Chapter 18 - A trek into the wilderness
The twilight forest was a great forest on the Fae realm, home to many of the fae forest dwellers, like nymphs, sprites, dryads, treants and many others. It’s name came from the fact that it resided in a region of the Fae realm bathed in perpetual twilight.
It’s a coniferous forest, while dominated mostly by evergreen pine trees also has many broadleaf evergreen trees. My first impression when crossing the portal is of a sanctuary against the chaos of the world, whatever problem infected this shard of the Fae realm, it seemed to be very far from where we crossed.
My second impression, made me groan, there is no path to be followed. This being a pathway we use rarely the path was never made or the forest has already reclaimed it. That means we would have to cleave our own way through the forest. The portal closes on our back as I think about our next step.
“The exit seems to the northwest.” Erick says after casting a small divination spell. “Just as per our briefing.”
“Ok, we are going to move in a single line. The order is Johnson leading, then me, Lilian Erick and Lis.” “We have no idea what Fae may have survived in this forest and what might have crossed into it, so keep alert all times.”
“Damn, why do I always have to do the hard work here?” Johnson complains about the fact it will fall to him to clear a way through the vegetation.
“Come on big guy” Lilian teases him “this is exactly reason why we have you. You wouldn’t want little me to do this right?”
Johnson sighs at that. “You are all taking advantage of my good heart.” he murmurs while putting away his hammer and drawing a machete from his belt.
Per our briefing this first part of our mission should take us two hours to reach the portal. Considering that the briefing didn’t say anything about being virgin forest, it will probably take twice as long.
We are all wary of our surroundings as we start moving through the forest, the beautiful scenery with tall trees and the perpetual twilight light isn’t enough to overcome an ominous feeling it gives me.
It was Johnson who broke the silence first. “This forest is so creepy, I can’t hear any birds or other wildlife.”
The kid is right, I realized the fact we don’t see any signs of wildlife is what is making me uncomfortable. Fae forests were always weird and dangerous, but there are always signs of life.
On the path we used in our last mission, we were crossing mostly a dead forest, so the silence wasn’t so unsettling, but here the contrast between a vivid healthy vegetation and a complete lack of wildlife noises, even birds is unsettling.
Still we continued going west looking for the portal out. After half an hour without any changes my mind started to wander against my will as I focused on the next step of our mission.
The enclave diviners have found tracers of a place where a major ley line was leaking magic, creating many magic wells in a small area. Something that if we managed to harvest would greatly increase our supplies. They were close to also divine a safe pathway to get there when the last big wild magic storm hit the enclave, disrupting their efforts.
Now with the storm finally abating, they were able to focus on it again. And the news weren’t very good. They found out that while the leaking is still happening, it was considerably diminished. Not wanting to give up on this new possible magic source, they decided to send us to investigate. Nothing really out of the usual so far, the catch is that the brass decided they couldn’t waste the magic to finish divining a safe passage, so they are sending us on the best they had so far. That is a two parts trip crossing two still unmarked pathways.
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That is the main reason I was so pissed. Having just finished the whole Magic district vampire mess and all the bureaucratic hell that followed, we were being sent in on a high risk mission.
The commander didn’t want to send us like this, but we were in desperate need of more magic sources. After this prolonged storm where near all the Fae courts magic was needed to shield the enclave, most of our magic reserves were used to keep everything else running.
With the storm gone, our current sources of magic should replenish our reserves, but that would take a really long time. And in case of another storm like this last one hits it would mean imposing rationing on the enclave.
The truth is this last storm left a lot of people nervous in the enclave. We never had one that lasted more than a week before, this one lasted over a month. So increasing our magic income and reserves is the hot topic in the enclave at the moment. And so it was decided to save magic by not divining a safer pathway until we could assert if this new source of magic is still viable.
“Captain” Johnson call brings me back to earth, well to the broken piece of the fae realm to be exact but not the point. “There are lights ahead. And they are coming in our direction.”
It take me a few seconds to spot them, there were a score or so of small colored lights coming in our direction. They were fast approaching in our direction.
I immediately ready my defences and summon my magic. Lilian and Erick do it as well.
“They are forest sprites, do not harm them.’ Pyralis says in a commanding voice.
Soon the small lights surround our party and start dancing around us. With them so close I can see what looks like small creatures. They looked like the disney variation of faeries, with humanoid forms and small wings. But their bodies are made fallen twigs and leafs merged together, their wings are small broadleafs.
Sprites are spiritual creatures. They are usually spirits born off places with a lot of life or magic energies, and they are mostly harmless, unless you harm the place they were born from. Forest sprites are, as the name say, spirits born from the forest. And they guard it.
While most of the sprites keep flying around us, a few of them are floating right in front of Lis as if communicating with her.
This goes for a while, and when I’m about to interrupt Lis, she nods to the sprites and they all fly away from us to the south, but they don’t go far. They position themselves in pairs with two meters or so between them. Forming a path deeper into the forest.
I knew right away I wouldn’t like what Lis had to say.
“They want my help.” She states. Damn, I knew I wouldn’t like it.
“Sorry Lis, not happening, we have our mission and the longer we stay here the bigger is the chance of something going wrong.” I asnwer her.
“I don’t have a choice wizard”. Damnit. Whenever she calls me Wizard means she is full on her Sidhe mode. “They are not asking me, they are asking the Summer Court, whom the sprites are vassals of. As a noble of the court I cannot deny help.
“I won’t ask for you all to come with me. Continue with the mission and I if I can, I will rejoin you once I’m done here.
For someone who was showing a big insight on mortals last night, she can sometimes be really naive. Looking around to everyone else I confirmed that there was no way we were going to let her do it alone. It’s good to know that we are of the same mind.
I mean we aren’t a democracy, so it was my call that mattered in the end. But it would be harder to convince Lis to let us help her if someone was unwilling.
As Pyralis start moving following the sprites path, we all move to follow her. She immediately stops and stares at us. I decided to play dumb. “Hey Lis you haven’t told us what the sprites need our help with.”
“I haven’t asked for your help Wizard. This is a Summer court matter, I won’t accept help from a minion of Winter.” Exactly what I expected, once the sprites asked her help as a Summer court noble, anything we help her can be seen as helping Summer, creating a small debt. Pyralis couldn’t accept it. Not out of stubbornness, her allegiance to the summer court really stopped her from doing so.
“Look Lis, personally I would prefer that we ignore the sprites and keep doing our mission. Now since that is not an option for you, then we are going to help you, you are part of the team and our friend.” Lilian tells her.
“Yeah, we leave nobody behind Lis.” Johnson complements.
“Not to mention our chances of surviving this missions greatly increase when you are with us.” Erick answer gets him a look from the other two. But it’s also the one which has the biggest impact to convince Lis.
We got to convince her that we are helping her for our own reasons or obligations, so that it creates no debt for her and Summer. God I hate sidhe politics.
“Also, if we befriend the sprites of the forest, it might make our passage easier on this and any future missions that use this way. Besides I can’t let you go and get yourself killed, you still owe me. But seriously Lis, our help is freely given with no obligations incurred.” I tell her.
Pyralis stares serious at us for a moment. “They are saying that their friend is on the way of danger and cannot get out of the way. They require us to help her.” After saying that she turns and starts walking again. She doesn't stop again when we start following her.