Open Chronicles Set Upon

[Heike Eisen]

They were nearly a hundred in number. Refugees, adventurers, hunters, mercenaries, merchants and their caravan hands. They, all of them, bound for Alliria from the eastern edges of the Allir Reach. A gathering of those on a common journey. They who had come together for safety and companionship and the sharing of commiserations and stories and sorrows and laughter and all the small joys of life.

Dawn comes. Sky overcast and the morning fog heavy and the patchy snow upon the ground of the pine forest.

The large band of travelers have mostly woken and breakfast is being prepared and there is some small talk and the campfires of the night previous are dwindling.

And this is when they are all set upon by an unknown enemy.

* * * * *​

Heike didn't need sleep. Not necessarily. In her traveling with this loose assortment of people she only pretended to sleep. All throughout the night she maintained her vigil. Watching over the girl entrusted to her care.

The light of dawn came, and the sun was hidden behind thick winter clouds. A good day for Heike. The bitter cold had many in the band of travelers bundled up in their cloaks. Heike stayed wrapped in hers for a different reason.

Heike sat with her back to a tree. A small campfire before her and the girl, Ella, sleeping, her small head rested upon Heike's legs. And here it was that Heike wished she had her own body heat to warm the girl. That tiny token of comfort, that tangible trace of humanity, even that no longer hers to offer, stolen away by her condition.

Many people were awake, only some still slept. Some quiet and tired conversation throughout the camp. Meats being warmed in the last vestiges of camp fires. Tents were being taken down. The merchants were loading their equipment onto their wagons and their caravan hands were feeding the horses. Some of the mercenaries were having an early drink from their flasks and a group of adventurers argued jovially over something on a big map they all held together.

Heike watched. She had not spoken much with the other travelers, not even the other refugees. Ella was one, a refugee, most of them being from the same mining village in the Spine that had been sacked by savage orcs. Heike had not been there for the attack, only the aftermath. And there instead of the fugitive she sought she had found Ella, both her mother and father slain. Ella had an uncle in Alliria, and Heike volunteered at once to take her there safely.

Perhaps Ella knew. Perhaps one or more of the other refugees knew. Ella had seen Heike's hands, her fingers. Her claws. She had seen them but she had made no comment on them. She only made mention of Heike's lack of body heat, this spoken as an innocent observation, simply a quality she had noticed but the implications of it unknown to her. It was all Heike could do to reply, "I'm sorry," and it was left at that.

The girl slept. Wrapped in the small cloak her mother had made for her. The gentle rise and fall of her chest. Heike with an arm and her own cloak around her. Keeping her as warm as she could.

It felt...nice. Fulfilling. To care for the girl.

"I need help."

Heike looked. A man, wandering slowly from the periphery of the camp back in, his voice a half-whimper and a half-yell, looking at no one in particular.

"I need..."

The man collapsed. Dead. Two large arrows protruding from his back.

A general sense of alarm crackled through the camp like a lightning strike. Those awake springing up to their feet if they were sitting and some drawing swords and some grabbing their bows and crossbows and some rushing to wake their fellows and some turning and looking around and some calling out for their friends who for one reason or another were not within sight and some whispering and hissing fearfully to one another about what just happened.

Another arrow sailed in from the fog and struck an adventurer right through his leather armor and he toppled face first down into a campfire and the flames sparked and sputtered.

"Get down!" shouted Mergo, the mercenary captain. "Everbody down! Now. Find yerself a tree!"

All at once the travelers no matter their background did as Mergo had said and scrambled for cover. Heike laid both of her palms on Ella, careful of her claws, and shook her.

"Ella! Ella!"

The girl started and looked up at Heike with eyes wide. Said loudly, "W-What? What is it, Heike?"

"Shhhh!" Heike kicked out the campfire and slid and turned and pressed her own body down, stomach flat against the ground. Without Heike telling her or any such prompting Ella did the same, looking about with uncertainty and dread but keeping herself composed. The tree Heike had rested against now their shield against the periphery of the camp and what lurked outside it in the lingering fog.

A flurry of arrows passing by overhead, the whistling faint and evidence they had come close. A shriek of pain elsewhere in the camp. The injured man continued to scream and call out for a healer, any healer, please.

"Don't move," Heike whispered.

Stillness through the pines. The forest bearing silent witness.

 

[Naghi]

Kellen Ashby was not a bad man.

He was a criminal, a smuggler and a murderer at times, but he wasn't bad. Most of his life had been spent in the slums of Alliria. He, unlike others, had dug himself out of a hole of nothingness and become something else all together.

Most people would never recognize him as a legitimate merchant, hell, most legitimate merchants wanted him dead. Yet even the most wealthy of Alliria could not deny that he had both wealth and position. That position had of course been bought with bribes and threats, but it was still there.

It was also why he was here.

Kellen had never much been one for the nobility, no, his people were those among the caravan. The downtrodden, the refugees, the mercenaries working at the behest of masters they detested. These were his people, the ones he could speak to, the ones that in five...ten...perhaps fifteen years would finally see that they were stronger together and would rise up.

It would take time, he knew that, but each man spoken to was another sword. Each woman convinced was another torch. All of them mattered, all of them just needed to be made to see it.

When the first arrow landed, Kellen was asleep.

He was no soldier, so when the first call went up his eyes snapped open. An arrow struck the tree nearby, a thunk resounding as it buried itself within the heavy wood. A curse escaped his lips, and quickly he scrambled to his feet.

 

[Uruk Brightsmile]

Uruk stood with his feet apart between two pine trees. He let out a sigh of relief at the sound of his stream splashing against the ground. The orc’s eyes skimmed the forest in front of him. A chill ran up his spine and he shuddered. Uruk didn’t like the cold. He preferred the dry summers and mild winters of his childhood. On days like today he’d think of the sea of tall-grass that shimmered in the evening light, the sound of song birds and the sensation of warm earth between his toes.. But that was then and this is now. Here the ground was hard and the cold seeped into his bones. Uruk grasped his cloak with his freehand and drew it closer around him- and then he heard the call.

