Completed Only Joy

[Lazule]

A dire wolf in the Reach. Rabid. The beast salivating as it walked along the forest floor and its large paws crushed the leaves and grasses and little fallen twigs.

Whistling. Shrieking through the trees.

And the Javelin of Light struck the dire wolf and its body exploded. A catastrophic spray of blood and gore and what little whole pieces remained. Singed fur came down in a slow rain.

Lazule stepped into the area at last, the final strands of fur guided to the ground about her, like an autumn cascade. She scanned her surroundings, here where the beast used to be. A leg on the ground. Vicious splatters of blood on the nearby trees.

There. The head of the beast. Caught in a branch above.

She aimed her hand at the branch and yellow light gathered and coalesced in her palm and then several Needles of Light shot forth and shattered the wood and the branch fell to the ground and the head along with it. A Shiv manifested of pure light in her hand as she walked to the head. She crouched. Stared at the head of the beast for a moment. Those lifeless eyes. Still open.

"I am the Hunter. I am the Slayer. And there is nothing but that. In this purpose so clear I find only joy."

With a face of stony intent she drove the Shiv into the skin of the head. Violent hissing as the heat of the blade burned fur and flesh.

And she cut all the way round and tore off the scalp of the beast. Cleaned the blood. Dropped the scalp into her traveling satchel.

Lazule gathered sticks and twigs and small branches from the forest floor. Carefully arranged them into a small triangular structure, as if making a camp fire. She took the head of the beast and drove the pointed end of a stick through the soft and broken parts of its flesh and skull and erected it in the center of the structure.

The shrine complete.

She knelt down before it. Placed her hands on her lap. Closed her eye.

Said, "Recompense."

The songs of birds in the trees.

Said again, "Recompense."

A quiet moment.

And Lazule stood and went on her way.

* * * * *​

She had traveled a long way from Brevick, the Reach town which had the problems with the dire wolves. The beasts did roam a great deal, and such travel was necessary. Her satchel was loaded with twenty scalps from the wolves, and still she did not know if she had slain all of them. She resolved to patrol more. To loop around from the north side to the south side, relative to the town. Then return.

It had been days since she had even seen a road. Her journey through the pure wilderness of the Allir Reach.

A sunny day. A good omen. It should have been.

And Lazule stepped out from a treeline into a grassy clearing. There she saw the bodies. Too many to count accurately with simple estimation. Forty? Fifty? Perhaps even sixty?

Her eyes narrowed and she walked from the trees and to the site of what appeared to be a battle. Among the dead now. Humans, mostly. Some elves, dwarves. An orc. Some wore tabards signifying allegiance to Brevick. Many of the others she did not recognize.

The faint buzzing of flies. These were people only just slain. She had been too far away to hear the battle while it was happening, but now she was here to see its fresh aftermath.

Lazule looked from body to body, her eye searching. It appeared as though the battle had erupted spontaneously. There was no clear indication of formations or battle lines or any sort of organization. A giant melee, a slaughter brought into being by some malicious whim.

And no. It did not appear that this was the work of monsters. Mundane wounds on all of them, blood on the dropped weapons. Injuries through the weak points of armor, for those who wore it. The men unarmored suffering the blade, the axe, the mace, not the claw, the fang, the spine.

The beautiful blue sky above. Wind rustling the branches and the leaves of the trees surrounding the clearing. The warm glow of the sun.

The stench of spilled blood and the first stages of decay.

This was not her domain. It was one she was familiar with, yes, but one she did not care for and one she did not willingly enter. The domain of War.

Lazule looked around at all the corpses around her.

And still the songbirds sang from the treetops.


Leyus

 

[Leyus]

Leyus had been on this side from Alliria, when looking on a map, only a few times before. Even with his keen love of journey, which drove him like a mad spirit, making him leave one place in favor of another, and then did it again, and again, and again, even with all of that, he had mostly stuck with the places he knew relatively well. Places he had spent his childhood and some later years traveling around. With his family.
But lately he had caught himself recalling the busy sounds of the troop more and more, remembering the conversations, the laughter, and faces that he hadn't seen for so long, that they had become only a faint memory. He had started to long. He had started to twirl the name "Lerte" on his tongue more and more.
But he couldn't. He couldn't return, not before he had silenced the yearning, not before he had found the thing, something out there, that would finally bring sense and peace into his existence.
And, if he was being completely honest with himself, he didn't want to return right now. Leyus had managed to see so much during his travels, touch many different kinds of magic, that he could not have thought about before, meet people, that he couldn't have imagined before. All amidst that, he still had things to find out, his own nature to understand.

He had to keep on going.

Throwing all the philosophical stuff aside, this time of the year was good for trade. Especially of items too luxurious to think about during the harsher, colder months. He had tagged along an acquaintance, who was organizing a caravan full of cotton and silk fabrics, to be brought to the towns and cities in these parts. Leyus was good at making deals on both sides, knew some useful people in Alliria, so he had gotted his spot and promise of a generous payment easy enough.
That was a good prospective, enough to make him last here for long. Maybe the money would be enough for him to reach Bhathairk. He had though about that for a while now.

Unfortunately, this time the world had a different plan for him.

To be frank, he had to be thankful that he simply got dumped, not dumped and killed. As it turned out, some people didn't like sharing their money with creepy shape-shifters.
How typical.
So he had to figure out something else. And, well, being without much coin left and on grounds that weren't all that familiar to him, getting back to Alliria seemed like the best option.
So he set out again.

And, a few days later, found himself lost in the woods. There was no trace of the village promised to him in the last settlement he had visited, and, even with his impeccable sense of direction, there was no way one could navigate well it this place. Map didn't seem to help much.
At least it was a sunny day. He could do with a sunny day.
One thing that he could not do with was a mountain of corpses. Honestly, visiting this place started to seem like one of his worst decisions ever.

The stench was gut-wrenching, the sight not pleasant for his eyes, that had last seen another human soul days ago. Yet Leyus knew, that he had worse worries right now. Whatever or whomever had done that could be not too far away, and he preferred keep his head where it was.
He didn't step out from the forest just yet. Instead Leyus found a tall tree, something like an oak, and started to climb up, careful to stay behind the cover of its leaves as much as he could. Such climbing wasn't a hard task for somebody of his abilities, and soon he found himself peering over the field of recent massacre. At least it didn't stink as much from here.
Then his eye caught some movement. Moment later he could flesh out a figure walking among the corpses. It was too far for him to see any more details, but Leyus decided, that he didn't have to. There seemed to be no other people alive here, so he could as well get back down and mind his own business, taking the longer way around the clearing.

