Hero- the Unknown Territories Page 5

  "It has been a long time, Kaja," the figure whispered.

  "Too long, Quaxatolan," said the rat.

  Kaja sat back on his rear haunches and gestured with his dirty, pink paws. He began to change in size and shape.

  A moment later, the rat had transformed into a skinny, shy-looking man. Some of his hair hung in his face, obscuring his almond-shaped eyes.

  Quaxatolan tilted his head, reading his visitor. "I am not known for my wealth of company," he breathed.

  Quaxatolan was a creature neither alive or dead. He was one of the living dead, and as such he didn't need to breathe at all. He just liked to do it for effect. "I smell the world on you."

  Kaja smiled. "You see a lot for someone without eyes."

  The tips of Quaxatolan’s bony fingers closed around the stone armrests of his throne. "More than you know," he said.

  "Yes, I've been doing a lot of traveling. Talking to many. Listening to some."

  Quaxatolan sat forward, turning his full attention on Kaja. His sightless gaze bored into Kaja’s, making the slight man feel very small and exposed.

  "Well anyway, I heard something. Something about a hero."

  His cloak ruffled restively as Quaxatolan leaned even closer. "A hero?"

  Kaja paused, enjoying the feeling of keeping Quaxatolan waiting, then spoke one word. "Tilger."

  Quaxatolan let out a long wet hiss between his teeth. "Tillllllger!"

  Clumps of stone crumbled as Quaxatolan dug his fingers into the throne. He stood up, lifting his hands high, wailing the name over and over.

  A shocking wind hit the room, and Quaxatolan's cloak flapped around him in angry slaps.

  “The one that all but destroyed me. Me! That meaningless speck! Years have I spent in this place, reaping the evil of the world to regain my strength, and just when I am nearly whole I hear that name, that curse, that wrenching dagger in my mind.”

  He turned back to Kaja. "What have you heard that you dare say that name to my face?” he asked, as he drew a swirling, black ball of mist from under his cloak. “Speak before you die."

  Kaja had underestimated the seething, insane rage Quaxatolan held for Tilger, and suddenly hoped his news was valuable enough to save him.

  "He ain't a hero no longer," he blurted. "He's been de-heroed."

  The wind died and the wispy, black ball evaporated, but Quaxatolan's anger was still there, still rampaging just behind that steel blindfold. He stood mere inches from Kaja.

  "He's been…?”

  "Un-heroed. You know, not a hero?"

  "Explain yourself."

  Kaja's mind ran though his thoughts like a crazed librarian trying to restore a mountain of books during an earthquake, gathering the bits of information that had been scattered by his fear of imminent death.

  "I heard he ran into a wizard and, um, this wizard put the whammy on him, and now he's just a regular man."

  A regular man. Quaxatolan repeated the words in his mind, letting the full meaning of them ripen.

  "If Tilger is nothing more than a common man, he will be no match..." The significance hit Quaxatolan with delicious impact. "The years of waiting, waiting."

  "Waiting for what?" asked Kaja.

  Quaxatolan looked at Kaja, who was slightly perplexed. "To kill him."

  "Oh right," Kaja flushed. “Um, so, how did he, you know, defea… uh, beat y… um, … win?”

  Quaxatolan seemed about to say something, then changed his mind. "That's not important," he said. There seemed a little more edge to his voice since Kaja's question. "What is important is whether you are sure?"

  "You mean about him not being a hero? Well, uh, I suppose,” said Kaja, "I heard it from someone who heard it from someone, and like that. The information traveled a long way through a lot of mouths."

  Quaxatolan sat back down on this throne. "I must know," he said, “and you will see if this thing is true."

  "But," stammered Kaja, “but...”

  “Yesss?” asked Quaxatolan, leaning forward in warning.

  "But where will I start?" Kaja said. "I don't know where he is."

  "You will find him. You will return to me," Quaxatolan growled, “and you will tell me if he is no longer a hero. Soon I will have come to my full strength and then I will seek him out. Do not fail me. Bring me word.”

