“Glass? Wouldn’t they shatter as soon as you strike something?”
“Well, it’s more of a crystal,” I explained. “It’s already quite strong but strengthened by magic to be nearly unbreakable.”
Handing my swords back to me, she asked, “So your father sent you away from home. Why?”
I sheathed my swords and exhaled heavily, thinking back to our last moments together. “Pop told me that his body would soon die, but we will be together again someday. He said that I would be killed and the city destroyed, so I was to leave Ashwood to stay with our cousins, the Light Elves.”
“And was your city destroyed?”
I thought for a moment, remembering Kronyx saying he spoke with the new guardian of Ashwood. “No.”
“Then you should go back. You should go home. If the city still stands, then your father’s grim vision didn’t come to pass.”
“I have never known Pop to be wrong, no matter how bizarre or vague his visions were.”
“Then you can still warn your people!” she exclaimed. “He may have told you to leave, but he didn’t tell you that you couldn’t go back.”
“Pop said that only together can we save our people.”
Lorena looked confused as she tried to understand what even I could not. “So you’re just supposed to turn your back on your people?” she finally asked.
“I… I need some sleep,” I told her, slowly getting to my feet. “Thank you for the drink.”
I turned to walk up the stairs from the dock when she took hold of my hand. I jerked my hand away. “Only Jinxie may hold my hand,” I said before realizing my rudeness. “I’m sorry…”
Sadly, Lorena whispered, “So that was her name.”
I left to find a place to sleep in the forest; if I could sleep after all that’s happened, after all that I’ve lost.
“Rain is coming,” I heard her say behind me.
“Rain is coming,” I repeated under my breath just as tears welled up in my eyes and broke from the edge of my lashes to pour down my face.
I walked between the huts and into the forest. I had to continually wipe tears from my eyes so that I could see where I was walking. The forest was sparse, and the sandy soil kept most of the undergrowth from taking root. Still within view of the restaurant, I took the pair of swords off my back and sat at the foot of a tree. I took a pinch of Jinxie’s ashes from the pouch on my belt to examine and feel between my fingers.
“This is far beyond my power,” I whispered to myself. “You were supposed to help me.”
I laid down just as rain droplets began pelting the tree leaves above me. I began getting wet but didn’t move from beneath the tree. Visions of my beloved Jinxie flooded my mind. I remembered her lying next to me, holding my hand while we drifted off to sleep, as she had done for decades but no more. She was gone, and I found myself holding my own hand. My hand tightened into a fist, and I beat the sand as the pain overwhelmed me. I wanted to be a kid again and free from the weight of the world. I wanted to be home in Lylandria with Jinxie in my arms. I wanted Pop here to assure me that everything was wonderful. But I couldn’t have those things back. The life I lived was over.
It began raining harder, and the tree that I was under could no longer keep me dry. I sat up from the dampening sand and pulled my knees up to my chest.
Jinxie’s final act of bravery was to save me. She died so that I may live. The pain was unbearable, but I could not give up; the world needed me; my people needed me. Jinxie’s sacrifice would not be in vain.
“Perhaps this was the best way you could help; you know I’ll find a way to save you.”
Through the trees, I saw Lorena running between the huts to come find me in the forest.
“Ambros! Ambros!” she called.
I stood from under the tree, and she hurried over to me.
She yelled over the pouring rain. “You can’t rest out here in this. Come on.”
I nodded, and she took hold of my wrist. We ran through the rain back to her hut where she had a fire burning inside for us to sit by.
The walls of the hut were made of bamboo that had been tied tightly together. The floor was soft sand, and the roof was made up of several layers of dried foliage over a bamboo frame. Wood panels were closed over the windows to keep the rain from blowing in. A small hatch near the roof’s peak was open to allow smoke from the fire to escape.
Colorful hats and sharp weapons decorated the walls of her spacious hut. Against the left wall, a bed covered in furs sat atop a wooden platform. Firewood was neatly stacked to the right. At the back were several chests, a table, and a mirror.
Lorena grabbed a towel to wrap her wet hair in and tossed me one to use. “Feel free to strip down,” she said, turning away from me.
Calling her out, I pointed to her reflection, “But you can still see me in the mirror!”
“All right,” she laughed, holding her hands out. “You caught me.”
Thinking for a moment, I suggested, “How about we sit in these chairs back to back by the fire and then we can both dry off with some privacy?”
Twisting her lips as she considered it, “That doesn’t sound fun at all, but okay.”
She grabbed another towel from a table and a robe for herself, and we turned our chairs so we could sit back to back.
I dried my hair with the towel and unbuttoned my black shirt, tossing it into the fire. It immediately vanished into the magical realm from whence I had summoned it.
“Hey! Don’t you think you’ll want to put those back on in the morning?” she asked.
I turned my head to see her speaking over her bare shoulder. To show her that I could easily recreate my clothing, I held my hands out to the side so she could watch me magically pull a hair ribbon from my hand.
“Did you make that?” Lorena asked, reaching back to take the ribbon.
“Magic isn’t used just for destruction or raising the dead. It can also be used to create.” I pulled off my shoes and tossed them, too, in the fire to see them immediately dissipate.
