A rider on a brown splotched fox trotter emerged from the low rolling mist that tended to gather around the foothills of the Mountains of the Orc much like a swimmer might suddenly break the surface of a high mountain lake after a deep dive. He wore a long gray cloak fringed with a floral arrangement on the collar of both the neck and sleeves, and his horse seemed small for his frame as the stirrups were so low that they almost dragged the ground. He stopped for a moment, pulled out a well tattered of parchment, and looked back over his shoulder towards the narrow path that led high into the peaks. Ahead of him a small river flowed from his right to his left and he traced a blue gash on his map that was labeled “Frosty Run.”
As he read the map his youthful face showed a square jaw with no trace of manly whiskers and light gray eyes that danced in the morning light. A broad smile, so genuine and happy that it seemed to cause even the birds to chirp with a little extra vigor, came across his face. He tucked the map back under the gray cloak, turned the horse to his left with a subtle movement of his hand, and began to follow the river downstream.
A few hours more and the mists of the mountain morning lay far behind him as he came to a river junction where another stream flowed from the north into the Frosty Run. He stopped again to pull out his map only to smile even more deeply than the first time and let out a great, “Whooop!” that echoed so deeply and loudly that a woman who tended to her kettle in a farmhouse almost a mile away looked up and around for a moment before she went back to work.
In the distance the rider saw smoke from what must be the chimneys of a small town, he dismounted quickly, and stood next to the horse so that they were shoulder to shoulder. He rubbed the mane and neck of the beast with gentle motions of hands so enormously large that the horse appeared to be a small version of the breed. “Eschrichtius,” he said and leaned down to whisper in its ear, “many miles, many months but now we are close to our destination, we will complete our mission.” Tche young man looked up to the sky, his hand fell on the thick gray scabbard at his side where a stone handled hilt protruded, and he ran his finger over it lightly, “For the Gray!” he shouted and slapped the horse on the rump, which launched the trotter into motion, and it pranced over the fields and left the young warrior behind for the moment.
He stripped off his gray cloak and revealed a rather skinny frame considering the tremendous size of his hands and then pulled off a heavy chain shirt and the jerkin below it. Within a few moments he was naked, his well-tanned and muscled body still yet to completely fill out. He took three enormous strides towards the river, dove in with a great splash, and screamed out in pain and ecstasy as his body hit the cold mountain runoff.
Ten minutes later, still swimming in the river with massive overhand stokes, he felt a presence and, with a look to the shore, spotted a young man near an eddy in the river with a small keg in his arms. Behind the boy stood a two-wheeled barrow with half a dozen more of the small kegs stacked neatly in it, on it side was emblazoned a symbol of a frothy mug of beer with the name “Smooth Stride” etched below.
“Hail there, boy,” shouted the young man in the river and stood so that the upper half of his body was revealed. “Is this Elekargul and do you understand me?”
The young boy nodded his head, his eyes wide as he stared at the behemoth in the river. The boy wore a heavy wool coat and deerhide pants that were worn and sturdy at the same time. “You have a funny accent,” he replied, “But I understand you.”
“I’ve been studying the whole trip,” said the young man in the river with a shake of his head that sent water cascading in all directions. “Father made me promise.”
“Who… who are you?” said the boy. The keg still dangled in his left hand and his eyes squinted a little to get a better look. As he glanced around the boy spotted the pile of clothes that included the chain shirt and the thick scabbard with the stone hilt and took a step backwards away from the river.
“I am Jon Gray, son of the Gray Lord, ambassador of Tanelorn the City of Gray. I come to Elekargul to meet with the First Rider and conduct affairs of the state.”
“Oh,” said the boy.
“I’ll come ashore there and get dressed if you don’t mind. I don’t mean you any harm,” continued the naked young warrior in the river.
The boy on the shore nodded his head and backed away further yet.
Jon emerged from the water, his thin frame somewhat blue from the short immersion. He strode up to the young man, gave him a hearty clap on the shoulder, and stuck out his hand, “Jon Gray at your service,” he said.
The boy looked up at the young man who stood at least a foot taller than him and whose body was half again as wide at the chest.