Get down! Find yerself a tree!

The orc glanced over his shoulder but could not see the encampment from where he stood. He gave himself one last shake before hastily fastening his trousers and making his way back through the brush.

Uruk emerged to find the camp in disarray. Through the fog he could see figures strewn about. Some sought cover behind wagons while most used trees and larger stones. Horses reared, children cried, and those who could were scrambling for their weapons. He felt a rush of air against the side of his head as something whizzed past him. Instinctively Uruk drew his blade moved for cover. He weaved his way past huddled masses and fearful eyes until he regrouped with his comrades behind their wagon.

Peering around the front of the wagon was a stout dwarf with a crossbow in hand. Khaz was cocking his weapon while humming some Dwarvish jig- a nervous habit of his. Crouched beside Khaz was Helv, a slender woman who was also peering over the top of the wagon with a short bow in hand. And cowering beside Helv was Pillar; a pudgy man bundled in cheap furs with a bulbous red nose. Pillar clutched a dagger with two shaky hands while muttering under his breath. Uruk could hear him negotiating with the powers that be.

Helv glanced at Uruk as he positioned himself on the opposite side of Pillar, “I thought they caught you with your trousers around your ankles,” She’d jest before letting an arrow loose, “They must’ve slipped past the sentries.”

Uruk peered around the wagon’s rear. He spotted a group of armed men rushing toward the source of the arrows, “I intend to make it out of here alive.” Answered Uruk. For a moment the orc paused. He touched the leather pouch that he wore around his neck. Uruk then took a deep breath to quell the unsettling fear that formed like a rock in his stomach. Without looking at Helv he abandoned the wagon’s protection and moved toward the fray.

 

[Fain]

Fucking humans.

Khurash nocked another bone-tipped arrow to his bow and drew the deer-gut string back until the goose fletching nearly touched his cheek. Then he let fly and watched the cedar shaft hiss off through the foggy dew of morning toward the camp.

They came with their picks and their shovels and hacked at Father Mountain’s bones. They came with their axes and saws and chopped down the sacred groves.

Always claiming they owned the land and waving their scraps of “paper” with their ink-speech scratches.

As bad as dwarves, but at least dwarves stayed inside their mountain caves.

This war party would push the humans back across the Reach. Back into their farmland where they belonged, with their cow shit and their wheat fields.

Already Khurash had taken the scalps of five of their warriors back at the mining village. But he sought the bravest of their heads. It would be a fine addition to his collection.

 

[Uruk Brightsmile]

Uruk knew of their attackers before he saw them. While advancing he caught sight of several shafts protruding from a woman's torso. The arrow tips were crude and barbed in design, and often caused infections if they didn't kill their mark straight away.

The deep bellow of a war-horn cut through the air. The sellsword braced himself.

They fell upon the encampment from all sides. Like phantoms of this ancient wood they emerged from the fog with guttural cries that shook even Uruk's resolve. He cut down his first foe with a broad slash across her chest. She was fierce with wild eyes and charged him head on. His second foe flanked him on his left- the orc came down on him with a savage swipe. The attack was a near miss.

Uruk had left his metal shield back at the wagon and had to rely on a mediocre half-shield he'd found along the way. The wooden shield could barely sustain the blows- an amateur mistake.

Parry. Parry. Dodge. Slash. Parry. Slash.

Another orc fell. Another moment of respite. Uruk struggled to maintain his footing in the snow and uneven earth. These weren't a ragtag gang of bandits, these were proud warriors that attacked their foes with a fury that was relentless. They were orcs that still adhered to the old ways- as some had put it- and fiercely protected what was their's.

Uruk cursed and tried to maintain his composure. Once more he sought comfort in the trinket strung around his neck.

A weak volley soared over him from behind. The unarmed scrambled past him for refuge. Another group of mercenaries had now arrived to reinforce the front. Their attackers had the higher ground and were descending from the fog-covered hills. Mercenary captain Mergo barked a command, but the orc couldn't hear him.

The captain's command was drowned out by the sound of splintering wood and the rabid war cry of his attacker. Another foe was on Uruk.

 

[Heike Eisen]

From around the camp, hushed whispers and voices:

A mercenary: "You see 'em? Do you see 'em?"

Mergo the captain: "I caint see nothin."

An adventurer, one of five, speaking to another: "Julie, is your protection spell ready?"

Julie, visibly shaken: "Y-Yes. Yes. Yes, ah-ah-only for a short time though."

A hunter, peering out from behind his tree, speaking loudly, "There's something moving out there!"

Another mercenary to the hunter: "Shhhh! Quiet, fool!"

A mother refugee, cradling her two sons, while their father aimed a worn crossbow from behind his tree: "It's okay, it's okay, papa's gonna keep us safe. Just listen to papa."

A caravan hand with his wooden shield raised, standing up from hiding, yelling toward where the arrows had come: "Come out, you cowards! Come out and--"

An arrow, then two more out of another four, hit the caravan hand in the back, each from a different angle. The caravan hand fell flat to the earth.

"Mother Metisa!" said one of the group of five adventurers. "They're everywhere! They're all around us! Run!"

"No, Morris, no! Stay down! Don't--"

His friend's pleas didn't stop him. Morris panicked, scrambled to his feet, ran a short distance, and an arrow caught him in the groin and he tumbled and fell and held himself and blood oozed through his fingers and he cried out ceaselessly.

* * * * *​

Ella stared back at the caravan hand. At the adventurer who had been shot in the groin and lay on the ground howling in pain.

