Shalmar

by Serena Whynd

  But it was evident that other members of the tribe wanted their piece of this reward. There soon began a quarrel between several Zals regarding who was most worthy of torturing, and later devouring, the warriors. The two new members of the Zal tribe, who had already witnessed the Amazons’ expert skills, considered all but their death to be completely unacceptable. Most other Zals found their capture too significant not to celebrate with a grand ritual dance followed by a lengthy torturing. After all, these prisoners were something extraordinary. They were recognized as members of the particular Warrior Order that they had often encountered at the southern end of Zal Forest. These battles had almost always ended poorly for the Zals.

  “Twenty-eight.” Shalmar spoke loud enough for Jacqueline to hear her over the din. Jacqueline nodded. She also considered the action maneuver as the most appropriate for their current situation. Amazon warrior training offered several hundred combat moves, divided into those to be used individually, in pairs and in groups. It was the obligation of each trainee to learn each of them by heart, so they could immediately recall a particular move when called.

  “Now!” the senior warrior shouted. The young Amazon yanked her arm out of the grip of the Zal who held her, catching him by surprise, and began running towards the rock on which the King sat. Shalmar got rid of her guard, thumping him in the nose with her elbow. Then she also began to run, a few feet behind her partner. Gru-Kath’s guards reacted quickly. They gathered in front of the King and stood at his defense. But Jacqueline stopped suddenly, just out of reach of their claws, and knelt down on one leg, bending her forehead to the floor. The very next moment Shalmar used Jacqueline’s back as a launch pad, jumping into the air. Flying over all four guards, she pulled off a fantastic backflip and landed immediately behind the King. Gripping his head, she paused, ready to snap his neck.

  “Be still!” Shalmar shouted to the crowd, “or you can say goodbye to your beloved King!”

  The collective roar was immediately replaced with silence. Jacqueline, however, soon found herself once again surrounded by beasts. One attempted to strike her with her own sword, but soon under her hand, he lost both the sword and his consciousness. Other creatures did not dare to attack. They returned the second sword as soon as Jacqueline threatened the Zal who held it.

  The surprised Zals backed down somewhat, glancing at each other in confusion. Many began to wonder whether the King was indeed worth saving. Jacqueline took advantage of a moment of mutual murmurs to cautiously move closer to her partner and return her weapon. Soon after, the Zals began to gather in small groups, ready to strike again. It became evident that the Zals’ ugly ruler was neither highly regarded nor worthy of their efforts. The King's guards began to show signs of bewilderment, at first prepared to defend the fat man who was always trying to please them. Then, it what appeared to be an unspoken mutual decision, they turned and stood with the others, abandoning the King and readying themselves for attack.

  The first attack was launched by the Zals nearest to the warriors. One of the two newcomers—the Zal who had given the Tarlaeth to the King—was at the frontline. The Amazons could feel his anger towards them. Seeing the Amazons creating problems for him a second time now, he lost all control. He jumped sharply towards his enemies, but Jacqueline was ready, cutting the monster’s head with a deft stroke. The bloody skull bounced off the rocks, rolling to a stop in front of a clump of other beasts preparing to attack.

  Such cruelty was meant to compel others to stand back and rethink their attack: this was the Amazons’ usual strategy when battling among men. However, this tactic did not work here. There were too many Zals who yearned to take on the girls, desiring their flesh. They continued to approach, replenishing the courage of others who had become insecure after seeing a fellow Zal lose his head.

  Realizing at last that his tribe cared not of his fate, the Zal King became enraged.

  “Raaaa! I am the king! The King!” even though he had Shalmar’s sword under his chin, he roared without control. Raising his arm, he loosened his grip on the object he had been holding, launching it over the heads of the Zals he still considered his subjects.

  Realizing what the object was, Shalmar pushed the King hard away from her into the crowd. While his own people turned on him, Shalmar scanned the sky, estimating where the object might land.

