by T J Trapp
“We need to equip you,” Alec said, rubbing his hand along his jaw.
“I could use this,” Erin said tentatively, picking up the remaining sword and swinging it. “I know how to use a sword.” But even Alec could see that this one wasn’t right for her. It was almost a yard long and designed for a two-handed grip.
“How can we make it better?” Alec mused.
Erin looked at it.
“Well, to start with,” she said, “it is too long, the balance is wrong, and it is dull as an old tooth.”
“Anything else?”
“Well,” she said, still looking at it, “it’s rather plain.”
Alec imagined the sword he wanted. Focus. The end of the old sword’s blade split off from the rest. Focus. Now he had the shape he wanted – Focus – and he feathered in a harder metal alloy at the blade’s edge to keep it sharp.
Erin picked it up, swung it a few times and tried the blade on a piece of her long hair. It cut without hesitation.
The hilt is wrong, Alec thought.
“Show me your hand,” he said to Erin. She stuck out her hand, first palm-side up, then turning it over to show him the back.
Focus – and the hilt shifted and shuddered and shrank until it looked about the right size for Erin’s hand. Focus, again, and the hilt covered itself with a microfiber style leather that would wick away moisture and keep the grip dry.
Now for the next step. Decoration. But with a purpose. Alec knew how to do this well. The ability to create diamonds or other gemstones with dark energy was one attribute that had first attracted him to study this field of science; at one time he had hoped to make large baubles to impress a former girlfriend. The girl departed before he could make any jewels, but his interest in the field of using dark energy to make other materials stayed with him. His mind strayed as he thought how the ability to make diamonds with dark energy had led to a law requiring three labels on diamonds: natural, synthetic, and artificial.
He brought his attention back to the sword. Focus – and a thumb-sized diamond appeared on the end of the hilt. Focus – and he created a small tricrystal and embedded it in the middle of the diamond. The tricrystal could feed dark energy into the sword.
“Perfect,” Erin said, trying out the sword’s new grip and admiring the diamond. She poked at the tricrystal frowning.
“Is it a flaw in the stone?” she asked, hesitantly.
“No,” Alec said quickly. “It’s a crystal. It will … help the sword.”
She picked at the tricrystal with her fingernail, clearly not impressed.
“We need only a couple more little things,” Alec said. He picked up the sword’s dirty sheath. Focus, and the now-clean sheath shortened to fit the re-designed sword.
“One last thing,” Alec said. Focus. Slowly the word ‘Erin’ appeared on the sword’s blade. Alec took the sword, put the sword in its sheath, and handed it to her. “Pull the sword out,” he said.
She drew the sword and could see ‘Erin’ written on the blade in stylized text.
“What are the runes?” she asked.
“They spell your name in my language. ‘Erin.’”
“My name in Wizard-runes?” asked Erin, obviously pleased.
“Yes. And your name … the runes … will do one more thing. Let me show you.”
Erin handed him the sword, and as soon as he held it, her name glowed like flames. Alec put the sword down, and the glow went away.
“How?” she said, wide-eyed, stepping back.
He laughed. “Don’t worry! I will teach you how to make it do that.” He pointed to the tricrystal. “This is what will make it glow. A ‘tricrystal.’ I will teach you how to feel the power crystal and control it. The crystal will also make the sword feel much lighter when you use it, and keep it sharp.” He smiled, and turned the sword over, looking at each side in turn. Then he handed it back to her and shrugged. “But until I teach you how to do those things, it will work great as a normal sword.”
Erin took the sword and strapped it on her side, quite pleased.
✽✽✽
By now the bright sun was high in the sky. It was time to break camp. Erin made a quick lunch and re-packed the trogus’ panniers and harnessed the drung. Erin put the saddles and harness on the two trogus and led one towards Alec.
Alec eyed the beast warily. “We have a problem,” he said.
“What is that?”
“I have never ridden any animal before. Not a horse, not anything! I have no idea what to do.”
