Chapter 3-1
2000 Words
Where was Nora? Where was the man who had grabbed me?
What’s happening?
What’s happening?I looked around, but I didn’t see either one of them.
“Nora?” I yelled out. “Nora, where are you?”
The sounds of insects around me went quiet for a moment, and then resumed. I could hear birds, but no Nora.
What’s happening?
What’s happening?Where was my house? How is it daytime? I could feel myself starting to panic, my breath coming faster and faster.
Stop! Breathe. Slowly. In. Hold. Out. Just breathe.
Stop! Breathe. Slowly. In. Hold. Out. Just breathe.My heart started to settle down.
Push forward. What’s the next thing to do? Take stock of the situation. I checked my pocket, but I’d left my cell phone on the dresser by my bed.
I stood up and looked around. I was in a small clearing on the side of a hill. There was forest in all directions. Puffs of white hung randomly in the sky. They were pretty, but that wasn’t going to be of any help.
I still had the knife that Nora had put in my hands. I saw that the other knife and its scabbard were by my feet, so I picked them up.
Where was I? In the distance, I could see an ocean or a big lake. There was nothing like that near where I lived. What just happened to me? How was I here? Where did that man come from? I had too many questions and no answers.
Okay. What was the practical thing to do?
I needed answers, and I wasn’t going to find them on my own. I also would need food, shelter, and water.
I needed help. People. But there was no one around, so I was going to have to find them. Hopefully, they wouldn’t be too far away. There would probably be people someplace on the shore of that lake or ocean, whatever it was. Besides, downhill sounded easier than uphill. That water looked like it was pretty far. I wished for my cell phone. But there probably wouldn’t have been any signal here, anyway, wherever “here” was.
I took one more look around, but I didn’t see anything special about the clearing to identify it. Maybe I should wait in case someone came for me. I shook my head at that thought. Probably the only one who could come for me would be whoever that man was who’d grabbed me, and I didn’t want to wait around to see if he showed up.
I walked across the small clearing and started downhill.
It was warm. Much warmer than the early summer I had left behind. The sun was above me, but I couldn’t tell if it was going up or going down. The trees seemed mainly like oak, with some pine. I passed the occasional glade and could see wildflowers in bloom. I could also see birds flitting around me in the trees.
I looked closer at one and stopped short. That wasn’t a bird. I didn’t know exactly what it was, but it appeared to be more like a little person than a bird. But it was gone before I could get a better look at it.
The way wasn’t very steep, so it was a mostly easy hike. After a couple of hours, I was wishing I had some water or something to eat. I should have been watching for that kind of thing. Another forty minutes or so passed. I’d always been pretty good at keeping track of time even without a watch.
I became aware of a sound. I walked towards it and was relieved to find a small brook trickling through a rocky fold where two hills came together. I’d be afraid to try any berries or other vegetation I didn’t recognize, but I needed water or I’d dehydrate. I crouched on the rocks and leaned down to touch my lips to the water and took a long drink. I hadn’t realized how thirsty I’d become. I wet my hands and ran my fingers through my hair. I reached into my pocket and, sure enough, there was my favorite scrunchie. I used that to pull my hair into a ponytail.
That felt much better. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a way to carry water with me. I drank twice more before continuing on my way.
Several minutes later, I heard a loud rustling in the bushes ahead to the right. Thinking it might be a large animal, I angled my walk toward the left. This all looked like normal forest and I’d done a lot of hiking in the past, especially in the last year with Nora, but I had no idea what animals would be around.
After about twenty minutes, it happened again, and once more, I angled to the left, away from the sound. Maybe an animal was stalking me. I wished Nora was here. She was the strong one. I never had to be afraid when she was around. At least I had my daggers to protect myself, not that they would help me against a pack of wolves or anything. After those birds that weren’t really birds, I didn’t know what to expect from this place.
Shortly, I found myself in a small clearing with brambles to the front and sides. I turned around to retrace my steps and go around the dead end I had walked into.
I stopped. A half-dozen creatures blocked my path. They looked almost like regular people, but they were only about four and a half feet tall at the most, maybe up to my shoulder, and very stocky. Their heads seemed large for their size, and they had heavy jaws and wide mouths. Their shoes were falling apart, but the hands at the end of their over-long arms held spears that appeared very sharp.
What were these things? What did they want?
