Sword Bearer (Return of the Dragons 1)

Kalle nodded. “This is the forgotten city, the Gammalstan. I cannot believe our luck. When the lightning began to thunder down upon us, I was sure all hope was lost.” He stopped and looked at me. “Who are you, Anders, really? Kara contacts you through a gateway, the keiler call you Herr, and now you open the gate into Gammalstan.”

I shook my head.

“I don’t know,” I said finally.

Kalle nodded. “The answers are in your blood, perhaps, not in your head.”

“Blood we hope not to have to shed.”

A spear point made of dark carved wood moved into my field of vision.

I heard Kara gasp.

We looked up together, and around us. Dazzled by the magical brilliance, I hadn’t even bothered to look around with my two normal eyes.

I followed the point of the spear up the shaft to its owner. A woman, a young woman — she looked little older than me — held the spear with confidence, and looked me straight in the eyes without blinking.

I really wanted her to smile, but she didn’t.

We were surrounded. They were all young, muscled, strong. They were all armed with spears, and the spears all pointed towards us. There must have been ten or twelve of them. Something told me the girl who had the spear pointing at my face was the leader.

She seemed surer of herself than the rest of them, for one thing. And on her head she wore a simpler but more elegant bonnet than the others. I watched the girl-woman with attention. Her face was cool, motionless, her eyes steady. I looked at her with my third eye and saw... nothing.

What was going on?

Was she somehow blocking my vision? I thought I caught the smallest flicker of a smile.

Don’t move, Anders, whatever you do. We need to go slowly, now.

That was Kalle. And this time I was sure the girl smiled.

“Yes, please don’t move. We need to establish a few things first.”

Why do you speak with them, Jona? They may be here to trick us.

I felt pretty sure that was a boy, a warrior around my age, just to my left. His thoughts felt strange, like he was thinking in another language. I turned my face slightly to face him. I felt very sure the his name was Woltan, but I did not know how I knew this. I decided to speak, all the same.

I opened my mouth, but when I did, out flowed a language I couldn’t understand. It was musical, and flowed like the music of the gateway and the sword. But honestly, if you begged me to, I wouldn’t be able to repeat a word of it.

Instead of thinking the words, I felt them as my mouth moved around them. The foreign words, velvety on my tongue, flowed out of my mouth. The language was strange and wonderful and made my whole body tense with energy.

For my ears and my brain it was melodious nonsense. But through the filter of my blood I managed to understand a little. Woltan, we come from far away. We seek shelter from the keiler of the Dark Lord. If my heart speaks true, and my blood tells no lies, then we here are all kin, and there is no foe inside these gates of the Forgotten City, Gammalstan.

There was a long pause. The air crackled with tension, and I felt my hairs stand up straight on my arms and legs.

By some silent signal, the children-warriors pulled their spears back. Then they stepped back, and suddenly we were alone again, still seated on the ground.

Had it all been some kind of hallucination? Some kind of strange dream?

I looked at Kalle and Kara and was about to ask a question when I noticed they hadn’t moved a muscle since the spears had been withdrawn.

“Kalle? Kara?”

No response. I waved my hand in front of their eyes. They didn’t even blink.

I stood up, and looked up at the clouds. They too seemed frozen. I looked around and saw, around a hundred feet away, a small building, and at the doorway, two figures. One of them beckoned.

I began to walk towards them. As I grew closer, I recognized Woltan and Jona. Woltan continued to wave me onward.