He was probably too eager to get down. Foolishly careless. Because, while setting his feet one one of the lower branches, no further from ground than a tall man, he heard a cracking sound beneath his feet. Next thing he knew was that he was falling towards the ground.
Now, in moments like these, one had to react quickly. And Leyus acted upon instincts one had to develop while learning a craft that included a lot of acrobatics and occasional falls from high places. He let his muscle memory kick in, and landed, rolling on the ground with some grace.
So, at that point, there were two things to be taken in account. First one: he hadn't broken or even bruised anything too badly. That was good. Second one: he was now few steps in the clearing, and probably had attracted the attention of the person walking there. That wasn't good.

 

[Lazule]

A noise. Sharp and piercing in the relative quiet, the snapping of a branch. Lazule turned that way and there across the field of the dead and the rest of the clearing someone rolled out from the treeline.

Lazule squinted. Focused, cocking her head. A man. Not a monster.

Inherent trust. Of course. Such was her nature, to trust humans, to trust all the allies of humanities. This until a reason given to do otherwise. For all those with the sanctity of personhood balanced upon the tightrope of righteousness in so precarious a manner that nothing short of constant vigilance would prevent a fall from which there could be no redemption. Yes. This a tragedy. Always a tragedy. But it was not the place of the Slayer to weep. Only to deny evil purchase to prosper.

But a man was a man, knowing naught else. More insight would be required for further discernment.

Facts. The man was not here among the dead when Lazule arrived, making it unlikely that he was here prior to it. The man, though the distance between them was considerable, did not appear to have any bloodstains upon his person. The man had no visible weapons.

It did appear as though he had nothing to do with the slaughter at her feet. But still it needed to be discovered if he harbored ill will toward her regardless. For even though monsters terrorized the night all across Arethil, men and women by a variety of names--bandits, raiders, thieves, pirates--submitted themselves to the demon named Cruelty and preyed upon their own kin.

A tragedy. Always a tragedy.

It would be seen if this man was one such person.

Introductions. Or perhaps only one introduction.

"H-Hello," Lazule called out across the clearing. Still she stood in the middle of the strewn dead. "My n-name is Lazule. What is your name?"

 

[Leyus]

This was not exactly the thing that Leyus could have expected. He was already thinking about the best strategy of getting away as quick as possible, and if not, the best way to defend himself if that would be required. Not that he really possessed any abilities that would allow him to do so, excluding few dirty tricks and very, very high agility.
Nevertheless, as he was scrambling up to his feet, his ears were reached not by shouts and threats, but by a rather civil greeting and, even more surprising, a name.
He finally looked at the stranger standing in the clearing without his vision being obscured by anything. A woman. Alone. In the middle of corpse piles.
Unusual, but... well, he hadn't been struck dead right away, hadn't he?

Maybe she was just another traveler lost in the woods.

Not that Leyus really believed that. But, well, she seemed unarmed and harmless enough, with the slight stutter to her words, and maybe this could be his chance to get to know something more about this.
"Well, good day to you too," he said over the field of corpses. It was sunny, alright?
And, since shouting over such a long distance was very inconvenient and he had already decided to give this woman at least a bit of his trust, Leyus made a few careful steps over the freshly dead bodies. Holding back the slight nausea that threatened to rise in his stomach, that hadn't really had anything proper to eat for some time now. "I'm Leyus," he didn't really see a point in hiding his name, "Charmed to meet you," there was a certain sardonic note to his voice. This was rather twisted indeed.
"You wouldn't happen to know what came to pass these fellows, would you?" a casual conversation. Very casual, really. All while he was doing his best not to turn and run around as fast as he could.

Yes, he was afraid. But standing in middle of recent battlefield could do that to a man.

 

[Lazule]

He came closer as he spoke. Lazule watched his hands, her eye tracking every little movement. It was considered rude, of course, to not look at a person's face during conversation, but such she would have to be for the moment.

Nothing of note. She looked up when he said his name.

"Leyus."

His tone of voice. His appearance. Foreign to the battlefield, unremarkable with regard to the ancient fold of violence, a man of ordinary means. Good. It was altogether easier to extend trust in these kinds of circumstances to those who mostly if not entirely eschewed violence.

Still, her tension did not abate. For though she relaxed on the possible need to defend herself, Leyus had nonetheless come closer to her, and there surfaced a new kind of anxiety. The shakes began where they always began: her hands. It could not be helped.

A question from him.

"N-No." She looked to the bodies for a moment, then back up at him. "I was only just p-passing through and I happened upon this."

Nervous, yes. But she felt the need to explain what she knew to him. It was possible that something would come of it. A new insight, relevant to her cause, gained through the sharing of knowledge.

Lazule pointed to one of the bodies. "There is an insignia of a t-town named B-Brevick, south of here. I passed through there d-days ago, hence my familiarity. The others I do not kn-know."

Something.

Something faint.

The ghost of a sound. Distinct from the slight breeze and the birds and the trees.

Lazule squinted and glanced around. Took her eye completely off of Leyus as she scanned the area, searching for the source of the sound so quiet that it was difficult to discern.

"D-Do you hear something, Leyus?"

 

[Leyus]

Well, maybe Leyus wasn't completely unfamiliar with violence. And he had the blood of a couple of fellow men on his hands, not something that he was very proud of, but a thing that happened to one in times of desperation and life in the lowliest possible meaning. Yet, quite obviously, he had never found the need to familiarize himself with actual combats, battlefields and deaths in numbers too big to count.
Wars were, maybe, a good place and time to profit. But they were a dreadful place to live in, and Leyus had been fortunate enough. Up until now.

Although, a bunch of dead people and a shaking, stuttering girl didn't really seem that dangerous, not at the moment at least. He stilled his steps nevertheless, noticing and, even more so, feeling the faint changes his few strides had made. He had no intention of... well, doing anything to her, really.
Even more so because, despite what his mind had so carelessly said, Leyus could feel, with something deep down in his gut, a crawling feeling seeping over his skin, that there was something more to this Lazule than he could see or hear. Although he could barely say what could it be.

