by Winfred Wong
“Why don’t you ask them if you are not certain?” Morph tempted him, fixating him with a frosty stare, hand off of the grip. “You already know the drill.”
“That’s actually a good idea,” Althalos said clearly, slowing down.
“Of course,” Morph said, smiling smugly, in a cunning tone. “Try to expand your mind, think wider, go beyond your experiences in life that refrain you from imagining, and believe that what you create in your mind is actually real.”
Immediately faked a smile, “That’s easier said than done,” Althalos said, lightly tugging his hair, when a strident and despairing scream from a hopeless man disrupted their conversation.
“What was that!?” Althalos said when that man wailed in agony again, and a terrible thought dawned on him.
“I’ll go have a look,” Morph said and ran up along the inclined road.
As he reached the end of the road, he saw three lightly-armed bandits, one dying local lying on the ground, thrashing around in pain, and Ayrith, the village, that was only about half a mile away. His eyes then lingered on the three outlaws. One of the bandits held a slightly damaged steel sword in his hand and was protected by an undersized leather garment while the rest of them only had short blunt knives. Morph slunk back to Althalos, slipped back like a nimble cat.
“Who are these guys?” he whispered to Althalos.
Yet Althalos could only respond with a deafening silence, he had his mouth widened, drawing in a deep breath, his eyes nearly popped out, and his limbs shaking like leaves, conspicuously petrified.
“Ma…lo….” he quavered as a coldness crept around his soul.
For one last time, the dying man howled out loud for help in anguish. The only difference between the first shriek and this was that this time it didn’t last long before stillness returned.
“NO!” Althalos cried out all of a sudden while tear drops were sliding down from each eye simultaneously.
Steeped in devastation, he hugged himself, crouched down, and placed his palms over his earlobes, hoping to ease his pain by isolating himself from the world.
Alarmed by the unexpected loud cry, the bandits realized that they were not alone. They closed in fast, judging by the hasty footsteps. Morph looked around, grabbed Althalos sleeve and dragged him up to hide out behind a tree.
“Stay put and do not make a sound!” he poked his nose and commanded.
Then he took out the bow on his chest, nocked it with an arrow and dashed toward the bandits.
Left behind when Morph went out of Althalos’s sight, the overwhelming panic in Althalos took charge over him entirely. Running away was the only thing he can think of within his startled mind. The soothing song of the parrots was still lingering in the azure sky just like it had always been, as if they were entreating him to stay, but he was no longer in the mood to listen, and he fled.
Fear propelled him out of his stillness, to run away frantically from the bandits, from his dying childhood friend, and from his terror. Knowing that the river will eventually lead him back to Ayrith, he sprinted back toward the streamlet and ran along it at full throttle until he felt safe.
∫∫
Before Althalos began running, Morph had already reached the elevated end of the road. He pulled the bowstring taut to his ears expertly and aimed at the bandit approaching quickly from the right with a knife. The flight path of the arrow had already conceived in his mind when the hideous bandits were in range. He didn’t hesitate to let the arrow fly when he was ready, and the soaring arrow precisely pierced through the man’s heart in a heartbeat, splitting air effortlessly.
Then he delicately placed his long bow on the uneven surface of graveled road and drew out a ruby thin curved blade, which gave off an unsavory odour of steel, from a lily-white sheath beneath his horse trunk to steel himself for a clash when the rest of the foes were advancing on the double fiercely.
As the bandit leader engaged him with his blunt sword upheld, he went for a downward slash followed by an upswing. Morph took a step backward to dodge the first swing and blocked the second with his bloodthirsty blade agilely despite the huge mass of his trunk.
In the meantime, the other bandit had already slid to his back, propelling his knife at Morph with his full strength, and at just a second before he was stabbed, Morph cracked out a smirk, kicked the leader in his stomach with his front legs and leapt to the left swiftly to evade the hit, all done within a second. Bugged his eyes out, the attacker didn’t even know how his target dodged it as the blistering and impeccable moves that he just witnessed were by far the best he had seen in his entire life.
The fate of failure of the bandits was sealed when Morph beautifully bashed the attacker’s arm and lacerated his left waist thrice brutally. Terrified by this savageness, the remaining bandit leader was scared to death, knowing by his palpitating hand that could barely hold a sword, but he did manage to calm himself down soon and brandish his sword to keep a safe distance from the centaur. However, disregarding the swinging sword of the bandit, Morph strode forward fearlessly and wielded his blade.
“Hey, scum,” Morph snarled, glaring at that man, who had an eagle tattoo on his neck. “I will spare your life if you tell me everything I want to know.”
Unanticipatedly, the shivering bandit did not speak a word. In order to open his mouth, Morph swung his red blade stoutly to meet that man’s dull sword in the air, and, as an inexorable result of the clinking collision, the blunt sword was shattered into pieces.
“I don’t have much time to waste!” he growled in rage.
The shards of the swords all showered on the floor of stones, and the disarmed bandit decided to flee. He was, nonetheless, shot in the right knee from behind by a spinning arrow after a few steps. After being hit, as a last-ditch effort to escape, he tried to get up, but the stiffness was just too much to bear, so, ultimately accepting his fate, he decided to lie down and await the end of his life when, with the long bow, Morph was coming over.
