Estyr

Chapter Eleven

Jack was worried. It was now two days since they’d encountered Mika and Rowan and still, Elmi hadn’t regained consciousness. On each of the last two nights whenever they set up camp, Lyra had examined the Dark Elf but could find no issue with her. She had even gone as far as crushing the roots of the orc root plant they had plucked before encountering Mika and her brother. Jack had thought at the time that if the smell from the sap was how orcs actually smelled, then he would be glad to never meet one. After propping her up, Lyra had gotten the Dark elf to take the sap from the root. It had, however, had no effect, which ruled out the possibility of poison. But while the possibility of it being poison was eliminated, they were still left with the open question of what it could be that the Dark elf was being affected by.

Lyra had been both right and wrong. She had been right that Mika had been hiding something, she had been wrong however when she assumed that Mika’s secret was the fact of her brother being close by. This was it, this was what Mika had been hiding. There was very little doubt in either one of them that whatever was affecting Elmi was the result of the trap in which she had been caught. There must have been a potion of some kind applied to the trap that was responsible for this effect. Jack could see the logic behind it, and in a way appreciated the intelligence of it. Losing your consciousness for days after having lost a limb was a recipe for bleeding out and even if the victim of the trap had fast healing and could recover very quickly, they would be passed out for days giving the hunters ample time to end the life of whatever it was they caught.

Jack had been a bit relieved when he found out that it wasn’t poison, but after thinking about it for a while, the worry had all come back. Elmi was essentially no different from one in a coma. If she stayed in the state she was in for too long she would starve or die from thirst. It wasn’t that he didn’t think that he could care for her in this state, but no doubt she would slow them down and Lyra had already made herself quite clear as to what she would do if Elmi proved to be an impediment to their mission. For the past two days that she had been out, Lyra hadn’t said or done anything to indicate the intent to harm her. Jack, however, didn’t know how long that would last.

“Jack!”

He was pulled out of the reverie his mind had gone on by Lyra’s voice. From the way she called his name, it was clear that she had already called him a number of times. Both of them were on top of the two remaining horses. The horses weren’t galloping however, they were instead trotting along. “I’m sorry,” he offered, turning to look at her. “What is it?” he asked.

Rather than verbally answer, Lyra pointed down the path off in the distance. Jack turned his head, his gaze following the direction in which Lyra was pointing. He immediately saw it. The path they were on, led to a small hill down further on, it then went up the hill. This, however, wasn’t what was of interest to them. Behind the hill was a thick column of smoke rising to the sky. It wasn’t the kind of smoke one saw from one burning building, the column was about half a mile across from Jack’s estimation. Jack and Lyra shared a glance before they each wordlessly signaled for their horses to start running.

On a normal horse, it would have taken them at least thirty minutes just to get to the hill itself. With these horses galloping at full speed, they came to the top of the hill well inside of ten minutes. Jack’s jaw clenched as he looked down at the town ablaze. Looking from its most easterly point to the west most part of it, there wasn’t a single house that had been left untouched. Every single one of them was on fire. Even from where they stood at the top of the hill, they could feel the hot air wafting in from the burning town. The fact that most of the houses in the town were made of wood only exacerbated the situation. Chances that any of them would be left unscathed by the fire were next to nil.

However, even more unsettling than the fact of the burning houses, was the smell of burning flesh that came in with the hot air. A few houses had roofs that had caved in. Jack could feel his skin crawling, an unpleasant chill running down his spine as he looked at the human forms that looked like they had been bundled together like firewood and burned up inside the houses. Their blackened bodies were still burning in most cases, but in some, only smoking remains were left behind.

“Jack,” This time Lyra didn’t have to call twice, he was glad to have any reason to turn his eyes away from the scene before him. Despite knowing that this was the life she was used to, it was still unnerving to Jack to find Lyra with a neutral, or more accurately a jaded expression. It was an expression that relayed that she had seen something like this one too many times. It no longer evoked the kind of visceral reaction it did from Jack. Instead, from the way her eyes kept moving from left to right in the fire, she clearly was looking for something. “There,” She said suddenly pointing. “On the east side,” she expressed.

Despite the fact that he was loath to do so, Jack turned his gaze back to the burning town. Once again, his gaze followed the direction in which Lyra was pointing, but unlike the first time, he didn’t immediately pick up on what it was that she was trying to show him. Instead, he could only see the hostile flames. It wasn’t until their query moved again that he saw it, someone was moving around in the burning town!

“Is it one of Sydrar’s men?” Jack asked as they regarded the figure.

Lyra muttered a few incantations in an arcane language. Just as it had been in the car when Jack had informed her that there was someone after them, runes had circled her eyes, probably enhancing her sight in some way. Jack also kept his eyes fixed on the figure as they moved about. After a while of observing him through the flames, it became clear that he was walking around the town with a torch in hand. He was setting alight a few housed that weren’t already burning that Jack had missed on his first scan of the town. “I can’t tell,” Lyra finally answered seemingly giving up the attempt to discern the answer to Jack’s question from this distance. On the one hand, there is that feeling of… evil, hanging in the air.”

It wasn’t until she mentioned it that Jack became aware of it. A feeling of evil, as she had put it,  did indeed hang thick in the air. A feeling of death and decay, like life was shriveling away and in its place, corruption was eating at both your flesh and very soul while you still drew breath. Even more thick than usual was the feeling of utter despondency. Whatever it was that protected Jack and kept him from feeling it, much less being affected by that feeling, had also kept him from picking up on it as quickly as she had. There was definitely the thick residue of dark magic in this area. Whether it came from the figure they could still see moving around in the fire or had been here before he came along, Jack also couldn’t tell from this distance.

“It’s the same air that is always around places where either Sydrar or one of his people have attacked,” Lyra pointed out. “Which normally, would indicate that it’s their handiwork,” She said in a contemplative tone as she continued to regard the figure.