“So you make your own clothing from magic?”
“I do,” I answered, removing my pants. I threw them into the fire and used the towel she had given me to dry off.
“Can you make rope?”
“I can, but like all summoned materials, it doesn’t retain its strength for very long. The rope will unravel and dissipate after a few hours unless it’s maintained.”
“Well, I suppose you can always use it to tie me up,” she whispered seductively.
I hurried to clothe myself, concentrating on another pair of pants. A light smoke swirled around my ankles and worked its way up my legs as it created a dark fabric. I summoned another shirt the same way before noticing that Lorena was no longer behind me. Turning around in my chair, I saw that she had turned her chair, so she could watch me. I suddenly felt embarrassed.
“There’s no reason to be shy. I didn’t see anything that I shouldn’t,” she smiled.
Wearing a fine silk robe, she sat with her legs crossed and one arm draped casually over the back of her chair. Her hair was brushed neatly straight, and her sun kissed skin looked luxurious in the fire light. I couldn’t deny that she was beautiful, well, for a human. And it wasn’t just her physical features that made her attractive. It was the way she carried herself, her take-charge attitude, her unhindered nature.
Realizing that I had been studying her for too long, I looked around the room. “So where should I sleep tonight?” I finally asked.
Nodding to the bed, Lorena answered, “Well, we could share the bed, or I can sleep here in this chair.”
“I would prefer to sleep alone,” I answered quickly, “but I cannot take your bed. I’ll sleep here in the chair.”
“You’re my guest. I don’t mind giving you the bed for one night. I insist that you sleep in it. After what you’ve told me, you could use a good night’s rest.”
Giving in to her hospitality, I accepted the offer to sleep in the
comfortable looking bed of thick animal furs. I stepped up on the platform and sat on the edge of the bed, pulling several layers of furs back. I placed my swords under the covers in case she felt the desire to steal them again.
“So you’ve chosen to sleep with your swords instead of a woman? I like you more and more,” she commented, drawing a tired laugh from me.
“Thank you for giving me a place to sleep for the night.” My body seemed to melt beneath the warm furs, and my eyes fell shut. The sound of pouring rain and burning wood eased me to sleep.
CHAPTER V
THE CRIMSON SPEAR
Dawn came, and the rain had passed. A warm breeze blew in through the open shutters, and Lorena was singing softly.
“Ugh, I’m alive,” I grunted, sitting up on my elbow and rubbing my face.
“Good morning,” Lorena said cheerfully. She was already dressed and looking at herself in the mirror while she brushed her hair. She took a sip from a mug and walked over to a kettle on the fire to dip out a cup for me.
I found my swords that were still in the bed with me and sat by the fire with her. Looking at the thick, red liquid within the mug that she handed me, I asked, “No spoon?”
She took a spoon from a pot of utensils near her and handed it to me.
Dipping it into the steaming cup, I found nothing solid within it to eat. “There’s nothing in it!” I declared.
“There’s not supposed to be anything in it; it’s tomato soup, silly.”
I held it to my nose to sniff, and Lorena laughed at me.
“Hmm, okay.” I handed the spoon back to her and took a sip of the soup. Smacking my lips as I tasted it, I nodded to her. “Not bad. Thank you.”
While sitting by the fire drinking soup, I thought about where to go from there. I needed answers. I needed to go back to Ashwood and meet their dragon guardian. Perhaps then I could find out what happened to Magnus and why Pop put so much faith in him.
After finishing her cup of soup, Lorena poured a kettle of water over the fire to put it out. “Come on. I’m ready for some breakfast.”
“You mean, this is not it?”
She waved for me to follow her, and we walked back to her restaurant where people were already eating.
With mouths full of food, everyone she walked by saluted her with a muffled, “Mornin’, Captain.”
She gave only a respectful nod as she headed toward the breakfast buffet.
Like the night before, a long table was filled with fruit, freshly baked breads, and many different types of seafood. I followed Lorena around the table while we filled our plates. She picked up a stick that had grilled chunks of fruit and curled pieces of meat on it. She placed one on both our plates. “You have to try this.”
“What is it?”
“It is skewered shrimp and pineapple,” she answered as she headed to an empty table. “It’s delightful.”
I sat across from her and began sampling the food on my plate.
“So how do you like it?” she asked while she ate.
I had to turn away; seeing her eat was making me nauseous. I had dissected maggot-filled carcasses on hot summer days with hardly a cough, but this human was turning my stomach just by eating breakfast. She was like a reanimated deer, beautiful, yet vicious.
“That good, huh?” she commented when I didn’t answer her.
When I looked back at her, I saw a corpse pulling shrimp from a skewer with its teeth! It had stringy, blonde hair and wore the same clothes that Lorena had been wearing. It was indeed Captain Lorena, only I saw her as a corpse. I closed my eyes and tried to shake away the vision.
“Are you okay?” she asked, reaching across the table to touch my hand.
I pulled my hand away and looked around the room to remind myself where I was but saw everyone as corpses! I examined my hands and found them to look healthy. I had skin, but everyone else was rotting.
“Ambros! Are you okay?” she repeated.
