The Enlightened Few - The Journey Begins

The face of an animal

The shackles around their feet had cut through their skin and left red bloody marks, which were growing deeper the further they walked. Blood began lacing the steel, Aden felt the pain of his old wound getting worse and his knees shook as he took each step.

They had been torturously dragged around for what seemed like an eternity. Aden looked at Anemone who was becoming weaker and his patience slowly ran out, he was ready to shout with anger and was prepared to face the consequences of a fight. These warriors were trained assassins, hunters in the wild, it would not be easy. Ilmatar could see Aden fighting the battle in his head, his thoughts were so loud that he worried the others could hear them too.

"Hang in there, you know what we came here for.", he whispered in Aden's ear.

Out of nowhere, the forest began opening up and it revealed two very large gruesomely carved totem poles. Their faces were not humanlike at all, they had tongues and eyes protruding and were painted in red, green, blue and white colours. The colours did not help tone down the images; in fact it made them look scarier.

Not far further into the wood, the path was clear and from each tree branch on the side of the road different circular beaded ornament hung on the tree branches, each one representing different animals in a different colour. These ornaments were connected to each other like a large spider web and must have served some form of purpose.

Apart from the manmade ornaments, the nature around them was serene and it felt soothing.

Aden did however not feel appeased at all, he knew a darkness was closing in. The forest encompassed them from all sides, tall looming trees ate through the view of the sky, the overhanging canopy of leaves and branches absorbed all the sounds and stillness befell. There was no breeze to be felt, the only movement present was in their feet and through the air circulating their lungs, it was as though time stood still. Aden caught Anemone and Ilmatar's unsettled looks in the corner of his eye, they felt great discomfort who could tell by their clenched fists and pursed lips and the air beneath their feet had been sucked out.

As if out of nowhere, the city appeared and no words could possibly be able to portray the view. Seven large totem poles could be seen outlining a V-shaped arrow directly pointing in the direction that they had been walking toward. There were leather huts lining the streets all around them, little carved out doorways held the secrets inside and revealed nothing. People were coming closed towards them without saying anything, their faces blank with similar marking to their escorts. Some had red horizontal stripes across their eyes and black drawn triangular tattoos around their mouths.

The houses had leather-overhanging doors, while different smells emanated around them like burnt herbs, cooked meat and wood fires. The door flaps of most of the houses had the similar crests to the ones on the guards' shoulders and arms.

The large, wooden totem poles had an animal atop of each one. The left most totem pole was a large eagle, followed by a panther slightly to the side of it and behind it a buffalo. The central totem pole had a bear atop of it and on the left slightly in front of it there was a wolf, followed by a snake and finally a deer.

The huts were grouped around these totem poles except for the central pole, where instead there was a massive tepee with many entrances. Thick smoke could be seen rising out of the top of it, something must have been burning inside. Aden could just imagine a large, flaming beast inside waiting to burn them on entry.

They knew they were almost there and their footsteps were heavily pounding the ground in desperation to rest. The captives looked towards their feet instead of straight ahead, almost avoiding the sight of their future.