"What...the fuck...was that?"
Everyone in the village of Blackmoor had reacted to the sound. It was the kind of noise that one felt in their chest, reverberating in their very bones. Skin turned to gooseflesh. Blood turned cold. Those who didn't freeze found themselves cowering, running for some sort of security in the form of cover, or drawing their weapons like safety blankets to ward off the terror.
"It sounded like it came from a lot of them," a different voice quivered despite itself. A small gathering had formed in the center of the village. "Whatever they are..."
"It came from the beast," another decided solemnly. Lawrence Clairborne tipped his black hat to those whose attention he garnered with his confidence.
"H-how do you know?"
"Simple deduction, really," Clairborne smiled broadly with dull brown eyes. He extended his manicured finger toward the east. "Roar came from that way. It's the same direction we've been hearing reports of the creature's activity: stomped vegetation and massive footprints a man could fall into!"
"It could be something else..."
"The obvious answer is usually the correct one." Clairborne patted the nervous man on the back. It did little to stop the trembling in the stranger's frame. The foreigner didn't seem to notice. "I'm told the dragon has many heads. Why shouldn't they all scream?"
"So, what if it did?" Brady Sand piped up gruffly. His arms were folded across his thick chest. His axe was resting in a leather holster on his hip. "What you s'pose we do?"
"Well, it's not quite for me to say..."
"Out wiv' it."
"I like to know exactly where the great danger lies. Now would be a good time to sort out where the behemoth has been hiding since it destroyed the gate."
"Madman," a stranger murmured.
"The contrary!" Clairborne chuckled. "We know so little about this dragon, where it came from, where it's been, and what it's capable of. Knowledge is power! Now is the time to pursue it, lay eyes on it! I propose a journey for answers to maintain the security of this village and Yaralon Proper! Surely the warriors in my midst see the value in my perspective."
"You're saying we should know the enemy," a mercenary sighed with his bow in hand and a full quiver on his back. "If we can track it, we can't so easily be surprised by it."
"Precisely." Clairborne's smile widened. He opened his arms toward the gathering with searching eyes. "Any volunteers?" The crowd was silent. Clairborne clicked his tongue and shook his head in disapproval though his grin never faded. "Not a single brave soul? Not even a Yari?"
"I'll come with you," Maxine's even, ominous voice rose.
Clairborne's eyes snapped to watch her meander her way to the front of the small gathering. He looked her up and down a few times before nodding his head. He didn't have to do more coaxing than that. The jab at the bravery of the Yari and a woman, let alone a foreigner, stepping up first seemed to rouse the rest to action.
"Aye," Brady grumped.
"I'll come," the archer sighed. "Name's Viktor. Between contracts anyhow..."
"So will we," a warrior in boiled leather bearing the symbol of a scorpion stepped forward. He had another archer and a pikeman next to him. "We know the road. We'll come along."
"Excellent!" Clairborne slapped his hands together like an overgrown child. He tipped his hat toward his merry band of volunteers. "Grab your gear and some rations for a few trials. Let's away before it's back on the move!"
------------
"Do y'know anythin' 'bout this guy?" Brady asked as his horse moved up beside Maxine's. His eyes fixed themselves on Clairborne's back where he rode ahead, fresh as a daisy like he was riding through his own field. "Somethin' 'bout him..."
"...Isn't right," Maxine finished the sentence for him.
"Aye...Somethin' ain't right. It's like...he's excited or sum, y'know? And not in the way like he's glory huntin' da slayin' of it."
"You notice something missing?"
"It ain't his balls, for sure."
"Where's his sword?"
"Bloody shit," Brady murmured incredulously with wide eyes. "He ain't strapped at all!"
"That's what should have your attention."
"So, Viktor!" Clairborne's voice shouted from the front as they approached the opened gate of Blackmoor Village. He turned in his saddle and spied the solo archer. "How far out do you estimate this beast is?"
"Ah," Viktor, as his name apparently was, spat off to the side of his ride and shrugged. "Ain't no dragon expert. Sounded at least a couple trials ride of swamp, off the main trails."
