The Guide

by Trudie Collins

  Without saying another word to anyone, he took Liselle by the hand, went down on one knee and asked her to marry him. He did not give her chance to say anything before ordering the Clerk of the House to call for a priest. They were married within the hour and left as soon as they were able. The Clerk signed the necessary papers that handed ownership of Liselle over to Torrick, who promptly signed the paper in the correct place to free her.

  The Master of Arms paid Torrick the wages he was owed and wished him well. The Lord, however, almost prevented them from leaving. Liselle had brought a lot of business his way and he did not want to let go of his asset without a fight, but his wife intervened again, pointing out that he was Lord only due to their marriage, whereas she had been born a Lady and, as such, could divorce him and leave him penniless. The Lord backed down, but vowed to get even with them if he ever got the chance.

  They went to his mother’s house, where they spent a few years helping to run the farm. The whole family struggled without Torrick’s wages, most of which he had sent home each week, but having two extra pairs of hands helping around the farm slowly turned it from a source of food and additional funds to support them to a profitable family business.

  By the time Torrick and Liselle left to join Tor on his quest, the farm had expanded enough to employ a couple of the local men permanently and some of the local lads part time, when they were not at school. Liselle gave birth to a healthy baby boy, whom they named Frederick, after Torrick’s father. A year later she gave him some siblings, twin girls named Hokien, after Liselle’s mother, and Layla, after Torrick’s. All three had been left behind when Torrick had decided to join Tor. He was a trained soldier and the urge to get away from the farm became too great. His younger sister, who had gotten married and was with child, had insisted that looking after 3 young children would be good practice for her. Torrick’s mother and other sisters were happy to help out, so Liselle decided to accompany him.

  Having told her story, Liselle went quiet for a while, lost in her own thoughts and memories. Sam did not say anything. She was too shocked by what had happened to Liselle to really know what to say. She had no problem talking about her past, but it was obvious that parts of it still hurt her greatly.

  They carried the cleaned dishes back to the camp and Sam noticed that Liselle went immediately to Torrick and settled down next to him. The slight smile on her face as she took his hand in hers showed how much she loved him and the way he tenderly kissed her forehead demonstrated that the feelings were mutual.

  Night had fallen. Dal was asleep with his head resting on Salabine’s tail. It almost looked as though he was trying to pin her to the ground to prevent her from flying away before he woke in the morning. Sam just hoped that the dragon realised he was there and didn’t roll over in the night, squashing him. Hawk had flown off while the rest were eating. To stretch his legs he had said, though Sam could not work out how he could possibly use his legs while flying. When he returned he offered his coffin to Sam again, which she gratefully accepted. Just prior to closing her eyes, she heard movement by the fire and, looking over, saw Bellak staring up at the sky, an unhappy frown on his face.

  “I am going for a walk,” he announced, though if anyone else heard, they offered no reply. “Come on Samson,” he said to the wolf, who dutifully leapt to his feet and trotted into the trees after the wizard. If anyone found this behaviour strange, they did not show it, but Sam puzzled over it for a while before eventually closing her eyes and drifting off to sleep.

  Chapter 7

  The next morning, Salabine was still with them. She awoke with a yawn, stretching out her wings. Dal was sent sprawling as she slowly stood up, but was not hurt. Picking himself up, he looked at her and grinned.

  “Good morning, o great one,” he said, a little insolently.

  Salabine snorted at him, the sudden rush of air sending him to the ground again, but she, too, smiled. Announcing that she was hungry but would find them on the road later, she took off into the air and gracefully glided out of sight.

  Bellak and Samson strode into the campsite, just as everyone was ready to leave. Both looked worn out, as though neither had slept at all. Sam wondered what was going on and why nobody else seemed curious. She asked Ellen about it and was told that the pair of them just went off together sometimes. Nobody had asked Bellak about it, but Ellen was sure that they would all be interested if Sam plucked up the courage to ask. Sam declined. She was curious, but not enough to force herself to spend any amount of time talking to him if she didn’t have to.

  Bellak mounted his horse and the wolf, having jumped into the back of the wagon, laid his head in his paws and started snoring. Seth glanced back at him, shaking his head in disgust, before calling for the donkey to move forward. Like the horses being ridden, the donkey pulling the wagon had no reigns. Seth simply called out instructions and the animal immediately obeyed. So much for stubborn mules, Sam thought.

  She stretched her stiff legs before asking Thresnine to follow. Although her muscles ached painfully by the end of the day still, it seemed to be lessening. Hopefully by the time they arrived at their destination, her body would have become accustomed to riding and would no longer cause any discomfort. Her posterior, however, was another matter. She had ridden a bike for the first time in years a few months previously and her rear had been tender for days afterward. At least on the bike she had a saddle. Riding bareback was ten times worse. She felt severely bruised, though had not had the opportunity to try to see if she actually was. Thresnine, of course, was mortified when she had overheard Sam’s whispered complaints and blamed herself. It took most of the morning for Sam to convince the poor animal that it was not her fault and that there was nothing she could do to make the journey more comfortable. It would just take a little time for Sam to harden up a bit. Sometimes being able to talk to animals was not an advantage.

