The Day of Fire

A former prince is forced to abandon his kingdom in the wake of an attack that destroyed everything he loved. In his company is an elderly mentor who is guiding him somewhere far, far north.

Prince Revan Dolera of the Korlar Kingdom was staring out the window of his chamber intently watching the marines of the Korlar Infantry attempt to begin the training of a new regimen. He had long honey-brown hair that he had tucked behind his ears to keep out of his face. He was clean-shaven, although he probably couldn’t have grown a beard anyways. He was a rather plump teenager of about eighteen years. He was speaking to Lela, who was a close friend of his since he was very young. She had golden hair and was covered in what seemed to be blood-birth marks on the side of her face and throughout her arms, although this did not reduce the beauty of her, if anything, it enhanced it. 

“Lela, we should visit the stables today and see how our friends are doing.” By friends, Revan was obviously referring to the two war stallions that were given to Revan and Lela from a previous diplomatic engagement with Revan’s father and an enemy tribesman.  Lela smiled at him, “I think that’s a great idea Rev, it sounds a lot better than watching spoiled petite little boys fall on their arses repeatedly.”  Revan laughed, she was right after all, this new group of recruits were nothing more than unblooded noble children who were to become officers someday. This was a ritual of the Korlar Kingdom, and helped keep a reserve of noble officers for times of war.  Revan agreed that he had enough of watching the recruits for a day, and after all he enjoyed Lela’s company and was looking forward to spending the day with her. Revan smiled at her. “Good. Let’s try and stay hidden from the guards, I’d rather not have a most boring day with those fools hovering over us.”

 Revan awoke suddenly. Every time he woke now it took him a moment to realize that his reality was nothing similar to the days of past he constantly dreamed about. He should’ve known it was just a dream, yet the very little amount of foolish hope left inside him still grasped for any memory of his old life. At one point in his life, he was a prince, or so he was told. It had seemed like so long since those days that Revan’s mind was starting to wonder if any of it was ever real, or just an imaginative story his tired mind had come up with to torture him more on a daily basis.

Murlack’s wrinkled hand was on Revan’s shoulder, as it seemed to be almost every time Revan woke up frightened and confused these days. They were in the middle of a vast forest, somewhere far to the north of his old home, the Korlar Kingdom. They had been travelling for months together, although it had seemed like years. Revan was thankful though that they both had managed to escape the castle with horses, as he would most likely have died on the trek having to manage it on foot. On the Day of Fire, while everyone in the castle was being slaughtered meticulously, Murlack was somehow able to retrieve Revan before the assassins made it to the stables where Revan and Lela were tending to their horses. In the confusion and panic of the situation, Lela and Revan were split up, and Revan had a glimpse of a white-masked woman in a long white robe with a ceremonial white dagger in her hand forcefully grabbing Lela as Murlack hurried Revan’s horse and his towards the gates of the kingdom. Revan repeatedly pleaded and yelled at Murlack to go back and try and help Lela, and the rest of his friends and family. But Murlack was relentless and would not turn around, and was holding the rope attached to Zinc, Revan’s horse. Revan was sure Lela was dead, as not many could’ve survived the slaughter that ensued that day.  As a matter of fact, Revan had already given up all hope of any of his friends and family members being alive still, he had seen the destruction that happened that day, and he was no fool after all.

 

Murlack spoke, while picking something out of his teeth with some sort of animal bone. “The good or bad dream, boy?” Murlack was not naïve to the fact Revan’s dreams haunted him on most nights. Murlack was Revan’s mentor of sorts, although to Revan he seemed just a kind, confused old man most days.  Murlack had been in Revan’s life since he was born, and assisted in raising Revan while Revan’s father was away from the kingdom during conquests, which tended to be very frequently. There were rumors throughout the kingdom that Murlack had once been a powerful sorcerer who had commanded a group of magic-wielding acolytes serving Revan’s father. But those were just rumors, if Murlack had any sort of wisdom or magic, Revan had yet to see it and doubted he ever would.  

Revan answered. “I dreamed of that day, and of Lela again. I’m fine Murlack, just tired is all. Hungry as well, is there any rabbit left?”   

“I saved you a leg, but eat it sparingly lad, as this is the last of our food and we have a long journey ahead of us today,” replied Murlack.

