by Justin Wayne
Chapter Fifteen: First Blood
“By Dirringyr’s hammer I hate ridin’ horses!” Merlon complained as his legs grew stiff and saddle sore. “If dwarves were meant for ridin’ we’d have been given softer feet and longer legs.”
Outsider turned around in his saddle to look back at him. The dwarf was bouncing around, left and right, his hands clamped tightly on the reins and pulling the horses’ head this way and that. Thom was jostling right along with him as he had decided to ride with his new friend.
“Lighten up on the reins, let her lead.” Outsider called back. He could hear Merlon’s grumbling and stifled a chuckle. Instead he turned to face the front again and focused on the horizon.
No more than half a day’s ride to the west lay the mountain range they were to cross. The mountain trail, often called the Pilgrimage Pass, was the only way across the range within several tendays of riding and the easiest. The less favored trails were rightly so as the winding roads were full of treacherous storms and roaming bandits. Not to mention they all exited into the unforgiving marshes of Blackwater where passing through only meant passing through to the next life.
Meanwhile the Pilgrimage Pass had a steady flow of knights, warriors, and travelers alike to keep the price high for any who would attempt an attack or raid. Even a few guards were known to patrol it here and there during the busy trading seasons.
But winter was no such time. All the trading to be done was either already completed or a local affair now. Soon the entire pass and every plain between would become so overgrown with snow that the mountain range would double in size until the thaw. Winter is the north’s true form and a state of being that shook the very bones of the land.
Outsider eyed the sky the nth time that morning and expected a mound of white to bury him. But the gray sky remained calm and placid. And while the wind still had a lip chapping chill and at least a foot of snow upon the ground, no more was falling.
“Yet.” He muttered under his breath, just knowing life was going to throw another problem his way.
The hours dragged by lazily with a horrifyingly slow pace. Outsider felt he was going to lose his longevity and find himself dying of old age before he would ever get close to the pass. Thom slumped in the saddle, too uncomfortable to sleep and stressed the approaching bloodshed. Merlon paid him no heed as he continued to shift from side to side in an attempt of rekindling life into his numb buttocks.
“This is hopeless it is!” he cried and plopped out of the saddle. He picked himself up and rubbed his sore backside furiously. “This horse hates me. I’d be better off runnin’ alongside it than stumblin’ atop it.” He crossed his arms and eyed the horse, its large round eye looking at him impassively. “Did ye’ see the look it just gave me? I never seen such a scornful glare!”
Outsider spun Jiff about and paced over to him. “No offense meant, but dwarves aren’t known for their speed. And we’ve quite the ways to go.” He gestured off into the distance. “It would be much easier if you simply rode there.”
But the stubborn dwarf was already shaking his head. “Nonsense. Me legs are fit as any horse’s and twice as strong.” he boasted. “Ye’ just worry ‘bout gettin’ there yerself. I’ll be fine.”
Thom shrugged and slid forward in the saddle to take the reins. He patted the horse gently and prayed it wouldn’t send him flying. “I’m no fan of riding, myself.” Thom explained. “But I can manage.”
“If you try to run—“Outsider began.
“I have nowhere to go out here,” the hobbit interrupted. “Escape means nothing now anyway. My name’s been branded for my actions now, eh?”
The elf noted the nod Merlon gave him and decided to trust in the dwarf’s sense of people and their intentions, as well as the hobbit’s new resolve.
He turned without another word and tenderly pressed his heels into Jiff’s sides. They were off at a jogging pace the horses could keep all day if need be; less risk of tiring them out and easier for Merlon to keep up. Luckily, the dwarf had left his axion strapped onto the saddle and wasn’t wearing plate armor as usual for such a fighter but leather bracers and greaves atop his typical attire.
His face soon grew red and sweaty and his breathing became fast and raspy, but the dwarves are tough as the stone they mine and his endurance was nowhere near peaked. His jaw set beneath his bushy beard and his eyes squinted in a wrinkled frown. Steadily his boots began to feel lighter, his footfalls not as loud, and his legs raised higher from the icy ground. His tempo increased to a run and before long he was ahead of Jiff.
The elf smiled beneath his hood at the stubborn fighter and couldn’t help but admire the determination of Merlon’s character. A complete stranger offering to help fight a suicidal battle in the hopes of saving his home and its people, with no guarantees of survival or even being capable of solving the mystery.
