The Tales of the Wanderer Volume One: A Book of Underrealm (The Underrealm Volumes 4) by Garrett Robinson (elon musk reading list TXT) 📕

Whetu had been a ranger long ago. She was the one who heard the sounds first. A heavy stomping, along with a deep, guttural snuffling.

She shot to her feet. “Paora,” she whispered.

Paora rose, though more slowly. “What is it?”

“Something is coming. I think—”

A loud, heavy crash shattered the stillness of the night. Towards the northern end of the village, someone screamed.

Whetu turned. “The girls.”

They ran inside the house to the back room. Their daughters were sitting up in bed, listening in terror as more screams rang out in the darkness. Together Whetu and Paora scooped them up, running for the front door.

CRASH

The wall to their left shattered inwards. A piece of wood whizzed through the air to jam straight into Whetu’s thigh. She managed to bite down on her scream, turning it into a grunt instead, but her daughter fell from her arms onto the floor.

“Whetu!” cried Paora.

“I am fine,” wheezed Whetu. “Get the—”

Her eldest daughter screamed, pointing at the new hole in the wall. A massive face was looking through it. The skin looked stony, with small formations of crystals looking as though they had erupted through the skin, and moss clinging to the cracks. Two tusks were visible in the bottom jaw, and two in the top. Huge ears, like miniature sails, swept back from either side of the head, twisting every which way. Small, beady eyes glinted with the light of a nearby fire.

The troll opened its mouth and roared.

“Run!” screamed Whetu, forcing herself to her feet. She seized her daughter’s hand and pulled her along, half-dragging her out the door and into the night, forcing herself to keep up with her husband despite the pain in her leg.

Together the family fled south, beyond the bounds of the village and up a rise. Most of the other villagers had gathered there. Whetu and Paora stopped in their midst, clinging to their daughters as they turned to look back at their home.

Trolls were ripping the village apart. There were at least a dozen that Whetu could see. Wooden timbers cracked in their grip as they ripped roofs and walls off of houses, as though they were peeling away the skin of great beasts to reveal and eat the insides. There were only a few stone buildings, but even those could not stand before the monsters—the trolls simply smashed their fists into the stone, and after a few blows, it crumbled before them. A fire had caught in one of the buildings, and tongues of orange licked up into the night. The trolls gave that building a wide berth.

“Why did they attack us?” said one of the villagers.

Whetu’s expression was grim. The village had been her home ever since she had retired from the Rangatira’s service. Ten years she had lived here, and they had been the happiest years of her life. Watching the trolls rip it apart was like watching them tear her life into pieces and scatter them to the winds.

“Who knows?” she said. “It does not matter now. We must make for Kahaunga.”

“She is right!” cried Paora, turning to the others. “We will be safe there. The Rangatira can protect us.”

Whetu held her tongue as she pushed through the crowd, leading them off south in the darkness. She wanted to say that Paora’s hope was misplaced. They needed to reach the city because they needed food and shelter. But if the trolls attacked Kahaunga, Lord Telfer would not be able to keep them safe. No one would.

Whetu wanted to say it, but she did not. She was no longer a ranger, but she had been. And a ranger was supposed to make her people feel safe. No matter what.

We were guests of honor in the Rangatira’s keep, and our quarters were more than comfortable. Mag distributed our possessions between the bedrooms we had been given. Dryleaf smiled broadly as I walked him about the place, letting him run his fingers along the bookshelves and push them into the deep, plush cushions of the furniture.

“We have gone from comfort to comfort the last few days,” he said. “Why could not the road from Bertram have been this gentle on my old bones?”

I laughed. “If only it had, friend. Let yourself relax. You will remain here while we set forth tomorrow.”

“Naturally,” said Dryleaf. He gave a sigh. “I never thought I would rest inside noble quarters again. It has been some time since I resigned myself to dying in Lan Shui.”

“It was our pleasure to change your fate,” said Mag.

Dryleaf chuckled. “Oh, I do not know if anything can do that. It depends upon whether you believe in fate or not, I suppose. But I certainly never suspected that I was destined to embark upon another adventure so late in life. The Birchwood was all I ever wanted, for a good long while.”

At that moment, a knock came at the door. Supper had been brought for us, though the sun was still well above the horizon. We would go to bed early that night, so that we were well rested when they came to wake us up before dawn. Servants set the dishes out for us, and we began to tuck in. The fare was nowhere near so fine as the meals at Victon’s had been, but it was still better than anything we had had upon the road.

“What was it about the Birchwood you so loved?” I asked Dryleaf as we ate. “Why there, and not any of the other wondrous places you must have visited in Underrealm?”

“A fair question,” said Dryleaf. “The Birchwood is a place of small wonder, but great peace—which is a wonder in itself, if a less obvious kind. There was something about the trees. Not the sight of them, mind you—that matters little to me, especially now. But there was a feeling to them, a peace beneath their boughs. Four branches