Cole

The cart rumbled westward. Dirt and rocks were kicked up by it’s heavy wheels, which wobbled every half-rotation. It had been traveling this path, a trail so ancient that it may as well be a natural formation, since the sun rose. The cart was large enough to hold five people, provided they were bound at the wrists and ankles and forced into tight balls, which the occupants of the cart were.

Cole was one of those bound in the cart. He had regained consciousness an hour ago, but barely had the composure to form sentences. Whatever the kidnappers had drugged him with didn’t wear off easily. Clouds of dust made each breath turn to a coughing fit. The sloppy knots binding him didn’t break circulation, but they did prevent a full range of movement. The most egregious offender in this situation was the sun, which had an unobstructed path with which to fry Cole’s nerves and force his eyes shut. It was only after he felt the embrace of an all-encompassing shade that Cole regained full use of his senses.

For the first time since waking, he became aware of a pair of whispering voices discussing their captivity. The first voice spoke in short grunts that conveyed a complete lack of fear for their situation, and a complete dissatisfaction for it at the same time. The other voice was deeper, more graveled, and yet more urgent.

“There’s only two guarding the cart.” The first voice stated.

“How do you know?” Each time the second voice spoke they punctuated their speech with a series of deep sniffs.

“There’s two.” The first voice repeated, more aggravated this time.

The second voice made an anxious groan. “We have no weapons.”

“Does that make it harder for you?”

The second voice stammered for several seconds before a contented sigh. “You and I share a mindset. My worry was that these guards may be well equipped.”

“They’re barbatus. They’re not strong and they’re not fast. Avoid the stinger and aim for the head.” As they spoke Cole could hear the strain of ropes being pulled taught.

Barbatus. Cole knew that word. He cast his mind back to last summer, when his wanderlust drove him to pour over a copy of Land to the West found in the academy library.

> “Barbatus: The bearded ant folk of Athshin. Known for their alien culture and appearance, Barbatus are to be the source of utmost caution. They have little care for ties to civilization, and are all too eager to engage in acts of slavery to support their underground hives.”

He recalled the detailed sketch of a Barbatus face. A head like a sideways tooth. On one end a quartet of pincers that a morbid mind could easily imagine clutching a skull. The beady compound eyes would stare lifelessly at Cole as he marveled at the creature’s depiction. “Bearded” the book had called them, and not without reason. The chin of the Barbatus was riddled with “hairs.” Some, according to the book, reaching 15 centimeters in length.

Captured by slaver ants. This trip wasn’t how Cole planned it, and yet he felt his pulse quicken. Not out of fear, but excitement. What a story this would make! If he lived, of course, but that felt likely with the confidence exuded from the two strangers plotting escape.

“What is this? Who has taken me?”

Cole felt a stirring in the cart. A new voice joined the other two. It was lighter and certainly from the North. He spoke anxiously, but didn’t exclaim. He was wisely addressing the others in the cart, not their captors.

The other two explained the situation, then expressed curiosity that he was just waking now. The cart had halted in the shadows. Cole heard the shifting of many legs adjacent to them. Perhaps the barbatus were cherishing the shade as well.

“My kind are taken easily by poison. I still feel it in my veins.” The northern voice mumbled. That statement meant he had to be a Fae, but the accent was too posh to be a Wood Elf or Hob. If he was an Elden, then he was almost as far from home as Cole was.

The graveled voice spoke next. “I smell two more that haven’t spoken. Are you awake, or injured?”

“I’m fine.” Cole said quickly in pitched voice. He was so enamored with the scenario that he forgot he was a participant.

The person to Cole’s left, who had been mute up to this point, tried to speak, but it came out as a series of grunts.

The graveled voice sounded eager for them to fight for their freedom. The cart vibrated with the anxious bouncing of their leg. “We outnumber them. I see this fight being easily won. That is…can the rest of you fight?”

“…I can.” The fae answered cautiously.

“Me as well! I’m a dancer with the blade.” Cole grinned under his hood. He was no longer afraid of their situation. This was building to a brilliant scene for him to retell. He did not add that all his combat experience was bound to lessons.

A metal pole struck the back of Cole’s head, rattling it with pain. An insectoid claw slowly dug into his neck. It didn’t break his skin, but needled deep enough to disturb Cole in his blinded state.

> “Barbatus make no vocalizations. Few understand speech, as all language sounds like muffled noise to them, but they do recognize it as communication.”

