As John walked onwards nearing the eastern edge of the forest, he thought of Sir Laverdere, his courageous mentor and hero. His flexing musculature and daunting build had captured the popular imagination. Songs were sung about him. Minstrels in courts throughout Ongash sang of heroic deeds he performed. Much of this was embellished but fact is more impressive than fiction. Fifteen years ago, the Hyperboreans, a tribe of barbarians from the far north, swept down from high in the Carpathians and attempted to siege Valorius. The castle lay under siege for two months. The leader of the Hyperboreans was Groog who tried everything at his disposal but to no avail. Valorius is almost unassailable. The top of the mountain is very steep and on three sides is faced in sheer cliffs that plunge downwards for a thousand feet. The forth side which the road winds down is heavily guarded. The gatehouse and barbican form an impregnable fortress. The Hyperboreans couldn't merely wait out the Yavinians since they would run out of food themselves. Then Groog attempted to dig a tunnel beneath the castle. The purpose was not to gain entry. If a cavity were dug directly beneath one of the towers then the structure would no longer have sufficient support and collapse. A large enclave was dug directly beneath one of the cornerstones of the right-hand tower and was braced with wooden beams during construction. Then the beams would be set on fire. Sir Laverdere knew of an escape passage that led to the eastern side of the mountain. He led fifteen men through the tiny passage. The passage opened onto a virtual cliff face. Laverdere and his men had the narrowest girth of overhanging rock to stand on. With their faces pressed against the rock, they gingerly made their way around to the front of the castle. They went into the tunnel that the Hyperboreans were feverishly digging. There ensued a great battle. Sword against sword rang beneath the tower.
During the course of the intense melee, one of the wooden support beams was knocked from its position. The tunnel was incomplete so the tower would not collapse if the tunnel caved in but everyone inside would be killed. All felt the heavy weight of stone and earth as it came crashing down on top of them. There was an earsplitting crash. All was in darkness. Many were killed. Those who hadn't been were pinned beneath heavy boulders. Laverdere coughed on the profusion of dust. The weightt upon him was tremendous. He was face down and one of the wooden beams was across his back. He heard one of the Hyperboreans cry for help. Summoning superhuman strength, he began to lift the wooden beam across his back and the rock above. His face contorted as he struggled to his knees. Soon there was enough room for those left alive to squeeze out. Then he himself got out from under the massive weight and let it crash to the ground, barely getting out of the way in time. The Hyperboreans beat a hasty retreat. More astounding than the fact Laverdere was able to lift the stone was that he risked his life further by waiting for all of his enemies to get out. He risked his life to save the lives who those who were trying to kill him.
John's father died in a shipwreck when he was three years old. His mother died of cholera when he was six. One of the horsegroomsmen of the castle had known John's father so he let John become a stableboy. Eventually, Sir Laverdere, who knew all of the servants by name, recognized his aptitude. When he was twelve years old, he let him become his squire. It was hard work but he knew he was lucky to get the job. John always had deep respect for Laverdere and felt it was an honor to work for him.
John had left the forest and was walking across the lush fields. This would be fertile farmland if someone chose to live here. The path had turned southward upon exiting the forest so he left it and waded through oceans of thick grass. He set a steady pace through the waist-high wet wild grass that undulated in the wind like fields of wheat. Scattered through it were clusters of wild flowers of various colors. There were lilacs, bluebells, the bright red petals of ashenfar, and the stinging yellow clusters of cromits, all of which were surrounded by clouds of buzzing bees. There were many flowers that John didn't recognize. John hoped none of the bees were really thrixes, which are insects that look like bees, but crawl in your ear, eat through your head, and crawl out your other ear. In the distance he could see the winding river against the green background that was the Avlar River. He could also see on the nearer bank, a conical object which he took to be the Unicorn Stone. He had often heard of it but had never seen it or even pictures of it. There were many stories about it, and his mind was full of fragments of them.
He traveled on for some hours. By evening, he reached the river. He sat on a rock and felt the relief of taking the load off his aching legs. The river flowed through a shallow canyon. The waterline was about five feet below the bank. The water was mirky and sort of a reddish purple color. It was also viscous as if it was mixed with some oily substance. The river was spanned by a narrow natural rock bridge that leaped across its width. This was the Tsumi Bridge. About ten feet from the bank was the Unicorn Stone. It was about seven feet tall and conical. It was spiraled like the horn of a unicorn. Some say that it was once the horn of an actual giant unicorn, and others go on to say that it is part of a slumbering unicorn that is buried underground. Almost everyone says that it has magical properties. Other stories say that it was built by a mysterious people who lived long ago and for some unknown purpose, perhaps to communicate with the Gods. John pitches camp near it. As the double suns of Selis and Rahm set in the west, he eats some of the salted pork that was in his backpack. He lies on a blanket and looks up at the stars. He can see various constellations. There is the Warcart, directly above him, which is suppose to resemble a famous battle wagon that supposedly existed during the Selucid Empire. It had seven wheels, contained several furnished rooms, and had a giant crossbow mounted on the front. He sees the constellations of Anu, Shu, and Tefnut, and wonders what the future has in store for him as he drifts off to sleep.
