Author's Note : So anyways, bad news, the worse news, then good news, then ugly news. The bad news, I'm doing another side story, so I'll be leaving this on pause for a month or so, enjoy the super cliff-hanger. The worse news it's nine updates long. The Good News! It's completely written so there's no 'It's nine updates that's actually eighteen udpates' I will be posting it separately so that people can skip it for now. The ugly news, it's a beach episodes (I've been informed I'm required to do one.)

Hopefully by the time I'm done posting it, I will have finished this arc.

Halkegenia Online v3 – Chapter 10 – Part 5

Pain, physical pain, had been Sheffield's constant companion as a girl. Pain to cleanse herself of sin. Pain to show her worthiness. Pain to help forget everything that was not God. Pain had become a tool as much as a torture, and so her fear of it had dulled. To walk the path of righteousness was painful, she had been told, again and again as she had been subjected to pain. And for a time, she had been willing to believe it. Until more often than not, the one wielding the lash or denying her food was herself.

Sheffield had thought herself accustomed to pain, until now, the sensation like fire burning up her arm and smoldering at the base of her skull, maddening as it throbbed and seeped like molten lead poured slowly over her brain. It was hard to imagine that just minutes ago it had been so very much worse.

The nausea assaulted her again, a reminder of the way she had tried to wretch up the contents of her stomach at the merest reminder of what the backlash had been like. 'Backlash', Sheffield steadied herself against the wall of the passage, that was the only word that seemed to describe what she had experienced.

The 'Inquisitor's Eye', that was what the scrying liquid had called itself when she had touched it. She'd known at once, everything about its creation and purpose, a purpose it had no doubt been put to good use on many occasions before finding itself forgotten here. Falling under its influence should have left any mind hopelessly snared by the Eye's wielder, their helpless victim to be picked apart at leisure. As a desperate trap laid by the Familiar Myozanatinir it should have had suitably devastating results.

It had, after a fashion, even as it had failed catastrophically. Sheffield touched her hand to her nose, her fingers came back warm and wet, bloody. The Familiar's whole body trembled as the afterimages appeared behind her closed eyes . . . the after images . . . and the after impressions of . . . something.

Her feet quickened.

Just thinking about it was enough to restore strength to her legs, a surge of fear propelling Sheffield back into a stumbling run. She didn't know what that . . . thing was beneath the guise of a girl. Fate forbid the Fae have more of her. She wasn't a Faerie, she was a monster. But whatever she was, Sheffield feared it. Whatever she was had done something that was not possible.

Fear, visceral fear, had been a stranger to Sheffield for the longest time. Of course she did not fear pain to any particular degree, nor did she overly fear her own death, inevitable as it was, fear was as meaningful to the prospect of oblivion as defiance or any other human emotion.

This was different though, this was something alien and unknown to her. Sheffield suspected it might be unknowable. She had been confronted by a being that had defied her predictions, and the predictions of her familiar runes, and that being was trying its hardest to kill her at that very moment. The lingering echoes of intent still crawled at the back of Sheffield's mind, the vague and overwhelming impression of hate, pure, choking, and almost tangible.

That was the motive of the thing hunting her. A storm of hatred and rage that fed upon itself and only grew stronger with every moment. Sheffield knew this, and she knew how she knew, and knowing simply made it worse. For the first time in a very long time, at least since her binding as her Master's Familiar, Sheffield's found that she feared.

All the more reason to flee.

Run, Sheffield thought to herself, she had to run, she had to get away!

There was a guardhouse on the edge of the Saxe Gotha estate, where Saxich Bridge connected the outer Noble estates and market to the city proper across the river, staffed at all hours by detachments of mage soldiers. She needed to get there she told herself as she verged on gibbering terror. She just needed to getthere and she would be safe. Truthfully, she did not believe that for a moment.

The passage widened as Sheffield neared the door that would let up into the crypt above. The door was still open and the spiral stairs as she had left them. She needed to buy herself some time, slow that monster down, she thought quickly, nerves jangling, as if her mind was wrapped in thick steel wool.

Hands, searching by memory and feel, found to small, metal disks in their pouches upon her best. She shrew both of her back and tried hard not to think long on whether they would be enough, or whether she would be cut down before she reached the top of the Crypt. Flightless as they were underground, Sheffield had seen the land speed of a Faerie first hand.

Heels striking sharply with each step, up the hundred spiral steps, the Myozanatinir almost hesitated, panting, as she passed the plinth and its engraved seal. Dare she use it now? Doubt mixed within her. If she had held faith in anything it was her Master and the encompassing power of Void. But her Void granted power had not foreseen her assailant nor warned her when she had used the Eye . . .

Noise from below forced her hand, the whip crack sound of the anemone she had left behind unspooling to seize their pray and the unhappy noises of something fighting them. It was doubtful the Faeries would be held by such measures for more than a moment.

Before she could linger long on the thought, Sheffield reached out, touching her hands lightly to the pedestal and biting down a grown as the concentration that her power demanded gave new life to the throbbing ache. If it had taken but a few moments longer it would have grown to be unbearable, but the pain faded all at once as she heard the slow grinding of ancient stone and released her concentration all at once.

The spiral staircase was raising itself, haltingly, step by step, soon to entomb whatever was caught inside. The Myozanatinir didn't dare stop, however, fleeing through the crypt's entrance, her eyes flashing to still smoldering remains of a corpse, one of her reanimated escorts, burned down to char and bone.

Her assailants knew about the undead and their weakness? Of course they did! Sheffield clutched at her temples, panting heavily and impatient with herself, with the sluggishness of her mind, and more with her failure to martial herself. She was better than this, she knew at any other time, but now, she won the battle with her faltering concentration, for the time being, shaking her head to clear a bout of dizziness.

They had proclaimed her a Necromancer. And they had dispatched one of her escorts by decapitation and incineration at the very least. Foolish not to see what was before her eyes. Foolish not to think that the Faeries would send someone to avenge their dead as well. It had always seemed like Cromwell's brand of problem, a matter that was far from her immediate attention, born out by attack on Kingston and the death of Governor Barnard.

The second of her Faerie guards lay immolated on the outer steps of the crypt, the heavily carbonized remains of a sword still clutched in one skeletal hand. Not far from corpse the Steward's escort, a pair of mages, had been dispatched by the conventional expedient of slitting their throats to the vertebrate.

A detached portion of the Familiar's mind noted that it was an appalling display of brutality, unrecognizable for the efficiency she would expect to see in an assassin. But for the majority of her mind, she was long past any awareness of this detail. No, what mattered more to her at that moment was what lay beyond the corpses. The horses were still alive, the assassin had neglected to slit their throats along with their riders, and if she had any hope of escape now, she was going to need them.

There were seven in all, five gray and white ponies borrowed from the Steward's mansion, and two . . . Sheffield hesitated to call them horses, much less beasts at all, as she came upon the two black maned and leather armored behemoths, each twice the size of a draft horse, frames covered in tightly bunched muscle beneath an obsidian black layer of self-grown armor, a wicked, iron sheathed horn rising from their brows this moonsless night. Legend was that there was some Unicorn in them, along with the Earth Drake, and Warhorse blood that had given them their monumental forms.

Dullahans, a creation of Germanian alchemy immensely favored as fearless war mounts. With their gigantic builds, grotesquely engorged musculature, and legendary resilience and stamina, they were monsters of a different sort than the one chasing her. Long ears perked and heads rose as Sheffield approached them.

She knew neither beast, nor did they know her, but that was just as well. They showed no alarm as she neared, calm in a way that no natural beast could be, nostrils flaring as they exhaled jets of steam and tossed their narrow, triangular heads. These must have been from the stocks purchased by her agents for Cromwell's army. Pure Germanian bred, a deceptive rarity given the realities involved in their creation. The original Germanian herds were coveted for their obedience to a rider as much as their fearsomeness.

