Mystoria: Trail of Thorns (Cancelled)

Chapter 6 (Posted 10-25-2020)

Chapter 6

Chronology: [4]

POV: [Jax]

Probable Chapter: [6]

Chapter or Part [#]: [?name?]

It was the scent of acrid smoke filled morning air that told Jax something was wrong. The gently drifting haze mixed with the grey mists in slowly swirling eddies. Jax's ears throbbed with his staccato heartbeat, almost drowning out the noise of his heavy footfalls as he careened through the trees. The sound almost muffling the screams. Jax broke into the burning town making a bee line for the saw hole of his backyard. His house, the tool shed, and even the pile of firewood were engulfed in an inferno.

"DAD!" He yelled toward the house, but rounding the corner brought a sight he wasn't prepared for.

His neighbor, Mr. Failgan, was slumped against a burning building. Pinned to the wall by a broken spear. Jax ran further into the village. A different variant of terror creeping into his soul. The world burned around him. His neighbors' bodies laying in the dirt streets. A scream to his left pulled his attention and he charged down the space between two buildings who's walls weren't yet engulfed.

Jax didn't hesitate when he saw the thing dragging one of the village women. He lifted his lumber axe, amazingly still in his grip, and swung at the creature's oversized head. The thing, which looked like some grotesque cross between a goblin and a human, ducked. Jax's axe arched wide to the left giving the sickly-grey skinned creature plenty of opportunity to make its own attack. Which it did.

Jax wasn't sure exactly what just happened. One moment he was swinging his axe at the thing, the next he was falling. The cellar door broke with the impact of his face. The stone stairs several feet lower were less yielding.

***

Mia's horse, while seemingly annoying by the smell, didn't otherwise react to the scene of desolation. Every wooden structure in the village was a smoldering pile of ash and burnt wood. The few stone structures among the buildings were coated in black soot. She stopped the horse in the center of the small village and surveyed the destruction.

The unburnt corpses in the streets suggested this was an attack instead of some accident. Judging by the smoldering it probably happened yesterday or maybe early this morning. Mia frowned. Could she make it to the next village by nightfall? Looking up at the afternoon sky told her that the answer was a solid no.

Mia closed her eyes and focused on what she wanted. She reached toward the ground, closed her fingers, and pulled. "Mystoria. Grant my eyes the ability to see life. Make the living shine to my vision like a beacon. Leave out the plants, rats, and insects. Show me the larger forms of life."

She opened her eyes, was forced to close them again, but once again had to open them as the inside of her eyelids shown brighter than the after image of the horse under her. This time keeping her head high, she noted the overwhelming pinkish pulsing of the horse as well as her own hands. A pulsing pink cut off any real peripheral sight. Likely the sides of her face. Mia focused away from herself. Birds and other smaller creatures outside of the ruins filled the trees like candles.

The village however was dead. As she prodded the horse around the smoldering wreckage, she found nothing. No people, no pets, no live stock, no... Mia stared down into the fallen timbers of a building. There was something under the pile. Something big and faint. Faint because it was dieing or faint because it was covered, she didn't know. She dismounted her horse.

Somehow this building had managed to keep its floor. Thick and ancient boards held up the smoldering ruin. On the opposite side was a cellar door and at the bottom of the stairwell was a body. A vibrantly glowing body. Mia dismissed her spell and cautiously made her way down the stone steps. It was a young man. Human. Covered in ash and dried blood. There was a bad gash between his forehead and right ear. His nose didn't look quite right either.