The Light of Endura

by Scott Zamek

  “Damn!” Filby slung his bow then checked the quiver; only one arrow remained, and he was sure he had just wasted another.

  Filby sat and put his head in his hands. “What now?” The sky became dim with stars, the river calm and quiet; a blurry moon wavered like a ghost in the rippling current. He ate some pummakin and smoked deer meat, then laid his sword and bow out next to the flames, the soft trickle of the spring adding a soothing tune to the night air. Filby checked on Ethreal then wrapped his arms around his knees and slumped next to the fire; he hadn’t slept in two days and was weary down to the bone. He listened; the forest seemed still—the trogg was gone. Closing his eyes, he began to allow the gentle hum of falling water into his dreams, but something deep within a corner of his mind told him he could not doze off. This time, the choice of watchmen was a choice of one.

  Filby opened his eyes and forced himself to sit up straight. The oblong moon still hung over the river, now reflecting a perfect silver stamp in the vast, dark water. Marsh grass swayed in a gentle fall wind, barely visible in the moonlight. And then the faint crunch of leaves, brush of a bush, snapping of twigs. It was the shuffling of feet. “The trogg from the forest!”

  Filby grabbed his sword and stood. Beyond a solitary oak tree at the edge of the forest: thin and malign, glowing red—those damn eyes again. But this time they did not circle; they grew larger. A trogg leapt from the darkness with a squeal, sword overhead, overrunning the camp before Filby could think. Filby instinctively raised his sword and felt metal against metal. A loud clang, and Filby staggered back. He fell, and the trogg advanced, slashing down with a short, quick blow. Filby rolled away and rose, then awkwardly swept his sword through the air. A loud cry rang out and the trogg fled, squealing a high-pitched scream in its retreat.

  Filby stiffened his back, breathless, straining to see into the darkness. He could feel his heart pounding. He glanced at Ethreal, who was writhing in her sleep, and Filby noticed that her hand was resting on the hilt of her sword. Another cry rose in the night as Filby turned to the west. Again, just to the left of the crooked oak tree, in the blackness beyond the firelight, the red eyes. Filby sheathed his sword and strung the last arrow. He took a bead, the eyes moved slightly out from behind the oak tree, and he fired. He heard the arrow clank against the rocks in the distance. The trogg gave an eerie scream of defiance; the eyes faded and Filby heard the scamper of feet, a distant cry, and the trogg was gone.

  “What would Ethreal say? I’ve wasted all of her arrows.” The sleepless nights made everything seem like a blur to Filby. The sounds of the forest were echoes, as if they were coming from some distant and muffled place far beyond the trees. But he knew he could not sleep, and he knew he could not linger in the forest long enough for Ethreal to recover. There was more waiting in the shadows than a single trogg—remaining too long would mean certain death at the hands of troggs or wraith or whatever other evil lurked in the darkness.

  Filby spent a fitful night, pacing and thinking, watching the moon melt slowly across the sky and finally watching the sun rise cool above the horizon, dodging treetops, until storm clouds blustered in but produced no rain. By noon, he had made up his mind. Something had to be done, anything, even if the plan was a desperate one.

  He set to work, frustrated and alone, feeling a sense of urgency and a sense of panic and the nagging fear that he would never escape the forest—that the trees would swallow him whole or his bare skeleton would be found someday bleached and gnawed to the bone. He toiled away in the dreary light of an overcast day, collecting dead logs from the forest floor, using his sword to fashion stays and cross members.

  “We’ll have to do without a cloak . . . again.” Putting his aching back and sore muscles out of his mind, Filby uncovered Ethreal and stripped the deerskin into long lashings with his pocket knife, then he rolled the two tree trunks together that were banking the fire, each about six feet long. He found a third log the same size at the edge of the river, and these he bound together with the deerskin lashings, taking care to wrap the deerskin tightly around each log.

