Alliances

by B. T. Robertson

  This confidence, more than anything else, stood out to Foran while he watched the giant's every move. The elf knew Farrin had liked chatting with him despite the obvious differences between their races. Foran was, above all else, an elfin warrior, training to become what Ithyllna already was: a Vrunyn Guard of Mynandrias. They were said to be the fiercest of the elfin warriors, even more so than their dark elf relatives, because of their heritage—the bosom children of the goddess Sheevos, according to their religion. Farrin knew this, and knew through talking with Foran that the elf held little else above attaining his goal. It was his life.

  Foran walked along, and couldn't help but notice how strong the brute was in spirit, a fact more overlooked with the giants than any other. Their massive physique and weapon wielding skills far outweighed their disregarded mental prowess. Foran had found hidden treasure in Farrin: his uncompromising attitude toward protecting his friends, his insatiable desire to lead his people out of hardship, and, quite surprisingly, his need for love. The elf had noticed it when Aerinas and Ithyllna walked off together in the grove. Farrin gazed after the pair through the trees, staring hard. Foran could see the love in his eyes for the elfin maiden-turned-warrior, and it astonished him so. How could this giant, this mountain-dwelling behemoth, come to love one not of his own race? In answering the question Foran found a reason: love knew no boundaries, knew nothing of why or when or even how, just that it existed in every being's heart as much as the desire for survival.

  "How be ya'?” Farrin asked, lightly shouldering the pondering Foran, nearly knocking the elf clean off his feet and into the brush-lined road.

  "A-ah...” he stuttered, surprised by the sudden interruption, “just fine, Farrin. How...be...ya'?"

  "Bwa-ha-ha!” Farrin laughed. He gave his friend another shove. “Now yer talkin’ like me n’ ma’ boys. Can tell yer've been hangin’ ‘round me too long."

  Foran gave Farrin a half-smile, still caught between his thoughts of the ‘mindless’ giant and the shoves.

  "Too quiet, though, I reckon,” the giant continued, noting Foran's withdrawn expression.

  Foran suddenly burst out laughing and gave his huge friend a shove when he least expected it. Farrin stumbled and crashed headlong into the brush off to the west side of the road.

  "Will you two knock it off please?” Aeligon scolded. He helped hoist Farrin out of the prickly bushes. “You're disturbing the peace."

  Farrin painfully pulled some thorns out of his forearms and knees with Foran in tow, still laughing. “Ah, sorry Aeligon,” Farrin grumbled. “I was just tryin’ to pep up my elfin companion ‘ere."

  "We don't need any injuries due to jesting, Farrin,” Aeligon said, ignoring the giant's excuse. Then, the wizard's eyes widened and a broad smile crossed his face.

  "Come here,” he ordered Farrin, who crossed the gap between them in one-and-a-half strides.

  Aeligon bent over, only slightly, to brush the dust off Farrin's knees into his outstretched palm. “Here is what makes these northern mountains so famous.” He held up his palm for the others to see. The dust was sparkling brightly in his hand like crystals caught in the golden glow of the sun's rays. “Amberfire,” he offered after they had all had a peek. “'Tis the rock the dwarves mine deep under these mountains."

  "They what?” Farrin exclaimed, his face alert and eyes wide. “Don't be tellin’ me dwarves be in me mountains, Aeligon."

  "They're not in your mountains, my giant friend; they're under them and far to the north, near the Arthean Sea."

  "But they be gettin’ rich off these tiny pebbles, eh?” he pressed.

  "Word is they do,” Aeligon laughed, brushing the Amberfire dust off his hands. “Sell them for a high price in Drameda. The dwarves lend little else to the economy besides that, but Amberfire is considered the purest of stones in all the land, and dwarves are the only ones willing and stubborn enough to brave the world beneath our feet."

  "Bah,” Farrin said with a wave of his hand. “Giants're just as willin’ ta’ be diggin’ tunnels in our mountains. But not fer treasure, mind ya'...fer a place outta the wind!"

  "To each their own,” Aeligon said. “Let's keep moving. We have to make it to the end of this road and camp in the land of Caran tonight. No sense in being caught in the mountains twice."

