Chapter 17 - Eldar

Volume III - That of Eldar

Chapter Seventeen

Éldar slammed the weathered wooden door shut and ran crying from the cottage, but closing the door didn’t stop the two companions who ran after him. Not bothering to open it, they simply passed through the door in pursuit, penetrating through the door’s oak beams and iron hinges as easily as light passing through a glass window.

The ten-year-old boy ran from the tiny stone cottage and out into the verdant yard that reflected the green of the cottage’s peat roof. He continued around the side of the house, leaped over the split rail fence, and dashed into the overgrown thicket beyond. His swept away the unruly jet-black hair from his tanned face as he ran, and wiped away the tears that streamed from eyes the color of polished steel. The moss-covered walls of the cottage disappeared behind him, and soon even the chimney and its wisp of blue smoke were gone, but the pain that welled up within him remained.

He had to get out. He couldn’t take another minute of watching his mother suffer. He feared she was nearing the end. “Áradun, is she going to die?” he sobbed aloud in prayer, and the tears fell with renewed strength. She was so sick.

As he ran, his two companions followed, one to his right, the other to his left, their golden capes billowing behind as they easily kept up with the boy.

Éldar ran under a brilliant blue sky through golden fields that smelled of ripe wheat and barley, hurdled over a tumbling clear stream, and dashed through patches of aspens and maples crowned with gold and crimson splendor. The world outside was bright and clean, the fall day a stark contrast to Éldar’s black, foreboding mood.

He ran without thinking where his feet led him, until some time later when he suddenly looked about and found he had run right into Cheyne, Scoth’s largest hamlet and the clan seat. Shops built of grey stone and stained wood flanked the dirt road where he stopped, fronted with gnarled wooden railings that held back meandering beds of shrubs and fall flowers. Blue-grey smoke curled from cobble-stoned chimneys topping many of the shops; most were roofed with straw thatch or peat, though a few of the nicer shops bore shingles of dark slate. People bustled in the streets below, along with horses pulling rough-hewn carts filled with harvested grain, squashes, apples, and other fall vegetables. In some places, the lanes were choked off by herds of sheep and cattle that were being driven to the sale pens.

Realizing where he was, Éldar froze in disbelief, sucking in the breath that, moments before, had been curling outward into the cool fall air in steamy tendrils. He couldn’t believe it. His steps had taken him to last place he wanted to be: The very center of town. He looked up at his two companions, who returned his gaze with a look that told him they would protect him from his latest mistake. Their compassionate looks were tinged with sadness. His companions took up flanking positions on either side of him as Éldar turned to retrace his path, but then he was spotted, and the taunting began.

“Hey, it’s the Seer!” cried a girl, adding an extra measure of derision in the way she spat out his nickname. She followed it with a loud razzing.

“It’s the addled one!” another burst out. “Hey, where are your friends? Oh, I’m sorry I forgot; we can’t see them!” The comment brought laughter from the children and adults who had begun gathering and pointing. Éldar watched them with pain in his eyes, noting that the Guardians of those gathered had moved away from their charges.

Watch your feet, a voice spoke in gentle warning, but Éldar ignored it.

Turning away from the teasing mob that was rapidly closing around him, Éldar tripped over someone’s extended boot. He tumbled to the ground, evoking another round of vicious laughter from the ever-growing crowd. He looked up to see his two companions standing over him in their golden robes, but they offered no aid. Instead, they seemed to be looking for something else, something beyond the crowd, yet to be seen.

Suddenly, Eldár’s two companions drew their swords; silver blades that came out of their scabbards blazing with a blinding, ethereal light. Though it was seconds before Éldar saw them, he knew immediately what the drawn swords meant. Demons were coming.

Seconds later, they appeared out of nowhere; scores of hideous creatures with mottled red and black skin baring yellow fangs and wielding sharp claws. They floated in the air above the crowd, who seemed totally unaware of them. The first demons that appeared descended toward Éldar in an attempt to reach him in the midst of the attacking mob, but Éldar dodged this way and that, ducking their lunges. His two companions fought off the demons with their shining swords, hacking at the horrid creatures. Each blow by Éldar's companions dispatched another demon, its existence ending with a brief but brilliant flash of sickly green light, and their swords didn't miss.