Heike put a palm on the back of her head and coaxed it forward and away from the dead inside the camp and out toward the perimeter of fog outside it. Said, "Don't look."

"It's happening again," Ella said. Her voice hollow.

"You're getting through this," Heike said.

"This is how mama and papa died."

"I'm not going to let anything happen to you. Look at me. Nothing--"

The horn, and warcries from all around the camp. Massive warriors emerging from the edges of the fog wherever one might look and charging into view. A whole orcish warband. All of the non-fighters of the camp went into the primal panic inherent in all cornered animals, scattering wildly. The few hunters loosed some arrows at the oncoming orcs and fell back toward the wagon line.

Captain Mergo and his men stood and lined up and the captain yelled to his fellow sellswords, "Uruk! Helv! Pillar!" The captain glanced back. Saw that Uruk had advanced. He turned and shouted to a few of the other independent mercenaries gathered by the wagon line. "Go! Help Uruk out on that side! We'll watch yer flanks!"

And they did as they were told, figuring the best chance of survival being working as a unit, however loose.

Heike stood and said, "Up! Up! Up!" and helped Ella to her feet. She turned about in a complete circle and searched but there was no clear means of escape, no where to run. She would have to fight.

Heike hurried with Ella at her side and took off her traveling cloak as she approached the last wagon in the merchants' wagon line. All the horses huffed and shied and stamped their hooves at the sounds of battle and panic all around the camp.

"Hide," Heike said. "Stay under my cloak and under the wagon. I'll come back--"

"Don't leave me!"

"I have to. It's too dangerous, I have to clear a way. I promise, I promise, I will come back for you. Now hide!"

The firmness in Heike's voice made Ella relent, and she hid as Heike told her. Heike turned--several more arrows all from differing directions whistling by--and she ran, her coat fluttering behind her.

Uruk. Heike had heard his name around camp. His she remembered because Ella was frightened stiff by him. That, and during all her time both alive and otherwise she had never before seen an orc. Not in Reikhurst, not in Alliria, not once before. Uruk was the first one.

And now, Heike saw more orcs than she would ever care to see. Seemed some of wilder tales about them--the tribal ones--were true, confirmed this day.

Heike approached Uruk and the group of independent mercenaries, all engaged in their own duels with the orc warriors. She went behind one of the warriors battering the shield of a mercenary and drove all of her claws deep into the orc's back. She felt his organs, slick and warm inside him. But the orc just snarled and flung an elbow back at her and smacked her in the face and sent her crashing down on her rear end in a patch of snow, dazed and with scraps of his intestines dangling in each hand.

She didn't want to overexert herself. To worsen the thirst after going days without feeding. But these orcs were incredibly resilient, incredibly strong. She needed to be as well. There was no choice.

Heike stood with an unnatural quickness. Jumped onto the back of the wounded orc warrior. Clamped onto his head with both hands and pressed harder and harder and exerted herself until her claws penetrated the bone and her hands crushed his skull.

The warrior crumbled, and Heike dropped to her feet.

 

[Uruk Brightsmile]

Khaz was the first to respond to the command. The dwarf clambered toward the front line with crossbow still in hand. He fired from the hip. The bolt shot forward and caught an orc square in the chest, causing him to tumble down hill. Khaz dropped his crossbow, unsheathed his sword, and leaped toward another attacker.

Helv and Pillar weren't far behind. Helv stayed back to let loose several arrows into hills before drawing her own blade. A foe had closed the distance between them and was now on Helv. She parried a series of vicious slashes. Her dark skin was a sharp contrast to the snow around her as she weaved past her opponent's strikes- each one was getting closer.

Helv called out between labored breaths, "Pillar- do something!"

With his athame in hand the pudgy man stumbled through the snow. Pillar now stood several feet away from the duel. Beads of sweat dotted his brow and hands were still shaky. He closed his eyes and visualized the knife. A hilt made of smooth, black, stone, a blade that shined pale in moonlight, the several runes etched into the metal- and then Pillar sensed it.

The hilt in his hand grew warmer until it felt as if he were clutching embers. He extended his left arm with his palm facing outward. A stream of orange and red flames projected from Pillar’s palm and engulfed Helv's attacker on his flank. The warrior let out a howl and collapsed. Helv tumbled away from the flames and watched the orc writhe on the ground. The flames consumed the orc's leathers- then his flesh.

Helv locked eyes with Pillar and thanked him with a nod.

* * *
Uruk could feel the half-shield's strength faltering.
Hack. Hack.
His arm ached from absorbing the shock of each blow.
Hack. Hack.
His feet were slipping.
Hack. Ha-

The attacks ceased. A bloodcurdling shriek replaced the guttural war-cry. Uruk lowered his shield, and he saw her.

Her skin was pale and her eyes were yellow, she had claws drenched in blood- what was she?

His mouth turned dry. His stomach was in knots. His knees felt weak. Uruk was no stranger to gore but this- this was unsettling. The savage orc's head was crushed. Pieces of grey matter seeped through the cracks. Blood pooled in the snow around the corpse. Uruk watched the newcomer with uneasy eyes. He glanced at the mutilated corpse, then back at her.

The sellsword slowly backed away, turned, and ran to meet the others.

Only one thought prevailed as he ran, At least it wasn't me.

 

[Naghi]

Orcs?

What the hell were Orcs doing all the way out here? A string of curses left his lips as he felt a blade sweep over his head. The odd cutlass like sword stuck into the tree that had been besides his hand, landing in the wood with a solid thunk.

"Fuck." The underlord said as he pulled out a knife from his sleeve and stabbed the orc in the neck.

A guttural sound escaped from the hulk of a creature, his hand releasing the blade as he struggled to grab at the wound in his throat. The man's eyes locked on Kellen, an odd look of betrayal staring through to his soul.

