Edrik sprinted through the forest, following the Compass, the form his Oath had taken.
It did not point north. Instead, it led to those who forsook death.
He chased after his quarry, ducking under a branch and then reaching up and catching an arrow flying at him with his club.
Glowing blue eyes peeked out at him from the treeline, and he charged. Knocking yet another arrow aside with his club.
This chase had been going on for the better part of an hour, but when his Compass had a target, he never tired until it was slain.
It had only been three days since he took his Oath, and he had not slept since or eaten. He'd not felt the need too since his Compass had begun leading him.
This was the third wight he'd fought in as many days. Not accounting for the one who had slain his sister.
His teeth ground together.
"Scoilt." A musical masculine voice called out, and another arrow flew at him, splitting into two, then three more arrows mid-air as they did.
He caught two of them with his wooden club mid-air, but the third spun around his club as the voice called again.
"Damhsa."
The arrow avoided his club and plunged into his shoulder.
He hardly noticed it, dashing after the eyes that glowed both brighter, yet a less vibrant blue than the other two Wights he'd fought. Like another glow was washing the color out.
Another arrow whistled through the air at him, and the voice spoke once more.
"Tine éan."
The arrow burst into flame and took the shape of the bird.
Edrik snarled and threw his club at it.
The hunk of wood smashed into the flaming bird. The club didn't stop there, snapping the arrow and snuffing its magic, the force of the throw carried it onward towards the archer's glowing eyes, which vanished as a thwack sounded out through the forest.
Edrik charged through soon after, throwing himself into a wild sprint on all fours.
He caught the archer who had murdered his sister- No, that was a different wight, one which Asgar and Argus had killed.
Edrik's mind cleared somewhat as he saw the wight he'd been chasing, his club had struck it and knocked it to the ground.
It had skin like sunbaked earth, and if not for the blue glow of its eyes, he'd think it was just a human for how fresh the corpse was.
It had murdered his sister.
He flung himself at it as it fired its bow at him from the ground.
"Scoilt."
Three arrows slammed into him. He ignored them.
He was on the wight now, grabbing its arm and placing his foot on its chest. Then he pulled, tearing the limb from its body and throwing it over his shoulder.
He was stronger when he was following his Compass.
It struck out at him with its other hand, holding an arrow, and plunging it into him.
He ignored the now forth arrow sprouting from his side and grabbed the other limb, and like the first, he pulled.
He was quicker when he was following his Compass
The wight tried to knee him in the groin.
He leaned back, grabbed the thrashing legs, and pulled.
He was always following his Compass.
He sunk his talons into the monster's face, the monster who killed his sister!
He slammed his other hand, talons first into the creature's skull. They sank with a squelch, shifting his foot back onto the now limbless undead's chest. He pulled.
Edrik breathed, and stumbled backward, his head felt lighter but clearer. As did the air, he was breathing.
He looked down at the carnage he had wrought, it had been like this the other two times as well, but this one felt worse than those.
He glowered at the bow with contempt. It had made the memories more vivid.
He thought of his sister, leaping atop the undead bear, an arrow lodged in her throat as she rained blows down on it with her axes.
He smiled, and picked up the bow, grabbing the quiver from the corpse as well.
He spoke, "May Tavig judge you well."
He turned and started walking, pulling the arrows from his body, picking up his club, and doing the same for it, placing any arrows still functional in the quiver.
The wounds would heal.
They healed quickly when he was following his Compass.
He turned away from the body and began to jog, then run, then sprint.
He was always following his Compass.
—-
It had been three weeks of this, running and slaying. Occasionally he'd slow to a jog. When he saw something that reminded him of Dara, but it felt harder to do that as time went on.
The Oath made it all... easier, it was fun, in a way. He had escaped his grief through the joy of fighting and putting down the undead.
And he was close to one now, charging onto a road and heading down it. The figure was easy to see.
Finding it had been difficult. Whoever was making these accursed things had become aware of him. And had begun spreading their wights and the zombies outward.