Éldar continued to duck and shy away from the fierce claws of the demons—creating quite a spectacle of himself—as he crawled out of their reach behind the protection of his Guardians. As he bobbed and weaved to avoid the demons, the voices of the crowd brought Éldar’s focus back to the mob around him. They were now backing up from the thrashing boy, scared by his wild dance with unseen things.

The crowd still seemed oblivious to the demons, although more had arrived and were now joining in the attack upon them; the demons had not come for Éldar only. Scores of them bit and clawed the mob, hacking into them with red hot scimitars. Because the demons were not of the material world, their attacks did not appear to cause any physical damage, yet Éldar knew the kind of harm being done, and he didn’t want any of it happening to him: The demons were ravaging the people’s souls.

“Look how he dodges things that aren’t there!” observed one of the mob with a laughing, oblivious to the huge, ugly demon that was stabbing repeatedly into the observer’s own abdomen.

“What do you see?” another mockingly asked Éldar. “Is it your Guardians?”

“Why don’t you ask your friends to save you?” yelled the first, still obviously unaware that Éldar’s companions were attempting to do just that.

Once they had backed away, the crowd’s fear of Éldar’s thrashes subsided quickly, turning to laughter again as they watched his strange behavior. They began to kick dust and dirt at him.

A boy fell to the ground among the encircled mob and began whirling and thrashing about. Éldar thought for a moment that the boy was feeling the attacks of the demons, but then he realized that the boy was just mocking him by pretending to be under attack by unseen things. He didn’t feel the real ones that were mauling him even as he mocked. “Help, the Guardians have got me!” the boy cried, using the same name Éldar had given to the companions that he claimed accompanied everyone. Then the boy broke into laughter and the others howled. When the laughter subsided, a few of the bolder boys standing at the front of the crowd picked up stones and hurled them at Éldar. The stones whistled past his head but he didn’t flinch; he just slowly got to his feet and glared at them.

The last of the demons above Éldar vanished in a flash of sickly green light, the result of a vicious slash from one of his companion’s weapons. Éldar’s demons were gone, but he saw others at the edge of the circle, hacking and clawing at the boys throwing rocks. Just like always, the boys seemed totally unaware of the demons’ presence. Éldar glanced off to the side looking for the boys' Guardians, the name he had given the companions. In seconds, he found them; standing almost a stone's throw away, looking utterly dejected at their charges behavior, but either unwilling or unable to come to the boys’ aid. Éldar knew why the boy’s Guardians failed to protect them; they were repulsed by the boys because the boys were engaging in behavior that was wrong in the eyes of Áradun, the Creator. The Guardians of the crowd, too, were huddled some distance away, just watching in sadness.

The crowd began to close in around Éldar again until he surprised the smothering mass with a sudden lunge toward those who were nearest. The crowd was caught off-guard and, for just an instant, drew back again, unsure of what the strange boy might do. Seeing his chance, Éldar broke through the encircled crowd, ran for an alleyway, and quickly found his way out of the village. The taunting mob gave chase for a few moments, but soon lost interest and quit.

Back in the grassy hills outside of Cheyne, Éldar continued to run, his Guardians right behind him. He should have been thankful for the way his companions had saved him from the demon attack, but instead Éldar was angry.

“I hate you both!” he screamed at Rigel and Sirius, which were the names he had given to the two who now ran alongside him as he headed away into the highlands.

“I hate being different from everyone else!” he said as if it were their fault. “I hate that I can see you both, but no one else can. I hate that I’m the only one who can see the demons.” He continued to glare at them, but they didn’t answer. “Why must I be different? Why am I cursed with this?” He said in accusation. “It’s because of you two that everyone hates me.” He shook his fist at them. “It’s because of you two that everyone thinks I’m crazy.” He stopped to catch his breath. “Why can’t you just leave me alone? Why must you always be here with me? I’m sick of seeing you,” he said with contempt. “I’m sick of hearing you!” He looked around to get his bearings, and then continued his verbal onslaught. “I know you protect me from the demons, but I can handle them on my own. I don’t need you,” he said vehemently. “I don’t want any Guardians,” he added. “I can take care of myself.” He pointed a finger at one Guardian, then the other. “You might as well leave me. I am never talking to you again.”