  Tarlaeth, a small stone statuette thrown by the fat Zal King, hit one of the former Royal Guards right in the chest. It bounced off to the side and landed with a thump on the rocky ground. The object that the warriors have tried so hard to find and retrieve presently broke into two.

  A massive surge of energy, followed by a bright bluish light, was released from the place where Tarlaeth had landed. The brilliant light exploded so rapidly and spread so vastly that it was likely visible from miles above. The earth trembled, and the Amazons and Zals quickly began to lose their balance and fall to the ground, a wave of energy and light rippling under and through them. The phenomenon disappeared as quickly as it had come. For an instant, those in its immediate vicinity felt an intense pressure bear down on their bodies. This was followed by an excruciating pain in the heads of Amazons and Zals alike.

  This led to a massive attack and unrestrained rampage. Some of the Zals began to attack one another, others fell to the ground, losing consciousness entirely, and others were still fixated on killing their enemy. The Amazons managed to recover fairly quickly, forcing themselves to fight through their discomfort.

  The creatures were dazed and disorientated, becoming increasingly less prepared to forge an attack. As such, they were easily defeated by the warriors’ blades. As more of the monsters lost consciousness, the two had fewer enemies to defeat.

  The piercing headaches that the two women had were intensifying. Jacqueline lost concentration during a short spell of dizziness and immediately felt a set of sharp claws sink into her arm. The sharp pain was immediate and strong enough for her to fall unconscious, her dead weight landing against the Zal who had struck her.

  “Jacqueline!” Shalmar shouted as she stabbed the offending Zal, taking its life instantly. Shalmar could feel herself losing focus as well. A Zal jumped on her back, and with that she collapsed. A fall on a jagged rock, which expelled the air from her lungs, together with the weight of the beast upon her, prevented her from further movement. She felt breath upon her neck, and as she thought of Jacqueline, everything went dark.

  *** CHAPTER 5 ***

  Meanwhile, far away from the Cursed Mountain and the land of Ro-Oth, and even further from Gilsk, on the most significant and northernmost island of the Magical Sea, Island of Mages, inside a small, ruinous stone castle, a daily ritual of renewal was being held.

  The inhabitants of this island were the only ones who knew of this ritual. Being that they were wizards, they had a prolonged life that lasted hundreds of years. There were 20 of them, and they were not afraid that someone would learn the secret behind their ceremony. For several reasons, this was just not possible.

  The grey island was covered mainly with dry, infertile soil. It was almost wholly parched by the tremendously strong and icy north winds that continually blew across the plains. Not even the most robust plants made an effort to sprout here, although the wind sometimes carried seeds from distant countries.

  Humans had not set foot here for thousands of years. The cold North Sea, the dangers brought by the wind and the ice had deterred all brave attempts to venture so far north. The only two-legged creatures who were able, thanks to their powers, to survive on this land, were those for which the island was named. It had been the only home they had ever known.

  The mages performed this monotonous ritual in the most important hall of the castle. More than 200,000 times, day after day, they had repeated this ritual in the Great Hall. Surprisingly, they never grew tired of it. They had too much appreciation for life and tried hard to maintain their gratitude. After all, they knew all the pleasures that life could provide—especially with the help of magic
. Nevertheless, they had not witnessed the full enjoyment of life for centuries. This ugly and lifeless island could not offer them any joy, and they had not felt soft ground under their feet in countless years.

  Suddenly, in the middle of the ritual, the wizards felt something strange and unusual. A powerful surge of energy passed quickly through their bodies. They had experienced similar tremors while performing magic. They knew of several rituals that had some influence on the body, in this or similar ways. But this was apparently something much more significant. The ceremony of renewal was not a spell that had physical effects on the body. Besides, contrary to most others, this wave of energy was incredibly pleasant. It filled the magicians with a fantastic power the likeness of which they had not felt for centuries.