John awoke early the next morning. The cool crisp morning air gave him a sense of ambition and conviction. He ate more of the food he brought and then began packing up his belongings. As he swung the leather backpack onto his shoulders, a slight breeze rustled the grass behind him. He walked delibrately towards the Tsumi. This was a natural rock bridge the spanned the width of turbid waters below. It was very narrow and almost circular in cross-section. It was like a long cylindrical beam laid across the river. He stepped up to it, and then cautiously put his right foot onto its surface. He gradually stepped onto it. It was perfectly smooth as if worn by the river when it was higher. He slowly cautiously placed his left foot in front of his right foot and then shifted his weight to his left foot. Then he carefully drew forward his right foot, and placed it directly ahead of his left, and shifted his weight to his right. He did this over and over again, seemingly forever. The water was dizzyingly far beneath him. The backpack was uncomfortably heavy. He kept his mind concentrating on what he was doing. He carefully put each foot in front of the other. Birds fluttered by but he blocked them out of his mind. He felt a headache coming on. He could feel how slippery the rock was beneath the soles of his shoes. He wanted to know how far he was to the end but he knew that he shouldn't look to see. He knew that he should concentrate his eyes at his feet and methodically make progress until he was at the end.
The pungent stench of the vulcrus seared his nostrils. The vulcrus was a red fungus that grew at the bottom of the river. As it rotted, it put forth rank fumes which steady steadily rose from the oily surface. These fumes have a mind-altering affect on people, and supposedly even hallucinogenic properties. The fungus is one of the world's most addictive drugs, and wars have been fought over it. More importantly to the matter at hand is that someone breathing the fumes becomes disoriented and loses their sense of balance, which is not a good thing under the circumstances. John kept steadily forward. He kept putting one foot in front of the other, over and over again. He felt like he had been doing this forever. He endured an overwhelming urge to glance forward to see far along he was. He knew he must repress this urge. If he were to find out how much farther he had, he might be discouraged and give up. He kept going making slow and steady progress. He kept putting one foot in front of the other. He wondered if he should have gotton down on his hands and knees, wrapped his arms and legs around the beam and scooted across. No, with the weight of the backpack, he would surely have swung upside, and would have been left clinging to the underside of the bridge, and what would he have done then? He swore the bridge was physically lengthening beneath his feet. He defied his better judgement and glanced ahead of him. He was very near the end. With strengthened resolve, he hurried the last few feet and jumped onto the bank.
He felt great relief at being on solid ground again. He imagined lying down in the grass and kissing the ground, but contented himself with the thought as opposed to the actual deed. He looked ahead of him. There were thick fields of grass as before, with scattered bushes and in the distance a few trees. On his left hand side, to the north, he could see a mountain range which was part of the Carpathians. He could also see a few smaller mountains farther away on his right hand side, to the south, which were probably the tail end of the Carpathians. Therefore he was sort of in a valley. He walked forward as before but more hesitantly. Very few people came here and he didn't know what to expect. There was a sense of foreboding in the air which was difficult to define. He wasn't consciously aware of it but it nagged at his subconscious and the peripheries of his mind. He walked through the thick high grass. When he glanced at the horizon, the glare of Selis and Rahm was in his eyes. When he averted his eyes, the suns' afterimage momentarily remained on his retina. The dew on the grass was gone by now. After he had been walking for about an hour, the uneasiness he had experienced after crossing the river hadn't subsided; indeed it had intensified. He was now passing the few heavy shade trees he had seen earlier. He had the feeling people have when they're walking in a place they've never been before and feel like there might be something wrong they don't know about. He wondered what someone would think if they had been watching him. This degenerated into a feeling that he was in fact being watched, which was most uncomfortable.