Éldar’s escape from Cheyne had taken him west of the village, so that it now lay between him and home. He decided to loop around to the north to give Cheyne a wide berth, and then re-intercept the eastern road from the village toward home. “Get away from me!” he screamed as he turned away and started off. “Leave me alone!”

The two tall Guardians just looked sadly after Éldar and said nothing as he ran away from them. They sheathed their shining swords and held back for just a moment. When the boy got a stone’s throw away, they renewed their chase.

Suddenly, demons appeared again, coming out of the shadows of the rocks and trees around Éldar to renew their onslaught. Though distraught at having been sent away, Éldar’s Guardians kept their distance. Their faces revealed their horror as they watched the boy. They were hurting as if it were they themselves who were under attack.

The boy swung wildly at the demons that swarmed him, but he was unable to keep them off. The monstrous spirits drew scimitars and began hacking at the boy. No physical damage occurred, but the boy feared for his soul. Several of the demons sunk their claws into his back and began biting him, their fangs and claws reaching deep inside his body. Éldar felt no physical pain, but his fear was another matter. Knowing they were after his soul, his fear overcame him and he fell—almost paralyzed—to the grassy loam.

“Áradun,” he finally screamed, calling on the Creator. “I’m sorry! Please help me!”

Instantly, his Guardians reacted. Answering his prayer, they covered the distance to the boy in the blink of an eye, drawing their shining blades as they came. They lay into the demons like a storm surge crashing upon a rocky shore; their blades sliced into the monsters, dispatching them with blows that fell with deadly accuracy. Demon after demon perished in a flash of green light, leaving behind only ash and smoke. In a matter of seconds, they were all gone.

“I’m sorry,” the boy sobbed to his two Guardians when the battle was over. “I’m sorry I told you to go away.” He tried to wipe the wetness from his face. “I wish you could understand what it’s like; being different from everyone else,” he said sadly, and then looked at both of them through his tears. “I’m sorry,” he said again. “Thank you for being here for me.”

The first Guardian, Rigel, sheathed his sword.

We will be here for you as long as you wish it, whilst you walk this world.

Éldar heard him as much with his heart as he did with his ears.

Sirius, the second Guardian, also returned his weapon to its gilded scabbard, and together the two laid their hands upon the boy. Éldar felt warmth enveloping within. His fear left him.

“I have to do this differently,” he said to the two as the adrenaline within him finally began to subside. “From now on, I’m only going to talk to you from in here,” he said, pointing to his heart. “Not out loud anymore. Maybe that way people won’t think I’m so strange.”

Éldar got up and started running for home again. The sun had long since passed its zenith and was now beginning to sink into the west. The air was growing colder. As he ran northward, skirting the village, Éldar began to think about what it might take to make the people stop teasing him. “If only I were a knight like my father,” he said aloud. “If only I had a Nyakil, a Sword of The Realm! Then people would look up to me and respect me. Then they’d stop teasing me. Then I might … make some friends,” he added sadly, admitting his real desire. After running for a long time, he finally grew tired and slowed to a walk. “Alas, it is as father said,” he thought aloud, out-of-breath. “A Sword of The Realm cannot be bought, or found, or inherited. It must be earned. It must be won through the trials of knighthood, something few are invited to do.” He knelt and drank from tumbling stream, then wiped the cold water from his chin. “But even those who are invited to the Clannad hardly ever pass it!” he continued dejectedly. “I’ll never be a knight.” He hung his head and left the stream behind, continuing toward home.

After walking awhile along a barren hillside, he picked up a stick and began to swat scythe-like at the tall grass. The sadness had passed, replaced by his ever-vivid imagination, and he began to parry with the stick as if it were a sword. “I must earn a Sword of the Realm! Oh, if only I could receive an invitation to the Clannad. Then everyone would respect me!” He thought about Lachan, one of the older boys in the village.

