Author's note: This one's a doozy, about twice as long as the average. I didn't want to split it up as this is the climax of this arc. Enjoy.
Land of the Roses
Chapter 25: Candlefire
Despite what they initially thought, the journey into the forest took them longer than they expected; the welcoming lights and sounds of the village of Doranshire disappeared into the distance as Andrea, Kimberly and Juliano trekked through the rain-soaked forest towards the cloud of glowing light ahead of them. Eventually, they found themselves shrouded in darkness and silence. The silence was periodically interrupted by a yelp of pain; hooked briars were common along the forest floor, and the darkness did little to help when it came to avoiding them, tried as they might.
Andrea's once-pristine striped stockings slowly started to shred as they snagged into the thorns, a fact that she loudly and verbally lamented numerous times. Kimberly wasn't safe from the briars' wrath either, but tried her best to avoid vocalizing her pain. Instead, her pain was visible, with several scratches and cuts marking her usually-smooth legs. Regardless of the personal cost, they pressed on; their interest in finding and studying the orbs was oddly irresistible, like a siren's call.
They fought through the densely packed and overgrown forest until they they eventually came to a rocky clearing, largely devoid of plant life, deep within the woods. Most of the orbs had gathered within the clearing, while a few lingered near the trees and spun around them. The light of the orbs was bright enough to overpower their lantern, and the glittery sound they emitted overpowered the bugs and the wind.
"So... we found them. What now?" Kimberly asked.
"We see if we can get a closer look," Andrea answered, dropping her backpack and her purse on a particularly large boulder. She wandered along the clearing, studying the movements of the orbs yet again. Most were clearly out of reach of her R-Kit, but a few lingered closer to the ground and were possibly in range. She returned to the boulder and hopped on top of it, waiting for one of the low-hanging orbs to pass overhead.
One eventually did. As it drifted closer to her, she held out her R-Kit and tried to scan it, only to be met with the accursed red sweeping beam of failure. In a last ditch effort, she pushed herself to her tip toes, but it wasn't enough. She grumbled with anger and dropped back down to firm footing as it drifted away. "Ugh! Still out of reach!"
"I'm not sure that you'll be able to get one, friend. They seem intent on staying just far enough away."
She ignored the comment and tried to think of ways to get closer to the orbs. She studied the trunk of one of the nearby trees, only to abandon her plan of climbing it when she realized it was too wide and too jagged to climb safely. Another thought came to mind. "C'mere and give me a boost, would you?" she called out.
"A boost?" Kimberly questioned as if it weren't a serious suggestion.
"Yeah, lift me up. I have to be just a few feet too short reach them with my scanner."
"Didn't you just tell me to keep my hands to myself?"
"Now who's being the difficult one?" she joked. "C'mon, before these things decide to run away again."
A grimace of doubt appeared on Kimberly's face as she thought it over, but she eventually nodded in agreement. She wandered over to Andrea and knelt down, waiting to hear some sort of plan, but none came. Instead, Andrea simply stepped into her awaiting hands with her muddy, damp boots. She did what she could to lift Andrea, but she struggled to bring her up even just a few inches off of the ground.
"Friend..." she grunted. "I'm afraid you're a little too... too heavy for me..."
"Easy now," Andrea warned. An unexpected wobble quickly brought her back down to the ground.
"Nothing meant by it, just the honest truth. I'm not very strong." she explained as she looked up at the orb, spinning around the tree like a planet in orbit. To her, it definitely looked as if it were within reach if one of them managed to get off the ground. "Perhaps you could give
me a lift?"
"What makes you think I'm any stronger than you?"
"This is just an observation and not meant to be a rude comment, but... I am quite a bit lighter than you."
Andrea laughed as she navigated to the Accu-Scan app. "I'll let that one slide, but only because you explained yourself before you said it."
"I am a trained gymnast, too, don't forget! I'd be better at balance as well."
"Okay, fine! I get it!"
"Is that thing difficult to use?" Kimberly asked as she watched Andrea effortlessly navigate the intricately layered list of options, menus and popup notifications.
"Not really. The hardest part is finding and configuring the sensor system, but I'm doing that for you. I'm setting up a broad spectrum scan, should take about a minute to complete." She unstrapped the R-Kit from her wrist, handed it over and explained further, "Try to keep your arm steady and in line with that orb, then hit the 'scan' button. It'll do the rest."
"Understood... half of that, at least."
"The important part, I hope. Let's get this circus act started..." She knelt down and placed her hands to the ground. "Now, why do I have to do this? Can't Juliano?"
Kimberly unwrapped the bindings that kept her heeled sandals wrapped around her feet, then gently tossed them onto the boulder. "He still needs to keep watch for any potential dangers. All it takes is that minute of distraction for things to turn ugly."
"Right... how difficult should I expect this to be?"
"Not very. I'll worry about balancing, you worry about keeping me up. Ready?"
Andrea counted down from three before lifting with all of her might. She struggled to maintain her balance as she held Kimberly aloft, having to rely on the tree beside her to do most of the work. Meanwhile, Kimberly almost effortlessly maintained her balance in Andrea's shaky hands as she pressed the button to start the scan. With her arm held out and following the gentle motions of the orb above her, the R-Kit gathered information about the mysterious light. After just over a minute, the R-Kit let out a satisfying confirmation beep, indicating a successful scan.
