Eden-South (35 page)

His face flooded back into her head again,
and with it, the kiss they had shared before she left. It had left
her weak in the knees, her breath knocked right out of her. What
she should have done, she thought regretfully, was slap him for
having the presumption to do such a thing to her. It had been
unwarranted and completely inappropriate, or so she convinced
herself. They had shared so many nights together, never crossing
that line. He had purposely used her departure as an excuse to do
so. In reality, she should have been quite furious with him, but
for some reason she wasn’t. Another curve ball. A change in her
life that she didn’t plan for, and would never have expected. What
would her father and mother think of her?

She slowed the pace of the horse, cursing
herself for what she was about to do. It was wrong, she knew it,
and extremely foolish. It went against everything she had been
taught, against her own better judgement. Turning the horse around,
she headed back the way she had come, hoping it wouldn’t be too
late, and that she’d be there when he returned.

The northern army was retreating—they were
actually retreating! Aiden and his men had beaten the first round
of beasts, and now that they faced the larger ones, they were
finding that fighting them was even easier than fighting the
others. Although these creatures were large and intimidating, they
appeared to be as dumb as nails. Their actions were slow and
confused, and they seemed to have no training with the weapons. It
was as if they were brought strictly for the purpose of
intimidation, offering no real asset to the army.

He was approaching one of the foot soldiers
when he felt the arrow hit him in the shoulder. He had been hit
before, and knew they had practically no effect on him. This one
looked different—there were black feathers on the end, which the
other ones didn’t have—but he didn’t think much about it at the
time. Lifting his hand to take it out, he suddenly felt himself go
limp, and he slowly slid off the saddle, crashing to the ground
amongst the dead. His breathing was shallow, a tight grip holding
his chest. The area where the arrow hit was burning; it spread like
wildfire. Soon his whole body felt like it was on fire, and all he
could do was scream. He had never felt pain like this before.

Wolf came first, running to kneel beside
him. He was calling his name, or so he assumed from the way his
lips were moving. Aiden couldn’t hear him. A sound like rushing
water filled his ears, and his vision became blurry. His eyes
started to roll around in his head, making it harder to concentrate
on anything. He knew he was still yelling, as the pain was
overwhelming, but he couldn’t even hear his own voice. Soon Logan
was there too—he could just make out his figure—and the King and
Captain came as well. The battle must have been over; they had won.
They were all speaking, but nothing came through.

Sudden visions came into his mind of his
mother and father and little Eddie. They had told him he couldn’t
die here, but he knew what was happening. Whatever this was, he
wasn’t healing from it, and the longer he lay where he was, the
harder his breathing became. All the people around him were blurred
now, and he couldn’t make any of them out. Everything was ending
all wrong. Everything was wrong.

She ran frantically across the field,
leaving the safety of her tree. It felt as if her legs couldn’t run
fast enough, her need to be there greater than any human ability.
Soon she reached them. A small crowd was kneeling around him, and
his screams of pain filled the air. She was sobbing by that point,
confused and furious.

“Aiden!” she yelled, kneeling beside his
head. She picked it up gently, placing it in her lap. “Aiden, can
you hear me?” His screams continued—he couldn’t hear any of them,
or he was in too much pain to acknowledge them. “What is wrong with
him?” she screamed at her father. The looks on everyone’s faces
showed complete bewilderment. No one knew what to do; no one had
any answers. Elisa looked over at Wolf, who sat disturbingly still,
a look of grief written over his face.

“We … we need to do something,” he
stuttered. His voice came out in a croak, emotion making it harder
for him to speak. “We need to save him!” he yelled at no one in
particular.

“Turk,” the King spoke for the first time.
“Go get Diana. She’ll know what to do.”

“We can only hope,” her father said, turning
to leave quickly.

Elisa’s tears wouldn’t stop—she thought her
heart would actually break as she sat there listening to his pain.
“Aiden,” she cried, stroking his hair.

“I don’t think he can hear us,” Wolf
said.

