The Sword of Retribution

Departures - Part 5

Later that day they came upon a most unusual clearing.

It was perfectly circular, about a hundred yards across, and contained a deep hollow in the centre, the ground sloping gently downwards to form a bowl-shaped depression whose centre was about ten yards below the centre of the surrounding forest. It was obviously artificial. It was much too perfectly regular to be natural, and a small pond about thirty yards wide had formed in the centre above which a thin layer of mist lay.

There was something about that layer of mist. Something very strange. Lirenna imagined that she could almost see vague, shadowy shapes drifting within it, as though it contained some kind of internal structure.

"What is it?" said Thomas, staring in fascination. He took a step closer, to see more clearly and the others followed him, equally entranced by the strange phenomenon.

Despite her anxiety at their vulnerable situation, Lirenna found herself smiling to herself as she looked across at the human wizard, feeling a warm delight that his curiosity seemed to know no limits. To Thomas, the world was a source of never ending wonder and delight and something inside her responded with adoration, that such a person could exist in a world containing so much cynicism and selfishness. And a human as well. A race that the shae folk generally held to be ugly, graceless and stupid. Little better than shologs.

There was something about Thomas, though, that attracted her in a way that no shae man ever had. He wasn't bad looking for a human and, even though small by human standards, he was still larger and stronger than any shae man. Strong enough that, if he wanted, he could physically overpower her and do anything he wanted to her. Anything at all. She shivered with delight at the fantasy that began to unfold in her imagination. Just a fantasy, of course. It could never be anything else. Could it?

Then something made her look back at the layer of mist they were approaching. There was something about it, she suddenly decided. Something she didn't like. A voice deep inside her head was screaming at her, trying to tell her something, and she stopped for a moment to try to figure out what it was. She concentrated hard, and suddenly it was as though there'd been a blanket of fog lying over her mind, a blanket that was suddenly pulled away, allowing her to see clearly again.

She saw her friends in front of her, slowly walking down towards the pond with their eyes fixed straight ahead as if in a trance, and the layer of mist seemed to grow thicker and denser as they approached, growing both in bulk and malicious intent. With a surge of terror close to blind panic, she understood in a flash what it was and, to her later, intense shame, came close to just running away, leaving her friends to their fate. She'd actually turned her back on them and taken a few staggering steps away, her body responding instinctively to the danger before her higher brain functions could override it.

Her feelings of loyalty and friendship towards them, and in particular her growing feelings for Thomas, stopped her in her tracks before she'd gone far. She felt as though she was attached to the wizard by an unbreakably strong fishing line whose hook was firmly lodged in her heart. She could no more abandon him than she could claw her own eyes out. With a cry of anguish, therefore, she turned back and ran madly past the others towards him, now only a few feet from the water's edge and the malevolent mist. The wizard was in a deep hypnotic trance and kept walking steadily onwards like a zombie, pushing past the demi shae as though she didn't exist. Completely ignoring her every effort to snap him out of it. He stepped into the water, and the mist swirled up around his legs to engulf him.

She grabbed his arm and tried to pull him back but, small and weak though he was by human standards, he was still much bigger and stronger than the small and slender demi shae and he shrugged her off with little effort. The mist was beginning to swirl around her own ankles as well now, and she felt a strange, tingly feeling in her feet as it began feeding on her. She jumped back out of the water with a cry and watched helplessly as the others stepped past her into the mist. Thomas was completely engulfed in swirling fog now, and his skin turned grey as some vital essence was sucked out of him. He began to sag weakly.