Fable - Ask No Way Out

[Aeyliea]

She was a cold-blooded killer when it came right down to it, but not in the same manner people that lived in the cities would assume that meant. Predating on others for some kind of power of them, to prove her prowess over those weaker than her...that was not her thing. She was cold, efficient, and clinical when killing was necessary,

What she was not was a machine. The numerous small wounds and couple of more serious ones all slowed her, all hurt, and all drained strength from her moment by moment. As they hobbled away, she felt her life flowing out of her in a hundred little places. She hurt, and she was absolutely exhausted.

Something crashed to the floor far behind them, the sound of masonry spraying out from whatever had fallen clear even this far away. Whatever battle had raged between the two wizards, it had fallen silent. Aeyliea was not about to believe that either of them had been slain, but the silence beyond was ominous.

Looking decidedly pale, the No'rei wordlessly pointed to the trail of blood they had left behind them. A few drops here and there, one trail heavier than the other. All in all, it did not matter. What mattered was that the absence of their blood would, if the Dreadlord was paying attention, be as good as a dead giveaway as to where they were hiding. "Maybe," she said. She swallowed, and tried to reach out to the Prim. And failed, the first time, but tried again.

That power flowed into her, the alien presence she had sensed every other time no longer present. She was too tired to care about that, though. Only the strangely quiescent flow, which she inexpertly wielded.

The spots of blood vanished up the corridor as far as she could see, leaving little trace beyond the lingering odor of burned blood behind. Without any fanfare, she let the flow of the Wild slip through her fingers, and sagged as though a sudden weight had fallen on her shoulders.

"Hide," she said. She suited her own words and slipped into the little hollow that Gale had made. It wasn't but moments after the other woman slipped in and sealed their little hole up that the pallid warrior slumped over onto the other, out cold.

 

[Gale]

The duo collapsed into the narrow holed out space that Gale had quickly opened to them. These little pockets of air within rock were common enough and just as the sound of rubble and stone had alerted Gale that she had successfully closed the entrance to their hideaway she used a last bit of magic. This time to part a tiny hole at the top of the enclosure, it allowed a small ray of sunshine and a continuous flow of oxygen into the chasm.

There was just enough space for the two of them and she could hear the muffled sound of steps as the Dreadlord seemed to be walking past their refuge.

White hair drifted her her chin as she was assaulted by the stumbling Aeyliea. Poor woman had just barely been keeping it together and now that they were safely tucked away she let consciousness finally take a break. Gale nodded, muscles ached and she'd lost a fair bit of blood too but it was obvious that the savage woman's wounds were deeper. Worse than her own.

A nightmare. That's what this whole ordeal had become. One nasty inconvenience after another.

For now she was content to let the her comrade-by-convenience sleep. She'd take first watch and make sure they were safe in this little hole. Or, at least, that's what she had intended. Within a few moments alertness and attentiveness gave way to wandering thoughts. Eyelids grew heavy. Those wandering thoughts consumed her until she passed into the world of dreams.

In a start she shook up. The splinter of sunlight was gone, replaced by the dull sounds of nightfall and its cool air. How long had they been out? At least a few hours. She nudged a finger, gently, at Aeyliea unaware if the other woman was still awake or asleep.

"We should get moving, might be easier to escape this place under moonlight."

 

[Aeyliea]

Blood loss and exhaustion pulled her down into an inky black place, a place where no stars shone and no light could be found. She dreamed, but she dread of a place she had never been to, a place where the Prim was the Wild, where it was as wild and untamed as the beasts of the plains and deserts and forests.

A void, where the white-haired tribal warrior drifted without a body, merely a mind cast loose in the endless darkness.

You...must...awa...k...e...n...

Haunting voice, melodious, beautiful. Though she had no eyes, Aeyliea looked around here for the source of the disembodied words. Was it the voice of the Prim itself? So sweet, so precious. She could not tell if it was the voice of her mother, or of the Elder, or of the Wild itself.

She found herself suddenly assault by a cascade of images that she was helpless to sort through. One after the other, too quickly to follow...

...and then...

...she groaned pitifully as the other woman poked her in the ribs. Awareness did not return quickly, and when it did the awareness of the passage of time was quick. Mostly because every part of her had stiffened and dozens of parts of her body were calling in to register complaints.

