“As I gazed rather intently at the earth my grandfather said: How long will your thoughts continue to dwell upon the earth?”

― Marcus Tullius Cicero , Somnium Scipionis

“Do you think…” Mireille did not get to finish the sentence as a whipcord-thin THING burst out of the ground, stabbing toward Alea’s back. A circular mouth opened, and black lustrous teeth arrayed like a lamprey’s spread with a disgusting squelch. The segmented body of several meters in length seemed more like a cut rope whipping through the air than some animal or beast.

Vanessa’s eyes widened before she desperately flung out her hand forming a glyph, and then she shouted a word of power. A shard of ice shot from her hand, missing the wormlike creature by a hair but forcing the being to dodge to the side, which led to it only grazing Alea. Tufts of fabric ripped loose, and a red color, shocking in its intensity, sprayed from a long wound on the girl’s upper left arm. Alea screamed as she was abruptly thrown forward, and the pain registered.

The shard of ice impacted the ground and was swallowed by the side of the dune with a puff of dust.

With a fierce yowling, a shadow separated from the one cast by Alyssa, and a cat made of mist and ice sprang forward, grabbing the worm, and then began to shred it with its powerful hind claws.

With disgust in her eyes, Alyssa focused void energies through her left hand, and dark flames bathed the cat and worm. The cat seemed to relish the black energies. With a hiss, like gas escaping a corpse, the insectoid monster dropped to the ground. Giving a savage growl, the nightmare cat ripped a length of chitin, dripping foul fluids out of the upper part of the worm before trotting over to Alyssa, putting it in front of her feet before then beginning to groom its left front paw.

“Ew.” Mireille swallowed down some bile before turning to the priestess. With lightning reinforcing and quickening her limbs, she shot forward and hit the arm that was clutching a dagger. “What are you thinking?! If you hurt any of us, we simply leave you to these creatures!” The forceful blow disarmed the white-clad woman, and with a pained grunt, she pulled back her injured wrist, cradling it against her chest. Remaining stubbornly silent through it all.

Sighing, Iseret walked forward and collected the dagger. “Anything else?” Waiting for a short time, she nodded. “Don’t try that again.”

Vanessa looked around. “We seem to have caught a lot of attention. Usually, it’s just me, so I don’t have much experience with living people and this plane.”

Iseret gave her a raised eyebrow.

The vampire shook her head and continued a bit embarrassedly. “That would take too much time to explain and serve no purpose. When I have the circle ready, don’t, for the love of the gods, disturb it. And keep our unwilling guest from doing so!” Vanessa was really worried about the soft ground she had used for carving the runes. The packed dust was easy to cut and usually held up fine, but when someone wanted to destroy a rune, it could not be easier.

Grabbing the dagger out of Iserets hands, she began to inscribe the complicated formula. “Please put some dust in there.” She pointed, and Iseret filled in a bit of mana dust. Answering the unspoken question in her friend's eyes, she continued. “The mana I can manage is not sufficient for a force shield large enough to cover us all. So the crystal dust is a must.”

The priestess was still standing back from the group, and with her head slightly lowered, her eyes were hidden by her dark-brown hair.

Mireille tilted her head to catch a glimpse of her eyes and shrugged her shoulders. “Everything alright?” After not getting a reply, she waved her hand in front of the woman's face. “Hello! Care to answer? We don’t seem to have unlimited time.”

“Heretic.” The word was spat at Mireille with enough venom to shame Iseret.

“I do think Nirileth likes me. And I like her. Jaros. Charys.” She folded raised fingers into her fist, counting them with the other hand. “I don’t think I’m very heretical for most of those. If my friends were not hunted by you and yours, I would not even think about much less fight you.”

“You consort with undead and impede the work of the goddess.”

“So the worms it is? I would be a bit sad, and Alea would probably take it harder, but if that is truly your wish, I won’t force you?” Mireille gestured helplessly.

Iseret took a few steps toward them. “I follow Many-as-One, and I know you should have a bit more flexibility than that. Even for the White-without-Stain, there is such a thing as means and ends. I don’t ask you to help us directly, but you could try to focus on the greater evil and keep your peace until that is vanquished. No one says you have to be stupid about it and die without reason.”

“I will not be like you. A heathen without morals and integrity!” The priestess shouted back. The noise was muted as the dust swallowed the sound, and the air was leaden.

In the distance, several questing tendrils rose from the dunes swaying and tasting the air.

“Last chance.” Iseret pushed Mireille back toward the circle, making a shushing motion with her hand before the redhead could talk back.

Malformed many-legged shadows began to gallop toward them from far down a narrow winding valley of dust winding between dead metallic trees. Garish pinks and blues shone from above, switching to green and dark red.

“I…” The woman swallowed.