The criminal shrugged.

"Sorry mate." He frowned. "Not much of a soldier."

A shrug rolled over his shoulders just as an arrow flew past his head. The broadhead buried itself deep in the tree behind him, almost reflecting off the blade stuck there. Another curse escaped him, and he quickly turned to run back towards the caravan.

Where was a mage when you needed one?

 

[Heike Eisen]

All the camp in violent disarray, the savage ambush spread throughout. The perimeter of the campsite of near one hundred souls large by necessity, Captain Mergo's efforts valiant but futile. Orcs had poured in, the grounds now host to dozens of dispersed duels, all with a degree of desperation for the travelers. For the orcs had both the advantages of raw strength and sheer numbers. This truth dawning rapidly.

An arrow streaked through the camp and inbetween several duels and struck one of Mergo's mercenaries in the back of the neck. Blood gurgled from the wound and his mouth and Mergo shouted, "Form a circle!" Mergo and the mercenaries under his command, their backs all to one another and facing down twice their number of orcish foes all around them. Mergo, defiant, bellowing at the orcs, "Come on then! Come on and git you some, you green savages!" And their last stand began.

One of the hunters bolted up a tree with surprising deftness to avoid two orcs bearing down on him. Halfway up he wrapped his legs about the trunk and bent back and shot arrows at the orcs from this inexplicable position.

Julie lay dead on the ground. Her protection spell miscast. Her companions now three in number ran and fought toward the edges of the camp.

The man whose body had fallen into a campfire when the arrow barrage had first begun consumed in flames now. Black smoke from his clothes and the smell of burnt flesh rising.

The father fired his crossbow into the chest of an oncoming orc warrior and the warrior kept coming and the father dropped the crossbow and picked up the sword of a fallen caravan hand and he fought with the orc, his wife and his sons huddled by a tree.

A refugee when cornered turned and dropped to his knees before the orc warrior charging him and begged and the warrior lopped off his head in a single stroke of his weapon.

Another orc warrior caught a fleeing merchant and pushed him to the ground and hacked away at his body in a frenzied rage fueled by the memory of a grievous transgression that neither the merchant nor any of the travelers would ever know.

* * * * *​

Heike's hands soaked in blood. It was fresh. She could drink it. Stave off the thirst. But it was too risky; what if her body rejected the orcish blood? It might. And she'd be left gagging and retching, vulnerable. She would have to endure.

Uruk looked at her, and she at him. It was all too familiar, her ordained lot in "life." That face of Uruk's one she had seen many times before, a near unanimous reaction to her appearance in full. During the journey she had kept her claws hidden under her cloak, eyes and skin under its hood. And now that veil was gone.

She didn't expect that face from an orc. She didn't know what she expected but she knew it wasn't that but there it was regardless. It might well be she would have to abandon the caravan with Ella--if there still was a caravan after this.

The moment passed. Uruk hurried to his fellows.

And a warcry. Growing louder. Behind her.

An orc warrior charged and swung a huge maul at her and she jerked back and he swung again with a surprising command of momentum and hit her square in her right arm and the force smacked her hard to the forest floor. Her bones should have broken. They didn't. The warrior raised the maul for an overhead swing and Heike bolted up and inside the strike and tore into the orc's inner thighs with her claws and with exerted speed and strength. Blood squirted in bright red jets from ripped arteries in both his legs and stained Heike's coat and the warrior howled and he dropped his weapon and his legs gave out and Heike stepped away.

A loud thumping. And there coming down the uphill slope beside the wagon line was a mountain troll clad in crude armor and running alongside its orcish beastmaster. The merchant at the head of the wagon line jumped onto the driver's platform of the wagon and feverishly snapped the reins. The wagon made it a few meters forward. The troll slammed into the wagon and heaved it over horse and all onto its side, wares and supplies spilling to the patchy snow and dirt. Refugees near the wagon ran back the way they had come, back into the melee in the camp. And the troll stamped its feet and roared and the beastmaster bid it to the next wagon.

"Ella."

No choice. Her word given, and Heike was thus bound. There was no sacrifice too great in the service of honoring her promise. She would fight to the utmost, damn the unholy thirst such would bring.

She sprinted. Twice as fast as a human. More. An arrow flying toward her. A dodge so quick it stood within reason for an outside observer that no dodge had even occurred. The thirst tangibly grasping at her throat.

The troll was poised to flip over now the third wagon in the line when Heike jumped up and springboarded off of the last wagon in the line and sailed far and caught onto the creature's back and clung fiercely.

 

[Olezka]

Leaving Morozgorod was supposed to be a good thing.

The longer Olezka stayed away from his home town the more he realized how messed up it was. Sympathy to dragons who razed villages, an anti-human rhetoric, and an overall intense xenophobia were consistent in his childhood. Maybe outside of his fucked up cult family, things would be nicer.



But no.



There had to be an orc attack.

Olezka had never seen an orc before. They were not quite as ugly as he had heard; He was expecting something much more grotesque and gnarled — A title that belonged to the troll that appeared with a thunderous crash.



He had been keeping himself busy with firing arrows and keeping his distance, ducking behind a tree as he spit tiny fireballs onto the sleek black arrowheads and fired them off. He now had a much larger threat to face coupled with the orcs running amok. Someone had launched onto the troll’s back like a tick, something that Olezka found both admirable and stupid. The woman on its back seemed to be one of the few warriors making a dent in the onslaught. He had to help.



Olezka pulled an arrow back, coughing a flame onto the end of the shaft, near the arrow tip. His arrow began to alight, but he didn’t fear the flame as it grew larger and fed on the fabric wrapped about the shaft. He aimed and fired at the large troll, hoping to hit between the eyes — but with how it squirmed about, he’d be thankful to hit it anywhere on the face.

