Chapter 5

Nathan

He turned and saw her there. Sumon Crowned, in all her beauty. Her fiery red hair framed her pale face, tied in a soft braid that hung down her shoulder, leaving some soft strands surrounding her face, rosy cheeks, and fleshy lips raised in a sweet smile. The green silk cloak highlighted the purple eyes. She had lowered the hood, probably to be recognized by the guards. She wore a simple blue dress with yellow and orange shades.

Surely his wife had gone into town to visit some orphanage, Nathan knew... But to go so far from the fortress was dangerous for her.

“What are you doing here?” the prince asked, looking at her.

Sumon approached him, crossing her arms across her chest.

“I was passing by and heard that there was a corpse. I never saw a dead person, I was curious.” She shrugged as if that were a valid excuse. Doreon laughed.

“Now that you have seen him... Guards take the princess back to the palace. This is not the place for her”, Nathan ordered again.

“And what would be the place that suits me?” she passed it and went towards the walls. “The other is definitely a woman.”

“How can you say that?” Doreon asked, ignoring Nathan and focusing his attention on Sumon.

Nathan approached Sumon while she stepped on one of the footprints.

“See? It’s the same size,” she said, lifting and lowering her foot on the footprint.

Doreon stooped to look better.

“Nathan, she is right, even if it is difficult to think that a woman can kill a man that way”, Doreon confirmed, getting up.

“Women can do worse things than men, especially if they are angry. Never underestimate us.” Doreon whistled to call some guards.

“This is not about being angry, Sumon. This is an execution,” Nathan said, turning away.

While they were talking, Doreon ordered the guards to bring three horses for them and at least ten guards. They had to go outside the walls and needed protection in case of any danger.

“A grand performance. Ripping out a heart is no small thing”, Sumon said, almost fascinated.

Doreon drew closer to them and looked again at the helpless body of the old man: his gaze was gloomy and thoughtful. Nathan also looked at the old man again. The beard concealed part of his face, but he knew he had already seen those eyes, but he could not remember exactly where.

Suddenly an image passed before his eyes. No, it was not just an image because all around him had changed, he was no longer in one of Sierra’s streets. He was at the foot of a staircase in front of a huge fortress of white stone. The sun was beating on his head high in the sky, could feel it on the cuticles of his hair. In front of him, there were several people. An old man bent over to whisper something in the ear of a king. The green eyes of the latter darted in the direction of Nathan, peering him from head to foot, while a sense of discomfort spread inside the prince.

“Nathan.” Doreon’s voice brought him back to the present, he blinked several times, and meanwhile, the image in front of him blurred, and his eyes returned to see the place where he was as if, for a moment, he had been transported elsewhere.

He passed a hand on his face, confused; he had always had dreams, but they had never been so vivid: he felt the sensations leaving his body, the discomfort of the sun’s rays against his head, yet the sun had just risen and still hidden between the buildings.

Maybe he was going crazy.

The guards had arrived with the horses, and Sumon was already mounted without giving him any chance of objection.

Wonderful. Last thing I needed.

They walked out of the walls, entering the village outside them. The peasants had started the bustle with carts full of freshly picked vegetables. Outside the walls, they met other guards who had followed the trail of footprints of the two intruders, who, apparently, were not only two but three.

“Three?” Sumon asked, stunned, making an acute line in surprise. Nathan rolled his eyes, almost indignant.

“My lady, outside the walls, next to the original footprints, there is another trail. They all head towards the forest,” the guard replied.

“The forest is dark and has a great cover. No one can see you from the walls, but the ground is too muddy not to leave footprints,” Nathan said to the guards holding the horse still.

Ready to walk into the woods before one of them stopped him.

“That’s why we tried to follow, sir, but we found... something strange.”

“Stranger than a man, whose heart was torn?” Sumon asked, raising the hood of her cloak over her head.

She gave off spurs and left first, forcing the others to follow her without a word. They set out inside the village, and past the latter, they would find the beginning of the wood stretched to the mountain’s foot.

They quickly passed the village and found themselves in front of the forest. The trees were huge, eighty or ninety feet tall, the barks were about twenty-four feet. Those trees had been there for centuries, and no man had managed to cut down one, they were taller than the perimeter walls of the city and provided almost impenetrable protection.

They started with the horses, followed by the royal guards and a few city guards. Sumon was at the head of the tail and trotted faster than the others.

That woman will drive me crazy.

Nathan followed with Doreon by her side, but they soon stopped, blocked by the disturbing spectacle they found themselves in front of.

“For the four demons!” Doreon jumped on the saddle and looked away.

In front of them lay a huge piece of the forest completely destroyed: it was in the middle of the high vegetation, in the easternmost part of the wood, almost near the foot of the mountain, so far from the walls that nobody had noticed the burnt area. In the middle of the expanse was also a pulverized animal carcass, probably a ram, but usually, such animals did not venture into the forest. He knew there was some wild flock on the other side of the east mountain, in the clearing, but he had never heard of flocks in the woods.

Nathan got off his horse and entered the large burnt area. Around it, the trees were completely intact, while inside the area, everything was ash. There was no way a fire had broken out. Although the walls had no view of what was happening inside the woods, the sentries on guard should have seen a great deal of smoke from such devastation.

