“Stay back between these boulders, while I hold them off from the front.”

“No!”

Surprised, I glanced down at the boy, who had suddenly given proof that he could still speak and quite vehemently at that. “No?” I asked.

“I want to help you!”

I nearly insisted that he do as I had told him to do, but I glimpsed the desperate need in his eyes and thought better of it. I liked the boy’s spunk.

“Okay then,” I drew my short sword from the holster on my back and handed it to the boy. The blade was just light enough for him to handle, without it being too cumbersome for him to manage. “Stay behind me and protect my back.”

He nodded his head vigorously in response as he gripped the sword hard enough to squeeze impressions on the steel handle. He was still pretty much where I had wanted him from the beginning, but he was there under his own terms and I respected that as a sign of strength that hinted at the kind of stalwart man he would someday be.

The sudden yipping and snarling taking place around us told me that the time for survival was once again upon us, as we faced off against man’s ancient foe, the wolf. I withdrew my sword and turned to face the snarling, yellow-eyed assailants arrayed out before me in a half circle.

There were five of them. A big mangy eared male made the first move as he lunged toward me. I half knelt forward on one knee and ripped my blade through the length of his stomach while he was in mid flight and then quickly stepped aside to avoid his falling carcass. As his trailing death yip sounded, I flung myself to the right, away from the boy, and decapitated a second wolf in one fluid swing of the blade in my hand. I quickly launched myself towards a third wolf off to my left. I heard an anguished yip sound behind me as I attacked the third wolf. The wolf tried to retreat, but my blade found its heart first.

I wheeled around, sword at the ready as fear gnawed at me, to see what had become of the boy and the other wolves during my time away. What I found was a dead wolf lying at my feet that had been brutally hacked several times. My gaze went from the dead wolf to the blood dripping from the boy’s sword. I glanced up the blade to the boy’s white knuckled hands and finally my eyes drifted to the boy’s frightened but proud face.

“Nice job!” I said, meaning every bit of it.

I saw a tremulous smile emerge on the boy’s face. Without this kid watching my back, I would most likely have had a moor wolf’s teeth wrapped around the back of my neck or calf muscle.

I heard the rustling in the brush as the last wolf escaped the scene as fast as it could go. The boy, trying to act calm and collected after his first test of emerging maturity, wiped the blood off the short sword with a rag and made as if to hand it back to me, but I declined it.

Holding up my hands in refusal I said, “No, keep it! You’ve earned it. It’s yours now.”

I saw a look of heartfelt gratitude flood into the boy’s eyes as if I’d just given him the moon. It felt good to give it to him. I wanted to do more of it, because I liked feeling as I did right now.

I asked, “What’s your name boy? I can’t keep calling you, boy.”

“Call me, Larc,” the boy said.

“Larc, it is then. Let’s get out of here and bed down somewhere else for the night.”

After several days of walking and living off the land we saw the end of the moors come into view. The Litian River lay beyond the moors, as it snaked through the plains at the base of the majestic mountains that rose up in the distance. I had never been this close to the Vallian Mountains before.

I wanted to see what lay up among those lofty peaks and the green valleys that I’d heard existed on the other side of the mountains.

The land of my father’s was so close! An intense desire to discover my ancestral homeland overwhelmed me and I found myself walking faster, but I pulled myself back to a sane pace for the boy’s sake.

It took awhile to get to the edge of the moors, but when we did, I saw something that disturbed me. A mounted warrior was stationed just on our side of the turbulent river. He was alone, but even more curious was that the warrior had three saddled horses with him. He was waiting for someone. Was the warrior waiting for us? It was unlikely, but what other explanation could there be for his presence here with extra saddled horses. Why three horses? They must have known about the boy, but hadn’t sought fit to inform me about the additional passenger. That annoyed me.

Larc whispered, “Jasper, is he a Valley Lander?”

“Yes, I think so,” I whispered back.

I didn’t like it, but I saw little other choice in the matter. We needed those horses. “Follow close behind me,” I said, as I stood up from hiding and started walking down from the elevated knoll of the moor towards the warrior by the river.

Larc stood and made to follow me, but hesitated for a moment, “I don’t like it, Jasper. Something doesn’t feel right about this!”

Glancing back at him I replied, “I don’t like it either Larc, but we need those horses.”

The mounted warrior noticed our approach almost immediately, but he stayed where he was with one hand holding the reins of the other three horses. The other hand, I noticed, was not far from the sword on his hip. As we drew closer to him something about our appearance must have given him confidence that we were the party he had been waiting for, because he smiled openly and said, “It’s good to see you, for it is tired I am of sitting out here in the open like a hobbled goat in front of a marsh cat den!”

I liked the man. I replied simply, “Sorry for the delay, but we got here as fast as we could. I wasn’t expecting to find you here waiting for us, but it’s a good thing as we need to get out of here quickly. Pursuit might not be too far behind us.”

The man nodded and then said, “I was told to expect three; an old man, a warrior, and a boy.”

“The boy’s father didn’t make it,” I replied.

Shaking his head solemnly, the warrior glanced over to Larc and said, “Sorry lad! Your father was a good man. He will be missed. Here, mount up now and let’s get you to your mother.”

The sound of whiffs of ruffled air announced the presence of the arrows even before I saw four of them smack into the warrior’s chest, causing him to reel back in his saddle from the shock of their impact. Choking on his own blood, the warrior cried out to me even as he tossed the reins of the saddled horses at me, “Get away from here and save the boy!” I leaped into one of the empty saddles and pulled Larc up behind me. As I swung the horse around to face the moors from the direction the arrows had come from, Zoarinian longbowmen started standing up from their concealment all along the line of the moor dunes. There had to be at least two dozen or more of them, which was most likely how many arrows would be sticking out of Larc and I if we tried to make a break for it.

Two groups of horsemen pulled out of concealment in the moors to either side of us and started toward us, riding along the river. I debated for a brief moment about grabbing Larc and throwing him and myself into the river, but even if we survived the raging current of the river we wouldn’t make it far without horses. I hated the feeling of helplessness that washed over me. If I had been alone, I would have made a try at getting away, but I had the boy to consider. I had to do what was best for him. Our best option, it would seem, was to bide our time, be patient, and wait for an opportunity to escape, if the opportunity came. I’d had to wait nine years the first time to get an opportunity to escape. I don’t think I could do that again.

*****

They evidently wanted us alive, as they had not fired upon us. That was at least something positive. I sat where I was and watched as the Zoarinian soldiers closed in on us. It was one of the hardest things I had ever done to just sit there and do nothing. I felt Larc’s arms get tighter around me as they closed in on us, “It’s okay, Larc, we’ll get out of this. You wait and see.”

After we had been disarmed, they mounted us on separate horses and tied us to the saddles. A cloaked figure rode up and flipped back his hood, chuckling as he did so. I recognized the Valley Lander warrior who had recruited me for this assignment. At my look of surprise on recognizing him, he said, “I know. I know. You’re surprised aren’t you. Jasper, it’s really very simple. The Valley Landers and their pathetic allies, the Tranquil Islanders, don’t stand a chance of winning against the power of the Zoarinians. It may seem that I am betraying my people in the here and now, I grant you, but once this nasty conflict is over, I’ll be able to help my people rebuild our nation better than it was before. We’ll advance on as a people, no longer hindered by the outdated practices that force our culture to a standstill. I’ve been promised an administrator position over Artanis itself!” He finished confidently, looking as if he genuinely expected me to agree with him that he was, in fact, loyal to his country and not a traitor, when all his actions amounted to was cowardice wrapped in a cloak of power hungry envy.