RP:Cogadh na Croise
Part of the What You Leave Behind Arc
Summary: As Krice stuns Lionel with news of a series of attacks, Síocháin falls and Lionel's dwarven retainers are mercilessly slain.
Cenril: The Winking Nod
Managing Frostmawian affairs from the far eastern Cenrili shores has been every bit as difficult as Lionel had foreseen, if not more so. So many letters and writs have been brought to the inn he and Esche selected as a temporary residence that Degrid, the owner and proprietor, has demanded bonus compensation on three separate occasions. The number of soldiers, spies, and salespeople who have scheduled meetings with the Catalian downstairs at the bar has exceeded Esche’s most careful plans and forced Degrid to seal off nearly half the establishment twice. Degrid’s coffers have been filled with silver, but her long-standing veteran patrons have been almost dissatisfied enough to risk Frostmaw’s wrath in formal complaint. At the dawn of the third consecutive week Lionel and Esche had spent at the Winking Nod, Degrid rapped at the door with hopes of awakening them to her rude commentary, all the better to enforce her rules about limiting the number of visiting dignitaries to a more polite 20 per week. Unfortunately for Degrid, the two of them were wide awake -- an astonishment to be sure, given how late she’d heard-tell they’d stayed awake the previous night. And so it went that Lionel’s business matters would irritate his landlord and she would seek to surprise him and it would backfire, again and again, for nearly three more weeks. It’s twilight tonight, and the bar crowd is thinner than it once was; too many patrons have opted to visit the decidedly less Frostmawian inn called the Shameless Seamus three blocks down Memorial Avenue. Lionel and Esche are well into their cups -- brandy for Lionel, Earl Grey tea for his companion -- and there is talk of the upcoming election. “You will dress suitably and represent your station,” Esche all but commands his superior officer, who yawns and shrugs noncommittally.
Krice hadn't been to the Cenrili Inn for a while. As he entered, clothed in the usual black attire with two katanas strapped to his back, he immediately noticed a buzz that told of recent activity. Though things had quieted right now, the building unmistakably held onto the ghosts of Lionel's subordinates, milling about the share and send information with and from the Steward. The warrior made his way to the bar where he found Esche and Lionel seated to nurse their respective drinks. He didn't order one for himself, opting instead to approach the pair without delay. The stoic man seemed even less receptive to others than usual, and after affording Esche a nod, he directed that gold-streaked stare to the Steward, ready to speak of his reason for the visit. He was very pointedly here to see Lionel.
Lionel glances up at random and spots Krice’s approach. With a somewhat strained blink, he leans up in his seat and buttons his black silk shirt up two more notches so that it’s closed to his collarbone. “Krice,” he says plainly. “Come in. Sit down. Have a drink. I’m being lectured.” Esche grimaces and regards their friend with a curt return nod. “I do not believe now is the time,” the elf assesses. Lionel laughs dryly. “That’s what I said. But on you went.” Esche shakes his head and reaches for his cup as he stands. “I will return momentarily. I believe it will be water that I bring, not further spirits.” He seems to have done a right fine assessment, indeed. As Esche departs to fulfill his order, Lionel frowns and polishes off the last of his brandy.
Krice glanced between the two men as they interacted, his expression unchanging despite the apparent levity of the exchange. He took a seat as invited and folded his arms across his thighs, katanas angled behind him with their sheathed tips resting past the chair. Without wasting time on trivial conversation, the enigma asked of Lionel, "What's going on down here? Seems like chaos at almost every turn." Studying the Steward, he offered an observation spoken with no judgment. "You look a little frazzled."
Lionel scratches the nape of his neck, mindful not to mess with the light wound he sustained during a recent encounter down in the depths of Craughmoyle. The cut is clean and slight, but lengthy with a blade’s intent. “Chaos and Cenril go together like two pilafs in a sauropod, Krice, but lately there’s been uproar over the pending mayoral election. I’ve seen Hudson enough times to know it’s at least partly a farce, smoke-and-mirrors to get a figurehead lined-up for string-tugging, but it’s the talk of the town.” The streets of Cenril are awash with carriages from one corner of Lithrydel to the other. Hawkers have been louder and more persistent with the selling of their wares, and food vendors have taken up position in even some of the seediest neighborhoods. Flags are flying proudly pronouncing one candidate or the other. Thieves are even thicker in number than usual, keen to catch travelers unawares. “I’ll be attending, on behalf of Frostmaw. I’ll be glad when it’s over with, but I’ll remain here a little longer.” Lionel isn’t forthcoming as to why. Keeping a watchful eye over an amnesiac woman who is allegedly dead is not a topic he wishes to share, even if it pains him to keep it secret. “And what brings you, then? I can’t imagine you’re here for the festival sweet rolls.” He squints comically. “Then again, perhaps I’ve misjudged and you’ve a terrible sweet tooth. The most terrible of all!”
