"Tyban" by Dennis ´Thain´ Boyd

Dedication: This story is dedicated to the one who inspired me to create, Corina Garza. In appreciation of her inspiration, advice, and proofreading; the semicolon in paragraph 3, line 19 has been named after her.

Relief was a tangible thing as the novice warrior slowly lowered himself into a vat of steaming water. Muscles tensed up from weeks in the saddle between one town and the next relaxed as the bath worked its magic on Tyban.

         While drying himself off after the therapeutic bath Tyban took a look at himself in the mirror. With his light brown hair and blue eyes he had always had that innocent country boy look that attracted farmer’s daughters back in his village, but the unexpected harshness of the road these months had lent him a ruggedly handsome look. He gingerly touched the spots where the chain mail had rubbed his tanned skin raw. He would have to have Gelrik help him pad the armor again.

He quickly put on the tunic and breeches that the serving woman had washed for him and carried his chain mail downstairs to join the others. The first of his companions Tyban identified was Gelrik, but one can always hear Gelrik before one sees him. Gelrik was a large bearded warrior with blonde braids that identified him as hailing from the north. Gelrik probably should have retired from adventuring years ago, but the last entrepreneur who had brought this opinion to Gelrik’s attention developed an amazing party trick of drinking ale through his nose.

         “Hey Ty! We were beginning to think maybe you’d turned into a great prune and couldn’t waddle out of the tub!” Gelrik exploded into laughter as he clapped Tyban on the back in a good natured, albeit painful, greeting. Tyban’s companions had left him the seat with its back to the rest of the common room, so he had a direct view of Lanton in the corner.

Prince Lanton as he called himself, Lanton was not one that you would call a thief, there was simply no comparison, yet there isn’t a better word for him. Lanton’s reasoning was that you must blend in with your victims to avoid suspicion, and what better victim than the rich? And Lanton certainly did make a convincing show of being rich with his sable doublet trimmed in silver – all satin of course – and his noble airs. A gold chain that supported an amulet with a falsified coat of arms led one’s eyes up to his noble face, currently filled with disgust at the filth of the inn even though his mug never seemed to forget the route to his mouth. On the table in front of him marched his ever-present cat Marina, walking by him as though her tail just happened to run just under his nose.

To Lanton’s right Sharelle was exchanging insults with Gelrik. Poor Gelrik. Sharelle was not really a large girl, and she didn’t have much in the way of weapons or armor. Or clothes for that matter. She had very well toned muscles, though they weren’t bulky as they may have been had she been the type to wield large weapons. Sharelle was a gymnast, and she had taken the art to a deadly level. Tyban had seen her practice after they had made camp sometimes; she could probably disarm even Lanton if she could figure out where he kept all of those dirks daggers and other various weapons hidden.

         “Would you like to see more farm boy?” Sharelle had caught Tyban’s purely clinical observations, but her apparent acceptance left him blushing. Luckily he was saved from his embarrassment by the innkeeper.

         “No! No cats on my table! Move ‘er or I’ll move you!” Lanton calmly raised his stein to his lips for another sip of ale. When he had finished the ale off he made a quick motion towards the innkeeper and a dagger sprang from nowhere and ended up pointing at the greasy man’s now racing heart.

         “You’re not going to be moving anything but blood if you don’t get an appreciation for animals real quick. The cat stays with me. Now good sir, we would like information about a possible job for groups of varied talents such as ours.” The innkeeper’s Adam’s apple made a quivering leap as he took a deep swallow.

         “The sheriff’s been lookin’ to round up a few fellows to explore an old cave system that some kids disappeared in while back.”

         “Fellows? Tsk tsk, my friend here asked for a job that would require our varied, talents” crooned Sharelle.

         “Ah, I didn’t mean nothin’ by it miss, I’m sure you’ll do just fine.” Lanton lowered his dagger and made it disappear with a flick of his wrist just as fast as it had appeared.

         “Thanks old boy, now just where may we find this sheriff?” Lanton seemed to have recovered from his bout of eagerness and now lazily stroked Marina’s snow white fur.

         “He takes to patrolling this main road at this time o’ day sir.” The innkeeper quickly found a barmaid to yell at elsewhere.

         “Well that sounds promising, exploring jobs pay whether you find anything or not. Whaddya think Ty?” Gelrik’s question had two additional pairs of eyes turned on Tyban as Sharelle and Lanton waited for his answer. Tyban wasn’t really comfortable with the way Gelrik trusted him with decisions and chores. These three had ridden through Tyban’s village a few months ago and persuaded him to come with them. During their nightly encampments Gelrik had been teaching Tyban rudimentary use of a long sword. Armor is a burden most farmers have never known; a fact that Tyban was painfully aware of as his tunic rubbed a sore spot.

