The Tales of Neroman: The Silver Savior

by Tom Burton

Then, the owner quickly leaves the table.

  Hours later, Luke slowly walks upstairs to his room. He carries his bag in one hand and the key for the room in the other. When he reaches his room, he slowly turns the key to enter. Inside, he pours scrolls out of the bag, onto the bed. He searches through the scrolls, examining the hand-drawn faces.

  “Nothing…”

  He shoves the scrolls back into the bag then throws the bag onto the floor. He then sits on the bed; after some heavy breathing, he slowly lies back onto the bed and turns in for the night.

  The next morning, Luke is suddenly awoken by a noise at the locked door. His eyes slowly open, but he moves gaze towards the door, instantly…. He sees that a letter has been pushed under the bottom of the door. Luke slowly gets out of bed and makes his way toward the door. He slowly bends down and picks up the letter, then opens it.

  Every War needs blood in the Ashes, but only in War,

  True Men become Kings

  Luke stares at the letter, reading and rereading it. He then looks at the window in his room and walks toward it. As he approaches the window, he sees a woman below, walking out of the Tavern, her back turned from the building. He is unable to see the woman’s face.

  Luke looks at the letter and rereads the text one more time. Then he looks back to the woman. The woman walks down the street quickly, and eventually Luke loses sight of her.

  Soon after, Luke changes into the clothes that he took off the night before. For a final time he looks at the letter that was sent to him, then folds the letter in half and puts it in his pocket. He grabs his belt and begins to wrap it around his trousers. As he does this, he approaches the window and looks out again. Now he notices a man leaning on the corner of the building opposite the tavern. Luke pauses and stares at the man. Then, he rushes to his bag and finds a specific scroll. He unrolls the scroll, presses it against the window to compare the man on the poster to the man outside.

  “Got you!” Luke says excitedly.

  He grabs his remaining possessions and rushes out of the door.

  As Luke leaves the tavern, he sees his target walking away. Luke walks after him but keeps his distance.

  The target walks down a small alleyway. As Luke turns the corner, following him, he sees the target facing him.

  “I figured it would be quieter down here….” The target says, trying to intimidate Luke and drawing his sword.

  Luke walks toward him. “Makes it easier for me when I kill you anyway.”

  Luke grabs the hilt of the knife in his belt. The target continues toward him. Luke quickly unsheathes the knife and throws it at the man. The knife pierces the man’s neck, and the man gasps for air.

  Then, he slowly falls to the ground.

  Luke stands over the man as he takes his last breath. He then begins to pickpocket the dead man’s body, stealing the target’s money and possessions. He grabs the “wanted” poster from his bag and a piece of twine, he uses it to tie the poster around the targets wrist.

  “You’re going to make me rich,” Luke whispers to himself. He chuckles. Then he begins to pick the target up — but he hears footsteps behind him.

  “Luke…” a female voice whispers.

  Luke grabs his knife and turns. The woman lifts her arms in the air and stops him in his place. It’s the same woman who walked out of the tavern! He tries to move his arm from its upward position, but he struggles to do so.

  “You posted that letter!” Luke tells her.

  The woman does not respond but only looks him in the eyes. She then slowly lowers her arm… and Luke’s arm slowly lowers with hers.

  “Come with me,” the woman tells Luke.

  She walks back out of the alleyway and onto the main street.

  Luke cleans his knife and places it back into his belt. He looks at the body then looks back at the woman. He leaves the body and begins to follow her instead.

  The two begin to leave town. They walk straight into a dead forest. The woman walks ahead of Luke, who keeps hold of the hilt on his knife.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  But Luke’s question is met with no response from the woman.

  Soon, the two come across a seemingly abandoned hut. She walks into the hut without hesitation, but Luke feels very reluctant. He looks around the dead forest; the clouds above begin to close in.

  Eventually, Luke follows the woman into the hut.

  Inside, Luke finds unlit candles surrounding the center of the room; the candles are arranged in a circle. The woman walks to the other side of the room and waves her hand. All of the candles light up. Luke looks at the woman fearfully.

  The woman slowly tends to the candles. “Why do you kill for money?” she asks in a sinister voice.

  Luke looks downward.

  The woman slowly looks across to him, noticing his silence.

  “Was it the fire that consumed them? Or the assassin?”

  Luke’s head shoots upward in surprise.

  “How do you know this?”

  The woman simply smiles at Luke as she resumes tending to the candles.

  “Have you ever heard of the Guardians of Neroman?”

  Luke shakes off the comments she made earlier. “It’s a popular story in the Crown Lands!” he replies sharply.

  “The truth is not so popular….” The woman laughs.

  “Everyone believes in their freedom. Freedom of choice, who to love, who to hate, who to spend their time on. But that is not the world we live in.”

  The woman turns to Luke and begins walking toward him.

  “Everyone has a destiny outside of their control. They can fight it; they can run from it. But in the end…everyone meets their destiny.”

  She places her hand on his chest. Luke suddenly receives an influx of memories…visions…storms of lightning, clash of swords and the stench of death during the Great War of the Wizards. His eyes turn red like flames, and he begins to scream loudly. The woman takes her hand off his chest. Luke falls to the floor.

