Witch-hunt

Part III

-Varg in the mist-

Toutatis

Ah.

This is good.

A smiling Toutatis mused as he skillfully carved a generous chunk of roasted meat from the bone with his skinning knife. The sizzling fat trickled onto the glowing embers, sending wisps of white smoke spiraling upward. It danced along the tree branches and then got lost into the dense canopy of the forest. The familiar sound of the flowing river barely reaching their camp, but its strong humidity battled the summer heat still dripping down from the green rooftop as the day slowly ended.

"What are you cooking there?" Labriel asked returning with an armful of dry wood that she quickly deposited next to a cot made of twigs and dry leaves.

"Pork wit spine," Toutatis replied wiping the grease from his partially scarred mouth, his sole eye staying on the young Zilan's figure and moist –now curling- blue hair.

Labriel made a funny face. "Porcupine. Never mind… Oras scythe, it smells so bad! Is it edible?"

Yep.

Toutatis swallowed and then used his tongue to clean the inside of his chipped front teeth, afore allowing his lips to form an unnerving grin.

"Tastes like rat, so pretty good. You want some? We can trade."

In nasty favors.

"Great," Labriel replied seemingly uncomfortable by the young teenager's intent stare. "I'll pass. Pretty good? How do you even know, what a rat tastes like?"

What? Are you kidding me? Ye find a rat dis size, yer set for a couple of days!

"Well, that's weird. You mean you don't know?" He asked with a troubled frown and stood up to stand away from the putrid smoke.

"Ehm, no? What kind of a question is this?" Labriel hissed and Toutatis shrugged his shoulders, not seeing anything wrong with his query. "They didn't return," she added sitting down on her custom cot.

They went to the tomb.

"They will. Don't worry about it," he assured her and went to sit by her side on the cot. Labriel smells nice after a good wash, but nowhere near as good as Aelrindel. Not a stride later, a stoic-faced Zilan dressed in leather pieces of armour came out of the foliage to his left –the direction of the river- and paused to stare at both of them.

Toutatis turned slowly to face the tall unknown Zilan, but caught sight out of the corner of his good right eye of another tall figure appear just behind the tree Labriel had set her cot next to. Paler in color and with a pained expression on his emaciated face, this second Zilan was also lightly armoured –with a couple of metal pieces on the shoulders and chest- and carried a bow on top of a front-curved sword.

"Ah," the first Zilan exclaimed and run a thumb over his thick blue eyebrows to wipe the sweat away. "It's the blind kid."

"One-eyed," Toutatis retorted with an affronted grunt.

"Where is it then? The other?"

"Fell off."

"Good heavens. Let's hope it's not contagious!" the Zilan countered without missing a beat.

Toutatis opened his mouth to fire back, switching from his skinning knife to a shortsword behind his back, but two more figures came out of the surrounding jungle shrubbery to reach their small camp-site's opening, just next to their tied mules. Two humans, both much better armored than the Zilan, with heavy boiled-leather armour sets, reinforced with chainmail on their torsos and carrying large arming-swords. One of them was thinner and almost six feet tall, and the other shorter, more stout in stature.

Both either Lorian-Cofol half-breeds or something not that far off.

"Well, we've got ourselves a gathering of cripples here. What happened to the hand lass?" the nastier of the two Zilan asked the recovering from her initial startle Labriel. She had stood up from her cot, a large stick in her left arm used as a cane.

"Ah," Labriel said unsure.

"This is Vydnisol. He's on a vegetable diet, but he ain't copping that well. I'm Menlzon," the first Zilan explained. "The two slow-moving lads are Sesto 'Wings' and Austen Nag. They are cheap, so it's fine."

"Damn. Thanks Zon," Austen griped crooking his mouth. "Remind me later to ask for a fucking raise!"

"Yeah. This is a bullshit job," Sesto agreed slapping a singing cricket away. "I knew it. Moment you started wit the whole 'make a small detour shite', I fucking knew it."

"Why ye call him wings?" Toutatis stalled as Labriel had taken her sweet time to answer.

Not always a good thing, Ralnor always said.

"He has a lot of wingspan," Menlzon replied, whilst Vydnisol's hungry stare went back and forth, from the young teenager to the anxious female Zilan.

Don't do it, Toutatis thought upon seeing her face change and fill up with anger.

Nothing about this new group appeared random to him.

"They kidnapped me," Labriel hissed and Menlzon raised an eyebrow.

"The kid?" He probed a little amused.

"Well, this shit escalated fast," Austen noted sarcastically.

"He's dangerous," Labriel said and the two humans stared at the innocently grinning Toutatis perturbed.

"Drop the blade kid," Vydnisol warned and took a step forward, but his eyes had stayed on Labriel's face. "Better to make the cut at the elbow," he told her raspingly. "Get yourself a nice fake arm. I can do it now."

What?

"Where's the witch?" Menlzon asked and Labriel blinked. "Where's the other dude?"

"She's a healer," Labriel replied and stood away from Vydnisol who had invaded her personal space.

"Right. What do you think Vyd?"

"This is a fucking jungle in the middle of nowhere chief," Vydnisol replied with a sniff at the weirded out Labriel. "We might not find them for a while and we only got supplies for a week. So search the trail up ahead for a bit and I'll stay back to talk with these two. I'll get what I can out of them and meet you down the path."

Five minutes later Vydnisol eyed the attempting to move Toutatis harshly. "Drop it and take a step back kid." He had a sword in his hand, held loosely and Toutatis dropped the shortsword next to his foot, before taking a small step back. "Take another two steps," Vydnisol warned.

A scowling Toutatis complied under the Zilan thug's watchful eyes. Labriel whispered the moment Vydnisol turned his head to look into their bags for a rope.

"I'll seduce this creep," she told the grimacing Toutatis reassuringly, throwing a wink into the mix in order to appear smart. "He's plenty aroused already."