"I think that's done it!" Kimberly said as she took a brief look at the screen. None of the information displayed on it made any sense to her. "I think I'm ready to come down now."
"Good! Glad to hear it!" Andrea struggled to say as her arms quivered from the stress. With little warning, Kimberly's weight shifted dramatically to the right and she felt her grasp on her friend's left foot slip. "Shoot shoot shoot
shoooot!" she shouted in panic. She held out her arms in an attempt to keep her friend from falling, but was only mildly successful at preventing it; she took the brunt of the fall as Kimberly tumbled to the ground, crashing directly on top of her. The impact was enough to knock the wind out of her and her vision flashed white for a brief second.
"Oof! Nice catch!" Kimberly giggled as she pushed herself off of Andrea. She offered her hand out to help Andrea off of the damp, leaf-blanketed ground. "I should have remembered that balance on both accounts, not just mine, is key to doing something like that. My fault for not warning you!"
"Gah... Sorry about that," she wheezed as she was pulled to her feet. She clutched her chest and coughed lightly in an effort to regain her breath. "Least neither of us got hurt, right?"
"Yes, thankfully." Kimberly undid the strap on the R-Kit and handed it back to her. "I'll let you figure out this mess of lines, numbers and words."
She leaned up against the tree and started to pore over the data that the scan gathered. Like it was for Kimberly, much of it was lost on her; graphs full of detailed energy readings, charts detailing the tiny fluctuations in lumens that the orbs were emitting, thermal readings and other over-the-top information littered the screen. With her background being based in biology, she recognized very little, and what she did recognize made little sense. However, with her background knowledge, she knew that some of the readings pointed to the possibility that the orbs were some kind of non-corporeal lifeform, an earlier theory of hers.
She knew very little about non-corporeal life forms, as it was a subject that she was only just starting to touch upon when she decided to drop out of her studies. She tried to recall what little she learned and apply it to the information in front of her, but little stuck. All she could think was that some of the graphs related to energy output vaguely resembled some human brainwave patterns that she saw in a book once, yet distinct in their own way. The thermal readings caught her attention as well; the air around the orb was about two degrees warmer than the ambient temperature, while the core of the orb was significantly lower. An interesting observation, but it told her nothing concrete.
"Hmmm..." she hummed as she continued to scroll through the pages and pages of information presented to her. "I think I'm going to have to take some time tomorrow to look over these readings more carefully, I have no idea what to make of them."
With her heeled sandals safely back on her feet, Kimberly returned to the clearing beside them and stared up at the lingering orbs. "So, no answers for what they are?"
She slumped against the tree and began to copy the most interesting of the scan results down into her notebook, clueless as to whether they were relevant to discovering the nature of the orbs or not. "Not yet."
Kimberly buried her hand into her purse and retrieved her phone, then activated the camera. She wandered around the clearing with her eyes glued to the screen of her phone, in search of the angle needed to capture the perfect selfie of herself in the glowing presence of one of the orbs. Nothing quite satisfied her as she continued her aimless wandering. "Come now..." she whispered to herself.
Andrea watched from afar, confused by Kimberly's bizarre and chaotic movements. "What are you doing?"
"I'm trying to get a picture! An opportunity like this might not come around again."
"Not a bad idea... A picture sounds great." She picked herself up off of the ground and grabbed her own phone.
"I should be able to get us both in frame if we find just the right angle," Kimberly explained as she beckoned Andrea over to join her under the lights.
"Huh? Oh!" she said awkwardly. She intended on taking photos of the orbs themselves rather than getting involved in any selfies, but didn't see the harm in it. "Yeah, sure! Why not?"
The two joined up in the middle of the clearing, arms over each other's shoulders as they tried to find a good angle for their photo. Comments about how difficult it was to find the perfect angle preceded laughter. Eventually, the perfect picture presented itself: a dim purple halo of light surrounded Andrea's head, while a golden orb drifted beside Kimberly as if it were joining in on the moment. The bright flash of light from the camera appeared to startle the orbs and they vacated the area around the two in a haphazard and quick motion.
"Look at that," Kimberly said, looking the photo over again. "You're smiling!"
She huffed at the comment and started to record a video of the orbs' movements with her phone. "I am capable of smiling, yes. I just don't like to if I don't have to."
"Such a dour girl! You have a beautiful smile!"
"
Liar," she thought, but refused to say it. "Andrea Dennison, visual report. Spritewood Forest, north of Doranshire, about 10:40 PM..." she began. "I don't know what these lights are, but they're fascinating. I've taken some readings with my R-Kit and I don't know what to make of them. I'll be including them alongside this video and my written notes so that someone more knowledgeable can go over them." She zoomed her camera in on one of the orbs. "Local legends said something about... uhh... what was it again, Kim?"
"An elderly lady told me that they were the spirits of the deceased."
"Right, spirits of the deceased. Not sure I'm ready to believe that, but hey. This is a crazy world, I've learned. The walking dead, rumors of demons prowling the village, who really knows? These lights could very well be ghosts." she said, still filming the increasingly erratic orbs as best as she could. "Anything you want to add, Kim? I'm sure you'll get an honorary mention in the report."