Looking back to her, she appeared normal. I took a deep breath and tapped a finger on the side of my head. “Death and decay rots away the brain.”
“You scare me sometimes, you know that?”
“HA! I scare you? If only you saw the world as I see it,” I told her as I began to eat my breakfast.
“And how do you see the world?” she asked with a smile.
“Everything is dead.” My expression was as lifeless as my words. “You’re dead.” I pointed to a grizzled old man at the table next to us. “He’s dead.” I pointed to the ladies putting food out on the buffet. “They’re dead. Everyone in here, everyone I’ve ever met, everyone I expect to meet is dead. And we eat the dead,” I added, lifting my plate on one side. “But what I can’t understand,” I said, looking at my hands, “is how come I look alive?”
The old man sitting at the table next to us stood up and said, “You’re scaring me.” He began to leave but came back for his bacon. He then walked out of the restaurant.
“I could have sworn I was alive when I woke up this morning,” Lorena joked.
“I wish I knew what was wrong with me.”
“Is there anyone back home you could talk to? Do you have friends there?”
Staring at the food on my plate, I shook my head. Then I remembered Pop’s notes and how he created me. A spark of hope lit my face. “Well, there may be something. Do you think you can take me home?”
Lorena burped and wiped her mouth on her sleeve before answering. “I don’t know. Any place from here is a long journey.”
“Okay, what do you want?”
Pointing to the swords on my back, she answered, “Devour would be nice.”
“These were given to me by my pop…”
“These were given to me by my pop,” she mocked. “You asked what I wanted, so I told you. You have nothing else to barter with.” She then bit her lip and started to suggest another form of payment. “We could…”
“…get you a similar sword once we reach Ashwood,” I said before she could say what I believed she was about to suggest.
Lorena laughed and took a bite of bread. “Ready the Spear,” she ordered loudly to everyone in the restaurant. The men immediately left their tables and hurried out the door.
“How many men does it take?” I asked.
Lorena went about finishing her breakfast. “Go ahead and finish your meal,” she answered between bites.
While I ate, I watched women clear tables and put away food. Lorena ate much quicker than I did, so she handed her empty plate to one of the ladies and got her mug refilled with juice to drink.
Once I finished, she downed the last of her juice and motioned for me to follow her outside where she pointed to the ship in the bay. “That is my ship, the Crimson Spear. It belonged to my father, but the other ship captains that sail these waters know that I didn’t follow in his nefarious footprints. Where he deceived people to obtain goods, I try to build and maintain business relations through bartering.”
The ship was narrow and painted red. It tapered into a point at the front and had a platform built at the rear, or what the sailors called the bow and stern of the ship.
Men loaded crates aboard the ship while women carried on baskets of food and jugs of water. We walked out on the pier and stepped over onto the ship. A couple dozen men sat on boxes along the deck where they readied long oars to propel it.
I followed Lorena into a small room beneath the ship’s rear platform where she unrolled a map on a table. “Show me where you need to go, and I’ll get you there,” she told me, and I pointed to the place.
When everyone was ready, Captain Lorena gave the order to depart, and the ship was slowly paddled out of the bay and out to sea.
I was a child of the forest, so I felt vulnerable, yet free, in the open waters. The salty ocean air was refreshing. A large flock of birds rested on the waves, paying no mind as we passed by.
The women braided each other’s hair to keep from getting tangles. Lorena offered me a hat to protect my head f
rom the harsh sun, but I told her that elves do not sunburn.
As the men began to sweat from rowing, the women wiped their brows and brought them water.
“Who do you work for?” Lorena yelled at the men.
“Captain Lorena!” they all answered in unison, rowing harder.
“What do you work for?” Lorena asked them.
“Legs and tail!”
Walking between the rows of men, she asked, “And who has the hottest legs and tail of them all?”
“Captain Lorena!”
“That’s right!” she proclaimed, placing a sandaled foot on one of the men’s back as he rowed. “Now do my bidding and push! Pull! Harder! Faster!” She repeated the orders over and over to keep them in rhythm. “We’ve broken through the current and have a good wind,” she announced to her crew. “Raise the sail!”
The men quickly pulled in their oars and hoisted a single white sail depicting a bloody spear. With the wind to our backs, Lorena stepped up on the rear platform and took over the steering oar from one of her female crewmates. She steered the ship while her crew filled their mugs to celebrate. One of the crew members began lightly stamping his feet. Others joined in, and the beat grew louder. Once everyone was stamping out the beat, they began singing.
With our ship in the sea,
The wind in our sail,
And ale in our mugs,
We are free!
With our gods in the sky,
The world at our feet,
And stars as our guide,
We’re alive!
The crew began repeating the lyrics, and a pretty, red-haired lady took my hand, pulling me into the fun. I mimicked her movements, stamping my feet and thrusting a fist into the air. I saw Lorena at the rear of the ship laughing and clapping her hands with the beat, happy to see me included.
After the celebration died down, everyone returned to their duties of weaving rope and working on other necessities. I walked to the back to talk to Lorena while she steered the ship.
“I see you survived a round with my crew,” she said to me while looking across the ship to the distant horizon.
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