That passage from Land to the West lit up Cole’s mind. He once spent a daydream wondering what it would take to effectively communicate with a barbatus. He assumed writing would still work, or even hand signs.

“What was that sound?” One of the deeper voices. Cole was not in the right mind to determine which.

Cole strained to speak, fearing another blow. “I think they can hear us, and they want us to stop.”

The claw on his throat relaxed somewhat. The barbatus understood that much, or maybe it only sensed that the plotting had halted. No one would speak now and Cole feared their revolt was quashed before it had begun.

His ear clued in to a small ripping sound towards the head of the cart. Cole held his breath. One of the prisoners had just pulled apart their bindings.

“Be right back.” Was the subdued battle cry of the casual voice.

The cart rattled as something large leapt off it. The claw on Cole’s neck was ripped away. Behind him scuffled steps in the dirt were followed by meaty sounding impacts. The person sitting next to Cole pressed their snout against him. He could feel rough scales under the burlap hood covering their face. Heat fumed from the person’s nostrils. Cole realized they were trying to speak.

“Rimuff te muscle.”

Cole locked- up. He couldn’t focus both on the sounds of battle and what his neighbor was doing. The person repeated their command, angrier this time.

“Rimuff. Te. Muscle.”

The snout dragged across Cole’s arm. He felt a protrusion that was neither scales nor flesh. It was a thick rope tied around their mouth. Cole understood. His hands were bound at the wrist, but he could still negotiate them to remove the stranger’s hood. His hands were now on the person’s face. Their scaled skin was weathered and hot. They growled aggressively the longer Cole took to find the muzzle. The muzzle itself would not slide off easily. It was bound with a crude knot just behind the stranger’s downward chin.

Behind them the escapee was still fending off the barbatus. A burlap sack landed at Cole’s feet. The cart shifted as another prisoner joined the fight. Cole heard them crash into one of the barbatus with an animalistic snarl. Cole could not see the person he was helping, but he knew they could see him. The thought of their eyes burning into him made Cole’s heart beat faster.

With a final pull, the knot loosened, and the rope became slack enough to remove. Immediately, the stranger pivoted to face the battle. From the back of their throat a hiss like a steam vent built into rupturing geyser. Cole felt intense heat over his shoulder. The man was an imperial coatlmade, and he was breathing fire upon the barbatus.

It took longer than it should have for Cole to realize that he could remove his own hood. He found it exciting trying to guess what was going on without sight. Gingerly removing his hood caused his vision to briefly blur. A flat horizon of grain-colored dirt and rocks welcomed him once his eyes adjusted. He looked for the source of their shade and was left breathless by the answer. They were occupying the circular shadow of a geodesic sphere five stories tall. It was the scale of the structure that held Cole’s attention. Stone columns dotted the area to the structure’s front, a little ways west of their position. Coming to Athshin, Cole had expected to see the ruined works of the Teotl, but he had never imagined being close enough to understand how utterly dwarfed he was by them. It was like looking upon the sun-bleached bones of something colossal and ancient and willfully forgotten.

A barbatus was thrown against the cart, causing Cole to yelp in surprise. The shape of it was exactly as the book had shown, though a still drawing could not capture how a barbatus looked in motion. The separate pieces of the head, antennae, eyes, and jaws, all moved independently of each other. Just as Cole was capturing the image in his mind’s eye a green fist cracked into the creature’s chin, snapping sections of chitinous armor that leaked white blood.

The fist’s owner was a lean, shirtless man. Orc-blooded certainly. The plating on his body was subdued, a sign of youth. His left elbow was keeping the barbatus against the cart while the free hand relentlessly pummeled it’s soft eyes. The barbatus struggled against the club-like arm holding it. It’s thorax bobbed in vain to strike with it’s orange stinger. The orc had an intense glare locked onto his target, unbroken only when he blinked. At the eleventh strike the barbatus finally stopped resisting and collapsed from the damage. The orc released him without care. His disdainful expression quickly subsided into boredom.

More movement from within the cart pulled Cole’s attention away from this wondrous display. The captive to his left was struggling with his own bindings. He was a coatlmade. His sleek scales were a dust-beaten imperial red. Ash gray feathers broke through the cracks to form a thin collar that sheltered his neck. He bent over the ropes on his wrists, trying to conjure a whisper of flame to burn them apart without setting alight all else around him. Once freed he made brief eye-contact with Cole. His sallow eyes were exactly as intense as Cole predicted.

