Ahren- the 13th Paladin Read online

  Torsten Weitze

  AHREN

  The 13th Paladin

  Volume 1

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  © Torsten Weitze, Krefeld, 2017

  Bild: Petra Rudolf / www.dracoliche.de

  Editor: Janina Klinck / www.lectoreena.jimdo.com

  Translator: Tim Casey

  Proof Reading: Neil Mc Court

  764 years earlier

  The figures slowly peeled away from the soaring column of smoke, which was becoming denser. They were different shapes and races but they all exhibited the same facial expressions which fluctuated between exhaustion, satisfaction and confusion. They clambered up the last few paces of the newly formed crater and turned around. They looked up for a while in silence at the pall of smoke, a good thousand paces in diameter, which rose smooth and dense, like a black wall in front of them. It hid the being within from the eyes of creation.

  One of the figures asked in a tired voice, without looking away, ‘will it suffice?’

  ‘It must suffice’, another answered. ‘We cannot do more, so long as one of us is missing’.

  There was a short pause before the voice continued, ‘if everything goes according to plan, it will only be for a short time’.

  One by one, the bedraggled forms turned away, leaving the pillar of smoke in their wake. It pointed towards the heavens like a warning black finger, defying the wind and the time.

  Chapter 1

  It was the sudden croaking of an ogre frog that woke Ahren up from his slumber. Startled, he looked down at the creature, a good forearm in length, which had woken him so rudely. With a frown and a wave of his hand he shooed the troublemaker away, and with an almighty leap the frog found the safety of the river some distance from the drowsy youngster.

  ‘Stupid frog’, Ahren muttered to himself, as he reached for his fishing rod. It was only now he noticed the waning intensity of colour in his surroundings, which could only have been caused by the encroaching dusk. ‘The Three be with me!’ blurted the youngster, now fully awake, as he suddenly realised he’d slept the afternoon away. A closer look at the rod revealed that a fine big creature must have taken the bait because the line had been snapped. With a sigh he imagined the splendid specimen and wondered how he had slept through the tugging of the fishing line. A look around him answered his question. Here, in the bend of the river, he was protected from the wind, far away from all the other villagers and their activities. The river was four paces in width and the willows, hanging low over it, afforded shade from the sun without covering him to the point that it would be cool. The sluggish stream lapped gently around stones that stuck out of the water and lulled anyone who was a good listener to sleep. The soft, grassy bank had done the rest, and so the idyllic surroundings had carried him away to the land of nod. Ahren stood up slowly. But now he was in for a rude awakening. As he stood there and looked around, he noticed that his bait box with its rare and coveted Godsday flies was lying knocked over, on the ground. These flies were used to catch the equally coveted and delicious blueshoal fish, which always fetched a handsome price at the market. Master Cossith always took one off him whenever Ahren managed to catch some and paid him with a large chunk of the delicious cheese he made so well. Ahren bent down to look for the flies and was startled to see tooth and claw marks on the wooden box. Martens had feasted on his bait! Unfortunately, these pests had just as much a weakness for the Godsday flies as the blueshoal fish. They were called Godsday flies because they only hatched on the Day of the Gods and died the same night. But if you caught them on the day and locked them away so they couldn’t see moonlight, then they would survive until the next Godsday. Unless of course, they served as bait for blueshoal fish. Ahren realised with exasperation that his full supply of flies was gone, which would have provided him with another three days’ fishing. Snorting with anger he flung the useless box into the river and put his rod on his shoulder. As he reached for his bucket with the day’s catch, a despondency, such as he hadn’t felt in a long time, came over him. His catch had been stolen too! He thought of what his father would say once he arrived home with no fish and no flies, not to mention a snapped fishing line, and felt a lump in his stomach. His backside was already sore at the mere thought of it.

  With slumped shoulders he made his way homewards, a journey that suddenly felt terribly long. He beat his way through thick bush and came out onto a small path which led from his home village of Deepstone and ran through the Eastern Forest. This was a small, dense forest which snaked alongside the river like a green ribbon. While it took hardly any effort to reach the west side of the wood from the river bank in less than an hour, it took two or three days march to get through it by sticking to the river – that’s what Falk, the Forest Guardian, said anyway. A feeling of imminent disaster, caused by his father’s scorn, hung over him, and it seemed to the thirteen-year old that the wood was stretching itself out. An hour became a small eternity as he walked between the trees towards the sound hiding that was waiting for him. The sun set slowly in high summer and accompanied him on his return journey.

  It still wasn’t dark when he stepped out from the trees and paused on the edge of the village. Deepstone clung to the edge of the forest and mirrored the Eastern Forest in its form. It was more than ten times longer than it was wide. Each house was no more than a bowshot from the wood, for it hadn’t taken long for the inhabitants to realise that the trees offered protection from the cold wind that swept over the hills of Eastland. A few had tried to build their wooden houses further away – with little success. In the best-case scenario this meant that twice the amount of wood was needed for heating in winter, and in the worst case, a family member would succumb to the Blue Death. Old Vera, the village Healer, said the winter wind would then no longer want to leave the afflicted person’s lungs. And indeed, the howling of the winter wind could be heard again with every wheezing breath that passed between the blue lips of the victim. Ahren’s mother had died in this way, shortly after his birth. Too weak, her body could offer no resistance to nor defy the Blue Death.