 

[Fain]

He came in from the tree line with the tide of good orcish bodies, ready to bury the weak beneath the avalanche of their onslaught.

Wearing only hide trousers and deerskin shoes, Khurash sprinted forward, tomahawk and long knife bouncing on either hip, firing his bow as he ran.

A warrior charged him, wielding only an axe.

The bow wood limbs shuddered and an arrow caught the warrior in the chest and sent him to the dirt. Khurash sped past him, checked a dwarf in the face with his bow, then shot him too as he stumbled back.

So, there were more than humans in this caravan. Even as the realization struck he saw a Komodi set an arrow on fire with his breath and shoot it at the troll, enraging it.

He did not yet have a Komodi head.

Khurash ran at the lizardman, wielding his bow like a club in two hands and bellowing a war cry.

 

[Olezka]

The war cry caught Olezka's attention, his ears pricking as he took his eyes off the troll he had surely pissed off.

Olezka had shot down charging bears before. He had slain rampaging elk and moose. He had killed humans who wished to harm he or his family. Olezka had never truly seen an orc before until this day, and the sight of this one tearing through the crowd to get to him specifically was enough to have the hair on the back of his neck stand up and make him curl his lips back to bare his teeth.

He glanced over his shoulder to make sure no one was sneaking behind him, backing up as the orc barreled his way. He shot an arrow, then a second one, while there was still space between them.

Olezka had fought bears. He had fought people. Yet he from how he saw the orcs behead, smash, and tear apart the humans, this wasn't something he was sure he was truly prepared for. Olezka grabbed the sword on his hip, retiring his bow for the moment.

 

[Fain]

One arrow hissed past Khurash’s painted face like an angry wasp, the other struck him in the side, glanced off a rib, and then hung there in his flesh like a tumorous growth.

Khurash did not even feel it. He could only feel the pounding of battle blood in his head like mighty drums as war joy gripped him in a furor.

Wielding the bow in two hands he brought it down in an overhand blow bound for the Komodi’s skull.

 

[Olezka]

When wild animals were struck with arrows, they often ran. Very rarely did they continue their charge; Those were the ones not to be messed with, the ones that were so frenzied in bloodlust their own safety went out the window. Olezka's hackles stood on end as he was charged, the orc bringing down his bow with a tremendous amount of force -- To the point that Olezka felt a hint of a breeze from it when he ducked low and out of the way. Sword drawn, struck at the orc's side as he passed and put a few yards between them. Not far enough for the orc to shoot at him, but not close enough for the orc to hit him with the bow.

Olezka had seen when people tried to reason with the orcs, or beg for mercy. There was no getting out of this safely. His mind went to the notion of setting the orc on fire, which was unpleasant but a necessary evil. His fire breath was a nightmare to deal with, leaving his throat dried, raw, and bleeding. Speaking would be a difficult task for a day or two. Breathing would be painful.

But, it was better than being dead.

Fuck it.

Olezka felt the familiar bubbling in his upper chest, expanding and volatile. He opened his mouth a crack, a thin smoke snaking from his nostrils and between his lips.

 

[Uruk Brightsmile]

Uruk stepped over corpses as he ran to meet Mergo. Among the fallen were unarmed refugees, merchants, and nearly a dozen other sellswords. Despite their differences they all shared the same fate: a snow covered grave.

Uruk caught sight of a man struggling to combat an attacker. The man was the only thing between the savage and a woman with her sons. Uruk charged the orc and buried his blade into the attacker's flank. He could feel the sword break skin, then muscle. They tumbled to the ground. The savage howled in pain. Uruk twisted his blade and yanked it free. Blood sprayed over the immediate, a fountain of gore that painted the snow a dark red.

The man looked at Uruk. His breathing was heavy, he was wide-eyed and trembling. He had just been battling an orc only to be saved by another. Uruk had no time. He barked at the man, "What are you doing? Run!" and continued his course.

Mergo's Milita had taken this contract with forty blades. When Uruk regrouped with his fellows he realized that a little more than half remained. Khaz had two arrows sticking out of his thigh. Helv's face was covered with cuts. She had deep slash across her torso that split her armor, but thankfully not her skin. Pillar was nowhere to be found.

Uruk and the rest of his company formed a loose circle. They hacked away at the wave of savages. One attacker cleaved away Uruk's left pauldron and left a gash along his arm, an arrow streaked past and caught a fellow sellsword in the breast, Mergo was slashing wildly, his face slick with blood- was there no end to this?

The earth shook. The sound of tree-limbs snapping was accompanied by a bellowing roar. A hulking mountain troll came crashing through the treeline with a gnarled log in hand.

Great, they have a mountain troll.

The beastmaster cracked his whip. Promptly the troll rammed itself into a wagon, sending its driver and contents soaring. Crack. A second wagon was shattered. Crack. The troll poised itself to charge a third- There was a flash of movement. A shade cut through the snow. And there she was again.

The pale woman was clinging to the back of the beast. It was the craziest thing Uruk had ever seen.

He knew he had to help.

Uruk pointed to the troll, "Fire! Hit it with fire!" He yelled as he broke from the formation.

The troll was now swinging wildly. An enormous hand reached overhead, as if it were trying to scratch a spot between its shoulder blades. The other hand that held the log swung carelessly. Several orcs were caught in the log's path, crushing bone and scattering them.

Uruk had his eyes set on the beastmaster. The savage was bare chested and covered in bright tribal paint. While dancing from side to side the beastmaster cracked his whip. He was making it difficult for Uruk to close the gap between them.

Four mercenaries had followed Uruk. Two sellswords were providing cover for a pair of evocators with daggers in hand. Both had their eyes closed. If they were to be effective, they had to block out the chaos that surrounded them.

Time was running out. If they couldn't take down this troll all hope was truly lost.

