The Journeymen

The Long Road

The three companions rode northward along the old dirt road with Jack keeping his horse out front, rifle held across his saddle horn. His dark eyes, shaded by the wide brim of his boonie cap, never ceased moving as they rode on. Jack had taken note over the last several years that, even in places that had never been heavily treed, the woods were reclaiming the world. As his eyes scanned the edges of the woods and ahead on the road, he thought back to all of the fantasy books he had enjoyed so much as a child.

So much from those books had come true, he wondered if the books were right about the forests as well. That the forests were magical places where the trees were alive and could move and communicate. As he looked into the woods, Jack's mind wandered. He felt a chill run down his spine as he imagined stumbling in the dark underbrush as branches and roots grabbed and pulled at his arms and legs, snagging on his clothes and scratching his skin. He shuddered and shook his head as he began to picture the branches of the normally peaceful trees stretching his body out and pulling. He hoped that if the trees were coming alive that they would be friendly.

***

While Jack rode on, continually scanning, Chuck took the opportunity of the quiet time to begin teaching Anya. Chuck's time as a Ranger and then his time as a cop gave him a wealth of knowledge in how to stay alive. He may not have had the wilderness and hunting experience that set Jack apart but his experience from going on urban raids in Iraq as well as his time working as a patrol officer had forged him into an elite warrior. Even as Chuck spoke with Anya, she could tell that he was just as aware of his environment that Jack was. Where Jack was the expert in the covert, Chuck was the expert in the overt.

"Do you see how Jack's head is moving?" Chuck said quietly, pointing out Jack's slow methodical scanning to Anya who was watching the master woodsman intently. "He isn't darting his head around, he's scanning slowly. He's not focusing on any one point, he's taking everything in at once. That comes with experience. Your peripheral vision can be a powerful tool. An enemy may not even think you see them but with practice you can see 180 degrees in front of you." Anya nodded, trying her hardest to make out objects along the edges of her field of view.

Chuck continued, "Another thing that's important is using your ears. I'm an old warfighter with bad hearing, but I can still use my ears. Even while you and I are talking, I'm alert to any sudden changes in our surroundings. I don't have to hear everything, I just have to notice when something is different. I got good at that by having to listen for my radio while interacting with people when I was a deputy. It takes time to get used to but it may be more useful than getting good at using your peripheral vision. Being in tune to the sounds of your environment can give you 360 degrees of awareness."

Anya nodded, amazed by the veteran warriors that she rode along with. The two men were already an elite team without the use of magic. Not wanting to appear too awestruck, Anya smiled and attempted to make casual conversation.

She asked, "So you're deaf just like my dad was then? I remember it seemed like he always had to be looking at my mouth moving just to understand what I said."

Chuck snorted quietly in laughter, "My wife never gets how I can hear everything at once but never actually understand what she says. And now that my eyes are even getting older it seems like it's harder to read lips. It's not like I can go get a pair of glasses anymore either. That'll be how I go, blind and deaf. All the years of close calls and gunfights and somehow I'll end up an old man going, 'huh? What did you say?'"

Chuck did his best old man voice to complete his statement, drawing a laugh from Anya that was a little too loud. Jack turned his head around, having been listening throughout the conversation.

He smirked and said, "You might think he's funny now but once you spend a few days on the road with him, you'll think different."

Chuck laughed at his old friend, "Whatever man, you still think I'm hilarious."

Jack dramatically rolled his eyes at Chuck and turned to face forward, "Remember there are at least a hundred goblins and those archer guys somewhere out here."

The calm night in Jack's village and peaceful afternoon ride had done a good job of distracting Anya from the past few days. The two Journeymen and their lessons also put her at ease. Her mind had been fully consumed with soaking up Chuck's stories and watching Jack's silent example. The threat of the goblins and their human allies had nearly disappeared from her mind.

"Do you think they might be looking for us?" she asked with the slightest tightness of nervousness in her voice.

"We can't be sure. I haven't noticed anything tracking us and the guards at the village didn't report anything. But they could have been waiting for us to leave. We also don't even know if they know that we discovered your village. We certainly weren't moving very fast or doing a very good job of covering our path when we left so they could have found our tracks. Goblins may not be smart but they're natural predators so I wouldn't put that past them," Chuck replied.

Jack now spoke up, "The smart thing to do is to behave as though they are following us. Which is why I've been watching so closely and why we aren't taking any breaks. You need to believe that they could be following us or waiting at the next bend in the road or dense part of the forest. We have a long way to go to meet with the Council."

Anya gulped nervously, "Don't worry, guys. I've got this," she said in her best attempt at sounding confident.

Then Anya thought about the mention of the Council and her mind instantly became flooded with questions, "Where are we going anyway? And what is this 'Council' you guys keep mentioning? And what are they going to do about this goblin problem?"

Anya saw Jack smile back at her. "Where we're going is Dumas, it used to be a small town in what used to be the pan handle of Texas. Now it's the biggest collection of people in what was once the southern United States. Dumas is the home of the Council of Masters, the governing body of the Journeymen. Chuck and I are both technically part of the Council since we're both master Journeymen and because we were founding members but we fortunately never have to go to the Meeting House except in major emergencies, which so far has never happened. As for what the Council can do, I'm hoping that they can get word to the other Journeymen so we can do we can start taking action and so we raise enough volunteers to fight the goblins. I have a feeling that the party that wiped out your village is just the beginning of something big. Hopefully the Council will see that too."

Chuck nodded reassuringly at Jack and Anya, "They will see it. We'll make them see it. It's not like they can just blow off two founders."

Anya tucked a strand of brown hair behind her ear that had fallen from the low ponytail she always wore her hair in. She paused for a moment in thought, planning out her next question, mouth slightly open. 

"Are you worried about your village at all? I mean you saw what they did to mine," Anya asked, suddenly concerned for the people that had so generously taken her and the survivors from her village in.

Jack shook his head, "Not at all. We told them to harvest early under a full guard and then to lock up the city for the winter and to be mindful of visitors. The walls are strong and the people are even stronger. There are lots of former soldiers and cops and they're also very well armed. We don't advertise it much but there are even enough machine guns to cover each section of the walls. They could easily handle a force twice the size of the one that attacked your village. We have nothing to worry about."

Anya hoped that through the confidence her master displayed was real and not a farce. She knew that Jack always worried about his family when he was away and now these goblins and their human allies were a major threat based off of the discretely urgent behaviors of her two masters. If they were right and something much bigger was going on, she wondered just how much their idyllic village could handle. They had always kept peace through strength but this new threat could be stronger than anything they had ever faced before.