The coatlmade followed a path of charred dirt until he came to the barbatus he had immolated. From it he claimed a crude glaive. It was a weathered weapon, but still sharp enough to cut the bindings of those still bound.

This included the second to leave the cart, the man with the graveled voice that had made those inhuman snarls. He was a wecher, a beast on two legs, powerfully built but possessing a blank, almost innocent face. He had been so eager to join the battle that he did not care about his ankles and wrists being tied. Cole fixated on guessing which breed the wecher belonged to. Given the size of the man he assumed Ptesan, though he saw no horns. Amarok then. Cole would have to ask him later, as either would be unheard of in Athshin.

The wecher snatched up the glaive of the second barbatus. He hesitated to offer it to either the orc or the wecher. The orc dismissed the weapon entirely, plainly stating: “Not my style.”

Cole felt another pair of eyes on him. It was the owner of the northern voice. Cole had been correct that they were a Fae. It was easy to tell once he saw the long ears that poked out of the wave of golden hair cascading to his shoulders. He wasn’t an ordinary elf, for only Elden had pupil and iris melded into a solid color. The man had removed his burlap hood and was now clutching it tight over his mouth. He seemed in shock of his current situation. When Cole met his eyes he snapped away, climbing out of the cart on the opposite side. He fiddled with the hood, ripping it into a mask that would cover the lower half of his face.

“Damn it all.” The elden whispered the Sylvan language into his closed hand. He looked like he hated himself for speaking. His slender frame stood stiff. Defiant of all around him.

After reigning in his breathing the elden turned to the others, speaking the common language this time: “There are more coming this way.”

They followed his gaze. In the shadow of a tilted column was another cart of captives. Cole guessed there were more spread amongst the ruins. Barbatus guards peeled away from their own prisoners to recapture those that had escaped. Eleven of the ants were approaching quickly, twisting their claws over the hilt of their weapons. Their thick, reddish antennae bobbed in all directions, their method of communicating to each other.

Cole decided it was his turn to finally exit cart. He almost landed on the striped gila saurian fixed to it. The large lizard was unaggravated with what was occurring, sidling its limbs into the cool dirt and smacking its chapped lips.

The wecher took stock of the approaching ants, then turned to the group with a grin. “So we must fight for further freedom. If we are to shed blood together I wish to know your names.”

“Rerume Mesoré.” The coatlmade stepped to the lead of the party.

“My name is Cole.”

“Bréag.” The elden said quickly.

“…I’m Azeroth.” Said the orc after some consideration.

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The wecher flashed his ivory teeth. “Good names. I am Frost Wildoath. May the scars we give and take be in equal measure.”

“We’re outnumbered and only two of us are armed.” Bréag urged in a firm tone.

“Three.” The orc flexed his bicep within Bréag’s sightline.

“It won’t be enough, not without losses.” Bréag explained, words hissing between his teeth. He stumbled slightly, still affected by the drug. His purple eyes examined their surroundings.

“There.” He pointed to a staircase at the base of the sphere. It was wide enough for three people to stand side to side and circled the exterior of the structure. “We lead them to that choke point. No need to make this harder than we have to.”

He was practically begging them to retreat. Rerume didn’t require further convincing and sprinted for the stairway the moment Bréag finished speaking. He didn’t look back. Bréag followed after a final pleading look to the others. Frost gaped, the wind taken out of his sails. Azeroth made a small shrug and went for the stairs as well. Cole was frozen in place, entranced by what Frost would do now that he was effectively alone. Frost’s teardrop ears flattened. He shouldered his glaive and followed suit.

Cole liked the idea of their small band overcoming the superior numbers with skill and strength on the open field, but this was the cleverer thing to do. Sprinting to catch the others, his foot caught on something soft buried in the loose dirt. It was a quiver loaded with five rusted javelins the length of his forearm. He brought the quiver with him, holding it high to show the others.

Rerume was uninterested. “This is Athshin. A dead warrior’s weapon is not the strangest thing to find buried. If it’s still sharp, use it.”

“Oh they’re definitely sharp.” Cole responded after one of the javelins drew blood from his prodding finger.

Despite having four legs, the barbatus were not fast runners. The five escapees had time to begin ascending the steps before the first ant reached them. The barbatus struggled to accommodate each other on the steps. Each was equally eager to maim the escaped prisoners first. If one was knocked off by its brethren it would scramble to summit the steps again.