Iseret turned and hurried back toward the circle. Energy sparked from the runes, and she quickly grabbed a small bag from her belt before dribbling a bit of crystal dust into the deeply cut runes.

A mournful howl rose from somewhere in the dark land.

“Wait!” The priestess hastened after her and coughed from the dust disturbed by their back and forth. “Only until we get back.”

Alyssa looked at her quietly. Beneath the anger, hate, and determination, she seemed so very young. ‘And when did I become ancient?’ she silently questioned herself.

With a dull snap and a sizzle, the runes caught fire, and a globe of darkness enfolded them, leaving no light safe for the runes themselves.

Breathing deeply before she was reminded of the circumstances, Mireille was soon coughing again. “Damned dust. Why is there so much dust?”

“There is no water. And no life to keep the soil from becoming dust.” Vanessa remarked as she sat down to meditate and regain her mana. “I once read that the astral plane was once alive. There were creatures, people, trees...and water. How it came to be as it is now, I have no idea.” She shook her head, settling in a crosslegged position, putting her hands to her temples before focusing inward.

“How long?” Mireille asked and wiped the drool and dust from her lips.

“The last time, it was an hour or two. I am not completely sure.” Iseret replied.

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“I did not think anyone knew.” Mireille looked at her.

“It was an emergency. Let’s leave it at that.”

Alea grimaced as she focused light magic on the gash on her arm. The flesh regained its healthy sheen, and the wound closed quickly.

“You can use light magic?” The priestess asked, seemingly despite herself.

“Naturally.” Mireille bragged. “She is a saint of Jaros.”

“What are you doing with those creatures!” The white woman asked incredulously.

“I should take offense at being labeled a creature, but if you compare me to Vanessa, I will take the compliment.” Mireille joked. “And did you not see her invoking this light wall spell of hers?”

“I thought it came from my people and meant to imprison you.”

“Nope. Was for us to get away without killing you. ‘twould have made Alea sad, so there is that.”

“Don’t say it as if it would not have made us all uncomfortable,” Alyssa interjected.

Iseret raised an eyebrow at that.

Alea brushed her hand over Cyrus’s head and smiled while seeming a bit forced. “What is your name? It’s unbecoming to simply call you ‘you.’”

“Jill. Jill Temrer.”

“I would say nice to meet you, but grandmother always said it’s no use lying if the other knows you do.” Mireille drank from her waterskin. “Anyone?” Waving it around and finding no takers, she fastened the skin back at her hip. “What? I think it makes sense.”

Alyssa giggled at that and then, mortified, put her hand to her lips, eliciting a laugh from Mireille.

“You are doing this to make me doubt myself, but it will not work!” Jill gritted her teeth and pressed her back against the dark sphere of the spell.

“I do think it would have been a lot easier to simply let you suffocate. So please think about what that could mean.” Mireille frowned.

“You still have a use for me, and it can’t be good.”

“Normally, I would encourage healthy skepticism, but what could we stand to gain from you? When we are back in the real world, your status as a liability will only increase if we don’t somehow imprison you.” Iseret stated calmly while yawning.

Jill responded by mumbling a prayer under her breath while huddling in her corner.

“I do think this is a lost cause.” Mireille sighed.

“But I could not let her die.” Alyssa shrugged. “I did not need the marble after all.”

“We could demand our money back! Those marbles would cost a pretty penny in Kronenburg.”

“Please don’t.” Alea scrunched her nose.

The time passed in uncomfortable silence. Even Alea was reticent after being rebuffed so firmly.

Mireille fixed Alea’s clothing with judicious applications of the cantrips learned from her late grandmother.

“So. I’m ready. I will try to get us closer to the mountains. Perhaps we can even assist in taking Nordmark’s capital, Sevenpeaks.” Vanessa dusted off her robes and stood before taking a long look around.

“Perhaps. If we are not killed by our ‘allies’ when we try.” Alyssa threw a glance at the still-praying Jill.

“Gather close. I will open the portal back, and anyone not going through will probably be eaten by worms. Also...when the portal opens, the forcefield will fall. Normally I could simply transfer us back, but with so many people, I sadly cannot.”

Looking a bit nervous, Mireille and Alea stood next to Alyssa, who focused on Jill. Cyrus was coiled around his mistress’s legs.

Beginning the incantation again after inscribing another magical circle, Vanessa finished a bit more leisurely than her hurried escape from Margramus’s home, but soon the portal flashed into being, showing a snowed-in woodland. “Hurry up!” Vanessa urged before the portal distorted when it hit the forcefield, and the latter vanished into nothingness.

Outside, several wolf-like creatures were lying in the dust, but as the protection fell, they quickly jumped back to their feet, some having six, some only three limbs hobbling, jumping, and running towards them.