Frostmaw: Síocháin
That same Cenrili dusk has painted the clouds of Northern Frostmaw a brilliant fuchsia, then peridot, and now a deep blue. Síocháin’s many shimmering emeralds have caught the light and reflect it beautifully. The fort, Lionel’s stout keep and private abode, is simply gorgeous this time of evening. With nightfall, the guards at their watchtowers are excited to change shift and head to their bunks. The replacement personnel is a little bit late tonight, though. It’s no cause for panic -- those night-shift guards have always been lazy, as far as the day shift crew is concerned -- but it’s irritating. Deep within Síocháin’s stony interior, the dwarven Catalian retainers Tratt, Delenn, Sheridan and Ivanova are all as far into their cups as their Cenril-situated prince. “And then I looked at him, don’t say I didn’t,” Sheridan boasts as Delenn snickers and sneers. “And I said ‘Stroud, you’re taller than me but not so tall as to outdrink me.’” The other dwarves cackle -- even stalwart and dignified Tratt -- and Ivanova shakes her head in disbelief. “Oh, Stroud. A dwarf’s beard but a Frost Giant’s tolerance for the good stuff.” Delenn purses her lips and sighs. “He will be missed.” "Aye", they all reply, and they toast Stroud’s memory. Somewhere closeby, in the deep, dark forest, the air stiffens and magical green streaks portend an arrival.
Cenril: The Winking Nod
Krice listened to Lionel attentively, and although he seemed at a heightened level of stoicism, something shadowed his eyes upon mention of Hudson and the upcoming election. The warrior voiced a bland, " Couldn't care less about festivities if I tried," before getting to the crux of his visit. " I encountered a band of toad warriors--sounds ridiculous, I know--a few days ago. They spilled forth from another plane, and when they were all dead, they disappeared. The leader mentioned your name in a string of crappy, primitive language." Throughout his words, the warrior scrutinized Lionel's face, disposition, for reaction or acknowledgment to and of everything he said as he said it, any recognition that Lionel knew of what he spoke.
Lionel’s disposition is at first one of incredulity at the word of toad warriors. After the things he and Krice have faced, it’s an easy thing to believe but a harder one to keep a straight face toward. Surely if he’d been there himself and seen their dead leader’s abilities firsthand he’d be less inclined to smirk, but he didn’t, so there’s the smirk. The twinkle in his eyes fades quickly at talk of another plane, however, and the disappearance act causes him to clench a fist and stare blankly at the redwood floor panels beneath his feet, so that by the time Krice mentions Lionel’s own name the Catalian is already in an entirely separate mood. If Krice was looking for a reaction, he’s found one. Thoughts come flooding in waves. Thoughts of the attacks in Frostmaw. Thoughts of mysteries unsolved. “Toad people?” It’s a ridiculous inquiry, made all the stranger by the dark husk in his voice. It’s the only thing that doesn’t track. The enigmatic murderers and substance-flingers Lionel and his allies have faced twice and barely held back either time were always clad in thick black garb but they carried themselves like fellow humans, not otherworldly beasts. Before he knows it Lionel has risen from his chair and began pacing. “It’s them. It has to be. But this… they’ve never struck one person before. It was bigger, more ambitious before.” He stops when it occurs to him that he hasn’t explained himself at all. “Krice… I think our ‘friends’ from those attacks on Frostmaw may have come back for more.”
Frostmaw: Síocháin
“It’s bloody well like them to think we live here,” Hopper complains. He tosses aside his last few betting chips and folds his arms over his chest. “We do live here, Hopper,” Margaret rebukes, “and you’re only so bitter because we cleaned you out. -Again.-” Hopper shoots his fellow guards a glare as they chuckle and reach for their earnings, preparing for another round without him at the dicing table. “Yeah, well, half an hour isn’t nothing.” Hopper looks out through the sill of Síocháin’s east watchtower, not for the first time. “It’s something. I’m telling Tratt. Those jokers deserve an evaluation. A good one. One that’ll kick them into action. 12 hours we get stuffed up here, and they don’t even have the decency to show up on time.” Margaret makes a crude gesture behind Hopper’s back and the other guards laugh a second time. The door swings open just as Hopper turns around. A wraithen creature in dark robes glides in at supernatural speed before any of them can do more than gape. Its scythe takes their heads in two quick, calculated swings. Blood splashes and fills the watchtower like a river.
