Child Of Storms (Volume 1) (54 page)

Toward midday, they skirted the shores of a small lake perhaps half a mile across. They stopped by the lake’s edge, glad for the simple pleasure of the blue sky above them and the cool air blowing past them. A few geese even flew overhead. Smiling, Ronias rode his horse forward into the lake and cast another of his balls of light energy at them. A single goose fell from the sky and splashed into the lake in front of the party. Dinner that night, at least, would be hearty.

              The endless hacking and sloshing through the dense swampland resumed. Hour after hour, mile after mile, they kept heading south. Clouds of insects pestered them, gigantic bats flittered in the distant shadows, and more than once they caught sight of larger animals, sliding away at their approach. Always they kept their weapons ready, waiting for another nightmarish monster to surge forth from the water or a band of Saurian raiders to attack.

             
Towards evening they happened upon a strange sight, the carcass of a large lizard  nailed to the trunk of a tree ten feet above the ground. It was half rotted away and covered in a swarm of flies. A single wooden spike was driven into its neck and into the soft, spongy bark.

             
“Ach!” Ironhelm exclaimed. “Wha’ is it?”

             
“A marker,” Willock said. “Signifying a boundary, perhaps.”

             
They filed past the grotesque sight, continuing on until the twilight deepened into the pitch blackness of night in the marshes. Finding a small dry patch, they risked a little fire and roasted the goose in silence. Ironhelm paced the perimeter of the camp, staring out into the darkness. It was dark, even to his dwarf eyes. He sniffed the air, convinced he had the ability to smell a Saurian approaching from any direction at a great distance, but all he smelled was the stench of the swamp.

             
Ironhelm and Jorn stayed awake after the others went to sleep, sitting a double watch. The swamps were silent, no drums this time beating incessantly in the night. They sat on opposite sides of the camp, Jorn watching one direction and Ironhelm watching the other. A few hours later, Ironhelm grew weary and roused Flatfoot to take over for him. The gnome sat atop a fallen log, watching the darkness next to Jorn. They chatted quietly by the gloom of Ronias’ glowing knife for an hour or more. Jorn finally felt too tired to resist his exhaustion any further, standing and walking off. He lay down a short distance away.

             
“Wake Willock or the knight as a second on watch,” he said, closing his eyes. “I’ve had enough tonight.”

Jorn tried to think pleasant thoughts as he drifted off to sleep, hoping to avoid his usual bad dreams. It was difficult. As pleasant images and memories rolled through his head, they invariably brought Inglefrid to mind. Even thinking of long northern summer days hunting elk with Thulgin or fishing in the many streams back home saddened his spirit.  He drifted off to sleep thinking of his foster brother and wondering what he might be doing at exactly that moment. Wherever Thulgin was and whatever he was doing, Jorn was certain he was not in so bad a place right then as the Nor Marshes. He was doubtless at Hrókur, perhaps enjoying one last mug of ale before bedding down for the evening. Or, he was already in bed with Yrsa. 

_____

              Jorn woke with a start, grabbing his sword and leaping to his feet. He had not been asleep very long at all, roused by what sounded like a cry of alarm. It was a high-pitched shout, as if from a child. Jorn’s eyes scanned the darkness, Willock jumping up and raising his bow.

             
“What was that?” the woodsman said.

             
“Where’s Flatfoot?” Jorn said.

             
“Flatfoot!” Willock shouted. “Sal!”

             
“The horses are gone also,” Jorn said. The others were up now, grabbing their weapons.

             
“What’s wrong?” Ailric said.

             
“Sal’s gone,” Jorn said. “So are the horses. I heard him cry out.”

             
“Might he have snuck off and abandoned us?” Ronias said.

             
“I heard him cry out!” Jorn said. “Besides, there’s his pack and his sword.”

             
“Look!” Willock said.

             
The woodsman pointed to a dim light out in the swamp, off to the southwest. It bobbed up and down very slightly, as a lantern might when being carried.

             
“Grang’s teeth!” Jorn swore. “That’s got to be who’s got him!”

             
“Who could they be?” Willock wondered.

             
“We’ll find out when we catch them,” Jorn said. “Quick, gather your things! The hunt’s on.”

Twenty-Three

            
 
Jorn took the lead, hacking through vines and pushing through branches in frantic pursuit of the flickering light. Without respite he kept up the chase. An hour passed, the light still as far ahead of them as ever. Not once did it stop, nor so much as momentarily slow down.

             
“Ach! Does the damned thing ever rest?” Ironhelm growled.

             
They kept on, the light leading them on a twisting path that seemed to run mostly southwest as near as Willock could tell in the darkness. Exhaustion threatened to overtake them as the brutal pace kept up, Ronias slowly falling behind the others. The elf stopped, out of breath, and leaned against the nearest tree. Finally, Ailric noticed and paused, giving the elf some time to catch up.

             
“Come along, Ronias,” the knight said. “We must not lose them. I didn’t drag Flatfoot out of that monster’s clutches to lose him to these swamps now.”

             
“I…cannot withstand this pace,” the elf said.