"Mmngf," she said, stirring unwillingly. She blinked back the haze of pain from her eyes, of sleep, and tried (mistakenly) to stretch. The wave of pain was followed quickly by a wave of nausea which, in the confined space, was no a good thing. "Yes," she said simply. The thickness of that word was only partly due to accent, and mostly due to exhaustion.

 

[Gale]

Dried blood on the white-haired savage's chest didn't mix well with the groans and sluggish reactions.

"You sure you're ok?" Gale asked with a tinge of concern.

There really wasn't time for the Obanese woman to wait for a confirmation. They had to move, even if Gale needed to drag Aeyliea out of this place. This encampment would likely still be in chaos and those who had survived the escape attempt and the ruckus caused by the rogue Dreadlord would hopefully be passed out from exhaustion.

With no time to delay the geomancer maneuvered a calloused finger in front of herself before swiftly moving it towards her left, causing a wave of sediment and rock to shift aside. The way was open and it was time for the duo to proceed out of this hellhole they had been sleeping in for the last few hours.

She glanced back, brown eyes locking into her companion, "time to go," was all she said as she took one step outwards into the hallway.

Looking towards the left, then the right, she ensured that no one was present in the compound. Lingering there for a moment as she waited for her fellow escapee to get on her feet. In a worst case scenario she'd drag her would-be friend to safety.

But, hopefully, it wouldn't come to that.

 

[Aeyliea]

She moved to allow Gale the opportunity to exit their confined space, trying to answer her as she did. "Yes," she said in a gasp; the pain of moving was very great, and for a moment everything went grey and she hovered on the edge of consciousness and oblivion. With a great deal of willpower, she pulled herself back from the brink, slumping against the wall of their enclosure. "Go," she rasped, straightening and trying to force her thoughts to clear themselves.

The magnitude of her hurts were perhaps a touch worse than she was willing to admit, especially to her companion whom had no reason whatsoever to ensure that she herself made it out of this place, wherever it was. Her arm throbbed abominably, and blood leaked through the filthy rag she had used to stymie the flow; her chest ached where that blade had pierced her breast, and the various cuts, lacerations, and punctures and the resulting flow of blood had all worked to chip away at her constitution. Stepping into the corridor, the normally caramel brown of her skin had a decidedly sickly cast.

The sound of silence greeted them in either direction, which was just as well. The new enemy was her own flesh, which sought to rebel against her at every step. It was a measure of her discipline and willpower that she did not collapse and give in to the darkness.

"How far....to get out..." she said, trying to hide the burgeoning weakness that the brief rest had brought upon her.

 

[Gale]

Gale's body slithered out of the cracked hole in the sediment and she eyed the white-haired primitive. She wasn't sure but the amount of blood and the way she held herself led the Obanese woman to believe that this girl was hurtin' more than she was lettin' on. It was tough to tell though, the other woman made it difficult to read her emotions.

One thing that nightfall had brought was silence though. Between that and the welcome chill she felt a bit of relief. Something about the cool of night always made Gale feel at home. Safe. And the fact that the guards seemed to all be dead or asleep only made matters more encouraging.

"We're almost there," she said reassuringly.

It was a half-truth. She was pretty sure this next corridor would lead directly outside and they could make their way from there. But she spoke with enough confidence that her weakened ally might believe her.

Regardless, Gale's fabrication proved true as they rounded the corner. The geomancer offered her own weight to Aeyliea in case the other woman was struggled to walk. She wasn't in the best condition herself but other than a minor limp and the stinging wounds across her limbs she wasn't banged up too bad.

When they reached the slatted door that allowed moonlight to flow in the pair could hear voices on the other side. Authoritative. Official. Sounded like there might've been an alert sent to whatever piss-stain of a settlement was operating this little enterprise and Anirian Guard had been dispatched to investigate. Dreadlords rarely operated in tandem with the official channels, she was pretty sure.

Her brown eyes looked back at Aeyliea as she whispered, "few goons out there but we can likely just sneak past." Of course, if they were on the right side of the law then maybe the two women could bluff their way out as 'victims' of whatever crisis was being investigated. Risky though.

 

[Aeyliea]

Pride. It was foolish, stubborn pride that kept her from accepting any aid from the other woman when she could really have used it. Aeyliea had always been filled with her own pride, of her own accomplishments and feats. Those things seemed awfully thin, now; she had been disabled of her superiority not once, but thrice now. Defeated on a simple raid, captured and kept by her enemy, and now very nearly bested by a bunch of soft city folk.

