Amelie and the doctor reached Myerigrad’s northern gate with no issue. On the way, the pink-haired girl took note of not only the blocked-off street, but also Seda and Mellick among the crowd. Maybe she’d say hello on the way back.
Once they arrived, there was already somebody waiting for them, clothed in the garb of the town guard. He raised a hand in greeting as they approached. “Dr. Vellicent, apologies for troubling you,” he began.
“No need for formalities,” the doctor replied coolly. “What’s the situation?”
“We’ve identified the target. A woman, looks to be a young adult, clothed in rags and blankets. She’s been slowly making her way down the road toward the city. A guard tried to approach her, but she declared that she was cursed, and that we should stay away.”
“So business as usual?” Amelie asked.
“Yes. Our request is the same as always. De-escalate, and if you can’t do that, then figure out what kind of power she has.”
“Understood,” Dr. Vellicent replied. “I’d like to wait outside the gate.”
The guard nodded in understanding. “All right. We’ll let you through.”
He stepped back, barking orders to the guards stationed closer to the gate. Vellicent and Amelie exchanged a look, but said nothing. Both of them knew what they needed to do.
And as the gate door opened, they slipped through.
--
It didn’t take that long for the culprit to appear on the horizon. Wrapped up in a purple blanket, they stood out against the road as they approached. Both Amelie and Vellicent watched them closely. “I’ll speak first,” the doctor informed her companion.
“You sure?” Amelie asked. “You’re not exactly the best at, ah, soothing nerves.”
“I’d like to try the logical path first.”
“...Fine. But if anything goes wrong, it’s your fault.”
As the figure approached, both doctor and apprentice noted that the woman’s gaze was fixated on the ground. Was it intentional? A bluff? A side effect of their curse?
The answer came when the woman looked up and paused, just a short distance away.
“Please leave.” The woman’s voice was tinged with a heavy accent that neither Vellicent nor Amelie could place. More than that, though, her tone seemed…Upset? Resigned? Mournful, even?
Dr. Vellicent stepped forward. “We cannot do that. Who are you?”
“I am…” The woman paused, blinking. “Hallbera. Warrior of the Hulvolki.”
“The Hulvolki…” Amelie muttered under her breath. Hulvolk was the country to the east. Amelie had never visited, but a majority of Myerigrad’s denizens still spoke the language, including herself. There was no reason to doubt the woman’s claim, strange accent or no.
“What brings you here?” Dr. Vellicent continued.
“Please leave,” Hallbera called again, a bit more desperate this time. “I do not know how long I can control myself.”
“Why?” The doctor’s voice was unwavering. “Are you cursed?”
A moment’s pause. “Yes.”
“Then we are here to help you.” Dr. Vellicent took another step forward. “I am Dr. Tyra Vellicent, and this is my assistant. I am a researcher, studying the Accursed.”
“Accursed…?” Hallbera tilted her head quizzically at the term. “If you would like to help, then leave me alone. I do not want to fight somebody who is trying to help.”
“There is no need for this to come to blows,” Vellicent said. An attempt at reassurance, Amelie assumed. “If you come with us, we can solve this amicably.”
“I…no,” Hallbera said, bringing up a hand to clutch her head. “We must fight. I do not want to, but we must. We must. We…I cannot stop it.” The other hand went up to her face.
“Please, run.”
“...It seems she is not in her right state of mind,” Dr. Vellicent declared. “Amelie?”
“Yeah, yeah.”
Just as Amelie took her place in front of the doctor, Hallbera looked up from her hands. Even from this distance, they could tell a change had come over the warrior; the way she slouched forward was unbecoming of the solemn traveler they’d just met a moment ago.
They stood there for a moment, tension hanging in the air. Amelie’s unblinking gaze, fixed on Hallbera’s dilating pupils.
Who would move first?
--
Stop it stop it stop it stop it-
Hallbera felt the same sensations as before rising in her as she averted her gaze from the two women before her. Gottskalk’s voice booming in her skull. Her vision beginning to blur. The burgeoning urge to fight-feed-feast.
