Open Chronicles The Raid On Hollowmere Crossing

The fall of Vyx'aria from power had meant the fall of Zathria as well. The Drow Commander had been loyal to the Queen through the fall and had sworn violent vengeance on the House that had cast them down, but survival had to come first. You couldn't strike back at those you hated if you were dead.

Her eyes flicked over to one of the degenerate male vagabonds they had picked up on the surface, his lecherous gaze constantly following her and somehow his presence never too far away. She made a note to run him through on this raid if she got a chance. Or maybe just leave him out as the person who could be cut down if they found themselves in conflict.

Her hand came to rest against the hilt of one of her sabers, its weight at her side a reassurance even amidst this accursed human settlement. The moon in the sky and these infernal torches were already more light than she wanted but the blackness of her Drow-weaved armor let her blend into the shadows left behind seamlessly.

It wasn't her saber, though, that she pulled as Vyx'aria urged them forward but her knife. The weapon slipped from its sheathe - its blade laced with a poison before she had set out on this raid - and she fell upon the nearest human, another drunkard who was nearly unconscious already. He opened his mouth to call out only for a gloved hand to smother his yelp the knife plunged through flesh and poured blood free into the dirt.

"Scouting reports point to a heavier guard presence on the other side of town. If we take the town before alerting them we can throw them off guard and drive them from their positions of strength on the walls," she said.

Light. First there was stone, and then, there was light. Voices that echoed in that crystalline cave. Voices from a thousand different pasts; voices of family, friends, lovers -- all strangers now, and yet, he knew them, deeper than he knew himself. They tugged at him, urging him to come back to them, to relive his moments with them; moments that were all but scattered into piles of fractured glass, no longer coherent, no longer making sense.

The light reflected it all and consumed all. A great, prismatic tunnel of it, one that he journeyed through at impossible speeds, outmatched by any steed, bird or man. Too fast. Too sudden. Too real. He wasn't ready. The light blazed through him, tore him apart, reforged him, blinded him and then . . .

J'rell opened his eyes with a hitch, breath catching, drenched in sweat. Slowly, he raised his head, glancing down at the pearls of sweat glistening on his own chest. His breathing roared in his ears; slowly, slowly calming down. It was near dark. No bright glare. The darkness layered over him like a comforting blanket, soothing him.

"You are awake," a voice purred from the darkness.

He sighed and lay back his hairless head on his mat. His mind carefully picked up the few pieces of glass it had left from its bowl of memory and put them back together. Eyes found the thatched roof, circled the rickety walls, reconstructing the hut he was in again. Hollowmere Crossing. The voice: he connected it to the medicine woman that had brought him here. Nishka. He recalled now. Her name was an anchor in a sea of infinity.

"I am awake," he agreed. Slowly, he pushed himself up, rediscovering the long, white loincloth that covered his legs. The golden tattoos that swirled across his jet-black skin. He used his deep, slow voice again, to test if it truly belonged to him: "And so are you."

Nishka cackled warmly.

"An astute observation. And I have been for some time. You talk in your sleep."

"What did I say?"

No plan survived contact with the enemy, sure, but Zathria thought that it should be "no plan survives contact with the idiot surfacer allies." She missed the discipline of the Underrealm. Those few veteran fighters who had fled the darkness with her were often picked for scouting teams and the like but they lacked the combat strength and numbers needed to actually sack a town or fight a battle.

"My Queen, I will draw their attention away with a trio of our scouts," she said, knowing that she could easily take a trio of Drow and lead the locals on a merry chase through the darkness of the town. She could have them swiping at shadows only to come up empty and that would mean the remaining fighters - and more importantly the idiot surfacers - would have less to deal with.

Zathria slipped her sabers out of their sheathes and pointed at a trio of the Drow, trusted scouts who she knew would not fail her, and motioned for them to come with her.

She flung herself from the darkness, falling upon one of the militiamen like a feral animal but each strike was precise. Three hits in just over a second to the neck, thigh, and sternum that sent him falling backwards.

