in his blood and body. With that blunt reminder, he threw the bandage into a nearby trash receptacle, and began to walk back to the Eastern Forest.
Chapter 23 — The Road to Elfdom
Three days later, he nearly lost his life. Estone was closer to Firheng than it was to the wilderness where Kestrel had encountered the yeti. Despite the fact that Kestrel dawdled along the way, in no hurry to face decisions within and about Elven culture, the journey from Estone to Firheng was less than a week in length. After two days of walking along the southern road from the capital, Kestrel had entered an unsettled land, where few farms or ranches existed, but occasional bands of thieves preyed upon travelers who journeyed without sufficient security.
He traveled slowly as he thought and rethought the question of leaving Merilla in his past. He considered turning around to go back and fetch her with him, and he considered going back to move in with her in Estone. His restless spirit would settle on neither approach as best for her though, so he continued to head back to his elven roots.
Then an arrow struck him in the chest. The arrow was shot with the strength of a human and it hit his left breast with considerable force. The impact of the shot was tremendous, causing him to abruptly stagger backwards two steps, creating enormous pain. He was stunned by the pain he felt, and uncertain what had happened until he looked down and saw the shaft lying on the dusty road before him, and he saw a small tear in the fabric of his shirt, where the arrow had struck him. The goddess’s crest upon his chest had stopped the arrow from penetrating his skin. He had suffered all the force of the blow, but had not received the intended fatal injury.
There was movement in the forest ahead of him, and whispered comments from whoever had intended to slay him. Recovering himself, Kestrel ran to the side of the road and stood behind a tree, as a second arrow shot forth and narrowly missed him.
Kestrel shrugged off his pack and pulled his own bow loose as he scanned the area before him. He drew an arrow of his own, looked in the direction he thought the two arrows had come from, and saw two figures lurking behind a bush. There was the sound of others crashing through the woods nearby as well, but he wanted first to return the injury that had been intended for him. He released one arrow, counting on the bush to provide no useful protection, reached for a second arrow, and took aim again. There was a scream, as his first arrow reached its target, and he released the second arrow. He dropped the bow and slid over to the next tree, switching positions to move slightly further from the road, as he drew his sword and concentrated on the sounds of others in the forest approaching him, at least three, he judged.
He caught sight of a trio coming through the bushes, spreading out as they approached, then he whirled and raised his sword in desperate defense as another of his unknown assailants surprised him with a stealthy approach. He blocked the first murderous swing of his opponent’s blade, then stepped away from the tree that he had been fruitlessly hiding behind.
“Over here!” the small man fighting him shouted. “Help!”
Kestrel went on the attack, trying to defeat the thief who had apparently only planned to ambush and kill him. The man wasn’t handy with a blade, and the failure of his first attack now left him vulnerable to Kestrel’s counter attack. Kestrel swung his sword low and nearly cut his opponent’s leg, then swung high, but fouled his blade in a low-hanging tree branch just before he could deliver a deadly blow.
The sounds of the other members of the band grew closer, and Kestrel knew he only had moments to win before he would be terribly outnumbered.
“Why did you attack me?” he asked as he thrust his blade hard at the man’s midsection. His attack was successful, so strongly pressed that the other fighter could not deflect it away, and Kestrel’s blade sank into his stomach. It was the first time Kestrel had every actually stabbed another person in the anger of battle, other than in the battle with the yeti, and the feel of his blade entering flesh repulsed him.
He pulled the sword free as he saw a kind of pleading expression in his opponent’s eyes, just before the man folded and fell to the ground. Kestrel quickly turned and judged that his next battle would begin in a few seconds, so he angled back towards the road, trying to isolate one of the three remaining attackers for his next battle.
The man at that end of the line was a large man, one who was taller and heavier and stronger than Kestrel, and just as good a swordsman too. Kestrel blocked and swung and blocked and stabbed while gaining no advantage, as the other two fighters came circling around to adjust to his new location. One was a woman, and one was another man, of about Kestrel’s own size, but he had no chance against the three of them, he knew.
The other two swords began to enter the fray and Kestrel stepped next to a tree to use it as an impromptu shield for a moment, then managed to land a slicing blow on the woman’s arm before he blocked a wild swing the largest man aimed at his head. Just blocking the force of the powerful shot pushed Kestrel against the tree he was utilizing, and momentarily disabled him. The smaller of the two men took advantage of his vulnerability and thrust a stab directly at Kestrel’s unprotected chest.
Just as it had protected him from the first arrow, the divine insignia on Kestrel’s chest blunted the stab, preventing the blade from penetrating. Kestrel grunted loudly, then swung his sword upward, slicing deeply into the man’s arm, causing him to cry aloud in pain as he dropped his sword.
The second man was disabled, the woman was lightly wounded and skittish about taking further injury, but the large man was unhurt and undeterred. “How do you do that? Do you have some special armor beneath your shirt?” he asked, just as he tried to slice at Kestrel’s thigh.
Kestrel danced around the tree to protect himself, and poked his sword from the other side, almost striking flesh. “The goddess protects me,” he grunted in reply. He broke off the engagement and ran back to where he had left his pack and bow on the ground. With only seconds of a lead over the man behind him, he knelt and grabbed his staff off of the pack, then raised one end to block a sword blow from his arriving opponent. He pivoted the staff and poked its end into the knee of the large man, then stood.
With the staff securely held in both hands, Kestrel went on the attack, using both ends to land blows on the big man, while blocking every swing of the sword with ease, his staff becoming nicked and hacked but remaining sturdy. Kestrel whacked the wooden staff hard on the other man’s knee, striking a nerve that made him involuntarily bow, and bringing his temple into range of a telling blow that knocked the man dizzy. Kestrel followed with a blow to the top of the head, a stiff prod to the midsection, and then a strike to the throat that left the man on the ground.
Kestrel stood wearily, looking about. The woman was the only one standing, watching him warily from behind a tree. “Are we done here?” Kestrel shouted at her.
She ducked behind the tree. “Go on,” she shouted. “Go on and leave us be.”
Kestrel sheathed his sword, then strapped his staff to his pack again, and swung the pack over his shoulder. He picked up his bow, and placed it over his left shoulder, where the goddess’s hand print had healed after days of treatment with the water from the healing spring. Satisfied that he had all his belongings, but shaken by the suddenness and pointlessness of the fruitless violence, he returned to the road and began raising a dusty cloud as he hurried south, seeking to put space between himself and the scene of the deadly encounter.
It was probably the next day that he crossed the unmarked border between the humans of Estone and the elves of the Eastern Forest. He slept in trees in the elven manner for the next two nights, and around noon, on the fifth day of his journey from Estone, he re-entered the gates of Firheng.
Chapter 24 — Return to Firheng
Belinda was not behind her desk when Kestrel walked into her office. “Gion, is the commander in?” Kestrel stuck his head out into the hall to ask the guard on duty.
“He’s down at the armory,” Gion answered. “Go on down and give him a challenge, why don’t you?” the