The fact that they could cover a mile a minute at a full gallop and maintain such a speed for upwards of ten miles distance was all the more reason to select one of the two living war engines, grabbing the reins and hiking a foot into the saddle stirrups to throw herself up and into the saddle.

The Dullahan's breathing deepened as it bore her weight, frame trembling as she stroked the short fur of its neck where skin fused into armored plate, pulling gingerly at the stirrups and feeling as the mount obliged eagerly. Then with only a moment to catch her breath, Sheffield kicked her heels into the animal's flanks, holding tightly as it was spurred at once into a cantor and then a gallop.

Swift and powerful, and with a gate like a wild animal. Dullahans were obedient beasts, but the riders that mounted them required the finest of riding skills just to stay mounted in the conditions of battle. Sheffield, lacking their armor, harness, or boots, was left to hold on for dear life, alternating between gasping for breath as she batted about and spurring the animal to still greater speeds.

The gravel road laid along the edge of the Saxe-Gotha estate became a pale white blur beneath the heavy hoof falls of two and a half tons of armored muscle, bone, and sinew, frame straining in a tireless sprint as Sheffield directed them along the curve of the roadway on the shortest path towards the feeble lights of the city and some hope of safety.

Casting an eye back over her shoulder, the Myozanatinir shivered at what she saw. Lights like fireflies rising into the air, three on yellow and gossamer wings. If she'd had any doubts to the fate of her assailants, they were extinguished now. She had . . . nothing that could stop them.

Her Master's eyes and ears, Sheffield's task was never to fight, and the tools which she wielded were at best a means of protection. The Anemone Traps, Deda's Butterfly, and Whirlwind Talisman were the extent of her personal weapons. Between her escorts and artifacts built for observation, they should have been more than enough to defend against anything that slipped through, or so she had thought. Now she was seeing how laughably inadequate they really were.

Keeping one hand locked in a death grip about the reins, her other clawing blindly to pull the protective talisman free from its pouch, the mechanism glimmered faintly in her hand, ready to used again as a last means of protection. It wasn't going to be enough, she knew as the Faerie wings, traveling low below the tree line to escape notice from afar, began to spread outward, searching for her. She would be spotted soon, and then they would converge on her in the open.

What she needed was something, anything to repel them, and as ludicrous as it seemed, she had begun to search the saddle until she came upon a quartet of tubes, heavy, and weighted at one end, packed into a heavily padded holster at her back. Flares. At first Sheffield was surprised to find them on the saddle of a mage soldier, but a moment's thought explained the mystery.

If the Dullahans were assigned to commoner scouts, as they might be as part of the garrison, then the men might need to mark their position by a means other than magic. Keeping the saddles of patrol mounts stocked with essential provisions was only sensible. Each flare contained a gunpowder charge powerful enough to propel it into the sky and an alchemic mixture that would burn brightly for the duration of its flight. The markings on the tubes proclaimed two yellow, a red, and blue signal, enough for a soldier to send a simple binary message that would be visible for at least a league in every direction.

The hunters at her back were beginning to gather speed, swooping low and vanishing for a moment behind a crest of a low hill only to appear again nearer and traveling faster towards her. She had been seen! And with that revelation the fear was redoubled. Grabbing the first flare tube, she tore the drawstring free of its wax seal and began to wrap the extra length around her free forearm while clutching the reigns with one hand, the end of the firing tube held away from herself in the crook of her arm.

She just needed to keep them back, away until she could reach the guardhouse at the bridge. She repeated that like a mantra to herself, as if saying it enough times would make it true.

The Faeries vanished again among the crowns of a copse of trees, sight of their glowing wings blotted out in the sea of leaves, lost to Sheffield's sight, the night sky was lit again only by the distant dusting of stars. No sight or sound of the Fae, or of any creature of flight until, very suddenly, a growing faint noise caused Sheffield to turn her eyes to her left as something threw itself from a branch high above, blade of glinting black metal coming down in a plunge.

Reflex saved her as Sheffield instinctively threw up her arm for protection. A deafening –Hiss- and a flash of light, blinding even through closed eyes, was joined by a burning sting, like molten sand biting into her cheek and temple. The flare didn't strike home, instead missing cleanly as the Faerie's wings flashed into existence and altered her trajectory at the last instant. By the time the after image had vanished from Sheffield's eyes, her assailant had been gone again. The Myozanatinir dared to think that for a moment she had heard a scream of rage as the assassin dropped back behind her.

They had vanished, into the trees and the dark all around her. Maybe they were the dark, something small and childish betrayed Sheffield, sending a tremble down her spine.

No. Foolish! The Faeries were not supernatural, they were creatures that bled like any other, her observations bore that out. The throbbing in her head grew again and she was powerless to stop it.

The light had banished them, the light, she thought as she hurriedly readied the next flare and shot it into the trees at the first sign of what might have been movement. She by no means could say for sure, but in the glare of light and shadows, she thought she'd had seen something flee. Without restraint, another flare into the blackness, dazzling as it ricocheted through the trees, casting harsh light and harsher shadows in every direction and then the last launched to her back as she was certain one waited there.

The spent flares fell, empty tubes smoking as they dropped from the saddle and Sheffield wrapped her grip tighter around the reigns.

The Dullahan's head came low, breath panting as the crunch of gravel became the sound of iron shod hooves striking cobble stone without slowing. They were through the tree line, through the old ornamental gates that stood abandoned on the edge of the estate and now the buildings of Saxich Street, closed and dark at this hour of the night, were rising around her, two and three storied stone and wood construction and at their end, Saxich Bridge, its overbuilt construction darkening the sky and narrowing the thoroughfare to a bare double cart-span overseen at the far end
by a single glowing point of light, the guards in their blockhouse.

Relief dared to blossom, refuge so close. She could see guards on the street and standing watch in the guard tower. Sharp eyed men with good night vision, by now, they could see her as well, approaching as she was, a slight figure on the back of a giant warhorse.

She heard their distant calls, hails to the strange apparition that was nearing them. The Myozanitnir retained the foresight to reign in her horse else the men running out to meet her might think her a threat. Again, it might have been only luck which saved her life.

Two of the guards were a mere half hundred mails away when the air at the center of the bridge began to dim, to thicken and to change, like a dark fog was coming in, an ill omen that caused Sheffield to yank back tightly on the reigns as the shouted challenges of the guardsmen turned to surprise, and then to screams only challenged by the louder cries of alarm and barks for order.

Sheffield saw the source of the screaming for herself in the weak light cast by an oil lantern, the thick black miasma crawling across the ground like ink dropped into water. Its outer reach came across the leg of a lamppost, and at once there was a faint grown and a creak as paint pealed and the iron beneath at once began to corrode.

It was the same everyplace that the substance touched. Glass clouded and cracked, stone bleached and crumbled like chalk, and wood smoldered and sparked as the smoke touched the walls of the buildings to either side of Saxich Street and began to collect and scale their sides, forming a barricade as thick impenetrable as stone to her front, and at her back . . .

Sheffield turned her head slowly, dread twisting in her stomach. She already knew what she would find, but like a small child, she had hoped if she did not see then it would not exist. They were waiting. Three, three black cats outline in the blocked out stars, perched atop the roofs and towers of the shops, like Deacons casting their judgment upon her. And for a moment, a private part of Sheffield that she had thought excised long ago wondered what words she had been taught as a girl would have delivered her from this.

The Myozanatinir sucked in a breath and tightened her grip around the talisman in her hand, wandering what could be done with it to save her now. The Faeries would not wait for an answer, they were already moving, as if they had only stopped for that single heartbeat to gather their breath.

As swift as they were quiet, the Faerie to the left and the Faerie to the right descended upon her, weapons drawn to finish her at the sword. Through her Familiar Runes, Sheffield felt her talisman stir, waking as the wind magic within reacted to gathered a repulsing gale against the leading threat. A wall of wind gathered in the path of the sword wielder to her right, gathered, and then broke against a plane of white light.