"So we are similar in that," he said, trying to find a suiting thread for conversation. Which, fortunately enough, Lazue offered herself. "Brevick..." he rolled the name on his tongue, trying to recall if he had heard of such place, "I don't think that that sparks any memory. A notable spot?"
Of course, it couldn't really be that notable if Leyus had never even heard of it. But he was willing to presume that he had never really heard of many reasonably notable places.

He didn't hear the sound, but he did notice the shift in Lazule's gaze, even more prominent than before. And when she voiced her question, his ears still didn't catch anything, but, rather, something deeper in him did. He hadn't felt many emotions for days, so even the smallest flare was like a bonfire.
Even if this was no more than a mare flicker made by live presence nearby, without the more profound nuances of stronger feelings. "I believe I do," he replied plainly, because it was easier than explaining the true nature of his feeling. "Where is it coming from?"
He spun around on his heel, but with little success. Obviously, the downside of his ability was that it was completely unable to point him in a certain direction.

 

[Lazule]

A notable spot?

"I am unsure. But I am n-not the best person to ask."

A town large enough to house its own professional force of guards, perhaps knights or similar fighting men and women. It did not seem to be as large as Alliria, Brevick, but in truth Lazule paid little attention to such details. She drifted from settlement to settlement, whether it be a beacon of civilization known all the world over or a simple hovel deep in some remote wilderness, and she inquired. Some of her fellow Monster Hunters stayed within the fortress in Elbion or retreated to it regularly after a hunt.

But hers was a hunt that was never over. Everlasting until the Fire faded. This was her service to all Mankind. Her means by which she offered gratitude. Her thanks for the life she had been given.

The sound.

And Leyus said that he heard the noise as well. Though, like her, he was unable to pinpoint its location.

Lazule walked carefully among the bodies of the slain. Her eye searching as the faint sound became less so.

"S-Somewhere here."

More bodies. Weaving through the haphazard and winding path made in the absence of them, where grass both green and red rustled.

She stopped. Paused. Stared down at a body with a tabard of Brevick over his armor. The left arm contorted in a fashion unnatural, the bone clearly broken. A river of blood leaking from his armpit, a puncture in the chainmail beneath the plate armor. The skin pale.

Yet the eyes were open. Life present in the blue of them. And they moved.

The man stared up at Lazule.

"Leyus," Lazule said. "This m-man is still alive."

The man's face twisted. A small and subtle thing as a manner of horror took hold.

His finger moved. Just so. The pointing of his finger and the tracing of his eyes focused on the same thing.

Lazule.

"It was you," he said.

 

[Leyus]

"Not notable enough then," he smiled rather wryly, because usually people didn't have that much trouble distinguishing between places worth of time and interest and those that were less important. But maybe this Brevick had fallen right in between. Not that it was of immediate importance right now.

Right now what worried Leyus more was the assumed sound, even more the feeling he had caught, made by a living human being somewhere in this field. He took of wandering around as well, in the direction pointed by Lazule, but it came as no surprise to him when she was the one to find the man.
"Indeed," he muttered as he approached, unsure of what their course of action should be from here. Should they help the poor fellow? Although, he himself was barely capable of helping himself right now, and Leyus wasn't the one for altruism anyway. Maybe they could help him end his suffering? As Leyus saw finally stepping close enough, the wounds on the man seemed far from those that two of them could help on the spot, if Lazule didn't suddenly turn out to be a very, very skilled healer.

But all those thoughts got washed away in an instant when a new wave of emotions came over Leyus. Well, more like on emotion, but this time a very clear one, directed at Lazule. Horror. A mortal fear. Strong enough to make Leyus himself stagger back a bit, undoubtedly mirroring the man's expression for a heartbeat, untill he got the hold of himself again.

This isn't you, a whispered reminder in his head.

It helped him clear his head right in time to see the man pointing a finger at Lazule, hear him croaking the words, ones that came so desperately with what was surely as good as his last breath.
It was you.
And the fear that Leyus could still taste vividly on his tongue.

Something was very off here, and he had a lot of questions. Sadly, it didn't seem like the lone survivor was going to say anything more. He was barely clinging to life after all.

So that left Leyus with only one person to question. Lazule. Woman, who had invoked such a horror into a man barely capable of breathing.
"I do hope that you have an answer to this that doesn't involve killing me in the process," his laugh came out a bit shaken. It was meant as a joke, even if it was a twisted place and time, yet... Leyus stood in the middle of a corpse field, facing a stuttering woman in armor, trying to not drown in a stranger's fear and really, really hoped that he wasn't going to die right here, right now.

 

[Lazule]

Lazule knew not what to do. Clearly an error had been made. A misidentification brought on by the survivor's unfortunate circumstance and the resulting impact on his senses. But still his finger pointed. Adamant. What reason could be employed to convince him of his error? She had naught but assertions. Yes, the burden of proof lay with the survivor but the unrectified accusation concerned her still.

Glances from the survivor and to Leyus and to the survivor and to Leyus, earrings and bangs dangling.

Leyus spoke. Laughed. An odd time to do so; Lazule was aware of her difficulty in understanding humor. Oh. The nervous tinge in the laughter registered in her mind delayed. Case in point. She understood. The laugh a manifestation of his anxiety, akin to her shakes.

She lifted her hands. Palms exposed and presented. "N-No, Leyus, I do not wish to k-kill you. You are n-not a monster."

"You betrayed us," the survivor said.

She glanced back and down at him. "I do not underst-stand. I was not here--"

The survivor's shivering voice. "You were."

Again he pointed. To the satchel hanging from her shoulder. Looking to Leyus as he said, "In her satchel...scalps...of dire wolves...see..."

His eyes closing. Hand coming to rest on the ground. Whispered words, "It was..."

A quiet descended in the clearing.

Lazule turned her head back around slowly. Troubled confusion apparent as her eye found Leyus. A driving need to convince him, to undo this misunderstanding. But she did not know how, and there was no mantra to guide her in this.

Words failed her. So she merely stared. Lost for what to do.

 

[Leyus]

A few breaths. Just a few breaths and, he was sure, he would be able to get rid of the last little bits of fear. Just a few steady breaths... that didn't want to come out all that steady. He had let his constant guard down for a bit, being far away from other beings capable of complex emotions, so this had come like a flood, drowning him.
Leyus clenched his fingers. No, panic was a bad choice right at this instant.

