by Aaron Hicks
“I tried my best not to scowl at them, but I must’ve because despite the fear for his sister, or maybe because of it, Thulmann started laughing harder! They did decide to work together until Thulmann’s sister was rescued as if I had no say! We travelled up the mountain some more, looking for signs of Lyssa. But we didn’t find any until we got to a cave where we started seeing lots of signs of life. We called out to her, but the cave was seemingly only occupied by a giant wolf with rigid spikes on its back that looked like they were poisonous. We were about to leave when Thulmann shouted, ‘Lyssa if you’re in the cave, shout out! We’re leaving if you’re not in there!’”
“I’m not sure what he was expecting, but the responding, ‘Thulmann! Is that you?’ surprised us all. Out walked Lyssa, who patted the wolf’s head casually. ‘What are you doing here?’ she asked.”
“‘We’re here to rescue you. Did you know that the drakes are dead?’”
“‘No! Not them! did you kill them?’ She was so sad, and looked hurt to find that the drakes had died.”
“Thulmann for his part seemed shocked, ‘Do you really think I could kill two drakes by myself?’ he asked.”
“‘I think, if you were properly motivated, you could kill anything that stood against you.’ She said it in the way that little sister often do of their bigger brothers.”
“With her two guardians dead, it wasn’t hard to convince Lyssa to travel with us back to Manori, which was less than a day’s walk from the cave. When we started travelling back to Manori, we ran into a group of dead men. I say that literally they were men, walking and well not talking like you and me, but they all had hideous wounds that would’ve felled any man.”
Uktesh interrupted unable to contain himself, “You fought Voukidists!”
Heathyr looked shocked, but Laurilli asked, “What are they?”
“They’re Afflicted humans that bring people back from the dead! They almost killed my people a hundred years ago, but we killed them all, or at least we thought that we had,” said Uktesh.
Heathyr continued, “Yes we did. We fought one. It was a desperate fight, as they outnumbered us eight to one, sixteen to one really since Lyssa and I didn’t fight. My uncle had two arrows into the mob before I could even think to do something. Both arrows each struck of the men in the chest, but they both kept coming. His next arrow went into the head of one of the dead men, and he dropped to the ground and didn’t move.”
“‘The head, they’re vulnerable if struck in the head!’ my uncle said as the fastest bunch closed in on us. Then Thulmann killed them. He just moved forward, and with each swing one of the creatures fell dead, or decapitated, sometimes two would die. My uncle took a few more shots before he stopped to watch. He moved so fast that it was over in moments, and I’m sure my jaw was hanging to my knees. Then I looked at all the dead and felt a violent heave in my stomach and quickly ran towards a tree. I barely made it before my stomach emptied itself onto the ground. I felt a hand gently pull my hair away from my face and my uncle whispered, ‘It’s ok lass. You’re not the first and you won’t be to last to be undone by as gruesome a sight as this.’”
“‘There are so many dead,’ I said wondering where they’d all come from, ‘and where’s the one that was controlling them?’ That comment got uneasy looks from Thulmann and my uncle.”
“‘Well,’ my uncle said, ‘we’ll just have to worry about that when the time comes. For now, it’s enough that we live.’”
“Then in the forest, back the way we had passed, an inhuman, unearthly roar sounded. Lyssa took a few steps away from the direction of the sound, her eyes wide, but her voice came out a whisper, ‘Dear gods, no!’”
“Thulmann was next to her in a flash, as another roar echoed into the still air, ‘What is it Lyssa? What do you know?’”
“‘She looked into Thulmann’s eyes, as tears streamed down her face, ‘They’ve been turned. My friends, my dear protectors, would never make such a noise of anguish if they were free.’”
“Thulmann stood quickly, as the realization hit us all. The two drakes, once dead, were now joining the fight. ‘We need to run!’”
