The Journeyman for Zdrell

by David K Bennett

  Calculating where the demon was headed, he opened a twenty-foot-wide portal directly in front of it, with the portal going to an empty realm. The demon didn’t even slow, but went straight into the hole and disappeared.

  Frantically, Eril tried to close the portal, but it wouldn’t close or dissipate. In moments, he could see why. The demon’s lifeline was still leading back to the portal in the grove of trees. Eril had already discovered that if anything, no matter how small, was crossing the threshold of a portal, it wouldn’t close.

  While the demon appeared to be gone, Eril wasn’t sure it couldn’t return, if he didn’t find a way to cut its lifeline. A human would be dead by now, if thrown into an empty realm, he wasn’t sure the same applied to a demon.

  He was just about to try and fly down to find his concealing amulet when the portal burst wide and the demon came flying back out. It didn’t look happy now.

  “That was a dirty trick, human,” the demon rumbled. “That was an empty realm, they are quite boring, and cold. And I bet you thought that would hurt me, like it would hurt one of your frail human bodies. Bah! Enough playing around. Time to get some pain out of you.”

  § § §

  The demon now lashed out with what looked like two impossibly long glowing swords. Eril dove frantically to avoid the first cut, only to be scored by the second. The blade seemed to completely ignore Eril’s shield and the tip raked the top of his left shoulder down to the bottom of his ribcage. The cut wasn’t very deep but it burned on contact and involuntarily, Eril screamed in agony.

  “Yes. That’s more like it,” the demon purred.

  Eril still had enough remaining excess energy in him that he was able to heal the cut almost immediately, but the demon was slashing again with the huge twin blades. Again, he was able to just avoid the first blade, only to have the second blade rake the side of his left leg.

  The pain this time was so intense, Eril nearly passed out. His vision went white before he was able to isolate the nerves and shut off the pain.

  The demon, now glowing more brightly, said, “None of that. You must feel my pain.” A wave of magic hit Eril then and the pain he’d blocked suddenly returned. Eril allowed himself to fall and healed the leg injury as he fell.

  After dropping nearly five hundred feet, Eril finished the healing only to look up to see that the demon was floating right next to him and grinning. Faster than Eril’s eyes could follow the demon sliced him multiple times in rapid succession. Each cut was shallow, but immensely painful. Eril tried but was still unable to block the pain. He shot upward as fast as he could go to try to escape his tormenter.

  The demon didn’t immediately follow, and Eril began to heal the worst bleeding wounds. In spite of his healing, he was losing a significant amount of blood and could feel the lack of it.

  Suddenly, the demon was there again, slicing him on the back, side, face, arms, and legs. He was bleeding everywhere, and the pain was so bad he wasn’t sure anything but pain existed in the universe. Meanwhile, the demon floated close by, crooning, “Good, good, oh soooo, gooood.”

  Eril was trying to heal the wounds, but there were so many of them, and the pain was so great, he wasn’t sure if the healing spells were having any effect. They had drifted down to roughly one hundred feet above the forest canopy. The healing spells must have been doing something because gradually his vision was clearing.

  The demon administered another series of cuts, but Eril must have passed the pain threshold and felt no real additional pain. He tried vainly to pull enough power to escape, but seemed unable. The blood loss had reached a point where Eril could feel himself losing consciousness. He gradually drifted lower as he tried in vain to heal the many wounds.

  The demon now looked disappointed. “You are not as strong as I’d hoped. Your pain has stopped.” Eril could feel it was true. His ability to feel pain was gone as though he’d deliberately blocked it. The demon continued. “A good feast nonetheless. Now for the best part.”

  Eril’s vision was fading. He could feel nothing. He could just discern the demon growing larger and larger, its mouth filled with innumerable jagged teeth opening wider and wider to engulf him. Then Eril saw no more.

