Yamara

by Phineas

Chapters links: Book I 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Book II 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Epilogue

Book 1 : Yamara

Chapter 1

Darkness. Darkness and pain, my first memories. Hiding in the closet of the room my mother and I shared while she conducted her business. I was to young to know what she was. A whore. To young to know much of anything, really. I was only a few years old, perhaps five, I do not know.

The pain? Well, the pain came from time to time when one of the men visiting her would discover me. Some were kind, some were not. Most were not. The worst time was also the last. That was the time when a merchant with a fondness for abuse visited my mother. She had seen him before, but he was never so violent. That time, he beat her to within an inch of her life while he rode her, and then he hit her again. Again and again, the man pounded himself into her while his fists fell on her. When he was done, he must have heard my sobs.

Yanking the sheet that hid me aside, he stared down at me. A wisp of a girl, with dirty blond hair and big eyes. Big green eyes with trails of tears running down my cheeks. I have since learned that many people, indeed most, would be moved by such a sight. Well, in the town of Ossulmere, ruled by a corrupt council and powered by its deals with creatures and beings whose origins and powers are cloaked in dark secrecy, kindness and compassion had little place. It was a lesson hard learned, but his renewed virility and violent beating taught me well as he left me for dead alongside my mother.

My mother and I were both dumped out with the garbage in the alley behind the brothel. They knew I lived, but being so young and freshly violated I was not worth the effort necessary to help me live. Cradling cracked ribs and swollen skin, I hid amongst the garbage, making no noise lest the equally corrupt city watch should discover me, or worse yet, any of the beggars, thieves, or other unspeakable things that roamed the night streets of Ossulmere. In the end, I managed to heal and survive, eating what scraps of food I could discover and remaining hidden.

So many times I had seen my mother beaten or abused by her customers. I saw her cry and plead for mercy from them. I saw what little it had gotten her most of the time. I vowed then and there that I would not be weak. I would not rely upon the kindness and actions of others for my own well being. I also vowed, as I sat there huddled amongst stinking refuse to scared and alone to cry, that I would not miss her. I have almost never cried from grief again.

As soon as I had healed enough, I moved out, heading for the markets. There I learned to beg and to steal. Always poor, I spent several months living like that, always hungry and cold, but growing smarter and more wily by the day. My skills grew rapidly, and soon I attracted the attention of the Ornithrym, my hand caught in the wrong man's grasp as I tried to nick his purse.

In Ossulmere the thieves guild and the Ornithrym are closely related. Some say they are one and the same, though they are not. Most children in my position, if they managed to survive, would end up in the thieves guild, though perhaps 1 in 10 of those would make it to adulthood, and 1 in 10 of those die of natural causes years later. Such was not my case, by pure twist of fate.

I remember well the man looking at me, sizing me up. Then he stared into my eyes, an amused smile on his face. Then he said to me, "You're no thief, girl, you're a different kind of animal. Come to the Temple of Melnar and put this in the offering plate if you want a warm meal and a place to sleep."

He was gone then, but in my hand I held the sheathed dagger he had pressed into it. My mouth fell open as I beheld it, then I quickly remembered my position and hid it beneath my clothes. I did not take it out to look again until darkness fell and I was safely hidden amongst my garbage.

It looked big and powerful and so full of potential to me. A simple dagger, with no special work about its hilt or pommel save for an ornate O engraved into the crosspiece. Yet to me it was filled with hope. With that dagger, there was so much I could do. I could finally put an end to the older and larger beggars that sent me running every time they saw me, with unwholesome things upon their mind no doubt.

Even at that young age, I was no maiden. One man that visited my mother once discovered me and offered her a great price to have me. My mother refused at first, but as the price raised, her resolve wavered. In the end, I came to know the touch of a man far to young for any girl to know, and my mother was racked with sobs as she looked away. My pain and misery was such at that memory that I feared it would always be so, so when the older boys found me, I always managed to slip away. And now that I had a weapon, I could show them up again, for none of them had something so fine as forged and crafted steel.

Then reality set in, and I realized that no matter how fine a weapon it was, I had no idea how to use it. My excitement at the day's catch had sent me to my hole so quickly that it was a long and cold night filled with hunger pains. Winter was nearly upon me.

No, I did not go the Temple of Melnar that night, or for many nights thereafter. I kept the dagger hidden about my person and continued my life as I knew it. As much as the promise of a warm meal and safe place to sleep appealed to me, I refused to entrust my safety to the words of someone else. And even more so, the Temple of Melnar was a place to be feared by most. Halador, the world upon which I was born, has many Gods, and each has their own worshippers. Melnar is the God of Strife. He is an evil God, and why some men worship him is beyond me. But I suppose all manner of Gods are needed to keep a world balanced. Needed by who, I did not know, for I knew I did not need them. No God had helped me at any time. No, religion was not for me. I had heard of the great powers that clerics and priests wielded in the name of their Gods, but that was only for those with the means to pay for such services, and even then, to be a servant of such a being was just that, a life of servitude. I would live for myself.

A month later, nearly frozen to the bone by the harsh winds and cold weather that gripped the Storres Sea that Ossulmere had a harbor on, I finally relented and visited the Temple of Melnar. The guards at the doors eyed me with contempt. Inside there was no mass going on, but acolytes moved about, doing whatever holy (or unholy) things they had been assigned. I moved to the offering plate and pulled the dagger out from where I had hidden it close to my stomach. I looked at it for a moment, I remember, with hesitation and indecision weighing heavily on me. A cold gust of wind from the doors as someone else entered helped me make up my mind, and the dagger fell into the plate. I turned and walked to a seat in the cathedral, sitting down and looking around. I felt scared again, there was an energy in the very air around me and it seemed to push against me. I could taste it, and it tasted foul.

Then it was gone. I realized some time had passed, but I did not know how long. I heard footsteps, and glancing behind me I saw an acolyte approach. He stopped beside me expectantly. Not knowing what to do, I feared I was in trouble. I got up from the pew and stood before him, staring up at him, trying to pierce the darkness of his hood. He turned and walked away, and after a moment of hesitation, I followed.

Into the back of the temple we went, beyond many rooms given over to a variety of purposes, from storage to sleeping chambers to offices to even smaller, private chapels. Finally he opened a thick door made of bronzed wood and led me down a set of lighted stairs. Now we were in a cellar of sorts, and I soon came to discover, a small dungeon as well. Another flight of stairs down and another reinforced door and I was in a large room with tables and several people in it. Many of them looked at me as I entered, and I was struck by how they all appeared to be the sort of people I would expect to find in a location such as this, yet without exception, they all appeared to be healthy and in good condition, both their persons and equipment.

The acolyte led me through the room down a hallway to a door. Knocking upon it, he turned and left. I knew not to follow him, though inside my chest my heart beat so loudly and quickly that I feared whoever was behind the door would hear it. When it opened, I saw the man from the marketplace sitting behind a desk. Another man was sitting at a chair opposite him. I stepped into the room then, perhaps the hardest step I had taken up to that point in my life.

I looked behind me as the door shut. Nobody was there to shut it, which made the hairs on my arms stand up in concern. The only thing I knew of wizardry I had heard muttered in the brothel or amongst commoners, and it was always curses and whispers of fear and loathing. I had no place for sorcery in my life either, I had my wits and my body, and from them I would make the most of myself.

"She's a bit young," The visiting man said, studying me with his eyes. "And poorly fed, I doubt she's got the strength to survive a day, let alone the testing."

"She is, but look in her eyes, there's power in there, I think she's just what we need," The other man said, idly toying with the dagger I had possessed for several weeks.

"Did you like having this, girl?" He addressed me.

I glanced at him and the other man, seeing both of them watching me curiously. I had made my decision when I entered the room, there was no going back now. "Yes," I admitted.

"Would you like to have it again?" He asked me.

I shrugged, determined not to give them anything to use over me. In spite of how being armed felt, I knew that without the knowledge to use it, having the dagger did me little good.

"What is your name?" The other man asked.

"Yamara Blackcloak." My voice betrayed nothing, or so I like to think.

"Take your clothes off, girl," He said, though his voice was one of curiosity, not lechery.

I glanced at the man behind the desk, but he gave no sign to me, instead merely looking on with his own interest while he continued to toy with the dagger. I did as he asked then, having no other bargaining chip. Off came the rags that had become my clothing, from the overlarge bag I had gnawed and torn holes in and fashioned into a tunic, to the threadbare pants that my mother had patched time and again for me, which now showed new holes and tears in them. Nonetheless, they ended up on the floor beside me, for that was all I owned.

Both men showed surprise then, for while I was only 5 or 6 years old, my body already had a story to tell. Flat chested and hairless where it counts, what stood out about me was not my physical immaturity nor how skinny I was, but the scars that showed on my pale skin. Without a word from them, I turned slowly, arms stretched out, so they could see everything. My back and buttocks were much the same as my front, lightly scarred from serious injuries mostly long past. When I had completed my turn, the men looked at one another.

"Wounds that look as though they would have killed a full grown man on that slip of a girl!" The visiting man said.

"Aye, I told you she has hidden strength," My possible benefactor replied.

"But does she have a mind to match it?" The other man wondered rhetorically. "Come here girl," he ordered.

"How old are you?" He asked me after studying me more closely and muttering something under his breath that I later learned to be a magical spell. He reached down and clinically touched my hairless slit, sliding his finger up inside me quickly. I felt the pressure of it but no pain, only an uncomfortable sensation. Nowhere near as uncomfortable some of the sensations some other men had caused me, however, so I stayed where I was.

"I don't know," I admitted. Not only did I not know how old I was, but I had no idea then how to count.

"5 years old?" Said the man behind the desk. The other grunted agreement.

"Had I a daughter your age, I would kill the man that took from you what has been taken." To the other man he said, "She is no maiden, though at her age I trust that be no fault of her own."

The man behind the desk grinned and said, "Excellent, that will keep the Melnarians upstairs from wanting her for any of their unholy rites. They require virgins for their sacrifices."

Again the man grunted. Then he looked at me and said, "Girl - Yamara - you have the opportunity to join with the Ornithrym. All that lies ahead of you is a test. Pass it and you become one of us, to be educated and trained as well as even ourselves, should you prove worthy. Fail and you will die. Are you ready?"

"What of your promise of warm food and a bed?" I asked, staring at the man behind the desk to gauge his reaction.

"It is yours if you pass the test," He responded.

I nodded then and waited for what was to happen next. "Take this," The man said, offering me the dagger. "You will have need of it."

I stepped closer to the desk and reached out, my hand closing over the hilt of the dagger. I gasped then, for a sudden surge of energy flowed through me. Blinking, I opened my eyes to see I was elsewhere. Above me I heard cheering. Looking up I saw several men and woman sitting in seats around the pit I was in. It was a gladiatorial arena with walls easily 12 feet high. I quickly located the two men I had been speaking to only moments before, they sat quietly, watching me intently. I scrambled to my feet then, realizing that I had been laying on the sandy floor of the arena. Glancing at myself, I saw that I was still naked, but that in my hand I still held the dagger.

I saw no opponent in the arena for me, only a pile of bones where someone had long ago fought and died. The catcalls and jeering of the crowd died then, and the man who had given me the dagger twice now stood up. "As is the custom, the new recruit will fight the last recruit who failed, may Melnar favor you."

I cursed under my breath then, for the man began chanting and moving his hands in a funny way. If I had known he was a wizard, I never would have tried to pick his pocket in the first place. As for cursing, well, I had never really tried it to much before, but I had heard the men that visited my mother use those words many times, and now seemed as good a time as any for me to use them too. The words failed me when he finished his spell though, for the pile of bones I had noticed now began to animate. With grinding noises that made my spine ache, they shifted around and slowly stood up, resembling once again the human that they had once been.

It stumbled towards me, propelled by arcane means I had no hope of fighting against. I scrambled away from it, desperately looking for a place to run and hide from it. The arena was not that big, however, and there were no visible ways in or out. It almost cornered me once, its bony fingers scratching along my shoulderblade as I ducked away from it. I could feel the burn of torn skin and new I would have some fresh scars if I survived this thing.

Survival was always my main goal, and knowing that escape was not an option, my mind turned to figuring out how else I could survive. Hearing the cheering and jeering, I knew that I was expected to destroy this skeleton. I had no idea how, especially since I was armed with only a dagger and it was unholy creation powered by powerful sorcery. What had once seemed like a big and powerful weapon now felt small and puny in my hands.

I studied it carefully as it approached me. I was much more agile and quicker then it was, but I already knew it was stronger and more powerful. I waited and waited until I had an opening, the I darted in. Striking out as best I could with the dagger, I felt it scrape along the femur of the skeleton, then I was away before its swing could connect with me. I felt my fear melt away then. It turned to despair. I had no idea how I was going to defeat this thing when the weapon I had was all but ineffective against it.

I glanced up again and saw the wizard was concentrating heavily on the skeleton, apparently his spell required him to keep focused on keeping it moving. The other man sat beside him, talking rather animatedly about what was going on as though the wizard could not see it himself. I lost some hair then, the skeletons fingers taking a handful of it with it. I gritted my teeth in pain and dove through its legs before it could do more damage.

Now I was closer to the wizard and his companion. I turned to face them and, taking a desperate chance, threw the dagger at him. As I said, I had no idea how to use a dagger, either in my hand or when thrown, but perhaps Melnar really was favoring that day, for it flew straight and true. The pommel of it hit the wizard in the chest hard enough to make him gasp in surprise and pain. His concentration was broken, that was the important thing.

Less then a foot behind me the skeleton collapsed back into the pile of bones it had begun as. I wasted no time. Turning back to it, I snatched up the pelvic bone and threw it as hard as I could into the stone wall of the arena. I grinned as I heard it crack and saw it fall into several pieces. I scooped up some more of the larger bones, legs, arms, hips, and such, and raced to the other end of the arena. The wizard had recovered and was quickly recasting the spell. I began to feel energy grow in the bones in my hands, but I had reached the wall by then. I began smashing the bones into the wall, feeling them crack and break apart in my hands. Looking back, I saw what remained of the skeleton sitting on the ground, missing a rib or two, as well as its legs and the bottom half of one arm. I looked at the femur in my hand and felt the magical pull on it. Grinning, I walked towards the skeleton, the femur in my hand. I approached it on the side where it had no real arm, and easily dodged the slashing movements made by the stump.

I stepped in behind it and, using both my hands to grip it, swung the femur as hard as I could. It connected solidly with the skeletons skull, which smashed the femur into two pieces and sent the cracked skull flying. It slammed into the arena wall and fell to the sandy floor in pieces. The skeleton in front of me shuddered and collapsed, never to rise again.

The crowd was silent, stunned by what I had done. Then slowly they began making noise. It grew quickly, with some calling out loudly saying that I had cheated, while others cheered my innovation. The man sitting beside the wizard was stunned at first, but then began smiling. The wizard held up the dagger and then began laughing.

The air shimmered in the middle of the arena, and then the wizard and his companion stepped through. "Well done, Yamara, you are now a member of the Ornithrym. Put these on."

I took the bundle the wizard offered me and unwrapped it. I slipped the robe over my head first, grinning in spite of myself. While simple and a plain gray color, it was easily the finest garment I had ever owned. Next I put on the sandals. They felt odd, for I had never worn any before, but I knew them to be an improvement of my station in life, if nothing else was. Finally I took back the dagger I had thrown at him. I smiled a bit sheepishly when accepting that, but he just chuckled and said, "As long as you never try that again, I'm willing to forget it happened."

"We welcome this girl, Yamara Blackcloak, into the ranks of the Ornithrym as a trainee. Let it be known to all that she is one of us!" The other man said, addressing the crowd.

It was a moment of great pride to me. A time of the weak accomplishing something great. I rose above my station then, and I knew it was only the first of many such moves for me. Soon after that, I learned a great many things. I learned numbers, to read and to write, to fight, and a great many other things. From courtly etiquette to tracking an animal (or a man) through the wilderness, it seemed my training was to include anything and everything. I even learned the basics of both sorcery and priestly magic, though only as a means of defending myself against them, for I had not the talent nor the inclination to use such powers. In time I was counted quite adept at dueling with a dagger or short sword. I also took it upon myself to learn better how to throw daggers, just in case.

After my first several months, the Ornithrym called upon me to repay what I had learned. My first task came to me. I suspect it was something to familiarize me as much as anything. I was to be a lookout for a Ornithrym raid against a merchant that felt he could slight the city of Ossulmere on the taxes he paid while he sold his wares. The merchant had many guards, but those were no match for the trained assassins the Ornithrym employed. As I said, I was the lookout on that mission, but I suspect I was to look on more then anything.

I took the images of what I had seen to bed with me. The cruelties that men had inflicted upon my mother and myself over the years were not the only cruelties I was to witness in life, apparently. Indeed, such cruelties had a place in the grand scheme of things, it appeared, and that was what I was to learn. I went out on many other missions, always seeking to learn and be of use. While those around and above me found me a reliable companion, none suspected my true motives were to learn as much as I could so I could make certain that none of the tactics and techniques the Ornithrym used could be used against me.

Having lost my virginity so young served two purposes. On one hand, it kept me safe from the Melnarians, those who worshipped Melnar. They did indeed often take young women to use in their rituals, but those young woman needed were primarily virgins. Secondly, it made me available for special intelligence gathering missions. I learned that a taste for young bed partners was not an uncommon thing among the rich or the nobility. As skilled as I became as a thief, a duelist, or a spy, my true weapon was knowledge. The more I came to know, the better I felt about myself.

I never forgave my mother for her choice of a profession, but I came to understand how she let herself become trapped in it. Many times I was offered to some rich passing merchant or minor noble with a desire for a rose whose flower had not been plucked. Oddly enough, they never seemed to notice I was no maiden, but the things I learned from them was the key to me. Never doomed to a life of prostitution, I used sex as a manipulative weapon. Indeed, later on in my life, once my body matured, I also came to know the pleasures of other women. It was never for my need alone, or at least, never for the passion alone that I did it, always there was an ulterior motive.

I became fearful when my time came and my body began to mature. My balance was off and my skills in the arena began to suffer as my body grew in spurts. My hips widened and my breasts became fuller, further off balancing me. I struggled as best I could, exercising and sparring relentlessly. Eventually I became used to my new body and recovered my lost skills, but it took 3 years. By then I was counted 15 years old and easily one of the most talented in the Ornithrym's lower ranks. My body had matured such that I ended up being 5'6" tall with a wiry and athletic build. My constant exercising kept my breasts very firm a nicely rounded, though not large and cumbersome. While my hips had widened with puberty, they had not done so unpleasantly. I like to think my well toned thighs and butt complimented me nicely.

Such were the improvements to my body that the Ornithrym chose me for promotion. Elevated from the ranks of street toughs, I was further educated on the arts of courtly intrigue and etiquette. Never having acquired a taste for magic, I was nevertheless visited repeatedly by wizards skilled in the arts of body manipulation. Over time and the repeated casting of many spells, my comeliness grew under their ministrations. When finished, I was as I am now, a pleasant sight to see I like to think. Still athletic, my breasts had filled out even more, though still average sized, they were full and cried out to be admired and fondled. My scars were dulled out and smoothed over, leaving many of them still visible, but only after a few moments of searching, for they seemed to blend in to my skin and escape attention. I had broken my nose a few times in my youth and it was straightened and smoothed as well. Even my teeth, which had shown a few signs of some minor gaps and twists here and there, were magically straightened and strengthened. In the end, I was a very dangerous tool for the Ornithrym.

I do not claim to be a siren so beautiful that I can lure men to their deaths. Far from it. I believe the intent was to make me attractive and desirable, but not so much so that my beauty drew attention and singled me out. Whatever the case, it worked well, for my training as a spy grew. Indeed, it grew from merely being a spy to even becoming an occasional assassin. My conscience knew no limits, for as much as I had taken from those willing to teach me, I knew my fellow men and women well. Under the appropriate circumstances, they would turn on me to further their own positions. I gave them no chance to do so.

It was at the age of 18 summers I learned quite accidentally of the merchant who had slain my mother and nearly myself. After several weeks of research, I sneaked past his guards and into his estate house. I paralyzed him with an injected poison and then, once I knew he was paying attention, I whispered quietly into his ear who I was and why I was doing it to him. Then I slit his throat. His wife never knew until the very next morning when she awoke next to a bloody mess on her sheets. I told him I was going to slaughter his wife and children as well, and he went to Hell thinking that. I never did touch them though, for my quarrel was with him, not them.

Shortly after that I became a member of a regular group of people. A special unit, there were several such groups that the Ornithrym employed to journey into the world and adventure for them. This took place for two more years, until one of the men in my group, a demented priest of the God of Disease, upset one of the higher ranking Ornithrym leaders.

We were sent on a special mission then, not so different from the rest of them actually. We were to infiltrate a village not far from Ossulmere called Shallowglen and use our priests magic to poison the town's water supply while another group served as a distraction. It turned out that we were betrayed. Our group ended up serving as the distraction, and I only escaped with my life because I happened to know a wealthy farmer in Shallowglen that would bring his goods to Ossulmere to sell from time to time. I managed to escape the guards that chased me long enough to pick the lock on his door and slip into bed beside him. I silenced his suspicions as best I could, taking him to the height of passion several times that night. My companions were killed trying to escape that night, and the next morning before the farmer could awaken, I had slipped away and headed for a city along the Storres Sea named Ironmouth Bay.

Ironmouth Bay was less then 10 days ride from Ossulmere, however, so I knew I was not safe there. I chartered passage on a boat and set sail across the Storres Sea, heading south towards the Carsian Empire. It took some time, over a month in fact, but eventually I reached a far away city named Euwon. From there, I planned to head by ship through the Storres Sea to Westdeep Port. However, pirates intercepted our ship, and as soon as it became apparent to me who would win, I joined the pirates side.

I became the captain's consort quickly, and headed back to the Pirate Isles with them. Being a band of cutthroats and thieves, eventually word somehow reached the Ornithrym of my continued existence. While I'd done nothing wrong in my eyes, apparently my ability to breathe upset somebody, for someone was dispatched to stop me from enjoying that liberty so much. It was a wizard, of course, and wizards, I am not afraid to say, bother me. They do not fight like normal people, they hide and skulk about and then pop up long enough to zap you with some nasty magical power before sneaking away again. Nothing as legitimate as a knife in the back.

It turned out I got lucky, this wizard upset some of the locals in the Pirate Isles and I got the drop on him before He knew where to find me. Push came to shove though, and before I knew it he had summoned up what appeared to be a particularly nasty spell to deal with me. Not much liking that idea, I used my refined dagger throwing skills. Dagger got him right in the throat, point first this time. One thing about wizards, all that time spent studying tends to make them a rather weak and anemic lot. Well, his spell was so close to being finished that it could not just drain away and be a good little spell. It had to turn into some wild magic. When the dust settled, I looked around and realized I was no longer on some nameless isle amongst the Pirate Isles. I was laying on the ground in a small rocky gully with a convulsing wizard drowning in his own blood a few feet away from me.

Book 1 : Chapter 2

Then I noticed two things. The first was how hot it was. Unbearably hot, in fact. The sun beat down mercilessly on us, and a quick glance around me showed no vegetation or even shade in which to hide from its harsh effects. The second was that I felt burdened. It took me a moment to figure it out, and when I did I was left speechless. I felt as though I weighed more then I had before, though my body and equipment was unchanged.

The wizard had died by now, of course, and I crawled over to him and pulled my dagger out of his throat. He did not seem to mind when I went through his pouches and robbed him of everything of possible value.

Not certain what I would do with all the strange things I had found on his body, I nevertheless was concerned that I might have somehow ended up in a location so remote from anything I was used to that anything I could use to barter for my continued well being might come in handy. More of that survival instinct I had learned at a young age. It did not help me when I heard a faint raspy noise, like something hard sliding along rock.

I looked around myself quickly and saw nothing, then I glanced up at the narrow walls of the gully. I hate to admit it, but I was caught off guard then. Surprised even, by the large reptilian head rapidly descending towards me. Before I could draw my sword to strike at it, its fangs sunk into my shoulder. I staggered back from it, and it let go easily. I prepared myself for a fight and was again caught off guard when it did not advance on me. In fact, it seemed to almost be ignoring me, turning its attention instead towards the dead wizard.

I backed away from it slowly, thinking that perhaps I could find a more favorable position to fight it from, or better yet, that I could just outrun it. Now that it was down in the gully with me, I could see it was a big insect of some sort. More of a cross between a lizard and a spider then anything. Easily 10 feet from head to the back of its abdomen, it was covered in some sort of hard chitin shell or plating that did not seem to limit its multi-legged movements in the least.

The spider thing examined the wound in the wizard's throat and then stuck out its forked tongue quickly to lick it. Satisfied with what it found, it continued to lap away at the congealing blood. When it had taken care of that, it worried at the wizards neck with its teeth, trying to force more blood out. Well, without a living heart to pump the blood, the critter was mostly unsuccessful. I stumbled then, trying to back away further. The creature had changed tactics and was now contenting itself with slowly eating the wizard.

I tried to regain my feet but had trouble doing so, my legs did not want to obey me. I tried to raise my arm to brace myself against the rocky wall of the gully but it too, betrayed me by hanging limply at my side. I knew then why the spizzard (part spider, part lizard - a drugged mind seldom thinks rationally) had ignored me after biting me. I had been poisoned. I tried desperately to fight off its effects, but only managed to lose what little position I had and ended up rolling myself over onto my belly. I could smell the hard baked ground and feel the heat radiating off of it onto my cheek. Desperate to escape, my heart thundered in my chest and my breathing quickened rapidly. I realized I was helping the poison spread even further by doing this, but I was understandably a little bit upset at my inability to defend or protect myself.

Imagine my delight, or lack thereof, when I felt the spider try to bite me again in the back after several minutes. I considered myself lucky when I realized it had missed my skin and instead had only managed to bite into the soft leather armor. Then I realized it did not matter, for it had picked me up and was dragging me off somewhere to be his next meal.

A quick death, as it turned out, might have been preferable. Instead, I was ensheathed in a silk cocoon. On one hand, at least I was out of the sun. But on the other, the silk cocoon acted like a blanket and I was kept miserably hot. I do not know how long I was kept like that, but I know a few days passed before I began to feel that I could move again. Unfortunately, the cocoon was a prison from which I was not going to be able to escape on my own. Then the foul creature stuck his head back inside and bit me again, this time almost gently, and in addition to injecting fresh poison into my system, he stuck around and drank all of the blood from the wound. I was not looking forward to my fate.

No food and no water had already begun to take their toll on me, but from that point on, I began to lose my sense of reality quickly. During my increasingly rare moments of lucidity, I still struggled to try and free myself, but my conscious mind had mostly given up, it was the dark self centered bitch within me that would not die.

That was a good thing too, I think, because the next time I became aware of my surroundings I head the sounds of conflict. Eventually the sounds died out, and I wondered if the spider had won or if I had found something new intent on eating me. My hopes grew when I heard the sound, muffled and indistinguishable through the silk cocoon, of voices. What could be worse then hanging upside down in a cocoon for several days paralyzed from a poison while an incredibly hot climate took its toll on me? Nothing. Well, that is what I thought until my would be rescuers cut the silk holding the cocoon hanging from the rocky overhang above me. It was perhaps a 20 foot fall onto hard rocks below. The silk cushioned me quite a bit, I suppose, or otherwise I would have ended up more then just bruised and battered.

It took them literally hours to cut me out of the thing, apparently the silk was not the same as I was used to, for it was incredibly strong and resilient to cutting. When I finally emerged, I was still groggy from my ordeal and partially suffering from the effects of the poison. One of them, a very tall woman dressed in an outlandish outfit, gave me some water, which was warm and not particularly tasty, but very welcome nonetheless. I tried to look around and recover my wits, but instead I overloaded my senses and passed out again.

When next I awoke it seemed to be dusk. A small campfire burned nearby and I was wrapped in my cloak and laying close to it. The others were huddled around it too. First I saw the woman that had given me water, she smiled oddly at me and I noticed that she had distinctly elven features. Pointy ears, high cheekbones, anemically thin… definitely a elf. She had blond hair cropped close to her head, pale blue eyes, and was quite beautiful, in an outlandish sort of way. What surprised me was her clothing, she had a cloak pulled loosely about her body to protect her from the chill of the evening and a pair of comfortable looking boots on. The rest I filled in from my memory, which consisted of a loose skirt that fell only partway down her legs, several water skins, and a few weapons that I could not remember.

Sitting next to her was a giant of a man. Sort of. He was 9 feet tall if he was an inch. Black eyes and mottled green skin on a distinctly reptilian face. Even considering his size, I could tell that he was incredibly strong from the breadth of his shoulders and the look of his hands. He too, had a large cloak wrapped about him, but occasionally he would reach out and turn the spit over the fire and I could see that he wore some sort of scale mail that was made from the scales of a creature I was unfamiliar with instead of steel.

Two others sat around the fire, next to the giant iguana was a 6 foot tall man with coal black skin and deep blue eyes the color of sapphires. His cloak was thrown over his shoulders and he was ignoring those around him as he sharpened a weathered steel battle axe. The way he handled it I knew he was not only an expert with weapons, but that he was taking extreme care with it. He had a bastard sword at his side, a two handed sword laying on the ground beside him, obviously next to be sharpened and maintained, and a heavy crossbow across his back. He wore a set of scale armor similar to the giants.

The last one of my rescuers was undeniably a human woman. Golden hair with reddish highlights framed her brown eyes and delicate face. She looked far too innocent and beautiful to be amongst such a group, but then she looked at me and our eyes met. I could instantly tell there were hidden strengths and secrets within her. She wore a cape wrapped around herself as well, but it was open in front to allow her to reach out and help the giant cook the meal. Her arms were bare, as was much of the rest of her body when I finally caught a glimpse of it. She wore a strange looking one piece light tan colored outfit consisting of a bustier that was open at the sides below her breasts and in front, revealing the top of her well defined stomach. The two pieces of fabric that covered her ample breasts connected just below her navel. From there it turned into a loin cloth. Two additional straps rode high on her hips and joined her outfit where her loin cloth began for additional support and also to support the saber at her side and several daggers concealed about her person. Like all the rest, she had several waterskins close at hand.

"How are you feeling?" The human girl asked me, her accent so strange she had to repeat herself before I could understand it.

I tried to speak but found my voice was not ready yet. After coughing against the scratch in my throat, I opened my cloak and pulled out one of my own two waterskins and took a drink out of it. Somewhat relieved, I was finally able to answer. "I've been better. Where am I?"

I glanced at the food cooking, thinking some food would do me good, even though I was still very light headed and nauseous from my ordeal. I was surprised to finally recognize it as my former captor, or at least a section of him.

"We are five days east and north of Neewon, on the eastern edge of the badlands there," The girl said to me. I call her a girl because while I was only 19 years old myself, she seemed a few years younger then I.

The names meant nothing to me. My blank look was noted.

"Where are you from?" The elf asked me, studying me carefully.

I took another pull on my waterskin and pulled my cloak back about me, hot as it had been during the day, it was cold at night. "Ossulmere, originally. Am I in the southern parts of Halador now?"

"Halador?" The human asked me, equally confused about the name as I was about Neewon. "Ossulmere? Where are these places?"

"How did you get here?" The elf asked again. The lizard-man paid little attention to the conversation, focusing mostly on the meal. The human man seemed oblivious as well, instead concentrating on his weapons.

I considered my situation as best I could, which was not saying much. Hungry, tired, sick, and dehydrated, I had little choice but to hope my rescuers continued to treat me well. "A wizard attacked me in the Pirate Isles, I had apparently upset someone or other at one point and they decided they did not want me to continue living. Well, as the wizard tried to cast a spell on me, I managed to stick him in the throat with a dagger. The spell apparently went wild and both of us ended up here, although he was dead in a matter of minutes from the wound. Then that giant spider attacked me, the rest you know." I left out my involvement with the Ornithrym, I figured it was better to keep quiet about that for now, just in case.

"Pirate Isles? I've never heard of them, are they in the Sea of Lost Souls?" The girl asked me. "Oh, and that wasn't a spider, that was a silk crawler."

The elf seemed to be on to something, however, for she spoke up before I could ask what in the nine hells the Sea of Lost Souls was. "Magic? What is that? Do you mean psionics? Does none of the areas we speak of sound familiar to you?"

I shook my head, a little surprised by the possibility, but not to badly, since I already knew I was not in the same place I had been. I glanced up at the night sky, looking for the familiar constellations of Halador. My mouth fell open then, and I can admit to being totally caught off guard. "Farther…"

"What do you mean? You're farther from your home then you thought? Is it on the other side of the Sea of Lost Souls?" I had to give the girl credit, she really was trying to understand and help.

"Look," I snapped at her, "I have no idea what a Sea of Lost Souls is! I've never heard of any of these places you mention, and I'm really very lost here! And why in the nine hells is that sun so damned small?"

That got their attention. The jolly green giant stopped turning the spit and instead stared at me. The man stopped sharpening his great sword and did likewise. The elf's eyes widened as she figured out what I was about to discover. The girl was on the same pace as me though, she looked up and looked back at me in surprise. "That is Kurth, the smaller sun that is always in the sky. Yorinn has only just set an hour or so past."

Kurth? Yorinn? I had no idea what those names were. "This isn't Halador, is it?" I asked, my voice dropping to a whisper.

"This world is called Acathia," the elf responded gently, ahead of me and realizing what a shock I was beginning to go through.

"Oh wow," The girl said, playing catch up. "You're from another world! The soothsayers were right! Did you come from the sky too?"

"My name is Sandala, you are welcome to come with us if you like," the elf woman said to me, indicating I should try and ignore the girl.

"Yeah, my name is Brina, please come with us, I'll tell you all about Acathia if you tell me about your world!"

I was a bit annoyed by the girls enthusiasm. I caught the man scowling, and decided that the more I looked at him, the more he reminded me of a dwarf, even though he had no beard. Or any hair at all, from the looks of him. The giant / lizard / man just looked on with interest, but at least he was turning the spit again.

"I will travel with you, my name is Yamara," I said to them, trying to keep my mental balance.

Brina opened her mouth to say more but Sandala stopped her by leaning over and laying her hand on her arm. "Brina, Yamara needs to eat, drink, and rest some more, save your questions for later."

Brina appeared annoyed, but nodded and smiled at me again. I took another drink of water and found myself suddenly numb. I drank more and found that I had nearly emptied one of my waterskins already. I nodded thankfully to Sandala and laid back down to rest a bit.

"She's not having any of my water," I heard the man mutter as he went back to working on his weapons.

"Kryl, shut up you witless Acathian! Can't you see she needs our help?" Brina snapped at him, favoring him with a blistering look.

"Is that what humans are called here?" I asked, sitting up too quickly.

Kryl shot me a dark look before he got up and put his weapons back about his person and stomped off into the cold night.

"Nay, Yamara," Sandala explained to me. "Acathians may have once been related to humans, but for countless generations they have been bred for fighting, either in armies or for gladiators. Very tough, very strong, and very powerful, but as you can see, they can be rather difficult too. Kryl is a hard worker and a very reliable man to have at your back, but he's as stubborn as a nezmir."

Before I could ask my next question, Sandala laughed lightly and said, "Sorry, a nezmir is a giant lizard used to pull wagons and caravans. Very unreliable though, it's not uncommon for them to eat their handlers."

I nodded my thanks to her, then shook my head at all the new information. I finished off my first waterskin and laid my head back down.

"Don't worry about Kryl, he just doesn't like changes much. He's happiest when he has some hard work set out for him and nothing to slow him down." Brina said, smiling at me again and trying to make me feel at ease.

I nodded again, to caught up in my own thoughts to appreciate her good intentions. I glanced at the giant and said, "Alright, then what are you?"

"Arktan," The giant said, pointing with his thumb towards his chest. "I am Faradwim."

I nodded. Of course he was, it made perfect sense. I stared up at the night sky, wondering if one of the tiny dots above me was Halador and how I would ever get back there.

The silk crawler was cooked fully soon. I was hesitant to try it, but I had to admit that it tasted pretty good. The meat was rather juicy, which made my mouth water more. I was well on the road to recover after my second helping of it. By the time we were done with it, I was ready to sleep some more. I still had so many questions, but my body demanded that I follow its orders first.

I never saw Kryl come back to the camp and stare long and hard at me. I never heard the four of them have a conversation about including me in their group, or at least Sandala and Brina arguing with Kryl about including me while Arktan just sat quietly and listened unless someone specifically addressed him. I had no idea of the decision they reached until I awoke the next morning to Brina's gentle touch on my shoulder.

Book 1 : Chapter 3

More shocks kept coming my way. First of all was our method of transportation. I rode with Brina in a large covered wagon. What was unique about it was not the wagon, though it was an odd design, but the mounts that pulled it called rasteers. Four large four legged insects were harnessed to the wagon, each roughly four feet high and eight feet long.

Arktan and Kryl both had leashes attached to immense lizards that were 16 feet long. The lizard, called an larassu, had a thick turtle-like shell on its back and belly, and a scaly and tough skin elsewhere. A large carriage was on the back of the larassu, called a howdah. Both Arktan and Kryl rode on their own respective mounts.

The larger sun, Yorinn, was just rising as I saw this, and already the day was getting so warm the sweat was beading up on my skin. For the time being I did not mind, for that meant that I had enough water in my body to sweat. In spite of the growing heat, Sandala had no mount. She carried her equipment, including several full waterskins, on her person. When we moved out she easily matched the pace of the mounts with her long legged stride. She made running look so effortless and easy I wondered at just how incredible a world this Acathia was.

Several hours later, amidst incredible amounts of sweat, I finally spoke to Brina, who had been chattering away at me incessantly the entire time. "How big is this desert?" I asked her.

She turned and looked at me, an amused look on her face. "Well, the badlands we're in now we'll be out of in another hour or two I think, which is good because that means we'll be entering the scrub beyond them and our mounts can forage for food, instead of relying on the stores we brought. Those larassues eat a lot of food too! My rasteers aren't that bad, they don't eat that much."

I filed away the information about the mounts for later use. She had not explained to me what I really wanted to know. "No, I mean, when does the desert end? You know, grass? Trees? Water… that kind of stuff."

"Well, um, we're heading towards the ruins of the ancient city called Guthmoor, we're hoping to find metal treasures there. We should be there in two more days if everything goes right, is that what you mean?" Brina said to me. "I mean, there's an oasis a few days southeast of Guthmoor, there might be some grass and trees there. And water, definitely some water."

I shook my head, "Wait a minute, you've been chattering about the city-states run by cruel tyrants, how slavery is commonplace, how Sandala is the descendent countless generations removed from some hero of her people named Tarolla, and how supposedly the last time visitors came from another world they came from the skies and it is only a legend spoken by the ancients. But you can't tell me when summer will end or how big this desert is?"

"What's summer?" Brina asked, glancing at me while she was busy guiding the rasteers. "It's always like this here. Always hot and dry. I have heard stories of great forests far to the north and the south and supposedly there is water aplenty there. But between you and me, I don't believe it. Just like all the rumored lost cities of gold and steel. But if you're from another world, then maybe those aren't rumors either!"

I had explained to Brina that magic had brought me here. A ruined wizards spell. I had not fallen from the sky as the mysterious legends she recounted. Apparently great ships had come from the sky, bearing her ancestors. There had been great battles and an eventual peace. She was kind of vague about it all, but I suspect that these legends were vague as well. Thousands of years is a considerable amount of time to keep a story straight, after all.

Brina paused a minute, considering something. I waited patiently for her to continue before I digested all of what she had told me. Finally she said to me in a tone that sounded like she was confiding a great secret to me, "My saber is metal! My father passed it on to me. Kryl has all those metal weapons too. He says he won his freedom in Borik as a gladiator, and continued to fight and won those weapons. Arktan has that steel two handed sword at his side too, but his battle axe is just obsidian edged. And Sandala, she has a steel hand and a half sword that she once told me she got from her tribe before she left it. She was pretty drunk when she told me though, so she might have made it up. She uses it and that obsidian edged longsword, which looks more like a weapon made by elves to me."

"What about you?" Brina asked, suddenly eyeing my weapons with curiosity, not envy, "Do you have steel and metals where you came from?"

I had to laugh then, but I tried not to do so condescendingly. "Aye, we have metals aplenty." To show her I drew my shortsword and dagger, which reflected the sunlight from outside off their magically sharp blades. I also pulled my two throwing daggers out for her to see, surprising her I think because she did not know I had them hidden inside the cuffs of my sleeves. I also showed her my ring, though I did not take it off because I was afraid I might lose something so small easily, and it was very valuable to me as it afforded me magical protection. Finally I decided if metal was as rare as she made it sound, I might be a very wealthy woman. I opened the pouch at my side and let her look in it. I had 100 gold pieces in it, a small fortune on Halador, and apparently a vast treasure on Acathia, by the look of her eyes.

"Is that real gold?" She asked, shocked to see it. I nodded and her eyes grew somehow bigger. "You're rich! All that gold and steel, you could probably buy enough men to take over a city!"

I chuckled at that, and took care of my gear before asking, "I have several rare gems and jewels too, are those worth anything here?"

Brina laughed lightly, "Yes, they are, but depending on what you have, you're gold may be worth more. There's enough gold in your pouch to let you live the rest of your life in pampered comfort."

I opened another pouch and showed her the gems and jewels within it. A small part of me enjoyed showing off my apparent wealth, though another part marked her well and I knew if any of it was missing who I would confront first. My pouch had several agates in it, a few aquamarines, some black pearls, 2 opals, and my most valuable gems were 2 sapphires worth 5,000 gold each on Halador.

"Oh wow, that is incredible!" Brina said after she remembered to close her mouth at my pearls. She had never seen there like before. "I never thought I'd see that much wealth in one place!"

I chuckled and took care of it. Brina seemed lost in thought as she realized all that I had and how much it was worth on Acathia. I let myself reflect on the things she had told me then, and began to wonder if I would ever get used to the incredible heat of what appeared to be my new home. I was not even out in the sun and it was this hot, I dreaded getting out of her wagon.

"How do you survive this heat?" I asked after several long minutes had passed and I was finally growing tired of the sweat running down the valley between my breasts.

"You'll get used to it, really," Brina said, amused at my discomfort. "You're wearing a lot of clothes too, and dark colors, that's rare and, well, kind of stupid. Good gear at night I guess, but during the day, the darker your clothing, the hotter it is."

I nodded and considered my appearance. Tanned nicely from my time spent on ships, both pirate and merchant, I nevertheless wore a full suit of toughened leather armor, from my grieves to my tunic and long sleeves. And of course, it was a very dark brown in color, given to it from the time spent in boiling vats of oil that toughen and harden the armor. Further, my black boots came nearly to my knee, and the cloak that hung from my shoulders was made of black fur from a rare arctic beast as well.

I eyed Brina's outfit, the same that she had worn the day before, and considered my options. In my belongings I had a softer and lower pair of black boots called footpads boots, obviously not much of an improvement. I also had my black silk bodysuit I would often use for missions of stealth at night which was again, not an option.

"Look, I'm a few inches taller then you, but not too much, our bodies look pretty much the same, I have a bunch of spare clothes in that sack over there," Brina said to me after noticing my troubled look. I glanced at the bag she pointed to and after a moment of thought, walked over to it. I rummaged through it, examining the different things she had to offer. "Pick whatever you want, when we get back to Neewon, or wherever we end up, you can buy some clothes there, you sure can afford them! I have lots of clothes myself, I have a tendency to get myself into all sorts of different things."

I nodded at that, noticing she had all manner of clothing, from simple peasant clothing to rags I remembered well from my childhood to courtly dresses. Nothing as elaborate as what I had seen on Halador, but I attributed that to the inescapable heat of the world. I glanced at Brina again and remembered Sandala, both had outfits so revealing that in Halador they would be shunned for indecency in many places. Here I could appreciate the simplicity of it though, for I was near to passing out from the heat.

I stripped off my clothing quickly, marveling at how damp it was from my sweat. Brina glanced back at me and I saw her eyes take in my body. At first she simply admired my form, something I noted but did not pay much attention to, then I heard her gasp slightly. "What happened to you? Were you a slave on your world?"

Ah, that explained it, she had glimpsed past the magic and seen my scars. She had the ability to look beyond the forest to see the trees within it that few people possessed. I admired Brina's ability to focus, and reconsidered her admiration of my body from lust to simple curiosity and respect.

"A slave of sorts, perhaps, but I did not think it so. Most of these are from the ungentle hands of men who abused me when I was younger." I said, leaving my past professions out of it.

"Ah," Brina said, thinking she understood me. I let her believe as she wanted to, for I did not wish to discuss my past with her without knowing her better. "Be careful to cover yourself when you leave the wagon, you are clearly not from Acathia, your skin is pale and the sun will burn you quickly."

I had always considered myself fairly well tanned, especially of late, but when I considered the skin I normally covered in comparison to the dark tan on Brina's body, I realized that she was right. I nodded to her and smiled, then proceeded to don some new clothing. I slipped on a halter top made of some type of cloth similar to cotton. It hung loosely on me, for while Brina was taller then me, she was also slightly skinnier. However, her breasts were larger then mine and that was what made the halter top loose. I did not mind, for it let the air flow between my breasts better, and perhaps any opponent I had would make the mistake of becoming distracted by my cleavage.

I went without boots or sandals, for mine were too large and hot, and she had nothing to spare. I eyed mine carefully, and decided that I could modify mine with a dagger and some needle and thread, which I had in my pack. I kept my belt with my weapons and pouches, refastening that about my waist. To add to it, I slipped on a loin cloth that reminded me of the outfit of a sultan's harem girl. I briefly considered doing a bit of a belly dance, then realized I was behaving oddly. I took a drink of water and moved to rejoin Brina.

"Those look good on you," she said when I had moved back to sit near her at the front of the wagon. I glanced at myself and smiled. Having my background, I had never been concerned with modesty. Indeed, I often used it, or a lack of it, to my advantage. Still, I felt oddly exposed on this strange new world, but given the alternative, I decided it would have to do.

Later that day, during which I passed the time by learning of Acathia from Brina or alternatively trying to doze in the dry heat, Sandala led us to a small oasis. The oasis seemed to mark the end of the badlands and the beginning of the scrub Brina had told me about. As we moved to leave the wagon, Brina held out a light brown cape to me and said, "Put this on, it will keep your skin from burning as quickly." I noted that she had said, 'as quickly'. I smiled grimly. In the days ahead, I knew I was in for some serious sunburns.

The water was hot and tasted of dirt, but I drank of it deeply. We refilled our waterskins and Arktan pulled a large barrel out of his howdah and also filled it. I guessed it to hold well over 100 gallons of water, and was amazed to see him sling a rope over it and his howdah then pull on the rope and lift it back into the howdah. It must have weighed over 900 pounds, and regardless of the rudimentary winch and pulley he had designed, to lift that much weight made me reassess how strong the faradwim must be. The mounts were led to the oasis next, which had begun to show signs of not being bottomless after we were finished with it. By the time the rasteers and the larassues were finished, the oasis was nothing but some muddy water less then an inch thick.

I eyed the oasis thoughtfully, realizing that if it could be drained so easily, then Acathia must truly be a world plagued by perpetual drought. The scraggly trees surrounding the hole provided some measure of shade, but already my face, arms, and lower legs were burning with the heat of the indirect sunlight. Overhead the smaller sun burned an angry red, instead of the warm and gentle whitish-yellow of the larger sun that I was accustomed to.

"The oasis will refill in a day or so," Sandala said, coming next to me and noticing my stare was directed at the muddy hole in the ground.

I started, realizing I was not adapting as quickly as I would like to. I was very vulnerable then, and it was good fortune for me that I found people with no wish to do me any harm. "That's good," I said, letting her think that was my concern. "I am still trying to learn about this world. This is a harsh lesson on how truly dry it is here, and how valuable water is."

Sandala smiled lightly. "Brina tells me you have enough gold and steel on you to buy a city. Is it so common where you come from?"

Sighing, I nodded, "Steel is easy to come by, we have smiths in every town able to produce the simplest things with it. Gold is not so common, but it is the currency with which most things are bought. Silver and copper is used as well, but gold is worth more, so I carry it instead of the lesser coins."

"Yes, we have silver coins here as well, and it is worth less then gold coins. But less then that are ceramic pieces, which can be split into 10 bits. The bit is the most common currency here, but a single gold coin is worth 1000 bits."

My eyes widened. I stumbled over the math in my head and quickly realized that in gold alone, I had a fortune if that was the case. "Then it appears I am indeed a wealthy woman," I said to her, my voice low. "But wealth can be a prison, for those who have it are plagued by those who want it."

Sandala smiled again, "You are wise, that will serve you well. None of us will trouble you for it, but you can be certain that others will not be so friendly."

"Where I come from, the company I often find myself in would as soon put a dagger in my back for a few silver. My thanks to you for your kindness, it is a rarity to find in any world, and from what I have heard, even more so here."

The elf nodded to me. "Brina probably didn't tell you, but our last adventure netted us quite a bit of gold as well, more then anyone should expect to see in a lifetime."

I chuckled, Brina was gaining more respect in my mind the longer I knew her. "Brina's not the excited little girl she acts like, is she?" I asked wryly.

Sandala laughed at that. "Nay, far from it. Our Brina is a rather exceptional thief. She's not bad in a fight I suppose, but she really earns her keep whenever we need to visit a town."

I nodded, that had been my assumption from the beginning, but it was nice to hear it confirmed. "And what of you and the others? I can't imagine Arktan being a thief, he's to big. Kryl seems to surly and reluctant to part with his weapons. Where I come from, most elves live in forests and wield magic as well as more common weapons of war."

Sandala raised an eyebrow at hearing that. "What is an elf? If you mean me, I am a pudarin. My lineage can be traced all the way back to the great Tarolla herself. My people are nomads, herders, and raiders. We wander the wastelands making our living as best we can in tribes usually numbering over a hundred. I am a warrior and a tracker myself, with an affinity for the wilderness."

"And what of your friends?" I asked, changing the topic to something less personal for her lest I say or do something she might misinterpret.

Sandala smiled, she obviously knew what I was doing as well. "Arktan is a warrior, if that's not obvious. He spent some time as a mercenary lending out his strength and skill before we met up with him. Being a caravan guard is a lousy job, and when his caravan was overrun by an pudarin tribe raiding it, he switched sides with us and gladly helped us escape. He looks and acts different and simple, but be warned, he's far smarter then you might think. Brina used to try and pull tricks on him, but the joke usually ended up being on her when he turned them around on her."

I nodded and took that information to heart. "The Acathian?"

"Kryl? He's a gladiator. A priest in Borik saw him when he was a young child and took him from his parents. Ever since, he was trained to fight in the pits for the amusement of the nobles, priests, and even the sorcerer king of Borik himself. He was one of the slaves in the caravan with Arktan and I when it was overrun by pudarin." Sandala said.

"Okay, so why were you a slave?" I asked, trying to learn as much as I could about them in case I needed it later.

"I was an pudarin in Borik at the wrong place at the wrong time," She replied, sneering slightly. "A thief had just stolen something from a priest and I happened to be nearby. Given the distrust of pudarin most people have, it was only logical that I be accused of it. Never mind that I didn't have what was stolen, I was captured and sold into slavery to line the priest's pockets."

Not really interested, but trying to keep the story going, I asked, "Did they ever catch the thief?"

She laughed at that. "No, they didn't. But Kryl, Arktan and I did after we'd escaped the caravan and returned to Borik to provision ourselves."

"Rather foolish to return to the same city you had just been captured in, wasn't it?" I asked, surprised that someone who seemed as intelligent and quick witted as Sandala did would attempt something like that.

"Our moment of fame was over before it began, fortunately," she explained. "Thievery and corruption is so common here that nobody remembered me less then a week after it had begun. Kryl was a different story, for he was a favored gladiator, but my contacts within the city allowed us to remain hidden while we supplied ourselves."

"You said you caught the thief, did you turn him in to prove your innocence or just kill him to avenge yourself?" I asked, surprised at the chaotic nature of things that I was learning.

"Neither," She said mysteriously.

"Then what did you do?" My curiosity, I had to admit, was growing.

"Asked her to join us."

I made the connection quickly and started laughing. I glanced over at where the campsite for the night was being set up by Kryl and Brina while Arktan was caring for the animals. Brina was where my gaze ended up. I was learning all sorts of surprising things about her.

It was more cooked silk crawler for dinner, then some mild conversation as we tried to get a feel for one another a bit more. I showed them my weapons and saw Kryl appraise them expertly. When he handed them back to me, I saw respect in his eyes, perhaps not for me, but for the smiths of Halador. We doubled up on taking watch that night. I spent the first watch with Kryl, to his apparent disgust, then Brina and Arktan spent the next one together. Sandala picked up the third one on her own. The next day saw us in the same riding arrangement as the day before. I was no more used to the heat, but I was used to feeling it at least, so it came as less of a shock to me.

Book 1 : Chapter 4

True to Brina's word, we reached the ruins of the ancient city of Guthmoor two days later. I had gotten to know all of them a little better, though I was far from placing my trust in them. Brina continued to treat me as a legendary hero that she idolized, though as our familiarity grew, she tempered it down a bit so that I felt that she considered me a treasured companion more important then the others. Trusting my own instincts about her, I kept my reservations about her, but responded to her warmly on the surface.

Arktan struck me as truly the strong but silent type. He possessed strength unlike anything I had ever seen before, and went about his tasks silently. I studied him carefully as best I could and came to learn that as Sandala had told me, he was not a dullard. The way in which he did things and even his lack of conversation at times showed signs of a keen mind. Occasionally I would catch him looking back at me, but when I caught him he would make an expression that reminded me of a snake trying to smile and then quickly move to do something else.

Kryl appeared exactly as he had been from the beginning. Arrogant, surly, and unpleasant. He reminded me of the dwarves I had met on Halador, always something to complain about. Unlike them, however, he showed no signs of ever enjoying life unless he had a task ahead of him that required all of his concentration. In fact, the longer we went the more unpleasant he became. Brina confided in me at one point that Kryl gets ornery when he doesn't have anything to fight for a long time. I did not consider 4 days a long time, but I was not from the same world as them, so what did I know?

I had learned about priests as well when I asked about the Gods of the world. There were no known Gods, but instead the priests of Acathia worshipped either one of the four elements or, in the case of priests, the sorcerer king of a city. That surprised me, to learn that the tyrants that controlled the cities were so powerful that beings could worship them and be granted spells. There was another type of priest on Acathia, a nature priest. They were called druids and reminded me much of the druids of Halador, save that these druids worshipped the nature spirit of a place and were granted their powers from that spirit, whom they were sworn to protect. Magic was non-existent in Acathia, from the looks I received when I asked of it. Sorcerer kings were not the sorcerers I was used to, instead they were powerful psionicists.

A psionicist, I learned, was someone with a powerful mind. Someone that could use their mind to affect others and in some instances, even the very world around them. Sounded like magic to me, just by a different name.

My head was abuzz with all the information I had learned in the past several days. I had begun to get accustomed to the heat, though by no means did that mean that I was able to claim immunity to it, simply that I could endure the 150 degree weather in silent misery. It was a moment of this misery that had me squinting through the shimmering heated air that rose off the ground when we reached Guthmoor.

I caught my first glimpse of the Sea of Lost Souls then too. Brina had finally explained to me what is was. It was sand, rock, and other bits of the world ground so finely as to be individually no larger then a spec of dust. The winds had blown these specks together in depressions across Acathia, leaving behind lakes and seas of this dust that was so fine that anything foolish enough to walk in it quickly was sucked under. Apparently at a depth of around 15 to 20 feet it was compressed enough by the weight of the dust that it became solid enough to walk on. However, only giants could reach that depth, and apparently Acathia did not possess any of them. To be sucked into the silt, I was told, is a painful and quick death of suffocation. Now that I saw it, I likened it to quicksand, for it looked harmless enough on the surface.

"So this is a city of the ancients?" I asked Brina of Guthmoor as we approached it.

She grinned and said, "Yeah, isn't it exciting? I've seen ruins before but never any this big. Look at how they fit the stones together, can you imagine how much skill that would have taken?"

I chuckled and surveyed the city. It was a good size one, I had to admit, but the walls were scarred and broken by the harsh climate. Many of the buildings we could see were equally broken down, and in many places the sand had been blown by the wind and covered up entire sections of it. If I had any doubt to the nature of the Sea of Lost Souls, it was erased when I saw the crumbling walls descending into the dust where once they had stood on solid ground.

