Spirit Sense
"Who are you?" Sveta asked the man standing before her. He stood tall in the Sanan armour, but he was no Sanan. He had the face of a true warrior, and a Goman complexion. The creaky floor of the cart they stood in groaned as he reached his hand out to her. She couldn't shake the feeling: he looked familiar.
"A friend of a friend," he almost mumbled the words, "We have to go. Now."
Sveta hesitated for a moment, then took the Goman's hand and got on her feet. He can't be worse than being stuck here. She took a long look at the pitch black long sword at his waist and the matching black ring on his finger. An alchemical artifact, Sveta was sure of it. It had the look, and the feeling. The man was an adept. Sveta wasn't sure if the fact made her more or less comfortable.
The two walked out of the cart slowly. Outside the sun was just starting to peek out from behind the mountains. Around most of the Sanans slept in their makeshift tents and hastily built paths through the heavy snow and thick ice weaved in between them. Carts and pack-goats dotted the landscape. The massive grey hanners, the Morgalese horses, stirred restlessly in the cold.
The Goman cut the binds around Sveta's wrists, but she kept her hands behind her back, giving the illusion that she was still bound. He walked behind her slowly, leading her away from the carriage. Some of the Sanans who were awake, scouts fletching arrows and cooks preparing breakfast, gave Sveta curious looks. A cook with a large gap between his two front teeth sneered, "Where ya'think yar taking the rat?"
The Goman stared and put a hand on the handle of his black blade. The cook grunted and went back to whatever foul dish he was cooking about the open flame. Sveta and her saviour continued on towards the perimeter of the Sanan camp.
"What's the plan?" Sveta whispered when they were out of earshot.
The Goman motioned his head towards a nearby conglomerate of crates and carts. "Burn the supplies," he said so quietly Sveta could barely make out the words.
"How?" she whispered. No response. Maybe he's a Mars ad-
Sveta's thoughts were cut off by a shout, "STOP!"
Instinctively, Sveta turned around and raised an arm to protect herself. Sparks of electricity bounded around her closed fist as Jupiter psynergy surged through her body. Oh no, she thought, my binds.
"HE'S FREEING HER!" the source of the shout rung out through the early morning. It was the cook with the gap in his tooth. The Goman groaned and quickly kicked the dying coals of a nearby fire onto the packs. A crate of dry hay for the horses started to ignite in small flames. Too slow, Sveta thought, and threw a blast of wind psynergy at the flames, fanning them into a true fire. The heat of hit nearly burned the whiskers on her face.
"Let's go!" the Goman yelled, and started sprinting away from the fire and away from the camp. Sveta followed. As she ran the Sanan soldiers tried to mount the grey hanners to give the fugitives chase. But the stubborn beasts threw there captors aside and kicked chaotically in fear of the growing flames. Sveta heard alternating shouts of the supplies are on fire and stop the queen, she's escaping! Chaos.
Only a few of the soldiers gained their composure fast enough to even attempt to halt Sveta and her saviour. The Goman dealt with them easily by sending blasts of earth up through the snow and into the bodies of the attackers, flinging them yards away. Sveta's intuition was correct, he is an adept.
Sveta took the weapon of one of these soldiers. A short, thin, and very sharp Sanan sword. She strapped the blade to her belt. The pair continued on, throwing down anyone that dared to try and stop them. But most didn't. Most just tried hopelessly to stop the fire from spreading, and to save as much of the supplies as they could.
In no time they made it outside the camp. But the flatness glacier offered no cover. Sveta could still easily make out the Sanan army's camp. If she could see them, that meant they could still see her. If they knew where to look. The orange and red of the flames, and the rising sun, created a spectacle of reflections on the ice. It was almost beautiful, if not for the madness of the shouting and neighing that still filled the air, even so many yards from the fire.
Out of the corner of her Sveta saw two Sanan scouts nearby. Probably heading back to see what all the ruckus is about. They struggled against their horses who wanted nothing to do with the fire on the horizon. Being consumed with the task, they took no notice of Sveta and her new companion.
Sveta put a hand on the Goman's shoulder. He ceased his running to look at her. Sveta was suddenly struck by a feeling of familiarity.
"What is is? We have to hurry," the Goman mumbled between breaths.
"We should take a ride," Sveta said and she pointed to the two Sanans struggling to hold the reins of two grey hanners, who attempted to flee.
"Those?" the Goman asked, looking skeptical.
"Trust me," Sveta spit out, and she turned towards the Sanans. With a blast of electricity she knocked out one of the soldiers.
"You!" the other shouted and drew his sword with alarming speed. Sveta copied the motion and parried two of the soldier's attacks, taking two steps back, and off of the snow path. Her foot nearly slipped on ice, and with both hands the soldier raised is sword high above his head to take advantage.
Just in time, the Goman stepped between them and lopped off the hands of the attacker. The Sanan's sword fell from his dismembered hands. Falling to his knees he cried out in agony.
"Please," he begged feebly as the Goman stood with his pitch black sword still pointed at the soldier. The Goman frowned and sheathed his sword. With speed and precision he applied a healing curse that closed the Sanan's open wounds.
"Thank you," the soldier murmured as he fainted from the pain, falling to the snow and ice beneath them.
