Quarterstars Awakening

by David L. McDaniel

  Now he just needed to get there as quick as he could without running into any of the troublesome wraeths that could hinder their progress. Traversing through this maze would not be the quickest way, and he needed to go above the Guardian’s chamber in order to accomplish his goal. In order for him to secure the Shard to the Talisman that Traelyn holds, the Guardian specifically told him that only a direct descendant of the first human king, Dar Drannon, which Traelyn and her two sons were, would be able to take it out of here. He only needed one of them, and by his stroke of good luck, he had both sons.

  Right now, all he wanted to do was secure the Shard and Talisman and take it for himself. The maze below was not somewhere he wanted to be. If wraeths were flying above as well as coming out of the ground, it would not be long before they would be coming out of their crypts.

  The last time Naemyn was here, the Guardian made it clear to him that his Kronn did not always bring about the best of him or those around him. He had to be cautious in using his Wrae and his Kronn, especially in these catacombs where both exist. Both Wrae and Kronn have existed here since the creation when their gods defeated the Markenhirth sending the star of creation through his heart and separating the star into four shards, and one of them landing here.

  He looked behind him and saw the others obediently following him. He lifted the hood of his cloak over his head and walked on. He knew his way around here, but he had to make a few extra turns to avoid some of the crypts. The Tombs of Kings was one in particular, and he did not want to run into the wraeth of King Keiyann Krowe. He did not know why, other than the guilt he carried that he might eventually betray the entombed king’s son, who was also his friend, Jaerick.

  Naemyn and the others walked into the maze but skirted the edge by staying to the left, hugging the wall, and taking every left turn. Daegon murmured his disgust many times, as he grew ever more impatient and distrustful following Naemyn, which Naemyn ignored and kept leading. After nearly an hour of wandering through the cavernous maze, they came to stone steps that looked to be painstakingly carved with a fork. The stairway went straight up for hundreds of feet at a sharp incline.

  “I can’t climb that,” Traelyn gasped.

  “I will help you Great Mother.” Traegon offered.

  Traelyn smiled and touched his chin. “I know child. I know you mean well, but I am not going to let you carry me.”

  “Then how are we going to get you up?” Daegon asked.

  “I will stay here. Traegon and Trapper can stay with me. You two will go.”

  “Then give me the talisman,” Daegon said holding out his hand.

  “I would no sooner give you the talisman as I would Naemyn.”

  “Then what are we going to do?” Daegon asked shaking his head while putting his hands on his temples.

  “It is going to be ok Traelyn. We are not in any hurry at this point. We will go one step at a time,” Naemyn said with a warm smile.

  Traegon and Daegon each took a hand and walked her up the steps, one step at a time, while Naemyn led and Trapper took the rear. Trapper took each step one at a time as well, but he let himself fall behind a few steps so that he could keep a close eye on the others as they advanced up the stairs. They had only traversed fifty steps when one of the wraeths came down from the sky, floating down onto the stairway about ten steps above them, and then materialized into an elf in full leather with leaf style imprints and silver ring mail battle armor. He wore a helm and held a shield in his left hand and a silver sword with a jeweled pommel in his right. Naemyn instantly recognized him as one of their greatest warriors.

  “Naemyn,” he spoke, as his eyes glowed the same blue hue that the dead ravages and elves had outside. “Do not continue in this endeavor.”

  “Why do you want me to stop?” he asked, removing his hood. “I recognize you. You are Eranon, and the Eranon I knew would not want to stop me.”

  “Indeed, I am Eranon, and though I have passed out of the living realm, I live in a more powerful realm, and I aim to retake elven power using this realm and yours.”

  “But I am trying to restore elven purity and dominance,” Naemyn said trying to convince this once living defender of elven purity.

  “Then you are on the wrong path. This woman is a descendant of Dar Drannon. Dar Drannon cannot return, and she will bring him back, so she must die here and now, and you, if you insist on pressing forward, you will disrupt our plans to nullify all that we are attempting to do.”

  As he said that, Traelyn’s body began to raise and spin with her hands outstretched. Naemyn felt something grasp his ankles and looked down, seeing his ankles held fast by muddy hands that came out from the steps. Daegon, Traegon, and Trapper each had a wraeth materialize behind them and wrap their arms around them as well, holding them so tight that all three of them gasped to breathe as they felt their chests were crushing from the pressure.

  Traelyn screamed in fear as six more wraeths dropped down from the sky and floated in front of her. Looking into their faces, she saw only skeletal figures that glowed blue and white flickering back and forth from boned skulls to full-fleshed elven form. They did this as they circled around her and began to scream louder and louder as they closed in tighter.

  Then, as if by some command, they stopped, and when they did, their form materialized into a solid form and all six wrapped their arms and legs around her. When they did so, the weight of their bodies dropped her to the ground and she came down hard, twisting her ankle and shattering her left shin.

  “Stop this!” Naemyn yelled at Eranon.

  Naemyn struggled to get free from his wraeth captor by using his Kronn, even though he knew doing so was dangerous in this place. He began to reach deep down inside to send out an explosion that would send the wraeths back to their sleeping tombs when he felt the air become thick. So thick that he could see the air floating in front of him like shimmering water.