There was no time to think on this catastrophic failure as the winds were turned back on Sheffield herself, defused but still plenty powerful to pluck her from the saddle and send her tumbling to the hard ground with an –ooph- of driven air and a cry of pain as something –crunched- in her shoulder.

The Dullahan neighed as it reared up on its hind legs, suddenly bereft of its rider, its cries turning to whinnies of pain as the dagger wielder landed upon its neck and dug her blades into the base of the shoulders, holding on as she twisted and wrenched and drove the bucking beast off.

Sheffield rolled on her back, coughing and groaning low as her vision spun in the sudden light rising up all around her. Whatever corruption of Faerie Magic that had begun to eat away at flesh and stone was transforming the wood of the bridge buildings into excellent kindling for the fires started by any number of mundane lamps as their housings corroded and they fell to the ground spreading flame and oil in their wake.

The Familiar watched as the Faerie swordswoman flared her wings, landing almost delicately with a crossing of her legs, assuming a predatory mincing gait as she walked the short dozen steps to stand over her. The Myozanatinir swallowed as she gazed up into the green eyes of a girl. Cat eared and cat tailed, but still a girl, face too soft, too round for the vicious snarl that it wore now.

This was a Faerie. She had thought she had studied them well enough through their dead, but now she knew everything she had seen was but a pale imitation.

'My King . . .' Sheffield thought as her hands curved around the hilt of the dagger which had started all of this, it's blade glowing bright, 'Forgive me my weakness my King . . .'

A force struck Sheffield, an impulse so short and so intense that at first she thought she'd been the recipient of a kick delivered with the Faerie girl's obscene strength, but when the ground didn't not strike her back, when instead she remained suspended in the winds, and when her landing came considerable lighter and a good deal later into arms waiting to receive her. Only then did Sheffield understand what had happened as she was confronted by pale blue, sharp eyes, presently concentrated elsewhere.

"S-Sir Wells?" Sheffield gasped out through pained breaths.

"Lady Sheffield", the Dragon Knight grunted an acknowledgment as he helped her into the saddle of his ground fire Dragon, situated at the far end of the bridge from her assailants. In the sky above a second dragon was circling, waiting for the chance to dive. "Are you injured?"

Hurt, the pain in her shouldered flared up again. Dislocated at the very least, possibly broken, but certainly not fatal. She shook her head slowly. It seemed as if this couldn't be real. "How . . .?"

"We spotted lights among the tress and came to investigate. Now do as I say and be silent." Sir Wells instructed as he helped her fully into the saddle upon the base of the drake's neck. Perhaps a hundred mails distant, at the center of the bridge, the Faeries were turning towards them. The sword wielder from before took one step, head tilting to the side as a wind arrow from the circling knight, which should have pierced the back of her skull, was effortlessly evaded. Sir Wells grimaced. "You've caused me enough trouble for the night."

As soon as her foot set down, the swordswoman burst forward, a sprint transforming into flight as her wings flared in the dark.

Her prey plucked from her at the very moment of victory. Shiori was . . . unamused . . . more or less.

In ALO, this was what Shiori would have called a FUBAR situation. The target was alerted in the middle of a hostile town and now their friends had started showing up. The numbers were turning against her by the second with two dragons and there Knights and who knew how many more on the way. Normally, this would have been where she'd cut her losses and run. She still could if she wanted to. Shiori just . . . didn't. She might never get a chance like this again and besides, Sword Shiori grit her teeth as the violation that the Necromancer had tried to commit returned to her, the twisting knot in her stomachs at the thought of that mental command, this had just become deeply personal.

Sword Shiori took a step, Mahou Shiori watching the sky saw a wind arrow meant for her and Shiori easily stepped aside, letting the wind construct passed harmlessly aside. Dagger Shiori leaped from the back of the crippled hellbeast Sheffield had fled on, landing on an awning and then kicking off into the air with the orbiting dragon in her sites. Mahou and Sword Shiori would handle the Necromancer and her Knight.

'Kill her now and quickly, before more show up.' Shiori told herself as Sword Shiori kicked off into ground skimming flight. It would still be okay if she could manage that much.

The Knight would be waiting for her, she wouldn't let him be a problem. Knights, undead, necromancers, it didn't matter to her, she'd kill them if they got in her way! The distance between them plummeted like a waterfall, out under this open sky with her wings free, the whole span of a hundred meter bridge was just the same as single room.

Dagger Shiori climbed into the night sky, dodging wind projectiles with increasing difficult as she neared. Shifting her grip on her weapons, if she recalled, there was one specific place to hit a dragon, near the base of the wings, hit right there and slice the tendons and the flight muscles anchored across the chest would be rendered useless.

The Mage's wind arrows gave way to their dragons' flame breath, bright and dazzling to Shiori's dark adjusted eyes, almost as bad as the flares Sheffield had nearly blinded two of her with. Flames weren't going to stop her, not now. Her wings raking back in a surge of acceleration, Shiori came up beneath dragon, aiming for the wing as she brought both daggers to her side and wound up to slash with all of her might . . . A last heavy wing beat from the dragon fell to its sides, the saddle revealed once again and Shiori's eyes went wide.

She didn't need her senses or those of her other bodies to tell her how and why. She knew what she would have done and that was probably what saved her Dagger self's life as she twisted in midair, arching her spine and cutting the power to her wings. She slammed into fire drake's thick neck, feet first, and kicked off the way she'd came as the telltale ripple of wind magic ripped through where she would have been if she hadn't changed course.

Beneath her, the mage rider was plummeting on a terminal path with the ground, two short and curved blades held at his side, glinting in the reflected firelight from the inferno growing in the bridge.

'No!'

The dragon was forgotten in a heartbeat as Dagger Shiori chased after the Knight, her powered dive eating distance, but there was a long way to catch up. She wasn't going to reach him in time, and she wasn't going to have a spell ready either, the only thing she could do was warn herself closer to the ground as the mage through his cutlass wide and then cast with a shout.

When the spell took shape, there were no wind arrows or fireballs, in fact reflecting on it, Shiori was sure the Spell wasn't anything overly special, the mage just had a dangerous imagination. She was sure she would have liked him, more or less, if she didn't have to kill him.

Every window down the third of the bridge between two of herselves and their necromancer prey began to rattle, crack, and then all at once explode, a rain of a million glass daggers that twinkled with lethal whimsy in the night and left the Cait wide eyed as the falling mage gave a shout.

"Sir!"

The Officer had reacted immediately, a cast of his wand joining with the gale generated by his subordinate to send the shower of glass swirling and then hurtling down range like a wall of razor sharp hail, breaking into finer and sharper shards in a storm that would ultimately flay skin from bone and leave nothing behind in its wake.

No time to climb, and no time to take cover, barely even enough time to release a barrier spell Mahou Shiori had been keeping in reserve. The hail of daggers struck the unfolding magic shield and broke like water against a river stone. Sword Shiori dug in, holding her Mahou self tightly as braced with her legs and , wandering which would give out first, the storm of glass or the barrier that Mahou Shiori was quickly recasting.

It turned out to be the former, lucky her, as the gale of magical winds were replaced by softer and intermittent beats of dragon wings, the Fire Dragon and its rider scaling the side of the overbuilt bridge to spread wings and take flight. And taking her prey with them.

'No you don't!'

Sword Shiori was moving, sprinting to close the distance and scaling the sides of the storefronts with flashes of her wings. The fast erratic hops making her a harder target as Mahou Shiori kept up a steady spell duel with the rider holding Sheffield tightly. Dagger Shiori meanwhile was locked in a duel with the fast casting aerial Mage who at the last moment torqued himself into a spin as a conjured blast of wind cushioned his fall to the street, at the same time channeling a wind blast upward to batter and whip at Dagger Shiori.

The Cait assassin came crashing down on top of him, Nidhogger's Fangs very narrowly missing as the Mage threw himself out of the way on another gale wind. She saw panic in his eyes and scented it in his sweat, a body already flooded with adrenaline, set her own blood to racing in excitement.

