Remnant Stream - Chapter 0 - Prologue

*text in this selection was copied directly from a .doc file which included formatting that may not show up - i.e. italics/bold font, tabs and spacing, etc. Visit my site (see link above) where the original .doc files may be found.

Prologue

Her trial
Ruin site 09, 100 km southwest of Sol Agravat, Jhyrindal

“There!” Dreka breathed, crouching beside a small crack in the beaten marble wall. “This’s where I saw the light.”
Jere, Coell, and Malik jogged after her, and Jere moved his lantern beside Dreka’s hand.
“Anything beyond this wall is unmapped,” Jere noted quietly. “We’d best be careful – that’d be a bad place to run into bandits.”
“Do you think we can take that wall out?” Malik ignored Jere’s warning.
Coell handed Malik her mini pick-axe.
While Malik went to work on the wall, trying not to collapse the entire structure down on them, Coell rummaged through her pack for the fifth time that Dive. “Hey, guys, we’ve got maybe two hours of lantern oil left, so-“
“We’ll be fine,” Dreka interrupted, but with a faint smile. “Trust us, okay?” Nonetheless, Coell observed that Dreka had started keeping her rifle in-hand rather than slung across her back.
Jere turned to face the two. “Don’t worry, Coell. Two hours is plenty of time. If the lantern runs dry, I still have one light rod.” Jere smiled warmly. He was older, and even didn’t seem capable of sending back food at a cafe, much less protecting anyone. But, he’d always been like a father to Coell, and his words were comforting. “But it’s that attention to detail will keep you safe in future Dives – never lose that.”
With an ear-shattering explosion, Malik’s sixth hit shattered the brittle old wall, revealing a deep, steel-lined shaft. Malik put the pick-axe down and approached the edge of the shaft, ducking under the jagged remains of the ancient structure. He peered down into the abyss for several seconds before kicking a piece of marble rubbish over the edge.
The others were all facing Malik in anticipation, giving him their full attention as he turned to face them. “Ten seconds, Dreka”, he said when he heard the muffled thud of the rubble hit the bottom.
The slender, middle-aged female Diver nodded, holding back excitement behind a melancholic stare, and began to fasten a rope to a sturdy-looking support beam in the ceiling near the shaft.
“Will that thing hold?’ Malik examined the ceiling beam.
“Looks strong enough,” Dreka responded. “I’ll go first, and see if it holds me.”
Coell put her back pack down and hesitantly approached the two. “I can do it.” Her voice was quiet but strong.
Dreka finished up the knot and placed a hand gently on Coell’s shoulder. “It could be dangerous down there, Coell. Sentinels, maybe.”
“Let her go, Dreka.” Jere intervened.
“But-“
“She’s better suited than the rest of us.”
Indeed, Coell weighed less than 50 kilograms, and, while she was an inexperienced Diver, she was the best climber in the group.
Dreka closed her eyes and shrugged. She stepped back against the wall, accepting Jere’s call.
The others also moved away from the edge so Coell could move in. Although Malik was officially the Guild’s leader, Jere was much more experienced and his word in impromptu decisions such as this one was often accepted.
Coell took a deep, relaxing breath and started fastening the rope about her waist. As she finished securing herself to the line, Dreka approached her. “Take this.”
Coell dropped the rope and looked at the flintlock and holster Dreka was presenting. It was Dreka’s primary side-arm weapon, always well-cleaned and oiled.
Coell’s eyes widened slightly. “No, I’ve…I’ve never even used one of those, so-“
“Just point and shoot.” Dreka interrupted her. “Don’t worry, it’s more of a safety precaution than a necessity. It’s doubtful that you’ll run into something down there; at least before the rest of us arrive.”
Coell hesitantly and carefully took the gun from Dreka’s hands.
“Keep it,” the senior Diver added.
“But….it’s yours, I mean you clean it every day, and….”
It was usually thought that Dreka lacked a nurturing instinct, or anything even remotely related to one, but Coell detected a hint of compassion through her faint, ghostly smile. “I’m about to replace it anyways. Let’s say it’s your initiation gift.”
Coell fumbled to attach the pistol securely to her clothes, and then looked at everyone, almost hoping they’d reconsider on letting her go first. Patient stares were returned to her. They won’t let me go back now…I’d just disappoint everyone…
Coell took one more deep breath, then swept up the lantern, fastened it to the rope above her, and prepared to descend. Leaning into the pit and facing the rest of the team, Coell’s climbing experience suddenly took over and her anxiety subsided.
And then Coell was gone, the lantern light bobbing away as she rappelled down the shaft. No one spoke for several minutes after the light had faded.
Finally, Jere lit his light rod, an advanced and irreproducible, but plentiful artifact found in the northern ruins of Bridana and parts of the Akurad Province. He moved to the edge and cocked his head toward the bottom of the shaft. Within half a minute he heard Coell’s voice. The clarity was lost in conflicting echoes, but he deciphered that she had made it down safely.
“She’s at the bottom,” Jere relayed to the rest of the team.
“I keep forgetting how fast she is,” Malik shook his head in amazement. He turned to Dreka. “Okay, you’re next.”
“You should go next,” Dreka replied. “Jere and I can hold you up if the support gives out, but if you’re last, there’s no guarantee the rope’ll hold.”
Though Malik wasn’t incredibly big, he was easily the largest member of the Guild, especially when the weight of his steel mail and battle axe was added in.
“Well, someone had better go, and quick, before Coell climbs back up here.”
The two turned to Jere.
The elderly Diver laughed. “Good thinking, Malik. You go ahead.”

