The Trinity of Heroes (I Will Protect You Book 1) (30 page)

Phillip bent down and grabbed her throat and looked into her one open, defiant eye. “Tomorrow night, my dear, my princess, you and I consummate our everlasting love!” he snarled gleefully.

He shoved her head back down and stood. He angrily swung the door closed behind him as he stomped out of the cell. He had all the time in the world. He would gain the courage he needed. Tomorrow night he would follow through.

Elsie lay broken and battered on the cold, damp floor of her single room prison. She still struggled to breathe. Her face and her chest hurt so badly that she could not gather enough strength or willpower to turn over or pull herself upright. The moans and the suffering of those around her and the putrid smell of death reminded her that she was still alive, for now. She thought of Lawrence and Benni, how they had left the castle to try and find help. She prayed for their quick return. She desperately didn’t want to die like this, naked and beaten and bloody in the pits of the dungeon. Exhaustion was the only reprieve from the torment she experienced. Her consciousness, and the dark world of misery around her, faded to black as she passed out.

When were they going to teach us this? When was Gorbin going to show me this whole new world? If it were up to me, this would be all I would practice. I play along with his teachings as though they matter to me, but I know deep down I have what it takes to be stronger than he is allowing. I think he fears I will surpass him or even his son. Maybe something will have to change…maybe sometime soon I will have to show him my power.

-
Journal of Kastor Char, Age 18

Kastor surveyed the carnage in the Everglen. “Well, that was certainly anti-climactic! Hahaha!” He laughed as he walked through the Everglen with a spring in his step and a new vision to transform it into his own personal dystopia. As he bounced and waltzed through the still beautiful clearing he sang, “La-da-ta-da…” He swung his arms in a circular motion and pointed to a nearby tree. “Die!” As it wilted he continued his song while picking up a stick. He swung it like a cane and pointed it toward the pond. “And dead fish, hiyah!” A dead fish floated to the top of the water; it began to bloat rapidly. “Ya-da-ta-da, Ba-bam!” He pointed to an owl that fell from a tree branch and exploded into a cloud of feathers on the ground.

“Oh, I love to sing and dance; it’s what I love to do! I love to sing and dance, and bring death unto you!” He drew out the ‘you’ as he pointed around to multiple animals scurrying about trying to escape. They collapsed dead, exploding into piles of guts and fur. He skipped toward a garden of flowers. “Well now, what have we here…pretty flowers? I don’t think so! Wab a dobedowah, and good bye!” The garden burst into flames, killing the flowers instantly. He saw a rabbit run across his path. “You can run all you like little one, but…Wa-bam!” The rabbit’s legs folded as it skidded across the hard ground, dead.

Kastor approached the animal. “You know, I always wanted one of those…those...oh what am I trying to say? Those foolish animal skin hats! That’s it! I’ll do you one better though, little guy, check this out!” He ripped its body cavity open with demonic strength and proceeded to wear the carcass like a hat, even as blood rushed down his face and into his open mouth.

“Kastor! What have you done?! Stop this madness!” Galvan shouted from behind him, cutting off his ramblings and stopping his dance. Galvan’s voice shook with rage and horror. “Kastor, do you have any idea--”

Kastor cut him off with a wave of his hand. “Wait, Galvan, just wait a minute…” Kastor paused for a moment. “Do you hear that?”

Galvan looked at him questioningly.

“Neither do I! Hahahahahahahahaa!” His laugh was loaded with cries of insanity and absolute bloodlust; he had lost his mind. “I’ve finally done it, Galvan, I’ve finally killed them! The ones who cast me out all those years ago, they’re all dead! Now, watch this!” He lifted his arms to the sky and pointed his fingers to the tree tops. “Rain death!”

Upon speaking the words, birds of many species began to fall from the trees. Blue birds, swallows, birds of paradise, other songbirds and the like, all crashed to the ground like falling stones. Some even fell on Galvan. There were so many, Galvan couldn’t see the sky above.

“Kastor, you are insane!” Galvan shouted as Kastor continued his dance of death. “I won’t let you get away with this, Kastor; I’ll stop you!”

