Power Quest: The Rebellion of Terrakia - Andrew Koenig (guided reading books txt) 📗

            “There was this group of guards outside when I got to the college,” Casimer muttered, scratching the back of his head.  “I have no idea what they were doing, but I couldn’t escape this… Feeling about one of them”

            Amanda just stared at Casimer for a moment, then broke out in uproarious laughter.  She clutched her stomach and gasped loudly for air, but found herself unable to control her ceaseless laughter.  Casimer’s eyes narrowed and his lips twisted into a confused frown.  “What’s so funny?”  He demanded.

            “Nothing, nothing,” she began, her wild laughter slowing down.  “I just never pictured you having a crush on an Imperial Guard.”  Amanda tried to stifle more laughter, but to no avail.

            It took Casimer a moment to register what she meant, but once he understood, his face twisted with disgust.  “No!  Not the kind of feeling I was talking about!”  Casimer shouted in protest.  “It was more like a… Nervousness, I guess.”

            Amanda managed to contain her laughter and looked at Casimer inquisitively.  “Nervousness?  About what?”

            “I have no idea.”  Casimer pondered, his eyes drifting towards the street again.

            The duo continued to stroll down the street, passing the occasional guard or group of children at play.  The road came to a fork with a general store sitting on the corner between the roads.  There were doors to the store available at either road and a battered sign hung from the roof at the corner of the road.  It read, on the painted golden yellow background “The Glowing Elf Trading Post”.  Beneath the name was an image of an overly pointy-eared elf with a sickly yellow skin tone holding a half-eaten mushroom.  The elf’s eyes were half closed in a pleasant and suggestive daze.  As Casimer and Amanda approached the general store, Amanda’s eyes lit up with a nostalgic glimmer.  She turned to Casimer and pulled on his arm, dragging him towards the shop.

            “Casimer!  Do you remember when we were children and we would come to this shop?” 

            He looked up at the weathered sign and his cheeks lit up with a grin.  “Of course I do,” he reminisced.  “We would use the coins Granny Velma gave us and we’d each buy a slice of honey cake.”  Just thinking about the sweet cake topped with roasted, honeyed almonds made Casimer’s mouth water.

            “Come on!  Let’s get some cake!”  Amanda grinned childishly and urged him towards the shop. 

            Casimer chuckled and shook his head.  “I would if I could, but I’ve got to be getting back to Granny Velma soon.” 

            Amanda’s lips fell into a fake pout and she crossed her arms in front of her chest.  “Don’t you want to take me on a date, Casimer?”  She shook her head and sighed.  “I was giving you every opportunity to, ya know.”

            “What?!”  Casimer exclaimed, his cheeks flushing a dark red.  “I mean, y-yeah!  Let’s go!”  Casimer reached into his pocket and pulled a few copper coins out of his coin purse.  Amanda giggled and shook her head at Casimer, turning around and heading back the way they came.

            “You’re so easy to fluster, Casimer,” Amanda laughed, walking back towards her house.  “Come on, let’s go home.” 

            Casimer’s heart was racing as he looked at the cobblestone street, processing what just happened.  He gave himself a moment to regain his composure before he jogged to catch up with Amanda, who was a ways ahead of him.  As they walked back to Amanda’s house, Casimer couldn’t help but smile.  Despite the heat and his apprehension towards the guard he encountered earlier, Amanda’s presence cleared his mind of such negativity.  He smiled as she told him the story of how her father burned himself on the oven last week, all the while walking as slow as he could to extend his time with her.

            Casimer left the bakery with a large cedar basket full of bread.  He thanked Mr. Diarmaid and took off down the streets, hurrying back to The Common Cup Inn before the late afternoon rush could begin.  His boots clicked against the cobblestone as he strode passed the crowd of afternoon shoppers in the marketplace.  Casimer noticed a mother frantically trying to tear her young daughter away from a vendor selling sweets and pastries.  He chuckled under his breath and made his way to the front door of the inn.

            Even before he opened the door, Casimer noticed something was out of place.  The inn exuded an uncanny silence that Casimer didn’t recognize.  The only thing he could hear from behind the oak door was the faint sound of whimpering and crying.  Casimer yanked the door open and ran into the inn as it crashed behind him. 

            The Common Cup Inn was a pitiful mess.  The stools at the bar had been flung across the room and were lying on the floor in splinters.  Tankards of mead had been thrown to the ground, spilling their contents upon the yellow and red rug on the floor.  On the bar, a small, cracked cask was still spilling warm ale all over the wooden bar.  Several pieces of artwork that had once decorated the walls of the inn were now strewn upon the floor, torn and shredded.  Several goat horn candle sconces were even knocked to the floor, their flames extinguished.

            In the center of the room, Granny Velma sat on her knees, her legs on either side of her.  Her hands rested on her face, stifling her whimpers and cries.  Tears were streaming down the sides of her face and her hair rested in a wispy mess around her head.  The man Casimer had spoken to earlier that morning was kneeling beside her, his arms around her shoulders as he attempted to console her.  Velma merely shook her head and continued to cry.