“This one’s easy,” one chuckled. He nodded to the one next to him. “You make fire for cooking. We catch.”
He glanced at the daggers I was holding in my hands. “That not help you.”
With that, several of them stepped towards me, gripping their spears in both hands as if ready to use them. I looked around, but there was nowhere to run.
“Ragar, you know better than to hunt in my woods.” A voice, female, rang out from the trees. I looked around, but couldn’t see who was talking.
“Not our fault,” the leader answered, looking around. “This one come from up the mountain.”
“Are you up the mountain now?”
I still couldn’t see who was talking, or even where the voice was coming from.
“You Dark Blade, eh? You think you can trick Ragar?” He scowled. “Use bait for trap!”
“You should leave,” the voice said without emotion.
“We leave,” he nodded. A sly look came over his face. “We take our prey and leave.”
Prey?
Prey?“No.”
No.The word came with such strength and finality that Ragar and his men—or whatever they were—froze. And then, he became angry.
“If you are so tough, why hide? Dark Blade not so tough. Astrina Ulané Poloso weak! All Ralahi Jhané weak!”
Ralahi Jhané“You are about to make a very big mistake.”
“No mistake! We not leaving. We stay and eat. You leave, or we eat you!”
“You had your chance.”
She appeared out of the shadows behind them. She wore snug leather clothing in dark greens and browns, making it difficult to see her in the forest. “Time for a lesson.” She drew a long knife from her belt.
Ragar roared and his men charged her. She moved so fast, I couldn’t follow her with my eyes. She seemed to be suddenly everywhere at once. Before I knew what was happening, there were five bodies on the ground, and she stood in front of Ragar with her knife at his throat.
“I’m not going to kill you, Ragar,” she said. “Do you know why?”
He shook his head slowly, his eyes never leaving her knife.
“Because if I kill you, no one can go back and remind your people why you don’t hunt here. And because I want you to deliver another message—send back Reelu Ulané Pulakaloso and her son Karis Ulané Panalira.” She stepped back. “Now go!”
Ragar took off without a sound or a backwards glance and disppeared into the forest. She turned to look at me and c****d her head to the side.
“You are human.” It sounded more like an observation than a question. She looked me up and down. “And one that is new to our world.”
The comment confused me and I nodded, speechless. I studied the creature that had come to my rescue. She wasn’t very big; she was slender and couldn’t have been more than four and a half feet tall, either. Her raven-black hair was pulled back in a ponytail, revealing pointed ears. Slanted eyes shone lavender from a heart-shaped face, looking at me intently. Her skin color was similar to mine, though not quite the same as my own light to dusky tone.
“What are you?” I blurted without thinking. I was immediately embarrassed—would she think I was rude? “Um, are you Asian?”
“I’m not from your world. I’m what humans would call a sprite.”
“But your features? They look like you might be some kind of Asian.”
“You’re not very bright, are you? Let’s try this again. I’m not from your world. I don’t know what an Asian is, but I’m not human. I’m a sprite.”
“I’m sorry!” I was frustrated. “I don’t know where I am or what’s going on! I’m just trying to make sense of things. What’s a sprite?”
“How can you speak the common tongue and not know what a sprite is?”
“What do you mean?” She was just confusing me more. “I’m speaking English, just like you.”
She walked around me, examining not just me, but also my clothes and my shoes. She looked at the knives I carried, still in their scabbards, then she pointed to my pendant.
“That,” she said as if it explained everything.
“What do you mean?” I held up the pendant and examined it.
“That is a very powerful amulet,” she said. “It uses the opal to make one of the strongest diplomacy spells I have ever seen. But it is very subtle. I wouldn’t have known it was there if I hadn’t been looking for it.”
“Spells?”
She sighed. “This is going to be a long conversation if you keep asking me to repeat myself.”
Something caught my eye in the forest behind her. I instantly grabbed her and pulled her to the side. A spear passed through where she had been standing and stuck into the ground. She looked at it and gave her head a small shake.
“Wait here,” she told me, and she blurred away from me. A minute later I heard a scream that was cut short. Not long after that, she came back into the clearing.
“How can you move so fast?” I asked her.
“Magic,” she smiled.
“That’s amazing. Can you teach me?”
She looked at me seriously.
“I owe you a blood debt,” she said. “You saved my life. Is this your wish? I pay my debt by teaching you to use magic? To move quickly?”
- Writer