             
“Do you think it’s easy in this armor?” Ailric said, beckoning him on. “Magic or not, it gets heavy.”

             
They passed through a long stretch of waist-deep water before the light led them to what passed as a genuine trail of some kind, the first they had happened upon in the marshes. It made it much easier for them to travel quickly. Jorn and Willock broke into a run now, Ironhelm right at their heels. The path twisted and turned, barely visible amid the dense foliage but still there. A small brook ten feet across interrupted the trail. Jorn sprinted towards it, leaping across its entire length and landing on the far shore.  The light still seemed no closer, in spite of all Jorn’s efforts.

             
“Come on, you filthy cur,” he growled at the light. “Grang’s teeth! Turn and fight already, whatever you are.”

             
The darkness began to retreat as dawn approached. Slowly, the outline of the trees all around them took shape as the blackness passed into a shadowy grayness. Jorn cursed the coming of daylight, for as the sun rose the flickering light ahead grew slowly dimmer. Soon it would be gone and so might any hope of rescuing the gnome. The thought spurred Jorn on. He had finally gained some ground on the light, but now the night was in rapid retreat. On he ran, the path twisting and turning through the flooded landscape. It did not occur to him to wonder who or what had bothered making this path.

             
The gap between Jorn and the elusive light narrowed a bit further, even as the first rays of dawn fell upon the Nor Marshes. Jorn broke into a sprint, the others unable to keep up with him. The elusive light suddenly turned sharply to the right, Jorn still sprinting after it. The trail ended abruptly, meeting a wide path that ran straight to both the left and the right. It took Jorn a moment to realize it was some sort of road, now mostly overgrown and long since fallen into disuse. The light was still moving along the road, several hundreds yards ahead of them. Jorn took off down the road after it, the sky now a dark shade of blue. The others stumbled out onto the road behind him, following him. For at least a mile they ran, leaping over the occasional fallen tree across the road. Here and there a section of the road had flooded, so they simply waded through with reckless abandon. Ahead the light still bobbed, some sort of a shadowy bulk seeming to be carrying it along at a swift pace.

Jorn caught only the barest glimpse of whatever it was, but it was too late. The day finally arrived, and the light faded away completely. Jorn cursed the sun, finally unable to run any further. He doubled over, almost vomiting onto the road. Picking up a small piece of marble amidst the rubble near the side of the road, he hurled it forward in the direction of the now-vanished light. Screaming with rage, he threw it as far as he could. It landed with a distant clink, rolling along the road.

“Damn them!” he growled. His hands shook with rage. “Damn! Damn! Grang damn them!”

             
Behind him, the others had begun to catch up and now slowed to a stop. Willock stood next to Jorn, exhausted, as Ironhelm leaned heavily against a nearby log. Ailric and Ronias came trotting slowly up the road from behind, the knight clinking and clanking heavily in his filthy armor. The elf bent over, emptying the contents of his stomach upon the ground.

             
“By every god,” Willock gasped. “We must’ve run for hours. I’m too old for this sort of thing.”

             
“We’ve lost him,” Ironhelm said, his head hung low. “Aye, he’s gone.”

“No, he’s not,” Jorn said, trying to slow his breath and compose himself. “I…, um, I think this road may take us to him yet. What the hell is such a road even doing here in the middle of the marsh?”

              “I don’t think this is the middle of anything,” Willock said. “We have been moving southwest this entire time, at a very fast pace. We can’t be more than a half day from the end.” He noted the position of the sun. “In fact, this road runs almost directly north to south.” He pointed in the direction the light had gone down, pausing for a moment. “That way runs north deeper into the marshes. The other direction must lead out just by the moors. I would guess it is but a few hours’ easy walk.”

             
“Well, that is some good news finally,” Ronias said, finally standing. “At least the rest of us will make it out of this cursed place.”

             
“We’re not leaving,” Jorn growled. “Sal went that way, so that’s where we’re going.”

             
“You don’t know for a moment if that is in fact where the gnome is,” Ronias said. “That light we have been chasing could have been anything. A ruse, perhaps. The gnome is probably Saurian food by now. We don’t need his skills that much to risk our lives for him. Up till now he has been dead weight, anyhow.”

             
“Grang’s teeth, Ronias, but you’re a black-hearted swine! We’re not leaving him! I don’t give a damn if the rest of you elect to take the road out of the swamp. I am headed
that
way after Sal, and you can all kiss my ass if you don’t like it. I’ll rescue him myself.”

             
Jorn turned from them, stomping off down the road. The others stood there for a moment, watching him. Willock silently strode forward behind Jorn, followed a moment later by Ironhelm.

             
“This is madness,” Ronias said, turning towards the knight. “We tried our best to rescue the gnome, truly we did, but heading deeper into the swamps is sheer madness!”

             
“You are…well, you are correct, my elf friend,” Ailric said. “It
is
madness. But the gnome deserves our best efforts to save him. I suppose we just owe it to him.”

             
The knight turned and headed down the road after the others. Ronias, shaking his head, fell in behind him, silently cursing Braemorgan for strong-arming him into the whole mess.

