“If I may ask,” he said. The man eventually managed to stop coughing looking up at him. “What does that seven-pointed emblem represent?”
One of their wrinkly fingers pressed against the northernmost tip of the star that was embedded onto their robe-like attire. “Each of these points represents a tenet that we have sworn ourselves to uphold. Seven tenets for our sacred order, seven oaths, and seven different punishments depending on which are broken.”
“That’s a whole lot of sevens,” he said somewhat jokingly.
“Laugh all you like but the number holds a lot of meaning to us. Or rather, what remains of us. I might be the only remaining member alive at this point.” His gaze darkened coming to this realization. He began to mutter words beneath his breath shallowly.
A secretive order living out here didn’t seem viable at all to him. “What made you all decide to settle out here? If I were to choose someplace to settle, this would be far from it.”
“It wasn’t by choice.” He began to cough again. Speckles of blood appeared on his palm that he wiped away with a piece of cloth from one of his robed pockets. I wish there was something I could do for him, but I wouldn’t even know where to begin to help him out with their health. “We were driven out here by her majesty Queen Luvia Aenveld. The tyrant herself could no longer tolerate our order so we were exiled forcing us all to wander endlessly in the wasteland. Eventually we decided to settle here and we were able to make it work for quite a while, but it did not last for all that long. The truth is, you can only fight and survive for so long. Eventually, you’re attacked and worn down enough, and then everyone is dead or soon to be dead. We are proof that even our efforts alone weren’t enough. We used magic and all of our accumulated knowledge to the best of our abilities and still it wasn’t enough.”
No kidding. This place was objectively speaking, a disaster. He just wished he had known to what extent of a disaster it was before stupidly marching in. And he knew that if this sorcerer died—which was very likely within the next few hours at most—that the barrier keeping the entrance to this tower secure would likely go down making things peculiarly difficult for him and Lar.
Something caught his attention. In the rightmost corner of the tower, a shadow once still began to shift. It was not a large shadow, it was in fact quite small hiding behind stacks of dusty old tomes and used vials.
“Worry not,” Darold muttered and then whistled towards whatever it was that hid from them. “You have nothing to be afraid of Leo. These guests of ours mean us no harm.” He began to laugh trying to provide a more jovial atmosphere despite what existed right outside the tower. “Worry not my dear friend. They will not harm you. They don’t look like the type who would.”
The tiny shadow began to move. A squirrel-like creature appeared revealing itself fully for the first time.
“Say hello to our guests Leo.”
“H-hello.”
The squirrel was most certainly a familiar like Lar. They spoke with a high-pitched tone making him unsure whether they were male or female—although their name might’ve suggested it to him already. Come to think of it, did familiars even have genders? He wasn’t quite sure. He always thought of Lar as a woman since that was how she appeared in her human form. She also sounded like what he thought a woman was as well so he was unsure of this squirrel despite their name.
Leo began to move over towards the sorcerer who gladly bent his back down so he could lift the squirrel into his two hands. He pulled Leo up and put them down on an old table in the center of the tower.
Now that Leo was closer to them, he became more aware of how tattered their appearance was. He was quite mangled looking with one of his eyes whited out.
“So I take it your order isn’t unfriendly towards familiars?” Lar asked.
Darold nodded his head. “That is perhaps the main reason the queen would no longer tolerate us. Although we weren’t associating with familiars for the most part. We found this little fellow out here during our travels. He’s been with us ever since but he’s in bad condition. He needs someone that can heal him, and sadly, I am not experienced in the kind of magic that would aid a familiar such as him.”
“Are you able to heal him?” he asked towards Lar.
She shook her head.
Leo appeared quite disheveled and shy. He looked at them skeptically while appearing to be in some kind of pain. Truthfully speaking, he felt bad for him even though he hardly knew them. Seeing any living creature in pain, especially harmless or friendly ones never went well with him.
Darold gripped the table to assist in their faltering ability to stand. “Where exactly are you two headed if I may ask?”
“To Liall,” Lar said.
“Really? Then…then perhaps if I may, would you consider taking Leo with you? I don’t believe he has the most time available to him, but if you were to make it there with him and find someone capable of healing a familiar, would you?”
Lar furrowed her brows and crossed her arms. “Liall’s still quite far from wherever we are right now. You sure he’s well enough to even tolerate traveling such a long journey?”
“If he stays here he’s for sure going to die. It will at least give him a chance.” Assuming of course we make it out of here alive, then maybe. Those nasty creatures out there certainly aren’t just going to let us walk away easily. “I on the other hand am not long for this world so you need not concern yourself about me. I’ll gladly die here with the rest of my people.”
Lar tapped her fingers along her crossed arm. “You know of a good way to get out of here other than the way we came in?”
“No,” Darold said. “But I can give you the opening you need to escape. The corpse breeders are hesitant in attacking.”
“Excuse me?” he said after hearing their name.
Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.
“That is the name I’ve chosen to give them due to their—rather—crude existence. Let’s just say that there were fewer of them around until more corpses existed within this settlement.”
He didn’t even want to contemplate what went on for that process to occur. It grossed him out just thinking about it so he chose to not think about it any further.
“The large one out there,” Darold went on to say, “will be the one we’ll have to be the most wary about. The smaller ones, not so much. They seem to like to just snicker and laugh at their prey while their creator does all the killing for them. I will however do whatever it is that I can to keep them off of you so that you can have a good chance at an escape.”
This sorcerer was willing to do a lot for them. Knowing that they were close to dying likely affected their eagerness to throw themselves to the wolves so to speak. “Thanks,” he said.
