The Return of the Fifth Stone

by Vincent Todarello

  "This is a dangerous place for an Aquidian. This close to the shoreline you are safer; the impure may assume you are one of them, a pirate. But further inland they will assume the opposite," explained Patreus.

  "My mother is half Aquidian," I added. "She feared for her life every day. She lived here in secret until she was captured." When Agimus asked I explained my parents' capture to him. I saw the pity in his eyes.

  I awoke the next morning to the sound of Peitus and Patreus arguing a short distance from the camp. The Aquidian, wrapped in robes from head to toe, slept. I listened to the quarrel.

  “But it is close! I must find her! And we can use the river for a fresh supply of water,” Peitus pressed.

  “Yes, my boy, but we are on the king’s errand. We shall not go frolic and detour in search of your ladyfriend.” Patreus grunted.

  “I plan to marry her, if she’ll have me. And besides, we will need to restock on supplies and food if we plan to make it to the Lapis Mountains alive. In our haste to leave Alapis we neglected proper packing,” Peitus argued.

  “True, but our faith will provide for us in times of need,” said Patreus.

  “Yes but it is illogical and impractical to pass without stopping. We are less than half a day’s journey from Kal’Adria. Not to mention we should be concerned about the others who fled the festival,” Peitus added.

  Patreus scowled. “Concerned, yes. Distracted, no.”

  “This is no distraction!” Peitus fumed.

  “The boy is right.” A muffled voice emerged from under the pile of robes that enveloped Agimus. He peeled them off and righted himself, addressing the two after wiping some dried gunk from his eyes. I sat up and looked at my map. “My supplies are low,” he continued. “Mostly gone ‘cept for me rum and me sea leaf, acourse.”

  “After Kal’Adria we could follow the river south, and then break off heading southwest toward the mountains,” I added.

  “Alright then,” responded Patreus. “But no wasting time at Kal’Adria. There’ll be no stopping at the tavern for a drink. We better get moving if we want to be back on our way south along the river before sundown.”

  We walked a steady pace eastbound, keeping a safe distance from Mir’Dinaas as we passed south of the Citadel. In the daylight we could see the city walls rise up along with the looming spires and ghastly palatial towers. So mighty was the place that I thought it could never fall, never crumble to the ground, never be defeated. We were relieved when it was out of sight, though we kept a keen and watchful eye behind us.

  By midday we were in a lush prairie, blanketed with waist high lemonstraw, a soft but woody grass shoot often used in teas and for flavoring meats. The smell of the freshly trodden straws ticked our noses with citrus as the sun beamed overhead. A gentle breeze whistled quietly across the ground. I couldn’t help but think back to how beautiful Haaret must have been before the Dark Times. I plucked a blade of grass, dusted off any bristly dried edges, and chewed it as we walked.

  “Is this someone’s farm?” I asked, noticing a small cabin ahead in the distance.

  “Indeed it may be,” Patreus responded. “Perhaps we should pass along that wooded area there.” He pointed to a patch of trees that extended around the north side of the cabin.

  As we passed the cabin from the wooded area I could see it was broken down, abandoned. Someone’s home, forgotten and left for nature to reclaim. Much like my old cabin, I suppose, without the damage from fire. Trees began to grow from inside the cabin, poking their way through the roof, which was partially collapsed and covered with grass. Vines engulfed what was once the doorway, wedging their clinging tendrils between the boards along the walls, prying them up from their fastenings.

  “Shall we inspect it?” Peitus suggested.

  After a moment of thought, Patreus responded. “Yes. Perhaps there are dry food rations stored away. Then we can forego our trip to Kal’Adria.”

  Peitus rolled his eyes, unhappy with the suggestion as we strolled up to the door, which was barely attached and twisted into a warped and rotting pulp. Suddenly the tip of a spear lunged out at us from the dampness inside, nearly grazing Peitus as he took the first step in. It tore his shirt as he dodged it. Then we heard a voice.

