The Revenge of the Elves (17 page)

“I can still find them in other places,” he replied, and his eyes lit up. She understood. “But the best ones are impossible to get to now.”

“How difficult for you,” Tamara sympathized. “But tell me then, how is it the darkness prohibits you from entering those areas?”

“The Darkening you mean. It’s evil, pure and simple! Nothing good about it. Nothing at all,” he said. His face looked different every time he mentioned it. Harlan bent beside her and whispered, “It gets me sick to go near it. Very sick. Days of sickness. It’s evil I tell you.”

“So you’ve crossed into the darkness before, but it upsets you physically?” Tamara tried to understand.

“The Darkening, woman! The Darkening. And I didn’t say I stepped into it! I said only that being close to it makes me sick. It’s dangerous to tread beyond the line! Haven’t I already told you that?” he said annoyed.

“Who so named it?” Conrad asked.

“It was always called that,” he replied, disinterested. Pulling another nut from his pocket, he split it open in his hand. Without asking, he handed a piece to Tamara. He popped another into his mouth and sighed as he chewed. “Would you like me to take you to where it began?”

Conrad frowned and stared at Tamara. She shouldn’t be eating these things, and he wished she weren’t so trusting.

“It has a starting point?” Tamara asked, surprised. She stood on her toes and pushed Harlan’s hair off his broad forehead. Is he simple? she thought. His eyes are so black, just like my… Startled by her touch, he stumbled away and swatted the air in front of him. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to frighten you,” she said, dropping her arms.

“Everything’s got a starting point, doesn’t it?” he stammered, flustered. His fingers went to his forehead and traced the line Tamara had touched.

“I imagine everything does, Master Goodheart,” Tamara agreed. She looked at Conrad, waiting for him to agree also. “We would like to see where it began. Is it different there than anywhere else?”

“See for yourself,” Harlan replied. “It’s not far. You would have found it yourselves if you just kept going.” Bending down low, he parted the dry leaves with his fingers, raked the surface with his ragged nails and once again retrieved a nut. Harlan smiled sheepishly at them both. “I can’t resist them! Come. Follow me,” he gestured with a raised hand while popping the nut into his mouth.

They walked behind him through the trees. Conrad tugged at her sleeve, but she ignored his concerns. Everything they passed seemed normal despite the absence of any bright light. The air smelled sweet and musty, the birds chirped and the animals scurried about at their approach as if they were in any stretch of forest in any land. The square-trunked cetus trees grew in abundance here, and their unnatural looking branches reached to the sky, like countless arms bent upward at the elbows. A slight wind swept the surface in intermittent gusts, rustling the leaves and drawing Harlan’s eyes covetously to the newly uncovered ground. Tamara noticed the look in them, the gleam each time a stretch of earth was revealed. He stopped and scrounged along the forest floor like an eager child, before moving on. When he found something, he grinned with content. If he came up empty handed, the look of disappointment on his face was almost heartbreaking.

“Do any of the great trees reside here?” Tamara asked after they’d wandered for a while.

“No. These woods are not so blessed,” he replied.

“Did one ever?” Conrad questioned him. Had a Lalas died in these woods?

“Ever? I suspect not. There’s no evidence of one. Aside from the nuts, this forest is very ordinary. Very. If not for them, I would have moved on myself, a long time ago,” he answered. “Look! Up there! That’s where it began,” he pointed to a hedge of brownish vegetation.

Holding the branches aside, Harlan created an opening in the tree wall for Tamara and Conrad to pass through. She bowed her head, trying to put him at ease with a smile, but he only stared ahead unaware, his eyes gleaming. She pushed by him with her arm in front of her face so she wouldn’t get scratched by the bush. Standing up, she dropped her hands to her sides.

“May the First help us all!” she gasped.

Chapter Nineteen

Maringar opened his eyes, then closed them just as fast. The pain in his head was intense, pounding at the back of his brain, and the piercing light only enhanced it. He raised his arm and blocked the sun from his face before opening his eyes again. His arm was stiff and sore, difficult to move, but he could lift it at least. He tried to shift his weight, but his legs wouldn’t move and he couldn’t use them to gain the leverage he needed. Looking down across his body through the glaring sun, he saw they were wedged under a large log that lay over him just above his knees.

Numb.
He couldn’t wiggle his toes and his legs felt very heavy.
Water! I remember water. Surging. Hitting me. Yes. Lost my breath. Swallowed it. Must have washed up here after, he thought. Beolan? Where? Where is he?
He could barely turn his head from side to side.
Remember. Yes! Saw him cross. Saw him reach other side before… Which side am I on?
He shuddered. It was coming back to him.
Trolls! Where are they?
he thought.

Agghhh!
his mind screamed.
Hurts. But I can feel them. A little. Can feel my legs. Thank the First! Can’t be too bad.