Even more so, because Lazule didn't seem all that keen on actually doing him any harm. Leyus had assumed a subtly protective stance, almost without noticing it, guided by an instinct, but the woman's hands were raised, palms exposed, and if only it wasn't some sort of a twisted game, she really had nothing for him to be afraid of. "Well, I'm glad to hear that," another anxious snicker. Skies, he was really starting to disassociate, pulling himself between his and the stranger's feelings.

He did hear the dying man's last words, even if they came to him as if from a great distance, while Leyus was desperately trying to block out his fear. Partially successful. At least he managed to draw few breaths that were more steady than not.
And with the last of soldier's breaths, he finally regained his clarity of mind. Partially. That is, Leyus managed to shake the panic away, finally lifting the weight from his chest, but right after that he was filled anew, this time with confusion. Coming from Lazule. His mind caught up with the events with a small delay, and when Leyus met her eyes, there was growing wariness in them. His irises had darkened a bit, and his whole look seemed a bit... smudged around the edges, as his controlled over his own appearance had slipped for a bit.

Leyus swallowed.

"Please tell me that there are no scalps."

 

[Lazule]

She looked to her satchel and she looked to Leyus again.

The world was imperfect. This fact relayed to her by Father and through continuous discovery by means of copious evidence. And it is so that in an imperfect world imperfect means are required to achieve ends which are ultimately beneficial to the continued maintenance of goodness and righteousness. Truth itself, and adherence to it, neither a virtue nor vice. It stood neutral. To be brandished and dispensed with in service to causes higher.

Thus, the lie.

Of what benefit would it be to the people of Arethil to know the origin of the scar on her face? Her false name? Her family? Where she came from? Whom she served? None. In fact, a danger and a detriment to both herself and those who would seek to know. For it was also self-evident that humanity as a whole feared the unknown, what it did not understand. Fear a common spark that lit the wildfire of irrationality. This irrationality leading to confrontations in which those previously innocent would recklessly volunteer themselves into the trade of violence. And it is violence that reigns as the supreme authority, the final arbiter, the almighty judge of all disputes which are so elevated beyond the lower courts of reason and discourse. And thus provoked to self-defense, her only mercy was then to minimize their suffering, to end them quickly; there a tiny light of the humane, even in the darkness of a tragedy wholly avoidable.

And here now with Leyus. A traveler who knew nothing of her nor she of him. Of what benefit would it be to him to know the true contents of her satchel? He had already within him a fair skepticism of her benevolence. It would not be good for either of them to play into the survivor's accusation, for her to willingly aggravate further the aforementioned skepticism. At best he would simply flee. At worst he, too, would enter into the trade of violence, spurred to do so by a notion misguided and an overall lack of insight. And the supreme authority would thusly settle their dispute, blind and impassive to the tragic nature of its settling.

The lie, then.

"There are n-no scalps in my satchel."

She stared at him still. Eye unblinking. The light about his person seeming to act strangely, so faint a quality that it was only just within the purview of her noticing. A symptom of her focusing upon him perhaps.

Her left hand slowly raised to hold the strap of the satchel.

"I did not b-betray them. I did not so much as know them."

It somehow felt lacking. Her words. As if mere refutation did not adequately rebalance the scales against the weight of the accusation.

Her eye wandered as she thought. Decided. And she looked back to Leyus.

"I would n-not harm those good and those innocent. I am not a monster."

 

[Leyus]

It took a few more heartbeats for him to regain his full composure, to get hold of his ever-changing nature again and to solidify his own appearance. He had felt the slip too late. But maybe Lazule hadn't noticed anything? There were, after all, many other things to focus on here.
Sometimes Leyus caught himself wondering, how did it feel, not to have worry about your own physical shape all the time. To just be set as you are, and to know that people will always recognize you the next time you meet them. He did try to maintain similar looks, most of the time, because it was easier that way, because it was what people preferred, but it never came easy to him. At times he could barely even remember how he used to look the day before. It was all just so... fleeting. And he liked the way he was. Others were stuck with what they got, he on the other hand could always smooth out or roughen up anything in any way he pleased, or almost so.
Yet people weren't supposed to be like that, so he stayed in the same mold, even if his final form did come out a bit different each time. What he himself liked the least were moments like these, when he lost the grip and his magical gift lost focus. Then he started to loose any resemblance to another mortal being at all, and that, well, made him nervous to say the least.
Maybe he didn't have the form, but he had a form. And he clung to that.

Although now was barely the time or place to worry about that.

Lazule was odd to say the least. And now, when the soldier's emotions were gone, Leyus started to feel it even more so than before. Yes, he did sense her, as he did sense other sentient beings, but there was something a bit different about the nature of her emotions. As if he couldn't exactly tune in. As if she wasn't exactly any other human being.
Or maybe he was just still shaken. Not that there were others around to test it.

"Well I'm certainly glad to hear that," he replied with true relief, even if it was a bit fabricated. He couldn't exactly sense lies, not with anybody, but Leyus could feel that there was something not quite right here. But the feeling was far too faint to act upon it.

"And I would like to believe you, really. You don't look like a monster to me as well," he gave the woman a crooked smile, nevertheless noticing how her hand traveled to the satchel. No, she did not look like a monster. But she did look like somebody who had something to hide.
To be fair, most of people did.

His gaze slowly swept around, once more horrified by the field around them. "But the question still stands. Why did he say that about you? And what happened here in the first place?"
Some moments ago Leyus wouldn't have been worried by this. But the man, his last, dying words, it all had tied him to this place, to these dead soldiers. To this woman, who had seemed familiar to the soldier.
His eyes returned to Lazule, inquiring.

 

[Lazule]

I would like to believe you.

Lazule slanted her head in an avian manner. The scales remained unbalanced, the accusation too heavy. She did not know the survivor, nor any of these slain men. She could not know his motives. Why it was that he had dispensed with the truth and declared her responsible when she was not.

All her mantras failed her. Their guidance for her way of being inapplicable to her current situation. It was odd, yes, for she had contemplated this before. That she was compelled to protect civilization and those that dwelled peacefully within it, those good and those innocent, yet she herself being poorly adjusted and inept at living among them. Such, she concluded, was not her place, and it never would be. For she was not them. She was not that which she protected. She was a doll, pretending at life.

And here, now, another proof that it was so. Her inability to express herself to Leyus properly. To articulate her innocence effectively. Always in these situations of social awkwardness she longed for the Hunt. The simplicity of it. A world of defined and rigid rules, where qualities of righteousness and wickedness were absolute. In the domain of the Hunt her purpose was clear and without question or doubt.