Kimberly thought about it, but she didn't feel it was her place to speculate. "No, I'm good."
"One of the villagers told me that someone who used to live here in Doranshire spent a lot of time studying these things. I can't remember his name specifically... it was something like William... William Selkirk, was it? Anyways, that guy left town a few years ago, so obviously I haven't been able to find him and ask him what he found out. It might be worth looking for him, he could have a lot of useful information. Unfortunately, before he left town, he said he was heading for Verdant Vale... He might not be alive anymore." She tried to think of anything else she wanted to say for her report, but couldn't. She rounded off her thoughts for whoever might view her report, then continued to document the orbs' movement in silence.
- - - - -
Even though they both told themselves that they wouldn't spend the night in the wilderness, that is exactly what they did. Andrea and Kimberly sat around the campfire they had established in the center of the clearing under the gentle light of the orbs. The fire had a soothing affect on everyone; Kimberly's worries about the dangers of the forest had faded, Andrea's concern about upsetting her friend had subsided and the orbs had nearly stopped moving entirely, hanging from the trees like luminescent fruit. The only one who wasn't relaxed was Juliano, still dedicated to his mission of protecting his master from whatever danger may be lurking in the distant shadows.
The two spent the better part of an hour chitchatting about a whole host of subjects as they watched the starlight dance of the orbs. Andrea told anecdotes from her days at university while Kimberly reminisced about her attempts at starting a career as an artist. Both were engaged and listening intently to each other's stories. They had seemingly rediscovered the magic that they felt when they first met; it dawned on them that there truly could be more to their friendship than arguments and remaining guarded if they simply relaxed and lost themselves in the ambiance.
Despite the mild temperatures of the night and her close proximity to the campfire, a chill overcame Andrea and she began to shiver. "Oof!" she said as she huddled her arms together.
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah... I just suddenly feel a little chilly, that's all..." She raised her wrist to look at her R-Kit; the temperature was a firm 16 degrees celsius, a fairly standard temperature for that time of year. "It's not even that cold... Wind must have hit me just right."
Kimberly could only shrug. "I don't feel it. I actually feel kind of hot, myself..."
"It's because you're practically sitting in that fire!"
Kimberly scooted about a foot backward. "Oh! I suppose I was."
"I don't get you sometimes," she answered with a laugh. "But I'm okay with that." She extended her hands out towards the fire, then pressed them back onto her arms in an attempt to warm up, but it did little to help. No matter the effort she made, her trembling continued.
"I wish I had a jacket for you."
"It's fine. Maybe it's a sign that we should get back to the village."
Kimberly nodded. "Mmm, yes. Mr. and Mrs. Holdt must be worried about us. We did wander off without telling them where we were going, we shouldn't have done that."
Just as they were finished packing up their makeshift camp, the glittery sound effect that had accompanied the orbs all night grew louder and more frantic. Their brightness waxed and waned in a chaotic and unpredictable fashion, their colors shifted at random among the rainbow spectrum and their movements became wild, erratic and frenzied. They cared not if they bumped into each other, into the trees or even the ground.
"Hold it," Andrea said, placing her arm out in front of Juliano as he readied his cannons to snuff out the campfire. "Something's happening. I might want to stay just a little while longer and observe."
Juliano huffed and turned his back to the fire, then resumed his dutiful patrol of the camp site's perimeter.
"Wonder what has them agitated. They've been so peaceful over the past hour..."
Kimberly shook her head. "I couldn't say. Are we even sure they're intelligent enough to understand emotions like happiness and agitation?"
"At this point, I still don't know if they even have the most basic levels of intelligence."
"True..." Kimberly yawned, covering her mouth politely as she did so. Both exhaustion and boredom were starting to set in, so she looked around in an effort to find something to occupy her mind as she waited. As she did so, she noticed something odd about the forest around her and spoke up. "Umm... Have I not been paying attention? Is it darker than it was an hour ago?"
"Darker?" The question seemed silly to Andrea until she too looked around; tree trunks that she could see when they first established camp had slipped into the shadows, while the orbs themselves seemed a touch brighter. "Huh, it is..." The only explanation was that the moon had been obscured by the clouds, so she wandered towards the far end of the camp and looked up in an effort to find it. She pointed toward the sky as she said, "Well! There's your answer!"
Kimberly rushed over and looked up. Once again, her hand met her mouth as she gasped at what she saw; the moon was completely shaded from north to south with a deep tinge of orange-crimson, with small bits hazed over by a thin layer of clouds. Against the bright disc in the sky, she saw the faint silhouettes of Zubats fluttering in the distance above them. "By the goddess... it's beautiful..."
Despite the sight being a marvelous thing to her, Andrea couldn't help but feel discomforted by it. She reckoned that it was only because of the circumstance; this had been the first lunar eclipse that she'd witnessed far away from the safety of her high rise apartment in Aughrim, or the cozy single story hovel in Goldwheat Meadows that she called home for much of her childhood. Once again, she was overtaken by a bout of shivering.
"Are you okay? You're white as a ghost!"
"I'm fine, I always look like this," she said, brushing off her friend's concern.
"No, not quite like that, friend. You look... dreadfully ill!"
She tried to change the subject away from her sickly pale skin. "Can't believe I forgot! I always keep track of when eclipses happen... Webster loves these things."
