by Luka Petrov
The young woman’s eyes lit up. “Have a good night, you guys.”
After bidding Val a goodnight, I lingered in the hallway with Yves. She looked uncomfortable. I asked her, “You want to talk about it?”
Yves frowned. “I just don’t have a good feeling about Val. Agnes told me that she told you. In any case, I’m glad we are away from the bounty hunters and have a place to stay for free where no one asks any questions. And if we have to eventually pay for the room ourselves, the fee to stay here is so low…”
“It’s probably to make up with the fact that this side of Gilmore is so close to the Enchanted Forest,” I told her. I gave her arm what I hoped was a reassuring squeeze. “We could manage it and make this our headquarters.”
“I know,” said Yves, but she still looked uneasy. “It’s Val. There’s something about him. All of this has just… everything about this seems too easy. The fact that he’s paid for a two-week stay doesn’t bother you?”
I blinked. “What do you mean?”
“I’ve been thinking. Do you think he was sent by Lord Abraxas to get us away from the bounty hunters, so he didn’t have to pay the bounty for Yves and Agnes?” She raised her brows as if there was a whole list of accusations in that sentence. “This is all strange. If the Demon Lord has been attacking Gilmore and has given the village three more days before they must surrender you, why is everyone acting so normal? Everyone here is pretending like the Demon Lord doesn’t have his base just outside of town. They’re just… going along with life!”
“I mean—”
“And he’s letting them!”
That made me pause. “What do you mean?”
“Ed,” said Yves, with all the patience of a saint. “Lord Abraxas hasn’t burned this town to the ground yet. He hasn’t done anything to Gilmore. But what we have been told seems off.”
I worried at my bottom lip. That thought hadn’t crossed my mind before. Hesitantly, I offered, “Wait for a second, we saw smoke coming from Gilmore when we crossed on our way to Santa Rocha, right?”
“Right!”
“And I distinctly saw King Hylar whipping villagers, and flames and smoke. You remember that?”
“I do! But everything seems like it is back to normal. What is going on? Everything seems like it is back to normal ever since Val came and rescued us.”
“You make a good point,” I realized. Yves was smart, and it bothered me. Before I would have been threatened by her logic, but now I am just glad that she is on my team.
Yves nodded her head. “Right. Something’s wrong here.”
“Maybe,” I said. When she stared at me, I relented, “probably. But there’s nothing we can do about it right now. We have to get Walter back and going after Lord Abraxas in the middle of the night isn’t an option. He has an advantage over us that way. Two of them, if you count the fact that I can’t do the spells yet and we don’t know where his portal is.”
Clearly put out, Yves said, “I know. I just… wanted someone else to think about what I’ve been thinking about.”
I clapped her on the arm again. “Well, you certainly have me thinking about it. But really, Yves, I think it’s fine. There are only a few hours left until dawn. As soon as the sun rises, we’ll be long gone from here.”
“I suppose,’ answered Yves, even though she still sounded far from being reassured. Slowly, she drifted towards the door to our room. “Just… do not sleep too heavily.”
I snorted. “Get some rest, Yves. I’ll see you at dawn,” as I slipped into my sheets. It had been ages before I slept on an actual mattress.
We didn’t make it to dawn.
The sound of Yves screaming roused me from an uneasy slumber, tucked away in my bed. I lurched to my feet, rolling out of the bed so quickly that I nearly tripped over the thin, tattered blanket.
I grabbed the staff and barreled into the small, narrow hallway—only to be met with the sight of Lord Abraxas’s minions having swarmed the inn.
Someone told, was my first thought, but it was quickly washed away by rationality. He’s been watching us. Of course, he’s been watching us! Val had been lying to us all along!
I slammed myself toward the bed that Yves and Agnes shared. Casting a firebolt, I scorched the wretched creature off of her. She must have been sleeping when it stormed her room, no time or presence of mind to even try to summon her magic. “Agnes stood on the floor of the bed, crying from being frightened. I had been waiting for this Agnes to return. The one who was scared of everything.
“We have to get out of here,” I said, helping Yves her to her feet. I grabbed my Bag of Holding, where I stored the Magi Staff and magic spell book.
There was a nasty gash on the side of her face from the minion’s claws. It was still bleeding sluggishly. We both spun towards the door but—Agnes was already there. Thankfully she got it together to get out of the room. She looked bruised and unkempt, but no worse for the wear.
Yves was still in her traveling clothes.
She’s always been the smartest of our group.
Yves said, “let’s go.”
And we moved.
The hallways were filled with minions. Still, this was far from the first time we’ve faced them down. The tight corridors of the hallway made it tricky but through luck and skill and desperation, we got out of the inn and into a small, dark alley. The minions were swarming the town, some brutalizing the town folk and others sniffing the air, looking for us.
My stomach twisted itself into knots. This was the last thing we needed. “There’s no way we can get to the Enchanted Forest like this. As soon as we make a move for the forest, they’re all going to come after us.”
“We can’t just give up,” protested Agnes.
