Strongjaw & The Dish

8

The thud of hoofbeats had now shifted to a slow, quiet movement through the trees. The path he had taken was not wide, nor commonly used. He had turned to the east and, if the druid was right, made haste toward the Mooren Run River.

She and her escort had departed after the scrying. She was Voice of the Tempest, whatever that meant, and had to return to her people before they had a fit of apoplexy because she was late getting home. Trisha had told herself she was angry with the redhead because she'd left them, but as the miles stretched on and she had nothing to do but think, she eventually came to understand that it was envy, not anger that filled her.

She saw a woman who had lost so much, but still felt she had a place. A purpose. Trisha had always lived with a feeling that the world was a transitory place. She loved Whitestone, but she never put true roots there. She would die to defend it, almost had more than once, but in the end, she did not feel what the druid obviously felt. That she was vital to anything or anyone.

Glancing toward Grog's wide back, she stared down the bear that flexed and twitched and made faces at her as the skin it was a part of shifted with every subtle movement. Since she had returned from her purging in the woods, he had been different. He barely looked at her now, much less his usual playful leering whose absence was like a dagger in her heart. Not that she wanted to. Thinking about it made her whole body lock up and go ice cold and fearful and she hated that, but it would have been nice to be able to pretend she wasn't ruined in his eyes.

Amidst the trees, a slowly creeping fog had begun to leave the trunks slightly hazy. Ahead of them, it seemed to thicken and drift like a slowly closing wall. In a few hundred yards, they would be blanketed in it. At the head of the line, Lord DeRolo threw a hand up and the line slowed and stopped as he dismounted, his hand resting at his hip. Each rider likewise dropped onto the road and they met midway.

"This could get a bit rough. We need to be stealthy but..." he eyed the large warhorse and the tiny gnome with equal measure of 'well that ain't gunna happen' evident in his eyes. "...if we can't, we'll need to be prepared and ready to move on a moment's notice." The blues shifted to her and Trisha stiffened to attention under her Lord's gaze out of habit. "Trisha, you up to this?"

She frowned a bit. "Sir, I may have suffered a blow, but if I can stand, I can fight, and if I can't stand?" She lifted her chin. "I'll take them on from the knees down."

His too-serious mien took a slight hint of amusement and he gave a single nod. "Well said. Alright, mount up. Grog, you move to the front with me. Pike and Scanlan, you take the middle. Trisha, I trust you to take the rear." He gave a nod and moved to mount back up.

She likewise walked back to step into the stirrup and pull herself up and onto the back of the dappled gray. That Lord DeRolo had her at the back of the line was a testament to his trust in her. The middle was where the weaker members went. The line moved again, and the fog closed around them until it was almost impossible

The fog stole sight, but also seemed to dull sound. She kept her hand on the handle of the sword laid across her thighs as they rode, tense and ready to defend. A half-hour... an hour... two... and there was no sense of progress. Only the same all-encompassing misty gray and the dark shadows of flanking trees. There had been no chatter, no conversation, only that heavy-handed feeling of portent. The road under them seemed to be widening. The horses, herd animals by nature, sought to move closer to one another as it shifted into what might be a clearing of sorts.

From behind them, a sound rose, a single note that set the hair on the back of her neck to prickle. A high-pitched howl that, in an instant, was joined by another, and another, each coming from a different direction. As one they reined their mounts to stop just as the wood erupted with dark shapes. She was knocked from her saddle, but went with it, rolling to find her feet and swinging outward with her blade. The figure before her, half lost in the thick fog, was at least as tall as Grog, a massive furred body that resembled nothing less than a combination of bear and man, a wide maw of sharp teeth and long furry arms ending in massive paws, each tipped with razor-sharp black claws that swung at her, barely missing her face as she adopted a defensive posture.