Fable - Ask Podhlajen

[Reynir Lykkisson]

A frigid wind whips roughly across the upper ridge of the gulley near Crobhear Lake, sending cascades of snow from the drifts above. A wretched time of year to need outside assistance. There was no doubt the wide open mountainside would be worse at this altitude.

It was rare, perhaps once every few years, that help was to be hired for the security of the clans. Rarer yet was it something as sensitive as this.

Disappearances, directly from the nests. Odd findings, not usual to regular Fjallsormr handicrafts. Strange noises from the depths, beyond the normal boundaries.

The safe arrival of the eminent aide was prayed over, both that the tumult of Nature lend him grace, and that he follow the explicit paths given, deviation from which being perilous for a biped. Many stones were prepared at fires, and a search party waited on standby.

Reynir pulls his hood tighter as the Old Easter Wind blows in the mouth of the gulley, and hoists the length of his body up the incline and out onto the ledge. He looks along the snow-coated path down the mountainside, and scan carefully with his heat pits, seeking the warmth of a living body. Some areas of the trail were blocked from the gusts, others less so.

I wish you fortitude and luck, warrior. We need you.

---

Cato

 

[Cato]

Cato had truly outdone himself this time. He almost certainly taken the job that was going to get him killed. More to the point, get him killed before the contract even started. His cold-and-battered mind wandered back to his time in the Allirian Guard, and his old sergeant.

'Ah here's Cato,' he'd say. 'The man who perfected the bad idea.' Been nearly two bloody decades since then and the mercenary was starting to think the old man was onto something. It was so cold that it physically hurt to do anything, even fucking think. At this point he was certain there wasn't nothing between his legs either. He wasn't dumb enough to check, if only to keep his sanity in check.

Part of him wondered why he even bothered taking this contract, but he already knew the answer. The pay was just too damn good. There was also history between the 'Shields and Fjallsormr. This wasn't the first time the mercenary company had worked with the clans. First time for Cato though, looking like it was going to be the bloody last too.

"F-f-fu-" It was so damned cold that he couldn't even properly swear. His entire body felt heavier than an Iuk-'uan hippo. Cato somehow knew that if he could just make it to the top of the ridge, things would be okay.

He made it two steps before collapsing face-first into the snow.

On his way down, he swore he could see the hazy outline of a figure in the distance.

Reynir Lykkisson

 

[Reynir Lykkisson]

It was Luck that would be held in high esteem that day. It was luck, and chance, that Reynir had caught a glimpse of black cloak, Human-sized, through a gap in the falling snow. That the Fjallsormr was able to turn and send a small pebble skittering down the gulley on the ice and snow to click off the very mouth of the cave, to alert the search party. That the path to the man wasn't made deadly by false footings from the snow.

Hold yourself, warrior. You're safer out of the wind down there.

He arrives next to Cato many long moments later, and dipping low, pulls the man out of the snow and into a protective coil of stony warmth. Soft suede-like leather stretched over rows upon rows of hard, flat stones and metal plating, radiating a heat that, while perhaps lower than most would prefer, was certainly warmer than the frigid snow surrounding them.

"Are you there?" Comes his even-toned voice, tinged with a lisp on the T. He shields the man's face from the blowing wind by placing his own back in the way. "You have travelled far. We will carry you the rest of the journey."

---

It was a matter of a risky quarter of an hour, with the search party arriving, carefully lifting Cato and shielding him from the wind as a group, and checking his mouth for breath, that they finally carry him into the cave and pass him along to one of the Witches.

Reynir simply follows, concerned, and divests most of his winter gear at the entrance of the den to join her. He and the Witch speak to each other in Sormurar Tunga, a complex language of hisses and guttural utterances, as she attends to Cato and brings his warmth up slowly near the fire, removing his frost-encrusted outer layers.

Be well. Be well, I beg.

---

Cato

 

[Cato]

"Am I fucking where?" He managed to mutter in response to the question. Cato sure as hell wasn't in a whorehouse, a tragedy as far as he was concerned. His mind could barely comprehend all that was around him. The mercenary attempted to manage one more curse but soon found the welcome of unconsciousness. Not a bad way to go if he really thought about it. Been a time when his two jewels would've been cut and then draped about his shoulders. A pleasant thought as the darkness of oblivion gripped him.

Pain, as always, brought him back to his senses many hours later. "Can't say I've had a hangover this bad in a spell," he groaned. There was a number of figures around him and none of them were human. Cato's immediate reaction was to reach for a blade but whatever sense he had prevented him doing anything rash. A mercenary's self-preservation was not to be underestimated.

"Don't suppose you lot got any whiskey?" ventured the mercenary captain.

Reynir Lykkisson

 

[Reynir Lykkisson]

When the mercenary awoke with a groan and complaint, Reynir couldn't help the small grin that came to his face, relief washing over him. He was alive. Now he needed to stay alive.

"Your return to those living is welcomed, warrior." Reynir announced, volume measured.

Reynir turns to the Witch attending Cato with a series of low sounds. In response, she approaches a tall cabinet and retrieves a cup, shot-sized, and two waterskins, one blue, one brown. They converse for a moment, before she hands the cup and blue skin to Cato, and reaches to help sit him upright with pillows.

"She insists on water first, warrior. And after, only one cup of liquor. She says it will affect your muscles. Do you hunger?"

Reynir moves to assist the Witch, and once Cato is upright, he coils up next to him, sitting.

"I am Reynir Vilhjálmsson Lykkisson. What is your ken, or I should say, what do you go by?"

---

Cato

 

[Cato]

"Almost thinking I was better off dead." The pain that wracked his body upon awakening was still very much presence. Trudging through the snow-filled valley had hardly done his body any favors. The mercenary looked to the other two in the room and scratched his head after a moment. "Appreciate you keeping me breathing."

Cato looked towards the two proffered skins and almost instinctively reached for the liquor. It turns out that he wasn't a complete bloody idiot. The mercenary didn't bother with the cup and just went for the source itself. He wondered when the last time he had found water to be so welcome. Well, it wouldn't have been that long ago since he was hungover often. Still, those days felt like so long ago. "I am fucking famished," Cato added once he drained nearly the entire waterskin.

He allowed himself to relax slightly, pouring himself a sole cup of his libation. "Name's Cato. Come here on account of the contract that the 'Shields accepted." The mercenary captain took a sip from his cup and nearly choked, it was damned strong. His pride wouldn't allow him to show any discomfort. "So Rey, what's the work? Yer lot seem capable enough..."


Reynir Lykkisson