Yves snapped, “He didn’t say we were giving up! He said the smart thing! He’s right. There’s no way we can get to the forest like this. There are too many minions to outrun.”
“So we don’t outrun them,” said Yves, with the straightforward resignation of someone that has already made a plan and fully expects the others to follow it.
It was a tone she wore well, and often.
Walter might have been the weakest, but Agnes at the moment was taking that role. “Get it together, Agnes. You’ve come so far from the girl who cried all the time at Draererth. Get it together,” I said, attempting to calm Agnes down.
I asked Yves, “What are you thinking?”
And, her brows pulled down, her mouth twisted into a grim line, she told me, “What we need is a distraction.”
Agnes, finally coming to her senses, asked, “Like fireworks?”
“Bigger than fireworks,” answered Yves. “And longer lasting. Someone needs to be bait.”
A long, heavy moment of silence descended over us.
Finally, I rasped out, “bait?”
“Bait,” repeated Agnes, just as steadfast. “I’ll stay behind and keep the minion’s distracted. The rest of you, go see if you can find where the portal is. See if you can figure out where the Demon Lord is keeping Walter.”
“But—”
“We’re going to have no choice but to rescue our teammate, our friend. We need Walter. And this is a chance where we might be able to get him.” Yves was firm in her tone and her expression. Clearly, this wasn’t something that she had any plans on turning into a debate. I was amazed at how far she had come. She went from thinking he was dead weight to save his sorry ass.
The awful thing was: I thought that she was right.
And even worse, everyone turned to look at me.
Because I was now leading the charge to save Walter.
Mouth dry and tongue heavy, I said, “Okay. Yves will stay here. Agnes and I will see if we can find the portal, we’ll see if we can get Walter.”
Agnes looked away, unhappy with the decision. I could tell that she hated the thought of leaving Yves alone. Together, this number of minions might not have been a challenge but alone?
There were so many of them!
And Yves was already so tired!
We were all already so tired.
But Walter was the most important and retrieving him wasn’t an option. As far as I could tell, this was the only option. When no one else offered a plan, Yves stood up.
She said, standing up, “Right. I’ll clear a path going south like we’re leaving through that gate. Most of the minions should follow me. They aren’t the smartest bunch. As soon as the path to the north gate starts to clear out, make a dash for it.”
I stood up too. Grabbing her hand, I gave her the most reassuring smile I could muster. “We’ll get Walter back, I promise.”
“You’d better,” she told me. “Don’t make me do all this work for nothing!”
I hoped not to regret that our goodbye wasn’t more heartfelt. But, at that moment, I was confident in our abilities to work together and succeed. I clapped her on the shoulder, and then, just like that, we were off.
I headed north, through the gate that emptied out into the field where the first battle occurred. For being a Demon Lord, the location of where the portal might be was rudimentary and simple. I mean, he put the portal right outside Gilmore in the empty field before the Enchanted Forest. Perhaps he planned to move it when he began the search for the magic spell book. However, I did not know how to find such a portal. I just knew the approximate location. It was clear that Lord Abraxas has no intention of staying for a long time; which was both a good thing and a bad one.
It was bad because if we messed this up; we were never going to get another chance. The forest was so close, I could already feel its presence, the darkness that seeped out and into my skin.
It was good because there aren’t any shields put up. Clearly, Lord Abraxas expected to have us all dead in our beds back at the inn. Or, if nothing else, he expected us to be dying on the streets as we fought his minions.
None of them have made it back with a message of our group separating. That meant Yves was doing a good job keeping everyone busy. We needed to move quickly, though. I gave my party members a quick, two-fingered waving motion.
It was rudimentary communication at best, but they all knew what I meant by it.
As we explored where the minions were coming from, we saw a thorn crowned man mounted on his horse.
King Hylar.
A firebolt shot from Agnes’ hand and slammed into the back of the enslaved king, catching him off guard. It didn’t do too much damage. While King Hylar was not a magic user, Lord Abraxas had cloaked him in layers or protective magic and enchanted armor. It was hard, if not near impossible, to do any amount of true damage to him.
Magic worked best against him because it could be used from a distance. They could slam him with spells, over and over, chipping away at his health in small increments. And even if they couldn’t do much damage, it would serve as a good distraction, keeping the king occupied for the time being.
King Hylar organized the Gilmore army and steered the minions who crossed the threshold of the portal. He was the general on land, navigating the different troops. His camp was set outside of the castle so he could better communicate with his troops.
My job, as the advanced magic user of the group, was to locate Walter and get him free.
It was actually a lot harder than it sounded; the camp descended into chaos in a matter of seconds, as Agnes rained an attack after an attack on King Hylar and his scattered minions. I dodged between the bursts of magic, gaze drifting, looking, searching—and there!
There he was!
I flung myself over to Walter. My knees hit the ground, hard. At some point during my search, a stray arrow cut a slice through one arm, and it was now bleeding. The heat from the battlefield sent red dripping and gushing down over my arm, my hand, even though the injury wasn’t that severe. It sure looked a right mess and made my fingers feel slick and uncoordinated.
