Wielder's Awakening (16 page)

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Awareness slowly began to creep back into Traven’s battered body.  At first, all that he was aware of was a biting pain that seemed to emanate from every inch of his body.  Slowly the pain faded away and was replaced by extreme soreness covering most of his body with spots of pain on his upper left arm and right thigh.  He opened his eyes and blinked in the brightness of dawn.  He squinted against the light and tried to clear his head.  What was going on?  Suddenly Traven remembered the attack and Meritza.  He tried to sit up but fell back down with a groan after only moving up a couple of inches.  Next to where he lay, a small fire crackled and the aroma of fish cooking filled the air.  He was coverd with a pile of furs and blankets.  He felt for his stone and was relieved to find it still around his neck.  His chest, left arm, and right thigh were bandaged.  How had he ended up here?  He looked around slowly, fighting against the pain in his head, to see whose camp this was.  Maybe the caravan had finally driven the thieves back.

Traven didn’t see anyone at first but finally saw that someone was down at the edge of the river not far off.  He propped himself up with his good arm to see who it was.  As soon as he could fully focus on the man, he was filled with disappointment.  The man was definitely not a guard from the caravan.  As the man made his way back to the fire, Traven stared in amazement.  The man was huge!  Most of the people he had met were shorter than himself, and he had only met a few that were taller than him.  However, this man looked as though he was much taller than him.  The man’s height was not the only thing that stunned Traven.  He was broad at the shoulders and extremely well-muscled.  He looked as strong as several men put together and walked up from the river with fluid grace.  Above his mighty shoulders rose the hilts of two swords that crossed one another on his back.  He had shoulder length dark, black hair pulled back in a tail by a leather cord.  He had a thin goatee framing his mouth and chin and golden hoop earrings.  From his face shown piercing green eyes that seemed to be taking in all of his surroundings at once.  He had immediately realized that Traven was watching him, and he wore a small smile as he sat down on the other side of the fire.

“So you finally decided to wake up,” the man said in a deep, bass voice.  “I rinsed the blood off of your clothes, but I couldn’t really do anything about your shirt.  There was only half a shirt left anyway when I pulled you out of the river.”  The man chuckled to himself.  “I bet you’re feeling great.”

Who was this man?  The man reached behind him and pulled out Traven’s clothes, minus his shirt.

“When you’re ready, here are your clothes.”

“Thanks.  Did you patch up my wounds?”  The man nodded his head.  “Thanks for everything.  I guess I probably owe my life to you.”

“No probably about it boy.  You were barely breathing when I found you.  You’re lucky to be alive.”  The man then tossed down Traven’s sheath.  “I’m not sure what happened to your sword, sorry.”

Traven remembered what had happened to his sword, but the thought of it made him sick.  He reached for his clothes and groaned with the effort.

“Here,” the man said, handing Traven some of the fish.  “You need to eat so your body has enough fuel to repair itself.  The gashes on your arm and thigh really weren’t that deep.  They should heal without any problems given a little time.  However, even though the gashes weren’t too deep, you still lost a lot of blood.  A few of your ribs might be cracked too, but I don’t think they are.  You’d be having a harder time breathing if they were.  I put some salve on the burns on your chest.  The salve will keep the pain down and allow them to heal quickly.  All you need is a little rest and some time for the wounds to heal.”

Traven quickly gobbled up the fish offered to him and then sank back down.  He closed his eyes for just a second.  He just needed a little rest, and he’d be able to get up.  He would go back to the caravan when he got up and . . .

Traven opened his eyes and was shocked to see the sun on the other side of the sky.  He bolted up into a sitting position but almost fell right back down as pain rippled through his body.  He noticed that the fire had burned out already and looked around for the man who had saved his life.  He was amazed by what he saw when he finally located the man in the moist dirt next to the river.  The man had a sword in either hand and was poised on the balls of his feet.  He suddenly sprang into action, the swords becoming only a blur as they swept around the man’s body.  He spun and leaped, a mass of metal death spinning around him.  He changed positions and motions fluidly as the swords never slowed.  Traven watched mesmerized as the man continued practicing.  He flowed through the different forms so smoothly that it reminded Traven of a dance.  Traven lost track of time as he hypnotically watched the man endlessly slice through the still air.  The man finally slowed and then stopped.  In a practiced, quick motion the blades were suddenly sheathed once again on his back.  He trotted over to Traven.

“How are you feeling?”  Traven tried to answer but began coughing, causing waves of pain through his body.  His throat was parched dry.  “You should have had some water before deciding to sleep away the day,” the man said as he tossed Traven a full waterskin.

Traven took it and drank the cool water from it immediately.  He didn’t know if water had ever tasted so wonderful and sweet.  After he had drained a large portion of the skin, he set it down and once again tried to talk.

“You are amazing.” he blurted out.  “How did you learn how to do all of that?  I bet you could face a hundred guys without any problem!”

“Calm down there boy.  I could definitely face a hundred guys, but I’m sure it would be a big problem.  I guess you must not be all better yet.”  Traven cringed at his foolishness.  “Don’t worry about it.  I at one time thought I was invincible too.”  The man’s eyes took on a sad cast as he quietly stared off at nothing.  After a few seconds he shook his head and turned back to Traven.  “Oh well.  We can’t do anything about our mistakes but learn from them.  You do look a lot better than you did earlier.  I’ll make some stew and then you can get some more rest.  Hopefully by the morning you’ll be well enough to travel.”