Outsider surprised himself then when envy coursed though his veins. He didn’t understand it yet. What was he jealous of? The fact that Merlon could trust others so easily? His confidence in the face of uncertainty as to his home’s fate? That he could have the chance to save his home as he hadn’t? Or was it just having something to fight for?
That last thought rang true.
His gaze fell from Merlon to the knives sheathed on the underside of his wrists and then to Thom. What was he fighting for, that little hobbit?
His family, Outsider’s mind answered in reply. His mother who raised and cared for him, and his ill sister who’s ailment continued to deteriorate her health until it drove his hand to crime. To feed, shelter, and heal them. To care for them.
An honorable cause.
His gaze fell once more to his knives. The blades that had killed many and spilled the blood of even more. The blades that had saved his life on numerous occasions, more than he could recount, and gotten him out of more jobs gone wrong than he was willing to admit. The blades that earned him enough money to have whatever he needed in his meager existence of living in the wilderness.
But what were those blades fighting for? What was he using them to achieve? All the violence, death, and pain he had caused had been for what purpose? To sell life for gold? The currency exchange in which men went for the metal in your pocket until the weight of coin matched that of the bodies?
A metallic taste filled his mouth and he spat bile.
His childhood flashed before his eyes; of dark elves sneering at him and murmuring to one another as bets were placed on the outcome of the match. Of warm blood running down his arms while he held onto the first other elf he had been forced to kill as life flowed from its body. Of the coins passed from hand to hand before unceremoniously dragging the corpse away then burning it and locking him in his room.
The tug of gold in his pocket felt as if the entire universe was pulling on it, slowing him, unbalancing him, wanting him to crawl on his hands and knees. The weight grew and grew until he was swaying in the saddle. He locked his legs to hold himself upright but the load proved too much.
He collapsed from the saddle and sprawled out in the snow. He didn’t feel the impact or the cold. Only the heavy presence of the blood money in his satchel. His fingers numbly scratched at the drawstring, feebly attempting to free himself from the weight.
From the burden.
Thom and Merlon were upon him then, rolling him over and calling out to him. But their voices were far away and dulled as if he were underwater. He realized he couldn’t breathe. His lungs began to contract and squeeze, pulse quickening to a fever pitch. Lights and colors flashed before his eyes in a myriad of waves and a conglomerate of shapes.
But through the collage of nothing and everything was the color red. It poured across the visions and splashed across his eyes, dripping and spilling until he felt he would drown in it.
His fingers picked at the satchel again.
The pressure increased, the crimson took over his sight. He could feel it running down the back of his throat and filling his lungs. Air was a distant mem
ory now.
His fingernail caught on the string and tugged it loose.
His sinuses filled with such an intensity he was sure he was screaming but couldn’t hear anything over the rushing in his ears. The waterfall-like sound of the ever present red spilling over him, pushing him down, down, so deep the surface was black and forgotten. His ears popped and he knew the pressure would kill him if the suffocation didn’t first.
His chest deflated and all the air was pressed from his lungs. His eyes rolled back into his head and the world went black, silent, like when he dreamed of his solace. The darkness that protected him. That made everything equal when appearance was but a figment of a long distant memory. Where everything was different and the same. Where no one could be judged by the color of their skin or their clothes, and only actions because a picture is worth a thousand words but all of them are painted black, so they must feel you and the changes you have made.
You must shake their reality within the darkness.
But there is no reality. So you just blend in with the rest of the nothing hidden within the everything until you’re forgotten and everyone is together in being alone. That is when they can understand his pain, and he will know theirs, and they can all be equal.
The darkness peeled away like ashes in the breeze; dark patches lifted from his vision as if he were being dug up from a grave. When the last of it had gone, he saw only the sky. The omnipresent gray he shrouded himself in. The clouds were still thick and roiling as they brewed storms to come.
Then he saw the faces staring at him with concern. Not the selfish sense of it such as fearing him but of fearing for him.
That’s new, he thought, or at least he thought he had thought it until Merlon laughed and nodded.