"Webster?"
"My room mate back in Aughrim. He's a big astronomy nerd." She raised her phone to the sky and began to take pictures again. "Guess I'm lucky I didn't miss it. I didn't even know about this one."
"Perhaps the moon is why these lights look like they're in a panic?"
"You think?"
"Well. The full moon has an effect on human behavior, does it not? Perhaps an eclipse might have the same effect?"
Andrea stifled a giggle. "No. There's no conclusive evidence of that, just a couple biased reports from cops in high crime areas. But... It is possible for something that isn't human to be spooked by an eclipse, I'll give you that. There's definitely evidence of
that."
"Hmm... Are you almost ready to head back yet? It's getting very late."
"Just a minute, I'm trying to figure out if there's a pattern to this madness," she said as her attention returned to the whirling orbs, in even more of a frenzy than before.
"I'm not sure that a few more minutes will unlock the mystery, friend."
She grumbled, but realized it was true. They returned to their makeshift camp and began to gather their belongings. Kimberly ordered Juliano to put out the fire, but before he could so, Andrea hurriedly picked up the lantern and turned it on. The light of the campfire went out in an instant with a hiss, sending a giant plume of smoke and steam into the air.
"Okay, let's go," Andrea said, urging the Blastoise and his master forward.
"Not yet!" Kimberly quipped as she began to stir her finger around the ashes and coals of the campfire. "Safety first. I don't want to be responsible for a wildfire, especially one in such a beautiful forest."
She nodded in agreement and waited. While she did so, she noticed the orbs above them start to bunch up like ocean fish in a swirling school. Before she could grab her phone to take another picture, they shot off towards the northwest with considerable speed, some of them carelessly smashing into trees and shattering from existence along the way. "Okay, these stupid things are a complete mystery."
As they made their final preparations for leaving the camp, an odd noise began to sweep through the forest; to the east, the heavy, drifty noise of large, flapping wings was accompanied by a high pitched screech that echoed through the trees.
She turned around in a panic and shined the lantern in the vague direction that the noise came from. "What in the..?!"
Kimberly perked up at the sound of it. "It sounded like... like..." she said, trying to think of it. The sound was familiar, but she couldn't recall where she heard it. To her, the exact cause of the noise was unimportant, as she realized what it meant; she stamped down on the wet pile of ashes in an effort to snuff out any remaining embers. "We absolutely need to leave now, I've heard that sound before."
"Good idea..."
"Juliano, keep us safe, understand? Stay extra alert, something could easily pop out of the darkness."
As they made their way away from the clearing, the sound pierced the night sky again. This time it was much clearer, allowing Kimberly to recognize it.
"Crobat..." Her pace doubled unexpectedly, threatening to leave Andrea behind. "Come now! Quickly!"
"I don't want to doubt you, but... what makes you think it's a Crobat? They're not a common sight in the wild."
"It's a sound you never forget. Nicole and I encountered one while we were in Alderney last year... it was terrifying, that noise it makes..."
"Not to mention the whole laundry list of diseases and health problems a single bite causes..."
"All the more reason we should pick up our pace."
Seconds became minutes as they hurried through the forest. The sound of flapping drew closer and closer, the source of it likely attracted by the light of their lantern, until eventually they could hear leaves swaying and branches being struck in the darkness beside them. They grew increasingly worried that they wouldn't make it to the relative safety of the village before the creature in the darkness had reached them.
"Should have listened to you, this was a stupid and careless idea!" Andrea shouted.
In front of them, masked by the darkness, a shadowy figure dropped from the sky with a monstrous thud. Andrea expertly trained the lantern's light on it within a second of it landing; a grey creature about the size of a human with large, tattered wings and piercing red eyes stood in front of them for only a brief split-second before taking off again.
"Run!" she shouted.
Their pace quickened even more as they began sprinting. Juliano, usually slow and methodical in his movements, exhibited surprising agility as he matched their speed and even surpassed them at times. His dedication to the protection of his friends was clearly evident as he stayed focused on the shadow lurking about in the trees above them; his positioning relative to the girls matched that of the creature, ready to shield them in case it tried to attack. Luckily, the creature lacked ample opportunities to do so amongst the dense trees. Eventually, the sound of the creature's wings grew more distant until it was but a faint whisper in the wind.
Eventually, fatigue caught up with Andrea and slowed her down considerably. "I think... Think we lost it..." she wheezed in a desperate attempt to catch her breath.
"I would rather not stick around to find out. We need to keep moving."
"What the heck was that thing? That didn't look like any Crobat I've ever seen, and I've read about almost every subspecies!"
"I don't know. I've never seen anything like it either."
After a moment's rest, the two were off again, and just in time; once more, the hideous shriek of the monster echoed through the woodland. They narrowly avoided the trees that they could barely see as they sprinted through the forest, ignoring the stinging grasp of the nettle bushes that they had so cautiously evaded just an hour earlier.
Up ahead of them, a dim light flickered amongst the trunks. At first, they thought that it was the welcoming safety of the village, but they soon realized that it was too dim and too low to the ground to be one of the sodium lamps that lit Doranshire's nights. The light was also mobile, swinging back and forth in a haphazard fashion. Regardless of whatever it may be, a source of light was a source of hope.
