Altarn: Chapter 3, part 1

Sorry for the day late update here, I've had some serious allergy problems recently which I think I've fixed. On with the adventure now.

Luciana went straight back to work in an attempt to finish off her remaining tasks as quickly as possible. Altarn laid back on his bed and wondered what types of problems they were going to run into with Berryl along. Having not only the potential for adventure ahead but the potential for trouble behind as well disturbed him somewhat. He drifted off to sleep and woke up to the crashing sound of metal on metal. Glancing out the window he wondered just how long Luciana was going to be working. From the position of the moon and stars it was an hour or two past midnight. His sleep groggy brain slowly focused on an orange light filtering into the window as well. There must be a fire in town. Quickly throwing on his clothes he headed for the door, upon opening it he finally realized the metallic sound he had awoken to was not blacksmithing but fighting going on someplace within the town. Rushing back into the house he pounded on Luciana’s door and not waiting for answer rushed in. “Luciana, Wake up! Someone is attacking the village!” Luciana slowly rubbed her eyes, “What are you talking about? No-one has ever bothered with the village before.” “Listen” as Altarn paused in silence, Luciana’s eyes opened wide and all thoughts of sleep deserted her. She leapt from bed, no thought of modesty in her mind and grabbed her clothes as Altarn blushed and turned his back to her. “What are you doing in here still? We’ve got to go help the guards, they are only militia with barely any combat training at all.” Luciana pulled on a leather jerkin and grabbed her weapon belt as she headed for the door. Altarn followed, “I don’t know what kind of help we’ll be, we’ve not had any combat training either.” “We’ll be two more bodies to help defend and with my strength and your brains we just might be valuable to them.” Altarn blushed at the off-handed compliment and followed Luciana into the night.

As the front door of the house opened it was like walking into dusk, enough buildings were burning that the light from the fires illuminated everything. Even so Altarn thought the shadows were playing tricks with his eyes as he caught sight of some of the attackers. “Orcs?” he thought, “There aren’t any orc lairs within days of here.” Luciana drew her newly made sword and jumped in to assist the man the orc was attacking. As Altarn pulled his dagger out and tried to get into position to attack the orc Luciana dropped it with a solid thrust to the stomach. “Come on” she said, “Most of the fighting sounds like it is in that direction.” She headed off down the street, Altarn trotting along behind. “Wait a moment” he said, grabbing her arm “We need to make some sort of plan as opposed to jumping into the thick of things.” Luciana turned to face him, fury evident on her face. The fury dissipated quickly as she looked at Altarn’s hand. “Where did you get that dagger?” she queried. “This is the dagger I’ve had all along, the one that has passed down through my family for generations” “Uhh-uh, that is one fine piece of craftsmanship you are holding there, I’ve seen your family’s heirloom, it is just a normal well used dagger. That dagger is something special.” “No, this is the one I’ve wanted all this time, the one my father finally gave me when I was leaving.” Altarn dropped his hand from her shoulder in confusion. “Wait a second, when you let go of me all I see now is a plain old dagger again.” Reaching out to touch Altarn her jaw dropped “Now I can see why you thought so highly of it if this is what you’ve been seeing all along, when I am in contact with you I see the same as you, when not I see just a plain old leather wrap hilted dagger. Anyhow, we’ve got to get to the fight before its over we’ll look into this more later.” Luciana spun and headed off down the street again, Altarn once more following along.

Hope you are enjoying the story...
Tom(Thralen)