Unlike the Riverside gate, the gate at Green Hills was a full carriage width and sat level with the grade. The road leading away was wide enough for a carriage and a half and made from hard packed dirt. With the grass at the edges cut back on both sides and the ruts somewhat smoothed, it was obvious that it was actively groomed. This side of the river was all young growth forest, thick with undergrowth that actively tried to grow over the road.
They walked for sometime in relative silence, before Jarred and Philip began an earnest attempt at conversing. Jarred started with, "Instructor Simone said something interesting the other day."
Philip quietly harrumphed, clearly unimpressed by the mention of the other instructor.
"He asked since everything we perceive can be replicated by illusion magic, how do we know that all of it isn't?"
"All of what isn't, Master?"
"Everything. Our existence. This world. Our experiences are open to systemic manipulation. Maybe it's all one complex illusion."
Harding didn't have to see Philip's face, his scorn was evident in his voice as he spoke, "And who could do that but the gods? And if the gods created this systemic illusion would it not just be reality? Why would they create a reality only to divert from it with a false reality?"
Cowed by Philip's derision, the teen signaled his retreat, "I don't know, it's not my idea. Simone said it was becoming popular among the philosophers of the Imperial Court though."
Not satisfied, Philip snidely sniped, "Of course it is, Master. The Imperial Court is famed for their enlightenment."
Jarred kept quiet.
What the hell am I listening to?
Harding fell back a few paces to protect his sanity. The conversation seemed to have died and they walked in relative silence for about a mile before the two started talking again. Even then it was terse.
Why aren't we on horses or something?
They had followed the road for nearly an hour before Rhett finally came to a stop. Rhett nodded to Philip, Philip turned to the young noble and announced, “Master Jarred, we are at the turn.”
With a trepid glance into the woods the teen ordered, “Very well, Philip. Proceed.”
Philip signaled back to Rhett who turned off the road and into the bushes. The others followed, Harding trailing all. He was surprised they were leaving the road, even if it was a game trail that was slightly obscured by some more resilient underbrush. The attitude of the group had changed too. Jarred was much more serious and carried himself upright instead of his usual bored-teenager slouch. Philip kept scanning the forest, growing more on edge the deeper they went. Rhett was ever consistent.
They continued this way for a bit more than a half hour, walking in the omnipresent shade of the overhead canopy. Summer was in full swing now and so was the insect population. Harding grumbled as he swatted at biting insects while following Philip's prancing plumage. Harding had hoped the bugs would thin out away from the river, but the swarming remained persistent even as the start of the mountains proper loomed near to the west through the trees.
Rhett held up a hand and they all stopped.
Philip coughed lightly and Jarred came around to talk to Harding, “There have been rumors of something stalking these woods and solitary travelers have disappeared within it. What little information witnesses provided suggests that this thing hunts while invisible.”
Why would there be solitary travelers in these woods when there was a perfectly good road?
Nevertheless, Harding listened, fully aware it was all going to get worse. This seemed like a setup. And it was in the teen's voice, the way he was explaining what shouldn't be a porter's business. Jarred didn't disappoint him, "We- I, rather, placed a contract with your association for a hunter who could see auras. They didn't show, but you can see them or something. Just walk with Rhett and look for unnatural auras and we will handle the monster.”
Philip coughed lightly again and when Jarred glanced at him he rubbed his thumb to his index finger. "Oh, uh-” Jarred added with discomfort, "since you were hired as a porter, we'll adjust your compensation.”
The noble looked back at Philip who nodded ever so slightly. Harding looked Jarred over and smirked. The scam was obvious now that he was way out in the woods with whatever was out here eating solitary travelers. He didn't really have a choice, so he joined Rhett. Rhett gave a sympathetic half-frowning smirk, carefully shielded from the others' view.
This is what Sancliff had meant about dealing with the realities of the job. He set me up!
Harding examined the situation mentally. He couldn't fight, and yet here they were stalking a monster with a history of killing people. The thing was apparently invisible and they didn't even know how to find it. Since finding it required a specialist, they probably couldn't see it. Harding wondered how they planned on fighting what they couldn't see. The entire thing seemed a monumentally bad idea.
The request to use aura sensing didn't make sense either. Not unless monsters used godseeds too.
Hmm, actually I don't know that. Maybe monsters do have auras?
Harding could reliably spirit sense in about maybe a twenty foot radius. He figured that a monster should have a spirit, but so did everything else in the forest. The trick would be to discern the difference. And even if he could, that was much closer than he wanted to be to it. It could easily evade them with such a small sending area. After a moment of hesitation, Harding stretched his spirit body out in all directions equally to sense what he could.
Might as well get this over and turned in.
It took him several minutes to get used to the complexity of the task. He couldn't really hold his spirit body that wide for an extended time, so he had to throw it out in various directions and retract it. The feedback of life he got was intense, after all this was a living forest. While non-sentient beings had less spirit presence, the forest came back as a wall of noise. Doing both casting and surveying was a whole order more complex than his exercises. Doing it while walking on uneven terrain and dodging branches started as a disaster and improved slowly. As he became accustomed to the mental load, he asked, "Will it be on the ground or in the trees?"
"Ah, they didn't say. I guess because it was invisible," answered Jarred off-handedly.
"Then how did they know it was even there, ah, Sir?"
"I don't know? Something attacked them and they couldn't see it."
Harding grunted with flair, dealing with nobility already souring him and his worldview. No one seemed to actually understand what was going on, they just operated on the assumption of the competency of others.
He could sense wider, but only by flattening his spirit body which meant anything in the trees would get missed. Harding restarted his sense casting, using the full sphere of sending. It was just easier mentally.
He adapted as he walked.
He tried to flatten the bottom of the sphere to get more distance but that tended to lift the whole thing up as well which defeated the purpose. Eventually, he gave up and just stuck with the basics.
The input bandwidth to his mind was uncomfortable. The theater of his experience was a jumble of physical inputs and non-visual awareness of the world that his brain was trying desperately to represent as a real-time spirit density heat map of sorts. Except he still couldn't really visualize spirit, causing it to become a hyperactive mess of shifting attention and senses. It simply hurt his brain.
And he kept tripping.
If I feel spirit when I should see it, what is this weird mix and why did it change now?
Accepting he might end up respawning because of it, Harding changed tactics again. In a reversal of his previous attempt, he stopped paying attention to the spirit sensing. He reasoned that he would be aware of any spike in density and the rest was not useful. Instead he just walked the forest, casting every couple of steps.
As they moved deeper in he started to notice the slight thickening of the air, like a fog rolling along the forest floor. It took him a moment to realize it wasn't in the air but an increase in ambient spirit in his perception. His brain was mixing signals together as long as he didn't focus.