“We need to send him home!” she urged,
looking at the King. The King looked back at her, his eyes full of
uncertainty. She didn’t know if that would help, but something told
her it was their best bet.

“Home? Home, where?” Wolf asked, looking
from one to the other. “What is she talking about?” He looked
around. Logan was looking blankly at Aiden, unable to speak. His
cries still filled the air—he hadn’t stopped, hadn’t faltered once.
It wrenched at their hearts just to hear him. It was the sound of
death; there was no other way to describe it.

Her father came back, quicker than any of
them expected. With him was the witch. She knelt beside Aiden,
looking over his body carefully.

“What happened?” she asked, her voice strong
and full of authority. She would take this situation under
control.

“He got hit by an arrow,” the King said,
pointing at the broken arrow that lay beside him. The end had
snapped off when he fell, the tip still embedded inside him. She
picked up the arrow, sniffing it.

“There is poison on this,” she said, her
voice heavy with concern. “I haven’t known of anyone who would
actually use it. It is extremely powerful. This was Aziz’s doing;
only he would have known about it.”

“What do we do?” Jameson asked.

“Although he can heal faster than normal
while he is in our world, the poison is too strong and moves too
quickly in his bloodstream. His body can’t work fast enough to
fight it off. He will most certainly die if I don’t send him back
right now.” She was looking at the King now. Wolf looked to Elisa,
confusion written on his face.

Elisa looked back down at Aiden, still
stroking his hair, trying to offer what little comfort she could to
him.

“We have no choice,” the King said firmly.
“You must do what you must. I cannot have the blood of this boy on
my hands.” Diana nodded.

“I’m going to need you all to step back,”
she said, looking at the three of them. The King and Turk were
already standing off to the side.

“Why? What the hell is going on here?” Wolf
asked angrily.

“We don’t have time for questions. He
doesn’t have much longer,” she replied urgently.

“Goodbye, Aiden,” Elisa whispered, keeping
her lips close to his ear. “Be safe, and always remember us.”

Placing his head back down gently, Elisa
walked over to stand beside her father. He placed a reassuring arm
around her shoulders as she cried harder. The northern army were
gone now, having retreated back into their land of mountains. The
men who had followed them to make sure were just coming back to
witness the scene on the field. They had won, but it surely did not
feel like a victory.

Wolf still sat beside him, looking down at
his friend.

“Wolf,” Diana said gently. “You must leave
him now. Say your goodbyes.”

Looking up, Elisa could see how much he did
not understand. She saw him mouth something and then grab Logan’s
arm and pull him up with him. Logan hadn’t spoken one word, nor had
the look on his face changed since the moment he had arrived by
Aiden’s side. They all stood in a line while Diana stayed by his
side, speaking words that none of them could understand.

“Did you know about this?” Wolf asked,
looking at Elisa. She didn’t answer him, keeping her eyes focused
on the two figures still on the ground.

A light began to build around the pair,
growing brighter, blinding them as it did. They could still hear
her voice, but it grew fainter as the light grew in intensity.
There was a rush of wind, and then nothing. No light, no voice, no
witch, and no Aiden. They were gone.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Uric had joined the northern army when he was
only sixteen. It was known that Brutus didn’t normally take boys
that young, finding their inexperience and need for direction too
cumbersome. It wasn’t like the King’s army in the south. In the
north they were accepted only when they were older, bigger than
their rivals. It was Uric’s good fortune that he just happened to
be extremely big for a sixteen-year-old. His father had been proud
of him his entire life, proclaiming that he would bring their
family pride and respect in the kingdom. It was a lot to have on
his shoulders, but he seemed to be handling it well.

The journey south to central Eden had been
long and tedious. Now that he was actually on the road with the
army, he realized how disgusting war really was. Their raids into
the smaller villages would often leave him feeling weak. The men
and women who lived there weren’t even their enemies. These were
citizens of the north, people who had followed Brutus’s rule for
the most part. It was not unknown to the barbarian that many of
them still proclaimed some allegiance to the High King, but they
never had revolted against him. It was that slight affection they
felt for his enemy that left them to Brutus’s retribution. They
wreaked havoc amongst his own people, killing anyone and everyone.
None of it made sense to him.

