Illuminating the Dark Prince

Tongue Tied

...Valarichard? No that wasn't it... Valaronaldo? Hmm... definitely not that...  Valarandall? Maybe?

There I was, awkwardly sitting on the massive cadaverous horse, back within the dark and oppressive claws of the forest, watching as Valaricky sliced up some sort of nasty and rather aggressive sentient plant. It was still very dark out, leading me to believe that I'd somehow slept all through the day. I felt rather guilty that he'd held me in that uncomfortable looking position for so long... I must have been incredibly tired. 

Thick suffocating mist obscured the dolorous undergrowth, which struggled to grow within the twisted roots and jagged stones that embroidered the perilous forest floor. It swirled around Valarodney as he sprang backwards, trampling a poor unsuspecting fern with his boot, just as three slimy barbed vines viciously lashed out at him like deadly whips. He quickly dodged them, and with a few swift metallic slashes they were immediately shredded by his menacing blades. 

I inwardly cheered, then covered my mouth and gasped, while he effortlessly jumped up and impaled the thing's sickly black stalk. Crimson goo disgustingly oozed down it's front side as it let out an ailing hiss of anguish. The rest of it's vines abruptly plopped to the root entangled ground below with a few soft thumps. Then it keeled over, dead as dust. 

Yikes...

We'd been back in this damnable forest for about an hour now, and already several harrowing creatures, including massive walrus sized zombie spiders, had tried to attack us... They might as well have thrown themselves into a blender. Valarobert had been swift to slice them all to mangled smithereens, making me feel far safer than I did the first time being out here.

But regardless of the new found sense of trust and security that I felt with this strange shadowy man, I was still not pleased that we'd come back. By the way he had been intently looking around and jumping off of the horse to tap on random roots, I had surmised that he was searching for something, but it was hard to know for certain. 

I seriously wished that I could just ask him what we were doing out here, and if it had any relevance to getting me home. But alas, we were as linguistically unavailing as my stupid useless foot currently was for walking. And I felt as frustrated as a seagull trying to communicate with a baboon. 

I tried to comb my fingers through my disheveled golden locks the best I could, while curiously watching his muscular arms powerfully rip the now dilapidated plant's spiky roots right out of the dark putrid soil. His ridiculously long shadowy hair cascaded down behind him, as he used the sharp tip of his sword to carefully cut two spikey thorns from the root. 

With the thorns held safely in his palm, he discarded the rest of the plant by throwing it against a corpse tree. The tree eagerly grasped at it with it's skeletal claws, then gobbled the apparently scrumptious thing down with a hiss of satisfaction. I noticed the dull metallic glimmer of a strange sword woven into the bark with it.

Our gazes met, and he had a similar apologetic look to the one when he was about to remove those pesky pebbles from my foot. The whirling veil of mist ominously caressed his cloaked frame like the long spindly fingers of a lovelorn specter, as he strolled back over and began rummaging around in the saddle bag. He pulled out a simple looking black book with strange dark grey symbols on it. 

"Lucilia, come." His pale clawed hand gently wrapped around my elbow, as he carefully guided me off of the horse and into his arms. 

"Oh, okay." I floundered a bit while trying to wrap my arms around his neck. 

He cradled me against his chest, then gently placed me down on a large gnarled root covered in squishy black moss. Luckily I was still wearing his black shirt, so I didn't have to worry about staining any clothes. Then with the grace of a swan gliding across water, his large frame knelt down on the rugged terrain before me, and he flipped open the book's aged pages to a marked spot.