It was a quiet morning. No birds chirped, no scavengers rustled through the bushes, no flies buzzed where they could be heard.
The only things that made any real sound near High Ridge were the five travelers who were walking about and gathering up their belongings. They had checked nearly five times each. All of the tools had been packed away, the ropes had been coiled up and stowed, and what could not be carried on foot had been tossed into the first bonfire. From the dying blaze, a putrid black smoke of flesh and fur spewed forth into the morning. All that remained in the ashes were charred and broken cadavers; those of a horse and those of a jack. In a separate and unconsecrated bonfire, the ashes of a thing they wished to push away from all memories smoldered in a foul odor.
When it was all done, one of the rangers came to the witch who sat with her back against the wall of the tower. She had been the last to awaken, but since rising, she had foregone any meal or preparation until she had completed spreading herbs and waving artifacts over the pile of kindling and bodies of the two beasts of burden. Now, she simply sat and rested, looking blankly ahead with empty eyes.
“Well,” Górin said, “It’s far time that we’re off. I warrant it will be midday soon.” The witch didn’t look at him, but she willingly stood up and brushed the grass off of her cloak. The witch then followed him to where the others stood watching her, and looked at each one in turn.
“Let us be off, then,” she said quietly, “There is no need for us to remain here any longer. Lead the way, Górin, if it can be done in our current condition.”
Dreading to go back nearly as much as he would to go forward, Górin led his companions down the eastern side of the ridge, and began to make the long and ill walk to Kaðrosedd. He had studied the collection of maps well, but found little need for them now. He had looked them over so much in the past branch that he could see them in his sleep. The town was almost due south from High Ridge, and though some hill country still remained in their way, he did not feel up to chance in routing a detour around it.
Their pace was slowed tremendously by the loss of the beasts of burden. What Górin had estimated would likely take no more than a day and a half at most was being reconsidered even upon the morning of the third day. Their packs had been re-organized the morning of their departure, and as much as could be transferred from the animals’ saddles was now carried by those that walked on two legs. It was with great regret that most of the deer meat was thrown into into the bonfire, for in the chaos that ensued during the final night at High Ridge, the fires of the oven had been forgotten and had died out in the night, leaving the carefully-prepared meat rotten and foul. The antlers and hide of the deer likewise were left behind.
They spoke little on the day of their departure, walked as mourners might, rested only twice, and ate without any satisfaction. From time to time, a distant thunder rolled out along the western horizon, but no rain fell upon them, to their glum appreciation. Relieving them all, no cries of any beast nor sign thereof was encountered all day. Frequent checks were made of the whereabouts of the others, for all walked some distance away from one another. The rangers walked separately to keep a broad eye on the lands around them, though perhaps it was by coincidence or intention that Górin and Handor had the greatest distance between the two.
Troíde attempted to speak to Jynge in regular intervals, but each attempt was met with a differing yet unsuccessful result. Sometimes, she gave small and brief responses. Other times, she ignored her friend altogether. Then, there were the times when Troíde attempted talking to her simply to get her to stop muttering to herself and resume her pace that she had slowed. This continued on for the days that followed, and if anything, her reluctance to speak diminished while her nonsensical mutterings only became more frequent. What she spoke of, Troíde could understand none of it, for she seemed not to contemplate anything, but rather to respond to strange unheard questions or statements.
Only at mealtimes did they remove their masks, and once it was all done, they quickly returned them to their faces and turned their heads towards anything but each other. By the second day near sunset, the miasma of the land had become considerably more foul than it had been, even just that morning. As they looked pitifully up at the sky, taking in the last moments of indirect sunlight they would receive that day, they sighed at the thickening fogs and mists that lay flowing over the southern lands. It was a pale white mist, flowing like fog, but curdling like milk.
Górin had stopped asking the witch if she had any reservations in going on. Except for rare occurrences of clarity, Jynge spoke with as much eloquence as a drunk. It had irritated for the first few attempts, but after he ceased trying, her ramblings only concerned him. Troíde insisted that she just needed to rest her legs and head, and usually this worked to some degree. It did not make for any speed, however, for the witch rested for long periods of valuable walking time. She was quick to fall to a nap, which Górin was ever-grateful for, as he doubted he could keep himself from coming to shouting at her if he had to listen to her incessant murmurs while she sat and covered no ground. At best, his fists trembled and he growled under his breath, but he kept his words civil.
The land was not necessarily becoming more barren the closer the group came to the lands surrounding Kaðrosedd, but it came to show more effects of the miasma above. Grass grew, but it was grey. Trees bore leaves, though they were brittle and brown. The river they passed had water that could be drunk after a single filtering, though it was bitter and stale. Though they had occasionally spotted a distant rabbit or wolf, sprinting alone from shrub to shrub, or even occasionally a flock of birds passing overhead, beasts were rarely seen.
The land was not deadly, though none of it supported life. The plague and its after-effects did not devastate the land, but it fouled it. For many years, life struggled and sputtered against death, but hope had never fully gone away. Perhaps if the Undead Hero had never been, or if he had failed, the necromancer would have had his way and razed Þérge to dust, creating in her place a true land of death. Yet, even when good is done, the scars of evil are not easily forgotten. Even as the Stékkr rose high and spread their power, they were still sown from the countless bodies of those who suffered. Such powers to cleanse the land could never forget what pain came before.
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The only real news that managed to raise their spirits, even slightly, came on the third day when Górin announced to them that they would likely be nearing the lands of Kaðrosedd by the following midday. Yet, even with what should have been good news, none of them were completely relieved of their low moods. Where once they chatted and sang to pass the time, now they may as well have been trying to sneak through the empty land undetected. Even at points of rest, they conversed little, though that is not to say that some did not speak.