  After several hours, Filby stepped back and studied the raft, a little reluctant. He didn’t know if the creation would even float, so he slowly dragged it into the river and stood by in waist-deep water and watched the logs bob with the current before he was completely convinced. He had been warm and sweating as he worked; now he was damp and cold and the absent sun did him no favors, but he knew there was no time to waste. He was anxious to move before nightfall—before the troggs rose from their daytime caves and crevasses. Filby shuddered at the thought and quickly packed up their meager supplies, the stiffness in his back haunting him with every bend of the legs or twist of the waist.

  Reaching a hand around to his side, he began to wonder if he really did have the energy to navigate the river; if he was actually doing the right thing. “If only Ethreal would wake up for even a minute . . . wake up enough to tell me what to do.” He stopped and stood and looked at the river. “If only Trader were here.”

  Filby beached one end of the raft, looking at the growing day around him, listening to the distant wind for any sign of falling footsteps in the dark forest to the west, and as he listened, he made a bed of branches and grass across the logs for Ethreal. He felt hurried, anxious to get out of that forsaken place and head east, or anywhere without troggs and dark trees and long shadows. He quickly hacked a log into a square wooden paddle with his sword, then glanced around at the fading day and the river and the old oak tree. It was deftly quiet.

  Filby topped off the canteen from the fresh spring, its slow trickle the only sound in the still forest, then he cradled Ethreal in his arms. Her eyes fluttered, and she put her arm around Filby’s neck as he carried her into the river and laid her down on the raft. He took one last look around at their campsite, then slowly shoved the raft away from shore and climbed onto the back.

  “No turning back now.” Filby watched the trees recede with his measured glide away from land. But he fidgeted and could not get comfortable, first sitting on the hard logs with his feet dangling in the water, then rising to his knees with the paddle trailing behind. He found there was just enough room to kneel on the back and guide the raft by rudder, with Ethreal lying flat before him, and that was the position that suited his aching back the best.

  He paddled into the main flow of the deep-brown river, then swung east. Looking down into the solid water, he could not see the bottom, not even an inch below the surface, and it seemed to him as if he was moving over the top of a thick stream of dark pudding. The current ran deep and slow and gentle, while Filby swiveled his head around to see a few ripples peaking over hidden snags and the leafy green banks glide by at walking pace. There was no need to paddle; he used his wooden blade as a rudder and felt as if his duties were suddenly reduced to that of spectator.

  Filby gazed around him, trying to focus his foggy mind. Rippling grass along the shore was backed by thick forest, while cattails and reeds smelling faintly of fish extended far into the water. A slack west wind pushed at Filby’s back. He eased the rudder slowly over as a few eddies and ripples poked up from the tawny river, but nothing extreme; he found it almost second nature to guide the raft through the current using his homemade paddle. Around midday, the river swept from a northeasterly direction to true east, where marsh grass gave way to forest pushing right up against the muddy banks. A few egrets and plovers bobbed for shellfish along the mudflats, and the trees thinned to show sparsely forested glens: grassy clearings, pine needles carpeting an understory of pitch pines, a bed of leaves beneath a grove of widely spaced oaks.

  “Ethreal?” A cool wind swept in from the north as Filby leaned over to check on his friend. He knew, without the deerskin cloak for a blanket, they would have to stop early and build a fire against the fall night. Yet his worry extended beyond fire. Where she once occasionally murmured and tossed, Ethreal now became still and deftly quiet. The constant sweat disappeared, and though her skin remain
ed warm to the touch, it was dry and sickly pale. If Aerol and the others were to suddenly appear along the riverbank, now would be a good time, thought Filby. He wondered if the group was safe. He hoped it was true; he hoped they had continued east to finish the mission and restore the Light, though he did not think he would be with them to see it happen. He was sure his part in the larger journey was at an end. The mission now was different. The mission was Ethreal.

  The hours passed in a tiring rhythmic paddle, while the current seemed to slacken and Filby noticed a transformation on the south bank. It became deforested, a few ramshackle wooden buildings filling the void as if the trees had suddenly been felled and left in disarray. Nothing was left of the buildings but broken logs stacked to form partial cabin walls, and half-built watchtowers, and crumbling storefronts facing a dusty street. A long-forgotten gate caught the wind and squeaked an eerie tune, back and forth, back and forth on rusty hinges. Filby ducked his head down and suddenly became wary, as if the creatures that had done such a thing were still eyeing him from the village or watching from afar. “Is this to be the entire land?” he thought. “Is this to be my fate . . . Ethreal’s fate—to be found broken and decayed in a land of lifeless towns and rotted trees and evil things.”

