Leeka and the Blade Trials, Chapter 6

Leeka and the Blade Trials, Chapter 6
File:Leeka and the Blade Trials, Chapter 6 (lorebook).png Hint: Found through Durstin Tallow
Category:	Misc
Area:	Serbule Hills
Visibility:	Ghosted Until Found

Leeka and the Blade Trials, Chapter 6 is a Lorebook found through a quest given by Durstin Tallow in Serbule Hills.

Content

Leeka slammed the door behind her and looked around. "Well, it's definitely dying. I just don't know how long it'll take. Oh..." there was a thud and a screeching in the room behind her. "There it goes."

The room past the vampire had been a library, and leaving it had required her to use the room's enchanted books. Beyond that, a statue that spoke riddles. Stupid riddles. And the last room had been a spider the size of a small home. Her leather armor was now pitted with acid holes. She drank her last health potion, then sighed. "Okay, are we finally done?"

This last bit was aimed at the two orcs who sat in the room. "Or do I have to do something with that forge?" A weird forge took pride of place in the large stone room. Most of the room was taken up with piles of wood and coal. In one corner sat the two orcs, apparently waiting for her to arrive.

"Leeka, my daughter. Come stand before me." One of the orcs stood up. That was his voice, her father's voice. But...

Leeka looked at the orc. She drew her sword. "More tests! I am so tired of this nonsense!"

Her father laughed. "The trial is over! You have passed!"

"What... what are you doing here? You swore that you'd never speak to me again."

He nodded. "But today, for the first time, I am proud of you, Leeka! You have more than made up for the shame your mother brought upon me. And Leeka: you have earned the right to have your human heritage erased."

"What?"

"It's true," said the other orc. This one was old, his hair white and his voice raspy. "I am a priest of Melkar, come here to administer the test. You passed, and so you must choose: you can become a Scion of Melkar, and your sword will become a symbol of The Bastard God's might in this world. Or you may toss the sword in this forge. If you do so, Melkar will take away your impurities and make you a full-blooded orc."

"What?" said Leeka again, sword still drawn. Her father looked just like she remembered him. A touch older, but everything about him -- his smell, the way he moved -- it was him.

"It's not him," said Heartseeker.

"Why do you say that?" asked the priest of Melkar. "I have spent the past week with him. He has told me stories of your youth, Leeka. He is here to take you home, if you choose to become full-blooded."

"Take me home? And... I would be treated as a full-blood kin?"

"Yes." Her father smiled. "Now. Can you stop pointing that evil blade at me?" His own blade was at his hip, but his hands were well away from it. Leeka lowered the weapon.

She fought back a wave of fatigue. Leeka was tired. So tired. But she had won. And her reward was tantalizing... but it meant destroying Heartseeker.

"Heartseeker. You have done well by me today. But I'm afraid--"

"No, hold on, you seriously believe this? Look, I met your father. That guy is not him. I mean, for starters, your father vowed never to speak to you again. Is your father the kind of orc that would break his vows to his daughter?"

"That was a different time!" said her father. "Before I learned about this trial, and that it could make you whole. You had to choose to go on the trial. I wasn't allowed to--"

"And is your father the kind of orc that would only do what he was 'allowed' to do?"

Her father grunted in annoyance. "I meant that if I interfered, Melkar's gift would not--"

The sword made a gravelly-throated laugh. "Okay, when you proposed to Leeka's mother, what did you say?"

"What?" It was her father's turn to say it. "But... she didn't wield you on that day."

"Yes she did. And even if she hadn't, she would have told me later. We were friends. The day you proposed to her was the day of a big hunt. Do you remember what we hunted?"

"Sword, it has been many years." Her father pounded the arm of his chair. "I am not a young orc anymore! I do not remember the day perfectly, but that doesn't mean--""

"Well, at least you could remember this: when you proposed to her that day, did she say yes? Or did you have to wait for her to propose to you?"

Her father hesitated. "I'm sorry. Leeka, truly I am sorry. I had my witch take those memories from me. Memories of your mother tormented me and I couldn't be the strong chief I needed to be. But I remember you."

"Oh, then what were her first words?" asked the sword.

"Not every detail! I remember my daughter. That's enough!"

"He's an imposter," said Heartseeker. Leeka tilted her head, catching her father's familiar smell. His mannerisms, like pounding the chair... it was him. And he wanted her to come home.

"I think he's telling the truth," said the priest of Melkar, "But it doesn't really matter. If he's some sort of imposter, fine. Kill him."

"Hey!" said her father.

"Kill him if he's an imposter. Or throw the sword in the furnace, and I'll loan you a newer, more practical sword to kill him with. But I have waited long enough. Will you become a Scion of Melkar, or will you become a full-blooded orc?"

"Leeka," said the sword. "Romast always said to trust your weapon. I'm a Blade of Romast and I'm telling you that's not your father."