The further they went on, the more frequent the distractions of Dákk became. More than once, Górin would be forced to run up to where his companion lingered and stared off idly into the mists. Muttering to himself, the borderland ranger would be led on by Górin’s hands on his shoulders for a while until he seemed to regain his composure.
The inability to ride on the mare and rest one’s legs, as well as having no other backs than their own to carry their supplies, tired them greatly. If there was some point of optimism, it was that none of the venison could weigh them down further, though this was merely one side of a bad circumstance. Thoughts of the fresh meat were prevalent as they swallowed the stale traveler’s bread. By sundown of the first day, they were so weakened and aching that they forewent supper for a time and gave more thought to simply laying themselves down and forgetting the journey behind and ahead.
As per their intended course, they were headed almost due south at this point, departing from the last reaches of the Silver Hills and entering into the lands that bordered Nahtkroínen. Steadily, as time passed, the ground began to flatten and the isolated patches of pines began to become little stretches of woodland. The change was a wholly welcome one, for the group had little desire to rest without some sort of cover of trees, and the gentler slopes had merely made their legs reasonably sore and not bursting with aching as had been the case within the rolling slopes.
When midday of the third day out from High Ridge came, no one said anything to Górin, and hopelessly awaited anything he might say to them. The fog had come in thickly, that morning, and even by midday, it had not ebbed even slightly. Even through the purifying embers of their masks, the faint traces of rot crept through and itched their noses. Navigation was difficult for their leader, who was forced to stop frequently as he pondered the maps, with such little visibility as he had then. They were very close to Kaðrosedd, he was certain of that much, but to misjudge their direction and lead them off-course could now be disastrous. By their estimate, they had just enough food and water left to reach the town, spend a night for the ritual, and then hastily return to the heartlands where game could be found.
It was hardly after midday, however, that the smog took a rare turn and abated for a short stretch of land. A slow wind had drifted by from the west, and revealed clarity of the land for some miles before them. In that brief visibility of the land, they were suddenly beheld to a low flatland, before a distant range of foothills. Within that flatland, a low wall rose up from the ground, and a smattering of buildings could be faintly seen from behind. It was a fair way off, of course, but not so much that they could not reach it by sundown.
Some spoke and made idle comments about the town. Jynge remained quietly by Troíde’s side, and when her guard looked over to her and gave a faint smile, fruitless from beneath the mask, she only bent her head to the ground.
“Just a little further, Jynge,” Troíde said with a deep breath, reaching to take comforting hold of the witch’s hand. It was cold, bony, and lifeless. “Look, we are soon upon Kaðrosedd.” The witch looked out from behind the glass and blinked sadly. Even though her face was obscured by white leather and black cloth, leaving only her eyes for recognition, Troíde had never seen her so depressed.
“I know. I see it too,” she said, “I did not believe that the town would be in such a state, but here it is before us. My elder witch would not lie to me, and I am sure the elder seer would not do so either, but I don’t know what I expected to find.”
“How do you mean?” Troíde asked, suddenly confused. “What state is it that you see the town in?”
“I will tell you later,” the witch said, lowering her voice so that Troíde was forced to bend her head close to hear. “Our leader and I were given direction not to tell the rest of you, but I have good faith in you, my friend. Not a season ago, rangers of King Gráðír had come to Kaðrosedd itself. There, they found unsettling evidence.” She paused once again. “I just don’t see how it is possible, though.”
“What isn’t possible, Jynge?”
The witch did not speak for a moment, and when she did, her voice was so faint that a light breeze would have prevented Troíde from hearing. “The necromancer,” she whispered. “Devoted and wicked scholars that seek to reach into another world and build a bridge so that he may return...I thought it a ridiculous thing, but I had no wish to decline a request from my elder witch.”
“The report was that the land was badly-affected,” she continued, “Not like this, though. Unless there was some mistake, Kaðrosedd had become a place of ruin and desolation, long ago. When my elder witch told me of what the rangers saw in place of it, I thought it merely a mistake. A delirious ranger’s memory addled by a passing Veil, or a worsening of the miasma in the time since. Perhaps it was just an unfortunate, but honest, mistake on their part. I didn’t expect that we would see anything more than stumps of broken stone and an empty hill. I should mourn the situation and take solace in the knowledge that it was poor luck and not malice on their part, I suppose.”
Jynge gave a low cry, half of despair and half of anguish. “Mercy! I only wish that such a sight were delusion. I pray that there was some mistake and this vision before us is nothing more than an illusion.”
By this point, Troíde was leading Jynge along by the hand, for the witch seemed to have lost much of the motivation to walk of her own accord. Her shoulders were sunken low, and her head was pointed at her feet. When Troíde made to look at the eyes behind the glass, Jynge turned her head with a sniff.
After neither had spoken for some while, Jynge slowly looked upwards once again towards the direction of the settlement, though by the point, the fog had settled back again and left the way ahead in pale obscurity. “A strange force surrounds us now, Troíde!” she whispered, “Can you not feel it, too? Look ahead and see the endless rot. Specters crying out in their misty exile. The thousand fallen, they reach up and grab at my ankles! They can see us, Troíde! They watch, and they wait.”
Troíde gave no answer, but quickly led the witch to the other rangers. In a cruel relief, she let herself relax some in the excuse that Jynge was beginning another one of her hysterical ramblings. With a quiet word to each of the rangers, they covertly arranged themselves all around Jynge as they entered the final mile to Kaðrosedd.