  “Gotcha you damned vermin! Now get off my land!” The words shook and wobbled, but were stern and commanding. It was an old hermit. His weathered body made him look old enough to have been the father of a grandfather. His eyes were glazed over with a white color, and they shot in every direction, searching for sights he was once able to see. He was blind.

  “Easy old man. We mean you no harm.” Patreus tried to calm him.

  “You’re trespassing on my land and I have a right to defend it!” he snapped angrily, nearly falling to the moss-covered floor.

  “That you sure do. It was our mistake. We thought this was an abandoned home so we entered merely to search for dry rations. We will be on our way and won’t cause you any more trouble,” Patreus responded.

  “Then leave five silver coins as a fine for your trespass,” he demanded.

  “I’d be glad to, but perhaps if you knew the purpose of our mission you would reconsider, as we are low on currency as well as supplies.”

  “Go on,” the old man prodded, still holding his crude spear at the ready.

  “We are on a mission from the king to meet the Divinae, who will then lead us into battle against Scievah,” he said.

  The old man grumbled with disapproval. “I care not for prophesies or causes. I just want my privacy and peace to do as I wish on my land.”

  “If Scievah has his way, your land will likely be destroyed,” added Peitus.

  “No one has ever done me any harm before, so why should I care?” he retorted.

  “The fate of all Haareti are intertwined now, and we must put an end to Scievah,” explained Patreus.

  “Scievah never trespassed on my land, but you have. That means you’ve done me more wrong than he,” the hermit reasoned.

  Patreus, frustrated with the man’s logic and impatient with his temperament, flipped a few coins in his direction. “We’ll be on our way now. Accept our apologies for an honest mistake.” The old man lowered his spear and sought out his prize on the cabin floor. We left his abode, continuing east.

  “For him to take on such a selfish outlook is ultimately detrimental to himself in this case,” Patreus grumbled. “If everyone were like him, concerned only for his own matters and blind to the grand scheme, then Scievah would surely have victory. While it is right to demand privacy on his own land and the right to do as he pleases without bringing harm to others, he cares not for others who may not have such luxuries. He plays neutral while evil rampages across the good.”

  The old man's stubborn ways bothered Patreus, and it bothered him to give up on reasoning with the old man. Patreus had a gift of being able to convince others to do the right thing. He was always clear headed and objective in assessing a situation, even when it was very personal or emotional to him. For him to give up on someone meant that our mission was too important to put on hold, too important for extended argument about its merits, too important for further testing.

  “Why won’t the king make him change his mind?” I asked while I looked over the map to monitor our progress..

  “Because then there would be no free will. We must be free to make our choices. Whether they are right or wrong, they must be chosen freely," he said.

  "Why didn't the king just ask him, or send him a message somehow, like how he asked you to go to the Lapis Mountains?" I pressed.

  "I don't know. Perhaps he has a different purpose for me because I am strong of faith. The king usually doesn’t interfere directly in that way because then it would detract from our ability to reason through problems ourselves.”

  “But this man wasn’t using sound reason,” Peitus added. “Or he was, but he ignored our input. Isn’t it up to us to make sure he understands, showing him the right choice?”

  “Y
es and no. We tried, we did our faithful duty, but he rejected us flatly. We are on a tight schedule and I saw no promise in his ability to agree with us, so I gave up. Besides, sometimes we must find our own way and put aside the map, so to speak. Strike out into the wilderness unknowing, trusting on the king’s guidance and what you know of his will to get you to where you need to be,” said Patreus.

  “That seems less reliable and more problematic than having a map that points the way,” Peitus pressed.

  “Yes indeed it can be, especially if misguided by the desires of fallen men. But in the end if you are true in your faith you will reach the proper destination. After all, even men who follow maps can get lost from time to time, relying on it instead of their hearts.”

  I stowed my map.

  CHAPTER 17

  Peitus bolted as fast as he could ahead of us. Up in the distance I saw a line of black smoke snaking its way up into the sky from the horizon. We ran after him. Kal’Adria was in trouble.

