The Borderlands The Memoirs Of Lord Tristan

Chapter IV

The next time I awoke was of my own accord. I raised my head, all were asleep. I had to clench my jaw to ensure no groan or gasp escaped. I surveyed their camp. It was under an overhang of rock to protect them from the elements. The two guards who were posted outside were asleep with the unmistakeable fumes of alcohol emanating from them.
Four horses were tethered outside, all of which once belonged to me. I pulled on my shirt, and stole three knives from a pile of weapons in the far right corner of the camp. Perhaps I should clarify; there were numerous camps of 100 to 1,000 Raiders scattered about the lower slopes of the mountains, this was only one of many.
I cut the horses free and mounted the beige, the rest followed unprompted. I was still unnoticed. Horses aren't the best creatures for the rocky terrain I was travelling on, but they would be useful once I got down to the plains. I urged my horse into a canter once we were out of earshot, the other three horses followed. The horses were well fed and well nourished for my journey.
Dawn broke across the sky. I stopped to let the horses drink snow melt. I could see the plains from where I sat atop the beige. They were covered over in a thin layer of fog. I urged the horses back into a canter.
We arrived within the hour on the plains. It was ghastly to behold. The Raiders hadn't buried their men or mine. It proved an eerie sight with the fog drifting in tendrils across the plains, with men and blood scattered liberally over the battleground. Flies began to swarm now that the morning had come. I was afraid of the Raiders, but I loved Gena more than I feared them. I searched for her body in the place where I thought I had last seen her. When I found it I swatted the flies away and began to dig a grave with a spear and shield. Her eyes were still open, I had forgotten to close them. The stench that hovers over all dead things assaulted my nostrils and I had to control myself from hurling. I closed Gena's eyes, pulled her engagement ring off her cold finger and slipped it on a cord around my neck. Then I placed her gently into the grave and shovelled the dust back into the ground.
"We are but dust, and to dust we will return," I muttered quoting an old song I had once heard. A pang of sorrow shot through me, had Gena liked music?
I looked across the battlefield strewn with the dead. I could as easily have been killed, yet I survived, and Gena did not.
But what about my mother, was she still alive? I looked up at the hill where my Manor should have been. Instead there lay a huge pile of burnt wood, the charred remains of furniture, and blackened stone. Wisps of smoke curled off the hill into the slight breeze. The best I could hope for was a couple survivors. I mounted one of the other horses and steered it toward the hill where my Manor once stood.
I tried to immerse myself in my outward pain so as to ignore the inward pain. I thought of the groaning in my bones, the incessant ache of my bruised body, the painful lacerations in my back, the torturous slice in my side, and the never diminishing agony in my ribs. Even breathing hurt, digging the grave had almost made me pass out. Gripping the horse's ribcage with my knees sent excruciating jolts throughout my entire body with each hoofbeat. And that feeling of pain was nothing, absolutely nothing, compared to the anguish in my heart.

When I reached the top of the hill, the devastation made me want to scream. Everything was burnt to the ground and charred black, nothing was spared. I wove my way through the mess calling my mother, Avan, Pamella, Zaryx and anyone else I could think of. All was silent in the gaps I left open for a reply. After many minutes of this, I heard a soft moan to my left. I darted toward a pile of burnt wood where fire still licked the blackness.
"Hello?!" I called. I knew the area where the sound had originated from, but I couldn't pin point it.
"Who?" asked a hoarse voice no more than a foot away. I threw away the pieces of wood and beat out the flames. It was my mother.
"Mother?" she didn't recognise me, "It's me Tristan!" I exclaimed.
"Tristan?" she asked in disbelief. Both her legs were badly burnt, her hair almost singed away. She suddenly burst into a fit of coughing, and that's when I knew she would soon die. The cough, the vacantness in her eyes, the condition of her body could only mean one thing.
"I'm here mother," I said, comfortingly.
"You're hurt," she whispered.
"No more than you are," I said, smiling bravely against my own internal and external pain.
"Where's Gena?"
Tears came to my eyes. "She's passed on," I said. The lonesomeness of my condition hit me. Beside my mother, everyone I knew was surely dead, and I, hunted.
"Oh Tristan," she said sadly, through her chapped lips, "Listen closely—" before she could proceed she burst into a second coughing fit. This one lasted for minutes though. "Your...uncle...sent—" she began to cough again.
"Sent what?" I asked, listening to every word she said. Her body began to convulse. One last breath exited her lungs and she became still; her eyes fixed on a point in the sky.
My mother was dead. And as for her last words, what had my uncle sent? The only way I could think to find out was to find him. Which ould prove a hard task, I had no doubt.