Chapter 1
SWISHHHHHHH!!!! THUD!!!!! HURAH!!!
The crowd went wild. Lord Zulu had just scored three bulls eyes in a row from 200 meters. He was a powerfully built, dark skinned human, about 6'6" with a shaved head and garbed in a loose white shirt, and leather pants. Across his chest he had a belt of throwing daggers, a gift from some of his close friends before he left. He had practiced with them everyday since he had left, and was now equally as proficient with them as any rogue he had ever met. That was why he was here today, for the 5th annual Sigil projectile throwing championship, where the greatest warriors from all over the world had come to show off their skills. So far, he was winning by a landslide, safely in first with a lead of 25 points. Everyone else seemed to be having trouble with the distance. Experience had taught him, however, that he wasn't out of the woods yet. Though he had a perfect score, he could still be tied and forced into an extra round to decide the winner. Three competitors later, Zulu (as he was called by his friends) began to relax, "only two more to go" he told himself. The next challenger was about 5 feet tall and wore a brown cloak and hood shading his face from view. THUD, THUD, THUD. There was a stunned pause before the crowd went absolutely bonkers. The stranger, in the blink of an eye, had thrown all three bone handled daggers at the same time, and they had all buried themselves to the hilt, side-by-side, in the bulls-eye. Zulu cursed himself for relaxing, and turned to go and sharpen his daggers for the extra round. Moments later, however, he turned around to the gasps and screams of the crowd. The last competitor was eight foot tall ogre, built like a house. Ogres had not been seen in the towns for decades, ever since they had been defeated by the Humans, Dwarfs, and Elves in the War for the Worlds. The offending barbarian tribes had been exterminated, and the other tribes had retreated from the persecution of the Humans and Elves. Only recently had they begun to reappear in the major towns, and generally for very short periods of time, collecting the information that they need, and leaving without a trace. They were generally accepted well, the atrocities committed by their kind during the war forgotten in this new generation, although some old timers occasionally took it upon themselves to hit them in the shins with staves. This however, was something altogether different. Flitting through a city was one thing, but entering a throwing championship was another. Zulu had had to spend all his remaining gold just to get into this tournament, and he wondered where an ogre could have come up with that kind of money. Once the crowd had settled down, the ogre turned his back to them and began rummaging through his pack. He seemed to find what he was looking for, and, summoning all his strength, hauled a wooden mallet, about the same size as the target, out and began spinning around with it, building momentum, until he finally let go of it and sent it sailing up in a perfect arc that brought it down so that the entirety of the mallet's head crashed through the target, leaving a gaping hole where the target had once been. There was a stunned silence, even longer than when the previous competitor had thrown all three daggers at once. Then, as what was left of the target's framework collapsed into itself, the crowd erupted into cheers. Once the crowd had died down, the scoreboard was updated, and the crowd cheered even louder. The judges had decided to give the ogre 150 points for the throw, as he hit all 5 sections of the target. All he had to do to win now was hit the target. There was a slight delay as the officials searched for a new target, and, when it was set up, the behemoth merely stooped for a stone, and once again put it through the center of the target. The crowd went wild… well, most of it did.
Sitting at the bar was a man, about 5ft. tall, wearing a tattered blue shirt, and a faded pair of brown pants. A light yellow headband was wrapped tightly around his head, covering the top of his ears. Skatche had watched the championship in a drunken stupor from the stands. He had cheered with the rest of them when Lord Zulu hit three bulls-eyes in a row, he had been shocked when the mysterious figure thrown all three daggers at once and he had cried when the ogre had got 150 points in one throw. Now he was running from his bookie. He had bet all the money he had left and then some on Zulu, and he had lost. Now he ran. He did not want to know what would happen if he was caught, nor did he want to. He headed north, towards the outskirts of town, where he planned on taking the northern road to Vospire. Even the Ash-Dragon was better than his bookie. As he ran it began to rain, and the road in front of him turned to mud, and he had to stare down at the road just to keep on the path. Suddenly, he hit what felt like a wall. He fell to the ground, and staring at the muddiness that was the ground, he thought "Funny, I don't remember there being a wall there." His questions were all shortly answered when he was hauled up by the scruff of his neck, and he found himself staring straight into steel grey eyes. It was his bookie.