This was all in the prisoners’ favor. Frost and Rerume attacked the barbatus that drew closest. Though Cole was no expert himself, it was fair to say that Frost had never used a glaive before. He was swinging it like a club, not accounting for the length. Still, his ferocity was not without merit as it kept the barbatus on the defensive.

Rerume performed better. After a few quick clashes he sunk his blade into the middle segment of the barbatus’ body. Dissatisfied with that, Rerume struck harder, cracking open the exoskeleton and spilling the white innards of the barbatus down it’s side. The creature’s body locked into a fetal position as it expired and was quickly knocked aside by it’s brethren.

There was no room for Azeroth in this melee. Dissatisfied with that, he leapt from the steps, encouraging those barbatus that fell to fight him rather than rejoin the battle above. This top-down perspective on the orc’s pugilist style brought an admiring whistle to Cole’s lips. Observing these three warriors, Cole had to impress them with his own ability. Even Bréag, who didn’t fight directly, was watching the movements of his allies and foes with an unwavering tactician’s eye.

“What arcana can you perform?” Cole asked over the sound of battle.

Bréag’s eyes briefly flitted to Cole’s. “None.”

“None? You’re an Elden!” Cole exclaimed. With all that had occurred, this had drawn the most shock.

“I’m aware!” Bréag howled bitterly. He would not engage with Cole further.

Cole turned away from Bréag and absently twirled a javelin in his left hand. He had never used one before, but it didn’t seem terribly complex. Each time he was prepared to attack Frost or Rerume would block his shot, causing him to stumble. Above all, he did not want to hit someone by accident and botch their building camaraderie.

Determined not to be useless, he backed up to get a better angle on Azeroth’s brawl. The javelin whipped from his hand in a smooth motion. Gravity did most of the work to skewer his target through the ample thorax. Azeroth finished the creature with spinning kick that careened it into the base of the sphere. The orc cocked his head upwards, confusion on his face. Understanding what Cole had done, he made a hesitant nod of thanks before bracing for his next attacker.

Emboldened by this praise, Cole ascended higher. His hasty heavy footsteps proved too much for the erosion rotted steps. As he drew his next javelin, the stairs beneath him shattered. All became a blur as Cole pivoted on his heel to return to stable ground. His arms flew out, prepared to seize whatever ledge he could.

A hand clasped around Cole’s forearm, which he reciprocated with his own panicked grip. Bréag had come to his aid. His eyes were shut with the strain of pulling Cole up. The dust covered steps offered little traction. Cole assessed how far from the ground he really was. It was around five meters. He could survive the fall. Azeroth came into view, chased by three barbatus. The ants were corralling him so that his back was to the wall.

“Drop me.” Cole said breathlessly.

“What?” Bréag struggled to speak. His grip was slipping.

“Drop me. It’ll be impressive.”

The hand on Cole’s arm released. Cole shut his mouth tight to prevent his insides from lurching out. He crashed into one of the barbatus, cracking it’s exoskeleton and leaving it sprawled. Cole’s own body bruised, but did not break. The landing jumbled his mind. He rolled off the barbatus and kicked upwards at the first shape to approach him. His boot struck against something smooth and twitching. One of the ants was bearing down on him, intent to pin him with its claws and subject him to its eager stinger. It writhed away from his next kick, giving Cole an opening to roll to his feet.

His javelins had scattered with his descent, but one remained. As the barbatus lunged again he did a quick pirouette to get into his fencing stance. The javelin he held was obviously a poor substitute for a foil blade, but it would do for this life-or-death moment. The barbatus performed a small u-turn to recover the spear it had dropped. Cole squared himself against this single opponent.

The barbatus was a hard opponent to read. Most enemies you watched the subtle gestures: where their eyes were looking, how they shifted their feet, the twitch of their weapon, but the barbatus was of such alien design that Cole didn’t know what to focus on. As such, the beast landed a few shallow cuts on Cole’s arms and chest. Cole aimed to parry a hard thrust, but his rusted javelin snapped under the duress. It would’ve been a comical moment had Cole’s life not been on the line.

When the barbatus thrust again, Cole slipped to one side and wrapped his hands around the shaft of the spear. Both struggled to rip the weapon from the other. The barbatus’ claws scrapped the wooden shaft. It’s head bobbed forward, trying to nip Cole with its serrated jaws. This was the illustration of Land to the West horribly realized.