At first, he was disappointed, he saw no glow in its eyes and suspected it was another simple zombie, once a human woman, a local by the looks of the jade skin. But the way it turned and watched him with a smirk seemed to dissuade that notion.
It called out to him as he closed the distance between the two.
"Are you the one killing my wights?"
His pulse quicked, and he sped up.
"I've meant for us to get a chance to speak-"
He lunged out at the undead, club swinging downward at her.
And then he was weightless, spinning head over heels, and with a clatter of metal smashed back first into a tree, bark and wood scattering from the impact.
His back had absorbed most of the crash, and he stood with a stumble, turning his eyes to the undead.
Now in front of it was a wight, a human one. It had been female and stood nearly as tall as he did, its skin was crimson red.
And it was strong, strong enough to throw him around like a bag of flour.
The massive wight turned its head like a dog. As if confused by how light he was.
He stared at the two before dropping to a knee as the first undead spoke once more.
"It's rude to interrupt, now as I was saying. I've been meaning to speak-"
He tore his bow from his back, luckily undamaged from the impact, and in one quick motion, strung it and fired an arrow at the talkative undead.
The large red wight knocked the arrow from the air with a handaxe before it could impact the speaker.
"Hey! I'm talking here!"
Edrik fired off another three arrows, this time aiming for the wight.
It knocked one from the air as it had the first, but the second and third struck their target, the first of the two hitting into its forearm and the second into its knee.
"What the-... Whatever, just kill him!"
Before the noisy one had gotten a chance to finish her order, another five arrows were flying.
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The wight ducked away from the first two, but the other three had not been aimed for it.
As the words left the undead mouth, three meaty thunks followed right after. Arrows tearing through its forehead, shoulder, and thigh.
The wight charged. The somehow still functioning undead raising its hand and calling out. "Sceenn, Sceenn, Sceenn."
His brow arched at the show of magic, and he deserted the bow and danced to the side in an attempt to dodge the strange bolt-shaped blasts of energy heading towards him, Yet they shifted mid-air, chasing after him and forcing him to shield his face with his arm.
The blasts twisted his limb and tore scales away like a mauling bear, creating deep, screw-shaped wounds into his arm.
He needed cover.
He gripped his club with his yet unwounded arm and met the wight's charge before the second volley could be fired.
The wight leaped forward with a kick that he ducked under, grabbing it's leg as it sailed overhead and using his Oath enhanced strength to arrest its momentum and swing it like his own club into the ground.
He heard the voice again as bolts began to race at him.
Edrik dragged the wight upward and used its body as a shield as the magic slammed into it like hail.
Its elbow slammed into his face. A loud pop rang out in his skull. It had dislocated his jaw.
It pulled itself free of his grasp as the force of the blow caused his brain to spin, before turning and striking at him with its handaxes, the spiral wounds visible across its front.
He caught one of the axes with his club, but the second slammed into his thigh, shearing through scales as if they weren't there.
The wight shifted the entirety of its weight to the side, dragging the handaxe deeper into his thigh, then pulling it forward.
It came free of his leg with a spray of blood, muscle, and broken scales.
His leg went limp from under him, and pain flared like a fire through the Drakon.
He would ignore it, throwing himself forward, grasping the leg of the wight and sinking his left hand's talons into it, clawing at its midsection with his right.
A pair of axes slammed into his back, being wrenched upward through his shoulders by incredible strength.
He screamed with pain and fury and tore his way upwards, clawing and biting at rotting flesh as axes were pulled loose from his back only to slam back into it again.
Blood poured out from him like a river as he struck at the right wrist of the wight, tearing through tendon and muscle and punching its hobbled knee inward as he tried to rise.
It fell, and suddenly he was looking down at it.
The wight slammed its axes into his side, cracking and breaking ribs with the blow.
He replied by sinking his talons into its collarbones to hold it steady, and then with a snarl opened his maw bite down on the wights head.
It struggled, throwing incredibly blows that forced the wind from his body as its skull creaked, and then with a horrendous crack, shattered. Drakon teeth and bone fragments plunged into the wight's brain as it did.