  "Stone golems be roamin',” Farrin ventured, peering into the distance where the fog formed a barrier to the beyond.

  Farrin's comment sent Aeligon back to that moment, then back to the encounter with the creature Grumpkin in the grove. He still hadn't mentioned it to anyone, and only Pux knew of it. Until the Healer had more substantial information, which wouldn't alarm everyone more than they already were, he chose to maintain secrecy.

  Only Aerinas could sense the wizard's preoccupation. From the midst of the travelers’ column, he watched Aeligon carefully. He felt an urgency to learn more of the mystical wizard. It was almost as if Aerinas could sense the magic surrounding Aeligon, read his thoughts at times. Everyone knew that elves possessed low-level magical abilities, but compared to Aerinas’ extraordinary aura, those were trivial.

  He wondered if Aeligon felt it, too, wondered if the Healer could feel Aerinas’ mental probing. Though Aerinas knew little of the source of his own magical powers, he was learning more about them. How much, he couldn't tell.

  Grumpkin stepped through the door right after waving to the tall wizard, who was looking back at him with a strange, but unsurprised expression.

  The trip the Lyymhorn took was not an easy one; he felt pain each time the vortex engulfed him. A globular mass of clear fluid wrapped around his body, constricting tightly. The ride commenced with the swirling and spinning of lights and the sound of metal on metal when the door shrank away into the disorienting abyss. After what seemed like many long minutes—when in truth it was only a microsecond of time—he was dumped out onto the other side of the doorway. The fluid glob spat him out into the world beyond—his own world, the home of the Lyymhorns.

  They were glad to see him. All of his family were waiting for him in the swampy grove of deadwood and snidegrass, and they embraced him the moment he was on his feet.

  "We happy to see Menishka'dun,” one said, hugging him tightly.

  "Yes, yes, we all happy to see him, yes, yes,” said another.

  The reunion was brief. The stagnant water of the swamp began to ripple and churn in regular intervals, vibrations thudding right to the core of the Lyymhorns’ bones.

  "He come, yes, he want talk with Menishka'dun,” said one, smiling broadly.

  Menishka'dun cowered low while the others scattered and scurried to their homes in the deadwood. The door behind the remaining Lyymhorn closed, and he stood alone on a tuft of snidegrass, awaiting His arrival.

  Though small and primitive, Menishka'dun was smart enough to know fear of his master. Will Master approve of games Menishka'dun play? he asked himself fleetingly. He didn't have time to muse much. Out from the darkness of the swamp's dark trees stepped a massive figure towering nearly as tall as the trees themselves. Most of the trees it easily pushed aside, snapping and breaking them off like they were kindling. Its footsteps made deep impressions in the mud, and the foul spray of turbid swamp water rained down on Menishka'dun's head, which he tried in vain to cover with his jacket.

  Menishka'dun and his kin were frightened because none of the Lyymhorns had ever seen the one they called Master face to face before. This must be serious if He was coming to them. It was all Menishka'dun could do to keep his knees from buckling and from vomiting all over himself. He was scared—they all were.

  When the figure finally emerged from the cover of the trees, Menishka'dun grew horrified. He pointed his stubby little finger at the approaching figure, stomping and running about the island of snidegrass he was standing on, unable to speak due to the fear coursing through him.

  "Calm yourself, Menishka'dun,” the other ordered, jamming the end of the club it held into the mud. “You speak when you are spoken
to.” The voice was deep and menacing, placing upon the air a heavy stench.

  Menishka'dun stood frozen with fear, whimpering, his knees quaking and his hands trembling.

  "Now, let us get down to business, shall we?” the other said. “First, did you do what I ordered you to do? Did you find the elves and did you kill them with your magic?"

  Menishka'dun nervously searched for the right words. After stammering a bit, he finally was able to utter something coherent. “I did what you command, but elves not dead. Elves found Menishka'dun and chased Menishka'dun away. Stonie just about to crush elves when they stopped me."

  "I know all that, you mindless whelp,” the other barked, shifting the spiked club from one hand to the other. “I meant the second time I sent you back, the trip you just returned from. Did you find the wizard man?"