"Stupendous," Clairborne sat up straighter in his saddle with his springy mood undampened. He looked to the trio of mercenaries just behind him with strict expressions. "Kenny, you up for navigating us through this terrain?"
"Aye, can and will," Kenny affirmed with a stiff nod. "We're off to meet with the other half of our outfit to do an escort for some merchant types. We'll show you the edge of the road, then we'll part ways."
"Amenable."
Maxine and Brady followed behind the small outfit of dragon seekers through the gates and toward the unknown. They took up the rear security for the group, and there seemed to be no protest from the others ahead. If Clairborne could bring his horse to a full-tilt race toward the deadly creature, Maxine figured he would have by now. Namira had mentioned the unforgiving nature of Maiden's Refuge. She imagined the rumors and stories of the dangers awaiting them kept Clairborne moving at a reasonable speed toward his fantasies instead.
"Why are you here?" Brady asked finally after a long bout of quiet between them.
"Immortals seem to will it."
"Superstitious then. I'm much more faithless."
"You?"
"Blackmoor is my home." He frowned. "Man's got a point. We're sittin' ducks if I don't."
"You think he's in town to sell snake oil?"
"No doubt in my mind."
While Maxine and Brady rocked in their saddles, marinating in their shared distrust for their fearless, foolhardy "leader", Clairborne and the mercenaries rode ahead with purpose. Machetes and swords were occasionally drawn the deeper they traveled down the road into the swamp to hack at the branches and brush that had grown in. Horses slunk through the mud and kicked through murky puddles from the minor flooding. Once a wily alligator lunged from the water and sent one of the horses into a tizzy, the archer nearly unhorsed into the reptile's jaws. The travelers had a mind to stay in the middle of their paths after that shocking reminder.
Eventually, the mercenaries led them to a place just off the trail where the terrain and flora had soaked up more of the moisture. Their horses, calves slick with mud and algae, seemed relieved to wander onto the drier land. There was a small structure that appeared to be a makeshift outpost. Clairborne raised his hand to signal the riders to stop at this clearing in the swampland. As though he commanded it, the archer, swordsman, and pikeman Scorpion company dismounted their horses and made for the outpost. Viktor put an arrow on his bowstring from his horse. Brady sat back with his reins tight in his hand while Maxine leaned a forearm onto the horn of her saddle. Once the mercenaries had cleared the little stone outpost, they signaled for the others to approach.
"Okay," the apparent leader of the small mercenary band announced. He sheathed his longsword and began to lead his horse toward an area that seemed designed to hitch. "The rest of you then." Everyone else dismounted and followed him.
Before long the horses were hitched and cared for. Guard posts were assigned. A small fire in the center of the stone rectangular outpost was lit. The mercenaries predictably took the first watch. The Scorpion leader took Viktor along, leaving his two remaining men with scorpions on their leather armored chests with the resting party near the flames. Each man and woman found their own corners of safety to retreat to. Max chose a corner further from the fire and embraced by shadow. Brady, as though he had grown an affinity toward her, gave her plenty of space but rested along the stone wall somewhat nearby. Clairborne sat in the firelight. He sipped on some sort of tea he'd made over the fire, a book in his lap and a pencil in his hand.
"You," the pikeman finally spoke up. He lounged back on his bedroll and gestured to the man with the moving pencil on paper. "Aye, you, Mr. Clairborne. 'Cept for her..." The speaker briefly glanced toward Maxine and then back to the man he was addressing. "...All us here'r Yari boys. Home 'er glory. Why're you out here lookin' for da beast, huh?"
"Why indeed," Clairborne mused with a small smile. Firelight put a gloss on his bald head now that the hat was off. "Why do you get out of bed, Mr...?"
"Boggs."
"Boggs! How fitting. Why then, Mr. Boggs, do you even get out of bed in the morning?"
"Heh." Boggs chuckled and glanced toward his friend. "'Cause I oughta get last night's wench outta bed 'fore she tinks she can move in!"
"What an amusing answer," Clairborne paused his drawing and peered down at his paper, lips pursing at it. "Although I hoped for more."
