The Obsidian Sword: An Unusual Quest

It hasn't been five minutes since I woke up before I start getting antsy about heading out again. Half an hour after that, when our bags are all packed up and ready, my stomach reminds me of something I hadn't thought of in my haste to set off yesterday and my hurry to pack today: food. I packed enough for the trip to the castle, but not enough for a journey that would take who-knew-how-long.

     "You wouldn't have happened to pack up food for a journey of indeterminate length, would you?" I ask Stephen over my shoulder while stuffing the last of my clothes into my backpack.

     His raised eyebrow answers for him.

     I sigh. "Yeah. I didn't think so." When a cursory search of the shack confirms my suspicions of its cupboards' state of emptiness, I have no choice but to sling my backpack over my shoulder, let Stephen get settled, and head out. "Time to gather some grub," I tell no one in particular. "And hope it's not poisonous," I add under my breath. All of a sudden, I'm strongly regretting not joining the Junior NeoScouts when I had the chance. Having to work as a scavenger to find food is a lot different from simply going down to the local store and exchanging Neopoints for whatever they had on the shelves. Well, no better way to learn than by experience, right? I was just going to have to hope for the best and avoid the obvious Poison Berries.

     I've gone maybe a quarter mile when I stumble upon an overgrown trail. I almost passed it right by. I would have, if Stephen hadn't smacked me in the head and pointed at it. On second thought, I suppose saying I stumbled upon it is giving me a little too much credit. With a lack of more promising options, we decide to follow it. Every trail leads somewhere, right?

     Or at least, they're supposed to.

     I walked for three hours. The sun was gracious enough to not shine at full power, choosing instead to snuggle behind several layers of clouds. I was about to stop and rest, roof over our heads or no roof, when Stephen perked up.

     "What is it?" I asked. He launched from my shoulder and caught onto my belt buckle on the way down, breaking his fall. Shimmying the rest of the way down, he finally hit the ground running. He crashed through bushes and brambles on the side of the trail. They were twice as tall as he was, and it didn't take long before he was out of sight.

     "Stephen!" I shout after him. No response. I tossed my head back and let out a groan before tackling the brambles my buddy had so conveniently just disappeared in. "You have GOT to start communicat-"

     Coming nose to nose with a weary, wrinkled Gelert's face efficiently cuts off the rest of my sentence. My head jerks back, attempting to put some space between us. "S-sorry," I stammer.

     "He yours?" the Gelert drawls. There is something familiar about him.

     My eyes slide down to where Stephen is standing next to the Gelert. "Him? Yeah, sort of. He's more my friend than my petp-"

     "Boy," the Gelert begins, looking me in the eye. "I was talkin' ta him," he says dryly while hooking a thumb in Stephen's general direction.

     My face goes redder than it already is due to my paint job. I rub the back of my neck sheepishly. "Oh. Yeah. I'm his," I answer, and flash a grin in response to Stephen's self-satisfied smirk. He is not the little Petpet too big for his body. Not today. Something tells me this Gelert can see more than meets the eye.

     "Figured so," the Gelert says, his accompanying nod just as drawn out as his drawl. "I was pickin' up some spilled Voidberries that fell outta my basket when he ran inta me. Tells me you're on a journey."

     An old Gelert that just happened to be out picking Voidberries? That's why he looked so familiar! I'd seen his face on the side of nearly every box of berries in the local Food Shop. I should've realized right away, but in person he looks more like an elderly, busy man who just happens to own a farm. Not much about him reminds me of the made-to-sell marketing picture of him as the classic old-school Berry Farmer with a rake and a pair of overalls. That is, not unless you've already made the connection.

     "That's right," I confirm. "We're searching for a rare item of interest to the His Lordship, the Duke of Ombre."

     "Is that righ'?"

     My stomach rumbles a response before I can.

     A small smile nearly twitches at the side of the Berry Farmer's face. He turns without a word and waves a hand over his shoulder, beckoning us to follow. "Well, c'mon," he says, his words sounding more like, 'Weeeyl, cuh-mawn.' "Yer stomach's gonna take away the rest of the hearin' I got left if it keeps up that racket."

