Monday, June 28, 2004

The End of The Dragons ch. 3
The next morning, a knock on the door woke me up. It was Johnny at the door. He didn’t even bother waiting for me to get out of bed to burst into my room. I sat up, took one look at him and began laughing.
“Didn’t you get any sleep last night?” I looked like he had spent all night packing this tremendous pack he was carrying on his back. It was at least three times his size.
“I was too excited to sleep last night.” He swings his pack off of his shoulders and throws it onto my bed. “I hope I’m not disturbing you too early.”
Looking out of the window, I notice the sun hasn’t come up yet. Oh well, we need to get ground covered before the sun gets too high anyway.
“Don’t too ahead of yourself squirt, I haven’t even asked King Horace if he will let you come yet.” Without missing a beat Johnny turned to me and said,
“Oh don’t worry. I stopped by the king’s quarters earlier this morning. He said I could have anything as long as I stopped shaking him awake.” I almost fell off the bed when he said that but I figured it must be okay if the king hasn’t thrown him in the dungeon.
After getting dressed I started to pack my bags but Johnny told me he already packed me one. I looked over to his pack and started sweating bullets.
“Relax Neith, it’s nowhere near as big as mine.” Whew, what a relief!
“You get to carry all the heavy stuff.” Doh! *sigh* Well, I guess I better go talk to King Horace.
“Hey Johnny, Let’s go see if King Horace is ready for breakfast.” I’m pretty sure he’s never sat with Horace at the table before. He’ll be excited, I thought. We walked the hallways to the dining hall where one of the pages informed that the king was indeed ready and waiting on us. The king and I were busy talking about the trip and Johnny didn’t pay much attention to us. His majesty told me of Johnny’s visit that early in the morning and we had a laugh.
“Your majesty, I must excuse myself but we need to be on the road before the sun comes up.” Johnny gave me a look like he didn’t want to leave, which I can understand. He doesn’t receive this much food as a page. He reluctantly excused himself from the table and followed me to the armory.
“We can’t go out into the wild,” I said, “without something with which to defend ourselves.” Upon reaching the armory we both pick out a dagger for ourselves. Johnny also grabs himself a walking stick, a lantern, some rope, and a bow and arrow set.
“I’m not really a close combat guy, Neith. I just help you out.” I personally grabbed a walking stick for myself and a nice short sword. It is a very good thing I took some weapons training on those days when I couldn’t talk to Larenda. When we were done, we returned to my room for our packs.
“Look Johnny, We don’t need this much stuff.” After our rations, bedding rolls, and equipment, we left all of the other stuff behind. That make our packs so much lighter. I thought I heard Johnny mumbling something about staying up all night packing but he never said anything to my face.
“One last look at the map to determine the best route.” We figured there were at least two towns to get through before the Rifle River, then another town, then the Dank Forest. We had quite a trip ahead of us. The first town was called Bark. Apparently the mayor was quite the dog lover.
We had six days rations, 100 gold coins (my allowance), and it was only a two day trip on foot. We’ll make it.
We can’t take horses because, face it, being ten years old I’m not exactly six feet tall. Being the squirt he is, Johnny couldn’t even ride a pony. That’s okay, my mom always said walking builds character. That’s okay because horses are one hundred and fifty gold pieces each. I think we’ll have to do without one.
We pass through the gates just as the sun begins to rise. Only two days left until we reach Bark. The first morning on the road was great. The sun was shining, our bellies were full from breakfast, and nothing could stop us now.
When we stopped for lunch we noticed a couple of strange things. On this of the most beautiful days, not even a bird was chirping. That and storm clouds were developing on the horizon.
“Johnny, we better cover as much ground as we can before this storm hits. It scared away all of the animals, it must be horrible.”
“Alright,” He said, “let’s get packed up and go.” we put out our fire, packed up all of our stuff, and set out on the road again. Walking in the afternoon sun was incredibly hot but we found a nice stream to swim in for about an hour. It gave us a nice chance to cool off in the sun. But I kept eyeing that storm cloud seriously.
Late that afternoon we came upon a nice bed and breakfast. A sign above the door read ‘Rachel’s Rest stop’. Upon entering, the place looked very eerie. There were many travelers sitting at tables in the restaurant, but the place was dead silent. Not a person was talking. That shut us up pretty good too.
“I don’t like this place.” Johnny whispered in my ear. “It’s too quiet.”
“Relax, squirt. That might just be because this place has good chow. I’ll go see about getting us a room.” Johnny perks up instantly (loving good food as he does) and says he is going to take a look around.
When I get to the counter, the woman hands me a piece of paper without saying a word. “Can I talk? Why’d you hand me this? Of course I can talk.”
“You can,” The blonde behind the counter says, “But none of the travelers who come through here can. It’s a curse placed on the people of Bark. No one can hear or speak. Hence the note.”