“I moved toward him ready to flee, but my uncle shook his head, ‘No lad. They’ll catch us from behind, unready, unprepared. We make our stand here. It’s open enough for me to help, and yet enclosed enough that the drakes won’t be able to use their flight to a great advantage. Girls go hide.’ I did what he told me to do and helped Lyssa move towards the forest. But before we reached safety, a man stepped out and blocked out path! For a moment, I thought that it was a dead man, but he wasn’t. He just had the pallor of a dead man. I bit back a scream, as I fell to the ground away from him. The noise alerted the men that we were in trouble. But there was nothing that they could do to help us, because right then the two drakes flew into the clearing. We were on our own.”
“What did you do then?”
“I picked myself up off of the ground and held the knife my uncle had given me defensively, but I did not know how to use it.”
Uktesh interrupted, “If it was a true Voukidist, then the only thing that kills them is fire. Unfortunately, their bodies are very resistant to fire, because their magic makes it that way.”
“Oh we burned him alright, but you’re getting ahead of the story. When we first fought him and the two drakes, it was a tough battle. I don’t want to get into the details, because I don’t remember all of them, but I do remember running from the Voukidist, my uncle shooting him in the head with an arrow, and him dropping to the ground. I hid with Lyssa while my Uncle and Thulmann fought the drakes. Thulmann ran forward, and I missed what he did next, but a quick as thought, it seemed to me, he was on one of their backs. My uncle shot arrows quickly into their faces, and the ones that were able to hit and stick in the beast’s hide seemed to do no damage.”
“Thulmann threw himself from the back of the drake, cut deeply into the neck of the other drake, and landed nimbly on the ground. He jumped immediately out of the reach of the drake he’d just cut, and this too didn’t seem to hurt the drake. Thulmann repeated this trick until the cut he had made slowly grew, until it cut through the beast’s neck and it dropped to the ground. Unfortunately, this no longer allowed for him to jump off the back into the other drake, and even if he was able to Thulmann was breathing so hard that he seemed ready to drop and sweat was pouring from him. I remember my uncle sighing and muttering something about wasting a gold coin on an arrow, before reaching into his pack and pulling out a strange arrow. Still muttering to himself, he twisted a section of it near the base and suddenly the whole arrow started sparking. While he was doing that, Thulmann must’ve realized what my uncle was doing, because he made what looked to me to be a fatal error.”
“He jumped directly in the path of the drake’s mouth and was engulfed in one giant bite. I remember screaming. I remember the sound echoing from Lyssa’s voice. When suddenly, the drake let out a roar and Thulmann jumped from its mouth! His sword was stuck in its mouth causing it to stay open, and right away my uncle fired his arrow into the maw of the drake. ‘Well that’s that. It’ll either work or it won’t. I guess one way or the other I’m not going to be getting or wanting my money back.’”
Thulmann limped towards us, nodded to my uncle, and smiled, ‘I hope that thing works. I saw one used twice before, worked once, didn’t work the other time. How much did it cost you?’”
“‘A full gold.’”
“‘That’s good. At that price, you have a much better chance of buying one that works.’”
“Then, while they were ignoring the roaring drake, something happened inside and its head exploded! I later found out that my uncle had bought an arrow made with Beletarian liquid fire inside it. ‘Never thought I’d run into a Voukidist again,’ said my uncle. ‘It isn’t well known, but a group of scouts joined the Beletarians on their final attack on the Voukidist stronghold. Of the twenty Sinians that fought with the Beletarians, only two of us returned, and po
or Onis wasn’t able to walk again without a limp. I was only eighteen then, but the horrors of that day are still vivid in my memory.’”
“‘ How old are you?’ asked Thulmann.”
“And my uncle just grinned and touched the side of his nose and said, ‘Old enough boy, but that day was a horror that you young people shouldn’t have to face. I’ll burn the body myself. We should still have enough time, before he recovers.’”
“‘Recovers?’ I asked. ‘How will he recover from an arrow to the head?’”
