Magdi peered up at Samuel, inspecting the miraculously re-skinned grazes on his face.
"Which way?" she enquired.
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Magdi peered up at Samuel, inspecting the miraculously re-skinned grazes on his face.
"Which way?" she enquired.
Samuel notices Magdi looking at his healed wounds, and self-consciously touches his face, remembering the blood and pain he had endured a short while ago. When she spoke, he snapped out of his painful memory, then ponders the question for a moment, before reaching a decision I think, that we may have already discovered what we were looking for in the form of those boxes and those two rooms in general. I mean, if you think about it, how many more secret rooms could there be in this place? I mean, we might find some treasure if we proceed, but, I'm not sure I would want it, it would feel to much like looting a grave to me. No, I think we should head back to the little one, take him with us and travel to Navek, where we can ask questions of people, including my mentor, Sirlaith Winters. After that, we can plot out a better course of action. I have no intention of letting this slip by. Sunpeak was my home, damnit, and one that I loved. I may have failed to protect it and it's citizens, but I'll be thrice-damned to the abyss itself before I give up on figuring out why what happened here happened. I owe it to all of the innocent people who lost their lives due to this atrocity. Finally he stopped speaking, a bit winded from his speech, but with a fierce look of determination in his eyes, as his gaze swept the others in their misfit, ragtag group.
Sorra nods. "We should go get Jory," she says. She hopes he isn't too afraid, waiting there in that strange room. She grips her sickle and looks to the others.
Magdi wiped her nose on her sleeve, suddenly feeling very heavy and exhausted at the mention of the word "home". Sunpeak was everything that she'd ever wanted, and now it was gone. The world felt cold and hopeless. What was the point in knowing why it had been taken away from her, if it didn't change the fact that she'd still never get it back?
She wanted to curl up in front of the fire and fall asleep in the chair next to Hywellen's while he recounted another dry account of the breakdown of the day's takings. Once he realised she'd nodded off, he'd toss a blanket over her and neglect to turn her out for the night. The next morning he'd bring her a bowl of porridge and tell her off for squatting where she might get in the way of the guests. She'd apologise, he'd say an apology wouldn't cut it, she'd call him an unfeeling lout and then they'd both go about their business for the day with the pleasant reassurance that all was as it should be in the world.
Magdi smiled to herself. Sunpeak as she knew it couldn't really be gone, that was absurd. Things were tough now, but they couldn't stay that way forever. She just had to ride it out.
She waited for Sam to finish and let Sorra respond first.
"I agree," she told the others. "We've left him by himself for long enough now, I think. But we're not marching off to Navek with him until he's had a proper meal. Growing boys don't march on a single piece of bread." She buttoned up her coat and began to inch back along the little ledge. "Stuff picked out from the snow ought to be fine - I have a spell that can improve the taste a little if necessary - but he'll need a round meal to keep him going." She reached over and crawled onto the floor at the end of the pit, putting very little trust into her sense of balance. Her ears were still ringing.
"I'm still at a loss as to what to do about his family and friends... I suppose shouting out for them when we're all outside would fall under the heading of 'bad ideas'...?"
Samuel ponders their dilemma concerning Jory and his parents for a bit, unsure as to how to go about looking for them. Finally, after several minutes have passed in silence, he speaks "Well, first off, we need to back to Jory. Then once we are, we should ask him if he and his parents had any plans to meet up somewhere? If I remember right, he said they had split up to look around the city, he was with his friends. So, there's a good chance, if they survived, they are waiting somewhere for Jory. If not, we can do a quick search of wherever Jory says they were heading when they split up. If they aren't there, well, I'm not really sure what to do. Hopefully he has family back in Navek as well that can take him in if need be. Samuel finishes, looking around with a rather sad, pensive look on his face as he imagines the worst case scenario concerning Jory's parents.
Sorra ponders the more likely alternative.
"It might well be better not to find them," she says, thinking hollowly about some of the bodies they'd passed. A part of her wonders what she'd do if she saw any of them--really saw them--dead. She swallows and pushes the thought away. "But I guess..." She shakes her head. "We should go get him, in any case. He's been alone for a while now."
You head back through the twisting corridors and to the room where you left Jory. Little enough happens on the way back. The door is still shut when you arrive, and you can see a tiny bit of light leaking out from underneath the door.
Feeling very silly, Sorra follows Eztra's instructions about the door. She knocks five times and says, "applesauce," and then waits for a response.
The door opens and Jory pokes his head out from behind it. "What'd you find? Did you find my mom 'n my dad? Did you find some food? Did the rocks help? Did you see anything bad?"
The intense feeling of relief at seeing Jory safe and sound was fleeting. Magdi's heart sunk at his questions. She looked back at the others in the faint hopes that one of them would reveal a miraculous solution.
