David swatted at the mosquitos circling his head. The White Torrent had turned into a creek that merged almost seamlessly with the surrounding bog, the border marked only by a narrow path. Created by wild animals, David reckoned. He saw deer in the distance.

Animals, or Fenn.

Despite the path, he had to lead his horse and probe the ground carefully to make sure it would carry the weight of an armoured war horse. Water collected in his footsteps.

It couldn’t be much further now. This looked like a perfect place for the Rot to bury in.

In the distance, the white peaks of the southern Crucible Ridge shone bright in the sun. The ever smaller streams that came down from their slopes collected on this plateau to form the wellspring of the White Torrent. David would have worried about whether or not they had the “real” spring in front of them, given how many tributaries there were, but Morgulon was very certain that they were in the right place.

See, she commented, as a single giant wolf bounded over the marsh towards them.

“Glad to see he’s still alive,” David commented.

Fenn had lost weight since they had last seen each other, and the fur on his snout and shoulders was patchy, the skin underneath scarred. Mud and blood caked his fur. When he spotted David and his entourage, he slowed down. Only his tail wagged excitedly.

You have no idea how glad I am to see you, Fenn said. Does that mean I’m getting released? Why’d you bring those three, though?

We’re going to create a Rot-queen to drive it at the Valoise, Ragna replied, before David could say anything.

Fenn’s tail stilled. He looked back and forth between the elders and the sacrifices. Pettau and Picot whined softly, while David thought deVries was praying. The traitors weren’t really capable of communicating in their wolf forms yet, but there was a vague babble coming from deVries.

You needn’t have brought those three for that, Fenn said. I would have been forced to abandon the wellspring in another month or so anyway. Just turn around and wait for the Rot to do to the rest.

“We don’t have a month,” David said. “The Valoise will be taking Deggan about now. They’ll be ready to sail up the White Torrent within a few days. We cannot let them take Deva, too, or the whole north of Loegrion will be open to them.”

He looked around. “This is the spring, yes?”

A few hundred yards more, if you want the densest spot, Fenn said.

“Dense how?”

Magically speaking, I mean, Fenn said. Most troublesome.

David craned his neck. He thought he saw open water sparkle in the distance. “Show me.”

Fenn shrugged, and turned around the direction he had come from. David felt the push as Morgulon forced the traitors to move after the guardian of the river, and wished she would push him, too. But he had to make his feet move all by himself.

This was it. The final atrocity.

Fenn followed the river. Flies tried to settle down on a nasty gash on his right flank. It looked very fresh, too.

Careful, Fenn said, jumping over one of the rivulets flowing into the Torrent. It was muddy, and there was something odd about the plants growing at its banks. The colours of the flowers were all wrong—a deep brown where yellow and white should have dominated—and the shapes of the leaves were warped, too.

David had only a moment to look, though. As the other elders reached the creek, the plants moved, retreating right into the ground.

You couldn’t have come to help me six months ago? Fenn asked.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“I’m sorry,” David said. “I should have known you’d need support.”

Especially after the battle at the Savre Camp.

“Thank you for holding the river this long,” he added.

I hope you’re not expecting me to stick around once you’re finished with them, Fenn said.

“No,” David said. “No, your job here is done.”

They would probably need the Red to cleanse the spring. Or Morgulon at the very least. With help.

There was a dead Rot-creature on the path, a strange merging of bird and fish, grown way beyond what the shallow waters should be able to support.

Been fighting that all morning, Fenn said. What a waste.

David kicked the thing with his boot. It looked like the kind of creeper even Greg could kill without much trouble these days.

The power of the spring, Morgulon commented, before David could ask. The fur on her neck and back stood on end. You wouldn’t have lasted another month.

She moved past David, but stopped after a few more yards. There it is, she said..

She had to mean the lake David had already spotted. It wasn’t big, partly overgrown by rushes. On the werewolves’ approach, birds flew up from the thickly growing plants, screeching as they went. David couldn’t see any tributaries flowing into the lake—just the creek that came out of it.

We’ll wait here, Morgulon added. You want the middle of the pond, ideally. If you want to go through with this. One more good thunderstorm is all it might take.

David looked up into the bright blue, cloudless sky. It was tempting to wait and leave it to the weather. Just hope for the best.

“No,” he said aloud. “Let’s get it over with.”

As you say.

Another silent command from Morgulon, and the three traitors began to turn human. David didn’t watch their painful contortions. Instead, he took the silver shackles from Silly’s saddle. He was ready long before the traitors managed to stand on two legs. He stared up into the bright blue sky again, blinked against the light, so he wouldn’t have to watch.

It was hard to muster hate for the three naked old men emerging in front of him.

“Please, please, please—” deVries started as soon as he had a human tongue.

“Shut up,” David said gruffly, slapping the shackles on him. Pettau cursed him as he repeated the same with him. Picot didn’t seem to see him until the silver touched his arms.

A few more days, and he’d be attacking David in a murderous rage, unstoppable even by Morgulon’s powers.

David dragged Picot forward with one hand, deVries and Pettau with the other. The silver made them weak as children, but did nothing to make them less heavy. Sweat ran down David’s back before he had taken more than three steps.

He hesitated when he reached the edge of the sedges and rushes that surrounded the water. The air was filled with the buzzing of insects. Static made the hairs on his arms stand up, and Alvin’s ghost flared into appearance even brighter than the sunlight on the lake.

The young werewolf walked ahead, right through the sharp leaves, to the middle of the lake. When he turned to look back at David, grinning wide, tongue lolling out of his mouth, the magic of the river made him look solid. Not real. Not alive.

Like a sliver of the full moon turned into a wolf.

Even the lake’s surface moved when Alvin jumped up just with his front legs, as if he wanted to tell David to hurry up.

Right.

The water sloshed into his riding boots when David pushed forwards. The lake wasn’t much more than knee deep, but he sunk into the mud to his ankles. The reeds cut through his dirty sleeves and skin. The naked men he dragged behind himself were cut up from their feet to their chests, their blood running into the lake, mixing with the dirt David was raising—not that it made a difference at this point.

David reached for the knife on his belt, and Pettau’s hair. The ground beneath his feet heaved before he even finished the motion.

For a second, David thought he had slipped in the treacherous mud, but no—the water was rippling, and he was being pushed up, rising with the ground beneath him.

The suddenly hard ground.

One of the werewolves barked in the distance. Alvin jumped up from the lake, straight up, to land with two feet on the thing that was lifting David. Standing there with the other two feet in the air, the other two feet on—

It looked like a stone. A glistening black stone, vaguely oval. But then the stone hissed, and a slitted tongue, black as the stone, wrapped around Pettau’s leg, pulling them both down before David could let go.

He would have landed hard on his arms, but the water and the mud absorbed most of the impact. Black, oily waves closed over his head. The ground was still heaving, and he rolled, once, twice, as if he had been thrown from his horse in the middle of a hunt, pushing up as soon as he felt himself crashing into the rushes, cursing and spitting.

The water burned in his throat, his eyes, on his skin. He tried to rise, but vertigo hit him like a freight train. He ended up on his hands and knees instead, barely managing to keep his head above the waves. Throwing up everything he had eaten in a week.

The Rot was here.

He hadn’t killed either of the sacrifices, but the Rot was already here.

And it was trying to swallow him whole.