  Then it happened. Everything went black, followed by bright orange light. The wraeths that held Traelyn screamed in terror and pain as their forms caught on fire. The fire wrapped around their bodies but was extinguished after a single burst of flame, which was immediately replaced by a solid block of ice around them. Their bodies flew to the air and then fell to the ground frozen. When their bodies hit the ground, they shattered and turned to water which was quickly absorbed into the ground.

  Traelyn stood up, and when she did, she was young. Naemyn stopped calling his Kronn and saw Traelyn as he remembered her when she left: young and agile, soft skin and long brown hair. She looked terrified, but he also saw rage and anger in her face.

  Sensing the change in her, Traelyn felt a renewed sense of commitment. She looked at her hands and felt a new invigoration to her soul. She would take her mission in her own hands.

  “I am here to find my father!” she shouted to Eranon walking up the steps pointing at him. “Your kind took him from me and you will bring him back to me.”

  “I will not and I cannot. Your father is imprisoned. Keiyann Krowe was fooled into thinking he was helping him, but know this, we have your father, and we will not let him go.”

  Chapter 25

  In a furious rage, brought on by a new flood of memories that came to her with her youth, and by the revelation that she and her father had been betrayed by the elves, Traelyn charged up the stairway towards Eranon. Her anger fumed so strongly inside of her that she had no time to notice that her ankle and leg were no longer broken.

  Along with this youth came the feelings of justified rage against the elves, but at the same time, her feelings of love for Jaerick were becoming increasingly stronger with every step up the stairs. She wanted to see him, and see him now. She needed to get at this elven spirit and dispel his being whence it came. She
did not know how she was going to do it, but she was going to get a hold of him and throttle him to death if she had to.

  Eranon did nothing but open his arms as if she was his long lost love.

  “Traelyn, stop!” Naemyn yelled.

  She did not stop, but Daegon, Traegon, and Trapper bolted behind her and was only a few steps behind when she felt a tug at her back. She could not lift her feet another step forward, but she could turn around, and when she did so she saw that Daegon, Traegon and Trapper were three solid blocks of obsidian black ice, smooth and tight against their bodies. They floated trapped in frozen blocks over the stairs, dripping as they were already beginning to melt. Naemyn stood behind them also frozen, but in fear and not ice. Traelyn was about to unleash her rage on Naemyn when he spoke first.

  “I am so sorry,” he pleaded in earnest as if he were a child apologizing to his mother.

  “What have you done?” she screamed in fury, raking her fingers through her hair from above her ears to the top of her head.

  “My Kronn doesn’t always work the way I intend it to.”

  Eranon began laughing as he turned around to walk up the steps, took two steps up, but stopped and turned back around.

  “You cannot control your Kronn Naemyn, because your heart is not pure anymore. You are not the Sor elf that you think you are, you are now neither Sor nor Val. You are a part of this puzzle that connects the two races, Val and Sor, in order to destroy everything.”

  “I am not here to destroy anything! I am here to bring power back to the elven race!”

  “Then why are you here with this daughter of Dar Drannon, if not for selfish desires?”

  “I want what she wants, she wants the Shard.”

  “If that is that what you want? Then I will not stop you.”

  Eranon turned around again, walked up two steps and then changed into his wraeth form and swirled into the air and flew away down the hallway at the top of the stairs.

  “What do you plan on doing do with my sons?” Traelyn asked.

  “I can help them,” Naemyn said, but as he said that, they heard Eranon’s voice in the chamber echoing out. “There is little you can do, that I cannot undo.”

  Naemyn was able to adjust his Kronn to release her, and when she was free, she looked up the steps to make sure that Eranon was gone, and once she confirmed that, she ran down the steps to her sons, and as Naemyn had promised, they began to melt out of their confinement.

  The ice block melted within minutes, and the three men fell to their knees. Traegon and Trapper rolled over to their sides, straddling on top of three steps and shivering out of control. Daegon however, stayed on all fours and began cursing, then stood up still shivering and pointed to Naemyn.

  “This is the last time you will betray us!” he yelled to Naemyn. “I may have been frozen solid, but I could hear every word you said. If your own people do not believe your motives why should we? And now this elf-wraeth is giving you the go ahead to move on. I do not trust you, and why should I?”

  “Daegon, you are right,” he said, holding up his hands as Daegon approached.

  “Please don’t touch me as I cannot guarantee your safety as far as my Kronn is concerned.”

  Daegon stopped, looked at Naemyn, and then turned to his son and Trapper, and saw them slowly rising to their feet. He turned back around to Naemyn rubbing his arms for warmth.

  “We want the same thing,” Naemyn began. “We may want it for different reasons, and I realize that you don’t want any of this at all, and are just doing it because Traelyn wants it, but we can get this shard and get out of here.”

  “Naemyn, you have us in a bind, and I don’t know why I allowed you to get us here. I devastated your force at the ambush, and now you are here telling us what to do.”

