Private Tales Something Amiss

[Lia]

"I will not retain it." Lia said simply, again not sounding embarrassed at all but seeming somewhat more hesitant to continue.

She had never really felt bad about her lack of understanding in these things, mostly because she knew that she was good at other things. Not everyone was a scholar after all.

"The Academy taught me this before, and I simply forgot." Her voice sounded a bit more strained. "I do not have a mind for...these studies."

Most studies really. She could read, but she wasn't grand at it. Math wasn't exactly in her wheelhouse either. "I can remember the hands on things, what to do, but other than that it will all slip away."

Though Lia was far from dumb, it was more accurate to call her 'street-smart' than intelligent.

 

[Kaska]

"That sucks," Kaska stated bluntly, seeing Lia in a new light. Her Sergeant had a flaw. A massive flaw, almost as bad as her own. She chose her next words very carefully.

"... Do they ... know?" The implication was clear. How the hell did she climb the ranks not know what was basics like that. Well. Basics to Kaska. Her snootiness showed here, despite her attempts to be polite. Some tendencies just couldn't be helped.

 

[Lia]

"Of course." Lia said with a shrug. "I wouldn't hide something like that, not when it could put others in danger."

She was very well aware that it could. Lia knew the knowledge that she lacked, and she played her role around it very well. Whenever she did not know something she asked those that did, or she had a book handy that could tell her. She wasn't ignorant or naive. "My skills more than make up for it."

Her head turned to Kaska for a moment.

"There is a reason I felt confident enough to save you from those bandits." While she lacked in some areas, she did truly excel in others. Enough that the Rangers overlooked her problems.

 

[Kaska]

"A fact about you, I guess, I should appreciate," she mused, looking troubled for a moment before letting the topic drop. For now. Which was more than her father could ever say about himself.

"Right. So. Fetch that dried grass over there and wrap them up into bushels. You'll need to make a spike of sorts and hand them over the fire's flames. Not so close, we don't want to cook them. But we do want the fire's heat focused continuously on them, so build it wide but low. I'll make a few more trips. With luck we could have enough dried by the day after tomorrow," she said more to herself, nodding at her plan as it formed.

"Set up a second fire well down wind. Hang the posionious ones there and protect yourself when you stoke the flame. It won't be pleasant. But you should aim to bathe yourself after each time. Only once your hands are completely cleaned, wash out your eyes too. We can't risk any more incidents. We're gonna need you for this fight." Not because Lia was a better fighter, noooo.

"I've lost my sword." That's why. No other reason, not a chance.

 

[Lia]

"Simple enough." She stated with that same resolve as before.

If this could get her the bracelet, she didn't care if she had to run through Alliria in the nude. That was her drive. She didn't particularly care about being uncomfortable or anything of the sort, though from what she did know of these plants she did not want to mess up either.

"After we do this." She considered for a moment. "If there are five left it will be enough."

From what she'd experienced none of the bandits had any particular skill with the blade, meaning she could deal with them easily enough. As long as the Lich didn't strike her while she did. "Let's get things ready."

The sooner they could do this the better.

 

[Kaska]

Kaska nodded, picking up her bow and slipping back out.

She repeated the task three more times, until she had comb the entire area around them. The resulting collection she laid down was noteworthy and she sat down beaming a little. It was late into the night,the sky completely black spare the stars in the sky.

She let herself flop to her back as she took a breather. "Is it all going well?" She asked, turning her head to the direction of Lia.

 

[Lia]

Lia shrugged. "Well enough."

When Kaska looked for herself she would find that almost everything had been set to utter perfection. Every bundle, every little task that the girl had instructed her on was completed in such a way that she might as well have done it herself.

That was not to say that Lia was suddenly an expert in this field.

She was just really good at following directions. It was the mark of a good soldier, and someone who could listen when they were instructed by an expert. The task was simple enough, and Lia did not mind doing it again and again. Mostly because that was what training was.

Repeating a task until it was driven into your skull.

 

[Kaska]

"Your hands are clean before you wash your eyes?" She checked, skimming the woman's work before sitting up and crawling the few feet to fetch a better look.

She snorted.

"Not bad." Definitely not impressed. Nope. She picked up a bundle and fingered it, tests its crunchiness.

 

[Lia]

"Mm." The sound came form her throat in confirmation, her lips thinning for just a few seconds as she glanced towards the North.

It was obvious that Lia was more than a little antsy to get on with this. She wanted those bandits and she wanted the bracelet back in her possession. She didn't like sitting around and waiting, she didn't like having to temper herself in the hopes that their plan would work.