“I’m sensing a but somewhere in that statement,” Jack voiced when Lyra went silent for a while.

“He’s burning the corpses,” she stated, causing something to click as Jack looked back at the figure. She didn’t need to say the rest, his mind already understood why this pointed in the direction of him not being one of Sydrar’s men. “There is only one way to kill an undead, completely destroy its physical body,” Lyra explained.  “The easiest and fastest way to do that, especially for a large group of them-”

“Is fire,” Jack finished, his eyes on the fire as it consumed the town.

“If he was one of Sydrar’s men, then he would essentially be burning his own army,” Lyra expressed what Jack had put together. “It would instead be more beneficial to him to have turned them into his undead army if he was allied with Sydrar,” she voiced. “On the other hand, if he happened to come across a whole town of undead and somehow managed to subdue them all, then whoever they are, they are no weakling,” Lyra voiced.

Despite being relieved at being presented with the option that the ones being burned had been already dead before they were set alight, Jack couldn’t help but darkly propose. “Or maybe, he burned a whole town of living people,” he said.

Lyra’s lips pressed into each other as she considered the possibility. “Either way,” she finally said after a while as she swung her leg over the back of the horse and climbed down from it. “We need to be very careful about how we approach this,” she said guiding the horse by its reins to the nearest tree and securing it there.

“Can’t we go around the town altogether?” Jack asked still on top of his own horse.

“I’ve told you before Jack,” Elmi replied. “We have woefully few allies. If he is against Sydrar and ready to so openly fight against him as they have done here, then perhaps we can gain an ally,” Lyra said.

“And if they are one of Sydrar’s men, or worse a mass murderer?” Jack asked.

“There is no difference between those two titles Jack,” Lyra answered, her eyes not on him but on the figure in the flames. “But to answer your question, If he is one of Sydrar’s men, then Sydrar will be one man short by the end of today, and if he is nothing more than a mass murderer, then the world will be rid another scoundrel,” she said.

“You don’t even know how powerful he is,” Jack objected as he too descended from his horse and tethered it to the same tree as Lyra had done hers.

“You are welcome to stay behind if you so wish,” Lyra said as she began moving downhill.

“Wait, you aren’t  going to keep me here?” Jack asked surprised at her response. He had expected to be wrapped in some kind of magical spell that kept him in place.

Lyra looked back at him. “You wanted to fight two days ago,” she said. “Today you may get the chance.”

In spite of the truth of her words, and the fact that he knew he would hate it if Lyra kept him from the fight, he couldn’t help the sped up beating of his heart. He looked up from her to the one moving around in the fire. Even from this distance, Jack could see that they were no weakling. He was barely conscious of it as he swallowed hard and looked back down at Lyra again. She, however, had noted his fear. “This is it, Jack,” she said quietly. “This is no longer training. That fear you feel is what it means to fight. You risk death every time you draw your weapon to face off with someone,” she explained. “The fact that you feel it doesn’t mean you are a coward, it means you are not stupid,” she added. “However,” her tone became even more grave and serious as she uttered the word. “I’d  strongly recommend you stay back if you are not ready to take a life,” She said.

Jack stood frozen in place as this new dimension was added to the whole issue. Back at Laura’s party, he had been ready to do as much as was required to defend himself even if that entailed using deadly force. But this was different, back then, he was the one being attacked and had simply been defending himself, now he would be the aggressor. The one attacking, and as Lyra had stipulated, with the intent to kill. There was the possibility the at the man moving about in the flames was the one responsible for all these deaths and that made him a monster, which would make it an easier decision to make peace with, but what if they attacked an innocent man and ended up doing something in the process that they could not take back?

What if the reverse happened? What if, whoever he was, he proved to be too powerful a foe for them and they died in this fight? But then, couldn’t the same be said about every other fight he ever found himself part of? Was his plan to cower in fear until he was absolutely sure he could beat whatever foe presented themselves in their path? Two days before, he had declared himself king! If he really meant it, then this was his new normal. He would constantly have to be facing foes like the man in the flames potentially was. Jack would be lying if he said he wasn’t afraid of dying. His heart was hammering away in his chest, but unlike two days prior, his mind was also panicking. Chances were this would be the last moments of his life if this didn’t go well.

Lyra was at the foot of the small hill by the time he settled on a decision. Right or wrong, whether he lived or died, there was no way Jack would leave Lyra to fight alone especially against such a formidable opponent. Jack clenched his jaws almost as if the physical act would help bolster in his mind that he was making the right choice as he ran after her. Lyra turned her head when she heard his footsteps approach. Jack could have sworn he saw a smile cross her lips as she turned her gaze back to the town ahead of them. Shields formed around him as he continued to descend the hill. For a moment, Jack had expected to be frozen in place by the shields. However, other than he himself stopping for a second, his motion was not in any way impeded.

Jack had thought that the shields were meant to be an added layer of protection for when they were in combat, and indeed it would be useful that way. However, as they got closer to the town and the heat intensified, he also realized that there was no way that he would have been able to approach the town without it. They were a hundred meters away and the air already stiflingly hot. Without the shields, there was no doubt in his mind that he would already be burning. Without pause, however, Lyra kept advancing on the town, sprinting with her head low. Jack couldn’t help but envy her. For the resolute look on her face, it was clear that questions of whether she would live through this or not were not in any way a bother to her. She seemed to be willing to do whatever was necessary, and whatever would come, would come.

