As the boat slipped into the cove, Jorb and Ethan hopped out and splashed into the water up to their waists. They helped pull the boat up onto the beach as far as they could. Traven and Darian then jumped out on the beach and helped pull the boat up a little further. They soon had the horses and all of their supplies unloaded. They then heaved the boat all the way out of the water and secured it in a small cave that was a short distance inland.
“We just leave it here?” Traven asked.
“Yes,” Jorb replied. “Our home village is the closest anyone is to here, and it is about ten miles to the south. No one really ventures north of the village. There’s nothing up here but dirt and wild beasts.”
As soon as the boat had been taken care of, they all mounted their horses and headed eastward with Ethan taking the lead.
“I thought your village was to the south,” Traven said. “Aren’t we going to stop there for the night?” Ethan and Jorb exchanged wistful glances.
“As much as we’d like to,” Ethan began, “it’s better that we don’t. We made an oath to serve at the keep for twenty years. If we see our homes and those we left, it will be harder for us to give it all up again and return to the keep. Jorb and I decided it would be easier for us to keep our oaths if we stay away from our village. We’ll reach the town of Arcad in a few days and can restock our supplies there.”
Traven would have liked to see the small fishing village that the human guardians came from. It would be fascinating to see what type of people would continue keeping the promise of providing the keep with guardians for so many hundreds of years. However, he understood that it might be hard for Ethan and Jorb to see their homes and have to leave immediately. He supposed that Ethan was correct, and it was best to bypass the village.
After traveling for a short distance through the growing darkness, the group stopped for the night. They started setting up camp at the base of a small cliff. Behind the cliff, dry mountains rose up, blocking the bottom half of the sky. They had been traveling at the base of the Parched Mountains ever since they left the coast.
“Are you sure you want to camp so close to the mountains?” Jorb asked Ethan.
“Sure,” the other guardian replied. “We have a wielder and an elf with us. What have we to fear?”
“I guess you’re right,” Jorb said glancing northward at the mountains. “But it still makes me a little nervous to sleep so near them. I probably won’t sleep very well.”
“What’s wrong with camping by the mountains?” Traven asked as they continued to set up camp. He glanced up into the mountains. They seemed desolate and devoid of anything but dirt and rocks.
“He’s just scared of the mountain beasts,” Ethan said dismissively.
“You would be too if you’d ever seen one,” Jorb replied defensively. “They really do live in these mountains. Multiple people have seen them.”
“What kind of mountain beasts?” Traven asked curiously.
“Some people don’t believe in them,” Jorb said giving Ethan a sharp look. “But they are definitely up in these mountains. They aren’t seen very often. Though, every once in a while someone gets a glimpse of them. They have skin like blood, glowing yellow eyes, and sharp fangs. I saw one when I was a little kid.”
“He thinks he saw one,” Ethan cut in.
“I know I saw one,” Jorb stated firmly. “And no one can deny how many people have disappeared in these mountains. Most people that venture too near these mountains never return.”
“That is the truth,” Ethan agreed. “These mountains are dangerous.”
“It sounds like galdaks to me,” Darian said, joining in the conversation. “They have red skin and their eyes do glow yellow. I didn’t realize there were any this far west.”
“See,” Jorb said. “Darian believes me.”
“But galdaks haven’t been seen for hundreds of years,” Ethan responded.
“Neither have elves,” Darian stated, “except for the guardians. And I can personally guarantee that there are plenty of elves still alive.”
“Wait,” Traven said. “What’s a galdak?” Everyone else seemed to know but him.
“Galdaks are another near human race like the elves,” Darian said. “They are bigger than the average human and have thick red skin. They dwell in the caves of the mountains. No one is really sure how many of them there are. Centuries ago they used to interact with humans. Then there was a really bad drought and a famine in the land. When the galdaks ventured from their mountain homes in search of food, the humans refused to share any of their food with them.
“A huge war erupted between the two races. The galdaks, frustrated with the humans for allowing them to starve, began to destroy the human villages in the north. The humans gathered together a huge army and drove the galdaks back to the mountains. The humans were so upset over the villages that had been destroyed and the people that had been killed that they didn’t stop pursuing the monsters. Even after the galdaks had been driven to the Parched Mountains, the human army continued to hunt them and drive them northward into the Barren Lands until they had killed all they could find.
“The galdaks haven’t been seen or heard of much since then. However, some did escape into the caves of the mountains. They have been spotted by the elves from time to time.”
Traven sat quietly, taking it all in. He glanced at the mountains to the north, wondering if there were any galdaks nearby.
“Are there any other races I don’t know about?” he asked.
“No,” Darian said chuckling. “As far as I know, the humans, elves, and galdaks are the only sentient races in the land. Now if we want to get an early start tomorrow, I suggest we finish setting up camp and go to sleep.”
They all agreed and quickly finished setting up camp. Despite the talk of galdaks, they were all tired from the long day and were soon all asleep. The night passed without incident, and they were up and heading east before the sun rose.
Over the next several days, they covered a lot of ground. They arose early each morning, traveled all day, and stopped after dark. Traven wanted to reach Candus as fast as they could, and he was happy with the progress they were making. He learned more about the galdaks and about the elves, though Darian wasn’t very forthcoming about his own people. He would answer specific questions that Traven asked, but he wouldn’t offer up anything extra.
Traven spent the majority of each day continuing to practice wielding the ambience from his saddle. At first he mostly worked on the defensive shields that Eldridge had taught him right before he had left. He could soon create the shields easily, without much thought. He practiced making them different sizes and different shapes.
He also spent a lot of time thinking of how he could use the ambience to repel different types of attacks. When he arrived at the battlefront, he wanted to be prepared for whatever he might have to face. He wanted to be ready to repel arrows and javelins as well as fire and lightning.
