The Longest Road – Ch. 3 – 1: A Splinter in My Hand

  • "And then he managed to proclaim that eating people is a perfectly valid form of burial!  Can you believe that?" ranted Maurice, continuing what was, thus far, an hour long diatribe detailing the many ways Valindor upbraided and offended him.  "Bloody ridiculous is what I say.  Surely, you're a sensible enough person to take no part in that drivel!"

    "What I believe doesn't matter," I muttered tiredly.

    "Oh, but it does!  What you believe determines where you go when you die.  Heathens like that elf will only find themselves in Namira's foul darkness."

    I turned on the Breton, my temper rising at last.  His eyes were wide with alarm as he stared, terrified, down the length of my sword.  The deer I rode upon paused and snorted in curiosity.  "Enough with you," I growled.

    "A-are you going to kill me?"

    "No," I sighed, hesitating just long enough to drive my message home.  Of course, I had no intention of actually killing him.  At that moment, knocking him unconscious and leaving his body for a guard to find sounded like the most appealing option.  We continued on down the road from Whiterun--a road I remembered as if from a dream.  Technically, it had been a dream, or a vision, for I slept overrun with fever, but had seen through the eyes of my companion Derkeethus.

    The deer strode across the cobbles, hooves clacking in a steady rhythm.  Rain poured over us, slowly drenching our clothes and pattering with a soft hiss in the grass.  Maurice stumped behind me, muttering dark curses to the dog.  We passed a traveling bard, who eyed our party warily.

    "Well, there's a sight you don't normally see," declared the bard.  Then, his feet splashed in the mud as he ran to catch up with us.  "I know you!" he said, looking up at me shrewdly.  His head swiveled and peered about.  "Where's your lizard friend?"

    "He's gone," I replied bluntly.

    "Oh...  Oh!  I'm very sorry, miss.  Had I known him better, I would have composed a mighty eulogy in his honor."

    'I'm afraid someone has already taken care of that matter."

    "I see.  Well, mayhap I can top his efforts.  Ahem..." the bard preened, clearing his throat.  After a breath, he started to sing, every note off-key and mutilated by his over-large teeth.  Our hands clapped over our ears.  Meeko howled discordantly.  Only the deer seemed to enjoy the 'music'.

    "Sir, truly you do Kynareth a discredit with such horrendous caterwauling!  You must cease and desist at once!" bellowed Maurice.  In vain, I attempted to regain the bard's attention, but I found I didn't need to when he stopped to crescendo into a finale.  Silently, we hurried up the hill and lost sight of him on the other side.  We heard the bard's creaky voice howl into the sky for the next mile.

    I kept up the fast walk until the shadows strengthened and the clouds overhead thinned into a vague mist.  The sun was weak and watery, and I shook and wrung out my hood, laying it across the deer's flanks to dry.  Maurice shivered in his damp clothes, for a cold breeze blew continuously over the hills.  We passed through fragrant lavender towards a tower with a bridge spanning a shallow river canyon that lay splayed open a quarter of a mile ahead, water tumbling away over an unseen edge.  In my mind's eye, I was riding through wind and rain on my horse, Nael, scaly hands gripping the reins.  I plunged by the tower and the image stilled.  There.  In the corner of my vision slouched a woman--a bandit.

    "What are you doing?" asked Maurice nervously.  Slowly, I drew my bow as we neared the tower, steering the deer with my knees.  The air seemed suddenly very tense and still.  Light reflecting off the water to my left hurt my eyes with its shimmer.  The shadows told me it was close to midday.

    "Bandits," I whispered, at last.  Sensing my intentions, Meeko's ears turned in every direction and a low growl rumbled in his throat.  His hackles rippled to life along his back, like waves of grass shuddering across a wide plain.

    The tower approached far too slowly, as if I rode a snail instead of a swift beast of the forest.  When we were almost abreast, I raised my bow, arrow drawn, looking about slowly.  Nothing moved.  My arrow pointed at the door leading to the tower.  A cooking pot squatted nearby, forgotten, its contents congealed into a foul, moldy mass.  We paused.  Maurice trotted up to the door, and rapped loudly with a stone.

    "Hello?  Anyone there?" he called.

    The breath I'd been holding rushed out in a huff.  "Maurice!  What are you trying to do?  Get yourself killed?" I hissed, darting my gaze about for movement.  Yet, all was still and eerily quiet.  Filled with a vague unrest, I turned backwards on my mount as the deer proceeded down the road that I knew would lead to a deep valley containing all of Eastmarch.  My bow remained drawn; my muscles and senses remained tense.

    "Looks like no one's home," he mused.

    "Brilliant.  Now, get over here!  They could start shooting at us at any moment!" I barked, utterly frustrated by this unarmed man with no sense of caution or self-preservation.  Maurice followed obediently enough, though he continued to cast backward glances at the towers for some time.  The coarse coughing of a raven made us jump.  Meeko barked angrily at the sound, as if accusing it of breaking his concentration.  Yet, the bird's call seemed to break a spell binding us and we relaxed.

    At length we came to the bottom of the valley, where the river rejoined its course after plunging suicidally from the cliffs above.  It took every ounce of my will to press onward and avoid staring at the bank off to my left.  My home used to be there, and I had no wish to see that dilapidated place.  No wish whatsoever to relive the pained memories that haunted me while I had lingered in that ruin after returning from my journey.  Such time wasted picking at the dried skin of a goat's corpse that I couldn't manage to clear away.  It stood for the entirety of my existence in that moment.  Maurice, however, was oblivious to my conscious inattention.

    "What's this?  A house?  I wonder who lives there..." he queried, running to the side of the road to peer down through the foliage.

    "No one lives there.  It's just a ruin."

    "But someone has to!  There's a pile of wood, and it looks like a garden in the middle.  Who built this place?  We should look into it, elf.  Maybe they need guidance on the Words of Kynareth."

    "We will do no such thing," I replied dully.

    "But--"  His feet stopped following me for a while, and I knew he was investigating the ruins.  I, however,  rode onward, slowly and inexorably approaching another place I secretly dreaded seeing once more.  Eventually, he caught up to me, and I heard Meeko's nails clicking along with him.  Good boy, Meeko. Protecting him while I couldn't, I thought.

    "You left me behind!" the Breton accused.

    "No.  I said we weren't going to be exploring that ruin, and I meant it," I stated levelly.  Part of me was dearly hating this journey.  The closer we came to Darkwater Crossing, the bleaker my mood turned.  I missed Valindor and his smile terribly, but missing the mer awakened a desolate kind of loneliness and guilt.  I shouldn't be missing my new friend, when my old, fallen one's soul waited somewhere in some terrible realm to be reclaimed and returned to its rightful place.  That was my intention, was it not?  I was going to bring him back, but for the first time since obsessing over the destination of Derk's soul, I wondered if I would be doing the right thing.

    "Oh, blessed be Kynareth!  A town!" cried Maurice.  The careening spiral of my thoughts was broken, and I looked up to see Darkwater Crossing sleeping in the mist of a late afternoon.  At least we weren't far from completing our pilgrimage.

Comments

2 Comments
  • Kynareth
    Kynareth   ·  July 1, 2013
    I think you captured Maurice quite well in this entry...his over zealous nature is infuriating enough to make a non-violent person want to pop him on the chin!  But he is helpful in the fact that he helped Gwiahen realize that she values Valindor's compan...  more
  • Matt Feeney the New Guy
    Matt Feeney the New Guy   ·  April 23, 2013
    >:O I know that bard wasn't supposed to be Talsgar, that guy is awesome!