Sword Shiori jumped, judging her arc true so that her trajectory intercepted with one wing of the rising dragon, a single well aimed slash drawing blood and a cry of pain from the drake as its right wing fell lame, body collapsing against the second floor and roof of the shop building. It couldn't get away anymore. That left only Sheffield and her Guardian, a pale and blonde haired man in the sort of fancy uniform that just screamed .

When she went for him first, the Officer sheltering Sheffield swung out with his wand, a cane style foci of wood reinforced by a brass frame, the rippling of the air around its edge warning of a wind sword that clashed with a double finger span from its surface. They might with a clash of sparks and metal, the mage not even trying to resist Shiori's Faerie strength, instead trying to merely blunt and redirect the blow. With a supreme exertion and a grimace of pain, he manage, somehow, and then to Shiori's surprise, he began to fall backwards from his saddle,
harness cleanly cut free in the same swing that had brought up his guard.

It was a heartbeat before Shiori realized it had been a deliberate act, allowing him to absorb the force of his swing and convert it into the energy of the roll that carried him down his dragon's spine, a wind-whip grabbing hold and dragging the startled Shiori down after him.

The dragon continued upward, flightless, it was still more than able to climb. Talons sank into wood or clawed at window frames for support, in search of the safety of a higher perch for itself and its remaining rider.

Meanwhile, Dagger Shiori had worked up a fast and furious Tempo with the tricky dual wielding mage, the bastard was a cut above Governor Barnard's magical mooks, but mostly it was the fact that he wouldn't stay still but was just enough of a threat that she couldn't ignore him else she'd leave her Mahou self vulnerable in the middle of another chant directed at killing the damned Mage Knight who was presently giving Sword Shiori problems.

It wasn't that he was particularly strong, Shiori thought angrily, because for all of her size, any of her were probably far stronger, and it wasn't that he was fast, although she was willing to bet his reflexes were in the upper tier of what a human could achieve. It was that he was experienced, she realized, and that made all of the difference in the world while trying to kill him. He didn't try to match her blow for blow, and he didn't try to keep up with her speed. Instead, he diverted her blows and countered, and preempted her speed and counterattacked.

The mage officer was good, probably the best swordsman she'd ever faced in a fair fight, something she would never ever have done willingly, and it pissed her off. His skill that was, the way it made her seem like a cheap knockoff in comparison, a newbie clutching the manual to her chest as she tried to make up for her own shortcomings.

Skirting along the ground or diving from above, trading spell fire which he expertly dodged, blocked, or countered to throw back at her. The fury of thrown spells had started to take its toll on the wrecked buildings all around them, fast becoming multistory heaps of kindling for the growing fires. If an alert hadn't been sent, there would be one soon. She couldn't waste time like this, Shiori thought impatiently.

Her only consolation was that he was starting to show the strain of keeping up, panting and getting slower, almost fatally so, he half parried her next strike and redirected a wall of flames to hold Sword Shiori at bay as he broke off. Mahou Shiori opened fire with a barrage, forcing the fire mage to take refuge and freeing a path upwards for her Sword Self to fly on unfurled wings. Sheffield!

The dragon was straddling the roofs of two shops, one beginning to smolder, the other already on its way to becoming a multistory inferno. The wounded drake hissed at spit and spit at her viciously as she rose overhead but declined to breathe fire without its master's instruction, sinking on its belly protectively.

Sheffield was right above her, Shiori thought, Sheffield was . . . Sheffieldwas . . . The saddle was empty. Sheffield wasn't there . . . Shiori's rage grew as she clenched her teeth in a grimace. Heedless of the bells beginning to sound in the distance, her eyes narrowed at the sight of a window, broken from the outside.

The dragon snapped out, trying to take a piece of her, and received a sharp slash across its snout for the trouble as Shiori dove past, dropping through the window neat as a Cait could be. As soon as her feet touched the ground her senses were alive. First noting the smoke, then the blood that had been left on shards of broken glass. Lifting a fragment to her nose, sword Shiori's lips peeled back, it was fresh. Her prey had gone this way . . .

Excitement replaced anger as she flourished in anticipation of the hunt coming to its final heat. Shiori stepped quickly, posture sinking low into a stocking stance as she moved deeper. It was easy, more or less, she just had to follow the blood. Or maybe it wasn't going to be so easy, she thought as Mahou and Dagger Shiori heard the approaching cries in the sky, more dragons, and where there were dragons, there were bound to be more foot troops on their way. There was still time, she told herself as Mahou Shiori used her wings in sparring bursts to dance along rooftops and awnings, alternating trading fire with both of the mages.

She regrouped with her dagger self, the fighting bringing them full circle so that their back were against the wall, or rather, the lingering cloud of the that had set to work corroding the soft parts of the bridge all around them.

The buildings to either side were burning merrily now, throwing off enough heat to make all three of her sweat. From the corner of her eyes, from time to time spotted fleeting figures, residents braving the street turned battlefield to escape, or taking their chances by leaping into the river. No one so far seemed stupid enough to try and fight the growing fires in the middle of a battle, the few that saw Shiori had only run that much faster.

Good.

Shouts, distant and panicked from the far side of the cloud bank reported that the fires had not been blocked by the corrosive fog and might in fact have been helped along by the magical decay. It wouldn't be long at all until the whole structure went up like a bonfire, the wood bits anyways. She was going to leave her mark here, one way or another.

Deeper into the shop, Sword Shiori was running into trouble. Her senses weren't doing her as much good as she would have hoped, between the air heavy with acrid smoke and some sort of spice burning up in the shop's storeroom, and the creek and groan of the building frame as the fast collapsing structure next door leaned ever more of its weight onto this one. There was too much noise, both scent and sound, and vision wasn't much better between the smoke, dark, and occasional sullen flame of the encroaching fire. But she could still find her way, Sheffield's path leading downward as it must to escape the building before it began to fail from fire damage. She couldn't lose her, not now.

Her Mahou and Dagger selves reengaged with the grounded Dragon Knights, fast spells, fast wings, and even faster blades as they broke into another dance of thrust, parry, and counter attack, Shiori relentlessly pressing her superior strength and stamina against the faltering Senior Knight while Mahou Shiori alternated keeping the dual wielder at bay and supporting her Dagger self.

Just had to buy a little more time to hunt down Sheffield, the thought burned behind her eyes, just a little more time, as two great shadows blocked out the stars in the sky, sweeping across the bridged and coming about to land, each with a heavy crash that splintered would and dug grooves in stone.

Wings spreading wide and then fanning as they roared, two more drakes had settled themselves at her back. Shiori knew now that she was out of time. And yet . . . she couldn't stop now. Not yet, not when she was this close, stocking the dark, and smoke, and heat, the choking air that was growing as hot as an oven as Sword Shiori traveled deeper, second floor, first floor, a twisting sense of dread as she realized the building had a 'basement', a sub floor built beneath the roadway that overlooked the river.

If Sheffield had escaped that was . . . No Shiori knew that she'd hurt her, badly, the Necromancer probably wouldn't survive a swim, not in the rivers strong currents. She hadn't gone down but rather . . . Leading slowly with her sword as she tiptoed through the slowly breaking building. Floorboards creaked and beams trembled overhead. She should have just brought the whole building down, but she had to be sure . . . However . . . That thought sparked an idea, one that her Dagger and Mahou selves were quick to carry out.

The perched dragons were rearing back, spreading their wings as their necks swelled grotesquely with the contents of their ignition pouches. Tongues rolled back to expose a bony protrusion in the floor of the mouth, jaw's opened wide as fire vomited forth like a river of oily red and yellow fanned outward by powerful wing beats and swallowing up the ground where Mahou and Dagger Shiori had stood.

The Faeries had kicked off, at the last instant, taking to the sky in a powered leap, and twisting through the air like a pair of acrobatic Siamese to come down between the dragons and their grounded allies, Mahou Shiori with a spell at the ready and already lined up.

