Part Five: The Impasse
With some assistance from the crew, the wreckage was picked through in short order, everyone saving as many supplies as they could carry and moving again, because help was needed to transport the injured. Nobody seemed to have come away with more than incidental injury, save of course Gwen and Lohengrin. Undoubtedly, the partyâs healer was beyond exhausted, but she at least had remained conscious.
It was decided that the sooner they moved, the betterâfor anyone who happened to find them where they were would have a series of sitting ducks to shoot at and little else. The closest settlement on any map was a hard dayâs march to the east, a small river-trading town on the Ysar River, called nothing more complicated than Post. The population, perhaps some hundred people or so, was mostly human, though a few dwarves and goblins were interspersed as well, the latter explained by the fact that there was a mine nearby that provided much of the ore that could be later refined and used in the mechanistâs trade.
There were two inns in the town, due to the comparatively high volume of temporary residents it housed, and the group chose the one furthest from the river, so as to draw less attention. It was likely a futile move, considering that they were coming from the plains direction with no obvious transport, and carried two unconscious, unresponsive people with them. It was, of course, also fairly unusual that there was even one favisae among them, setting aside the oddity of the humans. However strange they might have seemed, their money was plenty good enough for the innkeeper, and they were given the buildingâs third floor to themselves, which wasnât quite enough beds for everyone, but close.
Two days later, and Gwen stirred occasionally, but Lohengrin showed no signs of waking at all. Had it not been for the steady rise and fall of his chest, it would have been easy to think him dead, so still was he. But for all that healing magic could tell, he was simply very persistently asleep, and there was nothing to be done for either of them until they recovered on their own.
For ease of treatment, Kethyrian had kept both of her patients in the same roomânot that there was much by way of treatment to actually do. At this point, whether they ever woke up again was mostly up to them. The captain looked like sheâd recover in short order, at least physically. Kethy preferred not to make guesses about other peopleâs mental states. The lizard on the other hand was much more a mystery to her than sheâd ever taken him to be, and in that sense, she hadnât the faintest idea what would become of him.
Having just checked in on both of them, she returned now to her own lodging, padding down the carpet runner in the hallway and selecting the second door on the left. Slumping into a chair at the small circular table in the corner near the window, she was halfway through running a hand through her hair before she realized that it was interfering with her braid to do so and stopped, frowning slightly. In case present company wanted to know, she prefaced with an update. âNot much to report. Sheâs moving a bit more. If I had to guess, sheâll be up within a couple of days.â Glancing out the window from the corner of her eye, she caught sight of something and exhaled through her nose, her frown deepening.
âWe need a plan before then, unless we want the Vipers on our doorsteps⊠again.â
In terms of the report, anything was better than that stern-lipped, furrowed silence Sven was used to seeing when things weren't going so well for said patients. Soldiers, civilians, casualties. He was used to the shrill sounds of moaning, gasping men and women, crumpled in dirty beds. And the moment doctors slipped back to the able, shutting curtains. Closing doors. Solemn shakes of the head tended to carry a far heftier weight than words, in those cases. Fortunately, it was Kethyrian who was tending both patients and he did not doubt that she could do far better with her abilities. Initially, he'd perched in the room like an immovable gargoyle; a statue, watching from one of the corners, until he was shooed away. Forgoing sleep would not speed their recovery.
Now, he awaited Kethyrian in her room. Looking all-too-large for her chambers, with his arms crossed over his barrel chest and mouth poised in a thin line. âCouple of days. Good,â Sven mumbled under his breath. Some of the tension eased from his shoulders. His arms slackened their death-grip across his forearms, and he slouched in the laughably small chair he occupied. Here they were, stuck in a small, lazy riverside town, with two comatose people yet to awaken, and furious enemies were snuffling down their necks. If they weren't scouting out areas where they might have been, or if they were already frantically tailing them now, then it wouldn't be long. The blazing wreckage of the ship, and the clattering racket the mountain-creature had caused would not go ignored.
How long did they have? Without a vessel to carry them, and being stranded in the middle of nowhere; their options were slim. Sven scratched at the stubble already sprouting from his jawline, and rolled his eyes back towards the ceiling. âYou are not able to magic up new ship?â it might have been a joke, but he gave no indication that he was, âSmall boats, for fishing. No good.â If they had the means to contact someone in Artorias' circle, it would do them great merit. But he doubted that it was a possibility. They had to work with what they had, quickly.
âThis unit believes that we would be less likely to be noticed were our surroundings more populous,â Mordecai mused, folding his hands neatly behind him. He stood now at something of a rest, his body language designed to be nonthreatening and also not alarming, but it seemed to be quite impossible for him to maintain any posture less than perfect, for the moment he forgot to mind himself, he was impeccably upright again. âPerhaps the wisest course is to seek passage to a city and conceal ourselves before we continue any further?â
âWhy continue further at all?â Kethyrian asked, her tone reverted to its customary acid, though of course it was probably impossible for such a thing to offend Mordecai. âI donât know about the rest of you, but I can say with something damn near certainty that it was dumb luck that saved us back there. Or maybe it was partly the captain, but then itâs dumb luck that sheâs still alive. Same problem, and I for one have no wish to die.â What they had seen, what they had doneâthat kind of thing was just too big. There was no way a fragment of an old guild and a crew of airship privateers without an airship could hope to get through another encounter like that. And if colossi were real and dragons were, too⊠whatever was to come was bound to be way too far over their heads to bother.