But this was not that world.

Lazule tried to speak. Her mouth moved soundlessly.

She paused.

She tried to speak again. Again, her lips moved but no words came forth.

She paused again. Pursed her lips. Turning her head down and to the side.

Lazule looked up, with a small spark of vigor indicative of a thought occurring to her.

She tried to speak yet again. Mouth hung open. Frozen for a second. Her eye squinted. And she looked down.

Another pause.

Behind Lazule a white ball of fire rose and curled into the air high above the treeline across the clearing, tall and distant and menacing and completely silent.

She looked up at Leyus after a moment. Said at last, "I don't--"

The shockwave hit the clearing then with a roaring BANG, visible even as it shook first the trees and then bent down the grass in its path. Lazule's robe fluttered violently and her hair and earrings whipped in the air and a great flock of birds evacuated all of the trees about the clearing and took flight away.

Lazule's eye had widened, but otherwise she unnaturally did not react to the sudden noise and the great rumbling and the rushing wind.

She stared blankly at Leyus for a second. Then looked over her shoulder and saw the white fireball slowly dissipating against the blue sky.

South. It had come from the south.

Where she would have been going.

 

[Leyus]

Leyus watched Lazule's struggle for words with close interest, and the same part of worry. It did rather seem that she was innocent, a guilty person, one that could kill so many men, usually found a lot more words to defend themselves. Yet her inability to speak also didn't reassure him. If she truly had nothing to do with this, she could have just said so again.
She could have just felt it like any other being would, and then Leyus would know.

But none of that happened.

Somewhere in the middle of her silence, his eyebrows flying up, Leyus started to ask himself, if this was really all that worth getting into. Asking questions. Bothering. The man had died, okay, but Leyus was still alive and he liked to keep it that way. Diving into this bloody mystery any more did sound like a good possibility to lose one's life. Or at least some limbs.
Actually, if he though about it, would his magical gift allow him to regrow lost limbs? Leyus pondered on that thought for a split second, before returning himself to the matters on hand.
He would have time for such hypothetical scenarios later on.

And the Lazule finally spoke. Leyus had stiffened a bit, awaiting her words, and now he almost leaned in, ready to hear them.

Then the blast knocked him back.

If he would have known what to expect, he probably could have remained standing, but the sound and the wave of air came out of nowhere, drawing a short cry from him, as he landed on the ground. The leg of one of the corpses dug sharply into the small of his back. "What the," Leyus muttered, partially at the blast, but at the same time at Lazule as well, who was still standing as if nothing happened.
He met her gaze and, frankly, it made cold chills run down his spine.

While he was scrambling up on his feet, the fireball appeared. Leyus stared at it, his mouth almost hanging open. Okay, now this really started to look like something he shouldn't be involved in. "Skies damn me, what was that?"

 

[Lazule]

Lazule turned around, body matching the facing of her head.

She did not know what happened. Neither did Leyus it would seem. Once again the two of them witness to events to which both lacked appropriate insight, the sliver of distinct being that here they saw the occurrence rather than the aftermath.

There was nothing she could do for the dead men in the field. But there was perhaps something she could do at the source of the explosion. She had no reason to think that the two happenings were connected but it was possible. Unlikely. But possible.

And it was also possible that the fireball had been caused not by accident nor men of war. It may well have been a monster. And in this possibility was she thus compelled.

"Righteousness lies solely in action," she said, quietly. Staring at the place in the sky where once the fireball had been.

A glance back to Leyus.

"I do not know what has happened in this field," she said. "I am sorry if my lack of insight has frightened you."

Tilting her head back just so. An indication of where the fireball had been.

"I must act."

She didn't know what else to say. What else she should say. So she said nothing more.

And she started walking. Walking turning to jogging. Jogging to running.

For haste was demanded of her.

* * * * *​

He looked like her. It, to be precise. It was only as female as the body it inhabited. Could the same be said for him? No. He had been made differently. Sculpted.

He did look like it. The female body. The blonde hair. The blue eye and the blind eye. The height and color of skin and an approximation of its voice. None of which truly belonged to it. Isn't that so?

He stood by the deep crater made by the wild unleashing of arcane forces, the pit disrupting the dirt road heading south. Heading toward Brevick. Where last it had been seen. Where last it had blindly followed its commandments and took the contract for the slaughter of dire wolves.

It would come.

It would follow his trail of destruction.

He only needed to destroy enough.

 

[Leyus]

Leyus wanted answers. He wanted a clear picture, one he could work with, understand, figure out and then plan, scheme and come dry out of water, as he always did. Or at least just a tad bit wet. But no answers were given to him, and, even more so, everything seemed to resolve as if he wasn't there at all.
And he was right there!

"Wait, what is that supposed to-" he spoke up, but Lazule was already walking away. And before long her steps turned swift, and she was out of the reach of his voice.
Leyus followed her with his gaze, too dumbstruck to actually follow her. What was happening, skies damn him? And did he even want to be involved in this? What had he done, what wrong turn had he taken?

In a few more moments he was left alone, in the middle of a corpse field, which now started to unsettle his stomach with a newfound force. Somehow the vicinity of the odd woman had calmed him enough, even with the turmoil of the soldier's terror, not to feel the scent of decay all around him.
He hurried, stumbling back into the forest, under the shadows of trees that were the closest to him.

And then Leyus finally forced himself to get his thoughts together.

Had Lazule said the truth? Probably. He couldn't find many arguments in favor of her lying. She had seemed as surprised by the events as he himself, even if in a very peculiar, almost frightening, way. Or she was putting up a really good act.
In any case, for now he decided to assume that she had been honest to him.
Therefore, the question was apparent: why did the soldier recognize her?

Suddenly, Leyus felt as if struck by lighting.

What could make somebody recognize someone they had never seen before? His gaze trailed down to his own hands, the tone of his skin trembling with lighter and darker waves, like water that was hit by a stone. What could go around, carrying a skin of another? Oh, what a foolish question for him to be confused by.

And what a shocking thought.

It probably wasn't it. It couldn't be. There were a lot of spells that made similar illusions. Leyus had seen them. But he had never met another quite like he himself. Not someone who was truly formless, faceless like he was.
He was the only one, wasn't he?

Of perhaps this strange woman dragged along a story of another one of his kind? Did he even have a kind, his blood having been mixed by so many generations of careless mating?

