The Keeper: Ancestors' Knives

Chapter One - The Keeper

-Chapter One-

The Keeper

 

Ashe Vena sat beneath her favourite blossom tree; the spring breeze wafted in the afternoon heat. An airstream blew the few slivers of her flaming hair not kept in her bun and eased the flowers from the tree. Cherry blossoms floated down into her lap and she smiled at their simplistic beauty. Closing her eyes, she listened to all the sounds around her. The church in the middle of town had bells singing to celebrate Joseph the blacksmith and Mary the baker’s marriage. Street cats were meowing in the alley next to the butcher’s store. Mrs. Nova, the butcher’s wife, had forgotten to feed them, as she was attending the wedding.

            There were many sounds in the world and Ashe could hear them as if they were right beside her. She was listening to the rumble of a horse and carriage trotting down the stone road when it was drowned out by another noise, sharp and high-pitched. It grew louder and louder. Ashe’s mind filled with memories.

            First there was an old wagon and a cloaked man riding under the moon. Flashing quickly to her sneaking through a palace; another flash and she stood in front of a wall of darkness with voices calling for her. A man appeared, laughing manically as he attacked her. One more flash and she was trapped in the darkness as it tore at her body, her piercing scream echoing...

            Ashe’s eyes shot open as wide as orbs.

            The high-pitched sound stopped.

            She looked down at the blossoms in her hands. They were squashed; the petals fell apart in her palms as she rose. The breeze had changed direction, which was unusual. It blew the blossoms once again and they fell all around her. She looked down at the town from the hill where she stood. She searched for any signs of danger when her attention was caught by the shimmer of an army marching out of the forest, west of the town. They wore red spiked armour, which covered their entire bodies. She knew this signified they were the second highest-ranking soldiers in the Lord Zeon’s army.

            Lord Zeon was the dark ruler over their world. His reign began seven years ago when he killed all heirs of the royal family. Since then, the world had been engulfed in a suffocating darkness that ravaged the land, bringing sorrow and depression.

            Ashe knew these servants of the Dark Lord were looking for her. With that thought she placed her hand on a pair of ancient Sais knives strapped to her belt.

            These were once her mother’s, passed down from generation to generation of Vena women. Each mother bequeathed these knives of great power to their first daughter and thus handed over the greatest responsibility ever conceived by god or man.

            The knives were found four hundred years ago by Janea. She was the first in a long line of women known as The Keeper. Seven generations had passed, leaving Ashe as their only heir. It was her duty to protect their world from harm; from evil. That was until Ashe’s powers were taken from her.

            As Ashe looked out over her hometown and at the oncoming invasion, she knew what she had to do. She gripped the Ancestors’ Knives in either hand, took a deep breath and jumped off the edge of the hill. She slid down the side of the rocky slope as if she were surfing on a ten-foot wave. Ashe bent her knees and placed her arms out at the sides to keep her balance. Flying past her face were rocks, but she did not flinch.

            She had practiced sliding down hills when she was younger. With her friends from the orphanage, she would climb the hill and sit under the blossom tree playing games and lounging in the sun. When it was time for her friends to do their chores, they would all slide down the hil; or at least they tried to. Ashe had recently perfected her sliding technique on her nineteenth birthday. When she was younger, Ashe and her friends never really slid, rather rolled, but still they had fun. These days she did not see her friends. Either they had been married off or had gone to the capitol city of Alesca to become servants in the Palace.