The wagon stopped and I hopped out of it. Immediately the sun attacked my already burnt skin, making me grit my teeth against the pain. I knew that eventually I would tan down, but it felt like the sun would just burn me to the bone before that happened. I glanced about, squinting even more now that I had no cover, and noticed an occasional eddy of wind would blow up the fine silt and carry it far into the air before letting it drop so slowly I was further convinced of its dangerous nature.

"What now?" I asked, not sure of how they planned on exploring the ancient ruins. I knew how I would go about it, but they had their mounts and Brina's wagon to be concerned with.

"Well, usually Sandala and I head in to do a little scouting because we aren't as big and noisy as Arktan and Kryl are. Hey, do you want to come with us?" Brina asked me, a smile on her face as the idea hit her.

I knew damn well why she wanted me to go with them, she wanted to see if I was any good at what I did. Still, without a reason to stay behind, and with my own curiosity to see these ruins, I felt I might as well go along.

The others joined us in a few moments and Brina happily opened her mouth and said, "Yamara wants to come with us when we scout it, Sandala! Can she?"

Sandala looked at me with an amused expression, to which I rolled my eyes slightly. She hid a chuckle behind her hand and said, "Certainly, Yamara. From what we've heard, this place is abandoned mostly, so there should be little risk."

"Then let us be off," I said, loosening my sword in its scabbard and turning towards the ruins. A little surprised, the other two women quickly fell into step beside me.

We approached the ruins straight on, me angling towards the closest breach in the wall. The closer we got, the quieter we became. I noticed that we all slowed down a bit and began to choose our steps more carefully. By the time we reached the hole in the wall, I would not have known we were there if I had not seen us, so silent were we.

It was then that I felt something tickling the back of my head. I glanced behind me quickly, wondering what was happening. Nothing was back there save my two companions, and they only looked at me curiously. Shrugging it off, I stepped through the breach and glanced around as the tickle turned into a buzz. Several feet away from the wall were buildings, or at least the remnants of buildings. Broken down and in many places missing entire fronts, they nevertheless stretched away for several hundred feet.

Finally the buzzing resolved itself into a voice in my head that said, Go back, you are in danger! Then the feeling of something contacting my mind vanished, leaving me confused and wondering what had happened.

I spun around quickly and stared at Sandala suspiciously. I suspected her to be one of these psionicists I had learned of and I knew of no other way to speak in someone's mind then through magic, though they claimed no such thing existed. She looked back at me, wondering why I would stop in the middle of what was once an ancient road. I opened my mouth to say something when I heard a faint noise behind me, towards the ruined buildings.

I spun around in time to catch a small rock in the shoulder. It knocked me off balance it flew so quickly. It hurt as well, but it was not life threatening. Other rocks came flying at us too, seeming to jump from the very ground and attack us without anyone throwing them. Brina and Sandala both grunted as well as they were struck. More wary now, I dodged the others that came at me and looked for the source of the unnatural attack.

I found it a moment later. 10 spindly legged creatures came charging at us suddenly, emerging from behind broken walls and ruined buildings. Gaunt and lanky, they appeared to be the height of a man and ran on two legs, but they were bent over and grotesque looking. They wielded spears with heads made of sharpened obsidian, and had what looked like plates of larassu shell strapped on them for armor. I quickly drew my shortsword and my dagger, preparing for combat. Brina did likewise, but Sandala took enough time to knock an arrow and turn and fire it back towards where Arktan and Kryl waited outside the city. Unseen to all of us, it arced high into the air and fell only a few inches from Kryl's foot, sticking into the ground.

Battle was joined then, and I found that while the larassu shell armor the creatures wore was too thick and tough to easily penetrate, their skin was not. I had one disabled with a slash of my sword and thrust of my dagger, his blood being soaked up by the dry ground as quickly as it pumped out of his wounds. Nearby Brina had produced two throwing daggers and had thrown both to good effect, wounding one of the creatures rushing her badly enough so that when it reached her she could slip inside the swing of its spear and dispatch it with her saber. I was concerned about Sandala for she had no time to draw her bastard sword before 4 of the creatures were on her.

My fears were unfounded, however. I caught a glimpse of her briefly and saw her moving in a fluid dance like motion, her arms and feet striking out at the creatures to drive them back and give her room enough to draw her weapon. By the time she had acquired that room, one of them lay on the ground struggling to breath from a crushed windpipe and one of the others was cradling a broken arm.

Confident my companions could take care of themselves, I returned my attention fully to the other ones attacking me. More were emerging from the buildings to advance on us, and I quickly grew worried that there would be no end to them. My dagger took another of the things in the throat after my sword had parried its spear, but another took its place and then I faced two of them.

Fortunately for me, these creatures were not trained to fight together, and after a few blocks and parries, I managed to trick one of them into thrusting his spear at me while the other slashed with his. They ended up tangling each other up, and my shortsword thrust into the side of the one on the right, parting his ribs and cutting through his lungs and heart. I shoved him off my blade into the other creature, giving myself a moment to recover from the strike.

A roar from behind me somewhere distracted me though, and I did not move quickly enough to dodge another approaching creature. I expected them to use their spears as piercing weapons, but the large obsidian head they had on them they apparently felt was designed more for slashing. I barely managed to lean out of the way of the slash, and even then my success was not complete. The tip of the spear cut and tore the skin under my left breast, my ribs keeping it from sinking deeper. It came up and across, tearing the halter top I had borrowed from Brina into a useless rag and cutting a groove between my breasts and across my upper right one. It stung like hell too, but I had long since learned to ignore pain.

The roar, it turned out, was Kryl charging into combat. He swung a bastard sword around as though it weighed as much as my short sword. His strength and skill was impressive, I had to admit, for with each swing it seemed an adversary fell.

Arktan was a demon of battle as well, using his great size to benefit. Wielding a two handed sword, he literally cut his first opponent in half. In spite of the number of creatures growing to 23, I was certain they were going to deal with them now that Arktan and Kryl had arrived.

That required me to beat the things attacking me though, at least as far as I was concerned. After the spear slashed across my chest, I jumped forward inside the reach of it and plunged my dagger into the soft underside of the creatures chin, killing it instantly. The other one that I had managed to keep off balance and tied up so far was now ready to deal with me. He came at me with deadly intent, slashing overhead with his spear at me. I jumped to the side, pushing off the dying creature I had just stabbed, and felt the spear head snag on my borrowed cloak, but otherwise miss me. That tripped me up though and caused me to fall. With the wind knocked out of me, I saw the creature recover from his attack and turn to come at me again.

Behind me, Sandala was nursing a wounded arm and used her bastard sword in her other good arm. She had already claimed three of the humanoids that attacked us, and had wounded the remaining one that faced her. Brina had slain two herself, but two others had her slowly retreating as she tried desperately to keep them from wounding her any worse then the scratch on her thigh she had already taken. Kryl had slain four of them himself and, as I was busy raising my dagger and throwing it at the creature stalking me, he dispatched a fifth one. Arktan had a similar number of dead or dying humanoids around him, though it was hard to tell the exact number as his great strength meant that quite often only pieces remained.

My thrown dagger missed, but it caused the creature to dodge to the side. That gave me the time I needed to jump to my feet and sprint over on its flank. It spun to try and attack me, but my shortsword cut across its upper arm, causing it to draw back in pain. My next swing took the spear out of its hand, leaving it defenseless. I approached it again, sword held ready to strike, and the creature looked at me with fear in its eyes. It fell to its knees and raised its hands in a supplicating gesture, begging for mercy. I gave it the only mercy I knew… and its head fell beside its body.

I snatched up my dagger then and turned to see how my companions fared. Sandala was pulling her bastard sword out of the rib cage of the last of her adversaries, though she bled freely from her arm and her side. Kryl and Arktan were both finished with their foes, but were to far from the rest of us to offer much help. Brina was still retreating from the last two, her strikes becoming more and more desperate as the creatures got a feel for fighting with each other against her. I decided to even things up a bit and sheathed my sword and dagger. I pulled the two throwing daggers I always carry close by and threw both of them, one after another.

Brina saw the flash of steel and jumped forward, ramming her saber into the bowels of one of the creatures. The other one turned to strike her down but stumbled and fell to its knees instead. My daggers stuck out of its back, one spearing a kidney and another a lung. Wrenching her saber free in a disemboweling move, Brina turned and lopped the head of the kneeling creature to finish them both off. She smiled at me and winked, then looked around.

I reclaimed my throwing daggers and looked down at the scraps of the halter top hanging from my shoulders. I pulled it off my shoulders and winced as I stretched and the gash across my chest opened further. Chuckling ironically, I figured I had some fresh scars coming. The blood ran down my chest and across my belly. I opened a pouch at my side and reached into it, my hand sinking deeper in it then should have been possible. I saw Brina watching me out of the corner of her eye and I smiled to myself. She definitely had potential. I did not see Sandala also keeping her eye on me, however.

I pulled a vial of pale blue liquid out of my magical pouch of holding, so named for its extra-dimensional space inside that could hold far many times what it should be able to, as well as its ability to let whatever the user wants to find (if it is inside the pouch) be found simply by willing it to be so, instead of rooting around needlessly for the correct thing. I took the cork out of the end of the vial and carefully took a sip of it, making certain I drank no more then a third of it. The liquid ran down my throat and felt cool and soothing, tempting me to drink more of it simply to fight off the effects of the exertion in the heat.

Brina gasped when I turned around and faced them. While the blood on my chest and belly was still there, the wound itself had rapidly began to close and knit together. In a matter of moments a pink scar was all that remained, though it was still tender to the touch. An added benefit I had not considered would happen from taking a drink of my healing potion was that my skin, already a bright red from the suns harmful touch, tanned down quickly. Inadvertently, I had just saved myself several days or more of painful sunburn and peeling. I popped the cork back into the vial and placed it back in my magical pouch.

"What did you just drink?" Sandala asked, coming closer to me. Brina approached also, her hand reaching out subconsciously to touch my chest where the slash had been.

"It was a potion of healing," I said, watching Brina as her fingers lightly traced the new scar then pulled back as she realized that she had just practically fondled my breasts.

"A potion? I have never heard of such a thing," Sandala said, a hint of awe in her voice.

"They are common where I come from," I told her. "Or at least common among magical items."

"We have something similar here, though none of us have any," Sandala said, considering what she had learned. "To us such healing can take place by consuming kuwami fruits."

I tilted my head and considered what she said. "You okay?" Kryl said as he came up on the three of us. He had already gone through several of the dead creatures belongings, and Arktan was finishing up with the others. Arktan had a slight gash on one of his cheeks, and Kryl was unwounded.

"Aye, we'll live," Sandala said, smiling at the Acathian.

He grunted and studied me for a few moments, not paying any attention to my exposed chest any more then he did the rest of me. Finally he met my gaze for a moment and nodded. "You fought well," was all he said to me before he turned away went to check on more of the creatures.

"I think he likes you," Brina said conspiratorially to me with a grin. I could not help but laugh at that, in spite of myself.

"He's in a good mood," Sandala explained, "he got to fight."

I chuckled and turned to look at the slain beings. "What were they? I've never seen their like before."

"Shissar's," Sandala said. "A small group of them, usually there are many more. And usually they are lead by a more skilled and powerful leader with psionic powers."

Something clicked in my head at that. "Then there must be one about! When we approached I felt something contact my mind, I thought it was magic at the time. It warned me to retreat because we were in danger. Then those rocks all came flying at us, remember?"

Sandala, Brina, and Arktan all looked around suspiciously then, remembering the rocks themselves. "I don't think that the shissar leader would warn you before attacking," she said doubtfully. "But the rocks are proof enough of a powerful psionicist being here."

"He was here, and he has been dealt with."

I spun at the sound, seeing a man wearing a light brown robe floating slowly down from the exposed upper story of a ruined building. He held out his hands to show that he had no immediate ill intentions toward us, but my hands rested on the hilts of my weapons regardless.

"Who are you?" Sandala asked. Kryl had seen what was happening and rejoined us quickly, scowling at the man but clearly excited at the prospect of more battle.

"My name is Keeden," He said, finally reaching the ground and approaching us with a smile on his face. "I have been hiding from those Shissar for many days now, always a step ahead of them. I and my companion have been troubled by them, but they were to many for us to deal with. I thank you for your intervention, and in return I dealt with their leader so he would not harm you."

He turned and looked at me then, a strange look in his eye. "It was me that contacted and tried to warn you. You have a strange mind, not like your companions or any I have ever touched before. I think there is a hidden potential in you."

I bristled at that. "I thank you for your warning and help, but I warn you once and once only, stay out of my mind."

He held up his hands apologetically. "I'm sorry to upset you, I was not 'in your mind', as you put it, I merely touched it to warn you and sensed the unharnessed power within you. I could help you find it, if you would like."

I refused to believe that he was willing to help me without some sort of personal gain, it went against everything I had come to know and trust. "And what do you get out of it?"

He appeared surprised at that question, but I knew it had to be a ploy. "Well, um, I suppose you could pay me if you wanted, but I don't really need it. Consider it another sign of my thanks for helping me stop the Shissar that were plaguing me and my friend."

I snorted slightly and turned at the sound of someone approaching. From between two buildings emerged a woman using a walking staff that I was certain could double as a weapon in a moments notice. She wore a revealingly low cut tunic made of some tanned animal hide I did not recognize that also exposed her sides through wide leather laces. She also had a shield on her left arm, boots and a sand colored cloak to complete her outfit. A moment later a female lion slipped out behind her. Both came to stop next to the man, the lion sitting down and panting in the heat as she leaned affectionately against the woman's leg. I studied her carefully, noting faint elven - oops, make that Pudarin - features in her face and tall but skinny frame.

"Allow me to introduce my traveling partner, Sarya. We came here several weeks ago because I have heard there is some psychic disturbance in this area and I wished to investigate it for my own curiosity," Keeden said.

"Hoping to find some long lost treasure?" I asked cynically.

He laughed and responded, "Well, of course… aren't you?"

He had me there, so I did not respond. Sandala looked around at the scene we stood in the middle of. A small tribe of dead shissar with an as yet undiscovered psionic leader, and an admitted psionicist in front of us. Apparently my suspicions were not the only ones to be raised.

"Where is the shissar leader?" She asked.

"Check that building over there, he should be on the first floor in the back near what was once a window," Keeden responded.

Sandala nodded to Kryl to go and check it out. He scowled but headed towards the building. I glanced at Arktan and then the building and felt a brief moment of pity. Standing 9 feet tall, he would have a hard time fitting in almost any human sized establishment.

Kryl came out a moment later and tossed the body of another shissar onto the ground in front of us. Dried blood had run from his eyes, nose, ears, and mouth, and there was bruising apparent around his temples. I shuddered slightly to think of the power of a man that could kill with his mind alone, and vowed that I needed to learn as much about psionics as I could.

"You are wounded, please, Sarya is a priestess, she can tend your wounds," Keeden said, noticing the blood on us and how Brina and Sandala seemed to be not faring as well because of it. Sarya looked at him questioningly, but he just smiled and nodded towards us.

"What sort of priest is she?" I asked cautiously. After all the talk of corrupt priests serving evil sorcerer-kings, I was not about to let one of them touch me.

"I worship the elemental powers of water," Sarya said defensively, looking at me challengingly. I could tell right there that the two of us were not going to get along.

"A water priestess? You travel in good company, Keeden," Sandala said, nodding her assent to Sarya to treat her.

Sarya came forward and examined Sandala's wounds. She studied them for a few moments before chanting low arcane words that I sensed were little more then nonsense. She grabbed the waterskin at her side and pulled the stopper from it. She let a few drops of water fall into the palm of her hand and mixed a strange powder from one of her pouches with it. When she applied the mud to Sandala's injuries the wound quickly healed, leaving streaks of clean skin amidst all the dust and dirt of several days travel. She moved to Brina next and repeated her process. The lion yawned in the heat and moved over to a spot of shade next to the wall. She laid down and waited patiently for Sarya to finish.

She left Brina and approached Arktan next, motioning for him to bend over so she could heal the scratch on his head. He smiled at her and thanked her quietly, offering her some of the ceramic coins he had taken off of the dead shissar. She smiled at him and shook her head, pushing his hand away. She moved to me next, and I could tell that if it were up to her, she would leave me to die rather then heal me. I smiled at her sweetly, knowing how much she must be irritated and enjoying it for some dark reason. She looked at my wounds carefully though, spending as little time staring at my exposed chest as possible, before deciding there was nothing she could do for me.

I had been healed many times by clerics in the past and I knew damn well that she saw no open wounds or life threatening injuries so she did not want to waste her time on me, but I was still sore and could have used a little bit of help. Rather then add any fuel to the situation, I just smiled at her and said, "Thanks anyhow." She returned to Keeden's side, refusing to look at me.

"The day grows long and now that at least this part of Guthmoor appears safe, will you share a camp with us?" Keeden asked us. I glanced at my newfound companions and shrugged. It appeared the others had similar feelings.

"Our thanks again, Keeden and Sarya, we would be glad to share your fire," Sandala said.

Being the individualistic person that I am, I would have figured that Sandala and I would rub each other the wrong way, since she appeared to be the leader of the group. However, we got along quite well thus far, and I was surprised by it. I admired her keen intellect and ability to react to situations as they unfolded with the group in mind. I had to admit, she did a good job of it, probably even better then I would be able to, since I would keep my own well being as a priority over anyone else. Then again, we had not butted heads over anything yet either, so perhaps our comradely nature would dissolve as soon as it was tested.

Nonetheless, we gathered what things we needed from the mounts and moved them within the city walls several streets away where Keeden and Sarya had already set up a camp. I grabbed another shirt from Brina's sack of clothing, with her permission, and realized that by the time we reached a tailor, I would probably owe her a fortune in clothing alone. Picking a sharp rock out of my bare foot I realized that I would gladly pay a fortune for a decent pair of boots.

Night, or the perpetual dusk that Acathia called night, came quickly after that, and we split up the watch amongst all of us in pairs again. This time Keeden got stuck with me on the second watch, and the jealous looks from Sarya told me far more then I suspect she wanted me to know about their relationship. I filed it away for future use, and spent my time speaking with Keeden about psionics, wanting to learn as much as I could about them.

By the time our watch was over, Keeden had showed me some of his psionic abilities. Igniting the torn and useless top I had worn before the fight with his mind alone, as well as weakening a piece of rock so that I could snap it in two with my fingers. The powers of the mind, he explained to me, were limited only by the mind. Pretty existential. By the end of my watch with him, I was seriously considering his offer to help me unlock the hidden potential he claimed I had. My questions remained as to how far I could trust him to tamper with my mind. He insisted that he would not look into my thoughts, but if he could do all the things I had seen him do, and I was sure countless more beyond that, then how could I trust him? He had pointed out that my companions would be there to protect me in case anything happened, but that made me wonder just how much I trusted my companions.

I felt as though I had the potential to open up a great new world for exploration, but my fear was that perhaps instead of a door to a new world, I might instead find a fake door with a poisonous trap instead. Worse then that was the thought that I might become dependant upon people, even if only for a short time. Even worse yet, what if I could not let myself depend upon them?

Book 1 : Chapter 5

And so, after a night to sleep on it, I decided the very next day to let Keeden help me try to unlock my psychic potential. Having glimpsed the power I might have, I could not deny myself the opportunity to reach for them., whatever the cost.

I might have been better off had I not approached Keeden while he was with Sarya, but that would have stolen some of my fun. In a bleak world such as Acathia, I wanted as much enjoyment as I could get. "After our talk last night, I think I'm willing to enlist your help," was what I said.

It was not anything bad or misleading, but the look on Sarya's face showed that it did not need to be. She glared hard at me for a moment, then turned when Keeden responded. "Alright, let us try it tonight, when Yorinn sets. It will take me some time to prepare myself for it, and you would do well to relax and calm your mind beforehand as well, for it can be an exhaustive process."

Sarya's mouth opened and shut silently like a fish gasping for air. I fought down the chuckle and nodded, then turned and walked away. I could hear her start in on him as soon as I was out of earshot, and I could no longer resist the smile that found its way onto my face. Jealousy is such a foolish emotion.

For that day, Sarya and Keeden spent most of it by themselves, him preparing for the nights ordeal, and her waiting hand and foot on him. Kryl, Arktan, and Brina did some exploring of the ruins nearby. I waited and tried to spend the day resting and preparing myself, but that merely made the day lost longer. Sandala was nearby at all times, doing this or that, and always ready to talk whenever a question made its way through my thoughts. Even preoccupied as I was, I appreciated her kindness and wondered at the type of person that could show such a thing without any need or want for recompense. Somewhat bitterly I decided that I would owe her a favor later on, and that was surely why she was trying so hard to befriend me. More subtle then Brina, by far, but a similar bait to catch the Yamara fish.

So it was that when the time finally approached, I was more then ready to be done with it.

Keeden and I sat facing each other on the sandy ground, the campfire beside us casting flickering shadows across our faces. He threw some powder into the campfire which burned brightly and sent a pleasant smell into the air. I recognized it as simple incense, but suspected that he used it as a cheap parlor trick to try and increase the authenticity of his act. Then I had to admit, his act needed little convincing.

Taking his lead, I closed my eyes and let myself be lulled by the crackling fire and the smell of the incense into a meditative pose. Then I felt something brush up against the back of my head. It was like before, gently making contact with me so subtly that I barely knew it was there. Then the contact was fully established and our minds opened to each other.

I reveled in the sensation at first. It was so new and so wondrous, to be able to feel and see and read whatever thoughts were on the surface of his mind. Then I realized that he could do the same to me, and I took care to shield my thoughts by thinking about nothing. I felt his humor then, and heard him tell me to relax and to open myself up or else we would be unable to continue. Hesitantly, I relaxed my guard.

What came next stunned me. Our minds were already linked on the surface, but the convergence that took place left me feeling … inadequate. It was as if our minds were working together, our memories were shared, our skills were shared, our ability to think and to reason was shared. To a limited extent, even our consciousness was shared. It was quite overwhelming for me, and so I sat there stunned and more then a little frightened.

Keeden spoke to me in my mind, trying to reassure me. Slowly I regained my composure, and he proceeded, sifting through my mind like a healer trying to remove an arrowhead from a wound and causing as little damage as possible with his knife. I was unaware of how long it was taking, for it seemed as though all of eternity could pass in a moment.

I reached out then myself, exploring his mind as stealthily as I could. I think he had not anticipated this, for he left no wards or guards up to protect himself. I discovered his memories and quickly plunged into them, experiencing his life as much as he had experienced it. That finished, I continued on, searching out his knowledge, trying to learn as much as I could both about Acathia and about him and what he could do. I was quite impressed by the time I had finished, for I realized that here was a man who's mental discipline was very powerful. Through his memories, I had witnessed him crushing creatures with the power of his mind alone. It was rather humbling for me.

Then I realized that he could do the same thing to me, and I quickly stopped searching through his mind and returned to my own. I sensed his consciousness and realized he had been so intent upon what he was doing that he had no idea what I had done. Slightly comforted, I wondered what could fascinate him so much to make him oblivious to my actions. I linked up with him and realized that in spite of his proclamations of good will, he was rifling through my own memory. Enraged, I demanded that he relent. He fought against me, striking out like a starving beast denied food. I refused to let him run rampant in my thoughts, however.

Our minds linked as they were, I drew upon not only what I had learned by sifting through his mind, but also his mental strength. Stealing it from him surprised him, for he suddenly found himself floundering and my own rage was magnified. I lashed out at him, a poorly harnessed blast of psionic energy that drove him from my mind and severed our link.

With the link severed, I suddenly felt weak. Gone was the power I had tapped into. Gone was the warmth of a shared mind. I still had what I took from him, in terms or his memories and knowledge, but I felt empty otherwise. Fighting back the depression that threatened to overwhelm me, I realized there was more. I could feel my own mind was somehow stronger. More powerful. I realized that the procedure had been a success then, and that while I had not the range of talent that Keeden had, I was a psionic threat. The extent of my powers had yet to be determined, for at the moment I knew that I might be in danger.

Rousing myself from my trance, I saw Keeden laying on his back with Sarya crouched over him chanting healing mumbo-jumbo. Sandala and Brina were near me, one to either side. Everyone was uncertain of what had happened, except for Keeden and myself, and neither of us was talking about it. Keeden was unconscious and I was not going to share until I had to.

Finished with her chant, Sarya turned and glared at me. "What did you do to him?" She snapped angrily at me, her tone conveying a threat.

Before I could answer, Keeden groaned and tried to sit up. He shook his head lightly, then winced at the mistake of doing so. He looked around blankly for a moment, then his eyes settled on me and understanding rushed into them.

"I'm sorry," He muttered after taking a deep breath and pondering a course of action. "I was stunned by what I saw is all. This woman came from another world! A world with more water in a desert then we will ever see in our lifetimes!"

Sarya gasped, turning to glare at me again as though I was personally responsible for denying her access to a place that had so much water. Brina and Sandala seemed surprised as well, more so then they were at my explanation of how common steel was on my home world.

"He rifled through my thoughts and would not relent when I asked him to do so," I said through grated teeth. "The agreement was that he would do no such thing, yet he did it in spite of that."

"Don't feign such innocence," he angrily retorted. From apologetic, his expression had turned. He had seen to much in my mind, and I knew that the next few moments would be dangerous.

Before he could continue, I crudely thrust out with my mind at him. Still greatly weakened from the link we had, I established full contact with his mind easily and instantly, in spite of my fumbling about. Taking what I had experienced - through his memories - and changing it about, I then dominated him.

"She knows how to get water!" Keeden growled. In spite of his weakness, he thrust himself up from the ground then and came at me. Easily escaping Sarya's protective grasp, he rushed towards me before anyone could react. In less then a moment, he was on me, growling like an animal and muttering, "Water!" over and over.

His thoughts did not appear to be on water, however, for he thrust me back to the ground and ripped at my clothes. My latest halter top was gone quickly, the flimsy material easily shredding under his strong fingers. The loin cloth tore off next, and I have to admit, that stung a bit as the fabric dug into the flesh of my more sensitive areas. Before he could go any further he was stopped. Kryl's gauntlet crashed into the side of his head, knocking him off of me and shredding any traces of consciousness from him.

Sarya howled then, and leapt at Kryl's back. She sounded like a wounded animal herself, trying to bite and claw at Kryl from where she clung to his back. I shook my head, now that my thoughts were free to control my own body and not the unconscious Keeden. Just in time, for Kryl had managed to throw her free from his back and she landed in front of me, still facing the Acathian.

Kryl spun about to face her, ready with a cocked fist to send her to dreamland as well. He was to late thought, for her coiled up body slumped to the ground then, and I pulled my shortsword out from between her ribs. I wiped her blood off of it and sheathed it quietly.

Forgotten until now, the lion that had been Sarya's pet jumped towards us. I stumbled back barely dodging its pounce. It landed and turned to face me, intent upon protecting its master. An arrow slammed into its flank though, making it take a step sideways in surprise. Another thudded home before it could assess its new threat, which happened to be Sandala. It prepared to jump at her then, but the arrow in its thigh prevented it from doing more then limping along on three legs. It roared angrily and still tried for her, but the next arrow she sent into its chest silenced it.

I rose up from where I had fallen on my now naked butt. I stalked over to where Keeden lay comatose and before anyone could stop me, I dropped to one knee beside him and slit his throat with a dagger. Rising back up, I spit on his corpse and cleaned the blood off my blade before sheathing it.

I glanced at my companions to see their reactions. All of them had drawn weapons and adopted a ready pose, and only know were they relaxing. Brina and Arktan showed the most surprise, having been taken completely off guard by the events. Kryl looked at where Keeden lay and then looked at me. He nodded once, briefly, and began the grisly task of going through his belongings for anything of use.

"Did you have to kill him?" Brina asked, a little surprised at my ruthlessness.

I knew then that the moment of danger for me was not over, it had merely changed forms. I looked back at Keeden's body and then to my own. I had red scratches on my thigh and chest where his fingernails had scraped while tearing off my clothing. It had been under my control of his body, and carefully orchestrated as well, but I did not want them learning what he had discovered about me.

I let myself shudder then briefly, and adopted the look of trying to fight back tears. Brina saw the anguish in my face and came to me, hugging me tightly. "Of course you did," She justified. "He was a psionicist, and clearly an evil man. Even unarmed he would be dangerous, and more so if he had it in for you."

I nodded and hugged her back thankfully, pressing my nude body up against hers in a way that communicated my need to be close to her. Inside I was congratulating myself on another job well done. It would not be until later that night, after Brina had fallen asleep from the powerful lovemaking that I had showed her that I wondered if I really needed to go to the extreme measures to protect myself. Later I would wonder if perhaps these new companions I had made would actually have accepted me into their midst anyhow, regardless of the spying, whoring, thieving, and even murdering I had done in the past. Then, a few moments later I decided to stop second guessing myself. What was done was done.

Book 1 : Chapter 6

None of my companions brought up the incident on the following morning. They acted as though nothing was out of the ordinary, though I did catch Sandala studying me a few times. Brina seemed more friendly then before, but I attributed that to the prior nights intimacy. I had to admit to myself, she was pretty good in the sack. From my own past, I knew a night with me left an impression not soon to be forgotten - or at least, that's what virtually all of my partners expressed in one fashion or another.

I caught myself then, realizing that Brina was not as simple as she seemed. I was amazed that I kept falling for her act, and reminded myself yet again that the beautiful girl was perhaps the most dangerous of all my companions. At least to me.

While we were resting from the hottest rays of the suns at midday the question was finally broached. "What now?" Sandala asked, looking at everyone but me.

"What do you mean? We look for treasure like we always do," Brina said from fairly close beside me.

The others had surely heard our passion in the night, but they pretended to ignore it. For the time being, at least.

"She means more then that," I guessed, glimpsing at the hidden undertone of Sandala's question.

"Aye," She admitted, catching my eyes and staring at me for a moment before breaking away. "I mean both that and more. Treasure we always seek, that much is true. But there is more here then we thought, I think."

"What?" Kryl huffed, anxious to be on with things.

"Yeah, what?" Brina seconded.

"Keeden," I said, barely loud enough to be heard by them all.

Sandala smiled warmly at me. "Yes, Keeden. He was here for a treasure we knew nothing about, but I think that perhaps we should search for it nonetheless."

"What kind of treasure?" Brina asked, the thought of plunder overcoming everything else for her.

"Yamara?" Sandala asked, raising an eyebrow questioningly.

I nodded and took a deep breath and let it out before speaking. "He told us all of some psionic presence he sought out here, but he didn't elaborate. When our minds merged, I saw a lot of things in his, most of them confusing or strange or just messed up. Some were more clear then others though. I suspect his obsessive madness is what caused many of those visions and memories to be disjointed and confusing.

"One in particular though stood out though. It was of him descending into the silt to find a strange building made entirely of something that looked like steel. He saw a sealed doorway with a glowing light next to it that looked like a release for the door." I paused a moment, struggling to remember it properly before continuing.

"He wasn't actually there though, just his mind, so he could not open the door. Instead he walked through it in his dream traveling. Inside were strangely designed and lit passages through the building, all of them looked the same. Still, he somehow knew where he was going, because in his memory he moved with a purpose and never faltered at any intersections. He came to a great open pit in the floor and floated down it. There were no ladders or stairs or anything, so we will need to bring rope if we try to find this place. Descending forever it seemed, past many other openings into other passages, he finally reached the bottom. A tunnel there took him to a room with another sealed door. Inside of it was a great many strange things. Machines, I think, yet made so intricately and serving what purpose I have no idea. No smith I know of could have fashioned the things down there, but it is there that the treasure he sought rests."

"What treasure is it?" Brina asked, caught up in the thrill of it.

"I don't know," I admitted. "And neither did he, I don't think. But it's down there, a glowing nimbus of some sort of energy or power or magic or something, hidden in that room."

"Down there? Any idea where or how deep in the silt?" Kryl asked, clearly intrigued at the prospect of a difficult task but trying not to show any interest in it.

I thought for a moment, sifting through what remained of Keeden's memories in my head before responding. "Yes, I think I could figure out where if I walked along the edge of it. I'm not sure how deep it is, but I don't think it was too far down."

Kryl snorted derisively but held his comments back. Sandala looked lost in thought as she pondered what I had said. Arktan looked on calmly, ready to support whatever decision was made. Brina appeared excited at the prospect of a new treasure. But then again, she always acted that way.

"Well, what do you say? I can tell Brina wants to try for it, but what of the rest of you?"

"How are we supposed to get under the silt without suffocating?" Kryl asked. "Especially when you don't know how deep it is!"

"It's simple, my friend, we just go and find out," I said to him, smiling encouragingly.

"Yeah, and if we can't find it, then we give up! No harm done, right?" Brina said, sounding excited.

He grunted after a moment and threw up his hands. "Alright, fine. But if I die under the dust, it'd damn well better be a quick death!"

Arktan chuckled, his voice as deep as I remembered it being. "Arktan will help," he said, and I saw the humorous look in his eyes that made me wonder if he meant he would help us find the treasure, or if he would help make sure Kryl died quickly if it came to it. I appreciated the dry sense of humor, and cracked a faint smile.

"Good! It's settled! Let's go find it," Brina said, grinning widely.

Sandala chuckled and stood up. She brushed the sand off of the back of her legs and put her cloak around her shoulders. "Yamara, do you think you can find it from here?" She asked me.

I thought for a moment before responding. "Yes, I think I can. Any ideas on how we make it through the silt if it's buried?"

She smiled at me and replied, "Do you really need to ask?"

I did, since I had no idea what she had in mind. Then it dawned on me from her calm behavior. "You're a psionicist too!"

"The blood of my ancestors runs strong in me," she said, as though that explained it. "I can do some things with my mind, though I am no match for Keeden nor, I suspect, even you now that you have found yourself."

I hate surprises. Always have, always will. "I'm certainly not much of a threat right now, I barely know anything about this mental magic."

She raised an eyebrow curiously and said, "I wonder if Keeden would have agreed with your self-assessment."

Did she know more then she let on? I found myself forgetting to breathe for a brief moment. The pudarin wench had caught me off guard. I came out of my corner quickly though, and tried to change the subject while I tried to figure out what, if anything, was going on with her and I. "So how can you protect us from the dust?"

"It is a trick that many of the more gifted members of my tribe possess. During sandstorms those of us with the power can create a bubble of air around us that repels the blowing sand. I have never tried it in a dustbowl before, but I think it might work, though not as well." She replied without missing a beat. Maybe I was being paranoid. Then again, when wasn't I being paranoid?

I nodded, glad to have that cleared up. I rose as well and put my own cloak on. The added warmth was unwelcome, but the protection from the sun would be. In spite of a few days spent under it, as well as the magical healing I had undergone, my skin was still nowhere near as darkly or deeply tanned as my companions. I could not imagine what it would be like to wear only a loin cloth as Sandala did. My breasts and nipples were always sensitive, in spite of childhood abuses and their subsequent toughening as I grew up. A sunburn on them did not sound like my idea of a good time.

Brina hopped up beside me, and a glowering Kryl and still ambivalent looking Arktan followed. I waited a moment while everyone prepared themselves to leave the shelter the ruined building we had found provided us, then closed my eyes and tried to remember what I had stolen from Keeden's mind. Relatively sure of my path, I set out then, weary of any other aggressive inhabitants of the ruins.

It took nearly two hours of winding through the ruins and backtracking through rubble before I managed to lead them to the shore of the Sea of Lost Souls. No sign of any other indigenous life showed itself to us, which pleased all of us except for Kryl. Once there, it was another half an hour before I found what I believed to be the correct place along the shore.

"From Keeden's mind, it lies out there some 100 feet and then down into the silt," I said, pointing directly out from the shore. "Now I'm guessing here, but this reminds me of a dried up ocean where I'm from, filled with dust and sand instead of water. If that's the case, then this building we're looking for must be some type of a ship. If it's a ship, then I'm willing to wager there's a dock nearby that would take us out into the silt without risking falling into it."

They looked at me blankly. I sighed and said, "Ship… that's a large vessel that floats on water and carries people. Kind of a like a wagon built for water. A dock is what the ship is tied up to so that people can get on and off of it, or load or unload cargo from it."

"If there is water enough to float wagons that carry people on them where you are from, then truly it must be a wondrous thing to behold," Sandala said, grasping the concept the quickest.

"I hope we can find a way to get to your world, Yamara," Brina said earnestly. "I want to go there too!"

Kryl just huffed rather quietly, unimpressed. Arktan did what he always seemed to do, which was stand there and wait for something better to do.

"Arktan, can I borrow your great sword?" I asked the faradwim after studying the strange shoreline for a moment. He looked at me blankly for a moment, head tilted thoughtfully. Finally he shrugged and grinned a very toothy grin. I was reminded of an alligator I had once seen kept as a pet by one of the Ornithrym's senior members. I smiled thankfully to him as he handed it to me.

I very carefully walked along the edge of the shore, dragging the tip of the two handed sword in the dust to see how deep it was. My suspicions were all but confirmed as I noticed that it sloped gradually away from the shore, just as a lake or sea filled with water would. With each pass along the shore I stepped a little deeper into the silt, until it was up to my knees and walking became quite difficult. It was not unlike wading through snow. I chuckled at the thought of explaining snow to my companions.

Finally, I found what I had been searching for. Unfortunately, it was much deeper then I thought it would be, up past my waist in fact. Nevertheless, I then proceeded out on it, walking very carefully and testing each step before taking it. I glanced back and saw my companions staring at me with a mixture of shock and wonder. Here I was, nearly a hundred feet out from them in the silt and still above it.

"Follow me out!" I called to them. The air was still and my voice carried louder then I'd intended to them. I wondered how I was ever going to get the dust out of my clothing. Then I snorted and realized I virtually had no clothing. A groan followed, for that meant I would spend some serious time trying to get it out of places I really did not want it getting in.

Probably because I was thinking about it, by the time my companions had begun venturing out single file towards me, my womanly areas were itching furiously. I vowed right then that I would stop at nothing to get off of this hot and barren world. My vow actually contained quite a few other choice expletives, but since I am the one telling the story, I have chosen to try and preserve what small amount of good taste that I can.

"It's right here," I said when the finally reached me. My nether regions still felt quite chafed and irritated, but I knew that trying to do anything about it right now would only compound matters. See, more good taste. I could have referred to it as a broad selection of less then gentile terms, but I chose to go with something a little less vulgar. Just because I can make a sailor blush does not mean I have too. That is what being - or at least knowing to be pretend to be - a lady is like.

"Um, there's nothing here," Brina said, looking around us carefully.

"How deep?" Sandala asked, glancing around us with barely hidden fear.

"Well, if we are standing on the dock, then it used to be at our level. Then the water dried up, so it must be on the bottom now. I'd say very deep if it were a ship from my world, because in order for something to sink deep enough to hide the masts and sails, it would have to go at least 20 or 30 feet under, perhaps more. But here, who knows."

Arktan took a coil of rope off his shoulder and passed it out, making sure each of us tied it around our waist and left a few feet of room between us. He did this wordlessly, trying not to interrupt Sandala as she began to quietly focus her thoughts. I could a strange sensation gathering around me, and it felt very much like a wizards spell did on my homeland.

Then she was finished, but the feeling of magic about me did not waver. The dust we were standing in had been moving, slowly at first and then faster. Now it was finished moving, but only because it had been banished from a sphere around Sandala roughly 10 foot in diameter. "There, a bubble of air surrounds us, we can descend into the dust and still breathe freely. If we go too far though, the dust will cover the bubble around us and we will eventually suffocate."

The dock was visible beneath our feet now, which drew surprised gasps from my companions. It was made of some sort of metal none of us had not seen before. Metal at all, in such a quantity was a kings ransom to them, let alone a strange and unknown alloy. Regardless, it was mere proof that our adopted quest was worthy.

I nodded and closed my eyes to try and remember as exactly as I could. Reasonably sure of myself, I nodded again to myself and began to walk off to the side of the dock. In three steps my foot encountered nothing but dust, and I found myself falling. The dust rushed at my face as I fell into it, and I felt panic closing in on me. Then I noticed it stayed roughly a foot away from my face, parted by some unseen force when my fall was halted by the rope around my waist. Sandala lowered herself off the edge of the dock and came next, the envelope of air she sustained pushing the dust back in front of me. Anxious to explore, Brina quickly followed us. Kryl and Arktan stood firm, easily anchoring the rope and keeping us from descending further.

I could sense something then, as I hung suspended from my lifeline. It weakly penetrated the silt and the psychic bubble surrounding me, a familiar pulling. It reminded me of Keeden at first, then I realized it was not him that it reminded me of, but rather the psionic powers he had shared with me.

"It's here, below me… I can sense it!" I said to them. "Lower me further, we must be close!"

I faintly heard Kryl grumbling up above, but could not make out which words he had chosen to mutter about me. A few moments later I descended further by several feet. The light dimmed as the extent of Sandala's bubble began to be covered over with dust. Almost perfectly, I saw a dark shape materialize in front of me out of the silt. The poor lighting made it hard to make out details, but I could tell that it was a solid surface of something. I reached out and ran my hands along it, deciding it must be the hull of ship I was searching for.

"I found it!" I called up excitedly. "Now we need to find a way in," I muttered to myself.

Making a rather rash decision, I untied the rope from my waist quickly and dropped down. I fell only a couple of feet, my body crashing into the hull of the ship before I could get my feet beneath me. I heard Brina curse quietly behind me and a moment later, she thudded onto the ship beside me. I was already on my feet though, wondering how well Sandala's concentration would hold up if I began to search around.

"Be careful you do not separate to far or you will leave the bubble of air," Sandala said almost as though she was reading my mind. I almost stopped and stared back at her suspiciously. Maybe she was. I grew suddenly afraid then, and closed my eyes and called upon what little I had of my recent psionic powers. I felt no intrusion or other presence save that of what was in the ship, and that was not invasive but simply a beacon of psionic energy. Satisfied, I relaxed and opened my eyes.

Brina was staring at me, concern evident on her face. I smiled at her to show her I was okay and saw the instant relief cover her features. It was becoming obvious that what I was sure had once been a ploy to win my trust and confidence was becoming real.

Sandala dropped lightly behind us, saving me for the time being by ruining the moment. Her fall was a boon to us in more ways then that, for when the dust was parted around her it revealed a structure that rose off of what we were standing on and had a door placed in it. I revised my thinking and decided we must be standing on a metal deck instead of a hull. For the life of me though, I could not fathom why anyone would make a ship out of steel instead of wood. It would surely sink.

Just as in Keeden's dream, a small button that glowed with an internal yellow light was placed beside it. Pushing caution away, I pushed the button and waited. My wait was unnecessary though, for instantly the door hissed and began to slide open. It was unlike any door I had ever seen, but as soon as it opened magical lights along the ceiling came to life, some flickering at first but eventually growing strong enough to show a passage.

"We found a way in!" Brina called up to Kryl and Arktan. A few moments later Kryl landed on the deck with surprising agility and came to stand with us. He had another coil of rope around his shoulder, and the rope that Arktan held remained behind us, hanging into the telekinetically made pit.

There was no sand inside. Only some dust on the surface of everything. The lighting above, entirely unnatural, did a good job of lighting up the passages for us. The air inside the ship was very stale. Dead for countless years, I was surprised that we could even breathe it. Following Keeden's memory, I led the way down the passage. Kryl was next behind me, with Brina shadowing him. Sandala brought up the rear of our company.

In what seemed like no time, I had found the pit that Keeden remembered. Glancing into it, I laughed. In his memory it had seemed like it was quite deep, but in reality, it was a fall of less then 20 feet. I nimbly jumped down, landing softly and looking about. Kryl was there in an instant, scowling at me even before his legs absorbed the fall. I smiled sweetly and took off again. I could practically feel Kryl's eyes glaring at me as he hurriedly tossed the rope up to Sandala to tie off on something so that we had a means of getting back out. By then Brina had already leapt down herself and followed after me.

Our passage through the tunnels was easy to track, given the thick dust on the floor. With that in mind, I had no trouble in heading towards our goal. Brina was beside me quickly, and she flashed me an excited grin as we explored the abandoned ship. A few more turns, courtesy of the mental map from Keeden, and we found the steel door guarding shut the treasure we sought.

"Brrr," Brina said, clutching her cloak about herself. I had not noticed myself, but under the dust and out of the sunlight, it was almost chilly. I enjoyed it though, knowing how miserably hot it was outside. I remembered then the problem I had outside, and wondered at how I had so easily forgotten it in light of the discoveries we had made.

"This had better be worth it," I muttered.

"Worth what?" Brina asked.

"Worth all the sand and silt that I've got crammed in places that nobody but me has seen in quite some time," I griped. "It's going to take me a long time to clean all that out of there, especially in a world without much water!"

Brina grinned, "I'll be happy to help you with that."

I chuckled, unable to stop myself. "Okay, well maybe there's been one more person then me that's seen them recently."

Brina seemed to glow at the praise, but we quickly got back to our goal, which was discovering what lay behind the door. I could hear Kryl stomping through the passages after us, which meant he was getting close to catching up. I held my breath and reached for the buttons beside the door. A red light was above the strange pad, and I was certain it was an intricate lock. Studying it carefully, I realized quickly that, while different and strange, the diagrams on the buttons were actually numbers ranging from zero to nine.

"You can read?" Brina asked in awe.

"Aye, it's uncommon on my homeland, but not as rare as it is here." I replied.

"What does it say?" She asked me.

"There are a bunch of numbers on it, one through three across the top, then four to six in the next row, then seven, eight, and nine, and finally on the bottom a zero."

"Wow," was all she said, suitably impressed.

I smiled faintly but studied the pad of buttons and tried to remember what Keeden had seen. In his memory, he had just passed through the door, not even noticing the buttons. I struggled to focus on them though, and finally I thought I remembered him seeing four of them lit up out of the corner of his eye.

I pushed them carefully, one at a time. One. Two. Three. Six. The light above them changed from red to green and the door opened with a hiss. More stale air rushed out at us, but what awaited inside was no fearsome monster ready to feast upon our flesh.

We stepped inside then, with still no sign of Kryl or Sandala catching up to us. I glanced back, curious but saw nothing. "I might have confused our tracks up a bit back there to give us some time alone," Brina said, glancing about nervously at the admission.

I grinned then. I had to admit, it was hard not to like the girl. Instead of saying anything I grabbed her face and turned it toward mine. Without warning, I kissed her, our soft lips mashing almost roughly against each other. My tongue slipped into her mouth as she gasped in surprise at the assault, but she responded quickly. After a brief moment of the passionate kiss I released her and stepped back. She nearly stumbled then, so caught unaware was she. I winked at her and said, "There's nothing like a girl after my own heart."

I moved further in then, and only barely managed to hear her whisper to herself, "Yes, yes I am."

"What do you mean?" I asked her.

Her breath caught in her throat and her face showed that she was scared. "Nothing," she quickly stammered out. I stepped closer to her, raising my eyebrow to show that I did not believe her.

She took a few quick deep breaths and dropped her face shamefully. I let her for a moment, then I gently raised her face up with my hand until our eyes met. "Brina, what did you mean by that?"

"I mean I am after your heart!" The words gushed out quickly from her. "You're so exotic and different and beautiful! You're weak but that doesn't stop you, you make up for it and turn it to your advantage. I'm after your heart because somewhere, along the way, probably last night, I gave you mine."

Inwardly, I groaned. This was not a good time or place for this discussion. In my opinion, there was never a good time or place for that discussion though. "Brina," I said, trying to come up with something. "You're a sweet girl and I trust and value you as a companion more then I have perhaps any other. In time who knows what can happen. For now, let us worry about the present and let everything else come to us as it will."

She nodded, unshed tears threatening to spill from her eyes. She blinked them away rapidly, trying to hide them. "Yeah, I know, sorry, I just got caught up in things."

I smiled and leaned towards her, catching her by surprise with another deep and passionate kiss. This one lasted longer, but I knew our time was growing short. She was not as surprised when I ended that kiss, and I saw her smile at me. I knew that, for the time being, I had made things alright with her.

We moved through the room then, looking for the treasure I had seen in Keeden's memory. It seemed empty and lifeless, however. The machinery and design was the same as Keeden's memory had been, even the very spot where I had seen the glowing magic. It too was empty though, only a strange pad of some sort of metal on the floor gave sign to any difference other then the rest of the floor.

I stood on the pad and glanced around, trying to remember some clue from Keeden's dream. Nothing to me though. I glanced around and moved about the room, studying the machines. Translating the archaic written language into something I could figure out was slow, but I soon found one that was labeled in something I could understand. It said, "ON". I pushed the button and instantly the machines lit up. I snatched my hand back quickly, wondering at what strange magic was at work.

"What did you do?" Brina asked, staring at a machine in front of her that had seemingly come to life with the rest of them.

"I think I woke them up," I said. I looked at the machine again and saw a lit up display that showed a needle hovering in the red at the left end of things. Other displays showed other things, but I could make little sense of them.

Suddenly the room glowed a little brighter. Glancing up, I saw the swirling ball of magic I had seen in Keeden's dream had appeared. I heard Brina gasp from the side and knew she had seen it too.

"It's beautiful," she whispered, stepping towards it without realizing it.

"Stop!" I said, glancing at the needle I had seen and noting that it was moving deeper into the red at the left end of the dial. "We have to be quick about this, I think that whatever is keeping it alive is about to run out. If one of us goes, it might not work for the other." I cursed the fact that she was closer. Had it been me, I would have simply jumped into it and taken my chances. Knowing she was closer made me try to convince her that we could share it. Perhaps we could, I supposed, and that might not have been a bad thing really.

"Okay, then hurry," she said, reaching out her hand towards me.

I approached her and took her hand in mine then, and together we walked towards it. Before we stepped into it, she said to me, "Are you sure about this?" The slight tremor in her voice I could understand, I felt no small amount of trepidation myself.

"We've got nothing to lose," I said, as much to convince myself as her. I looked calm and confident on the outside, but inside I was not so certain. "I have a question though."

"What?" Brina asked me, both of us staring into the energy instead of at each other.

"What did you mean when you said I was weak?"

Brina laughed a little at that and turned to look at me. "Sorry, I didn't mean it to sound bad, I meant you're not as strong as any of us are. It's kind of nice knowing there is somebody weaker then me in the group though, so I'm not complaining!"

I chuckled at that. It was true, she did not look to be very strong herself, but I had learned the night before that looks were often deceiving. There seemed to be something about this world, it may be dying of dehydration, but the people on it very much alive.

Before Brina could return her attention to the magical energy in front of us, I pulled her to me again for a very quick kiss and said, "I'll show you strength."

Before she could respond, I threw both of us into the shimmering lights, entirely uncertain at the wisdom of my course of action.

Book 1 : Chapter 7

Given my recent history, I suppose I should not have been surprised by what occurred. Nonetheless, it was not everyday that I mysteriously appeared in the middle of a street wearing clothing modest only to the basest of whores with a similarly dressed woman in my arms. Fortunately for Brina and I, what seemed like a torrential downpour was in the process.

The shock of the strange surroundings was not my first concern, by any means. First it was base and raw joy at being inundated by the rainfall. Brina was speechless, and a little frightened, having never seen so much water in her entire life, let alone in a single place. Our clothing, what little we wore, was quickly plastered to our skin. It was night out, of that much I was certain, but the tempest that raged around us kept me from gauging a more accurate time. What was important to me was that it was a real night, with no extra suns in the sky.

Gathering my senses before Brina had even begun to do so, I snatched her hand and pulled her quickly after me, dodging towards a building from which I could see light leaking through the windows.

We drew stares from the few patrons of the tavern almost instantly. Conversation faltered, though it did not come to a stop. Glancing about the room, we both saw that there were eight customers, with a single serving girl and an older man with no hair and a patch over one eye behind the bar. After the initial shock of two young woman dressed like harem girls stumbling in from what seemed a monsoon wore off, the customers returned to their own business. More or less. We both knew that every eye in the place was still on us, even if not directly. From snatches of conversation I overheard I felt a wave of relief wash over me, the people here spoke the same common tongue Brina and I knew, though the dialect was once again something I would need time to become accustom to.

"Where are we, Yamara?" Brina asked quietly.

"I'm not sure," I said, moving towards the barkeep and hugging my arms about myself as though I were a lost waif seeking help.

"Please sir, could you help us?" I asked, my voice adopting the same tone that my manner showed. Brina fell in beside me, using her youthful looks to her advantage to appear as my younger sister or similar ward.

The barkeeps eyes roamed freely over both of us before he put the mug he was wiping with an already dirty rag down and leaned towards us. "What sort of help are you needing?" His voice was gruff and in character with what I expected from his appearance.

Ignoring the obvious connotations his leer put into his question, I said, "My sister and I are lost, could you please tell us where we are?"

"Aye, very lost I say!" He laughed roughly, and then nodded towards our appearance. "Where ya from, dressed and tanned as ya are?"

Cursing mentally, I struggled to figure out a safe answer. Finally, so as to not hesitate to long before responding, I said, "From the south, good barkeep, we were on our way to the city of Belleville when bandits beset us and captured my sister and I." His expression was not as bad as I expected at my blatant lie, so I pushed on with the tale. "We were kept bound and blindfolded for weeks and forced to dress like this. Every night at least one of the brigands would force other things upon us as well."

The barkeep now wore a guarded and suspicious expression, but I could see that he was also on the verge of believing me. "We don't know how long we were forced to continue as we were, but finally they put us into a wagon a few days ago and did not allow us to leave it for anything. At least we had the privilege of a chamber pot!"

I paused then, acting overcome at the recollection of our fictitious ordeal. The bartender leaned forward in interest, and I knew the hook had caught. "If you're slaves, then how're ya here an having weapons at your sides?"

I hid the smile within myself. He was still suspicious, but now he wanted to believe me. "They left us guarded by only two men in a nearby building and one of them decided to have his way with me," Brina said, speaking up in the perfect voice and tone of a young girl who was trying to be brave and strong in spite of the terrible tragedies that had befallen her. "My sister's chains were long enough to wrap them around his throat when he lay between my legs."

I forced away the false emotion that had threatened to overwhelm me and nodded. Clearing my throat quickly, I added, "She snatched up his keys then and unlocked us before the other man could come into the room and discover what had happened. I stole the dead bandits sword and killed the other one, and now it rests on my hip. We grabbed up the other weapons then, and rushed out blindly into the storm, running without thought or direction until we found this place."

The barkeep leaned back then, one hand stroking his chin thoughtfully. "Well it's a good tale, you've earned a meal if naught else, though I've ne'er heard of Belleville and I served with the Royal Elendarian Pathfinders for 12 years along the southern reaches near The Great Forest."

"'Tis true, good sir," Brina said, coming forward quickly like a good little lost waif desperate for a handout. It was partially true, I figured, since she had left all of her gold in her wagon on Acathia.

"We can pay for a meal and a place to stay," I said, letting a little coldness slip into my manner to show I did not approve of charity. "We need to know where we are, are we in Elendar?" The last was an example of me grasping for straws, hoping that the veteran barkeep would not wish to leave the land he once defended.

"Aye, lass, that you are," He said, grinning. "Brought straight away to Standopolis, home of King Avercrombie.

"If you're just away from thieves, then how're ya goin to buy a meal?" He asked, thinking he was calling my bluff.

Sure I was a woman, but where I grew up, that meant I had to be an even better card player. I grabbed my pouch of coins and dug a few gold coins out of it and slapped them on the bar. He eyed them suspiciously and reached for them. Before his hand got there, I snatched them back in my own hand and glared at him.

"If ya don't let me see them then I don't know that they be real, girl," he said, his voice dropping to betray a touch of a growl. I was back in his territory now, and I had to relent.

He picked up a single coin from where I left the four on the bar and looked at it closely. Finally he bit into it, putting a dent in it that apparently satisfied him. He grunted and swept up the other coins in his meaty palm.

"I don't know where these be from, but gold is gold, I says. Have to charge ya more cuz these aren't Elendarian coins, but you've bought you and your sister a meal, drinks, and a room for the night."

I nodded, knowing that I had plenty more to spare and quite certain I could get more if I needed it. I led Brina to a nearby table halfway between the bar and the entrance. We sat and waited patiently while the barmaid, not much younger then Brina, brought us each a mug of ale and a bowl made of bread and filled with steaming stew. Neither of us wasted any time in digging into what was a feast to us.