Coell was grinning when Malik finally reached the bottom. “Four-hundred and forty three, four-hundred and forty-hundred and-“
“Hey now, I’ve got plate mail here!”
Coell stuck her tongue out at him and laughed. “You know, it’s kinda creepy down here with only this gun that I don’t know how to use…”
Malik wrestled the rope out of the several entanglements it had formed around his body and looked around with the lantern.
They were standing in a small depression at the bottom of the shaft, and half a meter higher, a single hallway stretched on farther than they could see. The walls of the hallway were hurriedly cemented brick with steel supports at regular intervals, and the floor was just packed dirt.
A faint luminescence outlined the general structure of the hall, but it didn’t seem to have a source. Malik wandered slowly down the hall.
“Hey, shouldn’t we wait for everyone?” Coell called after him in a whisper just loud enough to be audible to the Guild Leader. “Malik?”
“Just a second….” Malik stopped, holding the lantern up to the ceiling. A narrow tube protruding a few centimeters from the roof seemed to be the source of the faint light that spread throughout the entire hall. He peered up into it, waved his hand into the opening, and sniffed slightly. Looking at his feet, Malik noticed a small buildup of sand on the floor underneath the tube.
“They’re bringing light in from the surface…” he noted, satisfied with his clever deduction. “But how does it disperse so-“
Malik reactively tore his dagger out of his belt sheath and jumped away from the clattering sound of something small moving a few meters away.
He scanned the origin of the sound with the relaxed alertness of a honed warrior. A small rolling rock came to a stop just inside the pool of his lantern light.
Malik turned around sheepishly when he heard Coell giggling.
“See, I told you this place was creepy!”
At a loss for a good comeback, Malik was saved when Dreka suddenly appeared at the bottom of the rope.
“The area’s secure,” Malik reported, which sent Coell into another fit of stifled laughter.
“As soon as Jere arrives, we’ll perform a hasty search, map the area, and return to the surface to resupply for a more extensive Dive tomorrow.”

“Now technically,” Jere argued to Dreka and Malik. “Malik’s idea is sound. But even a jaded old man like myself gets excited at the prospect of what we could find down here. In fact, we’re only half an hour from the first basement level, and it’s lit well enough there. We have enough lantern oil to spend almost an hour down here.”
“But even in an hour,” Malik continued. “What can we accomplish? I think we should spend that time concealing the entrance then come back with enough supplies to loot this place.”
“I told you this place was creepy,” Coell chided with a grin.