  As if to illustrate, the beast shape-shifted into wizard form—a wizard strangely familiar to Menishka'dun.

  Menishka'dun paused all of a sudden, confused, unsure of how to answer. “Well,” he ventured, “Menishka'dun found...you.” He pointed at the shapeshifter, who tried to hide the smile on his face.

  "Yes you did, didn't you?” the other replied with an evil grin. “But do you know how dangerous this particular wizard is? Do you? You toyed with him too lightly, and now he's still wandering Vaaluna with those elves! I want them destroyed, do you understand?” The figure shifted back into the beastly shape it had first assumed.

  Menishka'dun didn't understand at all. How did Master know? He guessed that Master always knew what happened—he was the master, after all. But why was Master so angry at wizard man? And why the sudden shift into wizard man? Was it to confuse and scare Menishka'dun? He wasn't sure, so he lied, “Yes, Menishka'dun understand. Master in charge. Menishka'dun will do as told. Menishka'dun kill elves and wizard man."

  Without uttering another word, the beast turned and crashed back through the trees and disappeared into the darkness of the swamp, leaving the frightened Lyymhorn alone with his fear and doubts.

  Menishka'dun's relatives slowly crept out of their holes and tree trunk hiding places, and joined him on the snidegrass island.

  "Fear not, Menishka'dun,” one said, placing a hand on his slumped shoulder. “Master knows best. Better Menishka'dun not argue with Master."

  "It true, poor Menishka'dun,” a female reinforced. “Master can see all things, see when you disobey. It best you leave now and do what Master said."

  Menishka'dun, defeated and dispirited, turned to the emptiness awaiting him there in his swamp home. His kin stepped back. He held out his index finger and mumbled something in his native language that he had spoken hundreds of times already in the Master's service. The end of the finger began to glow white. Then, he began to draw some linear patterns in the air—first a large circle, one diagonal line straight through it from the northeast quadrant to the southwest, and another larger half-circle on the outside that connected the two ends of the line. Lastly, a single diagonal line was drawn from the center of the inner circle to the northwestern quadrant of the design. When all was complete, Menishka'dun spoke one last word, and the lines all began to glow brighter white at the same time. They faded away; the door in time and space eased open, revealing the swirling fabric of twisting colors and the liquid glob ready to transport him over.

  With a glance back at his family, who were wide-eyed and scared for their son and brother, Menishka'dun winked at them in a playful way, albeit fake, and ducked inside.

  Menishka'dun had miscalculated. The lines he drew with his finger, with his brand of Wild Magic, were the coordinates to Vaaluna. If one movement was missed, one line drawn too long or not long enough, catastrophe soon followed. Fortunately for the Lyymhorn, the miscalculation still landed him in Vaaluna, but not in the intended spot hidden from the rest of the world. Instead, the door opened up at the top of a building—a human building! As the glowing lines faded away in the air, Menishka'dun found himself plummeting downward several feet to the rooftop. Howling winds and freezing rain assaulted him instantly, and flashes of lightning cracked down nearby, shattering the night's air like a god's speech.

  He was suddenly afraid, not so much because of what Master would surely do to him as punishment, but more so because he had landed in, what was obviously, a human town. From the rooftop, he spied the ships—large wooden vessels being tossed about in the harbor as they were lashed by the pounding waves. He had no idea where he really was, but was thanking the gods he hadn't landed in the water or any other of the countless pitfalls of Vaaluna. Still, his magic only allowed him safe passage when the door could be fully opened, and it took quite a bit of time to recover his strength to open it again.

  He was stranded in this unfamiliar town, and he had to find a way out.

  Moving across the entire rooftop, crouched low, he searched the busy cobblestone streets for any sign of an escape route. Humans were running in every direction, some with coats held over their heads while they ran from cover to cover before finally ducking inside a crowded tavern. Though he was confused, Menishka'dun had seen this before, enough to know how humans reacted to most things—in a panic. The Lyymhorn deduced the torrential storm had hit suddenly, like most coastland storms did. Menishka'dun knew the map of Vaaluna well.

