'Lo again, readers who refuse to review. Sheesh, and they call me lazy. Anyway, thanks to the person who did reveiw it's much appreciated. Anyway, not much of a happening thing in this chapter, you're just going to get to know four out of the five main characters in the story. Yes, Four. Anyway, Tell me what you think, I did spend a bit more time on this
When I awoke some time after, I found myself staring at a canopy of trees. Sunlight was filtering down and the sudden glimpse at light made my eyes sore, so to avoid further pain, I closed them. As I waited for that awkward burning sensation in my eyes to stop, I began to be able to make out voices. They were talking. What about, my senses where not returned enough to discover. I stayed on the ground as my senses began to pick up again, but I did not open my eyes. I felt something wet touch into my cheek, and a whimper sounded very close to my right ear. When I realized it was Jason, I felt relieved to find out he was still alive.
"I swear, if that beast doesn't shut up…" A voice broke into my trail of thoughts. It sounded as if it belonged to a man in his middle-ages. I strained to hear more, but found I didn't need to. My captors, or saviors, I wasn't quite sure yet, were rather close to me and I could pick up every word they were saying.
"Oh hush, Laresh. It's not doing any harm" This voice was feminine, and I remembered the archer. Perhaps they were indeed my saviors? I stirred, hoping they'd notice, so I wouldn't have such an awkward awakening.
"Doesn't matter now, he's waking up." A third voice, slightly higher pitched but still relatively deep. I heard boots crunch against dead leaves as someone headed my way and knelt beside me.
"Morning, sleepy head!" It was the girl's voice again, and I allowed myself to open my eyes slightly. The light that had pained me before was now blocked slightly by a young girl, likely to have only been in her early twenties, smiled down on me. She had short brown hair that was cut at her shoulders; one brain on her left side was tucked behind her ear. When she saw my eyes open, her smile brightened. I pushed myself into a sitting position and looked inquiringly at the girl, before I cast my gaze to her companions.
One of them had a build that was either very muscular, or simply hidden under large armor. It occurred to me that I was staring at the same Ebony and Gold knight that had shown up to my rescue that night. It looked like a pattern one of my father's friends use to wear, Dwarven Armor, he called it. Over the knights head was a black helmet that covered his skull and his neck, and part of it covered the bridge of his nose. Many of my father's comrades had worn helmets like this, only they had their kingdom's heirloom on it. His hand was resting on a sword I knew well, my friend's father was a blacksmith that specialized in the Ebony Longsword, being the blade in question. A matching Dwarven shield lay on the log beside him on which he sat.
Lest few paces away, stood a slightly shorter, thinner man that could not have been much older than the girl. He wore a white blouse-like top under a black leather vest, topped with black pants, rims tucked into black boots. A thin shortsword was belted to his side, but light blue markings danced across his cheeks and what little of his hand showed. This told me he was a magic user; my mother told me that those markings usually symbolized an experienced magician.
The girl who sat beside me had a bow and quiver of arrows strapped to her back. She was adorned in a white blouse with a brown vest and brown shorts, large leather boots covering her feet, and black fingerless gloves enwrapped her hands. She was the archer that had rather boldly flown through the window into my room. Everything was piecing together now.
I noticed I was surrounded by trees; I was located in a forest of some sort. My saviors, as I'd decided to label them, had made a small camp in a place where there'd been some sort of bad lightning storm. There were several fallen trees; the knight was sitting on one. Smoke billowed from a ring of stones, where burnt wood lay there. Jason was lying beside me, taking up most of the cloth I'd been laying on. After a moment or two, I finally found words to voice my question.
"Umm…Where are we?" I looked around as if to make a statement that I had no clue whatsoever as to our location, I didn't. No one seemed all that obliged to answer me, at least, no one being the knight. He turned away and poked at the smoking logs with a broken tree branch. The mage sat himself on a long rather close to my makeshift bed.
"We're but a day's walk away from Bruma, in the Heartlands." He told me, lifting a hand to gesture to the woods around us. The Heartlands? I had lived closer to Chorrol, in the Great woods. How they'd managed to get me so far was beyond me. Perhaps they'd used some sort of magic? That must've been it. I removed the cloth that was acting as a blanket for me before. I was still in my pajamas. The girl saw my puzzled look and decided to spark a conversation to take my mind off of it.
"I am Called Phoenix, my real name is Phoebe Mitchells, but I'd prefer if you called me Phoenix anyway" She said, lifting her eyebrows to show slight embarrassment. The mage waved a hand in somewhat of a greeting.
"My name is Dro'Gaindon" He said formally, bowing slightly to me. It was an Orcish name, but he was not an Orc, he looked more like a Breton to me, but I did not know much of the races. He continued "My friends call me Gain." This must've been a sign of friendship, or at least sympathy and future kindness. I found that I'd begun to like the man already. The third man, the Knight, did not answer. When my companions discovered he didn't plan on giving one, Phoenix did for him.
"He is called Laresh," But she said no more. I occurred to me that this Knight may have been a noble warrior, but he had a cold heart. He lifted his head and looked directly at me. He stared at me for a while with his cold blue eyes, as if he was intending to say something, but he did not. Phoenix shook her head, then looked at me again
"What's your name?" She asked. I tilted my head to one side then burst out with my story. I told her my name and all about my father, my mother and how I witnessed her die. In return, she and Gain gave me sympathetic glances, but the Knight only flicked his gaze to me when I'd brought up my father in my story. When I'd finished my tale, they began to tell me about themselves.