Malik was out-voted three to one.
It took the team half an hour of exploration to discover that their newly-found crypt actually appeared to be some sort of outpost. By then, Jere’s backpack was filled with ancient texts from a small database, and Malik had collected a few odd, half-filled, musty reagent bottles to study.
And then they came upon the end of the hallway, a dimly lit coliseum cluttered with enormous shadowed glass tubes and strewn texts, and animist symbols of vibrant colors were painted into the walls and ceilings. The temperature in the theater was considerably less than that of the adjoining halls and rooms.
All Coell could think of was “Wow….”
“I think for my new sidearm, I’ll have the finest spring-loading artifact pistol sent from Bridana,” whispered Dreka with a more than modest smile.
As the others moved in, removing and opening their packs in a rush of greed, emptying them of non-essential contents to make room for all the treasure they would soon acquire, Jere approached one of the open texts with more of an academic motivation.
“8…6…94…Year,” Jere’s eyes lit up. “It’s a dated document!” In his surprise, his words barely escaped his lips. He continued to translate what he know of the ancient text. “Enter…no, point?...day..day 17.…unstable…….Number… V.”
Jere spotted the archaic symbol ‘V’ faded on a slab of material labeling one of the large translucent cylinders.
“Jere!” Malik’s call whirled the elderly Diver toward the center of the room. Malik was looking up to the ceiling. “Hey, Jere, they’re doing it here, too. This tube goes all the way up to the surface. Somewhere high, too – that’s why it’s so cold down here. They’re pulling light down from the surface.”
“That pipe is so much bigger than the ones in the hall…,” Jere noted with a furrowed brow. “And notice the veins running along the inner surface…I’m not sure what, but this must’ve performed some other function.”
Coell suddenly let out a startled cry and backed away from one of the glass cylinders lining the perimeter of the room. The other three rushed over to her.
“What is it?” Dreka asked.
Jere approached the cylinder and held his light rod up to it. The tank was nearly a meter in diameter and three meters tall, and contained a large bronze statue of some hideous-looking reptilian beast. “It’s just a statue,” Jere shrugged.
Coell’s cheeks reddened slightly. “I…I thought it looked real….”
“It’s kind of creepy here, isn’t it?” commented Malik smugly.
“I hadn’t noticed anything being contained in these tubes earlier,” Jere spoke with an almost hypnotized fascination. He brought the light closer to the wall of the tube – the monster-like relic inside appeared to be suspended in the air inside the tube through some unknown mechanism. Jere touched the side of the tank to wipe dust from its surface and get a better look inside.
Instantly, a blast of light and smoke erupted from the far opposite end of the circular chamber halfway up towards the ceiling. A small, but grotesque and ominous-looking…thing…rippled into space at the center of the blast. It hovered on wings that looked too small to be of any use, and the majority of its small, spherical body’s anterior surface was a gigantic, sentient eye.
Coell had never seen such a creature, and though it looked relatively weak, she was nonetheless immobilized with an indescribable dread.
Jere had flattened himself against the cylinder in a vain, instinctive attempt to create as much distance between himself and the demonic beast as possible. “Ahriman…,” he whispered, as Malik and Dreka pummeled the creature with projectiles. He’d never encountered one himself, but rumors had portrayed them as demon messengers and disease vectors. Entire Guilds who’d gone insane or died from mysterious, gruesome illnesses reported having been caught off guard by Ahriman.
But within seconds, the Ahriman rippled out of space, blood seeping from its bullet holes and throwing knife wounds, the traces of its blood still in reality falling to the ground and burning small craters into the floor. Jere had heard that those seen by the Ahriman were haunted in dreams, a curse much worse the plagues they inflicted…
Malik and Dreka relaxed, and turned to face Coell and Jere. Everyone looked okay. Then the tube Jere had been planted against suddenly shattered, and the statue within it sprung to life.
Chaos ensued.
The reptilian monster took in a deep breath of air for the first time since its suspension so long ago, and stretched out to a height of over four meters. It stood on two gangly legs, lurching out of sleep. In a slow, groggy, but fluid swing, the beast tilted its long neck toward the invader that had fallen into its shattered cage.
Jere became tense as he realized that he was the beast’s first target.
Dreka whipped her hunting rifle from the strap across her back and took aim. The heavy round pierced the beast’s chest, where the heart would be. Does it even have a heart?, Dreka wondered.
Before she could figure out the answer to her mental inquiry, she was unexpectedly bludgeoned with a blunt javelin of flesh that shot out from the monster’s chest where the bullet had hit. Dreka was knocked against the back wall of the room and collapsed.
The beast shook itself like a wet dog and then retained its interest in the old man at its feet.
By then, Malik was charging. The reptile remained uninterested in any attackers even as Malik’s broad axe impacted its right knee – and shattered. Malik dropped the axe handle from the shock of impacting something with the consistency of a rock. Not to be taken by surprise, Malik intercepted the monster’s foot as it swept toward him in a kick. He blocked and clung to the ankle to stop from being sent flying across the room.
Now the beast ignored Jere. It flung its leg around, trying - without success - to remove the rider.
Coell snapped out of her paralysis and ran to Jere, hoping the beast would be preoccupied with Malik long enough to overlook her. She found the elder Diver pulling himself to his feet, bleeding all over the place from the shards of glass littering the floor.
