Eberon's Sword

by Rick Brown

  “Did you find Dreamer?” Abigail asked Brianna.

  “We did. We found them all. They were still spooked from the smell of werewolf, but we have them tied out front.

  With a squeal of delight, Abigail rushed out to see Dreamer.

  “That girl has an unhealthy love for that horse,” Whilhoit pointed out.

  “She just isn’t broken inside like the rest of us,” I disagreed. “I like that about her, but I fear it cannot last.”

  Unfortunately, the hour passed without Lenux’s return. Leaving the temple, I started to walk the streets looking for my friend. Brianna had told me where she had last seen him, which was an area of the city I had not yet explored. I once again became lost in the beauty of the city. I was walking through what had once been a large bazaar when Lenux called out. “Looking for me?”

  I turned and smiled at my longtime friend. He had found one of the few old stone benches still standing in the bazaar. “I was worried about you.”

  “I don’t know what to do Lee, what am I with the loss of my eye?” He asked.

  “Why do you think your entire worth was in that eye?” I returned his question. “I have yet to see that your talents are diminished. Even if they were, do you know how many people in this world I trust? Other than a couple of others, they are all in a temple down the street. Them and you. You do not understand how important that is to me.”

  “Thanks Lee, that’s good to... Do you hear that?” He asked, suddenly becoming alert. “Horses are coming, there are soldiers in the city.”

  “I don’t hear anything,” I said as I strained to hear.

  “Then you are deaf. We have to get the others, now,” He said as he leapt up from the bench and rushed down the road.

  “Do you know where you are going?” I asked as I chased after him.

  “Back to the temple,” He yelled back.

  “Good, because I got lost a long time ago.”

  “Soldiers! We have to go now!” Lenux shouted as he burst into the room. Nobody questioned him as they grabbed their things and rushed towards the horses.

  I sidled up next to him. “I’m not the only one that trusts you,” I whispered. “We all would trust you with our lives.”

  He gave me a smile as he grabbed his pack. “Thanks, but you better hurry, they are only three streets away.”

  “What? How can you know that?” I asked him.

  “I don’t know, I can hear them,” he answered with a shrug.

  I turned to Barad and imitated that shrug, “He can hear them.”

  “Sure, why not,” Barad shrugged back.

  Following Lenux, we made our way out of Ealinhart. Stopping when he ordered and rushing when he told us. I had to admit I had my doubts that he wasn’t just imaging things. After all, he had just been through a traumatic experience. My doubts were erased when he pointed out a soldier disappearing around a corner as we snuck past them. Soon, we were back in the open fields outside of the city.

  “Lenux, you are definitely not released from duty,” I told him when we were safely away. “I’ve never seen anything like that.”

  “How did you do that?” Brianna asked angrily. “I couldn’t hear anything you described.”

  “I don’t know,” Lenux admitted. “It all seemed natural to me. Now that I think about it, I don’t think I could normally hear something three streets away.”

  “Well, whatever it was, I am happy for it. We might have been caught by surprise otherwise,” I declared.

  “I guess it was rather suspicious, having a repaired temple in a restricted city,” Ryan pointed out.

  “Ha! I just wish I was there when they discover a room full of werewolves,” Orlik laughed.

  “You don’t think they’ll free them?” Abigail worried.

  “I don’t know, they are on the same side,” Barad stated.

  “They are all locked up in that room,” I told them. “There’s no one left to show them where they are imprisoned.”

  “Even so, I’ll feel more comfortable when we are miles away from here,” Father Yagen confessed.

  Chapter 13

  (Lenux)

  I don’t understand what is happening to me, I admitted to myself. In the week since I woke from being healed, so many unexplained things have happened. I could always tell what was going on around us. Knowing a bird was hidden in a tree that was completely concealed in leaves, a hare burrowed in the grass beside the road. I could hear them scratching, shuffling as they dug deeper into their hiding places.