The blows halted as the body went limp. Edrik allowed his jaw to go slack, and the once-human slipped from his jaws, hitting the earth with a smack and splat.
Blood pooled out from his maw, little of it his own, and he spat out chunks of rotting flesh and meat into the earth.
"Well, that was intense."
He turned slowly, straightening and gazed at the undead he'd shot. Still speaking despite the three arrows in it, one of which lodged in its brain.
Edrik began to move forward to kill it, softly speaking in Drake as he did. "These are your Wights?"
"Now you talk! And I'm so glad you ask! Can you stop killing them? What's your deal?"
He felt a coldness of rage fall over him, he stood before his sister's killer, or at least he suspected it. And while its hands might not have drawn back the bowstring that killed her, it had given animation to the hands that had.
He slowly closed the distance between the two, his body too damaged to move quickly anymore.
She gave him an irate sigh as he approached and spoke, "Anáil Oighir."
A cone of freezing wind and snow burst from the undead mouth, washing over Edrik as he closed the distance.
He limped through it, feeling the cold penetrate his body and closing his eyes so they would not freeze under the blast of winter. Perhaps if he'd been anything else but what he was, the freezing magic would have slain him, But white drakon- like their silver counterparts, were not easily phased by the cold.
Blinking violently as his eyes healed from their short exposure to freezing blizzard, he struck outward through it, slashing the undead across the chest.
The undead's eyes widened, and as he brought his other hand down on it to rip its throat open, it spoke. "Cúlú."
It only barely ducked under the strike. It moved with haste under the effects of its spell while it retreated.
Edrik stumbled, his blow not meeting the resistance he'd expect it to before straightening again.
He could feel his body knitting back together and turned to the undead and continued following it.
"Why are you even coming after me and hunting my wights? You're going to die from your wounds anyway; can't you answer some questions?"
He didn't reply, he just moved forward, his speed increasing as he did.
The corpse frowned. "Fine; Sceenn, Sceenn, Sceenn!"
He raised his club, shielding himself from the blasts with it.
The bolts of energy tried to dance around it, but he'd expected that and shifted his club accordingly as they carved the same spiral grooves into it.
He shifted, throwing his weight on his back foot before leaning forward and throwing the remains of his weapon at the undead.
It clearly hadn't been expecting that, smashing into it and splintering the damaged weapon, throwing the moving corpse to the ground and filling its stomach with the shrapnel.
It looked down at the wound and then looked at him as he began to charge and close the distance.
"At least, you'll make a half-decent wight, even if I can't salvage whatever your Oath is. What is your Oath?"
Edrik lunged down at the creature with a stomp as it rolled to the side dodging it, then smirking as it spoke. "Anáil Tine."
Unlike the blast of frost from before, this was a cone of flame, dancing over his body, and he stumbled back from the pain, his exposed flesh smoking, and his scales absorbing the heat and turning to scalding brands.
"Gah..." He vomited up from the pain even he couldn't ignore, looking around with thankfully, still functioning eyes. He'd close them on hearing the first portion of the spell.
"Do me a favor and die from that? Otherwise, I'll have to wait a day before making something of you."
He couldn't hear any more than the beat of his own frantic heart. He was dizzy and off-balance from the pain. He fell to his knees as the burn reversed any healing he'd achieved for his damaged leg.
But his Compass still guided him.
He crawled, following where it pointed.
"How are you still going?" The Naga puppeting the corpse questioned aloud.
She glanced at the bloodied mud. Iit looked like there was more of the Drakon's blood on the earth than he could have in his body.
Then she watched it slowly stand, taking a weak step towards her puppet.
"You're healing." In her true form, a shiver ran down her spine.
She began to curse and stomp as the Drakon slowly stumbled at her, not unlike one of her own zombies.
A Grudge Oath, it was one of the hardest things to deal with.
She eyed the Drakon, reaching into her reservoir of magic and calling out. "Tintreach."
Lightning burst from her finger, and with a rumble of thunder blasting into the Drakon, throwing it back to the ground as it's body convulsed and smoked.
The spell ceased moments later, She wouldn’t be unable to afford to cast anything greater from this distance, her reservoir already running low.
