The Warrior's Bane (War for the Quarterstar Shards Book 1) Read online

  Meanwhile, Detch stood his watch next to the keep and felt the frigid cold biting at his face. He looked at the tower with disgust. He, like Garge, hated this type of duty. He wasn’t the greatest, nor the most motivated soldier there was, but he did like to be useful with his time, and this was not one of the things that he considered useful. Plus, he hated the cold.

  Detch looked up toward the sky and made sure there were no grimshadows flying or scurrying about. So far it seemed it would be a calm day. Or was it nighttime? It was not easy to tell with any degree of certainty when it was day or night during the season of the Markenhirth Grimshaed. Regardless, he took a torch off the mantle on the wall and carried it with him as he walked the perimeter, not only so that he could see, but because it also made him feel a little more secure holding the light and heat source near his face.

  Detch looked back down at the cold hard snow and hoped that the rumors about the Markenhirth Grimshaed never ending were not true. They better be false, he thought as he shivered from the cold harsh wind. He turned around and began to retrace his path around the Time Keep. The wind had begun to pick up and he wanted to walk around to the other side of the Keep to keep out of its frozen grip. He looked down and saw his sword and scabbard dangling at his side.

  “What a joke,” he said to himself, realizing that if something were to happen, he couldn’t defend himself. He had so many layers of clothes underneath his oversized parka that he had nowhere near enough flexibility to even begin to think about drawing his sword, much less fight with it.

  He was still deep in frustrated thought when he heard a loud crackling noise coming from within the Time Keep. It sounded as if there were a raging campfire crackling within, but he knew that to be impossible. The Time Keep was made from stone, and it was far too cold.

  He knew something was amiss and he backed away from the tower just before a flash of bright light along with a deafening explosion came from within the tower. Chunks of stone flew into the sky and scattered back down into the snow as they dropped to the ground with dull thuds and disappeared into the snowdrifts.

  In an instant, it was dark again.

  Detch stumbled blindly to the front of the Time Keep to see what had happened. When he rounded the side, he saw a woman lying face down in the snow. She had no clothes on, and her skin looked to be slightly on fire, as if all the little hairs on her body each contained a single flame.

  Slowly he walked towards her with his torch in front of him and looked at her body. Even in shadowy torchlight he was able to see dark blood dripping from her head into the snow.

  Before he could reach her, he heard the crackling noise again. Knowing that something else was coming, he backed off safely behind the first pillar at the gate of the outside wall. He saw Sergeant Tremm followed by Garge and two of his other platoon members running across the snow toward him from their guard shack. They had their swords drawn and their shields on their arms, but held down by their sides and were running toward him as fast as their bulky parkas would allow.

  Detch yelled and tried to warn them that something was coming, but his voice was drowned out by the loud pop from within Time Keep. Sergeant Tremm and his men fell to their knees and squinted their eyes from the bright light and felt ringing pain in their ears from the thunderous noise.

  Detch was the first to see them coming out of the tower. Men with wings, huge men, and twice the size of the average person. Three in total. They had no clothes, and their muscles were perfectly defined and bulging beneath their skin. Their wings were on fire as they flew towards Sergeant Tremm and his men.

  He saw the first one land on top of Sergeant Tremm’s shoulders and unhinge its mouth to an unreal enormous size. With incredible speed, the huge man covered the sergeant’s whole head with his mouth and ripped it off with his long sharp teeth. The beast spit out the severed head and curled back his lips to reveal his fanged smile. Teeth extended from his mouth as far as the length of a dagger and spread apart in such large gaps that even when his mouth was closed, fire could still be seen from behind, highlighting them with a ghostly red glow.

  Detch’s mates did not have a chance to run. The three naked winged men attacked the guards as if butchering the humans was their sole purpose for invading their realm. The creatures shredded their bodies into pieces from head to toe. They did not eat their kill, but they laughed as they wildly threw the bloody flesh and bones into the snow.

  Detch managed to escape unnoticed and watched the gruesome attack from behind one of the nearby pine trees.

  When there was nothing left of any of the bodies to tear apart, the creatures stopped and scanned the area. They saw blood and body parts littered across the hard, icy snow and they seemed content until they saw the woman lying in the snow, unconscious. They screamed so loudly then that Detch had to hold his ears with the excruciating pain of their noise.

  Without delay they took to the sky and flew off to the south. Detch watched as their wings, now fully aflame, lit up the dark sky and left a dark trail of smoke as they flew away.

  Detch approached the woman in the snow, hoping to sort out exactly what had happened. These birds of fire were worse than any grimshaed demon he had ever encountered. Some grimshadows were easily killed, but it was the numbers of them only that many feared. For some, even ten in number was not an impossible task. But these things were vicious, far more vicious than anything he had ever seen. He couldn’t imagine killing even one of these creatures.

  As he stood over the woman’s body, she began to stir. He kneeled down and out of curiosity touched her red hair. To his surprise, he found that her hair was indeed on fire. Tiny little flames flickered from the ends of her hair and shot out sparks into the air. He jumped back, startled, and stood in confusion and awe as he watched the woman sit up and then rise to her feet.