         “It wouldn’t hurt to go check it out I guess” Tyban reluctantly said under the pinning stares. The four patrons finished their meals and drinks and filed out to find the sheriff. They found the man they took to be the sheriff almost immediately. He was an average looking man with a red armband, the symbol of office in this part of the world. He was leading a donkey down the road and looking around at all of the people who happened to be out and about.

         “Ho there good sire!” Lanton bellowed as they began to make their way to him. The sheriff stopped his donkey and turned to appraise each of them in turn as they approached him.

         “Hmm, nice ass” Sharelle noted without a smile.

         “Ah, um…yes. Thank you, I take good care of ‘im…” stuttered the sheriff as his face turned beet red. Sharelle’s answering grin was truly wicked. Lanton, ever the diplomat, stepped forward to shake the shocked sheriff’s hand. Tyban picked up Marina as she sat in front of the donkey’s leg twitching her tail, ready to make a climb and meet the sheriff.

         “We have heard that you are in need of assistance. We are a very resourceful group who would adore to help maintain the safety of these good folks.”

         “Ah, you must mean that ole cave out yonder. If you do it we’ll pay ya 5 gold a man, er person, and ya can keep whatcha find.” Lanton turned to his companions with a questioning look, and got nods of ascension from all of them.

         “Be glad to neighbor! If you’ll just direct us to this cave we can get started.” The sheriff began leading them down the dusty road that led to the south end of town. Just a little ways out he turned to the east and pointed to a dark hole in a cluster of rocks.

         “Right there. You can get started any time you like but if I were you I’d rest up for tonight and git goin’ first thing in the morning.” That idea certainly appealed to Tyban and he gave Lanton his hearty approval when asked for his thoughts.

That night Tyban left the common room a bit earlier than the rest of his group and blissfully sank onto a mattress stuffed with straw.

         “Maybe,” Tyban thought to himself, “I’ll find some gold in that cave and be able to buy my own sword and armor.” The chain mail Tyban was using, as well as the long sword, was Gelrik’s and didn’t fit too well.

         Early the next morning Tyban was awoken by Gelrik’s heavy hand shaking him by the shoulder, a somewhat nauseating experience. Gelrik helped him into the chain mail then Tyban followed him bleary-eyed down to join the others for breakfast.

         “Oh grow up Lanton, you can always steal more” Sharelle was saying as Gelrik and Tyban sat down.

         “What’s all this about?” asked Gelrik.

         “Lanton’s pouting because he didn’t get as much money as he had hoped from that sheriff’s pouch.”

         “You stole from him?” Tyban asked in shock. “He seemed like a nice person!”

         “Of course he was nice! I noticed his charity right away.” Lanton replied with a sudden grin.

         Sometimes there is just no reasoning with thieves.

         After finishing up their morning meal they went to the stables where their horses were being kept and Lanton paid to have them taken care of for a couple more days. They walked south to the mouth of the cave in a relative silence, unsure of what to expect. At the mouth they paused for a minute while Gelrik lit a torch, then Gelrik led the way in.

         The cave had that damp musty smell that habitually permeates the subterranean. Judging from the deep shadows left untouched by Gelrik’s torch on parts of the back wall there were a few passages leading away from this room.

         “So, shall we split up or pick one at random?” Lanton asked with a look of bored indifference on his face while stroking the white cat on his shoulders.

         “I think we should stick together, no telling what you’ll find in a cave like this,” Gelrik said softly.

         “Why Gelrik, you aren’t afraid of the dark are you?” Sharelle bantered. Gelrik seemed not to have heard the insult as he peered into the shadow.

         “Right then, I think I agree with our friend here.” Piped Lanton. “Tyban, why don’t you choose a path?” Silences seemed to make Lanton edgy for some reason.

         Tyban hastily pointed at a random passage in his surprise at being asked to make such an important decision.

         “Right-O, the middle path it would seem.” Gelrik walked towards the middle passageway with his torch held aloft. Their footsteps seemed impossibly loud in the empty rock cavern, and everyone tried to muffle the sound. Time always has an odd quality in the subterranean, so it was somewhere between minutes and eternity when they heard faint echoes of what seemed to be screaming.

         “I hate caves, you can never be sure just how near or far anything is” Gelrik lamented.

         “Or how many” agreed Lanton. Every now and again the passage would widen out into a cavern, some of them had passages leading in different directions, but they always chose the path directly across from where they had entered. It was in one of these caverns that they heard the screaming again, this time much closer. In fact, the man responsible came running into the cavern from a side passage. His clothes seemed to have been of a fair quality at one time, but now were dirty and ragged. He didn’t seem to be a very strong man; indeed it seemed like he hadn’t eaten in several days, yet in one hand he hefted a large sword. The man stopped at the sight of them and his head whipped around with a dull look in his eyes. Those dull eyes fixed themselves on Tyban and he raised the sword over his head with both hands and charged him with a shriek.