"Where ya headed Skatche?" the 5"5' dwarf asked. "I'd hate to think that you'd leave town with out saying goodbye."
"Ah, yes, well the thing is… err… that my, err, grandmother in Vospire has recently been taken ill, err, and I have to go and see her right away," Skatche mumbled.
"Oh really," the dwarf replied, "That's too bad. Well then, we'll just settle up our little bet, and I'll let you go."
"Oh riiiiight, the bet, completely slipped my mind. I've been meaning to talk to you about that. You see, my grandmother is the one with the money, so I'll just head up to Vospire and get it from her, and I'll be back with your money before you know it… if that's all right with you, of course."
"Oh, that's fine. So I'll see you in a few days?"
"Yeah," said Skatche and he turned to walk away. "Sheesh," he thought as he walked down the road, trying not to look too eager to get away, "what a mor-" and at this point the burly dwarf crashed into the small of his back, sending him sprawling into the mud once again. "Aw nuts," Skatche moaned as he clambered back to his feet, and wished to God that he hadn't drunk so much, as he was now having trouble seeing the ground in front of him, never mind his foe, who was no where to be seen. Stumbling around in a circle, he turned around just in time to be helpless to stop the titanic fist that was hurtling towards his head. It collided squarely with his nose, knocking him off his feet, and sending him sliding backwards through the mud for several feet after he landed.
"Pffft. Bettin' with money you don't have," the dwarf said contemptuously, "you disgust me! I'm gonna teach you a lesson you won't soon forget! Assuming you live through it of course." With that he drew a long skinning knife from his belt and lunged.
This time, however, Skatche was ready, and he rolled to side, as the knife passed through the ground where his left thigh had been seconds before. "Maniac," Skatche mumbled as he stumbled to his feet, and turned to his foe, who was in the process of stabbing at Skatche's head with his knife. Just in the nick of time, Skatche managed to throw himself out of the way, and by a fluke of luck, the knife lodged itself in Skatche's beautiful yellow headband.
"I never liked that head band in any case!" the dwarf roared as he ripped the knife through the yellow material, revealing Skatche's pointy ears which he had concealed beneath it. "Y-y-you're an elf?" he stammered.
Skatche sighed, "I HATE it when this happens!" he breathed to himself. "Half- elf actually," he stated in a matter of fact way. "I'm sorry," he continued, "but I can't let you live." The dwarf looked stunned at this turn of events; a few moments ago he had been dealing with a pathetic little human wouldn't pay his bets, and now he was dealing with powerful half-elfish mage who was threatening his life. He did what most people would do in his place: he tried to run away. Skatche had been expecting this, and had been summoning up his concentration to paralyse him. His eyes glowed an eerie blue, and both he and the dwarf glowed the same colour. When the color receded, the dwarf was standing stock still, though his eyes were wide with panic and rapidly searching in every direction for someone who might rescue him from his plight. Though Skatche hated to attack an unarmed man, he recognised what he had to do. Though he was unarmed, if Skatche let this man go, he would certainly be killed. And so Skatche began to summon the last of his magic power, most of which he had had to use to ward off the utter drunkenness that threatened to engulf him now. He felt the power come, coursing through his veins, and he began to focus it into the area in front of him. And that's when things began to go horribly wrong. He lost what little concentration he had left, and the magic power which he had summoned up ran wild, continuing to course unrestricted into what was now a mammoth fireball in front of him. Finally, when all of Skatche's magical power was drained, the fireball streaked forward, igniting the buildings 100 meters on either side of it with the sheer heat that it generated. 5 seconds later it hit the dwarf…