  Chapter 77

  Filora

  Things had been going so well, and then magic had gone and cursed it all again. Fil had been very pleased with the picnic so far. Eril looked so adorable when he panicked. She found it endlessly fascinating that this young wizard, wielder of unimaginably powerful energies could become so flustered by a few simple questions.

  She really did worry that while he was out saving the world that other women would see him for what he was and try and stake a claim. Fil would not have it. Eril was the first man or boy who had ever treated her like she was anything other than a future domestic slave. Eril saw her as a person first and a woman second, when he even remembered. She’d never met anyone like him. And the fact that he was irresistibly cute and innocent while also being so much more powerful than he even realized made Fil all the more determined that she would not lose him.

  Now their picnic was interrupted by yet another crisis. It was enough to make her want to spit, unladylike though that might be. As soon as Eril took off to try and save the town from a demon, she told Marta to take the wagon back to town and tell everyone she saw to shut themselves in, as a demon might soon come rampaging through the town.

  For her part, Fil grabbed Eril’s scabbarded sword out of the wagon bed and started walking in the direction Eril had flown. She also reached into her pocket to find the communicator she carried. She didn’t know who was on the other end of it, but she figured she had to give it a try. She tried calling as she walked, but received no response.

  Fil walked rapidly towards the sound of explosions at the break between the forest and the ruins. It sounded like the fight was already going on. She could hear an ominous gravely voice speaking words she couldn’t understand, then more explosions. She could hear trees being hit and limbs snapping. All these sounds got louder the closer she got.

  Finally, she saw the portal, a ten-foot-wide glowing circle of orange light, floating in the air. She also saw a young man, who she thought might be a wizard standing by the portal, staring up into the sky where the conflict raged. The look of glee on the wizard’s face made her want to rip his throat out, since she knew he was happy because something terrible was happening to Eril.

  She approached carefully, so the wizard wouldn’t see her until she was close, not that he had any eyes for her. He was too busy looking up at the fight happening above in the air.

  Finding a place that still shielded her from the wizard’s view, she looked up to see what was going on. The sight that greeted her eyes made her freeze with shock.

  She could see the demon and Eril fighting, but at this point, it wasn’t really a fight. Eril was covered with blood, drifting almost lifeless in the air while the demon kept slicing him with two glowing swords. She watched as Eril lost what little consciousness he had left.

  He slumped and started drifting faster to the ground, only to have the demon grow much larger in size and open its now enormous mouth.

  It was going to eat Eril.

  Without thinking, Fil was screaming as she unsheathed Eril’s sword and ran at the wizard by the portal. Two things happened then. The demon turned in the air and shrieked, and the wizard turned and saw her as she ran at him with the blade burning in her hand.

  The wizard started to gesture to cast some spell, but Fil never gave him a chance. She had the sword held high and slashed down in a diagonal arc as soon as she got close enough. The blade only slightly slowed as it sliced his upraised hand from his arm and then continued in an arc through his neck and chest. Where the sword went, it left a smoking wound, and the wizard slumped to the ground without a sound.

  Fil was now standing less than ten feet from the portal. It looked different now that she was holding the sword. She could see what looked like roiling orange glowing clouds th
rough the portal. She could also see an orange-silver rope reaching through the portal and up to the rapidly descending demon.

  The demon was such a fearsome sight she almost dropped the sword and ran, but knew that would end her as surely as if she did nothing, so she did the one thing Eril had said a person might do to hurt a demon, she hacked with the sword at the glowing rope.

  This time, the blade did not pass easily through the glowing line; instead it sparked and bounced off. Fil thought the demon had been roaring previously, but that was nothing compared to what it now did. The sheer force of the sound alone almost knocked her from her feet. Even so, she knew her only salvation lay in cutting the glowing line. She gripped the blade tightly in both hands and brought the sword down with all her force, willing it to slice through the lifeline.

  This time the blade cut fully halfway through, and the demon which had been diving at her with its saw-toothed mouth open and claw-like hands reaching for her, was thrown back as if some invisible battering ram had smashed into it.