As he walked, he imagined someone watching him. He imagined someone peeking out from behind the trees, staring at him. He turned and saw nothing. He couldn't shake this feeling. He felt pairs of eyes staring at the back of his neck. If he was going to let himself get caught up in this sort of paranoia then how was he going to react to real danger? He would have failed before he had begun. He put such silliness out of his mind, and walked onwards at a somewhat quickened pace. He heard some sort of rustling in the grass. He told himself that it was just the wind...Something that didn't sound quite like the wind...Well then, some small animal, a mouse...His overactive imagination was going to destroy him and he knew it. He walked quickly forward although he didn't know what he was trying to get to. He past a large oak tree several feet to his left. He swore he saw something. He stopped dead in his trackes...Movement... He had seen movement of some sort. He had seen movement like something ducking behind a tree. It wasn't like an animal; it was like something delibrately trying to not be seen by him. It was gone the instant he looked in that direction, but he swore he saw something. A shiver suddenly quivered up his spine. This was silly, he told himself. He wasn't going to let himself get caught up in this. He must keep a clear head. He very quickly resumed his previous course.
He kept walking forward. He was sure he was hearing something from the trees and bushes on either side of him, but he was blocking it out of his mind. He was looking straight ahead, walking forward in a business-like manner. He heard even stranger sounds and the rustling of the grass became more obvious. He tried not to notice. It had to be his imagination. Then, for an instant he did see something, then it was gone. He kept walking because if he stopped that would be acknowledging to himself that he did in fact see it. Something knotted in his stomache, and a numbness entered his legs. This he definitely had to have imagined. This is obviously due to the simple fact that what he thought he saw only exists in the human imagination. However, his subconscious protested. He didn't feel like he imagined it. With what rationalization does one come up with when one swears one saw something they know perfectly well that they could not have possibly seen. He knew he didn't see it; it was impossible. All of a sudden he saw it again and this time it stood right in front of him and stared back at him. It was a small old man about three inches tall, with sharp features, dressed in rags, and perfectly matched the stereotype of a brownie, which everyone knows exist only in faerie tales. He seemed elderly, and had a thin wiry frame, and a hook nose. John seriously considered the possibility that he had in fact gone mad from breathing in those vulcrus fumes and that perhaps this was the product of a severely diseased mind.
"Spek y'webbah...Cah'gochaton!"
John's mouth fell open but words didn't emerge.
"Weyamannahs y'wippahsnappah! Y'aintchutawt spekcha y'eldahs!"
John stared in disbelief. was there really an actual three inch tall man less than four feet from him?
"Ahz b'Grennald Yuhz aigahnuhname Ahguz Whuchudoin'ere?"
"...I...uh..."
John looked very hard to make sure that he was in fact seeing what he was seeing, but it didn't go away and he wasn't any more sure. If he had lost his mind he should be able to deal with his own aberrations.
"...I...uh...I am John...Who are you?..."
"Ah tohja! Whuchadoin'ere?!"
"...I...um...I am on...a quest.....do you live here?..."
"Corzahdo! Whuques? Ge'owda'ere!"
"...what?..."
John couldn't get over the fact that he was actually speaking to this person. Yet he also felt he was still being watched. He felt that pairs of unseen eyes were still on him but he couldn't take his eyes off the little man before him. On the periphery of his vision he could detect movement in the bushes.
"We dow whuchu kine 'ere!"
John turned his eyes from the little man to the general vicinity and was flabbergasted by what he saw. There were what appeared to be dozens of tiny humans walking towards him. Brownies are one type of faerie. There are many others. There were spriggan who are small nasty creatures covered with hair. Two of these slimy creatures slunk by his feet. Straysod are creatures who very much resemble tufts of grass. If you step on one you suddenly become lost. Supposedly this can be counteracted by wearing your coat inside out. There were creatures that closely resemble rocks with human faces. All of these and others gathered around poor John, who like everyone else had assumed that these creatures existed only in the human mind. John, like anyone would be, was overwhelmed by the impossibility of what his senses told him, and fell into a clammy numbness that rendered him nearly braindead. Another tiny old man stepped before him, richly dressed in robes that appeared to be woven from the strands of a spider web. He wore a cape woven from gossamer spider web. He held a dandelion like a staff. Droplets of dew encircled his head like a crown.
"Whoze you?!" he demanded.
"I'm John"
"Youz human!"
"...er...yes"
"Iz ahweez tawt 'umans ohly in stawres'n such"
"Oh, really"
"Whuchu doin'ere?"
"Just passing through actually"
"Weh ge'on widya den. Lissen, Iz poluhjize duh b'aryuh uh dem rown me."
"Who are you?"
"Iza be duh King o'duh Faeries, dats who Iza be."
"Oh, really"
"Lissen, Iza makya offuh. Ya leev now, fass like, 'n sumtime 'n da fewcha ya need 'elp ya yell ow Rikchikchik, 'n if any o' ma peepul iz 'n earshot, we commin'elp y'out ovit."