  I would watch the others. No one reacted. No one noticed. How was it possible that they could not hear these things that were so obvious? Then I had to wonder, were they obvious? A week ago, would I have noticed this? Could I have heard these animals? In my mind, I could picture them. Could I really determine how they sat just by the sound? Identify exactly which clump of grass they sat behind? Even though I couldn’t see anything on my right side, I knew exactly what was happening on that side. Who was there and what they were doing.

  I could hear my friends’ whispers, wondering just as I had, what had happened to me. My greatest fear was they wanted to leave me behind, now that my scouting was in question. Hearing them speak of their love and concern for me set my mind at ease. With practice, I was able to ignore those conversations, it didn’t seem right to eavesdrop.

  I paused as I heard something in the distance. “Horses! Approaching from behind!”

  Lee looked around. “We’ll hide behind that clump of trees,” He ordered, pointing to the closest hiding area. “Lenux, Brianna, and Farloc, do your best to hide our trail.” With that the others fled to the grove.

  This was becoming a more common occurrence. I had overheard the soldiers say that they were looking for us. We were now hiding two or more times a day as soldiers rode past.

  “How much time do we have?” Brianna asked as she gazed back down the road.

  “We have a few minutes before they are in sight,” I told her.

  Brianna shook her head. “I give up, you are now the ultimate sneak.”

  “I don’t know what happened, but it cost me my eye,” I told her angrily.

  “I saw you, Lenux. You were as good as dead. If not for what Lee did, I would have lost my best friend. Now, you have amazing magical abilities. Something Lee can’t explain. Do you think we would have survived this week without your ability to perceive our enemies? We would have been captured for sure.”

  “Brianna speaks the truth,” Farloc joined in. “I’ve never heard of someone with your new talents. You are very special.”

  “I’m sorry,” I replied, embarrassed. “I don’t know why I keep wallowing in self-pity. I’ll try to do better.”

  “You’d better,” Bri said with a smile. “I want my friend back.”

  We lead our horses to the grove, being careful not to leave a trail behind us. Once we were concealed, I walked over to Lee.

  “How long?” he asked.

  “I’d estimate two minutes,” I said as I listened to the soldiers’ approach.

  “Lee, what did you do to Lenux?” Brianna asked again as she approached us.

  “I didn’t do anything!” he repeated. “All I did was ask the stone to heal Lenux.”

  “No, you didn’t,” Abigail broke in.

  “What? Yes, I did,” Lee defended.

  “No, you asked it to ‘heal his eye’, it indicated it couldn’t. Then you asked it to ‘fix your friend’,” she corrected.

  “It’s the same thing,” he said, waving it off.

  “Oh, is it?” Father Yagen asked. “Alynon’s Tear was asked to fix a problem, Lenux’s diminished eyesight. It seems that it found an unexpected alternative.”

  Lee looked down, lost in thought as he considered what was said, then looked up at me, sorrow in his eyes. “Lenux, I’m sorry. It was me. Whatever has happened to you, it’s my fault.”

  “Lee,” I said with a smile. “It’s not my new ability that has me down, it was my fear that I was
no longer useful.”

  “No longer useful? Right now, you’re the most useful person here,” Lee answered in shock.

  “He’s right, boy,” Orlik agreed. “We’d have been dead for sure.”

  “Thank you, everyone,” I said truthfully. “Now be quiet, they are coming.”

  Everyone turned to watch the dust cloud approaching on the horizon. This group looked larger than the other patrols that had passed. The gray uniforms of maybe one hundred soldiers slowly came into view.

  “This group is better trained,” Lee commented. “it’s a more disciplined group. I don’t like this. Everyone, move deeper into the trees,” he ordered.

  Taking my horses reins, I guided her from the tree line and deeper into the grove. As we entered an open area wide enough for everyone to congregate, I heard the horses stop. Raising my hand, I silenced everyone so I could listen.

  “You were right, I can hear a scout approach our grove,” I told Lee.

  He nodded. “A unit this big will have a competent commander. He’s the first one we’ve seen that’s done his job.”