But how do I focus on not focusing?
“Woah,” Harding muttered absently. “This place is saturated with energy.”
Which made sense as it was a forest, but the density had precipitously thickened. And as they continued, the residual spirit became even thicker towards the start of the mountains. Harding semi-consciously followed that density, not bothering to reason out the relationship, instead just operating on the assumption that more magic meant more monsters.
It makes complete game sense.
Maintaining the sensing and the duality of active and passive awareness created a pinching pressure between his eyes, but he accepted the discomfort. Given time he would adapt. For now his brain thumped in the effort, or maybe it was his heart, it didn't matter much which it was. He just had to endure the consequences of the increased data flow.
I need to practice this more.
Turning to ask them how far they wanted to go, Harding's perception inexplicably warped. He could see the aura around the people he wasn't looking at, but it disappeared whenever he looked directly at someone. Any attempt to chase it resulted in failure to see it. For reasons beyond his understanding, Harding's sensory technique was combining spirit and aura visually, but only out of the corner of his eye.
Harding shuddered.
Fuck, this is weird.
Harding hadn't tried to actively use sense aura on the other two of the group, it felt invasive and improper to pry. But this was just extra signals from doing his job, so he felt comfortable with it. Jarred's red hummed in loud harmony, implying the teen was probably an archon. Harding had always thought of the platinum seeds as feeling assertive, but everything red felt sharp and cocky so he had no guess as to which type. Philip was only a soft yellow though, probably only a single seed.
Maybe a weak duo?
Conscious of his delay in speaking, he hurriedly asked, "Do we know anything about the location? How far in should we go? I can't imagine road travelers coming in this far.” Harding sighed internally, his rambling fusillade of questions making him upset with himself.
“We don’t know exactly, but the intermittent nature of contacts suggests it lives away from the road but hunts to the river," explained Philip. Harding felt like Philip was being condescending, but he couldn't identify why.
Maybe he's just repeating someone else and doesn't understand himself. Fear?
Harding wiped sweat from his brow. The day was heating up. He explained to Philip, "Well the ambient spirit is getting heavier towards the mountain. I'm not sure if that is usual, but my instinct is to angle that way."
“How can you see magic, I thought you have Aura Sight,” queried Jarred.
“He does not, young Master. He is a Spiritualist. They are sensitive to variations in spirit volume and coloration. He likely has no seeds or sight."
Maybe Philip isn't an idiot, only a condescending ass?
Philip continued, "Spiritualists are granted special abilities by their god to know the ways and temperament of magic."
Nevermind.
Philip turned to Harding and said, “Please continue your search in whatever direction seems fruitful.”
Harding took a few deep breaths while rapidly blinking and attempted to let go of his focus. The slightly fuzzed sight of his meditative sensing resumed in moments. He took up the lead once more into the ever thickening magic-fog. The ambient light dimmed as they moved, the canopy overhead denser with the older growth.
Harding felt watched.
He dismissed it as a silly notion, the others were watching him. Yet the feeling persisted. Nagged. Before long he started noticing strange movements, little flits and blinks of light and shadow out of the corner of his eye. He tried to pass it off as paranoia in the darkening woods. After all, his senses were acting strangely with his modified spiritualistic searching. That could easily induce a feeling of anxiety.
He collapsed his spirit body pulse flat to get a bit further range. There were definitely things out there, but he could not discern what they were. At first he thought it might be apprehensive forest creatures, skittishly hiding near trees. It slowly dawned on him, however, that the animals previously had not behaved as such.
This has to be something else.
He stopped and dropped the sensing, trying to watch for movement with his vision but saw nothing. “Hmm,” he mumbled. He was definitely being watched and whatever they were they were actively aware of and avoiding his spirit sensing.
“Do you see something,” Philip asked loud enough to make Harding cringe.
“I'm not sure, maybe they’re large insects,” theorized Harding. He knew he was rationalizing. Insects, being living creatures, did have tiny spirit energy in amplitude and volume. These weren't insects. Phillip’s face gave away his skepticism.
As Harding continued to stare though a shadow moved on its own. He shifted his gaze towards the movement, but could see nothing that would account for it. From the corner of his eye another shadow moved. There was no breeze to sway branches or other things that might cause moving shadows. The movements hadn't been in the same direction either. Yet every time his eyes chased movement he found nothing.
Anxiety crawled across his brain as he accepted what he had known but desperately rejected. They were man-sized shadows, not insects. And they were working as a group to mess with him, toying with his perception. Testing him, trying whether he saw them.
“You said one invisible creature, right,” he asked nervously.
“The reports were a singular being, yes. And divine monsters don’t breed, rarely more than two are found together outside of places of power,” Philip stated with certainty.
Harding pointed out the flaw in his logic, "The survivors said one, but missing people don't give reports."
Philip sniffed indignantly, not being one for criticism.
Now knowing what to look for, he continued to indirectly watch and refused to focus on the movement. Tentatively, he asked while he watched, “What about at least a dozen unseen entities in the area?”
“Impossible,” Phillip asserted adamantly.
“Well, I’m seeing at least a dozen man-sized things between the trees… no, uh- maybe more?”
They seemed like normal two dimensional shadows, but shifted onto an upright plane instead of cast and stretched by the angle of the light. They did not warp or distort which was how Harding started to pick them out. Some of the edges of the shadows stood at wrong angles.
They had no features, so Harding couldn't explain why but he felt as though he had locked gazes with one. The shape rushed forward at him. Harding didn’t react due to its speed and his observer mindset. Eyes of red flashed against the body of shadow just as an open hand of shadow swung at Harding. It connected with Harding's unprotected chest. He felt no impact but his robes split as did his flesh beneath.
Harding fell backwards on his ass, still suffering a certain level of surreal detachment. The shadow was simply gone. He was aware of the sounds of shuffling boots, grunts and excited yelling around him, but sat dazed for the moment. The wound stung but everything felt so distant. Slowly he looked up and saw that the other three stood around him, blades drawn and facing out.
Harding felt Rhett breath in power, not the normal ripple of magic but a sudden drain as if everything was suddenly tilted towards him. Then a burst of high density spirit energy from Rhett. Harding looked away, flinching. When Harding looked back, Rhett was no longer Rhett. Instead he stood as a slightly larger version of Rhett, but with the head of a fox.
He looks like a mega-sized Rubahwog.
It was definitely Rhett, though, and not quite right in shape for a Rubahwog either. Whatever Rhett was, it was leanly muscled and long in limb where the Rubahwog’s were the opposite. An oversized spear popped into existence in Rhett’s clawed hands, tasting of verdant magic. He had already launched into an attack, thrusting the spear into empty space. The spear shimmered and the nearly invisible creature popped and ceased to exist.
