Mists of Winter: Chapter Three

[Brock Marsh Runoff]

Dorgio draws a knife and quickly cuts a broad strip from the hem of his tunic, broad enough so that it won't sink easily in the Musarde. He mutters words of prayer over the cloth, and light bursts from it, bright as a torch. He throws the strip in the water, close to where he saw Raen and the hag go under. And as he illuminates the waters, his spear crashes below the waters, attacking at the hag.

[ewancummins]

Benn runs to the edge of the pier. He drops flat and grabs for snatches the trailing end of Vlad's rope where it snakes across the broken ice pack on its way down towards the witch and her prey.
His fingers close on the end of the rope as the last foot slides into the water.
Benn jerks hard, straining his legs, his arms, the big muscles of his back as he leans back into a kneeling position. No time for tying knots, he works by brute force, hauling like a mule on an ore cart.
He stands with effort.
Jenny fights from underwater, pulling hard for the river bottom.
His boots skid closer to the edge of the wooden platform.
Black water.
White ice.
Close, now, on the point of falling in--- and Benn feels something warm in his guts. The heat rises, spreads in his hips and shoulders.

He steps back six inches, dragging the rope.
Six more, and then he’s using all his strength just standing upright with the rope held against the witch’s terrible weight and force.


Kat sees lights all over the water, shifting hues and pastern in the dimness of evening.
Small lights rise, the evil eye ghosts that come closer and closer to the surface.
The sun-rod that Franz hurled below gives off a green radiance, light diminishing by swift degrees as its metallic source sinks straight down like a plumb line.
And now a rosy, warm glow joins those other lights; Dorgio’s strip of cloth bobbing on the surface over the biggest break in the ice shelf.
She sees Franz swimming down towards two shapes; dim silhouettes locked in a struggle. A rope line runs up past Franz at an angle, from the struggling pair to Benn on the pier’s topside, near her.


Sara reloads.

[alhoon]

Watching the light spread all through the lake, the evil witch lights rising and people dropping or diving in the water, Raen suddenly knows what he should do. It may well kill him, but it's a better death than dying in the clutches of a witch. At best, he would survive and the witch would be harmed enough to be killed by the magical apparitions the others throw at her. At the worst, he would go out fighting a monster; that's a good death and he knew it would eventually end that way.
Struggling with the witch, his hand goes to his pocket, finding the wet paper there. "Whatever Good Gods are out there, please, please, help me!" Raen prayed as he tried to read his own explosive rune in the dimming light.

[ewancummins]

Watching the light spread all through the lake, the evil witch lights rising and people dropping or diving in the water, Raen suddenly knows what he should do. It may well kill him, but it's a better death than dying in the clutches of a witch. At best, he would survive and the witch would be harmed enough to be killed by the magical apparitions the others throw at her. At the worst, he would go out fighting a monster; that's a good death and he knew it would eventually end that way.
Struggling with the witch, his hand goes to his pocket, finding the wet paper there. "Whatever Good Gods are out there, please, please, help me!" Raen prayed as he tried to read his own explosive rune in the dimming light.

Raen stares at the paper. The ink puffs out in little clouds as his hand, his arm, his whole body shakes in Jenny's grip.

The witch laughs, bubbles flowing from her mouth.
She turns Raen round and looks at him, smiling. Her jaws open, revealing rows of needle-like teeth.

He looks down at the paper one last time as her lips brush his neck---






Topside

A dull, shuddering thud from below shakes the pier.

Ice shatters between land and the lumber barge.

Water spouts through the cracks and slaps the edge of the dock.
Benn topples head over heels, rolling across the pier's width with the severed rope flapping in his hands.

Franz bobs up, white as curdled milk, a stunned look on his face. The big Falkovnian gasps, pawing at the water.



A moment later, two more bodies rise.


Raen floats face-down in the river, one leg resting under a big chunk of broken ice.


Jenny surfaces nearby, her green face staring up at the evening sky with glazed eyes.

[steveflam]

Franz tries to get to Raen as quickly as he possibly can by climbing onto the ice and sliding towards the two forms.

[Adam]

Bennedict stands, wiping at his forehead and looking at the chaos in the river.

"Mein gott," he says, piecing together what must have occurred. He looks around quickly, trying to find a way to get to Raen to save him, if possible.

[ewancummins]

Working together, the others get Raen’s limp body out of the water and onto the docks.
A violent tremor runs through the wizard’s whole frame; he rolls over and coughs water onto the boards.

In the water, Franz swims close to the witch. He stabs her with his knife. She makes no sound, but twitches just a little, green blood oozing into the water.
Two ghostly shapes fly up from the water below her, throwing a wave over Franz!
Jenny’s body leaps like a fish thrown by a bear, pierced and battered by the spiritual weapons conjured by Dorgio and Benedict.

The weapons return to hover near their summonses on the pier.
Franz sees that Jenny’s skull has been crushed and her chest pierced over the heart.
He checks again.
Stone dead.



Vlad, off the ice and on the pier now, points out over the water and shouts-

"The eyes!"

The eye-ghosts, three pairs of flickering orbs, lift from the surface of the river, climbing higher and higher into the gathering dusk.
They flash like fireflies, and fade away.

[alhoon]

Raen trembles from the shock, the fear and the cold. Noticing he's more or less alive, he coughs a bit more and gives a silent prayer of thanks to whatever out there helped him.
"Jenny?" He asks between coughs.