“Sorus Brewer,” he said with a look over his shoulder towards the smoke that rose down river. “I’m a brewing apprentice from Black Dale. I’m getting fresh water from the creek. How tall are you?”
Jon laughed aloud his deep voice booming and young Sorus suddenly found he couldn’t stop the laugh that rose to his own throat and, he smiled brightly. He thought to himself that nothing could go wrong with this enormous young man at his side. It was the first time he had the thought but many years later he still remembered the moment and how true it was in so many respects and yet how utterly and completely wrong it was at the same time.
“I like beer,” said Jon. “My father says too much, but what do old people know?”
Sorus laughed again, “He sounds like my dad. You are really tall, I’m near six feet and everyone says I’m the tallest boy in town for my age, maybe in all of Elekargul. Taller than a lot of the squires and some of the knights too.”
“I’m just short of seven feet myself,” said Jon with smile as he turned his back to the boy and began to gather up his clothes and pull them onto his wet frame with apparently no concern at all. “My sister says all my growing happened to my body not my brain, but what do girls know?”
Sorus laughed again, “Not much. How old are you, I’m fifteen but I’ll be sixteen in a six month.”
“Seventeen by now I’d guess. When I left Tanelorn I was sixteen but it’s been a long trip.”
“I’ve never heard of Tanelorn,” said Sorus a rather sheepish expression on his face. “Is it past Adas Jdar?”
“It’s north, far to the north near the center of the continent, have you heard of the Lake of the Demons?”
The boy shook his head.
“Hmm,” said Jon Gray. “Lonely Mountain?”
The boy shook his head.
“You’ve heard of Tarlton, the City in the Sand at least, right?”
The boy nodded his head, “That’s thousands of miles to the north but I’ve heard of it.”
“If you go to Tarlton and then travel the same distance twice more you’d be near Tanelorn,” said Jon Gray his smile suddenly seemed to widen further as he noted the wide eyed look of disbelief on the boy’s face. “You don’t believe me?”
“That’s all wild lands, filled with terrible monsters, you couldn’t have come all that way on horseback?”
“No, no,” said Jon with a smile. “I portaled to Sea’cra, that took some doing, and then caught a ship to Tarlton where my father wanted me to make some contacts. Then I continued on to Doria”
“You know how to use the old portals?” the boy said his eyes wide again, and he moved away from the young knight of gray.
“Not me, my father has a working one in the basement of his house and my brother Valary can make it go to some places,” said the Jon. “That was the first time I’ve used it. Val said he didn’t know any reliable ones further south so he sent me to Sea’cra instead.”
“Oh, said Sorus. “I’ve heard people talk about Sea’cra but it’s way, way north. I know about Doria too, that’s the City of Spiders and they have spider wizards that can cast spells that suck out all your juices just like spiders can.”
“Well,” said Jon an indulgent smile on his face. “Actually the city is filled with ancient towers dating back to the Old Empire and there are all these walkways between them so that when you see it from a distance it sort of looks like a spider web.”
“And these spider wizards,” went on the boy apparently oblivious to Jon, “They worship an eight legged woman who lives in the darkling lands. And they have fangs just like spiders and can spin webs from their… you know.”
“I’m not really sure there are any spider wizards actually,” went on Jon.
“And when they get married and have babies the women have dozens and dozens of little spider babies instead of a real person!” said Sorus his voice rising in excitement.
“If that was true…,” started Jon but was interrupted by the excited boy yet again.
“I even heard they eat their own young if they aren’t promising enough as wizards so only the really evil ones survive!”
“I guess that could be,” said Jon with a shrug of his shoulders. “How far away from that village of yours have you ever been?”
Sorus suddenly seemed to hear something Jon said and stopped his chatter to think for a moment, “I guess I’ve only really been in Black Dale mostly, although once I went with the brew master to Black Roost when I was a kid.”
“It’s a big world out there,” said Jon Gray now almost completely dressed. “Why don’t you let me give you hand filling up those kegs and we’ll head back to town. You can tell me who is important and who isn’t, does that sound fair?”
The boy nodded his head almost mechanically and then seemed to shake off his dazed expression. “I’m going to be late if I don’t hurry!”
