by Jada Fisher
With each word, Lord Bather seemed to get madder. “This is ludicrous,” he finally spat, throwing his hands in the air. “Another magic user…pish posh. Only Lady Reshni can use magic. Everyone knows that.”
“With all due respect, milord, I know what I saw.”
“Yeah, well, maybe you saw wrong. Maybe you’re lying to cover up your incompetence. Incompetence that got my daughter killed and four young, promising squires cut down.”
Dorrick tried to keep his anger down. He understood that the lord was upset, and he had that right, but this wasn’t his Dorrick’s fault.
“Sir, please. I did all I could do. We were totally unprepared—”
“Ha! See? Unprepared he says.” The man was hysterical. He got in Dorrick’s face and pushed him, hard. “Unprepared, incompetent. You killed my daughter!”
That about did it. The young knight couldn’t hold in his rage or stay patient any longer with this pampered lord. Maybe it was his fault. A part of him felt that way. A part of him blamed himself for what happened. But he would not stand this, not from this man, not from someone who knew nothing of him or what he’d gone through and done to make it to where he was now.
So, with a roar, he lashed out and punched him square in the jaw.
There was a terrible crack. White hot pain exploded from his hand. The lord reared back, blood spurting from his mouth. Dorrick’s momentum carried him forward, and he was ready to follow Lord Elron to the ground and pummel him further, but then his father was suddenly there. He shoved his son back into the waiting arms of two knights who Dorrick couldn’t see. They grabbed him by his arms and forced him onto his knees.
“Enough of this nonsense,” his father said, calm as ever.
But Dorrick would not calm. He was nowhere close to calm. He was scared and tired and sad and angry and in pain. He just wanted to make someone hurt.
“Why are you even here?” he yelled, struggling to free himself from the knights’ grips, but to no avail. “Why is Lord Bather here? And how did you get here so fast?” The time for decorum was over. Dorrick wanted answers and his father would give it to him. This whole situation made no sense to him.
His father was unfazed by Dorrick’s outburst. He folded his arms behind his back, cape billowing in the wind. “Lady Reshni received a vision. She was vague on details as usual, but she advised that I personally lead a company of men here, along with Lord Bather. She would not tell me what I would find, but she was urgent, and I have learned to heed her warnings.”
So one magical witch causes my friends to die, and another makes my father come to personally torment me over it? Dorrick was quickly losing faith in magic and sages and other unworldly things.
“As for how we got here,” his father continued, “we got here as you did. All my men and our mounts took Wild Breath. We galloped through the wilds and mountains, nonstop, and arrived in two days.”
“So, I— I’ve been unconscious for two days?”
“Indeed, it appears that way.”
That is not good for me, he thought. He should have been dead, yet here he was. A part of him really wished that he was dead.
His father stared at him, no pity or warmth in his eyes. None of the pride he’d shown just a week before. No, they were back to being cold, full of contempt and disgust for the son that took his wife from him. Lord Bather rose behind him, his face a mess of blood, still staring daggers at Dorrick. He wants me dead, the young knight thought with absolute certainty. The man who he blamed for his daughter’s death—and who’d punched him… Yeah, he wanted him dead. Of course, the lord wasn’t dumb enough to do anything rash with the commander standing in the way.
There was nothing else, though. Dorrick had already told them what happened, told them the truth. He had nothing more to say.
“What happens now?” Dorrick asked.
Vanter Vane took a deep breath and walked away from his son. Without looking at him, he said, “Due to your gross negligence, you have caused the deaths of one knight and four squires in your charge, and then you lied about the events to your commanding officer.”
Dorrick lunged forward, but the knights held firm. “I did not! I told you the truth. A witch and some girl stopped us!”
His father whirled around and slapped him hard across the face. “Only Lady Reshni can use magic. What you describe, this…this girl in green falls in line with the mythical Girl O’ Green, a wildling legend, a fairytale. You saw an illusion.”
“I know what I saw,” he retorted, teeth bared.
“And finally,” his father continued, ignoring his son’s pleas, “you assaulted a lord of the city.”
Of course, so that’s how they’ll play it. Pin everything on me. His father hadn’t been proud of him when he became a knight. He’d just put on a face. Finally, his father could be rid of him.
“With these charges, you are to be stripped of your rank of knight and expelled from the order.”
Dorrick knew what his father would say, but still, the words were like an arrow to the heart, like a mace to the back of the head. He saw stars. He saw his life flash before him, the good and the bad, the triumph and the struggles. The triumphs so brief, the love for Marcella so brief. Now it was all gone.
Usually for charges such as his, which were rare, they would have a trial before the captains…but his father was the commander. The chain of command ended with him. He could expel someone without a single thought. And it seemed that his own son wouldn’t be given the courtesy to defend himself to the other captains. Typical.
So that was it.
His father flicked his wrists, and the knights let Dorrick go. He slumped to his knees. He had no fight in him, for what was he to do?
Lord Bather wasn’t pleased. “That’s it?” he pleaded with the commander. “You won’t imprison him or have him killed? I want justice!”