     Shrugging, I pick up the basket of Voidberries the Farmer had forgotten, thank Fyora for my good fortune, and follow along down the trail leading to the farm house.

     Once we're inside the house, the smells hit me all at once. It's a fragrance of berry pies, wood shavings, and hay. The berries make sense, but I'm not sure where the rest comes from. Whatever it is, I like it. As I'm inhaling in contentment, the Berry Farmer raises an eyebrow.

     I halt, feeling self-conscious. "Sorry. I just...your house..."

     "I know, I know. I got a pie in the oven. It smells good, but you sure don't. Go take a bath, fer the sake o' all of us."

     Stephen snorts and grins at me until the Berry Farmer turns to him and tells him he smells just as bad. That wipes the grin away fast enough.

     After I'm done with the clawed bathtub and Stephen has made use of the large metal bath bucket, we head back to the livingroom where the aroma has hit its peak. The Berry Farmer hands us each a plate, and we thank him.

     "Where did you learn to make this?" I ask, wide-eyed already after the first bite.

     My mouth is stuffed with another by the time he replies, "Ain't no concern o' yers. Got it from my great-grandpappy and nobody's gonna take it from me. 'Sides, seems like yer the one with the secrets 'round here. How 'bout you tell me what yer lookin' fer, now that yer stomach ain't makin' me deaf?"

     I chuckle around the pie in my mouth and swallow it down. "It's a long story," I tell him.

     "Got all the time in the world out here," he says, undeterred.

     "It's a weird story," I warn.

     He raises one eyebrow - even this motion is slowed down, as if his expressions have a drawl as well - and stares at me. "Son," he says, blinking slowly at me, "if you'd seen half of wha' I've seen, you wouldn't tell me nothin' was weird by comparison, and that's just fact."

     My curiosity piqued, but knowing it was my duty to speak first since he'd asked, I shrugged and conceded. "All right. Let me start when I woke up yesterday morning..."

     By the time I got done with my story, I had helped our kind host wash off the plates we'd used, store the pie so it didn't dry out, tidied up the small kitchen island we'd been sitting at, and we were now sitting outside on the porch. He had a rocking chair and a porch swing, but we chose to sit instead on the green plank porch step, taking in the breeze that reached us better out from under the shade of his extended roof.

     "Well," said the farmer simply.

     I nodded somberly. "I'm not sure where to go from here," I told him in honesty.

     He scratched at the stubble on his neck. Suddenly his fingers froze. "What'd you say that ol' trinket was?"

     "A sword. I don't know what it looks like, though. I don't know anything about it, really, other than the fact that he desperately needs it."

     The Farmer frowned, then lept up faster than I would have thought him capable of. In a moment, he returned, waving around a journal.

     "This thing," he said, thumping it, "is an ol' journal I came into possession of after -- well, that's not important. Let's just say I'd always heard tell of a special sword back when I was a youngun', and this journal fascinated me, so I knew I had to find out all about its stories. Special stories it's got, too. Got some of my own wrapped up in 'em." He taps the front of the journal as if wishing it farewell, and then hands it off to me. "Went on a wild goosechase, lookin' fer that sword. Didn't know the duke had it all along, or I woulda saved some time. Woulda had a lot fewer adventures before taking over the land from my Grandpappy, too, though. So it all works out in the end." He shrugs and then scratches at his jaw, remembering the days gone by and the adventures he had.

     "I'll be sure to be careful when I'm reading it," I tell him. "Who wrote it?"

     "Oh!" He snaps out of his reverie and sits down again next to me. "A young Scorchio knight by the name of Thomas Flintley. He was 'roundabouts yer age when he set out lookin' fer it. It was written a good hundred years back, maybe more. From how he writes, it sounds like the sword has moved 'round lotsa times. Just 'til it got settled with the duke, I s'pose. Seems like it was lookin' hard fer somethin', even while Flintley was lookin' fer it. Had a mind of its own, that sword. It never ends up somewhere it don't wanna be, or have some kinda plan fer. Nobody knew that better than ol' Flintley, bless his heart for searchin' fer so long." He pauses and sighs. "Wish I could come with you two, but this old heart is tied to the land now."