"Someone got a better one?"
"She does."
All eyes moved to Maxine. She didn't need to open hers to know it. She could feel them all converge like a traitor had been pointed out in their midst. The Rusalka let out a sigh and peered toward her companions. A couple of them shifted uncomfortably in place or adverted their gaze.
"Yes, I was referring to you," Clairborne confirmed with a smile. He looked up from his drawing now and stared at her squarely. "Why do you join us to search for the dragon?"
"I needed a vacation," Maxine answered without missing a beat.
Her flippant sarcasm won her some chuckles. Clairborne practically beamed and he clapped his hands together, gesturing toward her as though showing the other men how right he was. He put his pencil down carefully on the ground beside him.
"That ain't a proper answer," Boggs protested grumpily.
"No, but it is an answer," Clairborne eased him evenly. "A humorous deflection to hopefully make us disinterested in questing further for the honest one."
"Just like asking someone else instead of answering when Boggs asked you," Maxine countered without missing a beat.
"Oh, very good!" Clairborne's wide eyes danced. "I think you and I are here because we have quite the imagination." He picked up his pencil again and stared at the paper in his lap. The rest of the company fell silent, watching him as he soon became mesmerized by whatever image he had drawn. "What do you suppose it looks like?" Clairborne asked the group and then quickly became lost in his art.
-------------------------
By the next morning, the merry band of dragon-interested fools had all risen and mounted their horses. The Scorpions secured their little outpost, throwing some branches over the stone in hopes that it perhaps looked less obvious if someone wandered off the trail. Brady had suggested he believed it was to-trial they would be in the area the great behemoth had roared, and Clairborne was so giddy it was almost childlike.
"Last ride," the Scorpion leader warned the group as they began to trek back down from their sanctuary to the "road" the Yari knew. "We getcha closer, then we gotta split from yous to meet back up with our company." Clairborne thanked the leader with his longsword, the pikeman named Boggs, and their archer before donning his hat. Viktor, likely a disgraced mercenary Maxine had guessed, fell in line behind them. Brady and Maxine took up the rear guard. The incident with the alligator kept them all wary once the ground became sopping beneath them again.
After a couple of loops through the swamp, they finally came upon the evidence they hungered for. Ahead, just off the path, there were footprints in the muddy terrain of gigantic proportion. Water had mostly filled and putrefied in the dragon’s foot print. Trees in its wake had collapsed and been swallowed by the moss, weeds, and wildlife eager to consume what had fallen. Clairborne made the company dismount so they could all inspect it closely. The very air around the man was electrified by his energy. Then they were on the road again.
They rode for half the trial in silence. Clairborne occasionally fixed his hat more snugly onto his head when a branch of hanging moss bumped it askew. His beady eyes moved through the woods, and the absence of his banter made Maxine think he was desperate for so much as a sigh from the dragon. Brady held his weapon in his belt as they carried on, gnawing on a piece of jerky. The only ones who seemed a little more at ease thanks to familiarity was the Scorpion gang.
"Barney," the Scorpion Leader turned on his saddle. His archer lifted his eyes to look at his better. "Ride ahead."
"Aye," Barney gave his response and put an arrow on his bowstring. He encouraged his horse forward and past Clairborne and his company. Before long there was a good few strides between the archer and the party behind him.
"What are your thoughts, Kenny?" Clairborne asked shamelessly.
"My thoughts," Kenny sighed as he gripped his sword hilt. "My thoughts are that a fork is on the horizon. I dun' wanna be caught trousers down if there's some unfriendlies ahead at it."
"Very well." Clairborne didn't seem fazed by the suggestion an ambush was looming. In fact, he smiled. "Are you sure you and yours don't want to stay on? What a lifetime opportunity to miss."
"We are professionals," Kenny gave his steadfast rebuttal. "We have a schedule to follow and a client to serve."