  Many of the stores in the town square were burnt down, some still ablaze. The heat radiating off the buildings was almost unbearable, and we had to shield our eyes from the airborne debris and ash. Fulton’s jewelry shop was destroyed. Behind the smoke I saw a figure struggling to move on the ground. It was Fulton, crawling on his stomach away from his storefront, which was burning. He was badly hurt. We ran to him.

  We turned him over onto his back and he immediately took a defensive position, expecting us to beat him more than he had already been beaten. He coughed and sputtered blood from his mouth. We sat him up and leaned him forward so he wouldn’t choke, but then we saw the wound on his stomach. He was dying. His injuries were too severe for him to recover. A trail of blood leading from his store to where he sat appeared when a gentle breeze cast aside the smoke that surrounded us.

  “Statue.” He moaned, aiming his chin in the direction of the statue of Tillius he maintained. It too was ruined, crushed into an indiscernible pile of stones.

  The breeze picked up into a gust, and the smoke cleared across the square, revealing dozens of bodies strewn across the blood stained and fire blackened cobblestone. The entire town was either demolished or on fire, the aftermath of a brutal attack on the pure. Bodies were gnawed upon, torn apart, eaten by both man and beast alike. Others were scorched. But most horrifying were those that were crushed. Half buried, they were flattened, their legs bent into unnatural positions, broken and twisted.

  Peitus panicked. He looked over at Patreus with a yearning expression. Patreus nodded. He knew Peitus wanted to search for Allewyn. Peitus was off, checking each body. There were none left alive, none but Fulton, who was on his last breath.

  “Pan…” Fulton struggled to speak. “Panta…”

  “Relax. Don’t strain yourself. Just relax.” Patreus tried to calm him. “We are here for you.”

  I tried as hard as I could to hold back my tears. I knelt beside him and put my hands on his wounds and asked the king to help him with all the focus I could muster, but nothing happened.

  “Panta…” He strained again. “Pantagruelian.” The word drained the life from him. His eyes went stony and his face lost all expression. His limbs went limp and his head tipped downward. He was dead.

  I looked up at Patreus to see the same stony, expressionless face on him. The words seemed to have drained the life from him as well. “The Pantagruelian,” he said with fear. “I didn’t think it was possible.”

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “A beast of gargantuan proportion, from the depths of the seas. It is an old myth, a creature that should not be, that cannot be. If Scievah is able to control this beast then we are lost,” Agimus explained.

  Suddenly it hit me. The victims that were half buried and crushed were all lying within large craters. Footprints. Footprints that were four men wide. They trailed eastward. I can only guess at the size of the monster that left them. How could any force fight back against such evil? Cannibalistic barbarians, dragons, flesh eating beasts, evil sorcerers, and now a deadly gargantuan creature the size of a castle.

  Agimus told us that deep in the sea's crevices there were giant creatures, but they were not violent or aggressive. He said that the Pantagruelian was something completely different; something only in myth. An angry beast that killed at the will of the evil one who created it. A monstrosity so wild and large that it could not be tamed or captured by anyone or anything but its creator, a demon.

  “Scievah?” I asked about the demon.

  “I suppose. Tis an old Aquidian myth. We were raised to believe ‘twas just a tale, something to teach us not to swim off into the unknown areas of the sea. But I ‘spose many myths are based on fact.”

  “She’s not here.” Peitus ran over to us. “Her parents were killed. Her brother Lumley too. But I cannot find her. Where could she be?” he cried.

  “There is a place where some may be hidden.” Patreus turned toward the tavern, which was torn to shreds but not burnt.

  We entered the remains of the Lion & Lamb through an opening where there used to be a door. The once welcoming watering hole was now an ominous wreck. Patreus navigated past broken wood beams and debris toward the back of the bar, where we had just recently ate a meal and listened to the bard’s tales. In the corner of the room he felt around for a latch along the wall near the floor. With a click, a few panels of the wooden wall opened to reveal a small stone-walled room. It was filled with survivors.