It had been months since I had tasted such fare, and I am not ashamed to admit I probably made a bit of a spectacle. Any scene I could have caused was far outshone by Brina, however. Being raised on a parched world, food such as stew was an unthinkable waste of water. Seeing me tear a small piece of bread off the bowl and dip it into the beefy mix was all the encouragement she needed. With her first taste, she was hooked, stopping only to drink when the entire bread bowl had been consumed.

"What was that?" She asked me, speaking in a hushed voice to not betray her wonder to the people nearby.

"Bread bowl stew," I explained, trying to hide my amusement. "A cheap and simple meal, but filling."

Brina nodded, looking around the tavern's common room in wonder. For the first time she noticed the metal about the room. The hinges on the door, the bands around our wooden mugs, the well cared for horsemen's axe that hung over the fireplace, the metal sconces in the walls holding torches, and various other common items. "Is this your world?" She finally asked, her eyes filled with wonder.

I frowned and glanced around the room myself. "No, it's not," I confessed finally. "Similar though I think, if the weather is any indication."

By mentioning the weather I opened another floodgate for Brina. Her arms were already hugging her arms as we dried off. To me the tavern room was fairly warm and pleasant, allowing us to dry off nicely. I was a bit chilly from the drying water and how I'd begun to grow accustom to the harsh climate of Acathia. Brina, on the other hand, had spent all of her life on Acathia and the temperature where we now found ourselves was much cooler then she was used to.

"Does it get warmer during the day?" She asked first. I glanced at her and noticed that she had started shivering now that she was thinking about it. Not only that, but through the flimsy material her halter top was made of it looked as though her nipples could have cut glass.

"If it's similar to Halador, it will get warmer, but not as warm as Acathia," I responded. I was fairly certain of what would come next because she reached up and ran her hands through her hair and brought them away dripping water.

"Will there be this much water all the time?" She asked, her voice trailing off and proving my hunch right.

I could hold my smile back no longer. Chuckling softly I said, "I hope not, the world would be flooded with storms like this all the time. The barkeep spoke of The Great Forest to the south, so that means it is probably a temperate climate with frequent rainfall. Most of the buildings and our mugs are made of wood, more proof of enough water to support a thriving lumber business."

Brina fell silent, easily in awe as she tried to imagine what the world must be like. "I want to see it all," she finally said, her excitement overcoming her fear.

"You'll have to wait until tomorrow," I said, noticing a group of six people at one table playing dice wrapping things up and getting ready to leave. "It grows late here and we should get some sleep."

The serving girl returned then and gathered up our empty mugs. She asked us if we would like another, but I turned her down. "You look to be close to the same size as my sister and I, would you have any clothes that we might buy from you?"

The girl looked surprised at the request, but then glanced at us more carefully and saw how foolishly we were dressed. "I might have some things, you can come with me if you like."

The offer made, I stood up and motioned for Brina to do the same. We followed her back through a doorway next to the bar and down a short hallway beyond a stairway that led to a cellar. Opposing doorways at the end of the hall were open to show two bedrooms, and a third door at the end of the hall was closed. The waitress led us into the one on the left. It was of a modest size and was clearly her bedroom.

She opened up a chest filled with a few items of clothing and pulled them out and showed them to us. Unfortunately, all she had was dresses and robes, nothing that would allows Brina or I the freedom of movement we desired. I thanked her for the effort and paid her a silver for her troubles before returning to the common room to see about getting a key to our room from the owner.

The barkeep was busy talking to a man that I noticed had been sitting at a corner table talking to a few other men earlier. Now the other men were gone and only he remained. He had an average build, a few inches under six feet in height, and had a reddish brown hair that was stylishly cut at a modest length. He had a scar along his left jawbone, but it only strove to make him look more distinguished. I noticed the sword at his side and the dagger at his other hip next, and they looked to be of some value, but also quite practical. I judged the man shrewd, and wondered at what business he might have with the owner.

A few moments longer and the man turned and left the bar. He flashed both of us a smile as he passed and headed towards the exit. I judged the smile harmless enough, but there was something about the man that put me ill at ease. Brina had already blown him off and was waiting for me to do something.

"Our key?" I asked the bartender, stepping up to the barkeep. He put the mug he was cleaning with the same dirty rag down and reached beneath the bar. A moment later he laid the key to a room on the bar for us.

"Third door on the right up the stairs," he said motioning with his head towards the stairs.

"Who was that?" I said as the barkeep turned away. He turned back slowly and looked at me.

"An old friend from the Pathfinders, if it's any of your worries," He said, an edge to his voice that indicated he wanted no more discussion on it. I nodded and turned towards the stairs to our room. Brina hesitated a moment, then followed me.

Upstairs in our room Brina immediately when to the shuttered window and opened it up. Instantly the wind grabbed the shutters, pulling them from her hands. Rain swept into the room, but she reveled in it. She looked at me, a childish grin of pure joy on her face. I scowled as I saw the water gathering in a puddle already on the floor. Her grin disappeared and she reached out and wrestled the shutters away from the storms grip to close them again. Mostly dried from our earlier appearance, she was now drenched anew and shivering.

"What do we do now, Yamara?" She asked me, rubbing her hands up and down her arms in an attempt to hasten the drying and return of warmth.

"Take your clothes off," I said to her, concerned about the shock to her system of the drastic climate change. I was concerned about my own health as well, but I was at least accustomed to the weather far better then she.

Thinking I had something special in mind, she grinned again and momentarily forgot that she was shivering and her teeth were chattering. She stripped off her soaked cloak, loin cloth, and halter top after removing her weapons. All of that was done with a quickness that surprised me. As soon as she stood before me nude, goose bumps on her skin and nipples the size of small daggers, I took off my cloak and handed it to her. There was a hint of a smile on my face, of course. Whether it was from the joke at her expense or simply out of appreciation of her beautiful young body I was not sure. Accepting the cloak without comment, I could nevertheless see the disappointment in her eyes.

"I can think of a way to help me warm up much faster," Brina said, not giving up her hopes.

I shook my head with a grin and replied, "Not tonight, Brina. I don't like the looks of that man in the tavern from earlier. If he's a friend of the barkeep from his time in the Pathfinders, he must have been a babe at the time."

Her mind quickly slipping into the challenge of following mine, she all but forgot about her lust. "How do you know that? Maybe the owner just got out of the army a short time ago?"

I shook my head again. "The axe over the fireplace was surely his chosen weapon, it showed signs of wear and use, though still in good shape. More importantly, it hasn't been used in years. Besides, that barkeep had the look of a grizzled veteran, yes, but his body had gone to slack. He'd still be a tough opponent, but he showed signs of slowed reactions not enough work to keep him in shape."

Brina was silent for a moment, remembering our encounter in the common room. After a few moments she nodded and said, "What do you expect?"

"I have no idea, but I want to be ready for it. I'll take the first watch"

Brina nodded again, glancing at the spartan accommodations of the room. The single bed had room for two if the occupants did not mind a little intimacy, which we surely would not have under other circumstances, but was filled with straw. She slipped under the coarse canvas blanket, wrapped in my cloak, and lay there for a long time thinking. Sleep was slow in coming to her, but she was so caught up in her own thoughts that she never once spoke aloud. Finally she fell asleep, leaving her with only a few hours of sleep before I roused her to take my spot.

Unfortunately for both of us, we never got the chance to swap. An unnatural breeze slipped into the room and blew out the candle in our room, plunging it into darkness. I cursed myself, wishing I would have had the common sense to extinguish it hours earlier so that my eyes would be accustomed to the dark. Regardless, I quickly moved to my feet and had my sword in one hand and dagger in the other.

I backed up to where the wall was so that the window was on my left and directly across from me was the bed with Brina in it. In spite of the latch on it, the shutters suddenly opened from without, letting a bare amount of light in. My eyes adjust quickly normally, and the faint light only helped me. I hefted my dagger and prepared to use it. Whether a faint scraping noise alerted me, a hint of movement from the corner of my eye, or just a sixth sense, I turned and threw my dagger instead at the now open door of our room. It caught the man entering the room just above the elbow, luckily for him he had reacted on the same instinct I had or else the point of the dirk would have found his throat. He stumbled back out of the way but was replaced quickly by another two men entering.

I scrambled for another dagger and turned back as a man slipped in through the window in a graceful fall that took him out of my range before my swing could connect with him. He rolled and stood in the middle of the room, facing me and separating me from Brina. For her part, Brina had come awake at the first sign of a scuffle and was getting out of bed quickly, reaching for her weapons at the side of it. Before she could reach them one of the two men from the door had closed on her and held his sword at her throat.

"You can do this the easy or the hard way," The man facing me said, his voice youthful and full of himself.

"What do you want?" I spat out, ready to launch myself at him.

"I'd like to see more of you two naked," He said with a lecherous grin I could barely make out in the dim light. "But it's not my wants that count. The boss wants to talk to you, and where things go from there are up to you two."

"Who's the boss?" I asked, increasingly unhappy with the situation.

"I am," said the man I had hit with the dagger. He glared at me with undisguised animosity. "Put that away before I have to hurt you."

I bristled at his talk and decided that, given the opportunity, I would have to kill him. A moment to late, I heard the other man muttering something under his breath. I spat out a curse that never finished as his spell overtook me. My muscles tightened at first, forcing me into an unnatural posture of rigidity. I stood there frozen, mouth partially open and body balanced low and ready for a good fight.

The 'boss' walked up to me then, and I fought desperately for the strength to break free of the magical paralysis and strike at him with my sword. For naught. He stepped in front of me and smiled wickedly. I braced myself then, for he brought his fist back and drove it hard into my face, splitting my lip and jarring a few teeth loose. While I couldn't control my muscles, apparently he could because my jaw clamped shut, biting my tongue hard enough to make it bleed. That was a secondary concern to me though, for the force of the blow had knocked me off balance and sent me crashing to the floor face first.

"That's for the dagger," He said from behind me. I changed my vow then. Instead of just killing him, I planned on making him suffer first. Any further plotting was halted as the mage cast another spell on Brina and I, dropping both of us into the blackness of sleep.

Book 1 : Chapter 8

The younger man leaned against the wall waiting for his boss to close the door behind him. The boss did so and nodded to the guards waiting on either side of the door, who in turn locked the door securely behind him. He then turned and headed off down the hall with the younger man following him.

"What do you think, James?" The younger man queried.

"I'm not sure, Paul," he responded, genuinely uncertain. Via Paul, James had responded quickly to the message from his agent at the Grinning Dragon Inn. The two suspected spies he had watched carefully long enough to determine that they were truly an enigma to him. Enigma enough that he had decided to blow his cover and pull them in after he had spoken with Berk at the Grinning Dragon.

"If they're spies, they must be from the south by their tans. No Gneissian would be so dark," James said, thinking aloud. Paul nodded, following his train of thought.

"Did Dagrazt send them?" He said quietly, wondering it aloud.

"Shh!" James hissed, stopping and turning on him. "You know better then to say that name aloud, it draws his attention!"

Paul mumbled an apology and had the good grace to look humbled. James turned and continued walking, heading up some stairs and back into more populated areas of the palace. They fell into silence, each lost in their own thoughts, scarcely noticing the pages and servants that worked at the late hour. Finally they reached James' office and headed inside, shutting the door behind them. James spent a few moments going over his office, checking to make sure nothing had been disturbed, then sat down and relaxed as much as the opportunity could.

"Has anybody ever seen him?" Paul asked after he had fallen into a chair facing James' desk.

"Who?" James asked, his mind already assembling a list of possible answers to the question.

"The evil one," Paul said, knowing better then to utter the name again.

"I never have," James admitted. "Nor do I know anyone who has."

"Then how do we know he exists?" Paul said, leaning forward anxiously. The subject was something that had troubled him quite a bit, and finally he had a chance to express his thoughts.

No stranger to doubt himself, James grinned at his protégé's line of thought. "I've little use for Gods myself, and I've never seen one," he said. "Does that mean that perhaps the God Ban-Dayid does not exist?"

Paul cocked his head to the side for a moment thoughtfully at James' challenge of the existence of the God of Healing. Finally he cracked a smirk himself. "Point. I can only assume he must exist because his priests have used their powers granted by him to heal me and others I know in the past."

"So if Ban-Dayid exists because his priests have healed you, then perhaps the Dark One exists because his priests have tried to harm you?"

Paul shrugged. "Tried and failed, mostly. But I yield. He has a mighty nation and is served by armies of fey beings, as well as a gathering of worshippers that wield powers clearly granted of a divine origin."

"Not to mention he was said to be old before the great wars plunged the world into chaos," James added, gazing thoughtfully towards the ceiling.

"Bah, that's clearly a rumor," Paul said, sneering. "To think that the tales told of the mighty feats even men without magic could do have any truth to them is a fairy tale at best."

"It was over a thousand years ago, Paul," James said, snapping out of his reverie and returning his mind to the present. "There's no telling what could have happened. From what I've learned, many survivors of the Great Wars cast down their sciences, magic, and knowledge in light of the damage and destruction they had caused, choosing instead to live a simpler life. Thus was found the empire of Gneiss to the west.

"Only those that clung to the destructive knowledge flocked to the Dark Ones banner many leagues to the south and west, carving out their fell kingdom there.

"Others sought a balance between the old and the new ways. Science and technology were cast aside, and our forefathers in Elendar turned to the Gods and the powers of magic to make their way in life."

Paul chuckled, "Spoken as well as any tutor to a bored child. But do you believe it? That the world was once filled with machines that served mankind and allowed him to cheat the very laws of nature that we live by?"

James shrugged the matter aside for the time being. "Sometimes I do. But right now, it's far more important that we bend our mind to figuring out what these two women are doing in Standopolis. Oh, and get in touch with Belwyr and see if any of his scouts have ever heard of a city to the south called Belleville."

Paul nodded, hopping to his feet. He tossed a sloppy salute James' way more as a friendly jest then a proper show of respect. Then he was out the door. James watched the door that he had gone through for a moment longer, pondering the young assistant. He showed much promise, though he had far to go if he was ever to be worthy of replacing James as head of the Elendarian Intelligence Agency. Shaking the thoughts from his head, he glanced at his arm and saw that the bandage on it had finally stopped the bleeding from the dagger the older of the two women had hit him with. He sighed and decided that before he did anything else, he needed to get his wound taken care of by a priest.

*****

I woke up from my magically induced slumber and heard the sound of keys jingling in a lock. I fought the urge to stretch and groan at the pain that assaulted me. My body had been frozen from the paralysis spell, causing my joints and muscles to ache. More immediately of concern to me was the fiery pain in my face from my swollen lips and bruised jaw. All of those inconveniences I bore silently, however, for the guard opened the door then and crept in as quietly as a man wearing a chain jerkin can be said to creep.

Peering through narrow slits, I saw Brina lying near me, partially wrapped in only my cloak, as she had been when we were captured. Part of me was glad to see her; another part wished she would have been taken elsewhere so that I would be able to escape more easily on my own. Then the shadow of the guard fell over me, blocking what little light filtered in through the open doorway.

He stopped before us, and based upon the lack of anybody other then the single guard in our cell, I knew that he was up to no good.

"You want the young one?" The guard closest to me called out softly.

"Bah, you're daft man!" The other one called back as quietly, but with a warning tone in his voice. "I'm not for laying a hand on them until Earl James says so, and if you've half a wit about you, neither will you!"

The guard near me snorted in derision. "You're a coward 'tis all. They'll be off for the block after he's done with them, the Earl won't let abide any spies that isn't his own here. Besides, you're the half-wit ta think we'll have another chance at two beauties like this again ere they be swinging from the gibbet!"

I risked a glance to see how things were laid out. The one guard was only a couple of feet between Brina and I, while the other one remained outside of the room at the door, refusing to look into the room so worried was he that they would be discovered. The guard discovered my movement though, and before I could do a thing about it, he had his sword drawn and pointing at me.

"Methinks I'll try this one out, she looks like she could use a man's touch."

I tried to scowl, but it hurt my face too much, so instead I just lay there limply. At least I could open my eyes fully and take in our new surroundings. "Off with your clothes, wench."

Fighting the urge to utter a nasty retort, I reached down and pulled my skimpy top off of my body, letting my average sized breasts be displayed for the guard's perverse pleasure. From the lewd grin of the one near me, I knew that he was taking pleasure indeed.

"And the rest," he said, nodding over the point of his sword at my skimpy loincloth. My belt with my scabbards, weapons, and pouches had already been removed, leaving me effectively naked already. Shrugging at what I would have to endure, I reached down and untied it and let it fall to the course rock floor of the room. I lay there fully revealed before my would-be ravager, expecting the worse.

"Get in here and keep an eye on the other one," he said to the far guard as he sheathed his sword. He began fumbling with his armor then, struggling to undo his hardened leather breeches under his chain shirt so that he could unsheathe his other sword. Grumbling something under his breath, the other guard moved into the room and drew his own blade.

I braced myself when the man kicked my legs apart with his boot and then fell to his knees between my outstretched limbs. I noticed that he had not been smart enough to take his weapons off, and that was where my hope rested. He got closer to me, his hand wrapped around his chubby little soldier to guide it. I braced myself, preparing for his inevitable invasion. My plan was simple, as soon as he was in me and started to lose control of himself at that moment when all men are equals, I would pretend to enjoy it and wrap my legs and arms about him, stealing his dagger and plunging it into his back.

My plan was shattered though. Seconds before the guard could begin his rape of me, the other guard hissed out a warning, "Beren, get up! Baron Paul comes!"

The guard in front of me, Beren, scrambled to his feet. His hands flew to his breeches, stuffing his package back inside and quickly tying the laces. I smirked as he backed up quickly so that he was next to the other guard. While my bid for freedom had disappeared, the haste and disappointment of the guard nearly made it worth it to me.

"What goes on here? Earl James left orders that the door was not to be opened unless he or I was present!" Paul snapped at the guards.

"Sorry Milord," Beren stammered. "One of them made some noises like she was sick or something, we came in to see what was afoot an there she lays like a whore, trying to win our favor."

Paul raised an eyebrow and looked at me. By now I had drawn my legs back together and had shifted to my side so that I appeared to be trying for some sort of modesty by making my blond curls hidden in a shadow and my breasts partially concealed by my arms which were wrapped in front of them. I cursed myself for not being quicker though, for my pose was lax enough to convey that modesty was not a serious concern of mine. He glanced back at the guards and nodded, though I thought he probably did not believe them, but did not consider the matter worth debating.

"Leave me, and lock the door behind me," He ordered. At once the guards obeyed, stepping out of the cell and shutting and barring the door from without.

"Well, well, looks like I get my wish after all," Paul mused, stepping close to me but keeping far enough away that I could not launch any sort of attack at him. I tried to scowl again, and again winced at the pain. Abandoning all modesty, I let my arms fall to my sides and I slowly rose from the floor, stretching as best I could to loosen up the kinks in my muscles.

Paul's eyes moved over my body hungrily, devouring what he saw. While far from aroused, the belowground prison was cool enough that my nipples were quite firmly erect, fueling whatever fantasies he might have had.

"Both of you naked and unable to resist me, how poetic."

I heard Brina's sharp intake of breath and knew that she had been only pretending to sleep. From the way that Paul's eyes darted to her, I knew that he had heard it as well.

"Why don't you try to find out just how much resistance we have left?" I said defiantly. I was angry with myself for getting captured so easily, and though I had checked and was missing no teeth, my jaw hurt like hell. All in all, it was not the beginning of a good day for me.

"Perhaps later," he said with a lecherous grin. "But first, we need to figure out what to do with you two. You see, Earl James and I think you are spies for the dark one. Our priests and wizards can find no magic about you, though some of your equipment possessed some minor dweomers. Nonetheless, you are surely not as innocent as you would have poor Berk believe."

The fingers on his right hand tapped absently on the hilt of a shortsword at his side. A shortsword that I recognized instantly. My anger grew. Not only had they taken us hostage without warrant, but now they had stolen from us as well.

"What's the matter, see something familiar?" He taunted me. I fought back the urge to lunge at him, but my headache and general low tolerance level was beginning to tell on me.

"I bet you'd like it back, wouldn't you?" He asked, tapping the pommel of my sword.

He was goading me and he knew it, but I do not think he was ready for me to act on it so quickly. "You talk to much," I growled at him as I lunged. His reflexes were good, I had to give him that. He jumped to the side away from and had my - now his - sword drawn quickly. What he had forgotten about was Brina.

Using more of the strange unarmed fighting style that I had seen her and Sandala use, she exploded into action as soon as he came within range. She pivoted quickly on the ground, her legs sweeping out and catching Paul in the back of the knees. He fell forward, surprised by her attack but having the presence of mind to try and throw himself away from her.

I was on him then, stepping on the back of his hand where it was wrapped around the hilt of the sword. He tried to throw me off but before he could do so my fist came down, connecting high on the side of his face, ensuring a black eye and a throbbing headache. It also ensured that I would have a sore hand and bruised knuckles too, but that was a concern for later.

He rolled away from me then, using the force of my blow to aid his momentum. I was off balance from the punch, allowing him to pull his hand holding the sword out from under my bare foot. He lurched back to his feet and stood on the defensive, sword leveled at Brina before she could finish her charge she was about to begin.

Distraction reared its ugly head then, as the door was opened and Earl James along with both guards entered the cell. Paul glanced over at them, his position requiring him to turn his head slightly to see them. That was all that we needed. I feinted in towards him, drawing his attention back to me. Brina also lunged in. Paul was fast, as I said, and he reacted accordingly, drawing the light weight shortsword back across in a swing aimed at her neck.

What happened next made me revise my opinion of Brina again, for it was a maneuver that nearly took my breath away. She dropped under the swing of the blade and launched a strike straight up with the palm of her fist leading the way. She hit the sword hilt as it crossed her head, striking it with enough force to knock it out of Paul's hand.

He was more stunned by it then I was, which allowed me to charge at him again with little threat of any lethal defense. He took a quick step back and turned to face me, throwing a haymaker at my face, which I easily avoided. Brina slipped behind him quickly and had her arms around his neck in a hold guaranteed to require his submission.

I glanced at James and saw him open his mouth, but the word, "Enough!" came to slow, for by the time the first syllable was uttered, there was a loud pop in the room that indicated Brina had finished Paul off with a forceful twist of his head. I forgot how strong she was, in spite of her size.

Both guards looked on in shock as Paul's limp body collapsed to the ground. James had a stunned look on his face too, but it quickly changed to disbelief at the thought of two unarmed and naked girls defeating his protégé. From there it turned to anger, and from anger to rage. He drew his own longsword and advanced on us, deadly intent in his eyes.

I scooped up my fallen shortsword and settled into a defensive position, wishing I had a dagger in my left hand. Brina slipped into a relaxed crouch as well with Paul's body at her feet. I realized yet again what a strange and dangerous young woman she was. James came on, and now the guards advanced behind him, their own longswords drawn.

"Even after killing the three of you, we can't escape," I said, multiple courses of action flashing through my mind in a heartbeat. I glanced at Brina and directed my eyes to the dirk on Paul's belt. In a quick and fluid motion, Brina reached down and pulled it free then tossed it to me. I caught it easily and turned my attention back just in time to deflect Beren's clumsy lunge at me.

With his sword out of the way, I took my newly acquired dagger and plunged it hilt deep into the side of his neck, twisting it when it hit bottom. He fell to the ground, trying to scoot away from me, one hand clutching at the gaping holes in his throat from which his lifeblood gurgled out.

My real concern was for Brina. James advanced on her and his movements matched every stance or shift in balance she adopted. Finally he lunged in at her, causing her to dodge to the side. He kept his distance and his balance, preventing her from launching any counter attacks.

The other guard advanced on me then. He had been waiting near the door to prevent us from making a break for it, but with his partner down, he had no choice but to come at me. He approached more carefully, having seen what I did to Beren. My concern for Brina was growing, so I threw caution to the wind and took the offensive against the guard.

Brina used my cloak to good effect then, whipping it around on her arm to foul up James' sword, slowing it enough so that she could land a solid kick to his stomach. He grunted and had his balance shifted back so that he had to take a half step back. He recovered quickly, yanking his sword free of the cloak and scoring a shallow cut along the outside of her left arm.

I tossed my dagger at the guard from an underhanded position, making him dodge to the side to avoid it. While distracted, I launched an overhand swing at him, drawing his longsword up high to keep his head from being split in two. Left with only my knee for a weapon, I drove it up and into his crotch, knocking the wind out of him in a small squeal. He doubled over briefly, the danger of his situation already overriding the impulse to curl into a fetal position. However, briefly was long enough, since my shortsword was no longer tangled up in his longsword. The point descended rapidly, sinking into his back just below his neck as he tried to stand back up. He shuddered and fell to his knees after a paralyzing moment of agony. I withdrew my blade and turned away from him to let him collapse to the ground and die.

I saw Brina try another foot sweep, but James deftly avoided it by jumping over her feet. Before he could launch a counter-attack she continued her sweep into another revolution, her leg aimed higher and driving out at the point of impact this time. He stumbled back and fell to one knee as her heel impacted directly with the front of his knee.

I slipped up behind him and laid my shortsword on his shoulder, the razor edge of it resting lightly against his neck. Brina sprung back to her feet and grinned triumphantly. I saw she had another minor wound on the inside of her right thigh as well, but she did not appear inconvenienced by it in spite of the trickle of blood that ran down the inside of her leg.

James, sensing defeat, dropped his sword and glared at Brina with undisguised hatred. "Everyone's life will last much longer if you don't make me kill you," I said, reaching down and grabbing the back of his tunic to indicate I wanted him to stand up. He did so slowly and raised his hands away from him. Brina moved closer and searched him carefully, removing a few throwing daggers and a dirk from his person, in addition to the longsword on the ground.

"Who are you?" He asked, his voice hard with anger.

"You're hardly in a position to ask questions," I responded, pressing lightly against his neck with my sword. "But since you asked so nicely, I'll tell you anyhow. I'm Yamara and she is Brina, and most recently, we're from Acathia."

"Where is that, somewhere in the Dark One's land?" He spat out.

"Don't know any Dark Ones, do you, Brina?" I said, enjoying the twist of fate.

"Could he mean a priest or a city-state King?" She asked.

"You know who I mean, don't taunt me!" He seethed. "The Dark One is far greater then any petty tyrant ruling any of the city-states to the south!"

"I don't think that's what he meant," I said rhetorically. "Acathia is, I believe, another world. Two suns there and only one here, you know. Before that I came from a world known as Halador. I tend to get myself involved with magical events that go awry."

"Yamara, what are we going to do now?" Brina asked me after a moment of thoughtful silence. I glanced at her, briefly surprised at how lost and small and almost innocent she looked in spite of the guard with the broken neck she had killed only a few minutes earlier.

"Yes, what are you going to do now?" James asked, trying to conceal the venom in his voice. "Everybody knows me well here, you'll not be able to escape."

I chafed at his words and his tone. We were in the position we were in entirely because of him. Left to our own devices, we would have moved on as best we could and not bothered him or his city. I was reminded of my desire to kill him then, and very nearly acted on it. I stayed my hand though, certain of a better way to do things. If only I could figure out what that way was. Perhaps my greatest mistake I ever made was in not acting on my instincts then and there.

"Tell us of this place," I said after a moment of thought, uncertain of what we would do, but knowing that we needed more information before we could do much of anything.

"Tell you of what place? This dungeon? The palace? Elendar? Malatoria?" His tone mocked me.

"We'll need to learn about this hole in the ground, but we can start with Malatoria."

James spoke of Malatoria then, haltingly and grudgingly at first, but gathering speed as he was questioned and prodded on. In what seemed a short order, Brina and I learned of the warlike and monotheistic Gneissian Empire to the west first. Gneiss was led by a man known as the Speaker of Symbos, the ageless high priest of the Gneissian God, Symbos. The preachings of Symbos were such that all citizens of the mighty empire were taught to believe only in what they were told. All creatures and things of magic not of a divine origin was false, in their eyes. That included any non-human race. No elves, dwarves, halflings, orcs, lizardfolk, gnomes, creatures of fairy (fey or benign in nature) were allowed within the great wall surrounding the empire. Soldiers serving along the wall or even further out, in border patrols or special missions, were reeducated before being allowed to return to the general public to maintain the falsehood of their existence.

I was fascinated that a con of such a magnitude could work successfully. James looked at me wearily, his long winded lesson broken up. Briefly, I saw a calculating look come into his eyes. He glanced around briefly, and then began to tell us more.

Gneissians could not completely disbelieve in magic, for whenever a war arose with Elendar or any of the other smaller nations of Malatoria, or something happened within the empire that could not be explained away in a normal way, magic was blamed. Magic was the tool of lesser, evil Gods. Not even Gods, according to the teachings of Symbos, but demons really.

"Sounds like Gneiss is ruled by a Sorcerer-King," Brina commented dryly, clearly not impressed.

James looked at her blankly, uncertain of what she was saying. "Where we are from, Acathia, the world is hot and lifeless. Where life does prosper is around oasises and fertile ground. Cities spring up there, and they are generally led by a powerful man or woman wielding a unique type of magic to lead great armies of men. They then title themselves as Sorcerer-Kings, and do whatever they can to run as corrupt a government as possible to break the backs of the slaves and freemen forced to eek out a living within their realm."

James looked thoughtfully at Brina, nodding as he compared the similarities before he caught himself and scowled slightly. "I have been to Gneiss many times, it is a beautiful land and the citizens are treated fairly. Poverty is all but unknown, but it's citizens are prisoners of their own realm, for it is forbidden for them to leave the borders… for their own safety, of course."

"How have you been there, if there are as xenophobic as they sound?" I asked, thinking I had found a hole in James' explanation.

"I do a great many things I'm not supposed to do," he said, giving me a cold smile.

I shivered then, as the damp and the cold of our cell suddenly set into me. I looked down at my body and realized that I was still naked and chilled. Glancing around our cell, I saw the bodies of the three dead men. I walked over to Paul's corpse since his clothing was in the best condition, and proceeded to strip him. Brina kept an eye on James while I quickly slipped into his breeches and shirt. They were large on me, but given the alternative, I made do using his belt. The belt was also handy for it allowed me to secure the James' throwing daggers in it, as well as the dirk I had taken from Paul. My sword remained in my hand.

I took over watching James while Brina eyed the two remaining clothed corpses. In a manner of minutes, she had slipped the best of their clothing on as well, which consisted of a tunic tied about her waist and a pair of tough leather pants. She took James' long sword as her own, though she preferred a short sword like me. Seeing that he had no use for it, she liberated the scabbard from James as well. She finished off her arsenal with a dagger from each of the guards corpses tucked into her belt.

With both of us paying attention to James again, I motioned for him to continue our education. I had to hand it to him though, he did not show any disappointment at the two of us clothing ourselves. Then again, it could have been due to his apparent - and deserved - hatred of us. Nonetheless, he continued.

Next we learned of the lands to the north, which were wild and untamed and home to fierce creatures. A large clan of giants lived in mountains to the north, but they kept to themselves mostly, especially since a rather notorious merchant by the name of Marius had managed to negotiate some trading with them. They raised sheep the size of horses, with wool that was far finer and tougher then anything to be found elsewhere.

Further north was a frozen land inhabited by occasional barbarian tribes, as well as other creatures accustomed to such environments. All in all, it was avoided by nearly any sane person, though every few years barbarian nomads might wander far enough south to cause some mischief along Elendar's northern borders.

South were a great many free cities, as well as The Great Forest, which housed the greatest concentration of elves in Malatoria. South of Gneiss was a small dwarven kingdom led by King Mordrim. Another barony of humans existed between the elves and dwarves, by the name of the Barony of Tyusk, under the rule of Baron Tyusk himself.

Further south of the elves were the free cities, largest and closest of them was Peltarch. Peltarch was a large shipping port as well, for many mines were found in the southern reaches of Elendar and Peltarch sat along the eastern shores of the Dragon Waters, a great ocean to which no end had been found that lay to the east of Elendar.

Beyond Peltarch and other free cities were more occasional settlements of people and demi-humans, and other, less savory humanoids. As well as many ruins of ancient civilizations. And to the south and east in a dark and evil land lay the realm of the Dark One. We could not get James to tell us the name of the Dark One, he vehemently insisted that doing so would draw it's attention, and that it had the powers of a God. Having seen similar fears and powers among my years on Halador, I did not push him. That and I was convinced that the more we tried to get him to tell us, the more convinced he would become that we were agents of the Dark One trying to draw it's attention and power.

By the time James had finished telling us several hours had passed. Neither Brina nor I had noticed, for we were fascinated by the world of Malatoria. But now that I had become aware of it, I realized that we had fallen into James' ploy. He had went along with us so readily because he was trying to lull us into wasting the hours away until a change of guards arrived. Time was against us, but we were not lost yet.

"Brina!" I hissed, getting her attention. She looked at me, snapping out of her near trance listening to James had caused. "We have to get going, more guards will arrive soon."

Her eyes opened as she realized what had nearly happened. She looked back at James accusingly, and saw his eyes harden. I knew that under his breath and in his mind, he was cursing at me for realizing it.

"How do we get out?" Brina asked, worry creeping into her voice.

I thought for a moment before responding, "The sewers!"

"What are those?" She asked me, puzzled at what was, to her, a strange word.

"Any city of size usually has them," I said, pausing to look at James until he reluctantly nodded. "They're for removing the cities waste, they run under the city, like caves or mines, but with water running through them. It's not pleasant, but we should be able to get out."

"So how do we get to them?" Brina asked me, hugging her cloak about her body more closely. I looked at James expectantly. He met my stare challengingly for a long moment before he finally nodded.

"I know how to get to them, but you'll never make it from here. You'd have to leave the palace and there are far to many guards along the way."

Brina looked at me, worry clear on her face. Gone was the crafty and calculating girl I had met on Acathia, in her place was the young and innocent girl that Brina should have been. I smiled at her quickly to reassure her then turned and glared at James.

"No, I don't think so," I stated. "I know your type, even if I just met you. You have an secret entrance hidden somewhere nearby, or I'm a man."

Brina laughed softly at my statement. If nothing else, she had firsthand knowledge that I was no man!

"So you'll take us there, or end up dying right here and now," I finished, stepping closer to him and gesturing with the point of my sword.

He laughed sharply. "Instead I help you escape so I can die later?"

I hated to admit it but he had a point there. We really had no choice but to kill him at some point or he would be after us, either personally or by sending countless soldiers. Fortunately, Brina came to my rescue the second she realized I had no witty response.

She moved over to him, letting her cloak fall away from where she had it gathered in front of her. Her tunic covered her from the front, but it was open on the sides to show her darkly tanned sides and the barely hidden swell of her young breasts under the tunic. She slipped around behind him, her fingers lightly tracing up James' arm as she did so.

Speaking softly, her lips nearly touching his ear, she said, "The longer you live, the better the chance you have to escape from us and bring about our capture. Two women alone on a strange world, how far and how long can we really go?"

Watching carefully, I hid my smirk at the girls ploy. Here was the Brina I was used to. She was definitely a dangerous creature, but fortunately, she was my creature. I liked to think that made me even more dangerous.

James did his best to ignore the intimacy with which she delivered her statement. Regardless, he was a man, and Brina was a beautiful young woman able to inspire fantasies in the most devout of priests. Still, I think James performed admirably. What got to him was what she said. No doubt he had been thinking it already, of this I was sure, but to be reminded of it in such a way hardened his resolve - or weakened it, depending upon how one looked at it.

"Very well, I will lead you out. But be on your toes, for every step of the way you'll have to be worried that I might be leading you into a trap or a trick of some sort that will allow the tables to be turned," He said, trying to recapture some momentum. He was speaking to me more then Brina, for he had identified me as the leader of our partnership.

"We wouldn't have it any other way," Brina breathed into his ear before I could respond. She even went so far as to reach out with her tongue and gently lick the inside rim of his ear. Then she was away, back at my side in only a moment. I glanced at her with a touch of pride, some of it even displayed on my face. Then again, maybe James was right, maybe we were agents of darkness. I could definitely see Brina making a very successful succubus!

I grabbed up a key ring from one of the guards and led the way out of the cell. James was next, and Brina came last. Following James' directions, I led the way through the poorly lit dungeon corridors.

"Haven't been to busy lately, have you?" I asked James in reference to all the empty cells.

"This is a special part of the dungeon," he confided, seeing nothing to be gained by not answering me. He did not volunteer any more information though about it though.

Luck was with us, for the hidden entrance to the sewers was hidden in the back of the furthest cell along the passage. Rather clever, I thought, to hide an escape route in what is traditionally considered a place that escape is impossible.

Only by shutting the door to the cell with which we found ourselves in and then prying a loose rock from a wall out and setting it on a pressure sensitive area of the floor near the door where we able to release the catch to the concealed doorway. Pushing the well oiled and counterbalanced section of the floor away from where it seamlessly blended into the rest of the floor revealed a seemingly endless drop into darkness.

"We need a light," I said, thinking where I could find a torch. There were sconces in the walls of the passage we had come down, but most of them were unlit and those that were not were secured far to well for us to try and take.

"There is a lantern, flint, and steel hidden below," James said, a trace of a smile on his face.

I scowled at him, knowing how much he was enjoying this. "We drop together," I told him. "How far is it?"

"Six feet down, then a ledge heading away from here for a few feet more, then it drops another two feet. A niche on the right is where the lantern is," He responded casually.

I nodded and repeated, "We drop together. You hold on to my shirt, both hands. If, at any time, I feel one of your hands not on me, you die."

"Wait," Brina said, stopping me. "Let me do it, you drop down first and secure the area, I'll drop with James." I thought about it quickly and nodded, she had a good point.

I slipped to the edge of the pit and peered into the inky blackness. Taking a deep breath, I let myself slip into it. Sure enough, after a few feet my feet hit the ground. In spite of the darkness, I landed gracefully. I moved off carefully, searching for the edge. Finding it, I slipped down to the next landing and called back softly to Brina to let her know I was out of the way.

"Turn and face me," Brina said, standing close to James. She held a dagger in her hand a few inches from his midsection. He glanced down and smiled at her.

"Careful with that, I'm cooperating rather nicely and I'd hate for us to slip and fall and have an accident."

Brina smiled right back at him, "Then I guess we'd better hope we don't slip." From where I could hear them, I smirked in the dark. Then I remembered the lantern and started searching about blindly for the niche that James said it was hidden in.

"Two hands on me, like Yamara said," Brina ordered him. He placed his hands on her sides directly on her skin, just above her hips. "Now on three, we jump."

Brina counted to three while I continued to search for the lantern. As she reached three, they both stepped into the pit. James' hands slid up as they descended, sliding under her tunic and halter top so that they rested gently over Brina's breasts. Her sudden intake of breath was not from the fall alone, though they landed safely.

"Keep your hands on her until I get the lantern lit," I ordered, unaware of their specific placement. Unknown in the dark, James grinned. His grin turned to a grimace when Brina's dagger pushed against his belly, cutting through the cloth with the point and just barely breaking the skin. In spite of the promise of pain, he kept his hands where they were, knowing that she was trying to get him to remove them so she could finish the thrust.

A few moments later, I found the lantern hidden cleverly in a niche, just as he had described. Reaching around inside of it, I pulled out the flint and steel as well. All the while the dagger pushed a little harder, but not enough to cause any serious damage.

A few more moments and I had the lantern lit. I shuttered it mostly and glanced back at James and Brina and saw him standing there with his hands dutifully on her sides again. I pride myself on my perception, and because of that I noticed that her cheeks looked redder then they had before, as though she was angry or embarrassed or otherwise flushed. I shrugged it away though, not knowing the real reason for it. I also noticed the faint red stain on James' shirt and the small hole the tip of Brina's dagger had caused.

"He give you any trouble?" I asked her, more concerned about it then I liked to admit.

She glared at him for a brief moment. "No, when we landed it was awkward and my arm went forward a little bit to balance myself." She looked back at him, a portion of the glare returning, "Take your hands off me now."

I raised my eyebrow curiously. I knew Brina was every bit as graceful as I was, and based upon the glare she sent him I suspected something else might have been at play too, but I figured Brina could take care of herself. Hell, I had seen her do some amazing things, I knew she could take of herself!

Turning about, we looked at the new tunnel we found ourselves in and headed down it, the pungent smell of the cities sewers growing rapidly stronger with each step.

Book 1 : Chapter 9

The trip through the sewers was an adventure by itself. Brina was astonished at the apparent waste of water necessary to float the distinctly unpleasant things through the underground passages and away from the city. According to James, the sewers drained into an underground river, downstream from the same river where the cities water source was obtained from.

Something James neglected to tell us was that every 3 hours the dams on the pipes leading from the sophisticated water tank in the city to the sewers were opened to flush the refuse and waste for 15 minutes. Then they were closed so that the water levels would be replenished by the prisoners forced to operate the water pumping mechanism. All in all, when we finally got him to describe it to us, I had to admit I was very impressed by the level of engineering that went into it.

What happened to alert us to this regular flushing was a slowly building roaring noise. Brina was the first to notice it. It grew quickly once she asked what it was. We turned to look at James to ask him what it was and saw the smirk on his face. He was behind me still, so I had to turn around to look at him. It was at that moment that I noticed the raising water level. The rapidly raising water level.

"Brina!" I called out, lunging forward and grabbing onto James' arm. I grabbed him just in time, for the leading edge of the frothing sewage filled water overcame us. We were swept off our feet instantly and sent down the passage, buffeted mercilessly by the walls of the passage and water unrecognizable objects were in the water with us. Somehow, I managed to keep hold of James.

I hate to think of the water that got in my mouth, up my nose and in my ears, or in any of my other more sensitive places. It was a rough ride, and James did his best to try and get away from me. I let go of the lantern I had in my hand almost instantly and did my best to wrap myself around him. In particular, I worked my way around behind him and kept one hand wrapped around his lower arm and my other arm managed a safe hold around his neck.

The crushing wave we were trapped in petered out before too long, though it seemed an eternity to me. I could only imagine what Brina was feeling like. As the water level receded and slowed somewhat, I managed to get my feet under me. James was all but limp in my arms - I guess I had gripped him a bit to tightly. I stood up in the water and dragged him over to the side of the tunnel with me to lean against the wall. I turned about to look for Brina then, knowing that James was no immediate threat.

Brina was nowhere to be seen though. I hoped that was because we had no light and our visibility was practically nothing. Some faint ambient light filtered in from somewhere though, but I had no idea where it came from at that point.

"Yamara!" A girlish shout, albeit waterlogged, sounded from somewhere further down the sewer tunnel. It was followed quickly by a groan, decidedly masculine in nature, then the sounds of someone thrashing in the water. Finally things grew quiet again.

A very uncharacteristic fear rose in me. I quelled it quickly, but grabbed James up all the same. "If you're people hurt her, death won't come quick enough for you!" I hissed to him. He had regained some of his strength, enough to stand on his own and whisper in response to me, "None of my people come down here."

He stopped and listened carefully to the echoing of the passage for a moment before saying, "The sounds came from up ahead, let's go."

I ached to go forward, which surprised me, but my suspicion overrode my foolish concerns. "Why are you suddenly helpful?"

"This is my city," He said, his tone quite insistent. "Whatever's down here with us shouldn't be here, and I'll be damned if I'm going to let it get away, even if that means allying myself with an agent of Dagrazt!"

There it was, the name Brina and I had been hoping to learn. I had to admit, for some reason simply hearing it sent a chill down my spine and made our surroundings suddenly that much more somber. "Is that the Dark One?" I asked to confirm my guess.

"Aye," he muttered, his tone showing he was irritated with something, most likely himself for having said the name.

"Then let's go, If Brina is dead, there'll be hell to pay!"

We moved forward through the sewer, almost blindly. We followed one wall carefully, but moving with as much haste as was prudent. The wall fell away from us on our left then, indicating a branch in the passage. It was here that the earlier scuffle had taken place. Ten disembodied pairs of red eyes was what we noticed first, but there was enough extra light here to see those eyes belonging to six bodies. Six of them were in the water with us, while the additional figures stood nearby, up higher where the rocky floor rose up some six inches out of the water to form a shelf. Of the four not near us already, one was crouched over the prone form of what could only be Brina.

"Orcs!" James hissed, reaching for the sword that was no longer at his side. I nodded, having instantly recognized the eyes of the creatures as belonging to orcs. Their infravision caused them to glow softly in the dark as they saw through the darkness by detecting the shades of heat. Their unnatural advantage of night-sight was lost to them when one of the other figures unhooded their lantern from which a small amount of light had leaked.

Light flooded through the passage, causing everyone to blink and squint suddenly. Call me lucky, but I had just glanced away when this happened, so I reacted first. I tossed the dagger I had taken from Paul to James, who caught it out of the air in spite of his impaired vision. Then I drew my shortsword and charged towards the closest orc, who was struggling to adapt to the sudden light messing up his low light vision.

Many creatures possessed the ability to see in the dark - goblins, orcs, elves, dwarves, and many others. For some reason I had never learned and none of them had ever explained to me, their low light vision only worked in near or total darkness. Even light such as a torch or lantern was to bright to allow it to function. Unwittingly, the forces arrayed against us had worked in our favor by flooding the tunnel with light.

The orc was pulling out a crude but lethal looking broadsword when I ran him through. I yanked my shortsword out and left him on his knees cradling the blood and gore that spilled over his fingers from the gaping wound in his upper abdomen. I ducked under a slash from another orc that had managed to make a half blind attack at me, and cut deeply into the inside of his thigh, hamstringing him and cutting through his femoral artery.

That orc fell into the water, thrashing in pain as the muscles in his leg twisted up and contracted. By the time he had come to terms with the pain, I knew he would be unable to fight due to blood loss.

James rushed forward beside me a heartbeat later, not as disadvantaged as the confused orcs. He kicked an orcs sword out to the side as the orc tried to raise it. His dagger plunged up into the underside of the orcs chin then, going straight into its brain. His other hand grabbed the broadsword out of the dead orcs hand as it twitched in death spasms.

The remaining 3 orcs had adjusted enough by then that they came at us a bit more organized. Still, they were just orcs. Where I had come from, orcs were generally threatening only in great numbers. Brutal and vicious, nevertheless they relied more on brute strength and numbers then grace, finesse, or skill. Now that these orcs had recovered somewhat from the sudden light, they approached us carefully enough that I knew them to be different then the orcs I was used to.

Still, the orcs made a mistake in assuming James was more dangerous then I was. Well, at least in my mind they did. Two of them went after him while only one came at me. He attacked carefully, thrusting his broadsword at me experimentally. I swatted it off to the left and turned my blade over to return a thrust in his direction. I was surprised by his speed and skill, for he altered the momentum of his deflected broadsword and brought it across in a swipe at my neck. I ducked low, ruining my thrust at him, but saving my own neck in the process.

I gathered my legs under me and raised my sword instinctively. Sure enough, I blocked the next swing from the broadsword, tremors running down my arms from the strike. I stood up quickly as the orc tried to recover and drove my foot into his crotch. Had the orc somehow survived or evaded my following attack with my shortsword, he would surely have been permanently unable to father any little orclings. Too bad for him, he would never reach that point in his life.

James was hard pressed against the two orcs he faced. Normally, when two opponents attack one target, they stand a greater chance of fouling each other up then actually causing the target injury. That was a normal situation. The alternative to that was when warriors had been trained in such tactics and knew how to fight alongside another. These orcs, surprisingly (to me) had been trained in those very tactics. It was everything he could do with dagger and broadsword to block attack after attack levied on him.

I was torn, I wanted desperately to go and battle the people that stood near Brina, but I knew if I left enemies behind me and James was overcome, my rescue effort would be short lived, at best. Cursing, I turned and moved behind one of the two orcs James faced. One of the figures on the landing spat out something in orcish, which I interpreted to be a warning. Before the orc could respond to it I grabbed it's head and used my shortsword to lay open it's throat from one ear to the other.

Facing only one orc suddenly, James took the offensive. The other orc was still in two on one combat mode, so he was totally unprepared for James to ignore the coming assault from the now dead attacker. James thrust his dagger deep into the side of the remaining orc and held his captured broadsword out to deflect the return attack by the orc. The stood locked like that for a moment while the orc tried to overpower James with the last of its strength. The pain of its wound overcame it quickly though and it staggered back away from him. James liberated the orc's head from its body before it had taken more then two steps back from him.

Together, we approached the four figures guarding Brina. I studied them more closely now, and saw that while they were more human then the orcs, they were still decidedly ugly. I had never seen them before, but I remembered learning about their kind back on Halador in my training with the Ornithrym. Half-Orcs. One part human, one part orc, and about twelve parts ugly. Half-orcs were more dangerous on average then a true orc, for they were considered to be more intelligent then their pure blooded cousins (the orc part, not the human part… although any human willing to mate with an orc could be considered considerably stupid as well).

I grabbed one of the throwing daggers from my belt and threw it with my left hand, distracting the orc hovering over Brina. He flinched and tried to dodge it, succeeding to the point where the pommel glanced off his elbow as it flew past. James, I am sure, would have preferred to draw the orcs to us, but I was concerned about Brina and did not want her used as a hostage. I heard James groan in dismay as I rushed forward, but he quickly followed after. The going was rough for the first several steps as we forced our feet through the brackish water. But then we cleared the water picked up speed on the rocky shelf.

I was a few steps ahead of James due to my head start, so the half-orcs had moved forward to block my way. All except the one that stood over Brina. He moved a few steps away from her, then stopped and looked back at her, thinking my worst fears, that she might make a good bargaining piece. Behind me James used me as a screen and threw the dagger I had given him. The half-orc never saw it coming, only that it had suddenly appeared in his studded leather covered stomach.

I had run out of room to run, what with only a matter of some ten feet of shelf from the water to where they were waiting. The half-orc James had wounded was staring down in surprise at the dagger in his belly. I threw a high attack at the half-orc beside him, forcing him to defend and take a step back, then I grabbed the dagger out of the first ones stomach before his hands could reach it. I reversed the motion and plunged it back in, this time higher. It slid off one of the studs on his leather armor, then ricocheted off of one of the half-orcs ribs, but the end result was still a dagger buried in his chest poking a sizeable hole in one of his lungs.

The third orc swung at me from my right flank where he had come around. Acting more on instinct then from actually seeing him, I ducked down. Not quite fast enough, his longsword caught some of my hair and tore it out, but not until after it glanced off the top of my head. I was stunned by the blow, unable to think clearly. I knew I needed to get away though, so I fell backwards and scrambled away quickly.

James, I hate to admit, came to my rescue. He stepped in above me and blocked a downwards slash aimed at me. His intervention caught the half-orcs by surprise, but outnumbering him two to one, he was on the defensive for himself quickly. I managed to get my feet under me again and shake my head to clear it. That hurt even worse. The pain helped focus me though. I realized I still had a hold on both the dagger and the sword, a testimony to my training.

I left James to handle the two half-orcs, though he looked hard pressed. The third remaining half-orc had started forward again, confident in defeating us. Then he saw me coming after him. He started backing up quickly, and from the way he held his longsword, I knew that Brina was in danger if I did not do something. At a distance of 8 feet, I threw my dagger. He had to dodge to his left to avoid being hit by it, but that worked in my favor because Brina was to his right. I leapt at him after another two steps, throwing my sword at him as well.

The half-orc had to use his own blade to parry my shortsword, allowing my flying body to slam into him around the waist. He grunted and fell back, falling to the ground on his back. I scrambled up his body quickly, before he could bring his sword down on me. Sure, at that range he would have a hard time using the blade, but that would not stop him from smashing the pommel into me if I gave him half a chance.

James found himself pushed back further and further from me by the two half-orcs. Like their now deceased cousins, the half-orcs knew how to fight together. James stayed on the defensive, breathing hard from the exertion of the fight. He had begun to see a pattern to their attacks, but the amount of energy he was expending was going to make it a close fight. He managed to hold on until the proper moment though, and then lashed out. His parry sent one of the half-orc's sword wide, making it break their rhythm as the other half-orc had to parry his own partner's weapon. James seized upon the opening and plunged his captured broadsword into the second half-orc's chest, tearing it out the left just as quickly. The half-orc fell away, clutching in agony at the mortal wound in its chest.

My knee found the half-orcs scrotum twice while we wrestled, drawing a painful grunt the first time, and more of an explosion of soundless air the second. The half-orc was clearly in pain, but he struggled against me in spite of it. His strength must have been a benefit from the orcish side of his family, for as I said long ago, I am quite strong myself and he was holding his own against me. I managed to get a hand free and sent it in, smashing against the side of his face. His head was rocked back, bouncing off the rock shelf, but he seemed unfazed by it. I delivered another jab before he got an arm up to block me.

With only one half-orc remaining, James was able to breathe a bit easier and conserve his strength while the two studied each others movements. James had to credit the half-orc with skill and cunning, but he was sure in time he would win. He had been trained by the King's weapons master, after all. His chance came after a furious bout of attacks and parries by both of them. He deflected the half-orcs sword down and to the left. The point hit the ground and bounced back a bit. James snapped his left foot out, catching the flat underside of the sword with his toes and lifting it up high before the half-orc could think to stabilize his sword. With the sword up high, James drove his fist into the orcs throat, bruising its windpipe and making it cough. It stumbled away from him, one arm going to its throat. James advanced, giving it no quarter.

The half-orc parried the next several swings from James sword, but each one was stronger and took more of its will to fight out of it. Finally, the half-orcs sword was knocked down and James' next swing, gripped in both hands, took its head from its shoulders.

A sharp lance of fire entered my hip then, and I realized that the half-orc's right arm that had gotten somewhat free had drawn a weapon that was now sticking in my left hip. The pain only drove me further though. My arm let go of his in a gamble and snapped up, catching him under the chin and driving his jaws together. The sound of his teeth crashing together nearly echoed in the sewers, but was muffled somewhat by his tongue that had gotten caught between his teeth. The bloody morsel of flesh fell back into his mouth as he opened it to scream in pain. Too bad for him, the tip of his tongue fell straight into his throat and he started to choke on it.

I felt the pain lesson in my hip as his hand fell away from my side, but I could feel the warmth and the wetness of blood running down my leg. I reached down and grabbed up the dagger that he had just used on me. It was a bit crude, but nonetheless, it served its purpose well. I stood up gingerly, testing my hip carefully. The orc twitched a few times, the dagger sunk into its ruined eye socket almost to the hilt.

I glanced over and saw that James had just finished off his opponents. I was impressed, but I did not waste the time to show it. Even my own concern for my injury paled in comparison to the concern I felt for Brina. Briefly, I pondered the strangeness that was overcoming me, then I shelved the thoughts for a later time.

I fell to my knees beside Brina, checking her over carefully before touching her. She looked a little pale in the feeble lantern light, but I could see no visible wounds on her. I looked at James, who approached me slowly, breathing heavily. I noticed he held the longsword uncertainly in his hands as he drew closer, as though he was not sure what to do with it. I motioned towards the lantern, figuring that we would sort things out later. James apparently agreed with me, because after a thoughtful moment, he walked over and got it.

With better light I could see some blood in Brina's hair, though it wasn't much. It was near the back of her head, near where my own head had been hit. Realizing that set off a wave of nausea in me as I remembered my own head wound. My vision grew dizzy for a moment then passed, but an impressive pounding began in my head. All in all, I felt like taking a nap was not such a bad idea after all. I shook the feeling off, which only served to make me dizzy again.

I gently felt through her hair, searching for anything truly dangerous. All I found was a bruised area that was wet with her blood, no serious injuries. In the better light, I could see her chest rising and falling as she breathed peacefully. I reached up then to my own head wound and gently probed at it. It was puffy and numb, and my hand came away with some blood on it, though not as much as I would have expected. I had gotten lucky and the edge of the sword had not caught my scalp, only the hair that had been torn out caused the blood.

"She's unconscious, they must have hit her in the head with something," I said, relaxing a little. "Now what do we do about you?"

I turned and stood up, a little unsteady on my feet. I felt the warmth of a trickle of blood running down my leg and it made me wonder how bad the wound was, but James did not need to know that. He studied me carefully, his sword held between us but in a relaxed position. I had no doubts that he could have it up and ready in a moments notice if need be. He turned and walked over to where my shortsword had fallen. He leaned over carefully and picked it up, keeping one eye on me the entire time. He casually glanced at it then tossed it my way.