  “You saw them?” she asks, looking down at him struggling to breathe.

  Luke turns to look up at her, his eyes now returned to their natural brown. He slowly nods his head then stands back on his feet.

  “What did you do to me?” he whispers.

  He struggles to stay standing. But once again, the woman chooses not to answer his question.

  “There may be three wizards in that war, but here, today—” the woman tells Luke “—there is only one true God of Neroman.”

  “Well where is he?” Luke asks sarcastically.

  The woman then begins to roll up her sleeve.

  “His body is broken, but he still lives within us in spirit.” Luke smiles. “So who is this God then?”

  He has fully gathered his strength again. The woman has rolled her sleeve up to her elbow. Luke sees the letter M branded on her forearm. He grabs the arm in shock.

  “Mutaro….” he whispers.

  Without hesitation, he grabs the knife from his belt and plunges it into the woman’s stomach. She takes a step back, shock in her eyes…but she leaves the knife in and begins to laugh at Luke.

  “This is your destiny…right here, right now,” she tells Luke.

  “You will join Mutaro, and you will cleanse this world of its evil—you can’t stop it!”

  The woman screams. Her scream varies in tone, traveling from high to low. Luke backs off, not sure what will happen next. The woman’s body then implodes: a dark cloud exerts itself from where her body once stood. The cloud stays for a few seconds…and then begins to dissipate. Soon after, the candles go out, and Luke stands in complete darkness.

  He runs out of the hut, into the dark forest.

  As Luke runs, he begins to sprint down the pathway toward the village. He glances back to the hut…but it has disappeared, even
as the scream of the woman continues to echo through the dead forest.

  Luke begins to push himself farther, but he soon notices that he is running much faster than he usually would. Sooner than he thought, he makes it to the forest edge. He stops and rests against a white tree, gathering his breath.

  “What is happening to me…?”

  He looks around and sees the village. Once he catches his breath, he again jogs toward it.

  Once he gets into the village, he begins to sweat from his forehead and continues to breathe heavily. He approaches some of the residents.

  “Doctor? Doctor?” he asks desperately. But the residents simply ignore him; they walk away in disgust. Luke approaches a market trader in a small stall.

  “Is there a doctor here…?” he asks the man.

  “Not here, friend. The nearest doctor is in the West.”

  He turns to look around onto another street. He notices someone on the other side of the street, looking in his direction. He focuses on whoever it is. Eventually, he realizes that it’s the woman in the hut.

  He grabs his knife and throws it at the figure. The knife goes through the woman and hits the wooden wall behind her. Everyone in the street has stopped in their tracks; now they stare at the knife and at Luke in horror and disgust. Luke looks at everyone and then looks back toward the woman—but she is gone. He slowly places his hands on his face in confusion. Then he goes toward the knife and pulls it away from the wall.

  Luke heads back into The Turn. As he opens the door and enters, he sees the tavern is very quiet. He storms past the tables and sits on a stool by the bar. He puts his head in his hands and begins to breathe heavily, attempting to calm himself.

  You cannot kill an idea…it will always be with you.

  Luke hears the female’s voice…but he is the only one who hears it. He quickly looks around, searching for the voice, but this only makes him more stressed. He begins to sweat again and breathes more deeply and heavily.

  The owner of the tavern approaches him.

  “Do I know you?” the owner asks.

  Luke only becomes more and more stressed. His sweat begins to drip onto the bar, and his breathing becomes louder and louder. He quickly looks up to the owner, startling him.

  Luke’s eyes then turn red. He shoots up into a standing position. He grabs the owner by the back of the head with one hand, and grabs the side of his face with the other. He twists the owner’s neck and suddenly breaks it.

  The owner’s body falls lifelessly to the floor.

  Luke’s eyes fade back to their normal brown. He looks back down and begins to tremble in shock. He takes a step back, scared seeing the man lying dead on the floor. He begins to look around the room and sees everyone stand up from their seats, staring at him…the men begin to grab their possessions from the table.

  Luke then looks over toward the front door.

  “Get him,” one of the men instructs. Five of them chase as Luke rushes toward the door. He makes it out before the men reach him.

  He barges out onto the street. He begins to run down the street with his newfound speed. Quickly, he loses sight of the men chasing after him. Once he turns a corner, losing the men for good, he hears neighing in the distance. He begins to follow the neighing, and soon comes across a stable. He sees a stableman walking across the stables. Luke quickly approaches.

  “How much?” Luke asks the man at the stables. The stableman looks toward the horses and back to Luke.

  “A horse…?” the stableman says. “Sorry, they are not for sale.”

  Luke reaches into his pocket and gives the stableman a bag of silver. The stableman is shocked at how much money has been given to him.

  “Erm….well, I suppose you can take one,” the stableman says, smiling as he counts his silver.

  Luke rushes to the first horse he can find. He quickly places a saddle on the horses and begins to ride out of the stables.

  “Which path goes to the West?” he asks the stableman.

  The stableman points down the leftmost path out of the stables. Luke then rides out on the path, heading west.