“I’m fine!” Jere said fiercely, in an attempt to convince that to both himself and Coell. “Go help Dreka, I’ll take care of things here!’
“But-“
“I’m fine!”
Coell took off toward the wounded gunner, but whirled back around when Jere let out a cry of pain. The beast retracted a spear of its flesh from Jere’s midsection, and the old man stumbled back.
“Jere!” Coell shrieked.
The old man cursed. “I’m fine!” he rasped through gritted teeth He doubled over, backing away from the monster as quickly as possible without falling over. “Go help Dreka!”
The 50 year old man stood up shakily, and dropped his hands into a fighting stance, his knife drawn.
Coell saw a frayed hole in the front of his tunic where the monster had lanced him, but there was no blood. I had no idea….
Divers that studied relics intensely eventually inherited some of the magical powers of the ancients, and certain artifacts were known to stimulate the learning of certain abilities. Schools had been set up to train these ‘Paladins’ by having them use and study the ancient relics, but most students were at least in their 70’s before they inherited any abilities. Coell knew that Jere was more gifted than most and knew some magic – she didn’t know that it was potent enough to deflect projectiles.
“Get ready, Malik!” Jere shouted with as much strength as remained in his body.
Malik picked up on Jere’s double-nod and clung tighter to the beast’s thrashing leg, withdrawing his knife. Jere dodged another javelin with quickness he no longer thought he had, and retaliated with a fluorescent radiation of heat and light, another of his well-kept secret tricks. Malik felt an intense, indescribable burning sensation rush through his body, but it abated in less than a second – the beast took most of the charge. It writhed and convulsed in pain, nearly throwing Malik loose. But the warrior was ready. He planted his feet into the monster’s leg and leapt at its chest, burying the knife blade between its ribs. To his dismay, his whole hand sunk through as the beast seemed to warp its body around the attack. Its neck suddenly elongated, stretching the head toward an unoccupied corner of the room, and the rest of its body traveled after it at a delay. With his support suddenly gone, Malik fell to the ground on his back.
“It hardens or softens to our attacks reflexively,” Coell whispered to Dreka, using her shoulder to support the wounded gunner’s arm and help her stand. “So even if we sneak up on it….” Coell helped lean Dreka against the far wall. “Can you shoot?”
Dreka nodded. Though blood trickled from her lips and her left side lay limp, her eyes didn’t indicate any pain or concession. The gunner put the entirety of her focus into her rifle, ignoring the screaming pain coursing through her body.
“I’ll distract it,” Coell called back as she sprinted toward the beast, which had regathered itself and was advancing on the bewildered Malik.
Coell crouched, took aim with Dreka’s pistol, and fired a shot into the beast’s midsection. She dropped onto her back as the expected spear shot toward her in return.
All that mattered was Dreka’s arms, her eyes, and the sights. The end of the barrel didn’t waver a millimeter. Her shot succeeded Coell’s by less than a second, and her bullet hit the monster just below the left eye, passing through its brain. Unable to adapt to the two different attacks simultaneously, the monster shuddered and dropped dead.
For several moments, the only sound in the musty amphitheater was Jere’s wheezing as he caught his breath. Slowly, not quite sure what had happened yet, Malik sat up. The abomination lay in a heap a few meters from him. He took a few seconds to absorb what had happened, then jumped to his feet. “Hey, Jere, you okay?”
The elder leaned back against the wall, eyes closed. Malik was worried until a thin smile spread across Jere’s lips and he let out a chuckle.
“I’m getting to old for this Malik.” He opened his eyes again. “Let’s collect our pay and go home, huh?”
Convinced that their unofficial leader was still healthy, Malik turned his attention to the far wall, and Coell and Dreka.
“She’s hurt,” Coell called across the room in response to Malik’s concerned visage.
“Hmph,” Dreka huffed challengingly, pushing herself to her feet with her rifle. “Like hell I am.”
It was that moment that Coell got a grasp of how strong her fellow Divers really were. It took everything she had to keep her composure when that beast had attacked, and her heart was still hammering away in her chest, but the others seemed to think slaying demons was an everyday occurrence. It was only her fourth Dive, but already the excitement had worn off, replaced by fear and guilt – for slowing down the rest of the group.
“Yeah, let’s go home, please?” Coell sincerely didn’t want to be a hindrance to the group, but nearly dying once in a day was more than enough. Fortunately, she gathered from the faces of the others that they all agreed with her.
Jere started to collect the scrolls that he had dropped in the confusion, and Malik examined Dreka’s injuries.
Coell sat against the wall and waited. She tried to calm herself, but never took her hand off Dreka’s pistol.
“I think you’ve got a fractured hip,” Malik told Dreka. He removed some of the salvaged alchemical reagents and jewelry from his backpack to lighten the load. If he was upset about having to leave the relics behind, Coell couldn’t detect it. “It’ll heal, but you won’t be walking back.” This time, Dreka was less argumentative about the extent of her injuries.
Movement drew Coell’s attention to the far wall, near the slain beast. A rectangular panel of the marble wall slowly slid open into a slot, a hidden doorway.
A single individual stepped through. Coell watched as she scanned the group curiously for a few seconds before moving forward, her footsteps producing echoes far more solid than her fragile appearance seemed capable of. Jere and Malik both whirled toward the source of the noise, then quickly relaxed.