 

[Naghi]

Who the fuck was attacking them?

How in the fuck had they gotten here?

Those were the too primary questions Kellen asked himself as he stepped back into the clearing only to be greeted by the sight of a troll flipping over a cart. The heavy wood slammed into a nearby tree, sending half a dozen splinters soaring towards him.

He ducked, still feeling one of the pieces of wood embedding itself in his side.

Before he moved he saw half a dozen warriors all heading towards the Troll. He checked the creature off mentally, deciding that he would leave it to the real soldiers here.

A curse escaped him, and he quickly drew himself up behind the thick bark of a tree. His head poked out, searching quickly for any sign of a leader. He knew precious little about orcs, most of the time they didn't pass through the Reach.

He assumed they had to have some sort of command structure.

A warchief or something.

His gaze swept over the barbarians still cutting their way through the convoy, most of them occupied by one warrior or another. Then he found him, an orc with more...unique armor. Flakes of red and paint of black on his face.

"Good as any." Kellen said to himself as he crept forward.

 

[Fain]

Around them, the skirmish intensified and the damp, foggy air rang with the shriek of tortured metal striking metal and the screams of the injured.

Yet, Khurash had the warrior’s focus, honed in upon the Komodi like a wolf catching the scent of prey.

Behind the Komodi, Khurash caught the flash of fur and he let out a laugh. The warg pack came.

But not soon enough, for the Komodi opened his maw. Khurash’s eyes widened, laugh cut short as he remembered the Komodi in the arena. Without hesitation he hurled his bow at the lizardman’s face, then dove for the dirt, where several fresh corpses lay atop the strewn pine needles.

 

[Olezka]

Olezka didn't predict a bow being thrown at his face. The heavy blow gave him a thwack on the forehead right as he opened his mouth, knocking his head back and shooting a cone of brilliant fire into the sky that lit up the battlefield with a vibrant orange glow. He lowered his head, body quivering from the effort as he rotated his head left, then right, then left again. He couldn't tell if he hit the orc but he had incinerated the surrounding brush that was tall enough to be set ablaze. The heavy snow was the only thing that kept the inferno from igniting the rest of the forest, melting and evaporating in dense clouds of fog. A nearby tree was caught in the blaze, it's trunk weakening as it threatened to topple over.

The orc had thrown himself down, somehow predicting Olezka's desperate attack. Olezka shut his mouth with a clack of his teeth, seeing this as an opportunity to escape. Adrenaline kept him from feeling the aching rawness in his throat, and he simply coughed out a plume out black smoke. He turned tail to run, now met with the warg pack approaching. Fuck.

The half-zmei darted away from the incoming pack and closer towards the chaos of the troll, glancing back only once to see if the orc had chosen to follow him.

 

[Heike Eisen]

The dwindling vestiges of resistance. They who would fall too.

Mergo now with his fighting force decimated, those who still lived with him struggling to find footing on ground that was not host to the bodies of their slain fellows.

A man in black who spoke very little of himself throughout the journey with the travelers now surrounded by orcs seeking a foe. He took from his pocket an orange crystal the size of his palm, one end rounded and one end sharpened, and within it a muted light swirling. He said something to himself and then plunged the crystal into his heart as one of the warriors stepped forward and the man in black's body exploded into an arcane fireball killing or maiming his assailants. There with his death the end of the mission that none save him among the caravan knew anything about, objective incomplete.

The hunter in the tree at last had his luck run dry and an orcish arrow found him and his legs loosened and his body plummeted to the ground.

A surreal sight: A woman with wild red hair on her knees in the near middle of all the terrible chaos, thus far untouched and undisturbed, hands clasped before her and eyes closed and there she recited a prayer to a pantheon of gods unknown.

The group of three adventurers, against all odds, having fought their past the warriors in their way and running into the expanse of the snowy forest before them. They didn't make it far. Wargs from the pack pursued and pounced and they were separated from Morris and Julie's fate by a small matter of minutes.

An orc warrior blessed to have the opportunity to fight two foes at once, rare as it was now in the course of the attack for a warrior to engage even in single combat. Two caravan hands by the wagon line. In a single strike that surely resounded throughout the hallowed lands of the afterlife and brought immeasurable pride to his observing ancestors the orc warrior cleaved the head and arm off one of the men and then cleanly cut the other in half at the waist. And he bellowed his triumph to the skies above.

A merchant, crazed, leaped from out of his tent in which he was hidding and grabbed Kellen by his shirt like a manic beggar and said, "By the gods, man, help me! Coin! Coin! All you could ever want!"

Another merchant, James "Shiny" Stonegarte, hastily unbuckling the horse from the second-to-last wagon. He succeeded. And an orcish arrow penetrated the horse's skull and the animal fell dead and Stonegarte turned around and the orc who had loosed the arrow but a few paces from him. The warrior dropped his bow and hacked into Stonegarte's chest with his hatchet and left him for dead. The man Stonegarte was and the man he wished to be and his hopes and his dreams and all he ever felt leaked from his wounds and left the snow and the dirt a solemn red.

Newly emerged from the fog an orcish shaman. Old and yet still physically powerful. He walked slowly and the ornaments on his staff dangled. He sighted the mercenary captain and chanted and called upon the elements and his bid of magic was so answered in moments. A lightning bolt arced down from the sky and struck Captain Mergo dead on the spot, his body blackened and charred and steaming, collapsing without further ceremony. And the shaman plodded forward as if nothing had happened at all.

* * * * *​

Heike raked one clawed hand across the troll's back and found purchase again and raked with her other hand and did this several times. Through all its shaggy fur it was difficult to discern how deep she was cutting, but she saw and felt the blood.

