Private Tales Something Amiss

[Kaska]

"Hmph," she huffed, mulling over his words.

She didn't know how much of that she believed. The safe bet would be to believe none and just get them there. She didn't have to arrive on any good terms with them. But something told her it wouldn't be wise to foster any bad tension now. She would be their first impression on how they would be treated when arriving, and she had a seeping suspicion Lia would give her a disapproving look for weeks if she was the cause of things going south on the field.

"I even cut off his arm," she exaggerated, unable to help the edging pride in her voice. "Well. Lia and I did."

She had taken the brunt of the pain for it to happen, so damn right she was laying claim to the success.

"It was my plan. And fetching you was too. We're not incompetent, we just need numbers we don't have. There's over fifty of them," she finally told him, going out on a limb to trust he wouldn't change plans with that reveal.

 

[Saul Talith]

Fifty? He frowned for a brief second. Were they all undead?

That would make things a tad easier, not all of them had holy weapons, but there were other ways to deal with the undead. Though she had also mentioned bandits. Lips thinned for a brief second, and he considered where their numbers would stand in a weeks time when the Lich raised even more.

They would be well outnumbered. "The Rangers have more people than us."

Saul commented dryly.

Though they were not as numerous as they once were, the number of Rangers still stood well into the thousands. Broken Sword had at last count a little under three hundred.

Why not get more Rangers instead?

 

[Kaska]

"Yeah, but you have holy weapons," she dismissed, hoping to the gods she didn't believe in that that was true enough for him not to pry further. Because she absolutely couldn't deal with telling him she suspected corruption inside the ranks.

It felt like borderline betrayal to her people. The power moves that could be made with that knowledge...

"Besides. Alliria is mostly composed of recruits. Our experiences numbers sit elsewhere, I couldn't have the ones on city duty deal with your messes," she bluffed.

"You were the best bet," she admitted matter of fact, no shame to her voice.

 

[Saul Talith]

"Not all of us." He mused quietly to himself. Some might have considered that a secret, but Saul didn't. The crafting of Holy Weapons was somewhat of a lost art. Berrick had managed to make one before, but only after reforging another.

Mixing the metal, the spells that went into it, the creation of weapons that could not only slay but outright destroy true undead was difficult now.

Of course, he knew that she wasn't telling the whole truth. There were Ranger Outposts other than Alliria that she could have reached within a week, certainly ones that could have provided her with more than thirty troops. There was something else going on here.

Though what he wasn't sure.

"There's other ways to kill a Lich." He wouldn't expect her to know such a thing. "Magic, holy water, dismembering it would work as well. Though only if the head loses sight of the body."

 

[Kaska]

Kaska sat up, turning to glance at him with no small amount of shock. "Seriously? That's all it takes? Removing the head from the body's sight?"

She threw up her hands, frustrated.

"It took us a week to learn about the holy weapons. And never mind how little we actually managed to find-- if all we've had to do is chop it's head off-" She made a frustrated noise, hitting at the boat railing.

She turned to face him, pulling her leg up and sitting cross-legged. "What else is there to know about them? How can you stop their magic from-" she made vague motions of being fried by pain.

 

[Saul Talith]

"Well you have to bury the head after." It sounded like he almost could have been telling a joke, but of course Saul was deadly serious. "It's still alive."

Technically speaking anyway.

Some Liches could do magic while speaking, but if you gagged it they couldn't even really do that. That method was far from the preferred of course, the best way was to either undo the magic that brought the Lich into the world in the first place or to execute it with a holy weapon.

Much safer. "It depends on the Lich, and the magic it uses."

The Templar explained.

"Some draw upon the Chaos of the universe, others Blood, and some simply the elements." He shrugged. "It is doubtful you could learn to stop it, best to remain out of their sight."

Anti-magic could prevent some of a Liches power, but teaching her that would take years. If she even had the potential.

 

[Kaska]

Kaska shook her head grimly. "That's not possible. We've had to enter it's sight to do anything to it, it always immobilizes me and-" she paused, grimacing. She shook her head, dismissing it.

"Someone has to be sacrificed to it. Unless this one can deal with us all..." An idea they hadn't had a chance to prune out. Lia had snuck up on him before. It was necessary.

"There's no way to stop his magic from touching me?" She asked again, uneasy.

 

[Saul Talith]

He shrugged. "Not unless you turn back the Wheel of Time and join the Templars about ten years ago."

Not to mention held a gift for Anti-magic in the first place.