  “Daegon, I understand your hatred for us, as I feel the same hatred for all humans, but together we can get your mother what she needs and then we can continue with our hatred for each other.”

  “I don’t trust you, and I…” Daegon started.

  “Where are we going Naemyn?” Traelyn, tired of their fighting, interrupted. “Lead us out of here, before I let my sons kill you now, and I will figure out my own way out of here.”

  “Traegon, Trapper, get up!” Daegon shouted. “We’re moving.”

  Traegon stood up first and picked up Trapper. When Trapper stood up, he found his legs were a bit wobbly and took him a few moments to regain his balance. Naemyn urged them to follow him up the stairs, without seeing if they would follow, but they did. Traelyn followed behind Naemyn showing a bounce in her step from her newly invigorated youthful legs. Traegon and Trapper followed her while Daegon took the rear. They climbed the stairs for many moments until they reached the top that opened up to a corridor that no longer had the illusion of sky, but rather a solid stone ceiling with an opening through the top that flooded the entire corridor with sunlight.

  “This is it,” Naemyn announced, sounding surprised that he had found the exact spot he was looking for.

  Naemyn picked up his pace to almost a run until he found another hole, but this one was a three-foot hole in the center of the floor. Naemyn went to his knees and stuck his head through it. He smiled when he saw the Guardian down below sitting at his table reading books. He heard the river rushing in the cavern. Even though it brought back bad memories of when the Guardian informed him of the deception of his own Kronn, he could not have been happier to find him.

  He pulled his head out of the hole and signaled to the others to gather around.

  “Get down here. Each of you take a look inside.”

  Daegon looked at Naemyn with distrust, as if by sticking his head through the hole, he might lose it.

  Everyone did as he asked, Traelyn was the last and when she pulled her head back out she looked incredulous.

  “Who is that?” she asked.

  “That is what we call the Guardian. We have called him the Guardian because he guards the Quarterstar Shard. No one can remove the Shard. I tried the last time I was here, and failed, but he did give me one important piece of information. He told me that a descendant of the first Human King Dar Drannon would remove the Shard from the catacombs.”

  “Which one of us should go?” Daegon asked.

  “They way I see it,” Naemyn said. “It doesn’t matter, three of you, including Traelyn are descendants of Dar Drannon. Traelyn is the closest, so I think she should go.”

  “She is NOT going down there,” Daegon protested.

  “Then it makes no difference to me. Descendant is descendant; I only need someone from the bloodline. You choose.”

  “I will go,” Traegon volunteered.

  “Then give him the talisman,” Naemyn said.

  Traelyn removed the talisman from the bag she held inside her blouse, and handed it to Traegon.

  However, I must tell you something more,” Naemyn said as he leaned back, still on his knees.

  “There will be a sacrifice in order for us to remove the Shard. I do not know what the sacrifice requires.”

  “Then I will go,” Traegon said. “Father, I am no use for you as a warrior, let me do this. This may be the only way to make a name for myself.”

  Daegon stood up and looked down upon his son. “I may not have a use for you as a warrior, but that is not what is important to me. You are my son, and I still love you. You will not go down there, I will.”

  “No father, listen, I want to do this. I can help the Great Mother achieve what she wants with the elven prince. That will be enough for me to know that I did something in a grand scale and be remembered for it. I want to do this. Look at the Great Mother
,” he said pointing to her. “She is young again. Something big is happening here, and I want to be a part of it.”

  “By sacrificing yourself? No, I won’t have it, and you have no choice. Besides, he is an elf, and elves die!” he said with a devious smile.

  With that, he leaned over, kissed his son on the forehead, snatched the talisman by the chain, and jumped into the hole.

  Daegon fell next to the Guardian. He landed hard on his feet and rolled over his shoulder, but the fall had been too far and both of his ankles snapped as he landed. He rolled away in pain grabbing his ankles.

  The Guardian stood up and walked over to Daegon, looked at him as if he knew he was coming, bent over, touched his ankles, and rubbed them. Daegon watched him as the Guardian’s warm hands massaged his ankles. As he did this, he looked around at the cavern he was in and felt the coolness of the river rushing by as it moved the air, removing the stale cavernous stench he had been breathing since they entered the catacombs.

  Daegon sat up, rubbed his ankles, and felt that there was no pain, soreness, or tightness to his ankles.

  “How did you do that?” he asked.

  “There are many things I have learned to do here. With the help of these books and with the help of the Shard and its Wrae and Kronn attributes, I have learned so much of this realm, and you will as well.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Are you not my replacement? I have been waiting for the king to replace me. I have served well over my required time.”

  Daegon shook his head. “No, I think you misunderstand, I am here to take the Shard. Naemyn said it would require a sacrifice, so I am here to make sure you make a proper sacrifice, so that we can take the Shard from here.”

  The Guardian looked at him confused.

  “That is impossible. Even if you kill me, or even if I was to give it freely, neither you nor Naemyn will be leaving here with the Shard,” he said.

  “You lied!” Naemyn roared from above and jumped through the hole, but instead of landing, he stopped in mid air five feet above them, and was held motionless under the Guardian’s power.