Chapter Four

Land awoke in darkness, the dripping hell had returned. A dear fell from his eye and dripped to the floor, the same sorrow that lined the cave.

The rocks and stalagmites twisted and distorted around him, forming strange and odd creatures; things he had never heard or seen before. Sighing he finally caved to the fact that he had gone crazy.

A laugh rumbled from his belly just as quick as his admission. They had tied him up to die of starvation, of thirst, of need for company, but they had given him a delicious opportunity to escape it all; he had squandered it on some bloke's eye.

For some reason, he found that hilarious. His cackle echoed through the cave as his eyes slowly glazed over. He knew deep down he was going mad, but there wasn't anything he wanted to do about it now. He was dead anyway, why even try to remain sane?

Then something snapped. His vision blinked out for a moment and he felt a crushing pain; being his body hitting the floor painfully.

He forced his eyes open for the briefest of blurry seconds and found a metallic boot in front of him, a black cape with strange designs on it behind the boot. A great horror he had never felt before crushed its way into his chest. Death itself was in front of him. He tried desperately to claw his way backwards, out of the way of the phantom, but the floor was slippery and he found no hold. He screamed as he clawed, but no sound came from his throat; the lack of water had removed his voice.

With eyes wide and breath short from terror Land saw the blurry outline of the phatom's face above him. One glowing red eye peaked out from a mass of black hair. An unblinking, fiery red eye that did not waver or move in the slightest.

The gaze pierced into his head and a all consuming panic coursed through him like a wildfire through a brush dry from summer without rain. The foot lifted, raised back and flew into his skull; he instantly fell unconscious.

The first breath of his awakening was the most painful. It was a wretched, dry gasp for air and water. He opened his eyes timidly and found himself in a dark brown room without any windows or doors.

He was sitting on a ratty bed that looked much too old to be safe to sleep upon and the stench that filled the air was nothing less than putrid. The smell wafted into him and he gagged at the stench of rotten flesh and decaying feces. He placed his hand over his mouth and tried his hardest not to heave, but the desire was too great.

Bent over his bed, he let the wretched, hollow and painful contractions consume his throat. Tears streamed down his eyes from the pain of his sandy throat and bursting lungs as he continued to heave nothing onto the floor. For several horrible minutes, he lay incapacitated on the floor, helpless to stop the wheezing and coughing.

Then the roof opened and there was fresh air. There had never been a more pleasant thing done to him in his life, and he almost thanked whoever had done it.

A blood-matted head peeked into the box and grinned widely. “Found you,” the disembodied head stated. A metal hand reached in and pulled him out of the box and out into the dazzling daylight sun, placing his body onto the heavenly soft grass facing towards the sunlight.

He immediately shielded his eyes from the sun's brilliance and tried his best to choke out the word, 'Water.' The person's face lifted in concern and he reached for his water pouch, raising an eyebrow.

Land tried to say 'yes,' but not even that simple word could be spoken. He nodded his head instead, silently thanking the gods that were watching over him.

His vision was still blurry, so he couldn't make out the man's face quite well; only that the man was furry and had blond hair. A strange, mellow tone came from the head, like the voice of a woman, and musically rhymed, “Alone, you were, 'o gentle soul, and bones you were; naught but cold.”

Land took a slight sip of the cool water, trying with all his might from guzzling down the whole bottle at once. The person's face brushed his overgrown hair out of the way and stated, “You know, if you weren't so beat up and exhausted, I'd bet you look rather cute, sir.”

Still at a loss of the gender of his unknown help, Land searched the form of the person over him to find a clue. Unable to find anything out about his rescuer except that it wore heavy clothing and armor, he croaked, “man or woman?”

He almost regretted saying anything at all. His body coughed and wheezed and he felt as hollow as a leather drum. The form sat down on its haunches and tilted its head, “Is your vision that bad?” He nodded and his guardian laughed lowly and stated, “I am a lady, yes.”

The next question was more important to Land. “Where?” He wheezed, trying not to cough but yet again failing in vain.

