|
Kellehendros -> RE: The Hallows Inn (2/1/2015 20:36:12)
|
Marietta watched the arrow on its flight, the shaft winging skyward. It was a good shot. The hunter knew it was a good shot, as though the arrow was guided by the hand of providence itself. Her teeth flashed in a wolfish grin as the projectile bit into its target, lodging itself in the flying Nazha’s stomach, missing Lily by only a few inches. The darkspawn, with even more disdain than the other Nazha had shown for their injuries, plucked the arrow out with a gout of blood, snapping it and casting the pieces away in disgust.
The half-elf closed her eyes, letting out a slow exhalation as the darkspawn standing above her burst apart, becoming a swarm of hellish screeching bats that beat their way skyward, flying after his bleeding master. Blue eyes opened a moment later, the smile fading from Marietta’s face. She rose slowly, gathering her things together and checking to ensure her gear was intact. Several of the arrows in her quiver had broken as a result of her unusual and forced transit, but her bow was intact, and everything else was in place.
Turning, the hunter surveyed the scene with a quick sweep of her eyes, taking in the battles as the remaining darkspawn fled or were dispatched. The guards had suffered terribly, and those she could see were either down and unmoving, or nursing wounds. She nodded once, to herself, since there was no one else nearby, arriving at the only decision she could under the circumstances. Pivoting, the half-elf moved towards the still open gate, and the trail she had seen forming, only to halt at the sound of a voice behind her.
“Marietta, wait!” Drex hurried up to her, clutching a long oak staff in his hands. “You’re alright, thank goodness. Where are you going?”
Marietta frowned slightly, smoothing the expression away after a moment with years of practice. “You shouldn’t be here, Drex. You’re a carpenter, not a guard.”
“Well,” he frowned himself, glancing around. “we might need a few more guards after this…” The man shook his head, looking back at the hunter and refusing to be distracted. “Where are you going?”
The half-elf sighed, her voice soft. “They took the girl, Drex. I’m going to follow them.”
“Marietta, that… that thing was flying.”
“It was also bleeding, Drex,” Marietta returned gently, “I can follow the trail.”
“That’s insane. You saw what these things did, what they’re capable of. You can’t go out there alone!”
The hunter looked back towards the town for a moment. “There’s no time to waste, Drex, and if not me then who?”
“Let me come with you then.”
Marietta looked at the carpenter, putting a gentle smile on her face. “You’re a good man, Drex, but this is beyond you. Go home to your wife.”
He scowled, stamping a foot irritably. “And what about you? Suppose you find them, then what? You’ll be alone out there, outnumbered, with no one to help you!”
“When I find them, I’ll come back. Someone needs to track them to their lair, find out what they are intending to do. I can’t wait for the others to sort themselves out. I’m ready now, and the trail is cooling as we speak. If you have to do something, find Sloan and tell him what happened here. He’ll know what to do.”
Drex bit his lip, looking from the half-elf to the distant inn, and back again. “Marietta, please, this isn’t your job.”
“But it is, Drex, it is. I’m a Sentinel, and this is what I am.” Without waiting for a reply, Marietta turned and trotted out the gate, eyes flicking over the ground and picking up the trail from the blood she had seen cascading from the darkspawn’s wound.
She was a Sentinel, as she had told the Nazha, the last standing against the Night. Her hand lifted, outlining the form of the pendant beneath her clothing. The title would hold no meaning to anyone here in Blackwater, even Kitsondra with all her knowledge and contacts. There had only ever been five of them, five children with mad dreams of honor and glory.
Ten years ago there had been a darkness, an inn, a little girl. Now, her closest friends mouldered in their graves, and she still heard their voices, calling out for vengeance, reminding her of her duty. Dead, they lingered on in her heart, and it was her heart that whispered to her that this was right, that this was what must be. Marietta loped through the woods, sharp eyes flashing over the foliage, only marginally hindered by the dark.
Ten years ago they had failed, and there had been only defeat, only death and horror and flight. She had stripped away all the extraneous material of her life, and rebuilt a foundation of steel upon the ruins of everything she had known, tempered by suffering and an encounter with a blackness that still stained her soul. Now there was another inn, another little girl. Whatever the personal cost to herself might be, Marietta intended to pay it. It was no less than what she owed her dearest friends, those she had loved so long ago.
Drawing an arrow, Marietta set it upon the string and kept moving along the faint trail, memories of the past bubbling up unbidden. There was blood, so much blood, and a woman’s soft whisper. “I would bear a thousand wounds, and die ten thousand deaths if each would buy the safety of an innocent life.”
|
|
|
|