Jumping through the portal, there was a second of disorientation, and then the biting cold of the winter woods hit them in the face. Mireille turned with her sword in hand, guarding against anything coming through the portal with them, and good thing, too, as two astral wolves rushed through the closing portal. A third only managed to get his head and front half into the open before the creature was cut in two by the suddenly vanishing oval.

The dark of night greeted them, illuminated by Gesserach's lost eye.

Jill tumbled through the snow along with the others but struggled back to her feet, athletic as she had proven to be, and began running into the forest.

With a screeching howl, more akin to metal on stone, the two wolf-beasts attacked, and one was swiftly skewered by Mireille lightning sparking through the scabby fur igniting foul oils lingering on the diseased-looking flesh. The maw was crooked and twisted like a corkscrew with metallic shimmering teeth stabbing out of it every which way. Three eyes were inserted without rhyme or reason into the domed forehead glaring with hatred and hunger at the small group of friends.

Mireille grinned broadly as she began to declaim her victory, but the smile vanished from her face as the astral wolf pulled back from her blade, bleeding brackish blood that steamed on the forest floor. Shaking itself, the wound began to close- slowly- as Vanessa peppered the other one with shards of ice.

Alyssa concentrated and incanted several void bolts in rapid succession, the ovals of destructive nothingness impacting against the side of the creature Mireille was battling. With a sucking sound gaping wounds opened in the matted fur, and with a final lingering squeal, the wolf fell on his side and did not move anymore.

The other creature was facing Iseret and Vanessa and was faring badly. Alea blinded it with a well-placed flash of light before an overhand chop from Iseret separated its head from its body, making it tumble end over end down a narrow slope.

Gasping for breath, Mireille spat the marble into her hand and, after wiping it on her robes, put it in one of her pockets. “Never know when that comes in handy!”

“Don’t rely on it too much. I hurried the enchantment. It should only be good for another hour or two.” Vanessa inspected the wolf with the short sword taken from the absent Priestess, lifting a flap of skin or a limb with thinly veiled disgust.

“Why do they have to be so ugly?” Mireille wiped her degen on the snow before then concluding the cleansing with a water spell begged from Alyssa.

“The strange energies from the rips in the sky do worse things with humanoids from our world if they are not shielded.” Vanessa shrugged. “They are astonishingly well adapted even as they are still suffering from the radiance.”

“Do we chase her?” Alea quietly asked. “Or did you wish for Jill to get away?”

“I wouldn’t recommend separating us at this point.” Iseret shook her head. “And when we did not bind her, it was nearly inevitable that she runs as soon as she was able.”

“And we are okay with that?” Mireille looked from one to the other.

“We are kilometers from Volstedt and much closer to the Nordmark capital. They will have a lot more to occupy them than hunting us. And even as she shouted about heathens and heretics, they still know that the rebels in league with the Heartstealer are much worse than us. Perhaps they lump us in together with them not believing what they can hear and see, but still, the capital will distract them nicely.” Iseret explained.

“Where are we exactly?” Alyssa asked, calming down a visibly agitated Cyrus.

“I simply took us closer to our goal. The spells I use fixate on areas significant in magic energy. So there should be something significant in the area.” Vanessa took a look around too. “And I would really like to put some distance to that…” She pointed at the slowly dissolving wolf creatures.

“Why are they getting all gooey?” Mireille took a few steps back.

“They are dead and originally not native to this plane, so they are rejected by the magical energies of this place,” Vanessa spoke absentmindedly before pointing further down the small hilly slope they were standing on. Tall oaks and other leaf-bearing trees surrounded them, barren and covered in snow as they were the light of the moon fell between the branches shining on the white floor. “It’s down there! Whatever pulled us to this place should be down this way.”

“Should I go ahead and take a look?” Iseret asked with a shallow smile.

“Please do.” Vanessa subconsciously smiled back.

Mireille grinned at Alyssa, who shook her head in exasperation.

Iseret nodded and vanished between the trees. Incanting the spells for movement and to lessen her weight, she jumped up to the lower branches making her way swiftly and silently.

Soon she reached the border of the forest and, before her, stretched a large field encircled by a high stone wall. Further behind the walled-in area, the lights of a large town or small city blinked in the darkness, and columns of smoke rose against the starry sky.

Stone monuments and mausolea, gravestones in orderly rows. A large graveyard opened up before Iseret’s eyes. Among the poorer section, torches flickered, and distant chanting could be heard. Dark-robed figures moved between the small houses of the dead, and a big figure clad in ancient armor presided at an altar made of skulls and bones.

Among the stones, Iseret could barely see a flitting figure wearing white clothes.

Sighing deeply as she saw from her position high up the path of the white priestess intersecting with a patrol made of undead led by a group of cultists. The chanting probably covered any noise those undead and cultists were making.

And then Iseret reached a decision.