“We need to be able to see them,” yelled Philip behind him.
Philip unleashed a spell, a ripple of power bursting around Harding like a blip of static. It was accompanied by a slight golden twinkle of light in the dim wood. He hadn't ever been this close to magical combat. As a spectator in the stands magic was clean, but in the thick of it he was drowned in chaotic waves of energy and influence. And emotion, he swore he could taste emotion on the waves. Harding realized the lights had settled on the three, but not him. Whatever spell it was had passed over him.
Shit. I didn't party with them.
Harding got to his feet, looking for threats. In front of him, Rhett’s spear swung and stabbed. For the briefest of moments he could see shadows solidify before Rhett’s darting brilliant spear eliminated them.
Harding’s back lit on fire as sharp claws slashed him from behind. He rolled forward instinctively and then faced the way of his attack. There was nothing there, he had been attacked inside their loose circle without anyone noticing. Keeping his back to Rhett, he looked across the circle at Philip and Jarred. Harding needed a weapon, some way to defend himself, and fast.
I need my staff.
Harding blinked. He looked down at his full hand. His magic staff had appeared as if called, filling his hand. He had not opened or prepared it, it just was. Lacking time to think about it, he took a quarter grip and pressed the tip out in front of him in a basic guard. He neither sensed nor saw any enemy within his reach.
“Back to the road,” yelled Philip wiping blood from a cut on his cheek. Backsword bared, the man started a retreat on his own. Jarred followed him, flashing his magic incessantly. While most magic was more felt than seen for Harding, Jarred’s output was a veritable light show. Red bolts of light rapidly flashed from his left hand as his sword spun in his right. Solid shadows were cut down by both, but more just kept coming.
A dozen had been a gross underestimation; the entire woods were moving.
Rhett stood his ground, his spear spinning and attacking to fend off the continual enveloping assault against him. He moved with a furious speed that would rival most Harding had seen in the arena. Suddenly, a box of red light popped up in front of Rhett, a good twenty feet long and seven wide and high. It looked like a giant stone box made of faint red light, even displaying slight decorative work along its surfaces. It was a poor illusion, transparent and obvious, but everything within it burned. The grass blackened and glowed as hot ember, wood dried, cracked and smoked. Within its embrace, the shadows died in flames.
Not a box, it's a sarcophagus. A tomb of light and heat.
Harding wrapped himself in a thick spirit bubble, lacking whatever aid Philip had buffed he did what he could to see. Tight and dense, he hoped it would avoid over-simulation of a broader view. All he needed was to see the ones close enough to attack him and try to cover Rhett's back.
“You lead, I’ll follow,” growled the not-human Rhett.
What Rhett wanted didn’t register at first in Harding's mind, he just watched as the first light sarcophagus flashed and a slightly smaller second copy came into being within it. The light boxes were providing cover for them to flee. A gift from the retreating Jarred, based on the color of the effect.
Glowcophagi? No, two Cast-kets.
Rhett meant to capitalize on the cover and wanted him to guide him backwards in a fighting retreat. Harding rotated towards the direction Philip and Jarred had fled and advanced slowly, swinging his staff in the air in slow sweeps. He reasoned he could still hit what he didn't see. Rhett walked backwards while killing, following Harding with ease.
Constantly at first, then intermittently, the forest slowly became brighter as the shadow masses dissipated. Harding moved slowly, avoiding trees and downed branches so that Rhett would be unlikely to back into them. They moved that way for some time, though Harding’s sense of time was completely shot under the sudden mental and physical burden.
Jarred and Philip had disappeared.
A sudden sense of overwhelming doom crashed down on Harding. It came with a ferocity that was as physical as it was mental. A loud, prolonged roar bellowed behind him with such force that Harding saw the leaves flutter and blow away.
Nope, not looking.
A moment later, Rhett crashed into him with force knocking them both down. Rhett wiggled on him, inadvertently keeping Harding pinned face down beneath him as he fought off whatever was attacking him. Something impacted Rhett heavily twice, crushing Harding beneath him and knocking the wind out of him. Rhett's increased weight and size kept Harding trapped. He could feel Rhett's reaction to each blow, hear his flesh ripped, the grunts and growls of pain. Another bellow sounded with such energy that dust and dirt lifted off the ground. Rhett gasped and a ton of spirit exploded in a rolling wave of green energy. Rhett, though, laid still. Harding accepted that he too would die here, a mortifying fatality pinned indignantly beneath a corpse.
He waited for the end.
After a couple minutes though, nothing had happened. There were no more sounds, no more attacks, no continued feeling of imminent doom. Certainly he felt dread and anxiety, but not the immediate mental press of direct and dire threat. He was once again aware of animal noises as they returned, birds chirping and a squirrel angrily chiding him for being too close.
He hadn't even realized that he couldn't hear those sounds when the things attacked.
Rhett wasn’t moving. With effort Harding rolled Rhett off of him. Crawling out from under him and seeing no immediate threat, he looked over the fallen guard. Rhett was human again and a bloody mess. Every exposed bit of skin seemed to be cut up, his gear had been shredded and torn from him, and even the plates of his armor were scored.
Death by a thousand cuts.
A small bell chimed in the woods.
Harding started. He looked around in panic, but he could see nothing unusual. He strained to hear, but all was silent. He cast out his spirit body wide and found no concern. He waited, trying to control his heart, in the still forest. All he could hear was his own heart pounding in his ears. As far as he could tell, he was the only living being around. Eventually, he had to give up his panicked vigilance and attend the pressing matters.
Despite the sheen of seeping blood, Rhett breathed shallowly. Harding was no doctor and was very aware of how woefully inadequate his knowledge was, but he was sure Rhett was alive and unconscious. Harding was grateful for it, he was alone and defenseless and Rhett recovering could save him. No wound he could see needed any immediate attention that he could give.
He had to keep moving.
Rhett had at least fifty pounds on Harding, but Harding wasn’t going to leave him behind and didn’t trust this current calm. Attempting to mimic how Brother Roberts had carried him, Harding tried to lift Rhett and failed. After several more tries all he had done was strain his back. Harding looked down at Rhett and watched him lay there slowly bleeding into the dirt.
Disappointed and with no other acceptable recourse, Harding set about collecting firewood. He built a small stick structure after establishing a large stack of fallen wood before he tried to ignite it with the flint and steel that was in his pack. The wood rebelled, seemingly impervious to his sparks. Just another skill he lacked. He was about to give up on it when an errant spark landed on Rhett’s torn shirt and caught it on fire.