Standing near the bandit, “Now, you are going to talk, scum,” Morph threatened the man, dragging his hair violently.
“Okay, I will tell you everything I know.” He begged with a twisted look.
“Did Pancho send you here? Why?” Morph interrogated.
“Yes, yes,” the bandit moaned. “He told us to look for a man who carries a red, ancient staff in that village.”
“How many of you have come??” asked Morph.
The bandit shook his head.
“Tell me!!” Morph thundered menacingly, trampling on his chest, manes on his limbs raised.
Then Morph, as to give vent to his impatience, punched him in his eyes, and the bandit grimaced in pain.
“I don’t know, I swear to god!! Many have come!! But I don’t know the number!!” the bruised bandit cried.
“What is Pancho’s plan??” Morph questioned.
“He told the three of us to disguise as mercenaries that are escorting a wagon to go into the village and find that man, but we came here late, and we couldn’t find that wagon,” he revealed. “Then we happened to meet a traveller who seemed to have some good stuffs in his bag, and the rest is history.”
“Liar! Pancho is no fool!” Morph snarled and pressed the edge of the blade on his throat. “He understands exactly what a mind-wielder is capable of, not to mention a wielder with that staff! Three bandits stand no chance against that man!”
“Please don’t kill me,” the bandit quavered while blood kept seeping out his separated skin on his neck. “According to the plan, we are supposed to find that man and lure him into an ambush, and even if we failed, the others are already preparing to raid the village at midnight. That man will be surprised by how we outnumber him.”
The talking was over. Leaving no men alive, Morph went back to look for Althalos, but there was no one. Resentfully, he glared at the village, where the staff owner and Althalos were, and pounded his chest like a Gorilla.
CHAPTER SIX
* * *
“Ali, I’m sorry to interrupt,” Desman tapped on the shoulder of the wagon owner, who had a long hair and a shiny necklace on, and said. “My friend here has decided to go with you.”
“Who?” Ali said, as he pointed his finger to Chavdar and Dulais. “I thought there was only one traveller.”
“Yes, you’re right about this,” Chavdar said, waving his hand, with his book. “He is the one leaving, not me.”
“Hmm,” Ali uttered, got in the vehicle and took the back seat when the masked driver took the elevated driver seat behind the horses after all the chests had been loaded. “Don’t forget to pay before you touch the lazyback on my seat, stranger.”
“Of course.” Dulais agreed, grabbed two coins from his waist bag and tossed it to him.
“I guess this is goodbye,” Chavdar said disappointedly. “And I still haven’t got the chance to figure out why the staff shined yet.”
“Don’t worry.” Dulais cheered him. “You will get your chance if you come with me.”
“Come with you?” he said slowly as if he had just heard something beyond expectation.
“Yes, if you wish,” the staff owner replied. “As I’ve told you, someone like you could be of a big help to us.”
“Um…” He held back, arms akimbo, imagining what would happen after he was gone.
“You don’t have to decide now, my young friend,” Dulais added, taking out a stained paper map that had a notable mark on it from his waist bag. “I know it takes time to make such a huge decision.”
“You can find me there whenever you like,” he said when he placed his foot on the mounting step and gave Chavdar the map. “It’s a wonderful place, and people, who are as special as you, there, may be willing to teach you a thing or two. And you may also receive a proper training there.”
“Take the front seat please, stranger,” Ali said.
Chavdar took a quick look at the map and laid his eyes on a cross mark on a place called Kloster.
“Mr. Ali, on a second thought,” Chavdar said to Ali, as he folded up the map and kept it in his trouser pocket, “would you please give me a free ride to the farm just outside the village so that I could help my people out with some farm works?”
The masked driver leered at Desman with a provoking look.
“Chavdar you would better stay here,” Desman persuaded, patting him consolingly on his shoulder. “You know, a trader is a trader, they don’t do things that are not beneficial to them.”
“Umm…” Chavdar said.
“I’ll pay for his ride,” Dulais said suddenly and tossed a coin to him.
The masked driver then exchanged eye contact with Ali.
“All right, all right,” Ali agreed, picking up the coin that landed on his snug fitting pant. “Quickly get in, we are already behind the schedule for the delivery.”
“I owe you one.” Chavdar thanked Dulais and sat right next to him at the front seat.
“No problem,” Dulais said.
“So why are you going to Valais?” Chavdar asked. “If your map is precise, that place should be located at somewhere on the borderline between Oskal and Austhun.”
“Yes, it is. I haven’t told you about this yet,” Dulais said when the horses began to pull the unexpectedly light wagon, judging by the speed it attained shortly.
“It’s all about the staff, right?” Chavdar whispered.
“Partly,” Dulais said, holding the staff horizontally. “There is an ongoing war in Valais, and I have to go to help.”
“A war? It sounds like something much worse than that when you said it,” Chavdar said when he suddenly noticed the usually congested street was a bit too vacant. “I bet you people are in some...” He paused dramatically and looked around the place nervously again and again.
