by Clark Graham
Sarchise said goodbye to his innkeeper friend and then got on the horse behind Fawn. She rode fast and hard and didn't stop until they were where Sarchise was going to enter the Westwood. As he got off the horse he asked Fawn a question that had been bothering him for a long time. "Why do you not return to your own people?"
She smiled, "I have been shunned by the Queen."
"What does that mean?"
"The other Valkyrie are not to talk to me unless absolutely necessary. It's not a bad punishment, I thought I was going to be banished. That would mean I am no longer a Valkyrie in their eyes, so it could be worse," she said.
"What did you do that was so bad?" Sarchise asked.
"I did that thing that no Valkyrie is allowed to do, I fell in love." She turned the horse and trotted away into the thickening fog.
Sarchise watched her go, not knowing who she had fallen in love with but wondering if it were him.
He shouldered his pack and walked into the Westwood.
He found an Elf mound when he had walked along the trail for several hours. He was making good time now that he did not have to lead Dwarves with short legs. His old Royal Scout instincts were back and felt that he had come home. He knew that he could not reach another Elf mound that day, he opted to camp at that one, even thought it was only early afternoon. He was soon lost in his thoughts. He had some decisions to make now that Ammlee was gone. Should he stay in the mountains, or take his sons to South Fort where he had grown up? He didn't know. He had seen a lot of death, but none affected him like her death did. Could he love another woman, should he even try? He drifted off into a troubled sleep.
He awoke again, it was early dawn and the sun was peeking through the thick forest. The bread and cheese he had brought out of the fort were gone, but he had plenty of the meat that came from the Mountains of Iron. He ate some of that while walking. If he made a steady pace he would be able to reach the city of Tarlina that day before nightfall. Sarchise kept one hand on his bow as he walked. He had an arrow notched and ready. He had adopted the black arrow of the Elves because the shafts were straight and true.
The sun was starting to fade as he walked through the broken gates of the city. He went directly to the palace where he saw the silver throne was replaced over the hole, where the entrance of the records vault was.
He did not want to stay in the middle of the dead city, but realized it was as good as anyplace. In the morning he would start tracking the Elf. He set himself in one of the corners of the palace. There would be no sneaking up on him. The bow was in his lap with an arrow at the ready. Even then he barely slept that night.
On the Road to Santera
In the morning, after yet another boring meal of dried meat, Sarchise started his walk towards the old Elf city of Santera. It was there the Crystal Caverns were. Although Sarchise didn't have the map to find the entrance, he planned on following the Elf's footsteps.
Sarchise looked and looked but could not find any footprints left by the Elf. The trail was too old and it had rained once or twice. Frustrated, he headed towards Santera in hopes of running into the Elf by sheer luck. He traveled quickly through the woods. About halfway through the morning he started coming across the tracks of men. The fresh imprints of boots along the trail could not be mistaken for any other race. Too large for a Dwarf, and the Elves wore soft soled shoes.
It was disturbing; the Royal Scouts wore shoes more like the Elves did, with a harder sole, but no heel. They would not have made these prints. He followed them for a while until they left the trail. He debated about continuing to follow them through the forest, but his main goal was to find the Elf. It was getting on to afternoon when he found drag marks. Someone had wanted to obscure their trail so they dragged a branch of pine boughs behind them.
It was strange to see this many tracks in the Westwood. Usually men shun going in there, except for the Royal Scouts, whose job it was to patrol the woods.
It was impossible to know who was making the tracks. Sarchise continued on until darkness was upon him, but Sarchise had located an Elf mound by then, and, after checking to make sure the area was relatively safe, he bedded down for the night.
The dreams took him right away. The walls were shattered, there more dead Elves and Dwarves at his feet. The other warriors were starting to retreat. That was when he saw the old man. He lay in between the dead bodies, but was still alive. Sarchise went to him. The old man had grey hair and a long matted, grey beard. He was hurt, so Sarchise cut the man's tunic to see if he was bleeding. When he looked there was no blood, just a massive bruise, like something very large had crushed his chest.
The old man grabbed Sarchise's arm. Sarchise was surprised by his strength. "You must attack their feet, the Elves do not listen, you must attack their feet, that is their only weakness."
Sarchise shook himself awake only to find the Elf sitting next to him with a small cooking fire going. It startled Sarchise and he sat bolt upright.
Sarchise's reaction only made Amlius laugh, "You can only find an Elf when an Elf wants to be found," Amlius said.
"Where have you been?" Sarchise asked while leaning back against a tree.
"The woods are very busy," Amlius replied. "Men hunting Gremlins to add to their armies, and bounty hunters killing Minotaur for their horns. Why, they were even trying to hunt me down, I learned that from a Gremlin I caught. They want me to give them the secret to breeding Gremlins."
"Do you know that secret?" Sarchise asked.
Amlius looked at him suspiciously, "I do, but don't worry, they would never get it out of me, so you will not have to kill me to protect the secret."
"After the way you scared me today, I'm going to have to take that into consideration. What did you do with the Gremlin?"