  Not one of the Wailing Houses, as they were called by the other inhabitants, was in use for more than one winter. Each and every family abandoned the house the following spring and build a new one in the shelter of the wood instead.

  And so, the little village resembled a small version of the protecting wood. The houses stood in a row, like a wooden pearl necklace along the edge of the forest in groups of no more than four or five houses together. The village population of Deepstone would never have amounted to its current two hundred inhabitants were it not for the fact that the land here was fertile and yielded a good harvest every year. Everything seemed still. It was high time for supper, and of course it would have been blueshoal fish on the table at home today, if Mother Nature hadn’t kindly lulled Ahren to sleep with her peace and quiet, only to make him then pay such a high price.

  The boy trod with a sigh to his father’s hut and stood still. The house his father had built that time had a compact structure that reminded him of a gnarled, dead tree stump, and gave a general appearance of ugliness and depression. The windows were small and the wood almost black. The hut had been coated with such a heavy layer of tar that in the dusk it resembled more a withered root that had pushed its way up through the earth than a place you could call home. The villagers used to say that after his wife had died, Edrik, Ahren’s father, had poured all his pain and sorrow into building this house. But later it became clear to Ahren, tha
t his father’s only aim had been to build a house that was completely wind-proof. He had succeeded in this and Ahren was sure that his house was the warmest in the whole village. Secretly though, he had to admit that the other villagers had a point. Ahren was young but he already knew that there was more than one kind of coldness that could trouble a person. This brownish-black wooden fortress provided no refuge. Shivering inside Ahren stopped studying the house and opened the door.

  It was no surprise that Ahren was still in bad form the following day. His father had reacted as expected and used his belt. Sitting was not an option now and Ahren stole away from the house before his father thought of a more severe punishment than the wood-cutting he had been ordered to do. At least that could be done standing up. He walked smartly into the wood to cut branches off one of the marked trees. Falk, the Forest Guardian, hunted the woodland animals, but he also knew which trees could be felled without damaging the forest. Unlike the practice in other villages, the Deepstone villagers could not cut wood willy-nilly. The protection offered by the forest was too important, and so the woodcutters often went deep into the forest to fell the trees that Falk had specially marked. He had singled out a small group of trees the previous week and Ahren made his way there. Even before he reached the clump of trees, he recognised the loud voices of Holken and his friends. Holken was the son of the local blacksmith and the strongest boy in the village. Ahren realised with a sigh that today was threatening to turn out even worse than yesterday. Although he wasn’t particularly slight for his age, he certainly couldn’t compete with that muscular bully. And for some reason, Holken always seemed to want to prove this. Naturally this led the other boys in Holken’s gang to see Ahren as nothing more than fair game. He avoided the blacksmith’s son as much as possible, but this was probably not going to be possible today. The next nearest group of marked trees he knew of was half an hour’s march away. And he would also have to carry the chopped wood back to the hut. So he would have to make the journey four or five times, laden down with wood. If he didn’t want to double his workload, he would simply have to make use of the clump of trees in front of him. Just as he was about to move to within sight of the young gang, he heard a familiar voice in the undergrowth.

  ‘Psst, Ahren, over here’.

  ‘Likis!’ Ahren nearly screamed with relief but stopped himself at the last minute with a low-voiced exhalation. He gave a start, afraid that the gang had heard him, and with two quick steps to the left he was behind the bushes where his best and indeed only friend was waiting. Likis looked the same as ever. A half smile in his narrow face, and a cheeky sparkle in the blue eyes that flashed from under his black hair. Added to that, there was the dirty clothing, which had doubtless been new and pristine a few days earlier, but which was now torn in several places. No jerkin in the world could survive Likis’ propensity to crawl through the undergrowth and hide. Ahren himself was of a somewhat lean build and a typical Midlander with his nut-brown hair and green eyes. But compared to Likis, he was stocky. And slow. Because if Likis was nothing else, he was certainly fast.

  ‘I was hoping you’d come here today. I’ve been sitting in this bush for half an hour already, wondering how I can get my hands on firewood without having such backache tomorrow that I won’t be able to stand’, said Likis in a low voice.

  ‘How did you know I’d be coming here?’ asked Ahren, surprised. Likis smiled mischievously and Ahren’s face turned bright red. Of course, his father hadn’t exactly been quiet the night before as he vented his feelings regarding his son’s failings. Likis’ family were immediate neighbours and must have heard everything.

  ‘Don’t worry about it. Everyone can have a bad day. But you really do have to tell me later how it’s possible to lose the fish, the flies, and the rod, all in the one day, without having been set upon by robbers’, said Likis with a chuckle.

