Silvia’s teeth were bared. For a moment, David was reminded of the young white wolf at Witch's Canyon and recalled the feral and majestic expression on its face.
“I will not stand for this!” Silvia launched herself at the old wise woman, both blades raised.
The tome's pages flew in the air as the book's spine hit the floor with a resounding thud. The remaining pages left inside the ancient book fell in a flurry of paper to a page marked with a red-violet ribbon. With the clanging of metal blades surrounding him as the two fought, David only had eyes for the elegant script on the age-colored paper.
Nothing in the past few days made sense. All that he could comprehend was the following:
He was supposedly the subject of a prophesy and a killing objective. He had befriended a talking, flying horse. And there was an angry girl trying to attack an old lady.
As worries of his mother crowded his mind, curiosity also screamed to be attended to. What was this prophecy? What was he destined to do? And why did the sorceress, the green-eyed man, and the flying monsters earlier want him?
Who knew when he would find these answers? The old woman said the girl wanted to withhold the truth from him, while Silvia claimed she was getting to it. Perhaps no one intended for him to know and planned to use him, though he doubted his usefulness. The opportunity was now.
With trembling fingers, he pulled the fallen book towards himself. In an instant, he could feel knowledge's power thrumming through his fingertips as he felt his heart quicken in excitement. This was it.
"Not for you to see!" The old woman cackled to David's incredulous face as she disentangled herself from her duel, badly wounded, to snatch the papers from David's eager hands. She used the ancient volume to shield herself from Silvia's next attack, and laughed when the graceful blade hummed through the air and ripped the papers to shreds.
Silvia’s right arm swung at the woman’s chest as the hag thrust the ruined book away from herself. The harpy blocked the next blow as well with a previously concealed sword. The two seemed to dance to a deadly tune as the blades weaved back and forth through the air. But the dance slammed to an abrupt half as Silvia disarmed her opponent with a flick of her wrist.
Silvia's breathe still came in even intervals, as if she had been calmly reading a book. Her right blade paused and rested against the woman’s throat.
“Are you going to kill me?” The hag demanded.
“No. What are you doing here? Trying to steal another fifty year life elixir?”
“No, I’m here because I’m on a secret mission that scum like you don’t need to know about. Scum like your mother don’t need to know about…” Silvia’s eyes flared and she hissed,
“My mother wasn't scum! Tell me! What are you doing here! Talk!” the princess pressed her blade harder against the hag's neck and pinned her against a crystal window.
“Since you are about to kill me and it’s too late anyways…”
“What’s too late?!” Silvia snapped.
“It’s too late to escape now!” The charlatan laughed that had an edge of madness in it. The woman, who had seemed to benevolent to David before, seemed ghoulish with her craned neck and stooping posture. Her face scarred with old pockmarks formed into thick wrinkles. David realized she was smiling. The hag grabbed the princess's wrist and forced Silvia's sword to create cracks within the crystal. Suddenly, she catapulted herself backwards against the glass. The cracks her frail body had made snapped and clicked as the splinters in the crystal expanded and made their way upwards. Without warning, the crystal shattered in a glimmer of sparkles as the shards flew everywhere. Elowen leaned back and fell over the slick edge of the tile floor and dragged the girl with her.
Silvia yelled, a shocked expression on her pale face, and slipped off the tower. David leaped forward. He skidded across the slick surface of the floor and extended his hand. As his fingers groped desperately for something. But all his fingertips found was air. He found his breath coming in quick increments as his heart rate accelerated. No...she couldn't be gone! She couldn't!
To his relief, he found a smooth hand still holding onto a nearby ledge as he looked down over the edge.
"David!" she yelled. He realized his arm's reach was not far enough, and desperately looked around himself for ideas. He eyed the velvet curtains.
"Wait, your highness!" he called down.
"Forget the niceties!" she snapped. "Just get me up! She's heavy!"
“I thought you wanted her dead,” David said quietly.
Silence.
"Can you hold onto the curtain I send down?" David wondered about hauling up two people from brute strength alone.
"I'm only holding onto this ledge by one hand!" she cried indignantly. "I can't let go! She's got my other wrist!"
"I'll lower myself down and grab you, alright?"
"Not alright, human! There is no way you can handle the both of us!"
There was that reference of human, again.
"Your highness, you're right. I can't pull you both up."
There was a pause on either end. It was inevitable, and practical.
"I'm not letting her go!"
