Chapter 15
"Hope Dawns"
The falcon's piercing screech resonated through the contemptible air as the bird of prey broke through the crowd of crows who cawed in astonishment as they scattered helplessly. Arianna's eyes never left the glinting creature as she watched it fly straight up to the sky and turned back. But her ears could not have disregarded the faraway bellow of a deep sounding horn immediately followed by a strange looming reverberation of a seemingly fast approaching storm. Her eyes widened, someone was coming!
One of the Black Knights growled something incoherent to the lean man as the Cotherians reared and shifted uncontrollably, spattering the blood oozing from their muzzle all over the ground. The gaunt looking knave swung his restless steed around and cursed loudly in his own language.
Arianna flitted her gaze a little to focus far beyond the fields and a small gasp escaped her lips. The ground rumbled with the thunder of about a hundred horses and she made out two dark green banners held high by two riders up front.
At the very head and center of the oncoming legion was a well-built knight clad in dark silver armor, though Arianna could hardly make out his features from the distance though as he neared, she could see his visor was up and the glint from his eyes disclosed his fearless and intense nature. His dark colored beard was short and rough and a few strands of his even darker hair bore a slight shade of white indicating he was recently past his prime. The emblem on his chest armor and on his shield was that of a humongous black bear standing on its hind legs revealing its pearly white underside. Its razor-sharp teeth and long claws were bared as though poised to attack. The powerful animal he rode was a large white stallion bearing articles branded with a similar crest. Clutched in the knight's right hand was a long steel sword with an unadorned hilt and in his left he held his oval shaped shield.
Arianna, mesmerized by the ferocious looking knight, was completely oblivious to what her assailant was hastily performing. She was even more taken aback when her eyes took in the large number of riders coming towards her.
She barely had time to breathe much less to react when suddenly a dark purplish fog suddenly closed in around her, slowly squeezing the air out of her lungs, as the mist grew even denser. She let out a small gasp of surprise as she also felt herself being slightly lifted from the ground.
The roaring battle cries, which were the cause of the storm like sounding resonation, driven by another blast of the deep horn were almost upon the small dismal group. She heard the guttural commands of her assailant somewhere behind the thick purple fog afterward she heard the cawing crows again as they passed right above her head.
Due to the abrupt alteration of her circumstance, Arianna found it strangely difficult to register fear back into her mind as the glowing mist enveloped tightly around her, instead she felt calmly irritated without knowing the reason why. Then, just when her head started to spin from lack of oxygen, a scintillating white light broke through the purple mist and immediately the constricted vapor that held her rapidly dissolved and she fell painfully down to the ground.
The clashing of steel, vicious cawing and ruthless neighing mixed with the voices of men engaged in a fierce battle rang in Arianna's ears. She rolled over on her back, part of her wanting to stay awake to witness this ensuing combat and the other half yearning to drop into oblivion right there and then.
Her half-open eyes were able to catch a glimpse of her surroundings. In the dim light of the half-covered moon, she saw a raging struggle of the most peculiar nature. Dusted silver against smoky black. But it wasn't just any ordinary hand-to-hand warfare, the ambiance of something both mystical and eerie hung heavy in the air. She could hardly believe what she was seeing even after all she had just been subjected to, everything was just occurring too fast for her humble senses to take in. At that moment, Arianna was undergoing a new kind of emotion, disbelief. For just as she looked around the ambiance she had felt was certainly something of the most unordinary of all…
It was magic, real pungent magic, and she was witnessing the veracity and great potency of it with her own eyes.
Arianna was certainly accurate with her perception, because just as she turned her head; she caught sight of a group in combat and she could hardly resist but marveled at how the few number of Dark Knights managed to keep the upper hand in their battle by means of their dark art. They simply vanished into gray mist in the midst of heavy combat against three to five other mortal riders to reappear right behind them slashing their back with one stroke of their long menacing blade. On the other side, she saw their leader charging his pet crows to attack here and there as he blasted away his opponents one by one with a few guttural words and a wave of his hand. A shimmer of purple dust drifted from his palms after every command.
Suddenly from behind him came large bolts of white light that knocked the lean man off his monstrous steed before he had a quick chance to shield himself. Arianna forced her eyes to open wider to see who had cast such a powerful magic form. Riding on a medium built pale yellow stallion was a heavy cloaked old man; his long gray shaggy hair was as dark as his long beard. The silver falcon was hovering right above him. He wore no armor nor bore a shield of any kind yet he attacked with such ferocity and conviction that it seemed he believed his skin was made of dragon scales. Another white ball was slowly forming in his left palm, which was slightly raised above his head as he neared his fallen enemy. But the gaunt man was not to be underestimated; with a quick gesture he shielded himself with a faint purple veil just as the white blob struck it.