He was bruised and wide-eyed and gaunt, but not severely injured. I made short work of his gag and then started on the ropes.
“Ed—Ed—you’re here!” His voice was hoarse, no doubt from dehydration and screaming.
“Course we’re here, Walt.” I got the first rope undone. “You think we would really leave you?”
“The others?” He twisted but couldn’t really help me with his bonds.
“Agnes is dealing with King Hylar. Yves is back at Gilmore, trying to clear out some of his goons.” The second rope came undone. As soon as it was free, I’ was grabbing Walter and hauling him to his feet.
Walter staggered and cried out; one of his ankles was broken.
“Easy,” I told him. “Lean on me.”
“And Cecily?”
“Haven’t found her yet.” I took my staff in one hand, aimed at where Agnes and King Hylar were fighting.
The glowing white orb I sent out to the sky; the signal to start working on a retreat.
As soon as it left my hand, I started moving, urging Walter along.
He went with me, only giving one last look over his shoulder at Agnes.
“She’ll be fine,” I promised him and found myself hoping, desperately, that I was not about to be made into a liar. Getting out of the camp was harder than getting into it.
A few of the minions charged us, but Walter knocked them away with well-placed fire bolts. Those have always been his preferred spell, and it wasn’t one that required too much energy or focus. I wasn’t weaponless, of course. While magic was my preferred manner of fighting, I had others.
A staff and a few dozen spells memorized. The magic spell book had not been useful as of yet, but always traveling with my Bag of Holding made lugging around these items much easier.
But my hands were mostly occupied with keeping Walter standing. He was shaking from head to toe by the time we were finally far enough away from the camp that he could rest. The bruises on his skin blended in well with the thick coating of dirt.
Walter collapsed onto the ground with a grateful groan. “I can’t believe it,” he said, breathless.
I sat down beside him, not much more graceful. “Can’t believe what?”
“That you came for me,” he said. There was something warm in his eyes. They looked wet like he was fighting back tears.
I gave him my most reassuring smile. “Of course we came for you, Walt. What kind of friends would we be, otherwise?”
The look he gave me wasn’t one that I would ever forget. “Yeah,” he said as if just now realizing that himself. “We are friends, huh?”
“Best friends,” I told him. A clap on the shoulder followed that up, largely because hugging wasn’t my thing and I was hoping to avoid that. “We told you once already, we’d follow you into Hell and back for this. Well, we haven’t made it into Hell yet…and we still have the whole way back to go.”
I was not a liar.
“I thought you were lying because you didn’t really want to tell me the truth. The truth that you would rather not have me on your team,” Walt said.
Agnes made her retreat from King Hylar without too many issues. We met up in a cluster of old oak trees and thick briars. It was not a comfortable hiding spot, but it was a good one. A quick discussion left Agnes, injured, waiting with Walter. Their wounds weren’t too deep, but minions had a way about them of homing in on an injury and ripping at that spot.
Besides, neither of them seemed keen on going back into battle just yet. I couldn’t really blame them. While their goal hadn’t been to defeat the King, I could tell that keeping him occupied, used up most, if not all, of their magic reserves. They were exhausted, and they needed a good long rest before they even thought about fighting anything else.
Using the Magi Staff was awkward and cumbersome, but I appreciated that it amplified my abilities and made my spells stronger, having opponents take more damage.
The trip back to Gilmore was strangely quiet. I was glad to have Walter back with us. He was our missing puzzle piece. The fifth member of our team. As we came back to Gilmore from the empty field, there
were no birds chirping. No animals moved about in the thick, wiry brush that lined the hard-packed dirt path leading to town. There was no sound of revelry, battle, or despair drifting on the wind.
It was in total silence.
It put me on edge.
Then I began thinking, why did Lord Abraxas have Walter tied up in the open like that? Why wasn’t he in the other dimension, on the other side of the portal?
It was a trap.
My heart sank as what happened met my anticipation. I felt a sword swing right above me. It was the Mad King, King Hylar!
Chapter Eight
I felt the air above my head move and heard the swoosh of the bland as it broke through the friction of the dense atmosphere. I instinctively ducked, as if I had known that the Mad King was training Agnes ever since I sent out the retreat signal.
The Mad King gets the initiative, drawing his sword, he swung madly at Edward. Within just a few moments, Edward dodges out of the way.
Without hesitation, I cast burning hands at King Hylar. It pained me to strike the king who I had revered for so long, but I had no choice.
Edward cast burning hands, hitting the Mad King for 5 points of damage.
Agnes saw that I was being attacked and sprang into action. She concentrated, and had three green ovals emerge from her palms, hitting the Mad King dead on.
Agnes cast magic missile at the king, hitting him for 6 points of damage.
I was appreciative to have Walter back on the team, however, it appeared that his magic was a little rusty since he had been taken prisoner for so long. All I saw were plumes of smoke coming from Walter’s finger.
Walter used his final spell slot for the day. Being a prisoner, he did not advance his abilities and in fact, they receded. He cast fire bolt at the king, only this time Walter failed his concentration check. The bolt dissipated.