He forced himself to a half-sitting position, but couldn’t manage to stay up with nothing to support his back. Flexing the muscles in his thighs and calves, he tried to shift his weight beneath the log, to move it off of him, but he couldn’t even budge it. Staring at the piece of wood that lay sprawled across him, he realized it would take more than his strength alone to get free. He was trapped under the narrower portion of a very stout tree trunk that the rushing water must have uprooted. Maringar flopped onto the wet ground, glaring straight up at the sky, panting. His head was killing him and his body was sore everywhere.

The rain had just about stopped although the sky remained gloomy and overcast.

Streaks of bright sunlight managed to pierce the dome of clouds that rose over him, blinding him with their intensity. His whole body was drenched and he felt the leather stuck to his skin. As mightily as he hated being in water, he hated being wet almost as much. Even his beard was tangled and damp. But his arms were free. Reaching to his side, he felt his axe still attached to his belt, thank the First for little things. The red leather scabbard on his other side was empty though, and his favorite dagger must have fallen loose and gotten carried away by the flood.

Better to lose the dagger
, he reasoned. Stretching his hand, he removed his axe from its thong and laid it across his chest. Every motion hurt. Gripping the handle hard, the weight of it still comforted him.
Where are they, miserable trolls? Dead? Drowned? Can defend myself now. Maybe. Feel like a trapped animal
, he worried.
Beolan? Where are you? Did you make it?

He tried to determine his location, but the underbrush was too tall for him to see beyond and he couldn’t raise himself up enough to look over it. So much debris lay everywhere, carried by the rushing water no doubt, and the terrain was altered considerably. Nothing looked familiar.

Crash!
The noise reverberated against the bushes.
What’s that?
His hand clenched the handle of his axe and he winced at the sudden movement.
Can’t see anything. Where?
Remaining still, he focused in the direction from which he thought it came.
Footsteps. Something’s coming.
The wet earth pounded. Whatever it was didn’t care much about stealth.

Bloody mess,
he thought as his heart beat faster in anticipation. He tried to move his legs out from under the log, squirming and twisting as noiselessly as he could, but they were stuck fast in the muddy earth, pushed down by the fallen tree and he couldn’t work them free. The noise grew louder and louder, and he waited for the bushes to part and his enemy to reveal itself.
Don’t move. Dead! Play dead. Dumb trolls. Fool it maybe. Wait for it to get close then
…

He saw it. A single mountain troll emerged from behind the wall of shrubs and stood stock still about twenty feet from where he lay trapped. Water dripped off of its sheepskin hide, and ugly bruises covered it in a number of obvious places. It held its hairy left arm tight to its side at an impossible angle, but its other hand carried a massive war hammer, poised and ready. Sniffing the air in snorts and gasps, Maringar knew it tracked him here. Though its vision was weak, its sense of smell was acute.

The big troll spotted the dwarf, stopped in its tracks and surveyed the situation. Walking in a wide circle around Maringar, it assessed his condition. It stood at least seven feet tall, and its hammer alone was four feet long. Dragging its left foot behind, it grimaced in visible pain with each step it took.

It’s injured. Bloody. Fresh blood. Good
, he thought.
Limping too. Must be weak. Got to trick it, make it think I’m dead. Lure it in close. Strike before it kills me.

He debated taunting it in his mind, but discarded that idea. The troll already knew he was trapped, by the looks of things, trapped or dead, and he didn’t want to precipitate a reaction. He held his axe close to his body.

The troll leaned toward him, to smell the air again, but it took care not to get too close. Bending down, it picked up a rock and tossed it at Maringar. A test. Just a test. It fell short of hitting him, and he didn’t move a muscle. It picked up a larger stone and threw it, but with more accuracy this time. It struck Maringar square in the chest, and though he cringed inwardly at the impact, he made no outward movement at all. Walking halfway around him, the troll stood behind Maringar’s head. Maringar tried to look backward so he could see what the beast was doing, expecting a boulder to fall upon his face at any moment, but he couldn’t twist himself around enough. There was no point concealing any longer that he was alive and trapped beneath the wood. If he was going to die, he wanted to do it with his eyes open.

The troll, dumb as he was, recognized the dwarf’s dire circumstances and grew more certain. Maringar heard him laughing, though it sounded more like an ululating growl. Then the beast began teasing him. A large handful of soil hit him in the face while the troll chuckled, and Maringar choked as it landed in his mouth. The soil blinded him and his eyes burned, while the beast laughed louder and harder. The troll stepped forward, emboldened by Maringar’s lack of response to the taunts. As Maringar tried to brush the dirt from his eyes with the back of his left hand, the troll reached out with his hammer and jabbed him on the shoulder. Maringar heard the laughter again, only this time it lasted a lot longer, rolling from his throat like a deranged grumble. He was enjoying this very much, toying with a captive dwarf. Despite its own injuries, to have Maringar helpless and unable to strike back, lying before it, was more than it could have ever dreamed of, and Maringar knew it. His humiliation muffled his hurt.

Pain! Sharp. He felt the hammer crack against his other shoulder and his head recoiled, shaken by a stiff blow. The troll kicked him and his neck went numb. Maringar seethed with anger and stifled his desire to curse at the brute. What good would it do? Trapped as he was, the next blow would likely knock him out and then it wouldn’t matter what the troll did to him anymore.