Cenril: The Winking Nod
Krice looked up when Lionel moved, but then he returned his gaze to the candles in the middle of the table. His response to the man's ramblings was silence, but he -did- offer words to the latter statement; that their 'friends' from Frostmaw's attack had come back for more. With his guarded eyes focused on the table, the warrior said, " I've been a little... distracted. What attack are you talking about?" Lifting his chin, the warrior glanced past his right shoulder at the other male and smirked, humourlessly. " Like I said, fighting toads sounds ridiculous, but they were actually quite deadly."
Lionel can’t imagine a life where anything could ever distract him from this obsession with unmasking the perpetrators of the multiple attacks over the past year. It’s the one thing that replaced his former obsession with watching for signs of a return of the shadowy forces which followed the Dark Immortals over a decade ago -- and it’s been Lionel’s greatest and most well-founded fear that these newer interlopers and those bygone demons are one and the same. Lionel has been so close to this investigation for so long that it has come to define him. Krice’s talk of distraction is as alien to him, despite the actual normalcy of the statement, that he might as well have said he was one of the toad men, himself. “When I first became Frostmaw’s Knight-Commander, an enemy force fell upon my first recruit battalion and slaughtered the majority. They disappeared as quickly as they’d arrived. I never found them. A few months ago, an enemy force fell upon the people of Frostmaw in the streets during a reconstruction celebration, tossing red dirt and ice spice into the populace in some kind of terror attack. They vanished without a trace. This is connected. It has to be.” His voice strains and his fingers whiten as his closed fist tightens. “Damn it, this is the threat I’ve been after all along. It -has- to be,” he repeats, almost pleadingly.
Frostmaw: Síocháin
The portal spits out orcs at an alarming pace, and they roll upon the soft, loamy soil as they fall. Once they’ve regained their balance, each orc is quick to pry a black steel serrated sword from its sheath. Then, the hunt begins. They take off in a trot, then a full-fledged sprint, and when they reach the opened gates their predatory eyes dart around for signs of life. They find it in abundance thanks to Síocháin’s fenced-in flocks of livestock. The slaughter is absolute. Animals shriek and make to flee, but their insides are ripped out and thrown coarsely to the ground or chewed and then spat-out. These orcs, their pale green skin bubbly and their bodies larger and stronger than they ought to be, would much rather dine on the humanoid inhabitants nestled safely in the keep. And they will.
Cenril: The Winking Nod
Krice seemed disconnected from the happenings. He was speaking mechanically out of a need to pass on vital information, but his emotions were not connected to the information shared - despite his own personal ordeal from one of the attacks. He shook his head as Lionel recounted tales of the 'red spice' that spilled across Frostmaw's citizenry so many months ago, his expression otherwise unchanged. He must have been considering it in his own silence, though; the warrior added his opinion shortly after. "Connected or not, it needs to be stopped. There was an attack on Pilar in Chartsend, and another here in Cenril, on the red-haired blacksmith." A moment passed before he realized that maybe Lionel didn't know of whom he spoke. The warrior added an indifferent, "Hudson's woman." Thereafter, he shifted in his seat to lean back against his left shoulder whilst avoiding his swords, arms crossed over his chest. "Frostmaw's High Priestess is capable of visiting other planes but it takes a lot out of her. I'm hesitant to ask for her help unless we need it." At last the warrior diverted his crimson stare to the face of the pacing Steward. "Know anyone?"
Lionel opens his palm and clasps his hands together. His face is white like a ghost’s. Several times he moves his lips to speak but remains silent. Krice. Pilar. Alvina. Each of them close to Lionel in their own way, or at least formerly so. Each of them meaningful to him, each of their lives especially valuable. His knees buckle as a dizziness threatens to overtake him. He very nearly collapses onto the floor. The only thing keeping Lionel standing is Krice’s insinuation that Pilar and Alvina both survived their ordeals. The only thing keeping him from screaming is the solace of their relative safety. Esche comes, bearing three brass goblets of chilled water. The elf stops in his tracks at the sight of Lionel, who has finally worked up the courage to say a few words. “I do.” He swallows hard. “I do know someone who can bring us to at least one other plane. I do.” Esche furrows his brows and places a hand upon Lionel’s shoulder after putting the goblets on the table. “Khitti is no longer with us, Lionel,” Esche reminds him before giving Krice a sad glance. The urge to scream returns to Lionel in full force now. Being caught in his and Brand’s lie at a moment like this is almost as painful as hearing how close his friends might have come to their deaths. “Gods damn it,” Lionel mutters.
