Skye is the Limit by Phenomenal Pen (best ebook reader ubuntu .TXT) 📖

Fairy flew lower and lower till she finally sat on Warrior’s wide shoulder. Warrior didn’t mind and actually felt a boost of bravery. Just a mild one.

The knights on either side of the path looked really menacing. Unlike Sir Delamere, they wore long flowing white surcoats emblazoned with their respective coats of arms. Colorful plumes fluttered on their helmets and their lances pointed skywards reminded the Dreamwalkers of the risk of being impaled. As secondary weapons, they bore swords on their backs and maces on their girdles. Parts of these barbaric weapons glinted in the sunlight that spilled through the forest canopy, which was thinner in that part of the forest. Blacksmith thought he saw bloodstains on some of the weapons.

Most of the grooms and servants cowered behind the knights’ horses. Only a few were brave enough to look at the Dreamwalkers or whisper to each other about them. Yet somehow, no matter what they did and how they turned their heads, their hoods always managed to fall in place and hide their faces. Even when they stared at the foreigners directly, there would be a pool of inky darkness inside the hoods as though they were filled with nothing but air. This supported Blacksmith’s theory about the elusive quality of faces in both dreams and computer simulations.

He dismissed all thoughts because they had finally arrived by the carriage’s side, where there was a small window covered with curtain. Brusquely, the knights around the carriage who had dismounted pushed them down into a kneeling position, except for Fairy who promptly flew to a safe height right under the forest canopy. The knights also forced them to bow their heads.      

<State your business,> the gravelly, almost hoarse voice asked from behind the curtain.

<Er, first of all, we wish to compliment Your Lordship for such a majestic retinue,> Blacksmith said.

<Flattery will get you nowhere, commoner. Explain to me why I should not have your heads for delaying my journey.>

Blacksmith and Warrior looked at each other and gulped. Their throats were suddenly dry and their necks felt kind of tingly.

<Consider this an interlude, Your Lordship,> Blacksmith replied, <from an otherwise long and monotonous travel.>   

Silence from the other side of the curtain.

<He is right, Dada,> another voice, a feminine one, came from the carriage. <Are we ever going to arrive at Lemnos?> 

<Why, of course we are, darling,> the chancellor said placatingly. <It is just a little farther ahead.>

<You have been saying that for the last four days.>

<Just a little bit more, Swetelove,> the chancellor said.

His head bowed, Blacksmith thought they might be able to use to their advantage what they had just heard. 

<Oh by God’s bones! What is that?!>

They heard the curtain being drawn with force. Blacksmith raised his lowered head to behold Swetelove. She wore a butterfly-shaped headdress, a cloth cap that covered the head and forehead and was tied under the chin, and another piece of cloth that wrapped around the neck. This produced a sort of frame for her face, which wasn’t exactly what the Dreamwalkers had expected.

Her face had very high cheekbones and was suggestive of a tall and slender woman. But if the Dreamwalkers had one word to describe the apparition they were seeing, it was: Ribbit. She looked like the princess in the fairytale after she had kissed the frog, but instead of transforming the frog into a human, the princess had turned into an anthropomorphized frog. She also had the oversized ears of a bat, the albino complexion of a mole-rat, and the incisors of a mouse.

Blacksmith’s mouth hung open. She was a goblin. They all were, which explained why they were hiding from direct sunlight.

This incredibly complicated things.

****

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hi guys! Thanks for reading my work. Please don't forget to Like, Comment and Add so you'll get updated when I release the next chapter. 

I update every Friday and Monday, so stay tuned!