Read The Battle of Ebulon for Free Online Page B

their errand.
    A few minutes later, they
passed a builder. A few men stood about a courtyard filled with
wooden beams that had been cut for construction. Malik abruptly
stopped again.
    “You, is this your
business?”
    “Yes,” said a middle aged
man.
    “I need you to take these
beams down to the gate. When you get there, have Guardsman Stern
open the gate for you and carry the beams outside. There, I want
you to bury the beams so they're standing upright with about four
or five feet of their length lodged in the ground.”
    “Why?” the man
said.
    “Because if you don't,
I'll gut you right now and leave you to die in the street like a
dog.”
    The man recoiled, but
seemed to soften at a look he caught on the face of Regent Jenner.
Instead of further protest, he simply nodded. Malik decided it was
good enough and turned on his heel.
    “Having you around is
proving to be more useful than I ever anticipated,” Malik quipped.
Jenner said nothing.
    A few minutes later they
arrived at the entryway to a small museum. A sign over the door was
etched with the words, “The Heroes of Ebulon.”
    Malik snorted and pushed
his way inside.
    A small man looked up from
a piece of parchment on a dusty desk
    “Welcome,” he said
smiling, “are you here to marvel at the weapons and armor of
Ebulon's heroes of old?”
    “No,” Malik snapped and
stepped past the groveling man. He pushed through a curtain and
entered a long hallway filled with glass cases. Inside the cases,
various styles of armor and weaponry were displayed.
    “No weapons cache...”
Malik muttered beneath his breath.
    Jenner said
nothing.
    “As you can see,” began
the old man from the entryway who had followed them into the
display hall, “we have carefully preserved the weapons and armor
from...”
    His words were cut off by
the sound of breaking glass.
    The sound was so shocking,
the old man could do nothing but stand and stare.
    Malik reached his hand
past the glass he had just broken to grasp the handle of a sword
that had fallen from its display at the force of Malik's
blow.
    “It's a little old
fashioned,” Malik said, giving the weapon an experimental swing,
“but it will suffice for killing Orc.”
    The old man began to
sputter in protest, so Malik decided it was best to give him
something to do.
    “You,” he said, pointing
at the fellow with the newly acquired blade, “can you procure me a
cart and a horse to pull it?”
    At first, the old man
didn't appear to know how to react. After a few uncomfortable
moments, however, he found his voice.
    “Y-yes.”
    “Good, go get it and have
it ready outside.”
    The old man stood rooted
firmly in place, still trying to work up the gumption to protest.
Malik robbed him of the chance.
    “Go!” he cried, and the
old man was off at a surprising clip for one of his age. “Get me
some oil as well,” Malik cried after the man, who turned and half
saluted in response.
    Malik shook his
head.
    “The denizens of Ebulon
are not making their salvation easy,” he said to
himself.
    Jenner opened his mouth to
reply, but whatever words he intended to speak were lost as Malik
attacked another display case and filled the room with the sound of
breaking glass.

    ***

    When Malik returned to the
gate, he was pleasantly surprised. About a hundred men had been
organized into small groups and were receiving some basic
instruction from Stern's Guardsmen. Beyond the gate, Malik could
see the builders erecting the wooden beams at regular intervals as
he had requested.
    “It's looking better,”
Malik said to Jenner and then lifted his voice. “Who among you
needs a sword?”
    Several confused faces
looked up from their drills and turned to face Malik. Malik stood
beside the cart the old man from the museum had obtained. The cart
was overflowing with weapons, and at the front there were two large
barrels filled with highly flammable oil.
    “Form an orderly line,”
Malik said, and gestured to the back of the cart.
    The