Ripple (Part 3)

She rushed in and swung her staff, keeping the monster from picking up its weapon. Idris did something with the ball of light and it came rushing in at the thing’s face. It swiped at the incorporeal light, halting its retreat. Taking advantage of the distraction, Eana took out its legs with another wide swing.

Idris rushed in and caved in its head with his hammer before saying, “Got another idea,” and casually flicking gore from his hammer.

He raised his hand and invoked Detect again. The quality of the light shifted and the footsteps of the dead imp came into focus. Idris raised the light into the air as high as he could so that they could still see and the steps were illuminated as far into the distance as possible. When the light got too high the steps started to vanish and Idris brought it back down to the appropriate distance.

“If we can see their footprints, we might be able to avoid more ambushes like that,” he said.

“Good call,” Eana said.

They took off into the trees, still not moving as fast as possible with Eana’s hurt leg and the diminished light, but it was better than nothing and hopefully they wouldn’t be such clear targets for the pursuing forest imps.

Ahead they saw a cluster of footprints from several directions, all gathering right behind a fallen tree. The combined misty white energy drifting off the prints congregated with so many of them together. It became like a visible beacon pointing out exactly what was waiting behind the forest debris.

Idris grabbed her hand and led her further into the woods, giving a wide berth to the obvious ambush. But as they cleared it they heard the imps spring from cover. With Radiance and Detect still showing the general area where the two of them were walking, the would be ambushers had now switched to pursuit.

“How on Order’s Path is it even possible,” Idris said, grinding out the words in obvious frustration, “That we came through these woods earlier today and didn’t meet one of these things, and now there’s I don’t even know how many after us!”

Eana just shook her head and kept moving. She raised a hand briefly to put another Minor Heal on her leg, mana once again exhausted.

“How.. are your.. wounds?” she panted.

“Almost a hundred percent,” Idris said, “But my mana is about empty. Where is the bridge?”

And as if in answer, the forest ahead cleared and made way for a packed earth road, and not fifty meters to their right the bridge to Irondale loomed out of the darkness.

They charged forward as quickly as Eana’s hurt leg would let them. She pushed through the pain, putting on more speed than she should have. The wound was opening wider, blood slicking her leg but she ignored it as much as she could. If they could just make it into the node they could rest literally anywhere and she could take care of-

A spear flew past her ear. Then another. Idris cried out and yanked one from his arm.

Then it was Eana’s turn.

A shaft of wood sank into her back, just below her ribs on her left side. The air suddenly rushed out of her lungs like she’d been punched full in the stomach. She couldn’t even cry out as she stumbled and collapsed to the ground.

She had to get up! The bridge was right there.

And something… else. A shimmering wall of shifting, magical energy. In the light of Idris’ Detect spell she could actually see the node.

Idris wasted no time admiring it. He yanked the spear from her back making Eana scream with air she didn’t know she still had in her lungs. There was no strength left in her to protest or berate him for probably worsening her bleeding. And before she knew what was happening she was in his arms and he was running.

The pain was terrible. It shot through her with every rumbling step Idris took. She wanted him to stop, to let her breath for a second, but her whole attention was on her interface. Over and over she tried to invoke Minor Heal, desperate for her mana to return and to lessen the pain just a little.

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The unnerving sensation of passing into magical safety washed over her as they reached the node, and mercifully, her spell worked. Her hands glowed with gold light which she sent rushing through her body to begin the work of closing the hole in her back.

But in the magical light of Idris’ spell, the shimmering wall of the node did something that somehow felt entirely wrong.

It rippled.

Like a massive stone had crashed onto the glassy surface of a lake, the space where Idris and Eana passed into the safety of the node rippled outward. And where the ripple began, a hole had appeared - a space where the shimmering protective barrier of the node no longer existed.

The pain reducing moment by moment as her spell worked its magic, Eana watched the gap forming from behind Idris’ back. He had slowed as he no doubt felt the sensation of having crossed into the node. But he didn’t see it.

“Idris,” she said, voice tight and bouncing with the jolting of his movement.