“I bet it is knowin' the kind of upbringin’ ye’ must’ve had.” the dwarf growled and swung the small satchel of gold cents around on his finger. “This what ye’ were tryin’ to get off?”
Outsider attempted to nod but his head felt like it weighed a ton. “Yes.” he managed to whisper. His lungs were steadily filling with air. Raw edges seared in his throat like salt water and he felt as if he had swallowed razors. He sat up slowly with help from the others and swooned before he had even found his feet.
“Not so fast, elf.” Merlon warned. “Ye’ might be sick. Yer skin’s pale and yer eyes darker than usual.” His face frowned and he scratched at his beard. “But yer aura seems brighter than ever. What the hell did ye’ do?”
Outsider shook his head and closed his eyes. Waves of nausea were passing over him followed by motion sickness. He still felt as if he were in the water. Or the blood. Whatever it was that he had been drowning in.
Thom stared at him then the money. “I know how you feel, Outsider.” He slapped the elf on the shoulder and grinned. “You may not have stolen that, but you don’t feel like you earned it right? So it weighs on your conscience until it pulls on your very soul. Least it feels that way.
“So you try to fight it and rationalize what you did to get it, to make yourself believe it was right. But you can’t lie to yourself and you get sick. Not sick of any disease but of yourself and what you’ve become.”
Merlon eyed the pouch in his hand and held it away from his face, arm fully extended and nose pinched with his free hand. “Whadda’ I do with it?” he spluttered nasally.
“Drop it.” Outsider croaked.
Merlon looked about. “In the saddle bag or in the snow?”
“The snow. Just leave it.”
The dwarf shrugged and the money sank to the ground. He dusted off his hands and muttered a few blessings to ward off any curses and knocked his knuckles against the wooden shaft of his throwing axe.
“Superstitious are we?” Thom noted.
“Better safe than sorry.” the dwarf retorted and held his hand out to the elf who accepted it gratefully and stood. “Ye’ feel up to ridin’?”
Outsider noticed the worry in his voice and wasn’t sure if he should feel offended or thankful. “I’m fine, just need a drink.” Thom handed him the wineskin full of melted snow and he drained it. He nodded his thanks and Thom smiled in reply.
“Feels good don’t it?” the hobbit inquired. His eyebrow rose in an arch-a habit he had picked up from Merlon-and his little smile was smug. Outsider’s shrug took the cockiness away but the smile remained.
“Feels lighter I’ll tell you that.” the elf conceded, unsure of how he truly felt about whatever had happened to him. “Like I’ve been carrying something on my shoulders for a while now and finally took it off.”
“Well good, ‘cause you’re gonna be needin’ that extra speed. Their fires are up.” Merlon observed gravely. The others turned to see what he was watching. “They’re ready an’ waitin’.”
A dozen campfires were strewn about the snow-laden plain in the distance. Just behind them stood the pass; mountains looming ominously over them in a seemingly random pattern of jigsaw like spikes protruding into the sky. Dark forms could be seen huddling around the fires, absorbing the heat and preparing for battle.
The light cast off the series of flames illuminated the field around the pass in a semicircle leaving no darkness to slip through. Fully lit in a curving wall of light, the battlefield was prepared and showed their force to be a daunting one to oppose.
“A few hours still until the sun has fully set.” Outsider decided. “We push on till nightfall then wait nearby until daybreak.”
“Then what?” Thom’s voiced wavered.
“We watch them during the day; see their patterns, identify their leaders, and get them antsy. Then we move in slowly at dusk, when their depth perception will be unstable. I’ll pick off as many as I can with my bow before they notice. Hopefully by then, the sun will have set and they’ll have to set up fires with more wood. That’s when we strike.”
Merlon nodded and liked the logic. “Catch ‘em with their pants down. I like the way ye’ think, elf. But ye’ sure ye’ can fight? Ye’ were out for nearly an hour.”
Thom remained silent, knowing he had no mind for battle tactics and simply tried to memorize the plans. The hard knot in his stomach twisted and ached so he had to keep his mouth shut for fear of vomiting.
“I’m fine. Better than before actually.” Outsider grinned wickedly. “Hopefully we can damage their numbers enough that we can slip through to the mountains where I can set more traps and fight them on my terms.” Outsider mused. “Then I’ll show them why surface dwellers should be afraid of the dark.”