"I let him go, but it didn't matter, you killed him a couple of days later, near the Lost City," Amlius replied, "I have to tell you that Barazar is dead. Five bounty hunters came after him, wanting his horns. He fought them off as best he could; I came to his aide and managed to kill two with my bow, the others we fought, hand to hand. All five of the men are dead now, but Barazar was badly wounded in the fight. I tried to stop the bleeding, but he was too deeply cut. He died while I was tending to him. I buried him in an unmarked grave deep in the forest, with his horns still attached. He was the last of the Minotaur,as you know."
"I didn't know that. He was a true friend to me. Ammlee died also. She had twins but died a couple of weeks later." Sarchise could feel that familiar sadness come back into his chest as he spoke.
"I am sorry to hear that," Amlius responded.
"I have found you now, I know that the enemy has not gotten the secret out of you, so now I can hang up my sword and be just a father," Sarchise commented while thinking of his two young sons back home.
"You will not stop being a warrior, why, even in your dreams you fight battles, I heard you talking in your sleep.’ The Elves do not listen, you must attack their feet.' Does that not sound familiar? It would be like me, no longer wanting to be an Elf. In the morning I will wake up and still be an Elf, and you my friend, will still be a warrior."
"That does sound very familiar, I have firsthand experience in Elves not listening," Sarchise said sarcastically.
"You do have a point there," admitted Amlius.
"So, where are you off to now?" asked Sarchise.
"I am going back to the Crystal Cavern, and you are coming with me. We have much to discuss," Amlius said as he put out the fire and started packing up his gear.
Sarchise knew that there was no point in arguing with the Elf, so he stood up and started packing too. Soon the two of them were headed down the trail. It was overcast, but not raining. It was a break from the hot days of summer. Sarchise struggled to keep up with the fast pace of the Elf, but they were making good time. Suddenly, Amlius left the main trail and started down a side path. It was hard going and sometimes the Elf would move a branch out of his way only to have it spring back and hit Sarchise i
n the face. When Sarchise complained, Amlius started being more careful.
The side path started into switchbacks as they came to long steep slope. After a lot of switchbacks descending into a canyon, they were at the entrance of a cave. It was dark in the entrance but there was a torch, left there by Amlius on a previous visit.
The Crystal Cavern
The entrance was small and had been obscured by a bush at one time.
They had to crawl on their hands and knees to get into the cave. After making their way through the entrance, they were standing on a large precipice. Amlius lit the torch and the whole cavern lit up underneath them. It was an indescribably beautiful, with glittering clear crystals hanging from the ceiling and jutting up from the floor. The crystals seemed to amplify the light of the torch and light up every corner of the cavern. There was a narrow stairway chiseled out of the rock side of the cave that led down into the cavern itself. A thin path had been cut through the crystal at the bottom of the cave, only wide enough to walk through it single file. Then there was another stairway that led down to an underground river.
Sarchise gazed in wonder. "This place is amazing," he said finally.
The two of them stood next to the river and Amlius pointed at a spot where all the crystal had been broken away on the far bank of the river." See that spot? That is where the breeding pits of old were. They were built after the last Elf Dwarf war, and it was meant to breed enough Gremlins to destroy the Dwarf once and for all. Wiser heads prevailed, those that were tired of war, and the pits were not used until the first Gremlin war. The Elves were breeding their own Gremlins to fight the Gremlin army of Tabor. Come to find out that Gremlins do not like to kill Gremlins and our Gremlins went and joined their ranks, added to Tabor strength. These breeding pits were then destroyed, never to be used again."
"Tabor," Amlius continued, "on finding out from his new Gremlin recruits, that there were yet other breeding pits, twenty times the size of the one under the Mountains of Iron, came with his army, through the Middle Kingdom and attacked this cavern, slaying all of the Elves that protected it. Wisely, the Elf had already destroyed the pits. Tabor went on to attack the Kingdom of Myr, while he was down here anyway. That is why the Kingdom of Ril got spared."
"So King Mortimur would have died, and the King of Myr would be the only ruler of Elvenshore," Sarchise commented.
"Exactly, that is why he has no more real claim to the thrones of those Kingdoms than men like Gregor, who was only a minor noble. Still, he has the largest army, so no one can oppose him. There are three pretenders who vie for the throne of Myr and two fight over the throne of the Middle Kingdom, but only Gregor claims the throne of Zor."
"Gregor has been put in shackles and is on his way to Ril, to have his head removed," Sarchise said.
"I knew that you had destroyed his Gremlin army, I saw the aftermath, but I didn't know Mortimur had captured Gregor. This will dissuade the other five in declaring themselves King until they have forces enough to back it up. The rest of the Gremlins have fled the Westwood for the quite of the Northwood. There were war stragglers there too. Those left are not too keen on fighting battles that they keep losing," Amlius said, then abruptly changing the subject asked, "Did you ever find the city of Vil Loree? I would love to visit it someday."
"It does not exist," Sarchise said flatly.
"I tell you now, it does." Amlius said defiantly, "When I was a young boy, My father said he had seen a city of the Dwarves. He had been allowed to visit the King in the city of Vil Loree. He described it as a city made entirely out of pure gold."