“This is justice, Elron,” the commander snapped, his nose almost touching the nobleman’s. “I’d be happy to leave you here with my son so you can settle the score yourself, but I will not intervene if he kills you thusly.”
And that would be a fight Dorrick would win, of that he was sure.
Lord Bather glared at the commander, but he knew when to concede. He turned around in a huff and returned to his daughter’s side where he dropped to his knees and started to cry. For a moment, Dorrick felt bad for him. He didn’t know the pain of losing a daughter, though that didn’t absolve the lord of his boorish behavior. Besides, Marcella had never spoken very highly of him.
His father said nothing else to him. Marcella and the squires were collected respectfully and put on a cart. They’d receive a funeral in the city, as all knights did. The knights and city-guardsmen built pyres for the villagers and burned them, the priest saying prayers and blessings for the departed souls. If there were any townsfolk left, then they’d fled and hadn’t come back. Dorrick hoped his mission hadn’t been a complete failure in that sense, though it felt like it.
All the while, Dorrick sat alone in the middle of it all, broken and tired.
Once it was all over, everyone mounted their horses and started to ride west to the city. Dorrick made to join them, but his horse was already gone, along with his saddle and supplies. He ran to the front of the procession to where his father led the way.
“Give me my horse,” he demanded.
His father didn’t spare him a glance. “The horse is owned by the order. And you are no longer of it.” He gave the reins a tug and spurred his horse forward. “Find your own way back. Or don’t.”
And then he cantered forward, and the rest followed.
Dorrick had no words. He was truly alone, with only a sword and the stench of burning corpses to keep him company. He sat in the middle of the road, watching the horses disappear into the mountains. A violent mountain gale whipped around him, but he didn’t care. He didn’t feel it. He was numb.
He was numb.
Numb.
Dead.
Broken inside
.
He’d lost everything, everyone he loved, and everything he’d ever cared about and striven for. He might as well have just sat there and let himself freeze to death. That would be the easiest thing to do. But that wasn’t who he was. He would go back to the city. Or try at least. He would try to start a new life, though he had no earthly idea what that life could be.
For now, he was tired, so tired. Cold and hungry and hurt, but mostly tired. He got up and went to the closest house that was still whole. He found a bed and threw himself into it. It was stiff and scratchy, made from straw, but he didn’t care.
He closed his eyes. Was it bad that he was so tired? For two days, he’d been unconscious, and now he would sleep again. Definitely not healthy. But if he slept and never woke up, then so be it.
So be it.
15
Tuni
The hike back to Tuni’s home was a grueling one, because she was still exhausted from the previous day’s battle with the knights and the rock golem. She wished that things didn’t have to go down like that. So much death, needless death that could have been avoided if only the knights would have listened to Gayla and stayed out of her way.
Now they were dead, and Tuni saw their blank, lifeless faces every time she shut her eyes.
The fight made her want to see her mom and sister again. She would continue to apprentice with the sage, though, learn all she could. The fight had shown her the realities of the sage’s life, but it didn’t scare Tuni away. She wanted it more than ever. The sage saved people, saved spirits and animals too. She wanted to be a part of that.
She just wanted to see her family and friends again, let them know she was okay, and that she loved them. And to tell Mom how sorry I am.
Gayla walked beside her, whistling a jig as she skipped along, her staff stretched across her shoulders, arms over the top of it. She looked so much like a girl Tuni’s age then, and not like the thousand-year-old magical being that she was.
“You’ve been awfully quiet, my dear,” Gayla said with a smile and an arched brow. “Something on your mind?”
Tuni kept her eyes ahead. She swallowed hard. “I’m just thinking about the fight. About…about those knights.”
“Hm. I understand. It’s hard to see death, especially when it could have been avoided. I’ve seen it far too many times, more than any living person on this earth probably, and it still hits me hard.”
Tuni nodded. It wasn’t exactly reassuring, but knowing that this all powerful being felt the same made her feel a bit better.
They walked on in relative silence for a few more miles. Gayla could have magically teleported them to her village at any time, but Tuni had declined the offer. She wanted to return as she’d left—on her own two feet, her own strength. No magic. Gayla understood and had insisted on accompanying her. Tuni hadn’t protested, since she could probably help explain some things to her mother.
Before long, the surroundings grew familiar to Tuni. A shriveled old mushroom she’d carved her name into. A grove of gold-leafed yuta trees, the largest of which had a rope tied to it that she and her friends had swung from as kids. She was almost home.
But as they approached, the air felt off. It was cold, too cold. And it was absolutely silent. No chirps or chitters or the low giggles and words of sprites. Nothing. The wilds were…well, wild. They were always teeming with life and sound and activity. When things went silent… That meant something very bad.
“Something’s not right,” the sage echoed, as if reading her thoughts. For all Tuni knew, maybe she could.
Suddenly, the ground shook, and a boom resounded from ahead. Then, a bone-chilling roar cut through the air. It made every hair on her body stand straight up. It sounded unnatural, evil. She’d heard the roar of beasts and spirits all her life, but this was something else. This sound made her want to weep and run and hide and never see the light of day.
And it was coming from the direction of her village.
“What was that?” she asked in a harsh whisper.