  In them returned an old feeling: one of complete control over all the abilities that their magic could provide. They also experienced a heightened sense of control over the environment. Their ritual words stopped, and each and every magician stood stalk still. Coming out of their stone-like trance, they looked at one another and then at their own hands and other body parts, partly confused, but mainly delighted by this incredible experience.

  And then one of them smiled enthusiastically and said, “The Magic of Tarlaeth has been interrupted.”

  He turned to the window that faced south and offered a view of the distant Continent, for which they had heartily yearned for an infinite number of days, and firmly exclaimed, “Liberation!”

  As if in a trance, the other mages immediately joined him, shouting in delirium: “Liberation! Liberation!”

  *** CHAPTER 6 ***

  “Jacqueline! Jacqueline! Wake up, damn it!”

  The young warrior regained consciousness a few moments after her colleague began to gently shake her. Immediately upon awakening, she felt intense pain, but was also aware of the pressure of fabric on her arm. Shalmar had bandaged her wound, applying some of the herbs that she had sewn inside her belt. Most Amazon warriors carried them this way.

  Jacqueline turned around, remembering the events that had led to this situation. She realized quickly that the landscape surrounding her was different than the one she remembered before losing consciousness. Shalmar immediately addressed her confusion.

  “I carried you here before the other Zals awoke. We are not much more than a stone’s throw away from their village.”

  “Thank you,” Jacqueline said, the smallest movement of her jaw bringing an intense pain. The effects of the strange phenomenon they had experienced had not yet passed. She turned back to Shalmar. “How did you get us out of there?”

  “At the end, we all passed out due to…whatever the hell that was. I had All on my side. One beast collapsed just as he knocked me down; he had already overthrown me. I was one of the first to wake up. Several Zals woke before me, but they did not notice that I was still alive because I laid almost entirely covered with the one that had fallen on me.”

  While retelling the events of the afternoon, Shalmar invariably turned around to observe the surroundings with caution, guarded for a possible attack.

  “I quickly overcame the few others who had woken up, and then threw you on my back and started running. By now the rest of the menacing bastards have probably woken up. They’re most likely hunting us as we speak.”

  Jacqueline took this to mean that they must immediately move on. She got up slowly and with uncertainty. Besides a headache, she was also feeling the effects of losing so much blood. Education within the Amazon order was often extremely life-threatening, and Jacqueline had many scars to show for her training. Nevertheless, she could not compare this situation with the previous experiences that had caused the wounds and fractures that dotted her body.

  “Oh, mighty All, I feel like my head is about to crack,” she winced. Only then she clearly remembered the most mysterious event that had occurred during the rush of the day. “ What the hell happened back there? The moment with the bright light and the...when everything went all…what was that?”

  “I’m not sure, and right now, I really don’t care,” Shalmar answered matter-of-factly. Then she pulled out two halves of the broken statuette from the inner pocket of her coat. She held them together, wishing desperately that they would magically fuse back into one.

  Only then did Jacqueline have the chance to see what Tarlaeth looked like. The statuette depicted a strong, long-haired, winged man. He wore a robe that completely concealed his feet, which were set on an oval base. His hands were laid on the handle of a lowered sword, whose tip also touched the base. His wings were raised above his head, one placed beside the other. They were geometrically perfect, completely symmetrical. The face was simple, but impressive, with a look that would inevitably garner respect from the observer.

  The most exciting thing was that the statuette had only broken in two, both pieces about the same size. One would have expected it to have shattered, or at least to have lost a few smaller fragments. Everything that was Tarlaeth was located within the two parts in Shalmar’s hands.

  “I'll think about you later,” Shalmar whispered, returning the chunks of stone into her coat. Escape was the matter of highest importance at that moment.

  “Zals are much faster creatures than us. They could catch us before we safely get back to Gilsk,” Jacqueline worried. But her colleague had a backup plan.

