Chapter 6-gods and gifts

We lern about the gods of this strange land and are given a couple of things that will come in handy in our travels... like a blanket to keep warm at night!

CHAPTER 6

GODS AND GIFTS

 

We stayed with the elves for a few days and practiced fighting. However because Surine was the only one with any real skill when he was fighting one of us we would fight mainly to make us faster and stronger. After a week of this all day every day we made our way to the practice fields (which were off to the side of the small arena) to find Surine standing there without his sword.

“Unstrapped your weapons and leave them there” he said pointing to a spot on the ground. We did so.

“This is Ankres he will train you today and I will watch you and shout insults as you fail to beat him” Surine said with a sly smile as another elf stepped forward. Ankres was a bulky elf that unlike the other elves had muscles to show. The other elves were slim and while they were strong you could see no muscles Ankres was strong and showed it. He was baled and had one of those short beards that don’t hang down of the chin because it’s too short to do anything but sit there covering your chin. Ankres was wearing only a pair of pants and seemed to have the personality of someone that likes showing off their strength and can fight but is really a friendly Giant

“Emily come here” Surine called her pointing opposite Ankres.

“Is your pendant active?”

“No” Emily replied.

“Activate it now” Surine said. “You’re going to need it” as I puzzled this out Emily activated her pendant. Then I realised what was happening.

“Emily watch out it’s a fight with...”

“Fight!” Surine said and Ankres punched Emily three times in the stomach so fast if I had blinked I would have missed it then before Emily could recover Ankres Lifted one leg and kicked Emily in the chest and sent her sprawling on the ground.

“...fist and feet” I finished weakly.

“Thanks Matt!” Emily said sarcastically. And for another week we fought using our hands and feet. Half way through the week we strapped on our weapons and would fight using our hands and feet so we could learn to move and not let our weapons get in the way This caused us all to move awkwardly at first and Amy even managed a couple of spectacular falls. By the end of the week we were fighting with our hands and feet and then midway drawing our swords and fighting with weapons. Then Surine told us the Qweex wanted to see us so the next day we went to the same dome roofed room we had first met the queen of the elves in.

“soon you must set out” she said” but to send you out without some general knowledge of this world will doom you from the start” she waved her hands and a elf ran forward with a few pieces of flat bark the Qweex showed them to us on each was a picture of a man or woman in each picture the artiste had given the figure a faint glow each was a different colure. The first picture the Qweex showed us was a Woman in White and her glow was the same colour of her clothes. White.

“This is Nogohpmm goddess of all”

“So the name of your god reflects that which she is?” I Asked quickly translating Nogohpmm into three words nog, oh, and pmm and from there into English, god of all.

“Only some, for example” the elvan queen said “this is Quintas the god of Trickery and promises.”

“Never trust him in other words” Daniel said “he promises something but it’s a trick so watch out!”

“On the contrary it is because of his trickery that he is the god of promises. Surine would you like to tell them the story?” We all jumped when Surine stepped out of the shadows we hadn’t seen him and I’m certain he had meant to do it as I saw a small mischievous twinkle in his eyes that seemed to say ‘gotcha.’

“for a long time life in the world was pleasant and people went about their lives happily wars came and went but none had he destructive force of  what came to be known as ‘The promised war.’ It started with a promise a single man and his woman went to the king and queen. They told them they could make the king and queen gods and asked for one thing in return, The thrones that would be left empty when the king and queen became gods and ascended to take their place with the other gods would go to the couple. The catch was that the couple had to be crowned as king and queen before they would make the current king and queen gods the king and queen accepted and the very night the new king and queen were crowned believing they would be with the gods as gods when they woke. Woke with the gods as a man and his wife who had been a king and queen les then a day before. They had in the night been brutally stabbed. The new king and queen ruled just as well as the ones they had tricked and then murdered for it was they who had held the knifes that had been plunged into the chest of the dead king and queen. But they made others promises so they could gain and suddenly the death rate soared. Every time they gained from someone there was a murder. Then other things started to go wrong first for 2 years there was a famine and when finally it ended many had died and all were starving a year later there were homeless on the streets eating whatever they could living in grime and dirt. Cutting purses and stealing getting hanged for taking half a loaf of bread. However the homeless touched food that they did not end up taking and the germs they had from living in the streets transferred to food that was later eaten. And it’s there that the plague started many died and no one had a cure it until one man from another land visited he was one of the first ever magical healers and he could cure all. Suddenly the king became sick. Worried the queen sent for this man that could cure anything. And he came took one look at the king and asked what he would be given in return for curing the king the queen offered him  many things but each he declined in the end the queen in her frustration cried out that she had offered all except her and her husband’s crown and the man said the crown was decent price the queen refused but the king got sicker and sicker and every day the healer would come and ask if the king was dead yet finally in her worry. She accepted the healer’s terms the healer waved his hands over the king mumbling nonsense and doing nothing then turned to the queen saying he will not be healed immediately. A week later the king no longer had a cold. It turned out that this healer was a ruler of another land and no matter how hard the king and queen tried they could not kill him but they never gave him the crown finally sick of waiting the healer said ‘have your crown I will never rule a land that is dishonest I promise’ and 2 weeks later his army marched on the city it is said that the last words uttered by the king was ‘But you promised.’ And the queen escaped only to be captured by thugs that forced her to sell her body to other men and one night she was stabbed by a man who was in a drunken rage. Now the gods knew what happened and the land was completely destroyed and very sick so the gods decided they needed a god of promises. And at the time there was also a young and new god called Quintas he was the god of trickery and the gods were sick of him tricking them so they made him the god of promises too. Quintas must strike down any man or woman that makes a promise on his name and breaks it. The gods could no longer be tricked for every time he tried they would ask him to swear on his own name that it was not a trick or deception” Surine finished and bowed to the queen.