Maxine watched the archer, Barney, continue further ahead until he was nearly out of view. Her dark eyes moved about the thick foliage and swamp that surrounded the shoddy road. Her gaze tightened and she eased the pace of her horse. Brady was chomping on another piece of jerky when he noticed the Rusalka's horse starting to veer away from the path and toward the flank, where he knew the alligators had come from before. He thought to protest her odd choice until he considered she might have been needing to take a risky piss. His skin bristled as she vanished into the foliage but he couldn't sort out why.
"Think of the Yari glory and profit you could earn," Clairborne was still trying to keep negotiating the unhired muscle. "The symbols on your chest would be married to that of the dragon, a great and terrible mystery of a beast! What a tale you could weave for your benefit..."
"You're a clever man, Mr. Clairborne," Kenny nodded. "I'm sure you are gifted in...whatever it is you do."
"I suspect this may be the greatest thing I'll ever do."
"You might be right. If you survive this ordeal, you'll have quite the--"
"AHHHHRGH!"
All the horses were screaming with the sudden cry of a man suffering ahead of the company. Hooves stomped and men growled their commands and yanked on reins. Weapons moved into ready, shaking hands. Clairborne righted his hat on his head. Barney's horse shrieked as it careened through the moss, stumbling and staggering off the road until it splashed into the water off the road. It was bleeding as though it fell upon some terrible mess of brambles. Its eyes were wide and white. Then the alligator lunged from the water at the tell of splashing, panicked prey and latched its teeth into the neck. The men cursed when the reptile yanked the thrashing mount into the swamp where the water turned a violent red.
"Barney!" Boggs cried before he stirred his horse forward with the archer at his side. Kenny was cursing but his commands fell on deaf, emotional ears. The company moved forward in time to find Boggs and the archer at a dead pause. Looming over them was a terror that turned their faces pale and put a shake in their limbs.
Barney was still screaming but his cries were dying with his body. The great creature, made of trunk and branches like a massive seven-and-a-half-foot tree, glared down at its quarry's companions gawking at its form. Moss hung from its bark-like flesh like it was any other Cypress tree in the swamp, and if it didn't have flecks of blood and a screaming man in its grasp, no man might've noticed it at all. Barney was cradled to its trunky-chest in a mess of branch-like tendrils. The tendrils tightened, fastening the human body impossibly to the tree while smaller root-like ones burrowed into the flesh. In short order a sickening series of cracks, breathy shrieks, and gore came about with the violent crushing of Barney into the tree monster itself.
"Fuck!" Viktor howled at the sight.
The root-like tendrils burrowed into the body with more vigor with the taste of blood. Behind the company they could still hear the thrashing of the horse losing its battle with the alligator in the murky water. Excited, more reptiles swam to join the bloody fray and feast on the victory of the first. The tree-like monster opened its bloody tree limbs and the stupor in the mercenaries began to finally die.
"Loose!" Kenny commanded and the first arrow hit the tree man in what could only be described as the face.
The tree monster turned its dark visage toward the archer and began its advance.
"Fuck this," Viktor growled and yanked on the reins of his horse. He turned his mount and gasped at the second tree monster behind them, standing seven feet tall in the center of the road he thought to retreat down. "No, no, no!" He loosed his arrow into the chest of this one, and the arrowhead merely rested where it landed.
Brady looked down at the axe in his hand and then at the two giant behemoths sandwiching them. He swallowed hard and slipped it back into its sheath on his belt. It would not put a dent in the center of the bodies of these woody demons. He knew that.
Clairborne was a statue between Brady and Viktor and the Scorpions directly before him. His hat was snug on his head and cast a small shadow on his face. His hands were empty except for the reins he held comfortably. He tilted his head at the bloody creature in front of him. For a moment his hand reached down and brushed the spine of his drawing book where it rested in his saddle bag.
"Form up!" Kenny yelled. "I said, 'form up', dammit!"
"You motherfucker!” Boggs howled but relented to the commands of his superior. He drew his horse back. His archer companion wasn’t so swift to give domain over his mount.
"Move, scared, dumb bastard!” the archer hollered.
The tree monster was on him. The first swipe of his massive limbs knocked the archer off his saddle. He held on for dear life, ankle caught in the stirrup while the horse careened forward against all sense. The second swipe of the other mess of woody limb knocked horse and man over. Horse crushed man upon landing, and the archer’s next protest was the agonal moaning of a man already lost.