He let the cloth burn while quickly transferring his little stick structure atop Rhett's burning raiment. Only then did he hack the cloth off with the knife. Harding burned his fingers lightly in his work, but they had fire. The haphazard stick structure crackled and smoked, a burning monument to Harding's triumph. A glance for larger pieces of wood revealed that his struggles had just begun.
Ultimately successful, he settled a little bit. Not entirely however, anxiety drove him to turn back to watch the woods every few minutes. That fire would drive them back instead of attracting them was a guess, one he had to admit might be pointless when it wasn't yet noon.
If they're fine out in the day, will the fire really help?
Harding once more went over Rhett’s injuries, slowly making sure that he hadn’t missed anything seemingly significant. They all seemed to be healing now, though Harding tried to help a few with some bandages Sancliff had packed. He was dubious as to the effect of his effort.
I wonder if Sancliff had any idea what a mess this would be?
Harding scoured the area again, finding as much deadfall he could in the immediate area. He was quickly reevaluating his earlier estimate of how much wood he would need. He would occasionally cast his spirit body out as he did so, flat and wide. Those things had avoided it before, maybe they would continue to do so. He knew he was probably doing more than needed, but he had no idea what was needed.
There's no way we killed them all.
Finally satisfied with his pile of wood, Harding quickly cycled his login for a quick bathroom visit, a small bite and a large drink. Afterwards, he settled in with the fire and waited for Philip and Jarred to return. They would have to return to get their man.
Time passed as he alternated between keeping the fire and keeping the watch. Part of his watch was flexing his spirit body. There was a difference between the meditative flex of spirit in safety and this exhaustive adoption under pressure. It was far less clean than his garden time, but he was tripping over the weaknesses of his previous assumptions and teachings.
The field was a completely different thing.
The major lesson was that the thinner the spirit body the more ambient spirit it absorbed. Brother Richards had taught him to push more out from his core and that had served him well in expanding his distance. But doing the opposite brought in more spirit. He didn't need it yet, but it was a notable observation. A fact no one has mentioned.
Second to that was the importance of shape. Shape had great importance for specific probing, but the uniformity of it was a waste. All the effort put into perfect geometric expression seemed a waste, though he reasoned it could be argued the practice made the practical application easier. Out here in danger, there was no realized benefit to it.
Perfection was a waste.
Harding sat huddled close to the fire. It was still sometime in the midafternoon, but the forest was dim despite the summer sun. Those things hadn’t really been invisible, but had been made of moving shadows. Or, maybe, just been using some kind of ability that bent light defensively. Whatever the truth, they used their obfuscation as a weapon. Sight and senses are defense.
The hours passed slowly and without incident.
Still haven't seen those invisible monsters.
Rhett had started moving fitfully, but was still asleep beside the fire. He was more torn up than Harding had first realized. He had no clue how much he had helped the man or if he even had. Healing was slow but Rhett seemed tough and the cuts were numerous but not that deep.
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Whatever the cause of Rhett's slumber, he was a fully seeded noble house warrior and the things that had done this to him were still out there. Rhett had slain at least a couple dozen of those shadow beings. Jarred had been holding his own too. But whatever that last thing was, Rhett didn’t have a chance against it.
So what hope would I have?
It was just him and his fire and he sure hoped the fire worked. He threw another couple sticks on to be sure.
“Don’t build it up too high,” Rhett croaked next to him.
Harding jumped. “Shit,” he exclaimed and looked over at the now awake Rhett. The man looked sick, but to be fair he also looked like he’d fought to the death against several large hunting cats. It took Harding a moment to respond. “Why not,” he asked, fearing he had made some grievous mistake with the fire.
Rhett explained, “Higher you build it, the more wood it takes.”
“Oh, that makes sense.”
“How long have I been out?"
“I’m not sure, a couple hours at least?"
Rhett remained silent as he watched the fire before finally asking, “How’d I live?”
“I don’t know how we lived. There was this big roar and then you fell on me. Something massive walked around a bit and then left and… I just laid there with you on top of me and didn't move for a while," Harding confessed.
Harding watched Rhett for a reaction but got nothing. As far as he could tell Rhett found it a perfectly normal strategy.
With a grimace Rhett asked, “And Master Jarred?"
“Don’t know. That thing went back towards the mountain, but, well I haven't heard anyone or anything since," Harding concluded with a shrug. He wasn’t sure if he had imagined the bell, it was too out of place to make sense. The monster had already left by then, maybe it was just someone’s lost sheep.
There were no farms on the way in. And it was a single ring. Idiot.
Rhett made a soft noise, which Harding couldn’t translate before Rhett gave a long, painful sigh. “Philip did the right thing, getting the young Master out of harm’s way first. His protection was the mission at that point.”
Harding could understand that from a guardian’s standpoint. If Jarred was dead out there in the woods somewhere, Rhett would probably have issues from the parents. Harding had to assume this whole venture would be viewed as a catastrophic failure.
“Got anything to drink in that pack of yours,” Rhett inquired.
Harding fetched out his waterskin and handed it to Rhett. “There’s a creek about fifty feet further. I can get some more.”
“May I go through your pack,” asked Rhett carefully.
“Sure, I didn’t pack it and I don’t know how to use most of the stuff in it,” admitted Harding.
Rhett rummaged around his pack, suppressing his winces as he did so. He produced several items and then gave Harding instructions. “Find a flat rock, set it into the coals. Nothing porous though. Then go fill that pot at the creek, come back and boil the water. I’ll tell you when it's good. We’ll eat then and you’ll need to collect more wood in case we’re here for the night.”
“For the night,” asked a dismayed Harding.
“Planning on getting rescued is no plan. Always assume no one is coming to save you.”
"You… we can't just walk out now?"
"I'm still in rough shape and need more time for regeneration. It's going to be dark soon. I'm not sure running blind and injured through the woods in the dark is a winning plan."
"And survival is the winning plan," agreed Harding.
Rhett chuckled lightly and laid his head back. "That it is. Make sure we get as much wood as we can."
"Uh, question?"
Rhett closed his eyes as he laid there. Without opening them, he agreed, "Let's hear it."
"Those shadow things didn't mind daylight, and light and dark make shadows."
"So why fire?"
"Basically?"
"Because it'll still get chilly tonight."
Rhett dozed off as Harding worked. Whatever he was healing from and however his regeneration worked, Harding trusted that Rhett knew what he needed. Harding gathered wood until the darkness started to set in.
Rhett woke again shortly after dark and they split some bread and cheese from the pack. The forest seemed to change with the dying light. Before, it had a sort of distantly ominous feel, but now it was oppressive. Nightmarish. Still, besides the odd noises outside the light which may or may not have been regular forest sounds, nothing seemed to tangibly change.
