The Edge of Twilight

As he made his way from the edge of the forest, and saw the clear expanse of prairie before him, Nezrin wondered what remained of his former village, and hoped there were people to go back to.

Memories… of so long ago, yet still so fresh in his mind. Vivid and dark memories of when he first entered the forest he was now leaving behind; twenty years ago, yet almost as if it was yesterday.

Nezin kept running blindly through the darkness of the underbrush, with only the dim starlight overhead to guide him from colliding with the dark shadows of the stones, bushes, and trees that lay in his path.

The woods were just a few days journey to the west of their land, and he had been running hard for what must have been two or three days now. He lost track of time due to sheer exhaustion and fatigue, just keeping focused on the end goal alone- to make it to the safety of the trees before they caught him.

His father always told him that if he ever had to hide, the forest to the west was a place of safety from the Shadow’s minions. “If anything happens to me son, you must head for the forest. Only within the branches of Erethor will you be safe. But even there, you must take care, for it is the land of the Elves, and none can travel within it without the blessing and permission of the Witch Queen. Obey their rules, and learn their ways. They too hate the Shadow, and have fought him for as long as we have- and with greater success.”

“But Papa, why would anything happen to you?” he remembered saying at the time. He had been so young then…so…naïve.

Up ahead the stars were blotted out by a growing line of darkness. It was as if a void rose up from the ground to blot out the little light there was. The great Forest. He was almost there.

And then he heard it- the howls he had been running from for the past days. They were wolves… or something darker, and from the urgency of their cry they knew where he was, and were determined not to let him get to his destination. Running blindly he glanced over his right shoulder in the darkness, straining to see anything that might tell him how much distance he had on them, and give him some hope of escape. Far behind him, but getting quickly closer he saw what appeared to be tiny dots of red light, sparks of flame in the night that danced in pairs of two. Their red eyes reflected the light from the stars in an eerie manner, making them appear to glow from within.

Nezrin’s foot caught on a piece of uneven ground, and he fell forward, knocking the wind out of him. Snarls of delight and barks of excitement came from the pack as they closed on their prey. Get up! he urged himself. Run! Still dizzy and winded from the fall, he pushed himself past exhaustion, no longer even thinking about what he would do once he got to the forest’s edge. How would it protect him? He didn’t think he had the strength anymore to climb one of the nearer trees. Even if he did, would he have time? They were almost upon him.

As he broke through the underbrush and briars at the edge of the forest he heard a whistling sound dart past his ear, and then another. His feet gave out at last and he fell to the ground, unable to run any further, listening to the howls and cries of the wolves that would soon tear him apart. But their cries were different now. The yelps were more frightened and abrupt, filled with the sounds of pain felt, not the excitement of pain soon to be given. More strange whistling sounds went past him, and the snarls became violent and angry, but they did not grow louder and the wolves did not come for him. Eventually the howls faded into the distance, and he opened his eyes from where he lay on the ground. Standing above him was a slender figure looking down on him. Nezrin thought this must be an elf, for his ears were pointed in the way his father described them to be, and he carried a finally carved bow in his hand.

The elf spoke to him in a language he did not understand at first, but as sleep overtook him, he thought he heard a voice say in a strange accent, “Sleep for now, little one. The enemies of the Shadow are safe here.”

His sleep that night was filled with dreams, or rather nightmares, of a few days past when his father sacrificed himself to the Orcs so that Nezrin might live.

They had done nothing differently on that fateful day. He had gone over each action leading up to his escape time and again, trying desperately to touch on why the Orcs had come for them that day, and he could find no failing. Perhaps it was just “ambar” as the Elves called it- fate.

The sun was fast setting and Nezrin was outside their home, cleaning fish his father had caught for their dinner. As he gutted a particularly a small fish with his father’s dull fishing knife, a contingent of soldiers came into sight- one of the Shadow’s patrols. They tipped over barrels and pulled damp clothing from the clotheslines before tossing them to the dirt as they passed. One of their neighbors, Mrs. Tillmore, grabbed her daughter and hurried inside their hut, whispering to the child to remain silent and stay at her side. Nezrin had seen goblins before, but it was uncommon for their larger, nastier cousins to be this far south without a reason.

“Look here- this young human has a weapon! Perhaps it means to attack us with it?” an ugly one with a long scar that trailed down the side of its face called out.

The largest orc came over, as his father came out of the house protectively.

“Well then… he shall have to be punished. You do know the punishment for carrying a weapon, don’t you boy?”

Nezrin put down the knife and wiped the fish blood on his pants. “No sir, it is only a fishing knife- to prepare dinner.”

“Carrying a weapon is punishable by enslavement,” the large orc laughed, “It looks like we have ourselves a new toy. Uthruk will be happy to have a new slave. Bring him to the wagon, Griill’g.”

His father moved to stand between the advancing orc and him. “Let the boy be. He’s done nothing wrong. It was I who gave him that rusty old knife to use.”

The smaller of the two orcs stopped advancing, and looked at his leader for direction. A few others stopped their pillaging of nearby sheds to come closer to better hear. They might get to kill today after all, they thought with interest.

The large orc paused and then grinned showing some rotted teeth, “Then you are guilty as well. Take them both.”

His father looked about frantically as the orcs advanced, and lunged for a hoe that lay on the ground nearby. Griil’g cackled and stood on it, preventing him from picking it up. “Did you see that, Grukk? He tried to attack us!”

The large orc laughed with malevolent amusement, “Yes. And we all know the penalty for that. Hold him. His son will learn by watching what happens when you disobey the law.”

Nezrin was frozen with fear as he watched his father struggle against the orcs that grabbed him, tore his shirt open at the back, and put him on his knees in front of their leader. The large one laughed and raised his huge scimitar in the same moment that his father kicked back with his left leg, catching one of his captors by surprise with a hard kick to the groin.

“Run boy! RUN!”

Nezrin could not get his feet to move, until he saw the sword come swinging down, and he forced himself to turn away at that instant and flee rather than witness the final moments. He ran harder than he ever had before, not looking back, only knowing that he had to go west, west to the great wood where his father told him he would be safe.

He shook off the painful memories, hefted his pack over his shoulder and headed off towards where he thought his homeland was. Had the orcs enslaved them all, or did some of them still live as free people under the Shadow’s watchful eye? It was time to find out, and fight alongside his own kind once more.