Although most in this town were not real combatants, the same could not be said for the captain of the guard. A veteran of multiple campaigns, he emerged from his house with sword and shield in hand, silvery chest plate catching faint rays of moonlight as his voice bellowed over the town.

"Rally to me, my brothers! We will drive these heathen back into the night!" he shouted and already people were beginning to gather to him, starting to form an actual defense rather than act like the scattered and frightened sheep they were.

Zathria At'Arel said:

"Rally to me, my brothers! We will drive these heathen back into the night!"

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Before the medicine woman ever got the chance to answer, a rallying cry splintered the night. Confusion and fear tore Hollowmere Crossing apart. Furor wandered the village. It was a sound he knew well; a sound he had heard many times before.

While animalistic anger stirred outside, J'rell's head only lowered with sorrow. He thought he had found solace in the night. But the night proved him wrong; it proved to have teeth. And once again, he would have to kill.

"Do you have a weapon?" he muttered, barely wanting to say the words.

"Behind the wicker baskets. There's a blade."

Her words had drained of warmth, cold with fear. J'rell rose in one, fluid motion and clenched and unclenched his hands before his face, as if confirming for himself that they were his own. Rippling muscle marked his arms, chest, abdomen, and he could feel the strength of his thighs and calves beneath the cloth.

This would do.

Pushing through the wicker baskets, he found the long blade and pulled it free. A dented, mangled piece of metal, with a brass crossguard and pommel. It looked the brutish size of an orcish weapon. Probably barely sharp.

Adequate.

He stepped through the tent, slow and methodical, like a wave cresting over the sea, waiting its turn before it would crash against shore. All around him, lights winked and shadows danced and people ran to and fro, committing the first mistake on any battlefield. Giving in to confusion.

While others ran, J'rell kept still, grand blade resting on his shoulder. Now standing outside the hut on tall supports, his ebony eyes surveyed Hollowmere Crossing. They squinted slightly, taking his time to locate any sign of the enemy, before committing himself to action.

Vyx'aria
Zathria At'Arel

Somewhere amidst the panic, a candle had been dropped in the village and one of the huts was now fully ablaze, casting irregular flickers of light across the entire village. It seemed someone had taken up to answer the call to defend the village, or perhaps more than one someone.

Zathria's eyes pierced the darkness to see the man who had risen in challenge, a single sword in hand. A part of her wanted to scoff at the idea, knowing well that the Queen could dance lethal circles around him, and yet there was a confidence in his stride that spoke of something dangerous. It wasn't the bumblings of a terrified villager but the stance of a warrior.

She couldn't move to interfere, though, instead moving to track down this captain who had risen to rally the people.

One of her scouts sent a poisoned handbow bolt at the man who deftly blocked it with his shield, bellowing further defiance.

"Come from the darkness and fight me, cowards!" he yelled, but Zathria didn't rise to the taunt. Pride was the undoing of many a warrior, and she was a victor. She would not be so easily baited into open confrontation with an unknown enemy.

J'rell
Vyx'aria

The sharp tolling of the town bell shattered the quiet of the night, pulling Ser Lorinna Asterel from a light sleep. She had been staying at the only inn at Hollowmere.

It was still dark beyond the shutters
For a moment she lay still, senses alert as shouts began to echo faintly from the streets below. The bell was ringing.

She jerked upright as her brain caught up.

Then the door burst open, admitting a gust of chill air and her squire, young Elias. His typically pale face was flushed and his eyes wide with alarm.

"Ser Asterel!" he gasped, lantern in hand.

She often forgot she had a squire now. She had spent so long as one herself before earning her knighthood.

"Raid! The bell's calling all to arms!"

Lorinna was on her feet, bare feet touching the cold wooden floor as the clamour grew. She looked to her armour. It was exceptional plate. She was as mobile as ever and almost invincible when wearing it.

"We should be ready to go and fetch help," Elias hissed.

Her full armour was set on a stand in the corner. Polished plate etched with protective runes, mail hauberk beneath. Her gambeson was in the cupboard.

"Start dressing me," she said. "We fight."

Lights danced in the window. Something was burning.

