Chapter Fourteen

## **Things Go South**

**Bjorstandag 22nd Biriskjur 1770**

It was a clear night and, with the exception of Nixe who had taken over watch duty from Brandyr and Booker, The Fellowship slept soundly following a peaceful day of travel.

In the early hours of the morning, Fitz emerged from his slumber, opening his eyes to reveal the stars and colours of the northern lights vibrant against the night sky. As he gazed upwards however, the stars began to disappear one by one, as if someone were extinguishing them like candles, and the patterns began to shift before his eyes until the sky above was in total darkness, save for a single swirling vortex of colour.

It was at this point that the Tiefling realised that he was in a state of complete paralysis. Unable to move or speak or blink, all he was able to do was stare upwards into the vortex. As he lay there, two voices emerged from the darkness. somehow both very distant, yet unbelievably clear. The first was not in any language that Fitz was familiar with yet he understood the meaning as if he spoke it fluently. In a deep, guttural, rasping voice, it said

*“There it is. Somehow, this one escaped our grasp but now it has been located, we shall reclaim what is ours”.*

A second voice responded from afar, or perhaps inside Fitz’s own head, in a language that he was all too familiar with this time. Replying in a clipped, refined infernal, the voice said

*“Not. So. Fast. I’m afraid this soul belongs to us, by virtue of lineage. A quite unbreakable contract, although I’m sure we could be convinced to part with it... for a price”*

*“Your deals hold no allure to us”* boomed the first voice. *“We do not barter. We take what is ours and consume what remains”*

*“Well, that is a shame, but this plane has far too much potential to allow you to... what was it, consume? We must insist you find your food elsewhere”*

*“We go where we please. We are unfathomable. Beyond comprehension even for one such as you, and we are unstoppable. If you insist on staking claim to what is ours, then we will consume you first”*

Fitz blinked, his eyes closing for just a fraction of a second, but when he opened them again the stars were back and the northern lights were spread across the night sky as they had been before. The voices were gone and he could move again. Casting his eye about the camp he saw that the rest of The Fellowship were still asleep, with the exception of Nixe who was still sat atop the taxi-wagon. Fitz pulled himself together and made his way out of his bedroll in order to relieve himself. The rest of the party was none-the-wiser as to what had just happened, but Fitz got no more sleep that night.

As morning broke the party set out once again. A fox’s den, covered by fresh snow, damaged the rear wheel and knocked Nixe from the roof of the carriage, but the wheel itself was easily repaired by Brandyr’s divine magic. A minor inconvenience, but perhaps a sign that the day would not be as uneventful as the previous one.

In the afternoon, as Brandyr and Nixe rode upon the roof of the cabin, they spotted four riders through a rocky outcropping travelling roughly parallel to the group. Telling Wilf to slow, the four riders emerged in the path before the taxi and, through their rough demeanour and scrappy appearance, it was clear that ill intent was afoot.

Brandyr weaved a spell and his voice boomed, commanding the heavily armed, would-be bandits to be on their way. Two of the men’s resolve faltered, but the others levelled their crossbows at the pair on top of the carriage and let their bolts fly. Battle had come to The Fellowship.

At Booker’s command, Wilf spurred on the goats and the carriage sped up again, carving through the centre of the men on horseback. In a moment of inadvisable bravado, Booker and Brandyr leapt from the cart at their assailants, foiling Plymouth’s plan to target the horses and leave the men in the dust. As Booker flew past the attackers, he let forth a thunderous expulsion of force that pummeled man and horse alike. Brandyr, however, missed his target and ended up on his back between the criminals, as the wagon accelerated away.

Fitz, believing the coachmen to be suitably distracted, misty-stepped to the roof of the vehicle as Plymouth commanded Wilf to come about. Two of the riders gave chase whilst the others bore down on those who lay prone before them. Swords were drawn and Delg produced a metal pipe from underneath his seat that let-forth a flurry of scrap metal with an explosive bang! Arrows, bolts and spells flew, but before long Nixe and Fitz lay bleeding and unconscious on the taxi-wagon's roof.

Wilf dropped the goats’ reigns and stepped from the cart, levelling a punch with each of his mighty fists to man and rider alike. Both crumpled beneath the force of his blows. Brandyr, now fighting back-to-back with his Gnomish companion, used his sorcerous magics to grant them both the power to act with utmost haste. He then threw himself onto the approaching wagon, twinning a second spell to revive the felled men on the roof.

The party restored, fists and knives and words flew once more and before long three men lay felled by the roadside and the fourth had begun to flee. Alas, his horse's speed was no match for Nixe’s arrow and he was picked off before he could make it past his bow’s range. The party salvaged what they could from the bandits’ meagre belongings and Nixe laid claim to the surviving horse, which introduced itself as Uraeus.

The party pushed on, giving themselves what healing they could as the taxi made its way further south. As night began to fall, they spotted a single-storey wooden hut, elevated on thick wooden stilts. Nixe recognised this building to be Ranger Station #2, one of many such stations located in and around the wildlands. Two figures stood on the veranda, a broad, human woman with short-cropped blonde hair and a scar running across her face, and a shorter, older human man with a beard, a shaved head and a big emerald earing. Nixe knew them to be Bolsø Berdal and her travelling companion, Friedrich Mohs, a rival ranger.

The banter flowed like fine wine, as the two rangers exchanged witticisms. Mohs informed Nixe of a summit for senior rangers that had recently been held back in Bezmadanbaor, and Nixe gave Mohs more details about the dragon attack on Russet, having already heard about it on his journey. Friedrich and Bolso left The Fellowship with a “Smell ya later” and headed out for an evening’s night-fishing as the party, aching and exhausted collapsed into the bunkbeds within the station and quickly succumbed to sleep.

Next: Chapter Fifteen. "What the fuck is up with that?"