“Lachan received an invitation,” he explained to Rigel, having quite forgotten his plan to never speak aloud to the Guardians. “You should’ve seen how the townspeople ‘oohed’ and ‘ahhed’. Éldar leveled a tall sunflower with one whack. “Lachan bragged about it for months, right up to the Clannad itself. He failed miserably of course. Everyone knew he would never pass the trials.” Éldar paused, and his tone took on a hint of envy. “But still, what respect he gained, just for being invited to try for knighthood. What an honor.” Éldar hung his head. “I wish it were me.”

As he continued to walk in the tall brown grass, Éldar began to think of all the other things he wanted. “I wish father were here. I wish—” and he remembered why he had run from his house. “I wish Mother could get well.” He felt sad again and grew silent, but soon more thrusting and parrying with his stick took his mind from his mother.

A group of ruffians, indeed the very ones who had thrown rocks at Éldar in the village earlier, were now roaming Cheyne’s outskirts, creating mischief as wayward boys were wont to do. They were four adolescents, led by a bully named Garish; a stocky, heavy kid with yellow teeth and overly large brows under dirty brown hair.

Always looking for trouble, the boys had left a trail of mischief. After letting a neighbor’s goats out of their pen, the ruffians had moved on until discovering an old woman taking laundry down off a line. Surprising her, they had pelted her with a barrage of stolen hen’s eggs. She cursed at them but had been forced inside her hut under their relentless attack. Then they rushed up and tore her simply made clothes from the line and trampled them into the dirt before running off, laughing.

Pleased with their triumph, they now whooped with evil glee as they ran north from the village until, rounding a barren hill, the mischievous group spied the young boy with tousled, blue-black hair playing in the countryside.

“Arrgh, it’s that fool seer again,” a dirty boy whispered, seeing that Éldar was not aware of them.

“Aye, it’s him all right,” Garish replied with a fiendish smile. “Let’s have some more fun with this addled one,” he sneered.

“But his father is a Knight of The Realm,” a thin and gangly boy offered with a worried tone, less confident now that the crowds of the village no longer backed them.

“And probably off chasing goblins half way to Hearthside,” the leader retorted as he cuffed the gangly one. “Are you scared of the seer?” he asked, then bullied the lackey while the others taunted.

Garish then turned his gaze back to Éldar, still oblivious to their presence. “Let’s get him,” he finished, and they all crept toward the boy playing at the edge of a grove of aspens. They snuck up on him while he fought against his make-believe foes, slashing at them with his stick-sword, narrating the action to allies unseen by the ruffians.

“Ho, he blocks a vicious thrust!” Éldar cheered as he fought the pretend enemies. “Éldar dispatches another goblin chief!” He narrated the action to himself as he stood triumphantly over an imaginary fallen foe.

The ruffians watched and giggled as Éldar continued speaking to no one.

“What is it Rigel? Why do you draw your gleaming blade? I don’t see any—” and Éldar stopped in mid-sentence as he spied the band of boys. They were dirty and mean, and Éldar saw the swarms of demons that accompanied them, pummeling the boys from all sides. They obviously didn’t feel the carnage they were receiving, but Éldar knew the damage that was being done. Éldar looked about for the boy’s Guardians. A quick glance to the left and Éldar saw them, dejectedly milling about almost a stone’s throw away, obviously sorry at the behavior of their charges.

The troublemakers rushed young Éldar and backed him up against the stand of trees. They surrounded him, and then Garish led the assault, punching and kicking at Éldar in the center of their circle. Though the ruffians attacked from all directions, their blows appeared to be ineffective; they missed repeatedly. Éldar seemed to know in advance what punches were coming, and from where, and the young boy avoided them all, even adding a nasty whack to the shins of Garish, which only enraged the leader all the more.

“C’mon, hit him!” Garish chastised his followers with his sour breath, and they renewed their attack even more fiercely.

Éldar continued to listen to the two calm voices within that were giving him defensive instructions.

Blow coming from high and right, block … now! It was Rigel.

Sirius jumped in. Watch the attack on your legs … jump … now duck … jab behind with your stick! Listening to his Guardians, Éldar was able to defend himself quite handily, and for a long time he held mastery over the group of older boys, until at last he began to tire. Then his counters began to slow, and several of the boy’s blows found their mark. The ruffians sensed their advantage, and moved in for the kill.