“They’ll come armed and heavy tomorrow,” Rhett told him. “Maybe for me, but there is no way they’ll leave these seeds just laying out here.”
“You didn’t get them sealed,” gasped Harding. He had no idea why someone could wander out with three godseeds unsealed.
“Sealed? I'm a House guard,” Rhett replied in mild confusion.
Harding tried to work through the connection, but failed to find obvious meaning. He admitted, "I don't understand. I'm new to the kingdom and all of this."
Rhett shrugged and leaned back, “Yeah, well, when you’re a House guard you don’t seal what you don’t own.”
“They don’t belong to you,” repeated an incredulous Harding.
“Nope." Rhett held up his hands staying any protest. "It isn't easy to join a House guard, but when you do they train, house, feed, equip, and pay you. And they do it better than pretty much anyone else. Some private association guys might make more coin, but not with the same family and sense of honor. That's worth something."
Rhett paused and Harding took a breath to reply but was stopped by Rhett raising his hands again.
"When you prove yourself, you get access to seeds. The more you accomplish, the more you get. You can earn ownership too, don't misunderstand, but usually it's just to use. See, as a regular guy you don't have much access to seeds unless you're really in the shit often. And then you won't have much choice in which seeds you get unless you're part of an organization that has an interest in maximizing your capability."
Harding shook his head, the explanation seemingly incomplete. “I get why having greater choice in seeds is beneficial, but why not why they don't seal them. You risk losing them when you die. With them sealed, you come back with them."
“Usually you come back, but not always," Rhett warned. "And when coming back, how long does it take? Do they go back to the House? A House usually doesn't take the risk, the other guards will pick up what you die with or guard it. They don’t seal house property, not usually at least, not unless you’re on a raid. If you see House guards with sealed seeds, they’re coming for war.”
Harding didn't press further. It wasn't like he could change the situation. Rhett went back to sleep shortly after that outburst anyways. Harding stayed up, tending the fire. Fear and the occasional twig snap kept him awake for most of the night. Once his head started to bob he cycled his login. It bought him a bit more time and he put a few more sticks on, however it didn’t stop the exhaustion from pulling him down into sleep.
Harding dreamed he was in a place of total darkness. All around him whispered voices. He could not make out what they were saying, but their tone was malicious. He heard a heavy snort in the darkness and looked about trying to find the source, but he could see nothing but blackness. The snort sounded again, even closer, so close the wind of it rushed across his face reeking of decay. Harding panicked but couldn’t move. Helpless in his blindness, Harding heard a whispered voice to the side of him. It was clearer than the other voices, but he still couldn't make out the words. They sounded foreign. In front of him the other thing roared in anger, hot breath and spittle splashing his face. Yet, he still couldn't move.
A bell sounded and the silvery chime brought Harding awake with his heart pounding. The fire was dim, more ember than flame, but it still burned. He immediately started adding sticks. As he did so, he wiped his face. His hand picked up a light mist on his skin.
That's just sweat.
Harding doubted his own explanation, this world was just too messed up to leave him in peace. But whatever was going on, the immediate needs always took precedent. He built up the fire and sat there, huddled against himself as he’d given the pack blanket to the injured Rhett.
He promised himself he wasn’t going to fall asleep again. Ever. There was no way he was going to risk losing the fire either. And yet, probably not more than thirty minutes later, he started to drift again. Harding struggled to stay awake, he threw sticks on the fire, and even tried pacing. As much as Harding fought it, he was losing.
As his consciousness started to slip away a loud roar ripped through the night. It was thick, low and high at the same time as if it was made from two voices. The howl was sustained and then suddenly stopped. The forest went quiet. Harding sat scared awake now, heart thundering as he listened to the dark.
He waited pensively but the night remained silent, no sounds but the crackle of the fire and Rhett’s heavy breathing. Harding didn’t know what was out there, but his thoughts terrorized him. He waited to hear the snort, to hear it come closer. But it didn’t.
A bell jingled in the night again, small and high.
“Oh, come on,” he growled quietly.
And then nothing. No clues, no attacks and no odd sounds. Just the night forest returning to normal activity. With torturous lethargy the first ribbons of light weaved between the trees to give a soft glow to the forest floor. Rhett continued to sleep. Harding figured they would need Rhett to be healthy to get out of the forest.
Shortly after full light, Rhett woke on his own. They split the last of the packed food in silence. Harding listened between bites, having decided that awareness of unnatural silences served as a better warning than watching for unusual shadows. Due to this, he heard it first. The clink of metal on metal.
Was that a bell?
Harding looked to Rhett who arched his eyebrows questioningly. Harding was lifting his hand to his ear when Rhett seemed to hear it too. He just smiled at Harding. More noises came moments later, the rattle of arms and muffled voices.
"Over here," yelled Harding. It was a pointless call though, as he could now see flashes of clothing as men moved through the forest towards the campfire. When the men emerged, Harding recognized their livery as House Garnet. A dozen or so armed men, led by a knight in full plate painted a matte maroon. In the knight's wake came Philip, but no Jarred.
The knight shrugged his small pack and freed up his water. After a long pull, he looked from Rhett to Harding and then back to Rhett. "What happened here?"
Harding looked to Rhett who nodded back at him. "To be honest, I'm not sure we entirely know," said Harding.
"My man will speak," said the knight curtly.
"Begging your pardon, Sir, but the boy was awake and witnessed more than I," explained Rhett.
The knight continued to look at Rhett a moment and then turned to Harding, "Continue, then."
Harding recounted the encounter and the events of the night. He made sure to emphasize that they'd probably faced forty or more shadow beings and at least one of those giant monsters. He left out the dreams and bells, believing that they would earn him only ridicule.
The knight picked up one end of Harding's staff and examined it, then looked him over just as carefully.
"How is it that a Guard corps porter with no seeds has a magic staff and saves a fully seeded House Guard, while the heir to the House and his well-compensated chaperone run in terror through the woods," asked the knight with genuine curiosity.
"My first duty is to protect the Master. Rhett was guarding the retreat and fell behind," argued Philip, having come to stand beside him while Harding had told his tale.
The knight stared at Philip with a dead expression, "If your first duty was to protect Master Jarred, you would not have brought him out here in the shadows of Black Barrow to hunt invisible monsters with a freshly seeded guard and a helpless porter."
Philip responded with disdain, "It was reported as a single monster and the Master insisted he needed to learn from actual combat."
"And the Lady forbade it," declared the knight with steely finality.
No one spoke, an uncomfortable inflammation to a social wound before the knight restarted in a less harsh tone but with no less firm an edge. "There may, in fact, be a problem with his education. And I have long argued that controlled training is not true combat experience, but if there is a problem with his training it is in the inadequacy of his instructors."