Before long, they found the source: a hooded figure in ragged leather clothing carried an archaic-looking lantern constructed of glass and dull, grimy brass. A pungent candle that smelled of burning animal fat hissed away within. The hooded figure stopped in its tracks and put its hand out, urging them to stop. "Careful!" a soft, feminine voice said from within the hood.
"There's a Crobat out there, lady!" Andrea shouted. She took a moment to slow down and catch her breath again. "You gotta get out of here!"
"Aye, I've been hearing it. I've been hearing you, too. That is no Crobat, I'm afraid. Come! I can lead you to safety!"
"How far is the village?
Where is the village? Kim and I have been running in circles it feels like."
"Your village is in the direction you've been coming from."
"Oh for cryin'--"
The woman made a gesture for them to follow. "There is a cabin nearby that we can shelter in."
"Cabin?" she asked. She put two and two together: knowledge of the land, the rugged leather clothing, a forest cabin, it all added up and clicked in her head. "You some sort of hunter?"
The unearthly screech echoed through the forest again.
"You can ask questions later," the figure warned. "If you value your life, you will follow." The figure abruptly turned around and started to rush away.
"I don't like this... What should we do?" Kimberly asked.
"I don't know, but that cabin sounds like our best hope," Andrea said. She cupped her hands together and called out, "Hold up, lady! We should stick together!"
With fear in their minds and having no idea where they were, or even what direction they were traveling in, the three reluctantly agreed to follow the mysterious figure. While Juliano kept a watchful eye on the tree tops, the girls quietly exchanged questions with each other about their newfound acquaintance: who was she? What was she doing in the forest in the middle of the night? What did she mean when she said the creature flying in the darkness wasn't a Crobat?
- - - - -
"Just over here," the hooded figure said, guiding the three through the thinning grove towards a clearing.
Andrea shined her lantern around. A moderately sized cabin constructed of crudely cut timber and brittle plaster sat in the middle of the small clearing, it's view of the sky largely obscured by the thick canopy around it. The land around the cabin was littered with all sorts of junk; old barrels, wooden boxes, a crumbling well, a rickety tool shed, some benches and a rust-covered anvil. The area looked oddly welcoming despite the circumstances and the rustic nature of it.
As they approached the cabin, both Andrea and Kimberly took note of the various fur pelts scattered around the area; some hung from ropes in the trees, while others were nailed to the trees themselves. Most seemed useless to a fur trader, being stained with blood, heavily tangled or caked in mud. Nearly every pelt was a deep black or grey in color and sported markings and patterns that allowed Andrea to quickly identify them: Mightyena.
"Yeah, this lady's gotta be a hunter..." Andrea commented quietly.
"Those poor things..." Kimberly added.
"Sometimes hunting is in the best interest in the ecosystem."
The hooded figure stopped at the front door of the cabin and struggled with the archaic handle before forcing the door open with her shoulder. The inside of the cabin was just as rustic as the outside, but much more welcoming; a large fire pit sat in the center of the room, with still-active embers sparking under a small cast iron pot filled to the brim with bubbling, heavenly smelling broth. Four hand-crafted wicker chairs surrounded the fire pit, with tables, shelves, crates and barrels hugging the walls. The thick stench of hickory incense hung heavily in the room.
The figure reached for the hood atop her head and pulled it back. The identity of the mysterious figure was a surprise to both of them: she was a young woman, likely no older than either Andrea or Kimberly, with a soft and friendly face that lacked any sort of imperfection or scarring, an oddity considering the rustic lifestyle she appeared to lead. Even in the harsh orange lighting from the fire pit, the blue of her eyes was easily apparent. Angelic-looking blonde hair hung over her eyes, draping over her leather clothing and reaching towards her hips.
"Wow," Kimberly instinctively whispered as she studied the woman's appearance.
"Please, have a seat," the woman said, gesturing towards the chairs beside the fire pit.
"Thanks for taking us in..." Andrea said as she sat down. "What the heck was that thing? You said it wasn't a Crobat... didn't look like a Crobat."
"It sounded like one, though," Kimberly added.
"Demons prowl these woods during the night of the blood moon," the woman said as she placed a roughly cut branch onto the dying fire.
Andrea perked up at the word. "Demons?"
She stirred the broth within the pot. "Monstrous beasts of the night. Winged terrors with horns, rippled grey skin. Unearthly, unholy creatures that prey on the weak and unaware."
Andrea combed the depths of her memories of her biology studies; the description the woman offered didn't match anything that she had read about. She knew of Pok?mon with wings, Pok?mon with horns and Pok?mon with grey skin, but none that had all three. The closest example she could come up with was the long extinct prehistoric monster known as Aerodactyl, but the likelihood of them finding one in modern Lanark was next to none. "Hmm. Won't this...
thing come for us here? What makes this cabin so safe? I could probably kick that door in and I'm not very strong."
"A ward of protection is in place."
"A ward?" Andrea asked.
"Like... magic?" Kimberly added.
Andrea shook her head. "Don't be silly."
She sampled a bit of the broth and nodded with approval before answering, "Forgotten methods of protection from centuries ago, developed by the Tracker's Guild. Did you notice the pelts among the trees? The herbs at the bases of the trunks?"
