Whill of Agora Trilogy: Book 01 - Whill of Agora (11 page)

He was lulled into a deep and peaceful sleep, one without pain or fear. As the elf woman’s voice slowly faded, he felt more at peace than ever he had been.

The bed beneath him rocked slowly, and Whill could feel a wet cloth being applied to his forehead. His body ached and his throat burned, but he had enough strength to open his eyes and see clearly. He was in the sleeping quarters of
Old Charlotte
, where more than two dozen women and children sat staring at him with strange expressions. Instantly he surveyed the surrounding crowd for the elven beauty, but to no avail. The only women in the room were human, and none of them resembled the woman he had seen. Perhaps he had been dreaming after all…except that she had seemed more real than these women did now.

“Please, my good lady,” he said to the woman sponging his forehead. “Where has the elven woman gone?”

She gave him a queer look. “I’m sorry, lad, there is no elf here. You still have a fever. You should rest some more.”

Whill ignored her request and swung his legs over the side of the cot. Dressed only in his pants, he quickly grabbed a shirt and threw it on. Again he surveyed the surrounding people. They wore ragged clothes, and their hair was dirty and matted. They looked as though they had not bathed nor eaten in weeks. He assumed that these were the families of the men who had first attacked Abram and him. But how had they gotten onto his ship, and where were the pirates? He needed to find Abram.

With the woman’s help, he stood and made his way to the stairs. As he stepped on deck and into the open air, he instantly began to feel better. The cool wind and saltwater mist bathed his face as he stepped onto the deck. The sun hung low in the east; it appeared to be a little past dawn. Abram was at the wheel, talking with a young slave boy. Four of the slave men were on deck also, and they gave Whill friendly smiles. Whill simply nodded, feeling a little ashamed that he had killed their friends, though he knew he’d had no choice.

Abram turned, as if sensing Whill’s approach. The boy turned too. When Whill saw the child’s face, he froze. It was Tarren.

“Whill, you look like you’ve seen a ghost,” said Abram with a warm laugh.

Tarren stood smiling, seemingly oblivious to what had happened to him. Whill reached out to touch his head and peered at the boy’s neck. There was no sign that it had ever been cut.

“Are you feeling better, Whill?” Tarren asked.

“Uh, yes…yes, I feel better.”

“That’s good, you gave us a good scare. And thanks, Whill. Thank you for saving me.” There were tears in his eyes as he flung his arms around Whill’s waist. Whill returned the hug and patted his back. There were a million questions on his tongue, but he bit them back behind an awkward smile.

“You’re welcome, Tarren, you’re welcome.”

Tarren released Whill after a few moments and wiped his nose on his sleeve.

Abram broke the silence. “Tarren, lad, do you think you could steer the old girl for a while so I can talk to Whill?”

“Yes, sir, I sure could!”

Abram put his arm on Whill’s shoulder and led him to the front of the ship so they could talk privately.

“Abram, what’s going on? How can Tarren be alive? What happened to me back there? Where are the pirates?”

“Relax, Whill, relax. It can all be explained. First off, you have been in a feverish sleep for two days now.”

“Two days!”

“Yes. You would wake up screaming and flailing about. I assumed you were having nightmares. You have been running a high fever up until this morning, How do you feel now?”

“I’m hungry as all hell, but otherwise I feel alright. Why, what happened?”

Abram studied Whill for a moment as if trying to read something of his health. “You don’t know what you did?”

“No. After Tarren fell I took him in my arms, and then everything went strange, and I blacked out.”

“You healed him, Whill. You saved his life.”

Whill shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

“When you went to Tarren, I was rallying the slave men to fight. Everything happened at once. The pirates attacked again; down the ropes they came and we began to fight. But you would not move. I screamed to you to get up, to fight, but you were not with us, not in mind, anyway. You just stared at Tarren, and then you put your hand upon his throat.” Abram stopped and looked at the slave men and at Tarren.

“When you touched Tarren’s throat, Whill, your hand began to glow with blue light. It was faint at first, but then it grew until it was hard to look directly at it. So bright it was that it took the attention of all who were near. The pirates who had just joined the fight stared in awe, transfixed by what they were witnessing, as did the slave men. Having seen an energy healing before, I knew what was happening—and what danger you were in. As fast as I could I ran to the two of you and pushed you back to break your contact with the boy.”