Viktor was still loosing arrows desperately. Each landed, a new ornament upon a beast that did not show any care. Water hissed as it trudged closer to the company, adding the pressure.
"Do we stand or run?!” Boggs asked his superior grimly.
"Stand, always,” Kenny decided harshly. He raised his sword, yelling something motivating that did not reach Brady’s ears. The Scorpion pair rushed the monster and began to beat it with steel in their first pass.
"No, no, no!” Viktor stirred his horse off the path, hurrying another arrow to his bowstring and looking for a new target area in hopes of finding purchase that mattered. "Back, you woody fuck!”
The second monster wearing Viktor’s arrows swiped the horse and spilled the archer onto the swampy road. Viktor gasped and hustled to his feet, starting to run but finding a tendril around his ankle. He tugged. The tree tugged back, and the archer found its hold was tighter than he was strong. His eyes widened as the tendril began to draw him toward the beast. Brady was off his horse now, listening as the man screamed.
"Again!” Kenny called from the front. The Scorpions gave another pass like a miniature cavalry at the first tree demon. The pike drove into the mess of wood and the sword hacked a couple branches apart, sending splinters everywhere.
"Help!” Viktor begged. He tried what he could, beating the tendril with his bow and loosing another arrow into the head of the unbothered predator. He kicked with his other foot but discovered his mistake when another tendril reached for it as he was drawn closer.
"Ugh!” Boggs groaned as he hit the ground, splashing into the muck. Mud covered his face and front. From the water he felt something wrap around his torso and began to squeeze, like an anaconda. "Well…dammit.”
Kenny could barely spin his horse when the squeeze happened. Blood spilled from Boggs’ mouth when the thick mess of tendrils at the base of the beast crushed his rib cage. Then it began to draw him like a tow line toward the ravenous, blood-thirsty enemy. Clairborne still had not moved. His expression had not even changed.
Viktor found his luck turned when Brady retrieved his battle axe from where he attached it to ride on his horse. The blade came down efficiently over the wooden trap, and the archer’s ankle was freed. He wasted no time hustling away from the monster already looking to claim him again with a limb swipe that barely missed him. Brady grimaced at his foe and rested the axe on his shoulder.
Kenny hacked at the mess of branches that tugged at Boggs. He found some purchase, breaking pieces away but his soldier did not get his feet under him to rise. The tree monster took its swing at the Scorpion leader with its other limb. Kenny ducked it, drove forward, and gave a mean series of slashes at the trunk. A small green glow emanated from the “wound” created.
Brady beat back a woody limb when it reached for him. The second hunted for him in quick succession, but that’s when the twister hit it. The monster and its limbs and tendrils leaned, some smaller bits breaking off its form entirely. Brady watched the tree’s form recollect itself and root in place instead of continuing its assault on him. Then his eyes followed Maxine where she dropped from a tree above its head and landed on its massive “shoulders.”
"’Bout bloody time,” Brady grumped with a shake of his head.
Maxine hacked her sword against what would’ve been a shoulder joint on a human. The limbs began to lift but not before they began to break. Branches hissed as they fell from the creature toward the road. The monster reached with its other “arm” for the pest. Max dismounted before she could be scooped up as the others had. Her feet hit the flooded road with a splash.
"I’ll get ‘em and go!” Brady announced to the Rusalka before catching a hold of Viktor by the arm. He dragged the stumbling archer away, toward the middle where Clairborne waited. "Forgot yer blade, wanker?”
Clairborne raised a brow and chuckled, but offered little else. Meanwhile, Kenny was moving with the vigor of a man who killed for a living but suffered the loss of his men. Max was following Brady’s retreat with her sword before her, cutting away tendrils and limbs as they swiped and reached.
"Die!” Kenny howled before he rushed his creature again. His horse faltered, tripped on a limb, and Kenny was sent over its top into the mud. He learned from Boggs and raced to his feet, putting distance between him and monster before it’s appendages could reveal themselves from the swamp floor.
