Michael Mathias - Kings, Queens, Heroes, and Fools

The Silver Skull had been quickly taken below deck. Talon followed the ship for a short way as it headed out to the deep sea, but since Phen didn’t appear to be aboard the craft, the hawkling circled back and began searching the shoreline and the edges of the foliage. Hyden’s heart was clenched with fear. To his utter dismay, not a single sign of Phen could be found. To make things worse, when the moon was high in the sky, a storm came blowing in, and a heavy tropical rain began to fall.

Hyden had Talon fly from the shoreline around the island in the rain to find the Seawander. Once it was located, he explained to Oarly how to direct Captain Trant to the site of Phen’s disappearance. He wanted Oarly and Biggs to go on to the ship while he went back the other way and searched for the boy.

“What was it the boy said about finding what had been invisible to us in his books?” Oarly asked while Hyden was lightening his packs. Hyden took his elven longbow and a small pack of supplies, but that was all.

“I’m not sure what he was talking about,” Hyden said absently. His thoughts were fixed on finding Phen. If the boy was alive, Hyden was determined to locate him. If he was dead, then Hyden would lay eyes on the corpse before he gave up.

“If he lives…” Oarly started, but stopped himself before he could finish the sentence. After a tug at his beard he spoke again. “Phen is a smart lad. He will find shelter and ride this storm out. You should rest, Sir Hyden Hawk. You’ve been through an ordeal. Your clearest wit would serve you better than this haste. You’ll not find anything but trouble traipsing across this strange island in the dark.”

“Aye,” Hyden agreed. “ ’Tis true I could use some sleep, but even if I lay down and closed my eyes, no sleep would come.” Hyden wiped the rain, or maybe a tear of worry, from his eyes. “I’ll not let him sit out there shivering in the cold, alone, and possibly injured, Oarly,” Hyden said as he started into the dark wet tangle. After a few paces he had disappeared completely. Oarly heard Hyden’s voice calling back to him, “Just get to the ship and have Trant set sail as quickly as you can. Talon will let you know if I find any trouble.”

“I will!” Oarly called back, but he was certain that the sound of the storm had swallowed his voice before it reached Hyden’s ears.

Hyden set a crisp pace for himself and charged on through the night. Talon had to land frequently, so that he could shiver the accumulated wetness his feathers absorbed as he flew around the area where Phen was last seen. Hyden cursed the rain. Any tracks the youngster might have left would be washed away. He turned the scene over and over again in his head. Why had Flick struck down the breed giant with his lightning spell? Had the breed tried to protect Phen? A horrid thought crossed his mind then. What if the breed giant had tried to hurt Phen? To keep his word, the wizard Flick might have killed his own man. Mikahl had told him that the breed giants were notorious eaters of man flesh. Nothing made any sense-the dead zard-man, the other giant staggering into the foliage.

He eventually decided not to dwell on anything as he jogged on toward the rocky shore. Twice he went off course because he let his thoughts wander to the darker possibilities. If it hadn’t been for Talon’s persistence, he’d have been wasting his time, but just before dawn the hawkling’s keen direction led him right to the bolt-riddled body of the breed giant that had staggered away from the shore.

Eight crossbow bolts, the same as the one the zard had sunk into Master Biggs’s shoulder, jutted up out of the huge corpse’s back. This breed giant hadn’t been the one handling Phen, but Hyden searched all around him anyway, for any indication that the boy had been there. After finding nothing, he rolled the breed over for a closer look. The sound of the quarrels breaking as the giant’s great weight snapped them off startled Hyden. A great three-clawed gash ran across the breed’s lower abdomen, probably from the claw of the dead zard that lay beyond the edge of the jungle.

“Phen,” Hyden called out as loud as he could. “Where are you Phen? It’s me, Hyden.”

There was no response, save for the roar of the storm-born waves as they crashed into the rocky shore not far away.

The scene at the shoreline was the same as he had seen it before. A mangled zard that had seemingly been torn in two lay on the rocks just above the tide line, and the breed giant with the great black char mark on his chest was rolling to and fro in the shallows. It was hard to see in the rainy gloom, but Hyden used Talon’s eyes and continued anyway.

“Phen!” he yelled what could’ve been a thousand times over. “Come out, Phen! It’s all right.” Hyden didn’t even notice the sunrise, or the way the storm rolled past the island leaving the shoreline a vivid world of lush green foliage, dark rocky crags, and bright blue sea. Hyden’s eyes kept finding the crimson stain of the lizard’s lifeless body, and the puckered black char that covered the breed giant’s chest.

“Phen!” he screamed and screamed some more until he finally collapsed on the rocks. His voice had turned to a torn and raspy wheeze. Even Talon’s piercing shriek had lost its resonance. The two of them were completely spent, overcome with the realization that Phen was nowhere to be found.

“Lord Bzorch,” Cozchin said with a smile that revealed his long wicked-looking lower teeth.

The Lord of Locar was sitting on his wooden throne doing absolutely nothing, but breathing heavy. All of the duties of running the city had fallen on Cozchin as of late. He didn’t mind it too much because he got plenty of boons out of the deal: an occasional woman to rape and eat, and plenty of extra coin. It wasn’t that hard to scare the human inhabitants of the city into compliance anyway. And it was entertaining.

“What is it?” Bzorch snarled, revealing teeth easily twice as deadly as Cozchin’s. The breed giant Lord had been thinking a lot lately. His spy, Graven had been reporting things that caused him to think in a more diplomatic manner than what he was used to. Despite all of his instinctual primitive urges, he wanted badly to be a good leader for his people. He was the Lord of Locar, and he was starting to take the title seriously.

“Graven has returned from Wildermont again,” said Cozchin with a look of distaste on his apish face. “He has news and says that it is important.”

“See him in,” Bzorch ordered. “Then, my dutiful cousin, I want you to find out if the dragon gun he brought back last time has been successfully replicated.”

“Yes, Lord,” Cozchin almost spat the response.

Graven had stolen his place as Lord Bzorch’s favorite. Cozchin didn’t like it at all. All Bzorch ever worried about now was what was happening in Wildermont, and how to mimic the pitiful humans’ mechanical forms of defense. Cozchin didn’t understand what use there was for a giant spear-launching weapon. The idea that once a working replica was perfected, Bzorch wanted one installed on every single watchtower around the city was preposterous. And now a wall. Why was Bzorch having a wall built around Locar?

Cozchin let Graven into the lobby then went off to check on the dragon gun with the hot fire of jealousy burning in his primitive mind. Half of the Reyhall Forest would be gone before Bzorch was done, figured the disgruntled half-breed as he went. Not that Cozchin cared about the trees. He was starting to think that Bzorch had gone mad with paranoia. Trenches, towers, dragon guns, and defensive walls- it was as if Lord Bzorch was expecting an attack soon.

“Lord,” Graven growled with a bow after he heard the door close behind him. Bzorch waved the supplication off. “What news?”