"Don't think you got this right at all," Toutatis hissed. "He looks hungry to me."

"You're just too young to understand these things," Labriel argued dismissively, although Toutatis wasn't that young and had plenty of aroused thoughts about her every fucking day, to know the blasted difference.

"You tie her up," Vydnisol said returning near them, sounding all professional and shit. "Loop it around her wrist and this trunk. Make it tight."

"You don't have to do this," Labriel told the gaunt-faced Zilan all sugary and touched the stick she held on her fit hip over the tight leather pants. Toutatis thought it was very effective, but Vydnisol appeared rather unaffected by the young female's charms.

"I have to." Vydnisol explained in a casual manner. "Hey, creepy kid, do the legs too. Can't have her move about during the cutting."

Eh.

I fucking knew it!

"Stop this," Labriel snapped a little spooked. "I'm Labriel O' Aerien, the line of Vaelerthiel of the woods!"

Vydnisol tossed Toutatis the hemp line. "A loop around the wrist, twice around the tree trunk and make it three good knots," he told him. "I'll be watching kid. Behave and I'll let you go."

Now that my dude, Toutatis thought grabbing hold of the line and looping it around his own wrist once to use as a whip.

Is an outright lie.

-

Soletha O' Marionel

Soren let out a grunt and swung again with the pickaxe to break the ground. The cracked glassy surface caving in and black earth coming out of the chasm. All the burned roots underneath the destroyed Greenhouse had come alive and weakened the once impenetrable ground. Green stems and flowers slowly covering the flat terrain, as nature returned to the meadow with a vengeance.

"Don't just take the pistil, cut the stem lower so the flower lasts longer," she told Mylael and Morthil -Vela's friend- followed her advice immediately.

"We only need the core and the petals," Mylael argued with a sigh and they both turned to watch the strange couple's return. The two Mori-Zilan, Larn and Lenar, had made quite an impression on Mylael earlier that month, but Soletha didn't have the opportunity to talk with them as she had just arrived. Lenar, a healer herself, had kept busy 'gathering supplies' from the garden and was away for some time according to Mylael, but for a couple of brief visits. When word properly comes out, Soletha thought keeping her eyes on the alluring dark-skinned Zilan female. Every healer will flock here irregardless of talent or race.

"It's them," Mylael whispered and Soletha stared at the scarred ghoulish-looking hybrid with the ashen skin and eyes. Larn walked in a deliberate manner to hide the weapons he carried under the heavy –for the season- cloak, but couldn't quite pull it off.

Or he just appeared clumsy next to the more animated Lenar.

Something in his stance and even face familiar to the old healer. Larn had stopped upon spotting Soren in the background –another new face, but Lenar walked with a smile towards Mylael to greet her warmly, not paying any attention to the big Nord swinging the pickaxe.

"To the heaven's above our greetings mistress," Lenar told the watching Soletha after she finished embracing the younger healer, whilst Larn cracked his thick neck right and then left, still standing a couple of steps back guardedly. "Ever be well, Lady Soletha."

"Praised be the kind Goddess," Soletha replied in her turn. "In our songs and invocations. Your accent brings memories of Cydonia Cazan, sweet Lenar, but not Coal Isle and it's a faint luster, worn out by time."

"I haven't been to Coal Isle, or any of the Isles in… many seasons," Lenar replied cutely and Soletha felt the woman's warmth, Lenar's aura touching her over the thin tunic, her nipples responding to the soft caress and the thin hairs on her forearms raising.

A charming spell, she thought greatly affected and swallowed slowly.

"Who was your tutor?" Soletha asked crossing both arms before her chest.

"Pela. One of Marionel's Cofol pupils, I'm not that young," Lenar replied and smiled at Mylael's efforts to place the cut flowers in the wooden box without damaging the fragile filaments.

"I studied under Marionel," Soletha replied and Lenar stood back to look into her face thoughtfully. "When Priestess Edlenn was still around."

"You're older than me," Lenar decided. "But not by much," she added and followed Mylael's plea to join her to the flowerbeds that had sprouted at the periphery, what was the ruins of the massive greenhouse effectively.

Could it be? Soletha thought feeling her skin tingling and stayed to watch the dark-skinned healer expertly cutting the red flower's stem low to the ground, placing it down and then working on the next one. Surely not. When a bundle was created, she used a thin stem to tie them into a neat bouquet and then placed it inside the open rattan box.

"Just follow her lead," Soletha advised Mylael. "But let her keep her share," she added and noticed the frowned Larn hadn't relaxed his stance at all. "It's early for a hunt," Soletha said in a casual manner. "I assume you're a hunter."

"Depends on the hunt," Larn retorted.

"I've seen you before," Soletha said in her most saccharine manner to mellow up the male's rigid attitude.

"I don't think so," Larn grunted clenching his jaw and Soletha noticed the badly sliced top of his ears. It must have hurt so much. She reached to touch his face out of compassion, but the half-breed snapped his hand and grabbed her wrist. "Don't."

Soletha reached and cupped his fist with her free hand. Worked nimble fingers over the dirty bandages, covering three of the digits and reaching well-over the knuckles. "What made this?" She whispered and some of Larn's outer harsh mask retreated, the taut face stirring with emotion briefly.

It quickly went away, but Soletha had the time to spot the person underneath and remember the boy he'd been many centuries ago.

"Tir Ral-Nor," Soletha whispered, a little shocked to see him still breathing after such a long time. "Goddess. You are still… what happened to you? Where is she?" She asked and Larn stood back with a deep frown.

"This is a mistake," he told her.

"No it's not," Soletha protested trying to piece together a timeline. "We want to know what happened. Is Lord Sulynor still with us? Lithoniela claims Aelrindel was killed. She must be lying."

"She's not."

Soletha let go off his arm. "Why would you lie to me? I was always good to you."