"We stayed indoors because we didn't want to leave you for too long," she replied, eventually. "We found another hideout: a place where some strange person had been keeping some odd things. They had a tiny cage full of dozens of rats, and scores of little boxes that shouted strange things, very loudly in all sorts of voices at once if you opened them. And the outside wall had been torn off of their bedroom."
The bad things that they'd seen, she didn't want to tell him, had mostly been outside. He'd have to find out soon enough though. They couldn't take him back to Navek without taking him outside.
"How have you been?" she asked him, swiping at a cut on the bridge of her nose before looking at him again.
"I drew a picture while you were gone," Jory says with pride. He points at the wall over the bed, where you can see a rather angular, almost stick-figure like drawing. It seems to be you all and Jory, below some sort of spiky red thing that might be a fire in a fireplace. Next to the drawing, there is childish writing in the Erlisan script. It reads 'Safe in Navek with friends'
Magdi shuffled forward to inspect the boy's work.
http://i1196.photobucket.com/albums/...ithfriends.jpg
"Look at this, guys!" she exclaimed to the others, pointing at the drawing "It's us!"
She noted Jory had omitted to include his parents in the portrait, and his other Sunpeak Spire friends.
Samuel smiles broadly at Jory as they walk into the room, and smiles even more upon seeing the drawing he made of them all. "That's fine work there Jory, it looks just like us! Hey little buddy, if you don't mind me asking, was there perhaps a specific spot you were supposed to meet up with your parents once you were done looking around in Sunpeak Spire? You know, like a bakery, or a street corner, or anything like that?" Samuel continues to smile, trying his best not to show how worried he is over all of this.
Jory shakes his head slowly. "I dunno. But my mum and dad are smart. They know the way back to Navek. They'll come back." He says this with a goodly amount of conviction, his ignorance clear.
Behind you, near the doorway, Eztra looks lost for words. How do you explain to a small child that he may well never see his parents or siblings again?
Magdi perched on the bed and put a hand to her head. This was never going to be easy.
"Jory," she said gently, "there was a reason we stayed indoors while we were away." She peered at him almost between her fingers. "Very bad things happened outside last night. And there wasn't very much sense in who they happened to: there are some things even smart people can't be ready for."
She tried to remember when she'd first been given "the talk" as a child. It seemed too long ago.
"A lot of people died last night." Perhaps a little blunt, but there was little use in beating around the bush. Unless they blindfolded him, he'd have to know soon enough. They could delay it for a while ensconsed here in the hideout, but as Sorra had pointed out, giving the boy false hope was hardly fair. "Did you ever have a friend or relative in Navek who died, Jory?"
This was a terrible way for him to learn about it if he hadn't. Finding out about death from a crazy old homeless woman? A goblin homeless woman? Still, it was a lesson that needed to be learned.
"No. I've seen the hogs at butcherin' time. They make an awful sound, you know. Dad said they were afraid of the axe." Jory curls in on himself, looking even smaller than before. "I dreamed I was a hog once. I was so scared.... Magdi, are...are you saying that-that Mum an' Dad are....are they?" There is a plea in his voice. Though Jory seems to get, intellectually, what might have happened, he doesn't seem to be able to voice it.
Magdi tucked herself into a more ball-like form too. This wasn't a comfortable conversation. She sniffed, then scooted a little closer to the boy, putting a hand on the mattress to invite him to shuffle up for a hug if he wanted.
"It's very likely, yes. I'm sorry." Her voice was thick but she was careful not to cry. They weren't her parents.
"We're going to do everything we can to protect you." she told him.
This was effectively putting words in the others' mouths, but she sensed that her friends would probably be at least as incandescent as she would be if anything tried to get at Jory.
Jory seems to be feeling at least a little better after a few minutes. "Nuthin's gonna get us, right? An you're gonna take me home to Granny, right?"
Truth be told, Magdi couldn't really afford to make any promises to the poor boy: she would make a rather pathetic protector, after all. Still, telling him as much wasn't going to make him feel any better, and she was determined to do all she could for him.
"Yes we'll take you to your Granny," she said firmly, "But you'll have to show us where she lives once we get to Navek, ok?"
She paused.
"How did you get to Sunpeak Spire in the first place, Jory?" she asked, out of curiosity more than anything else. "did you walk here?"
Jory wrinkles his nose. "Dad got them big ol' shaggy mountain ponies to ride. I rode all by myself. Horses'll slip," he says, as if this is some big revelation, rather than fairly common knowledge. The giants prolly took them an' et them though."
Magdi couldn't help making a face at the reminder of the giant habit of eating equines.