She wanted to continue the mission.

"If they keep traveling north they'll eventually hit the coast." She said out loud, more thinking to herself. "They could have a ship waiting...but then why not go South?"

It would have been faster.

 

[Kaska]

Kaska shook her head, pulling forward her last round and promptly sorting them for Lia to bundle and dry.

"I'm not sure. Perhaps this lich has a master. It's not unheard of for a necromancer to work through one and use the liche's natural power to control any army he might want to send out. Saves them the danger of having to be there themselves. It would make more sense then .... just a lich wanting the bracelet?" She shook her head.

"Do you have any idea what it does?"

 

[Lia]

She frowned for a moment. It was an idea that Lia had considered herself. Though she knew precious little about Liches, she had at least known they were undead and could be created either by a Necromancer, or though a mage somehow getting a ritual wrong.

"It's a conduit of power." That was how it had been described to her anyway. The Orders hadn't exactly been clear, but she'd asked one or two questions.

A frown touched her lips, and then she continued.

"Apparently with it an experienced mage could wipe an entire village off the face of the map." Though if that was true or not she wasn't entirely sure. "Though there is a cost to the user that makes it as dangerous wield as to suffer it's effects."

Though what that cost was Lia didn't know.

 

[Kaska]

Yikes...

"Hence the... lich... wearing the bracelet," she summarized, lackluster and appropriately unnerved. She grew painfully quiet for a moment, lips pursed.

"We cannot fight more than a lich. We need to agree on that. If it comes down to that bracelet entering a necromancers hands, we run," she told Lia firmly. Sometimes, she felt like Lia needed a firm no. Or one day that drive would drive the woman into an impossible situation that would get her killed.

 

[Lia]

"We get reinforcements." Lia said simply, clearly unwilling to agree on the idea of 'running' completely.

The idea of a necromancer unsettled her though, especially because she couldn't help but think that the bracelet could probably do more than just 'wipe out a village'. Likely it was just an example of destructive magic, but if that conduit was used on something like necromancy...

Would someone be able to raise an army? The idea made her stomach churn slightly. "We'll return once we have more Rangers with us."

Though at that point she had a feeling it would be too late.

Not that she was going to say that out loud, or even admit it to herself.

 

[Kaska]

Kaska nodded, relieved by this.

She worked silently for a moment, before wiping off her hands and looking a touch timidly up at Lia. "If that happens..." She started.

"If you could- If it's possible-... If you-... saw fit to refrain from reporting .... all of the details until the task is completed. I would like to see this through," she requested humbly, none of that usual flail to her tone. It appeared as if Lia had earned a degree of respect from her. Or something equivalent to it.

 

[Lia]

She paused for a second, her lips budging this time to slowly twist into a frown as she thought about her decision. It was a request that she could understand, but one she was hesitant about.

Her life in the Rangers was about following Orders, about doing the right thing. Lying, or even omitting the truth would not be the right thing to do...or would it? Lia slowly glanced at Kaska, studying her for a moment as she slowly made up her mind about what she would do. "Until it's done."

After?

She didn't know.

Kaska had made a mistake, she should pay for that mistake, but she saw how much the girl was trying. How different she was than at the start of this journey. Perhaps she had earned some forgiveness...though the idea still wrankled Lia somewhat.

 

[Kaska]

Kaska let out a shuddering breath, the tension palpable as it dissipated off of her. She nodded in a quick acknowledgement, then stood up and briskly went to tend to the fire dedicated to poisonious herbs. She returned after a bathing, sitting down and gathering the already dried piles before her. She pulled out two rocks, prepared to begin the grinding process on those they had.

"Get some sleep. I'll keep working at it and wake you at dawn. I say even if we leave by noon, we could keep pace. It should be enough to have this completed," she gestured to the task before her, absorbed in it.

 

[Lia]

"I am more than rested." She said simply.

Over the last few days she had slept about as much as she could, and even now she didn't really feel like going to sleep. Both of them were tired, exhausted, but both of them knew how important this was.

"We just need to get on with this." Lia said simply. "Get everything ready."

Those words would be the last spoken by the two girls for quite some time. Eventually Lia did in fact relent to rest, but only after helping a bit more with the task. Then she woke herself some time later, a natural biological clock sensitively attuned drawing her into an alert state.

She then made Kaska get the same amount of rest as her, until finally the two girls once again sat perched on their mounts, ready to enact their plan.