She was content to follow for now. The promise of an escape, however real or false, served as a prod to keep her moving forward. She pushed through the pain and the exhaustion with admirable silence, neither complaining nor slowing Gale down much. They just had to get free and clear. A few hundred more steps, and hour at worst to safety. A litany told to herself to keep from flagging and giving into weakness of spirit and flesh, things that would shame her greatly.

The savage picked up on the voices before Gale did, despite her condition. Her senses were alert as they came to a door, or as alert as they could be given the circumstances.

"Sneak is good," she replied in a tired voice. "Night is good for sneak, can...magic?" She was not sure if she was communicating well enough to get the point across, and was not entirely sure she had the strength to pull it off. At least camouflage was something she had some proficiency with. "Need...time for focus," she added.

 

[Gale]

"Sneak is great," Gale said in agreement. "You gotta focus?" she asked as she tried to help prop her companion up against the wall, even if she didn't want the aid.

What kind of magic did this woman have? Some kind of stealth or something? Or was she hoping for Gale to use her magic? They probably could burrow through the earth but it'd be noisy. And noticeable above ground as the displaced rock and soil would need somewhere to go.

No, Aeyliea had some sort of plan.

Gale adjusted one of her boots while she waited for her partner to use whatever spell or spells she had in mind. She combed a finger through her dusty hair and cautiously glanced outside of the slats to see what ther foes were up to.

And to count how many of them were present. By a simple look it seemed like seven or eight. No more than ten or eleven for sure. At least not in the immediate area. They were far enough away from the door and saddled around a campfire that sneaking did seem feasible. Based on their mannerism she was certain these were regular Anirian Guards and not the rabble who had kidnapped the two women.

But still, regular guards could mean a whole different type of trouble.

 

[Aeyliea]

Of course, she had nothing so grand as a plan. She had an idea that might get them a little further on along the path to freedom, but as muddled as her thoughts were, as exhausted as her flesh was....it was a very thin reed indeed.

Magic of the stripe she used wasn't anything so grand as a spell. It was far more primal, far more chaotic and lacking any specific form and - more importantly - rules. She fell silent, leaning against the wall and tried to compose her thoughts. She called out to the primal force, the Wild, and waited to see if it would respond. The feeling of magic suffused the area, but it was a muted and quiet power quite unlike that wielded by the Dreadlord and the other youth.

She struggled to hold on to the elusive power of the wild lands. It would be easier if she was in the grasslands or out under an open sky, but she could just about manage to do something with that quiet and unfathomable power. She was too tired to note the strange discordant note in it, though, too tired to pay heed to the quiet suggestions that seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere at once.

"Need....a distraction," she managed. The magic suffused the area, but if there was any effect to be discerned it was impossible to see. "They need to come....here. Open door, so we can sneak...out...?"

Opening the door was not something she could hide. Misdirection was the name of the game, and to one another they would look normal. To others, they would blend into their surroundings unless someone was being particularly attentive. Unfortunately, the people outside would have to open the door an enter so they could slip outside.

"Fast," she said. "Tired...cannot long do this..."

 

[Gale]

"Distraction, got it," Gale said with an overabundance of confidence.

She wasn't entirely sure what Aeyliea had planned but she could tell from the primal woman's tone and fractured speech that time was of the essence here. Gale slammed the door open and summoned her geomancy to cause a large spire to rupture up from the earth a few meters away from the Anirians.

Turning to face the primitive girl she whispered, "we needa go, fast."

Was this the distraction the white-haired woman had in mind? Probably not. Would it work? Maybe.

And that'd need to be good enough.

 

[Aeyliea]

That was not what Aeyliea was expecting to happen, and was certainly not what she meant by way of distraction. Worse, in her frazzled, exhausted state it served to break her concentration. For a dangerous moment she wavered on the brink of losing control of the magic she had gathered completely. Silver spots filtered across her vision, and she staggered...

...and then managed to regain control. The spell regained as much solidity as it was going to, and then she grabbed the other woman by the arm and drew her along for a moment before breaking into as much of a run as she could muster. Every footfall hurt, hurt her arms and legs and her head now, too. There was nothing for it to press on though, every breath a rattle in her throat.