Whill took in what he had just heard. “So I healed Tarren with my own energy?”

“Yes, but you didn’t know what you were doing. If I hadn’t stopped you, you would have poured all of your life force into Tarren and dropped dead on the spot.”

“But how could I have done that? Only elves have the power to heal with energy. Everyone knows that it is not a human gift.” Then he remembered the elf from his dreams, and how he had at first mistaken her for his mother. “Was my mother an elf? Is that why I was able to heal Tarren?”

Abram studied Whill for a moment, as if deciding upon something. “No, Whill, she was not.”

Whill let out a frustrated sigh. “Then why do I have such powers, and to what extent do I have them?”

Abram gave Whill a sympathetic smile. “You have a gift. I was surprised when you healed Tarren, I had no idea you would be able to tap into your abilities until you were properly trained, but you did. How you did it I do not know. It seems that your emotions were so strong; you instinctively did what you had to, to save the boy. As you have proven, you had no control over what you were doing, which is why it was so dangerous. It takes a great deal of energy to heal a person who is on the brink of death. Not only did you heal his wound, you mended his broken bones as well. That is why the feat took such a toll on you. It takes as much energy from the healer as it would take for the person to heal himself.”

“That doesn’t explain how I can do it.”

“That, my friend, I would rather explain to you along with everything else within the mountain.”

Whill had known that would be the answer, but he was too mentally drained to argue. “Fine, then. At least tell me what became of the pirates.”

Abram’s face relaxed, visually relieved to have the subject changed. He put his hands on the side of the ship and began to recall the events after Whill’s blackout.

“You were healing Tarren, and everyone was kind of frozen. After I broke your contact with the boy, you passed out, and that was when a great red dragon appeared out of nowhere and attacked the pirate ship. In an instant everything changed. Suddenly the pirates were fleeing back up the ropes, frantically trying to get away from you and me. I took the opportunity to free the slaves who remained on the boat. They still stood in awe, unflinching in the presence of the dragon. I told them to go and get their women and children, and I began up the ropes, screaming like a madman. The pirates not fleeing in terror were either busy loading the harpoons or jumping overboard. When I got to the ship’s deck, I followed Cirrosa below. He was waiting for me. After one hell of a fight, I finally got the best of the captain and cut him through. By that time half of the pirate ship was ablaze. I jumped in the water and swam away from the burning wreck and to our ship.”

Whill was wide-eyed. “And the dragon didn’t advance?”

Abram laughed. “No. It finished off the pirate ship, circled overhead twice, and flew away.”

“Why did it help us?”

Abram shook his head. “I really don’t know, Whill. It may be that when it saw what you were doing to Tarren, it thought you were indeed an elf. The dragons and elves have a strange friendship, as you are aware. It has been less strong of late, since the creation of the Draggard by the Dark elf Eadon. But loyalty still lies between them.”

Whill was at a loss for words. He couldn’t believe how they had all escaped such peril. And he still had not fully absorbed the fact that he had healed Tarren with energy. His head began to ache as he pondered the implications of such powers.

Abram again put his hand upon his shoulder. “Come, Whill, let’s get you something to eat. You’ve lost at least ten pounds in the last two days, or hadn’t you noticed? The slaves, it turns out, are from Eldon Island. The Eldonians are great fisherman and have caught quite a feast.”

Whill regarded the men at the opposite side of the boat. “They hold no animosity towards us? After all, we killed many of their people.”

“No, they do not blame us. They know we had no choice; we did what we had to do. On the contrary, they are grateful that we helped free them. Now come, and do not feel ashamed.”

