THE SORCERER KING

CHAPTER 1

He nearly had a heart attack, as he woke up the next morning to the sound of loud banging. The night before came back in fast-moving pictures. He closed his eyes, drawing his thin blanket over his head. There was no way they could have found him so soon, he had done his best to hide, the only one who even saw his face was cinders now. There was no possible... He felt strong arms being closed around him, gently peeling him from his blanket.

"You need to breathe, my friend; otherwise, you are going to go blue in the face and limp like one of those fish on land" the last was uttered with a chuckle.

He knew that voice, it was his friend. That big hearted-idiot, who had decided to help him out after he visited his father's shop looking for work. The blacksmith had laughed him off due to his skinny ass not being able to lift a stick, let alone anything in his shop. The only guy in town he had ever dared to give a spare key to the shack he lived in.

"There you go, just breath in and out," the comment was given with a pat on his back.

He winced, his friend had way too much strength and was too terrible at holding it back to be doing that. He was sure he had a nice bruise there now, one more to the extensive collection he had obtained yesterday.

"I am fine, or I will be as soon as you stop crushing me, Bobby."

After being released, he took a few quick breaths, then looked over at his companion. He was wearing sturdy clothing fit for a blacksmith, making him feel even worse in his tattered remains of an outfit. Yesterday had been hard on his non-existing wardrobe, and he was not even sure if he was going to...NO, no thinking about yesterday. He gave himself a punch to his head. Stupid idea, the room was spinning now.

"Are you alright, Irvin? You do know you should not go punching yourself? That hurts, I did that once by accident when I was in a shuffle with my brother, the guy made some weird circle move, and then I hit myself. It hurt real bad; I tell you."

The giant helped him to sit down on his bed, still babbling, it felt oddly soothing even if he understood nothing from it. As he sat there, he got a better look at the dirt and blood covering what was once a long time ago a white shirt. Bobby came back with a washcloth and a pot of water. He took the items. They spent the day like that, just fixing up his injuries and discarding the ruined shirt. Bobby never asked about what happened. Irvin knew he was going to at some point, but was just happy his friend had decided to wait to drop any real questions about it. He honestly had no idea what he was going to tell him.

"You need to take better care of yourself, my friend, if those injuries start bothering you, then you should go see Iah," the brute demanded.

Irvin merely nodded.

The conversation luckily had little time to evolve past that. Bobby refused to stay this close to the forest before sundown and left in a hurry. Over the years, they had argued a lot over his choice of living this close to the forest. Considering all the dangers within it. As dosed off in his bed, Irvin was pondering what he was going to do. Those guards were going to keep looking for him, and the town of Unman was tiny. It was not a question of if they were going to find him, but rather when. He had to leave, even if he had no plan for where he was going to go. It had been years since last he had been on the road. The next day Bobby came by as usual. He was in an annoyingly chipper mode.

"Have you heard about the witch house? It was burned down yesterday, Steve told me about it. I barely believed him at first, but then he showed me. I mean, it is great the place has finally been cleansed, but I am surprised anyone managed to do that. I mean, people have tried for years to get rid of that place, and nothing seemed to work."