Rivlo was too young to understand much of anything, but he understood fear. At least, he had always thought he understood fear. Now that the creatures had burst into town--their skin slick, their tails sharp, and their swords sharper--he realized that there were levels of fear, and he was terrified. He could see them skulking about outside his hide-covered bedroom window, some of them forcing their way into homes and seeking out the inhabitants within, and others pursuing the retreating villagers until they were out of sight. There were a couple of times when he saw a man or woman trip in their flight, and one of the ugly fiends came upon them and lifted a thirsty blade--but he refused to witness the outcome, shutting his eyes and clapping his hands over his ears. He knew those people were dead now; there was no need to confirm it. The attackers desired extermination, not friendship.
But why did the Armian people have to suffer? They had kept to themselves for the past one hundred years, at least, most of them working as patrolmen in the northern Shadow Hills, or as fishermen, or as farmers. Rivlo's neighbors were all friendly, honest people. Even the mayor, whom half the town seemed to hate and the other half seemed to love, was a nice man who had never had much interest in connecting Armus with the rest of the world. This attack seemed so very random. Random and sudden. The valley beyond town was expansive and sprinkled with individual farms; if the fiends wanted land or property so badly, there was plenty to be had in every direction. So why Armus Village, and why now? It was just one more thing Rivlo's young mind could not comprehend.
His father, mother, and younger sister were there in his bedroom with him. They had dragged the kitchen table into the room (they were now hiding under it) and had used a second table to keep the door closed. It would be of little use, Rivlo knew. The blades of the enemies were held by strong arms and were capable of breaking down doors in just a few hits. Even if they were somehow thwarted by the table, it was probable that they would produce some kind of fire-wreathed weapon to set the house ablaze. He could already smell the smoke of other homes that had met such a fate.
He ignored the whispered demands of his parents to join them beneath the table, and he peered out his window at a tavern off to the right. The sound of shouting came from within the building; it was a mixture of garbled voices, and he could not make out a single word. There was a woman, or maybe it was just a girl, protesting and arguing and threatening. The voices--belonging to the evil creatures, no doubt--retorted with must have been jeering and teasing. He did not know what the girl was saying, but in her voice was a fiery courage that filled him with strength. If he did not know any better, he would say that her voice was laced with magic, like one of those sorceresses he had heard about in the old stories. Or maybe she was just that brave.
The loud bang at the front door knocked him free of his trance. The beasts had reached his house at last. In half a minute they would wreck through the living room, and a few seconds later they would be outside the bedroom door. He looked across the room at his family, and the terror filled him again, a terror that should have driven him over the floorboards and into his mother's arms. But he had gone from a trance to a stasis. If he made even the slightest move, a floorboard could creak and alert the creatures to his location. He felt ashamed. If only he had possessed the courage of that girl in the tavern. If only he could rush out into the living room and bark out orders for his foes to turn away and find someone else to bother. But his fear was reaching his limit, and he knew he could do nothing. He would just remain where he was, and he would be quiet, and he would not even breathe, and he would pray for his family to be spared from the toll of the numbered dead.
It was a series of bangs, now. They were kicking and striking the door. He was not a fighter. His father was a good man but could wield nothing besides a pitchfork. His mother was stout but not prepared to defend her family from a troop of deadly animals. There would be no hope for them if the enemies made it inside. Was this the last time he would see his family alive? Would his bloodline be ended in a matter of seconds? Had he already taken his final breath?
There was an explosion outside, and he risked making a turn to see what had happened. It was the tavern. Something had smashed into one corner of the building, spraying wood and bricks everywhere. Time did not stand still the way people often described it, but what had once been a successful business almost instantly became a ruin. As the dust settled, he could see a young woman--who had probably been standing inside the other half of the building--rushing with all possible speed over the pile of rubble. He had seen her around town before but could not remember her name; she was the daughter of the odd woman whom everyone gossiped about, a fair girl with freckles and dirty-blonde hair. She had made it to the end of the rubble pile when one of the fiends revealed himself not twenty feet behind her. His head could be seen poking out above the dust and smoke, and his eyes were facing her back. Then Rivlo saw the creature pull out a bow and nock an arrow. The girl turned toward her foe, slowly. She may have been the one speaking and arguing confidently earlier, but now there was a sorrow, a defeat in her eyes. She knew what all the villagers had come to know: that there was no chance for mercy, that conversation was out of the question, and that death was the only possible outcome.
A young man no older than the girl suddenly dashed into view, his footfalls upon the grass so quiet that he remained hidden from all but the girl and Rivlo. In half a second a bow was in his hands, and he aimed it not at the girl but at the creature. Rivlo was not sure how the boy planned on taking down his target. There was still a haze of dust and smoke, and there was the sound of townspeople screaming and the din of collapsing homes and the pat-pat of heavy boots swarming the ground nearby. He would be amazed if even a trained soldier could focus in such chaos. But before the fiend could fell the girl, the boy released an arrow between two leaning pieces of wall, through the dust, and into the head of his enemy. The force of the strike knocked the creature to the side, causing its arrow to fire uselessly into a wall to the girl's left.
The group of fiends that had very likely been another kick or two from downing Rivlo's front door headed toward the commotion. What they encountered were not two frightened teenagers, but two warriors prepared to defend their town. The girl lifted a sword from a corpse and used it to slay two of the approaching enemies, and the boy dropped the third with another arrow.
It was a long time before Rivlo learned the names of the two warriors who had saved his life. It was due to their efforts that he and his family were among the few survivors of the Attack on Armus Village.
