Young Writers Society

Okrol drousily woke not opening his eyes, the back of his head was sore. His surroundings were warm especially the back of his head. He lay still for a minute, remembering what he could. Nothing made sense; everything had just blanked out.

Frantically sitting up and opening his eyes, he threw the soft, fleece blanket from him. The direct light of the full moon pierced his eyes, making him close them again as water leaked from behind his eyelids. It was at this point when he realized he was moving – fast.

Daring to open his eyes again, Okrol took a look at the navy blue blanket he'd thrown from him. A patch near the end of the cloth was blood stained. Bringing a hand to the back of his head, tears filled his eyes again as a stinging pain, issuing from his head filled every nerve in his body. His hands were flaked with brown, dried blood.

Okrol was sitting on an open topped trailer with a driver and two horses propelling it forward from the front. The driver, riding frantically sat near the front of the unit.

“Come on! Stupid animals!” he barked at the horses. It was the businessman; the man who had strangely appeared at Okrol's home, the man who, with Okrol's father had drawn their swords before – blackness.

Okrol slowly clambered toward the front of the carriage to where the businessman, still dressed in his fine clothing, dripped sweat from his forehead, his hands moving at a dizzying pace, egging the horses onwards through the night. The driver saw Okrol through the corner of his eye, he let go of the reins with his right hand and pushed Okrol back onto the trailer.

“Don't lift your head.” the driver began to explain, stopping only to dodge a barely visible arrow which sounded past the side of his head. At this, Okrol turned his head swiftly, looking over the back of the trailer. No more than twenty yards behind them was a group of men on horseback, brandishing swords and crossbows. Okrol was terrified. One of the men loaded another arrow into his crossbow, and took aim. But before he had a chance to shoot, an arrow whizzed passed Okrol's head from the other direction, knocking the man dead off his horse. It was the businessman who had fired the arrow from his own, polished, magnificent crossbow. Before Okrol had the chance to look behind him, his saviour's attention was back on driving and taking them both to safety.

The new obstacle in the road saw the horsemen behind the fallen crossbow wielder be thrown off their horses and fall face first onto the hard ground. Only two pursuers remained by the time Okrol had the chance to look back. Both parties had been climbing the mountain road out of Greygoff Valley on the Largate side. Okrol wasn't sure because he'd never been out of his valley home, but he thought the next town from Greygoff in the direction he was heading was Lampito, one of the scruffiest

towns in Largate, and very much the people to make a bad situation a worse one.

The two horsemen, shining metal swords glimmering in the moonlight, their arms outstretched, as they made their move. Their horses' paces quickened, and they made up ground. Okrol's driver took another quick glance behind, sensing the danger coming.

The businessman bellowed words which Okrol had never heard before, they sounded old, they were definitely not part of modern language. Suddenly the horses stopped, still, as though they were frozen, their riders too, frozen. Okrol's carriage carried on moving a few more yards before the businessman spoke another incantation – the men on the horses vanished; there was no cry of pain or blood, they just disappeared while their horses carried on running for a minute before sensing their masters had gone.

All seemed calm as the carriage reached the highest point in the road; the region where the mountains were at their smallest, which the road took advantage of by emitting travellers in and out of the valley at that point.

“Who are you?” Okrol sternly asked the businessman through nervously chattering teeth.

“My name is Arboar, a friend of your father's.” As Arboar introduced himself with these words, Okrol felt a sickening pain erupt in his torso -

“Where are my mother and father?” Okrol quizzed anxiously.

“There's no time to explain, but they're safe.”

“What happened at -” Okrol cut himself short. He looked back the way he had come. Smoke billowed endlessly from where his home was; the entire town was alight. Nothing could be made out from behind the deep blankets of smoke.

“'Riders' from the Zarphic Desert, my young friend.” Arboar said, slightly smirking.

“Riders!” Okrol gawked. “What do the Zarphic Riders want with Greygoff?”

“Greygoff is right on their border isn't it? The Riders must have been sent to destroy towns to scare the king.” finished Arboar, still riding as he talked, though only a little slower than his previously frantic pace.

“Who are you?” asked Okrol.

“I've told you, I'm a friend.” replied Arboar casually.

“Yes, but who actually are you?”

“Me and your father worked together many years ago. We worked on finding an answer to what lay beyond the Great Wall. Surely he must have told you of his work.”

“No, he never told me a thing. He never mentioned work, he said that it was his business.” Okrol said, slightly angrily.

“You're saying you never knew what your father worked as.” Arboar said, openly laughing. “Your father was a hero amongst us, well, he still is. Me and your father worked for the king, trying to find a way of breaching the Great Wall on the far side of the Zarphic Desert. Fifteen years we worked with a team of about twelve men, including some of the original Zarphic Riders, before the war started anyway. In those years we found so many things about the wall that you would not believe – so many things. For example: did you know that the wall wasn't just built upwards. No, it was built downwards, many miles into the ground, stopping people from simply digging under it. Unfortunately, our station was shut down, just before this foolish war started and we never actually recovered how to breach it.”

Okrol was gob-smacked, he never would have guessed that his father worked for royalty – it was crazy.

The carriage continued its way towards Lampito. Okrol noticed the road change from a muddy track to a wide, stone-filled path the further they were from Greygoff. The moon still shined menacingly in the sky, its white, knife-like light, penetrating Okrol until he fell asleep once again.