  He was in Drameda.

  The rain had them soaked to the bone that night, but Aeligon didn't care. They had made it through the mountain pass and into the woodlands of South Caran, the smallest of the territories in charted Vaaluna. With the mountains to their backs and the ocean in front of them, the cold air swept down, clashed with the warm air crossing the ocean, and met in the middle to provide Caran with mostly unpredictable weather. Seasons meant little there. Winter was a mixture of snow, ice, and rain, while summer was hot, sticky, and still rainy.

  "Bah, stinkin’ rain,” Farrin barked, obviously much more at home in the cold than under the torrential downpour.

  "It will pass,” Aeligon comforted, though none of them found the intention of his comment. But the wizard was comforted well enough. Drameda lay less than a half-day's walk from where they were camped, and the ground was flat and easy to travel, with little in the way of deadly creatures to contend with. They would have plenty of those in the human town they'd targeted.

  They all tried to put apprehension aside and concentrated on getting sleep, if the rain would allow it. Farrin volunteered to stay up all night and keep watch; he wasn't getting much sleep anyway and cursed the sky for sending the rain.

  Menishka'dun knew he had been spotted. He hadn't kept far enough away from the edge. The brutes waited until a lightning flash illuminated his hiding spot, then they rushed him. They came out of the shadows, four of them, each laughing and carrying bottles and boards. Two started to climb the stack of crates leaning against the front of the building, while the other two circled around to the back via the ally on the south side.

  There was nowhere he could go. He only had what little magic he could call up in this world, more sleight of hand than anything else. To cause a little diversion here, cast an illusion there, was his edge. He didn't even have a weapon—Planar travel didn't allow them. Besides, he had no melee experience with humans, who were taller, faster, and far more evil in their intentions than any creature he knew.

  Menishka'dun panicked.

  The first two humans scrambled over the roof ‘s edge, so Menishka'dun made for the opposite side. But the two who had circled around the back had also braved the climb, and were already making for him from that direction. He was surrounded and trapped, nowhere to go but to jump over the edge to the east or west, which would almost certainly lead to his death.

  His mind was racing, but there was no more apparent solution than to try to outsmart the drunken savages. Survival techniques from Was'un Mark wouldn't work here.

  "What're ya’ waitin’ fer?” one human squealed. “Take the ‘lil shit down!"

  The two coming in from the rear raised their wooden boards and reached for Menis
hka'dun. In a flash, the Lyymhorn bit the one's hand and did a rolling somersault between the other's legs. Once behind them, he stood up and kicked out quickly with his two feet, burying them solidly into the backs of their knees. The boards were dropped, and the two cursing men fell to the ground—but only for a moment. Even more outraged, the two were on their feet in a hurry and dove just in time to snatch Menishka'dun by his ankles.

  Menishka'dun struggled, but suddenly he heard the crunching sound of wood on bone, and he felt a warm sensation running across the skin of his head and neck in contrast to the chill of the rain. All went black.

  The next morning, the fog was thicker than any the group had ever witnessed. The rain had stopped, but had left its little brother behind to tend to the land while it rested in the gray clouds swirling overhead.

  "Are we ta’ see nothin’ of this cursed land?” Farrin snorted, still drenched and irritated from his sleepless night. “I don't even know why we bother keepin’ a watch goin’ in this mess. What creature would be crazy enough ta’ bother goin’ out in it ta’ make trouble?"

  His complaining trailed off. Aeligon tuned him out and surveyed the land ahead. Aerinas stood next to him, his elf eyes able to cut through the mist better than the Healer's.

  "The storm will silence our approach,” the elf noted while he and Aeligon looked on.

  "And the fog will mask our presence,” Aeligon added, looking back at Farrin and smiling. “Appears our visitor last night left us more than a wet and angry giant."

  Aerinas chuckled. “He was right, though."

  "About what?” Aeligon asked, turning to Aerinas.

  "When are we going to see this land of ours? It seems only yesterday we departed from Mynandrias, my home. I have only ever traveled to Merchindale under cover of darkness. I have yet to see what Vaaluna has to offer.” Aerinas’ voice was full of regret.