Boggs was regathered by then. His suffering body was rising to Kenny’s ire and grief until it was pressed to the chest of the beast. The tree monster forgot Kenny entirely only to wrap it’s limbs around itself and Boggs, tightening the sustenance won to itself while tendrils worked into the skin like it had Barney. More blood. By the time it was done, Kenny was taking in the sight of bones, guts, and pieces of his friend worn by the abomination.
The leather chest piece bearing the Scorpion was tangled in its form. Kenny sunk to his knees at the sight of that. He looked up at the monster as the limbs began to loosen from its trunk and extend. He felt his sword loosening in his fingers. The shadow of the horrible thing fell upon him.
Maxine’s gloved fist hit it in the chest before it reached Kenny. The stun gloves activated upon impact, and the creature paused as though it had forgotten itself and its terrible purpose. The gladius in her other hand hacked at one of the legs. Her sword was not meant for cleaving like this, but the hits she got in before the monster awakened again were not entirely in vain.
It lifted the leg and put it down, splintering the mess of weakened branches under its weight. Brady came in and hacked next from behind. The limb weakened enough that it snapped, and the monster fell sideways into the muck. Kenny picked his sword back up and found his legs beneath him again. Max climbed onto the thing’s chest and boldly struck it again, again, again, focusing on the center of its chest where the glow of ether drew her attention. Its wooden "arm" smacked her off its top like it was swatting a large fly. Max tumbled through the mud.
The other tree creature had closed the gap by now to help its tripped brother. Kenny had his sword under a thick chest piece against the trunk of the fallen monster, prying it away from the bright green glow beneath. What was left of the small company was starting to gain a collective understanding now: if they were to stand a chance of survival, they had to kill the light within. With a roar and a mess of splinters soaring through the air, Kenny managed to tear a chunk of woody armor off the creature's chest. It was a calculated risk, and his victory was short-lived. The other standing monster was upon him. One of its arms caught his left arm and yanked him into the swamp water.
"You!" Brady was shouting at the top of his lungs now as though hoping the monstrosities had ears. "Ya big ugly fuck! Look 'ere!" He swung his axe into the chest of the monster laying on the swamp floor, the blade of his battle axe crashing against the green glow. The wooden limbs of the beast shuddered by the other did not stop tugging Kenny through the water, past the alligators that snapped greedily at the captured mercenary. That is, until Maxine reappeared.
Her gladius hacked against a weaker portion of the wooden arm, and several of the branches holding the Scorpion leader crumbled. Kenny cried out when the wooden limb released him. His left arm was crushed and he could barely stand, let alone use it to push him to his feet. Brady was still hacking at the green glow, emboldened by the strange shuddering of the flailing tree abomination beneath him with every purchase he made. Rooty tendrils began to snake around his legs but he did not falter in his task.
Maxine had the standing monster's full attention now. Its assault was solely focused on her. She splashed through the thin layer of water on the road, circling the monster and then boldly sliding through its legs swifter than it could pursue her with its arms and tendrils though it tried. By the time she came out the other side and moved to its flank, she was caked in mud and soaking wet. Yet the creature was tangled in itself, unknowingly tightening around its own limbs until it collapsed, tipping into the swamp with its "legs" bound together when it tried to follow her. Kenny saw the same brief opening she did.
The pair leaped onto the top of this creature just as she had the first. Kenny was screaming against his own agony now, letting his mission drive him rather than the shackles of pain begging his body to disobey the fortitude of his mind. His sword drove into the chest of the creature. He was prying wooden pieces away, kicking through branches and brambles while she hacked with her smaller sword. The beast was moving beneath them, rocking and trying to unknot itself like it understood their intentions. The chest piece broke away. Then Maxine hurled her gloved fist into the glowing green well inside, striking it mightily with a defiant yell.
The tendrils and limbs of the woody thing fell limb. The glow of green began to fade and then turn vibrant before fading again. Maxine blinked at it. Then she understood. She shoved Kenny off the creature and dove just as a mess of branches, splinters, vines, moss, and roots all shot out in every direction. Brady had had mid-hack when the blast occurred, and just as the debris hit him harshly, the well in the creature he sought to slay burst too.