“What?” Erin said, laughing. “The Great Wizard can’t ride a simple beast?”
“Sorry to disappoint,” Alec said, somewhat annoyed. “I am neither a rider nor a ‘great wizard.’ I have no idea what to do!”
“That’s all right,” said Erin, still smiling. “I can teach you. I need to have some skills to make myself worthy of the Great Wizard.”
Erin patted the saddled animal closest to Alec. “These are easy to ride. Some are very difficult, but these two are relatively docile, and small. Just show no fear. Climb on the saddle, and then direct her with the neck reins.”
“Sounds easy.”
But it wasn’t. Alec’s first attempt to mount the trogus was unsuccessful. He managed to get his foot in the stirrup, but as the animal shifted, he hopped alongside it, one foot up, one foot down. Erin got on the other trogus with practiced grace.
“Like this,” she said.
Alec again put his foot in the stirrup and attempted to pull up onto the saddle. This time he overshot and came off the other side in a clumsy heap. The trogus turned and snarled at him.
“Hey!” Erin shouted sharply at the beast, and it calmed down.
Third time’s the charm. With some effort, Alec made it onto the animal and in the saddle. Then they set off through the grass. Erin went first and set the pace. Alec struggled to stay in the saddle and keep up. Occasionally he managed to look forward and could see Erin gracefully and effortlessly riding her beast.
After about two hours, Alec had all he could take.
“We need to stop,” he told Erin. She looked at him and nodded in agreement.
“It is just as well since we don’t want to reach their camp tired and unprepared.”
“How far away are we?”
“A couple of els moonward, I would think,” she said. “The Gryg would not yet have moved their camp.”
Alec had no clue whether an ‘el’ was a measure of distance, time, or something else. Or where ‘moonward’ was.
“Close, huh?” he said to no one in particular. Erin didn’t answer. Must be close.
Erin spotted a dense clump of brush and headed for it. They dismounted: Erin quickly, Alec slowly, rubbing his hindquarters as he regained his footing. Erin unsaddled both trogus and hobbled them with a practiced skill that Alec could not imagine imitating.
“What do troguses eat? Will they feed on the local grass?” As Alec looked at the animals’ sharp teeth, he knew it was a stupid question.
“They will eat any small animal they can find. These two were fed yesterday and won’t need to eat again for a couple of days.” Erin gave them a couple of pats on their thick necks and the one she had been riding nuzzled her shoulder. “But be careful. You don’t want to be close to their face if they are hungry. They will take your arm off while you watch.” Alec backed away from the animal, eying it warily. Erin laughed. “The drung, it is easier. It just eats grass.”
Alec heated rocks again, and Erin made another meal of the gritty porridge. The sunlight was beginning to fade. Alec could see a moon through the brush – or was it two moons? Had the other moon set? Or were these different moons newly risen?
Erin was making a nest on the edge of the bushes large enough for the two of them and spread the blanket they had used the night before. Alec looked at it askance.
“We are sleeping together?”
“Of course, just like last night,” she said. “We only have one blanket.”
“Um … Okay, but … I have a steady girlfriend at home,” Alec said. “I mean …” His voice trailed off.
Erin looked at him. “Great Wizard, we sleep together for warmth and protection. Besides, the nomads did as they wanted with me. There is nothing you can do that would be worse than what they have already done.” She crawled into the bower. Darkness was falling quickly, and there seemed to be few options besides sleeping with her or staying up all night.
What the heck, thought Alec. I’m so tired that I couldn’t do anything if I wanted to. The two of them curled up together, under the branches. But she certainly is attractive, he thought, and fell asleep.
3 – The Nomad Camp
Erin was already up and stirring about their camp when Alec woke. By now they had a routine: Alec collected and heated rocks while Erin made the porridge.
“This is the last of our food,” Erin said. “We will need to do something else tomorrow.”