Whill followed Abram to the rear of the ship and together they joined the Eldonian men. The men had caught a bundle of tuna, which Whill was eager to accept. Though he still felt awkward around them, he could not deny his hunger. He ate four bowls of the tuna as he listened to the Eldonians speak of their homeland. Eldon was a large island off the southern coast of Eldalon. In times of war it had been used as a lookout point. In the event that an attacking fleet was spotted, the people of Eldon would light great beacons atop the mountains, which thus became known as the Burning Mountains. In return for their constant watch over the waters, the Eldonians received protection from the king of Eldalon, and were allowed to live the way they had for centuries. Fishermen by trade, they lived peacefully on their island and were thought by many to be a primitive people. They shunned many of the ways and practices of the peoples of the mainland and were content to live their own way.

Whill listened with admiration as an Eldonian man spoke of the ways of his people. “We want only blue skies and long lives. We are happy having what we need. The want for unnecessary material things leads only to envy and greed. Wars are spawned from such ways of thought, as is evident on the mainland. We help the king of Eldalon because in this day it is a necessity for us to have his protection. Not that we cannot defend our own shores; rather, we choose to live in peace as we were intended to.”

He paused and looked at Whill, who glanced away, uneasy. “When the pirates took us we were at sea, which is why Eldalon was not alerted to our dilemma,” the man went on. “We had been prisoners of those beasts for almost a full year. They attacked our ship and made us their slaves. Many of us they killed, not because we tried to revolt, but for their own enjoyment. The old, the weak, and the sick were disposed of quickly. They used our women…”

The man stopped, so filled with rage was he at the memory of their imprisonment. He took a deep breath and looked to the sky with tears in his eyes. “And then the captain told us about the two of you, and said that if we could kill you he would let us go. So you see, we had to attack; though we knew you not, we saw you as our enemy, the only things standing between us and freedom. In my heart I knew that Cirrosa would not hold true to his word, but we had no choice. We would have all surely died if it had not been for you, and for that we are grateful. Those who died attacking you died with honor, and we begrudge you not for it.”

Whill did not know what to say, though he knew the man was sincere and he understood that he and Abram had had no choice in what they’d done. Still, he felt a deep guilt that he was sure he would never really be washed clean of. He himself had never known his father, and now he had killed the fathers of many children. They had been good men, forced to fight. The thought of it all made Whill sick to his stomach. Hoping not to be thought rude, he excused himself from the eating circle and joined Tarren at the wheel.

“Hello, Master Whill, did dinner do you some good?” He wore the same wide smile with which he always regarded Whill.

“I’m no longer hungry, but I couldn’t feel worse.” He looked solemnly out over the waters. “Tarren, what do you remember of what happened on that ship? I mean, when I…when I helped you?”

Tarren’s face scrunched up in thought. “I remember pain, and falling. Then I saw nothing but blackness. Then your voice—you were angry—and a blue light.” His eyes were wide, and a new excitement entered his voice and demeanor.

“And then I felt the strangest thing I’ve ever felt in my life, or call me a liar. It was like when you know it’s your birthday soon and you can’t wait, or when you’ve eaten way too much candy. Inside you feel like you might explode. It was like being in the center of a screaming crowd, but all of their excitement is inside your body. I felt no pain, and before I knew what had happened, your friend picked me up and told me to hide below.” He looked upon Whill with puzzlement and wonder. “How did you do it, Whill?

He put a hand atop the boy’s head. “I don’t know, Tarren. I don’t know.”

CHAPTER TEN

Survivors

T
he night was cool, the ocean calm. The stars shone brightly in the heavens, untouchable diamonds of the night. To Whill it seemed that the ocean mocked the night sky, reflecting the stars with the same brilliance, but also making them dance and shimmer in a way that the sky never could. He stood at the bow, entranced, hands on the rail, mind drifting with the midnight sea. He was tired but not hungry. He needed rest but could not sleep, not among those he felt he had wronged. Though he had been aboard the ship for three days now, he felt as though he had walked for weeks. His legs, back, arms, and even his mind ached. He knew he had not fully recovered, and was not sure how soon he would. Yet contemplating the length of time it would have taken Tarren to heal from his broken bones, Whill wondered how he himself had recovered so soon. Had the elf woman been real? Had she helped him along with some kind of magic, an energy healing of her own? Surely that was absurd, for they were hundreds of miles from Elladrindellia. She had been a dream figure and nothing more. But the more Whill thought of her, the more real she seemed. The way her hair hung low, her beautiful smile, her eyes….