Max moaned softly where she landed. Her ears were ringing. Her body was protesting the beating it just took. When she pried her face from the muck she found herself surrounded by the natural parts that once made up both their formidable enemies. She pushed herself upright and wavered in place. Slowly, as the world came into view, she brushed the splinters and bark from her skin and hair. Then a slow, audible clapping erupted.
"Bravo!" Clairborne announced safely from the sidelines. He swept debris from his shoulders and front before dusting off his hat. Then he placed it right back on, hiding his shiny head. "What a performance."
The Rusalka blinked, mind catching up slower than her perception of her world. She looked away from Clairborne's odd display and found Kenny sitting up nearby, wounded but alive. She turned her head in the other direction. Brady was face up in the watery swamp. His eyes were open toward the canopy. A couple of large spike-like pieces of the creature were lodged through his chest. Blood colored the water around him and soaked the soupy of the road. Max stared at him.
"They're called Cypreax," Clairborne began to prattle matter-of-factly. "I imagine they've been communicating with the grass, trees, and brush for some time now...feeling us with their roots, knowing we were coming. They're Cypress trees believed to have been corrupted by the Fractures here, given life by hoarding an ether core and thirsting for souls to keep it fed. It's been hypothesized the well doesn't last on its own, hence its especially aggressive and carnivorous behavior."
With blank eyes Max turned to look at Clairborne. He was still seated on his horse, now displaying the opened page of his sketch book. A drawing of the horrific Cypreax, like the pair they just dueled, sat boldly on the paper as though he drew it the night before. Then Maxine realized that he very likely had.
"You mad bastard," Kenny whispered. His limbs shook and he looked toward the gory remains of his people. "You're either an Immortal asshole...or surely a curse sent by one of them."
"You mourn for them," Clairborne observed with a tilt of his head, snapping his book shut. "Despair not. Cruel and beautiful, that is just the nature of this process they were a part of here."
"A process..."
"Yes." Clairborne slipped his book back into his saddlebag. "All things must die. All things must be consumed, one way or another."
"But not you...of course not you."
"It is the way of things." Clairborne took out a pipe from his coat pocket and packed it with some sort of tobacco. A flicker rang out before the end of it lit. Maxine didn't see him puffing. She was looking at Brady. The scent of tobacco mingled with that of spilled guts and putrid swamp land. "There's reason she is still alive, too. Isn't there, Ms. Maxine?"
"What?"
"She strayed from the company, wandered from the road into the brush. Did you not?"
"I did, but--" Maxine started to answer despite herself, flinching at the sound of an alligator tearing into the dead horse somewhere nearby.
"You knew they were coming."
"I didn't know they were--"
"You knew something was though and you told no one..."
Kenny was even looking at the Rusalka now. Clairborne eyed her, smirking smugly while he puffed on his tobacco pipe. His horse stomped at the muddy road under its feet. Maxine's brow furrowed, eyes blinking while she tried to think back...to rationalize...to--
"I'll tell you why you knew," Clairborne purred darkly. "I saw you the moment you stepped forward at Blackmoore. Sometimes you're the predator, sure. We all saw how powerful and fearless you can be in a fit of reckless abandon...but I know you've been prey in your life for far longer. Prey always makes themselves scarce when the predator draws near..."
"You've lost your damned mind, man!" Kenny shook his head slowly. He drove his longsword into the mud, sinking it until it became sturdy. His one good arm shook while he started to ease himself up.
"The contrary!" Clairborne assured him, unfettered. "I see oh so clearly now. It isn't too late. Come with us, Mr. Kenny. Come rest your eyes on the dragon. Look how far you've come and what you've sacrificed already."
"You sold them a selfish lie!"
"Don't let their deaths be in vain. They served their purpose. There's an order to these things. You and them, can all still be heroes to your country. Don't shy from destiny now."