“‘These creatures are not fully alive, so it takes a lot to kill them. So far the only thing we’ve found is fire, and even that they’re resistant to.’ While my uncle quickly built up a fire, the Voukidist woke up, grabbed a worm from the ground, and swallowed it. Then he spat out the worm again. This time the worm was bright yellow, and it quickly burrowed into the ground. My uncle quickly fired another arrow into the Voukidists head and the man stopped moving. My uncle threw the body of the Voukidist in the flames. We watched until the body started to burn before leaving, but even then the stench was horrible. We searched for that worm, not sure what he had done, but we were unable to find it. We quickly left the mountain putting the trials behind us and hoped to return quickly to Manori and return Lyssa to their parents’ home. We were not so fortunate.”
“We were on the road to Manori, when we were attacked by bandits. Their first arrow took my uncle in the throat, nearly at the same time, their second arrow took Thulmann in the shoulder. Lyssa and I dove to the ground. They came at us from both sides of the road, and it happened so quickly that I didn’t know what was happening until they were upon us. Thulmann was able to draw his sword and killed two before they became wise to his skill. My uncle, still holding onto life fired his bow four times, each time a life was lost. The six remaining men, having seen half their numbers fall realized this was a battle they were clearly not prepared for and they ran. My uncle, however, used the moments before they disappeared into the woods to kill three more. He collapsed to the ground, and by the time I got to him, he was already dead.” Tears streaked down Heathyr’s face as she recalled the tale, “Thulmann broke off the arrow from his shoulder and shouted, ‘no!’”
“I turned to see that Lyssa had fallen to the ground with an arrow in her chest, and I realized that when I’d dove to the ground she’d been forced to the ground by an arrow. ‘It’s ok brother, you and I knew the prophecy foretold that on the day I left the mountains I would die. At least this way I won’t be brought back as a walking corpse which would’ve been my fate had you not come for me.’” Heathyr paused, her voice suddenly became tight with emotion, “Her face and composure was so serene she actually smiled, ‘brother, you love this girl, I can tell, and she returns your feelings. Go with her and make a life of happiness together.’ Then she slipped silently into an eternal slumber. And that is how I met your father, and how your aunt was killed. I’m sorry, but I’m tired from all this talking, I feel I must take a moment to rest. If you need me I’ll be in my room.”
As she left, Uktesh could tell that this would be a memory that would haunt her till the day she died. Laurilli sat in silence with him for several minutes, until she curled into him and put her arms around him, and he put his arms around her. They stayed silent, holding each other until the afternoon light started to turn orange, then Laurilli said, “We should get dinner ready for mom.”
“Yeah, we should.”
Tournament of Murderers
Uktesh and Laurilli both continued to train and take their hero for hire jobs on the side, for the next three months until, true to their word, Tylor and his friends came to get Uktesh and Laurilli for the tournament. Heathyr stated that she would have to come as it would be unseemly to let two unmarried children stay together unsupervised. Uktesh knew that the real reason she wanted to go was to see if there was any word of Thulmann. There was a rumor going around that the best warriors in the army were no longer in the actual fight, but had started to train people to master a weapon of choice, and that one of them was going to be at the tournament.
After going another three months with no news from Thulmann, the three of them had started to get very worried that something terrible had happened to him. For the last two months Laurilli had been able to easily beat Heathyr and had started to spar with Uktesh. Uktesh started to have Laurilli do more and more of the lead roles when they worked their hero for hire jobs. He still reined her in when she wanted to take the lead on something she wasn’t ready for. After three months they had enough money that they felt they could live like kings for years and only make a dent in their funds. So they decided to do what anyone with a pile of money would do, they planned to make some wise bets with it in the upcoming tournament. It was while the three of them rode into town and passed a few townsfolk without getting a greeting from them that Uktesh realized they were still outsiders. He thought that perhaps because they had nothing to harvest during this festival and even despite the fact Laurilli and Uktesh had worked the last month of their Hero of Hire for the price those they chose to help suggested, he still felt like an outsider. Uktesh looked towards Li, he had started to call Laurilli “Li,” and thought, Next year we’ll help with the harvest, because it’s an easy way to bond. He’d started to call her Li first because of the stories she told, and second because he knew it bugged her a bit, and it allowed him to save the name “Laurilli,” for something important.
