Hostage
Zangulus came upon the remains of the trolls about a day after they had died,
the creatures of the twisted forest had nearly stripped the carcasses to the
bone, but the quality of the remaining flesh was not indicative of much
decay. He wasn't much behind them, which was perhaps as much a bad thing as
a good thing.
The bounty hunter did not doubt that he could take any one of these
children on their own. The black blade strapped to his back renewed his
youth and charged his strength beyond what he had had twenty years ago.
There were the uncomfortable urges that he had been having since taking the
blade. He had almost killed an unconscious girl, a half-mazoku freak, but
still just a defenseless girl. That was certainly not an honorable action.
He thanked Ceifeed that the girl woke up before he could slaughter her so.
Now he could slay her in honorable combat.
"First the staff, then Gabriev," Zangulus repeated to himself. He
thought of the defiant fox-girl then and how close he had come to breaking
her. "Business before pleasure."
"Master..."
"SILENCE!!" Roquen shouted from where he was engraving the floor with
symbols of death, magic, eternity and darkness. He had paused in his actions
as the shade spoke. "A distraction could bring a slip of the chisel and ruin
the circle! Fool!"
"But Master, the trolls have been destroyed."
"Hmph, I suspected as much," the necromancer gestured for the shade to
approach. "You witnessed the attack?"
"Yes," the necromancer stuck his hand in the shade's "head" and took the
knowledge he wished for out of the undead's mind. The shade screamed as its
master carelessly ripped its essence to pieces in the effort. As the shade
dissipated into nothng the necromancer retrieved his hand, shrivelled from
contact with the dark creature, and healed it.
"Such strength and power in such young children," Roquen commented. "The
princess of Sailoon I recognize, but these others..." he thought of the
warning his scrying pool had given about the moon and the elf. "That only
leaves the moon, who would that be?" He mumbled a chant and twisted his hand
in a summoning gesture. Another shade appeared before him.
"Yes master?" Roquen couldn't help but smile, the staff had increased his
power beyond what he had thought it would. Still he could not just throw
away these specters forever, there was only a limited supply of dead in the
area.
"There is a young elf-woman in the forest," Roquen said. "Collect her
and bring her here, but do not harm her."
"Yes master," the shade began to shift its form in preparation to leave.
"Oh, and do not engage her friends, they are too much for you."
"But how do I capture her then?"
"That is your problem."
Xina was finding chess infinitely more enjoyable than sparring. Amethyst
still beat her, but the difference in their skill was rapidly closing the
gap. At the moment, Xina's recklessness was what was getting her in trouble.
This was the usual state of affairs with her. As usual, Amethyst, who in
dealing with people and life was clueless, was much more cagey in a more
military conflict.
"Check!" Xina declared loudly as her mother dragu-slaved the illusionary
Val that served as the demon-side's black-square bishop. Xina watched the
illusionary spell battle in a wonder that hadn't yet diminished. Her mother
had had control of such devestating power and never mentioned it. Well, she
had told stories about defeating monsters and demons, but she had always
attributed the feats of magic to some other companion.
"Oh dear," Amethyst appeared troubled as she considered the move.
"Shouldn't we be travelling, Xina-san," Janus asked, a bit anxiously.
"If we knew where to go maybe," Xina shrugged, raising her eyes
momentarily to glance at the sorcerer with a sunny face. Her glance back
down at the bored took in Val's annoyed bristle at the obvious favor she was
placing at the sorcerer's feet. Good, let him stew on that.
"Besides which we're in better shape if we stay in one place for their
move," Xalan noted. "We know the undead generally stalk at night after all."
"You seem rather anxious to face potential death," Jolrael noted.
"I'd like to get this over and done with." So much for the sentimental
value of his old staff.
"It seems like you get less interested the closer we get," Val grumbled.
"Oh, Val-san, aren't isn't the flora here so interesting?" Val
sweatdropped as Tinuviel made a quick appearance. "I can't wait to get a
look at some of the fauna!" Xina glared as the elf-girl tried to drag Val
off to look at some twisted plant she had found. The distraction had killed
the chance she had to get more info out of the questionable sorcerer. If she
weren't so concerned over not letting anybody know she suspected him, she
could have just questioned him. She wanted to know more about his motives,
however.
"Your turn Xina-san," Amethyst said and Xina looked back at the board and
her eyes snapped wide. His mother's duplicate had vanished, replaced by some
orange haired guy with a big sword. The demon-rook had a straight line to
the figure of Amethyst's mother that served as "king" of Xina's pieces.
"Where did that...."
"Hey, let go of me!" Everybody looked to where Tinuviel, momentarily
discouraged by Val's continued resistance, had been investigating a crumbling
mutated tree. The elf girl was punching and kicking at a figure of shadow.
"I'm not done yet!" Her attacks were proving fairly useless.
"Let go of her dead man!" Jol shouted as he passed his sword through an
arm. The magical blade sliced the thing's unholy arm off, and the limb
dissipated as soon as it was cut from the rest of the creature. It let out
an unholy screech and dropped its chosen hostage, backing away from the
oncoming warriors. Xina noticed it fading into the shadows. Both her and
Xalan noted the sudden movement from various shadows of the area
"Get back Tinu," Xal commanded. "They're coming in strength."
"Look at that," Tinuviel said dreamily. "The animals of this forest must
possess some sort of shadow magic."
"Tinuviel, get behind us," Val shouted as he passed her "It'll be easier
to protect you!"
"Certainly Val-kun," Tinuviel bowed, speaking in a low awe-filled voice.
and Amethyst took a rear position to support the three fighters, or rather to
have a safe position to rain death on them. It didn't take long for Xina to
notice something about these new shadows.
"They all have one arm!" Xina shouted. "Its a trick!" She turned to
face Tinuviel in time to see the real shade again grabbing the elf-girl.
This time, though, a great flying beast of shadow and bone flew down to carry
shade and elf-girl away into the night sky.
"TINUVIEL!!!"
"Come on Val!" Xina shouted. The dragon was already half-way through the
transformation. Xina snapped up to the dragon's neck, followed by most
everyone else. Then Val lifted off in pursuit of the beastly flying
creature. The thing flew not much faster than the dragon, and soon it was
becoming obvious that it was heading for a rickety old tower built by some
long forgotten lord and overrun by the swamp soon after.
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