The bolt of ink blackness threaded between the two knights on the ground and hurtled into the ground floor of one of the building perched dragons. It was done.

"Aye!" The younger Knight cried out. "You missed us you mangy kittens!"

It was the first words any of them had spoken, and it almost made Mahou Shiori laugh, instead, she just replied. "That's because I wasn't aiming for you." In particular, overly much, as the acrid black ink writhed its way from the blasted out windows, and oozed under cracking and shriveling doorways.

She'd picked the ricketier of the two buildings supporting the dragons, all wood and porous looking stone not up to the task of holding up a five ton flying lizard on the best of days, now suddenly trying to do so as its foundations crumbled, and failing at it, more or less.

The whole towering edifice, cheap stone façade and all, was coming down like a defeated Dungeon Boss's palace and the mages suddenly found themselves with more to worry about than just two black cats trying to murder them as the debris showered down.

"Lieutenant Wells!" The younger Knight's voice carried high shrill as he flung himself clear on a gust of wind, the officer vanishing in a cloud of dust preceding the fall of the rest of the building.

With only a moment's hesitation, the dragon gathered itself up atop the collapsing roof, and with surprisingly sinuous grace, leaped out over the street, spreading wings in a shallow dive that brought it crashing first into one disintegrating building, and then another more sturdily built structure that withstood the weight of the aerial lizard.

The dragon twisted sharply, bringing long neck around to spit a thick ball of fire which blossomed into an explosion that drove Mahou and Dagger Shiori apart and for a precious moment left the Cait's Mage self exposed as she arced backwards though the air, in the end saved by the eyes of her dagger self who spotted the fast moving shadow among the flamed licking the rooftops and offering Mahou Shiori enough warning to spin about, bringing up the to protect herself from wind magic enhanced sword-strike.

Mahou Shiori hissed as she was confronted by the face of a man who seemed oblivious to the danger all around him. Another idiot!

"Get out of my way . . ." Shiori said what she thought out loud as she doubled her grip on her staff and lashed out with a kick to drive him off, spinning the focus quickly about and firing off another valley of magic shots as he flourished his blade, manipulating the rising flames as a shield.

The man's grin didn't fall, even as he touched a hand to his cheek, where the sharpened end of the had drawn blood. He was enjoying this, Shiori's chest heaved. Good she was too. "I'm afraid that's not going to happen today Little Kitty." He resumed a guard. "It's through me or not at all!"

Shiori's fangs barred in a smile. "If you insist." All three of her said under their breaths.

Closer, she had to be close now, so very close, Sword Shiori thought, and with nowhere left to hide, no more tricks up her sleeve. The woman, this woman, her hearts raced, from the battle, and from the thought that she would kill this woman. And then . . . and then who knew?

There were precious few places left to hide, the first floor, nothing but the shop front and its back room. A jewelry store, its wares left abandoned under their glass displays and within wall mounted lock-box. The back room empty, no noise, no wait, a rattle! Coming from the front, the door!

By the door, the front door, locked tight from the inside and out some sort of security mechanism? Or a way to discourage thieves? Shiori didn't care, her prey was trapped in here with her now. The Cait took care as she stepped, light and swift without a sound across the floor, the sound growing nearer. Nearer and nearer until it was just beyond the doorway of the backroom, right at the front door.

When she came through the threshold, leading with her sword, Shiori stopped as she was faced with . . .herself? The conflict froze her for a precious second as her mind, used to seeing herself through three pairs of eyes, was locked for a precious fraction of a second, just long enough for the sight of herself to be superseded by a flash of white, and a pressure that might have been pain exploding through her right temple on the shortest distance path out through her left.

Sword Shiori was thrown forward, into the reflection of herself that really was just a reflection, the mirror shattering and sending cold rippled up her arm as jagged fragments sliced skin deep along hand and forearm.

All three of her shared in a scream of rage as Sword Shiori spun, sword slicing thin air at her back and met with a –crack- and –crash- as Sheffield stumbled backwards, losing her improvised weapon as she fell into the already weakened dividing wall and broke through as wood split and a rain of embers erupted from a gap in the wall that was like the mouth of hell. It was the only place Sheffield had left to flee, and Shiori followed, squinting through the heat and the flame and pulling her cloak close for protection.

If the first shop had been smoldering, this one was fully alight, flames licking up the walls, and eating at overhead beams, weakening the structure with dismaying speed. The whole building was beginning to slump and collapse slowly, weight settling towards its rear as if it was simply going to fall off the side of the bridge. The floor boards buckling beneath her feet, it occurred to Shiori that was exactly what it was going to do, sooner rather than later.

Searching through the flames and the smoke and hunting for signs of a solitary, solid shadow, scurrying like a rat in a maze. Sheffield was harder to find than she had thought, but when she did, Shiori flew towards her, through the fires and embers and over glowing beams, poised for the kill as the door gave way and the Necromancer stumbled out into the battle between her other selves and the Knights desperate to rescue her.

The blonde fool saw Sheffield and tried to make a dash for her, receiving a timeout from a bind trap for his trouble, the pesky dual wielder slashing the black shadow tendrils and freeing him before Dagger Shiori could land the finishing blow. Dagger Shiori jumped to the side and rolled as a rain of precision wind spells fell from on high, cast by the still mounted knight clinging to a mostly intact stone building. Mahou Shiori turned on him, still mounted in his saddle and grounded, he was an easier target as a bolt of fair seared past her cheek, blinding her along her right side and sending searing alarms of racing through all three of her.

Mahou Shiori screamed as she clutched at the side of her face vision swimming as she opened her eyes once more. The Knight Officer, he was still alive, emerging from wreckage that had nearly buried him and holding his cane wand high overhead as he began to chant. Shiori hadn't seen this one before, and as she watched, she began to understand why.

Not even five minutes could have passed, but a half dozen buildings were doomed by now, cheap materials not much better than tinder as the flames raced to consume everything on the bridge. And yet, where the Knight walked, the flamed guttered and began to go out, or rather, like they were being drawn towards him, peeled away from their fuel and into the spell rippling like a heat wave down the length of his focus and then brightening as the air grew red, then yellow, then white. All around her, Shiori realized, the fires were going out, or rather, they were being trapped, converging into the flaming sword in the Knight's hand.

Then he swung, and the brilliant sword of flames came undone in a moment into a tsunami of flames bent on swallowing up Mahou Shiori like an insect in the path of blowtorch.

Her barriers rose, a hemisphere shield thrown up with every scrap of magic she had left, and then they buckled as the heat found a way through, so bright and intense that the Cait Mage had to keep her eyes shut, so hot that she could feel herself burning up.

No!

Dagger Shiori dove through the flames on her wings, cloak wrapped tight around her and reaching out for her other self as the translucent barrier began to flicker and falter and finally yield, the fire catching her like hitting a wall, an indescribably agony that peeled back every inch of her skin like an ice cold razorblade to leave nerves bare . . . Pain so intense Mahou Shiori seemed to cease in its onslaught, the nauseous feeling as a third of her mind went suddenly silent . . . or screamed so loud that the rest of her was deafened.

Sword Shiori staggered forward, doubling over as if it had been a blow to her own body, clinging to consciousness only by tooth and nail as she looked up and saw the witch she was after stumbling back, desperately back away from her, trying to flee as the world around the edges of Sword Shiori's vision began to darken.

Shiori could feel it, like threads snapping all at once, the pain as Dagger Shiori clutched at her Mahou self and raked her wings, blind, deaf, and dumbing to anything but pain as they were eaten alive by fire, as her mind began to die all around her, brilliant clarity shattering into kaleidoscopes of jagged past, present, and intuited future.

She was dying.

Sheffield!

And she didn't care.

SHEFFIELD!

Not now. Not anymore.