Sveta regained her footing on the slippery surface, "I don-"
"The horses. They're still here. Can you calm them?" the Goman cut her off. Sure enough, they were. Sveta was amazed they didn't run off, until she saw they were still tied to a hefty cart without wheels. Even with their captors dealt with, the beasts still kicked and battled against their reins.
Sveta walked slowly towards the larger horse. Reining in a spooked hanner was difficult work, even for a Beastman. Sveta remembered the stables in the city of her parents. The old woman who cared for the beasts used to let her and her brother ride them, but only if they could calm the creatures themselves. Now, Sveta realized this was probably on the request of her father, who loathed to hand anything to his children easily. Success is no accident, he used to say.
To her brother's humiliation, Sveta was always the best at calming the wild hanners. That was because she had a trick, one she never told her brother. Sveta used the power of alchemy, the one that she inherited from her father. She used Spirit Sense to feel what the horse felt, and to share in its emotions. She cast the spell now, and felt fear. The beast was terrified of the flames ahead, terrified of its abusive captors. Stronger than its fear though, was longing. The hanner longed for the open fields of its home. The Morgal Steppe. Sveta could see it in the beast's minds. She could feel the cool wind against her face and the tips of the tall yellow grass swaying through her fingers. Home.
She could hear the babbling softness of the forest brook. And she could see her father and brother fishing on a rock, while her mother stoked a small flame. She could see the white deer, dancing through the grove. Her thoughts were becoming her own, and she shared them with the beast. They shared the same longing. This made the hanner calm, and when Sveta but her palm on its head it neighed softly.
The other horse followed the larger's lead and calmed at the touch of the Goman warrior. Sveta jumped atop the horse, as she had done countless times in her youth. The Goman followed suit. Both horses were saddled with gear the Sanans stole from Belinsk.
"Let's go home," she whispered to the animal.
The Goman walked his horse beside her's, "You want to return to Belinsk?"
Sveta nodded, but then suddenly remembered her dream. Tret and Laurel, the Waelda of the old woods, called to her in the night. They bid her to visit them in their grove. Was it more than just a dream? She shook her head, it didn't matter. Her father held a deep reverence for the Waelda, but he wouldn't abandon his own people at their bidding. Belinsk was taken by the enemy. Sveta needed to return. Her people had to be liberated.
There was also Amiti. Ryu Kou had said that his army was posted in the south of the glacier. But the burning Sanan camp, and the village of Te Rya, where tens of Sanan scouts were surely scouring the landscape for any sign of Ayuthayan incursions, sat in between her and her old companion.
"Yes," she said.
The Goman gave her a curious look, "Alright then. I'm going that way anyways. We can travel together."
"You know the way?" Sveta was skeptical. Very few knew of the Teppe Ruins pass. Earlier, she was surprised that the Sanans knew the way. Is the secret out?
"I do," the Goman said.
Sveta shook her head. "Teppe Ruins? It's no good. The Sanans took me that way. They'll surely have an army posted there."
"Not the ruins. There is a pass."
Now Sveta was thoroughly confused. What is a Goman doing on the glacier? How does he know of Teppe Ruins? How did he know where I was and why did he save me? How does he even know Belinsk is my home?
"A pass? Through the mountains? That's impossible," Sveta said.
"Not impossible."
"Who are you?" Sveta finally asked, marveling at the absurdity of the situation.
Sveta thought she saw the hint of a smirk at the corner of the serious Goman's mouth. She couldn't be sure it wasn't just a twitch. "A wanderer," he said and looked over his shoulder at the flame that still lit the horizon, "We should really get going."
The Goman hurried his horse north-west, away from the camp. He didn't turn to see if Sveta followed. She looked back at the burning camp and thought she could hear faint shouts of the general's urging their troops to find the queen. No choice, she groaned to herself.
As the pair rode through the day an icy fog crept over the glacier. Sveta couldn't see whether or not they were being tailed. She could barely see the faint outline of the sun peaking through the frigid mist. But the Goman continued forward confidently. How he knew where he was going, or if he knew where he was going was a mystery to Sveta.
They didn't stop for lunch. The speed of their ride and the treacherousness of the ice made it impossible for Sveta to question the Goman. They simply moved forward in silence throughout the entirety of the day. The fog made her uneasy. She constantly turned back to see if she could see Sanan soldiers trailing them. She tried to make out the distinctively yellowish orange light that only Sanan oak torches made. But all she could see was fog. All she feel the frigid wind blowing through the gaps of the fur coat she stole from the Sanan camp, and the pain in her thighs from a day filled with riding.
Finally, they stopped for the night. The sun was already fully behind the western horizon, but the Goman had somehow found an ice cave beginning enough for the two of them and the horses. Sveta lit an oil lamp she had found in one of the horse's pack for light and heat. With earth psynergy the Goman raised a wall over its opening, leaving only a small opening for air to get in and smoke to get out.
For dinner, the two ate the scouts' dried meat and rice rations, and the hanners were given a small amount of hay, all from the horses' packs. They ate it in silence. Sveta could barely make out the face of the Goman in the dim cave. It was tired and dirty. It was cold and silent. But Sveta knew it was also brave. The same familiarity struck her.
"Who are you?" she asked again.