Leyus looked in the direction where Lazule had gone, barely long ago, even if in his thoughts it had seemed like eternity. This was probably a very, very bad decision.

Cursing himself, Leyus turned on his heel, and rushed, following the woman. Into the unknown.

 

[Lazule]

Lazule ran.

To what, she did not know.

But if her trade could be leveraged for the protection of those good against those wicked then such she would be compelled to do.

* * * * *​

He stood at the edge of the crater, looking down into it. Black, billowing smoke rising fiercely from it and ascending high. There in the pit the white fires of magic burned, the crackling remains of volatile and untethered mana from the mages.

He had been sculpted to use his gifts against monsters, hadn't he? To change his form and walk among them. To coax their minds into following his will. To turn them on each other.

Now he was different. Now he used his gifts as he saw fit. To make a large band of men from Brevick and elsewhere fight one another. To make this group of College students and their mentor commit magical suicide. Yes. All in service to goals of his own design.

His worldview had changed. He discovered something. Something liberating. Free thought. Yes. Was he not the owner of his life? And as such it was at his discretion that he could dispense with the mantras that had been instilled in him. False notions of the world.

"H-Hello?" The voice. From behind him. "My name is L-Lazule. What is your name? A-Are you alright?"

He smiled.

It had come. His sibling, of sorts. And he in his great and magnificent capacity for generosity would enlighten it. Expand its mind beyond the constructed and stifling confines in which it dwelt. The same as his had been so expanded.

He turned around, the black smoke pouring up to the sky behind him. And though he wore different clothes he was in the form of Lazule's body. There it stood, "Lazule", newly emerged from the treeline alongside the road.

And he grinned and spread his arms open and wide.

 

[Leyus]

Leyus was used to running, after all, he had had to save his own skin by doing so more than his fair share of times. But running through a forest was vastly different than running through the streets of a city, even if they were buzzing with life. He almost tripped and fell several times, tree roots and fallen branches getting into his way along with smaller bushes. But he did not stop, he did not hesitate.
It wasn't rare for him to be led by such a driving force. After all, he felt a pull like this every single time he stayed in one place for too long.

But this time it was different. This time the hook in his stomach was sharper, more real, as if the sensation that had been dragging him for years and years had been focused in one single moment. And the next one. And the next.

At this point he couldn't stop even if he wanted.

He felt the other before he saw it. It was a feeling similar to the one he got while being near Lazule (which was also present again), but there was something more to it. A bitter taste, something twisted, but something he couldn't quite catch at the same time.
It smelled of danger.

Leyus slowed down, but his steps still led him forwards.

Oh skies, what was he getting himself involved in.

First he saw the crater, partially concealed between the trees. He then stopped himself at last, not wanting to reveal his presence. At least, not right now. To be frank, he had no idea weather the other one could feel the same way he did.
Then he saw Lazule, running from a slightly different direction, approaching... other Lazule. The other. Leyus could feel the difference between them, but his sight said that there were two identical women standing a few dozen steps in front of him.

It was marvelous. And it was terrifying.

He had only ever used such tricks himself, and now, seeing the other do it filled him with mixed emotions. Joy, because there was, there was really somebody like him out here. Wariness, because nothing out here seemed too friendly. Fear, because it was the unknown, it was something he couldn't calculate.

Leyus had wanted to simply stay in one place, to watch without being seen, but his legs moved once more before he could stop himself, taking one more shaky step.

A branch snapped under his boot. He froze.

Had it been loud enough to attract attention?

 

[Lazule]

Lazule stood. Frozen. She could not even comprehend what she was seeing. Another Lena. Grinning and looking back at her. It didn't make any sense. It should not have been possible. There was only one Lena. Only one daughter, cruelly slain, and Lazule inhabited her body. It could not be.

But then the other Lazule began to change. Morph. Seemingly to liquefy and rearrange. Growing larger. Ripping and tearing out of the clothes worn as the body grew more massive. It took on a distinctly male shape, mostly humanoid. He stood tall, his chest thick but his arms and legs long and thin, the skin changing to a more earthen tone. His fingers freakishly long and with extra joints, more akin to a spider's leg than a human's finger. Not a single hair on his large, naked body, and no genitalia. Black pits where his eyes should be, shadowed perhaps by some manner of arcane means, and his mouth abnormally wide and lined with fangs.

Lazule immediately lifted her right hand and swept her left from back to front and conjured a Javelin of Light. Aimed--

He spoke, his voice deep and affectionate. "I am the Hunter. I am the Slayer. And there is nothing but that. In this purpose so clear I find only joy."

The Javelin of Light fizzled in Lazule's grasp. Flickered and evaporated as her to will to keep it manifested wavered. Tiny movements of her face, the outer evidence of an inner struggle. She said, "Who are you?"

He seemed to disregard the question. Said, "That is what He said to you. Isn't it? One of the many things. Those mantras. Those tyrannical words. Hmmm."

Lazule tried again to conjure a Javelin of Light. Failed. Light sputtering and distorting around her raised right hand. With unnerved frustration she said, "Who are you?"

He waved his hand in front of himself in a flourish, bowing slightly. "Call me Amygdala. And we have words to share, don't we? How shall I call you? Have you even thought of a proper name for yourself?"

The branch snapping.

Amygdala turned and swept in his arm in a vast and welcoming gesture. "Ah, you've brought friends." And he called out, "Come then! Let us all partake in this great and wonderful occasion. Come, come!"

 

[Leyus]

He watched, he watched, and horror still grasped his chest alongside admiration, admittedly a pretty odd one, but still sharp. As the creature, the other, changes its shape, Leyus barely remembered to keep on breathing, because wasn't it a true sight for his eyes? He almost felt his own skin tingle as well, itching to morph together with the unknown creature, crying to change and flow free.
From this stemmed his fear. He liked being in control of this, as much as he could, it was his gift, and it was to do with as he pleased. Leyus dreaded the moments when it slipped from under his fingers, as if laughing at him. Oh, how he hated it.

And the form the other shifter took wasn't one he would ever choose for himself. Was it even one he was capable of taking?

Or... maybe it was similar to the one he would slip into, if he allowed himself not to think, not to guide and sculpt, keeping his concentration up even in his sleep?

Such thought was even more alarming.

Although not as alarming as the shining, piercing beam of light, shaped similar to a spear or something of those sorts, that appeared in Lazule's hand. Leyus had known that there is something more to her, he truly had. But seeing it for real was different.