Sword Shiori's wings flared in a charge as she brought down in a lethal arc. The only thing in her world, herself, her pain, and Sheffield. The Necromancer, the defiler, the abomination that should not be in this world or any other. Just . . . like . . . her.

"SHEFFIELD!" Her hoarse scream rising into a blood curdling cry as she was met by a wind hammer and forced her way through, feeling bones groan and crack, bursting through a shell of fire and locking blades with the idiot blonde who had tried to stop her before. Wild strength batted him aside like a toy mouse, she'd felt hot blood on her hands and the crunch of bone as his eyes went wide.

And then Shiori herself felt suddenly very cold . . .

Sword Shiori . . . Just Shiori . . . trembled as the strength left her and an icy numbness spread through her chest. She looked down, trying to comprehend the sharp, blood covered blades that had erupted from her chest. Someone not much bigger than herself at her back and shaking as they drove the swords home. Then her eyes widened as she began to cough, struggling to breathe as it felt like she was beginning to drown on air.

The trembling grew, not just her own body but the ground beneath her feet beginning to crack and buckle, giving way as a terrible noise rose from beneath, Shiori was dropped to the ground, a puppet with her strings cut, fading in a blurred and confused haze as the world tilted, as she flew high up in the air in a haze of pain, clutching her burned self close to her chest, as she began to roll downward, plunging weightless past cracking stone pillars, as she ice cold liquid, as she crashed rolling across a secluded rooftop and came to a stop trembling, as she looked up through water and empty air at crumbling stone and fire. The last thing that Shiori saw as her collective mind faded, and then her isolated human mind, and then the small scared little animal mind, and then . . . dark.

'Ruin becomes us.'

Sheffield didn't recall where she had heard that said. Quite possibly it had been some play or another, something she had seen in the company of her master some long time ago. Whatever the source, the words felt fitting now as she sat and surveyed the destruction from the shelter of a house stoop overlooking the banks of the river.

Ruin had become them, or at least, it had become Saxich Bridge. The hundred and fifty mail stone span still blazed at places where the houses and shops had simply been permitted to burn and burn until they burned themselves out. About a third of the way from the far bank, the widest of the five stone arches which formed the bridge's base had half collapsed as a result of the furious battle between Faeries and Mages, dragging half a dozen buildings into the water with it, including the very one that Sheffield had sought shelter in.

The Void Familiar shivered again as she pulled the blanket closer around herself, a futile effort to banish the chill. The water mage working on her arm, an iron haired physician native to Saxe Gotha and pressed into service for the night, alternately muttered comforting nonsense and chanted healing spells as she moved her focus from wound to wound and removed the crude shards of ill made glass.

As she had suspected, her shouldered was indeed broken, shattered was closer to the truth. Now that the terror was wearing off and she could think that pain was a constant fire creeping its way up her neck and into her chest. The physicians estimated weeks before it would be fully healed by magic, and she was not the only one who had suffered injury tonight. No . . .

"Hold still you bloody eejiot!" Ensign Blair Trayvor growled as he pressed the tip of a blunt arming wand against Sir Meinhardt's sword arm. The Dragoon was making every effort to quell the river of red pouring from a gash in the Knight's bicep. Even in the weak light cast by magic and mundane lanterns, Sheffield could see the unnerving cleanness of the cut and the white of bone that was in complete opposition to the jagged wound torn deep into the Knight's opposite flank. Done by the same creature very nearly at the same time with its bare hands.

"Meinhardt?" A second Knight was looming over the Ensign, another physician in tow.

The wounded Knight wore a forced grin as he made to rise and was pushed back down by the second physician. "Holland? Aye, fuck me . . ." There was a paleness to his complexion that was not wholly natural. Shock and blood loss no doubt, and luck that it was only that much.

"That one has a compound fracture above the elbow and broken fingers in his left hand." The Doctor Working on Sheffield's shoulder reported to the new arrival. "The laceration is deep, but it's clean, seal the wound and worry about the ones along his ribs, looks like something tried to maul him. I'll be there to help once I'm done cleaning out this glass." Returning her attention to Sheffield's bloodied arm, the mage grimaced. "Now please Miss would you kindly hold still? You're in luck you didn't sever any arteries like this . . ." The doctor went on, mentioning something about concern for the nerves.

'Mauled.' Yes, that was the appropriate word for what had nearly befallen Sir Meinhardt. The other mages had fared better only by keeping their distance. The Faerie had barely even noticed the trained Knight who had put himself between her and Sheffield, simply shattering his arm under the full force of a sword swing, and tearing a gaping piece out of his side with her bare hands. Like a wild animal, some feral beast the Faeries had forced by magic to take the shape of a girl and then set loose as their attack dog.

Sheffield's eyes widened as she felt the ache at her temples starting up again, she went about massaging her brow with her good hand. That was right, whatever had been within that monster's mind, it couldn't have been human.

"Meinhardt are you alright? Come on man!" Holland breathed as he crouched by his friend's side.

"Aye, I don't know." Blair shook his head fearfully. "I tried to keep the bleedin' down like the doctor said . . ."

"You did fine Lad." One of the Doctors supplied gently.

"But . . ."

The wounded Knight began to chuckle with more strength than Sheffield would have thought was left in him. He half groaned as his chest expanded. "Seems I got a bit more experiencing done tonight, eh Holland? Pleasanter face than the Lieutenant's mind you. Fuck though," he said breathlessly, "If that's how Faerie girls fight, imagine what they're like in bed . . ."

Ensign Blair looked up with an expression that wordlessly seemed to say 'See?' But far from worry, the young flight Lieutenant appeared truly relieved. "He's going to be fine Blair. If he's got the strength to think about bedroom conquests, Meinhardt's a good ways from death's door."

"Says you." Sir Meinhardt began as a wand was waved over his person. "I plan to die with my head in the lap of a beautiful woman, thank you very much."

Ensign Blair looked disbelieving and then disgusted as he looked away from the fool who had somehow earned a Knightly title, muttering something under his breath that might be interpreted as "Aye, which head?"

The humor drained from Sir Meinhardt, like the blood before it, until all that was left was a pale and shivering young man under the care of the water mages busying themselves in the effort to keep him from becoming astill and dead young man.

"Holland . . . next time . . ."

"Aye." The Knight took his friend's good hand and squeezed. "Next time we'll be ready for them."

"Next time we torch them from the skies." Meinhardt finished with a grimace, and with that squinted up at Ensign Trayvor. "Well, unless you're our untouchable Ensign here. Not a scratch on you. You're a real piece of work Blair Trayvor."

Pale cheeks flushed as the Dragoon put down his arming wand. There was a look in his eyes, one he shared with Lieutenant Holland, it hadn't been there before the battle but now lingered, a resignation. "It's only because of the Lieutenant. Things were too busy fighting him to do more than glance my way from time ta time . . . I-I'd be dead if it wasn't for him."

And as for Lieutenant Wells . . . Sheffield's eyes traveled inevitably to the far side of the street where the battered and bloodied Knight was still on his feet and giving direction to the soldiers and guards arriving constantly. There was no sign of dissent or protest among the city garrison, though whether that was out of martial discipline or awe at the sight of a man who had fought Faeries to a standstill impossible to guess.

The destruction had woken the entire city of Saxe Gotha, from the palatial homes of the nobility down to the modest block houses and cottages of commoners and petty mages. News was already spreading among the citizens. It was doubtful that peace would return before morning, and how much longer would Peace return?

The Faeries had done this thrice now. Sheffield thought darkly. Attacking at York, Kingston, and now Saxe Gotha, and snubbing their noses at the defenders each time. Martial matters were normally none of her concern, Sheffield and her servants had concentrated their aid elsewhere and allowed Reconquista to scavenge the corpse of Albion for their military talent. Under their direction, the Rebel forces had become like smoke, no blow, however heavy, being more than a minor setback as more supplies and weaponry arrived from the continent. But if this was allowed to go on unopposed, even Cromwell's regime would collapse in on itself and no amount of outside aid would stop it.