Frostmaw: Síocháin
Tratt strides purposefully toward the roast duck, sniffing proudly at its succulent smells. “Crisped to perfection,” he announces, “for my friends, with love.” Ivanova belches loudly and raises her emptied glass. “Don’t ever tell him I said this, but I think our fair Tratt’s an even better chef than Esche.” Her words are slurred and her eyes are bloodshot. Sheridan scoffs and shakes his head. “Aye, Tratt’s good, but Esche has got the best omelets I’ve ever tasted. Well,” he quickly adds, “outside of Catal, anyway. I suppose I’d say they’re the best in the world now.” A touch of sadness creeps into his voice at that. Delenn’s eyes drop as she catches the meaning. Tratt carries his dish into the spacious living room, tending to the flames at the fireplace after setting it down for his ogling companions. “To Catal, too,” Delenn says. “To Stroud and to Catal. The best warrior and the greatest land, both fallen before their time.” Everyone toasts again, although Ivanova mumbles about killing the mood. Sheridan reaches over and steals a kiss upon Delenn’s lips while he begins carving the bird. “To absent friends,” Tratt corrects. The door to the keep opens with a haste, but the guard who’d opened it leaves a red streak upon the knob as she collapses in a pool of blood.
Cenril: The Winking Nod
Krice watched Lionel pace back and forth, almost collapse, contain his frustration and anger, and at last the warrior rose. He stood by the table with his arms down and his eyes on the other man, though they deviated briefly to Esche upon his return. By the conclusion of their exchange and reminder of Khitti's death, the silver-haired enigma studied the face of his Frostmawian counterpart and looked a little perplexed, himself. It was the biggest shift of expression that he had shown, though even then was only slight. "Calm down," he drawled to the other warrior, shaking his head before he stated, "I can at least ask the High Priestess about it. We need to figure out how to track these monsters before they leap into our plane. I could barely sense them at all before they attacked me."
Lionel wrestles with a dozen different responses. Calm down? Krice might not be so quick to tell him that if he wondered at the things Lionel wonders, suspected the things Lionel suspects, knew the things Lionel knows, saw the things Lionel has seen. Feared the things Lionel fears. If Krice had fought the monsters Lionel has fought, seen Lithrydel come within inches of its complete annihilation, Krice might not tell him to calm down. If he had seen Catal burn, or heard the cackles of the things that burned it, he might not tell him to calm down. Lionel scoffs. No, Krice being Krice, if he had felt as Lionel does, he might just have said it anyway. And the worst part of all is that Krice is right. “Do it. Please.” Lionel’s azure eyes flicker with a renewed resolve. Ever on the razor’s edge, those eyes; ever so close to tears and ever so close to anger. Always, they lurk in the meridian between sorrow and wrath, somewhere melancholy and prone to wild swings. “Please take the utmost care on your way to the High Priestess. If I’m right, this…” He meets Krice’s eyes head-on. “This is the real threat to the planet.”
Frostmaw: Síocháin
Lionel’s dwarven retainers are among the fiercest at their craft. They’ve fought with him against Raiez, they’ve fought with him against Macon’s Larket, and they’ve fought their fair share of foes abroad before it all. When they see the horde descend upon them, they waste no precious time. Tratt has a magical barrier up in seconds. Delenn’s rod is in her hands almost as quickly, and she concentrates on the orcs even as they scatter, summoning a sharp ice shard to launch across the room at one, then another, and then another. Sheridan and Ivanova both procure twin daggers from the holsters at their hips, diving into the pack of savage soldiers in a joint strafing run. They’re experts, one and all, and they do not lose their composure even here, even now. They thin the herd, slicing into and casting upon their foes, spilling their black blood, evading their black blades. The orcs, growling in frustration, fight back with a ferociousness that surpasses the ordinary constraints of their kind. They’re quicker, and deadlier with their swords, and they possess a cunning that enables them to spread out to prevent cornering. An orc kicks over the wooden logs from the fireplace and the fire spreads across the keep’s luxurious maroon carpeting with a hunger. Another orc howls, and two of its allies join in the howling. It’s a beacon; another roving pack of the foul things rushes in through the doorway and across the stone hall.