  After a quick lunch they continued their journey. Sam was getting sick of eating just bread and cheese, which was already hard, for a midday meal. She found herself dreaming of a burger and fries. She asked Thresnine to draw alongside the wagon and described what a burger was to Seth, wondering if he would be able to make one sometime, providing they were able to buy the ingredients.

  He confirmed that they should be able to get all that was needed next time they purchased supplies, but found the combination hilarious. Mixing beef, bacon, lettuce, tomato, cheese and fried onion then putting it all between two slices of bread did not appeal. He said it sounded awful. Grimmel, who was sitting next to him, agreed and dwarfs had a reputation for eating almost anything. The mayonnaise and ketchup were an issue, but Sam was sure she could find something to substitute if she was given the opportunity to see what was available.

  Half way through the afternoon, Tor called for a short break and everyone dismounted. Seth unhitched the donkey and took him to get a drink from the nearby stream. He shortly ran back, excited, and had an animated conversation with Tor, who frowned before finally nodding his head and calling out that they would be camping there for the night. Seth had found fish in the river and wanted to spend the afternoon catching enough for supper.

  There was a clearing just through the trees which was big enough for a camp and, from the sounds the water was making, there was a waterfall nearby. As soon as Tor mentioned this, the women stopped complaining about the delay and, grabbing towels and clean clothes, headed off to find the waterfall. Sam hurried after them, not sure what the fuss was all about.

  Liselle laughed when Sam asked, throwing a spare towel at her.

  “You have obviously never bathed in a waterfall.”

  It took Sam a moment to realise what she meant. “A natural shower,” she almost shouted in glee.

  Heading upstream, they soon found the source of the noise. It was one of the most beautiful waterfalls Sam had ever seen. They quickly stripped off all of their clothes and dived into the water. The sudden cold took Sam’s breath away and she swore out loud as soon as she
was able. She was half way through apologising for her language when she realised that the others hadn’t understood what she had said. Some words obviously didn’t translate properly from English, something she was quite glad about.

  Standing under the waterfall was wonderful. The dirt and grime of being in the same clothes for so many days was soon washed away. When everyone was clean, the dirty clothes were dragged into the river and scrubbed. Sam described a washing machine and just got blank stares in return. Maybe the difference between washing in a river and having a machine do it for you was just too big a gap for them to imagine.

  It was while they were hanging their clothes in the trees to dry that she realised she was the only one with nothing dry to change into. Walking back to the camp in just a towel was all well and good, but then what was she going to do? She could hardly change back into her wet things. Ellen saved her. She had brought a spare dress, being of a similar size and build to Sam. When they returned to the camp, the men headed off, minus Dal and Seth, who had gone fishing. Salabine had returned while the women had been bathing, so there was no need to set a guard. Even Samson seemed to like the thought of taking a shower, bounding ahead with his tail wagging wildly and his tongue flopping out of the side of his mouth.

  The men soon returned, bringing the ladies’ wet clothing as well as their own. They tied a line between two trees and hung them all out, then Salabine blew hot air over them until they were dry.

  ‘Great,” Sam exclaimed. ‘We have the honour of having a dragon among us and you lot treat her like a living tumble dryer.” She then had to explain what a tumble drier was, which the dragon found very amusing, her laughter rumbling around the clearing.

  The sun was beginning to set by the time Seth and Dal appeared, carrying enough fish between them to feed everyone in camp for the next two days. Dal was beaming. “I caught some of them,” he yelled in glee. “And I helped clean them.”

  Ellen gratefully took the fish, placing some of them in a pan over the fire, with a little oil and herbs, to gently fry, setting the rest aside for salting later. The salt would preserve them until the next day, when they would make a nice fish soup. Tor set about preparing vegetables to go with them. Sam found this surprising for some reason. Tor did not seem the type of man who would be happy in the kitchen, though he was good with a knife. When she commented, he explained that he had trained with the rangers when he was younger so he knew how to look after himself when away from civilization. If fact, he felt much more at home surrounded by trees than he did in the palace he grew up in, though he still called it home.

  “Right Dal,” Seth piped up. “Time we got ourselves clean. We seem to be the only ones who still smell.” He sniffed his hands. “I hate the smell of fish guts.”

  Dal looked horrified. “No...it is...alright,” he stammered. “I will get cleaned up when you have finished.”

  Tor laughed. “He is probably still at the age where he prefers to undress alone. Go ahead Seth. He will be fine on his own in the river.”

  Seth shrugged, gathered a towel and a spare set of clothes from the wagon and headed off.

  Hawk awoke just as the food was ready and flew off, looking for his own meal. He returned with the bodies of two rabbits, drained of blood of course, and threw them into the air. Salabine caught them and gratefully swallowed without chewing.

  “Nothing like an appetiser before dinner,” she said. Having smelt the fish cooking, she had declined the offer to share their food and flew off to look for live prey. Fish appealed to her so she got directions from Seth and soon returned, grinning broadly.