Despite the fact that they knew that the man was on the other side of the town, they still kept their heads low as they entered the town. Lyra did all she could to keep to a minimum any sound that she produced and Jack followed suit. They were dealing with magic now, the rules that would apply on the battlefield back on the other realm didn’t here. There was no way of knowing how sensitive the man’s senses were or if he was able to quickly move from one position to the next so that they could accidentally run into him if they were casual about their approach. Up until they were sure of where he was, then they needed to act like he was around every corner. It made their advance slower than it would otherwise be. But slow and alive was a good thing as far as he was concerned.

It felt both odd and unreal whenever they had their backs up against a building that was completely engulfed in flames. Their whole bodies would be engulfed in the flames as the wood burned behind them. Once or twice, the wall of a building they had been hiding behind collapsed and fell right on their heads. Lyra’s shield s, however, proved to be formidable enough to keep them safe as their necks barely had to bend forward as a result of the heavy timber. Despite being protected on this end, however, their advance was still hard. The air was thin, dry, and uncomfortably hot as a result of the heat such that Jack was forced to take long measured breaths to keep from passing out or burning his lungs by a sharp intake of air. Everything around them appeared to be hazy as the heated air appeared to be rising in a wavy fashion and if they were not careful, it would be all too easy to miss something moving in the haze.

They had been moving from house to house through the sizable town for the better part of twenty minutes when Lyra raised a hand while glancing around the corner of the house they were hiding behind. When she withdrew her head and turned to look forward, Jack couldn’t help but notice that her breathing pattern had changed just like his had. Given that he also had his back against the wall of the house, he found himself looking at the side profile of Lyra, and from this angle, he would have to be practically blind to miss her ample bosom as it slowly rose and fell at a steady rhythm. To make matters worse, a fine sheen of sweat covered the exposed skin that was her cleavage as a result of the heat around. This had the added effect of making them appear to be glistening in the flames.

“He’s around the corner,” Lyra’s words caused his eyes to snap back upwards to her face. It was an odd and almost comically stereotypical thing for him to do, especially in the circumstances that they were in. Luckily for him, however, Lyra hadn’t been looking in his direction. Her head had once again turned to look around the corner. “Stay hidden,” she instructed before turning to look him in the eye. “Wait for my signal,” she added in a whisper before turning to look back around the corner.

Jack immediately knew that something was wrong when Lyra’s head started to turn from side to side, her eyes clearly looking for something. Before she even had to say it, Jack could already deduce what had just happened. “He’s gone,” she said alarm in her voice.

“Who’s gone?”

Jack jumped involuntarily at the whispered question from his other side. Somewhere along the way, his battle instincts merged seamlessly with the surprise. Before he had even fully processed what was happening, his right hand had closed around the rod at his side. By the time he had raised it up to hold it in both hands, the rod had already elongated into a staff with the white-light blade at the end. The longer he stayed with the weapon and the more he used it, the more it seemed to be able to predict and react to his motions. He turned around swinging the staff in an arch at the man that had been standing beside them. His intention had been to stop the blade an inch short of the man’s neck so as to ensure that he wouldn’t make any moves against them.

For a man of his frame and size however, the man was blindingly fast. Before the swing could come to a stop, he had already ducked below the swinging staff in a ‘U’ motion of his head, leaving Jack’s attack to pass harmlessly above him. He came back up on the other side of the swing, raising his armored left arm as a guard to keep the staff from swinging back at him. His right hand curled into a tight fist and shot forward catching squarely in the chest. It felt like a power line post had been tied to a mile-long rope then allowed to swing from the highest point right into his chest. He was barely aware of it as he flew through the air. Or when his body crashed through the burning wooden wall of a house that had been across the street from where they’d been hiding. The only thought that had been in his mind, was the fact that if it had not been for Lyra’s shields protecting him, then there would have been a hole in his chest where the blow had connected.

The world was spinning. Jack couldn’t help the groan of agony that left him. While it had protected him from certain death, Jack doubted that even a shield twice as strong as the one Lyra had set up around her would have spared him of the pain of that blow. With immense effort and almost double that in pure will, Jack pushed himself onto his feet. He was now standing inside a burning building with a hole in the wall through which he could see Lyra and the man. It took a second for his mind to connect that it was he that had formed the hole as he broke through the wall. Lyra was now standing with her back to Jack with both her hands raised in a surrendering gesture. Jack had intended to sprint forward, to run to her aid, but all he succeeded in doing was dragging a shaky leg forward that felt like it weighed a ton.

Given the fact that the man wasn’t attacking Lyra, Jack could only assume that she was telling him something, probably to placate him. The man had with one blow driven the point home, that a fight with him wouldn’t end in their favor. While Jack had been the one that had had to endure the direct blow from the man, Lyra had been the one with the herculean task of maintaining the shields around him.  He had been the man inside the armor, whereas her mind had been the armor. It was no mean feat that she had somehow managed to keep her shields from shattering at the blow. That still, even now, she kept him safe from the flames despite what must have been a sledgehammer being swung at her head. Whatever Lyra was saying, however, Jack couldn’t hear. Partly because his ears were ringing, partly because of the raging inferno all around him.

Jack gritted his teeth as he forced one foot in front of the other, moving as fast as he could towards Lyra. He had no intention of becoming a liability to Lyra in this fight. He had chosen to fight and that’s just exactly what he would do if the man wasn’t appeased by whatever she was telling him. When he came to a stop beside Lyra, his teeth were gritted even harder than they had initially been from the effort. The man that had barely moved after he had countered his attack except to lower his arms, turned a glare on him. In spite of himself, Jack found himself fearing the possibility of a second attack. He was resolved to fight if it came to it, but he wasn’t sure how much his body would cooperate with him if it came to that. Not only was he in no condition to fight, but he doubted he could get away fast enough if that was the only option left to them.