  “There is a large swamp southeast of here. It stretches all the way to Midbay. Zals are afraid of water. From there we will quickly end up in Prymor.” Once again, Shalmar impressed her young partner with her knowledge of geography. Jacqueline also remembered what she had learned from the maps. She agreed that the most natural way out was toward the bay. The body of water was shared by four countries, including this wild Ro-Oth, and even their homeland, Gilsk.

  A few moments later they were on their way. They tried to leave very few traces behind, while moving as quickly as possible. They hoped the Zals would conclude that they had escaped on the route by which they had come, and also that they would not have the intelligence to split into multiple search groups.

  Climbing down from the hills of the Cursed Mountain to the swamp was much more unsettling than climbing it from the direction of the Zal Forest. Due to the steep downward slope and scarcity of walkable paths, they had to slow down far more often than they would have liked. The pain in Jacqueline’s jaw and her inability to fully use her right hand also made travelling much more difficult. Her colleague always had to lead the way and to watch how the younger warrior was coping with dangerous pieces of road. Jacqueline often had to accept her assistance.

  After hours of walking and running down the bumpy parts of the mountain, they noticed that their surroundings were changing. Larger and greener plants had begun to appear, and the rocky ground had begun to share its place with dry—and soon after slightly damp—earth.

  Just at the moment when they began to see big ponds and tall grass in the distance, they heard the sound of small stones rolling down the slope of the mountains behind them. They turned and glimpsed the silhouettes of wild humanoids deftly jumping from higher to lower rocks and rapidly progressing towards them.

  The Zals were still far enough not to pose a threat for the next few minutes. But the wild roar they could hear for a few seconds afterwards made it clear that they were quite angry. It sounded more like a state of madness. There were simply too many of them for Shalmar to fend off by herself and to defend her injured partner.

  So Shalmar quickly pulled Jacqueline by her good hand, and directed:

  “Fast! Now we must do our best to get to the water before they reach us!”

  They dashed to the swamp as fast as they could. Shalmar was now pushing her younger colleague in front of her, not allowing her to slow down, no matter how tired or how much pain she was in. She was not even concerned that she or Jacqueline might stumble on the rocks. The most important thing was to make the first step into deeper parts of Grall Swamp. The first puddles started to appear under their feet, and more a
nd more shrubs were surrounding them. This was still terrain on which the Zals could travel. The Zals were getting closer every second, their roar growing louder every moment. Both girls knew that if only one Zal reached out and grabbed one of them, it would soon be over for them both. And even if they overcame him, the rest of the terrible creatures would soon arrive, digging their claws and teeth into their tired bodies.

  The pain in their fatigued leg muscles was already unbearable, and simply breathing was becoming difficult. The savage roars and deep gasps were now coming from directly behind them. The quickest of the Zals was just about to grab Shalmar’s back...

  Just then, the girls stepped into wet, muddy ground, and only a few steps later found themselves in the murky, green waters of the swamp. The first Zal, along with a few others, also splashed into the muddy ground, but before reaching the actual water, he forced himself to stop. There was no more solid ground from which the creatures could reach the warriors.

  The Zals grimaced and scowled in their fury, standing just at the water’s edge. The Amazons moved away, pulling their feet out from the mud beneath the water. Shalmar walked backward, with her sword drawn, in case any Zals were to overcome their fear and step in after them. On the contrary, the beasts stood quietly. They seemed to have swallowed their defeat, sending only looks of hatred and anger at what they had hoped would have been tonight’s meal. Their fury was a message, meant to convey the fact that they would not have mercy on the warriors if they ever met again. The beasts turned around and began ambling back towards the hills.

  As soon as the Zals began to retreat, Jacqueline stopped to regain a bit of the strength she had lost. Shalmar returned the sword to its sheath and also allowed herself to rest. She took a quick look at her surroundings, remembering that this bit of nature was no less dangerous than that they had just come through. She then turned her attention to Jacqueline.