“Are you okay?”
“Nonac okay. Nonac tough.”
“Nonac stupid,” popped out of my mouth. Yeah, bad habit.
His brow furrowed and his eyes narrowed.
I thought fast. “Uh, it was stupid to save me. You should have just left me back there and saved yourself.”
Nonac's demeanor softened and he shook his shaggy head. “Nonac can't do that. Nonac save friend.” He patted me on the back or, in other words, he knocked me across the hall and into the far wall.
Once I brushed myself off, I looked at the cave-in again to see if there was a way to dig out. “This is going to take a while.”
“No, dis vay.” Nonac took my arm, dragging me down the hall again.
“Look, my barbarian buddy, I don't think there's anything down here. The bigger danger is that we can't get back out and we die of thirst.”
“No. Get orb first, den find vay out.”
“Well, if you insist.” I was trapped in a dusty labyrinth with a guy who had a brain the size of an ant. No water, no food, and a half-used torch; not even my trusty little knife could save me from this. I wished there really were zombies or skeletons who could come and put me out of my misery. To die of thirst, forgotten in an unknown tomb—that was not the way I'd planned to leave this world. I wanted something a little more glamorous or heroic.
We wandered aimlessly through the hallways. Nonac kept stopping and scratching his head, then he'd turn around and try another hall. Our torch began to flicker and I realized it was about three-fourths gone. “Great, I'm going to die in the dark,” I muttered. There was no way we could find our way out of this maze without light.
“Aha!” Nonac yelled, scaring me half out of my breeches. He had gotten a little ahead of me, so I had to jog to catch up.
“Did you find a way out?” I asked, hope flaring inside.
“No. Some-ting better. Da sorcerer's crypt!”
A pall of doom fell over me. How was that going to help? So we found some ancient dead guy, but unless he had warm clothes, gave us directions and a big leg of mutton, I didn't see how this could be better. We were just going to end up buried with the sorcerer and his stinking orb.
Nonac entered the chamber with a large grin on his face. I followed, if for no other reason than to see what could be so special about this place.
Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Just another empty, dusty room. Nonac wandered from end to end gesticulating with his large arms. “Vhy, vhy, vhy? Supposed to be here. Vhere is it?”
I let him go on like this for a minute before I asked, “Now can vee, I mean, we get out of here?” I looked at the sputtering remains of our torch. We were about to be plunged into eternal darkness.
Nonac shook his head. “No. Must find. Must be here.” One positive thing I can say about the guy, he sure did stick to his goals.
I took his arm, marveling at the beefiness. “Come on, my muscular friend. We need to get out of here while we can still see.”
As I pulled against his arm, my foot struck something. My heart stopped. I instantly looked at the ceiling to see if it was collapsing. It wasn’t. I looked back down. My foot had hit a long, stone slab set into the floor.
Nonac looked at it as well. “Vhat dis?” He bent over and, with his muscles rippling, put his fingers under the slab and lifted. He easily picked it up and threw it across the room, sending it shattering against the far wall. The thing had to weigh half a ton. I knew the next time I got in a tavern fight, I wanted Nonac on my side.
We both looked down into the sarcophagus. A skeleton lay there covered in a layer of dust. Whatever clothing it had worn had long ago moldered away. And there were no magic orbs anywhere in sight.
Nonac's shoulder's slumped as he went to the side of the room and sat against the wall. “Nonac fail.” His sword clattered onto the stone floor.
I had overestimated the life of our torch. It gave out one last sputter and then dimmed to a low glow. That was it. We were doomed to die in this place.
The waning torchlight caused something to sparkle from within the sarcophagus. I had been wrong to think that all of the sorcerer's clothing had rotted away. Somehow, his socks had survived the eons.
Oh, I thought, wouldn’t it be nice to pull on a warm, dry pair of socks? My feet were so cold and numb. The sorcerer’s socks were dry. I know what you’re thinking: gross. But imagine if your feet felt like they were going to freeze and fall off. A debate started in my mind: cold feet or dry socks taken from a skeleton. Once I realized that anything rotten inside the socks had long ago deteriorated, I took off my boots and wet socks. I reached in and yanked the socks from the bony toes. They felt gloriously dry and warm as I pulled them on.
Nonac looked up. “Vhat happenink?” He pointed at my feet.
I, too, stared at the silver socks and watched them begin to glow with a soft, warm light. Excitement grew within me. Yes! Magical socks! I sat there marveling at our stroke of luck. We would be able to see to get out of here after all!
Something stirred in the shadows. I looked up and saw two red glowing points emerging from the darkness of the sarcophagus. I wondered what could cause such a thing until I saw the sorcerer’s skull enter the light. Its bony hands pushed itself out of the sarcophagus and into a standing position. The glowing eyes looked down at my newly-acquired foot wear and then back up at me.
I am not ashamed to admit I screamed as I scrambled backwards and into the wall. It was only a little girly.
A skeletal finger pointed at my feet.
“Uh, you want these back? Sure, no problem.” I tried to take the socks off. I couldn’t get a hold of them. They had adhered to my feet. “They won't come off!” I tried to explain to my skeletal buddy. Just my luck, I’ve been searching for something magical all my life and what do I find? Cursed socks.
The sorcerer climbed up out of his sarcophagus and marched toward me. Before he could reach me, my friend, my hero, my most favorite barbarian in the world, leaped forward with a blood-curdling battle cry. His sword streaked out and slashed through the middle of the sorcerer's skeletal remains. But it didn't go down. Instead, it turned its attention toward Nonac. An ancient language creaked from its jaws.
“Run, Mah-reek!” Nonac commanded as he lunged at the skeleton again. “Nonac save you.”
I didn't argue. With my glowing socks to light the way, I ran from the crypt faster than I had ever run before.
* * *
I honestly don't know how I got out of there. All I remember is crawling through some tree roots and coming out on the far side of the hill with the cemetery. I waited a while for Nonac to come out but finally gave up and headed back to the ruins to pick up our mail bags. I made the two-day journey to Fairhaven alone and delivered the messages.
It wasn't until a week later that I saw Nut-boy again. Someone found him hiding in the hay loft of their barn, screaming about skeletons. They recognized his uniform and sent him back to Castle Fringol where we cleaned him up and got him ready for his next mission.
And Nonac? Don't worry, he survived. The barbarian had been smart enough (or maybe his mommy packed it for him) to have an extra torch in his bag. He smashed the skeletal sorcerer into dust and then made his way out of the catacombs. We had a wonderfully painful reunion (it took three weeks for my ribs to heal) several weeks later.
So, now you know why my feet glow. The socks do come in handy at times, though, and I've found they have several other enchantments, like enabling me to run for hours without tiring. No, I have not been able to find a way to remove them. I think I have to be dead to do that, and I don't plan on dying any time soon.
About the Author:
Berin grew up in Chugiak, Alaska. He has a masters degree in saxophone performance and teaches saxophone and clarinet lessons. He currently lives in Orem, Utah with his wife, five kids, dog, cat and aloe plant.
Berin’s first book, The Dragon War Relic, came out in 2009 and is a young adult fantasy/sci-fi/action/comedy. His second book
is Time Gangsters and came out in 2012. It is a middle grade urban fantasy. He also has a series of stories up at BigWorldNetwork.com called Delroy Versus the Yshtari.
For more information, visit: https://berinstephens.com
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