     "Don't worry," I tell him. "We'll keep the journal safe. When we get back, we'll have lots of adventures to fill you in on. And no matter whether we find it or not, we both thank you --" I motioned from myself to Stephen. Stephen nodded his head in agreement, "-- for the hospitality you've shown us. It means the world."

     The Farmer, appearing moved, gave an entire half smile for the occassion. "Well," he said, "hospitality ain't hospitality 'less you've got a place to sleep. How's a farmhouse sound for the night?"

     I grinned at him. "Trust me, after last night's sleeping arrangements, your farmhouse sounds brilliant."

      That night, after Stephen has settled into a blanket wrapped around itself multiple times until it looks like a nest, I settle in myself. First, though, I have to track my progress. It's slow-going so far, not knowing exactly where the item I'm looking for is located. The better track I can keep of where I've been and how long it took me to get there, the better I'll be able to know what I'm doing in the future. To aid in this, I've been using my journal as a makeshift map and route-keeper. I rummage through my bag until I spot a worn, brown leather-bound book. A little more rummaging earns me a pencil. After I take it out of my bag, I have to shake the backpack so that the other contents re-settle. Organized, I am not. Opening the journal, I come across an entry from a week ago, before all this happened. It makes my stomach leap and clench at the same time. It's a peculiar feeling - shock at seeing it, though I was the one who wrote it; shame; the thrill of knowing a secret is put down on paper...because now, anyone could find it. The strange thing about it is that it's not a secret about something I did. It's a secret about what I have not. It's not an untruth that makes it frightening, but rather the truth that makes it something I want to protect. It's raw, it's not pretend, it's not makeshift or tailored to fit the reader's preferences. It's me - and that's where the shame comes in. It's not what I want to be.

     Tuesday, March 6th

     I'm here again. It's been a while since I've done anything of note, so I'm not sure why I keep noting things. In ten years, twenty years, no one will care what I did on the weekends or what new move I learned - nor will they care about the difficulty I had in learning it. No one will care that I existed - rather, they will care about what exists because I did. And in this case, it's nothing. I have no legacy. I haven't formed an organization, or changed dozens of lives. I didn't start a charity, and I've never even been to Kreludor. How does one shoot for the moon when they've never seen it up close? How do you mimic its brightness when you are unfamiliar with its planes? This entire entry reads like a pity party, and for that reason I hope no one ever comes across it. How embarrassing. I'm embarrassed to read it myself. I don't know how to stop the pencil, or else I would. But I have to stop it, at some point. Because if I let it take its own reins, it will go on and on, writing about everything and doing nothing to change the issues I write about. I doubt that this is what I'll be remembered for. Or, at least, I hope it's not. How awful to be remembered as a mopey, ineffective person failure. So instead of rambling on, I'll put it as simply as I can and try not to let myself scribble the rest of it out, for honesty's sake:

     I am afraid.

     I am afraid I don't matter, and will not matter.

     I am afraid of becoming nothing.

     I am afraid terrified I already am.

     I'm not aware of having made a sound of any sort, but somehow Stephen's attention has been caught. He stares ate me for a moment, his eyes knowing. He's seen me like this before. Seen me at my lowest and seen me at my best. I think at that moment that it is possible that nobody in the world knows the truths of me as well as he does.

     "Don't worry," I tell him. "I'll be all right."

     He stares a moment longer, purses his lips as if to say I had better be, and then nods in acceptance of my words. I see him turn over and in moments hear his breathing change to that of the restful.

     I turn back to the entry and shake my head while skimming the words. No. 'No,' I think. 'I'm going to make something of myself.' I already am. On errand for the duke himself...what else was there? I felt a gnawing feeling in my chest, telling me there was more, but I pushed it away to think of at a later date. For now, there was another journal I needed to study. I rip out a blank page near the back and rip that further into several long strips to be used as bookmarks. Stuffing my journal back where it belongs, I open Thomas Flintley's. I read for hours, until my eyes are dry. Interesting pages I mark with the shreds of paper. I'm hoping that the Farmer will know more about these sections. Eventually, I realize I won't be going anywhere if I don't get to sleep, and so I put the journal on the nightstand next to an old dried-out flower and - finally - turn off the lamp.

To be continued...