I wonder if it has anything to do with the cloud over in that direction. “Hey Squirt! Get over here man. Check out what this lady is saying.”
Johnny runs on over in a hurry. He looks extremely startled.
“Hey Neith, all of these people are deaf. What is going on here? It’s not contagious is it?”
“I think it has something to do with that cloud over Bark.” Johnny ponders the subject for a moment until he gives in and agrees with me.
“That’s no cloud,” The lady behind the bar said, “that is a demonic aura. It cursed the people of Bark when the mayor had the army drive it out of town. Kyrobi was his name I think. He was more of a sub-demon if I remember correctly.” Johnny immediately got a puzzled look on his face.
“Sub-demon? What’s that?” She looked positively ecstatic to tell him. Her face lit up like a blaze of fire.
“It’s so good to actually talk to someone. All these people coming in deaf and dumb, it hurts my wrist continually writing these notes to all these people every day. I’m Rachel, I own a few motels from here all the way to the Dank Forest. I visit them all Frequently. I have a few sisters who help me out when I’m not there but if you wait long enough I will eventually get there if you need to find…..”
Rachel’s ranting drove Johnny crazy. He cut her off short, it was obvious this was a serious problem that needed to be taken care of immediately.
“AHEM. Sub-demon?” Rachel looked up quick and seemed a little disappointed but she got over it.
“A sub-demon is a demon who serves under a greater power. Kyrobi used to work for some powerful demon but I don’t remember it’s name.” We never heard about demons back in Knar, But demons never traveled that far east. Bark was far west of Knar. The mountain on the map with the x was really south-west of Knar but the easiest path that took us the closest ran through Bark. Where the demon was going to be waiting for us.
“It got booted out so don’t expect a bounty on your head when you’re done. You will kill it right?” Johnny and I exchanged glances, he nodded, and I told Rachel that we would accept on a couple of terms.
“Room and board?” Rachel asked, “If all you want is a room and some food that’s fine. I would have asked for money but you have got a deal.” She led us up to our rooms and we set our packs down. Looking out of the window in out room it was dark out.
“Uh-oh,” Rachel said, “it’s nowhere near sunset but look how dark out it is. It must be nearby. Be careful out there, it will attack any noise.”
The squirt and I grabbed our weapons and snuck outside. Johnny happily stood a few paces behind me. I could hear him shivering from where I was standing.
“Hey squirt, I have an idea. Why don’t you take your bow into that tree where it’s safe.”
Johnny didn’t say anything but he did nod. He was clutching his bow to his chest like a safety blanket.
“Don’t shoot until I give the signal, or else he will know you are there.”
He manages to stumble out a little “okay.”
When Johnny found a safe spot in the tree where he could see everything, I let out a nice scream hoping that the demon could hear me. It didn’t take me long to find out. A sudden high-pitched shriek radiated through the air. It felt like my eardrums were about to burst. When it stopped, I looked up to see if Johnny was okay but he looked all right.
We were going to have a problem, from that shriek I could tell it could fly. I wish Rachel would have told me. When I finally saw it, it was swooping in with tremendous bat wings. I pulled out my sword to defend myself, but I couldn’t see it well against the dark sky. The only advantage I had was that it made a tremendous amount of noise. I could hear it coming after me!
When he got real close, I swung in the direction I thought he was coming from. I missed but he nearly tackled me deep into the earth. He himself crashed but was quickly back into the sky. While recovering, I looked over to give Johnny the signal but I couldn’t talk. His screech had stopped me from talking. I got real worried real quick. I was jumping up and down, waving my arms frantically.
Johnny luckily caught on to my message. He nodded and raised his bow. He was shaking frantically, but at the last moment before I was attacked by Kyrobi, the little squirt steadied himself and released an arrow. After what seemed like forever, the arrow made contact with Kyrobi through his wing. There was no way he could fly now, I could handle it from here.
I charged the demon with my sword held high. He was distracted by Johnny so there was no way he could stop me now. I was very wrong. As I was readying myself to strike down on him, he spun and knocked me onto my back. My little sword was knocked out of my hand about fifty feet behind me. Instantly this seven foot tall demon was standing over me, stopping me from moving. He raises his claws high into the air, and just before he strikes, I reach into my belt for my dagger to stab him. Before I get the chance, a sharp point ejects from his head with blood dripping from his forehead. Looking around the dead demon, Johnny is standing two feet back holding his bow. That arrow through the head killed Kyrobi.
A great white light shot out of the hole in his head, this light shot straight into the sky. The dark sky began to clear and the stars and moon were clearly visible. The mute curse of Kyrobi had been lifted.
Back at Rachel’s place, the people were rejoicing over our victory. Many offered to buy us dinner and drinks but our food was paid for. None of them thought our victory was great enough for a straight monetary reward though. After many recounts of our victory, we slept well late that night.