"I can't do this, then. I'm sorry," David said. As he peered into those eyes, he saw them clearly: her irises were an icy blue rimmed with royal blue.
David suddenly felt himself immersed in her eyes and felt her irises flood with different colors. He could see the same woman he saw in the scrying mirror yesterday as though through a window, but the woman was just a girl. Those eyes and the princess's eyes were identical. The woman he saw now in the princess's eyes was her mother.
The old woman then was also much younger, and shone with exuberance as she repeatedly raised her sword and struck the girl's exposed back with the flat of the blade. David could see the girl open her mouth to emit a silent scream. Even in that image, David could see the hag mouth the words: Haven't you learned your lesson for today? You will never tell others of your predictions again!
"Will you help, or not?!" she asked, voice strained.
This wise woman accused Silvia's people of stealing babies and must have been the one who had accused the Aarchen of killing the Lenain's king. The two wise women were one and the same. How could he not have seen this earlier when one country had one appointed wise woman?
David's blood soon blazed with flames as he glared down at the woman who had been responsible for his village's massacre. As if the blackness clouded his mind, he felt that black part of himself whisper of revenge, and killing.
Kill her when you pull her up. Make her pay! his mind screamed.
David shook his head and attempted to clear his thoughts, but the screaming demands of his dark side grew louder and louder.
"Human!" the princess screamed. David roughly pushed aside the dark desires of murder from his mind. Saving the princess was his priority right now.
He pulled the curtain loose from its hangings and tied one end to a nearby table leg and the other end around his own leg. He braced himself as he felt the wind buffet his face and tried not to think of the long way down. He lowered himself cautiously down the tower, scaling the walls with sure feet. After all, this was not at all different from climbing the trees back home. There were many ledges and footholds on the pure white of the tower walls.
Cold wind kept wrapping itself around David as though it were a snake. As he edged close enough to the girl, he wrapped his fingers around her wrist and slowly hauled her up to the point she could kneel on the ledge she had hung onto. The weight was surprisingly like the weight of only one of the people he had pulled onto the ledge.
The wise woman was still dangling from the girl's extended wrist. David kept a firm grip on the princess as the old woman kept attempting to pull the girl to their deaths. As a precaution, he loosened the curtain around his foot and tied it to the girl's wrist.
"Climb. Send the curtain back when you're up."
"What about you? What if she knocks you down...?" David was surprised her almond eyes were concerned.
"I'll be careful. Climb."
She attempted to climb, but could not with only one arm. Suddenly, David noticed the girl's face was bone white, and realized she was in pain.
"Are you hurt?"
She winced and looked at her arm where Elowen, the old woman, was still dangling from.
"My arm..." she whispered. "I can't do it...It hurts my injury..."
"Injury? You're injured?"
"A long time ago. It still..."
"Then let me-"
"No- she'll drag you down."
"Then you'll have to let go," he said gently. He didn't mention his dark thoughts clouding his judgement. She sighed, looked into his eyes, and closed hers. She shook her head.
"No! If I do that, then I'm no better than her!"
"You meant to kill her earlier," he reasoned.
"But she was armed. She is defenseless now..."
Her eyes seemed to radiate stubbornness, but her blood red lips were in a grimace as the color drained from her face.
"Fine." He reached down, holding the curtain for balance, and dragged the woman up to the ledge edge. "Climb, princess." Then he untied her, for she had no fear of falling now, with just her own weight to carry.
She climbed, her burden released, and David climbed after. He knew what the woman would do after she climbed far enough over the ledge's edge, and was not surprised in the least when she grabbed his leg.
"You're coming down with me!" she whispered, her voice dry and crackling like dead crunching leaves. Her face creased in that wrinkled smile of hers and David glared down at her.
"Not in a lifetime! Not after you accused Aarchen of treachery to the Lenain kingdom! Either come up with us, or stay here."
"Boy of the prophecy...you want to kill me, don't you?" she cackled, one hand grabbing the ledge, the other twisting David's leg. "After I let the Illia run over your village like dried twigs and let them pillage and burn your life to the ground...I wager your parents didn't come out alive of that village. I knew you lived in that border town. I knew from my sources that you would live, unscathed, despite what I threw at you. The Cyrus will be displeased with me if you did not die...especially not the leaders. It's your life, or mine!"
"Go and burn in the underworld, then!" he whispered. His heart had never felt so cold yet boiling at the same time. He steeled himself, clenching his teeth, as he tried to ignore those dark whispers in his head.