“If I can do one last good deed and perhaps save a friend of mine,” he began to pet Leo running their hand along their tattered back, “I would do nearly anything before my soul is to finally depart this world.”
He looked over to Lar who kept her arms crossed. “What do you say Lar?”
“I say we give it a day before we throw ourselves back out there.”
“You may not want to delay it,” Darold said. “Wait another day, and I may not even be alive to help you.”
Then do we really have any other choice than to stand once more in that terrible rain and confront our fears?
He let out a sigh resigning himself away to the reality that the comfort of this relatively small tower provided was brief. The safety of it was nice while it lasted, but it all had to come to an end eventually.
“You wouldn’t happen to have something I could use for a weapon would you?” I could really use about anything to fight with so I’m not so useless out here.
“I’m sorry, but unless you’d like to fight with a broom, there’s not anything else here at least within this tower. You may find something useful elsewhere in this settlement, but I doubt you’ll want to linger around long enough to find anything.”
Lar’s fauchard appeared. Since he didn’t have a weapon it appeared that she would have to have his back without him being able to have hers. He supposed if he had to, he could try to use the strange presence he had used against those crows. Although he didn’t fully comprehend that power or whether it would always work.
“Leo, these two are going to help take you to someone that will heal you.” He shook his head angrily. The sorcerer pat his head looking at him warmly. “I know, I know. It’s frustrating, isn’t it? It’s also enormously unfair that I cannot go with you. But I have cherished our time together. You must go and take hold of your future. Let me aid you in this endeavor my dear friend one last time.”
He knew not of all the memories they shared together, but he felt like the two had a strong bond that should never be underestimated. If they could have strong bonds like that, he imagined it would be possible for him and Lar’s to grow as strong as well. At the very least it proved that humans and familiars just like with some of the bonds shared between humans could possess strong friendships among one another as well.
“Now we must go.” Darold lifted up Leo and handed him to him. “He’s in your hands now.” The sorcerer stood back and gestured towards the entrance preparing to lift the barrier “And now, I will try to assist in your escape from this depraved place.”
With a simple additional gesture of their hand, the barrier that kept the entrance sealed began to dissipate.
His heart began to race and it became immediately clear, that he had no other choice than to simply go forward. Darold chose to take the lead with a staff in their hand. Both he and Lar followed closely.
Rain began to cover him once again. It was a feeling he hadn’t missed. He had gotten familiar with it so it wasn’t like he couldn’t tolerate it even if he hated every moment of it with his being.
The rain itself was far from his main concern however. He instead focused on trying to spot the corpse breeders who weren’t immediately showing themselves.
They walked along a muddy path passing by numerous disheveled hovels. Corpses sat outside in certain places. One day they would turn to dust and be no more much like the souls that once occupied them.
As for Leo the squirrel, he held him in one of his hands while Lar and the old sorcerer walked ahead of him. They couldn’t move as quickly as he would’ve liked, but that was due to the old man’s condition.
Snickering appeared towards his left. The tiny creatures twisted their unnatural heads snickering to themselves. They kept enough distance however showing that their intent was merely to mock and watch.
If he had a sword or anything really, he wouldn’t hesitate in killing them. Lar certainly looked eager to lunge at them but she focused on staying by the sorcerer and getting them to the entrance that they began to near.
While he would’ve liked to have reached it without conflict, it always seemed silly to even think of that possibility. Especially when a terrifying high-pitched noise erupted for all of them to hear making it clear, that at least one of these abominations wanted to fight.
Everyone turned to see the much larger corpse breeder approaching them. It would not stand by and let them leave like the smaller ones that knew only to snicker. It demanded instead for them to become corpses like the rest of the dead within so that they could create more of themselves. The thought of whatever they would be doing to his corpse was a thought that made him squirm and feel intent on ensuring that he didn’t meet that horrid fate.
A wall of fire erupted causing the creature’s approach to stall. The flames reflected off the drenched ground covered in puddles with the reflection less than perfect due to the falling rain warping it. His ears began to hurt as a chirping-like sound occurred intermittently from the larger corpse breeder standing behind the wall of flames.
“Keep moving!” the old man yelled aloud.
He walked past the sorcerer heading for the entrance of the settlement. Lar kept up with him while the old man stayed back. As far as he could tell, there was no further danger up ahead. Not immediately anyway.
Once they reached right past the entrance, he looked back to the old man who looked over his shoulder. Before him were a dozen or so of the tiny creatures surrounding him and the large one finally developing the courage to burst through the wall of flames. The sorcerer summoned another wall of fire, this time with far more intensity and rage. The flames began to roar up to the sky causing every hovel nearby to burst aflame. The old man’s shadow stretched far from their body trying to reach them.
In this moment the otherwise injured old sorcerer who might be perceived as weak, appeared quite powerful. They appeared so powerful in this moment in fact, that even he would not want to face against them. He would rather fight a dozen of those half-human half-crow-like creatures rather than face a sorcerer like him.
“Go now and don’t look back.” The sorcerer’s words etched themselves into his mind.
He did as suggested and walked away. This sorcerer gave them their freedom. He wouldn’t take it for granted.
Although he couldn’t help but feel bad as they began to sprint along the muddy path outside the settlement. Leo shook in fear and wept as he carried him in his hand. Their tears didn’t feel any different than the rain itself.
I’m sorry little guy, but there’s no doubt that his bravery won’t be forgotten. And he’s granted you, Lar, and I our lives. We owe it to them, to survive so that their actions don’t go unearned.
When they had gotten a fair bit of distance away, he decided to check back in the direction of the settlement. A plentiful amount of smoke went up to the sky with rain to do its job of putting the fire out.