Would his smile stay the same as I remembered it, like a painting on a wall? What would happen in a few years? My recollection would fade, and these friends, my best friends, would be gone forever. I felt tears roll down my cheeks again. My memory was imperfect and would decay as a sandcastle built on the low tide eventually succumbs to the waves.

  If the Losher army conquered Nia, our small village would probably be left alone. We would report to a new tax master, but what would the new rulers care about a small fishing community of under a thousand people? Even if the Ancients ruled the world, we wouldn't realize a difference. I would grow old like Grandfather, teach children and adults to read and do math. I would remember the few months when I tried to be a hero and fled when the situation looked grim. Perhaps I would tell my children that I was forced to leave, but I had really wanted to stay. Maybe I would eventually believe that lie myself and think that I was a hero.