Reconquista had been too much of an investment in time and treasure to allow it to fold even before it had achieved its first objective. She would need to furnish them with countermeasures of some sort, if only to bolster Lord Cromwell's strength in the eyes of the public. The Jormungandr class were far from ready, and wholly unsuited besides, but they were looking less and less suited to the coming times by the moment as well. It might be to use them now or not at all. She could have the archetypes shipped from Gallia within the week, in any case. Gargoyles as well, she'd been meaning to start mass production, and . . .

Yes, she had been complacent until now, and now she would arm herself to fend off this new enemy. The Familiar Myozanatinir told herself that it was all for her Master's ambitions, even as she shook.

"And what about you, Lady Sheffield?"

Sheffield's name drew her from her thoughts. It had been Lieutenant Holland, the mouse of a young man who was somehow the last left standing as stronger figures lay buttered or defeated around him. Not only untouched, but somehow unsurprised by what had happened. A thoroughly impossible young man.

"I am . . . Fine . . . Save for my injuries Lieutenant." She said carefully. "My thanks, for your concern, and for the bravery of your friend." Little more than a roadblock he might have been, if not for Sir Meinhardt attempting to shelter her, the chances were good the sword that had nearly taken off his arm would have cleanly taken off her head.

"Hardly worth mentioning." Sir Meinhardt chuckled as he looked up to the stars in the sky. "The thanks of a beautiful woman is always a pleasure."

"Lieutenant Holland, Ensign Trayvor." Sir Wells barked as he stocked across the street, giving a final wave of his arm to dismiss the men who had been at his side.

"Sir!" Both cavalrymen rose to attention. Lieutenant Meinhardt attempted to sit up as well but was pushed back down with a grumble from his physician.

Lieutenant Wells was still standing although that was feat almost as impressive as having survived the Faerie onslaught. The bandages that had been wrapped tightly around his forearm, shoulder, and thigh, and the blood drying across his forehead and cheek showed that he had come out of the battle far from unscathed. An expert swordsman, the Lieutenant had sacrificed himself to a death by cuts in order to survive the melee as long as he had. Now however, that strength was beginning to ebb and he was starting to show the sign of being profoundly tired, perhaps near to exhaustion.

"Lieutenant, Ensign, your dragons and your persons are uninjured." Sir Wells waved both men at ease. "Saxe Gotha's garrison doesn't have a Dragoon detachment on hand. They were moved to the cliffs to defend . . ."The Knight trailed off with a disgusted shake of his head. "I want you to form a flight pair and sweep the river towards the Westernwoods."

"Sir!" Both Knights nodded and then the Ensign hesitantly added. "Sir? Pardon my asking, but why to the West?"

"To find the Faerie you ran through Ensign, and if you haven't already, to kill it." Sir Wells sank down on the steps of the stoop, running a hand through his hair.

The junior officers exchanged looks and then turned back to the Lieutenant. "If it isn't already dead?! I stuck two swords through its chest, Sir. Even if it survived, no one hurt like that is going to last long." Blair's hands opened and closed nervously, the boy looked unwell as his features twisted. "Nobody." He repeated a last time, confidently.

"Nobody human you mean." Sir Wells corrected tiredly. "It might not have to survive long if it ends up being rescued." Both of the Lieutenant's subordinates were left speechless. "We haven't found the corpses of the other two either." Sheffield felt her gut beginning to twist. "I know fire, and those flames weren't hot enough to immolate the remains. So assuming there are only three, that's still three unaccounted for."

Ensign Trayvor did not seem so enthused now as he nodded weakly and stepped back beside Lieutenant Holland. "You best get going now, the currents are swift once the river reaches the forest." Sir Wells said.

"And you, Sir?" Sir Holland asked, nodding to the Lieutenants bandaged arm.

"Unlike your friend Meinhardt I am not blessed with boundless magical stamina. Between the fatigue and blood loss I'm spent for tonight." Sir Wells leaned back slowly. "Once I catch my breath I'll be dispatching a report back to General Barnard. Now then, Gentlemen."

"Sir!"

The junior officers scurried off like mice scattered by a landing owl. The physicians finished with Sheffield and went about treating Sir Meinhardt before transferring him to a stretcher to be carried back to barracks. At last, Sheffield was left more or less alone with her thought among the bustling of the street. Alone in a sea of bodies. Almost.

"So tell me, Lady Sheffield." Sir Wells asked, eyes closed and arms crossed beside her. "Those Faeries were hell bent on killing you."

"I don't . . ."

"Do not deny it." The Knight warned quietly, but with a bite to his voice. "If they had been any less fixated on you, we would all be dead by now. That makes it something I rather pressingly would like to know the story to."

Sheffield was quiet for a heartbeat, two, slowly, she took out the small dagger with its scabbard unsheathed the blade just enough to see the metal fallen dull and lifeless.

"As I was about to say. I'm sorry, but I truly don't know."

Morning came to the forest as it always did, a slow lightening of the sky, the stirring and growing songs of the birds, and then all once the rays piercing the treetops, like first light in a cathedral. The air was still and crisp that morning, sweet with the summer smell of evergreen, the branches full of bird songs, and rustling in the bushes and trees.

Crawling through a fork in two tree trunks, a burly creature made its way on four short legs, body covered in bristle and short, black fur. A large, elongated head swung from side to side, snout wriggling as it scented across the ground and then stopped, raising its head to search its surroundings with beady red eyes.

Then, satisfied that all was well, it went back to its rooting around the trunks of the trees, in search of the choice tender truffles that were so often found there in spring and summer, quite occupied with its feeding as a broad head arrow pierced cleanly beneath its ribs and skewered its heart.

The forest went silent as the placid sounds of feeding were replaced by short, startled squeals of pain and the panicked clattering of hooves that quickly slowed and grew irregular as the animal's life blood drained. There was no use running, it had been dead as soon as the arrow had struck true.

The boar fell on its side, still struggling feebly as its squeals turned to whines, and then those too faded as it came to lay still. The silent forest which had stood witness to its death, slowly came alive again with noise, all the time and effort that the wild had to spare for one of its own as it breathed its last.

As the noises resumed, they were joined by another noise, a rustling as something fell from one of the trees to land somewhat precariously on all fours. A bizarre site to anyone not familiar with the huntsmen of Albion or the White Isles frequent bouts of freak cold that came even in the summer months. Bundled up tightly from boots to patchwork cap, mottled leggings and jacket, dark green scarf, and leather gloves and brace, not a single inch of a skin was left exposed save the tips of the fingers with which to draw the bow now shouldered as the hunter approached their kill.

They stopped a short distance away and unlimbered their bow, notching the next arrow and coming smoothly to full draw before nearing. The kill had looked clean, but it wouldn't be the first time that a boar had given a final struggle before expiring. The hunter took no chances until they had prodded the fresh carcass with the toe of their boot.

Only then satisfied did the bow go down, its arrow returning to the quiver on the hunter's back. The pack came off, the dressing knife came out, and the scarf came down to reveal a pale and girlish face, heart shaped with cheeks pink from the cold of staying up in the trees since before dawn's light. Her eyes were blue, her father's eyes, and her hair was pale blonde, her mother's hair, one of many things she had inherited from her mother.

"Thank you for your sacrifice." She said while looking into the lifeless eyes before her. "I promise I won't let any of you go to waste." It would be an easy promise to keep. A dozen hungry mouths made for a big family to feed.

Closing the boar's eyes as she closed her own, the girl whispered a small prayer of thanks directed to no god in particular and then set to work. First, peeling off her gloves and rolling up her sleeves to bare taut arms wiry with hard worked muscle, the girl produced a length of rope from her pack and bound open the carcass' hind legs so that they wouldn't get in the way, then she lifted the animal into the air by a noose around its neck, steadying the carcass at waist height.

Next came the dressing knife. It wasn't easy work, but a keen knife edge helped, so did experience. The promise of some fresh meat for herself and the children kept her motivated.

