[2004/05] Mired Hearts

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Solclaim, 15 P.Y.

Quoted Fiction at Turbine

"There's trouble," Antius said, leading Hendac into the room.

"When is there not?" Elysa responded, motioning to a set of chairs and flashing him a meager smile. She had been looking out her window, running her fingers over the scar in the center of her chest. Even though it had healed it burned still. Often she thought that the burning was all in her mind, knowing that out there somewhere, someone had wanted her dead. She put the thought from her mind and turned toward the table and chairs where Antius and Hendac now waited.

"What is it?" she asked, sitting in a chair beside Antius.

Hendac pushed a small leather scrollcase toward the High Queen. She reached across and took the case up. It was too large to be made by Isparians and the leather was tanned to be softer. It bore a resemblance to the hunting bags carried by the Tonk of Marae Lassel. Elysa recalled seeing the bags only recently; hunters from Marae Lassel had asked to hunt on Dereth and issue challenges to the Ispar tribe. They had set up a few camps across Osteth, and even near Ayan Baqur.

She undid the clasp, a stone buckle. The buckle was heavy and shaped squarely, Lugian-made. Lord Kresovus had expressed some anger over the continued slaughter of his warriors by some Isparians, but there had been fewer skirmishes in recent weeks and the matter seemed to be at rest. The only other group that could have made this was the renegade force that had splintered away from the Virindi.

"Renegades," she read the first few lines. "They mean to join with these new creatures?"

"Apparently," Antius said. Beside him Hendac bobbed his head, the furrow of his brow displaying his displeasure. "There's more."

Elysa finished reading and Hendac produced a folded scrap of parchment from within the folds of his leathers. He rose and walked to Elysa's other side and placed the parchment on the table. He pointed two fingers to his eyes and then tapped the parchment. Elysa knew what he meant.

"How did they build this?" Elysa asked as she stared at the drawing. It was done in Hendac's hand and showed a fortress of some kind. It was set against the side of a plateau with two mammoth stone sentinels towering on the forward edges of the flat land above.

"It's unclear, but Hendac has assured me that the structures appear to be identical to those at Candeth Keep. We visited the keep and found that one of the guards had gone missing recently. A Lugian, Okret." Antius paused. "He'd been stationed there since the work was first started on the outpost. His departure, and the discovery of this fortress well, they seem to be more than coincidence."

Elysa nodded.

"The Blackmire Swamp is being overrun by the Burun, Elysa. This new race has already driven most of the Mosswarts from there. I've no love for the Mosswarts, but they're being slaughtered." He paused. "That missive is from the fort in the Direlands. Muldaveus and Niarltah want to join forces with this new race, and if they do who knows which race they'll displace next."

"I know, Antius. We need to stop them. I'll speak with Kresovus." She paused and folded the parchment before handing it back to Hendac. "Perhaps he'll be willing to send agents of his own into the Renegade camp." It sickened her to say those words. She had prided herself on being honest and forthright throughout her life, now she was resorting to deceit. "We'll do what we can to keep the Renegades and Burun apart."

Elysa stood and walked back to her window, rubbing the wound on her chest.

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The sound of breaking bones and tearing flesh filled the small cavern. Okret had volunteered for this assignment because he knew that Muldaveus and Niarltah would look favorably on him should he perform the task well. As he stood in the entrance of this fetid cave, he began to think this had been an error in judgment. Cautiously he hoisted the great stone chest onto his shoulder and proceeded deeper into the grotto. Wails filled his ears and grew louder, serving as a beacon and guiding him deeper into the living cave.

The ground was moist, spongy and covered in a thin film of yellow slime. The place reeked of the swamp and something even fouler than decay. He paused to look at the peculiar sight of a phyntos wasp firmly stuck onto a small pike. He placed the stone chest on the ground and knelt to study the craft of the pike.

A set of yellow eyes blinked in the darkness of a nearby tunnel. The burun hunkered low, revealing two other sets of eyes. They moved just into the light of the wide cavern where Okret knelt and gnashed their rows of jagged teeth. In unison, the three let out a growl and screech like nothing Okret had ever heard.

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