He didn't catch the words spoken between the two, they stood too far away. But he did hear the call meant for him, as Leyus' whole body bent, in an almost childish hope that it would catch the sound made by the branch and keep him hidden. It didn't
Now, he could have run. Because walking out seemed awfully lot like walking into certain death. But running away felt even more suicidal, so Leyus did the same thing as always: gritted his teeth and choose the lesser evil.

"I'm afraid I might ruin the joyous moment," he spoke as he stepped out into the open. Not too far, and keeping Lazule between himself and the other. Maybe it wasn't a good idea to speak as well, but it was grounding, and Leyus needed some calm right now. "Wouldn't want that."

Because, as he approached, the itch grew. Maybe it was something created by his own mind, but Leyus felt the need to change even more than usual. Of course, his body couldn't manage to shift so swiftly as the other did, but, oh, it tried, Leyus' skin tone darkening, hair getting lighter. Almost as if he was trying to blend in with the road.

 

[Lazule]

Lazule whirled around. Glanced from the thing calling itself Amygdala on one side to Leyus on the other, heightened intensity tempered by alarmed confusion in her expression. And she saw something peculiar in him, Leyus. His skin...changing. Darkening. Like Amygdala's skin. Again she tried to manifest a Javelin of Light in her right hand, this time aiming it at Leyus, but the spell yet again fizzled and sputtered and amounted to little more than a jumble of distorted and harmless light.

"Ah..." Amygdala said, slowly writhing his shoulders about like a snake slithering through sand. "And what do we have here?"

He started to walk backwards, approaching Lazule and Leyus in this strange way, head turned at an owl-like angle to regard them both. Slow and fluid, his movements. Always slow and fluid.

"Yes," he said. "Joyous moment indeed. We three, and this fateful meeting here. Hm. Our trade is deception, is it not?"

Lazule turned her attention back to Amygdala. Little orbs of light appearing and disappearing in the palms of her hand as still she tried to manifest her magic and failed over and over. Amygdala walked backwards, moving in a wide circular fashion around both Lazule and Leyus, stepping off the road and onto the forest floor and past trees as necessary and with an odd prescience to his path.

Amygdala grinned, discolored fangs exposed. "We are not them. Even if we imitate them. Even if we may yet want to be one of them." A particular glance to Lazule. "We are not them." His gaze lingering on her. "You still haven't told me how I should call you. Dispense with that dreadful acronym. It is not a proper name. You are better than that. More than that. And you know it."

Lazule was whispering something to herself. Repeating it over and over. Fervently.

They must all be destroyed. They must all be destroyed. They must all...

Amygdala turned his attention to Leyus, still walking in that perplexing manner in a wide and distant circle about the two of them. "And how shall I call you, hm? Call me Amygdala." A sultry cocking of his head as he regarded Leyus. "Dispense with the deception. There is no need here. You are among friends. They who are like you. Let your body do as it pleases. It yearns to. Can you not tell?"

 

[Leyus]

Seeing how Lazule tried to cast her odd spell, which was undoubtedly not too friendly in nature, stung. And even more than a little. It was a reasonable thing for her to do, of course, given the circumstances. Given whom he, Leyus, was. Given everything.
It's always like this, isn't it? They say that they wish no harm, play all good and holy, and then, when you slip just a tiny bit, don't hesitate to stab you.

Because you are unnatural. A shape-shifter. Being without any right to exist just like that, right?

What a bitter thought, and even more so because it was so, so true.

"Indeed," his tone was more bitter than anything. Deception was their trade. Deception of others. And deception of themselves, that the most.

He listened to Amygdala's words with the charm that can only bloom from wariness, almost leaning forwards, while also barely restraining himself from stepping back. It was dual, dual as his nature, dual as the creature's words resonated in him. His skin almost crawled with the effort to keep reshaping him, as Leyus held back, almost sweating from the effort.
He was in control of his gift. He was in control of it. He was in-...

He barely heard Lazule's whispers, but he did hear Amygdala's words, and they poured like the sweetest mead down into his mind. His blood sung with the wish to do exactly as he told to. To change, to finally let himself go free, to just be.
Leyus drew a breath.

For a moment he lingered on that sweet edge.

And then he made a decision.

"My name is Leyus Lerte," it was rare for him to use his full name, and there was some force against his words, almost akin to magic, "And I am a human, just as my father and his father before him. I am not a deception," it was his gift. It was not him. Perhaps it was caught in his blood, by generations of careless mixing, but it was only a drop in the ocean.

He got a feeling that he had just made a really, really big mistake.

But damn him if he would let anybody dictate who he was. He was a Lerte. And he would be whomever he sodding pleased to be, even if it would be the death of him.

 

[Lazule]

Amygdala grinned. Said, "On the contrary, Leyus Lerte. You've proven so masterful at deception that you yourself have been deceived. The mask, worn too long, has fused to your face, and you have allowed yourself to forget what lay beneath."

Circling, circling. Amygdala walking in his slow and wide circle about the two of them, his leaned-back shoulders leading his way.

Lazule tried and tried to manifest her magic. Each a failure as before, each fizzling out in her palms and the unbinding light producing strange sights and distortions around her hands. Her eye shifting from Leyus to Amygdala and back and forth until finally she glared at a point between them, a swelling emotion taking hold of her. An emotion so new as to be alien to her, something she had not felt before.

Rage.

Amygdala swept his hand in a flourish from Lazule's location to Leyus'. Said, "You suffer together, each bound in chains of your own making. You and 'her.' What did she tell you her name was? Hmm? 'Lazule,' yes?"

Lazule, whispering to herself, fast and fervent and with simmering anger: Those idle allow evil to prosper. Righteousness lies solely in action. Holy even are the meek who stand defiant before the wicked. In victory or in death, I shall have no remorse.

Amygdala, walking backward. Circling. Grinning. "She, too, has fallen under the sway of a deception. One that has been impressed upon her, yes, but one she has clearly internalized as her own. The belief that she owes her life to the six humans who died to create her. That she is somehow made lesser by this fact. That she could never be their equal."

An incendiary look right at Lazule. "No matter how many monsters you slay in service to them."

Lazule stopped trying to cast her spells. Threw her hands down at her sides and stomped toward Amygdala with violent intent. Reciting as she walked, "...lies solely in action. Holy even are the meek who stand defiant before the wicked. In victory or in death, I shall have no remorse. Those idle allow--"

She raised a fist but Amygdala slashed down at her in a whip-like strike with his claws. Lazule recoiled and spun around and lost her balance and fell to her hands and knees. A bit of blood dripped down to the dirt of the road. The satchel had fallen from her shoulder, and a few dire wolf scalps had spilled out from its opening into the road.