“On Storms Rock I locked myself into a terrible struggle..,.” Cole recited under his breath. This moment had reminded him of a poem about a warrior that grappled a lightning bolt from the goddess Pashindra. It was foolish and distracting to think of that now, but it was all Cole could do to keep himself steady.

“-I did not need to prove my strength, only that I could endure.” Cole exhaled. It was a pointless gesture, but he grinned at the barbatus. Seconds later, Azeroth’s large green hands seized the creature and cast it aside like a sack of laundry.

Upon impact, the barbatus thrashed in the dirt to regain it’s footing. If it was capable of any vocalization, it would be screaming in anger. Cole snatched one of his discarded javelins and lobbed it for the killing blow. The battle settled, Cole looked to his companion grandly.

“We’re victorious!”

Azeroth was silent. He regarded Cole with a strange curiosity and suspicion.

Reigning in his adrenaline, Cole nodded to the last barbatus. “Thank you. For that.”

“You would have died otherwise.” Azeroth flatly stated. He turned away from Cole, walking toward the base of the stairs.

Cole nodded to Azeroth’s back. He made a final check that the surrounding barbatus were indeed dealt with. “…Aye. I suppose that’s true.”

After gathering his spilled javelins, Cole sprinted to catch-up to Azeroth and match his stride. The orc was fiddling with a wound on his chest. After a pained grunt he ripped free an orangish barb ten centimeters long. Cole recognized it as being one of the barbatus stingers.

“Was that from the one you threw?” Cole followed the stinger’s trajectory after Azeroth tossed it aside.

“I’ll be fine.” Azeroth commented.

“Oh I wasn’t worried.” Cole casually jammed his hands into his pockets. “One sting isn’t lethal. It hurts though, right?”

“Prick yourself and find out.” Azeroth thumbed to the stinger in the dirt behind them. Cole laughed, which drew the same perplexed look Azeroth had made earlier. It seemed like the orc didn’t know what to make of him.

They walked in silence until rejoining the other three. Frost and Rerume had been victorious in keeping back their half of the barbatus. Frost had abandoned his glaive, admitting that it had snapped when he swung it too hard.

Other than Cole, Frost was the only one finding any sort of thrill in their current situation. As the two halves of their group rejoined he made a beeline for Azeroth, coming close enough that their chests could touch with too full a breath. “You! You and I must fight when this is done.”

Azeroth pulled away from Frost’s panting breath. If Cole perplexed Azeroth, Frost utterly baffled him. “That’s a pretty big ‘when.’” He turned with intent towards the cart they had escaped from. The saurian hadn’t moved for the duration of the battle.

“You fight like your limbs are clubs.” Frost confessed, eager to hold Azeroth’s conversation. “I’ve never seen a warrior do that, not outside the grapplers of my tribe.”

“Orcs like to fight with our hands.” Azeroth answered plainly.

“They’re built for it.” Cole chimed in. Like Frost, he was curious about Azeroth. He had seen orcs in crowds, but could scarcely say he had spoken to one intimately. “But you’re not fully orc, are you? ‘A child of a separate father,’ as they say.”

“That’s right.” Azeroth replied. His passive-aggressive tone blockaded further inquiries.

As Cole and Frost prodded Azeroth for answers, Bréag and Rerume were assessing their next steps. The two seemed to have a professional rapport building, which was refreshing to both given the priorities of their current company. It was Rerume that put a definitive end to the idle chatter.

“Bréag has a plan for commanding the saurian. The four of use will see what remains of the barbatus that did not pursue us.”

“We can free the other slaves as well.” Cole agreed. No doubt those still bound on the other carts were confused about the prolonged break.

Rerume nodded once, but it seemed an afterthought to him. He took their lead and refused any to walk ahead of him. His manner was intense enough to bring silence to Cole and Frost, who equally tightened their lips to prevent from spilling into further conversation. Azeroth didn’t need such restraint. Taciturn seemed his default mode of communication.

The nearest cart was an arrow’s distance from their own. Cole volunteered to cut the captives free, wisely believing that he had the most welcoming face for them to see in this situation. The first four Cole cut free were plain folk. Tan-skinned humans native to Athshin. Not the kind of warriors Cole had woken among. They spoke in troubled tones, but Cole did not understand a word of it. It was similar to Shinar’s Common, but featured too many words he did not recognize.

“Dustspeak.” Rerume stepped forward to translate. “I know some of the dialect, enough to understand they come from a village far from here and are terrified to have been taken from it.”