_____

             
The road must have once been a marvel to behold. It was concrete, constructed in the ancient manner. It had to be many centuries old, by the look of it, yet somehow substantially intact amidst the marshes.

              “Another Guardian-built road,” Ironhelm said. “Aye, tis true. It can be no other.”

             
“The Guardians,” Jorn said quietly. “What where they doing here?”

             
“Recall what I told you,” Ronias said. “This was not always a stinking marsh. Once, it might have been simply the floor of a fertile mountain valley.”

             
They followed the road for another half hour or so. They came upon a portion of the road which was flooded out, covered in black water at least a foot deep for a hundred yards. They crossed through the water without incident, continuing still deeper into the marshes as they followed the road. A few minutes after the flooded zone, a horrific stench reached their nostrils.

             
“What is that stink?” Ronias said, turning away.

             
“I’ve smelled that odor before,” Ironhelm said. “A great battle was joined up ahead, it was.”

Over a dozen bloated, stinking Saurian corpses lay strewn about the road, swarms of insects crawling all over them.

              “They died in battle,” Jorn said, taking note of their wounds.  “And not more than a day or two ago by the looks of it.”

             
“Died in battle against what?” Willock said. “Not other Saurians. Saurians would never waste so much fresh meat as this.”

             
“Looks like this one’s skull was crushed right in, laddie,” Ironhelm said. “Aye, and by a large weapon at tha’.”

             
Jorn nodded, stepping around the bodies carefully. He strode on along the road, the others following him silently. A quarter of a mile further on he froze in his tracks. Protruding from just off the side of road stood a pair of tall stone columns, three or four times the height of a man. It was a most unusual thing to find in such a place, two bright white columns amid the tangled marshes.

             
“What do you make of this?” Jorn said. Smeared down the length of both columns were long lines of brownish-red stains.

             
“Ach,” Ironhelm said. “Another warning marker.”

Approaching still closer, they now saw several more columns fallen over and broken into dozens of smaller pieces. A great pile of rubble was also strewn about the entire area, the clear remnants of walls and a roof. Everything was covered in a thick coat of growth save for the pair of gleaming white columns. Ironhelm looked up at them.

“Someone has kept the marshes from claiming these columns, laddie. Aye, tis true. They’ve hacked away the vines and kept them standing straight even in the soft soil.”

“Same as the road,” Jorn noted. “It should’ve long ago disappeared under the creeping roots and vines. Somebody’s done just enough to keep it clear all these ages.”

              They passed by the little ruin, an anxious silence falling upon them. A few hundred yards later they noticed another small ruin, this time off the road on the right and surrounded by thick trees and hanging vines. Next they passed through a field of marble rubble strewn across the road. Most of the debris looked like the broken sections of more columns, but not all. Jorn noticed a strangely-shaped piece of marble. Kicking it casually with his foot, it rolled over. Although worn over and encrusted with mud, the instantly recognizable outline of a human face still jumped out at Jorn. Crouching down, he picked up the marble head and brushed away the dirt. It was a carved image of a maiden or perhaps a young boy. The ends of the lips curved gently upwards into a mischievous smile. Glancing around, he noticed a piece of a marble arm and a larger chunk of marble that might have once been the torso of some ancient statue. Jorn put the head back down, standing.

             
“Guardian crafted,” Ironhelm said, looking over the shattered statuary. “Aye.”

             
“The Guardian presence here must have once been extensive,” Ailric observed.

After they had walked a short distance further, they spotted what looked like a broad open area on the road more than a hundred yards ahead. The impression of vast openness through the trees was unmistakable, the same effect as when one is walking through a dense woods approaching a lake or a plowed field.

              Jorn paused, stepping towards the side of the road to remain out of sight. Crouching down in the weeds, they began their approach towards the open area but had only made it a few paces when a pair of distant figures suddenly stepped out onto the road in front of the opening. It was hard to make out much about them at that remoteness, only that they were immense, lumbering figures covered in some kind of thick brown fur. One of them seemed to be gesturing wildly to the other. Jorn did not see much, dashing into the swamp in a hurry to conceal himself. They rushed back into the marshes as quickly as they could, finding a large tree draped in thick vines about a hundred feet from the road which they hid behind.

Jorn lay on his back against its roots, clutching his sword and listening carefully as the others hid deeper in the swamps. He thought he heard a pair of grunting barks on the road. Slowly, he turned on his side and craned his neck to peek at the road.

For long moments, the road was empty. Then the lumbering giants arrived.

             
They were ten feet tall, with shoulders five feet across and bulging arms as thick as a man’s waist. Walking in a stooped, bent manner, their large heads hung down in between their shoulders and stuck out in front of them as they loped along. The back of their heads joined directly with their hulking backs, much like a troll’s. Yet these were like no trolls Jorn had ever seen. They were covered in thick brown fur and emerging from the sides of their jaws were huge yellow tusks which curved upwards. They wore no clothing and carried crude clubs six feet long. Striding forward, they looked from side to side at the thick swamp around them.