Wayne Batson - The Final Storm

“The trees, for one thing,” Thrivenbard replied. “They do not have the beauty or the toughness of those in Nock’s Blackwood, but they are tall enough to scrape the sky! And once, while climbing one of these giants, I disturbed a moth the size of a kite!”

“Trees and moths do not seem such a threat,” said Sir Rogan. “Is that all there is?”

“Nay. It is what dwells in the trees and feeds upon the moths that I speak of,” Thrivenbard said. “Snakes-as long as serpents-with skin that changes hue and texture to match that of the limbs where they dwell. Big enough to lift a knight right out of his saddle, they are. And there may be other things in the depths of the forest… things worse.”

“Aw! It cannot be that bad!” said Boldoak, absently rubbing the scar on his cheek. “After all, Zabediel was just a scribe, and he survived.” This earned Boldoak a smattering of laughs from the other knights assembled there.

“Be that as it may,” Thrivenbard went on, “we must still be on our guard. And we cannot forget that Paragor’s forces could be in the woods as well.”

And at Thrivenbard’s command, the knights filed out of Guard’s Keep and marched swiftly to the dragon pens.

As Splinter spiraled up into the sky, Robby looked out over the city walls and saw a large caravan approaching Alleble from the north. He applied pressure to the dragon’s flank with his right knee. She responded by drifting over closer to Trenna’s white dragon.

“May I help you with something, Sir Knight?!” Trenna asked, smiling playfully.

“Uh, verily, you can!” Robby answered, trying to sound noble and heroic. “Perhaps you could tell me who are all those soldiers.”

“Those are Mallik’s kin!” she replied. “The mighty folk of the Blue Mountains! They come to fortify the walls of Alleble… thanks to your magnificent discovery!”

“Why, thank you for thy kind words, m’lady!” Robby said. Feeling awkward in trying to speak more Glimpse-like, Robby decided to stick to his own manner of speech, such as it was. Even so, Robby did not speak again to anyone until they reached King’s Forest. For with Alleble now behind them, the dragon riders made for the gap between the twin peaks of Pennath Ador.

Robby had traveled by plane before. He’d looked out the small windows inside the cabin and been amazed by the way the land below became a patchwork of greens and browns. But nothing could compare to the awesome grandeur of these immense mountains.

Beyond the mountains, Robby saw King’s Forest. It was more vast than he had imagined, and it sat upon a mountain itself. The dragon riders descended to the stony foothills just outside the forest, and Robby realized that the size of the trees had deceived him. They weren’t growing on another mountain-they were just that tall!

Some of their massive trunks were as wide as a house, and all were covered in huge scales of black and gray bark. They had sparse limbs that reached out like arms with bracelets of dangling moss and wide paws of ferny foliage.

After securing the dragons, Thrivenbard insisted that the knights fan out into a wide row. Then he led them into the forest. “This is very different from the Blackwood,” said Nock excitedly as he drew near to Robby. “Blackwood trees do not tolerate other vegetation in their midst. But this place is teeming with vegetation! Cedar, oak, fir, and dragonwood-incredible! And look down!”

By their feet were huge feathery ferns and massive patches of some kind of clover with large pink flowers.

“Sorrel,” Nock said. “Beautiful, is it not? Oh, how I would like to lie in it!”

Suddenly, Thrivenbard was beside Nock. “Master Nock,” he said, “we must all keep our focus on the task at hand. Do not allow your mind to wander.” And just like that, Thrivenbard was gone and back to the front line. Weird, how he does that, Robby thought.

In spite of Thriven’s warning, Robby spent much of the first hour enjoying the natural surroundings. How could he not? There were squirrels the size of dogs, and once Robby and Trenna climbed up on the trunk of a fallen giant and strolled for more than a hundred yards along its length.

The bright afternoon sun filtered down through the treetops and cast glorious golden light on the forest floor and gilded the broad leaves of many of the trees. But the search had turned up nothing. No sign of a village. No sign that anyone had come through the forest recently.

The demeanor of the group had changed markedly after such a long, uneventful walk through the forest. Jarak and Locke amused themselves by telling stories of their hunting exploits in the forests of Acacia. Robby spotted Nock pointing all over the place to a very bored-looking Boldoak. Sir Rogan spoke with Baldergrim and trailed just behind Robby. Even Thrivenbard, who had been so tense early on, had begun to relax a bit.

They came to a section of the forest where the ground cover was a bed of tan pine needles and dead leaves. “Do you notice anything strange?” Trenna asked.

“No,” Robby replied, yawning.

“A few moments ago, the wood was alive with sounds,” she replied, looking warily up into the treetops. “Now it is utterly silent.”

Robby listened. “Yeah, you’re right,” he said.

Trenna drew her sword.

From up ahead, Jarak suddenly knelt. He reached down into a patch of ferns and held up a strand of gray. “Master Thrivenbard!” he called. “What do you make of-”

He never finished his sentence. Branches snapped. A dark brown blur. And Jarak was gone, pulled into the greenery.

“Hold, servants of the King!” Thrivenbard yelled. “Do not move another step!”

But it was too late. Baldergrim vanished with a sudden grunt. Locke drew a long curved blade and raced in the direction Jarak had been taken.

“Look to the skies!” Trenna yelled.

“Nay, look to the ground!” Thrivenbard called back. He reached carefully down and parted some shrubs to see what was there. “There are strands of… of web strewn across this place!”

Robby froze in his tracks. He stared at it: a twisted strand of gray stretched tight beneath the ground cover. “I see it!” he yelled.

“I do not see anything!” Sir Rogan bellowed. He charged up to Robby’s side, but took one step too many. He stepped directly onto the web. Suddenly, from the brush in front of him, a brown night-mare shot forth-but Sir Rogan’s axe was at the ready. He swept the broad blade in front of him. They heard a shrill chirping screech, and black blood spattered Sir Rogan, Robby, and Trenna. There at Sir Rogan’s feet twitched a long, hairy, segmented limb of brown.

“Spiders!” Sir Rogan spat.

“Thrivenbard, what do we do?” Halberad cried out. “They have taken Jarak and Baldergrim!”

“The webs are a type of tripwire,” said Thrivenbard, almost to himself at first. “These spiders live beneath the ground, and they will have taken our knights alive. We must find the burrows without ourselves being caught!”

A bloodcurdling scream came from nearby. Turning, they expected to see another knight being taken away by one of the giant spiders. But to their horror and amazement, they saw a huge emerald-green snake withdrawing up into the treetops with Locke’s legs protruding from its massive diamond-shaped jaws. Serpents began to swing down from above, trying to yank knights violently from the ground.

“Defend yourselves!” Thrivenbard yelled. “There are enemies above and below!” Several snakes fell headless, thanks to Sir Rogan’s mighty axe. Another snake, this one with jagged golden brown scales, seemed to materialize from the trunk of one of the gigantic trees. It opened its jaws behind Valden.

“Look out!” Sir Oswyn cried. But the snake fell limp to the tree trunk-one of Nock’s black-shafted arrows embedded deep in its eye.