Chapter 24
The sun was just rising over the eastern pains when Emily awoke to a jarring lurch from the cart she was chained to. One of the large wooden wheels had fallen off completely and the startled young woman grasped the iron bars to keep from sliding along the floor.
Curses were spitting out of the slaver’s mouths as they moved over to survey the damage.
“Beld, you stupid moron! I thought you inspected that wheel before we left.”
“I did check it you idiot,” Beld spat back. “If you would give me more money for repairs then I could do a better job.”
Emily’s grumpy captors continued to fight amongst themselves and she could not help but smile. She wished the worst for these evil men and did not feel one bit sorry for their misfortune. Bereft of all hope and with no expectation of salvation, she wondered if they would take their frustrations out on her. Only one day had passed since the town with the crazy old man and the thought of what had happened was fresh in her mind. She really doubted that anything would come from her prayer for deliverance, but there was still a nagging suspicion in her mind about what Ya could do for her. Some kind of powerful force had protected the old man and that was proof enough for her that Ya was real, but the pressing question was, does Ya care about me? Am I special enough for him to even notice that I exist?
Emily sighed deeply and hung her head, feeling very much alone in the world.
Her disheartening thoughts were interrupted when she heard a whistling sound followed by a sickening thunk. She looked up to see the stunned face of Beld, the man who had been poking her through the cage every day, with an arrow protruding out of his chest. Suddenly Emily felt very vulnerable sitting out in open. They were under attack! It did not take long for the other slavers to notice what was happening and they quickly moved into action, grabbing weapons to respond in defence. Arrows were still flying and each one met their mark with deadly accuracy. Quickly her concern switched away from the arrows to the slavers who were actually killing the other slaves.
“Kill all of them,” the leader screamed out. “If we can’t get the money from them then no one should.”
The ugly man’s words were cut short as he faced a giant, armoured man who came into the melee with swords slashing. It was a terrible sight that took Emily’s breath away and she hid her face in her hands after seeing one slaver’s head get lopped right off. In mere minutes, the sounds of battle died out and the shaking girl looked around to see that every one of the wicked men had been killed, but not before they had killed all of the other slaves. The big man moved closer to the cage door, his massive swords still dripping bright red blood and Emily cried out in terror.
“Leave me alone!” she said, doing her best to scramble away from the frightful warrior. “I promise that I will not tell anyone what you did, just let me go.”
With a quick, sharp swing, the big man struck the lock that held the gate closed, and the terrified girl screamed again. To her surprise, the knight stepped back slowly, and Emily found herself looking into the green eyes of the most beautiful woman she had ever seen.
“You will be safe now sweetie,” she said in a tender and loving voice. “Ya has sent us here to save you.”
Emily lifted her arms, still shackled to the broken cart to show that she could not come out until they were taken off.
“Jer!” the pretty red headed woman called. “Can you get our new friend out of those chains please?”
“No problem Red.” Emily looked up to see a young boy, about her age, jumping into the cell with a smile. “My name is Jer. What’s yours?”
“Emily,” she said simply.
“This is why everyone should learn to use a lock pick,” Jer said to her as he pulled out some small metal tools from his sleeve. “You are a fighter though eh Em? You really got scraped up trying to get out. I woulda done the same thing too…”
Emily looked around her as the young boy rambled on. The knight was wiping his massive swords on the grass and he still scared her, but she also could see more of this strange group. One was an older woman clad in leather clothing and she was rummaging around the bodies, looking for arrows. She must be the one who had killed Beld and Emily made a mental note to thank her later. The strangest of all her saviours was a grey robed man with eerie, glowing eyes. She could see that he had a kind face, but his white eyed gaze caused her to turn quickly. Once again her vision was drawn to the kind woman who had first spoken to her.
“Jer, you are going to drive Emily to boredom with all that babbling. My name is Rose and we are all glad to meet you Emily.”
All the emotion the young girl had been keeping inside came flooding out in wave of tears. Free of the chains, she jumped into the waiting arms of Rose and with wracking sobs, let all of her pain fall on the loving priestess. A faint glow could be seen emanating from the two as Rose once again became a conduit for the healing power of Ya.
“Let it all out sweetie,” Rose said in a tender voice as Emily continued to cry for at least a full minute. The others looked on in wonder and joy to see how Rose was blossoming in her newfound power.
When she had cried her last tear, Emily looked up into the face of Rose and smiled.
“I really thought that I would be killed by those men,” she said as Rose ran her fingers through her messy hair to pull out some of the knots. “They killed my mother you know.”
“We are here in answer to your prayers Emily,” Gaost said to her. “We are just glad that we got here in time to help you, even if we were too late to save the other slaves.”
Seeing that Emily was still slightly uncomfortable at the sight of the Cleric, Jirah spoke up to make some introductions.
“Emily, my name is Jirah. This man here with the funny eyes is Gaost.” she said with her crooked grin.
Gaost smiled slightly and responded, “It is nice to meet you Emily. I assure you that I am quite safe to be around; normal even.”