Now that he looked at the man, he could understand the power of his punch. He stood at easily over seven feet tall. He looked like one of those muscle-bound freaks that had been shot up with too many steroids, only Jack doubted that there was any such thing in this realm as steroids. The strength he possessed, was all naturally gained from the look of things. Jack couldn’t tell much about his facial features given the helmet he had on, all Jack could see of him was his crimson red eyes as they regarded him. He seemed to be deliberating whether to snap him in two like a twig or if it wasn’t worth the bother. In the end, he must have gone with the latter as he started to turn around to walk away, seemingly having lost interest in them. “Hey wait,” Other than his Jaws clenching, Jack showed no other outward reaction when Lyra called out to the man, he was screaming in the inside wondering why she could possibly want to turn his attention back on them?

“You don’t work with Sydrar,” it wasn’t a question, it was a statement of fact. Lyra seemed to have somehow come to the conclusion that the man that had just punched him across the street wasn’t one of Sydrar’s people. “If you did, you wouldn’t have burned the dead and you sure as hell wouldn’t have tried to walk away from us and leave us breathing,” she reasoned out loud. “Which leaves the question, what happened here?” She asked. Only now did Jack remember that they hoped to gain an ally.

The man regarded her for a while before asking. “How long can you keep your shields up?” There was something odd about his voice that Jack couldn’t exactly put his finger on. However, his words drew Jack’s attention to something else. It was only when he asked this question, that Jack noticed the subtle signs of strain on Lyra’s face. She had probably been keeping a straight face to keep the man from picking up on the strain she was under, in case he turned out to be hostile. She had, however, only succeeded in keeping Jack from picking up on it, the man wasn’t fooled. “Perhaps this conversation is not best had in the middle of an inferno,” as it had been with Lyra, this wasn’t a question or even a suggestion. He was simply telling them that they needed to move if they wanted to keep on talking. Again Jack found himself wondering at what it was about his voice sounded odd to him. Without awaiting an answer from them, however, the man turned and started off.

Lyra didn’t immediately move after him, instead she turned to him allowing a look of concern to cross her expression. “Are you okay?” She asked.

Despite the fact that he still felt like he’d  been run over by a truck, a warm feeling was spreading within him at her concern for him. He put on a brave smile for her and nodded. “I’ll be fine,” he said in a tone that betrayed none of the discomfort he was in.

Her eyes narrowed at him in a manner that relayed she clearly didn’t believe him. She, however, didn’t press the issue. “He’s strong,” she said. “I wasn’t  sure my shields would be enough to save you,” she voiced a bit of worry still in her voice.

“He’s strong, there is no denying that,” he conceded. “But I’ll  be fine,” he reassured. “Best not to lose sight of him,” he said nodding in the direction in which the man had gone.

Lyra’s lips pressed together, she clearly wanted to check up on him further but also knew that he was right. It would be unwise to lose sight of the man. “I’m  checking up on you after this,” she said in a tone that relayed that she wouldn’t hear any objections on the issue.

Jack’s smile widened at her as he allowed her to go before him. He didn’t want her to see him struggle. Right now, her attention needed to be entirely on the man that was with no apparent haste, making his way out of town. Jack followed behind her, doing his best to keep a straight face just in case Lyra turned around unexpectedly. He forced thoughts of just how close he’d  come to death out of his mind and instead admonished himself to stay focused on Lyra. It wasn’t  until they walked out of town that Jack realized that the man had been walking directly towards the hill on which they had left their horses. Was this a coincidence or is it that he had known about them from the moment they came over the hill?

With her walking in front of him, Jack could quite clearly see Lyra’s posture relax substantially once they were a safe distance away from the burning town. It was almost as if she hadn’t  allowed her physical body to relax lest she somehow lose the tight laser focus that she had employed to keep the shields around the both of them. “Are you okay?” it was Jack’s turn to be concerned about her.

“Give me a few minutes, I’ll  be fine,” she said quietly as they started their ascent of the small hill on which they had left their horses.

When they came to the top of the hill, they found the man standing before the horse that Jack had been riding on and was gently patting it down. Unlike Jack, the horse seemed to be completely at peace with the man and not in any way intimidated by him. He was whispering gently to the steed in a language that Jack could yet quite understand.

They both stopped and watched him for a while, it was almost impossible to believe that a man as large and powerful as he was, would be capable of any kind of gentleness. Inside the inferno, with everything burning down all around them, it had been impossible for Jack to place what it was about his voice sounded so odd. But now as Jack heard the man murmur to the steed, it became clear what it was he had been picking up on, much to his own unpleasant surprise. He sounded serene.

It was a sharp contrast to the giant of a man that looked like nothing short of a war machine. Given his reaction to Jack’s attack, he didn’t just look the part. He was every bit as dangerous as he looked, which only made what he was hearing all the more incongruent with the figure before him. It was only now listening to him, that Jack realized that he hadn’t heard the same kind of tranquil he could hear in his voice, in anyone else’s voice. To one degree or the other, everyone including Lyra and Elmi had had a measure of anxiety in anticipation of something going wrong. It was like they were living under the proverbial sword of Damocles and no matter how disciplined they were or how they tried to keep a cool head at all times, they were always conscious of it. There was always the tension in their voice of one who was expecting something to go wrong. Not this man.

His voice spoke of one who was conscious of nothing but the present moment. But not in the sense of one who was unconscious of or ignorant of the future. It also wasn’t of one who was arrogantly sure that whatever happened he would be able to fight and beat them. This was part of it, but not the whole. His peace seemed to be largely the result of a conscious choice. This man was at peace because he chose to be so. Whatever troubles and dangers the future held, this man had clearly chosen to not let it bother him. His focus was entirely on this moment now as he patted the horse. In fact, one would have been forgiven if they got the impression that the man was unaware of their presence given how absorbed he seemed to be in what he was doing. However, given how he had picked them out in the middle of an inferno without either one of them even picking up on it until he wanted them to, Jack knew better.