  I continued to listen as his horse patrolled along the trees, the scout looking within. When he finished, I heard him return to the unit. After a moment, they continued down the road.

  “We are good now, they are moving on,” I announced to everyone.

  Barad release the breath he had apparently been holding. “These encounters are getting dicer.”

  “And more common,” Brianna agreed.

  “It’s apparent they know who we are,” Father Yagen explained, “and, therefore, where we are going.”

  “They know we are going after the sword,” Lee agreed, “so, they are throwing a net over everything between Ealinhart and Olingard.”

  “One that will get tighter as we get closer to the Dearthmoon Mountains,” Ryan predicted.

  “Can we go around it?” Abigail asked.

  Lee shook his head. “It would take too much time. I can already feel the war looming, and we are not ready.”

  “Orlik, how many days until we are there?” Father Pild asked.

  “Maybe two weeks. Longer if we have to keep stopping,” Orlik answered.

  “Then, let’s keep moving,” Lee ordered. “But not on the road this time. Let’s ride across the pastures.”

  “It will slow us down,” Barad pointed out.

  “Not as badly as us spending half our days hiding in the bushes,” Lee corrected. “Let’s go, before more soldiers arrive.”

  The riding across country was slower, but most of this part of Alsselya was farm and pasture land. At least we were not having to hack our way to the dwarves’ home. As we neared summer, the warm nights made the trip seem almost pleasant. Other than dodging the occasional troops, the group traveled in relative ease.

  “So, that’s your home?” Barad asked Orlik as we made camp one night. He was pointed to the now visible outline of the mountains in the distance.

  “Aye, it once was,” the dwarf agreed sadly. “It ain’t no longer.”

  “What happened?” Abigail asked.

  “Plain stubbornness on my part. Me father was negotiating with Dommeran for peace and I would no hear of it. Walked away from them. Walked away from everything,” he answered with a sigh.

  “Negotiating with Dommeran? I can see why you did it,” Ryan backed Orlik with a nod.

  “No, Lad, me father wasn’t surrendering, he was just trying to prevent what happened here in Alsselya from happening to our home. I see that now. It took me years of growing up before I understood that there’s more to being a king than my bloody honor,” Orlik disagreed.

  “Your father sounds wise,” Lee said with a smile. “As do you. I can see the righteousness of both your sides.”

  “Then you are wiser than I was at your age,” Orlik smiled back.

  “Is that a fire in the distance?” Farloc asked. We all turned to look where he was pointing.

  “Multiple fires,” I answered, as I looked at the twinkling fires in the distance.

  “That doesn’t sound good,” Lee said with concern. “Lenux, you and Whilhoit check it out. See if we need to be running away.”

  I nodded to Whilhoit, and we both jumped on our horses and started riding towards the lights.

  “How close should we get?” Whilhoit asked.

  “No closer than a mile on horse, preferably further. The rest we will do on foot. Hopefully, my new hearing will allow us to stay a safe distance away.”

  As we neared the camp, I finally signaled Whilhoit to dismount. We tied our horses to a tree and started creeping towards the camp. Standard protocol would be to have patrols fifty meters around camp. We came within one hundred meters, then found a bush to sit behind and watch.

  Even at this distance, my enhanced hearing was picking out things from the camp. The mumbling of conversations between the soldiers. As I continued to listen, I started to get an idea of the size of this unit. It was large. Three hundred strong. The biggest we have seen since the force we saw headed towards Vaelin.

  I signaled Whilhoit to duck as a guard started to patrol near our hiding spot. I turned to him as the guard left. “I’m going to sneak closer. Stay here.” He looked to protest, but I turned and left before he could get a word out.

  I should have been nervous. After all, the last time I went out on my own, I had my face nearly ripped off. This time, however, I had my new hearing. I could tell where every guard was stationed, even which ones were asleep. Using this ability, I crept close enough to the tents that could start picking out individual conversations. Most were the types you would usually hear from soldiers—complaints of sore feet and bad food. As I moved around the camp, I finally caught a bit of conversation of interest.