"Romast is a dead god!" shouted Leeka. "You are a Blade of Melkar, the Bastard God, and you resent me! You resent that I can be whole!" She stepped toward the forge.

Her father nodded. "Just toss it in. You don't have to do anything else. The flames will consume it quickly."

"You're right," said the sword. "You're right that I am an instrument of Melkar. I am the legendary blade Heartseeker, wielded by the most famous half-bloods in orcish history! When the Formian King invaded Gazluk, Amatuk used me to kill him. I am the blade that slew Blightwing! Your mother used me to kill the Frost Siren. Half-bloods don't trust easily, but your mother trusted me. You need to trust me!"

Her father smirked, a face she remembered so well. He walked toward the forge. "See how pathetic these swords are? What orc would wield a weapon that demanded obedience? Swords are a tool, not a master. Come, I want to see it melt. To think that your mother could have chosen differently, if not for this sword's honeyed words, tricking her into a life of obedience to a useless bastard god!"

Leeka nodded. The sword was a hindrance. She could be an orc... a real orc. She could someday take her place as an orc chieftan.

"I am Heartseeker!" The sword nearly shouted. "I am Heartseeker, the legendary blade, and I have never once betrayed my wielder. I have never once lied to you. Your mother trusted me, and I have never given you reason to doubt me. We may disagree on a lot of things, but we're not discussing an opinion here, Leeka. I know this for a fact: that is not your father."

Leeka stopped in mid-stride towards the furnace. "... I know. But I so want to believe." She turned on her heel and lunged at her father, who fell back with a shout, drawing his blade. She pressed the assault, and with his every move she knew he was an imposter. He was martially trained, in fact quite skilled, but he had nowhere near the skill her father had.

"Stop!" Shouted the other orc. "Don't hurt him! Ruma, drop your sword!"

Leeka ignored the priest and lunged at the imposter father, who dropped his blade and fell to his knees. Leeka stopped, Heartseeker pressed into his throat, unsure of what to do. Her instinct was to kill the cruel creature that wore her father's face. But she doubted her instincts here. She wasn't seeing the whole picture.

The other orc was talking, and now her father was talking, but she tuned them out. They would simply say whatever they needed to say to live. Their words held no merit. You should let them live, said Heartseeker, but this time without speaking aloud. Oh good, I can talk to you without words! It's working. My powers are returning!

Leeka tried to 'think' a response to the sword, but after a moment decided it wasn't working. "Why should I spare them?" she asked aloud. Her father was still at blade-tip. The other orc had come closer and she watched him warily from the edge of her vision, ready to act if he moved suddenly. Both of them began speaking anew when she spoke, but she ignored them.

They're both priests of Melkar. I can sense the medallions around their neck now. This really WAS a test. A cruel test. But they're instruments, not masters.

Leeka slowly reached toward her fake-father's neck, found a cord, and pulled it up through his leather armor to reveal Melkar's sigil. Sighing, she stepped back several feet, then lowered her sword.

The other orc was speaking very quickly in Human, which Leeka needed concentration to decipher. Instead, she tuned out his words and watched his actions carefully. The priest began casting a spell on her father and his face began to morph and change. He was a young human -- no, a half-human, but favoring the human side save for his thick gray hair.

"I'm sorry to do that to you," said her ex-father in Orcish. "I know this was painful. But the more difficult the test, the more powers you can unlock with the blade, so we had to be convincing! And now, you are worthy of Heartseeker! You will be a champion for us all. For the forgotten, the forsaken, the betrayed."

"I don't want that." Leeka sheathed Heartseeker. "I wanted to --"

"-- You wanted to belong! Of course you did. That's the paradox of Melkar's chosen: you don't choose Melkar. Melkar didn't choose you, either. Your real father chose for you by disowning you."

Leeka fought back a welling of emotion. She turned to leave, then remembered the annoying chess corridor. "Must I perform the same dance to leave this wretched place?"

"Don't go yet!" said the priest. "We came all the way from Ormala City when we heard you were taking the test. I paid a high price for that disguise spell. And we've waited here for a week to meet you, to help restore Heartseeker! We're friends. Family. I know we aren't the family you want. And you have no reason to trust us. But we--"

"Not now." Leeka headed toward the exit. "Perhaps someday, but not today."

"Yeah," said the sword on her back. Apparently it could only speak into her mind when she held it. "Fuck these guys, and fuck Melkar. He may give me my powers, but this test is really dickish."

"But the moment you leave," said the humanish orc, "your memory of the Trials will be erased."

"What?! That quickly? Why?"

The older priest was standing now, too. "Which means that if you don't leave with us, you won't remember knowing us at all."

"That is fine by me," said Leeka, and she headed back to the swamp, and then on to wherever adventure called her.