He twitched, slowly moving despite the blackened flesh and scales glowing red with heat.
She scowled, releasing the strings puppeting the zombies, and went about creating a plan to kill the Drakon.
Edrik's mind whirled, and he felt the target his Compass was pointing to shrink or grow lesser somehow.
Seconds later, he felt weak blows striking him, the Compass pointed at the weakened source.
He reached up, gripping a flailing limb and pulled it down, biting down on it as he did.
He tasted rotten flesh and spat it out.
The blows continue, but half as many.
He reached up again, his eyes finally healed enough to see the talkative undead thrashing him like some mindless zombie.
He pushed himself up, its weak blows hardly noticeable, drowned in the torrent of pain his body screamed about.
Slowly, liking picking petals off a flower, he tore the zombie apart.
The Compass went dark, then lit up again.
He followed it.
—-
Natzsa admired the green Drakon wight, who served as her lair's guard.
She was excited. Soon she'd have at least two more to go along with it, maybe three! Albeit they'd not have this Drakon's wings.
It was damaged, The white Drakon that had been hunting her wights for the better part of a month had fought it and taken off the left arm.
She'd sacrificed three other wights to save it, but it had been worth it. She'd even fixed the limb by having a zombie reacquire it and stitched it back on.
She was also worried, she'd pulled back her remaining thirty Wights, and the host of zombies she controlled, as well as supplemented them with six cleric Wights that she was excited to incorporate into her strategy.
She'd done all of this to battle the Drakon Paladin she suspected was heading her way.
If only the other two Drakon had arrived a day late, she'd have had the Wights to bring them down, rather than the two she'd had on hand.
She only half paid attention to the zombie she was using to lead Father Elliot troop.
Truly, despite the concern of the Grudge Paladin, she was… happy.
Elliot, fool that he was, had agreed to her terms, leaving some of his men in exchange for guides to the prisoner’s camp.
She had been tailing it with undead birds for some time. No one ever seemed to expect undead beasts.
His troop would almost certainly deal with the two Drakon and the prisoners and would likely kill at least a few of Elliot's clerics, maybe even slay Elliot himself- and if they didn't get him, the wights traveling in secret behind him would.
Now She had a dozen living clerics at the front of the cave, and if all went well, they'd deal with the Grudge Paladin. He should be no more powerful than a normal one while fighting them if she had the right of his Oath, and if not, she has an army down here with her to deal with him, not to mention the traps being constructed at this very moment.
In a day Elliot and his men would reach the prisoners and their attempted saviors.
She hummed happily. Everything was coming up Natsza.
—-
Father Elliot scowled as he followed the guiding undead.
The lack of wights Natzsa had sent along with him was an insult. Granted the zombie leading him was puppeted directly by her.
But the three dozen or so other zombies traveling with his group of clerics were practically useless, even those fools Septimus and Sittia would have been able to defeat them.
His scowl deepened, and his heart hurt. They had not been friends exactly, and like all members of his kind he'd ever met, they'd conspired against each other.
But he'd never wanted them dead.
Now he was alone, trapped, wearing a single unchanging mask, and unable to speak to anyone about all the clever tricks he was playing on the humans following him.
He eyed the humans behind him as if they might hear his thoughts.
But they were not doppelgangers and had no such abilities.
He could listen to them now, even charmed into sub-service as they were, their minds were still active.
Fear of the battle on the horizon or excitement for the coming 'crusade'- though that was more common among his orc followers.
He looked ahead again, he would look forward to killing the Drakon. As after the undead creature, Natzsa had messed up in creating an escape. It had become clear that she alone would not have been able to kill his two comrades. That, coupled with the appearance of the two Drakon the gate guard had reported, the reality quickly became apparent.
They'd come into his town, killed his comrades, then traveled to a holy shrine he constructed for his god, killed his followers, and finally released the sacrifice he'd prepared for his lord and ran off with it.
His eyes were still scowling, but his mouth quirked into a smile.
He'd truly enjoy acquiring vengeance against these heathens.