“Okay,” Alec answered, and added, “We will get to the Gryg camp today.” If it goes well, Alec thought, we will take their food. But if it goes badly … we won’t need any more food. “Can we get closer without them seeing us?”
“That will be difficult. They post guards, and there is little cover so our trogus will be easily seen.”
“What if we try to sneak up on them, and just walk in?”
“No one has ever done that,” Erin said, mulling over the idea. “It might be possible. We can try. But … if it doesn’t work, we have no way to escape. They will run us down easily.”
“Hmm.” Alec thought a moment. “I wonder … let’s try something.”
Focus. A shimmering field of grass surrounded Alec.
“Can you see me?” he asked Erin.
Erin looked closely at the spot where Alec had just been standing. “If I really look, I can see you, but otherwise you vanish into the grass.”
“Let’s try it. The worst that can happen is we get killed.” He laughed faintly.
“That is the worst for you,” she said, clenching her jaw. “The worst for me is far more terrible.”
Alec looked at her.
“Are your rings worth the risk?” he asked softly.
“Absolutely,” she said.
This is stupid, he thought. The rational side of his brain said he should leave this girl, run, and find some other way home.
“Okay – we go for the rings.” The rational side of his brain wasn’t in control this morning.
Alec helped Erin hobble the three beasts and collect the items they would need. Erin had made a pack for Alec’s weapons – his sling and his staff – and he put them on his back. They bagged the remainder of the supplies and stashed them under a bush near the trogus. Then they started a slow walk towards the nomad’s camp. Periodically, Alec would create a dark energy lens and let the light bend around them, creating the illusion of grass waving gently in the wind.
They heard the first sentry before they saw him: a faint shuffling and loud coughing gave the man away. Alec bent the light around them as a shield, and the two stood stock still and watched as the sentry passed by. The man’s trogus was nervous and sensed something, but did not growl enough to alert the sentry.
After an hour of cautious walking, they were on a ridge overlooking the Gryg camp. The camp was larger than Alec had supposed. There were at least fifty gaudy tents for the nomads and twice that number of simpler tents for the slaves and servants. In the corner of the camp were wagons and the plundered gains from various caravans.
“Where are your rings?” Alec whispered, squinting at the tents.
“I don’t know,” said Erin. “I can sense the rings when I get close to them. I suspect they are in the treasure tent.” She pointed to a smallish tent near the center of the camp with red and purple stripes. “That middle tent is where they store the more valuable things that they steal.” She scanned the camp again. “I will go closer and sense if they are there.”
“All right. You sneak down to the tent, and I will try to create a diversion.”
“I do not have to sneak,” Erin said. “They know me. They will not be surprised to see me in the camp. If I pull my hair down, they will not notice the slave ring is not around my neck. I will walk to the tent. When I get close, you can distract them.”
With that, she slipped off her moccasins and pants, leaving only the slave-girl shift. “If I am wearing more, they will notice,” she said, not pleased with what she was doing.
“Take your sword,” Alec said.
“Why? Slaves don’t have swords.”
“And you are not a slave,” Alec said, impatiently. “Take it. You might need it.”
She looked at her sword. “Well, maybe if I leave it in its scabbard so no one will see its blade … it doesn’t look like a Gryg sword.” She thought for a moment. “I know. I’ll carry it like this,” she said, holding it awkwardly over her shoulder, “as if I am on an errand for my master. That should work.” Then she was off towards camp.
‘Distract them.’ Hmpf. Alec hoped her confidence in him was deserved.
His plan was simple. When she got close to the central tent, he would start a fire in a wagon on the other side, away from the treasure tent. Hopefully, in the ensuing confusion she could quickly slip in and slip out. If that didn’t work, Alec thought of a couple of other diversions he could try.
Erin moved with confidence. She knew the workings of the camp and if she acted as if she was on an errand no one should challenge her. Using the outer tents as a cover, she entered the camp, walked beside some of the slave tents, and moved towards the center tents.
