A Warrior's Journey

by Guy Stanton III

  I took my sabers back and straightened stiffly.

  Another friend from the patrol spoke up, “Where to now Sir?”

  I looked past him to where the inner citadel was already wreathed in flames.

  “Wherever the Creator leads us.” I said rather abstractly, as I headed back outside the gatehouse.

  I saw a city in utter chaos around me from my high vantage point. Most of the people had fled from the streets into the buildings, but those wouldn’t be safe soon. As if on cue with the flames spreading rapidly throughout the citadel heralded by black smoke lifting into the night sky, the rest of the city began to be put to the torch.

  We needed to get out of here before we were caught in fires of our own making. I made my way back down the steep stairs followed by my men. How in the world had I gotten up these stairs on a horse?

  It was hard enough going down the stairs on foot. A warrior held Relentless for me at the bottom of the stairs and I was glad to see that he was alright.

  Two warriors came dragging a man up between them to me, “Sir we’ve caught the governor of the city. He was trying to escape through a hidden passageway.”

  I barely glanced at him as I said, “Throw him back into the passageway and let him burn with his city.”

  Before they could do as I requested they were stopped by Talaric, who had come up unnoticed.

  “Wait there! Zevin we can hold him for ransom! They’ll pay dearly to get one of their governors back!”

  I responded harshly, “Father said nothing about taking hostages or bounty money! If gaining wealth had been the goal of this mission do you not think we would not have sacked the city before putting it to the torch?”

  I abruptly turned from him and headed for Relentless. The men holding the governor completed the task that I had ordered.

  As one the men who had come with me on this wild ride followed me back out of the burning citadel into the city now well taken with flame.

  I headed for the temple grounds where my father would be with his men, quickly outdistancing those setting fire to the city all around us.

  Roric was beginning to give up hope of finding a way into the underground cult complex. His men had searched over every inch of the expansive temple in search of an entrance to the complex that his dying spy had said existed.

  He wasn’t leaving until the job was completed and his friends avenged. There was little point in coming so far and risking so much, if he did not destroy the heart of this new cult’s headquarters.

  Under his breath he whispered, “Lord please show me the way and enable me to destroy this pit of darkness that infects the land with blasphemy.”

  Almost instantly a ray of light curled off the sword in his hand and twisted off through the air into the temple. Roric followed the light ray stepping over the bodies of temple priests, prostitutes and worshipers alike.

  The ray of light split into four smaller tendrils, which arced out to each surround a pillar which formed a square of space in the center of the main temple hall. Roric stood in the midst of the four pillars studying each pillar and the floor around it.

  There was a grooved pattern inscribed on the floor and going to one massive pillar Roric began to push and surprisingly the massive pillar shifted quite easily along the path of one such groove. The same pattern was reflected on the ceiling as well. Warriors standing around watching quickly worked at moving the remaining three pillars along their paths. As the last pillar moved into place there was an audible snap and the floor began to move.

  Sections of the floor collapsed in repetitious order and soon a spiral staircase leading downward into the darkness was visible. A horrible stench wafted up out of the dark hole filling the heavily perfumed corridors of the temple with the smell of rotting decay.

  Warriors looked among each other in a silent dread at having to go down into the darkness, but gamely straightened to the task willing to follow their leader wherever he led them.

  Roric gestured them back from the stairway, “Get out of here. Pull all of our forces from the temple grounds.”

  The warriors reluctantly started to move back hesitant to leave their leader they loved to face the darkness alone.

  I turned to go with them, when my father called my name, “Zevin.”

  I turned back to him.

  He had a strange look on his face as he asked me, “Would you like to come with me?”

  How did one answer such a question honestly? I knew beyond a doubt that I wished to see nothing that the darkness had in store for us beneath the floor, but I wanted to make father proud and I certainly didn’t want him to face the darkness alone.

  He must have read the quandary of decision going on inside of me, “Will you go with me son?”

  I stepped forward instantly, inwardly proud at my lack of hesitation to move even in the face of the fear that I felt at the action.

  Talaric stepped forward too, but before he had taken a second step the sword in my father’s hand swung toward him and colored light that seemed to express the anger my father felt shot out and knocked Talaric backward against a pillar, “You may not go!” Father spoke more roughly than I had ever heard him before to any of his children.

  Before a surprised Talaric could protest father spoke on, “Your spirit is not right before God and your actions are in defiance of me and what I taught you! You have disobeyed my orders yet again and as a result you nearly got your brother killed and almost caused us to fail in capturing the citadel! Now because you by your own actions have shown yourself unready for the war we are faced with, I am ordering you back for your own good!”

  Talaric his face tight with humiliation and anger responded hotly, “Why have you suddenly decided to play favorites with him? I’m the first born!”

  Roric looked back at him sadly and responded, “Yes you are the firstborn and you have received the bulk of my attention because of it, but Zevin has made more of himself with less attention and instruction than you have. He has earned this moment while you have lost the privilege. Now go!”