Just going to try and break the old man out of his prison was suicide, but at least it was suicide against humans and weapons and battle-programmed automata, not fucking moving hills and flying, firebreathing lizards. Their chances of doing either successfully were near nil, as far as Kethyrianâs evaluation could calculate. She wasnât a fool, and she was tired of doing the errands of one.
Vivi had entered the room as Kethy began to speak, holding an armful of fruits and bread. She paused looking a little surprised at all the faces stuffed in the room before shrugging and shutting the door behind her with a foot. She waited until Kethy was done talking before she began handing out the fruit. She threw an apple at Sven and a pear at Kethy before setting the load of bread down on the table. The remaining orange she'd taken for herself. "At least it's not the stuff we scavenged from the wreck. This has got taste," she said, setting about peeling the orange.
"Teo's doing that farsight thing he does, looking out for anything that might look like trouble," she said for anyone who might have wanted to know. She was quiet as she peeled, chewing over their options and what all had happened to them in only a span of a few days. "She's got a point," Vivi admitted, flicking away spiralled orange peel. "What do we even do? I'm not throwing myself at the next moving mountain-- that shit's not even fair." Shaking her head, she popped the first orange wedge in her mouth and began to chew.
"It's whatever you guys decide, I suppose," she said between chews.
The frown on Sven's face deepened, as if he were sucking on a lemon. Give up? Surrender? Throw up their hands because things were getting too hard? He didn't have the liberty. As soon as Gwendolyn woke up, as he knew she would, he'd be moving forward with this insane mission. He doubted that she would give up so easily, even if they'd just faced down a moving-mountain beast and realized Lohengrin's true form. And barely survived. What they'd been through, if anything... proved that they should continue. He might've been one of the most sceptical of them all; questioning why statues had chosen their specific number and allotted them runes. Destiny was the furthest word from his mind, but it had to be done. If not them, then who? Nothing would solve itself.
He caught the apple in his meaty paw, sniffed at it, and took a big bite. He grunted his thanks while wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, eyeing everyone in the room. Could they even continue if some of the others backed out? He doubted it. These plans were extensive, and the mission went far beyond anything they've ever done in the past. He had no experience to reflect on, and he doubted they did either. âWe continue vith plan. Like alvays. We find a way.â He'd nearly died several times, and figured everyone else had, too. The circumstances might have been different, but the danger remained. He saw no difference. Tumbling from a colossal beast or having your heart chewed up by shrapnel. It made no difference.
Sven swung his gaze back at Vivi and set the apple away from lips. âTheon's farsight,â he repeated, rolling the word around his head, âhow does it work? Can it help us move?â He motioned with his hand. Could it locate something useful? Walking was out of the question. Commandeering many river-ships, without drawing notice, would be difficult.
Vivi sputtered in response and shrugged. "I dunno, he doesn't let me in his head very often," she said between orange wedges. The next one she put in her mouth and sucked the juice out, using the time to put what she knew into something coherent. It took more time than was comfortable, with only the suction from the orange wedge filling the silence. Finally, she'd drained all the juice she could from it and spat it out to the side, and finally began to speak again.
"Well, it's like... I guess it's like seeing something, without actually... Seeing it?" She said, her nose scrunched up in confusion. It appeared the time it took to gather the words together weren't nearly long enough. "I mean, he can see stuff that's far away-- which is probably why it's called farsight," she added with a shrug. "But yeah, it can totally help us move. Teo used it all the time when we were out in the desert, and we never ran into anyone we didn't want to. Unless, you know... He was asleep and they got the jump on us... But then they ran into us," She said candidly, popping another orange wedge in her mouth.
Kethyrian sighed. Idiots, all of them, and she a bigger idiot for not putting up more of a fight when she alone seemed to know how badly this was all going to end. But really, what else was she going to do? It wasnât like she had any other place to be. Idiots or not, they amounted to all she had in the world. Quite literally now, as her meager material possessions had gone down with the ship. Ughâthat almost sounded sentimental.
Perhaps driven to sound even crankier than usual by the thought, she lopped the stem off the pear with a claw and scowled. âFarsight or not, twenty people trying to get anywhere is going to be noticed by someone. Either here in the middle of nowhere because weâre outsiders or in the middle of a city because weâre wanted. âWeâll find a wayâ is all well and good, but Iâm pretty sure the only thing weâll be finding a way to is a prison cell or the executionerâs block if we donât do this the smart way.â She didnât say it, but she was a little skeptical of their ability to do anything the smart way.
