It was a dark and stormy night...

Outside a boy shivered underneath a tree, hoping that maybe the horses would provide the warmth that his orphan-hood denied him. They would not, and had told him so by knocking him over with their strong heads, sprinkling him with saliva and adding horse breath to the uncomfortableness of his situation. So he took a horse's blanket and huddled by the strong oak, his back away from the cold wind that creeped into every uncovered part of his body.

The boy was used to it, however, as he had been orphaned ever since he could remember, hiding in caves or trees or river banks for each of his fourteen summers, migrating in every direction, scrounging or begging for food and travelling with the tribals. Sometimes they were nice enough to give him food, but never was he invited into a tent, which they considered too sacred for anyone outside their immediate family to enter. He really didn't mind, though. At least the tribes kept the wolves and the goblins away.

Not that he'd ever seen a goblin--oh no. He'd only heard of them from stories, legends and myths. He even heard once from an old story teller that the goblins and their kin even came from the same place as the tribes--the sky. This had shocked him at the time. After all, everything, he was taught, that was of this land came from the sky. From the stories he'd been told, it didn't seem like goblins could be natural creatures--more an abomination, or the result of tribals with bad spirits living inside them, or tribals who resented the gods and for their transgressions were deformed. The very idea that goblins came from the sky...!

The boy looked at the horses and shuddered, thinking of the repulsive smell of equine spittle. If horses like them came from the sky, he thought, then goblins could've come from the sky too.

A stroke of lightning flashed, striking the Blackened Mountains to the west. A few seconds later the thunder roared over the Vyrfleuvian plain, its echo rumbling off the foothills, jittering the horses. The tents seemed to leap in the air as the inhabitants reacted to the unknown meteorological phenomenon. The boy saw it coming, though, and did not flinch; instead he made a short prayer to Calea, prince of the sky, and raised his index finger to the bridge of his nose and then pointed it upward. He had heard stories of Calea also; how Calea had made a bow so powerful that its arrows cut into rock, how Calea had fooled the Spectator (some horrible creature that looked like a floating eyeball) into giving him the key to the Door that Led to the Heavens, and how Lord Karana loved him so much that he gave him the sky and the clouds.

Calea wasn't mad, though, the boy thought. He makes the thunder because his stomach is growling, and Ramesh hasn't gotten him anything to eat. Ramesh was the Bringer of Life and Food, and the boy couldn't help but be a little sympathetic with Calea. He was just as hungry, for the berries and deer seemed scarce this summer, and now it was the autumn.

The boy smiled. If the tents and the horses wouldn't keep the wolves and the goblins away, then maybe Calea's short-tempered hunger would keep them away.

The boy woke to the sound of camp breaking. The intricate rolling accent of these tribals fluttered through the camp, and the boy soon was fully awake and in a good mood. He only understood a little of the language of the Harrowa Tribe, which claimed to be from the sky like every other tribe he encountered, but from the northern regions of the continent. He liked the northern tribes--they seemed more cheerful, more lively than the tribes of the colder south. It was too bad it had rained last night, he thought. The Harrowa have festivities in the autumn, usually, and would've liked to experienced the dancing and the food. But the Harrowa, much like the Moguli and the Casalles, didn't celebrate in the rain. Lord Karana wouldn't be able to join the celebration with Calea's clouds in the way.

The boy stood up, stretched his arms out, and then picked up his leather bag and walked toward the gathering horses. The Harrowa tribe leaders smiled at him and asked him how he was feeling. Unable to answer, the boy shrugged and grinned, indicating his eagerness to travel far. One of the leaders pointed to his pouch and asked if he'd like to put it on a horse. The boy shook his head and held it close to his chest.

Soon the tribe was on its way, heading downstream on a beaten path. The boy wasn't sure where they were headed, and since he couldn't speak the tribes language was never able to ask. He followed them all the same, figuring that if they knew where they were going, then he'd probably want to be in the same place.

Days on the Vyrfleuvian plain were always a contrast to the nights. Even though it rained last night, the tribe was onslaughted with heavy sun and humidity. Many of the tribals wondered what they had done to make Lord Karana so angry. Many made prayers to Calea for clouds and to Ebra for rain. Others prayed to Krono, pleading him to speed up Karana's journey across the sky and bring in Lune, patron goddess of travellers.

The orphan boy didn't pray. He was too thirsty, and the Vyrflow was running low and muddy. He wondered why the tribe didn't stop, set up their tents under shade and rest until later in the afternoon. He guessed it had to do with the possiblity that it might not rain at night, and they could have a celebration. The boy thought that was pretty stupid, since the gods weren't doing them any favors now, why should they praise them later?

