Shepherd's Quest: The Broken Key #1

by Brian S. Pratt

  Later, they were back in the hall after watering the horses and allowing them to graze. Bart’s clothes still had a touch of odor from the oil about them but it wasn’t nearly as strong. They had decided, or rather Bart had decided, that they should rest before resuming their exploration. “After everything that happened today, I need a break.”

  “Not to mention the fact that we didn’t get all that great a sleep last night either,” Chad added.

  “You could say that again,” Kevik replied. “It took me over an hour to get back to sleep after the ghost battle.”

  A thoughtful look came over Riyan as he glanced outside. “You know, it might not be a bad idea to find another place to spend the night before it gets dark,” he said. “If the battle we witnessed is a nightly occurrence, we’ll not get much sleep tonight either.”

  Bart grinned. “You do have a point.”

  The others agreed and so it was decided to move to another building that had enough room for them and their horses. They searched the neighboring structures until they came across one that still had all four walls and most of its ceiling. It was a single story structure with a room large enough for their needs.

  One wall of the room held windows that looked out towards what Riyan called the ‘Command Building’ as it held a commanding presence here in the ruins. They made their camp near that wall and put their horses on the far side of the room. There were a few scraggly bushes on that side they could munch on if they needed.

  After a short stint of hauling in wood to last them through the night, they soon had a fire going. Seeing as how there was still some light left, Riyan took Chad with him to the edge of the ruins to hunt for a couple rabbits for dinner with his sling.

  Chad followed his friend silently for a few minutes until they reached the forest’s edge. Then he said, “Adventuring isn’t what I had thought it was going to be.”

  Riyan glanced over his shoulder at his friend. “Oh?”

  “I mean, we’ve narrowly escaped death a couple times now,” he explained.

  “What did you think it was going to be like?” Riyan asked. “A carefree adventure with no risks?” He glanced to his friend again and grinned. “You can’t have one without the other you know.”

  “I realize that,” Chad admitted.

  “Remember all those tales we used to tell each other?” When he saw Chad nod, he continued. “This is just like those.”

  “Yeah, but one of us usually died in those stories,” he said.

  “Relax,” Riyan said reassuringly, “Bart’s with us, not to mention we now have a magic user on our side. Kevik seems a rather capable person.”

  “True,” replied Chad. “He’s definitely quick with his magic.”

  “So just relax,” Riyan told him as he turned his attention back to the forest. “A tale is a tale, but this is real life. A person is always more careful in real life than in a story.” Then from up ahead he saw the bushes move. “Shhh,” he said to Chad.

  Moving forward, he began to twirl his sling. When the animal poked its head out, they readily recognized it as a kidog. Riyan then rapidly increased the twirl of his sling and released the stone. It flew straight and true, striking the kidog in the side.

  With a cry of pain, the kidog lurched back into the bushes in an attempt to flee. The stone didn’t immediately kill it, rather it had crushed its left hindquarter. Riyan noticed it dragging its leg as it fled. He was amazed at how fast the kidog moved despite its useless extremity.

  “After it!” hollered Riyan and then he and Chad raced into the bushes. They quickly overtook the kidog and came to a halt as it backed up against a tree. It bared its teeth and growled as it set to defend itself.

  Chad pulled forth his sword and advanced upon it. “I got this,” he said confidently.

  “If you say so,” replied Riyan. Just to be on the safe side, he placed another stone in his sling.

  The kidog snarled and growled with its ears low against its skull as Chad closed the distance. “Be careful,” he heard Riyan say behind him. Gripping the sword in both hands, Chad moved to within striking distance. He and the kidog locked eyes for a brief moment before he yelled an inarticulate cry and swung the sword.

  The kidog dodged clumsily to the side due to its injured leg but it needn’t bothered. Chad’s sword struck the tree half a foot above where he had been aiming. The blade sank in deep and lodged in the tree. Then the kidog snarled and leaped at him as he was trying to pull forth the sword from the trunk.

  “Watch out!” yelled Riyan at the unexpected attack.

  Chad failed to react in time and the kidog’s teeth sank into his left forearm. A cry of pain exploded from his throat as he forgot all about the sword and fell to the ground.

  Then Riyan was there with his sling. He kept it closed with the rock in it as he began striking the kidog in the back with the stone filled cup.

  “Get it off!” Chad yelled as he struggled to free himself. Already, blood was beginning to flow pretty good from where the kidog’s teeth were embedded in his flesh. Riyan kept pummeling the kidog with the stone in the sling until it finally let go. The animal backed away and moved off into the bushes.