The latter was of course extremely unlikely and the former entirely impossible. Still, he didn't want to take away all of her hope. The Lich wasn't going to be that much of a problem, especially if it was only going to be one. As long as they managed to kill him, any undead he raised wouldn't linger.

"Don't worry about it." He told her. "Just stay out of it's sight and let me handle it."

That was why they were here, wasn't it? "It will die fast enough."

 

[Kaska]

Kaska snorted, knowing there was no way in hell that was going to happen. She withheld that comment though. It was best to not give him time to try and stop her.

"We can't kill him until we learn who his master is, though. It's very important we know. Can you promise me that?" She asked, nonetheless serious as she changed topics.

 

[Saul Talith]

Ah so another piece of information came trickling out. Perhaps he was better than Valerie at this sort of thing. Politics had never really been his game, but apparently just talking...just talking he could do just fine.

Saul made a small mental note. "Interrogating a Lich is all but impossible."

The Commander responded quietly. Torturing a Lich was like trying to torture a rock. One could sort of do it with Anti-magic, but the undeads tolerance for pain and...well everything was the envy of even the toughest human being. It would be all but impossible to get information out of the thing.

They would have to trick it, or fail that just see if it would answer honestly.

"There is a possibility it resents it's master." He rolled his shoulders. "In which case it might just tell us as it dies."

Though that was a longshot. "Whoever raised it was powerful though. Would have to be."

 

[Kaska]

Or perhaps we was slowly feeding him trickles of information to test his character, little glances being casted at him periodically when she felt he wasn't looking.

"Let us pray for that then," she sighed, nodding a hello at the ranger Lia had tasked to accompany her. He sat down besides her, silent yet present ... in case she needed help in dealing with this Templar.

Both sides thought poorly of each other. She rubbed at her face, going for her pack.

"Is that all your questions?" She asked, a touch pointedly.

 

[Saul Talith]

"Not really." Saul stated plainly.

There were always questions. More qualities of the Lich, more things to know about the Fortress, the state of his army, how they had even learned of the damned thing. There were so many things that he didn't know as of yet, so many things he needed to find out.

But he knew Kaska wouldn't give them to him.

Perhaps that would change over the next few days, he'd already accomplished quite a bit tonight. He thought that Valerie would have been proud of him, though it was a tough call with her.

Ana would have been. "We'll talk more tomorrow."

The Templar Commander said with a heavy shrug, flashing the two Rangers a smile before he turned and headed back towards Leane.

 

[Kaska]

"I'm sure we will," she sighed, glancing sideways at her ranger. "We will train during the hour stops, so piss fast and eat on the ship," she told him, rubbing her face retreating grumpily into her thought.

And that was exactly what they did the next day, departing from the shore on the pretense of relieving themselves. They did so, but then Kaska drove them hard into a practice, her arm screaming in protest as decapitation moves were practiced time and time again, the girl focusing on accuracy among all else.

She would only have one chance to do this, she was sure.

 

[Saul Talith]

The Templar were about as impassive as could be on the journey, something that Saul had of course ordered them to be.

He didn't want tensions flaring up, he didn't want his men flouting themselves in the face of the Rangers. The Commander made sure to keep things quiet, made sure to keep everyone on an even keel. The Lich was what mattered, not some sort of inter-order rivalry.

The past was done with, best to leave it be. "We're getting close."

The words came on the fifth day of their journey. They were on the Sayve now, traveling against the current and slowing their progress just a bit. Saul didn't mind it, he'd taken the opportunity to go fishing.

Something he didn't get to do often.

"The Lich." Saul said as he stepped up behind Kaska. "What does he look like?"

 

[Kaska]

Kaska was more open to talking now. The closer they got, the more anxious she grew. Anything could have happened in these two weeks, and her imagination was not kind when she began to fuss out different possibilities. Her sleep got worse. And most embarrassingly, there were some nights were her dreams had woken more than just her up.

None of that matter though. Just getting there, that's all she thought about. Not finding the bodies of the other ten broken and left behind. That was her top priority.


She didn't turn around, or even tense. Strangely, she was growing use to the Templars. Use to, but not trusting. That would just be stupid.

"Um... Half dead? His face nearly rotting away..." She swallowed hard. "Armor.... crown on his head. S'missing an arm now. Hell my sword might still be buried in his chest," she mused, if just to brighten herself.

 

[Saul Talith]

Saul's eyes narrowed for a second. "Crown?"