Jon grabbed one of the small kegs from the barrow in each hand and walked them over to the river where he uncorked them and dunked them in the water.
Sorus did the same with the keg he was holding but used both hands and the weight of his body to push the thing under water so that it began to fill. The gurgling sound of the water as it flowed into the kegs filled the air for a few moments but then, when his was full, Sorus hauled it out of the water with some effort and stoppered it. He bent at the knees and put his arms around the barrel to get it up on his shoulder before he straightened his legs and slowly walked to the barrow. By the time he managed to roll it off his shoulder and carefully onto the wheelbarrow he found Jon Gray standing next to him one barrel under each arm and with a gay smile on his face. “What’s that bird there?” he asked apparently not even aware of the weight of the kegs, and pointed, with his chin to a small bird with a black band around its yellow feathered neck.
“That’s a Sandgrouse, I think, a yellow throated one they call it,” said Sorus as he looked at the bird for a moment. By the time he turned around Jon already had two more kegs at the river and pushed them under with an easy motion. Sorus grabbed the last keg and rushed over to join him. “You don’t have to do all the work,” he said and pushed his own barrel under.
“Who is in charge of that village, you called it Black Valley?” said Jon as the water gurgled into his kegs.
“Black Dale,” said Sorus his own keg filled quickly in the fast running river. “This twelve month it is Sir Thorius Brokenhand. He’s all right I guess but a bit of a blowhard,” continued the boy and suddenly looked around. When he saw they were alone. “Kind of a complete blowhard mostly but Thaddeus says most of the Brokenhands are that way.”
“Right, right,” said Jon Gray as the water filled up his kegs and he hauled them out of the river. “You guys have a whole naming thing. You’re Sorus Brewer because you’ll never be a knight just a commoner, right?”
“I could be a knight,” said Sorus and then after a pause a look of determination crossed his face as his jaw tightened and his lips came together. “I will be a knight. Anyone can be a knight if they do something heroic. I’m going to be a Coppercoin! Then maybe I’ll even do something so great I’ll get my own name!”
Jon looked at him with a half-smile and nodded his head. “I’m not sure what all that means, Sorus, but if you can be a knight by doing something heroic I’m sure you will be.”
Sorus suddenly felt himself blush like when he spoke to one of the prettier girls in town and he wanted to do something to impress this boy who was a year or so older. “Coppercoin is the name a commoner takes if he gets knighted.”
“Really,” said Jon with a smile. “So you get assigned a name when first knighted?”
“Well,” said Sorus as he loaded the last barrel into the wheelbarrow and then bent down to grab it by the handles.
“Here, we’ll each take one handle, are you right or left strong?” said Jon and leaned down with him.
“Are you really a lord’s son?” asked Sorus as they each grabbed a handle and began to wheel the laden barrow back to town.
“My father is the Gray Lord,” said Jon, “that just means he’s sort of in charge in Tanelorn but I’m not a lord or anything, just a gray knight, but that’s about the best thing you can be if you live in the gray city.”
Sorus looked at the huge warrior’s gray cloak and then at his gray eyes, “Is everything gray in Tanelorn?” he asked.
Jon Gray laughed out loud again and Sorus once more found himself laughing along although he wasn’t exactly sure what was so funny. “No, no. My father is a bit of a fanatic about neutrality. Gray is half way between black and white, good and evil, right and wrong, blah blah blah, blah blah. He’s always telling me to avoid the extremes and find middle ground but mostly he just gets mad at me and says I’m headstrong and young. My sister says I’m the stupid one of the family.”
“I have a sister like that,” said Sorus. “Is she older or younger?”
“That,” said Jon with a shake his head, “is the bane of my existence. You wouldn’t think twelve minutes would make that much difference but…,” and then he shrugged his shoulders.
“Mine’s older too,” said Sorus and reached up to clap Jon on the shoulder.
Jon reached over and put his arm around the lad and the two walked towards town together as they pushed the laden wheelbarrow along. With a look back the tall lad pursed his lips and whistled, a moment later the trotter appeared from a small copse of woods and followed them into town.