But this was no longer her first time being taken over. She could guess at what to expect now. The boiling blood, the throbbing in her skull, none of it was brand new. And that meant she could fight it. Hopefully.
Of course, it was an unbelievably uphill battle. Even as she fought to maintain a grip on her faculties, her mind felt like it was on fire. Keeping any kind of hold on her sense of self was like trying to hold magma. But she was no mere farmhand to be cowed by a simple enchantment.
She was Hallbera. A warrior born. No necromancer’s curse would stop her for long.
Though taking back control was easier said than done. Even if she could keep a grip on her sanity, she could tell the hold was weak. It would take all of her energy just to maintain proper consciousness. And in the meantime, her body would be completely out of her control.
As if to drive the point home, she felt her body sprint forward, reaching towards the woman with strangely-colored hair. The woman’s mouth moved, but any words were drowned out by the roaring in Hallbera’s ears. More importantly, she took a combat stance, though not any that the warrior recognized. They were both unarmed. So what would happen?
The answer came with a sound like thunder, as Hallbera found her body hurled to the side by…something. A wall of force slamming into her from the left with enough noise to pierce straight through the madness of her mind. She rolled through the snow for a bit, ears and skull both ringing, desperately trying to hold onto herself. Magic? Seemed most likely.
After a couple of tumbles, her body rolled up onto its feet again. Her opponents had repositioned. The pink-haired one seemed to want to keep distance between Hallbera and the black-clothed one. Maybe the black-clad one was a noncombatant?
Not that Hallbera’s analysis could affect her actions.
She felt herself charge again. Admittedly, part of her was annoyed with the curse’s lack of tact. Another straightforward charge? Against a mage? Really? She could still feel pain like this, even if the curse didn’t seem to care. But predictability was good. It meant that pink-hair could just keep beating her until she stopped moving.
Case in point, another raucous noise slammed into Hallbera from the side, sending her sliding towards the city walls. Good work, pink-haired mage. Keep her off-balance. Don’t let her get up again.
Unfortunately, Hallbera herself didn’t have much of a choice in the matter. She could already feel the curse pulling her body up again, along with the twinge of bruised flesh. A blanket wasn’t much of an armor, was it-
A surge of sudden energy cut through both Hallbera’s thoughts and the fog of her mind. The curse again? No, not quite. This was a different power. The curse tore through her, pounding away like she was a vessel to be discarded. This new sensation was a creeping energy, a wave that slowly but inexorably filled her with anxious power.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
For the first time since awakening, she felt a chill. She could feel something creeping across her face like a spider, but it wasn’t until it reached the corners of her vision that she recognized it as a layer of ice. What the hell?
As the frost crept across her face, her vision went white, and her mind lost its grip.
--
Amelie let out a tense breath. She’d hoped that this woman would stay down after the first attack, but it wasn’t to be. Whatever force had taken hold of the white-haired woman wasn’t letting her stay down for long. But on the flip side, said force didn’t seem interested in actually dodging. It would be a painful fight, but not a hard one.
Of course, that was her analysis before the off-season chill had run through the air. Watching frost creep across her opponent’s body wasn’t a particularly pleasant sight, but Amelie was more concerned with her teacher. Especially since their path back to the city was looking more perilous by the second.
Time to get serious. Unfortunately. Amelie cast a look back at Dr. Vellicent. “Earplugs, ma’am.”
Vellicent nodded, gaze filled with no fear but plenty of understanding. The pair of them both fished out a set of wool plugs from their coat pockets, setting them in their ears. Not the most comfortable, but both knew it was better than the alternative.
Just in time, as well. As soon as Amelie’s hand left her head, there was a series of crackling pops from her opponent. Ice cracking as joints moved, only to freeze back over. What an unpleasant power. Not that Amelie’s noisemaking was much better, she noted.
The frosted woman stepped forward-
-and suddenly, she was right in front of Amelie.
What? How the hell was ice going to make her opponent faster? Caught unable to explain her opponent’s sudden change in demeanor, Amelie’s instinct took over, and magic began to flow.
It had been a long time since she’d actually had to use her training, and she could certainly feel her body complaining. Fortunately, Accursed powers didn’t degrade like that. Not so long as a curse remained, that is.