The distraction was well timed but, sadly ineffective. Something smaller would have done well, but the guards, after their initial shock at the obvious magic, looked around them wildly. The shapes of the women were not invisible at all, merely obscured. Their lines blended into the background shadows, the definition of their bodies difficult - but not impossible to make out.

One of them, looking their way, looked away...and then snapped his eyes back.

"Over there! Something over there!" he cried, pulling a weapon loose and starting after the fleeing shadows heedless of whether the others were joining him or not.

 

[Gale]

It was true that, sometimes, Gale's actions could be over-the-top. Extreme even. This might've been one of those times.

Her eyes widened as her pearly-haired companion pulled her along and she saw the goosebumps and hairs on her arms fade into the atmosphere. They weren't transparent but they were camouflaged in a manner that Gale had never seen or thought possible. A foot, she believed her hers, bled into the ground itself as Aeyliea's magic attempted to obscure their retreat.

To no avail, sadly, as one of the guards spotted them and alerted the rest. Likely the result of a certain geomancer's extreme use of magic.

"Close your eyes," was the only whispered warning Gale gave as a torrent of spinning sand and dirt emerged from the ground. It clouded their escape further and the wave of soil spread down towards the Anirians.

The miasma of grit and gravel whipped violently, not only obscuring vision but threatening to get into the eyes and mouths of any of the Anirians who didn't take cover. It would buy them a bit more time to crest the hills and get to cover.

All it cost was the last bit of magical energy Gale had going for her.

Huffing loudly she whispered towards Aeyliea, "need to be getting to safety. Quickly."

 

[Aeyliea]

A quick memorization of the lay of the land before her was the only thing the No'rei had time for. It was surprising she had the wherewithal to even do that much.

And so when the geomancer played her last gambit, Aeyliea took the other woman by the arm and kept running forward, not slowing nor stopping for anything. Behind them, she could hear the curses of the few pursuers that had noticed the indistinct shapes of the women. It was enough, as it turned out; a few paces and she was going as hard as she could again, eyes open. Sand and grit fell out of her hair and clothes as she went along. There was only one focus - the crest of the hill overlooking whatever compound it was they had been in.

Everything that came after that could be dealt with once they got there.

Everything hurt, every muscle burned with the intense need for rest before, in the darkness, she felt the ground level out, and then begin to tilt down. In the darkness, she could just make out the trees that blanketed the far slope of the hill or ridge or whatever it was they had ascended.

The magic of the wilderness bled from her step by step. She let it go gratefully, but did not stop running. Not yet. It was better to run into a tree than it was to stop, because she was certain once she stopped, there would be no more running.

 

[Gale]

The two kept pressing forward, Gale spurred on by the tug from Aeyliea. Guards kept their pursuit up, deterred for only a second by the dust and dirt. As they approached the forested area ahead the Obanese woman felt like maybe, just maybe, they were in the home stretch.

Pine needles crunched under their pair of feet, limbs and trees whistled by their ears, and their vision was limited to whatever moonlight managed to peak through the increasingly obscured forest canopy.

With Aeyliea's arm still locked on hers Gale nudge the woman into a diagonal direction. They couldn't just run in a straight line. They had to make it harder for them to be followed.

Twisting and turning, doing their best to navigate through the trees, they kept moving.

Their directions became increasingly erratic as Gale's heart pounded, the drain of magic taking its toll. Maybe they were nearly at the end of the treeline? Maybe it was safe to rest now? She couldn't tell if the guards were still following them or if they had given up the chase.

Either way she wasn't ready to quit running just yet.

 

[Aeyliea]

Running became her life, a narrow tunnel with no exit in sight. One foot in front of the other, every jolting step painful enough to make her breath come shorter than it would have otherwise. It was just as well she was in such good shape; had she been some sluggard layabout of a city dweller she would likely have flagged and failed long before.

Time and distance became meaningless. They might have run a quarter of a mile from the complex, or it might have been three miles. Either way, she found herself stumbled through the tall grass of an open meadow between copses of trees, her legs finally having given out on her.

And there she lay, panting, staring at a star filled sky. The sounds of their pursuit had vanished, either because they had outrun them or because they had given up the chase. Either way, Aeyliea was not going to stand back up and continue running any further. She was drained, she hurt, and she had no idea where she was anyway.

"S-stop," she gasped, assuming that the other woman would have stopped running the moment she had stumbled.