The dwarves are now surrounded and outnumbered almost ten-to-one. The orcs are everywhere, rampaging and destroying everything in their sight, tossing torches into every room and burning sleeping visitors to ashes in their wake. After carving into an orc’s neck and flinching as his dagger erupts the black blood into a geyser, Sheridan grabs Ivanova’s arm before she can go after another. “Ring the bell,” he orders her, but she looks at him like he’s an insane. “I am not abandoning you to your deaths,” she replies, tugging her arm to get free. Sheridan redoubles his grip. “We are not abandoning anyone else to theirs,” Sheridan says. If someone can ring that bell, the nearby fishing cottages will be put on high alert and any nearby military patrols will be forewarned as well. But getting to the east watchtower will not be easy. “Please don’t ask me to watch you die,” Ivanova pleads. “I’m not asking you to watch.” Sheridan steels himself and flings his friend across the room, tossing her past a pair of orcs just before they can intercept her. Their blades take him instead, two cleaves to hips and chest, and he collapses, dead. Delenn’s horrified scream is the last thing Ivanova hears before the icy outside air assails her. She slams the door shut firmly behind her and dips into the shadows before the orcs hacking shredded sheep in the nearby pens can look up and notice her.
Cenril: The Winking Nod
Krice arched an eyebrow. The biggest threat to the planet? He had already turned to venture to Frostmaw when Lionel voiced this attention-grabbing statement, which ensured that the warrior's focus - and his feet - remained planted where they already were: on and in front of the Steward. "Tell me," he said, his voice stern but respectful. "The only information I have is of these attacks. What else do you know about this threat?"
Lionel shakes his head glumly. “That’s just it. I don’t know for sure. I don’t know anything about these people that you don’t -- not directly. But it’s come to a point that I simply cannot fathom they’re anyone else but the shadow that I have feared for a decade and more.” Esche reseats himself slowly and listens quietly as Lionel continues. “12 years ago, Lithrydel almost fell in an all-consuming conflict which came to be known as the Second Immortal War. The Immortals, Khasad and Elazul, relics from a long-ago age. They came back. They conquered. They ravaged.” He pauses noticeably. “They killed. We beat them, but at terrible cost. Actually, heh, right here in Cenril… this was the spot of the final battle. I thought that was the end of it, with the Immortals destroyed, but I was a fool. After I returned to Catal, their surviving followers burned it all to ashes. That was the fate of Catal, Krice. That was how it fell. I went back there and they followed me and made me pay. They killed my people because I was fool enough to think that I could…” His voice breaks. Telling him this now, so abruptly, is ludicrous. Lionel could almost laugh. Esche’s eyes narrow and his face takes on an air of regret, but still he is silent. “I felt… dead. I felt like they’d taken everything from me that was left. I redoubled my efforts. I returned to Lithrydel, Krice, because I knew in my heart that somewhere out there, the threat remains. I remembered that Lithrydel still stands. I’m here to protect it from its worst nightmares.” Another pause. “From -my- worst nightmares. Everything you’ve seen me do, every mission you’ve seen me lead along the way, it’s all traced back to that decision to stand vigilant against that threat. You ask me what I know of it? I know that it’s the single greatest foe I’ve ever faced. I know that Lithrydel is too consumed by too many problems to be ready for it at all, if indeed readiness is even ascertainable. I know that you need to find the High Priestess right away, Krice, and I need to warn the Queen.”
Frostmaw: Síocháin
Ivanova moves from shadow to shadow, quietly meandering around the packs of orcs unless lethality is her only viable option. Twice she sneaks up behind an orc and slashes its throat, and when she finds herself ducking near a shed with an orc of either side up ahead, the skillful rogue climbs the shed for a better vantage point and descends upon them both, knives held outright. Ivanova was always the fastest of Lionel’s dwarven entourage, always the lightest on her feet. It’s why Sheridan sent her. It’s why he died entrusting this final task to her. It’s why she cannot fail. The shadows grow harder to find as the orcs toss torches to the grass and light up the night. Briefly, Ivanova sees the many-splendored shimmering emeralds of Síocháin’s walls, and darkly she notices that with the fire reflecting on the emeralds’ surface, the keep has never looked better. “I’m so sorry,” she whispers. To Sheridan, to Tratt and Delenn, to the corpses of guards and servants spread out across the path. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” When she reaches the east watchtower, she glares up its length to the sill at its topmost floor. An orc launches itself from a nearby bush and she slides away nimbly, slamming her knives into its armor unwittingly and then pulling them free to slash its face before it can react. Its blood splatters all over her as it shrieks and dies. Covered in the blood, she runs into the tower and up the spiral staircase as fast as her legs can take her. At the top she finds the corpses of Hopper, Margaret, and their peers.