His guardian smiled and said, “It matters not, I'm taking you back to my village so that you can rest up. The fiends had left you to die out here, but they wont be coming back anytime soon.”

Land slumped back onto the ground, assured now that he was not in danger. Relaxed and completely exhausted from it all, he crumbled into sleep.

“So who is this man you've brought home, eh Kyna?”

Kyna scowled at her mother, “You know I'm not looking for a suitor, how many times do I have to tell you?”

Her mother's plump chest rumbled with laughter as she pointed out, “A lady in these parts need not a suitor to have a suitor in bed, my daughter!” She winked and quietly left the room, “Don't worry, I'll leave you two alone; but don't you have a child, hear?”

Kyna blushed scarlet red at her mother's forwardness. Her mother had always been rather—encouraging of her when it came to suitors of any kind, but she wasn't usually 'out in the open' about it in front of company.

Land croaked out, “Mother?”

Kyna nodded, “Yes, that was my mother. When did you wake?”

A smile faintly creased his chapped lips as he shrugged, still exhausted and direly hungry.

Kyna took Land off her shoulder and placed him on the couch. He smiled at her and nodded once before letting his eyes shut and falling into a light sleep.

Kyna sighed and brushed her hair back. “How am I going to explain you to mother?”

“Why does he have to be explained?” Kalla asked as she rounded the corner with some cheese and some slices of meat, “The poor child looks exhausted so I thought I'd make you two something to eat.”

Her mother placed the platters on the dining table, which was only an arm's reach away from the cough and sighed, “The poor dear, what happened to him Kyna?”

Breathing deeply, Kyna replied, “The Thieves of Alkab did this to the poor man; I know not why.”

Deep feelings of remorse encircled Kalla's heart as she remembered her husband, who had died at the hands of the Alkab thieves. Gently nudging Kyla out of the way, she kneeled in front of Land and placed her hand on his head. Kalla's eyes slowly drew closed and she began to chant in a whisper some strange language.

“Mother?” Kyla asked cautiously, knowing some of the rumors going about town recently that her mother practiced the healing arts in secret.

“Shh, Kyla, he'll be fine in the morning,” her mother assured as she opened her eyes. Handing Kyla a grocery list she had made earlier in the morning, she instructed, “I need those things and a few more when you get back to heal him.”

Startled by her mother's clairvoyance Kyla's eyes widened, “Mother, you can do--?”

Kalla smiled, “I prefer to call it 'divination,' dear. Now please, I need those things to make your man, here, well. Would you please, my dear Kyla?”

Blinking slowly as she digested the fact that the rumors were true about her mother, Kyla nodded once and without another sound took the list and was out the door to fetch the things from the local market that her mother needed.

Kalla once again had found another man wounded in her house. The last time it had been her husband. If history did repeat, then she prayed that it wouldn't repeat in the same way it had with her former husband, who had come to her doorstep to be healed after an encounter with the Alkab, stayed a bit longer than either expected, and was assassinated upon leaving the village for some medicine for her child, Kyla.

She placed one eye on the boy as she left the room, and his name came to her. “Land,” she whispered as she walked into the kitchen, “if you have a spirit, hear me: Make safe my daughter, it is my only request in exchange for your healed body.”

Since the boy had entered the room, dark, foreboding feelings had wrapped around the house. Kalla knew deep in her soul that soon there would come a terrible uprising of evil near the village, most likely the Alkab thieves, and should those thieves come out of their hole, she would put them into their graves. But she couldn't help but sense something terrible in her daughter's future, a terrible thing that would happen on the eve of the uprising.

As she washed the evening dishes for use in the morning, Kalla tried to seperate the boy's path from her husband's, but unnervingly, the destiny she felt in Land was near identical to the one her husband had had. A cold shiver worked down Kalla's spine and she couldn't help but feel helpless against the tide of fate in the world, even though she knew sometimes just what that fate was; even then she couldn't change it.

Oddly, though, she felt Land could. Shrugging off the strange prediction, Kalla returned to the dishes and this time tried her best to keep her mind off of the future until Kyla returned from the market.