“This place is dangerous,” Malik warned her, standing up.
The woman said nothing, but still stared at him as if she’d never seen another human being. She bore no weapons or armor, nor even a backpack for scavenging. Most of her body was obscured by dark, layered robes, and the exposed skin of her face and hands was pale. Her hair shimmered and reflected a near-white blonde that seemed to fade and intensify in an oscillatory pattern as she moved. But most peculiar of all were her emerald-green eyes with the depth of a still ocean on calm, sunny summer day.
She’s going to help us make it out of here, Coell thought, finally able to relax, and a trace of a smile spread across her face. We’re gonna be okay….
“Are you lost?” Malik continued. “Were you with a team of Divers? We’re heading toward the surface if you need to go that way.”
The woman seemed to contemplate something as if she was ignoring Malik, but she responded just before he could ask again. “Who are you? Why are you here?” she demanded in a quiet, clear voice.
She was young, unarmed, and appeared as frail as bamboo, but she projected an icy, foreboding presence that made Jere tense up and slide his hand to the handle of the dagger at his belt.
“It’s not safe here,” Malik repeated, convinced that the poor woman had been mentally scarred by some horrors she and her team had met up ahead. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
The mysterious woman blinked for the first time, and Malik was finally able to avert his focus from her lucid green eyes. Her gaze meandered to Jere’s knife.
The same feeling of paranoid suspicion crept its way into Malik’s head, and he drew his combat knife.
In a cascade effect, Malik’s apprehension permeated Coell’s dream-like tranquility, and allowed fear to bring her to her feet, pistol drawn.
The unarmed guest was suddenly challenged by a foursome of armed, scared Divers, and none of them were quite sure why they were afraid. She narrowed her eyes. “I thought that entrance had been sealed. You are NOT supposed to be down here!” The sudden rage in her last words exploded shards of dense marble from the high ceiling, and shrapnel rained down upon the confused Guild.
Still lying on the ground, Dreka tried to move but was too slow. A wide slab of rock crushed her skull.
Small chunks bounced off Malik’s helmet and shoulder pads, and he held back from rushing the witch. In all his years of Diving, he’d never seen anything like this, and anything he’d never seen before deserved some respect. His eyes darted around the surroundings as he tried to come up with something he could use as a weapon against his aggressor.
“Malik, you can’t fight her!” Jere shouted. “We’ve gotta go!”
To confirm his point, a floating gravity well started to form in front of the witch, collecting falling marble and strewn debris into a massive, dilapidated orb. Jere backed toward Coell, keeping his eyes ahead.
Her gun was raised and she tried to get the witch’s head in the sights of the awkward weapon. Jere pushed the barrel down. “We’re leaving! Quick!”
Neither Jere nor Malik had a long-ranged weapon, and Coell realized this. And getting close to the witch didn’t strike her as a good idea. Coell pushed Jere away and brought the gun back up. Dreka was dead, but Coell could make it right – no, she could never make it right, but Guild members still stuck up for their own. This is how they’re so strong…Malik, Jere, Dreka…they keep going to protect each other.
“For Dreka,” Coell whispered. “I’ll cover you two.”
Jere pulled Coell this time, toward the exit. “We don’t have time! Dreka wouldn’t have wanted to see you killed over her! Besides, you climb fastest! Move, NOW!”
Coell loosened her grip on the gun slightly and considered. And the levitating orb of rock that the witch had accumulated, now a meter in diameter, rocketed right towards Malik.
“Saw that one coming,” he huffed, rolling to the side. The missile harmlessly hit a barren wall and shattered into dust, leaving behind a small crater. “You should’ve known better.” He sprung to his feet and sprinted toward the witch.
“Go!” Jere shouted again, and this time Coell took off for the rappelling rope at the other end of the structure, with Jere right behind her.
“Malik!” Jere stopped and turned around. He cursed when he saw the warrior charging the mage. Coell stopped too. “I told him not to fight…” Jere growled.
Malik didn’t have a weapon, but he didn’t need one. The witch had started forming another massive ball of debris before he reached her, but it wasn’t complete. He grabbed her arm and, used his momentum to throw her backwards. Or he planned on doing that – but as soon as his hand connected with her robes, a brilliant electrical bolt arced between them, overloaded Malik’s nervous system, and put the warrior on the ground, convulsing.
“Malik!” Coell ran back towards the amphitheater, but Jere stopped her. It took all his strength to hold the struggling girl back.
“Not Malik too,” Coell choked, pleading Jere to let her go.
“Exit.” Jere pointed her back the way they’d come in, his voice more strict than she’d ever heard it. “NOW.”
Coell stopped fighting him, but took a couple seconds to decide what to do. She finally turned and ran back toward the shaft. But by then, a rock projectile was already chasing them down. The witch’s missile, smaller than the last but still deadly, hit Jere squarely in the back, shattered his spine, bowled him over, and kept going. It impacted high on the passage wall to Coell’s left, collapsed a steel support beam, and exploded just a few feet from Coell’s head. The shock threw her forward and shook the foundation of the underground facility.
Adrenaline pumping, Coell jumped to her feet and faced the wreckage – only to find half the hall behind her obscured behind slag blown out of the destroyed wall – and the other half was quickly filling in as marble collapsed down from the suddenly unsupported ceiling.
The lantern was lost, but it didn’t matter – Coell fumbled for the rope and started to climb up the pitch-black shaft. The witch did not follow.