“I’m so sorry,” she mutters again, glancing past them and over toward the bell she’s been sent to ring. She takes a single step forward… and gasps breathlessly when what she’d thought was a shaded spot in the room turns to face her, revealing the wraith responsible for the murders before her eyes. It rasps, its tightly-stretched pallid skin pulled taut as it opens its mouth and hisses. Its scythe is up in a flash of malachite and a swoosh of the air it crosses in the swinging. It zips across the room toward her at impossible speeds. Ivanova has time for only one action, and whatever it is, she knows it will likely be her last. She leaps to its left, a full head-on dive, and the scythe grazes her abdomen, ripping off a pound of flesh. Ivanova’s scream is primal with pain but she does not relent. She grabs the dice from the table near her landing spot and tosses them across the room before the wraith turns around. Instinctively, the creature looks to where they fall, pinpointing the sound in case it is a threat. It’s all the time Ivanova needs to slam her wounded body upon the bell, which tolls loudly like a warning klaxon, alerting anyone within a five-kilometer radius to the danger. “Go to hell,” Ivanova grunts as the wraith spreads its arms and shrieks in its anger. She smiles coldly in the instant before its scythe finishes her off.
Cenril: The Winking Nod
Krice was silent through the duration of Lionel's recounting. Krice himself had only been in Lythridel for the better part of five years, so he was completely unfamiliar with the dangers and tribulations of twelve years prior to now. It was evident in the darkening of his eyes, kindred to Lionel in his anger for the suffering of innocents, the persistence of evil. Upon hearing from Lionel that this very same threat had dispatched his 'people', the silver-haired man at last broke from his stoic, guarded behaviour and succumbed to a frown. He could understand, and empathise with, such a terrible, all-consuming blow. "I'm sorry," he murmured to the other male, his periphery taking note of Esche's location but the suboodinate was not his priority. Krice's focus lay on Lionel. By the end of the Steward's words, the enigmatic swordsman dropped his head into a firm nod. "I'll leave now to meet with the High Priestess. If I encounter Hildegarde on my travels, should I send her your way, or tell her to expect you?"
Lionel is the more stoic one now. Only a danger of this magnitude and along so personal a line could make it so. “Thank you,” he says with a forced nod. “I’ll write to Hildegarde posthaste. If you see her, please just tell her to be expecting that letter. This… needs to come from me, I think, and I need to decide how to say it.” The haunted look on his face paints a clear picture of the severity behind his words. Esche puts his hands on the arms of his chair and looks to Krice as the warrior makes to depart, then stares at the flames of a nearby fireplace. It has begun.
Krice didn't leave, yet. Hearing of Lionel's want to prepare a letter for Hildegarde, the warrior hesitated to offer, "Want to write two? Send me off with one. If I see Hildegarde before the other letter arrives, I'll give the second one to her." He narrowed his eyes ever so slightly, his expression one of determination and utmost confidence that he could at least arrive at Frostmaw faster than Lionel's letter would via courier, if not find Hildegarde first.
Frostmaw: Síocháin
Night deepens and the flames roll over the keep. Síocháin’s emeralds sparkle for the last time, a reflection that lights the entire forest in its wake, and then at last its towers collapse inward on themselves, and its frame buckles and caves, and its short-lived construction comes to a perilous end. It is gone, all its life extinguished, all its glory toppled. Sheridan’s skeletal remains are sprawled out beside Delenn’s, her hand having reached for him in anguish in her last moment on this earth. The bones of orcs are blown about like leaves near Tratt’s own body; the scholarly old dwarf had cast some spell to make them pay just before the keep’s destruction. The wraith observes the carnage with dull eyes. Somewhere in the distance beyond the treeline, people are shouting and shoring up defenses. Ivanova’s success has curbed the wraith’s mission. It can no longer slaughter the meat in the nearby huts and cottages. Dozens of lives have been saved, if only temporarily. The wraith sneers and joins the departed orcs through the portal, which glistens cool green magical tendrils for a few more seconds before closing.