Cole tsked that he couldn’t receive the hero’s praise he expected and let Rerume calm the villagers. He ebbed from their view and cut free the fifth prisoner, who sat at the back of the cart as still as a statue.

“Hello? Are you alive?” Cole shook the stranger.

“Yes.” Was the small, quiet response. Slowly, the stranger removed the bag over their head.

Another human. Black hair cut to a flattop with a thin goatee circling his thin lips. His eyes were blank, but he didn’t break eye contact with Cole. Then, as if a blockage in his mind cleared, he leaned forward and offered his hand to Cole.

“Lyr.”

Cole took the hand carefully. He was glad this one spoke Common, but Lyr had half-lidded eyes and an unreadable expression. He bled an aura of mystery, and so Cole asked “Who are you Lyr?”

“Nobody of importance.” Lyr answered as he left the cart.

Lyr seemed the odd one out for this group of captives. He could speak Dustspeak better than Rerume could, but carried himself in a much different manner than the villagers, who looked at him with no recognition.

“These folk are from a village called Scratch. They’re grateful for being rescued but are bit wary of the...monsters.” He made a subtle gesture towards Azeroth and Frost.

Azeroth caught the implication. A labored sigh blew between his lips. He turned his back on the group and went to investigate the plaza further. Frost, sensing opportunity to engage with Azeroth, followed. The villagers of Scratch watched them carefully and trembled each time Frost looked back in curiosity.

“They’re afraid either of them could turn on us in this situation.” Lyr continued coolly.

“I don’t think either of them want to turn on us.” Cole dismissed the concerns with a casual smile. They were, of course, concerns that Cole had in the back of his own mind, but he wouldn’t bring them to the fore until he had proof. Azeroth was flippant, not hostile, and Frost’s eagerness was too genuine to be a deception.

“I’ll take your word for it. As for me, I belong to the Lion’s Claw. Heard of it?”

“A mercenary company?” Rerume scowled. It was a fair guess. Such groups were common in Athshin, where soldiers would only go so far to help those beyond their city walls.

“I think we’re more like a protectorate.” Lyr answered. He was tranquil enough that Cole assumed he was still fighting the effects of the drug. “There should be another of my group bound here. An earthen coatlmade named Trub. The two of us were investigating the Barbatus, and wound up caught for it. Now who is that?”

Lyr squinted past Cole and Rerume. Bréag was approaching with their cart. He walked astride of the saurian, his hand hovering behind it’s head like there were invisible reins he was about to seize. At his touch, the saurian slowed to a standstill adjacent to the second cart. Bréag seemed satisfied with himself.

“They’re tame enough. I figured that if the barbatus don’t speak then they must use touch commands. Insofar I’ve figured how to make them stop, and go, which will be enough for leaving this place.”

“Yes. It will.” Rerume spoke firmly and gestured to Lyr. “If this man is to be believed, then there is another batch of slaves remaining. I assume those two have already sighted it.”

He nodded to the pillar where Azeroth was using a stiff arm to prevent Frost from venturing further. Frost was urgently pointing to something out of Cole’s sight.

“Best I go with you. If Trub is there then he’ll want to see a…friendly face.” Lyr thumbed his goatee as he thought. A golden ring glinted on his left index finger. Cole felt a spike of envy catching that. He had not been spared anything so valuable.

One of the villagers, an older man with wisping white hair, pulled on Lyr’s sleeve. He whispered and pointed to Bréag with wonder. Bréag, in turn, locked up like he was about to be accused of murder. After a short conversation, Lyr turned the man away.

“What was that about?” Bréag approached cautiously.

“Nothing much. He wanted confirmation of what you are. Only heard of your kind in stories, same as the orc over there. They’re not afraid of you, though. Quite the opposite.”

Similar to Azeroth, Bréag showed visible discomfort at having attention drawn to his race. And like Azeroth, his solution to this discomfort was vacating the area. Lyr watched him leave with interest, and soon followed. Both were joining Azeroth and Frost. Before Cole could set himself that way, Rerume forcibly turned him around.

“These people are nervous. Best if you stay to give them comfort.” His orange eyes narrowed and he spoke again before Cole could respond. “Or is that beyond your ability?”

Cole swallowed. He sensed an insult loaded into that question.

“I’ll guard them with my life.”

It was a dramatic line. Perhaps too dramatic. Cole didn’t care. He was living in an adventure now.