The clear and cutting barb landed, Philip's face scrunched up and flushed. "We contracted a full hunter from the Guard and the boy is a skilled Spiritualist."
I'm a what?
The knight turned on Philip, "And what good is that if he doesn't know how to fight? If you don't know what you're fighting? Do you somehow still remain ignorant to what it was you found?"
"I'm not sure I understand the que-"
"Name that which you fled, scholar," the knight spat with venom.
Harding could see the man struggling to contain his temper. The fact the knight was a man of violence and accompanied by thirteen warriors might have also played a part in Phillip’s restraint. Harding could see it, the men were all the knight's. Even Rhett. Philip had no support here and he knew it. Instead, Philip tried to retain his pride. "We fought scores of some sort of demons from the dreaming," Philip simultaneously boasted and excused.
The knight shook his head and sighed deeply. Harding was aware that the other men-at-arms had encircled them, but were keeping their distance. Guarding and containing. "No. They were splinters. Rare enough and obnoxious, to be sure, but not that dangerous to a knowledgeable combatant."
"They were strong enough to take down your man," pointed out Philip.
The knight shifted his balance. It was a small move, but one that threatened an attack. Whatever was between the men, it was clear to Harding that Philip's attempt to disparage Rhett to save face was not tolerated. The rest of the men-at-arms moved their hands to their weapons in reaction to the knight's shift.
He won't allow them to be dishonored and they'll fight for him.
"No. That was from being left on his own and what seems most likely a Shadow elemental. One that would have been the end of all of you. The fact these two are still alive appears to be entirely by luck."
The knight turned to look at Rhett. "How are your wounds," he asked.
"I'll manage, Sir."
The knight nodded, there was no need for more. "Join the men then."
The knight looked over his men, waiting for Rhett to collect himself before he spoke loudly. "Alright, men. We are dealing with a splinter infestation. Remember they'll attack if you look at them, attack one of them, or look vulnerable to them. They will go down to any wound, so keep your attacks light and fast. Their cuts have mild tranquilizer and anticoagulant properties, so cleanse periodically."
The men stood relaxed but listened attentively. Harding's impression was of competent and hard men.
"Now, it does sound like there's potentially a Shadow elemental about too, probably a lord class being," warned their commander. "Favor warm magics, but it's otherwise your typical rage-driven semi-feral divine. Spread to a loose line and we will hunt and purge the splinters together."
The knight addressed Harding, "Go back to town with Philip. He will pay you and you will not speak of this."
"Uh, actually," interjected Harding, "could I stay and fight?"
The knight smirked. "After the night you had, you want to hunt this thing down with no seeds?"
"I need to learn."
The knight chuckled, shaking his head. "Somehow, they brought the Master out here to learn a lesson, but you were the one who gained the education."
"Go back to the manor and await us," he commanded Philip.
"I'm not one of yours to command, Vostek."
"We are in the field, therefore I have command. Feel free to lodge a grievance with his Grace."
That seemed to silence Philip.
Vostek looked over at Harding and smiled for the first time. "What do I call you, porter?"
"Harding, sir."
"Monk-Initiate?"
"Aspirant, actually."
"Well met, Aspirant Harding. I am Knight-Commander Petr Vostek, Field Commander of House Garnet. It is always a pleasure to meet a young man with both brains and spine. It is exceedingly difficult to find recruits with both."
Uhm, I didn't volunteer to join…
Harding let it pass, assuming he misunderstood. "Thank you, sir."
Vostek leaned in, "As a Spiritualist, do you know how to mass key?"
"Uh, not by that name at least?"
"You know keying?"
Harding nodded.
"It is just keying an area instead of a single point. Won't do a thing in combat normally, but it is enough to put down something with such a tenuous existence as a splinter."
"That simple?"
Vostek grimaced sympathetically and confirmed, "You could have wiped out scores of them if you knew what you were doing. They say that renowned sages can simply will such creatures to cease existing, but generally speaking most Spiritualists are especially well-equipped to handle such types of beings."
"Shit."
The knight smiled knowingly, "That kind of thing happens all the time, don't let it get in your head. Just walk a staff length behind me in the middle of the formation and you'll be fine, but feel free to key anything you see."
The commander, noticing that Philip was still about, barked at him, "Why are you still here?"
Philip posed to protest, but his argument died as looked around. The men all seemed ready to make the argument physical, not forgiving of whatever faux-pas Philip had committed. Philip turned and walked into the forest towards the road without a word.
The men had reasoned some order while Vostek and Harding had spoken, sorting themselves out when their commander seemed ready. By the time Vostek took to the middle of the line, with Harding trailing, the line men spanned nearly a hundred yards.
Harding stood a full staff length behind the knight and waited for the order to march. Vostek looked back at Harding and gave him final instructions, “If something gets through, feed it your keyed staff. If more than two get through, mass key. Watch your backside, these things teleport. Do not engage with the Shadow elemental at all, and, especially, do not try keying it.“
And with that he pulled his sword, looked forward and yelled to his men, “Forward march.”
And march they did, slow and deliberate with weapons bared. They moved through the woods, the gaps opening and closing as men moved around trees and brush. It took a fair bit before any contact was made, and like before, combat set off a chain reaction. They went from having no contact to the entire line fighting heavily every step.
Those splinters are hyper social.
The splinters fell with little issue, cut down mechanically with little effort by the House’s unified front. The ones that appeared behind the line were just as readily brought down by spells, detected and targeted by means Harding didn’t understand.
I can sense them with spirit, why wouldn’t they be able to with more refined magic?
Eventually they made it to the base of the mountain, which was a steep cliff not quite thirty feet tall. Beneath it Vostek called a halt for rest. Each man took a breather, drank water and saw to whatever equipment maintenance had become necessary by the light but constant fighting. At the end of the break they gathered to reform. As they were spreading to themselves out again, there came a terrible roar.
One Harding recognized all too well.
The monster stepped out from behind a tree which was far too skinny to hide it, yet there was no part of it showing from the other side. Its arrival felt like a grease made of fear being spread over his mind. Harding regretted learning its appearance as it was pure nightmare fodder. It stood nearly twelve feet tall and was roughly the shape of a diamond, narrow shoulders and broad hips. It was made up of shadows and darkness, a chaotic mess of different moving shadows bound together as its skin. Off the edges of its body wisped black mist like the broken morning light was evaporating its very being. As it moved various parts of it seemed to be alternating between being two and three dimensional, wobbling in unnatural and nauseating lurches.