  There were two ways for dragons to fish, she explained. By flying low over a river, they can let their bottom jaw slide through the water, catching any fish that were swimming near the surface. The other way, what she called the lazy way, was for a dragon to totally submerge itself into the water and lay on the bottom with its mouth open. Dragons can hold their breath for a very long time and fish are stupid. It does not take them long to think that the body of the dragon is just another rock and the mouth is a cave, so they swim in. All the dragon has to do is close its mouth and swallow. Whole schools sometimes go in, providing an entire meal with just one snap of the jaws.

  The risk, however, was falling asleep. Some dragons; she emphasised the fact that she was not talking about herself; had been known to drown when they fell asleep in deep water and tried to breathe. Usually, when this happened, the unfortunate animal could make it to the surface in time, but sometimes the water was just too deep.

  “I guess when that happens, the dragon ends up feeding the fish,” Seth commented, grinning. Salabine did not find this amusing and glared at him, until he felt uncomfortable enough to apologize for his lack of sensitivity.

  Nobody felt much like sleeping, so they sat around the camp fire talking. Sam asked about Vada, toward which they were heading, and everyone, even Bellak, joined in telling all they knew. Vada was the largest city in Emvale, which was not surprising as it was the capital city of the country as well as the capital of the Amenian province.

  Emvale was ruled by King Allias and his much younger wife, Queen Hetta. Hetta was Allias’ second wife, his first having died nearly twenty years previous. Complications arose during the birth of their fourth child, resulting in the death of both mother and son. Allias had been inconsolable for many years, allowing his advisors to run the country while he concentrated on his three children, spending as much time with them as he could and making sure they all got the best education money could buy. Educating his daughter to that extent was a rarity among nobles, and especially royalty, with most fathers concentrating on their sons.

  He had only taken another woman as his wife to seal an alliance with the neighbouring province of Jundel, the Duke of which was trying to claim independence from Emvale. Hetta was the Duke’s niece. It had worked well, however. They seemed genuinely fond of each other. She had even talked him into making his eldest son steward, with a view to taking over the crown in a few years time.

  There was, however, trouble with the neighbouring country of Kinfen. For generations the two countries had been unfriendly toward each other, though not openly hostile. That all changed the previous year when Allias’ daughter went missing, supposedly just over the Kinfen side of the border, but the Kinfens denied all knowledge. The last anyone in the group had heard, Allias was close to declaring war on Kinfen, though that news was a few weeks old, so war may have already broken out. How this would affect them getting access to the library, nobody knew.

  “We’re walking into a war zone?” Sam asked, shocked. “Isn’t that kind of dangerous?”

  “We are hoping to avoid it, if possible,” Tor reassured her. “When we get closer, we can assess the situation.”

  “Speak for yourself,” Bellak interrupted. “I am getting to that library no matter what. Sometimes you all seem to have no interest in solving the next clue. If you are all too scared, why not frack off now.” He looked around at everyone, fiercely.

  Sam leaned over to Seth, who was sitting next to her. “Frack?”

  He grinned. “It is a swear word, commonly used here.”

  “I’ll have to remember that. That way I can swear without imagining my grandmother rolling over in her grave and threatening to wash my mouth out with soap and water.”

  Seth openly laughed at the comment, and was awarded a vicious glare from Bellak. “Is that what you used to get threatened with? Here the children are told that the skelk will cut out their tongues in the night.” He then had to go on to explain what a skelk was.

  Though supposedly a mythical creature, nobody was certain that it was not based on some kind of monster that existed somewhere. Numerous people claimed to have seen one, though most of these were the same people who claimed to have seen a number of things including ghosts and corpses walking. Most ‘sightings’ came from far north Kinfen, near the mountains. Due to the height, the air is thinner there, which the majority believe it to be the cause
of the hallucinations.

  A skelk was described slightly differently at every alleged sighting, but they all had some common features. Tall and thin with totally black skin, they had long manes of black hair running down their backs. They walk on two legs, like man. Their long thin arms almost drag on the ground as they walk and their fingers, ending in sharp nails, looked like very slim knife blades. These they supposedly used to slice out the tongues of children and eat them as a midnight feast.

  The worst part was the eyes. Every description ever written, or passed on by word of mouth, always described the eyes. They were murky yellow in colour, but when you looked into them you could almost feel your soul being pulled away from your body. Grown men started to whimper when describing the eyes.

  “That is enough Seth,” Ellen snapped. “There are no children here for you to scare with your silly stories.”

  “Actually, they may not be so silly,” Tor commented, moving closer to the fire. “I have been to far north Kinfen a number of times and spoken to some of those who claim to have seen a skelk. Though I very much doubt that they eat children’s tongues, many villagers who live close to the mountains live in fear, but as Seth said, it could well be just the thinness of the air affecting their brains.”

  Sam considered explaining about lack of oxygen the higher up a mountain you went, which affects the brain in a number of ways, but she didn’t think anyone would really understand. They probably did not even know what oxygen was. She thought about the skelk, wondering if it could be real, and shivered.

  Seth noticed. “You look cold,” he said and before she had time to explain that the shiver had nothing to do with the temperature, he was already half way to the wagon. When he returned he was carrying a large bottle.