  “Where am I?” she muttered curiously.

  “Uh,..Wrae-Kronn,” he answered, unsure if it was right even to speak to her. He thought of running, but curiosity had gotten the best of him.

  “I think you hit your head.”

  “I don’t care what you think. What am I doing here?” she spat.

  “Behind you is the Time Keep. The magic within it is supposed to be dead, but somehow you came through it.” He paused and looked into her cold black eyes and began to think about the flaming men and the slaughtering that had just occurred. “There were...these monsters, with wings of fire, do you...have anything to do with them?”

  Her eyes brightened and changed from black to orange.

  “Monsters?” she asked, looking even more confused. Then, as if a revelation had occurred to her, she asked “How many and where are they now?”

  When he hesitated, she grabbed his parka and lifted him up off the ground. Detch shook his head as he saw that his parka had begun to catch on fire, set by her touch.

  “South . . . they went . . . south. Who… what are you?”

  “I am called Fyaa. Where are they going?”

  Detch felt his parka begin to burn the skin about his neck.

  “Help me...I’m on fire.”

  “I don’t care. I want to find my friends, and they are not monsters. Why did you call them monsters?”

  “Because they were three flaming beasts who killed my friends. Look around you.”

  She did and noticed the blood that had painted the snow red.

  She shook her head, confused, and then angry, and she threw Detch to the ground. He hit the hard snow and all of the air from his last breath instantly left his lungs. He rolled over in the fetal position and tried to fill his lungs. As he gasped, he could feel his chest begin to catch on fire. When his breath had returned, he rolled in the snow in an attempt to put out his burning parka. “I don’t know
what happened,” the woman said. “We have been here before, and did not change, but I will find out and Wrae-Kronn will burn before I leave!”

  Fyaa looked to the man on the snow and watched him peel off his burning parka as he began rolling in the snow. She shook her head in worthless pity, and waited for him to stop. After he shed his parka and stopped squirming in the snow, she walked over to him and bent down. Detch looked at her naked breasts as she bent over.

  “Are you cold, love?” She smiled and looking down at him, cocking her head to the side as an empathic lover might.

  Detch only nodded.

  “Here. let me warm you up.,”

  Fyaa took both of her hands and placed them on his face. Her hands were uncannily warm, and the warmth felt comforting and refreshing. She rubbed his cheeks slightly for a few seconds before her hands burst into flame. She held his face tight and kissed him as he squirmed in fear. Her hands began to melt the skin off of his face.

  When he screamed, she let go and stood up. He put his face in the snow to stop the burning, but when it still hurt just as badly, he rolled over and covered his burned face with handfuls of the cold white ice.

  He finally opened his eyes to see what further fate might befall him, but he saw that she had already taken to the sky, just as the sun began to rise, and had headed south looking for her three partners.

  Detch watched her go. His face hurt and he could feel the skin oozing off his chin. He knew he would be scarred for life, but somehow he was thankful to be alive. For once, the cold and the snow felt good.

  Chapter 1

  Year 1231

  The sun burned down on Alaezdar as he walked behind the ox and plow to turn the rich, dark, powdery soil. Sweat beaded off his forehead as the plow worked the soft soil so common to this fertile Valeland area. The dust rose behind the plow, and it had an almost sweet smell to it as it mixed with the stale hot air.

  As he plowed, he looked around at the other fields surrounding him. Farmers worked their fields as well, tending to them, reworking the soil, plowing, weeding, or harvesting their final crop. Some of them had livestock that grazed the open lands to the east. Some had smaller herds of stock in fenced areas. The land was dotted with ranches and farms in the fertile valley west of the jagged Vixtaevus Mountains that jutted up along the horizon.

  Though he had been there almost a full year now, the villagers still considered him only a stranger who lived amongst them. Just about a year earlier, during the last Doreal, he had wandered from the outlying forest into the open vastness of the vale. He was exhausted from his traveling and hungry from eating only what he had found or tried to hunt. His face was dirty and his hands were sore. His long brown hair had been knotted up on his head, but now it fell over his face and covered his eyes. His head hung low as he walked and his back hurt, not because he was weak, but because he had been pushing his once fit body of twenty-five years to the limits with little to no sleep.

  Even though he walked slowly, tired and near the point of exhaustion, he was thankful for some things, like the fact that he no longer smelled himself because he had grown so accustomed to his own stench. He didn’t even look up as he exited the forest grove and came into the opening of the vale.

  The day he had arrived, the oak, birch and alder trees were beginning to turn red and yellow with the changing of the season. A light breeze was blowing from the south and caused some of the leaves to give up their hold upon the limbs that had spent the last six months of their lives providing shade and beauty to the quiet village.

  Alaezdar breathed in the crisp, dewy smell along with the pungent aroma of the farm animals which came with the breeze. He knew then that he wanted to stay, and that here he would welcome the change of smell which accompanied the change of the scenery.

