Lyric jumped as the cold, silent blade touched gently down upon her shoulder from behind her. “You’re dead,” a soft voice whispered in her ear. She spun around with her practice sword in hand to face her mother who wore a slight grin upon her face rather than the look of stern disapproval she usually displayed when she caught her daughter with her guard down.
“Sweet Haruk,” Lyric gasped when she at last found her breath. “How in the he…how did you sneak up on me like that?”
Her eyes darted around her trying to glean the path her mother could have possibly taken to get up to her unseen. The recently planted barley and wheat in the field where the pair stood was not even two hands high yet, and the nearest berry bushes that could possibly provide some cover were clustered over a dozen yards away. Lyric had chosen this exact spot for this exercise precisely because there had seemed to be no way for Kavrash to sneak up on her, but here they were.
Her mother removed the dull blade from where it kissed gently upon Lyric’s neck and slid it back into the worn scabbard at her side. “Well, you chose your positioning well, good sightlines in all directions,” Kavrash said, looking around her approvingly, “Therefore, I had to utilize a…less than usual…method to get to you this time.”
Lyric stared at her for a moment and then stammered, “You cheated!”
“No,” Kavrash said sternly, “I used one of the many arrows in my quiver, as it were.”
“You used magic!” Lyric replied indignantly.
Kavrash smiled, “Well yes, but that’s not cheating. It is simply one of the arrows that I want to try to arm you with now.”
The pair had spent the rest of the morning and much of the early afternoon practicing, with little to no success. Lyric’s frustration grew at the twentieth recitation of, “reach out to the shadows and to the silence and draw them to you, drape them about you like a robe.”
“I’m never going to get it,” Lyric groaned, dropping her hands to her side in exhausted frustration.
Kavrash reached out and touched her daughter tenderly upon her cheek. “Do not lose hope. This is a difficult skill to master. It will take time, but it is well worth the effort, I assure you.” Her mother got a faraway look in her eye, as she often did when remembering her time beneath the earth back with her people. She then turned back to Lyric, her violet eyes surprising soft and warm instead raging with the fierce, burning intensity they normally contained. “There will be times where your foot and blade will fail you…where you cannot run fast enough nor fight hard enough to prevail. In those moments being able to hide will be the only thing that matters. Keep practicing. You will not regret knowing this skill when you finally need it.”
Lyric reflected upon this memory as she warmed her aching bones by the fire in the cave, watching the dancing flames flicker dramatically against the luminous backdrop of the giant glowing mushrooms that bathed the dark cave in an effervescent violet hue. Her mother’s lessons had again proven prescient, she realized, much to her aggravation. Was there anything the woman had not been right about? This magic trick Kavrash had drilled into her over the next many months had been able to buy Lyric just enough time today to escape from the clutches of these strange creatures – monsters that looked like a cross between a vulture and some sort of insectoid-grizzly bear hybrid, but whose arms ended in giant bony hooks instead of clawed hands.
Why in the hells had I allowed myself to be sent beneath the loamy sand in the first place? She wondered to herself in disbelief. Sure, it appeared that the Dragon Army had been hiding something or trying to recover something buried here, but was it worth such a risk to try to discover this secret rather than leave it be?
Part of her knew that she had volunteered for the task to redeem herself for any perceived weakness she had shown during her breakdown after their last fight, where the group had nearly lost Deuxdahl to the shifting sands only the day before. Another part of the reason was an effort to validate her own bravery; to face being buried alive despite her fear of enclosed spaces and the knowledge that this was precisely how her friend DD had met his terrible end, despite the sheer suicidal idiocy of the “plan.”
These two reasons alone might have ameliorated the sense of shame she felt with herself for the sheer recklessness she had displayed that had nearly cost her her life. Even now, she could practically hear Kavrash’s bravery versus stupidity speech word for word on repeat in her head. But a nagging thought ate away at her, and she knew that she was lying to herself if she pretended that these were the reasons she had allowed herself to be dangled in the quicksand at the end of a rope. Without Deuxdahl’s fly spell, Eros’ diving encouragement, and Arnie’s strong back, she would currently be digesting inside one of these massive creatures instead of sitting here battered and bruised in front of this cheery flame. No, the real reason she had risked her life in such a manner was simple. Treasure.
She could practically smell it. Gold and art and magic; hidden tantalizingly just out of reach. Lyric had never thought herself to be driven by want and greed. Sure, she had fancied herself astride a magnificent alabaster steed instead of her father’s ruddy mare growing up. She pictured herself in a proper stone manor instead of a leaky wattle and daub farmhouse. But gold and jewels and silks and lace had never really appealed to her.
Until recently.
Now, she found that she could think of little else. Art, wealth, music, beauty. She bathed in them in her dreams. She looked down at the small mound of sparkling coins cradled in her hands and felt warmed by them, like a reptile basking upon a hot rock on a scalding summer day. It was a strange sensation, yet one wholly natural as well, it seemed. She had almost died to get them, but it was somehow totally worth it. It was alm…
“Uh-oh.” Lyric looked over to where Arnie was standing, looking down at the strange pit in the center of the cave, a worried look upon her face. “I think I made it mad,” the small kender continued.
The ground shook and buckled and a deafening roar echoed throughout the small cavern. The small mound of shimmering gold disappeared into the worn pouch on Lyric’s hip and Green Trust came alive in her hand as she leapt to her feet and prepared for what came next.
As she readied herself for battle a small thought tickled the back of her mind. “I wonder if it has any treasure?”