"We can worry about that later," was all he said. He walked over to where some spare equipment was piled up on the ledge and pulled the longsword off the top of the pile that Brina had taken from him. He glanced at the belt and scabbard Brina still wore around her waste longingly. "When she wakes up remind her to return that to me."

I nodded and smiled faintly. In spite of my headache, he had amused me, though I clearly did not trust him yet. I turned back to Brina and wondered if I should try waking her up or let her sleep some more. Before I could make a decision, I felt myself stumble. I found myself sitting on the floor, with a growing numbness in my hip.

"Are you hurt?" James asked, stopping from where he had headed to search through the corpses of the half-orcs.

"Got bumped in the head," I mumbled, still determined to hide my weakness from him. He nodded, stared at me for a long moment, then turned and resumed rifling through the half-orcs equipment.

I squirmed around a bit so that my wounded side was facing away from him, toward Brina. I fished around with the breeches I had taken from Paul and found a rather large tear in them where the half-orcs dagger had cut through. Using that as a point of entry, I spread the tear enough to get a decent look at my hip. Blood leaked out of the gash in it, soaking the pants and running down my body to wherever gravity took it. The flow was not mortal, but it definitely had caused me to lose enough blood to be concerned.

I pulled my shirt out of where I had tucked it into my pants and, using my short sword, cut off a couple of strips and a large patch. My newly tailored shirt was to short to tuck back in to my pants, and it even displayed a small portion of my belly. Given that it had little to no protective value in the first place, I was not concerned. The patch of cloth I folded up and placed over the wound, which was roughly two inches long on the surface and I suspected went rather deep into my upper hip. Had his blade been angled up instead of down, the half-orc probably would have been able to shove several inches of steel into my lower intestine.

For my next bit of self medication I had to get a little more involved. I glanced over at James and saw him quite engrossed in searching for clues as to what the task of humanoids was doing in the sewers. Satisfied, I slipped my pants down to my mid thigh. I was not the least concerned about modesty, but rather making certain James was as unaware of my injuries as possible until I trusted him. Considering the amount of trust I had to go around, I expected to be dead and buried and still not want him to know about it.

I slipped the shorter strip of cloth as high up on my leg as I could go without having it in my womb. I tied it almost tight enough to cut off circulation, securing the makeshift bandage in place. The longer strip went around my waste, only barely being long enough to wrap around the shorter strap and further secure the compress once tied. As soon as I had the straps in place, I slipped my breeches back up over my hips and tied them as tightly as I could.

I checked the bandage and noticed that while it was serving its purpose, blood was already beginning to soak through it. I scowled but decided that it would have to do. My next task was to make myself as comfortable as possible. I slipped onto my side to elevate my injured hip and looked over Brina to watch James as he pilfered the corpses.

In several more minutes, he had finished and came over to sit next to us, on the other side of Brina. He glanced at my blood soaked pants but said nothing to me. Instead he held out several brooches with the same design on them, a dark lightning bolt through a skull, made out of a dark silvery metal that I did not recognize.

"Can you tell me what these are?" He asked suspiciously.

"Bad fashion statements," I deadpanned.

He frowned at me and stared at me for a moment. Finally I shrugged. "I have no idea what they are. I'd guess they are too well crafted to be made by orcs though, if that's what you are getting at. What are they made out of?"

"The elves call it starsilver, the dwarves call it mithril," he said, glancing back at them. "They are badges worn by operatives of the dark one to help them recognize one another. They are specially enchanted so that those that can see in the dark can recognize one another instantly."

I nodded. It sounded like a good idea, provided the only people with low light vision were the ones that wore the brooches. "If he is so far away from here, what in the nine hells are these orcs doing here?"

"Probably planning on raiding the city, the Dark One considers Elendar his greatest threat. Gneiss has a larger army, but they only have priests whereas we have an academy of mages and warrior mages. Further, the Gneissian's do not believe in the foul powers of the Dark One's army, so he does not consider them a danger."

"How could 6 orcs and 4 half-orcs constitute a threat to Elendar's largest city?" I asked, almost noticing how warm I was beginning to get.

"My guess is that they have several of these bands scattered throughout the sewers. I have to get back up and warn the city," James glanced around, an uncertain look on his face. "I believe there is a way to the surface nearby."

I looked at him as he glanced around. James appeared so concerned that he had forgotten about Brina and I. His eyes found mine and we locked gazes for a moment. Finally he nodded and said, "I still do not know nor trust you and your friend, but I do not think you are agents of the Dark One. If you follow the passage we were on for some distance, you will come to a branch. To the left it the tunnel flows down and returns to return to the original underground river this once was. To the right it will branch up, leaving the water behind and emerge in the cellar of a tanner's shop. Say to him, 'Fisherman's Allure', and from there you can reach the gate of the city and be on your way."

"Why the change of heart?" I asked him, my vision becoming a bit fuzzy around the edges, though I struggled against the pain in my head and the growing warmth in my body that threatened to envelop me.

"I can not forgive you the murder of my assistant and the guards, but I believe you have proven yourself to be no enemy of Elendar," He explained.

"It is the nature of evil to do whatever is necessary to succeed," I mumbled, having trouble enunciating. My next words I was sure were impossible to understand, but James nodded thoughtfully in spite of it. "Perhaps I slew them to win your trust and affect my escape."

"You think deviously, I applaud that," James said. "But I think that, like it or not, you will enjoy my hospitality again, though this time I promise your treatment will not be as harsh."

I tried to deny him, but did not have the energy to do so. For that matter, I struggled desperately to rouse myself, but my injuries were to severe. In a few more moments, my head drooped to the stone and I passed out.

Book 1 : Chapter 10

"Yamara, please wake up!"

Brina's voice, hushed but filled with urgency, roused me from my slumber. No easy feat, considering the concussion I had suffered coupled with the blood loss due to the wound in my hip. I opened my eyes and looked up at her. My vision was blurry at first, but it focused within a few moments.

James was nearby, his sword drawn as he waited facing away from us looking up the side passage from which we had come down to find Brina. By his pose alone I could tell that something was amiss, even if the expression on Brina's face was not enough. I tried to sit up but pain and dizziness filled my head, making me settle back down and catch my breath.

"Are you okay?" Brina asked me, worry in her voice.

I cleared my throat first, then spoke. "Aye, just took a good whack in the head from a half-orc. I'm better now, just needed a nap. Still a little unsteady though, help me up, would you?"

Brina looked at me strangely, her expression telling me she knew I was lying and that it was foolish of me to do so. "What about your hip?" She asked me.

I smiled fiercely, "Just a scratch, I already took care of it, another scar to add to the rest of them."

She shook her head and reached down towards my hip. She gently pulled my pants down over the wound and pulled the makeshift bandage off of it, which was soaked through with blood, though it appeared to be mostly dried by now. "Have a look," she offered.

I glanced down at it and saw that it had changed. It was red and puffy, already clearly showing signs of infection. What impressed me more was the crude stitches in it, holding the wound closed so that it had finally stopped bleeding. "How long have I been sleeping?" I asked, surprised.

"James said about six hours, though how he can tell the time in this darkness is beyond me!" Brina said, glancing up at him where he kept watch. "I only awoke a couple of hours ago myself, one of those things smacked me in the back of the head with something after I nearly suffocated under the water. I never realized how deadly it could be!"

Six hours! I could not believe I had slept so long. Very irresponsible of me. Then again, considering the amount of blood that had stained my pants, I guessed that I had lost a lot more then I first thought. My hip burned and itched at the same time, no doubt reacting to the pain of the wound, the pain of the stitching, and the growing infection in it. I hated to admit it, but I knew that without a priest or a healer, I would be in dire trouble soon.

"Did you do this?" I clearly meant the doctoring up of my hip. She shook her head and glanced at James again.

"James did it. He had a sewing kit, of all things, tucked away in a container in one of his boots. Or at least, that's what he told me, I was still sleeping when he did it." Brina looked around for a moment before looking back at me. Her face was one of worry and fear. "Why didn't he leave us or kill us? And what are we going to do?"

I smiled wearily and put my hand on hers where it rested on my side. "He knows we're not agents of his enemy. We may not be friends, but I think he's curious enough now that he's more interested in learning from us." I thought for a moment as to what James' motivation could be before remembering our talk earlier, before I had passed out. "We may be in more trouble down here then we know of too, so perhaps he needs our help. He needs to get back up to the city, and we have no idea how to get out of here."

Brina nodded, fighting back the urge to throw her arms around me and hug me. She got control of herself and said, "So just like that, everything's okay? I thought you wanted to kill him? You certainly did act like it."

I smiled fiercely again. "I'm just getting started, Brina, I'm not done yet. As for us, well, he said he's not happy about Paul or the guards, but those are apparently lesser offenses in his eyes." I paused and slowly raised myself up some to test and see how I was feeling. The nausea was better this time around, though my throat was very dry and I felt quite weak. Suddenly I realized something that seemed amiss. "Wait a minute, if I've been sleeping for six hours, then why haven't the sewers flooded again and carried us away or drowned us?"

"James said we're far enough in them that the water has spread enough to not run over the ledge we're on."

I nodded, that made sense to me at least. The nodding motion made me feel a little sick, causing me to instantly regret it. Sighing softly, I decided that I had been lazy long enough. "Help me up girl, we need to get moving."

She looked ready to protest, but seeing the look in my face she bit back her words. She stood up and took my hands, helping me stand up. I was more then a little shaky, and a fresh spear of agony shot through my from my hip, but I managed to remain standing through grim determination if nothing else.

James glanced over at us, watching silently for a moment. Then he made his way quietly back to us. Seeing me swaying back and forth a bit, even with Brina's constant support, he reached down to his left boot and twisted the heel off of it. He pulled out a small flask less then half an inch in diameter and only two inches long. It was filled with a pale blue liquid. After replacing the heel of his boot, he handed it to me and said, "Drink this, it will give you strength."

I nodded and took it from him. I nearly lost my balance when my hands left Brina, but she held me up while I twisted the cork out of it and sniffed it carefully. The smile reminded me of own potions that had long since been lost in the palace while we were imprisoned. I swallowed it in one gulp, grateful of the cool soothing liquid that worked its way down my throat. The healing coolness spread out from my belly, renewing the strength in my body and reducing the pain in my hip to more of a dull ache.

"That won't last, it only serves to dull pain and provides little actual healing, besides its general invigorating effects," James explained with an almost apologetic shrug.

I nodded, knowing that I was far from out of trouble. "My thanks then. Let us use this borrowed time to get far from here then."

James nodded and looked back down the sewer tunnel he had been watching. "A few hours ago a couple of orcs, messengers I think, came down there and I had to kill them. I haven't seen any since, but I expect there are more where they came from."

"So how do we get out?" I asked, noticing that he sported some minor cuts himself that I had not seen before.

James grinned. "I tried scouting out the passage I told you would take you two up and out of her to the tanner's shop, but it's already been staked out by an even larger band of orcs. The next closest one is up that tunnel, where the orcs came from that I slew."

I nodded, expecting no less. "Let's get going then."

I took a few careful steps away from Brina, making sure I did not look at her because I knew she would be terribly worried about me. I felt fine, if a bit stiff. My hip was especially stiff, as was my blood encrusted clothing, but the anesthetic affects of the potion allowed me to function as I would not have otherwise been able to. I picked up my short sword and dagger and sheathed them, ready to move out. Brina readied herself as well, down to only daggers now that James had reclaimed his longsword from her.

I motioned to one of the broadswords the orcs had used, but Brina shook her head and said, "I'm better with a dagger or knife then I am a sword anyhow."

I nodded and followed after James. Brina came behind me, walking very close in case I needed her support. The magic of the potion was working fine in me, but I suspected that with each step my hip was getting worse. The tightness in it surely meant I was pulling and tearing the stitches, but time was more important then that. That, combined with the infection from the dirty water we had been wallowing through reminded me of my mortality.

We moved slowly through the water, trying to make as little noise as possible. Given the training Brina and I both had in stealth, it was a simple task. Living up to my growing expectations of him, James moved almost as silently as we did. It took us close to thirty minutes to reach a point where James shuttered the lantern he had been carrying. Now we crept even more silently, our visibility limited to only a few feet. We could hear the orcs muttering to each other from further up the tunnel. Now I could understand Orcish, if spoken slowly and clearly (which rarely ever happened), but this was to far away and too quiet for me to understand.

James stopped and motioned for us to close to him. Once we were there, he began whispering. "How do you feel?" he asked me first. I pondered my leg and general condition for a brief moment before I responded by nodding that I was ready.

"Good," he said. "We need to take them quickly, the way out is above them. There is no place for them to rest here, only the water. I suspect that this is a small group guarding this entrance while the rest of them were waiting for the order to join them and attack the city."

"The rest of them?" Brina asked quietly, glancing around nervously.

He grinned evilly, "Aye, the ones we already dealt with." Her mouth opened in surprise and then shut just as quickly, smiling as she glanced at me. James continued. "I counted 8 eight of them ahead a few hours back, counting the two I dispatched. They are straight down the tunnel then to the right when it branches off. Yamara, you take the lantern, you're a good fighter, but wounded like that is going to slow you down, whether you feel like it or not."

I nodded, annoyed at his knowledge of my condition, but forced to admit that he was right. "Can you handle a couple of orcs?" I asked Brina, knowing she'd have to do some serious fighting if we were outnumbered almost 3 to 1, nearly 4 to 1 considering my limited ability.

Brina gritted her teeth and nodded. She had both her hands on the hilt of the two daggers tucked into her makeshift belt. James had reclaimed his scabbard and belt from her, forcing her to make do with a piece of cloth torn from one of the orcs studded leather jerkins. James turned around and started forward quietly. I began to follow but Brina put her hand on my shoulder, drawing my attention. I turned back to face her and she leaned in suddenly, surprising me. Her lips touched mine and I felt the need in her. I returned her kiss with a surprising amount of passion from myself, then was against surprised by the sense of loss I felt at our parting.

"Just in case," she whispered, then was after James before I could say anything. I stood there for a few moments, uncertain of myself. That girl kept surprising me more and more. On top of that, I was surprising myself as well. I was not sure if I liked my behavior, but I had to acknowledge the part of me that liked her, even if it annoyed me to admit it.

I followed as quickly as I could and still remain silent. I noticed that in spite of the numbness surrounding my hip, I had begun to develop a limp. Looking forward, I strained to make out my companions in the darkness. I had always had better then average night vision, or at least as long as I could remember. I suspect it was another benefit of my special treatment among the Ornithrym. Regardless, while I could make out James ahead of me, I could not find Brina, and I knew she was much closer. I forced myself to not be concerned for her. She had proven time and again her ability to take care of herself.I remembered then of one of those times on Acathia, when we fought the Shissars and what had happened after. In particular, my encounter with Keeden. I had forgotten all about the latent psychic potential he had introduced me too (or that I had stolen from him). I wondered if it would still work, now that I was no longer on Acathia.

I reached out with my own mind for Brina and felt myself contact her. From what I had learned, such a thing was normally not possible unless I could see my intended target, but the level of familiarity and intimacy that Brina and I had shared made the link quite easy. I felt reassured, strangely, to know that she was indeed nearby and that I could contact her as easily. I knew she sensed that I had linked with her mind, so I sent her a simple feeling of contentment and warmth before breaking the link. She was pleased, I knew that much before I lost contact with her.

James came to the corner and stopped, and a few moments later I was there too. I reached out and touched Brina, not realizing that she was there until my hand actually rested on her shoulder. I was amazed at her ability to blend in. Normally rogues were skilled at hiding and moving about with stealth - and I was no exception to that - but her talent allowed made it seem more an art then a skill. James glanced back to make sure we were there. He did a double-take at how well Brina had blended into the wall beside her, but was able to find her from my hand that was on her arm. I nodded to indicate we were ready and he nodded back.

James stepped around the corner and rushed forward, splashing noisily through the water. We followed after, with me opening the shutter on the lantern as soon as I cleared the corner. I had already lost track of Brina, even with the full light streaming into the passage. I did see, however, the eight orcs that James had promised us. They were squinting furiously as they turned to face us and draw their broadswords.

Not all of them had broadswords though, two of them carried loaded crossbows. They struggled to pull the locking mechanism back and succeeded just as James reached them. He lashed out with his sword, cutting one orc down quickly. The first crossbow bolt was fired wildly, glancing off the stone ceiling of the tunnel and shooting harmless passed us into the water. The second quarrel was aimed a little more carefully, but James ducked to the side and evaded it. My wound prevented me from moving as quickly though.

The orc with the second crossbow grunted and fell to his knees shortly thereafter, before he could aim and fire his reloaded crossbow. Brina stood behind him, clearly visible now, a bloody dagger in each hand. The other crossbowman had reloaded and took more careful aim, firing again. James was distracted by the three orcs rushing towards him, and was then distracted anew by the barbed bolt suddenly sticking out of his chest, high up on his left side just below his collarbone.

The magical potion was still working good in me, I hardly even noticed the quarrel impaling my left thigh. It had hit high and towards the outside of my leg, perhaps six inches below the wound in my hip. I would have smiled at the irony of receiving another injury so close to my prior one, had I not know the potential severity of the wound. Nonetheless, I realized the potion was blocking the worst of the pain, so I used it to my short term advantage and set the lantern down roughly on the narrow ledge that ran along the side of the tunnel and drew my shortsword.

Brina cut the other crossbowmen down from behind, her daggers plunging simultaneously into his back. The other orcs became aware of her presence then, causing two of them to head towards her. Two of the three pressing James broke off and came at me then, for James appeared grievously wounded. James defended himself as best he could, trying to recover from the shock of the impact.

I had my dagger in my left hand and shortsword in my right by the time the orcs reached me. I feigned weakness and injury in my left leg, which was not really faking so much as pretending that I could actually feel how badly it was injured. The orcs came at me, trying to take advantage of my slower left side. To their surprise, I used my left leg and jumped towards them. My dagger blocked a surprise attack from the orc on my left, and my short sword took the orc on my right in the throat.

Brina threw one of her daggers at one of the orcs trying to reach her. It stuck in its side as it tried to dodge it. The wound was not serious, but it caused it more then a little pain and discomfort. The orc slowed to pull the dagger out and let it fall into the water. The other orc came on, launching an powerful swing at Brina with its broadsword. Brina deflected the horizontal swipe high, ignoring the jarring vibration in her arm from the parry, and sent her other hand straight out in a punch that hit the orc less then an inch below his sternum.

Gasping to recapture it's breath, the orc stumbled backwards, stumbling into its other companion as it tried to join the fight. Brina followed in closely, slicing across the orcs wrist of its sword arm and laying it open to the bone. The broadsword fell into the water and the orc continued to try and retreat from her as it rolled off its annoyed partner. Brina lashed out with her foot, connecting with the side of the orcs knee and hearing a satisfying pop. The orc crashed into the water, clutching its ruined wrist on the way down.

James had recovered enough of his wits to move from the defense to more of an offensive move. He kept his body twisted so that his right side was facing the orc in a duelist stance. The orc hammered repeatedly at him, using brute strength to try and overpower James in his weakened condition. Gritting his teeth, James forced himself to block each attack that came at him, not trusting himself to dodge or evade the assaults. Finally he ducked under a horizontal swing from the orc and lunged forward, driving his longsword deep into the bowels of the orc.

I stumbled back away from the remaining orc facing me. My leg, still feeling okay in spite of the serious injuries to it, chose that moment to go out on me. I fell into the water, my elbow connecting with the rocky floor under the water. Again, I was spared the majority of the pain, but the numbness that shot through my left arm told me I had just done some more damage to myself. The orc advanced on me quickly, certain that I was in trouble. He was more right then wrong.

Brina spun inside of the swing of the orc that attacked her. With her back to the orc she was unable to launch much of an attack, she stabbed downward with her dagger. It plunged deeply into the inside of the orcs thigh. She twisted her wrist, causing the dagger to twist inside the orcs leg. The orc dropped his sword and tried to wrap its rough hands around Brina's neck. Brina seemed to convulse as she bent over, sending the orc sailing over her head and onto the ground. She straightened up and dropped onto the orcs chest with her knee before he could rise up. Her dagger plunged into the orcs chest, finishing the fight.

I swing my sword across hard, knocking the orcs descending sword wide. It grated against the rocky floor, sparing me for a few more minutes. I scooted away and tried to get up. The water worked against me, making it very difficult for me. The orc had recovered by then, and prepared to skewer me with his sword. My back was turned to him as I struggled to get my knees on the floor so I could get up from there.

The sound of a crossbow firing and meaty thud behind me caused me to look back. The orc dropped his broadsword, which fell onto my back and then bounced into the water. My luck must have turned, for the sword managed to not cut me. The orc fell back away from me, his hands grabbing the crossbow bolt in his chest.

I glanced around and saw all the orcs dead or dying. James reached up to the bolt in his chest and gently pulled at it, wincing in pain as he did so. Realizing it was beyond his ability to deal with, he left it where it was. Brina ran over to me, sloshing through the water along the way. She helped me to my feet and looked at my impaled leg with the blood draining from her face. I smiled weakly and shrugged. My arm, at least, appeared to just have been stricken numb momentarily from the impact, because I could move it without any problems.

"Let's go," James said, his voice gruff with the pain of his injury. Blood had already soaked through most of his shirt from the wound, showing that it was serious. Crossbows were dangerous weapons, packing enough power at short range to punch all the way through a man's body. In James' case, his shoulderblade stopped the bolt from passing all the way through him. My leg, on the other hand, had the tip of the bolt sticking the back of it, and the feathers still poking out the front of it.

"Brina, hold on to me a second," I said to her, reaching down to the wooden bolt in my leg. I gritted my teeth and twisted my hand quickly, snapping the feathered end off just outside of my leg. In spite of the numbing potion, or perhaps it was wearing off, dull waves of pain emanated out from it through my body. Brina's held on to me from behind, bracing her body against mine. She held me up as I grabbed the barbed point and yanked it quickly out. My leg trembled as the muscles protested the abuse and I remained upright only because of Brina's support.

"Are you done yet?" James hissed, clearly irritated, though I suspected more from his wound then at me. I nodded, blinking back the tears from the pain overriding the magic of the potion.

James led the way up the ladder, having trouble using more then just his right arm. I followed, having trouble moving my left leg. Brina moved up directly behind me, helping me up the rungs in the wall. James managed to push a heavy iron grate off the top of the shaft, grunting at the effort. He pulled himself out of the sewer and collapsed on the ground of the alley. I came next, pulling myself slowly out and falling on the other side of the hole. Brina came last, the only one able to move freely of her own volition.

She helped me up first, and by the time I was standing - more then a little shakily - James had gotten to his feet as well. He led us through the pre-dawn city, getting out on the major thoroughfares of the city as quickly as possible to avoid the possibility of a early morning mugging. It took us close to an hour to reach the palace, and by that time I was in full agony of my injuries. Only my stubbornness kept me up, that and constant support from Brina.

The guards helped us into the palace. They intended to take us to the temple of Ban-Dayid located within the palace proper. James would have none of it though, instead demanding that we see King Avercrombie. I was not in the mood to agree, considering the severity of my injuries, but I lacked the strength to speak out. Brina was a bit overwhelmed by the situation, and did her best to keep me up and moving. We followed James and the guards into the King's office, separate from the throne room due to the early hour.

We sat down and rested as best we could. Sleep threatened the edges of my consciousness again, but I fought it desperately, uncertain of my ability to recover from the darkness should I succumb again. In a few more minutes, the King stepped through a doorway opened by his page. We tried to get to our feet to stand at attention, but the king waves us back, in light of our obvious injuries. James still stood, refusing to succumb to his wounds.

"Sire, I was exploring the sewers and came across several bands of the Dark One's agents, I believe they mean to attack any time now!" James said, once the King sat down. King Avercrombie raised an eyebrow at James and then looked at us.

"And who are these two?" He asked, his casual manner showing that the King and James had a relationship more familiar then lord and vassal.

James glanced at us, his eyes narrowing for a brief moment. "SET agents of mine, my lord, they went with me into the sewers and as you can see, we encountered opposition."

The King turned to his page then. "Squire, fetch General Andres immediately."

"Thank you Sire," James said, sagging visibly in relief. "I'll lead his men into the sewers immediately."

"No," King Avercrombie said, causing James to stiffen in surprise. "Jim, you've got a crossbow bolt halfway through your chest, most men would be dead or unconscious by now. Father Justin will be here in moments to take care of you. Andres can take care of this, he has enough men to thoroughly search the sewers and discover how the got in there in the first place."

"Not to mention," the King added, looking at us with a mock scowl, "you've managed to bleed all over my chairs. Those were a gift from the late elven King Thessanril, you know."

James smiled weakly in spite of himself. "My apologies, Sire. I'll see to their restoration myself when this is taken care of."

Further banter was cut short as Father Justin entered the office. He took a look at James and his face whitened. He hurried over to him and knelt in front of him to examine the wound.

"Father, please, check on her first, her injuries are more severe and longer lasting," James said, blocking the priests attempts to remove his shirt.

Father Justin glanced over at me, studying me carefully. I had to admit, I certainly did not look my best. My skin had a waxy pallor to it and my eyes were surely somewhat dull and glazed over in pain. Nonetheless, I did not think a couple of relatively minor flesh wounds could make up for the quarrel in James' chest.

"Father," I said through with a thick tongue. "Next time I'll tell the orcs to aim better, maybe they'll hit his lung and keep him from spouting nonsense."

I noticed Brina looking at me out of the corner of my eye. Her look was a mixture of worry, concern, and anger. She was angry with me for making light of my condition, I could tell.

The priest looked me over carefully, noticing the bloodstained state of my breeches. James had an impressive red splotch on his shirt as well, but simply due to the duration of my wounds, I had him beat in the category of gore and carnage.

"Don't listen to her, Father," James said. "She's had a potion of invigoration to keep her going."

If I did not know any better, I would have sworn the words the priest muttered under his breath was a most unpriestly oath. I had to chalk it up to delusions induced by my injuries though, for later nobody seemed to remember the specifics.

Things began to grow muffled and fuzzy again for me. Though this time the blackness clawing at the edges of my vision was not as warm and inviting as it had been before. It was cold and spoke of dark things hidden just beyond my vision waiting for me to let go my tenuous grip so they could pull me into the darkness with them. More of an overactive imagination, I am sure, but it sure did seem real at the time.

I think that the priest enlisted Brina to help him by shifting me to the side in the chair. He then tore away at the gash in my pants to get a better look at my wounds. He pulled away the makeshift bandage and made a face at the sight of my hip. I saw the look on Brina's face as well, and it was anything but good. It had only been a total of just over 6 hours since I received the injury, but apparently getting fresh sewer water in an open wound is not recommended by those in the know.

I remember him chanting and sprinkling something on my leg, but that was near the end of my recollection. Things got even fuzzier then, and the blackness nearly claimed me. I struggled against it though, and in the end, I managed to fight it off. A bit of clearness returned to my eyes, and I found myself resting in the chair a little easier. Neither Brina nor the priest was near me, but instead were watching over James. I heard a low groan that I wondered if it might have been me until I let my head roll over to the side facing where James sat.

Father Justin had his hands on either side of the quarrel in James' now bare chest, chanting with an unnaturally deep voice. Unlike the charlatan water priestess Sarya, Father Justin's chant had the resonation of true divinity and power to it. Meanwhile Brina had herself braced against James' chair and had both hands on the end of the bolt, steadying it or, I wondered with detached amusement, ready to pull it out. I ended up being right, for with a nod, Father Justin signaled Brina. She gritted her teeth and yanked on it, her strength surprising everyone present but me. The bolt was yanked free of the wound, the barbs on the tip tearing flesh on the way out. James' mouth opened and closed silently, like a fish gasping for air. Blood gushed out of the wound, spurting evenly in a way that told me he was not long for this world.

Father Justin's hands closed over the wound though, and his chanting continued. James passed out shortly, and I figured that he was on his way to those very same dark shapes that had just been after me. To my surprise, when Father Justin pulled his hands away, blood no longer pumped from James chest. Not only that, but the wound was closed. Still angry, red, and swollen, it was nonetheless closed and partially healed. I had heard of priest using their powers to heal, and had even seen a few lesser experiences of it in my time. Yet most of the priests I had known were devoted to fey Gods and prayers of healing and soothing were not quick to come to their lips.

"They will rest for many hours, for each has suffered grievous wounds," Father Justin said, turning to face King Avercrombie. His own face seemed drawn and tired, no doubt from channeling the powerful divine magic through him necessary to keep us going. "And this girl, her wounds are far lesser, but if My Lord wishes, I can have one of my acolytes sent to tend to her."

The King looked at Brina, who suddenly seemed quite small and anxious. "I'm okay," she said in a small voice. "Just a few scratches and a bump on the head."

"As you wish, milady," Father Justin said, bowing towards her.

"Guards!" the King called, gaining the attention of the guardsmen waiting in front of his office. "Fetch some stretchers, and have two guest rooms made ready immediately."

"Is that appropriate, young lady, or do you and the other have quarters nearby?" The King asked Brina softly. She blushed, out of her element to be in front of someone as powerful as the King was.

"You are most gracious, Highness," I said, forcing some energy into my weary body. "We would be most honored to accept lodging from you."

Father Justin's breath hissed in through his mouth. "How are you awake?" He stammered.

I shrugged weakly. "It's a bad habit," I confessed. "Insomnia."

"You must sleep and gather your strength, you were all but a corpse a few moments ago, lass," He lectured me gently, in a grandfatherly manner that did not seem to fit him for he appeared to have seen no more then 30 years.

"I look forward to seeing the three of you after you've recovered," The King said to us - or at least those of us still conscious to hear him. "Especially to learn about your interesting choices in clothing. But for now, I must bid you a goodbye, for your stretchers have arrived and so has my general."

I saw that he was right on both account, though General Andres hardly looked the part of a general clad in his nightshirt and boots, with his sword hastily buckled about him. Shorter then I, the general nevertheless appeared fully awake and alert. More then I could say about myself.

With Brina's help, I stood up and was prepared to walk to my room, but Father Justin would have nothing of the sort. Verbally lashing me in a way that only priests can, he reminded me that my leg was all but useless not twenty minutes earlier. Normally, I do not allow people to talk thusly to me, but given my condition, I relented and let Brina help me to lay down on the stretcher that the guards had fetched some pages to bring. James was likewise scooped up, but where he went was not the same direction that we were led (or carried, in my case).

I lapsed in and out of consciousness a few times during the trek, but always I came back awake quickly, fearing the dark creatures of my imagination would return for me. Finally, Brina and one of the pages helped put me in a bed. Brina shooed them away and undressed me. I tried to help as best I could but I think I hindered more then helped. In spite of my floundering, she succeeded finally and covered me up. It was easily the most noble and comfortable bed I had ever slept in, but I was several hours away from realizing that.

She watched me fight off sleep for several long minutes, a look of uncertainty on her face. Finally she turned to leave and head for her own room, which the pages had told her was next to mine. I dimly saw her leaving and was seized with an inexplicable fear. Somewhere deep inside of me, in spite of my condition, a part of me loathed myself for my sudden near panic.

"Brina," I managed to call out, though I suspect it was more of a croak. She was at my side in an instant, kneeling on the floor to put her face close to mine. "Stay with me," I whispered, already losing my fight with sleep.

She smiled in relief and in a matter of less then two seconds had her clothing stripped off. She took a little longer getting into bed, but that was out of consideration for me. She curled up next to me and happily wrapped her arms around me as best she could. Again a part of me hated myself, but another part of me reveled in the comfort and security. Another part of me enjoyed the raw sensuality of feeling her surprisingly soft skin against mine. Suddenly, the creatures of darkness that were waiting to pull me with them into a pit of eternal damnation lost some of their reality. They did not seem so frightening or so real anymore. Armored with Brina's care, I was able to at last lapse into a healing sleep, unafraid to do battle with them should they gain the strength to come for me.

Book 1 : Chapter 11

A week had passed, during which I recovered my strength more rapidly then I would have thought possible. Due in large part to the efforts of the clergy of the God of Healing, Ban-Dayid, my thigh wound had recovered completely. A faint scar remained both in the front and the rear of my leg, but like all of my other scars, only by focusing carefully on it could I notice it.

My hip had not recovered as well, but that had to do with the infection that had set into it. A mere six hour injury did not, to me, seem possible to grow into such a mess. James had visited us late the next day, handing me a dagger. It was the same one that the orc had jammed into my hip. Some careful examination of it showed that it was no ordinary dagger.

A channel ran along the length of the blade, normally referred to as a blood groove to make it more easily withdrawn from a wound. In this case, it was for the delivery of more vile substances. A hidden release in the pommel allowed me to unscrew it. Looking inside I could see a opening where liquid could be stored in it. Not just liquid, but typically poison. Just from sniffing it, I could tell it had some poison in it recently.

"Odd poison," I had commented. "It worked more on the wound then a poison designed to interfere with my heart, breathing, or mind."

James nodded, eyeing me carefully. "All of the half-orcs had one. The rest were disposed of, but I figured you might want to see why you had such a hard time. Deep wound, infection from the filthy water, and poison." James left the dagger with me. I, of course, saw a use for such a dangerous weapon, and decided to keep it.

That was five days ago. With equal amounts of hard work and rest, my hip was still sore, but I could walk short distances without limping. In the privacy of my own room I studied the wound daily, noticing how oddly it healed. It seemed resistant to the healing magic the priests used, and closed slowly because of it. Still, it never bled beyond that first time, but that made the wound all the more disturbing because of it.

Brina thought it odd herself, but truth be told, she had not been around me as much the past few days. More ambulatory then I was, James had enlisted her to answer a few more questions. Her responses had apparently been successful, for she had then began accompanying him on his trips into the sewers, trying to piece together how Dagrazt's minions had been able to intrude so closely. General Andres' soldiers had rooted them out with few losses themselves, but they had been unable to determine where they had come from in the first place.

James had provided both Brina and I with some new clothing, which was good considering mine were a bloody mess and Brina's never even came close to fitting her. I did have to show her how to dress in some of them, however. Brina had never seen so many clothes at one time, and laughed outright when I told her that some of them comprised a single outfit, in the case of some of the more formal dresses. Coming from a world where it reached 120 degrees in the shade led to a decided lack in minimum clothing standards, after all.

It was in a nicely tailored set of clothes that I had chosen to wear for our official meeting with King Avercrombie. Brina and myself were being presented to him officially, or so James had told me. She returned from her room next to mine with her new garments on. Like me, she had opted for a shirt tucked into a pair of man's breeches. My newly acquired dagger rested in a sheath on my right hip, while my trusty short sword was on my left hip. Brina had a new dagger at each of her hips, but had not had a chance to acquire another sword yet for herself. Our most prized possession, or at least mine, was the very comfortable and durable set of boots that James had given me. Brina wore a pair as well, but she was having more trouble becoming used to the enclosed footwear. All I knew was that my feet were very thankful to the protection, given that our barefoot adventure in the sewers was considerably less then pleasant.

I followed her out of the room, allowing that Brina was more familiar with the layout of the palace due to her increased mobility over the past week. She had been chatting quite a bit throughout the week about the world on which we found ourselves. She had shared virtually everything she could to James in their time spent together, telling him all about Acathia and what little she knew of me that she felt free to discuss. I had to applaud her for that, she kept enough of her wits about her in her excitement to leave it up to me what I would be willing to discuss of myself.

She prattled on again on our trip to meet up with James, discussing things she had seen. How things were different here then Acathia. I had to admit, things seemed much different here, other then how tolerable the weather was compared to Acathia' harsh environment. It seemed much more like Halador to me. She spoke of seeing beings called elves that bore a passing resemblance to the pudarin of Acathia and of stunted men called dwarves. James said he had never heard of a Faradwym, the lizard-man of Acathia. Though perhaps they were similar to the evil lizard men found in swamps and marshes on Malatoria. The thought saddened Brina somewhat, since she had fond memories of her former companion.

Her musings were cut short when we reached James' office. I was grateful, not only for the ceasing of her excited chatter, but also because my hip had begun to throb with each step I took. She knocked on the door and we heard a muffled voice bid us to enter. She opened it and let me walk in ahead of her.

James rose from behind his desk to greet us. "Good to see you up and about, Yamara," he said cordially. He favored Brina with a small smile, and she returned it. I had been quite irritable lately, being nearly bedridden for several days, and my irritability increased at seeing the familiarity that James and Brina seemed to share. This, of course, caused my annoyance to grow as I realized the sparks of jealousy within me.

"What happens now, Earl James?" I said, reminding everyone of our relative stations in life.

The smiles vanished instantly. James cleared his throat and met my challenging gaze without flinching. "I see the potential for trouble in your eyes, Yamara. Do you hate me still for our meeting?"

"I made myself a promise a while back, James. I vowed that I would kill you for the way you treated Brina and I." I paused and glanced at Brina, who had a worried look on her face. "I hate to break a vow."

"But have things not changed since then," James countered, speaking casually with me. "I'd like to think we set aside our differences in the sewers. After all, I managed to put aside my dislike of the two of you over the death of Paul and my guards."

I was further irritated at him for pointing that out to me. I glanced at Brina again, hoping to draw some strength or resolve from her. What I saw there drained me of my fight, however, for she nearly had a pleading look about her.

"And after we escaped the orcs, while we both lay near death we argued with Father Justin over who should be healed first, claiming the other was in worse condition," He pointed out.

"I wanted your death to be my responsibility," I said, though everyone could tell the fight was taken out of me. I glanced behind me and saw a chair. I collapsed into it gracefully, though my hip reminded me it was not fully healed yet as I did so.

"Well enough, let me know when you feel ready for the challenge," James said, grinning at me to let me know he had figured it out. "Until that time, I would like to employ the two of you."

"The King already believes you are agents of mine, and given my relationship with him, I have considerable leeway." James said thoughtfully. "I've given it much consideration, and I believe that based upon your performance, you would make good agents, much as I told him on a whim when we first interviewed out of the sewers."

Brina seemed more then a little interested in the job offer, but I was instantly concerned. "I worked for a large organization once, employing my special skills. I rose far and fast, given my origins as the daughter of a murdered whore cast out into the garbage behind the brothel. With my successes and favor came many benefits, but it eventually faded and sent me running for my life. The long and short of it is how I ended up here."

James looked at me without surprise or compassion in his eyes. Brina had not heard so much of my very early days and looked at me with a bit of sadness in her eyes. Sadness not of me, but for me. My own gaze was hard as steel as I did my best to ignore Brina and continue to stare at James. A bit of fight had come back into me.

"I have found that running my own life is by far more enjoyable. I like to be in charge of my fate," I finished up, waiting for his response.

"There is no organized thieves guild in this city, I won't allow one to form," James said matter-of-factly. "But individual thieves do try their best to make a living, it's hard to stop every one of them."

I was not sure where he was going with that, other then to let me know that he suspected I was quite proficient at thievery. I remained silent until he continued. "Where will you go? I have come to believe, from talking to Brina, that neither of you have any previous knowledge of Malatoria. It is a dangerous world to those who know nothing of it."

I shrugged. "I have no idea where we will go, but seldom has that been a concern of mine."

Brina's mouth opened and closed silently, unnoticed by James and only barely by me. James turned to face her then. "She said we, does that mean you go with her, Brina? I had hoped at least you would see the benefit of working within the security and safety of a large nation such as Elendar."

She looked from me to James, trying and failing to hide the confusion and worry on her face. "I… um, I'm not sure. I'll need to figure that out," she finally said, frustrated and hurt.

James nodded. "Let me know what the two of you decide. First though, we must be on our way to meet the King. He has taken a break from his court sessions to meet with us in his office. Based upon the positions I had hoped the two of you would accept, I wanted your induction and commendation to be as private as possible to prevent your faces from becoming known."

I nodded and stood back up, my hip rested enough to not complain to much. Before we could leave James glimpsed the dagger on my hip. "You might not want to wear that around here, it has the Dark One's sigil on it."

I had the good grace to blush, at least. I untied the sheath from my belt and slipped it into my right boot, hiding the hilt inside the leg of my pants. I stood back up and shrugged my shoulders before heading towards the door. James followed us out of the room and then took the lead, leading us to the office where we had met the King before. Brina's face remained clouded with worry. She kept glancing at me and then glancing away quickly when I tried to meet her gaze. I felt more then a little resistant. I had no desire to handicap myself by getting stuck in another organization that would cause my freedoms to be limited.

Brina and I stood at attention when we entered the room and faced King Avercrombie. Or as close to attention as two thieves knew how to stand. He smiled warmly at them.

"Earl James has told me about you two. I am honored to have people with your dedication and abilities in my service," The King said. "Given the nature of your service, I granted his request that we hold this little ceremony in private. Hardly a ceremony, really, and for that I am grateful. Too many damned ceremonies, running a kingdom. Hard to get anything accomplished."

I fought off the urge to smirk as the king rambled for a moment. I had no doubts that life as a king was not perfect, but given the other vocations I had seen, it certainly had its perks.

"Sire," James said once the King had stopped his rhetoric. "They are undecided, but may be wishing to leave service of the crown. Their tenure has been most honorable, in spite of their youth, and if they decide to leave, they have my blessings."

The King nodded and raised an eyebrow. "Pity that, it is hard to find good help. But given James' praise, should you choose to leave, I wish you nothing but the best of times in life."

He motioned to the page behind him to summon him. The young man came forward and held out a sword to him. The king took the sword from him and turned back around. "Brina, We present this sword to you to replace that which you lost in the sewers. It is Our privilege to honor you for your service to all of Elendar. You have Our thanks and earnest hope that you continue your service to the Crown."

Blushing furiously, Brina hesitantly took the shortsword from King Avercrombie, then tried to curtsy, a procedure she had glimpsed a few times in the palace. She did a halfway decent job, I had to admit, especially for someone who had never seen the maneuver prior to a few days past.

She stepped back from a smiling King, all the more embarrassed for it. The king then took the other item the page held out for him. It was a dagger. Finely made, I figured it would be useless in practicality, though I could probably sell it for a decent amount. I took it from him and curtsied myself, though my training allowed me to perform the unbalancing move with grace.

"Well, the royal patrons of Elendar await their King, I must return to them, I suppose. James, should they decide to go their own ways, see to it that they receive an extra months pay as thanks from the Crown."

"Yes, My Lord," James said dutifully. He bowed and Brina and I curtsied again before following James back out.

In the palace halls James stopped and turned to us. "Well ladies, I leave things to your discretion. You may stay here as long as you feel welcome, and my offer stands as well. Should you decide to leave, then I shall make good upon the King's offer. You will receive 200 gold, a months worth of wages."

He turned then and left us alone. I was stunned. That was a lot of money for a months worth of work. Far more then I made working for the Ornithrym. For that matter, it was more then I would make in a year in the Ornithrym. Well, more then what they would pay me. Plunder along the way served to pad my income quite nicely back then, and I was certain it worked similarly here.

Brina looked at me, near to tears. I smiled at her and headed back towards our rooms. She followed me, saying nothing when I began to limp. Finally we reached my room and filed into it. I sat down heavily in a chair and took the dagger the King had given me out to examine it.

It was very finely crafted, there was no doubt about that. The crossguard had a design carved into it of unknown origin, but set within the center was a sizeable sapphire, worth a kings fortune by itself, I wagered. The warp around the hilt was made of a fine leather as well. What impressed me the most about it was the blade though. Always a woman of practicality, I started with the blade and ended with it. It was forged of the same special metal that the orcs brooches had been made of, mithril. Though in the case of the dagger, it was a much finer job. The edge was what impressed me the most, for my initial doubt of it's usefulness caused my thumb to receive a cut. I viewed the dagger with more respect after that!

Brina cried out as she saw the blood well up on my thumb. She knelt down beside me and grabbed up my hand, handling it gently and sucking it into her mouth to try and stop the bleeding or something. I was not really sure, other then I knew she had done it out of concern for me. Misplaced concern, perhaps, I was not sure anymore now that I had recovered from my debilitating injuries.

She looked up at me then, anguish in her eyes. Something sparked in me, some of it good and some of it not. Yet again I was surprised at my own dualities. A part of me felt disgusted by the depth of her need, and another part of me cried out at me to give in to it. I pulled my thumb out of her mouth and noticed that some of my blood had fell on her lips. I leaned over towards her and she leaned up at me, as though drawn together by a loadstone. We kissed then, and I could taste the coppery taste of my blood on her tongue and lips.

The kiss was fevered and passionate. I felt something explode within me, my frustrations and rages vented and gave me a fierce energy. I stood up, breaking the kiss, and pulled her with me towards the bed. We fell on to it, my wounds forgotten altogether. Our clothes were quickly strewn about the bed and the floor so that we could more properly get at one another's body.

Wherever my mouth touched her body I left marks, nipping at her skin, whether it was her lips, her throat, her breasts and nipples, or even further down her sexy body, along the soft folds concealing her pussy. I was rough, my fingers rubbing against her and driving into her with a fevered passion. In no time, Brina shuddered against me, taken quickly over the edge of orgasm by my animalistic tongue thrusting into her with more force then it should have been able to. It was the first of many for her.

After I had sated my almost dangerous desire to inflict pleasure to the point of pain on her, I crawled up her body, feeling my rock hard nipples brushing over her darkly tanned skin. I settled finally over her face, my knees locked against the sides of her head. I settled myself down on her, using the oak headboard of the bed to hang on to with one hand. My other hand reached down and spread myself open for her tongue, which she tentatively stuck out and sampled me with. Brina had tasted sweet and young and pure, while I suspected that I had a bit of a tangier taste to myself. I was very flexible, but not nearly flexible enough to taste myself, yet from my experiences over the years with men and woman, I had gotten a taste now and then. Be it from a still wet finger or other, more masculine digit, or perhaps on a tongue or lips.

On Acathia, when we had made love it had been a gentler session of soft kisses and probing fingers, now I introduced her to the full passions of a lesbian encounter. Her tongue fluttered over my clit, learning as she went along. I rode her face hard, I admit, far harder then I should have for her first time in this type of encounter. But I needed the release and I was still full of angry energy. I growled and groaned as her inexperienced but enthusiastic tongue worked me over, but still it was not enough.

I reached down with the hand I had used to keep my balance and grabbed one of her hands away from my breast. I had not even consciously realized that she had the presence of thought to reach up and try to help me along by twisting and fondling my nipples with each of her hands. I pulled her hand down and led it towards my pussy from behind my, since my thighs were already above her shoulders.

I let a deep and throaty growl out of my throat when her fingers brushed against my pussy. She interpreted my lust induced sounds correctly, and quickly jammed two of her fingers inside of me as deeply as she felt she could safely. It was not enough for me. I wanted more, and I wanted it to push me over the edge. I wanted it to hurt. I groaned again and grabbed her wrist beneath my, trying to show her through action what I wanted.

To Brina's credit, although relatively inexperienced at treating another woman to carnal pleasures, she learned quickly. I actually heard myself purr deeply when she forced a third finger within me and drove them in with more force then before. Again and again she thrust herself into me, each thrust harder. I began to raise my hips up and smash them down on her, reveling in the force of the blow and the pressure it built up within me.

Finally, I came down and knew I was almost there. She had all but given up trying to suck and lick my clit because of my erratic motions, but that was now what I knew I needed. I ground my pussy against her face, rubbing my clit over her lips and up to her nose while her fingers writhed and thrust within me. I stiffened as I finally mastered the waves of pleasure within me, feeling my orgasm build to nearly painful proportions. I blacked out for a few seconds then, and when I regained full consciousness I realized I was laying on my back and side and my legs were bent painfully under me.

Brina crawled out from under me and cuddled up on top of me, helping me reposition my legs. She embraced me in a loving gesture that I was too tired to properly respond to. I just lay there, reveling in the after-shocks of my orgasm that washed over me, making my limbs jerk and my pussy clench and unclench. Brina placed small kisses on my neck, shoulders, face, lips, and anywhere else she could reach. Finally I reached up and placed my hand on her back to comfort her. My lustful rage was spent, my frustrations having been drained out of me by the encounter.

"That was so much better then before," Brina finally said, breaking the thought provoking silence we had endured for many long moments. "I thought it was incredible before when we did it, but it was nothing compared to feeling your…. To when you…"

She trailed off, embarrassed to finish her sentence. I chuckled softly. "Aye, it is a world of difference the feeling of a finger versus a tongue."

She nodded and smiled, her face red from embarrassment and the flush of sex. "Is it always so rough between women?" She asked, drawing another chuckle from me.

"No, Brina, that was something between us. It's not always like that, in fact, it's probably not usually like that. We had a lot of emotions built up within us that needed to be worked out, and I think, at least for me, that I got some of them out," I told her, talking to let myself hear my thoughts as much as for her.

"What do you mean?" She asked, a touch of worry slipping back into her voice.

"I'm a strange person, Brina," I admitted, trying to wrestle with my feelings on the subject. "And you're a danger to me… or at least my way of doing things and viewing myself."

The worry and anxiety were plain to see on her face. The girl could be devious and dangerous when the time arose, but I could see she was still young and had a long ways to go before reaching the level I had attained. A part of me hoped she would never reach my level - for her own good.

"All my life, Brina, I have cared for no one but myself. I learned at a young age that caring for others was a disadvantage. A weakness." I paused to check her reaction, she nodded in understanding to me, but I thought I saw the beginning of a glimmer of tears in her eyes. "When I first met you, I thought you a younger version of me. Different in training and history, but similar in spirit. I still think that, I guess, but not in the same way. I think that you possess a great potential to turn into a very powerful and dangerous woman, both physically and in all other ways. But realizing that potential would perhaps ruin you, as it has done for me."

Brina shook her head, denying what I had said. Still no tears fell, but they were definitely threatening to grow in her eyes. "I won't let you leave me," she said, determined to keep what she felt the inevitable outcome of our talk would be.

"I have no intention of leaving you, you beautiful thing," I said, surprised by the words even as I said them. "I just need you to know how I am and what I am capable of. Your infatuation with me has clearly gone from a simple crush and hero worship to a full fledged love, or at least what you consider it to be."

Brina nodded, the first tear spilling down her cheek. I reached over and wiped it off her cheek with my finger.

"I left the path of innocence at an age far younger then you are now, and you still have some within you. I have killed innocents, old and young alike. It is true that I took no pleasure in it, but neither did it upset me. It was merely a matter of business. Can you know that you are helping to poison an entire village and feel no remorse over it, Brina?"

The question was rhetorical, but she opened her mouth to answer it anyway. Then she closed it and thought more carefully. Finally she nodded and said, "I think if I had to do it, I could. But you are right, I would try to avoid it if they did not deserve it or at the very least, I would regret it greatly."

"Keep that conscious about you, Brina," I said more quietly. "I am no agent of this Dark One James speaks of, but under different circumstances I could easily be one."

Brina snorted. "Under different circumstances I could be the Dragon!"

I chuckled at her words, knowing that she was true but also because I suspected she was in for a shock. "Speaking of which, this world is very similar to the one I came from first, and if it shares as much as I think, then you need to know that there is not one dragon to fear, but many."

Her mouth fell open at that, our other discussion temporarily forgotten. "Many dragons?"

"Different colors, different powers, different ethical viewpoints," I said, enjoying the look of wonder on her face. "I've never seen one myself, but I've heard more then enough tales."

She shook her head a bit to clear it. "Well, if you've never seen one and you've done all the adventuring that you have done, then I will worry about it when I have to, and not before then."

I smiled. It was a good idea, I had to admit. Very practical girl, Brina. But then again, she was used to worrying about where the next skin of water would be found, not whether she later on she would run across something that could destroy her with so little effort as a human stepping on a bug.

"So anyhow," I brought us back around to our original topic, "I'm trying to teach myself some new things, and you are helping me learn. I know you like the idea of this Kingdom of Elendar, and you appreciate the offer James has extended us. I am hesitant from my own past. I will join it with you, but under the understanding that we watch our own backs and each others. King Avercrombie may be a good and kind man, but remember that he is not the only man, there are many others and many of those are more concerned with their own petty concerns then the greater spirit of Elendar."

"James seems a unique man, genuinely concerned with the welfare of Elendar. I think we are safe with him, but keep in mind that with people whose beliefs are so strong in something as his or King Avercrombie's, another danger exists. This danger is for the little people, like you and I. The good of the many outweighing the good of the few. Politics often will cause noble men to make sacrifices they might not otherwise make."

Brina nodded, listening to me closely because to her mind, I had never lead her wrong. Indeed, I had not, and by warning her of this, I might be saving her life down the road, though she could not understand what it was I was saying to her without experiencing the betrayal of a leader to further their own ends. The ends being good or evil did not seem to matter, it was the common people along the way that suffered the worst. I was determined to never be one of those common people again.

"Now enough of this talk, let us concern ourselves with James and Elendar and our new jobs tomorrow, for now we have more pressing concerns," I said to her, smiling mischievously.

"What concerns?" Brina asked, her own expression brightening to see that I was not trying to separate the two of us. Her further words were muffled by my lips as they descended lightly upon her, seeking an equally passionate but less forceful embrace.

"Concerns such as teaching you how to properly make love to a woman," I said when I broke the kiss.

"I do love you, you were right," Brina admitted, another tear threatening to spill, though this one a good tear.

I nodded, "I know I was, Brina. You'll have to bear with me, it will be a long time before I can let myself go that far, though I do grow increasingly annoyed at myself for being concerned more and more about you." I smiled warmly at the last, letting her know I had good intentions for her. She nodded and fell into each others arms again, exploring one another's bodies in a more intimate and gentle fashion.

Unknown to Brina and I, James shook his head and slipped quietly away from where he had silently watched us. I would later discover the spyholes myself in the ceiling where he had listened to Brina and I and watched our frenzied initial lovemaking. Once James had moved far enough away from my room to feel safe, he adjusted the hardness in his pants and cursed us under his breath. The curse was good natured, at least. He set off again, slipping out of the secret passages that catacombed the palace and heading towards his office. After a moment of thought, he changed his mind and headed out of the palace, intent upon finding a whore to help him with the problem we had inadvertently given him.

Book 1 : Chapter 12

My first mission for the Special Elendarian Task force was by and large a failure. Out of personal pride, I would have simply neglected to mention it at all, but I suppose some consideration must be given.

Firstly my partner. A raving idiot with no limitations as to his lunacy. Perhaps I speak to kindly of him. To this day I do not know why I rescued him. Oh wait, yes I do. Had I not rescued him, he might have be tortured into revealing some secrets to the Gneissians. The real question is, after rescuing him, why did I not kill him? Too much time with Brina I suppose, she warmed my heart a little.

Regardless, it started out with a miserable two weeks spent riding in the wagon with the buffoon, an elf wizard named Summerbloom Happytree. I still develop a nervous tic when I even think of the name, let alone the person. Incessantly talkative and equally moronic in his ability to converse, I would have been doing Malatoria a favor by dispatching him. Let me not forget to mention his incredible lackadaisical nature and happy-go-lucky attitude towards life.

Mind you, I have known a few elves in my time, and while some of them did tend towards a more care-free existence, Summerbloom (cringe) was above and beyond the call of elfdom.

So it came that when we arrived at the gates from Elendar to Gneiss, I anticipated the worst. As expected, they were border keeps with guards searching every person and wagon that passed through, at both keeps. They were separated by perhaps a mile of what could only be described as a no mans land. Little grew save some short grass and the occasional sapling or scrub brush. Though not recently, it had seen battle more then once there.

I hid myself well though, seizing the perfect opportunity to slip away when the Gneissian guards questioned my companion and drew their interest with his pathetic attempts at trickery. With their attention on him, it seemed simple for me to slip away from our wagon and conceal myself amongst the wagon in front of us that had been cleared to pass through.

Now the plan as I told him was for me to slip away thusly and set up a further diversion so that he could get through as well. In reality my plan was to slip away from him and leave him to rot.

Inside the gate, I slipped away to get lost within the maze of passages that made up the border keep. Avoiding discovery, I managed to find a servants section and found some garments that would allow me to properly make the next stage of my plan the most effective. Disguised as a simple serving wench, I did my best to mingle throughout the keep, pretending to be a busy mindless servant while I listened carefully and noted what transpired around me.

I came to find out that the news spread quickly, an evil demon had been captured at the gate, and that after right and proper torture he would be purified two days hence by pain and then his soul would be set free to be redeemed by Symbos, the only God Gneissians believed in, if he was worthy.