“What happened to the town?” Lyra finally broke the silence.

The man turned to look at them for a moment before turning to look at the inferno below. “I burned it,” He answered simply before turning his attention back to the horse. There was no mockery in his voice as he offered the answer,  he sounded every bit genuine as Jack would expect of someone he had just asked the time.

“What about the people inside?” Jack pressed.

The man looked back at the town, this time a dark look crossing his expression. “They were denied rest,” the man answered. “I gave it to them,” he added. He, however, didn’t turn his attention back to the horse like he had the first time. He was clearly bothered by whatever it was that was going on in his mind.

Jack, however, didn’t like the vagueness of the answer, so he further interrogated. “What do you mean they had been denied rest?” he asked.

“To live a corpse is a fate worse than death,” he answered.

“So they were all dead by the time you found them?” He asked.

“Corpses generally do not draw breath,” he answered turning his gaze away from the town and back to the horse. He then seemed to think a bit before turning back to Jack. “generally,” he repeated clearly in his own attempt at being as accurate as possible.

“Wait,” Lyra spoke up. “So what you are trying to say is that you fought a whole town of the dead on your own?” She asked not in any way trying to hide the doubt in her voice. Somehow, Jack got the impression that even if she had tried to hide it, the man would have seen right through her.

“A rotting corpse rarely puts up a spirited fight,” He replied. He did not add anything, his tone relaying that he considered this a complete answer. While Jack saw the logic and probable truth of the statement, he also couldn’t help but wonder what someone like the man before them considered to be a ‘spirited fight’.

“So they weren’t made into Sydrar’s slaves recently?” Lyra questioned.

“No,” he answered.

“Neither Sydrar nor any of his people are in the habit of leaving behind a whole group of the dead,” she said in a tone that transformed the statement into a question.

“A servant of death did lead them,” He answered. “I laid him to rest with them,” he added. Jack could feel his heart pick up pace and the glacial tone of the man. He wasn’t bragging about his fighting skills or the fact that he had killed whoever had been responsible for the mass death of the town. He clearly detested that he even had to do it. To him, what he had done was an act of justice, not something he was forced to do for survival. Whether he’d been attacked or had actually taken up the offensive and made the first move, Jack couldn’t quite yet tell. Whichever the order of events, however, the man had seen the battle through to the end and had even gone as far as burning the body of the corpses as a matter of principle.

*******

She could feel her heart hammering in her chest. If what he was saying was true, then he had been right when she told Jack that there was a chance they would gain an ally. But even she couldn’t have possibly foreseen just how powerful he would be. She hadn’t made secret the fact that she was skeptical about his claim that he fought the whole town on his own. But rather than become angry or defensive, he just made an off-hand comment about the fight not being as hard as she made it out to be. It wasn’t proof positive, but it was a good sign that he wasn’t lying.

Lyra would have used other more direct methods of assessing whether what he was saying was true if not for the fact that the man’s power. He seemed to be powerful enough that Lyra suspected that an attempt to manipulate his mind as she had in Mr. Phillips' case, would probably elicit a very hostile response from him. “What’s your name?” She at last asked. Her excitement and anticipation at gaining an ally faltered when the question hung in the air for a second too long. “Did you hear my question?” She found herself asking.

“I did hear you,” he answered, still running his hand along the mane of Jack’s horse. “I, however, didn’t hear why I should tell my name to two strangers that intended to attack me,” he stated.

While very little about his posture changed, his tone of voice made it clear that he was done answering questions. That it was now their turn to answer his questions. It was only now that it occurred to Lyra that they hadn’t asked anything personal to him other than the fact that he hadn’t massacred a whole town. To tell them about the fact that the town had been overtaken by one of Sydrar’s people or the fact that he had cleared it singlehandedly, revealed very little other than to caution them that they were in the presence of someone very powerful. That is if they hadn’t already gathered as much from his punch that had sent Jack barreling across a whole street.

“We only attempted to attack you because we thought you to be affiliated with Sydrar,” she answered. “In the same way you killed the one affiliated with Sydrar, we intended to do to you if you turned out to be affiliated with him,” She answered candidly, her voice not shaking, rising, or falling in the least. The one thing that she was sure of at this point, was that this person wasn’t affiliated with Sydrar. Also, given what he had told them, it was clear that he held no affection for Sydrar or anyone affiliated with him. So, despite his apparent power, telling him that they had intended to kill him if they had found him to be one of Sydrar’s men didn’t put them in any immediate danger that she could see.

Her eyes narrowed at her. “You thought that one affiliated with Sydrar was burning corpses?” He asked.

Lyra couldn’t help a feeling of déjà vu at the question and the look she got from him. It was very much the same as the one that she had gotten from Commander Izora when she had offered an answer that contradicted the information that she had. It was a look that told you that you had only a few seconds to straighten out the incongruence, else things would go horribly wrong.

Despite recognizing the danger they were presently in, Lyra kept her voice level as she answered. “Let’s just say, that I have been away from this realm for quite some time. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that my enemy has changed tactics,” she answered almost casually. “Besides,” she said as something else occurred to her. “The kind of foul magic that Sydrar’s people tend to leave behind wherever they pass through still hangs heavy in the air,” She said it, her tone of voice posing the question that she had left unspoken.

“The man regarded her for a long while before speaking. “The one I fought was quite powerful,” he stated as an answer to why the aura of decadence and evil still hung in the air. What struck Lyra more than the declaration itself, was the indifference with which it was offered. It was as if he was noting that the sky was blue, it didn’t matter to him one way or the other. “Which is why I don’t understand,” he went on. “Why you would bring someone powerless as him,” he held up a hand indicating Jack. Lyra cast a side glance at Jack. To his credit, despite a bit of color rising in his face, his expression remained unchanged. He kept on looking straight at the giant of a man before them. “To a fight in the middle of a burning town, where they would be little more than a liability?” he asked.

