Enter the Frey

Chapter 1

“Come on, he’s getting away!”

Adam sprinted toward the trees, hearing their approach. He took giant strides, avoiding the raised tree roots and embedded rocks with ease. Running away from bullies for years had sharpened his skills, fear being the most pertinent of motivators.

With the back of his hands, he wiped away the sweat that dripped from his hairline down to his nose and chin. Being the day hottest of the year so far, the humidity had been unbearable in a vegetative state, let alone running at full pelt. Surely these guys had to give up on him soon.

Adam knew they wouldn’t. Not after he had gotten them into trouble for bringing alcohol on the school trip. It hadn’t even been his fault. One of the teachers had been searching for a bag he’d forgotten in the dorm and come across the poorly hidden stash. Not that Carl Atkins and his g**g needed a reason. They were equally happy to t*****e Adam for no reason at all. All he had to do was look at one of them wrong or say something they didn’t like, and they would drag him away and beat him until he cried.

Adam slipped onto his bum and slid down the muddy embankment, toward the river. The sun had baked the river's bed and evaporated most of the water. It was possible to wade across, and probably the best option. At least the cool water would cool him off and reinvigorate his aching muscles.

As he plunged through, water filled his walking shoes and saturated his jeans, making it harder to keep striding forward through the sticky mud that formed a suction around his shoes with every step.

‘Surely they won’t follow me into this dirty water with their expensive trainers and clothes,’ Adam hoped.

He heard a s***h and laughter when he’s reached the halfway point. Carl appeared to have no problem walking through the river, stomping a path over to Adam in a few short seconds. Adam felt a hard shove in his chest and fell onto his backside with a splash. He tried to blink away the dirty water that dripped down his face and filled his mouth.

“Hold him under,” Carl barked the order at Fred, his right-hand man. Fred was larger than average for his age, had fists like boulders and and very little of his own initiative.

Before Adam could react, his head was plunged into the cold, murky water. As he began to struggle, he felt more arms pushing and shoving at him, weighing him down.

Just when it felt like his lungs would burst a hand grabbed a fistful of his hair and yanked his head so far back, he was looking at the sky. He squinted up at the harsh sunlight, desperately filling his oxygen-deprived lungs.

“Do it again,” he heard Carl say.

“No—” he tried to protest but was once again thrust into the water. Adam tried again to fight but couldn’t gain any sort of leverage over his aggressors. As he lost the fight to retain the air in his lungs, water gushed in, along with the sheer terror of breathlessness.

‘I’m going to die,’ Adam thought.

As his head was pulled up again, water burst from his mouth. He coughed and spluttered, trying to clear the water from his lungs.

“What do you think? One more?” Carl asked his mates with a grin.

“Please, please don’t,” Adam tried to beg them, knowing one more would likely kill him or at least leave him with brain damage. “Please.”

“Aww… please?” Carl and his friends mocked, faking sympathy and laughing.

Adam knew then it was hopeless. He gave up fighting the final time they held him down, taking in a giant gulp of air and clinging to it as long as he could.

“You killed him,” he heard one of the boy’s gasp as he looked down at the scene, distracted and emotionless. “You b****y killed him!”

“I can save you,” a voice whispered. Adam looked around but couldn’t locate the owner of the voice.

“Up here,” it rasped. The boys below were talking rapidly in panicked bursts, yet this whispering voice was louder. It seemed to fill his head rather than the space around him.

Looking up as he’d been told, Adam saw the face of a stranger staring down from the sky.

“Who are you?” Adam frowned. He expected the man to say God, but he just smiled.

“I am here to help you… if you want me to. I can push you back into your body and give you everything you need to get revenge on those bastards.”

“You can?” Adam asked, surprised that God would use such language.

“I’m not God, Adam, but I can help you in your world if you agree to help me in mine,” the man offered.

“He—help you? What can I do?” Adam asked. It was a fair question. Adam had no special skills or training of any kind that might make him useful in any conceivable situation.

“You will see. If you say yes. If not… you die here I’m afraid.”

‘I don’t want to die. Not like this,’ Adam thought. He pictured his parents receiving the phone call and collapsing in grief. It would kill them. If there was any chance, even a slim chance, he had to take it, no matter what.

“Okay,” Adam said.

“You consent to this?” he asked.

“Yes, I consent,” Adam said, and opened his eyes.

Sunlight blurred his vision, but it was muted and off colour, like a sunset or the northern lights. As his eyes began to focus, he saw the man from the sky hovering over him, staring intensely.

The stranger had chin-length white hair, dark brown skin, and deep purple eyes. Something about him was decidedly inhuman, though Adam couldn’t quite put his finger on what.

Looking up, Adam noticed a pair of curved dark horns poking out from the stranger’s hair.

“Great,” Adam sighed. “I got tricked by the devil.”

“What’s a devil?” the man asked, looking intrigued.

“You?” Adam asked. “Who… who are you?”