This actually bothered me. Yes, Summerbloom (cringe) had tortured me nonstop for the two weeks I had been forced to endure his company, but the torture the Gneissians would perform, followed by the purification of his soul by pain were more then I felt most people deserved. Perhaps not everyone, but most. Thus my plans changed, and I knew that most likely our mission was for naught.

I managed to make my way then about the keep some more, learning more of it. In time I discovered that which I sought, the keep commanders quarters. As it was growing late by that time, he was in them. Continuing my act as a serving girl, I gained access to his quarters easily enough and, with the aid of my psionic ability to enhance the attraction of those I wish to me, managed to seduce him.

He was enthusiastic in his lovemaking, I'll give him that, but little else. Unnecessarily rough and domineering, it was nothing but a turn off to me. Nonetheless, I acted as weak and polite and as honored to be ravaged by him as possible, as he clearly expected me to be. His only spout of imagination that altered the dreary incident was when he decided to finish things with me on my knees before him after nearly an hour of mundane boredom. Kneeling in front of him as he prepared to show for once and for all his obvious superiority presented me with the opening I needed. My hand had already located a dagger I had concealed earlier with a touch of minor sleight of hand. As he reached his peak of distraction I stood up quickly and slipped my dagger into his back, finding easily the area between his ribs and just under his shoulder blade.

I angled the thrust so that it would pierce his lung as well as his heart, ensuring his death in a timely manner and preventing him from calling out. See, I told you I had done this sort of thing before. The crowning touch for me though was seeing his mouth open in a painfully surprised gasp. I smiled and spat into his face. I jerked the dagger out as he coughed on my gift to him, then stepped back away from him.

He tried to reach behind his back, but only succeeded in falling to his knees. I could hear a faint wet gurgling noise every time he tried to breath, which was becoming more and more rapid with every passing moment as he tried to catch the wind that I had stolen from him forever. Finally realizing he was doomed, he remembered his duty and tried to come after me and take me with him into death. I stepped out of his reach though, and before he had taken more then two steps from what had been his kneeling position, he fell again to the floor, succumbing finally to the blackness of unconsciousness. I waited a few more minutes to make sure he was done, and knew it was over when his body jerked three times then lay still. Blood no longer bubbled out of the thin gash on his back.

Contrary to popular belief, people do not die quickly. It is a gruesome thing and only the most dedicated and hardened person can watch a person die. More then merely watch it happen, it must be studied to be certain. Add to that someone willing to cause such a condition to come about in the first place and you have someone well trained and dangerous. I am a professional.

I took a few swallows of wine to further clear my palate, murder is thirsty work, especially when it involves a prolonged bit of invasive discomfort as this one had. That accomplished, I moved the commander into his bed and posed him as though he was asleep. Spare clothes of his I used to mop up the bloody mess that he had spilled both on the floor and on me, and hid them in one of his chests.

Then I went through his belongings as quickly as I could, rummaging for things that I thought might be of interest to James. My chief concern, however, was in finding the commanders keys. It was easy to find, a ring filled with iron keys lay upon his desk in plain sight. What documents I could find that seemed of interest I rolled up and placed in a scroll case carved out of the bone of some large creature. I also found some gold, and that slipped away into my purse. Sure, service to the King paid well, but that was no reason not to supplement my income.

From there I made my way to the dungeon. I had to move far more carefully down there, for servants were, I presumed, not readily allowed into such a secured area. I came to the guardroom before to long and saw two soldiers sitting at a table. One was sopping up some stew with a chunk of bread while another was leaning back and sharpening his dagger.

I knocked timidly on the door, adopting a similar personality to the one I had used on the keeps commander. The guards were surprised and suspicious to see me, but I explained at first a strong interest in seeing the 'demon' that had been captured. That was to be denied to me, of course, for they were good soldiers and wanted no trouble. However, a comely young lass with a loosely tied bodice alone with them? Suffice to say they were in no hurry to be rid of me. What they did not know was my ace in the hole, my psionic talent that allowed me to make myself all the more alluring in their minds.

So it was that before long I was pining away about my lost love, a soldier who was slain cruelly by Elendarians, and how I missed him so dearly and how long it had been since I had been with him. Being men, they took my meaning correctly and that merely set the stage further. It was a fairly short order before I had them eating of my hand, though at a similar cost to me as what I had paid to the commander.

These soldiers were a bit more creative, thankfully, and though they did not at first want to share me, I helped them overcome their inhibitions. Not only that, but I convinced them that I would be fulfilled best only if they shared me at the same time, instead of one after another. I do my best work at the spur of the moment.

One of them, an older guard by the name of Jasgar, was the first to be done with me. I was entertaining his younger companion, Therrin, with my mouth when Jasgar emptied himself into me from behind. He staggered back, a smile on his face, and sat down heavily at the table. His eyes were glazed with the release, but he watched with interest while I continued to pleasure Therrin.

Therrin was young and virile. With Jasgar finished he decided to follow in his comrades footsteps. He repositioned me then and took the same stance that Jasgar had occupied earlier, plowing into me from behind. I was more then a little surprised when he changed tactics though. He suddenly pulled himself free of me and relocated. Caught off guard as I was, I hissed in pain at the sudden intrusion. I was quite angry, to be honest, but I caught hold of myself and focused on my training, forcing myself to relax and to welcome the pressure.

Therrin was spent quickly, as most men are when it comes to engaging in that particular act. It makes me wonder how men who love other men can have long or satisfying sex if they finish within two or three minutes of starting.

Therrin slunk away then, thoroughly sated and equally exhausted. He collapsed on the bench next to Jasgar at the table and fought the inevitable drowsiness that was overcoming him. I smiled, knowing that my job was nearly ready to be performed. They mistook my smile to be appreciation at the favors they had granted me. I let them, their time was about to end.

Men have no sense of things. First of all, never invade a woman's more sensitive holes unless invited - or at the very least, warn her first. And second, could a man breathe if he had a six inch link of sausage caught in their throat? I think not, so do not expect a woman to either.

I crawled towards them, still properly craven and wanton and unsatisfied. I had removed my clothing earlier at the foot of where Jasgar now lounged at the guard table. He could not have positioned himself better. I kissed his naked legs and let my mouth slowly rise up them. My hand, unseen, pulled my dagger free from my loose pile of clothing.

At the moment when Jasgar expected me to engulf him and arouse him anew, I drove my dagger in to the hilt directly between his legs and impaling those male organs that he had been using to think with. His mouth fell open in a soundless gasp at the same time his body spasmed and then collapsed, falling directly on top of me.

I had shielded my actions with my body and Jasgar's legs, so Therrin thought Jasgar simply overcome with renewed vigor. But still concern roused him from his letharsis. To keep the stunned Jasgar from crying out, I yanked my dagger free and plunged it into his throat, now that he had crumpled on top of me and was within reach.

I whimpered and slunk away quickly, hiding my dagger beneath me and out of sight from Therrin. My eyes had the look of a young girl crazed in fear at the sight of the blood. Therrin was caught off guard, looking from me to Jasgar, who was bleeding profusely now from both wounds. Therrin crouched beside the older guard, who was grabbing at his throat. He looked up at me with fear and pain in his eyes and reached out towards me. I rose up quickly behind Therrin and acted just as the young guard figured out what happened.

A few minutes later I had my clothes back on and both guards lay dead on the floor, one with his throat slit from ear to ear, the other from two mortal wounds. I grabbed up the cell keys and made my way down the passage. All of the cells were empty save for one, and in that one was Summerbloom (cringe). He was quite pleased to see me, of course.

No time for any nonsense, especially considering the elf's demonstrated nature. I directed him out, stopping only long enough as we slipped unseen through the halls to pick up my shortsword that I had hidden after first arriving. Say what you will about elves - leave it to me to say most of it - but they can be quiet when they want to. Out of professional interest, I prefer to think I am more adept at stealth when need be, but my companion was no slouch himself. Skulking about carefully, moving only when we were certain it was safe to do so, we finally made it out of the building of the keep and had only the gates or the walls to choose from for our egress.

Fate was kind to us then, for a cry went up. Either the dead guards or the dead commander had been discovered, I never learned which. Nor, for that matter, did I care. For the distraction allowed us to take the wooden stairs up to the thirty foot high stone wall of the keep without anyone noticing us, for all eyes were drawn to the front of the building. Peering over the edge, I made the decision then and there that our mission was a failure. We were on the Elendarian side of the keep, and more then that, even should we attempt a further penetration of Gneiss Summerbloom's description would race ahead of us and make us thoroughly hunted.

With that decision made, I glanced down and saw that the wall was very nearly a straight drop to the ground, though a very slight incline favored us. I prepared myself for a painful landing and prepared to jump. It was then that the elf made himself useful for the first, last, and only time. He grabbed my arm and pulled me back ere I could jump. Smiling at me, he held up a feather that had somehow gotten caught in my stolen bodice from my bedding the commander. I had not noticed it, and I chided myself for my lack of attention. It was in our favor though, for the elf muttered a few words quietly in the arcane language of magic. I felt a tingle pass over me briefly, then it was gone.

Without another word, he hopped over the crenellations and was gone. I glanced down and saw him floating slowly to the ground. Grinning, I followed his lead (also the first, last, and only time). We settled onto the ground gently a few moments later, and like a fully drawn arrow released, we were off.

My stamina is not what I would like it to be, but I do not think I had ever run so fast in my life. We made the Elendarian keep in under five minutes. Glancing back I noticed that the elf mage's spell had allowed us to run so lightly that we left no tracks on the ground. A moment of use amidst two weeks of irritation and antagonism, I still wish I would have killed him.

The Elendarian guards gave us a bit of trouble, but once I showed the Special Elendarian Task force badge to the watch commander, they let us through. Just in time too, for riders from the Gneissian fort came within hailing distance shortly thereafter. A brief and unfriendly, if not politically correct, shouting match ensued. They riders rode off, and we were safe. My only remaining complaint was the following two weeks, in which I had to deal with that annoying elf on the ride back to the capital.

I paused, letting James absorb all of it. He had nodded thoughtfully at several times, and now he seemed lost in thought. "You really do let nothing stop you from accomplishing your goals, do you?" He finally said.

I smiled thinly, I knew what he was referring to. "When something needs to be done, there are several ways to do it. Being a woman in a world dominated by men, I take the one that works the best. I suspect you would do the same if the roles were reversed."

James smiled faintly, he knew I had him there. "Summerbloom won't work with you again, I can promise you. He's busy doing other things now, so don't worry about him."

I nodded, grateful for that at least.

"As for the mission, you made it a little further then some of the other groups did, but not as far as I would have liked," James admitted.

"You sent more then one of us out on this?" I asked, remembering my betrayal at the hands of the Ornithrym long ago poignantly.

James saw the tightening around my eyes and held up his hands. "Don't worry, none of you were to be considered sacrificial. I was simply hedging my bets and hoping that at least one of you would make it."

I nodded, realizing I would have done the same thing. I let my building anger go then. "Did any of them make it?"

James shrugged, smiling ambiguously. "Maybe. I haven't heard from a couple yet, I'm hoping for the best."

"Get out of here and go relax. I've got something else in mind for you, but I don't have all the details I need yet," James said, motioning towards the door. "Oh, and by the way, good job."

I caught the pouch of gold he tossed at me as I rose. It was a decent amount, enough to keep me fed and clothed and rested well for at least a month. I turned and left, heading towards where he had told me Brina's quarters had be reassigned to.

Sure enough, she had missed me. She flew into my arms with an excited yelp of joy when she answered my knock at her door. I hated to admit it, but I had missed her too. Not so much when I was busy, but during the four weeks of travel time with the elf, I'd have given anything to be in Brina's arms instead. Weakness on my part, I realized, but I had developed a definite soft spot for the girl.

She pulled me in and I sat down with her, listening to her tell me all about life at the castle. She had been training as a servant to the royal family, but James kept assuring her that she was far, far more then that. He took a personal role in her training, teaching her extra things whenever possible that had little to do with being a servant and everything to do with being observant and intelligent. I approved. Soon though it began to get tiring. After all, I had lived in cities like the one we were in for most of my life, and I knew very well the etiquette and procedures of court, I had been trained to know them. Thus I found myself growing distracted.

Brina noticed finally, and asked me about it. I waved it off, saying I was merely tired from my journey. Inside I felt a small hollowness in my stomach, her infatuation with her position and even more so with her instructor, James, had me concerned. I shrugged it off mentally and assured myself it was nothing though.

Brina asked me then about my own adventures, which I had to shrug off as well as I could. "You know I'm not supposed to talk about them, especially if James has been training you in anything regarding intelligence."

Brina blushed. "Yeah, you're right. Still, I'm curious. I won't ask again, sorry."

She took it better then I expected. But my real surprise was at her next statement. "James had rooms set up next door to mine, if you're tired you can go rest there and we can catch up some more tomorrow. It is getting late, after all."

I nodded mutely, the hollow spot growing again. I smiled at her though, for there was no way I was going to betray my feelings in such a silly matter. She walked me to my room and there was an uncomfortable moment at my door before she leaned in and gave me a chaste peck on the lips. I smiled at her in spite of her odd behavior and let myself get acquainted to the room. For the time being, I put my thoughts of Brina out of my mind and focused instead on relaxing by doing some exercises I had learned from her earlier that focused the senses and helped in the mental discipline necessary to perform the fighting style she had begun to teach me before I left.

That finished, I still was not willing to focus on Brina's behavior. I knew that she had been spending a lot of time with James, and he was an attractive enough fellow, in a roguish sort of way. But… bah, I would deal with it later. For now I had more important things to do.

Using my nearly forgotten talents I had learned on Acathia in the Gneissian keep had sharpened in me my desire to learn more about them. I calmed myself and sat naked in the middle of my bed, legs drawn up and crossed over one another in a meditative pose. I let myself slip into a meditative trance and focused on exploring them as thoroughly as possible, as well as trying to recall more of what I had learned from the destructive mind meld.

It was several hours before I came out of my trance and realized that night had settled in. My candles had burned down and I was alone in the dark room. I did what came naturally then. I went to sleep.

Book 1 : Chapter 13

It had not been a good week. James and I stood facing one another with drawn steel and Brina's captive body separating us.

It had begun with me dealing with the increasing alienation I felt from Brina. At first merely a suspicion I tried not to dwell upon, it quickly became clear that something had arisen between James and her. That was okay with me, I suppose. I was a bit bitter, but it was probably for the best for her. Best for me as well, I had to keep reminding myself, because it kept me free of any ties that could be used against me.

We spent time together still when she was not working, of course, but that made it all the more difficult. She continued to instruct me in her unarmed fighting style and we spent time together much as any two women who are close can, though not as close as it had been. Now we were more as sisters then as lovers.

Then James had summoned me again with a new assignment. Considering my abilities and viewpoints, he actually wanted to set me up as an agent far a field, spying upon the movements of Dagrazt's minions. Better yet, he had said, perhaps I could even insinuate myself within the Dark Ones organization and spy from within.

All well and good, it was a very dangerous assignment, but I had lived in similar conditions all of my youth, so I knew how to handle it. It was what came next that really raised my wrath. He had suggested next that I should take care to avoid getting enmeshed too deeply, for it could only bring evil back upon Elendar. And if evil came in force to Elendar, then it also would fall upon Brina.

The insinuation was clear enough to me, and from the way our eyes met, I knew I was correct. He knew the relationship between Brina and I was deeper then we let on and he was counting on that and using Brina as a hostage. More bet hedging on his part. What he did not know was the special relationship Brina and I had shared was perilously close to being broken apart. His words clarified it for me, sundering it for good.

I left later that day, telling Brina only that James had set another task for me and that I might be gone for quite a while this time. She took it well, though with some sadness. At the same time I think she felt relief for no more was her loyalties torn between her past and present.

I sneaked back into the city that night, by way of the sewers that I had been secretly mapping whenever I had a chance to do so. That and my skills at disguise and stealth allowed me to reenter the castle with no one the wiser. Just another faceless servant. I easily picked the lock on Brina's door and slipped into her quarters. Somewhat to my cynical surprise, I found her alone.

A moment of doubt overcame me then. Steeling myself for the decision I had made, I quietly woke her and quickly explained myself. I told her of James threat against her and of my own decision to leave the surface of Elendar because of it. I offered her the choice to come with me, once and only. She looked troubled.

Things took a turn for the worse then. A secret door in the wall slide aside and James emerged from it, a dark look upon his face. I nearly recanted my decision to return and offer her the chance to escape then.

"You misread my words, Yamara," James said sternly. "I knew of no one you cared for in this place save Brina, thus I merely thought to remind you that innocents would suffer should you draw undue attention to Elendar."

"What are you doing, spying on me?" Brina asked, shocked at everything that had occurred so far.

"I suspected she might return and try to steal you from me, this was my final test for her, and she has failed. I suspected she might hasten to join with the Dark One if given the chance, for his means and hers seem much the same." James pointed his finger accusingly at me.

Words were fine, in their place, but I was past them. He had driven me beyond mere anger. How was he to know who I was and what I was like? Yes, I had decided to be done with Elendar because he was as able to deal with people duplicitously as any I had served under in Ossulmere, but I planned to avoid having anything to do with this Dagrazt. I was not the same women as before. I no longer sought to better myself at the expense of others who were of innocent nature or who had done me no wrong.

James had done me wrong though, and I would have no more of it. My sword and dagger was in my hand as I stepped towards him. James reacted as well, drawing his longsword and dirk. "See, she draws steel against me, already she seeks to sow discord at His bidding!"

I scowled and lunged forward. Steel rang as he blocked and dodged my nearly frenzied attacks. Brina called out for us to stop, begging and pleading from where she sat twisted up in the sheets of her bed.

We stopped our duel after several long minutes, both of us breathing hard and sweating. The time was past for words, and an even look of hatred we shared with one another. In wordless agreement, our hostilities renewed. The longer reach of his sword availed him at first, but once I got within its range my shorter blades worked to my advantage, pressing him back. To no avail though, for soon we broke apart again. Brina had tears running down her cheeks and a lost look upon her face. She was more torn then ever.

I noticed out of the corner of my eye one of the pillows of the bed on the floor then. I edged towards it while engaging James again after a very short respite. He seemed not to notice it, or at least paid it no attention. Having reached it, I drove my attacks high upon him, drawing his attention upwards. My foot flicked out then, from underneath the pillow. It sailed up between us, heading for his face.

Pillows by themselves are no threat, save to the smallest of babes perhaps. The movement caught him unawares, however, and his longsword arced across and down to clear it out of his way. I followed his movement, slamming my sword on top of his with force enough to jar it out of his hand and send it clattering to the stone floor. Before he could try and stoop to reclaim it I advanced, stabbing out and scoring a hit on his shoulder with my dagger.

James recoiled, drawing nearer to Brina. He grasped at the only chance he could and reached out for her. Grabbing her hair, grown slightly longer since our time together no Acathia, he pulled her from the bed so that she was between us, and his dagger rested against the dark and soft skin of her throat. I remembered that skin all to well, and grew angered that it was threatened by his naked steel.

"Leave now, Yamara, and you can escape," James panted, trying diplomacy where skill at arms had availed him not. "I will hunt you down, of course, but if you leave now Brina comes to no harm and I will give you until the morning ere I send out my men."

Brina's breath caught in her throat. The sudden events had taken her even more by surprise. She was specialized at close in fighting, but with a dagger rasping against her throat, she took no chance. She was prepared to come over to my side now though, I think. Until James spoke out, that was.

It was barely more then a whisper, and I still am not sure if I have heard it correctly to this day, yet I think I am in the right about it. "Don't worry, love, she will do you no harm and will only leave us in peace now," was what he whispered to her.

I searched into James' eyes and saw the truth. He would need an excuse and no witnesses, personal friend of the King or no. Brina would die as well as I, should I relent to him. My decision made, I looked at Brina and allowed her brief apologetic smile, then tried to forever close the doors within me upon her.

"I can't let him use you against me, Brina." Were my final words to her.

Shortsword in my right hand, I lunged forward, letting the magical blade slide through her belly and into his. As soon as I began to move James tried to draw his dagger across her throat. She smashed her head back into his face, crushing his nose and partially freeing herself. His dagger still struck partially true, cutting a grievous wound on one side of her throat, marring forever the virginal skin. My own dagger I thrust into his chest as they fell to the floor.

I let go of my blades so I was not pulled down with them. Brina's hands had come to her throat, but the blood welled over her fingers and left them dark and red in spite of the pressure. James did likewise, pulling the dagger out of his throat painfully and gasping air through the ruinous hole there. I stared at him darkly, a figure of fey vengeance. I felt nothing for Brina in that moment, and only grim satisfaction as James departing lifeblood left him. His last vision was of me standing victorious above him, then darkness as he passed out. What came next for him I knew not.

Brina's free hand stretched up towards me, beseeching me in a silent cry for help. I forced myself to remain impassive, calling upon my training from years past. I knelt beside her and took her hand in mine. Unbidden, a sole tear made its way down my face. I knew that I could not get help in time for her, and even if I could, my life would then be forfeit at the discovery.

She pulled me closer to her and tried to open her mouth and speak. Blood was in her mouth and spilled across her lips and cheek. She closed her mouth and tried to swallow. She started crying then, and I felt perhaps the lowest I had ever felt in my life. This sweet, young, innocent girl was dying. Dying because of me as well as because of James, but really because of me. Had I not brought her with me to Malatoria she would be alive and well on Acathia. Had I not come back for her, she would be alive and well in James' arms. Within me the dam broke. I hated myself for what I had done, even though later I would finally accept that there was nothing else I could have done.

"I'm sorry Brina," I mouthed the words instead of speaking them, for my voice would not work. Then I admitted to what she had done to me. What she had caused me to feel. What had brought about this ruinous situation. And this time, though it was ruined with emotion, my voice worked. "I loved you."

Her arm went limp at that statement, her hand sliding free from mine to fall to the floor. I did not even know if she heard my last words. My vision was blurred from the tears that fell shamefully from my eyes.

I made my way out then, pausing only long enough to take the money purse on James' belt. My hands reeked of murder, but only in Brina's case. James, I feel, had deserved it. Nonetheless, Elendar was closed to me henceforth and forever. Returning to the sewers through distorted and blurry vision, I found my way in had been blocked thanks to a rather untimely cave in of mud and sewage. My only recourse was to discover another way out, one that took me far beneath the surface of Elendar and many miles and days before I would see the light of day again. What is most important is that I had survived to draw another breath another day. Brina was gone, but I would always remember her, and petty and shallow as that was, it had to be enough for me. I was young still, though I did not feel it, and I had more life to live. More gold to amass. More relationships to form. More relationships to sunder. And many more mistakes to make.

Book 1 : Chapter 14

James found himself floating, alone, in a room filled with darkness and emptiness. Not a room, he realized, but an entire world. It was as though all of his existence had suddenly ceased to be, with the sole exception of his mind.

"So it's over and I'm dead at the hands of that bitch," James said. Or at least he thought he said it. He realized he felt totally disembodied, was he speaking of merely thinking?

It need not be finished, the words came out of nowhere and everywhere at once, surrounding James in a cold blanket of fear. Still, the hope it offered he leapt at.

"What do you mean? Show yourself, be you friend or foe?" He challenged.

You could not behold me and survive, Earl James, the ethereal voice responded. The air surrounding James seemed to press in on him more, though he still felt as though he had no body for he was unable to move.

"Dagrazt?" James whispered, filled with fear.

There was no response save that around him it seemed he heard a rustling and a chattering of creatures. Hundreds and thousands of beings whispering and moving. Laughing. At him.

"What do you mean, it need not be over?" James asked in spite of himself. Terror gripped at him and he strove desperately to hold onto the one thing that promised refuge from the horde of creatures that would at any moment tear him apart. The one thing that seemed a pinprick of light in the insufferable darkness. The one that was hope.

The voice was amused when it returned. Join with me, James, and I shall grant thee more station and power than that of a puny Earl. You can be a Lord in true form and power, answerable only to me, with minions to control and treat as you wish.

"At what price?" James asked, the strength of his voice dropping as he felt himself slowly growing weaker.

There is no price. Serve me and you shall live, deny me and you shall die. But choose, Earl, the voice made the title sound puny and insignificant, and choose quickly, ere you depart forever the realm of the living and pass beyond my powers to return you.

"Brina!" James gasped, realizing the voice was right, he was fading rapidly now, losing even his fear of the gibbering demons he imagined were surrounding him in the darkness.

I will give her to you, and she will serve you, but remember well your own parting from her.

"Vengeance," James said next. He felt himself slipping away almost to the point of no return, but he knew he would have no other chance to barter terms for his soul.

The voice seemed amused, though it made no sound of laughter. So long as you do not interfere with my realm or my plans, you may have it!

James had heard enough. He grabbed onto the receding pinprick of light with all his consciousness and ignored everything else. Hope was all he had left to him. "I accept! Return me to life… My Lord."

The last thing James remembered was a sense of satisfaction and amusement. Around him, the unseen but felt horde seemed disappointed. Then he knew no more as the nearly non-existent spot of light expanded so rapidly that it overwhelmed him and sent him into unconsciousness for the last time.

*****

With the upset woman out of the room, the shadow hiding under the bed crawled out and leaned over the spent form on the floor. There was still faint traces of life in the girl, though it was fading as it pondered the situation. The man, the shadows new Lord, stood behind her, surveying the situation and waiting impatiently for the shadow to obey his orders. It took form then, the shadow gathering and merging until a figure of dark feminine beauty stood towering over the dying mortal girl. Scraps of clothing the color of shadow revealed more of her curvaceous and shapely figure then they concealed. She stood easily 7 feet tall, with skin the color of blood and fire merged together. Black reptilians wings stretched from her back, expanding to their full span of nearly 12 feet from the tip of one to the other before folding back in and resting behind the demonic woman. Two small black horns graced her flawless forehead, one above each smoldering eye. Her tail, a single sinuous length, curled suggestively around her leg and ended in a sharp fork that seethed with deadly intent.

The demoness knelt next to Brina and opened her full and sultry lips to reveal sharp white teeth, with enlarged canines that spoke of the ability to pierce and rend anything placed with them. Her tongue slipped out from between them, red and flexible and impossibly long. The demoness licked at the wound in Brina's throat, which had all but stopped bleeding by then. Brina's body shuddered then, convulsing and seizing at the fire that spread from the contact and threatened to consume her. When she demoness retreated Brina's throat was whole and unmarred.

The demoness bit into her own wrist then, letting blood that sizzled when it hit the floor drip down her chin and her arm. The wound was placed over Brina's mouth. With the first drops of blood into Brina's mouth her body responded, though her consciousness had already tried to depart the dying shell of her body. She latched onto the wound in the she-demons wrist and drank from it, infusing her body with an unnatural and unholy warmth that chased away the chill of death that had been creeping into it.

Elsewhere, Brina realized she was returning. She had been prepared to sleep for a long time, she was so weary. With her return to wakefulness she remembered what had happened. Grief and terror overcame her and she tried to hide from it, tried to let go. Unable to do so she tried to fight at whatever it was that was pulling her back from the release she now sought.

Brina's eyes opened then, and she stared up at the demoness that held her while she suckled from its wrist. Fury overtook her when she saw James standing behind the creature, staring down at her with trepidation. James had changed though, he looked different. Paler, yet more substantial and daunting. His eyes were different too, they burned with an inner light she could not understand. She felt rage at seeing him, and felt her strength growing with every swallow of the life giving nectar she was drinking.

The demoness misjudged how much of her life she had given Brina, and further misjudged the strength of the Acathian woman. She tried to pull away from Brina then, to separate from the drain that she put on the demoness. Brina would not let go, however, and sucked more fiercely at the wound. She bit at it, trying to increase the flow of the blood into her mouth.

James smiled, realizing how strong his bride would be if she succeeded. Always full of surprises, that Brina. He hoped she would not hold anything against him for his earlier actions, but everything had been perfectly planned and orchestrated until Yamara returned. If only she had been captured and killed when he sent her to Gneiss with that foolish fop of an elf!

A few minutes later the demoness lost the last of her substance and faded back into the realm of shadow, trying in vain to escape the pull of the budding powers of Brina. Brina would not let her escape, and continued to inhale, sucking in the shadow essence of her now. The lamps and candles in the room flickered once as Brina was finished and the demoness was now contained within her, then they burned more brightly with its unholy presence dispatched.

"Come my love, this is no longer the place for us," James said, his voice darker and deeper now.

Brina nearly floated up off the floor. Her own skin was flushed with life, stolen from the demon. She glared at James and meant to leap at him and tear him apart with her own hands, which she was sure were now easily capable of the task. Her will was thwarted. She simply stood there, staring at him in open hatred.

"Hate not me, Brina, for I am not the one who plunged the sword into you," James said, seeing her look. "We are to be together for eternity, my bride, let yourself love me as you once wanted too. Yamara we will deal with when the time is ripe for us to do so."

Brina knew then some of what was happening. By accepting the demoness' gift, she had bound herself to James and whatever dark power he served. More, she had bound herself to a dark and unnatural existence from which death could not release her.

Book 2 : Revenge

Chapter 1

I relived those final moments in the capitol of Elendar. My sword plunging into Brina's belly to get to James and his own blade slashing mercilessly across half of Brina's throat. As much as I tried to stem their intrusion into my consciousness, I could not. No matter how cold or hard hearted I tried to be, I had let Brina in to deeply to rid myself of her memory like a duck shaking water off of its back.

Stumbling through the sewers, imagine my surprise to find the very same entrance I had used to enter the sewers when I confronted James was now sealed off by a combination cave in of mud and sewage. Thus I was forced to escaped from Elendar into a great system of caverns beneath the mighty kingdom. The things I heard and occasionally caught glimpses of in the eerie glow of the lichens and fungus caused me to squirm and shudder in ways I had forgotten since my earliest years. If King Avercrombie knew how close monsters lay to his realm, I doubt he would sleep as lightly as he seemed to. Hope seemed lost to me for I had run out of what meager ration of food I had managed to secure haphazardly on my flight from the palace. My fate seemed to be no less cruel the Brina's, and equal parts my own fault.

Then, when I had nearly decided to charge the next fearsome dweller of the deep I happened across, I heard from far ahead the sound of water falling. A great amount of it, no less. Approaching carefully lest I disturb the lair of whatever creature secured such a pool, I was greeted by increasing light. To my great surprise the distant thunder had become a veritable roar. Rounding a bend in the passage I beheld a great cavern with a recessed wall on the far side. Down this wall fell the great river that fed the noise that had drawn me there. The light was so bright it hurt my eyes there, though surely it was quite feeble by normal standards and my eyes merely adjusted to the dark. At the zenith of the falls a beam of sunlight plunged into the water, fragmenting and scattering across the cavern.

The rainbow created by the mist and the light was one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen. For a moment my heart was lifted, and thoughts of my tragedy left me. Then I noticed how difficult my path lay, for the wall was slick and several feet away from the hole in the ceiling of the chamber through which the water and light fell. Nonetheless, already buoyed, my spirits refused to leave me again. Falling back on my stubborn streak of pride, I pushed off at once.

It took me hours and no small amount of pain and blood loss to make my way up the 40 foot ascension to the ceiling, and perhaps another hour there to secure a way to escape the dank and slimy caverns below. I was blinded by the sunlight, even though it was nearly dusk by the time I emerged. The waterfall continued on above me, falling off of a cliff and into the depths to go whence I knew not where.

Around me was a small glade within a forest of mighty trees. A deer far off looked at me with its ears flattened for a moment before it took off, running deeper into the great oak and beech trees. Exhausted, I collapsed onto the ground and slept, unmindful of my safety.

I dreamt then, and they were dreams of terrible things. I saw a pale and seemingly bloodless James, grinning in death and surrounded by the splendor of rich vestments and gaudy decoration. He sat upon a dark throne made of cruelly forged iron, and beside him sitting upon the floor dressed like a concubine was Brina. Her skin was as I remembered it, though it seemed smoother and even more flawless. Including her throat, for in my dreams it was healed. James' gaze was filled with hatred, while Brina's was far more accusing. Both possessed eyes that seemed to glow with an inner fire.

I awoke then, covered in a cold sweat. Breathing hard, I looked around quickly, wondering if somehow Brina and James had come back from the dead and were stalking me. Instead I saw a host of animals. Wolves, bears, deer, squirrels, rabbits, owls, hawks, sparrows, and countless other species were gathered about the clearing, all watching me. I stood up slowly, making no threatening moves. My stomach grumbled loudly as I glanced at all of the wild game around me, reminding me that I had not eaten for a couple of days.

A man came out then from the trees, though I would have sworn he had not been there a moment before. He walked through the animals without concern, his face unseen within the hooded cowls of the brown robe that cloaked him. He came up to me and reached up to pull the hood back on his robe. He had a rugged countenance, with a flowing brown beard and mustache. His equally brown hair was long as well, though it seemed tended and not wild. His eyes were the most entrancing part of him, for they were a dark blue and pierced me as they looked at me. I felt lost for a moment as I met his gaze, then my inner self reared up and I forced myself to return his gaze with a strength bordering on belligerence.

"You are not of this world," He finally said to me. His tone was not judging but still somehow decisive.

"Who are you?" I asked, trying to steer the encounter my way instead of his.

"Humans once called me Andryth. The elves call me Quikwind. Names matter little to me, call me what you wish."

"What is this place, Andryth?" I asked, wondering if perhaps things were finally beginning to go my way.

"This is the Irewood, one of the few old forests that still remember in the lands this far north. Only the Great Forest to the south has trees as old and with memories as sharp as those here. I watch over these woods and protect them and all who live here from harm." He turned away and began to walk away then, as though he had said enough.

"Wait!" I called out, stepping after him. "Can you tell me no more?"

He continued to walk as he spoke. "What more is there to know? You are unnatural to this place, this world. There is no place for you here. You must leave. Harm no thing under my care and you may leave as you wish."

The animals parted to allow us to pass, though they closed up ranks behind us and followed closely, as though they were an honor guard.

"How do I get out of here then?" I asked, bristling at his calm surliness.

"You will be guided."

I opened my mouth to say more but stopped in my tracks when I realized that he had just walked into the trunk of an oak tree. Instead of bouncing off, as I or anyone else I know would do, he had literally walked into it, as though the tree had sucked him inside of it. I turned about to look around, testing my eyes. All of the animals that had been trailing us were gone as well. I swooned for a moment, questioning my sanity and wondering if perhaps my hunger had caused me to imagine things. Then I saw the tracks on the ground from all of the myriad creatures that had been behind me. I felt a little bitter, though still miserably hungry and lost.

"Where are you, oh promised guide?" I asked, my voice dripping with sarcasm and bitterness. No answer was forthcoming.

I glanced about then and guessed by the level of light that it was nearing dusk. I set about then to arrange a camp for myself. The temperature was pleasant but growing cooler. In the dead of night I suspected that it would be downright chilly where I was, and with only my fur lined cloak to protect myself over my leathers, I did not look forward to it. I had flint and steel with me though, so there was hope for a fire at least. I carried no axe for the chopping of wood, and my sword and dagger, while finely tuned for hewing flesh, were of little use against wood. Thus I set forth to gather fallen wood where it lay, thinking as I did so that perhaps this suited me better anyhow, as I was causing no harm to any of the trees here and thus not invoking the wrath of the druid, Andryth.

As a small boon, in my wandering I found a patch of ripe blueberries on a rocky hillside as the last of the suns rays slipped beneath the top edges of the forest. Feasting on them as though it was the finest meal I had eaten in days (it was), I began to feel a little better about my chances. When the spark caught in the deadwood and I had a warm and merry blaze to keep myself company throughout the night, I resolved to push ahead for a better tomorrow, regardless of my past misfortunes.

I had cared for Brina deeply. More deeply then I should have. The extent of that care I was uncertain of, however. Was it a camaraderie or a partnership or more of a sisterly bond. Or was it more still, that of a lover and mate? The last thought frightened me, for I refused to accept the possibility of even wanting a mate, be it of any gender or race. "Perhaps," I mused quietly to myself that night, "I am better off with Brina dead, as much by my own hand as any."

I slept soon then, convinced that the forest was safe. With the fire banked it kept me warm enough throughout the chilliest part of the night and was reduced to lukewarm embers by morning. My greatest surprise came from my new companion.

Standing over me stood a magnificent specimen of masculinity. Heavily muscled and gleaming in the early morning dew, I came to discover his name was Darion in the time that followed. Where his ridged and powerful looking stomach muscles ended fur began. The fur was a dark gray in color, and began the half of his physique I had seldom studied much, for I was only slightly familiar with the riding and tending of horses. He was a centaur, and apparently, my guide.

Darion spoke little to me throughout the next two days, only when he felt he must. Clearly he disliked me, though for what cause I had no idea. Perhaps centaurs possessed the ability to see a persons past, or perhaps that was merely a thought given to me by my latent guilt. Regardless, he shared his seemingly endless supply of nuts and berries that he carried in a pouch, and cool and clear water from a skin. The only other things he carried were a curved dagger near his waste, a bow across his back, and a quiver of flight arrows for the bow.

I thanked Darion when we reached the southern edge of the Irewood. I had been on my best behavior, doing my best to respect both the forest and my guide. Regardless he remained aloof. I considered asking him for a final meal before I left, but thought better of it for he clearly wished to be elsewhere.

I wandered south then, away from the forest and towards what I suspected was Elendar's southern border. Along the way my diet improved as I managed to snare a few rabbits and once even spirited away a farmers stray chicken. It took me a few weeks since I was avoiding any of the villages and cities along the way, but I was finally successful at reaching the border. However a great wall was in my way, patrolled by Elendarian guardsmen.

Hoping I had reached the southern borders ere news of my transgressions, I walked boldly through the gate. There I showed my SET badge to a sergeant and was offered all manner of courtesy. I secured a horse and some spare equipment, including some iron rations and water, and was on the road again without resting that very day. I found it both relieving and disconcerting that no word of James had reached the border keep as yet.

I came finally through trial and mishap to a port town by the name of Peltarch. It was one of the largest port towns south of Elendar for many leagues, and was a den of thievery and marketeering. I got away from there as quickly as I could, but not before I stumbled across a bar fight scene started by a man named Thorrik. I recognized him as a former sergeant of Elendar, then a SET agent. Of course, few people outside of Elendar knew of the existence of SET. To the scum of Peltarch, Thorrik was merely a thorn in their side. By the time I left the city, I began to notice wanted posters with his picture and description on them, offering upwards of a kings ransom of 20,000 gold for his capture, alive or dead. Seems he had made a mission out of his life to tweak the noses of Peltarch's nobles every chance he had.

Leaving Peltarch I made my way further to the south, where I heard of great ruins and a frontier type of living. I figured there I had a chance to earn a new way of life and escape the rut of my old one. Honest I might never be, but that did not mean I had to be a murderer and a thief. Well, at least not without a good reason.

I found what I sought in a small hamlet named Barovia. Far to the south, on the hottest of days it reminded me of a morning or evening on Brina's home world. That of course set me to remembering more of Brina, so I tried not to think about that. I still had dreams and nightmares about her and James as well. Sometimes they seemed so real that I felt as though they were searching for me or chasing after me. I suspected that it might be more then simply the work of a guilty conscience, but then thought better of it, for before I had never cared for anyone that I had killed, either directly or indirectly.

It was after a few months in Barovia, after I had begun to become accepted by the locals, when I had an opportunity to prove myself. Two boys had disappeared out hunting for food for their family while their father was busy tending the farm. The townsfolk were organizing search parties for them, though I personally held little hope for their survival. They had been missing for nearly two days by that time.

I set out on my own, explaining how I worked best alone with nobody else foiling up any tracks or getting in the way. This was accepted readily enough, for in Barovia I was just another trapper / furrier making her living as best she could. Nobody asked about a persons background in Barovia, for it seemed nearly everyone had one.

I got to the farm ahead of the rest of the townsfolk and tracked the boys out into the sparse woods nearby. From there I encountered other tracks. Tracks that I had trouble identifying, but finally decided they were humanoid, if a bit slurred and confused. Other tracks appeared to be that of wolves. I figured it to be a hunting party of men out with pet wolves, though I suppose orcs were more likely to accompany wolves the size of the ones the tracks indicated.

I followed immediately. I knew in my gut the children were already slain, but until I found signs of their demise, I had to proceed. The tracks led to the south, with the children's signs disappearing altogether. No doubt they were being carried. In no time the forest was left behind and the dry wasteland of the salt flats lay ahead of me. Tracking across a salt flat is all but impossible even for a trained and experienced ranger, let alone someone barely proficient in the skill. Nonetheless, I felt I knew where they were bound, for directly ahead in the distance I could just barely make out the shadow of the ruins of a once mighty city.

Daylight was fading by now. I had been on the chase for nearly five hours and had perhaps two left ere dusk. A chill crept down my spine for some unknown reason, but I felt my duty to these people I had chosen to try and make my own. I pushed forward then, thankful for the mountains to the west that would block the sunlight bearing down on me. In hindsight, sunlight might have been more preferable to the darkness that overcame me nearly 15 minutes before I reached the ruins.

Once in the ruins there was dust and sand enough to allow me to find the tracks of the mysterious kidnappers again. The tracks led me to the boys… by way of an ambush. The ruins were quite large and resembled buildings the type of which I had seen once before. They were similar to the ruined town of Guthmoor, on Acathia. It seemed I would never escape my past, for the future kept striving to bring it back to me.

It was thoroughly dark by then, with not even a faint bit of twilight from the sun in the west. The moon was risen a third of the way, however, and it was waning from full two nights past. Realizing that gave me the only warning I would have. I made the connection finally. A full moon two nights past, the same night the boys had disappeared. Tracks of both men and wolves. I was hunting were-beasts, though by now the hunter had become the hunted.

A musky animal smell wafted by my nose then, followed closely by the faint sound of claws scratching on stone. I spun around and ducked low just in time to avoid the snapping jaws of a wolf as it sailed over me. Well, partially over me, his hind quarters crashed into my shoulder and sent me stumbling to the side.

A growl from that direction had me skittering away, finally getting my sword and dirk in hand to defend myself. A wolf approached from that direction then, walking slowly and crouched, ready to spring. It snarled at me, spittle bubbling and drooling from it's mouth. I glanced around and saw a full five wolves surrounding me, each with a cruelly intelligent look in their eyes.

I have heard that chance favors the prepared mind. I was not prepared and they were, so I was determined to even the field a bit. I ran towards one, slashing out with my sword. The wolf sprang away, giving me an opening in the circle of teeth surrounding me. The other wolves yipped and came after me, but not in time to catch me before I leapt up to the top of a small dais where once a statue had apparently stood. I had gained a four foot height advantage on them, not nearly enough to thwart them, but enough to boost my odds.

They circled around me, occasionally darting towards me then backing away when they found my blades ready and waiting. A few times I was nearly taken by well timed attacks, but I always managed to fight them off. Several wolves now sported wounds from my magical blades which seemed to cause them a surprising amount of pain. The ones that were wounded regarded me warily, while the others simply approached me more carefully.

I killed them all, of course, otherwise I would not be able to tell this story. It was slow and fraught with peril though, and only after I luckily dispatched the first one with a thrown dagger did the others come close enough to allow me to meet out my brand of justice. Seeing one of their number down and me with only my shortsword, they all charged at me, nearly tripping over each other in their rush to get to me. I unsheathed the dagger given to me by King Avercrombie and noticed it fairly thrummed with power in my hand. It had not done that before, so I had no choice but to guess that it's magic enabled increased power when wielded against shape changers.

With the wolves dead or dying, I noticed how their bodies seemed to shimmer and contort, some more then others. When a few minutes had passed and I had caught my breath, all five of my slain enemies had partially reverted back to a humanoid form, some more then others. It was a rather unsettling sight, and I moved on quickly, checking myself carefully for wounds. I found only a few gouges from claws and one scrape and bruise from where I had landed on the dais a little less then gracefully. I knew from my studies with the Ornithrym that lycanthropism, the magical disease that infects men and causes them to change into animals at night, is transferred both via genetics in a more true and powerful form and also through the bite of an infected creature.

My cloak had some tears in it as well, but I was ready to go on and fight another day. Or at least another fight, since I was sure there were more of the werewolves around. I gathered my tossed dagger and returned the gift dagger to its concealed sheath in the small of my back.

I trekked on, trying to make sense of the tracks of the creatures. I followed them as best I could over the rubble of the ruins, ending up finally at what was a large building. It reeked of the musky scent of an animals den. I felt the dagger in the small of back radiating its magical energy as I got closer, warning me. I approached it carefully and was allowed to continue breathing because of that caution. The wolf defending the entrance of the lair missed me only by inches as I fell backwards. It landed on my chest though, and its claws dug painfully into my left arm and right breast. The wolves hind legs alternated tearing at my thighs and belly, raising welts under the tough leather armor that continued to protect me but risked a good shredding with each new assault. The wolves jaws and fetid breath snapped in my face, trying to go for my throat. Only my right arm grasping tightly about the wolves throat kept it from succeeding.

My sword and dagger had fallen somewhere nearby, making them unavailable to me. My left arm, pinned to the ground just below the shoulder by the wolves paw, was mobile enough to slip behind my back and once again draw the dagger from the King. I tried slashing at the wolf with it, but was unable to get enough leverage or distance with my arm to connect with the wolves furry torso. A great lance of fiery pain entered my body then, one of the wolf's hind legs had managed to hook just above my leather breeches and yank them down my leg part way, leaving four bloody furrows on my upper thigh.

I kicked upwards with my other leg, catching the wolf in the belly and genitals. I was pleased to note that the same assault works on males regardless of race or whether they go on two or four legs. The wolf yipped and backed off a bit, giving me enough of a chance to yank my arm out from under its paw and drive my dagger deep into its chest. The wolf staggered away, whimpering softly as its lifeblood bubbled out the ragged hole in its chest.

I sat there, breathing heavily and straining to listen for any signs of additional pursuit. I found my discarded weapons and regained my feet, yanking my torn and bloody pants back into proper place and favoring my wounded leg. Inside the lair I found another wolf standing guard over what appeared to be a pile of fabric or clothing or something. It was too dark in the building for me to be sure of what it was.

The wolf charged at me. I ducked under its lunge and laid its side open with my sword. It howled in pain and tried to scamper away. I followed it mercilessly, hacking into its head as it snapped at me. I turned towards whatever it was guarding as it lay quivering on the floor in death spasms.

It was indeed piles of clothing and equipment. Pots, pans, a few boxes and sacks, all manner of mundane gear that people would use for whatever utilitarian living purpose could be imagined. There was even some coins and weapons, the former I gathered up quickly while the latter I judged to be nothing out of the ordinary.

From there I studied the room more carefully. In the back, hidden in the shadows, was a passage leading deeper into the strange ruined building. I approached it slowly, ever mindful of the skill with which these creatures seemed able to hide themselves and launch a surprise attack with.

The passage went further then I needed to, for an open doorway on my right led into a room with some rubble piled off on my left side as I entered and some makeshift bedrolls scattered about the rest of it. It was in there that I found the two boys from Barovia. They were being cared for by a naked woman, not exactly the idea guardian. She sniffed wildly as I approached them, and then stood up to face me. She growled deep in her throat and bared her teeth at me. I could tell that she was one of the werewolves by the animalistic behavior, if not the thrumming power radiating from the dagger nestled against my back.

When she rushed towards me I noticed her face beginning to elongate and her fingers turning into wicked looking claws. She got in one swing with her fist / paw (which I slipped to the side of) before I retaliated, plunging my sword into her chest and driving my dagger into her mouth. I yanked my weapons free and let her slide to the floor, her body contorting itself into her death pose.

The boys were sleeping, though fitfully. They looked to be in fine shape, which surprised me greatly. I figured them for dinner for the pack of werewolves. I knelt next to them ready to wake them and have them follow me when I felt the dagger hum its warning. I spun around quickly, prepared for another surprise attack. Nothing was sneaking up on me though.

I turned back to the children, my stomach clenching. I pulled the dagger out and held it close to the boy. It glowed dimly in my hand and I could feel it vibrating with an inner wrath. I cursed softly. I held it near the other boy and achieved the same result. I examined the children more closely then, checking for wounds. Sure enough, on each of the calves was a mostly healed bite mark. They were not there for a meal, but to increase the pack.

To the best of my knowledge, there is no cure once the disease has set. Wolvesbane and other herbs are supposed to be able to fight it, but in that case, it was too late. I studied both children, one roughly 12 years old and the other 9. My hand quivered slightly as I clenched the dagger in fingers gone white. I glanced around one more time then spat out a muffled curse at whatever Gods were making my life as difficult as they were.

I stood up once the deed was done, blood dripping off the dagger. Turning towards the door I saw the first of the group of villagers that had reached the ruins staring in open mouthed shock at me. Two more stood behind him and others were in the hallway trying to get a look.

I opened my mouth to explain, realizing what the scene might look like to them. Any of my words were lost in the screaming that began. Roars of outrage and challenge assailed me as the posse surged forward. I was going to throw down my dagger and explain myself but I realized I would have no chance. The father of the children was in the lead, his great sword drawn and a murderous fury in his eyes.

I turned and ran, heading towards the rubble strewn side of the room. Above the fallen rubble was a small hole opening to another room. I jumped up and caught it with my hand then pulled myself through. Dropping into the next room, I found a window that led outside. I was outside and slipping quietly away from the building before any of them saw me leave. Then the inevitable happened. One of the guards left outside the werewolves lair spotted me and called out, thinking that I was still a friend and not a foe.

What choice did I have? I ran. The ruins were dark, the moon behind a cloud at the time. A faint wind had sprung up, just enough to add an extra bit of chill to the night. Heat still radiated off of the ground, but the earth had nearly given up what it had absorbed during the day already.

I slipped between ruined buildings, taking the toughest courses possible and knowing that I could navigate them far easier then my pursuers. This worked well for me until I came to a dead end. What had once been a doorway into a building had fallen into such a state of disrepair that the open doorway was filled from within by fallen rubble. I looked back behind me to see if I had time enough to slip back out and into another passage. My hopes were dashed as I heard them began to round the corner.

I felt a strange peace come over me then. I marveled at the lucid moment and realized that I had forgotten something very important. My mind.

I was still uncertain of the scope or extent of my powers, but I did remember a couple of things that I had filched out of Keeden's mind. I calmed myself still further and gave thought to cloaking myself. I realized the only way I could do it would be to contact the mind of each and every one of my pursuers and trick them into not seeing me. Something I would be unable to do given the time, let alone the complexity of trying to deal with so many different minds at once.

About to give up again, a new thought entered my mind. Ahead of me was a ruined wall of a building, some twenty feet up to a roof filled with holes. On my right was a taller building, and to my left a nearly vertical wall of rubble. I was a good climber and a strong girl, given my size, but with the pack of villagers on my heels, I would be unable to scale the wall fast enough as I was.

I concentrated then on making myself lighter. I envisioned the same effect that the buffoon of an elven wizard had cast on us, making us both light as feathers. I forced myself to believe that my body weighed no more then a few pebbles and felt myself growing lighter as I did so. My time was limited, so I wasted no more time to further the effect. As it was I probably had reduced my weight to less then one half of what I normally weigh.

I leapt up at the wall, sailing nearly halfway up it in a single bound! I scrambled to find a purchase against it, as I had gone much higher then I expected too. Another leap upwards took me to the roof, which was falling apart and lousy with holes where the weather had broken through it. With my reduced weight it was easy to negotiate. I ran lightly across it and was safely hidden from view by the time the villagers came upon the cul-de-sac.

"Where'd she go?" I heard one of the men asked, breathing heavily.

"I know she came down here, how could she get away? That rubble would fall apart with anyone climbing it!" Another one said.

"Did you see the look in her eyes or the dagger in her hand? It had the mark of the Dark One, I tell ya!" A third said, reaching for an explanation. I scowled from my hiding spot. My dagger had the Elendarian royal crest on its hilt!

"Come Karum, 'tis a fey night and all of us fools for sending a witch out where men should have gone!"

Karum, the father of the kidnapped children nodded, unseen to me. He glared about a bit more before he let his grief catch up to him and override his anger. Head bowed, he stalked off to gather up the bodies of his children. The others followed after him, and I remained hidden until I heard no more sound of their pursuit. I got up then and found that my full weight had returned as I had long since stopped concentrating on the effect.

My sadness over the boys fate was forgotten in the light of my discovery. It was a shame about them, but the living go on living and the dead do not grow any deader. I carefully made my way back down the wall and set out to explore the ruins further. It seemed that life for me amongst my own people was forever doomed to failure. Perhaps I was destined instead to live the life of a hermit.

Book 2 : Chapter 2

Months had passed since last I bothered to ponder my situation. Indeed, a morose black mood had gripped me. I despaired of existing a solitary life with little in the way of joy. Life had turned into a set of repetition for me, though in a paradoxal way, for I made certain I never did any of my daily routines the same way twice.

I had set up a residence within a ruined hovel near the western edge of the ruins where I had dispatched the werewolves. I had to liberate the building I chose for my lair from a group of spiders that individually were large enough to give me pause. As a group they were deadly, for each was the size of a hound. A little flint and steel applied to a torch provided a solution for me. I had simply tossed the torch into the network of webs within the stone building and butchered the surviving spiders that rushed out to escape the flames.

One had managed to bite me, however, and I lay in a swoon for nearly two days from the debilitating poison. I recovered well enough, though I was parched at that point as my fever had burned throughout while my body fought the poison. The spiders had been slain, at least, and I soon discovered that to a starving woman, roast spider can be a delicacy.

I scouted the ruins daily, learning what I could of my surroundings and clearing out all signs of the spiders occupation. The werewolf den was soon taken over by a new creatures, an apparently mated pair of reptilian beasts that walked on many legs. The smaller was 12 feet long while the larger was closer to 16. I stayed clear of them once I saw the larger one breath out a cloud of mist from its mouth to paralyze a giant rat that was searching for some refuse to feast on. It moved faster then I would have thought possible, snapping the rat into its mouth and returning back to its lair to share the feast with its mate.

That was another thing about the ruins… the rats. Ranging from one to four feet long, there seemed no end of them. I slew them whenever they came near me or my makeshift home, but they were forever waiting in the shadows wherever I went throughout the ruins, waiting for something to fall for them to feast on. They seemed voracious.

At times I thought that perhaps I was being watched. Ever careful, I was nonetheless unable to find any signs of a pursuer. I roughly mapped out in my mind as much of the ruins as I felt secure in exploring. South of me was a graveyard where, I was certain, the dead still walked. I avoided the place at night but heard enough noises carried by the dry wind to let me know that things were not as they should be there. The other inhabitants of the ruins likewise avoided the ruins, from what I could tell.

East, beyond the basilisks, lay the den of a mighty serpent. It looked old, from the one glimpse I had gotten of its scarred and worn hide, but with that age came not infirmity but rather experience and an animal cunning easily the match for anything else I had seen. Having not seen all of it, I could only guess at it's size, but the section of it I saw as it crawled between buildings early one morning in search of food was half again as big around as my chest. I guessed it to be over 40 feet long, perhaps more.

Each inhabitant of the ruins claimed a small territory for themselves, and anything that entered into it was trespassing and dealt with most harshly. I maintained this unwritten rule by fiercely defending my own little area, fighting back any rats or other creatures that sought to inhabit it. My defenses gradually took over more and more of my time, allowing me less and less exploration. I soon even had begun to stop working on searching my psychic talents. As with any muscle, when it is unused it atrophies. So too did my psionic powers languish, unused as long as they became.

Seasons came and went. Soon a year had passed, leaving me older but no wiser. My equipment began to show signs of wear and I replaced it as best I was able. Throughout the different times of the year the climate varied little. I had learned ways of finding food and water by watching the other creatures in the ruins. Life was far from fulfilling, but it was satisfactory. I had been alone so long by then that I had begun to forget anything else.

I secluded myself in an environment that reminded me every day of Acathia as a way of further torturing myself. In the absence of contact with people my memories and fantasies grew. My mind played tricks on me, remembering my time with Brina differently. Idealizing it, it became a time where she and I had lived in a utopian perfection, fulfilling one another's every needs until the bastard James had changed all of that.