You must run for it! Éldar heard Rigel’s voice. The tall one will lunge from the right, he calmly instructed. Jump backward, then leap over him and escape to the trees.

A split-second later, it happened just as Rigel had predicted. Éldar dodged a tall, pimply ruffian, leapt over him and found a clear path to the trees of the grove. He sprinted into the golden shade of the aspens and vanished among their silvery trunks.

“After him, you fools!” Garish shouted at his minions, and they all plunged into the trees.

Éldar heard them rushing behind him through the fallen leaves, and as he ran on, Rigel’s voice formed another idea in his head. There’s a pile of leaves up ahead. A second later it was there. Hide in the pile!

The ruffians tore through the grove of trees but lost the boy they pursued, who lay silent and still under the leaves. They searched for some twenty minutes, at times stepping within mere feet of where Éldar lay hidden. But their quarry eluded them. “Arrgh,” their leader cursed. “Come. Let’s find some other sap to harass!” He ordered them out of the grove, and they left for other prey.

Éldar lay for another minute among the earthy smell of the decaying yellow and brown matter, peeking quietly through the leaves as he watched their departure. As he watched them go, he saw their demons still flitting about them. He watched the misshapen creatures in mottled blacks and reds tearing into the boys, clawing their bodies and hacking them with their scimitars. He couldn’t help but wince, feeling a cold chill knowing the boys were unaware of their presence. It sickened him to watch their souls being rent. He watched as the boys’ Guardians followed their charges at a distance, a profound sadness in their gait.

Éldar looked up at his own two Guardians, whose voices had moments before guided his defense against the pack. They stood to either side of the pile of leaves where he lay; their shining swords were now sheathed, signaling that the danger had passed. Éldar tried to gauge their reaction to what had just occurred, but as was often the case, Rigel, on his left, just gazed out rather passively, while Sirius, on the right, just smiled his usual jovial smile and revealed nothing.

Studying them for a moment as he waited for the ruffians to move farther off, Éldar thought back as far as he could into his childhood and tried to remember the first time he had become aware of the Guardians. He always came to the same conclusion: They had always been there.

Usually standing one on each side of him, his Guardians appeared not transparent, as ghosts might appear, but instead seemed as real as anyone, yet brighter somehow, almost as if an aura surrounded each of them. They were real, and yet not, for when Éldar tried to touch them, his hand would pass right through as if they weren’t there. They walked as if their feet were on solid ground, but they were not hindered by it, and could descend into the earth if need be, or walk just as easily on water as on land. They could even float in the air when they desired. Their movement was not impeded by doors, nor stone, nor anything Éldar had ever observed, and even the weather failed to touch them. In rain, in blinding snow, or just standing in a roaring wind, they appeared to be totally unaffected, remaining dry and untouched by wind or any of the elements.

They were not ghosts. Tall they were, and royal featured. They looked human, yet seemed so much more so; somehow set apart from the race of men. They were handsome spirits, slender yet strong, with tan skin and flowing hair. Rigel, always laughing and full of mirth, had the look of one who was of a young age, not much more than a teen, while Sirius, always the more serious tempered, had streaks of grey at his temples. Éldar guessed that Rigel and Sirius had simply chosen images to fit their personalities because he was sure that both his Guardians were the same age, indeed ageless. He was sure because neither of his Guardians had aged a day in the ten years they had been at Éldar’s side.

The companions were dressed like warriors: clothes of silver, tall leather boots and breastplates of a chain link that twinkled. Over it all they wore golden cloaks. Each carried a broadsword sheathed at his side that shimmered like liquid fire when it was drawn, which Éldar observed they did very rarely. They wore no jewelry except for a large crystal that hung as a pendant around each of their necks. Their jewels appeared to be alike, and each shimmered as if it had captured the light of a thousand stars.

