The Trinity of Heroes (I Will Protect You Book 1) (12 page)

A handful of Knights began to close in on Phillip’s position. “Flint, be reasonable. Surely you and I can make a deal,” he offered. “There’s no reason for this animosity.”

“Not a chance, you miserable bastard,” Flint retorted. “I see clearly now the error of my ways and no amount of money is going to change my mind. Guards, take him away!”

The group of Knights grabbed Phillip and dragged him away, kicking and screaming. “I’ll get you for this, Flint Pyre! When I return, I’ll see this city ruined!”

Elsie stood there, proud and victorious. Her greatest demon had just been banished from Haile. She watched intently as Phillip was unceremoniously dragged out of the courtyard. She couldn’t remember a happier day in her life.

Her father turned to her and said, “Elsie, forgive me for what I have done. I used you as a bargaining chip in a game of politics and favors. I only wanted you to be happy. I wanted you to be loved and cared for. I thought that Phillip would have felt the same way about you. I was so wrong to place my own needs before the needs of my people and my family. I swear to you that I will never do that again.”

“I do forgive you, Father. Thank you for making things right. I know that your intentions were good and that you couldn’t possibly have thought Phillip to be this kind of monster.” Elsie couldn’t hold a grudge against her father, he had been too important in her life. She knew he had realized his past failures, and that he had tried to rectify them. Even Elsie didn’t expect or believe that Phillip could have this evil hatred inside of him. She sincerely hoped that she would never meet another member of the Galexia family again.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

“The ironworks’ cry is never silent. It continues day in and day out like a banshee in the wind. I swear I can even hear it in my dreams.”

-
Jackson Jonah, Ironworks Foreman

The guards roughly and unceremoniously shoved Phillip out of the West Gate of Haile. Phillip straightened his jacket, wiped his face, and looked back at the guards with a menacing stare. The guards did not budge. Phillip knew this was not the time; he could not defeat an entire city by himself. He swiftly turned and began his walk back to his village of Green Bryre. Phillip’s steps grew faster and faster, his pace deliberate and accelerating. He stopped momentarily, pointed back at Haile, and scoffed to the winds, “Someday, you will all burn.”

As he walked, clouds of dust puffed underfoot and the warm southern winds embraced him. Phillip seethed in anger, for the first time in his life he had been told “no.” Phillip knew his way back to his home village of Green Bryre, which was southwest from Haile, and he used the lonely walk to brood and plan. Green Bryre was a beautiful town just northeast of the famous Galexia Ironworks. Since its creation around one hundred years ago, the Galexia Ironworks had provided the Galexias, Forme’s wealthiest family, with all the money they could ever need. Phillip planned to use that money to buy himself an army of mercenaries and watch Haile burn as he marched upon it. He would have his revenge on Flint, Elsie, and the Knight Guard.

Phillip stopped at the outskirts of Green Bryre, a quaint village he had not seen now for some time, and took in the sights. To his left was the town grocer, run by two brothers, second generation owners, and expert salesmen. To the right was the armory, run by an old man who always had a story for his patrons. In fact, sometimes he talked so much that customers would walk away in the midst of a sale. Phillip looked to the center of the village where he could see it, the famous Galexia effigy. The statue towered high over the village square and depicted the glorious form of Mervin Steele Galexia, the first man to strike ore to the south. Phillip hated that infernal statue of his late grandfather. Phillip was proud of his family’s accomplishments, but being a Galexia brought with it a certain expectation from the townspeople. Phillip was only sixteen years old, but did not have the reputation for success that his father and his grandfather had garnered.

His grandfather had started the Ironworks, bringing a wave of jobs and prosperity to Green Bryre. His father, Arcel, had used the family fortune to erect multiple academies, churches, and other public areas around the town. This attracted a flourish of culture, art, and craft to Forme that was unheard of throughout the lands at that time. The mayor of Haile had claimed that Green Bryre was the diamond of Veronicia, the most beautiful of all the villages, and people from throughout the world came to spend time there. Phillip knew the townspeople expected him to continue the family legacy of philanthropy, and to ensure that the Ironworks would continue to provide jobs for Green Bryre. But the truth was that Phillip despised the business world. He hated the long hours and the tedious details. But most of all, he hated the people. He didn’t want to be in a position of leadership. He would sell the business as soon as his father stepped down, and use the profits for his own leisure. Phillip had little aspiration to achieve anything. He had money and he enjoyed using it. He could never spend it all, and he gave no thought to future generations. As far as he was concerned they would have to make their own way. Anything that required him to lift a finger was out of his realm of accomplishment. The townspeople in Green Bryre knew it, too. They asked him those annoying questions: ‘What academy do you attend?’ ‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ ‘Have you started working at the Ironworks yet?’ Phillip hated those conversations; it was his reason for leaving Green Bryre. He used to be able to stay in Knights Runn and hide from the biting inquiries.

Phillip quickly made his way through the town, head down, doing his best not to attract the attention of the nosey people who walked by him. He had no time to waste, and didn’t want to speak to anyone other than his father. A few people called out to him, but Phillip didn’t entertain them. He walked past the statue of Mervin and continued to a large, brick home beset against a hillside.