  Once it let go, Riyan immediately removed his shirt and began wrapping it around the wound on Chad’s arm. Out of the corner of his eye he kept alert for another attack by the kidog but it had slipped away.

  “Is it bad?” asked Chad. His face was a bit pale and Riyan could tell he was fearful of what he might tell him.

  “No,” he lied. He didn’t want to tell his friend that he had seen the white of the bone before he bandaged it up. “Let’s get you back to the others so we can fix you up better.” He tied it tight to lessen the blood loss, Chad had already lost quite a bit.

  “Alright,” Chad said. With Riyan’s help he made it back to his feet. Then with his good hand he pulled the sword from the tree and somehow managed to return it to his scabbard.

  Chad indicated where the kidog had gone and said, “It couldn’t have gotten far. We still could use its meat.”

  “You sure?” questioned Riyan. His friend looked like he was one step away from passing out.

  “Yeah,” he replied. He placed his good hand against the tree and leaned against it for support.

  “I’ll take a quick look,” Riyan told him. He held his sling ready as he moved into the bushes after the kidog. It had only made it three feet before it had settled down beneath a large bush. Riyan could see its tail sticking out.

  He stopped a few feet away and hollered back to Chad, “I found it.”

  “Good. Kill it and let’s get out of here,” he said. From the sound of his voice, Riyan could tell that it was more a sense of vengeance than the desire of meat that prompted him wanting Riyan to kill it.

  Riyan stared at the tail and saw it move ever so slightly. The kidog wasn’t dead. He could see why the town council of Quillim had posted a bounty on this animal. It was one mean critter.

  Riyan began twirling his sling and then loosed the missile. It sailed toward the bush and he could hear it hit the kidog but it didn’t make a sound. He then removed his sword and walked forward. The tail was no longer moving and when he reached the bush he poked his sword in until he touched the kidog. It didn’t move.

  Not for a second did he consider the animal dead. He cautiously reached down and grabbed the tail, all the while ready to jump back at the slightest evidence that it wasn’t dead.

  He began pulling the animal out and when it completely cleared the bush, saw where his stone had smashed its chest area. The animal was definitely dead now. Picking it up, he carried it back to where Chad was waiting then helped his friend back to the others.

  When they returned to the building where they were spending the night, Bart and Kevik were quick to realize something was wrong. After all, Chad had Riyan’s blood soaked shirt wrapped around his forearm.

  “What happened?” Bart asked as he came forward.

  “A kidog got hold of him,”
Riyan replied.

  Kevik waved them over to the fire. “Come here and let’s have a look at it.”

  Riyan aided Chad who had grown a little wobbly from loss of blood over to sit next to Kevik.

  “Now,” said Kevik, “let’s see what we have here.” While he undid the makeshift bandage from around the wound, he listened to Riyan as he related how this came to happen. When the shirt came free, he saw the damage done by the kidog. “This is bad.” Tendons were ripped and his whole forearm was a mass of torn flesh.

  “How bad?” asked Chad weakly. His face had grown very pale when he saw his forearm and felt like he was about to pass out.

  “Not so bad that we can’t fix it,” he replied. He motioned to get Riyan’s attention. When he had it he asked, “Could you hand me my pack please?”

  “Sure,” said Riyan then went over to where they were stacked together and brought it over to him.

  “Thank you,” Kevik said as he took his pack. He set it on the ground before him and pulled out a vial.

  Riyan recognized the vial as the one Kevik had tried to give his master when he was beneath the burning tree. “Healing potion?” he asked.

  Kevik nodded. “Yes.” Then he removed the wax seal from the top of the vial and pulled out the cork. He gave the vial to Chad and said, “Only drink half.”

  As Chad took the vial and began to drink, Bart asked, “Why only half?”

  “My master once told me that if you poured some onto the wound itself, it accelerated the healing process,” he explained.

  Riyan nodded at the logic and stared at Chad’s mauled forearm while he drank the potion. Once Chad consumed half as Kevik had instructed, he handed the vial back to him.

  Kevik then took the vial and moved its mouth to an inch above the worst section of the wound. There he began pouring drops of the liquid onto the torn pieces of flesh.

  Riyan, Bart, and Chad watched in wonder as the flesh seemed to be moving of its own volition as it moved back into place. Blood began filling the cavity formed by the wound as Kevik continued to drip the potion drop by solitary drop on various sections of the wound.

  “What does it feel like?” Riyan asked Chad after the first few drops entered the wounded area.

  “It stopped hurting,” he told him. “It itches something fierce however.”