Buckling it all properly, even with Elias's help, would steal precious minutes. Minutes while villagers died.

"Just the cuirass, pauldrona and helmet."

Lorinna pulled a leather jerkin over her nightshirt and went for her padded gambeson.

There had been other travellers at the inn. Some had been armed.

As she emerged, visor up to afford her some vision in the dark, she heard shouting.

"Where are they?" she called, stepping in the path of a panicked villager.

"Elves! That way!"

"Elias, get the horses, be ready."

She wouldn't run right away, but there was a chance they needed to warn others if the village was being overrun by an army.

The shouting was a captain of the guard. He had people formed up around him. Lorinna couldn't even see what he was yelling at.

The confused shadows spawned creatures of the Underrealm, garments and skin merging with the night, only their flashing blades, whipping ash-coloured hair and burning, red eyes giving testament to their presence. He saw them and recognised them for what they were; murderers and slavers with centuries of experience in their dark craft.

He was perhaps the only human here who could match their long-honed skills. Chief among them appeared a whirling storm of blades, cutting down villagers like a natural disaster. It was her that addressed him and this meagre line of defence, her voice thick with vicious challenge and mockery. The manic quality to it and her famished stance told him she meant to gain glory or riches, come what may. A desire nearing desperation, perhaps. The most dangerous of all. He had fought under one such figure before. Now he would have to face this insatiable bloodthirst head on.

A cold snake of recollection slithered through him. Where the others reacted with fear, his face shadowed with disappointment. An age had passed and yet nothing had changed at all. Weary of battles, he had hoped to leave such a life behind. But it seemed battle was not yet finished with him.

Perhaps he could pay back the young man whom he owed his name and life to by this act of sacrifice.

"Help the others retreat," J'rell called down to the captain, purposefully ignoring the drow queen. "And flee yourselves. You cannot win this fight." His sword fell down from his broad back like a lowering gate. He caught sight of a shadow skulking along the burning hut. "I will buy you time."

Taking a running start, J'rell exploded into movement. His feet took him to the edge of the platform, from which he soared into a mighty leap, joining the flickering shadows of the night. Drow bolts speared the night in his wake, narrowly missing, one of which came from a drow scout at the hut. J'rell's bare feet crashed on the shooter's shoulders, cracking the collarbone of the drow. The drow barely managed to gasp before J'rell's sword followed, piercing through his throat. In the same motion the drow fell, J'rell rolled past him to soften his own landing, never halting, never relenting, rushing behind the burning hut.

Fire was a poor imitation of the sun. But he remembered the aversion of the drow to light. Perhaps with this burning glare in their sight, he might be shielded a little longer from poisonous bolts and Emril blades.

Against a drow raiding party, he knew he could not win. He could only delay them and try and save as many lives as possible.

Vyx'aria
Lorinna Astarel

Zathria At'Arel​

J'rell had tried to give them a window of escape. Tried to save them.

But like so many times before, he had failed. Once again, the people he sought to protect perished. The captain's blood on the ground scrawled his failure into the skin of the earth, a permanent stain for the gods and heavens above to see. A contract signed in another's life, detailing the nature of his eternal punishment.

He would stay bound on this earth. Forever. And he would always witness the suffering of others.

With the burning building throwing him into a grim silhouette, J'rell came forth from his cover. The malicious smiles of drow competed against their blades in brilliant keenness. He looked Vyx'aria in the eye; red eyes that he had sought to avoid, a soul he had hoped not to engage in conversation.

She reminded him too much of his former empress, in the later stages of her life -- sanity cracked like a broken mirror, ambition flaring through it like distorted light.

But with his budding efforts dashed, negotiation on behalf of Hollowmere Crossing might be necessary. For some reason, she seemed to hold an interest in him, like one might consider a bauble before pocketing it. It put a pause to the slaughter, at least. Perhaps his best efforts at buying time would not be by the strength of his arms, but by the cunning of his tongue.

Though J'rell had never been one to speak unless he could help it. He preferred others to straddle the silky dance of persuasion, and for him to serve in silence.

"How can I trust your word? The reputation of your people does not lend credence to such a pledge."