[ewancummins]

Raen and his friends hear heavy footfalls, lots of them ,coming closer and closer from the buildings and alleys behind the docks.

[ewancummins]

GALANDEL ALONE


Galandel missed the rendezvous with Benn and the others at the pub in the southern part of town.
No one left a note for him and the humans at the bar don’t seem to know Benn and the others have gone. But the girl who waits on him says that they all left in a hurry, and that several of them looked scared or worried...

"Did anyone speak to them while they were here? Did you over hear their conversation at all?" Galandel asks girl.

The girl replies,
"No, but I overheard one of them saying something about trouble at home, earlier in the evening. The one who talks like a Falkovnian. Or a Lamordian. They sound the same to me. "

Galandel nods, he fetches a silver piece from his purse and hands it to the girl. Without saying anything else, he leaves the pub and heads to Benn's house.

The girl takes the coin, smiling.

''Thank you!"


...


later, at Benn's house


Galandel finds the house without much trouble; the city seems to have changed little since his last visit.

No lights show behind the shuttered windows.

No one answers the front door when he knocks.

He notices that the door frame looks damaged, and the panel, too. It looks as if someone kicked the door in, and then closed it.

He hears a faint noise from within, something scraping on a floor or wall, maybe...

Galandel will test the door, carefully and quietly, to see if it is locked or barred. If it is, he will look for another point of entry to the scholar's home. He keeps his sword sheathed but is ready to draw in case he is attacked.

The door does not open with a soft push. It seems to be locked or barred from the inside.

Searching around the side of the house, Galandel finds a battered old cellar door he may be able to pry open without making much noise.

Galandel will attempt to pry the old cellar door open while trying to make as little noise as possible.

Galandel pries.
The angled wooden door pops open without a soft groan and a dull splintering, not very loud.

His eyes adjust in an instant. The darkness of the cellar melts and he picks out details: footprints in coal dust on the floor of the small cellar, across the room an ascending staircase with a door standing ajar at the upper landing.
Sacks, boxes, and crates lie tumbled about the floor, some torn open.

Galandel enters the cellar cautiously. Someone has been, may still be here in fact and they are looking for something.

After his quick survey of the cellar, he makes his way to the stairs and proceeds up them. At the door he stops, peeking through the open space and listens for any noises.

Something squeals under his tread as he reaches the top of the stairs!

The rat races through the crack of the door, fleeing from him.

Voices sound from beyond the door; human-sounding, but he does not understand the language. At least two men.
Close.

His stealth blown, Galandel shoulders open the door stepping through to the other side. Pulling a dagger out from his cloak, he throws at the first human he sees...

[ewancummins]

THE PIER, SARA AND HER COMPANIONS


The footfalls some closer.
Lights appear in the murky spaces between buildings behind the dockyard.

[ewancummins]

GALANDEL ALONE


His dagger cast sends the weapon flying between the two burglars. It sticks in the wall.

The men turn, crying aloud.

One rushes him. They go down the stairs in a tangle.

Ooomph!

The man rolls away, grabbing a kosh from his belt as Gal rolls and yanks out his sword.

They fight in the lantern glow, dodging, weaving, swinging and jumping back.

Something whizzes past Gal's head in the dark--and arrow or blot, maybe.

The light gets brighter in the stairwell.

Gal spots an opening, swings, and the thug with the sap goes down with a bloody jaw where the sword hit him.



He catches his breath, moves to cover the bottom of the siarcase if they should attempt to rush him.

Listens.

They are making a lot of racket, moving around, breathing hard.

He hears a door open upstairs, receding footfalls.

Noise at the cellar door behind him, and softer noises at the top of the interior staircase.

Surrounded.

[steveflam]

Raen trembles from the shock, the fear and the cold. Noticing he's more or less alive, he coughs a bit more and gives a silent prayer of thanks to whatever out there helped him.
"Jenny?" He asks between coughs.

"She ist dead. Can you move, Raen?" Franz moves to help the man up at any rate. "We must keep moving, keep de blood unt body warm. MOve in place, jog a little, like dis." The soldier starts moving at first, then jogging in place to keep warm.

[ewancummins]

Raen trembles from the shock, the fear and the cold. Noticing he's more or less alive, he coughs a bit more and gives a silent prayer of thanks to whatever out there helped him.
"Jenny?" He asks between coughs.

"She ist dead. Can you move, Raen?" Franz moves to help the man up at any rate. "We must keep moving, keep de blood unt body warm. MOve in place, jog a little, like dis." The soldier starts moving at first, then jogging in place to keep warm.

Munchen rushes over to Franz and jumps at him, barking.

[alhoon]

"We must keep moving, keep de blood unt body warm. MOve in place, jog a little, like dis." The soldier starts moving at first, then jogging in place to keep warm.

Raen looks at the Falkovnian confused. He moves a bruised arm probably fractured in several places, fingers mangled by the explosion over his torn and battered form. "I'm lucky to be alive. Everything hurts. I can't listen at you well." he said as he tapped a broken finger over his bleeding ears.
With help from the Falkovian he gets on his feet, still trembling from the cold, shock and fear. He winces at each step and moans on more than one occasion.
"I have no more fight left in me. I'm done. I need a warm bath and some rest. May the Gods help Matilda, I really hope she's safe. But I can't help her right now."