This sonic attack was different than before. Amelie’s magic up to now had been little more than noise, thunderclaps to disorient but not defeat her opponent. No doubt her opponent expected more of the same.
Instead, what emanated from Amelie’s palm was a full-blown orchestra. Formless noise became a litany of full-blast brass. Caught head-on by a sonic assault, the frozen woman was flung back, the burst of noise carrying her all the way to crash against the gate.
Amelie leapt forward towards the gate, mind whirling. If this woman was that fast using her power, then the situation changed. If she began moving again, the chance that Amelie would be able to stop her would drop to near zero.
So she wouldn’t give her the chance.
The woman’s body began to stir, hauling herself to her feet. Amelie’s hand stretched out, magic surging through her again as a wall of sound slammed her opponent against the gate. The heavy wood shuddered, but held.
Except then the woman started getting up again. Amelie’s face changed for the first time since they’d stepped out, forehead creasing. Again, a burst of sound echoed forth. Again, the frozen woman was thrown against the gate. Again, she got back up.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Amelie grit her teeth. Nobody’s magic was unlimited, nor was their stamina. She was absolutely certain that she’d broken several of this woman’s ribs at this point, not to mention the clearly ruptured eardrums leaking frosted blood. There was no way she could take much more…right?
Only one way to find out. Just keep doing it until one of them ran out of energy, or until a blast managed to immobilize the woman’s legs. Again. Again. Again.
In the end, the first thing that gave out wasn’t a combatant at all. Myerigrad’s outer walls were no slouch historically, but they hadn’t been used for decades. Even the toughest defense would fade with disuse, and the gate became the day’s unfortunate example.
Worn with age and torn by repeated magical assaults, the center of the door shattered inwards, sending the woman sprawling with a splinter of timber. Amelie’s eyes went wide, but she only made it a few steps in pursuit before falling to a knee. Gods dammit. Too much energy spent to try and keep Hallbera down.
As she looked up, though, she saw that the woman wasn’t hauling herself to her feet this time. It was hard to tell much else through the hole she’d blown in the gate, but she dared hope.
Had she done it?
--
A short time earlier, Seda, Mellick, and Larisa were standing among the crowd outside the gate. Their original goal of supplies was long complete, if the bags split between the three were any indication, but it was also the least of their worries right now.
Amelie and Dr. Vellicent were out there. Seda was sure of it. In fact, she’d made eye contact with her roommate. What in the world were they doing?
When she’d informed Mellick, his gaze had darkened somewhat. “Are you sure?” He had asked.
“Amelie is…hard to mistake,” Seda had answered.
“Mmm.” Mellick hesitated. “This is probably Dr. Vellicent’s fault.”
“Her fault about what?” Lari chimed in curiously.
“Dr. Vellicent’s the university’s leading researcher of the Accursed, right?”
Larisa blanched a bit at the mention, but Seda just nodded. “Yes.”
“Well, as I recently learned, she doesn’t just help the university,” Mellick explained. “She helps out the guard as well. Especially when it comes to greeting cursed travelers-”
The sudden sound of a thunderclap from outside made all three of them start, and elicited a few gasps from the crowd. “Sounds like it’s not going well,” Mellick commented darkly.
Larisa’s eyes widened. “Are they going to be okay?”
“I…hope so,” Seda muttered. She’d just met Amelie and the Doctor, and they’d already helped her immensely. She didn’t want to think about what would happen if both were gone.
Larisa nodded, clearly thinking. “We got alchemical supplies while we were shopping, right, Mel?”
Mellick gave Larisa a look. “Lari, you’re not thinking of going out there, are you?”
“Well, not out,” Larisa said. “But if they come back injured, you know? We should have the supplies for a salve, right?”
Mellick cupped his chin with his free hand thoughtfully. “I think we do.”
“Great!”
Larisa grabbed one of the bags, beginning to rifle through it for a pestle and various greens that Seda couldn’t identify. For her part, Seda kept her eyes trained on the gate. Even if she couldn’t help with alchemy, there had to be another way to assist.