“Thanks, Rigel and Sirius, for helping me to get free of those bullies,” Éldar said gratefully as he stood up from the pile of leaves and swept the dusty bracken from his clothes. The Guardians smiled and nodded slightly. Éldar paid no more attention to them as he left the grove to head for home. Running from the ruffians had taken him even farther north and west, opposite the direction of his cottage. He knew now he probably wouldn’t make it back before dark. Nevertheless, Éldar decided to stick with his earlier plan and skirt Cheyne to the north rather than take a direct path back through town, though that meant adding miles to his trek. He did not want to repeat the taunting of earlier. He decided to continue north and then cut eastward across the moors. He left the grove of trees far behind and resumed the walk toward home.

The country north of Cheyne was mostly a treeless expanse of rolling hills blanketed with patches of bracken and heather, the valleys between filled with rivulets and watery bogs sprouting tiny islands of brown grass. As Éldar turned eastward to continue across this area of alternating thorny gorse and soggy mire, his own shadow stretched far out ahead of him as the setting suns behind cut long shadows along the hills. As the twin suns dropped below the horizon, a mist began to form in the moist, cool air. Sunlight was soon lost in a grey, featureless gloom. Éldar began to lose his way.

Éldar stopped as the mist grew heavier, unsure now which way was east. The blue sky and the golden twilight were lost to a world of grey, featureless terrain draped in fog. Éldar was lost. He did not panic, for he knew he had only to ask, and his Guardians would point the way. But as he turned to do precisely that, he found Rigel and Sirius both down on one knee, heads bowed.

“What is it?” he asked, and then he saw the Stranger.

Walking westward upon the moors, Éldar saw a tall Stranger cloaked and hooded in grey, crossing the heather in long, great strides, passing just a hundred yards north of Éldar’s course. Éldar felt a sudden, overwhelming feeling of peace flood through him, and he was struck with the desire to follow the Stranger. In fact, without realizing he had done it, he called out to him, but the Stranger paid him no heed.

The misty fog grew thicker and the Stranger began to fade from sight. Éldar turned to run after him but his Guardians stepped in front of him immediately, barring his way. Éldar ran right through them.

No, Sirius beckoned after Éldar. It is not yet time.

His warning was cryptic and strange, but Éldar hesitated for only a moment before rushing onward in pursuit. As he watched the tall Stranger walking ahead, something tugged at Éldar. There was something wrong with the Stranger, but Éldar couldn’t figure out what it was. He continued to give chase as the mist grew heavier still, and though Éldar sprinted as fast as he could, the Stranger dissolved away into the gloom and disappeared. Éldar could now see but a few feet in front of his own face. Nevertheless, he continued to rush in the direction the Stranger had been moving, calling out to him as he ran. His two Guardians ran beside him, glowing faintly in the dimness. Though Éldar was breathing heavily, they seemed not the least bit winded. The overwhelming desire to follow the Stranger continued, and Éldar quickened his headlong pace, though he could see but a few feet ahead.

Éldar, you must stop! There is danger ahead!

Éldar ignored his Guardians and kept running. Then, without warning, his feet left the ground and he was falling, his legs still churning in the air. He had run right off the edge of a large embankment, and now dropped like a stone into the narrow wash that had cut across his path. The heather clinging determinedly to the ravine’s edge gave way at the bottom to large boulders and stones protruding upward from a bog, which Éldar slammed into before crumpling at the bottom of the wet streambed. He had tried to land on his feet, but the streambed was too undulating, and Éldar landed with a sickly thud in the rocky bottom. Something snapped. A scream tore from his throat. His right leg burned with a fire, and his mind was flooded with excruciating pain.

He let out another agonizing yell as he reached downward and saw the blood on his breeches. A sharp, white bone protruded from his pant leg, surrounded by torn, bloody flesh. He lay still, but the pain was unbearable. Grasping clumps of brown grass in his fists, he cried aloud, rocking back and forth in a futile attempt to ease the horrific hurting. His Guardians knelt at his side and tried to comfort him, but their words were lost among the stabs of pain. Éldar saw blood shooting from the wound in repetitive spurts and knew he was going to die. Eerily, almost as if it was attracted to Éldar’s moaning, the mist closed in around him like a death shroud.