Her body flailed about as the troll thrashed. The thrashing made even worse when a flaming arrow struck the creature in its face. A low, rumbling roar. The arrow seemed hardly to affect the creature, but the flame, the flame stirred within the troll a primal panic. It swatted at its own face with reckless and lumbering strikes to rid itself of the fire.

Heike kept digging into its back. Claws searching through fur and flesh and sheer bulk of its bristling muscles for its spine.

The beastmaster held up the tribal fetish in his offhand and the fetish glowed with a soothing aura and the flame on the troll was extinguished. And the beastmaster cracked the whip in his other hand.

The troll now refocused. Reinvigorated. It reached back and its hand managed to find both of Heike's legs and it tore her away and slammed her down literally through the third wagon in the line. A great clattering as wares and supplies were either crushed or knocked away both near and far by the impact and the wood of the wagonbed shattered and the wagon was split in two and the two halves fell unevenly to the ground.

Heike lay there. Lay there shivering from the quaking drumbeat of pain throughout her body. She heard distantly the orc Uruk yelling, "Fire! Hit it with fire!"

Her bones should have broken. But they did not. And now her throat felt like a desert and her arms weak and her legs weak and a blackness creeping in through the edges of her eyes. She felt an oozing of blood on her back and the seeping of it into her shirt. She needed to feed. Now.

The troll stepped past the wreckage of the third wagon, the keen beastmaster bidding it to target the evokers concentrating and preparing their magic. They must have thought her dead.

She twisted her body around with great effort and crawled on her stomach out from the wreck and past the corpse of the horse once tied to the fourth wagon. There. A body. A human body, dead by the fourth wagon. Heike crawled with a small burst of renewed vigor under the fourth wagon and reached out and pulled the body under the wagon alongside her.

James "Shiny" Stonegarte. She had heard him around camp in all the nights previous. A jolly man, if ever there was one. Unmarried. No children. Lived a carefree and charmed life all up until this point, this ordained end.

"I'm sorry, James. Forgive me."

And Heike lowered her mask and sank her fangs into his neck. His heart was no longer beating so she had to work to siphon the blood and her body shuddered with delight as she tasted the first drops. A thing most terrible and most euphoric, sinful and joyous. The shame and the pleasure.

She drank. Drank as the bedlam continued about the camp.

A gasp. At once quiet and thunderous.

Heike looked up. Saw then that from under the fifth and final wagon in the wagon line, Ella was peeking from beneath the traveling cloak.

Watching her feed on James with eyes that were shocked and betrayed without truly knowing why.

 

[Olezka]

Olezka cursed repeatedly under his breath as he hopped over the bodies and logs of splintered trees. He wanted to get far away from those wargs, from that blood-crazed orc, and come up with a battle plan. The near destroyed wagon line was a good place to start, but Olezka would have to be careful not to get too close.

He saw a woman ... crying? Into a dead man’s neck. He almost paid it no mind until she looked up and he spied the blood around her mouth.

Humans are fucking crazy, was somehow all he thought before he turned his attention to the beastmaster. He was well armored, but distracted by his troll. If he was to kill the beastmaster, maybe the troll would be stunned long enough to be killed.

Or it would go into a frenzy.

There were truly no good options. Olezka grabbed an arrow, coughing a painful fireball onto the cloth covered shaft. His throat ached and he tasted copper on his tongue, but now was not the time. He fired once, aiming yet again for the face, immediately following with a second arrow.

 

[Uruk Brightsmile]

The evokers unleashed their magic just in time. Their guardians were overrun as a gang of savages crashed against their shields. Flames streamed for their palms and crashed against the mountain troll's chest. The fire took to the troll's shaggy hair. In a primal frenzy the troll began to swing wildly. At this point the beastmaster tried to calm his charge. He waved the fetish in his offhand. He chanted several commands. Nothing. With the beastmaster distracted Uruk unleashed several, heavy strikes on the beastmaster. A final strike sent the savage's head rolling into a pile of scattered pine needles.

Flames quickly engulfed the mountain troll. With the same ferocity that the troll used to charge the wagons did it now charge through the battle. Orcs were caught in its path and were cast aside like rag dolls. The evokers now turned their focus on the small contingent that had cut down their protectors. The evokers unleashed another stream of flames. The orcs were repelled back, scrambling for cover, as the flames engulfed them too.

In that moment Uruk felt a sense of hope. And then he heard the crash of lightening and feral snarls.

 

[Naghi]

Finally. The thought struck him like a tone of brick as he felt a ripple of power wash over the battlefield.

A bright flash of lightning lanced through the trees, a burst of power and energy that rippled the air and left a man dead. A thunderous clap followed the sound, and then the sounds of battle once again collapsed in on them all.

Kellen was left staring, a smile touching his face.

He would have mourned the man, but all he could now think about was the fact that he'd finally found a way to be useful.

The Shaman wobbled forward, his old form protected by magics and guards. Kellen moved quickly after him, his boots pressing the mud as he reached out. His power would begin to ebb, tugged and pulled away, ripped from the very elements that he'd sought.

Kellen could feel the power rush through him, his muscles sparking, his heart thundering in his chest as he pulled himself up.

Fingers tightened, and then he lashed out.

An arc of electricity sprang from his hand, lancing towards and Orc and sending him falling to the ground.

 

[Heike Eisen]

The camp fallen. The last fighters of the caravan pitiful in number, and those who could not fight either fleeing into the wilderness and the fog or dead on the ground.

A valiant hunter stood his ground in the camp and loosed arrow after arrow, covering the escape of a small group of refugees and merchants, hitting orc after orc. The most important arrows loosed in all his life, his final act upon Arethil. His sacrifice complete as an orcish arrow found his hiding spot and pinned his head to the side of a tree.

An orc warrior, assured of the victory over the humans, rummaging through the supplies of the toppled first wagon.