“The only thing you’re going to do is die, Galvan, but I’m not ready to kill you just yet! I want to write the epitaph for your tombstone first. How about, ‘He died as he lived…useless!’ Or wait, maybe, ‘Just another dead body!’ Wait, wait, wait, I have it, ‘Here lies Galvan Gabrielle, the son that couldn’t cut it!’ Oh, I’m sorry, was that last one out of line?”

Kastor’s words infuriated Galvan. He began tracing runes and reciting incantations to himself. Galvan hurled fireballs, ice spears, lightning bolts, and even a few missiles composed of pure magic at Kastor. But each missed their target, or barely grazed Kastor’s skin.

“Oh, come on, is that the best you can do?! I expected better from the prodigal son of Gorbin Gabrielle!” Kastor shouted after a lightning bolt caught him with a glancing blow.

Galvan was running out of energy from casting so many spells in succession. But Kastor was preoccupied with his rabbit hat which was falling off his head. Galvan sensed his opportunity and flung a fireball. The sorcery found its mark, instantly incinerating Kastor’s body, burning his clothes and singeing his face.

Kastor began to scream, “Ahhhhhh, what have you done to me!? What have you done?! It hurts, it hurts, it…feels so fucking good!” He accentuated every word, shaking his head from left to right, still laughing and dancing. Galvan looked on in shock as a sick smile came across Kastor’s burned and charred face. “Please, Galvan, hurt me more!” Kastor shrieked.

Galvan obliged him, sending several magical missiles down range, piercing his waist and chest. Kastor just stood there, absorbing everything Galvan could throw. Galvan’s speed was slowing greatly as he continued his assault. “A dragon…flies…” Galvan was heaving for breath, exhausted from the battle and the numerous sorceries he had cast. He was dangerously low on energy.

Kastor sensed his moment to strike. Several eyes sprouted on Kastor’s right arm; they seemed to just bubble up out of his skin. They blinked repeatedly. Kastor continued to laugh as he began to skip along through the Everglen with Galvan in a lumbering chase.

As he pursued Kastor, Galvan looked around seeing the death that had come to this once beautiful place. His heart sank as he saw the dead carcasses of people he knew as a child.

Kastor stopped over a body and turned toward Galvan. “You know, Galvan, I always loved you like a brother, albeit an adopted, bastard brother, one that I could pick on and beat whenever I wanted. But you know Galvan, there was someone else that I loved more than you, it was this man,” he said, pointing down at Gorbin’s dead corpse.

“Father!” Galvan wailed. He rushed to his father’s lifeless body.

“Uh uh uh uhhh!” Kastor chided, shaking his right index finger from side to side. “He’s dead, Galvan, there’s nothing you can do. You failed him, just like you failed all of these people living here!” His voice turned angry, cold, and dark. “You were their hero Galvan and…you failed them! They’re dead because of you!” He pointed his fingers at Galvan and shouted, “Die!”

A dark burst flew from Kastor’s hands, but Galvan was able to dodge it just in time. He took off running toward the pond at the edge of the rotting Everglen. He could hear Kastor laughing behind him while he ran, and he wondered when he would be hit by a death spell.

Galvan was only about ten paces from the pond now. His salvation was just ahead. Suddenly, Galvan’s legs gave out. His heart stopped. His arms fell to his sides. His eyes closed. He crashed into the pond. Kastor had hit him with one of his most powerful spells, and Galvan was dead before he ever hit the cold water. His lifeless body floated slowly toward the center of the pond, water overtaking his corpse and soaking his robes.

Kastor slowly approached the edge of the pond. His face was riddled with happiness and erotic arousal. “Ooops! Yahahahahahahahahahahaha! Goodbye, Galvan Gabrielle, last sorcerer of the Everglen.”

Kastor turned to walk away. “Now, what color should I make my new hut? Oh, I know, blood red! Hahahahahaha!” He kept musing to himself until he heard something happening in the pond behind him. The water in the pond began to bubble profusely, and suddenly it began to whirlpool. Kastor watched as Galvan’s body followed the waves around and around until finally it disappeared at the bottom. Kastor just shrugged to himself and proclaimed to his audience of dead bodies, “One less of you I gotta burn, hah!” He walked away victorious, blood soaked, insane.

