II The Picnic
"I remember it vividly, as if it were only yesterday. My sister Ahnnisa and
I were playing in the woods, just young girls we were. A picnic! Honey cakes,
cinnamon flat breads, brandywine tea, we loved to picnic in the spring.
We were just finishing our tea when Ahnnisa hushed
me;
"Listen, Ehlissa, listen... shh now and listen... do you hear that?"
And we listened but heard nothing.
"I don't hear anything, silly. You're playing games again." I said. "No! Listen..." She interrupted. "Do you hear the birds or the crickets or the other sounds the forest
makes?"
We listened but did not hear them, and we began to be afraid, very afraid.
But before we could think about why we were afraid, the forest began to
make terrible sounds like we had never heard before. Metallic sounds,
banging sounds, and then screaming and shouting. The next thing I knew I
was holding Ahnnisa, her arms wrapped so tightly around me I could hardly
breathe. We were holding each other for dear life, shivering and jumping
with each round of screams.
Suddenly, three green-skinned, pig-faced creatures had rushed out of the underbrush
at us. Ugly creatures, their visages twisted and distorted with hateful
stares. But they were knocked to the ground as a large nightsabre pummeled
them one by one. Out just beyond the tree line I saw a lone hunter. Mess
with a night elf? Not these three ever again. The hunter began launching
his arrows furiously at the three.
But as the cat was flattening the second creature, we later learned to call
them orcs - the last one cried out in a high pitched squealing voice. By
the time the nightsabre had dropped the second orc and turned his
attention, and claws, to the last one - others, larger, with swords and
axes came rushing from the forest. Ahnnisa and I could not move, frozen in
fear. We sat and watched, each squeezing the breath out of the other slowly
as we clung to each other desperately.
The hunters cat was a powerful nightsabre. He was tossing orcs aside left
and right, slashing this one here, flattening that one there. But there
were so many, and they just kept coming. Soon there were three
exceptionally large orcs all on top of him at once trying to hold him down.
The other smaller orcs were hitting him with clubs and tree branches and
rocks, anything they could get their grimy little hands on. Some of them
turned and noticed Ahnnisa and I.
They dropped their weapons and started rubbing their hands together and
grinning, it was horrible. I still have nightmares; the disgusting looks in
their eyes, the saliva dripping from their black tongues and yellow
teeth...
To be continued...