The Ashes of Allmau: The Orfolk of Allmau

Chapter 23

Restless, Euol swayed side to side in the sleeping bag. He found it near impossible to close his eyes longer than a blink. But Rory was right and he needed to rest, his heavy eyelids closed. And in doing so, his guilt-ridden mind cursed him with the sight of Ahna disappearing into the deadlands with his father.

"No..." no matter how tired he was, he wouldn't allow her to fall for that trap.

He dressed himself within the sleeping bag and squirmed free. Scanning the campsite for any lookouts, he blindly crawled towards the access road. Falling out of reach of the light, he turned forwards to focus, instantly setting his sight upon a woman in white, standing at the furthest reach of the light. Rosalyne; Surveying the deadlands. Ahna was far more important right now. He picked up a lantern nearby, and went to sneak past.

One step too close to the red witch, the white spectre, and he felt a prying force against him, "You're thinking of looking for your sister?" she asked.

Euol stopped at the edge of the camp light, caught 'red handed', "Yes."

"Alone?" her words cut through the night, and him, stark.

He hesitated for a moment, "If I need to."

"She's angry at you."

Her comment rendered him honest, "I know. I said something I regret."

"At least words can be taken back." She said, so quietly it might as well have been to herself.

She seemed so vulnerable, but adamant. Euol struggled to separate Rosalyne, his adult cousin, from Ahna, his little sister. It felt as though there was a shared thread. He'd seen Ahna staring at the abyss so many times he'd become null to it, but to see Rosalyne doing the same thing.

"Rory told me about what happened to you." He said, "With the orfolk, and Meryt. My father brought Meryt to you, right?"

She glanced to him, and after moments pause, she responded, "He did."

"I figured. Why did you come here?" he asked.

Rosalyne "The same reason your sister did."

"What do you mean?"

"Closure."

Euol had no real idea of what was going on in her mind. He was gifted with the aether, and couldn't sense the cause of Rosalyne's tumolt. But he was smart, and he could put things together, leading him to ask, "Are you going to take the orfolk?"

Rosalyne remained quiet. She focused on the deadlands. Far ahead the shadows moved and warped unnaturally and quietly. They did so in such a way that only magic could conduct. The dying force of the universe was quiet, but obvious to trained eyes.

On seeing the disturbance, an electric tension bubbled up in the air, Euol could feel it as it energised and terrified his mind. He looked to the deadlands but couldn't see what she could.

"What's happening?" he asked as Rosalyne turned and approached the camp.

"It's back." She replied.

"What?" he asked, he looked out to the shadows but couldn't see what she could.

Rosalyne ignored him totally and approached the camp at full pace. All about her the air energised, a soft wind rose against the still night. Men who slept woke suddenly, as if from nightmares. Those around the fire popped and tingled, as though reacting to a monstrous onset. All attention focused on Rosalyne without her saying a word.

She entered the camp and announced, "Gather your weapons, follow me." Then turned about and moved to lead.

Apia was alive with an endearing entertaining energy, nothing like the of the camp. Here, it was singing, eating and dancing as the orfolk delighted in meeting another smart creature in the deadlands. An odd, lesser discussed, quirk of pyronauts was that they made for interesting musical machines. All their moving parts, pipes, cables and cords, could be played by a community in aethereal harmony. This rare delight, which they played to one another over the deadlands on odd occasions, they treated Ahna to, taking her back to the Sounds and the Melody Mill and the community of Concordance and the Seven Sounds. She clapped along, but found herself far too clumsy and large to get involved.