Fable: Wrath

Chapter One: The Hall of Heroes

Akuji lived about four miles from the world famed Arena but still, he had only visited the Arena once, four and a half years ago; the only time his father had agreed to take him. Most people that went to the Arena came from the mainland. Tourists came from every corner of Albion; most of them were from the big cities such as Bowerstone, Oakvale, and Kingswood, but there was a strong attendance from smaller towns like Hook Coast, Lynchfield and Fische Coast. Yet, some times, like when Akuji had gone to the Arena, people from other lands came on boat to watch and fight at the Arena.

Some years, especially every five years when the competitions lasted for a whole month, people would come from far away lands. Some of them were slender and tall and beautiful, with blue eyes and blonde silky hair. They called themselves Elves and mastered English very easily; however, their language was beautiful and complex, and one no one other than an Elf could speak it. Their ears were long and pointed and their voices smooth and beautiful.

The Elves came in majestic ships, made of beautiful wood and expertly crafted with impressive décor. Their craftsmanship of wood made even the Xahons look inexperienced.

Elves came mainly too fight, and their warriors fought gracefully in the Arena; excelling with their incredible marksmanship and lighting quick bodies. Elves also brought a lot of gold to Albion and they loved gambling and many other games that involved gold; so every five years, Knothole Glade filled itself with tourists and temporary casinos.

Others looked a lot like the people of Albion, but they were about a foot shorter than most people in Albion. They were called Dwarves, and came mostly to trade with the locals, and sell their excellent smith crafts. Some of the most famous blades of history, like the Sword of Aeons were crafted by Dwarves. None match the Dwarves in the areas of building out of stone and iron and precious metals. The very few men who have gone to their cities and gazed upon their wonderful architecture find it hard to express with words its beauty.

Knothole Glade was full of tourists who came to visit the Arena. Once every six months the town's inn would get overbooked for the regular competitions which where held every two years. The inn consisted of four large buildings that could house about a twelve hundred people. The Arena had its own inn and pubs but people liked the idea of sleeping inside wooden houses and staying at Knothole Glade was a lot cheaper than at the Arena. When the Elves came for the Arena's extensive competitions held every five years, they booked every single room in Knothole, some even stayed at the houses of Knothole's residents. Four and a half years ago an Elf had stayed at Akuji's house, he participated at the games and won first place overall. Akuji's father only took him that once because the Elf had convinced him that Akuji should go and see him fight.

The trip left Akuji wanting to go again, but his father refused. Yet, the Elf that came to his house inspired Akuji to train himself so that one day, he might battle in the Arena.

Every six months for the duration of the competitions, Knothole Glade was packed with visitors and the economy boomed. During those times the village also got crowded by eager traders who came from all over the world to trade between themselves and to sell goods the tourists. They would set up their own camp in a small area dubbed accordingly Trader's Plaza and it would become a large trading market. After the tourists and traders had cleared the area the extra money was always spent on enlarging the forest village that was well on its way into becoming a major city.

Years before Akuji was born the village had only five buildings of different sizes enclosed in a tight wooden barrier. The two smaller buildings were sleeping quarters with a room for each family. Another building was a storage facility, and after that were the blacksmith and the mayor's house. People who lived there mainly worked for the Arena or cultivated in a small plantation to keep the settlement alive. Knothole's only goal back then was to survive and to provide weaponry and other supplies for the Arena.

The town quickly grew and it expanded backwards with a serpentine main road with branches, each named after one of the original twelve families of Knothole Glade. By the time Akuji was born everyone who lived in town had their own house and job; the town was thriving and expanding its economy into other areas like fur, lumber, and coal trading. There were three main plazas, aside from Trader's Plaza, the original one, another one where the village branched out in two and one final one at the end of the main road. The last one led to a dead end about 100 yards after the last branching road. It went up and ended in a cliff. The hill stood way over the trees surrounding the village and provided a good panoramic view of the Arena to the north and on the eastern horizon, past the sea, the lands of Albion. The sunrise and sunsets from there were beautiful; having all of Albion around you, the trees, the far away lands, the mountains, the sea, nothing matched its beauty.

A new pebbled road had been added from the income received six months ago and the town fortifications were slowly being changed to a stone wall. In another six months, when the Arena hosted it's month long competition and Elves came, the gold from the competitions would be enough to finish the fortifications and pebble roads.

That was only if the Arena continued to be successful. Akuji had overheard his father talking with the mayor and other adults about it. They all had agreed that Mr. Tranter, the town mayor, should talk to Arena officials about making different competitions, longer rounds and adding twists to the Arena to keep it fresh. It was because the town's mayor economic growth in the last thirty years had been caused by intelligently using the Arena seasons to bring profits to the village and a struggling Arena would stop the growth of Knothole Glade. Mr. Tranter had already negotiated with Arena officials and rumors of a 'special' round had spread around.

