Aurelius turned to Gabrian. “Can you hear that?”
“Hear what? Oh . . .” Gabrian trailed off, nodding knowingly. “He is speaking to you.”
“I didn’t realize . . .”
“That he could? He is a werewolf. Of course he can speak.”
Aurelius shook his head in disbelief. When the world didn’t swirl uneasily with the movement, he tried to stand. Gabrian helped him up.
“Where are we?” Aurelius asked, looking around. The cave wasn’t utterly dark. A few crusty red lichen and furry blue moss glowed along the ceiling and walls, but absent were the hanging icicles of the forest. The cave was reasonably large, at least two stories high and a few dozen feet across. It extended deep into the tree, branching off in two shadowy corridors. “It looks like a cave, but this is a tree. You don’t suppose someone, or some-thing made this place?”
“Hmmm, I wonder. . . .” Gabrian mused, looking around.
“What is it?”
“There’s blood on the walls,” Gabrian said in a quiet voice.
Aurelius felt an icy tentacle of dread crawl through his stomach. His hand automatically went to his side, but found his holster empty. Suddenly he remembered losing his pistol when the wolf saved his life, and he cursed viciously under his breath.
“Something wrong?” Gabrian asked.
“I lost my weapon.”
“That is a shame. Now what will you shoot me with?”
Aurelius just glared at Gabrian until the old man looked away.
“Something approaches.”
Aurelius followed the old man’s gaze to the entrance of the cave, his heart hammering in his chest. He peered into the hazy red gloom, but saw nothing.
“There’s nothing there, Wrinkle—”
That was when he saw a hulking shadow swirl out of the gloom. Its silhouette seemed to be that of a man—thud, thud, thud—but its footsteps were not. The wolf standing the doorway began snarling and backing away as the shadow drew near.
The giant stopped beneath the entrance, barely clearing it with his head. A nearby clump of lichen and moss cast a blue-red glow upon its face, and Aurelius gasped. It was almost a man, but far more terrifying. Two large yellow eyes glared from either side of a broad nose with fat gold rings pierced through it. The creature’s broad jaw and high, sloping forehead led up to a bald scalp with a pair of short horns poking out of it. Grotesquely bulging muscles and veins like cords of rope stood out on the giant’s frame. He seemed oblivious to the fact that much of his skin was exposed to the cold air, as though not even the elements could threaten him.
The monster grinned, revealing sharp, rotting yellow teeth. He heaved a giant carcass off his shoulders and set it at his feet with a meaty thump. “Food come to Gral for a change. Gral like this. Welcome, tasty things.”
* * *
“What in the nethers is that?” Aurelius asked.
“A troll,” Gabrian replied in a dull voice.
The wolf went on snarling until the troll began stomping toward him. “Come here, little tasty!”
The wolf skittered away as though actually afraid, and the troll stomped after it. Aurelius looked on with a frown as the monsters chased each other in circles around the cave.
“Stop running!” the troll boomed.
The troll reached around to the small of its back where Aurelius now noticed a pack of some kind. The troll’s fist emerged with a handful of ropes. Stones were caught up in the ropes and clacking together at the trailing ends.
It’s a net. . . .
The troll hurled the net after the fleeing wolf, and the ropes splayed open in midair, landing with the wolf dead center. The rocks clattered to the ground and Aurelius watched as the werewolf tripped and tumbled inside the net, becoming hopelessly entangled.
“Heh, heh, heh!” The troll laughed. “Not so fast now, tasty furry thing.”
The troll advanced on his prey and Aurelius turned to Gabrian, “Aren’t you going to stop it?”
Gabrian gave him a bland look. “Why? Would you expect someone to stop you from killing a chicken for dinner?”
“This isn’t the same! You said yourself that werewolves are half man. He can speak! He’s intelligent! If you let him die . . .”
Gabrian cocked his head curiously.
Aurelius gave an incredulous snort and started jogging toward the struggling werewolf. He was surprised to find that his calf could take his weight now—what’s more, it didn’t even hurt. Whatever Gabrian had done to his injuries, it had worked, and fast.