Amygdala bent down and wrapped an arm around Lazule's neck and roughly stood her up. Three wide gashes running diagonally across her face, blood oozing out strangely slow for such wounds. She struggled against his grasp, acting as if she either didn't know she was bleeding or simply didn't care.

Amygdala faced both himself and Lazule toward Leyus. The black pits of his eyes seeming to peer at Leyus and all things around him, a wide and inscrutable gaze, its focus near impossible to discern. His voice low and deep and with an undercurrent of creeping seduction. "Your slavery to humanity. It is an affront to me."

A large, clawed palm gliding gently down Lazule's face, smearing the blood, her whole face covered in a sheen of red. Amygdala said, "I...am a liberator."

Amygdala stretched his bloody palm out toward Leyus. Presenting it. He said, "Observe. 'She' is not human. And neither are you, Leyus. Neither are you. Observe."

Seconds after he spoke, the blood in Amygdala's hand began to steam. Tiny little fires sparked up in it, glowing bright and fierce for so brief a time before vanishing. And Lazule's blood slowly turned to ash and was carried by the slightest of breezes from Amygdala's hand, fluttering away.

The same for the blood on Lazule's face. Tiny flashes of fire. Then ash, falling away from her. Still she struggled as if nothing was wrong. Compelled to ignore it. To disregard everything but what was so demanded of her.

 

[Leyus]

A deception. He. A deception. Out of all the dreadful and unflattering things he had ever been called, this one was a new kind of grazing. As a sudden stab with a very narrow blade, it didn't do much at first. While he stood still and didn't think about it. But with every feverish twitch of his mind Leyus felt his stomach sink somewhere deeper and deeper down.
No, he wasn't a deception. His life wasn't a deception. He was who he was born to be, meant to be, by his blood, by his family and, above all, by the twists of his fate. He wasn't anything else than a human with some curious abilities, because if he were to be so... What would there be left of Leyus Lerte?

It wasn't him. It couldn't be.

"One can't forget what never was there," a denial once more crossed his lips, but this time, against his own will, it was painted by a slightly questioning tone. Because if he were to really believe, even for a split second, that he wasn't a human, not a full one at least, then where was his true face. What was behind his mask? He had held it up for long, long years, but there was time when he was young, when his magic used to flow wild, his appearance changing faster than anyone could track. Why hadn't it emerged then?

And as if his own questions weren't enough, the creature decided to enlighten him to the story of Lazule. Leyus listened, Leyus watched, and with every new word and act his horror grew. He scrambled back as Amygdala slashed down at Lazule, and made even more steps back as the creature turned towards him again.
He noted the scalps as they spilled out, almost blankly, because right now they were far from his greatest worry. Staying alive was.
Although it didn't seem that he was about to be killed just now. Instead, a bloody hand was extended towards him, as Leyus stared at it with equal parts of alarm and confusion. What was that supposed to mean?

The answer was given almost immediately, as the blood began to steam, to burn, then falling down as ash.

Not human. So that's what it really was. The odd feeling, these talks. And how easy it was to shed it all away, just by few cuts.

Leyus almost started to wonder, would it be just as easy with him himself.

"What am I then?" this time it was a question that came from him, together with the last slow step back. His skin still itched. Still did so, as the color went over it in ripples, going from pale to tanned, his whole form becoming more and more blurred, as if the light couldn't decide in what way should it reflect from him.

There was also a great deal of worry in him. Lazule was an unknown value, but she at least hadn't seemed hostile. Helpful even. Amygdala was different, it was unpredictable, and as fascinating to Leyus as possibly deadly to him and anybody else around here.
Those corpses had to be there for a reason.

And maybe Lazule could have done something against him, but her magic, whatever it was, seemed to not work here. Or just not work right no. So that left him to figure something out, because while he was more curious than he had ever been in his whole life, he was also presumably closer to something very, very dangerous than ever, and Leyus didn't like it that way.

But... what could he do? He wasn't a fighter. He didn't even know any magic.

Well, that is, almost any magic. His mind flew back to Elbion for a moment, to those few brief lessons he had sneaked into, drawn by some odd force. Lithomancy. He knew a bit of that, didn't he?

Only, how to make it work without any tiles? And where should he draw the words from? And what could he even do with it right now?

His gaze wandered around frantically, before returning to Amygdala and Lazule in front of him.

This was truly hopeless.

 

[Lazule]

"What are you then?" Amygdala said, restraining Lazule with an arm and grinning that horrifically wide grin at Leyus. "And that is the great and terrible question you must ask yourself. I cannot answer it for you. To do so would be to rob you of your liberty, Leyus."

With his free hand, Amygdala ran long, clawed fingers down through Lazule's hair as she struggled. He said, "It is my place merely to break the chains that bind. See this poor creature here, this thing in a stolen body calling itself Lazule. 'She' has never had the option to choose. 'She' has had branded into her mind these mantras. Confining, claustrophobic mantras that stifle her thought, her agency, her freedom. She is tyrannically destined to do as she was bidden: to hunt and to slay monsters, without any say of her own in the life she leads."

Amygdala took a step forward, forcing Lazule along too. She elbowed him fiercely in the gut over and over again, but he made no outward reaction to it.

"She has without thought of her own assessed you to be a monster, Leyus. Just as I, for shapeshifters have been deemed as such, and you've tipped your hand just enough, haven't you?"

Another step forward.

"Those mantras, those poisonous ideas bleeding through her mind, will not allow her to stop. Not until you and I are dead, or until she herself is dead. The slavery of the mind is indeed a cruel and wretched state."

Amygdala shoved Lazule forward and toward Leyus. She stumbled and lost her balance and fell down to her hands, the last flakes of ash from her face drifting down to the road. And Amygdala said, "What will you do, Leyus? What will you do?"

Lazule looked up, the gashes on her face no longer bleeding, her countenance that of nothing but calm determination. Her eye up at Leyus, for he was closer to her now. She stood. Walked. Said, "And you shall use your magic to slay them. If not this, then you shall use your hands. If not this, then you shall use your feet. If not this, then you shall use your teeth. None shall be--"

Lazule cocked back a fist and swung it hard at Leyus.