Focus. Alec started a fire in a medium-sized wagon on the far side of the camp. As soon as the nearby nomads noticed the flames, they started to shout for help. As Alec had planned, the fire created an uproar. Nomads and slaves ran to the fire to help extinguish the flames. Others ran in fear away from the fire.
Men and women passed Erin in each direction, responding to the fire or running from it. By the time she made it two-thirds of the way to the treasure tent, no one had challenged her, or, in the confusion caused by the fire, even noticed her. From his vantage point on the ridge, Alec watched her make her way around the tents and across the camp’s open spaces with no one giving her a second look.
Uh-oh. He could see Erin coming around a small tent, with a nomad coming around the same tent from the other direction. Apparently, neither could see the other.
✽✽✽
Erin looked up as she rounded the tent corner and found herself face-to-face with a swarthy Gryg. No! She thought. Why him? This nomad had been a companion of her former master, the now-dead nomad leader; they had treated her viciously, sometimes together, sometimes alone. A sly smile appeared on his face as he recognized her, and she braced herself. Avoiding him was impossible.
“Slave!” he said. “I wanted you last night and couldn’t find you. I will have you tonight, I am sure, but first – punishment for not appearing at my tent last night to see if I wanted you.” He chuckled. “Down on your knees and pull up your garment, slave! I want your back to remember me tonight!”
“I am on an errand for my master,” Erin said. “I have a task I must do. I must bring him his sword.”
“Pretty cheeky for a slave!” the man growled. “Do it later!” He pulled a whip from his belt. “Down!”
Erin momentarily felt lost. She had been sure that no one would notice her; that she could pull off her charade with no trouble. The excruciating pain that the slave collar could cause was still fresh in her memory. She clumsily lowered the sword from her shoulder. If she just closed her eyes and let him whip her, she could cancel out the pain in her mind; he would be done in a few moments and then leave her alone. Then she could continue to the treasure tent.
No. Erin felt a new anger boiling in her. Alec’s words rang in her ears. ‘You are not a slave.’ She was no longer wearing the slave neckpiece – she did not have to submit to this Gryg! She hated him for what he had forced her t
o do.
Instead of dropping the sword, she felt for its hilt and with one swift motion pulled it from its scabbard and slashed towards her tormentor. He was frozen for an instant, shocked by her resistance to his demands, then stepped back and drew his weapon, his years of fighting saving him.
Erin knew she was one of the best sword fighters in her land, and from his lesser level of skill, she knew she could beat the nomad one-on-one. However, if the fight took too long, others would arrive to help him; while she might successfully fight two or three, she would not last against many. The Wizard has not had enough time to create his diversion, she thought. She was on her own. Her best hope was to win this fight quickly.
Although most people in the camp were still fighting the wagon fire, Erin knew it was just a matter of time before her fight was noticed. And soon, from the corner of her eye, she saw three more people come around the tent: a nomad and two slaves. The slaves, of course, did not have weapons, and the other man didn’t have a sword – a stroke of luck. At their master’s command, the two slaves grabbed long poles and started towards her. She had to end this before even more people discovered her.
Suddenly there was a loud pop! in the sky above the camp. Then a loud bang! followed by a high-pitched whooshing sound. Then, a second loud bang! The sky lit up with red streamers, expanding in all directions like the claws of a giant crab. A third bang! – now white streamers covered the sky. Then, a bolt of lightning zapped from the sky and slammed into the ground with an audible crack!
The Wizard. Erin did not allow herself to look up, but she could see the two slaves recoil in terror and then flee with their master. Her assailant stopped and looked up at the sky, his hair on end, momentarily distracted from their fight. That was all Erin needed. Her sword flicked out like a snake’s tongue, cutting deep into his left arm. He looked at her, startled, and then down at his wound as blood gushed from his severed artery. Erin lashed out with a cut across his throat. He dropped in shock in a pool of blood. Soundless words came from his mouth as the blood gurgled, then he slumped to the ground. Erin silently intoned the curse of the victor, then spat upon his form.