First a cut along the loins so that the guts could be let to drop out. Then peeling back the skin and fur to reveal a healthy layer of white fat over pinkish white flesh. Good, this was a healthy young boar, and he'd been eating well this season, which meant his meat would be good. Bit by bit, she sliced away flanks and pared down the back and along the ribs, separating the shoulders, and splitting the hams.

It took her perhaps an hour to render down the wild pig, until what had started as a fully formed animal was reduced to neat piles of meat, fur, guts, and bone. She carefully collected the useable parts into the sacks she had brought for just such a purpose, the meat almost filling one of the sacks
completely on its own.

This had been an unexpected windfall. When she had set out, the girl had only intended to rid the near forest of a dangerous animal that might harm the children, she'd had no idea while tracking the boar over the past few days that it was such a big specimen, and she had to wonder if maybe she would need to go get the children to help carry it all.

Luckily, they still had enough salt left for preservation; the meat wouldn't be let to spoil before it could be eaten.

"I'm not getting you home on my own though." She decided finally, before looking down at her own hands. Besides, she needed to wash off all the blood.

The river wasn't far at all. In fact there was a place nearby where the river curved and where the currents tended to collect flotsam and any fish too lazy to struggle against the flow. She'd laid her traps there for exactly that reason, big wicker baskets hidden in the water, the fish could swim in, and then they couldn't get back out. Now was probably a good time to check the fish traps anyways and she could wash up while she did it. Salted pig and fresh fish, it would be a good start to the month.

Expertly tying up the dressed carcass, the girl left the meat and skin hanging high up in the same tree she'd used as her vantage to pick off the boar and then set out towards the river bank along well traveled animal paths and a few short cuts she'd found for herself.

The forest didn't fall silent as she passed, silence in a forest usually meant something was wrong, so she'd learned to mask herself by moving as a part of it instead. In fact, her sister insisted it came naturally to her, telling her that she was as at ease in the wild as her sister was in the city. She didn't think so, anyone could do it really, she just had a lifetime of practice. Well, maybe not a lifetime, but most of her own short lifetime.

It was the same as learning the lay of the land. This was her home, and she had grown accustomed to navigating its paths and its dangers. Though maybe that wasn't enough anymore, she thought to herself, keeping an eye and an ear to her surroundings as she traveled.

Sister didn't seem to think so. In her letters she'd said she would be returning soon, earlier than expected given how dangerous the war had made it to travel. Her letter . . . Had not made as much sense as the girl could have hoped. Something had happened on the continent, a fact born out in the rumors the children had relayed to her on the occasions she had sent them into town for supplies, but as always it was hard to say what was truth, what was rumor, and what was simply the children's vivid imaginations.

Fanciful stories about a land of Faeries and Magical Creatures. The girl had always thought Faeries were . . . well . . . Faerie Tales. And yet now her Sister was writing to her about those Faerie Tales as if they were completely real. Whether this was wonderful or terrible wasn't entirely clear in her Sister's letters. Sister said the Forest wasn't safe anymore, she said she'd found a better place.

And for all the confusion of her letters, the girl thought uncomfortably, sister was right. The Forest had beenchanging lately, newcomers that should not have been there, and not of the human sort. Thinking about them made her all the more nervous. Sister called them Orcs. They had been wiped out on Albion long ago, but had made a return recently, brought from the continent by the rebels to bolster their army.

Some had escaped or else wandered off from their armies, and now they were starting to find their way into the forests. The girl barely paid any mind to her own small frown as she brushed aside a messy strand of hair.

Big, pink skinned creatures, eerily like the wild boar she'd just killed, but even bigger and more violent, and with only thoughts of eating, fighting, and copulating running endlessly behind their beady eyes. The girl had already confronted a band of them to discover for herself that they could not live in peace. She had been careful to blank the band's minds so that they would wander off none the wiser, but they would be back, of course, in search of food no doubt. She bit her lip.

Though she didn't like it, it might come down to picking them off. A good, sharp, broad head to the heart would put them down the same as any other dangerous animal, and failing that, there were some poisons strong enough to do the job so long as the arrow got into their chest cavity. They were however pack hunters, like the wolves of the deep forest, thinning the pack on her own would be dangerous. If it was to be done, she'd have to wait for her sister's help.

The trees stayed thick all the way up to the bank along this stretch of the river, part of the reason it made such a good fishing spot. Not only did the shade draw the fish in, the trees overhead made for good cover on the off chance anyone might spy the tops of her fish traps. Even if they did see them, they could easily be mistaken for just more of the flotsam that collected at this spot along the river.

The girl slowed as the river way came into site. She could tell that something was wrong almost at once. The usual debris had found its way to the riverbank, but there was far more too much of it at a glance, a far toorefined at that. Twigs, branches, and logs, even the occasional small boat was common enough, but this morning the river played host to clearly hewn beams and the broken remnants of wood furniture, all obviously from Saxe Gotha up river.

Had something happened in the City? She wondered as she traveled down towards the bank, hopping lightly from stone to stone, and landing in a fast jog that brought her to a halt on the slick clay at the edge of the water. An accident? The river wasn't navigable much past Saxe Gotha. Maybe a cargo barge had gotten loose and broken up on the rapids.

This wasn't good, she pondered, someone might come looking to recover their valuables. Not, she judged the water logged ruin, that there was much of value left among sodden wood and the occasional bit of clinging fabric. Some of the beams still looked good though, and small enough that maybe they could be carried if they could be gotten out of the river . . .

The girl paused skittishly, looking in both directions along the bank, and then very consciously up into the sky before setting her pack down and beginning to pick her way through the wreckage. She stopped almost at once as she came across a hand.

Her stomach had twisted. It was a pale hand, so pale that she thought it must belong to a corpse, and so small that she was sure it had to be the corpse of a child. So it had been an accident, she thought quietly, and this child had suffered for it.

The girl approached cautiously, careful not to disturb the beam, caught precariously against the shore, as she made her way out along its length.

The debris had covered part of the body, half hiding a small figure clinging tightly to the largest of the beams. The impression of a child receded that little bit as the girl grew nearer. This one too was a girl, an adolescent older than the children but still perhaps a little younger than herself. Whatever fate she had suffered, it looked to have been horrible and over quickly. Her clothes were shredded to rags where they did not cling by water or blood to her small body, at places it seemed she had been pierced by . . . something . . . though girl could not imagine what. Her soaked
haired was a clotted with whet clumps of mud, or maybe blood, half hiding a face that had gone waxen and sickly like death itself.

"I'm sorry." The girl whispered as she reached out to touch the body. "I'm so sorry." The least she could do was take the remains from the river. Though whether to leave them on the bank or give them a proper burial, she couldn't say.

The question resolved itself as she pressed her palm against the still little body and felt a heart stopping tremble, so small that it might almost have been a trick of her own pulse. But the girl didn't believe that for a moment. Acting perhaps too quickly, she pulled her cap from her head, unruly blonde locks spilling down in a tangled and days' unwashed mess as she leaned close and listened.

A sound so faint, it took all of her concentration to hear it over the water, but definitely there, a tiny breath mixed with an unpleasant gurgling noise, feeble as a candle flame, but there nonetheless.

"You're alive!" The girl whispered, first excited, and then fearful as she clutched at the ring she wore safely on its chain beneath the warmth of her jacket. She stopped again as her hand brushed across hair and fingers caught on something fragile and thin as tissue.

It was damp, and stiff, one side covered with thick, fine black hairs like fur while the other felt smooth and soft as silk. The girl was mystified as her hand probed, following the strange structure those rose from a forest of damp, stringy locks to where it merged into the other girl's head behind and beneath her temple. Where her ears should have been, where her ears were. Ears . . . like a cat . . . Her ears!

Without thinking, the girl's free hand had reached to the side of her own head. She made her decision quickly, pulling her mother's ring from around her neck. She didn't know what was happening, but she knew what she had to do.