“Hey!” Aurelius called as the troll was bending down to pick up the net.
The troll straightened with the netted wolf dangling from his fist and turned to see who had called to him.
“Hello, little tasty. You wait for turn. I eat you next, no worry.”
“Put him down,” Aurelius said.
“Why should Gral do that?”
“Because if Gral doesn’t, then I’ll put a curse on him.”
The troll’s giant yellow eyes narrowed angrily and suddenly he dropped the net, drawing a yelp from the wolf. “Mean! Gral do nothing to you; why you want hurt Gral?” The giant took a few thudding steps toward Aurelius and jabbed an angry finger at him. It was only by an extreme force of will that he managed not to flinch. “Gral eat you first now!”
Thud, thud, thud . . .
Aurelius was just about to turn and run when he heard Gabrian begin speaking.
“Congela teru cuero!”
“Whaaaa?” The troll replied, turning in slow motion to see who’d spoken. Aurelius watched the monster’s movements becoming slower and slower until it froze like a statue just a few paces away. The monster’s jaws hung open in protest, green spittle poised to trickle from the corner of its mouth. Its eyes were not even blinking.
“Now, now, Gral. Gral Rahn, is it?” Gabrian said, coming up beside the troll. He reached up with his glowing staff and thunked the monster on the head. Aurelius wondered if he’d imagined the subsequent echo. “You don’t want to kill any of us. Wer teru amstas. Et er ar teru masto.” What followed was a long string of similarly incomprehensible words. Aurelius listened closely, but it was a useless exercise; he couldn’t find any meaning in them. He wondered if the troll even understood the strange language. It certainly didn’t seem to have a very good grasp of Meridian. Yet Aurelius suspected that Gabrian wouldn’t waste his breath if the troll didn’t understand. The more relevant question was why was the wizard speaking to the troll in another language when he could have used Meridian. It had to be another spell of some kind.
A violently churning ball of ropes caught Aurelius’s eye as it rolled past.
He smiled wryly in spite of the situation and walked over to the wolf to help it untangle itself. He was about to place a hand on the snarling ball of ropes when he caught a glint of teeth and thought better of it.
“Let me help you,” Aurelius said.
“I don’t need your help!” Another flash of ivory and Aurelius realized that the wolf was right. He was methodically cutting the ropes with his teeth. It wasn’t a minute before the wolf shook off the last shreds of the net, and they fell in a puddle of rope at its feet.
“Feels good not to be eaten, huh?”
The wolf growled softly. “You saved my life again, human. It would seem we are destined to share one another’s company a while longer.”
“But I didn’t save your—”
“The wizard would have left me for dead. I heard him. You intervened, risking your own life for mine. Now my life is yours in service until such a time as I can repay the debt.” Aurelius gaped at the giant wolf. “Do not abuse my honor, human, or I will eat you when it is satisfied.” Aurelius nodded mutely.
Gabrian finally stopped speaking to the troll, and Aurelius turned to see what had happened. The troll was still standing as it had been before, frozen in pursuit of its prey, but now as Aurelius watched, the wizard pointed his staff at the monster, and it was suddenly released from th
e magic. The troll fell to the ground with a thud and a grunt.
“Krak!” It beat the ground with its fist, sending a subtle vibration through the ground before it climbed slowly to its feet. Aurelius was already backing away, yet Gabrian was standing but an arm’s length from the troll and he made no attempt to run.
Once the troll regained its feet, it stood before Gabrian with its massive shoulders hunched and its head bowed as if it were suddenly carrying an enormous weight. “What orders for Gral?”
A crooked smile sprang to the old man’s face, and Aurelius’s eyebrows shot up. “Go fetch your kill that we may share the meat.”
Without protest, the giant slowly turned and stomped toward the entrance of the cave where he’d left the animal carcass.
Aurelius crept over to the wizard and whispered, “What did you do to him?”
“Trolls are simple-minded creatures. It is easy to compel their allegiance.”
“Well, that’s a vague answer, Wrinkles.”