  Filby watched intently as his makeshift raft bobbed past the clearing, swaying up and down in a light breeze, then drifted by the east end of the old village, where trees began to dot the banks again, and a decayed wooden dock marked the outskirts of town. He drew a deep breath and forced his fears aside. “There’s no time for imaginary dangers,” he said weakly. “Ethreal needs attention, and I need to focus on the task at hand. “

  He turned the rudder into a paddle and began making time. An outpost, a cabin, he was hoping to find anything that could help. He kept a constant eye toward the shore while a mix of white and gray clouds moved over the land, but the sun still showed itself in thin glimpses as it passed behind the treetops and began to lower in the west. A mixture of new trees—aspen, hemlock, and larch—mingled with the white pines and chestnut oaks of the inner forest, and thin fields invaded the land in long curling fingers reaching south. It seemed to Filby that the trees were thinning out, the forest becoming less dense, and he noticed more and more open meadow as the steady current pushed him ever east.

  The river narrowed, jogging north again, but Filby was dismayed to feel the pace of the current quicken beneath his knees. For the first time, he was forced to grip the rudder tightly lest he stray off course. Sparsely forested hills pressed in on either side, squeezing the river thin and swift, until another blind turn to the east sent the river spilling out into a substantial lake.

  “What the . . .” The raft suddenly shuddered. The current quickly melted into a dead calm. Filby’s rudder no longer responded in the slack water, leaving the raft to slowly spin full circle then arrive at a slow, skidding halt. Filby became dizzy—it had all happened so fast. He clutched the logs tightly with his fists, but even in his rattled state he could see he had washed up on a gently-sloping beach, one end of the raft still bobbing up and down in the waves; the other firmly mired in the sand.

  Filby shook his head to clear his mind then looked around him at the sparsely forested hills rising from the lakeshore in the distant north; at the gently sloping beach before him. He was surrounded by a long valley, the shallow shoreline leading out to an area of meadow and trees, but the forest was no longer dense and unbroken; instead, the trees appeared in groves, leaving the remainder of the land filled with field grass and wildflowers and scattered underbrush. He was surprised to see a wagon track skirt the eastern edge of the clearing.

  “Must go to the abandoned town we passed on the river,” he said quietly. But that was as far as his muddled mind would take him. He rose to his feet, slowly, gingerly, stretching out tight muscles wound up from hours kneeling in the same position, then he tamped the earthy sand with the souls of his shoes. He still felt like he was bobbing up and down with the waves, but even so he managed to wade into the river and check on Ethreal. She was pale and unmoving.

  “What else can I do that I haven’t already done?” He cradled her in his arms and waded ashore, then laid her down on a soft bed of fresh grass. She remained motionless throughout, dangerously limp, nor did she murmur or speak or open her eyes. She showed no signs of life aside from breath, and if not for that, Filby felt as if he would slip into hopeless despair.

  The sun was just beginning to touch the treetops in the west, a cool fall evening chasing white curls from the lake. Filby was grateful for a calm and rainless end to the day, but he still felt hurried and uneasy. He unpacked supplies in a rush and felt helpless; Ethreal’s condition was getting worse and he was at a loss what to do next. Her fever seemed to be gone, but now she was deathly cold to the touch, and her skin was dry and almost white. “And I’ve cut up the cloak . . . why did I cut up the cloak?”

  The day was replaced by dark clouds, a hidden moon peeking out every so often into patches of cold sky. Filby stacked a waist-high pile of firewood next to Ethreal and began building a small triangle of sticks and moss to catch with the flint. Ethreal turned and moaned, and Filby stopped to check. “Ethreal?” He dabbed her face with fresh water, but she did not move, until a faint sound distracted him from his work. The distant clatter of wood, or metal, or hooves—Filby was not sure. He peered down the wagon track, while almost unknowingly, he placed his hand on the hilt of his sword. An unsure image gathered in the twilight, way off on the edge of sight, where the road became blurred with haze. The outline of a covered wagon came into view.