“She didn’t bring me anywhere,” Jack replied. Despite having just been put down, Jack’s voice wasn’t defensive or in any way angry. It was neutral in a manner that not only met the challenge of what had just been spoken about him, it all but dismissed them. “I chose to fight,” he stated.

“You chose to join her, that much is true,” the man answered. “You, however, didn’t choose to fight because you’d first need to know how to fight to choose to do so,” he added in a flat tone of voice.

“You are a better fighter than I am,” Jack said calmly. “I’ll concede as much,” his expression neutral. It was a smart answer Lyra thought. A veiled way of saying that he hadn’t seen all that there was to him, without having to make a direct challenge. Besides, it would be a bit hard to make the direct argument that he was a good fighter after he was nearly killed by one punch.

The man regarded Jack for a short while before turning back to Lyra. “What makes even less sense, it that you left a dark elf back here sleeping,” he said. “She, at least, seems capable of handling herself,” he stated. “One would be forgiven for thinking you’re not really serious about fighting Sydrar?” He said.

“She’s under the effect of some potion,” Jack said in reply. “She was caught in a trap two days ago and we haven’t been able to rouse her yet,” he said calmly.

The man turned to look at Elmi as if trying to decide whether it warranted some kind of action from him or not. “Is there any way you can help us rouse her?” Jack asked picking up on the expression that crossed his face.

“I can,” he answered not moving.

“Will you help us? “ Jack was forced to ask when he didn’t make any move forward or take any action to actually help.

“I am as yet undecided,” it was a plain answer. His tone of voice relayed quite clearly that he wasn’t taunting them or trying to be difficult, he was just plainly undecided on whether to help them or not.

“If you can, then please do,” Lyra voiced the request.

The man remained unmoving for a second longer before a sigh left him. He turned and walked over to where Elmi was laid on her stomach across the horse. The man grabbed a handful of her the clothes on her back and proceed to lift her off the horse with one hand and to lay her on the ground on her back. He reached into a pouch that he had hanging on his belt and produced a vial full of lime green liquid. “What is that?” Lyra couldn’t help but ask.

“A potion to sharpen one’s senses and keep them alert,” the man answered. “Essential if you are on a long night watch or a march through unknown terrain,” He answered. “However, you are never to take more than a sip of it, otherwise, you won’t be able to sleep for days on end,” he explained before propping up Elmi’s head and bringing the vial to her lips. He then proceeded to empty half the vial down the Dark elf’s throat.

He then allowed her head to fall back to the ground as he stood up. Jack involuntarily winced in anticipation of the back of her head hitting the ground, but it never did. Barely a second after her the man had let go of her head, Elmi shot up in a sitting position her eyes wide. She looked about herself clearly trying to regain her bearings. “How are you feeling Elmi?” Jack asked studying her closely.

Elmi’s gaze turned to him and for a while, it was a blank stare as she tried to call to memory who he was. Before she could, something else clicked in her mind. Her eyes with a measure of panic turned to her leg. It was only after a few seconds of staring at the more exposed leg owing to the fact that the pants she had been wearing had also been ripped off, that a measure of calm and relief returned to her. When she turned her gaze back to Jack, there was a murderous glare in her eyes. “Where is she?” She asked in a glacial tone that left no questions about what she intended to do.

Jack smiled. He clearly took this for a sign that she was back to her normal self. “It’s nice to have you back,” he said.

Lyra wondered at the genuine warmth in Jack’s voice and expression. He seldom ever got along with the dark elf and didn’t agree with the brutality she employed in her methods. But for some reason, he seemed happy that Elmi was alright. Her lips pressed together as she only could find one explanation. Jack still hoped that the dark elf could be redeemed, turned from her brutal ways into a more kind and caring individual. Other than the thin line her lips had formed, she remained expressionless as she regarded Elmi. In her case, it was neither a good nor a bad thing that the Dark elf had been restored to wakefulness. She posed just as much a danger to them and their cause as whatever potential help she could be. Lyra had no delusions of ever getting her to change. Some people were just rotten to the core and very little could be done about it.

Movement at the edge of her vision caught her attention and she turned to find that the man in armor was almost a hundred feet away from them and walking away. It shouldn’t have surprised her, given the fact that he had somehow managed to not only pick them out but somehow come to stand beside them without them ever knowing it while they were still inside the town. Part of her had wanted to blame the inferno around them for covering any noise he made in his approach, now, however, as she caught sight of him having moved off without her even picking up on it, she knew that that explanation was dead in the water.

“Wait,” she said calling after him as she ran to catch up to him. The man turned to look back at her in a patiently neutral manner. “Join us,” she said plainly. Somehow, she doubted that anything other than being completely straight with him would work on him.

The man looked at her, then turned his gaze to the other two, causing Lyra to do the same. Jack was now crouched and talking to Elmi with a smile despite the Dark elf’s cold glare. “No,” the man said their gazes turning back to meet each other.

“I recognize your Armour, you know?” she said causing the man that had already started turning to leave to turn back to her once more. “I didn’t at first,” she stated. “But I can’t exactly be blamed for that, I was a little girl the last time I saw a royal knight,” she told. “You served under King Reigad and Queen Elysia. You were the ones charged with marching across the expanse of the kingdom to seek out any signs of Sydrar’s return,” she said.

The man turned to look at the burning town. “A task at which we failed,” he said in a low bitter tone.

“Indeed you did,” Lyra said in a neutral tone of voice. She wouldn’t offer him unwanted sympathy as she clearly got the impression that he wasn’t looking for it. He was simply pointing out their failure as a fact, he wasn’t bemoaning it or seeking some kind of reassurance. “It was thought that all knights fell by Sydrar’s hand, either losing their minds to Sydrar’s mental manipulations or being killed and made into his dead servants,” she stated. “In fact, no one has actually seen a royal knight since about a year after Sydrar’s return, except for those enslaved by him. How did you manage to survive and remain hidden?” She asked.