"I did," Andrea answered. "What are you? A hunter, fur trapper?" A look around the room showed an extensive collection of bundled herbs, dried herbs and herbs packaged in jars and boxes. "A botanist, even?"
"Hunter, mainly," she said. "The village council employs me to keep the local predator population in check. Experience and reading have taught me that these pelts serve as an excellent warning to the more... difficult creatures of the forest. The herbs serve a similar purpose for the others."
"Huh... I do remember reading about a 'Tracker's Guild' back when I studied history in school... Said something about how they were hired to take care of problems like Ursarings and Rhydons back in the medieval times. They used all sorts of methods to protect villages, farmsteads and merchant caravans, right?"
She nodded. "Over time, the threats have changed. Trackers aren't as common as they used to be, nor are our services as necessary as they used to be. But if you look closely, you can find us."
"Hmm. Interesting! I didn't know you guys were still around." Andrea said. "Sounds like you know a lot about this this subject. When would it be safe for us to return to the village?"
"Dawn," she answered.
Andrea grumbled at the thought and leaned back in her chair. "Ugh... Mr. and Mrs. Holdt are gonna be maaaaaad..."
"I'm sure they'll understand," Kimberly said.
"Are you two hungry?"
Andrea shook her head and accompanied it with a negative hand gesture, while Kimberly indicated that she was with a nod. "What kind of soup is that?"
"Wolfsbite stew."
"Wolfsbite? I'm not familiar with it."
The woman approached the pot and stirred it some more. She brought the spoon above the surface, bringing with it a cube of firm, crimson meat. "Diced Mightyena flanks, pepper, rosemary and potato in bone stock. No sense in letting my catches go to waste. Mightyena is quite the delicacy after you get used to it."
Kimberly grimaced at the mention of the ingredients. "Oh... that wouldn't work for me. I'm a vegetarian."
Her eyebrow raised with curiosity. "Hmm... Are you... I do have some vegetables lying around, we can make something for you." She turned to Andrea again. "Sure you're not hungry, miss?"
Once again, Andrea declined the offer.
She motioned for Kimberly to follow her. "Join me in the kitchen, we can go through my vegetables and see what you might like."
Kimberly and the woman disappeared into another room just beyond the fire pit, while Andrea took the time to inspect her surroundings some more. A look through the various crates and barrels scattered around the room offered a look into the woman's rustic lifestyle; more herbs, coils of twine, rusted scrap metal, glass vials filled with various colors of sand and powders, swatches of exquisite fur, first aid supplies and bundled leather were all neatly categorized throughout the containers.
A table in the corner of the room caught her attention next. Along the edges of the table was a large collection of melted candle stumps, blackened by soot from extensive use. Papers from a variety of little villages and hamlets from around the country spoke about hunting contracts and licenses, indicating that the Spritewood wasn't the woman's only hunting ground. A peculiar looking book with yellowed pages sat in the center of the table, open to a faded sketch of an owl clasping a key, flanked on both sides by roses. Pictograms that appeared to be from a foreign language were scrawled onto the page in burgundy ink.
She reached for her phone and took a photo of the page. "Such a beautiful drawing..."
Her attention drifted to a wine rack beside the table. Most of the bottle slots were empty with the exception of three. Curious, she pulled one of the bottles from the rack and inspected it. The bottle's label indicated that it was a craft wine by the name of Heart Attack, an apricot wine that Andrea had grown very fond of during her final year at university. The intoxicating aroma quickly overpowered her as she removed the cork from the nearly empty bottle.
"Mmm... Heart Attack! How I miss you..." she mumbled as she placed the bottle back onto the rack. "This girl's got some good taste."
Next to the wine rack was a window that offered a glimpse out into the darkened clearing. Looking outside brought the flying creature that had chased them back to the front of her mind. Even though she didn't see much when she shined her lantern on it, she couldn't shake the image from her head.
"What the heck was that thing... What the heck is
anything?" she muttered to herself. "First that skeleton monster, and now... a 'demon'? There is something seriously weird about this forest... Starting to think that maybe Dr. Reiland was right, I really
did need Tamara--"
The sound of metal hinges grinding against each other, followed by the loud sound of wood smashing into stone erupted from the other room, shattering the silent ambience of the cabin. A sharp scream and a cry for help came next.
"Ahh! Help! Get off o--" Kimberly's voice cried out before being muffled.
Adrenaline spiked within Andrea. She immediately dropped to the floor and grabbed Juliano's Master Ball, which rested next to the chair that Kimberly had been seated at, then rushed across the room towards the doorway. She stopped just short of entering the other room, taking a brief second to steady her nerves and her breathing. Without wasting too much time, she peaked her head around the door frame.
She was greeted by a horrific sight as she entered the room: rather than the charming young woman that they had spent the past half hour with, a withered old hag was in her place. She appeared to be centuries old, with rippled and ragged skin hanging off of her frail-looking figure. Her eyes were hollow and barely visible under the tangled mess of white, wiry hairs that sprouted from her brow, themselves hidden by the ratty and unkempt yellowish-gray hair that hung off of her spotty, partially bald head. Behind her, a door out into the forest was wide open.