  Looking miserable, Kaja realized there was nothing he could say. His lot was cast.

  He flicked his hands and a moment later a dingy, bony looking cat was standing where Kaja had been. The cat gave Quaxatolan a last look, turned and left.

  It was a long, dank and dark walk from Quaxatolan's chamber to the outside world, and a relief to Kaja to breathe fresh air. It was good to be among trees and grass; living things. Being in the sun started to lift the worry and dread that always clung to him after he spent any time with Quaxatolan.

  He couldn't help but smile, well, as much as a cat can smile; after all, Quaxatolan hadn't left that underground dungeon that he'd ever heard of. Yes, Quaxatolan wasn’t as powerful as he once was. He wouldn't even come out of his hole unless he knew Tilger was so weakened he could be easily killed.

  So, what was he afraid of? Some moldering, metal-covered bag of bones? Kaja decided that maybe he'd go looking for Tilger, and maybe he wouldn't. He'd do whatever he pleased.

  A creaking sound interrupted his thoughts, and before he knew it, his world was tumbling upside down.

  When it all stopped, Kaja found himself in the knobby grip of a tree, held high up in the air. His paws scrambled for something to hold onto, but it was useless.

  The tree looked up at him with a relief of Quaxatolan's face in its gnarled bark.

  "Did I mention that I'd be watching you?" asked the tree, between a groan and creak.

  "No, no you didn't," said Kaja.

  Panicking, he transformed into a scruffy raven. He slipped out of the tree's grasp and flapped his stunted wings almost as fast as his pounding heart.

  His heart had just started to slow down when large talons closed around him and he was plucked from the air.

  Kaja looked up into the face of a withered falcon, with metal banded eyes and a gray ponytail.

  "I wasn't finished," Quaxatolan screeched. Holding Kaja tightly, he folded his wings and dipped into a steep dive.

  The ground was hurtling towards them; in the next moment he was going to be smashed into the ground. Kaja moved his wings around and transformed into a cloud of flies. The next moment, Quaxatolan's talons had nothing to hold on to.

  The flies zipped around a tree and through a thorn bush. Coming out on the other side, the swarm flew into a large spider web.

  Now, Kaja was stuck. Separating into a swarm of flies made it very easy for Kaja to get into places, but he couldn't transform again with all of his pieces kept apart, like now. Any second now, Kaja expected to see Quaxatolan in spider form, come prowling out of the shadows. He was terrified of spiders; any size, it didn't matter, as long as it was a spider it was enough to make him break out in wide-eyed panic. He could bear anything, he thought, as long as it wasn't a spider. He couldn't be more wrong.

  Quaxatolan appeared out from under a shady bush as a fat, slimy toad.

  He was getting used to the missing eyes, but if Kaja remembered right, toads weren't supposed to have teeth; this one did. Two rows of dull, chipped teeth, not very good for piercing, but perfect for mashing up the bodies of helpless flies.

  "As I was saying," Quaxatolan said, his body swelling and contracting with each puff of air, “I'll be watching you from time to time... should you need help, you understand."

  "Oh, right. Much appreciated, your greatness,” said Kaja, as all the flies spoke in unison. "Very kind of you."

  “Yes,” puffed the toad. “It is.”

  "Sorry about that running away bit,” Kaja said. “Just reflex. Didn't know it was you.”

  "Hmmm," said Quaxatolan in a distracted sort of way, as a tall bird came bobbing into view, its sharp, pointed beak opening and closin
g with a clack as it fluttered to the ground one branch at a time.

  "Yes, reflex. That's what I was thinking," said Quaxatolan. "You're no fool, are you, Kaja? Not like those foolish enough to think that I've become feeble."

  "Feeble?" said Kaja, eyeing the bird nervously. “Never in my life, says I. As fit as you please."

  The large bird caught sight of Quaxatolan and bounced through the grass until it stood over the plump toad. Then it saw the web filled with flies and couldn't believe its good luck. It tilted its head between the flies and the toad, trying to decide which to dine on first.