"You gave me the peach cake you dropped," Larn hissed, pursing his mouth. "Let's not blow this fucking shite out of proportion!"

"I cleaned it up first. Anyways, have you ever had any cake before?" Soletha queried smartly and he narrowed his eyes annoyed she still remembered the small detail. Then she heard Lenar's chuckle in response to Morthil's vulgar market tales and she raised both eyebrows in surprise. "She sees the threads," Soletha murmured and Larn cracked his cloak open to reach for a weapon. "Because they are her mother's. Where is she?" the old healer exclaimed with a hoarse voice and Lenar's voice reverberated over the blooming out of season, open meadow.

"Don't even think about it," she warned the scowling half-breed.

"No one must know," a grimacing Larn rustled, re-sheathing the dagger. "Especially the Monarch."

Soletha's heart was beating so hard, it took her a moment to get her wits back.

Or understand what the half-breed was saying.

"The Monarch…?"

"That crook hates the sorceress," Larn added angrily.

Eh?

"Why… No, not her… Ena. It's… a long story," Soletha gasped trying to get her thoughts in order and battle her need to rush near the now standing up Mori-Zilan healer.

"We'll head north towards the tombs," Larn –the solemn stray Edlenn had brought to the Garden to keep her younger daughter company- explained. "If you care about helping her, this must stay between us. Focus on my words healer," he warned. "I may indulge her wishes, but only when she's around."

The emotional Soletha watched the odd couple walk away, now half-covered in the tall grass of the meadow, until two very thick arms wrapped around her waist, and a spade-like hand fully cupped her left buttock over the soaked tunic.

"Carry you to the river?" Soren asked in his baritone voice, and she pressed the back of her head on his naked hairy chest.

"It is kilometers away," she reminded him with a smile. "Very far."

"Is that a lot?"

"Aye. It is." Soletha chuckled and looked up in his serious face. "You just want to get me in the woods. I can feel you big boy."

"Me too. That's a lot of arse," Soren replied with a frown. "I wasn't thinking about the woods really. Do you want me to take you inside the woods?"

"Yes," Soletha replied hoarsely and jumped in his arms with a smile. "But not the forest to the west that's about a day's walk away. I prefer the chestnut thicket near the horses."

"That's not that far," the endearing giant said perturbed.

"Yes," Soletha repeated knowingly with a naughty wink and Morthil who stood nearby started chuckling hearing their back and forth.

"Mylael," Soletha said when Soren carried her past them easily, in order to head towards their horses. "What color are Lenar's hair?"

Mylael furrowed her blue eyebrows unsure. "White? She's an old Mori-Zilan. Great skin though. I'll bed her without a second thought."

"Me too," Morthil blurted out absentmindedly and feeling the two females disapproving glares, he added clearing his throat and assuming a stern expression. "But I'm committed to patching things up with Vela."

You better.

"Can you check again? Your eyes are better than mine in the distance," Soletha insisted running her fingers inside Soren's thick red beard.

Mylael sighed, cleaned her stained hands on her dirty tunic and stood up to cast 'the long eye' at the barely visible moving dots of their earlier visitors. The couple was heading north towards the mountains.

"Wait a second," Soletha whispered and gave Soren a quick kiss. "Am I too heavy?"

"Eh? The horse was heavy," the big Nord replied, the sight of him bringing their injured animal back to camp carrying it over his shoulder, still shocking to the old healer. "You are light as an empty bucket."

"Aw, you. That was almost lyrical."

"Ahm," Mylael was heard after a moment. "White and blue, I guess? What the hell?"

"What else?" The smiling priestess asked.

"Purple," Mylael replied and turned to stare at her elated tutor confused. "An illusion spell? Cast by a healer? Now I feel dumb."

Not just a healer.

Soletha knew it in her heart, the moment she recognized Ralnor.

Yeah.

Welcome back sorceress.

-

Aelrindel, of Edlenn

Ralnor had turned silent again at some point.

He still rode on old Dar, this iteration of his mount a grey stallion gifted to him by Prince Radin almost fifteen years ago –now on its last legs, not paying attention to this part of the Orchard. While tall reeds and wildflowers had filled up most of the paths between the fruit trees, some of the old trails still remained open. They followed them after they got back to their horses amidst the almond and fig trees, the bright citrus and the flashy apricots hanging from laden branches. Once neatly arranged rows of cherry trees and elderberries, now connected with vines and undergrowth.

Everything slowly giving away to rougher terrain as they traveled for hours up the inclines under the shade of Desert's Watch peaks and slopes. Near the northern edges of Nesande's Garden where they had to dismount, the forest turned into a forbidding wilderness and the cave entrances gapping at the limestone walls, amidst wayward sycamore trees that had managed to grab hold of the rocks on the plateau with their roots and now stood higher than all their brethren directly below them. In the distance and to their south, Aelrindel could see the outline of the massive Greenhouse's ruins, now overrun with the returning vegetation after she had breathed life into the burned soil.

"Is this it?" She asked Ralnor who had climbed up near a blocked cave entrance after they had left the horses behind.

"Never been here. Thought about it, but had more interesting stuff in my plate back then," Ralnor rustled, his gloominess suffocating the already depressed sorceress. "But this is a spell-forged rock, blocked with planks. Give me a minute to open a way inside."

"They don't look old," she noticed when Ralnor broke the first of the nailed planks and kicked away the rocks at the base to enter the opening.

"They are not," his words echoed from inside the cave, as she stooped under the cracked planks to enter behind him. The walls covered with dark moss and thorny vines, dead roots hanging from the roof of the cave and breaking under her leather shoes. "Somebody wanted to keep people out. It happened recently. These are military nails."

"Surely no one would ever enter an Elderblood's tomb without noble reason?" Aelrindel queried a little disturbed at the poor condition of the underground corridor and the signs of outside interference.