  She freed the blade and brought it down, again and again, hacking at the same place. On the fourth or fifth stroke, the demon’s lifeline parted, and the writhing demon tumbled in the air, seemingly unable to orient itself.

  Filora stood with the blade upraised. The demon threw some sort of energy bolt at her, but the blade deflected it into a nearby tree, setting it afire. She could see that the demon wanted to go through the portal, but she stood between it and its objective. The demon threw three more bolts at her, each weaker than the previous, but all were either absorbed or deflected by the blade.

  The demon now looked desperate. Its glow had diminished significantly, and it had shrunk to be only man-sized. It flew straight at her. She almost broke, but took courage from the power of Eril’s blade and stood her ground.

  The demon flew aiming straight at her, but instead of attacking, it veered at the last moment to dodge around and gain the portal. Fil saw the move for what it was and whipped the blade around to slice into the demon. As soon as the edge made contact, there was a huge explosion. She was knocked from her feet by the blast, and the portal snapped shut.

  She lay on the ground, dazed from the explosion and her landing. There was no sign of either the demon or the portal, but she continued looking around. Eril’s sword lay on the ground several feet away, smoking.

  Getting up, she looked around warily, then seeing that the immediate threat had passed, she ran to where Eril lay in a bloody heap. She ascertained that he was still breathing, so she immediately set about tearing pieces from her skirt to bind his wounds. He was covered with a considerable number of shallow slashes across nearly all his body, all of which were oozing blood.

  Quickly she realized that she didn’t have enough cloth in her entire dress to bind all his wounds, and though he was alive now, he might die before she was able to do what was needed to save him, if he could be saved.

  Once again, she reached for the communicator. This time after calling, she felt the response that someone was on the other side. “Who is this?” she called, frantic with fear.

  “It’s Dorull. What’s wrong, Filora.”

  “Eril’s been hurt. He’s unconscious, and he’s covered with cuts from one end to the other, too many to bind up or stop. I’m afraid he’s already lost too much blood.”

  “I’d ask how this happened, but I agree time is of the essence. If Eril was awake, he could probably heal himself,” Dorull said. “You need to see if you can wake him up. What rings is he wearing?”

  She looked. “Just the dull gold one he usually wears.”

  “Scars,” she heard the wizard swear. “Is the big boxy locket around his neck?”

  “No, just the three small ones,” she said after counting the lockets still hanging on his neck.

  “Wrath and scars!” he swore again. “We need to wake him up and get him some power. Is there anything else magical of his around?”

  “His sword is here,” she said hopefully.

  “Humph, I don’t know if that’ll do, but it’s better than nothing. Put it in his hand and then see if you can get him to wake up. If you can get him to wake, tell him he needs to heal himself quickly before he passes out again. Understand?”

  “Uh, yeah, I think so. I’ll try.” She grabbed the sword, which tingled when she touched it and placed the pommel in Eril’s limp hand.

  Gently, she lifted him up and shook him, wincing at how even this was aggravating his wounds.

  “Eril. Eril, you’ve got to wake up. Wake up and heal yourself,” she pleaded. He still lay there, unresponsive.

  She pushed the sword into his hand and curled his fingers around the hilt. Rocking him gently, she said, “Come on, you scar scumming cursed man. You have to wake up. I can’t heal you, you’re too cut up. You’ve lost too much blood. If you don’t wake up and use that stupid magic of yours to heal yourself, you’ll die.”

  His eyelids fluttered briefly, and he seemed to mutter something under his breath, but then he again went limp. Fil was frantic now. His skin was so white; it almost looked like chalk.

  She shifted him off her and lay him down, making sure his hand was still curled around the hilt of his sword.

  “Come on, Eril. You’re strong. You’re beautiful. You have to be alive. You can’t die on me!” she said and then slapped the side of his head. It only slumped to the side.