  “I'm gratified to hear it,” puffed Quaxatolan. “Some would delude themselves to believe distance equals safety."

  The bird decided on Quaxatolan first, and opened its beak to swallow him.

  Before it made another move, Quaxatolan lashed out a long, gray tongue.

  Kaja watched in horror as the tongue wrapped around the bird, crushing the life out of it and pulling it inside the toad's mouth. A couple of feathers clung to Quaxatolan's slimy mouth.

  "Neither," gulped Quaxatolan, “does size."

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER 6

  Three weeks into his journey, Tilger was as much at a loss to know how to find his beloved armor as he was on the first day. He had no map, no compass, nothing. He'd given up trying to find anything useful in his bottomless bag.

  One evening, he tried pulling out everything his hand came in contact with. He ended up with a sizable pile of junk; scraps of leather, a hammer, various bits of clothing, empty bottles, a carpet, a hat, one boot, and the list went on and on. The carpet, and the more useful looking things he put back. He also found that fruit and meat didn't spoil when they were kept in the bag.

  He had practiced putting a rock in the bag and then taking it out. It took some time and a number of rocks before he could find what he was looking for. By now, though, he could find what he wanted more than half the time.

  East. That's all he had to go on.

  "East," said Tilger. "East? What kind of direction is that?"

  It had been a long three weeks for Sho too. Up until Tilger's transformation, he'd been feeling like it was a good time for a change. After listening to Tilger grousing for three weeks, he was ready for another change.

  They stopped. It took Sho by surprise. His response to Tilger's use of the reigns had become automatic, and when Tilger had lightly pulled up on them, Sho unconsciously stopped. They had come to a fork in the road.

  They had been on the same road for three weeks in all of its forms, from rutted path to deer track, from gravel paved to weed-choked trail. In all this time, it had lead in one direction, which was easy enough, but now they had to make a decision.

  "What do you think?" Tilger asked Sho.

  Sho looked from one path to the other. Usually his instincts would help him, but neither direction stood out as better or worse.

  Sho's indecision was clear to Tilger. He climbed out of the saddle and walked up to the fork, staring hard at one lane, then the next, as if under his scrutiny the proper direction would reveal itself.

  Normally, this sort of thing didn't phase Tilger, but things had stopped being normal. When you were armored in fine steel and magic, you rarely gave a second thought about where you are going or what lay ahead.

  Fully equipped, Tilger was more than a match for some of the fiercest creatures. Now the feeling of the wind on his uncovered skin was not only an odd and new sensation, it was also a reminder of how exposed he was, and that was a growing source of frustration for him.

  "What kind of a person sends you on a quest without a bloody map?" said Tilger, waving the ring and leather bag. "This is all I have to work with. This mangy bag and this useless ring."

  Suddenly, Tilger was struck with a thought. He looked at the ring with narrowing eyes. Then he slipped it on.

  The ring was quiet.

  "You there," said Tilger, tapping the ring. "Hello, you, ring."

  The ring remained silent.

  "Bah." Tilger pulled off the ring then threw it down the left path. He stormed back to Sho and climbed on. "There," he ranted at the sky. "That's what I think of your worthless ring." He sat there stewing, looking for something else to be angry with. "I suppose you have something to say, do you?” he said to Sho.

  Even though Tilger rode on his back, Sho had always considered himself equal to Tilger, and he wasn't going to put up with being picked on. Sho swung his head around and gave Tilger a dark look that took some of the wind out of his sails.

  "Well, yes, of course," he said, scrambling out of the saddle again. "I was going to get it. No need to get wound up."

  Tilger trudged down the path and picked the ring off of the ground. As he headed back down the path, he put the ring on and it spoke.

  "Not that way."

  "What?" said Tilger.

  "Not that way," the ring replied flatly.

  "You mean this way?" Tilger turned around and started up the path again.

  "No."

  "You mean the other path then?"

  The ring said nothing more. Tilger walked back to the fork, gathered Sho's reigns, and started up the other path.

  "It looks like this is the path," he said to Sho.