The burning troll. Collapsing to a flaming heap in the center of the camp without the aid of its beastmaster's magic. A flaming arrow sticking out of its right eye.

An old orc warrior, approaching the praying woman with the wild red hair. He shoved two of his fellow warriors away from her. He said the name of a god to her. And she opened her eyes and looked up and in perfect Orcish spoke to the old warrior. And they conversed of the old ways as the slaughter continued around them, strangely apart from it.

Kellen's lance of lightning dropping a warrior, earning him the attention of the others around the shaman. And the shaman looked with a gaze almost aloof and called upon the very earth to grasp at Kellen's feet, hands of dirt reaching.

Three men, one woman, and a dwarf all that still lived of Mergo's mercenaries. They were outnumbered four to one, yet the orcs around them did not attack all at once. Each eagerly awaited a chance at one-on-one combat. A peculiar and spontaneous honoring of the ways of the noble warrior.

And in all directions from the camp noncombatants fled. Some of the orcish war party pursued, loosing arrows as they did. The unluckiest among they who fled had garnered the attention of wargs.

* * * * *​

Heike didn't finish. Didn't get her fill. She raised her head up and a trickle of blood from the side of her mouth ran down her chin. Her heart beating again in the wake of feeding. Yet in that frozen moment it felt a shallow imitation of Ella's own, a dead thing pretending at life.

Heike crawled in a feverish haste from her wagon and over to Ella's wagon. She grabbed the traveling cloak and pulled it aside and with great care with her clawed fingers made Ella look up at her. The child's eyes glassed with a latent fear.

"Ella."

A trembling whisper. "Why were you doing that?"

"Ella. We're leaving now."

"Why were you doing that?"

"We'll have to run fast. I'll carry you."

"James was a nice man."

A rumble in the ground as the troll collapsed.

"We have to go now."

"Heike."

"Yes?"

"There's blood around your mouth."

Heike had stared down monsters and murderers alike. Fought the most abhorrent and horrid among them as a knight and hunted the most cruel and callous among them as a vigilante. But they had not the power to crush her spirit. Not like this.

Heike wiped her mouth with the sleeve of her coat. Again. Still it felt as if it were there.

"Ella. Do you trust me?"

She didn't answer. Scattered screams as people fleeing the camp were cut down.

"Ella. Do you trust me?"

"I-I don't know."

An orc warrior nearby. The chunk of an axe digging into flesh. And the horse of the fifth wagon fell down and the wagon rocked.

No more time. Heike crawled out from under the wagon and didn't ask to take Ella's hand; her claws enormous when compared to the child's tiny fingers. Heike stood and picked Ella right up and took great pains to be cognizant of her claws while she held her.

One last survey of the camp. Uruk and Helv and Pillar there. Refugees fleeing wargs. A Komodi, she believed they were called, with a bow. A man whose name she may have heard shooting lightning from his hand and attacking an old orc in strange garb. The last of Mergo's mercenaries fighting and dying.

She could help none of them. Not without endangering Ella.

And Heike ran. Going uphill to the crest of the ridge as an orc warrior bellowed behind her and an arrow hit the ground in front of her. Behind her. At her feet.

 

[Heike Eisen]

Heike ran. She ran with the child in her arms and crested the ridge and her boots pounded through a patch of snow and another arrow slammed into the pine tree she'd only just passed. Shouts in the savage orcish tongue behind her. A glance hazarded back. Still they pursued, three, four, now five of them, orcs from the war party all with their massive bows drawn.

She did not know if any others from camp made it out. In what direction they were going if they did and if they too were being chased. She knew only that while some of the orcish war party had been slain they still possessed an overwhelming force. She could not stop. She could not dare to stop even to lay Ella down and to try to dispatch those five orcs pursuing them. To do so would only invite more of their party to come and fight her. And there she would eventually be overcome.

No. The best thing she could do for Ella was to run. To run and weave between the tall and impassive pines and keep running until the orcs grew tired and gave up the chase.

So she ran.

And ran.

And ran until she felt a harsh tug and impact in her back as if she'd be struck by a truncheon. She staggered to her right, but kept running. She'd been hit, she knew it. But she would have to sleep for her body to heal itself.

Ella whimpered. Sobbed weakly.

Heike ran. Spoke to her without looking down, "We're getting there. Alliria's a long way away, but we're getting there, I promise."

"Heike..." Something wrong with her voice.

"I know, Ella. I know you're scared."

"Heike...please."

Heike took her eyes from the pines and the snow and the fog and looked down. The large arrow had pierced through her own back and out from her chest and into Ella, impaling them both. No exit wound. The arrowhead was embedded in the girl, and blood soaked her clothes.

Ella's eyes. Wide and frightened. Heike hid her own alarm. Steeled herself and shoved her fear back down into the bubbling pit in her stomach.

The orcs shouting behind them. Another arrow passing just over Heike's left shoulder and rustling a bush where it landed.

"We can't stop," Heike said. "I know it hurts but we can't stop. Not yet. Stay with me. Everything's going to be okay. Keep talking to me."

"Heike...I can't...I can't feel..."

Heike stumbled over a small fallen tree and only just caught her balance and had to adjust Ella in her arms to secure her again and the girl shrieked in pain and cried.

"As soon as we can stop," Heike said as she ran. "As soon as we can stop I'll take the arrow out. Okay? I'll find you a healer or someone who can help. Okay?"

The girl's voice a faint, shivering whimper. "Okay...I trust you...Heike..."

The orcs bellowing out their battlecries, still doggedly behind them. Another volley of arrows landing about Heike. Missing only by the grace of luck.

"Your uncle is going to be happy to see you, Ella."

The girl didn't say anything.

"Ella. Talk to me. Keep talking to me."

The girl didn't say anything.

"Ella. Ella!"

The girl looked at nothing.