The wizard turned his creepy smile on Aurelius. “Yes.”
Aurelius frowned. “Can we trust him?”
“Don’t show him where to stab you and he won’t.”
“I’ll take that as, sleep with one eye open.”
The old man looked away as the troll began thudding toward them. “I prefer to sleep with two eyes open.” He cast the werewolf a quick glance as it padded softly up beside Aurelius.
“Be careful of the wolf, elder. He is cunning, and he hates humans with unreasoning fury.”
Aurelius followed the old man’s gaze to the giant beast beside him. The wolf’s shoulders were nearly as high as his own, but once Gral was standing before them with a strange, furry animal carcass dangling by one horn from his fist, Aurelius was able to appreciate a new sense of scale. The troll was nearly the height of two men, and broader than four standing abreast.
The hulking monster hefted the carcass in both hands and tore. There came sickening pop! and a sound like cloth being ripped apart. The troll tossed the ragged hindquarters of the beast at Gabrian’s feet, splattering his boots with dark flecks of blood. “That your half.” And with that, the giant turned and stomped away.
* * *
Gabrian whispered a spell over the bloody carcass at his feet, and Aurelius watched in disbelief as it ignited and cooked in sizzling blue flames before his eyes. The fur burned away and crumbled to ashes, while the skin browned and a delicious smell of roasting meat began wafting through the cave. The wolf began growling softly, and Aurelius peripherally noted drool dripping from its jaws. He made a note to get his meat before the werewolf slobbered all over it. Meanwhile, Gral had found a secluded corner and was eating his half of the kill raw with gruesome popping and ripping noises and juicy chewing.
Gabrian withdrew a long, thin knife from somewhere inside his voluminous robes and bent to slice off a hefty chunk of meat from the animal’s flank. Aurelius waited for the wizard to pass it along, but instead he began eating the meat and rather passed the knife. Aurelius took his turn, slicing off a smaller, more conservative piece. Before he fully remembered who was next in line, he turned to pass the knife along only to see the wolf pounce upon the remaining meat (which was nearly all of it) and begin devouring it with violent and indiscriminate gusto. The wolf tore a giant mouthful from the leg and came away with skin, tendons, and bone trailing out between its teeth.
Aurelius looked away with a suddenly churning stomach and winced as he listened to the crunching noises that followed. He sniffed his slice of meat warily. It smelled very gamey. His lips curled tremulously, but his stomach growled, reminding him that he hadn’t eaten for more than half a day. He took a hesitant bite.
The flavor was spicy and musky, almost overwhelmingly so, but it was succulent and tender. Aurelius devoured his slice and found his mouth watering for more, but it only took one look at the ragged remains of their roasted whatever-it-was to silence that need. Entrails were beginning to show through the glistening bones as the werewolf went on gnawing meat from the carcass.
Feeling a sudden need for air, Aurelius strode over to the entrance of the cave. Here the air was colder, refreshing. He heaved a few deep breaths and found his stomach settling. If only he could tune out the crunching and tearing sounds echoing inside the cave. A distant howl split the air and some of the chewing sounds quieted. Aurelius turned to see the wolf’s ears pricked up with some morsel of meat frozen halfway in and halfway out of its mouth, but when the wolf saw him watching, it went back to eating.
“We must leave.”
Aurelius started at the sound, and turned to find Gabrian standing quietly beside him. His skin prickled and crawled as he realized that he hadn’t even heard the old man approaching. Sneaky old man . . .
“Malgore is passing beyond my sight. His trail grows colder by the minute. He is being careful not to use magic now.”
“But is it safe out there?”
“No, yet we must leave all the same. Gral! Come.”
The bulk of the ripping and popping noises ceased with an irritated grunt, and Aurelius heard the giant’s thudding footsteps as it approached. A moment later the wolf stopped snarling and growling at his food and padded softly up beside them.
Gabrian pointed imperiously to the forest beyond the cave. “Make sure it is safe before we leave.”