  Slowly, the soft tamper of hooves grew louder and louder, until Filby could make out a shaggy draft horse ahead of a ramshackle wooden wagon, the bed covered by a patchwork of tattered cloth and stained canvas. As the horse plodded along, weathered boards came into view, and hand-forged iron nails poking out in places, only half-imbedded in the faded wood. The driver wore a short beard and farmer’s overalls peppered with dust from the trail, a cocked and loaded crossbow perched next to him on the front bench. He approached with a confused look on his face, and slowed, then gave a long “Whoooaaa,” pulling the draft horse to a halt.

  “Please, can you help,” appealed Filby, trying to hide a sudden wave of panic as he motioned to Ethreal. This was a chance, perhaps a last chance, to save Ethreal and find a way out of the forest, or at least find some semblance of civilization in an all but forsaken land. If this failed, or if the wagon driver was no friend, then he felt all was lost.

  The driver ran his thumbs down his leather suspenders, then the bench gave a long and rusty creak as he swung off the wagon. He knelt over Ethreal, lifting up the bandage on her leg. “You’re lucky I found you.” He looked up at Filby with concern.

  “I did what I could but . . .” Filby shrugged.

  “She needs help—we have to get her some herbs and . . .” The driver shook his head. “I’ve got some medicine back in my cabin.” He stood and wiped his hands on his shirttail. “Let’s get her in the wagon. It’s about to get dark—this is no place to be in the dark.”

  They lifted Ethreal into the back of the wagon, but she did not respond. Her eyes remained shut, and her body was cold and drooping. “Thirty minutes,” said the driver. “My cabin is thirty minute away.” He climbed aboard the wagon and Filby followed. “Names La Bont.”

  “Filby.”

  “Ran in to some troggs, I see. You’re lucky—I was just collecting firewood. Don’t normally go too far into the forest. There’s evil about.” He whipped the reins and the cart lurched ahead. Filby related some of his story as they began east, but not all. No one would believe it all, he thought. But Filby admitted, he was not quite sure where he was.

  “I run a small farm on the edge of the forest,” explained La Bont. “No one bothers me there—it’s sort of a piece of forgotten land. Not on any main road from the west or the east. And I like it that way too, with all the strangers on the road these days.”

  “I saw th
at abandoned village about a day to the west,” said Filby, trying his best to make polite conversation. He felt disoriented, even a bit dizzy.

  La Bont scratched his wiry brown beard and spit over the side. “And you’ll find a lot more. Don’t know of any who stayed. My farm is about fifty miles from the Ancient Lands, and there’s funny things happening there too.”

  Filby said no more. He was distracted with worry for Ethreal. La Bont seemed to be worried as well, by the way he constantly nudged the reins and urged his old draft horse to a faster tempo.

  The farm appeared with the last glimmer of twilight, where La Bont lit a lantern and hung it on a wooden post next to an open gate. They carried Ethreal inside and placed her on a wood-frame bed, then La Bont unwrapped Ethreal’s leg. “I’ve seen it before. We have to cut it to draw out the poison or she won’t survive.” La Bont walked over to a wood-burning stove and began boiling water. He reached into a cabinet and retrieved a few glass containers half-filled with herbs, then he made a paste out of the herbs and water. Returning to Ethreal’s bedside, La Bont withdrew the knife from his belt and made a long cut along the discolored wound. He packed herbs over the cut and wrapped it tightly with clean strips of cloth.

  “That’s all I can do,” he said, shaking his head. “We have to get her to a healer, and I mean right away.” La Bont wiped his hands on a clean towel and stood over the bed, then raised his eyes toward Filby. “There used to be one in the Ancient Lands not far from here, unless he’s already fled—many have in these dark times.” La Bont threw his towel into the sink and turned up his palms. “But we must try—we can make the journey in one day if we leave at first light.”