Sven's lips peeled back into something that appeared like a smile. All teeth and lines and scowling. âPoint is. Vhe go, no matter vhat.â There would be no further discussion about giving up this fool's errand, unless said complainant planned to walk away by themselves. He would force no one to continue, but even he knew that they there was a greater importance to whatever they were doing. Too many things were far from coincidental. He was a sceptic, but if things like farsight could exist, then what did he know?
He arched his eyebrows and straightened his shoulders. Theon's abilities would come in handy if they wanted to navigate anywhere without the airship's advantageous vantage points. Maybe he could see far enough into the future to guide them where they needed to be goingâor where they should be avoiding. âWe vhill need him before we make any decisions, further.â His gaze swivelled back to Kethyrian, âYou are having any smart ideas?â
She shrugged. âWe split up. Smaller groups are less noticeable, no matter how weird they are." It wasn't like she was in charge of this operation, however, and she didn't even bother to pretend there was anything more than a suggestion behind the words.
Finally, the door knob leading into the room rattled before slowly opening to reveal Artorias, and an armful of rolled papers. He stood at the doorway for a moment, looking at those gathered and gave a satisfactory nod. "Good, most of us are here," he explained, kicking the door shut behind him. "Bring that table to the center," he ordered, gesturing toward the table sitting at the back wall.
When the table was dragged away from the wall, he began the process of unrolling the papers and setting them up so that the others could see them as well. The man looked tired as he went about this. His eye sockets were sunken into his cheeks with bags beginning to form underneath them. A hint as to why this might've been was present on the papers. They were maps of both the surrounding areas and the cities that were closest to them. Not only that, but lines and arrows were drawn on it as well, with various sets of pointing toward various cities. Some were crossed out, some where underlined, but only one city was circled... Jherico.
Rubbing his eyes, Artorias took a seat in one of the chairs and reclined back. "Percy got these maps for us and he helped me plan out our movement last night... He should be asleep now." Leaning forward, Artorias grabbed the bread on the nearby table and took a huge bite out of it. It seemed that he'd also forgone food as well as sleep. "If you still want to continue, then this should be our course of action..." Artorias said, taking another bite out of the bread and tapping the maps.
"Jherico is the largest city on the fringe of the Kingdom's sphere of influence. We should be able to lay low and... Rebuild there." Artorias said, pausing from eating and staring at the map. A moment passed before he looked up at the others again, "We need to reestablish a base of operations, and this is the safest location. We will blend in among the crowds and it's far enough away from Galatea that we will not be hounded by the Crown."
He paused again, looking at those gathered before looking back at the map. Another moment passed before he spoke again "You are not my soldiers. You should not be expected to fight like them. I cannot force you or anyone else to continue if they do not wish to. The same goes for Gwen's crew too," Artorias added, looking at Sven. "They should be allowed to leave if they wish. I, however, will see this through. It is too important to not..." Artorias said, leaning back into his chair, feeling far more tired than he was.
Kethyrianâs sigh was heavy, perhaps as much exhaustion as exasperation. The last few days had been somewhat taxing on her, to say the least, help or no help. And it looked like respite was still a ways off. Glancing down at Artoriasâs maps through narrowed golden eyes, she reached down with a claw-tipped finger and traced a path lightly. âWeâll want the group transporting the injured to go the most direct way. The less theyâre moved, the better, but Iâm not sure we can wait for them both to wake up. I should go with them in case something unexpected happens.â She glanced back up, cocking an eyebrow at Artorias.
âThe other groups can approach from different directions, but weâll need a reliable way to find each other once we get there. Either a meeting location or a contact. Given the destination youâve chosen, river barge is the most logical option for those going the fast way. Do we have enough between us for the fare, and then some to shut the ferryman up if we need to?â Bribery was not at all an uncommon practice where she came from, and as it turned out, it tended to be remarkably effective.
Artorias chewed on the question for moment, clearly displeased that they would have to resort to bribery, but otherwise said nothing against it. "We can barter with some of the supplies we took from the Elysium, but do not be surprised if you are asked to help out," he said, before mulling over the first issue-- how to reorganize once they reached the city.
His contacts in the city were made unreliable, since for the rest of the planet, the King was still sat upon his throne in Galatea. However, he couldn't have been the only one who had cultivated contacts over the years, and his gaze shifted to Sven. "I would assume that Gwen would've made friends in a city like Jherico, Sven and the crew can get a hold of someone we can trust and we can have them set up a meeting point for us. The faster we move, the better. We risk a lot by lingering for too long."
Dio had entered the room a few moments earlier, quietly as she did, and caught just the tail end of the conversation, enough to know that they would indeed be moving out again soon, to try and relocate somewhere for the time being. That was all well and good with her; she still didn't know if she was actually an official member of this group, but she'd certainly been through enough with them by now to not want to leave, nor did she really have any reason to. The idea of avoiding further danger of getting squashed by giant rock monsters wasn't occurring to her at the moment.
For now, though, she had important news to deliver. "Erm... Lohengrin is awake now, and he's trying to move around. Failing pretty miserably at it, but... trying. I thought I'd come get you." She delivered the last sentence at Kethyrian, though how much medical expertise the woman had on dragons was likely not much. Dio had certainly never seen anything like it.