“My name is Ziel. As you get tell by my horns, I am a halfight,” Ziel introduced himself. Picking up on Adam’s confusion, he went on to explain, “Half Raithien, Half Ight.”

The explanation did nothing to alleviate Adam’s confusion.

“Ight?” he asked, hoping the explanation wouldn’t confuse him further.

“Yes,” Ziel nodded.

Adam looked down at his hands, flexing his fingers and shaking his head in confusion. The pale, delicate hands were not his own, yet they moved under his command.

“Oh yes, this body belongs to an elf named Valaar,” Ziel said, speaking in a conversational tone as though everything he was saying was nothing out of the ordinary. As though people swapped bodies on a regular basis.

“He’s dead,” Ziel shrugged, “So I guessed, he’s not using it, why let it go to waste.”

Ziel laughed, “Plus, it saves me from having to battle the elven royals. Nobody has time for that.”

Adam stood slowly, unaccustomed to inhabiting such a tall, long-limbed frame. Stretched out to his full height, Adam stood a head taller than his companion. He inspected his clothing, hands running over soft burgundy robes, tied at the waist with an intricate golden chain.

“Aim, he’s awake,” Ziel shouted.

A woman appeared from the tree line, sashaying over in a huge rara skirt. As she came closer Adam noticed how beautiful she was, with hair the colour of candy floss, chestnut skin and golden eyes.

“Yay,” she cried, bouncing up and down on the spot. With every bounce she gave Adam an eyeful of her frilly undergarments. He blinked and tried to look away, feeling like a p*****t. No girl had ever taken an interest in him, let alone given him a peak of their underwear.

“You will have to answer to Valaar from now on. Try not to say anything too weird, and if in doubt, stay quiet and turn your head derisively. You are a royal, after all,” Ziel offered words of advice.

“We still need one more person,” Aim pouted.

“You look after him, I have already picked a candidate for our final member,” Ziel said and walked off without saying goodbye.

“Here,” Aim said, pulling a compact mirror from her frilly pink satchel. “Say hello to your new face.”

Staring into the mirror at a face that was not his own Adam moved his lips and brow while poking at the flesh of his new face.

To say he was beautiful was a gross understatement. His beauty surpassed both the horned man and the pink hair girl, with hair of pale iridescence, opalescent with shining highlights of silver or gold depending on how the light struck it. His eyes, framed by thick black lashes, were the palest silver, almost white if not for their shine.

He blinked, moving the mirror back and forth, inspecting every inch of the face he now inhabited. The perfect jawline, the line of his nose, the position of his brow, all aligned to create perfection.

“Okay, okay, don’t fall in love with yourself.” Aim snapped, grabbing the mirror from his hands.

“Do all elves look like this?” Adam asked.

“Not exactly. But similar. You don’t see many elves about these days,” the girl explained. “I warn you; people will stare at you.”

Adam wasn’t accustomed to being stared at. He was generally ignored by the majority of his classmates and had never been attractive or interesting enough to get the attention of strangers. With brown hair, brown eyes and a plain face, Adam wasn’t exactly considered good looking in his own world.

‘If only my real face looked like this,’ Adam thought. ‘My life would have been so different.’

“What’s going to happen to my body, my real body, while I’m here?” he asked.

“This is your real body now,” Aim shrugged. “I don’t know where Ziel found you, but you are best to ask him. I’ll let you in on a little secret.”

Aim leaned up, pressing her lips to his ear, “I don’t actually know any magic at all.”

Having no reason to assume she did know magic; this did not come across as the shock she expected it to be.

“That makes two of us,” Adam said.

“Oh, you are a proficient magic-user. An expert,” Aim assured him.

“You mean… Valaar was?” Adam asked.

“Oh,” Aim looked confused. “I just assumed you would have the ability to use his magic.”

Adam raised his hand and tried to create a ball of light—something he had seen a powerful wizard do in a movie.

Nothing appeared.

He shrugged. “I guess the magic died with Valaar.”

“Oooo that’s not good,” Aim winced. “Just put off telling Ziel for a bit. He just got out of a bad mood.”

Those words worried Adam deeply. Would this man who had plucked him from near-death be angry with him? Would he throw him back into the river to die? Adam was struck by the fear of dying, despite his newfound knowledge that other worlds existed.

‘Maybe I did die,’ Adam thought. ‘Maybe this is the afterlife.’

If it was, it seemed an odd way to start out a new life. He had heard somewhere that upon reincarnation, one would forget all details of their old life. Since he could recall pretty much everything from his old life, it seemed unlikely this was reincarnation in the traditional sense.

Adam noticed that Aim had taken a seat on the grass and decided to join her. She laughed as he positioned himself on the floor.

“What?” he asked.

“Oh, it’s just funny seeing Elven royalty sitting on the grass like a commoner,” Aim explained.

“I have a lot to learn, don’t I?” Adam sighed.

“Start with learning magic,” Aim urged, “Please, for all our sakes.”