Night had fallen over The Vaults long before the column finished setting up camp. They had found a small, relatively flat area on the slope of some cliffs, protected by a rock wall that shielded them from the wind and offered enough of a view of the surroundings to detect any movement approaching at night. It wasn't a comfortable place, but after several days of traveling along increasingly difficult roads, no one complained much. The carts sat in the center of the camp, and the horses were tied near them, while the soldiers set up tents and lit small fires to prepare dinner.
The last few days had been considerably more exhausting than Edmund had expected. Goblins appeared frequently in the narrow passes, although they rarely posed a serious threat. On a couple of occasions they had also encountered groups led by orcs, and those encounters had been much more dangerous. Even so, none of the battles had directly involved the soldiers of Graymont. Ellaria, Tristan, Victoria, and Brogur had almost always taken responsibility for dealing with them, moving ahead of the column and eliminating the threats before they could get too close.
Although they handled all the encounters, the soldiers did the heavy work whenever the carts were damaged or they had to move the luggage.
For that reason, whenever they found a safe place, everyone took the opportunity to rest. That night was no different. Ellaria was sitting near the fire with the bow resting against a rock, while carefully checking the string of her crossbow and making sure the tips of her bolts had not splintered. Tristan had removed part of his armor and was resting against his backpack, his eyes closed. Victoria was doing something similar on the other side of the fire, cleaning one of her daggers with a small piece of cloth. Brogur, much more accustomed to sleeping on stone than any of them, had chosen a place beside one of the walls of the cliff and seemed perfectly comfortable there.
Edmund approached with a bowl of food and sat down beside them.
"It seems we finally have a quiet night."
Victoria opened one eye. "Don't say that."
Edmund looked at her, amused, knowing what she would say, but still asked. "Why?"
"Because every time you say we are having a quiet night, something tries to kill us."
Ellaria let out a small laugh. "That only happened twice."
"Twice is more than enough to call it a bad omen." Victoria shook her head as she put away the dagger, somewhat annoyed as she remembered those moments.
"They were spectacular battles," Tristan said half-asleep.
Edmund smiled. He had forgotten how familiar that kind of conversation felt. It had been a long time since the five of them had shared a camp, but some things had not changed.
"It has been a long time since we camped together," he said, sharing his thoughts.
The others remained silent for a few seconds.
"The four of us still camp together," Ellaria replied in a somewhat serious tone. "Someone was the one who decided to leave the group one day out of nowhere in the middle of the night."
Tristan sat up slightly, interested in how the conversation had turned, and looked at Edmund. "Looks like you stepped on a mine, boy."
Edmund laughed nervously. He had avoided the subject since he had encountered Ellaria and the rest of his companions since they arrived. This chapter is updated first at novelping.com.
Edmund laughed nervously. He had avoided that subject since he had reunited with them, perhaps because he knew that sooner or later he would have to face it. For years he had prepared excuses to explain his departure, but none of them sounded convincing when he had the same people in front of him who had shared countless journeys, wounds, and nights around a campfire with him.
"It wasn't exactly that I wanted to leave," he finally said.
"Then what was it?"
Edmund remained silent for a few seconds before answering. It was not a simple question. Too much time had passed since that night, and yet he remembered perfectly what had happened. He remembered the place, the cold of the early morning, and the way Ellaria had looked at him after kissing him for the first time. For years, he had tried to convince himself that leaving was the right thing to do, but sitting there, surrounded by the same people he had tried to protect by keeping himself away, he understood that perhaps he had only been running from his reality.
"Because I realized I was in love with Ellaria," he answered in the most honest way, because from now on he knew that he could only lie.
The silence that followed was heavier than the last.
Tristan opened his eyes completely. Victoria left the dagger on her legs, and Brogur slowly raised his head from his improvised resting place. Ellaria, on the other hand, remained motionless, looking at Edmund.
"That doesn't explain why you disappeared," she finally said with an even more annoyed expression.
"No." Edmund lowered his gaze toward the bowl he held in his hands. "What happened afterward does."
For a few seconds no one said anything. Edmund knew he could stop there, invent some simpler story, and leave the rest buried as he had done for so many years. But he no longer wanted to do that. He had wasted too much time trying to protect them from something he might not even be able to prevent.
"Before I met you, I started having dreams."
Tristan frowned, confused by the direction the conversation was taking. "Dreams?"
"Yes. At first they were small things. Places I didn't recognize, people I had never seen, battles I didn't understand. I thought they were just nightmares. Then I started recognizing some things."
Edmund breathed slowly.
"One of those visions showed a city in flames. There were thousands of people fleeing through the streets while monstrous creatures advanced between the buildings. In another, I saw entire armies marching south. Men, orcs, creatures I did not know how to name. I also saw entire cities turned into ruins and fields covered with corpses." The source of this chapter is NovelPing.
Ellaria did not take her eyes off him, and Edmund paused before continuing because of the guilt from the lies.
"At first I didn't understand anything. Then I started finding things that matched my dreams. Names of places. Wars. People. Even events that had not yet happened when I first saw them."
Victoria exchanged a look with Tristan.
"You mean you dreamed about the future?"
"I don't know exactly what they were." Edmund shook his head. "I never saw everything clearly. Some scenes were too confusing, and others seemed to take place much later. But over time I understood that many of them showed things that had not happened yet."
Brogur slowly sat up. "And you never told us anything?"
Edmund shook his head. "I didn't know how to do it. What could I tell them, that I constantly dreamed about the deaths of thousands of people? I simply decided to ignore it and live as if it didn't matter... But when I realized that I loved you, I realized how afraid I was of losing all of you."
"I don't understand. We have both witnessed the injustices of the world, but we have been able to deal with them together," Ellaria asked, somewhat worried.
"I saw the end of everything." His voice had changed. He no longer sounded like someone talking about a nightmare, but like someone who had spent too much time trying to find the right words to describe something no man should ever know.
Brogur stopped moving. "What do you mean, lad?"
Edmund slowly raised his gaze.
"This world will see the greatest demonic invasion it has ever faced. And it will not be a war like the ones we know. It will be an invasion led by an Everchosen, someone who will gather under his command armies of men, monsters, and creatures of Chaos."
The fire crackled between them.
"The lands will be ravaged in its wake. Entire cities will disappear. The armies that try to stop it will be defeated again and again. The enemies of all life will emerge from everywhere and advance without stopping, while the world we know crumbles."
I'll be posting two chapters a day there, unlike here.