 

[Kaska]

Kaska yawned on top of the mount, chewing an herb that would do nothing more than make her feel more alert. A nod to Lia, and then she set out. It would take a day of hard riding to get them back on the bandits tails, but the horses had had their fair share of rest and arrived without much strain.

They had been following for so long it was easy enough to judge when the bandit would make camp. So as the sun began to fall and dusk became imminent, Kaska Gestured for Lia to kick off to the side and push past the bandits with her. The left the horses in the distance, creeping forward as the bandits just began to make camp.

Kaska quickly spotted the stream, and as luck would have it, they had been fortuitous with the herbs and had managed to shave a day off her estimations. It was still small and rocky, the perfect size for the task at hand.

"They'll be fetching water soon. I will go on up ahead. Can you send out a bird call or something of the sorts when you see one approaching with the nightly barrel?" It would be ideal to have the water be caught by a shared water source, such as a nightly water tub brought over for cooking and drinking. If not...

She held up her bow. "I will bring back up once its done. It shouldn't take long to see the effects and judge for our next action."

 

[Lia]

She nodded. "A horned white owl."

It was a bird call that was not exactly rare in these parts, though unique enough that Kaska would be able to tell it from the other noises of the forest that surrounded them.

Funnily enough, bird calls were one of the things that Lia was actually quite good at. She wasn't really sure why, perhaps she simply had a very talented mouth. "Don't get caught."

Again.

She doubted that the girl needed a reminder, but it was worth saying anyway. The bandits would be on high alert, and if they had to fight...she wasn't entirely sure they would make it.

 

[Kaska]

Kaska nodded grimly.

"You too."

She crept away, satchel clutch in one hand and bow in the other. They hadn't really talked about how they would kill the lich. But she suspected that was because ... neither had an answer. The only hope was becoming a two version one situation. Then one could take the brunt of him, while the other...

She was strangely worried about this mission. Which was a first. She took deep breaths as she settled by a concealed bend of the stream up ahead, ears cocked as she waited...

 

[Lia]

Lia sat quietly within the bushes, her body almost entirely concealed save for a small sliver of her face that peeked out behind a large tree branch. No one would see her of course, not unless they knew exactly what they were looking for.

She sat there, quietly waiting.

Patience was a key part of being a Ranger, something that each person had to develop. Those who did not often washed out within a matter of months. The reason for that was simple of course; half of this job was simply waiting around for something to happen.

That was what Lia did.

She waited, and waited, and then she saw someone move.

Two men stalked through the woods and down the path towards the stream, each of them carrying two barrels that would need to be filled. Raising her hands to her mouth, Lia called to Kaska.

 

[Kaska]

Kaska stirred to action, dumping the powdered herbs in in waves. She spaced it out and held her breath, hoping that along the way, some would catch and hold onto the rocks of the stream, and into the barrels the rest would all go.

Once completed, she tucked the cloth between her armor and silently slinked back to Lia, peeking over the woman's shoulder to catch sight of the camp's movements.

"Have they started drinking it yet?" She whispered.

This part would also be quiet the waiting game, the side effects that would come would not all work in sync.

 

[Lia]

"No." She answered quietly. "Not yet."

Though it was only a matter of time now.

She had seen them drink from waterskins a few times since the two men had returned, but she assumed that was the last of their supply. Part of her wondered if it hadn't been wine or ale that they had left over, from the looks of some of the men conditions were not...grand.

Her hand went up and she pointed to one of the men, his face horribly scarred. "The flames must have struck him when I rescued you."

Lia's voice was calm.

 

[Kaska]

Kaska swallowed hard, eyeing the man she pointed out. "Right. Thanks for that," she whispered back. She knocked her bow, loosely holding it at the ready as she settled in.

"Any sign of the lich? The tent's up." She eyed it for a moment before looking back to the men that began to prepare the nightly slosh. Water was drawn and added to the big cooking pot-- a good sign. She quickly counted over the men remaining, checking for any missing.

"How many did you kill?"

 

[Lia]

Lia nodded her head, though she stayed quiet for a moment as she watched the men draw water. Their plan, the first stages at least, was happening exactly as they had planned it. For some reason she felt slight relief at that, a smile touching her face briefly.

"A figure in black moved from the outside of the camp to one of the tents." She assumed that was the Lich. It was highly doubtful that any of the other men would be wearing robes like that and in truth...it just fit the description of a walking undead.

As silly as that sounded.

"I killed three." She stated simply. "Including another that was burnt."

The other two with her blade. "There are ten left."