"Unalike things," Ralnor retorted raspingly looking at the twin doors and the stairs leading down into the pure darkness. "Are considered noble to different peoples. Some don't have a noble bone on their body," he added as Aelrindel whispered a magic word touching one of her many tattoos –hidden under her disguises- and created a small sphere of light that rose high enough to touch the ceiling and then travelled over the annoyed assassin.

Ralnor had gotten out a lightstone he'd bought back in Taras to use.

"Don't be silly," the sorceress said trying to make light of the situation and walked past him, following the small dancing ball of light deeper into the tomb and the cut in stone staircase. At the base, or twenty steps later, she reached the vault.

What was left of it that is.

Part of the ceiling had collapsed at some point, crashing several sarcophagi and liturgical altars, but most had been spared. They now stood silent martyrs in the gloomy light and moving shadows, amidst thick spider webs and debris, the old hanging roots sprouting out of the walls and the cracked tiles, covered in ancient dust.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

One of them violently opened and broken apart, with pieces of granite stone and glassy-looking orange chunks of a different material spread out from the epicenter of the event. The sarcophagus glaringly unoccupied. A tensed Aelrindel approached, clenching her fists and jumpy at the whispers assaulting her vulnerable psyche. Voices bouncing off of the walls, or reverberating briefly from old holes and new crannies.

"What does your mother say?" Ralnor's voice asked from deeper inside the tomb and Aelrindel reached to touch the cracked pieces of keratinous material overcome with emotion.

"Only echoes remain," she whispered lifting the brittle piece to examine it up close. "The ghosts have long departed."

"This is broken into as well, just covered up," Ralnor grunted standing next to a larger square sarcophagus five meters away.

"Ena was laid to rest here. It's Qerrali's magic what crafted all this," Aelrindel murmured and stared inside the empty stone coffin numbly. "They took her. Who would do that?"

"Looters," Ralnor rustled, trying to pry open the larger sarcophagus with his peleg. "Grave-robbers."

"What in sweet Goddess' name is valuable in a centuries-old dead body? Lest you are an Aken that is?"

"Divergent things," Ralnor repeated his previous mantra. "Hold value to different people. Eh," he grunted and stood back from the half-closed sarcophagus, the steel blade of the throwing axe clanging on the granite.

"What is it?" Aelrindel gasped, too scared to hear the answer, but also curious. She walked near the silent assassin like an automaton, but stopped just shy from the granite coffin. Her breathing coming out rugged and the distant walls of the underground mausoleum weighing on her.

The sarcophagus sides were impressed with familiar patterns and scenes of divine mythology. Two washed-out, engraved and different in size circles at the center of it all. Placed one inside the other, they represented the two moons on the night sky that had probably arrived outside the cave in the meantime.

"They probably stole everything," Ralnor said raspingly seeing the sorceress falter and stumble to find support on the heavy lid of the sarcophagus.

"I want… to see," Aelrindel croaked, a whirlwind of emotions and old memories rushing to the surface and the sound of the tomb's ghosts now grating to her sensitive ears.

"Master Faelar is here, sire," the young Zilan scout reported, face-cloth covered in frost, with more ice forming on his forehead and eyebrows. Aeleniel, the young ranger wearing a heavy bearskin, stood up and an equally covered from head to toe in furs Aelrindel placed a salve-soaked bandage on tiny Zilyana's feverish forehead, before standing as well to follow after the taller armed female.

The winds of northern winter blowing over their meager camp and their fires struggling to combat the bitter cold.

Sulynor's snow-covered Rokae armor cracked at the joints, where frost had taken hold, and he turned his bearded face towards the approaching lonesome, weather-beaten figure of the mounted Faelar that had just come out of the woods. The imperial ranger was almost two months late.

"You made it," Sulynor rustled without any fanfare, as everyone had already recognized Faelar's longbow and quiver.

"Why settle the coast?" Faelar queried and climbed down from his frost-covered horse. He gave the reins to Aeleniel and patted his heavy coat –worn over his armour- with gloved hands in order to get rid of some of the snow and lighten the load.

"Ships will come from Rain-Minas," Sulynor replied, same words he kept repeating for weeks to the rest of the exiles. "There are Horselords roaming east of the forest. It is not safe."

"You need to start building something permanent. Assume no one will come, but be glad if they do," Faelar cautioned and walked past the grimacing Sulynor to give the expectant Aelrindel a tight embrace. "You won't make it through the winter my lord."

"Did you?" Sulynor asked cautiously and Faelar nodded, keeping his eyes on the shaking young sorceress.

"Arranged it with Marionel and that pet," Faelar finally said, not going into more details. "It's a peaceful place. None shall disturb."

No, it isn't, she thought in dismay upon hearing and seeing the hefty stone lid move after Ralnor's heave managed to dislodge it. It dropped with a heavy thud and cracked the tiles underneath, revealing the sarcophagus' longtime occupant.

Aelrindel gasped in horror, a strangled sound of utter astonishment and dread at the sight of her beloved mother's crashed beyond recognition face, cracked open torso and half-burned body. The High Priestess' gnarly remains showing heavy signs of further defilement, with her funeral mask missing, along with every piece of jewelry Marionel had placed inside as offerings to Oras and of course her famed witch's staff.

Stripped of any dignity the grisly sight of the mummified corpse broke Aelinder's resolve and she collapsed to her knees with a voiceless whimper, her mouth opening and closing but producing no sound at all.

The echoes screamed for her though and the shadows stirred with anger, until a melodic humming broke through the veil of despair after a long drawn out moment to put a stop to it. One after the other the voices subsided, retreated to the great beyond and finally returned the underground tomb to a strange stillness.

Marred by Aelrindel's lamentations.

Lirue ni o linn, her mother sang to the sitting on the vault's dirty floor sorceress, who grieved loudly whilst hanging her knees tightly.

