A Warrior's Journey (6 page)

I looked at him and said honestly as I stood
up, “Father how can I not?”

His arms folded around me and mine him. He
turned his head to my ear and said, “Zevin you do not know the
beauty of your own heart. Many would have answered differently than
to say, ‘how can you avoid making the right choice when it is there
before you?’”

Stepping away from me he said, “I have
something for you.”

He turned away and went over to a shelf and
pulled something off of it. Returning to me I saw that it was his
pair of matched sabers encased in a black leather harness.

“These have served me well in the past and I
thought you should have them, as they fit your fighting style well
and you have more than earned them. I also have this for you.”

He went back to the shelf and pulled a
beautiful black composite bow and quiver of arrows from off the
shelf, which he then extended out to me.

“See the bow and quiver hook right into the
sword harness here.” He said as he demonstrated it for me.

Awed by the gifts I looked up at him, “You
never doubted what choice I would make did you?”

My father met my gaze and responded back as
confidently as could be, “Zevin I have never doubted the desire
within your heart to do what’s right.”

That was really something I thought to
myself later. How many could say that they had a father, who
thought that they would make the right decisions when it came down
to important choices. Having such a father only made me want to
prove his confidence in me as the truth of what would be.

Excitement coursed through my veins as I
held on to the reins of my horse, as I was swept along in the tide
of my father’s men. We were riding for Kingdom Pass to join the
rest of the army already gathered there. It was still hard to
believe what was happening. The weight of the swords and bow
against my back was a reminder that it was really so.

The swords with a history written upon them
from the grasp of my father’s hands were in some ways a boost of
confidence that helped stifle the unsteady giddiness I was feeling
in my stomach. The swords also helped reinforce that my father
thought I was man enough to go to war, even if the men around me
didn’t think so.

I wasn’t really sure what they thought about
me coming along. I rode within the column while my father and
Talaric rode at the head of the column along with the lords of the
northern castles. I could have ridden by my father’s side, but I
felt that would have been somehow presumptuous of me and looked
down upon by the men I was to fight alongside of. Some things had
to be earned and I knew the value of that.

The big stallion I rode was also confidence
inspiring. The big corded muscles I felt flexing beneath me made me
feel like I was a force to be reckoned with for as long as I was in
the saddle. The stallion had been yet one more gift of my
fathers.

The stallion was coal black and magnificent
to behold, a hardy offspring of my father’s past great warhorse
Flin. He was only a little over three years of age and this was his
first experience with war as well. We would face it together, but I
couldn’t help but feel that he was more ready for it than I
was.

I hadn’t named him yet simply because I
couldn’t think of a name that was right for him. A name was an
important thing and I didn’t want to get it wrong.

Whether the men around me welcomed my
presence or not I was aware of one in particular that was not happy
with me tagging along on this ride to war. Talaric had been
incensed to find out that I was coming along, which hadn’t been
overly surprising to me. Talaric very much lorded it over me and
Gavin that he was the firstborn and that we were beneath him.
Father bringing me along on Talaric’s first foray into war had been
in many ways an insult to him or at least he took it as such.

Before we had left Thunder Ridge he had
corned me in a hallway and pressed me up against the wall to
practically spit out in my face, “Don’t get in my way little
brother! This is the moment when I begin to shine and if you try to
upstage me you’ll regret it!”

I had shoved him away and continued on down
the hall angry at the injustice and selfishness on his part. I had
wanted to hit him, but I held back sensing that had been what he
had wanted. By getting involved in a petty fight Father might have
reconsidered taking me along.

The afternoon wore on and towards dusk we
reached the shores of Lake Sanjo, where the city of Kingdom Pass
had once stood. The city had never been rebuilt, but instead it had
been filled over with rock and dirt. A tomb that was to stand
forever in loving memory of the brave men and women, who had died
defending the city that had been before the great invasion by the
Zoarinians.

The tunnel gates had been collapsed upon
themselves and the breaches in the wall had been built up once
more, but to a lower height than the rest of the existing wall.

All the towers had been rebuilt but in lower
profile and more thickly stoned than before with iron plating on
their outsides. The two slightly lower sections of the rebuilt wall
served as channel falls for the two rivers that continued to flow
into the head of Kingdom Pass.

The water flowed out over the lower sections
of wall to fall cascading downward to the pass floor far below. The
area of fill was half as large as the old city had been and was as
high as the top of the walls. It was a level plain empty except for
the two river channels that cut through it as they exited Lake
Sanjo at the head of the pass and which covered the rest of the old
city and beyond.

There was a narrow road hewed out of the
rocky sides of the pass itself along the one side that gave access
to the top of the battlements along the wall. The gateway to the
lands we sought lay between the two giant waterfalls in the form of
a narrow ramp that led down at a steep angle to the pass floor
below.

If invaders were to attempt to ascend up the
steep ramp the flow of both rivers could be diverted to flow
directly down the ramp. The defenses of Kingdom Pass had only
gotten more formidable instead of less.

I rode in awe over the hallowed ground.
There was a still peace to the place that was something to feel,
even as the battlements and waterfalls were to behold. The blood of
our people was strong in this place, like a tangible essence that
reached out and claimed one’s respect for the sacrifice that had
been committed to keep this hallowed ground Valley Lander land for
forever.

We started down over the wall on the steep
ramp. On either side we were flanked by the onrushing columns of
water that crashed over the edge of the old walls into the chasm
below creating a deafening roar as the rivers foamed up in
whirlpools at the base of the wall before continuing on their
endless journey to the sea. A fine mist of spray kicked off the
cascading rivers to coat us as we rode down the ramp to join the
army already gathered in the pass below.