The homes in Green Bryre were some of the best crafted in all of Haile, but the Galexia home was a monument to architectural perfection. The home, referred to as the second castle in Forme by many, dwarfed all other buildings in Green Bryre in size and scope. It was awe-inspiring. The main entrance welcomed guests with its huge glass door. Caretakers worked on the trees, hedges, and lawn with surgical precision. Inside, Norman, the doorman, greeted Phillip with a bow, as he opened the door. Phillip walked past him, and other servants inside the house, without acknowledging their presence. Nothing about the home, inside or outside, could be considered awry, even to the most astute critic. Phillip didn’t care, but rather, he loathed the fact that his house was so large. It was a monument to his father’s ego, and another reminder of the unrealistic goals he was expected to achieve. It felt lonely and void, almost like a physical purgatory. Phillip wondered where his father could be. He didn’t feel like searching every room. The house was silent, except for a faint rustling coming from the end of a long, dimly-lit hallway.

Phillip strutted toward the noises, hoping to find his father. What he saw perplexed him. Outside the door to his father’s study, large saddlebags sat overflowing with odds and ends. Manuscripts and maps were strewn about. Phillip tiptoed around the mess and peered through the open door.

Arcel didn’t even notice his son as he scurried about like a ferret. He was frantically putting everything he could gather into larger and larger satchels.

“Father,” Phillip asked, “what in Veronicia are you doing?”

His father did not respond; he didn’t even look up. He just continued to dash about the study.

“Father!” Phillip yelled. He walked into the study. He was intent on getting Arcel’s attention.

Arcel finally glanced irritably at Phillip, and then lowered his head and went back to digging through drawers of an oak desk.

Phillip decided to continue the conversation. “Father, I need your help,” he whined. “The mayor just kicked me out of the castle and banned me from returning to the city. All because I beat up some Knight Guard trainee who was meddling in my affairs. You need to go and have a word with Flint; he is out of control.”

Arcel lifted his head in agitation as he slammed down a stack of papers he had gathered. “Are you serious, Phillip? Can’t you handle your own problems? You are a grown man now. I have bigger issues than your little scuffles to deal with. Can’t you see I’m busy?! I haven’t the time or the money to bail you out of any more trouble.”

The words rattled Phillip, who had expected his father to at least take his side. Phillip knew his father was preoccupied, but he wished his father would take the time to listen to his concerns. Arcel was rarely around and this greatly strained Phillip’s relationship with his father. Phillip was still young and learning, he needed a mentor, but Arcel often chose the saloons and brothels over a chance to spend time with his son. Arcel and Phillip didn’t treat each other like father and son, but more like two rival siblings who both only wanted to speak to each other if it could be beneficial for their own gain.

“What could be more important than helping me, your son, in his time of need? Please, Father,” Phillip pleaded.

“Phillip, you don’t understand.” Arcel struggled to stay interested in the conversation. “I’ve wasted our fortune at the whorehouses and pubs in town. Even if I wanted to help you, there is no money left to buy favors. The Galexia name is ruined.”

These words shocked Phillip. Arcel was known as a philanthropist, a man recognized throughout the lands for his charity. How could he have squandered the family fortune so quickly? This was supposed to be Phillip’s money, Phillip’s destiny. If the words his father had just spoken were true, then Phillip was
poor
.

“What do you mean, Father? We have more money than we could ever spend. Are you sure you are thinking straight, you seem a bit distracted.”

“Oh please, Phillip,” his father became irritated now, “don’t you think I know what I’m talking about? I gambled the money away on exquisite artifacts, whores, and fine drinks. There is no more fortune.”

“Well then what are you doing in here?” Phillip at least needed to know why his father had turned his neat, tidy study into a disorganized mess.

“Mayor Flint has commissioned me on a trip over the Frozen Mountains. He said if I can bring him proof of what lies beyond, I will be rewarded handsomely. I’m leaving soon. I’m doing this for us, son. I’m risking my life for you.”

Deep in his heart Phillip knew better. Arcel was risking his life for his own gain; it certainly had nothing to do with Phillip’s future. But then, what did it really matter. Phillip rarely saw his father anyway, so he may as well hope that the man would be able to recover some of the fortune that he had lost.

Still, Phillip detested the miserable fool even more for squandering his fortune in the first place. “How could you, Father? How could you do this to me? I have nothing now. I’m a nobody. What am I supposed to do now? I…I hate you!” Phillip stormed out of the study and sulked up two flights of steps to his room, which overlooked Green Bryre. A storm had rolled in and rain poured from the gray clouds that gripped the village.

There was nothing that Phillip could do. The family fortune was gone. Phillip had to fire their servants because they had no money to pay them. The home fell to disorder as neither Phillip nor Arcel had the necessary knowledge or skills to do basic repairs. A cavernous distance grew between Phillip and Arcel. They rarely spoke. They purposely avoided each other like two ex-lovers. Arcel spent his time planning his excursion and begging old friends for a drink at the local bar. They obliged him, happy to add another member to their inner-circle of misery and despair. Arcel’s fall from grace was the talk of the town. Phillip had to withstand a barrage of questions from the locals every time he went to the market. Phillip begged for a job at the Ironworks, as a day laborer, to make some money to buy food and provide a meager living for himself and his father. The foreman, Jackson Jonah, was happy to oblige him.