Grudgingly he kept on going. No way he was going to separate from the safety of the numbers and get eaten by a wolf or a goblin.

When Lord Karana finally joined his wife Coraxal in their bed in the foothills of the Blackened Mountains, the tribe was already done with the feast and was now into the dancing. The orphan watched as the women and children sauntered around the bonfire, chanting ritual praises to the powers above in high voices. From the fury of the dance, a tribe girl left her place in the circle and walked towards the boy.

The orphan stared at the tribe girl with amazement. Reigara had touched her like no other female he had ever seen before--beautiful blue eyes, dark black hair with whisps of green highlighting her soft golden face, a cute little nose and full rouged lips. The boy, who had never been approached by a girl his age before, looked upon her for what seemed to him like an eternity, wondering why he had never noticed her before. It was only when she moved her hands that he realized she was talking to him.

The boy could only stare, for he couldn't understand what she was saying. He expressed his inability by pointing to his ears and frowning. The girl understood, and motioned; she was asking him to join her in the dance! The boy looked at the dancers--they had switched from the ritual circling to a coupling movement. A tribesman and a woman paired up and moved to beating drums and flipple flutes, dancing in a complex variation of arm swings, foot stomps and hip circles. The boy stared, unable to picture himself doing the dance.

Impatient but smiling, the girl anxiously attempted to get the orphan to dance. The boy frowned, gave her an apologetic expression, and walked out of the camp. The tribe girl's smile left her face, and she sat down on a log, unable to retain her optimism, and softly cried.

The boy looked out across the Vyrfleuvian plain, leaning against a tree. Lune shined brightly atop the waving grass, giving the illusion of a sea of silver grass. The brightest stars in the sky made reflections on the grass too, casting small lights beneath the waves of grass. The boy could not enjoy the sight, however. He was disappointed in himself--he should've said yes to the tribe girl! But it was too late; a decision made was a decision to be stuck with, and he must live and learn by the consequences of his actions. It was the Way.

The orphan boy was lost in thought for a long time, until he realize that the stars' reflections on the plain were moving. The boy looked up towards the heavens; the stars were not rearranging themselves. Looking down upon the plain again, he saw the lights start to converge. As they got closer, the boy could start to make out moving figures start to emerge from the grass, and the familiar sight of fire and bronze became apparent under the moonlit night. There was a slight pause in the tribe's drum music, and then it started again. During the pause, the boy heard the gutteral noises of an amassing army.

The boy's jaw dropped. The night was going to be a long one, he could tell.

The boy ran into the campground screaming a string of sounds and images that would have been frightening to anyone who could understand him. The older tribesmen tried to grab him, to keep him from interrupting the dance, but the boy eluded their grasp. He ran around, creating threatening pictures with his arms and face, but the tribespeople just stared. Some of them even started to laugh. The boy ran to the girl touched by Reigara and pleaded to her, but she ignored him with a sad face.

The orphan boy gave up. He grabbed one of the tribesmen's ceremonial feather-laced spears and ran deep into the forest, never stopping or looking back.

The boy awoke the next morning one the ground in a misty glade. Shaking the leaves and twigs out of his hair, he peered out across the clearing. He couldn't remember where he had blackened out and fallen. Standing up, he brushed off his clothes and stretched his arms, letting out a long yawn. He looked up into the sky to see Lord Karana slowly pacing towards the top of the sky. It was then that the boy realized he was in a forest.

The boy was suddenly overwhelmed with fear. The stories of the goblins and the wolves could not compare with the stories that he'd heard about the forests. The forest spelled final doom for anyone who wandered inside. The boy grabbed the spear, which he was thankful he had managed to keep a hold of in his late-night run, held it close to his body and sat down, trembling.

Karana was making his descent towards his bed when the boy felt the hunger in his stomach begin to naw on his insides. Slowly standing he decided it would be the best move to leave the forest before nightfall--for who knows what lurks in the forest that make men disappear.

If he could only figure out which way was the quickest way out.

It was the rustle of the leaves that convinced him that he was faced in the right direction, but he swung around to meet whatever had moved behind him, spear set in both hands, which were shaking like an injured rabbit's legs. His eyes focused but met no seen danger. Flightily, the boy looked around in all directions to see where his assailant might come from.

The boy waited an hour but was never attacked.