David shook his leg from her grasp contemptuously and clambered after the princess. But not before taking the curtain with him. After he got up, he looked deep into the eyes of the hag.
With a sinister cackle at him, she threw herself off the edge, rather than give herself to the mysterious Cyrus's mercy. The princess watched solemnly too. Then she lifted her eyes to look into his face.
“There she is! There’s the boy! Grab them!” David turned around and found three men in full armor at the end of the golden hallway. The men were completely covered, so David couldn’t see their features, but he saw a shock of gray and red hair. The soldiers ran towards them, and he saw Silvia in his peripheral vision. She drawing her twin swords from their scabbards on her back with all the solemnity of a princess.
Silvia ran in front of David, blocking the coming swarm, growling. David remembered the old wise woman’s words. “She was protecting you….” David wouldn’t let this strange girl, or princess (he corrected himself), get hurt again. Not on his account, at least.
He took a nearby chair. At first he staggered under its weight, and had to regain his balance as it threatened to overwhelm him. When he felt he had a firm grip, he swung it sideways, twisting his torso for extra thrust, and steeling his feet for additional purchase. The chair arm connected with the head of the closest guard. David didn’t have the strength to knock this man out, but the chair was heavy enough to. David immediately dropped the tiger’s eye chair after that man collapsed. Never try the same trick twice, was what his father said. So David went in front of Silvia, holding his fists up threateningly. Or at least tried to.
~~~~~
No! This couldn’t be happening! Silvia thought. Couldn’t he tell she was trying to protect him? David had no experience in martial arts. How was he supposed to survive? Silvia dodged a flying tiger’s eye chair. She ran towards the other two, mysterious men and one of them tried to draw his saber, but Silvia quickly ran up to him, and executed a quick uppercut to the assailant's chin, knocking his head back with her fists under his skull with inhumane strength. She watched as the whites of the man's eyes showed as he toppled from knees down.
He fell to the ground in a crumple. Another of his comrades had evidently deemed it too dangerous to approach the princess too closely. Leaning down, he withdrew a small dagger from his boot, sliding it from its smooth leather sheath in one fluid motion and was aiming at her heart. Her mouth was in a grim line. She had a secret she used to her advantage. If they only knew what she was, they wouldn't cross her path.
She could hear the dagger soaring towards her and she sidestepped so quickly out of the way she was merely a blur of motion. She deftly and gracefully extended her hand and caught the dagger by its point with just her thumb and middle finger. She swung the blade, setting a spin into its motion by her movement of her wrist.
She didn't even pause to see the grim results as she heard the echo of the man's grunt as metal met its target.
Yet another attacker came from behind her, attempting a surprise lunge. She whirled around, as if this were just a dance, and swiftly drew one of her blades across the man’s chest. Red spilled and spurted on the tile and seemed to fly into the girl's face. Silvia felt a small twinge of regret. She never liked bloodshed, enemy or not. She ignored the warm flecks of blood she felt on her cheeks.
She sprinted across the hall where the last man was backing David into a wall where the man would soon corner the boy. Setting herself into motion across the hall, she brought herself besides David's opponent and twisted her torso, lending extra spin and strength as she executed a perfect, deadly side kick to the man's head. She hoped that it would be enough to dispose of him.
She felt another twinge of regret, but also of repulsion because some more blood splashed onto her face as the man coughed up blood. She was out of practice. She needed to aim a little higher. She didn't mean to kick him at the throat. David was staring at the two injured men, and at the body lying on the floor beside him. He was also staring at horror at Silvia.
“Ugh! Now what?” Silvia snapped, wiping the blood flecks from her face. She could still smell the iron scent of blood on her cheeks and knew she'd have to deal with the smears the blood left on her face later.
“Your highness…”
“No, David, don’t you ‘your highness’ me. You just think I’m some sort of contaminated animal! I can see the look on your face!” Her voice was a fierce whisper. She just sat there, silent and motionless, staring back into David’s brown eyes. He then saw the grief and anger again reflected in her eyes.
Silvia felt so hurt. If it weren’t for her he wouldn’t be alive right now. She did what she had to. Why was he still looking at her as if she were a ruthless killer?