"Don't worry about your friend..." the hideous woman rasped with an ancient-sounding, hoarse voice that echoed around her. "You'll be joining her soon enough!" She raised her decrepit hand and sparks of orange light began to arc between her bony fingers.
The strange sight spurred Andrea to action immediately. Thinking only of Kimberly's safety and with careless disregard for her own, she stood firm for a brief second, then charged as aggressively at the miserable wretch of a woman as she could; she lowered her head and rammed the full force of her shoulder into the woman, sending her flying across the kitchen and into a cabinet filled with herbs, gemstones and wooden dishes. She stepped over the battered old woman and rushed out of the open door.
"Kim!" she called out, her voice echoing through the silent forest. "Where are you?!"
"Get your hands off of me!" Kimberly's voice shouted in the distance. It was obvious that she was struggling against a kidnapper, but Andrea couldn't see anything.
"God
darn it!" she angrily shouted. She gripped the Master Ball tightly and tossed it into the air.
With a burst of bubbles and bright flash of light that briefly lit up the forest, Juliano appeared in the sky and dropped to the ground with a graceful thud. He turned his back to her and hunched over a tiny bit, then let out a deep grunt.
"What are you waiting for? Someone took Kim, we've gotta find her!"
He lowered to all fours and grunted again, followed by an angry growl.
It dawned on her that he was trying to give her a ride. She jumped onto the hard and jagged shell of the Blastoise and wrapped her hands around his shoulder-mounted cannons for a bit of stability. Before she was ready for it, Juliano stood up and rushed into the forest as quickly as he could. "Woah!" she shouted as she tried to stay on top of him. "Kim, we're coming!"
"Heeeeelp!" Kimberly's voice called out again.
Juliano's heading changed to match the direction that Kim's voice came from. Nearly every aspect of the ride atop the Blastoise's back threatened to throw her off, from the sudden turns, the collisions with the trees and the jumps over fallen logs. Yet through it all, her white-knuckled grip on his steel cannons kept her on top of him.
"I don't know what to expect... but be ready for a fight." she warned. "That lady... what the heck was she?"
Kimberly's pleas for help grew closer and closer; her captor hadn't gotten very far with her. A source of light appeared in the distance, shrouded by the silhouette of two men struggling to carry a young woman away. Juliano's pace quickened even further as he pushed himself to his highest limits. Within a dozen seconds, he was on top of them.
He skidded to a stop and shook his shell violently, carelessly throwing Andrea off, then blitzed off to the side. He curved around for a flanking position, charging with the full force of his weight into the captor that was guiding the way with a lantern. The man was lifted off of the ground and slammed hard into a tree, a grisly crunching sound echoing through the forest as Juliano dropped the limp body to the ground.
The Blastoise immediately turned around and locked eyes with the remaining two kidnappers, who had dropped Kimberly to the forest floor in a hurry. Blastoise's weren't known for their emotional expressions, but the two could see it in his eyes: he was pissed.
One of the captors reached into his jacket and pulled out a long, curved knife, then fiercely charged at the Blastoise while shouting at the top of his lungs. As Juliano turned around to deflect the incoming attack, the man raised the knife high into the air, then brought it down as hard as he could. To his surprise, the knife simply bounced off of Juliano's shell with a faint burst of sparks.
Juliano used his momentum to his advantage to sweep the man off of his feet with his broad tail, then put his massive foot onto the man's throat. He fixed a cruel gaze onto the last of the captors and let out a monstrous, bellowing roar that shook the air around him. The final captor, having seen how easily the Blastoise had dealt with his comrades, saw the futility in fighting and ran off into the forest without delay.
Juliano reached down and wrapped his clawed fingers around the man's neck, lifting him off of the ground. The man struggled valiantly against Juliano's crushing grip, but he couldn't break free. All he could do was flail his legs wildly, tickling Juliano's chest with weak kicks until he finally got the bright idea to spit into his face. His patience was already thin and that last act shattered it. With a forceful overhead toss, the man was thrown into the darkness, colliding with the ground with an audible thud. Gurgling groans of agony came from the darkness.
Meanwhile, Andrea had managed to pull Kimberly aside to safety during the scuffle. "Kim? Kim! Are you okay?" she asked.
Kimberly couldn't offer a coherent answer; she didn't appear to even be aware that Juliano had intervened and taken care of the kidnappers. Her breathing was erratic, her mind was running wild and she could hardly contain herself from yelling for help.
"Listen to me!" Andrea shouted as she vigorously shook her friend. "We have to get out of here,
NOW."
Unfortunately, the energetic shaking did little to bring Kimberly back to reality. She'd calmed down, but only ever so slightly; she still continued to quiver uncontrollably and gibber incoherent words, but at least the screaming had ceased.
"Juliano, come here," Andrea ordered. "This stupid forest, I've had it! We need to get back to town, and fast. Carry her if you have to."
He approached and knelt down in front of his master, gently patting her on the shoulder, but it did little to calm her nerves. He extended her arms outward and picked her up.
"Please, please... let this map work..." Andrea said as she navigated through her R-Kit. Much to her relief, the map showed that they weren't too far from the village. She knelt down and picked up the kidnapper's fallen lantern, then pointed to the southeast and urged Juliano to lead them back to the safety of Doranshire.