"Mother?" Aelrindel asked raising her disheveled head and the grim-faced Ralnor watching her for over twenty minutes, stirred from his position. She stared his way with swollen eyes for a moment and then turned her attention on the open sarcophagus. "The staff?"

"Taken," Ralnor replied solemnly and Aelrindel nodded. She managed to stand up on shaky legs after a couple of tries and then made a considerable effort not to stare inside the coffin again. This can't be the last image I have of her, she thought devastated. It is not right.

Ever trapped inside blackness and raped from all dignity.

"Don't put me in a cave," she told Ralnor hoarsely. "I want to feel the sun."

Her grim-faced companion grimaced as if fighting with himself and then reached to wipe the tears from her cheeks and move some of the moist curls away.

"Soletha claimed…" Ralnor rustled with difficulty. "Ena is the reason behind Reeves' hatred for all witches."

Aelrindel blinked unable to understand what he was talking about.

"Ena was in a coma. More dead than alive. After so many centuries surely gone," she told him and Ralnor shrugged his shoulders, before glancing at the heavy stone lid of the sarcophagus.

"Soletha speaks nonsense," Aelrindel insisted, less certain.

"She's also missing," Ralnor noted and then grimaced. "I'll… close up here. Wait for me at the top of the stairs."

"I want to talk to her," Aelrindel told him setting her jaw.

"She's past hearing Doll. You are torturing yourself," Ralnor rustled and she would have laughed at his cynical view of all things, if she wasn't on the verge of crying her eyes out again. Aelrindel sighed deeply and then walked towards the glowering Larn to give him a tight hug.

"You know I love you," she whispered in his maimed ear. "Even when you stink like a dead dog."

"But not like that," Ralnor rustled.

"You had my attention far longer than anyone else. Don't be so miserable," Aelrindel scolded him and pulled back.

"It is part of the job," he retorted and placed a lightstone at the corner of the sarcophagus. "Leave the light on when you finish," Ralnor told her in his raspy manner and departed to allow the sorceress to have some personal time with her deceased mother.

-

Ralnor

The stars were missing from the night sky, but the bright moons gave them a good view of the valley as they descended the slopes in silence. Ralnor could see a campfire burning bright, a tiny dancing light, where Soletha and her entourage had set up for the night. East of the Greenhouse. Dar seemed to enjoy the chill of the mountain for a while, but upon reaching the flats and the garden's packed with vegetation trails the heat returned. It made the old horse nervous.

Ralnor couldn't see the campsite fire now, despite being closer, and a thick night mist had started spreading from the lake's shores. Ever creeping deeper inside Nesande's Garden.

"We could stay with Soletha tonight," Aelrindel suggested. "Unless you think Tut might do something stupid with Labriel."

"The boy would be fine and I trust the girl less," Ralnor replied with a glance at the riding next to him sorceress. "But Soletha suspects us."

"Because you know her. How come?"

"We all did," Ralnor rustled.

"All the boys you mean?"

"She was nice and not bad to look at," Ralnor elucidated. "Second most coveted girl in the Garden."

"Shut up," Aelrindel gasped. "You didn't just put big Soletha over my sister! Come on, speak the truth."

"You can't handle the truth," Ralnor grunted and the sorceress puffed out. She gave him a bump bringing her horse closer to his.

"Don't be embarrassed now. I never had a truth problem," she told him raising a taunting eyebrow.

"Rinariel was at the top of the rankings. Each girl had a number, not the adults of course. With your mother and Galadriel around it wasn't much of a contest," Ralnor said and she grimaced, but managed to maintain an indifferent expression.

"Again with your stupid numbers. It's pseudo-science. Rin was also much older then and you were always filthy in your yearnings. I can't believe you lusted after my dead sister!"

She wasn't dead then for crying out loud!

"Gratitude for the understanding," Ralnor retorted mockingly, not really wanting to play along, but willing to give the sorceress a bit of small talk just this once. "Then it was Soletha, since what you describe as fat most perceived as mature for her age—"

"What? You will lie to my face?" Aelrindel snapped ogling her eyes furious. Dar snorted sounding disturbed and Ralnor cut their speed some more as they came out of the thicker part of the garden. The meadow leading to the Greenhouse ruins about a kilometer away and Soletha's fire again visible in the dark.

"You asked for the truth—"

"You were drooling in your sleep dreaming of me!" Aelrindel hissed, turning on the saddle to glare at him. "Peeking at me bathing behind the bushes!"

Yeah, half the class was there also, three gardeners and once even the Abarat patrol, because you were doing it on purpose!

"Eh. Listen, third spot is not that bad, considering the number of girls running about those days," Ralnor continued, maintaining a serious tone. "You were pretty young, a lot skinnier and not too friendly. But you quickly climbed up the ranks. It was a brutal ascent."

"What's that supposed to mean?" The sorceress bristled irate. "The number of girls? Skinnier?" She stared at her breasts. "Are you serious? My tits are perfect orbs. Look! Everything is exactly where it's supposed to be! Hmm? Do you want to try again?" She added threateningly.

For a moment that young girl had come out in full.

A person not prone to nostalgia, Ralnor did feel a bit nostalgic for a brief moment.

"I give up. You were the prettiest creature inside the garden doll," Ralnor yielded with a sigh as it was late, keeping his eyes on Soletha that had stood up the moment she spotted them. Mylael's Nimra Lion stirring next to the half-asleep healer and Morthil with Soren in a deep discussion by the fire.

"There," Aelrindel said now satisfied. "See how the truth always feels nicer?"

Ralnor went to answer, but Dar snorted again shaking his mane very annoyed, and he realized the horse was trying to warn them all this time. With a quick order he stopped his mount and stood up on the stirrups. His eyes settling on the lit up campsite first, where Mylael's big cat had stood up and snarled at someone in the distance.