  “Eril, I will never forgive you if you die. You’re not allowed to leave yet. You have to wake up and heal your stupid self, you scarring stupid, stupid man!” she said and slammed her fist down on his breast bone. With that, he suddenly took a deeper breath and his eyes partially opened.

  “Quick, Eril. Heal yourself. Dorull says you can do it. You have the power. Use your sword here to give you the power.”

  Eril closed his eyes, and at first she was convinced he had just passed out again, but in a few seconds he started to glow. The wounds that she could see were one by one closing up and disappearing. It was creepy to watch, almost like the slashes had been the illusion, but the healed skin was the reality.

  His breathing became more regular, and as the glow faded, she could see that his color, though still pale, had come somewhere closer to normal.

  He muttered, just barely loud enough for her to hear, “I think that takes care of the worst of it. I really need to sleep now.” His breathing deepened, and she could see he was sleeping normally.

  Fil relaxed slightly and re-gripped the communicator.

  “What happened?” immediately asked an anxious Dorull.

  “I did just what you said, and I finally got him to wake up enough to heal most of the worst wounds. He isn’t bleeding, and his color is looking better. He’s sleeping now.”

  “Good. Good,” said Dorull, relief in his voice. “Stay there with him, and I’ll be up shortly with a wagon, and we’ll fetch him back. Thank you for saving him.”

  “I didn’t save him for you,” she said.

  “I know, and that makes it all the better. You may have just saved all of us. Thank you, Filora. You truly are a noble woman.”

  Fil really didn’t know how to feel about that. Noble? She just didn’t want Eril to die, for purely selfish reasons. She didn’t care about the world. Let the world care about itself. She just wanted her best friend and future husband to survive.

  Chapter 78

  Eril woke in his bed. He didn’t know what time it was since there were no windows underground, but he felt like someone had worked him over from head to foot with a battering ram. He pushed himself up slowly, feeling the phantom pain from multiple recently healed wounds. He had no idea how he was alive.

  The last thing he remembered was the sight of the demon, grown enormous ready to bite him in half. Somehow, he had survived, though it obviously had not been something he’d done.

  He felt a wave of nausea and instinctively drew power from his ring to combat it. He noted he only had his power ring on, still. Worse, the room he was in wasn’t very warm with onl
y a single candle burning. He needed to get to a place where he could draw more power easily to finish healing.

  Just as he was swinging his body around to put his feet on the floor, Fil came in.

  “Oh, good, you’re awake,” she said in a business like tone.

  “Yeah,” he said, stretching to relieve some of the pain he felt. “But I have no idea how I’m alive to be awake.”

  “Well, I saved you, of course,” Fil said, deadpan.

  “You saved me? From that demon? How could you?”

  “I used the sword you stupidly left behind, Eril. It worked just like you said it would. It cut the demon’s lifeline and then when I hit the demon with the blade directly, it kind of exploded.”

  Eril sat there, shocked, both at being alive and that Fil, no matter how competent she was as a hunter, had somehow used his sword to kill the demon. He spent some moments just pondering this development.

  “Why didn’t you go back to town like I told you?” he asked, bewildered.

  “Because I saw that you’d left your sword behind, stupid man. I figured you’d need it, and I was right,” she said smugly.

  They left the room together. As they went, Fil described what she had seen, and Eril filled her in on what had led up to the point where she arrived.

  When they got out to the main cavern, he went over to the coal fire feeding energy into the gate and began to draw power with his ring. After ten minutes he was feeling much better, and in another ten he almost felt restored to normal.

  About that point, Dorull appeared.

  “You’re looking closer to your usual self, I see,” the wizard commented, looking Eril up and down. “What happened to your line-cutter and the master ring?”

  “The demon snatched my concealing amulet with both of them away from me at the beginning of the fight,” Eril said, feeling chagrined.

  “I thought it was something like that. You’ll need to go back to the woods where you fought the demon. Your concealing amulet is too good. I couldn’t find it in the dark, and I’m sure you can sense the thing more easily than I.”