         “Sword up Tyban!” Gelrik bellowed. All strategy and training Gelrik had given Tyban left him as he childishly flung his arms up and pointed the sword at his attacker. Tyban squinted his eyes closed as he felt his sword tear through every muscle that thought to obstruct the path between the man’s belly and his back. When all the motion had stopped and Tyban felt suspended between one moment and the next all he was aware of was the warmth of the blood trickling down his clenched fist. Tyban opened his eyes to view the ragged body that rested just on the other side of his sword’s crosspiece. His arms were still raised above his head, but he had dropped the sword. His eyes seemed to have lost their dullness, and now shone with tears. His mouth moved to speak a couple of times before any sound came out.

         “M…my name…isn’t Toby…it’s….” The man’s head rolled forward and he fell to the ground, ripping Tyban’s sword from his grasp.

“Hmm, that was an odd thing for a man to say before he dies,” remarked Lanton casually.

         “C’mon Tyban, it’s best not to linger on these things” Gelrik comforted. Gelrik picked up the fallen man’s sword and examined it.

         “This looks like pretty good quality Tyban, maybe you should take it and I’ll take my old sword back.” Tyban took the sword and looked at it. Whatever condition the man wielding it may have been in the sword positively gleamed. However the most striking feature of the sword was an eye, etched in exquisite detail on the pommel. Lanton, who had stopped to ‘check for vital signs’ stood up with a look of disappointment and handed Tyban the scabbard. Tyban wasted no time in strapping the sword on and they soon were under way.

         Since they had already been walking for hours they stopped in the cavern to rest and eat; Gelrik marking the passage they had entered from first. Once they were ready they continued on, once again choosing the path directly across from where they had entered. They hadn’t gone far before they heard high-pitched squeaks in a language they didn’t understand. The sound of several sets of footsteps was accompanied by the rasping of the various weapons of the four companions, Sharelle excluded. The sounds were followed shortly thereafter by two small creatures and the silhouettes of several others behind.

The creatures were child sized and had rodents like faces and hairy bodies. They carried bladed weapons somewhere between a dagger and a short sword in size and appearance. They wore tattered clothing and no armor, but the oddest thing about the two who had stepped into the light was that they seemed to have sprouted hilts from their foreheads as Lanton flicked his wrists. Three more came up to take the places of their now mysteriously lethargic companions, and Tyban found himself in front of the group with Gelrik, since there was only room enough for two to fight abreast. Unlike back in the cavern, Tyban’s mind was clear as he parried the rodent like thing’s sword thrusts. Soon he saw his opening and delivered an overhead stroke to the thing’s neck, cleanly beheading it. He looked up to see Gelrik dispatching the third as he already had to one other. The next thing Tyban knew the creatures that had remained in the shadows were running down the passage to escape the fate of their brothers.

         “I’ve always hated that chittering Kobold voice” Lanton mused as he retrieved his daggers.

         “You handled yourself pretty well Tyban,” Gelrik complimented, “soon you’ll be out to replace me!”

         “I wouldn’t count on it Gelrik” came Tyban’s timid reply.

         They stepped over the bodies and continued on their way. Hours of searching didn’t reveal anything other than miles of rock, so they eventually set up camp in a cavern. To decide who got which watch they threw dice, Tyban ended up with the middle of the three watches and Lanton got the whole night of sleep.

         “I think those dice are loaded” Gelrik grumbled.

         “What makes you think that old boy?”

         Gelrik muttered something unintelligible and walked to the edge of the firelight to sit out his watch.

         Sometime during the night Tyban was shaken awake for his watch. As he let his eyes adjust to the shadows beyond the fire he pulled out his new sword. After he had more closely examined it he launched into some of the exercises Gelrik had shown him. It didn’t take long before sweat was running down his face, but he couldn’t remember ever having a better practice.

         “Feels good, doesn’t it?” said an unfamiliar voice. Tyban whipped around, seeking the source of the voice.

         “Who’s there?” Tyban demanded, holding his sword in a defensive position.

         “It’s only me friend.” The voice seemed to come from all directions and none at once.

         “Come out into the light where I can see you” ordered Tyban, his voice trembling slightly despite his efforts.

         “But I am, I’m right between your fingers.” Tyban looked down at his sword and dropped it in fright; the eye on the pommel had begun to glow with a green light and seemed to be looking at him.