The Three Realms

Chapter 2- The People on the Plain

A small group of representatives that included Fraya, Devin, and Balthasar walked slowly up to the settlement. The scout had told them not long before that this was indeed where the drag marks from the bodybag ended, and Devin was itching to rush in and rescue their king. Zar recomended caution, and Fraya was inclined to agree. She had a bad feeling about this place...

They walked up to one of the border guards and asked to be taken to the person in charge. The guard stared at them with wide violet eyes, seeminly fascinated, and it took him a couple minutes to reply, "Ah, um, yes of course. Just follow me." Fraya rolled her eyes, slightly uneasy. That man was the first person she'd ever seen who had violet eyes like her. Could this be where she came from?

They were marched through the makeshift homes, and tents, seeing many forges and mess halls along the way. Fraya and Zar looked around curiously, not seeing many people about because of the earliness of the day. They soon reached a large purple and gold tent, and the guard, who seemed to have recovered from his initial shock, told them to wait for him to come back out. With that, he disappeared into the tent. "You know," Devin muttered to a soldier next to him, "that guard wasn't very intelligent, leaving us out here alone. How can he not worry that we're invaders?"

The tent flap opened and the guard stepped out, followed by a tall thin man with sleet gray hair in a heavily brocaded purple and gold dressing gown. Normally, seeing an old man in a dressing gown like that would make Fraya laugh so hard she'd cry, but not this guy. He managed to make his attire look formal and stiff, just like his gaze. "In answer to your question, Soldier," the man said in a deep voice. "We have no need to worry because we have magic that lets us know where strangers are, and what they are doing in our home." He smirked, "And occasionally, we hear what of they speak." Devin scowled, but it was quickly replaced by a conciliatory smile, "We were only worried for your wellbeing. I am called Devin, and this is Fraya and her dragon companion Balthasar, as well as Majory Jakiry and Lieutenant Sanders. We have come to ask you about an extremely fragile subject." 

Devin let his eyes slide to the guard, who immediately took the hint and bowed himself away. The old man then turned and walked back into his tent, motioning for the representatives to follow. Inside, the tent looked like the King's study, with a large desk dominating the room with papers stacked neatly, maps on the wall, and two plush chairs in front. "I am Lord Jarvis. My prince is not available right now, so you'll jst have to deal with me." He sat himself down at the desk and Devin walked up to him, "Lord Jarvis, we've come to ask about our King, who was kidnapped by a man who took him here. We would like to know if you have him in your custody."

Jarvis's eyes flashed, "That is very forthright of you Soldier. It could be interpreted as a threat..." Devin bowed his head and opened his mouth to continue, but he had always had a short temper, and Fraya decided that it was her turn to step in. "Sir, we are simply asking if you know the whereabouts of our king, and if he is all right." Jarvis's cold gaze turned to her and Fraya's heart froze. Were everyone's eyes here violet? "One cannot tell that answer to one question without understanding the other." He said cryptically. Balthasar made a warning sound and the Lord's eyes snapped to the dragon whose neck snaked in thorugh the tent opening. "What I am saying is that yes, I know where your king is. He is our... Guest."

"What kind of 'guest' would you be referring to?" Devin asked forcefully. "A special one," Lord Jarvis replied smoothly, his eyes not leaving the dragon. "May we see him?" Fraya asked. "No. It's time for you to leave. He's tired and must rest. His journey was quite trying." "I'll bet it was," Fraya muttered, thinking of the drag marks on the ground.

They were shown out quickly, and made their way back to their camp. "Now what?" Fraya asked. "We're not positive that Lord Jarvis is holding the King captive, even if that's what he implied. We're going to have to get concrete evidence." "And to do that, we have to see him," Devin groaned. "I'll send a scout in tomorrow. What did you four think of the settlement?" Fraya made quick eye contact with Zar, "It looked pretty temporary to me... Do you think they migrate around?" Lieutenant Sanders shook his head, "Not them. They've got too big of a population to be moving it around all the time. If I didn't know better, I'd say they were an army! Did you see all those forges? And the outline of scabbards against the tent walls? They weren't completely opaque with the sun shining through them."

Devin looked at him sharply, "But you do know better, Lieutenant, and you'd better hope that they're not an army, or we may not be going home alive. That Lord Jarvis didn't seem too happy to see us." "But they wouldn't murder us!" Major Jakiry protested. "Why not?" Devin said icily. "We're prying into their business. They have our King and they know we're going to try and get him back. What I'm confused about is why didn't Jarvis just lie? Tell us that he didn't have the King?"

"We wouldn't believe him," Fraya pointed out. "Yes, but we couldn't have done anything about it..." The Lieutenant mused. Balthasar roared in frustration, "I think Jarvis wanted us to know he has the King. Don't ask me why, because I don't know."

"We should send a scout in tomorrow with two guards to back him up, we need to see this 'prince' Jarvis  was talking about. Hopefully he'll have a different opinion on this." Recognising a dismissal when they heard it, the others made their way out of Devin's tent, all except Fraya. She crossed her arms, "With an assistant like Lord Jarvis," she said, "I doubt it." With that, Fraya turned on her heel and stomped out of the tent.

The next day, Devin sent down another group, this time a party of three, led by a scout. The scout had orders to identify the camp as simply a settlement, or an army, and to do his best to see the prince, but not to put himself or his guards at risk. This time, the group set out just after midday, when all the people would be out and about. 

Fraya and Balthasar took to the air to watch their progress, and saw many tiny figures walking around, as well as many glints of what could only be metal, and possibly weapons. They returned to the ground with heavy hearts and reported back to Devin. He paled, "We need to wait for confermation from the scout. I don't want to make any hasty decisions." Fraya wasn't quite sure what decisions he COULD make, because they certaintly couldn't go against these strange people. With so many tents came even more inhabitants. 

Down in the settlement, the scout and his guards were recieved but a different guard. As they walked through the tents, they saw many men with swords straped to their backs, and the thrum of arrows as men practiced shooting. This was an army all right. One massive, massive army. The question was, what did they want? And, more importantly, who were they planning to fight?

The group reached the purple and gold tent once again, and once again, the guard went inside to notify his leader. After a couple minutes of standing, the scout got impatient. He nodded to his guards and whipped open the tent flap. So shocked at what he had seen, he dropped it again. Then he grabbed it once more, just in time to see his King disappear from the study, followed briskly by a tall young man with jet black hair, wearing a thin gold circlet. The guard marched furiously to the front of the tent, where the scout and his guards were still staring at the place the King had vanished. "What do you think you're doing! You were told to wait!" The scout turned an ice cold glare upon him, knowing he'd seen his King whisked away by a mysterious captor. "This means war." He warned. Suddenly the guard grinned, "I'll see you on the battlefield." Then he ripped the tent flap out of the scout's hand and tied it shut, leaving the scout and his men to navigate the journey back to their camp through all the men they now knew as their enemies. "I'm not sure if this counts as putting us at risk," the scout muttered as he eyed a huge man with a scar down one side of his face. 

The man spat at the ground and snarled as the group of three men darted through the camp, finally relieved to see its end. Just before they crossed the border between these strange warriors and the plain, the scout turned back and fixed his eyes on the tall flag that marked the location of the purple and gold tent, "This means war," he repeated softly to himself. Then finally, he turned, trudging back to give his commander the news.