He approached the area where many of the corpse-filled huts still stood and sat down amidst the dirt. He felt at home as he lay down, allowing his body to be overtaken by dirt, ants, snakes, worms, and beetles. They covered him, encompassed his body, filling every orifice and lathering every wound. Kastor laughed as a swarm of ants, bugs, and rodents proceeded to rise like the rushing waters of a fountain, raising him off of the ground. He sat up and crossed his legs, looking around sensing that there was still much to do. He ordered hundreds of thousands of ants and other bugs to eat every blade of grass, and strip the trees of their leaves and bark. He ordered the bats that had flown in earlier to consume the healthy life still remaining in the clearing. He summoned a small army of wolves, several bears and a few nearby deer. He raised his hands over them and their eyes glowed red. They became infected with disease. He watched as they ran about the Everglen engaging in unnatural activity amongst themselves, and others. He snickered with excitement as he watched what was left of the Everglen become consumed, dark, and perverted. The entire, lifeless clearing now sat as a clean slate on which Kastor could create his dark utopia.

I traveled to the Endless today with my trusty steed, Clyde. I am here to refute a rumor that the giant wurms living in these woods can eat an entire horse in one gulp. I hate to admit this, but I really hope the rumors are false. I sat in an open clearing with Clyde for a long time, pondering what I would do if we found one of these wurms, when suddenly I felt a rumble. I looked all around trying to find the source of the noise and saw nothing. I heard some brush crackle to my left. When I looked I again saw nothing unusual. I turned back to Clyde, and to my surprise, he was gone. There was only some heavily disturbed dirt in the shape of a large hole where he had been standing, and a small splatter of blood on some nearby grass. I think I’ll be going now. Poor Clyde, I’ll miss you.

- Big Branic’s Big Book of Mysteries, Chapter 4

Lawrence kicked the sides of the steed, sending it into a furious pace. He had had no time to saddle it, and he and his mother jolted up and down with every stride the auburn stallion took. The southern lands of Forme were hilly and mostly barren. A few small lakes and creeks dotted the landscape. Lawrence had no time for sights. He had locked onto the massive ocean of trees that loomed on the horizon. He didn’t look back over his shoulder, praying that the beasts were too busy to concern themselves with his escape.

Lawrence’s mind raced as the steed tore across the valleys. He had acted so rashly, so involuntarily, that now he was starting to wonder if racing into an uncharted forest was his best option. How would he ever find his father? And even if he did, how would Jerreth be able to help them? At least he had his mother to accompany him. He couldn’t bear to think of what horrors she would have had to endure had she stayed in Haile. She probably wouldn’t have survived them…

The day was incredibly clear, but the southern wind sent reminders to Lawrence’s ears. He could hear the screams, fading behind him, of those he had left, those he had forsaken in his earnest attempt to save his mother. At least this way, maybe, he had a chance to help.

The Endless towered over Lawrence and his mother, beckoning menacingly, daring them to enter its labyrinth of trees. Lawrence felt small, like an ant amongst grasshoppers, as he stared into the leafy abyss. But Lawrence had no choice, either enter the prison of trees or ride back to Haile and its dungeons, and its captors.

Lawrence calmed his steed, and he and Elizabeth dismounted. Lawrence guided Elizabeth to a small opening and into the expanse of ferns and pines, cutting limbs with his longsword as he went. But the sunlight didn’t follow them for long. They were swallowed in shade and darkness as they moved deeper into the forest, only a faint hint of light still visible behind them. Dead branches reached toward Lawrence and Elizabeth like bony hands of skeletons trying to rip at their prey. Spears of sunlight tried desperately to reach the forest floor. Few succeeded. Almost no plant life grew on the ground; but a wealth of fungus suffused over dead logs and timber. The trees reached higher, cocooning around Lawrence and Elizabeth like a living tomb.

