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

right.  He had heard that if you are lost in a maze, the best way to find your way is to keep taking right turns.  Can’t make things any worse, he decided.
    But after he had taken a total of thirty-six right turns, he was just as lost as before.  He shook his head in disgust as he came to yet another intersection, wondering from what fountain of wisdom he had gleaned such infallible advice.  Right turns indeed , he thought.  Whoever came up with that probably never even set foot in a maze.   He sighed deeply and, because he didn’t know what else to do, took another right.
    A couple of steps later, Andaris came to an abrupt halt.  He was scraping the flint, but nothing was happening.  He tried it again and again.  A few brief sparks highlighted his strained expression, and then, once more, he was engulfed in blackness.
    “No,” he whispered.  “Please.”  Chest heaving, he shut his eyes, dropped his tools, and sat down.  Long minutes passed.  What was he going to do?  He was lost and alone—trapped.  He could die down here and no one would even know.  He clasped his hands together to stop them from trembling.  Normally, he was pretty good at keeping his emotions in check, thinking it unseemly to do otherwise, but now, sitting there in the dark, feeling very small and very frightened, the tears began to stream down his cheeks. 
    He’d left without telling his family where he was really going, saying only that he was visiting his Uncle Del’s farm on the outskirts of town, knowing that the truth, particularly for his doting mother, would have been too upsetting.  He shook his head in disbelief.  What have I done? he thought.  It had all been a game to him.  Deep down, in his heart of hearts, he had known he would return.  He had just needed some time away from things, a few days, perhaps a week, to assert his independence.  He’d not considered he could actually get hurt…or even die.
    What will they do if I don’t come home? he wondered.  But he knew.  He could visualize it all too well—his mother’s kind face drawn with worry, his father and brothers out searching for him, combing the countryside for his tracks.  His father was a fine woodsman, able to follow the coldest of trails, but even he had his limits.  What have I done? Andaris thought again.
    This continued, the crying and self-deprecation until, like a sip of water to a man dying of thirst, his father’s words came back to him.  “When everything seems hopeless,” he had said in his deep, resonant voice, “remember that you have Rocaren blood.”  Andaris would never forget that night around the glowing embers of the campfire.  It had been just the two of them, and for the first time in his life his father had spoken to him like a man instead of a child.
    He rubbed his eyes and took a steadying breath.  Come on, he thought.  Pull yourself together.  Can’t just give up.  Picturing his father’s face, so stoic and proud, he found the strength to open his eyes.  I can be strong, too, he thought, slowly getting to his feet.   If I must.
    With his left arm pressed against the wall and his right searching through the air, he began again.  Never in his life had he felt so helpless.  He could see no better than a blind man, and yet could swear the darkness was moving about him, full of unspent malevolence.
    It’s only in my head , he told himself, once more coming to a stop. But in the absence of his footfalls the silence wrapped around him, perfect and absolute.  He heard nothing.  He saw nothing—almost as if he had ceased to exist.
    “Rocaren blood,” he said, voice sounding frail in his ears, like that of a stranger.  He repeated the statement over and over as he walked, clinging to it for courage.  Was this to be his fate?  To travel through the silence and dark until his legs gave out, to die without even a hand to hold for comfort?
    The longer he spent in the caverns, the more unreal it all seemed