Adults worried about those things, kids were kids. Akuji never though about those kind of things before, but now he was almost a grown man; and even if he didn't agree with his father, he had already been trained by his father to take over the family business; which depended heavily from the Arena, as they were considered the best smith crafter's in town.

The day was just beginning for Akuji as he woke up late in the afternoon, he had stayed late last night, and usually found himself waking up at four in the afternoon or later, more so when he went to bed after the sunrise. During the summer, when the sunsets and sunrises where shaded with tones of pink and purple, sometimes Akuji would go to sleep after the sunrise and wake up in time for the sunset and the stars.

As he got up from bed Akuji noticed a small hand written note on his bedside table. It was set in place by small stack of gold coins. Akuji read it and had no choice but to follow his mother's orders to go and buy supplies.

Before doing his daily chores Akuji walked over in front of the mirror and looked at his reflection. Mirrors where very rare in Albion, expensive and hard to get.

None of his features were sharp; he wasn't chubby, Akuji had just enough fat on him to make his chin curve smoothly. His belly had gone away in the last months when Akuji finally started training himself seriously. He had started by getting into shape, and growing muscles. Where there was once a soft abdomen, his crunches and exercises where starting to take effect. From push-ups and pull ups his upper body had began to take shape too; and his lower body had not fallen behind, either.

Akuji stepped closer to the mirror. He had not shaved yesterday, and a strong shadow had grown; with his dagger Akuji trimmed it down before leaving his house. Pimples where rarely a problem with Akuji, but in the past week there had appeared quite a few all around his face. His hair was nice and messy, and his eyes looked rested and energetic. Thinking about Amissa, Akuji smiled a bit in front of the mirror.

Akuji walked up the main road to buy a few supplies from the last remaining traders that had been around for the competitions. He knew his friends would be there soon, but he thought he could count on some time before feeling jealous and sad inside, but he would have to make best of the few second before his friends would spot him and rush his mind with tales of glory and battle. He spotted Amissa long before she would spot him and had a long time to gaze at her beauty. Her silk-like light brown hair always waved when she walked and with those dark blue eyes and soft acne free skin, her hips and her perfectly sized ears and nose and her gorgeous shiny lips…

She noticed him and he quickly looked away at Coy who walked besides her, trying to pretend he hadn't been drooling at the sight of her. As his friends approached that became easier and easier to do because he was getting all sad inside. He had avoided them for the past week, but they probably understood why perfectly. Amissa hugged him tightly when she got close to him and tried to cheer him up. "I'm sorry your father didn't let you go, Kuji. But I brought you this." She stepped back and browsed her red leather bag for Akuji's gift.

Meanwhile, Coy had started to talk about how amazing the competition had been. "You should have seen it! It was wild, I missed the first day, but the real competition began on the second. Twister was unstoppable, but you should've…" Amissa punched Coy in the back, hard, and he stopped talking.

She gave him an angry look and turned to give Kuji his present. It was a six inch Twister figurine, she had remembered after all; even though he didn't ask her directly, not that he gave her an indirect request either. "And you know what's better? This statue is going to be worth a lot in the future."

"What do you mean?" He was puzzled, surely it would be worth something; Twister was a legend of the Arena. It was no surprise to him that the figurine would be worth a lot. Twister had been the only one to be able to fight alongside the Elves four years ago without looking pathetic.

Coy began talking excitedly again and told Kuji about Twister's fate. Akuji hadn't seen his friends much through the course of the games, so Coy gave him a brief summary of the events too. "He was the leader coming into the third day; Kraken beat him the second day but he was still leader. The third day was nice and tight, Kraken and Twister dominating with Quake behind. But on the fourth day they let out a surprise round, White Balverines! The crowed went wild with the announcements. They had one for each of the top five contestants. Kraken got injured fighting them, and missed the rest of the day; he came back the last day but didn't quite recover. Diamond was the best with his knife throwing, and the upset, Quake, stepped up and obliterated the competition from there on. Twister however got killed by the balverine. It was crazy. I mean, no one expected it. It just proved how dangerous the Arena really is."

"Well, it was actually disgusting. He was literally unrecognizable, just a pair of small bones and blood when the balverine was done with him. I don't see why people like to see that."

"Ouch." They all knew how much he would have wanted to see it, disgusting as it was. Coy then realized that all he wanted to do was talk about the Arena, but he couldn't actually talk about it to Akuji, so he said goodbye and went to talk with other friends. And he had forgotten to buy Kuji the figurine and he felt ashamed; all the more reason to do something else.

"Guess we won't be seeing him for the day…" Kuji lightly agreed and wished, once again, he could have gone to the Arena.

"I'm sorry…"

"It's ok, really. I'm used to it."

"Well, they aren't making any more Twister figurines next year, so it's a collector's item now."

He was really happy. Akuji had asked Coy to get him the figurine, but he wouldn't remember. He always got way too exited about the games. But he was happy that Amissa remembered. "It's great, I guess. Thank you."

