"Not now," J'role thought.
"Now, and always," the creature said.
J'role rushed to his father's side and helped him up.
"What.?" his father screamed, terror blazing in his eyed
"There!" came another voice from the distance.
J’role clamped his hand over his father's mouth and pulled him up. Releana rushed ahead.
At first J'role thought she was going to run off, but she waited for them to catch up. Then he saw that she was scouting their route, making sure they didn't rush into a thick wall of brambles.
Then came more shouts, the sounds of more dogs. The leaves and branches and bushes dragged at J'role, Releana, and Bevarden as they ran, catching their legs and clawing at their eyes and faces.
They ran for a few minutes when a thorn man suddenly sprang up from the ground, cutting them off from Releana. Bevarden said, "No, no, no."
J'role grabbed a thick stick from the ground and raised it in front of him. He swung it wildly, blocking the blows of the thorn man's magical spear. Whenever the tip of the spear hit the stick, the air crackled with blue-white light. The energy shot up J'role's hands, and his flesh became more and more numb after each blow.
Through the thorn man J'role saw Releana. She had her hands cupped a small flame appearing between them. Then she gestured her fingertips toward J'role. A bolt of flame raced through the air, through the thorn man, and then wrapped itself around his stick.
The red flames frightened J'role until he saw them parting around where his hand gripped the stick. He felt no heat from the flames. Releana had augmented the stick with magic.
The thorn man pulled back in fear too, though J'role did not know if it was the fear of a thinking person or of an animal panicked by fire. He swung the stick fiercely, the flames casting shifting red shadows among the branches and leaves of the forest.
The thorn man retreated a few more steps, and J'role pressed the attack. Though he knew little of the art of combat, the magic flames from the big stick seemed to help his blows.
Red sparks flared up as he struck the thorn man, illuminating the bones of several birds in its bramble chest. J'role smiled at his success.
Yet even as he forced the thorn man back, a strange discomfort overtook him. Fighting so openly, with a weapon of bright fire, felt-wrong. There was no other way to put it. A desire crept through his flesh to retreat to the shadows, to hide from his attackers and strike when they least expected it.
The agitation in his body drove him to a fury. He struck wildly at the thorn man, one blow after another. He knocked the spear out of the creature's hands, and the thing stumbled to the ground. With a final, massive blow he smashed in the thorn man's head, and dozens of sparks floated up like fireflies into the night air.
Dropping the flaming stick, J'role looked around for Releana and his father.
He found Bevarden leaning against a tree a few feet away, weeping silently but apparently unharmed. The next moment he looked around for Releana, and was greeted with the sight of two thorn men springing up out of the ground to attack her. She stood about thirty feet away.
The backs of the thorn men were to J'role, and a surge of excitement coursed through his chest. Exactly, he thought, and picked up the spear dropped by the thorn man he had fought. The weapon felt oddly balanced in his hands but he knew it would be more effective than his stick.
He rushed toward Releana's assailants, passing through the shadows like air, his footsteps wrapped in silence. The magic laughed inside him, seeing the perfection of his attack.
Yes. J'role was certain he would hit.
Releana dodged the thorn men's blows. Ducking and shifting left and right, she had not a moment's rest to prepare a spell. One of the thorn men slashed its spear against her right arm, and a crackle of blue energy burst on her skin, instantly leaving a black scar.
J 'role reached her without having made a sound or leaving a trace of his movement. Even Releana did not spot him through the gaps in the thorn man's body. He pulled his spear back and drove its tip-into the back of one of the thorn men, wondering only at the last moment if such a weapon could harm a creature made of branches and thorns.
But the spear's magical nature prevailed, and blue sparks flew wildly from the tip as it plunged into the thing's body. The creature's arms flew wide, its spear flung wildly away from Releana. The thorn man collapsed to the ground, then lay motionless. J'role whirled just in time to parry the thrust of the other thorn man.
He heard Releana's voice, then flames sprouted at the tip of his spear. J'role felt oddly giddy, and the moment seemed to freeze in his awareness. Before him stood a creature made of brambles and magic. He himself held a magic spear, now made more powerful by the spell of a magician. Despite all that had happened in his life, and no matter what would come next, everything he might ever have wanted from the fantastic had come his way.
His father hadn't lied at all. There was adventure in life. J'role knew now, however, that one could not define the terms of the adventure.
The thorn man stabbed his spear at J'role, and caught him full in the arm. A horrible pain coursed through his flesh and he staggered back. Raising the spear just in time, he blocked another blow, and then shoved the spear forward. The creature leaped out of the way.
The maneuvers cost J'role his balance, nearly sending him to the ground. He recovered just in time to dodge another blow from the thorn man. Jumping away from the attack, he whirled around and plunged his spear into the creature's right shoulder. The sparks flew wild, and the creature reeled back.
The two of them stalked each other now, moving in a wide circle around an undefined point of contention. Behind the thorn man, J'role saw Releana grab dirt from the ground, speak a few magic words, and toss the dirt at the thorn man. The dirt transformed into the same kind of darts that-had killed the dogs, but the darts passed harmlessly through the thorn man's hollow body.
The creature made a stab, then another. Each time J'role just barely dodged the attack.
Releana looked startled as she stared at some bushes back the way they'd come. J'role saw her wave her hands in the formation of another spell. A moment later an elf, his flesh pocked with thorns that pierced his flesh from the inside out, broke through the bushes, brandishing a sword and shouting, "Here, here!"
As J'role continued parrying with the thorn man, he saw Releana raise her hands again, and release another spell. A spear of ice formed under her fingertips and raced through the air. It slammed into the elf's chest, creating a red blossom on the elf's shirt of white petals.
In that instant the thorn man turned his focus from J'role, slightly toward Releana. J'role lunged forward and pierced the thorn man's chest, which began to glow white-hot as fire and sparks from the spear cut through it. The brambles exploded into flames as the thorn man fell apart and dropped to the ground.
"Come. We've got to go! Now!" Releana cried.
J'role hesitated. He wanted to go back and get the ring. He knew where it would be. On the shelves outside the elf queen's chamber with all the other gifts.
How could he leave the ring with the Alachia?
How could he leave her?
Without even thinking about it he began to walk back toward the castle a hand caught his arm and he turned sharply. It was Releana, looking concerned and confused. "We have to go!" she whispered harshly. "The Blood Wood, all of it, belongs to the elves. There's no place to hide. I already made that mistake. We have to get out. Now."