A question to keep her talking, as much as to learn.

Cynical Phoenix
Lorinna Astarel
Vyx'aria

Zathria threw herself into the combat with hesitation, the only place where everything always made sense. No politics, no scheming, only kill or be killed.

And yet, it was where cunning was the most critical. Without it, people ended up dead and skill or strength could only keep you alive so long if you were a fool.

She fell on the captain of the guard even as the other drow smashed into the briefly assembling soldiers and within another ten seconds the captain - a veteran of more wars than one - lay choking to death on his own blood. She had lived the length of his life twice over and fought in more battles than she could remember. Perhaps one day this would be her fate as well, but it wasn't now. This was another duel in which she claimed victory.

And yet, that victory was short lived as another challenger emerged onto the field. The armor of Lorinna Astarel caught Zathria's eye as she pointed one of her sabers out to the other woman.

"You. You stand for these people? They are weak. Why fight for them when you could have all the desires of your heart?" she asked. They were, after all, always looking for new recruits. Life was short and brutal for these humans, why not make the most of what could be rather than shed their blood for weaklings.

Vyx'aria
J'rell

J'rell's jaw tensed. Veins worked below his throat like ship's ropes growing taught with tension. His hand ground into the hilt of his borrowed blade, crunching leather with a faint crackling sound.

He had forgotten the brutal savagery of the drow. Now he remembered.

The sword raised in his hand, glinting in firelight. Hand crossbows held in elven hands raised with it, fingers on triggers, aimed for his heart and neck. The blade turned downward and thundered down in a blur of movement.

The tip struck earth with a tinny clatter. The blade drank the jungle soil, stabbed deep. The crossguard burned before his chest, reflecting the infernal conflagration behind it like a dance of golden, grinning imps. J'rell's fingers loosened before the leather hilt; slowly, reluctantly, like one might release the fingers of a deceased relative, acknowledging that their spirit had flown.

A universal sign on Arethil of surrender.

"Halt your killing. I will swear."

Vyx'aria

J'rell met Vyx'aria's gaze, awaiting and listening in wary silence.

Whether it was a warped sense of honour, pride or some personal dictum she venerated, she kept her word. With her voice and an umbral gesture, the night itself seemed to recede its claws, close its jaws and allow a trickle of villagers to pass through. The cries of woe and misery lingered, even intensified, as people realised what they had lost.

Vyx'aria said:

She studied him as one might study an unfamiliar weapon, tilting her head, eyes tracing his stance, his breath, the way he held himself even now.

“You do not smell like the others,” she said at last. “Nor do you move like prey.” Her gaze slid past him, toward the dark sprawl of jungle and ruin beyond.

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Indeed, J'rell stood taller than most, even when his shoulders buckled as though below an unseen load. Much like the statues depicting fabled titans of old carrying the world on their shoulders, he stood stock still below his burden, arms by his sides, keeping constant contact with her eyes, much like one might observe a stalking tiger in the bush.

Ambitions rung echoes in the crystalline cave of his mind. How often had he not heard this, spoken by several tongues? How often had they ever led to any permanent fulfillment?

Vyx'aria said:

Her smile sharpened, amused and dangerous. “Perhaps you will be the one offering them that choice,” she added. “So no one else feels compelled to ask foolish questions about drow… questions that so often end in blood.”

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The quality of his eyes changed at that. They sharpened, like an ethereal whetstone preparing his sight to pierce any armour of delusions.

Finally, she asked him a question. He would have to speak.

"J'rell."

The name still felt foreign to his own lips and ears. But it would serve. Notwithstanding his melancholic nature, where he would be happy to leave it at that, he realised he should say something more; if only to avoid this drow regent going on another killing spree on account of his discourtesy.

"I once knew another who sought to tame these lands."

His low, sonorant words drifted off into the night like smoke from a hidden fire. Merging with the wild jungle and the ruined village; this untamed backdrop finishing his thought better than any string of words could. The Ixchel Wilds submitted to no ruler. Not even those who almost conquered death.

Vyx'aria
Cynical Phoenix
Lorinna Astarel