Amissa, with her soft angel eyes just looked back at him. Her eyes and her smile saying the words for her.

They stood quietly for a couple of seconds before Amissa brought up the idea of having something to drink at the Balverine Cavern Pub. Amissa's father was the owner and they could get free drinks and sometimes Amy, one of the waitresses and Missa's older sister, would give them alcoholic drinks. Akuji had only gotten drunk about three times, and each one he had ended up sleeping on a small mattress in Amissa's attic.

They gave Amy their order and sat down in a corner of the room. With the pub empty, its usual state during the day while the competitions where taking place, their drinks and food were served really fast. A pair of lemonades and a bowl of rosemary potatoes zigzagged across the room between tables on the hands of a very able waitress.

As they ate Amissa brought up the trip they had been planning weeks before the Arena games and had been postponed. "You know, Kuji we still have to make that trip to the Xahon villages. It's on the other side of the island, but with the Cullis Gates it should be a breeze."

"It sounds like a good idea, maybe we should go this Friday and comeback Saturday…"

"What about your parents, will they let you go?"

"Your parents are against the idea too, Missa." Coy's parents would kill him if he went so he wasn't going, Dru was against the idea too, and Farrell was scared balverines would attack them.

"It's only you and me, no one else wants to go." She drank the last sip of her glass and put it down on the table.

"That's ok." Enjoying each others company, the both finished their food. Suddenly, he was feeling all rebellious and angry against the world inside. He never felt so decisive inside and he really meant what he spoke next. "I'm going to the Arena today. The Hall of Heroes will still be open."

"Come on Kuji, let's go home, you'll get grounded and we won't be able to go to the Xahon tree villages. Please don't go." She knew Akuji would do anything to go, but he had never seen him do anything this rash, he was usually a calm person and gave much thought to his actions. She had to change his mind; she wanted him to go with her to the Xahon villages after all. His father wouldn't ground him for life if he went to the Xahon villages, the Arena was another story. She didn't understand why Rohm didn't let his children go to the Arena. But then again, she didn't think Akuji knew. It was probably what Rohm thought best for his only child. Sometimes Amissa wondered why Rohm felt that separating Akuji from the Arena would make him loose interest in it.

She had taken his hand and got up with him. He couldn't say no to that, but he couldn't deny his other impulses either, he really wanted to see the Hall of Heroes.

"But I really want to see it, Missa." Akuji tried not to sound melodramatic, but he wasn't quite sure he managed it. What he said was true, though. He had only been when he was a kid and didn't remember everything.

Missa walked over to him and stood right next to him with a cute innocent expression. "Some other time, I promise I'll go with you. But some other time. Please. I'll go with you in six months, for your birthday it you want."

He gave up, he couldn't resist her cute face when she wanted something, and he would be lying to himself if he thought he could do something Amissa had asked him so kindly not to. And besides, he had to buy the supplies his mother had told him to buy and the traders would be leaving town any minute.

"Ok, I won't go. I have to buy a few things from the traders anyway. I'll see if I can stop by after sunset, ok?"

"There's still a while until the sunset. Maybe we can watch it together?"

"Yes. Wait for me up on the hill… Bye." He walked down the aisle and out into the streets. He walked to the Main Plaza hoping to find merchants to trade with. Most merchants by now would probably have already packed since the real trading action happened during the first days of the competition and by it's end most people had already bought whatever it was they wanted to buy; only a few of them remained for a few days after the competitions.

Akuji walked over to a merchant and pulled out the piece of paper where his mother had written what he needed to buy. The merchant had most of the things on the list at a good price, so Akuji went over to another trader, who had the rest of the items.

By the time he was walking towards the hill where Amissa was waiting for him the sun was still high in the sky; but the towering mountains behind Bowerstone made the day an hour shorter than it should. Everyone had lived seeing the sunset behind the mountains, so no one in Albion had really experienced a full day.

Amissa had been waiting for him, sitting on a wooden bench; she motioned him over when she heard his footsteps. "Hi. It's beautiful, isn't it?"

"It always is." After a short comfortable silence, Akuji added, "Just like you." Amissa blushed lightly and reclined herself against Akuji, who placed his arms around her as the sun began setting behind the mountains in the horizon, and the sky danced in bright shades of red. Birds flew high above, doves and eagles and hawks, flying in the dying rays of the sun.

Author's Note:

I hope you liked the changes made to the story. With the new additions Albion might not feel that much like the Albion in the game, but I don't think that is bad in any way. I know and understand that it might have been a tiresome thing for some to read through this chapter and the following ones, as you might have already read them. I thank you all for your patience and your time, and ask you, if you would be so kind, to review my story to the best of your ability.

If you didn't like the changes made to the story, then please inform me; yet do it in a constructive way, it serves me no purpose to read review that just say, "This sucks. It was better the other way around." I would just like to know why you might think that way, if it is not too much to ask. I know that some of you might like it better, and other won't; either way, please review constructively.