            Casimer’s eyes were wide open and he could feel his slow, heavy pulse in his temples.  He placed the basket of bread on the floor beside him and slowly began running to Granny Velma, his legs heavy and slow like molasses.  He dropped to his knees in front of her, grabbed her shoulders, and, pulling her head onto his shoulder, held her in a close hug. 

            “Gods, Granny Velma, what happened here?”  Casimer whispered, softly rubbing Velma’s back.  Casimer’s eyes fell upon a picture sitting in a broken frame.  It once depicted a ship sailing upon the light blue sea, but there was now a hole punched into the ship’s hull and the frame holding the picture had been fractured and strewn about the floor.

            Velma was whimpering too hard to respond, her body shaking up and down with her breaths and cries.  The man who had been comforting Velma knelt beside Casimer and placed his large, meaty hand on Casimer’s shoulder.  Casimer looked up at the man, his electric blue eyes swirling with anger and confusion.

            “The guards, boy,” The man began, his voice deep and rumbling.  “They sacked this place.  I’m so sorry, lad…”  His voice trailed off and he headed towards the stairwell, where a rested Mr. Habar was looking on. 

            Casimer held Velma’s face in his hand, wiping her tears away with his thumbs.  He stared into her wet, olive eyes, his brow wrinkled towards the center of his face, his forehead creasing in long, horizontal lines.  Velma stared back into Casimer’s eyes and managed to slow her tears and whimpers down to occasional tears and little sniffles.  After she had composed herself enough she reached up and ran her hand against Casimer’s left cheek.  Casimer could feel her wrinkled fingers run against his own smooth skin.  He offered her a sympathetic smile.

            “Granny Velma…” He began, unable to find the rights words.  “Why would they do this?”  His eyes watered up with tears and his lip curled downwards, into a trembling frown.

            She held his face in her hands and shook her head, sniffling.  “The men, t-they wanted their drinks for free.”  Velma whimpered, her tears drying on her cheeks as a few lone tears drifted down Casimer’s cheeks.  “When I told them they had to p-pay, they accused me of trying to incite a r-rebellion!”

            Velma began to weep again, tears pouring from her eyes like streams.  Tears crawled down Casimer’s cheeks as he held Velma’s face near his own.  He looked deep into her olive eyes and whispered.

            “Did they hurt you?”  His voice was husky and shaken badly.

            “W-what?”  She mumbled, whimpering.

            “Did those bastards lay a finger on you?”  Casimer’s electric blue eyes appeared dark to Velma, who swore she could see them growing cloudy, like the sky before a storm.

            Velma shook her head, nearly dazed.  “No, but,” she began, suddenly coming to a tear-filled revelation.  She pointed to a broken portrait lying in front of the hearth.  “They d-destroyed Sarkus and Oscar!”  She cried between tears and whimpers.  Casimer stood and walked to the hearth, wiping a few tears from his cheek.  He lifted the punctured image and stared at it, mindless.  It had once depicted an image of a young man and his older father, both looking nearly identical.  The elder had hair like coal, peppered with specks of grey and a goatee of matching color.  His hickory brown eyes were stern and deep-set, but his son’s eyes were not.  They were a warm cinnamon with flakes of a darker chocolate set into gentle, round eyes.  The younger man had the same hair and facial structure as his father but he had no facial hair.  They both wore fine, black and red velvet and leather tunics with white fur cloaks.  The tunics were fastened to their hips by black leather belts with buckles on the fronts.  Casimer found himself unable to take his eyes off of the unfamiliar men in the portrait.

            Leif Habar had moved from the stairwell to help Velma stand.  He helped walk her over to Casimer, who was still fixedly examining the men in the portrait, as if he hadn’t seen it in all of his seventeen years living with Velma.  Leif glanced at the portrait, then at Velma. 

            “Who’re the people in the picture?”  He asked, his voice shaky from his lingering hangover.

            Velma smiled remorsefully and sighed.  “The young man was to be my husband once.  The older gentleman was his father.”

            “So then they’re…”  Leif started, his eyes nervously darting around the floor.

            “Yes, Leif,” Velma sighed.  “They’re dead.”  Velma took the portrait from Casimer and sat down in a chair beside the glowing hearth.  “The elder here, Sarkus, built The Common Cup Inn when he was a young man.  He ran it for nearly thirty years before he passed.  I had been working for him for about four or five years before his son, Oscar, and I were married.  Unfortunately, Sarkus passed three years after that, Oscar followed him some four years later.”

            Velma began crying again, her tears falling onto the tattered fabric of her husband’s portrait.  “Sarkus had no heirs left, and Oscar and I never had children, so ownership of the inn fell to me.  I’ve been taking care of it ever since.”  Her whimpering became sobbing as she clutched the broken portrait to her chest, tears streaming down her cheeks in fountains.  Casimer ran to her and held her close as she wept bitterly.  “The inn is all I have of him!  It’s the only memento I have left!”

            Leif left Velma and Casimer to comfort each other and headed to the man at the stairwell.  After a brief silence, they both agreed to start helping Velma clean up the inn.  Leif found a rag behind the bar counter and used it to clean up the spilled ale from the cask.  The man collected the splinters from the bar stools and took them outside to toss them away. 

            After a few minutes, Velma wiped her eyes and smiled at Casimer and he did his best to fake