Jackal Among Snakes

“Any further steps, and we will be within their grasp,” Silvic cautioned their party as they idled.

Orion nodded. “This was made clear to me earlier. Being within their grasp is unimportant. A weak grip is easily broken.”

His ever-zealous words did not abate Argrave’s fear at all. Silvic continued, cautioning, “This will not be as other ambushes. We enter the distortion, the realm, of a being similar to myself—we will be in the heart of things, ostensibly surrounded by foes. It further suggests that the wetland spirit holding this fortress yet lives. If that is true, you will face more than a tide of corpses.”

Durran ran his finger against his bald patch caused by yesterday’s burns. He had taken the hardest knocks during this journey, yet he did not falter. That steeled Argrave somewhat. Anneliese stayed calm, likely dually from her own tranquil nature and the enchanted items he’d given to her at Jast.

“I will fight this Intrepid Troubadour Argrave claims to be beyond this distortion. The remainder of you are more than capable,” Orion assured.

“All save you, perhaps, will be unable to leave until the master of this distortion is dead and gone, or until you are allowed to leave,” Silvic once again warned.

“None intend to leave until the enemy is conquered,” Orion rebutted at once.

Without so much as a breath to gather his courage, Orion gestured for them to follow and stepped forth. In but a second, he seemed a chameleon that blended into the environment before he vanished altogether. Silvic was the second to move, and just after the Waxknights. Only once the first Waxknight had entered did Argrave follow, his companions trailing just after him.

Just the same as it had been when they travelled through the Marred Hallowed Grounds to find Silvic and bring her before Orion, the scene distorted before Argrave, and he stepped into what might as well be another world.

Endless isles of green dotted the land before him, thick and tall plants like cattails and reeds growing up out of rich brown soil. These isles were large, covered completely by greenery, like a vast archipelago of verdant growth. They were divided by fast-running rivers that were entirely clear yet seemed to stretch downwards forever as an ocean of water. The sky above was so blue and beautiful it was worthy of admiration.

On one of the overgrown green isles before them, a four-legged creature armored in shining, strong steel stood. It had a thick, round body easily identifiable as that of a horse’s. Its legs were thick and strong. Where its neck might’ve held an equine head, a man’s torso stood. A centaur, Argrave knew, and equipped in full steel plate that gleamed with enchantments. It dwarfed even the titanic rockhide hippopotamuses they’d grappled with during their journey, and held an unstrung bow taller than Argrave in hand.

Sitting on the centaur’s back was a humanoid figure made of wood and teeming with liquid light within. It was quite similar in appearance to Silvic, though without the waxpox corrupting most of its body. While Silvic was decidedly made in imitation of a female, this rider was male. He bore a crown of roots atop his head, though they twisted and entwined together to resemble two horns. He had a beautifully ornate stringed instrument in his hand most resembling a guitar, though different enough it could not be called so.

“We seek to kill the Plague Jester,” Orion called out, stepping forth to the edge of the isle all of them stood upon. “Will you stand down?”

“We stood down once, after you had slain thousands,” the troubadour aback the armored centaur called out. “You made fools and singers of us, weaving tales and jests that mocked our own people.”

The centaur strung the bow and held his hand up, where part of the troubadour’s wooden body morphed and broke off into a wooden arrow teeming with liquid light. The arrow was nocked and fired at Orion. Argrave flinched involuntarily at the quickly approaching projectile, yet Orion batted it aside with his mace, demonstrating inhuman speed.

“Now, you will need to kill us all,” the troubadour concluded. “Even then, we will not have stood down.”

Deflecting the arrow left the mace badly bent, and Orion corrected it with one hand. “Let it not be said I did not try to sway you,” he said coldly as he stepped forth onto the river. His heavy plate boots sunk not an inch before ice formed. He stepped across the thick river to the island where the centaur and the troubadour waited, and every time his feet lifted up, the ice melted behind him.

“That is a new spirit,” Silvic noted. “Like me, but… young.”

It was a vaguely familiar line to what it had been in ‘Heroes of Berendar.’ Argrave did not have time to marvel, though, and he looked about in paranoia for the first signs of their foes. And he saw it at once. The tall reeds of the islands brushed aside to make way for a new arrival, crawling free from the bottomless rivers dividing the islands. At first, it was one location—then, all the cattails and reeds on the edge of the island they stood atop shifted aside, making way for fell arrivals.

The Waxknights bunched together, uncomfortable by the fact that they could not see what was approaching. Slowly, their opponents rose above the tall reeds. The Sentinels of this wetland spirit were amphibious creatures, thick and long bodies closest in appearance to a crocodile. Their scales did not cover all of their flesh, as though they were immature—instead, one could see through their pink, translucent skin to spot organs that danced with liquid light, marking them as blessed by a wetland spirit.

“We hole up, endure all that’s thrown at us,” Argrave shouted out, attempting to rally everyone as was planned. The Waxknights answered him with a grunted HOAH of assent. Argrave gestured towards Silvic and urged, “See what you can do to block off any of the banks with roots or reeds, eliminate some avenues of approach.”