There was suspicion in his tone. A crown was not a typical thing for a Lich. They thought highly of themselves, all of them did without fail, but a crown? That was a bit of an oddity.

"What sort of crown?" The Templar walked forward and grasped the railing, leaning forward and watching the shore as it slowly slipped by.

His mind began to run with half a dozen different theories, ideas of what could be laying ahead of them, or rather who. A lich with a crown...fingers tightened slightly, legends spooling through his mind.

 

[Kaska]

She frowned, trying to bringing it to mind. "I-.. I don't know. I was too busy dealing with his magic to look. Bones, maybe? Why? Does it mean anything?"

She turn to him, her attention sharpening as she hoped this lead for an opening-- another plan of action-- some weakness. Anything.

"His eyes are blue?" She offered, trying to tip the scales to help.

 

[Saul Talith]

He frowned slightly, and then suddenly cracked a smile as she added the detail of the Lich's eyes. It wasn't something he really ever paid any attention to...the color of his enemies eyes. It seemed an odd thing to notice, especially if you didn't even take in his crown.

Saul's head shook slightly. "A Lich, in typical terms, was once a powerful sorcerer."

That was of course common knowledge.

"You don't have to be a Sorcerer to come back from the dead, you can be a warrior or something of the sort, but a Lich specifically is a sorcerer." He wondered if Rangers knew or even cared about that distinction. "There are few who would wear a crown."

From what he knew anyway. "Fewer still who made their home in the Reach."

 

[Kaska]

She remembered his eyes. She remembered them all too well. That and his mouth, open and laughing. Those were the two details she could describe to complete accuracy. Though she would never say why.

"Are you talking about a king? An old, magical, king?" Her mouth fell open, her mind already tearing through chapters of learn history, trying to find a man that matched the part.

As it was, her father did not focus her studies on frivolous details. Which to a degree, this was.

"Do you know one?" She asked, her voice edgy.

 

[Saul Talith]

"Or warlord who fancied himself one." Saul mused.

Templar, unlike Rangers it seemed, were taught the history of the area they lived in. It was an important thing to learn when you dealt with the undead, and not just because any day something could crop up and become a massive pain in the ass. There were some very real practical applications.

"The Reach had plenty." Before Alliria managed to wrangle an army powerful enough to systematically wipe them all off the face of the earth. He would have thought that even the Rangers remembered that, given the fact that they helped so much with it. "It could be one of them."

He mused. "I would have to see the crown."

 

[Kaska]

Kaska pursed her lips, trying hard to pull something forward. "...Bone?" She offered, no confidence in her tone.

"I'm sorry, like I said. It's jewelry wasn't something I was really focused on in the moment. His magic is a bitch," she finally warned, touching on the topic for the first time.

"You really need to avoid it. There's no functioning once it's on your body," she told her, her tone serious.

 

[Saul Talith]

The Templar Commander waved dismissively, clearly not concerned about the Lich and his magic. His stance shifted slightly, lips thinning as she leaned forward on the railing. "It won't work on me."

Some of the others it would, but not him.

From what Kaska had already described he knew that the Lich's magic was very likely not elemental in nature, nor blood magic. It was likely the more standard fare. Dark Magic was one thing he'd encountered half a dozen times already, and he knew well that his own abilities could counter it.

Even stop it.

"Though." He mused for a second. "If it is who I think he might not even try."

 

[Kaska]

Won't work on him? What kinda bullshit was that? She had heard this Templar chapter had some sort of secret weapon against magic different from all the rest, but since chapter knowledge didn't often creep its way outside the chapter ... the finer details were a mystery.

Before she had a chance to ask what exactly he did to make that occur, he spoke again.

"Wait. You have a name? Give it."

 

[Saul Talith]

"It is a theory." Saul said simply, not entirely sure that he was even correct. He needed more information, at least to see the Lich for himself.

His fingers drummed on the railing in front of him.

"I can't be sure." The Commander was weary of giving her information that might very well turn out to be wrong. "Not until I see him."

The fact that he was a man was a clue, the armor and the crown two more. The last was that he had specifically fought Rangers. There was a possibility, but it was slim.

Very much so.

 

[Kaska]

She straightened besides him, turning head on. "Well there's a lot I wasn't sure on that I told you. This is important, you shouldn't keep it to yourself, my men are already out there holding down the fort. If there's anything you know that could help them-" She threatened, her nostrils flaring at her threat.