There had to.
Brought back to the present moment, the trio was shaken as a burst of sound suddenly rattled the gate. Seda could only assume the noise was Amelie’s. While the pink-haired girl was remarkably secretive about her abilities, it wasn’t hard to draw a parallel between her musical tendencies and the orchestral noise that was currently reverberating.
For a moment, her spirits rose, but they fell as the door rattled again. And again. And again. She could feel her hands tensing, clenching and unclenching in anxiety. It had been a long time since she’d been worried about somebody else in this way. Not since before she left the Southlands. It was…relieving, even if she couldn’t stand the feeling.
She’d have to think about it later, since the gate had just had a hole torn in it. Several people in the crowd screamed as a white-haired woman came flying in with the shower of splinters, coming to lie on the cobbled ground with a concerning crack.
But Seda’s attention was focused elsewhere. From their vantage point in the middle of the road, she could see just well enough through the hole in the gate to see a pink-haired woman on her knees, looking wounded. She breathed out the name. “Amelie!”
Seda’s anxiety-fueled body took over before her mind caught up. Next thing she knew, she was past the closed signs, sprinting across the off-limits zone. Mellick was shouting behind her, sounding distressed. She felt bad, but the buzzing in her brain was intensifying. Not a thoughtful buzz, like Ikhan’s, but a distressed one. Something spurring her on, turning her anxiety into motion. She couldn’t lose a friend. Never be alone again. She sprinted past the woman lying motionless-
-And faceplanted into the ground.
It took a moment to register what had happened, and why the crowd had gone absolutely insane with shouting. The woman’s arm had shot out, closing around her ankle as Seda had passed by. As Seda watched, stunned, the woman’s face turned up to look at her. It was a horrifying sight; a mask of frosted ice obscured all but the burning of two eyes that smoldered like coals.
“Feeeeeast,” echoed a weak voice from behind the mask.
Amelie wounded. Seda in danger. The woman in front of her. The crowd going wild. Seda’s brain parsed them all at once, then none at all. She shorted out. This was it, huh? Losing to an unfamiliar impulse, to die at the hands of a frosted demon.
Now she’d truly be alone.
That final, panicked thought caused something to click in Seda’s short-circuited brain. A half-imagined voice, again.
You’re never alone.
Power surged within her. Seda felt it flow from her chest up through her body, a wave of reassuring energy passing through her mind and into her scalp. Her hair. It buzzed, pooling in the ground, as her shadow seemed to waver in the midday sun.
A hand shot out from the ground. Well, not a hand. More a shadow in the vague approximation of a hand. Despite its transient nature, however, it managed to grip onto the woman’s frozen face. The woman instinctively let go of Seda, hands scrabbling at whatever was gripping her face, but they could find no purchase. It was hardly there, after all.
The world stood still for a moment. Too much going on. Seda’s mind burned with confusion, anxiety, fear, and passion all at once. It wasn’t enough. She wasn’t enough.
Her vision swam, brain simply unable to handle what was happening. She became dimly aware of the woman’s cries turning to vague gurgling, then to silence. Don’t kill her, she wanted to cry, even as she felt the power within her sputter and go out. The roaring of the crowd was completely tuned out by the sudden realization that her heartbeat was louder than anything.
Seda felt a hand on her shoulder. She tensed, but a voice cut through the din. “Seda. Are you all right?”
Mellick. A friend. Seda did her best to relax, even though it wasn’t particularly working. “I…uh…” Sounds fumbled through her mouth, refusing to form into any actual words. She took a deep, shuddering breath, then spoke much louder than she meant to.
“Sorry!”
“It’s fine,” Mellick whispered reassuringly. “It’ll all be fine. Lari’s looking after Amelie and the doctor. Can you stand?”
Seda tried to speak, but her voice failed her. Instead, she just shook her head. Mellick nodded. “I’m going to carry you. Is that okay?”
A nod this time. Seda felt a pair of hands scoop her up. Probably Mellick’s. She was suddenly too tired to care. With a sputtered thanks, she shut her eyes and let the sweet embrace of darkness claim her for now.