Elfborn: The Quest

Rhetoric

With a jerk, Lash came awake. And immediately closed his eyes against the dull ache deep inside his head. 'So,' he thought darkly, squeezing his eyes tight against the flashes of purple and red that danced behind his closed lids in time to the throbbing pain in his head. 'It wasn't a bad dream after all! I truly am the last living descendant of Lord Ithus, Hero of the Shae.'

At that thought Lash almost snorted out loud as he pondered the responsibility that now seemed to rest on his shoulders. Aye, he now had the dubious duty to save the world, thanks to Ithus and his vow. 'Lucky me! On second thought, it was a bad dream!'

"So," Leo's deep voice rumbled softly in eerie echo to Lash's thoughts from somewhere in the darkness beyond Lash's closed eyes.

"The dead stirs." Even though it was little more than a whisper, Lash winced at the pain hearing the deep voice caused him.

"Unfortunately," he croaked. "Burn me, uncle, but do you have some water? I feel as if I've swallowed the Diamond Sand Desert itself!'"

"Indeed I do, nephew," Leo replied as Lash's eyelids flickered open to find himself in another tent all together. But, as only a small oil lamp sitting on a makeshift table lighted it, his dancing vision didn't give him the best impression of it. All he could tell was that it was smaller than the other tent and somewhat warmer. And that was about it.

A shadow passed in front of him and Lash looked up with a pained squint to find his uncle looming over him, his features cast mostly into shadow and therefore lost to him. But the small battered metal cup that he held in his hand Lash could see clearly and, after fumbling a hand out from beneath the blankets that were heaped high on his body, he took hold of it and noisily gulped down the liquid within.

Another cup full of the flat but cold water managed to restore most of Lash's voice and, as Leo handed him a third, he rasped.

"Where am I?"

"In my tent," the big knight replied. "My squire, Erik found you in one of the supply tents near the northern perimeter about fifteen minutes after you managed to lose me in the camp's center. Together we brought you back here."

"How .. how long have I been sleeping?" he asked hoarsely, trying to will the sharp pain in his head to dullness, if not away completely. Carefully he began to rub the hard granules of sleep sand from his eyes as he gazed at his uncle.

Leo smiled and stood, stretching his powerful body before answering.

"A good four days, Lash. And you slept like the dead! The only way I knew you were still alive was that your chest moved on occasion." He stepped to the makeshift table to pour himself a flagon of ale from a metal pitcher that sat in the light of the small lamp that flickered there.

"Four days?" Lash swallowed against the thick feeling in his mouth, a sure sign that he had been sleeping a long time. The last time he had felt that, he had been sick with the swine flu shortly after his sixteenth birthday. That time he had slept for two days solid before the fever broke, dragging him shivering from his bed.

Leo nodded as he swallowed a mouthful of the ale, a local brew that was barely tolerable to his more refined palate. He winced as the bitter fluid hit his tongue and rushed down his throat. He could swear that he hadn't had a decent flagon of ale since leaving Hybernia. He then shook his head and sighed. All things considered, he knew he was lucky to get ale at all!

"The vomit in the supply tent, along with you falling into a deep sleep has, ironically enough, confirmed your mortality for my more doubtful comrades, some of whom still had their reservations despite your little demonstration with Frederik's dagger." Leo signed and shook his head.