 “We have a long journey ahead of us every day Murlack, you’ve led me hundreds of miles north of our Kingdom, and still have yet to give me the slightest idea of why, and what in the bloody hell happened that day.” There was obvious frustration and desperateness in Revan’s voice. Revan mentioned these things almost on a daily basis, but never seemed to get any information out of Merlak nonetheless.

Murlack stared at him, his eyes looking numb with a sad smile on his face. “In due time lad, in due time. Now, fetch your sword and we shall begin.”

 

Revan was no longer as thick as he once was, having to eat much less now than he was accustomed to in the past being a prince. Between the lack of food and daily combat exercises that Murlack forced Revan to complete, Revan was actually pushing on the side of becoming thin for the first time in his life. Every morning Murlack would retrieve his solid black oak staff and force Revan to attempt to spar with him. When these exercises first began, Revan thought it was silly, he could seriously injure the old man with his sharp blade after all. To Revan’s astonishment however, Murlack showed no signs of the crippled old man that he was during their sessions. Revan could not explain it, Murlack had to have been in his eightieth year of life, his hands constantly trembled, and he walked with a limp at all times. Yet when he fought with Murlack, he moved with such swiftness and intensity that he seemed possessed.  Revan would finish each day with cuts and scrapes, and a severely bruised ego. He was glad no one was ever around to see their sessions, because a prince is not supposed to lose a duel with an elderly man every damned morning.

There was no question though that Revan was becoming a fair swordsman because of Murlack, and Revan was thankful for that. However, he had absolutely no idea the importance of training when his kingdom was gone, there was no hope or anything else to do but roam with this crippled old man until they both died due to starvation or being attacked by rogue bandits. 

Nonetheless, the dueling sessions with Murlack helped pass the time between the mind-numbing travelling that happened every day. Murlack was not exactly skilled in conversation, so their travels made for very long and very boring days. He would often randomly chuckle and smile staring up into the sky when any type of bird flew by, and Revan had no idea what for. He believed Murlack probably had an unwanted bowel movement in his robe or something trivial and was senile enough to find it humorous. However, although Murlack was not the best travelling companion in terms of excitement, Revan was secretively happy that Murlack was leading him, wherever the hell it was that Murlack was leading him. Murlack was like an estranged grandfather to him after all.

After completing the day’s vigorous dueling session with Murlack, Revan was drenched in sweat and panting heavily. Murlack seemed to not be tired in the least bit and slowly sat down with his legs crossed and his staff lying across the top of his knees. Murlack’s eyes were closed as they were every time he did this, and Revan knew it would be at least a half hour until Murlack came out of whatever it is he was doing. Crazy old b*****d, thought Revan.

“I’m going to look for food Murlack. Not that you can hear me anyway.” Revan set out into the forest with the homemade bow Murlack had made on his back and his sword on his hip. He wasn’t very good with the bow, but if he found an animal fat and slow enough, he at least had a chance at possibly hitting something, alas a rather minute chance. He covered himself in dirt in an attempt to blend in with the forest around him and slumped down at the base of a tree. He waited patiently, thinking of his old life, of Lela, of what happened that day. Being exhausted and distractingly daydreaming of another life, he began to drift…

 

CHAPTER 2

 

“Look what we got here boys, looks like someone’s a bit lost to me, don’t y’think?” Revan awoke alarmingly, to be staring into the face of a heavily scarred and bearded man that smelled of wine and vomit, holding a blade to Revan’s throat. The man had greying hair down to his shoulders, although he looked not a day over his fortieth year under the sun.

 

“Waddya know Gnarvin? The old pup is awake. Let’s cut his ears off since he can’t hear s**t anyways. As loud as Junia was when we seen the boy, he must be deaf to not have woken from his slumber. Dreaming of pies and great halls no doubt, by the looks of this pretty one.” Said one of the men behind the bearded man.

 

“Oh keep y’damn axe in your pants, Cyraxe. You’re gonna scare the poor boy into pissing his trousers, and that wouldn’t be no fun for no one. Looks about as harmless as a butterfly even with that stick on his belt.”

 

The man named Gnarvin pulled the blade from Revan’s throat, and Revan could see more clearly now. There were four men and a woman surrounding him. All of them were wearing cloaks with obvious red leather armor hidden underneath, with emblems that resembled a badly shaped worm.