Trevor
Near Masset, Akurad Empire

It was a particularly dreary afternoon, complete with a thick, dark, cloud cover that made it seem like evening all day. Hawerth trudged behind his dog, Yakar, and ahead of his best friend of 15, Ellyrd, in a mood that rivaled the current weather conditions.
His thoughts kept sliding back to three hours ago, when Ellyrd had called him a wuss for admitting his belief in the rumors of the Omniscry Plain being haunted. And it was a code of conduct that an adolescent, once called a wuss, did everything in his or her power to negate the accusation.
The Omniscry Plain had acquired its name because it was a plateau sitting atop a highland region, and someone on top of it looking all around would see the Ingar Mountains to one side, and walls of low clouds on the other three. Even before it was haunted, watching a storm from atop the Plain over the village of Masset about half a kilometer below was a feat only attempted by the brave and the foolish.
Up until about 20 years ago, the Plain was farmed, as the increased altitude allowed the farmers of Masset to grow rare herbs there. But the 30-odd farmers using the Plain were all found bloody and dead by the citizens wondering why none of them had returned to town that night.
Fortunately, Ellyrd had gotten a new hunting bow from his father for his birthday, and he felt confident that he could take on whatever demon had killed all the farmers 20 years ago should it decide to challenge him. Hawerth, though not as brave, was a bit more realistic, and planned to run back down the slopes toward town if anything happened.
Ellyrd put his hands on his hips when Hawerth stopped. Hawerth turned around.
“Will you go on already?” Ellyrd challenged impatiently. “Nothing’s gonna happen! You know why your parent’s told you that rumor?”
“You think they’d tell us the truth?” Hawerth replied quietly. “That the farmers were all mysteriously murdered up here? You know the grown-ups’ excuse we can’t go here cause’ bandits live up here is a bunch a’ crap!”
Ellyrd scowled, but didn’t argue further. “I said nothing’s gonna happen! I got my bow, so just keep on moving!”
Hawerth sighed and his shoulders sagged. “Then why aren’t you in front?” he grumbled, but Ellyrd didn’t hear him. He moved on.
Yakar suddenly stood erect, motionlessly staring out towards the north end of the field. Hawerth’s blood froze. When the dog let out a low growl, even Ellyrd’s heart skipped a beat.
“Yakar!” Haweth shrieked. “Come ‘ere, boy! Come on!”
Ellyrd started breathing again when the dog relaxed and moved on ahead, nose to the ground after a scent. Hawerth was still scared, though Yakar’s tail was now wagging with anticipation.
“Screw this!” Hawerth stomped the ground with one foot. “I’m going home! Wuss or not, I’m not dying here!”
“Stop being a baby,” Ellyrd scorned. “The dog doesn’t seem scared at all.”
Yakar kept on going, until there were a hundred meters between him and the boys.
“Fine, I’ll go get your dog back,” Ellyrd said with intentional irritation.
Hawerth could only watch as his friend jogged after his dog.
“Wuss…I’ll show him,” Hawerth spat at his feet. “Ellyrd, you coward, get back here!” He took off at a sprint after his dog.
He arrived out of breath, and Ellyrd was crouched over, studying something. The dog stood by, calmly sniffing.
Hawerth let out a startled cry when he saw that it was a boy.
The boy looked to be a couple years older than them, perhaps a noble judging by his clean skin and trimmed hair, though his clothes were in poor shape. He lay face down in the grass, moving slightly as if just waking up.
Though Hawerth’s and Ellyrd’s fear had dissipated, the waking boy’s terror elevated. Ellyrd and Hawerth jumped back as the stranger scrambled to his feet, eyes wide with fear, stumbled back to his knees, and vomited.
He began to speak fragmented, sobbing words in a language they didn’t understand, scrambling around in circles and trying, unsuccessfully, to stand.
“Maybe he was attacked,” Hawerth whispered. “By the demons.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Ellyrd countered, though his face had gone pale with the same realization.
The foreign adolescent had crawled into a fetal position in the grass, trembling, and with eyes squeezed shut.
“We should help him,” Hawerth suggested quietly, not wanting to speak to loudly or move to quickly and aggravate the quivering adolescent.
It took a while, but Ellyrd eventually responded. “Yeah…”