“At once,” Silvic hastened, sinking her root-like hand uncorrupted by waxpox into the reeds.

The Sentinels of this young troubadour pressed in on them with swaying, almost staggering steps. The closest opened their mouth and spewed poison gas, but their party was well-prepared in advance for such assaults, per Argrave’s cautions. With each of the Waxknights being spellcasters, wind magic quickly swept away the dangerous poison, scattering it and rendering it impotent.

The reeds of this strange place slowly twisted and writhed, spurred by Silvic to raise walls at the banks of the verdant isle. Their party did nothing more than hold back the Sentinels, killing those who got too close. Though powerful and poisonous, they were slow creatures. The greatest concern was the others on this plane.

Dragonflies as big as a grown man’s torso came to assault them. Their movements were erratic, unpredictable—in one moment they would be one place, in the next they’d dart in a straight line towards one of them, before zigzagging and attacking from the back. Their fangs were like knives, and Argrave, with only the hood of his duster for protection, collected cuts to the face one after the other. Even with magic, they were difficult to defeat. Galamon was the only who could consistently deal with them, but even then, they did not always fall. Elsewise, Argrave’s Brumesingers used their conjured warriors well.

The battle between the Intrepid Troubadour and Prince Orion raged in the background, the furthest thing from ‘slow.’ Orion charged the duo of the centaur and troubadour with all the rage and persistence of a bull seeing red. And, fittingly, the Intrepid Troubadour dodged with as much grace as a matador.

Arrow after arrow soared through the air at Orion, the armored centaur receiving more ammunition from the troubadour sitting on his back. All the while, it nimbly maneuvered around the isles, jumping from isle to isle as the arrows sought their target, leaving trails of green light floating just behind. When the arrows struck the earth or the water, explosions of plant life rose up and targeted Orion, groans and creaks echoing like the sound of timber falling.

Yet the Prince weaved through the summoned plants and the near bullet speed arrows with far too much grace, doggedly seeking the troubadour as though he had a death grudge to settle. None of his blows managed to hit home, but they left devastation in their wake, and had the power of the elements behind them.

Blow after blow ruined great swathes of this land, this eternal land of green isles. Orion’s fists left poison writhing on the edges of reeds, slowly eating them from within. His kicks summoned winds, sparks, flames. Sometimes, he seemed to run on the air itself. And as ever, his strength and endurance went far beyond the realm of what was normal. His armor could barely keep up with his prowess.

And as the fight proceeded, it became clear the troubadour could not keep up, either. When the centaur took to air, jumping to another island to flee Orion’s pursuit, the prince took his mace in hand and threw it. It spun through the air wildly, yet it was moving so quickly and towards such a large target it did not need to be particularly precise. It hit the front leg of the beast-man, and it crashed to the earth, throwing its rider down.

Reeds and roots rose to conceal and protect the troubadour, but Orion was faster. He grabbed the wetland spirit by the neck and wrenched it free, tearing free copious amounts of writhing greenery with him. Argrave barely noticed this in the distance and felt some relief as he knew things would soon end.

Yet Orion held the troubadour in the air, the stringed instrument dangling from his hands. Argrave waited for the end to come, and yet it did not. The centaur struggled to rise, incapable of doing so. The troubadour struggled desperately, yet it lacked the strength to free itself. All the while…

Is he talking? Argrave questioned.

Just then, he saw the reeds rise and twist around the injured leg of the centaur, replacing the lost flesh with wood and root. The troubadour kicked Orion with a sharp, light-imbued spike on the edge of its foot, and the prince staggered back. He slammed the troubadour to the earth at once, and…

Feeling as though his ears had popped, the scenery jarringly shifted around them. They were surrounded by stark, moss-covered old stone walls, with little else in sight. Orion stood there, pummeling the still corpse of the troubadour. The Sentinels had been brought with them but began to scramble.

The centaur, though, rose up to its feet. Orion turned his head, prepared to chase, yet already the beast-man, much larger in close proximity, bounded over the stone walls and fled. Its steps shook the earth.

“Orion!” Argrave shouted, running over.

“I am fine,” he assured, one hand held over the spot that he’d been kicked. A sharp fragment imbued with the liquid light of the wetland spirit persisted in the wound, though the lingering light faded quickly as the thing died. Argrave spared a glance at the fallen troubadour, which had become naught but a husk of wood leaking liquid light like oil.

“What was that? You stood there like a…!” Argrave began, trailing off.

Orion pulled free the wood fragment, then crushed it. “I tried to accept his surrender.”

Argrave took a deep, incredulous breath. He’s changing, he knew. And quickly. He doesn’t have normal sensibilities. That centaur escaped because of those changes—who knows what variables that will cause?

“We should talk,” Argrave said seriously. This might be the first time he’d said something like that to Orion. Hopefully, it would be the last.