Gayla was completely still, her eyes sharp and forward. Her grip on her staff was so hard her knuckles were white. “I haven’t heard a sound like that in a very long time.”
“But what is it?”
“A demon.”
Tuni’s skin rippled with gooseflesh and her veins ran cold with ice. She’d heard stories of demons—monstrous beasts of pure malice and evil, those that could only be summoned into their world from another plane—but that was all she thought they were. Stories. For an ancient sage to tell her that they were real? Frightening.
That also meant there was one by her village. No…
Oh gods, no…
Tuni took off at a sprint for home. Gayla yelled for her to stop, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t run from this.
As she approached the edge of the forest, birds, mice, small sprites, and all manner of other creatures fled in the opposite direction, their distress and fear rolling off them in palpable waves. But still, she would not stop. She would keep going, even if what she was about to see would break her heart.
She had hope, but then she broke through the tree line and saw her home.
It was like the mountain town, only worse. The houses and shops of her village were nothing but piles of smoldering rubble. There were some screams, but not many. She saw the baker stagger through the fields, blood dripping down his face. Old Mister Javen hobbled south, the limp body of his wife in his shaking arms.
Those were the only people Tuni could see, the only people moving, as she kept running. But the demon… Oh, she could see the demon.
It was a towering monster of ink-black skin, and as she got closer, she felt as if the skin was moving. It had a smile as wide as an ox cart and a body as wide and tall as a house. It was the most terrifying thing she’d ever seen, but she still ran toward it. Thoughts of her own life and safety flew out of her mind. All that mattered were her mother and sister.
She came around the smithy, now rubble, careful to keep herself out of sight of the monster. Nearby, the demon let out an ear-splitting cry and destroyed another wall or roof with a boom. That was accompanied by a quick cry that was immediately cut short. A life, a person she knew, a friend, dead.
I have to find them!
A beam was in her path. She ducked beneath it without breaking stride, and then she hopped over some rubble, tripped on a stone, and face-planted with a yelp in front of a body. She bit her tongue from the impact, and the coppery taste of blood filled her mouth.
Tuni cursed and spat out the blood, then looked up. She shouldn’t have. For she looked into the blank, dead eyes of her friend Rukshin.
A sharp cry escaped her. No! Blood stained his head all over and covered his lips and chin from where it had spilled from his mouth. She didn’t have to look any further to know that he was gone.
She flailed back onto her feet. Tears stung her eyes. This isn’t happening.
The demon roared again. Closer now. Every fiber of her body told her to run, but she would not. Her family was still out there. They lived on the edge of town, so it was possible that they had avoided this beast.
Tuni swiped the tears from her eyes and steeled herself. She ran. Sprinted. Arms pumping. The tears came again. The ground shook as the demon smashed something else. No time to think about that. Her beads, jewelry, and trinkets jingled much too loudly as she ran. Stealth wasn’t something she was accustomed to, but in this situation, she wished she could be more silent.
The square came upon her. The ground was cracked and broken from where the demon had stepped. The fountain was smashed to bits. A body floated face down in the green water around the base. She didn’t want to know who it was, but the blonde hair and thick build meant it wasn’t her family. There were other bodies thrown about, blood everywhere, nothing moving. Her eyes were too blurry with tears to tell who anyone was.
She kept on to the end of town where the road turned left onto a small dirt lane that her house sat at the end of. Roun
ding the corner at a sprint, almost toppling from her momentum, she saw the lane. The other houses were damaged, but not as destroyed as the rest of town. It gave her a brief glimmer of hope, the type that takes makes your heart swell before it is dashed against a stone and broken.
And that was what happened, because when her eyes finally settled on the end of the lane, she found the white plaster walls and reinforced mushroom cap roof of her home caved in and broken.
“No,” she said simply, out of breath. No, no, no!
Please no!
She had an out-of-body experience then. She didn’t really feel any physical sensations as her legs carried her the distance to her shattered home. The front lawn was churned to dirt. The low fence busted. The door was gone, exploded into splinters. Without hesitation, Tuni rushed through the doorway.
Telli was in the middle of the room, in a pool of blood, her body broken and almost unrecognizable.
Tuni screamed and fell to her knees. She crawled toward her little sister, her tears and sobs so strong that she could hardly breath. Snot ran into her mouth. Her whole body shook and hurt as everything inside of her filled with a cold emptiness.
Once she was at her sister’s side, she reached a shaky hand to her cheek, which was covered in blood. Her whole body was, as if she’d been crushed. Which was exactly what had happened. The demon did this.
She couldn’t breathe. Gasping, her chest pounded painfully. She backed away, trying to blink away tears but failing. This isn’t happening, she thought again and again. Sweet little Telli, so much life and joy, so full of knowledge, so many dreams, and now all extinguished.
It should have been me.
A groan cut through the silence, and through the deafening sorrow of her mind. Her heart skipped a beat. Mom.
Tuni left her sister behind and sprinted for their mother’s room. It was only steps away. The door was gone, and the roof was caved in here too. Furniture was crushed and broken, debris strewn about—glass and splinters and pieces of plaster.