If the leaders of the Valley Lands had
forgotten what my father had done for them, their soldiers had not.
They stood in rank and file order in a universal salute to my
father, as he rode through the encampment. I felt an immense sense
of both responsibility and pride course through me at the knowledge
that I was the son of a great man.

I whispered a prayer under my breadth, “ Oh
dear Lord help me to never tarnish my father’s name by any action
of mine. Help me serve You faithfully even as he has done.”

“Amen.” Said a soldier off to the side of me
and I blushed red at the knowledge that I had been overheard, but
the men around me didn’t appear to be in jest of me, but rather
their faces reflected serious acknowledgment of my statement.

It was a beginning of sorts of relating with
them. At least they knew I prayed. In some ways that was a lot to
know about someone.

We made camp there at the foot of the wall
that night and by dawn’s early light the army was on the move down
the pass.

After the great battle at the Shrine of
Remembrance, where the might of the Zoarinian Empire had been
crushed our armies though few in number had marched down into the
Southern Settlements and pushed all Zoarinian influence out from
there.

The Zoarinians had respected the boundary
that we had imposed between them and the southern settlements up
until recently. From all reports it appeared that the Zoarinian
Empire was once more stirring up confrontation between our two
peoples. We were hopefully going to find out what involvement this
strange new cult was playing in the stirring up of old hatreds once
more against our people, primarily because of our faith.

I had heard the night before, as the
soldiers were talking that this was primarily a peace keeping
mission and that open battle with enemy forces was extremely
unlikely. Still there might be small skirmishes. Skirmishes or not
being along on this quest was still so very exciting.

Talaric looked over his shoulder back at the
column behind him, as he rode next to his father. His good mood
that he had been having dissipated some when he saw his younger
brother laughing at some joke or something with a bunch of other
soldiers around him.

The soldiers around Zevin seemed to be
treating him as if he was one of the gang. One even smacked him on
the back over something funny he must have said.

Talaric turned to his father beside him and
asked, “Why do you permit Zevin to ride back there with the men
instead of up here with us?”

Roric shifted in the saddle and looked back
to where Zevin was freely engaged in conversation with those around
him and smiled knowingly.

Roric turned to his oldest son and answered
him in a way that insinuated a hidden lesson to be learned in the
moment like father’s have a way of doing, “Because he realizes that
to ride at the head of the men he will perhaps one day command in
battle is an honor that he has not won the right to yet. By riding
with the men instead of ahead of them he is showing that he thinks
of himself as no greater than them despite his birth as my son.
They will in turn respect him for it and automatically look to him
as a leader in time of battle long before he is asked to ride at
the head of the column in a position of leadership.”

Talaric scowled as he caught the drift of
his father’s latest lesson in humility before advancement and
dutifully let his horse fall back farther into the column away from
his father’s side.

The lesson only served as fuel on the fire
for the growing animosity that Talaric had growing for his little
brother.

Days passed with little commotion taking
place, just endless riding. We made our way through the small
settlements of my grandmother’s people living upon the Litian
plains as nomads. We stopped at Yorktown for a day before moving
on.

The people of the Southern Settlements
seemed glad to see us and our scouts reported nothing amiss. We
continued making our way through the Ernor Hills, as we headed for
the border of the Zoarinian Empire. That is when we began to see
the signs of a growing darkness upon the land.

At first the small villages appeared normal,
different only in that the people seemed somewhat more distant from
us in how eagerly they received us. Increasingly though the looks
we got turned more hostile in nature. Of the dark prophets we saw
nothing, but we saw evidence of their presence everywhere upon the
land.

Each village we came upon had strange signs
written upon the buildings and often on a high place near the
village an outdoor temple of sorts had been constructed out of
strangely arranged stones, surrounded by tall carved wooden
poles.

There were also altars within these outdoor
temples that were constructed of stacked stones and that showed
evidence of having had offerings made upon them. What those
offering may have been we did not know, as no one was talking to us
from the villages, but we knew what we were all thinking.

Father had every painted sign, stone, carved
wooden pole, and altar destroyed in our passing. He left nothing
that manifested a sign of this mysterious dark cult that we were on
the trail of. Near the border we came upon a village in the act of
an actual sacrifice with a dark prophet presiding over it.

The scouts ranging out ahead of us halted
the ceremony, until the main column could reach the village. My
father headed off from the main body of the army with a contingent
of cavalry close behind him. As he passed by he gestured to me to
follow and so I did, excitement rising at the expected showdown
with the dark prophet.

Although the look of him was as creepy as I
had imagined it would be, it was the menace that lay within his
eyes that I found most disconcerting of all. The townspeople were
all gathered at the outdoor temple and had the fear of some terror
heavy upon them. Our presence seemed to not alleviate whatever fear
they were under either.

Their focus was firmly rooted upon the dark
prophet, who stood by the altar of stones and not us, even as we
pulled up beside them. To the side of the dark man I saw something
laying on the altar. It was a little girl. She lay motionless on
the altar and given the evidence of the bloody dagger in the man’s
hand she must be dead.

Depression swept through me at the awful
sight of such depravity. By what reasoning could people allow the
death of their own children?

I watched as my father got off his horse and
walked up to the altar. He stared solemnly down at the little girl
laying upon the cold stones. He motioned with a hand and several
men rushed forward to him. He said something to them and they then
proceeded to gently remove the body of the little girl and took her
off for burial I presumed.

Father for the first time that I had noticed
turned his gaze to directly stare upon the dark prophet and I
sensed a deep level of hatred in his gaze. The dark prophet laughed
seemingly unafraid of my father or of the host that he
commanded.