  Talaric stormed out of the temple, in as black a mood, as I had ever seen him in. Father looked at me and looked as if he was about to say something, but then thought better of it and decided not to. That was alright, enough had been said already.

  Father turned towards the stairs and I moved to follow. He stopped and turned to me once more, “Zevin remember that the power of the Spirit of the Creator,” he tapped my chest with a finger, “is greater than any darkness that we may find in this pit understand me?”

  I nodded.

  “Do not allow yourself to be consumed with fear Zevin! Our Creator does not give us the spirit of fear, but rather of power and of a sound mind!”

  He turned back to the stairs and together we began to descend into the darkness. There were no lights, but the light streaming off of father’s sword gave us the light needed to see our way forward. As the darkness of the stairway became darker the light cast off by the sword only brightened.

  We reached the bottom of the stairway and started down a narrow hallway that had an illuminated doorway at the far end of it. The atmosphere of the place was oppressive and closed in on us.

  The doors opened under the force of some unseen power. There was no one there and we walked on through the doors. I jumped and spun around with my sabers raised as the doors slammed shut behind us abruptly. There was the click of a lock followed by a hollow sounding laugh that chilled me to the bone.

  Dark hallways opened up to us along either side, but father kept traveling down the central hallway. Each hallway entrance we passed seemed to hold some new dark horror hidden within its depths.

  The sound of someone sweeping the floor in one hallway. The sound of something chewing on a bone noisily in the next.

  The worst was the sound of a little child’s voice echoing eerily in some sing song chant down one hall. It went on and on until my thoughts were echoing with the noise of it.

  It was unnerving!
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br />   I was covered in sweat and the sound of my own breathing sounded loud to my own ears. Despite the sweat I felt, as cold as ice within the dark hallway and my skin crawled, as if trying to tell me I was under assault from some unseen force.

  I got the message, but there was nothing to be done other than to keep going on. I wished fervently with all my heart that this was all just some horrible nightmare that I would wake up from only to see white fluffy clouds drifting by overhead.

  Snap!

  I blinked as I about walked into my father, who had stopped and was facing me.

  “Remember!” He said tapping my chest firmly.

  I regained control of my breathing some and nodded. “How are you still so calm?” I asked desperate to have the confidence that I saw in him to be my own.

  Father’s eyes looked distant, as if he was remembering something, “I’ve been through hell before in my life and I’ve seen what my Creator can do to deliver me from it. Knowing that gives me confidence.”

  Feeling compelled but reluctant to ask I blurted out, “How do you know that He will act on your behalf, when you’re in places like this?”

  “Because He promised never to forsake me. I’m doing what I know He wants me to do, fight evil wherever I find it. Whether I live or die I’m His. So what is left to fear?”

  “How do I get more faith like you father?” I asked needing the confidence that he radiated in the midst of the torment of this place.

  His hand fell onto my shoulder, “This is how Zevin. All of what is happening is causing you to gain experience in the way that the Creator is at work in your life and others. Through experience comes faith and a strong faith in the Creator can move mountains son!”

  He gestured around us. “So what’s a few dark spirits whimpering in the background matter? Instead of being afraid of the noise they make think on this son, how afraid do you think they are at seeing the presence of the living God, which resides in you and me, come at them in the power of Divine purpose. We are not down here to show how brave we are Zevin. We’re here to do the Lord’s work and His Spirit is the authority by which we lift our hand against all the power of darkness. You can trust the Creator to deliver you even down here Zevin.”

  “You wanted me to experience this so my faith would grow?”

  “Yes, but I would not have brought you if I hadn’t thought you ready for the task or the lessons to be learned. Be strong in your faith son, He will see you through. Now are we good to go on?”

  “After you.”

  He smiled briefly and turned back around. His hand reached back and I grabbed a hold of it grateful beyond words for the confidence I felt through the touch. It was as comforting as a child huddled within the safety of his mother’s arms during a thunderstorm. I should know as I had often been that child growing up.

  It was a little ridiculous being like that now though. I dropped father’s hand, but I missed its comfort. Time to be a man and be like father.

  Suddenly there was a pair of doors directly in front of us. They had appeared out of nowhere. A dim light could be seen radiating out from underneath them.

  The big doors swung open creaking as they did so. This time they were pulled open by someone I could actually see though. The dark prophets stood to either side and allowed us to pass through. We walked past them into a scene that should have been reserved for hell alone and not anywhere on this world or any other.

  A large cavern like room opened up before us lit partially by candle and torch light. The stench of despair was heavy upon us, as we both looked upon the poor victims of this cult’s unholy handiwork. People were lined all along the walls fastened to it by iron chains.

  Some still strong enough called out to us, while others were too far gone or already dead, rotting in place. Still others were strapped atop table like altars in varying stages of torture. This was where father’s spies had been tortured.

  Quarta had said that they had not broken to the dark prophet’s requests of betrayal upon them, until after some old potion had been used upon them. I was not sure that I could ever be so strong as to resist the ways of such a horrible place and not betray my own family.