The female lion's head was turned to the south, beyond the open area of the Greenhouse, where the tall reeds and grass almost touched the thick mist. Soletha raised her right arm to greet them, they were now less than a hundred meters away and a soft breeze blew over the quiet meadow. The reeds danced at its touch, the heavy mist dissolving before forming again near the old dirt road coming from the bridge.

The lion let out a low-guttural growl that woke up Mylael and Ralnor reached for the crossbow hanged from a hook on his harness.

Out of the mist, in the middle of the road cutting through the tall grass, a muscular figure wearing a bizarre bulky rattan longcoat and a same-material hat with a wide rim had appeared. The stranger had a long simple staff in his hand and as Ralnor focused on him, he waved it as if in signal. Behind him, left and right on the road and even amidst the reeds on both sides, more figures appeared.

Animal figures, as if the man was a shepherd returning with his herd.

These are no blasted cows.

Soletha made a gesture for Mylael to leash the agitated big cat, Ralnor reached for a bolt from his horse's quiver and a drawn out howling rang up and down the valley. Another answering to their west from inside the Orchard and the forest, more coming from the side of the lake.

"Is that a wolf?" Aelrindel queried and the moving on four legs animals that had gathered around the stranger stood up on two legs.

One after the other.

Oras Hells, a grimacing Ralnor cursed. In witch's visions.

"VARG!" He barked to the alarmed Soletha, who twisted around just as the werewolf pack attacked at the stranger's unheard command.

Ralnor jumped from Dar, his boots hitting the soft ground with a thud and turned to the bewildered sorceress. "Head west towards Toutatis and the woods," he told her loading the crossbow.

Twenty.

More.

They'll move around us.

Cut us off in the open.

Shite.

"We need to help Soletha!" Aelrindel snapped and jumped from her agitated horse instead of galloping away. The sound of Varg approaching the campsite fast amidst howls and snarls, sending shivers down Ralnor's spine.

He turned his head towards the camp again and saw the Nimra lion landing on a Varg's neck, but another went for the big Nord, who stood up to block their advance hefting a battleaxe. Morthil had two spears in his hands and he tossed one of them to Soletha.

"They'll butcher them all," Ralnor told the nervous sorceress, seeing more and more shadows moving amidst the tall reeds, the mist working in the Varg's favor.

Mylael rushed to help her injured lion, but a big hairy Varg leaped out of the reeds and grabbed her savagely by the arm. He immediately brought her down with a brutal bite and started dragging her with ease towards the reeds. With a scream of fear Soletha moved to save her struggling on the ground pupil, hefting the spear Morthil had tossed her earlier. She poked the werewolf's back with it, right below the muscular neck -drawing blood and the beast let go of Mylael and rolled away on all fours. Soletha went to help the bleeding Mylael, and managed one stride before she had to stop as the Varg had returned with a monstrous leap to block her path.

The werewolf was once again standing on his two legs and loomed over the female Zilan with froth dripping down his grotesque mouth. As Soletha tried to pierce his midsection with the spear, the beastly creature lunged forward with a thick, hairy arm to seize the weapon. A swift tug and he wrenched it from her grasp, with a menacing snarl. At the end of that snarl the Varg unleashed a thunderous growl that sent the terrified Soletha crashing to her knees before him.

He's going to bite her skull off.

Ralnor raised his crossbow to fire, but held his finger at the last moment as he heard a strange blaring sound interrupting the Varg's growl, the large battleaxe that had caused it appearing right after -tumbling grip to head through the air. It smacked the Varg in the sternum with such stupendous force, it broke bones and split hide and flesh asunder, before it plunged so deep inside the beast's chest cavity, half the weapon disappeared from sight.

The force of the impact hurling the werewolf five meters away, after briefly flying – whilst spraying gore everywhere- over Mylael's shaking body.

Interesting, Ralnor thought and fired a bolt at a Varg fighting with Morthil. He got it right at the elbow joint of the left arm, a poor shot, but it distracted the beast enough for the Zilan to stab it through the neck with his spear.

"Make light. Rid us of this night," Aelrindel was heard humming in Witch Tongue behind him and before he could stop her, a much larger sphere of light jumped from her hands. It stopped about twenty meters from the ground and cast a bright light over a disproportionally larger area. Within a second the witch's spell had revealed friends and foes.

Including the tensed sorceress herself and a livid Ralnor who stood right in front of her with a manic snarl on his scarred face.

-

Early morning,

On the 6th of Metelaire Asta 3401 IC

(Imperial for 'Eighth Moon/Month, jargon 'end of summer')

Lorian, 6th Octavus (2nd Bacchanalia, or Nones -nine days before the ides of Octavus) 195 NC

Issir, the 3rd Month of Summer, or Eight Month of the year 195

The ruined outline of Edlenn's Greenhouse

Bordering the Orchard and the road coming from the bridge at Acid Lake

Nesande's Garden

"Goddess' mercy," Soletha was heard saying -still covered in gore, Mylael rolling on the ground holding her ravaged arm, the Nimra dying gutted from a Varg missing half his face, and the giant Northman Soren making his way towards the old healer whilst getting gnawed at from two Varg lurched on his back.

The rattan hat wearing Varg leader slowly turned his beastly snout in the direction of the sorceress, moist nostrils expanding and cunning werewolf-eyes glowing like glass. Every other Varg not engaged –and there were many- pausing briefly perturbed to stare towards their staff-wielding leader.

Bloody hell, Ralnor thought dismayed.

The empire's demise has done wonders for Draug's spawns!

"Wow, there are a lot more of them than what I thought!" Aelrindel gasped in genuine shock and the werewolf leader slotted thumb and index finger in his mouth to release a sharp double whistle that was followed by a sudden unnatural silence.

Less than a second later the Varg pack switched targets and galloped towards Ralnor and the Sorceress.