* * * * *

Ellyrd’s mother padded back across the living room with wet towels, which she applied to the forehead of the sleeping stranger on her couch. At present, the tending of this foreign child’s conditions was her primary focus, but Ellyrd knew it wouldn’t belong before the subject of the boys’ reasoning for venturing into the Omniscry Plain would come up. Fortunately, the coming of that inevitable punishment was delayed once more. The stranger opened his eyes.
His vision was slightly blurred, but a pleasant scent greeted him, and the shadowed walls of the room seemed to convince him that it was all a dream…a long, disturbing, but terminated dream.
He blinked a few times to clear his eyes. He was lying on a couch, alone. The room was lit by a fire in a pit near the far wall, over which a large boiling pot was hung. His heart rate sped up. Not a dream? His heart sunk into his chest as he discovered the taste of digestive acids and broken down food at the back of his throat. Calm down, got to calm down. He remembered blacking out – I can’t go back outside…I can’t, I can’t let that happen again…I can’t be here! This can’t be happening! Calm down, calm down, calm down...
But it was too late. He felt the transformation enveloping him, saw the swarm of black ants crawling from every corner of the room, writhing and squirming amongst themselves. Millions of them. It’s not real, it’s not real, it’s not real, it’s not real! His eyes widened as the swarm began to inch its way toward him. They can’t do this…it’s impossible, they were lying. Fear, that’s what they want me to think…oh God…The ants were up on the couch now crawling across his body toward his face, accelerating, and growing into large, fat millipedes.
Ellyd Belvune’s mother rushed into the living room in response to the deafening scream that resounded from there. The injured stranger was thrashing about the floor, ripping loose the bandages she had wrapped his wounds in, dislocating the brace she had applied to his broken arm.
Ellyrd watched with the same fear that had gripped him when he watched the stranger vomiting on the Plain, and he could only come to one realization. He’s been possessed by a demon.