Clairborne didn't so much as stuttered as he watched Maxine crossed the muck swiftly to rip him off his saddle. He landed roughly with a splash that excited a smaller alligator shunned away from the meals of horse and corpses. His hat fell and drifted on the flooded road. Mud marred his outfit, especially when he shoved himself to a stand. Maxine ran him through with her gladius on the spot. He hissed...and the sound devolved into a chuckle that bounced the pipe between his lips.
"Ah, Ms. Maxine," Clairborne whispered, grunting as he drove himself further into her blade until his ribs hit the hand guard. He clutched her and leaned in toward her ear. Smoke still puffed from the end of his pipe. "When you see him...you will understand...the nature...of...things."
She recoiled from him and struck him harshly with her forearm, knocking him off the edge of her sword in the same motion. Clairborne stumbled, and then he launched off the road into the swamp with a swift heel to his chest. A thrashing splash of water erupted almost as soon as he landed. He didn't make a sound even as the juvenile alligator began to tear him apart, the frenzy alerting the others and causing a couple more to swarm.
"I can show us the road out of here," Viktor's voice shook from the trees. He stepped forward, limping. "If you two don't remember the way..."
"I'm not going that way," Maxine responded emptily. She looked to her horse as it stomped its way into view, making an effort to avoid the splashing reptiles that fed. "I'm going to continue on..."
"My men and I," Kenny's voice shook and he moved to stand beside Maxine, the pair watching the ugly show of reptilian predators tearing at their prey. "We offered up our help to protect our homeland...because the cause seemed noble." He rested a hand on her shoulder gently. "The cause seems noble again. Thank you." He released her and limped over to Clairborne's stricken horse, soothing it with soft words. Then he mounted it painfully. His eyes darkened at the bloody water and chunks of flesh that belonged to Clairborne floating on the surface of the swamp.
"Boggs," Kenny continued softly, voice wavering. "Fucking Boggs. Grumpy fuck but the best time in a tavern. He could sing too..." He shook his head.
"Barney. He loved Moseke. Loved out here, shitty even as it could be. Most mercs, they love the real bastard Immortals, y'know? Raskalarn...Valtharn...Faldrun. No. Barney was devout to gods damned Moseke, praying and all that all the fucking time. Lot of good that did him. Murdered, by a fuckin' bastard grove."
Viktor quietly moved to each corpse while Kenny mourned them, plucking the Scorpion talisman each wore around their necks before delivering them to their wounded leader. Kenny took them in his weak, opened palm. When the talismans entered his hand he curled his fingers tightly over them and brought them to his chest. Then he looped them over his neck to wear them beside his own. Kenny clutched the reins of the horse and his lip curled.
"I'm all out of love for the Immortals. Fuck them all, for all I care. We really are on our own, aren't we?"
"I think so," Maxine responded despondently. Every time she found herself distracted, she always came back to the sight of Brady. "Maybe humanity as a whole would be better if we cast them all aside..."
"Or ran them through like the others," Kenny snapped back grimly. "I wouldn't mourn their ends."
"Hold onto that."
"Like the hate I bore for him?" Kenny jerked a thumb toward Clairborne, the feast for alligators. "I ain't got plans of letting it go." He gestured toward Viktor. "Alright, up. When I fall off this horse, you oughta be ready to take it home."
"I won't let you slump off," Viktor vowed as he gripped the saddle. In a painful lift he hauled himself onto the back of Kenny's house. From his uncomfortable seat he gave Maxine a forlorn wave.
"I'd wish for the Immortals to watch over you," Kenny said to Maxine as he circled the horse toward the fork in the road ahead. "But...I'll bid you good luck instead."
"I'll take it," Maxine nodded her head toward the man. "Get back to your men."
"What's left of 'em...aye."
Kenny stirred the horse forward and before long it was cantering down the path. The Rusalka stood in the carnage, frozen until the men and the horse were gone. Then she moved through the mess and whistled for her own horse. The nimble thing navigated the waters and followed her through the woody debris. She paused briefly at Brady and sighed. Then she got up on her saddle and continued in the direction the massive footprints were leading. Before long she abandoned the road entirely and let the increasingly fresh signs of the dragon, Vielkrontier, lead her toward her destiny.