“What are you looking for?” Dulais prompted, snapping his head around like Chavdar.
“Where is everybody?” he replied, turned his head around and focused his eyes on a bright red flag flying over the guard station.
“I thought it was the white Austhun flag,” Dulais murmured.
“It was!” piped Chavdar, jumped off of the fast-moving wagon, landed hard on his back and darted toward the station at once.
“Where are you going!?” Dulais yelled when he discovered Chavdar had left without his book. “Your book!!”
But there was no response. Without a choice, he picked the book up and kept it in his waist bag, thinking that he could return it to him someday if he decided to come.
Leaving the village behind, the squeaky wheel-moving sound of the wagon became particularly noisy when it double-timed off the paved road, went off to the left into a long narrow field, after it passed through the entrance.
“Shouldn’t we stay on the paved path?” Dulais asked, as the wagon came to a halt suddenly in the middle of the field.
“It’s a shortcut, stay in your seat, we’ll be back soon,” Ali replied, got off the wagon with the driver agilely and went out of Dulais’s sight swiftly before Dulais had the time to think through what was happening.
Sitting on the front seat alone, a sense of danger sneaked up in his heart as the horses neighed, he felt there was something wrong with the crates. He alighted the emptied wagon, held the grip of his dagger in one hand, the staff in another hand, and opened one of the chests cautiously.
“Black powder!” Dulais murmured when an excruciating pain in the flesh of his left arm alerted him to the mortal peril he was facing as a fire arrow scraped his skin.
Realized the whole thing was a trap in no time, he immediately visioned a thin water wall that separated him and the chests just a second before another illuminating flaming arrow, which set off a fatal explosion, pierced through the air and penetrated into the opened chest. And as a result, a fiery eruption of light and heat, followed by a shock wave with debris of the vehicle and chests blasted upward, vaporized the entire water wall and plumed up a white mist of steam.
Engulfed in the vapor yielded by the burning heat of ignition, he kept his body close to the ground to avoid being smothered. Tears were drizzling down his cheek involuntarily while his blood were dribbling down his thumb. He crept out of the mist and kept himself out of sight behind a pile of stones when he heard someone coming to him.
“Find him!” Ali commanded, standing in the wreckage of the wagon, as he felt anxious. “Strangle him if he is alive!”
Respiring deeply, Dulais stealthily cut his black cloak in half to bind up his bleeding wound. He then listened carefully to the approaching footsteps, peeked through a gap in between rocks to estimate the current position of enemies and saw the masked driver closing in from east cautiously, with an uplifted sword.
He decided to stay hushed and unseen behind the stones until the driver passed by the pile. And from behind, he was able to see a tattoo on the driver’s neck, which took him back to the inn when a whisperer spoke to Desman furtively. Staggered by this discovery, he pounced on the masked man boldly, stabbed him in his head from the back before he could make a sound and set down his dead body on the ground noiselessly.
Suspecting that Desman was involved in this ambush, he pulled down the driver’s mask and, unsurprisingly, confirmed that he was that whisperer he had seen before when the cloud of smoke finally dissipated.
“There he is!” Ali roared when the shadow of the staff owner became visible. “Kill him!”
All of his men, armed with spears and axes, rushed toward Dulais, immediately and aggressively, except one who was nocking an arrow standing not far in front of the wreckage. Realizing that long-range weapon could be one of the most lethal things, Dulais darted toward the bowman alm
ost instinctively and threw the mask of the driver right at his head while visioning some tiny water spheres above his shoulder.
As the archer drew the bowstring arm back toward his face and maintained a rock stable bow arm, he thrusted the spheres at the lower limb of the bow directly and tilted it, catching him off guard and making him unable to hold it tight for a release, when the gemstone of the staff shimmered automatically.
Taking advantage of it, Dulais successfully brought himself the time needed to get close enough to engage that bowman at close range before he was ready to make a shot again. He thwacked the back of the archer’s knee with his staff to immobilize him and knifed his bow arm deeply to render him defenceless while busily checking for the position of other enemies.
He then disarmed the archer with a kick before he saw a strong man, who was wielding a long shafted axe with a curved grip freely as if it was the weight of a feather, charging at him from the left from just a couple of steps away. Took a step backward, Dulais barely dodged a massive strike that would had clouted him to death if he was a second slower. Exhaled deeply for still being alive, he discovered that the remaining forward momentum of the charge would keep that man incapable of moving freely for at least a while. Grasping the chance, he dashed forward and tried to shove the bloody dagger in his waist before he could come to a stop, though it ended up hitting at the cheek of an axe as the man made a sudden backward jump to offset the momentum and blocked it with his axe in midair.
“You don’t stand a chance against us,” the man threatened Dulais croakily, as he came down on the ground and saw a spearman going headlong at Dulais from behind.
Hearing it, Dulais brandished his weapon to maintain a safe distance, looked back and saw that spearman closing in on him fast. Feeling the strain of his injured body arose from the immense strength used to confront the well-trained assassin head-on while staying unscathed, he promptly sized up the situation and decided to finish the man before him off before other hostile parties came.