Now Silvia was infuriated. She was not a murderer, yet David’s brown eyes silently accused her for hurting the men. “I did what I had to. Those men would have killed you if it weren’t for me. Considering what I did was not very cruel. It was necessary. It was essential. Not to mention that those men deserved much worse. What can be worse than trying to kill a defenseless-”
“I don’t care what they deserved. I know that those men deserved much worse, yet I sympathize them all the same. The reason I’m like this is because…..”
“Because what?” Silvia interrupted in her anger. She felt her left arm stiffen by the slightest bit.
“I’m afraid you might get killed.” Silvia didn’t know what to say.
Silvia couldn’t believe her ears. He was afraid for her? They had just met. He trusted her?
Silvia suddenly gasped.
“What? What’s wrong?”
“Elowen said that something was too late. What did she mean by that?” Silvia dashed to the window and her eyes widened. "What would salt traders want with something in Eurchess’s tower?”
“We’re in Eurchess’s tower!!!” David exclaimed. She shot him an annoyed glance.
“Yes. Keep your voice down.” Although David thought she seemed annoyed, she was smiling faintly. The strong, cold expression she gave him was gone. But it was instantly covered up again. “Why would they be surrounding the tower with that-wait a second- are those diamonds?”
~~~~
David peered out the window himself. He watched the men, people with different patches color of skin with shocks of gray and red hair, and violet eyes take a silver cup from their pockets and reach for a cupful of shiny, luminescent, little rocks the size of a grain of sand. They carefully poured it on the perimeter of the tower.
“These men are from the other side of the world,” Silvia breathed.
“What?” David asked.
“According to their features, they’re from the other side of the world. The world is shaped like a disconnected square, and the salt traders, come from one of the sides that hang sideways, but their magic allows them to stay on this Earth.”
“What are they surrounding the tower with?” David asked. Fear started to bubble in his chest.
“Salt.” David started to chuckle. He was instantly silenced by the furious Silvia.
“This isn’t any kind of salt, David!” Her icy eyes flashed. “If it so much as touches your skin...the coating layer of poison kills you...” That silenced David for sure.
“We...my people and I, I mean…..” she paused. When he didn’t say anything, she continued. She was thankful it had not occured to the human to ask as to where she was from. “We have done studies on them, and have analyzed that they believe in dragons as their gods. They bring attack forces in multiples of sixteen- their holy number.”
“Hmm…interesting.” David stated. Although his words came out slowly, his brain was working at a fast rate. He couldn’t think what the enemy’s motives might be except-something tugged at his mind at what Silvia had said. They said that the enemy was making every kingdom weak in order to take control by slowly picking them off!
The people that wanted to kill them must be after something to help them take control…But what was it? Silvia had been thinking too, and they were thinking alike. Suddenly, Silvia’s ear jewel was gold. Eyes lit up with excitement, she smiled. But then her face darkened as the full enormity of their plans dawned on her.
“They want the book,” Silvia said quietly.
“What?” David said, sure he hadn’t heard correctly.
“Would you do yourself the favor to not ask people to repeat themselves?” she asked irately.
He cleared his throat apologetically. “You were about to say….?”
“Well, it’s obvious that they want the book, The Art of Warfare. You see, back long ago, people from a different world came over and revolutionized many things. They also thought to conquer many places to settle.
“They planned to conquer this place, so they brought a book that they said was written by a genius called Sun Tzu. This book won many battles, and those people decided to use it to conquer the Peace Havens. Eurchess sent them back to their world, so no harm was done, but unfortunately, they left a copy of that same book in this world…by accident.
“The damage hadn’t been done or accomplished, but Eurchess trusted my kingdom,” she said with a smile, “to keep the book from ever being read by the enemy….or…” she looked at David, pausing, “…others. There’s a telescope in the highest room, yet if the enemy, or someone else, gets the amber stone, then….”
“Where is the amber stone hidden?” David asked.
“The Menelays princess was guardian of the stone. Her people are ignorant of the subject- just she herself and her father know the stone’s potential threat. But then, the princess was kidnapped. It reveals the location of the book. If it replaces the telescope lens, then the amber and the crystal windows will have a magical effect and produce a blue ray of light towards the book’s location.
“So you’ll stick with us?” Silvia asked.
“What?” David asked, for he felt his breath stolen from his lips as she took his hand, her eyes hopeful.
“Will you help us?” With the princess asking him, a boy, to help her, David’s voice deserted him. “To end this? We can stop this war together!” her eyes burned into his. The silence was again tangible. David then made the second most important decision of his life.
“Yes."