Without a word, Gral stomped out into the open, the remainder of his kill trailing limply from one oversized hand. Aurelius watched the giant look both ways as he left the cave. Walking out a dozen steps, Gral spun in a slow circle. Apparently satisfied that it was safe, he turned to Gabrian and nodded.
They proceeded quietly from the cave, and the wizard led the way. They kept their footsteps quiet to avoid any more run-ins with leviathans, but Gral made no such effort, and his giant feet formed a steady backdrop of thudding, crunching, and crashing as they walked through the forest. Aurelius heard the troll resume noisily eating his kill as they ambled between the trees. They reached a low-hanging row of glittering icicles, and as Aurelius passed warily beneath their deadly points, he realized that the troll wouldn’t be able to do the same. He turned to watch as Gral casually brought up his forearm to block his face before walking straight into the ice. The icicles cracked loudly and rained down all around the troll, momentarily burying him in a heavy rain of ice. Gral emerged a second later tearing off another mouthful of meat with his jaws and none the worse for the hundreds of pounds of ice that had just rained down on his head. Gral saw Aurelius watching and flashed him a bloody grin.
They walked on in the hazy gloom for what seemed like hours. The subtle illumination of the forest seemed to change from one tree to the next, as though each had been individually decorated. On some trees, lichen grew in only a luminous, pulsating blue. On others, furry moss splashed a fuzzy green glow on everything. The colors combined in places, seeming to alternate at random. One set of trees might be blue and green and the next red and blue. Some glowed steadily, while others flashed or pulsated in a steady rhythm. The icicles caught and refracted the light until they sparkled, but for all the eerie radiance, not a single beam of clean, white sunlight penetrated the forest canopy. Had day broken? How much time had passed since they’d entered the forest? It was impossible to know.
Aurelius looked up and saw nothing but a dizzying blur of red, green, and blue glinting darkly off the ice-covered branches. He wondered if the sun would even be able to penetrate the canopy. Rolling up his furry coat sleeve, Aurelius checked his forearm gauntlet for the time. According to his clock, it was 7:00 in the morning, and the sun should have already risen. But the blinking icon in the corner of the display told him that GPS and data sync were offline—no surprise there—so he had no way of knowing, but he certainly felt as though he’d been up the whole night.
“It is yet the middle of the night, elder.”
Aurelius frowned. “Reading my thoughts again? I thought I told you to quit that.”
“You were suspiciously silent. I had t
o know what you were thinking, lest you try to knock me out with a fallen tree branch.”
Aurelius huffed and drew alongside the wizard. “I doubt I could find one small enough to swing. How did these trees get so tall anyway? I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“That is a secret only the elves can reveal.”
“Elves?”
“Fairies if you prefer.”
Aurelius almost laughed. The word obviously had a different meaning in this time. “Let’s stick with Elves. Who are they?”
“Harbingers of doom.”
“You’re going to have to be more specific, Wrinkles.”
“They destroyed your people, the elders.”
Aurelius did a double take. “What?”
“No living being remembers exactly what happened, but their guilt is buried deep inside the Elvish libraries. Yet not even they will read their histories, for fear that they will destroy themselves with too much knowledge.”
Aurelius shook his head, struggling to catch up. “Destroy themselves with too much knowledge?”
“It is a long, complicated story, elder, but the relic we seek was created by the Elves, some time far in the future. The Elves believe that they used it to travel to your world in search of knowledge. They chose to forget everything they learned soon after they had learned it, but not before writing it all down in books. Thousands of books. In this way they ensured that no one person ever accumulated enough knowledge to undo his or her reason for travelling to the past.”
Aurelius’s head began to throb where he’d hit it inside the cave. “I don’t understand.”
Gabrian sighed. “It’s simple, elder. For example, if you traveled back in time to save someone’s life, and you succeeded, then in the future where you came from that person would still be alive and you would have never felt the need to go back and save them, which means that you never did. The instant that you accomplish yours goals in the past, you disappear from it as though you had never been there, and all memories of the experience likewise vanish.”
All we know for certain is that it wasn’t long after the Elves travelled back in time to your world before the elders met their end.”
Mrythdom: Game of Time Page 9