  They were scared at first but soon they cheered with relief. Though saddened at what had happened, they were comforted by the sight of friendly faces. Allewyn was among them. She quickly realized that it was Peitus who had come to her rescue. She leapt up onto him, wrapped her arms around him and planted a big kiss on his lips. Peitus didn’t deny her, but his mood soon changed. He had to break the bad news to her about her family. She didn’t know. She couldn’t have. Her mood was too cheerful.

  Peitus sat her down at one of the tables which remained unturned and quietly told her what happened. She began to weep, and embraced him with a hug. Peitus comforted her. When we left the tavern I saw that the urgency Patreus carried with him earlier had disappeared. His rush to reach the Lapis Mountains left his thoughts as soon as we came upon the destruction at Kal’Adria.

  The survivors were downtrodden. Hopeless. With slumped backs and faces wet with tears, they helped us move every body into the cemetery for proper burials. Peitus himself carried Allewyn's brother Lumley, her mother Merry, and her father Brimbley to their graves. With little resolve left in them, the other survivors worked their hardest to give burials to as many of the victims that they could find. We spoke solemn prayers for the dead and wished them eternal peace.

  One of the survivors broke into hysterics. “Why would the king let such a thing happen to his subjects? We are peaceful people!” He yelled at the sky, cursing the king’s name. Patreus attempted to console him but he refused at first, becoming even more enraged. Eventually his anger turned to sadness and he wept profusely. His entire family was killed. He had just put his wife and son into the ground, and his home was obliterated. Patreus held him like a father would hold a child. His name was Thomgren, and his question burned at me as Patreus spoke softly and inaudibly to the man.

  I could see it in the eyes of the other survivors. Their faith was shaken. They were consumed with doubt and suspicion. Who could blame them; this act of war seemed to be nothing but sporting practice compared to what could be coming.

  Among the survivors were Kalvis and his family, Gerron, the innkeeper Ostler, and a few others. They soon became filled with despair, their homes and entire town ruined. They would have to come with us; their good memories of this place too destroyed to stay. They explained how they escaped the attack at the festival, only to be followed and attacked again in town.

  Several of us dug through the remnants of the markets in search of food. We packed what few rations and supplies we could find and started to make our way south, with several extra mout
hs to feed, additional lives to protect from the evil forces around us, and more people to convince that the answers to their problems were to be found on our journey.

  Skepticism grew with hunger and lethargy. Patreus seemed to spend more time trying to persuade the survivors about the validity of his visions than guiding us. I saw this burden weighing on him, so I took the liberty to walk the front of our caravan with Peitus, using the map from Patreus’ study to guide the way. I thought it was selfless of Patreus to tend to such matters of the heart and of faith, when he, himself, was struggling with the idea that he may never see Deius again. I could see it in his demeanor that he mourned as if Deius already passed on into the realm of spirits.

  Despite the prospect of danger along a more oft-traveled route, we hugged the river bank for some time in hopes of spotting some fish to catch for food. With Agimus there I thought this would be an easy feat, but our hopes were dashed. The river was fruitless; it soon dried up and became a muddy bog that reeked of rot and death. So we turned west, now with the Lapis Mountains peeking through the clouds along the horizon. Looking out I recalled what those mountains were; the crumbled remains of Lapisian cities, countrysides, and homes. Reminders of Scievah’s treachery. There we stood, between a dead river and a mountain of catastrophe.

  Progress was slow traveling with a larger group. Many became tired and parched, and some even fainted with exhaustion. The townsfolk had been hiding for some time after the attack, likely without food or drink.

  We stopped often during part of the journey to sit and eat the edible wildflowers that dotted the countryside, providing some light sustenance. The tall grass of the dry prairie between us and the mountains blocked the icy wind that rushed in off the distant western shores. The cold season was approaching faster than expected, and the simple refuge of sitting down among the tall grass warmed me on brisk evenings and mornings.

  During one rest period, I sat with Patreus at a time when he was alone, unencumbered by the task of keeping everyone’s spirits on the up. The question he was asked back in town was still eating at me, and I wondered what he told Thomgren.