“We made it!” he shouted, doing a little victory shuffle that sent fresh waves of pain through Eana, making her scream and dig her fingers into him.

“Sorry!” he said, slowing to a stop and setting her gently on her feet, “I just can’t believe it!” He turned to stare back over the bridge and yelled at their pursuers, “Chaos take you all and..” he trailed off.

Behind them more than two dozen of the forest imps had gathered at the edge of the node, staring at the hole which had only just begun, much too slowly, to close back up.

“What is happening?” Idris asked.

Eana tugged on his arm, “We have to keep running.”

One of the maniacal little imps took a tentative step forward across what should have been the barrier of the node. Then it took another. And with a chorus of high pitched screams the whole mob charged forward.

The quality of the light from Radiance shifted back from the blue of detect to the white of the pure light spell and the node returned to invisibility. And with it the two turned and ran.

The adventurer’s camp wasn’t far ahead, and Eana could make out the shapes of a few of them around a camp fire.

“Hey!” she yelled, Idris’ voice joining hers as the two ran with fresh adrenaline toward what might be their salvation. There were at least a couple of dozen adventurers in the camp at any given time, and with the relative weakness of the forest imps they would be able to handle the rapidly closing mob without too much trouble.

If only the adventurers would pay attention.

“Shut it out there!” somebody shouted from inside one of the tents, which drew more attention from the few figures around the fire than either Idris or Eana had with their own yelling.

“There are monsters,” Idris shouted, “in the node!” His hammer was back in his hand.

Eana couldn’t help but be shocked at his willingness to keep fighting. She might have to invest in Toughness because the only thing she wanted to do was pass out. The damage in her back and leg were screaming at her and it was only pure adrenaline keeping her running into the seeming safety of the fire light.

The adventurers looked her over. They were weaponless, wearing street clothes and with no visible magical equipment at all. With eyes half open from drinking they looked back over the path the two had run from and made no moves from where they sat.

“What are you two even on about?” one of the men asked.

Frantically, Eana turned to point at where she knew the forest imps were closing in and was shocked to see that she couldn’t see anything at all. She was completely night blind after having run all this way with-

“Idris!” she shouted, “the light!”

“No mana!” he shouted back. He faced the night, waiting for the horde to be on them.

It was a stupid gesture. It would get him killed. If they ran, the adventurers would eventually kill all the imps. And they did this for a living! They would be fine!

She hoped.

So Eana did the only thing she could think of. Mana pool nearly empty, she invoked Psych Up and with enhanced strength yanked Idris off balance and back around the fire. She screamed with the pain of the effort but had managed to surprise him and his off balance tilt added momentum to her tugging. She yelled at the still seated adventurers, “They’re coming!”

She kept pulling on the off-balance Idris and just as they cleared the far edge of the firelight the forest imps hit the adventurers like wave of screeching green flesh, claws, fangs, and spears. Three or four leapt at each of the seated men, stabbing and clawing viciously. Shouts of alarm were replaced by screams of pain and even as the camp began to stir into life tents were bowled over by the tide of screeching forest imps.

Eana took all of this in at a glance and just kept yanking on Idris, but the much stronger man had finally regained his balance. She kept pulling but she may as well have tried to uproot an ironwood tree with her bare hands for all the progress she made.

“We have to help them!” Idris shouted at her. He raised his hand and launched his orb of light high into the air. He grimaced at the mana headache but over the camp he had brought light to the furthest edges. What he illuminated only made Eana’s decision even clearer.

Collapsed tents were everywhere, and everywhere a lump of a trapped person was visible the forest imps were there, stabbing with ferocious abandon.

They had to get out of there.

“Get to town, get Conrad and Gendra. Get your mana back. I’ll be OK,” Idris said, handing her back her charoite bracelet. With a twist he freed himself from her grasp and ran at the nearest of the imps, the red glow of his imbued hammer rushing through the air like a vengeful spirit of death.

With the knowledge that her other skills drew against her already nearly empty pool of mana and wounded as she was, there was nothing Eana could do that would not just get in the way of the others.

She did what he told her to do.

And yet again, she ran.