  He lumbered along with his overstuffed backpack concealing most of his sword. The only part exposed was the hilt that stuck out over his shoulder. His bow was slung over his other shoulder and his quiver dangled on the bottom of his backpack. His sword and scabbard were tucked underneath in a way that prevented any quick use if he ran into any trouble, but he was exhausted and had been for many days now. If he had been attacked, or needed quick use of his sword, he had been ready to forgo his life if it meant he had needed any quick action.

  He carried everything he owned in his pack. He had left his home in Daevanwood in a hurry and barely had had time to take anything but the essentials to keep him alive while he traveled. He had been on his own for a little more than thirty days when Tharntarius, the leader and founder of the village, saw him slumping in. Old but strong, Tharn worked the largest ranch in Valewood and among many other things commanded the security fence on the more dangerous eastern side.

  Tharn stopped feeding his chickens and watched the stranger walk along the edge of his fence line. Alaezdar said nothing as he walked past him, but Tharn, not the type to passively watch a stranger walk into his village, stopped him and asked him where he was headed. Alaezdar ignored him at first and kept walking, but when Tharn grabbed his arm and spun him around, Alaezdar stopped and stared emotionlessly at the man who began asking him questions.

  “I am hungry,” is all that he said in answer to Tharn’s barrage of questions.

  “Come with me, young man,” Tharn said and he headed back to his ranch house. Alaezdar followed him. For his advanced age, Tharn had a quick step and he still had some silvery stubble-hair on the sides of his head above his ears, but he was bald on top. His frame was large, but not overweight, and he was still strong, mostly due to his rigid work ethic of rising early and working late

  Tharn fed Alaezdar a simple sandwich back at his modest ranch home, but Alaezdar still did not talk. He remained quiet as a rock, which was his nature, and “Rock” was also his name when he had been with the Rager’s House of Renegades.

  Many in the realm know of that guild, and many feared, but respected its members. Those who were outside of the guild only know its members as “blade,” and addressed them only as “blade.” Only the members within the guild knew their guild names, such as Alaezdar’s name, Rock Blade, or his friend’s name, Shadow Blade.

  Alaezdar had decided to leave the guild under undesirable circumstances, circumstances that, in fact, had forced a death hunt upon his head for he had killed one of his own guild members in a mission gone wrong.

  Tharn finally persuaded Alaezdar to talk enough for him to understand that he needed food and shelter. Tharn wanted to let him know this was a safe place for him, so he offered him a job to work on his ranch. At first Alaezdar was put up in the bunkhouse with ten men who were tasked to cleaning out the horse stables and mucking out the cow stalls. It did not take long for Tharn to see that Alaezdar had an excellent work ethic and was flawlessly diligent at his tasks.

  As good as he was, he made Tharn even more curious. He seemed out of place for a common drifter. It seemed odd to Tharn that he knew how to care for a horse, knew how to trim the hooves and knew how to care for their teeth. He even knew how to care for the cows, sheep and chickens with very little instruction. Tharn put him up to a level of more advanced work, even passing up some workers he had had on the ranch for years. He even moved Alaezdar into one of his few single room villas on the ranch.

  After Alaezdar had lived at Valewood for a year, he had learned firsthand what it was like to be a rancher, caring not only for the livestock, but also learning the dynamics of running a farm for a complete cycle. He had impressed Tharn, but in the end this was exactly the quiet life he had sought out. That fall he and Tharn had harvested the last of the honeydew melons that grew there and he now tilled the land in preparation for the next crop.

  The last batch of melons he had picked, boxed and loaded into crates and had them ready in the wagon to sell at the village harvest ma
rket. Tharn had put Alaezdar in charge of this harvesting operation with many workers working for him. It actually surprised Alaezdar just how rewarding this type of work was. Tharn’s farming operation was not the type of work he had ever done. Sure, he had done simple farming and ranch chores before, when he was a child living at home, but those were just simple chores to provide for a single family. What he learned in a short time was that there on Tharn’s farm, they provided for not only the village, but they also sold produce at the large market for thousands of people in the northern kingdoms.

  Valewood lived and thrived as one community comprised mostly of farmers, livestock hands and blacksmiths. The woman folk cared for the children, did the cooking, sewing and weaving, and gathered food from the available trade markets within the community. Every person -- man or woman -- in the Valewood area took part in the effort to make Valewood a strong community.

  During that first year, Alaezdar had tried to stay anonymous, but living in a town where everyone knew each other made anonymity a daunting and nearly impossible task. Soon, even though he had tried to avoid friendly contact, by a natural process of time he still made friends as he worked by their side. His new friends, in their early conversations, were eager to tell him how the best parts of farming were starting with un-worked soil and raw seeds and watching the plants grow and flourish to bear fruits and vegetables and finally harvesting the crop and taking it to market to watch the profits grow from the year’s hard work.

  They said sometimes, unbelievably, the best part was working the crops from sunrise to sunset until it was time to harvest the crop. It had something to do with the hard labor and the pride of a hard day’s work and never having to worry about not falling asleep quickly enough. When the last crop was harvested and the 5th of Doreal celebration began, the whole village came together and was ready to celebrate their hard work. During the festival their crops and creations were sold at market and the excess was then stored for the Ethinar.