"Oh really, that's very kind of you. Thank you"
"Naw peepul! Scort dis genamin offa prawpity!"
(If you have trouble understanding the faeries, click here.)
The crowd gathered uncomfortably close to him. A beautiful sylvan faerie resembling a nude human female with wings of a butterfly crouched on the branch of a tree next to him. She had golden hair, milkwhite skin, and multicolored wings. When she spoke, her voice sounded like a flute.
"I like humans."
"Good"
"I said that I like human. It's delicious. Why would you say it's good. You've eaten your own kind? I didn't know humans were cannibalistic."
John had absolutely no possible response to this. He didn't have much time to think about it. The creature leaped from the branch and lunged for his neck. Its sharp teeth bit deeply into his jugular. He howled in pain as a trickle of blood ran from his neck down his shirt. He tried unsuccessfully to remove this immensely strong ravenous creature. At that instant, hundreds of assorted creatures of different shapes and sizes descended upon him like a plague of locusts. He flailed his arms against this oncomming flurry unable to beat off the hordes enveloping him.
He decided to take off running. He bolted from where he stood and madly blindly dashed in the general direction he had been headed. The stinking ensemble of elves and creatures stayed with him clinging to his hair and clothing. They tore at his flesh with tiny sharp teeth, fangs, claws, and horns. He felt like hundreds of pins were being stuck into his body. They ripped his clothes. His tunic was shredded. Many delighted in tying his hair in an impressively wide range of untyable knots. He believed about 50 were inside his backpack. This was all accompanied by the rank stench of the creatures which defied description. It was a smell that just kept coming at you. Just when you think it must have peaked, it would rise anew with an ever-increasing intensity in a crescendo of cacaolfactory to new heights until you think your very brain will vaporize. This in turn was accompanied by the overriding cackle of hysterical derisive laughter. His ears rang in the sound of the monstrous blood-curdling cackle that resembled a combination of the scream of someone being murdered, and the sound of someone playing the saw. This continued unabated hideous laughter would drive most men into the safety of insanity. This was the least of John's worries as he felt blood run down the length of his body from inumerable tiny wounds, as they spit into his ears, and as he held his hands permanently over his mouth and over his eyes to keep from being blinded.
This seemed to go on forever. Eventually most of the creaturs jumped off. Perhaps he had reached the edge of the region they claimed as their domain. He stopped, put his hands on his knees, and panted heavily. His mind was reeling. He had gone from abject disbelief to cold terror. Hopefully it was over now and he would have time to think and collect his thoughts. Most of the creatues had left him but not all. One that remained was a nasty shehouge that perched on his shoulder like a parrot. The shehouge is perhaps the most repugnant of all the inhabitants. It was scrawny, had huge bulging yellow eyes, and its fur was matted in a tar-like substance. Many children's nannies caused nightmares with tales of these creatures. It leaned to John's ear. John winced at its putrid breath. "Doncha heed no duh call uhduh Stentor, Laddy", it hissed. With that, it jumped off and scampered into the underbrush. All the rest were gone by now and John had time to sit heavily on the ground. He sat wearily in his thoughts. He looked at the clouds, glad to be able to concentrate on anything other than the horrors he had just left. Should he have accepted this mission? The question lurked in his subconscious. He looked down at his clothes which were badly shredded and bloodstained. One of the backpack's straps were broken and it hung from one shoulder. He took it off and saw there were huge holes in it.
He didn't want to open it and find out what state his belongings were in. He let a few good minutes comfortably pass before he did so. His food was gone. His blanket was torn up. The vile of oil had been opened and its contents saturated what remained in the backpack. He sighed heavily. He did not need this. He really did not need this on top of everything else. How was he going to meet the challenges facing him in this state? The primary problem was going to be food. What was he going to eat? He could try to forage off the land but the plants seemed different than at home. Maybe a plant which greatly resembles a plant which at home is edible would really be deadly poisonous. This was a problem he would have to deal with when hunger was with him although he did not look forward to this. He made sure he wasn't badly injured. He had sustained serious gashes on his right side and on his left knee. He tried to straighten up the way he looked. He tried to untie some of the most uncomfortable knots in his hair but it was hopeless, particularly without a mirror. He took a knife from his backpack and tried to cut some of them out. He realized that if he kept it up, he'd soon be bald so he put it back. He took both sides of the broken strap, the bottom being much longer, and tied them together. Hopefully it would hold. He heaved the backpack to his shoulder, composed himself, and set out once more. He walked dead east, towards what he hoped would be what he was coming for.
You're John. You continue walking. You know you'll be hungry in a few hours. Do you turn back and return to the faeries or keep walking?