One of the things he enjoyed practicing the most was bending light to make things invisible. It took him a whole day of practicing to finally be able to get it completely right. At first he could only blur things, but by the end of the day he could make them completely disappear. He had fun over the next few days making himself disappear at random times and making other various objects disappear.
They arrived at the mining town of Arcad after a few days and restocked their supplies. Darian stayed outside of the town to avoid anyone seeing that he was an elf. Traven offered to make him invisible so he could come along with them, but Darian declined. He said he wasn’t quite ready to be in a whole town of humans yet.
Arcad was an even rougher sort of town than Jatz had been. Luckily, no one was brave enough to attack three armed men. Traven was once again thankful for the presence of the guardians. He looked at the several inns they passed longingly. As much as he would have liked to stay in the town overnight, he knew that it was more important for them to continue on as swiftly as they could.
Once they left Arcad, they were able to begin following the well traveled highway that would stretch all the way to Candus. The highway made traveling a lot easier, and they began to cover more ground each day.
Traven continued having visions at night of the crown and the absence of the princess. He would always wake with the same anxious feeling and the pull to get to her as soon as he could. Every night he would scree up the princess to verify that she was still okay. The nightly routine helped him to sleep better, until he would have another one of his visions.
He wouldn’t only check on the princess and the position of the Royal Army daily, but he would also check on his own party’s current position. It allowed him to have a very good feel for how far they had traveled and how much longer it would take them to reach their destination. Screeing allowed him to pick landmarks and set goals for the day’s ride more accurately than a map would ever allow.
On the tenth night after they had left the keep, Traven walked a short distance from their campfire and once again called up the image of the princess. He had discovered about a week into the journey that he could actually call up the image of the princess without having to search for her like he had originally done. He wasn’t sure how he was able to do it, but it made checking on her safety much easier.
The thin layer of water in the dish sprang to life as he stared down at it. He was anxious to see the princess once again and relaxed as the image came into focus. She was no longer in the army camp but in a grand dining hall. There were amazing dishes of food all around her, and the hall was full of elaborately dressed people and brilliant colors. She must have finally reached Candus.
He wasn’t sure what the celebration was for. Perhaps they were celebrating the arrival of the army, but he doubted they would be doing such a thing before the battle. It did appear that the princess and her fiancé, the commander general, were the center of attention. They both had spots next to each other at the front of the giant dining hall.
Traven’s eyes wandered back to the dazzling image of the princess. She looked as stunning and beautiful as he had ever seen her. A delighted smile danced across her lips in between her bites of food, her hair was done up intricately, and her gown seemed to sparkle. Traven smiled at her beauty for several moments and then with a conscious effort let her image fade away.
He was delighted to see she had reached Candus safely. She would be staying in the palace there and should be safe until he arrived. However, he still wasn’t sure what he was going to tell her when he got to Candus. He knew he couldn’t just approach her and tell her that she was missing from his dreams and he was worried for her safety. She would think he was crazy.
Another problem was that he couldn’t deny that his feelings for her had grown over the last couple of weeks. He tried to tell himself that he was only doing his duty as a soldier in the Royal Army. He was just worried about the safety of the future High Queen of Kalia. There was nothing personal involved. However, no matter how many times he tried to tell himself that, he knew his feelings for her went beyond those of a loyal subject. He tried to fight his attraction to her but couldn’t seem to.
He supposed it was his visions that had caused the connection. The deep feelings that stemmed from them were too strong to ignore. Every night when he called up her image in the screeing dish, he found it harder and harder to let her image fade away. Seeing her alive and well was one of the things he looked forward to the most every day. He wouldn’t have worried about it so much if she wasn’t royalty and engaged to be married.
He knew he had no right to feel anything deeper for her than loyalty as one of her subjects. He hoped that when he finally reached Candus and found her safe, the feelings of urgency to protect her would go away. Perhaps once those feelings disappeared, he would be able to get his own emotions under control.
Of course, he still had the problem of how to approach her when he arrived. At first he had thought that he could discreetly keep a watch on her from a distance. However, he wondered if he would be able to stop the threat to her if he wasn’t nearby. He didn’t want the hasty journey to end with her death because he was too afraid to tell her the truth. He had decided that perhaps it would be best for him to offer his service as one of her guards. He could also leave the guardians as guards in his place if he had to leave the princess to join the fast approaching battle.
He shook his head with a sigh. He pulled up a new image in the screeing dish and checked on their progress. It looked as if they could reach Candus within about eight days. At least he would have until then to figure out the best course of action to follow when they arrived. He supposed it would probably be a good idea to share his dilemma with the guardians and get their advice.
He let the image of their whereabouts fade, picked up the dish, and walked back towards the fire. All three guardians had already settled down for the night and were preparing to sleep. He supposed he could ask their opinions the next day during the ride. He unrolled his bedroll and settled down as well. They had been riding hard, and he had been practicing the ambience extensively during the day. He closed his eyes, hoping that he wouldn’t have any visions, but secretly hoping that if he did, the princess would return to them.
23
Kalista raised her glass and clinked it against Gavin’s raised glass.
“To us,” she said, repeating the words Gavin had just spoken. She took a sip of the sweet drink and savored it. She then set her glass down and looked over the room once again. Most of the people who had come to the engagement feast had already filed out of the dining hall. The last few were finishing up their dessert and readying to head home for the night.
The Baron and Baroness of Candus sat to Gavin and Kalista’s left, beaming at their son and soon-to-be daughter-in-law. They had thrown a wonderful feast, and Kalista was grateful for it. She had to confess that what her fiancé had said about a wonderful dinner when they reached Candus was true. The food had been varied and exquisite. It had no doubt been enhanced even more by the recent lack of variety and taste in her meals, but it would have been considered grand under any circumstances.