  “Whatever you do,” cautioned Kevik, “don’t scratch.”

  “I wasn’t planning to,” replied Chad.

  The blood, now that it had filled the cavities of the wound, began spilling over the edge and dripping down his arm. “Flex your muscles,” Kevik advised. “That way the potion will better understand what needs doing.” He poured another dozen or so drops of the healing potion onto the wound before the vial was empty. He stoppered it once again and put it back in his pack.

  Chad began making a fist with his hand and bending his arm at the elbow.

  “I once heard of a man who had a much more severe wound than this on his leg,” Kevik continued to say as the wound kept healing over. “He used a healing potion but made the mistake of remaining still. The potion worked fine in repairing his leg and it did save his life.”

  “But?” asked Bart.

  Kevik glanced to him and grinned. “But, the magic of the potion didn’t understand the difference between tendon, muscles and regular skin. You see the potion itself knows that it has to heal the body. From what I understand, it takes what’s torn or damaged and binds it back together. Of course, it doesn’t always discriminate between what it should bind together or leave separate. So when the potion had run its course, it had healed the man alright. But where the wound had been in his leg, was now nothing more than one solid muscle that never worked right again.”

  “I had never heard that,” said Chad as he continued to move and flex his elbow, wrist, and fingers.

  “Not too surprising,” replied Kevik. “Those who make the potions try to suppress such tales. It hurts their business.”

  “That’s understandable,” said Riyan.

  “Bart,” Kevik said to him, “let me see your water bottle.”

  Taking it off his belt, he handed it over and said, “Sure.”

  Kevik opened it and began pouring it over the blood drenched arm. When the first of the water hit his arm, Chad flinched in anticipated pain, but instead only felt a cool sensation.

  The water began washing off the blood and soon they could see fresh skin underneath the blood. “It’s healed!” exclaimed Chad excitedly. Kevik kept pouring the water until the blood was completely gone. Where a gaping wound had been just minutes before, was now a layer of smooth pink skin.

  “How do you feel?” asked Kevik.

  “Good,” replied Chad. He glanced to Bart and Riyan. “There’s no pain.”

  Kevik pushed his pack toward Chad with his foot. “See how it feels when you pick this up.”

  Chad reached down with his newly healed arm and picked up the pack. “There’s a little pain,” he said, “and some stiffness.”

  “But otherwise it feels okay?” asked Riyan hopefully.

  Grinning, Chad said, “I think so.” He set the pack down and turned his gaze to Kevik. “I don’t know how I can thank you.”

  “You three saved me,” he replied. “It’s the least I could do. Now you better get some food and water in you. The potion may have healed your wound, but it took what it needed from you to do so.”

  “Just stay there and rest,” Riyan told his friend. Then he patted him on the shoulder as he went and began to dress the kidog and make a spit to roast it over the fire. Once it was set and the aroma of roasting meat began filling the room, he took his bloody shirt outside and washed it.

  Before the sun went down, the kidog was finished. Despite Chad’s objections, they gave him most of the meat, while they satisfied themselves with a smaller portion augmented by stale rations.

  After they ate, Chad quickly went to sleep since the healing potion had taken much of his energy. He curled up near the fire in his blanket and was out in no time. The others remained awake and talked as the ruins outside grew darker with the setting of the sun.

  They were unanimous in deciding to allow Chad to rest through the night instead of pulling a watch. Bart took the first watch, Riyan the second, and Kevik wound up with the third. Riyan was less than happy about the situation, he hated the mid watch. But as Bart explained it, he needed to be rested since he will be the one risking life and limb disarming any traps they may come across. Considering how many they have already come across, it’s a fairly safe assumption that there will be more tomorrow. Kevik, he argued, will need to be alert in case he’s called upon to cast magic in a hurry as he’s done twice before.

  Logic. What can you do when you’re faced with unwavering logic? Not a dang thing. So Riyan rolled out his blanket near Chad and laid down in an attempt to get what rest he could before Bart woke him. Sleep wouldn’t come, the events of the past few days kept running through his mind. Finally he forced his mind to still by concentrating on nothing but his breathing. He listened to his ever inhale and exhale, and when an errant thought tried to intrude, he squelched it. At last, sleep came.

  “Riyan,” he heard Bart say as he shook his shoulder lightly. Eyes snapping open, he actually groaned with the effort of coming awake.

  “It’s your turn,” Bart said.

  “It feels like I just fell asleep,” Riyan said. He sat up and looked around. Chad and Kevik were still sleeping and the fire was burning merrily.