Of course it was a lie, but it helped to preserve my sanity. At other times I even wondered if perhaps I had been wrong and perhaps I had been the one most wronged by the willful manipulations of Brina and James. My mind concocted all of these fascinations out of a strong sense of guilt and remorse. Both were emotions that I was largely unused to. I had never repented any of my actions or felt bad for anything I had done before, and now my emotions were catching up.

A group of people invaded my domain one day, forcing me out of my self-imposed exile. An adventuring group it seemed, though hardly suited towards adventuring in my expert opinion. A gnome trailed behind, eyes glancing about suspiciously at the shadows of the ruins. A pair of elves led the party, the male with a bow in one hand and the other absently stroking a holy symbol that hung on a chain from her neck. A halfling walked in between them, huffing as his short legged stride was hurried to keep up with the elves. The gnome was similarly short legged and hurried, but he seemed not to mind the pace. It might have had something to do with his girth not being in sizeable proportion to his height, as the halflings was. The final member of the party was a dwarf with a double bladed axe carried in his hands. He seemed cheerful, for a dwarf, but he kept a wary eye on his surroundings.

A part of me longed to go to them and talk, but the majority of my psyche, the part of me that had been in control for the past year, kept me hidden and suspicious. I suppose I should have at least done something to warn them. Of course, I did not.

The elven tracker fell prey to a snare trap I had laid. He was yanked up by his left foot and swung around to smash into a rock wall, which then promptly crumbled over atop of him, crushing him. The others ran forward to help him, but they were too late. This caused the elven priestess no small amount of grief, and my heart actually went out to her. Then I grew angry at both myself and her for feeling such pity and sympathy. I barred my feelings and turned away from where I lay watching them in a symbolic show of not caring what happened to them. My curiosity got the best of me after a few minutes though, so I crept to a new position to watch them from.

The halfling was the scout of the group, at least somewhat adept at discovering the traps and pitfalls I had set up around my demesne. Not adept enough. His foot came down on a patch of earth that I had a trigger string set up beneath. He heard or felt the vibration of it being set off and stopped abruptly. He looked up, the panic on his face his last expression as the scything blade swung horizontally across, severing his head. I had not considered a demi-human as prey, so I had set the blade low enough to disembowel a man. A quicker and cleaner death for the halfling, at any rate.

The dwarf howled in rage at this. Dwarves seemed to live for combat, whether on Halador or Malatoria. This stealth was not his style, and his frustrations showed as he bellowed out a challenge to whoever was destroying his company. His taunts ceased abruptly when he plunged into a 12 foot pit I had rigged with sharpened spikes treated with venom from the spiders. The venom had long since dried and become useless, but a stake sharpened forever remains a stake sharpened.

The elven priest and gnome wizard gathered close then, realizing that their time was drawing to a close. Still I could have approached and led them safely through, but I had closed myself to them, and instead watched only out of the interest of one who has to reset and repair her traps once they had accomplished their tasks.

The wizard managed to escape, through luck or coincidence I do not know. The priestess was close behind him when she actually slipped on some loose rubble and managed to sprain her ankle on her own. In upsetting the rubble she had managed to trigger another of my traps, causing more sharpened steaks to spring out of the rubble. None of them harmed her, but she stumbled away from the rubble, frightened anew.

And stumbled into a small grouping of snares I had set up. Each foot was caught by opposing traps, triggering the release of the powerful wooden springs I had set up. It had taken me days to set those traps, and included me cobbling together a rough rope and pulley system to enable me the leverage I needed to do so. The end effect on her, with a rope pulling each foot in the opposite direction, was quite grisly. It affected the previously stunned gnome in such a way that he was sent running away in fear.

As I said, he escaped my traps. He fared less well against my neighbors then he did me, however, but I was not to find that out for some time.

I waited a while to see if their sounds or actions had roused any curiosity in the rest of the population of the ruins. Though I had no direct knowledge, I had seen fleeting hints of deeper and darker denizens towards what had once been the cities center. More intelligent creatures with an active will towards destruction and evil.

After a few hours had passed I ventured out, examining each of the fallen adventurers. I went through their belongings, acquiring many coins and trinkets, as well as a few new weapons that I would save away for a chance to use either personally or in a new trap I devised. My greatest surprise came when I examined the priestess. It had been at least 2 hours since her left leg had been torn from her body, yet she still lived.

She had managed to incant a spell of healing through her pain, stemming the blood flow and extending her life. For a while, at least. The pain had caused her to black out shortly thereafter though, and now it appeared that she was passing in and out of consciousness as her blood continued to leak out onto the ground.

I knelt above her, dagger in my hand yet unsure as to what I should do with it. I nearly got up and left her when I sensed her awareness return. I looked down and saw that her eyes were clouded with pain, but that she beheld me clearly enough.

"Who are you?" She hissed, having trouble forming words through her agony.

My hand clenched around the dagger held within it. The words were as music to me, yet I feared them more clearly then I feared the dreams I had in which Brina and James hunted me.

"Are you Yamara Blackcloak?" she asked more clearly.

I nodded after another moment of indecision. It seemed my fears would allow me that much communication at least. If nothing else, at least she was unable to present any threat to me now, for she lay clearly on her deathbed.

"The King needs to see you," she whispered, struggling to speak and remain awake. "About James. He wants you to return. He knows the truth now. James betrayed…."

Her voice trailed off into a silent moan of agony. She passed out then, her fingers relaxing their rigid pose from where they clawed at the hard baked ground. I remained rock steady above her but inside my mind and emotions where tumbling about like wheat in a tornado.

James betrayed? Betrayed who? Betrayed me, yes, most certainly. Betrayed Brina? Yes that as well. Had he betrayed Elendar as well? What truth did the king now? Did he know how Brina had manipulated and toyed with me? Did he - no, wait. That's not right, is it? Did James lie to Brina and find a way to convince her that I was tired of her or that I wished to be rid of her? Perhaps he told her the reason I sought assignments abroad was so that I could be away from her because she angered and annoyed me. That James had surely been at the root of it was evident, no matter the means. James was the one that tore Brina from me, he was the one that slew her in cold blooded murder before my very eyes. Yes, that was what happened, I tried to defend her but he used her as a shield and pushed her on my blade. Brina was innocent, caught up in what had happened and by James' lies.

I started to rise when I felt the elf's hand grab mine. She had roused herself from the blackness that continued to try to claim her for its own. I looked down at her and felt rage at her for bringing this to me, for ruining the relative peace I had found there.

"Please," she whispered to me, tears leaking from her eyes. I looked down, seeing that she was pulling my hand with the dagger in it towards her. My expression softened then, for I knew what she was asking. She was in agony and because of her spell it would be prolonged for hours more, perhaps even days.

I nodded and her hand fell from my dagger. She passed out again then and I gently lifted her head up from the ground. Re-awakening old skills that had been dormant too long, I faultlessly located the spot on her neck and slid the dagger home, killing her instantly. I laid her back down and stood up, glancing at her one final time and noticing the holy symbol grasped firmly in her hand. It was the symbol of Ban-Dayid, the God of healing. I had just murdered a priestess of Ban-Dayid, how much worse could I get?

I got worse. I reached down and grabbed up her holy symbol and slipped it into my pouch. It felt heavy in my hand and very warm to the touch. I knew it was not my imagination but rather a bit of prescience that told me the more I handled it, the more uncomfortable it might become to me. I was truly on the road to damnation.

My only hopes were to take a few choice people with me.

Book 2 : Chapter 3

My first step was simple. I needed to know more. A few obvious choices lay before me, but at least one of them had a low survival probability. The best alternative was also the closest. I had to find that gnome.

Tracking him was easy, he had run away from my small realm in terror, after all. And run right through the basilisk's and the snake's domains. The basilisks had been napping through the warmth of the afternoon sun, but the snake had been more alert. What do you do when you are tracking the same thing that a 50 foot snake is after?

I came up behind the snake and debated long and hard about the sudden turn of events. The gnome still lived for the snake continued forward, following his tracks and his scent. He had slowed down for a little while, some thirty feet perhaps, but then something had spooked him and he had taken flight again. It was that which probably kept him alive.

I was still carrying the spare weapons I had acquired from the group of adventurers. One item, in particular, showed that it might have some promise for my situation. A short spear, five feet long from shaft to head, had been one of the weapons the elven ranger had carried. The head was broad and suited for both slashing and piercing. Not familiar with the weapon, it nevertheless did not strike me as being suited for throwing, but rather for hand-to-hand combat.

And so I used it thusly. I crept through a ruined building the snake was next to and moved both quickly and silently. I gained height via a set of crumbling stairs and looked out through what had once been a window, but was now a ruined and gaping hole. It moved below me now, swiftly for its size but not nearly as swiftly as I knew it could move. I took a few steadying breaths and prepared the spear in front of me. Then I jumped.

It can be argued many ways as to how my luck runs. Some would insist it naught but bad luck, considering the turn of events time and again in my life that kept me running from one poor situation to the next. Others might think it was good, as I still drew breath while many of those around me did not. I did not believe in luck, myself.

So then it had to be skill that allowed me to drive that spear through the middle of the snakes sinuous body and leave it firmly imbedded in the hard ground beneath. That or maybe coincidence, which I did believe in. Regardless of why or how it happened was the simple fact that it did happen. The next thing to happen, as I rolled away and came back to my feet, was just as easily foreseeable. The snake was understandably perturbed by this change of events. Not only had its odds of having a gnome for dinner been reduced, but it had a giant toothpick sticking out of its back.

The snake turned to survey the situation, hissing angrily. It saw me and snapped forward, trying - and succeeding - to twist its body around ahead of where I had pinned it. I jumped backwards and continued to backpedal furiously. I knew that the odds of me striking a mortal blow to the creature a one in a million chance, but figured what the hell, I had seen more difficult tasks accomplished.

Fortunately, the spear held and the snake's mobility was limited. I went around the same building I had used to ambush the reptile then, and continued towards wherever the gnome had gone. His frenzied flight had taken him further towards the center of the ruins, into areas where I had scarcely been before, if at all. I kept my blades ready and slowed my pursuit to try and make certain that nothing got the drop on me.

I ground my teeth in frustration. My caution might cost the gnome his life. While his well being did not matter to me in the least, he did possess information that I sought. Information that would be extremely difficult to get out of him if he were dead.

I managed to catch up to the gnome late that night. He had a cold camp and kept a bleary eyed watch. That did little to deter me, however. He was hiding in the shadowy recesses underneath a pillar that had toppled centuries past, and stared out with his sleep dulled night vision.

What caught me off guard was the intense keening noise that erupted out of nowhere when I slipped up behind his hole. I leapt atop the pillar and dove into his lair, clapping my hands onto him and pulling him to the ground as quickly as possible to prevent him from gaining any more advantage over me. I knew instinctively what I had tripped in my stalking of him, some sort of magical alarm spell.

"Silence that racket, gnome, ere we are discovered!" I whispered harshly to him while my hands dug cruelly into his body. He whimpered and struggled against me. I let him get enough room to see that I was human and he opened his mouth to squawk out a magical command that silenced it.

I only hoped he had done it in time. I had never been that deep into the ruins so I had no idea what lived there.

"Who are you?" He said, staring angrily at me. It was an angry fear though, a look that I do not think I had ever seen before.

I had no reason to hide, the gnome was at my mercy, wizard or no. "I am Yamara Blackcloak."

His expression turned to one of surprise. "We came to find you. I mean, my friends and I. But now I'm the only one left."

He trailed off, becoming sorrowful. I had no time or interest in his misery though. "I know, I spoke with your priest ere she died. She told me you sought me."

"You saw her?" he asked, surprise in his tone. Surprise and a bit of skepticism. "Is what they said about you in Barovia true then?"

"Depends on what they say," I muttered, growing tired of the conversation. I glanced about and noted no movement, yet I felt as though something was coming. "Come, we must away ere your cantrip summons up the creatures that guard this place."

Some of the blood that had gone back into his face left it again at that. He looked around nervously. "What creatures?"

"Stay and find out, if you wish."

He hurried after me, little legs pumping furiously to catch up to my longer legged stride. I detoured around the snakes lair and headed north and east, angling to get out of the ruins as quickly as possible. They had served me well for a time, but now I felt that I must again rejoin the world of my peers, for better or ill.

The gnome was silent throughout, keeping up with me without complaint. I stopped and waited only once, when the morning sun began to clear the eastern horizon. A small group of leathery winged creatures, humanoid but perhaps two feet tall at the most, were fighting with each other as they tumbled out of a ruined building. The fight appeared not to serious to me, more a thing of play or of establishing rank. One of them was wounded in the fight and tried to limp away from the skirmish. Instead the others teamed up against him and in moments fell on him, sharp teeth and claws tearing him apart. With their fast thus broken, they moved off into the ruins to the south of us, heading deeper in.

I silenced any questions the gnome might have with a glare and moved off again, passing quickly through their territory. It was only another hour or so from there until we left the monster riddled ruins and marched across the hard packed broken desert.

I kept up a merciless pace throughout the day. I was used to the heat and the struggle of the desert, my short companion was not. Perhaps three hours before the sun set we reached the short grasses that marked the beginning of the end of the hard packed desert ground. Another 30 minutes saw the grass up to my knees and the gnomes hips. He was breathing hard and sweating profusely, but still he remained silent and determined. I admired his willpower, if nothing else.

I stopped finally when the grasses began to be dotted with stunted trees. A small half-hearted copse of the diminutive trees provided a little shelter, enough for a small fire and perhaps a wind break. Still silent, I set up a small camp, taking care first to dig a small hole in the ground and stake out the leather funnel I had devised out of rat hide long ago. The hole in the bottom of it would drain the condensation from the dew at night into a waterskin, augmenting my water supply. The gnome was thoroughly confused and amazed at my makeshift invention. I admit, I was rather proud of it myself, having figured it out after several weeks spent trying to determine a way to get the meager water that formed at night into a container.

Then I used my dagger to cut away some of the branches from the hardy little trees around us and between chips of wood and the dry grasses around us, I soon had a small fire going. With that out of the way, I dug into one of my pouches and pulled out some dried meat and set to warming it up over the fire. The gnome looked at it hungrily, alternating from watching the meat cook to watching me.

"What do the villagers say?" I asked at last, pulling the first piece of meat off of the stick I roasted them on and nibbling on it.

The gnome jumped in surprise at the sound of my voice. He had become engrossed in the fire and the meat and had forgotten everything else for the moment. I noticed that he carried three water skins, of which only one still seemed full and another was mostly gone.

"Some say you slew a pack of werewolves, including two boys that were taken from the city," He answered, testing his voice carefully first before speaking. "Others say you are a werewolf yourself, and you slew the rest out of competition. One man said you were something far worse."

I chuckled darkly at that. I wondered then and there why I had ever bothered even trying to reform myself. It seemed that evil was wound tightly with my fate, denying it did me little good. Even when I tried to do good, those around me betrayed my actions. "It may be that the last is true," I said at length.

He stared into the fire and pulled hi knees up to his robed chest. "Did you kill my friends?" His voice was quiet, almost as though he was afraid to hear the answer.

I stared hard at him, even though his eyes refused to meet mine. "Yes."

He shuddered then, and I thought for a moment that he was going to cry. He recovered quickly, but anger replaced his sorrow. "Why?" He demanded, now staring me in the eyes. "We sought you out to deliver a message and a pardon from the King himself! You treat us with such harshness without hearing our business, what sort of evil are you?"

"I am the worst sort of evil," I said, wondering if he could ever understand my twisted meaning behind the words. "I set those traps long ago, to defend my portion of the ruins. Your friends and you wandered into them. They slew your friends before I got to all but the priestess, and she was so near death she begged me to end her suffering after she told me of your mission."

He tried to glare at me longer but the intensity and coldness of my stare finally got to him. He looked away and sniffled back the tears of the loss of his comrades. "Did the others suffer?" He asked finally.

I shook my head, though he did not look at me. "No, death came quickly for all but the priestess, and for her it was as quick as I could make it."

He nodded and looked back at me. "I thank you for that, at least. They deserved better." He sighed and took a drink from his nearly empty skin.

"One of the villagers, the father of the slain boys no less, defended you before the rest of the town. He said that his boys had been bitten and were cursed, you gave them the only peace they could have ever known, and from the looks of the wounds, you did it quickly and with mercy while they slept. He had nothing kind to say of you, mind you, but he at least thought you ought to be treated fairly."

I like to think I kept my surprise off my face. That he, of all of them, would come to my defense was something I had never expected. Perhaps I had judged them to soon. Ah well, what was done was done, my life had moved on.

"And what of you, gnome? Would you run and hide from me or better yet, stick a knife in my throat while I sleep?" He looked surprised at my question. Appalled at the thought of murder even. I was no judge of gnomes and their ages, but this one clearly was a young one to be so naďve as to the nature of the world.

"I return to Elendar, with you I hope. I still have a mission, though only one in my troop survives to accomplish it. I must bring you back, if you will accompany me, or else report that you have chosen to move on," He said with a trace of resignation in his voice.

"What is your name?

"Fizzulthorp Thunderwhistle, at your service." Fizzulthorp stood up and bowed low to me, sweeping off his wide brimmed hat in the process. I almost cracked a smile at the ludicrous site.

"Well Fizzulthorp, this offer your King makes intrigues me. I wish to learn more of it, so I think that I shall indeed return with you on the morrow." He looked relieved at that. I suspect he was glad that he would not have to be the only one to explain all of his dead companions now.

"But know this," I continued, my voice carrying a hint of danger to it, "if I am trifled with, misled, or betrayed, you shall be the first to fall and with every breath in my body I shall strive to make King Avercrombie pay with his own blood."

His eyes widened at my oath. He nodded and leaned closer to the fire for warmth. Words failed us for a few more minutes before he nervously asked, "Do you have any more of that, um… meat?"

"Oh this?" I asked, handing him the piece I had just finished roasting. I pulled out another strip and pierced it with my dagger to roast.

He dug into it hungrily, pausing only after a few bites to taste it. "What sort of meat is this? It tastes odd. Not bad, just odd. Sort of greasy and a little tangy."

I smiled innocently and told him. "Giant rat."

If you have never seen a gnome turn green, then you are missing out on a truly heart warming experience. He managed to keep it down and even finish the piece I had given him, but his appetite had been taken out of him.

I let him keep the first watch then, and woke myself at midnight to relieve him. He was staring off into the desert back towards the ruins with streaks of tears on his cheeks. I silently tapped him on the shoulder and motioned towards the fire. He shook himself out of his reverie and smiled weakly at me by way of thanks. I nodded and took his spot with my back to the fire. I too knew what it was like to have companions taken away. Funny thing was, both my companion and his had been taken away by me. Then again, maybe it was not funny at all.

That thought led me towards other, darker thoughts about James and how he had managed to twist Brina and me around so thoroughly. I still did not know where her heart had lain in all of it, but I suspected more and more as time went by that I had doubly been played the fool. I hoped King Avercrombie would be able to shed some light on things for me. In a black mood I glanced again at Fizzulthorp. I no longer felt sorry for him for his loss of his companions, but instead I pitied him his apparent deep reliance on them in the first place.

Book 2 : Chapter 4

Fizzulthorp and I had planned to return to Elendar by way of the Great Forest, which I had bypassed on my way south since I had gone through Peltarch, which lay several days ride to the east of it. Fizzulthorp insisted upon speaking with the elves of the Great Forest to inform them of his companions deaths. I had no interest in it, but since it was a more direct route, I figured it would save me some time and get me the vengeance I sought a little bit faster.

It seems that fate forever holds different plans for me then what I would have of it. Nearly a week north from the desert we encountered one of the larger trade roads among the free cities of Malatoria. It was heading to the west, and after hailing one of the drivers to inquire as to their destination, we learned it planned to stop at Morovia. Morovia happened to be only three days ride from the Great Forest. I had more then enough gold to buy horses for us when we reached there.

That is how the gnome and I found ourselves in a fight later that night. The wagons had set up camp and invited us to share one of their fires. The food was a welcome change, for in spite of a year of a limited diet, I had not grown the least bit fond of rat. Fizzulthorp had subsisted on foraged nuts, berries, and roots along the way, as well as a coney I had managed to bring down with a thrown dagger two days past. What with sharing the fire and food, my short companion felt somewhat indebted to them. I think that was what kept him around when the first troubles began.

It began with an unnatural chill felt in the bones of even those already sleeping. In mere moments a fey wind had sprung up and swept through the flat area beside the road we had set up. The night had been warm, but now it raised the hair on our arms. From the Cyprus trees on the southern edge of the road dark shapes emerged and moved across the road towards the caravan, seemingly in no hurry. Their movements seemed disjointed and clumsy.

As they neared the light from the fires it became apparent why. It was like a half remembered nightmare from my childhood for me. The dead walked against us. Wearing rotting armor and wielding rusty weapons, they ranged from partially eaten away zombie corpses to the empty grinning skulls of animated skeletons. More continued to emerge from the trees, coming towards us with deliberate purpose.

Had it been my decision, I would have simply slipped away. Matter of fact, I started to do so. It was my knowledge of the gnome that stopped me. I saw him readying himself for battle, setting his sling beside him and concentrating on bringing up his arsenal of spells. I slipped up next to him and lightly put my hand on his shoulder.

"Come, Fizzulthorp, let us away from this. It is not ours to fight," I said, judging how little time we had before the undead would contact the first of the shaken defenders.

He looked at me with surprise in his eyes. Then the look turned hard and he just looked away. "Go if you will, Yamara. I will run no longer."

I sighed and glanced around again quickly. I turned and began walking towards the rising foothills to the north, but stopped before I had walked ten steps. The gnome spoke of his terror laced rout form my traps in the ruins a few days ago. He was fighting this battle for himself as much as for the merchants of the caravan. He had nothing to gain by it save for his sense of self worth. Indeed, by the look of the green caravan guards and the sheer number of undead still emerging from the tree line, it seemed a doomed cause.

What Fizzulthorp had not counted on was his words hitting me. I was running too. I always ran. I ran when Brina had been slain, though I felt it was no fault of mine. I ran again in Barovia. I was even running from my self-imposed exile in the ruins, for fear that much longer would make me begin to face things that I lay hidden and only barely remembered. I ran whenever trouble loomed it seemed. I suddenly felt ashamed. That filled me with rage quick enough. If I meant to exact vengeance on whatever was responsible for killing Brina, I needed to begin to stand up to things. Stealth and avoidance had always been my way of life. Now it was time for me to adopt the way of the warrior.

I turned and walked back towards the road, passing a surprised Fizzulthorp and surprising him with my even and determined stride. I held my short sword and dagger in hand, ready to do battle. I met the lead skeleton before any of the undead had managed to even reach the caravan guards. I left it behind me as a pile of bones with a shattered skull.

The walking corpses turned towards me, converging on my position. I took the fight to them though, refusing to let myself be overwhelmed. Skeletons and zombies are poor adversaries, at best. They have no mind, no skill, and little in the way of defense. Still, they are untiring and unaffected by wounds save for the one that damages them so thoroughly that the magic that sustains their existence can no longer function. That endurance coupled with the vast numbers against me seemed to spell my doom.

Indeed it would have, had it not been for the merchant guards and Fizzulthorp. He let loose some wailing gnomish battle cry, which sounded like the warble from a wounded badger to me, and put his sling to use, flinging rounded lead bullets at the undead. Where his missiles hit, bones were broken but the horde seemed otherwise unaffected. He threw down his sling then, realizing it availed him not, and focused instead on his magic.

The guards charged out from their makeshift bulwarks. The undead had focused on me so with them entertained thusly, several of them were felled before they began to turn their attention back to the small force of men that hacked into their flank. Still, it seemed odd to me that the majority of the undead did not heed this new threat, but instead still lusted for my blood.

Great flames erupted from the ground between me and the woods, roasting the living dead that walked through it with such heat that their putrid skin erupted and their bones burst. The wall of flames roared on, long enough from one end to the other to keep further undead from harassing us. The ones that had crossed the no-mans-land still outnumbered us by a trice, however.

So it was that I continued to lay about with my short sword and dagger, hewing into bony limb after limb. Chips of bones flew from my blades, and rotting flesh was cut asunder. My leathers were in tatters from all the clawing and grasping fingers that came at me, and no limb or large portion of my flesh escaped unscathed from the scrapes and gouges. Yet no weapon found purchase, for I kept them at bay. I seriously doubted any of the rusted and falling apart armaments the undead used would be able to injure me in the first place though.

With a cackle of homicidal glee, Fizzulthorp unleashed another spell. This one sent great sheets of flames out from his diminutive hands, further baking anything unfortunate enough to be caught in its effect. Undead fell and exploded under the heat, no longer a threat to anyone. A few caught at the edges of it pushed on towards the short evoker, their bodies burning as they walked and their bones blackened.

All of this I was only dimly aware of. My blood throbbed in my ears and my face burned hot with my wrath. I only barely avoided slaying a human guard that had gotten to close to me at one point. But watched emotionlessly as bleached white fingers wrapped around his throat from behind and tore deep spurting wounds in it. He fell at my feet, clutching at his throat and gasping for the breath that was his no longer. I growled then, and destroyed the skeleton that had slain him with a fury I did not knew I possessed. I did not care for the guard, but rather in the back of my mind I was reminded of a somewhat similar situation that had happened before. The skeleton was destroyed and eternally lifeless long before my blades stopped hacking at it.

I knew not what fate Fizzulthorp was involved in, and at the moment I did not care. As the unholy mob surrounded me I grinned fiercely. Suicidally. I relished the challenge and the confrontation. Perhaps at last it was a chance for me to find the answers to my questions.

Such was not to be. My fate was delayed for a while it seemed, for a small phalanx of four guards reached me then, and it seemed the worst of the undead horde had been destroyed. A few remained, and those I sought out with a vengeance. Finally I turned to survey the battle scene. The wall of flames was dying down at last, and on the other side no skeleton nor zombie waited. I did see the leader of the force sent against us though, if only for a brief moment. He was tall and mounted upon a steed of pure black, with flaming hooves and fire for eyes. The hellish horse snorted a jet of flames and stomped its fiery hoof on the ground in anger when I stared at it.

Upon its back was a creature wrapped in a cloak of midnight, so dark was it. Red baleful eyes stared out from beneath the hood, meeting my gaze with a hateful fury. The demonic horse stomped once again then turned and was off, riding back into the Cyprus trees and away before any of us could do anything about it. I thought to give chase but realized that, even had I a steed, my horse would be unable to keep up with the dread commander's.

One thing alone had I seen that gave me pause. It was when the beast and its rider turned to leave, I had seen the hands of the rider as they pulled on the reigns. The hands of the captain of the undead force were small. Small and of a very dark color, though with the night so full about us, I could hazard no guess as to any more details.

The remainder of the night was spent in tending the wounded and getting the wagons ready to move out as soon as dawn came. No one seemed of a mood to sleep any longer, and all of us were anxious to be on our way. All of us but me. I spent what time I could scouting the direction our attackers had come from. I was searching for signs or some clue as to what had evoked the attack. For naught it seemed.

We were underway without delay, and reached a small hamlet along the road a few hours past dawn, ere the sun reached its zenith. The usual signs and sounds of life were mysteriously absent, however. It became readily apparent that something was wrong. Gravely wrong.

A quick search started turning up answers. Those answers, in turn, opened more questions. The people were all missing, though by all appearances they had been slain in their homes or whatever place they had chosen to defend. The signs of violence and bloodshed were unmistakable. On a hunch, I wandered to the village's graveyard and found that my guess was true. Here was where some, if not all, of the undead that had besieged us had come from.

"A powerful necromancer caused this," I said after returning to where the nervous merchants and their guards were huddled. "The graveyard is empty, the graves erupted from within."

A few of the more superstitious made signs of protection while others muttered quick prayers. Fizzulthorp frowned mightily. "What makes you suspect a necromancer?" He asked me.

I blinked in surprise at him. "Walking corpses. Empty town. People appear to have died violently before disappearing… call it a hunch."

His frown deepened.

"I like this place not," One of the merchants said, a man named Berigund. "Let us be away, with haste we can make Morovia by nightfall."

The other merchants grumbled agreement, though it strained them to push their wagons and horses as hard as they must. Fizzulthorp motioned for me to follow him before saying, "Yamara and I must take our leave as well, we wish you a safe journey and good profits, friends."

Now it was my turn to frown. For the gnome to take such liberties irritated me greatly. I wondered if perhaps I would make a faster return to Standopolis on my own. Longer legs make for longer strides, after all.

For their part, the merchants expressed regret at our parting. After all, without us to aid them, the attack would probably have been successful. They wasted no time in leaving, in spite of trying to convince us to remain with them. Barely rested, they pulled out again, setting a harsh pace.

Alone with the gnome wizard, I felt it was time for me to confront him. "What was that about?" I demanded.

"I have reason to believe those undead attacked us, not the caravan," He responded, watching fondly as the last of the wagons rolled out of view around a bend in the road.

"And what reason is that?" My voice had dropped back into a colder tone. My hands edged slowly towards my weapons.

"I'm not able to say," Fizzulthorp responded calmly.

I wanted him dead at that point. Clearly he knew more then he was telling me, and where my well being was involved, that was inexcusable. My dagger was in my hand and hovering with its point fractions of an inch from his eye. "You get one chance to try again."

"Is killing me going to make things any better for you?" He asked coldly. He seemed unfazed by the threat to his mortality.

"It will make me feel better."

"The King wants to speak with you," He stated. "James and Brina left Standopolis shortly after you were sent on your mission. I don't know why, but rumor has it that James was acting oddly. Other rumors placed you as an agent of the Dark Lord's."

I cursed. It was neither quiet nor subtle. Fizzulthorp, in spite of being in my company for several days now, flinched visibly at the extent of my vocabulary. All in all, I did not like the way this was turning out. I longed for my peaceful hut back in the ruins to the south surrounded by inhuman monsters. Monsters and carnivorous animals seem such better company then people. There are no animal politicians, after all.

"I was told nothing, save that I am to convey the Kings sincere wishes that you return and that you need fear no harm or betrayal on Elendar's part," Fizzulthorp finally broke his eyes away from my steely gaze; they rested on the tip of the dagger poised a fingers breadth from his right eye.

I favored him with one last scathing glance then sheathed my dirk. Turning sharply, I walked away from him, heading to the east down the road after the wagons.

"Where are you going?" Fizzulthorp called out to me, not moving but clearly bothered by my actions.

"This way," I responded. In truth I was not entirely sure. He had not explained why he had felt the need to separate us from the caravan. I suspected he knew still more then he told me, and secrets of such nature make for poor companions. I intended to find out if the undead truly were after me, and if they were, why? Then, of course, I planned to deal with whoever wanted me dead, if that was indeed the case. So I had a plan and a map to go about it, but my map had no names and no identifiable locations on it.

Fizzulthorp had jogged after me to catch up. I ignored him; I had more then enough of the runt. He, apparently, had not had enough of me. "Yamara wait, you must come to Elendar! Please!"

I stopped and whirled to face him. I bent over and stared right in his face. "Why must I go to Elendar, gnome? Because your King says so? He is no king of mine. I choose to go where I wish. And dissembling and untruthful gnomes shall have no partnership with me!"

I had more on my mind to say to him, but words failed me when all of what he had said to me registered finally. He prepared to defend himself but was likewise silent when he saw that I was suddenly uncertain.

"What's wrong, Yamara?" He asked at length after I turned and sat down on a rock beside the rode rather roughly.

"James and Brina left Standopolis?" I breathed, unable to comprehend the words fully.

"Aye," He said, "I saw it with my own eyes. They left late at night under cover of darkness. James looked pale and not wholly well, Brina I did not see directly, but a woman was in the carriage with him."

I shook my head and closed my eyes. "That's not possible," I whispered, my memories flooding back to me of the fateful night against my wishes. Memories I was not ready to fully relive. I shut my eyes harder and forced them out, growling loudly to distract myself.

"I killed James!" I said, lunging to my feet and glaring at Fizzulthorp. I wanted to kill him too, the lying gnome. I needed to shut him up. Needed to keep him from telling me anything else that I did not want to hear.

"That would explain much," Fizzulthorp muttered, flinching and backing up a step from me defensively.

"It would, would it?" I countered angrily. "What would it explain, gnome?"

My caustic tone meant my questions were rhetoric in nature. I advanced on Fizzulthorp in the hopes of closing the range between us so that I could dispatch of him before he could get any spells off at me.

"It would explain why King Avercrombie wants you to return!" He said hastily. "If you slew James and somehow he still lives yet has left without reason, there must be more at play here then we know. The King needs to know what goes on, and why it is that James has abandoned his position and title."

"Because the murderous bastard betrayed Elendar," I hissed. "As he betrayed Brina and myself."

"What proof have you of this?" He asked, growing bolder since I had stopped advancing on him. "If Brina was betrayed, why does she travel with him?"

I closed my eyes and felt a great knot of tension, rage, and pain welling up within me. I forced it down. "Brina was slain in the same confrontation. It was a wound that could not be healed. The light had gone out of her eyes ere I left them lying on the floor of her chamber."

I opened my eyes to see Fizzulthorp looking at me with an expression on his face that I could not place. It was part disbelief, part sympathy. I think. It was an odd expression, and I was in no condition to be evaluating it reliably.

"Come back with me, Yamara, and this can be resolved. You can be at peace," He said consolingly after a moment while I battled my internal demons.

"The only peace I will have will be with James' head in my hand," I spat out. I turned then and started walking, my fury giving me strength.

"Where will you go?" Fizzulthorp asked, at once racing to fall in step beside me.

"Where has he gone?" I asked.

"James? I, uh… well, we're not sure," He admitted.

"Then I go to Dagrazt's realm."

Fizzulthorp's breath hissed between his teeth. He stopped abruptly and stared after me for a moment before he rushed forward to be at my side again. "Why the dark one? I figured this to be more of a Gneissian plot."

I pondered the possibilities of Fizzulthorp's idea. It had merit, I had to admit, for that would make my aborted mission to Gneiss that much more logical. With allies and friends in Gneiss, he could dispose of me far easier then he could in Elendar. One thing bothered me enough to disprove that option.

"I would agree with you, were it not for the fact that I killed him. Dead, totally. Brina may have merely been hovering on death's door, but James was beyond a doubt slain."

"Why does that make it impossible for Gneiss to be involved?" He asked, not understanding me.

"The only way James could be up and about is if he were undead himself, and as much as I dislike Gneissians, they are not the type to negotiate with the dead."

"A powerful Gneissian priest could have resurrected them."

I laughed scornfully. "Bring them back from the dead to life restored? Ha! A fanciful children's tale."

"Yamara," Fizzulthorp said in grave seriousness, "Gneissian priests have that power. The Gods we know of grant their individual priests more varied powers then Cymbos gives his worshippers, but their high priests have more power then ours, and among them include to ability to restore life to the dead. It is an exhausting and expensive ritual, but they can be done."

Once I accepted the possibility, it made sense to me that Fizzulthorp thought it possible that James had gone to Gneiss. After all, in the sewers he had shown as pure a hatred of orcs attacking Standopolis as any I had seen. Much more then his apparent dislike of Gneissian's. It seemed to neat to me though, and I found that it did not sit right with me. I stopped and glanced about the countryside briefly.

"No," I finally said, staring off at the path ahead of us. "James has switched over to the Dark One's side."

"How do you know this?" He insisted.

I glanced at him, the look of conviction in my features unmistakable. "I dreamed it."

His mouth open, I left him standing on the rode as I continued west again. Fizzulthorp remained standing silently, watching me go. He shook his head and started north, heading towards Morovia and a horse, then stopped and looked at me again. He cursed under his breath and hurried after me, falling silently in beside me as I continued my course.

Book 2 : Chapter 5

The trip into Dagrazt's dark realm, Mardurin, had taken Fizzulthorp and I many weeks. We took a circuitous route to confuse any potential pursuit, as well as to allow us time to be more certain of what we were doing. I had no doubts of my intended goal, but I needed information still. Both Fizzulthorp and those I queried along the way provided the substance of that information for me.

Dagrazt, more commonly known simply as the Dark One, was older then anyone could remember. It was rumored that he had existed since the before the great wars had stripped Malatoria of great civilizations. When the races had turned from science and learning to magic and religion, much as they had in ages so far past no written or oral record of them still existed.

As a side note it had also explained the strange stars to me. Apparently the power of the ancients had been so great that they had been able to create the brightly shining stars that rocketed across the night sky each night. Hundreds or more of them in the course of a night, brighter and larger then the rest but still so small that they seemed distant stars racing across the sky. They served no purpose such that I could see, but the ancients of Malatoria apparently used their powers of science at a whim for their own trivial amusements.

Dagrazt had reportedly been a great one even among the ancients. With the destruction the great wars rained down upon Malatoria many were slain and greater was the loss of knowledge. Dagrazt had seen it coming and prepared himself for it. A great amount of his learning had been saved and retained, hidden deep beneath the surface of Malatoria. In addition to maintaining the old, his embraced the new way of life as well, rising quickly in power and solidifying himself.

His powers and his following grew rapidly. He enlisted the aid of the craven, the weak, and the power hungry. Races once noble and respectable, or at least civilized, fell under his sway. Promises of greatness proved to be the chains that bound them. The sacrifice of freedom and autonomy came later.

Warped and twisted by Dagrazt's magic and his science, the minions became fey and more powerful. Dagrazt's promises became true, though in a way beyond any that they had dreamed possible. The modern races of trolls, orcs, ogres, giants, and others had been created, forever sundered from their more enlightened ancestors. It was interesting to me to learn of their creation in such a manner. On the world of my birth the story of creation had been told differently, though the evil humanoids I described were indeed created by powers so great as to be considered by Gods by those who worshipped them. This Dagrazt then, by that set of prerequisites, was qualified to be worshipped and considered a deity.

It sent shudders down my spine. To think that a man could become so powerful. I was greatly relieved to learn from my repeated prying that the place I sought, the home of the latest powerful Baron of Mardurin, lay far from the capitol. Far from Dagrazt.

My gladness was tempered by the gut wrenching sense of emptiness I felt when I learned of the rumors surrounding this Baron's consort. The descriptions of both the Baron and his mistress were halting and brief, given their mysterious nature to those we encountered, but it seemed to me that more then just James had survived our final encounter. It seemed that Brina had as well. I could not understand the how or the why of her continuing service to him. After what he had done to her - he had slain her and sundered us, after all - why did she continue to have relations with him? Something nagged at the back of my mind but I paid it no heed. I repeatedly decided that he must have some sort of magical coercion over her.

Another point that Fizzulthorp continued to remind me as we progressed was that the creatures we interrogated were largely stupid and unreliable. They were merely lackeys fit only to serve as fodder on a battlefield. We had taken to capturing small bands of patrolling orcs, goblins, and the small wiry humans that seemed native to the lands bordering Mardurin on the east. My greatest surprise lay ahead of me, yet it reminded me all to deeply of my past.

"Why do you do this?" Fizzulthorp asked me as we sat around a small campfire one night. In less then a week we stood to enter the border realms of Mardurin. With the increasing proximity his anxiety had risen steadily.

I looked at him for a long moment, studying my short companion. We had gotten along well enough, though both of us felt certain that at no point would we ever call the other a friend. This time though I knew he would not accept the same evasive techniques I had used all along to avoid his question. Perhaps it was time for me to go on alone.

"I need to kill James," I said, staring belligerently at him. I dared him to refute me.

He dared. "And I'm beardless dwarf!" He snorted. "I have learned much of you in our time together, Yamara. Enough to know more about you then you would have known. Forget not that I am your elder by nearly 50 years. We gnomes age slower then you humans."

I shrugged. I had no intention of letting him bother me. Or at least letting him know he bothered me. "That means I am younger and faster, gnome. And as you have seen, very capable."

He snorted. "You behave as a child. Listen to me for once, instead of hiding behind that adolescent swagger you cling to so preciously."

I bristled. It was definitely time for me to part company with the pretentious wizard.

"You don't care about James," he continued, ignoring my dark expression. "You are after something else. I have known you enough to know that a person like James, even having wronged you as you claim he has, does not get this sort of special attention from you. You do not forgive. You do not forget. But neither are you foolish enough to cross hundreds of leagues merely for the sake of proving a point."

I stood up and turned, intent upon leaving. The fool of a gnome knew nothing about me. I whirled back on him then, speaking with barely controlled fury. "What do you know of hate, runt? What do you know of vengeance? My mother was a whore killed by a patron. It took me a decade to find him and kill him."

Fizzulthorp nodded, not breaking contact with my eyes. "I am sorry for you, Yamara. Sorry to see you touched so young by pain and hatred. I see that you have known little else. It saddens me. I hope you can open yourself up to the joys that life can offer before your hatred gets you killed. Or worse."

That condescending bastard gnome. My hands were clenched and the color drained from my cheeks. Pity? I did not need his pity! I was done with him. I would have slain him then and there for his manner with me save that he had been the one to tell me about James' and, presumably, Brina's continuing existence. So I turned about yet again and took my first step towards Mardurin.

What bothered me the most was that he was right. I hated to admit it. Hated it more then I hated him, at that moment. Yet it was true. I was, at best, a coward. I was running from what he said. Running from the truth. I had done so before, justifying my actions to myself when the simple truth lay before me. Nay, not truth, fact. Truth varies by perspective. Fact remains constant.

"He took something from me." I turned around and looked back at him. He seemed a little surprised. Good. I was too.

"What?" Fizzulthorp asked, recovering after only a moment of silence. "What could possibly be worth the quest you give yourself?"

"If you know me so well, mage, then you tell me," I spat out at him. I headed back to the fire and picked up the small pack I had bought a few weeks past to store some of the more common items I needed for traveling a long time in the wilderness. In my rush a few moments past I had forgotten all about it. Stupid and careless. I needed to be much more careful.

"Leaving?" Fizzulthorp asked again after I had put the pack on and slipped my cloak over it. It made me look as though I had a hunched back.

"Yes, I tire of your company," I said, giving him a look that told him what I thought of him.

"Very well," he responded, not moving. He was silent a moment before he continued. "Here then is my final lesson to you about the Dark One's realm. It is a realm much like any other, such as Elendar. He is the Lord supreme of it all, yet each area is run by a lesser Lord. James is known to his vassals as Baron Palungol, for the barony of Palungol lies in the northern reaches of Mardurin.

"Head west and north and you will reach it, barring discovery or capture by the hordes of orcs, trolls, ogres, giants and giant-kin, fallen humans, or scores of other evil minions of the Dark One. The barony you will enter first is known as Emmerdwim. It's lord is Baron Ssythanduras, a powerful lizardman with skills at both sorcery and priestly magic. Much of Emmerdwim is a swamp, with some drier areas housing settlements of various races.

"They varied races serving the Dark One may live in relative peace, but know that there is no prosperity. They constantly vie for power and hate each other only slightly less then they hate those not of their fate. Your blond hair and height, though normal for a human, will mark you as different from the Havrin. The Havrin are human as well, but as you have seen from those we have avoided or captured, they are smaller and darker of build and hair."

I nodded. The gnome did indeed seem possessed of an unusual amount of knowledge. Then again, he was a wizard. They made a habit of knowing as much as possible. On the world of my birth gnomes typically made poor wizards. Usually those that pursued such a route became parlor magicians, thrilling people with minor illusions and works of divination. Fizzulthorp was no such court jester.

"My thanks then, gnome," I said stiffly. "Now go from here and return to Elendar. Tell King Avercrombie that when my task is done, perhaps then I shall return to him. Perhaps."

"I think I will wait nearby for word of your quest," Fizzulthorp said, ignoring me. I fought back the scowl and simply shrugged instead. I had more important things ahead of me then worrying about the rebellious magician.

Book 2 : Chapter 6

The countryside had gotten steadily more foreboding as Fizzulthorp and I had gone west. Here a fey looking tree, there a dark cave with an aura of evil around it. Now, three days since my parting from the gnome, I could tell that I journeyed towards a realm in which sunlight and pleasant thoughts had little sway.

The undergrowth of the woods, jungles really, that I traveled through prevented me from taking anything but the most direct paths. Even the runways of deer and smaller woodland creatures were absent, as well as the sounds from birds, squirrels and the like. What the jungle did seem to have was snakes. Spiders as well; the large and unpleasant sort. Some as large as my hand, not counting their spread of their spindly legs. The snakes had a variety of coloring and sizes, and I imagined virtually every one of them possessed poison lethal to young, blond, determined women. Perhaps others as well, but I was more concerned with my own well being.

I drew the hood up on my cloak, hiding my blond hair as best I could. I regretted that I had not taken more time to prepare myself, for I had learned early in my training with the Ossulmere the art of disguise. A properly prepared mixture would leave my hair darkened for days. Alas that I had no such mixture nor time to experiment with the local roots and insects to make one like it.

The trail I was taking joined with others to form a road. Somewhat indistinct at first, it broadened soon enough. I passed a few wagons heading either west or east, as well as people who journeyed both on foot and horse. None paid me any attention, save to avoid running into me in the case of other walkers. They were all likewise cloaked and concealed, minding their own business and wishing others to do the same.

On my fourth and fifth day on my own I noticed that the land had been imperceptibly sloping upwards. Now it did so more noticeably. Then, midway through my fifth day the road peaked. It leveled off briefly before plunging back down. And plunge seemed the correct word, though its angle was not so acute as to cause undue trouble to mounts of draft animals.

The descending road turned into a small rift or valley as the walls rose around it. Gentle slopes turned into more pronounced rocky walls the further the road went. Soon it became obvious that, though the canyon had been natural at one point, it had been widened by tools and manual labor.

Near nightfall the fist leg of my journey was ended. I entered the outskirts of a ramshackle town. It was surrounded on all sides save one by towering cliffs. That one side was equally menacing, however, for it contained a swamp so dark and filled with gloom, even ere the sun had set, that I could feel the vile nature of the things within it.

I quickly found a tavern and ducked into it, hoping to secret myself away in a corner and pick up what information I could learn with the simple art of eavesdropping. Many a thing that should go unsaid can be learned in such a manner, especially when alcohol loosens the tongue of those that know better. Boastful pillow talk is another method of learning privied information, but I would resort to that in only the most desperate of cases, concerning the nature of the townsfolk.

The inhabitants consisted of a varied mix of Havrin and lizardfolk, with a few other unsightly beings tossed in here and there such as orcs, trolls, and ogres. Almost without exception every one of them seemed unwashed and exceptionally dirty. In any other world, for any other person, it would have been a mother's nightmare for her daughter to be in such a place. Fortunately for me, I had no worries about my mother having any such qualms.

The tavern itself was dimly lit. Humanoid races had little need for light, their eyes having long ago adjusted for their nocturnal activities. The humans within made no complaint though, they simply adjusted as well. Besides, the gloom suited either their actions or their moods.

I watched and listened quietly for several minutes from my table, with my back to a wall. It was no corner table, but in a place such as that those were always the first to go. Finally I caught noticed of a man sitting at a table who would glance at me from time to time. A few others sat with him, exchanging words briefly, sometimes an item or a few coins as well. Always the transactions were concealed and well hidden from a casual glance. Mine was never casual.

After a break in the more or less steady stream of people paying him a visit, he looked at me for a relatively long moment before getting up from his table. He approached me slowly, yet with no hesitation. "You're not from around here," he said when he reached my table.

I stared at him blankly. The cowl of my cloak his my features well enough that I knew my expression to be even less readable then it normally is. Inside I cursed, and my right hand, which was under the table, flexed in anticipation of drawing the dagger I had concealed in a special sheath on the inside of my forearm.

"May I?" He inquired, his hand going to the back of a chair. I nodded, wishing that I had been able to get a table closer to the door. Instead all I had nearby as a means of egress was a shuttered window some six feet away.

After seating himself, he reached over slowly towards my face with his hand. His hair was as dark and curly as that of all the other Havrin I had seen thus far, but his skin seemed lighter. His features were not so sharp either. A half-breed, I was certain. No doubt his mother had been a poor helpless human captured by some raiding party and made a slave by his father. Based on my suspicion, I did not know whether I should pity the woman or be disgusted at her inability to at the very least take her own life to escape her slavery.

Then again, was my own past really so different? I sold myself into slavery with the Ornithrym, and simply bided my time and endured until events transpired to change my life. I had not known of a better way. Perhaps his mother was the same way. Stupidity and pacifism are crimes against free will and human nature; a lack of education, however, is merely an absence of opportunity.

I watched his hand approach and I carefully measured my breathing to keep it even. I was being tested, I suspected, though for what and how to properly pass the test was beyond me. Finally the hand was within inches of my face and I was on the verge of slapping it away with the edge of a dagger. Then he stopped. He twisted his wrist a little and brought my attention to what he held in his hand. My gaze had been settled on his eyes, staring into them and showing nothing. Now I realized that I had been stupid and careless yet again. He held between his fingers a small lock of my golden hair that had slipped out of my hood. I waited for him to raise some alarm. At any other time I would have already bolted, but his calm manner kept me foolishly seated, waiting.

"You should keep that out of site," He said, smirking. "Not to many people around here with hair that color. Those that do usually come looking for something, but what finds them is rarely what they are looking for."

I reached up and took my hair from his hand with my own, tucking it back into my hood and out of sight. "What do you want?" I asked, hoping that my hammering heart did not betray me. I was surrounded by enemies, clearly with my head in the lions maw.

"I want to know what a pretty thing like you is doing in an ugly place like this?" He countered.

I sneered and mutter, "Not so pretty."

He shrugged and said with a wry grin. "Look around you, consider the alternatives."

I nearly chuckled at that. This man, be he evil or not, had a sense of humor I could at least appreciate. I had learned that it often a most telling factor about a person is their sense of humor. It is the first and perhaps most important lock on the door to their soul.

"I wish to purchase passage to Emmerdwym," I offered, having already suspected that this smuggler had many hidden agendas, but none so important as serving himself.

He glanced about then looked back at me. He nodded and stood up. "Follow me."

I stayed seated. I was no fool. I had no reason to rush blindly into some trap. For all I knew he was Dagrazt's bosom buddy and therefore leading me into a trap. Or perhaps James had left agents hidden along the way to ensnare me.

When he saw that I had no intention of following him he scowled. "Dammit wench, this is no place for you to be speaking of such things. Half the creatures in here are agents of one power or another, and the other half would simply turn you in hoping for a reward… after having satisfied themselves with you."

"And what of you?" I asked suspiciously.

"I'm part of the first half," he said after a short moment of thought.

Honesty in the face of irrefutable fact is no less worthy of suspicion then a lie. Still, my options were limited and if I at least got out of the inn I would have a much better chance of escape, should things turn out as I feared they would. I nodded and stood up to follow him. My hand remained clenched and curled in, with the nearly invisible string around my finger that led back to the hidden sheath on my forearm stretched so taught that it was nearly at the breaking point. When the string broke the dagger hidden with the sheath would slide into my palm with either the aid of gravity or a flick of my wrist. My own invention that had saved me many a time back in my more dubious days. And of course, I had one on each wrist.

The man led me out of the tavern and back into the town. We passed through a few streets when he veered towards a dark alley filled with refuse. I was reminded of my childhood before the coming of the Ornithrym at first. I stopped and said, "No. No allies. I'll not let myself be set up that easily."

He turned and looked at me. "This is no game you play, bitch! My life is at stake merely for not turning you in, and your life is the least of your worries in a place such as this!"

I turned and walked away from him, scanning everything about me even quicker and more acutely then normal. I expected soldiers to burst from every building at any moment, converging upon me. I searched for a way out, but the closest avenue that resembled escape led towards the swamp. Now that night had fallen, it took on an even more ominous look.

A hand grabbed my left elbow, pulling me to a stop. I used the momentum to swing myself around, my dagger sliding into my right hand neatly. Up and across my hand came, slice deeply into and through his throat. I reversed the grip on my knife as soon as the cut was made, preparing to plunge into his chest if he needed further convincing.

He stumbled back a step, his breath exploding out in a surprised grunt. Instead it merely burst out of the rent in his throat,, spattering blood all over me. His hand went to his throat as his face took on a terrified expression. Death was moments away for him, and it was unavoidable.

He reached into his shirt quickly, scrambling desperately for something. I suspected he was up to no good and was determined to turn me in even at the last few moments of his life. I stayed my thrust though, on a sudden twitch of instinct. What if I had made a mistake in killing him?

His hand came out with the last thing I had expected to see. It was a S.E.T. badge, like the one I still possessed. He fiddled around with the clasp on the back of it, his fingers moving erratically as the blood that fed oxygen to his brain was no longer available. He fell to his knees then, but managed to accomplish what he was trying to do. I saw nothing out of the ordinary, but felt for the briefest moment a powerful tingling sensation caress my skin. Then it was over. He stayed there kneeling for a moment longer, with his head bent towards the ground.

Then he looked back up at me. His eyes were filled with fury. He stood up, his throat made whole once again, though scarred now, by some magic I did not know existed. He looked around and opened his mouth to speak. A strangled gasp came out, which led to a coughing fit. He spat some blood on the ground a few times then regarded me again. If anything, he looked even angrier.

"Do not try that again!" He said, his voice menacing and raw. He grabbed my arm again and this time, I let him lead me. We moved towards the swamp this time, which surprised me. He still coughed and spat out blood occasionally on our short journey. I kept my dagger at the ready, though I had it partially concealed in my hand by holding the hilt backwards, with the blade tucked up against my wrist.

We arrived at the edge of the swamp, where several small piers stood with skiffs, rafts, and canoes tied to them. He moved down the row, towing me along none to gently, until he reached what I guessed to be his canoe. He pushed me towards it and grunted. I climbed into it and sat down at the far end, my superior dexterity allowing me to balance easily in the unsteady vessel. He climbed in after me and untied it from the dock. Taking up a paddle, he pushed off and began to row us out into the swamp.

My back was facing the front of the canoe at the moment, so I was spared the terrifying view of the vastness of the dark swamp that we were entering. The haunting moss and vines hanging from the trees, as well as the sickly plants and weeds that grew out of the fey looking waters around us. Here and there small islands existed, from whence most of the trees took root, but their shores looked more like quicksand then stable ground.

After several steady minutes of paddling my "guide" put his paddle inside the boat and regarded me. His anger had abated only a little, from the look on his face.

"Who are you?" He asked at last, after obviously discarding several other less polite questions.

I wondered how many more times he could heal a mortal wound. The fact that he had not turned me in to the powers-that-be had not been lost on me, however, and I wondered if perhaps my latent gut instinct to not finish him off earlier may have been right.

"I am looking for something someone took from me," I answered. It always pays to be careful.

"By the Gods! Listen up, wench," he spat out at me, "this is my world you are in now. This swamp here? Nobody knows it like I do! Already we are so far removed from Harthag that without me to guide you back you would never find it. And this swamp? Things live in this swamp that are to be feared far more then anything back in Harthag. Things that would delight in eating your flesh while you still lived. If you want to live through this, then answer my questions!"

I glanced around, noting that as careful as I had been, he was right. I had no idea how to get back to the small village we had just left. Harthag, if I understood him correctly. I nodded to him. "Alright, you can call the shots for now."

He snorted and looked out over the water for a moment. Then he looked back at me. "You are Yamara, aren't you?"

I nodded again. A chill went down my spine though. If this man knew who I was, what other even more unpleasant surprises awaited me.

"I've been waiting for you for well over a year. Earl James sent me word that you would be arriving with the cover story of trying to insinuate yourself into the Dark One's armies. According to him though, you were a traitor and that I should kill you as soon as I saw you."

Suddenly, things began snapping into place. James had not merely been trying to get me out of his hair so he could have his way with Brina, but he had been planning on making certain that I never returned. But at the time he also needed to be sure I did not give away any Elendar's secrets I knew under torture or willingly.

"Why didn't you kill me then?" I asked, reaching for more understanding.

"You never showed up. That meant that either you had been captured already or you had taken a different path," he said. He took up the paddle and began making smooth even strokes once again. "Then I learned about Earl James' disappearance. Shortly thereafter came word of Baron Palungol's sudden rise from obscurity into power. I did some checking and the similarities between Earl James and Baron Palungol are to many to dismiss."

"By the way, I am Evart," he offered.

I nodded but said nothing. I was busy piecing things together.

"What caused James to betray his King?" Evart asked. "It makes no sense, there was never a man more in love with Elendar then he. No man who's loyalty was less questioned. The circumstances involving you at the same time tell me you must know what could have caused this."

"Love is a dangerous thing," I responded, staring over the waters into the gloom. I did not want to meet his gaze right then, for I was dealing with my own confused emotions.