The man’s gaze turned from the burning town to Lyra. However, she couldn’t help the feeling that he wasn’t actually seeing her. His mind seemed to be a million miles away. “I didn’t,” he replied enigmatically before turning to start off once more.

“You are a royal knight,” She said as he moved off. “You have fought Sydrar before. More than anyone else, you should know that no one can beat Sydrar alone,” she pointed out. “If you go on by yourself, then you might as well join his side,” she said. The man turned a glare that told him another wrong word and her life would be forfeit. Lyra, however, remained calm. She had expected as much. She calmly regarded him, silently challenging him to call her a liar. As incendiary as the statement had been, it was true. Sydrar was too powerful to be taken on by a single individual, heck, even most armies would fall before him. Anyone stupid enough to try and take him on by themselves would soon become one of his undead servants.

“Do you suppose that you and your…” his eyes shifted to Jack and Elmi. Jack had his hand held out to help Elmi up. The Dark Elf slapped the hand away with a cold glare at him and rose to her feet by herself. “Companions,” he said the word with the tone of one that had chosen to forego other more choice alternatives. “Will improve my chances?” he posed, not hiding the fact that he clearly didn’t think so.

“I can offer you something better!” Lyra said drawing his gaze back to her. She paused both for effect and to summon the courage to take the next risk. There was the very real chance that he would react badly to her next words, but it was the only way she could see to get him to join them. She had to hope the sense of justice that had driven him to take on a whole town of the dead, would keep him from taking off her head for a comment that he didn’t like. She, however, did her best not to let any of her reservations show on her face. “You failed both King Reigad and Queen Elysia. The one task given to the royal knights was to warn the Kingdom of Sydrar’s return. You were the guardians of the kingdom and you all failed. King Reigad died and Queen Elysia is now bound to Sydrar because of it,” She made sure not to put any impassioned accusation in her tone of voice. Instead, her tone was a cold recitation of the facts. If the impression she had gotten of him was true, then the words themselves would cut deep enough for her purposes.

The man’s posture became a bit stiffer, almost as if he was bracing himself against wave after wave as the accusations hit him. “You must be seeking a quick way to the grave,” Lyra could almost literally feel the temperature drop at the glacial tone of his voice.

Again, Lyra remained silent. She knew that to say anything at this point when she had just run sandpaper across an open and sore wound, would only further fan the flames of his rage. To say anything at this crucial point would be a fatal mistake, she had brought him to the edge and any more would push him over it. So she quietly held his gaze challenging him with her eyes to call her a liar. If her assessment of him was correct, then he hated everything that she had just said. But if he thought them to be true, he wouldn’t deny any of it or attack her for saying it.

After a while of them staring each other down, the man turned again to leave. This had been the signal she had been waiting for. If he had calmed himself down enough to try and walk away from her, then he was calm enough to hear her without taking her head off. “I can, however, give you a way of redeeming yourself,” she said causing him to pause mid-turn.

“If those words are a lie,” He spoke in a tone that sent fear coursing through every fiber of her being. “These are the last moments of your life,” he said turning back fully to Lyra.

Lyra swallowed hard trying to calm herself down not trying to hide her fear in any way. It was a risk, but if anyone could be trusted with the information, a royal knight could. “Before Sydrar’s return,” she said keeping her voice steady despite how she felt. “King Reigad and Queen Elysia had a son,” she stated. “Most people think that he perished in that first attack that Sydrar launched on our capital, Hirgon,” she continued. “He didn’t, he is standing next to a Dark Elf about a hundred feet behind me,” she said causing the man’s eyes to widen as his eyes moved undoubtedly to Jack.

“King Reigad was the greatest fighter there ever was,” he said. “Queen Elysia was the greatest magician, second only to the scourge that is Sydrar. Without having the power of some deity to augment her abilities,” the knight stated. “The boy can’t fight and has barely enough power within him to boil a pot of water,” he stated his skepticism unhidden.

“I’m sure that you are one that can easily tell when one is lying,” Lyra said. “Am I lying?” She asked.

The man regarded him for a while before saying. “You may very well believe him to be who you claim he is, but that doesn’t mean he is,” he voiced.

She sighed. “His name is Jack Reigad, he was in another realm. Commander Izora took him there when Sydrar attacked that’s why no one has seen or heard anything of him since that day,” she said. “I told you before that I haven’t been in this realm for a while, it is him that I went to get,” she explained.

“Where then is Commander Izora?” the Knight questioned.

Lyra’s lips pressed into each other, knowing exactly how her answer would sound. “She died as we returned to this realm,” she said.

His helmet, made it so that it was impossible to see his facial expression. His eyes, however, told it all. “How convenient,” he voiced what his eyes were saying.

“You are free to walk away if you so wish,” she said. “But if what I am saying is true, then you have walked away from King Reigad and Queen Elysia’s son,” she said. Before turning and starting off. At the very least she had managed to get through the conversation without getting herself killed.

“Where is your next destination?”

Lyra couldn’t keep the smile off her face when she heard the question from the knight…

*******

At first, Jack hadn’t liked the fact that Egon, the knight, had joined them. This was largely because of Lyra. Jack would have been okay riding with him and to have Elmi and Lyra ride on the other horse. The Dark Elf, however, would hear nothing of it. Whatever horse he was on was the one that she would be riding on. The same way she had been unwilling to have him sleep in a different room from hers was the same way she didn’t want him on another horse, if they could be on the same one. She wanted herself positioned close enough to protect him from any danger that might arise. This meant that the knight had been riding with Lyra for the last two days.