The boy, overwhelmed with hunger, burst into a run through the thick of the forest. Beyond his hysterical breath, his palpitating heart and the crunch of leaves beneath his sandals, he could here a large crunch every couple of heartbeats. The boy envisioned the giant behind him, hungry, visciferous and quick, wielding a club large enough to be a tree.

But strangely silent for a hungry giant crashing through the branches of a dense forest.

The boy's facial expression slowly changed from fear to curiousity. How could a large giant hide in the forest from him for over an hour, and how come it wasn't blocking out Karana's light?

The boy suddenly stopped his pace and side-stepped behind a tree, whirled around to see his stalker. He inhaled and almost gasped as he saw no one in view.

A heartbeat later, the boy heard the leaves crunch behind him. The boy whipped around, and didn't see anything, until he looked down.

The boy was staring face to face with a four-foot tall frog.

But it wasn't like any other frog he'd seen in the Vyrflow. It was brighter, with blue skin and green spots that almost highlighted his features. The frog was wearing a red sash with a blue chemise. And a bronze sword.

The boy whipped up his spear in front of the frog's face, which flinched and grimaced with the sudden invasion of personal space. The frog rotated its head and looked at the spear point curiously.

The boy was frustrated. Why didn't he pull out his sword and fight? The frog was just looking at the tip of his spear!

The boy realized he was wrong. The frog was looking at the feathers attached to the tip of the spear.

The boy had never noticed the feathers. They were colored with almost every hue, taken from some bird that migrates during its molting period. The frog held out a wet, stubby finger and gently caressed the feathers, the pines flipping and smoothing themselves into their original form. The frog seemed most impressed, marveling at the rainbow inside the feathers.

The boy was surprised. He hadn't expected a frog, or the frog's behavior, or the fact that this being, which stuck out like a deer in winter, was able to hide from his view for so long.

The frog put his hand (if that's what it was; it was more like an evolved flipper) into his sash and displayed a metallic ring with a grey sheen. The frog then pointed at the feathers, put his hand on his head, then pointed to the ring, and finally to the boy's head.

The boy looked at him, confused. The frog repeated the ritual, then finally just grabbed the boy's hand and put the ring into it, then grabbed the feathers and jumped into the trees.

The boy was taken aback. The feel of the frog's cold and slimy hand, the new wealth bestowed upon him, and the frog's quick disappearance startled him, and he took two desperate steps backwards and tripped over a log. His back hit the ground, sending leaves in all directions. Taking the opportunity to rest for awhile, he stared up in the sky and contemplated what just happened.

It all seemed too absurd to be real. Instead he put the ring on his finger and took a short nap.

11/2/97...When the boy awoke again, Lord Karana was just reaching his bed. The boy stood up quickly and started to run again in the direction he thought was the right way. He ran for almost half an hour, when he entered the clearing which he remembered to be the tribe's campground a night ago, or was it two nights?

Or at least is seemed to be the tribe's campground. The site was strewn with tents and twigs and--

The boy bent down and threw up. Dead tribal bodies. The gutted carcasses of the tribal horses. Torn leather, torn cloth, broken spears, smashed pottery, glints of bronze everywhere--it was too much for the boy to take.

Especially the body that was obviously not Harrowan.

It was quite repulsive. Aside from the brown clotting blood all over its body, it had dark grey skin and a large hideous snout, huge teeth and a small forehead. Its hands were rough and calloused, but its arms were muscular and bulging. A large bronze sword, caked with blood, sat next to it, and in its left hand it held a severed lock of hair, with blood and what looked like flesh at the end. Perhaps this was a goblin, the orphan thought.

In the beliefs of the tribals, Harrowa or otherwise, it was considered next to the Lord Karana's beauty to take the possessions of dead friends and use them, for all possessions are important during life but meaningless after death. The boy was able to scavenge a chipped bronze sword and a leather pouch half-filled with jerked meat, probably deer or antelope. After removing the goblinoid's body from the campsite, he set fire to the grounds and prayed. Consumed by the fury of Shemar and his underlings, the Harrowa tribe danced their last celebration, only this time inside Lord Karana's flame instead of around it, the divine dance that lead them to Lord Karana's side....

11/6/97...The boy stopped to rest against a tree along the ridge that sloped into the valley of the Vyrflow as Karana towered above him in the unusually sweltering heat of the autumn crest. To get to the destination that the tribe was headed for, that was his goal. The tribals often spoke of a "Vyrsmir", but what it was, a well, a lake, a forest, was beyond the boy's knowledge.
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