Larn dropped the crossbow and got his Kopis out from the scabbard secured on his back, and almost at the same time unhooked the peleg with his injured left hand. He used the latter to slap Dar's hind side to get the horse going towards safety and then rolled on the ground right under the first arriving Varg's hairy legs, the blade of the axe -he'd strategically rested over his shoulder- rising at the right time to connect with his opponent's gonads.

The sharpened peleg brutally castrated the first Varg, and the standing up Dar Eherdir delivered a devastating finishing blow on its broad back that shattered the groaning Varg's spine. Larn twisted on a leg, a claw ripping part of the flapping hood from his bald head and he hacked the next Varg above the knee joint, his blade's edge splitting flesh and tendons to thud on dense bone.

Hot blood gushed from the wound as Larn pivoted to dodge the return, the lurching Varg's putrid breath in his face mixed with foul saliva and the assassin's blade parked between them. Larn heaved using his shoulder to punch upwards and lodged the tip of the sword under the werewolf's snout breaking the palate. The beast vomited gore when Larn yanked the Kopis out and the sweaty assassin twirled to attack before the third youngish Varg had the time to close its beastly arms around him. The peleg hacking down and the sword slashing upwards in an arc, Larn's ogled right eye on the sorceress that oomphed her tits out of a huge werewolf's knife-sized claws incensed, and slapped the beast so hard its neck cracked.

But didn't break.

Well shit, I guess.

And much respect. It's not every day you find someone who can withstand the sorceress heavy hand.

The Varg's froth-flooded mouth opened wide enough to wolf down Aelrindel's pretty head in one go, but Larn's hurled peleg whooshed just in time to smack the right side of his hairy double-bucket sized cranium and snap it aside.

Putting a stop to this potential malarkey.

The gore-stained Larn leaped lithely to reach them next, the feat ruined by a severe spasm of discomfort distorting his taut face –as his hurt back protested at the constant abuse and recent overuse of calisthenics. He wanted to get his peleg back and finish off the werewolf, but the suddenly furious -for some reason- sorceress used both her arms –snapping them forward, in a spell-shove that catapulted the badly injured Varg –still carrying Larn's peleg lodged in its right temple- ten meters away.

"Ah," Larn gasped seeing the beefy beast crashing in the reeds, very disappointed. He caught out of the corner of his right eye Soren bashing a Varg out of his away with a backhand to clear the path towards Soletha. The marching with slow though large heavy strides Nord –he somehow appeared rather confused with the attack- reached with a spade-sized hand to grab the nape of a Varg-child. The latter fought to keep its hold on his left shoulder with frantic claws and teeth, still chomping vigorously at the Nord's flesh over the leather armour.

Larn heard the Varg's neck break from twenty meters away, but the sorceress' scream refocused his attention in their own predicaments.

Because the Varg are here for her, Larn thought.

"Oh, shut up with these ascetic glares! He spit some nasty bullshit in my face!" Aelrindel snapped at him with a loud screech –sort of answering Larn's previous query- whilst feverishly trying to clean the Varg's bloody phlegm away with both hands.

"Focus," Larn grunted pushing her away from a wounded Varg crawling on the ground that had tried to grab her foot. "I need you to kill the lights."

"Ugh?"

"Now," Larn growled and stabbed down with both hands savagely, punching the sword's blade through the still stirring Varg's thick skull.

The moment Aelrindel's sphere popped out of existence, Larn took them both inside the shadows.

The best and worst ability of canines and their kin, is their keen sense of smell, a frowned Larn decided the moment they jumped out of the shadows –their trip not that exciting this time- and he stared back through the last row of trees at the agitated pack that had turned to come after them.

They needed to drag them deeper into the forest.

"We need to help poor Soletha," the sorceress said with passion, yet again disconnected with the bigger picture. "They are our friends!"

"You never liked her!" Larn snapped back with an angry grunt, which didn't help him catch his breath. "Toutatis is near the river. We'll head there. They are here for you!"

"I'll do it myself," Aelrindel declared stubbornly and turned around to come face to face with a muscular Varg who stepped out of a shadow like they just had done. This one, a good head taller than any of the others still howling out in the fields and twice as muscular. As it happens this dressed in leather armour grey-haired Varg had a somewhat cultured appearance at some point in his life, but with three quarters of his hideous face now badly burned, Draug looked much worse now than what Dar Eherdir remembered him.

"Harr…" Draug growled and reached to grab Aelrindel's shoulder before his yellow eyes settled on Ralnor. "Half breed… Harr," the werewolf alpha and assassin of the Circle growled and gave Aelrindel a brutal shove that sent her sprawling on the muddy ground amidst two Sycamore trees.

Ralnor had hurled six knives –three per toss- before Draug had the time to unsheath his large custom sword. Two deflected by the assassin's armor and hide, but four connected one after the other. Two on his chest, one on Draug's turned right cheek hitting the back molars and the last one got stuck on the Varg's vambrace.

"Argh…" Draug grunted and then leaped forward. He covered the distance between them in half-a-second, and immediately attacked with his sword.

Larn's raised blade blocked the brutal hack, but got rattled by the monstrous strength behind it and had to stumble back, barely keeping ahold of his own sword. His right arm hand had gone numb.

Obviously fighting Dar Draug at this point was the last thing Larn wanted. Not with so many of the werewolf patriarch's kin rushing through the woods to reach them. The pack had their scent and cold logic dictated a strategic retreat.

Draug slashed again, with a forward leap he followed with a swipe of his left arm. Larn parried the heavy blade away, the wooden handle on his Kopis cracking from the vibration and ducked under the Varg's claw relatively unscathed.

But for a nasty cut that started under his right ear and ended above his chin.

While it was sandwiched between two older -now healed scars, there's only so much damage a face can take, afore it starts resembling a chimpanzee's wrinkled arsehole.

