Becoming P.T. Lyfantod - 1

A serial fantasy novel

Becoming P.T. Lyfantod

Chapter One:

Wrath

“Rudy. Rudy, calm down, son! There’s no reason to panic.”

I strove to smother the panic in my own voice as I said it, but it bubbled out all the same. Mere moments had passed since I’d awoken in the near darkness, my cheek flat in a puddle on the floor. Since I’d raised my head to find the boy above me, scrabbling at the walls. I had no idea where we were, or how we’d got there, but I knew I had to project confidence. The children would follow my lead. But my mind was all cobwebs and fuzz. We’d been in the swamp…

“I’m not panicking!” Rudy’s clinging coat highlighted the sharp angles of his frame. His face was pale, his dirty-blond hair dripping. He paced, palming the seamless stone, pointedly ignoring the pool of dark water in the center of our claustrophobic prison. Given our sodden state and the lack of any other obvious ways in or out, it took no great genius to deduce we’d come through it. I shivered.

“Then what are you doing, exactly?” Coira’s voice had lost none of its usual bite. She at least appeared more angry than afraid. She sat across the pool in a puddle of her own, her mane of black hair reduced to a bedraggled mop, the badger skin on her shoulders limp and matted.

“Figuring out how to get out of here!”

“Really? Because it looks like you’re having a fit.”

“Shut—rrrrgh!” Rudy whirled on her, his small hands curling into fists.

“Rudy, please.”

“Don’t tell me please! You—you useless…” He leveled an accusatory finger. “You were supposed to help me save them, but now we’re trapped in here, and they’re out there with that…that thing. And Wendy. She’s just a baby! And—and there’s no way out!”

That thing. Rudy’s words evoked a flash of red and white in my addled brain. An inhuman voice. An invocation…

“There is a way out, you dimwit, if you’d calm down long enough to use your eyes.”

“You mean that?” He thrust an open hand at the pool. “You want to go in there? It’s black as squid ink and probably deeper than…than…”

Coira climbed to her feet and crossed her arms. A flick of her head sent water spraying. “We obviously came in that way.”

The fuzz in my head was joined by a squirming in my belly. “I don’t know if I… Aherrm. I don’t think I can go in there either.”

“What?” Coira rounded on me.

“I have a…an issue with deep water. A phobia.”

“A what?” Rudy’s face screwed up in confusion.

“It means he’s afraid of it, stupid. Christ, get a dictionary.”

“So we are trapped! We’re going to die in here, and they’re going to die out there, and there’s nothing—”

“Now—now hold on! I didn’t say that.” The boy was spiraling. I needed to throw him a rope before he lost his wits entirely. Before he tried something foolish. Before he blew us all up, or lost himself inside a wall. I needed to show him a way out. A way out. The black pool seemed to swell in my vision. The dark depths taunted me. I longed to look away, but there was nowhere else to look. There was a way there, but I…

“I…”

“Uh—detective?” Coira nudged me with the toe of her boot.

Her voice was a lifeline and I grasped for it. Wrested my eyes away. Focused on her face, real and in front of me, brow furrowed in concern. A bead of water slid down her cheek. Traced a line down to the dimpled corner of her mouth and disappeared. Her voice. My eyes flicked to the pool and back again. I had an idea. I’d never be able to do it myself, but perhaps with a little coaching… I swallowed. I would have to tell them. Tell them everything. Who I’d been and what I’d done. I felt sick. I couldn’t come at it directly, but I might work up to it. That wound, old as it was, was still too deep.

“I—I have an idea,” I said. “But I’ll need time. In order for it to work, there are things you need to know.”

“Time? We don’t have time. We—”

“Rudy, please. You’ve got to get ahold of yourself. I’ll get us out of here, I promise.”

“Don’t—”

“Listen! I’m going to get us out of here, all right? But I need to tell you a story first.”

“I don’t want to hear a story!”

“I promise, you’ll want to hear this one.”

“You really think you can get us out?” Coira’s dark eyes were probing. She saw so much for one so young. Would she see through me?

“Yes. In fact, I’m sure of it,” I lied. "But I need your cooperation. And I need time.”

“Fine. Get about it then.” Rudy turned back to the walls. “But I’m not listening to a stupid story.”

“Coira?”

“Yeah, whatever. I’ll listen, I guess. Not like I could stop you from talking.”

“All right. And Rudy—”

“I said I’m not interested.”

“I was going to say, you’re free to listen or not as you wish.”

“I don’t.”

“Understood. Now then. Where to begin…”

“How about the beginning?”

“I thought you weren’t listening.”

“You want me to put my hands over my ears? Would you hurry up? Clock’s ticking, detective.”

“The beginning then,” I took a calming breath, but there was a shudder in it. It’s just a story, I told myself, and stories are your stock in trade. Sneak up on the thing…

“I remember it like yesterday. Bards have excellent memories, you know. It’s a requirement. Those were the good times. Before, ah…I was called Eremin. And I was a thief. Not unlike you."

“I’m not a thief.” Rudy was on his hands and knees, probing the crease where wall met floor.

“You aren’t?”

“You are so a thief!” Coira sneered.

“Get stuffed, Brownie! No. I’m not.”

“Err. Well, what are you then?"

“I’m a Late Bloomer is what I am. We look out for ourselves cause nobody else does. Sometimes that means taking things from other people. But that doesn’t make us thieves."

“Oh. I beg your pardon.”

“Sounds like a thief to me.”

“Whatever. You were called Eremin, and you were a thief. Not at all like me.”

“So much for not listening.”

“Would you shut up?”

“Both of you—listen!”

“Fine!” said Rudy.

“Hurry up then,” added Coira.

“Right. Where was I?”

“Oh my God—”

“Right. The beginning. We had just arrived in a village called Wrath, on the banks of a lake called Glass.”

“Who’s we?”

“Wrath? Glass? I’ve never heard of either of those. They sound made up.”

“You wouldn’t have. We were a band of adventurers. There were four of us, including myself. Argon, a paladin, was our leader—”

“Pala-what?”

“It’s like a holy knight.”

“Christmas?”

“No! The other kind! Like King Arthur! Idiot…”

“Exactly. Like King Arthur. Or Saint Illtud. And he’s not an idiot.”

“Could’a fooled me.”

“Anyway! Argon, the holy knight. There was Dona, the halfling fighter. She was small but wicked tough, with a tongue like a boning knife. A halfling is like—”

“We know!”

“Right. And last was Hurlin, the dwarven cleric. That’s four, isn’t it?”

“You thief, dwarven cleric, paladin, halfling fighter. Yeah. Four.”

“Are you sure this story isn’t made up? It sounds made up.”

“It’s entirely true. And now I’ve…lost my train of thought. I’m going to start again. Try not to interrupt so often. Bear with me…”

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