Read The Sword and The Seven Stones: Diamond Page 14

Laying in the clearing, the fog dissipated and the morning sun was starting to come through the trees. Gavin was the first to awake and looked around. The horses were standing by a pond, drinking the crystal clear water and the mountain that they were on last night was behind them now. As he stood up, he noticed the other three were stirring from the deep sleep they had been put under. Alman opened his eyes and turned his head to look at Gavin. “What the hell happened?” Gavin shook his head as he looked around the clearing. What kind of fog can lift a man and bring him thousands of feet from where they were? He didn’t like the unknown. Jordon, Nelvil, and Harry started to wake also. Nelvil stood up and stretched. “I’m starving so I’m going to see if I can’t find something for us to eat. He grabbed his bow and went out to look for some food. “I’m coming with you. You told me you would show me how to shoot an arrow,” Harry shouted as he went running after him. Jordon walked over to the pool where the horses took their drink from to fill the canteens with water. If a horse drank from the pool then it would be safe for humans. Horses were fickle creatures and if the water smelled bad, they wouldn’t have drank from it. Looking down, he could see all the way down to the bottom of the pool. He kneeled down and took some water into his hands and brought it up to his nose and smelled it first before trying to drink it. As the cool liquid ran down his throat, he had never tasted anything so refreshing. The horses had their filled and were now grazing in the field. As he looked into the water, he noticed something that was very odd. There was no life in the waters. No fish swam around and no other water life could be seen. Gavin was still looking around when Alman finally got up. The prince felt like he had slept for days. Shaking his head, he was still trying to figure out what happened. He remembered watching Nelvil go over the side of the cliff, screaming out because he hadn’t been close enough to him to grab him before he went over the side. Then the fog came in and the feeling of being wrapped in a warm blanket had come over him. Waking up lying in the field with the sun shining and the day clear from it being nighttime in what felt like seconds ago, was very strange. What kind of magic had its hold over this area? Nelvil came back with Harry following him. He had a huge grin on his face. Harry walked into the camp site and threw down two rabbits. “Nelvil let me use his bow and I got them both with only one arrow each.” Alman walked over to Harry and slapped him on the back. “Did you bother to tell Nelvil that you almost killed our instructor when it came to the bow?” Nelvil looked up surprised at this information. Jordon came walking back over with some wood in his arms. “Let’s set up a fire and cook these. I’m starving since we haven’t eaten since last night.” Or was it still night? He didn’t know. Everything was strange since they entered the mountains. Nelvil took out his blade and started to skin the rabbits. It took him minutes where it took Churil a little longer to do. Harry fashioned a spit and they had the rabbits tied and cooking over the fire Jordon had going strong. Gavin went over to the horses. He noticed Jordon’s horse was limping. He put his hand to the war horse’s nose and then gave him a rub on the side. He moved slowly down with his hand rubbing the horse as he went to his hind quarter. He knew never to rush a war horse. They could kill a man with one hoof. No one wanted to be the person under one of these huge beast. Gavin had seen in battles the strength that these horses had in them. As he noticed the puss coming out of the scratch. He was relieved that it was not poisonous but he had to stop the infection from getting any worse. He took some aloe out of his bag and applied a small amount to the scratch. The horse turned his head toward Gavin. “Don’t worry, big guy, your life is spared today.” Jordon came over to see what Gavin was doing to his horse. When he saw the scratch, Gavin told him that his horse was fine and that it would heal in a few days. Jordon nodded and let his horse graze as he went back to join the others. Everyone took a seat around the fire, waiting for the rabbit to finish cooking. “So what is the plan now?” Nelvil asked. Alman knew that they had to get through the forest that lay on the other side of the field. “We have to go through the forest and the sapling is supposed to be within there. Once I find it, I have to bring it to the old man.” Alman knew time was running out. They only had a few more days till the new moon. He didn’t want to be the cause of all his father’s people dying. It wasn’t even about the sword now. He needed to save lives and one, being his father. “Well let’s eat and then get on our way. We should use as much daylight as possible,” Gavin told them. He wanted to get back to the palace before anything else wrong could happen. Nelvil tore pieces of the rabbit off for each of them. They ate until they were full and then Jordon and Harry brought the horses over. Harry would ride with Nelvil and Alman would be with Gavin. Jordon didn’t want to chance the extra weight on his horse with the injury. They started towards the forest when the clouds moved in and the rain started.