"A tale of a golden city? Is this the same Elf that told me once, the Valkyrie had horses that could fly?" Sarchise asked mockingly.
"That was the story I was told as a boy, to explain the reason that a group of women warriors was able to defeat our proud army."
"I see," said Sarchise. By the look on his face he looked totally unconvinced.
"Just do me a favor and look for it one more time. It is likely to be hidden," Amlius pleaded.
"That I can do."
The two spent the night in the cavern, Sarchise was amazed how dark it was when the torch was put out. In the morning they crawled back out. Sarchise looked up at the long winding trail that they had come down and gave a deep sigh, and started to climb up, but Amlius stopped him.
"Where are you going?" Amlius asked.
"Back out of the valley," Sarchise said pointing in the way that they had come the previous day.
"No, our journey isn't over yet, we need to go this way to the city of Santera. There are more things I want to show you."
Sarchise looked over at the other side of the canyon, in the distance he noticed an even steeper trail and more switchbacks.
"That is why the canyon remained undiscovered all these years. The trail is grueling and the hiker is too weary to explore once he reaches this spot," Amlius said as he headed out along the floor of the canyon.
Sarchise obediently followed.
The Elf was correct in his evaluation of the trail going up. Sarchise and Amlius had to stop several times to catch their breath. Of course, Amlius made it seem that he was only stopping for Sarchise's benefit, but he was also breathing heavy and sweating profusely. It didn't help that he sun was broken out of the cloud cover and was beating down on them.
Once they reached the rim of the canyon, Sarchise was able to look out upon the area climbed out of. It was a circular canyon, with a waterfall at the far end. It was as if some other world giant had slammed his fist down upon it to make a large hole. Trees had taken over the bottom and the edges of the canyon, where the sides were not too steep. The water from the falls disappeared into the canyon floor soon after it touched it.
"Where does the water go?" Sarchise asked.
"It comes from the Mountains of Iron's snow melt, goes underground at the base of the falls then flows under High Mountain and out to the sea from there,"answered Amlius. "Over the years it has undermined the land above it and then one day, long ago, it all came crashing down, forming this canyon."
"Must have made of very loud noise," Sarchise exclaimed.
"One can only imagine."
The City of Santera
At the top of the canyon rim there was an Elf mound. Even the original Elf mound builders knew that the travelers were going to need to rest after making it out of the valley. Sarchise and Amlius were no exception.
Sarchise finally asked, "What is the secret of the Elf mounds? Why do not the predators come here? Can anyone make a fire on them or just you?"
Amlius did not always like answering questions and usually if one posed too many questions at the same time, he would not answer any of them. But the day had found him tired and willing to talk. "The Elves have always had complete control over their environment. When the razor bear and Blockspot Spider were few in the land, they were captured and tied up. They were brought to each mound in turn. The forest was much smaller then and the mounds were fewer. The beasts were badly beaten at each mound. They let them heal in between. This way they developed an instinct in the beasts to avoid the mounds, or they would be beaten. This instinct was so ingrained that it passed on the offspring of the predators. Their offspring also avoid the mounds, though they don't know why they do. Yes, you can make a fire; the predators will not come near."
"So that is how you Elves pass safely through the Westwood, without all the problems that the other races have?"
"Yes," Amlius said and then added, "If I keep giving you the secrets of the Elves I will have none left."
"What does it matter, the Elves have abandoned this land and you along with it," Sarchise said.
"There was an interesting thing about my banishment that I read while I was in the records vault. Most of the people thought I had served enough time for the killing of Nevelef. They did not like that Elf, since he was the main reason that the Elves were leaving Elvenshore. But the Grand Chancellor had been a good friend to Nevelef, so he made the army
commanders and men swear to never allow me on a ship that was headed for the Far Shore."
Amlius continued, "Since nobody was allowed to come get me and since I would not have been allowed on a ship anyway, I was left behind. It was a great relief for me to find out that my own race does not hate me as I had always supposed. It's only the leaders that do."
"That is good news," Sarchise said, "Maybe someday you can rejoin your people."
"That is what I am hoping."
When Sarchise had relaxed awhile, he headed out into the woods and shot a couple of rabbits with his bow, then brought them back to the Elf mound to cook. Amlius had a fire going by then. They slow roasted the rabbits for a while and then had a nice meal. They let the fire burn down while they talked into the night. By the time they went to sleep, the fire was out.
By mid-morning the two were going down the trail and making good time. The city was very near to the caverns and they did not have far to go. When they came around a corner, they got their first sight of the city of Santera. The gates were wide open, but intact. When they moved closer they could see inside. The streets were devoid of corpses and the walls stood. There was row up on row of buildings, undamaged.
Sarchise was very confused. "I thought that Tabor had destroyed this city."
"So did I until I visited here, after going through the vaults and the cavern. I then realized what happened. Tabor was trying to starve out the Minotaur, but while they still had strength, they all gathered at the gate and made a mad rush into the army of the Gremlin in an effort to overwhelm them and get away. Men, women and child of the Minotaur issued forth through the gates. Better to fight it out than to starve to death. It worked for a while, as the Gremlin army had the city surrounded and not all of their forces were in front of the gate."