Whilst everyone and everything around her were preoccupied in the intensity of their skirmish, Arianna wondered if might be an appropriate moment to make her escape and slip away but it seemed once again the lean man predicted her every move even if he was engaged in straining to keep his shield raised against the old man. Indignantly, he faced his palm in Arianna's direction attempting to entrap her once again in his fog but was abruptly daunted once again, not by the old rider as Arianna would have expected but by the fierce and dominating white knight who swiftly appeared by her side.
His shield, which seemed to have been bewitched to repel magic figures, deterred the spell of his indigo-eyed foe as he moved his steed before Arianna in a defensive and arrogant manner. The trifling action seemed to emit an unseen signal to the beings in battle to halt. Then, in a mere second later, the Dark Knights and crows reappeared behind their leader and the Black riders raised their bloody sabers in a threatening action but the lean man motioned them briskly to lower their weapons.
The white knight glared at them with gravity through his dark copper eyes; his sword also poised to strike.
Silence rested a moment in the apprehensive air as both sides stood opposite to each other.
Then, the knight spoke in a deep menacing voice that sent shivers down Arianna's spine. They were speaking in yet, another unfamiliar foreign language. The gaunt man pointed and spat uncouthly in her direction while the knight replied to his every statement with such stable calmness that Arianna was starting to grow anxious as to which side this knight was really on.
She felt the knight turn his gaze on her for a fleeting moment before looking back at the lean man and stating something in an exceptionally sadistic tone. The gaunt man eyes flashed heatedly and he bared his yellowish teeth at the knight's remark. Without warning, he made a gesture and the crows cawed excitedly rushing forward towards the white knight but then the old magician, once again anticipating accurately the unexpected moment waved his arm in one fluid movement and the crows instantly froze in their positions high on the air.
The lean man snarled and cursed in his guttural tongue and it seemed that he was sensing that although he and his minions were prominently powerful magically but it was nearly dawn, and time was running out. The lean man reared his steed and spun it around, fleeing from his opponents. He barked a command and the Black Knights followed suit before they and their monstrous Cotherians dissolved into thin gray mist as they retreated.
The white knight bellowed a victorious command and his men raced after their fleeing enemies. Arianna watched as one by one the Black Knights of Gilbor faded into their dim fog and then the gaunt looking man with malicious indigo eyes stopped at a distance and turned his steed to face her. His eyes met hers and it seemed he was sending a mental message to her that she understood.
Shall our paths cross again, princess, thou shall not be as lucky as thou art now!
He then garbled something unintelligible and the crows sprang back to motion but instead of defending their master from the approaching attackers, the crows instead flew directly to him, surrounding and covering him underneath their oily black feathers till neither the monstrous steed nor the rider himself was visible. A pale and sickly purplish glow seemed to emerge from beneath the black wings.
Arianna heard the knight's deep commanding voice somewhere sounding urgent.
Once the soldiers reached the crowd of crows, the cawing flock hastily dispersed and flew far out of reach but once they had all gone, there was no sign or trace of the gaunt man or his black Cotherian as if they vanished along with the crows.
Arianna's head was whirling and her vision blurred slightly once she witnessed the disappearance of the indigo-eyed man and his Dark Knights. She vaguely pulled herself to her feet and started to stagger away. Her pains had grown numb and she felt as if she was floating above the ground instead of walking on it. Her mind was blank and empty, to weary to think or wonder. The unopened box and her long bow still cradled in her arms, she hadn't loosed her hold on them ever since.
Then, after struggling a few steps and nearly losing consciousness, she suddenly felt a strong arm grasp speedily around her midsection scooping her effortlessly from the ground and unto a racing steed. Her head bounced and lolled as she was set firmly atop a white stallion's fair back. She felt the brush of cold metal steel on her back; the arm that held her was still around her, grasping her in a protective manner.
Arianna lifted her head slightly; the dark sky was slowly turning pale with the first signs of dawn approaching. The wind that brushed her skin was cold and brisk and yet slightly soothing. The excruciating sores, wounds and blisters burned her skin once again and Arianna knew she could no longer keep awake. The red star on her arm stayed imprinted on her skin.
She thought she heard a soft deep voice muttering comforting words in her ear but she took no heed of it.
Arianna saw the velvet horizon turning to a hue of pale blue before she, at long last, surrendered entirely to the aching fatigue that plagued her mind, body and spirit.
Fading into the black pit of oblivion where she heard, saw, and remembered nothing more…
Ďėŏ ŏū ģō