As the man started the fire back up, Traven dragged himself out from under the blankets and pulled on his clothes slowly and carefully.  When he had finally gotten dressed, he just sat and watched the man as he made the stew.  Traven’s stomach growled as the aroma of the stew began to permeate the air.  He was starving.  The man had known what he was talking about when he said that Traven’s body needed food for it to repair itself.  He then realized that he still didn’t know the man’s name, and he hadn’t told the man his name either.

“My name’s Traven.”

The man looked up from the stew with confussion and then started laughing.

“Sorry about that.  My name’s Blaize.  I usually introduce myself when I meet someone, but you weren’t in the mood for talking when I found you.”  Traven smiled as Blaize went back to stirring the stew.  “So Traven, how did you happen to end up floating down the river half dead?”

Traven related how he had joined with the caravan and everything had been fine until night fell.  He then explained that over a hundred thieves had attacked them in the night, but they had been ready for them.  Five men had come against him and the other two guarding the right flank, and he had gotten the gashes on his thigh and arm but was the only one of the three to survive.  He had then been heading across the camp to help the leader of the caravan but had been struck by a horse and fell into the river.  When Traven finished his story, Blaize gave him a thoughtful look and then spooned him some stew which he gratefully ate.

“I can believe your story except for one thing.  How did your shirt happen to catch on fire?  Your chest has some pretty nasty burns on it.  Do you care to explain that?”

Traven paused in eating the stew.  That was something he had not even wanted to think about himself.  He had no idea what had happened.  He seemed to foggily remember everything slowing down and him becoming extremely calm until the world suddenly burst into fiery pain.  Other than that, he had no idea as to what had happened.  His shirt could not have just burst into flames.  Something had to have caused it, but what he did not know.  Traven shook his head and tried to clear the incident from his memory.

“If you don’t want to talk about it, fine.  I don’t really care.  I was just curious,” Blaize said in between mouthfuls of the stew.  “There’s something else I’ve been wondering about though.  What significance does that stone around your neck have?  I’ve never seen another one like it.  It almost seems to glow in the dark.”

A nightmare from what seemed like years ago crashed into Traven’s memory as he glanced down and realized he was clenching the stone in his hand.  He could feel the warmth of the stone, but what had happened in his dream was impossible!  There was no way that a stone could spontaneously burst forth with heat.  Yet he forced himself to remember that the stone had spontaneously changed from blue to amber.  He knew that he hadn’t imagined that.  He began to tremble with the thought that maybe what had happened in his dream could be true.

“Sorry if the stone is a touchy subject with you.  I was just . . .”

“Oh, it’s nothing like that,” Traven said quickly, trying to get himself under control.  He didn’t want to upset the man who had saved his life.  “It belonged to my father.  It’s all I really have left of him.  I don’t know what kind of stone it is or where my father got it.”

Traven was glad that his voice seemed steady enough.  Blaize dished him up another bowl of the stew, and he finished it off as quickly as he had the first.  When he asked if he could have a third helping, Blaize just chuckled and scraped out the rest of the stew for Traven.  When he finished, he was feeling a lot better but was extremely tired.  He had been sleeping all day and didn’t know how he could be tired, but he took Blaize’s advice and went back to sleep.

When he woke up early the next morning, Blaize was already breaking the camp.  Traven tried to stand and was pleasantly surprised to find that he actually could.  He was still sore all over but felt a lot stronger than he had the day before.  Blaize tossed him a stale biscuit to eat for breakfast and asked him if he thought that he would be able to ride some today.

“I feel a lot better.  I think I can ride without any problems,” Traven answered back with a smile.

“If you say so Traven.”

Blaize threw his saddle onto his large horse.  Traven was surprised that he hadn’t noticed the animal earlier.  It was a beautiful dark, reddish brown.  It had a deep chest and a well-muscled rump.  It definitely looked fast and robust.  When Blaize had loaded his belongings into the saddlebags, he turned back to Traven.

“You can ride Flame, and I’ll walk.  Your camp isn’t that far off.  We’ll go and see what’s left.  I don’t want you to get any hopes up though.  From what I saw, I think all of the wagons were set on fire.”

Traven grunted as he weakly pulled himself up onto Blaize’s horse.  Maybe he was not as strong as he had thought.  Blaize led the way holding onto Flame’s reins so that Traven did not have to do anything but sit.  After a while, they came in sight of the rise.  It looked like the whole top of the hill had been scorched by fire, but as they came closer he realized that the top of the hill was black because it was covered with ravens and vultures.  A slight breeze blew past him from the direction of the hill, and he almost gagged.  He had never encountered such a sickening stench.  Blaize stopped walking and turned back to him.

“Maybe you should stay down here while I go up and take a look around.”

Traven thought about accepting the offer after what he had smelt but decided against it.

“Thanks, but I need to see for myself what happened.  Let’s hurry and get this over with.”

“If you say so.”

Blaize continued his measured pace up the rise.  The birds scattered at the presence of Blaize and Traven, revealing a scene of carnage that even the smell had not prepared Traven for.  Stinking, mutilated bodies covered almost the entire hill.  Traven bent over the side of the saddle and emptied his stomach of everything that he had ever eaten.  Another glance at the scene before him caused him to heave everything that he had not eaten.  When there was nothing left in his stomach, Traven wiped his mouth and slipped down from Flame on the opposite side.  He walked up and stood next to Blaize, feeling embarrassed that he had not taken his advice.  Blaize was staring out over the whole hillside taking everything in.  Traven on the other hand tried to keep his eyes above the ground, holding his breath as much as possible.