“I did not mean the entire story Surine as enjoyable as it was. A simple the gods needed a promise god and were sick of being tricked would have sufficed.” The elvan queen said. “But yes it is true. This is Quintas”  she said holding out a picture of a man in dark blue the shine he emitted however was not blue but green which made the picture look rather strange. The next picture was of another woman in bright red with a red glow.

“The goddess of love her name is Loasina” I stared at the picture. It looked exactly like Amy.

“She’s hot!” Daniel said. Ryan was nodding his head vigorously agreeing with Daniel.

“Hey!” I said then stoped confused Ryan would never agree that a girl that looked exactly like Amy was hot.

“Are we seeing different pictures?” I asked the elvan queen. She smiled before nodding

“men will see a picture of a woman that is to them attractive however the women will see her true form which is still very beautiful” she held out another goddess “Gepkri goddess of death” the glow surrounding the woman was Yellow which I thought would have been more suited to a god or goddess of something other than death. “Mihe God of Life” The man was bald and fat like a budda but his arms showed muscles giving him a strange look. And he gave of an orange glow. “And finally there is Gelkywtkiox”

“Who?!” Daniel asked

“Gelkywtkiox” the Qweex repeated

“What?!” Daniel said this time.

“Gelk something or rather” Amy said.

“ywtkiox” Surine said.

“Huh?” Daniel said finally.

“Gelkywtkiox... destruction?” I asked “god or goddess?”

“God and the one you want to please but keep away from the most for every bit of evil in this land is his doing and as destruction is his to control he can control tools of destruction like war he cannot decide the outcome but he can make a huge difference. This is him” it was a simple picture the elvan queen held up this god was also bald but he was thin and tall giving of a grey glow. “You must remember these gods as they will be useful in your travels you must appear to be from this world which means you would have grown up knowing about each of them. Now before you go we have some things to give you” 5 elves ran forward and handed each of us a green roll tied with a short piece of rope. “when you untie the these shake them or lay them on the ground and roll them out and they will change size and become a full sized bed roll the next day simply roll them up again and they will shrink back to their current size.” We were then handed a piece of rope about 30 centimetres long. “this is pocket rope it extends in length as you tie it or if you hold it in the grove, between your thumb and index finger, with your right hand and then slide your hand towards the end it will extend then you do the same with your left hand to shorten it again it will not get any shorter than 30 centimetres though I doubt that will be a problem.” Suddenly the elves were shoving a single arrow into our hands

“This arrow is very rare and can only be used once. We only have 5 and we are giving them to you so use them wisely. They are a zip line or a climb in rope. You simply fire it and then touch what you want it to reach your end saying ‘toxxetk’ and a rope will appear under your hand that will extend if you start to tie it around something will hold your weight and that is connected to the end of the arrow the arrow will stick in anything you fire it at and not move after 3 days it will simply dissolve. We however have one final gift for you Surine stepped forward and the elf Kyilkpx and another female elf I didn’t recognise came into the domed area. “We, being me Kyilkpx and Irana, are going to travel with you for a while” Surine said. The female elf, who I guessed was Irana, handed Surine his sword. Which he strapped on and then confirmed her identity as Irana by saying “thank you Irana.” Kyilkpx also had very long sword strapped across his back, but he carried about six daggers just above his stomach 3 on the left and 3 on the right. Irana was a tall slim and beautiful elf with a quiver full of arrows and powerful recurve bow on her back and a single dagger at her hip. “Now” the Qweex said “Go!”