He left me alone for a while, perhaps sensing my need for privacy. Finally I blinked and nodded to myself. My resolve had been reestablished. My will was hardened and my course dedicated once again. "My… sister," I began, stumbling over the words. "James fell in love with her the moment he saw her, I think. Yet we shared a special bond that would not permit him to possess her. He tried again and again to send me out on suicidal missions, yet I returned always. My sister became confused as he spent more time with her and I was gone more. On the eve of the day I was to leave for Mardurin, I had finally determined what James' plans were, and I went to her to plead with her to flee with me from Elendar. Mardurin was the last place I wished to go.

"She was confused then, for James' silvery words had poisoned her thinking much by then. She hesitated and in that moment James burst into the room from a hidden passage he had been using all along to spy upon us. James and I fought then, for he tried then and there to turn my sister against me."

I paused, fighting back a lump in my throat as my mind raced ahead of my words, remembering the event for what must have been the thousandth time, if not more. "I had him beat, and he knew it. He was wounded and could not stop me. He grabbed up my sister then, and held his knife to her throat. He whispered sweet things into her ear and told me to leave. Told me that she would be safe with him only if I were gone.

"She saw then the truth behind things, I think. She and I struck out at him at the same time, but she was too slow in escaping. His knife did its work on her, ruining forever her beautiful life. I…" I had to pause, my voice was caught in my throat as I remembered holding Brina in my arms and seeing her eyes close. After I finally admitted my love for her and watched myself lose her forever.

"I escaped from the palace then, and from Elendar in general." I looked at him squarely, daring him to challenge me. "No pursuit came, and that surprised me. Not until a year later did news reach me that James had escaped. An impossible task, given that I had slain him most surely."

I laughed bitterly then. "Slain him as surely as I had slain you, I suppose!"

Evart cracked a tight lipped smile. "Nearly did, a fine swipe with that dagger, if ever I saw one."

"How did you survive?" I asked, hoping to find out how many more uses that pin had.

"Every S.E.T. badge can be used in such a way once," Evart explained, putting his paddle aside and taking out his badge to show it to me. "There is a sequence of gems on the back of it that when pushed in such a sequence," he showed me the sequence without really thinking about what he was doing, "causes the magic of the item to be released in a healing spell powerful enough to mend a single mortal wound."

"Good thing I did not follow up on it then," I muttered, thinking about how closely I had come to plunging my dagger into his breast after my initial slash.

"Aye!" he nodded, his hand going to the freshly pink scar on his throat.

I thought about my own S.E.T. badge hidden amongst my belongings and wondered if it too would do such a thing for me, should I need it. When I was away from Evart I would have to examine it more carefully to try and determine if it were possible. If it was, then it would be a great magical boon to have with me.

"This sister of yours," he said, his tone cautious, "does she have hair the color of polished Dwarven gold and a beauty so great as to be terrifying?"

I had never thought of Brina that way, but I could see the resemblance. Especially if she had fallen sway to James and his new Dark Lord. I nodded and said, "Perhaps, though never before was her beauty anything but innocent and pure."

"Then yes, Baron Palungol is most assuredly Duke James. And his consort, Mistress Palungol, must be her."

Something inside of me rejoiced. Brina yet lived. Impossible, but somehow it had happened. Then that spark began to die as I realized how she now stood aligned. She was openly James' consort, and therefore, a servant of Dagrazt. A wave of despair crashed over me, threatening to overwhelm me.

I closed my eyes and let my head sag. All of my fears and nightmares from the past year crashed into and over me, like storm laden waves breaking upon a harbor wall. I fought only to remember to keep my head above the proverbial water so that I could breathe.

I looked back up at long last. No single tear had escaped, but the dam had been near to bursting. My eyes were surely red in spite of it. I thanked again the hood on my cloak for shadowing my face from Evart, though he now seemed genuine. Looks tend to deceive, however.

What was not in the least bit deceptive was the spiny ridges moving silently through the water behind us. My eyes widened as I realized it was not merely a submerged log we had avoided but instead the sinuous back of a carnivorous swamp dwelling creature. Before I could open my mouth to warn Evart, the beast burst from the water. It towered over our canoe by eight or nine feet, with the majority of its reptilian body hidden beneath the surface of the swamp.

My dagger, momentarily forgotten, was flying towards the things head. It had opened its many fanged mouth and began a plunge that would result in Evart losing a good portion of his upper torso, had my dagger not pierced its meaty tongue and pinned it to the bottom of its jaw. The fateful lunge aborted, it roared angrily and shook its head ferociously. My dagger went flying out into the swamp, lost forever.

Evart had reacted by this time, and twisted about in his seat to see what threatened him. He cursed and called out to me, "Aim for its eyes!"

Considering the look of its scaly hide, I had already decided to try something just like that. Problem was, I did not want to lose any more of my daggers. Sure, I had a lot of daggers, but where I was going it did not look like I would have much of a chance to replenish the ones I lost. So, I stood up in the canoe and drew my shortsword. That got the critter's attention.

Evart cursed again and scrambled to get out his own weapon, a crude looking broadsword he had stashed in the bottom of the canoe. The swamp thing lunged at me that time, its own blood dripping off its jaw. I did not relish the thought of my blood mingling with it. Evart acted at the best possible time, slamming his broadsword into the slightly less scaly hide of the creatures underside. It distracted the creature enough that I was able to jump out of the canoe and hook one arm around one of the thick spines sticking out of the creatures back.

I swung myself up onto its back, wishing I had some climbing hooks in my boots to help me stay seated on the back of the giant snake-like thing. Below me, I saw that my leap out of the canoe had sent Evart tumbling out of it, as well as capsizing it. I hoped, for his sake, that the swamp was not too deep and that worse creatures did not dwell under the water.

The beast that I rode reared its head back, trying to throw me off of it. I clung to it tightly, refusing to budge from its slimy skin. Realizing it could not be rid of me that way, the overgrown snake plunged into the water, thrashing about and moving through it with a speed that terrified me. I held my breath and clung to it tightly, ignoring the disgusting feel of the muck filled water all around me. Soon enough my exertions to hold on were taking their toll. I was running out of air and still the creature refused to surface. I dared not open my eyes for fear of what the water had in it.

Remembering my sword, I clung to the spine in my left hand tightly and poked about blindly with my shortsword in my right hand. Feeling a soft spot that doubled with a spasm beneath me, I plunged the sword in as deeply as I could. It sank in with few obstructions, almost all the way to the hilt before I felt the tip of my sword grate off bone. Beneath me, the snake spasmed anew, convulsing uncontrollably. It began rolling as well, and I knew that one way or another my place was no longer with it.

I let go and swam desperately away from the dying creature, hoping that I was swimming towards the surface as well. Instead, I crashed headfirst into a tree, stunning myself enough that I let the air burst out of my lungs. I managed to keep from breathing in any water, but had a hard time remembering to surface. Only through blind luck did I happen to nearly be at the surface already. I felt up the tree and grabbed some of the roots, pulling myself up out of the water and only then letting myself breathe.

"Yamara!"

I heard Evart's call only after breathing rapidly for several minutes and trying to recover from my ordeal. I could not make him out in the dark, and instead I clung to the roots of the tree.

"Over here!" I called back, trying not to yell to loudly but hoping it was loud enough for him to find me.

Find me he did, after several more minutes. He clung to the canoe and pushed it as he swam, but it remained upside down. I chuckled at the sight of it and pushed off the tree, helping him steer it towards a muddy island nearby. We managed to make our way through the muck surrounding the island and right the boat. Rather then climbing back into it though, Evart climbed up one of the trees and came back down with several dead and broken off twigs and pieces of moss.

"A fire? Out here?" I asked him, thinking it rather stupid to announce our presence.

"Aye, trust me, you'll soon see why."

I shrugged and let him build the fire. It was a long time in coming, but soon enough it brightened up our makeshift campsite. As soon as Evart was satisfied with the fire, he stood up straight and began to take his clothing off.

"Check me and I will check you," he grunted, pulling a leech off of his chest.

I raised my eyebrows. Modesty had never been a problem for me, but once again I thought it an odd place to risk being virtually defenseless, especially with the fire acting as a beacon to anyone looking for us. Seeing the leeches that were on his well toned body convinced me otherwise, however. Large and ugly, they covered his skin and sucked hungrily at him. I shuddered at the thought of all of them on me. In a matter of seconds I was standing in front of him, naked.

We went to work on each other quickly. I plucked the leeches off of Evart where he could not reach them, including a couple that had secreted themselves in places he probably did not want me sticking my fingers. That made two of us, as far as I was concerned. I was not covered as badly as he was, though that still left me as an all-you-can-eat buffet for the bloodsuckers. Evart returned the favor to me, freeing my back and legs and unmentionable areas. Finished at last Evart opened his mouth to say something the made a face of pure revulsion. His hand went up to his mouth and a few seconds later he was pulling a leach out that had managed to attach itself to the inside of his cheek.

"Gah! Damned things will go anywhere! They especially love getting into whatever opening they can, blood flows better there."

I nodded thoughtfully, it made sense. Fortunately I had never had my mouth open under water so they could not get in there. I noticed Evart glancing thoughtfully at my hips then, and I figured that in spite of recent events, he was behaving like a man again. Then I realized he had a troubled expression on his face, as though he was having a hard time trying to figure out how to say something.

With a jolt of terror, I realized what it was he was trying to say. The leeches tried to get into whatever opening they could. Whatever available orifice. The color drained from my face at the thought of a leech inside of me. My hands flew to myself and I began a very thorough inspection, completely ignoring Evart standing less then four feet away from me looking on expertly. Relieved, I found nothing.

I shook the chills off and regarded Evart again, who was now smirking. I scowled at him and picked up my clothes, going through them to make sure no leeches remained trapped in them.

"I was right, you know," He said, doing the same to his own clothing.

"What?" I asked, not paying him any attention now that I was once again donning my clothing.

"You are a pretty thing."

I scowled at him anew and continued putting my wet clothing back on. The cloak I hung on a branch to dry. Evart did the same and soon we sat by the fire, letting ourselves dry before resuming our trek.

"Well, we can start over again," he said after a shared moment of thoughtful silence. "Now you've managed to kill me and save my life, so you've broke even."

I chuckled. He had a point. "Where are we going?" I asked.

"I thought you needed to go to Emmerdwym?" He asked.

I thought about it. Did I? Was there any point to my quest anymore? Was Brina lost to me forever, or was there still hope? Did I still care enough to try to find out? Ultimately I realized I had chosen my course already, I had to see it through.

"I stay my course," I said to myself as much as Evart. "If it is too late for Brina, then it is not too late for James."

"Not to late? For what?" Evart asked, surprised at my statement.

"Not to late to make sure he stays dead this time."

He widened his eyes then nodded. I did not really care what he thought, but I was pleased anyhow that he saw my goal and agreed.

Evart tossed a fresh log in the fire and said, "At first light, we leave for Emerdwym."

Book 2 : Chapter 7

I awoke to a nightmare of giving birth to a giant leech. It left me with a cold shiver that would not leave me for several minutes. I had taken the first watch to be certain that I had not bumped my head overly hard on the tree; Evart now looked over as I stretched away the last of the unpleasant dream and stood up.

The swamp looked much as before, though with the faint light of an approaching Dawn it seemed less hospitable then ever. What promised to be an overcast sky finished off the grim scenery. As I glanced about our surroundings the prior night rushed through my head. Or at least, my disclosure to Evart regarding Brina and James. I expected to feel some trepidation or regret about telling him so much, but to my surprise, I found none of those emotions. Instead I found more questions.

"Tell me then, who now leads the Special Elendarian Task force?" I asked him.

Evart stared at me for a long moment, clearly debating where his loyalties lie and whether or not he should divulge such information. At the last he decided to be open. "Duke James former right hand man, Baron Paul, now runs the Elendarian Intelligence Agency."

I looked at him with raised eyebrows. "Does nobody stay dead in this world?" My tone was incredulous. I was amazed at what he said.

"What do you mean?" He asked me, clearly interested.

"Brina, my sister, slew him months before I killed James."

"You are sure of this?"

I nodded. "I stood from me to you away from him when she snapped his neck. Rifled through his belongings myself. Not a pulse, not a breath. As surely slain as a man can be without being entombed as well."

Evart cursed. "Word must be returned to Elendar of these happenings. And not through the network, you must return there!"

I chuckled. "In good time, Evart. There are things that I must do first."

"If what you say is true and that you have slain these men before yet still they live, perhaps your quest is in vain. Your goals might be better served to return and root out the source of evil there!"

I began gathering up my things, my will more determined then ever. "If you wish to put a stop to the source of evil in men, then you must first destroy their free will."

Evart fell silent, noting my determination. Finally he sighed. "Very well, let us be off then."

Camp was broken and our now dried equipment was repacked and stashed back aboard the canoe. "Do you know how to paddle?" He asked me. I just nodded.

Then we were off, paddling through the swamp and heading towards the Emmerdwym. Time and distance seemed to pass slowly, with the hidden sun slowly warming the fen around us, sweat began to run down our skin.

"What was that creature I slew yesterday?" I asked him after a couple of hours of silence had passed between us. Only the sound of the paddles dipping in the water and our breathing as we stroked through the thick waters had surrounded us.

"A bogwyrm," Evart responded without preamble. "Some say them twisted cousins of dragons, though they boast no intelligence above that of a snakes cunning."

I nodded from the front of the canoe, my curiosity sated. Silence again resumed between us, save for the occasional guidance from Evart as to which way I should paddle. We remained that way for a few more hours, until the soon had passed its zenith. No more sign of attack came to us, though I saw many predatory eyes regard us off in the distance. Mostly snakes and crocodiles, though both larger then any I had seen before.

We stopped early that day, with at least three hours of the half-light that constituted daytime in the eternal bog remaining. Evart explained it away as us having made more progress then he had anticipated, and that to progress further at night was not wise. So instead we set up a cold camp and went about checking and rechecking our equipment.

"Do you think we are being watched?" I asked him while we quietly went over our gear. I had felt no prying eyes, but I considered it highly likely that our presence had not only been noted, but actively sought out.

Evart just shrugged. "I know this swamp as well as any, I have seen no signs of pursuit."

"With James and Paul now working for Dagrazt, don't you think it likely that your position here was long ago compromised? My money says you live under intense scrutiny from one day to the next."

Evart scowled. "Say not the Dark One's name so close to his realm, you will draw his attention!" Then after glaring at me for a moment he sighed and let out a mirthless chuckle. "Perhaps. Or perhaps I have switched sides as well? Why stop with merely James? Perhaps I am leading you into a trap? Or perhaps you are one of the enemies followers after all, sent here with a story so unbelievable I would be forced to accept it, only to lead me to a trap that would deliver me unto the inquisitioners of the Dark One?"

I shared his dark chuckle. "Fair enough. Though I think the last most unlikely, considering my cut." Evart's hand went to the new scar on his throat thoughtfully. He shrugged his shoulders and grinned.

"True. That leaves it more likely that I am going to great lengths to deliver you to Baron and Mistress Palungol."

I scowled at the mention of Brina in such a way, though I must admit that all evidence clearly showed my reaction to be unfair. "Moreso considering your racial heritage," I pointed out.

Evart sighed. He stared off into the quickly approaching dusk long enough that I considered him to be avoiding my unspoken question. At long last though, he spoke, catching me almost by surprise.

"As a child my mother was part of a group of Gneissian's on a holy pilgrimage. Unbeknownst to them, a great battle had taken place to the south of them, at a gate in the great wall surrounding Gneiss north of Mardurin. Back in the days before King Mordrim had led his people to take up the mountains west of the Barony of Tyusk.

"The gate lay a smoking ruin, blasted apart by unholy magic and the combined might of ogre-kin. Their purpose was a simple one, a raiding party to show the Gneissian's they were not safe and that their zealous disbelief served only to make them unprepared for the realities of the world."

Evart stopped, recalling the stories his mother had told him long ago. "My mother was captured when this raiding party had overtaken the pilgrims. She watched her own mother raped countless times by inhuman things before at long last her will to live was broken and her tortured body would support her no longer. Still they used her, though she felt the pain never again. Her father, a priest himself, refused to fight. Instead he called upon the aid of Cymbos to protect them all. The aid Cymbos gave him was far from enough. The last my mother saw of her father was him trying to pull his own entrails from the mouths of the great wolves of Mardurin."

I admit, I was impressed. It was the beginning of a good story, true or not.

"So then your mother was raped, but managed to escape before she could be slain?"

Evart shook his head. "No, she was young and pure. She was to be taken back to Mardurin for worse things. On their triumphant return, the evil force was tracked and assaulted by a special unit of Gneissians trained to be not so blind in their beliefs as the common soldier. They were outnumbered greatly, but they attacked by surprise and had routed the evil party.

"The small company that laid claim to my mother fled south, hurrying over the mountains to reach the safe borders of their dark demesne. Instead they chanced upon a small company of Elendarian's. A S.E.T. group, in fact. Amongst their number was none other then Mordrim, ere he returned to his people, as well as the legendary elven heroine, Tarala Redmoon. Gildor, the soon to be renowned Elendarian pathfinder led their troop. Their final member is perhaps known to you now by the name of General Andres."

I was surprised. Andres had not looked to be anything overly skilled or dangerous to me when I had seen him in the Elendarian palace. Then again, he was old now, compared to back when he was in his prime.

"Outnumbered more then 5 to 1, they nevertheless gave battle. Tarala's sorcery and archery began the furor, with Gildor's keen eyes and bow the only weapon able to surpass the elven maiden. By the time Mordrim and Andres reached my mothers captors their ranks had been decimated twice over. Tarala and Gildor took up their swords and joined them, cutting a swath through their ranks. In several minutes the battle was over and my mother rescued."

"Of all of them, it was Mordrim who took care of my mother the best. They were returning from a great mission in which they had retrieved a ancient Dwarven artifact that Mordrim wielded with great pride."

"All well and good, but Gneissian's do not resemble you hardly at all. A good story though," I said to him.

"I'm not finished," he rebuked me with a glare. "My mother became an agent of Elendar, never again to have anything to do with Gneiss. One of her missions, many years later, put her as a spy near Mardurin. She was required to seduce an agent of the Dark One, and in the process of doing so, I was conceived. I was born near this land, the son of a Havrin war leader. Because of me it was many years before my mother could escape, for she refused to leave me behind."

"And that, essentially, is why I am part Havrin and able to blend in so well down here. I know their ways because I lived as one of them for the beginning of my life. I speak the languages down here, and were it not for my mother's secret teachings to me, I would be your enemy."

"Perhaps you still are," I said, smiling faintly to show that I was not accusing him so much as teasing him. "Where is your mother now?"

"Dead, of course. In our escape from the tribe of Havrin my father was the chief of, she took a wound that became infected. She languished for weeks, but we returned all the way to Elendar before at long last she succumbed to her wounds. I was 13 years old." Evart looked at me, daring me to challenge him further. I took him at face value for the moment, but let myself be swayed not at all towards giving him any of my trust. After all, it was a good story.

An uncomfortable silence descended between us, something I was very unaccustomed to. Silence is normally very comfortable to me, even if I am around somebody else who does not find it so comforting. It was a very odd feeling.

Evart ended it abruptly by standing up and looking about us. I remained seated, but glanced about suspiciously, wondering if he could have picked up on something that I missed. Sensing nothing, I looked at him questioningly.

"We have no food," he reminded me. When our canoe had been dumped during the fight with the bogwyrm all of our food had either fallen into the swamp or been thoroughly soaked and ruined by the brackish water. Our skins of water remained safely sealed and nearly full, and I had some trail rations stored safely away in my magical pouch, but those were for emergency purposes. As yet, I did not feel as though we were in an emergency. Nor did I want Evart to know any more about my belongings then necessary.

I rose as well now, my stomach grumbling silently at the sudden realization that we had not eaten all day. "What is safe to eat in this place?" I asked him, considering the nature of the foul waters surrounding us.

"Stay here and get a small fire going, I will find something for us."

I watched him suspiciously as he went to the canoe and fished around in it until he found what he was looking for. He pulled out a short bow and strung it with a string he had sealed away within a small bone tube. He climbed into the canoe and paddled slowly away from our island next, with me staring at him all the while. He gave a smile and a wave and then disappeared behind some trees.

I scowled. I was now stranded on a small muddy island with only a few trees for cover. Not only that, but there was nothing stopping him from going and fetching whatever allies he may have nearby and coming back to capture or kill me. I cursed in a most unladylike fashion and looked about my impromptu prison for something to use.

Seeing nothing of immediate use, I scaled one of the moss covered trees and began gathering twigs and branches to make a fire. While up there, I was so busy chastising myself for letting Evart slip away so easily that I did not notice my sudden companion. Did not notice it until it was almost too late, that is.

A giant snake, roughly 18 feet long if not more, coiled around my legs and knocked me off balance before I could escape from it. I fell from the tree and hung there in mid air, suspended by the snake that held my legs wrapped tightly within its coils. My shortsword was in my hand already, as I hung there upside down, but I knew that if I were to lash out I had nothing but a very unpleasant drop awaiting me.

Glancing down I saw that I was at least over the swamp. However, wonder of wonders, a pair of open jaws awaited me there as well, in the form of a small crocodile. Small compared to some of the ones I had seen in the swamp, this one still looked to be easily 12 feet long.

I looked back up and saw that my captor had wasted no time in positioning its head so that in a matter of a few moments it would be able to begin the unhealthy process of swallowing me whole. Unhealthy for me, that is. I considered the distance and decided that prolonging my life, even if only a matter of few seconds, was definitely in my best interests.

I drew a throwing dagger from inside my shirt and sent it towards the croc below me, making it snap its mouth shut when the blade cut a gash across its snout. Using the momentum the throw had given me, I bent my torso up towards the snake and lashed out with my shortsword, severing its head from its body in one swing.

The snakes body spasmed around me, crushing my legs for a brief moment, then letting me slip free to fall. Like a cat, I twisted about in mid air and got my feet below me as I plummeted toward the hurt and angry crocodile. My feet landed on the croc's back, with one sliding off instantly. More importantly though, my sword, angled to absorb as much of the impact as possible, drove through the thick bone in the crocodile's head. The reptile thrashed around me, dying in great seizures. I went under the surface of the water, stunned repeatedly by the convulsing crocodile. Not to mention the pain in my left leg, from ankle to hip, that had managed to land more securely on the back of the croc while my right foot had slid free.

I surfaced and swam toward the shore, gripping my shortsword tightly all the while. I emerged from the water only to be splashed as the body of the snake slid free from the tree and came down behind me. I glanced back and cursed. If Evart found nothing to eat, I had just found two perfectly fine sources of meat. However, that required another trip into the filth that served as water.

Scowling, I stopped only long enough to take off my spare equipment and weapons, though they were already soaked through again, I did not want to run any further risk of losing anything. I waded back in, my feet sinking in to the muck nearly to my knees with each step, and pulled first the body of the snake to shore, then on the next trip, I tugged the heavy crocodile onto the bank. Lances of fiery pain shot up my leg with nearly every step, but in an environment as harsh as the one I was in, I had no room for weakness.

Once I was finished retrieving what would soon be supper, I stripped down completely and began the unpleasant task of removing the nearly fist sized leeches that again covered my body. I shuddered in renewed revulsion at the thought of where some of them might have gone, but was again pleased to find none of them in places where only a select few invited guests are allowed to enter.

Now I had food. My wood I intended to use to start a fire was still up in the trees, however. What I had gathered before had fallen from my surprised hands into the swamp during my encounter with the snake. Scowling anew at the situation, I strapped my sword belt around my naked hips and scaled the same tree, being a little more careful to watch out for native inhabitants. I returned with enough kindling to start a fire, though already one seemed to be burning in my leg. My ankle seemed the worst, and I presumed I had twisted it during my fall.

Nonetheless, a girl's work is never done. I scaled the tree again, searching for larger branches that I could hack down with my sword. By the end of my second trip I was determined to never climb another tree again.

Evart returned as I was blowing a spark into a flame in the tinder. He beached the canoe where we had when first approaching the small island, not seeing the results of my own hunting expedition on the opposite side of the atoll. He whistled softly, some sort of bird hanging from his hand.

"Now that's as fine a way to be welcomed back as I can imagine!" He said, chuckling at my nudity. I scowled at him and turned my back to him.

"Did I get them all off?" I asked.

He instantly knew what I meant. Some of the leeches were still attached to my back, feasting happily away. I knew they were there but did my best to not think about them as I had gone about my business. Evart quickly pulled them off, then demanded that I let him inspect me more thoroughly to be certain I had gotten the rest. Scowling unhappily, I let him do it even though I knew I had done as fine a job as could be done. Turns out I had missed a smaller one on the back of my neck though, so I ended up sheepishly thanking him.

"I was going to say this toratoo bird is not much, but it will let us keep our strength," Evart said, noticing the 16 foot headless body of the snake laying nearby. "But it appears I should have stayed here instead! I'm sorry for not warning you about the tree pythons, though normally they go after much smaller prey like this toratoo bird. This was a really big one though, one of the biggest I have ever seen!"

I just nodded. Of course it was, that was just how my luck ran. "That's nothing," I offered, motioning with my head over towards the body of the crocodile.

Evart looked and let out a whistle of appreciation. "You ever meet anything you didn't kill?" He said with a grin and a casual brush of his throat. I smiled fiercely then looked over to my clothes drying on the branches I had stuck into the ground and formed a makeshift clothesline with.

Evart went to work on the corpses, cutting away parts of the snake and then the croc for dinner. I finished getting the fire going and then began working on hardening a branch to use as a spit. In short order, we were roasting our swamp critter dinner. Evart was doing everything he could to not stare at my nakedness. For my part, I was doing nothing to conceal it either. Noticing how awkward it seemed for him, I suddenly felt a little awkward myself. I changed my position a few times, trying to obtain some small measure of modesty. It was a strange feeling.

Finally I gave up and tried to walk over to where my clothing was drying. I nearly collapsed with my first step, my ankle not wanting to support me. Evart was there in an instant, asking me what had happened.

"Just twisted my ankle earlier is all. It will be fine," I insisted. First rule of being successful in my profession is to never need help, and even when you do, never show that need or ask for it.

He said a few colorful words that showed he did not believe me, and walked over to where the head of the snake sat on the ground. He took out a dagger and began working on the head of the snake, cutting expertly into it. In a few minutes he approached me again, holding a few sharpened splinters of wood that had some glistening liquid on the end of them.

"Sit," he demanded, motioning towards a spot of bare ground. I frowned at him but did so. His manner indicated he knew what he was doing. Besides, my ankle had swollen up to nearly half again its normal size, I began to fear I might have broken it.

He knelt next to where I sat and took my leg into his lap. Gently he probed my ankle with his fingers, trying to determine as I was whether the damage was serious or not. He grunted at last, a satisfied expression on his face. "Just a sprain I think," he said.

"This will numb it and reduce the swelling. If you keep off of it as much as possible it might even be mostly healed by tomorrow night."

"What is it?" I asked, wondering what he was planning.

"Poison and blood from the snake mixed together. In small amounts it aids in healing. In larger amounts, it acts as a drug and sells for quite a price." I felt the first prick then. Then feeling washed away almost instantly though as the snake oil medicine began to affect my ankle. When he was finished I had 6 splinters pin-cushioning my ankle, though none stuck into it deeply. The relief was nearly instantaneous, though I knew better then to put any pressure on it. I nodded my thanks to him, uncertain of any proper way to show it. Only my companions on Acathia would have treated me thusly. I was uncertain as to how to behave towards Evart, the more time I spent with him, the more he seemed to be a decent sort of man. The type of man that I felt quite certain that did not exist, especially in a place such as the one we were in.

"Now put your clothes back on, wench," He said, slapping me playfully on the thigh, "you're making it hard for me to concentrate lying there like that!"

I chuckled in spite of myself. He was a man after all, that much was certain. Evart helped me to my feet and then over to where my clothing was drying. I could hardly get my breeches around my ankle, so I simply made do with my tunic for the time being. It was mostly dried, so I had little cause for complaint.

I took the first watch again, letting Evart get some sleep while I kept an eye out for any more indigenous life forms that felt the need to try and eat me. Inside of a few hours the smell of the slain snake and crocodile drew the attention of other natives of the swamp. They waited impatiently at the edge of the fire's light, anxious for a chance to dart in and feast on my kills. I counted mostly other crocodiles, but a few shapes seemed even more outlandish. I just kept up my watch and occasionally tossed a burning branch out towards any the approached to closely.

By the time my watch was over I was running low on firewood. I woke Evart and showed him the situation. He told me he had expected as much, and climbed up a tree to gather more wood for his watch. It was a long time coming, considering our guests, but eventually I managed to catch a few hours of sleep ere the dawn came.

With dawn I found our uninvited dinner guests gone. Gone also were the leftover remains of our dinner. When I showed my interest in it, Evart explained how the hungry denizens had grown more bold after I fell asleep and come forward enough to drag the meals back into the water with them. I shuddered inside at the thought of all those teeth, but assumed that Evart had made certain we were in no unnecessary danger.

I realized in short order that my leg was feeling much better as well. The ankle seemed all but healed. Only a little stiffness remained, which I stretched out of it as soon as I became aware of it. My knee showed a few twinges of pain whenever I walked down a slope, but it was easy for me to deal with and in no way hindered my movement.

Our days journey through the swamp brought us within site of others in makeshift skiffs, canoes, and boats. In almost all cases some or all of the travelers within those boats were lizardmen. Evart cautioned me to wear my hood early that morning to avoid any undue attention. I wore it without complaint at first, in spite of the quickly growing heat of the day. Then as I saw our new neighbors on the waterways, I silently praised his good advice.

"Welcome to Emmerdwym," he said in a voice pitched low so as to not carry over the fetid water. Ahead of us I could just make out the burning lamps and torches along the docks of the port city of Sarph.

"How big is it?" I asked, my voice equally toned for silence.

"The barony is many leagues across, but to go where you need to go, we will provision ourselves here then head to the north and west, avoiding the more heavily populated areas. We will see a change in scenery in perhaps ten days, and enter into Palungol in two weeks."

Book 2 : Chapter 8

I frowned. It was far longer then I wished to remain within the swamp. Surprisingly, our journey met with little incident. A few of the swamps more adventurous denizens harassed us at night, but they were scared away or slain easily enough. Nothing so difficult as our first encounters within the swamp, though I suspected that was because I had a better grasp on the dangers the swamp represented and between Evart and I keeping a sharp eye out, we avoided the worst of things.

I remained at camp or with our boat whenever possible while Evart would journey into the towns teeming with lizardmen, Havrin, trolls, and other dark races. We regularly died my hair but given my lack of knowledge of local customs, we deemed it best that I stay out of sight as much as possible. More so for fear of agents of Baron Palungol being afoot.

As the days passed we did indeed notice changes. The swamp slowly began to recede while the islands grew larger and rockier. As Evart had predicted, on the 10th day the change was undeniable. We now traveled up what resembled a river more then a swamp. The nonstop haze of the swamp had begun to thin as well, and on occasion we could catch glimpses of mountains ahead of us to the north and the west.

Without realizing it, I found myself opening up to Evart more each day of our journey as well. As much as I could, I even began to trust him and rely upon him. Not depend, of course. No, that would be impossible for me. But I accepted that the things he said were true, and his actions further satisfied me. I blame it on his simple nature and our shared experience. While he was obviously quite capable of guile, he used none of it with me. Or at least not to the best of my knowledge, and I like to think there are few people better able to spot such duplicity then me.

"The first city we will reach has a name nobody can pronounce. Instead it is called Trollhome." Evart was filling me in on the details of the new region early in the morning of what he promised was our last day in the canoe.

"Trollhome and the surrounding areas do not really belong to any of the baronies of Mardurin. Instead, it is inhabited by a tribe of remarkably intelligent trolls and a clan of ogres," he explained, making my scowl deepen. "Long ago a powerful troll chieftain named Muzgrob refused to join with the Dark One's armies. This, of course, brought about the attention and the displeasure of Dark One. He sent armies of orcs, goblins, lizardmen, Havrin, and even ogres and great things. The trolls, fought them back, combining their great strength, regenerative powers, and their surprisingly talented knowledge of strategy and tactics. An ogre warrior named Arag, seeing this going on, secretly made a deal with Muzgrob. He and the other ogres he had allied to his side changed sides in mid battle, helping the trolls overthrow a swamp dragon."

I snorted. It was a colorful tale but the thought of trolls and ogres possessing such advanced cunning was preposterous.

Evart ignored me and continued. "With the two humanoid races aligned, victory was more trouble then it was worth. The Dark One's emissary met with them and they set up a small tract of free land that the trolls and ogres could live on safely, so long as they agreed to a garrison force of the Dark One's army."

"So this is basically more of the same I have seen everywhere else then?" I asked with a smirk. "Lots of bad guys of different races."

"Indeed," Evart said, grinning. "But this place is different in that most of the creatures we may see could care less about you and I. But owing to the semi-autonomy the place enjoys, several spies exist there as well."

I chuckled. "Alright, thanks for the heads up… though it does smack of the same story every other town around here has. Only difference this time is that, somehow, I expect the inhabitants here to smell even worse then the citizens of the other towns do."

Evart smiled. "There is that. But the reason I tell you is so that you have some background, just in case we should get separated or spend more time there then we want to."

I nodded. It made sense and I was one of the most research and intelligence gathering savvy people I knew. "So how long will it take us to get through this Trollhome place?:"

Evart's smile turned into a genuine grin. "That's the good news. We are getting close to Palungol. Trollhome is a matter of only a few days to cross. The city is large because of the semi-free trade that occurs there. What that really means is the thriving black market, but the lands surrounding the city are fairly small. A few days up a trail into the mountains to the northwest and we will reach the mountains of Palungol."

"Black market, eh?" I said doubtfully. "You mean to tell me that the Dark One has placed limits and laws on his cronies?"

My companion raised an eyebrow thoughtfully. "That is a good point, Yamara. I suppose anything you and I might normally have a little trouble finding due to laws and availability doesn't mean very much down here. However, Trollhome's markets thrive in the items that are harder to obtain in most places. Slaves, drugs, magic, you name it, they have it and will sell it for a price. Not much in the way of laws there either. Oh, the trolls and ogres, amazingly, are very organized and disciplined amongst themselves, but they see everyone else as an outsider and do not care what one outsider does to another. Wrong a troll or an ogre though, and things get ugly real quick."

Finally Evart had gotten to the good information. I suppose it was all useful, but this type of intelligence seemed the best. "Never did care for trolls much, damn things never seem to stay dead."

Evart nodded fervently in agreement with me. We kept rowing, heading up the river the swamp had turned into. From time to time other skiffs, barges, and canoes past us. Some heading the way we were, others head downstream. I did my best to remain anonymous with my hood over my head. The humidity was stifling, but I figured if I had lived through Acathia, I could live through anything the climate of Malatoria would throw at me.

We rounded another bend in the river and I saw the reason behind the increasing river traffic. Ahead of us lay the docks of Trollhome. For a backwater town in the middle of the filth and vermin that made Mardurin their home, I had to admit, I was impressed. It had a 16 foot wall made out of rocks and stone, filled in with mortar. What was more impressive about the wall was the iron spikes that stuck out of it roughly 12 inches from the bottom 4 feet of it. The spikes angled upwards and looked to be quite sharp. Outside of the wall, of all places, were built up mounds of earth with reinforced positions at the top of them, allowing for archers or spear wielders a commanding view of the terrain. The earthen towers stood easily 12 feet tall themselves, tall enough to make a difference but not tall enough to aid an attacker should one fall. I suspected that underground tunnels allowed access to the towers, for I saw no doors or other visible means of accessing them. That meant, of course, that the tunnels could be secured somehow in case they became occupied.

But outside of the defenses I was impressed by the port. The docks could probably support a good 30 or 40 boats the size of a longboat, which covered most of the skiffs and other boats used to traverse the swamp. It was well maintained and guarded by trolls. Ugh.

Worse part about trolls in my experiences was not the smell, which was bad, or their behavior, which was worse, but how damned hard they were to kill. Chop a leg off a troll and the leg will grow back, given enough time. How much time? Only a day or so, maybe less. Amazing healing powers they had. The only way to stop a troll from healing was to burn them or kill them so dead that every last bit of living tissue in their body died, and that meant magic. Sure, a good pounding could knock one down and make it seem dead, but even with a removed heart the unnatural healing prowess of their blood and their body would knit a knew heart and start it pumping again. So the trick, as I mentioned, was to knock one out of the fight and drop a torch into their remains. Not only was fire the surest way to kill one, whatever it was that made them so good at healing also made them very flammable. Not many things burn as well as troll blood.

One look told me volumes about these trolls though. Big, green, and ugly like all trolls, they stood at least 7 feet tall and had long and lanky arms and legs ending in vicious looking fingers and toes. The average troll is somewhere on the reasoning level of a rock though; these trolls looked smart. They were boiled leather cuirasses studded with iron spikes, and various other mismatching pieces of hide, cloth, and other light armors. Many of them wore shields or bucklers, and all possessed some sort of weapon. The garden variety troll usually attacked with their vicious claws and pointy but disgusting teeth. These trolls seemed to have evolved and realized that they possessed opposable thumbs for a reason.

With me extremely leery, Evart guided our canoe up to one of the empty docks. He lashed a rope around the site and moored it to the dock before we gathered up what little gear we had and climbed out of it. As I was straightening up I saw a very large and very green foot thud into the dock in front of me.

"You pay toll," He said, his voice deep and guttural. The accent was harsh, but he was easily understandable, if a little weak on his grammar.

"How much?" Evart asked, drawing the trolls attention.

The harbormaster, such as it was, grinned a very toothy grin. "2 gold each day."

My eyes widened considerably. I was glad my hood concealed my face because the look on it would have surely not gone unnoticed. Evart coughed a little himself at the outrageous fee.

"You are in luck, my friend," Evart said conspiratorially. "I find myself having no wish to return to Emmerdwym, how about my friend and I head into town and we let you keep our boat… for free!"

The grin turned to a scowl. "Me not gonna let dat boat stay here free!"

"No no no," Evart said, gesturing with his hands. "I mean I find myself feeling charitable, I am willing to give you my boat for free."

The troll frowned, an odd gesture on such a large and bestial face. "Nuthin free in Trollhome, an dat boat not gonna stay here free!"

Evart sighed. I rolled my eyes. He had told me these trolls were intelligent. Well, I suppose most trolls had trouble doing more then grunting, so he had a few notches on them.

"Troll," I said, trying to disguise my voice and make it sound more masculine. "You are right, my guide is wrong to fool you so, you have seen through his tricks. The boat is yours for two gold pieces."

A smug look appeared on the trolls face. He laughed, which was a frightening sound. "Rocktooth not stupid, me not gonna pay dat much!"

Evart looked at me questioningly, almost as though he thought I was mad. I ignored him and nodded to the troll. "Very well then, you drive a hard bargain. Let it not be said that the trolls of Trollhome are shrewd. A single gold piece for the boat, that is half the price to store it, a bargain to be had."

The troll nodded thoughtfully for a few long moments. Finally he grinned, convinced he had the better of us and fished around in his belt pouch. A handful of ten silver coins later and we were hurrying away from the dock with both of us trying hard not to laugh.

"I thought these trolls were smart?" I asked, shaking my head in amazement.

"Well, individuals may vary," Evart admitted.

Still laughing quietly to ourselves, I let Evart lead me through the dock section of Trollhome and into the interior. All along the way we saw various merchants of various races. Their wares varied from unidentifiable foods to (even worse) identifiable foods to weapons of all makes and sizes to other outlandish things. Such a wide variety I had never seen in one place, it seemed that Trollhome truly was a melting pot of cultures, though I was certain nearly everything available was either stolen or taken from the dead hands of its prior owner.

Before long I saw my first ogre of Trollhome. Normally ogres are big and dumb. That is to say, almost as dumb as the average troll but at least 2 or 3 feet larger. These ogres lacked nothing for size, but like the trolls, their wardrobe was considerably better then I had expected. Studded leather jerkins, bracers and greaves, and weapons that appeared to be very well maintained. The sloping brow most ogres proudly displayed was lacking as well, these ogres actually looked like they could count… and not just their fingers and toes.

Trollhome was divided into sections for defense. The overall layout of the city was very secure. Each section of the city was separated by walls, with the roadways joining them easily secured via heavy gates. We had passed through two of them until we came across the main market of the town. If I was surprised at the vendors we had already passed, then I was amazed at what the market had to offer.

Slaves (of both genders and almost any race imaginable), foods, more weapons and tools, various alcohols and drugs, boys and girls of varying ages for acts of pleasure, potions and oils their vendors claimed were magical, "ancient" maps to hidden treasures, books (both mundane and supposedly magical), and virtually anything else a person could hope to find or hope to never see available.

"I was shocked the first time I came through here too," Evart said quietly to me, hearing the catch in my breath. "The merchants have to disclose what they are selling to the city's clerk, though the city does not care, then they are charged a tax based upon the value of the item the city has assigned to it. The tax is fairly low and the merchants do not mind paying it in most cases. After all, where else could they get this kind of exposure for most of their goods?"

I nodded thoughtfully. The merchants themselves were almost as varied as their wares. Here and there were orcs and half orcs, an occasional goblin or kobold, several humans, scattered lizardmen, and more then a few trolls and ogres as well. On the far side of the market I could just make out a fire giant selling some items. A fire giant! I shook my head to clear it and just followed Evart as he wound his way through the busy marketplace.

He stopped finally at a booth where a man had a small pen behind him. Within it were a few ponies and horses, as well as a few other mounts that reminded me of my time spent on Acathia. Giant lizards the size of a saddle with saddles on them, as well as a few oxen and even a horse-like beast with some large humps on its back. Having no idea what Evart was up to, I stayed slightly behind him and kept my senses opened and in tuned to the crowd around me. A place like this was surely prone to draw thieves and pick pockets.

Evart spent several minutes haggling with the dark skinned human. When they finally reached an agreeable price Evart went back with one of the boys, probably the merchants sons, and retrieved two horses. They saddled them up and led them over to where I still stood.

"We have mounts," Evart said, the boy handing me the reigns to the one he led. I nodded and took them.

"We're being watched," I told him quietly, walking beside him away from the booth.

"Not surprising in this place, everybody wants to know everybody else's business, or at least be able to convince them to come over and buy from them."

"No," I told him. "Not so simple, there are three people, a half-orc, a havrin, and a goblin. They are keeping an eye on us, one or two at a time, then one will disappear for a while to make it seem coincidental."

Evart grunted, casually glancing about over the next few minutes to try and observe them. I had to hand it to him, he did a good job of not drawing suspicion to himself. That probably came from years of working for the S.E.T. down in the pit of evil that Mardurin represented. Finally he nodded as though he was thinking about something. He pushed on, forcing me to follow him again.

We stopped at a few more booths so that we could buy some food, which I had considerable concerns about, then Evart also purchased a broadsword to replace the one he had lost in the swamp. Realizing this may be my one and only chance to do so, I stepped up to the weapon venders booth he was at and surveyed his wares.

"How much?" I asked him, picking up a long bladed dirk that looked like it would serve me well. I then saw a group of four specially weighted throwing daggers and knew that I had to have them as well. "And those," I said, gesturing towards them.

The ogre merchant set a price and we began haggling. I was surprised quickly at the ogre's shrewdness. He did not resemble the troll at the docks, but instead was well able to keep track of the conversation. My first attempt to outwit him nearly ended with him refusing to do business with me, in fact. In the end, I paid a little more then I had hoped too, but was pleased nonetheless to be able to fill my empty sheath and to also have some throwing knives to boot.

By the time we were finished with the market and ready to press on, the sun was deep in the western sky. Mindful of the trio watchers, I suspected the worst. "Let us press on tonight," I said to Evart. I was hardly afraid of them, but wanted to cause no trouble inside a city that was filled with such creatures as this was.

"Aye, there are a couple of hours of light left to ride by," Evart agreed with me without questioning my reasoning.

And so we set out. The guards at the northern gate of Trollhome gave us no trouble, they simply ignored us as we made our way out. We mounted our horses and went north along the path that was slowly but steadily raising towards the mountains that marked the border of Palungol. As I gazed at the mountains my mouth and threat suddenly felt dry. My destination was getting closer and I was not sure if I dreaded it or anticipated it. That I felt considerable anxiety was certain to me.

Needless to say, I was introspective that night and kept mostly to myself. I forced myself to once again play the events through my mind as I knew them to have happened. The fact that James needed to be destroyed remained a constant within my head and my heart, but knowing that Brina was with him made me falter. Was I ready to face her again, after all that had happened? If she had not escaped him and sought me out since that hateful day, would she want to see me?

My questions went unanswered. Far from being further worried about them, however, I found myself instead reacting to that nagging itch in the back of my head. Maybe it was carelessness on the part of the attackers or maybe it was my rarely ever worked on sixth sense. Regardless, I was jumping to my feet and spinning around with a throwing dagger in each hand. Unknown to me, my abrupt rotation had caused a crossbow bolt that had been fired at me to narrowly miss me and cut through the air behind my back instead.

The goblin came first. He leapt over a log, a well cared for battle axe gripped in both his hands. I threw both of my daggers at him, changing his snarl to a wide eyed look of fear. It was justified, for both daggers imbedded themselves in his chest to the hilt.

Evart had readied himself by this time, not reacting until the first sign of trouble. For him that first sign was my sudden movement. Only now was he narrowing his search to the goblin, which had collapsed to the ground and was trying to pull the lung piercing daggers out of his chest. Evart's new broadsword cleared its scabbard and he readied himself for what was sure to come next.

And come next it did. The half-orc slipped almost noiselessly into the firelight of our campfire. Only by keeping aware of his surroundings did Evart happen to notice the would-be assassin. He wheeled on him in time to bat aside a skillful thrust of the half-orc's longsword. He returned the lunge with a swipe, being defeated by the parry from the half-orc. Battle was joined in full force between the two.

The human came at the same time, but I was prepared for him. He stepped into the firelight on the opposite side of the camp from the half-orc, completing the triangle the goblin had started. Had it not been for the goblin's premature attack, we would have been sorely pressed by the three. As it was, I had my shortsword and trusty dagger in hand. He advanced slowly, knowing his surprise was ruined. I lowered my shortsword and held my dagger high, presenting what appeared to be a poorly defended target.

The half-orc was actually taller and stronger then Evart, but Evart's skill and cunning was greater. I only heard a few clangs as steel rang on steel, then the unmistakable sound of metal cleaving into flesh, followed by a grunt of pain. I could only hope the wound was for the best. From the curse the man in front of me muttered under his breath, I assumed such was the case.

Dimly, on some subconscious level, I heard the click of a crossbow release. It did not register until half a second later when I felt a sudden sting on my upper arm. The sting was followed by a sudden blossom of fiery pain and made me cry out at the suddenness of it. The man jumped at his chance and beat down at me with his scimitar, driving me to my knees as I blocked the heavy curved blade with my short sword. The fingers on my left hand, suddenly numb, let my dagger slip free from their grasp. My head swam with the pain and the shock in my arm, distracting me in spite of years of discipline. I wanted it to stop and I was very nearly willing to do anything to achieve that end. The part that frightened me the most was that it had only just started!

Evart came to my rescue. He leapt over me and lashed out at the man attacking me. The man growled at Evart and parried his first few attacks. Then he launched a series of his own. Finding himself unable to beat through Evart's defenses right away, he scowled and thumbed the onyx that was seated in a ring he had twisted around backwards on his finger. Instantly a cloud of blackness rapidly swelled up and around him like smoke. In seconds all three of us were blinded. For fear of striking me, Evart crouched low and held his sword defensively in front of him, I did likewise with my shortsword, though it drooped low as I struggled against the waves of agony emanating from my arm.

No attack came. When the odorless black smoke dispersed a few moments later there was no sign of the man. Evart glanced about nervously, noting that the half-orc and goblin were missing as well, though both had been dealt mortal wounds. Evart cursed and turned back to me. He sheathed his sword and knelt next to me, examining my wound. I looked to his face, searching for an answer in his expression as he studied me. I saw only puzzlement on his face.

"'Tis a scratch, Yamara," he said, still looking puzzled.

I glanced down at it, turning slowly so that the firelight augmented what little daylight remained to help me see it. The cut was just above my elbow on the outside edge of it. The bolt that had scored me had a broadhead instead of a point on it, but as he said, the wound was slight. Already though it was angry and red, and as I reached to touch it with my other hand it burned with an inner heat.

I knew the answer already, but it was unlike anything I had ever seen before. "Poison," I said, my voice raspy and dry.

Evart nodded thoughtfully. He grabbed my arm roughly and took out a curved dagger. I looked at him, alarmed. When he made no move but instead gave me a questioning look, I nodded to him. Two quick swipes and he had scored an "x" over the wound. Like a snakebite, he took it in his mouth to suck out the poison. His eyes widened the instant his lips touched my arm and he staggered backwards, spitting forcefully.

I looked at him, clearly surprised. The pain had begun to slowly lessen, or maybe I had grown used to it, I was not sure. Regardless, I stared in surprise at the wound. In spite of the three cuts in my arm, no blood showed at the surface. It was angry and red from inside, and nearly seemed to glow with the ferocity of it, but nothing dripped from it.

Evart touched his lips with his fingers, wincing in pain and pulling them away. A quick glance at his face showed that blisters were forming on his lips.

"I have never seen anything like this!" Evart said, clearly at a loss for what to do. I nodded, equally confused and frustrated. The pain had lessened enough by now to allow me to think a little more clearly by now though.

Seizing upon an idea, I reached into my magical pouch and called forth one of my precious few remaining potions of healing. I pulled the cork out with my teeth and spat it upon the ground, fearing myself in mortal danger if I waited any longer. I drained it without taking a breath, nearly choking myself on the slightly amber liquid. I took a few shuddering breaths as the magic of the potion raced through my body. When it swept through my arm I felt it slow and then a battle began within my body. It was very nearly terrifying to me, this concern that my fate might be out of my hand.

Suddenly there was a powerful release within my arm, exploding through my body in a rush. My senses were swept away with it and I knew only blackness then. As my consciousness fled I heard, as though from a great distance, the ghostly echoing of a horse galloping away.

Book 2 : Chapter 9

I dreamt. The dreams were figments and shadows and altogether unholy. Dark shapes reaching for me from the depths of I knew not where. They grasped at my body, trying to pull me down but I fought against them, unable to clearly see any of them but knowing they were there by the cold feel of their hands on my body and their none to gentle tugging. Then the shadows stopped and drew back away from me. From the gloom that surrounded me in my subconscious hell a figure emerged to face me.

It was a man. More a boy then a man, I doubted he needed to shave to keep his chin clean. He looked at me and I sensed a distinct familiarity to him, though I could not place him. Some of my surroundings became visible for a moment, and I saw that I stood in a deserted alley upon dusty ground that was hard baked dirt. Then the alley vanished and I was once again alone in the dark with the boy, who seemed to glow with an internal light. I felt myself moving towards him, of no volition of my own, and as I grew closer I felt a great fear outside of me. That the fear did not come from within me caused my own fear to rise. I did not understand what was happening, I could only watch. I had no power to act, speak, or even think for myself it seemed.

The boy was in my arms then, He fought back suddenly, his youthful strength valiant but unable to stop me. In seconds he was stiff with terror and no longer offering any resistance. He stared at me with fearful recognition in his eyes, then I descended upon him. I bit into his neck, taking no care at the delicate nature of his skin. My teeth, sharper then they possibly could have been, easily knifed through his skin and artery. The hot liquid pulsed into my mouth, filling me with its salty metallic taste. I struggled within myself, trying to put a stop to the nightmare.

In minutes that seemed to last only seconds the young man died in my arms. I let him fall to the ground then and looked down at myself. My blouse was covered in his blood. My hands dripped it into the darkness below my feet. The corpse was gone, disappeared as though it had never been. Everything faded from me then, everything but the feelings. The rush of excitement. The feelings of power. The joy I felt at the taking of the boys life. He had been only a few years younger then I, but knowing how easily I had dispatched him brought an elated feeling into me. I did now know if the feelings were my own or someone else's. They felt alien to me, yet alluring and comfortable as well. Then I descended into darkness again.

I arose from the depths of my nightmarish slumber several times, though instead of arising to wakefulness, I returned to the surreal dreams. Each one was violent and terrifying, yet equally arousing and exciting. I grew more and more confused with each one, and more and more terrified as an explanation began to form in the back of my mind. While the first had been a vampiric dream, none other had been anything like it. They all involved the claiming of what appeared to be innocent lives, but the methods varied. All were personal and disturbing, more so as they felt so fulfilling in an alien way.

My final dream was undeniably my own. It took place in Brina's room in the palace with myself, Brina, and James in our fateful confrontation. I saw the fight take place and watched it unfold with a critical eye. Then realization dropped on me, I was not watching it as I should be. I saw myself and James fighting! The person I did not see was Brina. I was Brina. It was undeniably not my own!

The pillow came up and James' sword cleared it from his field of view. My sword crashed into his, slamming it out of his hand. It happened in slow motion now, my dagger reaching out propelled by my lunging hand and stabbing into his shoulder. I tried to scream. I tried to call out and beg for them to stop. Then I realized I was not the one trying to do this, but Brina was. Or more accurately, both of us were trying to make it stop, but I was just a passenger in this memory she was sharing with me somehow.

James pulled back away from me and closer to Brina, who was also me at the moment. I felt Brina's confusion, felt her want to shrink away and hide from him. I could feel his fear and his anger. Before Brina could move he reached out and grabbed her, pulling her to him. I felt the pain as her hair tugged loose of her skull at points, yet most remained and drew her to him. Then the cold steel at her throat, rasping harshly against her so soft and delicate skin.

"Leave now, Yamara, and you can escape," He said, panting. The words came fresh in my mind as he said them, I had hidden them deep within me but would never be able to forget them. "I will hunt you down, of course, but if you leave now Brina comes to no harm and I will give you until the morning ere I send out my men."

Brina's confusion and fear nearly caused her to panic. Instead it tricked her into hesitation and a decided lack of doing anything. She shivered as chills ran down her spine and she looked at me pleadingly. Then James whispered into her ear. Our ears now.

"Don't worry, love, she will do you no harm and will only leave us in peace now," was what he whispered to her. It was as I remembered it exactly.

I braced myself, prepared for the horror that was to come. I knew what happened next, yet something deep within me turned cold and made me suddenly terribly afraid. He was going to cut her throat and push her onto my blade and I did not think I could bear to see it again.

"I can't let him use you against me, Brina," I heard myself say. The cold that was within me settled over me suddenly. I had buried that deep within me and refused to let myself remember it. I felt Brina's sudden spike of fear and felt her realize she had to act and act right then.

Brina's head snapped back, taking my vision with her. I, we, felt his nose crumple against the back of Brina's head. A terrible burning pain entered her belly then, driving through her and out her back. Another knife edge of agony tore along one side of her neck. James stumbled back, letting go of Brina. My sword in her belly was tugged painfully again as it slid free of where it had stuck in James. I looked down and saw Yamara, myself, let go of the sword that impaled us. Brina's hand rose to her throat to try and make the burning stop, but it only seemed hotter when the blood washed over her fingers.

My dagger was in James' throat by then, though I did not see how it happened, chained to Brina's vision as I was. All of my own emotions had gone numb and cold by now. I was seeing it as she had seen it. Experiencing it as she had. I was understanding how she had truly died. Her other hand, the one not grasping at her throat, reached out to me. I felt her trying to reach for me, to pull me down to her to take the pain away and make her better. I saw myself stand there with an face of stone. Then I knelt down beside her, taking her hand in mine. I felt Brina cling to it desperately, she put every last hope she had in using my hand as a lifeline.

My gut twisted inside at what I knew was going to happen. I wanted to be sick. I wanted to die for what I had done. Watching my face from Brina's eyes, I saw that my own face had gone terribly white and what I thought was excellent emotional control at the time was anything but. The reality of the situation had crashed into me, my eyes watered and a tear spilled down my face while my chin quivered.

Brina pulled me closer then, desperate to ask me for help. She knew she was dying and there was no hope, but she had seen the magic of my potions and hoped for a miracle cure. I had done the impossible time and again to her, surely death was just another thing I could fix for her. She adored me and forever would, no matter what happened… if only I could just do this one thing for her.