From dawn to dusk,

Iron to rust

We work all night and day!

Brawn or bust,

Until we’re dust

We won’t be walkin’ away!

- Ironworker’s chant

A loud clamor awoke Phillip earlier than he ever had in his life. His new employment at the Galexia Ironworks required him to be to work before sun up. If it weren’t for his father stumbling home drunk from the pub in the early hours of the morning and banging the door shut, he would probably have overslept. Phillip struggled his way out of the silent, dilapidated mansion and groggily made his way to his job at the Galexia Ironworks. Jackson Jonah, the foreman of the Ironworks, and one of Phillip’s childhood friends from Green Bryre, was standing out front to welcome his newest laborer.

“Time for some real work, Phillip, get down there, now!” Jonah bellowed, pointing a meaty finger toward the forge. The man took a sick pleasure in commanding Phillip, who he knew would be at his mercy.

Phillip was unaccustomed to manual labor. But, he would have been able to adjust if not for the heat. Oh the heat! A heat so unbearable, so blistering, that it sent even the strongest men home on their first day in mere minutes. But, the foreman would not grant Phillip that reprieve. Jackson Jonah barely obliged Phillip’s request for water. Phillip removed all the clothes he could, but still the heat was insufferable. Phillip had to survive; he couldn’t lose his job. It was the only way he could afford to eat! It was as though the heat was pulling little drops of his soul out of him one torturous drip of sweat at a time. Beads of sweat inched their way down his brow, down his arms, down his thighs, driving Phillip closer to the brink of insanity, further into the depths of his own madness.

Phillip descended the rickety, poorly constructed steps of the Ironworks, his ears ringing with the loud clangs of metals as he brought a large pitcher of water to his workmates. A large, burly man approached him, and grabbed the pitcher forcefully. He took a large gulp of water, passed it to a nearby workmate, and let out a satisfied “Ah!”

The men were the bottom of society’s barrel, and Phillip didn’t feel as though he belonged amongst them. In the past Phillip always drank first, a sign of his family’s status, but here in the Ironworks he was nothing more than another hand that would eventually get crushed or burned to a crisp. Finally, a thin, muscular man thrust the pitcher back to Phillip. Phillip leaned his head back and shook the pitcher, trying to coax every drop of water from it. But still it was barely enough to quench his dry, parched throat. His hands shook as he dropped the pitcher to the ground, the clang barely audible over the bolstering forge.

How did it come to this?
Phillip thought to himself as he moved tools from one workplace to another, their weight tearing at his arms, causing him to hunch over in pain.
I’m not meant to do these strenuous, menial tasks! I’m meant to marry a beautiful, wealthy girl and live a life of luxury! Those dogs in Haile will pay if it’s the last thing I ever do!
Phillip brooded all day long while he worked in the forge. He was assigned clean-up duties as well as being what those who worked in the forge called a “runner.” He was forced to run tools from the depths of the forge all the way to town to be sharpened by the blacksmiths, and then return them back down to the pits.

At one point during the day all of the working men gathered on the middle level of the ironworks and began eating sticks of salted beef and pork. They grabbed some dented mugs and dipped them into a community water trough. Phillip reached for a dirty, half crushed mug on a nearby table. Before he could wrap his filthy, battered hands around it, a stout, muscular man knocked it to the ground. “You used to treat us like dogs, Phillip. Hardly better than slaves!” the man shouted. “Now you’re the dog, now you’re our slave!” He moved his face to within inches of Phillip’s.

Phillip recoiled from his rancid breath.

“The only reason we haven’t torn you to pieces is because we need someone to do the running!” He pushed even closer and snarled, “You have no friends here, Phillip.”

The man had made his point and Phillip dejectedly left the group to eat alone along a sidewall. He waited until everyone had finished eating and picked up the soiled mug from the floor. There was barely any water remaining in the trough, but Phillip scooped up what he could. The warm water provided him little comfort. Phillip swore quietly to himself and cursed his father for putting the family in the position it was currently in.

Finally, work ended for the day, and Phillip limped out of the Ironworks. He was shocked to find darkness and stars covering the sky.
How long have I been here?
Phillip was exhausted and he was barely able to find the energy to shuffle his way home. The boys he had grown up with around Green Bryre, and was now forced to work with at the Ironworks, didn’t invite him to the pub after work. Phillip knew why. He knew that deep down they resented him, hated him even. He knew they would talk about him, and about his family’s decline.

Phillip now longed for the giant home that he used to despise. He welcomed the way it greeted him with its cold, dead silence. He appreciated how comforting it was, and how it didn’t chide or belittle him. He felt safe. He could think there in the dark lonesomeness. He could plan. He could dream, dream of the day when he could return to Haile and have his revenge.