Suddenly, without warning, the cloaked and hooded Stranger appeared out of the mist, standing at the top of the gully. With one great leap he jumped down into the wash and landed nimbly next to Éldar. He knelt down, and lowered his great hood. Éldar forgot the pain in his leg at that moment, for he was awestruck by the Stranger’s appearance. Before him knelt one who was tall and fair of face, with golden locks and far-seeing eyes of deepest blue. But this was no man. He seemed to Éldar more like a God, or perhaps a Guardian who had cast off his armor and become flesh and blood. The Stranger’s face radiated. Peace and calm were in his eyes, and also a deepness of knowledge that seemed to span both future and past. But most strange of all were his ears. They lay flat against his head like normal ears, except they tapered gradually to pointed tips and had the shape of elm tree leaves.

The Stranger said nothing, but looked into Éldar’s eyes, and Éldar felt calmness in that gaze. His pain had returned, but was lessened. Still, the Stranger did not speak, but just reached up and took Éldar’s head in his hands. His touch was like nothing Éldar had ever felt before. A warmth of peace flooded through his pain-wracked body, pushing the pain out and into the hands of the Stranger. The Stranger smiled, and Éldar felt all his pain leave him.

After a moment, the Stranger turned his attention to Éldar’s leg wound. Éldar could see that the wound was still there, though he no longer felt pain from it. The Stranger placed his palm against the bloody bone that protruded from the torn flesh, and suddenly it was healed. Not bandaged or stitched, braced or splinted, but healed. All sign of the wound simply disappeared from Éldar’s leg. There was no pain, no scar, and no blood except that which remained on the torn pants.

Éldar could not believe his eyes. Tears welled up and began to run down his face, not out of fear or hurt, but because the Stranger’s touch had filled Éldar with the most overpowering feeling of love.

The Stranger took Éldar’s face again in one hand, smiling. He reached inside his cloak and produced a small curious object. He handed it to Éldar, who noted that it was made of some sort of crystal and contained a tiny spark of white light dancing within. Then the Stranger stood, raised his hood, turned, and with a single leap up the embankment, disappeared westward into the mist.

Éldar just lay there and watched him depart. Then he noticed his Guardians. As usual, they were on each side of him, but like before, they were down on one knee with heads bowed, just as he had seen them before the Stranger first appeared. It was then, as he looked at his Guardians, that Éldar realized what had been different about the Stranger. No Guardians accompanied him. Éldar had seen none, though his own still glowed beside him in the fog. No Guardians had accompanied the Stranger; no Guardians had stood off at a distance. They had been absent altogether, yet in their absence no demons had assaulted Him, rode upon His back, nor hacked at Him in their murderous fashion. The stranger had been totally alone.

Once more the feeling to follow the Stranger overwhelmed Éldar, and he jumped up with renewed strength to begin the chase again. He climbed out of the ravine, his leg feeling as good as new. But as he reached the top of the embankment, before his very eyes, the mist suddenly cleared. The sun had set, though its glow still lay on the far horizon, now revealed. The evening star glimmered in the western sky before him, heralding more stars soon to follow as evening wore on. Éldar looked in all directions and found from this spot he could see for miles, yet the Stranger was nowhere founding sight. He was gone.

Éldar asked his Guardians to point out where the Stranger had gone, but couldn’t. Their reason was strange.

He does not lay in any direction.

Éldar searched awhile more, but as night continued to fall he realized he must give up and return home. The urge to follow the Stranger slowly passed, replaced by a profound sadness, as if Éldar had missed the opportunity of a lifetime. Reluctantly giving up his search, he asked Rigel to point the way home. Apparently Éldar’s trek across the moors after the Stranger had only carried him farther from home, farther westward than he realized, for still the shortest way home went through town. This time, he started off straight toward the twinkling lights of Cheyne in the distance, as dusk deepened to darkness. Éldar no longer cared if he received ill treatment from the villagers; his encounter had left him changed.

Éldar never saw the violet skinned Nightshade stand up from its hiding place in the heather.

He had watched Éldar’s encounter with the Stranger, and now he began to follow him into the village. He saw the twinkling lights of Cheyne, and quickened his pace a little. He thought for a moment about spreading his great, bat-like wings and flying ahead of the boy, but decided against it.