- - - - -
"Set her down here..." Andrea said, guiding Juliano to a bench that sat in the center of the Doranshire's empty and silent commercial street. Not a soul lingered in the streets and the sky was empty of the orbs that had graced it just a few hours earlier. The only sign of life was the flickering, buzzing neon sign that advertised an ATM at the convenience store down the road.
Juliano set his panicked master down on the bench and sat on the ground in front of her. Her breathing finally seemed to steady as her eyes met with his, and she whispered his name repeatedly in an effort to comfort herself.
Andrea sat down next to her. "You okay?"
"Where..." she muttered as she looked around. Panic surged through her veins again. "Where are they!? Are they gone?"
"Yeah. Juliano made sure of that."
She looked around some more. The darkness obscured her vision, with only a single street lamp lighting the area around them in a harsh-yet-dim orange glow. "So we're..."
Andrea nodded. "Yeah, we're back in Doranshire."
The words of comfort were enough to break her already shaky nerves. She reached out and grabbed ahold of Andrea, wrapping her arms tightly around her, then proceeded to wail loudly and uncontrollably. "Oh thank the goddess... Thank you..." were the only words that she had the ability to form.
"Hey, shh shh shhhhh... It's going to be okay! I'm going to keep you safe, I promise..."
Juliano glared at Andrea. He knew those words were a lie.
"I can't thank you enough... I would have--"
Andrea placed her finger on her lips and interrupted her. "Hey! Don't even think of it like that. We got out of there alive and that's what matters."
"Thank you..."
As they embraced each other, Andrea saw some movement out of the corner of her eye; a portly and solid looking man, clad in the characteristic green and white uniform of the Lanark Police Force, was advancing in their direction. His big bushy mustache and round, ruddy cheeks painted the picture of a cheerful protector and put Andrea at ease.
"Evenin'!" his thick, burly voice called out in a friendly manner. "I could year you two wailin' from clear across town. What's the trouble?"
"Good... Let me do the talking, okay?" she quietly whispered.
Kimberly nodded as she tried to regain her composure.
The officer turned his flashlight on and shined it in their faces to get a good look at them. "What are you two doing up so late? Just get out of Black Hog? Need me to walk you home?"
"No, we're... we... we need help," she pleaded. "We were camping in the forest and..."
The officer patiently waited for her to finish her thought, but she never did. "And?"
She thought long and hard about what she was about to say, worried that it wouldn't be taken seriously. "Something attacked us, and I don't know what."
"Try your best. What would this 'thing' be? A Mightyena, maybe?"
"No, it was... I... I don't know how to explain it, but there's a... a witch out in that forest! And a... a demon! A bat thing!"
The officer put his hands to his hips and shifted his weight onto his other leg, readying himself for yet another of the wild and fantastic stories he'd heard over the past few weeks. "Uh huh. Demons and witches."
"That's the only way I can describe her. We were out camping and... a giant bat thing swooped down, started chasing us. We got away from it and that's when we met her... She was so young and beautiful... She claimed she was a local hunter working for the village."
The officer continued to nod as he listened to her story. "Local hunter? Huh... don't know of any women who hunt on these lands... Tell me more about this lady. What makes you say she's a witch?"
"She offered to bring us to her cabin, to protect us from the bat. When we got there, she... she turned into this hideous monster. She looked like she was hundreds of years old! Almost like a corpse, but she was standing there, threatening me!"
"Right..." he muttered to himself.
"That's when the men barged in and took Kim away!"
The officer's posture straightened and the expression on his face changed from bemused to concerned. "Kim?" he asked.
"Her," she said as she rested her hand on Kimberly's shoulder.
In an instant, the officer's posture relaxed again. Once again, his interest in her wild story faded.
"Me and this Blastoise chased her kidnappers down before they got away. We scared one of them off, and the other two... I don't know, it all happened so fast. They didn't chase after us, but..." She picked up the lantern she had taken from the kidnappers. "This belonged to one of them."
The officer reached out and grabbed the lantern. He noted the cracked glass and the squishy candle within. "Looks pretty old and beat up... Never seen one with a candle in it before... Curious..." he mumbled. He eyed her suspiciously, once again shining the flashlight in her face. "You sure you're not drunk?"
"Absolutely. I've been sober for almost five months. I'll take whatever sobriety test you want."
He shook his head and let out a sigh. "I might regret this, but... Why don't you come down to the station? We'll get this whole thing straightened out, see if there's anything about this wild story of yours that makes sense."
"Do you believe any of it?"
"Well, uhh... Your witch story? No. Been getting a lot of reports about that lately, none of them have checked out. But those kidnappers you talked about... We
have had a few girls your age go missing over the past couple of months, this is definitely something we're going to have to look at, even if your credibility is... W-we'll look at it, that's all I'm saying."
She leaned in towards Kimberly and spoke softly. "You hear that? We'll be at a police station, we'll definitely be safe there."
He motioned for the two to stand up and follow him. "Alright, let's go before you wake up the whole village! Station's just up the street. We'll need to get some official statements and some paperwork done." He took one look at Juliano and offered a polite nod. "Oh, and uh... recall this Blastoise, would you? Town ordinance, there's a curfew on Pok?mon past 11 PM. I understand if you called him out for your protection, but I'll handle that from here."