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Chapter 4- Prisoner of Myth

Darkness surrounded Alduren as he floated in the emptiness around him. Visions and scenes played out before him. He watched as clouds turned into beautiful dragons that in turn flew up into a writhing mass of dragons over his head. That was no good. Dragons didn't even exist. The scene changed and he looked on as a huge gold and red bird, a phoenix, swooped down from a sunny sky and dragged its talons across the mirror surface of a lake. Phoenix didn't exist either. He groaned in exasperation. He wanted to forget things that didn't exist and now they were chasing him even here. Something tugged at him. He was forgetting something very important. He pushed it away from him.
Suddenly pain cut through the senselessness his mind was cloaked into him. He was drawn out of the darkness and the pain centered itself into the right side of his head. The prince felt groggy and disoriented but even as he blinked his eyes open the pain remained with him. What he saw made him shut his eyes. Someone laughed, a gravely, deep laugh that sounded as though there was something wrong with the laughers throat. Alduren opened his eyes again and stared dumbfounded at the face before him.
Its skin was dark green and brown. Its features were out of proportion, eyes fixed into permanent squints, nose a large nub of misshapen skin in the center of its face. The face was unhealthy looking both drawn and filled in at the same time. The thing before him laughed again. “Ah, look at this. The pretty little elf man never seen a goblin before!” There were more barks of laughter and tearing his eyes away from the goblin before him, he noticed the rest. There were six of them all sprawled about a fire. He was shocked at how different they all were. It seemed to be a common trait for the creatures to be short and haunched but there skin color ranged from dark green to browns so dark as to be almost black. He saw ears that were pointed and resembled his own elfin ears. There were eyes that were round like coins and some that looked as though they were slits cut into faces by jagged knives. All of the eyes were focused on him.
The goblin in front of him started speaking again. “You had a very nasty hit, you did.” his dark eyes gleamed with evil mirth. “But don't worry, that won't be the end of it. Elves are so foolish, believing their homes are protected. We were sent to find and capture an elf that could give the lord information. And who do we find just wandering about? Why the Elvin prince in the flesh.” At this he laughed again reveling a mouth of pointed and rotten teeth. The goblin began to move back, its long hands swinging inches from the ground. “Don't get to comfortable now.” it called to him then turned around to join its companions around the fire.
Alduren was repulsed by the creatures. They were the embodiment of evil and they had captured him. He cleared his mind then focused on his surroundings. His back was against something. He turned his head and saw that it was a tree. His hands were bound behind him with cord that was tied so tightly, it cut into his wrist every time he tried to move his arms. Because of the way he was tied, his elbows were forced behind his back and into the tree. There was a length of rope around his torso that kept him from leaning forward. His legs were brought up to his chest and another cord was tied around his ankles, looped around his knees, then brought around to the tree behind him.
Alduren leaned back and let his muscles relax. By the fire, the goblins were preparing for sleep. There was a brief argument about who would take first watch. An exceptionally short goblin with nearly black skin was the unlucky winner. Sullenly, it moved to the edge of the firelight and sat down. It was faced outward so that it had a view of the land outside of the light but it could still see Alduren in its peripheral vision. He took a minuet to try to push away the fear that he had felt at seeing the goblins and realizing that he was their prisoner. It would be perfectly rational to be fearful but at the moment it served him no good. After he had dispelled it enough to think clearly, he examined the situation anew.
He focused his attention back unto the lone sentry. It had a pattern. Its head would turn to the left and stare out the horizon then it would turn towards the right and the prince. Each interval on either side started at about twenty seconds then lengthened as the minuets passed. Alduren waited. The goblin turned its head towards the left again. Immediately, he started to move his wrist up and down in the small wiggle space he had. His hands felt numb from lack of circulation and every time he moved his wrist, pain lanced up his arm where the rough cord dug into the raw and opened skin. After thirty seconds, the goblin turned its head towards the right and the elf made his stuggles less obvious. He twitched his wrist and closed his eyes halfway. The guard turned his head again and he continued to fight the bonds.
He struggled with the wrist bonds all through the night, pausing only when the sentry would go wake up one of its companions. One of them had noticed his constant movement and had kept his eye on him for its entire shift. The utter darkness of the sky lightened at the approaching dawn. The color of the sky slowly changed from black to dark blue to purple to gray until the stars were lost and the moon had moved on. He was so close. The cord was so loose, he could almost pull his hand through. Another trickle of his blood leaked from his wrist, slid under the bonds, then dripped from his finger tip. He twisted his arm trying to saturate the cord with the liquid. His face screwed up with concentration and he pulled. His arm contorted into his back and his hand was slipping free.
In the latest moments of his struggle, he hadn't noticed the sentry, a lean goblin with pale green skin, stand and cross to the burnt out skeleton of the fire and the remaining goblins. Suddenly the pressure of the rope around his torso was released and a hand grabbed his collar and jerked him forward. He was heaved over his knees and then dumped unceremoniously onto the ground in front of him. Someone pulled his arms up and the cord around it was untied then retied tighter. He was hauled back onto his knees. His arms were pulled straight down behind him then re wrapped against him with the same length of rope.
He raised his head to the waiting goblins assembled in front of him. The sneers and cruel laughter was gone. The same goblin whom he had seen upon awakening leaned closer to his face. His voice was cold, unmasked danger evident in every syllable. “The little elf man tried to escape. Ha! I'll say the pointy-eared one didn't get any sleep? Well isn't that a shame. We are going to march all day and that includes you. If you start to lag, a whip behind you will encourage you to speed up. If you try to escape again, there will be consequences that I'm almost positive, you don't want to pay. Do I make myself clear to you?” Alduren couldn't say anything so he nodded.