The face was vaguely humanoid, but the jaw was grotesquely elongated, sagging beneath a muzzle which protruded like a short snout instead of an individual nose and mouth. There were no other facial features other than the stretched mouth full of dagger-like teeth of decaying bone, not even eyes.
It extended its long arms outwards to display its size, like a bird stretches its wings to be threatening. It even splayed its bladed fingers open to make it look as large as possible. The monster lowered its head and bellowed a challenge at them in an attempt at intimidation.
Harding found the attempt extremely successful.
The Garnet men's spells ripped into it before it was even done vocalizing. No command was needed, their experience leading the men to waste no opportunity. Beams of red, wobbling blobs of green, and roaring flames slammed into it. Explosions against its form buffeted it and yet it took the time to complete its defiant display before charging the men.
For a big thing, it moved with concerning speed. It went from being rocked by a dozen spells to having a man grasped in its fingers with sickening celerity. The hand squeezed and bladed fingers cut into its victim like sharp scissors. Metal armor screeched and the man was sheared in half, armor and all. It let the pieces drop, the broken body no longer of interest.
With the man dead, the men-at-arms opened up again with abandon on the elemental, freed of the worry of friendly fire. The surface of the Shadow elemental became a discordant strobe of color. While he knew many spells were without visual signs, the violent churn of the local spirit was so great Harding could feel it without active sensing.
It made him unsteady.
The thing lurched sideways, stumbled, then sprinted forward a few steps to grab another House guard. The man screamed as he was cut by the clamping grasp. Spells hit the man in what he assumed were aid and not friendly fire. Harding watched in horror as the elemental rotated its wrist and smashed the man head first into the ground several times. All that hung from the man's slumped shoulders were a few pieces of bloody skin. The monster lifted the corpse up to look at it as though it were confused by it before discarding the broken body.
Attacks increased again and the beast’s skin lightened, its body sagged momentarily, and then it roared a renewed challenge. This time bubbles of green and yellow formed around a single fighter several spots down the line from the beast. That man stepped forward and bellowed back at the horrible shadow.
The monster looked at the man in what Harding assumed was shock. Harding certainly was shocked. Despite common mechanics concepts like taunting and aggro management, the idea someone would try it without actual abilities seemed nonsensical. That it was working was even more insane.
It louped several strides and backhanded the challenging man as he raised his shield. Even as the shield sparkled with enchantments triggered, the tanking fighter was launched from his feet. He flew through the air and impacted a tree ten yards behind with a loud crack. He slid to the forest floor and struggled to get up, making it to his knees before swaying and falling back on his backside.
The magical assault continued, but their focus on the monster left them open to ambushes by yet more splinters drawn in by the fight. Harding watched a splinter pop in behind a man who was firing beams of brilliant red at the nightmare. It reached around to draw its claws diagonally down the caster's face, leaving nasty gashes. The exposed wounds stood open to the bone for a heartbeat before the profuse bleeding began.
Harding snapped out of his shock and tried not to watch the nightmare of the elemental biting down on the head of its next victim. Instead he cast his spirit body out in every direction while keeping it flat and slammed his spirit with a strong exhaling force. The first attempt didn't work well but by the third he was destroying every splinter within twenty feet of him.
He forced spirit through his spirit body to the background of screams of pain, thuds of bodies and the clatter of arms. The whole act of it felt different than any Spiritualism he had done before. He was definitely expending energy, the mass keying proving to him that keying was indeed casting an undefined spell. He was accustomed to and practiced spirit manipulation, but spell work was entirely new and had him exhausted quickly.
Yet, he couldn't stop.
Harding began to extend his spirit body in what he meant to be a triangle, but it came out more like a deformed cone. Perfection and form didn't matter, he had pushed his reach out past twenty feet now. All that mattered was destroying splinters. He didn't bother to aim, instead just spinning and spraying his spirit attack everywhere men were. The pain of the effort ate at his mind. Sickness and agony worked together in an attempt to make him stop. But he did not, instead he fought against it.
But it was obviously a losing fight.
He sucked in spirit from the magic rich environment when he withdrew his body, but expelled more with each mass key. He was slowly burning out. Harding had chosen the casting and drawing of his spirit body over sustained output despite it meaning an area was only being keyed about a third of the time. It was just too much. Harding was far past his natural limits. He wanted to quit, but it was this or die.
The pain will stop when I die.
He accepted the suffering.
Harding paid the price and clamped down on his spirit body to propel every ounce of energy out of it that he could. His spirit body flew out in all directions, the energy bursting from it. He was keenly aware of every spirit his spirit body passed through. The splinters were terrible, like sniffing noxious vapors. Their bitter existence permeated their very spirit. And as he passed through them his spirit body, not just present but charged and expelling spirit, they lost their precarious cohesion and were no more. Broken, the splinters became just puffs of fouled energy floating on the crashing waves of the ambient spirit. Their bitterness gradually neutralized as their remains were reabsorbed into nature.
Energy waffed up from the blood spilled on the ground. Bits flung out and peeled off the fighters as they wounded and were wounded by the terrible monster. The elemental itself though was like a void. All the floating energy that touched it poured into it, like a great sinkhole had opened up in spirit and everything was collapsing through. When he touched it with his spirit, it grabbed hold and tried to drain him. Harding was sure he broke free only because of the distraction of combat.
Even as pieces were carved and broken from its form, it drank back in from the energies of both the assailing magic and its own lost life. For certain, it was being damaged towards its destruction. Its roars were of pain now more than challenge, yet its gross regeneration mechanism challenged Harding's concept of the possible. Instead of regrowing, it cannibalized the energy of its own destruction.
Exhausted himself, he tried something experimental. As he cast out, he focused on eliminating the edge of his spirit body as much as he could. Then he hardened the edge as he drew it back into himself. Brother Richards had taught that a hard edge was a waste of spirit density, but this elemental suggested more. With no edge it absorbed everything, so would an edge scrape excess spirit back to him?
The effort did not by any measure refill his reservoir of spirit. He did not take back in much more than what he had before. But it was more. It proved in concept that such a thing could be done even if this attempt lacked efficiency. A Spiritualist didn't have to be limited to the commonly taught inhalation of spirit, but could instead feed off the area.
Elated, Harding missed the moment of the elemental's death, but the effect was dramatic. There was a strange sucking sound and then a pop. Pressure on Harding's ears that he had been unaware of lifted, ears popping and clearing. The moans of the wounded became clearer. Men lay strewn about, the left wing of the line was scattered and broken. Some dead, some dying, some laying there with bones jutting out or skin flayed and hanging as blood poured down armor.
The splinters were gone too.
