• Chapter Three: A Sorrowful Past

    As they set out the two wagons remained side by side for a short while util they came to an almost unknown junction where the trade route met with one of the Old Roads. Here is where the two parties would part company. Jason, Laeon, and Ken taking the Old Road while Lily, Martin, and Nathan continued along the trade route.

    Lily was in a sour mood for hours after the wagons parted company. Martin and Nathan sitting on the driver's bench smoking thier pipes and yammering about trade tolls and whatnot didn't help her mood either. She missed Laeon already and he was only across a small thicket on the Old Road. She raised a flap on the wagon's side for the twentieth time and could still see the canvas through the trees. Then it hit her. The two men were so busy smoking and discussing that they hadn't paid her any mind at all. She pulled a slip of paper out of an inner sleeve pocket and jotted a quick note for them to find explaining where she'd gone. She waited for the wagon to hit a bump and hopped out. She ran toward the woods and in not caring what may lay between her and the other wagon.

    ~*.*.*~

    While Lily was making her mad dash through the woods, Martin was discussing Inn prices in the towns along the trade route.

    "The way I see it," Lord Nathan said after taking a long puff at his pipe, "we ought to stick to camping as much as possible so that we don't have to press too hard to make it from town to town."

    "That's all well and good," Martin replied, "but we should at least pick a few towns with less expensive accommodations in which to stay so that hard ground will occassionally be interspersed with a soft bed." Nathan nodded at the logic but still argued that they had the resources to stay at whatever inn was closest on a night they needed a bed. Martin was beginning to get a little disgruntled with the older lord. "I think I'll go check on Lily. She's been upset ever since we parted ways with Jason and the others." He said ducking into the back of the wagon to discover her missing. "Lord Nathan! Lily is gone." He said peeking back out of the canvas flap.

    "Of course she is," Nathan said continuing on," I saw her make a dash for the woods a few turns back," he paused to puff at his pipe, "She probably went to join the others." Martin was apalled. How could this stuck up lord be so calm. Did he even know what was in those woods? Martin was about to hop ship himself when Nathan stopped him. "It won't do to follow her Martin. What would you do if you caught up to her anyway? Drag her back by the scruff of her neck," he shook his head, "not Lily you wouldn't, now, just stay right here. We'll stop at an inn tomorrow night and have a talk about Lily's hasty actions. Once you learn a bit about her, you'll understand why she does things like this." Martin sat down and shut up. He was on the easy road to Neopolis and would be able to rest along the way in towns when Jason and the others would have to travel the Old Roads. He wished he could have stayed with his friends from Haven but that would have defeated the purpose of the plan. He decided to wallow in his sorrow some other time and struck up another conversation with the old lord.

    ~*.*.*~

    Laeon sat on the driver's bench alongside Jason. It was Ken's turn to sleep. They had divided the time by turns. Every twenty turns they rotated positions. In another ten turns it would be Laeon driving the wagon with Ken at his side. The wagon came around a bend and hit a straight stretch as far as they could see. Jason tied off the reigns and turned to Laeon.

    "You owe me a story," he said taking out a waterskin and taking a sip, "what did you mean when you told me your hands were too bloodstained to hold Lily's with a clean conscience," Laeon sighed and took out his flask. Just as he was about to take a swig a yell almost made him drop it.

    "HEY!" a familiar voice cried from up ahead of them, "JAAAASOOON! LAAAAEOOOOON! SLOW DOWN AND LET ME ON!!" Lily stood at the side of the road just up ahead of them. Jason untied the reigns and slowed the horses so that Lily could jump up on the lower bench. "I'm glad I came out ahead of you guys and not behind. I didn't think about having to chase down the wagon." She wasn't even breathing hard. She explained about having jumped from her wagon and running through the woods toward the Old road. Luckily for her she had come out by following a dried rainstream through the woods that made a kind of path connecting the two roads.

    "Looks like we'll have to postpone that story, Jason," Laeon said with a look at Lily.

    "Oh, no you don't. You aren't worming your way out of this one," Jason said, "I want to know, and I think Lily has a right to know." Jason turned to Lily, "After the battle Laeon told me about how you came to him, and he said he was afraid his hands were too bloodstained to hold yours with a clean conscience." Laeon glared at Jason and began to scratch the handle of one of his daggers. Then he shook his head.

    "No, you're right, Jason. I should tell both of you the story. You see I'm not originally from Syphar." Lily gasped and Jason stared at his friend. Laeon continued, "I'm originally from Chyran across the river. My family was one of the greatest assassin clans Chyran had. We were known as the Beast Corp. Every youth in my family was brought up to believe they would become one of the proud assassins. That is, until he learned what his final exam was."

    ~*.Cridell Pass-Chyran-Five years earlier.*~

    The young Laeon ran to the class for those who had passed the sub-exam. Today the final exam to enter the Beast Corp would be revealed. Today he would earn his fangs. He arrived to find his father standing at the lecturn on the training grounds, the older teens who had passed the sub were already there.