They were now in the last leg of their journey according to Lyra. She had said they’d be there by midday, which was now barely half an hour away. They would be at their destination any moment now.

Jack had already surmised that the place was hidden very much in the same way as the doorway to this realm was hidden. This was largely because looking around, Jack couldn’t even see any sign of humanity other than the path they were on which seemed to be regularly traveled on. Wherever she was taking them, it wasn’t in some remote hidden location as he now knew he’d been unconsciously expecting it to be. Instead, Jack couldn’t help but think that none of the thousands of people who must have used this road would have ever guessed that they had passed close to some hidden lair for a group of ‘masters’ as Lyra usually referred to them, that were planning to save the kingdom.

Jack cast a side glance to see Lyra with her hands around the torso of the knight as he guided the horse, just as he was on the other horse with Elmi’s arms around him. It was petty jealousy and he knew it. Knowing it, however, had done very little to help him quell it. Jack had even found himself hoping that the horses wouldn’t be able to bear his weight.

It was a stupid thing to hope for, and it would have been a rather big inconvenience for them as it would have drastically slowed them down. But then it was like trying to will fire not to be hot! He felt jealous and that was all there was to it. He had no more power to change this than he had to do anything about the first. As far as the horse went, one might as well have placed a feather on its back for all the effect that the knight’s weight had on the beast. It wasn’t in any way slowed down in its movement and even after a whole day of riding, it didn’t seem to get any more tired than it usually got before the Knight had joined them.

The one good thing about the whole thing, was the fact that he’d had enough of a good sense not to say anything about it. He had kept his mouth shut and his eyes pinned to the road ahead with the exception of the odd unconscious glance at them here and there. The fact that the knight had seemed almost as if he was completely unaware that someone was clinging on to him whenever he looked in their direction, had helped. It was the result of the fact that he was in full metal armor but still Jack found himself feeling happy and liking him for this.

What had not helped his situation, however, was Elmi continuously whispering in his ear. The Dark Elf for all of her coldness and callousness towards what others feel had been perceptive enough to pick up on what he was feeling. She had, however, made it her business to taunt him for the whole of the past two days.

“I can’t imagine what it must be like to hold to that hunk of a man,” she whispered to him low enough to only be heard by only him. “Gosh, Lyra is so lucky. She gets to ride with two stallions, while I’m stuck babysitting you,” and other stupid statements like that had what he’d been subjected to for the whole period. It had been a test of his endurance and self-control to keep himself from saying anything. He had, however, maintained silence and ignored her entirely. He knew that she was trying to get a rise out of him and to even ask her to knock it off would be all the encouragement she needed to keep tormenting him.

What had made it easier for him to ignore her and to even push down his own jealousy, was the fact that he actually really liked Egon. Whenever they were down on the ground taking a break from riding or even making camp, he had the most informative and funny stories to tell. He had this manner of speaking dryly and in a matter of fact manner that made statements that shouldn’t have been funny, leave Jack bursting with laughter.

“And that my friend, is why you don’t try to pet the cub of the white mountain tiger,” he would say, and then add in the tone of one who had only gained this insight through actual experience. “Especially when the mother tiger is sleeping nearby.”

Also, while Lyra seemed to be well versed and knowledgeable about the plants and animal life around them, she wasn’t in the same league as Egon. Not even close. The man seems to be an overflowing wellspring of knowledge about everything around them. Lyra seemed to be learning just as much from him as Jack was. Even Elmi, despite acting like she couldn’t be any less interested in them, would from time to time forget to act disinterested and would have her attention fixed on him as he explained how a certain part of some strange animal could be used to temporarily double your strength and speed for a day or so if prepared in some such manner. Egon also went to great lengths to carefully explain a thing to Jack if it turned out he didn’t know anything about it. Sometimes he went overboard and explained more than he needed to, giving him small facts and little known knowledge about something or a faster way of doing things, but it was never a boring repetition or droning on about something.

The only quirk about the man was the fact that he never took off his armor. Jack had at no point seen him take so much as his helmet off. He even slept in it, which Jack couldn’t imagine was comfortable. He seemed to be a soldier always on guard, always on the ready for something only he had a clue about. Despite this, however, his best feature was his serenity. Both in the way he spoke and the way he carried himself. It was almost as if he was unaware of the evil and danger that seemed to lurk everywhere around in this world. In fact, one would have easily been forgiven for coming to this conclusion, if not for his eyes. Egon had the penetrating look that told you that not only was he seeing right through you, he was also aware of everything around him to a degree that you couldn’t even begin to comprehend.

In fact, it was this very trait that made Jack to immediately bring his horse to a stop when Egon raised his hand as a signal to stop. He too had slowed down his horse and jumped off it before it had even come to a full stop. His eyes scoured the area around them almost as if he could see something that the rest of them couldn’t. He turned his gaze back to Lyra who had stopped the horse a few meters ahead of them and had turned it around to come back and meet them. Jack could see it in the eyes of the knight that he couldn’t see what it was that he’d sensed that had caused him to stop, however, there was certainty in his eyes that there was something somewhere in the vicinity. On Lyra’s face, there was a small smile, she was clearly impressed by the knight’s acute senses.

“Is the doorway to your masters’ lair here?” He asked. With the helmet on, it was impossible to get a read of his facial expression. His tone, however, caused a sense of nervousness to come over Jack and the smile on Lyra’s face to straighten a bit.

“Yes, it’s ten meters behind you,” she answered her voice mirroring some of the nervousness that Egon seemed to have infected them with.

“Something is wrong!” He said in a grave voice…

*******

Author's Note

Chapter Thirty One is now up on my Patreon (the link is on my profile). Please, please, please, consider supporting my writing. It really does go a long way in enabling me to write without worrying about bills and daily sustenance.

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