  ‘Only the line, not the whole rod!’ said Ahren defensively, which only provoked the usual half-smile from his partner. Sometimes Ahren hated him for that grin. It seemed as if his wiry friend would meet every situation with this crooked smile, no matter how serious or awkward things became. One time, Likis had gone so far with his pranks that the bailiff had seriously considered dragging him before the village council. This was one of the most humiliating things that could befall a person in a community as small as Deepstone. Likis had simply adopted this half smile and begun to talk the bailiff out of his plan. Half an hour later he was let go. Old Mara, who had seen the whole thing, had said to Ahren: ‘That young boy has a gift, no doubt about it. In ten years, he’ll either be sitting on the village council himself, or he’ll have been banished’. She had shaken her head kind-heartedly as she watched Likis scampering away.

  ‘I see, I see, just the fishing line. Then it’s not so bad. That could happen to anyone’, said the wiry boy, referring teasingly to Ahren’s misfortune.

  ‘Just leave it, will you? I’ll tell you everything later’, Ahren responded, giving in. He knew his friend would give him no peace anyway if he didn’t. The word ‘curiosity’ took on a whole new meaning when you were in Likis’ company. Maybe, thought Ahren, that was why he combined stealth and chattering so well. What the merchant’s son couldn’t find out through cajoling, he did through stealth. Yet he never used this acquired knowledge to his own advantage. Yes, he got up to tricks, but he never harmed anyone unless he was forced into a corner. Maybe that’s why he got away with so much, thought Ahren to himself. He said to Likis, ‘but first I need firewood, and preferably without being nabbed by Holken. Two beatings in two days are just too much’ and with a grimace he rubbed his backside.

  ‘That’s exactly what I thought too, when I saw Hammerhead here’, said Likis. Hammerhead was a nickname he had invented for the budding apprentice blacksmith because he was firmly of the opinion that he big bully wouldn’t need a hammer for his handiwork, his head would do just as good a job – it was of no use for anything else anyway. The fact that Holken really did possess a somewhat angular head just added insult to injury. Likis relished picking the right words and thereby really infuriating the target of his scorn. Not that he was ever brought to book in this regard. Likis was small and slight, but beside his ability to be stealthy, he was also the best sprinter in the village and used his surroundings artfully to his benefit. Any time he was in imminent danger of being eventually hunted down and caught, he would find refuge among several sympathetic villagers. He would have plausibly convinced them that it was certainly not his fault that at that moment he was being chased by a gang of ruffians. That was just as well, Ahren thought to himself, for Holken would certainly tear the younger boy apart if he ever caught him.

  Ahren valued his friend for these very reasons. His sharp humour, his quick-wittedness, and of course his fleet-footedness (which saved him from the consequences of the other two qualities) were a combination of all the things lacking in Ahren. For some reason his hands and feet were always getting in the way, and even if he never considered himself to be stupid, he never had the courage or the presence of mind to find the right words at the right time. Now Likis was grinning at him and formulating his plan on how they could get to the firewood as quickly as possible without having to do the heavy work themselves or without falling into the hands of the other youngsters.

  ‘It’s really very simple’, he whispered. ‘I’ll lure them away from the clearing and you grab the firewood. Hammerhead is so hell-bent on getting his hands on me that he’ll give chase as soon as he sees me. The other idiots will follow him for fear of getting a tongue-lashing if they don’t help and then I’ll give him the slip.’

  ‘Yes, that sounds great. Let’s go!’ agreed Ahren enthusiastically. The thought of not having to spend hours on end cutting wood, but of snatching the fruit of the others’ hard-earned labour, appealed to Ahren so much that he agreed without giving it a second thought. Yesterday’s misfortune had wounded him deeply and the thought of outwitting the world in general and the village boys in particular,
seemed to him in his present state of mind to be poetic justice.

  ‘Good, get into position over there and grab the wood as soon as they’re all gone. Best bring it to Safehold, it’s not so far and you can easily hide there’. Safehold was a tree-house the two boys had built the previous summer. Falk was the only other person who knew about it – the pair had asked him about a suitable tree because they wanted to be sure that their tree-house wouldn’t be chopped down one fine day.

  ‘Sure, I’ll do it. Just be careful nobody catches you’.

  ‘They haven’t managed it yet’, chuckled Likis, and disappeared among the trees.

  ‘That’s exactly what worries me’ muttered Ahren and stared at the place where he had just seen his friend. The day would come when fortune wouldn’t smile on the crafty boy and then it could end in tears. Already Likis’ plan didn’t seem like such a good idea to him. But his nimble friend was already gone and Ahren crept into the undergrowth with an uneasy feeling in his stomach. He pushed himself into the designated position and had to admire Likis’ trained eye in such matters. From here he had a good view of the cluster of trees in question and of the four youths toiling away, without being seen himself. As long as he didn’t draw attention to himself with sudden movements, he’d be able to lie here unnoticed for a good while.

  He contemplated the scene before him. Holken dominated the picture of course, with his bulging muscles rippling under his sweaty skin as he worked on the thickest branches with forceful swings of the axe. With a derogatory snort Ahren observed that the show-off had taken off his shirt so that he could be admired more. He did this for the benefit of the four other youngsters. Besides, Holken was the eldest in the clearing so the others looked up to him anyway. Ahren was almost sick with envy as he watched them joking around. He’d have given anything to be part of their group, instead of having been chosen to be a whipping boy by a stupid twist of fate. Maybe that’s why he couldn’t stand Holken.