  Two days later, Tilger rode into a town. For being in the Unknown Territories, this town didn't look much different from other towns he'd been in.

  Among the huts, they had what looked like taverns, a blacksmith and a store. Yet, on closer inspection, he did begin to notice that some things were different. The posts used to tie horses to were made up of a collection of cogs and gears. Many of them had reigns tied to them, but there were no horses attached to them. A couple of the buildings had strangely crafted doors, with the most life-like impressions of people’s faces in them.

  Most towns had a temple for the worshipping of whatever local deities seemed to catch the public's fancy. The temple in this town was a smoking ruin, and the destruction looked recent. Being a deity wasn't easy; you try and keep a couple of hundred people happy all at the same time and see what happens. Everyone wants to be rich, handsome, popula,r and when they aren’t it's your fault.

  The further into this town he rode, the stranger it felt.

  There's always that one thing that lifts up the heart of a weary traveler, something that gives a sense of being at a home away from home, and to Tilger's relief he found it; the town was holding a public execution.

  At first there didn't seem to be anyone on the chopping block, but still the axe-man was wrapping his thick fingers around the solid walnut handle, and the crowd was delightedly cheering him on.

  As he got a little closer, Tilger was shocked to see a boy in colorful clothing, laying face down across the block. His head was covered by a rough sack and his arms were tied behind his back. He was so small that that he needed to kneel on an overturned bucket to properly reach the chopping block.

  Tilger was all for a good execution now and then, as long as the person at the business end of the axe was the most horrible type of evil-doer. A child was another thing altogether.

  Tilger tapped his heels against Sho's sides and they galloped into the town square.

  "What are you doing?" asked the ring. "Don't go in there."

  "Be quiet," said Tilger.

  The surprised crowd stopped their cheering and jumped out of the way as Tilger rode through them to the execution platform. The crowd's angry curses where ignored by Tilger, his focus being on the executioner.

  "Stop," Tilger commanded the executioner.

  The command itself was mostly useless for two reasons: it's universally understood that most people are not going to be ordered about by a scrawny, unarmed peon, especially when that scrawny, unarmed peon is addressing someone who carries a large and well sharpened axe; the other reason the command was useless was that the executioner had already stopped, having been distracted by all the commotion.

  Tilger just assumed it was his authoritative presence, w
hich only encouraged him.

  "What kind of people are you?" demanded Tilger. “At the most this small one may deserve a good spanking, but this? It goes beyond the pale. I will not allow this to happen,” he proclaimed. “And anyone who says contrary does so at their own peril,” he added in answer to the growing rumble of anger from the crowd.

  "Run," hissed the ring to Tilger. "Run now."

  It's a serious offence to interfere with an execution, and even more so when it's somebody else's town. Tilger was too caught up in the moment to appreciate that Sho was the only reason the townsfolk hadn't put him next in line on the chopping block; his dark glare and stomping hoof was enough to keep the people at bay.

  "Who are you to tell us what we can do?" yelled a voice from the crowd.

  The mob shouted their agreement.

  Tilger straightened in his saddle as he prepared to give his hero introduction speech. But he caught his reflection in the axe being lovingly, if not menacingly, handled by the executioner. They'd think he was a mad man. They wouldn't need an axe to kill him; they would have laughed him to death.

  "Who I am is of no matter," he said. "I demand an explanation. What could this small one have done that could warrant such punishment?"

  "He built doors that swing open for ya," shouted someone.

  "I believe I saw them as I came in," said Tilger. "The carving of faces was particularly good."

  "That weren't no carving," said someone. "It was my wife. Them death traps swing the wrong way and smash you in the face."

  “An honest mistake, I'm sure,” said Tilger. “One error can hardly…”

  "He built a hitching post supposed to keep the horse from pulling free,” yelled another voice.

  “Well,” started Tilger. “There you…”

  "It yanked their heads right off,” cried out a weeping voice.

  The crowd grumbled in union. Sho's eyes widened in alarm.

  "Yes, well, I'll grant you that's fairly serious," said Tilger pragmatically, “but still not deserving of death."