All of the men in the army were from the
mountains. Uric had grown up in one of the small homes built into
the mountainside. It was required that you be born and raised
there; Brutus never accepted anyone from the surrounding lands.
Uric was happy to know that his parents would be safe and away from
the madness. The same couldn’t be said for him.

The morning of the battle, Brutus himself
had come to find him. Uric was one of their best archers, hitting
his targets more often than any of the others. It helped that most
of them were old and did not see as well as he did. This made him
look better in the eyes of his Captains. Apparently, his reputation
had reached the ears of Brutus, which led him to find Uric that
fateful day.

“I have a special job for you, my boy,” the
large man said. Uric gulped, finding it hard to think of words
around this man. He had been told stories of Brutus the Red
throughout his whole childhood. It was an unreal experience to be
sitting next to him. His leader waited for him to reply before
continuing. Trying not to look daft in front of him, Uric simply
nodded his head, signifying that he should continue.

Clearing his throat, Brutus continued,
looking at him oddly.
Damn it,
Uric cursed inwardly, he
definitely thought he was daft. “There will be a boy amongst the
ranks of the King’s army. The only way you will be able to tell him
from the others is that the majority of the beasts will target him.
They have been given his description; I have not. You’ll have to
watch carefully, and take note if you see a boy that seems to be …
healing quickly.”

“Healing quickly, sir?” Uric asked,
confused.

Brutus sighed. “Apparently.” He shrugged
slightly. “The boy is young, and Aziz told us he will be able to
heal from his wounds faster than normal.”

Uric felt sceptical. He thought Brutus
almost looked the same. Reaching beside him, Brutus handed him an
arrow. It was longer than normal, and the end was decorated with a
black ostrich feather. Uric had never seen one before, but he knew
what it was. The people in the east were known for using things
like this on their weapons. There was a smell coming from the arrow
as well, something he didn’t recognize, but it offended his
nose.

“Use this when you’ve located him. It
doesn’t matter where it hits, as long as you get him.”

Nodding slowly, Uric looked down at the
arrow and wondered what kind of pain it would cause its intended
victim. Whoever this boy was, he had made a great enemy out of the
sorcerer.

It didn’t take him long to find the boy: he
was the one person almost every pair of eyes around the field was
drawn to. No one could understand how he kept getting up and
fighting. Everyone saw him get bitten numerous times by the evil
creatures, but nothing fazed him. He was unstoppable—a force to be
reckoned with. Uric pulled back the string on his bow and then
watched as the fateful arrow flew through the air into the shoulder
of the young boy. He looked even younger than Uric himself. The
cries that escaped the boy were painful to listen to and stayed
with him as he retreated with the rest of the army.

It would take months for Uric to forget
those screams, knowing that it had been he who had inflicted such
pain. He would often wake up in the middle of the night, the boy’s
cries filling his mind. Once again the truth of war had reared its
ugly head, and Uric found himself wondering if there was another
path in life that would suit him better than this one.

All the sounds from the field faded into the
background. There was a bright light in his eyes, keeping him from
making out what was in front of him. The heat still radiated
through his body. It was unbearable. He tried to call out for
someone to help, but no one was there, no one would answer. He
could hear his voice now. It was clear in his mind, and no more
rushing sounds filled his ears. The pain started to subside. The
heat was still there, but it was no longer painful. His breathing
returned to normal. Suddenly, he felt something soft underneath
him. It was comfortable, and the smell around him became
familiar.

Aiden woke up in his bed. His pillow and
sheets were soaked with sweat; his blankets lay kicked off onto the
floor. Gasping for air, he looked around and realized immediately
where he was. Reaching to his shoulder, he felt nothing. There was
no arrow, no poison. He was fine, and he was
home
. A light
shone through his window again. Getting up, he rushed toward it,
looking down at the lawn beside his house. There was nothing there.
The light was coming from a street light beside the house. It had
always been there, he remembered, casting a low glow through his
window.