The Glaive of Hope

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

"We're nearly there now," Micki said, pointing down the dirt road they were walking on. True to her word, she had gotten out of the village somehow—she wouldn't say how—and tracked down Naomi and Henry. She was directing them to the person she called her source, far to the east of the village, near the edge of the Tall Woods. In Naomi's opinion, Micki was also being incredibly annoying, but Naomi had no idea where to go otherwise. She and Henry had tried losing Micki and going it alone, and they ended up wandering directionless for a few hours then sitting in a field until Micki found them again. So, without any other real option, Naomi was deferring to Micki's directions.

"Hey, let me see the Glaive again," Micki said to Naomi.

Naomi gave her a cold look. "Why should I do that?"

"What's with that look? Didn't you steal it from your village?" Micki put an arm around Naomi's shoulders and gave her a squeeze. "We're accomplices now."

Naomi shoved her away. "I didn't steal it. I just forgot to give it back. There was a lot going on."

"I think you just wanted to keep it," Micki said while she held up and inspected the piece of the Glaive she had taken from Naomi's pack. She laughed when Naomi cried out and grabbed it back.

"Don't do that again," Naomi said. She felt angry because there was some truth to what Micki said. She did want to keep the Glaive to herself, and perhaps the most frustrating thing was that she didn't understand exactly why.

"What even is a glaive anyway?" Micki asked. "I thought it was some sort of big spear thing."

"The Glaive of Hope is a throwing glaive," Henry said helpfully.

"A throwing...?" Micki frowned at him. "You're just making this up as you go along, aren't you?"

"It is an incredibly powerful artifact," Henry said. "It was made as a throwing glaive to represent the willingness to release that power once it's no longer needed."

"It sounds like that didn't work so well," Naomi muttered as she sheepishly put the Glaive back into her pack. Then she looked up as something occurred to her. "You said it was an artifact and was made as a glaive. What does that mean?"

"The form it's fashioned in isn't important," Henry said. "It's not really a weapon, after all, and you wouldn't use it that way."

"How come you know so much about the Glaive of Hope?" Micki asked Henry. "I thought you lost your memory or something."

Henry shrugged. "My purpose is to protect the Glaive of Hope, so the knowledge is useful." He glanced down and tightened his lips. "Maybe anything else isn't useful."

Micki hopped in front of him and stood in his way. "What, like you're just supposed to be some Glaive-saving machine and nothing else?" She shook her head emphatically. "No, that's too depressing. I'm forbidding you from that kind of thinking. Anyway, we turn off right over there."

The group left the road at an unremarkable spot and began slogging through the tall grass. After a mile or so they came to a small hill. Once they crested it, they saw a hedgerow dividing the tall grass from a field of flowers. The variety of colors took Naomi's breath away, and she stood for a moment even as the others began to descend. She noticed a cottage in the approximate center of the field, and beyond that a dark smear of trees which she thought must be the Tall Woods. Though it was hard to tell at a distance, the trees did seem tall to her, and the woods spread as far as she could see across the horizon. She started down the hill, where Micki was waving and hollering at her to hurry up.