Phoenix was an Imperial archer, trained by the fighter's guild; her parents were in Leyawiin, where she'd grown up. She was only a young girl when a boy a little older than her had come through town after hunting. She was curious about him and spied on him, for she was also proving to be a talented thief. She watched him night after night. She eventually learned of his plan to continue out of Leyawiin, traveling off to Imperial city. Phoebe had longed to go there, so she convinced the boy to take her with him. She'd been friends with him since, and had grown even closer to him after they'd left Leyawiin and met up with Gain.
Gain had lived in the forest for as long as he could recall. He'd been abandoned by his parents when he was born, for they wished to have a girl. When their wish was not granted, they left him out in the woods to die. An Orsimer family had raised him in their home in the heart of The Nebonoy Valley. He'd grown up with them and learned to love them as his own parents. They gave him an Orcish name and raised him as their own. He longed to travel though, and his foster parents knew this, but they had a family and could not take their adopted son beyond the hills. When Phoenix and the boy had passed through there, having gotten lost, he'd offered to take them back to the trail if they took him with them. Of course, they agreed.
I found out then that the boy had been Laresh, but he was now a grown man. I began to wonder, what had changed him so much? The way his friends had spoken of him, he seemed a lot more cheerful and friendly. But maybe that was the person they saw him as? He was their leader and their friend, after all. I looked at Laresh inquiringly; I wanted to know more about him. He suddenly stood up and strode over to me, towering over me for a moment and then turned to Gain and Phoenix. He spoke as if I wasn't there
"Get him a pair of boots, we're heading to Bruma." He said and Jason stirred. In the trading of stories, I'd almost forgotten about him. I stroked his fur, and then suddenly remembered what the knight thought of my friend.
"Can Jason come too?" I asked, Phoenix looked at me, frowning slightly and shrugged, then turned to glance at Laresh, he said nothing, but simply began to pack up the camp they'd made. Phoenix turned to smile at me and nod. I hugged Jason tightly as Gain brought me a pair of leather boots
"We'll get you clothes when we arrive at Bruma." He told me. I nodded and fit the boots over my feet, then pushed myself up.
An hour later, we were treading up the path into the mountains where Bruma was located. Phoenix was telling me about Bruma, its temperature, the guilds and the shops. I found that aside from Laresh, I was beginning to like our little traveling troupe. Gain was kind and helpful, Phoenix was kind as well, but she was more of a friend. Both of them were careful to stay off the subject of why the Wraiths attacked my house, who that man was and why they attacked me. One question I'd asked them was why they came to my rescue, but nobody answered. As we climbed, I found myself getting colder. I willed us faster, but Laresh set a pace that was steady, but didn't wear anyone down.
When my teeth began to chatter and the greenery was covered with frost, Laresh flicked his gaze towards me and began to walk faster. For a while, I was grateful for the change of pace, but then I began to feel worn out and tired. Jason, who had been keeping pace with me and refusing to leave my side, whimpered every once in a while. When we slowed down, I was relieved. Phoenix began to talk to me in a low voice, I began to feel sleepy. It dawned upon me that I was dragging the group behind. We were going slower because I couldn't keep the pace. Either Laresh was hiding his anger, or he didn't care. He simply kept his gaze fixed ahead of him, and I never saw more than the back of his helmet. I'd fallen silent after a while, and Phoenix and Gain were talking quietly behind me. Laresh was in front of me, his pace steady. I took a breath in a jogged forward, holding my arms out of the sheer cold. I didn't stop jogging until I was walking beside him. For a while, he said nothing and simply allowed me attempt to keep his pace.
We traveled for another few hours; I forced myself to keep a steady and grimly silent pace with the knight. But he scarcely spared me a glance, let alone a word. I decided to speak instead.
"Uhh…" This was awkward; I didn't know how to start talking to him. He was a knight of apparent strength of respect that had just gone up against some sort of Dark lord to save my hide from his hands. I should've at least had something to say. "Thank you…" I began, finally finding something to say after a moment of stuttering "…For saving me…Before I mean," I blushed heavily, but my face was red from the cold anyway, I'm not sure if he would've noticed. He was silent for another minute or so. I began to tell myself he simply did not feel like talking when he took a breath in to speak.
"You're welcome." He said nothing more than those two words, but at least he'd said something to me. I smiled at him, but he was still staring ahead. I slowed down and allowed him to take the lead and once again resumed my place in the center of the troupe. As I rubbed my hands up and down my arms for warmth and marveled at the white mist that appeared in front of me whenever I breathed out, I couldn't help but to wonder about the Knight. His friends refused to say much about him, he didn't even say anything about himself. I stared at his back as if I could see through the armor and into his personality. This was a false hope, of course, but it was fun to think about what I could do if I could see into people's souls.
It puzzled me about my newfound companions. The Mage and Archer were friendly and open about their past and opinions, but the Knight was quiet and said little. His friends said little about him or his history. But as I reflected my situation, I recalled how much this was alike to the story book adventures my mom used to read to me before bed. An adventure, I liked the sound of that. I set forward and strode at a much faster pace, eager to get to Bruma and get into warmer clothes. I wanted to become a Knight suddenly, and my newfound dream was definitely not going to become reality in my Pajamas!
And then there was silence...So how'd you like it? Good, huh? huh? Yeah. Well, even if you didn't like it, thanks for reading it. Please review, just say Bladsjghsdjghdas or something, or type something out like a sane person, your choice.
Toodles,
Shmeeko