  Dark prophets were standing all throughout the room and watched our progression into the room quietly not lifting a hand to stop us. I think I would have preferred to walk through a scene of battle, with ten thousand dead upon the ground then to pass through the tortured human wreckage of this place.

  It would have been cleaner somehow. All I saw in this place was the work of wicked men consumed by darkness and I hated it and its perpetrators with a stronger passion than I had ever felt against anyone before in my life. I felt something touch my hand and I looked down at what had once been a man.

  I couldn’t believe that life still remained in the form of the creature that stared up at me, his eyes sunken into a face gaunt with starvation and the memory of pain.

  Barely I heard his cracked lips whisper, “Kill me, please!”

  Oh God!

  I thought to myself as I was overwhelmed with the plight of so many being tortured within the room and who knows how many before them.

  Father continued on into the room toward an upraised dais that had a chair like throne upon it.

  Reaching it father turned to the room of dark prophets and those they had tortured for some demon’s delight and asked, “Who sits here?”

  “I do.” Came a sibilant reply.

  I watched as a skinny man, who looked in near starvation himself, separated away from the group of those standing within the room. I stepped up beside father, as the other dark prophets gathered close, as if they were a circling mass of scavenging vultures.

  “Roric son of Lorn why do you trouble our hall of suffering, our most holy shrine? These souls are guilty of the punishment that they receive, they require no savior.”

  “That is a lie! To all a Savior has been born and has ascended upon high!”

  The leader darkly chuckled, “Is it of yourself that you speak oh lofty one born among the ranks of men?”

  Father lifted his sword to hold it leveled out and pointed against the offending prophet, “You utter blasphemy against the Ancient of Days! By His direction I have reached this place and by the Spirit of His power I will destroy this place of darkness, where the hearts of men have run free with vial imagining!”

  The leader cackled at father’s words, as if he thought them but an idle threat not to be concerned with, “Oh mighty warrior valiant among the living, even you will die, as all mankind will!”

  “Your point?” Father asked in retort.

  The leader spread his thin arms wide, “Those you see are but a few of the number that our ranks have swelled to. While our ways are abhorrent to you they are sweet to those we serve, who indwell us with the power to change the hearts of men to the selfish pursuits of their own minds, as it should have been from the beginning. It is only natural for man to rebel from a strict an overbearing tyrant such as the master you serve. Our masters give us freedom for our service to them in place of the stricture of the undeserving one that you continue to yoke yourself to in a show of pathetic and truly pitifully useless faith.”

  “Freedom?” Father asked incuriously looking around the room.

  “Come Roric, we are both men of wisdom you know that there is a dear price to pay for freedom. It is a debt that someone must pay. You were a fool to come here to this city, to our holy shrine. The people will unite against you even stronger than ever before and adopt our ways in droves eager for the revenge that we offer to those to combat against the unbelievers. Did you think that we did not know of your coming to our city? You’ve done our work for us within a single night! Truly Roric you have become a laughingstock among not only our own people, but also your own. Your people no longer want you and your high handed ideals! Even your eldest son rebels against your foolish faith. Why waste your life on adhering to the code of a forgotten God that offers a fairy tale future in place of enjoying your life the
way you were meant to in the here and now. It is a promise that was never meant to be kept even if He ever could. Come be like us who followed the first rebel. We have found our freedom in him and more than that he has given us power to wield that no ordinary man may ever posses. Be one of us and we will make you a king above all men!”

  “Never! Cease your senseless muttering child of hell itself! Shame on you! Shame on all of you for the loss of your souls in exchange for a season of hellish glee! May the Creator curse you for the vileness of your actions and for the wicked quality of your words to speak so against the sovereignty of the Ancient of Days, who reigns supreme over all creation!”

  The gaunt looking leader spoke vemenously in reply, “Fool, we offered you more than you deserve considering the trouble you have been to the advancement of our holy cause! You shall perish here with your whelp of a son that you were so foolish to bring! You will see our power oh mighty Valley Lander and be brought down to your knees. You will beg us for that which we offered you!”

  As one the dark prophets began to chant, as the one we had encountered upon the patrol had. Father turned to me and I was shocked to see him smile at me. In that moment I felt that I was alone with just him in the room, as the dark prophets around us barraged us with their dark words.

  He kept my gaze as he set his glowing sword point down between us. His hands drifted out to grasp the cross guards of the sword leaving the handle free.

  He couldn’t be serious!

  But he was, “I think you should pray this time.”

  I stammered out, “I’m not ready for this father! Am I?”

  Father nodded, “I think you are. Zevin it says in the Words of the Creator that where two or three are gathered together in prayer that our Lord is in the midst of them. It also says that when two are gathered together in prayer that whatever they ask for in faith believing will be bound both in the Earth and in heaven. This may not be the Earth, but it is a world of our Lord’s creation none the less. Zevin it’s time to pray.”