They were all on their way into town, each on their horses, with the fourth that they’d captured used as a pack horse. Uktesh and Laurilli wore their customary black coats, a gift from a grateful leather worker whose daughter they’d saved, to meet up with Tylor Taylor and his friends. They noticed Baloce and Dekan as they stood in the shade of the tree they seemed to enjoy, as it was between Manori and their home, “Well if it isn’t the heroes for hire,” said Dekan, “hey Laurilli I got something you can do for me! I’ll pay you real good too,” he brayed out a laugh that annoyed Uktesh to no end.
Uktesh hopped off his horse and moved to stand in front of Dekan, who had grown another three or four inches, but Uktesh had hit a growth spurt as well and was now five feet four inches, and finally the same height as Laurilli. Even with his growth Dekan still towered over him by nearly eight inches, but Uktesh said, “Now what did I tell you would happen if you said one more thing about Laurilli?”
“You’d beat me.”
“I’d beat you. Did you think I was kidding?”
“Nope, I just don’t think you can back it up.”
Uktesh laughed, and stuck his chin out, “Look I’ll even give you the first punch.” When Dekan didn’t do anything Uktesh shut his eyes and said, “Fine I won’t even watch, although I can practically smell your long greasy brown hair from here.”
He heard Baloce mutter, “Dekan,” a clear warning for him to not do whatever he wanted to do.
Uktesh opened his eyes and said, “That’s what I thought, you’re a coward.” Uktesh vaulted back onto his horse and said, “You’re not even worth my time, all those muscles and no willpower to use them.” He quickly caught up to the women.
Heathyr was furious, “Why didn’t you hurt that pissant!”
Laurilli answered for Uktesh, “They’ve been verbally abusing me in the hopes that Uktesh will throw the first punch in a fight, because it’ll give them cause to call us before the mayor, Baloce’s uncle, and get us in trouble. Fortunately the first time they’d set it up to happen with an adult witness Uktesh caught on to what was happening, since then they’ve escalated their word choices.”
“I’ll string them up by their ass hairs, before I let them talk about you that way!”
“Momma bear shows her claws with a strange word choice,” Uktesh said to Laurilli who giggled. “Don’t worry Heathyr, we’ve got a plan. You see they’re both participating in the tournament this year, in sword, unarmed, and any weapon combat. I’m going to enter all three in the hopes of meeting one of them in a ‘fair,’ fight,�
� Uktesh knew that his smile was predatory and if Dekan or Baloce saw it, it would cause more than a little a fear, but it matched Heathyr and Laurilli’s. “Anyway Li have you decided if you want to participate in sword?”
“I don’t know if I’m up to it yet.”
“Well you’re pretty good, plus I doubt the men will attack you with their full strength until the later rounds, if you make it that far. So the first few rounds will be a great chance to test your skill level.”
“I guess I can try it if you think I’m ready.”
“I think you’re ready, so it’s settled.”
A whistle interrupted the rest of their conversation, “Who’s the beautiful woman with my two best customers?” shouted Tylor Taylor as he sat on his red mare, to “match my hair,” he would say. Next to him was Larut the six feet eight inches muscular fighter, who shaved his head bald. Next to him was Repus a six feet four inches tall, willowy man with long brown hair. Next was Esolc a five feet eleven inches tall wiry man, with a brown Mohawk, that the tip of was dyed blond. The last of Tylor’s four best friends was Myrtin a six feet even tall man who, Uktesh felt could have once had defined muscles but a few years of marriage had soften him. He was still strong looking, but he had a small gut and with his black hair that had started to gray, he looked more scholarly than military.
Uktesh shouted back, “A married mother you lecher!”
“Married women get lonely boy,” he said and lowered his voice as they got closer, “but knowing her daughter, I’d be too afraid to make an advance at her, injury would surely follow that course of action.”