Brina gagged on her own blood, unable to talk. I saw myself succumb completely to my emotions. Tears ran freely. I knew then that she understood what had happened. She understood and she forgave me. She actually forgave me. In this wretched dream where I had no control, where no one could ever see me or ever know, I knew grief unlike any I ever had.

"I'm sorry Brina." I heard myself say it and I knew that no matter how I had felt at the time, the passing of time since then had made it all the more true for me now. I could not fathom a deeper regret then the one I felt. The next words I remembered well over the years, though with some pain. "I loved you."

I had admitted it to her at long last. Always sisterly our affection had been, at the end I wish I had acknowledged that my love for her had been on every level that I knew.

Hearing that, Brina relaxed. Her arm dropped from mine and she accepted her fate. She relaxed and let me go. I felt such sadness and longing in her as we drifted apart. Darkness claimed us. I prepared to succumb to my typical restless period of darkness.

Then she came. Brina woke and I awoke with her. Kneeling over us was a demon straight out of one of the deepest and darkest places of existence. She was awesome and terrible and dark. Beautiful beyond any measure. Taller then any women I had ever seen, she further defied nature by possessing a tail that lay gracefully on the floor between her legs. That and the large batlike wings sprouting from her back. Her wrist was sealed to Brina's lips and a fiery liquid filled her mouth. Brina swallowed as her mouth filled, the demoness's blood burning it's way down her throat like a potent whiskey. She was filled with terror at first, uncertain of what was happening and knowing on some basic level that it was wrong. Still she could not stop herself.

I felt Brina's thoughts and feelings as she rushed back to consciousness. She grasped at the opportunity to live and sucked feverishly at her wrist with no thought to the consequences. As the fiery elixir worked its way through her she felt it reawaken her body and infuse it with a warmth to replace the cold that had been settling in. She actually felt the torn tissues and muscles in her stomach knitting themselves together again. Her throat already felt as though nothing had happened to it.

The more she drew on the demoness' wrist, the more angry she got. Everything came back to her about the fight. She pulled more fiercely. Then the magical creature tried to pull away from her. Brina and I saw James standing above, looking down at us. His features had changed. He had become paler and more grim looking then before. Fury unlike anything I had ever felt rushed through Brina. She wanted to rip James apart and I was glad. Brina latched onto the succubus' arm and continued to draw its strength into her, easily overpowering the weakening creature.

Finally, seeking escape from the unnaturally strong woman, the succubus dissolved into the shadows from which she had coalesced. Not willing to be cheated, Brina inhaled and drew the essence of the demoness into her, not stopping until she had fully contained her. Brina felt the power rush through her body, infusing her with strength and vitality. She felt invincible.

"Come my love, this is no place for us."

Brina stood up slowly and glared at James. Her intent was to lash out at him and keep lashing out until nothing remained but bloody pieces. Before she would have easily been able to kill him with her own hands, but now she was sure could do more then kill him, she could rend him limb from limb. She tried to take a step towards him but her body refused to obey her.

"Hate not me, Brina, for I am not the one who plunged the sword into you," James said, seeing her look. "We are to be together for eternity, my bride, let yourself love me as you once wanted too. Yamara we will deal with when the time is ripe for us to do so."

I tried to scream at her to tell her what he was saying was a lie. I struggled but I was merely a silent passenger in this dream, this memory. I wanted it to end anew, I could bear to watch no more.

I felt the understanding flush through Brina. She realized that her first instincts had been right. Perhaps it would have been better to let death claim her. Now, somehow, she was bound to James. He was her Lord and Master. What he said even began to make sense as she thought it over. Yamara had moved first. She had plunged the sword into her. Perhaps James' dagger cutting across her throat had not been James' intention. Yes, all along he had wanted no harm to come to her, he was merely bluffing. She could understand it now.

Brina's consciousness took a turn then, it turned inward and it found me. I felt her staring at me, even though I was not there. The image of her eyes, now filled with a hateful fire, stared at me. I cowered before them and before myself. "It's a lie!" I tried to tell her, "he's telling you lies about what happened!". Of course my words never formed, in the ethereal nightmare I remained silent and forced to endure the passage of events.

"Yamara!"

I woke up to someone shaking me. My body was cold in spite of resting next to a campfire.

Book 2 : Chapter 10

What happened that night was so completely out of character for me I have trouble believing it ever really happened. Evart was gently shaking me out of my nightmare filled sleep. My body was sore and I had no energy. I felt cold. Not chilled, but so cold to the bone as though I might never recover. My head still swirled with remnants of the dream. Remnants of the intoxicating essence of the succubus that Brina had consumed and somehow shared with me.

"Thank the Gods, you're awake!" Evart hissed, sitting back at last and looking on me with concern.

I glanced at him, aware that he had spoken but unwilling and unable to respond. I had to many things inside of me I was struggling with. I saw that in addition to my own cloak, he had wrapped his around me as well to try and keep me warm. I could feel the wetness on my face, my tears in the dream had been more real then I thought.

Realizing it and remembering sent waves of grief back through me again. I somehow found the strength to roll towards the fire so that I was only a foot away from it and let the strong but silent sobs tear through me. I felt as though I had lost her all over again. Only this time I knew it was worse then I had ever imagined. James did live, and so did Brina. How and as what I did not fully know, but they lived.

Evart, risking life and limb in a way he had never known, gently laid his hand on my upper arm. I noticed it immediately, and though I did not feel reassured as he might have hoped, I did crave the contact. My own hand wrapped over his and pulled him to me somewhat awkwardly. Off balance and surprised, Evart crashed to the ground and half fell on me. He rearranged himself quickly and laid on the ground behind me, spooning with me and wrapping his arms around me as best he could. For this one and only time, I gave in completely and let myself be the cowardly needy woman I had striven forever against.

Some time later, at least an hour or two, I finally spoke. "How long?"

"4 days," Evart said softly. I nodded but did not move. I had warmed up some time ago but still luxuriated in the feel of the fire on my skin. It consisted mostly of hot coals by now, but a few logs still felt the lick of flames.

I glanced about and noticed we were not in the same camp we had been before. In fact, the entire terrain was different. "Where are we?" I asked him.

"Palungol," he answered. "We had our horses still so I lashed you to my horse and rode with you to keep you safe while your horse became the pack animal with all our gear. I knew that if you survived the poison you would be upset if I did not try to bring us closer."

He paused for my response, but when none was forthcoming he continued on. "We passed the highest point of the trail this morning, now we descend into the Barony. If you are up to it, we can push the horses a bit and reach the citadel in perhaps three more days."

I stared into the coals, seeing Brina's glowing red eyes instead. I snapped myself out of it finally. "Poison?" I asked, remembering that Evart had wondered if I would recover from the poison.

"Aye, I'd never seen the like of it before. Don't you remember? I tried to cut into the wound and suck it out before you fell asleep and it burned my lips badly."

I did remember, now that he mentioned it. I pulled my arm around and looked at it in the firelight. The wound was wrapped but a few moments of tugging at the bandage resolved that problem. It was angry and red, but appeared to be fighting against my body. Clear lines of normal colored flesh butted up against a line of redness where the poison that was still in the wound tried to wind its way up my arm and towards my heart. The actual cut itself showed no seepage of fluid, instead appearing as torn flesh void of any blood.

"Not poison," I said, understanding better what had happened. "Blood. Brina's blood."

Evart's breath caught behind me. "After you fell I heard a horse riding away. We killed the three that attacked us, but their must have been a fourth that shot you."

"It was her," I said, my voice resigned and weak. "Brina shot me. Then she rode off on her demonsteed."

"Lucky she's to not be a very good shot," Evart commented.

I said nothing. I did not know, but I suspected that she had hit me exactly as she had wanted to. I sat up then and turned to face him. He let go of me uncertainly, not knowing what I intended.

"Be careful, you've not eaten for days and you're strength is not what you might expect," he advised me softly.

Considering that I felt as though I could barely move, I doubted the wisdom of his words. I smiled weakly in spite of myself though. He sat up next to me, ready to catch me should my strength give out. I was not hungry in spite of the ravages my body had undergone fighting off Brina's poisonous blood. I knew I should eat buy first another unique urge overcame me.

I leaned in to Evart and before he knew what was happening my lips touched his. After a few moments he responded, though still somewhat hesitantly. It was not the chaste kiss of a friend or a sibling, but rather the full on passion of the most jaded lady of the night. I broke it after several minutes had passed and smiled softly at him.

With sadness in my voice I explained. "Thank you for taking care of me, Evart. You do not look the part, but you have the makings of great deeds in you. In another time and in another life, I could have and would have been yours."

He opened his mouth to respond but I stopped him with my fingers brushing his lips. "This will never happen again, for I am not that woman. I owe you more then I can give you and you deserve even more then that. Come tomorrow morning I will never mention this night again. I ask you once only to honor with that same privacy."

Evart nodded slowly, prompting me to drop my hand from his face. He was mine for the taking right then and there if I wanted him, for he surely wanted me. A part of me wanted him, the part that had been overwhelmed and imprisoned with me by the Yamara-bitch that I was. Another part of me hungered for his warmth as well, but that part was unhealthy and was alien to me. That part was the blood that Brina had forced upon me, craving to hold his still spurting heart in my hands.

I stood up then, a bit unsteady, but getting better as I moved and regained my sense of balance. I stretched and began some exercises to get my blood flowing. My strength was down and I tired out quickly, however.

"Eat this," Evart said to me after I nearly collapsed from my movements several minutes later. I glanced over and saw that he was cooking the haunch of a goat over the fire. I did a double take and realized the smell of the roasting flesh smelled wonderful. My only question was when did he find a mountain goat?

"When did you get that?" I asked, unable to let it go unanswered.

Evart raised an eyebrow at me. "I saw him right before I stopped to make camp. I figured he would make a good dinner in case you woke. If not, then he would feed me well at least!"

"You mean there has been a freshly slaughtered animal here the entire time and I did not notice it?"

He nodded. "You need more rest, Yamara, you are not ready to face the things you wish to face."

I closed my eyes and felt myself sway back and forth on my feet slightly. He was right. I wanted to… I wanted everything. I was confused. I needed to sit down, that much I knew. I took a few faltering steps towards Evart before my legs gave out on me and I crumpled to the ground. He was there in a moment, helping me bring myself back to a sitting position. I stared at his face for a moment.

"You're not a very handsome man, Evart," I said, laughing lightly.

His face paled briefly. Then he chuckled and helped me move closer to the fire again. "I think you got up a little too soon, lass."

He had a spit set up over the fire and from that he tore off a small section of roasted goat. How had I not seen the spit before? Things were getting weirder and weirder. For a moment I wondered if I had really not woken up from the nightmare after all.

Evart handed the meat to me. It was steaming in the cold mountain night air. I stared at it then looked up at him. It was true, he was not a very handsome man, but if he had a character flaw I could not find it. I wanted him. Wanted to kiss him again, wanted to do more. Wanted to do things to him I had never done with another man, or at least not done for the same reasons.

The smell of the meat in my hand brought my attention back around to it. I stuffed it into my mouth and as soon as I tasted it I chomped hungrily on it. In seconds it was gone and I was reaching for more. All thoughts of Evart were out of my mind now, I had focus only for eating.

Evart backed away from me as I tore into the roasted leg. I bit into it and ate from it as an animal, tearing away at it almost desperately. I had no conscious involvement in what was happening, instead I simply knew I was sating my desire. Impossibly, it was soon gone down to the bone. I reached for the bone with the intention of cracking it open to suck out the marrow when Evart's hands on my arms stopped me.

"Yamara! What are you doing?" He demanded of me.

I stopped fighting against him and looked at the bone in my hands. I shook my head a little and let it drop. "I…" I hesitated. What had I been doing? "I don't know. I was hungry."

"You need more rest, Yamara, that is what you need I think."

I nodded, sleep did sound good. Looking at Evart now I felt no strange compulsions towards him. No urges to love him or hate him. No urges to mate with him. No desire to plunge my hands into his belly and pull his organs out from his body and show them to him. I stopped, my mouth hanging open. Where had that last thought come from?

"Rest, yes, good idea." I finally said, moving as far from him as I could and still feel the heat of the fire on my body. He piled a few more logs on it and kept watch over me and the trail down the hill ahead of us. In seconds I was asleep.

My sleep was troubled again, but the quality of the dreams was different. This time they came from within me, not from without as they had before. These dreams were violent in nature. In them I found myself centered in scenes of carnage, scenes I had caused. When I awoke the next morning, sweaty and feverish, I remembered none of them distinctly and felt as though I had not rested at all.

My thoughts were clearer though. I remembered most of the night before and wondered how much of it Evart would bring up. I groaned inwardly at the thought of facing him, I had acted so foolishly. I hoped he would not do anything that would force me to kill him, I still needed him as a guide. I shook my head again to clear it; another unbidden thought, that one.

Evart checked on me and saw that, though I was clearly still fighting off the poison, I was conscious and much clearer then I had been. He offered me a tentative smile and proceeded to break down the camp. I helped where I could, still a little weak and unsteady. In scarcely more time then it normally took us we were on our horses and ready to move out. Evart handed me some strips of spiced and dried meat which I chewed on as our horses picked their way down the wide mountain trail.

I was so caught up in my own memories and thoughts that it was not until well after the midday that I realized we had not seen any other traffic along the road. A wide and well used road, the only direct route from Palungol to Trollhome, and we were the only people upon it? Something was amiss.

"Where are the people?" I asked after taking an unsatisfying drink from my waterskin.

"I've not seen anyone since we were attacked," Evart answered, making me feel even more ill at ease. "They know we are coming, perhaps they fear us."

"Damn well better," I muttered, slipping back into a darkly introspective mood.

That night at camp Evart's bow brought down a mountain lion. Far from an ideal dinner, cats are usually rather greasy and stringy. I did not notice, eating with nearly as much gusto as I had the night before. After dinner Evart and I sat silently around the fire. My arm ached near the wound as the alien blood tried to fight past the healing powers of the potion I had imbibed. My heart thudded dully in my chest and my head throbbed with each pulse.

"I lied," I said quietly, desperate for something to take my mind off of the condition my body was in. Evart looked up at me, a questioning look on his face. He clearly was not going to offer any conversation until he knew what I had in mind. I chalked up a point for him in my mental book of respect.

"Brina was not really my sister. She more then a sister and a friend," I admitted after starting and stopping several times. "And I killed her."

Evart nodded and listened, relaxing a little. I think he feared I was going to bring up last night, which clearly had left him uncomfortable. I ignored him this time though, instead focusing on myself and forcing myself to relive those final moments in my head again. Not Brina's memory this time, but my own. My own that I had lied and deceived myself with time and again. I stripped off those lies and forced myself to see it again as it happened.

"James had a wounded shoulder and he grabbed her up to use her as a shield. His dagger was at her throat and his sword on the floor. He lied to her and demanded I leave, but I could not. My pride would not let me leave. I… I had to know that he couldn't use her against me." I stopped for a moment. This desire for a cathartic release was eating away at me. I blamed it on the poison.

"I wanted Brina to come with me, of course, but we had grown so close it scared me. And then when James started pulling us apart, I guess I went a little crazy. I didn't know what to do. I thought I knew when I saw him holding her like that. The person I had learned to be growing up in a pit of thieves, assassins, murderers, and smugglers knew the answer to my problems. And that person took over."

I took a deep breath and ignored the tears falling down my cheeks. "I said to her, 'I can't let him use you against me.'. Then I shoved my sword into her stomach and through her, into him. She knew what was going to happen, she knew and she tried to escape. She broke his nose with the back of her head and tried to slip away from his dagger."

"But not in time?" Evart asked, finishing the story I let hang as I sorted myself out and renewed my strength for the telling of the story.

"No, not in time," I echoed. "I drove my dagger into James' throat and knelt next to Brina. She could not talk, her mouth was full of blood. The machine that I had been collapsed and I understood what had happened. Brina had gotten inside of me, Evart. She had changed me. No matter how bad I want to stop hurting, no matter how bad I want to go back and be that cold bitch who cared about nothing and no one except myself, I can't."

I stared at him for a long moment, daring him to say something. Begging him to say something. I was confused and sick of it and with it. My head was thick with emotion and infection.

"I can't give you absolution, Yamara," Evart finally said. "Closure only you can find, and I think this quest will give it to you. Either that or it will kill you, and then you will not care anymore. I feel pity for you only in that you found the one thing worth any sacrifice for only after it was too late to do anything with it."

"This is love?" I spat out. "I used to be certain of my every move. I used to be able to trust myself. If I came across who I am now a few years ago, I would have done myself a favor and put me out of my misery!"

Evart smiled mischievously. "I am glad I did not know you a few years ago, you sound like you were truly a dangerous person. The type of person who would cut my throat at the drop of a hat."

I stared at him thickly for a moment before I realized what he was talking about. When I had first met him I thought he might have been a spy waiting for me to show up. My dagger had cut cleanly through his throat, dooming him has it not been for his magical S.E.T. pendant that carried a one use only healing charge of magic in it. I had one as well, but continued to forget about it when it might come in handy. I considered using it now to fight off this poison that coursed through my body. I stayed my hand though, remembering how my healing potion I had drank only stayed the poison when it should have healed it.

"You are either a fool to think that you can enjoy a full life needing only yourself or sadly misled," Evart continued after he saw the recognition in my eyes. His words were harsh, but his tone soft enough to make me consider them.

"In Gneiss it would be no thing to find love among women or among men. In Elendar things are different, that sort of thing is discouraged because such a union produces no children, and we can always use all the children we can get; they are the future of the nation. Nevertheless, it is a freer kingdom then many around and none would have openly opposed such a union."

I chuckled. "I have known men and women a plenty in my time, Evart, that does not bother me and never has."

"I see," Evart said thoughtfully.

"Do you?" I asked darkly. It was a rhetorical question that needed no answer. He seemed to understand as much for he let me be for the time being.

I stayed there as the night deepened, hugging my knees to my chest and thinking about what had happened. Or what was happening to me. Finally, the hour to late for me to judge it in my condition, I finally fell asleep. Evart carefully rearranged my body on the ground and covered me with a cloak.

I awoke in the morning when Evart gently nudged my shoulder. I came up quickly, reaching for him with my hands twisted into claws. He stumbled away before I could get a hold of him and I stopped myself, wondering what I was doing. I shook my head and mumbled an apology, explaining that he had startled me.

"How are you feeling today?" He asked me, somewhat leery still.

I took stock of my condition mentally. I seemed to be okay, though I was very thirsty. I felt a little chilled and knew that I still had a fever. My mind seemed sharper then it had been, and for that I was thankful.

"A little better, I think," I said, then glanced down at my arm. The redness had advanced a little, pushing up my arm another inch or so. At this rate it might reach my shoulder by the time we reached Castle Palungol.

A gut wrenching spasm passed through my stomach then. Hurrying, I stumbled to my feet and over behind some trees and a scratchy bush. I fumbled with the laces on my breeches and only just managed to lower them in time before the sickness hit me. Foul liquids came gushing out of me, smelling as though something had been decaying within me for days. The smell added to my discomfort and made me sick. I heaved, adding stomach bile and dark blood to the mess on the ground. My eyes widened in fear as I saw the mixture. What was happening to me?

I stumbled back into the camp later, fiercely thirsty but no longer having any stomach pains. Evart looked at me with concern in his eyes. I shrugged and lied, "Mountain lion does not agree with my stomach."

"That or I'm a bad cook," Evart said, smiling.

I offered him a ghost of a smile and proceeded to help him break our camp. Twice more that day I had to make sudden rushes into concealment in order to relieve myself, and both times I grew more and more concerned. I had suffered no internal injury, nor did I feel any pain, but it appeared as though I was bleeding internally quite heavily. To offset the fluid loss I drank water rapidly, refilling my waterskins at every spring or mountain stream we could find.

My strength returned with each passing hour, and the dull haze in my head receded to a distant fog. The ache in my arm never abated, and at times my heart beat so loudly in my chest I thought Evart could hear it.

Dinner that night consisted of two rabbits and a squirrel that Evart brought down throughout the day. We cooked our own meat, since we had separate critters to roast. Mine had only been lightly scorched on the outside before I could stand the wait no more and had to try it. The coney tasted far better then it had in the past.

Evart glanced over at me at one point and nearly dropped his rabbit into the fire. "Yamara!" He said, shocked at my behavior.

I looked at him, wondering what was bothering him. He reached over slowly and I had to momentarily fight the urge to snap at his finger with my teeth. He touched my cheek and pulled his finger back, showing it to me. It was covered in blood. I looked down at the rabbit in my hands and saw that it was only marginally cooked on the outside, the deeper, tastier pieces of meat were still raw. My own eyes grew wide at this and I dropped it from me.

"What's happening to me, Evart?" I asked, my voice faltering.

"It must be the poison, Brina's blood, that is in you. It must be trying to turn you into what she is."

I nodded, scared. My mind had lost my appetite, but my stomach urged me to reach for the uncooked rabbit and scarf it down. I washed my mouth out with some unsatisfying water and sat silently near the fire, thinking.

The next day was much the same as that one, with slightly fewer frequent stops for me to leave a foul stain upon the ground. Apparently my stomach preferred meat raw over cooked. Otherwise the day was silent and uneventful. I was lost in thought going over the same thoughts in my head and discovering nothing new about them. Evart, whatever he was thinking, kept mostly to himself. I caught him looking at me from time to time with concern in his eyes. It was almost flattering, except it infuriated me to think that anybody felt that I could not take care of myself. Then I remembered a few times already during which I had not been able to take care of myself but he had stepped in to help. I wanted to thank him for his kindness and I wanted to butcher him for seeing such weakness in me.

The next morning brought us upon a rocky overlook of Castle Palungol. The citadel stood with its back to a cliff and a deep lake along half of the front of it. The main gate led to a road that ran to the northwest and the southeast. The southeastern direction twisted through some hills to come up to where we were at. The other direction led off through the mountains and hills to other, smaller towns and eventually out of Mardurin. Still no signs of people greeted us. Even Castle Palungol seemed barren and empty. We were far enough away that it would have been nearly impossible to see anyone within the castle itself, however.

"We will reach the town tonight, a few hours before dusk. Do you have any idea how you want to do this?" Evart informed and asked me as we stood overlooking the walled city.

"It's funny," I said distantly. "For months I have longed for this moment, and for over a year I have dreamed of a resolution to this."

"Nervous? Afraid?" Evart asked me filling the silence I had dropped into.

I shook my head and smirked coldly. "Numb, my friend. I am numb. I think the unstoppable fire that drove me to come here has doomed me. I think I died that same day I killed Brina. Only now my body has finally found a way to catch up."

I pulled the reigns on my horse and headed down the road towards the city. Evart hurried to catch up to me. "Just right through the front gate then?" He asked me.

I nodded. "Might as well, she's known we were coming for days at the least. He is her Master, so neither guile nor stealth will help us."

Evart nodded his head, slowly at first, then with a final resolution. "Right. Then let us see this to its end."

I pulled my horse to a stop and turned to face my riding companion. "I called you my friend earlier, Evart. That is an odd thing to me. I have never really had a friend before, but I meant it. Circumstances have made me a different woman then I used to be, whether weaker or stronger or better or worse I do not yet know. I do not wish any harm to come to you. I want you to leave me to this now. Turn around and go back. Go to Elendar and tell the King what you will about this, you might even find a pretentious and obnoxious gnome along the way named Fizzulthorp who is waiting for news."

He smiled grimly and just shook his head. "You call me a friend yet you ask me to not behave like one, Yamara you disappoint me."

"Death awaits us you fool!" I spat at him, growing angry. "We are surrounded by hostile armies within this land! We ride into the lair of unholy evil! Sometimes at night I have to fight with myself to keep from crawling over to where you sleep and ripping your eyeballs out with my fingers so I can feast on your brains, it is one of my nightmares that at some point my control will slip and I will do one of the many horrors that I fear I am now capable of!"

"Yamara, rail against me as you will, I promise you this; I shall not leave your side while my heart still beats and my lungs yet draw breath. My sword is yours to help you in this quest." Evart had never looked so serious or so handsome as he did sitting on his horse staring at me. In spite of his not-so-attractive features, he looked valiant and heroic. Truly the stuff of legends.

I sighed. "What about your vows to Elendar?"

He chuckled. "Which Elendar do you speak of? My vows are to the people that make up Elendar, not the lands upon which it sits. I promised my service to King Avercrombie and he in turn is pledged to protect the people. You are one of those people, Yamara. Whether you acknowledge it or not, without people who live and think and feel as you do, Elendar is nothing but a dying tract of land. Thus, in a sense, I have now sworn to protect you twice."

I shook my head. To many things were on my mind to follow his logic. I just shrugged and faced ahead again. Finally, after a few long moments of silence between us I prodded my horse into action and headed down the road anew. "Then let us ride."

Book 2 : Chapter 11

It came as no great surprise to us when we saw at least two score of orcs waiting for us at the gate. We saw them as soon as we came around the final bend in the road. With barely a glance at one another we continued onwards, showing no fear or concern. I had not worn the hood of my cloak up in several days now, and after a brief moment of thought decided to leave it down. There was no subterfuge left in me.

At the gate they moved to surround us, giving us a wide berth but leaving no route to escape. We were fully committed at that point. The gates opened, all without a word being spoken, and the orcs started forward, us moving along with them out of necessity.

We moved down the main thoroughfare of the small city, past a tavern that doubled as an inn, a general store, not one but two smithies, and a few large buildings that could only be barracks. Off in the distance down side roads we could see other buildings that surely performed functions not dissimilar from those found in any town; a tanners booth, housing for peasants and wealthier folk, carpenters and the like, stuff of such common nature. Were it not for the orcs surrounding us and the native inhabitants being a mixture of human and non-human races generally considered evil, I would have sworn we could have been in any town. It did not have the look of vile and infamy associated with Mardurin. In fact, the town actually looked quite clean.

A smaller wall with a smaller gate soon was before us. Only 8 feet high, this wall could be jumped over by a trained leaper. It would do well to stall the advance of a large group, however, while archers and pike wielders behind it picked them off. The gate opened and we were led through. Once inside we stopped and saw the manor house in which James and Brina now called their home. My breath suddenly left me. It took me a for moments of careful concentration to relax and breathe evenly again without showing any signs of distress.

A man emerged from behind the gate, pale even in the waning afternoon light. He bowed to us and said, "The Master has been waiting for your arrival. Please dismount and follow me."

Evart looked to me and I nodded. I swallowed down the lump in my throat and swung my leg over the horse. A remarkably well behaved orc came forward and took the reigns. Another one did the same for Evart. The orcs stayed behind as we followed the servant into the manor.

The doors opened of their own accord before us, leading us further and further into the house. It did not seem as large from the outside as it appeared to be on the inside. A turn to the right brought us to a large set of double doors, and from there into an anteroom. Another set of doors and we were introduced into the throne room of Baron Palungol. James sat in a royal chair upon a raised dais.

His skin was so pale it seemed nearly made of ivory. His expression was frozen as well, but it was frozen into an amused look. His eyes seemed possessed of an inner fire, though they did not burn with a sinister red light as Brina's did.

With Brina in mind I looked about, wondering where she was. We appeared to be alone in the room with James and his servant. Doing a double take I realized that the servant that had led us through the palace was gone. That left only James and us. I suspected some of the statues were more then just statues as well, but had no way of knowing.

"Welcome, Yamara, to my new home," James said with a dangerous grin. His voice had changed some. It sounded drier then it had before; it had a raspy quality to it now.

"It sounds as though my dagger did not cut deep enough," I responded, anger beginning to build up within me. The wound in my arm suddenly grew warm, making me glance down at it in surprise. It seemed the same as always, hidden beneath the poorly mended sleeve of my blouse.

Evart watched the exchange quietly, poised and ready for whatever happened. He recognized James easily, but was startled at the change in his look and demeanor.

James sneered at me. "A clever move you made, long history now. I should thank you though, for giving me the chance at this rebirth, with Brina forever at my side."

I felt the blood drain from my face at that. What had been growing anger turned into white hot rage instantly. "Where is she you bastard?" I growled at him, stepping forward menacingly.

James chuckled, his voice hissing and further irritating me. "Brina, we have guests you might be interested in."

I followed James outstretched arm and saw shadows move like smoke in the dimly lit room. The moved beside him and, as I watched, they shaped themselves into a human form. Then the shadows disappeared and in their place stood a woman wearing a hooded cloak. My breath caught in my throat as I saw the twin red glimmerings beneath the cowl. She reached up, her hands nearly bronze in color with sharp and cruel looking fingernails extending nearly an inch from her fingers, and laid the hood back from her head.

"Brina!" I gasped. She looked at me and underwent a range of emotions, from the appearance of her face. She was happy for a portion of a second, then enraged, then confused, then sad, then finally she fixed me with a cold hate filled stare.

She began walking forward then, stepping down the four steps from the raised dais to the floor level and walking towards us. She practically floated over the floor, so gracefully and sinuously did she move. Evart's jaw dropped open slightly as he saw her. All we could see was her once angelic, now demonic, face and her hands, the rest was obscured by the cloak. That was enough for him to understand her dark and terrible beauty.

"You left me," Brina said to me as she stopped in front of me. Her voice was quiet and cold. "You killed me and left me to die with him."

I nodded, tears threatening to run down my face. I blinked them away as rapidly as I could. I opened my mouth to respond, uncertain of what I was going to say. I had longed for this moment since that fell day, longed for it and dreaded it. Now that I had it, I did not know what to do with it.

"Yamara understood what was happening, Brina. She understood and refused to let anyone have you if she could not!" James called out harshly from his throne.

Evart bristled at his words, he knew they were prompting me into an action that, once entered, could only be seen through to a grisly end. He was right, James always had a way of pushing me into action.

"He lies," I said, my tone tight and controlled as I stared into the twin pools of liquid fire that were Brina's eyes. "He lies and I will have no more of it!"

I took a step towards James, moving around Brina. Her hand, so deadly with its razor sharp fingernails, laid upon my arm with a gentleness that was surprising considering the hidden strength it employed to stop me. That and the battling emotions playing across her face.

"He is my Master, Yamara," She said to me, the inflections in her voice changing with her conflicting emotions. As she talked I also noticed how incredibly white and equally incredibly sharp her teeth looked. "I must protect him."

I looked at her and felt another surge of warmth in my wounded arm. The tingling in it was driving me crazy. I reached across slowly and tore my sleeve away to look at it. The redness had advanced up to at my shoulder by that time, and as I thought about it I could feel it fighting to sink further into my chest.

"Why did you do this to me?" I asked, looking back at her. My anger was forgotten for the moment. I knew why she had done it, but I needed to hear her say it.

Brina turned her head and looked back up at James briefly before turning back to me. I saw no exchange pass between them but suspected they had a silent means of communication. Regardless, she answered me and he remained where he was.

"You dodged the first bolt," she said calmly, "without knowing it. The second only grazed you, nearly a miss."

"But why?" I asked, surprised. I did not know she had missed me the first time. I began to doubt that I knew her after all. "I can understand wanting to kill me. I would want no less in your shoes. For someone to have done what I did, I would know no limit to my search for vengeance."

"And you ask my why I do this to you?" She hissed at me, practically spitting on me. "In death, Yamara, I became the thing you never wanted me to be. I became more like you then ever you realized."

My jaw hung slack for a moment. Brina had slapped me with words more sharp then any hand could have been. I closed my eyes and nodded, a tear falling to the ground almost in slow motion as my head dipped down. I opened my eyes and looked back at her, my vision blurry.

"I lost everything that day, Brina. I even lost myself. And now, in life, these last few days as your poison works through me, I have become more like you were."

"Enough of this!" James shouted, standing up. He liked our conversation and our shared words little, apparently. He had been hoping for more hatred and angst between us, I think. "The poison works through you too slowly, wench! I shall have my vengeance upon you before this day is done. You were promised to me, whore, I will have my fun with you yet!"

I glared at him and dropped my hands to my sword and dagger. Without realizing it, I had easily torn my arm free of Brina's iron grip. "What makes you think you can succeed now when you failed at the same thing before?" I asked icily.

Brina snarled, though I did not think it was at me, but rather at the pending situation. She backed up and dropped a little lower, raising her hands up in front of her in a way that promised much pain to anyone who dealt with her. James chuckled maliciously at the sight of her. "As much fun as it would be to have you kill her, Brina, I want you to watch instead. I will rid this world of her and her treachery."

"You will find, Yamara, that I am far stronger now then I was before," James said, returning his gaze to me as he stepped down the stairs. Brina backed up slowly, lowering her arms and her head. I could not be certain, but I felt as though her eyes still followed me.

Another wave of fiery warmth spread out from the shoulder, making me grit my teeth and try to ignore it. My arm, while filled with fiery tendrils of sensation, behaved normally and seemed as though it would not betray me and cause my dagger to slip.

"What do you know of treachery, lapdog of Dagrazt?" Evart said, moving beside me. I glanced at him and scowled. This was to be my fight. "Ah, I forgot, you seem to have defined the word, Baron Palungol!"

James stopped and looked at Evart. "Why Evart, I had forgotten you were here. Ever a loyal servant to the Crown, I see. Run along now and I will let you live, so long as you leave Mardurin and never return."

"Unlike you, coward, I will stand by my duties and my charge unto my very death," Evart vowed. I snorted softly at his claim.

"You truly are cursed, Yamara," James said, chuckling and moving towards me again. "Not only will you die, but you will be responsible for Evart dying as well. Ironic, how far you've come only to meet this grisly end. Tell me, how does the poison feel Yamara?"

Again I felt a surge within me, and this time it was accompanied by one of the stomach cramps I had experienced lately. This one was different though, instead of being in my bowels it was higher. I gasped and bent over to spit out some dark blood on the floor. Evart looked at it with wide eyes, suddenly understanding what had made me rush to relieve myself so many times recently.

"You're dying," he said softly, realization settling in.

"Leave me here, you fool," I hissed at him, wiping the back of my hand on my chin to clear off the leftover blood and bile. I spat a few more times to try and clear the foul taste from my mouth.

"No."

Evart drew his broadsword and stepped in front of me protectively. James just laughed more loudly. He drew his own longsword and dagger and advanced on Evart. "Very well, bastard son of the whore of a Havrin, you die first!"

Evart lunged forward first, sinking his blade into James' belly deeply. James brought his sword down in a mighty blow and smashed it into Evart's blade, causing the newly purchased sword to shatter. Evart looked in shock at the broken hilt in his hand, then glanced up to see James' dagger slash across at him. He tried to react but only managed to avoid the worst of the blow, it still cut deeply into his shoulder and sent him reeling backwards.

James advanced on him and swung his sword across in a crude attempt to behead my companion. My friend. My only friend. I rose up, ignoring the pain in my stomach and shouted, "No! You're fight is with me!"

Evart ducked under the cut but met James steel-reinforced boot in the chest, driving him up and off the ground a few feet from the force of the impact. He crashed back down, not moving. James turned to me then and grinned. "Very well, bitch, let us fight."

It was obvious to me that James' strength was far greater now then it had been before, seeing what he did to Evart. As he walked towards me he reached down and pulled the piece of Evart's broadsword free from his abdomen, then discarded it carelessly. Seen through his torn clothing, his skin looked whole and uninjured.

I charged him, knowing my only chance, if I had one at all, was to keep him off balance. I lashed out with my weapons, finding my speed was surprising even me. Each cut or thrust landed, though the ones with my dagger healed up instantly. My shortsword, a remnant from the world of my birth and possessing a magical dweomer that kept its edge keen, caused lasting wounds upon him. Wounds that did not bleed. They reminded me of the wound in my arm.

James reacted as soon as he felt the first bite of my magical blade. Realizing I possessed a weapon that could harm him, he growled at me and tried to cut me down. I dodged the blow, knowing that to block it would probably mean my weapon would be knocked free from my hand. From there we began to move more cautiously at one another. I dodged or deflected his weapons whenever possible and he did the same to mine. My skill and speed was still greater, but his strength and apparent disregard for his own safety made up for my advantage.

Also to his boon was the growing fire in my gut. It stabbed at me from inside and demanded that I collapse and succumb to it. The poison, with my heart rate up, spread throughout my body. It brought it's warm tingling throughout me, reminding me of the shared dream I had with Brina when she first tasted the blood of the demoness. I fought a battle on two fronts, on with my weapons and another one inside my body.

I saw that Evart had managed to roll over but was in no condition to move. He coughed up blood himself, with broken ribs sure to be the cause. His shoulder leaked blood heavily down his arm and onto the floor as well, but it did not spurt out, giving hope that with some pressure or a bandage it might not prove mortal.

Brina stood watching the fight, her hands flexing in agitation. Other then that and a pinched expression on her face, she betrayed no movement or interest.

We traded blows for many minutes, circling one another and lashing out often. James should have bled from over a dozen wounds but as yet he seemed unfazed by any of the rents in his flesh. My sword had even opened up a gash in his right cheek deep enough to see his teeth. His response had been a macabre grin.

What surprised me as much as his seemingly immortal nature was my stamina. Outside of the pain in my gut, which had begun to lessen now that the poison had free reign in my system and pulled at the edges of my consciousness, I felt no lack of energy or strength from the prolonged fight. Neither did I breathe as hard as I expected to. Then I felt my heart beating within my chest. It actually slowed down a little, scaring me, and beat with a dull dual thud. I did not know what Brina's blood would do to me that would prove fatal, but I vowed I had to fight off it's effects long enough to see James destroyed once and for all.

James outmaneuvered me then, so caught up was I in my condition, and I was forced with the only choice of blocking his sword with my dagger. The blade of the dagger, forged of hard steel as it was, was no match for the cruelly wrong longsword he wielded. The blade snapped off at the tang and did little more then deflect his sword. It sliced through my leather jerkin effortlessly, cutting deeply into my left breast and grating along the skin of my stomach before it's perilous arc carried it away from my body. I gasped in pain at the wound, stumbling backwards several steps out of harm's way.

I reached for another dagger and remembered through my misery the magical blade I had been given by King Avercrombie. I pulled the dagger out from the sheath in the small of my back and without waiting, threw it at him. Surprised at the missile weapon, James reacted late to it and felt it sink into his flesh between his right shoulder and his neck. He spat out a curse at me and yanked it free, throwing it far from me to the ground in disgust. The wound stayed, being made by a magical weapon.

I cast about me for some other source of a weapon but saw nothing. I had only my short sword in my hand to do battle with now, while he had both a dagger and sword at his disposal. And he was well versed in the use of two weapons.

I glanced down then at my chest, expecting to see the reason behind the burning sensation along my chest. What I saw amazed me. The wound was there, a deep cut through my breast missing my nipple by a scant inch and then a more shallow groove a few inches along my belly. My shock came at how very little blood flowed from it.

I looked back up in time to see James had reached me and now punched out at me with the hilt of his dagger. It crashed into my face and sent me reeling. I crashed into the ground, ending up on my back with my short sword several feet away from me. I shook my head to clear the effects of the stunning blow and tried to remember to scramble away from him.

Not in time though. James' boot crashed into my side, sending me rolling with the force of it. I tried to roll away but he followed to quickly, kicking out at me again. The blow only glanced off of me, but it still caused me to gasp in pain. My breath had been driven out of me with his first kick, and while that distressed me, it did not have as much an effect on me as I would have otherwise thought.

It was then that I saw the dagger tucked into my boot. The dagger I had taken from the orc so very long ago in the sewers of Standopolis. The dagger that had the symbol of Dagrazt on it. What better irony then to use it on him, a servant of Dagrazt!

I got my chance to retrieve it after James' next kick landed on me squarely in the abdomen. I doubled over in pain, spewing out what had to be the last of the bloody mess in my stomach upon the ground. While curled into the fetal position I kept my senses about me enough to pull the dagger out and reverse my hold on it so I could hold it concealed against my forearm.

I lay there coughing, gasping, and retching for a few blessed moments of relief when no further kicks came. When I finally looked up I saw James looking down upon me with a victorious sneer upon his face.

"I had expected more from you, Yamara. You disappoint me yet again."

"My Lord, will you hold a moment so that I may repay her for her kindness to me." Brina's words were cold and sent chills down my spine. The chills were nearly welcome, since the rest of my body burned with the unholy fire of the poison within me.

James chuckled. "Of course, do what you will with her, save only that you leave the final blow for me."

Brina walked over to me, her footsteps making no noise upon the cold stone floor. She knelt down next to me and with a strength I had not known even she possessed, she rolled me out of the puddle of my own vomitus. I was a mess, but unknown to both of them, I was not beaten quite yet. My only hope was that Brina would not weaken me so much that I could not have my final attack on James. It was a small thing, but it was the only thing I had left to leave me focused enough to continue my fight to live.

"I loved you once greater then any friend or sister could," she said to me flatly. I tried to ignore her words, to not hear her so I would not lose my focus on the one thing I still needed to do before I slept.

Rather then continue to speak, she leaned over me and spread my shredded jerkin. I dimly found it more then a little odd. She bent over further and I felt her cold lips upon my breast, kissing it softly. Then I felt a fiery drop of liquid fall into my cut. She had bitten her tongue and bled into me, further poisoning me with her blood. I gasped at the sensation and felt my resolve weaken. Surely I would be dead long before I found the strength for my final thrust.

A new sensation joined the others. A sharp pricking sensation as though I had been pierced with a splinter or a needle. Then more followed and I understood Brina had just bitten me. She pulled what little blood that was in me to surrender to her mouth and swirled it around on her tongue before she swallowed it. She shuddered once, briefly, then looked up at my face. She looked at me then with an expression on her face that caused my failing heart to nearly give up altogether. It was a look mixed with such joy and such sorrow that I had never seen it before. Tears of blood ran down her face.

"Give in to the blood, it will make you strong enough to do what you must," she whispered to me so silently I was not sure if she had spoken the words or if I had heard them in my head.

I closed my eyes and struggled to breathe. What she said made no sense, it would kill me. Yet I knew from the look on her face that she would never cause me harm again. Even now, after the tragedy that had been her life with me, something had somehow changed her mind. She had found some memory or some hidden thing within herself that let her fight James' dominion of her. I was doomed and accepted it. Brina knew it too. She must have also known then that the only way for me to finish what I had come there to do was to do as she bade me.

I surrendered to the sensations coursing through me. I relaxed my body and let the darkness in my assaulting my head overcome me. I lay there and collapsed in upon myself for a moment, with time seeming to come to a standstill. I heard Evart's every shallow gasping breath clearly, heard my own heart beat slowly but clearly in my chest, I heard the rasp of my clothing on the floor as I shuddered. I felt the slight wind on my skin as Brina sat up straight and looked down sadly upon me. Then she stood and moved back behind James.

In a rush everything sped up again. I was clearly alert and fully conscious. Aware of every inch of my body, I had never felt more alive. I felt strong too, stronger then I had ever before. Brina had given me some of herself, enough to sustain me through the dark time ahead. I knew then that the crossbow quarrel had been meant to kill me, but to do so slowly and to force me to endure the visions that I had seen. It was meant to make me suffer before I died.

However, the magical potion I had drank had changed that outcome. Instead it allowed me to fight it off long enough to partially co-exist with it. It also allowed a bond to form between Brina and I. Her blood was magical, and because of that she sensed my distress at the visions and knew what she had been told was not the truth of it. Or at least she suspected there was more to it.

I knew then what I had to do as well. It was as I expected but it involved more then I would have known. The unlikely nature of it all struck me as far to well thought out to have happened coincidentally. Nevertheless, hiding my dagger behind my back I cut into the only flesh I could readily reach, that of my right buttock. Brina's gift made me acutely aware of the pain of the magical dagger slicing into my behind. Nevertheless I endured it silently and coated the blade with as much of my own poisoned blood as I hoped I could, given that I could not see it.

"Finish her, Master, I have had my fill of her," Brina said. James' eyes had never left me, so great was his obsession and hatred of me, so he never noticed the streaks of bloody tears on Brina's face. His hatred and obsession was so powerful it was nearly a match for my own.

He sheathed his dagger and stepped so that he towered over me. Using his now free hand he grabbed my short hair and yanked me to my knees by it. I kept my face downcast as much as possible to avoid him seeing me. He raised his sword in one hand, keeping me steady with the other and prepared to finish me off.

"I'm almost going to miss having you around to hate, Yamara, you above all else have kept me strong all this time. I suppose I will have to do with Brina, she is such a charming creature, don't you think?" James said sweetly, thinking he was treating me to a final condescending show of his power.

"Let. Her. Go!"

James looked back over his shoulder to where Evart tried desperately to regain his feet. He had crawled over to where my shortsword lay and even in his near death was preparing to try and defend me. I used the distraction he provided to my benefit.

Lunging up far faster then humanly possible, I swung the now poisonous dagger around in an arc gathering inhuman speed and power. I pulled a very surprised James to me so that my chest touched his and speared the dagger deeply into his back. It knifed through his spine and pierced his heart from behind. James' head twisted around to face me, surprise and pain evident on it. He gasped a few times and then laughed.

"You stupid bitch," he said, trying to push me away. "You can't destroy me like that, this body has already been dead!"

My strength was greater then he expected though, and he was unable to push me away. More so as I had severed his spine and with every bit of force his arms exerted he realized that his legs were not supporting him as he teetered off balance. I rode him to the floor when he crashed there, making sure I kept maximum pressure on the dagger.

"What did you do to me!" He screamed at me. He reached down and tried to pry me off again. I ignored his fingers as they clawed and tore at my skin, trying to find a good purchase with which to rip me away from him.

James made a strangled noise then. The mixture of my blood and Brina's was pushing through his system. His heart, unnaturally beating after his death, continued to pump in spite of my steel sawing into it with each pulse. It pushed the poison into his limbs further and further with each moment, going up and into his brain as well. Unseen to me, who only had eyes for James, Brina turned away from the gruesome spectacle.

He lay there, paralyzed and frozen as it worked its way through him. His jaw moved and he struggled to talk, his eyes following me fearfully. "No," he managed to gasp out, "this cannot be! Master, help me!"

A great gust of ethereal wind blew through the room then. It chilled my already abused and ravaged body to the bone. Evart collapsed back to the ground with a grunt. Brina shuddered and fell to her knees. I rolled off of James' body and slowly stood up.

Upon the dais stood a new figure. He was covered in a hooded cloak not so different from Brina's, save that a gut clenching fear emanated from him. Had I not already faced my worst fears that very day, I would have been senselessly wallowing on the ground and wetting myself.

"Master!" James gasped again, reaching up towards him.

"No, James, you have failed me," The figure said, a powerful voice said out from beneath the hood. It reminded me of a great many things at once. It sounded like a snake hissing, yet at the same time it had the deep pitch of a giant of a barbarian. I heard the voice of a small girl in it and an elderly man. It was impossible to fully understand the voice, yet we could hear it clearly. The only thing that was truly unmistakable about it was that it belonged to a being of enormous power.

"I told you once to not grow so obsessed that you neglected your duties. You have disappointed me."

"Wait," James said, struggling desperately to speak. "I -"

James never finished his sentence. He burst into flames suddenly before my very eyes. The figure did not move at all, he simply stood there silently watching.

"You destroyed him as surely as I, Mistress Blackcloak, would you be the Baroness Palungol?" It asked me. I shivered at the thought of it.

"No, I will strike no deal with you. I will die soon, best to leave it as that, I have seen to much to go on," I said without hesitation. I knew of wizard and priests striking deals with demons and wanted no part of it, especially considering this being was far more powerful then any demon I had ever heard of.

"Very well, the seat shall be empty," he said. "You must leave this place, girl, I will accept your presence no longer."

I nodded. "Gladly, Dark One."

He chuckled, his odd voice reminding me of a nest of angry hornets buzzing about. "I admire your courage, girl, you have spirit. For that I will grant you this one and only boon."

Suddenly I felt weak. My legs collapsed under me and I crashed to the floor. I shook my head and realized that I felt like a child. Everything seemed muffled to me. I had trouble breathing, my heart hammered in my chest, and even my vision seemed to be dimming. Some boon, I thought.

"Your body is your own again," he said to me. "You will live your short human life."

I slowly picked myself back up, an ache or a pain in every bone as I did so. My body felt bloated, so full of blood was it once again. I looked to Brina, who was still kneeling on the ground too terrified to even shake. Evart was likewise paralyzed, but his was a paralysis of shock, he could not comprehend fully what was going on.

"The druid was right, you are unnatural and have no place here on this world. Leave it and never return."

"How?" I asked, sensing my interview with the supreme evil being was about to be concluded.

A glowing nimbus of light appeared next to him on the dais. "One person only may enter, if it is not you, I will see to it that you are imprisoned and tortured for a thousand years."

The warmth returned to the room then suddenly. It was gone.

I looked at the waning color in Evart's face and saw that Brina was still kneeling on the floor, too horrified to move yet. I rushed over to Evart and pulled out my S.E.T. badge. I pressed it into his hand and said, "Use this, my friend, or you will not survive to make it out of this room, let alone these lands."

Evart looked at me thoughtfully. His fingers fumbled with it for a minute and then he performed the same procedure he had down what seemed like a lifetime ago in the swamp. He sighed as the healing magic coursed through him, restoring his lungs, shoulder, and ribs to their proper condition. He rose shakily to his feet and stretched a little, smiling.

I turned from him and walked up to Brina. I knelt next to her and lifted her face to look at mine. Dark streaks showed the tears that fell from her face. I pulled her to me and hugged her against my chest. My leathers still lay open but my wounds had been healed. Brina sobbed against me for several long minutes.

When last she could speak she said to me, "I am sorry, Yamara. Sorry to have ever doubted you!"

I hushed her before responding. "You did as any would, Brina, and you were not wrong in doing so. I used you poorly at the time and handled the situation so very wrongly. The fault is mine. Wholly mine."

"I did not know truly what to do with you when you were on the floor at James' feet. I did not know what to think. I had to be sure, or I would have tried to do something sooner!" She said in a rush.

"I had to know what went through your head and your heart, no words could tell me and we had not the time," she continued. "I had to take your blood in me, had to know what you knew."

I nodded, that made sense. It worked both ways, by giving me her blood she had given me visions of what she had experienced, and by doing to opposite she had been able to see what she needed to.

"I saw what you did and how you felt, before during and after. I know what you went through and I understand better then you do what it is that you have done to yourself." Brina paused and looked up at me, the most tender expression on her face I had ever seen. Long ago had the mischievous little girl I had met on Acathia disappeared. In its place had grown a beautiful woman. Even if she did have the occasional desire to rip the heart from a newborn and feast upon it, we all had our faults.

"Feel no grief anymore for me, Yamara, I should have never left Acathia. You are the one meant to travel and do more deeds. I was a simple moth who tried to live to close to a flame."

I did not like the way her words coming out. "Hush Brina, we will get you out of here. There must be some way for you to come with me and we can put all this behind us. So your eyes glow in the dark and you prefer to feast on the raw flesh of innocents, we can always find a way to get by."

She smiled at me and shook her head. "No, Yamara, I am done here. With James gone I can pick my own fate now, and I pick the fate that you and he once gave me."

"Brina, No, I forbid it!" I said, my voice thickening and my eyes starting to tear again. "We've been through to much now for you to give up!"

"You heard him, Yamara, only you may leave this world and you must do it. I have done to many horrible things to continue to live. Even knowing what I have done makes it impossible for me to live with myself now that I am free of James' control." Brina looked sad but resolute, and I finally accepted what must be. "I can never be normal again. I can never go among people like this. I will always have the overpowering urges the demoness gave to me. I must be destroyed, and you must do it."

"No," I breathed, shaking my head. I could not do it. I had killed her once, to do it again would destroy me forever. "I can't, Brina. Not again. Not ever again!"

"You must, Yamara," she said. "I will have no one else show me this most desperate act of love, sacrifice, and mercy."

Tears fell freely, obscuring my vision. I pulled Brina to me and hugged her desperately, trying to come up with any other way of making things work. I felt her cold tears against my chest, leaving bloody tracks dripping down my chest. Finally she pushed me away.

"Do it now, before we lose the heart to do so. Already I feel the urges in me to rise up and lash out."

I nodded, moving slowly to my feet. "How?" I asked, managing to choke it out between deep breaths.

"Grab James' sword and sever my head in a single blow. Quick and painless and it will be over. I will be gone but know that you will forever carry my memory and my love with you."

Numbly I walked over and picked up the longsword that James had used against me. It was warm to the touch and hummed with an inner energy. I walked back over to where Brina knelt and moved behind her. Not thinking clearly, I positioned the sword and drew it back for a single swift cut.

"Are you ready?" I asked her, my voice subdued so as to not crack.

"Wait," she whispered. Her hand came around in front of her and, unseen to me but witnessed by Evart, she parted her cloak to reveal that she wore nothing underneath of it. Her hand, sporting those cruel edged fingernails, rested for a moment just underneath her rib cage. "Take this and carry it with you forever."

I saw her arm suddenly jerk inward. Evart watched her hand plunge into her chest and behind her sternum. She latched onto that which she sought and with a single spastic pull wrenched her heart free of her chest. I saw her pull the organ and hold it in mid air and nearly fainted at the sight of it. It was still beating. Her thick and dark blood ran down her arm and dripped to the floor. She squeezed it in her hand, her movements becoming jerkier by the second, and then she opened her hand to display a small tear shaped ruby resting in her palm.

I grabbed it up, knowing I had to move quickly now. I had a job to do and if I had failed her time and again before, this last time I was not about to do so. I resumed my prior position and swung the sword as hard as I could. It connected with her neck and in less then a second it was over. There was a powerful flash and I was thrown from my feet to the ground. When I came to my senses a few minutes later all that remained of Brina was her empty cloak on the floor and the ruby in my hand.

I crawled over to the cloak and held it in my hands, trying to catch a last smell of her scent. There was nothing to it. I clutched it in both hands and let the tears flow freely a final time. I did not know how long I lay there grieving, nor did I care. Only that at the time nothing had any meaning for me in the world.

Epilogue

"Yamara."

Evart was sitting there, looking at me. He might have called my name out several times, I was not sure. All I know is that finally I was aware of him again. I stood up and walked towards him. He rose to meet me. Wordlessly he wrapped his arms around me and hugged me. He held me for another indeterminate amount of time and I let him. I was exhausted in every possible way. I needed any support I could get, and he was there to give it to me.

"Thank you, Evart," I whispered to him at one point. "Thank you for being my friend. One of the two only true friends I have ever known."

He just gave me a little squeeze in acknowledgement. It was enough at the time.

But, as all good things must end, so must all bad things. And that was a bittersweet mix of the two extreme. I broke away from him before speaking. "I have to go, Evart. Whatever God's-forsaken world Dagrazt is going to send me too, I have to leave. For your protection as much as my own."

I wandered around the room and picked up my discarded short sword and thrown dagger, resheathing all of them then looking at Evart, who was watching me carefully.

Evart smiled sadly. "I look forward to the time when the Gods shall favor us with a meeting again."

I returned his smile. "I share that hope, Evart. I large part of me died here today, a part that I think I am glad to bury. I am a new person, born again and soon to be in a different place. A place that, if it was to happen, you could and you would be able to have me, I think."

Evart chuckled. "I shall look for that place then! And until then, go with my blessings and know that no matter how trying times are, You have a friend to the death and beyond in me."

Another one of those damned tears got away from me. I grabbed him and pulled him to me, hugging him again in a death grip that lasted roughly a thousand years to short. Then, before either of us could say or do anything else, I turned and walked up the stairs of the dais. I glanced back at him and studied him for a second, noting he was doing the same for me. My next step into the nimbus of light made everything around me fade away.

*****

Evart grabbed up James' longsword and put it into his empty scabbard. It fit loosely, but it fit and that was enough. He had to get out of the castle as quick as he could. Being a Havrin he had a far better chance of escape alone then he had if Yamara had been permitted to come with him though.

Yamara. Now there was a story. A women the likes of which he had never met. Stronger then anyone he had ever met, in spite of what she considered to be constant moments of weakness near the end. He thought she might have been learning better though. He shook his head and made himself move on. If he played his cards right there would be plenty of time later for him to remember her fondly over a mug of ale.

But for now, he had to get back to Elendar and report on all that had happened. More importantly he had a little business to take care of first. Paul, formerly James' squire, was still at large. It just would not do to have him able to follow up in James' footsteps, now would it?