    Laeon's father spoke to the assembled class. "Now then, I will tell you maggots the tradition that has been passed down through our family for generations. Each three years one, only one assassin among the teens is added to the Beast Corp. That one is added because he has proved his worth by being the last one to survive the test. I have one set of fangs that I will hide at the top of the pass. The one who holds the daggers at midnight tonight, or the one who survives will be entered into the Beast Corp. However, this isn't some mere survival excersize, no; this is a bloodbath, each of you will be provided with one dagger and six knives. Your test is to reach the daggers and kill any fellow student who stands in your way. Eat or be eaten, that is the rule of the beasts and therefore it is the rule of the Beast Corp. Now the procters will take you to your designated starting points in the pass." The procters stepped forward and took the stunned students to thier starting points. Only when he got to his did he remember what his father had done last night. His father had handed him a medium length snake knife.

    "My father gave this to me the night before my exam," he had said as he smiled at his excited son, "I hope it brings you the same luck it brought me." Laeon understood the meaning of his father's words now. His father had given him an extra knife, an unfair advantage. He wondered for a moment how many of the other parents had gifted thier children with extra knives and daggers, then he determined that he would earn the daggers without killing his friends and without having an unfair advantage. He threw down the snake knife and ran off with his requisite equipment. He reached the top of the pass and found the fangs they were bound into the sheathes with a notice that said the students were not to use them until the test was over. Laeon strapped the sheathes to the back of his belt and ran down the pass to his starting point. He had to avoid several skirmishes on the way but finally he made it and sat there to wait.

    Hours passed, and the sun set. More hours passed and in the distance down the path to the homes Laeon could see the lanterns of the procters coming to see who held the daggers. Then a figure crashed through the brush at the entrance to the pass. "I finally found you little brother," Arcam had survived the test and had found him. Laeon didn't want to kill his own brother, but he didn't want his brother to kill him either and he knew that unless he forfiet the fangs his brother would kill him, he looked at the ground and unlatched the daggers.

    "You can have them Arcam I don't want to kill my brother and I know unless I give them to you; you'll kill me," Laeon tossed the fangs to his brother who lashed them to the back of his own belt. Just then the procters arrived.

    "How touching the younger brother doesn't want to kill his own kin so he sacrifices his place. I told you he shouldn't have passed the sub, Mal," one of the other procters said to Laeon's father.

    "You are right I'm afraid," Laeon's father said shaking his head sadly, "Arcam, midnight has come and you hold the fangs. Turn in your other weapons both of you." They both obeyed and then their father spoke again, "Arcam, you have your first job as a member of the Beast Corp. The rule of the beasts is to kill or be killed and your brother refused to kill. Kill him." Arcam turned and grinned at his brother. Laeon was shocked. NO! he thought I can't die now I gave up my place to save myself.

    "NO!" He screamed and flung himself out of the way of his brother's swing with the dagger. He dodged and ducked and rolled while the procters and his father laughed at him. He felt rage bubble up within him. A beast that he could not quell, but could not unleash either. He was a fangless beast of rage. Then he fell backward and his hand brushed against a cold metal object. The snake knife he had thrown down earlier. Something triggered within him, "NO ThE NiGhTmArE CaNnOt DiE!!!!" he screamed psychotically as he grabbed the handle of the snake knife and charged to meet his brother head on.

    "The boy's gone mad with fear of death. He'll never be able to survive with just a knife to defend himself," one of the procters said. His father smiled.

    "He will be the death of us all tonight," he said and all the other procters looked at him, "My son is the Rogue's Nightmare foretold by the Syphar oracle that we killed those few nights ago." He couldn't help but laugh. "First he'll kill his brother then he'll kill us all.

    "DiE wOrM!!" Laeon screamed plunging the knife hilt deep into his brother's neck. "aLl Of YoU DiE, dIe, DiE!!!" He screamed running from procter to procter slitting throats and puncturing organs with the snake knife. Finally he came to his father.

    "You wouldn't kill the one whose gift saved your life would you?" he asked with an arrogant absence of fear.

    "The NIGHTMARE spares.......No OnE!!! You gave this to me." he hefted the knife toward his father, "Now I'll ReTuRn It!!" He threw the knife and it stabbed into his father's head right between the man's eyes. He walked to the corpse of his brother and picked up the daggers and sheathes and strapped them to his belt. "The NiGhTmArE iS BoRn!!!" He screamed and strode off down toward the homes. None of the accursed beasts would live the night.

    ~*.The Old Road.*~

    "I burned down our family's compound," Laeon said, "from that time on the one survivor of that catastrophy spread the tale of Laeon the Rogue's Nightmare. The Beast Corp was annihilated and I hunted any soldier of Chyran I could find. Leaving their corpses chewed to a pulp. I'm the only one who kills like that any more now that my family is dead." Laeon turned to his friends pleadingly. He wanted them to understand and not condemn him as so many had.

    "I still don't see why you think your sins are too great to return my love," Lily said looking at him with a smile. I must be dreaming Laeon thought. "Laeon, your past doesn't matter to me. I know you as you are now, and I love that Laeon," she climbed up onto the driver's bench and sat down beside him hugging him, "even if you have a sorrowful past."