“There were no reports of fires outside the walls, were there?” Doreon asked as he descended from his horse and entered the devastated space. He stood next to Nathan and watched the expanse.

“No, Ser,” the guard replied.

Nathan turned to Doreon while Sumon also got off her horse.

“It was not a fire, it was as if something very hot had been placed here. So hot it incinerated everything.”

At the edge of the sod, some grass was slightly burnt and crushed. Nathan pointed.

“The grass on the sides is flattened. It must have been something very big. He even had a snack.” Then he concluded, pointing to the burnt carcass.

“What could be so big and warm as to create such a thing?” Doreon asked, puzzled.

“A dragon...” Sumon intervened.

The guards stared at her in surprise, as did Doreon and Nathan. She lowered the hood of her cloak and looked at them.

“Dragons do not exist. They are just stories...” Nathan began to say before being interrupted by his wife.

“To scare the children, yes, I know.” She moved A strand of red hair behind her ear and discovered the shiny pendant she was wearing.

“In all stories, however, there is always a fund of truth. Think about it. What other creature, known by the human world, is big and warm enough to create such a thing? I will help you. None. Sometimes you have to try to explain the inexplicable with something equally inexplicable”, she said, shrugging.

“Legends say that dragons have such a hot body that they incinerate anything that comes into contact with them,” Doreon intervened. “We are seeing it right here. Trees are incinerated as well as grass. What other explanation do you want to give to it?”

The commander crouched on the ground and took a handful of ash in his hand before letting it fly in the wind.

“Are you telling me that no one noticed a huge dragon landing here and then leaving undisturbed?” Nathan began to get impatient.

He felt like he was in one of the stories Myra told him when he was a child. Stories of knights who had managed to tame dragons and traveled the world on the backs of those huge creatures encountering dangers and adventures.

He always stayed up late at night, imagining he was one of those brave warriors. Myra had often found him in the room looking lost in the moon while his mind wandered. He often felt right in front of one of those warriors in those distant times. He could see them so clearly before Myra brought him back each time by shaking him and calling him by name with a frightened voice.

He shook his head at the memory.

“Fires in the lower town,” Sumon began.

“In this way the guards were too busy to tame the flames rather than look around. But how did they start fires while they were outside the walls? The guards reported that there was no one” said Doreon, doubtful.

No matter how hard he tried, Nathan couldn’t find a solution to the puzzle he was facing. Why did they bother killing an old tramp? Why all the fuss over a homeless man? How did they start the fires?

“Maybe they used magic.” Doreon burst out laughing again, holding a hand to his belly, when he suddenly froze, staring out. He turned pale, staring at an inaccurate spot in front of him.

Both Nathan and Sumon began to worry. Sumon, who was closer to Doreon, extended a hand towards his shoulder, then froze and quickly retracted, a gesture that obviously did not escape Nathan.

“Hey, are you all right, Ser?” Sumon asked.

Doreon shook his head and stood straight. “Nothing, nothing.”

Nathan was about to insist, but he was interrupted by one of the guards, who emerged from the woods.

“There are other footprints in the mud. They head east towards the clearing. There are two people.”

“Two? The footprints at the lower town were three,” Nathan said confused.

“Nathan” Doreon called him, “after the clearing, there is the old port. Whomever the intruders were, they came from the sea.”

Damn.

Merchants no longer used the port. After his marriage with Sumon, all trade took place in the port of Devian, the kingdom bordering his and of which his wife was a princess. His father, the king, knew full well that Devian was the continent’s largest trading center and had decided to move the Haefest trade there as well.

The port of the kingdom had become a meeting place for the trafficking of mercenaries and pirates.

“If they went there, we will never know where the intruders came from” Nathan turned to Doreon while Sumon returned to her horse.

“Follow the tracks to where they lead you, even if they are to the old port. Look for information, but don’t get too close to the ships,” he ordered.

“You care for me, Your Grace,” Doreon laughed.

“I’m serious, Doreon... that place is dangerous. Take off the coat of arms and take some guards but have them take off the coat of arms. If they see that you are from the city, they will kill you,” the prince insisted.

“Let them try!” Doreon said, sure of himself. Nathan was going to respond abruptly, it wasn’t a game.

“All right, Captain. Nothing strange. Easy.” He whistled to call three guards. “Take off your cloak and armor. Come with me.”

Then he turned again to Nathan “See? It’s very easy.”

Before she could answer, Doreon turned and approached her horse. Sumon had already climbed on her horse. She looked around and said something softly to Doreon. Nathan couldn’t hear, but it made Doreon smile, but he immediately hid his smile, returning serious.

“Patrol the perimeter,” Nathan told the guards, then he approached Sumon, who was about to go to the fortress alone.

“My lady!” he called her, raising his voice. She stopped, turning her head towards him. “I come with you. You three are coming with us. The others remain on patrol.”

The guards separated, and he got on the horse and approached his wife. Doreon and the three guards accompanying him had already disappeared into the trees.

Nathan and Sumon gave spurs and departed to return inside the walls. His wife was strangely silent, more thoughtful than usual, she would have dared to say she was as perplexed as he was. Everything they saw was terribly strange, there had to be a logical explanation that didn’t include creatures that came from legends and myths.