"I was leading a pony when the giants came. She ran away, very fast, knocked me over doing it too. I guess that would be why!"
She hoped Blodwyn hadn't been eaten. It couldn't be ruled out, unfortunately.
Sorra stares hollowly at the picture Jory drew. Safe, she thinks, and shakes her head slowly. When the others start trying to explain about his parents, she starts to speak and stops.
They're not coming back, is her first thought. It doesn't feel right or real. Her eyes are still on the picture. In the crude drawing, Sam looks almost like her older brother. They're never coming back, she thinks, harder, and this time the thought is solid. When the boy mentions hogs at butchering, the sound of squealing fills her head, wavering on the edge of human screams. She remembers the old one-eared sow from a few years back. She'd been good bacon, but that only reminds her of the smell, and that the smell of burning human flesh, not so different really.
Sorra doesn't hear the rest. Something in her mind turns off, and she takes a quiet step backwards, then another, until she is standing outside the door. Her knees go soft, so she sits against the wall, the fire and the screaming rocketing around in her head.
"They are never coming back." She says it out loud, just a hoarse whisper. Her throat hurts, and she swallows repeatedly. She coughs. For a moment she wants very much to cry, but nothing happens. She cradles the sickle close to her chest like a baby, then shakes her head and makes herself get back up. "Don't be stupid," she whispers.
Sorra closes her eyes and pictures them briefly. They don't quite look right, like she's already forgetting. She shakes her head and pins them down in her mind, brothers, sister, father. Then she puts them away, tightens her grip on her sickle, and steps back slowly into the room, trying to look like she never left. The goblin woman is speaking.
"Ponies are fast," Sorra supplies hopefully, though somewhat dubiously. Enough things are dead already.
At Sorra's sudden input, Magdi starts slightly, almost having forgotten she was there.
"Yes," she said, "Ponies are pretty quick. Blodwyn's run away before. She has a tendency to drift back towards the inn." She paused, catching her lip slightly. "The fact that it's not there any more might put her off a little though."
She sniffed a little then smiled at Jory to show she was alright, reaching forward and jangling his festival bell bracelet a little as a tease.
Jory smiles somewhat shakily at the sound of the bell. "We goin' now?"
Magdi stood up and made a little show of stretching and shaking out her tired old limbs, patting herself down again, wiggling her fingers so that the joints clicked and taking a deep breath.
"Sure, if that's what you'd like!" she said warmly. She glanced at Sorra as if seeking confirmation or permission.
Sorra nods sharply and turns back to the door, sickle raised. She starts back into the hallway.
Magdi held out a hand for Jory to take if he wanted. Perhaps he was to grown up to need a hand to hold. The option was there though if he wanted it.
She glanced around the room, taking in the doodles, the patchwork, the imitation crystal ball and the sad little toys once more. "Is there anything small you want to take with you?" she asked the boy, trying not to put too much emphasis on the word 'small'. "I've got my good luck stone here in my pocket..." she patted it to demonstrate this.
Jory nods slowly and gets up, picking three smooth river rocks out of the pile, and after a moment, taking the imitation crystal ball as well. His movements are slow and thoughtful, for a child. The rocks go in his pocket, and he wraps the crystal ball carefully in a little blanket before tucking it under his arm. "'m ready now, Magdi, Sorra, Sam, Ez-Eztra." He clearly has a little difficulty pronouncing the strange southern name. After a moment of hesitation, he takes Magdi's hand.
Magdi watched the child collect his belongings sadly. Three rocks: one for Mum, one for Dad and one for Brother? It was hard to say. The imitation crystal ball was a curious object, and probably not the lightest of keepsakes, so evidentally it had particular meaning and resonance for Jory. Now probably wasn't the time to ask about it though. She held his hand and shuffled out into the corridor to meet Sorra, looking back briefly to check if Sam and Eztra were ready to follow.
The journey to Navek was unlikely to be easy. The four of them had struggled enough just getting up that staircase - perhaps something Nohar's tunnels could help them bypass? Of course, unlike Nohar, Magdi didn't know the tunnels. Jory might, but that wouldn't make poor Eztra anymore comfortable in the dark, and Samuel and Sorra would no doubt feel rather claustrophic in them too.
SpoilerI apologize for not posting recently, for some odd reason my subscriptions haven't been showing any threads as new ><
Sam looks on sadly as Jory gathers up his few possessions, noting the boys lackluster energy and over-all unhappy demeanor once they revealed their suspicions about the boys parents and sibling. "Well, is everyone ready to go now? We should get started as soon as possible, though maybe we should try to scavenge the bakery for some more bread, even if it is frozen, we'll need some sort of sustenance to keep us going on the trip to Navek." Sam looks at the others for confirmation of his idea.