Draug let out a guttural growl to alert the pack of their position and the darkness they had found themselves into -under the jungle's canopy- lit up with a dancing red light. The branches stirred and the air crackled as the sorceress' small fireball screamed a foot from the scowling Larn.

Lacking hair this time turning into the pale assassin's favor.

Draug leaped out of the way, vigorous motherfucker, and the fireball exploded on a giant chestnut tree's trunk, blowing cinders and burning splinters in a ten meter radius. The tree came down on the Varg's position with a racket of epic proportions, most of its branches now engulfed in flames but Draug had already moved.

So Aelrindel hurled a bigger fireball at the masterfully dodging werewolf, who initially let out a taunting wolfish snigger, afore he realized the hissing fireball had turned to follow after him and was forced to step into a skittish shadow to escape it. Another sycamore tree burst out in flames, branches snapped and twigs crackled as they were set alight.

"We need to move!" Ralnor blasted the chanting sorceress who was in the process of shaping another fireball between her moving hands.

"They are not after me!" Aelrindel snapped back, her face strained to keep her concentration and waiting for Draug to reappear. Are you insane? "Trust me. Just go," she said returning Larn's incredulous stare, the bald assassin's sweaty face distorted as he was torn between two completely different strategies.

Hmm.

Because the witch could potentially be right.

Ralnor ignited incense and leaped into a dancing shadow just as Draug came out of another three meters away. Dar Eherdir crossed over and his opponent had to dodge the witch's incoming fireballs again. Aelrindel, after he'd spend over a month working hard to mend the Orchard and her mother's garden, was about to burn it all down in a single night.

The pack had entered the woods, but the fire had disoriented them, even driven some away. Larn knew he had to ambush and take them out one by one, or in small groups. Trust the sorceress' ability to survive, or her intuition and look to remove Draug from the equation.

The Varg with a brain.

Foil Nym's plan.

Or she has sent everyone here and this might turn quickly into an even bigger shitshow.

Which it did, but it came at Larn from a different angle.

That would be the left, right after he'd heard a twig snap behind a bush and he decided to move around a large tree trunk in order to flank his sneaking adversary. Larn felt more than saw something launched towards him and twisted violently to place less flesh in the way, so the harpoon went through his right ribs at a slight angle. It's like attempting to catch a watery turd without fouling your fingers. You just can't.

Larn heard bones breaking and something cut through his liver, whilst the force of the impact twirled him around.

He dropped to a knee, bile in his throat and heard someone moving extremely fast in a circle around him. Larn groaned, switching weapons –from sword to a dagger and low-key wishing he still had the darn peleg- whilst faltering to stand up and trying to follow blindly the sound of rapid footsteps. The nearby explosions, the loud howling of the irritated Vargs and his trauma, making it difficult to pinpoint his opponent's position.

Another twig cracked and the snarling Larn hurled his dagger towards the sound, found nothing there but the large sycamore tree he'd come around earlier. The dagger punched inside the bark and a noose looped around his neck, as his opponent was standing right behind him. Juiced up son of a bitch! Larn slotted his injured finger under the noose before it snapped tight, but he was yanked backwards and to the ground alike a sack laden with potatoes. The impact so fierce that the digit's barely healed bone snapped anew.

Flesh, skin and bandage ripped away when the stitches broke like a sausage from a spit.

ARGH!

Larn was violently dragged backwards, with his back on the ground, and for several meters, despite twisting and turning strangled by the tight rope. Part of the spear stuck in him broke and as he was dragged struggling with the lasso's noose, he left a line of gore on the disturbed ground between his wildly kicking legs.

He briefly lost consciousness from the shock, but willed himself awake with an animalistic groan and felt his back now touching the base of a hard tree trunk. The tight rope looping around the trunk and still severely restricting his breathing through the noose.

As a matter of fact he couldn't breathe at all.

Probably will put some color in my cheeks.

Alright. Don't breathe then, Larn ordered himself, determined to overcome his ambusher.

Whatever the fuck he was.

"Right through the liver. Wanted the spleen ruined, but it is fine," the freak commented. He was dressed in cheap dark overalls, his face-skin strangely loose –as if dislodged and mostly bunched up at the upper part of his head above the mouth. The lower part without the skin, consisted of a monstrous jaw –the bone marred by calcified small tumors and the chin made of similarly fragmented and then regrown bone, while the mandibles were inhumanly large by any metric.

Oras Hells.

He sort of opened them to speak initially, then just left them open –the voice coming from deep in his chest which isn't how normal folk talk. The action revealed a small human tongue stirring inside the cavernous mouth that again seemed to open way beyond what was humanly possible. Not even Ticu could dislocate their jaws to do that, and in any case, the disfigured male didn't appear to be one.

Despite his severe injury, blood loss, eh… lack of oxygen is up there for sure and general precarious position, Larn had the presence of mind to remember where he'd seen a freak like that before.

Well, it wasn't helpful to explore at this point, but still, given that he needed a moment to get back in it and he'd already caught sight of his dagger -still stuck on the tree trunk about two meters over his head- Larn decided to entertain the notion, however unlikely.

Because as it happened, Larn was certain he had been ambushed by a Fiend.

I bet they won't advertise it in the fucking brochures!

Citizens, visit the remade Garden, where nature fights back, grave-robbers make a killing and a casual stroll gives thee the rare chance to gallivant amidst sociable Varg and misunderstood Fiends!

If I find out, the witch's constant nagging whilst we navigated the in-between realms caused me to miss a whole blasted Fiend sneak up after us and then hop outside, a sour Ralnor thought making a gurgling sound in his attempt to draw a bit of air amidst all the blood and phlegm from his blocked throat.

I'll be god darn furious!

"Wait for it," the Fiend said and walked away from him, a hand on his ear. "Ah, here he comes. Time to tie up them loose ends."

Eh.

This is bad.

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