“No matter if he makes the village,” he chuckled viciously. “I can kill him just as easily in front of the townspeople.” The Nightshade feared no one in Cheyne.

No sooner had Éldar started off when Rigel and Sirius drew their shining blades, signaling Éldar was in danger. Run Éldar, Run! Rigel commanded.

“What is it?” Éldar asked as he broke for the lights of town.

A Nil'Ganash hunts you. Sirius answered.

“A what?”

A Nightshade.

Éldar began to run, feeling a lump rise in his throat. Though he had been lucky enough to never see one, he knew well the dark tales of violet-skinned vampires. He sensed with despair that his luck was about to change. Behind him, the Nightshade saw him take off and quickened his pace.

Éldar, the Nightshade overtakes you. You will have to use the Limnos.

“The What?” He was now scared and confused.

The small sphere you were given. If the Nightshade approaches you, throw it to the ground in front of him, Sirius instructed.

Éldar saw the lamps of the village growing closer. He was going to make it.

Do not look at the sphere when it lands, Rigel continued, though he gave the last instruction with almost a laugh.

Éldar was surprised by his tone. How can he be so full of mirth all the time? I’m in great danger at the moment! He did notice that Rigel’s lightheartedness made him feel a little bit better, though. For a moment anyway, until he heard the flap of giant wings, as a dark shape landed in front of him, blocking his path into the village. The Nightshade had used his wings after all.

“You surprise me, Avanyar,” he said as he stood before the boy, in a voice that was almost melodious. “I can move rather silently when I desire. I find it curious that you detected me,” he said as he studied the boy for a moment. “No matter. Your luck has availed you not.” He took a step toward the boy, claws twitching with anticipation of what was to come.

Éldar stood frozen before his first Nightshade. He saw the thin, angular jaw, the prominent nose, the slicked back hair of midnight black, and the eyes that glowed with eerie, lavender light. He saw the violet skin, almost black in the darkness. And its voice, so haunting … so beckoning. Éldar felt mesmerized by it. He was oblivious to everything else around him; right up until his Guardians swung their mighty broadswords through the thing.

Their attack snapped him out of his daze. Whatever a Nightshade was, it was real, for their blades didn’t damage it in the least.

Wait, Éldar thought suddenly. Yes! There. As Rigel’s sword passed through the creature, he winced! He felt something. Then Éldar realized with horror that whatever he felt from Rigel’s sword was not slowing it down, for the Nil'Ganash was almost on him.

The Limno! Throw it!

The shout in his head was so loud it knocked the last of the mists that clouded his head away, and suddenly he was free to think and act again. He felt the crystal sphere in his right hand. He must have unconsciously drawn it from his pocket. Without hesitation he threw it at the feet of the Nightshade, remembering at the last second to close his eyes. And that was a good thing, for even through his closed lids he felt the blinding flash of light that erupted as the sphere hit the ground. It had felt so solid in his hand, unbreakable almost, yet it had shattered easily.

“Arrgh!” the Nightshade screamed, his eyes blinded by the sudden flash of a light brighter than the suns. He staggered back, arms covering his face as he shied away from the tiny but incredible blast.

What was in that sphere? Éldar slowly opened his eyes to see the Nightshade backing away. He heard Sirius again.

Run! Get to the village. The Limnos will only stun those who see its radiance. You must run.

Éldar took off again, running around the Nightshade which had fallen backward, driven to his knees and obviously in pain. The flash of light was already gone, though Éldar could still see spots in his vision where it had come through his eyelids. In minutes he was into the village, but he kept running, for Rigel and Sirius had not put away their swords.

Behind him, the Nightshade reeled for some time before the effects of the Limnos began to ebb.

“Azh Naga Limnos!” he cursed in his native tongue. “Calling forth the light of that accursed realm will cost you dearly,” he spat, finishing the sentence with a long snarl.

He shook off the last vestiges of the blinding sphere and started after the boy again, knowing he had probably reached the village. No matter, he thought, for he held no fear for the villagers, and knew their fear of him.

The spheres of Limnos are rare, little one. Do you have another, I wonder? It will avail you not, the Nightshade mused. I will not be so easily fooled again. The Nightshade walked into the village as darkness enveloped the land.