“Sure, If you call living for thousands of years and talking to god on a regular basis normal,” Jer said with a laugh.
“You have already met Jer our goofy comedian,” Jirah said, cuffing the boy playfully on the head. “And lastly, this big giant is Logan, Knight of the Thorn and the Champion of Ya.”
Emily looked now to the terrible warrior and saw past the swords to see that the big man had very kind eyes.
“It is a pleasure to meet you all,” she said, giving a short curtsy as her mother had taught her. “I have to admit, I thought that you were coming to kill me too.”
“Let’s sit down over here for a bit and you can tell us a little more of your story dear,” Jirah said, gesturing to a fallen log on the roadside. “You can ask us any questions you might have as well.”
They all moved over to sit down, Rose with her arm still wrapped tightly around the weary girl. Once they sat down, Emily told them of the horrible day when the slaving caravan came and about her mother’s death.
Rose still sat very close to the young lady, the whole time tenderly pulling the knots out of her long, curly brown hair.
“When the caravan pulled through that little town back there, we ran into a crazy old man,” Emily said. “He was screaming and yelling something about the Eternal Ya and calling the slaver’s ‘servants of Belial’ or something like that. Anyway, I have never heard of this Ya person before, but I didn’t think it could hurt to see if he was willing to help me escape.”
“You did the right thing Emily,” Rose said in agreement. “Ya heard your prayer and told me about you. That is how we knew where to find you.”
Emily continued to ask questions of all the companions for a long while and many of her questions were answered, but one nagging question still troubled the new orphan.
“If this Ya loves me so much, then why did he let my mother die?” she asked with a quiver in her voice.
It was Jirah who first responded to that question. “I
have asked myself that same question many times dear. I lost my husband years ago, and he was a devout follower of Ya.”
The huntress became silent, and Emily could see on her face that the pain of loss was still very real for this strong woman.
“All of us here have experienced the same type of loss Emily,” Gaost said in a soft voice. “I will give you my best answer, but I am afraid that there is nothing I can do to make the pain go away. That is Rose’s department.”
All eyes were on the Cleric as he spoke, each person hoping to hear something that would explain the problem of how a loving god could allow such suffering in the world.
“When Ya created mankind, he gave us the right to chose for ourselves how we should live,” he said simply. “He wants us to choose to love him. Many people have chosen rather to serve themselves and they reject the god that made them. People’s bad choices have made this such a miserable world to live in.” It was a very simple answer, but somehow it made sense to Emily. If Ya were to force his creation to love him, then it would not be love at all.
“The enemy of Ya is a great fallen being named Belial,” Gaost continued. “The Fallen One has been doing everything he can to spread death and destruction in this world because he hates the one who created it. Each one of us here has been called by Ya himself to fight against the darkness that has spread to every corner of this world. We all have a unique role to play, and now you must choose for yourself how you will live.”
Emily now stood to her feet in response and her fighting nature made the choice very easy for her.
“I choose to fight!” she said with firmness. “I want to be someone who is trying to make this world a better place to live.”
“That’s the spirit Emily,” Logan said, also rising to his feet. “You are a young woman after my own heart.”
Emily grinned brightly at the compliment and blushed slightly at the show of support from the big handsome man.
“Can I stay with you guys now?” Emily asked hopefully. “I have no place to live anymore and I do not want to be alone.”
“I’m afraid that you will not be able to go with us on our quest my dear,” Gaost said, shaking his hooded head. “We are going to a place that is even more dangerous than here.”
“We can’t just leave her on her own out in the wilderness Gaost,” Rose said firmly. “Isn’t there something we can do?”
“I am positive that my folks would be more than happy to have a pretty young girl come and live with them on the farm,” Logan suggested. “You could be my new little sister then Emily.”
Emily thought about it for a moment. She had never lived on a farm before, but her options were very limited right now. She had no other family that could give her a place to live.
Logan noticed that she was not very sure about all that farm life would entail, so he explained, “You will like farm life I think. My parents are very kind and have taken in other young people when they needed help.”
Emily looked up at Rose, who was still running her slender fingers through the young woman’s hair and asked her, “Couldn’t I stay with you Rose? You already feel like a big sister to me.”
“I would love to have you stay with me sweetie,” Rose said with a big grin. “We could come back for you once we finish our quest. Would that be ok?” Rose had lived so much of her life alone; she found her heart getting very heavy at the thought of leaving Emily alone in this miserable world.
“I understand I guess,” Emily said with a sigh. “I have been in enough danger over the last few days to last the rest of my life. It will be nice to stay out of trouble for a little while.”
“It’s decided then,” Jirah stated. “Take us to the family farm Logan. I have always wanted to meet your folks and now I get my chance.”
“O good,” Jer said mischievously. “Now we can find out all of the stupid things that the knight did when he was a kid.”
All of them had a good laugh at that statement, even Goast.
“What am I getting myself into?” Logan said, shaking his big head.
It would take them the rest of the day to travel from where they found Emily to Logan’s family farm and for the first time in many days, the young orphan girl found herself smiling brightly at the hope of a good future.
***