  A few days later, Luke rides steadily to a small village in the West. He reads one of the signposts planted in the ground on the way in, the sign reads Greyshore. He pauses for a moment as he looks at the sign. Still on his horse, he looks at the village ahead of him and gallops toward it. As there are no walls or gates to protect the village, he freely rides in. Then he dismounts the horse and begins to walk through the town with the horse beside him. The people are friendly, smiling at him as he walks past them.

  Soon after, he sees a green plus sign on a wooden building, the symbol that denotes medicine. Luke stops and walks toward it. He ties the horse up next to the building, and walks in.

  “Good morning!” a man behind the counter says joyfully as he sees Luke walk in.

  “Morning,” Luke replies, in a less joyful tone. “I was wondering if there is a doctor here?”

  The man points at an open door to the left of him. Luke looks toward the door.

  “You’re in luck, she’s free now, if you wish,” the man says.

  “Thank you,” Luke replies gratefully as he walks into the doctor’s room.

  He closes the door behind him. A woman is writing notes down on a piece of parchment. Luke greets, “Hello…?”

  The doctor turns around and immediately approaches Luke.

  “Morning…my name is Dr. Lucille Stafford, and you are—?” She reaches out to shake Luke’s hand.

  “Luke Snow.”

  “Please sit down,” she gestures toward the empty chair across her desk.

  “So how can I help?” She leans back slightly in her chair.

  Luke takes a moment, rubbing his hands together nervously.

  “Before I tell you, I ask that you not breathe a word of this to anyone.” Luke pleads.

  “Of course.”

  Luke then takes a heavy breath.

  “Okay, a few days ago, I had an encounter with a woman, she took me to this hut in the middle of a dead forest. And…I don’t know, she must have conjured some sort of spell on me, because I see her everywhere I go, and I seem to be blessed with speed and strength. But as I got more and more stressed over the situation, I snapped—” Luke tells the doctor, “—and I killed someone.”

  Lucille looks at Luke for a long moment then fully leans back, wondering whether to believe his story.

  “So when you killed this person, what sort of state were you in?” Lucille asks.

  Luke looks guiltily to the floor.

  “I was stressed,” Luke answers. “So many things were going on all around me, I just could not focus. But when I did it, it was almost like an out-of-body experience. I had absolutely no control over what I was doing.”

  Lucille stands and begins to search through a medicine cabinet.

  “This sort of magic only comes from the time of wizards and Pioneers—myth and legend now, of course.” She fails to find the medicine, so she sits back down and looks straight at Luke. “And because it was so long ago, many in my profession choose not to find a cure.”

  “You mean you don’t have any theories—any at all—as to what it might be?” Luke asks desperately.

  “This woman may very well be some sort of mage, a student of the old magic, and she has latched this spell onto you for reasons neither of us know. And her control over you is complete when you lose control of your mental state,” Lucille suggests.

  Luke leans forward.

  “So what am I to do?”

  Lucille takes a few moments to answer.

  “I do not have the knowledge of this kind of affliction, nor can anything in my cabinet be of any help. All that I can suggest to you is to not lose control of your mental state. Stay calm and focused on what is surrounding you…stay calm as much as possi
ble.”

  Luke is unimpressed with the doctor. He quickly leans back in his chair.

  “That’s it?” he asks.

  The doctor simply nods her head. There is a long pause as the two remain staring at each other. Eventually, Luke shakes his head in disappointment.

  “Well…thank you for your time, doctor,” Luke says. He stands up and shakes hands with the doctor.

  “Feel free to come back anytime if you have any more questions,” Lucille offers. Luke ignores the doctor’s invitation and storms out of the room, then walks past the counter. He continues out onto the street, slamming the doctor’s door closed behind him. Suddenly, he hears a man shouting:

  “Help! Help!”

  Luke looks over to see a second person running away from the man.

  “He stole my valuables, he stole it!” The man points vigorously at the man running away.

  Some other passersby try to stop him, but he only pushes them out of the way. Luke then begins to run after the man, he soon begins to full sprint, and, just like before, he sees that he is running faster than he has ever run before. The people of the village see this and stare in awe at how fast Luke is running. Luke very quickly catches up to the thief and leaps onto him. The two men fall hard onto the ground, and Luke very quickly restrains the man, turning him onto his stomach. Luke then hits the man over the head, seemingly knocking him out, then retrieves the silver from him.

  As he slowly walks back to the victim, he sees the people on the street begin to applaud him. As they applaud, they all begin to walk toward him, but Luke remains focused on the victim. The victim gets emotional as Luke approaches him: tears form in his eyes.

  “Here you are,” Luke says, as he hands the bag of silver back to the victim.

  “Thank you so much,” the victim says, wiping away his tears.

  The crowd continues to applaud Luke, but he remains apprehensive. He slowly walks toward his horse and unties him. He mounts the horse then slowly rides off.

  Just outside of the village, in an open green field, Luke slowly dismounts the horse and ties him round a lone tree. He then looks at his hands, slowly waving them in front of him. He begins to smile.

  “This might just be a good thing…,” he whispers to himself, chuckling.