Short Story – “The Airborne Bandit”
You find yourself embracing the warmth of the fire as an unseasonable chill assails the town of Windpeak. With ale in hand, you sip as you watch the flames dance and take in the pleasant atmosphere around you. People are sitting, talking, and drinking — nothing out of the ordinary. It’s mostly comfortable and quiet. You’re just about to close your eyes and skip to the next morning with the hope of better weather when you hear the beginnings of a conversation behind you. Although you can’t see their faces, you know it’s the voice of the barmaid you bought your drink from earlier. She’s weaving a tale, and it has piqued your interest. Instead of nestling in and escaping to dreams, you perk up your ears and listen as the story unravels…
Dale wasn’t what you’d call a respectable member of the community, and I should know, the fact being that I am his sister. You could summarise the man in one word, actually — drunk. Whatever pay he got for the meagre chores he performed around Windpeak, he would spend on piss-poor beverages and playing the occasional game of Towers. It was only a matter of time before he got himself into some real trouble, and although I spent much of my energy trying to convince him out of his debauched habits, he was never really one for listening to reason.
I’m not entirely sure where he found the shield, but I have my suspicions. It had been a long winter season, as it usually was in Windpeak, and the lake had frozen over fiercely. My brother had this long-standing tradition of going for a swim when the season turned enough, and I suspect he found the shield there. It had probably been sitting beneath the surface for some time and had drifted enough to be found. If there was ever a person worse than Dale for finding something of a magical nature, I can’t imagine them.
The first thing he did was bring it home to our little shed of a house near the town centre. I’m sure he attracted all kinds of looks because this shield was massive. It was of them tower shields designed to protect the entire body, but we quickly discovered it was much more than that. The thing vibrated, and it had this strange and constant hum that could drive a person towards madness if they let it. Strangest thing of all, though, was what it could do. Reading an old inscription on the back revealed a series of words that could bring the shield to life. It would hover in place at times, follow you at a distance, stay put at your command, or slide across the floor with several inches between it and the ground.
It was a little broken here and there, covered in pond scum and weeds, but I knew it was valuable. These things always are. You hear stories all the time of people finding these odd things and making themselves rich because they can do stuff that only the wizards can do. My brother, though, wasn’t one for all that. It was his find, so it was his property, but he wasn’t a soldier or nothing. He obviously wasn’t going to fight with it. I had no idea what he was going to use the shield for, but I soon found out.
The first I heard of it was from the town crier. There had been an incident in Ropewalk. A man, one fitting the description of my brother, had stolen the better part of a thousand gold crowns from a tavern there. The guards would have had him had it not been for the magical shield in his possession. Apparently, he had used the shield’s abilities to slide away from the scene of the crime and barrel into the guards like a frail wooden fence. They’d been bowled over, and he’d escaped with a tidy profit.
As the weeks came and went, I saw nothing of my brother but heard more of his antics. Dale had gone on a crime spree, assailing several towns and villages and taking off with their loot. It seemed he always had a trick up his sleeve when it came to that shield, and he never got caught. At one point, he became so famous in the north that he earned himself a little nickname. The Airborne Bandit, they called him. Which, of course, wasn’t actually true as the shield couldn’t fly, but I assume they called him that because he was always hovering away. In all this time, I saw nothing of him and had no idea where he could be hiding, no matter who asked.
The weeks turned to months, and somehow, he attracted people to his side. Other criminals, I assume, that wanted to keep a good thing going. They became collectively known as the Shield Bandits — which wasn’t as original as Dale’s own nickname, but whatever — and continued to threaten the local area. They weren’t dangerous, though. I’d never heard of anyone getting seriously hurt in these shenanigans, but there was a tipping point. As I understand it, Dale and his motley crew of thieves had broken into the estate of some wealthy lord and taken off with over ten thousand gold crowns worth of loot. According to the story, my brother had used his infamous shield to carry said gold coins across the grounds.
Unfortunately, this brazen act was one too far, and the Pilavens (this was the wealthy family he had stolen from) wanted blood. At first, it was just guards in the woods, but eventually, the search spread to every town in Tressa. They wanted to find him and quick. The longer his search went on, the stupider the Pilaven family would seem for doing it. Honestly, it made me think there was more going on than what I was being told. Sure, they had lost some money, but they were wealthy enough to get by. It made me think that something had been stolen, something precious that they wanted back desperately.