 

Gnarvin saw Revan staring at the emblem on his cloak, smiled, and said “Oh you’re aware of the Blood Lizards are’ya?”

 

“I am not sir, but I thought it was a worms with horns,” replied Revan.

The woman, looking bored with her arms crossed in the background snorted. “Those are supposed to be little legs, lad.”

Cyraxe looked furious. “SON OF A B***H! Gnarvin, I told you lot that man who made these was as dumb as an ox. He had one good eye for fucksake. It’s not a f****n’ worm, boy, it’s a lizard. That’s it I’m going back to that village and cutting that man’s dick off and feedin’ it to his goats. We ain’t the damn Blood Worms.”

Revan was shocked by the man’s outburst. His eyes bounced between them quickly, as his heartrate continued to increase.

Gnarvin, who seemed to be the leader, if you could call him that, spoke next. “We’ll get the damn emblems fixed later, right now we have to figure out what to do with this one. I guess I could introduce all of us, considering we’re probably gon’ have to kill ya anyways unfortunately. And these lot love to introduce themselves before killing, it’s like a ritual for the b******s.”

“I’m Gnarvin, I don’t too much like noble-born, and I love me a good woman. Except that one over there, she’s more of a wild boar than a woman, the b***h. Pretty sure she ain’t got woman parts, actually she probably got a bigger member than Cyraxe over there. We love her though, tougher than a bear, and meaner than s**t to boot.”

“F**k off Gnar.” Said the one named Cyraxe. He was the tallest of the bunch, and had a massive scar on his right eye that gave his face the resemblance of an evil wink that was sarcastic and violent in nature. It seemed he was still able to see out of the slit that his eyelids had become since the scar. “I’m Cyraxe, boy. And if you stare at me like that again I’ll cut your feet off and tie’em to those soft hands of yours and make you climb a burning tree with your pants down.”

“Oh cut the s**t Cy,” the woman interjected. 

She was a burly woman, with short black hair tucked into a bun under her hood. She might have resembled something attractive at one point in her life but it was obvious that the scars and whatever she had been through had changed that. She had a soothing voice though surprising enough. She was just as large as Gnarvin and Cyraxe, and wielded two longswords on both sides of her hips. 

“Don’t mind him, boy. He ain’t been laid by anything other than a woodland deer in years, you’d probably be a bit agitated too if only thing your dick had been in was your own fat hand since birth.”

 

Cyraxe shrugged and gave the woman an obscene gesture, and proceeded to let her continue.

“My name is Tusks, on account of these two man-killers on my hips. And because these sons of b*****s love to call me a she-boar. The man on my right is Sealer, or that’s what we call him at least. He don’t open his mouth too much, but sure as hell knows how to seal a wound like nobody’s business. Not too bad with those throwing axes in his belt either, fortunately for us.”

 

Sealer was a short thick man, resembling a tree-stump, with massive hairy arms and a thick black beard covering his wide face. He had big bushy eye-brows that seemed to almost cover his eyelids and made it seem impossible he could see anything more than an arms length in front of him. Out of nowhere, he grunted and pulled out one of the axes at his hip, and threw it towards Revan so quickly Revan had no idea what had happened until he felt wind blow the hairs on the top of his head. The axe landed with a thump in the spot in the tree directly above his head, trimming some of the hairs sticking up on his head. “I think that’s better than not bad, she-boar,” Sealer exclaimed with a grunt.

Author's Note

It is just the beginning, and I will definitely be making changes. It took me a few hours today, I just wanted to know if anyone finds it interesting enough for me to continue. Or if anyone has any critiques for whatsoever.

Reviews

[Number Six]

While doing homework, I decided I'd check up on WC to see if any new writer had done anything that would interest me.
Came across your story. Thought to myself that it might be a Sci-fi story. First thing I noticed was how long it was. I tried to read just the first chapter, but I was unable to finish and had to read all of it.

I liked it, and think you should continue.
The pacing was nice, the main character's interesting enough, and the blood-worms' banter was actually funny enough to make me laugh out loud.

Good job.

If you continue this in any way, I'd sure like to read it.

-Number Six

[FirstTimer]

Thanks for the read! That's awesome that I could make you laugh. I could have put the longer part at the beginning into paragraphs to not seem so overwhelming, which I might do now. Thank you again! I love writing but am new to posting things online like this. I will definitely continue to write this, and hopefully you come back and read it!