The Head of Gildabareth

Amarian stood with High Lord Gildabareth in the pass. The twin peaks of Zaknul and Haknul towered over them. The servant boy trembled, but the warrior simply starred ahead with his great sword in his hand.

“Do you fear death?” Gildabareth asked.

“Y-yes, my lord,” Amarian responded.

Gildabareth smirked and laughed. “All fear what they do not understand.” He turned and looked down at the boy. “No matter what happens, we shall triumph. Do you hear me?”

Amarian nodded, but his heart was not in it. His heart was in Schelude, before the flood, when all was sunny and bright. This time, this war, was all beyond him.

Gildabareth took his shoulder. “Stand boy, stand with courage!”

There was the sound of hooves clopping and echoing among the rocks. “He’s coming,” Amarian said, a whine of terror creeping into his voice.

Gildabareth turned back to the path. Naldar appeared. Amarian drew back, frightened at the sight of the warlord. His lower half was like one of the King’s stallions, jet black and well muscled. His upper half was like a man’s, yet with a mane down his back and colored the same horse black as his lower half. Geometric tattoos criss-crossed his body. In his hands was a mighty bladed spear. So ferocious was his approach that Amarian hid his face.

Naldar came to a halt a fair distance from Gildabareth. He looked the High Lord over with a practiced eye. A chance glance caught Amarian in his stare. The boy did not want the centaur warlord to look at him. It made him feel thin and without substance.

“You brought a simple boy to this?” Naldar asked. His voice was smooth and clear, not at all what Amarian had expected.

“He is my squire,” Gildabareth said. “Together he and I shall defeat you, Dark Lord.”

“You give titles where they are not due, Gildabareth of Iregion. I am not a Dark Lord, merely Lord of Nanthrazil.”

Gildabareth frowned. “You harry our citizens, encroach on our borders, and openly defy our King. You are evil.”

Naldar laughed. “Are you forgetting all of Iregion’s conquests? It’s the way of the world, Gildabareth.”

“Come, Amarian,” Gildabareth commanded. “Stand beside me.”

“Did you forget your shield of metal, and replace it with a shield of flesh?” Naldar asked. “Who is craven now, man of Iregion? Who is the true Lord of Slaves?”

Gildabareth let loose a mighty cry and raised his sword. Naldar smiled. He cried out as well and held his spear over his head. The two warriors made Amarian quake in fright. Their posturing, their power, it was all too much. He drew away against a rock, afraid.

The High Lord charged forward. His golden armor glinted in the tiny bit of sun that shone down into the pass. But that same sun was behind Naldar, and its setting rays framed him with fire. The warlord stood his ground.

Their blades met. The sound echoed in the pass and made Anarian’s ears ring. He wanted to go forward, to aid Gildabareth as he had been commanded to. Yet fear held him back like an ice-cold manacle chained to his heart.

Three more times the two great warriors struck at each other. On the last strike Naldar brought his spear down upon the sword of Gildabareth and shattered it. The High Lord staggered back. The spear swiftly swung around again. Its blade took Gildabareth’s head from his shoulders. Amarian watched as it bounced down the rocky slope to the river below.

The warlord breathed heavy for a few moments. His gaze was fixed on the body of his fallen opponent. At last he sighed and lowered his spear to the ground.

“High Lord Gildabareth, you once led men with honor and fought with courage. But years and politics have cost you your head. Where is the glory of elder days?”

Only the faint echoes of the rocks answered Naldar. Amarian watched as the warlord bowed his head upon his chest.

“Rest well with dignity, good Sam Gildabareth of Iregion. Would that times had not made us enemies.”

Finished, he raised his head and looked around. His gaze met Amarian’s. The boy looked into the centaur’s eyes. There was a bit of the nobility and honor that had been in Lord Gildabareth’s eyes. But there was also something else, a sort of wild instinct, which lurked there.

“Are you afraid of me?” Naldar asked Amarian. The boy nodded. “Are you mute? Tell me your answer, don’t hide your voice like some dumb animal.”

“Yes, I-I’m afraid of y-you,” Amarian said.

The warlord jammed his spear into the ground and left it there. He walked over to Amarian. The boy shrank back a little.

“You only fear what you do not understand,” Naldar said. “Do you think me a vicious animal? I assure you I think and speak just as you do, though perhaps in much grander ways. What is your name?”

“Amarian.”

“And where do you hail from, Amarian?”

“Schelude, by the sea in Hollith,” Amarian replied.

“What are you doing as an Iregion High Lord’s squire then?”

“He rescued me, from the flood that destroyed Schelude, and took me as his squire.”

Naldar looked at him thoughtfully. The boy shied away from that glance. “I make you feel small, don’t I?”

“Y-yes.”

“Raise your head, Amarian of Hollith.”

The boy did so. Naldar reached out and held his shoulder. The grasp was strong, yet not hard. Amarian did not pull away.

“You are now Amarian of Hollith, Squire of Naldar. You will come back to Nanthrazil with me, and serve me in the same way that you served the departed High Lord Gildabareth. Due so faithfully, and through all my days Hollith shall be under the protection of the Host of Nanthrazil.”

Amarian was amazed. “But, but you just slew my master. Will you not slay me?”

“No,” Naldar said. “I am not the Dark Lord Iregion would make me out to be. I simply think on an entirely different level and enact plans that do not have fruit at the moment. Sometimes I go against Iregion, sometimes I stand behind it. It makes no difference, so long as Nanthrazil endures.”

Amarian did not know what to say. Naldar put his other hand on the boy’s other shoulder.

“I do this for a reason. I see potential in you, potential that would have been smothered beneath what Gildabareth had become. In Nanthrazil, you will be free to become a man of your own right, and someday to return to Hollith and serve it well.”

The thought of returning to Hollith made Amarian’s heart leap a little and a smile graced his face for a moment. The Lord of Nanthrazil smiled as well.

“You yearn for home. Rest assured, my noble squire, that home is where you will be in the end.”

Amarian took a deep breath. “What would you have me do first?”

“My spear. Take it up from the ground.”

Amarian walked over to where the great black spear of Naldar was, still stuck in the ground. He put his hands to the shaft. There was the smell of horse sweat upon it, from the fight. With all his might Amarian pulled it from the ground and presented it to Naldar.

“Bear it for me, squire, till we reach the gates of my country. They are not far, and I would have my people see what you are to me.”

Amarian nodded and held the spear over one shoulder. Naldar walked down the pass, away from the field of battle. His new squire followed in his wake. But before he left, Amarian took one last look at the fallen High Lord Gildabareth. His head long gone, the man did not look the same. He just appeared to be a set of bloody golden armor, and could have been empty from his perspective. There was nothing there to see anymore. Amarian turned and followed after his new lord.