I didn’t realise how much trouble Dale was in until I came home late from a shift at the tavern one night. There was a stranger there waiting for me. I caught his quarterstaff leaning against my bookshelf, and it told me he was probably one of those wizards I kept hearing about — the kind of person you don’t see except for one place in the north. From memory, he was a broader man with a salt-and-pepper beard and wore what other people would commonly wear around these parts. I remember thinking that his face was too tanned for someone this far north, and that made him stick out the most. When I asked for his name and what he was doing in my home, he told me that people called him Gallenswith and that he was looking for my brother.
I began to ask more questions and drew a confession out of him. Dale had, in fact, stolen something that he shouldn’t have, but it turns out that wizards had been stolen from first. The Pilaven family, through means I couldn’t fathom, had managed to get their hands on a thing known as a Spirit Diamond. I’d never seen or heard of one before, but Gallenswith told me it was very valuable thanks to its ability to bring a person back from the dead. I got the impression there was more than what he told me, but I couldn’t prize it from him. The wizard promised my brother would be safe if he and his friends got to him first.
I still cared for my brother. Of course, I did. Seeing him home would have been worth more than gold for me. The wizard brought me to the Drawstring Woods, to the southern border of Tressa, where he thought my brother might be hiding, and then handed me a strange piece of parchment that felt warm to the touch. Unrolling it revealed a series of words I knew that seemed to float above the page. Gallenswith told me that, upon reading it, I would be able to cast a spell a single time. I can’t remember what he called it, but it was a spell that could locate my brother. It had to be me because I was so familiar with him.
A wave of insight washed over me, and I’m not sure how, but I knew in which direction I’d find Dale. I led the way as this wizard and a few of his accompanying friends followed me. Dale was moving quite fast, and we soon discovered the reason why. Turns out we weren’t the first to go looking for him here, and the guards, under the command of the Pilavens, had gotten here before us. We moved into a field of bandits that had been struck down by the guard’s swords, but there was no sign of my brother.
We continued, running now, and came upon a scene deep within the sea of trees. My brother had used the shield to escape, sliding down a lengthy slope, but something had gone terribly wrong. From the fallen tree that had been sliced in half and the shield now buried in the ground, I surmised that he had accidentally gone through it and was now lying in a ditch with several stalwart guards approaching him. The wizards flung into action, casting a variety of spells that I could simply not keep track of. Colours whirled, swords clattered, the wind howled, shields bashed, rock was brought to life, bolts of every kind imaginable were thrown, and I was caught right in the middle of this madness.
Despite my own fear, I managed to crawl over to my brother. He was smiling like a madman before the storm. Dale was quite drunk and as reckless as he’d ever been. I was with him for only a moment before Gallenswith got to us. I’m not sure what happened. I couldn’t tell you. We were in the forest one moment, and the next, we were back in Windpeak. Back on my own front doorstep. I’d later learn that the wizard had teleported us across the world in a magnificent feat of power.
It was a stern eye that quickly followed the catching of breath. Gallenswith demanded the gem from him, and with a sheepish look, my brother handed it over willingly. It was not how I had imagined it or how it was described to me. I had thought the gem would be dazzlingly beautiful and flawless, but what my brother pulled out from his beaten-up satchel was a thing of darkness. It felt evil if that makes sense. It was a black gem that looked like something was wrong with it — like it was diseased.
With the gem in hand, the wizard bowed his head to us and left. Most likely to rejoin his other companions. I was glad to have my brother safe and sound, but he didn’t stay in my life for longer than a few days. He told me he had to return to the forest and find his shield again. I told him it would be pointless. No doubt the guards would have taken it by now if for nothing else but to further stop any trouble it was causing. My brother just smiled at that, though, in the same way he had smiled at me back in the forest. There had been a word on the back of that shield that I had forgotten about, a command that cemented it in place. It could not be moved by anyone except for himself, and you can be sure he would get it back.
I’ve not seen him since nor heard much. If he’s still stealing with the damn shield, I’m sure he’s probably moved on to a place that doesn’t know him as well. It’s a shame he didn’t want to sell the damnable thing. With all the infamy surrounding it now, I’m sure he would’ve gotten a nice deal for it. Still, that’s my brother, the legend you’ve heard so much about. It’s as simple as a man who was never one to throw away a good thing. Even if it killed him.
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