  “…patrols along the road. There’s been no sign of them since Ealinhart.”

  “It’s just not possible,” a frustrated voice replied. “They couldn’t have just disappeared.”

  “They must be hiding here in the country,” the first voice responded. “It’s the only way they could have avoided us.”

  “If it was them at all, I’m not convinced.”

  “The werewolves were tracking them. They wouldn’t follow the wrong trail.”

  “Those things? I wouldn’t trust them. They’ll kill anyone,” the second man complained. I couldn’t agree more, I thought.

  “They’ll be back on the trail soon enough,” the first man said. “The leader, Hannen, lead us to where the others were locked up. Last I heard they were sending Alsselyians to dig them out.”

  “They’ll all be killed by those animals.”

  “That’s why they are sending Alsselyians,” the first man laughed. “In the meanwhile, we are to continue beating these bushes until we flush them out.”

  I had heard enough. The werewolves were to be freed, if they weren’t already. We had to move fast. I dodged my way through the patrols and found a very impatient Whilhoit. We quickly made our way back to camp as I explained what I heard.

  Chapter 14

  (Lee)

  The news Lenux and Whilhoit brought back was worrying. We immediately packed up and continued south to the dwarves. The idea that the werewolves might already be loose and could catch us out in the open made us all nervous.

  We rode through the night and the next day before we had to stop due to exhaustion. Finally, we found an abandon farmhouse to make camp that night. As we rolled out our blankets, Barad stared out the window.

  “How can it be we haven’t reached those mountains yet?” he complained.

  “They have been seeming to loom over us for days,” Whilhoit agreed.

  “Their size does belie the distance. I would estimate we still have two more days of travel before we arrive,” Farloc explained.

  “Two days?” Abigail moaned. “This pace is killing me.”

  “Better than playing with them werewolves again,” Orlik disagreed.

  “I’m with Orlik,” I added as I put a shield over the house. Now
that we were entering summer, it was no longer necessary to heat the air at night. “I’ll sleep better when I have a mountain between us and those monsters.”

  “Aye, and I hope my people give you a warm welcome. That, maybe, they resisted Dommeran after I left,” Orlik said sadly.

  “When will you leave us?” Abigail asked.

  “Oh, I’ll travel close enough to get you to the entrance, best go no further though. Me being there would do ya no good, that be for sure.”

  “We will miss you, my friend,” I said with a smile. “You’ve been an excellent guide for our party.”

  “Well, it helps, his being as old as dirt,” Barad quipped.

  “Sure, old enough to still take you over my knee,” Orlik answered with a wink.

  “Is your father still king?” Ryan asked.

  “I think so, I’d like to think I’d have heard were he to die. Still, I haven’t had communication from Olingard in years. Maybe he passed during that time.”

  “Wouldn’t that make you king?” Whilhoit questioned.

  “Nah, not since I’m exiled. It’d have to go to my uncle or one of me cousins. Alynon knows, there’s enough of them.”

  “Well, let’s get some sleep. We ride hard again tomorrow,” I warned.

  “There’s no way forward?” I asked Lenux. He shook his head. Farloc’s prediction proved true, it took two days to reach the base of the mountains, where we discovered a whole new problem.

  “Now we know where all those soldiers were going. The entire front of the mountain is lined with soldiers. Even with my enhanced perceptions, I couldn’t guide us through without being caught,” he replied.

  I stepped away in frustration. We were so close. The Dearthmoon mountains towered over us. Now that we were at the dwarves’ doorstep, we were blocked. “Orlik, are there other ways in?” I turned and asked the dwarf.

  “Aye, but I cannot promise the Dommerians ain’t aware of them too,” he answered.

  “Choose one far enough away from here to get around this army,” I ordered. “We can’t give up now.”

  “They may be guarding the front entrance, but the dwarves have to breathe, don’t they?” Ryan asked. “Are there air tunnels that are maybe unguarded?”