Harding collapsed to the ground, gasping and nauseous. He watched as the survivors moved with efficiency, each member seemingly competent in triaging the wounded. All he could do was gasp while his body shook involuntarily. A man in armored robes stood in the middle and began pumping out green and blue frequency energy at a prodigious rate. As his spells flashed, they washed over everyone. The dead, the wounded and the hale. Even Harding felt the energy flow over him. His weariness abated and his aches dulled. Those wounded did not suddenly heal, no blood flow stopped but from the use of skilled care. Yet, for all of them, their conditions seemed to have improved somewhat. Except the dead. They were still dead.
Harding realized he had forgotten to join the party, again, and sighed.
Once they had done what they could for the wounded, the Knight-Commander approached the spot the monster had been slain. There on the forest floor was a lump of what appeared to be coal, slightly larger than a man’s hand. He picked it up in his gauntlet. Taking it in both hands, Vostek broke away the surface to reveal a godseed beneath, filled with a light purple glow. Around it was a thick band of copper filigree.
“A fucking Yhanodod-spawn Nightmare walking the living world,” someone near him swore. Another whispered, "Was a Nightmare, not a Shadow."
Vostek watched the seed in his hands as the copper filigree slowly receded, the metal fluidly retreating back to the equator of the sphere until it was just the barest of lines. Sitting there, just barely having control of his heavy exhausted breathing, Harding caught a foul odor in the spirit for a moment.
“Expensive, this,” Vostek said to no one in particular. He then turned to face his men more squarely and commanded loudly, “Police the dead, ready the wounded. We will depart these accursed woods shortly.”
Harding, suspect of the suddenly absent splinters, let out a broad and thin cast of spirit, exhausting himself once more with the violent strength of the expansion. He reached even further than he had before, the back part of the ring touching the stone of the mountain. The contact made him gasp in shock. He stumbled to his feet and threw up a little on the forest floor.
Spitting clean his mouth he looked up to see Vostek standing in front of him. “Uh, Sir,” greeted Harding, far outside of his comfort physically and mentally. It really was amazing to Harding how much he hurt without having a single fresh, physical wound.
“Good job, son,” commended the knight.
“Thank you, sir,” Harding responded. Then, after a pause, “Sir? There is something wrong with that hill.”
“There is more than one thing wrong within it and its cursed gates.”
Seeing the question on Harding’s face, Vostek explained, “There is an ungiving gate on the other side of this foul rock. The area is saturated in ancient woe. This forest is still near enough to that dark place that Master Jarred should never have been here so carelessly.”
Harding tasted the energy flowing from the rock face once more, barely keeping his stomach, before questioning the knight again, “Are you sure it opens on the other side? There is spirit energy pouring out of it like a wound down just a bit.”
The Knight-Commander examined him, lost in some thought, before he put his finger to his lips for silence.
“Jones, get over here,” he yelled. “Campton, you too.”
Two men approached. One was injured, but mobile despite his clear discomfort and freshly soiled bandages wrapping his arm. The other was relatively untouched other than a few gouges in the enamel of his armor.
“Point the direction, if you would,” the commander asked Harding in a tone that indicated it was a request due to politeness alone.
Harding complied.
Vostek looked at them and spoke with importance, “Jones, go that way with your senses open. Look for a wellspring of power. Campton, protect him. If anything engages you, even a single splinter, you disengage. If you can't, you do not bring it back here.”
“Yes, Sir,” they said in unison, though the wounded Jones lacked Campton's vigor.
The two men slowly wandered off, moving at the ready. Behind Harding, the dead were being stripped of all possessions, including having their seeds extracted. One of the dead was Rhett. Despite not truly knowing him, to see Rhett laying there stripped of possessions like he was now just some inconvenient slab of meat caused a stir of emotions in Harding that he couldn’t fully articulate. Anger but also pride, a sense of loss and hope.
Whatever he felt, he better understood the reality of combat.
The dead ended up being loaded on litters to be carried out. Harding was left to himself, having no social contacts with the House guards and lacking the free reign to follow the Knight-Commander around. It suited him just fine, only the desire to be gone from the forest made his exhausted self look forward to the walk ahead. After nearly twenty minutes of watching the men hurriedly prepare to move, Jones and Campton returned and had a quiet conversation with Vostek. They were given new instructions and joined the group.
“Greffenberg, report,” called out the commander. Harding watched another man, the one who had been the mass magical healer in fact, come over to Vostek and engage in a quick conversation. After a moment, Vostek started walking towards Harding while continuing to speak, Greffenberg in tow. As they approached Harding could hear a bit of their hushed conversation, “... three ambulatory, the rest only minor wounds.”
Vostek came to a stop in front of Harding and asked, “Are you injured?"
“No, sir," Harding replied. "Not really, just old cuts and exhaustion."
Vostek nodded. “Greffenberg, will you be needed by the men when we hit town?”
“No Sir, I’ve done what I can. What remains is for the chirurgeons and alchemists,” he commented, running fingers through his sable hair before suddenly coming to attention realizing his lackness.
“You’re learning at the Okkor Temple in Two Brents,” Vostek asked Harding.
“Ah- yeah.”
"Bunked there too?"
Harding nodded.
Knight-Commander Vostek scratched his chin in thought, before ordering, "When we get back to town, Greffenberg, you will drop off your load at the manor and go to the temple. There you will collect the Aspirant's things, he is named Harding, and inform the monks that the young man will be our guest for the foreseeable future. Leave nothing behind and no confirmation of which of our estates he is staying at or why.”
“Wait a minute-” Harding started, but stopped when Vostek stared hard at him.
Something has changed.
“You’ve no idea what you have stubbled on nor the ramifications of an errant tongue in this matter. For your protection, you will be a guest until the matter is resolved,” Vostek declared. “I’m sure the young Master would enjoy the company and opportunity to apologize for his cowardly… steward.”
While Vostek gave him a wry smile, it was very clear to Harding that he had no say in this and was, effectively, on the receiving end of polite abduction via political power. It took a moment before realization turned to panic.
“If I may request, Sir. Please make sure to completely clear out my bookshelf. There are some books and items in there, behind the other books, that are personal and I would greatly appreciate the monks not going through them,” Harding asked gingerly.
Vostek chuckled. “Greffenberg will be as thorough as he is discreet,” stated Vostek, glancing sideways at the healer to emphasize the matter. There really wasn't anything else for Harding to say on the matter. By opening his mouth about the spirit leak he had lost control of all his life plans.
“Come then,” offered Vostek, “we march for home.”
They walked back towards the group of men-at-arms and the Knight-Commander shouted, “Up. We’re moving!” On his command, resting soldiers moved, packs were lifted, litters hoisted, and boots moved. The men, what was left of them, moved through the woods, eyes open for any sign of movement.