  It was almost an hour before they reached the treeline. Gavin didn’t think it was that far but it seemed as they traveled towards it they weren’t making too much headway. The trees were old and stood tall. The ground beneath their horses’ hooves was soft, which made it tricky for the horses to keep their footing. Jordon got off his horse and walked beside him instead. He didn’t want to take any chances of having him get injured any more than what he was. “How far do you think we have to go before you find this tree?” Jordon asked him. Alman couldn’t tell him that answer. He knew that he would find it when it was time. Nothing seemed to go the way he wanted it to go anyway, with large cats trying to kill them and the water creatures coming out of the water. He could only hope that this part of the journey will be uneventful. As they came to another watering hole, they decided to break for a bit to give the horses a rest. Harry jumped down and the ground seemed like a spongy moss. He bent down to touch it and the moss came up and took hold of his hand. The horses spooked as he let out scream as the needle like prongs set into his hand. Jordon took out his sword and buried into the soft earth and the prongs let go. Harry stumbled back and landed against a tree. Gavin and Alman had gotten down off the horse as soon as he got the beast back under control from Harry yelling. “Let me take a look at it,” Gavin told Harry. From what he could see, there was only two puncture wounds. As he started to take the aloe out of his bag to put on the wound, he noticed a blood stain on the side of Harry’s shirt. “What happened here,” as he moved his jacket out of the way. Harry looked down and noticed the blood. “One of the cats must have gotten me.” Gavin knew Harry would have felt the cat do this to him. The scratch was about two inches long. It was enough for the poison to seep in. He also noticed that Harry didn’t look as refreshed as they had when they woke up that morning. This wound must have been the cause. Gavin didn’t know what to do about this. It was one thing to take a horse aside and kill it and in some instances a man too but Harry was a young man that he had watched grow up beside the prince. He could just tell Nelvil to take him out to the forest and leave him there. No, he couldn’t do that either. They would just have to keep an eye on him. He hoped with the amount of aloe he applied to it that it would do the trick. Gavin got up and stood there while he explained everything to Alman. “We will have to see how he is doing in the next few hours. Since the cats vanished into ash, maybe the magic that was within them may have vanished too.” He could only hope so. He could only imagine what a horrible death it would be. It took Harry an hour or so to feel up to moving on. Alman wasn’t going to leave his best friend behind so they waited for him. Harry started the quest with him and he was determined to make sure that Harry finished it with him too. They got him up on the horse behind Nelvil and Alman jumped up behind Gavin. The hours went by and even though he knew they were going in the right direction, it seemed like they were making no headway. Harry pointed out the same tree three times. Gavin got off his horse and took his sword to make a nick in the trunk. If they were going in circles then he would know. An hour later, they ended up at the same tree. The daylight was setting and evening would be upon them soon. Alman walked to the tree and sat his back agai
nst it. As soon as he did, the ground opened up and he slid down. Gavin saw the ground open and before he reach out to him, Alman was gone. They took turns leaning against the tree but nothing happened. Gavin walked away, putting his hands though his hair. The king was not going to be happy to know that he lost his son. Harry had starting sweating an hour earlier. Jordon went to the pool of water and gathered some up so that he could clean the wound on Harry’s side. As he gave Harry some to drink, the heat flush that had been in his face started to dissipate. He took a cloth and put some on the rag and then applied it to the wound. Within minutes, the scratch started to heal. Nelvil came over to look at what was happening. He knew it had to be another form of magic.