The more he tried to shift and maneuver his legs, the deeper they wedged themselves into the soft, wet ground beneath him. He stopped moving and gritted his teeth in frustration. Taking a deep breath, Maringar envisioned where the troll stood, picturing the malicious grin on its face. Its odor was unmistakable, which made it just a bit easier. He flexed his muscles without moving to make sure his arm wasn’t atrophied from laying motionless all this while. His arm still had strength and he straightened it until his weapon was parallel to his body instead of lying across his chest. Then he waited for the right moment.

He suffered another blow to the head, certain this one drew blood, and his vision blurred. The pain radiated through him like a needle jamming into his skull. He clenched his jaw and stayed as still as he could. Maringar knew the troll could kill him just as easily from a safe distance as he could from nearby, but trolls were dumb. He’d enjoy the torment more if Maringar cried out and pleaded for his life, but he kept his mouth shut, waiting for an opportunity, probably his last. Listening to the snorts and hoots of his tormentor, the anger rose up inside of him with each harassing attack. But so did the pain. It was getting worse.

He focused on the sounds behind him, estimating the troll’s distance at a few feet away. Its wheezing breath was close, very close, he could hear it, smell it, and he could just about feel the hot, rancid air on his face. The last jab to his shoulder ripped right through the leather of his vest leaving a ragged gash in his skin, but he remained still. The troll laughed in its rasping, guttural way. He waited for Maringar to respond, to cringe and cower in pain and fear, but he didn’t and that kept the troll interested. He wanted the satisfaction of getting him to cry out, to plead for his life. Provoking Maringar over and over, he hoped only to see the expression on his face when he finally succeeded.

A soft crunching sound assured him the troll’s big foot was very near the right side of his own head. And the odor!
Closer. Closer. Another step.
Maringar waited, unmoving.
Can’t miss.
He shifted his axe in his hand. Swinging it around in a full arc as fast as he could, he caught the creature square on the ankle, slicing through its flesh and shattering the bone beneath it with an audible crack.

Shrieking in pain, the troll’s warm blood spurted out, splattering Maringar’s arm. Jumping away from him, Maringar heard it tumble to the ground with a thud, yelping like a wounded dog. His sharp blade did its damage. The beast could no longer stand on its own. Dragging its bulky body along the ground, it retreated to a nearby tree stump, leaned against it and pulled a string of thick animal gut from the sack that hung upon its belt. Tying it off above its splintered bone, it pulled the tourniquet hard, wincing and moaning. Its pain was turning to rage and all it wanted now was to squash the trapped dwarf’s head under a rock and watch its miserable brains spill out onto the wet surface.

Struggling to its feet, huffing and snorting, it picked up the largest boulder it could get its grimy hands on while hobbling forward, its wounded leg scraping along the ground, it stopped just short of the dwarf’s reach. Maringar closed his eyes and girded himself against the next attack, having only his axe to shield him. His blow wasn’t hard enough. The troll could still walk and Maringar’s arm was too weak to fight back. The beast grunted and snorted, and he knew he had only moments remaining. He closed his eyes and waited.

It crashed down upon him. A ponderous weight lay on his chest, covering his face, crushing his ribs. The stench was unbearable. The pain numbed him and he couldn’t tell where he hurt most. He couldn’t see and it was hard to breathe. Whatever was on top of him was suffocating him and he couldn’t budge it. He felt warm blood running down his chest.

What’s he doing? Smothering me! Can’t feel anything. Numb
… He was losing consciousness. His thoughts drifted away.

“Maringar! Maringar!” He heard a voice call out.

Beolan! It was Beolan. “How? What?” he tried to speak but he couldn’t open his jaw enough to get the words out.

He lay there as Beolan pushed the body off of him. As it slid to the side, he felt the arrow that pierced the troll’s throat from back to front, scratching across his chest. In a minute, the filthy mountain troll lay beside him, it’s face a bloody ruin, its beady eyes still open and frozen in a death stare.

“Thank the First, Beolan,” Maringar gasped. “How’d you find me?” He tried moving his arms but they were sore and stiff. Nothing was broken though. He could feel his fingers. He let the feeling return to his upper body, but his legs were still trapped beneath the tree stump.

“It wasn’t hard to follow the troll’s trail. He made no effort to conceal it. Besides, I saw his horse standing in the clearing over there,” he pointed to the dappled destrier scrounging for grass about twenty yards ahead. “They must have been washed to this side when the water wall rushed through. When I climbed over the edge, just before it took you under, I saw the water rising on the other side too. Most of them probably drowned or retreated, but this one wasn’t so lucky.”

“I almost wasn’t either. He would have killed me if you hadn’t shown up. I got him good, but my blow wasn’t fatal,” Maringar said, still unable to move freely.

“Let me get this tree off of you and then we can see if those legs of yours still work,” Beolan replied. “We have a ways to go yet before we get to Odelot.”

“Do you have the key?” he asked, afraid of what the answer would be.

“Yes, my friend. I have it,” he reassured Maringar while releasing him from his captivity.