Specimen of Orbel
Masset, Akurad Empire

It took several days on the part of the linguist, Mirian D’Engle to get coherent speech from the stranger. Mirian had traveled to Masset from the capital of the Akurad Empire, West Orbel, at a request from the rural village to teach their language to a stranger from an unknown culture. Being a young professional in Akurad was not easy, as the society was moderately conservative and thought that the older someone was, the more skilled they would be, period. Mirrian felt up to the task, though, as she had almost ten years of language studies under her belt, and her research mentor agreed to give her this job. She’d been trained to speak each major language and recognize most minor languages used in the known world, but Mirian still couldn’t detect any significant similarities between the stranger’s native language and any known language. Her training of the adolescent in their language had been made more difficult by warnings and interference from some of the more superstitious folk of Masset who, after hearing the boy was found on the Omniscry Plain, were convinced he was tainted with demonic influence.
“Trevor, that’s your name?” Mirian said slowly, pointing to him as she pronounced the name.
“Trevor,” the boy repeated in a shy, quiet voice, nodding slightly and pointing to his chest.
Mirian noted that his culture also used head shaking and nodding to communicate, giving it at least some similarities with all other known languages.
“My name is Mirian,” she pointed to herself. She waited and watched as the adolescent’s eye and head movements confirmed that he understood her. “Trevor, where are you from?”
“Was….,” Trevor searched for words. “Long chair, sit…sitting, sleeping chair.”
Mirian’s eyes traveled to the couch a few feet away where Trevor had apparently been sleeping since being brought to Masset.
“Your home, Trevor,” Mirian shook her head. “Where is home? Do you remember that word, home?”
“Home…Ellryd home,” he pointed to the floor.
“Good,” Mirian nodded with a smile. “Where’s Trevor’s home?”
“Home…,” Trevor suddenly shuddered and the color started to drain from his face. Mirian watched with curiosity as he closed his eyes tightly and began to rock in his seat. It didn’t last more than a few seconds. The boy calmed down and hesitantly opened his eyes again. They reflected fear, weariness, and sadness.
Mirian took a gamble, and asked Trevor again about his home. This time, he didn’t lose control of himself.
“No home,” Trevor said after some thought, through closed eyes.
“You don’t know?” Mirian questioned.
“No home.”
“Can you remember?”
No home,” Trevor’s voice was tired, broken, but firm.
Mirian sighed and concluded that Trevor had been through a traumatic ordeal, and further prompting might promote him to become even more unstable.
“Are you sick?” she asked.
“Sick….” Trevor raised his eyes to the ceiling in thought. “Sick, yes.”
“Do you need a doctor?”
“Doc….doctor….”
“Do you need medicine?”
“No, no medicine.”
“Will you get better?”
“No, medicine not…will not work.”
Mirrian leaned back in her chair, scribbling the proceedings into her journal and wondering what horrible circumstances could have resulted in Trevor’s current condition.
She thanked Trevor, gave him a piece of candy from her travel bag, and went into the kitchen to speak with Mrs. Belvune.
“Any luck?” Ellyrd’s mother asked while chopping stew vegetables.
Mirian shrugged. “I can’t tell where he’s from. He won’t say. But he has picked up our language, to some degree anyways.”
“Will he be staying here?”
“That’s up to you, Mrs. Belvune. He’s been through something terrible, and he’ll probably need support. From the whole village. He needs to be accepted.”
“What do you need me to do?”
Mirian didn’t actually expect Mrs. Belvune to be interested in keeping the boy, so the question took her by surprise. “Ah, I think….give him something active to do. Work in the fields, tend your store maybe. Keep him clothed, fed, and just, well, comfortable.”
“He would’ve been about that age now…,” Mrs. Belvune’s voice trailed off. “My eldest son,” she added in response to Mirian’s confused expression. “He…was attacked by bandits seven years ago, while he was hunting…”
Mirian lowered her eyes. “I’m sorry…Ah, well, if Trevor was to stay here, I could probably arrange to have money from the Orbel Academic Institute pay for his food, but we would still need to visit with him on occasion.”
“I’ll take care of him,” Mrs. Belvune smiled in agreement. “Ellyrd will have a new brother to play with. He gets so lonely being the only child…”
Mirian smiled politely. “Thank you, Mrs. Belvune. I’ll be going back to the Inn for the night, and I can have contracts ready for you to look over tomorrow morning.”
Mirian excused herself and went straight back to her quarters at Masset’s only Inn and tavern, skipping supper for the evening.
Relieved that she had acted professionally on her first client-based job, Mirian now began to wonder again what could have happened to Trevor. How pale his skin got and how he seemed to try to shut everything out of his memory. How Mrs. Belvune described his occasional screams of sheer terror waking her up at night, and how he convulsed and vomited when the two boys had found him on the Plain. Is he really sick? What happened to him…?
“Poor kid…”
Mirian snuffed out her lantern, but lay awake for several more hours.

* * * * *

Mirian spent three more days speaking with Trevor, teaching him more of their language structure, but also getting him to speak and write a few words in his own language, which he had been oddly reluctant to use around her. With her initial work completed, she thanked the Belvunes for their hospitality and left by carriage for West Orbel to study her notes.