Lawrence was too focused on cutting branches and steadying his mother to realize how frightened he was. His mother had told him many bedtime stories about the horrors of the Endless, how no one had ever returned after venturing into its depths. She had told him about the creatures that inhabited it, the ones that feasted on wanderers and lost cattle. So why was he pushing deeper into the forest now?

The cool, still air surrounded them now as they hacked their way farther yet through the vast confines of trees. “Jerreth…Jerreth!” Lawrence called anxiously, hoping that his father would answer his plea. Silence. A chipmunk darted across a hollow log. An owl hooted, responding to his words, alerting others that an intruder was in their midst. Elizabeth mustered her remaining strength and echoed Lawrence’s call as she steadied herself against a tree.

Lawrence and Elizabeth stopped in a clearing, taking a moment to rehydrate. As Lawrence closed his deerskin pouch, he heard it. It was a rumbling underground, faint at first, but growing ever stronger as time passed. He glanced at his mother, unsure of what to make of the strange noise.

He had no chance to ponder it further.

The ground exploded underneath them, the blast sending Elizabeth hurling through the air, separating her from Lawrence. She hit the ground with a loud thud. She didn’t move. A monstrous brown wurm, twenty feet in length, charged out of the ground and slithered to the opposite end of the clearing. It whirled and twisted itself around. It reared up, bringing its head off the ground, and opened its giant maw. Hundreds of razor sharp teeth circled around and around, as it screeched in anger at missing its prey.

Lawrence was petrified. He had been only inches away from being swallowed whole by the beast. The myths his mother had told him were true. He had heard of these creatures, the massive wurms of the Endless, but only in bedtime stories. They lived deep underground, sensing the vibrations from deer or other animals that ran through the forest. They attacked their unsuspecting prey with predatory precision, engulfing them in their nightmarish maw before their victims had a chance to realize they were in danger. The only clue they gave their quarry to their imminent demise was the faint rumbling underground that grew gradually louder as they approached.

“Mother!” Lawrence shouted. He instinctively raced toward his mother’s crumpled body. He stopped dead in his tracks after a few steps, realizing his fatal mistake. The wurm’s underground dwellings had, through generations of evolution, enhanced its hearing a thousand fold. Even though the wurm had lost its eyes to the same process, its keen sense of hearing more than made up for its lack of sight. The wurm burrowed back underground at a torrid pace; Lawrence knew its target. The ground rumbled loudly as Lawrence ran opposite where his mother lay. The wurm burst through the ground as Lawrence dove to avoid it. Pieces of sod and dirt flew everywhere. The wurm moved with a pace that defied its enormous size. It could hear Lawrence flail about as he tried to stand. The wurm flicked its tail around Lawrence’s prone body, snatching him off the ground. The wurm began to encircle him, twisting Lawrence under immense pressure. Lawrence struggled in vain to escape, but could not draw his sword as his sheath was crushed against the wurm’s constricting, fleshy body.

The wurm postured for the kill, and drove its toothy head toward Lawrence’s defenseless body. Lawrence screamed helplessly as his death approached. He could feel the rush of wind from the whirring of the beast’s myriad fangs. He closed his eyes, and swayed around, trying to cling to life for every last breath he could.

But he didn’t feel the teeth rip through his body. At least he was pretty sure he didn’t. Instead he felt the wurm’s grip go limp as he was sprayed by its slimy entrails. He lifted his arms from the wurm’s flaccid body, wiped his face off, and opened his eyes. He was awe-struck by the sight around him. The wurm’s head lie at his feet as brown blood and guts spouted from the beast’s still upright body. Finally, the corpse of the monstrous beast toppled over, like a broken tree trunk, and crashed to the ground below. Sticks and debris crackled in its wake.

And Lawrence saw his savior.

A man stood facing Lawrence. His beard was grey, long, and scraggly. It descended down to his navel. His face was hardened from the elements, his hair long and dirty. He wore a deerskin hide, moccasins, and battered leather leggings. A raccoon fur hat was his helm. He held a colossal sword in his right hand, drenched in the thick blood of the beast he had just decapitated. His yellow eyes stared at Lawrence.

“Hello, son!”