  “You were out about four hours,” replied Bart with a yawn. “It’s been quiet.”

  Riyan got to his feet and went to the window overlooking the Command Building wherein the entrance to the secret underground network of passages lay. “Anything happen over there yet?” he asked Bart.

  “Not that I’ve noticed,” he said. Lying down, Bart pulled his pack close to use as a pillow and tried to make himself comfortable.

  Riyan turned back to the window and looked out. Overhead the quarter moo
n was beginning its arc across the sky, a hint of a breeze was blowing in, and the place was unnaturally quiet. He remembered how last night it had been quiet too, just before all hell broke loose. At least they’re not going to be in the middle of it again if it should happen tonight.

  He continued to gaze out the window for a few more minutes. Then he noticed the fire could use more wood and walked over to put a couple more pieces on the fire. “That’s better,” he said to himself when the wood began to catch and the fire came back to life. The flames gave a comforting light that pushed back his feelings of unease. Just looking out at the darkened ruins gave him the creeps.

  For the next couple of hours he walked around the room they were in, at times stopping to peer out at the ruins through one of the many windows. Now and then, he would return and place more wood on the fire when it began to burn low.

  It was during one of the times when he was staring out the window that the horses began to grow restless. He glanced back to where they were huddled together at the far side of the room. His nervousness spiked when he saw all three were awake and acting skittish.

  Riyan glanced to the sleeping forms of his comrades. They were still sleeping soundly. Even though the fire wasn’t really low enough for more wood, he went over and placed most of their remaining fuel in the flames. He kept an eye on the restless horses as the flames grew higher and higher. When all the shadows were at last banished by the fire, he didn’t see anything at the other side of the room except the occasional flash of equine eyes reflecting the fire’s light back to him.

  Clang!

  “Oh no,” he said to himself as he heard the clang of metal on metal. It was the same sound he had heard last night before the onslaught of the ghost battle. He immediately moved to the window and looked out over to the Command Building but the night remained quiet.

  Clang!

  There it went again. His anxiety was definitely peeking as he tried to ascertain where the sound was coming from. At the other end of the room, the horses began to grow even more agitated.

  Riyan couldn’t take it by himself anymore and he went to awaken Bart. Before he could reach his sleeping friend, the horses began screaming and the smell of blood filled the room.

  “Bart! Chad!” he yelled as he looked in horror as two of their horses fell to the floor. Numerous wounds covered their bodies as even more materialized.

  Bart was the first one up and saw where Riyan was looking. He turned his attention to the horses just as the last horse fell. Horror filled him as before the final horse hit the ground, something sheared its head off and sent it flying across the room.

  Chad and Kevik were up by this time and staring at the carnage. “Run!” Kevik yelled.

  They turned and bolted for the door. Chad and Kevik made it through the door first, while Bart dove through the window. “Where do we go?” Kevik hollered.

  “There!” yelled Riyan as he fled the building. He was pointing to the Command Building. “It’s our only hope.” Sprinting, they headed for the building.

  “What’s happening?” asked Chad. Then he stumbled and fell to the ground. Riyan was quick to his side and helped him to his feet. With an arm around Riyan’s neck, he hurried as fast as he could.

  “I don’t know,” Riyan replied.

  Clang!

  The noise of the swords striking one another followed them to the double doors of the building.

  Clang!

  Bart reached the doors first and swung one open. “Hurry!” he yelled as he held it open for them. Within the darkness behind Riyan and Chad he could see a barely visible shimmering. “Don’t look back!” he hollered as he urged them on.

  Kevik flew through the doors first and came to a stop just inside. He turned back just as Riyan and Chad appeared. He cast his bobbing sphere spell to give them light.

  Clang!

  Bart followed them in and slammed the door shut. He and the others came together as they stared at the doors, afraid of what might be out there.

  Smash!

  A noise like breaking glass came from behind them. They turned and saw a ghost in armor with a sword, fighting with something that could not be seen at the window.

  “Here we go again,” moaned Chad.

  Smash! Crash! Bang!

  Throughout the room, the sounds of shattering glass could be heard as other ghostly forms began appearing and fighting unseen opponents. All around them ghostly forms continued to materialize just as…

  Bam!

  …the front doors burst open.

  “Back!” yelled Bart. “Back to the hallways!”

  They turned and fled the hall until they reached the hallways leading further into the building. No sooner do they get there than the lord and his entourage appeared just as they had the night before. Moving to the fore of his men, the lord again fought whatever was attacking them.

