The Eight Walls of Rogar: An Epic Fantasy Adventure Series! (The Lost Kingdoms of Laotswend Trilogy--Book One) Read Free

would be a hero, respected by all—including his father and brothers.
    Andaris had known he had to leave, but now that he had a definite goal in mind, a quest with a beginning and an end, he could scarcely contain his eagerness.  He felt like a character out of one of his beloved books, like Argolath of the Silver Circle, racing against time to save the kingdom of Nore from destruction.  He had never felt so splendid, so utterly alive.  In part because of this, and in part because the trail finally began to straighten out, he traveled the remainder of the morning with a light step and a sense of brimming confidence, delighting in all that he saw.
    Until, that is, his stomach began to rumble.  Even heroes have to eat , he thought.  All this walking had given him quite an appetite.  Not one to ignore his hunger for long, Andaris began searching for a suitable place to stop and have a picnic lunch.
    Sometime around midday, he came across a nice sunny clearing full of green grass and little blue flowers.  In the exact center of the clearing, as though placed there by the hand of a giant, was a large boulder covered with moss.  He walked to the boulder with a look of childlike wonder on his face, poked at the moss with his thumb, then took off his pack and had a seat.
    Many of the trees in this part of the forest were already in full bloom, most notably the ones with the white trunks and gold-tipped leaves.  Once he’d finished his meal of cheese and nuts, he lay back upon the blanket of moss and watched as cottony seeds floated into and out of the light.  The wind sighed through the branches of the taller trees, creaking them gently to and fro.  Feeling the warmth of the sunshine against his skin, he closed his eyes and began to doze
    .
    * * *
     
    Andaris was not an especially handsome young man, at least not on the outside.  His father had always told him that he could tell an honest man by his face.  Generally speaking, the plainer the face, the more honest the man.  If so, then Andaris supposed he must be one of the more honest men around.  It wasn’t that he was ugly, just that a person had to look extra close to see anything of note about him, good or bad.
    Why go to all the trouble when it was so much easier to love and admire his two elder brothers—Jorden for his blue eyes and bright smile, and Blakeland for his square jaw and level head?  Andaris possessed none of these qualities.  He was the dreamer who couldn’t seem to keep his mind on all those pesky details of everyday life that, for some reason, everyone else found so blasted important.
    The ground had been free of snow for more than a month now, and it was getting warmer every day, something for which Andaris was truly grateful.  He was weighted down enough as it was.  In order to lug all his winter things, he’d need a pack mule.
    Presently, he wore only a homespun cotton shirt, a pair of scuffed leather boots, deerskin pants, and a wide belt to which he had strapped his thin-bladed hunting knife.  His pack, which he usually kept slung over his left shoulder, contained strips of smoked meat, nuts, dried fruit, the mead, the block of sharp yellow cheese and, most importantly, some of his mother’s ginger spice cookies.  In addition to food, it held the woolen cloak—the nights still got chilly enough to warrant it, especially in the high country—two blankets, flint and steel for starting fires, and a small hand axe with a hickory root handle for chopping woods.  Any more weight and I’d buckle, he thought.
    Most would call it reckless to venture alone into the uncharted wilderness.  Indeed, some might say that you’d have to be touched in the head to even consider such a thing.  Fortunately, Andaris didn’t care what most people thought.
    Besides, there was more to him than met the eye.  No one would know, for instance, that his pants had been treated with the fat from a deepwater hollarcan fish, the dark oil making the