  “Over here to this hallway,” Bart told the others. He led them over to the hallway leading back to the kitchen, the one the lord had escaped through the previous night. He entered the hallway and moved down until reaching one of the hallways branching off. There he paused and motioned for the others to enter the side hallway before him.

  He waited there at the junction for a second or two. Then he heard the explosions announcing that the ghost magic user had joined the fray. “It won’t be much longer now,” he said.

  “What do you mean?” asked Kevik.

  Still standing in the junction of hallways, he glanced at Kevik and said, “It’s just like the night before. If I’m right, then the lord should run past here on his way to the kitchen. Then, shortly after that, the last of the ghosts will fall and it will be over.”

  Bart turned his attention back down the hallway and saw the ghostly form of the lord entering the hallway. He nodded as he said, “Here he comes.” Stepping back into the branching hallway with the others, he has them step back from the junction a dozen feet or more before coming to a stop.

  They turned to look back at the junction just as the lord and his men rushed past. “Follow me,” Bart said as he moved to reenter the hallway and follow the lord.

  Riyan helped Chad as they followed Bart. When they entered the hallway they could see ghosts fighting at the end that opened up on the hall. “They’re covering his retreat,” commented Chad.

  “Exactly,” Bart said. “Just as they did the night before.” He continued to lead them towards the kitchen. When he arrived there, the lord and his party were just entering the secret stairwell.

  “Aren’t we going to follow?” asked Kevik when Bart hesitated.

  Bart shook his head. “No. All of our equipment, including my lockpicks, is back in the other building.” He kept an eye at the ghosts fighting in the hallway. Then, when the last one died, it laid there for a minute before an unseen tremor rolled through the building. When the tremor died, the fallen ghosts vanished.

  By the light of the bobbing sphere, they glanced at each other. “Do you think it’s safe?” asked Kevik.

  “It was last night,” replied Riyan. He glanced to Bart and received a nod in agreement.

  Bart took the lead and they made their way slowly back down the hallway to the large hall. As long as they kept the pace slow to moderate, Chad was able to keep up on his own. His body still hadn’t recovered the strength that had been sapped by the potion.

  That had actually been the first potion ever used on him. He never realized how healing potions used the energy, or strength, of the one they healed. In all the stories he heard growing up, the hero drank down a healing potion and was cured. There was never any mention of recovery time to regain strength. But then that wouldn’t have been a very exciting point to include in the story.

  Back out in the hall, they found the door they came through closed. Again, no sign of any ghosts, nor was there any evidence of ghosts having been there. Just as it had been last night.

  “You know,” Riyan commented as they headed for the open door, “they may do this every night.”<
br />
  “That occurred to me too,” Bart said. “Every night for who knows how long.”

  They left the Command Building and returned to where they had been spending the night. The smell hit them before they even came close. Death. Bart was the first to enter, and when Kevik followed him in with his bobbing sphere, they saw what was left of their horses.

  The fire was still burning. Bart and Riyan both grabbed a burning brand before they crossed over to the horses’ remains. “What did this?” asked Chad. They were a gory mess on the floor, almost unrecognizable as the horses had been so horribly mutilated.

  Bart and Riyan glanced at each other. Bart shrugged.

  “I’m not sure,” Riyan replied after a moment. “I heard the clanging of metal on metal again just before the horses were attacked. It was the same as I heard last night before all hell broke loose.”

  “Now what are we to do?” Kevik asked. Everyone suddenly realized what Kevik already had. Without the horses they’ll be forced to walk out of the goblin’s territory. A prospect none of them looked forward to.

  “We still need to finish our search below,” Bart said. “Once that’s completed, we’ll worry about how to get out of here.”

  Riyan was still looking at the remains of the horses. He turned to the others. “This could very well be what the totems had warned against,” he said. The other three turned to face him as he continued. “I wonder if what happened to the horses happens to anything caught outside in the ruins at night. Maybe the only safe place is in the Command Building the ghosts were defending.”

  “You may have a point,” agreed Bart. “It hit here first, then almost seemed like it followed us there.”

  “That’s true,” added Kevik. “It wasn’t until after we got there that the ghost warriors appeared and began fighting whatever it was.”

  They returned to the fire and settled in on their blankets for a little while longer, debating the whys and wherefores of what happened. When they came to the conclusion that they really didn’t know what was going on, they decided to return to sleep while Kevik kept watch until the morning. The remains of the horses on the far side of the room didn’t bother them nearly as bad as returning to the dark ruins outside.

  Kevik threw more fuel on the fire and huddled close to the comforting flames.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

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